#Superheroes don’t exist but I wish they did so that they could restore some order in this crazy world

[wandeel]

Sooo

I've seen quite a few people around the world talking on Twitter about what's going on in France right now, that we're just revolting over the pension reform at 64 years minimum

I am not a specialist in politics or economics, just a student of history, unemployed, from a small middle class family far from the big cities

So the pension reform, I've already talked about it a bit, is the last straw. We were lucky before to have a pension age of 60, then 62 in 2010, and to be the ones who retired the earliest compared to the other European countries around us, which exceed 65 years of age

With this reform, the minimum retirement age is 64, unless you have had a long education or started working fully before the age of 21 (as I have at the moment), in which case you will have to work longer to compensate for the years of study, and on average higher education in France is 3 to 5 years for masters. The pension is calculated in semesters, not years, but in any case, a student who has completed 5 years of study without having worked continuously before 21 will automatically have to work at over 65 from now on

This is if the person has access to money to live on after retirement. I think that no matter what country you are in, you know that many older people continue to work for a living or become homeless

Also, this pension reform should not have been put in place, it's Prime Minister Borne who forced it by using for the 11th time in 1 year, the 49.3 procedure, an undemocratic procedure that should normally be used in case of emergency

Add to that the inflation that has affected everyone with the war in Ukraine where the consumer (the people) is the one who loses the most

Also, we have had Macron for 6 years now who takes us for fools, if he was re-elected once, it is only to prevent Marine Le Pen, main head of the extreme right (political party of racists, homophobes, neo-nazis etc...), from being elected. But Macron was not elected for what he is! He was just the default choice! He too is rotten, privileging the richest (very minority)

He keeps closing more and more classes in schools (some primary classes have more than 40 students at present while in my time (I am 21 years old), there were still about twenty per class). He is also closing more and more beds in hospitals, nurses and doctors testified after the Covid crisis that they had to, in the resuscitation services, make the choice to let the weaker or older people die to leave the beds in resuscitation for people who were most likely to survive

I think there is no need to develop on he's inaction for ecology...

Let’s also talk about demonstrations, the national sport of France since forever

The problem with the demonstrations is that the police, the Brav-M, are not properly trained! They are bludgeoning absolutely everyone, demonstrators or not, even journalists who are supposed to be branded with their press cards. There are insults, abusive statements, sexual touching. There are problems of excessive power in the police but this brigade beats all the records

Anyway, there are demonstrations because we’re saturated. It’s not out of pleasure that people go out on the street to take blows, it’s because we can’t keep being docile

#France #Pension Reform #I have never wanted the independence of Brittany in France so much as now #Learn a little more if you want but don’t trust the big media they don’t show everything #Superheroes don’t exist but I wish they did so that they could restore some order in this crazy world #Well let’s see how it all ends

[blackbat05]

Night talks and Dim Sum

Shangqi x Reader

A/N: Hey y’all! This is my first time trying to write a one-shot/fic on tumblr. I have an existing wattpad account where I have some stories published! It’s mainly DC (young justice) combined with hunger games so if you are a fan, do check out @Runnerpottermore! Anyways, I have no idea why I suddenly decided to write a fic after so long - maybe because I wasn’t going through the best of days and also watched the movie recently? I just love the whole cast in general and Mr Simu Liu just killed his role - so yeah! Before I ramble on, I hope you enjoy my fic that I came up with!

Genre: Fluff, PG13, platonic friendship that can maybe turn into something more?

Warning: None? Just maybe broken Mandarin and sweaty people?

Extra Note: Please be kind to me!🥺

‘Bye.’

I take a deep breath, moving the cursor to close the window. Another day was done. Leaning back against the office chair, I stare up into the celling before closing my eyes, taking in the conversation a few hours ago.

‘It’s difficult to change what has already been so ingrained into our childhood. But what you can do is ask - what is the part of yourself that you want to keep?’

Rubbing my temples from the simple yet complex question, I decided that it was time to hit the road and get some fresh air. It was 6pm, Shangqi and Katy were probably still at the hotel.

As dreadful as running sounded to many people, this was one of the days where I could just zone out and mull over the day. The feeling of my shoes pounding into the pavement, body slowly being covered by a sheet of sweat… it felt good. Turning into the last corner of the run, a light tap on my shoulder jolted me out of my little world.

‘Woah is just me!’ My sudden stop had almost resulted me barreling right into Shangqi’s equally sweaty frame. He gives me his signature boyish grin only to earn a smack on his shoulder.

‘干嘛!’ (gànmá) [‘What are you doing!’]

‘吓死我了!’ (xià sǐ wǒ le!) [‘You scared me!’] I retorted back, removing my headphones. ‘What are you doing here, I thought you still had work?’

‘We did, but our shift ended early so I thought I’ll get in a quick run.’

‘10km is quick?’ I look at his phone that was calculating the distance, brows raised. ‘You’re a beast.’

‘Ha ha, very funny. Enough about me, what’s got you out today? I thought you were taking a break?’ We walked side by side, towards the direction of a renowned dim sum stall. ‘Yeah…’ I dragged my words for a while, hesitating to continue. ‘Just needed to think some things through.’ Shangqi nods. That’s the thing I liked about him. He never forced me to tell him things that I didn’t want to. He would wait quietly until I was ready.

‘I don’t know if I’m even going in the right direction. I thought I was doing things right - getting the grades, making sure I understood what was being taught at school… I was so sure that I could help people if I put my mind to it. But these feelings of not being able to do more… I don’t even know my future as a social worker anymore.’ I bit my lips, kicking a stray pebble.

‘Hold up!’ Shangqi steps in front of me, gripping the sides of my shoulders. ‘What did you say?’ He asks me in mock disbelief. ‘I said I’m not a good-‘

‘Nope! The conversation before this has been void! Because the (Y/N) I know is an amazing person and social worker who helps these kids to become the better version of themselves.’ He waves towards the many young Asian-American kids running around merrily in the playground as if to make his statement. A small smile formed on my lips watching Shangqi’s exaggerated movements to the disapproval of an elderly man with wispy white hair. He seemed to have noticed the looks he was getting as he dropped his hands to the sides in embarrassment.

‘Look, my point is that not many people can do what you do. Putting people before yourself, how many people would do that in this world?’

I throw him a skeptical glance. ‘You’re doing it. You’re a literal superhero that stopped a mythical creature from destroying our world. Not that it hasn’t happened.’ Shangqi snorts, ‘Sure. But hear me out. Who were the people that worked day and night to restore some order when the snap happened? Who made sure that these young kids weren’t afraid and reassured them that everything was going to be alright.’

He did have a point. Five years ago, the whole world was thrown into chaos. If I could forget something, it would be the chaos at the children and youth center on the exact day of the snap. Kids as young as four, crying uncontrollably for their missing parents. The older children who put on brave faces for their younger siblings but they too couldn’t make sense of the situation. The remaining social workers scrambling to attend to every need, every child. I was one of them. The sleepless nights, the constant worries - the social services were already overloaded, anymore pressure and the whole industry would collapse. I wanted to believe him but the doubts were becoming stronger by the minute.

Shangqi carefully stares at me as if analyzing my micro expression. ‘I know what I’m saying won’t change anything instantly. But what I do know is that we all have these moments of doubt, even me. I can’t offer you professional advice, but just like how Katy, my aunt and my mom were there for me when I needed them the most in Ta Lo, I’ll be here if you want to talk.’

‘You’re a good friend you know that right.’ My heart felt much lighter compared to the day.

‘Better than Katy?’

‘Don’t push it.’ I joked, eliciting laughter from both of us. Before we knew it, we arrived at the dim sum stall. As always, it was bustling with hungry customers. ‘Come on! Katy’s got a seat for us already, I’m starving!’ He opened the door for an young couple pushing a stroller.

‘Wait!’ Shangqi looks at me curiously. ‘I know we’re both sweaty but I think the situation calls for one.’ I gave a huge hug, ‘Thank you, that meant a lot to me.’

The sudden bear hug definitely threw the man off, but he to was glad for the heart to heart conversation. For more reasons than one.

‘Alright then! Who’s up for some char siew bao! I’m gonna inhale them - deserved it!’ I loudly declared my war against the dim sum, walking towards Katy who was enthusiastically waving at us.

Little did I know, there was a lot going on in Shangqi’s mind too.

A/N: Wew! That was long! If you’ve read it up till here, thank you for reading it! This idea really just popped out at the last minute so I’m not sure if it’s to y’all taste. Please do forgive me for my inaccurate translation - I am Chinese but like Katy my Mandarin is super rusty. Also whichever countries you come from, please give your social workers more recognition. They deserve it for a long time coming! Do give a comment or like if you wish! Just here to write and try and give simple joy to people who are such fans of Shangqi and the MCU in general.

#xu shangqi #shangqi imagine #shangqi x reader #mcu phase 4 #shang chi #Shang chi x reader #fluff #platonic #possibly suggestions of unrequited love?

[gotmilk5101520]

Miraculous Ladybug Rewatch Episode 67 Feast

Let the feast begin!

“Super Adrien…” “Isn’t Adrien Chat Noir?” “Shh. She doesn’t know that”

“Here, a black knight”

“Or Black Cat Miraculous holder”

“Here, a lady”

“Or a Butterfly superhero”

“Now this, Hercules”

“Or Lion Miraculous holder” Alya is smart. And she still can’t figure out Marinette is Ladybug.

“Why not a Bunny Miraculous while you're at it? Oh wait”

Man i wish i could see little details like this.

“According to my old man, the statue is almost two hundred years old!” “From what I found there hasn't been any Miraculous-wearing superheroes for the last two hundred years!” But in Backwarder Marianne knew of the Miraculous and how they work. So that would mean the remaining Miraculous, that Master Fu had, were used in secret.

“Alya is an excellent journalist. Sooner or later, she would have unveiled this secret kept under wraps for centuries” Can’t wait till it’s 100 years in the future and someone puts together the pieces that Marinette and Adrien were Ladybug and Chat Noir.

“Remember when I told you I made a terrible mistake? For you to understand, I must tell you the entire story”

“I was younger than you when I was chosen to be a guardian”

“My parents told me that it was a great honor. That I couldn't turn it down. So they took me to the temple” Okay, 2 things. First what does someone have to do to get picked to become a guardian? Do you have to sense something about them? And second Fu’s parents said this is a great honor that couldn’t be turn down. So people knew the Guardians existed back then? Was there like a village around the temple and the Guardians would go down there looking for successors?

“I wasn't very happy there. I would have preferred to live with my parents and be with other children my age. I didn't want to be a guardian of anything”

“One of the test to become a guardian required me to watch over a Miracle Box. For a full twenty-four hours without any food“ Noticed he said a Miracle Box.

“All I had for support was my apprentice's staff. Soon I was hungry. With each passing hour I became hungrier”

“And it was all because of the Miraculous. Because I had to watch over them. I couldn't take it any longer”

“So I took the Peacock Miraculous and used its power”

“All I wanted was a nice little companion I could sent to the kitchen to fetch me some rice balls. But the Miraculous must never be used for the wrong reasons” All in all this series keeps reminding us the Miraculous can’t be use for selfish reasons or something bad happens.

“The anger I was feeling mingled with my intense hunger. And I created a sentimonster that was very different from the one I had envisioned”

“A ravenous sentimonster out to devour everything, but specifically the Miraculous, since they were the bane of my life at that very moment”

“In my panic I lost my staff. The very object that would have enabled me to control it. I was just a young boy. I was so afraid I didn't even think of destroying it by simply using the Peacock Miraculous”

“I tried to erase all traces of the foolish thing that I had done. A monk told me to run away with the grimoire he managed to save, and the Miraculous Box. The very last Miraculous Box”

“That's when I realized my sentimonster had devoured all the other Miraculous Boxes that were kept in the temple” Wait i wonder if the people in the village i mentioned before noticed and went to check.

“And when the monks tried to stop it—the temple, the Order of the Guardians, everything… it was destroyed” Hold up he said the monks tried to to stop Feast. Did they use some of the Miraculous? Or were they skilled fighters without them?

“I tried to run away from the sentimonster”

“But by doing so, I lost the grimoire and both the Butterfly and the Peacock Miraculous”

“I thought the sentimonster had disappeared forever” Wait so the lava didn’t burn the sentimonster or the Butterfly and Peacock Miraculous?

“Nathalie sometimes gets dizzy spells. But it's nothing serious”

“Why the long face?”

“My mom used to have dizzy spells… just like Nathalie. My father said those weren't serious either” *Cries in French*

“I will help you. It comes from the region where we found our Miraculous” “Oh the place where your wife used the Peacock Miraculous, and that’s how we got ourselves in this mess”

How about a duet?

*Cries in French again*

Mayura has made it into Area 51

“Oh, but don't you worry, I'll give them back to you as soon as I'm done with them. I'll even give you the Peacock and mine as a bonus” Why would Gabriel want to get rid of the Miraculous after it’s over? Then all the Miraculous would be gone and no one would use them.

“Really? You just made it bigger?”

“What sort of fucking magic is this?”

Marinette has trained to face her biggest enemy. The Fence.

“Chat Noir? Is that you? Why a Banana? Where did you get it?”

“Well it was just laying around”

“Master, look! Ladybug and Chat Noir, despite their ridiculous costumes, okay where did they get those ridiculous costumes?”

“Hey, have a taste of this! Some exploding banana split from Bananoir!”

“Much tastier than any Miraculous!” Are you sure about that?”

Best side of the love square. Bikerbug x Bananoir.

“Hey! Leave them alone! I'm the one you have been wanting the past one hundred and seventy-two years!”

“The guardian of the Miraculous is this decrepit old man? Wait have i seen him somewhere before?”

“He’s that old man!”

“I am not scared of you anymore!”

“Okay, maybe i still am”

“There are only two places where your staff could be. Where the temple was, or…” If it was still at the temple then they would’ve been fucked.

“Hurry, my lady, this thing already swallowed my stick whole!” Yeah “Stick”

“Uh, you sure it's the right time, my lady?” The right time for what?

“Oh no, not the tongue…”

Yeah right.

“Man, look at all these things it ate. Wait are those humans?” “Pretty sure they’ll die once we defeat the sentimonster” “What if they don’t?” “Then we can show them memes”

“Don't be bemused, it's just the news! Extraordinary and inexplicable!”

“That pretty much sums up the surprising reappearance of this temple in the Tibetan mountains—”

“ —a hundred and seventy-two years after it was destroyed”

“Let's go to Clara Contard on location” Umm why were they watching? It makes sense to see Gabriel, Nathalie, and Alya. But Tomoe and Audrey? Why were they watching it? Are they planning to form some evil bad parents team?

“That's correct, Nadja. But what makes this phenomenon particularly unexplainable is that all the monks who used to live in the temple have also reappeared year 1844!” So who’s gonna show them memes?

“The monks have been freed and the temple has been restored. It’s going to be awkward for them seeing technology”

“I shall go and see them someday soon, and explain everything to them. And show them some fun cat memes”

“And the time has come for me to prepare you to become the new guardian”

“The guardian? But Master, you're the guardian! You have been for a hundred and seventy-two years! Let’s talk about this another time” “Marinette, it’s been 11 episodes since i told you. Stop delaying this”

“I was joking. Those strict traditions did no good when I was your age I mean it’s not like you’ll end up burning Paris to the ground” “Yeah... Hahahaha...”

“Now that Hawkmoth knows who I am it's too dangerous for me to live here” “Is the mustache really necessary”

“I'm not going anywhere until Hawkmoth is defeated. I'll never leave you” *Cries in Miracle Queen*

Now that was a feast to remember.

I want to play video games. No I must finish this!

#miraculous ladybug #milk rewatches miraculous ladybug

[naruwitch]

Code Geass: Paladins of Voltron Chapter 30: Castle Held Hostage

"Are you sure you want to get to the Chinese Federation this way? I could have easily just dropped you off in the country itself you know?"

"Perhaps. But traveling in disguise like this will make it more difficult for Britannia to locate me. Especially Charles and V.V. Best not to tip them off." C.C. answered the Green Paladin as he escorted her into the airport terminal. He was dressed in his casual blue shirt, grey jacket, and black jeans while the immortal was currently wearing a dark blue business suit with a dress, black heeled shoes, and glasses with a black wig.

After Tohdoh and the Four Holy Swords were officially integrated into the Black Knights and Voltron Coalition, as they had shortly afterward begun to call themselves, the group had become much more organized and was slowly trying to integrate into a more cell-based structure. All that they had to do now was finalize details with Kyoto.

When Rai had left to take C.C. to the airport, Suzaku and a couple of the other Paladins had been preparing to take Tohdoh, Ohgi, Sayoko, and the rest of the Black Knights to Earth to discuss with Kyoto the means of locating and integrating the remainder of the JLF into the coalition before the Britannian forces found them, along with any other resistance groups that were still putting up a fight.

When questioning Tohdoh about General Katase's whereabouts, the Colonel informed the Paladins that he and the Four Holy Swords had been meeting at a rendezvous point when they had been ambushed by the Britannians, leading to Tohdoh's capture. The Six Houses were likely the only people that had the means to find and contact the General now.

Coran would also be accompanying Rakshata and Kaguya to the planet so that the Altean could better familiarize himself with the technology Earth could offer them. Hopefully, once he had a better grasp on it, he, Rakshata, and whoever else Kyoto could convince to help could finally create a successful, working space Knightmare.

"I suppose that makes sense…" Rai sighed, "How did Lelouch put it? 'If you look humble they'll look down on you' or something?"

"Whether that statement is correct or not, I do possess some humility," C.C. quipped back.

Rai chuckled, "Well, I guess you'll put it to good use then. Passport okay?"

"It's almost a perfect forgery," C.C. said, a layer of awe in her tone, "Almost too perfect."

"Well, that's what happens when alien technology comes into play," Rai countered.

C.C. sighed softly, "Other than that, I'm all set."

"Great," Rai nodded, "if you get into trouble contact us immediately, okay? We'll be there in a flash."

"Tell Lelouch not to draw too much attention to himself while I'm gone, will you?"

"I'll relay the message," the Green Paladin casually confirmed as he walked purposefully out of the airport, his eyes darting everywhere to make sure that no one recognized him. He was still technically considered 'missing' after all.

He found Zerith exactly where he left her, her cloaking system still active as she sat calmly just outside of the Britannian airspace. Thanks to Lelouch's experiment when they met with Kyoto for the first time, the group knew that the Britannians wouldn't be able to track the Lions from any place or area, so it was easy to park them in any secluded location.

"Well, that's done," Rai smiled as he settled down into Zerith's cockpit, his Lion's warm presence greeting him. He also sensed curiosity about what exactly was going on. Rai figured if the Lions had ages, Zerith would likely be the youngest of the pride. She certainly possessed the curiosity of a young adolescent.

"Don't worry girl, everything's going according to plan," he reassured as she purred lowly and took off into the air. The sudden shift in the wind was the only evidence left behind that she had been there at all.

o~o

"Suzaku."

The Purple Paladin jumped from his seat in Yoru's cockpit at the sound of Tohdohs voice. He was in the process of transporting his sensei, along with the Four Holy Swords and his cousin, Kaguya, back to Earth to meet with Kyoto. Hopefully, by the time the meeting finished, they'd be able to locate the rest of the JLF and either transport them to the Castle or create some kind of alliance at the very least.

"Oh, Sensei," the Purple Paladin greeted as Yoru just began to descend into Earth's atmosphere, "is something wrong?"

"I'll get straight to the point, Suzaku…" Tohdoh said with a serious tone, "...Do Lelouch and the other Paladins know about your father?"

Suzaku stiffened, nearly forgetting how to breathe. The last time he had even thought about his father, what he had done was…

"...No. Not yet," Suzaku answered softly.

Tohdoh breathed out slowly through his nose. He wasn't angry, or disappointed in Suzaku in any way. After all, what child would want to admit they were the reason their parent was dead? Besides himself, Tohdoh knew that the leaders of the Six Houses were the only people that knew the truth of the Prime Minister's death.

However, keeping such a secret as this would eventually take its toll on even the strongest of warriors.

"...They'll discover the truth eventually, Suzaku," Tohdoh said after almost a minute of silence, "you do realize that, correct?"

A look of pure helplessness crossed Suzaku's face as he looked by at the Colonel, "Sensei, don't tell. Please. I'm begging you…"

"I won't," Tohdoh promised, "but you should tell them… sooner rather than later. The truth always has a way of coming out in one way or another."

Suzaku swallowed back bile as he directed Yoru to land in a deserted area of the ghettos. He knew his sensei was right… but how on Earth could he tell them?

o~o

"Allura, big brother told me that you and the mice can really talk to each other!" Nunnally said in awe as she glided onto the bridge in Allura's old hover chair, "Is that true?"

Allura chuckled fondly and the mice squeaked in greeting from her shoulders, "Yes, we can talk to each other. When I was frozen in a cryopod, the mice fell asleep inside with me. During that time, somehow our minds connected, so now we can communicate psychically."

Nunnally gasped in wonder. She wished she could talk to animals! Though waiting years frozen in space to do so seemed like a more extreme method.

Lelouch also chuckled as he briskly walked onto the bridge moments later. He was happy to see his sister so cheerful and even more grateful that her ailments had been completely cured. He'd forever be thankful to the Alteans for helping him and Nunnally.

The very first thing that he and the rest of the Paladins had done was give Nunnally a tour of the Castle, which included each of the bays where the Lions rested. She had been confused at first when they told her how the Lions were alive in a way, it resulted in Nunnally giving an uncertain 'meow' to Zenobia (the first Lion she saw). This was so adorable that it left Rivalz, Suzaku, Rai, and Milly in stitches, though Kallen, Shirley, and Lelouch chuckled as well.

Despite Coran's correct diagnosis of Nunnally's legs being mobile again and her eyesight restored, Nunnally was far for a hundred percent yet. Just as the older Altean had predicted, the years of inactivity had deteriorated Nunnally's leg muscles, and although the pods had successfully reattached the nerves and aligned the sinews correctly, the young princess would have to go through some weeks of physical therapy in order to walk properly again.

Fate seemed to be smiling on the vi Britannia siblings, though, as they found out the same evening that Nunnally woke up that one of the Black Knights, Kento Sugiyama, actually had some experience in this field. The blue-haired rebel had explained that he had been studying to become a physical therapist before the Britannian occupation and had been about to begin residency when the war had started. Once he retrieved his old college books from his apartment, he offered to assist in Nunnally's recovery.

"The Space Mice have proven to be valuable members in their own right," Lelouch agreed, "I believe if it weren't for them, this Castle and Voltron would probably be in Galran hands by now."

The four mice straightened proudly on their hindlegs, puffing their chests out proudly like superheroes at the complement.

Nunnally giggled at how adorable the gesture was. She sobered only a moment later though.

"Big brother… you promised to tell me where you've been… and…" Nunnally hesitated, "and I understand why you're Zero, but what about Voltron? How did you find the Lions and why are they here?"

Lelouch gasped softly and grimaced. Personally, he had wanted to save this conversation for when the rest of the Paladins got back so that he could have some additional support.

Despite it being inevitable, Lelouch still wished that he could have found a way to shield Nunnally from this war that had grown in larger proportions than ever before, but that simply wasn't possible. Zarkon and his armies could arrive any day (honestly, Lelouch was shocked that he hadn't arrived already) and when that day came, he wouldn't be able to spare the horrors of it from Nunnally. His sister may be young, but she wasn't stupid either. If he didn't tell, she'd find out some other way.

After sharing a look with Allura, the princess also looking reluctant, Lelouch sighed before settling down on the middle platform steps, becoming eye-level with his sister.

"Nunnally," Allura began, "I'm sure you're aware by now, but Coran and I aren't from Earth. Our home was a planet called Altea. My father and mother were king and queen of this planet, and 10,000 years ago, my father was also the one who built the Voltron Lions."

"10,000 years ago?" Nunnally wondering if she had misheard the alien princess.

"Yes," Allura nodded, a pained expression on her face, "my planet unfortunately doesn't exist anymore. It was destroyed by the Galra, and their leader, Zarkon, shortly after I was put to sleep for such a long period."

Nunnally gasped when she heard what happened to Allura's home. She couldn't imagine something so horrific happening to anyone. If Earth was destroyed, and she woke up one day to discover that she was the only survivor...

She banished the thought before she could pursue it further.

"Ever since Altea's destruction, and while Allura and Coran slept inside this ship," Lelouch continued as Allura pulled up the star map, "the Galra didn't simply stop there. They continued to spread and conquer and any planet or world that they could lay their eyes on," feeling a sense of deja vu, but this time from the opposite perspective, the room soon turned from a comforting blue to a harsh red as all the planets that the Galra had taken, except a couple of tiny spots scattered here and there.

The view then shifted a slightly brighter part of the star map, still blue instead of red, "Earth is here, Nunnally," he pointed at their solar system glowing above them. He winced as he noticed that the red had bled further in their planet's direction compared to the last time they looked when the Black Knights first came on board, "at the rate that they are expanding, I wouldn't be surprised if their ships came raining from the sky just a few years from now. And right now, Voltron is the only known force in the universe that has a chance to stop Zarkon and armies."

"The only one?" Nunnally asked, "What about Britannia?" a small quiver of hope in her voice.

Lelouch scowled and shook her head, "As Britannia stands now, it, much less the rest of Earth, doesn't stand a chance. That's why we're here now though. It's not just to prepare Earth for the Galra's arrival, but it's also to ensure that Britannia doesn't fall back into its old way of conquest once the Galra are repelled. Voltron will need to leave Earth at some point in order to win this war. Before we do though, we need to make sure that Earth has a better chance of a brighter future, not one under Britannian subjugation."

Nunnally looked thoughtful for a moment but then nodded her head, "I understand. But Lelouch, why don't you just tell Britannia about the Galra. If father knew the truth, I'm sure he'd be willing to help. Earth is his home too. I was even able to convince him to let me speak to you when you first came back with Voltron."

Lelouch grimaced, "Nunnally, and I'm not saying this to make you upset, but I'm sure the only reason that the Emperor agreed to that arrangement was because he suspected that I was Zero from the beginning. You were simply the bait."

"I must agree, Nunnally," Allura said solemnly, "I find it hard to believe that a man who would not only dismiss his wife's murder like it was nothing, and then exile his own children when they had the right to demand justice, could even consider himself a parent."

Lelouch felt his own heart clench when he saw Nunnally's sad expression, but he needed to make sure she understood, no matter how painful it was.

"Honestly, Nunnally, I don't see any difference between our father and Zarkon himself. Even if, by some miracle, we convince him to help us, what's to stop him from backstabbing us to get his hands on Voltron himself?"

At this accusation, Nunnally looked like she was about to protest, but Lelouch continued.

"Nunnally, I want you to think long and hard about this. Do you really think our biological father, Charles zi Britannia, the leader of a ruthless, borderline evil empire that refuses to take any responsibility for any mistakes is going to listen or change his mind, even in the face of an even worse threat?"

Nunnally doesn't answer right away, but does pause to think about her answer. To her own dismay though, no logical argument comes to mind. Looking down sadly, Nunnally knew, deep down, that Lelouch was right. If their father wouldn't help them…

"...What about big brother Schneizel then? Or Euphie? Can't we at least tell them that I'm okay, that I'm not in danger?"

Lelouch frowned a moment, conflicted on how to answer this inquiry, "...I'm honestly unsure whether or not to trust our brother Nunnally," he finally admitted, "When I confronted Clovis when he was clearing out Shinjuku, I learned that Schneizel and Cornelia may know something about our mother's murder. Possibly even having a hand in it."

"What?!" Nunnally gasped, eyes wide. She couldn't fathom why the two of them would be involved in something like that. While she wasn't as sure about Schneizel, from what she remembered at Ares Villa, Cornelia adored their mother, practically worshipped her. Why would she want to kill her?

"However, while I also don't doubt that Euphemia would be willing to assist us," Lelouch added, "we need to be careful about how we proceed from here. If we take a single misstep, a civil war could easily break out as well. That would only hurt Earth's chances of preparing for the Galra in time."

Nunnally frowned sadly, her head bowed. Logically, her brother's reasoning made sense. Though she truly believed that there were other reasons why their family couldn't reach them during the war, she wouldn't deny that the Royal Family was far from perfect. All of the lying and fighting had truly pushed their family apart. It was moments like this where she wished more than anything that the world was a gentler place. Maybe it still could be someday. But it wouldn't be today.

The tense conversation was interrupted by the bay doors opening again. Looking up, the trio was greeted by the other Paladins who had just returned from their errands on Earth.

"Mission accomplished, Lulu," Milly reported with a grin, "Everyone has been dropped off at their rendezvous points. They'll contact us when they're ready to be picked up."

"Good. Thank you," Lelouch nodded.

"Nice to see you back on your feet Nunnally," Rivalz joked with a laugh.

"Rivalz!" Kallen snapped, "Would it kill you to be at least a little more sensitive?" Kallen wasn't the only one sharing an offended look with the Blue Paladin, and Milly and Rai looked at him in shock as well.

Despite the bad joke, and Rivalz flushed in embarrassment after he realized his mistake, Nunnally giggled nonetheless.

"I'm glad that you're all okay," she said with a smile, "I was so worried about all of you. When I heard the news…"

"Sorry we scared you, Nunnally," Suzaku said, walking up and placing a hand on her shoulder, "but everything's gonna be okay now. Okay?"

Nunnally beamed up at her childhood friend, grateful that she now had a chance to see his face and nodded.

A loud 'meow' suddenly interrupted everyone. Swinging their heads towards the source, only then did the group register that Shirley had an extra guest with her.

"Arthur?" Rai asked in realization.

Shirley blushed and scratched the cat behind his ear, "I kind of made a pit-stop at the Academy - don't worry, no one saw me - to at least check up on him. And… it didn't look like anyone had been taking care of him for a while. I mean, he was clearly getting fed, but that was about it."

"Shirley…" Kallen said slowly, "You brought a cat… where there's also… mice?!"

As if the words were magic, Arthur's head shot up and looked straight at the four space mice still perched on Allura's shoulders. With a yowl, the cat leaped out of Shirley's arms and made a beeline for the rodents.

With squeaks of horror, the mice launched into evasive actions, scattering throughout the bridge.

"No! Arthur! Bad cat!"

"Someone catch him!"

"No, save the mice first!"

The next five doboshes consisted of trying to gather the mice and keep them away from a surprisingly determined Arthur. Shirley may have said that he was being fed, but apparently not enough for Arthur to leave mice alone. Or maybe it was simply his inner animal instincts kicking in.

The debacle eventually ended with the mice finding refuge in Nunnally's arms and Suzaku diving after the cat behind one of the chairs.

Suzaku yelped in pain and then groaned.

"Are you all right, Suzaku?!" Allura gasped, frazzled from the chaos just moments ago.

"Yeah…don't worry, it's a familiar feeling," the Purple Paladin moaned, sitting up and raising his right hand. Low and behold Arthur was in a familiar position of having latched onto said hand, his claws also having sunk deep into the palm as well.

"Oh!" Allura gasped, eyes widening in shock.

"Oh my!" Nunnally also exclaimed as the mice peeked out from her hair. All four of them were glaring angrily at the cat, hissing fiercely.

"I'm so sorry guys," Shirley said miserably, "I didn't even think about the mice. But when I thought about Arthur, I-I… I just…"

"It's okay, Shirley," Lelouch reassured her, and smiling fondly as he helped Suzaku unlatch Arthur from his hand, "it seems we simply have another 'pet' to look after."

The atmosphere suddenly turned serious at the use of Lelouch's wording. Everyone knew what he meant by 'pet' after all.

"I do believe it's time that we talked to you sister," Allura said, with a frown, "she's been conscious for the past several varga."

"Anything to note?" Lelouch asked.

"No," Allura said, pulling up a screen, "she's tried to break the energy barrier a couple of times, but it's held firm." There, they spotted the Viceroy pacing in a small, round cell located in the lower parts of the Castle. All of the sides were made with glass, reinforced with a thin layer of quintessence, so no matter how many times Cornelia tried to break it, it wouldn't budge. The cell itself was connected to a long, narrow bridge in front of the elevator. Only one way in and one way out.

The cell itself wasn't very large. Only a small narrow bench similar to the ones in the lounges was inside. No other pieces of furniture decorated the room.

"Can I come with you Lelouch?" Nunnally asked. When she heard that Cornelia was here, she hoped that she could at least assure her sister that she was alive and better even.

Lelouch grimaced, "Not right now Nunnally," he pressed on before his sister could protest, "If it's true that Cornelia was involved with mother's death, I don't want her anywhere near you. You understand, right?"

"...All right," Nunnally eventually nodded sadly.

o~o

Cornelia li Britannia scowled as she sat down for the hundredth time on the small bench in her cell. If Zero truly thought that capturing her would be enough to spill her guts, he would be sorely mistaken. And once she figured out how to get out of here, she would kill him with her own two hands, and bring his head back on a platter!

A light humming caught the princess's attention and she noticed the bright light of the elevator descending.

So it seemed Zero was finally greeting his 'guest' huh?

Cornelia's suspicions were confirmed as the masked man himself exited the elevator, and more people in darkened helmets, who Cornelia assumed were the other Paladins, trailed closely behind him, along with a tall slender woman she didn't recognize.

"Zero," Cornelia said with a scoff, "If you think I'm going to accept this-"

"I don't believe you have much of a choice right now Viceroy," Zero interrupted, "I'm sure you've realized by now that this isn't an ordinary cell. Brute force isn't going to so much as scratch that container, and we're the only ones with code to open this door."

Cornelia tisked and looked away with a scowl. She assumed they'd likely been watching her attempt to break out already. The only saving grace she could think of is that they weren't there personally to watch her make a fool of herself.

"So… what do you plan to do with me now?" she sneered, "Torture me for information? I'll save you the energy. No matter what's done to me, my loyalty won't shake. And if you think you get me to beg for mercy, you'll be disappointed as well."

"No, you're not the begging type, are you?" Zero asked, "Unlike Clovis."

"It actually makes me a laugh a little," the figure in the green armor snarked, "Zero said Clovis begged for his life, while at the same time, he had ordered the deaths of millions of innocents in Shinjuku ghetto. Which, might we add, you tried to do the same thing in Saitama just to lure Zero out."

"How does the old saying go again? 'The apple doesn't fall far from the tree' or something?" the red figure added.

"...You know, I actually used to admire the royal family for the longest time," the shortest one, in blue armor, spoke up, "but after seeing everything you've really done, all I can think is how stupid I actually was."

Cornelia blinked at that statement. Why on Earth would a terrorist admire the royal family?

"What? Surprised?" the yellow armored woman asked, "Well, it was true… at least, for a while."

At the Yellow Paladin's final statement, all of them, save Zero himself, grasped their helmets and lifted them off.

Like most of the other people who had seen their faces, Cornelia couldn't stop the small gasp as she recognized the six missing students from Ashford Academy. Most of them were looking at her with scornful expressions, save for the orange-haired girl (Charlotte or something?) who looked more nervous than angry, and-

"Suzaku Kururugi," Cornelia addressed with contempt. Unlike his fellow Paladins, the warrant officer looked more disappointed than derisive. She scoffed, "Why am I not surprised? No fighting one's blood I guess."

If the Paladins weren't angry before, they were now.

"Hey, Suzaku's our friend. You can't talk to him like that!" Rivalz shouted, balling his fists.

"Is it really all about blood and race to you?!" Kallen exclaimed, "The Japanese, or I suppose Elevens to you, are people too you know!"

"You should be ashamed of yourself," Rai growled.

"Enough," Zero said calmly, "we're not here to lynch the Viceroy."

"So what exactly did you do, Zero, to make them so loyal? Bribe them? Brainwash them? Blackmail perhaps?" Cornelia accused.

"Excuse me?!" Milly exclaimed, angrily.

"Blackmail? Brainwashing? There was never a need for such inhumane actions," Zero said, promptly silencing Milly, "I just told them the truth about their beloved Britannia. A country whose government is full of nothing but hypocrites and criminals. You do realize that it doesn't take much to turn someone against their own country, if you give the right reason to do so."

"So you made them traitors instead?" Cornelia spat, "Once the Emperor gets wind of this, they'll be charged for their treachery. And besides, what sort of crimes are you claiming Britannia has committed?"

"I'm talking about the crimes that I saw unfold right in front of my eyes eight years ago. At Aries Villa," Cornelia's eyes widened at this statement. Zero must have noticed as he continued, a hand raising to his own mask, "I'm sure you know what I'm talking about, don't you… dear sister?"

Cornelia's nearly stopped breathing as any form of anger on her face morphed into surprise and shock as Zero finally lowered his mask

"L...Lelouch!"

"It's been a while, hasn't it, Cornelia?" Lelouch glared distastefully at his elder half-sister.

Cornelia couldn't believe it. Zero, the masked terrorist that she had been hunting ever since she came to Area 11 was actually her younger brother. But why? Why on Earth would he turn against his own country-

"You mean the same country that killed my mother?" Lelouch yelled. It was then Cornelia registered that she had spoken that thought aloud, "The same country who exiled me and Nunnally when we did nothing wrong?! Or when they almost killed us when they invaded Japan?! And that's not even counting all the other innocent people you and our so-called family have murdered!"

"'Poison gas.' That's what we were told on the news," Rivalz said, "That terrorists were using it on civilians in the ghettos. But that was just an excuse to wipe those people out, wasn't it?!"

"Don't you realize that whole families were killed because of what you've done?!" Shirley cried, "Children! Babies! They didn't do anything but happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Not that they had much control over that either!"

"You kill people you see below you for the most simple of crimes. Last I checked, a full-blooded Britannian wouldn't be sentenced to death because they stole a couple loaves of bread! But an Eleven certainly would, wouldn't they?!" Kallen roared, the memory of her brother's execution flashing through her mind.

"And like I mentioned earlier," Rai growled, "you were doing the same thing as Clovis in Saitama, killing every Japanese person you could see just to get to Zero. You're as much of a murderer as he is!"

"I'm ashamed to admit that I didn't act to stop all of the discrimination happening at the Academy alone sooner," Milly muttered, "But why should the fact that someone is of a different race make it appropriate to bully and belittle them?"

Cornelia couldn't believe what she was hearing. Britannians, students for that matter, speaking so lowly of their own nation.

"I find it difficult to believe that students of the Empire would speak to me as if-"

"As if you were one of the leaders of one of the most bloodthirsty empires we've ever seen," Allura interrupted her with a scowl of her own.

"'Bloodthirsty'?" Cornelia exclaimed in offense, "Britannia is trying to save the world!"

"Saving?!" Kallen bellowed, "You call invading other countries, committing daily massacres, you call all that saving the world?!"

"Thanks, Viceroy," Rai said sarcastically, "that makes us feel so much better."

"You know," Suzaku said, speaking for the first time since coming down, "The only reason I joined the Britannian military at the time was because I thought I could change Britannia from the inside. But, thinking about it now, that was just a foolish pipe dream. If Britannia believes that slaughter is the only way to change the world, then maybe it can't change."

"Why are you so surprised?" Cornelia argued, "People die every day! It's not just Britannia's doing. As a soldier I would have thought you'd understand that. If that's what it takes, so be it!"

Allura pursed her lips and narrowed her eyes, "Sounds like you are your father's daughter."

These words angered Cornelia as she shot to her feet, "And who are you to judge me?!"

Allura didn't flinch, "As someone who's seen your kind before. Someone who destroys innocent lives to pursue their own petty dreams of power and refuses to take responsibility for the lives they ruin in their wake. Voltron stands to protect those who can't protect themselves, to protect the weak from ruthless monsters like Britannia, and Voltron will tear it to the ground."

Cornelia's face contorted in rage, and was about to start screaming at Allura when Lelouch interrupted her, "For the record, a small part of me had hoped that you would be able to work with us, considering how close we were as children. But… it seems that that person has never existed. All I see is a warmonger who will even use her own family for political gain… like Nunnally."

At the mention of his sister, Cornelia's widened in surprise before narrowing again with a glare, "This coming from the boy who kidnapped his own sister?"

"We didn't kidnap her!" it was Shirley who shouted this time, "We rescued her!"

"Yeah!" Rivalz agreed, "And she's much better now too! She can walk again now! And see!"

Milly elbowed Rivalz firmly before he could reveal anything else.

"Nunnally is perfectly fine," Lelouch said with finality, "she's far away from our monster of a father and away from you! If you, by some miracle, manage to get out of this cell, me and the rest of the Paladins will personally hunt you down, and drag you back before you so much as lay a finger on her!"

"What?!" Cornelia exclaimed, even more shocked now, "Why on Earth would you think I'd want to hurt her?!"

"I've already lost one member of my family to the likes of you! I'll be damned if you take another one away from me!"

"Wh-what are you talking about?!" Cornelia practically demanded.

"My mother, Cornelia!" Lelouch shouted in rage, "Clovis told me that you knew something. About her death! How you might even be involved in it! You and Schneizel!"

This accusation seemed to strike Cornelia speechless. For several moments, she opened her mouth, but no words came out.

Finally she grit her teeth and shouted, "Lelouch, I didn't kill your mother! I held Lady Marianne in the highest regard! I'm beyond offended that you would even think I'd hurt her or Nunnally!"

"Either way," Lelouch glowered, raising a hand to his face, "the truth won't be hidden from me any longer! So…" upon lowering the same hand, his Geass glowed brightly in his eye, "You will answer anything I ask!"

His Geass sigil flew into Cornelia's eyes, and just like with his brother, Cornelia's eyes lit up with a red ring.

"Yes, go on," the Viceroy said almost robotically.

"Cornelia, are you the one who killed my mother?" was the first thing Lelouch asked.

"No," Cornelia responded.

"Then who was it?" Lelouch pressed.

"I don't know," she answered immediately.

Lelouch gasped and stepped back in surprise. Most of the rest of the Paladins shared similar looks.

"But you were put in charge of her personal guard, were you not?" Lelouch asked with a frown.

"Yes," Cornelia confirmed.

"Then why did you withdraw her escort?"

"I was asked to," Cornelia said.

"What?!" Lelouch gasped, before narrowing his eyes, "By whom?!"

The answer that came next shocked everyone in the room.

"Lady Marianne."

Gasps and murmurs whispered within the group. How was that possible? Why would the Empress ask for her own escort to withdraw?

That could only mean…

"That's impossible…" Lelouch muttered, "Did she-my mother knew she'd be attacked that day?! No… that can't be… if she did… she would have gotten us out of there!"

Inhaling sharply, Lelouch angrily demanded, "What really happened back then?! Who killed her?! Who killed my mother, dammit?!"

"Lelouch! Calm yourself!" Allura exclaimed, grasping his arm.

Breathing heavily, he looked at the Altean Princess, frustrated tears gathering in his eyes. Looking back at Cornelia, the Viceroy opened her mouth to answer, but then stopped. It seemed she couldn't answer. Which meant…

"You don't know the truth? Then who does?! Someone must know! Why did Clovis mention that you knew something?!" Lelouch inquired aggressively.

"He was probably talking about my investigations on the incident," Cornelia said calmly, "And I remember His Majesty the Emperor ordered Schneizel to transport the body out of there."

"The body…?" Milly asked, remembering the live broadcast of Lady Marianne's funeral, "Wait, what was in the coffin then?"

Lelouch repeated the question to his sister, but she didn't answer. It was obvious that she didn't know either.

Lelouch grimaced, "What else did you find out? Tell me everything!"

"I didn't find anything in the investigation," Cornelia explained "Though, I've always theorized that the responsible party is from the Royal Family, besides myself, Euphemia, Clovis, and Schneizel."

"Does that include the Emperor as well?" Lelouch questioned further.

"No, though I couldn't think of, or see a reason why he would do it, he was never cleared of suspicion," Cornelia said.

"Then why didn't you do anything about it?" Lelouch asked.

"There was no evidence of his involvement, and even if I did confront him, I was worried he would do something to Euphemia in retaliation," Cornelia answered.

Behind Lelouch, Allura scowled. The fact that children were scared that one wrong misstep with the person they should call a parent could bring consequences like that sickened her.

Lelouch sighed in disappointment. It didn't look like there were very many clues to the murderer besides simply clearing a few suspects.

Then he remembered something else.

"Have you ever heard or met someone by the name of 'V.V.' before?" he asked

"No," Cornelia answered.

This Lelouch grimaced in frustration. Not only were there no new clues to his mother's death, but they couldn't get more information on this mysterious other code-bearer. Though he didn't have evidence, his gut was telling him that this person may have something to do with the murder, possibly even be the perpetrator himself. But if Cornelia didn't know him…

He shook his head, he had more pressing issues to deal with right now. There was still plenty of other information that Cornelia could offer them while she was still under his Geass.

"Now, tell me everything you know about Britannia's military operations in Japan."

"Of course. What first?"

o~o

Nunnally hummed lightly as she glided down the hall of the Castleship in the hover chair she had been given for temporary use. Along one of the walls was a long narrow window that looked out into the outside of the ship. Right now, it was facing the blue and white surface of Earth below. Yes, Nunnally remembered seeing pictures like this before their mother was killed, but those photographs were nothing compared to seeing it from a distance with her own eyes.

To say that Nunnally never would have imagined that she would be in space one day was an understatement. She especially never even imagined that aliens actually existed. It was simply never something that she took the time to think about back on Earth.

Either way, this unexpected event certainly had advantages. In particular, her brother. Despite her disability back then, Nunnally was much more observant than she seemed. She knew that ever since they were sent to Japan, that something in her brother had broken. Besides when he was with her, Lelouch became distant from everyone else. It took him months to finally let the young Suzaku in. She knew that it took a couple years for him to trust the now-members of the student council, with the exception of Milly due to her family's history with their mother.

So to see that her brother wasn't simply talking, but speaking openly and honestly with the Alteans and even more than ever before with the student council made her very happy. She wasn't sure what sort of magic (come to think of it, was that a real thing in space too? Somewhere at least?) the Alteans and Lions worked on her brother, but she certainly wasn't complaining. Seeing her brother genuinely happy overjoyed her as well.

However, while this new trait in her brother was amazing, another factor in this situation saddened her. All of these things happened because of violence and war. Their mother was killed by someone inside their own family, Britannia invaded an innocent and unsuspecting nation, and now this! A universal war that had been lasting for over ten millennia! It was all madness! Why on Earth was there so much bloodshed even not on their homeworld? What on Earth did the Galra want to accomplish in all of this?!

Of course, upon hearing about the threat the Galra had, Nunnally understood why her brother was so urgently preparing Earth for what was likely an all-out alien onslaught. It was the only way that their planet would have a future at all. And though she sometimes didn't agree with his methods, she knew that Lelouch's heart was always in the place.

Therefore, she would support him. She would support all of the Paladins in the best way that she could.

"Oh! I'm sorry, I didn't know anyone else was down here," a friendly voice said from down the hall.

Turning to look (she still couldn't believe that she could actually do that again!) Nunnally spotted the woman the Black Knights had been calling 'Villetta.' She remembered Lelouch explaining to her that this woman had been a soldier for the Britannian military, but got amnesia during the mission to rescue her. Though he seemed hesitant about the idea, Lelouch didn't outright forbid Nunnally from interacting with the woman either. She seemed nice. She was always helping out with chores on the ship and always seemed to be smiling.

"It's okay," Nunnally smiled, "I was just enjoying the view."

Villetta chuckled and walked closer to join her by the window, "Yes, it is beautiful isn't it…? I just wish I remember more of it…"

Nunnally looked at the woman sympathetically, "You still don't remember anything before you came here?"

"No, I'm afraid not…" she sighed sadly, "The only reason I remember my name is because I was told it when I woke up here."

"...Do you like your name?" Nunnally asked curiously. Villetta looked at Nunnally confused. The princess blushed, "It's just… I've sometimes heard stories where people get amnesia and find out their name and they don't like it. So… do you?"

"...It's okay," Villetta shrugged, "Although to be honest, every time I think about it, I get strangely uncomfortable…"

"Would you like a different name then? At least until you get your memories back?" Nunnally asked.

"...I guess it's not a bad idea," Villetta smiled, "Why don't you pick it for me?"

Nunnally thought hard about it. For some reason choosing a Britannian name felt wrong, so… what else could she pick? She looked Villetta up and down. Her tan skin, bright golden eye, and long flowing blue-grey hair. The way that it flowed behind her reminded Nunnally of wind blowing through her hair as she sat on a hill, surrounded by wildflowers.

Wait… that was it!

"How about 'Chigusa'? In Japanese it means flowering plants or something like that."

"Hmmm…" the woman hummed, rolling the name around in her head for a few minutes before smiling and nodding, "I like it! Thank you, Nunnally."

"You're welcome," Nunnally giggled in response.

"Oh, how precious!"

The sound of the unfamiliar voice, twined with the sound of clapping hands made the two girls freeze and turn around.

Their eyes widened in fear.

o~o

"So… that happened," Rivalz said as he and the rest of the team plopped down on the couches in the main lounge. To say that they had learned a lot from Cornelia was an understatement. They now knew the movements of every Britannian military unit and every strategy that Britannia could implement with the resources they currently had.

Besides that though…

"...Lelouch, are you okay?" Shirley was the first who was brave enough to ask the Black Paladin this question. He was currently hunched over, his fingers loosely folded in front of his face. His eyes were looking at nothing in particular but were focused in concentration.

It took a couple of minutes for Lelouch to reply, and for a moment Shirley wondered if he even heard her.

"I'm fine," was all he said. He then sighed, allowing his hands to fall into his lap, "I'm sorry I dragged all of you into my family drama."

"Hey, no need to apologize, Lulu," Milly chastised, "we all know your family was nuts… besides Nunna and maybe Euphemia of course."

Lelouch actually snorted a little from the afterthought. It was true. Those two were likely the only sane ones left in the royal family as far as he was concerned.

"Plus, we promised you we'd help you figure out your mother's murder," Kallen added, "and we got a lot of information from Cornelia about it."

"Thank you," Lelouch smiled, "Really, thanks for everything."

"Lelouch, sorry if this sounds nosy, but what exactly was your relationship with Cornelia before your exile?" Rai asked.

"I loved her," Lelouch answered honestly, "She was… she was my big sister. She coddled over Nunnally, Euphie, and me all the time. I admired her skills as a warrior and saw her as a role model, someone I wanted to be like someday. I admired her like I did my mother. But, after our exile… after Japan was attacked… I… I was so angry! It seemed that she… and everyone else abandoned us. Abandoned me. You… you have no idea… how much that hurt… and seeing her now…"

"Lulu…" Shirley said sadly, gently placing a hand on his shoulder.

"Well, if you're so concerned about fighting against her, just Geass her onto our side," Kallen said bluntly.

No one saw it, but Suzaku winced. The idea of controlling someone like this made him feel sick. However, he already knew what Lelouch's answer to that would be, so stayed silent.

"That's not an option," Lelouch said firmly, "if I use Geass to force her to join us, I'm no different from my father. Or Zarkon for that matter."

Suzaku smiled in relief at this answer.

"...Is there really no hope of Cornelia joining us? When we were talking to her, she seemed like she was genuine when she talked about wanting to keep Nunnally safe," Shirley pointed out.

"I noticed that too," Lelouch admitted, "Cornelia's a lot like me when it comes to her family. She'll do anything if it means that those close to her remain safe."

"I am not so sure…" Allura murmured, speaking for the first time since they got there, "The more I learn about your country, the more similarities I see with the Galra Empire. If Charles is to be compared to Zarkon, Cornelia is equivalent to Sendak."

"Hmmm… now that you bring it up, those two do have a lot in common, don't they?" Rai said, "They only difference I can think of is that Sendak has openly admitted that he's a murderer."

"Even so," Suzaku spoke up, "If we're not only going to get Britannia's help, but also improve and change the country once the Galra are pushed back, we're going to need the Royal Family's support. All of our efforts will mean nothing if the Imperial Family still sees us as enemies when all of this is over!"

"How will we know if their support is genuine though?" Kallen asked skeptically, "It's like Lelouch said when we got here. Most of Britannia's royalty only acts on their own personal needs. Once something is deemed 'useless' to them, they throw it away and move on to the next best thing."

"...What about Euphemia?" Rivalz suddenly suggested, "Maybe she can help! She's a lot like Nunnally right? She hates fighting too and certainly doesn't seem to support a lot of the Emperor's views."

"Yeah!" Milly agreed enthusiastically, "After all, she saved us during the hotel jacking. She could have easily stayed back and watched while those terrorists threatened us."

"I won't lie, the first word that comes to my mind when I think of Euphemia is 'pacifist'," Lelouch said, "which I find to be the finest form of irony ever considering the circumstances. However, I'll also acknowledge that out of everyone in the Royal Family right now who would assist us without any interior motives would indeed be Euphemia."

While the rest of the Paladins murmured and nodded in agreement, Allura still remained unconvinced. This was Cornelia's full-blooded sister they were talking about and first impressions of that woman weren't the greatest. Despite the praise this younger sister seemed to be receiving, Allura couldn't quite believe that this Euphemia person was really that different from her elder sibling.

But, notwithstanding her own prejudices, she knew that it was ultimately Lelouch who knew his own family the best. She would simply have to trust that he knew what he was doing.

Any further conversation was interrupted by a loud buzzing coming from Lelouch's pocket. It was his cell phone.

Blinking dubiously, along with most of the rest of the team, Lelouch cautiously answered it.

"Hello?" he asked, still highly confused.

"Lelouch!" He heard his sister's distressed cry.

"Nunnally! What's wrong? Where are you?!" Lelouch exclaimed in alarm, turning on speakerphone in the process.

"I don't know, but I can't move!" she grunted a bit as apparently the phone was taken away from her.

"Nunnally!" Lelouch exclaimed.

"Long time, no see, Lulu," a new voice spoke from the phone. A voice Lelouch, nor anyone else, ever believed to hear again.

"Mao!"

"He's alive?!" Rivalz squawked, "How is that possible?! That shouldn't be possible!"

"More importantly, how did he get into the Castle?!" Rai demanded.

"You and your little alien buddies dropped your guard, Lelouch. Just because you all thought I was dead," was the answer they received.

"Mao listen, C.C. isn't here right now," Lelouch practically growled.

"That's why I came. Someone immune to my Geass would be troublesome, now." Mao replied with a giggle, "I'll save my encounter with her for a later date. First things first, I'm gonna pay you back for that little session the other day. Your cute little sister and her lovely companion should be plenty of leverage to deal with you."

'Companion?' Lelouch wondered. He then remembered that Villetta was still on the ship too. So Mao managed to capture her and Nunnally!

"Well, on the bright side, we know he's somewhere on the Castle, right?" Shirley pointed out nervously.

"Well, obviously genius! Now why don't you try to find me?"

"Here's a good question, how the hell are you still alive you bastard?!" Kallen demanded.

"I'm not telling~" Mao practically sang before continuing, "Now listen carefully. You lot have five Earth hours before this Castle of yours goes up in flames. Oh, by the way, since the game is just between you all and me, no calling in any of the Black Knights or other alien friends. I'm not in the mood to get shot up again," he laughed sadistically.

"You're a sick, twisted piece of work," Suzaku ground out.

"You might wanna watch your language, Suzaku," Mao warned. "Considering I hold the cards. You guys really should have made sure I was dead, maybe even have my body dumped in a river or something? You left off the finishing touch, and now dear sweet little Nunnally and Villetta are in a bind! What a quandary, what a quagmire, what a crunch!"

"Now you listen-" before Allura could finish her threat, Mao hung up.

By now most of the Paladins were beginning to panic. How the hell did Mao get onto the ship? Much less recover quickly enough to be alive and moving again?!

"You know what, whatever!" Kallen finally shouted, "We can just beat the answers out of him once we catch that son of a bitch!"

Lelouch exclamation managed to shake Lelouch of his stupor and he frowned in suppressed fury.

"All right, split into two teams. Shirley, Rai, Rivalz, and Milly will be one, while Kallen, Allura, Suzaku, and I will be the other. Search the Castle! If you find him, shoot him on sight! Don't give him time to play any of his mind games. His maximum range remains about five hundred meters, that's large but it's not enough to cover the entire ship. That's our one advantage over him. Now go!"

"We're on it!" Milly said with a scowl.

"Got it!" Rai nodded.

o~o

The sound of feet thundering down the hall could be heard as Rai led his team carefully down the hall. Each of them at their Bayards out and ready. They were especially grateful that two of their Bayards were automatically long-ranged weapons, although Rai and Milly's could extend their range as well.

"Hmmm...hmmmmm!" Rivalz hummed aggressively, face looking comically pinched and focused.

"Um… Rivalz? What are you doing?" Milly had to ask.

"I'm trying to clear my mind so Mao can't read it!" the Blue Paladin answered, "Like Suzaku did the first time!"

"I don't think that's how that works Rivalz," Rai deadpanned. If it weren't for the life-threatening situation they were currently in, the Green Paladin likely would have found the behavior hilarious. Rivalz looked like he was more constipated than concentrated.

"Um… more importantly," Shirley said anxiously, "how is Mao still alive?!"

"Shirley calm down," Rai said softly, "we've taken him down before. We can beat him again."

"Yeah, don't worry," Milly said with a determined grin, "We know how he likes to play the game. We just got to make sure he doesn't have a chance to play it. If we mess with him like last time, it can trip him up!"

"But… won't he know that that's what our plan is?" Rivalz asked, abandoning his quest to 'clear his mind.'

"Maybe, but he still won't know how to counter it. Once he loses control of the situation, we strike," Rai decided as they cautiously entered through another hallway leading to the engine room. Lelouch told them that Mao said that he was planning to blow the ship up, so obviously the first place to check for any explosives would be the engine room. Any other part was too heavily shielded or could be repaired (perhaps not immediately but still could be).

They came to the end of the hall, towards the large sliding doors that automatically opened for the group, revealing the engine room on the other side. And sitting in the center, tied with duct tape to a large bomb was…

"Nunnally!" All of them exclaimed as they ran into the chamber.

Due to her mouth being taped over, all Nunnally could do was muffle out a cry of relief and struggle weakly against her bonds. Villetta also attempted to loosen her bindings but wasn't having much luck at all.

"Hold on, we're gonna get you out, okay?" Shirley said as they started to run across the narrow platform.

Before they could make it though, a figure stepped out from the shadows, clapping casually.

With gasps that quickly turned into scowls, everyone activated their Bayards, aiming them at Mao.

"Uh, uh, uh! I wouldn't do that if I were you now!"

It was only then that they noticed something in his hand. It looked like a switch of some sort, but Mao seemed to be pressing down on the button.

Rai was the first to recognize what it was.

"You bastard…!"

"Figured it out did you? Well you're absolutely right!" Mao congratulated mockingly, "Yes, it's a dead-man switch. If this little device leaves my hand for any reason at all, the entire ship will go up! You don't want that to happen now do you?"

"You're insane! You'll die too if that happens!" Rivalz argued.

"Don't be so sure," Mao sniggered, "I have a little… insurance from my new contractor if anything goes awry this time.

"New contractor?" Milly questioned, "Wait-is it that V.V. guy?"

"I'm not telling~" Mao repeated in the same sing-song manner.

The next second, Mao's eyes snapped up, and a flash of black light blinded everyone. Instinctively, Rivalz turned his own Geass on, his nearly translucent shield blocking everyone from getting in.

But he apparently wasn't fast enough.

"No… not- stop!" Rai suddenly cried, collapsing to his knees, clutching his head, "Not again! What else will you do to me?!"

"Huh?" Rivalz gasped. He jumped when Shirley screamed, tears gathering in her eyes.

"No! Mom! Dad! Don't leave me!"

"Shut up…" Milly murmured behind him, pure anguish on her face, "Mom you can't… talk to me… like… that!"

"What the…" was all Rivalz could say as his friends collapsed, eyes skewed shut in pain.

"Oh my!" Mao exclaimed as he clapped, "Quite impressive! I've never seen a Geass do that before!"

"You! What the hell did you do to my friends!?" Rivalz demanded angrily.

"Oh spoilers!" Mao grinned, "Let's just say my Geass got an upgrade. I don't just read minds anymore. No, no! I can see the worst fears of any person… and bring them to life before their eyes! Pretty cool, huh?"

Rivalz growled and raised his gun, aiming it Mao, "You're insane!"

"Oh, are you going to shoot me with that shield still up? I know you can't! Sure, my Geass can protect you from my fear visions right now, but I already know the ins-and-outs of your Geass. Sure, no one can get through that shield to you, but you, nor nothing else inside the shield already can get out. To move, you're going to have to lower that shield, right?"

"And besides," Mao chuckled psychotically, "a flimsy shield like that won't stop me from letting go of this dead-man switch and blowing up the Castle anyway! Where's your little strategy now?"

Rivalz's eyes narrowed before his eyes wandered behind Mao, to his two frightened hostages. Villetta looked scared, but Nunnally was shaking in terror, her eyes building with tears. The Blue Paladin met the younger girl's eye… and winked with a smirk.

In the blink of an eye, Rivalz's shield flickered off.

A second later, Mao's eyes widened.

"You little-"

"You get all of that, Lelouch?" Rivalz continued to smirk.

"Affirmative, Rivalz," Lelouch's voice crackled through Rivalz's helmet. The Black Paladin had heard everything. Including Mao's upgraded Geass.

"You talk way too much, you know that?" Rivalz said almost cockily.

Mao didn't reply, simply growling ferally, pulling a grenade out from his pocket. Pulling the pin ring with his teeth, he chucked the explosive towards the group. It exploded before Rivalz could raise his shield again.

With a shout of surprise, Rivalz flew backward from the impact. With a crack, he was knocked unconscious along with the rest of his friends.

Nunnally and Villetta both screamed under their gags, eyes wide in terror.

"Oh please, don't get your hair in a bunch," Mao chastised nonchalantly, "that grenade wasn't enough to kill them. Even if he was hit point-blank, that armor would have blocked most of the damage."

Mao then smirked and shook his head, "Well whatever, it doesn't matter if Lelouch knows my plan now. I'll just have a little fun with him for now."

Nunnally grunted behind him. Turning around he saw that the girl was glaring at him as hard as she could.

"Oh, is the whittle kitty growing some claws?" Mao giggled, "My, my, look at that glare! Guess you're trying to make up for being such a burden to your big brother all these years, aren't you?"

Villetta also jerked, nearly lunging at the man, only to lose her balance and fall to the ground instead.

"You know, if you actually had your memories back, I'd actually have been scared by that move," Mao shrugged, "Oh well, I shouldn't leave his highness waiting now, should I? Heh, heh, enjoy your last few hours… alive…"

With a chortle, he skipped out of the engine room to set up the final stage of his revenge.

o~o

Back on the bridge, Lelouch, Allura, Kallen, and Suzaku scowled as they heard the last of Mao's little speech. Lelouch was especially livid as he heard him taunt Nunnally but knew that an outburst from his was likely what Mao was aiming for, so forced himself to stay calm.

"He's heading for Zenobia's bay," Kallen said, her Geass flashing, "and… wait, what's that? He's holding something besides the switch."

"You think he's just taunting us by heading there?" Suzaku asked.

Allura frowned and pulled up the security cameras in the engine room.

"Oh dear," Allura's eyes widened upon seeing the large bomb by the main engine.

"Do you think we can disarm it?" Kallen asked, looking at the explosive.

"We can try, but the engine room isn't too far from Zenobia's bay," Lelouch said, "We'd still be in Mao's Geass range. If he hears that we're tampering with the bomb, he could set it off immediately by letting go of that dead-man switch. In order to stop him… we need to figure out a way to either dismantle that bomb without him knowing, or get him to let go of the switch, without activating it… he's certainly dotted all of the 'i's and crossed all the 't's for this."

"This situation only looks impossible Lelouch," Suzaku said, "There's a solution… there has to be."

"Look at the information and tools we've gathered so far," Allura suggested, "it's not like we're completely powerless."

"We have your Geass and mine," Kallen listed, "as well three highly-trained fighters standing in front of you. So use that gigantic brain of yours and figure out how to solve this problem, because I certainly can't! The only one who can do this, is you, Lelouch."

o~o

Mao hummed absent-mindedly as he lounged on the ledge Zenobia was propped on. The Lion, herself, had her shield up, so Mao wasn't able to enter her even if he wanted to.

"Oh if only my little gift could make me read your mind," Mao said to Zen, "I mean, a mind over 10,000 years old, oh just imagine the information running around in there! Say, what exactly do you see in someone like Lelouch anyway? If you ask me, you should dump him and let me be your Paladin! I'm much better than he will ever be!"

The only reply he got was a low threatening growl that vibrated the floor.

This only caused Mao to scowl in irritation, "Tch, you're no fun!"

His irritation soon faded as a familiar voice, or mental voice appeared in his head. He smiled manically. It seems Lelouch wasn't such a coward after all. He blinked when he noticed that Lelouch's voice was the only one he heard. Oh well, he guessed the other three were ordered to stay behind. Oh, so the prince did have a heart. After all, if any of them attacked him right now, they still had the dead-man switch to worry about.

'What now? What's he got planned for me next?' Mao heard thought as Lelouch walked closer to the chamber, 'Mao will be able to hear us if we go for the bomb. He can also let go of the dead-man switch at any time. That would kill everyone on the ship, including him. What a whack job. I told Suzaku, Kallen, and Allura to behind, and we haven't called for back-up in any way. Guess I'm on my own unless someone miraculously comes back to the ship on their own. But with how little time is left, that's unlikely.'

Lelouch finally entered the Black Lion bay, face solemn but determined.

"Well, if it isn't Casanova!" Mao greeted mockingly as he clapped his hands, "No weapons, no Lions, no friends, no strategy, you can't defuse the bomb without me hearing what you're doing! What's wrong, Lulu?"

"I'm not explaining anything to you!" Lelouch glared, eyes burning in hidden fury, "The final game, is it ready?"

"Let's put an end to this," Mao revealed a fully assembled chess board next to him, "with your specialty."

"Hm?" Lelouch asked, eying the board suspiciously.

"You see, the scale is the bomb's detonator and its cancellation switch," Mao explained, gesturing to the device next to the board, "The chess pieces we capture will go here. If the needle swings all the way towards me, the bomb goes off. If it stings towards you, the bomb will be disarmed. In short, if you win the game, you save your sister's life and everyone else's!"

"Your mind is twisted, no wonder C.C. left you," Lelouch scowled as he settled on the black side of the board.

"Provoking me won't work. I can read your thoughts, so I know what you're trying to do," Mao said with a grin as he captured Lelouch's pawn and placed it on his scale, causing the meter to tip closer toward him.

The two jumped when they heard a vicious snarl coming from Zenobia. Though she didn't move from her position, Lelouch smirked as her emotions flooded his being.

He laughed softly, shaking his head, "She really wants to kill you."

Surprisingly, Mao didn't look offended or scared of this statement. He simply smirked, "Must have gotten that killer-instinct from her last Paladin."

Lelouch didn't lash out, but he still glared fiercely at the mind-reader. But doing so would accomplish nothing, so he forced himself to play the game.

Unfortunately, chess was a game best used with the mind, a mind that Mao could read perfectly.

"You're dead to me."

Lelouch gasped and whipped around. That voice. It had been his father's! But… that was impossible.

"Hmmm? Something wrong, Lulu?" Mao smirked savagely.

"You can't fight it."

Lelouch gasped again as this time Zarkon's voice rang in his head.

Then it hit him.

"That Geass! I heard that it was upgraded, wasn't it?" Lelouch accused.

"Hmmm, well that's one way of putting it," Mao shrugged as he captured two more pawns, "I certainly have better control of it this time, and even has a little bonus! Everyone has their fears after all. I simply can… 'help' them realize them. Whether with their own eyes or planting a couple of stray voices here and there. Little things like that."

'He's screwing with me,' Lelouch thought, as Mao nabbed a knight, 'I can't let those distract me!'

"Oh, that's just wishful thinking on your part Lulu. I'm afraid you're not the type of person who can keep your mind, empty," Mao continued to mock him, "There's the part of you that's a critic, constantly watching your own moves… making sure that you don't end up like big, bad Zarkon. And there's another part that's an observer watching the critic — watching you. You're that type of person. But I know all your thoughts, so I'm always a step ahead, you can't win."

Mao captured Lelouch's remaining knight and put it on his scale, causing the needle to tip closer towards Lelouch. Lelouch scowled, but Mao was able to read what he was thinking.

"Bravo!" Mao clapped as he saw Lelouch move his next piece, "Your plan is to think of seven things at once to confuse me and trip me up! But you see, if I focus my Geass directly on you, it's easy to tell which one is your true thought," Mao captured another of Lelouch's pawns. "Ah, your last plan is failing you as well. You underestimated me, and that's why everyone is…" He threw the piece onto his scale.

The needle was less than a centimeter away from the red zone. If that was hit, the bomb would detonate. Now Lelouch was getting more than a little bit nervous. He began to tremble.

"'What do I do? I'm out of strategies. I can't call for backup as long as Nunnally is being held hostage.'" Mao mocked, reading Lelouch's fearful thoughts out loud.

Mao then pulled a coin out of his pocket and it clattered to the floor.

Lelouch jumped.

"Sorry, sorry, I dropped it."

He picked up the coin and clapped once more. "Your turn, better hurry."

He saw that Lelouch was hesitating, "Looky, looky, time is running out. Your little team is not gonna make it. You're going to lose everything."

Lelouch reached to move his king. "Ah, is that the right move? Are you sure you wanna do that?"

Lelouch hung his head down. It was impossible. He couldn't beat Mao. Not when his sister's life, all his friends' lives, hung in the balance. There was only one way out.

"Isn't this enough?" Lelouch pleaded desperately, "Please stop it, Mao…"

"I can't hear you very well," Mao sang.

"You got everything you wanted! Let everyone go!" Lelouch shouted.

"Huh?" Mao mockingly said, wanting Lelouch to say it.

"I admit it… you have beaten me."

That was all the madman needed to hear. Like a hyena, he cackled as he clapped his hands, like a child being presented its favorite toy, "Very well said! You're finally speaking your thoughts from the deepest part of your soul, huh? That feels great! Fantastic...! But no. This… is checkmate."

"NNNNNOOOOO!" Lelouch screamed and Mao laughed maniacally… only to stop when nothing happened.

"What?!" he gasped. Slammed his hand against the switch again, "What's wrong with this thing! Everything should have gone 'Boom!'"

Reaching into his pocket again, Mao pulled out what looked like a viewing device. To his shock and confusion, the bomb remained untouched. Nunnally and Villetta also remained alive.

Suddenly, with a *bang* the doors to the bay burst open, and Suzaku and Kallen charged in, shocking Mao even further.

With a yell, Mao pulled out a gun and fired at the duo. However, his bullets did nothing but harmless bounce off the energy shields. With a swift kick, Suzaku smacked the gun out of Mao's hands. Kallen followed up with a punch to the jaw, sending Mao flying backward. Before the mind-reader could recover, Suzaku leaped onto him, keeping pinned and locking his arms behind his back.

"How did you… you!" Mao glared hatefully at Lelouch, "What the hell did you do?! How did you disarm the bomb?! I would have heard you! The engine room is in my range!"

"It was all part of the plan," Kallen smirked, towering over Mao, "Isn't that right, Lelouch?"

Lelouch blinked as his eyes each had a red ring form before fading immediately. In a rush, all the memories from before rolled back.

"That's right," Lelouch smirked triumphantly at the madman. "Mao, it would seem this is my checkmate."

Mao's eyes widened in realization, "Lelouch… Don't tell me…"

"Yes," Lelouch said to him with his thoughts as he, Kallen, and Suzaku all smirked. "I gave Suzaku, Kallen, and Allura their instructions, while also using Geass on myself to forget so you couldn't find out. You believe that if you know a person's thoughts you know everything. That's why you narrowed your range and focused your all power on my mind. That was your mistake."

"Then while you were distracted, the three of us disarmed the bomb. Lelouch told us which wires to cut ahead of time," Suzaku added calmly, though he could barely hide the satisfying smirk on his face too.

"While we're on the subject, you said your Geass can give people nightmares, huh? So how come I'm not seeing anything?!"

That was indeed strange. It had obviously affected Lelouch from close range, so how come Kallen and Suzaku weren't experiencing hallucinations.

"...Oh, I think I know," Suzaku murmured, "You have to actually see someone to give them visions, don't you. Not necessarily eye-contact like Lelouch, you just need to see their face. But with you pinned down like this, you can't look at me or Kallen, huh?"

"And even if you did try anything, your little mind games won't work on me! I already know who I am! Nothing you say is going to change that!" Kallen declared.

"Allura," Suzaku said into his comm, "It's safe to untie them now."

o~o

"Understood," the princess replied on the other end. Back in the engine room Allura quickly moved to reach Nunnally and Villetta.

"Oh um… forgive me, Nunnally, this will hurt," she apologized before ripping the duck tape off her mouth.

Despite the stinging pain from the rip, Nunnally started crying in relief as Allura undid her bands. She quickly did the same to Villetta.

Allura then nearly lost her balance as Nunnally sprang forward and hugged the Altean tightly, still crying.

"Oh, Nunnally," Allura murmured, running her fingers through the girl's hair. Villetta looked on sympathetically as well.

o~o

Unfortunately, even this wasn't enough for Mao to accept defeat as he began to struggle relentlessly in Suzaku's hold.

"Stop it!" Suzaku told him.

"Get your hands off me, father-killer!"

Suzaku's pupils shrunk and the world froze. He didn't hear Kallen's gasp next to him. Even Lelouch stopped in surprise.

It was all Mao needed to head-butt the Purple Paladin and scramble away, grabbing his gun in the process. For the slightest second that Suzaku's guard had dropped, Mao had pulled out a trump card he never had until now.

Smiling once again like a maniac, Mao continued, "You killed your own father seven years ago. He called for do-or-die resistance, and you thought stopping him would end the war. What a childish idea. The fact is you're a murderer!"

"That's not true! I just… I…" Suzaku stuttered.

"How lucky for you that no one ever found out." Mao continued. "All the adults lied to protect you."

"Wait no!" Kallen objected, "That doesn't make sense! All the reports said his suicide was a protest against the military actions."

"A lie! All of it! Nothing but a big, fat, lie!" Mao confirmed with a cackle.

"Suzaku…" Lelouch looked at his friend with both shock but also sympathy.

"I didn't have any choice!" Suzaku said immediately, "If I didn't… Japan would have…"

"That's how you justify it in retrospect? Well, it explains your death-wish!" Mao stated, causing Suzaku to gasp again. Mao smirked evilly, "You wanna save people's lives? It's your own wretched soul you're trying to save! That's why you're always charging into danger! Placing yourself on the edge of death!"

Now that he had a view of Suzaku's face, Mao didn't waste any time force-feeding a vision of that very night before Suzaku's eyes. The Purple Paladin screamed and clutched his head between his knees. Then the vision shifted. He was no longer standing over his father's corpse but over Allura's. The other Paladins lined up by her, all dead.

"Congratulations," Zarkon's voice echoed in his head. Looking down, Suzaku was horrified to see himself dressed as a Galran soldier, "You're one of us now."

"You're no hero!" Mao continued to mock, "You're just trying to wash the blood off your hands! A little brat begging to be punished!"

"MAO!" Lelouch roared in rage, twining with Zenobia's that ricocheted off the walls of the bay. In shock, the mind-reader looked up. With a flash of red from Lelouch's Geass, the Black Paladin commanded, "NEVER SPEAK AGAIN!"

"No!" Mao tried to cover his face, but it was already too late. Lelouch's Geass flew into his eyes. Mao opened his mouth, but no words came out except incoherent gurgles

With a scream of fury of her own, Kallen rushed at Mao, her Bayard claws activated and wildly sliced at Mao's side. The mind-reader managed to sidestep in time to avoid being sliced in two, but it still left a deep gash either way.

In an act of desperation, Mao meets Kallen's face with his Black Geass, and the Red Paladin screamed in anguish as she watched her brother being gunned down in the middle of the Shinjuku square. She didn't even register that Mao had shoved into her, and knocked her down.

Knowing they couldn't let him get away, Lelouch raced towards him as well, only for Mao raise his gun, ready to shoot Lelouch in his unprotected forehead… when a glowing orange arrow pierced his chest.

Eyes wide, with a choked gasp, blood splattering across the floor, Mao collapsed to his knees and fell lifeless to the ground, the heart-piercing arrow putting an end to his life.

Stupefied, but quickly shaking it off, Lelouch raised his head to see Rai's team standing in the doorway. They looked like they had been about to charge in, but were now facing the opposite direction. Behind him, Shirley breathed gasped heavily, her hands shaking violently as she lowered the bow.

With the main source now deceased, the visions faded from Suzaku and Kallen's eyes. The Red Paladin looked around in confusion before spotting Shirley.

"Shirley…?" Rai asked anxiously.

"I...I just-" her Bayard slipped from her fingers and hurtled to the floor. The Orange Paladin collapsed to her own knees.

"Shirley!" Rai exclaimed in alarm, quickly catching her before her head could hit the ground.

Seeing that Shirley was taken care of for now, Milly and Rivalz both rushed to Lelouch and Kallen.

"You okay?" Milly asked, pulling the Red Paladin to her feet.

"Yeah," Kallen nodded breathlessly, "We're fine…"

"...How much?" Lelouch asked as Rivalz swung an arm over his shoulder.

"...We heard all of it," Milly admitted guiltily.

Slowly, everyone, sans the unconscious Shirley, turned and gazed sorrowfully at Suzaku, who hadn't seemed to process anything that had happened. He remained on his knees, shocked still.

"I just… I just…"

#Voltron #Code Geass #Crossover #Fanfiction #lelouch lamperouge #rivalz cardemonde #milly ashford #shirley fenette #rai (lost colors) #suzaku kururugi #kallen kozuki #allura #nunnally lamperouge #villetta nu #mao #cornelia li britannia

[f4liveblogarchives]

Fantastic Four Vol. 1 Annual 1978

Thur Aug 29 2019 [10:54 PM] Wack'd: The unusual detail on the colors (credit to F Mouly) contrasted with the horror on Johnny's face

[10:54 PM] Wack'd: Can't blame Keith Pollard this time [10:54 PM] Wack'd: Hi Sal Buscema [10:55 PM] maxwellelvis: “They took my fucking eyes.” [10:56 PM] Wack'd: Johnny is making 4s and also fireworks which I guess is a thing he can do [10:56 PM] Wack'd: Unfortunately NYC in in the middle of a three-week drought and the fire department politely asks him to knock it off [10:57 PM] Wack'd: Some sort of child

[10:58 PM] Umbramatic: “Put that thing back where it came from or so help me” [10:58 PM] Wack'd: So Alicia's brought the whole team to her apartment to unveil her latest statue [10:59 PM] Wack'd: "Actually, I just assumed you were young and pretty because you're a woman in a superhero comic. But I like your version better."

[11:01 PM] Wack'd: Meanwhile, there's a string of kidnappings happening! [11:01 PM] Wack'd: Mole Man has let his Moloids into the streets of NYC and they're just fucking grabbing folks [11:01 PM] Umbramatic: damn moles [11:01 PM] Wack'd: Specifically: ugly people and blind people [11:02 PM] Wack'd: Also statues depicting the young and beautiful [11:02 PM] Wack'd: That's a little mean, narrator!

[11:03 PM] Wack'd: Humorously, the Moloids are about to nab Matt Murdoch when he jumps out into the night to investigate as Daredevil [11:04 PM] Wack'd: He doesn't notice the horde of moloids about to grab him I guess! Some radar-vision! [11:04 PM] Wack'd: Police spending has gotten out of hand

[11:05 PM] Bocaj: Official Police Limousine for Police Prom [11:06 PM] Wack'd: So I guess this takes place before 201 because Reed declines to help the police with the missing persons' case since they're all so busy trying to get their own affairs in order, like getting stuff back from SHIELD and re-renting the Baxter [11:07 PM] maxwellelvis: I'm going to guess Mole Man's plan is "If I snatch up all the ugly people and all the beautiful blind people in this city, statistically I HAVE to eventually capture Alicia and Grimm!" [11:07 PM] Wack'd: Alicia offers to let the Four stay with her but Ben turns her down because he doesn't want a supervillain attack [11:07 PM] Wack'd: @maxwellelvis : Nah, he knows where they are and is appreciative that they're too busy to look into his shit [11:08 PM] Bocaj: If Ben is ugly then why are so many people interested in him? Answer that with all of your science [11:08 PM] maxwellelvis: Because he's got beautiful blue eyes [11:09 PM] Wack'd: A child does actually ask Ben to his face why he hasn't been kidnapped yet, since he's so ugly [11:09 PM] Wack'd: Ben takes it about as well as you'd expect [11:09 PM] Aleph Null: jesus [11:09 PM] Bocaj: Rude child [11:09 PM] Wack'd: Probably better actually since he doesn't try to beat up this literal child [11:10 PM] Wack'd: So it turns out the Four don't need to be couch-surfing at Alicia's for supervillains to attack there [11:10 PM] Wack'd: The Four and Alicia find Mole Man and his moloids cleaning house on Alicia's sculptures [11:11 PM] Wack'd: Fight fight fight [11:12 PM] Wack'd:

Mole Man: Did you forget my bat-like radar-senses? Ben: Did you forget my club-like fists?

[11:12 PM] Bocaj: Hah [11:13 PM] Wack'd: So the Four are overwhelmed with sheer numbers and Mole Man makes off with Alicia [11:13 PM] Wack'd: I feel so goddamn bad for the Moloids, honestly

[11:14 PM] Wack'd: They put up with so much shit [11:14 PM] Wack'd: Also: this is the plot of the 1994 movie I'm pretty sure [11:14 PM] maxwellelvis: One time the Moloids found the Basilisk's frozen body, and one of them restores his life, and the Basilisk repays that by killing it. [11:15 PM] Bocaj: Being Moloid is suffering [11:15 PM] maxwellelvis: We'll know for sure if he starts trying to steal from Doctor Doom. [11:15 PM] Wack'd: 😦 [11:15 PM] Wack'd: So Sue invisibly follows the two out the window, implicitly also using the Moloid ladder [11:15 PM] Bocaj: God damn sue [11:16 PM] Wack'd: The remaining three slowly regain consciousness and give pursuit. Was kinda hoping for a Sue solo mission for at least a little but nah they catch up just about immediately [11:17 PM] Wack'd: *siiiiiigh*

[11:17 PM] Wack'd: Also they take a cab to get to where Sue set off the flare and stiff the cabbie on the bill [11:18 PM] Wack'd: He finally gives up trying to get them to pay when Reed tells him to bill it to Tony Stark, at which point he realizes he's wasting his time and drives away [11:20 PM] maxwellelvis: Was looking for a clip of Shrek going "For five minutes, could you not be yourself? FOR FIVE MINUTES?!" but there's not a version of just that line that's not obnoxiously loud. [11:21 PM] Wack'd: Marv Wolfman (or in this case Bill Mantlo) seem to really be pushing the narrative that Sue is essentially Johnny's mom, or at least mom friend, and I could keep grousing about the fact that there's no evidence of this for the first like 16 years of the team's existence, or I could just be glad that they finally have a dynamic and move on

[11:22 PM] Wack'd: But it does unfortunately continue to pigeonhole Sue as "the girl one" and I'm really desperate for literally any other reading of her character at this point [11:23 PM] Wack'd: So anyway they find Mole Man and Alicia

[11:24 PM] Wack'd: Given that we literally saw Moloids throwing bags over peoples heads to drag them off into the night, this is kind of a tough sell [11:26 PM] Wack'd: Not really sure how I feel about a narrative of minorities willingly removing themselves from society en masse

[11:27 PM] Wack'd: So, uh [11:28 PM] Wack'd: The story ends with the Four deciding that if folks wanna stay here there's...really nothing to be done [11:28 PM] Wack'd: (Granted, it's not all of them, and those that wish to return are guided back to the surface) [11:29 PM] Wack'd: Well...okay

[11:29 PM] Wack'd: I mean I imagine he traumatized a fair few folks...committed lots of theft...and he still has literal slaves [11:29 PM] Wack'd: But whatever. A happy ending! [11:30 PM] Wack'd: Yaaaaaaaaaaaay [11:30 PM] maxwellelvis: We're never seeing any of those people again, are we? [11:30 PM] Wack'd: *shrug* [11:32 PM] Wack'd: They're apparently a vaguely ongoing concern through the eighties [11:33 PM] Wack'd: Though the article does note that it does seem like most of the non-superpowered members eventually fucked off [11:33 PM] maxwellelvis: I'm surprised Masque didn't make them join the Morlocks or something.

#1978 #Bill Mantlo #Sal Buscema #The Main Book

[vaguelygeiszlerian]

1 to 50

ok i just saw this existed, i live on tumblr mobile where i ignore the activity tab and scroll endlessly, bear w me

Animated character that was your gay awakening? uhhhhhhh,,,....,,,.. if i remembered anything abt my childhood i would tell u, im gonna say rukia from bleach because i want gorgeous short people to step on me

Grilled cheese or PB&J? peanut butter Always... tho if it was a fancy grilled cheese (there is a special preparation).... i would be torn

What show/YouTube video(s) do you put on in the background when you when you don’t have anything to watch but you want something on? it really depends! i bounce around, i watch a lot of baumgartner restorations, i watch a LOT of nyx fears video essays on horror movies i would never watch, i watch longplays of, like, nier automata bc im still delighted by cryaotic?

Your go-to bar order, if you drink? i dont really get to order a lot of drinks at bars, itll depend, if im with friends ill order as many things off the cocktail menu as my money allows, if im with my parents ill order long island iced teas or whiskey and lemonade

What’s your favorite pair of shoes that you own? i literally own like 3 pairs of shoes, one of which being the only pair i can actually safely wear haha.... but my favorite pair is the black red and gold converse that dont fit anymore but still remind me of high school

Top three cuisines? mexican, italian, whomever the fuck invented kasoundi

What was your first word as a child (that wasn’t a variation of “Mom” or “Dad”)? yeah as said above i have no clue about anything about my childhood so idk i think mum said once that my first proper word was just ‘no’ which sounds abt right

What’s a job that you’ve had that people might be surprised to find out you’ve had? idk if my last job counts? i mean i used to do all round garden labor stuff until my pain got worse and i literally couldnt anymore so i got relegated to desk work

Look up. What’s directly across from you? oh a container of pesto i didnt like the flavour of and just... forgot to throw out.... i will do that tomorrow

Do you own any signed books/memorabilia in general? i have a rwby poster signed by ray and jack? its p cool

Preferred way to spend a rainy day? preferred right now? wrapped in a metric fuckton of blankets w my partner

What do you get on your bagels? What WOULD you get if you had access to anything you wanted? i..... dont like bagels

Brunch or midnight snacks? i live a weirdly scheduled life, midnight snacks and brunch are interchangeable to me now, so both

Favorite mug you own i..... dont really have one? all of my actual mugs that are mine have my deadname on them haha

What coffee drink would you describe yourself as? overbrewed black coffee that someone left to go cold before dumping six packs of sugar in

Pick a song lyric to describe your current mood (and drop the name and artist!) ‘ And I don't want your pity I just want somebody near me ‘ bc we all love a bit of mitski when we are feeling the self isolation creeping in

Fruity or herbal teas? fruity teas only! or rather i drink fruit tisanes! but if you mean actual tea then herbal, i only drink peppermint tea

What’s that one TV show that you’re a little bit embarrassed to watch but you still like nonetheless? fruits basket! everyone watch the reboot

That book you were forced to read for class but actually ended up enjoying? all the books i read for class sucked but medea wasnt so bad

Do you match your socks? only when theyre very fun patterned socks, and even then sometimes i will match them to the wrong pair but the same pattern, aka my double watermelon combo (i have a pair of green socks w watermelons and a pair of black socks w watermelons so)

Have you ever been horseback riding? no and i never will because i am fucking terrified of horses

What was your “phase” when you were younger? (i.e., Mythology Nerd, Horse Girl, Space Geek, etc) uh.... uh i mean im not sure if it counts as a phase but i was stupid into vampires (to the point of me and my friends constructing the intricate theory that our teacher was a vampire and we had to kill her by the time we graduated (she was not and we did not and i hate all of those people now) i was just the weird conspiracy kid i guess, we used to spend every lunch staring across the oval at a house we were SURE an alien lived in (it was just a plastic bag being rustled by a fan)

Have you ever been to jail? bkdnbrb god no

What’s your opinion on Lazy Susan’s (the spinning tray in the middle of tables)? im a lazy susan

Puzzles? i cant solve a rubiks cube but give me a 2000 piece jigsaw and ill sit there for 6 hours trying to solve it

You can only have one juice for the rest of your life, what is it? oh this is tough..... orange juice, the fancy kind but with no bits in it, i used to like the bits but these days i just want a clean juice experience

What section do you immediately head for when you walk into a bookstore? ,,,,,,the ya fiction section, i never buy anything from there but i like to see if series i read as a teenager ever got new instalments after i stopped liking them

What’s one thing you’re trying to learn/relearn in your downtime right now? how to sleep like a normal person

Who’s your go-to musical artist when you’re feeling upbeat? uh, it depends! lizzo or my playlist of musicals! (which is literally just starkid/tcb stuff)

Where could someone find you in a museum? i could literally be anywhere, probably in front of some old piece though, just staring for an hour bc im struck by the majesty of it (and my legs probably locked up so i couldnt move anyway)

What’s that one outfit in your closet you never get the chance to wear but want to? so i have a nice white button up and some really nice jeans i just got, and my suspenders, and my cool blue heels that i know i cant wear bc my legs cant handle walking in heels anymore, but it would look cool am i right

Rainbows, stars, or sunset colored clouds? i look up at my roof which is almost entirely covered in glow in the dark stars and then stare into the camera (i wish every day that my roof was like the roof of the healthy harold van, i still have fucking dreams of that beautiful ceiling)

If you could own any non-traditional pet (dogs, cats, fish, rodents, etc), what would it be? non traditional? id want a lizard that could curl round my shoulders like a leathery scarf

Do you have more art on your walls or more photographs? i dont have any photos on my wall so art by default

You have to get one meme tattooed on your body, what meme is it and where does it go? i just want the pensive emoji tattooed in the small of my back so if i wear a crop top everyone has to suffer with me

Pick a superhero sidekick to hang out with fuck superheroes they suck, can i hang out with jason todd red hood style

Lakes, rivers, or oceans? oceans, i want to go to the beach so fucking bad

Favorite mid-2000s song i dont really have a Big Favorite but like..... i constantly thank god for esteban

How do you dress when you’re home alone? ive been in the same sweatpants and old paint shirt i got from my painting and decorating course for three days

Where do you sit in the living room (we all have a preferred spot, and you know it)? armchair closest to the kitchen, perfect to make a quick escape if dad comes in

Knives or swords? knives, i dont have the upper body strength for swords

A song you didn’t think you’d enjoy but ended up loving? oh uh run away with me by crj, *bwoooooooo buhnuhnuuuuuu buhnuhnuuuuuhhh buhnuhnuuuuhhhhh*

Pick an old-school Disney Channel Original Movie HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL BUT SPECIFICALLY ONLY CERTAIN PARTS FROM EACH OF THEM BC COLLECTIVELY THEY SUCK BUT PARTS OF THEM ARE PERFECT

Are you a “Quote that relates to the photos” caption-er, an “explanation of where I took the photos” caption-er, or a no caption kinda person when you post pictures online? no caption i dont want people to really acknowledge that i post things

Name a classic Vine https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anQds9PQ7CA

What’s the freezer food that you stock up on when you go to the grocery store? hash browns hash browns hash browns ONLY

How do you top your ice cream? god its been so long since ive been able to eat ice cream.... with the reeses peanut butter ice cream shell topping

Do you like Jello? jelly is the pinnacle of our society and i wish i were eating it right now

What’s something that you don’t have a picture of that you wish you did? i wish i had a picture of myself and my partner so i could set it as my phone lock screen (that or i wish i had a picture of me and a friend i really dearly miss bc i have pics of her in my phone but not of us together and i want some but i cant bring myself to say so)

How are you at climbing trees? theres a tree in my front yard i used to be able to hang off but nowadays i think id hurt myself just trying to lift my nasty meat sack off the ground trying

#long post #christ that took like 3 hours #i dont know things about myself #thanks for asking though #Anonymous

[fyeahfantasticfour]

1960s Sue Storm: A Recuperative, Feminist Reading

I’m not going to pretend that comics in the 1960s weren’t sexist by today’s standards. Of course they were. All popular media from that time was. Second Wave Feminism, at the time Sue first appeared in November of 1961, was still in its infancy and hadn’t yet made its way into popular consciousness (Betty Friedan’s groundbreaking feminist tract, The Feminine Mystique, wouldn’t be published until 1963). Pointing out all of the ways in which Lee/Kirby’s run on the Fantastic Four is sexist is not much of a challenge and not very interesting — what I’m going to do by reading 1960s Sue against the grain is something far more nuanced that I hope will restore some of the agency that fandom interpretations have stripped away from her. I am striving for a recuperative reading of 1960s Sue Storm, one that pushes back against the fairly common and pernicious notion that she is or ever has been “just” a meek and mild housewife, because she never has been that, and I think that highlighting the degree of agency, strength, and courage she had even in the 1960s will help emphasize that. I don’t find the complete and total erasure of the level of agency Sue did, in fact, possess in the 1960s to be particularly nuanced or feminist because it ignores how transgressive she would have seemed at the time. So I am going to point to moments during Lee/Kirby’s run where Sue exhibited agency, strength, and power that were feminist for the period in which they were written, while simultaneously acknowledging that the narrative frequently undercuts and underserves her. I am not at all pretending that any of this was intentional on Jack Kirby or Stan Lee’s part -- I don’t and can’t know that, and frankly, I don’t think it matters in this context.

To begin with, Sue’s invisibility can be read as a critique of sexism, since it grants her both the ability to escape the male gaze and to weaponize her societal invisibility as a woman. I’m sure we’ve all heard of Ellison’s 1952 novel Invisible Man, which comments on both the hyper- and invisibility of black men. The manner in which Sue’s powers function is not unconnected to Ellison’s nameless Invisible Man. Sue’s physical beauty always exposed her to a great deal of unwanted male attention, but that surely escalated after she became famous as a member of the FF, thus becoming hypervisible to a degree she hadn’t been before. We see this in Fantastic Four v1 #10, when a strange man on the street recognizes Sue and interprets her fame as permission to harass her. Her invisibility allows her to dodge him and his gaze while she vehemently condemns his misogynistic behavior. 

Note that it’s specifically framed as Sue resisting, by turning invisible, his reductive view of her as a beautiful object that exists for his pleasure and not much else. “Mmm -- you shouldn’t ever turn invisible, doll!” he tells her. “How’s about a smile for one of your fans??” This is immediately followed by Sue directly defying him by both refusing to smile and turning invisible, thus removing herself from his sexualizing male gaze. Sue’s invisibility is in this way feminist and transgressive -- if women within the highly patriarchal society of the U.S. in the 1960s were given little choice but to exist as sexual objects on display for the titillation of the men around them, their subjectivity and humanity stripped from them, Sue’s invisibility gave her the power to defy that narrow categorization and control when she is seen and by whom. She claimed for herself the power to remove herself from the patriarchal male gaze that sexualized and dehumanized her whenever she wished.

Cut for length.

Her invisibility also allows her to transgressively wield her enemies’ sexist tendency to overlook and underestimate her against them (i.e., treat her as though she is insignificant and thus invisible). She is only successful in defeating male villains when she turns invisible because none of them ever think to wonder what happened to the FF’s female member. They are too busy focusing on the men, who they mistakenly view as more powerful and thus more of a threat than a mere woman. In Fantastic Four #5, for instance, Victor Von Doom demands that Sue surrender herself as a hostage so that he can coerce the male members of the team into doing as he demands. Victor’s plan hinges around Sue being a helpless damsel in distress, but Sue turns the tables on Victor by making the decision to go with Victor part of HER plan to gather information and draw him out into the open. Notice that Reed defers to Sue’s leadership here:

And her plan ultimately works. She defeats Victor and rescues herself and her teammates, all of whom would have been murdered by Victor if not for her. She is able to do so only because Victor does not deem her much of a threat and therefore overlooks her. She might as well have been invisible, as far as he was concerned—and she uses that fact to defeat him.

This overlooking of Sue by male antagonists happens repeatedly -- for instance in Fantastic Four v1 #95, when the Monocle also forgets about Sue completely:

Fantastic Four #5 is not the only time in the 1960s that Reed defers to Sue and her leadership, might I add -- in Fantastic Four v1 #20, Sue proposes one that centers around her taking the Molecule Man’s wand away, and Reed agrees to play bait for her:

They are working as a team here, as equal partners, which is what Lee at least presented Sue as, even if his ability to imagine what equality for a woman looked like was severely limited. Within the comics themselves, Sue herself has always insisted on equality both as a team member and as Reed’s lover and, later on, wife. In 1964′s Fantastic Four Annual #2, Reed, concerned with his girlfriend’s safety, decides that Doom is far too dangerous an enemy for Sue to go up against, but Sue insists on being treated like a full member of the team, as she always has been—and even threatens to break up with Reed if dating him means that she’ll be left behind on dangerous missions. 

And she actually follows through on that threat nearly a decade later in 1973′s Fantastic Four v1 #130, which takes place after they’re married and have a son. The Frightful Four attack and Sue participates in the battle, but when Reed orders her to get their infant son to safety and Sue doesn’t listen, they get into an argument. Reed is livid that Sue (recklessly, he believes) prioritized remaining in the fight over their baby’s life, and Sue is equally furious that Reed is treating her as though Franklin’s mother is all she is rather than as an equal teammate. She then leaves him for the first of two times (the other being during Civil War I). 

When they reunite, Sue is adamant that she be treated as an equal by all of them. Reed struggles at first to stop being so overprotective of Sue, but he does his best to comply because she has been very clear that if he does not, he will lose her permanently. By the time Marvel Two-In-One v1 #67 was published in 1980, he is able to tell Ben that he’s made his peace with the fact that Sue has just as much right to put herself in harm’s way as he does:

It’s worth noting also that in every version of the origin story, Sue’s decision to become a superhero—i.e., a warrior, on active, front-line duty—is never questioned by Reed, Ben, or Johnny (contrast that with Wonder Woman two decades or so earlier, who was initially relegated to being the Justice Society’s secretary). As a matter of fact, while Reed mentions in Fantastic Four v1 #22, the issue where Sue develops the ability to create forcefields, that Sue has been doubting the value of her powers and her usefulness to the team, he emphasizes that, to the contrary, she is “about to become the star member.” So not only has Sue always been a member of the FF, 22 issues after her first appearance she was already being presented as its most powerful member thanks to her forcefields. Needless to say, the fact that Sue was not only a member of the FF but also explicitly its most powerful member was fairly groundbreaking for the 1960s. I struggle to think of another team from that time period that could say that its female member(s) were the most powerful or that their superiority was openly acknowledged by every male member of the team.

Sue was also an active part of the team from the beginning and went everywhere her team members did—to the moon, other planets, other dimensions, Monster Island, the heart of Latveria, up against the Hulk, Skrulls, the Molecule Man, etc.—no matter how dangerous. She occasionally even spearheaded their attacks on villains and even made her own battle plans. In Fantastic Four v1 #3, which was only the FF’s third appearance, Sue goes after the Miracle Man by herself because she believes that she alone will be more effective than an entire army battalion:

Sue takes on a leadership role in these early issues far more often than anyone nowadays ever acknowledges. In Fantastic Four v1 #23, when the FF start to bicker and question why Reed gets to be the one in charge, Ben, Sue, and Johnny all vote for who they think should lead the team—and Sue votes for herself. She isn’t content to simply be a part of the team. It is 1964, and she already wants to lead the FF and thinks it’s time for a woman to do so.

And she one day would. By the 1980s, she was already the FF’s second-in-command, in charge when Reed wasn’t there, and she briefly took over leadership of the team when Reed was abducted and put on trial for saving Galactus’ life. In the 1990s, when Reed was twice presumed dead, Sue became the team leader both times and Ben and Johnny answered to her. By the 2000s and 2010s, the balance of power in Reed and Sue’s relationship has shifted almost entirely in Sue’s favor, to the point that Reed himself admits that Sue is the real leader of the team:

But it’s not as though these panels have no precedent, even all the way back in 1970′s Fantastic Four v1 #98:

Reed and Sue’s relationship has simply never been what fandom makes it out to be -- one that is profoundly unequal, where Sue gets no say at all in anything. It’s always been more of a back-and-forth, more of a partnership. Sue has always had the power to order Reed around (in certain contexts, at least) and Reed has always listened to Sue and her advice. Her power and influence has indisputably increased over the years, but it’s important to note that it was never wholly absent.

I could also point out that Sue has a perfect right to lead the team she was largely responsible for creating. Her role in the formation of the FF tends to be vastly underestimated. Sue was instrumental in orchestrating the FF’s theft of the rocket ship that Reed designed, which has been canon since Fantastic Four v1 #1. Without Sue passionately persuading Ben to fly the rocket (while Reed stood silently by), the flight never would have happened:

Neither was she solely motivated by her love and loyalty to Reed—in this, the original version you see above, her sense of patriotism had just as much to do with why she decided to accompany Reed on the rocket flight. Later writers have even portrayed Sue as being motivated by a love for adventure that rivals Reed’s and, more importantly, as being responsible for pushing Reed to go through with his plan -- Reed says point-blank that he was “content doing pure research” until Sue “pulled me out of the lab and into your amorphous idea of ‘field work.’” Despite the fact that it’s largely (wrongly) understood as Reed’s plan and Reed’s decision, I think that canon actually points to the theft of the rocket ship as being something that Reed and Sue decided and implemented together—or, arguably, even as more Sue’s than it was Reed’s. He floated the idea. She made it happen. Ben decided to pilot the rocket because Sue talked him into it. Johnny tagged along because of his love for Sue. The FF would never have come into being if not for Sue.

While 1960s Reed has become something of the poster boy for 1960s sexism in fandom, I think that attitude is unfair, inaccurate, and detrimental to fandom perceptions of Sue. At the time, Reed certainly wouldn’t have been read that way -- he gave his wife a great deal of freedom and autonomy for the time period, readily acknowledged that she was more powerful than he was, followed her leadership at times, and even personally trained Sue in hand-to-hand combat. Sue, it’s worth pointing out, has always defied and exceeded conventional femininity’s bounds, and Reed has never had an issue with that -- to the contrary, he’s actively supported and encouraged her. In Fantastic Four v1 #17, for instance, Victor abducts Alicia Masters, and Sue is the one who finds her first. When Victor enters the room, Sue is so confident that she can defeat him singlehandedly in hand-to-hand combat that she calls him her prisoner and says that she’s been looking forward to proving what she can do on her own:

And then she does, and Victor is forced to resort to pointing a gun at her to defeat her (this was before her forcefields):

She is so confident that she can beat him in hand-to-hand because she has been trained to fight by Reed, who even in the 1960s thought his girlfriend should know how to fight and didn’t think it too unladylike. 

Furthermore, I would argue that Sue chose to marry Reed rather than Namor precisely because Reed was significantly more respectful of her agency, consent, and right to self-determination and bodily autonomy than Namor ever was (...not that that’s a high bar). In Fantastic Four v1 #11, Reed, while discussing his and Sue’s lengthy romance (at the time, they were childhood sweethearts who had known each other their whole lives), brings up the fact that Sue has not decisively chosen between him and Namor. Sue tells him that she doesn’t know how she feels, and Reed very respectfully says that he understands how she feels and promises he won’t mention it again until she does, a promise he, crucially, keeps. 

Fantastic Four v1 #27, however, is the pivotal issue where Sue definitively chooses Reed over Namor, and she does so because Namor proves to her that he has no respect for her or her wishes while Reed proves that he does. The issue begins with Namor deciding unilaterally that he has waited long enough for Sue to make up her mind -- he wants the decision made on his terms, at his pace, rather than on Sue’s. So he announces to his people that he’s going to marry Sue now (without having bothered to ask her what she wants, if she’s ready, etc.) and then goes to the Baxter Building and beats up Sue’s family. When she arrives, she is horrified at what he’s done and frantically tries to see if her 17yo baby brother is all right, but Namor knocks her out and abducts her. She wakes up to find herself trapped in a glass bowl and screams to be let out, but Namor ignores her pleas:

This is a clear violation of Sue’s right to bodily autonomy and self-determination. She does not want to be in that glass bowl, but Namor does not listen to her or care about her consent. Namor is attempting to coerce Sue into behaving as he wishes -- i.e., imposing his will on her -- rather than allowing her to make up her own mind as Reed did. And he has the colossal gall to literally blame the victim by implying that she made him abduct and imprison her because of her indecisiveness. Reed, let me point out, never felt the need to do the same, despite being in a worse situation, given that he and Sue had known each other their whole lives, been dating for years, and were virtually engaged before Namor showed up. Despite all that, when Namor taunts Reed by asking what he would do if Sue chose Namor rather than him, Reed replies that Sue will, of course, decide for herself -- but on her time and her terms, not on Namor’s or Reed’s. Sue, unsurprisingly, announces at the end of this issue that she loves Reed and not Namor, and that was the end of the love triangle for the next decade. 

Reed continues to be uncertain about her feelings, however. He doesn’t propose until Fantastic Four v1 #35, and he does so only after Sue herself says that she has been waiting for him to propose and echoes back the phrase (“It’s always been you!”) that Reed used to declare his love for her in Fantastic Four v1 #11. He waited until she signaled to him that she was ready, on her own terms and at her own pace. 

I keep reading people wondering why Sue would have chosen a nerd like Reed over a hunk like Namor, and this is why. Reed proved to Sue that he respected her right to decide who she loves on her time and her terms, and Namor proved definitively that he did not.

And even after Sue marries Reed and has a baby, she does not quit the team or remain at home. While she does take a brief leave of absence during her pregnancy, she returns to active duty in a rather spectacular way. Reed, Ben, Johnny, and Crystal are all in Latveria, powerless, and on the verge of being blown up by Doom’s bombs, along with the village they are in. The bombs go off...and everyone is mysteriously fine. No one can understand why they’re still alive until Sue materializes, and they realize that she saved everyone with her forcefields. 

Reed is overjoyed that she’s there -- despite the extreme danger -- and not at all upset by the fact that she has returned to active duty. Let me also point out that there was never any question of Sue leaving the team after she married Reed or even after she had a baby, and this at a time when it was expected and commonplace for women to quit their jobs and become housewives after marriage. Reed, Ben, Johnny -- they all simply assumed Sue would continue on the team as she always had. 

So of course comics in the 1960s were sexist, of course Sue was sometimes frustratingly passive and silent by today’s standards, but that doesn’t erase or diminish all of the times when she was not. Sue has been fighting tooth and nail to assert herself as an equal for decades, and personally, I think that her tenacity, determination, and courage even when belittled and underestimated by the men around her make her just as much of a hero as her superpowers, if not more so, and I am, frankly, tired of fandom's constant belittlement of Sue.

#fantastic four #susan storm #reed richards #prime marvel universe #comics #meta #mod: lamujerarana #long post

[starfleets-marvels-motherfxcker]

Blog Canon for Mobile

I will include a short version of the canon but you need to read below the cut as well. There’s a lot going on on this blog and let me emphasize this, I will not be portraying them as they appear in their canon. I will cross them over to other universes including back to where they come from but they will still follow this primary canon.

I don’t know some of their universes super well. This is why I don’t write their pasts much.

The short version is this blog is based in a Star Trek-inspired universe, and the 15 muses present on this blog were adopted by a woman named Rebecca, one of my muses on a different blog. They are all siblings of the 23rd-24th century. Specifics below (each muse is sorted by verse), again, PLEASE read and leave a like on this once you read them.

Star Trek

Let’s start simple. Saavik is 4 when her Romulan father is killed by angry Vulcans, and her Vulcan mother was already dead from illness by then. All it leaves is a small orphan on a planetoid in the neutral zone. She’s on her own for five years, fending for herself off the land. She learns to survive quickly, learns that when faced with a problem, you need to attack it before it attacks you.

So when she’s nine, a landing party of Vulcans tells her to get a sharp stick and fight back. Fortunately, most of them leave… but there’s one woman.

She has Vulcan ears, but her eyes are… kind. Not emotionless, as mother’s, as her father’s murderers, but… gentle. And she notices Saavik, when the others do not. She doesn’t get close. Her name, she tells Saavik, is Rebecca– and she is not Vulcan. She is human, with some Changeling genetics that allow her to change her ears.

She tells Saavik she is with Vulcans because they are her crew, that she has made her ears this way because her adoptive father is a Vulcan, and she offers to take Saavik far from this planet. Saavik is wary of her, when another Vulcan arrives and sees her.

Saavik feels it would be better if it looked like the woman is her prisoner, so she grabs her and holds up her stick menacingly. He moves on, seemingly laughing, but Rebecca reassures her and finishes her thought.

Saavik doesn’t have to stay with Vulcans if she does not wish to. But she could leave this planet, and have a real bed… warm food… clean water… a family, perhaps. So she leaves with Rebecca… but quickly becomes attached to the woman, calling her “mother” before two days’ time on the ship.

When she is a teenager, Saavik is kidnapped for ransom, and her mother trades places with her. By the time her father and the rest of the Polyhymnia crew have saved her mother, she has no memory of anything or anyone. Saavik lies to Starfleet recruiters, claiming that she has her grandfather’s permission to enlist (as she is 16 and could fast track) in order to join Starfleet and fight in the war for her mother. So… she’s grounded a year later, when her mother’s memories are back and she’s angry, but proud, and so she’s allowed to remain, a science officer on the USS Orville.

Shazam

It should be noted that this canon takes place in a timeline where Marvel and DC superheroes exist together. You’ll also notice some Heroes crossover, don’t worry about it.

Following the end of the movie, the kids go about their daily lives– hiding their identities from their foster parents, doing superhero things as needed, mainly living out normal lives.

Or, at least, they were until a man named Sylar figured out their secret identities. After their powers, he murdered their foster parents, leaving them once again without family… except each other.

Given their secret and their bond, the kids ran off together, continuing to fight crime and do their best to create a normal situation, on the run trying to keep away from Sylar. Unfortunately, a super villain battle causes him to catch up with them… well, anyways, it would be unfortunate if not for the woman who had suddenly appeared on the street during the battle, stunning the Sandman and stepping between them and Sylar when he’d arrived.

This was Rebecca. She was a young woman who looked at them as superheroes and saw the children they really were, and they as children got to see the adult she really was. They would tell their story– how Sylar had killed their parents, how they were on their own and didn’t know what to do or where to go, and she would offer to bring them back with her, to her universe and year– 2291. They would accept, becoming among only 8 superpowered humans in their timeline at the time of their arrival.

Brightburn

Brightburn, Kansas was gone. All that was left was one little boy, survived by some fluke, some miracle, but nobody knew that just yet. Brandon had left a trail of destruction in his wake, and was wrestling with his emotions.

Because inside of him was more than just an instinctive call to take the world. Inside of him was a 12-year-old who was terrified that he’d killed the only family he’d known even considering what they’d wanted to do to him. Even his mother…

A noise had jarred him and he’d whipped around to find a confused young woman, in a uniform from those really old space shows that sometimes came on TV when he was growing up, who cocks her head at him, telling him she’s lost, and her name is Rebecca.

He notices the weapon at her side, and fires his laser eyes at her, missing intentionally, just enough to scare her and make her disarm, which she does unquestioningly… unafraid. Why wasn’t she scared of him?

She helps him, as he wrestles with his feelings. Rebecca doesn’t hate him for what happened to Brightburn, even though he tells her. She tells him what her mother did to her, how she was abandoned, scorned, mocked… and tells him a story she knows, about two wolves at odds within every person, and how which wolf wins is the one that he feeds.

He doesn’t know which one he wants to win. But he takes her hand when the golden lights swirl around her, and goes back to her ship with her. Maybe it’ll be better there for him. Away from the call of his ship, away from the horrible things he’s done.

The Boys

One day, following Vought’s unveiling of a transporting technology that meant any of the Seven could be on the scene of a crime in seconds (instead of just certain people), Starlight curiously approaches the thing… and a glitch causes it to transport her off to a destination unknown.

The location would be a starship known as the USS Polyhymnia. When Annie panics and prepares to attack the strange people on the ship, she’s abruptly knocked unconscious by a twelve year old with glowing red eyes before being carried to the brig for the ship’s safety… and one of its science officers is called in to see her.

Rebecca meets Annie, a 17-year-old who just got out of hell even though she’s uncertain how she feels about it. Annie is cagey about the world she came from, but admits to being a superhero, lighting her eyes up with the yellow-ish glow when the woman briefly shapeshifts to a dark blue form with black hair and yellow eyes. Rebecca offers to give the teenager a place in her family and… admittedly scared of the risk of going back… Annie accepts.

One day, unexpectedly, another arrival appears from her old universe. He calls himself Homelander and when he learns he can never return to where he came from, sets his sights on one thing and one thing only: the same level of adoration in this universe as he had in his own. The immediate way he sees of doing that? None other than Starlight’s new mommy, poster child of Starfleet, face of the Federation, Rebecca.

Now, Rebecca is married and completely devoted, but a silly little thing like that won’t stop him. He forces Annie to help him lure out Rebecca away from others, capturing her and taking her into Romulan space to hide her and erase her memories again. Which would have been more successful if he’d known this timeline had just come to peaceful relations with Romulus and six Starfleet ships would be quick to get on the hunt for him.

They’re going off almost nothing until Rebecca, amnesiac again, wakes up… and her gut tells her the man saying he’s her husband, and that he loves her, is lying, and remembering voices when he calls her Rebecca– people, talking to her. Parents. Siblings. A man who calls her ashaya and his voice is so gentle and comforting and familiar…

She tricks the man who has her hostage into letting her call her brother. James answers and is greeted by her calling him by a nickname. A nickname she uses as a code word for being in danger, while she taps her nails against the console. V'Len on the Polyhymnia translates the tapping as morse code– her coordinates, and the ships locate her with ease after that.

Homelander kills two security officers from the USS Mayflower, but he doesn’t get a hand on the others– Rebecca’s siblings and husband, and James lands the killing blow against him, snapping his neck before going to help restore his older sister’s memories.

This is when Annie finally realizes how much Rebecca loves her, as she’s released from custody on Rebecca’s own order. This is when she starts to feel accepted in her new family… even…

One day, while having ice cream with some of her younger siblings, Brandon asks her what her world was like. And she’s careful. Her brother is only going on thirteen, there’s no need for her to go into detail, but Mary picks up on what she’s not saying…

As does Rebecca, who had been walking into the mess hall with T'Ri. As quickly as she’d heard what Annie had been through, she’s gone, going to the transporter room with such a murderous glint in her eyes none of her crew question her, transporting her to Annie’s universe per her request.

Rebecca sits in Homelander’s chair with the back turned to the room when the others arrive, informing her of their feelings without knowing who was really in the room yet. When she turns around, she reveals the truth– Homelander is dead, Annie is safe… and they’re going to die that day by her hand.

Queen Maeve is spared. But the others… it’s brutal. Especially The Deep. Annie never learns the story, just sees her mother come back covered in blood… with Hughie in tow.

The vigilante gang had arrived at Vought with the intent to finally kill the supes, but were astonished to find one young woman in a Star Trek uniform wiping blood off her hands and three corpses. She would tell them of Homelander’s own demise and Starlight’s safety, punching Butcher himself in the face upon realizing who he was and what he’d done to her daughter. It was Hughie who pleaded with Rebecca to take him back… and so she had, after dismantling Vought’s transporter and he’d called his own father to say goodbye.

The Runaways

Everything is set for Rebecca to retire at long last.

Well. Until a transporter malfunction strands her back in her old timeline. While she tries in vain to get in contact with her ship, she runs into a group of children… and a dinosaur. Questioning what she’s looking at, Rebecca keeps them from running off and convinces them to open up to her.

Fortunately, this is when her PADD that runs her timeline assessing program kicks back to life. These children allegedly vanish sometimes around now, believed kidnapped and killed by the Church of Gibbon.

Rebecca convinces them to leave with her instead, and decides to test out a new piece of technology invented by a group of (accidental) universe hoppers that allows her to make a transporter door to her own universe, bringing all of them back with her… but only adopting four, allowing the other two to be adopted by some on her crew to not harm the relationships present within their group. (Find Dex, Sophie, Keefe, Fitz, Linh, Tam, Marella, Biana, and Stina on my main indie, take-to-the-fxcking-stars)

The Darkest Minds

This is where it gets really messy. Ruby would be the first exception Rebecca would make to altering a timeline’s plotted course, convincing Cate to give her Ruby after breaking her out of Thurmond instead of letting Ruby suffer as she had any further past that point.

This, however, would take place after rescuing young Jude from an explosion, bringing both back to the Polyhymnia with conflicting and confused memories that she would explain to them both after settling her emotions regarding their universe. She hated herself for not being able to save them all.

So Brandon would be the first to suggest the alternative. Maybe their mom can’t save everyone… but they can. He gathers his superpowered siblings and Saavik, and convinces them to return to the universe Ruby and Jude came from, sometime after Jude’s alleged death, and start a revolution. Free the camps, save the kids, and overthrow the president.

Ruby is uncertain but insists on going along. Now adults, Billy convinces the captain of his ship (the Enterprise), also known as his aunt Demora, to perform the universal shift to attempt the revolution. When Demora is captured by President Gray, the team of Rebecca’s children beams down to the California coast and begins the revolution, eventually rescuing Demora and returning home with a number of extras– including kids who Ruby thinks, in another life, may have been her best friends somehow. (Find Liam, Chubs, Zu, and Vida on my main indie, take-to-the-fxcking stars)

Following this mission, Demora follows her older sister’s footsteps and retires, and while her own first officer is assigned a ship, Starfleet asks Billy to take the mantle as captain of the Enterprise considering his role in the rescue mission, which he nervously accepts.

#mobile reference