#like you may get more prospects or opportunities but that doesn’t guarantee you anything

[shishiikura]

The internet is full of convoluted dating advice about all the hoops to jump through and requirements to meet in order to be eligible for love and like so much of it is crap cuz people are not willing to admit that it’s mostly luck lmao

#it’s not about being perfect or perfectly healed or conventionally hot #like you may get more prospects or opportunities but that doesn’t guarantee you anything #like it’s not about good enough not good enough it’s right place right time right person #and ppl do not want to admit that!! they want it so badly to be within their control #cuz putting in so much effort for possibly nothing is a hard pill to swallow #we want ppl to beat themselves up over whatever they feel makes them unworthy when it’s NOT ABOUT THAT #so don’t fall for it #liv rants

[khajamdraihan]

How You Can Get a Government Tender License as a Highway Contractor

In Bangladesh, it is very important to interact with the public sector when you need to propose a highway contract. You must guarantee that everything is ideal. Although it can seem complicated at first. However, in this article, we will break it down into easy steps and provide our best bidding advice for all tender notices.

Guidelines for Tender Highway Contracts in Bangladesh

You should select just the bids where you have a decent probability of winning. The tendering procedure requires time. You should spend time seeking the “best fits” rather than spending time bidding on projects you won’t win and making them all available online.

A tender must be handled by a team that includes important people, administrators, and management personnel, and consider employing external “assets” like consultants. Moreover, you should take the buyer’s needs into account. That is the key to a winning presentation.

Verifying that the contract opportunity is appropriate for your organization is vital. Also, assess if you are qualified before deciding to make a bid by posing the following queries to yourself:

You have to see if the contract is available. Also, you have to know if you can provide evidence of your delivery.

If it’s a strategic match for your company.

If your chances of success are good or not. Try to determine who your possible top rivals are and how you stack up.

Lastly, if you see yourself satisfying all minimum requirements and assessment standards. If not, you run the danger of failing the initial assessment.

Before writing a proposal, make a plan for your submission or simply copy and paste the essay from another tender. Each proposal will have time restrictions, but setting aside some time at the start of the tender process can help you understand the tender, prevent missing anything, and set clear goals and objectives. Therefore, for the bid to stay on track, set more reasonable timelines.

It’s not uncommon to hear phrases like “it’s a fix” or “don’t worry, the authority knows us and we will get this contract.”The tendering procedure for a contract must be fair and open, even though you could be friends with the contracting body.

Your judgment will be based purely on the tender you provide, not on any past relationships or assurances that everything will be well. You may lose the contract to the business that won the tender with a better score than you did. Similarly, just because you are new to a certain authority doesn’t guarantee that you won’t get the job.

To submit any tender bid, make sure you have a plan in place, are aware of the dates for contract expiration and renewal, and have the team or resources required.

Before submitting your proposal, try to assess it and ensure its quality wherever possible. Keep looking for opportunities to submit your next offer if your initial tender submission was rejected.

if the reviews are not mentioning you or provide you with any constructive criticism. Then, you must ensure that the information you have provided is entirely unconnected to the subject at hand. You must thus make sure that your remarks are always relevant, succinct, and free of long tales if you want to attract attention. Also, keep the information brief and make compelling arguments. If you want to leave a favorable impression and increase your chances of winning bids.

An answer that is too brief or superficial may prevent you from taking advantage of prime bid-winning prospects. Along with that, the descriptions and proposals must be comprehensive to be taken seriously. Convince the tender reviewers of the specifics of the items they are acquiring. Also, make sure the reviewers are well aware of the product they are purchasing.

To increase your chances of being hired, it might be tempting to make several bids for projects. By creating a tender evaluation process, a business may more clearly identify the tenders. This will help to successfully and efficiently deliver.

Registration and licensing procedure

The construction industry has contributed recently to the increase in the GDP of Bangladesh. This encouraged investment in this industry from both domestic and international firms. Investors that are interested in starting a business in this area must first elect to establish an entity. They can choose to form a partnership, sole proprietorship, branch office, or private limited company as a legal organization.

The process of forming a corporation begins with obtaining the Name Clearance certificate from the Company House, Registrar of Joint Stock and Companies (RJSC), as well as the creation of the Company’s Articles and Memorandum of Association, Form XII (Director’s Particulars), and Form IX (Director’s Consent), all of which must be completed by the shareholders. The essential paperwork indicated above, the signed MOA and AOA, and the necessary payments must be presented to the RJSC.

Executing a partnership deed between the partners and registering the partnership with the Registrar of Joint Stock Companies and Firms are two ways to start a partnership firm (RJSC).

No partners are involved in the establishment of this kind of company. A trade license, a personal TIN, and a VAT certificate are required to do business through such an organization, which can only be created by a citizen of Bangladesh.

Before and after establishing a corporation, branch office, single proprietorship, or partnership in Bangladesh, legal assistance is necessary. When establishing a business, branch office, sole proprietorship, or partnership, all original, signed papers and pertinent paperwork must be presented to the appropriate government agency. Otherwise, there is little doubt that the application will be denied.

Infrastructure Construction by Individuals/Companies and Public Sector Infrastructure Compliances are fundamentally dissimilar from one another. Infrastructure projects involving the construction of buildings and housing necessitate the execution of a construction contract with the landowner and the construction owner outlining the terms and conditions of the agreement under the Contract Act 1872, including the time limit within which the construction will be completed, the handover date of the property, termination clause, etc. Adherence to the Bangladesh National Building Code (BNBC) 2006 is required for the constructor.

Regardless of nationality, every worker hired by the construction company must have an appointment letter signed by the business.

Read Also: How To Start a Tendering Business

Conclusion

In conclusion, bidding for a highway contract in Bangladesh might seem like a difficult procedure. If you comprehend the tendering procedure and use our advice, your chances of success will rise. To get the most out of our advice, you must carefully consider it.

This article originally published at techcrams.com

#bdtender #tendering #etender

[fuller18omar]

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#GEARS TACTICS

[starlightrows]

Something Sweet

Chapter 0 - Chasing Dreams

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Series Masterlist

Pairing: Modern!Paz Vizsla x fem!reader

Word Count: 3.4K

Warnings: angst, symptoms of depression (not graphic or diagnosed), brief mention of alcohol and drug use, hopeful ending

Summary: Paz finds himself trapped in a routine that’s keeping him tied to a lifestyle that brings him no joy. It’s not until a phone call from his good friend Din, that he realizes that there are better things waiting just over the horizon if you can just be brave enough to make the leap of faith

This chapter is labeled chapter 0, because it takes places before the events of the actual story and does not include the reader. If you’re only here for the couply-goodness, feel free to skip this chapter and sit tight the romance is coming I promise!

Chapter 0 - Chasing Dreams is dedicated to @maybege who inspires me to chase my fan fiction dreams every single day, and is single handedly responsible for my love, yearning, and obsession with the Big Blue Mando Man we all know and love as Paz Vizsla! This is one is for you May ❤️

The 5am train is full of commuters, heading into work with coffee cups in hand and more or less rested ready to start the day. Everyone seems to be on the same page, consume enough caffeine to be personable by the time you get to the office, use the time on the train to do your hair or makeup or start a little early on emails from your phone if you’re behind. It’s all very hustle and bustle, keep your head down and keep grinding to make it in the big city.

Paz rode the 5am train every morning. But not heading into the city. No, he got on the train at 5am and rode it all the way down to the end of the line to get back to his dumpy little shoebox of an apartment on the outskirts of the city around 8am.

Why he chose to move to the city after getting out of the Marine Corps was beyond him. His commander told him that he had a friend that was looking to hire some muscle as private security for his upper echelon nightclubs and it could be a good job opportunity for him fresh out of the service. Not having anywhere else to go, he took the job. Now his days blurred together in a lopsided haze. Wake up around 3pm, eat something cheap and tasteless, work out, shower and get dressed to work. Catch the 6pm train into the city and spend all three hours thinking about far away places. What his life might be like if he was someone else or somewhere else. Get to the club and start work at 9pm. Spend the night watching people dance and sing and scream, drink ridiculously expensive alcohol and take brightly colored party drugs that blow out their pupils and make them want to dance and sing more. By the time 5am rolls around again his head is pounding from listening to electronic dance music for 8 continuous hours, and he spends the remaining 3 hours of his day riding the train back out of the city and wishing he had made different choices in his life.

Of course he does get Monday’s and Tuesday’s off, those days he still doesn’t really know what to do with himself. It’s too expensive to have a car in the city, so he can’t drive anywhere. And he’s too far away from any of the attractions of the city to walk to them. So he tends to spend his off days either walking around the track at the local park, or in his tiny kitchen kneading bread dough and baking test batches until it comes out the way he liked it. This is one of the big things he spends his time wondering about. If he kept up working in private security, and paying for this shit apartment, would he someday be able to afford to move closer to work and spend less time commuting? Maybe he could eventually save up and get a place with a bigger kitchen so he could try making more things. He liked baking. Kneading bread dough, making cake batter, mixing frosting colors. It’s telling that a man like him dreamt about pastries and cooking every night, and spent his long commuting hours debating on saving up more for a better place or spending a little extra on culinary equipment.

He didn’t tell anybody this is how he spent his time and money, not that he really talked to anyone these days anyway. Since leaving the service he hasn’t been good about keeping up with his brothers in arms, or his friends from before getting deployed. He hasn’t really made new friends in the city either. It’s not that he doesn’t want to talk to any of them, he’s just busy and when he does think about reaching out to someone, he always figures they’re busy too. Every day the sun rises and sets, and it’s like he’s just floating through life, waiting for something to change.

One Monday, Paz is walking around the track at the local park. It’s scraggly and not well maintained but at least it’s outdoors. He’s thinking about the sourdough loaf back in his apartment rising right now. Hopefully this one will turn out good, he’s planning to try a dutch oven bake soon, but that requires buying a dutch oven and he’s trying so hard to save up for a better apartment. His phone vibrates in his pocket, and he considers just letting it go to voicemail figuring it was probably his boss asking him to come in and work tonight. But something in him tells him to look, the name on the screen surprises him. Din Djarin. His long time friend from way back before joining the service. Paz answered the phone.

“Hey buddy, Happy Birthday!” Din says. Paz stopped walking

“It’s not my birthday?” Paz stepped off to the side of the track and sat down on a bench running a hand over his face.

Din laughs on the other end of the line, “Yeah it is, April 30th right?”

Paz pulls his phone away from his face and checks the date, “Holy shit, it is my birthday,”

“Yeah man. Did you really forget?” Din asks, he sounds like he’s moving around Paz hopes he’s not bothering him or getting in the way of his day right now.

“Honestly yeah, it feels like April just started,” he admits

“Been busy then? Running around in the big city, making big money, romancing cute hunnies?” Din teases, Paz can hear another voice on the other side. He figure’s it’s Din’s son, he’s gotta be about two or three years old now.

“Yeah, something like that,” Paz mumbles

“Yeah? Then why don’t you sound happy about it?” Din asks, sensing his friends lack of enthusiasm

“It’s fine, really. The city is nice, I just wish I could actually live in it and enjoy it. Actually I wish everyone who lived here actually enjoyed it. Kinda just feels like everyone who lives here only knows how to work or be a strung out party goer,” Paz sighs

“Guess the big city life isn’t all it's cracked up to be huh,” Din says “Listen… you should come out to visit sometime. I feel like this city is more your style. We’re still a major city with nice attractions and events, but there’s more community here and things are a little slower ya know,”

“I can’t just drop everything and go all the way out there. You live over 2000 miles away,” Paz says, though the prospect of a smaller city with a community atmosphere does sound awfully appealing

“Paz, you’ve been working for a private security company for two years and I can almost guarantee that you haven’t taken a single hour of paid time off or sick leave. Flights are a little pricey, I’ll give you that, but you can stay with me so you don’t have to pay for a hotel or anything,” Din offers “I’ll pay for your half of your flight, call it a birthday present,”

“I’ll tell you what Din, I’ll think about it. You’re probably right, I do need to get out of the city for a bit. I’ll talk to the boss about taking some time off,” Paz says, standing back up.

“That’s the spirit!” Din exclaims “Call me when you figure out a time that’s good for you so we can book you a flight,”

Paz and Din chat idly for another couple of minutes before Din bids him goodbye, and happy birthday. Paz tucks his phone back into his pocket and smiles. For the first time in a very long time, he’s actually looking forward to something.

----

Two weeks later Paz is sitting on a plane for the first time since coming back to the states after deployment, with two weeks off of paid vacation time on his way to visit Din. It’s a long six and half hour flight and the seat is pretty small for how wide his frame is, but he’s hopeful. If nothing else, he was going to get to spend two weeks with his best friend.

Din is waiting for him at the airport when his flight arrives. He greets him with a bracing hug and the promise of a really good dinner waiting for him. The moment Paz steps out of the airport he knows he’s in trouble. Instead of a massive industrial looking city full of high rise buildings with thousands of people pushing their way through to get on with their day, he’s met with bright blue skies. Trees that are just starting to put out new leaves and flowers for spring. The air is fresh and clear. A feeling wells up in his chest, when he turns and can see mountains in the distance. It’s beautiful.

“You coming?” Din draws him out of his thoughts, tossing his suitcase in the back of his truck.

“Yeah, I just didn’t realize you lived so close to the mountains,” Paz admitted stepping up into the passenger seat.

“Everyone says that when they first come here. You should see them in winter when they’re covered in snow,” Din says. Paz can imagine it, but he hopes to see it with his own eyes.

Din drives through the city, it’s a lot like the city Paz had just come from, except older and less flashy. Less people, and less cars. All of the businesses looked unique and inviting.

Din passes a street and points down it without looking, “My studio is right down there. It’s a great little spot. All the business owners on the block are close, we play poker and shoot pool on Tuesday nights at the bar on the corner. You’re definitely coming with me for that this week,”

“I could shoot some pool,” Paz laughs.

Din turns out of the downtown area, and takes a main boulevard lined with fast food restaurants and dive bars. Din points again, “That’s the stadium for the university. Hope you like football, because it’s kind of a big thing here,”

“Still think I could have pulled a scholarship for football straight out of high school if I wasn’t so dead set on going into the Marine Corps,” Paz jokes

“It’s just as well,” Din shrugs with a smile “you make one hell of a Marine,”

Din turns down another road off the main drag. They pass parks, an elementary school, neighborhoods, and a lone Dairy Queen before turning into another neighborhood full of very nice houses with front lawns and trees giving off pink and white flower buds.

Din pulls the truck up into one of the driveways, and cuts the engine. Paz gets out of the truck and takes in the house. It’s massive by his standards.

“Is your girlfriend a CEO or something?” Paz asks with a laugh. Din gives him a look, and goes to take the suitcase out of the back.

“No? She and her brothers flip houses together,” he replies “why do you ask?”

“Your place is huge, man! When I was a kid these are the kind of houses I thought millionaires lived in,” Paz follows Din towards the front door.

Din laughs, as he unlocks the door. “Maybe in other states, but not here. The million dollar houses here are the size of castles. This house is pretty average for this area, and it didn’t cost us an arm and a leg to get,”

Paz nods and follows his friend into the house. It’s not just a house, it’s a home. Paz can tell because even though it’s clean on the inside it looks lived in, well loved. Pictures and art on the walls. The living room had a big tv and sectional couch, perfect for hosting game day events and watch parties. He could see a chest in the corner that clearly had toys in it. The kitchen was huge! A double doored refrigerator, cabinet space and marble countertops. He can see through a sliding glass door there’s a backyard, a play structure and home swing set sat in the middle of it for Din’s little boy. He didn’t have any pets but he could picture a dog running around out there too.

This is it. This is what he’d spent the last two years dreaming about on the train rides to and from the city. This is his far away place. He’s been here for less than half an hour and he already knows, he is meant to be here.

The next two weeks are the happiest Paz has ever felt. Exploring the downtown area, visiting the parks and the nature reserve just outside of town, the restaurants serve great food that doesn’t cost a fortune. He takes Din’s little boy to the zoo and out for ice cream. He gets to know Din’s girlfriend and her two brothers, apparently flipping houses in some of the older more run down parts of town is very rewarding and breathes new life into the city. He visits Din’s tattoo studio, and goes with him to the bar on Tuesday night like he promised.

Everyone there is friendly, welcoming and adamantly against him leaving at the end of the week.

“You sure you have to go back, you’re part of the crew man!” says Cara, she owns the boxing studio down the street.

Paz took a swing from his beer, and laughed “You think I want to go back there? I gotta figure out how to get out of my lease, quit my job. I gotta find somewhere to live and work here first,”

“If you’re looking for a job just to get on your feet, I could use another bartender,” Boba, the guy who owns the bar says “Fennec is looking to move to part time too, more time slots available for work,”

“If you’re serious, I’ll take you up on that offer,” Paz says.

Boba extends a hand to him, “Job’s yours if you want it,” Paz grins and shakes his hand.

A few days later Paz is genuinely sad about having to hug Din’s little boy goodbye, and get back on the plane to take him back across the country. Back to the city that never sleeps, and doesn’t appreciate the little things in life. Back to the six hours round trip of commuting. Back to the scraggly uncared for parks and dirty streets. He promised himself on that plane ride, he would not get caught up in the monotony and blinding routine like before. There is a better life waiting for him. All he has to do is make the leap of faith and take it.

———

He holds himself to his promise. In the first week when he got back he spent the entire three hour train ride to work researching apartments in the area he wanted to live. He was shocked to find out the exact same price he was paying for his shoebox apartment with no amenities and terrible maintenance; could get him a huge apartment with a big kitchen, access to a pool, gym, and shared entertainment space. It even came with a parking spot. And there were other options that were almost as nice for less money. And to think he had wasted so much time and money pretending he was happy, or was getting close to being able to afford to be happy living in the bigger city. What a joke.

He had Din submit an application to an apartment complex he really liked about a week after he got back. The second he found out he was approved and got the apartment, he put in his two weeks notice and started packing. Another six hours plane trip didn’t sound very appealing but, at least it was a one way trip this time.

Paz found moving out of his apartment to be exceptionally easy. He threw all of his belongings into two suitcases, and shipped the few things that wouldn’t fit in a box he could pick up at the post office when he got there. Everything else was not worth saving, so he put everything out on the side of the road in front of his old apartment with a piece of paper taped to it that read: FREE!

Unfortunately moving into the new apartment in the new city was a little more challenging. Furnishing an apartment from scratch is no small task. But to his amazement and truly heartfelt joy, all of Din’s friends he had met when he came to visit helped him move things into his new place. Boba even loaned him his truck to go pick up bigger furniture like the couch and bed frame he ordered. Cara and Peli, the woman who owned the auto parts store on the next block over from Din’s studio and Boba’s bar, sat with him for hours assembling IKEA furniture. Din’s girlfriend even came by with Din’s little boy, to visit uncle Paz and help him figure out how to appropriately decorate and furnish a “real apartment”.

He loves his new life in this new city. Working for Boba at the bar in the evenings is pretty low stress, and he makes quite a bit in tips. During the day he’s been working on sourdough starters, determining the best herbs and flavors to top focaccia bread, trying his hand at doing French baguettes. And more recently, he’s been trying to make chocolate croissants from scratch. Though he hasn’t had much success yet. But he keeps trying.

Every time something comes out perfect, he writes down every step in a blue notebook he found lying around with his things before he moved.

Paz never imagined his life turning out like this. If he was told just 3 months ago he would be moving across the country on a whim, to chase his dream of living a simpler life, he wouldn’t have believed it. And then things got even better.

About six months after moving, Paz really felt like he was home in this city. He split his time between working part time as an instructor at Cara’s boxing studio, bartending for Boba, and working on his culinary hobby. Until one day, the older couple that owned the bagel shop a few doors down from Din’s tattoo studio closed up shop. Apparently they were retiring, packing up the business and moving out of state to be closer to their grandchildren.

There was a sign on the vacant building indicating the unit was about to become available. A thought crossed his mind…. he had no idea where it came from or if he was remotely qualified to pull it off… but it couldn’t hurt to ask.

“Does anyone have a contact number for the couple that owned the bagel shop?” Paz asks the group

“Yeah,” Cara pipes up “I house sat for them once. Why?”

“I want to buy their industrial baking equipment, and takeover their lease,” he replies seriously

“You want to run the bagel shop?” Fennec asks

“No�� I uh, I wanna open a bakery,” Paz admits

“You do make a mean sourdough dude…. I say go for it,” Din encourages him

“I’m sure they’ll sell you the equipment at a discount. Hell they might even leave it to you for free if you tell them what you’re gonna do with it,” Cara tells him, she writes down a phone number on a napkin and hands it to Paz. He pockets the napkin with a thank you and a nod.

The next day he calls the number, and has a lovely chat with the wife who, as Cara pointed out, was eager to get the equipment off their hands. She also provided a ton of helpful information on running a small business in this area, who trustworthy suppliers were, a good lawyer to get all the paperwork done, a good accountant to file taxes next spring, and more. Honestly it was a lot more than Paz has even considered, but something in his heart was telling him it’s the right decision. That this is a challenge he absolutely had to tackle. That maybe this has always been his calling.

And right he was. Vizsla’s Bakery had a grand debut the following autumn. And he knew, this is it. He’s finally made it. All of the time he spent in the Marines fighting in wars he never truly understood, all of his years spent working a mindless job in a depressing city, pretending he was not struggling. All of it has led him here. To a city he loves, with friends so close to him they’re like family, a home… a real home. And a dream he can finally live out.

Tag List: @maybege

#Star Wars #The Mandalorian #Paz Vizsla #Paz Vizsla x reader #Paz Viszla #Paz Viszla x reader #Pastry Chef!Paz AU #Pastry Chef!Paz #Modern!AU #Modern!Paz Vizsla

[petri808]

And That’s How We Became a Legend...

Bakudeku alpha/omega fantasy AU written on Twitter based on this idea: I plan to clean it up and post it on AO3 later :)

Think of the story as an origin to the Bridegroom’s Oak.

The old alpha worn with time sat his grandpup on his knee. “Shall I tell you a bedtime story?”

“Yes!” The green-eyed child beamed brightly.

“Very well. Once upon a time...”

In his tiny village, Izuku Midoriya was just born to be unlucky in love. As a tiny male omega he was at the bottom of the marriage pool because alphas preferred buxom stock with firm child bearing hips, as they called it, so a skinny choice like him would never get chosen. He wasn’t ugly... many even called him cute with his curly green hair and bright emerald eyes. But cute didn’t guarantee a brood. Izuku was more fated to be a lonely servant or a whelping docent for another family. His poor mother could only look on in sadness at her sons pain.

So, by the time he’d reached adulthood, Izuku stayed mostly to himself on their small farm. Tending the crops his mother would sell to support them. During heat cycles, the lowly omega locked himself away and made due through the tears and desire he alone could soothe.

There was one thing he could do to bring himself some happiness. With little to no friends, the forest became his second refuge. When chores were completed, Izuku would wander the dense woodlands surrounding the village, or trek the nearby mountain and its hidden waterfall. He loved the peace and quiet even the remote and darkest areas because it wasn’t any worse than the loneliness he felt in his own home. There was always a chance of running into a wolf or other animal, but so far they stayed clear. Perhaps even predators thought he wasn’t worthy a kill or pitied the omega. Some say animals can sense such sullen energies. That’s okay, at least he could commune with his thoughts in these woods to the sounds of birds chirping or bullfrogs croaking.

Of all the areas he’d roamed, there was one particular tree he loved. An old oak tree, twisted and worn who’s trunk was so large Izuku couldn’t wrap his arms around it. The top branches melded with the canopy high above his head, and during spring and summer it’s leaves sheltered all that rested beneath it. He spent many a day resting at its base.

In its trunk was a deep hollow, weathered by time and the creatures that once created it. Perhaps a squirrel or woodpecker, who knew but the gods who watched over these forests. For Izuku, this hollow became a treasure chest where he could write about anything and hide away those words in a journal that only he would read. He poured his heart out into that notebook. All his pains and anguish, of forlornly outlooks, and heartaches desiring but one thing in this world... a family of his own. The omega in him wept to fulfill its purpose.

This journal allowed him to bury his sadness so when he went home he could put on a brave face for his mother. ‘I’ll be okay,’ Izuku would smile brightly at the woman. ‘I have you’ and I have my forest... fear of making her sad was the only thing keeping Izuku going.

Then one day in his eighteenth Spring, Izuku ventured out to his tree as he often would to vent. This season always left him saddened for it represented new beginnings and new life, something he believed he would never experience. But once he reached the tree, he immediately noticed something amiss. Izuku always tightly wrapped his journal in a thick bear skin to keep the weather from reaching it, and made sure it was pushed as far into the hollow too. But not only was it too close to the edge, the wrapping was messy as if re-bound hastily.

Izuku growled. People were so irritating! His refuge was violated and it left him feeling vulnerable. Now he would need to find a new hiding place! He pulled the journal out and inspected it to see if anything else was wrong with it. It better not be damaged! But his eyes zero in on a ripped piece of parchment that was folded and tucked into the first page of the notebook. The intruder had left him a note?! Why?! He unfolded it, eyes widening, and moisture gathering as he read the poorly written words someone had left behind.

‘Damn runt you sound like a mess, what the fuck happened after I left? If this is who I think it is and based on the simpering rambles and scent I think I’m right, be here at high noon each day so I can find you.’

The letter lowered in Izuku’s hand as he processed its contents. Who was this mystery person and why did they want to find him again? They seemed to know who he was just based off his words. He had vague memories of a possibility, but after all these years had chalked it up to an imaginary friend for a lonely three year-old. Plus it made little sense since a three year-old couldn’t write, so how would this stranger know he tended to talk a lot or ramble?! His brows furrowed, or it could be a trap. Slavers were not unknown in these parts, which was why only alphas tended to roam the woods or hunted. But Izuku wouldn’t make for a great prize either. This was certainly intriguing to say the least. The prospect of someone wanting him too good an opportunity to pass up. Though he was no fool.

The next day, Izuku trekked early to the tree and hid away in the brush. He wanted to see just who this stranger was, but if it was someone he didn’t recognize, he’d slip away again. As he waited, he wrote in his journal, chronicling the whole situation. His emotions, how the pangs of loneliness and longing for love fueled his curiosity as well as anxieties to sit there and unravel the mystery.

He hears the cracking of fallen branch litter and sure enough a form rounds the tree. Izuku’s heartbeat paused in recognition of the platinum blonde hair, and once the man turned to where he could see ruby red eyes glaring, he knew exactly who it was. His imaginary friend! But this was no child’s fantasy, for the virile male standing beside the tree was as real as the blood in Izuku’s veins flowing south.

“Come out,” the man commanded. “I can smell you.”

Izuku stepped out with the journal clutched to his chest and walked slowly towards the alpha.

“By the gods, you’re still as tiny as I remember,” the male snickered. “Do you even remember me?”

“I thought I’d made you up,” Izuku stammered.

The man came closer, grabbing the omega by the chin. “Oh, I’m very real.”

Izuku swallowed thickly, “what do you want from me?”

“What was promised,” the alpha responded. “You may be weak, but your scent was the only thing that calmed me as a child, so our mothers arranged for our betrothal at your 18th yr.”

Though a true statement, being called weak still upset Izuku. He pulled his face away from the alphas grip. “You need not pity me. I release you to choose a more suitable dame if you feel I am too weak.” Never mind the fact his mother has never mentioned him being betrothed!

“Tch! I don’t want another and your writings speak of family desire. What fool would refuse my offer to give them what they long for?!”

The tears well up in Izuku’s eyes. “I don’t even know your name.” And so many more questions ripple through his mind. Why hadn’t his mother said anything? Why had this man disappeared all this time? How did he even find him here?! Because this tree wasn’t even close to the village.

“You called me Kacchan cause you couldn’t say my name back then. But my family name is Bakugou.”

Izuku shook his head with all his thoughts and confusion. “Still, why wasn’t I told?!” He looked dead straight at the man, “and why’d you leave the village in the first place?!”

“Tch, fool, like I had a choice! I was five! This village is small so my parents moved to a bigger township with better opportunities.”

“But you could have kept in touch...” Tears now fall freely. “All my life I was so lonely. If I’d known you existed I would’ve had hope!”

“Look, I can’t help—“

“Don’t!” The omega roared cutting the alpha off. “So many nights I thought of ending my misery. How would you feel if you’d come back to find me dead?!”

The alpha snarled. “I can’t fucking change the past! Screwed up or not, at least I’m here now!”

But when the omega flinched and a flurry of fearful pheromones hit the alphas nose he stopped and took a deep inhale to calm himself. “Izuku, I’m here now, that’s all I can do to start things over. So, will you accept my proposal or not?”

Izuku hung his head, how could he say no?

To say no would mean throwing away the best chance he’s had for the life he’s craved. An opportunity to have a family, a sire for the pups he desired to bear. This alpha was a perfect specimen, and Izuku would be a fool to turn him down. But all his life, he’d only known disappointment. What if this turned out to be too good to be true? This alpha would take him away from all he’d known, granted he wasn’t happy there, but what of his mother? As a widower she had no one to care for her in old age. What if he couldn’t bear pups? Would this alpha cast him away for another? To go from loneliness to heartbreak? Which would be worse? And on top of that, he doesn’t know this man, or at least doesn’t remember much. The memories are vague, children playing, maybe some bullying, that’s all. He didn’t hate nor love him... yet.

But he could grow to love this alpha.

This Kacchan has a wondrous scent of spice and power brimming from within. He’ll produce fine pups for sure.

“Are you really sure you want me?” Izuku’s voice was meek and full of hesitation. “Nobody else has ever wanted me before.”

The alpha sighed. “Nobody makes me do what I don’t want to. I’m here by choice.”

“But look at me.” Izuku gestured at his body. “People say I won’t be able to carry a litter, I’m too small. You even called me weak. Why take a chance on me when surely you could find better?”

“Pfft, ignore these foolish villagers. In the larger cities I have seen many just like you do perfectly fine. Have produced perfect broods. These small-minded fools know not about such things and only believe in superstition. Give your answer now for I grow tired of this banter.”

After a brief pause, Izuku decided to accept his fate, whatever that may be. The alpha wanted him and only him. If in the end it doesn’t work out, at least he got to experience what he’d longed for, and that was better than never having to at all.

“Okay Kacchan. I accept.”

“Good. Then we shall pack up your things and travel to my home post haste. I’ve arranged for a horse and cart to transport everything, so you won’t need to return.”

“What of my mother? I-I cannot leave her alone.”

“She’ll come with us as a docent. You’ll need help to raise our pups.”

True to his word, the alpha took the Midoriya’s back to a sprawling estate located a four days journey away. The Bakugou clan had done well for itself in the fifteen years since they’d left the tiny remote village. On the property, the alphas parents lived in one home, a second was built for the young couple, while Izuku’s mother had a smaller one next to theirs. There was a farm and ranching enterprise along with trade that Bakugou senior engaged in to grow their wealth.

“Wow...” Izuku’s eyes lit up as he walked in. “It’s so much bigger than back home.”

Through the long journey, Izuku caught up on many of the questions that plagued him, such as how his mother thought when the Bakugou’s left the arrangement had been canceled, so that’s why she never mentioned it. But the alpha he knew now as Katsuki had never forgotten about him.

A beautiful nest had already been prepared and scented for the omega. It would need to wait until their formal ceremony took place the following day, but Izuku was just excited this was taking place. All the pain of the last fifteen years dissolved away in that moment. He turned to his alpha with tears streaming down his face and his scent filling the air of lavender wildflowers. It’s been so long since Izuku released a happy scent, even he’d forgotten what it was like. His eyes twinkled, crinkled in delight. “It’s so beautiful Kacchan, like in a fairytale.”

The alphas eyes roll back as he purred from his omegas pheromones filling their new home. He pulled Izuku to his broad chest. “That’s the scent I remember. The scent I loved as a child. How could anyone not snatch you up just for that?”

“Maybe because no one else has smelled it?”

Such a statement makes the alpha growl low from happiness, his chest rumbling with content. “Good.” He tipped Izuku’s chin up, red eyes boring down as he swept away tears. This scent belonged to him alone. “It’s all I wanna smell from now on. No more sadness or fear, understood?”

Izuku nodded his head as he smile grew. “Yes, my alpha.”

Katsuki placed a long, lingering kiss on the omegas lips that made Izuku’s heartbeat soar. For such a large male, the alpha was gentle with him. He knew the man had a fiery side, but Katsuki also knew how to love....

As autumn leaves made an entrance, tiny cries broke the air as two newborn pups came into their world. The pregnancy had been a bit difficult for the tiny omega, but with the support of his mate and family, Izuku accomplished everything he’d been told would never come to pass.

“Kacchan...” the omega, flushed with exhaustion, but beamed with pride, and shed tears of joy as he rested his head against his alpha’s supportive hand.

“See, I told you those villagers were fools.” Katsuki smiled, while lovingly soothing his omega. “You gave me two beautiful pups.”

“I love you Kacchan...”

“And they lived happily ever after,” the old alpha stated. “The end.”

“But grandpa, that’s nothing like the stories.”

“What do you mean?”

“Izuku didn’t leave a letter in the tree, a-and he knew Katsuki as a kid.”

“Well, you see over many, many Springs the true story was lost and all that remained is the story of an alpha finding an omegas sad love letter. People thought if that omega could get lucky, maybe I can too and began leaving letters in the tree. Today, the tradition continues.”

“Then how do you know the true story?”

“Izuku had green eyes right?”

“Yeah, like me!”

“Because he’s your great, great, great grandpa.”

#bakudeku #bakudeku fan fic #bakudeku fan fiction #bkdk #katsudeku #ktdk #angst with happy ending #bakugou katsuki #midoriya izuku #alpha/omega

[zodiactalks]

These Zodiac Signs will be FIRST to GET UP and DANCE

Nothing beats going out with your friends and dancing all night, right? Well, some people compare this experience to real torture! As their shy character won't let them enjoy this type of activity.

However, others have a more inhibited spirit and don't care what others think as long as they have a good time!

Do you think you are one of them? Read on and find out which Signs are the first to get up and dance at a party!

#1. Sagittarius

When we talk about partying, we talk about Sagittarius! There's no one like them to spark a crowd, especially if it involves a celebration. They LOVE to dance, and they can easily rock the night away.

Embarrassed? That word is not written in Sagittarius' dictionary. They will move their whole body to the music, without shame or fear of criticism from the people around them. Now that's an example to follow!

#2. Leo

You can guarantee that Leo will be the first person to get up and dance in front of a stage. They love the exposure and this is an ideal opportunity to have all eyes on them. Plus, they know all kinds of dances and choreographies that they can't wait to show off to others! The more people are watching them, the faster they will start grooving to the music. Their uninhibited attitude is just something to admire.

#3. Aquarius

They may not be the most talented or sensual dancers, but Aquarians love to go out to parties and enjoy listening to music. Whatever kind it is! They have fun fooling around with their friends and have no hint of shame in their bodies. That's why they usually encourage others to take heart and let themselves be carried away by the music! The present moment is the only thing that matters and others can mind their own business.

#4. Aries

There is nothing Aries won't dare to do, as long as someone challenges them, of course. If they are facing some kind of dance competition, it doesn't matter if they don't know how to perform! They will be the first ones to get up and go for it. Aries wants to be the best, plus, they love to move their body and drain all that extra energy that keeps them awake at night. What others may think about them is the least of their worries! In a few minutes, they'll forget all about it.

#5. Gemini

Gemini is sociable, multifaceted, and can't sit still. It is the perfect combination of people who like to dance all night long! From the time the sun goes down until it reappears on the horizon.

Thus, they are not only the first ones to get up and dance but also the last ones to do it! They love parties, noise, smoke, people, and anything that involves getting out of the house and having a good time.

#6. Libra

Libra knows how to attract the gaze of the people around them. They will be the first to get up and dance if they have their sights set on a prospective lover. They will bring out all their seduction guns on the dance floor, and they are very good at it! They don't just move their body in any old way, but know about rhythm and aesthetics, earning the admiration of others.

#Aquarius #Aries #Cancer #Capricorn #leo #libra #Gemini #virgo #scorpio #taurus #Pisces #Sagittarius #Zodiac Talks #Zodiac #Zodiac Signs

[heartsofbeskar]

from the ashes

chapter 7 | read on AO3

din djarin x oc

WARNINGS: violence, blood, mild torture, swearing, mentions of gambling

WORDS: 5.2K

EXCERPT: Knives had always been his last choice, a last resort when his firearms failed him or were no longer an option. They were inefficient in his brutish hands, often requiring close contact and were never a guarantee to kill. But in hers … they were more than just knives, they were instruments, that she played effortlessly to sing a serenade of violence.

He wondered if the Force had anything to do with it, or if she just had that many years of practice.

“You and that casino operator seemed close,” he continued musing into the silent space between them. There were no indications she had heard him, but he knew she had. Maker knew why, Din decided to push his luck. “Did you fuck her?”

MASTERLIST | SERIES MASTERLIST

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Din’s mind whirled faster than light speed as they ran back to her ship.

I am not a Jedi.

The words echoed over and over again. But she had to be … right? Or at least some kind of trainee, like Grogu was. He let his mind dwell on the small foundling. How he’d been able to lift impossible weights for his tiny body, how he’d healed terminal injuries— how he’d choked Cara just as Ten had choked the security officer who’d held a blaster to her head.

But there was no pretending Ten was some helpless creature that just happened to be overloaded with this weird power. She was a grown woman, a trained fighter. She wielded it with precision. She had to have learned how to do that somewhere, somehow.

I am not a Jedi.

The Empire … they chased me too.

If she wasn’t a Jedi, why would the Empire pursue her?

I never knew why—I still don’t.

Had she just lied to him? His skin felt like it was on fire. He didn’t know why the prospect of that bothered him so much. Many people had lied to him before, and he in turn had told many lies. His whole identity was built around an air of secrecy, but … it had felt like an intimate capsule of time, back on that asteroid. Where a barrier had slipped, for the both of them. Din didn’t want to consider it had all been false.

I am not a Jedi.

The ship entered his view, the distance closing much faster than before. Ten didn’t look back at him as she opened the hold and headed directly into the cockpit. He didn’t follow her in.

He sat on the nearest crate, shedding his gloves. He pressed the palms of his hands into his helmet, as if it were skin. A part of him … hoped she was Jedi. That she could get in contact with the ones who had taken Grogu. That he could see him again. Maybe even…

Din shook his head forcefully as he felt the ship jump to hyperspace. It was stupid and wishful for him to dwell on those things.

Ten emerged from the cockpit, avoiding his eyes. She was still wearing her cloak as she hurried into the refresher, and then towards where he sat, holding a small metal box now. He straightened.

“You’re bleeding,” she pointed out. She sat down next to him and rifled through the box. Her thigh pressed against his, and Din had the inexplicable urge to jerk away, which he ignored. He furrowed his brow beneath his helmet, turning to examine himself and — ah. A blaster graze was indeed on his arm, the fabric torn away just below the pauldron. Blood slowly dripped down onto the sleeve.

Setting the box on the ground, she slowly brought her hands up to grip the edges of his pauldron. They stilled there, her eyes lifting to his. Asking for permission. He nodded.

She pried the metal off his arm, and he groaned. He could feel the sting now, the frayed nerves hit by blaster fire. She ripped the fabric further up his arm, exposing the burn and his tanned skin.

“It’s not too bad, just partially got past the beskar,” she muttered, running her fingers over the surrounding area. They were cold, Din noticed. She touched him with a gentleness that didn’t suit her face.

As she began to wipe grime off the area, she said quietly, “Aren’t you going to ask?”

Din turned his face to look in hers, but her eyes were down, staying focused on the burn. Her brows were furrowed. He didn’t even know what the question would be. He settled for silence as she finished cleaning his arm, then reached for a small can of bacta spray.

“This’ll sting.” She began to spray the area. It did sting, but Din registered it only in some far away portion of his mind. He wanted to take the opportunity she’d opened, but his mind was still grasping at the formulation of a thought that didn’t sound … well, stupid.

As she placed a patch on the now scarring burn, he gave up.

“How can you do that if you’re not a Jedi?”

Her eyes finally flickered back up to meet his. “The Jedi do not have nor have they ever had exclusive control over the Force.”

“The Force … that’s where those … powers come from, right?”

She straightened from where she’d been rearranging the first aid box and gave a small laugh. Din … wasn’t sure he’d heard that sound from her before. Not like this.

“Powers, that’s…” she shook her head. “That’s cute, Mandalorian. Yes, the Force is what enables me to do the things most can’t. But it’s all a matter of someone’s connection.”

Ten stood, heading back to the refresher. Din couldn’t help but follow. The questions seemed to be falling out of his mouth now. Grogu had never been able to tell him anything about his powers. It felt as if by learning more he could be closer to him, somehow. Understand his son and the extraordinary life he had lived.

“Connection? What does that mean?”

She half turned towards him, shrugging off her cloak and then her jacket. Wraps encased her forearms, as Din had always seen. She raised an eyebrow at him.

“You’re more curious about this than I thought you would be,” she remarked. Facing the mirror, she turned on the tap.

“You just incapacitated someone without even touching them.”

“A blaster can do that as well,” she said, leaning down and splashing water onto her face. The edges of her hair brushed the sink ledge, the dark strands wetting slightly. Din scoffed.

“A blaster doesn’t—” he stopped. He rubbed a hand along the edge of his helmet, realizing his gloves were still off. “Why did you lie to me before? About the Empire?”

Ten spun quickly to face him, water droplets still dripping down the planes of her face. She narrowed her eyes. “I never lied to you. That armour, your helmet, that’s your Creed. This is mine. Hiding my connection from the Force is the only way I’ve lived all these years. If you were anyone else … I would’ve killed you already.”

Her eyes stayed locked on his helmet, not even blinking. He believed her. And he knew, he could tell, it was something she’d done before. He understood, so he nodded, slowly.

As she passed, he placed a hand on her arm. “I wouldn’t betray you to the Empire.”

She placed a hand on top of his. Din was acutely aware of their bare skin touching. He could feel the texture of her skin. It was softer than he had expected. Was everything about her softer than it appeared?

“People I’ve known for years have sold me out to the Empire. I’ve only known you for less than a month.”

—

Her vision was muddied with the blood that had erupted from her face. It clung to her lashes, falling into her eye, and she tried to rapidly blink it away. Ten spit it out when it accumulated into her mouth. She was afraid to touch her face, afraid of what she would find there.

Good morning, beautiful. Antilles had greeted her that way nearly every morning for as long as she’d known him. Beautiful. She supposed she probably wasn’t, not anymore. Quell had seen to that.

The troopers took turns shoving her with their rifles to move her along. Her ankle screamed its objections, and Ten couldn’t even tell through the blood and sweat if there were tears.

She cried out as she tripped over something hard, falling forward and landing on her forearms. A metal surface. This must be their ship, she realized. A shudder went through her. She tried desperately to reach out to the Force, to feel its steady rhythm beneath her own breathing, but it felt too far away. Pushed down by her own panic.

Someone grabbed her by the collar of her shirt now, pulling her along beside them. She felt them ascending a ramp and then she was unceremoniously thrown towards the floor. Panting, she rested the uncut half of her face on the cool surface under her. Voices filtered through the ship to her ears.

“The asset is secure. We should prepare to leave immediately. You—” A snapping noise. Quell’s voice. “Clean this up, dispose of this waste.”

A different voice responded. “Sir, if I may, it was specified that the asset be delivered unharmed.”

Quell barked a laugh. “The bitch is fine. Surface level, nothing more. It’ll heal and she’ll be just as useful to the Empire as before.”

Ten felt her eyes burning, and she knew now there were undoubtedly tears. She couldn’t muster the effort to be ashamed. Some of the blood cleared from her eye. She focused on the crate that sat directly in front of her, counting the letters of the logo stamped to the side. Footsteps echoed off the metal, louder as they drew closer to her.

“We’re about to have some fun.”

With a small gasp, Ten’s eyes flew open. The hammock she lay in was gently swaying with the movements of the ship. She slowly ran a hand over her cheek. Dry.

She was alone in the ship’s hold. The engines were humming softly. She flexed her hand in front of her; it was still a little sore. One of the wraps on her arm had slipped down as she’d slept. Ten absentmindedly rubbed the tattooed “10” on her forearm. Years ago, she used to rub the skin until it was raw, sometimes on the verge of bleeding. But the ink always remained buried beneath.

Swinging her legs over the side of the hammock, she signed, rubbing the back of her neck. She hadn’t had an outburst like that with the Force in … well, she didn’t like to dwell on the last time it had happened. At least this time hadn’t been disastrous. Maybe she really was in more control, had somehow mastered the connections with no guidance. Or she was just simply fooling herself. It wouldn’t be the first time.

Mando’s footsteps filtered to her as they came down the short hallway. Ten hurriedly rewrapped her arm as he came into view. He’d put his pauldron back on, but not bothered yet to change his shirt — she could still see some of the bare skin around where he’d been burned. The feeling of it under her fingers echoed in her mind.

As he walked towards her, she was hit with the sudden realization of him knowing … and being a Mandalorian, at that. She remembered laying under the stars, Silya’s warm arm wrapped around her. Telling her tales of the ancient days of Mandalore, of their clashes with the Jedi. The enemies of all Mandalorians. Is that how he would view her now? Did she care? She was annoyed that the first response in her mind wasn’t no, of course not.

It felt like she was being laid bare in front of him.

“I went over the communication logs we downloaded.” His helmet was downturned, looking at the holopad in front of him. “The Empire usually slingshots its transmissions around Corellia, Issiluu, and Shih, in specific patterns. I don’t see any of that in here.”

Ten rubbed a hand over her face. “That would make sense, given the levels of security. The Empire would never leave their conspirator without at least a few troopers on the property.”

“We should choose who to check out next so we can get going,” he said, fingers moving quickly over the holopad screen. She rose from the hammock, muscles protesting. He’d put his gloves back on, she noticed. She followed him into the cockpit.

Settling into the co-pilot seat, he pulled up the holographic display which began listing Karga’s associates. He tapped his finger in the corner and it began scrolling through their details.

“I still think we should focus on those who were known to deal in weapons or adjacent industries during the height of the Empire,” Mando’s voice hummed in the background as Ten watched the names go by, along with the imagery of their various business pursuits. They were beginning to blur together and Ten sighed when— she saw it.

“Stop,” she demanded harshly. The screen had already moved forward. Mando’s helmet jerked in her direction. “Go back one. Another one. There— stop it here.”

Ten leaned forward, examining the information. It was the profile of Doman Tosche. He looked mild mannered enough, round face slightly reddened in the display picture. He owned a myriad of businesses in the Core, primarily food and household goods, which he’d recently been exporting further out. The only known connection to the Empire, based on their combined records and knowledge, was a second cousin who’d enlisted decades prior.

None of that was what had grabbed her attention.

There, next to one of his agricultural businesses, Mal’s Production Incorporated. A logo. One she’d seen before.

Blood was dripping down her brow. Her body was wracked with shivers against the cold metal floor. Quell’s voice was in the background, arrogant and spiteful. The crate. The crate sat right in front of her. A logo painted onto the side. She counted the letters. Mal’s Production Incorporated.

She’d seen it before. On Quell’s ship. Years ago.

“He’s working with the Empire,” she said. She didn’t look at Mando. “He always has been.”

“You’re sure?” Ten looked at him now. He had leaned in, just slightly, and his fingers twitched like they wanted to reach. They didn’t. She nodded. “Okay.”

Taking a deep breath, she motioned to the display. “Looks like he has no centralized office, but he was in Canto Bight … two days ago, according to the shipyard logs. We should head there.”

Mando nodded, settling back in his seat, flexing his fingers. He seemed uneasy as she set in their new course. Clearing his throat, he asked, “Is this … is this a Force thing?”

“No,” she said. Her fingers tightened around the handle of the controls. “It’s a memory thing.”

—

“We should try to be back before the sun rises, in case there’s any New Republic officers patrolling.” Ten had her back turned to him, adjusting her weapons. The muscles in her shoulders flexed, and a strangely linear burn scar covered her left shoulder blade. Din’s eyes followed the line of her arm down to where her wrappings covered her skin. He felt a pang of guilt thinking about the glimpse he’d accidentally stolen of the skin underneath earlier. Of the tattoo he guessed she was hiding, though he couldn’t even begin to understand why. But he knew what it was to feel safe in cover, to need to block off physical parts of one’s self. He wouldn’t tell her he’d seen. She continued speaking as she turned around to face him, fastening her cloak at her neck. “I can blend in a crowd, but the beskar’s not exactly … inconspicuous.”

“You’d be surprised,” he muttered. “But I agree, we should be careful. How much do you trust this contact you have here?”

She laughed at that. “Not at all, Mando.”

As they made their way past the bright casino lights, Din could tell the reflections off his armour made her uncomfortable as they moved amongst the city’s tourists. In his experience, the reflections often had the opposite effect she feared — he was like a mirror, where the surroundings drew all the attention, and he became nothing but a neutral piece of the structure.

Ten led him down a narrower side alley, offset from the main casino attractions, which seemed to help her relax a touch, despite its much seedier nature. A few shadowy figures lingered in doorways and Din’s hand came up to rest on his blaster, even though the woman in front of him seemed unbothered by their presence.

A dirty hand lunged out from an alcove as they passed by, grabbing tightly onto Ten’s arm and yanking. With the surprise leverage, the hand — attached to a man with a face equally dirty — pushed her down into the gravel. Din pulled his blaster from his belt but as he pointed it at the man, he had already his own blaster pressed into her temple.

“Go ahead Tin Can, shoot me,” he snarled. “By the time it reaches me I’ll have pulled the trigger on your friend here.”

As if to illustrate his point, he pushed the blaster harder into her temple. His other hand rested on the back of her head, and he pressed her face into the ground. Her hands were pinned beneath his knees. Din felt the blood rushing in his ears, his adrenaline spiking.

“You fucking idiot,” he heard Ten swear at him, her voice muffled.

“Oh, I’m the fucking idiot, eh?” he responded, turning his eyes down to her. Din dropped his free arm beneath his cloak. “You cost us a right lot of credits last time you were here, bitch. Fucked over our whole operation, ya did.”

“Your operation had the constitution of a burlap sack, you absolute—” The rest of her sentence was cut off as Din launched forward, propelled by the phoenix. He slammed his body into the other man, sending them into the opposite wall, and his body protested. The small space filled with smoke and Din pulled the vibroblade from his arm as it cleared. Bringing it down in a swift stroke, he plunged it into the direction of the man’s neck. As it sunk in and blood sprayed onto his chest plate he knew he’d hit the mark.

As the man slumped to the ground, he turned to where Ten had been. She was coughing lightly through the smoke, lifting herself on her elbows. He stepped towards her.

“Are you alright?” He extended a gloved hand down towards her. She ignored it.

“Shit,” she cursed again. Din watched as she slowly rose to her feet, brushing gravel off the front of her body. There was a red mark at her temple where the blaster had been, but he let out a breath when she seemed otherwise fine. Her eyes locked onto his. “I didn’t need your help.”

“Yeah, seemed like you had it all under control,” he muttered, rolling his eyes.

Some gravel still clung to the smooth skin of her face. Before he could stop himself, his hand reached up and began to gingerly wipe it away.

Her hand darted up to grab him by the wrist. It gripped him like a vice, and neither of them moved. It felt like there was some inflexible string tying them together in that moment, constricting each of them separately. The expression in her eyes was unreadable. It was as if she had her own beskar helmet to cover her outward expression. Din wasn’t even sure they were breathing.

He had no idea how long it had been — seconds? minutes? hours? — when the grip on his wrist finally released. His hand lowered.

“I didn’t need your help,” she said, tone softer than before. Ripping her eyes from him, she resumed their previous path down the alley.

—

Ten clenched her fists, tight enough to hurt, beneath her cloak. If she didn’t, she knew she would shake.

Not from the attempt on her life. No, that was a pretty standard day. And she’d met that man before, when he’d helped run a ring of backdoor casinos, scalping off the legitimate casino profits. The legitimate casinos had, unsurprisingly, hired her to flush out all the information on their counterparts.

No, Ten was shaking because … well, she couldn’t really say why. Was she humiliated? Maybe. Was she annoyed? Most definitely. She wanted to turn on her Mandalorian counterpart and give him the brunt of it, about how she was no damsel in distress for him to save and protect.

It wasn’t completely logical, she knew. They were partners, and someone had her on the ground with a blaster to her head. The second time in so many days. But she bristled all the same.

And the way his hand had brushed off the dirt from her face … what the fuck? Her nerves felt frayed, as if her very skin had been peeled open and set alight.

She didn’t look back at him again as they made their way to the end of the alley. A large metal door was inset in the wall that marked the end. There was no handle of any kind, but a small window at eye level which was shut.

Approaching, she motioned to Mando to stand back behind her. She banged one, two, three times exactly on the door. With a squeak, the metal cover on the small window slid open. It was just large enough to view the eyes of the person on the other side. Their brow was furrowed.

“You have a fathier for today’s race?” a gruff voice asked.

“Yes, he’s being tended to in the thirteenth stable.”

The metal window covering snapped shut abruptly. A moment later the entire door gave a low moan, opening just wide enough for a person to fit through. Ten entered, gesturing for the Mandalorian to follow.

The small room reeked of smoke, more sour and concentrated than the smoke in the alley had been. A large green Trandoshan sat on a stool and leaned against the dirty wall, picking at their teeth. The Devaronian who let them in gave them a short grunt, which she knew to interpret as wait here. He disappeared down another short hallway, which quickly faded to blackness.

Rather than make eye contact with the Trandoshan, Ten turned herself back towards Mando. The single bulb that lit the room reflected off the top corner of his breastplate. His helmet tilted down to look at her.

“A waiting room?”

She raised an eyebrow at him. Experimentally, she clenched and unclenched her fist beside her. The shaking had subsided.

“They don’t allow weapons inside their main casino.” She nodded down the hallway. “And I don’t allow myself anywhere without weapons.”

“I take it this isn’t the operation you fucked over, then,” he said, helmet turning to look back at the entrance. Ten swore she could hear a smirk in his voice.

“I was paid by the big boys to profile everything I could find on illegitimate operations in the city,” she shrugged. “Kirana paid me even more to remain … discrete.”

Before he could say anything in response, a human woman emerged from the hallway with the Devaronian hovering just over her shoulder. She was conspicuously dressed, a bright red gown draped over her body, with a significant dip into her cleavage, opening the expanse of skin. Her red lips turned up into a smile when she entered the room with them.

“My dear nameless friend,” she cooed, embracing Ten’s upper arms. She placed a kiss on each of her cheeks. “How lovely of you to grace us with your presence in Canto Bight!”

“Kirana, you’re looking lovely as ever,” Ten gestured beside her. “This is the Mandalorian, he’s helping me with a job.”

“A nameless associate, how very on brand,” Kirana flashed them a dazzling smile. “Tell me, what can I do for my favourite devious double agent, hmm?”

“Doman Tosche,” she spat the name out at no one in particular. “We tapped shipyard logs and apparently he was here just a few days ago. He runs some businesses from the Core, but we— I— think he’s been dealing with Imps since the Empire days.”

Kirana raised a delicate eyebrow. Ten struggled to read the expression in her eyes.

“Not many reputable Core businessmen visit my establishments, I’m afraid.”

“There’s also not many people at all who enter and leave this city that you don’t know about.” With this, the well dressed woman broke into a lilting laugh that echoed off the metal walls. She ran her hands higher up Tens arms, grasping her near her shoulders, and smiled at her.

“Now that you’re right about,” she sighed. “I do know a certain Mr. Tosche was here, he likes to frequent certain girls who work by the betting tracks. However, he left after one night on a passenger caravan. Obviously under a false name if it’s not in the logs.”

Ten gritted her teeth hearing that he was already gone. She turned her head ever so slightly, looking at the Mandalorian from the corner of her eye, before focusing back on Kirana.

“I don’t suppose there’s a chance you know where that ship was headed?”

Kirana shook her head, looking rueful. “Even if I did, they usually make a number of unlogged stops, especially if they’re well paid,” she muttered. Gently, she lifted a hand to cup Ten’s cheek— the same one the Mandalorian had touched, Ten registered, somewhere in a corner of her mind. She pushed it even further back. “But, I do know that he didn’t arrive here alone. A business associate, some sort of manager, perhaps. He stayed on world and has spent the last many hours inside my humble establishment.”

“He’s in there now?” Ten asked, eyes darting to the dark hallway. “Kirana, you have to let me in to get him.”

The Trandoshan stirred now, leaning in her direction, a low growl in its throat. Ten saw the glint of beskar moving beside her.

“Now, now, there’s no reason for any sort of violence here,” Kirana turned her eyes onto Mando, narrowing them. “But you know my rules, dear. No weapons inside my premises. That includes these lovely hands of yours. However, once someone leaves…”

Mando spoke up for the first time since Kirana had appeared. “We’ll be waiting then.”

—

For once, their timing seemed to work out favourably. The man Kirana said worked for Tosche — Hamal Hearns — took less than an hour to stumble out of the back alley casino, yawning and scratching at the stubble that had grown out on his face.

Subduing him was too easy to even be fun, Din lamented. He spent a large portion of the walk back to the Ursa, through the still dark streets of Canto Bight then the deserts of the surrounding area, grovelling and talking about ransoms, about the powerful men he worked for, how they would pay for him, however much they needed. Ten rewarded him with a sharp punch to the nose, after which he fell silent.

She threw him unceremoniously into the storage room Din had adopted as his sleeping quarters. Din could hear him softly crying through the door.

“He shouldn’t need much pushing,” he commented, leaning against the corner of the wall. Ten was in her weapons compartment, seemingly picking out her favourite. He once again found himself marvelling at the sheer number of blades. And the single blaster he knew she carried at her left hip.

Knives had always been his last choice, a last resort when his firearms failed him or were no longer an option. They were inefficient in his brutish hands, often requiring close contact and were never a guarantee to kill. But in hers … they were more than just knives, they were instruments, that she played effortlessly to sing a serenade of violence.

He wondered if the Force had anything to do with it, or if she just had that many years of practice.

“You and that casino operator seemed close,” he continued musing into the silent space between them. There were no indications she had heard him, but he knew she had. Maker knew why, Din decided to push his luck. “Did you fuck her?”

That got her attention. Her hand snapped to his direction. She picked out a large knife, its blade slightly curved, and began walking slowly towards him. He wondered if she finally was going to stab him.

“Not that it’s any of your business, Mandalorian,” she came to a stop beside him, her shoulder brushing his. “But yes … I did.”

For another moment, neither of them moved, staring at the other. It seemed to stretch from that second into infinity, and then it ended as quickly as it began. Ten continued down the small hallway to the room where their guest was. Taking a deep breath, Din followed.

Hamal Hearns was on his knees, hands still cuffed behind his back. His face was covered in snot and sweat and tears and a small trickle of blood out of his nose from when Ten had hit him. His eyes brimmed with more tears as she held his chin in one of her hands.

“I have a very simple question for you, Mr. Hearns,” she murmured, her tone much gentler than Din expected. He crossed his arms over his chest, not missing the way the man’s eyes flitted back and forth between them. Ten’s hand on his face tightened.

“Is your boss working for the Empire?”

His eyes widened, tears spilling over, lips trembling.

“Please, please, miss, we wouldn’t do anything like that I promise—”

“Shhh,” Ten cooed. “I’m afraid you misunderstood. You see, I know the answer already, I was just hoping … you could be honest with me.”

She was kneeling in front of him now, and brought her other hand up to the cheek she hadn’t already been holding. He widened his eyes as they stayed locked on her face.

Din had expected some violence, perhaps Ten’s favourite flavour of physical torture, to get the skittish man to tell them what he knew.

But the silence only deepened, and as Ten and Hearns maintained eye contact, he watched the latter’s body begin to shake. He tried to shake his head back and forth, but she held it steady. Blood began to seep from his eyes, falling like tears, then out of his ears, and mouth.

“Please,” he whimpered. He coughed and gasped around the blood in his mouth. “I’ll—” Another cough. “I’ll tell you everything I know! He’s been selling to the Empire for years! P-please just stop!”

Ten leaned back, stretching her hands out. “Good. I knew you’d do the right thing. You’re going to tell my Mandalorian friend everything useful you know. Or I’ll be back.”

He nodded vigorously, not even attempting to cover the sobs that racked his body. Blood still covered his face, but no longer seemed to be freshly flowing.

What had she done to him?

She stood, and Din didn’t miss the shaking in her legs. As she turned, he saw the bags under her eyes that he swore weren’t there when they had entered the room. She laid a hand on his breastplate.

“Take it from here, please, Mando.”

#*writes a chapter twice as long as average* #ummm anyway im v happy w this i hope ppl like it #the mandalorian fanfic #the mandalorian fanfiction #the mandalorian x oc #the mandalorian x original character #the mandalorian #din djain #din djarin x oc #din djarin x original character #din djarin fanfiction #star wars fanfic #star wars fanfiction #star wars #mywriting

[geekdigitalmarketing]

The Way to Hire the Perfect Search Engine Optimization Company

For many organizations, the task performed in their electronic advertising campaigns may produce the distinction between failure or success for that entire small company. Search engine optimization is a critical element of a yearlong digital marketing strategy, as millions of people utilize search engines every day to locate advice, goods, or replies with your own own questions. You can find a lot more than 60,000 queries per moment on Google, and users hunt three to four times a day.

Search engine optimisation has come a ways in late years and now is now continuing to grow at an increasingly rapid speed. Staying in touch with these changes, the more competitive arena, and also the effect of brand new algorithm updates and technologies gives a challenge and also an prospect for associations, and necessitates dedicated affordable seo assist.

Why Employ an SEO Company

Once your business has got the need for affordable seo, you have to come to a decision whether you wish to seek the services of some body in house or utilize an search engine optimisation company. There clearly was a whole great deal of advantages and value of choosing a in house search engine optimisation or with an search engine optimization crew. However, some organizations usually would not have the support structurally or financially todo so job in any respect. In such instances, choosing an agency can be a cost-effect option for a corporation's search engine optimisation requirements.

Meanwhile, authorities that can already have an inhouse search engine marketing team face different challenges which may be solved by choosing a search engine marketing agency. They may be building a sizable or complex site, be lower on bandwidth, or the team could possibly be missing a key item of knowledge. When it can seem like selecting an in house SEO is the ideal alternative, locating somebody with the ability amount needed could be hard. As well as, employing a service can also bring into a fresh perspective and new ideas.

The Way to Recognize an Insufficient Search Engine Optimisation Agency

The process of hiring and finding a search engine marketing bureau can be intimidating if you aren't familiar with SEO your self. There are several reputable search engine optimisation services available on the market. However you can find even more bad ones, and some times it really is really hard to share with the real deal from an overall whole fraud. Just as employing a lousy at-home search engine optimisation could be very high priced, therefore can working together with a poor search engine optimization agency.

Following are some of the warning signs and matters to Be on the Lookout to help you Determine an inadequate Search Engine Marketing bureau:

Keyword Stuffing

Keyword-stuffing is an spammy search engine marketing technique that targets a keyword an excessive number of that time period in order to gain an unfair position benefit from the search outcomes. You can read much more on the topic of keyword stuffing in Google's Quality Guidelines.

Charges for Every Website Hyperlink

As tempting as 10 per link may seem, those are penalty-generating inbound hyperlinks. Even in the event the agency charges based upon the"link quality," the product grade of the link could be difficult to measure, and also the link might not show up for weeks or months. Attempting to sell links additionally suggests they very probably possess a hyperlink system (that will be very terrible ), or they're naive. In any event, avoid any agency that charges per associate.

Makes Promises

If a company promises #|1 positions (or anything that seems too good to be true), run-away! Should they create these promises, among lots of others prefer,"we promise 1000 new visitors into a own site next week," or else they know someone at Google and possess insider understanding all around Google calculations, then then do not work with these. As tempting as it may sound, then it will harm your organic search operation in the long term. Actually if it's a"money-back warranty, then" your own website's recovery from a penalty is not guaranteed.

Automated Search Engine Optimisation

I am not 100% sure that which bureaus mean by supplying"automated services," so I won't go too far. But anyone promising any automated way of SEO should cause you to get doubtful. When you can find a lot of SEO programs out there, not one of these is able to carry out an search engine optimisation analysis or enhance a site together with being a living breathing human may. Click here: https://domain.com/ for more information.

Incompetence

If the search engine optimization agency you are researching cannot do SEO for themselves, then that is the very evident sign you are going to be throwing away your hard earned money. Simply look at the key on-page search engine optimization elements (name tag, meta description( and dictionary ) and assess how well they're optimized (when ).

You are able to easily see all on-page elements for any webpage having Portent's search engine optimisation webpage Review Chrome extension.

Get Familiar With Blackhat SEO Tactics

While search engines are becoming smarter every calendar year, there are still many blackhat and techniques that are spammy SEOs utilize to deceive search engines into rank a full page as soon as the page doesn't deserve to be rated.

Just take the opportunity to familiarize yourself with blackhat search engine optimisation and spam approaches to produce sure to aren't staying sold those tactics, and also your service is not executing them on your own site. As stated earlier in the day, blackhat search engine marketing strategies may get the job done for just a small time, however they are going to gradually bring about your web site becoming penalized by search engines like google.

#cheap seo #Affordable seo #Search Engine Optimization

[duanewardell]

Way to Becoming a Doctor: Steps to Take from High School

Possibly you've longed for being a doctor since the day you got your toy specialist's pack. Or then again maybe you began considering a clinical vocation in secondary school. Despite when the thought happened to you, you're probably pondering exactly the stuff to turn into a specialist.

While medication is probably the hardest calling out there, there are approaches to build your chances of acquiring that subtle white coat. Continue perusing to discover more about a profession in the clinical field, alongside the means you can take to help your risks click here.

What Does a Doctor Do?

America's No. 1 most renowned calling, specialists assume a key part in our general public. Alongside diagnosing physical and states of mind, specialists treat illnesses, wounds, and sicknesses so as to improve wellbeing and prosperity. Contingent upon the specialist's forte, they may arrange tests, recommend drug, perform medical procedure, or simply tune in while a patient subtleties their torment.

In view of the significance of the undertaking they play out, it's nothing unexpected that specialists are commonly generously compensated. As per an investigation by ZipRecruiter, the normal yearly compensation for a clinical doctor is $224,190, with most specialists making somewhere in the range of $150,000 and $312,000.

Step by step instructions to Become a Doctor: High School Through Residency

Regardless of whether you see yourself working in a specialist's office or a trauma center, in a lab or a facility, you should begin getting ready for your vocation at the earliest opportunity preferably while you're still in secondary school. The following are a portion of the urgent strides to take at different focuses in your instructive vocation:

Secondary School

While you presumably realize that you should take a lot of science classes during your secondary school vocation, you probably won't understand how significant your school decision can be.Also, understudies who are certainly dedicated to gaining a clinical degree might need to consider applying to at least one BSMD programs. Permitting understudies to win a Bachelor's of Science qualification and a Doctor of Medicine in one program, this choice can bring about a quickened time period, wherein understudies total their investigations in as meager as six years. Study the different BSMD programs out there.

In case you're not absolutely sure in the event that you need to be a specialist, perhaps the most ideal approaches to find out about the field is to shadow a specialist in your locale. Shadowing permits imminent drug understudies to follow a specialist for the duration of the day to all the more likely comprehend what the job involves. As a high schooler, you can don't hesitate to inquire as to whether they'd be available to you shadowing them, or converse with your educators to check whether they know somebody who may be amiable.

Also, secondary school understudies can increase significant data about a profession in medication by booking instructive meetings. Dissimilar to prospective employee meetings, the motivation behind an enlightening meeting is essentially to collect data about a position. Pose inquiries, find out about every day duties, and see whether you'd be glad working in this calling. Regardless of whether you choose a vocation in medication isn't directly for you toward the day's end, you'll be one bit nearer to securing your fantasy position.

School

Along these lines, you've picked a school and are prepared to set out on your clinical training. While numerous individuals erroneously accept that you can study pre-medications, in all actuality pre-drug is an overall track as opposed to a particular major. Essentially, a pre-drug understudy is only one who expects to go to clinical school down the line.

Indeed, a pre-drug understudy could in fact major in anything, as long as they complete the necessary courses for prescription school confirmations. A pre-medications understudy could be a music major, for example! The restricting variable is only that the essential course list is extensive, and the greater part of them are science classes. It's ordinarily less difficult for pre-prescriptions to study a science field, as opposed to need to stress over finishing significant prerequisites in an entirely unexpected space alongside the pre-drug necessities.

It's important that hopeful medications school participants ought to abstain from taking an excessive number of classes at junior colleges. As indicated by U.S. News and World Report, medications school confirmations officials lean toward understudies to take most of their science classes at four-year foundations.

Taking the correct school classes isn't just about satisfying the prerequisites, in any case. Future specialists likewise need to grow their insight so as to get ready for the MCAT. A PC based test enduring seven hours, The Medical College Admission Test assumes a key function in medications school confirmation choices. This test covers brain research, humanism, material science, science, natural science, organic chemistry, and science. The MCAT additionally covers basic perusing, so it's likewise essential to create solid literary examination aptitudes in your humanities classes, for example, theory or writing.

Since the MCAT is such a profound test, and such a vital piece of clinical school affirmations, you need to develop the important aptitudes and information through the span of your school vocation. The MCAT is certainly not something you can pro by just self-reading for a couple of months; you need a solid establishment to accomplish a high score, and taking every one of those science courses will assist you with building that establishment.

In the event that this sounds overpowering, recollect that most schools brag pre-prescription educating boards of trustees contained with respect to science and wellbeing experts. These specialists can help guarantee you find a way to turn into a serious clinical school candidate. A few boards of trustees are more required than others, however you should exploit yours. Most will assist you with delineating your school a long time as a pre-drug, however some may even compose an advisory group wide suggestion for you and assist you with planning for clinical school interviews.

Clinical School

During the four years understudies spend considering medication, they'll get the opportunity to invest energy both inside and outside the study hall. Coursework during the initial two years incorporates life structures, natural chemistry, microbiology, pathology, and pharmacology, just as more essential science classes. Furthermore, understudies will gain proficiency with the correct techniques for analyzing and interfacing with patients. Being acknowledged to mbbs in china l is a critical advance on your excursion to turning into a specialist.

During the following two years of drug school, understudies will begin to set out on their emergency clinic and facility revolutions, where they work one next to the other with inhabitants. Most understudies select a strength in Year Three, with choices including inner medication, general medical procedure, gynecology, pediatrics, orthopedics, and numerous others.

Before proceeding onward to your residency, you should finish a test known as USMLE Step 2, which incorporates both various decision and patient-communication segments.

Residency

Following four years of clinical school, understudies are currently viewed as specialists. Nonetheless, that doesn't mean their time of difficult work and learning is finished. As an inhabitant, you will probably go through 3-7 years working in a showing emergency clinic under more experienced specialists.

Also, you'll have to finish a board test in your picked forte before proceeding to rehearse medication all alone.

#Study mbbs in china #mbbs in china #Mbbs China consultancy

[brinazzle]

! >>

My colleague Phil tripped down his basement steps and landed hard on his head. For a few moments as he lay on the floor, his arms and shoulders tingling, he thought he was paralyzed. Too wobbly to stand up, he sat against a wall and assessed the damage. The tingling in his limbs meant he still retained feeling (a good thing). His head and neck were throbbing. He could feel blood trickling down his back from a lacerated scalp. He knew that he needed to go to an ER so they could clean up the wound and check for broken bones and internal bleeding. He also knew he was in no shape to drive himself. It was a Saturday morning. Phil’s wife and grown sons were not home. He was alone in his quiet suburban house. He pulled his cell phone out to call for help. As he scrolled through names he realized he didn’t have a single friend nearby whom he felt comfortable calling in an emergency. He’d never made the effort to know his neighbors. Reluctant to call 911 since he wasn’t gushing blood or having a heart attack, Phil tracked down the home number of a middle-aged couple a few houses away and dialed. A woman named Kay answered, someone he acknowledged on the street but had rarely spoken to. He explained his situation and Kay rushed over, entering Phil’s home through an unlocked back door. She found Phil in the basement, helped him to his feet, and drove him to the local hospital, staying with him during the five hours he was examined. Yes, he’d suffered a concussion, the doctors said, and he’d be in pain for a few weeks, but nothing was broken and he’d recover. Kay drove him back to his house. Resting in his dark house later that day, Phil thought about how close he had come to disaster. He recalled the moment when his head hit the floor, the bright brittle sound at impact, like a hammer coming down on a marble counter and shattering the stone into tiny pieces. He remembered the electrical charge coursing through his limbs and the terror he felt at the prospect of never walking again. He thought about how lucky he was. But Phil’s fall triggered more than gratitude for not being crippled. He also reflected on the remarkable kindness of his neighbor Kay, and how she had selflessly given up her day for him. For the first time in years, he thought about how he was living his life. Phil told himself, “I need to get better at making friends.” Not because he might need people like Kay to save him in the future, but because he wanted to become more like Kay. Not all of us require a violent life-threatening knock on the head to change our behavior. It only seems that way.   This is a book about adult behavioral change. Why are we so bad at it? How do we get better at it? How do we choose what to change? How do we make others appreciate that we’ve changed? How can we strengthen our resolve to wrestle with the timeless, omnipresent challenge any successful person must stare down—becoming the person we want to be? To answer these questions, I’ll begin by focusing on the triggers in our environment. Their impact is profound. A trigger is any stimulus that reshapes our thoughts and actions. In every waking hour we are being triggered by people, events, and circumstances that have the potential to change us. These triggers appear suddenly and unexpectedly. They can be major moments, like Phil’s concussion, or as minor as a paper cut. They can be pleasant, like a teacher’s praise that elevates our discipline and ambition—and turns our life around 180 degrees. Or they can be counterproductive, like an ice cream cone that tempts us off our diet or peer pressure that confuses us into doing something we know is wrong. They can stir our competitive instincts, from the common workplace carrot of a bigger paycheck to the annoying sight of a rival outdistancing us. They can drain us, like the news that a loved one is seriously ill or that our company is up for sale. They can be as elemental as the sound of rain triggering a sweet memory. Triggers are practically infinite in number. Where do they come from? Why do they make us behave against our interests?Why are we oblivious to them? How do we pinpoint the triggering moments that anger us, or throw us off course, or make us feel that all is right in the world—so we can avoid the bad ones, repeat the good ones? How do we make triggers work for us? Our environment is the most potent triggering mechanism in our lives—and not always for our benefit. We make plans, set goals, and stake our happiness on achieving these goals. But our environment constantly intervenes. The smell of bacon wafts up from the kitchen, and we forget our doctor’s advice about lowering our cholesterol. Our colleagues work late every night, so we feel obliged to match their commitment, and miss one of our kid’s baseball games, then another, then another. Our phone chirps, and we glance at the glowing screen instead of looking into the eyes of the person we love. This is how our environment triggers undesirable behavior. Because our environmental factors are so often outside of our control, we may think there is not much we can do about them. We feel like victims of circumstance. Puppets of fate. I don’t accept that. Fate is the hand of cards we’ve been dealt. Choice is how we play the hand. Despite a hard knock on the head, Phil didn’t bend to circumstance. His fate was to fall, hit his head, and recover. His choice was to become a better neighbor.   There’s an emotion we’re all familiar with hovering over these pages rather than coursing through them. It’s not explicit. But that doesn’t mean it’s less real. It’s the feeling of regret. It’s implied every time we ask ourselves why we haven’t become the person we want to be. A big part of my research for this book involved asking people the simple question, “What’s the biggest behavioral change you’ve ever made?” The answers run the gamut, but the most poignant ones—guaranteed to raise the emotional temperature in the room—come from people recalling the behavior they should have changed but didn’t. They’re reflecting on their failure to become the person they wanted to be. And it often overwhelms them with desolate feelings of regret. We are not like Jane Austen’s overbearing Lady Catherine de Bourgh (from Pride and Prejudice), who boasts of her natural taste in music, then without a sixteenth note of irony, says, “If I had ever learnt, I should have been a great proficient.” Unlike Lady Catherine, we feel regret’s sharp sting when we reflect on the opportunities squandered, the choices deferred, the efforts not made, the talents never developed in our lives. Usually when it’s too late to do much about it. Regret was definitely in the air when I interviewed Tim, a once-powerful executive producer of a network sports division. Tim’s network career ended prematurely when he was in his mid-forties because he didn’t get along with his superiors. A decade later, in his mid-fifties, Tim was getting by with consulting jobs. He still had an expertise that companies needed. But he would never find the stable executive position he once had. He has a reputation: doesn’t play well with others. Tim has had years to confront the reasons for this reputation. But he never articulated them until the day his daughter asked for fatherly advice before she started her first TV job. “I told her the greatest virtue is patience,” Tim said. “You’re operating in a business where everyone’s looking at the clock. A show starts and ends precisely at a given time. The control booth screens display everything in hundredths of a second. And it never stops. There’s always another show to do. The clock is always ticking. This creates an incredible sense of urgency in everyone. But if you’re in charge, it also tests your patience. You want everything done now, or even sooner. You become very demanding, and when you don’t get what you want, you can get frustrated and angry. You start treating people as the enemy. They’re not only disappointing you but making you look bad. And then you get angry.” That was a triggering moment for Tim. Until he said it he hadn’t realized how much his professional impatience was influenced by a savage network TV environment—and how it had seeped into other parts of his life. He explained: “I saw that I’m the kind of guy who emails a friend and gets mad if I don’t hear back within the hour. Then I start harassing that friend for ignoring me. Basically, I’m treating my friends the way I used to treat production assistants. It’s how I face the world. That’s no way to live.” Tim needed an intimate father-daughter encounter to trigger an insight that fed the powerful feeling of regret. “If I could change anything about my life,” he concluded, “I’d be more patient.” Regret is the emotion we experience when we assess our present circumstances and reconsider how we got here. Wereplay what we actually did against what we should have done—and find ourselves wanting in some way. Regret can hurt. For such a penetrating and wounding emotion, regret doesn’t get much respect. We treat it as a benign factor, something to deny or rationalize away. We tell ourselves, “I’ve made stupid choices but they’ve made me who I am today. Lamenting the past is a waste of time. I learned my lesson. Let’s move on.” That’s one way of looking at regret—if only as a form of self-protection from the pain of knowing we missed out. We’re comforted by the fact that no one is immune to regret (we’re not alone) and that time heals all wounds (the only thing worse than experiencing pain is not knowing if and when the pain will go away). I want to suggest a different attitude, namely embracing regret (although not too tightly or for too long). The pain that comes with regret should be mandatory, not something to be shooed away like an annoying pet. When we make bad choices and fail ourselves or hurt the people we love, we should feel pain. That pain can be motivating and in the best sense, triggering—a reminder that maybe we messed up but we can do better. It’s one of the most powerful feelings guiding us to change. If I do my job properly here and you do your part, two things will happen: 1) you will move closer to becoming the person you want to be and 2) you’ll have less regret. Shall we get started?

[barryslightningrod]

Course Credit

WestAllen for the prompt, “Person A is studying a major in art & takes a life drawing class. Person B is one of the nude models. Person A has trouble concentrating/keeps erasing their drawings, not because Person B is naked, but because they’re a neighbor & Person A already has a crush on them. Bonus: Person B is either oblivious or is aware of Person A being flustered. Bonus 2: Person A works up the nerve to ask them out after class. Bonus 3: Person B tries to see Person A’s sketches. You decide how Person A responds.” 

Barry Allen gathers his sketchpad and charcoal pencil collection in preparation for his walk to Central City University’s studio. As a fine arts student, he loved nothing more than being afforded the privilege of attending a school that valued its liberal arts and humanities programs just as much as its STEM ones. He didn’t think he’d have been able to bear being greeted with disapproving eyes any time he introduced himself and his major otherwise, an occurrence that was far too often whenever he revealed his studies to certain relatives or former high school classmates, even when he explained his desire to work as a forensic artist. Luckily enough, CCU was the perfect utopic institution where the two disciplines coincided with mutual respect, where he could vibe well with his mechanical engineering major roommate Cisco Ramon, and even strike up a close friendship with him. 

For some time now, he’s anticipated this assignment for ART 236, Anatomy and Figure Drawing, a drawing elective. When deciding between electives, he knew registering for this particular course was an obvious necessity considering his career goals. Even if his goals changed, it would allow him to step out of his comfort zone of computer graphic design, and he owed it to himself to take advantage of as many opportunities as he could to expand his graduation prospects. It would speak to his skillset if his portfolio included a wide array of images and techniques. 

Today’s project has him slightly nervous because it was the first time he was working with a live model. In class, they were moving past drawing from photographic references and onto actual living, breathing people. 

Nude people. 

He knew he had opted to get himself into these circumstances and that his choice of career could likely have him recreating naked bodies for the rest of his life, but the initial awkwardness of it all was still an obstacle he was going to have to overcome. To ease the discomfort, his professor, Dr. Wells, had each student list their availability at the beginning of the semester to be matched with a model for a private drawing session in the studio. Dr. Wells insisted that one-on-one sessions would allow for maximum concentration and leave no room for anything else, but Barry would rather at least a second student be working adjacently. Caitlin Snow, his TA, would be present in the office next door if assistance was needed, so he did feel a sense of relief that he wouldn’t be entirely alone with a naked stranger. 

Hopefully, he would grow accustomed to it sooner rather than later so that his focus could be entirely on producing the best image. He didn’t want his nerves to affect the quality of his drawing, or a more frivolous desire, the chance to secure another A on his transcript. Of course, Barry was aware that artistic talent could not be quantified in grades, but he was still proud of his perfect grade point average and had aspirations to graduate with honors.  

The trip to the studio is a short one from his dormitory. Barry checks the time on his phone, and in a panic, sees that it’s 10:08 AM. He was already late to his meeting with the model, and he still had to check his phone in with Caitlin and go over paperwork with her before entering the studio. He curses himself for adding unnecessary stress to a situation he was already apprehensive about and rushes quickly into Caitlin’s office.

“Barry,” Caitlin greets flatly. “You’re late.”

“I know, I know,” Barry acknowledges. Caitlin was a fellow art major, though on a premed track. When she introduced herself during the first day of class, she described this course as the perfect blend of her anatomic and artistic interests, which was why she applied to be a teaching assistant. She was a good one, but she was quite strict and cold, and evidently had a habit of bluntly stating truths, most especially when they least needed to be heard. 

Still, he knows her assessment of him is a factor in his overall grade, so he forces a smile and an apology. 

“You may be a fast drawer who impresses Dr. Wells-and myself,” Caitlin admits, almost reluctantly. “But you should still be mindful of my time and the time of your model.” 

Barry’s stomach sinks at her reproach, despite her compliment. It was true that he had garnered praise for how quickly he worked compared to his classmates, even earning himself a fond nickname, “Flash”, but that still didn’t mean he wanted to be thought of as irresponsible. 

Caitlin seals his phone into a security baggie and has him review and sign the College of Art and Design’s non-harassment policy, as well as its student rules and guidelines for figure modeling sessions. 

“I’m here if you have any questions,” she concludes. 

“Got it,” Barry nods, anxious to get started. He makes his way down the hall, hoping the piece he produced could make up for Caitlin’s dissatisfaction with him. 

He pulls the studio door aside, ready to greet his subject, his apology for his tardiness already on his tongue-

He slams the door back shut again as soon as he’d opened it, hardly believing who stood in the room. He half wanted to open it again to check his eyes weren’t deceiving him, but he feared letting it fall closed a second time once he got confirmation that it was indeed her and embarrassing himself even further. 

Forget graduating with honors: he was going to fail this class entirely. 

Caitlin must have heard the door slam, because she peeks her head outside the office to see what the source of the noise had been. 

“Is there a reason you’re not inside the studio already?” she interrogates. “I have an Orgo exam later you know-” 

“I can’t do this,” Barry blurts, without even an attempt at pretense. 

Caitlin frowns. “Why? Are you uncomfortable or something?”

Barry decides to go with that excuse, given that it wasn’t entirely false: “Yes.” 

She stares at him. 

“This is an elective course, one that you opted to take. You JUST signed a form promising that you understand what’s expected of you.”

“I did,” Barry gulps. “But-”

Caitlin sighs. 

“Look, Barry-don’t you think I’m also going to be a little uncomfortable the first time I have to examine a naked patient?” she states matter-of-factly, as though medical school admission were guaranteed in her future. “You’ll get used to it.”

“You don’t understand!” Barry cries, near hysteria now. “I didn’t realize that-that-”

“That this assignment is worth thirty percent of your final grade?” she suggests, brows raised.

She was right. There was no option besides following through with the situation at hand. If he left, he would receive a zero, and if he asked for another model, that would certainly raise suspicion. Worst of all, it might offend her, and that wasn’t exactly the best thing to do to someone he admired, someone he wanted to love, someone whose affection he dreamed about…

Mortified, Barry swallows again to compose himself and opens the studio door for a second time, coming face-to-face with his crush, Iris West, wearing nothing but a robe and an expression of confusion. 

“Are you the ART 236 student?” she asks immediately. “Barry Allen?”

“That’s me!” Barry chirps, despite breaking out into a sweat. 

Iris relaxes visibly. “Thank God. I was beginning to wonder if I came on the wrong day.”

If only you did, Barry wishes. He would almost rather draw a naked Dr. Wells than go through with this.

“Why did you come in and then sprint out?” she probes, furrowing her brows. 

Barry's pulse pounds loudly in his ears. He should have known that Iris wasn't going to let him off the hook easily.

“Oh-uhhh-I had to use the bathroom,” he lies, before realizing that presenting himself as someone who put off bathroom use to the point of barely containing himself wasn't quite attractive. 

Nonetheless, Iris accepts his explanation as sufficient and seemingly moves on to the next rational step of their meeting, introducing herself.

“I'm Iris West," she states, beaming up at him with her signature smile that confirmed she was indeed the one and only.

"I know," he replies, smiling back instinctively. His grin vanishes however once he realizes Iris isn't exactly aware he knows who she is. 

Sure enough, his fear is validated. 

"You know me?" she questions. 

“Uh-uh-” Barry stammers again, wondering how possibly he was going to explain himself without coming off as a creep. He can't believe the deeper hole he's managed to dig himself into. 

"We-we took a Gen-Ed course together actually," he confesses, hoping that would seem more normal than he'd convinced himself it wasn’t. 

To his surprise, Iris doesn't seem disturbed by his recollection of her, despite how large the student population was. On the contrary, she appears thoughtful. 

“What course was that?" she inquires. “I feel like I would have remembered you.”

At that, Barry's heart flutters. Why would she have remembered him? Would he have left a positive or less-than-stellar impression on her?

He decides to take his chance at answering that question, letting her make the judgement lest he torment himself further. 

"It was PSYC 100,” he explains. “I was pretty quiet in class, but I just-remember you always answering questions and leading discussions.”

That much was true, as it was the first time he had been made aware of her, in all her drive, intelligence, and beauty, but he leaves that part out.

"Hmmm," Iris considers, before perking up. "Well, I'm sorry that I can’t remember you, but all that means is that I get a second chance to get to know you now to remember you later, right?”

Barry blinks before an easy smile takes over his face. That was such a nice thing to say. It didn't surprise him that Iris was as sweet as she was beautiful. Maybe he had won the jackpot in being assigned to her for the chance to get to know her better. How else was he ever going to otherwise? Catching glimpses of her at random spots on campus? Reading her articles in the student paper? Clicking her profile on Facebook?

His optimism is short-lived though, as she tugs onto the belt of her robe, reminding him that she was completely nude underneath and that this situation was far from how he wanted to become more acquainted with her. 

"So," she bubbles. "Are you ready to start?”

There was no way he would ever be ready, but Barry has no choice but to brace himself and nod yes.

Wordlessly, and with such ease, as though she were alone, Iris slips her robe over her shoulders and lets it drop to the floor. Barry silently thanks whoever had placed the chair in the room in the spot it was at, otherwise he might have collapsed instead of stumble into it out of sheer mesmerization.

His throat goes dry as he takes her in fully, certain that any high score he earns for this assignment would rightfully be attributed to her rather than his technique. Alternatively, he could completely botch the entire thing due to an inability to keep his cool around such beauty.

He had known ever since he first laid eyes on her that she was beautiful, but nothing could have prepared him for just how exquisite she would be unveiled. The first thing he takes note of after her allure is how much more petite she seems nude. Without the enhancements of shoes or clothes, her true height is apparent. She has a chiseled collarbone that Barry isn’t sure he can sculpt with his charcoal. He had practiced drawing breasts of varying shapes and sizes from photographs over the course of the semester, but he’s never seen a pair suspended from a chest as gracefully as hers. As they make contact with the cool air, her nipples animate before his eyes, and he’s suddenly overcome with the thrill of the challenge in capturing their pebbling with a still image.  

His gaze follows the contour of her waist that gives way to her rounded hips, then her supple thighs, between them a matte of dark curls whose texture he’s already itching to replicate. Even her feet and hands strike him, despite weeks of browsing and sketching from photos upon photos of different human appendages.

His only regret in looking at her was that he was duplicating her in black, white, and grey, because he'd love nothing more than to paint the vivid brown of her skin or the soft pink of her lips. A portrait devoid of her coloring wasn’t an accurate representation of how commanding a subject she was.

Unfortunately, while his eyes recognize her beauty, so does his body, and he registers that his gaze upon her triggers his pulse, which prompts his own anatomy. 

Fuck.

Barry crosses his legs and clears his throat, setting his sketchbook on his lap. Thankfully, he snaps out of his daze the moment he does, because Iris had been trying to get his attention all while he was ogling her. 

"You alright?" she inquires. “You've been staring at me for a while now.”

Barry adds that to the growing list of ways he's been giving himself away today. 

"Oh, haha," he fumbles. “Sorry, just an artist thing. We tend to-study our subjects intently,” he bullshits. “You know, so that we can do the best job possible. It’s easy to get caught up sometimes, especially when they're beautiful-I mean, not beautiful-I mean, you ARE beautiful-”

Iris smirks. “Let’s get to it?”

Yes. The less he spoke the better.

"How do you want me to pose?" 

“Right.” Barry could deal with logistics. He rummages through his sketchbook, to show her a photograph of a figure sprawled across a couch, arms spread out carelessly above her, ankles slack beneath her. “This is the pose my professor wants us to recreate.”

“That’s a relief,” Iris breathes. “I was worried I was going to have to stand on my head or something.”

“No, no,” Barry assures her. “This is a beginners’ assignment, so he just wants us to get the hang of  structure and shading and proportions for now before we move on to more complicated poses.”

Iris settles down onto the couch and leans back, raising her wrists above her head so that they dangle off of the arm rest. Her legs follow suit on the sofa’s other end.

“Is this okay?”

Barry takes a deep breath. Seeing her spread out and on blatant display under quality lighting was even more glorious. His dick twitches at the vision.

“It's perfect,” he manages. 

He commences his sketching like he typically does, positioning vertical and horizontal lines in strategic locations on the page to scale the image. His next step is to lightly trace shapes to represent different body parts, but just as Barry puts his pencil tip to the paper to draw an oval, he hesitates. 

It doesn’t feel proper to craft a body as beautiful as Iris's from basic shapes. She’s too ethereal to arise from simple figures. Suddenly he wants to try to emulate her as intricately and as meticulously as he can, fashioning her from head to toe. It would take him longer than he’s used to, especially considering his "Flash" status, but he owes it to Iris to capture her as best he can, even if Caitlin isn’t going be too pleased with him. 

He hopes she’d studied enough for her exam later.

"Why are you taking out a fresh sheet of paper?" Iris wonders, a smile quirking her lips. “Am I harder to draw than you thought?”

You have no idea, Barry muses truthfully, but he’s also honest when he replies, "Wanna make sure I get you down in a way that does you justice.”

Iris's smile widens, and the image of her lounging elegantly while her eyes sparkle at him has his dick straining in his pants. He squeezes his thighs together tightly and does his best to concentrate on his work. 

“So, what year are you?" Iris asks, her tone singsongy. 

“I'm a sophomore," Barry answers, tracing an outline of her silhouette. 

“Me too!” she gushes. Barry tries not to let himself feel too roused at her enthusiasm. "Art major?"

Barry connects the ends of Iris’s profile together. 

“How’d you know?” he jokes, trying to make her laugh before self-consciously following his attempt to be funny with a, “You?” He was eager to know everything about her after all. 

"I'm undecided," Iris states. "But it's a toss between psychology and journalism." 

Barry bobs his head thoughtfully, now shading under the neck of his figure to highlight the angle of Iris’s chin. 

"Both valuable in their own right." 

"So is art," Iris remarks. "If only more people in the world thought so." 

“Yeah," Barry agrees, pleased that she not only was accepting of his studies, but critical of the society that wasn’t. "I actually have a career plan that’s more ‘practical' as they say, but even if I didn’t, I still would study art. It’s what I love.”

"And that's all that matters," Iris comments warmly, and Barry’s surprised to be more moved by her support and approval than he’s ever been by anyone else’s, even his parents and friends.

"I wish I were more artistically inclined,” she sighs. 

You are art, Barry wants to say, but instead he grasps another opportunity to compliment her. 

"Well, I wish I had your writing skills," he says, meaning it.

Iris perks up, shifting slightly. “You-read my articles?" she asks incredulously. “In the student paper?”

“Ahhh wait-can you go back to how you were,” Barry snickers, finding her excitement endearingly adorable.

“Oops, sorry about that.” Iris settles back into her pose. "I just can’t believe that people actually read what I write in CCU Local. I love researching and reporting, but I was worried about joining the paper here because CCU's journalism program isn't all that. That's why i'm also considering psychology.”

"I think you have potential in either subject," Barry declares sincerely. “I remember how passionate you seemed in class and I’ve read how thorough your articles are. You have a way with words."

“Thanks,” Iris beams. “It's really nice to know that someone out there is reading my stuff.” 

It falls silent momentarily, and his drawing exerts its relaxing properties on Barry. He finds himself consumed by his piece enough for his initial nerves to ease. The bulge between his legs is still there, but thankfully, isn't as bothersome as it first had been. He'd probably take care of it once he got back to his dorm because as much as he hates to admit it, the tension in his body at the sight of hers is too good not to release.

He’s actually almost done sketching her body so that he’ll be able to progress to her face, surprised at how long it’s taken him to get her down on paper compared to his usual pace, but Iris was deserving of all his attention and effort when it came to her details, from her dainty ankles to the grains of her brows and everything in between.

"I'm surprised I'm not sick of this yet," Iris giggles. “Usually I start to get restless after half an hour, but it's been fun talking to you and watching you work.”

Barry tries not to let that get to his head, particularly the part about watching him. 

"How long have you been working as a figure model?” he asks, hoping to deflect the conversation from himself and exhibit a collected manner. 

"This is only my second semester doing it.”

“Do you like it?” he continues, genuinely curious. 

Iris shrugs. “I guess? It's a side gig that earns me some extra money. You know how crazy expensive this school is.”

Barry nods sympathetically, recognizing that probably nothing could unite him and Iris like the burden of college tuition could. 

“Are you-shy about it?” he wonders, unable to help himself. 

“Not really,” Iris replies practically. “I was a little bit when I first started, but you get used to it the more you do it.”

“That makes sense.”

Iris studies him carefully: “You should think about modeling.”

“Me?” he exclaims, pausing from his work to stare at her, bewildered. “I don’t think I could.”  

“Why not?” Iris challenges. 

“I’d be way too nervous,” he snickers. It was true: he didn't think he could ever possess the valor to strip down naked and be scrutinized. 

“You really do get used to it,” she promises, “but I understand, it’s not for everyone.”

“Yeah,” Barry agrees, seizing the opportunity for humor. “It’s for the better though cause I don't think anyone would be too excited to have to draw me,” he jokes. 

“But you’re beautiful,” Iris says simply. 

Barry nearly ruins his sketch with the jerk of his wrist, his face heating dangerously. Of all the possible responses she could have offered, that was the absolute least one he expected. In fact, it never even would have crossed his mind. 

“Uhhh-thanks, that is-that’s really nice of you to say,” he stutters, knowing his blush was deepening with each word he uttered. “Especially when you yourself look-like that…”

His brain finally figures it’s better to just shut up and his mouth follows suit. He swallows to get a hold of himself, his heart pounding in his ears as he erases the stray mark on the paper with what he hopes is subtlety. If he didn't know any better he would think that Iris was grinning slyly at him, but he doesn't want to consider what those implications could be. She was most likely just teasing him anyway. 

It’s time now for him to draw her face, so he sighs and gets straight to it, knowing this would be the most challenging part of the session. Copying faces was always more difficult for him than anything else, and at the task of duplicating one like Iris’s, he was intimidated even further.

“Okay so, I don’t mean to be commanding or anything, but I’m working on your face now, so I’ll need you to hold a steady expression, which means-”

“No talking?” Iris guesses.

“No talking,” Barry laughs nervously. Perhaps this was better for his sake as well as the the drawing’s. 

“Got it.”

Once silence permeates the studio though, Barry wishes that they could still talk. In the absence of their casual conversation, the setting and situation suddenly take an intimately private turn from the academic, given her nudity, his attraction to her, and her possibly reciprocated attraction to him (???). The atmosphere becomes too muted for his liking, too charged. Most fraught and suggestive of all is how she bores into his soul with that piercing smolder of hers that he has no choice but to keep looking into, not even just briefly, but requiring his fixed attention, as he has to replicate it as best he can. Without being able to speak, their eyes seem to carry on an exchange of their own, one devoid of words and laden with something else. 

He prays desperately that she's oblivious to the reddening of his cheeks because he senses them burning up again as his focus alternates from her face to the page and back again as he crafts the apex of her chin, the bow of her mouth, the circle of her nose. He attempts to animate the zeal in her eyes, the wisp of her lashes, the purse of her brows…

God, she was gorgeous, and this was turning out to be one of his best pieces, perhaps his best simply because she was so. 

He tries not to each time he glances up at her, but when he studies her lips, he contemplates kissing them, and when he studies her nostrils, he pictures their flare in pleasure, and when he studies her pupils, he imagines them gleaming at him with want-

Barry releases a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been suppressing at the tension accompanying his overwhelming eye contact with her.

“All done.”

“Already?” Iris queries.

“That’s actually the longest I’ve ever taken,” Barry chuckles. “I’m usually much quicker, but…”

“But?” Iris probes. 

“But…I guess I wanted to take my time,” he says, his gaze directly on hers.

Iris blinks at him before sitting up slowly, making her way toward his chair. He notices she doesn’t fetch her robe to wear again.

“Can I see it?” 

He inhales sharply at her towering over him, but tilts his sketchbook so that she can see her portrait. 

“Wow,” she marvels, drawing her own breath in. “It’s beautiful.” 

“You are,” he agrees, subdued.

Their eyes meet, voluntarily this time. Barry feels a bit lightheaded at her proximity, all the nerves he had repressed materializing. Now that he didn’t have his assignment to occupy him, he was gradually slipping back into his daze at the vision of her.

“Can I-use this for my portfolio?” he asks, somewhat to calm himself and somewhat because he really did want to know if he could.

“Of course,” Iris urges, still seemingly stunned over how well he had done. “People need to see how talented you are.” 

“Its all you,” he insists to her once more.

He doesn’t think he can stand being in her presence any longer, not especially with her still naked, making no attempt to dress, and watching him carefully. The crotch of his jeans starts to constrict again.

Barry stands abruptly. 

“We’d better get going,” he announces, hoping this might prompt her to at least put her robe back on.

Iris continues studying him, as if he hadn’t said anything.

“My TA is waiting for us,” Barry tries anew, using Caitlin as a convenient excuse despite not having been considerate of her earlier. “She has an exam later.” 

Still, Iris doesn’t acknowledge what he’s said. Barry shivers, breaking out into a sweat. There was no sketchbook to save him this time, no diversion he could employ. There was only her standing before him in all her glory, refusing to take her eyes off of him. 

“I signed a form that said I would remain professional throughout the entire session,” Barry offers one last time, his last-ditch effort to prevent what his physiology was readying him for.

That finally elicits a response from Iris.

“So did I,” she whispers, and then she’s on him, and any coherent notion outside of her flees Barry. 

He doesn’t know why he stood from the chair in the first place, since Iris was just going to thrust him back into it, kissing him fiercely as she did. Barry makes a noise he’s never made before, startling himself at how helpless he sounds, but it’s fitting considering he’s never lacked defense like this. 

Then again, did he really expect Iris West to not be a force of her own?

“Iris,” he breathes, powerless beneath her as she sucks on his lips in a frenzy. “Iris-God-” 

She bites him at his pulse point, having moved onto his throat, and Barry thinks he might meet God right then and there, wonders if he’s going to make it out of the studio alive. 

Iris surfaces, but not to go any kind of easy on him.

“Let’s make this an even playing field, no?” she coaxes, lifting the hem of his tee past his navel. 

He doubts his own nudity could repair the imbalance between them, but he lets her strip him of his shirt nonetheless. 

“Wish I could trace these on paper,” she huffs, grazing his freckles with her fingertips. Apparently, not being able to fulfill her wish wasn’t going to stop Iris from trying to, and she bends her neck to lick a path across his chest from mole to mole. 

Barry jerks underneath her tongue, at the mercy of her ministrations. 

“Didn’t you-say you wanted an even playing field?” he manages to get out before shuddering at her wet kisses to his skin. 

A cunning smile takes over Iris’s face, and Barry questions if he just signed his death waiver. 

“You’re right,” Iris smirks, fixating on his groin: “We need balance.” 

Before he can prepare himself, she has his fly open in an instant and her palm around his erection.

“This has been ready for me for a while, hasn’t it?” Iris purrs in his ear. Barry swells even further in her hand, his own way of confessing that, indeed, it had.

She wastes no time wrestling his jeans down to his knees. He kicks them off his feet for her, figuring it was the least he could do. There’s already a dark spot expanding through his shorts, seeping outward as if she needed further proof, and if that wasn’t enough, his springing free at her tugging was the last credence.

She eyes his dick hungrily. 

“You ever try to draw this beauty?” she murmurs, wrapping her fingers around him. 

Barry squeezes his eyes shut, hoping he’ll delay the inevitable. 

“No,” he musters, his legs trembling with anticipation. 

Iris laughs. 

“Relax, I’m not going to let you come like this,” she promises, though she rubs his shaft until his head tilts and his jaw drops, all his control forsaken.  

“I just want to treat you like you treated me, to convince you that you’re beautiful,” she tempts. “Like you’re something to be worshipped, something to be admired, something like art…”   

Her voice drops several octaves as she stills her wrist: “Besides, there’s no way this cock is coming anywhere but inside me.” 

“I told you you have a way with words,” Barry manages to choke out, his hips seeking out her movements again while she giggles at his desperation. “But I hate to break it to you-I don’t have a condom.”

Iris actually swears in frustration, apparently choosing to express her dissatisfaction with him by kissing him furiously. Barry recognizes the chance to finally get on equal footing with her. He manages to get her hands off him and pry her own thighs apart, figuring he should apologize for his lack of protection. 

“What are you-hunnnh…” Her mouth parts to break their kiss as he makes bare contact with her skin, his finger passing where she protrudes most.

Barry swears he can only see the white in her eyes before they close, answering to his fingers on her. He spreads her, already dripping impatience, and strokes her like she’s velvet, up and down the curvature of her, around and between the flesh of her, in and out of the cleft of her. 

“Of course you’re good with your hands,” she rasps, her pelvis surging forward, her depraved attempt to to parallel his touch.

“Only when they have a good subject,” he entices her, getting the hang of her game, and he can tell it’s working because she mewls appreciatively. While his fingers soothe her, he licks the skin under her breasts, just at the line where they started, hoping to rival her even further. He’d outlined them in pencil as best he could, but nothing he had created could come close to her texture beneath his tongue, her flush nipples between his lips. 

The fingers fondling her were now coated down to his knuckles.

“Wait,” she breathes, still feverishly grinding into his hand. “Wait-I want your cock.” 

“But-”

She doesn’t give him the chance to finish because before he knows it, her palm is squeezing the head of him against her. 

“Iris,” he sighs, because the feeling is divine, “I wasn’t lying-I don’t have-” 

“It’s okay,” she gasps, sliding up and down until her cunt opens around the length of him, his shaft locked in the thick of her folds. “Just-do like this…”

And they do just that, Iris rolling into him and Barry bucking into her, exchanging breath to whine and moan together, comprising their own unique chorus. She worries him in between her folds, seesawing up and down his cock, and Barry watches her through half-lidded eyes, knowing that no artist could ever capture the image of her like this arching against him, pressing into him, her breasts moving in rhythm to her panting. Perhaps his whole study of art, maybe even the entirety of its discipline and its practice was futile for this reason alone. 

Just when Barry thinks he can no longer hold out, Iris thrusts forward so that the tip of him aligns with clit. She rubs against his skin one more time until she spasms around him, the sensation so sublime that he in turn shoots upward once, twice, and finally for a third time before trickling back onto the floor.  

Barry lays slack against the chair, astounded at what had just occurred. He couldn’t believe he walked into the studio an hour ago to complete an assignment only to be reduced to a post-orgasmic state with Iris West buried into his shoulder. 

“What-just happened?” he vocalizes, because he feels like he needs confirmation that this is real. 

Iris giggles against him. 

“We made a mess,” she jokes, glancing down at the tile. 

Barry tilts his head back to study her, wondering if she had any regrets about what they had done, but when he finds her beaming down at him, it’s hard to stop his mouth from twisting into a slow, satisfied smile, mirroring her own.

“That was-”

“I know,” Iris agrees, making no attempt to conceal her suggestive grin or the lewd wiggle of her brows. 

Barry’s smile takes on a playful hue of its own. “Aren’t you a writer?” he teases. “Shouldn’t you be able to describe what that was?”

“Yeah, well, some things render you speechless,” she replies haughtily, eyeing his lips before bending forward to take them in her own. Barry smirks at her wit, opening his mouth to accept her kiss-

A pounding on the door startles them apart.

“What are you two still doing in there?!” Caitlin’s muffled voice demands. “I’m going to be late for my exam!” 

It’s then that Barry realizes he very likely may have just lost his chance to earn an A on this assignment, but as he and Iris chuckle together and dress each other, all he can conclude is that she had absolutely been worth it. 

Author’s notes: This is only my second AU, and again, Barry is an artist 😂 @cygnetofthesea asked if I could do this literally months ago. I don’t typically do prompts (probably because they take me that long loll), but I did give this one a shot. I hate my ending, as usual, but I hope you enjoyed! 

#westallen #westallen fic #alternate universe #AU #my writing #course credit

[leesaleslie-blog]

Adult Education byAntonio_y_Cleopatra

Can there be a fun, romantic, and relaxed way to push the sexual boundaries? Sure there can! You just need the right partner and a lot of time... * "I bet he wants your ass, too. Men always think women want that, and they never do." I watched the other ladies in the group laugh or look down. That was Jennifer talking, and she was teasing Jackie about her boyfriend, whom Jackie described as "pretty adventurous in bed." "What do you think, Eric?" Amy's eyes challenged mine as I snapped over to her. "I think I'm smart enough to stay out of this conversation," I replied, to a couple of giggles from the ladies. "Well that's the nice, safe, boring answer," Amy chided. "You won't tell us what you think?" "OK, I'll take the bait. Like anything sexual, I think it depends on the woman. Some would never do it, some put up with it for their partners, and some really enjoy it." "And I suppose you have the magic touch to make them enjoy it?" Jennifer's sarcasm dripped out. "I never said anything about me. Heck, you can read about this if you want. They've surveyed a lot of women about this, like everything else." "So what about you?" Amy again, her eyes sparkling. "When did this become a discussion of my sex life?" "You've got a group of women here, talking about sex with you, and you're backing down? Hello? Is there any red blood in there?" "Yes!" I blurted out—Amy had got me. "I know they can enjoy it from personal experience. I don't kiss and tell, so I'm not going to reveal who, but I absolutely know that at least one woman can have extremely powerful, soul-crashing orgasms that way." "And you're so sure about that? And that she wanted it?" Jennifer again. "When she puts a bottle of lube in your lap and hooks her finger at you while she sashays to the bedroom, I think it's safe to say she wants it. As for the orgasm part, it's more the involuntary side that I picked up on. Tremors, spasms, and all that. She wasn't in control of herself." "And you didn't marry her for life?" Amy gave me a theatrical look of disbelief. "Very funny," I said. "It would be great if sex were the only aspect of a relationship. We were great in the sack, but there were other issues. It didn't work out in the long run." "A guy admits that there's more to a relationship than sex?" Jackie quipped. "I didn't know that happened." The other ladies laughed while I rolled my eyes. I looked over at Amy. "So I've spilled a bit, Lady. I'm not going to keep up a one-way conversation." "Fair enough," she said, laughing. "I'll just say that I haven't done it, but I try to keep an open mind on things sexual." "Whoa. Maybe we've got another adventurous soul in the sack!" Karen observed. Amy just stuck her tongue out. "Speaking of relationships, you and Lisa have been split for several months now, right?" Jennifer asked me, changing the subject. "How come you aren't hooked up with some new babe?" "I try to avoid the rebound thing. That usually leads to regret. Why, you want to hook up? Probably enough time has passed for me." I wanted to get a barb in at Jennifer. "In your dreams, stud," she said, rolling her eyes while the other ladies laughed. They continued to a discussion of boyfriends and prospects, with a lot of laughs and catcalls. I joined in the fun. After another half hour or so, Jackie looked down. "Look's like it's time for me to go. Got to get ready for tonight." "I'll bet, with your adventurous boyfriend," Jennifer commented. "Come on, girls. We should give Amy and Eric a chance to clean up. By the way, Eric, that's very nice of you to help Amy with this little afternoon party." "I'm hoping you spread this story around with the ladies. I can start with a good reputation, and coast for a while in my usual lazy, self-centered way." That got a few more laughs and teases as everyone picked up their things and said goodbye. Most of the other folks had left an hour or so ago. Amy had done a good job inviting a co-ed mixture, and the party had gone well. She was right—an afternoon party got a lot more folks to come, since they could make evening plans as well. "Ready to help with the dishes? By the way, thanks so much for co-hosting," Amy said. "Anytime, Amy. Let's do it." Amy had been a good friend of my girlfriend Lisa, and we continued the friendship with each other after Lisa left. We both felt the loss when Lisa moved away, but the job opportunity had been perfect for her. Lisa and I both knew that we didn't have enough going for her to stay or for me to relocate with her. Lisa had told me that I should go after Amy, but it felt a little weird to hit up on a friend of my ex-girlfriend. Amy and I lived in the same condo building, so we saw each other a lot. "Soul-crashing orgasms, huh?" I noticed how close together we were at the sink. The dishes became a little harder to hold. "Uh-oh. Not my sex life again," I replied, groping for something to say. "Hey, maybe I'm trying to help," she said. "I've got a friend who's mentioned that she wanted to try anal sex some day. Should I hook the two of you up?" I shook my head. "I know it sounds crazy that I'm not jumping at the chance to get some girl's ass, but you have to understand how I operate. I only have fun in the sack if the girl is having a great time herself." "Who says she won't have fun?" "It's not as simple as just pushing inside and having her swoon with pleasure. That may be what porn movies show, but it doesn't work that way in real life. While she may endure it and eventually come to enjoy it, chances are it will just be a horrible experience. For me, anal sex is something that comes after a lot of trust and history have built up. Both partners need to be comfortable with many other forms of sex together, and the lady has to have learned how to relax and receive pleasure from that part of her body. Finally, she's sharing a verypersonal, private part of herself, so she needs to completely trust her partner. If all those ingredients come together, it can be pretty amazing, and she has a good chance of loving it. On the other hand, it's just not something to check off in a hook-up." "Sounds like a very mature outlook, Eric. Or are you just looking for a package deal—you know—guaranteed sex for a while?" I laughed. "I think you got me there. I'm a package deal kind of guy. Now, if she's interested in that type of thing, maybe we should talk. I'm certainly not against it, and you generally have great friends. I'm not a big condom guy, so make sure you ask about getting tested, so she can rest her mind about that aspect of things. It's all about relaxing and having fun." "Sounds right. I'll look into it," Amy said. "You'll be a lucky man if she says yes." "No doubt. Now, if you keep talking like this, I'm going to have to get an apron on." Amy laughed her deep, rich laugh. She enjoyed teasing and having fun with people. "OK, I'll let you off the hook for a while. Let's get the chairs and everything off the deck." We did that, chatting about other things. Amy didn't show any sign that we had been discussing intimate subjects just a few minutes before. She moved gracefully through her house, her blonde hair swishing between her shoulders. Many times, I had noticed her combination of tight body and curves in all the right places. With Lisa in the picture, I had been more discrete, but now I enjoyed having a friend so easy on the eyes. I fell silent while I admired her. "What are you thinking?" Busted. Amy always seemed to pick up on what I was thinking, and she loved putting me on the spot. For someone who had a reputation as a great friend and all-around nice person, Amy kept me on my toes. "I think it might fall into the category of too much information. What are youthinking?" I said, trying to turn the tables. Amy gave me a long look with her piercing blue eyes. "I think it falls into the same category," she said. "Let's fold up these tablecloths." We got the last one folded. I put it on top of the others. Neither of us had said a thing. "Eric." My eyes snapped back to her. She stood there, beautiful. "Yes?" "I didn't give you the full story before, with my friend. Yes, we have discussed her interest in back door sex. But I wasn't asking for her when I talked to you." Suddenly, a lightheaded feeling coursed through me. "Uh, you weren't?" I asked lamely. She smiled, looking straight into my eyes. "No, Eric. Your story sounded pretty good, and I was really asking for myself. If you're interested, let me know." Time stopped. I'm sure I looked stunned. Then my brain got back in gear. My heart was hammering. "I'd love to!" I blurted out. I was still trying to comprehend what was going on, but some part of me knew to answer with enthusiasm. "I mean, whenever you would want to." Amy laughed. "I'll take that for a yes, silly boy. So how should we get started?" "With a hug and a kiss," I whispered, moving close to her. I took her in my arms. "Wow, Amy, you've left me speechless." "You don't have to say anything," she whispered, catching my lips with hers. When our lips connected, something clicked inside, and I realized how much Amy had attracted me all along. I wanted to be more than friends, much more. I could feel the same waves coming off of her. Our kiss heated up. Finally, we separated, both a little breathless. "Amy, you kiss fantastic." "Thank you. I figured you were a good kisser, too, and I was right," she said. "I think we'll work out together. Now, I like your idea about testing, even if it slows us down for a while. If we hurry today, we may still have time." "Lead on, Lady," I said. "Do you know a place?" "I think I've seen one, but I'm going to check online. Just a sec." Amy pulled out her phone, concentrating. After a minute or so, she made a call. "We've got an hour before closing. Let's go—I'll drive." My mind was still in a whirl while we drove down there. A lot had happened since I woke up this morning. "Eric, thanks for doing this," Amy casually remarked as she drove. "Amy, I don't think you need to thank me." "Any guy is lucky just to be with me, huh?" "Something like that." Amy laughed. "So, you might be interested in dinner? Part of that 'getting to know each other' thing you were talking about?" "I'd love to, Amy." "Good. Let's plan on it. Maybe we can walk down along the river and then look for something." "Good idea. We can walk up an appetite." We found the clinic and parked. As Amy walked in, I noticed some of the subtle looks she was getting. Both men and women checked her out, and I saw the admiration in their faces. She had a girl-next-door look of shirt, skirt, and sandals, but they fit her curves just right. They looked at me, too, and I caught their faint smiles as they realized what we were doing together at the clinic. We finished and drove over to the river. I took her hand as we started walking. She squeezed back, a smile on her face. "Glad the testing part is over," Amy said a few minutes later. "But, Eric, I appreciate it. You're a great guy. It will be a long week." "If we're creative, we might be able to work on getting a little closer without getting too intimate." "What are you thinking?" she asked, turning to me. "Let's see how the evening plays out," I replied, "and then we'll discuss it." "A little mystery for me to think about?" "Exactly." Amy gave me another of her looks, shaking her head and smiling to herself. We walked on, just enjoying being together. I was walking on a cloud. "Remember when we'd bike with Lisa?" Amy said as she saw some bikes go by. "Yeah, I miss that. You still interested?" "I am. I try to stay in shape, and it's fun to do things together. I run with my friends, but I enjoy biking, hiking, and other things, too." "Let's plan on it." I said. "How about tomorrow?" "Great." Amy squeezed my hand again. "So what type of food do you like?" "As you mentioned in another context, I try to stay open-minded." That got a snort from Amy. "Like to play with fire, huh?" she challenged. "Can't help it." Amy laughed again. "I guess I can't blame you. I like to play myself." "Now to answer your question, I like anything prepared well. So if you have a favorite, let's do it." "I'm the same. Why don't we stroll around, check the menus, and see what catches our eye?" "Perfect. I'm having fun." "Me, too, Eric." Amy squeezed my hand again. We found a seafood place tucked around a corner with a nice outdoor area. I had been before and really liked it. We kicked back with a bottle of Chardonnay, talking about all kinds of things. I had always liked talking to Amy. She combined wit and humor with a playful, curious attitude. "Excuse me, Eric. I'd like to wash up before the food comes." "Of course." I got up and held her chair. "Such a gentleman. Thank you." Amy left her phone and purse on the table, so I didn't go with her. I took the chance to check out her ass while she sauntered away from the table. It was everything I remembered—rounded and tight. She suddenly turned her head, caught me looking, and smiled to herself before disappearing around the corner. It was my turn to smile, thinking how Amy kept a wicked side carefully wrapped in her fresh, girl-next-door exterior. I got cleaned up myself and then we enjoyed a great meal of seafood, wine, some salad, and crusty bread. We both ordered somewhat light, not wanting to slow ourselves down. "Fantastic dinner, Amy. Thanks for asking." "My pleasure," she replied. "Shall we head back?" "I think that's a great idea," I answered, as my cock started to swell. We walked hand-in-hand back to Amy's car and then drove back to our building, continuing to talk about all sorts of things. As we were getting close, Amy turned to me. "I don't know exactly what you have in mind, Eric, but if it involves us being together, perhaps you'd like to grab your toothbrush and spend the night?" "Great idea. I'd like that," I replied. I never liked having sex and then going to sleep alone. In a flash of insight, it suddenly hit me that Amy knew a lot about me. Lisa had liked the fact that I spent the night, and I'm sure she mentioned it to Amy. I wondered what else she had mentioned. I looked over at Amy as she seemed to study the road. It felt like she knew what I was thinking. Amy parked and took my hand as we walked to my place together. Amy had a little smile on her face as she put me on the spot again. She had managed to invite herself in without any preparation from me. "Nice try, but I've got my place decent. Didn't know if anyone would stop by afterward." Amy looked up, all innocent. I laughed and got just the barest hint of a smile in return. She followed me into my place, pretending to stay close as she got to check out my drawers and cabinets. I grabbed a set of morning clothes and a few toiletries. When I went to the nightstand to get a bottle of massage oil, she briefly raised her eyebrows, but never said a word. "I think I've got everything," I said as I moved to the door. Amy took my hand again. "Sure?" "I've got you, and that's the main thing," I replied. "You say such the prettiest things," she said as she batted her eyes. "Let's go." We walked over to her place and she let us in. Locking the door behind her, she leaned back against it, as if to say I've got you all to myself now. "Why don't you put your things in the other bedroom," she directed. "Then we can talk about what you have in mind." "Got you wondering?" "Bedroom's around the corner, or don't you remember?" I laughed and moved on. I heard Amy's sink running, so I took the opportunity to brush my teeth as well. When I walked out, she caught me in her arms. In the split second before we hugged close, I thought I caught a little more definition in her nipples. "Yes—wondering," she said simply, looking up at me. "OK. Well, we can definitely kiss and hold each other. That felt really good before. But the fact that we can't touch each other in certain places doesn't mean we can't have an orgasm at some point, does it?" I watched her take that in. Her eyes got wide. "You are a wicked little boy, aren't you?" she whispered. "Definitely. You'll have to admit that we will know each other a lot better afterward." "I'll say. I haven't played with myself for very many people." I wonder how many—Amy's definitely my type, I thought to myself. "After we kiss for a while, I was figuring we could move to your bed and I would give you a massage. When the time's right, you can touch yourself." "While you get to watch everything." "Yes. It's going to be totally hot," I replied. "You think?" Amy shot back. "I get this. You're helping me share my secrets. Pretty clever." I nodded. "Anything to help a friend." "Right," Amy drawled. "Thanks for being so considerate." "You are so welcome," I answered. "I may not last long when you return the favor." "So I get to watch, too?" "Amy, we will do everything together. Part of building trust is that you will be getting to know my body as well." "All of it?" "All of it." "I can live with that. In fact, I like it a lot. OK, I'll go along with your little plan." Her eyes flashed. "You're a lucky guy, Eric. Just remember that." I pulled her close. "I won't forget." I caught her lips again. We stood close and shared the gift of kissing. When we took a breath, she took my hand and led me to the sofa, kicking her sandals off and pulling me down beside her. Her hands wandered along my legs and chest, so I moved mine a little further. I teased her for a long time before I finally cupped a breast. She was nearly pushing her chest into my hands. "Ohhhhhhhh. Finally. You are a tease," she whispered. I chuckled against her lips as I gently played with her chest. I liked what I felt under her shirt—I guessed a nice, full B-cup. Exactly what would fit the rest of her athletic build. Her nipples stood out and brushed against my hands as her breath got hot. "Let's try that massage," she said, a little impatient. "Perfect," I answered. Amy got up and took my hand again. She led me into the other bedroom, grabbed the massage oil, and then led me into her room. She went to one side of the bed, and I helped her turn it down from the other side. "A towel to lie on might help," I suggested. "Good idea." Amy disappeared into her bathroom and came out with a bath towel. We arranged it on the bed, and then she moved to the end. "Come here," she whispered, crooking a finger at me. We joined for another smoldering kiss, our hands wandering up and down each other's backs. As she heated up again, Amy moved her fingers to my front and started unbuttoning my shirt. She slid it off me and then raised her arms, inviting me to pull her top off. I slid it gently over her head, and then caught my breath. "Wow, you are beautiful," I sighed. Her breasts stood firm, crowned with hard nipples just begging to be sucked. Amy smiled. "Just wait for when I can really get you to myself. You are so lost, little boy." I smiled back. "I can't wait." "Now, are you just going to stand there with your tongue hanging out, or are you going to get my skirt off too?" "As you wish, madam." I found her zipper and carefully worked it down, sliding her skirt down her legs and off. Standing back up, I took in her figure, wearing only a sheer pair of pink panties. "Your turn," she said, undoing my belt and sliding the zipper carefully around my straining cock. "A little excited, huh?"

[travllingbunny]

The 100 rewatch: 2x14 Bodyguard of Lies

A solid episode that focuses on a small number of character interactions and some action scenes and sets up the climax of the season, the two-part finale. I’ve only realized on this rewatch what is unusual about 2x14: half of the main characters don’t appear in it. There is no Abby or Kane, no Jasper, Monty or any of the Delinquents in Mount Weather, and no Lincoln, even though he’s somewhere around the camp of the joint Grounder/Arker army, which is one of the few locations this episode focuses on.

According to The 100 wiki, the title comes from a quote by Winston Churchill (dude really had a way with words, his various quotes have been used in the pop culture quite a bit): "In wartime, truth is so precious that she must often be attended by a bodyguard of lies." In other words, sorry peeps, but we leaders feel we need to lie to you and deceive you and we justify that by “It is war”. In this case, it’s Lexa and Clarke trying to hide the fact they knew about the bombing of Tondc and didn’t warn anyone, and dealing (in very different ways) the potential problem posed by Octavia figuring out what happened. This storyline is focused on the relationship between Clarke and Lexa, which undergoes some development including Lexa explicitly showing her romantic interest in Clarke for the first time, and between Clarke and Octavia, which has, unsurprisingly, seriously deteriorated. Meanwhile, Bellamy’s plot is about his attempts to disable the acid fog, which is crucial for the war against Mount Weather. Raven is helping Bellamy talking to him by radio, and also gets an opportunity for a new relationship and maybe also start moving on from Finn (or maybe not). And there’s some more movement in the B plot with Jaha’s and Murphy’s journey.

Rating: 9/10

I feel like this episode more or less encapsulates the main features of the overall dynamic between Clarke and Lexa: Lexa really wants Clarke, loves the idea of the two of them as natural born leaders who are just right for each other because they’re the same (in her mind) and tries to make Clarke more like herself (aka the type of leader she thinks is the best, ruthless and without “weaknesses” like compassion), but at the same time is torn between going for it and doing the “I’m the strong unemotional leader” thing; Clarke is drawn to/intrigued by Lexa, but not sure if she would like to pursue anything, and most of the time her mind is elsewhere, too distracted by thinking about the fates of her people – those she’s been doing everything for all this time – and above all, she needs Lexa’s support to save her people, but also has to spend most of her energy on getting Lexa to use less violent and murdery methods, and not do things such as kill Clarke’s friends. This time, the episode largely revolves around the issue of whether Octavia is going to tell people the truth about Tondc, which could result in the alliance falling apart (and I’m guessing that’s not just about the alliance between Arkers and Grounders – I doubt that leaders of other Grounder clans would be happy to know that Lexa let a bomb drop on them without warning them). Clarke’s solution was to try to convince Octavia not to say anything, while Lexa’s solution was to have her murdered by one of her bodyguards.

But that’s getting ahead. At the start of this episode, when we see Clarke and Lexa discussing the war, Clarke was, once again, pacing and loudly worrying about Bellamy, as she has been almost constantly since he went to Mount Weather. I already thought in 1x10 Lexa was noticing the way Clarke talks about Bellamy, but now the subtext has become text, as she starts questioning her about her feelings, trying to assess the competition:

Lexa: “You care about him”

Clarke: “I care about all of them.”

Lexa: “But you worry about him more.”

But Clarke is not ready to admit that – I’m not sure how much she’s even ready to face up that herself at this point, but she’s certainly not ready to admit that aloud to others, so she starts explaining it all by Bellamy’s importance to the survival of the entire group. (It’s kind of like when Bellamy is repeating “We need Clarke” in 3x02). I don’t think Lexa looks all that convinced, and I’m not sure that yet another one of Clarke’s constant speeches about how awesome Bellamy is, is helping convince her, or me. But it seems there’s a sizable portion of the audience who totally bought it and is convinced that there was absolutely nothing between Clarke and Bellamy other than work partnership feelings, and these really unsubtle hints to the contrary didn’t mean a thing.

Lexa replies by lecturing Clarke once again about leadership, telling her that she is born to be a leader just as she was, and that she could be an awesome leader who will be able to inspire people and ask them to die for her. It’s not surprising that this is how she thinks of leadership – she was treated all her life as someone who’s above mere mortals due to a special bloodline, had to fight and kill some other kids, and became an absolute ruler as a child, and I’m sure she thinks she’s doing something really good for Clarke when she’s telling her that they’re both special and above everyone else and that she needs to treat her “subjects” as expendable. Clarke is, fortunately, unimpressed.

Clarke’s and Octavia’s relationship becomes really strained at this point, to put it mildly, since Octavia makes it clear that she’s figured out the truth about Tondc, and tells Clarke exactly how she feels about it. Clarke is again on the defensive, as with Abby before, trying to explain her reasons – protecting Bellamy, winning the war - but obviously feeling guilty. Octavia doesn’t accept her reasons even after Clarke brings up Bellamy, pointing out the fact that Bellamy would never want that and would prefer to find another way – which I’m sure Clarke is well aware of, but she replies: “I couldn’t take that risk”. (In contrast to what she said in 2x09 when she told Bellamy he should go to Mount Weather, revoking her former objection based on the risk to his life: “I was being weak… It is worth the risk”.) Octavia is unimpressed, especially since Clarke kind of left her to die, tells her she doesn’t take her orders (which is the third time one of Clarke’s friends have told her that this season – after Bellamy and Raven), accuses Clarke of giving herself the right to decide who lives or dies, and as the ultimate insult/accusation, compares Clarke to the leadership on the Ark: “You’d fit right in the Council”. (The prospect of becoming just like the people she resented and who executed her father, is something that will haunt Clarke in season 4, too.) Octavia tells Clarke she won’t say anything because of winning the war, but that they’re done being friends.

As Octavia later finds out, she’s not the only one who’s figured out the truth: Indra has already been aware of it, but she’s OK with it and still loyal to the Commander, she has Lexa did what she had to do, blames only the Mountain Men for all the deaths, and she thinks “Lexa is a great commander because she’s ruthless.” Questionable whether that’s a trait of a good leader or not, but that’s one way to look at it. “That’s why we’re going to win this war”. Or not.

Clarke goes on to save Octavia’s life – without Octavia even knowing – when she realizes what’s going on and stops Lexa’s bodyguard from murdering Octavia, and then goes on to confront Lexa and convince her to stop trying to kill her, and that she guarantees for Octavia, because Octavia will not do anything to endanger her brother, because he is the most important thing to her in the world. (There is no bigger believer in the strength of the Blake sibling relationship than Clarke.) It’s kind of funny when Clarke tells Lexa: “You can’t kill everyone you don’t trust!” and Lexa replies “Actually, I can”.  But Clarke is really angry and also has been fed up with Lexa’s “Love is weakness” lectures, and maybe also because Lexa was questioning her about her feelings before, so she goes on the offensive and tells Lexa that she’s just pretending, mentions Gustus and Costia as examples that Lexa has feelings, and tells her that emotions are not a weakness, but that Lexa has feelings but is weak for trying to deny them. It’s good to see Clarke take an upper hand, though maybe the scene is a bit too on the nose, by making this visually explicit by Clarke getting into Lexa’s face and Lexa literally retreating and having her back against the wall.

Lexa feels calls out and has a vulnerable moment when she basically admits that she has feelings for Clarke, by replying that she didn’t let everyone die in the bombs: “Not everyone… not you.” Which seems to take Clarke aback. Now, I’m guessing this was supposed to mean “I would not have let you die” (though it’s exactly what she does in 2x15) – because it’s not like Lexa saved Clarke’s life there, Clarke was the one who warned her about the missile. But be that as it may, it is kind of messed up to imply “You are the one person not expendable to me, I can’t let you die, but that doesn’t apply to everyone else, like your friends and family”. I’ve said before that Lexa is Clarke’s “Shadow” character, and this fits right into that, because there’s a parallel to the way Clarke was protecting Bellamy but let his sister almost die – and this is something that she does consciously in 4x10/4x11.

The dialogue between Clarke and Lexa in this episode about what real strength is, and what life should be about, is really interesting, and Clarke has one of those memorable lines that get callbacks throughout the show: “Maybe life should be about more than just surviving. Don't we deserve better than that?”

Which prompts Lexa to make her decision in her “love – yes or no?” dilemma, and kiss Clarke for the first time. This kiss seems to have overshadowed everything else in the popular consciousness – probably because canon f/f romances on US network TV were still not that common in 2015? I’m pretty sure there were less uncommon on cable, and these days they’re not uncommon on CW, either, but this must have been a big thing at the time. What I like about this is the casual way that this scene revealed both Clarke’s bisexuality, and the fact that people in the universe of The 100 don’t have any kind of prejudice against same sex attraction/relationships and don’t even seem to put labels on people in terms of sexuality, just like they don’t seem to think in terms of race. (Of course, just because the characters don’t, doesn’t mean that the audience does not, which is what complicates the whole thing.)

Clarke is clearly surprised by the kiss, finds herself being into it and returns it for a moment, but then pulls away – but clearly none of it is in any way because of Lexa being a woman. She didn’t notice Lexa’s interest before because she was obviously distracted, and as she explains, she’s not ready for another relationship – with anyone – yet. Completely understandable – since she had to kill her ex-boyfriend (and probably first love) about a week before! It’s interesting that the music during the kiss was the kind of score indicating dramatic tension, rather than romance (unlike the music and lighting in 3x07).

But Clarke is not the only character who gets an opportunity to maybe move on a week after Finn’s death: the developing relationship between Raven and fellow mechanic Kyle Wick gets a lot of screentime in this episode. They did have good chemistry, and it’s obvious that this was meant to be a major romance for Raven (with how much screentime it got in this and 2x15/2x16) – but the fact that the actor playing Wick was such a jerk in real life ruined it all, so it’s all kind of weird to watch now, after the ship was dropped and Wick written out. The sex scene between them is one of the better ones in the show – and Raven’s disability is not ignored, but isn’t an obstacle, either (Wick mentions that the brace he designed would be easier to take off). However, when I think about the timeline, I have less sympathy for Wick regarding his disappointment that Raven is clearly having second thoughts after sex and doesn’t feel like having a real relationship. It’s been a week since she watched her ex-boyfriend die and less than a month since they broke up, and that was her only boyfriend that she had been with for years and known all her life! Dude, give her a break!

There isn’t much to say about Bellamy’s plot in this episode – as in much of season 2, he’s being the perfect action hero. Which makes season 2 the least interesting for him in terms of character development (and least controversial). Here, he apparently manages to disable the acid fog (or “the Veil” as the Mountain Men call it – what a euphemism!) following Raven’s and Wick’s advice, to the joy of Raven and Wick (who go on to hug and then impulsively have sex) and Clarke and Lexa and the whole army (who get pumped up for battle – Lexa especially looks pumped up to fight, which is weird considering that she does a 180 in the next episode). But – twist – of course it wasn’t that easy: Cage and Emerson had known that there’s an intruder for a while, and that was all a ploy to get the army to get close enough to Mount Weather so they could deploy the acid fog on them. Bellamy realizes that and has a big Die Hard style action scene, where he escapes several guards and disables the acid fog by blowing up the room, and somehow manages to escape through the vent. It looked like he was caught by the explosion and would at least get severely burned, so I’m not sure how he got out of it without any serious injuries, except for being protected by Plot Armor.

The Mountain Men at this point are in a pretty tough situation: Emerson tells Cage that they have nothing left to protect them from the army coming in, except the door. It certainly looks like our protagonists are at the verge of victory that’s going to be much easier than expected? Ha ha, of course not, this is The 100…

…

In in the completely separate B plot about Jaha’s party looking for the City of Light: the party keeps following Emori’s advice to go “north”, but they run into an unmarked minefield. Two people die in the mine explosion, so their little group is now just 4 people. (It started with 12 of them, but 6 people changed their minds in 2x12 and decided to go back to Camp Jaha. We never found out what happened to them.)

One of the casualties was a guy called Harris, who liked telling dark jokes such as “A Grouder and a Reaper walk into a bar…” and “A Grounder, an Arker and a Mountain man walk into a bar…” It didn’t take it long for people at Camp Jaha to turn the newest shocking revelations (cannibalism, the Mountain Men draining the Grounders and Arkers) into dark humor. He got blown up before he got to the punchline of the second one, but according to one of the executive producers, the punchline was the Mountain Men saying “Make theirs a double” after the Arker and the Mountain Man ordered drinks. I don’t normally pay much attention to behind-the-scenes stuff, since it’s not canon, but in this case, I’ll make an exception - it’s not like we’ll ever hear the rest of the joke on-screen. I like these kinds of in-universe jokes, you rarely hear any kind of humor on The 100, but it makes sense that people would try to cope with traumatic situations that way, it’s what people often do in real life.

They think for a moment they’ve reached the City of Light when they see glowing field. Jaha’s determination is unwavering and he finds a way through the minefield with others following in his footsteps, but the glowing field turns out to be a solar panel at the seaside. That doesn’t deter Jaha, but disappoints everyone else - but to everyone’s surprise, a drone appears when Murphy hits a panel with a rock, and directs them to a boat on the other side. (The drone was ALIE’s, of course, but minefield, like the panel, was probably there from before the nuclear apocalypse – protecting the way to the bunker? I’m not sure why ALIE would want a minefield there - she wants to entice people, not deter them from coming?)

Jaha, of course, insists they take it, and keeps talking about faith and the higher purpose, convinced that there had to be a reason he survived against all odds. Murphy plays the role of the mouthpiece of the audience when he has another good line: “I wonder, what level of crazy is too much for you? I’m just curious.” But they still all follow Jaha – partly because there’s not much they could do at this point, but there is also power in that kind of conviction: you may sound nuts, but at least you have a clear idea what you want, while everyone else is lost.

At this point, I really had no patience with Jaha, and I disliked him from season 1 – he really annoyed me with his refusal to ever question his actions. Instead of feeling guilty, like Kane, Jaha was always justifying everything he did. However, while I haven’t changed my views on him as a leader, on rewatch, I have more sympathy because I think I finally understand where it all comes from: he basically sacrificed his son for what he saw as the “greater good” and something he thought he had to do as a leader, and that that keeps haunting him and will as long as he’s alive, so he feels has nothing else to live for except to make some grand gesture that will save everyone. He feels he has to have a greater destiny, and he can’t question himself, or try to be live like a normal person, because then he’d feel that Wells’ death was for nothing.

Timeline: This episode probably takes place on the day after the previous episode.  

And this is how I calculated it has been around 7 days since Finn’s death: the end of 2x08 was at night; 2x09 lasted 2 days and ends again at night; there 2 days between the end of that episode and 2x11 (since it was said that’s how long Monty was missing after being taken and put in a cage); 2x12 started6 hours after the end of 2x11 and ended at night again – and we know it was 2 days since 2x10 (since Abby said Jaha had left two days ago), meaning it lasted1 day; 2x13 started almost immediately after 2x12, at night, lasted one day and ended the next night; 2x14 is presumably set on the day after. Which makes a week.

Body count: 

Two Arkers (Harris and Lily) in Jaha’s party, in the mine explosion; 

several Mount Weather guards (6 according to the wiki) blown up by Bellamy– which would mean there are 346 Mountain Men left.

#the 100 #the 100 rewatch #the 100 season 2 #the 100 2x14 #bodyguard of lies #clarke griffin #octavia blake #raven reyes #bellamy blake #thelonius jaha #john murphy #alie #cage wallace #carl emerson #kyle wick #indra

[leliflowers-blog]

The most effective method to Choose A SEO Agency

Picking a SEO office can be a troublesome and overwhelming prospect. With such huge numbers of organizations out there, how would you know the great from the terrible when you're attempting to work out how to pick a SEO office?

Website design enhancement is a profoundly unpredictable promoting discipline that traverses a wide scope of ranges of abilities. Finding an office that has the imperative information, aptitudes, approach and a style of record the executives that gels with you and your group is basic in guaranteeing your valuable advertising spending plan is being put to the best use.

Locate the correct accomplice and you can expect powerful SEO battles to help drive your business forward and anticipate a long and fruitful association with your organization. Pick an inappropriate one, and long stretches of dissatisfaction and disappointment may anticipate.

So how would you pick the privilege SEO organization for your business? Utilize the quicklinks underneath to hop to the applicable segments

Trust Signals

It's difficult to envision connecting any SEO organization without first looking at their site, so it's likely a decent spot to begin. A key angle to be vigilant for is trust signals. Trust sign are those key markers that not just approve the way this is an authentic business yet in addition a certified business that conveys extraordinary outcomes and encounters for their customers. In any case, know that a portion of these sign can be anything but difficult to counterfeit so be careful in your appraisal of them and nobody sign ought to be taken in segregation.

Contextual analyses or Portfolio of Work

An extraordinary SEO office will be pleased to show off their work as well as edgy that you perceive how glad they are of their work. Of course, no SEO organization is regularly going to be quick to show off anything other than their most prominent triumphs yet an arrangement of work or late contextual analyses (you can locate our own here) are an incredible pointer of an organization that realizes how to convey.

Contextual investigations ought to incorporate the customer's destinations, the outcomes accomplished against these and some sign with regards to the time span it took. In a perfect world, those contextual investigations ought to likewise incorporate or be connected to audits or tributes from that customer to help them.

Be careful about contextual analyses that do exclude the name of the organization. Anybody can create a contextual analysis so if it's not ascribed to a particular organization wonder why that is.

Surveys and Testimonials

When picking a SEO organization, there's no preferable certainty developer over direct audits and tributes from their past or existing customers. Once more, a customer that is pleased with their work and have extraordinary associations with customers will be sharp for you to see this kind of data, so they ought to be shown unmistakably on location. (look at our contextual investigations here)

Tributes ought to be preferably be ascribed to a particular individual, at a particular association to demonstrate their credibility. Surveys ought to come in all the time and preferably through an outsider audit stage like Trust Pilot or Reviews.co.uk. (investigate our surveys here)

Verify whether the surveys and tributes look genuine and are for a particular station or the office all in all, as certain audits may not be pertinent to SEO.

Grants

The advanced showcasing world has a practically interminable number of honor functions and classes. For certain organizations, this is their sacred goal and you'll see them entering, designated and now and again winning industry grants that will no uncertainty be gladly shown in the footer of their site. What you may not comprehend about the honors business is that it is a compensation to play game.

These honors aren't simply distributed to the most elite, you should pay to enter, so while they are an incredible marker of industry acknowledgment, an organization that decides not to participate in these could even now be an extraordinary office for you.

In the event that any organization positions themselves as an honor victor, approach them about what it is really going after, you can comprehend whether it has any bearing on the work they may accomplish for you.

Their Own Content Marketing

Substance is a center segment of any SEO venture, truth be told, it's a piece of the motivation behind why this piece has been composed. Along these lines, set aside the effort to investigate the substance your planned offices are making for themselves. Is the substance of high caliber? Is it refreshed normally? Does it show up for hunts identified with the point it's about? What arrangements do they use? Would comparative kinds of substance be an enhancement for the substance you are presently creating? These are largely contemplations to accept when you're attempting to measure the nature of their yield.

There is a well-known adage that goes "the shoemakers child has no shoes." And that can be symptomatic of SEO organizations. They are so caught up with creating incredible substance for customers that their very own substance advertising drops to the base of the need list.

An office delivering gigantic volumes of substance isn't consequently superior to anything one who produces one piece a month so attempt to make a decision on quality as opposed to amount. (You can look at our blog here)

Natural Visibility of Their Own Site

In the event that you're explicitly searching for a SEO organization, at that point you'd trust that they could convey a sensible degree of natural perceivability for their very own site, Afterall, the confirmation is in the pudding. Nonetheless, a site that positions well doesn't consequently mean they are an extraordinary office. Relationship especially does not rise to causation in this example. I am aware of a few offices that rival our very own website that are utilizing fairly obscure strategies to expand their perceivability, some of which straightforwardly go against Google's Webmaster Guidelines.

Along these lines, while you would trust that the best organizations would convey a degree of natural perceivability for themselves, there are incredible offices out there that basically can't contend in this vertical. They might be more up to date offices, littler offices, authority organizations that solitary arrangement with specific parts of SEO and they could be the ideal accomplice for your needs.

Rather than simply searching for wide expressions to see whether they show up naturally, likewise look how they deal with their quality for their very own image searches and whether they exploit all the hunt page results highlights accessible.

Instances of Companies They Work With

This trust sign is most likely the weakest one in the rundown and consequently the one to be taken with the greatest squeeze of salt. On advanced showcasing organization sites, you'll frequently observe other organization logos specked about. These organizations may well have worked with these organizations, in spite of the fact that it's anything but difficult to include a logo and expectation nobody checks, they give no sign with regards to the work they accomplished for these organizations.

Is it safe to say that it was for SEO or would it say it was another channel? Maybe it was an irregular consultancy piece and you're truly searching for an office that works with enormous customers on longer retainer ventures. Maybe the relationship finished awfully, you can't tell from a solitary logo.

When you address your waitlist of organizations, explicitly get some information about these customers they are partner themselves with to discover what they did and whether they are as yet working with them.

In this way, you found two or three organizations you think may work and you've experienced their site to discover what they do and whether you feel they are reliable. The subsequent stage is to get in touch with them to start the way toward narrowing down your potential choices. This beginning period is an incredible chance to begin burrowing somewhat more profound.

Staff Experience

While it's simple for an organization to profess to have been around for a considerable length of time or even decades, the main thing is the degree of experience of the group that you're entrusting your SEO as well. Try not to be timid to get some information about the experience of the group and your potential record director or group taking a shot at your record.

You need to realize your record won't be doled out to a lesser individual from the group who will be left to learn at work. Everybody must begin some place however you need to ensure you have the ideal individuals from the office taking a shot at your benefit.

Most organizations will have a 'Meet the Team' page or comparative. Invest some energy perusing these, perusing the profiles and getting the opportunity to comprehend which individuals you may lean toward for you.

Do They Use Outsourcing?

While you're discussing their staff and the individuals possibly taking a shot at your record, get some information about their strategy on redistributing? Sooner or later, I picture a great deal of offices have had a need to re-appropriate work because of the volume of work, understaffing or basically tight due dates grouped together. Redistributing shouldn't be viewed as a grimy word. Yet, what is significant is the place is that work being re-appropriated to?

An organization with a little system of profoundly talented and exceptionally trust consultants can at present convey incredible work and you'll presumably never differentiate between the redistributed work and the work done in-house. In any case, an office that utilizations shoddy outside work, from individuals that perhaps don't have English as a first language would be fairly concerning.

Be sure to get some information about whether the office will possibly utilize outsourcers and assuming this is the case, how would they deal with this procedure and guarantee principles are kept up.

Part Experience and Client Size

Think about not just the customers they work with and the size of these organizations yet in addition the divisions planned offices have specific involvement in. While you may not wish o work with an organization that additionally works with an immediate contender, there might be some critical advantage to working with an office that as of now has ability and learning of your part.

This may not generally be as far as immediate work with a customer. There might be individuals from staff that have a specific intrigue or energy for what you do and that could offer included worth that you may not get with different organizations.

You may likewise need to consider the size of customers they work with. Would you like to be the greatest fish in their customer lake or do you wan

[materiajunkie]

PIXEL SCOUT REVIEW – THE MOST OF THEIR SOCIAL ADVERTISEMENT

Pixel Scout OTO is a cutting-edge software which includes both an entire course on Facebook Advertising and the instrument helping Facebook Advertisers and SEO specialists with clients prospecting.

"I Need to be the owner of a business but I have no idea where to find the clients"

Pixel Scout will dismiss this worry, it instantly scan your potential customers -- sites in Google & The Yellow Pages that are missing The Facebook pixel, Google analytics, Schema, SSL, & other important indicators. You don't even need to contact them manually as you get its automatic reporting function & email outreach system to rapidly contact business owners. It is a nice start right? What to do for the next step? Learn in the following parts of my Pixel Scout review.

This invention was created by a specialist in Facebook Advertisement field -- Dino Gomez. He has been in the community for almost 10 years as a trainer in the search engine optimization mastermind, a speaker at the Chiang Mai SEO Conference (on FB ads) and a founder of the digital marketing agency.

In collaboration with Todd Spears and Herc Magnus, two other big names in Online Marketing and Software Developing, Dino and his partners hope to bring the users a possible land to generate money online as well as the ultimate solution to clients hard prospecting.

As I mentioned before, Pixel Scout provides you with the necessary tool to begin and a complete back end Facebook advertising course, The 5 Client Challenge giving users a copy&paste formula to get immediate leads for your new clients.

The most important advantage, Pixel Scout gives you a complete business strategy.

Next, after successfully locate who is in demand, get an interactive report made for all websites.

Use ready-to-go and proven Outreach Email Templates that are pre-loaded into your account

Access them and select one that best suits

Send to your customers

Finally, help your clients convert retargeting ads and instantly bring a flush of new clients to their business. And you get paid as well!

This means that you can remove manual jobs by sending emails directly from Pixel Scout through the email provider of your choice

Pixel Scout is Cloud-Based and doesn't require any setup, allowing people to access from any browsers

Last but not the least, Pixel Scout Facebook Re-targeting Ads Training

Its dad -- Dino Gomez is a specialist in this market and you'll have a chance to experience his training through this course.

Simple detailed training on how to become a Facebook re-targeting ads expert overnight. There are 3 courses as displayed in the picture:

Have a Look at what's inside FB Ad Training:

First of all, it is the overview after you log in:

I don't major in this market so I decide to take the training first, you can jump onto the software also

The Program is in form of videos, includes the Cheat Sheet so it is easy to learn and remember:

Once I have learned some, start using Pixel Scout in 3 simple steps

Step 1: Enter the keyword for the business and area you would like to target & Choose how deep in Google you would like to search!

I demonstrate this measure in the picture below:

The more credits you have, the more results (meaning potential customers you'll get). And the number of credits are based on the purchasing options that I will talk later.

By looking at the detailed search results, you will find out what this business is missing so that you can supply the service

Step 2: After targeting clients, automatically generate an interactive, personalized, & automatic report for those companies.

In the last step you get the email address, now you start to write and send an email to your potential clients right from Pixel Scout.

The question is, how to convince them to use your services?

It is easy! Come back to TEMPLATE in the dashboard

Read and copy content:

Step 3: Assist these companies install their Facebook Pixel & run simple retargeting ads

Also, in case you still feel unsure, see my DEMO video right below:

PIXEL SCOUT REVIEW -- IS IT REALLY WORTH A TRY?

Yes, definitely!

However, I don't think you should consider it as a try but a smart choice and a profitable investment that changes the way you do local marketing as well as make money online. I have evidences for what I have said.

The first signs, the demand keeps growing while there's a lack of supply.

It is estimated that there are 28 million small businesses in the U.S. alone and 97 percent of local companies with а website, don't hаve а Facebook pixel on it, which leads the problems in locating clients. They are now hungry for a cost-effective service to make their brands widespread and more accessible to costumers.

Do you realize a major opportunity here? Jump onto it right now since it is going to become a hot trend in very near future, until this moment, you may regret not catching up with it!

The next evidence right inside Characteristics Part, Pixel Scout is a comprehensive system preparing for you from A to Z

If you do not know anything, you can learn from 3 courses included that contain what you need to do in the niche

If you cannot find a customer, Pixel Scout software may, I mean just with a keyword it provides you will the detailed vital information regarding the appropriate brand.

If you do not know how to convince them, you will find proven-to-work email templates and automatic reports take care

If you do find a customer but helping them use Facebook Pixel to run ads requires technical skills that you don't have, again, simple detailed training on how to become a Facebook retargeting ads expert overnight are prepared for you.

The next evidence from actual testimonials

It has received a number of very good feedback from former customers, why not become a member and have that awesome using experience?

If you are still suspicious, you can take it and use for 30 days. Anytime you find in do not work well, simply return it and get your money back. Simply spend a couple of days and who knows you are coming close to your MMO dream!

Most local businesses are not running Facebook Ads while it's one of the most cost-effective lead generation platforms. Maybe Local Business owners are struggling hard with the low and slow returns from offline marketing, SEO or Google Adwords. For that reason, it's high time you should come to tackle their emergency needs.

People who should use Pixel Scout for clients prospecting:

+ Neighborhood Marketers

+ SEO Pros

PIXEL SCOUT REVIEW -- PRICE & EVALUATION

You have 3 choices for purchasing Pixel Scout. Take a Glance at the comparison

It is up to your demand as well as your budget to decide on the option. Actually, I highly recommend you buy $47 version. The purchase price difference ($2-$5) isn't considerable as you get the maximum credits, which means the most search results, more accessibility to potential clients through many pages of Google.

Anyway, I find those price affordable. A tiny investment brings you the technique to find the customer, generate professional Facebook Pixel and charge customers hundreds a month! That easy! In addition, you still get 30 Day Money Back guarantee with NO questions asked. Whenever you feel unsatisfied, return it and get back your money. It is a risk-free investment.

Notice! This good deal will not last long because the price will go up shortly after few hours. Take action now!

https://uprafficoto.com/

[carrilloziegler9]

All The Help You Need To Get An Amazing Car You Can Afford

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#Scrap