#the time before

[greenjudy]

Suzanne Vega - Solitude Standing

Please observe this style. 

Please study the expression in Vega’s eyes. 

This is a document from the time before: before phones, before Insta, before we grew accustomed to being on camera. 

Look at modern style and ask yourself if you see that many layers. Or if maybe the layers in modern stuff have gotten flattened out by the need to look a certain way, on camera. 

Please study this style.

[cdelphiki]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Jason stumbled as his vision cleared. He was still on his feet, and he was definitely still in Mask’s office.

His helmet was heavy on his head. His gear was heavy. His arms were heavy.

And. His side hurt. 

He still had the device in his hands—the Kumiraian device he and Mask were both grasping. Jason gripped the slick metal tighter with his gloved hands and yanked. 

“What?” Mask muttered, as he lost his balance and stumbled back and into the wall behind him. His eyes went wide and he demanded, “What did you do?” 

Instead of answer, Jason took the device and slammed it right into Mask’s stupid head. Jason couldn’t even appreciate how it knocked Mask out cold, because his side hurt and his breathing was shallow, and he felt a little dizzy.

“Bastard,” Jason muttered, as he pressed one hand into his side and turned around, to start limping out of the room. He had to get to a safe spot.

Get to a safe spot, so Bruce.

So Bruce could.

Jason brought his other hand up to his head, but between him holding the device still, and the helmet on his head, he wasn’t really sure what he was trying to do.

His head felt. Murky.

He had to call Bruce.

[renee-writer]

The Time Before

Written for @flashfictionfridayofficial 148 prompt.

“They rose as high as the trees.” His listeners sit in rapt attention. “With windows that looked out on the streets. Oh the streets, they were full of vehicles, cars, trucks and, buses.” As they sit next to one, rusted out and half covered by the tree that grows through it, they can sort of picture it.  “It was so loud. You couldn’t hear the sound of the birds singing, no sound of the creek running.” They give each other nervous looks. How could it have ever been so loud to drown out the sounds they are surrounded by? “Hard to imagine, but true. Worse,” how could anything be worse? “There was very little green.  Everything was grey’s and white with the concrete, the only green came from a few trees, growing in small areas called parks. A few trees, a few bits of grass. But even that is broken up by more concrete that made places to park the cars and by plastic that made structures for the children to play on.” Confused mummers from the children. Places to play? The trees offer that, the creeks, the swinging vines. Why would anyone need more? “They didn’t know how to play without directions. How sad is that? These big cities where the pinnacle of life in what used to be. In the time before.”  They shake their heads before their moms call them to eat. They stand, bare foot and bare bodies and run off. Their great-grandfather watches them with a smile. Very few recall the time before. He wants to make sure they know so the big cities will never be rebuilt.

[kalendraashtar]

Tale Time #20

“Oh, I’ve had a fascinating query from a junior professor that I wish to start on as soon as possible, about a point of French philosophy as it relates to Egyptian religious practice. Can you imagine?”

“Not even a little bit.” I smiled at him, charmed by his never-ending enthusiasm for his research. I was much more interested in getting out at night, myself, sans escort. The opportunities for cinema-going, dancing or cavorting with handsome men had been rather thin on the ground in Peru. I had spent more than nine months longing for a little fun.

Well, maybe not longing that hard, I thought, remembering some of the more steamy nights in the jungle, keeping not-so-cool with one of the more attractive graduate students working on the dig. Helmut was tall and sandy-haired, with brown eyes and a devastating smile, and a nigh-unquenchable thirst for the only girl in miles. We had a fair bit of fun sneaking about the ruins, and he had promised to write, but I wasn’t planning on holding my breath.

I did, however, put thoughts of Helmut and his callused hands aside, worried my face would reveal more than I intended. But Uncle Lamb had his nose in his research notebook. We never discussed my liaisons, and I honestly wasn’t sure how much he knew about my social life. He had given me a very scientific explanation of where babies come from at age 10, and we had never spoken of it again. My uncle was an oddly distracted man, but I was sure he couldn’t have been totally oblivious to my late-night comings and goings or flirtations during mealtimes. And he had been going on about the vestal virgins again...

The Time Before, at Chapter 1, @convivialcamera

[songs-of-everythings]

You had something to hide Should have hidden it, shouldn’t you Now you’re not satisfied With what you’re being put through It’s just time to pay the price For not listening to advice And deciding in your youth On the policy of truth Things could be so different now It used to be so civilised You will always wonder how It could have been if you’d only lied It’s too late to change events It’s time to face the consequence For delivering the proof In the policy of truth Never again is what you swore The time before Never again is what you swore The time before Now you’re standing there tongue tied You’d better learn your lesson well Hide what you have to hide And tell what you have to tell You’ll see your problems multiplied If you continually decide To faithfully pursue The policy of truth Never again is what you swore The time before Never again is what you swore The time before

[mdaprimavera-blog]

the time before by Rona Keller Via Flickr: the snow leaves and makes way for a rainy night and foggy windows in the morning for the third month in a row

[conflicteduality]

Cave Johnson: As founder and CEO of Aperture Science, I thank you for your participation and hope we can count on you for another round of tests. We're not going to release this stuff into the wild until it's good and damn ready, so as long as you keep yourself in top physical form, there will always be a limo waiting for you. Say goodbye, Caroline.

Caroline: Goodbye, Caroline!

Cave Johnson: She is a gem.