Rabbits And Umbrellas

Odds and Ends

A Ghost Hunt short story,

Noll asked, “Why are you here?”

The boy, older than him but still young enough to look out of place in the spacious SPR office, shrugged. “A test or something? They told me to talk to some doctor. I’m guessing that’s you.”

Noll scowled, but not at the underlying jest of the question. He was used to people questioning his expertise. “Indeed,” he said, “but why are you here?” The question was moot; he already knew why.

The boy sitting across from him was Lyle Mund, a chemistry student from Queen’s College. He was supposedly the catalyst in a series of events stemming from a demonstration of the Light Box and a otherwise unachievable score.

“I don’t know,” Lyle said, “you’re the doctor here.”

Noll sighed. The ‘test’ he was referring to was a rather simple one; guess which light will turn on next. The odds are, more or less, even. Given enough chances, the average human will be wrong 50% of the time. Noll remembered, rather fondly, proving his Japanese assistant was psychic using that very test. Except, where she had failed, Lyle seemed to succeed.

“97% success rate on a game of chance. That is a mathematical impossibility.”

Lyle shrugged. “It was luck.”

“Luck,” Noll said, “is subjective. Do you know what we study here at SPR?”

“I hear your guys in the parapsychology course get to go ghost hunting as an extra curricular.”

It was hard to deny that. All prospect hires at the University we’re invited to study SPR’s research methods. Most the time that included fielding active cases.

Lyle went on, “From what I’ve seen, it looks like you guys are going hard for the modern magician vibe. Card tricks, misdirection and all that.”

“SPR,” Noll started, “stands for the society for psychical research. We aim to understand events commonly described as paranormal. Ghost hunting is a part of that. We study mediumship, haunting, and the manifestation of psychic abilities.”

Noll knew the bemused look on his face well. The arched eyebrow was one of his favorites.

Lyle said, “You mean magic.”

“It’s only magic when you don’t understand what’s really happening.”

“Do you understand?”

Noll didn’t answer.

“I thought you looked the is-this-your-card type.” Lyle laughed, gathering his jacket. “Not interested but thanks for the talk.”

Noll watched him carefully.

On one hand, his skepticism could help them. SPR thrived on the disbelieving. It was easier to dismiss inexplicable phenomena when one didn’t exactly believe in it. Disappearing objects became forgetfulness, disembodied voices traced to a television accidentally left on.

On the other hand, SPR didn’t have a need for psychics unwilling to believe in their own abilities. That left Noll in a peculiar position. He dug in his pocket, flicking a small black and white object between his fingers. What if he could convince him?

Noll set the object on the table with a light chink.

Lyle eyed it sideways, halfway between his seat and the door. “What’s that?”

“One die.” Noll said, “Six sided. Would you like to roll it? Just once, then you can leave.”

Lyle rolled his eyes. “You can’t be serious.”

Noll frowned. He was always serious.

Lyle strode back and snatched the die from the table.

Noll said, “Call out a number.”

“What?”

“Before you roll, call out a number.” He urged, arms crossed. “One through six.”

“Three.” Lyle spit. He was annoyed, but that was okay. Noll just needed him to understand.

The die hit the table, once, twice, and spun to a stand still. Three solid black dots faced the ceiling.

Lyle stared at it for a full minute. “Coincidence,” he said.

“Could be.” Noll agreed, “Why don’t you try again? For good measure.”

Lyle hesitated.

Noll took advantage, reaching into his pocket. “What about two dice?” He set another black and white die beside the first. “The chances of rolling a pair of dice with the same number is 16.7%. That’s not exactly impossible, but the odds are against you.”

Lyle’s dark eyes cut Noll’s but the levity of his stare was something Noll was used to. He waited out the silence.

Slowly, eventually, Lyle picked up both dice, one by one, making a show out of checking they were the exact same.

“Number?”

“Again?”

“It doesn’t work if you don’t say a number.”

Lyle paused, fist over the table. “Three, he said again, “Wait no. Six.”

The dice collided with each other, sending themselves to opposing sides of the table. The die on the left showed six small black dots, the right, only three.

Lyle shook his head. “That’s not possible.”

“Why did you change your mind?”

“I don’t know. It just sounded stupid to say the same thing twice.”

Noll waved a hand producing four more die. “Three dice and the odds of rolling any number you call out falls to 1/36. What are the odds,” he said, setting them down one by one, “of six dice? I’d say there’s around 0.013% chance of guessing all six.”

Lyle laughed. “You’re crazy.”

“Hm.” Noll said. A smirk had already fixed itself to his smug face. “This is what we do here at SPR. We hypothesize, we research, and we gather data.”

Lyle glanced at the dice. “What does it mean?”

Noll blinked. He thought it was pretty self explanatory.

“What does it mean to guess right?” Lyle kept on.

“I guess that makes you a good guesser.”

“Seriously?”

Noll held his chin in his palm. “Call your number.”

Lyle thought hard, gathering the dice in his first. He held it steady over the table. “How many?”

“What do you think?”

Lyle said, “One,” and opened his hand.

All six dice landed in a kind of starburst pattern. They spun and thunked on the table before coming to a staggered standstill. Looking from the table to Noll then back to the table, Lyle couldn’t stop the disbelieving grin spreading over his face. Every dice showed a single small black dot.

“What,” Noll said, “are the odds?”

Why were the twins left alive

This question is a question that interests everyone, and I thought of sharing my take on it:

It was all a test.

Previously I suggested that the Queen might always be watching her Watchdog, the Phantomhive Earl. You can find the post with that theory here. There I explained how I think the queen has always been watching our earl, since he returned from the demonic cult, all the way until now - however, I also believe she might’ve been watching over him (and his brother) from the moment they left the Phantomhive mansion. 

In fact, I believe that the twins were left alive with one purpose - to test them to see if either of them was strong enough to become the new Watchdog.

Also, this theory does not necessarily go with the RCMT, but also not against it. It works both ways. 

How I believe everything went down after Vincent was killed

It is clear that the queen needs a Watchdog. Whatever Vincent did - or refused to do - was something so bad that he simply couldn’t be left alive. I personally believe that people aren’t killed when they don’t do something - they’re killed when they know too much.

With Vincent dead, the Queen would need another Watchdog. The twins - especially the heir, Ciel Phantomhive - were young, but the Queen thought that, perhaps, they were capable. They had it in their blood.  So she figured she should test them: let the twins, who don’t know what their father knows, alive. Kidnap them and sell them to child traffickers, then keep an eye on them to see if they are capable of returning to their rightful place.

Here things could take a turn: the queen might or might have not sent them to the cult on purpose. She might have ordered her servants to give them to the child traffickers and it just happened that the man from the cult got to them, or she might have planned everything, including that the twins would get to the cult - to make it an even harsher experience and see if either of them is truly capable of making it out alive, of becoming the Watchdog. 

Once the twins got to the cult, the servant(s) of the queen kept on watching them, to see what would become of them. One of them, most likely John Brown, was there the night Sebastian was summoned and saw the whole thing. Most likely the servant also saw our!Ciel taking the identity of his older brother and informed the queen of this matter.

However, I don’t think she cares about that. The only thing that interested her was that someone strong enough returned to take over the duty of the Watchdog. Whichever twin it was, I don’t think she cares. Had both twins returned, naturally the older twin, the heir, would take the title and the duty. Had neither twin returned - it’s a matter for another post. It’s coming soon after this one. 

Perhaps this was also part of the reason why all the other Phantomhive servants had to be killed, so no one would help the twins, search for them or save them. Also why Tanaka wasn’t killed - but was injured. Tanaka, although he’s probably the one who knows the most in the story, and although he most likely also knows the identity of the mastermind, he has the duty of serving and preserving the Phantomhive bloodline. That’s why he says he cannot die before his master - there must always be a master to serve for a Phantomhive butler. 

There must always be a Watchdog.

Following up, I present a few clues that support/made me consider my theory. Do check them out if you’re interested. If not, then thank you for reading this far!

Clue 1: The twins were left alive on purpose

This couldn’t be any clearer. Whoever attacked the Phantomhive mansion had orders to leave the twins alive. In fact, in this post I also suggest the possibility that:

I believe there were two attackers not necessarily because both of them had to kill, but maybe because one was in charge of retrieving the twins.

Now why do I say they absolutely had to have orders to leave the twins alive? Well:

1) The attackers were too cruel to feel pity for the children. I don’t think it’s a matter of mercy.

2) If they wanted to kill them, they would have killed them on the spot, not taken them away.

3) If somebody else (an ally of Vincent, someone like Undertaker or Frances) had found them, I don’t think the children would have gotten to the traffickers.

So yeah. The only way I see it is that they were left alive on purpose.

Clue 2: There is a suspicious person present the night the twins were supposed to be sacrificed, who looks as if they were watching the whole thing

That person, basically. And I strongly believe that was one of the servants of the queen - most likely John Brown. A very important detail about this person: it looks like they are completely unfazed by Sebastian’s summoning, and they’re just observing how things went down. The fact that a demon just showed up doesn’t surprise them at all, which is… weird. Probably any regular human being would have, at least, been surprised. But they don’t seem surprised nor scared in the slightest.

Clue 3: Our Ciel didn’t have to pass any special tests when he returned to take the title

Remember how the queen tested our Earl’s abilities and loyalty in the Book of murders arc? That entire arc was a test, after the Circus act, to see if our Earl ‘still had what it needed to be the Watchdog of the queen’. However, upon his return from the cult, his abilities and loyalty were never tested. But how could that be?

Would the queen be foolish enough to give a child the duties of a Watchdog and have him killed immediately? Certainly not. She must have been absolutely certain that he was capable.

Clue 4: The Queen never referred to our young master directly by the name of “Ciel”

Except for that one letter when he just returned, but, when addressing him directly, I don’t think she’s ever called him “Ciel”.  She’s called him, instead, her dear boy or just Earl Phantomhive. Do correct me if I’m wrong.

Clue 5: In the whole time when there wasn’t a Watchdog, the queen didn’t make a single move to name another person - it’s like she was waiting to see what would happen

The twins were at the cult for an entire month. It’s true that it was around Christmas and the New Year, so maybe it was just convenient, but I still think is seems like she was waiting to see if either twin could, actually, escape the cult.

These are the main clues that got me to this theory. If I think of more, I will reblog and add to them. Thank you very much for reading all of this. Any thoughts on it? I welcome any comments, agreements or disagreements, as long as you keep in my mind it’s nothing but a theory - no need to take it personally. ^^

I’ve started reposting ToshoSen translations on my website, but it seems it’ll take forever to format it right >_<

Here’s a preview of Index 1: http://www.fuyunoyo.com/index.php?file=Sections&op=article&artid=4

I know the website is in French so it’s not as intuitive as tumblr, but it should still be alright I think. I added page breaks to make it more legible and links to full size pics. Let me know if there’s anything you don’t like and I’ll try to fix it - otherwise I’ll keep uploading the rest of the chapters.

Psycho-Pass 3 Actor AU! ✨

on twitter

some people think writers are so eloquent and good with words, but the reality is that we can sit there with our fingers on the keyboard going, “what’s the word for non-sunlight lighting? Like, fake lighting?” and for ten minutes, all our brain will supply is “unofficial”, and we know that’s not the right word, but it’s the only word we can come up with…until finally it’s like our face got smashed into a brick wall and we remember the word we want is “artificial”.

Unmute this

Writing Fanfiction Is:

Losing motivation when you have time

Getting motivation at ungodly hours of the day or when busy

Going back to your story trying to remember what the fuck you said

“Am I writing this character good or nah?”

“does the plot make sense?”

feeling guilty sometimes for absolutely no reason

waiting for comments on your fic from specific readers

writing something and thinking “oh yeah, thats definitely going to hurt them”

procrastinating on writing by writing other fics

having too many ideas and not enough time

never finishing your wips

debating whether to add the fucking dumbass joke in that scene or not

wondering if you should or shouldn’t add that angsty scene purely to fuck with the readers bc its not like its gonna kill them or anything

Hoping no one finds it while simultaneously hoping ppl read it

playing music for inspiration and zoning out

planning fics and never writing them

thinking its shit but ppl like it and suddenly ur imposter syndrome acts up LIKE A FUCKING BITCH

loving ur readers so so much

Midnight Train (Part 4/4)

Prompt: Naru and Mai shares a dream (or multiple dreams), but neither of them know they’re actually sharing it. - @seoulsborne123​

——

A week later, a client finally came in with a promising case.  Promising, in that at least it didn’t sound totally bogus, but it was still the type of case that Naru normally wouldn’t take interest in.  Nonetheless, he accepted the job, to Lin’s visible surprise.

The next issue was whether this case actually had any legit paranormal activity, and if not, would Gene even appear?  Naru had Mai contact Masako right away, and while they were setting up the base, she spotted him checking a hand mirror periodically.

They had managed to get through the past week without another spree of nightmares, but Mai could tell he was impatient to get his dreams back to himself.  She tried not to take it personally.

Masako arrived on the evening of the first day.  So far, they had collected very little data, and their investigation showed that the reported phenomena could be easily explained.

Mai watched anxiously as Masako walked around the house.  At last, she came to a stop.

“There is a spirit here,” she said.

They breathed a sigh of relief.

“It is the spirit of an old man,” Masako went on to explain.  “I see this kind often. I believe he must have passed away in his sleep and simply hasn’t realized he has died.  It would be very easy to purify him.” She turned to Naru. “Shall I?”

“No,” said Naru, a bit too quickly.

Masako blinked.

“I’d like to gather more data first,” he lied.  “If you could please come back tomorrow.”

“If you insist,” she smiled.

Mai facepalmed and sent the medium a mental apology.  This wasn’t what it looked like!

  ——

  That night, Naru and Mai left Lin to watch the base and went to bed at the same time.  This earned them a suspicious look, but they could deal with that later.

They sat in the train compartment and waited.  And waited.

Finally, they heard someone walking down the corridor.  Gene appeared outside the door, and his face lit up when he saw them inside.

He opened the door and came inside.  “It worked!” he said.

Naru stood up.  “Like hell it did.”

Oh shit, Mai thought.  She could actually see the murderous aura gathering around him.  Naru was furious.

As his brother approached, Gene’s smile widened nervously.  “N-Noll?”

Naru grabbed his twin by the shirt collar, and Mai decided now would be a good time to intervene.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!”  She cut in between them, holding Naru back as best she could.  “You can’t kill your dead brother!”

“Do you have any idea what you’ve done?” Naru seethed.

“I’m sorry?”  Gene looked confused.  “I didn’t know if it would work!  It was just an idea I had…and then I fell asleep before I could fully see it through…why, did something go wrong?”

“Oh, Gene…” Mai groaned.

“What?” he looked at her, now worried.

“It worked,” Naru said through grit teeth.  “And it’s been stuck that way for over a week.”

“Oh.”  Gene looked between them.  “Oh.”

They watched as the news continued to sink in.

Then finally, Gene put on a smile.  “Did you guys have fun though?”

Naru smacked him upside the head.

“NARU!”

“I’m sorry!”  Gene put up his hands defensively.  “I’m sorry, both of you! I just…ow, why does that hurt, I’m not even alive…”

“Give me one good reason not to do it again,” Naru said.

Gene hung his head.  “I’m sorry…I only wanted to see if I could meet you face-to-face, instead of just through a mirror.  So I thought, maybe this way…”

There was an awkward silence.

Naru lowered his hand and let out a sigh.  “If you ever pull something like this again, I swear, I will exorcise you.”

“Naru!”

“I guess that’s fair,” Gene smiled weakly.  “It is good seeing you again, though.  Despite the violence.”

“And?  Can you undo this?”  Naru crossed his arms, with an unspoken ‘you’d better.’

“I’ll try my best.”  Gene turned to Mai. “I’m really sorry, Mai.  I didn’t mean to subject you to my brother’s subconscious for that long.”

“Oh, it’s okay,” she said, blushing a little.  “It was, um…interesting.”

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Naru huff and look away.  A little bit of regret settled in her heart.

——

Mai and Naru saw Gene out at the doorway to their compartment.

“Just sit still, you two.  I’ll go get this figured out.”  Gene wandered off down the corridor.  

As they watched him go, Mai gripped the door frame for support.

“Hey, Naru?” she asked.  “Before we wake up…can I ask you something?”

“What?”

“Do you ever dream about me?”

Naru hesitated.

She already knew the answer.  And judging by the look on his face, he knew that she knew.

“Sometimes,” he admitted.

Mai knew that wasn’t necessarily a good thing, as she’d seen before.  But judging by how unphased he’d looked seeing her in his dream the first time, she hoped those instances didn’t all become nightmares.

Nightmares ➝Shinkane Week Day 3 ➝WC: 7203 / Rating: M (gore mentions/themes) / AU

Trapped in an apocalyptic world falling apart at the gruesome, decaying hands of a governmental experiment gone completely abysmal, Akane and Kogami take shelter in an abandoned apartment to wait for help.

Keep reading

compilations of unlucky idiots