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what is THE worst thing you've ever drank. all liquids acceptable. please tell me what it was, bonus points for why

Hey whoa hi. Hello. I am looking directly into your ear canal. What do you mean you drank a tube of virus concentrate.

So, I was working in a lab, right? My job in the lab was preparing a pure, concentrated enough sample of virus. This is tricky since, y'know, viruses require hosts to replicate, but you then need to get the host cells (and the pieces of the host cells that died!) out of the sample while still keeping the viruses. Once I'd finished and the samples had been sent to the database for analysis as well as a second one sent to be frozen for future reference, there was still some left over that needed to be disposed of.

I, knowing that this was a once in a lifetime opportunity, waited carefully for the lab director to be deep in conversation with someone else on the other side of the laboratory. And then I took my chance.

Test tubes, as it turns out, are really bad as shot glasses. Their shape turns any liquid inside into a stream, so you really can't knock it back quickly - it takes a couple seconds. Additionally, the best way I can describe the taste of virus concentrate was "sterile rot". A very unique kind of bad! Made worse by the test tube's inefficiency as a shot glass.

(by the way we were studying bacteriophages, not animal viruses. these viruses are too specialized on attacking prokaryotes to even recognize our cells as targets at all, according to studies.)

(but also like. if the viruses managed to successfully switch hosts and killed me with a violent infection, itd still be worth it.)

(for science.)

violetthunderstorm

You have a fitting blog title

nico-the-overlord

this post is getting 50k easy

marlinspirkhall

spookonlooks

Meet cute comic of Grace and Simon in the plant shop AU <3

Tumblr pls don’t let this flop ts my first comic 😭💔‼️

Pt.2

saltwater-goldfishy

ok I know everyone’s considered Ryland grace wearing an “I put the ace in space” t shirt but. have we considered the infinitely funnier option of putting this shirt on eva stratt

raviolireptile

I had to draw this

grac3yn

take his clothes and take his glasses until there's nothing left to take

ayinvui

yearner x yearner

inspired by these edits! [1] [2]

pris-cas

Lesson #4 buoyancy

For those interested specifically it is:

• Freshwater: ~ 1.00 g/cm3

• Seawater (Saltwater): ~ 1.025 g/cm3

• Average Human Body: ~ 0.985 g/cm3

Lesson #1 Prervious Lesson

Again huge thanks for the support and Ideas people are giving me!! I’m glad glad glad people enjoy this series!! Also I’m so sorry for the lack of interaction on my part I’m kinda new to tumblr!!

starink-2005

╔════════════════════════════════════╗

MORNINGSTAR WONDERS

╚════════════════════════════════════╝

✦ ARCHIVE ✦

"Every sunrise tells a story."

Welcome to the official Morningstar Wonders Archive.

Here you'll find every published chapter in chronological order. New chapters will be added as the story progresses.

Status: Ongoing

Language: English

Genre: Drama • Romance • Family • Slow Burn

Current Chapters: 33

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

Su versión en español lo puedes encontrar en Wattpad! ⭐

Haz click aqui!

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ☼ ARC I — BEGINNINGS ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

❖ Chapter 1 — Prologue

❖ Chapter 2 — Function in the Dark

❖ Chapter 3 — Cold

❖ Chapter 4 — Fever

❖ Chapter 5 — Visit

❖ Chapter 6 — Illegals

❖ Chapter 7 — Jealousy

❖ Chapter 8 — Adopters

❖ Chapter 9 — Separation

❖ Chapter 10 — Future

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ☼ ARC II — BONDS ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

❖ Chapter 11 — Friction

❖ Chapter 12 — Control

❖ Chapter 13 — Resentment

❖ Chapter 14 — A Date (Part I)

❖ Chapter 15 — A Date (Part II)

❖ Chapter 16 — Sack

❖ Chapter 17 — Department

❖ Chapter 18 — Shy

❖ Chapter 19 — The Morningstars

❖ Chapter 20 — Threat

❖ Chapter 21 — Moving

❖ Chapter 22 — First Aid

❖ Chapter 23 — Heal

❖ Chapter 24 — Wedding?

❖ Chapter 25 — Suspicions

❖ Chapter 26 — Cameras

❖ Chapter 27 — One Step at a Time

❖ Chapter 28 — Passion

❖ Chapter 29 — Face (Part I)

❖ Chapter 30 — Phase 2

❖ Chapter 31 — End of a Problem

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ☼ ARC III — A NEW PATH ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

❖ Chapter 32 — A New Beginning

❖ Chapter 33 — First Week

❖ Chapter 34 — Last Week

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ✦ AUTHOR'S NOTE ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Thank you for reading Morningstar Wonders.

Your support, comments, and reblogs help this story continue to grow.

May every new sunrise bring another chapter.

starink-2005

Previous chapter / Next chapter

Chapter 33: First week

The early morning static had never sounded quite so loud.

One weeks had passed since the afternoon train had carried Alastor away toward the north, and New Orleans seemed determined to avenge the announcer's absence by chilling the atmosphere of the apartment. The nights had turned dense, wrapped in a constant fog that extinguished the gas lamps and muffled the sound of jazz on the street corners of the French Quarter.

(...)

Inside the old warehouse of Morningstar Wonders, the sole source of light was the articulated lamp hanging over Lucifer’s drafting table. The architect—his shirt sleeves rolled up to his elbows and his fingers stained with India ink—kept his gaze fixed upon the intricate design of the support arches for the customs market. The project was moving forward at a steady pace; local merchants were beginning to notice that the blonde met his deadlines without demanding the extortionate taxes of the Senatorial District. Respect was being earned centimeter by centimeter, line by line.

Yet, the silence of the studio felt incomplete.

Upon the wooden shelf, the WNOL radio receiver was turned on, but the voice emanating from the bakelite speaker did not belong to the master of the night. The substitute announcer—a young man with a flat, monotonous voice whom the station director had put on the shift—read the commercial advertisements for tobacco and coffee with the passion of a bureaucrat reviewing judicial archives.

There were no wordplays, no sly laughs to make the skin prickle, nor that theatrical cadence that usually dominated the city's frequency.

Lucifer let out a sigh, letting his pen drop onto the inkwell. He leaned back in his wooden chair, rubbing his tired eyes. He glanced at the wall clock: it was a quarter past three in the morning. Inside the warehouse, the wooden microphone he had crafted for the brunette remained immaculate, as did Alastor’s statuette, just as he had promised. But the bed felt far too large, and the aroma of sweet tobacco was beginning to fade from the curtains.

Suddenly, the shrill ringing of the wall telephone shattered the monotony of the warehouse.

The sound cut through the air like a whip. Lucifer jolted, blinking in surprise. No one called an architectural studio at three o'clock in the morning unless a pier was collapsing or...

He stood up abruptly, nearly knocking over his chair, and strode toward the dark wood apparatus hanging beside the door. He unhooked the metal receiver and brought it to his ear, his heart accelerating without warning.

—Hello? Morningstar Wonders? —Lucifer spoke, attempting to maintain a professional voice despite his racing pulse.

On the other end of the line, the first thing he heard was a volley of metallic clicks, the dull hum of wires crossing half the country, and, in the background, the distant roar of a storm and the whistle of a locomotive. Then, the telephone static suddenly cleared, and a thoroughly familiar vibration—filtered by the distance but unmistakably crisp—flooded his ear.

—Well, well! It seems the grand designer of the docks remains awake, stealing hours from his rest —Alastor’s voice purred. It lacked the modulation of the radio microphone, carrying instead that smooth, low, and private register that Lucifer had missed so dearly—. Good morning, my dear spectator.

Lucifer felt the air rush back into his lungs all at once, and an involuntary smile—the first truly wide one in fourteen days—spread across his face. He leaned his shoulder against the brick wall, gripping the receiver tightly.

—Alastor... —he whispered, letting his voice betray all the relief he felt—. You are insane. It is three in the morning. Where are you calling from?

—From an exceedingly narrow and uncomfortable telephone booth in the middle of a transfer station on the outskirts of Chicago —the brunette responded, and Lucifer could perfectly picture the rigid line of his smile beneath the flickering light of the booth—. Autumn up here is an insult to decency, dear. The wind cuts like a razor, and these northerners believe that putting coal in a stove is an aristocratic luxury. I have had to endure three meetings with executives who possess the charisma of a piece of wet wood. I deeply yearn for the humidity of our cozy dwelling.

Lucifer let out a clean laugh, a sound that echoed through the empty warehouse.

—Well, your replacement at WNOL isn't doing any better —the blonde commented, turning his head to look at the radio set—. I believe tonight he read the price of a bushel of rice three times with the exact same voice one uses to read a last will and testament. The city is missing its oddity.

—Oh, I imagine! The radio must be a lost cause without me —Alastor laughed, though the laughter distorted slightly due to long-distance interference. There was a brief pause on the line, a silence where only the pattering of rain against the metal roof of the booth in Illinois could be heard—. And what of you, Lucifer? Is the sanctuary still in order?

The architect lowered his gaze to his ink-stained fingers. Alastor’s tone had dropped its playful edge; he was now searching for that private frequency that belonged only to the two of them, crossing the telephone wires to shorten the miles.

—It is in order —Lucifer responded softly, lowering his voice—. Dusted clean. But... the house is far too quiet, Alastor. You are desperately missed on the airwaves. And on the sofa.

On the other end of the line, the static seemed to dampen for a second, catching the announcer's subtle, lingering sigh. However, Alastor’s clinical ear wasted no time in detecting the accumulated exhaustion in the blonde's tone—that slight vibration of frustration that Lucifer attempted to conceal behind his blueprints.

—That frequency sounds somewhat saturated, my dear architect —Alastor commented, returning to that smooth, analytical register he utilized when dismantling the problems of the docks—. And I doubt very much that it is solely due to the lack of my eloquent presence. Tell me, what is disturbing the lines of Morningstar Wonders tonight?

Lucifer rested his forehead against the cold brick wall of the warehouse, releasing the breath he hadn't realized he was holding. With Alastor, it was useless to pretend; the brunette knew how to read his silences better than anyone.

—It is the design of the support arches for the customs market —the architect admitted, glancing sideways at the sketches on the table—. And the client who commissioned them, an old contractor from pier four. He keeps looking at me as though I am going to swindle him at any given moment. First thing tomorrow morning, I have to present him with the final structural calculation for the timber and iron, and... I don't know, Alastor. Every time I draw a line, I feel the weight of my father's expectations telling me that the port mire will sink any foundation I attempt to raise on my own. I find it hard to believe they will trust my design and won't care about what happened to my family.

A metallic click resonated from Chicago, followed by the sound of Alastor shifting the receiver against his ear. When he spoke again, his voice carried a certainty so absolute, so implacable, that it seemed to banish the warehouse fog in a single stroke.

—So that was it... —Alastor declared, and though his tone was firm, the warmth toward the blonde was undeniable—. Listen to me well, Lucifer. Your father built marble monsters to conceal the debts and sins of his people; you are designing structures to support the weight of a living community. That old contractor from pier four does not fear your calculations; he fears the ghost that you yourself insist on seating beside you at the drafting table.

Lucifer blinked, straightening his torso as he processed the announcer's words.

—The people of the port are not fools, dear —Alastor continued, his voice flowing with the astute psychology of someone who knew every corner of the mire—. They are untrusting out of a survival instinct, but they respect strength and honesty above any signature. Tomorrow, do not go to sell him a surname; go to deliver the solution so that his merchandise does not rot in the Mississippi humidity. Look him in the eye, show him that every bolt and every cedar beam is designed for his needs, and you will see how the ghost of the Morningstars vanishes from his warehouse. You are the sole owner of those wonders, Lucifer. Do not let a handful of bureaucratic northerners or the memory of your father strip you of your authorship.

The blonde remained silent, feeling a current of renewed confidence surge down his spine. The warmth of the message had crossed the long-distance wires to restore the steady pulse he had lost halfway through the night.

—My... —Lucifer murmured, a genuine, relieved smile breaking across his face—. I see Chicago hasn't frozen your wit at all, you oddity. It remains as sharp as ever.

—Oh, it takes far more than an Illinois blizzard to extinguish my signal! —Alastor laughed, and in the background, the operator's chime rang out, warning that the call's time was nearly exhausted—. Our time is running out, my dear spectator. Return to that table, adjust those arches with your characteristic audacity, and sleep for a couple of hours. I desire to hear excellent news from Morningstar Wonders on our next frequency.

—You will, Alastor. I promise you —Lucifer responded, squeezing the receiver for one last second—. Stay safe from the cold.

—Always, dear. Good night.

The click of the line disconnecting left a brief void, but the silence of the warehouse no longer felt heavy or incomplete.

Lucifer hung up the phone slowly, breathing in the air of the room with entirely renewed energy.

He walked back to the sturdy oak table, adjusted the articulated lamp to illuminate the center of the blueprint, and took up his pen with firm fingers. He looked upon the arches of the customs market with fresh eyes, free from his father's shadow. With swift, decisive, and elegant strokes, he began to correct the support lines, redesigning the foundations with the absolute certainty that the port mire would not sink his work, but rather hold it up with pride. Alastor was right: the city was already his, and tomorrow, pier four would learn the true meaning of his wonders.

(...)

Autumn in Chicago lacked the mystical delicacy of the New Orleans fog; it was a block of dirty ice, the clatter of streetcars, and a deafening wind that slipped between concrete skyscrapers like an industrial lament.

Alastor hung up the receiver of the public booth at the transfer station with meticulous deliberation. The metal of the apparatus was so cold it nearly adhered to the skin of his bare fingers, but the smile upon his face remained intact, fixed and radiant in the dimness.

Hearing Lucifer’s voice, noting how the architect's pulse stabilized through the telephone wire, had left a strange sensation of warmth in his chest—an echo of clean tuning that the northern static could not corrupt.

He adjusted his dark gloves, retrieved his bronze cane, and stepped out of the booth, receiving the full brunt of the night blizzard that whipped the tails of his wine-colored coat.

You might wonder what Alastor was doing out at such hours. Well, he had taken it upon himself to scout the surroundings, just in case he found something interesting to amuse himself with.

(...)

Three hours later, the outlook was no more encouraging. Alastor sat in the opulent boardroom on the top floor of the National Broadcasting Network building. The space was the epitome of eighties modernity: white neon lights, smoked-glass desks, and heavy chrome ashtrays. An environment the announcer found deeply sterile and devoid of soul.

Across the round table, surrounded by folders of audience graphics and sponsorship contracts, sat the man responsible for his invitation to Chicago: Vincent.

Vincent—whom modern broadcasting circles were already beginning to nickname "Vox" due to his obsession with mass projection—was the exact opposite of Alastor. He wore an electric-blue suit with broad shoulder pads, kept his hair perfectly slicked back, and his eyes, concealed behind thick-rimmed glasses, gleamed with the ambition of someone who saw radio not as an art, but as a money-making machine. In his corner of the desk, a prototype white-and-black television monitor flickered with static, reflecting across his face.

—I’m telling you, Alastor, you are wasting your signal in that southern swamp —Vincent spoke, tapping an advertising report with his finger as he exhaled cigarette smoke—. The shipping lines case in New Orleans was genius, a masterpiece of muckraking journalism. It reached federal agencies. But the future isn't in telling sailor stories at midnight on a local station. The future is the national network. Contracts with automobile brands, satellites, television. If you join my division in Chicago, we could control the frequency of the entire Midwest by the end of the year.

Alastor maintained his impeccable posture, resting both hands upon the knob of his cane. His smile widened, but his brown eyes remained gelid, evaluating the man before him like a curious, yet predictable specimen.

—My dear Vincent —Alastor responded, his voice adopting that modulated, magnetic tone that made the air in the room vibrate without the need for amplifiers—. You underestimate the value of identity. Chicago is a grand vending machine: noisy, efficient, and completely interchangeable. New Orleans has mire, it has secrets, and above all, it has memory. A national microphone only serves to shout at a mass of strangers who will forget your name by the next commercial break. I prefer to be the master of the early hours for those who truly listen.

Vincent let out a sour laugh, leaning back in his leather chair and crossing his legs.

—Memory doesn't pay the station's bills, Alastor. Your romanticism for the past is going to leave you obsolete. Look around you. The world is moving fast.

Alastor’s gaze sharpened instantaneously—a fraction of a second where the smile on his lips turned into a rigid, dangerous line. Inside his leather briefcase, wrapped in a silk handkerchief, traveled a small wooden replica that Lucifer had slipped into his coat pocket before his departure: a reminder that someone awaited him at home.

—It is the design of a true artist, Vincent —Alastor sentenced, and for an instant, the static on the television monitor in the corner flickered violently, altered by a sudden drop in voltage within the room—. Something I doubt very much your bar graphs and phosphor screens could ever replicate.

Vincent furrowed his brow, adjusting his glasses as he stared at the monitor that had just stabilized. He felt an inexplicable chill, the subtle warning that the WNOL announcer was not someone who could be cornered into a corporate contract.

—Suit yourself —Vincent scoffed, stubbing out his cigarette in the chrome ashtray—. You have three more weeks to review the northern smuggling archives and give your lectures. But think about it. The national network's offer won't be on the table forever. If you stay on the docks, you'll end up sinking with them.

Alastor stood up with absolute elegance, adjusting the hat upon his head. He looked at Vincent through the smoked glass of the table, possessing the absolute certainty that the man in the blue suit would never understand what it meant to build something real.

—The port mire does not sink authentic things, my dear Vincent; it preserves them —Alastor concluded, giving the floor a light tap with the bronze tip of his cane—. Good night. I have a broadcast to review and a month to shorten.

As he walked toward the elevators, the echo of his own footsteps restored his peace. Vincent could keep his noisy technology and his empty screens. Alastor had already found the perfect frequency a thousand miles away, inside a remodeled old warehouse where a blonde architect, with ink-stained fingers, was raising an empire called Morningstar Wonders. And there was no static in the north capable of extinguishing that signal.

(...)

It was 7:00 AM. A thousand miles away from gelid Chicago, the first morning sun began to break through the dense fog over the Mississippi River. The waters of the port, tinged with a pale, golden hue, reflected the rocking of the steamboats that were already beginning their noisy workday.

On pier four, the air smelled of tar, salted fish, and the cured tobacco stacked within the warehouses. Dressed in an impeccable gray suit of simple lines but flawless tailoring, Lucifer Morningstar walked with a firm stride over the damp wooden planks. Under his arm, he carried the metal tube that protected the blueprints corrected in the dead of night. There was no longer any trace of exhaustion in his blue eyes; the reassurance Alastor's voice had injected into him through the telephone wire continued to vibrate through his system like a well-executed jazz melody.

He entered the tobacco warehouse without knocking, planting himself with natural elegance before the rustic desk where the distrustful old contractor reviewed his accounts with a worn pencil. The man raised his eyes, furrowing his brow upon seeing the blonde so early.

—You arrive punctually, Morningstar —the merchant grunted, setting his pencil aside—. I hope you bring something better than the inflated rates your family had us accustomed to. The mire of this pier does not forgive calculation errors.

Lucifer did not falter. With a serene, decided smile, he unscrewed the metal tube, unrolled the large tracing paper across the table, and placed a pair of heavy iron tools on the corners to hold it steady.

—The mire does not forgive errors, sir, but good architecture knows how to use them to its advantage —Lucifer declared, leaning slightly over the design with a confidence the contractor had not seen in him during the previous days—. Look here. I have completely redesigned the support arches of the customs market. We are no longer using the imported stone from the Senatorial District that cracks with coastal humidity. These are twin beams of local red cedar, treated with linseed oil and anchored with wrought-iron bolts from the pier three shipyards.

Lucifer's finger traced the clean, elegant lines with milimetric precision, explaining how the structure would distribute the weight of heavy cargoes without yielding a single millimeter before the rising river. He was not selling him a luxurious surname; he was delivering the exact solution to protect his life's livelihood.

The old contractor narrowed his eyes, drawing closer to the paper. He passed his calloused fingers over the ink strokes, following Lucifer’s technical annotations. The silence within the warehouse stretched into an eternal minute, broken only by the cry of the gulls outside. Finally, the man let out a long sigh, and the rigidity of his shoulders relaxed completely. He raised his head, looking at the young blonde with a genuine respect that had nothing to do with the northern Morningstars.

—Damn it... —the old man murmured, breaking into a frank smile—. This isn't just a blueprint, boy. This is a damn wonder. No cursed bureaucrat from the District would have taken the trouble to calculate the wood's resistance against the customs floods.

The merchant extended a large, rough hand across the desk.

—Pier four accepts the design. It's a deal, Morningstar.

Lucifer shook the man's hand with a firm, clean grip, feeling an immense warmth expand through his chest.

Upon leaving the warehouse minutes later, the saline breeze of the port greeted him head-on. The blonde stopped in the middle of the pier, breathing in the damp air and filling his lungs with that freedom that had cost him so much to achieve.

He turned slowly to look toward his studio. In the distance, the morning sun illuminated the wrought-iron sign, making the letters gleam with a renewed pride before the eyes of the stevedores and sailors passing around him.

He had won his first great battle completely alone. His surname was no longer an invisible condemnation or a shadow of the past; now, beneath the dawn light, the city was beginning to understand the true meaning of MORNINGSTAR WONDERS. And a thousand miles away, he knew perfectly well that Alastor’s signal was applauding on his very same frequency.

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