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#i posted another chapter for clancy
mooseonahunt · 11 months
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Y'know what? I'm gonna post my DBH x John Wick AU ideas here just so I can come back to them whenever I'm back in brainrot mode.
Nines and Gavin made it out from under The Table's authority together and completely distanced themselves from their past lives to live calmer ones where they could settle down in peace
And then Nines got really sick and died because of course he did
So Gavin was left completely alone (well not completely)
Cue The Puppy and Car Incident from the first movie but it's with a cat instead because you can pry the "Gavin's a cat lover" hc from my cold dead hands
Gavin is dragged back into his former life because he wants revenge for what happened
Connor and Sixty run the Detroit Continental Hotel as manager and concierge
They simultaneously hate Gavin for taking Nines from them (since they went no contact after making it out of this line of work) and also consider him family because 1. married Nines and 2. managed to escape from this life with their younger brother to live lives they can't
Also Ralph is taking the role of Bowery King here because I think he fits but other considerations were Rupert because of the pigeons weak reason but I did seriously entertain the idea and Lucy because of the mystical, prophetic vibes
Going back to the Detroit Continental Hotel idea, I was going to have Kamski run it and Chloe be his concierge, but then I remembered the Ruska Roma family when I watched Chapter 4 and thought "wow I love this half-brothers HC so much I should shove it in this AU too" and now Kamski and Chloe are the heads of a crime syndicate family that Gavin belonged to
In my original notes, Gavin's family was gonna be the Jericrew asdjflk I'm gonna find another way to fit them in
They could honestly run another Continental Hotel since there's multiple across the world
If that's the case, then Markus is gonna be the manager and his concierge will most likely be North
I want to fit so many characters into this
Tina and Chris are somewhere in here, too. As Gavin's friends/allies of course
But after watching Chapter 4 I'm dead set on Kara taking Caine's role
And Perkins could be the Marquis until I find someone who might actually fit the role asdfhdk
You're never gonna believe this... Hank? Hank as the Harbinger in Chapter 4? You know... the guy played by Clancy Brown? Unimaginable, I know.
And that's all I had before I got hit by the RE4R truck (thank you Leto <33).
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a-pale-azure-moon · 6 months
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WIP Wednesday
It's done.
There will be revisions and tweaks to make between now and when I post it in a few days, but I have finished the final chapter of Someday We'll Shine Together. At long last, it is complete.
I'm struggling to distill all of my emotions into words at the moment. This fic has been a part of my life for about three years now. I'm feeling accomplished and proud of myself for really and truly finishing it despite the fact that when I first had the idea, I was convinced this was another of those fleeting inspirational flashes that would never go anywhere and would forever languish in my WIP folder. I got very attached to this story in the process of creating it, and I got even more attached to it when it was one of the things that helped see me through a very difficult time in my personal life. As such, I'm also grieving that it's over and that I now must let it go. Sure, it'll always exist for me to revisit whenever I want, but that feeling is never the same as the one derived from actively working on it.
While I'm still digesting all of these emotions, here's a rough timeline and some background of the fic's development, so you can all see how I finally got to this point. This is pretty personal too, because the two are irrevocably intertwined. (Content warning: death/grief)
Summer 2020: Initial inspiration hits after I rewatched Utena during COVID lockdown.
Fall 2020: Brainworms are on-and-off active, writing short blurbs in a Google doc when they come to me, but there's no true shape to the whole plot yet, it’s just random scenes. It's more or less still strictly a 3H-esque retelling of Utena, and I'm not expecting anything to actually come of these blurbs.
Winter 2020: More blurbs trickle in here and there. The story in my head is starting to divert more drastically from the show.
February 19, 2021: Draft of the pivotal scene at the end of Chapter 15 written. I remember the specific day for this because I wrote it the same day we put down our dog, Clancy. (Writing emotional scenes often helps me process my own emotions.)
April 11, 2021: Creation of my dedicated author's notes file to keep track of the various threads and ideas I'd come up with, especially the backstory about Faerghus and how Dimitri became the Lion Prince. I filled it in like an extended summary or wikipedia entry about the 'verse and the overall plot of the story. I jotted a lot of stuff down between April and June as the brainworms really got to work again.
Summer 2021: I'm starting to entertain the idea of actually seeing this project through. Chapters 1 and 2 are drafted over the summer months, but I hit a block and the self doubt comes roaring right in to deter me.  A LARGE part of my struggle with getting this fic out of development hell was me being unable to get out of my own way.  Every stumbling block I hit (especially early on) was an invitation for my inner critic to resume browbeating me into giving up this “stupid” idea.
September 2021: I finally make up my mind that I'm really going to do this, and I spend the next six weeks ironing out the bumps in the plot and making a chapter-by-chapter outline highlighting the key scenes/plot points/character beats within each one. I organized the various blurbs I had into chronological order and put them under the correct chapter headings. I also started thinking of the best way to get myself to see this project through, as well as what would be a realistic timetable for its completion. I estimated that the final length of the whole thing would be around 350 pages or roughly 150K words. (This is hilarious to me in hindsight.  I severely underestimated the scope of this fic!)
November 2021: I try to do the NaNoWriMo challenge (50K words in a month) to draft as much of the fic as I can. I "only" produce about 35K words in the end, but it was enough to draft Chapters 3 and 4 and write at least one decent-sized blurb within each of all of the remaining chapters.
December 2021: I took a short hiatus from working on SWST to finish Beneath the Ethereal Moon. When that's done, I went over my outline yet again to refine it further and then cleaned up my draft of Chapter 1 with an eye on posting it after right after New Year's. I determined that posting (and writing) one chapter per month should be doable, especially since I have a generous buffer to start with.
January 2022: I get a bad case of cold feet/anxiety and don't post Chapter 1. I'm having trouble getting a feel for Chapter 5 and fail to finish it before the end of the month. (This naturally doesn't help alleviate my self-doubt or silence my very loud inner critic.)
February 2022: Cold feet strike again and I fail to post Chapter 1 a second time. I'm still stuck on Chapter 5 (though I've at least made some progress), and while I'm extremely aware that I'm being my own worst enemy, that doesn't make it any easier to beat back old habits.
March 2, 2022: In the wee hours of the night (it was after midnight), I finally posted Chapter 1 and went straight to bed after. I slept terribly of course, haha.
I wish I could say "and you know the rest from here," but that's not true. Posting Chapter 1 was a huge mental hurdle cleared, but there were other things going on behind the scenes that almost derailed this project for good. The timing was such that if I were more prone to hubris, I'd think that the universe itself was testing my resolve. Or possibly mocking me.
On March 3, 2022 (yes, the day after I posted Chapter 1), my father was admitted to the hospital with a debilitating pain in his lower back. Initially, we thought it might be a flare up of his sciatica or maybe something like a kidney stone, but the truth was far worse. What he had was a spinal epidural abscess caused by a bacterial infection in his blood. He was transported to the ICU of a larger (further away) hospital once the severity of his condition was discovered, and he was pumped full of massive doses of antibiotics. Thanks to that, he stabilized, but what followed after was a long period of uncertainty as he would start to make gains only to suffer a setback. Even once the infection and his pain level were under control, he'd been so severely sick that the bacteria had ravaged his various body systems, leading to issues with his kidneys and his heart.
For 91 days, my family and I were stuck on a wretched rollercoaster of getting hopeful (he was transferred to a rehab facility three different times when it looked like he was improving) and then having our hopes dashed when something would happen that would see him sent back to the hospital (falling out of bed, chest pains, difficulty breathing). Hope began to fade in mid May when he was transferred back to the ICU due to diastolic heart failure, which caused his lungs to fill up with fluid. They tapped his lungs thrice, removing at least a liter of fluid each time, but they kept filling up again despite all the diuretics the doctors were giving him. Then his kidneys began to shut down too. We kept hoping right until the end, but he passed away on June 1, 2022, the day before what would've been his and my mother's 49th wedding anniversary.
(Proof that real life can be even crueler than fiction.)
I was only able to continue updating SWST while my father was sick because of that buffer I'd had, and I very nearly deleted the story from AO3 altogether after he died. I remember ruminating about how futile it was to continue with this project; I'd written almost nothing while he was sick, so my buffer was now gone and I questioned whether or not I'd be able to write, let alone write consistently, with the promised months of grief and general upheaval ahead. Even writing a story that I had, to that point, been passionate about felt utterly pointless.
It was strange though. I woke up on June 2nd thinking that maybe I should go ahead and post chapter 4 anyway, since it was already done and it was one of the chapters I particularly liked. So I did. And in the following days, we had my father's funeral and a part of me felt like I could breathe again. I was grieving yes, but the constant daily stress and uncertainty from his illness was gone, and I think that freed my creative drive to start working again. I remember the first day I sat back down at my computer with the intention to write and how much better I felt in general after I got some words onto the screen.
It's hella ironic that I planned SWST with grief and loss as major themes and it turned out I'd be processing such things myself while writing most of it. I know my own grief affected the story, though it's impossible to say to what degree; I get a lot of catharsis in general from writing emotional scenes, so I tend to go hard on them regardless. It didn't change the plot or direction of the story at all, since that was already planned, but it's certainly safe to say that I channeled a lot of my own feelings into some of the most intense moments. The ending of Chapter 9 stands out in particular as something that felt like it was coming straight out of my own heart.
Even on the hard days when I was feeling too overwhelmed and/or the words just weren’t coming, this story gave me a reason to keep going.  Just keeping the goal in mind and reasserting my resolve to be consistent and see this project through to the end helped me cope.  It both kept me grounded and helped me process what I was going through and it gave me something to look forward to when I uploaded each chapter and anxiously waited to see what the readers would think.
I started this fic as a means of testing myself: testing my commitment to writing consistently, to finishing a long-term project, and to getting over at least some of the many, MANY mental hurdles that have held me back from writing for way too long.  I knew that this story would always be near and dear to me if I managed to finish it, but it became even more precious than I ever could’ve imagined back in 2020.  It hurts that I must say goodbye to it, but…it’s forever mine.  I can say with my whole chest that I MADE THIS THING and I’m so very proud of it! <3
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openworldadventurer · 7 months
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Hello! I was looking at an old Tumblr post you made back in 2020, and I saw you mention working on the Wasteland Survival Guide quest for Fallout 3!
I was kind of curious about the development of the quest, specifically regarding Moira Brown and her old name of "Lea Marsh," a cut Centaur portion with one named "Clancy," the removed portion regarding Hubris Comics and any other cool tidbits!
I really enjoyed playing Fallout 3, and I'm glad that your work is present in the game. Thank you! <3<3
Oh wow, you must’ve done some impressive digging in the engine to find all that, huh? Heck, I only barely remember those — we used to jokingly call the Wasteland Survival Guide “the other main quest” because it was so long and complicated. And that meant it went through a lot of revisions at different points.
Let’s see — yes, Moira was named Lea Marsh in the first drafts, but we decided she needed a different name. Can’t remember the precise reason, but it was still early in dev, so a complete name change was pretty easy.
I don’t remember Clancy the centaur at all, sadly. If I had to guess, I’d suspect that this was going to be another one of her chapters/branches of the quest, but we decided that a centaur was just too much of a threat for an early-level character. This quest was, after all, doing the job of tutorial to a lot of side systems, so players were expected to be pretty low level.
And while I’m not sure what bit of Hubris Comics got removed (since every quest and dungeon went through a bunch of revisions), I was also working on the Superhuman Gambit at the time, and wrote the various letters to the editor on terminals in there, which open up a secret dialogue option with the Ant Agonist. So I suspect I had been writing a few things for that location and wanted to tie it to more than one of my quests.
Sorry I couldn’t answer more of the questions there, but it’s kinda lost history at this point. These games go through so many revisions and modifications over time, and now fifteen+ years afterwards, some of the older details are all kind of a blur of late nights and coffee-fueled scripting.
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sunnydaleherald · 1 year
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The Sunnydale Herald Newsletter, Sunday, February 12
WILLOW: Have you googled her yet? XANDER: Willow, she's 17! WILLOW: It's a search engine.
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silastheanon · 2 years
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Let’s see how long I can keep this up
Chapter Three is up!
@professionallydeadinside if you’re in class when I post this don’t you dare ignore your school for this!
You can read it on AO3 https://archiveofourown.org/works/34833532/chapters/86899318
Or you can read it below!
It was a little concerning how quickly Josef was getting used to riding on Diedre’s shoulders. Her shoulders were very nice to ride on. The “dismount” (he couldn’t think of a better word for it) was getting smoother as well, which was as nice as it was weird.
In the language room, Josef noticed that everyone who had been in the Hallway was there, too.
Hoodie--Hoffman--still had his hood up, apparently none of the teachers cared enough to stop him. He was sitting on a chair, like a normal person, while Lucas sat on the top of the desk. They had been friends for a long time, Josef was sure, like Ethan and Mia surely were. Unlike Mia and Ethan, however, Hoffman and Lucas’s friendship seemed almost meaner, or like friends who have seen each other break and hurt many times, but have never mentioned it, and instead silently helped the other up. They didn’t offer each other a quiet refuge, but offered a silent room that would never betray your thoughts and would never mention it saw you vulnerable.
Clancy was talking with Giles, or Shifty Eyes, about something or other. Giles had a shit-eating grin on his face, while Clancy mainly looked tired.
Sweater Vest, or Dwight, was talking animatedly to Kind Eyes, Giles’s twin Miles, and Mean Tank Top--Sal, Josef reminded himself.
He was about to find himself a seat when Zoe grabbed his arm and started dragging him.
“Be gentle, Zoe! He’s sweet, I don’t want you to break him!” Diedre called out after them, her deep and rumbly voice becoming loud and booming when she yelled.
It didn’t take Josef very long to realise Zoe was bringing him over to Ethan, Karl, Mia, and Alcina.
“Oi, Eat-ham!” Zoe shouted in lieu of a greeting, “You’ve got Mr. S for math, right?”
“Yeah, why?” Ethan had an arm around Karl, who was furiously cleaning a pair of sunglasses on his shirt.
“Need you to make sure the kid doesn’t get trampled, you know how bad the hallways can be. Plus, figured you’d be pretty skilled at this, considering tiny next to you,” Karl looked up, stuck his tongue out, and went back to bullying grease streaks off the lenses. Zoe stuck her own tongue out at his uncaring face.
Ethan’s shoulders shook as he laughed quietly, his eyes closed and a goofy grin on his face. “Yeah, ‘course, Zoe,” he said, fighting off snickers. “What’s your name, kid?” Ethan asked, a crocked smile on his face.
It was then that Josef noticed Ethan had a large and frankly nasty scar around one of his wrists, the same wrist he had a FitBit like watch on. Josef was careful not to stare.
“Josef Veal,” Josef stated, a debate happening in his head on whether he should offer his hand for Ethan to shake. After all, his mother did raise a gentleman. . .
Ethan, however, made the choice for him; he reached over and ruffled Josef’s hair.
“We won’t let you get trampled, kid,” he’s like a dad, Josef thought.
Zoe, then, unceremoniously, punched Ethan in his arm, quite hardly, from the sound of it. She then started directing him over to Donna and Diedre.
They passed Lucas on their way, who leaned back on the desk until he was upside down and grabbed at her. She swatted at him, which led to a weird slap/swat fight that lasted for a healthy thirty seconds before Lucas shoved her away.
She spun around and stuck her tongue out at him, which he reciprocated in kind.
Yeah. Definitely siblings.
They had just made it over to Donna and Diedre when the bell rang and another teacher walked in. She began talking about all the same stuff the science teacher had, with only a couple variations. Most of the kids were quiet, though it didn’t take Josef long to realise Giles was going to be the one making all the noise. At least Hoffman only had to nudge Lucas for him to step in and swipe at Giles.
So they were actual friends, good to know.
Diedre had mentioned some kind of group, and that Lucas had apparently always been a part of it. How long had Hoffman been in it? Or Diedre, or Dwight, or Miles and Giles? Did Miles join first, and then Giles had wormed his way in? Or had Giles become friends with Lucas and them, and Miles had been introduced because of that? Josef was curious. Yes, it wasn’t really any of his business, but he’d never had a friend group like this of his own.
Sure, he had some friends back in the middle school, but even they hadn’t really felt like friends to him. It was sort of sad, actually, how three people he had just met that day felt more like actual friends to him than the people he had known for years.
The class overall passed without incident, though Josef was a bit bummed out that apparently Diedre didn’t share math with him, since Ethan was placed in charge of him.
Josef felt like a puppy that didn’t know how to behave on a walk.
Finally, the bell rang and everyone hurried up and out. Diedre was quick to pluck him up before the swarm of students could devour him.
Yet again the students parted for her like water for a stone, it was fascinating to see.
She ferried him safely to his locker, Zoe and Donna both helping to get him down from his perch on Diedre’s tall shoulders. Diedre patted Josef on his head, his fluffy hair flattening before bouncing back in retaliation, before she hurried away to her own locker.
Josef turned back to his own and was quietly impressed with himself yet again when he opened it with ease. Books in, books out.
He felt a little sad Diedre wasn’t going to be with him in his next class, and a little afraid. Would Ethan be even half as nice as her? Josef wondered as he walked to where Ethan stood, talking to Mia. His fears were proven unfounded when Ethan gave him a crooked grin once he saw him.
Ethan grabbed ahold of his shoulder tightly, though not harshly or roughly.
Instead of Josef having to weave between people, Ethan simply shouldered his way through. People didn’t part like water for him like they did Diedre, but he didn’t seem to mind.
Karl was at his side, he had a hammer in his hands that he pulled out of somewhere, he definitely hadn’t had it when Zoe dragged Josef over to them to “negotiate” (Josef couldn’t think of a better word for that, either). Zoe had called Karl tiny, but he wasn’t all that shorter than Ethan.
Josef assumed Tall Lady, Alcina, hadn’t had the same math class, otherwise she would’ve been the obvious choice.
They made it to the class, somehow without Karl getting sent to the office for having a fucking sledge hammer with him. They quickly went in, and Josef was glad and relieved that Ethan seemed to be taking him to sit with him and Karl.
Maybe he was starting to worm his way into this group after all.
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96harmony96 · 3 years
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Chapter 15
Friday found Trey sharing breakfast with Cary and me after an overnighter. As I drank the day’s first cup of coffee, I watched him interact with Cary and I was genuinely thrilled to see the intimate smiles and covert touches they gave one another.
I’d had easy relationships like that and hadn’t appreciated them at the time. They had been comfortable and uncomplicated, but they’d been superficial in a fundamental way, too.
How deep could a love affair get if you didn’t know the darkest recesses of your lover’s soul? That was the dilemma I’d faced with Lauren.
Day 2 After Lauren had begun. I found myself wanting to go to her and apologize for leaving her yet again. I wanted to tell her I was there for her, ready to listen or simply offer silent comfort. But I was too emotionally invested. I got wounded too easily. I was too afraid of rejection. And knowing she wouldn’t let me get too close only intensified that fear. Even if we did figure things out, I’d only tear myself apart trying to live with just the bits and pieces she decided to share with me.
At least my job was going well. The celebratory lunch the executives gave in honor of the agency landing the Kingsman account made me genuinely happy. I felt blessed to work in such a positive environment. But when I heard that Lauren had been invited—although no one expected her to show up—I returned quietly to my desk and focused on work the rest of the afternoon.
I hit the gym on the way home; then picked up some items to make fettuccini alfredo for dinner with crème brulée for dessert—comfort food guaranteed to put me in a carbohydrate coma. I expected sleep to offer me a break from the endless what-ifs my brain was recycling, hopefully long into Saturday morning.
Cary and I ate in the living room with chopsticks, his idea to cheer me up. He said dinner was great, but I couldn’t tell. I snapped out of it when he fell silent, too, and I realized I was being a less than stellar friend.
“When are the Grey Isles’ campaign ads going up?” I asked.
“I’m not sure, but get this…” He grinned. “You know how it is with male models—we’re tossed around like condoms at an orgy. It’s tough to stand out from the crowd, unless you’re dating someone famous. Which I’m suddenly reported to be doing since those photos of you and me were plastered everywhere. I’m the side piece of action in your relationship with Lauren Jauregui. You’ve done wonders for making me a hot commodity.”
I laughed. “You didn’t need my help for that.”
“Well, it certainly didn’t hurt. Anyway, they called me back for a couple more shoots. I think they might just use me for more than five minutes.”
“We’ll have to celebrate,” I teased.
“Absolutely. When you’re up for it.”
We ended up hanging out and watching the original Tron. His smartphone rang twenty minutes into the movie and I heard him speaking to his agency. “Sure. I’ll be there in fifteen, tops. I’ll call you when I get there.”
“Got a job?” I asked after he’d hung up.
“Yeah. A model showed up for a night shoot so trashed he’s worthless.” He studied me. “You wanna come?”
I stretched my legs out on the couch. “Nope. I’m good right here.”
“You sure you’re okay?”
“All I need is mindless entertainment. Just the thought of getting dressed again exhausts me.” I’d be happy wearing my flannel pajama bottoms and holey old tank top all weekend. As much as I hurt inside, total comfort outside seemed like a necessity. “Don’t worry about me. I know I’ve been a mess lately, but I’ll get it together. Go on and enjoy yourself.”
After Cary rushed out, I paused the movie and went to the kitchen for some wine. I stopped by the breakfast bar, my fingertips gliding over the roses Lauren had sent me the previous weekend. Petals fell to the countertop like tears. I thought about cutting the stems and using the flower food packet that came with the bouquet, but it was pointless hanging on to them. I’d throw the arrangement away tomorrow, the last reminder of my equally doomed relationship.
I’d gotten farther with Lauren in one week than I had with other relationships that lasted two years. I would always love her for that. Maybe I’d always love her, period.
And one day, that might not hurt so badly.
“Rise and shine, sleepyhead,” Cary singsonged as he yanked the comforter off of me.
“Ugh. Go away.”
“You’ve got five minutes to get your ass up and in the shower, or the shower’s coming to you.”
Opening one eye, I peeked at him. He was shirtless and wearing baggy pants that barely clung to his hips. As far as wake-up calls went, he was prime. “Why do I have to get up?”
“Because when you’re flat on your back you’re not on your feet.”
“Wow. That was deep, Cary Taylor.”
He crossed his arms and shot me an arch look. “We need to go shopping.”
I buried my face in the pillow. “No.”
“Yes. I seem to remember you saying this was a ‘Sunday garden party’ and ‘rock star gathering’ in the same sentence. What the hell do I wear to something like that?”
“Ah, well. Good point.”
“What are you wearing?”
“I…I don’t know. I was leaning toward the ‘English tea with hat’ look, but now I’m not so sure.”
He gave a brisk nod. “Right. Let’s hit the shops and find something sexy, classy, and cool.”
Growling a token protest, I rolled out of bed and padded over to the bathroom. It was impossible to shower without thinking of Lauren, without picturing her perfect body and remembering the desperate sounds she made when she came in my mouth. Everywhere I looked, Lauren was there. I’d even started hallucinating black Bentley SUVs all around town. I thought I spotted one damn near everywhere I went.
Cary and I had lunch; then we bounced all over the city, hitting the best of the Upper East Side thrift stores and Madison Avenue boutiques before taking a taxi downtown to SoHo. Along the way, Cary had two teenage girls ask for his autograph, which tickled me more than him, I think.
“Told you,” he crowed.
“Told me what?”
“They recognized me from an entertainment news blog. One of the posts about you and Jauregui.”
I snorted. “Glad my love life is working out for someone.”
He was due at another job around three and I went with him, spending a few hours in the studio of a loud and brash photographer. Remembering it was Saturday, I slipped into a far corner and made my weekly call to my dad.
“You still happy in New York?” he asked me above the background noise of dispatch talking over the radio in his cruiser.
“So far so good.” A lie, but the truth helped no one.
His partner said something I didn’t catch. My dad snorted and said, “Hey, Chris insists he saw you on television the other day. Some cable channel, celebrity gossip thing. The guys won’t leave me alone about it.”
I sighed. “Tell them watching those shows is bad for their brain cells.”
“So you’re not dating one of the richest people in America?”
“No. What about your love life?” I asked, quickly diverting. “Are you seeing anyone?”
“Nothing serious. Hang on.” He responded to a call on the radio, then said, “Sorry, sweetheart. I have to run. I love you. Miss you like crazy.”
“I miss you, too, Daddy. Be careful.”
“Always. Bye.”
I killed the call and went back to my former spot to wait for Cary to wrap things up. In the lull, my mind tormented me. Where was Lauren now? What was she doing?
Would Monday bring me an inbox full of photos of her with another woman?
____
Sunday afternoon I borrowed Clancy and one of Stanton’s town cars for the drive out to the Vidal estate in Dutchess County. Leaning back in the seat, I looked out the window, absently admiring the serene vista of rolling meadows and green woodlands that stretched to the distant horizon. I realized I was working on Day 4 After Lauren. The pain I’d felt the first few days had turned into a dull throbbing that felt almost like the flu. Every part of my body ached, as if I was going through some sort of physical withdrawal and my throat burned with unshed tears.
“Are you nervous?” Cary asked me.
I glanced at him. “Not really. Lauren won’t be there.”
“You’re sure about that?”
“I wouldn’t be going if I thought otherwise. I do have some pride you know.” I watched him drum his fingers on the armrest between our two seats. For all the shopping we’d done yesterday, he’d made only one purchase: a black leather tie. I’d teased him mercilessly about it, he of the perfect fashion sense going with something like that.
He caught me looking at it. “What? You still don’t like my tie? I think it works well with the emo jeans and my lounge lizard jacket.”
“Cary”—my lips quirked—“you can wear anything.”
It was true. Cary could pull any look off, a benefit of having a sculpted rangy body and a face that could make angels weep.
I set my hand over his restless fingers. “Are you nervous?”
“Trey didn’t call last night,” he muttered. “He said he would.”
I gave his hand a reassuring squeeze. “It’s just one missed call, Cary. I’m sure it doesn’t mean anything serious.”
“He could’ve called this morning,” he argued. “Trey’s not flakey like the others I’ve dated. He wouldn’t have forgotten to call, which means he just doesn’t want to.”
“The rat bastard. I’ll be sure to take lots of pictures of you having a great time looking sexy, classy, and cool to torment him with on Monday.”
His mouth twitched. “Ah, the deviousness of the female mind. It’s a shame Jauregui won’t see you today. I think I got a semi when you came out of your room in that dress.”
“Eww!” I smacked his shoulder and mock-glared when he laughed.
The dress had seemed perfect to both of us when we’d found it. It was cut in a classic garden party style—fitted bodice with a knee-length skirt that flared out from the waist. It was even white with flowers. But that’s where the tea-and-crumpets style ended.
The edginess came from the strapless form, the alternating layers of black and crimson satin underskirts that gave it volume, and the black leather flowers that looked like wicked pinwheels. Cary had picked the red Jimmy Choo peep-toe pumps out of my closet and the ruby drop earrings to give it all the finishing touch. We’d decided to leave my hair loose around my shoulders, in case we arrived and learned that hats were required. All in all, I felt pretty and confident.
Clancy drove us through an imposing set of monogrammed gates and turned into a circular driveway, following the direction of a valet. Cary and I got out by the entrance, and he took my arm as my heels sank into blue-gray gravel on the walk to the house.
Upon entering the Vidal’s sprawling Tudor-style mansion, we were warmly greeted by lauren’s family in a receiving line—her mother, stepfather, Christopher, and their sister.
I took in the sight, thinking the Vidal family could only look more perfect if Lauren was lined up with them. Her mother and sister had her coloring, both women boasting the same glossy obsidian hair and thickly-lashed green eyes. They were both beautiful in a finely wrought way.
“Camila!” Lauren’s mother drew me toward her, then air-kissed both of my cheeks. “I’m so pleased to finally meet you. What a gorgeous girl you are! And your dress. I love it.”
“Thank you.”
Her hands brushed over my hair, cupped my face, and then slid down my arms. It was hard for me to bear it, because touching was sometimes an anxiety trigger for me when the person was a stranger. “Your hair, is it naturally brunette?”
“Yes,” I replied, startled and confused by the question. Who asked a question like that of a stranger?
“How fascinating. Well, welcome. I hope you have a wonderful time. We’re so glad you could make it.”
Feeling strangely unsettled, I was grateful when her attention moved to Cary and zeroed in.
“And you must be Cary,” she crooned. “Here I’d been certain my three children were the most attractive in the world. I see I was wrong about that. You are simply divine, young man.”
Cary flashed his megawatt smile. “Ah, I think I’m in love, Mrs. Vidal.”
she laughed with throaty delight. “Please. Call me Elizabeth. Or Lizzie, if you’re brave enough.”
Looking away, I found my hand clasped by Christopher Vidal Senior. In many ways, he reminded me of his son, with his slate green eyes and boyish smile. In others, he was a pleasant surprise. Dressed in khakis, loafers, and a cashmere cardigan, he looked more like a college professor than a music company executive.
“Camila. May I call you Camila?”
“Please do.”
“Call me Chris. It makes it a little easier to distinguish between me and Christopher.” His head tilted to the side as he contemplated me through quirky brass spectacles. “I can see why Lauren is so taken with you. Your eyes are a deep chocolate brown, yet they’re so clear and direct. Quite the most beautiful eyes I think I’ve ever seen, aside from my wife’s.”
I flushed. “Thank you.”
“Is Lauren coming?”
“Not that I’m aware of.” Why didn’t her parents know the answer to that question?
“We always hope.” He gestured at a waiting servant. “Please head back to the gardens and make yourself at home.”
Christopher greeted me with a hug and a kiss on the cheek, while lauren’s sister Ireland sized me up in a sulky way that only a teenager could pull off. “You’re a brunette,” she said.
Jeez. Was lauren’s preference for light-haired women a damn law or something? “And you’re a very lovely brunette.”
Cary offered me his arm and I accepted it gratefully.
As we walked away, he asked me quietly, “Were they what you expected?”
“Her mom, maybe. Her stepdad, no.” I looked back over my shoulder, taking in the elegant floor-length cream sheath dress that clung to Elizabeth Vidal’s svelte figure. I thought of what little I knew about Lauren’s family. “How does a girl grow up to be a businesswoman who takes over her stepfather’s family business?”
“Jauregui owns shares in Vidal Records?”
“Controlling interest.”
“Hmm. Maybe it was a bailout?” he offered. “A helping hand during a trying time for the music industry?”
“Why not just give him the money?” I wondered.
“Because she’s a shrewd businesswoman?”
With a sharp exhalation, I waved the question away and cleared my mind. I was attending the party for Cary, not Lauren, and I was going to keep that first and foremost in my thoughts.
Once we’d moved outside, we found a large, elaborately decorated marquee erected in the rear garden. Although the day was beautiful enough to stay out in the sun, I found a seat at a circular table covered in white damask instead.
Cary patted my shoulder. “You relax. I’ll network.”
“Go get ’em.”
He moved away, intent on his agenda.
I sipped champagne and chatted with everyone who stopped by to strike up a conversation. There were a lot of recording artists at the party whose work I listened to, and I watched them covertly, a bit starstruck. For all the elegance of the surroundings and the endless number of servants, the overall vibe was casual and relaxed.
I was starting to enjoy myself when someone I’d hoped never to see again stepped out of the house onto the terrace: Magdalene Perez, looking phenomenal in a rose-hued chiffon gown that floated around her knees.
A hand settled on my shoulder and squeezed, setting my heart racing because it reminded me of the night Cary and I had gone to lauren’s club. But the figure that rounded me this time was Christopher.
“Hey, Camila.” He took the chair next to mine and set his elbows on his knees, leaning toward me. “Are you having fun? You’re not mingling much.”
“I’m having a great time.” At least I had been. “Thank you for inviting me.”
“Thank you for coming. My parents are stoked you’re here. Me, too, of course.” His grin made me smile, as did his tie, which had cartoon vinyl records all over it. “Are you hungry? The crab cakes are great. Grab one when the tray comes by.”
“I’ll do that.”
“Let me know if you need anything. And save a dance for me.” He winked, and then hopped up and away.
Ireland took his seat, arranging herself with the practiced grace of a finishing school graduate. Her hair fell in a single length to her waist and her beautiful eyes were direct in a way I could appreciate. she looked worldlier than her seventeen years. “Hi.”
“Hello.”
“Where’s Lauren?”
I shrugged at the blunt question. “I’m not sure.”
she nodded sagely. “she’s good at being a loner.”
“Has she always been that way?”
“I guess. she moved out when I was little. Do you love her?”
My breath caught for a second. I released it in a rush and said simply, “Yes.”
“I thought so when I saw that video of you two in Bryant Park.” she bit her lush lower lip. “Is she fun? You know…to hang around with?”
“Oh. Well…” God. Did anyone know Lauren? “I wouldn’t say she’s fun, but she’s never boring.”
The live band began playing “I’ve Got You Under My Skin” and Cary appeared beside me as if by magic. “Time to make me look good, Ginger.”
“I’ll try my best, Fred.” I smiled at Ireland. “Excuse me a minute.”
“Three minutes, forty seconds,” she corrected, displaying some of her family’s expertise in music.
Cary led me onto the empty dance floor and pulled me into a swift foxtrot. It took me a minute to get into it, because I’d been stiff and tight with misery for days. Then the synergy of longtime partners kicked in and we glided across the floor with sweeping steps.
When the singer’s voice faded with the music, we stopped, breathless. We were pleasantly surprised by applause. Cary gave an elegant bow and I held on to his hand for stability as I dipped into a curtsy.
When I lifted my head and straightened, I found Lauren standing in front of me. Startled, I stumbled back a step. she was seriously underdressed in jeans and an untucked white dress shirt that was open at the collar and rolled up at the sleeves, but she was so damn fine she still put every other woman in attendance to shame.
The tremendous yearning I felt at the sight of her overwhelmed me. Distantly I was aware of the band’s singer pulling Cary away, but I couldn’t tear my gaze away from Lauren, whose wildly green eyes burned into mine.
“What are you doing here?” she snapped, scowling.
I recoiled from her harshness. “Excuse me?”
“You shouldn’t be here.” she grabbed me by the elbow and started hauling me toward the house. “I don’t want you here.”
If she’d spit in my face, it couldn’t have devastated me more. I yanked my arm free of her and walked briskly toward the house with my head held high, praying I could make it to the privacy of the town car and Clancy’s protective watch before the tears started falling.
Behind me, I heard a come-hither female voice call out lauren’s name and I sent up a prayer that the woman would stall her long enough for me to get out without further confrontation.
I thought I just might make it when I passed into the cool interior of the house.
“Camila, wait.”
My shoulders hunched at the sound of Lauren’s voice and I refused to look at her. “Get lost. I can show myself out.”
“I’m not done—”
“I am!” I pivoted to face her. “You don’t get to talk to me that way. Who do you think you are? You think I came here for you? That I was hoping I’d see you and you’d throw me a goddamn scrap or bone…some pathetic acknowledgment of my existence? Maybe I’d be able to harass you into a quick, dirty fuck in a corner somewhere in a pitiful effort to win you back?”
“Shut up, Camila.” Her gaze was scorching hot, her jaw tight and hard. “Listen to me—”
“I’m only here because I was told you wouldn’t be. I’m here for Cary and his career. So you can go back to the party and forget about me all over again. I assure you, when I walk out the door, I’ll be doing the same to you.”
“Shut your damned mouth.” she caught me by the elbows and shook me so hard my teeth snapped together. “Just shut up and let me talk.”
I slapped her hard enough to turn her head. “Don’t touch me.”
With a growl, Lauren hauled me into her and kissed me hard, bruising my lips. Her hand was in my hair, fisting it roughly, holding me in place so I couldn’t turn away. I bit the tongue she thrust aggressively into my mouth, then her lower lip, tasting blood, but she didn’t stop. I shoved at her shoulders with everything I had, but I couldn’t budge her.
Goddamn Stanton! If not for him and my crazy-assed mother, I’d have had a few Krav Maga classes under my belt by now…
Lauren kissed me as if she was starved for the taste of me and my resistance began to melt. she smelled so good, so familiar. Her body felt so perfectly right against mine. My nipples betrayed me, hardening into tight points, and a slow, hot trickle of arousal gathered in my core. My heart thundered in my chest.
God, I wanted her. The craving hadn’t gone away, not even for a minute.
she picked me up. Imprisoned by her tight grip, it was hard to breathe and my head began to spin. When she carried me through a door and kicked it shut behind her, I couldn’t do more than make a feeble sound of protest.
I found myself pressed against a heavy glass door on the other side of a library, lauren’s hard and powerful body subduing my own. Her arm at my waist slid lower, her hand delving beneath my skirts and finding the curves of my butt exposed by my lacy boy shorts underwear. she wrenched my hips hard to her, making me feel how hard she was, how aroused. My sex trembled with want, achingly empty.
All the fight left me. My arms fell to my sides, my palms pressing flat to the glass. I felt the brittle tension drain from her body as I softened in surrender, the pressure of her mouth easing and her kiss turning into a passionate coaxing.
“Camila,” she breathed gruffly. “Don’t fight me. I can’t take it.”
My eyes closed. “Let me go, Lauren.”
she nuzzled her cheek against mine, her breath gusting hard and fast over my ear. “I can’t. I know you’re disgusted by what you saw the other night…what I was doing to myself—”
“Lauren, no!” God. Did she think I left hee because of that? “That’s not why—”
“I’m losing my mind without you.” Her lips were gliding down my neck, her tongue stroking over my racing pulse. she sucked on my skin and pleasure radiated through me. “I can’t think. I can’t work or sleep. My body aches for you. I can make you want me again. Let me try.”
Tears slipped free and ran down my face. They splashed on the upper swell of my breasts and she licked at them, lapping them away.
How would I ever recover if she made love to me again? How would I survive if she didn’t?
“I never stopped wanting you,” I whispered. “I can’t stop. But you hurt me, Lauren. You have the power to hurt me like no one else can.”
Her gaze was stark and confused on my face. “I hurt you? How?”
“You lied to me. You shut me out.” I cupped her face, needing hero to understand this one thing without question. “Your past doesn’t have the power to push me away. Only you can do that, and you did.”
“I didn’t know what to do,” she rasped. “I never wanted you to see me like that…”
“That’s the problem, Lauren. I want to know who you are, the good and the bad, and you want to keep parts of yourself hidden from me. If you don’t open up, we’re going to lose each other down the road and I won’t be able to take it. I’m barely surviving it now. I’ve crawled through the last four days of my life. Another week, a month…It’ll break me to give you up.”
“I can let you in, Camila. I’m trying. But your first response when I screw up is to run away. You do it every time and I can’t stand feeling like any moment I’m going to do or say something wrong and you’re going to bolt.”
Her mouth was tender again as she brushed her lips back and forth over mine. I didn’t argue with her. How could I, when she was right?
“I hoped you’d come back on your own,” she murmured, “but I can’t stay away anymore. I’ll carry you out of here if I have to. Whatever it takes to get you back in the same room with me, talking this out.”
My heart stuttered. “You were hoping I’d come back? I thought…You gave me back my keys. I thought we were over.”
she pulled back, her face set in fierce lines. “We’ll never be over, Camila.”
I looked at her, my heart aching like an open wound at how beautiful she was, how broken and in pain she was—pain I’d caused to some degree.
On tiptoes, I kissed the reddened handprint I’d left on her cheek, clutching her thick silky hair in my hands.
Lauren bent her knees to align our bodies, her breathing harsh and erratic. “I’ll do whatever you want, whatever you need. Anything. Just take me back.”
Maybe I should have been scared by the depth of her need, but I felt the same passionate insanity for her.
Running my hands down her chest in an effort to soothe her trembling, I gave her the hard truth. “We can’t seem to stop making each other miserable. I can’t keep doing this to you and I can’t keep going through these crazy highs and lows. We need help, Lauren. We’re seriously dysfunctional.”
“I saw Dr. Petersen on Friday. He’s going to take me on as a patient, and—if you agree—he’ll take us both on as a couple. I figured if you can trust him, I can try.”
“Dr. Petersen?” I remembered the brief jolt I’d felt at seeing a black Bentley SUV when Clancy pulled away from the doctor’s office. At the time, I’d told myself it was wishful thinking. After all, there were countless black SUVs in New York. “You had me followed.”
Her chest expanded on a deep breath. she didn’t deny it.
I bit back my anger. I could only imagine how terrible it must be for her to be so dependent on something—someone—she couldn’t control. What mattered most at that moment were her willingness to try and the fact that it wasn’t just talk. she’d actually taken steps. “It’s going to be a lot of work, Lauren,” I warned her.
“I’m not afraid of work.” she was touching me restlessly, her hands sliding over my thighs and buttocks as if caressing my bare skin was as necessary to her as breathing. “I’m only afraid of losing you.”
I pressed my cheek to her. We completed each other. Even now, as her hands roamed possessively over me, I felt a thawing in my soul, the desperate relief of being held—finally—by the woman who understood and satisfied my deepest, most intimate desires.
“I need you.” Her mouth was sliding over my cheek and down my throat. “I need to be inside you…”
“No. My God. Not here.” But my protest sounded weak even to my own ears. I wanted her anywhere, anytime, any way…
“It has to be here,” she muttered, dropping to her knees. “It has to be now.”
she chafed my skin ripping the lace of my panties away; then she shoved my skirts to my waist and licked my cleft, her tongue parting my folds to stroke over my throbbing clit.
I gasped and tried to recoil, but there was nowhere to go. Not with the door at my back and a grimly determined Lauren in front, one hand keeping me pinned while the other lifted my left leg over her shoulder, opening me to her ardent mouth.
My head thudded against the glass, heat pulsing through my blood from the point where her tongue was driving me mad. My leg flexed against her back, urging her closer, my hands cupping her head to hold her still as I rocked into her. Feeling the rough satin strands of her hair against my sensitive inner thighs was its own provocation, heightening my awareness of everything around me…
We were in Lauren’s parents’ house, in the midst of a party attended by dozens of famous people, and she was on her knees, growling her hunger as she licked and sucked my slick, aching cleft. she knew just how to get to me, knew what I liked and needed. she had an understanding of my nature that went above and beyond her incredible oral skills. The combination was devastating and addicting.
My body shook, my eyelids heavy from the illicit pleasure. “Lauren…You make me come so hard.”
Her tongue rubbed over and over the clenching entrance to my body, teasing me, making me grind shamelessly into her working mouth. Her hands cupped my bare butt, kneading, urging me onto her tongue as she thrust it inside me. There was reverence in the greedy way she enjoyed me, the unmistakable sense that she worshipped my body, that pleasuring it and taking pleasure from it was as vital to her as the blood in her veins.
“Yes,” I hissed, feeling the orgasm building. I was buzzed by champagne and the heated scent of Lauren’s skin mixed with my own arousal. My breasts strained within the increasingly too-tight confines of my strapless bra, my body trembling on the edge of a desperately needed orgasm. “I’m so close.”
A movement on the far side of the room caught my eye and I froze, my gaze locking with Magdalene’s. she stood just inside the door, halted midstride, staring wide-eyed and open-mouthed at the back of Lauren’s moving head.
But she was either oblivious or too impassioned to care. Her lips circled my clit and her cheeks hallowed. Sucking rhythmically, she massaged the hypersensitive knot with the tip of her tongue.
Everything tightened viciously, then released in a fiery burst of pleasure.
The orgasm poured through me in a scorching wave. I cried out, pumping my hips mindlessly into her mouth, lost to the primal connection between us. Lauren held me up as my knees weakened, tonguing my quivering flesh until the last tremor faded.
When I opened my eyes again, our audience of one had fled.
Standing in a rush Lauren picked me up and carried me to the couch. she dropped me lengthwise on the cushion; then hauled my hips up to rest on the armrest, arching my spine.
I eyed her up the length of my torso. Why not just fold me over and fuck me from behind?
Then she ripped open her button-fly and pulled her big, beautiful penis out, and I didn’t care how she took me just so long as she did. I whimpered as she shoved into me, my body struggling to accommodate the wonderful fullness I craved. Yanking my hips to meet her powerful thrusts, Lauren battered my tender sex with that brutally thick column of rigid flesh, her gaze dark and possessive, her breath leaving her in primitive grunts every time she hit the end of me.
A trembling moan left me, the friction of her drives stirring my never-sated need to be fucked senseless by her. Only her.
A handful of strokes and her head fell back as she gasped my name, her hips rolling to stir me into a frenzy. “Squeeze me, Camila. Squeeze my dick.”
When I complied, the ragged sound she made was so erotic my sex trembled in appreciation. “Yeah, angel…just like that.”
I tightened around her and she cursed. Her gaze found mine, the stunning green hazed with sexual euphoria. A convulsive shudder wracked her powerful frame, followed by an agonized sound of ecstasy. Her cock jerked inside me, once, twice, and then she was coming long and hard, spurting hotly into the clutching depths of my body.
I didn’t have time to climax again, but it didn’t matter. I watched her with awe and pure female triumph. I could do this to her.
In the moments of orgasm, I owned her as completely as she owned me.
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cicelythereaper · 4 years
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Hello! I was wondering if you had anything on Y Gododdin 😃
hey! fellow gododdin enthusiast! what a delight
i presume this is a request for reading recommendations - i don’t know exactly what you’re looking for, or how accessible these will be, but i’ve tried to cover most bases here. i WISH there were more literary criticism, maybe there is in the welsh-language scholarship and i just haven’t found it? 
it’s entirely possible that i will have missed some obvious things here, i’m mostly sticking to stuff that i personally have read. if something mind-blowing has come out since the last time i did gododdin reading then it’s not here, i’m afraid! 
but enough disclaimers. on to the recs!
text and translation:
for a translation, i cannot recommend enough joseph p. clancy’s translation as found in the triumph tree: scotland’s earliest poetry, 550-1350, ed. t. o. clancy (1998). this is fantastic. it’s poetic, it’s a joy to read, and having used it as part of a deep read last year where i went through the welsh text in detail i am honestly AMAZED regularly at how well clancy handles the many translation issues that arise. it’s loose, and it doesn’t translate every single stanza unfortunately, but for the spirit of the poem you really can’t do better
that said, if you need another translation to check against/to fill in the gaps, i’d recommend kenneth jackson’s the gododdin: the oldest scottish poem (1969). it’s a prose translation, so it’s harder to use in conjunction with the text, but it’s pretty clear and accurate
text-wise... things get complicated. honestly, the best edition is probably still ifor williams’ canu aneirin (1938), in terms of faithfulness to the words on the manuscript page. (i also really enjoy his textual commentary, but it is in modern welsh so not accessible to everyone.) the major problem with it is that you are not going to get the stanzas in the order they appear in the manuscript - he reorders them into groups of perceived variants. this also makes it harder to distinguish between the A-text and the B-text. AND it means that the stanzas are not in the same order as in any of the translations!
if you can get hold of it, i really really think it is worth having daniel huws’ llyfr aneirin: a facsimile (1989). the introduction is SO useful for understanding the manuscript context, and it comes with gwenogvryn evans’ transcription of the book of aneirin, which you can compare with williams’ edition if need be to work out where a stanza actually goes.
there’s a conspectus of editions which i think thomas owen clancy put together but i cannot for the LIFE of me remember where it is - if you think you’ll need it, PM me and i’ll see what i can do
dating, textual criticism and historicity:
t. m. charles-edwards, wales and the britons, 350-1064 (2013), chapter 11 - this is from more of a historical perspective than a strictly linguistic/palaeographical/dating perspective, but it’s a really good general introduction and i definitely recommend starting with it. if you read nothing else, read this. this whole book is a godsend
t. m. charles-edwards, 'the authenticity of the gododdin: an historian's view', in astudiaethau ar yr hengerdd, eds. bromwich and jones (1978), pp. 44-91 - this kind of lays out the standard view which everyone has been deconstructing ever since. we don’t know anything about what’s going on with y gododdin, but at one point we thought we did know something and this was what it looked like
d. n. dumville, 'early welsh poetry: problems of historicity', in early welsh poetry: studies in the book of aneirin, ed. b. f. roberts (1988) - and HERE is the deconstruction! a pretty good overview of the issues with “knowing anything” when it comes to y gododdin
p. sims-williams, 'dating the poems of aneirin and taliesin', zeitschrift für celtische philologie 36 (2016), 163-224 - i don’t have any notes on this and haven’t read it recently, but i remember it being good (it’s sims-williams so of course it is). almost certainly contains linguistics, but is probably also written readably
o. j. padel, 'aneirin and taliesin: sceptical speculations', in beyond the gododdin: dark age scotland in medieval wales, ed. a. woolf (2013), pp. 153-75 - if you can stand linguistics talk, padel does his best to make it understandable here and gives a good overview of the linguistic arguments for and against suggested dates for y gododdin. this whole book is actually very useful
g. r. isaac, 'canu aneirin awdl LI', journal of celtic linguistics 2 (1993), 65-91, AND 'readings in the history and transmission of the gododdin', cambrian medieval celtic studies 37 (1999), 55-78 - DEEP IN THE TEXTUAL CRITICISM. honestly, my poor attention span means i find it hard to pay attention all the way through these two, but if you want a really in-depth look at the possible relationships between the A and B-texts of y gododdin, this is the way to go
historical discussion and background:
charles-edwards in wales and the britons chapter 11 again
j. rowland, 'warfare and horses in the gododdin and the problem of catraeth', cambrian medieval celtic studies 30 (1995), 13-40 - this is a pretty cool look at the role of cavalry in y gododdin and while i don’t agree with all of it, i think it’s really useful reading if you’re going for a historical take on the poem
p. m. dunshea, 'the meaning of catraeth: a revised early context for y gododdin', in beyond the gododdin again, pp. 81-114 - makes some ESSENTIAL points re the question of: is catraeth catterick? moreover, IS CATRAETH A PLACE?
c. cessford, 'northern england and the gododdin poem', northern history 33 (1997), 218-22 - a historical perspective on the poem with some very useful points, comparing the situation as sketched out in y gododdin with what we know of the area at the time
m. wood, 'bernician transitions: place-names and archaeology', in early medieval northumbria: kingdoms and communities, AD 450-1100, eds. petts and turner (2011), pp. 35-70 - a welcome look at the archaeological and place-name evidence for what was going on in bernicia as it changed from a brittonic to a germanic-dominated area. really useful to have in mind both when reading the poem and when reading more literary history
r. collins, 'military communities and transformation of the frontier from the fourth to the sixth centuries', in the same book, pp. 15-34 - pretty fascinating look at the earlier background running up to the time period depicted in y gododdin, and the possibility of continuity between the roman occupation of hadrian’s wall and the post-roman era there. useful social/archaeological perspective!
f. h. clark, 'thinking about western northumbria', in the same book, pp. 113-28 - an early medieval english perspective on the area at the time, useful for comparison and completeness’ sake 
literary discussion:
ifor williams, lectures on early welsh poetry (1944) and the beginnings of welsh poetry, ed. bromwich (1972, 2nd ed. 1980) - THE CLASSICS. an old-fashioned, not to say outdated, viewpoint, but that’s because this is the guy who INVENTED the viewpoint back when it was new! even now there’s a lot of good stuff packed into these and ifor williams’ prose style is a real pleasure to read. not to be missed
a. o. h. jarman, 'the heroic ideal in early welsh poetry', in beiträge zur indogermanistik und keltologie, ed. meid (1967), pp. 193-211 - likewise somewhat old-fashioned now, but lays out the classic viewpoint well and makes some good literary points. it may also be worth reading the introduction to his edition/translation, aneirin: the gododdin (1988). (i don’t recommend using it as an edition because he conflates the A and B texts and renders the text into modern welsh - this means it reads very smoothly but is quite a bit further away from what’s on the manuscript page.) 
h. fulton, 'cultural heroism in the old north of britain: the evidence of aneirin's gododdin', in the epic in history ed. davidson, mukherjee and zlatar (1994), pp. 18-39 - a pretty interesting read, about the mindset expressed in the poetry, its purpose and its construction
this isn’t lit crit but i’m putting in my favourite g. r. isaac quote from his article ‘gweith gwen ystrat and the northern heroic age of the sixth century’, p. 69: ‘Koch writes that the Book of Aneirin’s ‘immediate milieu is… not the Celtic Heroic Age, but the High Middle Ages’, as if the ‘Celtic Heroic Age’ were a period of comparable historical status to the High Middle Ages. This is not the case, however. A ‘heroic age’ cannot be the ‘immediate milieu’ of any literary production, a ‘heroic age’ cannot produce literature, because a ‘heroic age’ is itself produced through literature (taken in the broadest sense). It is a literary product. The Homeric epics are not the product of  a Bronze Age Achaean heroic age, but vice versa. The Irish Ulster Cycle is not the product of an Iron Age, pre-Christian heroic age, but vice versa. And the medieval Welsh poems of ‘Aneirin’ and ‘Taliesin’ (and Triads, sections of the Historia Brittonum, and much else) are not products of a sixth-century North British heroic age, but vice versa.’
honestly there just is not nearly enough lit crit for y gododdin, in english at least, especially to explain cool shit that the welsh text is doing that isn’t visible in the translation, and/or things that could be subversive or ambiguous about it - so, i don’t know what your level of engagement with the medieval welsh text is, but if you’re curious, if you want to know more about what’s going on in a specific stanza (or which stanzas are extended puns), or just which things i’ve been dying to yell about all year, PLEASE message me and I! WILL! YELL! 
articles which are almost certainly good and useful but it’s been too long since i’ve read them to say:
t. o. clancy, 'the kingdoms of the north: poetry, places, politics', in beyond the gododdin again, pp. 153-75
m. haycock, 'early welsh poets look north', likewise in beyond the gododdin, pp. 115-52
FINAL NOTE:
one of the problems with translations is that they give an impression of way more certainty about the meaning of the text... than is actually there. you’re pretty safe with clancy or kenneth jackson, but tread carefully. again, i don’t know your level of engagement with medieval welsh, but if you want to know if there are any major textual issues with a stanza, hmu and i will gladly consult my copious textual notes! but in general, BEWARE of basing anything too heavily on the following groups of stanzas:
A40, A41, B5, B6 (Am drynni drylaw drylenn; Clancy ‘For the feast, most sad, disastrous’)
A42, B25, B35 (Eur ar vur caer; Clancy ‘Gold on fortress wall’)
A48, B3, B24 (Llech leutu tud leudvre; Clancy ‘Standing stone in cleared ground’)
A62, B14, B15, B16, B36 (Angor dewr daen; Clancy ‘Anchor, Deifr-router’)
the Gorchanau if you’re interacting with those, especially the Gwarchan Maeldderw - if anyone tells you they know exactly what is going on in these, do not believe them. isaac has a full translation of the gwarchan maeldderw in cambrian medieval studies 44, and it’s useful, but i’m not by ANY means completely convinced by it, so tread carefully.  
the more stanzas there are in a group of variants (or at least a group that shares lines), the more likely it is that those stanzas are going to be SUPER DUPER TEXTUALLY FUCKED UP, is a pretty good rule of thumb.
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ssunkissed-icaruss · 4 years
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“I wish I was back in Hereford right now.”
The engineer’s voice became quaint while he rested his head on whatever pieces of rubble were available. His hand returned to the laceration on his side in order to keep the bleeding at bay. There was more blood than before from what he felt moments prior. The scuffle with the roach must’ve worsened it. Not good. “There’s still that documentary I need to watch… What was it about?” Talking to himself could’ve been considered insane had it not been an effective way of keeping him calm and alert. He needed to stay awake lest he drown in his own thoughts and never see the light of another day.
“The ocean. It was about the ocean.”
~
After crash landing in a gas station convenience store, Marius is left alone with his thoughts as the threat of death looms overhead.
Words: 2059, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English
Fandom: Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six (Video Games)
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Characters: Marius "Jäger" Streicher, Jordan "Thermite" Trace, Gustave "Doc" Kateb, Olivier "Lion" Flament, Lera "Finka" Melnikova
Additional Tags: Game: Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Siege: Operation Chimera DLC, Blood, Blood and Injury, Mild Gore, Body Horror, Near Death Experiences, Near Death, Missions Gone Wrong, Airplane Crashes, Crash Landing, Fear, Fear of Death, Zombies, Monsters, Infection, Virus, One Shot, Short One Shot, Character Study, Major Character Injury, POV Third Person Limited, My First Fanfic, My First Work in This Fandom, My First AO3 Post
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eightyonekilograms · 4 years
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Mentioning Anathem in a post last weekend made me want to go back and plow through all the Stephenson again, so I did. Brief impressions:
Snow Crash: Still very dumb but very fun. I wish the rest of the book could’ve rocked as hard as the first two chapters. Apparently Joe Cornish is directing the HBO miniseries; it’s a neat idea and he’s a good fit for the material, but I wonder if its time has come and gone: cyberpunk is so cliché now that the fact that Snow Crash was making fun of it may go over everyone’s head and it will just seem really dated.
The Diamond Age: Better than I remembered. Does a believable job showing how you can still have poverty and social stratification even though everyone has Star Trek-style matter replicators. Precocious child characters are usually both obnoxious and unrealistic, but Nell and her journey is how to do this trope correctly. As far as I know it’s the earliest SF to feature voluntary nation-states based on shared values eclipsing geographical ones, which of course got fleshed out a lot more in Terra Ignota.
Seveneves: Worse than I remembered. The painfully obvious Elon Musk expy character was a bad idea in 2015 and has only gotten worse since then. Obviously the Internet swarmed over the last third of the book looking for something Problematic just on its premise; if they found something, it didn’t make a big enough blow-up that I remember it, but it is just weird and there’s not really any payoff for the setup. “Good overall but the ending sucks” is of course the usual gripe about Stephenson; most of the time I actually disagree and like his endings, but it sure is true here.
The Baroque Cycle: Didn’t reread. I don’t have that much free time. (I didn’t do Zodiac  or The Big U either)
Cryptonomicon: Still a classic, even though the premise basically came true but it turns out cryptocurrency enthusiasts are not brilliant roguish renegades fighting tyranny but mostly dumbass teenagers either foisting or falling for scams, over and over. 
Anathem: Continues to be my favorite book that I can never seem to get anyone else into, most find it excruciatingly dull. This time around rather than just gush I tried looking for faults in it, and there definitely are some: 
the characterization is pretty poor. Despite some cursory attempts at giving them distinct quirks, Jesry, Lio and Arsibalt are basically interchangeable.
the attempted romantic subplot is perfunctory even by Stephenson’s standards. Sometimes I get the feeling that Stephenson is asexual, as a writer if not necessarily as a person, and only includes scraps of romance and sex in his books because he thinks he’s supposed to, despite his very evident lack of enthusiasm for it. (I feel the same way about Christopher Nolan)
There is the troubling usual Stephenson undercurrent of “the heroic nerds vs. the slack-jawed idiot masses”. It’s much worse in some of his other books, especially Seveneves, but Anathem never leaves any doubt as to who the better people are and how they should obviously  be running the world are.
But I don’t care: it plays with Big Ideas but in a way that actually ties them into the plot instead of having them being meaningless digressions, the worldbuilding is endless fun, even though as I’ve mentioned before I usually don’t go for worldbuilding-qua-worldbuilding, and I think the pacing the perfect for what the story is trying to do. This is another Stephenson book where everyone complains that the ending is a letdown, but I loved it.
Reamde: Still completely forgettable. If it didn’t have Stephenson’s name on it I’d swear it was a Tom Clancy novel.
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queenofthedramedies · 3 years
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Something to Rely On: Ch. 14
Hello, my lovely readers. This chapter is a little darker than most, and this is my nod to Halloween; so we're getting a little horror-ific! On with the show…
Ch. 14 She Vanished One Night
Davina
Just another night shift. Nothing was out of the ordinary. Davina Claire liked the night shift at New Orleans Grace Hospital better than the majority of her fellow doctors. The chaos of the day dissolved into quiet as visitors left, staff became limited and patients attempted to rest. Right now, Davina sat behind the counter of the ICU. A glowing computer screen stared back at her. She had charts to finish typing up and then she could work on studying up on procedures. It would keep her mind of her break-up with Kol which still did not seem real. But if she stayed for focused on work; she would get through the night. Then she could go home and sleep, until the next shift, which would begin in less than twenty-four hours.
Davina's attention was drawn towards the sound of a gurney's wheel on the linoleum tile. The soft creak one of the only sounds in the empty hallway. She exchanged a quick glance with the nurse on duty, who sat in front of a computer that monitored the patients' on the floor's vitals. They both turned back, to watch in silence at Dr. Bennett and an officer from NOLA PD moved along either side of the gurney. Clank. Clank. Clank. Eyes finding the source of the clanking, Davina gulped. The man on the gurney had been handcuffed to the railing. Davina had never experienced being on a floor with a suspect or a prisoner.
Dr. Bennett opened a door to an open room, two doors down from the desk, and returned to the end of the gurney to push it inside the room. The officer went in behind her and let the door close behind them.
"Got to love working the holiday shifts." The nurse rolled her eyes and wrote something down on a pad of paper with a pen. It made a scritch, a scritch sound as the pen moved over the paper.
Holiday? Then Davina remembered it was Halloween. Or it would be in an hour. She shivered. When she was a kid, she liked Halloween, but as she grew up, she could not help but notice how any stories involved women being terrorized by some jackass, in a mask, with a weapon. Didn't seem so fun when you put in that context. Although she did like chocolate.
The door opened and Dr. Bennett left the room where their new patient lay. The officer came out, too, and they moved down the hallway to confer about something Davina could not catch. Then the officer returned. He took his place outside the door and Davina tried not to stare.
The officer looked at Davina and nodded before going over to the desk. "You don't happen to have a magazine, or something, would you?"
"No. But I do have the latest Tom Clancy novel."
"That'll work. Thank you." He drummed his fingers on the desktop. Tap. Tap. Tap. Zip, went the nurse's bag as she opened it and withdrew the book. Tipping his cap, the officer went back to his post.
The nurse got up. "Well, it's time for my break. Call the kids. Make sure they didn't eat the trick-or-treaters candy. Get a snack and a cup of joe. Dr. Claire, you need anything?"
"No. I'm fine. Thank you." Davina smiled and returned to her work.
After ten minutes, Davina felt how heavy her eyes were becoming. Yawning, she rubbed the balcony of her neck. Coffee. She needed coffee. Good thing there was a machine in the lobby, just around the corner.
Getting up, Davina grabbed her purse. She walked around the desk and nodded to the officer. "I'm getting a coffee. Would you like one?"
"No. Thanks. Had plenty before I got here."
"Okay." Davina headed off and down the hall. Turning the corner, she confronted her old friend, Mr. Coffee Machine. He'd gotten her through many a shift. Her eyes went down to the C3 that would offer her hit of cappuccino. Removing two, crisp dollar bills, she slid then into the machine, and hit the buttons. They made beep, beep sounds before the machine came to life with a whir and then a cup went plop. The gentle slosh of coffee pouring into the cup and drip, drip concluded its work.
Davina bent over to push the platinum door open and slid the coffee put with care. Both her hands cupped the warm paper and she blew on the steam rising into the air as she turned back down the corner. Her eyes went up at the sound of an angry: BEEP, BEEP, BEEP. It came from the nurse's side of the desk.
Hurrying down the hallway, Davina forgot all about the still hot liquid in the cup. In her rush, she caused coffee to splatter her fingers. "Ow! Shit!" she cried as she made it to the computer. She could see that a flash of red accompanied the beep sound. Someone needed help. Her eyes widened at the sight of which room the alert came from. 391. The room where their newest patient lay.
Eyes moving upward, Davina felt her heart pound in her chest. The officer was no longer at the door. But she had an obligation to check on the patient, NO matter who who the patient was, or what he might have done.
Davina grabbed a couple of tissues and dried her fingers, setting the cup down and then made her way toward the door. Her hand into her pocket. It curled around a pen which she clicked open. She knew where to stab someone if the man tried anything stupid. She would not end being one of those helpless girls in the movies.
                                                    Read more
Thank you for reading, faving, reblogging, and following. 😊
Happy Halloween! 🎃
Be safe,
-J  
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mirrorworldangel · 4 years
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Chapters: 9/? Fandom: Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six (Video Games) Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings Relationships: Elena "Mira" Maria Alvarez/Alexsandr "Tachanka" Senaviev, Maxim "Kapkan" Basuda/Timur "Glaz" Glazkov, Gustave "Doc" Kateb/Julien "Rook" Nizan, Olivier "Lion" Flament/Gilles "Montagne" Touré, Seamus "Sledge" Cowden/Marius "Jäger" Streicher, Mike "Thatcher" Baker/Jordan "Thermite" Trace Characters: too long - Character, not gonna type them all out Additional Tags: if you want to wirte a fanfic based on these rules, be my guest, just tag me first, you can recommend some more of the craziest rules at the comments below, and if you are curious of some of them, i will explain it to you in more detail at the comments, there is so much bullshit happening at the base, thatcher and kaid are so fed up with them all, based on some Tumblr posts by kiki_92, and by Grain_crain, and many others I cannot list out, its too long Summary:
Rules ever agreed by everyone not to do ever again. Period.
Another list! This time you can join in! All you have to do id think of any crazy, silly, stupid and dangerous ideas you can make up from your mind and be inducted into the List of Infamy!! Message me your ideas in the comments below and don’t forget to tag me because Tumblr has fucked up my notifications!
Let’s hope its long enough to make a book out from it! 
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callsignbaphomet · 4 years
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10 Qs!
Tagged by @lordfenric (tysm!)
1. Do you have an OC that’s basically a version of yourself?
I....do actually. I've said it a couple of times and then I get embarrassed and then delete the post. Anyway, he's a version of myself AND a version of myself I wish I was. Ya know, my ideal self. He also filled another role which I haven't had the need to put to use as hard in a very long time which is a good thing I think. He's grown, evolved, matured as I have. Any changes to him are pretty much things I've changed about myself. Basically he'll always be a WIP because I'm one too.
2. What is your favorite type of scene to write?
Ooh! Many scenes! Fight scenes are super fun! Love me a good gun fight. I think I like more dramatic and emotionally charged scenes. I think I'm pretty good at those and suspense filled scenes. Not to be mistaken for horror though.
I know it wasn't part of the question but my least favorite are sex scenes only because I am HORRIBLY TERRIBLE at them. For real. I've tried my hand at it numerous times but it sounds disingenuous and like I'm trying way too hard. I really suck at them. Got a bunch of half finished files of n///sfw stuff that I never finished because I just think I did a terrible job at it. Maybe I'll upload 'em for a laugh one of these days.
3. Do you write cliffhangers?
No. I don't like them. I think they're like jump scares in horror movies. Just cheap ways to get the reader's attention.
If I ever leave a chapter on a cliffhanger it was not intentional. Much less would I leave a story on a cliffhanger.
4. One word or phrase that you think you overuse (but probably don’t):
I overuse the word however way too much. Probably another one but can't recall at the moment.
5. Least favorite thing about writing?
Editing. Gods above I haaaaaaaate editing. Mainly for two reasons: I always think the sentence/paragraph/chapter coulda been better executed. Second reason is I waste a shit ton of time second guessing my choices in words. Listen, you don't need to tell me my vocabulary is at kindergarten level. I KNOW it is. Most times I feel like shit about it and waste even more time with the browser on dictionary.com looking for synonyms for words to replace them with so it doesn't look like a 5-year-old just tried to write a weird espionage (idk C called what I'm writing that and it's stuck ever since).
6. How much prepwork do you do before writing if any? (outline, scene breakdown etc)
Far
Too
Much
I overthink it to death.
I have my plot, characters, locations and everything that goes into it. To the point of what weapons everyone will be using and why. I take a crash course on the locations, the culture, languages, take an unnerving amount of screenshots on Google Earth. Check stores and hours of business. Traffic, population, day to day activity. Check the history of the location and a refresher on what happened in the years where the story takes place. Find ways to translate the local language. Weapons! I check their history, when they were made, if they're still in service, what ammo, they're strengths and flaws, manufacturers. Same goes for the gear they wear. Why are the antagonists there. What do they want and how do they get it and how can they succeed. Should they succeed? Should they fail? Why? What motives they have. What the history and origin of the mythological creature(s) are involved is.
Take all I just said and triple the amount of work if I make up a town or city for the sake of storytelling.
Tl;dr a lot.
7. Do you use any visuals to help you with writing? If so, what?
Nowadays I have to. I don't know, I think my brain is broken or something and I can't concentrate like I used to. I can see and hear the scene in my head like a movie and I can repeat it as many times as needed but as soon as my fingers touch the keyboard I draw a blank and lose direction. I've actually resorted to doing storyboards of scenes and rough sketches of buildings so I know where to go, why and what for. I've turned all my sketchbooks into storyboards.
If there's hand to hand fighting or with bladed weapons I watch some videos on YouTube or wherever I find them and write down what I see and later edit it well.
If I was any good at it Legion would be a comic instead but I'm no good at it. So I gotta resort to writing and even then I heavily question my ability to do so. I know I'll get something written and finished someday but boy is it frustrating.
8. Is there magic or new technology in your WIP? How did you come up with it?
Yes. Both but mostly magic. I'm kinda working on implementing more technology. I do also combine both magic and technology. One example is a small sphere made of plastic that can easily break. Place it in your mouth and bite into it. Inside is a light pink mist that feels like a warm liquid (also minty sensation) that travels through your body. It's a combination of adrenaline, pain killer and healing aid. Won't magically mend broken bones, remove bullets or revive the dead but it'll help in ugly situations. There's also laser weapons that run on crystals. So long as the crystal has energy you got ammo then just recharge the crystal and you're good to go. There's some more tech but that's for another time.
The only magic I've made up for this is Astral magic and its counterpart and it's been a bitch trying to balance it out but I've gotten there.
Portals are also a thing I added in.
Honestly I really wanted to add magic. There's supernatural stuff in it anyway so might as well go all the way. I just come up with these out of wanting it there or to fill a role.
9. What are you currently reading?
Nothing. With my attention span I'm lucky to get to the third page. Last book I bought is still in a drawer gathering dust. Was a Tom Clancy I believe.
10. What would you like to see more of in Fantasy novels?
Wouldn't be fair to make demands for a thing I don't partake in now would it. Don't read anymore honestly.
Tagging: no one but if ya wanna give this a go then go right ahead.
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hobbitsetal · 4 years
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👀👀
ooh, this reminds me i need to post another Vex chapter!also this reminds me i need to write another Vex chapter...also also (because i have no other segue from one train of thought to another) TWO eyes means TWO snippets from TWO stories!!
~~~
He went back to the tent and tossed the empty bowl on Iraj’s bed, interrupting Iraj’s senet game with Mahin. “The cook wouldn’t give me any,” Vex said. 
Iraj looked at the empty bowl. He looked at Vex’s face. Then he moved a game piece and said, “How unfortunate.” 
Under Mahin’s contemptuous stare, Vex felt obligated to add, “I told him it was for my master.” 
“How thoughtful,” Iraj said. “It was not for me, actually, but I appreciate your attempt to obtain the soup.”
Vex blinked at him. “If it was not for you, then why send me for soup?”
“It was for you,” Iraj explained sweetly. “I am dining with friends tonight. What a dreadful shame that cook was so rude!”
~~~
ClaimingDiamond’s territory was a surefire way to stir up trouble. Without informationor backup, I decided I didn’t need to stir anything. I bought salad greens,potatoes, and short ribs, and spent the rest of the day cooking for myself. Itwasn’t as much fun as cooking at the Clancys’, with the kids asking questionsand trying to help, but it was something to do.
       It was the only thing to do, really,since I couldn’t chase any leads. And since food was the best substitute forplant magic outside the Land, I loaded up and then gave myself a physical. Mybroken ribs were practically healed and my side barely had a scar. Nothing toshow I had almost died ten days ago. Though I still wasn’t ready to tackle anynew healings, the last of the magical burnout was gone.
       I didn’t think I’d sleep, but dinner hitme as well as two bottles of Sablinian whiskey and a lot less painfully. I wokeup around midmorning feeling downright refreshed. After eating the leftoverpotatoes, I even felt equal to Hatchett’s chaos-ridden orders.
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simonxriley · 5 years
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Chapters: 13/48
Fandom: Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six (Video Games)
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Relationships: Alexsandr "Tachanka" Senaviev/Original Female Character(s), Alexsandr "Tachanka" Senaviev/Skylar "Phoenix" Jackson
Characters: Eliza "Ash" Cohen, Original Female Character(s), Jordan "Thermite" Trace, Alexsandr "Tachanka" Senaviev, Jack "Pulse" Estrada, Miles "Castle" Campbell, Timur "Glaz" Glazkov, Maxim "Kapkan" Basuda, Elias "Blitz" Kotz, Mike "Thatcher" Baker, Yumiko "Hibana" Imagawa
Additional Tags: Friendship, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, Heavy Angst, Developing Relationship, Platonic Relationships, Age Difference, Pre-Outbreak, to post outbreak, Tachanka is a sweetheart, Dialogue Heavy, in some parts, Explicit Sexual Content, Oral Sex, Hand Jobs, unprotected sex, Vaginal Sex, Some Humor, no one messes with overprotective tachanka, skylar has major baby fever, she just wants to settle down with tachanka and have a cute little family, is that so much to ask?
Series: Part 1 of The Tachanka And His Kotyonok
Summary: FBI SWAT Skylar “Phoenix” Jackson is the newest member of Team Rainbow. Between doing a job she loves and a blossoming relationship between her and Spetsnaz operator Tachanka, who helps her comes to terms with past problems, she finds herself in a life full of bliss. However, when a sudden outbreak happens in Truth or Consequence, New Mexico, that blissful life just might go up in flames right in front of her eyes.
The Outbreak will commence at chapter 18. For those who are wondering.
--------------------------------------------------------
Another 9.5K chapter and tbh i’m not sure if it’s more self-indulgent for me or for @gear-redfield but I hope everyone else enjoys it as well!!
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gunaerystargarygun · 6 years
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Okay here’s the review, go fuckin ham:
Detroit: David Cage’s New Best or Worst Mess?
WARNING: This post contains massive plot spoilers.
David Cage's Quantic Dream has recently released a new game for the PS4. An interactive storytelling drama that allows the player to choose their own paths, explore branching possibilities and experience a game that is totally unique to the player. While these characteristics sound amazing, the unfortunate thing is that they are attached to David Cage. Cage's work is infamous within the gaming community, and for better or worse, that is what has gotten him noticed.  
Detroit: Become Human follows the usual pattern of Cage’s games in the last 10 years. There are three different characters whose paths can cross and interact with should the player choose that, much like Heavy Rain. Detroit: Become Human, however, has something different.
Now, I knew nothing about this game. I didn’t even know Cage was planning to grace us with another sexual assault filled game until my boyfriend texted me saying: “Quantic has a new game out, it has androids and is like Heavy Rain. Think you might like it?” He had me at androids, quite honestly.  But I was not prepared.
To begin with, we might as well address the elephant in the room. Detroit: Become Human has been accused of reflecting current (or serious) issues in a callous nature. They are not wrong. The game is entirely rooted in politics and mirrors the struggles of black Americans in the 1900’s, as well as holocaust imagery towards the end of the game. Yet, Cage insists this is not a political game and is not about slavery, racism, or any other type of -ism.
The mirroring begins very early in the game. Protesters line the streets, furious that machinery has pushed the unemployment rate to a staggering 41% (though it seems more than half the U.S. owns androids, which cost around $8,000, but plot inconsistencies will be mentioned later). Markus, one of our playable characters, is harassed and beaten (optional) before he steps onto the back of the bus. The android compartment on the bus. Which happens to be in the back. Walled off from the rest of the passengers. But there are no racist analogies, right?  
We will continue with Markus’ (portrayed by Jesse Williams) story before moving to the others.
Pushing through the “I-don’t-want-this-guy-as-my-partner” and mommy simulator that are the other two stories, Markus finds there is a place called “Jericho” where androids can be free, though getting there it is more akin to a recently flooded basement with junkies. The player can explore this one room of Jericho that you would expect to hold more androids, but there are not. The player can meet an android who is very clearly damaged, and asking what happened the android tells you he was chained to the back of a car and drug up and down a stretch of road. Does that sound similar to anything a marginalized group could have experienced in America? No, of course not, this is a video game, silly. There a few more nameless androids you can interact with, but they just push the point above.
Markus steps up and becomes the leader of Jericho, because despite how long Jericho has operated, apparently, nobody decided to be a leader or make a two-second decision of going to get supplies to help the dying androids in their midst.  
There are two routes you can take as the leader of Jericho: Pacifist or Violent. One makes you feel like a jackass because your people are getting gunned down left and right while you stand there with your hands in the air like a kid begging for the bathroom, and the other makes you feel like a bloodthirsty maniac and destroying public property. The choices you take here do directly affect another character’s story, which I thought to be interesting and a nice choice in story narrative.
Markus also gets the ability to deviate androids, making them free and able to choose their own decisions. How? He touches them and, I'm assuming, transfer "Freedom.exe" straight into their directory folders. This is never explained except through a cryptic conversation you get in another character's story which may or may not even explain it.
Whilst you continue to send spam into android’s CPU, you have vocal options during the freedom march. Yes, androids have a freedom march down the streets of Detroit while chanting “We have a dream". No, I am not making this shit up. This is real, actual in-game dialogue. There is a point where you can choose violent or pacifist options as well what your slogan and icon will be for your revolution. An option is a closed fist that mimics the black power movement's, along with two quotes ripped straight from MLK. "We can't breathe but we are alive," and "We have a dream". These are projected onto park benches or walls with weird holographic guns, but whom the hell is even keeping up with the weird sci-fi elements at this point.
One of the things that bothered me the most about this game is the forced romance between Markus and a member of Jericho, North. North can be the foil to Markus or his second in command. North, whom we learn was a sex android, is extremely violent and tries to get Markus to kill all humans at any chance she can get. Even if playing as a pacifist and having North at the lowest affinity does not stop the two from becoming lovers after their hands' touch for seven seconds. The reason? Their hearts are compatible. There is no build up to this, there is no special branching dialogue that could have possibly opened up the idea to romance, and the line "our hearts are compatible" is such a cheap, bullshit tactic to force an uninteresting romance onto the player. I was flabbergasted when I got to this part, and I almost restarted the chapter just to avoid her. However, I wanted one original playthrough so I pushed on.
Something I also noticed with Markus was how stiff the actor was, which I think ultimately lead me to dislike or not caring much for him. The rally speeches Markus gives are uninspired, boring and sound monotone like Cage was offscreen with a cattle prod ready to strike if there was any deviation from the script. After the chapter "Broken", all personality seems to leave Markus and flies off into the ether, never to be seen again. Which is unfortunate, had the personality and emotion come through, the character would have been much more believable and likable. Markus is right on the cusp of becoming an iconic figure in a game, but the delivery just wasn't there.
With likable characters, this segways into our next character: Connor.
Connor (portrayed by Bryan Dechart) is actually the first character we are able to play as, and his first mission is actually the playable demo of Detroit: Become Human. We are thrown into the thick of it, trying to diffuse a hostage situation. Overall, the scene is well done and does a good job of getting the player interested in the game as well as Connor’s story.
It’s undeniable that Connor became the most popular character in the Detroit: Become Human universe, which is not unsurprising. Connor’s story, also unsurprisingly, the most interesting out of all three.
A model designed to hunt deviants, the player is partnered with an android hating cop to track down androids and figure out the cause of the deviation.  The relationship you have with Lieutenant Hank Anderson (portrayed by Clancy Brown) is one of the more believable elements of the game. Why may you ask? Because the actors continually ad-libbed some of their best scenes and ignored David Cage's instructions. But back to the story.
Connor's story has such an impact because we play as a machine that does not actively deviate on its own. Markus and Kara both deviate in times of intense stress, and the player has no option but to go along with it and tear down the programming wall. With Connor, we see the process of deviation and how long it takes if the choices are made. The breakdown of Connor's self is fascinating, as there are key points when he looks lost, frozen, or afraid. It is also noticed in the way he reacts towards the Lieutenant questioning his actions if Connor chooses ones that raise his software instability.  
Hilariously, if you hate Connor or are aiming for an achievement, Connor is the only character that comes back from the dead if he is killed. In every chapter, Connor can meet an untimely demise and be perfectly fine in the next chapter since he was transferred to another body. The dialogue with Hank is hilarious if you choose to do so.
Connor is seemingly the only one who actually becomes a human, or at the very least, emotes the most human emotion out of all the characters. Which isn't saying a whole lot, actually. Connor's story still suffers from cliches and a lot of them. The racist cop-buddy act, pity the sexbots, find your humanity, and at a certain point, you will have to fight a clone of yourself. What a saving grace that Clancy Brown had been in that situation before with Spongebob.
Speaking of Clancy, the character Hank is supposed to be anti-android but it doesn't come off as that. You get a few insulting scenes of Hank calling Connor a "plastic asshole" or saying "be a good robot", but beyond that, Hank's change in character is relatively quick and abrupt. Hank begins to show sympathy very early on, and after the Eden club, seems to act extremely sympathetic towards the Travis and their plight. Why? Did lesbian androids really have that much of an effect on the supposedly hard ass lieutenant? It might also have been a cover-up for the fact that Hank never truly blamed androids, as Hank brushes that off in later chapters. Regardless, the writing feels lazy in Hank's story at parts, and about as cliché as they come. But at least they let Mr. Krabs say fuck.
Finally, we have the last character: Kara. Kara (portrayed by Valorie Curry) is a housekeeping android that was reset at the time we begin to play. The man who owns her is a drug addicted, child beater who managed to get the android repaired despite being in a massive amount of debt. He also hides his drugs in the laundry detergent, which makes no sense as he actively smokes meth out the beer can pipe he made in front of his kid. He may as well have had it just sitting out or under the couch cushions. I digress. Kara's story is possibly the most upsetting because, for the first two scenes, we have to watch Todd hit and verbally abuse his daughter before we have the option to get out.
You steal the child and begin your life on the lamb, eventually winding up at a weird vampire type house where you meet a man named Zlatko and his android assistant, Luther. Zlatko offers to help and suggests Canada be the perfect refuge for androids.
I have an issue with this plan. Canada is android free, meaning there are no cyberlife stores, there are no manufacturing plants for android components or blue blood, which are all things that android’s need in order to keep their bio components in working order. It’s never expressly mentioned how often these need to be replaced, but if it’s like an oil change, that’s still moderate.
Regardless, it turns out Zlatko has been lying and turning androids into his personal experiments, ripping them apart and attaching all sorts of apparatuses to their bodies. Afterward, you leave with Luther in tow to find help and come across Rose. Rose is a black woman who seeks to help androids, and you can ask her why to which she will reply: "My people were made to feel they were useless", yes, Cage actually did that. Also, that chapter is called "Midnight Train", as if punching you in the face with allegories wasn't enough.  
The rest of the story past that is boring, if I'm being honest, though Luther and Alice somehow managed to wedge themselves into my heart, and Alice took up the position of being my second video game daughter after Clementine from Telltale series. The point where Kara's story takes an absolute nosedive is the Big Twist.
Alice is an android. Todd purchased a YK500 model after his wife left to prove that he could be a good father and take care of a child like he was unable to do with his actual daughter. Clearly, that worked out just swell. It absolutely ripped everything away from Kara's story. Alice is a child, innocent from what the other humans have done and would have deserved protection, and the entire time you thought you were protecting a human, someone who is capable of feeling real, actual pain and you were doing your best to protect against that. It just seemed to make the entire drive of Kara's story useless, and it was such an obvious twist I really didn't expect it to be in the game. Yet again, I was fooled by Cage. The entire reason we don't know that Alice is an android? Kara was in denial. Though there are points when you could easily figure it out, though apparently like Kara, I didn't want to believe it.
Kara's story is directly affected by Markus' actions if they choose to go the direct way to Canada. A peaceful demonstration will allow Kara, Luther, and Alice to make it into Canada by the mercy of the border guard, though the opposite is true if Markus' lead a violent protest. Kara can opt to sacrifice one of many people (or herself) in order to get across the border, and I find this byproduct of choices to be interesting and finally true that "your actions have consequences".  Alternatively, if Kara is captured, they are taken to an actual concentration camp where they are forced to strip naked and remove their skin, revealing their uniform android skin underneath. They are also forced to line up and can be shot and dumped in a landfill (or mass grave). Again, yes, an actual part of the game that has no connection to the real world, nope, not at all.
For the love of god, do not take the boat. I'm begging you. Sacrifice a Jerry, but do not take that damn boat.
With the main cast of characters covered, these are other grievances I have with the game.
Red Ice is a drug in the game made of usual drug ingredients but also with Thirium. Thirium is the "blue blood" or rather fluid that powers biocomponents, and it's found at three locations in the game, all in the homes of people who abused androids. I think there was a possible storyline that ended up being cut from the game for whatever possible reason. The issue is, it's there. It's in the world, you said it was made with Thirium, and now I'm curious. I want to know more. I wouldn't have cared if it were an extra scene you only got if you found every piece of Red Ice in the game, or if it ended up getting expanded upon in a DLC, I just want and need closure for this drug that is apparently a huge deal. Hank has experience with the drug; it's what caused a surgeon to fuck up and be unable to save his son, and yet it's swept away as if it meant nothing. It wasn't integral to the story, as Hank could've easily said that a surgeon was too hopped up on coke to operate, but since it's made from android fluid, it opens the door to something new.  
Secondly, an issue arises from Eden Club. The sex androids, as Connor says, have their memories wiped every two hours. This is most likely akin to a total reset like they do at Cyberlife stores. The Traci androids there are in love, but that doesn’t make sense. If their memories are constantly reset, they shouldn’t remember one another. Kara was reset and had to deviate at the beginning of the story, and only retained her memory at Zlatko’s (possibly) if you have enough memory triggers. Now, if you’re telling me that the Traci androids got reset and continually remembered each other for God knows how long only to forget each other possibly an hour and fifteen minutes later all while servicing customers, you have one long super reach grabber. I’ve seen some people say it’s true love, but what it is in reality? Bad writing. It was either forgotten about or put in at the last minute, and it leaves a huge plot hole.
I'm not even going to get started on the entire “Bury-Your-Gays” that is a possibility with the Traci bots because it has been mentioned a thousand times over and as someone who identifies with LGBT, I am over it.
A delightful thing I learned about that scene is that the Traci androids are portrayed by Amelia Rose Dechart, Bryan Dechart’s wife. So Connor got his ass kicked by his soon to be wife, and his wife's lover, who is also his wife. What a wild ride.
The game suffers from a lot of cageisms that we’ve come to expect from any David Cage title, though this game lacks sexual assault and mystical hoodoo-voodoo, which we are all thankful for. Instead, it is replaced with racism and poor analogies at that. To be truthful, if Cage had admitted the game had racist undertones and actually wanted to address them, I would be more okay with the game than I am currently. But he did not, and will not admit that.  Though this review has been mostly negative, there are a few highlights from the game, essentially being: The game itself is beautiful. Visually, it is stunning and nothing less I would expect from a Cage game and it’s improved greatly since the days of Heavy Rain. Secondly, Bryan Dechart himself. It has been such a long time since I have seen an actor engage and be so actively happy with a fan base, and it warms my heart to see that, even if the game itself falls below sub-par.
In conclusion: Would I recommend the game? If you enjoy narrative stories and can ignore the massive amounts of life parallels, and stomach David Cage's work, then yes. Watching a Let’s Play or someone else do it is just as good, though. My overall thoughts and score for the game are:
5/10. The game is not terrible in every sense, but there are a lot of issues that could have been corrected. If Cage stopped for a moment and stopped treating video games like movies with choices, we might actually get something we can all enjoy.
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mechanicalinertia · 2 years
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STMPD Recommends His Own Bubblegum Crisis Fanfiction With Some Caveats
So! Part Two. This time, I tackle the first fanfiction I ever wrote - a continuation of Vigilante's Run.
It wasn't badly written at all, you see. Quite good, in fact. I was bamboozled by the slickness and chaotic cyberpunk energy of my own prose, actually. Good stuff. I got calibers and projectile speeds wrong in a very Cyberpunk 2020 way, but oh well.
Why'd I stop writing it, then? Well, because it wasn't very popular, no one gave two shits about BGC fic wherever I posted it. Shit, even Song of Silverhand, a bet that CP2077 would cause an uptick in CP2020-ish fanfiction, was dead wrong, and that was well-written but lacked a coherent plot plan, refused to slow down before speeding up the way Run could. Either way Divine Patronage was popular, still is, and I really should just write another chapter of that.
Now, action scenes weren't always well thought-out, maybe the 'blocking' could have used some work, but I would be hard-pressed to call any of it bad. I was trying to reverse the usual fanfic cliche of the OC bamboozling the core characters - to make Nemesis need Sylia more than the other way around. I'm not sure if I ended up making scenes like that seem any less smarmy, though, so... yeah.
But what really stopped me was that I didn't know how to finish it. When stuck, my primary solution was to escalate conflict, bringing ever-heavier gear onto the streets of Megatokyo, Chinatown, ruined offshore platforms as the crime syndicates responded to the loss of materiel at the hands of Nemesis and the Sabers. I was never sure what the theme was, though, how to tie all these plot threads together, how to make them all mean something solid.
But I think I had a thematic thread that did keep me going, and if I were to restart writing that, I'd need to double down on that part specifically. The thread being, of course, that Nemesis is no hero, not even an anti-hero. The crime syndicates aren't either, but the idea was to strip away the glamor of being like him - a Tom-Clancy elite operative, returned to the mean streets of the ostensibly civilized world to wreak Special Forces violence upon the ethnic-ish scum who infest 'his' city. Reed tried to make it seem like he was doing it because 'it was right', because no one else would, but he calls the criminals 'jackals' in the same breath as he says that the police and government being 'bound by laws' makes them impossible to stop by normal means. (Hey, plenty of laws allow for vigilantism! Stand Your Ground Laws? The citizen's arrest laws we saw in play with Ahmad Aubrey's killers, which started to empower vigilante slave-catchers? And I wouldn't argue they've been used in service of justice, like, ever.)
So: No. Nemesis solves violent problems through violence. In so doing - in prompting other syndicates to call in outside help in hopes of getting a share of the power pie - he makes things worse. And he can't stop - won't stop. It was never about the ends, but about the means, about expressing his vision of violent justice in his particularly American way, the way we Americans think Good Guys with Guns are the only things worth having in a state, and nothing else.
It would have to have a downer ending, then, wouldn't it? One where GENOM may not necessarily profit, but one where the state of the city goes to the shitter really, really fast as the Hou Bang and the other syndicates fight over the city. I'm sure Reed wanted his sole Virtuous Gangster, Skeeter Karns, to take the place of the Sleeping Dragon, but I don't buy that it would go that way for a second. Karns is big, he ain't Hou Bang big. He could broker a peace, but probably only after tens of thousands were dead and the ADP corporatized and empowered after that - the cops as just another overmilitarized faction in the power struggle. And all the while Nemesis seems to be unable to process that he's making things worse, because he's so up his own ass - still smarting from the South American coup he was supposed to win, but lost - that he refuses to admit defeat, or to try alternative tactics. Would this lead to a showdown between Nemesis and the Sabers? Yeah. Maybe. Maybe not?
Which is all well and good but god damn if I don't especially want to figure out how to make all this shit work. Order - chapter by chapter - was my problem. I could let stuff like the ADP plotline fall by the wayside, but that wouldn't solve the problem of 'how to get to the assault on Sato's mansion' and then 'what the fuck comes after that'. And I just tried to write some more a few days ago, and I had such difficulty doing it, because I have all these emotions and regrets swirling around this work.
I encourage you to still read it, all the same. It's worth reading, especially the part where I was convinced the US was going to invade Venezuela around 2019 (see if you can deduce which part!). Trump was... he was a thing that influenced writing this fic. Or at least his brand of politics was.
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