#they’re a focused heroic group now

[sciralta]

Can someone edit Mal’s long hair onto his new look I wanna see if he looks better in it with short or long hair

#for the record I actually like everyone’s new look except Nia’s cause it give the vibe like #they’re a focused heroic group now #like they know what the job is and they’re going to get it done #like yeah I would change a couple things but I do like them overall and I think it’s a cool direction #playchoices #choices #blades of light and shadow #choices blades

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

It was a mundane, unanimously supported bill on liquor taxation that saw state Sen. Machaela Cavanaugh take to the mic on the Nebraska Legislature floor last week. She offered her support, then spent the next three days discussing everything but the bill, including her favorite Girl Scout cookies, Omaha’s best doughnuts and the plot of the animated movie “Madagascar.”

She also spent that time railing against an unrelated bill that would outlaw gender-affirming therapies for those 18 and younger. It was the advancement of that bill out of committee that led Cavanaugh to promise three weeks ago to filibuster every bill that comes before the Legislature this year — even the ones she supports.

“If this Legislature collectively decides that legislating hate against children is our priority, then I am going to make it painful — painful for everyone,” the Omaha married mother of three said. “I will burn the session to the ground over this bill.”

True to her word, Cavanaugh has slowed the business of passing laws to a crawl by introducing amendment after amendment to every bill that makes it to the state Senate floor and taking up all eight debate hours allowed by the rules — even during the week she was suffering from strep throat. Wednesday marks the halfway point of this year’s 90-day session, and not a single bill will have passed thanks to Cavanaugh’s relentless filibustering.

Clerk of the Legislature Brandon Metzler said a delay like this has happened only a couple of times in the past 10 years.

“But what is really uncommon is the lack of bills that have advanced,” Metzler said. “Usually, we’re a lot further along the line than we’re seeing now.”

In fact, only 26 bills have advanced from the first of three rounds of debate required to pass a bill in Nebraska. There would normally be two to three times that number by mid-March, Metzler said. In the last three weeks since Cavanaugh began her bill blockade, only three bills have advanced.

The Nebraska bill and another that would ban trans people from using bathrooms and locker rooms or playing on sports teams that don’t align with the gender listed on their birth certificates are among roughly 150 bills targeting transgender people that have been introduced in state legislatures this year. Bans on gender-affirming care for minors have already been enacted this year in some Republican-led states, including South Dakota and Utah, and Republican Governors in Tennessee and Mississippi are expected to sign similar bans into law. And Arkansas and Alabama have bans that were temporarily blocked by federal judges.

Cavanaugh’s effort has drawn the gratitude of the LGBTQ community, said Abbi Swatsworth, executive director of LGBTQ advocacy group OutNebraska. The organization has been encouraging members and others to inundate state lawmakers with calls and emails to support Cavanaugh’s effort and oppose bills targeting transgender people.

“We really see it as a heroic effort,” Swatsworth said of the filibuster. “It is extremely meaningful when an ally does more than pay lip service to allyship. She really is leading this charge.”

Both Cavanaugh and the conservative Omaha lawmaker who introduced the trans bill, state Sen. Kathleen Kauth, said they’re seeking to protect children. Cavanaugh cited a 2021 survey by The Trevor Project, a nonprofit focused on suicide prevention efforts among LGBTQ youth, that found that 58% of transgender and nonbinary youth in Nebraska seriously considered suicide in the previous year, and more than 1 in 5 reported that they had attempted it.

“This is a bill that attacks trans children,” Cavanaugh said. “It is legislating hate. It is legislating meanness. The children of Nebraska deserve to have somebody stand up and fight for them.”

Kauth said she’s trying to protect children from undertaking gender-affirming treatments that they might later regret as adults. She has characterized treatments such as hormone therapy and gender reassignment surgery as medically unproven and potentially dangerous in the long term — although the American Medical Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics and the American Psychiatric Association all support gender-affirming care for youths.

Cavanaugh and other lawmakers who support her filibuster effort “don’t want to acknowledge the support I have for this bill,” Kauth said.

“We should be allowed to debate this,” she said. “What this is doing is taking the ball and going home.”

Nebraska’s unique single-chamber Legislature is officially nonpartisan, but it is dominated by members who are registered Republicans. Although bills can win approval with a simple majority in the 49-seat body, it takes 33 votes to overcome a filibuster. The Legislature is currently made up of 32 registered Republicans and 17 registered Democrats, but the slim margin means that the defection of a single Democrat could allow Republicans to pass whatever laws they want.

Democrats have had some success in using filibusters, which burn valuable time from the session, delay votes on other issues and force lawmakers to work longer days. Last year, conservative lawmakers were unable to overcome Democratic filibusters to pass an abortion ban or a law that would have allowed people to carry concealed guns without a permit.

Cavanaugh said she has taken a page from the playbook of Ernie Chambers — a left-leaning former legislator from Omaha who was the longest-serving lawmaker in state history. He mastered the use of the filibuster to try to tank bills he opposed and force support for bills he backed.

“But I’m not aware of anyone carrying out a filibuster to this extent,” Cavanaugh said. “I know it’s frustrating. It’s frustrating for me. But there is a way to put an end to — just put a stop to this hateful bill.”

Chambers praised Cavanaugh’s “perseverance, gumption and stamina to fight as hard as she can using the rules” to stand up for the marginalized, adding, “I would be right there fighting with her if I were still there.”

Speaker John Arch has taken steps to try to speed the process, such as sometimes scheduling the Legislature to work through lunch to tick off another hour on the debate clock. And he noted that the Legislature will soon be moving to all-day debate once committee hearings on bills come to an end later this month.

But even with frustration growing over the hobbled process, the Republican speaker defended Cavanaugh’s use of the filibuster.

“The rules allow her to do this, and those rules are there to protect the voice of the minority,” Arch said. “We may find that we’re passing fewer bills, but the bills we do pass will be bigger bills we care about.”

Chambers said this is a sign that Cavanaugh’s efforts are working. Typically, the Speaker will step in and seek to postpone the bill causing the delay to allow more pressing legislation such as tax cuts or budget items to move forward.

“I think you’re going to start to see some of that happen,” Chambers said. “I think if (Cavanaugh) has the physical stamina, she can do it. I don’t think she shoots blanks.”

#us politics #news #nbc news #nebraska #Machaela Cavanaugh #filibuster #trans healthcare ban #trans healthcare #trans rights #transgender #lgbtqia+ rights #lgbtqia+ #lgbtqia+ representation #Nebraska Legislature #2023 #Brandon Metzler #Abbi Swatsworth #OutNebraska #Kathleen Kauth #hormone therapy #gender reassignment surgery #Ernie Chambers #John Arch

[quibbs126]

So I was thinking of another swap au thing where the villains are good and vice versa for Cookie Run, like I did before with Dark Cacao and Dark Choco and the Licorice Sea, since while I like that one, I admit the scope of “swapping” is very limited, since for all intents and purposes, the two were the same as their originals, just something happened to Dark Cacao. And I suppose that Dark Enchantress and her group were more benevolent. (Although now that I think back, I think I may have intended it to be this was one difference in this world and not the only one, but whatever)

But anyways yeah, I had another idea this morning and I wanted to share

Okay, so basically here, I’m focusing on the Ancients and their Soul Jams, as the big difference here is that the Soul Jams Are corrupting the Ancients. But also like, they don’t know it’s corrupting them. Like, when they first started out on their journeys together, they were still largely the same as the originals, but after finding the Soul Jams, they became corrupted over time by them, each vying for the other Soul Jams and for more power, while also becoming crueler and their negative traits being increasingly amplified. They eventually started waging all out war on each other’s kingdoms, not resting until they had the other Soul Jams, leading Earthbread into chaos

White Lily didn’t have a kingdom and she largely stayed out of the conflict as an opposing force (rather planning on taking them from the others when the dust settles and they’re all weakened), but still continued her experiments with Cookies and learning the purpose of their creation. She still goes to the Witch’s Banquet and gets rebaked, but here, her rebaking disconnects her from her Soul Jam, freeing her mind from its influence. Afterwards, she realizes that she and her old friends were basically being manipulated by the gems, and her quest to obtain their Soul Jams is now about destroying them and ridding the other Ancients of their influence, in hopes of possibly saving them. The Dark Flour War is more her intervening in the conflict to stop them all.

Unfortunately, her efforts are only partially successful. She was able to shatter the Soul Jams and keep them out of the Ancients’ hands, and her efforts led to relative peace in Earthbread, as the others were also weakened without them and couldn’t continue their wars, but they were still under the influence of the Soul Jams (though perhaps lessened somewhat), and it’d only be a matter of time until they’re reassembled once more, and now she was imprisoned and unable to do anything outside of trying to guide her followers, both in their attempts to better Earthbread and to free her

Dark Enchantress probably isn’t called “Dark Enchantress”, given her new heroic role, but I haven’t figured out what other than “Light Enchantress”, but I feel like that sounds kind of silly

I feel like this swap has the potential to massively change other characters, considering the fact that the main characters in question have long lasting impacts on the rest of Earthbread, but I haven’t exactly figured out how other characters are changed in this au, only White Lily/Dark Enchantress

I’m also not sure how the kids of the Ancients would be different, since while their parents are horrible versions of themselves, I’m not sure if they’d be like, cruel parents now or something, or how their different influences might change them growing up. Like, maybe some follow in their parent’s footsteps, but others see it as wrong and rebel, I’m just not really sure

The only thing I really have is that I imagine Pure Vanilla to be a straight up “holier than thou” sort of character, where he still acts like a benevolent, saintly ruler, but he’s incredibly hypocritical and looks down on pretty much everyone, most of all his former friends, seeing himself as above all their petty conflicts, despite also waging war on them

Edit: oh wait, another idea, this time for Pomegranate Cookie. So basically she was the priestess for the Pomegranate Village, but instead of turning to darkness and destroying her village, since Dark Enchantress is more a benevolent force here, she simply left the village to join her side so that they might be able to save Earthbread. The high priestess we meet in game is just the person put as her replacement for the time being since she’s out helping the Enchantress. And also they don’t hate her because of this, since there’s not much to really hate

But yeah, hope you think this sounds interesting to you, I thought it was a neat idea

#cookie run #cookie run kingdom #cookie run au #what do I call this? #corrupted soul jam au #let’s call it that #white lily cookie #dark enchantress cookie #ancient cookies #pure vanilla cookie #dark cacao cookie #hollyberry cookie #golden cheese cookie #my au

[dokidokitsuna]

Team STRQ//Neverfell Edition

It’s been a while since I had an idea for some fun RWBY art~ (warning: loooong post ahead)

For the longest time I never really cared about Team STRQ-- I think that’s the gamble you take when you keep bringing up a group of characters as if they’re relevant, but never saying anything of substance about them. Some of your audience will latch onto them anyway, but others will simply lose interest after a while. I was in the latter group. :/

Until the other day, when I started thinking about what their history would be like in the context of NeverFell. Considering how little information we have to work with, it’s certainly an interesting puzzle…and as you know, I love to solve character puzzles. ^^

What made these ideas fun for me was how cliche’d most of them were: for some reason, the first things that came to mind when I considered what a young Team STRQ would be like were the absolute most basic romantic-dramedy junk. ^^ And figuring out how I would use each ‘icky’ idea in an interesting way solidified my interest, at least enough to get me to write all this.

Idea #1: A Raven-Tai-Summer love triangle~ As in, Taiyang is in love with Raven, and Summer is in (currently unrequited…) love with Tai. And it’d be like, in every ‘episode’ of this hypothetical series, you’d see Summer staring at him from behind a corner like “if only he’d notice me” or “why doesn’t he look at me that way…” XD Even though she’s the team leader… This one is so corny I have to keep it~

Idea #2: Qrow is the socially awkward somewhat-comedic 4th wheel EXCEPT, I don’t like Qrow being ‘left out’-- that’s just lazy writing. Focusing only on ‘romantic antics’ and ignoring any character interactions that don’t contribute to them…we get enough of that in the show proper, tbh. Like, I’m definitely getting the feeling that the writers think platonic relationships write themselves (spoiler alert: they don’t). I do like the idea of him being awkward and moody as a teen, though, especially considering his semblance. It’d be fun to write him adjusting to city life and coming out of his shell, to become the cynical-cool personality we know and love today.

Idea #3: Qrow is secretly in love with Summer REEEEJECTED! …I don’t have anything against this idea, I just don’t wanna do it. :T Instead, I prefer for them to form a really deep friendship that would probably be at the center of the series. For one thing, so much of Ruby, Summer’s daughter, is derived from Qrow. She fights like him, she idolizes him; she even wears matching cross accessories. And I think it would be cool to preface that present-day relationship with a past relationship that ‘lays the foundation’ for it, so to speak. To show that maybe Qrow is so close with Ruby because he was close with Summer in a lot of the same ways. Secondly, I think Summer could be a huge force for change in Qrow’s character. There’s so much a heroic idealist like herself could bring into the life of someone who was literally sent to school to learn how to murder people better. I don’t know what’s considered the canon driving force behind Qrow’s character development (probably Ozpin’s manipulation…) but I choose That Girl™!

Idea #4: Speaking of Ozpin…he’s 1000x worse now Let’s take a break from STRQ to address my favorite “morally gray” wizard, who at this point in the AU is well into the darker shades of moral grayness. ^^

So I don’t know if I explained this, but in NeverFell Ozpin/Ozma himself is a shapeshifter. He doesn’t reincarnate; whenever he needs to start a new life he just runs away, puts on a new face, and works his way back up the food chain until he’s powerful enough to start a new Inner Circle. During Team STRQ’s time at Beacon, he’s only very recently gotten back to that point by becoming the headmaster, and he’s just DYING to try out some new schemes and start stringing up his next set of puppets. ^^ Which makes him tend less towards ‘quiet lies of omission’ and more towards ‘full-scale gaslighting’.

In a hypothetical story, I would like to show this version of Oz being a sort of ‘dark mentor’ to Team STRQ, giving them guidance and encouraging them to bond as a team, but also preying on their insecurities to keep them loyal, and molding the group dynamic to suit his purposes. For example: rather than Raven singlehandedly forcing STRQ to split up because she’s just so evil and irredeemable, I think it’s more believable that Ozpin, sensing that she was losing faith in the cause and might influence the others, manipulated the other three into distrusting her, until she felt isolated enough to just give up, save herself, and leave.

Idea #5: Tsundere Raven Rather than rejecting this idea, I decided to reinterpret it. ^^ I think it’s okay for teen Raven to be a little unstable and mood-swingy, not because ‘she’s hiding her feewings’, but because she doesn’t understand her feelings and no one is teaching her how to handle them. So she relies on the only outlet she’s ever known: violence and cruelty.

Tai likes her, but she’s never really been ‘liked’ before and isn’t sure how to respond? Mock him, push him back, threaten him for being ‘mushy’. Maybe when they become closer, she’ll use more subtle methods like changing the subject or being sarcastic.

Qrow is thinking seriously about becoming a huntsman, increasingly filling her with doubts about the path that led them to Beacon? Shame him, accuse him of being disloyal, tell him he’d never succeed anyway. This would probably start the rift between the twins that continues to the present day.

Summer calls her out on her behavior, making her fear that her strongest beliefs might actually be wrong? Scoff at her, ridicule her ideas, call her naive and unrealistic. These two would probably get into a lot of arguments. ^^;

I don’t mean to paint Raven as a monstrous brat who drags down the team; I think in order for STRQ to function she would have to find a more stable place in it at some point (and she’s smart enough to understand that). But even after that point, when she occasionally does act out, ^this would be the rationale.

Idea #6: Summer and Tai were ‘always meant to be’! Now, this idea I think would be fun to subvert. We could start by dropping the usual hints all over the series, like: occasionally Summer and Tai have a special moment between just the two of them, to put some doubts in Tai’s head before he inevitably goes back to Raven. And it’d be like, ‘oooh yeah; these two are the real OTP, and eventually fate will bring them together, just you wait’! …And then when they finally do get together, it’ll turn out that reality isn’t that simple. ^^;

I’m no expert on romantic relationships, but I can’t help feeling something’s fishy about how fast Tai just switches over to Summer after Raven leaves. Apparently her leaving was supposed to be a huge deal that devastates the friend group, shaking everyone up, and yet in just two years a new baby is born to Tai and his new wife?? I mean, two years (more like one year, if we subtract the necessary 9 months) isn’t exactly a short time…but it’s not a long time either. :/ Given what we know of Raven’s personality, I can’t see a romance with her being anything but a slow-burn, uphill climb to gain her trust…and yet, he apparently gets over her relatively quickly.

We could assume Raven was just that awful, having a baby made a strained relationship even worse, and by the time Yang was born they were both sick of each other…but I wouldn’t recommend jumping into a new relationship immediately after that, either. Sounds like an easy way to saddle a new partner with old pain that you haven’t completely worked through yet…or for said new partner to unrealistically see themselves as the ‘answer’ to a difficult situation.

With all that said, I think Summer might feel a little…disillusioned, in the end. Like, maybe she spent so long dreaming of being with her crush she didn’t consider how many years have passed since they first met, and how different they are now. Maybe she tries so hard to be ‘Super-Mom’ to help herself feel like she belongs with Tai and his daughter, and maybe she goes on more and more dangerous missions to distract herself from her doubts. If she can be the big hero that her family reveres and loves, then that’ll be enough, won’t it? If she can fill the space that Raven left behind, make her daughters proud, save the world from the forces of evil, heal all the pain and fix all the problems…then maybe she’ll finally convince herself that this really is the ‘happy ending’ she always wanted.

Unfortunately, I think she will die still searching for that closure.

#ugh what a sad ending #why do i always write depressing things #i'm actually a very cheerful person i swear #rwby #neverfell #Summer Rose #qrow branwen #raven branwen #taiyang xiao long #professor ozpin

[changeling-rin]

Okay a version of this has probably been asked before BUT-

In the Link Masterpost, you mentioned this about Rune:

He’s quiet to the point of almost being forgettable, which is a side effect of a) spending nearly all his time in the wilderness alone with nobody to talk to, and b) having to constantly be on the alert for Guardians because nothing alerts a Guardian like a loud hylian.

Which. Yeah. That checks out. It makes sense

But how does this impact his first meeting with the Chain, seeing as they’re 17(ish) people with no sense of calm and the definition of quiet is nowhere in sight

In particular, how panicked does he get upon meeting Lore, whose go to response in dangerous situations usually has to do with shouting at enemies and trying to distract them which Lore they’re mechanical spiders they’re not gonna listen to you - Lore get BACK HERE THAT WASN’T A CHALLENGE-

Well, we're assuming that Rune is a 'dangerous situation', which I'm inclined to think he's not. Most of the time.

Remember, at this point the Chain is 18+ Links strong, and the automatic response to seeing a vaguely blond and heroic teenage boy now is to go 'fellow Link???' like an excited puppy meeting new people. If anything, Rune's first response is going to be 'overstimulation via loud and happy group hug'.

He'll be up in this tree for roughly twenty minutes or so? And then he'll come back down and try again. They're not dangerous to him, he can tell, they're just... uh, very enthusiastic.

On Lore and the Guardians though: Rune is very much okay with this, because a Guardian focused on the loudest and most noticeable target is a Guardian not paying attention to him, coming around back, with an Ancient Arrow nocked and ready. Wow this kid is good at being loud

#Changeling Answers #DL Questions #balladoftime #Rune #Lore #Rune's overstimulation is the kind where everything is just Too Loud #Treetops are quiet and peaceful

[ziracona]

New chapter! Kotarou finally. As per the norm, Tumblr gets it first, but less proofed u know glass half empty, glass half full, but I like to think of it as a nice positive 70-30 split myself.

[Fate/GO AU – The Kid (pt: 1, … 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, ?)] {Some spoilers for original Grand Order run/through Temple of Time}

.

“Alright,” says Doctor Archaman, sliding his hand along the blueprint to flatten it, “Here’s what we’ve got. Now. This is going to be partial—bare bones. Mages are always secretive about their work, so any blueprints beyond the original, observable skeleton from the outside, are going to end up being practically worthless in a corporation like Mercury.”

“Well,” observes Robin Hood, leaning a forearm across the top of a chair and leaning forward over it to see better, “Least it’s smaller than Ur-shanabi.”

“Smaller, yes,” agrees the doctor, glancing at him, “But on high alert, and less predictable. We should move fast, to have our best chance. My guess? Word will be inescapably out that Ur-shanabi was hit, but they’ll be trying to cover how bad the losses are, so there’s a good chance they don’t know the cause was someone freeing the heroic spirits yet. It’s only a matter of time before they get alerted by someone that their own might be at threat, and any time a mage facility in your vicinity is attacked by an unknown source, everyone else goes into lockdown. Speed is our best bet. The quicker we mobilize, the better our chances they’re not prepared for us yet.”

“But, you said we have no idea what they want—I-I mean, what they’re doing, as a company?” pipes up Ritsuka, looking up from her water bottle.

“No,” agrees the doctor, “They’re extremely secretive. But, I can make a few guesses. Just, take them with a grain of salt.”

“Only way I take anything,” says Robin with a smile, and Billy the Kid grins at him.

I’m still not sure what the hell to make of this doctor. Except that he’s highly goddamn suspicious. What honestly throws me off the most is David. He knows something, but he’s not telling the rest of us. At least now Robin’s back to keep an eye out too. This whole situation is exhausting, but I guess it’s turned out surprisingly well so far, all things considered. Which makes me antsy. Things usually don’t go this well, not for anyone. Not for this long.

“Well,” says the doctor slowly, glancing at the group and getting a Go on gesture from David, “Each mage organization tends to have its own focus. Of course they’re all after knowledge and power, in some forms, but you have lineages who focus on combining modernization with magecraft, you have ones focusing on creating familiars, or magecraft through specific genetic modifications, ones interested in research into lost arts, ones trying to find The Root. Defense, offence. Places like Atlas cut off from the rest of the world entirely. Of the organizations in the immediate area,” he takes Ritsuka’s little whiteboard and wipes it clean with an arm, then starts to draw, “we have Ur-shanabi, Mercury, and several families of note. Mercury had much less interest in Ur-shanabi’s research, than gaining a power source, so we at least know they’re not gunning for the same sort of development—unsurprising, as I know they only contacted Chaldea because they knew we were taking a …different approach, to any work with spirits. I think they tried to cut true rivals out entirely.”

“Our director,” he continues, making a note on his little chart, “Animusphere, has had little to do with Mercury, which means they don’t seem to be a threat to our work, and that they don’t have research we need right now. Since Chaldea is focused on research, defense, and observation as areas of study, and Mercury had little interest in Ur-shanabi aside from acquiring a power source, my guess would be they’re developing offensive technology, probably in areas they know would provoke action from the Mage’s Association if it came to light. They also chose Fuuma Kotarou, as the spirit they purchased. There are some options like safety to consider, like uhm—obviously I would never participate in that kind of behavior anyway,” he says nervously, glancing at Cu Chulainn, “But in a hypothetical scenario where I did, I would not have chosen him, because I don’t care what the setup is—the odds of him breaking out and killing everyone would be too high.”

Lancer looks extremely pleased with himself. I can’t exactly say Doctor Archaman is wrong, though. Idiotic to have a spirit like him imprisoned in the first place. They were asking to get ripped to shreds. That would be like expecting long-term containment of a living atom bomb to go well.

“That said though, he’s not the only choice. I don’t mean to be…” he gives up on whatever he’s trying to say politely, makes a hopeless gesture, and just while looking sorry adds, “It’s worth noting that while David, Salieri, and Cu Chulainn would have all been risky choices, they came when Billy the Kid was still in confinement, and he, Robin Hood, and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart would all have been levels similar to Fuuma Kotarou’s as far as their likelihood of escape. And they still took the assassin.”

Salieri does not seem to appreciate the second comment, even though it’s not about him, while Mozart has little reaction aside from looking like he wishes he wasn’t remembering whatever he’s remembering, Billy looks angered in a quiet way, but not towards the doctor, and Robin has no discernable reaction, but he’s listening intently. God I hate that he keeps doing what I know I would do. I guess it’s a mercy he doesn’t seem to remember me though. It would only fuel bad blood now, and we don’t need that. Still, it’s not exactly bad to have him on the team. As annoying as seeing similarities in someone else can be, they’re useful too, especially under pressure.

“This is based off of one single interaction I had with their staff when they were in Ur-shanabi,” continues the doctor, “but my guess is they chose him out of that list based solely on the visual design of the trap.”

“The visual design?” echoes Ritsuka.

“Yes,” says the doctor, somber, “Out of all three, I think, without going into detail, it would appeal the most to someone with a…military mindset. It was…formal, clean, and absolute. And…cruel.”

“So, if you’re right, we can except heavy resistance,” says David.

“Yes, although I expect in the form of more modernized weapons. Less creativity, and I’d be surprised if they had someone with abilities like Toujou’s on their staff. I’m…sorry, that I don’t have more to go on,” he adds.

Hm.

“Look,” I say, stepping forward from my spot against the wall, and the others turn, “Don’t get me wrong; I appreciate that you’ve reliably done several things to help us at this point, but if we’re going to go into an incredibly fortified mage stronghold, depending on you for information, then before we go on, we should clarify something. So.” I look at David. “Explain. We’ve gone on faith long enough. You know him. You have some reason for thinking he’s trustworthy, clearly, and you have since the moment we saw him in Ur-shanabi. What is it?”

The doctor looks a little taken aback, but David almost looks enthusiastic about the question.

“Oh, have I not said?” he asks innocently, all charisma, moving up to the doctor and clapping an arm forcefully around his shoulder while the man grimaces and then gives him a nervous look.

No. You haven’t, I think, crossing my arms and tilting my head, waiting to hear it.

“I knew him! Before. I know his father very well—I fought for him in a ritual. Very wonderful, dependable man,” says David carelessly, exceedingly pleased, “talented too! I would have explained sooner,” he adds apologetically to Ritsuka, “but I was not sure at first—only that he was familiar. He was quite a bit younger when I saw him last. And he’s changed his name. I didn’t figure everything out until we were heading back from the vault.”

“R-Right,” says Doctor Archaman, looking anxiously from David, to Ritsuka, “it was a long time ago for me too. I wasn’t sure he’d recognize me—spirits don’t always keep their memories after a summons, and if I’d tried, and he hadn’t, it would have made things even worse looking for my trustworthiness.”

A plausible explanation, although while it explains David’s attitude towards the doctor earlier perfectly, it hardly explains Archaman’s towards him. If he’d really been hoping David would recognize him on his own, why was he working overtime to do anything but make eye contact when we ran into him in the lab?

“That’s enough to make you sure?” asks Salieri, following his own logic path, tone hard to read.

“Oh yes,” says David carelessly, letting go of the doctor and waving the concern aside, “You would not understand since you were not there, but I have complete faith in him. It was a bit of a complicated relationship, his father and me, and the time I spent with him, but I can say I am very certain. And haven’t I been right so far?”

Well. That’s true anyway. I still don’t think this is the whole truth, but I don’t think all of that is a lie either. The best lies are always partial truths, and that’s how this feels to me for sure. Well. It’s better than nothing. What kind of relationship with a mage did you have to feel that positively about their kids though? If you saw one after- … …I guess I really shouldn’t talk. Sure, it’s rare enough, but. I can think of more than two mages I myself would probably put a little faith in the children of… Out of some kind of pathetic nostalgia, if nothing else…

I sigh.

I guess it’s enough for now…

Still suspicious, though. All of it. But I get the impression whatever isn’t true, David is very sure of this man, and David seems…maybe not the most reliable man on the planet, but hardly the kind of person who would backstab his master. So I can work with that, for now. There’s always the chance he’s deceived though, I add mentally, eyeing the doctor again.

I just don’t get it. If he gave me some kind of bad feeling, I’d feel a lot safer around him, but he doesn’t. I don’t like feeling like I can’t read someone at all. I guess that’s not exactly how I feel about the doctor, but feeling like the read I get can’t possibly be accurate equates to about the same. Who are you? Why are you like this? And is it genuine, or is this some big act?

He returns my glance a little nervously, which seems to be his default state, but again, it’s not the kind of anxiety that would usually make me suspicious. It’s less…’I don’t want to get caught’ anxiety, and more ‘I’m out of my depth’ social anxiety. The guy gives me a weak, hopeful smile, and it’s unnerving how sincere that reads to me.

Shit, maybe I’m wrong. Maybe we’ve just stumbled onto two of the strangest, and nicest currently living members of the mage world. The odds for that have to be almost impossible though, and in 24 hours?

Mozart breaks the silence, asking something about if we should get back to strategy now that that’s all cleared, but I miss the details because for a second I’m hung up on what I just thought. Best currently living mages? Shit, it’s what, 2015? She’s twenty-eight right now. I’m out there somewhere, traveling I think. December?

…I can’t remember. …anymore.

…Fuck!

It isn’t fair. I’ve tried so hard, to hold onto the things most important to me, and it doesn’t matter. The throne takes what it wants. So much is just burned away.

Nothing though? Nothing at all?

Two-Thousand-Fifteen… We. …

I don’t know.

I don’t. It’s gone, now. All of it.

God, that hurts. More than anything I’ve thought about in a while. I fucking hate being summoned to the time I was alive. I always think about it more, at least once or twice, and it feels like this. I bet if I saw her, she’d try to get me to stick around, as horrible as that would be for the me now, and the me I am. What’s worse is she could probably find some terrible way to make that work out.

I smile to myself, even though it hurts. Thinking about that last goodbye on a hilltop. Things that never happened, and the few things I can remember that did.

Are those even my proper memories? It’s hard to know anymore. They weren’t originally, but they are now. Maybe that’s why I’m not allowed to remember them as well, even if they’re my favorites. Part of me still wishes to god I’d killed him. But, I don’t mean that. Not all the way, not anymore.

!

I remember. I remember. One thing, from the end of this year. October…fuck. I can’t even remember what day it was anymore. His birthday. It had been in late October, I know that. She’d taken him…they were overseas, and she’d taken him to a market. They’d had things to do, but she’d done what she always did, and bullied him out of the house, all smiles and unstoppable like a force of nature. The market had been huge, and beautiful, and confusing. And she’d taken him to buy things to cook with, kept asking him…questions, that was right. About what foods were that she didn’t recognize, and what spices were good with what, what different dishes were like, and how they were made. I smile. It hurts.

I don’t even know if you really didn’t know any of the things you asked me about, or if you just wanted to keep me talking about something I loved. Probably a bit of both. It must have been so boring, hearing about spices and ways to use roots, for hours. But he’d been so happy, and he hadn’t even noticed until part way into the afternoon what she’d been doing at all.

Thank you, I think to the slight possibility there’s something out there that shows occasional pity towards me at all. Maybe it’s her, exerting her influence over the universe again, just like old times. For letting me remember something.

Fuck—I’m not paying attention at all!

Struggling to refocus, I turn my attention back to the table, listening.

“Well,” Mozart is saying in response to something I completely missed, “I’m all rested up now and feeling very ready, but what about the rest of you? Miss Fujimaru? You just underwent an operation, right? Are you sure you’re ready to go right back out there? You must be exhausted.”

An unexpectedly fair point from the caster. Especially with the emotional toll from earlier tacked on to everything else? Yeah, the kid’s got to be wiped out.

“I’m okay,” says Ritsuka as convincingly as she can.

“I highly doubt that,” I say, uncrossing my arms to gesture, “You’ve done a frankly dangerous amount of physical exertion already. If we want to be smart about this, we should combine being quick with being practical. Eat a little more, then get at least two hours of sleep. Being rash can get people killed just as easily as hesitating can.”

“He’s got a point,” says Billy, giving Ritsuka a concerned glance, “You ain’t had real rest all night, and you were so tired after rescuing me that you were passed out on the floor. Been through some battle, multiple contracts, and two magic operations since then. Least a little shut-eye seems needed.”

“But. Won’t we run out of time for Fuuma Kotarou?” she asks the doctor worriedly.

He gives her a kind smile and shakes his head. “We shouldn’t wait too long, but a little time to regroup is probably wise. Most of the spirits could probably use it too—certainly Cu Chulainn can.”

I don’t think Lancer enjoys being singled out as in need of R&R, from the look on his face, but I don’t think the doctor is wrong. Healed or not, I doubt even whatever magic the guy was able to pull off is the kind that just lets somebody bounce right back from a spirit core that was about to crack in two.

“Well,” says Ritsuka, looking us all over.

“It’s wise,” I agree, “We could all use a brief rest.”

Salieri seems like his mind is on something else, but he gives a distracted nod of agreement, and Robin gives a more tuned-in one.

“Same for you, Doctor,” says David, clapping a hand on his arm, “I know you’ve had some, but you were nearly dead a few hours ago, and you humans don’t heal the same way we do. Even with the magic I used, you’re going to be exhausted and a little sore—besides, you performed some heavy magic just now yourself.”

“Well, I’m not exactly going to be boots on the ground, but, point taken,” admits the doctor in the manner of someone mostly admitting defeat because they see their opponent is going to crush them if they try and fight it.

“Someone should keep watch,” says Robin Hood, “Obviously. I’m up for it, if the rest of you need some down time. I took the battle pretty well, comparatively.”

“No, I’ll do it,” says Mozart, standing up and stretching, “I already got my sleep, and besides, it’s usually up to the caster to acquire territory and set up defenses, yes? I should get something in place before we leave the doctor here on his own.”

Again, surprised pretty intensely by the level of capability and pragmatism I’m getting from Mozart. He seem—acts—like one of the most carefree and irresponsible spirits I’ve ever met, but I guess he’s not stupid.

“Have you had time to recover yourself?” asks Salieri unwillingly.

“Of course! Did you think I was napping for fun? I can strategize too,” says Mozart proudly, “Go on. I can handle guard duty.”

That I don’t buy—I believe he’s smart enough to suggest this, but no way he’s someone acting with that amount of forethought. Still, I’ll take what I can get.

“Fine. We should all be trying to conserve our magical energy best we can, anyway. Even if she’s got a vast supply, for a mage, she’s already supporting what—seven spirits? Alone?” I say.

“And looking to add an eighth,” chimes in Robin Hood.

“Well, I’m doing pretty okay now, but I guess that’s a good point,” says Ritsuka, standing up, “I’ll put together some more food while Dr. Romani keeps going over strategy, and we can all eat to help you replenish your magical energy too.”

There’s something painfully familiar about that. This little redhead getting up to hurry off to the kitchen to make a meal before battle like it’s the most natural choice in the world. Like looking into an old mirror, and I don’t like it, but at least for once I don’t feel anger. Just sadness.

She isn’t you, I tell myself, It won’t be the same.

“Are you hungry?” she asks the doctor, sticking her head back out from the little kitchenette.

“Oh, uh,” he starts, surprised.

“—Yes!” answers David for him without hesitation, “Thank you!”

The doctor gives him some kind of a look, but just accepts that. I swear, there’s something almost recognizable about their behavior. I guess at least it’s not giving me warning bells.

“Uhm,” comes Ritsuka’s voice from the kitchen, “I know some of you already had the curry, but there’s more if you’re hungry, and I have a lot of snacks! I’ve got chips, and pocky, and some chocolates, if you want something sweet.”

Billy the Kid’s eyes light up with excitement.

“I’ll take whatever you got,” says Lancer with a careless shrug and a grin.

As she gets things together, Doctor Archaman continues his strategy breakdown. There’s not a lot to go on, but he seems pretty sure from the layout that they’re keeping the most important things in the operation about dead-center in the building—most reinforced walls there, and it looks like the best point of entry for us will be from the roof. Shame we’re breaking in to get an assassin, instead of bringing one with us, because getting into places unseen is what they excel at. Can’t be helped, I guess.

After a minute of listening to discussion between the others about how well trained to expect personnel to be, I get up and walk over to the kitchen and glance in.

This poor kid. She’s got a whole row of plates on the tiny counter-top, balanced precariously, doing her best to keep a big pan of curry from burning, while checking ingredients and throwing together what else she can. Guess she was really planning to only be entertaining Billy, and while she over-planned for that, her supplies are looking stretched pretty thin.

“Need a hand?” I ask almost under my breath so the others won’t hear.

She looks up at me in surprise—guess she didn’t hear me coming, and then looks embarrassed, kind of downcast. “I-I guess so…I’m. Not so good at this, huh?”

I smile and move into the small space. “I wouldn’t say that. Looks like you’ve already made the best choice you can with your supplies. You’re running low on powder, it looks like though. I can improvise something with the spices you’ve got.”

“Really? But I have so few,” she says in surprise, moving to give me some room.

I smile to myself, remembering things I haven’t thought of in…years. Things that seem like somebody else’s life. “Not the first time I’ve had to improvise, and you’ve got a lot of onions—that’ll help.” Actually, that’s a shit-ton of onions. Why the hell did she get so many??

Whatever.

“Okay,” she says, almost excited now, “What can I do to help?”

“Just give me a full count of what you’ve got left in the way of meat and vegetables, to start,” I say.

As she counts off potatoes and carrots, I tune back in to the strategy session. Huh. It’s a pretty large amount of soldiers expected, and if they really are a military organization of some kind…

“What about a feint?” asks Robin Hood.

That’s just what I was about to say.

“That could work,” chimes in Billy the Kid, “We have a main group put up a real fight somewhere they’re worried about, and they all come runnin’—meanwhile, one or two of us goes and gets the assassin out.”

“To do that, we’ll have to make them think our objective is something it’s not,” observes Salieri, “But we don’t even know what they’d have to steal.”

“We don’t have to be stealing anything,” says Lancer with conviction, tapping an area on the bare-bones blueprint near the front, “What if we’re just there to destroy them? Mages do that shit—use us to wipe each other off the map. That works on its own.”

“In that case, the frontline should be the spirits they’re least likely to recognize quickly,” says Doctor Archaman, “So not Billy the Kid, Robin Hood, or Mozart.”

“Fine by me,” says Robin Hood with a shrug, “We can take Mmm—Ritsuka, around the long way from the roof. Get the assassin out. Three of us should be more than enough.”

“Mmm, I think I should stay,” says Mozart, “I don’t have the concealment skills an Archer has, and I couldn’t keep up with you two either.”

“Yeah, but you could keep an eye out for traps,” says Billy the Kid.

“I didn’t think about that,” says Mozart.

That is more what I expected from him. Still, seems workable enough for a thrown-together plan.

“I’ve already got the potatoes and the rice done,” says Ritsuka, smiling up at me. She’s sweating and a mess and looks dead-tired, but she looks happy too.

It makes me tired to see her. I really hope the world doesn’t chew her up and spit her back out, but that’s usually what happens to people like this.

“Good,” I say, not showing any of that, because it’s not like it’ll do her any good, and I add my improvised powder to what she had left, and absently summon a blade to slice through some of the extra vegetables.

“Whoa,” she says, “You’re really good at that.”

I guess. Ah, my most useful skill, I think bitterly. Still. Doesn’t exactly feel bad to be doing this again after such a long time.

“How do you do it so neat and so fast?” she asks, trying to push up on the counter to get close enough to see better.

For a beginner? “Here,” I say, passing her a carrot and summoning another chef’s knife for her and passing it over, “Like this.” I hold up my own hand and tilt it, showing the grip. “Take it so you’re holding the back of the knife itself, not the handle, with your thumb and index finger. Better control. If it’s something like a carrot, that will slide around, square it off first-“ I quickly do with my own, removing the edges so it’s blocky, “-Then, off hand grips the thing you’re cutting at an angle, like a claw, so your knuckles are closest to the knife as you slice, not your fingertips. This keeps you from slicing into your hand when you go fast. That, and you don’t really move the tip of the knife off the cutting board. Like this—like—a rocking horse.” Shit, was that really the best metaphor I could come up with? Uhg, no one’s asked me to explain this before. “Tip stays on the board for better control, base is raised above the vegetable to slice in, and after a slice, you move your hand a little closer to your knuckles to get the next slice. This allows you to go quickly with optimal control, and to not take off a finger, because you can’t.”

I demonstrate, letting the back of the knife hit my knuckles as I move it to the side. It’s not raising enough to slice through them, and it’s hitting them and stopping well before it is in reach of my fingertips.

“Give it a go?”

She watches me intently, then cautiously copies the technique—correctly, if a little hesitant, and then, excited by it not blowing up in her face, goes faster, and looks up at me eagerly for approval.

“Not bad,” I say with a nod, trying not to smile.

“Thanks,” she says, “That’s a lot easier.”

“Just don’t miss too much of what they’re saying,” I remind.

She nods, and glances back towards the table for a second, then slices a few more vegetables for me.

“You said you had snacks?” I ask as I work.

Ritsuka nods.

“Go ahead and pass them and some drinks out then, if you want. I can finish this—it’ll give you a chance to rest. I already got some while you were working on getting the crest transferred.”

“Are you sure?” she asks. Man, she looks ready to drop.

“Yes. Here.” I take a bit of the curry I’d thrown together with the vegetables and meat she already had prepared, and add it to one of the plates of waiting rice, “It’ll be a bit before the rest of this is ready, but you can test out the spice mix—see what you think. Then sleep. I know you feel responsible, but you’re keeping all the rest of us up. The most responsible thing you can do is get the proper rest to keep doing that.”

She gives me a very sincere nod, and takes the plate and tries a mouthful of the curry, and her eyes light up. “How?” she says, “It’s even better than the mix was?”

“Trade secret,” I say, indicating the rest of her supplies with my head, “Now go on. I’ll finish up here. Pass things out, make sure there’s nothing you missed about the plan as it stands, then get some sleep.”

Ritsuka nods again and gets an armful of bags, one hand precariously hanging onto her plate, and shoots me a grateful smile. “Thanks, Emiya.”

Still not used to being called that. I wish she’d just stuck with Archer. But I guess it is what it is.

“I’m really glad you were the one who came,” she adds, and then, suddenly embarrassed, hurries off to the rest of the room, where I hear chatter as she passes out snacks. And just for a moment, I don’t mind the sound of it so much.

Only for a moment, though.

I look down at the sizzling food beneath my fingertips, and it’s all too familiar to me. I feel like I’m reliving something terrible, but as an outsider, and for a second I forget to stir. Just look at nothing.

That was strange, I think to myself slowly as I begin to move again. It could have just been me, but I don’t think it was the cooking. I think it was something else in my head, for just a moment there. I felt like I was seeing…

A sky? Why on earth would a night sky make me feel like that? Why do I have a memory of that at all? I’ve never met this girl before.

No, maybe it’s my imagination. I have an old memory of looking up at a sky myself, that made me feel that way. That’s probably all it is. Just. Too much a little too familiar, at once.

Hm, I think with an odd sense of pleasure for an instant, a feeling that’s almost foreign at this point, It’s been a long time I guess, since I cooked for heroic spirits.

Funny it felt so natural to do. I guess old habits die hard.

————————————————-

  I let out a slow breath, turning my head back the way we came from and listening, hand up in a sign of halt for the others in the shadows.

One. Two. Three. Four—

There—in the distance, I hear a thud.

“Okay, let’s move,” I tell the other three mentally, making a motion with my hand.

Billy gives me a nod and falls into step behind me, crouched by the wall, Ritsuka just behind him, Mozart bringing up the rear.

“We should rethink this formation,” I tell Billy mentally as I lift off one of the duct covers and motion the others past me, watching Billy leap in carefully, and then taking Ritsuka as I lower her by the hand. “As much as I’d like you watching my own back, we can’t put Master or the Caster in the back of the group.”

Billy gives a little nod. “You want point, or rear guard?”

I watch Mozart land, and then silently follow suit. Give him a glance. There’s cameras, but I can tell they’re currently deactivated. Emiya sent Salieri to do something he said would give us about four minutes—knocking out the power grid for the whole block. Two, if they’ve got heavy enough backup generators. Which we all expect they do. Still, it’s decent time. Thank god it takes a lot to power something this big. Whatever he did he said should knock out the power with a surge, so it’ll take things longer than normal to reboot, and trigger safety checks in case it was a cyber attack. Still, better hurry.

The place is dark. Eerie. Much wider halls than at Ur-shanabi, I can tell, but somehow it still makes me feel claustrophobic. A very different vibe than that lab was, but it’s not a better one. Least I can safely say Dr. Archaman was right on the money with his military applications guess.

“Rear,” I decide, “We get spotted, they won’t realize I’ve seen them if I stay invisible—might buy us a few seconds. And you’re a quicker draw—point suits you.”

He shoots me a grin, a little nervous, then glances at Mozart too.

Finished his read of the area, the caster glances back at as and mentally says, “There’s no traps near us. A few basic alarm triggers and such, but I should be able to fool them if we don’t go too quick. I can sense several massive concentrations of mana, but there’s only one servant signature.”

“Wait, you can sense him?” asks Ritsuka in surprise, “I thought they’d hide it.”

“I couldn’t pick it up at all from outside,” says Mozart, “But in here, there’s basically no shielding for sensors.”

Over-confident, then. Or criminally inexperienced, and I’m willing to bet it’s the former. Good.

“Let’s move,” I say, giving Billy a nod, and he hurries down the hall going the most in the direction Mozart indicated the servant signature was in, Mozart right behind, and Ritsuka after, me last.

I pop up my hood and vanish as we pick up speed, keeping my eyes open and senses on high alert.

“Just like old times, huh?” says Billy happily inside my head as he checks a corner ahead, then motions us to follow, and we dash.

I smile automatically. “Yeah.” It’s nice, even if I don’t really remember the old times at all, thanks to the throne. I still know this is familiar, and familiar still feels good. “Just missing Geronimo.”

That’s right. I said it without thinking, but of course that’s right. Three of us. There’s supposed—there were—the three of us.

“Yeah,” says Billy, sounding sad and fond at the same time, “Wish the bloodstained warrior could be here too. He’d like Ritsuka a lot, I bet.”

Yeah. Well, who wouldn’t? I sure with every spirit I like could have gotten this kind of summons—it’s practically a vacation compared to what we usually get, even with the constant fighting.

“On the left—one second,” comes Mozart’s voice, cutting off something Billy was starting to say in my head that he couldn’t hear. The halls all look exactly the same, long, square, steel—way too shiny. Gives away how new everything is. No matter how hard you polish, there’s just a level of ‘new’ things never get back to. Makes me feel more confident we’re not dealing with the most experienced group though, so I welcome the sight. There are markers on the halls, numbers and letters, the only indicator of where you are. It would be damn disorienting if I couldn’t sense as well as I can—I mean, it’s still disorienting, just, I don’t feel blind as a bat at least.

There’s a quick pulse as I study the hallway, and I feel Mozart’s energy flash up ahead, and only after he’s done something to it do I sense the panel in the wall up ahead’s sigils.

“Disarmed it?” I check.

“Mmm,” he says like ‘kind of,’ smiling, “Figured that might tip them off, so it’s more like I uh---covered it up? I don’t claim to be the best Caster around, but even for me, it’s not exactly a feat.” He notices Ritsuka watching him with curiosity as we take off again and adds, “You know, uh, in spy movies--when there is a camera and they take a photograph of the scene the camera is viewing, and then just tape the photo to the camera? I did the sigil version of taping a photo. Very poor security on all the traps I’ve seen so far. That’s the first one I’ve even had to slow down to cast over, and I’m not even good at this kind of magic.”

Well, that’s a relief. Nothing as reassuring as your enemy’s own incompetence.

We’re not too far. Not exactly close either, but I’m feeling pretty confident about our odds. I couldn’t sense the other spirit as fast as Mozart, but I can now, faintly, and that level of horrible shielding in here bodes real well for us.

“…Hey, Billy,” I ask after a second, since I feel like I can allow some chatting and still have the focus I need for this particular task. We can all hear the fighting out front, but so far we haven’t seen a living human, and nobody is shadowing us, I’ve made sure. “How much do you remember, about how we met?”

Most people, I wouldn’t ask—wouldn’t care to let on I don’t know, but uh, Billy’s really not the type to be affected by that. And if he remembers more than me, I’d like the secondhand memories back. It would…be nice.

“Huh?” he says, glancing back for a second before refocusing on the goal ahead as we finally hear living people up ahead, and take a couple of corridors out of our way to skirt around them, “Oh—Uh.” He makes a considering grimace. “Not sure, actually? I know that’s a weird answer. But uh, it’s like I remember tons of little things, but I got no clue what we were doin’, y’know? I remember you’n me met pinned down in this tiny town, somewhere on my home turf. Holdin’ out against a whole army, all our own. For days. Geronimo was workin’ with us, and someone else. Don’t remember who—but he dropped by with news and supplies. We really had it rough in a choke point a while. But you’n I held ‘em off until…” He smiles sheepishly and sends another glance my way. “…somethin’ happened. Can’t rightly remember what, but. We did make it! N’ I remember I told you we would when you figured we wouldn’t, and I was real smug about it.”

I grin. “Yeah, that sounds about right.” Pinned down, huh? I remember…A little of that, now that he’s put a name to it. Sometimes things work this way, and it’s a relief. I don’t remember as much as he seems to, but I remember calling out to him over a wooden windowsill. Something joking about how I was sure if he prayed for help, we’d be saved.

“Don’t remember much I take it?” he asks me.

“No,” I sigh, “But I got pieces.”

“Yeah, me too,” he says like it’s a pity, which it is, “Still!” he perks up, “I sure remember you!”

Yeah, me too, I think right back, smiling to myself. “Well, we’re both pretty hard to forget.”

“Sure are!” agrees Billy, “Same for Geronimo.”

“Remember anything else?” I ask him.

He considers. “Mmmm.” His face falls a little, and he looks far away for a second, regretful. “Pretty sure I bit it before you. Think I failed to save Geronimo too.”

Shit. Wouldn’t have asked if I’d remembered that kind of thing. “It’s just how being a heroic spirit is,” I say, “It never really ends happily. You know he knows that too.”

“Yeah,” he agrees, smiling a little weakly, “Wish that made it a lot easier.”

Yeah. Me too.

“So it was America?” I ask, trying to shift his mind to something else.

“Oh—yeah. Out west somewhere. Maybe like, N—”

There’s no sound, but there’s an explosion of mana from back by the main gates, and Ritsuka doesn’t seem to feel a thing, but the rest of us three spirits turn our heads to stare at what we can’t see.

“W-What happened?” asks Ritsuka, noticing us freeze, and skidding to a stop herself.

“Front gate,” I answer without any detail, because, well, there isn’t any to give. She gets it, though.

“Emiya?” she calls mentally, “David, Salieri, Cu Chulainn? Are you okay?”

There’s nothing, then a harried, “Uhhhh yeah,” from Cu Chulainn, which surprises me because I sort of expected any of the other three to answer first. He’s not entirely convincing. “We’re handling it. They’ve just got some. Weird shit out here. Took us by surprise.”

“How weird?” I ask, “Bad enough we should be concerned weird?”

“Uhh.” Emiya this time. Clearly mid-battle from the sound of his voice.

“They’re more…inventive than expected,” comes David’s voice, “And we think we know why they purchased a spirit.”

“Wait, he’s out there?” I ask without thinking, but when I sense, I can still clearly feel a heroic spirit up ahead, and no one but our own towards the gate.

“No, they’re skimming energy off to infuse their weapons. We took a hailstorm of ammunition that shouldn’t have done any real damage, and it almost put a hole through us,” says Emiya.

Interesting. Not actually the most complicated or original idea, but I’ll keep that in mind.

“We should keep moving,” I say out loud to Ritsuka.

She gives a nod, and we start out again.

“You’ll be fine though—you can handle it?” Ritsuka asks as we go.

“Easily,” says Emiya at the same time Cu Chulainn says, “Easy,” and there is a brief, unhappy pause in the second after.

“Be careful, though,” adds Emiya, breaking in, “If they’re using him as a resource beyond a generator, it’s pretty likely they’ve got better security that we initially suspected for the room itself.”

“Thanks for the heads up! Watch each others’ backs and stay safe, okay? And keep me updated if something happens, so I can help,” says Ritsuka.

I grin to myself, dipping deeper into my hood to hide it before I remember my stupid, tired self is invisible right now. She’s doing a pretty good job, though. At being a Master—leader—I mean, I guess. Strategist. I was surprised she had so little problem when the Doctor offered to run support for the frontal assault so she could focus on this, but that seems to be paying off. Guess she’s got decent instincts for what other people can be trusted with—well, that or she’s lucky, and honestly, either one of those abilities is an asset.

“Well, we’re getting close,” whispers Mozart, “so give me a second before we go any further, alright?”

He’s right. We’re almost to the room. This is the most boringly designed building I’ve ever been in—it’s like a warehouse. But for all that, at least it’s easily and quickly navigable. We haven’t even had to blow through walls to save time, like we did in Ur-Shanabi.

Mozart whispers to himself and waves his arms like a conductor, which is the goofiest way I think to date I’ve seen a caster, uh, cast. But hey, gets the job done.

“Anything?” At first I think Billy is asking Mozart, but I realize he means me.

“What, tailing us? No,” I confirm, and he gives a nod. We’re still clear.

“Alright,” Mozart lets out a breath and smiles. “He was right! This is more heavily guarded. It’s…interesting, though. I’d have thought there would be a lot more alarms and guards, but it’s mostly traps.”

“Traps?” echoes Billy.

Mozart nods. “I mean, there are alarms. But not as many more as I expected. It’s weird, isn’t it?” he adds, glancing at us, “I mean. I don’t know what any of you three know about magic, but alarms are more easy to miss and trigger, and they’re more effective if all you need is an alert, because they only take one mistake to work. A trap takes at least two—being set off, and hitting. Traps are also more complex, bulky, and difficult to hide. So it’s odd, isn’t it?”

He doesn’t sound worried, but that kind of made me uncomfortable about this. He’s not exactly wrong. I’m no mage, but I used my fair share of traps and warning systems in life, and sure, traps are a hell of a lot more useful in battle, but if all you need is fair warning, something that makes a sound or alters you some other way is way easier to make, hide, and make a lot of.

“Well…can we take care of the alarms and traps?” asks Ritsuka.

He gives a nod. “I can handle the alarms the way I have been, but the traps are more…tricky.. Honestly, I could try to diffuse or get us past them all, but it might be more efficient just sort of beat down the door and rush, letting them go off just not with us in them, and get out quick. Nobody’s close, right?”

We exchange glances.

“Well…Not that I’ve seen or heard,” says Billy uncertainly.

“Well, we need to get a little closer for me to finish covering the alarms, so we have a minute to think about it,” says Mozart, moving forward again.

Billy thinks for a few seconds as we go, then glances at Ritsuka. “What do you think?”

“I…” she considers. “…think we should be careful, even if it takes a little longer. Emiya said they’re handling it okay, and they haven’t told us we need to speed it way up. If we get inside and it takes longer to free him than we expect, we could be in real trouble.”

“Well,” I say, “You heard the little lady. So, what’s the plan of attack for avoiding traps?”

“I was hoping I wouldn’t have to come up with one,” says Mozart with a cheery sigh, “But I guess I will now.”

That inspires confidence…

We hit an area really close to the room I can sense a Servant signature coming from. An assassin would usually be impossible for me to sense unless they wanted me to, but I doubt presence concealment is on his mind. Honestly, if anything, he probably is trying to shine like a beacon on the off chance someone comes to save him. Or put him out of his misery.

How long could a person stay sane like that?

Shit, that’s a thing to consider. Sure, we’ve all been through hell, but Billy and I were both dying in a way that let us go in and out of consciousness. Blood loss isn’t a fun way to go, but it isn’t exactly the worst one on the table either. As much as a bullet wound hurts, it’s not like being halfway to beheaded—whatever that even means. Which is…how Fuuma Kotarou died. Mozart’s setup sounds like it might have been as bad, and Cu Chulainn’s was pretty grisly, but neither of them had been summoned as long. If Kotarou’s been here long enough to have been picked out and sold, that means at least a few weeks. How much of his version of dying can a mind take before it shatters?

I’ve been feeling pretty secure about diverting some of my attention to thinking ahead, because there’s nothing much for me to do while our Caster does his thing with the alarms between us and the last room, but there’s a little burst of static from my ear then, and the communicators we’ve been given so the Doctor back at our home base can contact us in an emergency come on. Which cannot possibly be good.

“Hi, uh—we’ve hit a problem.”

Shit. Figures. This was going too smoothly.

“What happened?” asks Ritsuka into hers.

“Well, uh. Okay—several things,” comes his voice, quick and frazzled, “—we lost the Archer.”

Yeah, that clarifies nothing.

“There’s more than one of us!” calls Billy, voicing my thoughts.

“S-Sorry, uhm—Emiya,” he responds, “David’s alright. Right now. Uh. Sh-shit—Uh—”

“LOST?” asks Ritsuka in horror, and she shuts her eyes to concentrate—Oh right, I can do that too.

I do, feeling for the connection, and it’s still there, so he can’t be dead, but it is fucked. There is some energy coming from it I can’t even really describe, except that it does not feel promising.

“Wait, but he’s still here,” she says, opening her eyes and looking confused and relieved.

“Right—sorry—not dead—Go! Take the left side—it’s narrow!” he adds to someone who is clearly not one of us—I guess one of the other three he’s been trying to help strategize on the frontal assault. “They had something—some kind of weapon. Hidden with their regular rounds. I don’t really have time to explain, but there’s stuff inside a holly grail that corrupts heroic spirts, among many other things, and this wasn’t that, but whatever they used, it has similar energy. I can’t be sure if it’ll wear off. We might need you to get down here and see what you can do with a command seal, but—”

“—Wait, he turned on us??” asks Mozart in confusion, finally breaking concentration on his actual job to glance back at the rest of us.

“Well no—it’s more like it uhhh…It seems to have an effect like a much worse version of a madness enchantment,” comes the frazzled, staticky voice of the doctor, “It’s like it caused him to frenzy. Not for or against anyone, but, a spirit doing that is still a problem.”

Poor Ritsuka’s turned white as a sheet.

“The Lancer’s got it handled for the moment though,” assures the doctor quickly, “That’s not the real problem. Uh—the real problem is that we’re down those two because of it, and we lost Salieri too.”

Mozart’s face goes the color of Ritsuka’s. “He. He got hit too?” he asks in the tiniest voice imaginable. Yeah. I’d be fleeing the country if I was you right now, given even my weak grasp on the situation between you two.

“No—No, he wasn’t hit,” says the doctor, “But when they used their weapon, they hit a lot of their own forces—mostly vengeful spirits—not that powerful, but, a lot of them. Lots of necromancy. Uh—their own undead went into a frenzy too, though—broke formation and are heading towards anything that moves. We lost—David and I lost Salieri in the confusion. He’s tried to talk to him, and so have I, through coms, but no response. He’s still up, though, and he doesn’t seem to have been infected. Just---I-I don’t know. Anyway, the bigger issue is it’s just David with Salieri missing and the other two, uh, indisposed in combat. And the biggest source of ‘things that move’ for all these monsters to target is-“

“-The city!” says Ritsuka with horror.

“R-Right,” says the doctor, “David’s slowing them down well—we’ve got a little time, but if you can spare one or two of the others, we might need that. If the Lancer can’t fix things quickly, or we can’t find Salieri fast enough…”

She’s clearly thinking a million miles an hour, face grave. “Mozart,” she says quickly, “How much is left?”

“Traps?” says Mozart, incredibly anxious himself now, “Uh. About five. Movement sensitive,” he says, indicating an area of hall ahead, then another, “pressure sensitive,” he points to a third, “heat sensitive,” he indicates a fourth right by the door, “and that one senses mana,” he adds last, indicating the area surrounding the room at large. “Uh. If Salieri has lost composure out there, though, and you’re not going, I think I would be more effective going to try and stop-“

“-I know,” agrees Ritsuka with a shaky smile, “You think if Billy and I rush it, we can make it in alone? Like you suggested before?”

“Oh? Uh, yes,” says Mozart, lighting up, at the same time Billy says, “Hell yeah we can!”

Hopping forward to put a hand on her shoulder, Billy tugs Ritsuka closer and gives her a sure grin. God he’s short—hilarious this teenager is taller than him. I can’t help but smile at the fervency though.

“If worst comes to worst, I got an ace up my sleeve to get out of any trap!” declares Billy with a grin, “So don’t even worry—worst happens and we don’t get past one, we’ll still get past it! Promise,” he adds, shooting me a smile too.

I give a nod. “Okay then. Mozart?”

“Right,” says the caster, straightening up, “We should probably run.”

“Yeah, we’re going to,” I say, and I give the other two a nod, and tear off. Over coms, I hear Ritsuka say, “Billy and I are going ahead alone; we’ll meet back up with you out front once we’ve saved Fuuma Kotarou! I’m sending Robin Hood and Mozart on ahead.”

Right.

“Billy,” I call mentally to him and just him.

“Yeah?” he asks in surprise.

“Just, it’ll probably be okay, but the assassin’s been under tremendous mental strain, what with the way he died. It’s possible he…won’t be entirely, uh, there by the time you get to him. Just. Be careful. Make sure M—make sure Ritsuka doesn’t pay for that.”

“You got it,” comes Billy’s cheerful voice, with a note of sincerity to it, “Catch up to you soon.”

Right. I let out a breath as Mozart and I dash through another hall and towards the front of the building, paying no attention to security this time, only the sounds of violence getting louder and louder up ahead, and turn focus to the new task in front of me.

————————————————-

  “’Kay, hang on tight, aright?” I say.

I have an arm around Ritsuka, holding her up, and she wraps one arm around me to stay steady and gives a nod.

Let’s do this, I think, mentally timing out the spaces ahead of me. We’re absolutely getting blasted by whatever the traps are, but if I’m quick enough, it won’t matter. You got this, Billy.

“Ready?” I check, nervous suddenly as I am reminded by the thudding heartbeat I can feel from the chest against mine that I am not responsible for just my own safety, but also safety of someone a lot more frail’n me.

It’s funny, looking at her face, I wouldn’t know she was anxious at all. She looks so ready and serious. Makes me smile. Makes me calmer, too. That steady look on the face of a girl whose heart I can feel knocking around at 100 miles an hour.

“Ready,” she agrees.

I bolt.

The first trap would have killed a normal person. It’s not a trap so much as an execution. The second we move through the hall, the walls slam together, crushing anything not moving fast enough through it to break the sound barrier, into pulp. Luckily, we are. I jump and propel myself off the wall on the right as it tries to crush us, using the force and strength my Servant body gives me to dive through the second motion sensitive trap. I don’t even have time to see what that one does, and I don’t want to, but I can smell the static of electric charge in the air so thick I smell the edges of my clothes and hair burn for just an instant, and then we’re past it, on to the area Mozart said was pressure sensitive. That, I know how to avoid, and I turn in the air and fire off Thunderer for the extra momentum to shoot us the last twenty feet down the hall without touching a single surface, land right by the door, skid on my feet and whip around to fire at the wall and break us through.

I know I got seconds. I can feel the time slip away. This one is mana sensitive, he said, and I’m about to use some, but I’m made of mana—I subsist on it. It ain’t gonna matter. He said two traps, heat sensitive too, so we’ve already tripped both. Come on come on. “I’ll put a bullet right between your eyes!” I call, and the magic rips from my gun barrel, tearing through the wall in a shower of sparks and dust and particles of metal and mana, and I can tell what the first of the two traps is as a canister releases and gas cascades into the hall. Shit!

“Hold your-!” I start to call, and then I can’t. There’s a seal here—a trap, like the one in Ur-shanabi, but weaker, and it lights up around me, reacting to the mana, and I can’t move. Shit-shit! God damn it! Uhg, being a newer spirit sucks—I got the magic resistance of nothing! If I was Emiya, I could probably just jump right through this, but I ain’t designed even with the resistance that would usually go with my class. O-Okay—you were hoping not to have to do this, but it’s fine! We’ll make it! Just gotta use my—

“No wait!”

I stop in surprise, halfway to calling out my second phantasm, and turn to look at Ritsuka as she lets go of me. Huh?

Her face is scrunched up with what must be a big breath of oxygen she sucked in before the poison hit, but I can tell past the puffy face that she’s smiling at me.

“I got this! They expected either humans or something magic like you—not both! Leave this one to me!” she calls in my head, and to my intense surprise she reaches over, grabs me around the waist, grunts, and throws me over a shoulder like it ain’t nothing, then books through the hole I tore in the wall. The second we’re through, I can move again, and still on her shoulder I lean around and fire my gun through the hole again, aiming for the cannisters still shooting gas that I didn’t see before. That’s half the problem solved.

Seeing I can move, Ritsuka lets go, and I hop down and frantically look for anything I can use for the second half of the problem. Gas in the air is gonna go everywhere fast—that’s what gas does, and that ain’t good for Ritsuka! The room we’re in is big and dark—not as in dim, but as in totally unlit—only reason it seems large to me is the echo I hear when I hit the ground. No good options appearing, I panic and shoot around a panel of the ceiling above me as fast as I can, because what else am I gonna do? –snag Ritsuka, hop out of the way as it falls, and then grab it and shove it up over the hole we came through, and kick it so hard it dents outwards, close as I can get to an airtight seal on short notice. Don’t smell much in the air though, so I think it’s okay to breathe.

“Seem okay?” I ask her mentally.

She hesitates, then takes a cautious breath, and then nods and gives me a smile.

“Quick thinkin’” I say appreciatively, shooting her a grin, “You’re pretty strong, too!”

“I’ve done it before,” she replies proudly.

That’s right, guess she has.

There’s a sound like something dying. A gurgle. An incredible unnerving sound to hear come out of anythin alive at all.

It’s coming from deeper in the room, and Ritsuka and I turn as one, but I can’t see, and I’m sure she can’t either. Even with a chunk of ceiling gone, it’s pitch black, because the room above was too, and there’s no cracks to let in light behind us from the hall.

“You got a light?” I ask, surprised to feel nervous. I guess what Robin said is in the back of my head. It’s gonna be real bad if we get to this guy and it’s too late. Won’t be anything we can do, I guess, except put him out his misery, and that ain’t fair. I don’t really wanna see what they done to him, but I guess we gotta.

Ritsuka takes out her phone and turns on a flashlight from it and holds that up. It ain’t much, but I can see pipes. Thick, heavy feeling, running along the ceiling and floor and walls, all to some little boxy shape in the dead center. Side from that, the room’s entirely barren. We hear the awful choked gargling sound again, and it’s coming from there—from the dead center, and we exchange looks and a quick nod and move forward.

“Careful,” I tell her, passing on Robin’s concerns.

She pauses in surprise to give me a worried look.

“You remember how David acted before we could calm him down? This might be like that, but a lot worse. Sometimes you go through too much to be thinkin’ much anymore.” I say, and she gives me a solemn nod.

I move up ahead, hand on my gun, careful, Ritsuka right behind me. It’s a big room, but it still ain’t far.

As we get closer, I can make out enough to tell there’s a body on the ground there, with something near his head. I can tell he hears us, too. He can’t seem to turn his head at all, but he’s twitching, and the sounds increase in franticness and frequency. It’s awful. A bubbling, strangled, wet, agonized sound.

And then we’re close enough I can really see the setup.

It’s simple, kinda like mine was. Just a metal plate the thick metal tubes along the room all seem to hook into, sort of on a very slightly raised dais, but only to about knee height. He’s bolted down to the metal plate—band around his forehead, his chest, stomach, arms and legs in several places. I doubt he can move at all. And it’s so fucking clean it makes me furious. There’s a drain, right beneath his neck, for the blood. And he’s small, like me. Maybe about the same height. Younger looking than I thought too—shit, he could be Ritsuka’s age. Red hair like hers, just a bit darker. Matted to his face with sweat, covering his eyes. He’s so pale he looks like a corpse, and he’s shaking. It’s the only movement—I can’t even tell he’s breathing, though he’s gotta be. And the thing by his head is almost nothing at all. It’s just a stand. A katana stand, with a sword on it. A sword resting so fucking effortlessly and gently, like a trophy display case, only, it’s resting halfway through his mostly severed neck.

Ritsuka sucks in a breath and flinches and almost cries at the sight. She looks like she’s trying not to vomit. Honestly, I about am too.

Fuck—we—we’re off to the side a little—we came from his left and a little behind him, and he’s in our line of sight, but he can’t even tilt his head, so we ain’t in his, and I can see him breathing now, because it’s frantic and shallow. He’s trying so hard to make sounds and failing. Desperate, almost crying sounds through that severed throat and what’s left of his vocal chords. That’s cruel—I didn’t mean to—b-but, to him we could be anything, come to make this worse.

“Hey,” I try, moving before thinkin because being fast seems the most important to me, and I step right up by and in front of him, doing my best to get into his line of sight.

His bangs are long and stuck to his skin, but I can make out part of one eye, dilated pupil finding and fixing itself on me in a barely there panic.

“’S okay,” I promise, spinning my gun into its holster and holding up my hands, palm out, “We ain’t with them—we’re here to save you.”

I…shit, I guess that was the wrong thing to say somehow, because there’s this awful look on his face then, like I’ve just watched the last of his sanity shatter. His pupil expands and constricts and expands rapidly, unnaturally; his breath hitches and stops and then begins frantically again, but the line of his mouth doesn’t move an inch. I-I don’t understand what…

“Hey.” Ritsuka, moving up beside me. I step back a little to make room. She gives me a worried look, then kneels by the spirit. His eyes leave me and go with her, blood seeping out of his neck and neatly into the drain beneath it as he struggles to breathe and chokes. “You’re Fuuma Kotarou, right?”

He stops breathing for a second completely. His expression goes completely blank. I-I freak out for a second and think he’s dead, but then he breathes again, making an awful squelching sound from his throat, and a choked sound like a sob if it could come from your neck instead of your mouth. God, I-I can’t watch this. I will though. Fuck.

“I’m Ritsuka Fujimaru,” says Ritsuka, placing the hand with command seals on her chest. His eye flashes to it and back to her, and I see abject terror in it now.

“It’s okay!” I promise, moving up again, and his frantic eye darts towards me, “She ain’t a real mage. She’s just a kid—she’s helpin us out. I was in a trap like this too, and she broke me free. We’re tryin’ to get everybody.”

Worried, she looks from me to him, and nods. “I-I’m not like the people who did this. He’s right, I-I’m not really a mage either. I can’t even really do any magic, except a little healing. But I want to help.”

Shit, hope I didn’t offend her. ‘Not a mage’ is a compliment around heroic spirits, but not sure she knows that.

Kotarou looks from me to her with the one eye he can see out of, desperate, and then settles on her again. Scared, eye big, but listening. Guess I’d listen to anything too, if I was in his trap.

“I’m gonna try to get you out, okay?” says Ritsuka, and again, he has that look on his face. Like he’s shattered at the words. He’s suddenly looking at her and at nothing, and he makes the worst, wettest weeping sound in his throat I’ve heard yet and sustains it for a few seconds before he seems to come back, but I realize slowly this time I think I was wrong. I think that look is relief. A kind of relief that looks like despair that I don’t quite know how to describe. Relief that came too late maybe, or relief that doesn’t believe in it itself and is terrified to.

“It’s gonna be okay,” I promise, more relived and more worried about him now.

“Right,” agrees Ritsuka, looking grateful, and then her expression falls as she looks over the bolts holding him down, and the sword, then back to me. “W-We. If we move the sword, do you think he…?”

“Almost immediately,” I agree, “It’s the only thing keepin’ the blood from coming out so fast it’s killed him already.”

Frantic, his eye darts from one of us to the other and his breathing becomes so fast it’s hyperventilating, sucking against the sword in the half a throat he has, and I realize he thinks this means we might give up.

“O-Okay,” says Ritsuka before I can say something, looking back at Kotarou, “I’ve only got one idea. You’re hurt really, really bad. We can’t do anything to heal you until the trap you’re in is broken, but as soon as we break it and move the sword, you’ll die. But if. If you form a contract with me, the second we break the trap, I can use a command spell.” She holds up her hand to show him the array, two left. “To heal you. And I think we can do it fast enough, you’ll be okay.”

He stops moving again, blank wide eye fixed on her. He looks so pitiful. He’s gotta be a teenager, the age he was summoned. That’s a cruel thing to do. I guess I’m lucky in a way that I made it to 21 to die. I know he did too, and past, so I can’t imagine what justification the throne gave for sending him back like this. Gotta be worse for Ritsuka too. He could be a classmate in another life. Could be her.

“I promise. I know you don’t know me, but I won’t do anything to hurt you or force you to do anything at all. I just want to help. I-I’m sorry the only way I know how to help is like this. But please, please, if you trust me, I can save you,” begs Ritsuka.

I look at Kotarou. He has no expression at all. He’s staring at her, but nothing changes. He doesn’t move, or make a sound, other than the awful, agonized, sucking breathing coming from his throat. Just blankness. And then, slowly, his eye wells up and spills over down against his cheek, and keeps going. Silent. I don’t know if it’s fear, or misery, or hope, or despair, or things you can only feel in that much pain, but I want to help it stop.

“I promise,” I tell him myself, “I wouldn’t lie to another heroic spirit. Not about a thing like this. We’ll help you.”

He makes an agonized sound, then again, and again, and one like a whimper in his chest. The liquid pouring out of his eye becomes thicker, more, and I realize he has no way to say yes or no. He can’t speak.

“C-Can you move your fingers?” I ask him.

His eyes widen, and immediately, his left hand, trembling, taps its ring finger against the ground.

“Okay. One for no, two for yes,” I say.

He taps twice, fast, then pauses, and taps again, then again, and then he just keeps going and doesn’t stop, the thick liquid seeping out of his eye so fast it’s starting to swell.

“Okay,” promises Ritsuka, desperate too, “yes—we hear you. We’ll do it. It’s gonna be okay.”

He takes an awful, shuddering, squelching breath, and stops tapping. Makes a pained sound best he can.

“Billy?” says Ritsuka, looking at me.

I give a nod and move to the other side and kneel, hand hovering by the handle to the katana. I see Kotarou start to tremble. Hang in there. I know this can’t be doable, forget easy, but you’re almost there.

“Go. I’ll rip it out right when you reach the end. All he has to do is accept, and you can save him,” I promise.

“Are you ready?” she asks Kotarou.

His left hand taps a weak double-tap.

“My soul becomes your will; your spirit becomes my destiny. If you hear my call and accept me, then bind to me, Assassin!” she calls, starting calm and ending almost at a fever pitch in her own desperation. At the name of his class, I rip the katana upwards, and he jerks and makes an awful, headless scream, and in the same instant I see him frantically slamming his fingers against the ground, trying to accept, and I praying to God to please let it work, and it must because Ritsuka raises her hand skyward and shouts, “HEAL!” at the top of her lungs, and I feel a massive surge of power burst out of the command seals and slam into the assassin beside me, and his body jerks and convulses the little it can nailed down, then goes still.

“Kotarou!” calls Rituska, scrambling on her knees to be by his head. His neck is solid again, and I can sense he’s alive, but his eyes are shut. He coughs then, an awful, wet cough, sending blood over Ritsuka’s sleeve, groans, and goes still.

“Billy!”

“Right!” I call, breaking my own trance, and I rip Thunderer from his holster and blow the restraints off one by one, starting with his head, careful to be precise predicting the angle of the shrapnel.

Soon as he’s free, Ritsuka drags him up and partially onto her lap. “Hey! Are you okay?” She looks frantically at me. “D-Did I do it wrong?”

“No, I don’t-“ I start to reassure, stooping closer, when Kotarou coughs again, a deep, wracking, wet cough, expelling more blood, and then he takes a weak gasp and his eyes half open, dazed and sunken.

“Hey!” calls Ritsuka, relieved, “You’re okay! Oh I was so scared y-“

His eyes weakly move to look up at what he can see of her, and then he closes them and begins to shudder and weep, and she stops. I stop too.

“H-Hey,” she tries after a second, nervously placing her hand gently on his head and when he has no response at all instead of flinching, she tries stroking it to calm him down. “It’s okay. You’re out now. It’s over.”

The teenage spirit keeps crying—starts to have trouble breathing through it, and then suddenly he moves, dragging himself off of her and back, and I panic for a second and get my hand on my gun just in case, but all he does is collapse on his knees with his head against the floor, bowing.

“Thank you, Master,” he manages through crying he hasn’t really been able to stop. It sounds painful to speak, and his voice is shaking like his body. “Thank you. Thank you thank you thank you.” The words come out choked, almost a whisper. “I-I’m yours. Anything, ever. I’m yours.”

He’s still crying. I rarely get to feel older than any heroic spirit I’m spendin’ time with, but it hurts to see that, and I do.

“I-I,” Ritsuka falters, overwhelmed, and she looks to me, so I try to give her a reassuring look back. She hesitates again, then scoots closer on her knees and puts a hand on his shoulder. This time he does flinch, but he stays where he is. “It’s okay. You’re welcome, but I’m not your Master. I just want to be your friend.”

From the side, I see his eyes get wide and confused, worried almost. Then she reaches and straightens him up a little on his knees so he’s even with her instead of bowing, face still dirty with blood and tears, and shivering like a leaf.

“You’re your own. But, if you want to stick around for a little bit, we could use the help,” she adds, giving his worried face a tentative smile, “I brought a lot of friends to help break you out, and they’re fighting the people who kept you trapped right now, and it’s going pretty scary right now. You don’t have to. You can run away if you want, or we can take you somewhere safe-“

“-I.” He stops immediately and flinches, realizing he cut her off, but when she waits and just smiles at him, he keeps going. “…I don’t understand,” he manages with his damaged voice.

She cocks her head. “Which part?”

“…W…” He stops, eyes darting a little, frantic and desperate for a second, then looks back at her. “Why are you doing this? You don’t…”

“Uhm…I guess I don’t have a really interesting reason,” she says, flushing a little, and its his turn to cock his head and blink, trying to understand. “I just. Found out this was happening, so I tried to stop it. That’s really all of it there is.”

He looks at her for a few seconds, then me, and I give him a grin. Yeah, this shit never happens to us.

“R-Really?” he asks, sounding more like a kid and more like a normal person for the first time.

She nods.

“W-Well…” He thinks again, worried, then looks up at her. “What do I call you, M-…Uhm.”

Now he looks embarrassed. She smiles. “Ritsuka, i-if you want!”

Ah, her turn again. I forget that first names are kind of a big deal here.

He seems surprised, then cautiously smiles back, and it’s almost painful, the way he looks, to see that. “Okay,” he says softly, “Uh. Then. My Lord Ritsuka, you said…there’s more of you, fighting the people who trapped me here, right now?”

She nods.

Kotarou holds up a hand and concentrates painfully, and a belt with pockets and various kunai and tools strapped to it appears in his outstretched fingertips. Breathing hard, he turns and offers it to her. “I want to help.”

#the kid (fic) #the kid #fate grand order #fate au fic #fate fic #fate #fgo #billy the kid #ritsuka fujimaru #fuuma kotarou #emiya archer #cu chulainn #antonio salieri #wolfgang amadeus mozart #romani archaman #king david #robin hood

[thequietmanno1]

TheLreads, Vigilantes ch 101, Replies Part 2

1) “YEAH BOY! THAT’S THE STUFF!

PLUS FUCKING ULTRA!

NOW AT LEAST REMEMBER TO BREATH, WE DON’T WANT YOU TURNING BLUE BY THE TIME YOU REACH THE HOSPITAL”- And here comes the big reveal that connects both Izuku and Koichi’s powers. All along, they’ve been limited by their users’ self-imagined beliefs and understanding of how they think they work. It’s when they let go of thinking and start using the powers on instinct, like it’s a third limb they’ve been born with, that the true potential finally shows. The centipede’s dilemma was capping off Koichi’s real strength this whole time, so when he stops thinking about what he can’t do, and focuses on something more important, like saving Pop, his power skyrockets, and his limits vanish. 2) “…Welp spoke too soon. Shame. Now with his death the fabric of reality shall begin to unravel and disintegrate.”-Only once he finishes Phelps off by shooting him with an actual bullet, “for old times’ sake”. 3) “Ah shit it was just Soga. Never mind then, keep moving koichi, there’s more important stuff to care about right now.”- Sadly, Soga is the designated “ideas man” for the vigilante group right now, which means any clever strategy they need to turn the tables on Nomura needs to be run by him first. Downsides of not having Koichi become completely independent and self-sufficient as a hero- er, Vigilante. 4) “Alright Mr. Strategist, do tell us what the counterattack will entail, since you’re apparently the brain of this whole operation.”- I will admit that for all his strengths as a protagonist, Koichi not having Izuku’s ability to think and plan on his feet, and thus being reliant on others for ideas, does majorly handicap his ability to heroically perform in action. 5) “Jokes on you Soggy, that’s been his life for the past three non-important years. You wouldn’t know, since they weren’t important and thus weren’t shown, but I’ll assure you, all that non-important stuff was building up to this exact moment right here.”- I’d say it was a joke, but it really was all leading up to this fight all along – and us being absent from the humdrum day-to-day does really make us feel the disconnect in Koichi’s journey as a hero compared to Izuku, who we’ve followed closely for an entire year of his life up to this current fight with Tomura. 6) “Also, where’s Midnight? Why isn’t she here? Her quirk could’ve put all of them to sleep, or at least she could try to do so.”- Would that even work on the drones? They have mouths, sure, but they don’t seem to have noses or such to breath with, and it’s unclear if their weird biology would even be affected by the normal cocktail of chemicals that Midnight uses to make others go to sleep.

7) “Again, how many of those fucking things did AfO gave McBee? I was under the impression that Nomus were, you know, difficult to make, even the less-powerful models, and it would probably be worse here considering that this is the early models, before the technology was properly mastered.”- Given the bomber cells have weird “growing” capacities, like we saw with how Nomura formed hands out of them in order to beat Knuckles, it’s possible that he just grew a big vat of the stuff and had it form under Nomura’s control into humanoid Drones to control with. The issue being is that this growth results in the cells being unstable and bad for long-term use, so they won’t work with a Nomu’s trademark durability down the line, but they’re useful for making a large disposable force for an assault like this- don’t even leave any traces behind with how they utterly eradicate themselves with each blast. 8) “So, the final clash is about to start for real. Even McBee himself is there to get his hands dirt, but my oh my, Koichi is right here, and as he showed he has unlocked the next level of his quirk, and if he was already fucking him over before, well, let us just say McBee doesn’t stand much of a chance right now…”- This fight is gonna be wild, let me tell you. @thelreads

#my hero academia #bnha #chapter replies #thelreads #bnha vigilantes #vigilantes 101

[koenigbarrera]

The Queue: Raising Fatigue

Welcome back to The Queue. This is where the WoW Insider team will answer all your questions about World of Warcraft. Adam Holisky (@adamholisky) will be your host for today.

It is officially the time to get rid of raiding fatigue. It's that time of the expansion when enthusiasm for raiding is at a low. You suddenly go from tackling 25 man heroics to barely being capable of fielding enough to field a 10-man.

Hmpf.

I've put together this video to keep me up.

Revynn asked:

I had a "discussion" with someone in the beta/trade chat that was trying to sell craft mats at 15,000g per piece. I offered him 5g for each piece. Beta's price gouging is insane (lol I have eleventy billion golds I can't keep !").). In the next few minutes, I came across someone advertising their new all-worgen guild that included "long term plans" as it were an active RP server. So . . . What is the most bizarre or ridiculous thing you've seen in a game?

The beta and PTRs draw some of the stupidest people out of the woodwork. Sorry, I can't say it in a pleasant and friendly manner, but it's the truth.

The most ridiculous thing I've seen is when an acquaintance decided to join a trade chat and complain about not being invited to raids. He thought this was fine and wouldn't get him kicked. It did however, and Mumble was the bidding battle to see who could kick him. It was more than 100,000 gold.

I'm not sure if I've ever witnessed anyone being widely criticized so strongly. Every guild drama has many sides However, everyone was against this loser.

Fallen asked:

What is it about LFR that makes me want to kill everyone in my group as well as Myself? It seems like it would be able to solve all the drama, if blizzard hasn't yet input the LFR system for MOP.

Raid Finder is extremely difficult to use these days. It's worse than even a few months ago. This is likely due to the grumpiness of players on the Raid Finder system right now; most would like MoP to be released and all are focused on getting gear or shards or whatever. Very little interest in being a decent person. Azov.tv

I'm certain Blizzard would love to implement the new Raid Finder loot system in place right now however there are many technical issues that need to be changed in the backend and the client first and they are all currently in the beta testing stage. I wouldn't be surprised to see them with patch 5.0 (preexpansion patch) and maybe we get a little taste before MoP hits.

Lookingin:

If we know someone who boasts that they have a private server Is there anything I can do to inform Blizzard about this violation of the TOS?

You can report them through the in-game tools, but the chances are there's not much Blizzard is going to be able do to them at least, not without getting a large number of legal folks involved. However when they're on guild chat bragging about their l337 private server, I'd have to imagine a ban would be pretty swift and easy.

Luro asked:

I've never taken part in WoW beta testing before. I was thinking about if at some point does Blizz allow users to create level-capped premade characters? I have no desire to test the questing system, but I'd like to experience healing and tanking at 90.

Yes, it should. I wouldn't be surprised if level 90 premades were available this week.

#Azov #Wow servers #wow private servers

[autumn-sweet-fae]

So I adore Lady Sneaseler going to the future with Ingo, and it’s interesting to think how others would react to her in the early days of his return. Particularly focusing on the jokes I’ve seen about Sinnoh researchers spending their lives trying to bring back lost pokemon breeds and then learning that this funny train man just HAS one and being all “this is my villian origin story”. Because what if it was??

Like Ingo and Akari arrive in modern Sinnoh, and before they can even unlock either of their backstory’s a group of asshole researchers try to have Sneaseler taken away from Ingo! Along with any other hisuian pokemon Akari brought back with her. Of course Sneaseler is having none of it and stays with her humans but now they’re all on the run and trying to navigate a world they both only vaguely remember. Meanwhile news is spread of these terrible pokemon thieves who have stolen these rare endangered pokemon the these heroic researchers have only recently recovered.

Imagine poor Emmet seeing a wanted poster of Ingo and getting the shock of his life. His brother is alive, in a whole other region, and supposedly stealing Pokémon. Now he has to track him down before the cops do, hoping that there’s a clear explanation for all of this and that his brother hadn’t just abandoned him for a life of crime as some reporters are now declaring.

Later, after the truth is revealed and the true bad guys are dealt with, Ingo would need to get official documentation/approval for him to continue his job of being Sneaselers warden. I could see Cynthia rolling up with books upon books of historical research of Hisuian earliest laws regarding Wardens and their recognized and respected status as caretakers to their nobles. So even if the jerks tried to go after Ingo legally they never had a leg to stand on lol

#Ingo #submas #sneaseler #Emmet #akari #cynthia #pokemon legends arceus #another idea for you all #my babbling #submas wanted au

[overthinkingfandom]

Cards on the Table - Breaking down the tactics in L'manburg Independence

/rp /dsmp

Much has been said in the fandom about L'manburg's independence. It is, after all, arguably the most important moment in DSMP's history, as the rest of the story wouldn't have existed without it. 

In light of the recent anniversary of it, yes I know I’m late, I wanted to throw my hat in the ring and add something to the discussion surrounding it. However, as the morality of the situation has been discussed to death I'll be taking a slightly different approach to it. 

Due to the nature of the DSMP's medium, the story has many unique quirks. One of those quirks is how realistic the tactics used in the story's portrayal of politics are. The independence conflict is a great example of it. While on the surface things seem to be rather simplistic in nature, there's a lot more going on that’s less obvious.

Both Wilbur and Dream are brilliant politicians who get to show both their strengths and weaknesses in dealing with an equally skilled opponent in this encounter. There’s actually quite a bit to go into, despite their interactions being so short.

When most people think about the L'manburg's independence, they think about the moment the declaration has been written up and the subsequent declaration of war. While this moment is certainly iconic, it's not really all that impactful in the grand scheme of things. Both declarations are the culmination of decisions that have been made beforehand. It's the moment when those decisions were made that really influenced things.

Conveniently, Wilbur and Dream only hold a single conversation about L'manburg before the declarations are drawn up, so we don’t need to look far in order to figure out where those decisions were formed. 

Wilbur has been working on L’manburg, collecting materials and building the wall surrounding it, for almost an hour when he spots Dream lurking. “Get [Dream] into the VC, I need to talk with him. He’s the leader of the other nation, I think we need to have a congress.” (52:44)

Dream: “Hello?”

Wilbur: “Hello Dream. Welcome to our great nation of L’manburg.”

Dream: “L’manburg?”

Wilbur: “Yes. We are seceding from Dream SMP. This is our own server now. This area, just this part [between the walls of L’manburg], is our server.”

Wilbur doesn’t waste any time before getting right down to business and talking about the matter at hand. However, the way he speaks about it here and in the rest of the conversation is fairly interesting. Wilbur is talking about L’manburg as if it’s something which already exists. They are seceding. This is their land. This conversation is merely a courtesy to give Dream a formal notice of their separation.

Yet, a bit later Wilbur shows he knows they need Dream’s acknowledgement in order for L’manburg to be its own entity. Independence is not a concrete thing that can just be taken or created on one person’s whim, after all. It only exists when the people with power agree it exists. 

Wilbur: “Dream, basically all we want from you is just acknowledgement that we are an independent nation now. That’s all we need.” (56:20)

So if Wilbur knows they aren’t independent yet, why is he talking like that? 

It’s because he’s using a salesman technique called an Assumptive Close. Instead of posing it as a question and putting the choice of agreeing or disagreeing in Dream’s hands, Wilbur acts as if it’s already true and leaves the burden of challenging his claims on Dream’s shoulders. He even moves on to ask secondary questions on how Dream feels about having embassies in his land (and notably he frames it as a question, unlike how he frames the topic of L’manburg’s independence) as if L’manburg is already a political entity. 

Wilbur: “Dream, I’ve got a proposition for you. How do you feel about having Tommy’s land being an embassy? Like it’s an enclave in your own land.” (59:01)

Wilbur’s use of this technique has an interesting side effect in that it signals to Dream Wilbur is taking a non-compromising position in this negotiation. In essence saying “L’manburg is independent, take it or leave it.” 

A non-compromising position is the game theory term for when someone goes, "I'm going to do that, this is going to happen and nothing can dissuade me from this course of action." It's a strong tactic which forces everyone to react to that person's position, reducing the others' options into a binary of either accepting that position or rejecting it. 

This is a very common tactic and various manifestations of it can be seen all over history and media. From Martin Luther who refused to recant or compromise with his famous words of “Here I stand, I cannot do otherwise” to groups who cultivate a "with us or against us" mentality to heroic characters who say they would die before giving in to whatever Evil the story focuses on.

This is the situation Dream is facing here. He can either accept Wilbur's assertion that L'manburg is an independent entity by either encouraging them or even doing nothing, or he can reject Wilbur's assertion by acting against it.

As we all know, he ended up choosing the second option but what were his considerations for doing so?

For that we would need to know what his goal was here, something we don't really get a sense of from his conversation with Wilbur. However, he ends up stating what it was in a later conversation with Skeppy. 

(Emphasis added by me and wasn’t part of the original dialogue.)

“Everyone can build wherever they want. [L’manburg] just decided to say that they get to determine where they can build and we can’t and we said well no, you can’t do that. And that’s what the whole war was over.” (31:44)

“[L’manburg] can’t tell us that we can’t go in their land. That’s all we wanted to say. That they’re not independent, they are a part of the Dream Team SMP. They’re just a delusional, small part." (34:26)

Dream lies a lot, so just because he says something doesn't mean it's necessarily true. However, this seems to be genuine. Dream has no problem telling Skeppy “we burned down their houses and blew up the whole land.” (32:36) later on in the conversation, so we can rule out that he's trying to paint himself in a better light, and there aren't really any other reasons for him to lie to Skeppy here about this. 

When looking at Dream's options with his goal we can see the choice is pretty much a no-brainer. 

Accepting is a total lose scenario for him. Not only will it fail to fulfill his goals, it would actively encourage the sort of behavior he doesn't want to happen, as Wilbur would set a precedent that so long as someone insisted hard enough and implied Dream is a bad person he would fold in negotiations and give them what they want.

Rejecting gets him far closer to his goal of railing against L’manburg’s exclusion. Going to war means he has to invest much more effort and resources into his reaction than if he just accepted as well as deal with the risks any war has, however the sheer difference in ability between Dream's side and Wilbur's side make the risk minimal. 

Going to a war he’s pretty sure he can win VS encouraging the sort of thing he disapproves of, isn’t really a hard choice.

This is actually the result of a mistake on Wilbur's part. CC!Wilbur called his character naive (37:49) and he's not wrong. Wilbur has a tendency to act as he wishes and not take into account that people might disagree or retaliate. We see it with him saying they could just ignore the Americans (1:51:17) or during the elections when he told Quackity his scheme and got blindsided by Quackity deciding to run against him. 

Historically, non-compromising positions worked best when the person who used it made sure rejection would be more costly than acceptance in one way or the other. In essence, narrowing down the options for others even more and leaving them only with acceptance. 

Wilbur may have managed to wipe off the table all other options and put pressure on Dream to accept with his use of Assumptive Close, but he didn't do anything to prevent Dream from rejecting. In fact, it seems like Wilbur didn't even consider it as a valid possibility as he outright dismissed it when Dream brought it up as an option.

Dream: “What happens if the rest of the server decides to take over your land?”

Wilbur: “They can’t. It’s literally not how servers- Dream you’re supposed to be smart man, that’s not how servers work. You can’t just take over another person’s server.” (54:33)

But, you may be asking, if it was better for Dream to go to war against L'manburg rather than grant them independence, why did he end up giving into their desire for independence in the war? Wouldn't it have been better if he just saved everyone the trouble and gave it to them when they asked for it the first time? Or maybe Dream’s obsession with Tommy and his discs is just that strong?

We can find the answer to all those questions at Punz’ video where he shows the behind the scenes of the independence war, including some of the planning which went into it from the Dream Team’s side of the war. Specifically, this quote:

Dream: “[The L’manburgians] are never gonna give up. So then in the end the resolution will probably just be, we won but they can think whatever they want, we’re just going to ignore them because they’re essentially like- You want to think you’re independent? You’re not, you’re still part of the SMP, but if you want to think you’re independent, you can.” (9:04)

“They’re never gonna give up.”

Whether it’s true or not doesn’t matter, as this is what Dream thinks and so this is what dictates his actions. Perhaps he’s overestimating his opponents here, or maybe he’s talking about how even if L’manburg is defeated this time they would try again for independence in the future. In either case, it’s clear Dream thinks the best case scenario for him - completely preventing people from fighting for L'manburg's independence - is impossible. 

So, he tries for the second best case. If he can’t prevent L’manburg, he’s going to allow it but only under Dream’s terms. That’s what his “they can think whatever they want” line is all about. He intends on giving them token independence here, something which would satisfy them but wouldn't pose a real threat. Which is exactly what he ends up offering them during the bow duel.

Dream: “Let me just clarify: if you win, we grant L’Manburg independence.”

Tommy: “Alright.”

Dream: “But we recognize it still as a part of the Dream Team SMP.”

Wilbur: “That’s fine, that’s a fine condition.” (40:54)

The token independence thing didn’t work out so well for him. L'manburg quickly grew to be seen as an entity separate from Greater Dream SMP by everyone, and so Dream was forced to concede and treat it as one as well. 

However, despite this part of his plan failing, overall the independence war was a glowing success for Dream. 

By giving L'manburg independence after winning the war, Dream sent a very clear message. L'manburg only gets to be independent so long as they stay on Dream's good side. If they don't adhere to the terms Dream sets out for them? He can and will kick their asses, as the war so aptly demonstrated.

This message is received loud and clear. During his entire presidency Wilbur went out of his way to treat Dream with respect and try not to piss him off. Something he clearly demonstrates a number of times, like when he asked if he should call Dream “king Dream” (59:08) or during the railway skirmish (24:16).

In fact, it can be argued that this message lasted all the way up to Tubbo's presidency. Unlike Quackity, who was perfectly fine with starting a fight with Dream, Tubbo knew first hand what a war against Dream looks like. He knew that they could not win a war against him, especially in their weakened state at the time, and that influenced his decision. 

As Dream once said: "L'manburg can be independent but it can't be free."

#dsmp analysis #c!dream #c!wilbur #strategist c!dream #dreblr #dsmp #analysis #game theory stuff

[itsclydebitches]

I’ve been seeing an uptick in “anti-RWDE” posts lately  — which is a phenomenon I’d like to comment on at a later date  — but for now one of them (quite unintentionally) made me realize something about the finale that I haven’t seen others discuss yet. 

So RWBYJNOR saves everyone, right? Let’s just put aside the animation for a moment  — which didn’t show any army members making it out  — as well as the forgotten side characters  — Maria, Pietro, Qrow’s group isn’t forgotten, but still left behind  — and take things on good faith here. We’ll read the finale through the thematic intention: RWBYJNOR saved “everyone” in the Kingdom of Atlas in Volume 8, deliberately contrasting them with Ironwood who was willing to sacrifice a chunk of the Kingdom in Volume 7. Forget all the messiness and just accept that regardless of the consequences  — like a destroyed Kingdom and a “dead” team  — the heroes are heroic because they didn’t give into a “lesser evil” thinking and managed to save everyone. 

Now, how was that possible? 

Let’s go back to the beginning of the seventh episode of Volume 8, “War.” Salem’s grimm have just burrowed through Atlas’ defenses and taken them out. The shields are gone. She flies Monstra into the fields and releases an army of darkness that immediately heads for the city. What’s the very first thing Ironwood does? 

Soldier: Yes, sir?

Ironwood: I am evacuating all citizens to the subway. Prepare Manta Squad Omega, and dispatch to every part of Atlas.

Soldier: But sir-

Ironwood: Now!

He evacuates the people, with “the people” meaning all the Atlesians and however many Mantle folk got to the city prior to Salem’s arrival. When this episode aired I mentioned being confused as to why the soldier was so hesitant. Why wouldn’t you want the people to get to safety when a grimm army is heading their way? Fans against Ironwood took the soldier’s side, claiming that Mountain Glenn proved that any underground evacuation is a death sentence and thus he obviously doesn’t really care about the peoples’ safety. Fans in support of/neutral towards Ironwood pointed out that this is a pretty big leap, no one is coming up with a better idea for what he should do instead, and that within these circumstances it reads like the soldiers is illogically against this idea simply because everyone is against Ironwood now. The show wants characters criticizing his decisions and making him out to look like a crazed dictator... even during moments when it doesn’t make any sense to be upset with him. Shooting the councilman yes, trying to keep the people safe no. Basically, this small exchange was a mess, but the rest of the volume proved that this was a sound call. The subway never collapsed and no grimm ever made it to that enclosed space to pick the civilians off like fish in an underground barrel. 

So, why didn’t that happen? Well, one answer is because Oscar and Ozpin destroyed the whale. But how did they have time to do that? Without the people dying while they were being tortured, talking to Hazel, escaping with Emerald, fighting Salem, etc.? A lot happened between Salem starting her attack and Oscar ending it, so why wasn’t 2/3rds of the Kingdom’s population decimated during that time? 

Because Ironwood sent his army out to keep the grimm occupied. 

Outside of Ironwood’s cartoon villain actions  — random murders and bomb threats  — which get the most attention due to how deliberately, over-the-top horrific they are, these are the two actions that get the most negative attention from both the story and the fanbase. The soldier seems horrified by the order to evacuate. Marrow is devastated that young adults are fighting in this battle. The fandom is disgusted by both aspects of Ironwood’s character: giving orders that, as general, he expects to be obeyed and having an army that follows those orders. Putting side that cartoon villainy, this is what supposedly makes Ironwood the antagonist here. These are the qualities that have existed since Volume 2, resulting in a “he was always a bad guy” interpretation. These are the qualities that have resulted in anyone who likes his character being labeled as a “bootlicker.” We know these qualities make the fandom hate him because otherwise, more people would be confused as to why a presumably heroic character randomly shot Oscar. Orders, armies, and general military associations are at the heart of Ironwood’s presumed villainy. 

So let’s remove them. 

Ironwood has no evil army. Ironwood gives no evil orders. Power and control lies solely in the hands of our non-military heroes. Everything is better! 

...well, no. Because we saw in Volume 8 precisely the choices our heroes made when the attack started: half of them focused on saving a single individual (Oscar) and the other half kept to the sidelines. At no point did our RWB group act after sending the message and prior to securing the Staff. AKA, during the attack of Salem’s army. We got a very explicit moment in which Ruby looked out the window at the battle going on and turned away from it, continuing to discuss ethics instead of joining the fight. The people of Atlas (which, again, includes many Mantle citizens) had no one but Ironwood and his army because a third of the group was trying to rescue Oscar (they never even had a plan to blow up Monstra — that was also Ironwood), a third of the group was up in Amity, and a third was sitting in the mansion. They did nothing to help the people of Atlas being attacked by grimm. 

Thus, if you remove Ironwood’s actions, everything goes to hell. There is no longer an order to evacuate to the subway. Maybe some people go there anyway. Most probably don’t. They run in a panic wherever they can. Hide wherever they can. Go back home for some semblance of safety. 

There’s no longer an army. Either it doesn’t exist because we’ve determined it’s simplistically bad despite RWBY’s grimm-specific context, or Ironwood likewise never gives the order to protect Atlas’ border. Salem’s army moves unimpeded through the city, killing countless people as it goes. How do we know? Because they’re civilians who can’t defend themselves and there’s literally no one else to help. Remember: Ironwood is not giving orders, there is no army, RWB is in the mansion, YJOR is in the whale, Penny is out of commission, the Happy Huntresses are in Mantle. Those in Atlas are entirely alone. In time, Oscar destroys the whale, but by then it’s too late. There’s no concrete way to theorize how many have died, but it’s inevitably a lot. Everyone else is scatted across the city, trying to survive. 

So this scene 

no longer exists. 

When the group gets the Staff and creates portals for “everyone” to escape through, Mantle is ready to go. They’ve gotten everyone into the crater and can funnel them straight to Vacuo. Atlas, however, is in chaos. When Jaune enters the subway there’s only a few people there, many of which may be wounded or dying. He’s right back where he started, in Mantle at the beginning of Volume 8: needing to go door-to-door to find where people have hidden themselves, trying to convince them all to follow him (remember Oscar commenting to Ozpin about how difficult that was?). Except now, he and Nora are the only ones trying to get people to safey, the city is filled with far more grimm, a significant amount of time has passed for people to be killed or injured (making evacuating them even harder, both due to injuries and an unwillingness to leave hurt/dead/missing loved ones behind), he’s trying to convince these panicking people to go through magic portals, not just walk to a crater, and he’s aware that there’s a very short time limit for this task. 

Jaune returns in a panic of his own, explaining how difficult it will be to get that 2/3rds of the Kingdom to Vacuo. How many are already dead. Barricaded. Missing. Closeup on Ruby looking horrified, but then she rallies. They can do it. Atlas is falling, but residual dust gives them just enough time to find, calm, and evacuate those people. They’re heroes after all. Beating the odds is what they do. 

Then Cinder attacks. 

Suddenly, the group can’t evacuate people because they’re trying to keep themselves safe from her. Maybe Cinder gets the powers because Jaune was off looking for civilians, leaving Penny without a mercy kill. Maybe Nora dies because she’s still trying to help people on the city that plows into the one below. Regardless of how details might change, they’re not getting a spread out, decimated population through those portals before Cinder changes the wish and makes them disappear.  

In this version, the story starts with Ironwood wanting to sacrifice 1/3rd of the population to save 2/3rds and the future of the war. It ends with 2/3rds of the population dying instead. 

This is what I mean when I say the majority of the fandom wants to view a very complex situation through a ridiculously simple lens. The fandom wants to denounce every bit of RWBY’s fictionalized military, the context issues of that aside. The story wants to paint RWBYJNOR as the only heroes, in part because they succeeded in saving everyone (“everyone”) in the Kingdom when Ironwood gave up. 

But they only managed to save everyone because of Ironwood. Because he kept fighting for his people to the bitter end. This is why, though his horrific actions obviously exist in the story, they make no sense (he’ll threaten to kill his people so he can... save his people?) and mess up what little is working in the finale. The story wants us to celebrate the group for evacuating Mantle and Atlas, but the Atlas evacuation would not have happened if not for Ironwood’s actions  — the actions that are ignored in favor of having Winter blame him for everything and then killing him off. The rescue of “everyone” was very much a joint effort. RWBYJNOR’s win is not actually a contrast to Ironwood’s intended sacrifice, for the simple reason that their win depended entirely on Ironwood’s actions. 

If we’re going to celebrate the group getting everyone to safety, we should probably also celebrate the guy who got them all to an easy evacuation point and ensured they weren’t eaten before then. Does that mean Ironwood never did anything wrong? Of course not. As established, the story went out of its way to make him into a villain. Rather, it means that other parts of the story failed to maintain that black and white view, complicating the heroism of RWBYJNOR in the process. If we want Ironwood to be incapable of heroic action, always the bad guy, nothing good to say about him whatsoever... then we likewise need to accept that the group is rather unheroic in many regards too. That, on their own, they would have failed to save everyone, just as Ironwood’s plan failed to save everyone at the end of Volume 7. Because they chose their friend over a kingdom. Because they sat around in a mansion. Because by the time they took action again and tried to escape, without Ironwood’s help they would have lost a larger majority than they originally insisted be saved. 

#rwby #rwde #mymetas

[justauthoring]

Lie Your Way To The Truth

Prompt: Ooh I have an idea - Bokuto being a bro and coming up with increasingly absurd heroic acts for Kuroo to impress the reader?? Like “saving” a child from “drowning”, bragging about him so on Requested by: anonymous.

A/N: I very much adore Kuroo, and want you all to know I listed to a Kuroo playlist while writing this fic cause I felt it was only natural. Pairing: Kuroo Tetsuro x F!Reader

“There she is!”

“Honestly, Bokuto, this is absurd--!”

“Shh,” there’s a resounding clap as his hand hits his chest, “this will work.”

Your eyes scan across the entire gym, easing when you catch sight of the group of boys you’d been sent after. After the managers noticed a select few still hadn’t come to grab dinner, they’d sent you promptly on their way after them (and specifically your team’s captain) without really letting you get a word in edgewise.

Nonetheless, you hadn’t had much to complain about. Because you were all too happy to have the chance to catch up with Kuroo. He had, of course, been lately busy with training camp going on.

You catch his eye, offering a bright smile as you make your way into the gym. All eyes fall on you at your intrusion, but Bokuto being the way he always is, continues on with his conversation with Kuroo, quite loudly if you were being honest.

“It’s honestly thanks to you, man,” he sends a jab to Kuroo’s side, “that that puppy is now safe and all warm and happy in it’s new home. Without you, it would’ve probably starved, maybe even to death, and--”

Sending a look Kuroo’s way at Bokuto’s words, to which the man only blushes, you come to a stop in front of the two, as the other’s gather around them. “Hello boys,” you greet warmly, tilting your head to the side in a greeting that has Kuroo’s stomach fluttering with butterflies of all things and he’s almost completely enamored by the presence of you.

“Y/N/N!”

At least until he nearly goes deaf at Bokuto’s boisterous greeting.

Kuroo straightens out the second Bokuto’s arm leaves his shoulders, letting out a small sigh at the relief it puts on his already tired muscles. But Bokuto seems all too oblivious, his attention now fully on you as the rest stare on in wonder. Well, at least, Lev and Tsukishima seem curious, Akaashi looks like this is a daily occurrence for him.

“I did not see you come in at all,” he adds, putting a little too much emphasis on his words.

You just seemed confused, baffled even -- which was a lot given that Bokuto didn’t really make sense most of the time. And Kuroo can’t help the small smile that curls onto his lips when you once again look towards him for some kind of guidance, to which he simply shrugs, and the two of you, in his opinion, share your own little moment.

“Ah, well, anyways,” you laugh lightly, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear and Kuroo shamelessly watches the movement of your hand with great focus. “I came to grab you guys because they’re about to put dinner away and start cleaning up for the night and I didn’t want you--ahh!”

A squeak leaves your lips as you’re all but suddenly swept up into a pair of strong arms, your feet leaving to comfortable ground beneath you completely. It takes you a moment, a blink or two before you realize it’s Bokuto whose got you all wrapped up in his arms, cheering loudly; “you’re an absolute savior, Y/N/N! I’m starving!”

Frowning, Kuroo steps forward; “put her down, dumbass. Before you drop her.”

Bokuto heeds, but the second you’re back on your own two feet, a little dizzy if nothing else, he’s sending a pout the boys way. “Moo... You’re so cruel, Kuroo.” But his sadness doesn’t last as Akaashi simply reminds him the two of them better start heading towards the cafeteria before the foods all gone, pointing towards the door Lev and Tsukishima have already made their way out of.

“Hey hey hey!” Bokuto cheers, voice booming as he drags Akaashi along with him.

Kuroo and you watch the two run off, realizing a second later that it’s just the two of you left.

“Did you eat?” Kuroo asks you, pulling your attention on him as he moves forward.

You nod, smiling softly. “I ate with Kenma,” you explain, “and I put a plate aside for you.”

Kuroo’s eyes gleam. “How thoughtful,” he whistles, pressing a hand right above his heart before sending you a smirk. “I never thought you cared about me so much, Y/N/N.”

You flush lightly, “sh-shut up,” you huff, picking up the speed in your step. “I made one for Lev too, of course!”

But, in reality, you didn’t.

-

“Didn’t you save a kid from drowning once?”

It’s breakfast the next morning, and instantly you’re one sided focus on your breakfast is interrupted as Bokuto’s words drift towards you. Swallowing the food in your mouth, you look up from your spot across from the two boys, quirking a curious brow.

“You did?” You question, attention focused solely on Kuroo -- thus, you miss the sly grin that grows on Bokuto’s lips.

“Well, not--” He cuts off by a groan, Bokuto’s elbow hitting him directly in the gut and sending an unpleasant feeling throughout his entire body. Kuroo sends the boy a sharp glare, but he only responds with a harsher one, subtly tilting his head in your direction as if Kuroo was dumb.

Oh.

Oh...

so this was Bokuto’s plan? Come up with obscure heroic acts to brag about for the sake of impressing you for him... He had to admit it was a good plan, and not a complete lie. He had found a puppy once on the side of the street, but hadn’t necessarily nursed it back to health himself. And there was that one time his cousin had been drowning in the pool, but Kuroo had been too busy laughing at his misfortune to focus on saving him and oh-- what the hell.

Why not?

“I-I did, yes,” Kuroo nods, turning to you with a smirk. “My cousin.”

“That’s right,” Bokuto grins, clapping his hands. “Your mother went on and on about it that one time I came over. She wouldn’t stop gushing about how brave you were.” 

Kuroo eyes you and honestly, you seem a little skeptical if the narrowing of your eyes was any telling. But, you were smiling that cute little smile of yours and you seemed amused nonetheless -- not to mention your attention was focused on him, so, Kuroo felt Bokuto’s plan, despite how odd it seemed to compliment the idiot, was actually working.

“Well then,” you smile over at Kuroo, eyes twinkling with delight. “I’ll make sure to bring you along the next time I go swimming. I absolutely suck.”

Kuroo practically beams with praise.

“Of course!”

-

“Isn’t it kind of bad to... lie?”

“Nah, nah, see, my padawan,” Kuroo pointedly chooses to ignore that comment, “we’re not really lying. Just bending the truth a little.”

“It still seems wrong,” Kuroo frowns, “I don’t want her to be disappointed when she learns I’m not actually that amazing of a person.”

Frowning, Bokuto’s expression turns suddenly serious at that. He promptly sets his hand on his friends shoulder, squeezing tightly in what he’s sure is a reassuring way (but honestly, Kuroo is more weirded out then anything) and sends the boy a wistful look (he just looks like an owl) before nodding; “you aren’t.”

Kuroo blinks. Once, twice, and then all but rips Bokuto’s hand off of him; “what the hell man!”

“Don’t get mad,” Bokuto cries, holding his hands up in surrender. “I’m just telling the truth. We’ve painted you out to be some war hero or something--”

“Hardly.”

“--And you’re definitely not--”

“We don’t know that.”

“But fear not,” Bokuto grins, sending him a thumbs up, “my plan will work.”

And honestly, Kuroo figured it was too late to back out now.

-

“And then he pulled a itty-bitty-kitty from burning in a house--”

“Tetsuro?”

All falls silent as you speak, and Kuroo, wincing, turns to look at you. “Yes?”

Smile never faltering, you tilt your head to the side; “can I speak to you for a minute?”

“Um,” hating the way his chest tightens and everything seems to close in on him, Kuroo forces himself to respond. “O-Of course,” he nods, moving to walk in step with you but not without sending a pointed, somewhat panicked look back at Bokuto who seems plainly oblivious to the fact that they’ve been caught in their lie as he sends him a grin and a thumbs up.

This was so not good.

You don’t stop until the two of you are out of the gym, in the cool night air, away from any prying eyes or ears to listen in on the conversation. Kuroo finds himself uncharacteristically nervous and he almost feels like he’s going to vomit as he prepares himself for your lecture.

You’d have every right, and that’s something he can’t argue against, and he curses himself because he knew he shouldn’t have let Bokuto continue spouting these absurd stories that were so clearly meant to brag and--

“You know you don’t have to make up absurd stories to get my attention right?”

And Kuroo blinks but you seem so entirely not angry that he’s stunned silent.

“I mean, I’ll admit I believed them at first,” you laugh lightly, and the sound of it is so soothing to Kuroo. “But honestly, there’s no need to try and get my attention because... because--” and then you falter, and Kuroo blinks as he notices your gaze lower and your cheeks warm, as if you’re embarrassed--

“I already notice you. Just the way you are.”

Did he... did he hear that correctly?

Was that... was that meant to be a confession?

You’d just confessed to him, and Kuroo’s so completely in his own head with disbelief that he doesn’t realize with each passing moment you’re growing more and more unsure.

“Unless,” you squeak, causing Kuroo to blink down at you. “Unless I misread the situation and you weren’t trying to get my attention. Which if that’s the case, i’m so--”

But you never finish because in the next second Kuroo’s lips are pressed firmly against your own and his arms are slipping around your waist, pulling you flush against him he pours his absolutely everything into that kiss like he’s being dying to do since you walk through those gym doors three years ago.

“Yes, operation get-Y/N-to-notice-Kuroo a success!”

“What an original name...”

“Were you watching us?”

“Bokuto!”

#haikyuu!! #haikyuu #haikyuu imagine #haikyuu x reader #hq #hq x reader #hq imagine #kuroo tetsuro #kuroo tetsuro imagine #kuroo tetsuro x reader #kuroo imagine #kuroo x reader #kuroo tetsuro x you #kuroo x you #kuroo scenarios #imagine #imagines #my fics

[ladyloveandjustice]

Spring 2021 anime overview: Quick Takes

Now for my Spring 2021 anime thoughts! I’ve decided from now on if a season’s like, 20- to-24 episodes I’m just going to wait ‘til it’s done to review it unless I feels super passionately, so though I watched To Your Eternity (it’s good!) and MHA (eh), I’ll comment on them next time. Also, for the record, I watched the first eight eps of Joran: Princess and Snow of Blood but I dropped it because it had clearly crossed the line from entertainingly dumb to boring dumb. 

I will probably give Supercub and some other stuff a shot later, this was a stacked season! May give updates on all that later, but this is what I have for now.

ODDTAXI

Quick Summary: A mild mannered middle-aged walrus taxi driver is drawn into a case involving a missing girl, yakuza, Youtube clout-chasers, manzai comedians and idols with big secrets.

It’s rare to walk away from media and be like “that is a singular experience I will definitely never see repeated again” but ODDTAXI is definitely one of those. A tense noir thriller murder mystery starring cartoon animals that spends an entire episode detailing the one (cat)man’s very fall into darkness triggered by addiction to gacha games and an online auction for a novelty eraser? Also there’s a porcupine Yakuza who speaks entirely in rap? Also there’s tons of meandering conversations about stuff like manzai comedy and the struggle to go viral on Twitter?

Admittedly, I had a hard time getting into the first episode, the dry meandering humor not being enough to hold my attention while I was sitting still, but once I watched this while I was working out at the end of the season, I found it an easy binge. A ton of characters with dark secrets or dangerous ambitions, each with their own part to play in a tableau of intersecting events- and it all actually comes together really well.(As for the female characters, it’s a pretty dude driven story, but they do get nuanced characterization and even some good heroic moments from one of them.)

 It’s a great example of a carefully planned narrative paying off, with all the twists appropriately seeded and foreshadowed to reward viewers who paid attention. Even when it ended on a perfect “OH SHIT” moment and denied me closure, I couldn’t help but respect it. If you that all sounds interesting to you, definitely check out the first couple episodes and see if you like it- you’re likely to have a memorable, satisfying experience!

Shadows House

Quick Summary: Emilyko is a ‘living doll’ who’s told she was created to act as the ‘face’ of her shadow master, Kate. The shadows and their ‘dolls’ all reside on the mansion and are required to pass a ‘debut’ to prove they’re a good pairing. If they don’t pass, they might be disposed of. And so the mystery of the Shadow mansion grows...

This slice of gothic intrigue was my favorite of the season, tied with ODDTAXI. With an interesting premise, slightly tense undertones and a strong focus on character building and relationships, it kept me hooked the whole way through. And for any squeamish fans put off by the hype about it, don’t worry, while there are some suspenseful elements, I wouldn’t qualify it as horror. I thought the relationship between Kate and Emilyko might end up being a completely sinister one, but it’s thankfully a lot more complex than that and it’s really interesting to follow how both their characters and relationship grow. The focus of the show is, unsurprisingly, on the “dolls” slowly discovering their autonomy and personhood as they struggle under the rigid system imposed on them by the mysterious elders of this weird Victorian mansion. Can they develop a more equitable relationship with their shadow “masters” (who are also shown to suffer under this system)? There’s a lot to dig into there, and the show has the characters develop through learning to understand and appreciate each other, which is pretty heartwarming. Our hero, Emilyko, is the typical plucky ball of sunshine (they even nickname her sunshine), but she’s also shown to be clever in her own off-the-wall way and she bounces off the far more subdued and cynical Kate well, not to mention the other ‘dolls’ she ends up befriending. 

What’s more, the show spends plenty of time to developing several other character pairings and combinations, and they all have their own interesting dynamic that makes you want to see more of them. Same-gender bonds are at the forefront of this show, and many of them are ripe for queer readings (I definitely appreciated the healthy helping of ladies carrying ladies), but even outside that it’s nice to see a show where a strong, complex bond between girls is at the forefront. My only real complaints about the show are the anime original ending is noticeably a bit rushed (though it’s not too bad, and leaves room for a season 2) and I wish the animation used the whole “shadow” theme more strikingly (like the opening and endings do)- instead the colors are a bit washed out which makes the shadows blend into the background sometimes. The “debut” arc also drags a bit in places, but it makes up for it by having a lot of good character integration.

I hope to check out the (full color)! manga soon and see more of this quirky, shadowy story. There’s some physical abuse depicted, sad things happening to characters and naturally the whole “oppressive familial system” thing, but otherwise not much I can think of to warn about. I give this one a big rec, especially If you’re a fan of gothic fairytales and stories of self discovery.  

Zombie Land Saga Revenge

Quickest summary: In this sequel season, everyone’s favorite zombie idol group must claw their way back into prominence after a disastrous show- the fate of the Saga prefecture LITERALLY depends on it!

This was a fun follow-up to the first season- if you liked the first zombie-girl romp, you’ll probably enjoy this one. In fact, there were a couple areas it improved on- namely, Kotaro failed, ate crow and embarrassed himself a lot more this season, which made him more likeable (as did the fact the girls gained a lot of independence from him). This season also shed more light on what the ‘goal’ of this zombie raising project is and what kind of shit Kotaro got involved with to make this happen, and it’s appropriately off-the-wall and ridiculous. We finally got some backstory for Yugiri too! I wish it had focused on more of her interiority, but she got to be a badass in it, and it was a treat to see this zombie idol show turn into a period piece for a couple episodes (also her song ruled).

 Tae also got a cute focus episode and there was a particular SMASHING performance early on! Also That revelation last season that had the potential to turn creepy hasn’t yet, and hopefully never will. The finale was heartwarming with big hints of more drama to come- I’m definitely down for more zombie hijinks!

Vivy: Flourite Eye’s Song

Quickest Summary: A songstress AI named DIVA (nicknamed Vivy) is approached by another AI named Matsumoto, who says he’s from the future and they must work together to prevent AI exterminating all of humankind 100 years from now.

This show is absolutely gorgeous visually with some really nice action scenes, but when it comes to the story my feelings basically amount to a shrug. It’s fine! I guess! Vivy starts out as an interesting layered character- and I guess still is by the end- with her stoic but stubborn determination bouncing off her fast-talking bossy partner Matsumoto well. She never listens to him, which is delightful. The way the show took place over the course of 100 years was an interesting conceit as well. However, it bought up a lot of themes and then sort of... dropped them. For instance, Vivy interprets her mission (PRIME DIRECTIVE if you will) as protecting humans at all costs, no matter how destructive said humans are or what their fate is supposed to be, and is perfectly willing to murder her fellow androids to do this, showing she inherently thinks of androids (herself and her own people!) as less worthy. Which is a little alarming! There’s a very dramatic point in the show where they bring this up as a potential conflict for her character but then it’s sort of...dropped. Pretty much.

Actually, despite the premise, the show doesn’t dip into the “AI rights” as much as you think it would with the main theme being more about Vivy’s search to find her own creativity and discover what it means to ‘pour your heart into something’. Vivy herself doesn’t actually care if she has rights or anything. Which is in some ways fine, because ‘AI as an oppressed class’ has been done to death, but IT’S ALSO KIND OF IN THE PREMISE, so that means that the show just shrugs really hard at a lot of the questions it brings up  basically just going “humans and AI should work together probably” and that’s it. There’s a lot that feels underexplored. The antagonists in the show also either have motivations that don’t really make sense or have boring hackneyed motivations. In the finale in particular, it feels like a lot of things happen “just because” and it falls a little flat.

I also have to warn that one of the arcs focus on a robot ‘pairing’ where the dude-coded robots actions toward his partner are straight up awful and rob her of her autonomy, but it’s played like a tragic love story. I suppose you could read it differently too, but it definitely made me go ‘ew’ the story seemed to want me to sympathize with this robo dude,

Overall, I wouldn’t anti-recommend this show, it’s an all right little sci-fic romp (and definitely SUPER pretty). My favorite element was definitely the episodes where Vivy develops an entirely new (an loveable) personality, because it played with the idea of of an AI getting “rebooted” really well and interplay between her two “selves” was done really well. But there are a lot of other parts of the show that just feel...a little underexplored and empty, making me have an ‘eh’ feeling on the show overall. It’s definitely an ambitious project, and while it didn’t quite stick the landing, there’s something to be said for a show that shoots for the stars and falls short over a show that just languishes in mediocrity.

Fruits Basket The Final

Quick summary: The final season of that dramatic drama about that weird family with a zodiac curse and the girl who loves them.

It’s very weird that after not cutting a lot out, they kinda sped through some material for, you know, the finale. I guess they thought they couldn’t stretch this final arc to 26 episodes? Or weren’t cleared for another double cour? However, though there were a couple places that felt awkward, despite being a bit condensed it mostly held together pretty well for a D R A M A T I C and ultimately heartwarming conclusion. I was really disappointed they kept the part where Ritsu cut their hair for the ‘happy ending’, I thought  their intro episode not showing them in men’s clothes meant the anime had decided their presentation didn’t need to be “fixed” but WELL I GUESS NOT. That was the only big upset for me though, otherwise the adaptation went about how I expected, sticking to the source material. Furuba has a lot of bumps, from weird age gap stuff to ...gender, but it also has a lot of important feels and great character arcs. It was a gateway shoujo for many and has its important place in animanga history, so I’m glad it finally got a shiny, full adaptation.

#anime overview #spring 2021 anime #shadows house #oddtaxi #zombie land saga #fruits basket #vivy: fluorite eye's song #zombie land saga revenge #fruits basket the final #anime #my reviews #long post

[persepholline]

I've read that article about the romanticization of the Darkling and while I absolutely understand people who are pissed off/sad and I agree that it's shitty, I find LB's attitude towards Darkles stans very funny in a "girl what are you doing" sort of way because it's so petty like I've never heard of a bestselling author writing a portion of their fans into their books as a crazy cult before, it clearly hit a nerve

I'm new to the fandom but the feeling I get is she wrote something problematic ten years ago and became very embarrassed about it afterwards so she turned on the fans that liked it as a way to absolve herself. Especially since fandoms in general have become a lot more focused on discussion of what constitutes healthy/acceptable relationships to write about. And in a way I get it I had a huge Twilight phase in high school and afterwards I was super embarassed about it because of how problematic and cringe it was. But now with distance and more maturity I'm able to both still see why it was problematic and also why I was drawn to it (mostly the very unhinged representation of female desire) and like...it's really not the end of the world and no it never made me believe that breaking into somebody's room at night to watch them sleep was actually ok in real life lmao. This feels so obvious to me but apparently it needs to be said.

(More under the break this is turning into an essay, I've been thinking of this a lot recently)

And of course it's good to have these discussions about how historically romance tropes have echoed social dynamics of men's shitty behavior being romanticized and excused. But these days they often are so simplistic and focused on chasing clout that they become this weird new puritanism and moral panic about oh now women are reading novels it's going to make them hysterical or something

So you have these weird assumptions that you can't like a character and also be critical of their actions, or enjoy certain parts of a character and not others, or wish they were written differently and like them more for their potential (which I'm sure stings a bit for an author lol) - it assumes that if you like a character it means you would approve of their actions in real life, or that people just stupidly reproduce whatever they see on TV. That tendency to treat fictional characters like real people is the thing that actually worries me, to be honest, because it indicates a lack of distance and critical capacities regarding how stories are used and received. But people - fans and authors - are so scared of being called out as problematic and harassed for it that they're going to shy away from any nuance.

And yeah I think that it's good that standards of what constitutes an ideal relationship are evolving and becoming more feminist and communicative and all that and we definitely need more of that. But not all fiction has to be aspirational! Sometimes you just want to read about fucked up shit, because it's cathartic or fascinating, even healing at times because with fiction you are absolutely in control and can choose when to close the book. Toxic relationships in fiction can have an appeal specifically because they go to extremes of feeling that we don't want to go to in reality, in exactly the same way as horror movies or very violent action movies - which I don't see a lot of people besides fundamentalist Christians argue that they turn you into violent psychopaths (and that feels very obviously sexist). And for women, who are often taught growing up that love is the purpose of life, the "saving someone with your ability to love" can be a power fantasy in the same way that being a buff superhero who saves the day with their capacity for incredible violence can be a power fantasy for men. Still doesn't mean those women are going to fall in love with actual murderers or that those men are going to start beating up people at night. And love is scary, and weird, and weirdly close to horror at times, with all the potential for loss of self and being vulnerable and overwhelming feelings and potential for being horribly hurt and it should be possible for stories to explore that without anybody screaming about how this is going to Corrupt the Youth or something

And I mean I get it LB wanted to write a cautionary tale for teenagers, but it just did not work for reasons a lot of people have already written about - the fact that the Darkling is the leader of an oppressed minority and is the only one with a real political agenda to end that oppression in the first trilogy, the fact that he helps Alina come into her own power while her endgame LI is someone she keeps herself small for, that she's shamed for wanting power after growing up without any, a generally very wonky conception of privilege, and a lot of other stuff with yucky regressive implications to the point where stanning the villain actually feels liberating and empowering which is a surefire sign that the narrative is broken (unless it's a villain focused story lmao). But of course that Fanside article makes almost no mention of the political dynamics, it's all about interpersonal stuff which is an annoying trend in YA, there are those massive events happening in the background but it's made all about the feelings of the hero(ine) ; war as a self-development quest (which is kind of gross). Helnik is kind of an example of this too - I like them, I think they're fun ! But Matthias spends a big part of the story wanting to brutally murder Nina and her kind, and he mostly changes his mind because he finds her hot. Like you don't feel there is some sort of big revelation that his entire moral system and political framework is completely rotten ; it's all better because of feelings now.

As a teenager that kind of sanctimonious bullshit would have annoyed the hell out of me ; I read those books in my early twenties and I found the ending so stupid I wouldn't have trusted any message or life lessons coming from them. And I liked reading/watching dark stuff as a teenager, as a way to deal with the very intense inner turmoil I was dealing with - and I turned out fine ! Meanwhile I've seen several times women in very shitty relationships being obsessed with positive energies and stories ; they were so terrified of their life not being perfectly wholesome they ended up being delusional about their own situations.

Like personally I think the Darkling is a compelling, interesting, alluring character and also a manipulative, murderous piece of shit and that Alina should get to punish him (like in a sexy way) - but he's also the end result of centuries of war, oppression and trauma and reducing that to "toxic wounded boy" feels kind of offensive ngl ESPECIALLY since the books don't offer any kind of systemic analysis or response to oppression beyond "the bad guy should die" and "now the king/queen is a good guy our problems are solved!!!!"

In Lives of the Saints, we see how Yuri is abused extremely badly and almost killed by his father, and so when his father dies when the Fold swallows Novokribirsk, he thinks the Starless Saint has saved him. Later in KoS/RoW he's turned into this fanatic who explains away all the Darkling's crimes. The other followers talk about how the Starless Saint will bring equality for all men. Then the Darkling comes back and actually thinks his followers are pathetic, which feels again like a very pointed message to his IRL stans. Which is absolutely hilarious to me. Like oh no, if he was real he would not like you and think you're pathetic ! Yeah ...but he's not. Real. Damn right he would not like the fics where Alina puts him on a leash. I'm still going to read them. What is he going to do about it, jump out of the page ? Jfjfjjdhfgfjfj

Anyway I think the intended message is "assholes will use noble political causes for their own gain and to manipulate people" and "being abused/oppressed is not an excuse to behave badly." Which. Sure. But that's kind of like...a tired take, honestly ? A big number of villains nowadays are like this ; either they've been bullied as kids, or they're part of an oppressed group, or they have "good ideals but too extreme". This is not surprising because a lot of mainstream heroic narratives present clinging to the status quo as Good and change as chaotic and dangerous. And like sure in real life people often do bad shit because they're wounded and in danger. But if you want to do a story like that, you have to do it with nuance, talk about cycles of violence, about how society creates vulnerable people to be exploited, about how privilege gives you more choices and the luxury of morals, etc. The Grishaverse does not have this level of nuance (maybe in SoC a little bit but definitely not in TGT). So it kind of comes off as "trauma makes you evil" and "egalitarianism is dangerous" and "if you're abused/oppressed you're not allowed to fight back". And ignores the fact that historically, evil generally comes from unchecked privilege.

I guess my point is that there are many things I like about LB's writing, she knows how to create these really exciting character dynamics, and the world she has created is fascinating. But these stories are not a great starting point for imparting moral lessons. And her best characters tend to be, at least in canon, the morally grey ones. I hope one day she'll be at peace with the fact that she wrote the Darkling the way she did and leave his fans alone but in the meantime I'm just not going to take this whole thing seriously I'm sorry

#darklina #the darkling #alina starkov #aleksander morozova

[whitehotharlots]

The point is control

Whenever we think or talk about censorship, we usually conceptualize it as certain types of speech being somehow disallowed: maybe (rarely) it's made formally illegal by the government, maybe it's banned in certain venues, maybe the FCC will fine you if you broadcast it, maybe your boss will fire you if she learns of it, maybe your friends will stop talking to you if they see what you've written, etc. etc. 

This understanding engenders a lot of mostly worthless discussion precisely because it's so broad. Pedants--usually arguing in favor of banning a certain work or idea--will often argue that speech protections only apply to direct, government bans. These bans, when they exist, are fairly narrow and apply only to those rare speech acts in which other people are put in danger by speech (yelling the N-word in a crowded theater, for example). This pedantry isn't correct even within its own terms, however, because plenty of people get in trouble for making threats. The FBI has an entire entrapment program dedicated to getting mentally ill muslims and rednecks to post stuff like "Death 2 the Super bowl!!" on twitter, arresting them, and the doing a press conference about how they heroically saved the world from terrorism. 

Another, more recent pedant's trend is claiming that, actually, you do have freedom of speech; you just don't have freedom from the consequences of speech. This logic is eerily dictatorial and ignores the entire purpose of speech protections. Like, even in the history's most repressive regimes, people still technically had freedom of speech but not from consequences. Those leftist kids who the nazis beheaded for speaking out against the war were, by this logic, merely being held accountable. 

The two conceptualizations of censorship I described above are, 99% of the time, deployed by people who are arguing in favor of a certain act of censorship but trying to exempt themselves from the moral implications of doing so. Censorship is rad when they get to do it, but they realize such a solipsism seems kinda icky so they need to explain how, actually, they're not censoring anybody, what they're doing is an act of righteous silencing that's a totally different matter. Maybe they associate censorship with groups they don't like, such as nazis or religious zealots. Maybe they have a vague dedication toward Enlightenment principles and don't want to be regarded as incurious dullards. Most typically, they're just afraid of the axe slicing both ways, and they want to make sure that the precedent they're establishing for others will not be applied to themselves.

Anyone who engages with this honestly for more than a few minutes will realize that censorship is much more complicated, especially in regards to its informal and social dimensions. We can all agree that society simply would not function if everyone said whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted. You might think your boss is a moron or your wife's dress doesn't look flattering, but you realize that such tidbits are probably best kept to yourself. 

Again, this is a two-way proposition that everyone is seeking to balance. Do you really want people to verbalize every time they dislike or disagree with you? I sure as hell don't. And so, as part of a social compact, we learn to self-censor. Sometimes this is to the detriment of ourselves and our communities. Most often, however, it's just a price we have to pay in order to keep things from collapsing. 

But as systems, large and small, grow increasingly more insane and untenable, so do the comportment standards of speech. The disconnect between America's reality and the image Americans have of themselves has never been more plainly obvious, and so striving for situational equanimity is no longer good enough. We can't just pretend cops aren't racist and the economy isn't run by venal retards or that the government places any value on the life of its citizens. There's too much evidence that contradicts all that, and the evidence is too omnipresent. There's too many damn internet videos, and only so many of them can be cast as Russian disinformation. So, sadly, we must abandon our old ways of communicating and embrace instead systems that are even more unstable, repressive, and insane than the ones that were previously in place.

Until very, very recently, nuance and big-picture, balanced thinking were considered signs of seriousness, if not intelligence. Such considerations were always exploited by shitheads to obfuscate things that otherwise would have seemed much less ambiguous, yes, but this fact alone does not mitigate the potential value of such an approach to understanding the world--especially since the stuff that's been offered up to replace it is, by every worthwhile metric, even worse.

So let's not pretend I'm Malcolm Gladwell or some similarly slimy asshole seeking to "both sides" a clearcut moral issue. Let's pretend I am me. Flash back to about a year ago, when there was real, widespread, and sustained support for police reform. Remember that? Seems like forever ago, man, but it was just last year... anyhow, now, remember what happened? Direct, issues-focused attempts to reform policing were knocked down. Blotted out. Instead, we were told two things: 1) we had to repeat the slogan ABOLISH THE POLICE, and 2) we had to say it was actually very good and beautiful and nonviolent and valid when rioters burned down poor neighborhoods.

Now, in a relatively healthy discourse, it might have been possible for someone to say something like "while I agree that American policing is heavily violent and racist and requires substantial reforms, I worry that taking such an absolutist point of demanding abolition and cheering on the destruction of city blocks will be a political non-starter." This statement would have been, in retrospect, 100000000% correct. But could you have said it, in any worthwhile manner? If you had said something along those lines, what would the fallout had been? Would you have lost friends? Your job? Would you have suffered something more minor, like getting yelled at, told your opinion did not matter? Would your acquaintances still now--a year later, after their political project has failed beyond all dispute--would they still defame you in "whisper networks," never quite articulating your verbal sins but nonetheless informing others that you are a dangerous and bad person because one time you tried to tell them how utterly fucking self-destructive they were being? It is undeniably clear that last year's most-elevated voices were demanding not reform but catharsis. I hope they really had fun watching those immigrant-owned bodegas burn down, because that’s it, that will forever be remembered as the most palpable and consequential aspect of their shitty, selfish movement. We ain't reforming shit. Instead, we gave everyone who's already in power a blank check to fortify that power to a degree you and I cannot fully fathom.

But, oh, these people knew what they were doing. They were good little boys and girls. They have been rewarded with near-total control of the national discourse, and they are all either too guilt-ridden or too stupid to realize how badly they played into the hands of the structures they were supposedly trying to upend.

And so left-liberalism is now controlled by people whose worldview is equal parts superficial and incoherent. This was the only possible outcome that would have let the system continue to sustain itself in light of such immense evidence of its unsustainability without resulting in reform, so that's what has happened.

But... okay, let's take a step back. Let's focus on what I wanted to talk about when I started this.

I came across a post today from a young man who claimed that his high school English department head had been removed from his position and had his tenure revoked for refusing to remove three books from classrooms. This was, of course, fallout from the ongoing debate about Critical Race Theory. Two of those books were Marjane Satropi's Persepolis and, oh boy, The Diary of Anne Frank. Fuck. Jesus christ, fuck.

Now, here's the thing... When Persepolis was named, I assumed the bannors were anti-CRT. The graphic novel does not deal with racism all that much, at least not as its discussed contemporarily, but it centers an Iranian girl protagonist and maybe that upset Republican types. But Anne Frank? I'm sorry, but the most likely censors there are liberal identiarians who believe that teaching her diary amounts to centering the suffering of a white woman instead of talking about the One Real Racism, which must always be understood in an American context. The super woke cult group Black Hammer made waves recently with their #FuckAnneFrank campaign... you'd be hard pressed to find anyone associated with the GOP taking a firm stance against the diary since, oh, about 1975 or so.

So which side was it? That doesn't matter. What matters is, I cannot find out.

Now, pro-CRT people always accuse anti-CRT people of not knowing what CRT is, and then after making such accusations they always define CRT in a way that absolutely is not what CRT is. Pro-CRTers default to "they don't want  students to read about slavery or racism." This is absolutely not true, and absolutely not what actual CRT concerns itself with. Slavery and racism have been mainstays of American history curriucla since before I was born. Even people who barely paid attention in school would admit this, if there were any more desire for honesty in our discourse. 

My high school history teacher was a southern "lost causer" who took the south's side in the Civil War but nonetheless provided us with the most descriptive and unapologetic understandings of slavery's brutalities I had heard up until that point. He also unambiguously referred to the nuclear attacks on Hiroshmia and Nagasaki as "genocidal." Why? Because most people's politics are idiosyncratic, and because you cannot genuinely infer a person to believe one thing based on their opinion of another, tangentially related thing. The totality of human understanding used to be something open-minded people prided themselves on being aware of, believe it or not...

This is the problem with CRT. This is is the motivation behind the majority of people who wish to ban it. It’s not because they are necessarily racist themselves. It’s because they recognize, correctly, that the now-ascendant frames for understanding social issues boils everything down to a superficial patina that denies not only the realities of the systems they seek to upend but the very humanity of the people who exist within them. There is no humanity without depth and nuance and complexities and contradictions. When you argue otherwise, people will get mad and fight back. 

And this is the most bitter irony of this idiotic debate: it was never about not wanting to teach the sinful or embarrassing parts of our history. That was a different debate, one that was settled and won long ago. It is instead an immense, embarrassing overreach on behalf of people who have bullied their way to complete dominance of their spheres of influence within media and academe assuming they could do the same to everyone else. Some of its purveyors may have convinced themselves that getting students to admit complicity in privilege will prevent police shootings, sure. But I know these people. I’ve spoken to them at length. I’ve read their work. The vast, vast majority of them aren’t that stupid. The point is to exert control. The point is to make sure they stay in charge and that nothing changes. The point is failure. 

[eretzyisrael]

An extinguished, precious life remembered in Melbourne

Twenty years ago we started the endless process of adjusting to life without our delightful first-born daughter Malka Chana - Malki to her friends - stolen from us before she reached her sixteenth birthday.

Our copy of the Melbourne Herald-Sun's front page report on August 11, 2001 isdamaged. We are trying to acquire a repairedimage.

It wasn't an illness or a tragic accident that removed Malki from the warm embrace of those who loved her. It was a gang of ideology-crazed thugs led by a chillingly satanic Jordanian woman, armed with a powerful explosive package disguised as a human being, an Arab man in his twenties, and egged on by millions of backers.

Those millions still exert a deeply painful influence on our lives.

We scan the Arabic social media six days a week. This week on the day of the twentieth anniversary we saw - though we didn't need it - plenty of evidence of how utterly different the world in which they live their lives is from ours in this generations-long war of terror.

It's a war that Arabs launched against against Jews in Palestine long before the name Palestine was appropriated by the Arab side. And decades before the State of Israel announced its existence as new-born state on the 1948 day the British Mandate ended and six Arab armies invaded.

A random selection of some deeply hostile and ugly anniversary messages appearing on Twitter (minus the links - we have interest in giving these people any traffic or attention):

Today marks the twentieth anniversary of Operation Sbarro carried out by the martyr Izz Al-Din Al-Masri in Jaffa Street in occupied Jerusalem with the help of the liberated captive Ahlam Al-Tamimi in retaliation for the martyrdom of the two leaders Gamal Selim and Jamal Mansour [Arabic]

..A martyrdom operation in the Sbarro restaurant in Jerusalem which led to the deaths of 20 Zionists and the wounding of 100 [Arabic]

We do not want to forget the liberated captive, Ahlam Al-Tamimi, who carried the attacker of the Sbarro restaurant, Izz Al-Din Al-Masri, to the restaurant after which she was arrested by the occupation army [Arabic]

Prepare it for them in the manner of the people of Aqaba and serve it [pizza] hot and delicious. Al-Masri [the name of the human bomb], go through here. Occupied Jerusalem August 9, 2001 [Arabic]

Proud of our representative from the family in the heroic operation. The liberated captive, Ahlam Al-Tamimi, who transported the martyr Izz Al-Din Al-Masri and handed him a guitar stuffed with maddening death [Arabic - posted by a male with the surname Tamimi]

...Al-Masri was killed on the responsibility of the Jews and their responsibility is extensive [Arabic]

If her parents hadn’t chosen to become foreign invaders she’d probably be alive now

My argument is with the creation of an apartheid theocratic state created by the West (mostly by the US and Britain) in Palestine largely so Jews wouldn't immigrate to the US. I'm a Jew not an Israeli Zionist. She should never have been put in this position by her dad.

We saw no Arabic messages condemning or criticizing Tamimi or the massacre. They might exist and we're just not seeing them, but the truth is we have been looking for years and not finding.

Malki, like her father, was born in Australia. The current edition of the Australian Jewish News, a weekly community-focused newspaper, ran this editorial on Thursday. It's reprinted with the permission of its editor, Zeddy Lawrence.

‘A precious life extinguished’

"THE Australian Jewish community was in mourning this week," reported The AJN 20 years ago, on Friday, August 17, 2001. "The death of 15-year-old Malki Roth in the Sbarro bombing catapulted Israel's crisis into personal grief for much of this community."

Fifteen innocent people were killed in the terrorist attack just a few days earlier, when a guitar case packed with nails was detonated at the central Jerusalem pizza restaurant. Among the victims were seven people aged between just two and 16. Scores of other diners were wounded.

Reflecting on the death of his daughter at the time, Arnold Roth told The AJN, "This was the extinguishing of a precious life."

Ahlam Aref Ahmad Al-Tamimi, who masterminded the attack and drove the bomber to the restaurant, was apprehended by Israel soon afterwards and sentenced to 16 life terms in an Israeli jail. But in 2011, she was one of more than 1000 Palestinian prisoners freed in exchange for the release of Gilad Shalit, who had been held hostage in Gaza for five years.

Since that time, Tamimi has lived in Jordan, feted as a celebrity, and expressing her joy at the high death toll the Sbarro bombing inflicted.

Determined to bring her back to justice, Arnold and his American-born wife Frimet have long called for her to be extradited to the US, as Malki and another victim held American citizenship.

A warrant was issued, but insisting the extradition treaty between the countries was never ratified, Jordan has never acted on it.

The latest evidence, however, appears to show that the treaty was indeed signed.

With that in mind, as the community marks 20 years since Malki's death, the Roths are hoping their sustained campaign may bear fruit.

Pressure is mounting within Washington for the US to withhold foreign assistance from Jordan, and they're urging the Australian government – who they claim have been reticent to speak out – to also take a stand.

Twenty years on, we share their hope that the authorities, both here and Stateside, will take action, so that the unrepentant, bragging terrorist who has Malki's blood on her hands will soon be back behind bars, where she belongs.

The same AJN edition carried this article by senior journalist Peter Kohn:

Still seeking justice for Malki Roth

ON the 20th of Av this year (July 29), Arnold and Frimet Roth visited the Israeli grave of Malki Roth and recited Kaddish. It was their daughter’s yahrzeit – 20 years after the Australian-born teenager was murdered in a Palestinian terrorist attack at a Jerusalem pizzeria, along with 15 others, including seven children.

“Life was heavy,” Malki’s father told The AJN this week, reflecting on the yahrzeit. “You’re missing somebody desperately and feel awful about the fact that she’s not part of your life.”

But this Monday, August 9, the secular anniversary of Malki’s killing, Roth was back on Zoom and on the phone continuing his relentless campaign to see Ahlam Tamimi, the mastermind of the attack, extradited from Jordan to the US. “The ninth of August … that’s all about justice,” he stated.

Tamimi had picked out the Sbarro pizzeria targeted by her and another bomber on August 9, 2001, her accomplice dying in the attack. Tamimi left the scene disguised as a tourist, later professing her glee as the ever-rising death toll was reported.

Although sentenced in Israel to 16 consecutive life terms, she was exchanged in a 2011 prisoner swap to free Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit from Hamas captivity. She continues to be feted as a media celebrity in Jordan, and, according to Roth, she recently added a regular newspaper column to her stint as a Jordanian TV show host.

In the US, she faces charges relating to the death of two American citizens – Malki, who held dual citizenship, being one of them – and an extradition request was issued in 2017.

But four years on, Roth is still battling three governments to get Tamimi extradited.

For years, the US had maintained its hands were tied because Jordan had not ratified its extradition treaty, a position stated by a Jordanian court in 2017. However, in 2019, Roth learned from an American official that Jordan had indeed ratified the treaty as far back as 1995.

Last year, under US freedom-of-information laws, he even received an archived letter from Jordan’s former monarch King Hussein to the US State Department confirming that fact. He is hopeful this legal development will provide a much needed stepping stone.

Desperate for the Australian government to weigh in, Roth’s entreaties to Malcolm Turnbull when he was PM did not bear fruit. Approaches to Prime Minister Scott Morrison last year were referred to Foreign Minister Marise Payne, whose office cited constitutional problems in Jordan with extraditing its nationals, an assertion Roth rejects because oddly “it goes beyond what the Jordanians say”.

In Israel meanwhile, Roth says his fight to have Tamimi extradited to the US has been “betrayed by a chain of Netanyahu governments and, so far at least, by the new government. Of course, Israel could do something. But Israel has no charges against this woman. Israel has washed its hands of the case.”

Roth’s growing perception is that justice for Malki has become expendable to higher policy priorities in Jerusalem, Washington and Canberra.

“There’s a lot of group-think going on – among Israelis, among Americans, among media people,” he said, describing Tamimi as “the most wanted female fugitive alive today”.

The Roths maintain their ties to the families of other victims of the Sbarro bombing, particularly to a victim who remains “in a vegetative state”, he said.

Arnold remains honorary chair of the Malki Foundation, established in his daughter’s memory to support children with disabilities. Malki had been a caring, loving companion to her severely disabled younger sister and others with special needs.

“A 15-year-old girl who had a legacy – it’s unbelievable, but she did,” exclaimed Roth. “She was so good, so empathetic, so involved in making the world better for children with special needs.”

This blog isn't a memorial to our daughter. That function belongs to the website of the Malki Foundation (www.kerenmalki.org). We hope you will visit it.

In the context of terrorism and the worldwide efforts to defeat it, we write here at the site you are now visiting about our efforts to bring Malki's killers to justice - in particular Ahlam Tamimi. the Jordanian orchestrator of the massacre at Sbarro twenty years ago.

Tamimi, now 41 years old and a celebrity in the Arab world, lives free and famous in her homeland despite being the world's most woman female fugitive with a $5M reward issued by the US State Department for her capture and conviction.

One valuable way to give us your support is to sign our petition at change.org/ExtraditeTamimi

#AJN #Australia #Herald Sun #Jordan #JusticeForMalki #melbourne #Rewards for Justice #Sbarro #State Department