#( dash commentary. intercoms. ) ━☆ﾟ.*･｡ﾟ | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

rivalsforlife · 5 years ago

Note

oooo i'm sorry but one more scene for commentary if youre up to it: maya and phoenix talking in chapter 6?

Of course, no need to apologize!! Once more, keeping this under a “keep reading”:

Around noon, his apartment intercom buzzed. “Nick, it’s Maya! Let me up.”

Maya? What was she even doing here? Maya never visited him out of the blue anymore… Whatever. She’d probably think he was at his office. She’d go away soon.

There was another buzz. “Nick! I know you’re in there! I called your office, you know!”

Kids these days. Selling out their bosses that easily… Maybe he should cut Athena’s salary. Nah, he wasn’t Edgeworth. … Edgeworth.

“don’t think about Edgeworth don’t think about Edgeworth -- ah damn it”

“Nick! Hello! Nick!”

She had to give up eventually, right? Whatever she was here for, someone else could help her…

“Security’s coming after me, if they arrest me you’re gonna have to defend me, you know, do you want that? I’m not even gonna try to pay you for it since it’s gonna be your fault —”

Ugh.

Phoenix stumbled out of bed and buzzed her in. “Fine. Come up.”

“Thank you!” she chirped in a sing-songy voice. “Hey, you heard him, let me go…”

Maya’s Obnoxious Little Sister Energy is eternal. Her next strategy was to break from the guards and dash as far as she could go trying to break her way into Phoenix’s apartment which... wouldn’t have ended well haha.

Also! Like I mentioned in the previous ask, a lot of this fic was just Phoenix’s Relationship Issues, and the way I characterized him in this fic was a lot of... he needs to have people around or he kind of falls apart, and his history of having people around was that these people needed him in some way -- Maya after she was accused of murder and then hanging around for Mia’s sake, Trucy being abandoned and needing looking after, even Miles to an extent needing to be saved from his corrupt ways and the von Karma influence -- and now that they’re all growing up and don’t need him anymore he thinks they’re going to abandon him.

That’s a long-winded way of referring to that one sentence of “Whatever she was here for, someone else could help her”

Also... I don’t live in an apartment and haven’t visited many apartments? So I’m not totally sure how the whole buzzing someone in process works. no one’s called me out on it though so I guess I’m okay.

Phoenix sighed and wondered if he should make himself look presentable. There probably wasn’t enough time. Maya wouldn’t notice that he hadn’t changed his clothes for two days, right?

She probably would. But he couldn’t do anything about it, as just then there was a knock on the door. Figuring he should appease her so she wouldn’t give security anymore trouble, he reluctantly let her in.

Indeed, there was Maya, looking cheery as ever. “Hey, dude. What’s going on with you?”

“Nothing,” said Phoenix, and in response to Maya’s raised eyebrow as she took in his appearance, “Just not feeling well. Why’re you here, Maya? I thought you were busy up at the village.”

passive-aggressive “oh aren’t you supposed to be busy?” from Phoenix here...

One of the other major changes I made to this fic in the editing process was cutting out a LOT of Maya content. I really love her and wanted her to be here more, but to properly go through the Phoenix Characterization Study I had to make it seem like she wasn’t around as much so that Phoenix would feel more lonely. again, sorry, Phoenix... but like originally she came down for the picnic in chapter 3 and was around at the beginning of chapter 4, so it would be SO WEIRD if she showed up in every single chapter except for chapter 5 and then Phoenix accuses her here of being too busy to hang out with him. She was there all the time! So I only had her show up for the wedding and added in a few more lines alluding to her not being here as much as she used to in trilogy days.

“I am,” she admitted, pushing her way into his apartment. “But your daughter called me yesterday morning and said that if you didn’t call, I should check in on you. So. Here I am. And I know you’re not just sick.”

Kids these days indeed! Like Phoenix didn’t feel bad enough, his own daughter had to go and parent him. “Look, Maya, everything’s fine. I’m sorry Trucy made you think something was wrong.”

One writing tip I got and I’ve been working on implementing is like... trying to have a general idea of what every character is up to when they’re not “on screen”, so to speak. Even then, what they’re thinking about when they’re not the POV focus. So basically after the call with Trucy just prior to this scene, she immediately decided to call Maya (because she could tell something was Off with her dad and Miles, given his reaction when she mentioned his name,) and then told her to check up on him because he really scared her during that phone call... though she wouldn’t admit it. She basically saw it as a hint of returning to a sort of... disbarment-era depression, which she didn’t want, so she wanted to make sure someone could check in on him as soon as he could since she couldn’t.

Also another small aspect of Phoenix characterization (that’s going to be like 99% of my commentary about this fic I’m sorry) is that the way he deals best with depression is like... being around people, and doing things with people. It’s obviously not a method that works for everyone, but it keeps him from dwelling on things and kind of gives him a purpose, helps him feel like he’s needed. Mostly got this headcanon from RFTA where he says he was unable to take on any cases when Maya was gone until Ema showed up... and then even at the beginning of 2-2 he does seem pretty down. Trucy kind of knows some of this since she was the main thing keeping him together during disbarment era, at least enough to know that when Phoenix is depressed he’ll do much better if he’s got someone he cares about around.

Anyways, Trucy probably told Maya just to call in, because she knows her aunt is busy and part of the reason Maya hasn’t been around much is because she’s stuck with all sorts of Master responsibilities at Kurain, but Maya herself wanted to come down and check on Phoenix in person because she knows how he can get and if it was enough to worry Trucy, then she was pretty worried too.

Maya planted her hands on her hips. “No way, mister. I did not take a two hour train ride down here for you to tell me everything’s fine. Do you know how difficult it was to get permission to leave?! I had to pull the old ‘I need to visit my boyfriend’ card for them to let me go!”

Phoenix groaned, despite himself. “Have they still not caught on about that?”

“Their desperation for an heir has blinded them to common sense. They made me drink some disgusting fertility tea before I left, so you really owe me one.” She lowered her hands and sighed. “Look, Nick, I know something’s up. So talk to me. Please.”

I took a few liberties to sprinkle in my Kurain headcanons in here... which I’ve rambled about more in depth elsewhere, so I won’t go into too much detail, but basically: hereditary spiritual power leads to a lot of pressure on people who have said hereditary spiritual power to reproduce so they can pass it on to the next generation. Particularly with Maya (and Pearls to some extent though I believe Maya would willingly take the heat on it) since the two of them are the only remaining spirit channelers of the Kurain technique. And since it took Maya a really long time to become the Master officially (I don’t buy the idea that she wasn’t skilled enough by the end of T&T, my headcanon is the Master training process involves two years in Khura’in but she put that off until Phoenix was in the clear regarding Kristoph stuff) they probably don’t want her leaving the village to “goof off” unless she’s doing it to produce an heir. her biological clock is ticking! haha! (... ugh.)

And this kind of leads to -- in the elaborate backstory of this fic that I can only touch on through DVD commentaries which is like half the reason I do these things -- Maya and Phoenix agreeing that if Maya needs to get out of the village but whoever the other people in the village are start putting pressure on her, she can say she’s “visiting her boyfriend” who they think is Phoenix but really isn’t... and I guess they assume they’re getting up to heir-making activities but oh darn! didn’t work this time! guess I’ll have to go again next week! (obviously they’re just out getting burgers or something.)

Hence people in the village pushing fertility tea on her because they think the problem is that she’s not getting pregnant... although they’re kind of misunderstanding the reason why she’s not getting pregnant... because no amount of fertility tea in the world will lead to a spontaneous pregnancy without other activities first. which aren’t happening. I feel like I need to clarify this multiple times just in case someone misunderstands.

Pearls both knows about this agreement and knows that Phoenix and Maya aren’t actually dating because she’s like nineteen now? She’s probably known for years, she never brings it up during DD and SOJ.

“I won’t go into much detail” oops. I’m so sorry.

Phoenix didn’t say anything.

Maya took him by the arm and guided him to the couch, plopping him down none-too-gently before sitting next to him. “You can trust me, right?” she asked. “You’re my best friend. I’m here for you, even if you did something really stupid.”

Phoenix laughed a bit. “Yeah… I did something really stupid.”

“Okay. Tell me.”

Phoenix buried his face in his hands with a sigh, then rolled his head to peek through his fingers at Maya. She looked — angry, sure, he wasn’t exactly being the most cooperative of people right now, but — open. Prepared. Like she was actually going to listen.

I know that SOJ called Miles Phoenix’s best friend, which don’t get me wrong I absolutely loved, but I do wish Maya was ALSO considered Phoenix’s best friend if not one of his closest friends, because they’re so obviously best friends. They’re a different flavour of best friends than Phoenix and Miles, because Phoenix and Miles are the “it’s complicated and there are secret romantic feelings possibly but we trust each other unconditionally” best friends, Phoenix and Maya have a twenty-five step secret handshake they have to execute every time upon meeting.

But of course that doesn’t mean they can’t be serious, Maya is absolutely here for her dumb best friend

“It’s…” He sighed, again. “Have you ever — have you ever wanted something for a really long time, but — but you never thought you’d get it, and then you have this chance, and you just… panic?”

Maya nodded solemnly. “Steel Samurai movie premiere tickets. I won a raffle, but I forgot I signed up for them and thought it was a hoax, and didn’t get to accept them before the deadline. The bad Wi-Fi didn’t help, either.”

“But that doesn’t mean they can’t be serious” um

The one constant among all the ace attorney main characters is that NONE OF THEM WANT TO TALK ABOUT THEIR FEELINGS EVER

Also I struggled a lot with this fic trying to figure out... exactly what was going on in Phoenix’s head, and how he would interpret what was going on in his head. I kept changing opinions all the time and it was so off before I did editing haha. Even this line is still a little weird with the “Have you ever wanted something for a really long time” because he probably shouldn’t be aware that he has wanted this for a long time. ... I’m going to stop pointing out the flaws in my own fic now--

At Phoenix’s glare, she added, “I’m just kidding. Thought I’d lighten the mood a bit. Is this about Edgeworth?”

“What makes you think that?”

“‘Cause when is it not about Edgeworth with you,” asked Maya, cutting straight to the heart of things, as always. “Did he ask you out?”

“Not even that.” Phoenix turned his gaze to the floor, ashamed. “He said he loved me. I… I told him I didn’t feel the same.”

Maya was silent for a moment. Phoenix didn’t dare look at her. “Do you?”

“I like being around him,” said Phoenix. “I like seeing him smile, and laugh, and — and he makes me happy.”

What he wouldn’t give to see Edgeworth smile and laugh at him again.

“Not what I asked, dude.”

“Nick’s being really broody again it’s GOTTA be Edgeworth...”

Anyways that second-to-last line there is sticking out at me and I’m pretty sure it’s one I wavered back and forth on deleting before deciding to keep. ... at least I think I kept it? I’m taking these from google docs so there might be a few tiny changes from the ao3 version but I don’t think there’s anything too major I changed while doing last-minute edits.

Again we run into the problem of Phoenix Is Incapable Of Admitting He’s In Love With Miles -- which is the whole psyche-locks thing that pops up in the scene after this. The psyche-locks were also a pretty last-minute addition plot-wise... I think this fic was the most I deviated from my outline, but I was pretty rushed for time so I didn’t do as much planning as I normally would.

Hm I think there’s another ask where I can talk more about the psyche-locks? I’ll talk a bit here because I put a lot of thought into it. Basically I ran with the idea of black psyche-locks hiding something even the owner isn’t aware of, and that those psyche-locks are (typically? who knows about Kristoph) inflicted through traumatic events. Phoenix has three because I came up with three main Issues he had to work through, but some of them kind of blend together... two of them came up through specific traumatic events (Phoenix guesses them in chapter 8) and another one is just general overall trauma. if no one brings up the particular scenes by the time I get to that other ask, I’ll talk more about them, but basically there are three locks from three separate traumas and three occasions where they break -- someone guessed one of the breaking scenes on the narumitsu discord, but no one’s brought up the other two yet!

Long-winded way of saying that the psyche-locks are the reason that Phoenix can’t admit that he’s in love with Miles yet... and it’s kind of a cheap fantasy visualization of the trauma, basically? Maybe not the most elegant way of addressing it, but I never claimed to be writing for a series which addresses issues elegantly.

“But — but can you even imagine it?” Phoenix demanded, raising his head to gesture fully at the ridiculousness of it all. “Me and Edgeworth?”

“Yeah,” said Maya, simply. “It’s not that hard, really.”

Phoenix had no response.

“You two balance each other out well, and you trust each other, and you both care a ton about each other,” Maya elaborated. “If you love him, what’s the problem?”

oh Phoenix you have no idea. you and Miles are so easy to imagine together that you’re the number one pairing on ace attorney ao3 by a longshot.

Also one thing I kind of wanted to avoid was less of the... “you and Miles are PERFECT for each other how do you not SEE this” thing. nothing against the trope, of course! Just the whole concept of people shipping their friends intensely is something I’m not super familiar with and tbh would make me pretty uncomfortable...? It’s sort of the deal with rpf. Of course this is fanfiction with fictional characters but from an in-universe perspective...

So Maya’s taking the approach of more “Yeah, I can see you and Edgeworth as a couple, I think you’d work well together” rather than “you two are SO perfect together and I’ve been shipping you since 2016!!” because while that may be what Maya is THINKING it’s definitely not what Phoenix needs to hear right now.

“It just… seems like a recipe for disaster. I wouldn’t even know how to… like, this isn’t my first time feeling like this, but when I think about us, me and Edgeworth, it’s…” Why couldn’t he find the right words? “It’s too much.”

Maya brought a hand to her chin and tilted her head thoughtfully. “So — tell me if I’ve got this right — you like Edgeworth too, but for some reason, when he confessed to you, you panicked and you don’t know why.”

“I guess…” Phoenix returned his face to the comforting darkness of his hands. “I don’t know what it is. I-I shouldn’t have a problem, right? But the thought of a-actually admitting that I… or being in a relationship, it feels like I’m standing at the edge of a cliff and am about to fall off.”

Maya was silent for a long time. Phoenix just hoped that whatever she said next, it would somehow magically fix all his problems.

Instead, she said the most ridiculous thing Phoenix could possibly imagine. “Maybe you have trust issues?”

It certainly lightened the mood. Phoenix threw his head back and laughed harder than he had in a long time.

Phoenix is a very trusting person, absolutely, but you can’t tell me this man walked out of the Dahlia Debacle without quite a few romance-related issues. It’s kind of a weird sort of contradiction...

“No, I’m serious,” she persisted, through his laughter.

“What are you talking about, Maya?” Phoenix managed to get out, once he had that fit of mirth under control. “There’s no way I have trust issues. My whole thing is trusting people and believing in people until the end, you know?”

“Yeah, I know. But trusting someone not to be a murderer is a bit different, isn’t it?”

“It’s not like that’s as far as it goes,” Phoenix argued. “I trust you, I trust all of our friends, more than just not being murderers.”

“Yeah, sure, but romance is kind of on a different level.” She leaned back into the couch thoughtfully. “When’s the last time you’ve been with anyone?”

“... At least not since I got Trucy,” Phoenix admitted, only a little shamefully. “You try hooking up with people while having the world’s most perceptive daughter who’s desperate for a ‘new mommy’.”

“Been with anyone seriously, I mean.”

Phoenix winced. “... College.”

“I rest my case, Your Honor.”

Prettty self-explanatory here, I managed to get most of my thoughts on the actual fic instead of wanting to put it in an appendix or something. Basically... you can trust people in different ways? Phoenix can trust someone to not be a murderer to the extent of putting his own life on the line for them... but when it comes to revealing any sort of details about himself, or general emotional intimacy, he’s kind of stingy about it. Of course the out-of-universe explanation is “Phoenix doesn’t talk about this stuff because we need suspense so the player keeps playing the game instead of an exposition dump as soon as the issue comes up” but I like finding in-universe explanations for out-of-universe stuff.

I think I just regurgitated my points in a few excerpts oops.

Last little comment there regarding the idea of Phoenix presumably having a casual sex life -- Iiiiii am super asexual, have known that for a long time, generally kind of squeamish about the concept and also live a very sheltered life. so I don’t know much about people hooking up... like how people just go out and do these things. But I know people do these things so I try to reference it within my limited knowledge. Anyways yeah presumably that was happening in the background throughout the trilogy in the universe of this fic. probably not an important point. i’m moving on now.

“I’m not hung up on that!” Phoenix insisted. “Iris was a good person, she was the person I trusted. I’ve known that for years, now!”

“But she did lie to you,” Maya pointed out. “And you thought she tried to kill you for five years. I dunno, if it were me, I’d have a hell of a lot of relationship issues now.”

“Do you want me to psychoanalyze you too, now, Maya? It’s not gonna be pretty.”

“Oh, no thanks, that’s what therapy’s for,” she said, far too cheerily. “But really, Nick.”

Anyways I’m pretty invested in the whole Iris-Phoenix dynamic post-Bridge to the Turnabout, because like on the one hand, hypothetically the woman you were in love with but you thought was a killer coming out to say that she actually didn’t kill anyone and was actually in love with you should resolve all your lingering relationship issues resulting from that... but I don’t see that actually happening.

It probably took Phoenix the whole five years to come to terms with the fact that Dahlia hated his guts and tried to kill him, because I do believe he was seriously hardcore in love with her at the time. Well, Iris, but he didn’t know the difference. And then finding out Iris actually loved him... but not enough to actually, say, tell him this beforehand?... makes things kind of messy. Phoenix probably thinks he should be all better now but really the whole Dahlia-Iris thing was messed up and undoubtedly messed him up a lot.

Last little bit is just me squeezing in that Maya probably also has a lot of messed up relationship issues and also definitely needs therapy. (And is getting a bit of therapy in this fic! Good for her!) I have a lot of thoughts about Maya’s trauma... but unfortunately this fic is about Phoenix so I couldn’t go too in depth about that. Sorry, Maya. One day.

Phoenix sank further into the couch. “I don’t have trust issues.”

“Y’know, there’s still a lot of stuff I don’t know about you,” said Maya. “You never tell me anything personal until there’s a murder or something and then you have to. What happened to Edgeworth, both times. The whole Dahlia thing. It took me ages to get you to tell me how you got disbarred, even! And, like, romance has this level of intimacy to it, where he’d need to know stuff about you that I wouldn’t know, that Trucy wouldn’t know. And Nick, you know I love you, but I know you’re scared of that.”

“What do you know about it?” Phoenix snapped. “You’re barely ever here.”

He felt horrible as soon as the words left his mouth. Maya gave a sharp inhale and stiffened, her eyebrows knitting above an angry and hurt glare.

“I’m sorry,” Phoenix apologized, looking at the floor. “That was… that was unfair.”

“Yeah,” said Maya. “Yeah, it was.”

yep regurgitating my points from above. Anyways, highlights: platonic “I love you”s are great, we should have more of those. Just... emphasizing that it’s platonic because the Phoenix and Maya friendship is one of my favourite things in the series.

And there’s that “You’re barely ever here�� comment that I had to cut Maya out of most of this fic to fit in, because otherwise it wouldn’t make any sense. In the universe of this fic Maya was pretty distant being busy with training and spirit medium Master stuff after the trilogy... and presumably hasn’t seen Phoenix as much as either of them would like. She loves hanging out with her best friend, and probably feels super guilty too, that Phoenix is dealing with all these issues and she can’t be there because she has other responsibilities -- so obviously it upsets her when Phoenix kind of accuses her of not being there for him, because she definitely would be, if she could, and if Phoenix would let her.

Pretty much you can’t always be around for everyone all the time, Maya would be so worn out if she had to juggle coming down to the city to hang out with Phoenix all the time on top of all her other responsibilities. She knows this, Phoenix knows this too, he’s just kind of lashing out right now because he’s hurt and confused and misses all his important people, but Maya just happens to be in front of him right now.

And yeah what Phoenix said was pretty uncalled for, which he realizes right away, and Maya acknowledges -- a pretty short fight, I don’t think these two would stay mad at each other for too long.

They sat in a tense silence for some time, until Maya sighed and brushed back her hair.

“Look, I’m saying these things because I’m scared of it, too,” she said, barely above a whisper. “After Mia, and Mom… I don’t want to be left behind again.”

“Maya…”

“Just think about it, okay?” She extended a pinky towards him. “Promise.”

Reluctantly, Phoenix linked his pinky with hers. “Fine. I’ll think about it.”

points at this and says Maya’s Definitely Got Trauma From Trilogy Events then brushes it off to get off the uncomfortable emotion topics

“Good.” Maya hopped up from the couch and stretched her arms above her head. “I’ll forget about what you said if you buy me lunch, okay? I’ve got a client this evening, so I can’t stay long, but I’ve got enough time to stop by Eldoon’s.”

“If you insist,” said Phoenix with an exaggerated sigh, and Maya laughed, so Phoenix willed himself to push the conversation from his mind for now. Maya would be spending four hours on a train today for his sake; Eldoon’s really was the least he could provide.

and in true Phoenix and Maya fashion we’re just gonna forget about the emotions and go get ramen!

Anyways thanks anon for requesting this scene I apparently have so many thoughts about Phoenix and Maya friendship... sorry if this is totally incoherent I should not have started this so late it’s like 11:30! But thank you! I will do more of these tomorrow... hopefully.

#dvd commentary meme #the catch-up game #asks

5 notes · View notes

whoareurl · 6 years ago

Text

Causing Chaos in Pyjamas (8/9)

(final update for today but now it’s up to date with the forum version sorry for flooding ur dash love me)

Not-Q was a fast draw but Bond was faster. No sooner had Not-Q pointed his gun at M’s chest than Bond was between them with his gun staring right at Not-Q’s forehead. He could hear Q’s ragged breaths from behind him and was very aware that there the henchmen’s guns were trained on him. Good - better him than the higher ups.

M and Q were both MI6 heads and far more important than a dispensable double-oh could ever be. This was what he’d been trained to do; to be the shield when he couldn’t be the bullet.

“You can order your men to shoot me,” Bond began, steadfastly ignoring Q’s pained gasp from behind him and M’s eyes burning into his back. “But I guarantee I’m fast enough to kill you on my way out.”

Not-Q seemed to consider this and, after a moment’s hesitation, lowered his gun to his side. The other guns, however, continued to stare Bond down. Bond didn’t move.

“Good call,” he said darkly.

“Stand down, 007,” said Not-Q calmly and Bond felt his blood boil.

“Not bloody likely,” he growled through gritted teeth.

Not-Q raised his eyebrows mockingly. “Technically, I am your superior.”

Bond scowled. “You’re a traitor.”

“I’m the Quaterma-”

“You’re not,” Bond spat before quickly reining himself in. For someone well-trained to bury emotions, he was struggling to prevent his anger at hearing anyone else try to claim Q’s title from bubbling abruptly to the surface.

Unfortunately for Bond’s temper, Not-Q seemed to pick up on this. “Protective of your pet genius, aren’t we?” He smirked, looking past Bond to Q. Bond had to resist the urge to turn around, to let Q know somehow that he’d be damned if he was going to let anything happen to him.

Somehow, now knowing how Q’s body felt when it was draped tiredly against his, Bond found it difficult to remember that he was in fact a highly trained MI6 operative with undoubtedly excellent marksmanship. Today, he had seen a much more vulnerable side of his Quartermaster and, well, Bond had always enjoyed feeling useful.

“Tell you what,” Not-Q went on, looking down at his gun and, despite all his training telling him not to take his eyes off his mark, Bond couldn’t help but follow his gaze.

And that small lapse in judgement was all it took. When he looked up again, Hired Muscle #1 had his gun trained directly at Q. Bond’s blood ran cold.

“Lower your gun and I won’t shoot your little mouse.”

Bond felt his control of the situation quickly slipping through his fingers. He’d very much preferred it when all the guns had been pointed at him.

“007, don’t you dare,” Q croaked out, voice a pitiful imitation of his usual clipped professionalism.

“I won’t wait all day, agent,” Not-Q said and his voice turned to steel while fire flashed in his dark eyes. “You have five seconds to lower your weapon.”

“007, that’s an order!” Snapped Q hoarsely.

“Four.”

Bond took a deep breath and analysed his options. He could shoot Not-Q right now but those bodyguards were likely as trigger-happy as he was. He’d barely have squeezed the trigger and they’d shoot Q. Out of the question.

“Three.”

“Shoot him, damn it!” Q’s voice was giving out on him. Bond could hear the telltale whisper of another one of those awful coughs on the horizon.

Bond was quick on his feet - two steps to the right and he’d be directly in front of Q. He could make it. In the confusion, M might be able to grab his gun and shoot someone. Maybe Q could grab Bond’s gun and-

“Two.”

There’s no way they’d survive. It was a lost cause. There was only one thing to do.

“One.”

Bond lowered his gun. Q swore.

“Good boy,” Not-Q cooed, making Bond’s upper lip curl. “Now, drop it.”

His tone resembled one used to speak to a dog but Bond didn’t rise to the bait. Slowly, he let the gun slip out of his hands and clatter to the floor, making sure to click the safety back in place first. He cursed internally (Q cursed externally again). He should have been able to figure out another way.

Bond took a step back as Q practically doubled over against his knees, coughing up a storm. Bond never took his eyes off the gun trained on his Quartermaster.

“Your turn,” he bit out.

Following a nod from Not-Q, both bodyguards lowered their guns. Bond dropped down to Q’s side and one hand automatically found his back, rubbing rhythmic circles as Q hacked up his lungs.

“Now, isn’t this better,” Not-Q said with a smile. “Space for a civil conversation.”

Q spat and raised his head, glaring up at his counterpart with anger blazing in his gaze. “I would point out that you’re the one who pulled a gun in the first place.”

Bond wished, just this once, that Q would hold his tongue.

Not-Q smirked at Bond, nodding his head towards Q as he said, “He’s got a quick tongue. I can see why you like him.”

Bond didn’t miss the innuendo but nor did he let his somewhat embarrassed response show on his face. Q, apparently having heard Bond’s silent wish, said nothing. Or perhaps it was because he was too busy panting, leaning heavily to one side in his seat and apparently fighting just to keep himself conscious. His glassy eyes blinked rapidly behind his glasses and for a moment Bond was afraid that Q would faint and, consequently, that his sudden movement might trigger gunfire he had no hope of stopping.

But Q caught Bond’s eye and the strained smile he sent in Bond’s direction was at least somewhat reassuring.

Don’t break down yet, he heard himself saying in his head; the same words he’d said to Q earlier. His brain was speeding through possible next moves faster than he could even contemplate them but he hadn’t yet managed to settle on anything concrete.

“What, precisely, are you hoping to achieve by keeping us trapped here, Mr Driver?” asked M’s voice from behind Bond. “Surely you must be aware of our extensive security. Killing us here would be a death sentence for you.”

Bond had to hand it to Mallory; he wasn’t her, but he was a damn good M.

Not-Q (Bond pointedly refused to call him anything else) simply smiled. “You’re quite the fool, Mallory, if you truly believe me to be the same Marcus Driver who gained Olivia Mansfield’s trust. Or do you really think so little of your predecessor that you imagine she’d be fooled into trusting a traitor?”

“It wouldn’t be the first time,” M retorted harshly.

Bond scowled. Alec’s - Trevelyan's, his brain corrected him - betrayal had cut deep for M almost as much as it had Bond. They’d trained together, drank together, laughed together, entertained the thought of sleeping together; he pushed down the spark of anger that flared up against Mallory.

Q’s body suddenly convulsed in on itself as he stifled a sneeze, apparently putting all his energy into keeping quiet. Bond saw Hired Muscle #1’s gun twitch in his hand at the movement and felt a leap of anxiety in his throat but he pushed it down.

Later, he reprimanded himself.

“Mr Driver,” M continued patiently. “Is there really any need to have those two guarding the door like that? I hardly think any of us are planning to make a run for it.”

Not-Q smiled indulgently. “Perhaps not but I wouldn’t want anyone interrupting our time together.”

Bond raised an eyebrow. What the hell was Mallory doing?

“What do you want from MI6, Mr Driver?” M asked calmly. “It must be something quite important if you’re willing to kill all three of us.”

Not-Q’s smile widened. “I already have what I want.”

Bond caught Q’s almighty eye-roll out of the corner of his eye and felt his lips twitch in amusement. In the field, he’d often heard Q’s snarky commentary in his ear on the inexplicable tendency of targets to play mind games with his agents.

Yeah, whatever, Doctor Doom, get to the point, said Q’s voice in his head and Bond disguised an amused huff as a cough. Not-Q looked at him sharply.

“Something amusing, agent?”

Bond smirked. “Oh, no. Just marvelling at your complete lack of finesse.”

A vein in Not-Q’s temple began pulsing and Bond could see his anger in the set of his jaw. He tried to imagine what Q would say in his ear right now. Probably something exasperated. Q’s tone was frequently exasperated when it came to Bond.

A movement by the desk had one of the guards aiming his gun at Mallory who put his hands up, knees bent comically as though he was in the middle of standing up. The other guard, apparently spooked by this, had his gun trained on Q again.

“Just taking a seat,” Mallory said, sitting down slowly and putting his hands flat on the desk in front of him. Bond was starting to get quite sick of having guns pointed at everybody but him. “You don’t mind do you?”

Not-Q frowned but said nothing. Slowly, the guards lowered their guns once more and Bond breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

“After all, both my agents are seated. I was starting to feel left out. I’d join them by the filing cabinet but I think I’d rather be at my desk.”

For the first time since he’d surrendered his weapon, Bond felt a surge of hope that they might get out of there alive. From where he was, he couldn’t see any indication that M’s intercom was active but if he were a betting man - and he was - he’d put everything he had on that being the case. M was broadcasting the layout of the room and the people in it straight to Eve Moneypenny’s earpiece.

Bond glanced at his watch, being careful to move only his eyes. By his estimate, it had been about three minutes since they’d been interrupted and Bond was sure M had activated the intercom as soon as the situation turned sour. Eve should have assembled a team in about-

The door flew open with a bang followed by a flurry of gunfire and Bond moved to yank Q down to the ground but found himself unexpectedly stopped in his tracks and he jolted backwards and overbalanced.

Blood blossomed across the shoulder of Bond’s shirt and he barely had time to grunt in pain before all three of the traitors were on the ground. The two hired muscles were dead, bleeding out all over Mallory’s carpet. But Not-Q had been shot in the back of his knees and was hissing in pain in a crumpled heap on the floor.

Bond glanced up at Eve who was lowering her gun and grimaced. “I hope you’re not planning to make a habit of shooting me,” he grumbled, pressing his hand into his bleeding shoulder.

Eve pulled off her light-brown jacket and balled it up, pressing it to Bond’s shoulder to stem the bleeding. “I’m sure you’ll do something to deserve it,” she muttered as she pushed harder, making Bond grunt again.

“Once is bad luck. Twice is just careless,” he sniped.

“Well, one in each shoulder. Should balance you out,” Eve quipped back, glancing over her shoulder at where Q was starting to stand on shaky legs. “Q, so help me god, if you don’t get your arse back in that seat I’ll shoot you too.”

Q had the good sense not to doubt her and collapsed back into his chair, looking more like a ragdoll than a man.

“How do you still have a licence to carry that thing?” Bond grouched, repositioning himself so his back was leaning against the filing cabinet and taking over applying pressure to his wound. The pain was thudding through his entire body but he suspected the residual adrenaline was doing something to keep him sensible.

“Medical are on their way for both of you,” said M, looking between Bond and Q with an expression as close to concern as it ever seemed to get. “I’ll get your reports on this whole business tomorrow. I expect you’ll be spending the night.”

Bond had never in his entire career spent a night in Medical. He’d been cajoled into several hospital stays but never a prolonged stint in Vauxhall Cross’s medical wing. Q though. Bond shot his Quartermaster an anxious glance and saw him looking more pallid than ever. He shut his eyes, focusing on breathing. Fuck. This was almost definitely his least favourite part of this job. Getting shot, no matter how many times it happened, never hurt any less.

“One minute,” said M and Bond opened his eyes to find M’s gaze fixed on him. He must look really bad.

Something scraped over to Bond’s right and he turned, at the same time thinking that Not-Q had fallen awfully quiet. By the time Bond saw Not-Q’s hand deactivating the safety on his bodyguard’s discarded gun, it was too late to do anything. There was an almighty bang and Bond’s heart leapt into his mouth.

Q...

#chaosinpjs #sickfic #q sickfic #acefic #acefic 007 #acefic 00q

5 notes · View notes

adminspinel · 2 months ago

Text

Gato.

#[intercom; dash commentary]#hello fellow vees!

3 notes · View notes

flashingmarkii · 2 years ago

Text

Shudder!

When you've been in this line of work for so long, sensing these kind of things is rather... instinctive. Or maybe it's plain paranoia. That has to be it. Yeah.

There's no telling what this feeling is, at least not as she goes the extra mile to inspect Celestial Being units, and only those. It's tough when you've got so many hands yet none is even allowed to get anywhere close to them.

Add to that the fact that even she isn't allowed to take off her helmet, perfectly polarized so no one can look at her face while she words. Terrible, truly terrible... a tragedy!

("... It's so hot in here...")

Back to work.

#( ballet mécanique ) ━☆ﾟ.*･｡ﾟ #( dash commentary. intercoms. ) ━☆ﾟ.*･｡ﾟ #( mfw wild graham )

1 note · View note

sbknews · 4 years ago

Text

Drift Innovations Ghost X Action Cam Review

Neil Jewell of Jewell Bike Training tests the Ghost X Action Cam with many thanks to Drift Innovations check driftinnovation.com for more info Cameras are everywhere you look these days. Speed Cameras, CCTV cameras, Dash Cams and also Action Cams. If you are looking to capture your epic events then is an action camera the tool for the job? Superbike News recently reviewed a motorcycle dash cam https://superbike-news.co.uk/viofo-mt1-dash-cam-review/ so, which is right for you, an Action Cam or a Dash Cam. The Ghost X from Drift is a compact action camera that has been designed to be mounted virtually anywhere. It records HD 1080P video at 30fps

It’s Drift’s budget camera coming it at about £130, it offers a 5 hour battery life which can be extended to 8 hours with the bigger battery unit that is available for another £25. The included 32GB microSD card might need to be replaced for a bigger one as a 10 minute video (1080P) takes up 3.8GB of storage so by my very rough calculations you are probably good for 1.5 hours before you’d fill the card. Not a problem if you change one of the mirad of settings to give you loop recording. The loop interval can be set at different stages between 10 seconds and 10 minutes meaning it will record at 10 minute lengths until the card is full then return to the start and begin overwriting.

In the box is everything you need to get started. I initially ignored the instruction manual as it looked too thick and technical. I set about figuring the camera out myself. There are only 3 buttons on the top how hard could it be. One button is clearly an on/off as identified by the international on/off symbol. I pressed it, nothing. I pressed and held it for a couple of seconds and the little camera beeped into life. The back of the Ghost X has the tiniest of screens, smaller than a postage stamp, it had illuminated a pleasant green colour. This is where those with bad eyesight may begin to struggle. The little screen is giving out a lot of information in such a small space but, if you can see it, it does makes sense. Information such a recording mode; view angle; recording quality; the number of files saved; battery life and remaining card capacity are all shown on a screen size of 132mm² Staring at the screen I began pressing buttons, The top button, the one closest to you as you look at the screen, cycles the display through the various modes that the Ghost X has to offer, Video, Still camera, time lapse, burst image, settings menu, each one of these comes with its own colour. This will prove useful as you can instantly tell the mode the camera is in simply by looking at the glow and not squinting at the screen. Pressing the button again cycles back to the start. I pressed the middle button and discovered this cycles through the options on the screen being displayed, so in video mode you can alter the resolution to 1080, 960, 720 or WVGA which is probably the same resolution as a typical CCTV camera the advantage being you can up the frame rate to 60fps if you need to. I’m not a keen photographer so would probably need to look up what a lot of the settings do to fully understand the functionality of the Ghost X but then I would probably ignore them all and set it to record video at its best 1080P x 30fps resolution and never touch any settings again.

Cycling through the screens and the modes, I only had to revert to the instruction book once and that was to understand what the K140 meant. I could change it to K90 and K115 but did not know what I was doing. Reluctantly, I flicked through the quick guide to realise that the K wasn’t a K but a symbol to illustrate the field of vision for the recordings. There are three options 90º, 115º and 140º. Once familiar with the button layout and how the options on the screens cycle through the menu options and back to the beginning, setting up the time and date and other options on the Ghost X was relatively simple. Just click slowly to get to where to need to be otherwise run the risk of cycling through all 28 menu options before getting back to where you need to be. (press and hold the button to go backwards through the menus) One of the 28 menus was Video tagging, this seems like a very clever idea if you don’t want to be recording all day and then have to wade back through hours of footage to find that one time where your mate did something cool. Video tagging is like having the Ghost X set in sleep mode, it’s always watching but not recording until you press the record button. Then, depending on the settings it can record the previous 2 minutes and the following 2 minutes. With Video Tagging, you’ll never miss that perfect action shot ever again. I eventually found my way back to the screen that told me the camera was in video mode but how to actually record video? I had one button left to press so pressed it, The Ghost X emitted a little beep, change to a big beep or no beep in settings, and the green glow turned red. It was recording. Starting and stopping is as simple as touching a button and to check it was all fine I hooked the camera up to the computer using the included USB lead and was impressed at how quickly the device was recognised. Much easier than removing the SD card from a DashCam type recorder. The Camera also charges up while attached to the computer and the little screen glows green when fully charged.

Feeling good that I had worked out all the buttons and squinting at the tiny screen, I was feeling ready. I just one had more flick through the user guide to make sure I had found everything. It was at this point I made the life decision to read the manual first on every new thing I get.

The guide was easy to use and only so thick because it contained all of the languages. It mentioned an APP, of course there is an APP, I downloaded that and looked up how to connect the APP to the camera. It was here that the instruction booklet came into its own. After connecting the APP to the phone via on-board Wi-Fi (easy) you get full access to all the system settings on your phone screen, not one that is 11mm wide x 12mm high. You can see a live image of the camera on the phone to help you set in the perfect location. You live and learn. The APP does a lot more than just system settings you can control the camera, live stream and join the drift community to share videos and experiences. After fiddling with the menus, it was time to fix the camera to my crash helmet. I already have a motorcycle dash cam on the bike, I didn’t want to go full Tellytubby and mount it on the top on my lid so opted for the side. The box contains 2 x 3M sticky pads, one is flat and the other curved. There was a lot of searching for the best location on the helmet to stick it. 3M pads are wondrously sticky so I wanted to find the right place first time. One of the great things about the Ghost X is that the lens can rotate so the camera can be mounted at any angle and the level corrected by simply rotating the lens so that the marker arrow is pointing straight up. Doing this exercise while looking at the image on your phone means you can get it right first time.

As expected from an action camera there are many different mounting option available, the handlebar mount, designed for mountain bikes, might work on the handle bars or crash bars of some motorbikes. It is made from metal and looks & feels well build and robust. There is a pivot mount that will allow for the camera being mounted any which way; a roll bar mount for clamping onto scaffold sized tube. In fact, wherever you want to mount your camera there is probably a mount designed to do that job on the Driftinnovation.com website.

I wanted a sleek fitting camera so went for the simplest solution of the curved sticky pad and then having the camera clip fitting directly into that. The camera clip is indexed onto the camera with a serrated grooved ring that controls the vertical angle the camera. The horizontal view depends on where you put the sticky pad. Changing the orientation of the camera and rotating the lens can be done without tools making camera position changes quick and easy, something that can’t be done with a dashcam.

The camera clip locks into the sticky pad via a couple of spring loaded plastic prongs. Pinching these together enables the camera to slide out. When not on the helmet the sticky pad socket is hardly noticeable. One thing I would always want to be sure of, though, is that the camera clip is securely located in its socket. Make sure you listen for 2 audible clicks as it locks into place and then try to pull it back out. The last thing you want to see is footage of your camera bouncing down the road, if you ever find it again that is. There are no tethers available on the website to offer peace of mind. The buttons and the release prongs are easy to use with a gloved hand. Once you have mastered where the buttons are, you can turn the Ghost X on and off and start and stop the recording by touch. Or do as I did and start the camera recording and then lock it into place on the helmet. Remember that colour coded screen? There’s a small indicator light above the lens so you can check in a mirror what mode you’re in and if you are recording or not just by looking at it. Out and about on the bike, I didn’t notice the camera at all. It’s slim enough that it doesn’t rub on your shoulder when cornering and light enough that I couldn’t feel it. I made a few runs, the first one used the onboard mic and suffered horrific wind noise, maybe the sensitivity was too high. The second run I used the external mic. On returning back to base and reviewing the footage I was very disappointed that the mic had not picked up commentary. I did some checks with another mic and diagnosed a bad connector on the original mic. I’ve ordered a new one for £10 which fixed the issue.

With the mic fixed and installed inside my helmet alongside my intercom mic, I connected the app to the camera via the on-board Wi-Fi and set off on another test run using the app to alter the settings along the way. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WDiYkKhAGHk The Ghost X is not waterproof at least, I don’t think it is. It’s probably not fully waterproof. you see, I’m not really sure if it is or not but there is a waterproof case that is available as an accessory so, if you do want to go out in the rain then that is probably what you need. I tried in on the camera and was not happy with it. It’s good for 40m underwater though! The Ghost XL is waterproof, according to the website, and as it’s only another £20 I’d get that one. However there is one annoyance that comes from browsing the Driftinnovation.com website, and that’s the constant notifications that people are buying stuff. I really don’t need to know that Karen from Margate has just bought a Drift Class 10 MicroSD card 1 hour ago. I want to know the IPX rating of the Ghost X is please so I can decide to go out in the rain or not. Thank you very much.

Overall, a great action camera, reasonably simple to set up and get going but will need some fine tuning of the settings to get the most out of it. I was happy that it came with a fully charged battery so I could start to mess with it immediately. I later searched the website and found out that the Ghost X is IPX4 rated. This means that you can use it in the rain, but not at high speed in heavy rain.

It has other modes apart from the video; you can take 12MP still images; bursts of up to 15, 4MP images and set up time lapse. These are good to have but I wonder how many times they will be used. It’s certainly less hassle as a camera than a dash cam system, it’s compact and easy to access the files with the USB link, the quality of the video is great and it offers more to the video creator because when mounted on the helmet it follows the rider’s eye. With the bigger battery and a larger SD card up to 128GB the recording times are comparable to that of a hardwired dash cam system, but ask yourself how often do you ride for longer than 8 hours? Even if you do, grab a spare battery that can be charged up via USB and swap them in seconds. The downside is that it only records in one direction and if something happens behind you you’ll miss it.

So which is right for me dash cam or action cam? Well the perfect solution is to have both. The helmet mounted action cam will be used extensively to record live commentary over the top of video for training and feedback purposes and the front and rear dash cam system will be there to record any incidents and as also as back up when, not if, I forget to press the record button. Definitely a great little camera that looks sleek has a lot of functionality and will absolutely capture your best moments. You should get one. Review and photos by Neil Jewell of Jewell Bike Training You can check out Jewell Bike Training website and also follow on socials T: @jewelltraining FB: @jewellbiketraining Insta: @jewellbiketraining For more reviews check out our dedicated Reviews page For more Drift Innovation and our reviews check out our new dedicated page Drift Innovation News or head to the official Drift Innovation website www.driftinnovation.com

If you would like to receive our headlines daily to your email inbox then sign up to our newsletter: Here Subscribe to our news channels: Here

Read the full article

#DriftInnovations #GhostX

0 notes