#i think sometimes he's very shocked by my general lack of ambitions. while i do have all this artistic knowledge

[britneyshakespeare]

you know what it is. i talk about how vain he is and how he only talks about himself and that is the impression a lot of people have of him and it is the impression i favor leaning towards. he has a very coded way of self-disclosure; he often seems like he's trying to impress people but i know him to be not-the-most-assured in a lot of ways. when i first complimented him on his poetry and told him how much i liked a few pieces (and i loved some of what i read before i knew his last name, so when i read his poetry i did not assume the person whose poetry i so loved was, well, that retired male model i met in passing every now and then). when i told him that. he was very moved by it.

and i do talk about how vain he is; i do say he only talks about himself; but every now and then when he does say something about me it is not at all hidden that he does admire me. some of what he says that seems to coded to impress me or to get my validation, i know he is doing this towards me because he thinks im this smart poetry girl. and i am? i am that, he's not wrong. i think it makes me feel hopeless to think that he really does respect me and care what i think of him because i'd rather he didn't. i'd rather him be this charming but shallow pretty boy which i think he has been seen as by a lot of people throughout his life. despite that he is hardworking, despite that he has (or at least tries very hard to have) an intellectual side. perhaps what he says about himself is so often coded to please me even while it is fishing for my attention, and i want to see that as a reflection of his own self-regard but i don't know that it is.

i don't know that it's not, but i don't know that it is either and as neither of us is very frequently vulnerable with the other, it's not fair for me to say which is the case. or even that there's a "which" like it can't be both. i don't know that he admires me; i don't know that he sees me as this girl who is (or at least used to be) very charmed by him. i do know that he always comes to me and asks me about poetry because as far as he's told me, i'm the only one who has ever cared about his. for all i know that could also be bullshit, but then why should i assume it is either? i'm quite unfair to him in my assessments of him. i do have to admit, he has never actually seemed to have a disrespectful or unfair assessment of me.

#he told me today i was 'exquisite' basically #i think sometimes he's very shocked by my general lack of ambitions. while i do have all this artistic knowledge #i'm like some sort of poetry guru to him. which does make me laugh a little #his estimation of me is overstated. #im a fairy to him! a strange creature he doesnt understand #like how rochester used to call jane eyre a fairy. except we're both pretty good-looking #tales from diana #i dont call myself good-looking often either but i know other people see me as that. so. it is what it is #thats another piece of the puzzle is back in 2020 during quarantine he was... well he still is #but he WAS initially very flirty w me and sort of asked me out 'if we ever get out of this' (quarantine) #whether he sees me as some pretty smart girl who's 8 years younger than him. well. #thats probably exactly what he sees me as #although im not pretty enough or smart enough. or hell even young enough anymore #god we're both old now. #i do promise you reader i won't marry him

[themurphyzone]

This post is a combination of the 90s PatB alongside the reboot’s Ep 13. Spoilers below. 

So...I was certainly not expecting a flashback in this ep. Great usage of the ‘everyone asks how, but no one ever asks why’ question by Pinky. 

No matter the adaptation, Brain is always presented as a mouse with a pathological need for control because he sorely lacked it as a young mouse. When he loses that control, whether in this episode with being locked in a car and taken on a road trip against his will, or in other episodes with different situations, he’ll lose control of himself, the very thing he’s trying to avoid. 

Anyways, the flashback presented in this episode can reasonably fit with the origin episodes in the 90s PatB, so I’m gonna try and present these in an order that can fit together, so let’s start off with Leggo My Ego, shall we? 

Anyway, Brain starts life as an innocent field mouse. Ain’t he the cutest little thing you’d ever see? 

Um...hey guys, maybe we could let the cute mouse baby blow a feather around and be happy? 

Nope...oof. Time to begin a life of trauma. 

He’s a babey.... He needs hugs! How do you people not have sympathy for him??????

So basically, the 90s cartoon presents several origins and some of them are more contradictory than others. I believe Leggo My Ego and The Visit are the only episodes that mention Brain was originally a wild mouse captured by humans, but it’s generally the most widely accepted origin for him.

In Leggo My Ego, Freud notes that Brain’s desire for world domination appears to be a subconscious desire to return to the simple life he once led. 

So..let’s bring in Snowball now. 

In this post, I’m trying to be chronological here. In this flashback, Brain describes how he and Snowball were once very close and how he could always make Snowball laugh. 

Brain and Snowball grew up together, and Brain genuinely cared about Snowball, even into adulthood when the two became enemies. 

They went through the gene splicer together after an experiment gone wrong. The gene splicer exploded and supposedly messed with Snowball’s mind. 

Snowball did something that caused him to get kicked out of ACME Lab. The rift became permanent, though what was the exact cause or if clashing ambitions fueled it is unknown. 

This event left a permanent mark on Brain, and Pinky himself had never heard about Snowball until he tried to steal one of Brain’s schemes. 

But anyway, the exact timeline of the splicing and the break in friendship is unknown. So...I think this flashback in the reboot’s Ep 13: Roadent Trip might fill one of the blanks in on an event that might’ve occurred during Brain’s time with Snowball, before he met Pinky. 

Alright, so for this post’s sake, I’m going to present the new flashback as if it took place shortly after Brain’s splicing with Snowball. I’m also going to disregard the 90s PatB episode Project BRAIN, because there’s stronger canon evidence that Brain was born in the wild and that he grew up with Snowball. However, I do enjoy keeping that Brain named Pinky. 

Anyways, that’s enough for the introduction. Grab your tissues if you haven’t already. 

Pinky: “You’re always trying to work out how to take over the world, but you’ve never told me why you want to take over the world, Brain.” 

*moment of silence*

Pinky: “Brain?” 

Brain: “If I answer this, you’ll let me expire in peace?” 

Honestly, a GIF would do Brain’s reaction justice, because he doesn’t outright dismiss Pinky’s question. He’s more hesitant because he realizes this moment is going to lead to a heart to heart talk, something he’d rather not engage in. And you know what? I can’t recall any instance of Brain admitting to Pinky about why he wanted to take over the world, just how or that he was going to do it with this particular plan. 

I think this correlates well with Leggo My Ego above; that Brain doesn’t reflect on the ultimate driving force behind his actions, just that he wants it and he’s going to somehow get it. If he does have a moment of clarity, he always dismisses it and goes right back to the drawing board. 

And most importantly, that he just wants love and respect. Does he create his own misery? Yes. But at the same time, he’s sadly a product of the combination of human curiosity and ignorance. 

So...I deeply apologize for this tangent real quick before I move onto the rest of this post. 

*takes deep breath* 

LOOK AT THIS BABY HE’S SUCH A CUTIE I WANNA HUG HIM SO BAD HE DOESN’T DESERVE THIS CRAP YOU WILL LOOK AT HIM AND YOU WILL LOVE HIM 

Okay, so like I said before, due to his head shape and how he seems to display early cognitive abilities here, I honestly think the best timeframe for this would be sometime in the 90s, just after his and Snowball’s splicing. Again, Brain was ultimately a child in Snowball, but since he’s the one narrating, we’re led to assume he set his sights on the world right away. 

Actually, it seems more likely that while Brain’s capacity for knowledge was enhanced, he still had to make the effort to learn. What he knows as an adult didn’t come all at once. So here, he has cognition, but he’s still fairly optimistic because the weight of the world truly hasn’t set in yet. 

Alright, so my explanation is that Snowball was elsewhere in the lab, and that they’re simply separated for the day. Brain was lifted out of an experiment with other mice, and placed directly into a solo study. 

The scientists place a huge slice of cheese on a stun plate, with the intention that Brain will be shocked if he tries to go for the cheese. Of course, who would be able to resist having this much food placed in front of them? I certainly wouldn’t. 

But the moment he tries to go for the cheese, he gets shocked. But since he’s very much learning, he doesn’t understand why he gets shocked if he steps on the plate. 

It’s this pose that makes me believe he’s spliced at this point. Brain adopts that thinking pose well into adulthood. However, he doesn’t really have a plan. He just thinks he’ll succeed if he goes for it enough times, much like the world. 

Also, compare his tail shape between this photo and the one above it. Rather fitting for it to be a lightning bolt, is it not? Mice tails do get kinked in real life if handled improperly, which is very much the case here too. 

Scientist 1: “The idea is that once we remove the electronic stimulus, he still won’t go for the cheese.” 

Scientist 2: “Learned helplessness.”  

And sadly...their hypothesis is proven correct. 

And the thing is, Brain does recognize that the shock is turned off. He does learn that he shouldn’t touch the plate. So he tries once more...

And stops. 

Even with the cheese’s proximity, it’s still unattainable. The only thing that holds Brain back is himself. He wants the cheese, but he’ll get hurt if he tries to go for it. So...despite there being no obvious danger, Brain doesn’t go for it again. 

Learned Helplessness Wikipedia Page Link

This could potentially be the moment where Brain finally loses his innocence. He has to control everything because the moment he doesn’t...he’ll get shocked. 

Notice how everything Brain’s ever wanted at any stage is always in close proximity to himself? In Leggo My Ego, he was extremely close to his parents and the tin can upon capture. In Snowball, he clearly desired companionship, but he and Snowball were never in the same cage. In this flashback, the cheese is ripe for the taking with the shock turned off, and he doesn’t try again. 

Brain is able to learn. And he learns that the world is cruel, that he’s only an interesting specimen for science with no autonomy of his own. He learns that he has to be in control to stop hurting so much.  

“From that day hence, I vowed I would be the one in control. Of myself, of my surroundings, of the world. Yet again, here I am, totally helpless.” 

Okay, I swear this wasn’t intentional and I didn’t notice this until I made this post, but look at how similar the final pose in the flashback and Brain’s pose in this shot are. 

That in some ways, Brain is still that child with simple desires. Maybe he phrases them differently, but that’s what it ultimately boils down to.  

And from Brain’s emotionally charged delivery of the above line, this experience was so traumatic that he kept it hidden for two decades. 

And while the cheese is supposed to represent how he can’t obtain the world despite living in it, I think there’s another thing that went unstated. It also happens to represent: 

Pinky is the cheese. Brain won’t step on a stun plate if he tries to touch Pinky. Rather, Pinky will welcome any affectionate gesture with open arms. 

But Brain believes he’ll be hurt if he tries. The humans set the precedent. Desire affection, desire love, you’ll get hurt, they taught him. 

The only thing holding Brain back is himself. 

And it’s absolutely tragic.

Be like Pinky. Give Brain a hug.   

If you’ll excuse me, Imma go cry. 

#pinky and the brain #animaniacs spoilers #patb spoilers #long post #animaniacs reboot #also i'm sorry i fooled you into believing this post would actually have good analysis #that's how all these start out and it quickly devolves me into crying over cute mouse babies

[purplesurveys]

1269

Last thing you bought online? Did you like it? OMG OMG so I got Angela an Army Bomb!!!!!! for her birthday!!!! It was HELLLL looking for sealed ones that were already onhand, but fortunately I was able to find one from this really nice seller a few days ago and the shipping was quick as well. I’m just a little worried because the outbox has a little dent on it :( but it was the best onhand offer I could find so I got it before anybody could call dibs. I still hope she likes it! I got her batteries too so that she can try lighting it up as soon as she has it. :D

Could you date someone who didn’t drive (and didn’t show an interest in ever getting their license, either)?  I feel like this is such a petty thing to make a big deal about...if they knew how to commute or any other way to get to their destination, I don’t think this should be a problem. It would only be an issue to me if they refused to get a license in a very I-generally-lack-ambition kind of way.

How would you react if your artwork became famous?  I don’t have any to show off to begin with. I love appreciating art, but creating it was never a forte of mine.

Would you get your nipples pierced?  No, I don’t plan on getting any piercings. How many people know your birthday?  Outside of my family, my best friends. I think everyone else relies on Facebook to be reminded, which is fine with me.

Has anyone ever tried to ruin a relationship you were in?  No. Quite the contrary, really...I was sometimes informed about red flags taking place, which of course my stubborn ass ignored.

Have you ever watched a whole hour long infomercial?  Probably, as a kid. The channel from which I used to watch WWE aired these really long infomercials so I would watch those while waiting for like Raw or whatever show was going on after.

What is your current MySpace song?  I never hung out on Myspace. I had an account, but I was too young for it so it wasn’t long before I got bored.

What is your favorite kind of meat to put on your sandwich?  Pulled pork or fried chicken.

Which one of your exes do you feel like you have the most chemistry with?  I only have one ex.

How do you feel about people who make Facebook profiles for their pets? I find it really cute. But I personally wouldn’t put in as much effort lol.

Have you ever personally known a pair of conjoined twins?  Hmmmmmmmm I don’t think so.

What was the most disturbing thing you have ever heard your mother say? She threatened suicide in front of me and my dad in a very calm way when I was around 11, I think? Maybe 12, idk. I haven’t actually thought about that moment in an extremely long time until this question. I’ll move on now and shove the memory at the very very back of my head before I get sad.

Is there something in particular you like to look at photos of? What is it?  Aside from members of BTS (lol), interior design inspirations.

Chewy chocolate-chip cookies: like or dislike?  Ooh, love. When I bite into a cookie it hassssss to ooze chocolate, otherwise I would be underwhelmed.

If your boyfriend/girlfriend wanted to dress only in the opposite sex’s clothing, would you support that? If not, would you leave them?  Support.

Do you think your grandmother is/was beautiful?  They both are.

Which of your fields of interest are you a total expert on?  Anything that has to do with writing (except poems), I guess? I like being able to give people advice and tips when it comes to that.

When was the last time you got all dolled up?  Last July when we had a big PR media launch thingy and I couldn’t afford to look like shit on Zoom.

Do you ever name objects? (i.e. mp3 players, guitars, cars, etc.)  Never.

Do you have a criminal record?  Not criminal but it’s possibleeeee that I have some kind of record on my license from the time I got stopped by an officer in Alabang, lmao. It was a minor offense from a tiny part of the town so I don’t actually know if they filed it, but it’s possible.

Last person you took a nap with?  I don’t really nap with other people. I hate falling asleep in front of others to begin with.

Does seeing your mother cry automatically make you feel sad as well?  No.

Do you think someone likes the same person you like?  I don’t like anybody.

Do you want your life to stay the way it is right now forever?  No, I do not want to stay in a pandemic and not get to maximize my life the way it’s supposed to be enjoyed forever.

Have you ever been to craigslist.com?  I’ve never checked it out; idk if we have that here?

What about eBay?  I also dunno if they operate here so no, I’ve never bothered.

Have you ever used Nair?  Not Nair, but I’ve used Veet before.

Are you medicated?  Nope.

Do you shape/fill in your eyebrows?  I never do stuff to my eyebrows except shave them.

Have you ever stolen/borrowed clothes from an ex?  Several articles of clothing were left behind here, yeah. I never had the chance to give them back because I stupidly thought we were going to get back together eventually. By the time I moved on the timing was already off, so the clothes stayed with me untillll...just a few days ago, actually – when I finally cleaned up my room and got rid of a bunch of knickknacks that accumulated here over the years, including all her shirts and sweaters and stuff.

Could you make a statement about anything political?  The 2022 presidential election landscape looks like complete shit and I’m nearly at that point where I want to stop giving a fuck about this country’s future.

Do you think you’ve already met your soulmate?  No.

Do you get the feeling something good will happen in your life soon?  I think I’m already living in it, haha.

Do you enjoy romantic movies, even when they’re cliche?  Sure, but cliché is also hit and miss for me. I love Titanic and Love Actually, but I cannot stand movies like Me Before You and The Notebook. I guess it depends on certain executions, like the acting, screenplay, casting, etc.

Have you been to McDonald’s in the past month?  No, not inside. We did drive-thru within the last month, though.

Have you ever slept over at your best friend’s house?  Not at Andi’s, but I have at Angela’s.

How often do you go bowling?  Extremely rarely. I can’t tell you the last time I went bowling.

Last time you were in an apartment?  Like 2007 when I visited my aunt back when she still lived in one. None of my friends have their own apartments.

Have you ever seen a live seahorse?  I don’t think so.

Would you like to have your own yacht? I mean I wouldn't say no if you offered it to me for free, but I'm not exactly interested in one. < Same.

Winnie the Pooh or Tigger?  Tigger always made me laugh as a kid.

What’s the unhealthiest thing you’ve eaten today?  Luncheon meat, I think? I didn’t go overboard with the junk food today.

Has a stranger ever offered to buy you a drink?  Hm, not that I can recall.

What is something you’d be happy to receive as a gift, that doesn’t cost a lot?  A bag of the salted egg chips that I really like costs like 30 bucks, or roughly 60 US cents.

What kind of music does your significant other/crush like to listen to?  I don’t have any irl crushes, can I use a celebrity crush instead? HAHA he’s heavily into jazz and whenever he gets asked for music recos he always gives jazz artists from like the 50s and 60s.

Who did you have your first kiss with? Do you remember what colour his/her eyes were?  Gab. Dark brown.

Are there any themes from TV shows that you like to sing along to? The Big Bang Theory and Friends; and then I also liked humming to the themes of Breaking Bad, The Walking Dead, and BoJack Horseman. The Phineas & Ferb theme was also a lot of fun to sing along to.

Do you eat dessert after dinner? No, I never do that. I’m usually already full after dinner, and we don’t always have sweets at home anyway.

Have you ever had too much to drink and felt embarrassed about your behavior the next day?  Sure.

When you go out drinking, what do you prefer to drink?  Cocktails. I very rarely go for hard drinks/shots, especially if I brought my own car.

What was the last animal that you saw?  Dog.

What was the last thing that you said to one of your siblings?  I just told my sister I was done using her laptop so she can have it back. My Memories of 2020 DVD turned out to be region-locked so I have to use her laptop every time I want to watch it :(

What is the most expensive thing that you’ve purchased that you paid for:  My Map of the Soul photobook cost me around 5k in total.

What is your favorite messaging program?  Messenger.

Do you eat fast food more than 5 times a week?  Wow no. Aside from being extremely unhealthy, that’s also a LOT of spending??

Have you ever almost drowned?  Yes.

Have you ever learned something shocking about someone through Facebook?  I mean I’ve had to learn about more than one family death through my Facebook feed, which sucks but is nothing I have control over. Otherwise the most shocking thing I’ve seen is probably classmates from high school having their own kids, but at this point I’m used to it already.

What’s the scariest living animal that you’ve petted?  I’m not really afraid of carrying/petting animals especially if there’s a guide or expert nearby, but the most daring one was probably the crocodile I volunteered to hold in Palawan.

Do you remember the first conversation you ever had with the person you currently have feelings for?  Not at all.

Do you dread certain days of the week? If yes, what day/s and why?  I hate Mondays for obvious reasons lol. I don’t know anyone who is actively cheery about reporting back to work.

If you eat oatmeal, do you have it plain or do you have certain toppings that you like to add to it?  I never eat oatmeal. I had that every single day for breakfast from like kindergarten to 4th grade and I vowed never to take a spoonful of it again.

What is the funniest or strangest thing you’ve ever heard somebody say in their sleep?  I dunno. I used to keep a log of the things my ex used to say in her sleep and a great deal of them were hilarious, but obviously I deleted that note a long time ago.

Choose one - Butterfinger, Milky Way, Snickers:  Butterfinger.

Do you use Mozilla Firefox? Nopes.

Who is your favorite person to hug? Angela and Laurice.

Have you ever had to have a mug shot?  Nope.

What was the last thing you carried to your room?  Kimi.

When was the last time you had a late night phone call?  WELL over a year ago.

#survey #surveys

[danwhobrowses]

Why ‘The Karate Kid Part II’ Deserves More Respect

So guess what film I finished watching today? Of course, the Karate Kid franchise is considered iconic mainly for its first entry; Wax on Wax off, Skeleton fights, Sweep the Leg and the Crane Kick all cemented its legacy that allowed Cobra Kai to also be such a success. But imagine my shock when the approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes for Part II is 45% - 21% lower than the Jaden Smith ‘The Karate Kung Fu Kid’ version (and Part III is scored 15%, which is also super harsh but hard to debate outside of the magnificence of Terry Silver). Originally this was just gonna be a general post of how much I enjoyed retreading Part II, but upon seeing that score I had to give it my ‘Deserves More Respect’ posts.

It is an off-chance, but if you haven’t watched this film there will be spoilers within, I encourage you to watch it before reading, and maybe watch it again if you have so it’s fresh in the mind

Let’s start with a controversial point shall we? There are several parts where Part II is actually better than the original. Now I know! There’s a lot about the original which is iconic, but nostalgia does blind you to other shortcomings and while it’s easy to sell the first part because of its mystique, a sequel has the added pressure of rising above and developing on old and new themes set by the predecessor. The Premise In case you decided against refreshing your memory. Karate Kid Part II starts with a recap of Part I, a bit of content that was meant to be Part I’s final scene (in the script, not for filming) and then a timeskip. Ali with an i is gone - brutally dumping Daniel for some Football Player before Senior Prom and after crashing his car, Daniel’s mother is in Fresno for work and Miyagi has received a letter from his home Okinawa in news of his father’s fading health. The stage is set for Daniel and the audience to learn more about the iconic Mr. Miyagi and the life he left behind. Okay, so there is bad in this film Part II deserves respect, but it’s not perfect. It definitely gets messy near the end with Daniel’s antagonist Chozen, he mainly took beats from Johnny Lawrence in physically confronting Daniel when he could with a bunch of no-named goons and he fought pretty similarly to Johnny in catch counters and leg strikes. The opening recap did take a lot of time too, while the ending remained somewhat abrupt having just beaten up Chozen to embrace Kumiko (who had a delayed recovery after being punched once). While not bad, a fair amount of retreaded content felt like downgrades of the original; Chozen and Sato lacked the charisma of Johnny and Kreese, the crane kick was far more impressive than the drum technique and the Tournament setting was grander than the O-Bon festival. But, there are Iconic Moments in this film too Part I may have the Crane Kick and the Skeletons and the Training and Sweep the Leg. But people may forget that Part II had awesome moments too.

Like Daniel chopping through 6 Sheets of Ice! If that isn’t one hell of a power play I don’t know what is. It is a moment genuinely impressive in and outside of the 80s cheese universe of Karate Kid, and it gets referenced in Season 2 of Cobra Kai.

Also referenced in Season 2 is Miyagi vs Kreese. While this is the intended ending for Part I, it certainly acted better at the start of Part II, especially given that is foreshadows the situation Daniel finds himself in at the end of the movie. This moment is equally iconic as it completely encapsulates the character of both senseis - Kreese the confident brute brought to a sniveling mouse when size and power failed him and Miyagi the cool-headed and vastly more intelligent fighter still with the cheeky prankster lightness to him as he honks the scared shitless Kreese on the nose. Perfect.

While I did want to cite the Tea Ceremony as well I think the more iconic moment for Part II had to be Miyagi chopping the log during the storm. The storm itself is a very well-done scene which unmasks several characters in the face of adversity. True tension, worry and stakes are sold as the village are in danger of the cruel whims of nature, an act which is all too real for Sato when the house he’s in collapses on him in the calm before his scheduled deathmatch with Miyagi. Not only is this again some great foreshadowing by the rule of three (Daniel asking if Miyagi can chop a log like Sato is doing with a banner and then Miyagi and Sato meeting and seeing Sato fail to chop a log) it proves a pivotal point where Sato turns from aggrieved antagonist to repenting ally. A great show of power and friendship as Miyagi metaphorically breaks the rift between their friendship that weighs Sato down. Okay, we hear you, but how is it better? I do have to preface that I do still love Part I, I have to because in pointing out where Part II is better I have to pick at Part I’s faults. While the ending is messy Part II definitely has much better pacing, until the skeletons scene Part I doesn’t really pick up because it has to set up, Part II while it does recap doesn’t need to worry about it. Giving Miyagi the main plot was definitely Part II’s strongest suit. Part I profited from Miyagi being the ‘mysterious old teacher’ but learning a lot more about his humanity and history was engrossing and it allowed positive development for Miyagi and Daniel, especially their bond as a surrogate father and son when Daniel personally goes out of his way to support Miyagi on a very personal matter. The main characters maintain their charm as well, still a lovely array of life lessons in Part II more than just finding balance, Miyagi teaches Daniel through words and action on taking time to breathe, to refocus when imbalanced, to forgive rather than to harbour hate, mercy, selflessness and humbleness

“never put passion before principle. Even if win, you lose.” - Mr. Miyagi

The scenes involving Miyagi and his father were some of the most deep and emotive of the series up until Cobra Kai, some still haven’t been topped such as Miyagi’s dad’s first words to his son or when Daniel talked about when his father died.  And say what you will about Chozen, he does have a lot of Johnny vibes but a lot of the character we believed was Johnny due to nostalgia goggles was more fitting of Chozen’s manner. The story did a great job in making sure Chozen was always an asshole, at times Johnny did at least display honour and grace but Chozen was always sore about stuff and quick to claim dishonour even when he was in the wrong. Contrary to Johnny it’s more about his family than it is about a girl, which allowed a lot more freedom in the plot. Whether you felt Elizabeth Shue’s Ali with an i was prettier than Tamlyn Tomita’s Kumiko is up to personal preference, but the messy-haired Kumiko definitely had a slightly improved presence in Part II than Ali did, with actual focus on her own feelings outside of attraction to Daniel, her ambition to become a dancer directly linking to the O-Bon Festival - which in turn related to the Drum technique - as well as the delicately beautiful Tea Ceremony scene and actually contributing to the final fight (granted Ali wouldn’t be allowed to). Also Daniel didn’t try to eat her face which is a general improvement to the romantic subplot, extra applause has to go to Tomita here too because this was legitimately her first role - Shue had her second so that’s impressive too - and both women had good careers going forward. The increased stakes definitely worked in the favour of Part II as well, as sequel culture is forced to do, but by moving to Okinawa (actually filmed in Hawaii) we opened the door to better suit Miyagi’s world while keeping Daniel the fish out of water. I can’t speak too much for appropriation because there is still kinda some ‘white saviour’ undertones but I didn’t feel like Japan was treated negatively in this light, its culture of the O-Bon Festival and the Tea Ceremony was treated with the utmost respect and explained without pandering, the flute music had definitely stepped up its game for the soundtrack as did the imagery. Can also appreciate that Daniel does go for the Crane kick when fighting Chozen but is parried. Added hat tip has to go to costuming too. A lot of costumes would have to have distinct Kamon such as Sato’s twin fish and Miyagi’s bonsai on a lot of their clothing

Between Sato and Miyagi the colours of their clothes often code their emotions towards each other, with Sato usually in grey and Miyagi in white or cream, when Sato and Miyagi prepare for death they are in black and when Sato wants forgiveness he moves to a lighter shade. While Part I also used black and white to differ Johnny and Daniel, Part II put Chozen and Daniel in the more Japanese-themed Red and Blue. While both men wear red, blue and whites at time, Chozen’s clothes almost devolve from the white he debuts in as his darker side comes out before flat out embracing yellow after his chance to prove his honour in the storm is refused (and he’s in white then), while Daniel often moves to Red or red tones even in his blue shirt. Kumiko also moves from white to blue, sometimes even purple, in set up to the final fight to have the primary colours stand out in the colourful crowd of the O-Bon festival, but even in the blue Kumiko had red to pair her connection with Daniel. Also her Yukata at the festival is just stunning, the Great Wave off Kanagawa print is a nice touch.

Anything else we should know? It might not be much else about the film itself I can tell you, but I do appreciate something I’m starting to call ‘The Rocky Connection’ when it comes to Karate Kid. Like Part I’s ‘You’re the Best (Around)’ was shortlisted for Rocky III, Part II’s song ‘Glory of Love’ was shortlisted for Rocky IV’s theme, losing to ‘Hearts on Fire’, Bill Conti also chose to score this film instead of Rocky IV. I like to pair this with Daniel’s Rocky-esque character, he has that same kind of swagger but a lot more naive and childlike. Martin Kove also gets a nod because those bleeding hands were legit, he had an accident on-set and the footage was kept for the final cut. Tamlyn Tomita wasn’t the only film debut for Part II, B.D. Wong of...well, several famous roles including but not limited to Shang in the animated Mulan, Dr. Wu in the Jurassic Park franchise, Hugo Strange in Gotham and many more, also had his debut here in a minor speaking role when he’s handing out flyers for the dance party to Kumiko and Daniel before the Ice Chopping Scene. So, why does it deserve respect A film that adds to a beloved character in a respectful fashion without having really any god awful moments does not deserve a 4.5/10 rating. It may not have as emphatic an ending or as great a villain but it has a captivating plot and a good pace, better stakes and much more emotionally driven and responsive scenes. A lot of effort and dedication went into this film to explore new dimensions of the main characters in a fashion which was enjoyable and at times heartwarming. And characters are given human moments, even Miyagi confesses himself not to be perfect and it keeps each character grounded. Even to this day parts of Part II are remembered fondly rather than the campness that Part III had outside of Terry Silver and his magnificent ponytail, the fondness also continues to reflect in Cobra Kai with homages and fan theories of Daniel going to Okinawa again and even re-encountering Chozen. Not to mention it grossed $113m on a $13m budget and got nominated for a Best Original Song Oscar (losing to Top Gun) Part II was a good and enjoyable film which deserves far more credit than to be rated this low, for that it deserves respect.

#karate kid #karate kid part ii #karate kid 2 #daniel larusso #ralph macchio #mr miyagi #pat morita #chozen #yuji okumoto #kumiko #tamlyn tomita #sato #danny kamekona #john kreese #martin kove #johnny lawrence #billy zabka #yukie #nobu mccarthy #cobra kai

[primatechnosynthpop]

Oh yeah just remembered several weeks ago I jotted this down in the notes app on my phone. Not really developed enough to warrant posting on any fanfiction websites or whatever but I guess I may as well share it here

The old manor across the street from the arcade has been haunted for decades. The groundskeeper knows this all too well, for reasons he prefers not to share, especially because nobody ever listens when he tells them. But he really did try to warn those kids.

The morning after three young men waltzed into the manor against his warnings, two of those young men ran out, screaming at the top of their lungs. Cooper couldn't say he didn't feel bad. But he had tried to warn them, and what did they do? Just went right on in anyway.

Later the following day, once the kids have long since left the vicinity, he takes a look around the manor to clean up whatever remains the ghoul may have left behind from its latest victim. Sure enough, it doesn't take long for him to find a body: eyes torn out; skewered by tentacles in several places; innards partially consumed. Scattered next to the corpse are several of Cooper's belongings. Seems like this guy had been trying to steal... maybe planning to commit identity theft? Well, whatever his motivations were, it's too late to ask him now. Cooper bags the body, drags it outside, and gets to burying it.

A couple hours later, the two kids who got away show back up. They look real skittish, especially the skinny one with the glasses, but they manage to stammer through an inquiry as to whether their friend "made it out okay". They refer to him by name, and say a whole bunch of stuff about who they are and what they were doing there the night before, but it all kind of goes in one ear and out the other-- in part because the two young guys talk over each other a bit, and in part because, hell, it's not like it matters. Cooper, no longer able to muster much sympathy after learning these punks tried to steal from him, leads them over to the newest "grave" on the property, hands them a shovel, and tells them to start digging.

As he's walking away, he overhears one of them saying to the other, "is he saying Kevin escaped using a secret network of underground tunnels?" The other guy offers an equally chipper comment in return. He can't tell whether they're deep in the denial stage of grief, or just complete idiots. Either way, they aren't looking so chipper when they trudge off his property about half an hour later. Cooper watches them from the window and thinks, good riddance. Hopefully they'll spread the word around, and people will actually listen for once, and stop walking into their deaths in this house.

It isn't until several days later, when Cooper is out mowing the lawn, that he notices a change in the air. By now, he's so used to sudden chills running through his body and the like that he barely registers it at all. But this is a new sensation. It's more like getting zapped or burnt. He looks behind him, and rather than the ghoul's familiar skeletal grin, sees the translucent but well-defined and largely humanoid figure of a man standing there and glaring at him with eyes that are big patches of static.

Well, that's a new one. But after living with one malevolent spirit for nearly forty years, Cooper isn't gonna be too freaked out by the appearance of another. Hell, this isn't even the first time this has happened recently. Other ghosts, ghouls, and spirits come and go from this place all the time. Why, just a few weeks ago the temperamental spirit of some real nasty-looking guy about this punk's age wandered through the property before settling down at the arcade across the road. So he just shrugs and goes back to his groundskeeper duties.

This new ghost proves not to be much of a threat. It seems to do a lot of macho posturing without ever really attacking Cooper like it means it. Most of the time, it's out of sight and out of mind, to the point where Cooper keeps assuming it's moved on after going a day or two without seeing it, only to be mildly surprised when he sees it again, rattling the doors of his old pickup truck or going through his gardening tools or just generally wandering around and groaning to itself.

He can always tell when the two spirits run into each other, because what follows is a cacophony of moaning and screaming that can be heard from any corner of the house. It's nothing he hasn't heard a million times before, but it's so loud and incessant that it keeps him up at night, like a dog barking or a car alarm going off outside. The ghoul never did get along very well with its victims' spirits. It starts getting annoying after a while.

Eventually, Cooper starts looking for a way to put this young ghost's soul at ease just so it'll stop making a racket. The next time he catches it rifling through his gardening supplies, he doesn't stop it or shoo it away. He lets it grab his hoe and his spare shovel, and then, out of mild curiosity and the lack of anything better to do, tags along from a safe distance to see what it does with them.

As it turns out, this ghost has lofty ambitions.

It tracks down the ghoul that killed it and thrusts the blade of the hoe into it, over and over. The ghoul lashes its tentacles, but each time it touches the other ghost it recoils as though from an electric shock. Watching this, Cooper almost feels sorry for the old ghoul. It's been in charge here for so long, but (perhaps by pure luck) this newcomer seems to have figured out its one weakness. As the one-sided battle progresses, the ghoul's tentacles are lopped off one by one, eventually leaving it defenseless. From there, it doesn't take long until it's completely pulverized. You can't kill a supernatural being with an ordinary weapon, from what Cooper knows, but you sure can destroy it. And sometimes being destroyed is worse than being killed.

Oh, but the ghoul will reassemble itself in time, once it recovers enough energy. Again, it's not like this is the first time any of this has happened. This other ghost doesn't have to know that, though-- let it think that its unfinished business is now finished, so it can go away. It turns and walks outside, and Cooper runs to the window to watch it leave.

But it doesn't leave.

In fact, it wanders across the property, shovel in hand, to the patch of upturned soil where Cooper buried the body. He realizes what it's trying to do as it starts digging, and despite everything, he almost starts feeling bad for it again. He goes outside and watches it dig for a while before speaking up.

"That won't work. There's nothing there." The ghost turns to stare at him with those big patches of static where its eyes should be, and Cooper crosses his arms. "Your little friends came by and dug up your body. It's gone now."

The ghost emits a reproachful moan. It drops the shovel and stomps on the ground. Then, with a shake of its head that sends little sparks of energy flying off it like water droplets off a wet dog when it shakes itself, it turns and shuffles away.

Cooper never sees that particular ghost again, and never thinks much of it again, either. There are always new supernatural happenings to be dealt with in this house. No need to get hung up on one guy in particular just because he was a would-be thief or died young or tried to fight the ghoul. He wasn't the first to fit any of those descriptors, and he wouldn't be the last.

It's not until many years later that he sees those three young men again, traipsing down the sidewalk toward the arcade across the road. So many people are coming and going to and from the arcade that day that he barely even notices. By the time it sinks in that it's definitely the same guys, and definitely all three of them, the arcade doors have already closed behind them and he can't look again to double-check. But Cooper knows what he saw, or thinks he does. He never finds out how or why, and frankly, he doesn't care. Whatever happened with that guy in the plaid shirt, it didn't break the cycle of paranormal events on Cooper's property.

Only... after that busy day at the arcade, new ghosts stop showing up, even when people visit his manor and meet their ends. And then one day, people stop meeting their end there altogether. He wakes up one day, almost another full year after the fact, and realizes that he hasn't seen the ghoul in months.

It's like there was some kind of portal open all this time, and now for whatever reason it's closed-- maybe whoever was keeping it open is gone now? Whatever. Cooper has no way of knowing, and he doesn't really care to find out. The point is, it seems like this property is all his now. It's almost lonely, in an odd way, without any spirits wandering around. Gradually, people stop dropping by so often. He should be glad to finally be left alone, but...

Ah, forget about it. Whatever happened with those kids, he still doesn't care, and he's sure as hell not gonna seek them out to express his gratitude to them for seemingly indirectly exorcising his house. He's an old man, after all, without many years left in him. And whatever years remain of his life, he intends to spend them continuing to work as a groundskeeper.

#this is kinda... not cerebral per se but it sorta relies upon some implied bits of lore that aren't explicitly suggested by the text itself #hey did you know that i write stuff sometimes?

[queenharumiura]

(When you casually remember you have another KHR blog that you can connect timelines with for the luls. This tiny brain rot hasn't left me so I thought to write a small thing for it. Readmore bc i'm shy.)

@belacedia​

-

With a small bird perched on her shoulder, Haru was led down the long halls by Kusakabe, who was quite used to escorting her to and fro on the behest of Hibari Kyouya, the Cloud Guardian of the Vongola.

Haru was showed into a room where Hibari was already sipping a warm cup of tea at. It never ceased to amaze her how this room in particular was filled to the brim with Japanese aesthetic. A traditional room fitting for a man who was somewhat old-fashioned.

She didn’t know what exactly she was called in here for, but she didn’t feel unnerved by his presence. Over the years, the two would interact with each other at random and one could say they’ve formed something akin to a friendship. At least, that was how Haru saw it.

Don’t get her wrong, it took an incredibly long amount of time to reach a stage where the two could enjoy a cup of tea together as Haru would speak on random inanities. The little bird, who Haru dubbed ‘Mi-chan,’ flew towards Hibari, perching on his outstretched finger. “Miura.” He greets her calmly.

“Hibari-san.” She greets back as she simply approaches, sitting down at the table where a cup of tea was already poured for her. “Can I ask why you’ve sent Mi-chan to me today?” Not bothering to waste time with the pleasantries, she cut right to the chase.

The warmth of the teacup felt comforting as her nerves were wound tight in anticipation. While there were many yellow feathered ‘minions’ under Hibari’s command, there was one in particular that Haru often interacted with, and it was due to the fact that Haru had found it injured one day and nursed it back to health before returning it to Hibari’s side.

Having grown attached to Haru, Hibari deemed it useful to allow this one lone bird to serve as a liaison between Haru and himself. It was quite rare when the bird that Haru has affectionately named ‘Mi-chan’ was used for any business other than spoiling the bird with treats, so being summoned the way she had today had Haru feeling nervous.

“A couple birds have reported something interesting. A certain Prince has been visiting you frequently.”

Haru almost dropped her tea in shock, but she managed to keep the cup in her hands by fumbling. She wasn't expecting to be having this conversation with Hibari of all people. “Hahi? They told you about that? Well- it’s not wrong…” She awkwardly fiddled with the cup in her hands. “… He’s been visiting me often.” At a certain point, she’d dare say he was just terrorizing her by getting on her nerves, but at large, it was mostly harmless.

She did ponder on this fact in her downtime, but it did seem like Belphegor’s frequent visits didn't go completely unnoticed. So far, it seemed that only Hibari knew about it (Or rather he was the only one to outright confront her about it).

Eyebrows raised in surprise, “You called me here just for that?” Her tone was incredulous as he never involved himself in her business as it wasn’t his place to do so. The two would talk on occasion and it was merely due to the fact that Haru put forth the effort to try to get along with all of the guardians, and that included Hibari. It was accurate to say that the both of them had come to a common agreement to simply accept each other’s existence and not bother the other.

It helped that Haru got along with the yellow avians, often looking after them if they wanted to rest after a long day of hard work. It only took one of the avians to speak well of her for the rest to understand that she was a ‘good person who can serve as a secondary food source.’

Not one to owe others favors, Hibari willingly associated with her on occasion. Luckily, Haru never asked too much of him, so they could interact with each other in peace. “What is he planning to do in Namimori that involves your cooperation?” His teacup now empty, she had his entire attention. Obviously, this conversation would not budge from this topic.

She blinks a few times before she chuckles quietly. “I don’t think anyone has plans to harm Namimori, Hibari-san. I understand the concern, but he can be agreeable if you’re willing to meet him halfway. He certainly is very lacking in sociability, but he’s doing his best… I think. Even though his reputation is what it is, he is able to be civil, so I don’t think you need to be concerned about his casual visits.” She has absolutely no intention of stating that Belphegor wouldn’t destroy Namimori if a mission was involved.

“You have a positive opinion of him.” Hibari notes, his piercing gaze picking every small movement of hers down as his mind then collates everything together to form a coherent but unorthodox thought. “Don’t get played.” A pointed comment that both would be able to understand.

Of course, he was referring to a certain 10th generation mafia boss. “Tsuna-san didn’t play around with me.” Haru hisses, instantly going on the defensive. Being played would suggest that he even looked in her direction to begin with—which he didn’t. Just like the lightning comes and goes with a sudden flash, her temper could leave as quickly as it came. “I don't think Bel is playing around with me. I feel he's being sincere. At the very least, he doesn’t force any expectations on me. He respects my ambitions more than some others we know, and I appreciate that. He’s surprisingly--- likable at times. Would I be stupid for thinking about him?” Who knew there'd come a day when Haru speaks about relationships with the  Hibari Kyouya?

The matter of relationships and feelings were foreign ground for the likes of Hibari, who much preferred to keep to himself, save for those he approves of. Just as she didn’t interfere with his business, he wouldn’t interfere with hers. If she could objectively deduce that she trusted the destructive Prince, that was her choice to make.

Surely, she wouldn’t continue the mistake of falling for yet another person who wouldn’t look her way. Then again, perhaps that wouldn’t be an issue, if Belphegor’s frequent visits were of any indication. It was also true to say that he hadn't received any reports of any significant property damage in Namimori immediately following Belphegor's casual visits, so it may be beneficial to relax his guard on the matter.

Steel cold eyes glanced at the woman across the table, noting the indecisive sheen in her eyes. The normally ambitious and self-assured woman had moments of hesitation, it seems. “It’s your choice to make. Don’t belittle yourself. Any damage to Namimori and it’s people will be met with force.”

"With force!" The yellow bird chimes in randomly, flapping its wings energetically. 

A small smile graces Haru’s features as she read between the lines, “Haru is being made into a convenient excuse for a fight, hm? At least give me a chance to fight for myself first.” In other words, should anything go wrong, the best person to have as an ally in Namimori was Hibari himself. There were some benefits to trying to befriend the guardians, wouldn’t you know? 

It was only a matter of time before others learned about what was going on, so it would be beneficial for all parties involved for her to make her decision quickly, lest she be bothered by a couple of worried nagging guys.

“I told you all this in confidence, you know? Of course, you wouldn’t go blabbing, right?”

“Your private life is of no business to the rest.” Living life without an annoying pest worrying about inanities was a day well spent, after all. 

“Hibari-san understands well.”

She thought it was a bit early to be considering anything in seriousness, but it never hurt to cover your bases. The moment Gokudera or Tsuna heard about Belphegor’s frequent visits, her life was going to be rife with annoyances. Hibari wouldn’t alert the others to what he’s noticed and he may feel it necessary to ensure the others are kept in the dark for the sake of peace and quiet.

The moment Tsunayoshi’s worries trickle down the ranks of the Vongola, Namimori’s peace would surely take the fall. Barring a Prince from doing whatever he wished to do? That reeked of property damage.

Really, it was nice having someone like him as a ‘friend’, sometimes. “Since I’m here, let me tell you about a recipe I’ve thought up recently. I think the birds would love it. It would be tasty and healthy for them.” 

"Hm. Give the recipe to Kusakabe."

“Roger that.” 

#Belacedia #Neo Drabble #((Guest muse: Hibari)) #((The setting for this in my mind would be after the bazooka thread and before the time Bel breaks into her apartment)) #((This brain rot hasn't left the since the day I thought about it and it's high time for me to do something about it)) #((Now I can let this thought rest))

[imyourliquor-youremypoison]

Heksen af Kattegat (Ivar x OC) Halloween Oneshot

(= The Witch of Kattegat in Danish)

Synopsis: In the deepest part of the forest there dwells a creature of darkness. Everyone knows of her yet no one saw her and lived to tell about it. Like a shadow, she is and she is not. She is a lurking presence, the silence of the night, the breath in your neck. No one dares to venture out there after dusk,  for there is an evil in these woods, and she is it.

Word Count: off the charts, just make sure you sit comfortably and don’t have a pressing appointment in the coming hour

A/N: This is not part of anyone’s Halloween challenge but my very own. I challenged myself to write a goddamn Halloween fanfic for once and not just ignore the general spooky mood in favor of doing my own thing like an absolute asocial. I really wanted it to be a one shot and not turn this into yet another series I have to update more or less regularly. It’s long guys. It’s a monstrosity, I’m sorry.

He grew up with this story. They all did. It was a bogeyman parents told their children about to make them behave, nothing more. It was an ancient tale someone made up and that got passed onto the next generation and so on until its origin was lost to all. A story of magic and things that go bump in the night, a warning to the young ones who were tempted to sneak out at night, or venture too far into the woods.

But Ivar has always been a smart child, sharper than any of his brothers. He was by far the less likely to believe such a tale - and judging by his mother's knowing smile she was aware of it. He listened carefully and glanced at his older brothers staring at their mother with wide eyes glimmering with wonder and barely hidden fear.

One day Ivar went to see his mother and told her he knew the truth.

“What truth are you speaking of, my sweet child?” Aslaug had asked, gently pinching his chin.

“Your story is a lie!” He accused, making her stare in surprise. “It can't be real! No one lives that old!”

A fair point, she had had to admit. Her expression softened a bit upon hearing his argument, as though she had been expecting something else.

“Some living creatures live a very long time,” Aslaug started, “to find them, all you have to do is gaze into their eyes, and you will see the weight of all their years of existence,” she countered, tapping the tip of his nose.

The action caused a childish kind of frustration to appear on his face – Ivar hated not being taken seriously because of his age. How he wished he too was as old and wise as time sometimes. How he secretly wished the tale was true, and that such state of agelessness was achievable – the things he would do!

“Now where are you brothers? It is time for dinner,” his mother told him, putting an end to their conversation before Ivar could argue further and ask more questions.

Ivar crawled away to get his brothers, a scowl on his face as he called their names. His mind was elsewhere during the whole evening. He sat through dinner but didn't say a word, barely ate as he glared ahead of him, thinking hard.

If his mother was telling the truth then he had to find out more about it. He had to listen more carefully tonight when she would once again recount a dark tale to capture their attention and put them to sleep.

For if the tales were real, it opened new horizons. Horizons that young Ivar could not see the width of yet. In hindsight these stories were hardly appropriate for children, even if his brothers begged for the scary stories, claiming they weren't afraid. But Ivar had stopped counting the number of times he caught them shooting a wary glance towards the forest and its shaded areas.

Ivar and the other children of Kattegat had grown up hearing tales of a monstrous thing lurking in the dark, waiting for a child to wander off to eat them. Sordid tales of a shape-shifting creature with no name, no face, an ageless being to stay clean of, lest they find themselves in its clutches.

Stories about the one thing even mighty warriors tried to avoid, something – someone – that fought not with weapons but with something entirely different. Stories about the witch of Kattegat.

*

Despite his young age, Ivar could say he faced a great number of hardships in his life. And some of those very nearly made him do the unthinkable. He remembered the first time he spoke of finding the witch, how the room fell silent, as though time came to a stop, how his brothers stared in shock and bewilderment, their spoons halfway to their mouths. Then all hell broke loose, and it was like they were children again – terrified of the scary, children eating, men mauling, life sucking witch that lived in the woods. A table full of grown men afraid of a creature that might not even exist.

Ivar had abandoned the thought – it was nothing more than that after all, a spontaneous thought he didn't plan on acting on, not really.

His eyes burned with an untamed flame but he could do nothing about it. He was the youngest son, the cripple, the last in line, the unworthy. His ambitions would forever remain unachievable because of his physical condition – or so he thought up until Ragnar came back from the dead, old, diminished, and the shadow of the legendary king he became years before.

His life sped up from this moment on, and all thoughts of witches and magic were pushed out of his minds. At least until he nearly drowned during the journey to Wessex, when his father took him to sail west with him. Though even then he remembered with great clarity the moment he went underwater and wished, hoped, prayed for a magical intervention. He didn't like to think too hard about his miraculous survival. He tried to forget the rocky beginning of his adventure. But then, when things turned sour and he was imprisoned while his father was being executed, his mind turned once again towards this witch and the powers she might have.

Oh he remembered clear as day how strongly he wished for a magical interference. If the gods didn't meddle with their mortal lives and save his father, then maybe the witch would have. Maybe if he had found her as he had considered so many times for years, he would have tamed her by now made her into his plaything, his pet.

But he hadn't. He hadn't, and his father died, and he sailed back home to gather forces and avenge that cruel death, unworthy of the king he was. He came back to Kattegat with a furnace alight behind his dark irises, a fire no disability would ever extinguish or diminish. Confident in his skills despite the lack of usage of his legs, Ivar allowed his ambitions to come alive again. Ragnar had blown on the red embers of his rage and drive.

He didn't need magic to get what he wanted. And what he wanted was greatness. A name for himself, a legend, a legacy.

He wouldn't stop before he got what he wanted, until the witch trembled at the mere mention of his name. He would bring the creature to its knees.

*

His mother was dead. Ivar's mind was hazy with hurt, anger, and grief. His hands ached to reach for his mother's hands, yet there was nothing to grasp. She was gone. He screamed at the void, his voice echoing around him. No one heard him, that much he was sure of, for he had wandered far from the town.

No one wanted to deal with him anyway, and he didn't want to deal with them either. Sitting on a rock in the middle of the thickest fog he had ever seen, Ivar wallowed in self-pity and cried for his departed dearly beloved mother, killed by the usurper Lagertha.

It was right then and there, on this rock, after hours of sitting unmoving in the cold humidity that Ivar came to a decision. Nothing else worked, nothing his dead father, his dead mother, or his thick brothers ever suggested, or approved of has ever shown any results. He needed to take action.

Floki always laughed when Ivar brought up the tale of the witch, as if he had been warned by every mother in Kattegat not to tell the children it was but a bogeyman. As if he was hiding something behind his maniac laugh. Ivar knew better than to ask him directly, for no one was as good as Floki to answer questions without giving a proper response.

Knowing that there was something someone withheld from him was motivation enough to Ivar. He wanted to know – no, more than that, he needed to know. He needed to see for himself. Perhaps it really was but a tale to scare the young ones, but if there was even a slight chance it had any truth to it, then he had to try.

Ivar set his mind. He would find the witch, make her use her powers on him, give him proper legs, and with them he knew he would find a way to rise above his current condition and kill his mother's murderer.

*

The decision ended up being an easy one – because of Lagertha's overtaking of Kattegat he was welcome no more, and while his brothers still fought her upfront, he was planning his revenge. She publicly refused his challenge when he asked to battle it out with her. She had the nerve to turn her back to her enemy, showing no more worry than if he were still a child and not a young man trained in the art of war.

Ivar seethed with rage and let it be known to all of Kattegat that he would avenge Aslaug and kill the usurper. The wretched woman ruined his life. She robbed his mother of a painless and dignified death and instead shot her in the back, like a coward would. She was defenceless and surrendered without resistance, there was no honour in killing an enemy who didn't fight back.

The thought still made his brain boil with anger, though it happened a few months ago. Ivar was on a self-exile, wondering if he would ever find his way back; if anyone had noticed his absence at all; if he was on a wild goose chase. So many questions swirled about in his head and the quiet of the woods did nothing to prevent him from over-thinking.

His arms hurt and were covered in bruises because of his crutches. He walked the woods painfully slowly, the bumpy tracks, leaf covered, muddy ground did nothing to help him navigate in the maze that was the forest. Each and every tree looked exactly like its neighbours once he reached a point he had never been before. His entire body was but ache, hunger, and cold.

Maybe he was going to die in these woods, ruminating his thoughts of vengeance until his last breath – that would surely take place under some oak during a night colder than usual. Maybe the witch would come across his lifeless body and smile – yet another foolish man who thought he would find her.

No.

Such thoughts were not allowed, he couldn't have it. His brothers would never be able to accomplish their vengeance without him, he knew it. They had legs but if the brain guiding them wasn't set on the right path it was pointless, they might as well be headless chickens. If the gods had granted Ivar legs, he would be king of the world by now.

He tripped on a root, his body hitting the hard ground in a thud muffled by the leaves and moss. He cursed out loud, having long stopped caring if there was a living soul to hear him cuss. Surely that wouldn't put off the witch if there ever was one in the first place.

But instead of getting discouraged, each passing day of nothing but trees, mist, and mud felt like a blow of wind on the red embers of his determination. The more she hid from him, the more he wanted to find her. For her existence suddenly seemed real, and not a mere story anymore. Alone in these gloomy woods, Ivar felt it in his bones that something dangerous lived here.

Its presence made his hair stand on end, his sweat run cold, his blood curl. It was madness to whip his head round every time he thought he saw movement, only to see it was a raven or an howl sitting on a branch and staring at him with big, curious eyes. He rubbed the base of his neck and stood up again, with more difficulty but more determination each time he fell. His knuckles were dry and bloody, each joint sore, every patch of skin burning from the biting cold.

He didn't care. He walked on, straining his muscles, pushing through the pain. For she was there, Ivar knew it, felt it. He has roamed these woods day and night, ignoring the sharp pain shooting up his bad leg – his worse leg – and pushing way beyond the limits of his body. Surely that couldn't be for nothing, the gods wouldn't play such a tasteless trick on him. Whatever awaited him, it had to be grand, she had to be a terrifyingly powerful creature, and he would use it.

For days now he followed a moving shadow. His guts told him she wasn't far, but his eyes kept betraying him. Shadows don't move on their own, and nothing in the surrounding stillness moved, so naturally it couldn't be that the shadow moved. No matter the wind, the trees were ancient and thick, but he could have sworn something moved behind the line of trees, something fast, something silent in the night.

After the first week he recognized a particular crooked tree and realized he had walked past it a couple times already. The shadow was leading him round and round in the hopes to tire him out or make him go mad. Loki himself could be playing with his sanity and Ivar would be none the wiser. However, the young Viking highly doubted the trickster god was the one leaning his astray.

To Ivar it was a sign he was close to his goal, for this shadow must have belonged to someone. And whose could it be but hers? Who lived this far out in the woods knowing evil lurked in its darkest corners?

It has now been three weeks since he realized he unintentionally became the sorceress' plaything. The thought was maddening, but at the same time he was sure no one had been this close to finding out who she was.

As always when dusk came and it became too difficult for Ivar to keep on moving in the dark with his crutches, he found a place to settle for the night, wrapping himself in furs and willing away the cold. Moss was not his bed in Kattegat, and he constantly had to remind himself he no longer had a bed or a home in Kattegat. The wind blew hard tonight so he had to find a sheltered corner to sit down, leaning against a twisted tree that looked like it came straight out of his nightmares. The woods' silence was slowly replaced by the noise of nocturnal animals who came out of their hiding spot, and Ivar closed his eyes.

It was a relatively harsh and restless night, as most were these days. He couldn't tell whether it was due to the setting or the circumstances, but he knew that neither the cold hard ground nor the death of both his parents helped in the matter.

Things were no longer what they were, what they were supposed to be, or what they seemed to be. Everything was either too quiet or too loud, too slow or too fast. Ivar couldn't trust his senses anymore. His eyes saw things that were not, his ears perceived sounds that couldn't be. Like the soft whispers of the wind, murmuring against his neck. If he was inclined to believe such things possible, he'd say he even felt a warm breath against his nape.

But he was undoubtedly alone. He didn't need eyes nor ears to know that, he felt it. No human presence other than himself was in these woods. Then again, perhaps the witch wasn't quite human.

He stirred and shook from the cold in his sleep, until he was rested enough that his eyes opened from themselves, though it was still night. The frightful sight before him nearly caused his heart to stop. He stopped breathing, and he would swear the forest also held its breath in this moment.

She looked at him with intent, a sharp glimmer in his glowing eyes. Ivar didn't dare move a muscle, not even to breathe. She blink and narrowed her eyes, as though she was gazing upon a curious creature she had never seen before in her life. Still and struck mute, Ivar could do nothing but stare back with equal focus – not that he had the option to look anywhere else, her eyes quite literally shone in the dark, like two crystals catching the moonlight.

Her face remained hidden in the shadow of her cloak, a clothing so dark he couldn't see where it ended and where the night began. Ivar could make out a nose and a mouth, but before he could fully study her face, she moved.

A brisk, silent movement that seemed to finally free Ivar of her spell and allowed him to take in some much needed air. She stood a mere few meters away from him but the air was already much more breathable and he could think straight again and not just stare in fascination.

“You are trespassing,” came her disembodied voice, whispering and screaming at the same time, coming from here and there, from the sky above and the earth below, from in and from out. The words echoed in his mind as though Ivar was the one who thought them. He blinked and she was gone.

Ivar was on his feet faster than ever.

“No!” He yelled when his voice was returned to him. “Don't go!”

Ivar looked around, seeing nothing in the pitch black night but the glowing eyes of small animals and birds. He still felt her. She was there, watching him, like a predator watching their prey.

“You are not welcome here.” The voice became clearer and Ivar spun around, wincing at the pain and grunting.

He nearly toppled over both in hurt and shock. The sun had set hours ago and the moon wasn't full tonight. He could barely make out her figure standing a couple meters to his left. But even at this distance her eyes in particular stood out - sharp clear eyes, holding his attention like she'd put a spell on him. Ivar felt stuck, like he had just stepped into a trap. They were entrancing and for a moment he forgot he had to say something.

The creature stared at him, slowing titling her head to the right as if studying him. Her eyes were a light colour but were painted black. Charcoal it seemed was smudged over her face from ear to ear and the stark contrast of colours didn't help Ivar's sudden muteness. There wasn't much else he could see other than her pale complexion - a ghost really. As though she had spent years avoiding the daylight. No wonder he couldn't find her during daytime, perhaps she only wandered out at night, like all the other forest creatures who want to avoid men.

“I need your services,” he finally said, the words coming out croaky and more hesitant than he would have liked.

She did not move. Her glare was strong and piercing. Ivar shuddered, either from the cold or her hard stare. It was clear that she had no intention to answer that. Even worse: she looked amused!

“You have magic. Use it to fix my legs, help me achieve my ambitions and I will cover you in more gold than you can imagine,” he continued, growing impatient.

He had been looking for her for days now, the least she could do was to speak to him. Facing such intense silence unsettled him.

Of course his first instinct was to bargain. Who could resist the thought of gold and living a life of opulence and comfort? She could apparently. She sneered, though she remained quiet, her hard unforgiving gaze stuck on him. The thought that he was a defenceless mouse in a trap struck Ivar again but he shook it away.

“Land. I can give you land if gold is of no interest to you,” he added. “Power. Servants if you want,” he kept on going, not seeing that she couldn't be swayed by earthly possessions.

“The land belongs to no mortal soul, only the gods own this land and the sky above,” the creature barked back as if Ivar had just made a blasphemy.

Her voice was smoky and low, as though she hadn't used it in some time and was only now getting back the hang of it. He recoiled when she stepped forward menacingly and cursed himself for showing a sign of weakness to an unknown creatures who could very well turn out to be an enemy.

“I have more power than you could ever give me, and I will never use it to submit another living creature,” she told him with a bit of condescension, a clear sign that she wasn't a complete stranger to the way of men after all.

“Then ask and you shall receive whatever you want, witch.”

She backed away at the last word, her eyes finally looking down and freeing Ivar from their mesmerizing sight.

“No.” It was curt, final.

“No?” Who was she to refuse his more than generous offer?

“I will not. You are king enough as it is, and vengeance is sterile act. I will play no part in this power game of yours,” she stated, giving him full sentences at long last.

Ivar was beginning to think her seclusion had driven her mad. He was no king. He was the errand son of a dead king, whose throne was currently occupied by his first wife and the killer of his dear mother. If there ever was a creature as miserable as Ivar he has not heard of it.

“The gods took your legs away, it is not my place to give them back,” she explained, her voice softer this time, as though she realized she has been bargaining with a grieving child and not a mighty Viking threatening her with an axe. “Everything has a reason to be or not to be.”

“So it means that you have the ability to. You could help me if you wanted,” Ivar pointed out, not exactly waiting for an answer. “You seem to know who I am. If so, you should know I'm not beyond using lower methods to obtain what I want.”

He couldn't be sure because of the dark but Ivar swore her figure didn't stay still. Like a cloak, shadows moved and billowed behind her, as though they were a living creature ready to strike whoever threatened their master. The shadows didn't engulf her, they surrounded her, enveloped her like a protective glove. His very being screamed at him to stay where he was and not attempt to close the space between them.

She started smiling. First timidly and than bigger and bigger until it became grotesque. Was it possible to stretch your mouth so wide open? Ivar wouldn't know but cold sweat trickled down his back while a shiver ran down his spine.

“And if you know who I am then you should know the wise thing to do is to turn around and never look back,” she replied, the threat barely veiled behind her amused tone.

Her presence grew, Ivar felt smaller, oppressed by the heavy shadows.

“Wise people never achieve anything. I deemed the reward worth the risk when I set my mind to finding you,” he told her boldly.

“You walk alongside death and treat it like a comrade but one day it will look you in the eye and you will know, it never was your friend.”

Her ominous statement took him aback, but her words burned in his memory, where they would stay for a long time, he was certain of it. He blinked one moment too long and she was gone. Laughter erupted in the air. It came from nowhere in particular yet everywhere at the same time. It felt like being surrounded by a pack of hungry wolves on the hunt, liking their chops in anticipation of the meal to come.

“Go. You are unwelcome,” she said again, this time from his right.

She stood farther away, all trace of humour gone from her features. Somehow she seemed even more hidden by the dark than before.

“I will not help you. The people of Kattegat do not deserve my help, or my mercy. I do not owe anything to anyone. Leave me be and do not come again or you will regret it.”

Her last words were spoken softly, like a whisper, like a hushed confession she spoke into his ear. But there was no mistaking the dignity of her tone, and no doubting she would carry out her threat. Before Ivar could protest, she was gone again, vanishing between the trees. They too looked like they could move and dance with the shadows. She was no longer here this time, he didn't feel her presence any longer and the noises of the sleeping forest started again, breaking the eerie quietness. Feeling he had already tested his luck enough for one day, Ivar made to return to his sleeping spot to finish his night and get some rest. He would look for her again tomorrow. He would come walk these parts as many times as he had to in order to get what he wanted.

*

Aslaug had told Ivar countless times that perseverance was key but he hadn't really given it much credit until now. Being in the shoes of a predator for the first time in his life made him realize just how much discipline and will it took to wait. Waiting for his target to show herself, waiting for her to acknowledge him, speak to him.

Patience was a quality he did no possess, and he cursed the gods once again for making him so. Nevertheless, he persevered and roamed the forest until his body reached its limits, until his arms were blue from the cold and the bruises, his skin dry and red from the merciless wind blowing through the tall trees.

It was a good day when he caught sight of the witch, even if she disappeared almost immediately. She hasn't tried to lure him into a trap, which he considered a small victory. She hasn't lead him astray again, but on the other hand she hasn't spoken to him again either. Ivar was desperate for a conversation, a chance to speak to her and defend his cause. She was obviously a creature of intelligence – there was no mistaking the glimmer in her eyes – only a sharp-minded person would behave the way she did.

She proceeded with caution, studied her stalker, kept her distance. He supposed that if she hasn't tried to hex him into oblivion despite her clear threat the day of their first meeting it meant that she wasn't past seeing reason. Perhaps she only waited for Ivar to make a better offer.

But what could a witch want? She lived secluded, alone, and only the gods knew what she was truly capable of. Was there anything Ivar could give her that she couldn't get herself? It was a thought worth pondering – especially since Ivar had so much time to think now that she reverted to silence.

The more he thought about it, the more inclined he was to reconsider his mother's tales and the legend surrounding the witch. Could it be that she was the owl and the raven that seemed to follow him during his first weeks of wandering? Would she answer truthfully if he asked? If it was him he wouldn't tell a soul.

Sometimes he thought she was there but didn't see anything. On other occasions he saw her, and then she walked round a tree and was there no longer. On rarer instances he thought he heard footsteps, or the rustling of leaves and branches indicating someone was coming, but nothing moved at all.

He would have burnt this forest to the ground if he thought for a second that it would get her out of her lair, but he knew better. If he disrespected her sacred land, she would forever remain out of reach and never listen to him. She made it clear that she was a being of the earth, protector of the woods and its inhabitants – perhaps she would kill him for his crimes lest he give in to his destructive urges.

No. He would keep going. He would follow her like her cloak of shadows until she couldn't ignore his presence anymore.

*

She sighed, and knelt to the ground. This young Viking was tenacious, she had to give him that. Her hands dug in the wet ground and ripped out the roots she needed, storing them in her basket before she rose to her feet again. A slight shiver made her hair stand on end, and she knew he wasn't far.

He was good. Very perceptive – for a man. Despite the wards she cast about her he somehow always found his way back towards her, even forcing her to use tricks to lure him away. The sun has barely risen in the foggy morning, but already she sensed he was near, the sound of his crutches tapping against the ground growing closer.

She walked on, her eyes fixed on the ground, looking for herbs and mushrooms. Would he ever give up? He was young and reckless, but she sensed no danger from him. He had an aura of darkness about him, as though his young age hid horrendous actions, and she had no difficulty imagining him do terrible things, but still he did not seem to mean harm – not towards her.

When his eyes locked with hers, she saw not fear like she usually did in the eyes of men, but profound respect, awe, and envy. Truly she pitied the poor creature. She wished her fate to no living being, not even the wretched people of Kattegat.

Having found a tree with the mushrooms she was looking for, she stopped walking again. Her mind constantly jumped back to the Viking, unable to push him out of her thoughts. So far she has been able to keep her home hidden from view, leading him in a wrong direction every time he came too close, but she knew it was but a matter of time until he slipped past her vigilant eyes and saw where she lived.

Why couldn't he give up like the others? Run away in fear? She greeted him in the worst way possible, in the middle of the night, by surprise, and let her shadows loom over him like the wide open jaws of a predator ready to rip his head clean off. Why was he still walking in her tracks?

He wouldn't last much longer, that much she knew. Each day the nights became colder and the small animals began to prepare for winter, soon the forest would become quiet as a grave, and the young man would die. The cold and hunger would take him sneakily, with no warning.

And for a reason beyond her comprehension, it didn't sit well in her stomach.

Sighing once more though there was no one near enough to hear her, she left a few mushrooms on the bark of the tree. She already had more than enough, and he needed them more than she did anyway. Momentarily breaking the silence spell she put on herself, she walked away noisily to catch his attention.

Hopefully he would follow it and find the mushrooms. His cheeks hollowed by the day.

*

Ivar wasn't a fool, he understood what she was trying to do, and he hated it. But one thing he came to realize was that she didn't want him to die, and that played in his favour. Why else would she leave fruits, mushrooms and edible plants in her wake? It also told him that she knew he followed her, and that she let him. So perhaps he shouldn't take too much pride in his tracking skills, perhaps she only allowed him to follow her, as opposed to Ivar hunting her down.

For a moment he thought he had the upper hand but she was a step ahead of him. What was going through her mind? If she thought he was going to get tired of pursuing her or bored, then she had another thing coming. Ivar wouldn't stop until he got what he wanted, one way or another.

It seemed like the witch saw no reason to hide while she performed dull daily tasks. Ivar saw her walk about here and there, picking fruits, gathering small wood, chopping bigger firewood, collecting moss, fetching water. All of this told him one important thing: she had a house.

Somewhere in these woods was her home. She wasn't an evanescent creature that appeared and disappeared at will and fed on unlucky children or the soul of mortal men. She ate apples, and stew, and slept in a bed.

His stomach rumbled at the sheer idea of a warm meal. Ivar hasn't had meat in a while – rabbits grew rare these days.

“By the Norns, you stubborn thing!” He heard her curse from behind him and nearly gave himself whiplash when he twisted his head around to see her.

There she stood, in the shade of a tree. Though shade implied that there was sunlight, and Ivar hadn't seen the sun in about as much time as he hasn't had meat. However the day hasn't come to an end yet, and he could see her better this time. Her face remained hidden, but her appearance was much less intimidating then during night-time.

“I told you,” he started. “I need your services. I will not go back until you listen to me.”

His voice was cautious, as to not make her flee again. He's had a lot of time to ponder what he was going to tell her once he managed to get her attention.

“Are you on a death wish?” She asked him, cocking an eyebrow under her heavy hood. “Will you hide away in a corner to die like an animal? Go back to your village and leave your mad thoughts behind. I cannot help you,” she insisted, trying to make him see reason.

Ivar's mouth twisted in a cocky grin, his confidence rising.

“You seem worried,” he pointed out, not bothering to hide his victorious smile.

“I do not want to have your rotting corpse on my territory,” she scowled. His grin wavered under her stern gaze.

“I thought the land belonged only to the gods,” Ivar said, using her own words against her.

She at least had the decency to look offended. More than offended, she became angry and stepped forward until her feet stood firmly in the ground before Ivar, his eyes no higher than her knees.

“I will not play your games, young Viking,” she uttered menacingly.

“My name is Ivar,” he told her, and this time he saw her flinch slightly, even if most her face was still unreadable what with the charcoal she painted it with.

“Very well, young Ivar...” she started, and he almost scowled when he heard her using the word young again. Young, young... Always too young to be taken seriously, even by a hermit witch. “I do not care for your play on words or your desperation. I do not care for your life, you shall live or die or do whatever you see fit.” Her eyes didn't leave him, they pinned him to the ground, silently forbade him to move or talk until she was done. “But I will not have you spoiling these parts. For the last time, go away.”

Once the last word was uttered she looked away and spun on her heels, ready to leave him in the dust with the knowledge that her point came across. But that was a mistake she would only make once, for Ivar wasn't done with her.

“I don't believe you,” he said. The sap even had the gall to snigger! “You wouldn't be here, lecturing me, if you didn't care.”

The witch stopped dead in her tracks but refused to turn around. She bit down on her lower lip hard enough to draw blood to the surface. Her hand was already in her basket, and she was no liar.

“It's true that I do not have the prerogative of being insensitive to other creatures' suffering,” she said at long last, when the silent had stretched so that Ivar thought she wouldn't answer at all. “Perhaps it is my weakness, but it's one I gladly embrace. Here!” He turned around only to throw something at Ivar, which he caught as a reflex. “Soon there will be no small animal left to hunt. No fruits, no mushrooms. I might have some sympathy for you, but the seasons don't care if you live or die, Ivar. Go home. You don't belong here.”

This time he sensed he couldn't say anything else to change her mind – for now. Ivar watched her resume her walking when suddenly she stopped again.

“One last word if I may. Don't give your name so freely in these parts, young Viking. There is evil in this world, and not all as gracious as me.”

With those ominous words she left him alone, vanishing between the trees as per usual. Ivar supposed she didn't want him to see where she was going, and concluded that she must be going home – like she suggested he should.

But he wouldn't. Ivar looked down at his hand, still somewhat befuddled. He didn't think too long or hard though, and simply bit in the loaf of bread. He moaned in delight – it was crusty on the outside, and soft and still warm on the inside. It was dark bread mixed with all sorts of nuts and herbs.

Be that as it may, she just provided him with enough food to last another handful of days in the woods, and he would use them to carry on his stalking.

*

Some days he didn't see her at all, and while Ivar expected it to anger him, it mostly disappointed him. Even he could not ignore the loneliness of his endeavour and relished her company – although she mostly ignored him or lectured him, he found her rather endearing.

He was sure that she had grown to appreciate his presence just as he did hers. After years of living alone in the woods, surely she must seek out conversation and human company? What of her needs? Who warmed her bed? Who helped her not go insane?

He observed her and tried to follow her lead to survive in this wild environment. He tried to find the secret spots where mushrooms still grew in the increasingly cold temperatures, or spot the edible herbs. When he did he stuffed his mouth with the little brown fungi, sometimes not even bothering to rinse them in a puddle. Hunger dominated him. The witch made a very good point when she said he would starve himself to death by staying here, but Ivar would reach his limits before giving up.

If he left now he might never find her again. Perhaps it was what she wanted, but he wasn't going to take the risk. Not for a good night's sleep, not for a large serving of pork chops. Mushrooms made him sick now, but he had to keep eating anything he could. It warmed him up to have something in his stomach, and it gave him enough force to continue walking.

Some other days, he didn't even try to talk to her at all. But he kept a close eye on her, as if he waited to see what she would do if she found him spying on her again.

One day he saw her cleaning herself in a pond, swimming across, amid the fallen leaves floating on the surface. He briefly thought that it was too cold to bathe in the dark waters, but she didn't seemed bothered at all.

After a while she returned to the edge and started washing away the sweat, mud, dust and dirt. Her hair was longer than he had imagined once freed from all the knots and ornaments. It clung to her back and reached the bump of her backside. He expected its dark hue to make a stark contrast with her creamy skin but was once again stunned by what his eyes shows him. Not black hair, no, but white, pure as freshly fallen snow, blending in with the rest of her uncharacteristically pale complexion.

They say all cats are grey in the dark but Ivar could not have expected this any less. Where was the creature of darkness he was told about? And if she's not it, than who was she?

Her arms were littered in tiny scars as one would expect from someone who lives in the wilderness. But what stood out most where the many runes littering her entire body. Up and down her legs, on her stomach, on her arms and around her wrists.

From the spot Ivar was posted at he could not read them but he was fascinated all the same. They were everywhere. Her body was a book.

She lived alone out there, how could she have tattoos on her back? Where did they come from?

She was back to him, her hands trailing up and down her arms to scrub off the dirt. The water around her became muddy, so she dived down and came back to the surface a couple meters from where she stood, pushing her long hair out of her face.

This time she faced Ivar fully, and it was as though he saw her for the first time. However he couldn't bring himself to look anywhere but her face, for her eyes were locked on him. He suddenly understood with full force that she had always been aware of his presence. She let him spy on her. Probably for days.

And he didn't even care. So far all he had seen was a troubling dark creature always draped in long cloaks and engulfing dresses. He couldn't remember seeing her face once, he didn't know what she looked like at all. The memory of her piercing blue eyes still burned in his mind, like two flaming torches flickering in the night, eclipsing everything else.

She didn't move, didn't blink, didn't try to cover her naked body. Ivar was locked on her gaze, and a strong pull emanated from her. He was struck by the urge to join her. He couldn't walk, and certainly couldn't swim, trying to join her in the pond would be suicide. Yet something about her sucked him in – and as sure as the sun rose each morning, he knew that very same thing would spit him out.

Yet his body took the lead despite his better judgement, and Ivar was shocked beyond words when he felt his legs push his body up from the ground without the help of his crutches. He stood tall and without any pain or outside help for the briefest moment, and then came the darkness.

*

Ivar woke up in a start, sweating and heaving, his eyes darting madly around him to see where he was and what was happening. He didn't recognize his surroundings at all. It was dark, he wasn't outside, he was too hot, and laid on something soft. This was as far as his assessment of the situation went.

“Stay still you foolish boy,” a voice snapped at him.

He didn't recognize it, but he knew the sternness in it, he had heard it before. His dear mother's voice had the same ring to it whenever she addressed her wayward sons, and Ivar recognized the scolding tone of a woman who intended to be obeyed.

There was something on his chest, making it an ordeal to breathe. Each new intake of air was a gift, and Ivar struggled to get rid of whatever weighted down on him, though however much his hands fumbled around he did not find a thing.

“I said stop moving!” The voice came again. “I told you this would happen, I warned you that you weren't welcome.” A tinge of panic tainted the scolding voice, and Ivar felt someone else's hands still his own and place them back each side of his body. “The forest protects its inhabitants and chases away the foolhardy who dare trespass. I tried to tell you, I tried...”

Was she talking to herself? Ivar couldn't tell. His eyes were closed again, unable to keep open what with the blindingly bright flame dancing in the hearth. A house, he was in a house. A woman's house. Could it be... ?

“Oh young Ivar,” the voice said, and this time he knew. The witch. He felt a cold hand rest on his forehead, wiping away the sweat pearling there, combing back his damp hair. “Fight.”

There was will in this single word, determination. It wasn't a wish, it sounded more like an order, like a demand. And somehow, he wanted to obey. It instilled strength in his sore limbs, cleared his mind. The hand still stroked his head, chasing away the cold dampness and grounding him to this world.

Ivar recognized the symptoms of a fever, and he knew the first night was crucial. If he made it through the night, he would survive.

He had to fight.

*

The second time he woke up it was daytime and he was alone from what he could tell – but not for long. Ivar barely had the time to take in his new surroundings, and wonder if he really was inside the witch's house, if this was all it took – a little fever – to get in, when she burst through the door, letting in a gust a chilling wind.

She was rubbing her arms to warm herself and sat down on a small stool in front of the fire to warm her hands. Ivar did not budge – if she didn't notice he was awake, then it was the perfect occasion to study her from up close. Apart from the few times she wanted to intimidate him into leaving, he never saw her this clearly.

That and this one time he saw her bathe, right before his fever took a hold of him. A memory that brought red to his cheeks and made him stir despite himself. She whipped around and stood up, grabbing her basket overflowing with all kinds of herbs Ivar couldn't identify for the life of him.

“What happened?” He asked, his voice coming out huskier than he expected. How long has it been since he last used it?

“You didn't take my warning seriously is what happened,” the witch replied, her voice sharp and final.

“Tell me,” Ivar insisted, coughing a bit to set his voice right. “I don't remember anything.”

She froze, her hands crushing a few herbs in her closed fist and looked straight ahead of her. For a moment Ivar thought she wasn't going to answer, or maybe even kick him out for being such a troublesome guest.

“My guess is that you ate poisonous mushrooms,” she finally said before setting to work again, cutting up some herbs, ripping the leaves off others, crushing certain flowers and throwing it all in a pot over the fire. She let it all brew and stirred occasionally, still turning her back to Ivar. “But I can't know for sure what it was. All I can tell is that your fever wasn't due to sickness or a weakness of body.”

Ivar grumbled something under his breath when he heard 'weakness of body' but he didn't say anything more than that. He should feel lucky he got an answer out of her. She was still draped in her black cape, the hood up even inside her house – probably for his sake and not just because she was still cold from her trip outdoors.

Truth be told he felt better than the last time he was conscious, but he was still heartsick, as though he was back on the boat that took him to Wessex, when he nearly drowned. His head was a haze, his memory hazardous as well, and his throat felt dry.

“I need water,” he said.

He saw her sigh more than he heard her, but the witch fetched a pitcher of water nonetheless. She poured some in a horn and came to sit next to him, holding it up for him to drink out of. Ivar drunk sloppily, all the while staring at her face, trying to see her from under her gigantic hood.

“More?” She asked when he was finished.

“Please,” Ivar said, the word burning his throat almost as much as the thirst.

She repeated the same operation as before and came back, and when Ivar had emptied his second drink he felt better.

“I suppose you must be hungry as well,” she said, not bothering to hide the slight annoyance in her tone. It made Ivar feel like a stray cat that ventured into someone's home and that now needed feeding.

“No mushrooms,” Ivar grunted, sitting upright on the makeshift bed.

It looked like she set him in front of the hearth to keep him warm, but this room had three doors, one of them leading outside, which meant the house was bigger than what Ivar saw from where he sat. She didn't give him her bed.

“I, unlike you, know my edible mushrooms from the poisonous ones,” she sniggered, obviously finding great amusement in the thought that her threats and the harsh weather didn't make him budge but a little mushroom nearly got the best of him. “You will eat whatever I give you, these times don't allow choosiness,” she added more seriously.

“I suppose you expect a thank you,” Ivar said in a mocking tone soon as she handed him a bowl of stew. He could see carrots floating in it, and potatoes. “But we wouldn't have come to his if you had agreed to listen to me in the first place.”

He couldn't see her clench her jaw but Ivar sure as Helheim heard her teeth screeching.

“It's not too late to kick you out of my house and let the wolves finish what the mushrooms started,” she warned him. “I gave you my answer the day we met: I won't do as you ask. I didn't leave you waiting for an answer young Viking, and it is no one's fault but yours if you don't accept it.”

His anger flared again, and Ivar was tempted to throw the bowl in her face, if only to make her finally show herself. Obviously he won't get his way with her like he did with most people. Most people were afraid of him and it made it easy to drop a few veiled threats here and there to bend them to his will.

The witch wasn't an ignorant people of Kattegat who lived in fear. She was in her home, Ivar was at her mercy in the middle of an unknown, dark forest full of dangerous animals in the early winter, and she knew for a fact that the most dangerous of them all was herself.

“Eat now, before it gets cold,” she told him, with that same motherly voice she used on him before. Ivar knew not how to refuse her when she used that voice and he was hungry anyway, so he obeyed.

“I know what tales your people must have told you about me, I know what they call me,” she started talking while he spooned the stew into his mouth, closing his eyes at the delightful taste and moaning when it warmed him from inside. “I've been spending a great deal of my time wondering what drove you to this length. What on earth would make you seek out the witch of Kattegat, the monster that eats children and bathe in the blood of men?” She asked.

Ivar recognized a rhetorical question when he heard one though.

“Then I thought perhaps you were the same as me,” she suggested. “Perhaps they drove you away because you were different and it scared them. But it just doesn't line up with the gold and land you promised me, should I accept to help you in your vengeful quest.”

He took mental note of everything she said, it would become food for thoughts later.

“If they drove you away then why don't you seek vengeance yourself?” Ivar questioned her, having finished his bowl.

Without asking if he wanted more, she gave him another serving. He didn't know if she was any good at brewing potions but he had never tasted a better stew in his life.

“They haven't, not really. But they would, given the chance,” she told him laconically.

“I do not understand you,” Ivar admitted, even if it pained him to do so.

“It is better if you don't. I don't wish to elicit pity, and I know you wouldn't sympathize with me even if I told you everything about me.” Ivar was about to protest. “Soon as you are better, I will lead you back to the path leading to your village, and we will never meet again.”

“No.”

“I won't house you forever, and you have already proven yourself quite bothersome,” she replied, squinting her eyes at him. “I have better things to do than to care for a crippled young Viking who wants nothing more than enslave me for my powers.”

“If you choose to stand by my side I shall do no such thing,” Ivar told her. “Together we could rule the entire world,” he assured her.

The witch blinked and stared at him in surprise before finally bursting in laughter. She stood up, wiping away tears and went back to her basket to put away her herbs now that Ivar was sated.

“I don't want to rule the world Ivar. I don't want to rule anyone but myself,” she told him, still laughing a bit. “You and I could not be more different it appears.”

“It seems so, yes...” Ivar agreed. “But it doesn't mean we cannot help each other. What would it cost you to help me? Why do you refuse so adamantly?” He wondered, attempting to drive out her motivations while she still felt talkative.

“I don't meddle with men. I have always lived away from your kind, who are wary of me, who scorn me, spit on me as I walk by. It might seem selfish or unfair to you, but you have no idea what you ask of me, young Viking. I cannot help you.”

“Then explain. Tell me why it is too much to ask. What is the cost?” Ivar insisted.

A gust a wind coming from nowhere suddenly made the doors and windows slam shut, and extinguished the fire in the hearth as well as all the candles he had lit in the room, and Ivar felt her presence looming over him after she'd dropped her basket to the floor.

It was like they were back in the forest on their first encounter, the shadows where everywhere, and his heart froze in shock. Ivar's breath caught in is throat, stricken with fear. He suddenly understood where her reputation came from.

“The cost! You always speak about cost! Cost, cost, cost!” She screeched at him, her voice transformed into something sharp and unpleasant. The sound pierced Ivar's ears, it felt like so many nails being driven into his skull. “You think you can buy everything? You can buy land, and thralls, and slaves. You can buy armies, loyalty, even a throne. But you cannot buy me, Ivar. You cannot buy my magic, and you certainly cannot repay me for what I already gave you.”

And just like that, the light came back. The windows opened, letting in weak rays of sunlight, and the fire in the hearth was just as roaring as it was before the witch's display of power. Her voice too was back to the clear, crystalline sound Ivar knew.

“Don't forget I saved your life. You owe me,” she said before storming into the next room, leaving Ivar to his thoughts.

*

A quiet mutual understanding was born between them from the moment Ivar understood who exactly he was up against, and developed a new sense of respect for the witch. The witch who vehemently refused to give him her name.

Somehow he managed to bargain his stay, and she accepted for obscure reasons he intended to find out. He hadn't expected her to accept and found it very suspicious that she did, but couldn't exactly complain as it provided him with more time to convince her that he was in his birthright to wage war against the usurper who killed his mother.

It seemed to emulate some kind of an emotion when he mentioned his mother, and so Ivar tried to coax answers out of her yet again, asking her about her family.

“I live alone,” she told him as an answer, but Ivar could tell she tried to elude the question.

“Where does you family live then? Surely you can't be all on your own. Someone must have helped you get all the tattoos on your back,” he told her nonchalantly while peeling vegetables as per her request – their deal was that Ivar could stay as long as he worked for it, and help bring food on the table and wood in the hearth. It had only been three weeks so far.

The witch dropped her knife, and it stayed stuck upright in the wooden floor. She was sitting fairly far away from him, still hiding from his eyes as much as she could, therefore Ivar couldn't see the expression on her face, but he guessed it.

“How do you know about that?” She asked him.

A chill ran down his spine, and the temperature of the room dropped all of a sudden.

“Don't pretend you don't remember,” Ivar replied, taking a bite out of a carrot.

“What are you speaking of?” She asked, the cold in her voice undeniable but not as chilling as seconds before.

“I know you saw me spy on your bathe,” Ivar said, without an ounce of shame.

He mused that she didn't have any reason to deny it either, or feel shame. She was a beautiful woman. Why she kept trying to hide her face from him was a mystery because as far as he could tell, he has seen it all.

She picked up her knife and slammed it in the table. At least it got Ivar's full attention, and he stopped looking at the damned carrots instead of taking her astonishment seriously.

“Ivar,” she said his name and it sounded like it came from inside his skull. “This never happened.”

“What do you mean it never happened? I didn't just make it up, how else would I know of the runes on your back?” He said, now looking at her.

He didn't appreciate that she tried to make him a liar, or doubted his word. Ivar might be many things, but he had honour and pride, and he wouldn't lie about watching a woman bathe.

“You mean these?” She asked, and under Ivar's started eyes she pulled back her sleeve to show the runic tattoos swirling around her wrist.

He thought he would never get to see them again, especially not any closer than he did on the day he spied on her.

He frowned. They didn't make any sense.

“I know you cannot read them,” she said upon seeing the confusion painting on his features. “What else did you see?”

His eyebrows rose up now, and he smirked.

“Plenty,” he stated in a manner that he wanted smooth, but it only earned him a stern glare. “You were bathing, witch. What do you think I saw? And shouldn't you know it too? You caught me staring that day.”

“It never happened,” she repeated, stressing each word this time. “Whatever you saw must have been a fever induced hallucination, I would never have let you spy on me bathing, let alone let you live if I caught you doing so,” she assured him.

Ivar could tell she told the truth, there was no mistaking the dangerous glimmer in her eyes. It had nothing to do with her being a powerful witch, and everything to do with her womanly pride.

“Then it must have been a gift from the gods,” Ivar stated. “It is a sign we were bound to meet.”

“It is a sign you ate hallucinogenic mushrooms,” she corrected him dryly. She didn't want to admit it out loud but Ivar must be right in some way. He does know about something she had always kept hidden from the eyes of the world, and that was no coincidence.

“You have no need for this hood now, witch,” Ivar told her, having resumed his cutting vegetable and cleaning mushrooms.

The words were spoken lightly, Ivar didn't think she would give him any mind, as her eyes were lost in the distance. She must be thinking over what he told her, and not even listening to him anymore. But suddenly he felt her eyes on him, and when he looked up, she had dropped her hood and undid the knot tying her cape at the base of her throat, letting the material slip to the floor.

His eyes widened as he took in the sight, and he stilled. He never got a good look at her up until now, however much he tried. He began to study her more closely in the dim daylight.

Her long hair was a mess of braids and beads and tangles along with feathers and leather strips. She wore a string of leather around her neck, to which she attached little bones she found on the forest grounds. Birds, rabbits, cats, dogs, foxes, does, chicken, and many Ivar could not identify. They hang around her neck and clicked with each of her movements.

Along with her current appearance, Ivar invoked whatever memory he had of her other attires. On cold days she draped a roughly cut fox pelt on her shoulders, the colour matching her hair and making her look like a strange animal. Her fingers were dipped in black, her nails long and sharp – or so he would have sworn after their first meeting, but now, when he looked at her hands he saw normal, clean, hands.

She carved the bones she picked up and stuck them through the holes in her ear lobes. She concocted various mixtures of many different colours that she used to paint her face along with the black charcoal around her eyes. She wore leather and bird skulls around her wrists. Jewels, she liked jewels.

There was not a hint of gold, not even iron. Wood and bones and stones, sometimes flowers were her source materials and she lived in complete harmony with her surroundings. Never disfiguring the face of he earth, never leaving permanent marks of her trace. Nature ruled over her and not the other way around. She was a wild thing, untamed, untouched, unreachable.

Ivar thought she wasn't so different from him after a few months of frequently seeing her, but perhaps he was in the wrong. Perhaps he wasn't up to the task he set himself to.

A ghost. She was pale as a ghost, and Ivar's understanding of the world shattered when he was finished taking in her appearance.

“What are you?”

Soon as he asked the question he felt stupid for it. He remembered the gentleness of her touch against his hot forehead during his fever, and decided she couldn't be a ghost.

“I am a woman,” she barked at him, as if he had somehow offended her. “I thought you, out of everyone, might understand that. After all I'm sure people have put your manhood in question because of your own... defects.”

She stomped away to the bowl of clear water and splashed some on her face to get rid of the paint and charcoal, washing it all away. Her cheeks beheld an angry red hue when she was done, but Ivar saw her more clearly than ever.

Her long white hair, and pale skin glowed even in the light. No wonder he had thought her a magical being in the darkness of the forest, no wonder he thought her eyes shining in the dark. She was the colour of a freshly fallen snow, still immaculate and free of footsteps. Her clear eyes stared back at him, waiting for a reaction.

“Are you even a witch?” He asked. “Or just another poor creature forgotten by the gods?”

A sadness tainted his voice, and she guessed that thinking about her own physical defects hit very close to his own. Still, she huffed lightly.

“Do you need to ask? Have I not given you proof enough yet?” She replied.

She had. They both knew it.

“I stand by what I said. You should understand better than anyone on this earth why I need your help in avenging my parents and retrieving their kingdom. You know my pain, and my frustration, you feel it too.”

“I only wish for a quiet life, one I am denied among men, but that the forest grants me,” she explained, sitting closer to him now. “If we are as alike as you say, then why can't you understand how I feel?”

“I supposed it is not in my nature. I was born a prince.”

“I was born a nothing. I know my place, and I stick to it. I like it. I do not aspire to anything more than what I already have, and I wish you can one day find the same kind of peace I have here,” she said, letting her hand rest on his elbow.

It was the first time she touched him. Ivar didn't count the time when he was sick, he was barely conscious. He felt a jolt of electricity shoot up his arm, and she must have felt it too because she withdrew her hand abruptly and looked at it in confusion.

“I'm sorry, I don't know-” She started, but was interrupted when Ivar pulled her to him, his arm holding her waist and pressing her to him.

She was warm, and soft under his hands. He could feel the gentle slope of her curves as he moved his hand up her body. She stopped breathing when his nose brushed against her own, he could feel her holding her breath. How long would she last?

Her own hands found a place to rest. One palm open above his heart, the other one of his shoulder. She was acutely aware of his proximity and how it affected her heartbeat and her ability to think straight.

She knew he was giving her a chance to push him away, or say no, but she stayed still, and listened to the steady beat of his heart under her palm, counting in her head in a vain attempt to slow down her own. How could he stay to collected?

“I have never kissed a witch,” he told her, his lips grazing against hers.

“Because I'm the first one you meet or because they all rejected you?” She somehow managed to ask, though her head was a mess.

“I knew I'd get you from the first time I heard about the scary witch of Kattegat,” Ivar told her, his hot breath making her dizzy. She tried to keep a clear head. “The tales the elders told us when we were children sparked my interest, even then. My brothers feared you, but I knew I'd find a soul mate in you,” he continued whispering seductively until he felt her lean in slowly, parting her lips ever so slightly.

He was about to close the remaining distance between them when she pulled away and laughed. Not mockingly, not to be mean, but Ivar still felt hurt in his pride when she stood up. But standing up she needed to do, because she couldn't keep the conversation going for much longer if he held her like that.

No man had ever touched her like this. No one who stumbled in her part of the forest ever treated her like a woman. She wanted to kiss him, oh yes she wanted it so very badly. But it was a bad idea.

“The tales of the elders!” She exclaimed. “How old do you think I am, Ivar?”

He frowned a bit.

“I think you have no age. That time doesn't affect you like it does mortal men,” he said, ignoring the growing grin on her face.

“This might be a disappointment to you, but I am not an ageless magical creature. These tales spoke of my mother, and her mother before her, and so on...” she explained, and light suddenly appeared in Ivar's eyes.

She could see the question forming in his head and chose to answer before he could ask it.

“They are dead now. Killed by your own.” Now a shadow fell before his eyes and his mouth twisted in anger and disgust. “Every now and again men think the witch is vulnerable, that age is a sign of her weakness, and go hunt the elder of my family. They think they killed the witch of Kattegat, but then the next in line replaces her, and the story repeats itself with each new generation.”

“I will put an end to it once I am king,” Ivar vowed. “With your help.”

“You never give up. I understand, I suppose it is a quality – most of the time. But I do not intend to live long Ivar, rather to live well.”

“You could have both. If you come back to Kattegat with me no one will dare lay a finger on you, you will be under my protection and that of my brothers. The fool who will defy the sons of Ragnar to get to you is not yet born,” he told her with so much certainty in his voice that she dared imagine what her life would be like if she agreed.

But she didn't consider the thought seriously, not even for a moment.

“I am so sorry,” she began, and Ivar's face fell. “You must think that I settled for this life of reclusion, but it did not. I chose it. I chose to stay away from men and their violence.”

“You must let some men into your life,” Ivar's tempered flare. “You are the daughter of someone, I would wager even witches need a man to have a child.”

She stepped back a little, blushing.

“We have our ways,” she admitted, looking away with dignity and refusing to meet his burning glare.

Ivar stood up now, using the table to keep himself standing.

“What of the male children? Do you throw them into the sea? Eat them?” He now accused her of all sorts of hateful things, and she knew it came from a place of anger and frustration because she denied him a kiss, and once again refused to help him, but his words stung all the same.

“If we birth a boy we bring it to its father,” she said, as detached as she could.

She hadn't experienced any of this herself, for her mother had only given birth to one child: her. These were tales to her, as much as the scary witch of Kattegat was a tale to Ivar. The children mauling witch.

“How do you lure the men to your bed? Do you venture out of your land and hex a poor passer-by, and then leave him with a child to care for if it turns out to be a boy?”

His accusations made her feel small, and little by little she stepped back until she stood in a corner, and Ivar advanced on her, having grabbed his crutches.

“No!”

“Do you use people and throw them away? Aren't you doing the very thing you reproach me?” He barked at her. “At least I have the decency to be honest about my intentions. I came here asking for help and offered something in return! What do you offer? A night between your thighs?!”

“Stop it!” She shouted.

Her voice came out disembodied and she filled the room, her shadows flaring about her until this corner of the house was but a pitch black hole and Ivar didn't know where the ground was anymore. The dawning realizing that he overstepped an invisible line came crashing down on him, but it was too late to take back his words.

“Another word and I will rip you apart you foul man!” She threatened him. “Do not test my patience, for its limits will come much quicker than you think. I will not stand being insulted in my own home another second!”

Her eyes now glowed red and fiery like the deepest pits of Helheim, and Ivar felt the ground quake and shake as if the entire house was connected to her in some way, trembling with indignation in face of Ivar's grotesque accusations.

When she reabsorbed the shadows and the ground felt steady again, Ivar collapsed, his eyes not leaving hers as they recovered their normal ghostly colour.

“Be careful where you direct your anger, Ivar,” she told him with her usual voice now. “I am not one of your thralls, you cannot yell at me and expect no consequences, and no reaction. I will not submit.”

“I don't expect you to.”

Feeling her own tempter rising, she scoffed and stormed out of the house, slamming the door behind her. It was a downpour outside, the cold rain hitting her at hard as small drops of metal, and she didn't take her coat. No, instead she ran to the pond and dove in it.

She didn't calm down until she was under the surface, the water cancelling out any and all noise, even the one inside her.

*

Ivar hadn't stopped pacing around since she left, anguishing over what could happen to her out there in the cold and wild weather. He couldn't go out like that, he wouldn't make it back, and it wouldn't help if he got lost in the woods.

Though perhaps she wished for it to happen. He knew he crossed a line, and took his frustration out on her for no reason. His ego took a severe blow and his quick temper got the best of him. She never gave him any reason to think badly of her. She fed him, cared for him, gave him shelter, and trusted him with information she had never shared with anyone, and what did he do?

He pushed her away. Because every single person who ever cared for him had left him, one way or another. His father executed, his mother murdered, his uncle Floki self-exiled, who was left?

If he allowed himself to let this young witch into his life, would he have to watch her leave too? Did he want to take the risk?

All those weeks far away from home, from his brothers and from the politics of life, showed him life under a new perspective. She was right to refuse his invitation to accompany him to Kattegat. Her life here was much sweeter. The slow and steady pace of life was comforting, even Ivar could admit that, though his Viking blood boiled for war and raids.

She had a home here, a safe, undisturbed home that he violated. And if he took so much as a second to consider things from her point of view, he could easily understand why she refused so adamantly to help him, and thus engage with men and their pointless feuds.

He was so relieved when she came back that he thought he might pick her up if he could. He quickly assessed the situation, taking note that she was soaked through and through, shaking so much her teeth rattled.

“B-bath,” she breathed out.

Ivar first thought she was asking him to draw her a bath – which he never did and didn't know how to do, even if he was willing to oblige her. But then she walked past him, grabbing his sleeve as she did and lead him into the small adjacent room. There was a basin and while Ivar still wondered what she was doing, he saw it fill up all on its own.

The witch whispered something under her breath until it was filled to her satisfaction and steaming hot. She undressed before his eyes, her clothes sliding down her body and creating a puddle on the ground.

“What are you doing?” Ivar asked, a lump in his throat. He felt hotter than a minute before.

She didn't answer before she was fully immersed in the hot water and the trembling of her limps stopped.

“I'm taking a bath, it's really cold outside,” she said as though it was nothing. “Sit.”

“Don't order me around,” Ivar told her but did what she said anyway.

“You accused me of a great many serious things, Ivar, I think you owe it to me to listen now,” she declared with unwavering resolution. He couldn't deny her that.

“I am listening,” he told her. “I'm always listening.”

“Not always no, if you were you wouldn't have said those atrocities,” she replied.

While she was outside Ivar had vowed to not let his temper speak in his stead anymore, but the moment he heard this familiar aloofness in her voice he was tempted to scream again.

“Don't do that. You're not a detached person, you take things at heart,” he pointed out.

Her white hair clung to her face and she pushed it back, then grabbed the bar of soap sitting on the edge of the basin, still ignoring Ivar. It was maddening to speak to someone who obstinately refused to look at him!

“I was wrong to let you in as much as I did,” she said. “You took me by surprise with that strange dream of yours, but it was a mistake to tell you so many things about me.”

“I will not betray your trust,” he assured her. “If you don't give any credit to my word at least trust my selfishness. What would it bring me to share what I know? Information is power, and I know the witch of Kattegat now,” he added when he saw her wrinkle her nose upon hearing him ask her to trust him.

“Oh I know how much you value information. I know you will keep my secrets. But I still regret telling you. I regret thinking for a second that you weren't like the other men. That we were the same. My mother knew what men were like and I should have listened to her instead of taking pity on you and letting you into my home, my sanctuary. This is what I get for saving your life I suppose, being accused of murdering children and raping innocent men.”

Ivar swallowed thickly but stayed silent.

“No man is innocent,” she declared, her eyes finally settling on him. “Least of all you.”

“I know. I'm the one who murders men, women, and children. I'm the monster Kattegat should fear,” he said. “And I'm on a warpath.”

“So what am I in all of that?” She asked, her eyes pleading again, pleading for the truth, for relief. “A means to an end?”

“At first yes.” Relief did come when she heard the honestly in his voice, but it had a bitter after-taste. “I expected a quick exchange of favours and to never see you again, not that you'd take me in and care for me.”

“I do not care for you,” she told her, but her eyes disagreed.

“I care for you. And it'll get you killed,” Ivar said. “Which is why I am leaving on the morrow. You'll never hear of me again unless you seek me out yourself. In which case you will be welcome in Kattegat once I take it back.”

She wanted to believe him but his promises sounded empty. Her mother didn't die for this to happen. Her grandmother wasn't burned alive for her to make the mistake to trust a man's word.

“Allow me to make you one last offer before we part though,” Ivar added.

The witch closed her eyes. Of course. Of course he was only after her powers.

“What could you possibly offer me now? I already declined everything you were willing to give,” she scoffed, a bit more irritably than intended.

Would she miss bickering with him and hearing him promise her the world against the smallest favour? Yes, she would. But the longer he stayed the harder the toll on her when he would leave. In all honesty she was tempted to give him what he wanted just to get rid of him, and perhaps it was his strategy all along, to wear her out.

On the morrow. He would leave in a few hours. Why did it feel like a such a long time, and yet so short?

“Me.”

She froze.

“What are you even saying?”

“Me. I'm on the table now. You need a man, or you'll need one at some point, to have a child yourself.”

“Who says I want a child? Why would I want to bring a living being into this world only to see it suffer like I did for being different? If I had half a mind I would remain the last of my line until you fail to keep your promise and a group of angry men who blame the witch for their bad harvest come and kill me!” She exclaimed, and soon climbed out of the basin, wrapping herself in furs to keep warm.

She stomped off to her bedroom, and Ivar followed.

“You don't have half a mind, you have a whole, brilliant one. And I can tell you desire a child. Any girl your age would already have three in Kattegat.”

“You don't know my age.”

“I'll wager you are my age,” he said, crushing her weak argument. “You are lonely, and you seek connection. Otherwise you wouldn't have taken in a poor Viking cripple, let alone bear with my foul mood and mouth.”

“You do have a foul mouth,” she agreed, shooting him a serious yet somewhat amused glare that Ivar took as a positive sign.

“I came here to use you, and I regret it. If I wasn't so blinded with rage I would have seen past what the tales said. I would have seen the woman behind the witch. I do now.”

Couldn't Ivar see the impact of his words? She wore her heart on her sleeve and her face must have betrayed her emotions yet he didn't take notice of the anguish, the agony he put her into. Talking about children, about connection. What did he know about those things? He himself probably never thought about them or took them for granted. He had no idea how much it hurt to know that she might never get either.

“What do you want from me Ivar?!” She shouted at him, barely holding back the tears. “What will make you stop this sweet torture? I cannot bear it another second. Do you want me to drop a crown on your head? Make all your enemies drop dead this second? Bring back your parents? Make you an able bodied man? You seem to think I have endless power, that I can defy the gods, but I cannot!”

She sat down on the bed, still holding onto her furs, rage-wiping away the tears that fell down her cheeks.

“I told you from the moment we met that I cannot undo what the gods did. I cannot bring back the dead, or take lives without consequences. I cannot give you your legs back without sacrificing something else, I cannot- I... I cannot...” She hiccuped helplessly, slipping to the ground.

Ivar caught her before she hit the floor and lifted her back onto her bed, only now measuring the full extent of the harm his had done.

“You said it yourself, I owe you for saving my life. This way I will pay my debt to you, and if the gods see fit to give me a child, even one I will never see, then it will be compensation enough.”

“But I cannot use my magic for you,” the witch said again, as if to emphasis her powerlessness in this situation.

She drew her power from the earth, and gave back everything she took in various ways. What he asked of her- what he wanted her to do... it would require too great a sacrifice. This much power would kill her.

“The offer is on the table, I won't take it back. You decide what happens now,” he told her, still holding her against him. “Don't be afraid of what might happen if you have this child, my child. Whether you accept or not, witch hunting has come to an end, I will make sure of it. And if anything happened to my child, I would raise Hel and rain down on whoever touched her.”

“Do not talk like that.”

She couldn't listen to Ivar talk about her child, their child, as though she was already there, cradled in her arm, smiling up at her. Like they were happy parents who marvelled at their offspring and swore to kill anyone who laid a finger on her. The sheer thought tore her insides.

“Magic... is a curse, Ivar,” she managed to say in between two hiccups. “We are both cursed.”

“I know,” he said, once again wishing he could address her with her own name. “I know... But it doesn't need to be so always.”

*

It was snowing on Kattegat, and Ivar rose early this day. He always made sure to wake up before anyone else when the weather promised snow, because he wanted to see his kingdom covered in an immaculate blanket of untainted snow. No one had stepped out of their house yet, no one had disturbed the perfect landscape before his eyes.

Snow always reminded him of the witch. After their goodbyes he never saw her again, no matter how many times he tried to find his way back to her little house in the woods. People thought him mad.

Most thought him dead by the time he returned, and while he kept a secret where he had spent the last few weeks, his brothers guessed what he was up to.

“Did you find her?” Hvitserk had asked him elusively.

Ivar grinned and rustled his brother's hair, knowing he hated it.

“Find the witch? Do you still believe in children's tales Hvitserk?” He had said. The remark made Hvitserk grumble something and never bring up the subject again.

It all happened so many moons ago that Ivar wasn't entirely sure he could trust his memory, but on the other hand, how could he have made it all up? If he wasn't with the witch, where was he during those months he disappeared?

If he closed his eyes he could still see her smile. She hadn't done it often, but she did offer him a smile when she bid him farewell, her hands crossed over her stomach in a silent prayer, and that was the last picture Ivar had of her. He was glad it was a happy one. He wouldn't have been able to bear it if they had left things the way they were after their argument.

He had never consoled a crying woman before, and never thought he would be any good at it. Perhaps it was simply because he could never understand their sadness. But he understood the witch, as she did him. And he stayed with her until her tears ran dry.

He expected her to turn him down again, especially after she admitted – or rather after he finally understood, though she has been telling him in subtle ways all along – that she could not solve his problems with her magic, that it didn't work like that. But in the dead of night, he felt her slip under his furs, and when he turned around he saw her beautiful clear blue eyes asking him a silent question.

He answered with a kiss, and his hands found the tender flesh of her hips, relishing in her warmth and the soft feeling of her delicate skin under his rough hands. He had trailed his fingers up on down the runic tattoos on her back and those on her thighs.

This night was imprinted in his mind, and he couldn't shake it off. In the end he never knew if the night they spent together bore fruit, but he mused that he liked it this way.

He liked not knowing what his Ísdís's real name was. In the end he had to settle for a name himself, if only to think about her in another term than 'the witch', and settle on what she reminded him most of.

Yes, Ivar liked quiet winter mornings, before the usual hustle and bustle of Kattegat. Yes, sometimes he regretted having ever left the arms of his little witch, and even sought her out in the woods. But he still remembered what he told her – that she would never see him again after their night together, unless she came to him.

He liked to think that she watched him come and go, and smiled to herself. His Ísdís, his first love. He would never know what could have been. All he knew was that he wasn't brought a little boy wrapped in furs nine months after leaving her. He knew that in his old days he would once again go to the forest and seek her out. Maybe find a tomb engraved with the same runes that ornamented her body. He had memorised some of them.

But for now, she was alive, he felt it in his bones. He sensed her presence sometimes, and when he looked up and saw a raven, or an owl, or sometimes a fox lurking behind a tree, and just assumed it was her, watching over him.

He would never be entirely sure that he made the right decision when he left her, but it felt right in his heart.

She was a wonder. A mystery that should be left alone and unsolved, lest it lose its magic.

.

.

.

If you like my work please consider buying me a coffee <3

[Edit and moodboard by me, feel free to share/save/repost as long as you credit me]

A/N: The witch is obviously albinos. I didn’t state it explicitly because the word albinos didn’t exist before the 17th century.

Ísdís: Derived from Old Norse ís "ice" and dís "goddess".

This is indeed an ivar x Reader work, but written third person, and the name Ísdís is a name he gave her because she never revealed her name.

I tried to make it spooky but I’m not a horror writer and it shows (i think). But anyway, the goal wasn’t to make you crap your pants but to go a little off the beaten track and try something new (and something I haven’t read yet). Also it’s a 100% self indulgent work, because I’m very passionate about witchcraft and I was just waiting for the right time (and a valid excuse) to go witchy on your asses.

Spoopy Halloween everyone

#vikings #ivar the boneless #ivar #halloween #halloween oneshot #viking #ivar ragnarsson #ivar lothbrok #ivar's heathen army #sister wives #History Channel #witch #kattegat #ivar fanfic #ivar fanfiction #fanfic #fanfiction #writing is hard #wattpad #ao3 #alex hogh andersen #alex høgh #ivar x oc #oc #original character #halloween challenge #halloween writing #heksen #albinos #ivar x reader

[walterisaacson-blog]

Holbrooke in Heat

A review in the New York Times

Walter Isaacson

Our Man: Richard Holbrooke and the End of the American Century

By George Packer

608 pages. Alfred A. Knopf. $30.00

​Richard Holbrooke was a large man with gargantuan appetites – for food and women and movies and acclaim and, above all, diplomatic and undiplomatic maneuvering – appetitesthat struggled to feed an outsized ego that was matched only by his insecurities. As the last great freewheeling diplomat of the American Century, his turbocharged zeal and laughable lack of self-awareness earned him fervent admirers and fevered enemies, including a few longstanding colleagues who fell passionately and paradoxically into both camps. In fact, Holbrooke himself was caught in this duality of being his own most fervent admirer and worst enemy (although when someone once commented that he was his own worst enemy, a national security adviser he had worked with snapped, “not as long asI’m around.”)

​I doubt that any novel, not even one coauthored by Graham Greene and F. Scott Fitzgerald, could have captured Holbrooke fully, and I certainly thought that no biography ever would. But now one has. George Packer’s Our Man portrays Holbrooke in all of his endearing and exasperating self-willed glory: relentless, ambitious, voracious, brilliant, idealistic, noble,needy, and containing multitudes. It’s both a sweeping diplomatic history and a Shakespearean tragicomedy, with Holbrooke strutting and fretting his hour on the stage.

​Perhaps intentionally, the book emulates the rollicking cadences, lapidary character descriptions and exhaustive reporting of The Best and the Brightest by Holbrooke’s close friend David Halberstam. (Packer on Halberstam: “Jewish and middle-class, with thick-framed glasses and big hairy hands and violent gestures and moral certainties, with his gift for dramatizing everything, including himself.”) Informed by complete access to Holbrooke’s intimate diaries and letters along with more than 250 interviews, the book overflows with the trait that was Holbrooke’s saving grace: an in-your-face intellectual honesty that is not tainted, as Holbrooke’s was, by being manipulative. The result is so bracing that Our Man not only revitalizes but in some ways reinvents the art of journalistic biography.

​Packer pulls no punches, and the complex shadings of the all-too-human personalities – including Holbrooke’s widow Kati Marton, his lifelong frenemy Tony Lake, his patron Hillary Clinton and his nemesis Barack Obama – are painted with vibrant complexity. They will likely wince but then nod as they read. So too, I think, would Holbrooke himself, who died in December 2010 when his heart exploded from the strain of unappreciated diplomatic exertions. I can almost hear him howling at Packer from the grave, berating him for the brutalpassages, and then, after realizing how brilliant and brilliantly he has been portrayed, pouring on his flattery and ham-handed charm. (Full disclosure: when I was a journalist, I fell into the camp of his alloyed admirers, and he would do all of that to me, albeit while looking over my shoulder to see if there was someone more important to flatter and berate.)

​Packer establishes a Holbrookian intimacy by talking directly to the reader at times. “Holbrooke?” he begins. “Yes I knew him. I can’t get his voice out of my head.” And a few pages later, “Do you mind if we hurry through the early years? There are no mysteries here that can be unlocked by nursery school.”

​The key to the mysteries, instead, begins with Vietnam. When Holbrooke arrived in Saigon in 1963 as a newly minted foreign service officer, America was not yet waist-deep in a quagmire. His role as a rural affairs advisor was to help win “hearts and minds” in “strategic hamlets” as part of the “pacification” program, before napalm and Zippo lighters had imbued those words with an ironic and then sinister stench. He and his colleagues read Graham Greene’s Vietnam novel The Quiet American, but they did not yet fully appreciate Greene’s deft description of his title character: “I never knew a man who had better motives for all the trouble he caused.”

​Holbrooke was among the first diplomats to harbor doubts about the war. “I sometimes think this first year in Vietnam was the best of Richard Holbrooke,” Packer writes. “His ambition still had a clean smell, and youth was working in his favor – physical courage, moral passion, the boundless energy and enthusiasm and sheer sense of fun, the skepticism, the readiness to talk straight to ambassadors and generals.”

​In Vietnam Holbrooke became best friends with Tony Lake, a fellow foreign service officer “who kept his ambition more tightly wrapped,” a talent that came naturally to someone born into the WASP establishment that Holbrooke hungered to join. The intensity of their friendship and then their falling out provides one of the many wrenching plots in the book. They play tennis, invent games, party, smoke pot, and travel together. But when they return to Washington, Holbrooke’s social-climbing among the Harrimans and Alsops of the Georgetown elite turned Lake sour. “Friendship with Holbrooke had acquired a whiff of the instrumental,” Packer writes. Eventually almost all of Holbrooke’s colleagues, even the admiring ones, came to feel used.

​Also at times abused. With his appetites, Holbrooke couldn’t help himself. In one of the most egregious examples, he decided to pursue a romance with Lake’s wife. “Holbrooke’s betrayal,” Packer writes, “would stay secret from almost everyone, while the acid it released would take years to eat silently at the bonds of youthful ambition and Vietnam and tennis and American greatness that had held the two men together.”

​Holbrooke’s compulsion for cheating on or with women – and also Packer’s willingness to report with gusto the psychological and physical details involved – would seem shocking were these passions not so interwoven with the neediness and drive that was at the core of his professional life.Holbrooke was perpetually in heat. Chapters recounting feveredstatecraft are interspersed with those chronicling Holbrooke’s three marriages and multiple affairs and romances, including one with Dianne Sawyer, all featuring the same detailed reporting and sharp personality portraiture.

​The most intense and intensely described relationship is with his last wife, Kati Marton, who gave Packer exclusive access to his papers. A vibrant reporter and writer of nine highly-acclaimed books, including an extraordinarily powerful memoir of the family betrayals and secret love affairs that accompanied her parents’ escape from Nazi and then Communist Hungary, Marton’s career ascended during periods when her husband’s languished. This was not a recipe for marital harmony. Each has dramatic affairs, but they were tethered by ambition. “She became what he never had,” Packer writes, “a climbing partner.”

​The peak of Holbrooke’s career came under President Bill Clinton, when he shuttled around the Balkans cajoling Bosnian warlords and Serbian war criminals to make peace. His work culminated with three weeks of negotiations in November 1995 at an air force base near Dayton, Ohio, where he pushed Serbian leader Slobodan Milošević and others into a peace agreement.“Let’s given him his due. He ended a war,” Packer writes. “Diplomacy is not for the short of breath.”

​True to form, Holbrooke personally led his own lobbying campaign for the Nobel Peace Prize. He wrote letters extolling his accomplishment and pressed others to sign them. He also repeatedly found excuses to travel to Oslo, where he made a point of meeting several times with the secretary of the Norwegian Nobel Committee. “He campaigned so hard for that Nobel Prize that that’s probably one reason he didn’t get it,” President Clinton remarked.

​He also did not get the other prize he wanted. After Dayton, Clinton passed him over for Secretary of State and gave the job to Madeleine Albright. Even though (or perhaps because) they agreed on most major issues, Holbrooke’s contempt for Albright, which mixed sexism with rivalry, oozed out regularly. On the back of a menu card at a lunch she hosted, he jotted his unfair opinion of her: “MKA – very articulate, even eloquent on values – weak on process, policy + diplomacy – uneven, unpredictable – charming + mean – insecure – her biography was her career – very strong will.” In this universe, particles of like charge are destined to repel each other.

​When Barack Obama was elected president, Holbrooke again lobbied hard to be Secretary of State, but the incoming president became allergic to him. Obama, who took as much pride in telling people he hadn’t read their books as Holbrooke did saying that he had, was disdainful of Holbrooke’s compulsion to flatter and be flattered. When the president called him Dick at their first meeting, Holbrooke stopped him and, as Marton had instructed him to do, asked the president to call him Richard instead. “If Holbrooke had tried to repel him in their first minute together he couldn’t have done a better job,” Packer reports.

​Instead, Obama recruited Hillary Clinton to be secretary and Holbrooke’s erstwhile friend Tony Lake to be National Security Advisor. Bravely defying intense resistance from the White House, Secretary Clinton appointed Holbrooke as her special representative to handle Afghanistan and Pakistan. Unlike the no-drama Obama crowd, she understood that what made Holbrooke a handful also made him effective.

​Holbrooke’s tenacity as he whirled relentlessly through the region might have, if he had been given time and support, allowed him to cajole and browbeat the prideful warlords there like he had done in the Balkans. But it soon became clear he was completely lacking in support from the President.

​Obama thought that Holbrooke was “disruptive,” and Holbrooke thought, as he told a young woman he had an affair with, “Obama has ice water running in his veins.” The problem was they were both right. When Obama made a surprise trip to Kabul in November of 2010, he didn’t invite Holbrooke aboard Air Force One or even let him know about the trip in advance.

​Exhausted by his missions and drained by his tumultuous commuter marriage with Kati Marton, Holbrooke woke up anxious on the morning of December 10, and barreled into the White House, sweating and pasty-faced, to make yet another effort to wrangle a private session with Obama. He was rebuffed. He then dashed to the State Department for a meeting with Secretary Clinton. Suddenly, his face turned red, his legs collapsed. An aneurysm in his heart had burst, ripping a hole in his aorta. When he arrived at the trauma bay of the hospital, the doctor told him to relax. “I can’t relax,” he replied. “I am in charge of Afghanistan and Pakistan.” Three days later he died.

​His multiple memorial services were packed with friends and enemies. Marton later took pride that she had choreographed the one at the Kennedy Center so that Obama had to sit through two hours of testimonials. “I could never understand people who didn’t appreciate him,” Bill Clinton said in his eulogy. “Most of the people who didn’t were not nearly as good at doing.” At aservice a few weeks later in the U.N. General Assembly chamber in New York, Tony Lake, with a gray beard, sat alone in the balcony, feeling conflicted as always.

​The overriding theme of Holbrooke’s life, detailed with unnerving accuracy in this book, was ambition. He was relentless in forcing his way into meetings to which he wasn’t invited and clambering into motorcades where he wasn’t manifested. During the Carter Administration, when Holbrook was an assistant secretary, Secretary of State Cyrus Vance’s personal secretary had to send him a memo. “Henceforth, you may not insert yourself as a passenger in the Secretary’s car unless this office has specifically approved,” it said, adding that the security detail had been given instructions to enforce this edict. As Packer notes, “Holbrooke, undeterred, had the memo framed.”

​“Ambition is not a pretty thing up close,” Packer writes. “It’s wild and crass, and mortifying in the details. It brings a noticeable smell into the room… Because of Holbrooke’s psychological mutation of not being able to see himself, and maybe not give a shit anyway, he let us ogle ambition in the nude.” Lurking in this description is a more subtle point. It wasn’t just Holbrooke’s ambition that hobbled him, it was his inability to cloak his ambition like the more polished members of Washington’s striving elite.

​The difficulty in writing biographies of grand players, as I know from trying to do it with Steve Jobs, is to be honest about their rough personalities while guiding a reader to the conclusion, which is as true for Holbrooke as it was for Jobs, that their unvarnished drives were part and parcel of their true greatness. “I don’t think I run roughshod over people, but if something sucks, I tell people to their face,” Jobs once said. “I know what I’m talking about, and I usually turn out to be right. Maybe there’s a better way – a gentlemen’s club where we all wear ties and speak in this Brahmin language and velvet code-words – but I don’t know that way.” Or as he put it more poetically: “The people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world are the ones who do.”

​In corporate as well as government realms, leaders often prefer, as Obama did, teammates who are low-maintenance. But as Packer shows, there can be a payoff for those able to harness a Holbrooke. “Don’t forget that inside most people you read about in history books is a child who fiercely resisted toilet training. Suppose the mess they leave is inseparable from their reach and grasp? Then our judgment depends on what they’re ambitious for – the saving glimmer of wanting something worthy.”

​Why such a mammoth book – and such a long review of it – about a mid-level diplomat whose only major achievement was helping settle a war in a faraway place with unpronounceable names? Because if you could read only one book to comprehend America’s foreign policy and its quixotic forays into quicksands over the past fifty years, this would be it.You have to begin in Vietnam, as Holbrooke did, and understand that U.S. involvement there was a complex mix of sincerity and blindness and idealism and hubris. Likewise, our subsequent involvements, including Iraq and Syria and Afghanistan, have involved good intentions, outsized ambitions, and a deficit of humility. Just like Holbrooke. “Our confidence and energy, our reach and our grasp, our excess and blindness – they were not so different from Holbrooke’s,” Packer writes. “He was our man.”

​Our man, our man in full. “I still can’t get his voice out of my head,” Packer concludes. “One day I know it will start to fade, along with his memory, along with the idea of a life lived as if the world needed an American hand to help set things right. By this point you’re familiar with its every failing. But now that Holbrooke is gone, and we’re getting to know the alternatives, don’t you, too, feel some regret? History is cruel that way. He loved it all the same.”

Walter Isaacson, a professor of history at Tulane, is the coauthor, with Evan Thomas, of The Wise Men and the author of biographies of Henry Kissinger, Benjamin Franklin, Albert Einstein, Steve Jobs, and Leonardo da Vinci.

[waltdisneyconfessions]

I remember one of you was into astrology and I was wondering if you could tell me what you think the signs of the 11 Disney princesses are?

That would be me! (Jen). Actually I worked with disneyyandmore to make a gif set here representing what I believe their signs are: CLICK HERE TO SEE!

Here are the bullet points

Snow White- CancerCinderella- TaurusAurora- LibraAriel- LeoBelle- AquariusJasmine- AriesPocahontas-SagittariusMulan- LeoTiana- CapricornRapunzel- PiscesMerida- Scorpio (In addition, so I don’t leave Gemini and Virgo out, I believe that Anna is a Gemini and Elsa is a Virgo.)

Here is the Longer explanation

Snow White- CANCER: Cancers are the most emotionally sensitive of the zodiac sign, and they have the strongest connection to home and family. They can also be quite domineering and possessive (check out Snow White taking over the dwarfs' house and becoming the boss in .5 seconds flat) as well as extremely nurturing and caring. Cancers are also, in my opinion, sometimes dramatic and have a tendency to overreact. Cancers can also be a bit moody and clingy-- we see that Snow White is rarely ever alone. 

Cinderella-TAURUS:  Cinderella is a dreamer, sure, so an instinct would be Pisces, but Cinderella is way too grounded and levelheaded to be a Pisces. Also, Cinderella isn't afraid of confrontation-- I never gathered that she was afraid of standing up to her stepmother or stepsisters, just more convinced that if she kept believing and being kind her dreams would come true. Cinderella looks in the long run rather than the short term, but also, boy is Cinderella ever stubborn-- ever since she was a kid she has clung to the dream that if you keep on believing, your dreams will come true. And she sticks to it, and sticks to it, and STICKS to it. She's also tirelessly loyal to her family, her father, her own dreams, and her father's estate, and has that quiet perseverance that Taurus are known for. She is also stable, dedicated, and trustworthy. Definitely a Taurus. 

Aurora-Libra: Aurora is honestly vague enough to place almost anywhere because she's not got much depth, but there's enough there for me to place her as a Libra. Libras are lovers of the finer things in life--art, music, etc. They also are the eternal diplomats, doing whatever it takes to keep the peace. That's why it's no shock that Aurora went along with the fairies instead of rebelling against them, even if it upset her (All Libras aren't necessarily like this, but it's certainly a libra quality). Libras are also effortless flirts and can very easily get people to like them. Even her character itself is a Libra--everyone in the kingdom loves Aurora, and Libras are known for bridging gaps between people which Aurora does between the two kingdoms to bring peace back to the land. Libras have a lot of tact and know how to well handle an awkward situation which she does with Phillip and the fairies. 

Ariel- LEO:   I think her and Mulan are possibly the most difficult to place and coincidentally, I think they are both Leos. To explain, let's get a couple things out of the way-- An Earth sign, she is not. She is not level headed nor practical. I absolutely cannot stand when I see Ariel placed as a water sign just because she's a mermaid (AND mistakenly placed as an Aquarius to boot because people think Aquarius' are water signs). Water signs are known for their intuition and sensitivity, both of which Ariel is lacking SEVERELY. Let me say it louder for the people in the back: ARIEL IS NOT A WATER SIGN! Now that we have that out of the way, lets talk about air vs. fire. Air signs are knowledge seekers, and Ariel definitely has some air qualities like being inconsistent and unreliable- and she certainly has a thirst for knowledge of the human world. But that's not the same as mental adventurousness and knowledge. Ariel's hunger for human goods stems from her passion to be a human, not the other way around. Ariel is definitely a fire sign, she has serious ambition, drive, and passion inside of her and very impulsive. This narrows us down to Sagittarius, Aries, and Leo.   One of the things about Ariel is that she has a craving to be liked by humans. This desire for love and admiration ("where they don't reprimand their daughters- bright young women, sick of swimmin' , ready to stand") is a strong vote for the Leo category. Beyond that, Ariel is strongly liked by Atlantica despite all her faults, and Leos are usually one of the most well-liked Zodiac signs.   Leos are also again, the big ego types, and very selfish. Ariel wants what she wants and she will stop at nothing to get it. Leos always come across as incredibly selfish, and boy if anyone ever has a complaint about Ariel, it's how selfish she is. Leos tend to have addictive personalities and are the life of the party--Ariel is definitely both. She fights for what she wants fiercely and will do anything to get it, that takes quite the bit of ego and confidence.   You could argue she's an aries because she can be temperamental, but Aries tend to be cold and way more blunt than Ariel is. Ariel definitely speaks out, but she's not the cutting and cold Jasmine, who tells it exactly like it is. Ariel's outbursts are outbursts of passion. She's even further from Sagittarius because she has no issue being decisive or committing to what she wants.   I stand by my decision that Ariel is a definite Leo. 

Belle- AQUARIUS: Belle is first and foremost, a knowledge seeker. She is curious to a fault. That's the quality of an air sign. Belle is also selfless and always very humanitarianly generous, putting her father before herself and not letting emotion overcome her- she's very logical and somewhat calculating. She also has a bit of trouble seeing anyone else's view but her own and thinks the way she views life is the best (she can be a bit condescending). She is also marked as different and unique, tying in with my previous point. Aquarius' are also innovative, individualistic, and idealistic...these and the traits above mark Belle as an Aquarius. 

Jasmine-ARIES: For me, this is a fairly easy one to place. Aries have this chill outside--they always pretend everything is cool, but they have this temper underneath with a lot of outbursts and are easily frustrated. They definitely know how to speak their minds, are very energetic, courageous, impulsive, and spontaneous, but they can be temperamental and very proud. Aries also do not mince words. I was able to place Jasmine within seconds haha. 

Pocahontas-SAGITTARIUS: I can see arguments being made for Pocahontas for a lot of signs aside from any of the earth signs--she is no parts judgemental, levelheaded, or practical. Pocahontas could be an air sign because she's so flighty and indecisive--- however, she is very passionate and not afraid to face her future, even if it confuses her. I don't really see Pocahontas as a knowledge seeker like the air signs are, sure she's got her beliefs about the earth and how we should treat it, but she's mostly a big goofball until John Smith shows up, not really taking anything seriously and definitely not wanting to be tied down-- two qualities of the adventurous Sagittarius.  While air signs are mentally adventurous, Sag's are actually physically adventurous and extremely impulsive; they may one day just decide to get up and move to a completely different country out of the blue. Sag's are known for being highly independent and having serious commitment issues-- this SCREAMS Pocahontas, who can't ever decide which side to pick.  Sagittarius' have a lot of internal personal power and strength and they are known for being very hard to tie down and commit. They value freedom first and foremost (as a rising sag, I panic at any sort of commitment).  Also, side note, but I notice Sagittarius' tend to make these dramatic posts on Facebook about literally anything including what kind of cereal they ate this morning and the deeper meaning behind it and I can see Pocahontas doing that.

Mulan- LEO: Mulan is probably the hardest of the princesses to place. I know people may argue with me on this placement, but hear me out. Leos have the biggest ego of the zodiac sign. While that may not sit well with people because Mulan seems fairly humble (I'll touch on that later), ego is not necessarily vanity- Leos have a desire to be loved and please others. This is VERY much Mulan. Mulan wants to impress and please her family, her father, but at the same time, wants to find out who SHE is--this is a Leo ego as well, having this hunger to prove and define herself.  Leos are fiercely loyal, another strong quality of Mulan, and can take a very brutal hit if they disappoint someone or are betrayed.  and Mulan's father's disappointment, her hunger to prove herself and find where she belongs as well as her fierce loyalty is enough to drive her to join the army. Another key Leo quality is when Mulan joins the army and Shang sends her home, a lot of zodiac signs would have used this opportunity to go home safely and rejoin the family. But Mulan sticks to it and perseveres- she has a hunger for success that is seen in fire signs. They love success and power.  Mulan also isn't as humble as people like to think she is-- giving the divine emperor a hug takes a lot of vanity and confidence in yourself- that's a serious overstepping of boundaries. As well as returning to Shang to warn him about the Huns and speaking over her father when he is drafted- Mulan doesn't really have a whole lot of humility. I'm thinking of the scene where she grabs the canon and defies Shang's orders-- that's pretty gutsy and again, you have to have a lot of narrow minded confidence to try to pull that off. I think that Mulan's ego, her loyalty, her drive for success and her need to please others places her squarely in the Leo category.  

Tiana-CAPRICORN: To me, another extremely obvious choice. Capricorns are career chasers- they put their material dreams first. That alone could categorize Tiana. Caps are also sometimes labeled as boring or predictable, (which Tiana is often accused of) and they are levelheaded (as earth signs are) as well as emotionally cold, ambitious, conservative, helpful, and judgemental. An easy placement. 

Rapunzel- PISCES:  Pisces are dreamers, almost to the point that it's a hindrance. They love to daydream and they despise confrontation--they really need to get worked up to confront someone. They are also what I call the bleeding hearts of the zodiac, always sympathizing and caring about others. Rapunzel's obsession with the lanterns, her inability to stand up to Gothel until pushed to the limit, and her creativity, spunk, and intuition--pisces are great at getting a read on others-- places Rapunzel as a Pisces. 

Merida- SCORPIO: I think it's easy to place Merida as a fire sign, however Scorpios are often misjudged as fire signs. They are extremely passionate and almost never know when to back down or let go--- do a Scorpio wrong and prepare to have the wrath of vengeance come your way. The fact that Merida is so persistent about not being betrothed including defying her mother and winning her own hand shows a strong sense of justice, another thing that Scorpios are really into (see Esmeralda, who is the epitome of Scorpio). All of this defines Merida as a Scorpio for me. 

#mod #ask #astrology #zodiac

[notbemoved-blog]

Books, Books, Books

Lists are all the rage at the end of any year and this plague year is no exception. Since I’ve read a fair number of books by friends this past year or so, I thought I’d send out my “Goodreads” reviews of all three books that I’ve enjoyed with the hope of giving each a bit more recognition (and perhaps a bump in sales) in the New Year. The reviews are presented in the order that I reviewed them. All three books are available on Amazon or through your local independent bookstore. Also try IndieBound, the online independent bookseller. 

[End of Year Note: My apologies for not being more active on social media lately. I’m working on my own follow up to “We Shall Not Be Moved” and have tried to stay away from all forms of distraction, including social media. With any luck, my next project, the story of the Tougaloo Nine Library Sit-In, will be on its way to the publisher at the end of 2021.]

And now, for our 2020 BOOKS, BOOKS, BOOKS!

Wave On: A Surfing Story by Michael E.C. Gery

(Amazon Digital Services, 2018, 432 pages, Autobiographical Fiction)

[Reviewed August 2019]

"A wonderfully adept stoner’s diary for the boomer generation."

I was thoroughly enchanted with “Wave On” from beginning to end. Even when I wasn’t sure exactly where we were going, the ride was exhilarating. Perhaps it was because I knew many of the places where the action takes place: Williamsburg, the Outer Banks, Annapolis, Ocean City, College Park, and even The Who concert back in 1971 [or was it ’70?] at Merriweather Post Pavilion, which I also happened to attend!! I read very little fiction but a fair amount of biography and memoir, and I must say that I rarely find a work of fiction that is as engaging and heart-driven as “Wave On.”

Part One is a pure, lovely, romantic love story that is contemporaneous with our early adulthood and, thus, easy for me to put myself in the shoes of Cro as he tries to navigate the strictures of young adulthood in a laissez-faire new world of the mid-1960s. The fact that he has been schooled at an Episcopalian Boys school and loves all of those old hymns and prayers makes it all the more real for me, having attended a 4-year Catholic high school seminary. Cro’s goofiness, uncertainty, and (initial) shyness around women also resonated.

What I loved about Part One is that Gery establishes a voice for Cro, the Narrator, that is immediate, engaging, alive, and consistent throughout the entire novelization of what I believe is Gery’s young adult life. (A new term I just picked up--“autofiction” i.e., autobiographical fiction--seems to apply here.) Cro is so normal in his struggles to understand how the world works, so honest in his mistakes, so in love with his environment—the ocean, the waves, the shore—that he makes us love them, too, perhaps a bit more than we already do. But it is that voice that intrigued me throughout. No matter what kind of scrape Cro and his interesting band of friends and lovers gets into, there is a confidence that they are up to the challenge. [I must admit that Cro’s drift during Part Two with regard to his professional aspirations and even his family life was a bit baffling, but I came to think that the weed had a lot to do with his lack of ambition and direction.]

Part Two, of course, gets a bit more complicated as real life intervenes and our little Love Couple begins to encounter troubles from within and without. I hated to see that and was certain that Cro was going to lose his wonderful Ella and Adam and couldn’t see my way through to how it all might resolve, particularly when Maryanne enters the picture and the Neil Young Concert kiss betrays a problematic (if not fatal) flaw in our hero. But I suffered through all of that, wanting to see how it all came out in the end. Although there was no deus ex machina, the surprising turn of events that helps resolve these dramatic arcs is shocking yet consistent. It all made narrative sense and helped explain why we were taken on so many to such a happy ending.

“Wave On” is a wonderfully adept stoner’s diary for our boomer generation. I can’t wait for Gery’s next work of autofiction to continue the journey with him. 

 Hard Road South by Scott Gates

(Blue Ink Press, 2020, 254 pages, Fiction)

[Reviewed, May 2020] 

“A little jewel box of a novel.”

 “Hard Road South” is a little jewel box of a novel set during the early days of Reconstruction Virginia. This beautifully rendered tale imagines a naïve Connecticut Yankee—a former Union soldier—who travels South to visit and potentially settle in some of the lush foothills of the Shenandoah Valley where he once engaged the Confederate “enemy”. Hoping to find peace while helping to reform a culture that wishes to be left alone, our hero, one Solomon Dykes, finds fast friends but also fast enemies amidst the verdant pastures of his would-be Old Virginny Home.

An early scene sets the tone: A down on her luck woman is stopped in the town of Middleburg—the place that would become the enclave of the likes of millionaires John and Jackie Kennedy and Jack Kemp Cooke a century later—by some Union soldiers still on the scene occupying this “foreign” land to ensure compliance with Union directives. Her transgression? Wearing the Confederate uniform jacket of her dead husband. The three Confederate buttons on the jacket must be removed or she will be arrested and charged with treason. Such is the over-reach of conquering heroes.

Our damsel in distress is aided by the swift thinking of one Jeb Mosby, a local farmer, who pulls out his knife and gently removes the buttons so as to spare his life-long neighbor the embarrassment of arrest. “Such was life now,” Mosby observes. “Filled with reminders—small as they may seem—that life would not soon be returning to how he’d left it before the war.” It is small observations such as this that gives this book its charm and its weight. Representations of what life must have been like for the conquered South are constant reminders that the likes of Solomon Dykes were not at all welcome and most likely would be rebuffed should the opportunity arise. Scott Gates is new to novel writing, but you wouldn’t know it from his sharp eye for detail and his pacing. Gates gives his story and his characters plenty of room to breathe and develop while providing the reader with glimpses of the specifics of their war-torn lives. A Southerner by birth, Gates offers a sensibility of one trying to bridge the great divide while not shying away from the difficulties building that bridge might require. This is a tale for our time, as well, as our nation is once again fraught with deep divisions perhaps not seen since the ending of that great Civil War more than 150 years ago. We are stuck and unable to move forward until some fundamental rift gets settled. “Hard Road South” is a highly readable, thoroughly enjoyable yet cautionary tale for our time. Perhaps we can learn from the past and this time get things right. Perhaps … 

 Small Business Big Heart: How One Family Redefined the Bottom Line by Paul Wesslund

(Highway 61 Communications, 2020, 242 pages, Nonfiction)

[Reviewed, August 2020]

“Big-hearted Book Teaches That Care for Others = Good Business”

In the midst of a global health crisis—the worst we’ve seen in generations—and while we struggle as a country, as a people, to find our footing morally and culturally during a reductio ad absurdum political creep show, Small Business BIG HEART lands as a corrective, a balm to soothe frayed nerves and intemperate minds. That is not to say that this big-hearted book is pablum. No, the stories it brings are all too real—people who often have lost their way through drugs, alcohol, and bad choices; refugees who have fled horrific circumstances and are looking only to start a new life but can’t due to the stigma of being different; and one family in particular that is faced with its own dissolution as well as the loss of its dream of a thriving family business. The high-stakes rollercoaster ride that journalist Paul Wesslund takes us on is dizzying not only for its incredible highs and sometimes tragic lows, but also because it introduces a concept too often forgotten … no, disregarded … in modern business life—what corporate governance experts would call “the duty of CARE.”

Sal and Cindy Rubino are two hard-working business owners who, through the course of their trials and tribulations, manage to hold on to the dream of a creating their own business from scratch while also enduring the inevitable personal strains that such a dream exacts. The two met and fell in love while working toward Hospitality Management business degrees in Miami, but the real story starts when they try and apply the lessons of their training in the difficult day-to-day drudgery of actually running their own restaurant—simply named “The Café”—in an offbeat, run-down section of Louisville, Cindy’s hometown. It is here that their skills and wills are tested to the limits and each will have to adjust their visions to fit the realities not explored in textbooks. And it is here that their hearts will be broken, and then opened to the truths that adaptability and innovation can be applied not only to recipes and business models, but to the very people you employ and the methods you use to build a team for success.

Along the way, we meet all manner of broken individuals. The restaurant business is notorious for laying waste to lives due to its thankless dawn-to-dusk hours and the constant requirement to please the customer at all costs. Wesslund has an expert’s eye for the telling detail and the wrenching story line. [I found myself tearing up at any number of stories throughout this engaging, nonfiction tale.] His twenty years as editor-in-chief of Kentucky Living, the largest circulation monthly magazine within the state, shows in the well-drawn portraits of individuals from as far away as Bhutan and as near as Pricilla’s Place, a half-way house just a few blocks from the Café, where Cindy and Sal would find some of their best employees. Perhaps Wesslund’s (not to mention the Rubinos’) refusal to judge people by the standards of upwardly mobile middle-class values but instead, with extraordinary discernment, to look deeper into their souls to spot their special sparks and unique talents is the hallmark of this extraordinary book.

It is rare outside of evangelical circles to find a book that so openly espouses Christian principles, but Sal and Cindy make no bones about the fact that their faith community helped to save their marriage as well as their business, and Wesslund recounts the strength of those relationships and the power of religious inspiration with rare delicacy. Yet the book is not all seriousness and drama. We get, of all things, recipes (!) at the start of nearly every chapter—a creative way of introducing a new topic or the next development of this constantly churning story. And we are introduced to Cindy’s creative cooking style, to Sal’s winning smile and to their gracious, open approach to hospitality.

Small Business BIG HEART runs the gamut of the small business life cycle. It is a soup-to-nuts (literally) primer on the ups and downs of small business management. As such, it is tough medicine for anyone daring to think of creating their own start-up. Given that, however, it provides a deeply affecting microcosm of how we as a society—as a culture—might live if we, indeed, saw everyone we encountered as a member of our own family. It does not skimp on the tough decisions that must be made to keep a business afloat—the “tension between compassion and the bottom line”—but it provides a template on how to “run a business with heart”—where everyone can be a winner.

Wishing you a New Year full of new books, new ideas, new opportunities, new promise. 

#Michael Gery #Wave On: A Surfing Story #Scott Gates #Hard Road South #Paul Wesslund #Small Business Big Heart #Top Books of 2020

[markoftheasphodel]

Shadows of Valentia Top Ten -- #1 Lukas: The Messenger

Well, I am who I am. I imagine I should stop hoping for more.

Sometimes canon gives you a character so precisely attuned to your biases that you can't believe it's actually real.

Lukas. The name means "bringer of light" so it's fitting he's the one who sounds the Call to Arms for Alm's particular Hero's Journey. My assumption regarding Lukas headed into the remake was pretty simple-- he'd be, like, Alm's surrogate-brother guy. His death quote in OG Gaiden references Alm, he was in the Team Alm banner for FE Heroes along with Clair & Faye aka Alm's fangirl squad, so I figured he and Alm would be bros. Or, you know, "bros" with the usual wink-wink stuff.

Yeah, well, they're not bros like that. Everything about it is way more complicated, from the position Lukas holds as the younger son of a noble but not-very-illustrious house to what's going on inside of his head. On the surface, he's this incredibly pleasant and reasonable guy. Take the scene where he agrees to bring Alm & Friends back to the Deliverance and Lukas assures Tobin that it's fine to have a not-idealistic motivation like money for joining the army. What a cool guy! So open-minded and reassuring to the village kiddies! What a great Team Mom he is.

Three base conversations later, we find out Lukas himself had zero motivation to join the Deliverance or any other army and was in fact sent there by an elder half-brother who plainly didn't care whether Lukas lived or died and most likely would've been A-OK with his little brother coming home in a box. And Lukas relays this with a small smile and no emotional shading whatsoever, like he's discussing the weather. On the one hand, it comes out of left field, but on the other hand, this was set up from the moment he recruited Tobin: "It's OK not to have heroic motives for being here. I don't. :)"

This happens a great deal with Lukas, as pieces of characterization flow forward and backward across the main game script, the support conversations, and the Rise of the Deliverance DLC. That big confrontation he has with Fernand at Deliverance HQ turns out to have a massive and meaningful backstory. Any alarm bells that ring when he gives Alm advice on conducting a "good-hearted" invasion of Rigel that's bound to have casualties rise to a crescendo at the finale to Rise of the Deliverance when Lukas uses civilian hostages as a bargaining chip in dealing with Chancellor Desaix. He seems more than a little irreverent towards Valentia's gods and the “old children’s tale” of a prophesied hero even as he acts out a self-aware role in fulfilling said prophecy-- emphasis on the self-aware part as I don't think that can be overlooked. And that perpetually even-keeled niceness turns out not to be a front for something more troubling but a result of his central conflict as a character.

Lukas doesn't feel things like other people and he's not happy about it. Deep visceral emotions like rage, envy, and romantic passion are outside his experience. I'm not going to digress into the root cause of his state of being, whether he's good or bad representation of whatever it is he's representing... assuming the writers didn't get lucky when assembling him. We don't know if this is an organic disconnect or something that developed from how he was treated by his father and half-brother or a combination of both... or if someone on the writing staff wanted a character "like that" and didn't think too hard as to why and were just savvy enough not to use "magic" as a reason. But it's the through-line of his one in-game support with Clive and the big reveal of his DLC support with Python and it manifests in everything else from the glimpses he gives of his ungood family life to his final battle quote. Killing a god? That could potentially be exciting.

Setting aside the issue of whether or not it takes deicide for Lukas to get his rocks off, instead of being bros with Alm, reboot!Lukas has clearly imprinted on Clive (the only character whose death Lukas mourns post-chapter) and their dialogue at the end of Rise of the Deliverance is a wonderful scene that evoked memories of reading about historical generals dealing with the aftermath of real-life battles like Shiloh. Yet their support chain goes pear-shaped immediately as Clive praises Lukas for his cold and analytical nature aka the very thing Lukas doesn't especially like about himself. This is not your standard senior knight/junior knight mentoring here, as Clive steps in it during the C support, causing Lukas to stew and then unleash (by his standards) an outburst in the B support, and then Clive makes a transparent and clumsy attempt to make it all better in the A-support at the end of the war. Sounds like they haven't talked much about anything deep in the interim. And the way it wraps up, with Lukas saying "Why do you keep me around if not for my greatest virtue?" is probably self-deprecating humor, but who knows?

Then too there's a sense of containment in spite of his network his friends in the Deliverance (and both his Clive support and his Heroes dialogue show a clear-eyed and unsentimental take on said friends). Everyone thinks well of him but should he die, no one person takes a time-out to mourn him. His ending, though fitting and satisfying, is fixed and the loss of Clive or the others won't change it. Doesn't sound like he finds value in his background as a middle-tier noble, which he's basically repudiating by Act V anyway. Oh yeah, and even before the main game he's rejected his blood family, declaring he has no home with them anymore. One can only assume the lady he was courting (as referred to in the Python supports) never hears from him again.

Back to the prophecy. If Clive gets the Dorias role in this as the voice of flawed traditionalism and a certain strain of idealism that goes with it, Lukas takes on the role inhabited by August (and then Soren) as the pragmatist who gets shit done, the one willing to metaphorically and literally dirty his hands-- while both of them were in on the hostage plot, Clive’s the one affected by their actions. Lukas doesn’t appear to have any qualms. In another possible echo of the way August groomed Leif for his role, Lukas appears to grasp well before the Big Reveal that what they're all doing with Alm isn't giving a kid an army and turning him loose, but actually making a hero. Despite his skepticism of the whole “hero prophecy” thing, in trying to shape the narrative of the invasion of Rigel, in saying what he does and doesn't when Alm picks up the Royal Sword, possibly all the way back in Ram Village when he recruits five teenagers instead of the veteran leader he was sent to collect, there's an undercurrent of craft to what Lukas is doing. How curious that this deliberately literate character is the one speaking in terms of "taming myths" and of messaging while Clive (who also knows about the prophecy) is fretting over bloodlines and whether not he bet on the wrong colt. 

I've seen some speculation that Mycen tipped off Lukas to the grand plan during the failed "recruitment" and I don't think that's entirely true because the Royal Sword scene is the rare moment where Lukas sounds shocked, but even if Mycen didn't give him the crib notes I think Lukas pieces together enough that by the invasion of Rigel he is trying to make sure hero suitable to the prophecy shows up at Rigel Castle. Why else establish that he and Clive are actively thinking about the identity of the hero? For lulz and irony, maybe. Maybe, but there’s all the other stuff above to take into account..

So, Lukas. Coldly competent, sweetly fucked-up, calculating as hell, genuinely nice, turning a dry and unsparing eye and a polite smile upon the world. He uses my favorite FE weapon class and he really just wants to lose himself in a book. And hanging above him is that undefined and seemingly unattainable "more" that we never can know for sure if he actually finds, or at least finds peace in the lack thereof. And we never do find out what his "ambition" was referred to in his retreat quote even was before he apparently (?) let it go. Don’t pity him, though-- he’s not asking for pity, and he’s not allowing himself regret.

#valentia love #valentia meta #valentia top 10 #fe15 spoilers/ #lukas emblem #text post #long post

[skyetrga847]

Description games Grand Theft Auto 4

I grew up in the era when GTA was generally contraband. In 2003, my colleagues and I pitched in to acquire a reproduction of Secondary Town and split this amongst one another, out of the eyesight of our mothers, which given all happened performed in a fearful frenzy in documents with STATES Now about the game’s prostitution with chaotic propensities. GTA wasn’t a game toward us but was a essential component of your adolescence, the kind of all-caps MATURE article we encountered as an pretense of rebellion as much as a joy thing to authorize the time.

Grand Theft Auto 4 arrived at a new age. I wasn’t level playing sports at that point anymore, having forgot my consoles when I attended higher education with 2007 in an effort to focus on my studies and become a world-renowned author™. Still, I even get myself drawn to IV, not because it became the next-gen adaptation of GTA, yet as a lot of that game talked with a thematic evolution i was considering. Head-down in publications such as Good Gatsby then The Scream Of Group 49, GTA IV’s somber take on finding yourself spent in the cold tunnels of The National Dream as a poor person while the precious get stupider, crueler, and richer talked to me. I spent countless hours on a friend’s Xbox 360 to complete the game, eagerly playing through the sad account of Niko Bellic.

You’ve probably read a hundred hot stands on Grand Theft Auto IV with The Us Hope. You can reach below for my style of this if you want, but I must focus on somewhat different for this part. IV excels when it comes to building something is red for open-world up for: a thematically unified incident to drive when it comes to telling a story while and recognizing that the player is an independent inhabitant of the world instead of a traveler. How that GTA IV complete of which stays that it highlights the weight.

Large is (forgive myself) a loaded word. There are obvious examples of heavy, when it comes to physical weight. Something – a case of stones, the anvil – is deep. There is plus the thematic model on the phrase, of course; to say anything happens deep is to tell the thinking about you eat emotionally, it’s depressing you. GTA IV has systems in place both at home moment-by-moment gameplay and also the plot that embraces both of these.

Since the narrative's emotional heaviness is pretty clear for anyone who’s played Grand Theft Auto IV, let’s look at the gameplay concepts, like physics. GTA 4’s physics are surprisingly single in them to display a surprisingly eloquent take on awkwardness. Everything feels like it offers a defined load with GTA IV that drags that down. Niko goes without elegance, always a victim of her own lack of balance. Sometimes someone may brush beyond him or a car can gently tap him, with torture fall over awkwardly. Vehicles are the expansion of the. Level the faster convertible vehicles turn much more slowly than they would in a racer or a new Grand Theft Auto game. To label them tanks would be exaggerating, but they’re not nimble.

In Grand Theft Auto 4, gunfights feel similarly unique. Plenty of action games make use of destructible case but there’s anything about the significance in the planet which makes this feel alive in the single means. Taking cover behind a car during a struggle with the law will cause the vehicle slightly start when rounds beat this, the flute above you will break and water you as bullets hole through. Melee battle is awkward but animal, with Niko's brutal pistol belt involving the enemy going round the corner creating a combination of tension with shock. The prolonged delivery on the progress benefit the enemy's stagger backward result in an opening for you to kill them down, and it is surprisingly and uncomfortably intimate.

People rightfully noticed that the ragdoll animations and even rate of the gunfight action modified for Grand Theft Auto V, with enemies popping out all over and their bodies responding into further of a “lower down” sort of manner than IV’s mixture of prolonged and dropping animations. IV’s kills are shifting because of the relationship that Against trades away for the scope and kind meetings. Where V is regularly putting people into the kind of action sequences you’d view in Rush and Vision Impossible, IV’s gunfights often occur in squalor. The nearness of nailing a drug dealer’s eyeball around the turn in the ratty slum’s hallway with a blind fire from the pistol and then looking at their lead strike back counter to the edges is much more frightening (also fascinating) than V’s approach.

The big difference between the two modes of assault makes sense when you believe the creation they're aping. V is the termination of Rockstar’s bond with the records of Jordan Mann (Thief, Stage). The engagement is cheerful and enjoyable, with the show briefly display to let you know if you kill someone.

Notice the elements here. There’s a lot of remaining on the injuries, blood splattering on the window, the factor with the van slowly go ahead to deviate with the square one, the bullets. There is no zipping present with scores. This sort of storytelling places focus not about frantic action but instead for the idea this violence is holding the emotional with real effect on the world. Cars move. Glass shatters. People moan with agony.

Grand Theft Auto 5 says these look, like grass defeat with death moans, but they're minimized due to the high production rates as well as the trends of opponents that come after you while Tangerine Dream’s beautiful score compete in the family. That kind a side among a person and also the violence. Yes, this is entertainment. Don’t worry, you’re just performing a video game that takes place mimicking that battle hit people notice last summer.

IV has very little in the way of such artificial barriers. There is no soundtrack to cover up the cries with the man you just taken since he begs someone nearby to see the partner he enjoys her. The violence is frightening and often cruel, helping turn Niko Bellic into a complex character, a person with noble value which nonetheless commits heinous wars that provide dying with bear upon countless people.

Niko’s emotional scratches and experiencing a challenging, adolescent betrayal have left him incapable of crossing the earth as something other than a mercenary for hire – someone capable of drive away from their feelings to injured citizens for dollars. The method with Grand Theft Auto IV, particularly when it comes to physics and movements in combat, stress that as much as the report does. Every feat of assault is mired in the throes https://gtadownload.org of artistic realism, with quality models falling again, while the world erupts in people in a sluggish but convincing direction which grounds the theatre of Niko's story.

Of course, a lot of these distinctions probably be outside the realm of creative intent. GTA IV was Rockstar's first real attempt to seize with the RAGE engine on the large scale, so the awkward physics and clunkiness of battle is more likely a result of that than any intent. However, at the end from the day, you have the bit of painting with purpose only concern with a degree. No matter if GTA 4's physics are accidentally compelling or a mistake, they're still charming and immersive storytelling props.

Storytelling with activities is still unfortunately often observed in terms of traditional plot. "The plot then the figures are superior." However, I think it's worth paying attention to the elements outside of that. Just as a actor provides a reputation on a script to life for a film, the strict stuff which you might not love about opening view (like the way physics weigh on a atmosphere and identify the tether on the planet) is often key in making that lie what it is in the earliest position. The most awful thing that can ever happen to GTA IV, beyond being removed from room and stage, is a remaster that develops the gunplay then produces the persons animations more attractive. To do that would puncture Rockstar's disturbing yet compelling interpretation of The National Dream.

Yes, GTA V is a great practical and inventive success that dwarfs IV in terms of substance and pleasurable activities to do. And Vice Urban and III were both incredible games in which did a lot to improve the intermediate. However, IV remains an important GTA to me since it’s a high-budget game produced by one of the most successful developers to goes all-in at generating a great encounter on wandering, sympathetic souls doing awful points also earning hard amounts to survive a dingy, despairing world.

IV is not without the drawbacks. The writing is tricky in some areas, particularly some homophobic and misogynistic pieces to touch juvenile rather than provocative, and Oh My Lord I Ignored How Severe The Checkpoint Order Is. But, IV's ambitions and its performances with those goals, are still unmatched in virtually another game away here through our measure. Epic in scope and bitter but humanistic, IV lives beyond these concerns as a modern classic in a way that the other GTAs just don't.

[cinnaminsvga]

🍜 | taehyung

the sleep deprived series (n.): drabbles that i write when i’m sad and tired

→ cashier!taehyung | 1.4K words → College!AU wherein Taehyung is a part-time cashier and you are a tired student just trying to power your way through finals with the help of a dozen or so energy drinks.

You always thought that college would never come. Not that you were excited for it or anything—on the contrary, you practically dreaded it. As the youngest, you were expected to exceed the accomplishments of your siblings, going above and beyond your family’s expectations. As such, you were expected to leave your sleepy suburban home and study at one of the country’s finest universities.

Of course, this did not bode well with you. In fact, you never wanted to leave. It was not like you lacked ambition or dreams; it was just that you knew you could achieve those goals in your hometown’s university. All of your friends were staying, and you were not necessarily the greatest when it came to making new friends. Why leave when you have everything at your disposal right there at your hometown? You fought almost regularly with your parents about this, but after a particularly devastating argument, you decided it would be better to shut your mouth and just suck it up.

After all, how hard could college be?

Yet, here you are, standing in the middle of the campus’ supermarket in your pajamas, searching for the energy drink aisle.

It was getting late—at 10PM, you were surprised they were even still open. But as you glanced at the small horde of zombie-like students who were all carrying boxes of coffee and RedBull, you knew that finals week was killing all of you. The supermarket manager probably knew this, and kept the store open for crammers like you to make use of their services.

As you placed the last bottle of generic instant coffee into your basket, you sneaked a peek at the cup noodles sitting innocently near the counter. You could almost feel yourself salivating, but you hesitated, as you knew that the moment you snatched one from the counter, you would get five of them. Seeing as how your diet already consisted of caffeine and potato chips, you were already on your way to becoming just one ball of grease.

While you were having your internal argument, you failed to notice the cashier giggling softly at your dilemma. When the giggles did not stop, you finally heard it. Removed from your stupor, your head snapped up to look at the source of the laughter.

“Having trouble there, miss?” The cashier said smoothly, his boxy-grin bringing a small blush to your face.

“Uhh…” You said dumbly, your face probably stuck motionless as you gaped openly at the boy. His handsome face broke into a bigger grin, and you could almost feel yourself lose your breath. He brought his hands through his soft brown hair, and you wondered distractedly how it would feel like to have your hands replace his instead.

“I… I was just thinking whether I should get the… noodles.” You said with difficulty, your face contorting into what you hoped was a casual smile. You were suddenly reminded of the fact that your hair was probably a mess right now and that you were currently in your pajamas, and it seriously did not help that the boy was seriously good-looking. As you tried to somewhat fix your appearance, you looked up to see him watching you amusedly. You brought your arms around yourself self-consciously, but he continued on regardless.

He turned to look at the noodles, his cheek resting on his arm in a faux-contemplative manner. “To noodle or not to noodle, that is the question,” he said, his hand rubbing his chin as if he were an old man.

You snorted, failing to stop the embarrassing sound from escaping. He smiled back at you, seemingly pleased with your response.

“What’s the problem? Didn’t bring enough change?” He asked, his eyebrows quirking.

“No!” You said a little bit too quickly. You cursed, forcing yourself to calm down. Easy now, he’s just a boy. A cute, handsome, and very funny boy. “N-no, it’s just that I’m trying to stop myself, you know? Gotta keep some form of order in my life.” You laughed nervously, slightly intimidated by his unfaltering stare.

“Stop yourself? Baby, it’s finals week! Got to reward yourself sometimes, right?” He smirked. You had blushed when he called you baby, and you knew that he noticed.

You shook your head, trying to hide your flustered state. “W-well, I still have a lot of snacks at home, so I think I’m good.“

You glanced back at him. Another smile graced his lips.

“Are you sure? This brand is my favorite, after all. You sure you don’t want to get them?” He pouted, almost childishly. It brought a small smile to your lips, but you shook your head nonetheless.

“No, it’s fine, really.” You said.

Suddenly, his eyes brightened significantly. “Oh, I know! You know what, how about I…” He said, before glancing around the shop, as if conspiring with you. He leaned in close to your face, and you could not help (yet again) the blush from rising to your ears. You could feel the warmth of his breath fan your cheeks, and you fought to keep your heartbeat in check, lest he somehow heard it.

With his face still insanely near yours, he whispered deeply, “How about I give it to you? On the house.” He finished, leaning back away from you as if nothing happened.

You let out the breath you did not know you had been holding. This man was going to put your face on fire. “Err, really? “ You said, wringing your hands nervously. He was getting you way too flustered, and it was kind of maddening that he was still so calm. "You don’t have to do that…”

“Oh c’mon! It’s free food!” He said, laughing cutely at you. Oh, there goes your heart. He easily maneuvered his body around his station, grabbing three or four cup noodles and placing them on the conveyor belt.

Even as he smiled kindly at you, you hesitated, wondering what his intentions were.

As if sensing your doubt, his smile softens, and he gently called you to come closer. “Hey, I’m serious. Want me to ring you up?”

After another moment or two, you decided to take his offer. As you place your other items on the counter, you cannot help sneaking a few more peaks at the strange, handsome boy. He hummed happily while he scanned your items, shaking his head to the beat. You smiled warmly to yourself, marvelling at his incredible personality. You wondered if it was worth asking him for his name.

“Well, that’s going to be $26 and one date. How about it?” He said a bit too quickly, and you almost miss the last part. You began to question whether you did hear the last part.

“I’m sorry, what?” You asked incredulously, and you noticed the small blush that graces his cheeks.

“I said $26 and a date. How about it?” He repeated, his smile never wavering.

You stared, gobsmacked. Here you were, wondering if you should ask his name, then he goes and pulls this.

“Uhh, you sure we’re talking about the same person now?” You said, your mouth gaping in shock.

He laughed, and you cannot help but want to say yes to his offer just to hear his laugh again. And again, and again.

“Of course! But if you’re still unsure, I’m sure we can first get to know each other.” He gestured to the supermarket. “If you need me, I’m always here.”

You could not stop the smile from gracing your lips. You found yourself struggling to find a reason to say no. He was just too nice to say no to. Stopping the nagging shyness in the back of your mind, you decided to take the risk. After all, he was buying you food. That’s already a good indicator that he was a generally nice guy.

After a few moments, you finally answered. “You know what? Alright.”

“Wait, so you mean—you’re saying yes?” He said excitedly, and you do not stop yourself from giggling. His giddiness was intoxicating.

“Of course. By the way, my name’s Y/N. You?”

You knew his boxy-smile was going to haunt your dreams, or at least until you saw him again.

“Taehyung. It’s nice to meet you, Y/N.”

As you both smiled shyly back at each other, it was at that moment that you thought that maybe going to a college far away from your hometown was not so bad after all.

#the sleep deprived series #bts #bts scenarios #taehyung #kim taehyung #v #taehyung scenarios #fanfics #bts fanfiction #v scenarios #bts v #bts fanfic #bts x you #bangtan scenarios #bangtan scenario #bangtan fanfic #bangtan fanfiction #taehyung x reader #v x reader #my writing

[shutupkimjongdae]

[TRANS/MAGAZINE] Singles March 2017 Issue: Chen Your collaboration song with Dynamic Duo, ‘Nosedive’, won first place on a music show after getting first place on online music charts. It happened just yesterday. I was surprised when I heard the news. Every award is meaningful, but it felt even more special since we won without going on music shows. To be honest, you and Dynamic Duo working together was a bit unexpected. How did it happen? When I visited Gaeko’s studio for the first time, we talked about a lot of things. I was telling him about how I grew up listening to his music, and (he said) ‘what if we actually worked together on a song?’ Having the opportunity to work with Dynamic Duo, I was able to fulfill yet another one of my dreams. Many people have said they felt comforted by the song. Something I focused on the most while recording the song was the lyrics. Rather than showcasing my voice, I wanted people to be able to hear the lyrics clearly. The lyrics also seem to go well with the music video’s mood. Neither Dynamic Duo nor I appear in the music video, but Ryu Boksong’s presence was enough to make a great music video. Last year, you worked on many different projects. EXO released three albums, and you also participated in EXO-CBX promotions and released an OST for a drama. 2016 was a year that filled me with many ambitions as a singer. I especially felt that way during the EXO-CBX promotions. Right after ‘Hey Mama!’ promotions ended, I even talked to Xiumin and Baekhyun about the next album. I don’t know when or with what kind of song we will make a comeback, but we have been talking about it. People have said that you and Punch’s song ‘Everytime’ from made the drama even more entertaining. I’m thankful if they thought that way. But I should be thanking the actors and the drama instead. Thanks to the OST, people started to recognize my voice. You also sang the OSTs for and . What is your main concern when you’re recording a song that’s to appear in a drama? When singing the OST for , I got D.O.’s help. I asked him for advice on which way of singing will best match the show’s mood. Recently, I’ve been trying to study the message behind the song itself rather than studying the drama and its characters. Since I’m not an actor, I think it’s more appropriate to approach it musically. If I can sing with a full understanding of the song, I’m sure it will also prove to be fitting for the scenes of the drama. I heard that when you sing, you care the most about conveying emotions whereas most young singers nowadays like to focus on technique and singing methods. I want to sing in the way I’m good at and the way I prefer to sing. When I listen to a new song, the first thing I hear is its lyrics, so I want the people who are listening to my songs to focus on the lyrics as well. To effectively deliver the lyrics’ meaning, you need to capture the underlying emotions and vice versa; when you sing with those emotions, people will be able to hear the lyrics better. However, I’m not saying that technical skills aren’t important. I still have a lot to learn, so I am always practicing to be better in the areas I lack in. But you’re EXO’s main vocal and regarded as a great vocalist even outside of EXO? I still have a long way to go. I have never felt satisfied after hearing my recording. There are so many great singers in this world too. What kind of technical skill do you want to improve on? Groove. There is a huge gap in my ability to sing ballad and R&B. When you’re on a team, you can clearly see what your strengths and weaknesses are as well as your team members’. Seeing each other like that must be motivating for you guys. It’s been six years since we debuted. Now, just by stepping foot inside the recording studio, I can see how the members have improved. I can feel how much our experience of recording numerous songs in the past has benefited us. Naturally, when it’s my turn to sing, it pushes me to try harder. Since you’re a member of a performance team with many members, there hasn’t been many opportunities like the OSTs and stages to showcase your capability as a vocalist. Do you sometimes feel the urge to sing more? Since we are a team, it takes time for everyone to get noticed and recognized as individuals. I get to sing as much as I want in the practice room. I usually feel satisfied after doing that. My ultimate dream is to be able to sing a self-composed song written in my favorite style. What’s your favorite song to sing in the practice room lately? Beyonce’s ‘Hello’. It’s not a recently released song, but I recently came across it while driving. It’s a high pitched song since it’s sung by a female artist, but the song was so good that I decided to adjust it to fit my own vocal range. By the way, it was interesting how you recommended Lucia and Epitone project’s songs under a music page of this one website. I want to keep an open mind when listening to songs. I even keep indie songs in my playlist and look up the ones that catch my attention, and that’s how I found the song ‘Will You Love Me For a Season Like Flowers’. Are you saying that you, a member of the hottest boy group right now, understand that sentiment? I’m actually very old fashioned. I’m not on social media, and I don’t go on the Internet often. There’s no specific reason for it; it just kind of happened. Sometimes, my friends make fun of me by saying I’m technologically challenged. Are you okay with not keeping up and not knowing about the things that everyone else knows about? I don’t really care much. I just like to live at my own pace. You seem like you know your own mind well. I think you need to have confidence in yourself. If not, you are going to sway. It’s easier to just go your own way and follow your beliefs. Honestly, that’s why I’m waiting right now to release self-composed songs. People around me have been telling me to try different styles and find what I like, but I’m more about figuring out what kind of music I want to do first before actually going at it. I don’t feel the need to rush, and I’m thinking like ’when it’s the right time, I’ll do it’. Because I’m going to do music for the rest of my life (there’s plenty of time). Like fruit, it will eventually ripen with time. What is something that has changed the most, before and after debut? Before, I was shy and lacked confidence. I used to get nervous and couldn’t talk in front of a crowd, and that’s changed after I became a member of EXO. Even among the EXO members, the fans like to group Xiumin and Chen together and they call you ‘Kim Brothers’. You guys admit that you two are very close; when do you feel like Xiumin knows you too well? He knows my likes and dislikes too well. So whenever we go somewhere together, he prepares the things that I like and tries to avoid the things that I dislike. Sometimes it even feels like he’s my personal manager. It’s convenient for me, so (I have no complaints)… He is good at reading other people in general. It gives me chills when I see that he knows so many things about the other members that I’ve never known about. You’ve mentioned before that you want to learn from Xiumin’s professionalism. You’ve said that he never shows up to practice unprepared. Is it true, even when you’re on a busy schedule? I try to avoid looking unprofessional and making mistakes. I hate feeling ashamed on stage. Even though I don’t go on the Internet much, I always monitor the performances that I’ve been in. I used to feel so guilty about the smallest mistakes, but nowadays I don’t dwell on the past too much. If I were to list EXO’s accomplishments, domestic or international, the list would be endless. EXO’s been around for 6 years, but is there something that’s still shocking and unbelievable even for you? Winning the daesang for four years in a row! It’s difficult to win an award like that even once in your lifetime, but we won it four years in a row. I’m both amazed and grateful. If you didn’t debut as Chen of EXO, what do you think you’d be doing right now? I also wonder about that often. Um, I used to want to major in applied music. I guess I would’ve kept studying music, and I would probably be preparing to become a trainer or a teacher right now. Just like how I relieve stress by singing, I hope other people can live while enjoying music too. I would like to help people realize the joy of music.

source: cover [1,2], scan translator: jen please take out our translations with full credit only!

#chen #exo m #exo #translations #t: magazine #singles march 2017 #trans: korean #shutupkjdsubs

[beeblackburn]

What are your other favorite novels besides TSOIAF?

Thanks for the question!

OH GOOD GOD WHERE DO I BEGIN? 

Putting a “Keep reading” cut because some spoilers for the Realm of the Elderlingsseries and much gushing over one… okay, maybe two of the The First Law sequel standalones. 

First off, most of the novels from the Realm of the Elderlings series. (I’m not totally a fan of Golden Fool and even less of a fan of City of Dragons, except for the Malta, Alise and Sedric parts. Seriously, Malta is better than you all.) Hobb has this romantic melancholy that’s dripping with atmosphere throughout her stories. And I honestly like the meandering in her stories. It builds up this idyllic atmosphere and character development before Hobb’s punctures it and her characters with extreme violence inflicted onto them.

But if I had to single out books… Mad Ship, Fool’s Errand, Dragon Haven and Fool’s Quest.

Mad Ship because I kind of love Wintrow’s character arc here, balancing out his introspective tendencies (and condescension, let’s be honest) with the pragmatism of being in very dangerous territory and having to adapt in ways he never expected from the start of the trilogy. And I rather love how it comes out here and the jarring shift in perspective he has to have.

And this was the first book I got really… engaged with Kennit as a person. Ship of Magic, I was more disgruntled and sighing at his distrust of practically everyone, enemies and allies. I liked his character and Kennit was an intriguing bastard, but he lacked a sort-of human dimension for me. Here, it becomes damn clear that Kennit’s been through so much damage.

And his relationship with Etta and Wintrow and Vivicia is just really kind of intriguing and interesting and engaging to read because it felt like new territory for these characters and I love the way they bounced off each other in this book. They fed and worked off each other splendidly and I even got a few sad feels over Kennit with his relationship with Wintrow.

(No, I’m not excusing his behavior in Ship of Destiny, just pointing out that Mad Ship gave Kennit more dimensions for me to sink my teeth into.)

Althea, Brashen and the other Vestrit family members stopped making me slap my forehead a quarter of the time as well! With a common goal and united together, they were a force to reckon with. Shame it didn’t happen a book earlier, but hey, I’ll take what I can get. Paragon and Amber’s relationship was super intriguing (Amber has the best quote in Mad Ship by far) and Paragon is… Paragon. :)

Also, I STOPPED wanting to push Malta off a bridge. Forever. After a book and a half of her being the world’s most brattiest daughter (and bridge-pushing worthy) her POV became a delight to read because she finally got her priorities straight. The intelligence and cunning was always inside her, she just focused it onto other areas.

ALSO SHE STRONGARMED A DRAGON INTO HELPING HER. Heart eyes, yo.

Fool’s Errand was just great because it was the start to a whole new Fitz. A more dangerous, more competent and “not taking any shit” Fitz. He was rude, he was addicted to elfbark, he snapped back at Chade (honestly, I don’t blame him here), he cuts off all sexual relations with Starling after realizing her marriage, he’s quite obstinate to Dutiful and… that scene. Just that scene. If you read the novel, you know the scene.

Also more Fitz and Fool is wonderful. Along with Nighteyes. It’s a great three-way dynamic between all three and Fitz continued to shine as one of my favorite fantasy protagonists ever, showing off an older, mayhaps wiser, Fitz while making me cringe as he keeps retreating, he cuts himself from people he loves and probably love him back because he thinks they won’t care for him or that he’ll just trouble them.

It’s just a really good, self-contained book in my opinion, containing a nice main plot and a few good subplots thrown into the pot. It starts off slow as Robin Hobb books are like to do and subjects you to a tense storyline full of bang fantastic finishes and narrative pay-offs like you wouldn’t believe that hurt. That really hurt and twist in your heart.

I have an irrational soft spot for Dragon Haven. Sedric, Leftrin and Alise’s arcs were all amazing and I love how Sedric and Alise navigated their respective past abusive relationships and forged onward after realizing and accepting how awful their partner was. My heart ached for Sedric and Alise, even when they were screw-ups in their own right.

Fool’s Quest is just the book that Robin Hobb kept breaking my heart every 20-30 pages. It was so packed full of call-backs, narrative pay-offs, tragedy and heartbreak and triumphs and… I actually never wanted to facepalm at Fitz once. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I love how deer-headed Fitz can be sometimes, but other times, they made me sigh and see red at Fitz for being an idiot (I’m talking that scene in Golden Fool.)

Here? Absolutely none of that. Everything made dramatic and characterization sense. There’s just a beauty and believable desperation in Fitz’s inner monologue over the circumstances of this novel. I love the way the story is paced, the snowy jewel that is Hobb’s prose, the old characters I meet again (Chade and Nettle) and the new characters I learn more about and like (Shun and Lant) and the settings Fitz treks to. This novel’s what I’d actually consider the best-constructed Robin Hobb story so far. No contest.

My all-time favorite fantasy standalone though? The Heroes by Joe Abercrombie. I love it, I just love it to pieces, I have a lot of embarrassing emotions for it and I’m pretty unapologetic about it. I have reread that book about 5-6 times and it’s still hilarious, insightful, pithy and full of rich characterization that I can chuckle at and feel a twig of empathy for.

It’s full of anti-war imagery and themes, but what I especially love about it are three things in particular:

1. I love how well Abercrombie captures the “sexy” nature of military bureaucracy. He’s done it with West’s chapters in The First Law, but here, he captures how frustrating it is to deal with the chain of command from a grunt and commander perspective, given his shifting POVs and how slow and unreliable communication between the ranks can be in medieval times. 

Good and shit men die, not because the enemy host was stronger or better than their host, but because lack of military intelligence, fog of war, racial prejudice, inability to take advantage of the terrain or inter-military rivalries. Sometimes, your men die because the messenger you sent to give your orders to them got shot by a stray arrow. By sheer luck, men can lose their lives.

Also, Tunny. Tunny is a one-man commentary on military chain of command.

2. The prose. Abercrombie writes battle scenes like no one’s else business. In my opinion, he writes some of the most chaotic, blood-rushing and deafening war scenes ever, perfectly capturing what it’s like for a common soldier to fight in the middle of a warzone… and how utterly nuts it is, given all that clangor and blades flying. Basically, read the “Casualties” chapter. It’s a masterpiece.

But Abercrombie isn’t content with writing visceral, skull-bashing action, he’s also hilarious, full of sardonic asides and witticisms into his descriptions. Basically, every thought out of Gorst and Calder’s head is gold, Gorst’s in how acidic, self-pitying and sarcastic it is (oh my god, the letter he writes to the King of the Union alone… and stuff like this in the middle of a battlefield: “Gorst had the expression of a boy who had been told he could not have a puppy this year.”) and Calder in how sardonic, slippery and self-conscious it can be. 

And his prose is always clear-cut, but it sings with how accessible and seamless it feels to read. It’s beautiful in a sharp way, most sentences are meant to cut you with a feeling and they hit their marks generally. That’s the thing about Abercrombie’s works: they’re infinitely quotable, almost every line hilarious, poignant, brutal or darkly funny. 

3. THE CHARACTERIZATION BECAUSE ABERCROMBIE EXCELS HERE.

First off, I love Beck. He’s a kid who goes through a well-treaded “war is hell” arc, but it works here because 1. he wasn’t a total innocent, he was an asshole at the start and that’s okay, Abercrombie doesn’t gloss over teenage entitlement, 2. the way he finds out about how hellish war can be is rather shocking in a genre sense, 3. The First Law is all about people trying to escape the cycle of violence and failing and only getting out through death or getting out before your wrists are drenched in blood. Beck’s fate at the end is downright refreshing as a result.

Also, Gorst. Gorst is one fascinating onion from outer layer to the deepest depths of himself. You get all this noted politeness from the giant he is, his constant scathing, contemptuous inner monologue, snarking at everyone’s blaring incompetence, some truly messed-up impulses from his psyche and some really savage swordplay from a “gentle giant” of a man. Gorst is layered and the narrative pay-off for his arc at the end is truly Abercrombiesque.

Finree. Okay, this woman is awesome. Flawed and she constantly blurs the lines of decency and self-interest, love and ambition, gritted politeness and sharp bluntness, but she is awesome and she’s a fascinatingly different perspective on war, both from her relations with her commander father and husband and her own cunning. When you stare down and snipe at both Bayaz and Black Dow, wiping the smirk off Bayaz’s face, you win. You just win to me.

Craw was a cool old guy and I love how Abercrombie doesn’t really tear down the “honor gets you dead” idea that more nihilistic, darker fantasies (including his own!) here. Craw being a “Straight Edge” is actually what gains him social cache and nets him approval from others. People trust him not to stab them in the back and, for the most part, Craw’s not really punished for that so much as his sense of ethics doing it for him. Plus, it’s really fascinating to get a peek into Black Dow’s psyche through Craw’s eyes.

(Also, holy crap, Shivers. You’re scary. You’re so very scary, you’re more ruthless and nihilistic Sandor and my heart kind of hurts for you, but you’re frightening as hell.)

But yeah, I just want to talk about Prince Calder because so many emotions over this scheming bastard. His first chapter already endeared me to his characterization, being an ambitious, scheming, quippy fallen prince who has a heart of silver (bronze more like) towards his wife, his growing insecurities over his place in this warrior society gave me room to empathize with and even his blunt, direct scheming was charming in a win-less way. And his ruthlessness with strangers was par for the course of Abercrombie protagonists.

Then Scale’s initial fate on the battlefield and Calder’s reaction to it. 

Calder only grew more awesome from there when he finally decided to start walking the talk and apply himself into showing the kind of leader he could be. From the military actions he takes, to the funny stuff he commits to, to being snarky under pressure, I grew more and more respect for him not being all talk while acknowledging he’s done some ugly stuff in the past and will continue to do so in the future.

And then his interactions with Black Dow and Bayaz at the end. My brain cheered at the former and it melted at the latter. That meeting was legendary. And then his last chapter. Calder is playing a ballsy as all hell game in the North. It’s just… Calder’s got layers and probably the best character arc in The Heroes.

So yeah, The Heroes, I will always gush unabashedly. Great characters, tight pacing, wonderful themes, smooth prose, witty quotes, hilarious remarks, what’s not to love?

That being said, Red Country has really growing on me a lot in the past year ever since I got more into the Western genre and the writing style in my university courses. It might be Abercrombie’s warmest of his first six novels where not all characters are strictly bastards or monsters, some just being normal people whose only crime is being stuck in a moral rut and not being strong enough to break out of it yet or dark people genuinely trying to reach for better. Same world, but different cast of characters, a relatively moral one.

In that sense, I really appreciate Red Country as Abercrombie deconstructing himself. Temple and Shy are two normal people caught in the muck of darker people and made witnesses to even blacker deeds. It’s genuinely jarring when I read Cosca, one of my favorite anti-heroes, become a dark, dark man since last time, his humor intertwined with horror and atrocity he perpetuates onto more innocents now. And Lamb… let’s just say I got the chills reading Lamb and my reactions to them were Temple and Shy’s reactions to them.

And yet, it’s not entirely pitch-black. The same cutting humor is still there, but there’s a gentle wistfulness in this work barely there in The Heroes. There are some people who regret their black deeds of the past and some who want to rise above the mud again… and some even succeed, believe it or not. For the most overt time, Abercrombie allows some characters to change for the better. After a shitton of skulls, but it’s par for the course of Abercrombie. 

@racefortheironthrone​ also, I’m curious. I’ve seen that you’ve read Abercrombie and commented on the world-building of The First Law but what’s your take on the sequel standalones as stories of themselves?

As for other favorites… Wolf Hall (very well-written historical fiction), The Goblin Emperor (not a book for cynics), The Lies of Locke Lamora (reread 3-4 times, such a beautiful jewel of prose) and the entirety of The Dagger and the Coin quintet (seriously, read it for Geder Palliako and Clara Kalliam, such rich characters that deconstruct well-worn tropes).

#robin hobb #realm of the elderlings #golden fool #city of dragons #mad ship #fool's errand #fool's quest #dragon haven #joe abercrombie #the heroes #red country #wolf hall #the goblin emperor #the lies of locke lamora #the dagger and the coin #too many character tags

[itsyourturnblog]

Everybody has baggage — is it time to unpack?

Photo by Caroline Selfors on Unsplash

Last week I shared Pause-Parse-Peace, a few thoughts about the need to be kind, generous and compassionate to yourself in order to share that true self with others. In its essence, we can think of that simply as “Be Yourself”.

The essence of today’s thoughts are the flip-side: “Deal with Yourself”.

Everybody has baggage — the stories we tell ourselves and that we bring into our interactions with others:

Emotional wounds from broken relationships — a faltered friendship, a bad breakup, a unrequited love, an absent parent.

The imprints from our childhood — the catch we didn’t make and the jeers of other players, the fights our parents had, how our families dealt with conflict (or didn’t), how mom enforced her rules, how dad complied with them… or maybe they were dad’s rules and mom survived them.

Photo by NeONBRAND on Unsplash

Perhaps one of them left you behind without explanation.

Or was it the way in which money was treated — were things scarce or was there abundance?

What social markers were lauded and which were lambasted?

Maybe the worldview of a neighbor or a teacher profoundly impacted us for good. Or for bad.

In your family, was it okay to be vulnerable or were you taught to “be tough” or “don’t let them see you sweat” or maybe “boys don’t cry”?

These are just a few.

There are an infinite number of ways these messages have been programmed into each of our lives and in which we are unwittingly carrying around duffel bags of unpacked junk. And some of us have way more than just one bag…

As leaders, we can’t ignore our baggage. If we do, those we lead or those we love will pay the price.

A side note — if you’re tempted to say of yourself, “I’m not a leader,” don’t be deceived. Everyone leads somehow, from the newest intern to the most senior executive, we all impact the lives of those we encounter.

Anyhow, each of us lead and each of us have baggage. While it is critically important to be generous to ourselves and to accept ourselves as we are in order to offer our unique gifts to the world, we also must be aware that our experiences, our wounds, our disappointments will shape how we treat others and how they experience us. If left unpacked, that baggage likely will have a damaging effect on the people in your life, whether at work or home or places in between.

Imagine this. You’re seated on a plane just after you’ve boarded. Someone near you gets taken out by the guy who turns quickly, forgetting he’s wearing a very full backpack. Or you watch as the gal with the enormous purse clips every person in an aisle seat all the way to her place in 37B.

Now imagine that your wounds fill those bags, the people on the plane are your relationships, and your closest relationships are sitting in aisle seats. And there you are, running up and down the aisle, interacting with each of them, with the best of intentions… and your Volkswagen sized purse and your ginormous mountaineering backpack of junk are smacking them in their heads, spilling their bad airplane coffees and creating the worst kind of ruckus, all because you are oblivious to the impacts of your unpacked bags.

That’s basically what happens when we don’t deal with our crap.

There’s a anecdote from Jerry Colonna in Reboot: Leadership and the Art of Growing Up that beautifully addresses this very notion:

For those who hold power, the price of unsorted baggage is paid by those with whom they pass their days — their coworkers, peers, direct reports. Of course, not all organizational challenges can be traced back to the dismembered, unsorted parts of themselves in the leaders’ shadows. But the toughest, most intransigent, most troubling aspects of the collective unconscious blithely referred to as culture can more effectively be worked when the leader commits to doing self-inquiry work. Power in the hands of one afraid or unwilling to look in the mirror perpetuates an often silent, always seething violence in the workplace. Worse still, when a leader leads from his or her shadow, the dismembering havoc is perpetuated down the line until the company, the tribe, the community simply assumes this is how life must be.

I was called to lead an off-site with a senior leadership team. The problem on the table, the “presenting agenda” to use a coaching term, was that the company was “stuck,” and the CEO and the board were frustrated by the lack of innovation and progress.

The morning we were to start the off-site, the CEO pulled me aside: both the heads of sales and engineering had called in sick. This was a problem, because each of them was considered a problem. Everyone else had already concluded that the aggressive style each of them showed was the reason the company couldn’t make any decisions.

“I don’t think either of them is really sick,” the CEO confided in me. “I think they just don’t want to deal with all the touchy-feely stuff you make people talk about.” I nodded and joked about having a pheromone that makes people cry.

We began by talking about the ways we listen and the ways we do — or don’t — communicate. I asked about how failure was handled. I listened with my head, my ears, but then listened with my body as well. My head was pleased. It all sounded right.

“We celebrate failure,” someone offered. I smiled, made small talk about failure and mistakes. Again, it all sounded right.

But my body felt otherwise, and my vigilant heart perked up. “How do you handle disagreement?” They looked puzzled and stayed silent. I pressed on. “I mean, you’ve more than a thousand employees now, you’ve got to disagree sometime. Do you celebrate that?” More silence.

Following my intuition, I wandered over to the CEO. “Tell me how disagreement was handled in your family,” I asked, echoing the work I did with the other, conflict-avoidant team. “Was there any violence at home?”

Shocked, he said emphatically, “No! Not at all.” Puzzled, I turned away, listening to my gut. The CEO added quickly, “Only a lot of yelling.”

I smiled, putting a question to the whole room, “Does anyone on your team ever yell?”

He paused before noting, “Only those two who didn’t show up today.”

With that one move, we quickly pieced together their unconscious, unspoken cultural rules. Conflict was to be avoided at all costs. In this case, it might lead to unacceptable yelling, which is too threatening.

The result was an incredibly loving culture to which most folks were deeply loyal. Most folks. To those for whom frustration was an inherent part of experimentation, of ambition, of drive, the culture was to be fought against at every turn.

Experimentation creates tension. It carries a risk of failure. Moreover, when such experiments succeed, and companies innovate, people have to integrate change. The potential of failure and the need for change can terrify people. It can feel like the conflicts from their childhood that folks were programmed to avoid.

Then those who clearly see the need for change in an organization become the unconscious holders of the tension. The frustrations that drove the company to try to change and innovate get banished. The falsely safe and loving culture is preserved but the company slowly strangles itself with a lack of new ideas and an inability to confront competitors.

When the leader is willing to embrace that which has been banished — to embrace without fear the potential of failure, for example — then a company is able to free itself from the false safety of conflict avoidance and change and grow.

So, as you enter this week consider what baggage you might need to unpack.

Consider how leaving that baggage packed will impact the people who need you most.

Then unshoulder that pack.

Unzip the main compartment, or maybe start with a small side compartment.

Look in there, and pull something out, examine it, and ask what story you’re telling yourself about what you find.

Start unpacking.

Photo by Lauren Fleischmann on Unsplash

Everybody has baggage — is it time to unpack? was originally published in It's Your Turn on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

by Batch Batchelder via It's Your Turn - Medium #itsyourturn #altMBA #SethGodin #quotes #inspiration #stories #change #transformation #writers #writing #self #shipping #personaldevelopment #growth #education #marketing #entrepreneurship #leadership #personaldev #wellness #medium #blogging #quoteoftheday #inspirationoftheday

#ItsYourTurn #It's Your Turn #IYT #altMBA #Seth Godin #Inspiration #Stories #Change #Transformation #Blog #Medi