#permalink

Hey Nonny!

No worries! I have a permalink of all my fic recs at the following link:

https://inevitably-johnlocked.tumblr.com/myficrecs

If you're on mobile, copy-paste that link into your mobile web browser, and it will load up fine :) It doesn't work if you try to open it in the app, apparently.

You should then be able to get to all the pages from there! I'm going to have to be splitting up the pages again soon so I don't want to out-date this post by linking all the pages separately, so just go there hahah.

In the early days of the pandemic, the UK pursued a plan that was developed for a less contagious, less lethal flu pandemic, which proposed deliberately allowing the disease to burn through the population quickly to develop "herd immunity."

https://www.theguardian.com/world/ng-interactive/2020/feb/27/what-are-the-uks-plans-for-dealing-with-a-pandemic-virus

Despite expert advice that this would not work with the novel coronavirus, the UK Tory government pushed ahead with it. PM Boris Johnson sought out covid patients to shake hands with while gerning for newscameras. (He ended up in intensive care).

https://www.newsweek.com/boris-johnson-says-shaken-hands-coronavirus-patients-1490214

How much damage did this political malpractice inflict upon Britons? It turns out there's something of a national experiment that we can use to answer that question, by looking at what happened in the Republic of Ireland.

These are two neighbouring, English-speaking nations with similar cultures (Ireland was long a colony of Britain), comparably underfunded health services, and they experienced their first covid cases on the same day.

By comparing the outcomes in the two countries, we can get an estimate of how lethal the Conservative government's incompetence really was.

It's not pretty.

As medical historian Elaine Doyle writes in an epic thread, Britons are dying at MORE THAN TWICE the rate of the Irish.

https://twitter.com/laineydoyle/status/1249127908876128259

Doyle points out that as the Irish government was shutting schools, 250,000 people in the UK were gathering for a Cheltenham match.

Ireland canceled St Paddy's Day and shut pubs a week in advance. The UK had megaconcerts like the Stereophonics gig in Cardiff.

The Irish government made clear, continuous announcements about the gravity of the pandemic, urging people to stay home and take care. The UK government was virtually silent.

The thing about exponential growth is that early interventions make a huge difference. The UK dawdled for nearly two weeks before taking the lockdown steps that the Irish enacted.

The Tory ideology holds that governments are incompetent. This creates a perverse incentive: when Tories govern badly, they prove their own point. But Tories are supposed to murder poor people to juice the economy, not murder pensioners AND the economy.

Boris Johnson is a vile piece of work: a racist, misogynist bigot and a fool. His unwillingness to take (medical) expert advice (and his reliance on finance-sector advice) resulted in the measurable, deaths of Britons. Thousands of them.

Image:

Think London https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Boris_Johnson_(cropped).jpg

@support Uh also, can I have the option to right click the permalink button and open in new tab again please?

Giving each of your posts their own permalink is easy on your laptop & important. That way each post has its’ own little home & people can find just the post & not have to plow thru your whole blog. When I create something on my iPad and post it, there’s no permalink option so...the action stops there. Why can’t the post, like the cheese, stand alone? Why isn’t it on its’ own page as it is on my laptop? Why am I such a clueless fruit fly?

서른 여덟 번 째 복도전/ 야와야츠_안녕여름 /여름 밤, 우리가 잠든 시간에 / 최정아

Piccolo Dai Maho, second in command in the Sacred Circle of Elders in the Namekusei planet entered his home with tired steps.

 Three days ago, a space ship crashed outside one of the villages, and from it, appeared a bunch of strong warriors with tails and armors. The villagers went to their rescue, as expected, and were greeted with laser beams and destruction.

 It was madness, a full afternoon of madness… but their warriors prevailed.

 Apparently, these foreign warriors thought namekians were no more than a bunch of peace makers and weaklings. It seemed they knew nothing of the namekian warrior race, which erased the saiyans, as they called themselves.

 But now, the namekians were worried, since it appeared that this lot had been no more than a recognition lot, and that meant that stronger warriors would come… and soon.

 The eyes of the Elder looked in the direction of his son´s home, which was absolutely silent.

 Piccolo Jr. was his pride and join, a warrior namek to the core, so opposed to all of his brothers of race. He knew nothing of peace and quiet, for him everything was movement, training, and techniques. In a way… he had waited for something like this to happen all of his life.

 The old namekian thought for a second in his son, keeping an eye on one the surviving saiyans, one of the weakest, who had been captured for information, to know about the horrors that were to come to them very soon.

 As his father had thought, Piccolo was with the captive, but he was not searching for any kind of information, neither was he worried about the other saiyans that would come soon, or thinking about anything related to an imminent war… even if that is what the namek warrior waiting outside the cave thought he was doing.

 His thoughts were confused, his dark eyes were upon the creature before him, unconscious and chained to the rock wall.

 It was a female, apparently. He knew they existed, but of course, never encountered one before.

 Pale skin, dark long hair, petite body. How was it even possible that such a little thing had been able to fight?

 He knelt in front of her, and not even by that action was he able to look at her straight at the face. He was tall, taller even than most of his warrior namek comrades. And this… female… was so small…

 She also had a weird smell, something sweet, but strong… like flowers and wet dirt, like… like the air before the rain.

 Piccolo knew he should wake her, force information from her, everything necessary to protect his people… but he was too busy mesmerized by the foreign creature… by her smell, her soft lips, the unknown feminine curves…

 The namek forced himself to stand and step away.

 He needed to focus.

 But this female…

 Piccolo knelt again and took her face delicately, making her face him. Her lips opened with the movement, and the warrior felt a strong pull.

 He needed… he needed to put his mouth on hers… as weird and stupid as that sounded.

 So he did… he tasted her, he forced her neck until almost breaking it, he felt a strange energy blasting inside of his body, he felt the necessity of holding her closer, of touching every inch of her skin hidden by the armor, to bite her neck and make her bleed…

 But it took him less than a second to let her go and throw her at the wall then she bit him with all her force, bleeding his lips and staining her pretty face with his purple blood.

 -          FUCKING PORUNGA!! YOU IMBECILE!

 Piccolo retrated, a hand to his bleeding lips. He turned around to see the saiyans, his emerald hand still covering half his face, and saw the female still chained to the rock. She was wide awake, an angry scowl on her face, his blood still on her lips.

 -          Well that was rude of you, namek.

-          Shut up you woman.

-          But impressive… I mean, for a warrior with empty pants, that was quite good. Even better than the ones I have received from my fiancée.

 The saiyans female spitted, and then shrugged to take out some hair out of her face.

 -          Name is Chichi… and you are, big boy?

 There was silence, she was looking at him… and kept doing it. No one had ever done that, everyone said his eyes were so hard to stare to… and she was doing it easily, almost as a game.

 -          Piccolo.

-          What did you say, big boy?

-          PICCOLO. And stop talking you crazy female.

-          Female, that one is weird.

 She stood up and looked at him from below, smirking.

 -          Pleased to meet you, big boy. As I said, my name is Chichi, low level saiyans soldier, and I must say, that watching you crush Yamcha´s head against a rock and seeing his insides turn into syrup was quite entertaining… but quite revealing also… I above his power, but not by much. If you opened that idiot as a fruit, I am quite sure you can do pretty much the same to me. So…

 She pulled both of her hands, breaking her chains in a smooth movement, and then laid her hands on her hips.

 -          What happens now?

-          Now, female, now you are going to tell me everything about the saiyans that are going to come to our planet.

-          You don´t say! Gossip me sharing that kind of information.

-          DON´T YOU DARE TO PLAY WITH ME!

 Piccolo advanced the few steps he was away from Chichi and took her by the neck, pulling her up and choking her. Even with the lack of air, she did not stop smiling.

 -          YOU DARE TO COME TO OUR PLANET, TO KILL OUT PEOPLE, TO MOCK US, AND YOU THINK THIS IS A GAME??

 With the last word, the namek warrior threw the saiyans female against the wall. The mountain shook and a few pebbles fell to the floor.

 Chichi coughed for a few seconds, a hand trying to recover her sore throat… and then, came a light laughter. A bell of happiness sounding in the deep hearth of the mountain.

 -          I like you… if you had been born a saiyans; you and I could have had so much fun together.

 The female warrior stood again, still smiling confidently.

 -          As I said… so much passion for someone with empty pants.

-          I´m losing my patience, female.

-          You never had much to begin to, big boy… you want information? Ok, I´ll give you some.

 She walked over him with feline steps, his hips swinging hypnotically in her deep purple uniform, her hair a cascade or darkness. Chichi floated until she was eye to eye with the warrior, who started to sweat.

 -          Listen carefully, big boy.

 Her lips caressed his, and Piccolo felt his hands moving without permission, until he was holding her waist.

 -          Saiyans are mercenaries. Once we spot a planet, that planet basically belongs to us already. We are thousands, all of us warriors… you are a few hundreds, mostly farmers. Your little planet is doomed. It belongs to us already… but you are not aware of it yet.

 Chichi pressed her soft lips against him, and Piccolo almost choked at the sound that tried to escape from him. He separated a little, just enough to talk.

 -          When?

-          Soon, big boy… my body won´t be in the grave for long before the next team comes… and if they fail as we did, another one shall take their place… tell me big boy… do you have enough people to stop us?

 She left his lips and moved to his oversized ear, licking it, and biting his earlobe. Chichi whispered.

 -          Are you sure you can stop us?

 Piccolo felt a shiver, and his hands squeezed the narrow waist, his claws almost piercing the armor.

 -          You are a bunch of animals…

-          That we are.

 Dark eyes meet again, and this time, both of them felt a potent pull passing between them. She touched his cheek and cupped his face; he took a string of hair and put it behind her ear.

 -          What would I give, big boy... for your fangs piercing my neck in a mate bite… but that cannot be.

-          You won´t stop, will you?

-          Never.

-          If I release you, you will be off to kill more of my people.

-          That I will do.

-          When the saiyans come, you will go to them to tell them what you know of what you saw of our fighting techniques.

-          I would… If I could. But I am realistic… you are the last living thing I´ll ever see.

 Chichi took the face of the namek warrior in her small hands and kissed him fiercely, the taste of his blood still on her lips. Piccolo answered, almost crushing her with one of his arms. Her legs surrounded him and embraced him strongly.

 She moved away only enough to speak.

 -          If only you had been born a saiyan… big boy…

  Outside the cave, Nail was looking at the distance.

 He was the personal protector of the patriarch, just as his father had been, as the father of his father had been. And now, he was away from his sacred duty because he was with the crazy warrior fanatic of a son of Elder Dai Maho. He did not like it, of course… but he knew that there was no better warrior than him.

 The ground moved beneath his feet, and the mountain seemed to breathe for a moment… and in the silence, the echo of steps made him turn around.

 Piccolo was coming.

 Nail suppressed a growl. He did not know why, but Piccolo and he were so alike, they could have easily been twins.

 -          Is everything ok, brother Piccolo?

 The answer was a simple noise.

 -          Brother, you are bleeding, are you…

-          We need to call the seven Elders. I´ll go inform my father while you go with the Great Patriarch and prepare for the invocation of Porunga.

-          What?

 Piccolo started to float, and Nail was immediately behind him, both of them moving smoothly towards the sky.

 -          What is going on? What did the female told you?

-          The saiyans that will come are monsters. We will never defeat them.

-          You and I…

-          You and I are useless against hundreds of well-trained warriors. Even if we win a few battles, we are doomed to lose this war. We will call Porunga and request Him to move our entire planet to a safe location somewhere in the universe, where those animals cannot find us.

-          WHAT! You cannot decide such a thing! You need the elders to…

-          I can, and I already did. Go to the Great Patriarch. NOW.

 Nail looked at Piccolo with something very close to hate. He loved peace, he lived for peace… but this namekian in special… he had very… unpeaceful feelings towards him. The protector did not say other words, and instead flew away.

 Piccolo stared at the mountain for a moment, and finally, he raised his hand, and released a powerful blast of energy.

 The sky turned orange with the explosion, some trees from the neighbor islands were lost in the wild wind, and the fish swam away as fast as they could to avoid the pile of heavy rocks that landed in the water.