I Can’t Stand Myself Anymore

“But if you forget to reblog Madame Zeroni, you and your family will be cursed for always and eternity.”

First kiss ft. Vilkas, Teldryn Sero, Brynjolf, Gwilin

A/N: Guess who’s back? (but for how long?)

Requested: Yes

–

Vilkas:

It had been a long trek back - but a rewarding one – finding the merry revelers as they wandered the land with their packs full of mead, happy to share in their revelry when the ‘grand companion’ passed by. He’d nursed the bottle right the way to Jorrvaskr, his smile fading as he witnessed his harbinger hunched uncomfortably over the table, elbow propped up on the wood with thumb and finger pinched at the top of their nose. They huffed resignedly, slamming down her charcoal to the point it shattered and rolled back into the hearth.  

He pulled out a seat beside them, barely finishing his inquiry as to what troubles were plaguing them before the pile of parchment was slid in his direction.

Contracts, summons, missives… inheritance… their toll weighed heavy. Then his eyes trailed to the higher pile, the completed pile, and the two empty ink pots beside it.

“Perhaps I could be of assistance.” They shook their head wearily.

“You’ve only just returned Vilkas, I couldn’t ask it of you. Go, get your rest.”

“And what of your rest. If we finish these together, we’ll both get what we want.”

There was no further argument when he fixed them with a glare, their mouth slamming shut as he began his work.

He took the contracts, signing them off with a flick of his wrist, and the personal papers were left aside, another night in the privacy of the dragonborns quarters would be for them.

An hour and a half later, they were done, and the completion of the job was about as satisfying as the cracks they received from their backs.

“Thank you Vilkas, I do believe drinks are on me when Hulda allows back in the mare.” It was fleeting, innocent, but it set his heart pounding. Their hand squoze his shoulder, and then their lips were pressed against his cheek, the sensation lingering long after their footsteps had disappeared.

Teldryn Sero:

The ash had whipped up dramatically, sending the duo to seek shelter. The cave was a mere crack in the mountainside, cold, damp, and dark – til Teldryns palm fluttered alight with arcane flame. What little kindling they could find was thrown to the flame, the fire growing till it was enough to light the small cavern and warm their freezing fingertips.

They pressed together – side by side beneath a threadbare blanket, holier than a priest of Arkay. With a bottle of Sujamma between them, they made the best of the situation, laughing until they were wheezing at one another’s tales. He’d long shed the cowl - for it did nothing but inhibit his ability to drink - but his mask remained. Through glossy, beady eyes he gazed at his companion, their flushed cheeks, gleaming grin, and sparkling eyes as they – yet again – told him the story of the tiny jester and his broken wagon. He’d heard it numerous times before, but he drank up every word, if for no other reason than to hear their jovial laughter.

He passed the bottle, barely a mouthful left, but still, they threw it back, the blanket slipping from their shoulder in the process.

“You know…” They whispered, eyes lidded as they glossed over his mask “This is technically an indirect kiss.” They giggled, covering their mouth light a child. He grinned back, leaning to fix the blanket at their shoulder.

“Then perhaps we should kiss properly. There’s no drink left after all.” He hadn’t meant for his voice to purr in such a way – though when they leaned into him without a second thought, he didn’t complain.

Brynjolf:

“Mind if I join you?” He took his seat with the nod of their head, placing his tankard down and fingering the rim. Despite all that had occurred, it seemed neither could summon the courage to address their current predicament. Desperately, he threw shy, fleeting glances, coughing, fidgeting – pitiful attempts to gain their attention. His mishap still pounded in his head.

They’d barely made it out the ruin, bruised, battered, and soaked to the bone. Mercer had taken his toll on all of them, but none more so than the dragonborn. Brynjolf could see it – the way they stood, all hunched, swaying ever so slightly. They were drained, and seemingly invisible to Karliah as she prattled on about Nocturnal and the task his friend was set to complete.

He’d caught them when they’d fell, legs giving way to the fatigue that flooded their limbs. He held them, their face pressed against his shoulder, and reflected on all he’d put them through. From a quick pick on the streets of Riften to slaying their own guild master in a Falmer infested dwarven ruin. And what had he done to help?

His hands stilled them as they heaved themselves back up, face steeled and tired as they looked to him for – something. So he leaned in, brash and uncalculated as he pressed his lips against theirs.

He’d forgotten the Nightingale armour was akin to a second skin.

They chuckled from across the table, grinning as he flushed across his cheeks and down his neck. He’d never been so embarrassed. His hands held his face, a groan rattling through his throat as their chuckles silenced, teeth at their lip to hold in what hadn’t escaped.

A gentle touch at his wrists and his hands were being withdrawn, placed upon the table with theirs atop his own. His breath hitched as they leaned towards him, smirk shrinking til their lips puckered and pressed against his own, unobstructed.

Gwilin:

“Excellent day for a swim” his voice was honey on the wind, an irresistible treat that had the dragonborn turning from their task in an instant. His shadow covered them, granting them the ability to gaze upon his smiling face, eyes crinkled at the corners, as he peered over the bridge at them.

“Perhaps you should join me them.” They’d been serious, but the jovial chime of his laughter proved the man was still all too innocent of their affections.

Once again, the sun shone in their eyes, and the crunching of fallen leaves that grew closer proved he’d abandoned his previous spot. They joined him at the bank, his eyes darting away and a dusky brown coating his cheeks. They were soaked to the bone, dressed in nothing but their underthing’s – and the medallion that hung from their wrist.

“I do believe this situation is a tad inappropriate” He mused

“Have to live life in the moment though don’t you?” It was a motto of sorts, one they turned on him regularly – an excuse to drink, to fight, to love – all to see his nose twitch in mild discomfort. They weren’t wrong.

“True, but yours are turning to bad habits.” He mumbled, allowing their laughter to ring in his ears and deepen his flush.

Temba’s voice shocked them both – a summon almost as powerful as the greybeards. He looked towards to mill, considering what trouble a moments delay could cause him – the dragonborn didn’t visit Ivarstead often.

With a deep sigh, he turned to say his farewells, only to have their touch behind his neck, and their lips upon his own.

“I do hope that becomes a habit.”

My life in a gif

Well now I just wanna see Goose put her hat on Ghost

Hehehe

“What’s this?” Simon asks, tipping your hat back. You swat his fingers away and push your brim back down.

“It’s nothing.”

“Didn’t look like nothing.” He raises a brow, staring you down, you can tell he’s smiling under his mask. 

“Shouldn’t you just be happy I’m not stealing your hat today?” You frown at him, swatting his hand away again when he reaches for your brim.

“I like when you steal my hat.” You really hate how many butterflies he conjures in you just saying that. 

“Only because you know you’ll get lucky later,” You gripe, letting him hook his fingers in your belt loops and tug you closer. 

“Maybe,” He says, “Maybe I just like seeing you wear it.”

More butterflies, you push at his face, cover his eyes so he doesn’t see you blush. It’s too early for him to be this smooth. What ever happened to him ignoring you where your dad could see?

“You don’t wanna see me with your claim?” Simon asks behind your hand.

“That’s different.” You tell him, it feels different at least. Feels less like a game and more like something… permanent. You wonder if he feels the same way about you stealing his hat these days.

“Doesn’t have to be.” Simon plucks your hat from your head, leaning down to let you swipe his.

You make an annoyed noise and grab his hat, watching him replace it with yours. It doesn’t really fit, but neither of you thought it would. You shove his hat onto your head and storm off to find a chore to do away from Simon’s too pleased smile.

He tips the brim of your hat down to check on the dark black he’d spotted against the chocolate felt. It’s his name. “Simon” spelled out in neat letters along the edge. He runs his thumb over the burnt felt, the brand you must’ve put on just for you, and now him, to see. That explains the attitude. You’re so cute when you’re embarrassed.

Ah, he’s gonna have to reward you for this later.

More like what’s my crack.

Pirates of the Caribbean greatness

when you’re young you just run but you come back to what you need (insp.) 

“You’re a kind girl..”

~ Kakashi Hatake

The Writer’s Guide to Burns, Part 1: Depth and Percentage

First, I would like to start this post with a little bit of a disclaimer. Burns are absolutely horrific things. They can destroy our sense of self, of even being able to see ourselves as truly human. They inflict pain in such types and amounts as to be mind-boggling, perhaps even debilitating. This series comes with content warnings for burns, childhood burns, pain, critical illness, ICU stays, and comparisons of human flesh to that of animals. Ultimately, it’s what we are.

A quick image search will turn up horrendously graphic images of people whose lives have been completely changed–some might use the word “destroyed”–by burns. I’m endeavoring to keep the images to illustrations, rather than actual photographs. I may succeed, I may not. I strongly recommend you do NOT search for these images. They’re absofuckinglutely horrific.

For my own part, I’ve collected people out of fires, and not all of them have lived. I’ve done my best to keep them alive and deliver them safely to the burn unit. I’ve also spent a brief amount of time rotating through the burn unit at a major, world-known medical center and have been fortunate enough to get lectures from their staff on a  couple of occasions.

Being exposed to people who’ve been burned like that changes you.

It changes the way you’re willing to perceive human lives. We are no longer indestructible. We are knit of flesh, and we roast, just like any other. We are so very, very fragile.

In this series of posts I will do my best to keep these memories out, to stick to the medicine and not the experience. But it may creep in around the edges.

So this series is dedicated to burn victims, to their families, and to the godsdamned courageous Burn ICU nurses and doctors who care for the most-badly burned. Thank you for all that you do.

Burn Depth and Degree

There are multiple ways to classify burns. However, I’ll use the two most common ones, which classify burns based on depth.

Burns are typically classified into degrees, which talk about how far into the skin burns go. I’ll go into detail after this handy illustration, courtesy of Medscape (WARNING: That linked slideshow contains graphic images).

Courtesy of Medscape.

First-degree burns are the least serious. They damage only the top layer of skin (the epidermis), and tend to come from the coolest sources around. The skin may turn red, and be painful, but won’t be permanently damaged. Humans can develop first-degree burns from thermal (heat) sources, or from UV radiation, such as a sunburn.

Second-degree burns are more serious. As you can see above, the dermis, the underlayer of the skin (which contains things like sweat glands and certain nerve endings). Burns like this may blister – this is a relatively reliable indication of a second degree burn.

I cannot overstate this enough: second degree burns are extremely painful, especially across large areas of the body.

Third-degree burns are burns that have made their way through the entire layer of the dermis and into the subcutaneous tissue. These are the burns that destroy underlying blood vessels and cause them to coagulate, that destroy nerve endings.

The tissue itself may look waxy and white in color, or it may char over or turn brown. It may gain a leathery appearance.

Third-degree burns may also continue to burn deeper, causing damage to the underlying muscle and even bone. Burns, under the right circumstances, can cause amputations, though these are rare.

One other thing  worth noting about 3rd-degree burns: the center of them doesn’t hurt, because the underlying nerves have been burned away. However, no 3rd-degree burn is isolated. Because that tissue retains heat, it will always burn the area around it. A third degree burn will always have a circumferential a second degree burn around it, and that second degree burn will hurt all to hell.

4th-6th degree burns: You may sometimes see people referring to burns as “4th degree” burns, all the way up to 6th degree burns. This is an older nomenclature; these numbers indicate burns below the depth of the skin, into the muscle tissue and underlying organs. But this is, at least in my service area, outdated terminology. Burns this deep are still categorized as 3rd degree.

Partial- and Full-Thickness Burns

This is an easier way of classifying burn depth. Partial-thickness burns only involve the epidermis and potentially part of the dermis layer – 1st and 2nd degree – while anything worse involves all of the dermal layers (3rd degree). The burn unit I’ve worked most closely with actually prefers this nomenclature, but the other is so well known I had to include it as well.

Common Burn Sources

Burns can come from one of several sources. They may be because of direct heat, such as in a house fire, or from a hot liquid splashing on someone. Critical burns have come from coffee cups and frying pans, especially in small children, who love to grab at things without understanding why grabbing the pot handle on the stove may be a terrible idea.

This blog does not give real world advice. However, if there are small children near you, turn your godsdamned pot handles IN on the stovetop. Childhood burns are preventable. Prevent them.

Yes, I’m willing to break a very strict blog policy I’ve had since day one for this. It’s that important, and it’s that simple. Don’t give them anything to grab.

The Rule of 9s

Estimating burn size is an inexact science, but we’ve sure tried! The Rule of 9 gives a quick estimate of “percent” of the burn – specifically, the percentage of the patient’s Body Surface Area that’s burned (%BSA in medslang).

The chart looks like this:

Image courtesy of WebMD

As you can see, each aspect of the body accounts for 9% of total body surface area, except for the genitals, which account for 1% of BSA regardless of configuration or size. As my EMS instructors like to say, even Ron Jeremy’s 1% is still only 1%.

So a person with complete circumferential burns of one leg would have burns over 18% BSA (Anterior: 9, posterior: 9; 9+9=18%). Meanwhile, if the burns encompassed the abdomen and anterior right forearm, their %BSA would be 13.5 (9% + 4.5%). A burn over the entire lumbar area, half the upper back, and entire left arm would have (9% + 4.5% + 9% = ) 22.5% BSA burns.

For smaller areas, the area of the patient’s palm is equivalent to 1% of BSA.

For writing, %BSA is only important as a throwaway comment, but it’s worth the quick math to figure out how much the character is burned so a medical character can sound like a smartypants. (“Mister Rogerthorn has full-thickness burns over 36% of his body” sounds quite official!)

That’s It for Part 1!

This post is running long, so we’re going to stop here for now. Next time on this series we’ll talk about burn first aid and field care, along with co-morbidities we might see (including inhalation burns and carbon monoxide poisoning).

Thanks so much for your time, and for your attention, and I’ll see you in Part 2!

xoxo, Aunt Scripty

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lead guard: men, look upon that woman in the market.

guard: what about her?

lead guard: she is possibly the most dangerous person in all of tamriel.

lead guard: she has the power of the voice, and it’s speculated that she may be the dragonborn.

lead guard: she’s widely known as the master of the thieves guild.

lead guard: she located, killed and stole the identity of the gourmet, then poisoned the double posing as the emperor.

lead guard: later, she killed commander maro and the entire penitus oculatus in a fit of rage after the dark brotherhood was killed off. she then boarded the emperor’s ship and murdered him as well.

lead guard: she has the favour of multiple daedric lords and carries their artifacts.

lead guard: she is a danger to everyone in her path.

guard: then we should kill her, now, while she’s unaware and shopping!

lead guard: fuck no, she spent seven days in jail. she’s paid off her wrongdoings.