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soraegeeks · 5 years

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Review: Quiet Rapture

Alright kids I’m back with another review/reaction piece, whatever you want to call it. Up next is Quiet Rapture a BKDK story by Lalazee. Set in the canon universe with Quirks but Izuku is Quirkless. The story is 22 chapters in right now and might be the first Alpha/Beta/Omega story I read. I think? Maybe? Anyway, before we get started a few things:

A. This will be a LONG piece. While I reread I ended up with eight pages of notes in my notebook. *smdh*

II. Warning for anyone planning to read QR there are discussions of past abuse, intimate partner violence, sexual assault, and violent acts so there are some dark moments.

三. Lalazee created thematic Spotify playlists and there’s a Quiet Rapture one that I’ve been listening to while reading, rereading and writing this.

Alright so let’s get rolling with the official summary:

“That ABO fic where cocky Alpha Bakugou falls in mate-love at first scent, while Midoriya is just a poor bookstore-owning Omega who got his nose punched in is a kid and can't smell a damn thing. Also known as: That time an Alpha had to use his actual personality to woo his mate instead of relying on his scent.”

Off the break we have Katsuki Bakugou losing his shit walking into the bookstore and being overwhelmed by Izuku Midoriya’s scent. I love the description of his scent: “Thunderstorm, ozone, electricity.” I know EXACTLY what that ozone smell is. The smell of the air right before a thunderstorm. I was an adult before I found out that it wasn’t my imagination that there was a smell and a name for it.

So, Katsuki is overcome by his Alpha instincts and subsequently almost ends up with a broken nose. Izuku is no ordinary Omega and he was having none of that aggressive shit..and Katsuki was intrigued by this. Katsuki's inner Alpha, though, immediately believes that Izuku is his mate. Imagine his shock upon learning that Izuku can’t smell him and he has to talk to explain what he’s smelling. HAAA! The twist that Izuku can’t smell anything so he isn’t driven by pheremones and uses his other senses to try and figure people out is so quirky. I can imagine Izuku cocking his head to the side with a look of curiosity. Then the ego popped up when Katsuki introduced himself. LAWD LOL “You at least owe me one damn date…” someone stop this fool. And Izuku easily just dismissed him and blew poor Katsuki’s damn mind.

A stakeout. Katsuki Bakugou and Kirishima Eijirou on a stakeout?! Oh, this is pure comedy!!! Katsui pumping out all of those damn Alpha pheromones and killing poor Kiri in the car. Please someone help Kiri as he gasps for air out of the window. BWAAAAA Kiri really wants him to get laid and chill out and he can’t figure out why Katsuki smells the way he does. And Katsuki’s ass is smelling the book he bought from Izuku like a lovesick puppy. Did they even gather any intel during their stakeout after all of their shenanigans?! LOL

Back to the bookstore and big bad Alpha Katsuki is in trouble again. Izuku is a FIGHTER and not going to let himself get boxed in by Katsuki’s Alpha shenanigans. (Shenanigans is my son’s favorite word and one of mine as well. LOL) ANNNDDDD we have now crossed the line. Katsuki scent marked Izuku without his consent. WOO BOY! No, Just NO!!!

We get some insight into Izuku and why he smells the way he does. In this telling Omega’s smell very sweet, almost pastry-like and Izuku has an earthy smell. By luck of genetics Izuku is an Omega with Alpha traits. His body could have presented as either one being dominant and the other recessive. As a result his scent is strong and suppressive drugs don’t work for him. Of course, this is something private that he doesn’t easily share.

Ok, Izuku’s cat Natsume isn’t a cat! That’s a small bear, I don’t care. LOL The headbutting and whining thing is very familiar. My cats act like the world is ending when the food level is low in their bowls. *smdh* Enter Hitoshi Shinsou!! I read the manga in addition to watching the anime and Shinsou has grown on me as one of my faves. I always love how his quiet, brooding character is portrayed. And he’s wearing the scarf. The LONG white scarf capture weapon!!!! And who the hell pops up out of nowhere but Katsuki in full-on Alpha protective mode. He shoved Shinsou into a bookshelf and when Shinsou realized who it was he looked like the cat who ate the canary. Immediately into how much can I tease without overstepping mode. Like oho my best friend purposely didn’t tell me who his “stalker” was, who scented him and it’s big bad Katsuki Bakugou who has never shown an interest in anyone. “As much as I love the whole mystery surrounding this, because – let’s face it – your life is about as exciting as a game of backgammon at the old folks’ home these days.” WHAATT???!!! LMAO Shinsou’s an ass but a master of diffusing a situation. LOL Izuku on the other hand is a firecracker. He was PISSSEEED off by Katsuki but his inner Omega was like ok let’s do this especially after finding out that Katsuki had cooked for him (a subconscious Alpha provision method)! I did find it interesting that Izuku didn’t notice/point out that Katsuki was overly familiar by calling him by his first name!!! Katsuki wants that damn date so bad and still feels entitled to it. *smh*

Whoahohoooo. What do we have here?! Katsuki had a wet dream (and apparently has BEEN having dreams) about Izuku. Lawd, his inner Alpha has it BAAADD! For the record, who the hell drinks scalding hot tea??!!! No one but this fool. LOL And why he thought that demanding a date as opposed to asking and confirming was a good idea. But ya know, Alpha who knows nothing about relationships especially not with a skittish mate. His “spiteful little Omega” is MORE than a match for him. LOL I love that their interactions are forcing Katsuki to humble himself little by little. Always being told how great he is by everyone but Izuku breaks that mold. I also love that Izuku is sharing who he is through books. To me it’s a very intimate move. Izuku’s perspective on the world is interesting, though. He sees hero life as war mongering while Katsuki sees it as his duty to bring down the evil in the world. Izuku can learn to widen his world view, while Katsuki can learn to not be so aggressive towards his “miniature Alpha.”

It’s Bakusquad time!!!! Katsuki’s crew is a joy to me. I love these fools especially when they’ve been drinking! And their sworn mission for the night is to rescue Katsuki from the train wreck that is his love life. The interaction was interesting when they realized that Katsuki was pining after a guy. He was very concerned that they’d tease him for his sexual preference and I felt sad for him. To him he has never had an orientation, he just is and the only person he’s cared about is Izuku so that’s him, Izuku-lover. Good job Mina with the suggestion that he apologize for his behavior with a gift for Izuku. And yay Kiri for the advice on physical no-nos when approaching an Omega. Katsuki did well with gift selection and presenting the gift without crowding Izuku. Izuku surprised him with his preheat reaction. Izuku’s inner Omega was so happy to receive a gift and Katsuki’s inner Alpha was SO happy to provide. Good on Katsuki for immediately leaving, not so good when he came back to the bookstore and got into an argument. He is the king of self-destruction. Pre-heat Izuku and a riled up Katsuki. *sigh* I’m enjoying how there are little signs here and there of how Izuku’s inner Omega is reacting to Katsuki. The early heat, the fact that Izuku is WEARING the gift that Katsuki gave him, and how he scent marked Katsuki. Izuku is determined that his mind will overcome his nature.

Enter a character who I think had SO MUCH potential in the manga, Kai Chisaki. Katsuki ran into him while looking for Izuku at the bookstore. Izuku’s heat had come on and Kai was manning the store. He instantly goaded Katsuki into an argument. Kai does NOT like heroes and Katsuki was defensive about that and also irritated that here was another of Izuku’s friends that he couldn’t figure out the connection with. Katsuki jumps off of the deep end after leaving the bookstore. He totally abused his position as a Pro Hero and had the database searched to get Izuku’s address. Sigh. Not cool Katsuki. Izuku accused you of being a stalker and that is totally stalkerish behavior!! Katsuki learned more about Izuku while talking him through his heat from the opposite side of his front door but it was a HUGE gamble and inappropriate. From the talking though Katsuki started to realize how naive his worldview is. He’s always been focused on being the #1 hero and he never entertained the pain others’ paths may have contained. Hearing Izuku alluding to being sexually assaulted was heartbreaking. Katsuki did show restraint in not breaking down Izuku’s door. Honestly, even without his quirk he was strong enough to do it. It was heartwarming that he sat outside the door and read to Izuku so he could sleep. It was STILL wrong that he was there and Shinsou said as much when he saw Katsuki there. It’s interesting how they’re all bending/skirting the law even Shinsou when he used his Quirk on Katsuki to find out how he got there. I can’t say that I wouldn’t do the same while trying to protect my best friend and Katsuki knew it. Shinsou didn’t seem to bat an eye when Katsuki called Izuku his “mate.” Shinsou has a soft spot for his classmate and as he’s said before he knows more than he lets on about people. I was surprised that none of Izuku’s neighbors said anything. Maybe they were too scared of the imposing Alpha sitting outside of Izuku’s door.

Guys night out and as expected Kai and Inasa were NOT happy to learn about the stunt that Katsuki pulled. (Side note: I love Inasa Yoarashi. He’s so big and full of life!) Lawd, if Inasa had gotten a hold of Katsuki. WOAH! Shinsou is still an ass, but what else is new. He’s an instigator but also calmed the situation when he called Katsuki’s number and gave Izuku the phone. It threw Izuku for a loop but it also allowed him to be the one to deal with the situation. Shinsou and Shouto are good friends and knowing Katsuki better than anyone else in their friend group, they tried to give Izuku some more insight into him. Izuku was confronted with some preconceived notions that he had about Katsuki. Maybe he isn’t the playboy that Izuku assumed he was. Hmmmm. It was good to read about Izuku’s pack and to see that he does have people who care about him.

The Omega murders. There’s evidently someone or some people attacking Omegas, tearing out their scent glands and leaving them for dead. Like WHAT THE HELL???!!!! It was interesting to see Momo Yaoyorozu and Mashirao Ojiro mentioned. I like to see what the rest of class 1-A is doing in this AU. Soooo, why does Camie smell like blood??!!!! Her day was “extra murdery?” The hell did she encounter in the day and can they send her back to take another shower?! And why is she so against her Omega secondary gender?! I noticed in an earlier chapter when she overheard Katsuki talking to Kiri about Izuku. How do you call others like you “weak” and dissociate yourself just because you’re a Pro Hero? And wow at Katsuki’s confrontation with Amajiki. It was all Katsuki’s fault, though. He raised Amajiki’s suspicion that Izuku might have something to do with the murders and Katsuki TOTALLY overreacted to his Omega superior. Katsuki LOST IT and was put in his place when Mirio scruffed him. Pack hierarchy at work. Up until that point I hadn’t thought about who would be bigger and badder! LOL Something that caught my eye though was Katsuki mentioning an Alpha smelling like “rot and sewage.” Was he saying that Mirio smelled like that or was he having a flashback? Anyway, he’s lucky that he was only sent home early and told to take the next day off. Who would have expected Katsuki to seek out Shouto for advice? Shouto Todoroki of ALL people! And wait, Katsuki asking someone for help in general??!!! Growth in his adult years. LOL I chuckled heartily that Katsuki and Shouto ended up wearing matching turtlenecks. TWINSIES!! Shouto, as is, canon was no help as expected and a little oblivious. But Shinsou in his Pusheen pajamas did what he could. (Pusheen pajamas, though! My son would LOVE some LOL)

Next chapter is a flashback of how Izuku and Shinsou met in their first year of high school. We learn that male Omegas are rare in this AU and even rarer as Heros. Izuku got into a fight and Shinsou stepped into help. They formed a bond, understanding each other like no one else could. Omegas that no one deemed worthy of anything. It was sad to read that that was the fight that cost Izuku his sense of smell.

Back to present and after Katsuki left Shinsou and Shouto’s place he went to Izuku’s apartment hoping to talk to him. Izuku’s building now has an outside lock and intercom system. I’d bet my house in the Hamptons (which I don’t have) that that was a result of Katsuki’s visit there a few weeks ago. Katsuki wasn’t sure if Izuku was going to let him in and it looked like Izuku wasn’t sure either. It’s interesting reading Izuku’s point of view and the tells that he notices about Katsuki. The little things that Katsuki is doing to not intrude or the semblances of control that Izuku hasn’t seen in Alphas that he had dealt with previously. Izuku’s hands are bigger than Katsuki’s?! Oooooh. Awww, Katsuki took Mina’s advice and he took a few seconds to stop himself from firing off his usual knee-jerk responses. And he is so shy talking about anything sexual and so blushy. I’m glad that those two goofballs were able to talk without arguing. Almost like they could be civil with each other. Ha! A slight ease and honesty. When Izuku teased Katsuki about knowing what Katsuki wanted to do more than he did Izuku assumed it had to do with what Izuku said before that other Alphas had done to him. Katsuki blushed but I think it was actually because he’s inexperienced. Katsuki meeting the “lion” Natume was HILARIOUS! I’m personally shocked by how big those things get. I have cats but that’s TOO much for me. LOL Izuku finally made an effort to find out a little about Katsuki, asking him how he liked his job. Izuku is oddly focused on “battles” and “killing” as if that’s all heroes do. But Katsuki loves his job and made sure to emphasize that killing is a minor part of it and only when unavoidable. Katsuki keeps surprising Izuku. He’s been so traumatized by previous Alphas that Katsuki's non-violent reactions throw him.

This is one of my favorite chapters. It’s New Year’s Eve and karaoke with the crews, Bakusquad and Izuku’s pack. Katsuki recognizes that Izuku has a lot of traumatic baggage and he is SPRUNG! It was supposed to be a night of enjoying time with his friends but all Katsuki can think about is Izuku. As if by magic BAM Izuku is next door in another karaoke room and the scent is OVERWHELMING. “The punch of petrichor was a sudden deluge to Katsuki’s senses, an overload that soaked him to the bone and weakened his wobbly knees.” Look “petrichor” might be my new favorite word. It’s going right into my commonplace book. LOL Why was Izuku ON TOP of the table singing??!!! I’m 5’5” as well and I’m just imagining walking in and seeing my drunk ass singing on a table and I can’t stop laughing. Comedy!! Katsuki almost got into a fight just swinging the door open, though. Kai was NOT happy to see him and Inasa was ready to play bodyguard. When Shinso was described as a meerkat looking above Inasa’s shoulder I immediately thought about that show Meerkat Manor. I LOVED that show...but I digress. I’m glad that their groups met thanks to Shinsou’s and Mina’s meddling. Katsuki and Izuku felt so played. LOL I thought Mina was a little uncouth with her comments about Izuku’s “smell”, though. Yeah, it’s “different” but she could have found another way to word it or just not said anything at all. It shouldn’t have been surprising that Izuku followed Katsuki when he went outside for a breather. It was surprising when Izuku kissed him (Katsuki’s first kiss!!!) and Katsuki was right for calling him out on trying to blame the attraction on him. These two still have lots to work out.

During their morning run, Mina did seem to make up for what she said during the party. She just has an odd way of wording things. Katsuki is starting to see that he can get advice from his friends but his connection with Izuku is different than those of his friends. Their advice can only take him so far and he and Izuku have to figure out the rest. Of course, it isn’t long before thirsty Katsuki heads to the bookstore. I love that Izuku’s scent immediately soothes him. And glad they’re talking a little more and slowly knocking some kinks into Izuku’s wall and opening Katsuki’s world.

The next chapter is hard. It’s a flashback into Izuku’s past. A glimpse into Izuku looking for something, anything to make him feel alive. Discovering hallucinogens, having his first sexual encounter, allowing someone to harm him leaving him with permanent damage. Unprotected sex that he barely remembers since he was under the influence. The introduction of Dabi, as Shinsou described him “a guy who looks like he wears other people's’ skin for fun.”

Back to the present and Izuku is at a therapy appointment. First off, I am so glad to see that with all of the trauma that we readers know about so far (and the trauma we don’t), he is seeing a therapist. As an aside, I was going through the chapters in my mind while in the shower and his conversation with his therapist went through my mind. Specifically, Izuku’s fear of going beyond moderation to excess and backsliding. That sat with me for a while. I am happy to see Eri in this AU and with Kai as her adopted father role. Also, happy to see “Mr. Yagi” as leaving his bookstore, his legacy, to Izuku. In a crazy turn of events Izuku is a witness to an Omega attack and kept the attacker from doing more harm. We definitely saw his Alpha traits as he hauled ass over to figure out what was going on. PROTECTIVE KATSUKI TO THE RESCUE!!!!! He was on duty and heard about the attack so he went to pick Izuku up from the police station and take him back to Katsuki’s house. OF COURSE these two butt heads because what else do they do. I giggled when Katsuki walked him outside and said “let’s go home, already.” I don’t think that he purposely phrased it that way but Izuku internally responded to it. When they finally make it to Katsuki’s house, he has a very sappy moment when Izuku compliments his place. Katuki prefers Izuku’s smaller place because it’s like him, “small, warm, smells like home.” Kiddies our boy is GONE! LOL Izuku is still convinced that Katsuki has/has had NUMEROUS romantic interests no matter how many times Katuki and their mutual friends have told him otherwise. And then they had A MOMENT in the kitchen!!!!! The desire and attraction is palpable in the air but they really need to get to know each other better.

And we start the next chapter with Katsuki’s very vivid ass wet dream. Good thing that Izuku can’t smell anything because that apartment had to have smelled like complete lust. LOL Katsuki saw Izuku’s damaged wrist gland and it broke his heart. All of the things in Izuku’s past that Katsuki couldn’t protect him from. There have been multiple references to Izuku “drowning” and not being able to breathe and it’s so sad. When will he be able to be out from all of that?

We’re introduced to Kota as a character but sadly as the kid in the latest Omega attack. And Camie with the Omega degradation again and now she’s on Katsuki’s case about Izuku. Sigh. Oh, I’ve been looking through the story comments and saw that folks are starting to suspect that she has something to do with the Omega murders and I’m inclined to agree that it’s suspicious. When Izuku rescued Kota he noticed that the attacker just disappeared and Camie’s quirk IS illusions. “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.” Hmmmm. Welp, it took a few weeks but Katsuki’s abusing his privilege to get Izuku’s address finally came back to bite him. A month’s suspension! OUCH! Again he’s lucky because he started to get aggressive against his superior again. Any mention of Izuku sends him over the deep end. Side note, I’m glad that I reread this chapter and noticed the unnamed mention of Dabi in Izuku’s file. With nowhere else to go Katsuki sought out Shinsou for advice. They’re becoming better adult friends. It’s amazing what a mutual connection will do. Our boy Katsuki is so sprung. He took his drunk ass to the bookstore, complemented Izuku and walked him home hand-in-hand. All full of sweetness and fluff. LOL

Wow Kai and Izuku. Kai has his own baggage that colors his view of heroes, all the while Inasa, a PRO HERO, has been sniffing around him for years trying to get his attention. Like brothers, Kai and Izuku argued. But if you can’t argue with your family about their bullshit who else can you argue with? Kai used the fact that Izuku’s last boyfriend raped and tried to kill him like a weapon. And the way Kai was described I don’t think that he’d ever seen Izuku as angry as he was at that moment. Kai was completely thrown off by the truths Izuku spouted back at him and “Tornado Gold Retriever” Inasa flew into protective Alpha mode when he saw them. Thankfully, Kai interceeded and calmed Inasa. When Inasa returned to give Izuku a pep talk it was so adorable. He’s just so honest and BIG with his feelings about life. Inasa was able to make Izuku consider a different way of thinking about himself and Katsuki. Izuku isn’t the scared younger man that he was before and maybe Katsuki isn’t that enemy Izuku was making him out to be. “But think of it this way. Bakugou is not your adversary. He’s on your team.” Well now! Thanks to Inasa, Izuku and Katsuki took a step closer in their relationship through the exchange of phone numbers. OH, and evidently the night that Bakugou has a vivid dream, so did Izuku. Well, WAYLE!!!

More fun with Bakusquad!!! With Katsuki being at home suspended I loved Sero teasing him when he claimed to not be bored. Yeah right Mr. Always Has to be Doing SOMETHING Work Related. Good friend banter is always the best. Like how do you tell your friend that his attacks against villains are just “light bondage??!!!” LMAO The worst. Yay, for Ochako being worked into the story. I like the mutual respect they developed in first year continues into their adulthood. I have to totally agree with his assessment that he is “lawful good” and Izuku is “chaotic good” cause these two fools are a mess!!! Katsuki the enemy of villains, Izuku the almost-vigilante turned pacifist. Heaven help them. LOL

Ugh, I was starting to wonder when Camie would show up and there she is again surprising Katsuki when he leaves the company gym. And that whole interaction made my skin CRAWL, like YOOO!!!! DO NOT TRUST HER!!! She came onto him so strongly. WHHYYY??!!! On some no one can resist her type crap. With her mentioning Izuku combined with my suspicions about her being involved with the murders makes me worried for Izuku.

Danger, Will Robinson! DANGER!!!! Katsuki is NOT prepared to deal with a pretty much in heat Izuku. YOO!!!! ABORT MISSION! RUN!!! Izuku flipped between wanton Omega and aggressive Alpha and Katsuki's head was spinning. Katsuki displayed the strength of Hercules (ha, a reference to Inasa’s comment back in chapter 10) when he kept his urges at bay and stopped him and Izuku from making a mistake. On end of all that he got the promise of a date! Way to go Ground Zero!

So first, Katsuki’s descriptions of Izuku’s anxious thoughts were SO familiar. UGH “Did Midoriya even sleep through a night for all the worry he brought into his own life?” THAT’S ME, THAT’S ME! UGH!!!! Next, we get more interaction with Ochako and it’s the best. Katsuki is so excited about his date with Izuku that he can’t think straight. “You go from scowling like a murderer to smiling like a shark in the span of minutes, and I think you’re legitimately scaring the children.” A SHARK??!!! BWAAAAAAA Everyone can tell that he’s smitten and his face can’t hide anything. And the moment (well, one of the moments) we’ve been waiting for has arrived. IT’S DATE DAY!!! OMG Katsuki killed me when he didn’t care who Izuku had been with prior. “Did you screw like twenty dudes in the past? Trick question - I don’t care.” WHO DOES THAT??!!! Katsuki F-ing Bakugou, that’s who. LMAO Poor Katsuki is so messed up that Izuku wore scent blockers and he can’t smell Izuku. He even WHINED!!!! Lawd, Katsuki is a goner. LOL And these two can’t go 5 minutes without arguing. They both have to be in charge. Indoor rock climbing with these two competitive asses. What could possibly go wrong?! Oh, only Izuku’s blockers wearing off and their combined scenets driving the Alpha customers into ruts. And the employee just wanted to earn his paycheck and now he has to deal with all of this insanity. LMAO Katsuki may have made an honest misstep when he offered to get Izuku’s nose fixed but he didn’t see it as a big deal. Add that to the list of things that should talk about in the future. Katsuki completely forgot that he’s a public figure and out of nowhere came some fans. As annoying as they were, it may have been a blessing in disguise because it interrupted the argument they had brewing. And it led to their cuteness in the convenience store trying on hero paraphernalia. Another Mr. Yagi reference. Of COURSE, it has to be the same person and I can’t wait to find out in what way Katsuki knows him in this story. I mean they already have the overlapping friend groups even though they never met in high school. Katsuki gets so riled up in their flirting that he’s pumping out pheromones again “in technicolor Alpha waves.” iDied!!!!! LMAO I really didn’t expect Mirio to call Katsuki but it was only a matter of time before SOMEONE saw his familiar face out in public. It tickled me when Katsuki was spinning in circles looking for a bodiless Mirio poking his head out of a potato chip display. LOL Now the question is what did Mirio see on the internet and how did it get there? Maybe at the rock climbing fiasco, or the fans who saw them on the street or maybe even at that convenience store since they’re eating right by a window. We shall seee!!!!!

The next chapter is another Izuku flashback. I love that Izuku has known about Katsuki since back in high school but when they met Katsuki didn’t know anything about him. LOL Izuku first meets Shouto over drinks with Inasa and Shinsou and inadvertently reveals that he knows about Shouto’s brother Dabi, err Touya. This connects with chapter 11 when Shouto brushed over how he first met Izuku while talking to Katsuki and in chapter 18 when Amajiki mentions that Izuku had a restraining order against a now villian. We also find out that Izuku has multiple cigarette burn scars from Dabi on his body. :( We also get more information about Jin, Izuku’s former boyfriend. I completely forgot that Jin was Twice’s real name and didn’t make the connection at first. Oops. Then his character description made complete sense. It connected to chapter 18 when Amajiki mentioned him and said he’d almost killed Izuku and also chapter 19 when Kai talks about Izuku’s rape and hospitalization. So, we’re getting a glimpse into Izuku’s life post-Dabi and during his time with Jin right before Izuku hits rock bottom. Looking back on the threats that Kai made against Katsuki and there’s no way he WASN’T response for Jin’s disappearance. Izuku is bruised from a previous interaction with Jin. We don’t know exactly WHAT happened but we know it’s happened multiple times with Jin not remembering or pretending to not remember. Sadly, I wonder if the end of the chapter lead into Jin’s attack on Izuku.

“Izuku flopped face-down on his own bed in a drowsy, drunken stupor, that he remembered he was meant to meet Jin at the end of the night.

Ah, well. He could handle a few more bruises.”

Welp, that’s it and it was A LOT. I can’t wait for the next chapter and the aftermath of the date.

#bnha #mha #ktdk #bkdk #bakudeku #katsudeku #So Rae Geeks Reviews #fic: Quiet Rapture #lalazee

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crstapor · 3 years

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Why I am so Cynical

“I say unto you: one must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.” - Zarathustra

Part 3

Let me stop shouting - sometimes I get carried away. Because it needs be clearly stated that my perspective on the matter at hand is not based solely on 'personal' experience (of course one can never deny the importance such datum possess!) but also 'phenomenological' experience, which is, clearly, a different animal altogether. That this menagerie has informed my thought will surprise no-one who's ever tried it; thinking, I mean. How else, if one is being as honest as possible, can one arrive at any conclusions whatsoever? While the first part of this essay waxed rather subjectively poetic, allow me to offer this third as a sort of empirical respite. Facts, good reader, let me proffer facts to further found my cynicism most severe.

But let me first define the scope these facts will express. The working title for this missive to minds who want to think was 'A Polemic against American Modernity'. Allowing that my interests, here, lie not north to Canada or south of Texas, the parameters of this diatribe should be well understood by all with even meager cartographic skill.

Superficial perhaps I've structured these facts into three distinct phenomena; the surface, the self, and the symbol. I do so not to make any sweeping ontologic distinctions or assertions, rather, to help me think through them. System-building is not my purpose here - system-analysis is. The facets of modern America culture were well in place before I came along, and, unless I'm completely mistaken, I've done little to add to or enhance any of them. Apart from the clear truth of my having lived with and through them the vast majority of my mortal years. This 'truth', my citizenship and biography, allow me credence to present what follows as 'fact'; though of course it's still just one man's opinion!

Knowledge!

The Surface

Politics. Democracy. American Exceptionalism. Yeah right. So, help me out here, we have a great democracy because we vote for other people to get to vote on who actually becomes leader? Unless of course nine robes get that special privilege - based off of their admitted political preferences naturally! - like back in 2000. How the legislature is just a club for the privileged, connected, and the rich (which is almost redundant). How once 'money' became speech only those with 'money' had speech. The Founders are grave-rolling and Mussolini's having a laugh - fascism much? Let's remember Benito's definition of the term; which is when State and corporate interests converge (more or less). And we find that just about everywhere we look up in DC these days. Apparently we have the 'political will' to help banks, big oil, agribusiness, gun manufacturers, and all the other consolidated purveyors of terror, hate or control (sure, tobacco had to be sacrificed - occasionally you must throw the peasants a bone to keep the lie alive) but can't find the time to help out 'we the people': see continuing cuts to social programs; see the limp-dick governmental response to the housing/mortgage crisis of 2008 - ?; see the student loan pyramid scheme; see a 'minimum' wage that consistently fails to keep up with inflation; see a 'healthcare' plan that mandates private citizens purchase a product from non-governmental, for-profit companies - and taxes them if they don't; see how prohibition (here considered against natural, earth-born narcotics) continues to fuel a for-profit prison system and further erodes race relations; see how the gravest existential threat to the species (climate change, for realz) is perpetually laughed off and ignored; see how we lecture others on human rights while keeping Gitmo open and denying homosexuals equal protection under the law; see how NASA's (quite possibly, from a historical perspective, the greatest achievement of our modern society) budget keeps getting gutted while their priorities are schizophrenically re-ordered with each administration; see how children keep slaughtering children with weapons of war and no one can even attempt to do anything about it; see how voter ID laws are passed like Jim Crow; see how the innate sovereignty of the nation has been torn asunder now that private corporations can be 'to big to fail'; see an ever increasingly militarized police force; see the constitutional absurdity of 'free speech zones'; see democratic campaigns where one guy runs but once elected that guy's nowhere to be found and in his place is a carbon copy of the last guy who held the office ... See how our 'political parties' are two sides of the same coin ... But let's stop here and consider that last point in greater depth, as it is so vital to any understanding of 'democracy' in America ... Republicans, Democrats; Jefferson has been famously remembered, quoted, as saying once our (more properly his) democracy devolved into a two party system it would be a democracy no more. And I've certainly been a witness to that in my life. Sure, America isn't a dictatorship, but it sure as hell isn't the country Jefferson helped forge. And the main reason for that, to my eyes, seems to be the consolidation of power in the hands of politicians with more in common with each other than their constituents. R or D you can bet they're there for Wall Street or the military-information-industrial complex. Anyone else? Good luck with that citizen ... And while they're both complicit in gutting the middle class, let's take a moment to reflect, ethically, on that matter ... You can't blame the snake for its venom, but you can sure as hell blame the snake-oil salesman for shilling his bullshit wares. In case that metaphor wasn't clear enough allow me to decode it for you:

R = snake. D = snake-oil salesman.

Switching gears - though not by much! - let's shift to the state of modern American entertainment. To the uninitiated possibly a trite transition, any who've watched politics lately will surely see the connection. And just as our politics smell rotten, the main complaint with what passes as entertainment these days is how bad it tastes. Yes, it's a question of taste, as it seems most Americans have none. From 'reality TV' (which is surely anything but - though let's not forget Barnum's maxim!), to a pop-music ecosystem that's cannibalized itself to the point of parody, a movie industry that can seemingly fill ten months of releases with one script, the apotheosis of sport, the devolution of literature into a hobby for diarists, the way the performing arts are continually hoarded into smaller and smaller urban green zones, well, it's just hard to swallow most of that without gagging. Or throwing up. Yet a more concerted analysis along these lines is not called for here - we have much too much ground yet to cover.

Speaking of ground and covering it why not mention war? That old playground of glory now some video game where you might win many things; though honor's not among them. The full transition here is yet to occur, but we're definitely in the middle of it. Drones, air strikes, GPS targeting and bombs dropped from orbit (sure, not yet - wait for it!). The complete impersonalization of the other; that total objectification of the enemy (you better believe the pornographers have drone-envy). Let's not equivocate; it's one thing to look someone in the eye and take their life - quite another to push a button sixteen time-zones away and watch an image of indiscriminate carnage. How long will it be before we don't even let a homo sapien sapien push that button? How long before the machines are killing us on their own .?. Nothing to be cynical about here!

And if killing our 'enemies' has/is becoming so much more impersonal healing our 'own' has a fortiori. I'm not even going to start bandying about statistics but it's well known that of the 'first-world', 'post-industrialized' countries we're the only one that still considers healthcare a cash-grab instead of a human-right. And to what wonderful affect! Go ahead and try to ignore all the horror stories of your fellow Americans who lost it all because they couldn't pay their medical bills, or because they did. Pay no attention to record profit margins at insurance companies while the poor forgo all but emergency treatment and the wealth of the middle class is bled out and transferred to HMO executives. Sure, Uncle Tom tried to change all that - by passing a Republican plan even though the Ds had two branches of the federal government! - but when I tried to sign up for 'Obamacare' I still couldn't afford it even though I had $200 in the bank, no assets, and had been unemployed for over two years. If I lived in any other country where English is the primary language I'd be covered without paying a dime. My solution? To use the actual Republican plan - don't get sick!

But that should be easy since we all know of the three pillars of good health (diet, exercise, genetics) eating right is the easiest of all ... Hell. No, sorry, I was about to go all sarcastic and make it seem America knows nothing about sugar overload, HFCS, preservatives, the increasingly and horrifying inability of urbanites to access fresh foods (specifically the poor ones!), pesticides, pink slime, corn or corn or more corn or when will there ever be enough corn already, price gouging on foods that were produced the way they've been produced for centuries (read: organic, grass-fed, free-range), trans-fats, GMO proliferation in our breadbasket without an honest debate on the merits or looking at the science past what some corporation's panel has assured us is true, sodas, the food-gap, throwing away enough food daily to feed the world's hungry cuz it wouldn't make a dime, slaughterhouses like Auschwitz or Dachau ... That Quite Barbarism ... But that would be foolish - America knows all about that ... Why shouldn't it? America invented most of it …

And we invented the largest consumer-driven transportation system the world has ever seen to move all that food around. Sure, China will catch up with us eventually (if not already), but for the better part of three generations the US led the world in road-building and car-buying. Quite apart from the environmental effects this produced there was a profound psychological positive feed-back loop involved as well: one justifying the pre-dominate narrative of our consumer culture. Choice is sacred; you are special and unique and can reflect that through choice; so choose this product or this other one and express your uniqueness through possessing any one of these infinitely similar products; the choice is yours. Perhaps nowhere else in the market was this ‘story’ sold as diligently and aggressively than in the automobile industry. While it is true the US is, spatially speaking, a very large country, it is not true that every adult American needed or needs their own set of wheels to connect it. There are other options, other technologies that could’ve been employed to bring the masses together with more energy efficiency and communal cohesion. I admit it’s no Copernican Revolution, but the thought that Americans are so stubbornly self-interested and quick to discriminate opposed many of their European or native counterparts can not be divorced from the fact we all love to be in the driver’s seat. That commodified ‘freedom’ we are told awaits us on an open road with our very own internal combustion engine humming along in front of our feet; a freedom trains, buses, or carpooling can never provide. Again, notwithstanding the ecological impact of all this, the psychological dimension is impossible to ignore: even if we all owned Tesla’s that were powered by clean fusion charging stations it would still be me, me, me … which is quite naturally a completely uncynical disposition from which to hold a society together …

American’s fascination with their own value and freedom has of course been a dominate theme in the grand narrative of the country for some time; and while cars and roads were the major technological expression of that for much of the twentieth century, we have turned the corner here, in this regard, finding ourselves lost amid tiny little shiny screens that put the whole world inches from our eyes. With the advent of mobile computing the freedom so many seek isn’t conceived any longer by MPG rather MPBS. The new speed of information, and the promise of perpetual access, have enchanted the newer generations in much the same way vehicles did their antecedents. The technology is different while the story remains the same. It is still a self-centered freedom underlying the need, desire, to own the newest, quickest, coolest gadget. A freedom of information surely, yet one closely connected with the freedom cars brought their older relatives; it is as much economic as it is self-satisfying. The internet changed the game, naturally - and hail and well met etc. etc.! - but a claustrophobic observation remains … for a technology that has brought so many people together - and it has - it sure as hell does an awful good job sundering them as well … for you can’t find a public space anymore where a near-majority of your fellow citizens aren’t more interested in their precious little screens than those flesh and blood humans nearby. Perhaps this is just the necessary evolution of the social fabric - perhaps resistance is futile - though a social contract that has more to do with Facebook’s TOS opposed a Bill of Rights just (and forgive me for being so cynical) doesn’t seem like much of a society worth bothering with to this writer. Certainly not one worth the name.

Speaking of the modern technology we all now can’t live without, it seems to me a funny thing happened on the way to Google’s homepage … we now have access to all the information we can consume, on any topic, just a keystroke away, and look what we’re doing with it … I’m not just talking about social media or pornography, I mean the fundamental epistemological conundrum of an allegedly intelligent species that now has post-scarcity style access to information yet we’ve made of the web one colossal echo-chamber where the tribes huddle together in aggrieved resentment or ignorant bliss of the ‘others’ … look at it like this: in a day and age when the work of science (you know, that thing that made all this ((by which I mean ‘Modernity’ and all its toys)) possible) is more evenly, widely, and objectively disseminated than at any other time in history the public’s grasp and understanding of science and its work is at an all-time low. Basic data are disputed; empirical findings are called into question by anyone with a laptop, forget about a degree in the subject: what used to be considered non-issues, resolved subjects, are now argued over as if the Earth might actually be flat … all of which might just be good for a laugh if there weren’t actual existential threats to the species that only science can solve; yet we can’t even begin that discussion because some car salesman googled Glenn Beck and now we have legislatures that don’t think climate change is real; or they say the data doesn’t support an anthropogenic cause even though they never took a serious science course in their life; or that can’t be right because it doesn’t fit into our time-warp economy and a dollar today is obviously more important than our children’s future; or anyway shut-up idiot scientists just because you actually studied something other than law or business doesn’t mean you know any more than me because I have a high speed internet connection and I bookmarked the Drudge Report … how is it, philosophically speaking, tenable that the more information you have the stupider you become? I don’t know, but if you want a good example of the principle in action take a look at America today. Or just Google it …

Of course there is one thread that ties all these elements of ‘the surface’ together and that thread is consumerism as expressed by our current form of capitalism. The ascendancy of the dollar over all else (sorry God!). The desire to possess, acquire, consume. We are material creatures, we humans, and thus must consume to survive; fine: but do we have to do so in the manner we seem set on here and now? No, not at all, even suggesting that our’s is the only system, the only way to satiate the human hunger is absurd on its face as well as betraying an amnesiac’s conception of history. No, there are other paths, yet we have chosen this one, this ‘capitalism’ that mimics the terrors and rigors of the jungle at every turn. In the act of deifying money (more on that later) we have dehumanized ourselves. For the most part we are simple cogs in a vast machine that cares little or nothing for us; and so we care only for ourselves. The inherent egoism of the modern American psyche is spectacular to behold, certainly, in its primal vanity; at the same time giving the lie to any ethical system we still tenuously cling to as reminder of simpler days (sorry Christianity!). So we are, as a culture, no better than spoiled children grasping for another slice of pie. And while that’s certainly comical, it is also tragic, since such a system is not sustainable whatsoever (there is never enough pie). Neither history or science can provide any examples of such a system expanding into perpetuity (literature has given us a few but they are either satire or utopias ((same thing really))), and yet a sincere, concerted discussion on this issue has yet to percolate through the public sphere, or if so, only in the usual places and thus not given the sort of urgency it requires. But to have this conversation we all have to be ready to listen; it is not enough for the cynics and naysayers to keep shouting into the wild or the web: there has to be an audience, a receptive ear. Which brings us to our next section.

The Self

The problems elucidated in ‘The Surface’ are, to a great extent, symptoms of our sense of self, or, as is more often (if paradoxically) the case, our lack of one. While I am specifically referring to the modern American ‘self’, I’m going to be doing so with large brushstrokes; forming great swathes of colored splotches closer in kind to a rorscharch test than a pointilistic canvass. You may not see a reflection here so much as a sense of remembrance, or deja vu. That’s fine. I can’t be alone in thinking our lifespeeds have altered, and it’s just that alteration I want to discuss.

Lifespeed. Right. Let’s define that quickly so we can move on. By lifespeed I mean that facile quality of Being that tethers us to the ‘now’. Perceptually, our lives happen at a specific point in time, and I’ve conceived the word lifespeed to represent this point, as well as our conscious reaction to it. It’s just a word. Other than this meager definition it means nothing; has no other value. Right.

We were talking about choice earlier and there’s a clear connection between the act of choosing and the extant phenomena adjoining it. Just the relationship that lifespeed is meant to express. On its face, choice is neutral. Neither positive or negative, good or bad. The ‘designed’ choice of our consumer-driven society I find abhorrent, though not from some reactionary impulse, but a genuine longing for what it’s replaced. By making choices we define ourselves and I fear many of us are accepting a story that tells us we can only make this or that choice opposed to this that or the other. That we are told certain stories so many times we think we have no choice how they end; or wether to listen to them at all. In this way our lifespeeds have been damaged; like a bonsai pruned too severely.

Perhaps many are content defining themselves through ‘designed’ choice, or who ‘designed’ it anyway? Yes … there will always be sheep and lemmings in human form, and if that’s your angle you have my pity but nothing else. On the other hand, if you genuinely desire a leveling-up on the self-awareness front but have found this difficult to achieve thus far, you must realize two hard truths; the first that it is your business alone, none others - and the second, that it will be incredibly difficult to achieve because our society was not constructed to assist in this goal - quite the contrary! - it was designed to prevent it, at almost every turn. Here we return to the ‘designed’ component of American choice. Since the beginning the tiny tribes watching the throne have conspired to affect a marked class distinction in the land of the ‘free’. From the original agricultural workers of the new world, to the industrial workers who built a modern nation, to the current service sector workers slipping into poverty those with the firmest grip on the levers of power have continually strived to erect massive obstacles between those that labor for a living and those that live off that labor. Nor are these obstacles simply economic or aspirational in nature, no, due their pervasiveness through the generations they have percolated down into the most subterranean reaches of the mass conscious; into the very stories we use to define ourselves. Egads! a polite-hyper-modern-liberal-minded-triangulator might reply, don’t you know everyone has a TV! A refrigerator! Cheapest food ever! Why yes of course, there is an exception to every rule. While, for about thirty years in the middle of the last century, it seemed America was finally delivering on its promise, just look how long it took for us to devolve into another gilded age (the apparent default position of American society). It is foolish to define a thing based off aberrations, opposed its consistencies. In this way we clearly see the US for what it is … the second most successful marketing scheme in human history (naturally one must award Christianity top honors on that mark) … in the same way tobacco used to be good for you, that sodas were harmless, or how fast food is every bit nutritious as home-made, America cries ‘freedom’ when in so many ways the reverse is clearly the case. From ‘power’s’ perspective it’s nihilistically brilliant sure - give the people a semblance of freedom (in our case economic choice) and they’ll extrapolate that into a veritable cosmos of self-authorized-self-actualization - and you bet the monarchists, dictators, or petty politburos are jealous as hell at the level of control the political classes of America have been able to sustain generation after generation. A state of affairs that continues for no other reason than that an over-whelming majority of Americans keep believing the lies. We are forced to ask: why do they?

Let’s speculate wildly! Is it possible there exists some globe-spanning underground tributary of Lethe that constantly replenishes all the aquifers in the land? Or perhaps when we, on average a truly vain people, look into a mirror our historical consciousness is reset to zero? Or maybe we’ve all become so addicted to the stories we repeat about American Exceptionalism even the most destitute are content to sacrifice any chance they might have of another, better life, so as the stories can keep being told .?. the gyre is constricting at every turn, just like water flowing down the drain we’re becoming closer and closer to ourselves and ours; we’re losing a visceral sense of community and common cause through the ‘designed’ choices of a consumerist economy and specifically the newer technologies of self-absorption. So many of us don’t seem able to see past our own reflections, our problems, that even beginning to consider the larger problems facing our country seems as pointless as sending a manned mission to Mars.

The latent greed of the species is given free reign in America and this greed is destroying us. Making us sick. Stunted, withered, cloying little souls blighted with giga-myopia and eterno-amnesia. Greed. Most cultures have oft thought it a base emotion, one needing constant oversight - not the good ’ole US of A! We saw right through that ethical clap-trap - we saw that by harnessing the simmering greed of a people and putting them to work fulfilling that greed great things could happen … just absolutely amazing things … and we have accomplished quite a bit worth being proud over, and we sure have shown all those historical moralists just how wrong they were about the most solipsistic emotion … but this is a strange greed, our American one, one many may not even be aware of, so deep do its roots dive; a conniving greed that wraps in upon itself like a fresh burrito from Chipotle or those roller coasters you remember from Disneyland or Six-Flags … a greed that we have to learn to turn off, ignore, or quit seeing as so basic and benign in all our lives that there’s nothing you can do about it anyway - because it isn’t benign, it reacts to us and the environment as surely as we do it, and lately it’s been acting badly … yes, there are historical elements to this greed, there is also the question of personal responsibility, mutual complicity, systems of control and power as well - so many factors … I guess I’m nostalgic for another type of human being, one not fueled by avarice or beholden to the choices of others … qualities most seem to have lost somewhere on the way to Walmart … a human being that might never have existed except in a dream …

The Symbol

Human beings have long used symbols to represent value. Symbols are convenient, easy, and incredibly mutable. They can be transferred or translated almost infinitely. With a symbol ideas that might take an incredible amount of energy to explain or describe can be conveyed almost instantaneously. Logic and mathematics could likely not exist without them, nor, indeed, any language. And like any good thing, as is so often the case with any wonderfully useful thing, we humans have become dependent on them. Created for ourselves a world where we can not live without them. We are, in many ways, addicted to their utility. On its face there is nothing ethically challenging about this. Language and math are boons to humanity, practically describing our modern conception of ourselves. Symbols are naturally value neutral, like any high-level epistemological building block. And yet, we modern Americans have found ourselves in a tricky spot. We have crafted a society where one symbol is supreme. Where one symbol, and one symbol alone, holds all the power. A symbol that, if you find yourself without it, without access to it, without a stock-pile of it hiding somewhere, essentially makes you a non-entity. No longer part of the culture, the game. For it is certainly true that the only game in modern America is money. That collecting dollars has superseded all other activities; has supplanted any other endeavor as the only one with value. This state of affairs is the genesis of our cultural decline; of the death of the ideals that the Founders (who themselves were already playing the only game) attempted to instill in the New World: will in the end be understood by future historians as the single greatest crime of our time.

I say crime and I mean it. Don’t use the word for shock or awe. Nor do I want to dwell on this particular subject (not being the place for an extended analysis of this issue I will allow such a discussion its own essay, its own space, a place where it can be a bit more academic and dry, not so emotive or cynical) though we do have to mention a few more things before moving on. Crime. Yes. What was this crime? In short order here we go … it used to be the case that money was a symbol that referred to labor, actual work performed by one human that held value for another. So far as that is all money is, there is nothing ethically suspect about it. Then, at some point in the past, a few cunning paradigm-shifters saw an opportunity and changed the rules regarding what money was; they removed the labor as referent of value, replacing it with rare objects (typically gold) that few among any populace would ever see in their lives. Well, since the promise of alchemy was a lie, and the philosopher’s stone was never discovered, at least this money still referred to something real, something that couldn’t just be made up on the spot. Ah ha! the sons of the sneaky paradigm-shifters thought, that would just be the icing on the cake! Let’s remove the rare objects as value referent as well - let’s go all in on a communal mass delusion and see if anyone believes it … let’s just have money valued at whatever we say it’s valued at. Let’s create a massive shell game that only a very few will ever truly know the rules to, though the outcome, the results, will effect everyone … yes … let’s create the only game worth playing, and let’s give every live birth a turn … which leaves us with a system that, no matter how hard you work, no matter how industrious you are, if you don’t know the rules of the game (in modern America we can think of the Federal Reserve, Wall Street bankers, old money, select members of the Treasury Department etc. as the holders of the rule book) you will not win at it. You will play and play and play and keep losing and losing and losing all the while the rule keepers keep winning and winning and winning because for most players in this game the tokens of victory they collect (dollars) are bought at the hard price of actual labor, as if they never heard about how money grew up - no, they slave and slave for pennies without any chance of leveling up in this game and getting to that haughty echelon where money is no longer about work but having money make money off of someone else’s work … this little narrative I just outlined is a crime because there are clear stealers and victims (of course there are exceptions to every rule, but for every Bill Gates or Steve Jobs, there are a hundred and fifty million working at Walmart for a slave-wage). You see, the architects of the monetary symbol’s paradigm shift knew that by removing any referent to an actual act (labor) or object (gold) they were essentially hollowing out the natural relationship between the symbol and the symbolized, and in that empty space they would find their own El Dorado; their own little universe where they called the shots and none other. They essentially re-wrote the rules of symbolism, and clearly in their favor. And while symbols shift meaning all the time, especially in religious or political environments, these shifts are fundamentally harmless as neither religion or political discourse ever directly affects the physical well being of a human being as does their ability to acquire food, or energy, or health care, or shelter (I understand that by including ‘politics’ in this sense I might seem to be advocating a ‘post-history’ perspective; one where capitalistic-liberalism has won over all other political narratives, and while I hope that isn’t so, at the moment, and especially as an American author, one would be hard pressed to argue the point otherwise). To be clear, I’m not suggesting there was some shadowy cabal that gathered and planned out this great hollowing out of the monetary symbol; as is often the case it happened by fits and starts, here and there, as history would have it, propelled by the innate greed of the least amongst us. And yet they have scored a grand victory, these acolytes of avarice. Have pulled the proverbial wool over so many eyes - and in the process redefined a country that promised freedom into a vassal state completely enthralled to an ugly little strip of green denim that truly means nothing at all …

Of course this transformation did not just occur on American soil. But we sure as hell took the ball and ran it home. More than any other modern nation we are more readily defined by the empty symbology of the dollar than any others. This is not just an American problem; but we must be the first to address it …

America’s enslavement to the dollar is the singular cause of all the problems I put forth in ‘The Surface’, and, in many ways, ‘The Self’. We are a nation of suckers, rats, blind idealists, idiot sensualists, blatant thieves and the occasional dreamer … and knowing that, seeing my country in this way does nothing to alleviate my pathological cynicism … but allow me a query - do you still ask me why I am so cynical .?.

#Essay #Philosophy #c. r. stapor #cynicism #nietszche #modernity #philosophers on tumblr #writers on tumblr

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tirkdi · 7 years

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A Family Affair: Mal & the Darkling at a Family Reunion

The premise sounds like crack but the relationship is canon and I can’t believe we don’t have more of this. Featuring hacker!Alina, genetic analysis, and the Darkling’s Terrible Innuendos™. I’m not even sorry.

‘Family’ was still a new concept for Malyen Oretsev.

He’d heard of families all his life, of course – mostly in the context of his not having one. Growing up in an orphanage had been rough at the best of times, but even in his darkest moments Mal had never let himself imagine that there was a family waiting for him somewhere out there.

To look around at them now was … unreal.

When Alina had come home a few months before from her new job at a fancy-and-secretive tech company with a couple coupons for free genetic background analysis, Mal hadn’t thought much of it. He’d scoffed at the cheek swabs but she wanted to do it and he wanted her to be happy so he’d sent his sample in along with hers. When the emails arrived saying their results were ready, they logged into Alina’s account first.

Alina was, the site had said, a carrier for several western African and Ashkenazi genetic diseases, a fact seemingly at odds with the heritage summary that had reported her genetic makeup as split evenly between a region of central China and an unspecified indigenous South American group.

Alina Starkov, the site had proudly announced, you have 0 potential relatives on our site. And then, in moment of exceptional cruelty: Click here to order some kits for your family!

Mal’s results had been less surprising – the site reported that his brown hair and blue eyes came from some combination of the usual west and north European suspects. More unexpected, though, had been that he had five potential relatives on the site.

“Click to see who they are!” Alina prompted, but Mal had hesitated, unsure. In the morning, though, he had a message waiting from one of them.

Dear cousin, it began, and suddenly there was wind or maybe dust in the room because Mal’s vision started to blur.

Ginny, his cousin a few times removed it turned out, had been doing a large scale genealogy project on her own family and had hoped that some people from branches for whom the records petered out might show up on the site. She was beyond thrilled to learn that he was an Oretsev.

She had told him about a family reunion she was planning the next month, conveniently close to where they lived. With Alina’s new job (Mal understood just enough to know that it involved security, computers, and was very, very impressive) they could, for the first time, afford to travel. Unfortunately, Alina was practically chained to her laptop; she’d had to fight just to get the day off to come to the reunion. (“It’s on a Saturday,” Mal had said. Alina had rolled her eyes. “Our CTO says hackers don’t take weekends.”)

They’d rented a car and driven, nearly a three hour trip including a few routes more scenic than they’d meant to take, and they’d arrived late. Mal had gone to apologize to Ginny, but when she saw him she had just thrown her arms around his neck and hugged him.

Maybe this is what family is, he’d thought, amazed.

He and Alina had spent the last half-hour on the lawn, shaking hands with members of his very extended family. The Oretsevs were a bit of a lost branch and he hadn’t met anyone who had a common relative closer than four or five generations back, but everyone was happy to meet him, welcoming and warm.

Alina was beautiful in a sundress and charming in a way he almost never saw her. She typically preferred to be behind her computer screen, often grumbling that she had more in common with hackers in other continents than with their neighbors. But here around his family she seemed energized, somehow, excited – none of the nerves that he had, all of the joy.

She squeezed his hand. “I’m going to go see if Ginny has any more of that lavender lemonade. Want anything while I’m in there?” Mal shook his head and she smiled, kissed him lightly on the nose. “I love you.”

That was enough. It had always been enough.

Mal turned to see another late arrival to the party, inwardly relieved that he and Alina weren’t the last ones to show up. A man, suited, escorted a much older woman with a cane – his mother, Mal supposed. The woman took a seat and was immediately engaged in conversation (or at least talked at) by several other matriarchs. Mal walked across the lawn towards the man.

“Hi,” he said, holding out his hand. “I’m Mal.”

A glance of cool grey, a nod towards Mal’s name tag. “I can see that.”

Ooookay. He smiled gamely and pointed at a nearby table. “If you want one, name tags are over there.”

“I’m aware.”

New strategy. “So you have much contact with this branch of your family?”

“None, actually.”

Somehow Mal wasn’t surprised. “What brings you here then?”

“My mother wished to come.” He responded to Mal’s look with an even gaze. “Haven’t you ever done anything to make your mother happy?”

One part of Mal’s brain reasoned that this man couldn’t possibly know that he was an orphan. The other part of his brain insisted that he had intended that comment to hurt every bit as much as it did.

Mal had never been so relieved to see Alina as when she stepped out of the house at that moment. She saw him and smiled, her face lighting like the sun – just for a moment, before her expression was replaced by something much darker.

She stomped over to where he was, furious, and he didn’t understand why until she walked right past him to the suited man, grabbing his arm and turning him around.

“What happened,” she practically shouted, “to 'hackers don’t take weekends’??”

It took Mal a moment. Then he looked at the man, back at Alina. “You’re the …”

“He’s my CTO.” Alina scowled.

The man seemed unperturbed. He was silent for a moment before turning to Mal. “That stands for Chief Technology Officer.”

“I know what it stands for,” Mal ground out. Alina had been complaining about the CTO nearly since she started the job; Mal was beginning to understand why.

She narrowed her eyes. “It’s quite a coincidence that I take one day off in the last three months and you show up to my boyfriend’s family reunion.”

“Your boyfriend,” the man repeated. He glanced between the two of them and something like relief crossed his face, replaced quickly by something like irritation. Then boredom. Mal wasn’t sure which he liked least.

He didn’t have a chance to decide, however, because Ginny chose that exact moment to appear. Her mouth formed an excited O as she looked up at the man in front of her. “You must be one of the Morozovas!” His lack of response didn’t discourage her, and she continued: “You look just like the photos of your grandfather Ilya.”

“Fascinating,” the CTO replied.

Ginny beamed despite his tone, either ignoring or failing to notice the fact that he hadn’t looked at her once. All his attention was on Alina, who glared back at him, hands clenched to fists at her sides. Ginny waved at someone across the lawn and excused herself, leaving the three of them alone again.

“On my way here, I received word that that contract we’d been hoping for came through,” the man told Alina, his tone deliberately casual in a way to indicate that it was anything but. “We’ll need to get started immediately.”

Alina’s fists didn’t unclench, but her eyes widened just enough to dim her scowl.

“What sort of project?” asked Mal.

“The classified sort.” Morozova hadn’t looked his way and Mal thought he wouldn’t elaborate, but after a beat he continued. “The reporting structure will be different for the duration of this project – Alina will be working directly under me.”

Mal furrowed his brow. Did he just –

The CTO turned towards Mal, met his eyes. “It’s going to require a lot of long, hard nights.”

Mal’s jaw dropped. HE DID.

Alina’s scowl was back. “Come on, Mal,” she bit out as she grabbed his hand. “Let’s go talk to someone from the non-asshole side of your family.”

Mal let her lead him away and glanced back at the CTO who seemed, shockingly, almost amused. “I’ll see you at the office this evening, Alina.”

She waved back at him using one particular finger and led Mal straight across the lawn. Mal regained his capacity for speech somewhere past the table full of tiny cucumber sandwiches. “He’s even worse than you said.”

“I know.” She dropped his hand, put hers on her hips and scanned the yard, a deep line formed between her brow. “But I can handle him – other than that, it’s my dream job.”

“Won’t he fire you if you talk to him like that though?”

Alina exhaled loudly and shook her head, frustration evident in her movements. “No, he needs me too much.”

Mal knew he should keep his mouth shut, and he tried to – and failed. “Long, hard nights kind of need you?”

If she had stormed off and taken the car back to the city, leaving him in the yard in the middle of nowhere, he would have deserved it. For a second there, he thought she might. But then she laughed, and this time when she shook her head it was light. “More like I’m the only reason we got that contract in the first place. I think I’m going to go see if Ginny has anything stronger than that lemonade. Can you drive us home?” She grabbed his hand again, and at her touch he felt the tension in his chest release.

He smiled. “Anything for you.”

She smiled back before leading him across the yard to a table with drinks where more family members waited, eager to meet him, unlike the one they’d left behind. I guess you really can’t choose your family, Mal thought, amazed at the aptness of a saying he’d never thought would apply to him.

When, sometime later, Mal looked back towards where the CTO stood, the man was still staring at Alina. Mal was about to mention it to her when the man’s gaze shifted towards him and something about his expression made Mal think better of saying anything at all and anxious to leave. It wasn’t until a couple hours later, relieved to have concrete passing below him at 70 miles an hour and Alina snoring lightly in the passenger seat, that he realized that he hadn’t really escaped, that family was the one thing he wouldn’t be able to just leave behind.

Alina shifted towards him, maybe dreaming, and Mal sighed, turning back to the long stretch of highway in the approaching dusk. After a moment he reached towards her, the only family he had chosen, and grasped her fingers in his. In her sleep, Alina smiled.

#the grisha trilogy #malyen oretsev #grisha fic #the darkling #sun soldier #alina starkov

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penumbra-rp · 5 years

Photo

Congratulations Riley, you have been accepted for the role of Daisy Hookum!

She doesn’t exactly have natural maternal instincts, but she likes to think she has a good eye for making things work, and that includes her team. If one part of the machine is broken, they might as well all be. She approaches keeping her team in check with a practical philosophy, although she might be a bit more attached to some of them than she lets on.

I’m so excited to have the Auror’s unofficial-mama-bear! Aside from the fact that she’s badass and knows how to whip her team into shape, what I adore about Daisy is how driven she is to succeed. All her life, she has done well and managed to get by without too much of a struggle-- but I think she’ll find her latest career path kicking up a few hurdles. She’s up against a lot and it’s going to take no small amount of work for her to achieve all that she wants with so many ulterior motives fuelling the actions of her colleagues, but if anyone can do it I reckon it’s her. Let’s hope she can persuade her team to see things from her point of view.

Please check out our checklist for joining Penumbra.

01. Out of Character

NAME: Riley

AGE: over 18

YOUR BIRTHDAY: October 12

PRONOUNS: he/him

TIMEZONE: GMT/BST

02. In Character

CHARACTER: Daisy Hookum

CHARACTER’S PRONOUNS: she/her

FACECLAIM: Elodie Yung

CHARACTER’S BIRTHDAY: 22 February

PERSONALITY:

+ Experienced: Daisy had been at this longer than her colleagues on Operation Auror and she’s determined to be a leader. She can be a bit like a dog with a bone. Actually, she’s more like a pit-bull pulling on the trouser-leg of justice. She isn’t like Alasator, someone who doesn’t know when to quit. Daisy knows her limits, but she also likes to test them. She can ask the tough questions and she isn’t afraid of looking like the bad guy if it’s necessary. She can interview her suspects and make it seem as if she’s just making conversation, or she can be blunt and to the point. It’s all about knowing what the situation needs.

+ Perceptive: Daisy has a way of picking people apart like they’re made of lego bricks. She has keen observational skills and a keen eye for bullshit. Daisy knows when someone is pulling her leg and it frustrated her to no end when her instinct that someone is misleading her kicks in but she can’t prove it. In their line of work, a gut feeling doesn’t always cut it, but her gut feelings have been right on plenty of occasions.

+ Protective: She rolls her eyes at being called the mother of her squad, but God, someone has to look out for them. Whether she’s stopping Frank diving down another rabbit hole or cutting in with the press when they get a bit too harsh about her team members, Daisy has taken the role of protector. She’s a little reluctant. She doesn’t exactly have natural maternal instincts, but she likes to think she has a good eye for making things work, and that includes her team. If one part of the machine is broken, they might as well all be. She approaches keeping her team in check with a practical philosophy, although she might be a bit more attached to some of them than she lets on.

- Blunt: It’s almost funny, hearing her swear with her clipped middle-class accent, watching that child-of-a-lawyer temper flare up. Daisy doesn’t exactly try to be aloof or rude, but Daisy has a way of coming off harsh. There’s often an implied ‘wanker’ at the end of her sentences, and though she’s professional, she doesn’t always phrase things in the most delicate way and when she’s frustrated, she does a bad job of hiding it.

- Manipulative: It’s not against the rules for police officers to lie to get you to make a confession. It might be a little unethical, but who cares about that, right? It’s about results. If you’ve gotta tell the rich banker in the interview room that his receptionist turned over print-outs of his emails to get him to confess to everything then so be it. He’s guilty anyway. Some people look at Daisy like they can’t believe she just did that when she steps on the other side of the two way mirror from time to time. It can be scary how good she is, and they’re cautious of her using her tricks to find out who ate the last of the biscuits without replacing them, or maybe even something worse…

- Political: Much as she hates to pull rank sometimes, Daisy is still the senior detective on her squad, and that means she has to make sacrifices sometimes. If she has to drag her team to a fundraiser for an afternoon in order to get the boss to sign off on the over-time they need, she’ll do it. She hates it, but it’s a necessity. It wouldn’t exactly be fair to say that she’s fake. In fact, Daisy can be brutally honest at times, and often is. But she knows when to keep her mouth shut and when to play the game. She’s ambitious and while she would never sell out her squad, sometimes she worries they’re not always convinced of that.

BRIEF BULLET POINT BIO:

God bless the woman with ambition, people say. Or maybe it’s ‘god fear the woman with ambition’. Daisy can never remember. Either way, she somehow wants to prove that point before she even knows what it is, a child determined to win at sports day and get ten out of ten on every spelling test even in primary school.

It’s not something she trains in the beginning. It’s just a gift, an amazing memory and a knack for perception. It starts with something small, her pointing out every car that drives past that’s the same make as her father’s before she’s out of pushchairs.

Her parents make games out of tests and tests out of games, shapes and colours and cards. Daisy doesn’t mind. In fact, she likes it when she ‘wins’.

All parents think their children are exceptional but there’s no denying Daisy is pretty bright. Maybe it’s luck, the resulting genetics of an Oxford Law Graduate turned up and coming lawyer and an Archivist at the National History Museum. Whatever it is, they’re determined not to let her waste it.

She never has the typical teenage rebellion with the drugs and the cigarettes and the staying out too late at night. She just suffers from the frustration at being boxed in, of being told who to be. Her teenage rebellion is teenage laziness, the habit of coasting because she knows she’s clever. It takes her favourite teacher to pull her aside after she bombs a practice exam at sixth form and asking her what’s going on for her to get her head on straight.

Maybe a heart to heart is just what she needed, an honest conversation with someone outside the family, someone independent. She and the teacher have a few cigarettes together and they chat about the pressures of expectation and what she wants from the future. Only Daisy can decide, the teacher says, but she’s going to limit her options if she gives up now.

It works. When the real test comes around, Daisy aces it. She has a goal in mind now. She could no doubt be a lawyer like her dad with the way she can spin a narrative, but she wants something else, something a little more on the front lines. She wants to become a police officer, maybe even an intelligence officer some day.

She goes to Uni in Scotland for a bit of space. After all, with her parents living in London, it’s about as far away as she can reasonably get without going all the way to Europe, and while Scots might seem as if they speak a foreign language at times, at least she can understand them.

The distance works. When she graduates, she does so with honours and she has her pick of jobs, but the only one she wants is back home at Scotland Yard. You can take the girl out of London, but you can’t take the London out of the girl.

People know who her dad is. They respect him. Daisy wants that respect too, and she does whatever she can to get it. She doesn’t want to coast any more, neither on her intelligence nor on her name. Hard work combined with natural intelligence? Now that’ll do the job. She rises through the ranks, her grit and determination blending well with her knack for politics.

She becomes the head of Operation Auror because that’s the job she wants. It’s challenging, it’s exciting, and it’s current. But if the newspapers or her dad ask, most importantly, it’s the right thing to do. After all, even if she’s doing what she believes in, she can’t be seen to be too sappy now, can she?

INTERVIEW:

i. How do you feel about your current occupation?

Daisy has to remind herself that you’re not supposed to be rude to journalists. You’re not supposed to treat them like they’re stupid. It’s their job to ask questions as if the answer isn’t obvious, because they need the words to come out of your mouth, not just from their pen. She puts on a smile she hopes doesn’t come across nearly as forced as it is. She’s gonna kill the Captain for this. Next time, she’s sending Frank. He has that boy next door charm that people love. “I’m one of the youngest supervising officers at Scotland Yard. I’ve got my own team, a good team, and a cause I believe in. My job is difficult, but it’s a necessity–a public service.”

ii. What song would you say describes yourself?

“I’d like to think my life is too complicated to be summed up in a single song,” Daisy answers pointedly. She hates questions like this. They might as well be as abstract as ‘if you were a fruit, what fruit would you be?’ Ultimately pointless, but designed to challenge her own perception of herself. “Just because I listened to this album in the car earlier, I suppose I’ll go with Icarus by Bastille. I always feel like I’m testing my limits, trying to avoid burning out and crashing. But it hasn’t happened yet. So I’m just going to keep pushing.”

iii. Does reputation matter to you?

Too flipping much. Her dad is practically worshipped in his field. More than once she’s heard people whispering behind their back about nepotism, bias, her dad pulling strings. He went from being a brilliant prosecutor to a judge, one of the most respected in London. “Reputation can make or break a person,” she answers, calculated and succinct. “And the frustrating part is that only some of it is in your control. You can turn up early every day and stay late every night, but some people will say you don’t deserve what you’ve got. Eventually, actions speak louder than words. I try and make my own reputation instead of letting other people do it for me.”

iv. What is your relationship with your parents like?

“It’s pressure, time and heat that creates diamonds,” she replies almost too coldly. “That’s what my parents raised me with. Oh, there was praise, but they weren’t the sort of namby-pamby lot that hung the crap drawings on the fridge. Would they love me if I wasn’t excellent?” she asks with a small shrug. “Yes, of course. But they’d also be disappointed. I don’t exceed for them. I do it for myself. But making them proud is a nice bonus.”

v. What languages can you speak?

“Does sarcasm count? Because I speak that fluently.” But that’s not the kind of thing people want to hear. They want to hear things that sound impressive next to a by-line. “Fluent French,” she answers. She was raised speaking both languages her whole life. “And conversational Khmer, from my mother’s Cambodian heritage.” She doesn’t get the chance to practice that one as much.

vi. If your home was on fire and you could only save one item, what would you choose?

vii. Which Hogwarts University faculty did you study at? The Gryffindor School of Applied Science, the Ravenclaw School of Humanities, the Slytherin School of Social Science, or the Hufflepuff School of Art?

“Don’t think my dad would have forgiven me if I’d been anything but a Slytherin,” Daisy says with a low chuckle. She hates this bollocks, feature pieces for the local newspapers, ‘meet the local heroes’ type stuff, but if it helps them budget for the extra surveillance equipment of gets a warrant sighed, so be it. “Criminal Justice and Law. I was always going to be either in a court-room or a police station. Next step is MI-5.” She gives a wry smirk, not clear if she’s kidding or not.

vix. What is your social media username?

She’d hardly bother with the social media stuff if it wasn’t so important in the current world. These days, between snapchat, Instagram and facebook, people were surveilling themselves. “It’s just my name, no dots or dashes. It’s important the police are accountable, and if the public want to check up on me, they can find me easily.” She gives a small, perhaps smug, shrug, smiling wryly. “I have nothing to hide.” And she might be one of the few officers who can really say that.

EXTRAS:

(sorry the links are from when her name was still Florence)

https://keiynan-lonsdale.tumblr.com/tagged/char:%20florence

https://www.pinterest.co.uk/rileyliamm/florence/

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