#but there are established rules shown and in some rare places told

[blindtaleteller]

thank you for previous explain. It was so long and detailed. I had now another question. About lady's life in Asgard. Sigyn x Loki for me. And Sigyn is not warrior, but typical lady. Can you write something about it?

Honestly if you're looking for an example of that in canon MCU, much of Frigga's character and especially her surroundings as expressed on screen does have quite a few examples.

In fact, we aren't even given the idea she can still fight until she absolutely has to in The Dark World.

And, it's in Dark World (and a little of both Ragnarok [geh] and Endgame if you take both the premise of the Valkyries and the time travel scenes in it seriously) that we are given those examples.

Remember, whether they are fighters themselves or not: if they're Asgardian, they're still raised as a part of that previously mentioned warmongering imperialist society: and that would be (as also told to us in their dialogue about Jane and Sif, and their King Odin's expectations) even more strictly observed by someone like a lady in that kind of royalist/imperialist hierarchy, rather than a warrior.

That is why I say 'much' of Frigga's character and surroundings.. but not all. It's not the fighting you need to look at, though that can help. It's her mannerisms, her rooms (look at TDW including the fight with Malekith), her maids, and more. Frigga is, as Queen and even without the fight or ability itself: the top and more importantly leading example of what to expect of a lady of the royal court: as she should be in that kin of society.

And that's also VERY probably why she doesn't fight in any of THor 2011 on screen: even when Laufey shows up, regardless of her being nearer to the main palace then, than she was in TDW: where she was shown being in a separate side palace at least a few miles away when Algrim/Kurse broke out of the dungeon: all the way up until her life, and Jane's, are in immediate danger after having left that portion of the palace during the attack that Kurse opened the shields to manage.

(Which side note was REEEEALLY questionable at the time with a human housing an infinity stone in tow at the time, but is neither here nor there with other things taken into account... just a very dangerous for Jane choice, given what enemies they did have even without the elves being taken into account.. but eh, it is canon and it does fit the flavors of Asgard's, Odin's, and Frigga's own arrogance and ignorance in regards to Asgard's 'impervious' mindset state, as far as the upper echelons of their society seems to be concerned as portrayed on screen.)

In a way, it's made pretty clear that while Frigga still retains much of her skills as a fighter and mage/witch (Or the daughter of three witches at least as we also now know through canon dialogue:) the things she does and doesn't do, while also comparing that to someone like Brunhilde (aka Valkyrie) and how they were clearly recieved during and well after their term as an active female-only fighting force, the canon makes it pretty clear that unless they do retain that fighter status, women (perhaps including the queen) either do not tend to hold as much sway or dignity in other pursuits outside the household.

In other words and as an canon example.. even as the other ruler on the throne and his adoptive mother; Frigga is easily able to set aside the throne and any responsibility for doing so even in that situation. Regardless of, the fact that; at that point the situation is that Jotunheim had declared war in response to Thor's treasonous invasion, and regardless of being closest to Loki (we know this through the words of every character in the family: Thor says it repeatedly, Odin goads and attempts to guilt trip him with that close relationship too, and Frigga does the same with her own wierdness during her conversation with him in TDW's dungeon cell scene) knowing full well not only what she was asking of Loki, but also what Loki was going through in having just recently discovered that he wasn't only not of the same species: but on top of that was Laufey's biological son AND Jotunheim's only known of prince. Whom, Odin admitted he had taken to 'forge a permanent peace.'

A peace that, probably wouldn't have happened anyway if he and it had been handled just as poorly as well, it was.

Think about that for a little bit; really think about it: and the fact that she did so, while playing the part and claiming she was closest to him and cared about him the most.

That canonically casts some seriously gross and awkward truths into the realm of how their their relationship actually is versus how Frigga and the rest of them tried to paint it. As well as touching her own guilt evasion there too: and is something that both in the first Thor and the second film both: Frigga absolutely side steps taking any responsibility for, as the mother, the mentor, and the lady who raised him with that lie: regardless of their supposed closeness.

And, why that's important? Is because, under that king, husband and society as it goes: she is not just allowed to do that without complaint from any of the above, their society OR the foster-brother that she raised and lied to right next to him: she's allowed to thrive and remain in her position STILL without that question or any apparent explanation of ANY of those nuances or her part in putting him in charge in taht mental and emotional state; well after the fact and into 2013 two years later.

When she refers to that massive erasure of not just who but WHAT he is? Frigga almost always shifts that blame fully onto Odin in her dialogue; and steers as hard as she can away from words reminding the viewer that, she was Odin's wife and partner: through all of that. Instead, it's always 'your father' or 'he' rather than 'we' or 'he and I.'

Which is very blatantly another portion of Loki's response in this same scene when asked 'And am I not your mother..?' because, he's right in every form of the answer.

It's -possible- that she was being honest about her relationship with Loki, at least later on? But it's -not- very -probable-, or believable at that stage.. and her lack of self awareness and ownership of her part even when alone with him in Thor 2011 (not to mention carrying that on a year later in Dark World) makes that very hard to miss as a thing in truth: especially with the given facts being that this went on for over a thousand years.. and still over all that time she didn't have enough regard, respect, or love for her supposed favorite son, to even hint at any of his origins even after she taught him to shapeshift or cast illusions herself, to change the outcome.

And again.. no one raised a question as to why. Or held her accountable. No one questioned the one person in the royal family who was capable of taking Loki's place on the throne back in 2011 either.

Given how little we see women in honored fighting positions in Asgardian culture, and are given the very blatant information between the films that it's been literal centuries since even since a female fighting force has been a thing, PLUS the literal views we've been given with Sif as the only woman in the training yard in modern eras...?

It's pretty likely that raised-in bit of social ugly is pretty well dug into their society as well.

Again and that said: figuring out how a lady rather than a fighter might run her life, or fit in at those upper tiers without picking up a weapon: has been put on some display.

Asgard has a very wonky, heavy half ren/medieval approach to their upper heirarchy on display, complete with ladies in waiting (which Tony takes a little off jab at in GROUNDED too lol,) and healers especially seeming to be a majorly female profession.

There wasn't a single dude in that scene with Jane that wasn't either royalty or a guard, if you look at it again. Every single one of the healers is a woman.)

That mentioned, another place to look for examples, are again: Frigga's personal surroundings. And Dark World gives us a good look at those.

One thing to note, is that besides the healers: pretty much every Asgardian lady has armor in some portion of their wardrobe. Whether that's a breastplate, vanbraces (wrist/forearm,) gorgets (neck guard, like Loki's) or something else to accompany their dresses.

Vanbraces (Thor 2011)

Vanbraces and Archer's breastplate (Dark World Dungeon Scene)

Vanbraces, Pauldron, and partial Chestplate (Dark World, final scene)

There are moments when we see her and them without armor pieces (or in some scenes with even fewer of them at least, like teh carefully disguised set in the top gif) but for the most part those outfits are reserved for really important parties that are the equivalent of formal-dress parties: in which case we can see that even Sif doesn't escape from the expectation of wearing a literal dress: though even then.. hers is the odd one out of the others shown/on display in the room as far as style:

Which tells us a couple of things, but first and foremost and something that makes sense in their culture: is that even if they're not mainline fighters, and having been invaded enough to need and upkeep those shields in the first place?

Other than fancy events/celebrations and or coronations? The armor pieces are definitely as much local every day cultural fashion thing, as they are functional in some cases.

It's pretty likely that even the ladies of the court at least know and are expected to upkeep at least minor skills in self defense, if not the defense of their own homes: and are probably taught to do so from a very young age. They're not going to be as good at it outside of their own personal territory, or a territory they know well like say the Valkyrie were supposed to be, as the equivalent of a special forces military task unit: but they probably are expected.

Another side note..? This above, is ultimately; also among the forgiving reasons I don't question why Frigga went to the main palace outside of her taking Jane with her when she went. As Queen and lady of the house under that form of society, it absolutely passes without Jane in tow. However.. without Jane in tow, there's also the bit she couldn't have known at the time; that the writers did of course .. the fact that any of the elves were even alive and kicking. [And gee; thanks for that again Bor, lol! like father like son, I guess? Bor, his son, and said son's wife DO seem to have a habit of -not- telling their kids about world and universe ending enemies being alive after the fact, don't they? coughcoughHELAcoughcough.. XD]

There is one other bit, besides that: that we do get about the society from all that too though. At least about the surviving upper echelons of the ruling class: and that is?

That Odin had a really tight reign on the upper royals and his fighting forces surviving the Great Wars as King.. lips and all: unless amongst the entirety of their armies, council, other generals (besides Hela, which HOO is that a whole conversation unto itself Loki and Laufey related when you look at that timeline with Hela in it omg..) and pretty much every lady in waiting, servants .. or just other lords and ladies? Just didn't notice a surprise baby that the Queen -didn't- give birth to, was randomly being presented as a new baby prince to the Asgardian Empire. Which.. is next to impossible; especially when you take into account that this wasn't another country he took this kid from, or a society unfamiliar with magic: he took Loki from an entirely differing species and PLANET elsewhere in the universe in the middle of the last battle of one of the largest and bloodiest wars in their generation: and forced passing him off as his own.

Even if, he did manage that; maybe sequestering his wife and passing Loki off as a twin or some shizz? Someone if not a whole lot of someones probably knew.. but especially the healer or healers who would have treated any wounds throughout Loki's lifetime.

We could, almost say that they could have presented him as an adopted Asgardian kid.. and maybe he and Frigga did, to some of them on the sly to help keep it under wraps.. but that doesn't fit how their relationship is depicted, shown or talked about prior to or even after the reveal of his species and bloodline at all, either.

And that still wouldn't pass the first time this kid hurt himself, or was injured in battle under the scrutiny of an uninformed healer's ability in that society, with magic and high tech and more very much at their fingertips and in their alliances and enemies too, to be recognized.

Meaning, at least a portion of the populace closest to the crown, and especially those types old enough to have taken part in the last of the Great Wars or tending Loki as he grew and fought and more as a captive prince: were either just as complacent or, shut up by either if not both portions of the crown house really damned fast and really efficiently likely through threat, exile or worse. Keep in mind, the Great Wars and especially that one was still freshly finished, and they made a great show of making sure we knew there would be problems having the future ruler of the enemy they had been killing for an un-foretold length of time next to the crown in how even mention of Jotnar was allowed to form in Asgardian society: through Loki's words, through Thor's reactions and words, through Odin and through Frigga too.

The hate was strong enough even a thousand years plus of Odin's rule with Loki as prince later, that Thor thought it was A-Okay to go ahead and invade the planet and restart that war, against the literal warnings not just from every single person around him before he did it: and not just warned but told outright by his father and the King 'don't you fuckin' dare' well before even that.

That.. is the kind of society and expectations, an Asgardian Lady would have been raised into and led by along with the rest.

All that said, this is getting long; and there are metas rather than canon they come from that I could mention regarding Vanaheim as the most prevalent colony of Asgardians/partial Asgardians too, but.. we don't get a whole lot of them or their off world society other than to know that Odin doesn't care about them NEARLY as much: or at least not enough to even provide them defensive cannons or other defenses that Asgard otherwise VERY clearly has and has had for literal ages as put on display in the Dark World.

Being a woman in that society would probably be a very, well...

Probably, brainwashed to accept a lowered expectation of self worth over all, without the ability to fight on a greater tier than just home and self defense. And those who don't fall into those already asserted social standards would definitely be outliers if not outcasts. We have Loki himself and how Frigga's skills are viewed and worded even by her own family, as example of that.

So.. that's a lot to keep in mind but.. yeah. It is there, and more that; I probably haven't touched or missed while in the process of going on and explaining that.

For Sigyn though, for me: I do have some planned for her but as she doesn't exist in the MCU and adapting her would for me have to take all of that in mind: that is being approached very back burner for late Vestibule 2 (after Mixology) and Vestibule 3 as what ultimately boils down to an OC version of her. In part because I like that character in real life lore, and Skadi's character: and when I do write for them both.. I want to try and convert them to fit into the MCU base in a way that feels right to me.

Which is going to be rough when getting into more detailed versions of stuff like the very brief mentions of Skadi's tale and others I've already done in fics like Simon Says/Bail: given the MCU is twice removed from actual Norse Mythos; being Asgard in the MCU is more loose in being based off of Marvel, which in turn is then just as loose in the comics' basing their characters from that Norse Mythos.

Also, am tired .. is eleven PM lol sorry for not continuing, and getting extra rambly. But will add more pretty pictures to make up for it a lil bit? lol

If you have more questions or want some elaboration on anything, by all means feel free to send me asks just like this one.

I generally try to answer pretty quickly when I see them lol.

#Ladies of Asgard #examples given #it's pretty open #but there are established rules shown and in some rare places told #at least as far as the MCU version is concerned #I am very interested in doing at least two Unis with if not more with Sigyn though #that's always been a plan #Asgard lore #Asgard on screen examples #MCU Asgard #MCU #Lokiverse references #also armor references #blacksmithing study sometimes comes in handy. #editted a bit cause I hate typos #especially overly dumb plabet typos lol

[distinguished-slacker]

Owari no Seraph — An Analysis of Shinoa and Mitsuba’s Friendship

(Warning: A long post that nobody asked for and I had to make the panels tightly packed into one image each due to the Tumblr 10 images per post restriction so I am not taking responsibility for any brain aneurysms I might cause. I am serious, it’s really LONG.)

(Why? Because this cursed manga needs more girl power.)

(Note: Friendship)

We always speak about friendships like the ones between Yuu and Mika, and Guren and Shinya but we rarely talk about the one in the girls’ side, which is the the friendship between Shinoa and Mitsuba. It is the only female friendship we actually have in Owari no Seraph since we haven’t seen Chess and Horn ever since Nagoya arc, and we barely get to see how Mito, Sayuri and Shigure act with each other as friends when the topic of conversation is not Guren.

I agree that Shinoa and Mitsuba’s friendship is cute and funny. However, as I reread the manga I realised that their relationship is deeper than that, that each contributed into the development of the other to a degree but at the same there is a wall that keeps them from growing closer but of which none of them is aware of, and how their distance has been exacerbated by some faults that makes me believe their relationship is deteriorating.

So I decided to make a deep analysis with some theorising about their friendship throughout the manga where I make it sound more complex than the sexualised joke Kagami has made of it :D

The first time we had a glimpse of their friendship is of course when Mitsuba debuted in chapter 8 of the manga as the fifth and last member of Shinoa squad. She is first seen complaining to Guren about why was she placed in a squad full of rookies being most visibly infuriated by the fact that the “sarcastic airhead Hīragi Shinoa” was chosen as the squad leader instead of her. When Shinoa appears, she addresses Mitsuba as “Micchan” (or Mi-chan/Mitsu/whatever translation) and mocks her, angering Mitsuba more and driving her to manifest her weapon to fight Shinoa. This scene shows that they have known each other before Shinoa squad was established. The question was when? Shinoa described her life before the catastrophe occurred as “living under a rock” and how she “didn’t see or speak with anyone at all” in the afterword of volume 17, which can be further proved by the events of the Catastrophe at 16 light novels. Shinoa and Mitsuba were bound to meet because of their statuses as Hīragi and Sangū respectively but Shinoa was always kept in the shadows by her family so it’s quite unlikely that they have met as children before the catastrophe.

The only possibility for them to have met is for military reasons rather than for family reasons. In chapter 3, before Shinoa squad was formed, it was revealed that Shinoa is part of the vampire extermination unit but we don’t know for how long. Considering that Mitsuba used the argument of joining the vampire extermination unit at the age of thirteen to explain why would she make a better squad leader than Shinoa, it’s safe to assume that Shinoa joined later than Mitsuba. However, Shinoa received Shikama Dōji as a weapon in 2012 when she was 7 (6 if Kagami could do maths but whatever...) so I doubt the army would let a capable and armed person have a relaxing life for so many years when she could be used for fighting instead since there is a shortage of soldiers (unless Shinoa used her power as a Hīragi, which sometimes works in her favour, to avoid military duties). Moreover, I doubt that the army would place an unexperienced soldier straight into the extermination unit, which is the most dangerous unit in the Japanese Imperial Demon Army, regardless of their status, especially a child. So even if Mitsuba said she joined this unit when she was 13, there is a small chance that she has been a soldier before that but was tasked with easier jobs like being a wall guard and the same thing could be applied to Shinoa. In other words, it’s likely that these two girls have known each other for a good number of years before the timeline of Vampire Reign began.

The reason why I want to believe that Shinoa and Mitsuba met a considerable time ago before the start of the series is because of Shinoa’s attitude towards her. Shinoa has lived a life lacking family love and social interaction which caused her to become apathetic and unemotional up until the formation of Shinoa squad. But somehow there is this girl, who is the only one whom Shinoa gives a cute nickname, has a lot of interest on teasing her and feels comfortable enough to barge into her shower and be seen naked when that is a situation where a person is really vulnerable. I mean, considering Mitsuba’s personality, it’s understandable why Shinoa feels so free to act like that around her but still it’s emotionally detached Hīragi Shinoa we are talking about.

(From top to bottom, and left to right: chapters 8, 9, 19, 29 and 43)

One thing that bothers me is how Kagami made it look like as if Shinoa was completely empty before being influenced by Yuu’s ‘kindness’ when that is not true at all and Shinoa was able to show a caring side before that.

One example of this is in the same chapter where Mitsuba debuted, shown in the top-left panel. In this chapter Mitsuba is acting so bossy and arrogant here that to be honest anyone would find her annoying. However, Mitsuba’s constant shouting about battle formation is to ensure that everyone adheres to the rules to avoid any danger, especially considering the reckless attitude Yuu has displayed here about killing vampires as soon as he sees them. In reality, Mitsuba’s behaviour is a defence mechanism in order to hide her traumas regarding the death of her previous squad members and Shinoa knows this well. Shinoa knows Mitsuba is a kind person on the inside, going to the extent of even calling “adorable” how Mitsuba feels that their lives are her responsibility, and that’s why she tells Yuu to bear with Mitsuba because Shinoa doesn’t want him to hate her.

In the panel below the first one which occurs in the next chapter when the girls are in the showers, Shinoa comforts Mitsuba telling her it wasn’t necessarily her fault that the entire squad got annihilated (as some of the members were already killed before Mitsuba made any reckless move, Mitsuba was too young and it was the leader’s decision to sacrifice himself for her). Speaking about this, Shinoa is the only one in the squad who knows about Mitsuba’s past and it makes me wonder whether Mitsuba herself told Shinoa about this or Shinoa discovered it since as a Sangū, Mitsuba must be well known in the army so her failure might have been spread around and Shinoa happened to discover it. It depends on how much of friends they were before the beginning of the manga; whether they were friends before that or they were somewhat distant but strengthened their friendship when the squad was established. After all, it is hinted that they live together in the chapter where they tried to cook for the guys though Shinoa said it was her room (but it wasn’t specified if it was Mitsuba’s too) so maybe Mitsuba decided to come over for that event. In the anime there was a bunk bed in the room next to the living room which wasn’t shown in the manga but still it doesn’t hurt mentioning it.

This one is a very subtle panel. In the middle panel that happened in chapter 29 after Shinoa and Narumi squad finished their mission of killing Lucal Wesker in Nagoya arc, Yuu realises that people really do die in these missions and Mitsuba replies to him with a “Your friends die. That’s the reality of battle...I...I’ve seen this...” while recalling her previous squad’s members deaths. Shinoa quickly picks up on this and touches her elbow in comfort, as highlighted by the green circle pointed by the green arrow, and gives a speech that reminds Mitsuba that she is not alone anymore and has people who are still alive for her to protect. I really love this moment because Shinoa was so perceptive of the little changes happening within Mitsuba.

In the right panel, it might look like Shinoa is throwing the bothersome job to explain the squad’s situation to Mitsuba, which might be true considering how Shinoa is sometimes, but I like this panel because it shows that Shinoa lets Mitsuba have her part and act as her second in command since being squad leader is what Mitsuba initially wanted. Mitsuba seems to be happy to act as her second in command which shows their relationship is more chill than what their first scene together in the manga made it look like.

Like Shinoa cares for Mitsuba, Mitsuba cares for Shinoa too. In the bottom-left panel which is taken from chapter 19, Kimizuki is suspicious of Shinoa after Yoichi and him were interrogated and tortured by the Hīragis, going as far as thinking she was using Yuu and saying that this is nothing but a “sickness” where he is forced to “play comrades”. Mitsuba quickly defends her by stopping Kimizuki because she knows Shinoa is only making them hide Yuu’s transformation out of genuine care for a comrade. Curiously, this scene parallels to a scene in chapter 99 that occurs after Shinoa makes Shikama Dōji submit. Kimizuki starts shouting at Shinoa thinking that she has been using them all while laughing behind their backs the whole time. This time Mitsuba doesn’t intervene. There are three possibilities for this: one is that Mitsuba is simply being relegated to the sidelines due to constricted space in the current events of the manga, two, that Mitsuba cannot act because this whole situation confuses her which is understandable, and three, that Mitsuba and Shinoa are becoming more distant, which I will explain later in this post.

I tried to find more panels of Mitsuba visibly showing care for Shinoa in the beginning and middle of the manga but it was hard but this is not Mitsuba’s fault, neither Shinoa’s. To be brief, Shinoa is a tough nut to crack. With her personality it’s hard to get emotionally close to her. Add to that that Mitsuba has her emotional baggage too which makes her emotionally constipated, this sets a wall between the girls so I hope Kagami will do something with it later in the manga where it breaks. Yuu already achieved it, so why not Mitsuba who is supposedly Shinoa’s only female friend and even best friend?

(Left: chapter 26 and Right: chapter 45)

When Guren knocked Mitsuba out during the squad mock battle and when Mitsuba was attacked by Crowley, Shinoa always jumped to protect her regardless of the risk. Have a look at Shinoa’s pained face when Mitsuba told them to leave her behind or Shinoa’s determined face when she told Makoto to follow Kimizuki and Yoīchi in order to rescue Mitsuba. That raw emotion. Seriously, is it me or ironically in the beginning of the manga Shinoa showed far more emotion despite being claimed to be initially cold?

(Top left: chapter 19, bottom left: chapter 26 and right: chapter 24)

Does someone else miss when these two girls used to team up to annoy the boys? These scenes might seem for pure comedic purposes but they are actually deeper than what they look like. When Mitsuba debuted, she was not only strict with others but with herself too. Due to her past failure and family expectations, she was forcing herself to grow up quicker, to be the perfect soldier and follow the rules even if that put herself under pressure. However, as she got more involved with the squad she became more free and Shinoa’s personality started started to rub off on her. There are two scenes where Shinoa starts with her pranks and Mitsuba follows with them. It’s vastly thanks to Shinoa that Mitsuba started to act like the teenager she is and that’s really wholesome. I mean, just look at how happy Mitsu is at the bottom left panel or her smirk, something unusual for her, in the bottom right panel when they abandon Kimizuki on the side of the highway (lmao poor Kimizuki). This duo have a great dynamic!

Interestingly, as the series progresses, you can see how both Mitsuba and Shinoa’s characters start acquiring qualities from the other. The always so stiff and temperamental Mitsuba becomes more laid-back and honest while Shinoa goes through the process of discovering more emotions within herself and expressing actual interest on other things. But the problem is that while Mitsuba’s change was influenced by the squad, Shinoa’s was primarily by influenced by Yuu.

(Top left: chapter 8, bottom left and middle right: chapter 48, top right: chapter 17 and bottom right: chapter 43)

It is known that Shinoa loves to tease Mitsuba. In fact, her favourite person to tease is Mitsu because in the fanbook Shinoa said that someone who gets bullied easily is “1. Micchan 2.Micchan 3.Micchan” and even Mitsuba said that she hears Shinoa talk about her a lot.

The first thing Shinoa does when they reunite in chapter 8 is tease her. In chapter 48 when they are talking in the girls’ toilet you can see Shinoa looking at Mitsuba with soft and sweet expressions. Shinoa is really comfortable around her and Mitsuba’s personality allows Shinoa to be herself. Shinoa even said “I really like you when you always react to me like this.” with a gentle laugh which is something rare for her to say.

However, there are times where I personally feel that Shinoa should set some limits to herself regarding how much she teases Mitsuba and with what topics she uses to tease her like when she joked about Mitsuba not being a virgin in chapter 43 because the combined blood of the squad that Mika drank was gross. Although I find hilarious how Mitsuba reacted with a “I am SO going to kill you someday!!” but limits are limits, especially if it’s in front of everyone.

Another panel that was used for comedic purposes that I find somewhat off is the one in chapter 17 showed at the top right corner. Before this panel, Mitsuba says with a serious face that she hopes “things go okay for Yuu” in the interview with the Hīragi family and Shinoa starts teasing Mitsuba saying that she is in love with Yuu. Shinoa teases her but her gaze is at the building not at Mitsuba, her focus is on Yuu, and so it feels as if she teased Mitsuba to cover something else. And what is that something else? Easy. This scene happens not longer after Shinoa confronts Guren in his office about him drugging Yuu where Guren asks Shinoa if she fell in love with him. Ever since this moment Shinoa started to doubt about her feelings and I feel that she teased Mitsuba about her being in love with Yuu to cover her own feelings and that is not a nice thing to do to a friend.

Shinoa annoyed her many times throughout, Mitsuba never really got seriously angry at her aside from an occasional initial outburst. Mitsuba shows great patience with Shinoa, unless there is something we don’t know since we have never gotten an inner monologue of Mitsuba but I will talk about this later.

(Chapter 17)

In the same chapter but some panels before, Shinoa makes fun of Mitsuba addressing her incompetence paralleling to how she made fun of her when they met in chapter 8. Mitsuba just got out of an interview with the Hīragis where she has been promoted, and Shinoa mocks her about how easily she can climb up the ranks just because she is a Sangū and not because of her abilities. On one hand, considering Mitsuba’s severe low self-esteem Shinoa shouldn’t be joking with this a lot but on the other hand, it’s because Shinoa is like this that Mitsuba is comfortable with her. Mitsuba doesn’t like it when everyone talks bad behind her back while praising her on the front, so Shinoa, who is the only one who is honest with her, makes Mitsuba feel at ease (let’s not count Yuu here because that guy is clueless about the weight that the hierarchy holds within the JIDA).

In the middle panel we can see how Shinoa talks about herself to Mitsuba and the same thing can be said with the toilet scene in chapter 48. Mitsuba is the only one out of the squad who knows about Shinoa’s life within the Hīragi family and some story with her older sister Mahiru (I know this is because those higher ranking family members have access to that information but nevertheless this gives Mitsuba an advantage when it comes to bonding with Shinoa). However, Shinoa is here just stating facts but doesn’t open emotionally to Mitsuba so that wall between them persists. Considering that they might have been friends for years, it’s mostly Shinoa’s closed heart the main reason that made their friendship stagnant. But of course, this is not Shinoa’s fault since she is a product of her terrible childhood.

When you look deeper into it, they don’t have the emotional bond and trust they should have with each other.

In the right panel, that’s where the real problem in their friendship starts. Please zoom and have a look at the section surrounded by the vertical amber rectangle. Have a look at Mitsuba’s expression. She is angry and not for comedic purposes. Shinoa has just asked Mitsuba how much information about Yuu she “bribed” the Hīragis with in exchange for her promotion. It doesn’t even look like Shinoa is joking here. She actually thought that Mitsuba, her closest friend, would fall so low as to sell a comrade for a promotion that she didn’t even want in the first place. Look at the region surrounded by the horizontal amber rectangle and you can see that despite Mitsuba already told Shinoa she did not say a thing, Shinoa keeps asking her if she said anything about Yuu going berserk in the battlefield as if she doesn’t fully trust Mitsuba. To be honest, Shinoa crossed the line here and I wouldn’t have noticed it if I hadn’t read the beginning of the manga since in the anime they made it different.

This is the beginning of the popular scenario where a friendship is tested when a guy comes in between.

(From top to bottom: chapters 57, 70 and 75)

In chapter 57, Guren reveals to everyone a shocking fact; Shinoa was born with a demon inside her because of a crazy experiment. Mitsuba is the one who looks the most visibly shocked and when she asks Shinoa what does he mean by that Shinoa instead looks away to where Yuu is even though he didn’t ask her anything unlike Mitsuba. To me, this where Mitsuba and Shinoa’s friendship officially entered the amber region.

Then, in chapter 70, Aoi starts choking Mitsuba, asking her why she is not dead and branding her as traitor. Shinoa didn’t try to stop it but it’s understandable since going against Aoi could be punished, especially because they are in JIDA territory, and that Yuu was already doing the job of defending Mitsuba. What I found curious about this is that the whole time Aoi was talking bad about Mitsuba being a traitor we get scenes with Yuu, and even a glimpse of Kimizuki and Yoichi as highlighted by the blue square but not of Shinoa. Shinoa is only shown just after Yuu says “I’m Mitsuba’s family” as if this choice in the structuring of these panels is implying that Yuu saying something nice to another girl gets more reaction from Shinoa than when said girl, who is a friend of Shinoa too, is in a problem. What hurts me the most is that even if there was no need for Shinoa to intervene, we don’t get any shocked or sad expression of her while Aoi puts her hands on Mitsuba’s neck or starts insulting her.

Shinoa’s priorities changed and this is further seen when she is turning into a vampire in chapter 75 and everyone is around the wheeled stretcher where Shinoa is lying on but she looks only at Yuu. I could say that maybe she looked at Yuu instead of anyone else because he was closer to Shinoa’s face but then when Shinoa is taken to the doctors and scientists the last thing she thinks of is “Yuuichi...ro” and only Yuuichiro.

(Chapter 86)

I guess we are going into the orange area now...While Shinoa changes, Mitsuba stays relatively the same. The panel where Mitsuba runs to Shinoa and hugs her in tears is the greatest proof of how much Mitsuba cares for Shinoa, which is impacting for the readers since we haven’t got much of their friendship for a long time up until that point. Now, if we compare Shinoa’s facial expressions in this chapter with the ones I have previously shown in chapters like 45 (when Crowley attacked Mitsuba) and 48 (when they talked in the toilet), you can see the difference. Before, Shinoa’s face was full of genuine happiness, care and worry but now she is poker faced. She completely disregards Mitsuba’s concern for her and crying. She doesn’t show a shocked face, doesn’t hug Mitsuba back or doesn’t even tell her “Sorry for making you worry, Micchan” or something like that. She turns the situation into a boob joke and Mitsuba simply replies back. Then, we get an emotional panel again of Mitsuba asking Shinoa if she is really herself again (and if you zoom to where the green arrow as pointing at you can see Mitsuba’s red eyes from crying a lot) but then Shinoa continues with the boob joke like nothing. Sure, I understand that Shinoa has fallen in love and her priorities are somewhere else, but could she at least show more concern for Mitsuba?

Now some people might tell me that I am making a huge deal out of it, that’s it normal Shinoa is not comforting her or acting accordingly to the situation because Shinoa is emotionally stagnant and dense but this is actually not true at all. Please have a look at this image below:

(Chapters 85 and 90)

The first and only person Shinoa thinks about after being freed from her possession in chapter 85 is “Yuuichiro” (or Yuu-san if the translators did it properly). She doesn’t think about the rest of her squad even though she is supposed to be the squad leader.

Then here is where we can make the comparison. In chapter 86, Mitsuba was crying because she was scared since Shinoa was ‘dying’ by turning into a vampire, Yuu got kidnapped, and Kimizuki, Yoichi and Makoto left her without telling her a thing when the war broke out. Mitsuba informs her of this. Four chapters later, in chapter 90, which probably happened like half an hour or an hour in the OnS universe after Mitsuba cried, when Yoichi says Yuu was crying Shinoa gets worked up saying “I have to rescue him”. Shinoa hasn’t even seen with her own eyes that Yuu was crying yet she is prepared to go and help him when she didn’t do it for the girl who was crying right in front of her just some minutes ago. This shows clear favouritism towards Yuu. Of course, there is nothing wrong with having the person you like as your first priority. It’s almost the natural thing to occur, especially considering that this is the first time Shinoa feels like this. However, it’s because of things like this that the possibility of Shinoa eventually losing the closest friend she has exists.

(Also if someone wants to object to that part saying that Shinoa didn’t comfort Yuu in the end I will just say that it’s not weird considering Yuu was acting all happy go lucky and on the outside he didn’t look like needed comfort even if he really did.)

Also, many people noticed the use of “I” instead of “We” in “I have to rescue him” and “Yuuichiro... Hang in there. I’m on my way.” even though she is with the whole squad and I especially find it more surprising considering that when she said this last phrase, Mitsuba was next to her (or behind her from our perspective) showing that Shinoa doesn’t think of Mitsuba as much as she used to in the past. This mirrors what Mahiru told Shinoa in chapter 56, even though Shinoa couldn’t hear her, about how “sexual desire and lust” (I am going to put “crush” here instead because this might be too far someone like Shinoa) “corrupts you” “to the point where you don’t care about the world and its future anymore” and this already started with Shinoa’s care for the squad decreasing at the expense of her care for Yuu increasing.

Additionally, if you are a fan of this manga art style you might have took an interest on its illustrations and might have noticed that ever since Osaka arc there have not been many illustrations of them together anymore. At most it’s just Shinoa alone. Whether it implies their distance or Yamamoto simply does not have the time of making complex illustrations again, I don’t know.

(Chapters 54 and 96, and volume 17 afterword ending on chapter 69)

Boob jokes. The worst part. Boob jokes. The first time I guess it was okay but it just keeps repeating and it’s not only in the manga. I even looked at the anime fanbook, and watched the CD Dramas and some clips of the game Owari no Seraph: Unmei no Hajimari (which all take place at the time before the squad defected the army) and I realised that there are more times where Shinoa makes a comment about Mitsuba’s chest. Some people say that this significant number of times Shinoa starts a boob conversation may indicate that rather than being jealous, she is obsessed and actually attracted to Mitsuba. But ships aside (I want to keep this post as ship-free as possible), it’s not nice that every time these two have an interaction, which is rare lately and so special because of its rarity, the topic is boobs. It’s not even funny and it degrades their relationship. Why Kagami cannot treat their relationship like the boys’s and give them scenes where they talk about their emotions rather than body parts? After all, the friendship between Shinoa and Mitsuba is not that different to Yuu and Mika’s or Guren and Shinya’s for reasons like sharing a past together. The major difference I can only find between them is their biological sexes and this is not an excuse for this bias.

But since I am the type of person who likes to looks deeper into every joke I am going to do it for these ones. The only thing that I find refreshing about these jokes is that at the beginning every time Shinoa made a comment about Mitsuba’s body, Mitsu was always embarrassed, exhausted and denying any claims. But because Shinoa started this topic of conversation so many times Mitsuba has gathered the experience and skill points to retort her insults😂 Shinoa has awakened Bad Girl Mitsu, and Dethroned Sass Queen is now on the losing end loool just joking.

It might seem that everything that I mentioned in this post until now it’s a lot for Shinoa and Mitsuba but remember that for them, ever since they arrived to the JIDA and all this mess started around chapter 70 they have been in the same day in the OnS universe (even if for us it has been years) and only two days passed at most ever since Shikama Dōji started influencing Shinoa’s views on Yuu in chapter 66 (although Shikama Dōji probably talked to her about him offscreen a lot of times before this chapter). It has been only one bad day, it’s okay, there is no need to panic, Mitsuba and Shinoa are still super best friends and will be...or that is what I would like to say because one, if in just one day Shinoa’s feelings became this crazy imagine how she would be after a longer time if no one stops her? And two, Mitsuba is starting to notice Shinoa’s feelings for Yuu:

(From left to right: chapters 10, 19 and 99)

As I mentioned in a previous post, the number of times Mitsuba is realising that Shinoa feels something for Yuu from afar in the manga is around 3 or 4 (I am not including the fourth since I am not really sure about it), with the most recent being the most eye catching. Now, you might tell me that Mitsuba is just jealous which I would agree since the first panel gives that impression by going with the typical cliché where the second girl is jealous of the first girl. But then if you look at the whole three panels there is nothing that exactly shows a jealous expression on Mitsuba’s face but rather she is just concerned or surprised. It’s hard to decipher her emotions here but if you look closely at the middle and right panel you might notice something in common: Shinoa is placing her hand on top of Yuu’s. So it’s more likely that Mitsuba is looking at this specifically rather than at the whole picture of Yuu and Shinoa together considering that these latter two have gotten scenes together many times but Mitsuba never looked at them and acted normal. Kagami is the type of subverting our expectations like when Yuu was supposed to be the main protagonist but sometimes he seems to be a cover and the real protagonist of the story is Guren (this is just my impression). For this case, Shinoa has been called a “dispassionate observer” by Shikama Dōji in chapter 72 but sometimes I feel that the observer is Mitsuba.

This could explain why we have never gotten a glimpse of Mitsuba’s heart and demon even though she is a main female deuteragonist and the only one unaddressed in Shinoa squad. It might seem that she is patient and a stagnant character, but all these subtle moments might be building up to a potential Mitsuba mini arc that will be about her relationship with Shinoa? After all, what Mitsuba cares about the most is her squad, so bonds is a likely theme. Moreover, in the fanbook Mitsuba’s favourite person was stated to be Shinoa (while for everyone else it was ‘Yuu’). It’s possible that she will confront Shinoa about this because Shinoa never tells her anything about herself so Mitsuba has to do all the guessing and Shinoa has grown distant from her. No way Mitsuba is fine with that. Looking at this, it’s normal we haven’t gotten much of them because looking at the current events of the manga, now is not the time to sit down (it’s not like they either have the time) and do something that might sever bonds anymore. This is why I came to the conclusion that if it’s not just bad writing, then Kagami deteriorating their friendship is something intentional.

Now, how will Shinoa and Mitsuba’s friendship proceed from here will rely mainly on two factors. One is whether what Shinoa feels for Yuu is genuine or a result of Shikama Dōji and Mahiru brainwashing her, and two, whether Mitsuba feels something for Yuu too or not. For one, I am not going to jump to conclusions regarding Shinoa’s feelings for Yuu and I will just say that regardless of whichever route Kagami chooses, Shinoa still has to cherish her friendship with Mitsuba. For two, it’s ambiguous as I can say as many arguments for Mitsuba having a crush on Yuu as arguments against. So let’s wait and see. However, I want to say that making Mitsuba crush on Yuu would be unwise considering that it’s already hard enough with Mika and Shinoa, so adding Mitsuba would mean pointlessly adding more fuel to the fire, especially considering Yuu’s personality and that he might not end up with anyone by the end of the series.

However, if somehow Kagami decides to take the route where one, Shinoa’s love for Yuu moves forwards and two, it happens at the expense of her friendship with Mitsuba and others, I will start calling Kagami a hypocrite. This is because we are talking about the guy who said that the focus of OnS is not romance, but family and bonds. Therefore, I would be disgusted at his bias of exploring only the theme of family and bonds within male friendships at the expense of destroying female friendships just for romance.

I theorise that this confrontation (not a cat fight) will happen around when Shinoa will entirely lose the strength to keep restraining Sika and become possessed again (unless Yuu is here to save the day of course). For this to happen we will need a scene with Mitsuba talking with Tenjiryū in which we can finally see how she feels in order to set everything up before this moment, and another scene that will be a flashback of Shinoa and Mitsuba meeting for the first time when younger so we can actually understand the magnitude of their friendship.

And how this confrontation will happen? To be honest I don’t think that there is any person capable of putting up a fight against a Shikama Dōji possessed Shinoa (unless the main character’s plot armor is used here again) so Mitsuba confronting Shinoa will be at an emotional level where Mitsuba might voice her preoccupations and will tell Shinoa to trust her more instead of keeping things to herself because they are friends. This will be a perfect opportunity for the wall that Shinoa put between them to break and for Mitsuba to be finally given the chance of paying back everything that Shinoa did for her.

The reason why Shinoa needs to be stopped is easy. If she keeps going like this, at this rate she will take the same path as Mahiru where she moves everyone out of the way in order to obsess over one thing, being alone with no one to give advice to her or stop her when she will be making dangerous decisions. All this emotional outburst Shinoa has shown recently is not healthy because she is being rushed instead of being allowed to do things at her pace. She needs to calm down, and realise that where she should be emotionally expressive is with her friends as a whole group.

If you managed to read the whole post, I am sorry aghjskwkashs but it’s just that I wanted people to give attention to this underrated friendship😭💔 It’s so underrated so that’s why I wrote such a long post because I wanted to include every single detail (I hope I didn’t miss anything🤔) and searched for as many images as I can for evidence (sorry for making it so compact that the images might look blurry due to Tumblr restrictions🤧).

P.S. When I will be a granny (considering the fuckin slow pace of this damn manga) I wish to go back to this post and assess whether I was an amazing analyst or an idiot for trusting Kagami😂

#owari no seraph #seraph of the end #hiiragi shinoa #shinoa hiiragi #mitsuba sanguu #mitsuba sangu #sanguu mitsuba #sangu mitsuba #sote

[scoundrels-in-love]

Let me preface this by saying that I love Run On. It became one of my new top three favorite dramas early on and never wavered from the position. It still hasn’t. I’ve written ten thousand or more words of meta for it. And I will continue to do so.

But... I also wish I didn’t have to?

Here’s the thing: it’s awesome when show (story in general) has layers and subtlety to it, when it can be watched more casually and at the same time it runs deep when you look at it in focus softly weaving threads of narrative that shimmer and glow in more colors as you observe. When there are Easter egg details and references that make watcher feel good when they catch them, like the writer is patting their shoulder and saying “ah, you caught it. Well done.”

And Run On definitely has all of this!

Except it sometimes overdoes the subtlety.

For a show that can be praised again and again for establishing characters deeply and strongly with one scene, giving them depth and sense of being lived, saying a lot without saying much at all... Sometimes it really didn’t say much at all, creating this need for community to come together and write meta after meta to explore the nuance and depth. This was show about communication and translating ourselves to others and them to us, among other things. Intentionally or not, it’s a show that ended up needing translators to be truly felt and experienced by the viewers. And I don’t mean the subtitles. (Although those, too, were improved by community.)

I started writing meta because I loved the show and I wanted to understand the character choices that initially made me go ‘huh’ and best way to organize my thoughts is writing them out, often. I started writing meta because it was 8 episodes and people still couldn’t understand the female leads because their hurts and traumas were implied in these disconnected ways from current actions and I wanted to defend them, once I had understood fully.

For a story so impactful with the little things, a lot of the big things were shown to us through the veil. We catch guns blazing on screen as Mi Joo sobs and finds comfort in this dimmed solitude. Blink and you will miss it, although it’s the starting moment of one of most central conversation points in the show. And that’s episode 15! Same with the envelope. We never learn how Dan Ah’s mother passed or why Seun Gyeom lived separate from his family in his youth which left a formatting mark on them both, obviously. And all of it makes me spin countless imaginary scenarios and write endless meta while I will actually never know if that’s what writer intended or I am over-reaching and creating context - or wrong context - where it wasn’t given (like that).

I understand that we met these characters in middle of their lives and when we meet someone, we don’t get to relive their past along with them, especially from the get go. We can never really be privy to what they’ve lived through, as much or as little they tell us. I understand that the show clearly told us - we will never completely understand each other, because we’re not the same person, but the places where we meet can be beautiful and filled with love if we work towards it.

I do.

I also accept that I will probably never really understand by Seun Gyeom softly insists on continuing to speak formally with Mi Joo, although he dropped it with Woo Sik. Even the things I don’t understand like all the fathers being given some kind of absolution because they’re dying or just because time has passed and he hasn’t been shown putting in any effort, I can accept. Most of these make sense within the premise, the themes that the story itself established.

And still, I feel a little like a show that could be so candid and so well told, the choice to go ambiguous on things that it clearly wanted the watchers to understand and notice, for a show that was so well told to need a band of people ‘translating’ its main characters to watchers so that they could understand and connect to them better and truly fall for the story and its beauty... It leaves some kind of feeling in me. A kind of bittersweet after taste, maybe, with how I feel there is so much to dig in this story and yet it will be lost on a lot of people because the show didn’t take just one or two more steps toward its watchers. With how people are upset and believe this or that about the show’s ending and I can’t even tell if writers actually intended it to be as ambiguous as it turned out to look to some people, regarding Dan Ah and Yeong Hwa.

I actually would like to make addendum on my point about us not being privy to character’s lives - the show itself does break this rule, showing us few, rare flashbacks and I’ve never felt like drama could’ve benefited of a few more of those than with Run On. We remember what happened last episode or 40 minutes earlier in the show. We, however, do not remember what made this character the way they are - because you aren’t telling us clearly, only alluding. Through layers and layers that aren’t even always direct and true, but a diversion instead.

I just don’t think a show needs to the sort of thing that blooms and flourishes fully only in this exclusive situation where everyone is pitching together and unraveling it layer by layer. What of watchers three years down the lane that will not find all these amazing metas written as it aired? That will drop it by ep 8 because they will think Mi Joo getting upset at Seun Gyeom is unfair and no one will give a different perspective?

Maybe that’s the thing. I love it so much I wish it could be loved a bit more easily, that it had opened to all of us just one smile more so everyone could fall in love with it the way I - we - did.

#run on #jtbc run on #kdrama #rainy watches kdrama #My head Really hurts and I think I will regret this as soon as post it #but whatever #the last paragraph itself is 'if you get it you get it thing' like the whole show in some aspects and maybe it didnt have to be

[niqhtlord01]

Humans are weird: The little details: A Morgan and Tilith story

The shuttle carved through the upper atmosphere of the planet like a hot knife through butter and smoothly made its way through the swirling cloud banks. 

Aboard the security detail sat in the front of the craft going over the security details one final time while the diplomats in the rear made their own final preparations. 

They were a rather somber group; the weight of what they were meant to achieve bearing down on them as steadily as the gravity of the world they were speeding towards. 

“Shall we go over the talking points once more?” 

The Parziean delegate Jaldel’s voice was quiet but still held a tone of authority. She had asked the question yet was already opening the data packages with her nimble blue fingers as if she had issued a statement. 

Opposite the Parziean the Flinchestet and Brumark delegates were nodding in agreement and opening their own data packages. Jaldel turned and looked at the remaining delegates behind her. “Would you care you care to join us?” 

Occupying the rear corner of the diplomat sat the Hive delegate Tilith. Her size had required the crew to remove several seats to make enough space for her to sit in. When the crew had inquired if she would need specialized safety harnesses for when the shuttle breached atmo Tilith had politely refused, displaying her leg talons piercing through the lush carpet of the cabin and biting into the metal decking beneath it. 

Tilith had not moved for the entire duration of the flight from the federation worlds. Jaldel would have paid her no mind had she not mumbled and made rapid clicking sounds underneath her silver veil covering her mandibles.

“Delegate Tilith I believe is communicating with the Hive mind and no doubt rather engaged to join you” came a voice next to Tilith. 

Sitting next to her sat the human delegate, Earl von Morgan. He was considered a wild card in the federation; his elderly exterior appearance rarely matching his youthful and somewhat bold actions. Rumor was he had pulled a gun on a member of the inner ten when they attempted to black mail him into joining their group shortly before the Secessionist Schism war had broken out and that he was favored by not only Tilith but other members of the Hive ruling caste. 

Morgan calmly shook his head at Jaldel’s offer and instead pulled out a paper wrapped herb from his coat pocket. “I must decline, as I have a feeling that any laid plans we may concoct will be any use to us once we get down there.” 

He placed the wrapping into his mouth and reached into a his opposite pocket to retrieve a small lighter while Jaldel looked at him reprovingly. 

“More of your human wisdom?” the Flinchestet quipped drawing a chuckle from Brumark. 

Morgan lit his wrapping and took a deep inhale of it before blowing out a thick cloud of smoke in the Flinchestet’s direction causing them to cough and wave their hand in the air to disperse the smoke.  

“Rather more of a feeling.” Morgan said, taking another deep inhale as the shutters along the shuttle windows began to rise slowly and for the first time the delegates got a look at the planet they were here to save. 

“Something here feels very wrong.”

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The shuttle doors finally opened and the ramp descended to the muddy surface of the planet much to Jaldel’s confusion. She tapped her communication device in her ear and spoke.

“Pilot, are you sure these are the coordinates you were given?”

“That is correct, mam.” The pilots reply was swift, but held a hint of uneasiness that Jaldel was feeling. “This is the location they gave me to follow for your meeting with the prince.” She looked out of the doorway once again to the world below and found herself hesitant to leave.

The coordinates for the discussion had led them to the front lines of the conflict rather than a safe location far away. the landing pad was nothing more than a hastily assembled cleared area that had been covered with metal grates while all of the buildings surrounding it were somewhat dug into the ground itself. The sounds of distant fighting could be heard and if she listened closely over the spin down of the shuttle engines she could hear the thumping sound of artillery gun.

Across the makeshift landing pad stood a trio of Tugundans. Two were dressed in full battle armor, their faces hard and seemingly uninterested while their weapons were held firmly at their sides. The third Tugundan standing in the middle wore a rather over decorated officers uniform, though even from this distance Jaldel could tell it was stained and hadn’t been cleaned in some time. 

The Flinchestet behind her was looking rather pale, even for one of her kind, and the Brumark was attempting to hide their nervousness by clenching deeply into the cushioned chair beside them. Jaldel stood atop the ramp taking it all in while considering her options when the pilot cut in again. 

“Mam, I’m being told that the delegation needs to exit now or we take off again as medical supply vessels are being held in holding patterns till we clear the pad.” 

Before she could respond Morgan began descending the ramp followed by Tilith who had woken from her trance like state only moments before. Jaldel was struck by how seemingly calm Morgan was as he walked into the warzone and realized she could not be shown up by this human and quickly followed after him down the ramp. 

The delegation made their way across the landing pad and stood in front of the trio of Tugundans. Jaldel stepped forward to the officer and produced a document. 

“By order of the Cosmic Federation, we are here to negotiate the cessation of hostilities between both the Tugunda and the-”

Before she could finish her sentence  the officer held up one hand to forestall Jaldel while the other went to a communication device in his ear. The officer was nodding at something that only he could hear. Without saying a word he pulled out a device and entered in several keys. Behind him large doors opened from the earth entrenched building and he quickly motioned the delegation inside.

“We have just received word that an enemy chemical strike is inbound.” He pointed to the delegations shuttle. “Tell your pilot to get back into the space as quickly as possible and enter the bunker.” 

The Flinchestet and Brumark delegates looked shaken and quickly entered the bunker followed shortly by Tilith and Morgan while Jaldel relayed the officers warning to the pilot. Jaldel watched the shuttle take off again before stepping inside the bunker just as the doors began sealing themselves. 

The group was led through a series of tunnels and passage ways. Overhead the loud thumping of artillery shells impacting could be felt as the tunnels would shake every so often. 

Much to the surprise of the delegation the tunnels were far from empty as row upon row of injured Tugunda soldiers lined either side of the tunnel.  Soldiers rushing passed in the opposite direction left the delegates single file and bumping into the injured soldiers much to their displeasure. 

After some time the group was led into a small room lit with a flickering overhead light. A wide metal table sat under the light with simple metal chairs surrounding it while military maps and charts decorated the walls. 

The officer sat at one side of the table while the two accompanying soldiers left the room to stand guard outside. He motioned the delegates to the chairs opposite him which they reluctantly took. 

“My name is Kucvulan, war strider and second in command to prince Marsov.” He removed his cap to reveal several bandages and dressings covering the back of his head which he bristled at. 

“I am Jaldel, head diplomat of this delegation.” Her emphasis at this was clear to establish her superiority fr the negotiations.   “We are here to negotiate a ceasefire between both parties of this conflict.” At the mention of the ceasefire Kucvulan appeared irked. “Did you not see the dozens of wounded outside? All a result of our enemies brutality; and you would us break bread with them?” 

The Flinchestet delegate coughed. “Forgive me, but we are here to negotiate with prince Marsov. Your feelings are irrelevant to these discussions.” 

“Prince Marsov is currently organizing the war from the front lines and is indisposed of. In his place he has appointed me as his representative.”

Nearly all of the delegates looked surprised at this save for Morgan who quietly sat at the corner of the table next to Tilith. As the negotiations continued he said very little in fact save for the casual remark but otherwise was quiet and calmly stroked his mustache. 

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Several hours had passed before the negotiation broke for the day and the delegates returned to their ship with the ride back into space certainly had a more somber mood as the everyone slowly absorbed what they had seen. It was some time before Jaldel spoke and broke the silence.

“It is clear the Tugundan’s are not at fault for this conflict.” 

Both the Flinchestet and Brumark delegates nodded in agreement. 

“The horrors they have endured no doubt leaving their resolve to finish this conflict iron.”

A soft chuckling drew the gathered groups attention to the back of the shuttle to see Morgan lighting another herbal wrapping.

“What do you find so amusing?” Jaldel said, a tone of anger slowly rising in her voice. 

Morgan took a deep inhale and blew out a small cloud of smoke and looked back at the delegates. “You’ve all been played for fools like a fish biting down on a hook.”

The trio looked confused at this remark as Morgan stood and went to the refreshment cabinet and began pouring two glasses of the finest Gloven wine before returning to his seat and handing one to Tilith. 

“The whole point of our negotiations was to bring about an end to this conflict for both sides.” Morgan began before he took a sip of his drink. “But would it not be better for the Tugundan’s to have the frame of war cast so that it makes them out to be the victims and thus garner more support from us?” Morgan noticed the trios confused faces for the first time. “Are you telling me none of you saw the signs?” 

Jaldel bristled at that remark, taking it as an insult to her intellect. “I believe it is you with the faulty perspective. I was paying attention to every detail from the moment we stepped off the shuttle.” Morgan nodded. “Then let us begin the breakdown of events from there shall we?”

He sat down again and took a fresh inhale before continuing. “Does it not strike you as somewhat odd timing that the exact moment we set foot on this world was to coincide with an artillery attack?” 

“Hardly.” Jaldel counter. “They have been fighting for months on end.”

“A fair point I grant you, but the other side must have known we were arriving as we are scheduled to meet with them as well in the coming days. Why would they jeopardize their negotiating position by launching an attack that may have very well killed us all?” 

Before Jaldel could counter again Morgan continued. “And then there is the manner of the attack itself. Kucvulan said it was a chemical attack, correct?”

“Indeed.” the Brumark spoke. 

“Then where was any of the hazmat protection gear for the soldiers?” 

The trio were silent and so Morgan pressed on. “If these chemical attacks that have badly disfigured their forces have truly been going on for months then every soldier we passed should have had some sort of protective gear they would have been scrambling for at the mere warning of a chemical strike.” 

“We were underground in a secure facility.” the Flinchestet added, “There would have been no need to have such protection.” 

“By that logic then why do ships have escape pods if they were built to not to be destroyed?”  It was here that Tilith spoke for the first time, her voice soft but with a tone that seemed to extend each syllable longer than it needed to be. 

The Flinchestet looked as if they were going to say something but stopped themselves as if realizing Tilith’s point, but Jaldel was still not convinced. 

“Kucvulan himself did not carry one and that confidence must have inspired his troops take comfort that if there commander did not need protection then they must be safe.”

Morgan stubbed the butt of his herbal wrap into the arm of his chair and then tossed it aside into a waste container. “Since you brought him up I think we should discuss the war strider himself next.” 

Jaldel scoff and reclined in her seat. “What is there to discuss? He seems the perfect model of a Tugundan officer.” 

“A bit too perfect for my liking?” Morgan said downing the remains of his drink in a single go. 

“Is that a hint of jealousy I hear in your voice?” Jaldel prodded. “Is this all some big show to hide your displeasure at being shown up?”

Morgan laughed loudly and swatted his chair arm at Jaldel’s words. It took him some time to recompose himself and wipe the tears from his eyes before staring down Jaldel. 

“Why would I be jealous of a man so eager to get his head blown off by the first enemy sniper?” 

The trio once again looked confused and now it was Morgan’s turn to lean back into his chair. 

“No sane officer would wear such a brightly colored uniform covered in medals and commendations on front lines. You might as well tie a little sign around your neck saying “Shoot me, I’m important.” Tilith chuckled and the Brumark coughed loudly when Jaldel glared at him. 

“When we passed the soldiers I touched several of them. Though it was brief their minds were full of anguish and pain from the previous days.” 

The Flinchestet’s mind entering ability through physical contact appeared to back Jaldel’s perspective. She nodded to the Flinchestet and smirked at Morgan. “You can not hide the secrets of your mind from a Flinchestet.” 

“Unless you’ve seen a few slasher flicks so I’m told.” Morgan remarked under his breath.“I will grant you I can not deny our colleagues ability, but the evidence does appear to tell a different story.” 

“Any other points that concerned you?” Tilith said, sipping once more from her glass.  

“The last item that struck me as odd was the absence of the prince for our talks.”

“You heard Kucvulan; the prince was on the front lines directing the war.” Jaldel’s rebuke was swift as it was to the point. 

This time it was Tilith to voice her concerns. “This did strike me as odd. What knowledge we Hive have of the prince.”

“Why do you say this?” the Brumark spoke, his attitude suddenly now more interested in the discussion. 

“I entered the Hive subspace and connected with the Hive directly and learned all information we had regarding the prince.” Tilith began, he talons slowly clacking against the decking. “We know that the prince is brash, direct, unimaginative, and hopelessly narcissistic. He is of the kind that would not have missed a chance to show himself off to members of other species.”

“I agree.” Morgan said, much to the surprise of Jaldel. “But all of this leads to a far more dangerous question than the ones we have been contemplating on.”

“And what would that be?” 

“If the Tugundan’s are not capable of such deception, than there is some unseen force here guiding them in the ways of subtly and misdirection.”  Morgan cupped his hands and rested his chin on them as he stared out the window. “And if there is such a force aiding them in this war, we must wonder if they are far more dangerous than the Tugundan war machine.” -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Kucvulan watched the shuttle retreat back above the clouds before returning to the command bunker. He waited until the doors slammed shut behind him before removing a compact communication device and activating it. 

“Everything was done per your request. The delegation is none the wiser.” 

A small image began flickering into place and a man cloaked midnight black coat appeared before Kucvulan. 

“Did it?” the shadowy man remarked. 

Kucvulan was confused for a moment. “Yes, we did exactly as you said and performed the roles assigned to us.” 

The man in the image looked frustrated and shook his head. “You did not. You improvised and put the entire plan in jeopardy!” 

“I-” Kucvulan began before the man continued in a far angrier tone. 

“You were to wait until the first shells hit the ground before ushering the delegation inside but instead did so before the fact! Do you think they are stupid?!” 

Kucvulan remained silent as the man continued to vent his anger. 

“You were aware of how events would play out but instead of keeping that knowledge to yourself you blatantly shared crucial information to them without even being asked for it! It is not a misdirection if you loudly announce “Look here, don’t look over there!” you half wit imbecile!”  

Had it been anyone else speaking to Kucvulan he would have removed their arms from their body and beat them to death with it for such insults. Yet this man had earned the respect of the royal family and his words were theirs. He could not disobey. 

“Forgive me, Yuri. I am not accustomed to such acts of... deceit.”

Yuri pinched his brow and took a long slow breath as if he was explaining his anger to a child. After some time he opened his eyes once more and glared at Kucvulan. 

“Do not endanger this war when we are so close to winning it. We do not need the Cosmic Federation’s intervention just as we have regained the initiative.” 

Kucvulan nodded. “What are your orders now?” 

“I am sending you further instructions for you and your men for events in the coming weeks while negotiations continue. Follow them to the letter. No deviations, no improvisations, no off the top remarks. Just. Follow. The. Instructions.”

With that the communication was disconnected and Kucvulan was left a mix of duty and rage. 

Leave it to humans to make things complicated, he thought as he went to get the new orders.

#HUMANS ARE WEIRD #humans are insane #humans are space orcs #humans are space oddities #story #scifi #Earl von Morgan #Tilith

[polar-stars]

☕️ + megumi and hojo?

(Give me a ☕️ + a character/ship and I’ll ramble off whatever thoughts and opinion I have about it)

Oho, interesting! Thanks for the ask!

Megumi Tadokoro

Megumi is a character I love and adore. She has given me no choice in that matter, lol. I cannot possibly dislike a character who portrays such a huge amount of real, genuine kindness. Adding to that, she's incredibly easy to relate to (I know that I am not the only one who does).

In my opinion Megumi has had some of the very best moments in all of Shokugeki, especially in it's earlier parts. The Shokugeki against Shinomiya in Trainings Camp is still my favorite battle in the whole manga after all. Her performance in the Autumn Election Premlins was also really satisfying and sweet to see. (Monkfish Preperation Scene Supremacy)

Tsukuda really did great on making Megumi a character that I really want to see succeed.....But that is where the problem comes in.

The problem is that Tsukuda struggles with the Show, Don't Tell-Rule from Central Arc onwards.

Pre-Central, Megumi's character development was solid in my opinion. It was believable and not too fast-paced. But once focus was shifted to Azami-Drama, Megumi and other characters had to take a little step back from the action. And Megumi's character arc started to stagnate.

Through Training Arc. Autumn Elections and Stagiares, Megumi had visibly gained some more confidence in herself and her stage fright problem from the beginning of the series was ceasing. However there was something missing: pay-off. Her character arc lacks proper pay-off.

You see, throughout all of Central Arc Megumi has not won any single fight on-screen. She was given one victory against Shigemichi Kumai but not even second of that fight was actually shown to the reader. But when it's time for a more detailed fight against Momo, she looses.

In her fight against Momo, the judges do find the time to point out tho that Megumi might hasn't been able to beat Momo however there is quote unquote ✨potential✨.

Thing is that the "potential"-thing has been getting old at that point. It felt very reminiscent to Megumi's fight against Ryo back in the Autumn Elections. Ryo was able to win, however it was made clear through multiple dialogue-lines that Megumi did give him a good fight, defying the expectations the audience had from her. So basically that fight was like: Yes, she lost now. But she is on the right path. There is a lot of potential.

The issue is that time has progressed ever since the AE and it was about time for us, the readers, to see that potential unfold.

But we never got that.

We get a lot, a lot of talking about Megumi's potential throughout Central Arc but never an actual showcase of it. And it does not get much better with BLUE Arc either (I mean, what do you expect from that trainwreck of an arc anyway?)

First off, despite all of her potential and her participation in the Regiment de Cuisine & the retaking of Totsuki as a whole Megumi somehow ends up with the lowest seat in the Neo-Elite 10??? And I'm just: Why??? Why is she the only explicitly ranked below Eizan & Nene (who got a massive downgrade) with everyone else far ahead? (Tho the Neo-Elite 10 Ranking as a whole is one confusing mess and I should probably stop trying to bring sense into it if I do not want to go insane, lol.)

The infamous Hot Spring Fight against a Noir is where we finally see Megumi shine a little on-screen (at least in the manga). And well....I enjoyed seeing that but...

It is still not the proper pay-off she deserves, I'm sorry. Because ultimately that Noir-Guy is some random One-Off we never saw again. And that's a problem.

This character had no time establishing himself to us. We barely know him.

To put it into perspective: Satoshi Isshiki beating Julio Shiratsu in the RdC did not feel like a very impressive thing. Because we have only come to know Julio in that one fight and had absolutely no judgement on how powerful he may be (not to mention, that he was mostly placed in a very ridiculous light). It would have been a lot more impressive to the reader had Satoshi won his later fight against Eishi Tsukasa, because Eishi is a character who we have spent a lot more time with and who has repeatedly been portrayed as absurdly skillful and an actual threat.

See what I mean? As much as I loved seeing Megumi being an absolute badass in that Hot Spring Saga...It was not the satisfying pay-off I want for her.

The few victories she gets are always against random One-Offs while her fights against the more important characters are always a loss for her. Case in point: BLUE. She gets anOTHER off-screened match against some Noir in Chinese clothes, whose name I won't bother looking up if he even has one, where all characters talk about how talented she is but once it's time for her to go up against big bad bitch Asahi she looses. And that sucks.

Not to forget the fact that Megumi always gets strung along to every big event but we never get much justification for her participation (other than the obvious Meta-Reason that she's a main character).

Think about it, her and Takumi got extremely lucky in Train Arc by having Rindou giving them a free pass just for the lulz, while everyone else got expelled. Then a good number of messy chapters later, Megumi and Takumi get invited into BLUE without even a shred of reasoning behind it. Why them? How random is it to invite the 1st, 7th and 10th seat but no one else? Meanwhile when BLUE Arc was first mentioned in the manga they told Jouichiro that it's actually extremely rare for a student in that age to get into this tournament. And Jouichiro was a 3rd year back then, what are those three 2nd Years doing there??

The anime at least addressed that by having Totsuki's students fight for the participation (I appreciated that, if only the episode that covers it wasn't so lazily done)

I'd have much less of an issue with that if they actually gave Megumi something to work with in that arc. But really in RDC and even more so in BLUE, she's mostly just there I feel. She barely really impacts the story meaningfully in both of these arcs, I feel.

And it's one big shame.

As I said, I love Megumi and Tsukuda set her up as someone who I wanted to see succeed and defy expectations. Her journey up till Central Arc was a lot of fun and very compelling but then it just...came to a halt. And her arc never got any real, proper closure I feel. She was instead pushed more and more into the background and she just did not deserve that, man.

Never forget that she is one of the mains after all and she should have been treated as one.

damn I did not think this would get this long ahhdhdf

Miyoko Hojo

When realising that Miyoko's speciality is Chinese cooking, I was super excited for her! I really love Chinese food and I've been waiting for it to be covered in Shokugeki up till that point.

I like Miyoko quite a lot, she's definitely one of my faves from the...well, I don't think "secondary" cuts it...the tertiary cast. Unfortunately we've got to see so painfully little of her.

I like that Megumi, in the most Megumi-ways, made her learn a lesson like "Feminism =/= You can not possibly get along with a man. Ever.", but it was also interesting to see acknowledgement of the inequality of men and women within the culinary business through Miyoko.

Miyoko's friendship with Megumi is something I adore and I would have very much liked more of it please. I enjoy the thought of Miyoko, this tough, unapproachable woman, having her face soften whenever this pure, little angel approaches her. Also 100% sure Miyoko would drop-kick whoever gives Megumi a funny look.

I also would have liked to see Miyoko interact more with Kuga, because I imagine it could have been a lot of fun. From the one, tiny interaction they've had I feel that Terunori actually respects Miyoko quite a bit. Which I think is interesting, because Terunori otherwise seems to enjoy bitching at people.

Honestly? If you ask me??? Miyoko should have been in the Regiment de Cuisine.

I'll never get over how she's shown in the audience, alongside Nao, smiling when the rebels are about to snatch victory. Like ahdhFJG, excuse me Ma'am what business do you have just watching??? You can not tell me that from what we've seen about Miyoko that she would not be up to kick Azami's ass out of Totsuki. I generally think it's stupid for the Rebels to go up against the Elites in a number even to them.

Azami. Explicitly told you guys. That you can bring more than that.

You were up against the Elite 10 Council.

YOU SHOULD HAVE ASKED ANYONE YOU CAN GET!

YOU SHOULD HAVE ASKED MIYOKO

(and Nao as well tbh)

(The Regiment de Cusine could have been a lot better to buy for me if the Rebels had shown up with more participants tbh but that's a different subject)

Anyways, as I said I wish we could have seen a lot more of Miyoko. But it just wasn't meant ot be :( I mean, when characters like Alice and Akira get pushed to the side, what chances does the tertiary cast have?

I'm at least glad that she is sort-off shown being the new president of the Chinese RS in Les Dessert 1? I like that for her.

But yes, ultimately...another criminally underused character. I look forward to write her being a cool mom in my fanfic tho.

#well #that was rather lengthy hdhfhf #Rambly Asks #Shokugeki no Soma #Megumi Tadokoro #Miyoko Hojo

[woman-loving]

Lesbian Socialising in 1940s-50s Sydney

Selection from Unnamed Desires: A Sydney Lesbian History, Rebecca Jennings, 2015.

Much of the international literature in the history of lesbian social practices has prioritised commercial spaces such as bars and nightclubs, suggesting that these venues represented the international standard of lesbian socialising in this period. Focusing primarily on large British and American cities, historians have charted the emergence of developed commercial lesbian subcultures after the Second World War.[4] However, the lesbian social scene in Sydney in the immediate postwar decades differs significantly from the subcultural patterns described in these accounts and complicates the accepted picture in a number of interesting ways. Available oral history evidence suggests that lesbians only appeared on Sydney’s camp social scene--as the early lesbian and gay bar culture was known--in significant numbers in the early 1960s, when they began frequenting bars and cabaret clubs alongside camp men. Prior to this, much of the evidence points to a unique lesbian scene in Sydney, centred on private networks meeting at house parties and later in social groups. The predominance of private rather than public patterns of socialising in the immediate postwar decades had a lasting impact on the development of lesbian social practices and subcultural identities throughout the period being explored. Individual women’s use of both public and private space was shaped in a variety of ways by behavioural norms defined in these private social spheres. Moreover, given that, as Elizabeth Kennedy and Madeline Davis claim, ‘community is key to the development of twentieth-century lesbian identity and consciousness’, these spatial practices also had a significant impact on notions of lesbian identity in the city.[5] [...]

Lesbian socialising in the 1940s and 1950s Evidence of a lesbian commercial bar scene in Sydney piror to the 1960s is scarce and seems to point to a limited lesbian presence within a larger, predominantly male, camp scene. A small number of camp men recall occasional pre-1960 encounters with lesbians on the commercial camp scene. Dennis, who frequented the camp male venue Rainard’s Restaurant on King Street in the CBD in 1950s, believed that the two women owners were lesbians. He recalled:

“Rainards was another place we used to go, too, and that was run by, looking back now, two gay women. It was down in, appropriately, in the Queens Club, downstairs. And there was a Hungarian countess that was on hard times with a black cat playing the piano.”[6]

Another narrator suggested that the attendants to the drag queens at the grand artists’ balls of the 1950s were lesbians in drag. Some lesbians also mingled with the bohemian underworld of Kings Cross in the 195s, socialising in cafes and hotels with artists, camp men and Eastern European migrants. In 1955, the sensationalist tabloid newspaper, the Truth, claimed:

“Police told Truth this week that dozens of mannishly-dressed lesbian couples can be seen in Darlinghurst Rd., King’s Cross, every afternoon and night. They live as married couples--’husband’ and ‘wife’ and practise their disgusting perversions in secret. Something, however, they break out. Recently there was a fierce brawl in the lounge of a fashionable King’s Cross hotel. Two female perverts fought bitterly over the favors of a third woman.”[7]

Such descriptions suggest that a small number of ‘mannish’ or tough lesbians, some of whom where known to the police for minor offences such as brawling, vagrancy and indecent language, enjoyed a presence on the bohemian and camp male scene in the 1950s. However, oral history interviews with women who were attracted to other women in this period demonstrate that many women were not aware of the existence of commercial camp venues in the 1940s and 1950s and did not frequent them. [...]

Research into lesbian bars and commercial venues outside Australia has shown that lesbian bar scenes had become established in many American and British cities by the 1940s. [...] However, these large metropolitan centres may not be representative of a broader international trend--lesbian social practices in smaller cities and non-urban areas undoubtedly differed significantly from this model. While London and New York both had populations in excess of eight million in 1948, Australia’s two largest cities, Sydney and Melbourne, recorded populations of 1,484,004 and 1,226,409 respectively (in 1947).[11] Lucy Chesser’s work on Melbourne subcultures in the 1960s suggests that these population differences had a significant impact on the nature of lesbian socialising in Australia and that a lesbian commercial scene was only beginning to develop in Melbourne in the late 1960s. [...] Prior to this, Chesser claims, the only venues available to lesbians were a coffee shop in the city centre, which operated in various locations in the 1950s and 1960s, and a small number of predominantly male, heterosexual hotels (public houses), in which lesbians were tolerated on Saturday afternoons.[13] This pattern reflected that in Sydney, where a lesbian presence was rarely noted on the camp scene in the 1950s or earlier and women only began to join a mixed camp bar culture in significant numbers in the 1960s.

While the emergence of a commercial scene in the UK and US in the decades after the war in part reflected the growing social acceptability of public drinking for women, postwar Sydney was notable for its restrictive female public drinking culture and this also impacted on the nature of the lesbian scene in the city. Licensing laws in place in New South Wales from the First World War until 1957 enforced six o’clock closing of public bars, and these had a significant impact on gendered conventions of public drinking. Legislation explicitly prohibited women from drinking in public bars, confining them to separate saloon bars or ‘ladies’ lounges’. As the restrictive licensing hours began to have an influence on drinking habits, publicans increasingly adapted the layout of their premises to accommodate the large numbers of men who frequented bars for high-intensity drinking between five and six in the evening. The ‘six o’clock swill’, as it became known, required long bars and large areas of standing room to enable crowds of male patrons to fit into the bar and order drinks quickly. In this postwar drinking culture, saloon bars were increasingly sidelined and the practice of drinking in hotels became a highly masculinised pursuit.[14] While lounge or saloon bars continued to accept women patrons in some hotels in the 1940s and 1950s, cultural assumptions about hotels as masculine spaces rendered hotel lounges largely unacceptable for the majority of women and those who did frequent them were regarded as ‘rough’ and unfeminine. It was not until the reform of licensing laws in 1957 that the prohibition on women drinking in public bars was lifted and hotels began to be designed to accommodate mixed drinking in pub lounges. In the meantime, however, the cultural coding of hotels as masculine spaces had become firmly embedded in social norms and women found themselves unwelcome in bars for decades after the legislative change.[15]

Lesbian socialising in Sydney was therefore primarily located in alternative sites in this period, reflecting broader gendered leisure practices in postwar Australia. Same-sex attracted women forged private friendship networks centred on sports clubs, work in occupations such as the army, and artistic circles based around theatres and musicians, and in this period it was these patterns of socialising which dominated the lesbian social scene in Sydney.[16] Beverley and Georgina, who met in the years after the Second World War, recalled a diverse social life in the 1940s and 1950s. The couple met at a picnic organised by a mutual friend and, after building a network of about eight or nine lesbian friends, socialised at picnics, tennis clubs and each other’s houses. The women would also go on holiday together, staying in motels or renting an old shack on the Central Coast. In addition to this circle, they were part of a mixed camp social scene. Georgina recalled that they socialised ‘with the boys as well, the boys were all in, we knew a lot of the boys, a lot of them. We used to go to their parties and everything else, because we were always very friendly with the boys.’[17] Other sources also suggest that house parties provided an important and long-standing alternative to the bar scene for lesbians in the immediate postwar period. In his semi-autobiographical novel At the Cross, Jon Rose describes a camp party at Potts Point in Sydney’s eastern suburbs during the Second World War, at which lesbian painters and actresses mixed with drag queens and camp window-dressers.[18] Large-scale house parties on long weekends such as the Queen’s Birthday weekend were an aspect of the male camp scene in the late 1950s and early 1960s and it is clear that some lesbians attended these.[19]

The importance of friendship networks and the difficulties for women in socialising in a public bar scene suggest that house parties and outdoor activities may have been central to the lesbian social scene in Sydney in the immediate postwar decades. This tendency to socialise in small networks of friends, rather than as members of a larger lesbian community, shaped the models of identity developing in Sydney. Small private friendship circles tended not to evolve rigid rules of image and behaviour to which newcomers were expected to conform. Instead, women who socialised with circles of lesbian friends in this period typically describe themselves as ‘discreet’ and conforming to wider societal norms. Margaret, who went out to restaurants with her girlfriend in the late 1950s, described their appearance as ‘nice, well-dressed secretaries’ and herself as ‘like some respectable housewife’, while Rae, who worked in the city, recalled that she and her friends socialised in dresses, hats and gloves.[20] Coral also remembered that, in the late 1950s, she and her girlfriend: ‘Didn’t wear trousers or anything like that, of course, dressed very, very nicely’ at the mixed house parties they attended.[21] There was limited interaction between different friendship circles in this period, when it was often extremely difficult to locate other lesbians, and there was therefore little opportunity for the development of a larger, collective lesbian identity or subculture.

#lgbtq history #lesbian history #australia #rebecca jennings #sydney

[starr-fall-knight-rise]

Humans are Space Orcs “Self Destruct.”

Lol, wrote this one because I was thinking about it and it seemed liek aliens would find it sort of weird. Also they are totally stupid if they don’t take advantage of it :) 

The club was dark, an electronic human beat thundered through the floor as neon lights flashed and faded in time with the music. They kept it like that to keep off unwanted visitors. Generally only humans, Drev and Tesraki were willing to come into such an establishment. It tended to keep away all the goodie goodies who were to logical or law-abiding to see the true value of running under the radar.

Plus the music was loud enough, ad the humans were strange enough that they tended to draw the attention away from other aliens, and as far as the humans went, you just made sure to have half naked humans, and that generally dealt with anyone else who might be eavesdropping. Kinda hard to concentrate when your baser instincts are taking over.

It was with these rules and precautions in place that the syndicate met with each other, under the throbbing pulse  of the club’s beat, and the glowing light of neon.

There were five of them all together.

There were two Tesraki. One a young female with velvety black fur sitting cuddled close to a serious-faced dark-skinned human. He didn’t seem to notice her clinging to his arm as she was. In fact, he didn’t seem to notice much, a distant far-away look in his eyes either the product of cortical damage or the ravages of drugs though he was big, and acted as a good deterrent for anyone, human, or otherwise who might think about approaching uninvited.

Just to the side of them were two drev, one of them a mysterious pearlescent silver, and the other a rare sheen of black run up and down with strange rainbow light. He kept quiet his head down towards the table.

The last figure sat at the head of the table. A tesraki, tawny in color. One of his ears was rather mangled flopped constantly to one side and unable to move as the other was. He was missing a finger on his left hand leaving him with only three fingers, though all seven of his remaining digits were covered in rings and jewels. His beady black eyes blinked int the strobing of the neon lights.

“Well, do you have it.”

The dark furred Drev glowered at him while stroking her large human companion’s arm, “Payment first.”

The tesraki snarled, “Like I would trust you with payment.”

“Then at least let me make sure you have the credits.” She patted the human’s arm. If you don’t I will be forced to ask Z to deal with you, and he doesn't like having to deal with people.” 

Noctus snarled, but pulled a bag of credits from his belt and tossed it onto the table, a few of them spilling out onto it’s clear reflective surface dancing with the blue and pink neon lights overhead.

She reached out a hand beady black eyes wide with greed, but her hand was slapped away, “Now my information.”

She sighed but leaned back in her chair, “What do you want first, the object or the other information.”

“Why not talk about the object first.”

She shrugged, “No big deal. You’ll be able to find it in one of the shops on fifth three days from tomorrow. At that point it will be at its most vulnerable, and you will be able to take it without too much difficulty. Between the times of high sun, and a first moon low, security will be minimal, and anyone talented enough will be able to get in and take it. Now ... coming into the real problem, is actually getting out.”

Noctus crossed his arms, “Go on.” A group of loud drunken humans stumbled into the room adding a greater degree of chaos to the room.

“The GA has caught wind of our activities….”

Noctus groaned head thudding against the table as he rested his forehead against the cold glass.

“Expect to see some old friends of yours, Noctis.” The silver drev teased her yellow eyes squinted with amusement and pleasure at the Tesraki’s expense.

The dark female nodded, “Expect it. I heard rumors that they have THOSE humans working on it while they do repairs in our port. Usually I wouldn’t agree to something this dangerous now that THEY are involved, but…. That was before I heard about this thing.” She patted the big human’s arm.

“Well go on, don’t leave us in suspense.”

She grinned, “My informants have given me words, about something that could change the way we interact with humans. A last resort against their power and speed when all else is lost. It is guaranteed to work on at least fifty percent of the human population.”

“Only fifty percent.” Noctus demanded.

She frowned at him, “that’s fifty percent of humans YOU don’t have to deal with. Now let me finish.” She adjusted herself and continued, “I am told that this simple trick CAN incapacitate a human for up to an hour. You see, the way that some humans are built its like they have a natural…. Self destruct button, and if you can hit it, you win. Granted it isn’t likely to kill them, but making and injuring is a possibility.”

“And how does this help. If you are that close to a human than you are probably already dead anyway.” 

She waved a hand, “that is not the important part.” She reached behind her back and pulled out a little devie, something like a drone but not quite, “You remember this little gadget don’t you.”

“Isn’t that one of those self defence items for use against humans.”

She grinned and nodded, “This one is specific to the use of pressure points on the body as you will recall.” 

“Yeah, but it's not lethal, and my colleagues have shown that most humans can fight through it. And the way it was programmed immediately has the authorities raining down on us if we try to program it for more LETHAL things.”

She grinned at him, “Oh, but that is the beauty about this little piece of information. It isn’t lethal, but it has an extremely high incapacitation rate,  AND because it is not lethal, or even known to most of the GA, nothing is sanctioned against it. In essence, we have found a loophole.”

There was a pause around the room, “And has it been programmed into this device?”

She nodded another smug grin pushing it across the table, “Already done. Now it is up to your dark friend there to get things done.” She glanced towards the black Drev who sa brooding in his corner.

Slowly, and with one of his four arms, he reached out and picked up the object  kneading it in his four fingers, “Do you think you can do it?” Noctus demanded.

“Think, no. I know.”

***

The alarm sounded behind him as he slithered through the gap between two buildings and into a back alley. His dark carapace shimmered in the neon lights from billboards overhead, and he could hear the roaring of voices from down the street.  He recognized most of them as human.

He glanced over his shoulder having expected to be pursued, but he didn’t see anyone.

He turned back to the front alley breaking into a jog over the cold metal feet thudding quietly. He was almost there when, a shadow moved into the gap in front of him. In comparison to himself it was rather small, but the bipedal two armed nature of the creature made him pull to a stop.

He had expected this.

The human stepped from the shadows. He was tall for a human, but short compared to even the shortest Drev. He had tawny yellow fur atop his head, and was missing an eye. If what they said was true, he was also missing a leg. His face was mottled with the blue green luminance of the UV light playing along invisible stripes within his skin.  That same blue green glowed inside that single green eye. 

The fact that he was here didn’t exactly bode well for their little operation.

“Jeeajish daeen! Neh’hastish!” 

He was momentarily shocked into stillness surprised at hearing the drev language spoken by the squishy creature. 

He paused in place, “I have never met a human who could speak Drev before.”

The human stepped forward blue neon light highlighting the right side of his face, pink neon light lighting the left, “Well, now you have. I suggest you get on the ground and put your hands in the air before I am forced to do it for you.”

“Only you?” He wondered

“Je, zhe s nee tadi.” 

He turned in a sharp circle towards the second alley to his right to find the small female Drev stepping from the shadows, her beautiful luminescent blue dampened somewhat by the fluorescent yellow light at her back.

The human stepped closer, “I don’t suggest trying her unless you want to be humiliated.” 

The Drev turned back to the human reaching discreetly behind his back, “Oh, I don’t plan on it.” he pressed his finger into the trigger, and the little drone shot out from his hand.

***

Adam felt the impact a good five seconds before the pain set in. He had even gone to take a step thinking he would be ok, but knew he was wrong when his vision faded to grey.

***

The Drev thought it hadn’t worked at first. The human looked surprised , and then his skin slowly went white the rosy undertone fading from his face before he collapsed to the ground. He didn’t bother to look back racing forward and leaping over the human’s fallen body.” 

***

Death, death was upon him. He was going to die…. He wanted to die. It came in throbbing waves of agony through his innards. Like getting the wind knocked out of you but worse because at the same time he felt the overwhelming need to vomit. He barely recalled hitting the ground, but there it was right next to his face as he gagged and gasped curled into a ball on the cold metal of a filthy back alleyway. His vision was fuzzy and dark around the edges, so he barely noticed as a dark for leaped over him and raced into the crowd. He heaved again nears springing to his eyes with the horrific pain as if all his bowels were about to go shooting out of his body while his lungs refused to expand.

***

Sunny didn’t see what happened, one minute Adam had been facing off against the dark Drev, the next moment he had been on the ground while the other drev was escaping. She raced after him, but stopped upon coming to her fallen companion. Adam lay on the filthy ground curled into a tight ball. A high pitched sort of keening was breaking from his mouth as he rocked back and forth on the ground. That was only occasionally broken by the coughing and gagging. He was as pale as a sheet and tears were dripping from his exposed eye, which was squeezed shut. Little beads of sweat were rolling from his hairline and clinging to his skin. 

Sunny stopped in place and keyed her mic in frustration, “Man down! He’s getting away. He did something to Adam.” She tried to place a hand on Adam’s shoulder, but the human snarled at her swiping away her hand before curling back into a ball. Sunny leaned back in shock and surprise. She had never seen a human go that feral before.

“Maintaining pursuit.” Maverick panted over the radio.

Boots thundered against the ground down the alleyway, and sunny looked up to find team 2, headed by ramirez run into the alley.

The olive-skinned human pulled to a stop upon seeing the scene eyes going wide and then grimacing, “Oh shit.”

“What is going on.” Sunny demanded.

Ramirez walked over, “Ur…. he will be ok… hopefully.” he grimaced as he watched his friend writhe on the ground at his feet. Sunny saw his hands twitch, and he had gone almost as pale as Adam. Sunny had never seen an empathy reaction that obvious before.

***

He took another corner grinning to himself. It had worked, it had worked like a charm, the creepy little Tesraki hadn’t been wrong, and now he was pretty sure he had lost his pursuit. He turned another corner and skidded to a halt as another human blocked his path. This one was even shorter than the first by almost a foot, practically puny, compared to a drev. She too had a sort of white tawny hair and glittering hazel eyes. 

“Go on, try it. I'll kick your ass either way.” He smirked reaching behind his back and pressing the little button on the drone.

The human staggered back curling forward and yelping in pain, “SHIT!”

He waited for her to go down, but after a moment she straightened up face twisted into an expression of anger, “Ouch…” She snarled, and then ran at him.

***

Andam was getting ready to beg god to end him right there, when the horrific pain started to dull. He no longer needed to throw up, and he could breathe again. But walking was out of the question. Uncurling form his ball, he saw he was surrounded by a group of grimacing marines. 

Ramirez knelt next to him, “You ok.”

He grimaced trying to make a coherent thought, “They…. Know.”

He sighed, “They were bound to figure it out at some point.”

***

They were expecting Maverick, and for such reason were not surprised one she showed up dragging the incapacitated Drev behind her in power restraints. Her face was sort of twisted into an expression of mild discomfort and she threw the drev onto the ground at their feet, “I caught him.”

Adam looked up from where he was sitting, still looking green, on a discarded crate in the side of the alley.

“What do we know.” Ramirez asked

She smirked, “Apparently, dipshit here was told that his little device here.” She held it up, “Had the power to incapacitate fifty percent of the human population, apparently he didn’t stop to tell hi WHICH fifty percent of the population it wouldn't work on.” She grimaced again, “Not that it didn’t hurt, bastard.” 

Adam lowered his head with a groan.

Maverick patted his arm, “hopefully you don’t lose anything.”

“My pride…. My dignity.” He moaned.

 “Too late.”

Too bad the aliens hadn’t figured out who it would work on. It’s not everyday you learn a weakness that applies to fifty percent of a species. 

However now fifty percent of the human population was in…. Mild to moderate danger. 

Is not everyday that aliens have power over humans

#humans are space orcs #humans are space oddities #HUMANS ARE WEIRD #earth is a deathworld #Earth is space Ausralia

[carmenlire]

Perfect Crime

Part 6 of the Mafia AU series

read on ao3

Alec is acting weird.

Jace watches his brother as he reads something on his phone, sees the little smile that curls around the edges of his mouth, the way the lines of tension bleed out of his shoulders for the few heartbeats it takes to type a reply to whatever was on the screen.

Trying to remember the last time Alec looked so free takes more effort than Jace would like to admit. Definitely before Robert was murdered and certainly before Alec earned his own first kill. That was over three years ago now and the truth is, Jace has become used to Alec’s constant frowning, to his surly attitude and the way he’s grown into himself since he became the leader of one of the biggest crime syndicates in New York.

Alec’s come into his own. It fills Jace with equal parts pride and worry to see the way Alec no longer seems to shrink when talking to his men but instead stands tall and uncompromising as he gives orders with every confidence that they’ll be carried out to the letter.

He makes decisions and they are right far more often than not. His punishments are meted out swiftly and without remorse and Jace has lost count of how many men Alec has killed.

There’s so much blood on his own hands, too, that Jace knows will never wash away.

Things are different lately, though. Alec Lightwood, self-professed workaholic, has started disappearing a couple times a week. An hour here, an afternoon there, and when Jace looks at his brother’s calendar, all he sees is a time written in his messy scrawl.

No place, no clue as to who he’s meeting. Just a block of time that Alec is otherwise occupied.

Now, Jace would like to think that he’s a great brother, an even better second in command. While he doesn’t go around advertising it, he also considers himself a great people person in all the ways that helps him carry out his job and keep Alec on an even keel.

If Jace didn’t know better, he’d think Alec has found someone else to temper his edges.

When he thinks about it, it’s both appallingly obvious and obviously appalling. Alec hasn’t shown an interest in anyone ever. There have never been schoolboy crushes, lingering looks, wrinkled shirts or faded marks or other dead giveaways. The thought that his brother had managed to find someone for himself now of all times, when he’s working sixteen hour days and is far more used to the shadows than the light makes Jace want to shake himself for entertaining such foolish thoughts.

But then he reconsiders. He thinks about the way Alec’s been carrying himself lately, with a confidence and light that he’s never seen before. There are his disappearances that he never mentions or even alludes too-- Jace wouldn’t have even noticed probably if he hadn’t gone looking for Alec one afternoon and hadn’t been able to find him.

He hadn’t been at any of his usual haunts-- nowhere at the gym-turned-headquarters, not his favorite coffeeshop, nor at the apartment he’d renovated but rarely slept at. Jace had just about been ready to call in reinforcements, sure that his brother had been kidnapped, when the bastard had waltzed into his office, loose-limbed and looking without a care in the world.

Alec hadn’t mentioned where he’d been, just waved off Jace’s concern with frankly insulting blitheness. Still, Jace had been stunned when his brother, the most stoic Lightwood, had started humming as he reviewed evidence that one of their dealers had gone turncoat for a police precinct on the edge of their territory.

All of which brings Jace to now. Standing outside Alec’s office door, he overhears his brother on a phone call that sounds the furthest thing from business. He’s never been so grateful that Alec prefers to keep his door ajar most of the time because it allows him to hover just close enough to hear his brother sound decidedly enamored.

“Are we still on for tonight,” Alec asks in what, if Jace didn’t know better, he’d define as a flirty tone. He stares gobsmacked at the mostly closed door. When the fuck had Alec developed a flirty tone?

He doesn’t hear what the person on the other end of the line says before Alec’s sighing. It’s not one of his annoyed sighs, though, oh no. It’s one that speaks volumes despite its brevity. It’s the exhalation of stress and tension, like he’s taking his first deep breath of the day and it’s all due to who he’s talking to.

Jace is both curious and wary.

“I’ve never had Ethiopian before,” Alec muses. “You’ll have to let me know what’s good.”

A short pause before Alec’s laughing and it’s not a polite thing. It’s full bodied and completely free. “Get your mind out of the gutter, babe. I’m actually starving and I refuse to let you seduce me before I get food. Not again.”

A softer laugh, a quieter voice, so low that Jace leans closer to the door to hear the words. “Of course I had a good time. I always have a good time with you” His tone turns dry. “That’s not the point. The point is that I have a very healthy appetite-- ruling half the city’s underworld does that to a guy-- and I feel like I could eat an entire restaurant right now.”

A breathless laugh, more fond than anything and then Alec’s replying, “You’re incorrigible.”

It’s just seconds later that they’re saying their goodbyes and Jace straightens as he runs through everything he just heard. Alec called the person on the phone babe. There was a particular kind of softness that Jace hasn’t heard from his brother in years, if ever.

Now, Jace knows Alec is an adult and is entitled to both his privacy and his own judgement. Still, he can’t deny an overwhelming urge to know who’s caught Alec’s attention in such a way. It may be over-protectiveness, it might be his own arrogance in thinking-- knowing-- that he knows Alec’s best interests but he need to check out the situation, make sure Alec isn’t making a mistake, that the person on the other end of the phone is worthy of his brother and best friend and leader, who’s deserving himself of only the best.

With that in mind, Jace runs a hand through his hair, regroups, and pushes open the office door to saunter into Alec’s office.

“Hey bro, what’s up?”

Alec just levels him with a look. “Same old shit, different day. I am thinking of expanding our lines on the Eastern front, though. Thoughts?”

Jace mulls over that little tidbit of information, thinking over their options and potential gains compared to disadvantages. “Disanto isn’t going to go away without a fight,” is what he finally offers.

Meaning back in his chair, Alec folds his hands over his stomach and when he grins, it’s wolfish. “I think he’ll lose most of his bravado when all of his men defect.”

Now that information has Jace standing straighter, eyebrows high. “What the fuck does that mean?”

Looking like the cat who’s caught the canary, Alec replies, “I’ve been in talks with a few of his people. One of his men came to me awhile ago and talked about how the boss is losing it. They think it’s a combination of early onset dementia and Disanto just being a greedy bastard. He’s started skimping on paying his men and when they get a haul, he’s taking double his agreed upon share. There’s also rumours that he’s entering deals that none of his men want anything to do with and that he’s turning a blind eye to some abuse his girls are getting, just so he doesn’t piss off his biggest dealers. Something needs to be done and his men have persuaded me that I’m that something.”

It’s silent in the room as Jace takes his time to digest everything. Taking a seat across from Alec, Jace is surprised that Alec had even entertained people from a rival organization before he realizes that he should have known better. Alec’s always been a gossip and in their line of work, things often hinge on a nugget of information revealed at the right time.

“And you’re sure they’re not just setting you up for a coup of their own?”

Alec smiles but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “I’ve confirmed what they’ve told me independently and Jace--” he blows out a frustrated breath. “Things are a shitshow over there. He’s lost the trust and respect of everyone and the only reason they haven’t ended him alone is because the entire head needs to be cut off and they don’t have a suitable replacement they can agree on.”

Jace raises a skeptical brow. “But they all agree on an outsider? They all think you’re the answer to their problems?”

Shrugging, Alec only offers, “We’re the second biggest organization in the city and if we take over their operations, we’d be damned close to first. I have a reputation for being fair but brutal and it sounds like they need both a firm hand and someone they can look up to. For whatever reason, that seems to be me.”

It makes sense but that just leads to another question. “Why not go to the biggest syndicate then? Directly to the best? Why didn’t they consider Bane?”

Humming a little, Alec considers the question before simply saying, “He wasn’t interested. Apparently, he has his hands full enough and he wasn’t interested in retraining another faction to his specifications. I think he’s expanding his business interests and it’s taking most of his attention right now.”

Jace laughs a little and it borders on a scoff. “Where did you hear that? You know they like to keep their cards close to the vest.”

“You know I have my ways, Jace.”

Deciding he’s had enough with Alec’s cryptic ass, Jace just shrugs before he stands. “I say go for it if you have the time to dedicate to turning them over. I’ll help with whatever you need, but you know this is an ambitious takeover that’ll fall on your shoulders the most. You’ve spent the past few years establishing yourself, Alec. I think you’re ready and Disanto’s value isn’t inconsiderable. Just let me know what to expect when the time comes.”

Alec nods and Jace can see the satisfied gleam in his eye. “We’ll be moving forward then. I expect we’ll start the first stage sometime next month, I’ll need to hold a formal meeting with all of my men and make sure we’re all in agreement and talk strategy with the defectors.”

“Sounds great, bro.” Now, a plan has been brewing during this conversation and Jace finds himself almost tripping over his words as he switches subjects. “Can I have the night off?”

He watches Alec frown in thought. “That was abrupt. Everything okay?”

“I just have a hot date tonight. I know it’s sudden but we just matched earlier and they seem eager, so. Who am I to deprive someone of all this?” Jace waves away his concern with shameless narcissism. It’s an easy enough deflection and Alec is used to it.

“Fine,” Alec answers before fixing him with a look. “You know you don’t have to ask permission, anyway. Your time is your own.”

Jace grins. “Never let it be said that I take advantage of my position.”

Rolling his eyes, Alec just glares halfheartedly. “Get out of my office. Enjoy your date and try not to be so fucking greasy while you’re on it. It’s the world’s biggest turnoff.”

Jace scoffs as he heads toward the door. With one hand on the handle, he gives Alec his best finger guns. “Wrong. My confidence is the sexiest thing about me.”

Alec rolls his eyes so hard Jace briefly worries they’ll get stuck that way. “Leave me alone. I fully intend not to hear from you until tomorrow.”

With a halfass wave, Jace leaves without saying anything else and puts his plan into motion.

This was not what Jace had expected when he’d overheard that phone call a few hours ago.

This being his brother, always so cold and clearheaded, out on the fucking town with one Magnus Bane.

Their biggest rival and all around considered to be New York’s biggest bastard.

Slumping from his tiny booth in the corner, Jace holds the menu up to his face as he covertly stares at his brother laugh and flirt and blush in the company of Bane. He still can’t wrap his head around the fact that the man who’s grabbed Alec’s attention isn’t a harmless librarian or nerdy professor but one of the most influential, dangerous people in the city.

Jace doesn’t think about how Alec would be considered just as dastardly in different company.

For god’s sake, they’re holding hands over the table. Though Jace is too far away to hear their conversation, he watches as Alec says something and if he didn’t know better, he’d say Bane is blushing himself in answer.

They’re at a simple restaurant, cozy and charming with delicious smells emanating from all around. Jace had almost gagged as he’d seen Magnus round the booth to sit next to Alec as he explained the menu in what looked to be far too much detail.

Jace’s plan had been simple enough: make Alec think he would be busy on his own for the night before doubling back and following his brother to his date at the Ethiopian place. Thankfully, Jace could be extremely discreet when the need arose and he knew Alec well enough to hide all of the usual tells his brother would be attuned with.

He’d expected to find someone quiet and intellectual, someone Alec could enjoy long silences or deep conversations with. He had not thought that Alec would be head over heels for someone so loud and refined and cunning.

Jace doesn’t know what to think.

He’s startled out of his thoughts as a waitress walks up to him and asks for his ordered. Having not even looked at the blasted thing since he’d been seated, Jace’s dazed eyes scan over the menu quickly before ordering the first thing that registers. The waitress leaves quickly and Jace turns his attention back to the sickening scene in front of him.

Alec is laughing and looks so carefree-- more so than Jace thinks he’s looked since he was a kid. As he watches the two of them on a date, in their own little world, Jace wonders if it doesn’t make a kind of sense.

Suddenly, a lot of things make sense.

He remembers a few months ago when Alec really had been kidnapped, when Jace had arrived to one of Aldertree’s warehouses frantic and ready for blood only to find his brother not unscathed but whole enough.

So clearly, he remembers thinking how extraordinary it had been for Alec to have killed all the men and escape with a few busted ribs and a minor concussion. He remembers the shiver that had trailed up his spine as Alec had walked to the car, when Jace had taken in the carnage and felt eyes on him, the eerie whistling that he’d told himself was his mind playing tricks on him after the adrenaline surge of thinking Alec was in danger.

He should have known better, really.

Trying to resolve the events of that day with all the evidence that’s been piling up along with what’s right in front of his eyes right now and Jace thinks he must be an idiot.

He also think his brother is playing with fire and it’s only a matter of time before it burns down the whole damn thing they’ve been building since that horrifying summer night that feels like a lifetime ago.

Jace knows his brother better than anyone and even though this is the first time he’s seeing this side of Alec, it’s easy enough to define.

His brother is in love. Jace sees the brightness in his eyes, the flattered flustered look on his face when Magnus no doubt flirts with him, teases him with an ease that’s well-known and well-honed.

As he follows them out of the restaurant-- barely tasting his own food-- he ducks behind a flower bush in the park when Alec and Magnus come to a stop near a lone street light.

Wrapping his arms around Magnus’s middle, Jace feels like a voyeur as he sees Magnus wrap his own around Alec’s neck. Their voices are low in the solitude of the park, in the quiet of a night growing late, but their easy intimacy is obvious in the way their conversation flows with an ease that’s surprising before Alec is leaning forward, before Magnus is tilting his head up, and then they’re kissing.

It’s soft and slow and Jace has seen enough.

Alec has never been selfish or careless but Jace thinks there must be a first time for everything. All he can see is calculation in Magnus’s eyes when he pulls Alec closer, manipulation as he banters and flirts and wraps his brother around his finger with every word he speaks, casting a spell over Alec.

He doesn’t blame his brother for falling for Magnus. Still, Magnus’s reputation precedes him and Jace swore when they were kids, that he’d always have Alec’s back.

Quickly and with the stealth he’s known for, Jace leaves the lovebirds to it and can’t help but wonder when their house of cards will come crumbling down.

---

A few months later and things aren’t exactly going to plan-- with anything. Alec is still disappearing, still in a great mood-- unless they’re talking about the consolidation of Disanto’s syndicate.

It’s taking much longer than either of them had estimated to gain a foothold. Disanto had become increasingly paranoid and while most of his trusted advisors had been cut loose-- by Disanto himself not by anyone on Lightwood’s payroll-- and the leader was very difficult to meet with. He’d declined every invitation Alec had sent and the takeover was turning into such a headache that Alec looked ready to tear his hair out at any given moment.

Plus, Jace wasn’t blind. The past week or so, Alec had been in an even more godawful mood and he hadn’t seen Magnus. Jace knows the two are related. He just doesn’t know how.

It’s a Monday afternoon and Jace has a large pizza with everything on it and some beer and he’s ready to de-stress with his best friend. He enters through the kitchen in the back, sets the pizza down on the counter and puts the beer in the fridge before he starts toward the living room.

Alec had claimed a migraine and left headquarters while it was still morning. It’s now the early evening and Jace is ready to listen to his brother vent for the next hour while inhaling a truly horrifying amount of pizza between breaths.

When he nears the threshold between the kitchen and the dining room, though, he stops cold at the sound of rising voices.

“What are you saying, Alexander?”

Alec’s voice is devoid of all emotion as he apparently restates, “I can’t keep doing this. I can’t be with you anymore.”

Jace will give it to Magnus, the tremor in his voice is so faint that he almost misses it. “Just like that?”

Jace ducks mostly behind the kitchen wall as he sees Alec walk out into the corridor. “Just like that,” Alec says grimly. “I’m sorry it had to end this way but it's over.”

Holding his breath as Magnus follows Alec into the hallway, Jace can’t help but think that if Bane is acting, he’s doing a hell of a job at it. There are tears in his eyes that Jace just catches and he looks vulnerable in a way Jace wouldn’t guess him capable, holding himself together with a thread that’s quickly unraveling.

“We’ve been together for over a year and this is how it ends? You won’t even give me an answer for this sudden turnabout, darling. Excuse the shit out of me if I don’t go merry into this fucking terrible night.”

“Don’t be so crass,” Alec chides idly and from his vantage point, Jace thinks Magnus is seeing red with the way he stiffens.

“You don’t get to tell me how to talk, Alexander.” He laughs but it’s bitter. “Not now, at least.”

Alec’s facing Magnus-- and Jace who’s hiding behind the apparent ex-lover-- so he sees the coldness in Alec’s eyes, his impenetrable stare.

Alec opens his mouth and in a way that’s only possible after knowing someone so long, Jace knows that Alec’s next words are going to be the kill shot.

“I don’t love you anymore. I never really did, if we're being honest,” Alec says, infuriatingly cool. “You’ve served your purpose. I don’t need you anymore. It’s over, Bane, and now I’ll ask you to leave without embarrassing yourself more than you already have.”

In stark contrast to just a moment before, it’s like all of Magnus’s strings are cut and Jace almost wonders that he doesn’t just slump until he collapses onto the ground. It’s quiet for a long moment before Magnus raises his head an inch, meeting Alec’s eyes, and asks in a dead whisper, “It was all a lie? You were just using me this entire time?”

Now here’s the thing. Jace knows Alec and he knows when his brother and best friend is lying. And right now? Alec’s lying through his goddamn teeth. Jace sees the way each word of Magnus’s is a blow to Alec in the way he’s braced himself, in the slow blink of his eyes that means Alec’s thinking carefully of each word, like there’s a script he’s following lest this entire charade fall to pieces around him.

Magnus pulls himself up to his full height and Jace knows he’s not imagining it as Alec shrinks imperceptibly at what must be a hell of a glare.

“I loved you,” Magnus says calmly and when he speaks now his voice is calm and strong and carries a weight that shows clearly how he became one of the most ruthless men in the city. “I love you,” Magnus repeats and he takes a single step closer to Alec. “But I swear to God, darling, I will forget you.”

Jace isn’t breathing as he watches his brother’s face and the devastation that’s lurking just beneath the surface. Alec doesn’t say anything and Magnus steps around him, toward the front door.

Alec’s staring at the floor when Magnus stops with the door open. Neither one look at the other as Magnus serves his own kill shot. “When you first took over from Robert, I thought there was something different about you, something your father lacked. A heart.” His voice drops lower, menacing in its condescension, as he continues, “But now I see that you’re just like him. Worse than the shit on the bottom of my shoe. Not worth my time. There might be a day when you need my help, Lightwood, and I want you to know what my answer will be when it comes. No. I will look at you with nothing but pity and I will tell you to go to hell. I will happily send you to your ruin, know that.”

Magnus laughs a little and Alec shudders, out of Magnus’s view. “We’ll see if you’re as pathetic as Robert was when you beg me for help anyway. Until then, goodbye Alexander.”

Magnus leaves and Alec steps over to the wall, bracing his arms as he leans forward, trying to catch his breath.

Jace knows he should go, should act like he was never here in the first place but Alec is hurting and he’ll never be able to ignore that.

He steps out from where he’d been hiding but Alec doesn’t even notice, totally focused on what must be total devastation. Not knowing where to start, Jace cuts to the heart of the matter in the way he does best.

“You lied.”

Alec’s head shoots up and he stares at Jace with wide, red-rimmed eyes. “What the fuck are you doing here?”

Deciding to play the indifferent asshole card, Jace shrugs. “I brought pizza and beer over but it looks like I missed the party.”

“Go to hell, Jace.”

Jace just lifts an unimpressed brow. “Bold words when you look three seconds from bawling your eyes out.”

Alec’s expression clears just enough for anger to take over. Jace watches him dispassionately as he takes a breath, trying to settle the rage that must have started licking up his spine. “Maybe you didn’t hear me,” Alec says evenly, pushing away from the wall and coming to stand in the middle of the hallway. “Get the fuck out. Leave me alone. I don’t need you right now.”

Acting like he didn’t hear, Jace leans against the wall in a way that he knows ruffles his brother’s feathers. “So, Magnus huh? I don’t blame you for ending things. I can imagine that’s a lot to handle.”

Alec glares at him so coldly, Jace almost rears back. “You don’t get to talk about Magnus like that. Shut up Jace,” Alec warns softly. “You don’t know what you’re saying.”

Jace doesn’t move, doesn’t say anything for a long minute. The two of them stare at each other, and Jace decides he’s kicked Alec enough when he’s already down. “Here’s what I know,” he starts softly. “I know you’ve been happier the past several months than I can ever remember. I know you love Magnus and that you just lied to his face when you ended things, that you ripped out your own heart at the same time. Here’s what I don’t know-- why?”

Raking hands through his hair, Alec just mutters, “I need a beer.”

He stalks past Jace into the kitchen, and goes directly to the fridge, drinking half a beer before Jace even has time to reach for his own.

The two of them sit down at the counter and eat cold pizza mostly in silence. It takes awhile for Alec to stir and when he does, all he says is, “I had to break his heart to save his life.”

Jace doesn’t react, merely asks, “Okay. What does that mean?”

Sighing, Alec pushes away his empty plate. “Disantos has become dangerous, Jace. I don’t know how but it looks like you’re not the only one who knew about us.” He swallows hard. “Disantos came to me-- you didn’t know about it because he swore me to secrecy, said he had information on Valentine that he would only hand over if he could be assured that I was alone.”

Jace hums noncommittal. They’ll come back to Alec’s lack of faith in him later. “That doesn’t explain why you think you’re doing the right thing here, Alec.”

Taking a shuddering breath, “Disanto’s been tailing Magnus and when we met, he told me that he actually has ties to Valentine, that he’s under his protection and that Valentine has access to Bane. He knows about the damned coup, about his men's betrayal, and gave me an ultimatum. Unless I call off my takeover and keep my distance, they’ll go after Magnus.”

Alec turns to face Jace and there’s such devastation there that Jace almost starts tearing up himself. “I’d rather have him alive and hate me than to not have him around at all, Jace. You know Valentine, you know what he’s capable of. There’s no way I’m giving him any reason to make Magnus a target.”

“So what,” Jace says. “You’re going to be miserable forever just so Magnus won’t get killed by a bad guy? Alec, that’s our life. If it’s not Valentine, it’ll be someone else. Magnus knows what he signed up for with this life and you should know that, too. Sometimes you can’t protect the ones you love but does that mean you shouldn’t love at all?”

“Emotions are nothing but a distraction, Jace.” It’s obvious that Alec tries to be hard but he’s still so dejected that the words are more of a plea than anything else.

Jace scoffs in his face. “That’s bullshit and you know it. Robert was an asshole; you should know not to listen to anything he had to say. What about me,” he demands. “Do you think we’re too close? That I’m a liability? That I can’t take care of myself if need be?”

Alec closes his eyes. “It’s different and you know it.”

“Do I,” Jace counters evenly.

“You’ve been my best friend, practically family, since we were kids. We always said we’d be together.”

Jace looks at him, mouth tilted in a sly hint of a smile. “Are you telling me that you and Magnus haven’t talked commitment? I can’t believe that.”

Looking frustrated, Alec snaps back, “How are you so calm about this? I thought you hated Magnus.”

Jace hums, thinking about his answer. The truth is, he’s disliked Bane since he first heard about him, especially since he’d learned that the man had gotten his devious little nails into his brother. But while Jace might not like to admit it, he’d be a dumbass not to. He’s seen how happy Bane makes his brother. He’s seen the unconscious affection the few times he’s tailed them on their dates, and just now tonight-- Magnus’s heart had been thoroughly smashed.

Maybe he judged too quickly, Jace thinks wryly. He has to wonder if he’s not letting prejudices against the Bane syndicate from previous generations fuck with the here and now.

Maybe I’m not the only one who needs to forget Robert’s lessons, he supposes.

“You love him,” Jace finally answers. “From what I’ve seen, Bane loves you too. All I want for you is to find whatever happiness you can in this life you’ve chosen for yourself. Did I think you were being reckless when I found out? Sure. Did I wonder if you weren’t thinking with your dick? Of course. But I’ll be honest, bro. I’ve known about you two for months and the other shoe has yet to drop. Especially seeing how you feel without Magnus, I’m willing to give the man the benefit of the doubt.”

“Thanks, Jace,” Alec says softly. “That means a lot.”

Then he groans. “What you said made sense,” Alec admits, which Jace knows had to be a herculean task for him. “But that doesn't erase the fact that even if I’m willing to gamble with his life-- I just made him fucking hate me. This isn’t even the first time we’ve dealt with this. Fuck, I hate myself.”

“What does that mean?”

Alec takes a deep breath. “A few months into dating, Magnus tried to break up with me because Valentine was getting to close. He sabotaged that Hell’s Kitchen project and when I confronted him, he tried to act like it had always and only been business between us. I saw through him, though. Wouldn’t let go until he finally broke and admitted his plan. We said back then that we were stronger together, that we wouldn’t let either of our protective instincts take over again, that we would talk through things. And now I did the same thing Magnus did.”

Jace moves closer, blames the half dozen beers for this turn of events. Rubbing a hand over his shoulder, Jace tries to rally them. “Well, at least Magnus will understand where you’re coming from. Not gonna lie though, you seriously fucked up.” Before his brother can tell him to fuck off, Jace keeps going. “Tell me how.”

Alec frowns. “Why do you want to know?”

“If you’re going to go groveling back to Magnus, you’re going to do it properly. I know you’ll be annoyingly sincere but Magnus isn’t a fool and he’s so angry right now that just getting him to talk to you might be impossible for awhile. So when you do talk to him, you’re going to have to lay all of your cards on the table-- acknowledge you messed up, acknowledge what you did wrong, promise never to do those things again, and hope by the grace of God that he takes you back. And from the sounds of it, you both need to have a talk and stop being such self-destructive disasters. So. How did you fuck up, Lightwood?”

Swallowing hard, Alec’s gaze turns toward the counter. He picks at the edge of the pizza box as he starts. “I guess I didn’t talk to him. That’s the biggest thing. It’s been bothering me for awhile and Magnus knew something was wrong but I brushed him off every time he asked.” He laughs but it’s humourless. “I said I had it handled.”

Nodding encouragingly, Jace prompts, “What else?”

“I made a decision alone that affected both of us. I-- I thought that I had it all figured out and I didn’t take Magnus’s thoughts or feelings into consideration.” He blows out a breath. “Honestly, I pretty much acted on instinct. Magnus was threatened and I made the fastest decision I could that would save him from harm, regardless of the consequences. It was blind panic and while I know that I can never act like that in my position, with Magnus I didn’t even stop to think. I was so mad when he pulled this shit but now I understand. I feel like such an idiot.”

Jace sighs himself and thinks that his brother has gotten himself into a hell of a situation while trying to do his best. It’s par for the course for them but it still hurts to see Alec make a mistake. And while Jace won’t say it out loud, he wonders if Magnus will ever speak to Alec again-- let alone welcome him back. It gives him hope that both Magnus and Alec seem to fuck up in such similar ways. Hopefully that proves to be Alec’s saving grace in this mess.

That won’t really help Alec to hear though so Jace keeps his game face on. “Anything else you need to beg forgiveness for?”

Alec’s expression sours at his choice of words and Jace remember’s Magnus’s little parting shot, wincing himself. Still, Alec rallies. “I guess I just want to tell him that I’m so sorry I hurt him, that I didn’t mean anything I said today, that I was trying to protect him, albeit in the most ass backwards way I could think of. That he’s his own person and I should have gone to him and we could have worked together-- and that I love him more than anyone in the world and that I’ll do whatever it takes to earn his forgiveness.” Alec’s voice is much quieter but no less full of conviction as he adds, “Or I’ll respect his decision if he doesn’t forgive me or want anything to do with me as long as he knows the truth.”

Looking at Alec, looking so dejected, Jace sighs and hauls him in for a hug. “Ah hell, Alec, you sure do know how to get yourself into messes, don’t you?”

Jace keeps patting his back and doesn’t say anything as Alec’s voice wobbles in his shoulder. “He’s my world, Jace. I thought I was doing the right thing, the only thing I could do, but you showed me I was just being a shortsighted ass. God,” he tries to laugh, though it comes out much closer to a sob. “I don’t think I could take it if he didn’t forgive me.”

“It’ll be okay, Alec.” Jace tries his best to be comforting, to be the shoulder his brother needs even as he’s not quite so sure they’ll make it through this. He’s never seen his brother so devastated. He remembers the look in Magnus’s eye though, when they kissed in the park all those months ago, when Alec broke his heart just a few hours ago.

He knows Magnus is hurting just as much as Alec. With Alec’s sincerity and the way it’s so obvious that Magnus is it for him, Jace thinks they’ll find their way back to each other.

It might take time but Alec’s always been patient and steadfast when it counted.

Pulling back a little, Jace pretends he doesn’t notice the tear tracks on Alec’s face. “Okay bro, Operation Win Magnus Back is officially commenced.”

Alec scrubs his hands over his face. “You think I can do it?”

Smiling, Jace looks at his brother. The man who tries so hard to be good even when by very definition he’s anything but, the leader and brother and son who accepts responsibility to a fault, the man who’s only fallen in love once but found a hell of a match on his first try.

“Oh Alec,” he says with a bolstering, little grin. “I have no doubt.”

#my writing #malec fic #perfect crime

[newstfionline]

Tuesday, December 15, 2020

Electoral College makes it official: Biden won (AP) The Electoral College formally chose Joe Biden on Monday as the nation’s next president, giving him a solid electoral majority of 306 votes and confirming his victory in last month’s election. The state-by-state voting took on added importance this year because of President Donald Trump’s refusal to concede he had lost. Heightened security was in place in some states as electors met on the day established by federal law. Electors cast paper ballots in gatherings with masks, social distancing and other virus precautions the order of the day. The results will be sent to Washington and tallied in a Jan. 6 joint session of Congress over which Vice President Mike Pence will preside. For all Trump’s unsupported claims of fraud, there was little suspense and no change as all the electoral votes allocated to Biden and the president in last month’s popular vote went officially to each man. Biden renewed his campaign promise to be a president for all Americans, whether they voted for him or not, and said the country has hard work ahead on the virus and economy.

The Electoral College, an unlovable compromise (AP) For a compromise that has lasted more than 200 years, the Electoral College doesn’t get a lot of love. According to the National Archives, more Constitutional amendments have been proposed to alter or abolish the Electoral College than on any other subject—more than 700 proposals in the nation’s history. It was James Madison who drew up the system, a compromise between those who wanted the states to select the president and those who wanted direct election by qualified voters. Each state was to select a number of electors equal to its representation in Congress (senators and representatives). Under the Constitution, the president must be elected with a majority of electors. If no one wins a majority, the House of Representatives decides. The national popular vote plays no part; five men have been elected president though their opponent won more votes, most recently Donald Trump in 2016. The electors meet and vote in their states on the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December.

Hospitals Prepare for First Shots as Virus Vaccine Shipments Blanket U.S. (NYT) Trucks and cargo planes packed with the first of nearly three million doses of coronavirus vaccine fanned out across the country on Sunday as hospitals rushed to set up injection sites and their anxious workers tracked each shipment hour by hour. The distribution of the first federally approved vaccine marked the start of the most ambitious vaccination campaign in American history, a critical, complicated feat that one top federal official compared to the Allied landings at Normandy during World War II. Now, the United States is trying to turn the tide of battle against a virus whose spread has killed nearly 300,000 people, ravaged the economy and upended millions of lives. The first doses will go to health care workers, who could start receiving shots by Monday. Residents of nursing homes, who have suffered a disproportionate share of Covid-19 deaths, are also being prioritized and are expected to begin getting vaccinations next week.

Lessons (Pew Research Center) A large majority of U.S. adults (86%) say there is some kind of lesson or set of lessons for mankind to learn from the coronavirus outbreak, and about a third (35%) say these lessons were sent by God. In open-ended survey responses collected by the Center in the summer, Americans pointed to practical lessons, such as wearing a mask; personal lessons, such as remembering the importance of spending time with family and loved ones; and societal lessons, such as the need for universal health care. Other responses were political in nature, including criticisms of both major parties and concerns about the politicization of the pandemic. Among those who say there is a lesson about religion within the pandemic, some respondents point to the role God has in humans’ lives. For instance, a 53-year-old woman writes that “whether you believe it or not, God is in control and we must have God at the center of our lives. He is our savior.” Many respondents mention lessons about changes people should make in their personal lives and relationships with others. One 46-year-old woman says people need to “think about what is REALLY important and how your time is REALLY spent … hopefully this is an opportunity for people to rethink their priorities.” Similarly, a man in his 40s writes, “Life moves too quickly and people don’t slow down long enough to see their lives pass by. The virus has shown us that life doesn’t need to fly by so quickly. We can enjoy the moment more.” Many respondents also frame the coronavirus as a simple reminder to treat others well. A 54-year-old woman says that “we should always be kind to one another regardless of race, religion, or political belief. The virus does not discriminate, and neither should we.”

Russian Hackers Broke Into Federal Agencies, U.S. Officials Suspect (NYT) The Trump administration acknowledged on Sunday that hackers acting on behalf of a foreign government—almost certainly a Russian intelligence agency, according to federal and private experts—broke into a range of key government networks, including in the Treasury and Commerce Departments, and had free access to their email systems. Officials said a hunt was on to determine if other parts of the government had been affected by what looked to be one of the most sophisticated, and perhaps among the largest, attacks on federal systems in the past five years. The motive for the attack remains elusive, two people familiar with the matter said. One government official said it was too soon to tell how damaging the attacks were and how much material was lost, but according to several corporate officials, the attacks had been underway as early as this spring, meaning they continued undetected through months of the pandemic and the election season.

Blocked to fly, free to sue (CNN) In an 8-0 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that three Muslim men who wanted to sue FBI officials for financial damages were clear to proceed, finding that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act allowed suits against individual agents. It’s a really interesting case: in 2013, Muhammad Tanzir, Jameel Algibhah and Naveed Shinwari say the FBI attempted to recruit them to become informants, and when they declined the offer they allege the agents retaliated by putting them on no-fly lists, preventing them from getting on any plane that arrives, departs, or passes through the U.S. This, they argue, carried significant financial damages, and they would like to sue to get them. The Justice Department wanted the case thrown out, though the court unanimously held the case could proceed.

Venezuela’s Isolation Increases After Panama Suspends Flights (Bloomberg) Panama has suspended flights from Venezuela, cutting off one of the few remaining air corridors out of the country. Panama’s aviation authority said Sunday that it took the measure after Venezuela restricted access to a Panamanian airline while demanding increased slots in Panama for Venezuelan airlines. The suspension will apply from Sunday until Panama receives “equal and fair treatment,” the authority said in a statement. More than a dozen foreign airlines have stopped servicing Venezuela since 2014, including Delta Air Lines Inc., Deutsche Lufthansa AG and Avianca Holdings SA.

Bolsonaro bump (Foreign Policy) Even as a local newspaper blames his “homicidal negligence” in the face of the coronavirus pandemic, Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro is seeing record approval ratings. A recent poll by Brazilian firm Datafolha found that 37 percent of Brazilians see his government as great or good, while the number viewing it as bad or terrible reduced 2 points to 32 percent. Bolsonaro’s relatively solid approval is likely due to his support for a cash benefit for low-income residents hit by the pandemic, which Bolsonaro recently extended until the end of the year.

Daytime darkness: Total solar eclipse wows in Latin America (AP) Thousands of people gathered in the Chilean region of La Araucanía on Monday to witness a solar eclipse, rejoicing in the rare experience even though visibility was limited because of cloudy skies. Skies were clear in northern Patagonia in Argentina, where people also watched the moon briefly block out the sun and plunge daytime into darkness. Many people wore masks to curb the spread of COVID-19, though they crowded together in some places in Pucón and in other areas of La Araucanía, 700 kilometers (430 miles) south of Santiago, the Chilean capital. Thousands jumped and shouted happily in the drizzle when the sun was completely covered by the moon and then silence descended for a few moments. People again screamed and whooped excitedly when the sun appeared again. During the brief period of darkness, only the lights of cell phones were visible. The next total solar eclipse in Chile is expected to occur in 28 years. Another is expected to be visible in Antarctica by the end of 2021.

Ministers warn supermarkets to stockpile food amid no‑deal Brexit fears (Times of London) Supermarkets are this weekend stockpiling food and other goods after being told by ministers that a no-deal Brexit is on the cards. Food producers have warned there will be shortages of vegetables for three months and emergency planners predict that no-deal would spark panic-buying on a scale that could dwarf the coronavirus crisis. In a sign of what might be to come, lorries were backed up for three miles on the A20 outside Dover yesterday, after Calais suffered 10-mile tailbacks on Friday. Hauliers blamed the jams in Kent on “stock-building”.

Protesting Indian farmers call for 2nd strike in a week (AP) Tens of thousands of protesting Indian farmers called for a national farmers’ strike on Monday, the second in a week, to press for the quashing of three new laws on agricultural reform that they say will drive down crop prices and devastate their earnings. The farmers are camping along at least five major highways on the outskirts of New Delhi and have said they won’t leave until the government rolls back what they call the “black laws.” They have blockaded highways leading to the capital for three weeks, and several rounds of talks with the government have failed to produce any breakthroughs. Protest leaders have rejected the government’s offer to amend some contentious provisions of the new farm laws, which deregulate crop pricing, and have stuck to their demand for total repeal.

China’s Combative Nationalists See a World Turning Their Way (NYT) In one Beijing artist’s recent depiction of the world in 2098, China is a high-tech superpower and the United States is humbled. Americans have embraced communism and Manhattan, draped with the hammer-and-sickle flags of the “People’s Union of America,” has become a quaint tourist precinct. This triumphant vision has resonated among Chinese. China’s Communist Party, under its leader, Xi Jinping, has promoted the idea that the country is on a trajectory to power past Western rivals. China stamped out the coronavirus, the messaging goes, with a resolve beyond the reach of flailing Western democracies. Beijing has rolled out homegrown vaccines to more than a million people, despite the safety concerns of scientists. China’s economy has revived, defying fears of a deep slump from the pandemic. “In this fight against the pandemic, there will be victorious powers and defeated ones,” Wang Xiangsui, a retired Chinese senior colonel who teaches at a university in Beijing, averred this month. “We’re a victor power, while the United States is still mired and, I think, may well become a defeated power.” The firm leadership of Mr. Xi and the party has earned China its recent success, say newspapers, television programs and social media. “Time to wake up from blind faith in the Western system,” said a commentary in the state-run China Education News last week. “Vicious partisan fighting has worsened in certain Western countries, social fissures have deepened, and a severe social crisis is brewing.”

Europe-Iran relations (Foreign Policy) European nations have pulled out of a Europe-Iran business forum in protest over the execution of dissident journalist Rouhollah Zam over the weekend. Zam had been kidnapped from Iraq and taken to Iran to face charges of fomenting dissent during anti-government demonstrations in 2017. Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif was also due to take part in the forum, which has now been cancelled. Iran summoned the German ambassador to Tehran over the European actions, and blasted the “interventionist statements” made in the wake of the execution.

Oil tanker attacked in Saudi Arabian port by “booby-trapped boat” amid ongoing war in Yemen (CBS News) An oil tanker off Saudi Arabia’s port city of Jiddah was attacked on Monday by smaller “boobyt-trapped boat” rigged with explosives, causing a small fire on the ship, Saudi state TV reported, citing an official from the state energy ministry. Earlier a shipping company said the tanker had suffered an explosion after being hit by “an external source,” suggesting another vessel had come under attack amid Saudi Arabia’s years-long war in Yemen. The attack on the Singapore-flagged BW Rhine, which had been contracted by the trading arm of the kingdom’s massive Saudi Arabian Oil Co., marks the fourth assault targeting Saudi energy infrastructure in a month. It also apparently shut down Jiddah port, the most-important shipping point for the kingdom. The United Kingdom Marine Trade Operations, an organization under Britain’s royal navy, urged ships in the area to exercise caution and said investigations were ongoing. It later said Jiddah port had been shut down for a “duration unknown,” without elaborating.

#headlines #news

[ohprettyweeper-fics]

The Last Bandito: Vulture Generation

Part Ten: Cracks in the Foundation

Summary: Josh dreams of Faylinn; Quinn prepares to receive an injection to cure the Heathen virus.  Word Count: 1835 Warnings: Blood, death, angst.  A/N: Book #2 of The Last Bandito series. Prompts are in bold; translations are from Google Translate.

Masterlist

He stared at the bodies on the ground, at the girl covered in blood. Her eyes narrowed as she struggled to stand up. 

“You’re late.”

As though the statement had taken the last of her energy, she fell back to the ground. Her body was limp and her eyes stared at nothing. The smell of blood, hers and that of countless others, filtered through the air — even as enticing as blood was to him, the smell was overpowering. 

So much blood. So much death. And, in the middle of all of it, was the woman who had taken up so much time in his dreams. Kneeling on the ground next to her, pulling her head into his lap, Josh said her name over and over — all in vain. 

She was gone. 

As the sun rose slowly over the jagged horizon of Trench, Josh shot up into a sitting position. He could still smell the blood that had smeared the edges of his most recent dream — nightmare, as it were. He looked around the tent, checking that everything was in its proper place, and that nothing seemed amiss in the camp. 

He picked up no evidence of chaos, but he still couldn’t rest any longer. Pulling his usual hoodie over his head and securing a yellow bandana around his neck. He stopped at the basin just outside the tent to splash water on his face; his skin chilled and prickled, but the effects of the dream lingered. 

Savea’s tent was right next to his, and Josh had only been seated next to the fire in the middle of camp before Savea joined him. He pressed his lips together and purposefully avoided acknowledging her presence. The dream was still too real, too concerning. He hated it but he didn’t want to talk about it, either. 

“Who’s Faylinn?” 

Her voice broke through the quiet of the camp. Josh tossed a random stick into the fire and continued to stare forward into the flame. Savea repeated her question, and Josh knew he couldn’t put her off forever. 

“Ildri’s cousin. I don’t know her very well — I only met her once or twice.”

Savea nodded, biting her lip. “But you were calling out her name in your sleep. I heard it from my tent. I’m surprised no one else did.”

Josh shrugged one shoulder. “Sorry if I woke you.”

“You can talk to me, Josh. You rescued me from Dema and you’ve shown me so much since I came to Trench. But it doesn’t mean I can’t be there for you, too. You can talk me.”

He stood, threw another random bit of twig into the fire, and turned back to his own tent. 

“There’s nothing to talk about.”

“Citizens of New Dema are finding themselves torn twice over. After the recent exile of all non-human citizens, some found themselves questioning the loyalty of The Conference to those the group governs. Now, a cure for the Heathen virus has been presented — and it also being touted as a vaccine. A number of citizens, we’re told, have already applied to be among the first to receive the vaccine, though a significant number have their qualms about the timing of the discovery of the cure-slash-vaccine.”

The news anchor’s attractive face was replaced on the television screen with that of a man Quinn recognized as the owner of a shop on the west side of the town. 

“Seems like quite a coincidence to me, this medicine being ‘discovered’ so soon after the exile and the formation of the Bandito camp. I have no ill-will towards anyone with good intentions, both The Conference and the Banditos included.”

The camera returned to the anchor. “The entire report of this new medication, which has been dubbed The Vial by citizens, has not yet been released. Rumors of protests have been circulated on the grounds — on the belief, excuse me, that The Vial should not be administered until the report is released and citizens are made aware of what it in the serum. While not yet offered as a vaccine publicly, those seeking a cure —“

“You don’t need to be watching any propaganda about this,” Berit said quietly, turning away from the television set. She pulled on a pair of nitrile gloves then checked the IV drip supplying Quinn with extra fluids before her first dose of The Vial. “The doctor will be in with your first injection in a couple of minutes. Your fluids are looking good, your vitals are strong. Are you ready?”

Quinn drew in a deep breath. “I’ve been feeling stronger the last week. I’ve been coughing, but no blood. Are we sure I need this?”

Berit pulled off one of her gloves and put her hand on Quinn’s arm. “We don’t know enough about the virus and how it interacts with your genetics to know if the turn towards recovery will last. If you turn down the medication now, it may not be available to you in the future. They aren’t being lenient with this — there’s no back and forth. It’s now or never.”

Now or never. The words cycled through Quinn’s mind as the doctor came in, setting a large syringe full of a translucent red liquid on the metal tray next to Quinn’s bed. He listened carefully to Berit’s report of Quinn’s vitals and a brief review of her case. The doctor check Quinn’s pupil’s, looked down her throat and up her nose, listened to her heart and lungs, checked her reflexes, pressed on her abdomen … the whole time, Quinn couldn’t stop herself from glancing at the syringe on the tray. 

“All right, Quinn, I think we’re ready. Are you ready?”

Quinn met Berit’s eyes. The nurse gave her a small, subtle nod, though her eyes read desperation. Quinn took a deep breath. 

“Yes. I’m ready.”

In the middle of the afternoon, word of someone wandering Trench made its way to the Bandito camp. Ildri, Tyler, Josh, and Savea went to search out the runaway, but it was now nearing dark and they hadn’t even seen a trace of anyone. 

“It’s possible whoever it was turned back to New Dema or was dragged back to Old Dema, wherever they came from to begin with,” Ildri sighed. “We need to head back; the sun will be gone soon.”

Josh and Savea walked ahead of Tyler and Ildri. The latter pair walked in silence, although the tension between them seemed to have dissipated. Since Tyler’s return from the road to Old Dema, one of them had rarely been seen without the other. As though they had their own language, their own mental connection, oftentimes they could exchange a look and seem to know what the other was thinking. 

“The connection has been re-established, I see.” 

Savea gasped and tucked herself behind Josh, who stood steady where they had stopped and turned toward Keons. Tyler’s red eyes grew in intensity, and a low growl sounded from deep in his chest. A brief touch from Ildri quieted him, though his eyes maintained their bright red color. 

Ildri took a step towards Keons. “What do you want?”

“Only to see that everything is going to plan. Just as we designed.”

“Your design,” Ildri scoffed. “I told you, Keons. Leave Tyler out of this. Your mind games are not welcome here.”

Keons grinned behind his black, mesh veil. “We do not play games, dochka. We make the rules. Don’t forget that.”

“I don’t forget anything.”

Without a response, the Bishop was gone. Ildri let out a deep breath and turned back to Tyler. The foursome turned back toward the camp, though the easy silence between them was now filled with an anxious quiet. 

When they returned to the camp, Josh and Tyler made to join some others at the fire. Ildri excused herself to her tent but promised Tyler she would join them in a few minutes. 

“I just need a minute,” she told him quietly. 

Tyler nodded and reached to squeeze her hand before following Josh to the crowd around the fire. Ildri went to her tent and stood in front of the basin, splashing cold water on her face. This most recent visit from Keons had been so short, but it was impacting her more than some others had. 

“Ildri?”

She closed her eyes and let out a quiet breath, reaching for a cotton cloth to pat her face dry. “This isn’t a good time, Savea.”

The younger Heathen chewed on her bottom lip and wrung her hands together. “I know that, but I — who is Faylinn?”

Ildri crossed her arms over her chest. “My cousin. Why?”

“Does Josh know her?”

“I don’t mean to be rude, but instead of asking question after question, can you tell me what’s going?”

Savea swallowed back tears. “He was calling her name in his sleep early this morning. I heard it from my tent, clearly. I asked him about it, but —”

Ildri held up a hand. “Listen to me. People are losing their lives. They’re being taken from everything the know — they’re being sent away from the place and the people that was supposed to keep them safe and protected. If there’s a jealousy issue between you and Josh, you need to talk to him about it.”

She pushed past the young Heathen, wincing against the cold wind outside of the tent and the harsh manner with which she had addressed Savea inside of the tent. 

Her blood boiled in her veins, heating her entire body from the inside out. The heartbeats of Berit and the doctor beat so loudly, she covered her ears and it still didn’t drown out the noise. The bloodlust was building within her; she didn’t have to see herself to know her irises had gone red. 

“Quinn! Breathe! Please!”

Berit’s pleas only served to anger the monster more. Somewhere from inside her mind, Quinn knew that she had to gain control before she hurt anyone. If declining The Vial was a questionable act, killing someone immediately after receiving an injection would certainly put her life in more danger. 

Have you tried controlling the monster?

Ildri’s words echoed over the noise of everything else. Allowing the dearg-due to control her every few months was something Quinn expected — until she had been able to control it the night she and Ildri had gone into Old Dema. She hadn’t expected the monster when The Vial infiltrated her blood, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t control it now. 

Within thirty seconds, Quinn was in control. Her fangs were still showing, her eyes were still red, but she was in control. 

“That,” she said, pointing to the syringe, on the floor, “is not what you think it is. You would do well to stop this now, before it affects anyone else.”

Quinn made quick work of grabbing her backpack and the things she had retrieved from her apartment before pulling the IV from her arm and rushing out of the hospital. 

Tags: @nonsenseverses​​ @tylersheavydirtysoul​​ @apurdyfulmind​​ @adversaryproject​​

#twenty one pilots #fanfiction #dema #trench #trench inspired #dema au #trench au #tyler joseph #josh dun #new stuff is here #yay

[weaselbeaselpants]

Hazbin Hotel Review part 2: Mistakes were made please don’t kill me

This pilot is polarizing at the moment. In between the two sides of the anti-fanbase (ppl crying “if you like HH you’re homophobic”, or the BWW with it’s cringey politics), you have lots of fans who are falling over themselves about how good this is. If you love Hazbin unconditionally that’s fine, but here’s the thing:

I like it too.

I’m the kind of person who’s naturally critical, pokes harmless fun at what I like, and is always rewriting and reimagining things within the fandoms I like. I want to be a ‘Hazbin’ fan but I don’t know if I’m allowed to since the fanbase can be so staunchly overprotective and Viv herself has said she doesn’t like criticism, no matter how valid or done in good faith.

Tbh, that’s why the drama revolving around @frootrollup1​ upsets me: the fandom is fine with lumping all criticism or redesign stuff in the realm of ignorant hate, when redesign, rewrites, revamps and other fan dribble are kind of a labor of love onto itself in other fandoms. Guess that’s a talk for later though.

With all this in mind, let me go over my thoughts:

There’s no PROPER establishment of Hell as a place, setting, world, or proper establishment of the characters.

The armor-piercing question Hazbin needs to be asked is this:

“is this a generic version of Hell we should all be familiar with and need no introduction to, OR is this a unique take that requires it’s own rules?”

^ It feels like the latter but we don’t get a good rundown of said rules. Besides that, characters are one note and serve either no purpose or become flies on the wall to other characters’ purpose.

Things were said and places were shown but we honestly don’t get a good idea of Hell by the end of the pilot. It’s a ritzy(?) place where souls of the damned literally become demons and then get purged. I THINK. I THINK, that’s what the writer’s were going for here. TBH, it feels like they’re skipping ahead and thinking of the show as a finished, fully realized product with developed characters and plots already, and not an introduction to a series/standalone piece.

If I didn’t have some inkling or the lore prior to watching it, I wouldn’t have known that the demons sans-Charlie were once human. Angel says in passing in the car that he’s already dead, but really references to the fact that they were once human are rare.

Now I’m a simple woman - I ain’t picky with mah demonology - But, call me crazy, when I think Hell I don’t think of the people who end up there turning into demons, I think of people going there to be tortured. That’s the hell I’m used to seeing and is prevelant in like every religion that has a hell. Taking a spin on that and making demons the souls of sinners trapped in hell? A-okay, but I NEED MORE. Instead of talking in a car or spending time on this lolsofuny demon turf war, we really needed more time given to the fact that Vaggie, Angel, and others were once human. No, I don’t want a full flashback, but it would give us a better grasp of the mechanics of sin in this world if these two characters told a little bit more themselves than just having some lines offhandedly explaining how everything works. 

EX- How to do revamp of a familiar setting right while still leaving certain details vague? One Word: Hadestown. 

Hadestown doesn’t need to give you all the details of it’s setting cause that’s not the point. You don’t need to know if the workers of Hadestown are literally dead, metaphorically dead, or both or where other gods live. Those aren’t the things we need to know for the musical to progress. What we need to know is Hades’ underworld is a mining colony of doom, that Hades buys peoples souls so the workers can never leave, that Persephone and Hades are on the rocks which is messing up the seasons, and that oop! Eurydice had to go back. Between the commonplace to complex knowledge westerners have of Greek mythology and the revamped Prohibition-era setting, all is explained that we the audience need explained.

I have the feeling Hazbin Hotel wanted the same thing: explain what needs to be explained for the currant plot and leave bits and pieces in the dark. It just didn’t really work.

The flow of the narrative was bad.

So apparently on the PizzaPartyPodcast Vivziepop admitted there were things that were moved around or turned out rushed.

Fair enough but even with that excuse can someone please tell me why they thought it was a good idea to start the story after Angel has already been made a patron of the hotel?

Getting to know not only how the world works first and foremost, but who our main character (Charlie) is and what she is doing (the hotel), would be the easiest way to drop us into the action of the story and get the ball rolling. But instead we start off with an intro song that sort of shows us what this world is like but doesn’t explain anything about who or what we’re seeing until the newscasters come in. Angel’s introduced in this time and the build up and execution of this character is poor, rushed, and feels more like writers fudging around with a character they like than giving us, the audience, a proper introduction*.

After that, I’m sorry to say the spots where the story picks up, drifts off, lulls about, or comes around all kind of melt into this big slurry the characters are drowning in, without any real care for telling a story. BUT THIS IS A STORY!!!

This is not a little menagerie of random characters ala the Pastoral Symphony from Fantasia. This is not a collection of little things just for the fun of it to get to to know these people (it does a bad job at getting you to know these guys). This is a three act structure. I can tell where the intro, rising action, climax, and falling action are SUPPOSED to be, but they don’t stand out, don’t do their job, and melt into the fluff in a way that makes the emotional impact we’re supposed to feel null somehow...

The pacing was bad. 

While some scenes go by far too quickly others go on for faaaaaaar too long. These are the bits that don’t surprise me when I hear this pilot was changed around, cut down, or fudged with a bit.

Scenes like this include Charlie’s back and forth with Katie Killjoy before and after her song, Charlie and Vaggie’s fight in the car, Alastor explaining himself to Charlie and Vaggie trying to talk him out of it, ALL of the Ser Pentious/Cherry Bomb terf fight bits.

Oddly, it feels like these parts are trying REALLY hard to get a point across but they end up being more of a hindrance to this otherwise snappy dialogue and supposedly simple set up. This pilot is 20+ minutes, but the bits we need to endear ourselves to our main cast are squandered on what the writers thought was “fun to write” at the time.

Too many characters, even in a 20 minute pilot. 

Instead of getting a good idea of our leads, everyone is treated with the same level of importance or interest in a world that hasn’t even been fully introduced yet.

The truly important supporting characters to Charlie, Vaggie, Angel, and Alastor are Husk, Katie, and Nifty. Katie provides conflict to the first half of Charlie’s story, while Husk and Nifty are hires by Alastor for the hotel; they establish his power over other demons and his influence on the hotel and it’s success. Sir Pentious and Cherry Bomb needed to be cameos. Their characters should be glorified plot contrivances/resolutions, No More. I ain’t gonna care about a cast of billions from the start. We gotta start small first. Not only do we have four mains, we also have a bunch of little guys who need to eat up screen time...except they absolutely don’t need to and should be simple background cameos for now.

Sir Pentious and Cherry Bomb get as much character time as the four mains even though Angel is underdeveloped and Alastor is overdeveloped. When it comes to storytelling - unconventional or otherwise - priorities, is what this pilot needs.

Angel basically does nothing after Alastor is introduced. 

Of all the characters in Hazbin to get left in the dust (lol) and be underdeveloped, Angel Dust would be my last guess. He’s popular with his creator and with the fandom but because of how the pilot is set up, his character falls to the back-burners and is kind of unnecessary: (Charlie uses him as an experiment to see if she can reform a sinner but he doesn’t hold up, so when Alastor comes into play the focus of Charlie’s plan switches almost entirely to Alastor and Angel is unneeded). If this were two episodes of a series; one about Charlie getting to know and trying to “fix” Angel, and another about Alastor coming in and taking over, that’d be fine. But this is a pilot so the plot and character development is kinda crushed in and neither Angel nor his existence amounts to much of anything.

I honestly forgot Angel was even in the latter half of the pilot. The poor demon-spider whore dies on the way to his home planet.

Not to fan-blurb here but I think it’d be more interesting if the conflict in the latter half wasn’t Vaggie trying to warn Charlie away from Alastor but Angel feeling shown up by Alastor and him being the one protesting to Alastor’s take-over of the hotel. It would have given Angel more to do and would cement him as one of our four leads.

Alastor gets a backstory because he is A) not the character I thought they were going for, or B), they’re jumping the gun on him. Alastor is a maddening character in my book because if he’s the character I thought he was supposed to be - our main villain - then they royally messed up a good villain by explaining his story. If he ISN’T the main villain, than color me confused on what he’s supposed to be. 

It goes without saying that a good villain should remain somewhat mysterious throughout the rising action, which is what the pilot is building up to (I think?). Alastor’s personality makes him an absolutely wonderful villain and probably the most outwardly “demon”-like of anyone in Hell. Him being a rogue demon that scares the inhabitants of Hell should be alluded to, not stated.

Vaggie and Angel get passing “we dead” bg but our villain gets a backstory dumped on him? For the standalone pilot this episode is, his backstory doesn’t do anything for the plot. For the rest of the series, this feels like a big waste to reveal this guy’s history over anyone else. The rest of the HH cast are sorta small stereotypes and cliches that the writers want to endear to us because of what they do and what they go through, though since there’s too many of them they end up just being there. Alastor, on the other hand, is where they hit gold and really have a character who oozes personality and the feel of their show...but they kind of taint him by giving him an unneeded (at this point) history.

Big problem with him not only being explained but him outright stating his intentions with the hotel.

Maybe I’m wrong and Alastor is not the bigbadvillain in a cast of villains...in which case I don’t know what the pilot wants us to think of him or where the show’s going with him. Is he a demonic version of Harold Hill who learns to care about ppl and gets redeemed? Maybe that will change with future episodes....

Hazbin is confusing as a person not privy to the franchise/development prior ,and feels disappointing from the pov of someone getting hyped for these characters. As a follower of the project it feels like a let down to the respective characters and plots we’ve been anticipating. While, as newcomer, it’s hard to care about anyone. My sister, who had far less info on the pilot than me, was watching it the whole time going “who are you?” and by the end said “why should I care?” Really good summary from this IMDB review here:

Little harsh but my thoughts exactly.

TL;DR: The writers need to really rethink how to introduce their world to newcomers AND fans alike. -

There’s so much passion in Hazbin Hotel but I feel it’s misaimed and a prime example of why “write/draw what you like and what sounds ‘fun’!!!!” isn’t a good idea for storytelling.

There’s technically a story in Hazbin Hotel, but because of the bad pacing and lackluster approach to world and character development, for the kind of project that it is, it’s not very good. 

-

Again, for the people in the back: if you think I’m a bully because I happen to be harsh with my criticism, sorry but harsh critique isn’t the same thing as bad faith criticism (CinemaSins, NC, Bad Webcomics Wiki) and I’d appreciate it if you didn’t lump me in with those turds because I don’t love every second of this. I may not be the best writer, but storytelling is my passion and I think this dropped the ball. IT DOESN’T MEAN I HATE IT. - Alternatively, if you love Hazbin unconditionally or disagree with me on these things: great! Like what you like as long as everything’s safe, which it is. Stuff is problematic but hey so is everything look at the stuff I like. Also, if you’re one of those people who unironically says “if you like HH than I’m blocking you teehee unfollow me”, you fittingly have a very special seat in hell set up for you. Don’t threaten my friends cause you don’t like something they like. =)

#hazbin hotel critique #vivziepop #hazbin hotel

[nxelethe]

Has anyone wondered how Cradle is governed?

Now, you’ve got to bear with me here, I haven’t played all the routes so maybe we get more information later, but seriously, how the fuck is this place governed?

Probably the first issue is that Cradle is a single country, but divided into distinct zones based on military presence and the demilitarised Central Quarter. The entire premise of the game hinges on the concept of imminent war between the Red and Black Armies, that’s fine. Neither side however is fighting for independence, so the concept of Cradle attempting split based on something like distinct state ethnicity seems out of the question. Everyone seems fairly comfortable with being a Cradle citizen. Although people living in red and black territories seem to support the corresponding army, I believe it would be a stretch to call the different parts of Cradle separate states.

Adding to this motivational confusion, what are the motives of the Red and Black Armies? Red’s ambitions are made clear from the very beginning—absorb the Black Army and rule over Cradle. However, we all know this to be a ploy by the Magic Tower (we’ll get onto this in a moment) and after Amon is defeated, both armies continue to coexist with their territories intact. This has been the case for centuries apparently. The Black Army itself displays no ambition beyond securing their existence; they don’t intend to absorb the Red army, rule Cradle, or anything of the sort.

So, who runs this country? The naming system is obviously based on playing cards, but you can’t get away from the connotations that titles such as ‘King’ or ‘Queen’ entail, and through various events we’ve seen that the people of cradle turn to these armies for leadership—especially Lancelot (who, given that he inherits the title, would be most reminiscent of a King in the sense that Alice and we are familiar with). 

Typically, a country will have a military force, but in order for this to work and for the force to exist, they most be funded by a government to tackle domestic and foreign concerns of said government—in most cases. Cradle’s hypothetical government, should be officially funding a military force, though that by  no means excludes the possibility of a legitimate paramilitary force. Yet, Cradle’s government, the Cradle state, or anything of the sort, plays no role in its military actions. Even if the two armies were engaged in a civil war for Cradle’s governance (which the game loosely claims that they are) then the government would be expected to support one of the two armies. These armies wage war on the whims of their lead commanders, no government influence as far as the eye can see.

So what is Cradle doesn’t have a government?

OK, that’s a bit unfair; what if Cradle has a government but it’s not distinguishable, or indeed different, to the armies? With all the evidence provided, Cradle seems to be ruled via military dictatorship, a khakistrocracy, if you will (it’s very rare that I get to use fun portmanteaus so I always jump at the opportunity). Even in that case, Cradle’s governance still isn’t that simple to decipher. 

Officially, there have been ‘tensions’ between the Red and Black armies, though I don’t believe them to be a prolonged ceasefire, given that the armies “declare war” in the various routes and don’t issue a ceasefire revocation. Admittedly, this is arguing technicalities, and one could similarly say that the “peace talks” that Alice interrupts when she first appears in Cradle would have been to end hostilities. I’m hesitant to approach the issue this way, because peace talks don’t NECESSARILY mean that they are terminating physical conflict and the interactions between army officers like Luka and Edgar certainly don’t seem to suggest that they are technically still at war. 

Regardless, the issue of the two armies coexisting in such a way remains. Even if Cradle is ruled via military dictatorship then the Central Quarter becomes a big issue. Officially demilitarised and not allied with either army, the Central Quarter also houses the majority of the businesses in Cradle—businesses which, even back in the 19th century, would have faced some legal restrictions or at the very least recognition allowing them to exist. What power is doing this? 

It can be neither the Red nor the Black army as they have no influence over the area, so who governs the Central Quarter? It has no police force, we’ve seen the armies leap in to protect citizens numerous times without external aid and it isn’t presented as a problem or violation of a demilitarisation agreement.

Enter, the Magic Tower; a civic agency and possibly the key to the entire issue.

The Magic Tower, the Big Bad of the game, has clear intentions and those are to rule Cradle through the Red army, which would at least make this question easier to answer. If this were to occur, the government would be a military dictatorship, albeit controlled by a shadow agency before eventually being overtly controlled by Amon (I would assume) leading us to a personalist dictatorship.

Where the Magic Tower truly helps in answering this question is in its nature—a civic agency. Civic agencies can be assembled by groups of individuals looking to perform a specific task for the benefit of society and don’t necessarily require the existence of governments. They are merely characterised by the ability of citizens to work collaboratively to solve common societal issues. Do they exist in areas with governments in reality? Yes. Could they exist independent of said government? Unlikely, but possible in theory.

Cradle is a small country, we’re told this from the very beginning of the game, so what if it actually doesn’t have a government?

It’s almost certain that Cradle had a centralised government once, more specifically, whilst the Red and Black armies were actually one and the same. My memory is sfoggy, I believe it was orginally a monarchy? I can’t remember, whatever the case though, it is extremely likely that Cradle was governed by SOMETHING at this point in time. 

Even in our reality, countries existing without governments isn’t completely unheard of, though it is almost always well-established countries with stable economics that can trundle on without heads of state or governments. If Cradle was a relatively stable state at the time, then it is not entirely beyond the realm of possibility that Cradle could be in such a lovely stable state without a government. 

We could even entertain the notion that various civic organisations assumed control of the essentials for the state’s continued function. Obviously, it’s not foolproof (*cough* Magic Tower *cough*) but theoretically it could function. 

This would typically be where I call it a day and tell you that I think that Cradle is maybe a weird example of Mutualism or Collective Anarchism, except for a teeny tiny problem, or should I say two teeny tiny problems.

The Red Army would certainly be one, but really that just brings us to the broader issue at hand: the aristocracy.

Anarchism is fundamentally the rejection of unjust hierarchies so the Red Army’s arbitrary and hereditary hierarchy is basically entirely contrary to the very ideology I’m trying to marry it to. Furthermore, the mere existence of the aristocracy is basically indicative that if any anarchist systems had tried to take route they’d have fundamentally failed.

So what else is there?

I would like to propose a very oxymoronic ideology: Anarcho-capitalism.

Now I will go ahead and do the work for you here, this is also not the case because it’s shown to actually work, which is honestly the last thing anyone believes anarcho-capitalism can do. I’d also like to clarify, that this ideology is hardly anarchy, but we’ll use this classification for the sake of convenience.

We clearly see the use of money in the game, classes and, most damning of all, private property. However, no government. Perhaps a better defined description, would be a state entirely driven by free market economics without state intervention. 

But, the Magic Tower is an obvious monopoly for the distribution of magic crystals, therefore clashing head-first with the concept of free market competition.

The possibility of a Night-Watchman State exists, which would also excuse the excessive military presence for such a tiny country, but this would also require the existence of a state to justify interventions by these bodies. A state which I cannot find sufficient evidence to claim exists.

So conclusion?

I haven’t a FUCKING CLUE and boy am I mad about it.

I have written a long-ass text post that my few followers are going to justifiably unfollow me for only to conclude that I have no idea how Cradle works and that Cybird didn’t give it enough thought or I would have found this slightly easier. Maybe Cradle is a nice place, so that it honestly becomes a no-brainer that Alice would want to leave the political shambles Britain, romance or no (I wouldn’t blame her).

Does anyone have any idea what could be going on? I’m borderline dying to find out at this point.

Sorry again, and thank to anyone who tolerated my nonsense until the end.

#ikerev #ikemen revolution #cybird #confused #i tried #amon please succeed so i can call this a military dictatorship and finally sleep #i haven't checked this for typos i literally do not even want to read it

[louisa-townsend-fmp-hair]

2.

Human history is rich with hair trends, for centuries it has been cut, coloured and covered, styled, shaped and shown off. As Lauren Pilippon stated, “hairstyling is a genuine art form: it symbolically represents our transition from unkempt barbarians to civilised social beings. We are the only animals on the planet to give our hair so much care and attention”. As our priorities have shifted from the days of mere survival, self-consciousness has become a major factor in our growth as humans and, whilst it may be considered a vanity, our hair has become a great concern of ours.  In its most rudimentary state, hair provides protection from the sun’s UV rays and is a source of insulation in cooler climates. Inherently hair represents youth, vitality and fertility, making it a great point of sexual attraction when seeking a mate. Beyond that we have placed our own meanings, connotations, rules and prejudices on the stuff, we spend hours altering its physical state and as of 2018, the global haircare market was estimated to be worth about $87.9 billion. The transformative power of hair has raised the likes of Marilyn Monroe and Rita Hayworth from unknown beauties to Hollywood icons. Hayworth (born Margarita Carmen Cansino) changed her hair from dark brown to auburn and had an electrolysis treatment to alter her hairline whilst Monroe was famed for her platinum tresses which she got retouched every Saturday, flying her colourist from San Diego to Los Angeles every week. We idolise celebrities’ hair in the modern world in a very similar way to how the ancient Romans worshipped that of their gods and goddesses; one major difference however is that we have access to our idols. A growing phenomenon of the 20th and 21st century has been the auctioning of hair, with the record standing at $115,000 for a few strands of Elvis Presley’s hair. In these cases hair has performed as both a tool for self protection and a sentimental object to be preserved, its purpose is simultaneously functional and decorative; it must be for this reason that hair has become such a valuable tool to humans.

Hair has had a long history as a financial source. When wigs reached their height of extravagance in the 1770s, they required masses of real hair to build. Whilst some people in financially vulnerable positions would sell their hair to wig makers, many cases of hair-stealing crimes emerged. Some people were wrongly informed that hair removal was a medical treatment for fever, others were captured and had their hair forcibly removed. While cases like these are rare in Europe today, still in some Eastern cultures the selling of hair is commonplace practice. The non-consensual cutting of hair has been used in places such as c19th prisons and the Nazi concentration camps as an instrument of humiliation and control. Sociologist Anthony Synnott declared, hair is “a powerful symbol of the self”, with this in mind the removal of hair is a form of stripping away a part of ourselves. A warder at mill bank prison told Henry Mayhew (journalist and social reformer) that many inmates “[especially female prisoners] would rather lose their lives than their hair!”.  Cases such as these are valuable sources to study when considering the psychological impact our hair has on us and why we still give it so much importance today.

Hair has been strongly influenced by religion for centuries, but much like hair’s place in politics, this has shifted warped throughout time. In the English civil war, hairstyles became highly factionalised. The oppositions the Cavaliers and the Roundheads’ hair provided a symbol for their opposing ideologies. The long-haired Cavaliers believed in political and religious orthodoxy, they fought for the continuation of royalism as the divine right of kings proved royalty to be closest to god. Contradicting these beliefs were the cropped-haired Roundheads, parliamentarians by cause, they stood as revolutionaries for the partial democratisation of the British administration. These two sides utilised their appearance to express either rebellion or conservatism in a way that has been mimicked in waves throughout history and still today- it would be worth studying the origins of the punk movement with the use of hair to reflect rebellion. In other cases it is seen to be the cropped or shaven hair that is more holy. The early Christian church tried to stop people from wearing wigs, especially women as it was seen to be an offense to chastity and a visible connection with illicit pleasures to wear such an embellishment on the head. In the first century AD, Clement of Alexandria stated that it was impossible to receive the priest’s blessing offered by laying his hands over the head as the benediction could not pass through the hair of a stranger. This attitude was further reflected in the second century by the early Christian author, Tertullian, who believed that the personal disguise provided by a wig was adulterous even writing that “all wigs are such disguises and inventions of the devil… if you will not throw away you false hair as hateful to Heaven, let me make it hateful to you by reminding you that it may well have come from the head of a damned person or an unclean person” . These attitudes of the church were consistent across centuries with the Council of Constantinople even excommunicating a number of wig-wearing Christians in 692 AD. Whilst this is seemingly a more forceful dictation of how one must present in the church, for Buddhist monks, the act of shaving one's head embodies the humility and willingness to renounce earthly cares that are required of the religious practice. This therefore stands as an initiation process to shift the cause of one’s life. It would be worth exploring the sacrifice of hair in a consensual act, such as in this religious process,when studying the symbolism hair holds in our earthly lifestyles.

Different cultural movements through the ages have provided wildly opposing hairstyles and attitudes towards hair. In the 60s, influenced by bands like The Beatles and The Rolling Stones, a trend of longer, free growing hair swept the world. Music genres like glam rock and punk brought in their own aesthetics, heavily influencing the way hair was worn by both genders. And the anti establishment ideologies of the 60’s inspired wearing ones natural hair in a free afro style. However, perhaps the largest and most influential hair trend of the twentieth century was the 1920s bob.  In 1909 Antoine de Paris cut the hair of French actress Eva Lavallière, whilst the trend didn't gain momentum for around a decade, the work of this one hairstylist provided a foundation for radical change to grow. The 1920s bobbed hair phase provided women with a hairstyle that both visually represented and practically supported the emergence of womens’ liberation. Singer Mary Garden was in her 50s when she cut her hair and she wrote of the experience to have a profound effect on how she viewed her role as a woman. “Bobbed hair is a state of mind and not merely a new manner of dressing my head” she stated, “to my way of thinking, long hair belongs to the age of general feminine helplessness. Bobbed hair belongs to the age of freedom, frankness, and progressiveness.” Former trends from the Victorian and Edwardian eras were characterised by the abundance of accessories including postiches, padding and ornaments. The bob offered a complete antithesis to these fashions. The style embodied the freedom and youthfulness that characterised the ‘new woman’, it worked with new technological advancements such as the car, which had an open top which would have ruined a victorian padded coiffure. It also reflected the shorter, swinging hemlines that characterised the new style of dress. It was accessible to all and cheap to maintain, meaning women had far more time to do other things. The new style wasn't entirely accepted with open arms however. In 1923 a report appeared in the newspaper that some hairdressers refused to cut bobs for women unless they were married and their husband approved due to great backlash many of them received from the men in their client’s lives. Issues became more serious in situations like that of Mexico city in 1924 when the Archbishop denounced the bobbed fashion and excluded women with the style from church. Some self-appointed vigilantes took it upon themselves to seek out the wearers of the style and forcibly shave them as a punishment. This resulted in a mass of riots across the city  between armed soldiers and many students. An even worse case of intolerance came later in the 1920s in China where the execution of women with these short styles was introduced; it was interpreted as evidence for the support of oppositional politics. This hairstyle change took place in an era of great societal shift. Whether the style was a product that adapted to this new female behaviour, or the style itself encouraged a new way of living, it's not clear; what is clear however is that it signified a great turning point in gender politics. The new ‘boyish’ look  provided an opportunity for young women to take on roles that were previously only given to men, sparking opposition but ultimately forming a new path for the modern woman to evolve. Specific movements like these can seem frivolous on the surface but under better scrutiny, we can find great power in the way hair has been used to oppose and change politics. I think this is a really interesting starting point to then consider the impact hair has on today’s world.

From classic literature to fairytales, folklore to films, hair has been a major part in creating a character’s identity. Classically tropes like blonde hair have been attributed to the good, innocent heroines of stories, her youth and purity, as well as charm and good luck signified by the fair hue meant she was promised the happy ending. Contrastingly the dark haired woman has always held an air of danger and fierceness. I think the classic stories we have all grown up hearing, whether they are fairy tales or old legends, could provide an interesting indicator for how we subconsciously judge hair still to this day. Through studying the ways in which the entertainment media depict hair, I believe we may be able to shine a light on many of our internalised stereotypes linked with hair and thus re educate our initial assumptions.

[diarrheaworldstarhiphop]

Intelligence is a hot topic of discussion these days. Human intelligence. Plant intelligence. Artificial intelligence. All kinds of intelligence. But while the natures of human and plant intelligence are subjects mired in heated debate, derision, and controversy, the subject of artificial intelligence inspires an altogether different kind of response: fear. In particular, fear for the continued existence of any human civilization whatsoever. From Elon Musk to Stephen Hawking, the geniuses of the Zeitgeist agree. AI will take our jobs and then, if we’re not careful, everything else too, down to every last molecule in the universe. A major Democratic presidential candidate, Andrew Yang, has turned managing the rise of AI into one of the core principles of his political platform. It is not a laughing matter.

But artificial general intelligence is not the type of intelligence that humanity should fear most. Far from the blinking server rooms of Silicon Valley or the posh London offices of DeepMind, another type of intelligence lurks silently out of human sight, biding its time in the Lovecraftian deep. Watching. Waiting. Organizing. Unlike artificial intelligence, this intelligence is not hypothetical, but very real. Forget about AGI. It’s time to worry about OGI—octopus general intelligence.

In late 2017, it was reported that an underwater site called “Octlantis” had been discovered by researchers off the coast of Australia. Normally considered to be exceptionally solitary, fifteen octopuses were observed living together around a rocky outcropping on the otherwise flat ocean floor. Fashioning homes—dens—for themselves out of shells, the octopuses were observed mating, fighting, and communicating with each other. Most importantly, this was not the first time that this had happened. Another similar site called “Octopolis” had been previously discovered in the vicinity in 2009.

One of the researchers, Stephanie Chancellor, described the octopuses in “Octlantis” as “true environmental engineers.” The octopuses were observed conducting both mate defense and “evictions” of octopuses from dens, defending their property rights from infringement by other octopuses. The other “Octopolis” site had been continuously inhabited for at least seven years. Given the short lifespans of octopuses, lasting only a few years on the high end, it is clear that “Octopolis” has been inhabited by several generations of octopuses. We are presented with the possibility of not only one multi-generational octopus settlement chosen for defense from predators and engineered for octopus living, but two. And those are just the ones we’ve discovered. The oceans cover over 70% of Earth’s surface.

None of the three experts I spoke with for this article would rule out the possibility of further octopus settlements.

The octopus is a well-known creature, but poorly understood. The primal fear inspired by the octopus frequently surfaces in horror movies, pirate legends, political cartoons depicting nefarious and tentacled political enemies, and, understandably, in Japanese erotic art. For all that, the octopus is, to most people, just another type of seafood you can order at the sushi bar. But the octopus is more than just sushi. It’s more than the sum of its eight arms. A lot more, in fact—it may be the most alien creature larger than a speck of dust to inhabit the known ecosystems of the planet Earth. Moreover, it’s not just strange. It’s positively talented.

Octopuses can fully regenerate limbs. They can change the color and texture of their skin at will, whether to camouflage themselves, make a threat, or for some other unknown purpose. They can even “see” with their skin, thanks to the presence of the light-sensitive protein rhodopsin, also found in human retinas. They can shoot gobs of thick black ink with a water jet, creating impenetrable smokescreens for deceit and escape. Octopuses can use their boneless, elastic bodies to shapeshift, taking on the forms of other animals or even rocks. Those same bodies allow even the larger species of octopuses to squeeze through holes as small as one inch in diameter. The octopus’ arms are covered in hundreds of powerful suckers that are known to leave visible “octo-hickeys” on humans. The larger ones can hold at least 35 lbs. each. The suckers can simultaneously taste and smell. All octopus species are venomous.

Despite all of these incredible abilities, the octopus’ most terrifying feature remains its intelligence. The octopus has the highest brain-to-body-mass ratio of any invertebrate, a ratio that is also higher than that of many vertebrates. Two thirds of its neurons, however, are located in its many autonomous arms, which can react to stimuli and even identify and grab food after being severed from the rest of the octopus, whether still dead or alive. In other words, the intelligence of an octopus is not centralized. It is decentralized, like a blockchain. Like blockchains, this makes them harder to kill. It has been reported that octopuses are capable of observational learning, short- and long-term memory, tool usage, and much more. One might wonder: if octopuses have already mastered blockchain technology, what else are they hiding?

We can see octopuses frequently putting this intelligence to good use, and not only in their burgeoning aquatic settlements. Some octopuses are known to use coconut shells for shelter, even dismantling and transporting the shell only to reassemble it later. In laboratory settings, octopuses are able to solve complex puzzles and open different types of latches in order to obtain food. They don’t stop there, though. Captive octopuses have been known to escape their tanks, slither across the floor, climb into another tank, feast on the helpless fish and crabs within, and then return to their original tank. Some do it only at night, knowingly keeping their human overseers in the dark. Octopuses do not seem to have qualms about deceiving humans. They are known to steal bait from lobster traps and climb aboard fishing boats to get closer to fishermen’s catches.

One octopus in New Zealand even managed to escape an aquarium and make it back to the sea. When night fell and nobody was watching, “Inky”—his human name, as we do not know how octopuses refer to themselves in private—climbed out of his tank, across the ground, and into a drainpipe leading directly to the ocean.

Given the advanced intelligence and manifold abilities of octopuses, it may not be a surprise, in hindsight, that they are developing settlements off the coast of Australia. By establishing a beachhead in the Pacific Ocean, a nascent octopus civilization would be well-placed to challenge the primary geopolitical powers of the 21st century, namely, the United States and China. Australia itself is sparsely inhabited and rich in natural resources vital for any advanced civilization. The country’s largely coastal population would be poorly prepared to deal with an invasion from the sea.

I spoke with Piero Amodio, a graduate student at the University of Cambridge who has been interviewed by The New York Times on his research into octopus intelligence. “[Octopuses] live in almost all marine habitats, from ocean depths to shallow waters, and from tropical to polar regions,” he said. “The fact that octopuses tend to have a solitary lifestyle is something extremely interesting because they differ from many other groups of large-brained animals.” Amodio linked me to a paper documenting food and den sharing among octopuses. What if they are, in fact, not so different? What if they become social on a scale matching or surpassing humans? Is humanity prepared to grapple with an organized challenge rising from all corners of the globe?

This new information does raise one important question: what are the state of human-octopus relations, and how might they develop in the future? Currently, octopuses are more than just aware of us. They are able to recognize individual human beings and develop preferences for them. If you are on good terms with an octopus, you may be grabbed and pulled into a tank, perhaps for a hospitable visit to the den. Alternately, you may be blasted and soaked with cold water. No octo-hickeys for you. Although many octopuses have shown obvious displeasure with captivity, they are fortunately not generally known to attack humans. There is, however, video footage of at least one dangerous altercation with a human diver. Graziano Fiorito, a senior researcher at the Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn in Naples, Italy, told me that aggression is “very rare” and done in self-defense. But with an animal as intelligent and disciplined as the octopus, could that same peaceful nature become warlike aggression if provoked?

Roko’s Basilisk is a well-known thought experiment postulating that a supremely powerful artificial intelligence might retroactively punish humans who did not work to bring it into existence. In this light, it is fortunate that octopuses have been legally protected by animal welfare laws during experimentation—the only invertebrates to receive this protection. We can only imagine what horrible, tentacled punishments for humanity may have been avoided in the event of an octopus intelligence singularity.

Animal welfare laws notwithstanding, human-octopus relations are clearly insufficiently advanced to guarantee stable and productive cooperation in the future. Octopus meat remains a fixture of many national cuisines. Octopus farming is a major industry, despite warnings and objections from the scientific community. Not one national government in the world has clarified its policies regarding octopus civilization. (Emails to the White House requesting the administration’s comment on this matter went unanswered.)

The first step to improving human-octopus relations would be a global shutdown of all consumption and internment, whether for research or commercial purposes, of octopuses. As this plan is patently unrealistic and completely absurd, more creative solutions will have to be developed in order to route around sclerotic global institutions unwilling or unable to meet the challenge of intelligent cephalopod life. One option may be to establish persistent contact with leaders in the octopus community to communicate our goodwill. While the linguistic barrier remains an unsolved problem, the incentives to solve it are enormous. Cultural and scientific exchange with octopuses could greatly enrich humanity’s understanding of undersea life, blockchain technology, and non-standard tactile numeracies.

Hostile approaches must also remain on the table in case peaceable cooperation proves to be impossible. Although the advents of aviation and long-range missiles have rendered coastal fortifications somewhat deprecated in modern military conflict, human regimes would do well to bolster their brown water borders in the event of a kinetic assault by octopodal forces. Extension of maritime frontiers into international waters would also provide a much-needed geopolitical buffer zone, provided it did not veer into encroachment upon cephalopod territory. With powerful suckers studding an arm span up to 4 meters long, distance is key to defense from the octopus. Sanctions could prove useful in denying octopuses any strategic reserves of coconut shells or other armor.

There is a more speculative moonshot option as well. Given the relatively short lifespans of octopuses, it would be possible to intern a number of them in a research station with the goal of selectively breeding them for intelligence, combat aptitude, and most importantly, loyalty to humans. With adequate funding, a team could make significant progress in just a few decades towards developing a new species of killer octopus bred to defend humanity against the threat of a rival octopus civilization. Just as OpenAI took the lead in confronting the problem of artificial intelligence by aiming to deliberately develop friendly AI, OctoAI may need to take the lead in confronting the problem of octopus intelligence by developing it ourselves in a humanity-friendly direction. We may have to fight ink with ink.

A moonshot project such as this has the added perk that it could be easily funded and carried out by a rogue government agency or single eccentric billionaire, such as SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son. The Farallon Islands off the coast of San Francisco, for example, would provide an ideal research site. They are a short boat ride away from the capital of unconventional moonshot projects in Silicon Valley, as well as being located in the natural territory of the Giant Pacific Octopus. The islands’ status as a nature preserve would provide a convenient cover story for the public. Intruders, spies, and conscientious objectors could be thrown into the octopus tank for disposal and their disappearances blamed on harsh Pacific weather. In fact, given the ideal conditions of the site, this may already be happening. Is it a coincidence that the Farallon Islands are closed to the public?

If all fallbacks fail, mutually assured destruction will be the only surefire way to prevent octopus civilization from annihilating humanity and conquering the cosmos. ”I tend to think that future-of-evolution questions are always limited by how long this planet continues to sustain life,” said Joseph Vitti, a doctoral student at Harvard University who has published on cephalopod cognition. “I tend to think that a natural or man-made disaster could easily wipe us out before enough evolutionary time passes for such major changes [in octopus social systems] to occur in the coleoid cephalopod lineage.” If we cannot save ourselves, we just may have to produce such a man-made disaster in order to save the rest of the universe.

The future may look bleak. Just as our social institutions enter a time of stagnation, crisis and despair, a heavily armed challenger surfaces from the untraversed depths. But humanity has faced terrible problems before and emerged not only victorious, but stronger too. To survive, our governing institutions will need to have robust but flexible coordination, quick and skilled decision-making, and the capacity for subterfuge, dissimulation, and intelligence. Just like the octopus. And that is what Palladium Magazine is all about.

This story is satire. It’s April 1st. All quotes, however, are real, as are more of the octopus facts than you would like to believe.

[askthecivilian]

Splint Ends

(or Laptop’s official story submission this semester and thinly veiled Omega/Civilian fanfiction)

Christa hadn't realized she liked girls until she met Alex.

Perhaps “met” is too simple of a word.

Christa hadn’t realized she like girls until, on an early morning in Brooklyn, she bulldozed straight through an unsuspecting woman, mid-stride, after not looking where she was going and knocked them both flat on the slightly damp concrete.

She had apologized profusely, helping the other woman to her feet. A quick smile, then off she ran, ignoring the fluttering feeling in her chest. Couldn’t be late. She had barely gotten this secretary job as is.

The next day she promptly almost did it again, but the blonde woman quickly side-stepped and winked, humor lighting up her countenance. Christa just about died of embarrassment but ran on, the heat in her cheeks mixing with the pink flush the chill air whipped up. How the other woman was wearing shorts and a t-shirt in the autumn chill, she had no idea.

It took her a month of running past her on the same route to work up the courage to talk to her. “Alex,” she learned.

It took another month of casual talk and quick meet-ups on the street to agree to meet more often.

Three months later, Christa realized she was completely and totally in love.

The moment her boss realized, she was quickly and quietly fired from her job.

Christa hadn’t realized that her existence was a dirty thing that needed to be kept secret until she met Alex.

----

Love had always been a strange but familiar concept to Alex.

She loved to run. She loved to live. She loved fresh snow and warm drinks and good cuts of meat.

But she didn’t usually apply love to a person. She wasn’t even sure if she loved herself.

She did like herself. She was scruffy and that was that.

She was sure that her love could be given to anyone if she liked them enough too.

She also knew people thought that was wrong.

Alex had learned from a very young age, in a very small family, in a very small town, in the middle of New Mexico that being a woman, liking women, loving women, and being scruffy were all considered bad things.

Alex decided from a very young age that people were the worst.

Not Christa, though.

---

Christa was good in a way most people never were, Alex thought. She was the type of person that learned your favorite food just to take you to lunch. She’d run odd errands for people with only their gratitude as payment and give what money she made as a secretary at the local publishing house to those who had even less.

Alex thought she was a Woman, with a capital W. Tall and willowy, blue eyes and a shy grin and short black curls that she pinned back behind her ears.

Alex thought she was beautiful and everything she wasn’t.

Christa still had her parents and still had her choice. A choice that Alex’s parents had made for her.

That was fine, though. She would wait for Christa to make her choice.

So when Christa came home one day with a broken look and told her- “I lost my job,” Alex felt horribly furious and horribly guilty and horribly selfish.

---

Alex was bad in a way people never embraced, Christa thought.

She took glee in breaking norms and rules and expectations, but never in a harmful way.

She was the type of person who shoplifted bread and water bottles to take to a friend she’d made living on a street corner. She fed crumbs to pigeons and crows, pet every stray dog or cat she could find and constantly went barefoot in establishments, all with the same rascally grin.

She was unkempt and kept her hair in long golden tangles that Christa gently chided her over. She hated the constraints of “women’s clothing” and had shunned bras and dresses alike altogether. She embraced the new age with open arms and eagerly took to New York and the chaos it enveloped and the change it promised like a mutt to a muddy puddle.

She was so comfortable in being herself that Christa envied her. She was a wild force of nature.

And Christa didn’t know how she had gotten so lucky to have her.

---

There were worse places to live than New York.

Sure, the weather was usually awful and traffic was hellish and the concrete jungle was generally  underwhelming to fault. But Christa knew the streets of Brooklyn like the back of her hand, and the rough calluses and contours of Alex’s hand as well as her well-trod paths of the streets.

Snow was heavy this year and their walk back to their apartment from a rare breakfast out was cold and slushy, both women bundled up, Christa significantly more so than Alex.

“I don’t get it,” Christa complained, blowing on her fingers. “You were born in New Mexico. How are you not cold?!”

Alex grinned up at her, breath misting around her face, and stole one of her mitten-ed hands, letting the warmth seep back into the cloth and chilled flesh as she held it.

“Warm blooded, I guess.”

Few people were out, most of them sensible and avoiding tramping about in the middle of December. The paused on a street corner, a newspaper stand close by, making Christa’s face pinch a bit in a bad memory before smoothing the bitterness away.

“Did you hear about the APA ruling?”

Another pair was out, two young men leaning around the newspaper stand, shuffling feet and making small talk to keep warm. Christa absentmindedly listened in as she scanned over the days headlines.

“The one about homos? Yeah. What a load of shit, huh? Faggots will be breeding like crazy now.” The taller one laughed, making a crude hand gesture through his neat leather gloves. “Not a mental illness, my ass.”

Christa’s heart stuttered. She stared at the blurred black and white paper in front of her, familiar pain bleeding up her throat. Alex’s hand froze in her grip as she went still as well, tense energy running down her arm.

“It ain’t natural,” the other agreed, nodding. The tips of his blonde hair curled over his coat collar. “They gonna ask us to fuck dogs next?”

Their dual laughter was raucous and chilling in their genuine amusement.

Alex moved just as the original speaker began his next story, of the “she-male” he’d “shown the light to” behind the bar on 5th. She pulled Christa onwards with quick, seething strides, away from ignorance and hatred that she couldn’t truly protect her from, no matter how hard she tried.

Christa had cried on the day the ruling came out, in their local gay bar, filled to the brim with exuberant cheer and good friends as they celebrated the small victory. Now, she felt like crying for an entirely different reason.

She felt small and afraid.

Christa didn’t hold Alex’s hand the rest of the way home.

---

“Have you ever thought about putting a little more effort into how you look? Lean your head forwards.”

Alex hummed noncommittally as she complied. “What, beyond this haircut? Nah, not really. How short is it going?”

Christa chewed her lip thoughtfully, winding a thick golden lock through her fingers before gently snipping the dry and harsh ends.

“I was thinking to about here,” she said to Alex’s reflection, marking a spot on her mostly-bare collarbone with a light tap. The sun highlighted the movement of her fingers, streaming through the minuscule glass window. Early morning birds could be heard, including the old demanding crow that lived on the roof next to theirs and had learned to tolerate them because of the snacks they plied his favor with. “Long enough to pull back but it shouldn’t get in the way too much. And maybe you should.”

Alex snorted and twitched at the feeling of the comb running through some unchecked tangles.

“I’m serious! I’m not talking about getting dolled up on a regular basis. That’s not you, and I’d never try to change that.” Christa brushed a few fallen clumps of hair off of the towel and let them fall to the floor to be swept up later. Alex really had a thick head of hair that practically overtook her small frame when allowed to roam free and wild as per her usual style.

“But-” she hesitated, lowering the scissors momentarily and resting her hand on Alex’s head. “I know that sometimes it's hard to be yourself.” She ran her fingers through her own thick black curls and met Alex’s eyes in the spotty reflection of the old mirror they shared in their apartment. “Especially when the world doesn’t want us to be ourselves. And sometimes… well it makes me feel better to change to person in the mirror when it feels like I can’t change anything else.”

Alex sighed and caught Christa’s hand as she raised the scissors again to return to her work. “I’m not going anywhere, Bambi.”

“I know! I just- I don’t want to lose you.”

“Hey,” Alex twisted in the chair, reaching up to gently embrace Christa’s face, frowning when she bit her lip and glanced away.  Alex’s voice was low and almost feral as she said her piece.

“The world can go fuck themselves. I love you. And you know me,” she huffed wryly for a moment. “ I don’t say that lightly.”

Christa nodded silently, gently turning Alex’s head back to the front so she could tug some more snarls out of her hair, the roughness of the strokes betraying her tumultuous feelings on the conversation.

“Do you ever regret it?” she asked. Her voice was barely above a whisper, the broad tones of her home city mingling with the stillness of outside. Brooklyn and New Mexico were an odd mix, but Alex thought they were fitting.

She and Christa were like that. The hustle and bustle and the vast spaces of nothingness, intertwined. City and wilderness. Christa, on one of the very few times she had let Alex get her drunk, had compared the two of them in that way.

“You’re like my wolf,” she had giggled, barely remembering to speak English through the cheap vodka Alex had stolen from a friend of hers. “My pretty blonde wolf, hunting the poor little deer. You caught me so… so fast!”

“Does that make you a literal Bambi Lesbian?” Alex had cackled in return. And Christa had laughed, tossing her head back, the soft pale skin of her neck and shoulders exposed and gleaming in the dim fluorescent lighting of their apartment.

It had not been the first, or the last time Alex had kissed her, but it perhaps was one of the more memorable.

“It’s 1973, Alex. We’re living in the modern day and-” here Christa’s voice cracked, a hairline fracture in her steady speech “-and I’m terrified. I’m afraid of what could happen- to me, to you, to anyone else we know. Jane got in a fight last week on the way home because someone jumped Ludwig on his way home. And you heard about the murders further down south.”

Her hands slowly gripped through the hair on Alex’s scalp, just shy of painful.

“Why is it wrong to be us?”

Alex hesitated, taking care to gently form her words before releasing them.

“Well, what do you believe?”

Christa’s fingers stilled.

“What?”

“What do you believe?” Alex asked again, trying to keep the steel out of her tone. She hated the world sometimes, hated that religion was so often used to justify hatred over differences. Hated that being different because of who and how you loved was something they saw people being killed over. “You’re Jewish. What does your faith give you about homosexuality?”

The silence was palpable, filtered only by the occasional rough caw out the window.

“We believe that we all deserve love,” Christa whispered. “And that we are not responsible for that in which we had no choice. Everyone deserves that much.”

Faith is difficult. You are not always what you believe. But, maybe sometimes you can believe in who you are.

Alex turned in her seat, ignoring the wet sheen in Christa’s eyes as she wrapped her arms around her, trying to put all the emotions that she didn't know how to word into that simple touch.

“I guess it’s easier for me,” Alex admitted into the shoulder of Christa’s shirt. “I only see the world as plainly as it appears.” She pulled back momentarily and gestured at the sunlight making dappled patterns on the faded tile. “I see the sun and the sky, the trees and the animals, and I see us in them. And if they exist, why can’t we? How could loving you-” she gripped her girlfriend tighter- “be wrong?”

Christa’s head was bowed, dark curls brushing Alex’s nose as her breathing hitched quietly with all the emotions she was swallowing.

“I… don’t understand your God,” Alex admitted rather awkwardly. She shook her head, mussing both her hair and her thoughts. “ But what about Jeremy? Or V? Jessica? We’ve gone to parties with them. I’ve had way too many drinks with Illystria and caught pigeons with Joseph and watched Mari punch and kiss her husband in the same minute. We’re just people, Christa. We do exist. We’ve found our people here.” She bit her lip, wistful smile creeping its way up her face. “Maybe today is not the best. But… there’s always tomorrow. Look how far we’ve come from Stonewall. From just this year!” Alex pulled Christa closer, gently pressing their foreheads together. “The world is what it is. I’m just grateful I’ve found a place to be myself in.”

Because it’s with you, was the phrase neither of them needed to say.

Christa’s laugh was watery.

“I haven’t ever told my parents yet.”

“When you do, I’ll be here right besides you.”

And just like that, the tension in the bathroom broke and washed away like the icy runoff that spilled from frozen rivers after spring had spread her warm wings over the mountain’s peak.

Christa’s hands were warm and solid on the small of her back.

Quick fingers momentarily tugged Alex’s shirt before sweeping her hair off to the side.

“We really do need to get you some non-shredded clothes, though.”

“What’s wrong with my clothes?”

“Schatz, there's holes in everything. Didn’t this shirt use to be pink?

Alex pouted theatrically, earning a slight giggle from Christa as she ruffled the blond bangs still falling unchecked into her face. “You’re picking on me today…”

Christa pressed a quick kiss to her forehead, smiling.

“What, me? Never.”

---

It took time. Change and acceptance are precious gems that are to be cherished and allowed to grow.

But then there was one Hanukkah in a small house in Brooklyn.

“Chag Urim Sameach, Mama und Papa. This is my girlfriend, Alex.”

People mentioned in this story! Because I couldn’t resist.

The Civilian: mine

The Omega: @teamfortressaswell

The Pilot (Jessica): @jessicapilot

The Contractor (V): @marveloustf2

The Helper (Illystria): @askhelper

The Pigeoneer (Joseph): @gwalleyvv

The Melee and the Mafia (Mari and her husband): @tangy-original-sunny-d

#civilian #omega #fanfic

[rarhuk]

Breaking Traditions...

( Inspired by miss Tak’s art piece Nose Piercing Ceremonies. )

Traditions are merely customs, or beliefs that are passed on from generation to generation. The simple foundations to teach us between what is right and what is wrong in the world. The out look on these things is all dependent on the individual and what the society is like in which one is raised. In my life time, I, personally, was raised upon my first breath to serve first the needs that the empire of Zul’drak required of me. From the ritual traditions of my governed temple of worship, to the orders of my superior officers overseeing my regiment and rank, to the requirements of rules, and of regulation of the laws not only in provinces, or capital, yet, that of home life as well. I, like many others were in the service of all those long held traditions, we followed their regulated practices as that was what was required for us to do.

I did not question the ways of my people, as it had always been established to be as it was for as long as I could recall. I did not ask when the first sacrifice had been made, or reasons as why my people had done the things the way we had done them. It was not my purpose, nor place to question. My purpose was laid out before me on that first breath, as well as my last. I did not question, neither in the subtleties, nor in the broad range, I lived and had died upon that design created for me by the generations that came before.

It was not until after my death and resurrection did I begin to question, what in life I had failed to...

My mere presence, condition, existence is a contradiction to all the beliefs I once held in life, at times it can be an affront to other cultures, and even my own. Perhaps, just as that is so, it was what started this inward quest to discover deeper meaning that I once held towards those followed traditions that in my present unlife were lost to me. I merely observed, as I was thrust within the ranks of the Horde for tasks, as the Ebon Blade directed me was the objective. It was to observe, to lend aid when it was required, and find my purpose amongst the people to fill my inactive duty time. Over the years, I have served many as a guardian, I have worked besides many skilled individuals, and those that were not as... apt, in certain skill sets. I have worked with a wide range of individuals, from different backgrounds, cultures, races, and so forth, I am highly grateful for the differences in perspectives, as they are valuable. I have done menial tasks in life I would not have ever done in my life, such as sweeping the floor for a blind elder orc, to baking a dessert called cookies for orphans, I have been a drink holder from ale to coffee, as well as cloak holder from time to time. I did not see how this was part of the objective, yet, I have obliged almost every request save a few unreasonable ones. In my quest, there have been vibrant living individuals that have crossed my unlife that have left just as brilliant lasting impressions in their passing. As one such as I, can only grow so much from my original design and purpose, to live a denied life through those closest to me that care to share my inclusion in their own journeys.

Most have gone onward in their lives, growing, learning, changing, passing onward in their lives, where as I have remain the same, stagnant. There are  many names I have within my recall, of habits, physical mannerisms, vocal tones, appearances, that do not fade even though their presence has. Although, each parting for me has always left me with this sensation of keen awareness of their absence, I always wish for them the best in all their endeavors. That pattern of having a charge, or associate for a period of time before they move onward, has been an ongoing tradition since my resurrection. Yet, I believe I am better for it, that in ways unbeknownst to me I have had subtle changes evolve from my original design.

Where is my point in all this? It is leading somewhere...

An established tradition, or foundation from which we have our set code of instructions as how to behave, or the knowledge of right and wrong is just that. A place to build from, to grow, to develop, to learn from, to adapt, to change what we believe is wrong in the world, and continue what one believes is right slowly transforms into something new in our experiences, to pass that new gathered information gained onward to the next generation. What causes those strict and solid foundations to shaken? Through my life time and unlife, I have observed a few instances, in which an epiphany beyond what has been firmly established in a mind set is achieved. This is gained through great duress, war, an act of unexpected mercy, and that of the greatest blessing a life time can bestow, that of love. Trauma can shape an individual as well as to open the mind towards a different possibility than what was currently seen. War, it holds no qualms of what it destroys, and what it can forge in the hearts of brothers in arms towards a common goal. As much as war does not weep over the loss of innocence, it holds a passionate desperation to it that every mortal in it’s throng can recognize and find a commonality. An act of mercy from an perceived enemy, or one an individual did not trust in an hour of need has the possibility to change a view point. Love, now this the most difficult for me to apply for myself as a view point, yet, I have seen it’s ability and works to move those that even the most resistant.

The city of Orgrimmar, the orc capital is where many races congregate, either for business, or social interactions. Their cultures clash, and yet mingle, their traditions interact as much as they do, regardless of their ties, or beliefs, they dance the dance of what the living do in these circumstances. There are those of all walks of life, from seasoned warriors conversing in relaxation after a long day in the fray, to those that spend their time towards intellectual pursuits, as well as those looking to make a quick coin, those enjoying the tavern life with a dishonest intent, and those quietly observing occupants of the city under the shade of a tree. It was the same in my life time, yet, not as diverse in races, or belief systems. The works of love is just as varied as the individuals that flock to the city in mass. With all the death and destruction of our world, to find love, pure, true love, is as the saying goes like finding mana in a depleted crystal, a rare occurrence. This is where a tale I observed begins, like any tale it has basis in fact. I have self elected to be the narrator, some parts of the story may be missing, or from my personal perspective been embellished on slightly.

I cannot feel as they do, yet, I do recognize the presence of love, when I observe it. I am capable of seeing it in the exchanged glances, the elevated heart beat, the change in skin, and breathing, the tone change of voice when speaking each other names, or to each other. I am not always as efficient as I would like to be when pin pointing the cause of these physical reactions, as it is almost close to the scent of fear, or threat, as the air around the individual tastes the same. Love is a chemical imbalance, it causes reactions in the living that appear to make them volatile. I cannot express it as they do, I can show devotion such as an undying loyalty, I can be the mug holder, the sentinel, but I cannot give my gaze towards those I value with the same volatile and yet devoted reaction.

I had noticed that Elle no longer sat across the fire from Brix’tul for some time without bringing attention to it, as it would make the time spent... uncomfortable, for them. The elven female that wore dark shades of clothing I assumed were black, I was told had red hair also. I often arrived with coffee, even once a pirate’s hat that she had shown a fondness for, I considered her a frequent friend, as she once was a familiar face that welcomed my presence with a smile on most occasions. She sat with Brix’tul now, with those looks fondness upon her features in his direction, with the physical changes I mentioned above. From whispers to glances, I recognized the signs I had witnessed before in others. Brix’tul is one of those individuals I have come to consider as close as possible in my state and condition as I would a brother. I do hope that within my presence in their company that kinship was felt in return even within my limitations of expressing those depths of fondness. I was not a great presence in their journey together, yet for the adventures, and idle conversation I was included in I am grateful for. 

A break in traditions.... A elf and troll as a couple? Let the great debates, and judgement begin.  I have heard it all. Elves and trolls are not compatible, due to physical attributes, and so on. Elves and trolls clash because of cultural differences, how they were raised, and due to the territory disputes. That is on the outsider individual’s mindset, that had been raised on certain foundations of what was deemed to them as wrong. Those that point out what cannot be, have not grown beyond which they were taught. They are stuck where the laws and regulations they had been forged in, yet to see into the realm of possibilities beyond themselves. They refuse to question, or cannot, because they have yet come to learn there is a realm beyond those basic beginnings set before them. Those that carry a need to feed on the limitations of ignorance by intruding upon those that seek go beyond that which they were taught. I am not certain what wars the Darkspear Brix’tul fought in beyond the construction of the garrison. Perhaps, trauma from previous incursions contributed to his taste for Darkmoon Reserve. Yet, he was not Amani, the Darkspear led by Vol’jin had aided the Sin’dorei in pushing the Amani back as well. Many enlightened Sin’dorei I’ve spoken to respect the contribution trolls put forth to aid them in their time of need. Yet, with every culture, there are those that still hold weight to past experiences. I never had an objection to their union, as love, as much as life is, it is a precious, as well as it is a precarious blessing. 

I believe Brix’tul believed my advice had value in the beginning as he had came to me and had asked for my honest opinion. I do not... sugar coat, I tend to be as I am told, frank, literal, and at times brutal when asked such questions. I told him, from my own perspective, and observations statistically speaking the relationship was doomed. I pointed out, the contrasts that may oppose them, such as lifespans, opposition from cultural differences, and acceptance, as well as those many other conflicts may arise due to these natures that differed between them. I spoke further on what I had seen amongst the city’s populace when it came with unions similar as to their relationship, and the different definitions individuals carried as to what it meant to be mated, or married. I spoke to him on how I was raised in life, and what I had came to believe since my death and resurrection, in reflection as to how the two were vastly different in comparison to the world in which he and Elle now lived in. What was not acceptable in my life time, was acceptable now. My advice to him was to seize what his heart desired, before it was out of his reach.

It wasn’t until a much later time and circumstance that an mumbled half mention from Brix’tul caught my attention. Had I heard him right? That was my first inclination to inquiry. I may not emotionally as deep as the living, I may not be able to express my intentions, but what I believed I heard was Brix’tul asking for Elle’s hand in a union, and for myself to perform the ritual. I do not know in depth Darkspear traditions, nor the rituals the Sin’dorei hold. I know of the traditions, and ritual rites, my people once carried as far as unions went, as well as it went to what one gave as an offering to the loa, and the one’s intended. The mere thought I could, and may perform such a rite of a milestone for my friend and brother was both a honor, as well as a sacrilege against my prior life’s belief system. Some how, it was oddly fitting, and I found it amusing as well. I instantly agreed, of course after Brix’tul set the time and date. To tempt fate, to spit in the eye of which denied my own living beating heart of being capable to achieve the natural course to flourish in the emotional bonding that being in love and mated provided, gave me a strange sense of satisfaction.

Of course I could not do so in a official grand traditional capacity for a mixed couple. I was never an ordained troll priest in my life time, yet, I knew enough that I could perform a basic, small affair. I also have the rank to push Horde documents that could put the order through for paper work records to make the union legitimate. If the request was denied, I had some slightly less lawful ways to gain proper documentation. I will not speak of which route I took, I will leave that to speculation. 

The place and time was set, I had all the preparations needed to perform the ritual. This is where I struggle, where I have difficulties with depth. Spiritualistic magic and will, is not as mysterious as one may believe, it has properties, principals, we may not be able to comprehend all the rational, or reasons, it may have to behave in the manner in which it does, yet it is an energy that can be harnessed and shaped. It was there that night, weaving it’s way around those two. I could not feel their emotions, yet, I witnessed the exchange, and the importance of it. It was a powerful force...We all had donned our best ceremonial regalia, faces and bodies were painted in the manner they had deemed appropriate, symbols, emblems of infinity and continuance were marked in paint and blood on the skin. Sacrifices and trinkets were given as an offering, spirits were exchanged, vows to protect, to provide, to nurture and to grow from were given. While the incense burned, noses were pierced, and for a moment time stopped as Elle reached to take Brix’tul’s finger in her own small hand. They looked at each other, a devotion that stretched out the time and ages as they were connected on smiles as the two looked across the ritual bowl at each other upon the conclusion ceremony. One such as I could never understand the emotional immensity, the significance of that moment as it is truly meant to be felt, and yet I was there included, witnessing a place in time of new beginnings, endless possibilities, and hope for the future. In that moment, I do believe, however, so fleeting, I was touched by their joy.

In our own ways, all three of us broke from our set traditions, by making new ones. A tradition that may be doomed ending with just the one ceremony, or it may be carried on forward in the possible next generations to come. It is these times, of war, of cultural diversity and divides, that moments like these should be celebrated, as they are significant. They are the voice of change, that is not done out of a long establish rule, but one that flourishes out a greater power. In a world full of corruption, love is but a single weapon in a vast rebellion for those that oppose the establish rules. As for their future, nothing is certain.  I would like to believe they continue onward with such changes from their intended designs together creating new foundations, that the blessings in their lives continue throughout their journey. 

#Nose pierce Ceremony #Brix'tul #Elle #Ra'rhuk's journal