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bigskydreaming · 3 years

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Hi, I was reading your post about Jason punching Dick in the face when Dick revealed he fake his death was bullshit ( which it was) and it reminded me of an issue/question that has bothered me for sometime.

Why did people believe Dick was actually dead?

I’m not the most avid comic reader so maybe I missed something but it was always weird to me that everyone just accepted this especially given how Bruce was acting or should I say wasn’t acting.

This is a man when his child died another child had to come along and told him sir you are being too violent and emotional you need supervision. When his other child died he went all over the universe to bring him back to life because he knew it was possible ( which was happening at the same time), so why didn’t anyone think it was weird he wasn’t doing that for Dick. Can you imagine Dick really dying that soon after Damian it would be injustice Batman Version. You are telling me that Tim, Jason or Barbara didn’t think it was weird that Bruce didn’t also bring Dick’s corpse to the bring Damian back to life mission or mention it to themselves. Like what more likely Dick dead and Bruce is handling it well or that he fake his death to do something stupid and Dangerous after his partner/brother/ little bit my son the feelings are complicated died after he was knocked out and woke up to his corpse.

Oh man, this is like, the entire nature of my beef?

(Slight derail just to emphasize the fact real quick that Dick DID actually die, he was just revived quickly, but like, the trauma of his death was very real and its not like anyone was clued into Luthor having a resurrection backdoor built into his literal murder of Dick in the actual moment of it happening. So Dick’s death wasn’t fake, and additionally, he didn’t have anything to do with like, telling people about it, because he was literally comatose in the cave and recovering while Bruce was telling people....by the time Dick woke up in the cave, we already know that Alfred at least had already been convinced by Bruce that Dick was dead, so I have a kneejerk need to pushback against the Dick faked his death narrative by reminding people wherever possible that Dick had no agency in the spreading of that narrative.

It happened without him being involved, and the only actual contribution he ever made to it was just not revealing he was alive before Grayson #12, after Bruce like.....emotionally, mentally and physically badgered him into accepting that doing so would be directly harmful to his family and he didn’t want to be the reason more people died when like, people had just died because he ‘let’ himself be captured and interrogated by Power Woman’s Lasso of Submission, did he?

SORRY TO BE PEDANTIC, just wanted to start this off on a clarification, even though I know the aim of your ask was very much in tune with the rest of my response. A lot of people don’t read the actual comics, so like, I’m never gonna skip over an opportunity to emphasize that the shorthand people use to refer to Dick’s death and the year he was with Spyral, is like, literally just shorthand for describing it. Its not actually an accurate description of how all that went down and who had the most hand in it).

BUT ANYWAY. BACK TO THE MEAT OF THE BEEF.

Okay so like, not only was the entire family and Bruce himself giving Dick shit for his death and Spyral, like, PAINFULLY egregious because it was literal victim blaming in every possible sense of the word....

None of it made a LICK of sense with ANY of their characterizations, and they ONLY all accepted it on face value because the Plot Demanded It, and when you're like, no, as a reader I say The Plot Demanded It is not a good enough reason for me to be like well sure, that makes sense......looking at the characters ACTUAL actions at face value pretty much just makes them all look like assholes?

Like, Tim has never gracefully accepted anyone's death. Ever. This is core characterization for him. He will go to the ends of the earth for his loved ones and to bring them back, prove they're not dead, refuse to let death be the final verdict for them. He was tempted to use the Lazarus Pit to bring his parents back to life. He refused to accept Bruce was dead long before he had any proof whatsoever of that theory. He tried to clone his BFF/future-husband Kon in his fucking basement like, dude was two whole inches away from going Full Dark Side in his quest to bring back a lost loved one no matter WHAT the cost.....and then you've got Dick unmasked onscreen, killed offscreen, and Bruce then reporting to the rest of them with zero inflection 'oh Dick's dead now. Its very sad' and Tim's just like, sure. Sounds legit.

I mean?!?!

And you're SO RIGHT ABOUT THE DAMIAN THING! Bruce LITERALLY LITERALLY LITERALLY went BEYOND the ends of the Earth, like, he full on chartered a fucking space ship to fly his whole family out to APOKOLIPS to bring Damian back from the dead by going to EXTREME lengths.....WHILE everyone else thought Dick was dead....

And not a single person looked at Bruce and was like, okay, not that we're not down to do this for Damian because we miss Stabby Smurf something fierce ourselves, but.....what the fuck is UP with you dude? Why aren't you displaying ANY hint of this same kind of energy in regards to your eldest son that you said you watched die right in front of you?

Like....I don't know that we were actually ever told that Dick's coffin was empty or had a fake in it, but like....this family of detectives who refuse to accept death, defy death, COME BACK FROM THE DEAD....not a single one of them said like, okay, if I'm gonna like, ACCEPT accept that Dick is dead and gone for good, I need to at least just see him one last time? That's literally all it would have taken for someone to realize hey something's a little wonky here. Where's the dead body, Pops?

Since when has Jason ever missed an opportunity to prove Bruce is a) full of shit, b) acting like an emotionless robot and all his kids deserve better especially when they've just like....died, c) just factually incorrect and wrong and jumped to a conclusion before it was conclusively proved, d) lying like a liar or e) all of the above?

Nobody even ASKED if Dick's body could be put in a Lazarus Pit? Yeah, Jason wouldn't necessarily recommend it himself, given what it put him through, but actually fuck that, I take that back, because I'm NOT actually of the opinion that Jason full on hates his life and actively spends every second of every day wishing he hadn't been resurrected, even if it had come with a huge buffet of additional trauma and pain.

And that's kinda what's implied when people just take it for granted that he would never be on board with any scenario involving using a Lazarus Pit to bring Dick back, because it suggests that based even just on his own experiences and feelings, he honestly believes Dick would prefer being dead and not have ANY further opportunities to be with his loved ones, his friends, help save the damn world again at some future point.....that Jason, projecting based just off himself, legit feels Dick would rather be dead than have another shot at life even WITH the downsides of Lazarus Pit usage? Nope. Sorry, I don't buy it.

Speaking of not buying it.....you know what was missing from all those soliloquies the others monologued at Dick about how they felt and were hurt and just devastated by his death, to such a point they can't seem to muster a single shred of happiness that he's NOT dead still -

(seriously, Damian was the ONLY person in ALL THE LANDS OF EMOTION-HAVING who expressed ANY kind of positive reaction to having Dick back. We were so fucking cheated of like.....ANY opportunity to have the characters show just how much they valued him by just being fucking HAPPY he was alive, no matter what else was involved....and then most of fandom compounded that by for years being like mmmm, no, Dick didn't get yelled at enough by his family for what HE put THEM through. Needs more yelling. More punching too. Bad Dick. Bad. This is the only way you'll learn not to die and get shipped off on a mission that you don't want but at least is to protect your family after being beaten into it by your dad whilst victim blaming you for dying in the first place. WHEN WILL YOU LEARN TO THINK ABOUT OTHER PEOPLE AND THEIR FEELINGS FOR A CHANGE, DICK?!?)

- But like, BUT I DIGRESS aside....you know what was missing from all those monologues about how hard DICK'S death and ensuing year of basically exile from his loved ones was for EVERYONE BUT HIM?

We never got a single line of explanation as to what everyone else officially thinks even happened to him in the first place?

Like, did Bruce straight up just say oh bad news kids, your brother umm. Expired. Spontaneously. There's no one to blame, he just keeled over, its all very sad.

Is that how that went down?

You're telling me that the explanation of Dick's death didn't come with a single pointed finger at someone for this family of blame-happy vigilantes to like, BLAME for the loss of this brother they all mourned oh so much, they just couldn't help but blame him for all the hurt it caused them?

The family that in every other fic is like OBSESSED with avenging and being avenged and all things vengeful and even tangentially vengeance-y....like didn't ask for a single detail on whomst the fuck deprived us of our brother-having?

Where were the attempts on Luthor's life by Jason (who I mean, yeah I know it was in a previous continuity, but erasing that timeline doesn't erase my awareness of the time Dick killed Jason's murderer so like.....mmm, just saying, woulda been nice)....where was the rage directed at the Crime Syndicate and references to how seriously and personally the Batfam took making sure that they were PUNISHED for all this and would never be free to wreak havoc on their world or their family again? What did they tell Damian when he came back to life, and how are you going to tell me that this fraternal little ball of fury didn't aim himself like a cannonball at whomever the fuck had DARED take HIS Batman from him when Damian wasn't around to have his back?

Not only does everyone else's desire to be avenged start falling really flat the second you factor in hey maybe Dick feels "mmm what about MY avenging" sometimes, and why doesn't anyone ever care about doing that for him.....but also, y'know what REALLY sucks about the ONLY person we actually SEE being blamed for Dick's death and ensuing absence being like....Dick himself?

Not only were his family all super keen on making all of this HIS fault and HIM the bad guy because of how it made them all feeeeeeel (and meanwhile fuck his feelings, am I right Batfam hfaklshfklahfkla).....

They somehow found a way to justify prioritizing this OVER ever even getting around to blaming some villain for his death in the FIRST place, in the entire year or so they thought he was still dead!

Like, you couldn't come up with a single target in all that time, but Dick's back two seconds, and you don't even give him a chance to EXPLAIN before you're punching him, shutting him down with 'I expected better from you' and turning away with 'I don't want to hear it, why am I surprised Dick Grayson disappointed me again'?

afshklfhalfhalfhla

Make it make sense!

And like, it won't, cuz it doesn't, and it never will, and like I said at the top, the ONLY reason it all played out this way is because DC doesn't give a fuck about character development and deemed it necessary to go down this way for the sake of the plot (which was totes worth it, I mean, glad we sacrificed characters for this A+ plot which was clearly the greatest plot of all time and definitely justified every story choice made or not made around it loooool).

BUT.

BUT BUT BUT.

The problem isn't JUST that DC is stupid, even though that is an eternal mood and quite the problem.

Its that the SECOND large parts of fandom decided to play along with DC and just accept the story at face value, only add to it and play into it exactly as it happened in canon with no significant deviations, and like, heaping on the LITERAL abuse from Dick's siblings while ignoring the LITERAL abuse from his father....

THAT....is when all of this becomes relevant.

Because the second people decided TO engage with the reasoning DC gave for what Bruce did and how and what Dick did and how and just not mess with any of that and have it all play out exactly like that...

The second people are like, okay we're FINE with not just dismissing this story as OOC writing that doesn't make any sense, and actually VALIDATING it to various degrees by engaging with it as is....

That's when 'OOC writing' stops being an excuse or explanation for alllll of the above gaps in character logic and actions.

Because its like, when you had abundant chance to REJECT this story and say nope, this was bullshit from start to finish and I'm not here for it, when you were just as capable of transforming literally ANY aspect of this story you didn't like into something that made more sense to you....

And you chose not to.

That's.....accepting it as valid writing. You were like, okay, I'm game to just treat this as a thing that happened, just like they said that happened.

For the chance to give Dick shit for it, see. For the angst, see.

And that's when I'm like okay cool, so when engaging with this story as is and accepting it on face value and just delving into the characters as they were SHOWN interacting with and around these events......for the angst or whatever....

You guys just all decided en masse to just hop, skip and jump over allllllllll the opportunities for angst inherent in examining even ANY SINGLE ONE of the above lapses in judgment or hypocrisy on the parts of the characters (who don't get to be excused by OOC writing if you're not going to call the story an example of OOC writing, whoops).

And its just like, uh, what's up with that?

#lol thank you for this ask tho #I havent gone on a good Spyral rant in months #it does wonders for my pores

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sepublic · 4 years

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Campfire, Canyon of the Golden Winged Snakes, Hey Ho Whoa!

AMELIA IS BACK BABY!!!

Let me tell you, when I first saw her, I had to do a double-take… Like the way the characters just so casually passed her, I blinked and was like- Wait, was what Amelia?!? And then I realized it was, and I just… WHAT!

I was a bit afraid we wouldn’t see her, but it seems that she’s our NEW fourth companion, to replace Tuba… RIP to Tuba, you had a good funeral, and given the trajectory this season is going as of now, we… Really won’t see you again, huh?

Screw you Simon.

We’ve gotten SO many fascinating revelations in these three episodes… I can’t say I’m surprised at all that Amelia, or at least the revelation of her, would return to help Grace (and maybe Simon) resolve her issues! That was a very neat twist with the massive pile of numbers actually indicating it was AMELIA and her monumental issues, not the Apex! Very clever of the writing team to have us heading towards her the entire time, though it makes me wonder when we’ll get back to the Apex given how we only have TWO episodes left…!

What’s interesting is that according to Amelia, there’s ‘corrupted code’ in some cars, and apparently this refers to any cars that SHE made while trying to figure out the perfect world? Amelia mentions ‘quarantining’ them, and One-One wants them gone as well… Given what Amelia says about ‘ejecting’ cars, does that mean they’re all transported to the very end of the Infinity Train, and just… thrown off?

Are there a bunch of cars strewn about somewhere in the wasteland, is there even an END to this Infinity Train??? Or are they all just lumped together and some sort of force-field is placed around them, or some other barrier, to keep the corrupt code from –presumably- infecting the other cars around them?

It is a bit weird to see One-One insist on getting rid of those cars, though… I hope the denizens inside are okay, especially those corgis! Given his lesson with Tulip about not blaming himself worked, I feel like this is contrary to what he’d learned? Or is he simply allowing those worlds to exist, and remain ‘weird’, while still fixing the corrupted code so it doesn’t spread and disrupt the world of other cars who have their own thing going on? Regardless, as Amelia said… it seems One-One is still working on his issue of viewing passengers as ‘numbers’ to fix, like the cogs of a machine! It seems he’s at least TRYING to be more personable, but, well…

It seems that Amelia is still working on that sound-motif she’s always had, which is pretty neat! She mentions a ‘pulse’, so I presume it’s sent out from the engine, and when it scans an ‘anomaly’ (AKA anything with corrupted code, including stuff and denizens from the unfinished cars) they’re ejected… Given Amelia mentioning having to quarantine Hazel soon, I imagine this pulse heads out every now and then? Shouldn’t one pulse alone have done the trick, or is there a certain range to them and Amelia has to travel through the cars and activate the pulse from her location, to allow maximum effect?

Anyhow, Amelia! You know, I mused that Episode 7 of this season would introduce the Book 4 protagonist, given how our previous Episode 7’s worked… Each one established the general idea/setting for our protagonist, as well as a formal introduction! The Chrome Car told us about Lake and her deal with wanting to be her own person, escaping the Flecs… The Mall Car established the Apex and properly introduced us to Simon and Grace…

So… maybe The Canyon of the Golden Winged Snakes Car re-introduces us to Amelia, while establishing the conflict of the next Book; Fixing the corrupted cars! This is just speculation on my part, of course…

Back to Amelia, I guess I shouldn’t be all-too surprised that she’s still kind of a jerk, what with the way she just… steamrolls over what Hazel has to say to ‘correct’ her with the proper facts, and whatnot! I’m a little glad, because it doesn’t completely forget that she still has a bigger number than Simon or Grace by FAR… But also upset, because c’mon Amelia, Hazel is a freaking kid! I know you’re trying to erase multiple decades’ of past sins and mistakes, but she doesn’t know!

I also like seeing her just trash-talk Simon and calling him a child, especially since we know that he and Grace are only eighteen thanks to the Reddit AMA by Owen Dennis… Even if Simon were physically older, mentally he really isn’t! Granted I guess I can’t blame him for THAT, though I can blame him for Tuba’s death…

I remember when the writers discussed juggling multiple characters, so after seeing Tuba die, I was wondering what was really the point… But I see now! It’s because they ALSO have to handle Amelia as well! And dang, she’s still remarkably callous… She doesn’t remember Grace at all and doesn’t even seem remotely interested… And upon hearing that a cult was started in her honor, she just does NOT care! It really shows that Amelia still has a LOT to work on, that just fixing the broken cars isn’t enough for her…

It was a bit weird to have our main trio just pass by this obvious, fellow passenger, and just totally ignore them… But given Grace’s rule about ‘not trusting adult passengers’, I guess I’m not surprised? I have to wonder when it was made, and how young she was when it was established; If Grace was a kid and that was part of her apprehension towards adults, and/or they were actually trying to get their numbers down, so she saw them as ‘deceitful’ or whatever! Coupled with adults being less likely to fall for the Apex’s propaganda, and it makes sense…

What’s really fascinating is that One-One doesn’t even know about the Apex, according to Amelia! Which, given the implied length of the Infinity Train, it really says a lot about how much stuff could’ve happened, completely independent from one another! It almost seems like fate that Simon and Grace encountered so many kids and brought them together… Whereas Tulip didn’t encounter ANY passengers, sans Amelia, on her journey!

(Well, there was that ONE dude in the next car over who immediately got sent back home. And she was only there for five months, but still!)

I feel this low-key ties back to what I discussed earlier, about One-One being an ‘ends justifies the means’ sort of person; That the situation with the denizens is less a matter of them dying, and more about what that says about the Apex passengers as people! Of course, he doesn’t even KNOW about them, which honestly blows my mind… He really IS disconnected, huh? I guess Tulip helped make a dent in his metal head, but there’s still a lot of work to go… You know, Amelia’s criticism of One-One seeing passengers as just ‘numbers’ reminds me of what some other fans brought up, on the idea of if whether or not issues can actually be quantified like that!

Given what Owen said about the train also being wrong sometimes, and I have to wonder if this will be resolved by the end of Book 3… or perhaps Book 4, assuming we get it! Yeah, most of the team has been laid off and the viewings are low, so SERIOUSLY- WATCH on HBO Max, spend actual money on this thing if you want it around because you’re LITERALLY paying for Book 4’s production by this point people! And spread the word!

Anyhow, looks like other fans were right- Hazel IS a failed creation of Amelia, in this case her attempt to recreate Alrick… Although she implies that Hazel is more than just a ‘clone’ of him, is this referring to Hazel being a little girl, or something else entirely? Is the implication that Hazel would’ve been her and Alrick’s child, because uh… Amelia and Alrick are white. She also mentions a ‘handkerchief’, so what’s THAT about…?! Did she just toss one aside and it glitched into Hazel…?

Hazel is taking this about as well as you’d expect a child, and I’m wondering if Grace suddenly turning around and calling her ‘null’, only to ask to stay overnight… Means that she has a plan to ditch Simon and hang out with Hazel and Amelia, for the rest of her life? Either way, Simon is apparently taking her ‘betrayal’ to heart… That, or he’s expressing genuine remorse at seeing what he did to Hazel, but probably not. Honestly, the way his character is going it seems like he may go off the deep end…

OR, maybe not! Because we get some more development on him and THE CAT… Samantha! That’s right, an actual name! I guess I’m not shocked that ‘Samantha’ managed to smuggle some tiny One-Ones out of the Tape Car, and even a miniature player as well! I have to wonder how she finds her stuff, honestly… Considering how vast the Infinity Train is, it’s not out of the question for people to go entire months without encountering others! It’s actually kind of a miracle of fate that The Cat has encountered so many passengers, over and over, across this show…! Given the possibility aired by Mace about some characters being ‘destined’ by the Infinity Train, and I’ve got to wonder…

It’s interesting that even when Simon is taking his rage out physically, he NEVER goes for The Cat… and she knows this, no less! Not once is she ever scared for her life, instead she’s more concerned for what this has to say about Simon! It’s complicated, all right, and apparently all we know for now is that The Cat accidentally left Simon behind, and ultimately stuck with her choice to prioritize herself! It’s interesting, the idea that even if Simon and The Cat have a better understanding as to why the other did what they did, they won’t ever really ‘forgive’ one another, or reconcile- Just go their separate paths, for now and likely eternity…

Simon is of course getting mad at Grace for not talking to him and is confused by her changing her mind! A confrontation between the two is inevitable in our last two episodes, and given how we haven’t seen Grace’s number at all… It’s probably low. I can see the two reuniting with the Apex at the end, only for Simon to invoke his larger number to turn them on Grace… Or try to head back to the Apex to do exactly that!

Still, given how the show is still making the point to delve into his perspective and trauma, and how he STILL won’t harm The Cat… I have to wonder if the season really will end with Grace leaving the Infinity Train, and Simon staying behind to fix his own issues? Of course, what about Hazel… We know she’s a denizen for sure so she can’t leave, right? Unless her fake number can fool One-One… Speaking of which, was Amelia’s number at 337 when she first arrived? Because that seems a bit small for someone who had otherwise hijacked the Infinity Train by then and was making unfinished worlds…

Back to Amelia, if Simon doesn’t help… I wonder if Book 3 will end with HER taking lead of the Apex and leading them down a new path? It’d be ironic given how she mentioned about not being great with kids, and tie back to her penance… Or, maybe Grace will continue to live with the Apex and help! Maybe Simon will join Amelia… Who knows? Personally I’m fixated on the fact that Amelia just UTTERLY outclasses Simon… I expressed previous appreciation at Tuba being able to defend herself, until you know what…

But given how Amelia is a lot more savvy, jaded, and cynical about this sort of situation; I think she’s probably safe for now! It’d feel a bit unresolved for Simon to get HER killed off too…

Overall, a fascinating turn of events, and I can get a good sense of why the episodes were clustered the way they were together, to be released separately! Each does its own little arc… The first one establishing the mood and having Tuba, only for her to die! Then the next one involving Amelia and the fall-out of the Hazel revelation… And the last two episodes will be THE finale, just like it’s traditionally been in the past! I can’t wait to see what happens next…

#infinity train #infinity train spoilers #spoilers #infinity train book 3 spoilers #infinity train season 3 #infinity train book 3 #infinity train grace #grace monroe #infinity train amelia #infinity train simon #simon laurent #infinity train hazel #analysis #speculation

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hellowkatey · 3 years

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Febuwhump Day 13

Prompt: hiding injury

Read on AO3

Note: I connected the next three Febuwhump days within the same plot, so day 14 and 15 will be parts 2 and 3.

The Further I Fall

With a parka zipped all the way up to his chin, hood up, two layers of snow pants, and his arms crossed against his chest loosely (since his many layers of clothing have decreased his range of motion), General Skywalker has never looked more like a pouting child. Rex watches in utter amusement as he quarrels with a very tired looking General Kenobi.

"Hoth? You realize when people describe cold icy hells, they are actually talking about Hoth, right?"

"We're not taking a vacation, Anakin, this is a mission and you are welcome to stay on the ship if you are afraid of a little chill," the Jedi Master replies without even looking up from his datapad. It is an absolute wonder to Rex that Kenobi has put up with Skywalker for over a decade now. He's known the guy for like a year and even that has been draining, albeit, amusing in most cases.

His pouting only increases at that suggestion. "I'm not afraid. And I can't let you go alone, either."

"Cody and Rex will be with me," he says, glancing up as Cody walks into the room in his own cold-weather gear. "Really, Anakin, it's just a recon mission. Checking on a crashed Separatist ship and then we're done." he finally looks at his former padawan. "So are we going to complain, or get this over with?"

The younger Jedi grumbles something that Rex can't hear and stomps away. Sometimes he forgets that Skywalker is still very young. Practically a teenager-- why they gave a teenager another teenager of his own is beyond him, but the Jedi seem to operate a little differently than logic would suggest. He supposes he can't really argue since his brothers are all technically pre-teens in standard time, but at least they have adult development and the ability to grow facial hair.

Rex leans over to Cody and elbows him in the ribs. "How long do you think your Jedi lasts until he blows up on Skywalker?"

Cody raises an eyebrow. "Are you bettering on our generals getting into a fight?"

"Uh, yeah. Have you met them?"

A pause. "Okay, are we talking a verbal or physical fight..."

By the time they reach the surface of Hoth, Rex is shocked by the cold that immediately cuts straight to his bones. No matter how many layers he thought was sufficient, he was wrong. Luckily his armor hides the shake of his body and his helmet modulates out the chattering of his teeth.

"We shall make this quick," General Kenobi yells over the wind as they walk from the ship. It takes a moment for Rex to see it through the raging storm, but he soon can make out the outline of a Separatist cruiser half-buried in the snow. Their intelligence indicated it crashed only a week ago by Hoth standards, but you wouldn't know it by looking at the ice-covered ship. Already it seems to be feeling the effects of the cold, some parts looking to be concaved in either from the crash or the weight of the snow. The ship is quickly becoming a permanent part of the landscape.

They find an entrance and slip into the ship, which is thankfully resting on its belly. Thankfully, these ships are made for deep space and have the insulation to keep the cold out at least a little bit. Rex can see the general's breaths forming clouds, but it's better than the bitter windchill from outside.

"What a dump," Skywalker mutters as they traverse the ruined halls.

"Agreed," Rex whispers back. They aren't exactly sure what they'll find-- hopefully an operational computer they can download data from, but taking out a few cold clankers would also be a plus. So far all the droids seem to have had a bad time in the crash. Their parts are scattered around at random, a head here, half an arm there. Rex and Cody kick a ball socket from the hinge of their elbows back and forth to one another as they walk.

"So let me get this straight," Skywalker starts, an edge in his voice that Rex knows well. "They sent two Generals, and two high ranking troopers to walk through an abandoned ship at the edge of hell?"

"You must be forgetting the part of the council meeting where they assigned only you to the mission, and you managed to rope me into accompanying you."

Skywalker grimaces, and Rex smirks under his mask. "But what about Rex and Cody?"

"They volunteered."

"Someone's got to watch your back, sir," Rex grins.

Maybe the universe decided to make Rex put his credits where his mouth is because the ship lets out a low groan and suddenly their horizontal trek down the hall becomes vertical. Rex hardly has time to react before falling onto his back and slipping down the hallway like some sort of demented slide.

"Hold on!" he hears General Kenobi yell out, and suddenly Rex is being thrown in a direction that is not in line with gravity. He and Skywalker collapse into a heap on the wall beside a blast door, Rex's armor crashing into the electrical panel and shattering the display. The door slams closed with an echoing boom.

"Obi-Wan!" Skywalker groans, looking wide-eyed around the wall they now sit on. "Self-sacrificing, bastard," he curses, realizing that he and Rex are alone on one side of the blast door, and assumedly Kenobi and Cody are on the other. He reaches for his commlink to contact Cody, but to his dismay, that too was crunched in the fall.

"Alright, the ship's structural integrity is probably compromised so we ought to--"

Skywalker doesn't wait for whatever Rex has to say before thrusting his lightsaber into the wall. I don't know why I even try.

If there is an argument he knows he can't win, it's anything that involves getting between the Jedi. Rex learned very quickly it is better to just let them do whatever it is they think is the next step. Skywalker cuts out a circle in the wall and moments later it drops into the hallway below. Rex internally counts how long it takes to hit-- 1...2...3...4...5...6

The piece of durasteel slams into something that is definitely not the wall of a ship. It makes a transperisteel-like shattering noise that resonates back up through the vertical corridor, but that is not what concerns Rex primarily. The time it took to fall makes him nervous. He glances up at the Jedi, wondering if he too is concerned they heard no noise from below. No yell of surprise at a falling piece of durasteel or even talking amongst the General and Cody.

"I got you, Rex," Skywalker says, standing at the edge of the hole. Rex, again, knows what's coming. The Jedi doesn't think twice before jumping down through the hole, and Rex-- having done this song and dance a few times with the Jedi follows close behind. He's plummeting through complete darkness, the updraft nearly sending his helmet flying off his head. Rex squeezes his eyes shut, knowing nothing he does now can save him-- it's up to Skywalker.

Sure enough, he gets the strange sensation of the air around him thickening, slowing his velocity until he is practically floating right above the floor. His general releases him from his Force powers, and Rex's boots land with a solid thud on the ground. From the light of Skywalkers' saber, he can see why the durasteel circle didn't make the noise he expected-- it appears in this portion of the ship was torn apart, giving way to the interior of an icy glacier.

So where are Kenobi and Cody?

"Rex," General Skywalker says, having walked up ahead a little further. He can now see the large tunnel that goes deeper into the icy mountain. There is a clammer, and then to the clone captain's surprise, the tunnel illuminates. Skywalker stands at a control panel, staring pensively down the lit-up passage.

"Sir, I don't think this ship crash was an accident," Rex says. He scans the entrance using a thermal scan in his helmet. Most of it is a bright white or blue, but thankfully there are faint yellow footprints leading down the tunnel. Two pairs of them. Rex walks up next to Skywalker, turning off the display. "Looks like General Kenobi and Cody decided to check it out."

Skywalker seems to have relaxed by this news, shaking his head. "And they didn't even think to wait for us."

__________

As much as Obi-Wan was hoping he would have the time to use the Force to cushion his own fall, he supposes slamming into a wall of ice and snow works as well. The sudden change of medium surprises him, as he was expecting to reach out for a durasteel wall.

The impact knocks the wind out of him completely, and for a few long moments, he's worried he'll blackout. Pins and needles run up his arms and legs, but he isn't sure if it's due to the cold or the fall.

Thankfully, the shift of the ship must have caused a blanket of fresh powder to gather in the exact spot he landed, giving him just enough cushioning to keep him conscious. While Anakin might argue this is a moment for him to believe in luck, Obi-Wan would argue that the shard of ice that has embedded itself in his back would beg to differ.

He lies there for a moment, a little afraid to move just yet. Obi-Wan takes a quick assessment of his condition. The shard isn't horribly long-- maybe the length of his thumb, and it seems to have missed his vital organs.

The concern will be for his ribs. He can definitely feel at least one broken-- if not completely shattered-- which could be bad news if he has to move too much.

In summary, he will live. He will be fine once they get off this Force-forsaken wasteland, and an upside to the cold is it will make him numb to the pain for a little while. Nature's anesthetic.

Obi-Wan hears rustling around nearby. He wonders who landed with him-- he's fairly sure he managed to get two to safety on the other side of the blast doors and aid the fall of a third down to the lower levels with him. A moment later, the visor of Commander Cody appears over him.

"General! Are you alright?"

Okay, so Cody is here, meaning Rex and Anakin are above. Sure enough, when he reaches out with the Force, he senses two strong presences nearby. They appear to be uninjured, which is a relief. Obi-Wan lifts his hand, ignoring the sharp pain that comes from his side as he does so. "Quite alright, Cody." The commander helps him to his feet, and Obi-Wan finally gets a better look at their location.

"It seems the ship was resting on a hinge point, and our weight caused it to topple, sir."

"Fantastic," he says dryly. "And conveniently it has deposited us at the mouth of some sort of tunnel or cave."

"Appears so."

"My old master used to tell me there was no such thing as coincidences," he says shaking his head. Of course, a simple recon mission would turn into finding a secret hideaway. The question is, who's hideaway? "Shall we?"

They begin down the hall, Obi-Wan allowing Cody to lead while he covertly tears off pieces of his tunic and stuffs them into the puncture wound to keep pressure. When he's finally satisfied that the makeshift bandage will hold for a little while he catches up with the commander. As they get deeper into the passage, the icy tunnel turns more and more manufactured. Durasteel beams offer supports, and Obi-Wan spots some lighting periodically. Perhaps it is a good thing the lights aren't on... hopefully means nobody is home.

"Who in their right mind would set up shop on Hoth?" Cody says, his teeth obviously chattering under his helmet.

"Probably not someone in their right mind," Obi-Wan smiles. "I suppose it's a desolate location. The chances of being found are very slim."

"Unless a Seppie ship crashes into you. From the looks of the construction, this place has been around for far longer than the ship."

Obi-Wan has a bad feeling about this. Maybe it's skewed by his steadily bleeding wound, but it just seems strange to him that a ship would crash right on top of some sort of secret tunnel. All of Hoth and it reveals this?

Suddenly the lights flicker to life, revealing the tunnel opens up ahead of them into a larger area. He and Cody look up and behind them in surprise.

"What are the odds that was Rex and General Skywalker?" Cody asks, tightening his grip on his blaster.

"I'm optimistic, though, I don't suggest waiting around to find out." Obi-Wan is curious where all of this is leading. They approach the large area, which turns out to be a massive rotunda made entirely of carefully sculpted ice. It's rather grandiose in appearance, but not in practice as his eyes are diverted from the gorgeous ceiling to the remainder of the room. He would expect to see a grand ballroom of sorts, perhaps a dual-staircase traversing delicately down the sides of the slick walls, but no such hidden beauty lies before them.

It's a lab. Operational as of recently from the looks of it. Various tables cluttered with beakers and chemicals make a large U shape in the center of the room, surrounding what seems to be a primitive prototype of a bacta tank.

Most disturbing of all, a tilt-table is bolted to the ground off to the side, its durasteel restraints unlocked, but around the base lies the dark crimson of dried blood. Lots of blood.

"Oh good," Obi-Wan says, sighing deeply. The lab of a mad scientist is not at all what he expected to find (they must be crazy to set up on Hoth of all places). He is unwillingly reminded of a particularly sensitive portion of his padawan years where Qui-Gon was abducted by Jenna Zan Arbor to try and figure out the scientific basis of Jedi powers. He was tortured, his blood drained so he was kept on the very brink of death in hopes for her to study Force healing.

She also took Anakin once. Escaped yet again. Every time they come close to finding her, she manages to slip away. Though it has been years since she was committed to the cause of figuring out how the Force works, he is still uneasy by what he sees. He can't deny the similarities in the set-ups.

Cody walks further into the cavern carefully, but Obi-Wan suddenly feeling a bit weak decides to stay back and watch the tunnel entrance. He watches as the clone commander takes a holovid of the scene, careful to step over the puddles of blood.

"Hard to tell with the cold," Cody says as he finishes his assessment. "But I'd say it's been abandoned about a week."

"Ship crash probably scared them off... Whoever it is."

Cody bends down to take a sample of the blood, but in Obi-Wan's vision there seem to be two of him. He is quite sure they didn't bring a second 212th member though.

Footsteps echo through the tunnel, and his instincts kick in. He grabs his lightsaber, igniting it and whirling around to meet whoever runs after them. The Force is murky now, only confusing him more. Two figures appear from the dim lighting, one in armor and the other with floppy brown hair. Obi-Wan blinks, taking a staggering step forward.

"Master?" he mutters, his lightsaber dropping to his side and rolling away from him.

"Obi-Wan?" the man yells, his name echoing multiple times through the chamber.

"Master watch out! It's Arbor!"

"Obi-Wan!"

He's on his knees, vision tunneling. A hand rests on his back, carefully yet frantically tugging at him to look up but his head is heavy.

"I'm fine," he says as his world is turned upside down and now he's staring at the beautiful ceiling, which is very quickly fading away. "I'm okay."

#febuwhump #febuwhumpday13 #hiding injury #obi-wan kenobi #star wars #anakin skywalker #cody #rex #hoth #hell on hoth

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barrybluejeansandbestjeanist · 4 years

Text

Notes on the Artemis Fowl movie by yours truly.

Bear in mind I wrote these while watching the movie. There’s a lot of them.

1. If you think the police and/or reporters would ever be anywhere near fowl manor you’re wrong.

2. Mulch isn’t bad so far but he’d never be caught by police.

3. Is our first introduction to Artemis him running? I think not thank you very much.

4. Plus it looks like he’s going to do some water sport. Also wrong.

5. Surfing!!??!!?

6. Artemis doesn’t have even close to the coordination to do that.

7. I don’t even think he knows how to swim.

8. He doesn’t love Ireland.

9. Of course he doesn’t love school! Have you seen his teachers’ remarks on him? They aren’t nice.

10. It was a boys-only school but that’s definitely one of the smaller offenses.

11. He did do the chess thing if I recall correctly.

12. Same for the opera house.

13. He didn’t clone a goat or name anything Bruce.

14. Unusual is an understatement.

15. Dr. Po?!

16. Fake chair! Yeah!

17. That exchange from the Arctic incident wasn’t a bad choice to include. Too early though I think. We’ll see how the rest of the movie goes.

18. He’s got blue eyes. At least there’s that.

19. He doesn’t have a biography!

20. His mom isn’t dead! Disney is just scared of showing mental illness.

21. If you think Angelina Fowl can’t control Artemis you’re wrong. She calls him Arty for god’s sake. He loves his mom.

22. Mysterious absences my ass. He’s the one that should be presumed dead.

23. “This is a sensitive area doctor” sure.

24. Fake chair ftw.

25. The burden of his father’s name?! He’s proud of that name.

26. This scene wasn’t so bad. We’ll see how the rest of the movie fairs.

27. Who does he think he is? He Artemis freaking Fowl!

28. Skateboarding! I’m about to have an aneurysm.

29. Also, why is he wearing jeans? Get this man a suit!

30. He did not like being at home with his dad. Not in the first book anyway. His parent being out of the way allowed him to do what he did.

31. His dad’s actor looks good for the part.

32. His father is a criminal. World-famous. He did not just deal with antiques and rarities.

33. His dad also didn’t care for fairytales.

34. Music’s nice I guess.

35. Why is arty wearing a hoodie?! He would never!

36. Artemis was not taught about fairies. He discovered them himself with basically no help.

37. So much physical contact between Artemis sr. and jr. No.

38. His dad did not believe in any such legends.

39. They shared only a passion for crime and that didn’t even last.

40. He wasn’t determined about any such thing. See point 36.

41. He wasn’t preparing Artemis for anything like that.

42. Fairy stones? What are those?

43. There was no peace made between humans and fairies.

44. Tuatha De Danaan? What is that?

45. Artemis would want to get to the point I guess.

46. His work was not coming to an end. What is going on? Can we meet Holly soon?

47. I’m ten minutes in and suffering.

48. Artemis wasn’t really one to smile unless things were going his way.

49. You are a child! You are still a kid! You’re like a literal baby still!

50. The whole point of him being 12 in the books was that he could still believe in magic as well as science. Wtf is going on?

51. I do know the Hill of Tara.

52. I take issue with “all I really want is to believe in you” but I don’t have time to get into it here.

53. He’s still wearing a hoodie. >:(

54. Hugging his dad. No.

55. I will accept the helicopter on the front lawn if only because it seems one thing that could’ve happened in the books.

56. Where are the Butlers? Why are neither of the fowls being guarded? I need more Juliet and Butler in this movie NOW.

57. And Holly.

58. Pretty sure they don’t have a lighthouse. Also, pretty sure fowl manor wasn’t next to the ocean.

59. Might’ve been near a Forrest. I don’t quite remember.

60. Legos?! LEGOS?!??!!

61. Also, star wars? I don’t think Artemis has ever seen a sci-fi movie. He’s too busy making them a reality.

62. Artemis would also not sleep with a book.

63. Why did Butler’s name in the subtitles appear as Domovoi? You know there’s a whole thing about his name and why Arty doesn’t know it right?

64. So his dad disappeared. Not bad. A little late but okay.

65. Everyone has already aired their grievances about Butlers actor so I shall refrain from doing so as well. I’ll just say one word and leave it at that. Eurasian.

66. Also, fowl manor doesn’t look bad. I can accept this house.

67. No no no. No one should be calling him Domovoi. Only Butler.

68. Also, that isn’t the training he had.

69. He is the butler though? I mean. Only sort of but like. ???

70. No. You could not call him Dom or Domovoi.

71. Very large man in a suit is slightly acceptable.

72. He could totally snap you in half but not without good reason. Come on, guys. He’s a nice guy. Scary, but nice.

73. Like, the dude cooks and gardens and whatnot. How is that not nice?

74. Also, I’m still hung up on the goat thing. Like I don’t deny that he could clone a goat but why on earth would he name it Bruce. Is it a Batman reference or something? I don’t understand this movie.

75. World wide manhunt? Pardon my doubt.

76. Superyacht? Owl star?

77. I get it. It’s a stupid pun.

78. I guess the South China Sea is close enough to Russia.

79. Again. Not an antiquities dealer.

80. Robberies? He ran a criminal empire!

81. Not sure how one would go about stealing the Rosetta Stone or why but sure.

82. I’ve never even heard of Boru’s Harp.

83. Nor the book of kells.

84. Why are you calling Butler Dom???

85. Yes! He is a criminal mastermind! Thank you for slightly acknowledging that!

86. Also, Artemis is not that rash.

87. He’s your dad and a criminal.

88. Why must Disney do this to my boy? He was an incredible character, smart, cunning, and a criminal and now he’s just a sort of smart kid. Lame.

89. I swear if this “raspy voice” is opal I will be so disappointed.

90. What is this? Artemis is supposed to be kidnapping fairies, not the other way around!

91. What is this Aculos and why should I care about it?

92. Also, why isn’t it Christmas? You could at least set it in winter. For crying out loud.

93. That isn’t word for word Artemis. I know you can remember it exactly.

94. I’m starting to think Orion is better than this fool.

95. Why is he wearing a hoodie?!??!???!

96. Just going to have a secret basement full of whatever secret stuff shoved in there because of course.

97. Also. As if butler would know about any of this.

98. Bunch of bottles of water. Okay.

99. ‘Cause Artemis Sr. totally knew about the fairies.

100. This is a stupid basement.

101. I’m so done with this.

102. Ah yes! An important journal! Predictable.

103. Stupid poem. Stupid way of finding the journal.

104. That was opal I see. I’m dying.

105. Beechwood. Isn’t that guy related to Holly or something? Also, not from the books.

106. Yes, Arty fairies exist. Surprising no one.

107. I like how they made the city look I suppose. And they kept the name the same. Of course, it must be noted that not all fairies live in haven. There are other cities.

108. Why is holly a baby? She shouldn’t look like a child. Also, tons of people have already spoken on holly’s appearance as well so I won’t say anymore.

109. Koboi mentioned. It was totally opal.

110. The fairies don’t look bad either. Though I don’t know if the little things are supposed to be goblins or what?

111. I guess not. These goblins also seem way too smart.

112. “You and I would make a great team” foreshadowing.

113. I do think mulch being taller is kinda funny.

114. Briar Cudgeon looks about how I expected. Do you think he’ll get his face melted?

115. Opal and Cudgeon working together. Unsurprising if a bit early.

116. You spy or you die. The CIA’s motto.

117. L.E.P. Recon. Nice.

118. I’m also not going to address the changing of roots gender and the fact that Holly is supposed to be the first female officer because again, many people have spoken at length about that. Still upset though.

119. Kelp and Verbil are around I see.

120. What is the Aculos? Like I get that it’s a weapon by why should I care?

121. Also, I think Root should be smoking.

122. Holly’s father? Why should he matter or even be a part of this?

123. They kept Holly 84. Good.

124. Reinforcements? Juliet?!!!!

125. She’s 12? She’s supposed to be sixteen! No!

126. Niece!!!! She’s supposed to be his sister.

127. Also, screw Disney for changing the fairy alphabet so we can’t read it.

128. Artemis should be able to decode it though. He’s not much of a genius, is he?

129. Foals needs a tinfoil hat and should look way way nerdier.

130. Troll! Time! Yeah!

131. Yeah! Lava chutes!

132. Foaly’s CGI is a little wonky but whatever.

133. So that’s why Holly’s father is important. Stupid.

134. The executors. You mean the council.

135. Don’t just fly over the surface unshielded, you dolt!

136. Butler your camouflage sucks ass.

137. Butler wouldn’t complain.

138. Butler’s eyes are freaking me out. No one’s eyes look like that.

139. The LEP helmets are stupid looking.

140. That isn’t what a troll looks like. Stop it, Disney.

141. Time Stop. Not a time freeze.

142. The magic looks cool.

143. That’s not how a time stop works. But at least it looks cool.

144. I suppose I can accept that’s how they do mind wipes.

145. “This is a strange wedding” is the best joke so far.

146. Why are none of the fairies shielded?

147. Holly has such boring motivation.

148. You shouldn’t just read your dad’s journal Arty. It’s rude.

149. I’m so over arty’s dad already knowing about the fairies as well as this beechwood fellow.

150. Why does this Aculos exist? If it’s so dangerous, why not get rid of it?

151. Opal Koboi. Finally.

152. Like Arty would ever dress like that. He’d still be wearing a suit and be spotless.

153. “They’re real.” No kidding!

154. Fox!

155. I’m surprised they included trying and succeeding to shoot holly.

156. Kinda wish they’d kept the bury an acorn to get magic thing but small fish and all.

157. Now it’s starting to remind me of the real Artemis Fowl story.

158. Cudgeon is slimy and annoying and I’m here for it.

159. That’s a shitty looking cage.

160. “Not happy” I wonder why?

161. Reflective glasses! Yes! Give me the fowl crew in cringey reflective sunglasses.

162. The Mesmer is done nicely. Love Juliet’s glasses.

163. A flannel and reflective sunglasses. That classic Artemis fowl look.

164. So he did decode their language.

165. The acting isn’t terrible.

166. Most humans are afraid of gluten how do you think they’d handle goblins is a good line.

167. Again. Not how time stops work but okay.

168. So let me get this right. Instead of the fairy bible which Artemis poisoned a fairy to get they just replaced it with his dad‘s journal. great.

169. Don’t give Artemis a weapon! He’s gonna cut his own arm off!

170. The time freeze does look cool though.

171. I can appreciate them gathering on the beach. That’s kinda cool.

172. Finally a suit! Get this kid properly clothed!

173. Though that tie is a little sus. Why’s it so skinny?

174. That fight scene wasn’t too bad. Again Arty is definitely not supposed to be good at anything physical but it’s whatever.

175. Flair for the dramatic? This is hardly as dramatic as the book.

176. I hate opal’s voice.

177. Waged war on your people? That was 10,000 years ago!

178. Opal’s motives are also super boring.

179. I’m sad we don’t get to see arty practicing his evil smile in the mirror.

180. In one of those pots. From under the rainbow. Fun.

181. Glad they kept the whole while I’m alive stipulation.

182. Glad to see the goblins still have fire powers.

183. These goblins really shouldn’t be so smart.

184. I hope we get to see mulch unhinge his jaw soon.

185. I do like mulch.

186. This heart to heart is stupid. Artemis wouldn’t trust holly just like that me thinks.

187. I like that mulch is up on all the human pop culture. I do wish he’d make a Gordon Ramsey reference though since he likes him.

188. Mulch not wanting to be tall is excellent character motivation though.

189. Now this is the heart to heart I needed.

190. Is he gonna unhinge his jaw?! I’ve been waiting for this the whole time!

191. Yeah!!!!!!

192. Eat that dirt!

193. Mulch!

194. “What would your parents be?”

195. A really really big dwarf.

196. Sick safe. Nothing mulch can’t handle.

197. That definitely isn’t what I expected from mulch’s hair but that’s okay.

198. Yeah! Holly punched Artemis! Now there just needs to be a lollipop remark.

199. Is that the Aculos? It looks stupid.

200. Also, I do appreciate the inclusion of the iris cam.

201. Opal, you’re so boring.

202. Cudgeon is taking over. Kinda wish it was of his own will because that’s more interesting but whatever.

203. Troll time part two. I doubt butler is going to almost die fighting it. Maybe he’ll wear a suit of armor though. That’d be cool.

204. How is it we’re an hour in and only just now get a d’arvit? Surely many other scenes warranted that.

205. I do like that mulch pickpocketed butler.

206. Don’t just stand in front of the door when A Troll is about to be sent in!

207. The wings do look really cool though.

208. Also, Juliet really shouldn’t be trying to fight a troll.

209. I mean. None of them should but you know.

210. Mulch eating the Aculos is very in character. I’m glad Artemis’s bedroom is being destroyed. It was terrible.

211. While I don’t care for the way the troll looks (Far too human, not enough claws and venom) the amount of destruction it’s causing is appropriate I feel.

212. I guess that’s how the fight can go.

213. Also, Juliet is so smart and strong yet she can’t pull herself over a ledge? Pathetic.

214. Don’t move butler to a completely different room! He’s got a back injury! You probably just made it worse!

215. Butler isn’t going to die. This is stupid.

216. Trouble doing the lords work.

217. I told you butler would be fine.

218. One of the times Butler would nearly die. If we’re following the books then more should follow.

219. Also what is this room they’re in?

220. Butler would not be ashamed to cry.

221. I’m living for everyone’s reactions to where mulch stored the Aculos.

222. I like the way it looks when they get grabbed by the time stop.

223. She’s gonna save Artemis. Obviously.

224. I like the way it looked when the time stop broke.

225. “Breaking every rule in the book” we haven’t even seen your book! Just his dad’s stupid journal.

226. He and holly should not be friends yet. He kidnapped her!

227. Ooh, forever friends how sweet! Get fucked. Both of you.

228. Now are we in Russia?

229. Opal annoys me so much.

230. So are you trying to tell me that this Aculos is the movie’s version of the book? Holly’s saying that poem.

231. This isn’t how magic is supposed to work.

232. >:(

233. I will admit it looked cool. Begrudgingly.

234. Your dad isn’t dead.

235. He’s in the secret basement that still exists for some reason.

236. Also, I didn’t note this before, but I doubt Arty ever called his dad, dad.

237. Opal is thwarted.

238. Why she so ugly looking? Pretty sure she was supposed to be pretty.

239. This is so stupid.

240. Opals accomplices, you mean those two dunderheads she had helping her?

241. How are there still fifteen minutes of this torture left?!

242. Again. Butler would not be ashamed to cry.

243. Just wait until Artemis gets magic of his own.

244. I’m so tired. It’s 12:14 at night and I just want this torture to end. Please god just let the credits roll already!

245. And now they’re famous. Whoop de do. Just tell us how mulch gets captured and escapes and end the movie. That’s all I ask.

246. You know he hasn’t been referred to as Artemis Fowl the Second throughout this whole disaster. What a slight to him.

247. Ray bans.

248. Oh yeah. Brag to opal. Great idea.

249. Criminal mastermind. Juvenile Genius. Same difference.

250. Why is his tie so skinny?

251. Is he gonna fly the helicopter?! Finally something in character!

252. Now just let mulch escape and finish this godforsaken nightmare!

253. Fowls? Protecting us? Pardon me while I laugh.

254. They do the unhinging of mulch’s jaw nicely.

255. And now they mission impossible him out of there. Perfect.

256. I’m dying. Let it be over. Please.

257. No more!

258. Fly off into the sunset. Of course.

259. Thank god! Credits! I’m free!

260. And another thing! They didn’t have the follow-up scene with Dr. Po! That would’ve been a way better ending! And you can’t just have one scene without the other!

#artemis fowl #artemis fowl movie #artemis fowl the second #artemis fowl the movie #hate

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rebelcourtesan · 4 years

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Hordak - Peeling Back the Layers

Alright, if you’ve been following my blog for a while, then you know how much I like villains. A show is only as good as its villain and She-Ra and the Princesses of Power have given us several awesome villains.

Since it’s a reboot, all of the characters have underwent redesigns. From She-ra’s more modest outfit that brought out raging fanboys, and the wide range of ridiculous 80′s outfits remodeled to be more practical and stylish. Perfuma isn’t wearing a flower on her head and Catra is actually a cat girl and not a lady stalking around in a tight red dress.

long post below

One of the biggest changes is Hordak himself. Instead of some muscle bound brute, they remodel him to have a slimmer build and wearing a tunic/tabard with a technological mind.

In season 1, we actually do not see him in person until the end of the THIRD episode. Though he is the leader of the Horde which should put him as the main antagonist, I consider Shadow Weaver to be the main antagonist of season 1, mainly because she makes more appearances and has more influence over the actions that hamper the heroes (BFF Squad). At best, he’s a recurring character, at least in the first season.

However, even then, I was drawn to him because I liked his redesign so much and was quite intrigued with him. He was shrouded in mystery and kept himself distant from current affairs unless it’s to make a brief appearance to intimidate Shadow Weaver and receive reports on what’s happening outside his sanctum via monitors.

In the original She-Ra series, Hordak was much more attached to Adora. In SPOP, he dismisses her as a lost cause and in turn makes Catra the new Force Captain, overruling Shadow Weaver’s selection, which shows a very pragmatic side to him. He also overruled her when it came to using the Garnet runestone to attack Bright Moon.

He pretty much remains a static character throughout season 1. We still don’t know more about him other than his being the Leader of the Horde and he has a cool disposition towards his underlings.

It not until we hit season 2-3 that multiple layers are stripped away to allow us a closer look. And the one responsible for peeling back those layers is Entrapta.

I’ve gone on in length about why these two work so well together as a couple. With her lack of social skills and obsession with science and experimentation made her to the perfect companion of a man who isolates himself from others and considers Etheria a backwater planet with no concept of interstellar travel. They suited each other as if cut from the same cloth.

Imperfection is beautiful.

These are the words that sparked a deep relationship he had never experienced before, that he had never imagined and we’re given Hordak’s background . . . or a side of it.

Hordak plays the part of an unreliable narrator when he talks about his past. An unreliable narrator. An unreliable narrator is a narrator whose credibility is compromised. Whether its someone who is bias towards events (racist), naive of certain events (a child), has an askew perception (Humbert Humber, the pedophile narrator in Lolita.

In Hordak’s case, it’s his programming as a clone and strong attachment to his ‘brother’ progenitor Horde Prime. We’re given only one part of the story and we’re led to believe that his ‘defection’ was a physical disability that causes his body to break down and chronic pain. And for a long time, until the end of Season 4, this is what we the audience believed was the case.

However, we are quickly shown the true reason why he was discarded. He had attained a mind of his own and individuality.

Which asks the question, did Horde Prime allow Hordak to come to the conclusion that it was a physical defect? Or was it Hordak’s won misconception that led him to believe such? There had to be a reason why his ‘brother’ would reject him so and he body was falling apart. So that must be the reason, and therefore he must rise above his frailties to prove himself strong in Horde Prime’s eyes.

Yet, he meets Entrapta and experiences genuine acceptance. Unconditional love and affection from someone he didn’t have to prove himself to. Entrapta who created a suit to ease his pain and make him more functional without expecting nor asking for anything in return, but did it simply out of friendship and love. It’s literally an eye opening moment for him.

From this point on, he shows a wider range of emotion beyond that of anger, cool reception, or frustration.

He struggles to give his thanks to Entrapta, even going as far as to assure her she was worth something.

He demonstrates regret at the thought of returning to the Horde Prime.

Hurt when he believes Entrapta betrayed him.

Loss and grief over loosing her.

Pleasure in the battle field.

Embarrassment when the Imp teases him for thinking about Entrapta.

Season 4 has Hordak leaving his shell or sanctum to lead the Horde army in taking over Salineas and has a taste for battle.

For Season 4, he has the mannerisms of something had just been spurned by a lover. He disallows Entrapta’s name to be spoken in his presence, has her things thrown out, and yearns for her while desiring her work and recordings to help him finish his arm cannon. He even wanted to face in her battle as if he wanted to show her up or have a confrontation.

He has become a leader that is more open with his underlings now, more confidant and isn’t a malignant being that intimidates his followers from the shadows as he had done in Season 1.

Then another layer is stripped away when Double Trouble (lauded as a hero for this) reveals what really happened to Entrapta.

Now we see him as a man in pain, suffering loss and grieving for a loved one. He had been the fool that had discounted her loyalty. And with sending someone to Beast Island is considered a death sentence, in his mind, Entrapta is dead, murdered by Catra to gain his trust and steal power.

Then he does something out of character for himself.

Remember, in Season One, he was calm and collected, pragmatic and cold with his mind focus on his goal.

Then as the Horde is posed to win the war, he attacks his second in command Catra. Which is understandable reaction to see revenge, but it’s a very human thing to do. I’m using the term ‘human’ loosely as many of our favorite characters aren’t human as a race, but you know what I mean.

He destroys a good portion of the Fright Zone, his own lair and base, trying to kill Catra, consumed with fury over Entrapta and being tricked. One doesn’t need to be a soldier or a general to know how this would weaken his position in a war. Yet, the emotional pain has put him past caring of how this would weaken him. All he wants is to avenge Entrapta.

Then we have the final layer removed. The false hope.

We are finally given a missing piece of a puzzle that we didn’t know was missing. We learn that Hordak’s true defect was having a will of his own.

When we are introduced to Horde Prime (and brutally so), he completely outstrips Hordak as the main villain of the series and lays him bare to raw vulnerable person seeking affection he never truly had.

Let’s compare.

We went from this, when we first see him in the series. Cold, calculating and feared.

to this. On his knees, begging for approval, and frightened.

What I love about this is that it happened so naturally over the course of four seasons in a way I cannot find fault or call bullshit on. This is a character whose barriers have been stripped from him, first through love and then fury, and then fear and rejection.

His motivation throughout his life had been to please Horde Prime and his actions which has been the cause of so much strife in the series from the war, banishing King Micah, Shadow Weaver betraying Mystacore, Adora’s seperation from her family, Catra, Lonnie, Kyle, and Rogolio’s childhoods, have all been to reunite with an abuser that not only outright rejects him, but then rips away what was left of his mind.

When Season 5 comes around, we’re going to see a new Hordak. Not a reprogram amnesiac (though I believe he’ll start that way), but someone who has to find a new purpose. And in finding a new purpose, he’ll likely become a new man.

But predictions are for another post.

#hordak #essay #she pop

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a-stitch-in-time-and-space · 4 years

Note

You ask for prompts and I'm here again to seek new content to read: 3. How often do/can they see each other (due to living on different planets, having stressful jobs, etc) with Gashir (/Garakshir) 🤩🤩

Eyyyyy. I am just gonna… casually fold into this… a little trans-Bashir as a treat…. because it’s trans day of visibility!!! Also I hc Cardassians as intersex, in the sense of they as a species don’t call themselves intersex, but their genders are far more loosely determined at birth, because there’s not really sexual dimorphism (or rather, there is, but it’s so many different factors that it’s not classified) and then gendering comes later in life depending on what role they’re supposed to play in society ahem – different post to make!

Also Garak has a tail in this, also casually.. also this got longer than intended… oops?

—– Letter Analysis ——

Their lives have a sort of normality that many families in this day and age exist with. Space travel, careers that necessitate being off-planet for long stretches at a time, the struggles of being a representative for entire planets or systems, all of this isn’t out of the ordinary.

Still, it takes them a little while to adjust, if only because they spent so long not getting it together that now that they have, well, they want to savour it. On the flip-side their relationship functions much better than so many who enter into partnerships of some kind without fully considering the difficulties of spending so much time apart and inevitably crumble.

Because of all that time they know, without a doubt, that their lives are entwined for good, regardless of how much of it they spend without one another’s physical company.

They fall into letter-writing naturally. After all, they had been doing the same before, why stop now.

It has become something of a competition at this point: who can write the longest letter. Thus far, Julian is winning and Elim is still in the process of reading his when they see one another again. He pretends to be blasé about it, but Julian can read him easily these days. He wonders at the time when he couldn’t and can’t really picture it.

While Elim is giving him a back-handed compliment at the way he’s managed to fold three words worth of content into whole paragraphs, Julian realises that he’s never known anyone as well as he knows Elim. And every detail of himself is known in turn. From the scars of his chest surgery that he purposefully kept, to the ridges at the base of Elim’s tail, it feels like everything about them was perfectly made for the other.

It’s strange, how many tiny moments are filled with love, they both learn.

(After Elim sends him a letter of 3000 pages, Julian simply answers: You win).

They consider what it would be like to have a family with the way their lives are run. Elim generally lives on Cardassia unless his diplomatic duties take him elsewhere, while Julian is hopping from emergency to medical find to distress call to conference.

Still, they approach the matter on the premise that it will happen. Their letters during these years follow a trajectory of thought with little variation, as they can’t actually be together for the discussion.

They discuss pregnancy – both of them are capable of bearing a child, but the time needed (nine earth months for humans, even longer for cardassians) makes it a challenging prospect. Moreover Julian and Elim, each for their own reason, have issues with concepts surrounding an uncontrollable force fundamentally changing their bodies.

It doesn’t take them long to agree that adoption was always the only option. Still there’s the matter of their careers being incompatible with children. Neither of them wants to put a child in harm’s way and both of their careers contain elements of danger. I believe, writes Elim drily and with an underlying sadness that Julian wishes he could heal, that this sixth assassination attempt may contain a sign that a child would not be particularly safe in my company.

The way this resolves itself is oddly perfect for what they need and who they are and comes through both of their continued work with mixed-species war-orphans, who more often than not are homeless, ostrasized and suffering from any number of easily treatable diseases. Garak opens a series of institutions in the name of Ziyal and habitually lends a hand in their various gardens where he befriends a number of the kids.

This plan also works to ground a lot of Julian’s focus in the space of mixed-species research, specifically writing papers on the future of the galaxy needing to see species integration for the sake of these kids as an inevitability as cultures mix and to understand the medical and cultural implications thereof.

Kira and Ro get heavily involved on the Bajoran side of things – in general a bunch of adults from DS9 days come together to give kids a better chance than they had.

Beyond that though, they come to realise that they’re okay on family. With these kids – many of whom they get to know personally over the years – with Molly and Yoshi O'Brien and Rebecca Sisko getting older and the two of them functioning as uncles, there’s more than enough for them to be getting on with on the children front: Elim and I were very happy to see you all again – Don’t worry, I’ll keep Yoshi safe – we’ll be making a stop at Bajor where Nerys is very excited to see him again –

Their circle is actually a sizeable, cross-galaxy household. They come to realise that it doesn’t matter if your family is someone you can’t see often, what matters is they’re all inhabiting the same space.

They don’t argue often. With the lack of time they have together, what would be the point of raising petty squabbles. There are things like the time Julian forgot about a very important dinner that Elim was a guest of honour at, which opened up a box of the kind of loneliness Elim thought he’d overcome, but it wasn’t about anger or arguing, it was about the two of them figuring out that sometimes this not seeing one another was actually damned hard. It was about asking for forgiveness and receiving it even before the asking. It was about making sure that they wouldn’t let things ever be unsaid, because their time together – comparative to their whole lives – was always going to be so short.

The actual worst long-standing consequence is that Elim and Julian are political celebrities, and so whatever tabloid-equivalent exists publishes one thousand pieces on their apparently irreconcilable relationship. Julian finds himself referred to as everything from a “heartthrob who found he needed more,” to “a cheater who habitually has several affairs at once.”

It’s amazing, remarks Elim in his latest letter, how these kinds of spurious articles are written even today, and how they still don’t seem to know the facts. On that note I hope you have a wonderful time with Data, and Parmak sends his love from my lap - it’s making it very hard to write this.

They’re both twenty years older by now, but things aren’t slowing down with their work by the looks of things. Julian’s work centres more and more on the various groups whose medical needs are considered less valid or even non-medical, because of their social status and who often have medical issues of kinds that don’t come up in normative societies – mixed-species, augments, A.I. (for awhile his standing suffers, when he argues that mechanical needs for A.I. ought to be taught in Starfleet Medical), non-bipedal species, Ex-B’s, Jem'Hadar, clones.

Elim keeps his Carrington Award on the wall for everyone to see. Partly to mess with him – To The Prestigious Winner of the CA – many of his letters begin for several years after, but mostly out of pride.

(In return and with as much love, Julian addresses him as Ambassador and Castellan – the joke evolves as they find ever more flowery titles for one another. Julian wins this one: My Dearest, the Ambassador to the United Federation of planets, Castellan of the Cardassian Union, Blusher when Being Whispered Compliments about the Length of Your Tail, Not-So-Secret Reader of Austen and Pratchett, Seducer of Doctors (No Doubt Currently Spluttering in Denial), Possessor of Biteable Ridges (Blushing Again, I Hope) and of My Heart… this opening continues a further four pages. The letter itself reads: I expect to land on Cardassia within the next three days. Surprise.)

At the end of it all, Julian finally comes to Cardassia for good. Along the way it’s become his home more than any planet, station, starship, or system, for the simple fact that he’s been returning to Elim, and Elim is home.

There’s a strangeness to all the time they have. The walks they take, the languid mornings, the discussions of books they’ve read whilst in each other’s company, it’s all far more surreal than the years spent wanting to see one another again and catching whatever moments they could.

They can’t shake the habit of writing one another letters, even as they’re sitting in the same room. They don’t need to be long or well-formed any more, although occasionally silly competitions spring up, just for fun.

The one Julian’s reading right now, as Elim’s tail languidly curls around his waist, simply says: I am glad that you’re finally home – E

–— The End ——

Submissions for drabbles are now closed, thank you for sending me asks!

#Julian Bashir #Elim Garak #Garashir #ds9 #st: ds9 #star trek #fanfic #writing

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whiskeyworen · 5 years

Text

Fateful Encounter

She moved through the heat-baked walls of the facility with a fluidity and confidence she didn't feel inside. How could she? Not with that-- nnghhh! The moment her mind turned its focus away from its goal, Moryggan felt the vicious mental slap across her psyche. The pain was shaped in just such a way, drawn from her own memories. Memories of the lightning lash that had stripped a permanent scar along her face, those few terrible years ago. The memory alone was enough to trigger shakes in her sword arm, and make her temple and cheek throb with sympathetic pain. Every time she disobeyed, It lashed her with the memory of that pain. The trauma, divested of the physical damage, but still intrinsically tied to the sensation of it. The perfect leash. She tried to whimper, pausing to lean against the sooty, scorched panels that made up the hallway she'd broken into, but It changed her reaction into a grunt and a grimace, before pulling her away from the wall. Continue, child. It's voice echoed in her mind. The first time she'd heard It, in the days after the Breachmaker went down, it had been a gutteral growl that shook her to her bones. It hadn't even spoken tyrian to her until a few hours later, and even then It was short with her.

Find it. Destroy it. It demanded. Whatever it was, It didn't declare what needed to be destroyed... only that it needed to be. And then It began to pull her along, like a child's toy on a string.

She'd been pulled, pulled so far from the Pale Tree. So far from home. Moryggan had crossed field and dale in Queensdale, Kessex Hills. She'd scaled the mountain paths through the hidden routes of Lornar's Pass at It's beckoning; the less people saw of her, the less someone might be inclined to ask her where she was going or why.

It wasn't that It wasn't capable of lying. It fully could and would. It merely felt no need to draw attention to her, and by proxy, Itself. Better to minimize contact.

At some point, frozen glacier had given way to scorched, ravaged landscape. Broken ruins, shattered walls, burned forests... she'd crossed them all without thinking clearly. Her mind was fuzzy with pain as It tugged her string. There were a few clear memories though.

She was reasonably sure, for instance, that somewhere in one of those scorched, ashen forests, she'd slipped up on a squad of Flame Legion and annihilated them without a second thought. There was the distinct impression in her mind of the smell of Charr blood as she'd drawn both her swords across the muscled neck of an opponent that had never seen her coming. Memories of staring across as her phantasms and magical clones did the same to the survivors of that squad.

The entire time, that thing in her head merely chuckled darkly, and then tugged her one way with the string it was pulling...and lashed her from the other side, to ensure her movement.

That string had grown into many, as it bound up her mind in its will and began to more directly control its puppet. Moryggan had tried to rail against it, tried to break away from the path she was being sent on, but as It became more familiar with her mind and body, her resistance began to abate. No...not abate. It was supressed under the weight of the Shadow in her mind. Its terrible, cruel weight.

She had to break free. But how? Moryggan tried to think clearly, to think of a plan before the next mental lashing. Her body was barely under her control. As long as she went where It ordered, it didn't lash her. It only spoke in a language she didn't understand, and she could feel its evil, vile tendrils stroking her mind and soul as if in affection; a reward for obeying properly. Moryggan grimaced, her hands reflexively going to her twinned swords and snapping them out of their belt loops. With a sharp flick of both wrists, the folded, jointed blades extended to their full length, their segments locking together with mechanical precision and presenting unified blade edges. There was something in the chamber ahead that It wanted gone. And there was someone there as well.

Find it. Destroy it. Kill any who stand in your way. It said in her mind as she silently stepped into the chamber. This time, the voice was much, much closer to her own in her head...

****

It stank. One thing he hated was when someplace stank. It was hard to compare, but situating a base above a lavapool, even as heavily vented and scrubbed as the air was, it still reeked of sulphur. The heat was phenomenal as well. Since the base had been abandoned, its coolant systems had been turned down to almost nil, so the air was a stifling furnace. If it weren't for the coolant systems in his suit, Cyrus would have been boiling. In a twist of irony, the temperature was just right for his pets; Dangles the jungle prowler and Dribbles the Cave Spider both came from high temperature environments, so other than disliking the smell of the place, they were both fairly comfortable. Cyrus put the data crystal in the console and immediately began bypassing the security controls. Scarlet had upgraded her systems since the last time he'd been there, and from the looks of things she'd left some nasty surprises for anyone trying to access them without permission.

Thankfully, some sane part of her mind had decided to leave his own accesses unhindered, though he had to navigate very carefully. One wrong move and the console would shut down. Then the security systems would engage with Lethal Vector protocols, and he REALLY didn't want to face down a thirty-foot tall segmented screaming doll with flamethrowers and chainsaws for hands. At least, not alone. As he worked, he glanced over at Dangles, who sat beside the console, grooming himself. "...Keep on guard, buddy. This might take a while and I really don't want to be distracted." The jungle cat murphed and sat up, looking around. Whether he was really being alert, or was just being a cat was up for debate. Knowing this fundamental nature of felines, Cyrus sighed and reached a hand up to his shoulder, so that his pet spider could climb onto it from its hidden den in his shoulder guard. "You too, Dribbles. I need you to watch my back, okay little fella?" The 'little' jungle spider, the size of his fist, squeaked in that unsettling, almost electronic squeal way spiders do, and wiggled its mandibles in an approximation of an affirmation. It scurried from his shoulder and settled onto his back. Due to its coloration, shape, and how it spread its legs to cling to his gear, Dribbles almost appeared to merge against the darkened metal. It nestled between two heat sink vents just below Cyrus's shoulder blades, hiding in plain sight. In its small head the trio of eyes tracked in three separate directions for a threat.

As Cyrus worked at breaking through the firewalls of the computer system, he idly reflected on the facility. It had once been an Inquest outpost, but had been 'acquired' by Scarlet during her dealings with them. It sat uncomfortably deep inside basaltic rock, somewhere in Fireheart Rise, over a natural magma lake. The Inquest had merely used the void to build their base, but Scarlet had rebuilt it into a manufactory. Where the Inquest had rerouted lava flows to part around their structures, the Mad Sylvari had used those flows to power geothermal turbines, and fed the liquid metal and stone into various subsurface, self-contained factory units she'd built. There, the molten metal would be separated from the stone, to be smelted, forged, and formed into all the various mechanisms she filled her world with. At a facility much like this one, teams of Molten Alliance had made vast sheets of Dredge metal; nigh-indestructable metal only seconded to Deldrimor Steel, the Dredge metal had been used to form the hulls of the Aetherblade airships and ultimately the Breachmaker itself.

Thoughts of the Breachmaker made Cyrus frown, and he doubled his efforts to get into the computer. This place was one of perhaps a dozen places where Scarlet had stored some of her designs. Designs Cyrus very much wanted.

"Come on..." He muttered as he finally got through the logins and files began to open up. "Just come on... Let's see. Marionette blueprints -- not going to need THAT. Requirements for Steam beast portals -- Yeah, right. If I needed that I'd just steal a Steambrain... Where are they? Where are the plans?!" In response to his query, whether through tapped commands or responding to his voice and authorizations, a new data stream opened up. As each file opened, the primary blueprints for them popped up in the holo imager. "Ah! There we go!" Cyrus chuckled darkly, pulling out a second data crystal -- this one was blank. The one in the system already had had all the authorizations he'd been given. This new one was to be a repository; for all intents and purposes, it was just a storage device. "Mmm... Aether-powered ion beam cannon prototypes... Aetherwarp transit engine Mk.1 designs... Plasma weapons, Artificial intelligence core programming..." He stepped back, surprised at his own smile. "It's all here. I didn't think she was being truthful, but it's all here. Now I just need engineers and a factory..." At the word 'Factory' a new folder opened, displaying a set of coordinates. There were more than the usual two sets of coordinates for location; there were FIVE. Cyrus stared at it, wonderingly. Where in the hell did you stash this, Scarlet? Did you really build it out there?...

His thoughts were broken off suddenly by an almost electronic squeal, and a sharp jab in his side from Dribbles. There was someone else here.

****

There. Kill him. Kill him. Him. He dies. Kill him. It demanded, gripping her mind in a vice of thought and squeezing. Obey. Kill the human. Destroy the machine.

Moryggan felt a snarl forming on her face as she silent stalked towards the figure at the podium. How dare he be in her path? Interloper. Thief. It would only take her a few moments to cross the distance between them and end his life. This would be quick. She also belatedly noticed the large jungle cat that was curled up beside him. As soon as it saw her it stood up, ears perking, yet made no move to attack her. Perhaps she would spare the animal after she killed its master?...

Then she heard the hiss. It came from directly in her path, where the man stood, his back facing her. What was it? It was a squeal, a trill of some kind, but did he make it? Why was that sound so familiar? "I would advise you to stop approaching me, stranger." The man suddenly announced, his head slowly coming up, though he made no move to turn around. He reached out and gave the cat a skritch on the top of its head. The stripey jungle cat made an approving sound, and then settled back to the floorplates. "This is private property and you're violating my territory. If you don't want trouble, then move on." She stood there, shocked into immobility; he was addressing her like he'd always known she was there and had merely been polite enough to ignore her! Her shock only lasted a second or two, followed by irritation that was greatly fed by the Thing in her mind. End him! End him now! Destroy the machine! Obey! "You can't beat me, human." She growled at him, raising her collapsible sabers. "Especially when you can't even see me." "I don't need to see you. Sylvari." He chuckled. "I can hear it in your accent. And the fact you called me human, and you don't sound short." Idly Cyrus continued clicking keys on the console. "You have about seven seconds to disappear before I decide to express my annoyance." "Why you..." Moryggan began to start for him. She only got three steps before his hand shot up, finger pointed upward. "Might want to watch your step, my dear." He replied cryptically. "You could have a very bad time." It was at that moment she heard a click from underfoot. She glanced down immediately, seeing the handsized disc spotted with holes. Already, a green gas was leaking from those holes, as her foot shifted on the trigger mechanism. Venom! Moryggan's mind screamed as she instinctively teleported backwards, reappearing over ten meters to the side. Now that her foot was no longer on the trigger, the trap sprung entirely; with a loud click, the vents fully opened and the noxious green and purple gas was forcefully vented outward. The thick roiling cloud didn't spread very far, just from the whiff she'd gotten from the fumes, it was something damned potent.

The man finally turned to face her, having heard his trap deploy. He shifted his glasses back up his nose and frowned. "...Now where did she?..." The cat murphed, and indicated where Moryggan had teleported to. "Ah, I see. A Mesmer. Just wonderful." The sarcasm in his voice was thick as his hands went to his weapons. "Frickin' mind-melters." "....You've laid traps in here?" She asked, indicating the floor between them. The glow of the lava came up through the metal grates, the heat shimmer making it hard to see precisely. "Wouldn't that be detrimental to you as well?" Cyrus smirked and began to walk towards her, giving his sword and axe a preparatory swirl and twirl. His foot came down on one of his own traps, and with a click, the green/purple gas was vented once more, entirely enveloping him. Moryggan almost laughed; the cocky human had gotten caught in his own poison trap. She relaxed for a moment....until a steady shape emerged confidently from the thick gas, the smirk still on his face.

"But... how?!" She demanded, feeling the voice digging into her mind again. Move faster. It said.

"Funny thing about Miasma." Cyrus pointed out, rolling his neck a little, and taking a deep breath of tainted air. "... it doesn't affect you if you've been permanently innoculated against it."

They launched themselves at each other, swords clanging heavily as they collided. Moryggan grit her teeth, trying to hook her second sword under his guard to stab, but he kept deflecting it with quick swings of his axe. They were practically face to face with each other; her carefully oiled blade sparked against the purple energy field of his asuran peacemaker sword, but neither was budging.

"Innoculated? No one is immune to the Scarlet's Miasma! The Orders had to use gas masks! Those decayed by the HOUR!" She growled at him, pressing closer. If she could get past him, she could smash the console and at least get some mental relief.

"Scarlet's troops were innoculated." Cyrus replied simply. "Mechanically or biologically, they were immunized against it." He grinned and tilted his head, exposing the glowing green veins that had risen against his skin when he'd entered the gas. "I helped design the concept; of course she'd give me the Treatment." "You were Aetherblade..." Moryggan's eyes widened. Suddenly the voice was screaming in her head, crushing her thoughts with one overwhelming demand: KILL. HIM.

She drew back a step, breaking their contact for an instant. As he continued to move towards her, Moryggan rallied and lunged forward again. At least, that's how it looked. As she began to move, there was a bright flash of purple magic that erupted from all around her, hiding her in its flare. It was bright enough that she could see Cyrus's eyes squint as he brought his axe back for another swing, presumably to block her own sword from cutting into his side. Their weapons met once again in a clash of metal, but there was a difference this time. It wasn't truly Moryggan he was clashing with anymore. She'd summoned a clone during the flash, hiding herself in a light-reflective shield of mesmeric magic while her duplicate took her place perfectly. Instead, she dashed around to the side, planning to plunge both of her blades into his back and end this annoying human. All she needed was two seconds of movement...

There was something wrong.

They say that when times are stressful, when you are under threat, that how you percieve time cuts down. Instead of thinking hours ahead, you think minutes. If you can't think minutes, you think seconds ahead. And if you can't manage that, time seems to slow enough that mere moments become long and drawn out.

She had to take only four steps, after her swap with her clone. Four steps around him, hidden beneath mesmer magic while he battled a pointless clone. Another quarter second to draw back her blades, and two more to bisect him as the voice in her head demanded she do.

First step.

Moryggan glanced up at his face as she passed at a distance that would have let her fronds brush against his cheek. She glanced only to make sure he was focused on her diversion; that her vanishing had been total.

Second step. He was still looking ahead, teeth gritted as his axe met her clone's immaterial blade. To an outsider, her clone would be perfect; unlike a phantasm which would appear hollow and glow with energy, a clone was a perfect physical mimic, though it only lasted a short time.

His eye shifted to look at her. In that frozen moment in time, she could visibly see him turn his gaze from the clone, over his shoulder, to where she was passing by him. There's no way he could see her though; she was still cloaked!

Third Step.

It was impossible. There's no way he could see her; she'd evaded Risen, Krait, Icebrood. She'd hidden in plain sight in crowded city streets. She'd snuck up on fellow mesmers and ended them using the same tricks they used! There's no way he could see her. That's what she told herself, though she didn't have time to form the thought properly in that instant. In that instant that his eye continued to track her. He had begun to shift his entire body; the heavily armored, studded shoulder guard began to descend as he dropped into a lower posture. The axe in his left hand flicked the sword of the clone aside for a moment, distracting it, while he dropped that right shoulder. Moryggan, already committed to the fourth step and her own inertia, couldn't change her own trajectory. That ugly, steel plated shoulderplate, laced with strange magitech glowing panels, lowered until it was almost even with her body as she rounded him.

Fourth Ste--

She never made the last step. As her foot began to descend, as she began to twist her body to round him, he shoulder-charged her. He didn't move far to do it, Cyrus had redirected the weight of his entire suit into the shoulder charge, and the impact struck Moryggan directly, knocking her away violently. The moment of impact shattered her fragile shield of invisibility as she was launched to skid across the slick, hot metal flooring. She felt herself bounce over a few of those damned trap pods, which immediately spread their noxious miasma. There's no way she could avoid breathing in a lungful of the vile stuff. Cyrus immediately dispatched the clone, an underhanded, dismissive flick of the axe rending it up the chest, spilling immaterial 'blood' in a swirling arc. The clone had a moment to scream in pain before shattering like glass, the shards evaporating as the magic binding it broke. Even the blood, still arcing through the air, shattered into a billion mirror shards before fading away. "You almost had me, sprout." He commended her, straightening up and stepping closer as she gasped in the purple-green mist. He smirked. "That purple flash actually blinded me for a moment there! It's been a while since I've had to fight a talented mesmer." Moryggan gasped deeply, coughing, eyes watering as the miasma took hold. Horrible shadowy creatures stalked closer, appearing from nowhere. Terrible whispers, different from that voice in her head, told her vile things and whispered promises and terrors. From her hands her swords dropped, clanking dully to the metal floor as she wept openly. The voice in her head roared in displeasure, retreating in the face of the miasma, until she couldn't feel it in her mind anymore. It was... gone! But for how long? Till the gas wore off? Would she lose all control then?

Cyrus reached her and knelt down, sniffing at the miasma. He could see the tears streaking her face, and felt pity for a moment. He had no idea where this sylvari woman had come from, or what she wanted. But she'd tried to kill him. Still...why was she crying? "Hey now. Come on. You lost. I'll even let you go if you leave me alone, okay?" He offered. He had no idea how badly the Miasma was affecting her. He'd seen people rendered into curled balls of terror, and others lashing out at things only they could see. This woman seemed, for all her confidence and toughness, to be on the edge of becoming the former, rather than the latter.

"Kill me. Please." She whispered, covering her face carefully. The horrors of the Miasma were too much. They weren't nearly as bad as the voice, but they were unnerving to look at. She could almost FEEL them on her skin. And the sounds... "Quickly! Please! Kill me before the voice takes me over again!" He froze, the smile vanishing from his face in an instant. She's not referring to a miasma voice... he realized as she repeated her demand, louder and even more anxious. When she pulled her hands away from her eyes, they widened in horror; the mist was disippating. "The Voice?" "Yes! The Voice! I-It pulls, and yanks, and screams in my mind! It forced me to come here!" She looked at him, eyes wide. "I didn't WANT to be here! I barely know where I am right now! And the only thing keeping it from taking over, from hurting me again... from hurting YOU... is the Miasma! When it's gone I'm.. I'm going to..." Oh god. Cyrus paled. There was way too much honesty in her face right now. In her eyes. He could see the horror in them, the absolute terror that had nothing to do with the hallucenogenic gas. Is she already affected by it?! How much time to I have? There is NO way I'm dealing with another Scarlet. "Dribbles!" He yelled. The little spider detached from his back and skittered down his arm to rest on his bracer. "Bind and subdue! No kill! Just sleep." The spider squeaked and leapt onto Moryggan's body, rapidly racing back and forth over her, spitting glue-like thread and trailing steel hard filaments behind it. While it did that, Cyrus reached over and picked up one of the nearby untriggered traps. With a single move, he flipped it over and bashed it against the floor, triggering the simple pressure plate on its top. As the Miasma thickened, he looked through it at Moryggan. "That voice. Can you tell me how close it feels to you? How much can you resist it?" She took a deep breath of mist, shuddering as goosebumps broke out from the instant flight-or-fight response it triggered in her. She braced herself and answered slowly, carefully. "It's still there, but it's pulled back as much as it can. It really, really doesn't like Miasma for some reason. I don't understand why. But if it stays so far away, or buried deep in my mind... I think I can manage for a bit..." Cyrus chuckled humorlessly. "The reason it doesn't like the Miasma is because this shit was specifically designed to fuck it up." He smiled at her confused expresson. "If that voice you hear is what I think it is... then yeah. We designed and bred Nightmare Bloom trees to give it the worst headache imaginable." The spider stopped spinning its webbing, and squeaked again. Cyrus picked it up and laid it next to her neck; she had been bound from there down entirely in spider-silk.

"This will probably hurt a little, but Dribbles is actually pretty good at being careful when he needs to be." Cyrus offered, shrugging. He put a fresh miasma trap on her chest, just below her chin, and carefully opened the flues on it after disabling the mechanism, to let the fumes out in a controlled manner. The spider, on the other hand, inched towards her neck, laying its two largest front legs on her flesh. "Sorry about this. But I'm going to see if there's anything I can do to help you." "Why?" She asked, as the spider bit in, and paralytic venom began to draw her into unconsciousness. "Why help me at all?..." As her eyes slowly closed, she barely heard him say "Because I watched another go the route you're going...and I couldn't stop it."

****

Moryggan hurt. All over, she hurt.

Her chest and shoulder ached, one from the miasma she'd inhaled, and both from the painful shoulder charge that had knocked her on her rear. Her neck throbbed from the spider bite... and her lungs felt like they were on fire. How long had she been out?

She opened her eyes onto a very different view. Moryggan was on her back, looking up at more of that dreadful soot-stained stone ceiling. But the air in the room was clean and scentless. Scentless.... The Miasma!!

Her heart hitched as she realized the miasma was entirely missing. Oh no... She grimaced, feeling the tears well up again. The voice would be back, no doubt very soon now that she was awake. The pain would start again. Except. She couldn't sense it anymore. Moryggan blinked in surprise, as she realized that the dull roar, the constant hiss, the sensation of being glared at in hatred was gone from inside her skull. But...how?...

With one hand, she reached up to touch her head -- only to jolt in surprise at the sight of her own arm. Where she'd fallen unconscious wearing sleek bracers and gloves, the devices on her arms now were heavy, bulky, and glowing with contained power and magic. There was almost something soothing about the blue glow coming off the curved crystals along the back of the forearm, and from the spikey crystals that hovered just off the armlets in the grasp of some kind of field. That's when she recognized she was also seeing things through some kind of tinted lens as well. A helmet? She felt around, afraid to find out the extent of it, and was relieved to find it only covered the top of her head and face, like a typical helmet. Her mouth was entirely free in the front. From the feel of it, the sharp angles and diamond patterns she could make out with her hands, at least one Asura had been involved in its design.

"I wouldn't remove that if I were you." She heard a now familiar voice call from nearby. Laying where she was, she turned her head, the metal of the helmet rasping against whatever surface she was on. Apparently she was on some kind of table, whether operating or otherwise. Nearby, his back turned to her, Cyrus finished writing something down, before turning to her. "Right now that helmet and those armguards -- and the shoulder guards you can't see right now -- are the only thing keeping you from being taken control of." Moryggan went to sit up, groaning in pain as new soreness opened up on her body. "What... what happened?" "The miasma trap wore out before I could get you to the infirmary here." He replied, crossing his arms. "You probably feel a bit more sore than you did after our fight, right?" She nodded.

He humphed and shook his head. "Sorry about that. You started to come around at one point, and the only way I could keep you on the table was to have Dangles here sit on you, pinning you down." He gestured to the big jungle cat that sat beside him, scritching behind its ear with one finger. The cat purred in response, before looking at her and blinking. "While he did that, Dribbles dosed you with venom again, putting you out. That gave me enough time to find the designs." "What... designs?" She asked, sliding off the table slowly, before she ran a hand along the gauntlets, feeling the electric tingle of the energy field. "Just what are these?" Cyrus smiled wistfully. "A remnant of Scarlet. One of her first ideas, but one of the last she ever made...for reasons I think you understand more than most." He indicated the helmet. "The Pact call it 'Scarlet's Veil', but they don't understand what it is. After all, the only one they ever saw was destroyed when Scarlet died and the Breachmaker blew up." Moryggan's lips peeled back in a sneer. "Scarlet? Ugh. Why would I want anything on me that psycho made? Why shouldn't I just take them off, huh?" She looked at her hands now like they were covered in filth. He frowned. "Because she made them to save her own mind from the predations of the Elder Dragon. The one that ended up taking her sanity because its sleeping mind did...hideous things to her psyche." He pointed at the nose of the helmet. "Like I said, the Pact has no idea what these are. They think they were just some kind of armor she wore. But they weren't. She was trying to save herself from becoming something....else." "Hmmph. Whatever." Cyrus's eyes narrowed. "Tell me: do you hear the voice anymore? Do you feel, as you called it when you screamed it last time you woke up, that your 'strings are being pulled'?" She shivered, and shook her head. Just the thought, the memory of what that felt like was going to give her nightmares.

"That's because those -- We call them Psi-Nullifier Amplification Gear -- has cut you entirely off from it." He stared at her for a moment. ".... tell me, do you normally sense the Dream? the one the sylvari talk about all the time?" "Well yes, I always feel the Dre--" She paused, her eyes widening. It's not there. It's not there it's not there it's not there!!! "WHERE IS IT?!"

"Like I said; Psi. Nullifier. Amplification. It's designed to cut you off from psychic influences that would normally affect your mind. Unfortunately it seems the Dream counts, but..." He waved his hand dismissively. "That can be adjusted for. Once the programs built into it can isolate it from the Call of the Dragon, it'll let your precious Dream come back." "B-but what am I supposed to do until then?!" Moryggan demanded. She felt physically sick. At no point in her short life had she ever been cut off from the Dream. Even Soundless still heard the Dream even if they ignored it. But this emptiness... "My purpose; my DREAM. It's gone!" "It'll be back." Cyrus shrugged, stepping off to one side and pouring a cup of tea for each of them. "Maybe not too soon, but sooner than you think. For now, though, you'll be just like us 'dreamless' humans. And Norn. And Charr. And Asura." He pondered. "Pretty much every race, really." Moryggan reluctantly accepted the tea, sipping it under the edge of the helmet. "....why didn't these help Scarlet, if she designed them to?" Cyrus took a sip, and closed his eyes. "...Because even though she designed them the moment she came out of Omadd's machine, she...got distracted. She never made them until too late, and the mark the Dragon had left in her mind had started to mature. It was working from within, corrupting her plans, her thoughts." He opened his eyes, pinched in grief. "It's one of the reasons I left early. Her plans were advancing, but she'd forgotten the purpose of the Plan itself. Of what she had originally intended to do. And that damned voice convinced her she was still on the path." "....And what was this 'Plan'?" She asked, curious. Everyone knew the story of Scarlet Briar, or at least what the Pact had figured out about the crazed sylvari. But this human apparently had a different view of her. It was...enlightening if it were true.

"To save the sylvari, and the rest of Tyria from the Elder Dragon." Cyrus told her flatly. He looked into her eyes, the grief replaced with ironhard rage. "Mordremoth; father of the Pale Tree, grandfather of all sylvari. Her plan, the moment she realized what had almost destroyed her mind, was to kill the dragon as fast as possible." Moryggan blinked in surprise at the vehemence in his voice. "Scarlet wanted to kill the Dragon? That's a load of dolyak shit!" She countered, putting the cup down. "She terrorized Tyria! Her weapons of destruction tore up entire regions! That blasted Marionette of hers, and whatever its weapon was, killed every living, sentient thing in Timberline Falls!! The burials went on for DAYS!" "I know, damnit!" Cyrus yelled back, clenching his fists. "She... none of that was supposed to happen. The original goal was to enlist the aid of the nations to build the mechanized army, and have that storm into the Dragon's realm. But all five nations turned her down, so she had to enlist... others. Less than reputable sources of technology, power, money. Ones you can't trust with your back turned. The Nightmare tower was a prototype for a weapon to be used against the Dragon's control!" He pointed at her. "You, of all people right now, know how effective Miasma is against it! You told me yourself it retreated from your mind the moment you breathed it in!" "I-I...!" She stuttered for a second, put off. He was right; the voice had disappearred with the arrival of the Miasma. But, if Scarlet had been working for the Dragon, then why design a weapon against it? "But... I don't understand! Why would that work anyway?" "Near as we can tell... could tell..." Cyrus's mood softened slightly with the past tense. "The Elder Dragon of the Jungle is a thing of plant and mind. The Miasma was designed to interrupt that with hallucinations and terror. The Tower -- towers, if we could have made the pods big enough -- would have been area denial weapons. Wherever they dropped and grew, the Dragon would be unable to control either itself or its minions."

"But the Watchwork Nightmares --"

"Assault troops. Send them in first to clear the path with chainsaw and flame." Cyrus looked away for a moment. "Their spidery form was supposed to be for enhanced mobility. The menders would keep them repaired as they cut and burned a path towards the Dragon and destroyed whatever defenses it had." "Aetherblades?" "Aerial troops. More area denial; fire-based weapons to burn entire swaths of jungle to ash. Etherwarp drives in case the Dragon got frisky and tried to swat them from the sky. Hard to hit something if it just disappears in front of you and reappears a mile away." He offered a weak grin. "That engine is one of the reasons I'm here in this base today. I want one, and there's none left intact after Lion's Arch."

Moryggan pursed her lips. "But...what about the Marionette? the Breachmaker that destroyed Lion's Arch and woke the Dragon? I heard the Call. I felt it..." She touched the faceplate of the helmet she now wore. "At least, until today I felt it." "Both the Breachmaker and the Marionette came from the same project, but different tactics, so far as I can tell." Cyrus shrugged. He reached for the counter and picked up a holoslate with the data crystal in it. A few finger-flicks later, he pulled up both designs. "The Breachmaker was originally just going to be a heavily armored transport for the Marionette, as you can see here." He pointed at the designs. "The idea was to lower the Marionette from a safe height and have it go toe-to-whatever with the Dragon itself." He chuckled. "It would have been a great fistfight I think."

He indicated the second design, the one of the drill-equipped Breachmaker. "Somewhere in its development, Scarlet came up with the Aethercannon. It's not so much a cannon as it is a highly focused charge of energy of a particular signal that is similar to what the Miasma produces at a very minor level, only magnified to ridiculous scale. When she realized what she could do with it, she had the entire ship recommissioned into a battleship." The new design had thicker plating and was almost twice the size of the one carrying the Marionette.

Moryggan stared at the drill on the end, and the diagram's pulsing internal glow that indicated its weapons' power distribution. She'd never seen the real thing, but she had seen bits of the wreckage around the ruins of Lion's Arch. "So... what would that do?" "It was supposed to find leyline hubs -- hubs of natural magical energy that flow in certain paths under or on the surface -- and forcibly breach them, injecting what was supposed to be a 'tainted' form of magic. Unpalatable, possibly poisonous for the Dragon." He sighed. "If it worked, the ship would have moved from hub to hub, cutting the Dragon off from its food supply. Possibly wounding it on the way. If we got really, really lucky, a tainted burst would give the damned monster the equivalent of a heart attack. Or quickly starve it to death." There was a warped kind of logic to it. On some level, Moryggan could almost understand what he was saying -- what Scarlet's original plan had been -- which almost made it tragic that it went so horribly awry. "So... she made all of it to kill the Dragon...but didn't give herself enough protection from it." She mulled it over in her mind, pursing her lips. "Or it tricked her into not giving her enough." "Yeah..."

"Where does that leave me though?"

"It depends. According to the computers in this place, it'll take the better part of a week to permanently lock that voice out of your mind for good." Her face seemed to brighten under the helmet. "After that, it'll be up to you what you want to do." "And what about you?" He shrugged. "I'm still going to go with the Plan. The original one. Find a way to kill the Dragon. I won't do what Scarlet did, but I sure as hell will use as much of her knowledge and tech as I can." He gave her an odd look, questioning. "I can't do it alone. I know we just fought, and neither one of us has much of a reason to trust each other but..."

"What are you asking?" Moryggan asked, though she could almost see the answer -- the Question -- written in his face. She tried to hide the smile she could feel growing on her face at the thought.

"Do you want to kill a Dragon with me? Maybe save the sylvari and the rest of Tyria as a bonus?" He asked, smirking.

"Oh yes... I think I very much want to do that." Her smile was like a shark's grin.

Her grin made his smirk widen, and he offered her his hand. "In that case, my name is Cyrus Sigismund. Late of the Priory, Late of the Aetherblades. And yourself?" "Moryggan Deraleth, of the Dawn. Lightbringer of the Order of Whispers...though you didn't hear that from me." She accepted his hand in her armored grasp. "A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Cyrus." "The pleasure is all mine, Moryggan. Welcome to the team." ---- Author’s note: This was supposed to have been a SHORT story. A five minute story. It didn’t end up that way. I hope it’s enjoyable. It fits more the ‘desperation’ more than the ‘hope’, but I hope the end lends itself to the idea of Hope. This is phenomenally late for Week 1. LoL. I’m almost embarassed.

#gw2 fanfiction #tyriaslibrary #my characters #Cyrus Sigismund #Moryggan Deraleth #scarlet briar #Breachmaker #Twisted Nightmare #desperation/hope #violence cw #cw mental trauma #pain #My stories #long story

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imagineredwood · 6 years

Photo

Request: You’re happy’s 19 y/o daughter and your whole life you’ve only ever known his name so you track him down and he immediately recognizes you and shows you a baby pic he kept and tells about why they both agreed it was best you grow up

***So I know I usually won’t include any physical aspects of the reader so everyone feels included but Happy has features and colors that are dominant genes so I referenced to that. Hope yall don’t mind. ***

“Is this it?”

You spoke to yourself and smiled softly as you gazed out of the window of your car. The clubhouse was much bigger than you had imagined, the whole lot having both the clubhouse and the garage within. The line of bikes out in front of the clubhouse answered the question.

“Yep, this is it.”

Turning the key in the ignition and shutting off the vehicle, you ran your suddenly clammy palms over the thighs of your jeans. The last months and months of research had finally led to this moment. All this time, you’ve only had his name and nothing else to go by. No pictures, no address. Only his name and the will to finally know your father. You had jumped through hoops, searching every database the you had access to just to find dead end after dead end. Except for the last one. The database search flagged in Stockton jail. Finally, you had a link.

Happy Lowman. Inmate #827493. Charming, CA.

He had been released for sometime now but still. It was a lead. After searching for a while more and filling in blank spaces, you were now standing in front of the place you believed your father to be. You wondered what he looked like. Did you look like him? Were there similarities? The ache in your chest had you stepping out of your car quickly and slinging your bag over your shoulder, your hands shaking by your sides in nerves. Time felt like it was in slow motion as you walked over to the garage, knowing better than to try and approach the clubhouse first. An older gentleman with salt and pepper hair, scars spread across his cheeks looked up from the hood of a car he was working on, a warm smile gracing his face. He grabbed a towel from the hood and wiped his hands as he walked towards you.

“Hello darlin’. Are you waiting for your car?”

You smiled softly and shook your head, laughing nervously.

“Uh, actually no. I’m here to see someone? I was wondering if you could tell me if he was here.”

The mans smile faltered slightly but he still held a friendly vibe. You didn’t miss his eyes looking you over though, searching for some sort of badge or identification. He relaxed slightly when he didn’t see one but you could still feel the tension and chose to speak before he got the wrong idea.

“My uh…my mom…I think someone here is my dad…”

After you said it, you became how aware of how crazy and out there you sounded, but the man’s sigh and nod made you feel as though you couldn’t have been the first one.

“Aye, maybe one of us is.”

He laughed dryly before whistling.

“Who do you think it is?”

Without skipping a beat, you answered him. It was easy, considering you’ve dreamed of this name since you were small.

“It’s uh, Happy. Lowman.”

Chibs ran a hand over his face and waved his hand for you to follow him.

“I’ll bring you to him but if he doesn’t know you, you’re outta here lass.”

“Yes sir.”

Your politeness soothed him a bit and he lead you closer to the garage where other employees were working. He pointed you towards someone who had a shaved head but you couldn’t see his face. It was buried under the hood of a corvette. The older man called out his name and suddenly it hit you that you hadn’t though about what would happen if he denied it. Or what if he just flat out didn’t want to deal with you. You didn’t really have time to think out it though as he stood up straight and turned to face you, his brown eyes locking with yours. You could see it immediately, the resemblance. It was almost like looking into a mirror while still having subtle differences from your mom. She had been right though, you were a spitting image of him. He’d have to be a fool to deny you his child when you looked almost like his clone. But the smile that etched itself into his hardened face told you that that wouldn’t be the case.

His cheeks stung at the stretch of his grin, tossing down a wrench that he held down onto the garage floor as his eyes looked you over, recognizing you immediately. How you weren’t sure, but it didn’t dim the flutter you felt in your heart though. He jogged over to you quickly but stopped abruptly as he came to stand in front of you. You could see his arms itching by his sides and you took it upon yourself to throw yourself into him.

“Dad.”

It didn’t take long for his arms to encircle you as well, holding you tightly to his body.

“Hi babygirl.”

You weren’t sure how long you stood there hugging but when you did pull away, you saw the garage empty, the older man who’d introduced you assumedly giving the two of you your space. Happy held you away from him at arm’s length and smiled again before pulling his wallet up from the chain it was attached to at his side and opening it. It was safe to say you were shocked when he pulled out a picture of you.

“You were four months only here. Just a little thing.”

“You kept this?”

Happy nodded, squeezing your hand.

“I have a couple but I keep this one with me.”

“Why this one?”

He cleared his throat and swallowed around the lump that suddenly formed in his throat.

“I took this one myself. Before I left.”

He cleared his throat again, already knowing what question was hanging over your head.

“I didn’t want to leave baby, I had to. It was better for you, and your mom. If you found me then you must’ve found something from my record so you already know I ain’t exactly clean. We just wanted what was best for you and back then that just wasn’t…me.”

You could hear the pain in his voice and shook your head a smile on your face.

“I know. I understand. I’m not upset about that, not anymore. I get it as I got older. All I ask is that we can start over. Spend time together, make up for lost time over a beer.”

He smiled along with you and started pulling you to into the clubhouse.

“Sounds like a plan baby girl. Except I’ll be having the beer and you can have a soda. Don’t act like I don’t know you’re 19.”

A snort left you as you chuckled.

“Already on Dad mode I see.”

#happy lowman #sons of anarchy #sons of anarchy imagine #imagines #SAMCRO #happy x reader

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chibichocopaws · 6 years

Text

Visions of a Dark Star

A theory by chibichocopaws!

(Note: This is stupid long. There are no actual facts backing my theory up, it is, after all a theory. I am open to friendly discussion or debate on the topic as well. Apologies for any grammatical errors. I may or may not have written parts while enjoying some prescribed pain relievers. And....

SEASON 6 VLD SPOILERS AHEAD!

K.thanks!)

Krolia: “Time collapses this close to dark stars. Going through the light triggers glimpses of the past and the future.” (Season 6, Episode 2: Razor’s Edge)

We are starting with Kieth's return to the Castle of Lions in Season 6, Episode 4: The Colony. He seems very accepting of what's happening with Shiro, and even slightly pulled back when he sees Shiro at first.

What I mean by this, is the first time Keith speaks to Shiro is over a com when he's on the Altean space pod. He seems slightly frantic, given the information about Lotor. He quickly identifies himself, saying "Shiro it's Keith." Then instantly asks where Lotor is. Granted, this isn't very unlike a Leader of Voltron to do. "It's me. Don't fire. Friend not foe. Now here's the important part."

But even when he lands the Altean pod, and steps out, there's little interaction between the two. Now, Sheith fans jump on the look Shiro gives Keith. It's a big "Holy shit, you look hotter." Look. As a Sheith fan, I'm not going to argue that look, but I am trying to be unbiased here. Soooo, how about we take that look as something different. Where is the hug? Where is the hand shake? Some sort of physical contact. We know Keith and Shiro share physical contact frequently. A hand on the shoulder, an arm around the shoulder, etc. It's uncommon for them to not be near each other, or exchanging a touch. We know Keith doesn't do this with many others. “He's not exactly handing out love hearts to anyone.” Whether that be as a friend or more. Again, different topic. So, we know Keith is reserved to begin with during this reunion, so perhaps that's really what the look is for. Keith barely acknowledges Shiro here. Sure, he's matured, but he's holding back. There's only one point he's smiling at Shiro when he's returned. Otherwise, he's rarely interacting with him. He's brushing off Shiro’s questions, and focusing on other people's questions. If you watch the episode closely, he rarely even looks at Shiro.

To touch on the “one time he is smiling” was when Haggar was looking through Shiro’s eyes. Of course she was. Why would she not be. The universe really hates Keith sometimes. Poor guy. Anyways, it's after the introduction of Krolia, when she thanks Shiro for raising him to be the man he is today. So, even if we dissect this, it can still stand to reason, that he's simply smiling because of his mother's words. If they had the visions, and Krolia too saw what was bound to happen, why would she do this? It's a funny thing, mothers. They do things that their kids don't always understand, but it's for the best. Krolia understands that Shiro has been and is a huge part of Keith’s life. She's had 2 years and countless past and future visions to discover this, nevermind if Keith opens up to her verbally (which is likely considering 2 years with only one other person, not including cosmic wolf because I'm left to assume it cannot communicate, is a long time to sit in complete silence, especially with all their dirty secrets being shown in visions to each other). So perhaps, Krolia does and says this more for Keith than Shiro. Krolia is difficult to read though, she's naturally obscure with her facial expressions, most likely due to her being Galra and a member of the Blade of Mamora.

So let me throw this out there. Based on what we know from Episode 2, every time that time collapses, Keith and Krolia fell victim to visions of the past and the future. Yet, Episode 2 only showed one vision from the future, then proceeded to only show visions of the past. Yet, this makes no sense, unless of course, the visions of the future were obscured by the creators to "not give anything away" (such as the small snippet of battle between Shiro/Kuron and Keith. As viewers we only knew it was going to happen, though we didn't know to what extent or why at the time of episode 2).

They were on that space whale for 2 years. I'm not sure what the frequency of time collapses was, but they occurred on the space whale as well. It seemed the trip to the space whale from the destruction of their ship, could not have lasted more than a couple of days to a maximum of a week. I say this based on Keith being human, because he mentions they won't survive much longer without food or water. Some humans can train their bodies to go longer periods without sustenance, and sadly, I imagine Keith has had to do just that based on his history as a child. Ok, so supposedly the average human can last without food for about three weeks. I, personally don't believe that. (Backstory: I went an entire week without any food as a cleansing exercise and by day 6 I was about ready to pass out, day 7 found me literally blacking out randomly. Keeping in mind, I only drank water, and continued to work at a grueling physically laboring job). So I’m assuming this 3 weeks statement is for those that can basically veg out without much, if any, physical labor. Now, water is a different story. The human body cannot survive very long without it (a matter of days really). Days under normal circumstances, not extreme labor, like pushing from space rock to space rock, sweating from exertion, etc. But, if we take into consideration that Keith is also half Galra, that may extend the amount of time he needs liquid. I am not familiar with how frequently Galra need sustenance to survive.

Back on topic though... In that time we were given three time collapses. So, let's say we go with the maximum of a week they were jumping from space rock to space rock before encountering the whale. (This time frame is important because we need to figure out how often the time collapses were occurring and we need a point of reference, which would be prior to the space whale) That's 3x52 (52 weeks in a year) which is 156 time collapses in a year. Now that's 156 times 2 for 2 years that they were gone, and that's 312.

Obviously that's not including any changes. So yes, there's a possibility that maybe the whale has blocked some of the collapses, or that the collapses happen less frequently the closer or farther away the whale gets to or from the star. Or even if the collapse is blocked from hitting them by something. But even if it were only 100 visions of the past and future, that's still A LOT!

So here's my theory. Keith knows. He knows the entire time what's going to happen. I'm basing this on a linear future, meaning it cannot be altered.

There is a time in episode 4 where Keith tries to reach out to Shiro (right after Shiro steals a pod and Lotor and flies off, Keith calls him through vocal com) desperately. He tried to keep his voice calm, telling Shiro it will be alright. Without my theory, it's something Keith would maybe do. I mean, if he doesn't know what's happening, why would he speak calmly to Shiro. Why wouldn't he yell and be like "Shiro what are you doing!?" Sure, he's matured in two years, but it seems like something more of a last hope reach out. I truly believe, at this point, he knows already. He knows that Shiro is a clone. He knows that they are going to battle, but that doesn't mean he can't try to stop it still.

But, 2 years is a long time to come to terms with the inevitable. It by no means makes it any easier, but it can be accepted. He's also had 2 years to discuss this with his mother. Now, looking at Krolia, she is very cool headed. She seems to know herself and her limits very well. She has seemed to since before having Keith. Krolia very well could have been the voice of reason he needed to accept that he may have to kill Shiro/Kuron, or at the very least, fight him.

Now, because it's not released, it's impossible to know how much was revealed in the future visions. The past visions seemed to be weird intervals, some long, some very short. So I'm not sure what was shown for future visions or the lengths of them. Though 2 years is a long time to get the entire fight and what brought Shiro to that place. So, I honestly have little doubt.

Ok, this finally wraps around to “The Battle”. Ugh. My heart hurts rewatching this episode, but I didn't feel I could full circle my theory without doing it.

Season 6, Episode 5: The Black Paladins.

The cracking sound you're hearing? Oh, just my heart shattering. I'll find some glue or something later.

Anyways. They rush out as Voltron to fight Haggar’s goonies. I really want to call them the switchers. It's hard to keep up who's side they're on. Point is, they do their battle, get flung into a rock and Haggar opens up a wormhole. So at this point he says “We have to make sure we get Shiro back.” (Well there's this little conversation prior to this line, but it doesn't pertain to my point.)

Hunk: “But Shiro isn't Shiro anymore.”

Keith says he knows, but it's almost exasperated. Like, sure he could have taken that tone because it was obvious, or he could have taken the tone because he knew well before they did. He says “But something is wrong with him, the Galra or Lotor have to be behind it.” Weird right? Because if he had visions for two years, he should have been able to piece things together, right? Maybe not because there's two bad guys right now. Lotor and Haggar (which would currently be classified under as Galra). So sure, he's had visions, but it's like being handed 5 different ingredients to a meal and telling someone “cook whatever with just this”. If you hand those same 5 ingredients to someone else, there's a good chance they won't come up with the same menu. So, maybe Keith was able to piece together most of it, but pinpointing which bad guy was responsible for which scene (ingredient) could be trickier for him.

So after their little chit chat, Keith goes on to say: “We all know he wouldn't give up on us, we can't give up on him.” Yet, he doesn't say this immediately. He stops, closes his eyes, takes a breath then says it. Why? We know the creators of VLD don't ever put anything in the show without meaning. So why have Keith pause? This action, the looking down, closing your eyes, breathing. It's a way to center our thoughts. He's trying to remain focused, but why? Is it because he feels himself slipping, becoming emotional? I mean, he doesn't look emotional. Or is it because he's trying to re-center himself within the timeline of the visions he remembers?

Why does he have to recenter himself within the timeline of visions? Maybe something is missing! Maybe he was unable to piece together why the other Paladins weren't by his side during his battle with Shiro. Maybe he thought they gave up on Shiro. Maybe this part of the timeline wasn't revealed to him (this part being the fact that only Keith gets through the wormhole), so he felt that he needed to reassure them that Shiro was worth saving.

Now, look at Keith’s shift when he yells disband. All that coolness from earlier, the calm collectedness he had is gone, and he legitimately looks like something has clicked. He gets it. He understands why they aren't there during the battle, because the only one who can make it through the wormhole is him. He goes from calm to confident in a second. And although his facial features change when the speed is intense, he doesn't look scared or nervous. Just in pain. Like he legit knows he's going to make it, it's just taking a lot of exertion on his body to do so, but he has no doubt he will get through. Why? There should be a glimmer of doubt unless he knew otherwise.

Except of course when he comes out the other side of the wormhole and is met with a fleet of Galra battle cruisers. Oops. Guess that part wasn't in the vision. Oooor maybe it was. He literally effortlessly glides through that. The Black Lion isn't at full capacity with its broken thruster, and yet he GLIDES through the line of fire, almost as if he's done it before. So why the face of surprise? Let's be honest. Someone could tell you “oh, there's like a thousand bees over there. Look I took a picture even.” But then you go over there and seeing a thousand bees can be intimidating face to face. Or, maybe he's surprised because he recognizes it instantly. Like “Oh, right. Seen this part before.” This would also make sense, if he didn't know why the other Paladins weren't around for the fight. As in, he missed a vision from two seconds earlier, but now it's one of his visions again.

Even Ezor turns around and is like “Wow, I can't believe he made it through that.” Maybe she's talking about the wormhole, or maybe she's talking about the fleet of Galra battle cruisers.

His mini battle with Acxa kind of proves my point further. He has been Lion-less for over 2 years. Sure, it could be like riding a bike, but his moves are so precise, you know, almost like he knows what's going to happen!

Also, he flies right to the ship and to the area where Shiro, Lotor, Ezor and Zethrid are. How did he know where they went in the middle of a fleet of ships, while distracted by Acxa? (As a side note…. I love Ezor’s line of “Is it broken?” *poke* *poke*. She's so damn cute I can't take it.)

Now, I personally think Keith does not believe this is a linear timeline. I think he truly believes he can alter what he saw somehow. So at this point Acxa has grabbed his attention again. He says “Think. Think. How are we going to get in?” If he truly believes he can change this timeline, at this point he could really be trying to avoid the next part from happening.

Now things are going to get intense and I'm going to cry… again.

“Shiro…. Shiro come in! I don't know what's wrong, but I know we can fix this.” Listen to that desperation! Still stuck on him not knowing? Him just being more mature? Spent so much time with his mother he adapted her calmness in moments of crisis? I disagree. He's begging. Keith is legitimately begging. He knows where this is leading, and he's pulling a last call to try to stop it before it goes there. We know he saw a part of the fight in a vision. We know that much. He has to know where this is going. “Let me help you.”

But wait…. Acxa has locked his position. He knows she's on his tail. Why isn't he moving out of the way? He's given her a clear line on his position. Keith is an ace pilot. He can maneuver and have a conversation. Why isn't he? Because Shiro is more important? Sure we could go with that, or because he knows she won't fire. He saw she doesn't fire.

At this point he turns his attention towards Black. Look at his face. Listen to the sound of his tone. He's accepted this is going to happen. His facial expression is bitter acceptance. Bitter acceptance in the manner that he knows it's going to happen, but it doesn't mean he has to be happy about it. “I know you're hurting. We just need to keep it together a little longer.” He said we. We need to keep it together a little longer. He's hurting too. He knows what's about to happen. How could he not. He's not only telling Black, he's telling himself.

At this point we have a focus shift. The virus shuts down the Castle of Lions, it's panic, but let's focus on what little amount of Krolia we can see. When Pidge gets the systems fixed for all of like 3 seconds, Krolia remains rigid. As if she knows it's not going to last. This could be a stretch, sure. I mean, maybe she's just rigid from the panic, but when the systems fail again, you can see her face. It's detailed. She's worried, but distant. She's not worried about herself or the crew. Distant look implores us to believe she's worried about someone or something that's not present. Keith. Shiro. Their battle. If Keith saw Krolia’s past, it's safe to assume Krolia was able to see Keith’s future. At first, I wondered if this was only when they were touching, but it appears not. If we go back and look at Episode 2 again, there is a point, on the space whale, where Krolia sees a young Keith over his father’s gravestone. At this point Krolia is not touching Keith. She's across the way sitting next to the fire with Keith on the other side sleeping, or at least laying down. So it's easy to assume the memories and future visions are shared between the two of them every time the time collapses.

Ok, skipping over the Lotor/Honerva and switchers (Yup. Doing it. Zethrid, Acxa and Ezor shall now be known as the switchers) scene, it's unrelated (though… woah Lotor you sneaky bastard).

Next we see Keith has found an abandoned shuttle pod. He tracks the footsteps. And his face. It says it all. “This is it. It's time.” The pure definition of determination. He's ready. It's happening. There's nothing he can do or say at this point. The time has come.

He even walks with purpose. But here's another thought. When he no longer has footprints to follow, how does he know where to go? He takes a lift and goes exactly where Shiro is. How did he know unless he saw it?

There's a lot of facial expressions talk for the next few scenes. So first he enters the room with a surprised look on his face. This could be from a “where am I?” in a sense of visions showed him nothing, or with my theory this could be a “Wow, it's exactly as the vision showed me.”

The next facial expression is back to determination, which leads me to believe the surprised look was more of a “Wow, exactly as my vision.” If he were lost or unsure of himself he wouldn't have switched to determination so quickly and suddenly.

Now, the determination expression could also be confusion. If he's confused, it could really just be him thinking “Ok, I'm here, but where is Shiro? This is where I'm supposed to be, but I don't see him.”

Next he seems genuinely surprised. He places a hand on the clone pod, and one by one they all light up. This very well could have not been part of a vision based on his reaction. Sure, the pods were there during the battle, therefore there during his vision, but it could have been background, and he could have been far more focused on the battle with Shiro as opposed to what was around him.

But, “Hello Keith” is in his vision. If we go back to Episode 2, those words are in it. At this point Keith turns. He kind of looks surprised but I interpret the look more as a “Oh no.” So at this point, we know for a fact Keith has seen this. We don't know how much of this he has seen. The entire thing? Just parts? We don't know. We do know he's seen from this point and at least part of the battle based on what was shown to us from episode 2.

In the vision from episode 2 we hear the following words. “Hello Keith.” “Yes. I know.”

“It's going to be ok, we just have to get back to the castle.” “Shiro!!!!!”

and “....are not going anywhere.”

Which, if we're following it in sequence, means he saw the entire before-the-fight-sequence, but also more. The beginning of the fight Keith does not yell Shiro. The words were all spoken before Shiro goes in for attack.

Next scene, Pidge to the rescue in the worst way. Also not pertinent to this, but something I would like to touch base on some other time.

Battle ensues between Keith and Shiro, but Keith isn't fighting. At least not at first. Keith is strictly defending. At least until his helmet comes off. The punch hits him hard, maybe he whacks his head on the way down. His Galra is showing. (kek). It isn't until his Galra side comes out that he starts fighting back. This could be because he doesn't want to hurt Shiro, or because he's still holding out hope that the timeline isn't linear.

“That's the Keith I remember.” Seems to spark something in Keith and bring back his human side, and once again he starts avoiding attacks and defending. No longer on the offense.

When Shiro knocks down a tower, and Keith starts talking to him by saying “Shiro.” Is this the Shiro from Episode 2? It's hard to tell. This Shiro call sounds more raw vocally, than the vision. So, let's move on, pretty sure this is not it.

Now, I know this was touched upon by someone else, but here’s another take, Keith’s lack of reaction to Shiro’s hurtful words. “And I should have abandoned you, just like your parents did. They saw that you were broken. Worthless. I should have seen it too.” If Keith had been able to hear these words in any of the visions, he could have already dealt with the pain they caused. He could have already spoken with Krolia about it. She has already told him he was the most important thing to her. So I believe he's already dealt with that pain, and been reassured of its falseness by Krolia herself.

Ooh, another time Keith yells Shiro. At this point Shiro is… well I'm not really sure what's happening. His hand is connecting with the Galra tech and turning into a giant laser? Well, whatever the case may be, this sounds more like the Shiro yelled in ep 2. So, this implies Keith’s first and only on screen vision was from before the battle to this point. Keep in mind, the creators would not include an in depth vision in episode 2, but leave hints. They didn't want to give away the fight entirely.

Now, the next set of scenes depicts Shiro destroying the base. There are times where Keith seems surprised, but ironically, he knows when to jump out of the way of a falling piece without looking up to see it. How would he know to jump out of the way? He's already seen this all happen. He's pretty banged up, sure, but just because he knows what's happening before it happens, doesn't mean it's less painful either physically or mentally. Remember, we are basing this on a linear timeline. So regardless, certain things are going to occur.

He lands on a ledge, catches his breath for a moment and immediately looks in the direction of his blade, like he already knew where it had landed. He's determined. He knows he has to get to it. He knows it's the only way to end the battle, but his body is exhausted. Far too much exertion.

He doesn't make it till the last second, but does manage to grab it before Shiro’s killing blow. Next we fans all die a little. We all know the line. “Shiro, please. You're my brother. I love you.” That's a whole different subject for a different time. (Can't even describe how difficult it is to not touch on this right now, but it's not pertinent to my point.) So Shiro proceeds to tell Keith that the castle and Paladins are gone. Why doesn't Keith react? Sure he's using all his strength to hold off Shiro from cutting his head clean off, but he should have had some sort of reaction unless he knew it wasn't true! He saw it wasn't true.

Now, there's a chance that he does react. That the news is what wakes up his Galra side, but I don't really think so. It's several moments after Shiro’s words that Keith reacts. If we look at just moments before when Keith was punched, we can use this as a safe assumption of what causes his Galra side to wake up. Pain. He's being burned by Shiro’s blade. Boom. Galra side is awake.

So, with the Galra power awakening, Keith gains strength and cuts off Shiro’s arm. The camera pans to his face. Oh gosh. The feels are too strong. Keith is the definition of regret right now, but is it just regret that he's hurt Shiro, or is it regret for more. Regret he couldn't stop this before it got to this point. It's a horrible thing.

They fall, but his face. Oh that agonizing face. What's this tell us? He didn't want it to be like this, but he's not giving up. He could be not giving up because it was a promise Shiro made that he needs to reciprocate, or maybe he already knows Shiro will come back to him.

Flashbacks. End episode 5. Aaaah.

Nope. Not done yet. Hah. You thought that was it?

Season 6, Episode 6: All Good Things

This episode starts off strong. And confusing for my theory, but things still work, I promise. The visions from Episode 2 are never inclusive of thoughts that we can see. They tend to be themselves during the visions/memories. So why does Keith look surprised and sound surprised by Shiro’s words in the black lion? Because, technically, that never actually happens. It's in Keith’s mind (well actually Black’s mind). So because it doesn't occur on a physical plane, it is not shown in his visions, thus he is surprised by Shiro.

This also relates back to my theory of Keith having known. He seems unsure now. Out of nowhere. He's reacting how we would expect Keith to react when Shiro stole Lotor. He's angry, scared, nervous, anxious. What happened to our calm, collected and determined Keith? Where'd he go? Could it be because Keith never had a vision of this. He wasn't prepared for this? I really believe so.

But what about when he says “The others. You said… you…” And then glowy Shiro appears behind him and Keith turns, interrupting himself. This leads us to believe that Keith didn't know the others were going to be ok after all, right? I disagree. So far, Keith has been very aware of every moment. Things have been very linear, but he's done everything he can to try to change it. This was never in his visions, and now he's doubting them. Now he's wondering if he did change things, and that fear that maybe things aren't linear anymore is taking hold, and Keith is Keith once more. Sporadic. Moody. Easily angered Keith.

“I died Keith.” Surprise! Keith didn't know this either, even with my theory. Because again, he was only being shown things that happened on a physical plane. So if we take this scene out entirely, and pretend it didn't happen, it would still be difficult for Keith to piece that information together unless specifically told so on the physical realm.

Back to calm and collected Keith now. Things are back to normal, visions are back in sync? Notice how he doesn't tell any of the crew that Shiro died. He just says that the other Shiro is a clone. So if he had a vision of this part, he still wouldn't have known Shiro was really dead, thus the shock when he found out.

Almost half an episode not pertaining to this post later, and we have Krolia asking Coran if setting a bomb off in the main turbine is a good idea. Keep in mind, if Krolia and Keith had experienced future visions, she could be nervous at this point that this is where the Castle of Lions gets destroyed. If the visions were not shown to them in a linear fashion, but random fragments, there's the possibility that she doesn't really know exactly when or how the Castle of Lions is destroyed. But if you also notice, she doesn't seem too surprised that his theory worked, just relieved.

Back to Keith. After unlocking the Black Lion’s thruster wings and making it back to the team. Keith says “Now hurry, we don't have much time. Form Voltron.” I mean, this could be an educated guess. Maybe he just assumes that Lotor will be up and moving quickly, but look at his face. Again. Self assurance. Self confidence. He knows.

Season 6, Episode 7: Defender of All Universes

The battle with Lotor. Ok, trying to make this a quick synapses as opposed to going attack per attack, otherwise this will result in another Episode 5 length segment lol. So, Keith is making some great calls during this battle, quick on defense, quick on the offense calls, but what really struck me was when he yells “move”. Is that Shiro telling him? Or is that him remembering? Or is his reaction time (after two years of peaceful waiting) that good?

Ok, what about when Lotor teleports (for the first time)? Well, if we look at Kieth’s face here, he's the only one that isn't showing an expression. He's blank. Completely blank. Almost like he's trying to recall what happens next. He looks over right before the portal appears though, why before if he didn't know?

Next scene shows Krolia staring at the pod that Shiro is being put in by Coran. Her face. It's of betrayal, pain and yet relief. She knows too.

Voltron and quintessence scene was next, yanno, after Voltron got the snot kicked out of him. I mean, there's only so much they could have done, even with Keith knowing what was going to happen. Voltron was infinitely slower than Lotor’s suit. But anyways, on topic here. Keith says it's the only way, they have to try to enter the quintessence field to win. Everyone else has trepidation or nerves, but not Keith. He knows.

In the quintessence field Keith seems surprised once more, but only after his “we did it look.” This could be because maybe, the quintessence field isn't exactly a physical plane of existence. I mean it is the plane between existences, so perhaps it falls into the same category as Black’s consciousness. Or maybe it is considered a physical plane, and he's just caught up by its intensity. I mean, a infinite space full of power? Who wouldn't get caught up in the moment?

So after the battle, and the Castle of Lions is destroyed Keith says “We need to find somewhere to land to see if we can help Shiro.” He seems calm, but not necessarily knowing. It's hard to tell with this scene. I feel it would be easier if they showed his facial expression, but they simply showed Shiro.

Now Keith admits that Shiro’s soul is in Black, but heard out of context there's a good possibility that, if Keith had seen this as a vision on the space whale, that it was misinterpreted. Maybe he thought that somehow they transferred his spirit there to save him because the clone body was barely alive. We have to think about those ingredients again. They've been handed to Keith randomly, and he can't be entirely certain what he's required to make. What order he's supposed to put them in.

I must point out here, that this scene focuses a lot on Lance’s grief, panning away from Keith, so it's difficult to really tell what Keith is thinking or what he looks like at the point Allura walked up to the Black Lion to rescue Shiro’s soul.

At some point the scene pans to the Paladins watching Allura. Everyone has their eyes wide and their mouth hung… except for Keith. His mouth is open, but his eyes are not wide. We know wide eyes is an expression Keith takes often. So it's not like a shocked expression would be out of place on his face either. So why aren't his eyes wide in shock. He knows what's happening. His eyes are squinted slightly, as if expressing a relieved “finally”.

Keith does look surprised and hopeful when it works, but if we look at Krolia, she's smiling and doesn't even flinch a single bit (unlike Romelle) when the Green Lion roars behind her.

And to testify for my cause more, Keith looking surprised and hopeful, keep in mind what Keith has experienced in life. Things can being going perfectly for him and suddenly everything is in pieces. It's a mindset he's used to expecting, why would this be any different. Sure, based on my theory, he's seen the outcome, and thus far everything has been true, but Keith is the universe’s punching bag. He's privy to this, he always expects the worst, and I'm not surprised he would wait with bated breath for the validity of this part of his visions.

While we've spoken about his facial expression. The ending. (Wait... is that my heart glue!?) Look at Keith's face now. Totally different. Relief. Happiness. He's back to looking at Shiro how he used to. How he hasn't since before the space whale. He knew. He had to have known.

Aaaand end! Well of my points from the episodes.

In summary, I truly believe Keith and Krolia have seen every moment on the physical plane of both their pasts and their futures up until this point. I can't quite tell how much farther past the end of Season 6 they have seen, but with the grin on Kieth’s face at the end of the episode, he definitely knows something we don't know. I can't wait to see if this theory is true, and I would love to hear what others think of my theory. If you totally disagree please share with me! I would love to hear other people's theories, or even examples on why my theory is bogus. Bring it on!

And, if you've made it this far. OMG I love you. I love you. I love you. Special kudos and Web cookies for you.

Thanks for reading! :D

#vld #vld thesis #vld spoilers #vld keith #vld shiro #vld krolia

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hitchell-mope · 6 years

Text

Ok I’ve been working on something for years that I hope to make it into a tv show one day but probably can’t because once upon a time beat me to it

So imagine

Michael darling single handedly stopped a war that was never meant to end at the cost of his life and to correct “something” the universe sees fit to tear open a hole in the fabric of reality which all cartoons bleed through. Disney Pixar Simpson’s marvel dc blue sky laika everything you can think of are now inhabiting the real world the only humans left are Wendy darling and her close family and friends

Disney’s taken over Great Britain and Ireland. Mickey and Minnie are the king and queen until they see fit to retire

Simpson’s are now in Hollywood Bart is filthy stinking rich and the Whitehouse is his mansion

So on and so forth

Main characters

Jane Ophelia Emerson: now known as Jaime aster blonde hair blue eyes around 5 foot 8 inches. Has magic like the whole of her mothers side of the family. Unlocks it when she meets Peter Pan for the first time. Like her mother and grandmother before her she fell for him hard. So imagine the bitterness when she discovers she wasn’t the first to fall for him and she won’t be the last seeing as he’s fated to be her son in law. She stops her and her friends physical aging process when she’s 16 because she’s terrified of growing up and having to leave everything behind. Gets married to three guys. James pleiades Hawkins from treasure planet. An evil bisexualversion of superman she was forced to create out of two variations of kryptonite (black and pink). William smees illegitimate son that he got from a hooker on the neverland pier. Padraic hutchins. And together they’ve adopted three kids not much younger then them. Youngest to oldest. Timothy Tiberius Turner. Horrid Henry. Alice Liddell. Preferred drink is olive oil until she decides to stop aging then she goes all out on the booze. She really does not like using mjolnir but that’s exactly why she can use it. She killed her own cousin after Peter Pan was taken advantage of. Speaks how she was raised. Posh. But the angrier she gets the more common she sounds.

James pleiades Hawkins: nicknamed Plei shoulder length brown hair turquoise eyes five foot nine. Space cadet. Made a little mistake in that he wished he had magic when holding an empty lamp. This means he’s now a genie but he can appear normal except when angered and he turns an olive green. His lamp stays hidden in Jaime’s blood stream. Very protective of his kids. From montressor but speaks with a middling California accent

Kal: under duress Jaime creates him by combining black and pink kryptonite (according to what I’ve read black turns him evil and somehow pink turns him gay I don’t know why so please don’t ask) so imagine a five foot eleven inch evil bisexual superman built like a tank flirting with anyone he sees. There are limits. He cannot go after anyone younger then Jaime or older then Wendy. Or anyone she is directly related to. Has a side thing going with she hulk (cause of that man of steel woman of Kleenex problem). Looks so much like Clark Kent (blue eyes jet black hair) that once the bitterness has subsided they eventually declare themselves twins. Actually talks with a Kansas accent (it’s a pet peeve of mine) hair goes to his shoulder blades

Padraic Hutchins: five foot ten. Mixed race but unless he showed you a picture of his father (mr smee who is like really white) you wouldn’t be able to tell. Dark black skin (think terry crews) dark blonde waist length hair. Emerald green eyes. Met Jaime when he was working as cabin boy (and hooks personal stool master) on the Jolly Roger. Jaime offered him a deal. Sword fight just him and her. She wins he becomes her butler and all that entails. He wins she becomes his butler and all that entails. It comes to a stalemate. He decides to go with her though. (If you had to wipe hooks ass wouldn’t you leave given a chance) invents a new method of killing when getting revenge on a racist homophobic cop in Springfield. He may look like terry crews but speaks like Katie McGrath (his accent is Dublin posh)

Merida: jaimes best friend. Scottish. Really really curly bright orange hair halfway down her back. Grey blue eyes. 5”8. Harsh rivalry with Clarabelle cow Clarabelle keeps calling her fat by accident. She is not fat. The slightly barrel like figure she has is pure muscle. Moved in with Jaime after an absolutely blow out fight with her mother and hasn’t looked back since. Met Parker through tragedy. The were on an excursion with the parr children and dash died in front of her. Completely destroyed her for months. Tried to change everything about herself to feel better. None of it worked. Cut and straightened her hair. Tried to lose weight (just became addicted to caffeine). She even gave up archery (which if you know her is a serious cause for concern). And through it all Parker was there

Peter Benjamin Parker: the group calls him Parker because there are one too many Peters in the world and they needed to differentiate. Brown hair that grows out to his chin. Brown eyes. 5”9. Splits himself so he can have a somewhat normal life. There is now three of him. The original with Merida. Petey living with aunt may. Spider-Man. Parker actually grows to like the venom suit and through magic is actually able to control it. Realised he was bi when he kissed Padraic to cheer him up after Kal was being a jackass. Then harry arrived. Still has his native New York accent but it interchanges with a British accent after he’s lived in Kensington for some time.

Melody: Danish princess. Daughter of Ariel and Eric. Granddaughter of king triton. Black hair blue eyes. 5”8. Has a thing for blonde men. Was attracted to Cody before he told her he was asexual then she layed off him. Eventually gets with zephyr. Non practicing catholic except in one respect. Jaime gave her her own trident. Loves to swim. She’ll shrink herself down and use a wine glass if she has to. Always wears her hair in a ponytail

Zephyr: French Romani. Blonde shoulder length hair in a pageboy style cut. Green blue eyes. 5”9. Always wears the outfit he had on in his film only now it’s in an older more mature style. Smitten with melody when they met but she had a thing for Cody so he couldn’t say anything. He just got steadily more drunk. Scarily flexible. Likes to hang from chandeliers with his toes. Bit like a blonde Dick Grayson. Non practicing catholic in the same way melody is.

Cody Anderson: Swedish but has spent a lot of time in Australia. 5”11. Blonde hair long enough to braid. Keeps it in a man bun 90% of the time. Asexual. Much rather run climb or play video games then date or sleep with someone. Poor thing has been conscripted as Kals wingman. He absolutely hates it. He just tells the intended targets the truth and if Kal can’t seal the deal on his own merits it’s not Cody’s problem. Apparently can survive on one hour sleep.

Alice Liddell: one of Jaime Plei Kal and Padraics adoptive children. 12 years old. 5”5. Reality warper. Mostly this means she can make a portal to wonderland through any surface. But then she gets magic and all bets are off. Adopted because we birth parents were about to have her committed to an asylum because she kept insisting wonderland is real (it is of course but they have literal Victorian sensibilities and to them Alice has cracked) favourite Dad is Plei. Blonde hair half way down her back. Blue eyes. Actually does look like Jaime a little bit except Jaime’s hair is more of a tawny gold colour and Alice’s is more yellow. Like Jaime defies the dumb blonde stereotype. Uses her powers in very creative ways. Eventually ditches the pinafore

“Horrid” henry: except not really. His biological parents are just jackasses who scapegoat him so the worm is the professed golden child. Reddish brown hair and definitely fulfils the firey redhead stereotype. But manages to use it in helpful ways after Henry’s his own magic. Loves his chemistry set. Many a stink bomb was made from it. 5”4. 11 years old. Green eyes. Favourite Dad is Kal. Again like Zephyr, he always wears the same outfit. Adopted because Jaime could see that he was miserable at his own house and was always happiest when she was babysitting him.

Timothy Tiberius Turner: brown hair blue eyes pink hat. Still has his fairy godparents because Jorgen Von strangle is terrified of Jaime (the girl unionised death). Not stupid per-say but he doesn’t think things through. Favourite Dad is Padraic. Adopted after Jaime went to talk to his fairies and saw his babysitter strapping him to a torture wheel. Definitely the baby of the group being 10 years old

Harry Osborn: 5”9. Black hair blue eyes. Bi. Enters a relationship with Parker and Merida. Hung up on Parker for longer then he’d care to admit. But always believed (as Parker did) that he was straight. Strikes up an odd friendship with Jaime over the “Peters who have ruined their lives” (Parker and Pan) the only difference Osborn is now with his Peter and Jaime doesn’t love her one anymore. He revels in the fact Parker feels the need to protect him and their respective positions in the relationship have changed. Was dying before he used magic to cure the unknown disease that would ravage his body. Couldn’t use his fortune to find a cure because his fathers will stipulates that he’d be disinherited if he tried to cure himself. That and he wanted to defend himself properly should the need arise

Ashton Darling: Jaime’s cousin born in the same hospital month day and the exact same time. Shoulder length tawny gold hair blue eyes same height as Jaime. It’s a running gag that he and Jaime look so much alike they could easily be the same person cloned and don’t think that before puberty when her hair was shorter they didn’t pull pull a twin switch. They even have the same taste in men. Fictional with bright eyes. Expected a bigger reaction from Jaime when he came out to her. She knew and they carried on as normal. Eventually starts dating Jack Frost from rise of the guardians. His parents are fans of that 70’s show. His younger brother is called Topher

Jack Frost: pure white hair blue eyes. 5”9. Always in the same outfit. Guardian of fun. Has a sibling like rivalry with Elsa. She thinks he’s annoying and he thinks she’s boring despite them having the same powers. In Jack Elsa sees what she could have had. Yes Jack was lonely but he made the best of it for centuries and he had people to talk to (North toothania bunnymund and Sandy) whereas Elsa retreated into herself scared of going near others. Though they come to an understanding and when Jaime gives the shovel talk to Jack Elsa gives the shovel talk to Ashton. Ashton and Jack met in similar circumstances to Merida and Parker except the Ashton and Jack’s weren’t nearly as tragic as Merida and Parker

Taran: 13 years old. 5”6. Red hair green eyes. Dalbens ward but somehow ends up staying at Jaime’s (admittedly insanely cavernous) flat more then necessary and everyone knows why except him. Alice has taken a shine to him. He doesn’t quite know why. Gurgis still attached to his hip. He and Eilonwy drifted apart but they are still friends. Has next to no idea what’s going on more than half the time

Felicia Hardy: old friend of Harry and Parker. The friend that would not leave. Her father died and she still is not over it. Cinnamon colour hair hazel eyes. 5”8. Hapless. That is until the symbiote infects her and almost starts a war with the galactic federation.

Johnny Storm: like Parker the group just call him storm. 5”9. Mid length spiky blonde hair. Blue eyes. The human torch. Enters the group by happenstance. Works at Oscorp on an intern. When Parker took the fall for what Felicia was blamed for harry had a bit of a panic attack demanding that he and Parker weren’t separated again so to assuage him Parker takes him on a holiday in a private suite in the death hotel. But then Storm arrives with this contract he needs harry to sign and it escalates from there so now Merida has three boyfriends who are also dating each other one of which is in intergalactic jail.

There are a multitude of alternate realities that are accessed through a full length mirror in Jaime’s flat. Some have diffoerent circumstances or flipped morality/genders or different outcomes. For example

Different circumstances: Clark crashed into the Wayne’s greenhouses and the shock set off Martha’s labour. Clark married a one Diana prince and had two children. Oliver Kingston Wayne and Barry Allen Wayne. Bruce is the drink uncle who accidentally joined a big brother program and Clark is making damned sure Bruce is honouringthe commitment. Oliver dances at a club to be self sufficient. Barry meanwhile is obsessed with chemistry. Clark stayed home with a sick Alfred that fateful night and has never forgiven himself. So he became superman to make sure something like that never happens to anyone else. Bruce however became a preteen alcoholic. Chardonnay is his drink of choice. Their pool cleaner a mr Arthur curry and their chauffeur is a mr Hal Jordan

Different outcome: Professor farnsworth took over New New York with an army of bending units aided by his insane son Phillip. Leela is Phillips personal slave. An impoverished Amy Wong is his public slave (Leela is a sewer mutant). Carol Walt Larry and Igner are incarcerated for trying to throw a coup

Flipped morality: Snow White, jealous of her fathers affection for his new wife, killed her father and blamed grimhilde for it. She learned dark magic and killed the queen in a mirror storm then took over the kingdom with only seven diamond armoured dwarfs. All when she was fourteen.

Flipped gender: Cendrillon used as servant in his own home until he’s able to go to the ball aided by his fairy godfather. The princess saved him with a glass slipper

You get the idea

The characters relation ships with their parents:

Jaime and Wendy had a major falling out because Wendy kept trying to put her solutions in alignment with Jaime’s problems. Eventually Jaime moved next door into a flat in Mickey and Minnie’s castle. And now Jaime’s the queen. Wendy is 5”10 tawny gold hair almost always in a bun. Blue eyes and always dressed in blue. Mid to late forties. Edward Emerson. Think Henry cavil in prime superman mode greying at the temples in either army fatigues or black denim. One year older than Wendy. Besides George he is the only mortal in the family and being mortal he can use a magic wand (no one quite knows why only mortals can use wands)

Plei’s mother Sarah looks the same as in the film. Now you need to go through trauma for your magic to settle. And Plei’s trauma is seeing his father Leland a gain in god know how long. It does not go well

Kal have a rivalry with Clark because Kal sees Clark as a wimp who is wasting his powers on helping people and Clark thinks Kal is a no good miscreant. Their parents though treat Kal the same way they treat Clark. Doesn’t matter if he’s a close W he’s their son. In return Kal values them and does not hate them like he hates Kal (high praise in deed)

Smee just wants Padraic to be happy and if that means Padraic being in England in an entirely different dimension then so be it.

Elinor got impatient with Merida taking so long to choose a suitor and then Merida decided to try and find a boyfriend from non options (read as she doesn’t love the clans sons). So they had a hard he blow out fight which led to Merida moving in with Jaime and she’s barely looked back since

May doesn’t know Parker is no longer st school and he is not planning on telling her. And besides she’s got Benji

Ariel and Eric know everything and as long as melody isn’t hurt they’re fine with it

Phoebus and Esmeralda are just like Ariel and Eric

Cody’s mother isn’t in the picture anymore

Alice’s parents tried to have her committed so their relationship is next to nonexistent

Henry’s is his parents scapegoat so his brother retains a veneer of so called “perfection”

Timmy’s parents are negligent and let him be babysat by a psychopath who repeatedly tries to kill him. His fairy god parents are crazy but at least they care

Norman put a stipulation in his will that if harry seeks a cure then he will be disinherited. So try to gage their relationship from that

John darling came out as bi and his wife couldn’t handle it so she divorced him and took Ashton and Topher to New York. John remarries Casey mulligan. Casey is actually Jamie’s ex husband (don’t get worried it was some stupid new law that all marriages in England are legal. Including playground marriages. Jaime and Casey’s happenedwhen she was five and he was nine). So they got a quickie divorce. And as it turns out Casey has a son from his ex girlfriend. Casey junior (get it?). So now John is a 42 year old divorcee remarried to a twenty year old with a 10 month old step son and two teenage children. Annalise got remarried to Ashton’s high school crush, his Australian swim coach

Jack’s family died a couple centuries ago so what accounts for his family are the guardians a boy who remembers him less and less every year. Elsa who sees him as who she could have been and Anna who just wants everybody to get along. Then there’s kristoff who just wants peace

Taran still goes to see Dalben henwen fflewder and eilonwy when he can

Felicia’s last words to her father were “piss off” so she desperate to make amends with his ghost

Well you know about the fantastic four.

Jaime has become a children’s advocate. Simple stuff like babysitting and making sure the recess gang isn’t split up. But she isn’t up to date on slang so when a mourning 13 year old Angelica pickles drunk dials her, Jaime has no idea what’s the girls saying. And she takes it upon herself to punish the “evil children” ie DW Reed, 3 year old Angelica Pickles, manny heffley, Francine nebulon the children the make their older siblings lives a living hell.

Simpson’s:

Jaime aged up the child population of Springfield by ten years. Barts twenty Lisa’s eighteen Maggies twelve and so on. She also given them special powers. Bart has super speed Lisa HAD telekinesis (she abused it so she losed it. Painful rhyme I know) Maggie has electrokinesis milhouse can ghost through objects Nelson can put national monuments on his pinky nail. Ralph can bend reality to his will. Sherri can teleport Terri can fly. That sort of thing. Though some have non active powers. Moe can not die no matter how hard he tries. Homer and barney have regenerative livers (so they can be sozzled all the time) Bart has inherited Montys fortune and company

#mine #copyright me

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dannyphantomrpg · 7 years

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Analysis: Ten Years Later

So, I’ve been thinking a lot about the Ten Years Later videos lately, and this analysis post just sort of happened~

To be fair, I did need to work it all out since I mildly referenced it in my Foley Fest drabble.

If I get any comic book info wrong, I'm so sorry. I don't know anything about Marvel aside what my husband knows about the 90's Spiderman cartoon.

Let's start off with Sam and Tucker, cause honestly? There's not much to go over with them.

Sam is sort of basic. Sort of dull. Butch says "leather" trench, but it's most likely pleather, or something more animal-friendly. Even (especially) ten years later, I don't see Sam giving up the good fight.

Her crop top, tho, seems to be a constant. I don't know if that's really her aesthetic, or if Butch just thinks all women like to show off their stomachs. Either way, the DP logo is something Sam would definitely sport.

Something I wanted to point out: in her first TYL sketch, Butch compares her to Black Widow. A quick Wiki skim later gives a bit more depth to the comic book ignorant like me. Black Widow's origin story is that of an orphan child being raised by the Russian government as a sort of Anti-Capitan America. She met up with Tony Stark by trying to assassinate someone in his company.

Sort of interesting to compare Sam with Black Widow, and then give her all those huge anti-ghost guns, hm~?

Tucker, I have a few issues with. Not his design (aside how he only got one sketch and then his final design - show your own characters some love, Butch!), but how Butch talks about him.

Specifically, that he's running for president. Quoting from Wikipedia:

“Article Two, Section 1 of the United States Constitution sets forth the eligibility requirements for serving as President of the United States:

No person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.”

Tucker would only be twenty-four in TYL. He's still got 11 years to go before he can even think about running for president. So, like...

What happened to that little bit of legality?

Also of note, Tucker is the only redesign without the DP logo. Most likely, this is because he was the first and therefore before Butch had the idea, but he did give the majority of Sam's the logo.

Moving right along, we get into the meat of TYL. The Fentons.

A moment of silence for my baby Jazz.

How did "I want to go into psychology to help troubled teens" turn into "I'm essentially Tucker now"? Yes, she's the only one we've seen use the Fenton Peeler, but that doesn't really equate to getting "into the tech side of things."

Even in her sketch of just being in a jumpsuit with a "Maddie" haircut, Butch specifically gives her a piece of technology. He has her in a lab, leaning against a circuitry panel. Not a book in sight - not even one on ghost hunting!

And her final design? Oh, my sweet, smart child. There's just something so inhuman and terrifying about this image. Physically wired into Fenton Works? She "helps run all the gadgets"? She has control over traffic lights and automatic doors? Somehow, I feel like Tucker being up close and personal with his iPhone would be way more helpful than Jazz in a building on the other side of the city would be.

What happens the moment she runs into Technus? Heck, just send someone in to cut the power physically and she's completely vulnerable.

I guess Jack would be happy to be half robot? I mean, it seems like half his brain would be gone, so he can probably just be programmed to be excited about it anyway. I've never really seen Jack as the kind of guy to be upset about hygiene. If anything, I see him as a really clean person (until he gets completely distracted with an invention or something).

His second sketch is the one I really prefer - older, but still Jack. He’s big and buff and still a big old teddy bear. I can see this as a man who saw his son save the world and think "I'm slapping that logo on everything to show how proud of him I am".

Jack's finalized sketch is what really gave me pause in the first place. He's missing an eye. He's missing a leg. He has a prosthetic that, according to Butch, runs on ectoplasm. And, ok, I can see that happening. For God's sake, he turned his son and college best friend into halfas on accident because he wasn't paying attention - this man is not someone you really want in a lab setting.

But that's not what happened.

According to Butch, there is a possibility that people did this. That flesh and blood humans went after the Fentons and did them personal harm simply because of their connection to Danny. Jack lost a limb because a person decided to a) take out ghost-hunting competition, or b) cause Danny some kind of psychological harm, i.e. "If we can't get to you, we can get to your family".

And Maddie?

She was first and foremost a mother. Despite all the angst and family drama this fandom produces, Maddie loves her son above anything else. I feel, personally, if there was a choice between continuing her research and her children, she would give it all up in a heartbeat to make sure they're safe and happy.

That's all gone in her sketches.

Her very first image, she has a buzz cut, she has a huge weapon that's creating some sort of unmerciful death-ray, her goggles are down and she means business. There's nothing matronly about her in that image, no remnants of the mother that would look fondly on her son. No, she's murdering the F out of some ghost and does not care.

Again, in he second sketch, her hair is cut off and the goggles are down. There is something out there and she is going to destroy it. There is something out there that made Maddie leap "out of some sort of an airborne vehicle" with the ghost equivalent of the Little Boy and the Fat Man.

And, again, Butch is not helping.

"Well, I think maybe the Ghost Zone is in turmoil. I think that the ghosts need to live somewhere, and they’re trying to come here. So that’s why the Fentons get involved and that’s why there are so many weapons and why they’re up night and day, fighting off the ghosts."

First off - it's been established that the Ghost Zone and the Human World are connected. Anything that happens to one, will affect the other. So if the Ghost Zone has become so uninhabitable that the ghosts are coming here? How bad off is our world?

Second, Butch didn't say the ghosts were attacking. He said they wanted to live here. Yes, there are some ghost jerks out there *cough*Skulker*cough* but what about peaceful ones like Dora and Poindexter? The people of the Far Frozen? Shouldn't the Fentons know by now that not all ghosts are hostile? (Plus, this would have been an amazing use of Jazz's psychology to talk to some of these ghosts, to calm them down and learn from them.)

Maddie's final version manages to paint an even more bleak image for her. Butch mentions Mad Max and, a quick Wiki read later, that's, like, not good. Civilization is gone, lawlessness runs rampant, murder seems to be the only way to protect yourself. And Maddie is supposed to call forth that image?

Her hair is now essentially the shortest length Butch can give her without shaving her head. She's still wearing those goggles. We have yet to see this woman's eyes, she keeps them so hidden from the world. She has no guns to defend herself, only an ectoplasm-charged bat. She doesn't care about keeping her distance - oh no, she wants to be in the middle of the action.

And those BDSM ghosts? She keeps them on leashes short enough that they could touch her. She keeps them around to "help her sense other ghosts", nevermind the fact that, from what I recall, Danny is the only one with an actual ghost sense. Those ghosts look angry and not at all subdued.

And she's still wearing the DP logo. Somehow, even knowing her son is part ghost, she still has enough detachment/hatred of ghosts to demean them down to an animalistic level.

Vlad's designs are, whoo boy... Unique? Different? Each one portrays a completely different vision of the future that don't really mesh together. His first sketch is rather, uh, let's be completely honest here, Satanic. But other than that apparent dive into absolute evil, he looks more or less the same. Like no time has passed. I guess Clockwork could have yanked him out of space before too long?

By now everybody knows about the second sketch with fat!Vlad, tiger!Maddie, and perfect clone!Daniel. Heck, I knew about Daniel before I even knew there was a Ten Years Later video.

And let me just say this real quick: I love that, as soon as the words "He’s finally got himself a cloned child." were said we all, individually, came to the conclusion that: his name is Daniel Masters, he can be a spoiled jerk but isn't really evil, and he just wants someone to be friends with and play video games with. Like, I've yet to even see him in a TYL setting, he's more of a "Season 4" character.

My other thing I love about this image? Fat!Vlad. For a middle-aged man who kept in perfect shape, who fights with ghost teenagers every day, to suddenly put on weight? To me, in my experience, that means he's happy. He's found a way to be calm and relax and, yes, be settled enough to put on a few pounds. That's what happened to my husband. Before we got together she was an anxious, angry (precious) emo chick. And now she's calm, she's happy, she's adorably chubby~ (don't tell her I said this lol). Like, Vlad's so chill in this sketch that, whenever he finds out Daniel's been hanging out with Danny, he's not even mad! He's just like, "Be home by curfew, love you!" (My TYL Vlad is -absolutely- Maes Hughes. There isn't a single employee at Dalv Corp that hasn't seen a fold out wallet full of Daniel's pictures.)

(And just think, when Daniel brings home his boyfriend/girlfriend, Vlad brings out the baby book and Daniel's S/O is just like, "Why were your first steps when you were fourteen???")

Tiger!Maddie is great, if a little odd. Then again, Vlad's just living the dream of every five year old that just went to the zoo for the first time: "I wanna bring home the big kitty!"

And we get back to crazytown with the third sketch. Vlad wants to be king, what? When? Butch do you... do you know who Vlad is? You were so close with perfect clone!Daniel, and then you pull this. The only thing I can see this working as is some kind of Medieval AU with Dora and Aragon/pre-Sarcophagus Pariah Dark. Other than that, I can't see this sketch fitting in anywhere in DP.

But Vlad's final sketch returns us to the nightmare that is TYL. Vlad was abandoned in space, all human contact cut off, the only person that willingly called him a friend turned his back on him. He's probably ready to curl up and die at that point and then aliens come and kidnap him, forcing him to be a miner and then a coliseum fighter. I can't imagine the blow to his pride all that did.

I can accept that he would keep enough presence of mind to escape. Heck, I can almost believe that he would willingly keep the chain on his arm (though as less of a "reminder of where he came from" and more of a "I'm going to make these guys pay!"). But what really gets me is Butch saying, "he really, really wants to get Danny now".

That's not at all ominous. Not at all.

Like, what is that supposed to mean? I'm sure we're supposed to infer he's coming after Danny, but, would he? After all that time alone, after being broken down by some crazy Criminal Minds aliens? I'm sure that, in all that time Vlad was captured, he must have let it slip that he wasn't the only halfa. That this boy on Earth was more powerful that he had been in his prime. Could he be coming to warn Danny? Maybe the reason he escaped was because the aliens have their eye on a new "champion"?

Danielle is absolutely precious to me. My sweet little girl who only wants to live her own life. I love that her first sketch gives her a bit more of the Vlad influence (especially since I headcanon that she has his fire core and not Danny's ice core). The opposing black and white outfit, though, just looks like a bad Harley Quinn to me.

The second sketch is kind of cutsie, kind of bleh. There's something about Butch's femme designs that just... don't really hit the mark.

I'm adoring her third sketch. The overall feel of "ghost" really comes through with this design (and she finally has matching boots and gloves) and it feels really right with her. I've always loved the idea that she's more ghost than human, and this images hits it just right.

Her final design is ok. We go back to the alternating colors, which I don't like, but she also looks more like Danny, which I do like. Butch says she "likes to party" which I can kind of see. She's full of spunk, she has an adventurous side, she'd love to go out and see everything and get involved with as much as she can. The fact that she can shape ectoplasm into words seems like something she'd be into. Just imagine her floating outside of Vlad's window, cussing him out with floaty green writing.

Now, we finally get to Danny. His first sketch isn't too bad. He has a dedicated place for the Thermos - good idea on his part. A little simple, little plain. Loving the cargo pants, tho.

His second design looks a little more like a plain upgrade form his usual hazmat, but with more armor. Makes me think Sam and Tucker went to a sporting goods store and slapped all the knee/elbow pads they could on him to keep him from hurting himself so much.

I like the idea of the third design. When he embraces his ghost side, he gets more Dan-like qualities. I think something like this would take him a while to adjust to, but he would be better for it. This design feels like it would be the strongest one - delving into his ghost half and pulling power from it instead of fighting to keep it balanced with his human half.

Danny's final design, however, make me think. His hazmat has been replaced, or most likely upgraded, to include more Fenton gadgets - specifically trading the Thermos for a Glove. But the Glove, instead of just being a catch/release system, actually uses the caught ghost to power his suit. The green isn't just for design, it's the power he's taken from other ghosts he's captured. Does this mean he's just taking whatever the captured ghost's power is (like weather-control, or even power over boxes)? Or is it like the rest of Fenton tech where he's actually taking the ectoplasm from the captured ghost to power himself? How much is that hurting the other ghost?

As strong as Danny is, as strong as he keeps getting, why does he need to power a suit to keep fighting?

I've been thinking about this final design, thinking about the designs for all the other characters, especially the Fentons. I thought about how Danny would fight until his last breath to protect Amity Park, and, like...

Did he?

Did Danny die at some point prior to Ten Years Later?

Only once is Danny referred to as Danny Fenton, and that's during the sketch for Jack's original design. He's not even called Fenton in his own redesigns. He's had several sketches, but all of them were for Phantom. Heck, Vlad got a human drawing, even if it wasn't for his final design.

And the more I think about it, the more it seems to make sense.

Jazz gave up on psychology when her little brother died. She probably became depressed and couldn't leave the house. Wiring herself into Fenton Works seemed like the next logical step - at least this way she could help without having to face his friends who could go on without him.

Jack was probably grieving when he was attacked. He lost his son, his eye, and his leg.

Without having to reconcile her son's humanity with his ghostlyness, Maddie was free to revert back to a lifetime of thinking that all ghosts were nonsentient. She probably didn't get enough of a chance to being to change her views permanently, so she sees nothing wrong with how she's treating the leashed ghosts.

And Danny himself would even have an excuse for his suit. I've seen in the fandom that the reason Danny is such a strong ghost is because he's young, and he's still growing. That the more he ages, the stronger he becomes. When Danny died, he would have stopped growing in power. Heck, he might have even started -losing- power, and trying to revert to how strong he was when he first "died" in the accident. Having a suit that runs on other ghosts, using their power to replace his own, would actually make sense, especially if Maddie helped make it.

#Danny Phantom #Ten Years LAter #analysis post #danny fenton #sam manson #Tucker Foley #jazz fenton #Maddie Fenton #jack fenton #Vlad Masters #vlad plasmius #dani #perfect clone!daniel #tiger!maddie #honestly i kinda want to see a part three #just to see how far this trainwreck can go

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ramajmedia · 5 years

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Star Trek: The 10 Biggest Deep Space Nine Twists and Reveals, Ranked

Deep Space Nine remains one of the most beloved (and controversial) entries in the Star Trek franchise. It bridged the gap between Star Trek: The Next Generation and Star Trek: Voyager, separating itself from its predecessors by taking place on a space station, not a Federation starship exploring the universe. It focused more on the interpersonal relationships of its inhabitants, rather than external situations.

This changed in later seasons, when it diverged from the normal episodic format of Star Trek and became a more serialized program with over-arching plots and inter-connected storylines. It's dark and gritty tone differed from Star Trek's normally upbeat and altruistic mode, but it never failed to capture fan's imagination with intriguing narratives and colorful characters. It was full of the most exciting plot twists and reveals of any Star Trek series. Below you'll find ten of the biggest, ranked.

10 ODO AND KIRA HAVING A RELATIONSHIP

Odo had a seemingly unrequited love for Kira, the brash Bajoran militia member for the length of DS9, and it made for some emotionally moving episodes. His feelings aside, viewers never expected Kira to return his affections, since nowhere in the series was it hinted at that she might have feelings for him in the same way.

Despite fans misgivings, Odo and Kira got together anyway. Their relationship was saccharine and pejorative, doing neither of their characters any favors. It never really made sense why someone like Kira would end up caring for Odo the same way he did her, and why Odo would sort of abandon their life together in pursuit of the Great Link.

RELATED: Star Trek: 10 Hysterical DS9 Logic Memes Only True Fans Understand

9 QUARK BECOMING THE GRAND NAGUS

Gentle, obedient Rom was one of the most wholesome characters on the show, and by that token, the worst Ferengi. Still, him ending up as Nagus was a great twist, if only because the position of the Grand Nagus had been previously offered to one of the most unscrupulous Ferengi, Quark.

Despite Rom's bumbling, in the middle of the series it was revealed that he actually had hidden talents. He may not have been the mathematician that Quark was, but his engineering prowess knew no bounds, which endeared him to his people and to the Bajoran militia. Quark on the other hand, though he was offered the position of Grand Nagus, turned it down to tend bar and run the holodeck.

8 WORF AND JADZIA'S MARRIAGE

On the surface it might have seemed like a contrivance to have Worf (the newly minted DS9 cast member) and Jadzia become an item. Worf was fresh off of Star Trek: The Next Generation, and seemed like an odd fit to the motley crew of established DS9 characters.

However, his bristly demeanor and abrupt candor matched well with Jadzia's forthright nature. They were both characters whose personalities had a way of making their fellow crew members uncomfortable. It was certainly more logical pairing than Worf and Counselor Troi. Plus, the wedding ceremony between Jadzia and Worf was a highlight amidst DS9's doom and gloom.

RELATED: Star Trek: The 10 Best Alien Starfleet Members Ever

7 MILES O'BRIEN TURNING OUT TO BE A CLONE

In one memorable episode, Miles O'Brien's behavior is just off enough to cause other members of the crew to grow suspicious. Viewers spend the entire episode thinking they're following the real Miles O'Brien on a bad day, only to discover at the conclusion it's actually a clone of the real Miles O'Brien, who ends up taking down the rogue version of himself.

In reality, the clone was an operative of the Dominion, sent to retrieve Federation intelligence from Deep Space Nine. As though that wasn't bad enough, Miles O'Brien also had an instance where an alien implanted memories from a 20 year stint in prison that he never experienced, but had to deal with emotionally. Poor Chief O'Brien!

6 GUL DUKAT BEING A TURNCOAT

Gul Dukat turning out to be, well, Gul Dukat wasn't that much of a plot twist, but if you consider he had started to get in the habit of helping Sisko and Co. in a period of grey morality for his character, it came as a punch to the gut. In some ways, the greater twist would have been for Gul Dukat to not side with the Dominion Empire in the last season of the series.

His perspective that the whole of Deep Space Nine and the Federation were doomed with the advancement of the The Founders was in line with his character's rationale, but many fans would have liked him to stay a part of the DS9 crew and possibly have explored his feelings for Kira.

RELATED: Star Trek: The 10 Deadliest Villains The Crew Has Ever Faced

5 BASHIR TURNING OUT TO BE AUGMENTED

Of all the doctors in all the Star Trek series, Dr. Julian Bashir had the best bedside manner. Dr. Beverly Crusher on Star Trek: The Next Generation comes a close second, but even she didn't have the natural charm and warmth of Dr. Bashir (we won't even touch Doc McCoy's ornery nature or the EMH's stuffy efficiency). The best parts of his personality turned into a lie when it was revealed that he had been altered as a young child.

His parents had allowed all sorts "upgrades" be given to the young boy to improve his reflexes, stamina, intelligence, and even his physical appearance. The best parts of Bashir's character turned out to be the product of genetic experimentation.

4 GARAK BEING A MEMBER OF THE OBSIDIAN ORDER

Garak was one of the most sensationalized characters on the series, if not all of Deep Space Nine itself. By day, he was a mild-mannered tailor on the promenade, and by night he was gossiping at Quark's bar, fishing for information. The fact that he was so congenial yet so private made him one of the most mysterious inhabitants of the station.

Fans eagerly awaited when Garak's past would finally be revealed - it was sure to be something juicy, especially since he was a Cardassian ex-pat. Garak turned out to be a high-ranking former member of the Obsidian Order, the Cardassian intelligence agency.

3 BASHIR BEING A SPY AND RECRUITED BY SECTION 31

In many ways Section 31, the Special Ops of the Federation with the ability to manipulate time and space, was a plot twist in and of itself. Suddenly, no plot-line was safe if Section 31 members were involved - it could go pear-shaped at a moment's notice depending on the episode narrative.

One of the most sudden reveals was the recruitment of Dr. Julian Bashir into their clandestine ranks. This was at the same time that Bashir was being accused of being a spy for the Dominion Empire. Apparently his augmented self was a prize for both agencies!

RELATED: Star Trek: 10 DS9 Storylines That Were Never Resolved

2 SISKO GOING OFF TO JOIN THE PROPHETS

Early on in DS9, Benjamin Sisko meets one of the religious leaders of the Bajoran people. As Commander of the space station Deep Space Nine, he has vowed to let all inhabitants peacefully practice their faiths, from the Bajorans (whose planet DS9 orbits) to the Cardassians that seek asylum. He takes a particular interest in the religious leader called Kai Opaka, the spiritual guide for all Bajorans.

It's through their initial meeting, and subsequent spiritual encounters that Sisko begins to learn of his true nature as a prophet, and spiritual guide to the universe. When he leaves at the end of DS9 to fulfill his duties, it seemed an odd twist for a Starfleet officer.

RELATED: Star Trek: 5 Reasons Why TNG Is The Best Spin-Off (And 5 Why It's DS9)

1 JULIAN BASHIR BEING A CHANGELING

Julian Bashir was part of several plot twists, some of which were received well by viewers and some of which that were considered ridiculous. One of the most effective occurred when Dr. Bashir turned out to be a Changeling, an operative sent by the Dominion Empire to infiltrate Deep Space Nine.

What was so fruitful about this plot twist was the fact that fans realized Dr. Bashir had done all sorts of things as "fake Bashir," including perform surgery on Commander Sisko! Not really knowing how long they'd been dutifully watching Dr. Bashir made for a twist no one could see coming (fans concede it was about five episodes, or a month's time).

NEXT: Star Trek: The 10 Biggest TNG Twists & Reveals, Ranked

source https://screenrant.com/star-trek-10-biggest-ds9-twists-reveals-ranked/

#screenrant

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i-just-like-commenting · 7 years

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Star Wars rewatch, part 5: Episode 3, Revenge of the Sith

General Impressions

I’ve been sitting on this review for a while because life has been busy lately – I’m starting a new job in a little over a week – and hadn’t gotten around to writing it. This film was a large part of why I wanted to do this rewatch, to see whether or not Revenge of the Sith was as good as I remembered it.

The answer is that I’d actually forgotten just how good this movie is. Like, seriously, I will fight you on this, RotS is a good movie. Not a great movie, and we will be talking about its flaws as I go along, most of which center around Padme. But it is a good movie, at least on par with Return of the Jedi.

It really does help, I think, to watch Tartakovsky’s Clone Wars immediately before this, not just because that film-length series ends right before RotS opens, but because there’s a certain stylistic match. A lot of the action moments in RotS feel very Tartakovsky-esque, and preceding this with an animated film made the CGI a lot more palatable – this looks very much like an animated film, just with live action performers filling in the human parts. It’s a definite upgrade from the previous sequels, sometimes looking absolutely gorgeous, especially on Coruscant.

Also upgraded? The acting. Hayden Christiansen is massively improved in this film. While still not an Oscar-worthy performance or what have you, he’s on the level of the original actors in the first trilogy, which is to say competent most of the time, and occasionally even quite intensely compelling. It helps that he and Natalie Portman seem to have settled on how to handle their ridiculous romantic dialog, playing it as “Anakin can’t do romantic interactions well, Padme knows this, finds it charming, and teases him for it.” The lines are still awkward but played with an awareness of the awkwardness.

But speaking of romance, having rewatched these, how in love with Anakin was Obiwan? The answer is a lot. I know, I know, when they met Anakin was a child and that’s kind of creepy, but by the end of RotS it’s hard not to read Ewan MacGregor’s performance as more than a little bit smitten. It doesn’t help that in Clone Wars, he and Anakin have an exchange that is a literal copy-paste of Han and Leia.

The music is also killer for this film, and supplements all of the best scenes, like the tale of Darth Plagueis, Padme and Anakin on the balconies at sunset, the implements of Order 66, Obiwan and Anakin’s final battle…this is a well-made film, you guys. But let’s dig into some of the flaws.

Continuity, part 1: Relation to the Other Prequels

You know, if the mitochlorians had just been introduced as “a kind of symbiont that can spontaneously generate life” as an explanation for Shmi’s mysterious pregnancy, I don’t think people would’ve had a problem with it. It’s that it explains connectivity to the Force that nobody likes. So the reappearance of mitochlorians doesn’t bother me at all in this context.

I mentioned in my last post that one cut of Attack of the Clones that I enjoyed deleted Anakin confessing the murder of the Sand People to Padme, and while I support that change, it would make that Anakin told Palpatine the truth that much more disturbing. Palpatine is genuinely manipulating the fatherless Anakin in a disturbing way.

The biggest problem in relation to the other prequels, though, is the demotion of Padme to side character. She’s very passive in this film, as being increasingly pregnant limits her ability to be an action girl. But it didn’t have to be this way – there are a sequence of deleted scenes, some of which are redundant and thus wouldn’t be more than about 5 minutes, that depict Padme being one of the founding members of what became the Rebel Alliance. It’s an unfortunate cut not just because it would have kept Padme as a more active figure, but also because one scene has Palpatine trying to sow doubts in Anakin’s mind about Padme’s trustworthiness, setting up that he will snap at the end and kill her.

Continuity, part 2: Relation to the Original Series

Which brings us to Padme’s death, the other big flaw in her character in this film. That she has nothing physically wrong with her, she just “lost the will to live,” is the dumbest part of this film, and one that was almost immediately retconned. I understand that Lucas was trying to say that the psychological effect of everything that had happened to her had as much to do with her death as physical injuries, but it could have been something more like “we’ve done what we can to fix her, but the shock and emotional strain is inhibiting her body’s recovery process.”

More significantly, though, Padme shouldn’t have died yet. Leia says very clearly in Return of the Jedi that she remembers her mother, so unless Leia can remember events from her birth…or did Bail Organa’s wife also die, when Leia was very young? Leia must have known she was adopted, why does she not mention that instead?

When I was growing up watching the OT, I’d always assumed that Leia’s mother remarried Bail and passed off Leia as their daughter. That wouldn’t work with the trilogy as-is, because Bail is too prominent and it wouldn’t be a good place to hide her.

So let me propose an alternative scenario: Padme survives, but is clearly never going to recover from her injuries. Obiwan persuades her to divide up her children to keep them safe, with her keeping one and other sent to live with Anakin’s siblings. Padme lives in hiding on Alderaan for a few years before ultimately dying, and Bail adopts Leia. She remembers her biological mother and thinks of Bail as her father. Maybe he’s a single father; maybe he’s got a husband. Either way, it fills in that continuity gap.

The other dumb connection to the main trilogy is the random scene of Chewbacca knowing Yoda. I have no problem with Wookies being in this film, or with Chewbacca being a former general who had to go rogue after the war was over, but him knowing Yoda? Pointless fan service, doesn’t add anything to his character.

The best connection with the main trilogy is that ending, though. Critics are absolutely correct that the reveal of Darth Vader being accompanied by an anguished “NO!!!” isn’t a good transition into episode 4, where you need him to be a terrifying villain. But it is the perfect transition into episode 6, where you need to realize that he’s a broken, miserable, hollow human being. So yeah, the correct order for the first time watching is, indeed, 4-5-1-2-Clone Wars-3-6.

On every subsequent viewing, though, make it 4-5-Clone Wars-3-6. 1 and 2 just aren’t good enough to justify rewatch.

Continuity, part 3: Relation to the Current Series

There is still a part of me that wants Hayden Christiansen to get his redemption and reappear as Anakin’s Force ghost with a good script and a good director and yell at his grandson about how badly he is behaving. Failing that, Ewan MacGregor as Obiwan.

That said, the status of Force ghosts are still strange in this universe. In a deleted scene for RotS, Yoda gets a message from Qui-Gon that he’s learned to basically transition his body straight into a Force ghost at the point of death, which is why Yoda and Obiwan can appear after their deaths. The scene’s actually in the film, but there’s no voice over and so we’re left to figure out what message Yoda got from Qui-Gon by ourselves. But why doesn’t Qui-Gon appear in the OT? Is there a point chronologically after which you can’t do it, and that’s why we don’t have Force ghost Anakin yelling at Kylo? How did Anakin know how to do this if it was something new?

I kind of want to do a “Reimagined Prequel Trilogy” that fixes these hiccups, with the premise that Tartakovsky could remake them in animated form. That’s not ever going to happen, any more than Game of Thrones is going to remake seasons 3 and on to actually match their source material, but I always like speculating on these things, it helps me as a writer.

Conclusion: Brainwashing as a Joke

C3PO gets his mind casually wiped at the end of this film, which by all appearance is standard procedure for protocol droids when they get new owners, presumably to keep secrets of their former owners safe and to ensure their loyalty to their new ones. This is absolutely horrifying if you accept droids as sentient beings, of course, and seems to be banned in the New Republic.

What’s unnerving is that in the captioning, R2’s reaction is described as laughter. He’s mocking C3PO for his plight. From this I can only conclude that the true tenderness of their relationship must have started after episode 3, and R2 right now is taking delight in the irony of his more obedient counterpart being victimized by a system he supported. Not a cool attitude, R2, but it gives him an implied arc, too, as the two droids grow closer.

#star wars #revenge of the sith #spoilers for whole franchise #review

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wiseabsol · 7 years

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Excerpts from a Prompts Project

For those of you who read my Pokemon fanfic “The Phoenix Rose Saga” back in the day, here is the first of three excerpts showing what a re-imagined version of it would look like.

Prompt #1: Creation, featuring Aaron from “TPRS”

Creation:

As far as creations went, the second of their mew clones (or the third, if he decided to count the prototype, which he generally didn’t) wasn’t much of a success.

Perhaps Aaron shouldn’t say that. The clone, who his assistants had named “Neva” for her snowy white pelt, was alive and healthy. That was more than most of their early clones could boast. They had died while they were growing in their gestation tanks or shortly after their births. Still, there wasn’t much else that could be said in Neva’s favor. Her albinism, while unusual among pokémon, wasn’t as rare or valuable as the “shiny” coloration. The vulnerability of her eyes and skin to sunlight, thanks to her condition, didn’t help either. If they weren’t careful, she might eventually go blind or develop skin cancer (which was another reason why confining her to the lab was for the best).

Yet compared to her other flaws, her albinism could be overlooked. Her being deaf and psychically disabled were much more serious problems.

The deafness could be worked around. Neva’s primary caretaker, Dr. Rosenberg, knew several languages, including the local version of sign language. In addition to her other duties, Dr. Rosenberg was adapting that version into a three-fingered one that Neva could use. She’d given Aaron reports on how Neva was progressing, along with the growing list of signs that Neva had learned, but he’d only managed to skim through them. Neva’s “sister,” Morgan, interested him more than her less capable sibling. Most of his time was spent going over her medical reports and her battle analyses instead. As long as Dr. Rosenberg was confident that her pet project was going well, he felt safe entrusting her with the second clone. Until he found a use for Neva, her time could be spent in language lessons.

What else was he supposed to do with her? She didn’t have a wisp of psychic power, nor any hint of the others, despite the lineage she boasted. Mew was said to be able to learn every move a pokémon could learn, he thought, rubbing his temples as he waited for his coffee to brew. And this creature can barely use Scratch.

Cloning pokémon was always a gamble, of course. His colleagues back on Cinnabar had stressed that time and again as they’d sifted through fossilized remains, looking for the most promising samples. Even the best-preserved ones, though, captured in ice and amber, would have holes somewhere in their genetic codes. Using stem cells from dittos could fill in only so much of what had been lost. For the rest of the gaps, they had to splice in genes from other pokémon and people, which threw all sort of variables into the mix. No doubt that had been what had brought about Morgan’s blue coloration (due to the vaporeon genes in her genetic cocktail) and Neva’s disabilities. That or her mew fossil had been from a flawed specimen, which was entirely possible. Aaron had hardly expected to find one set of mew remains, let alone two, so of course he had made clones from them both. That was more than Dr. Fuji had accomplished!

It niggled at Aaron, though, that Dr. Fuji’s prototype had been practically perfect. Its psychic powers alone could have leveled mountains. Such a shame, really, that its temperament had been so foul….

Even if Aaron’s creations weren’t as strong as their predecessor, at least they were under his control. Certainly, Morgan was a handful. She was eager to test herself in battle—she was rather like the prototype that way (if only, if only he could capture Mewtwo as well and use it as a stud. The offspring would no doubt be priceless). But she still obeyed them and adhered to the rules and restrictions they’d laid out for her, and all because he’d taken the time to sit down with her and answer her questions. He’d be careful to treat her like a person, even though she wasn’t one, and that had made the difference. His lab was still standing and he and his people were still alive. That put him well ahead of Dr. Fuji, as far as Aaron was concerned.

But the question remained: what was he supposed to do with Neva?

Euthanizing and dissecting her was out of the question (unless her body started breaking down like some of the others had, in which case his intervention would be a mercy). They’d sunk too much money, too much time, too much labor and energy into making her. He couldn’t waste the investment. He hadn’t been able to back when she was gestating, when her pure white fur and her biopsies had told him of her condition. Mew samples were too hard to come by, and even a flawed sample couldn’t be discarded because the result was imperfect. But if she couldn’t be used for battle or for contests—or for activities that the League didn’t sanction, but his financers pursued—what else was left?

Breeding, the answer came to him. She can be used for breeding. If nothing else, she could act as a surrogate for her sister’s offspring. That way, Morgan can remain in the arena and won’t be injured by any pregnancy complications. The mew clones, after all, were essentially chimeras. Delivering might be harder for them than for their purer ancestors. Especially if they had litters.

It would have to be carefully done. They had gambled with the genetic cocktails that had brought the sisters into being, but they could not take the same risks with the offspring (if the sisters were even fertile. They might not be. Most pokémon were and could breed across species lines, but there were a select few who were more restrictive. The mews could have been one of those, regardless of their supposed “ancestor of all” designation). Fortunately, both sisters had a readier supply of gametes than Aaron had of fossilized remains, so he could do more with the genes he’d be mixing. Maybe he could increase the claw length in the offspring…maybe tweak their coloration…definitely expand their move sets if he could…yes, there was a lot he could experiment with.

After mixing a tooth-aching amount of sugar and a dollop of cream into his coffee, he left his office and went to the training center for the clones. Morgan was making good progress on converting her psychic energies into electric attacks and was making short work of her opponents. She seemed restless, but he supposed that was to be expected when none of her challengers were putting up a good fight. They would have to increase the level tier again and see how she fared then.

Neva, in contrast, was practicing signs with Dr. Rosenberg. They were in the botanical lab today. Dr. Rosenberg was teaching Neva the names and medicinal uses of the plants there, as if she would have any use for that knowledge. But he supposed they had to improve Neva’s communication skills somehow, and keeping her in a stagnant environment like her pen would hinder her in that. If only she had half of her sister’s innate empathic abilities. Then she would be fluent in their language already….

“Dr. Rosenberg,” he called through the doorway, feeling the moist, sticky heat of the lab against his face. “A word?”

She nodded and made some quick signs to Neva, who nodded and started working clumsily on a project. She was getting dirt everywhere on the floor. Dr. Rosenberg removed her gardening gloves and joined him. “Yes?”

“I wanted to run something by you.” He explained the breeding idea to her. To his surprise, she looked uncertain about it. “Is something the matter?”

“Sir, it’s just…the sisters might be physically mature, but psychologically, they’re far from it. They need more time to learn and develop before—I’m not saying that we shouldn’t consider it,” she added hastily, seeing his annoyance, “but maybe we should wait a year or two for their minds to catch up to their bodies.”

“That would be fine, if we didn’t have Ms. Stoneson breathing down our necks. But we do, and while she’s pleased with Morgan’s progress, she’s starting to see Neva as a waste of resources.” That had come up repeatedly in their last meeting. “I’m not sure how much more she is willing to spend on a failed investment.”

“Neva is not a failure!”

Gods protect him from scientists who grew too attached to their experiments. “She is in the eyes of our employer,” he explained, with rather more patience than Dr. Rosenberg deserved. “But that could change if we find a use for her. I’m open to alternative suggestions.” When the now red-faced Dr. Rosenberg seemed at a loss, he added, “If you think of any, let me know. Otherwise, inform Neva that this is where things are heading. We might start her on a hormone regime as soon as next month.”

As he was turning away, Dr. Rosenberg reached out and grabbed his wrist. “Aaron, she’s a child, you can’t—”

“Would you rather she be a dead child? Because that’s another option our dear employer has mentioned. Using Neva for samples and spare parts certainly would put an end to the drain she’s being, even if it wouldn’t give us back a fraction of the fortune we spent on making her.”

Dr. Rosenberg paled at that. Aaron nodded. “I don’t want that either, but I might not have a choice if Neva doesn’t prove her value somehow.” He looked past her, at the creation, who had buried her muzzle into the roses. “Take a day to think about it,” he told Dr. Rosenberg, then left.

They had to find a use for the clone somehow. This was the only way he could think of.

Better this than the dissection table, he thought. I’m sure even Neva would agree.

But he would never ask her that. He would become like Dr. Rosenberg if he did—too involved, too close to keep perspective like he should, when they were working for people who had no patience for such softheartedness. He had to keep his distance and keep in mind what the sisters were: creations. Products. Property. Not pokémon. Not even people.

No matter what Dr. Rosenberg might say, Aaron couldn’t allow himself to lose sight of that.

#WiseAbsol #My Fanfiction #The Phoenix Rose Saga #Prompts Project #Pokemon

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