They Also Have An Animal One That I Linked A Whole Back On The Same Site !

I have never felt so fucking enraged as when I saw a cop in a camouflaged uniform holding a pride flag crunched up.

To everyone, 20 people have been illegally arrested by the police duringba Pride Protest that also fronted #JunkTerrorBill and other ongoing issues in the Philippines.

The Terror Bill has NOT been signed yet AND THEY'RE ALREADY ABUSING POWER.

FREE PRIDE 20! JUNK TERROR BILL !!

SO HERE IS THE WHOLE STORY (SO FAR).

I am on my knees begging you to reblog this post and to stop reblogging the original ones I sent out yesterday. This is the complete account with all the most recent info; the other one is just sending people down senselessly panicked avenues that no longer lead anywhere.

IN SHORT

Cliff Weitzman, CEO of Speechify and (aspiring?) voice actor, used AI to scrape thousands of popular, finished works off AO3 to list them on his own for-profit website and in his attached app. He did this without getting any kind of permission from the authors of said work or informing AO3. Obviously.

When fandom at large was made aware of his theft and started pushing back, Weitzman issued a non-apology on the original social media posts—using 

his dyslexia; 

his intent to implement a tip-system for the plagiarized authors; and 

a sudden willingness to take down the work of every author who saw my original social media posts and emailed him individually with a ‘valid’ claim,

as reasons we should allow him to continue monetizing fanwork for his own financial gain.

When we less-than-kindly refused, he took down his ‘apologies’ as well as his website (allegedly—it’s possible that our complaints to his web host, the deluge of emails he received or the unanticipated traffic brought it down, since there wasn’t any sort of official statement made about it), and when it came back up several hours later, all of the work formerly listed in the fan fiction category was no longer there. 

THE TAKEAWAYS

1. Cliff Weitzman (aka Ofek Weitzman) is a scumbag with no qualms about taking fanwork without permission, feeding it to AI and monetizing it for his own financial gain; 

2. Fandom can really get things done when it wants to, and 

3. Our fanworks appear to be hidden, but they’re NOT DELETED from Weitzman’s servers, and independently published, original works are still listed without the authors' permission. We need to hold this man responsible for his theft, keep an eye on both his current and future endeavors, and take action immediately when he crosses the line again. 

THE TIMELINE, THE DETAILS, THE SCREENSHOTS (behind the cut)

Sunday night, December 22nd 2024, I noticed an influx in visitors to my fic You & Me & Holiday Wine. When I searched the title online, hoping to find out where they came from, a new listing popped up (third one down, no less):

This listing is still up today, by the way, though now when you follow the link to word-stream, it just brings you to the main site. (Also, to be clear, this was not the cause for the influx of traffic to my fic; word-stream did not link back to the original work anywhere.)

I followed the link to word-stream, where to my horror Y&M&HW was listed in its entirety—though, beyond the first half of the first chapter, behind a paywall—along with a link promising to take me—through an app downloadable on the Apple Store—to an AI-narrated audiobook version. When I searched word-stream itself for my ao3 handle I found both of my multi-chapter fics were listed this way:

Because the tags on my fics (which included genres* and characters, but never the original IPs**) weren’t working, I put ‘Kara Danvers’ into the search bar and discovered that many more supercorp fics (Supergirl TV fandom, Kara Danvers/Lena Luthor pairing) were listed.

I went looking online for any mention of word-stream and AI plagiarism (the covers—as well as the ridiculously inflated number of reviews and ratings—made it immediately obvious that AI fuckery was involved), but found almost nothing: only one single Reddit post had been made, and it received (at that time) only a handful of upvotes and no advice. 

I decided to make a tumblr post to bring the supercorp fandom up to speed about the theft. I draw as well as write for fandom and I’ve only ever had to deal with art theft—which has a clear set of steps to take depending on where said art was reposted—and I was at a loss regarding where to start in this situation.

After my post went up I remembered Project Copy Knight, which is worth commending for the work they’ve done to get fic stolen from AO3 taken down from monetized AI 'audiobook’ YouTube accounts. I reached out to @echoekhi, asking if they’d heard of this site and whether they could advise me on how to get our works taken down.

While waiting for a reply I looked into Copy Knight’s methods and decided to contact OTW’s legal department:

And then I went to bed.

By morning, tumblr friends @makicarn and @fazedlight as well as a very helpful tumblr anon had seen my post and done some very productive sleuthing:

@echoekhi had also gotten back to me, advising me, as expected, to contact the OTW. So I decided to sit tight until I got a response from them.

That response came only an hour or so later: 

Which was 100% understandable, but still disappointing—I doubted a handful of individual takedown requests would accomplish much, and I wasn’t eager to share my given name and personal information with Cliff Weitzman himself, which is unavoidable if you want to file a DMCA.

I decided to take it to Reddit, hoping it would gain traction in the wider fanfic community, considering so many fandoms were affected. My Reddit posts (with the updates at the bottom as they were emerging) can be found here and here.

A helpful Reddit user posted a guide on how users could go about filing a DMCA against word-stream here (to wobbly-at-best results)

A different helpful Reddit user signed up to access insight into word-streams pricing. Comment is here.

Smells unbelievably scammy, right? In addition to those audacious prices—though in all fairness any amount of money would be audacious considering every work listed is accessible elsewhere for free—my dyscalculia is screaming silently at the sight of that completely unnecessary amount of intentionally obscured numbers.

Speaking of which! As soon as the post on r/AO3—and, as a result, my original tumblr post—began taking off properly, sometime around 1 pm, jumpscare! A notification that a tumblr account named @cliffweitzman had commented on my post, and I got a bit mad about the gist of his message :

Fortunately he caught plenty of flack in the comments from other users (truly you should check out the comment section, it is extremely gratifying and people are making tremendously good points), in response to which, of course, he first tried to both reiterate and renegotiate his point in a second, longer comment (which I didn’t screenshot in time so I’m sorry for the crappy notification email formatting):

which he then proceeded to also post to Reddit (this is another Reddit user’s screenshot, I didn’t see it at all, the notifications were moving too fast for me to follow by then)

... where he got a roughly equal amount of righteously furious replies. (Check downthread, they're still there, all the way at the bottom.)

After which Cliff went ahead & deleted his messages altogether. 

It’s not entirely clear whether his account was suspended by Reddit soon after or whether he deleted it himself, but considering his tumblr account is still intact, I assume it’s the former. He made a handful of sock puppet accounts to play around with for a while, both on Reddit and Tumblr, only one of which I have a screenshot of, but since they all say roughly the same thing, you’re not missing much:

And then word-stream started throwing a DNS error.

That lasted for a good number of hours, which was unfortunately right around the time that a lot of authors first heard about the situation and started asking me individually how to find out whether their work was stolen too. I do not have that information and I am unclear on the perimeters Weitzman set for his AI scraper, so this is all conjecture: it LOOKS like the fics that were lifted had three things in common:

They were completed works;

They had over several thousand kudos on AO3; and

They were written by authors who had actively posted or updated work over the past year.

If anyone knows more about these perimeters or has info that counters my observation, please let me know!

I finally thought to check/alert evil Twitter during this time, and found out that the news was doing the rounds there already. I made a quick thread summarizing everything that had happened just in case. You can find it here.

I went to Bluesky too, where fandom was doing all the heavy lifting for me already, so I just reskeeted, as you do, and carried on.

Sometime in the very early evening, word-stream went back up—but the fan fiction category was nowhere to be seen. Tentative joy and celebration!***

That’s when several users—the ones who had signed up for accounts to gain intel and had accessed their own fics that way—reported that their work could still be accessed through their history. Relevant Reddit post here.

Sooo—

We’re obviously not done. The fanwork that was stolen by Weitzman may be inaccessible through his website right now, but they aren’t actually gone. And the fact that Weitzman wasn’t willing to get rid of them altogether means he still has plans for them. 

This was my final edit on my Reddit post before turning off notifications, and it's pretty much where my head will be at for at least the foreseeable future:

Please feel free to add info in the comments, make your own posts, take whatever action you want to take to protect your work. I only beg you—seriously, I’m on my knees here—to not give up like I saw a handful of people express the urge to do. Keep sharing your creative work and remain vigilant and stay active to make sure we can continue to do so freely. Visit your favorite fics, and the ones you’ve kept in your ‘marked for later’ lists but never made time to read, and leave kudos, leave comments, support your fandom creatives, celebrate podficcers and support AO3. We created this place and it’s our responsibility to keep it alive and thriving for as long as we possibly can.

Also FUCK generative AI. It has NO place in fandom spaces.

THE 'SMALL' PRINT (some of it in all caps):

*Weitzman knew what he was doing and can NOT claim ignorance. One, it’s pretty basic kindergarten stuff that you don’t steal some other kid’s art project and present it as your own only to act surprised when they protest and then tell the victim that they should have told you sooner that they didn’t want their project stolen. And two, he was very careful never to list the IPs these fanworks were based on, so it’s clear he was at least familiar enough with the legalities to not get himself in hot water with corporate lawyers. Fucking over fans, though, he figured he could get away with that. 

**A note about the AI that Weitzman used to steal our work: it’s even greasier than it looks at first glance. It’s not just the method he used to lift works off AO3 and then regurgitate onto his own website and app. Looking beyond the untold horrors of his AI-generated cover ‘art’, in many cases these covers attempt to depict something from the fics in question that can’t be gleaned from their summaries alone. In addition, my fics (and I assume the others, as well) were listed with generated genres; tags that did not appear anywhere in or on my fic on AO3 and were sometimes scarily accurate and sometimes way off the mark. I remember You & Me & Holiday Wine had ‘found family’ (100% correct, but not tagged by me as such) and I believe The Shape of Soup was listed as, among others, ‘enemies to friends to lovers’ and ‘love triangle’ (both wildly inaccurate). Even worse, not all the fic listed (as authors on Reddit pointed out) came with their original summaries at all. Often the entire summary was AI-generated. All of these things make it very clear that it was an all-encompassing scrape—not only were our fics stolen, they were also fed word-for-word into the AI Weitzman used and then analyzed to suit Weitzman’s needs. This means our work was literally fed to this AI to basically do with whatever its other users want, including (one assumes) text generation. 

***Fan fiction appears to have been made (largely) inaccessible on word-stream at this time, but I’m hearing from several authors that their original, independently published work, which is listed at places like Kindle Unlimited, DOES still appear in word-stream’s search engine. This obviously hurts writers, especially independent ones, who depend on these works for income and, as a rule, don’t have a huge budget or a legal team with oceans of time to fight these battles for them. If you consider yourself an author in the broader sense, beyond merely existing online as a fandom author, beyond concerns that your own work is immediately at risk, DO NOT STOP MAKING NOISE ABOUT THIS.

Again, please, please PLEASE reblog this post instead of the one I sent originally. All the information is here, and it's driving me nuts to see the old ones are still passed around, sending people on wild goose chases.

Thank you all so much.

Fran Thoughts 1

I know this isn't healthy to let it out here but better something than nothing-

Some people thought being art student is easy but it is not, between juggling to general education subjects and doing major art subjects makes the time difficulty especially this online class.

Not only that you missed and craved the interaction between your peers especially while your doing artworks with them. Even if the art profs not teaching *ehem* just really giving projects to you. Or that after school fatigue yet became gone atleast for awhile because hanging out despite getting four hours of sleep is worth it.

Now on online class it's only not much interaction between classmates because we had many things to do not only in school but many personal things happening at home. It felt like just passing time doing plates (projects) and doing requirements of school yet felt like there was no reward for it.

Yet despite the negative feelings, we still strive to be if not best do better for ourselves.

I love that the Witcher proves how you can have a sexist world without having a sexist story. The framework is patriarchal, it's at times blatantly sexist and at one point Yennefer even bitterly points out that, as far as the world as concerned, women are just vessels. But the narrative isn't.

Things like -- it would be so easy to turn Yennefer into a villain. She's got a classic Femme Fatale backstory, she hits every point, she's powerful and ambitious and ruthless... but she isn't evil. In the end, she doesn't put her ambition over doing the right thing. She doesn't let her recklessness get in the way of the Battle at Sodden Hill; she registers some displeasure at being put up in the tower to observe and report, but she does it, and she does it without reserve or bitterness, to the best of her ability. She went through hell to find the power that she thought would give her what she wanted, only to discover that it wasn't all it was cracked up to be -- on her own. She didn't get this revelation from a lover, or from some great tragic descent into madness and fall from grace. She came to this realization over time, without someone else's opinion.

Queen Calanthe -- jfc, Queen Calanthe is how Daenerys Targaryen should have been handled. She's a powerful woman, an unapologetically ambitious warrior woman, who falls and loses her throne and country -- exactly the same way a King would have. Her flaws -- her hubris, her selfishness, her unwillingness to let go of her granddaughter -- lead to her downfall, but they do so rationally. She doesn't go mad, or start making stupid irrational decisions, or have to be otherwise softened -- she loses the battle. She was out-maneuvered, and her support was blocked, and she just failed. She just lost. Queens -- any poweful woman, really -- always go mad and have to be put down For The Greater Good, they never get to be a Tragic Hero in the classical sense -- always Lady Macbeth, never Hamlet.

Calanthe is a fucking Greek Tragedy. She hits all the high points of an Aristotelean Tragic Hero: she evokes pity and the fear that the viewer could have made all the same mistakes; her fortunes change from prosperity to adversity, not through vice or depravity but through error of judgment; that error is made through a fundamental character flaw, something that the character could have stopped, but also couldn't because of who they are as a person.

I cannot think of another Queen treated this way in fiction.

There's one single mention of rape, and that character does imply that this in part led to her not being a princess anymore -- followed almost-immediately by the main character explicitly and pointedly calling her Princess, pointing out that it isn't what was done to her that makes her monstrous, it's what she herself does. Even so, it's simply part of her backstory, she's the one who brings it up, and there's no gruesome flashback to "evoke sympathy" or whatever bullshit excuse to show women suffering.

It's just. It's so obvious that this showrunner is a woman. The comparisons to GoT are all over the place, and obviously -- they're both dark, gritty fantasies with a heavy political aspect -- but the way this show treats its characters, and particularly its women, is just so refreshing. It's not without its flaws, and while I'll admit that there were a few moments where I was like, "did she really need to be naked here?" none of those moments were tasteless or predatory, and there was none of that gratuitous degradation of women that was such a hallmark (and turnoff) of Game of Thrones.

(There's more, too, about how the Witcher differs from GoT in how sometimes, some people are just decent and kind. Sometimes, people really are all right, and do the right thing regardless of their own self-interest. And while, yes, it would be unrealistic if everyone or even most people were that way -- it's just as unrealistic to have no one be. There's this element of human compassion in the Witcher that's far too rare, if it exists at all, in Westeros, that makes the world so much less heavy. There's plenty of darkness and bleakness, but there's also kindness and compassion to balance it out. But that's a whole other post.)

It's just. God, it is just so nice, to have a fantasy show that acknowledges sexism without itself devaluing the female characters.

(hope my art is not too terrible for an arts student..)

I may or may not did study at this papi....

I may or not become part in the fandom and that is all thanks to The Mandalorian ahii

I know it stress and all in this point of time, stay strong everyone and stay safe peeps!

I loved the opportunity to make him as human and as accessible as possible which is strange to say because it’s impossible to get to him because he’s covered in armor from head to toe. 

And yet the idea is that he is relatable, we are all kinda covered in our own armor and terrified of taking that armor off and that’s the thing that crosses him over into a character that we all really wanna follow.

Pedro Pascal about the Mandalorian

Everything Everywhere All At Once Blooper Reel

oh my! I'm one of the finalists at a painting completion, still cannot believe it aaaaa

Task force 141 found out about your soft spots

Summary: You’re one of the members in the taskforce, and you’re one of the more quiet, self-reserved and stoic soldiers among them. They didn’t mind since they respected your personal space, but at some point, they saw just a glimpse of your rather different, softer side. a/n: I’ve had this idea in mind for a long time and just wanted to get this out there, English is not my main language so I apologize for any mistakes along the way! This is also my first fic so feedbacks are appreciated :] Tags: incorrect military terms/training, fluff, can be read as platonic or romantic, x gn!reader, reader's text is in purple Part 2 is out! PLEASE DO NOT RESHARE MY WORK ON OTHER PLATFORMS WITHOUT MY PERMISSION 

Captain John Price

You were on a mission with Price in another city, stalking and trailing the target, when suddenly the target decided to take a turn and entered a cafe. With the captain’s signal, both of you followed and took a spot in one of the corners in the warm, bustling cafe. It was a perfect atmosphere; the cafe was not necessarily noisy, but the number of people and music were busy enough for you and your captain to stay hidden and blend in well. You kept a keen eye on the target, noticing that he was in the queue and, so far, not presenting any signs of danger or threats. The captain gave your foot a nudge as he diverted your attention to the young waitress beside the table that you didn’t notice. "Hi! What would you like to order?" The waitress spoke in the local language that you didn't understand, but you knew she was most likely trying to take an order with the way she held a small notepad and a pen. You gave a small nod as you glanced at Captain for a moment, who was also reading the menu. You do the same, only frowning slightly as you couldn't read anything as well, and because you wanted to get this over with, you randomly pointed at one item to the waitress as she smiled and jotted down your order.

When the waitress walked away, you followed the captain’s gaze on the target; it seemed that he was still in line. You're slightly confused but relieved that the target remains in sight. Not long after, the drinks ordered previously arrived, but your eyes remained fixated on the sketchy figure. It wasn't until the Captain cleared his throat that you broke your gaze and stared down at the table. You froze slightly at the sight before you.

You watched a little wiggle action of the foam on top of what you assume is coffee before you. Except it's not the normal flat latte art kind of foam, but a huge bear foam with a cute face drawn with chocolate. You blink once, then twice before releasing a breath you didn't know you were holding.

This is so cute!! 

You thought to yourself internally as you felt yourself smiling, before realising the situation at hand as you snapped your head towards the captain, hoping he didn't see you, and to your relief, his eyes were still glued to the target. You take this opportunity to slowly take out your phone and take a quick picture of the drink before doing the same and observing the target again. As soon as you do, the target made its move and headed to the exit, which made the both of you follow promptly, seemed like he had a bag as well which was definitely not good news. You were a bit disappointed that you were not given the chance to try the cute drink, but you know you have a job to do, so you just hope that perhaps you can take a closer look again at the coffee later on your phone.

What you didn’t know was how the Captain noticed the change in your demeanour when you spotted the drink; he honestly wasn't expecting much from you, thinking you might just ignore it. But he saw from the corner of his eyes just how your eyes widen slightly, how they are shining when you realize what you ordered, and the way your cheeks had a shade of pink on it as you smile. He rarely gets to see you smile, and he found it endearing to think a cold soldier like you has a liking for cute things. He smiled internally as he noticed how you took the photo sneakily when you thought he wasn’t looking.

He made a mental note to bring you to a cafe he knows that have those famous latte art drinks after the mission, just to see you smile like that again.

John Soap McTavish

The military base has decided to bring in military working dogs to aid in the next mission, which involves scouting and detection for drug detection at the port, where secret drug trafficking from a certain group of terrorists has been reported.  

"Soap, you’re assigned to Max and Judy; you’ll have to talk to Sergeant Sam about the training," the Captain says as he walks through the compound. You noticed how Soap seemed to tense slightly as he clenched his jaw; you also noticed how his breath hitched as he stared at the two German shepherds standing on the sides of the dog handler; you knew he had a bad history with canines in general when you stumbled upon his journal once; and seeing how uncomfortable he was, you decided to step up for the job.

"Captain, can I do it instead?" The captain glanced back, his beard shifting as he thinks for a moment before nodding and giving you permission. Soap stared at you upon hearing your voice and gave you an apologetic yet grateful look as he breathed out a sigh of relief.

"Aye thanks… Let me know if yae ever need something from meh in the future."

He watched as you gave him a gentle pat on his shoulder as you nodded. Unbeknownst to him, you actually own a German Shepherd yourself, and you’re very much a dog person, and you’re excited to start the training with the military dogs. He stood on the side as you approached the two dogs, nodding along to the instructions given by Sam. As you bent down and extended your hand out, the two dogs gave a few sniffs before finally warming up to you, with their tails wagging as they circle your body. He’s impressed with how friendly you seem with animals, and you were natural with the dogs.

After the training, he went around looking for you as he held a bottle of ice-cold mineral water, hoping that he could give it to you since you were training heavily under the hot, blazing sun. As he turned a corner, right behind the shed, he heard a few barks. He softened his steps as he leant in and took a peek behind the wall, and he was glad he did.

Who’s a good boy? Yes, you are! Yes, you are! Come here! Oooh, such a big boy are you? You did such a great job with me just now~ oh! No wait wait- aH-!

He watched with a grin as he took in the image before him. You, giggling and rolling on the floor as the dogs lick and nuzzle your face and neck, having fun and relaxing with the dogs. He would almost forget that they were military dogs, and yet, with you? They looked domestic. On top of that, he has never heard you laugh or speak like this before; sure, you were using a baby voice and all as you cooed the dog, but he didn’t care because you have the softest yet brightest giggle, a stark contrast to your usual stoic self. He left after watching you for a while, smiling as he walked away to let you have your moments with the doggies. Next time, he’ll definitely want to join you in the training if it means getting to see this side of you more often. 

Kyle Gaz Garrick 

You groan as you sit on the passenger side as Gaz drives the Jeep. It was almost 9.30 pm as you were both ordered to buy a few furniture pieces, tables, and chairs specifically as an emergency thanks to Soap breaking them when he was messing around earlier.

"Why can’t we buy it tomorrow?"

Gaz asks as he, too, frowns and crosses his arms as a yawn escapes his mouth.

"We have a meeting with the other members from London tomorrow, and we can’t make them sit on the floor now, can we?"

Captain replied with a sigh as he frowned; he too was tired and annoyed with the situation, but he has a point. Gaz has asked you for help since the furniture needs to be carried, and you followed along (not without silently complaining).

The day has been terrible for you, it seems like bad luck was looming around your shoulders in every moment. Just this morning, you stubbed your toe and you couldn’t find your left sock, then sprained your shoulder slightly during the sparring session with Ghost. Not only that, the sandwiches that you always order for dinner were out of stock, so overall, you’re not having the best day. But who can you blame? You just decided to suck it up as you nod and follow Gaz. 

After parking a spot in IKEA, both of you decided to split up to find the respective wood and parts of the tables and chairs that, thankfully, the details of them have been sent to you by the Captain, so that the process can be faster before the store closes for the night. You sigh as you place the last part of the table in the trolley, crossing off the last serial number and name. You walk towards the place that Gaz told you to meet up with before stopping when you walk past the kid's section.

There it is, in all its glory: Djungelskog and the other notable plushies in the corner. Truth be told, you actually own two Blåhaj (they're in your house) and a baby Blåhaj in the quarters. You’re a big fan of plushies, especially the ones from IKEA and Miniso. You just haven't saved up enough cash to bring the big brown bear home. You take a step, then another, inching closer to the tray, until you’re right in front of the bear. You glanced around to make sure no one is around before you gently pick up the bear, thankful that there weren't many people in the first place due to the late hour. Without a second thought, you gave in and squish your face into its tummy as you give a big sigh and hug it tightly, smiling to yourself as you feel the stress dissolving away. Something about burying yourself in the soft cushion of cotton is healing for you; it gives you a safe, warming feeling, and it reminds you of the comfort that you never got much of as a kid.

You gave it a few more squeezes before finally parting ways with the bear, softly nudging its nose a few times as you whispered softly:

I swear I’ll come and bring you home next time I come.

You smile and place the bear back in its original position, glancing at it one last time as you spot Gaz in the distance, then swiftly push the trolley towards him. Gaz pays for the parts, and both of you head to the car. You get ready in your seat and fasten the seatbelt before Gaz speaks up.

"Oh, I forgot something. Give me a sec"

You haven’t even had the chance to ask back as he bolted back into IKEA. What did he forget? All the parts have been bought, and the store is nearing its closing time as well, but whatever it is, you waited patiently.

Maybe it's because of the long day, but as you rested your head on the window, you dozed off while you were waiting and didn’t wake up until you heard the driver's side car door open.

"Sorry it took awhile, we’ll go back now"

You nod sleepily as you murmur. "What did you forget?"

"Oh, don't worry about it", Gaz replies as he presses the gas pedal and promptly drives back to the base. You didn’t question further; you figured he probably needed something himself.

You went straight to bed after dropping off the equipment for Soap and Ghost to handle, immediately passing out as you landed on the soft bed.

The next morning, you were getting ready for the day as you stretched, satisfied that at least the sleep last night was good enough. As you open the door, a soft material lands in your room with a soft “umph” sound, you immediately look down cautiously, and that's when you see it.

Djungelskog, with its head tilted to your side as its fluffy hand remains on its tummy, on your floor. You were confused, and frankly, you were not awake enough to fully comprehend what just happened. But once you connected the dots, you smiled to yourself as you lifted the bear up and hugged it.

You make sure to buy Gaz something next time as a thank you.

Simon Ghost Riley

The day was mundane; after a few gruelling missions, the task force had many reports to do. You’ve opted to do them in one of the empty meeting rooms; you liked doing work in these rooms more than facing the concrete wall of your own quarters. At least here, the table was wide and it was fairly quiet; sometimes Ghost will join you as he feels the same. You enjoy his presence because, unlike the rest of the group, he is one of the few people you like spending time with in silence. Today was no different.

The hours go by quickly with the room filled with nothing but paper shuffling and turning pages. You sigh as you place down your pen and give a big stretch, deciding to take a break as you stand and move towards the door. The big man himself also follows along; you don’t question it; you figured he might need a break too.

As you walked away from the room, you decided to go to the bathroom. You passed by the training hall as you overheard the Captain and Laswell talking over some topics for the upcoming mission, but something caught your attention.

"....My wife brought cheesecake; it's in the fridge…."

Your ears perked up to the sound of cake; you haven’t had any dessert recently, and you do like cheesecake. You make a mental note to take a trip to the mess hall after using the bathroom, hoping to have a slice yourself.

As you make your way to the fridge silently, you approach the kitchen and let out a soft sigh of relief when the place is empty. You slowly open the door of the fridge as you poke your head in and search for any sign of cake. You were about to give up when you couldn’t see any, but you jolted slightly when you felt a pat on your shoulder. You quickly turn around, only to be met by Ghost again, with a plate in his hand. As you look at the plate, which has a slice of cheesecake, your eyes blink with hope as you slowly glance back at him. He gives you a nod as he hands you the plate, and you nod back as well with a smile, happy and grateful that he saved you a slice. You take a seat at one of the stools and grab a fork as you eat the cheesecake happily. Ghost leaned against the counter opposite you as he makes himself a cup of coffee. He watched silently as your mood seems to improve. Earlier, he saw how you stopped in your tracks when you overheard the conversation, how your eyelashes fluttered, and how your steps grew lighter. He immediately went to the kitchen when you head to the bathroom and managed to pry one last slice of Soap before he finished them, hoping to save you a piece when you come by later. As you take the first few bites with your eyes closed, you give a hum of approval as your shoulders drop. It’s not like the cheesecake was extremely good, but you can tell from the texture that it was homemade. You miss baking yourself; the last time you did it was with a roommate before you joined the military. You missed those silly moments as you clumsily mixed the ingredients and argued with your friend to stop adding too much sugar into the batter, or the time your friend made fun of you for baking the hardest brownies that can break cement if thrown at them. You also tend to have favouritism towards home-cooked stuff, no matter who made it; you always liked how the food tends to taste just slightly better. Is it because of comfort? Or the memories that flood your mind when you take in the smell? You honestly don't know; maybe it's both. Or maybe you like the thoughts and love people put into the meals when they cook. You were so lost in thought that you didn't realise you were swinging your feet idly on the stool. The stool was slightly taller than the regular one, and your legs barely touched the floor.

Ghost finds the view a bit charming—to see you relax and content over a slice of cake. It's not that he is complaining; he just never really saw you this comfortable before. He observes you silently and takes note of how you like to munch on your right cheek more than the left, making it puffy. He chuckles to himself when you start swinging your legs too. He's glad that he managed to snatch the last piece of cake, and perhaps in the near future, he’ll bring you some cake to share with you.

•·················•·················•·················•·················•·················•·················• a/n: that's all! Let me know what you think!! like a part two or something, have a nice day/night! :>

so to be clear,

1. Codslut isnt dead

2. "Codslut" is most likely "sheheal"

3. People with racist tendencies will do anything and everything to defend themselves from criticism including traumatizing a shit ton of people on the internet by faking their death.

I'm so fucking tired wtf is happening 💀

all over the fair argument of "not including Gaz in 141 posts is weird".

I dont think anyone deserves death threats over a fictional character but faking your death isnt any better tbh. This is so childish and disgusting.