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[harlivies]

Legacies: The Little Spin-Off That Wouldn't

[Article translated into English below; access link above for original Portuguese version.]

With the first anniversary of Legacies' series finale long past us, it seems the appropriate time has finally come for us to reflect a bit on the various elements that led to the series not achieving the same kind of success as its predecessors. If you haven't seen this spin-off of The Vampire Diaries and The Originals in its entirety, don't worry; you didn't miss out on much. If, on the other hand, you followed the series and our reviews while it was on the air, you know we have a lot to discuss. So grab your favorite snacks, maybe a drink, and without further ado, let's get into it.

Created by Julie Plec, Legacies premiered in October 2018 on The CW. The spin-off provides a continuation to the story of Hope Mikaelson (played by Danielle Rose Russell since The Originals' fifth season), the descendant of some of the most powerful lineages of vampires, witches, and werewolves in the universe created by The Vampire Diaries. The teenager attends the Salvatore School for the Young and Gifted, a boarding school that aims to provide a safe haven for young supernatural beings, teaching them to control their powers and navigate the challenges of an adolescence which, albeit similar to that of ordinary mortals, isn't without its differences.

Despite a promising premise that had indeed worked in the past, Legacies came to an end after only four seasons, becoming one of the last series to succumb to the great purge of 2022. This cancellation was not received with much surprise by most of its audience, who, after a season marked by the departure of an original cast member, anticipated the inevitable. However, Legacies' failure can hardly be exclusively attributed to what happened during its final stretch, having the problems of "the little spin-off that wouldn't" started long before the final nail was ever hammered into its coffin.

The Forgotten Legacy

As a spin-off, Legacies inherited not only a well-established vast universe from its predecessors but also the obligation to find its own voice within it. It's quite the burden, but let's be honest: anyone who wanted to revisit The Vampire Diaries or The Originals could do so at any time, so something a little different wouldn't have been frowned upon. However, while there is much to be said about Legacies' distinct tone – and, believe me, we will get to it –, one of its cardinal sins will forever be the relationship of narrative neglect it maintained to the original series.

For a self-titled "legacies" show, Legacies always used its source material rather loosely, treating the inherited mythology and characters with carelessness. If its solid mythological foundation was disrespected and scattered with the introduction of the ill-fated "monster of the week," so were the very characters who were brought into this derivative of The Vampire Diaries. By name alone, Hope, Josie (Kaylee Bryant), and Lizzie (Jenny Boyd) are the "legacies" the series should've served. Instead, the baggage they had accumulated throughout both original series and its implications were often minimized to favor a more carefree plot, reducing the main trio to a mere shadow of what it could've been.

It's purely antithetical that Legacies sought to capitalize on the emotional connection its audience had to the source material all the while ignoring it entirely, but that didn't stop it from trying. This led to the existence of cameos and references that, in an attempt to evoke a nostalgic feeling, appeared at moments that contributed little to the plot. If, in The Originals, Hope's family moved heaven and earth for the young tribrid, in Legacies, they seemed too busy to provide any kind of support to the character until the ratings demanded it. As for Caroline's (Josie and Lizzie's mother, portrayed by Candice Accola) absence, although its reason was briefly explained at the beginning of the season, her mission hardly justified her being gone through circumstances that truly warranted her visit, with the character making her first and only appearance in Legacies' series finale.

Everything Everywhere All at Once

As previously mentioned, it's no secret that Legacies attempted to differentiate itself from the other series in its universe by adopting a lighter tone, opting for largely inconsequential narratives, caricatured villains, and a whole roster of stock characters. During its first season, this gave the show its own vibe, something akin to series like Legends of Tomorrow: a comic book series with a somewhat out-there premise, but still with rather captivating characters. However, Legacies quickly began to alternate between its decidedly camp style and a more serious tone in an attempt to rationalize its overall lack of seriousness. Thus, while one episode would present a more grounded reality, the next would return to its extravagant origins, giving rise to scenarios such as a musical, a dream world, and even an alternate universe.

This inconsistency in tone between episodes had a negative impact on the various storylines and how they were received. The constant change not only left the series' audience uncertain about what to expect from any given episode but also caused many important storylines to fall flat, their content and message often contrasting with the overall tone of that particular chapter.

It's fair to say Legacies tried to be a bit of everything: comedy, drama, fantasy, film noir, western – the list goes on. But thinking that this amalgamation of genres would result in a cohesive series was just another of the many mistakes made by the production. Continuing on this topic, whose inevitable conclusion is the maxim "less is more," Legacies was inconsistent even with its characters, introducing a too vast array of figures that, ultimately, it couldn't develop. Instead of focusing on the main and secondary characters it introduced during its first season, the series wasted its time not only with the monsters that appeared in each new episode, but also with so many figures whose impact on the narrative proved negligible. Eventually, this disregard was reflected in the loss of actors (such as Olivia Liang or Peyton Alex Smith) and characters of interest to the audience to more appealing projects.

A Wronged Protagonist

Werewolf, vampire, witch. These are the three factions from which Hope Mikaelson descends, making her the first tribrid in the The Vampire Diaries universe and one of the most powerful supernatural beings in its mythology. When dealing with characters as overpowered as Hope, there are several avenues writers can explore to lay the foundation for their conflict. They can create an even greater force to pose a challenge to the protagonist, or they can choose to present an internal struggle, for example. Ideally, good writers seek to develop both external and internal conflicts side by side. Legacies, however, relegated all of Hope's baggage to the background, neglecting all that made the character great in favor of a supernatural bulldozer that had little use beyond dealing with whatever threat was present at the time.

The primary conflict for a character like Hope Mikaelson should always be internal – that's a fact. In this particular case, Legacies had no shortage of material to work with, to the extent that it would be possible to write an entire article about its protagonist alone. Identity crises due to her unique position in the supernatural world, expectations associated with her lineage, the fear of becoming like her parents, ethical and moral issues related to her powers, the fear of losing those around her... These are just some of the many viable options the series had at its disposal but, unfortunately, chose not to explore.

Another criticism that must be leveled at how Legacies treated its protagonist related to the romantic relationship between the character and Landon Kirby (played by Aria Shaghasemi). For reasons that, in all honesty, I'm still unable to comprehend, higher powers believed it would be beneficial for the series to focus its narrative on Landon instead of Hope. Thus, storylines like that of Malivore – which initiated the external conflict of Legacies – gradually began to shift toward the character, placing Hope in a secondary position.

Finally, the very characterization of the protagonist suffered from the presence of Landon in her orbit. Any qualities or interests the young Mikaelson might've had faded over time. In a way (and taking the opportunity to make a Barbie reference), he was everything; she was just Hope.

The Risks Not Taken

The existence of a protagonist like Hope, all-powerful and always ready to save the day, was a factor that consistently contributed to the lack of perceived stakes throughout the series. Legacies had several other opportunities to raise the bar of its storyline but, like many other aspects discussed throughout this article, it chose the easiest path to tread. In general, whenever something a bit more daring happened, it quickly got resolved. This rule could be applied to almost everything within the show, from narrative threads that were concluded easily and inconsequentially to the deaths and subsequent resurrections of a handful of characters.

Combined with the fact that the narrative was almost circular in both its content and development, this regression in any kind of weighty decision resulted in a progressive loss of interest for an audience that, considering the unpredictability of The Vampire Diaries and The Originals, concluded that the spin-off was entirely too mild.

In summary, the series made promises it simply couldn't keep. Its initial marketing and the premise set forth during its first season had little to do with what the spin-off eventually became. Instead of a drama about the trials and tribulations of supernatural teenagers with a special focus on a trio of female lead characters, the audience ended up with a clash of titans between these same young adults and Greco-Roman gods. No, I don't think it's unreasonable to say that the production of Legacies lost the plot.

Even with months separating the end of the series and the date I finish writing this article, it's impossible not to feel a certain level of frustration with this spin-off. Legacies had everything it needed to become a successful series, including feedback from the audience and numerous opportunities over time to correct its many mistakes, but it never did. Whether out of pride or stubbornness, it continued to dig its own grave by reinforcing everything its fans and critics complained about. For this reason, Legacies will forever live in my memory not as "the little spin-off that could" (an allusion to the folktale The Little Engine That Could), but rather as "the little spin-off that wouldn't."

You can revisit Legacies on Max.

[grim-faux]

X3 _ The Hazards We Keep 

 

First - A Small Quiet

The only good thing about scaling the rooftops was skipping the journey through inside the worn and narrow corridors, and staying out of places where it was easy to get cornered. Though trading out the dangers and some shelter meant he was outside, at odds with the bleak weather, bombarded by frigid gale or merciless rain. It was a fortunate hour for once, the rains were scarce, leaving only a dense cloud cover to mask the distance. The wind was bitter and sharp, but he could see better without rainfall lashing his face.

Far below the ledge he perched on, the Viewers lurked in wispy suggestions. He watched them, and guessed they could also watch him. The lumbering bodies held motionless at the roof edge, barely tethered by a breeze that kept them from tipping to far in the wrong way. That didn’t stop one body from twitching and then folding, the dark shape dissolved into the mist further below the high buildings the others lingered. Where they went, he wasn’t certain. He knew the Viewers plunged downward and eventually broke on the pavement, but from where he sat watching, it was hard to imagine beneath all the mist. Down there somewhere the streets awaited, he knew this, he remembered the pathways and alleys. But being so far above the world, it was hard to remember what the roads looked like or where they went. The roads didn't ever go anyway, except more roads and cavernous gorges.

Only buildings and walls existed, and the occasional rooftop where he could emerge to view the gray sky, feel the rain. And for a time, the roads stopped existing, the gaping chasms vanished. He lived in the walls and lurked under floorboards, listening to the click of steps above. If he needed to, he could burrow away and hide from the world.

When he went into the buildings, the Tower couldn’t see him. Even if he couldn’t see where it was through the fog, somewhere out there the gleaming beacon burned. Somehow, he could still feel it. The Tower did not… call for him, not the way it did before the television. Not like the way it did when the televisions blazed and he had to touch the cold screen, and wander through the misty hallway. But the searing glare still made his skin tingle, and with a little quiver he knocked the droplets off his hat.

Mono didn’t know how long he sat on the eave of the roof, but it had to have been some while. His joints were stiff and his toes tingly. He was wet through, despite having emerged from the window only sort of damp. He gave his coat another flick as he uncoiled, and took a moment to lean down on his hands and give his legs more of a stretch to pop out any kinks.

Traveling further along the roofs crooked edge, he located the jagged patch of bricks that gave him the clean climb to the highest point. He might could have gone higher or sought a plank bridging a gap, but he had reached this high ledge and a leveled surface, which seemed sheltered enough to wander around on without risk. It was important not to scout too far off, or he might get stranded somewhere or unable to venture back.

The bricks took him back down to a large vent duct or thick pipes, what it was didn’t matter as much as its anchorage in the wall. As he followed the pipes around the next corner of the building, a few fat drops began to fall. It was getting darker too, and he relied on the light peeking through the worn boards of the windows to gleam across the glossy pipe. In short time he reached the broken and wide window from where he emerged, just as the gale began tugging at his coat and the falling drops began to thicken. He slipped under the creaky board and plopped down into the suffocating darkness within – as he held perfectly still and held his breath, the murk ebbed and the familiar room revealed itself.

Outside the wind howled at his departure, he could imagine it complaining about losing someone to the dank and gloomy innards of the building. He ignored it, and focused on listening to the other noises within the room. The bulb above glistened and dimmed, while the prattling of rain on the brick outside the window sizzled through his thoughts. His soddened toes turned clumpy with the globs of dirt, and steadily thickening puddle gathering droplets from his coat. He took a breath and suppressed the sneeze that tried leaping from his nose.

He needed to be quiet.

Leaving the room, he began with his usual search through the halls – as the lights flashed and waned, he would stall and listen. The constant of the walls moaned, whenever the lights pulsed against the onslaught of the brewing storm. In the back of his head, the even buzz of static whittled through his focus. He ignored the comfort of the static in favor of finishing his scout, searching through the few rooms and the corridor – ever attentive and hyper focused to anything that might be out of place. All the dust on the floors was as he remembered, none of the doors left only a little ajar had shifted; that would be alarming, since most of the open doors were jammed against the floorboards or debris.

Only one time did he poke his head into the room, where the tallest figure sat hunched at a table. After he assured the Thin Man was where he left him, then the other rooms needed a strict explore, but now he was back to check again if the Thin Man needed anything.

None of the packages or gifts he dragged into the room looked disturbed. The Thin Man was amazing, he could sit forever and scratch at pages, never-ever raising his head or doing anything but stare at the marks. Mono didn’t understand it, but he could not ever think about himself spending all his time staring at the books and doing… whatever the Thin Man did.

The only thing that made the room special was the table and a few chairs, one sturdy chair was for the Thin Man’s use. He made it better – this Mono watched him do that. Nothing else made the room better or bad for keep, the one wall had cupboards, but no food. Still, Mono could hide in the cabinets, and he nested one up with plenty of fabric and whatever else was soft, like cotton.

It was tempting to go snuggle into the downy stuff and warm himself, but it was more important to check his Thin Man. Which is what he did.

He sat between the shoes and stared up at the underside of the table, where the edge met the front of the Thin Man’s chest. Through the timber, the steady scuffing of the marking rattled through, along with the faint rustle of static. There he stayed listening to the steady busy that the Thin Man did for the long hours, the tall figure quiet and Mono very quiet.

Always in these long spans Mono wondered what the man and his hat did. What did the marks do? Why did he put them all over the paper. The scribbles matched the marks in the books, so did the Thin Man copy the shapes? For why?

The Thin Man didn’t fix the other sad chairs, but one held together enough for Mono’s weight. It rattled and wobbled as he climbed onto the seat, and crackled in agony when he leapt off to the table edge.

Atop the table, papers and books sat stacked in mismatched heaps. Some books might have been coming undone, or the pages had been jammed with dozens of papers. A couple of books lay open, many had gathered a faint layer of soot – which prompted another snort from Mono (he stifled that – he had to be stealthy).

When the Thin Man didn’t shift his attention from the page he scratched all over – with dark lines and curves – Mono crouched low and scooted up beside one pile of books mixed with papers. He stayed hidden there for a moment, made certain the Thin Man had his busy, before shuffling along the edge of the table and creeping to the Thin Man’s elbow. This was the best way of sneaking to the Thin Man without catching his attention. He was very good of sneaking up to the Thin Man, especially when his hat was turned down and his eyes locked onto the pages.

The marks appeared beneath the stubby end of the writing thing. Mono poked his head up over a long arm so he could watch the strikes and curves sprawl across the page. It would be fun to help the Thin Man fill the papers, but he wasn’t sure if the Thin Man would like his marks. He could help with the pictures.

On one of the pages held a lot of what looked like buildings, he’s sure because of the small blocks inside the larger blocky shapes. One paper swelled with too many Eyes, but he saw a tall and narrow block, with a familiar symbol at the top.

It happened so much that Mono just forgot about the Thin Man and the Tower. He was never sure if the Thin Man lived there, but for some reason he thought that was right, but he didn’t know where the thought came from. It made sense in his head. Maybe from the warning speek the other kids made about the tall man in the hat, and then the Tower. He supposed it had more to do with that was where She would be, he knew... that was where the Thin Man took children. It was where he wanted to be.

There were some things kids just… knew. Like not to eat the bitter boxes under the sink, or don’t drink colorful water. They saw something that made the connection clear, but forgot what the thing was. Sometimes seeing terrible things made them forget, but the awful results made sure they would never make the same mistakes. Noisy children die. Danger lurked everywhere. The world was full of awful, and it was always that way.

Mono wanted to fight the Tower. But the Thin Man said it would… dez... dist’roy. Yeah. The tall thin man made that speek, and warned Mono about the terrible for going to the Tower and steal Her. It was bad. The man in the hat was right about that. Mono couldn't really figure how the Thin Man was right, but he knew something happened.

Why make speek of the Tower? What did the man and his hat think about the building hiding all the awful that made the city horrible?

“Mmm. Tower,” Mono hummed. He tried balancing himself on the long arm with his tummy. He could lift his legs and hold perfectly elevated. “S’for safe yoo?”

“H̴̺̒m̶̡͂ṃ̴̆.̸̥̋.̴̙̄.̷̳́.̷̜͑”

Without slipping off his perch, Mono stretched his arm out to the sketch of the Tower. “S’to go? Why Tower?” Did the marks bending around the tall shape mean something? What did the lumpy form of the scribbles mean? He was curious with unbridled questions filling his thoughts.

Everything terrible was the Tower’s doing. All kids knew that. Just like there was a man that came out of the TVs, or that adults would chase, and that no matter how safe a place seemed, shelter was only temporary. Something about the tallest building staring down on the city was awful. That was just how it was.

“T̴̬͛ḧ̷̺́e̸̟͂ ̶̡͛T̴̮̎o̴̧͗ẉ̷̎ẹ̷͘ŕ̸̦,” the Thin Man crackled, startling Mono out of his thoughts. “It was my home. ̶̮̄O̶̮͆n̶̳͌c̸̛̼ë̵͓.̵̬̉.̷̭̐.̸͓̋.̴̱͂”

He flipped off the arm and came to a rest flat on his back, staring upside down at the hard carved face beneath the brim of the hat.

Does speek. About Tower. That was so unexpected – the Thin Man was always so fixed on his scratching at pages, nothing Mono did or his pestering stole his attention except when Mono was being too much. Mono was too sneaky for his own good.

“Hooom’mah,” he tried. Weird speek. “Hom’eh? Good?” he ventured, tilting his head. He had rolled back onto his seat, and gave the impassive face his attention. The scratching on the page continued, and for a second Mono supposed he heard nothing but his own inner thinking.

“Ṉ̴̈õ̸̺.̴̟̽”

A fluttering burned in Mono’s chest. The Thin Man didn’t pause in his scribbly busy, but he was doing speek. Doing speek with Mono!

“Mmm,” Mono hummed, after calming himself. “For awful made.” The static buzzed a little louder through his ears. “Am better for keep.” He flopped back onto the arm and rubbed his cheek onto the coarse fiber of the sleeve. It didn’t matter if the Thin Man didn’t like him, Mono always liked the Thin Man. The tall man in the hat was important and wanted.

He fell over when the Thin Man lifted his arm, to crush out the smoking nub that hide between his fingers. After pulverizing the nub, he made a half attempt to dust away the thick black smudge off the table. That didn’t do anything, aside from remove the pieces from the other cigarettes scraps that’d been obliterated into the tables surface – a short distance from all the books left lying around.

One time the flickering flame turned the edge of a page black and made the paper curl. In response, the Thin Man chattered and made a big show to stop the singing from spreading. For a long while after, Mono hid under the floorboards, waiting for the boiling static to soothe. He knew how much to be around the Thin Man when the static bristled and the lights pulsed.

Like now, he scooted closer to the tables edge in case he needed to slip away. Mono’s gaze flashed from the Thin Man to the smoky patch on the table, and then to the floor beyond the tables end; he kept himself low and invisible, the muscles in his legs wound and tight.

It wasn’t until the Thin Man settled his arm back to the table, that Mono let his muscles uncoil. He stayed low and listened to the mix of the finger, now tapping, mix with the soft scuffing of the mark nub grinding across the paper. The dull hiss eased after a span of waiting, the Thin Man moved aside a page and pulled over a fresh sheet. Everything was at it was before Mono climbed the table.

“S’kids to Tower?” he whispered. “And am Mono?” The Thin Man didn’t shift from the rhythm of filling the fresh page with shapes. “Am Mono for Tower?” The steady scrawl on the page didn’t stop, but the Thin Man did sigh, and it made Mono chilled from how damp his coat was.

“Y̴͙̽ė̴̺s̴̺͂.̶̧͗ ̵̛͖ You were M̸͕͂e̵̛͚á̸̺ņ̷̒t̸̪͂ ̵̱͑ Ṯ̸͆ò̸̩ ̵̳̎ S̴̳̉t̴͕̏a̸͎͆y̷͇̆  ̴̳͌I̵̮͒n̷͊͜ ̷̡̾  T̸̘͐h̷̡͐ẽ̴̼ ̶̺̀ T̴͇̓o̶͓̽w̵͍̎e̸̤̕r̷͕̐.̴̼̐”

Mono was about to reply, but caught himself. He didn’t remember much of the Tower or after S̶̻͝ḧ̶͔e̶̟̎ ̷̛͔ L̷̫̉e̴̚͜f̵̼̅t̵̥̆ ̴̞̋ H̴͙̔i̵͇̕m̶̪̃.̸̘̊ Like everything else about the Tower, it was terrible and the haunts still crowded him out of naps. He was always certain the Thin Man stole him from the Tower and put him in a box, and stayed for a while when Mono was very tired.

“Am’keep,” he reminded. That was important.

“Of course.”

He plucked at a hangnail on his toe. “S’kids to Tower?” He wanted to add, ‘And Ḧ̷̗é̸̟r̸̝̆?̷̰̽’ But the Thin Man turned frowny if he dared mention the girl in the yellow coat.

“S̴̟̊o̴̓ͅm̴̝̆ê̶̝t̶̹͒ï̴͕m̷̥̀ĕ̸̮ş̷̈́.̵͇̕”

Mono was getting a bit shaky. Not because the Thin Man did say some kids went to the Tower, but it was speek.

“Them flee. But stole” He still picked at his toenail, but he tilted his head back to peer up at the Thin Man. Sitting directly beneath his chin, he had no way of making out the hard features or lines. And the Thin Man held his focus on the paper, never once glancing aside or down on Mono. This was good, he was calm and happy with the busy. “Why n’Tower?”

The scratching on paper went on while the static buzzed at his nerves and bones. He gave up on waiting, and settled comfortably on the table to watch the growing marks move across the paper.

“T̵̡̊h̴̫͝a̵̼͘t̶͚̅ ̵͔̇ Í̵͎s̸̭̈́ ̷̡͆ N̷̨͆o̴̼͐t̸̜̓ ̷̤̇ I̵̩̽m̷̐͜p̴̧̕o̶̫͛ȑ̵̥t̷̢́á̴̗n̸̠̐ț̸̄.̴̹́”

Mono shrugged his shoulders. It was more to pop a stiff joint, but he had known the Thin Man wouldn’t go on about the other children. The Thin Man was odd about thinking about them, especially the ones that hid or ran away. And he was always upset about the ones that got stole.

“The children?”

Mono winced. Of all the times for the Thin Man to listen, it was when he mumbled something without meaning to.

“D̵̟́o̴̫͘ ̷̺̀ Ṉ̵͝o̷̱͐t̶̬͘ ̵̜̅ C̵̟̈ö̷͍́n̴͇̅c̴̞̀e̷͈̅r̵̾ͅn̴̢͛ ̴̢͐ Ỳ̴̳o̶̫͛ū̷̱ṛ̵͠s̸͓͌e̸̪͝ḷ̴̃f̷̣͛ ̶͔̓ W̴̮͐ì̶̮t̶̿ͅḩ̷̊ ̸̪̅ T̶̯̂ẖ̵̌ę̸̈́ ̶̯̈́ O̷̖͛n̸̙̕ẽ̷̟s̸͈͊ ̷͎̿ T̷̖̽h̵͎͝a̵̳͠t̴͈͊ ̷͍̐ Ȃ̸̳r̷̥̄e̴̹͝ ̵̢͝ T̸̳̆ă̷͜k̷͎̚e̸̗̎n̷͚̕.̵̖͆” His freehand reached over to an open book, which the Thin Man drew close and flipped through the pages. “Your crisis begins when you sought to steal back W̶͈̃ḩ̵͠ą̸͊t̶̥͌ ̶̠̓ W̵̳̌a̸͈͐s̵̲͑ ̵͇́ T̸͕̈́a̸̠̾k̴̠̀e̵̟͊ǹ̷̞.̸̠̋  A̸͇̔n̵̝͐d̸̥͛ ̴̣̚ T̸̮͒h̸̺͑a̸̜͂t̴̺͒ ̴̝͘ P̸̫͌é̷̺r̸̢͝p̶̀͜ȇ̴̤t̶͓͝u̴̙̚a̸̲̋t̷̹͋ě̵̠s̷̺͗  ̷̺̕Ó̸̻û̸̝r̵͓͝ ̸̣͝ C̴̜͒ú̸̹r̴̠̒s̵̤̚ẹ̵̕d̷̡̅  ̷̳̓Ẻ̶͕x̴̱͝i̸̖͠s̴̝͋t̵̡̉e̴̗̿n̴̟͒c̴̲͒ȩ̵̕.̸͖͠”

That was something else the Thin Man always muttered about. ‘cycles’ and ‘hurt’ and ‘per… pit’uaals’ or something. And the thing called ‘egg’cist-sense’. But he knew about how cursed Mono was, and how everything was bad when Mono was around.

He tucked his arms into his soggy coat and tried to warm himself. “Am not bad.” The Thin Man snorted.

“You are V̶͗ͅe̵̼͘r̶̊ͅy̴̬͌ ̸̠̈ B̶͚͊ạ̷̊d̷̙͝.̵̢̃ The worst C̵̜̽r̴̘̕ḙ̶͠a̸̳̍ẗ̸̡́u̵̡͌r̵͚͝e̸̡̒ ̸͉͝ in all T̷̟͗h̵̹̍e̵̼͂ ̷̞͒ Ć̸͉i̸̞̇t̵͖̾ỹ̴ͅ. Q̸͕̎u̴̞͝i̸͇̚t̸̞̍e̶͚̓ ̸̘͠T̸̛͖è̸̬r̷͇͝r̵͓̒i̸̮̅b̶͍̂l̷̬̉e̶͖͑.̴̧͐”

Mono shook his head and tucked into his little ball more, with his hat shielding him from the smokey draft. He was not bad. That was lie. But it did no good arguing with the Thin Man. The static rustled as the Thin Man took another breath.

“S̷͉̒e̷͆͜e̴̪͋?̸̬̏ ̷͉̔ T̴̺̍h̷̲̓ĩ̸̞s̵͉͊ ̵͔́ I̴̙̍s̴͇̍ ̸͕̾ why I never explain T̵͍͋h̷̭̑e̶̠̓ ̵̥͘ Ṇ̸̌ã̴̩t̷̯̉u̴̮̔r̶͛͜ë̵͙́ of the world T̴̘̅ọ̴̅  ̴̗͗Y̷̎ͅo̵̪̅ȕ̸̘.̶͓̏” He sighed, and Mono felt much colder. “Ḯ̶̥ ̵̼̌ S̴̤̓ṵ̸͋p̶͍͝p̴͖̃ô̵͓s̶̞̀e̵̝̾ that too will always be A̶͇͗ ̶̦͝ P̸̟̔å̴̠r̴̟̂ṱ̶̉ ̷̞̕ O̵̞͒f̸̬͋ ̴̢͆ W̸͇͐h̷̻͌ǫ̶͗ ̷̗̋ Ẉ̷̐ë̷̦ ̴͙̾ A̶̖̕ṛ̸̈́e̷͉͝.̶̜͊”

The scuffing on paper stopped, and then the Thin Man brushed a finger over the back of his head. It didn’t make Mono feel better, not the way it did when he felt anxious and the Thin Man wrapped him up in his arms. This careful touch made Mono feel small and silly. That was probably why the Thin Man did it, so Mono knew he was very small and very silly to have a head full of think.

“Am Mono. Not you.” The Thin Man barked an ugly sort of giggle. It took him a while to settle the crackling and catch his breath, the whole while Mono felt even sillier.

“O̴̺͑h̶̥̋ ̶͕̔ M̵͔͋ý̴̥ word!  ̴͙̀F̸̹́o̸͉͆r̷̠̎ the ̸̛̯Ṱ̷̏o̶͎͊ẃ̷͉e̷͍̅r̵̲̒. You are something.”

“Am Mono,” he chirped. Still without lifting his head, so his cry was muffled. At least the Thin Man moved his hand away.

“A̶̒ͅĺ̶̟w̴͎͠ã̷̟y̵̩͆s̷̲͑ ̸̹̾ H̴̜̓ĩ̷͔d̵̩̅i̴̫͝n̵̮̐g̴̱̾.̸̗͐ For the S̶̛̳h̷̻͌ǎ̵͍m̵̲̾e̷͕͌.̴͔͂”

Mono growled in his throat and coiled more into himself, until he was nothing but a soggy lump of fabric. He was not terrible. He was not bad. Mono was wonderful and great. He took care of the Thin Man and he wrote amazing stories for the other travelers.

“T̵̞͝ĥ̴̠i̵̖͑s̸̳͌ ̶͖͊ D̸̫͒o̶̪̔e̵̫̎s̶͍͆ ̴̛̘ N̵̡͆o̵̻̎t̶͍̅ help your case,” rumbled the Thin Man. “One day H̴̦͒ḯ̷̥d̵͉̿i̷͔̐n̶͓̏g̶̲͂ ̵̩̇ W̵̧̌į̵̋l̵̳̏l̸̰̎ ̷̲̈́ Ḃ̶̭e̶͍̒ ̵̮͘ I̴̠͛m̵͕͑p̶͍̿o̸̼̿s̴͍͠s̶͖͐i̵̜̓b̶͉̾l̵͈̅ȇ̷̦.̵̝͠”

The Thin Man was stupid and never made sense, but he was kinda right.

Mono slowly loosened out of his protective shield, as another page flipped in the book. The pages crinkled on the verge of disintegrating, and stains blotted the sprawling sheets. He watched as the Thin Man flipped and stopped, his stony glare bore into the mixture of lines and curves. Mono’s own gaze slipped between the book and up to the Thin Man’s face. If the man or his hat got anything from the marks, it was lost on Mono.

“Then W̵̼͠h̷͇̽a̶̝̅t̶͖̒ ̶̹̈ Ạ̵͒r̴̜̎e̴̗͊  ̵͉̉Y̸͈͑o̵̡͘ṷ̶̈́?̶̭̈́” The question came from nowhere, and the Thin Man didn’t shift his attention from the book. “What do you T̸͇͠h̵̼͠i̶͘ͅn̷̞̔k̸̰͘ of Ý̷̖ö̸͇́ú̸̫r̷̩̚ŝ̷̪è̵̙l̷̪͘f̵̺͑ ̴̪̾ Å̴̹s̷̨͊?̵̻̈”

That question didn’t mean anything to Mono, and he really didn’t get what the Thin Man was getting at. “Am Mono.”

“V̸̳̚è̴̟r̶̻͗y̸̟͘ ̷̩̃ W̶̛̖e̶̺̿ḽ̵̀l̵̖͑,” chattered the static. “But what I̷̹̾s̴̙̚ ̴̘͛T̵͎̕ĥ̵̫a̶̻͌t̵̝̐?̴̣̏ ̸̫͑What do you S̶̖̈́ḙ̷͌ḙ̶̄ ̴̦̑ Y̶̞̆ô̵̫u̸̻̒r̵̫̄ș̸̾e̶͕͂l̸̲̏ḟ̷̳ ̸͚̋ A̵̧̋s̸̫͝?̸̪̎”

Mono stretched himself out, until his spine popped. “Am child. Y’know child? Am Mono s’child.” While it was calm, he scooted out more over the table until he was beside the Thin Man’s elbow. He didn’t go too far, in case he needed to bolt. He would pay more attention to the soft buzz teasing the lights. It let him see more of the Thin Man’s face, too.

“A child,” the Thin Man muttered, as if it was weird to suddenly say that now. He always called Mono child or boy. He asked stupid questions that he knew the answers to. “V̵̤̾e̷̠̾r̶̤̀ẙ̷͍ ̵͉̀ W̶̢̌é̶͉l̷̮̇l̷̺͋.̵̺͝” His hand released the page he was about to turn and instead settled on the book. “And what D̸͎̽ọ̶̊ ̵̳̑ Y̵͍͐o̴̩͌ù̷̥ ̷͒͜  think Ĭ̷̜ ̶̮̎  A̶͍͌m̷̝̄?”

Mono tilted his head and fixed his hat. “Monster.”

The space between the Thin Man’s eyebrows twitched, and he nodded. “Well….” His gaze fell back into the book at his hand. “A child, and A̶̻͂ ̶͉̀ M̶̦͝o̸̺̔n̷̤͐s̴͇̀t̴̺̀e̴͍͊ŕ̴͉.̶̙͘.̶̻̋.̵̲̈́.̷̹̐”

“Mm-hmm.” He pushed his hand under his hat and worked at some of the tangles tugging against the seams. He watched the Thin Man, but the man and nor his hat was watching him. Just the book.

“T̶͔̈́ȟ̵̩ḁ̷̿t̸͈͘  ̶̣͌I̸͓̒ś̷̱ ̸̢̇ I̶͕͂ń̴ͅt̸͔̑ḙ̵͝r̵̨̊e̸͍̅s̷̥̎ẗ̵̞́i̸̹͠n̵̞̕g̶̻̾.̴͍͆”

Did the Thin Man now think it was weird for Mono to keep him? The other kids were scared of monsters, but Mono knew best. The Thin Man wasn’t the same sort of monster as the Viewers or the Teacher. He did speek with Mono – like right now, or he let Mono curl up by him, and they could have company and look at books. Mono was thinking about making scribbles too, the same way the Thin Man did. He needed a book for himself, because the Thin Man didn’t like to share books or papers.

“For A̷͙̍  ̸̙̽C̷͂ͅḧ̸̳í̶̧l̶̫̾d̷͔̀,̸̫͝ you have a few Ŝ̸̺į̶͝m̷͔̒i̵̢͗ļ̸͝a̵͕̓r̶̖̂i̷̛̹t̴̼̿ȉ̸̮ë̵̜́s̴̢͝ ̴̠̈́ to a M̷̖̚o̷͉͆n̵͔͛s̶̥̚t̸͎͋e̵̖̽r̴̜͒.̸͈̓  ̷̧̒I̵̝̋s̷͙̋ ̷͚̓  that N̴͎̐ǒ̶̠t̸̬̾ ̷̰̂ Ť̵̯r̷͉͛ȕ̵̬ě̷̡?̵̳̐”

“Sim… lair-eet’ees?”

“Same. We have Q̶̼̈u̸͓̎i̴̙͒ţ̸̒ē̸̥ ̴͕̓ A̵̤̐ ̶̜̓ B̸̘̉ǐ̵͔t̷̮̐  ̶͍̕O̸̝͠f̶̛̠ ̴̹́ S̵̛̜a̷̳͂m̵̨͂e̶̗͗.̴͕̔” At last, he flipped the page and settled his hand back onto the book. “You have insisted on this before, H̴̻̓a̴̬̾v̶̠̀ë̷̮́ ̸͕̓ Y̷̧͝o̸̤͑ù̸̙?̶͈̐”

Mono nibbled on his hand, but nodded. “Static. Telee’vision.” Those were important, since no other kids could do any of that. It was the biggest same he had for the man in the hat.

“We have O̵͑ͅt̴̩͝h̸̤͆ȇ̵̬r̴̤̈ ̷͉̌S̷̲̐à̶̤m̸̯̅è̶͈.̸̮͂ ̷̗̒ Is that N̷̘͝o̷͉͊t̴͎̐  ̶͎̅S̴͖͗o̵͉̕?̸̦̍ Can you think of others?”

The Thin Man brought the other hand close to Mono’s side and turned his palm up. Mono kept an eye on the hand, trying to decide what was planned or what the Thin Man meant. When he pulled his own hand away from his teeth, it clicked.

“Hand?”

A slight nod was his reward. “Hmm. We both have hands. Ȩ̴̈́x̴̛̼a̶̖̓c̵̛̜t̶̰͋l̸̥̀y̶̻͑ ̴̹̕ T̵̬͝h̸͋͜e̴̠͒ ̵̲̔ S̸̡͝a̴̠̒m̵̥͛e̴͜͝.̸͚̔”

Not really much same. Mono felt even smaller beside the Thin Man’s hand. But he did like when the Thin Man moved his hand, and all the different ways his fingers could bend or work. Especially when he was scrawling across a sheet of paper. Or, flipping the pages in a book. And Mono hands… didn’t look as nice. The Thin Man had very amazing hands, but Mono’s were all chewed up and beaten from all the climbing and tugging on the wood panels. He tucked his hands back into his coat.

“What else is same?” prompted the man and his hat.

Mono looked up at him when the other hand lifted off the book. The Thin Man pointed to his head, beneath his.... “Hat.” The Thin Man’s brow twitched and he sighed.

“I was indicating O̵̰͊ȗ̷̞r̷̰̓ ̸͎́ Ė̶͕y̴̗͆ẹ̷̓s̷̺̆.̵͇͂ But yes, W̵͋ͅe̶̪̊ ̴̘͐ D̴͙͒o̴̟͗ ̸̘͒ E̶̳̿n̴̠̓j̵̠̐o̵̠͒ẙ̵̤ ̶̜̃ W̸̧̆ê̵̯a̶̩̿r̴̞̉i̵̱̾n̸͉̈ǧ̶̢ ̸͉̕ H̶̭͂a̴͎͐ẗ̴̹́s̷̗͗.̵̙͝”

“Hat.” Mono removed the hat from his head to check inside. He held it up for the Thin Man.

“I̷̜͝ ̴̨̆ P̶̎͜r̸͉̚ḛ̷̚f̸̲́ḙ̵͝r̸̈́͜ ̷̞̂ Ȏ̵̟ṋ̵͌e̵͎̒ ̷̳͝ H̸̬̏a̶̪͗t̵͎̔.̸͔͝”

“But tol.” He clutched the hat to his chest and stared up at the tallest creature in all the City.

“True. I am very tall. O̶͇͊ṅ̵̻ȩ̶̑ ̵̳͘ D̸̗̊a̴̬̚ỷ̴͚ ̸̲͆ Y̶͙̽ỏ̸̪u̷͍̓ ̵̝̈́ W̸͚͐i̴̘̾l̶͎͘l̸̗̆,̷͍̎ ̸̨̄ Ḁ̴͆s̵̺̐ ̶̳̑ W̵̩͊ë̶̪́l̵͘͜l̷̨̍.̴͓͐ V̶͍̏e̵͉͝ṙ̵̬y̸̫̋ ̷̖̅ T̴̬͒a̴͌ͅļ̷̊ḻ̸̓.̵̪̄”

The way the Thin Man said that was weird, like it was funny but also irritating. “Am child. Mono.”

It would be incredible to be massive and terrible, and make all the other creatures flee in horror. If he had a monstrous cry like the Hunter’s thunder stick, or gnarled claws like the Teacher – no child and no other monster would dare look at him. One time, he did have a dream like that, but only once.

The halls were dark and water seeped from the broken ceiling, but some of the windows let a haze of light in. His shadow stretched across the room as he stalked through the doorways, searching for anything moving, or anything whimpering. Though he didn’t remember much about the dream (and it was a dream, not a haunt), he knew he was searching for something small and i̴̠͆r̶͈͝r̷̹̚ï̶̩t̸̪́á̶̼t̷̲̎ḯ̶̼ṉ̴̎g̸̳͊.̴͚́ He was annoyed because he had to lean down and check inside the cupboards, or look under the beds. That is where children would hide. But they were quiet and illusive, and he felt like every time he turned his back on a wall, something would zip across the floor. He never saw them in the act, but he felt like that was what happened and why he couldn’t win the game.

It was fun because for once he wasn’t scared, and nothing about the dream made him feel terrible. He was happy to search the rooms and poke at the musty crevices beneath furniture. Whatever he sought was frightened of him, this was obvious. It was frightened and ran away, and for once he got to chase rather than be chased and flee for his own life.

But dreams always stopped, and he woke up to face another miserable hour of lurking and hiding, running and creeping through the murk. Struggling to find something for nibbling before the pains in his middle ached too much, or he fell into a mood where it was a its own battle to tear away from a wonderful nest. It was never good to stay in any place for too long. Danger.

Remembering the dream, made him wonder about…H̴̰͝e̵͙̅r̴̖̾.̵͓̽ Did She think She was dream, in Tower? She hunted him when he hurt the sing box. She was angry, but did She also have… was it fun? He didn’t doubt if She caught him, She would have torn him to shreds. It was the risk he was willing to take, if it meant getting Her away. Together.

Ā̶͙n̶̮̎d̴͙̆ ̸͓̓ S̴͍͘h̶͉͋e̵͓͠ ̷̤͒ h̷̫̔ȃ̷̮t̵̛̪ë̴̼ḍ̵̔ ̵̣̊ h̷̭͊ỉ̸̲m̸͙͝ ̴̞̃ f̵̰͝ô̷̲r̴͍͗ ̶̢̕ ě̸͚v̸͉̀ȩ̶̐r̸̭̔y̷̞̿ṫ̵̼h̷̙̍ī̵̪n̷̨͒g̴͛͜.̵̩̎

While distracted, he missed the Thin Man’s hand nudging under his side until he lost his balance and tumbled into his palm. Off went another hat, but he was too stuck on paddling his arms out and getting upright, or keep himself from falling. He was lifted to the Thin Man’s face, which stalled all his movement. His head churned to make sense of this, for what changed or what Mono missed. Was hurt? No. Mono was certain he wasn’t hurt.

His whole view was overtaken by the Thin Man’s chiseled face, and he could… see his own reflection in the Thin Man’s eyes. That fascinated Mono, he had not know it was possible for eyes to reflect anything – but maybe this was something unique about the Thin Man’s glittering eyes – he’d never gotten close enough to another kid to really look into their eyes. It would be weird, and probably taboo. Another reason to hate Mono.

But the Thin Man was always curious about Mono, looking at him closely – especially for hurt. Something about the Thin Man’s questions rang in his ears, alongside the crackle of static. Same. So much same.

We have same.

Was that… bad? Did the Thin Man not like all that same. His face always frowned when Mono couldn’t do the tricks, and always scowled more when Mono tried to make up for it. When they had games and Mono really showed the teleporting and worked to impress the man in the hat, it made the tall thin man run away. It didn’t make him happy to have Mono.

That was something Mono tried to ignore. Nothing he did ever made the Thin Man smile. He brought all the best food boxes and collected bones, he searched everywhere for shiny things and chains that sparkled. He gathered neat feathers or scraps of soft cloth with no stains, and he built great toys, he found sparkle rocks. When it was quiet, Mono did the company and whispered how important the Thin Man was, and how he could keep him and make everything right. He could fix it. Mono was not a danger, he would keep the Thin Man safe.

None of that made the Thin Man happy. He wasn’t an idiot, of course nothing a child did could make things right or anything better. The Thin Man had his books and scribbled line shapes onto paper, and he let Mono chase and keep; though, nothing really changed how the Thin Man saw the world, or Mono. It was all stuff Mono was unraveling for his own ideas and planning – because Mono never stopped planning – he had to know everything, and where to go, how to flee, or what to look out for if danger lurked.

Staring at his reflection in those glistening eyes, Mono felt the most small and silly he had in ever. All the same wasn’t important, and neither was Mono. Even so, the Thin Man would always be the most important to Mono. He had no one else.

He was still very wet from wandering across the roofs, and the shallow breathing made him all the more chilled. But the Thin Man wanted something from him, or he needed to find something in Mono’s own eyes. And he knew it would never be enough, even if he could do all the ex-peck’tasions the Thin Man wanted, or have all the same. It would never change how the Thin Man saw him.

“W̴̺͗ḫ̶͆a̷̪͌t̵̜̽ ̶̙̚ I̵͈̓s̵̛̟ ̸̻̍ W̶̨̐r̵̮̆o̵̬͐n̸͖͑g̸̱̉?̴̨̚”

Mono took a breath but it was choked in his throat. He swallowed and tried again. “Am… have same.” The Thin Man drew him a bit away from his face, but the scowl deepened.

“H̴̼͛m̸͙̈m̷̠̂.̶̙́.̴̲̓.̷͙̏ ̵͔͘ȳ̴͎e̵͇̾s̴̫̏.̵͇͝ We have a great deal  ̷̝̓O̶̩̓f̸̨̍ ̶͉̚S̷̛̠a̷̢͒m̸̤̈́e̷̖͠.̷̖͗” He lowered his hand to the table and tipped Mono off, setting him on a clear space. “Yet you do not grasp the S̶̖͒i̸̞͠ġ̸̪n̸̯͊ì̷͚f̴̖̋i̵̺̔c̵̬̅a̵̹͘n̵̪̈́c̶̖͐ȇ̵̩ ̴͈̓ O̴̠̿f̵̧̉ ̷̟̕ S̷̜̾u̷̯͌c̴͚̾h̷͈̿ ̴͕͒ A̶͔̋t̸̛͙t̶̘͐ṛ̶̍ì̵̠b̵̰̊u̴̲̿ț̶͋ë̸͕́s̶̱̀.̵̦̌”

Mono tried to push away the hand that settled atop his head. “S’import-ent?” The Thin Man didn’t look his way, but instead returned his focus to the open book. The hand that had already tussled his hair badly, now settled to brush a thumb down his back. “T’we same?”

A snicker rattled through the Thin Man. “Twee same?”

Mono buried his face into the cufflink on the Thin Man’s wrist, and let him stroke his back. If the man in the hat was good with soft, he wouldn’t bite. “Have same. We?” It wasn’t together, but it was something like it. We. It was important when the Thin Man said ‘we’, because he always meant Mono. No other kid. Him. And Mono. We.

“Ņ̵̾ā̶̢t̷̲̎ű̶̹r̸̪͝a̶͇̎l̵̫̈́l̴͇̀y̵͈̑.̶͓̈ ̷͚̕We have S̶̬͗ȃ̶̪m̴̲̒e̵͜͝.̴̥̆”

Mono nodded, and then curled down on the table. “That best.” Which was true. The Thin Man could have all the other children, none of them had the sames like Mono had. This he was certain of.

The steady scraping returned to the paper, when the Thin Man retrieved the small nub for mark making. Mono turned his head over to watch the careful movements of the hand as it made sharp strokes and tight curves, and the whole time the hand inched its way across the page. The Thin Man’s focus remained rooted to the page, only the glittery of his eyes danced between the book and the paper.

Mono did pick his head up and searched across the room, in the pale light offered by the bulb. No other noise disrupted the soft buzz of static that hummed through his ears. He might’ve scurried off to go check the rooms one more time, but the fingers pressed him back down onto the table top.

“N̷͌ͅo̸͋ͅ.̵̡̕  ̵̟̍Ï̶̮ ̸̜͑ K̴͔̃n̸͙͂ő̶̟w̵̗͝ ̴̹̑ Y̸͍̽ȏ̷̥u̷͍͂ ̸̗̍ H̵̥͆a̸̮͘v̴̱͗e̷̖̓ ̶̤͠ N̸̢̿o̸̜̔t̶̤̋ ̸̦̌ H̵̘͝a̸͕̎d̶͔̚ ̴̬͒ A̵̝̚ ̴̭͂ P̴̗̍r̴̠̎ò̵̪p̴͉̊ḙ̸̒ṛ̴͝ ̵̧̒ R̵̪͝è̸͉s̷̢͐t̸̲͠.̴̰͆”

Though Mono was more interested in scouting around, his limbs did feel heavy after his earlier explore. And it felt nice to shut his eyes and listen to the soft scraping of the busy work, while knowing this would keep his Thin Man occupied for a short time. The rhythmic motion up and down his spine felt wonderful, too.

It rekindled soft memories of his old pack, when he had a bad scout for foods. If kids could stop and rest in a pack, they did. Kids did more resting than actual scouting or eating. He could remember one time he stayed curled up in a corner with scraps of fur and cotton, trying to forget the so much he had seen. Everything was terrible, and the ugly scenes wouldn’t leave his thoughts.

One of the other kids knew how to keep others quiet without strangling them. The kid would paw at the heads and backs of restless sleepers and made cooing noises that slipped beneath the creaking of uneasy walls. He never saw which kid it was, he stayed buried and withdrawn from everything. It helped, though. The presence of another kid, a survivor from his pack, and someone staying close for the watch.

The Thin Man must’ve figured it out after dealing with all the other kids. It made him wonder how many kids would let the Thin Man hold them – probably the ones bad at flee and doomed to getting stole. Mono never got caught. He was too clever.

Most of the time, the man and his hat was a big dolt who didn’t get anything. A few times, the most important times, he did know how to be for Mono, when he was crumbling under so much. It wasn’t the same as pack, but the Thin Man wasn’t child, he didn’t know how children took care of other children.

That was probably the biggest reason why the man or his hat didn’t get why Mono tried so hard to look after him. Mono couldn’t recall another adult taking care of another adult. String them up in a big bloody sack, sure, or crush them with a jagged trap – that was the Hunter’s way of greeting snoopers and foragers. The adults were vicious for children, and anything – except maybe a Viewer pod – would tear another adult to pieces.

And he decided this was to made the Thin Man lonely.

Children could be nasty and vicious to intruders or just Mono, but they liked packs and the safety that gave. And only especially clever children – like Mono – could trick adults, or pose a danger. Mono didn’t think the Thin Man was worried the other children might be too clever. He never looked bothered – annoyed most times, and full of bristly static, but never hurt. Mono always made sure to check his Thin Man.

All of this think made sense. It did make him feel better to pull these pieces into a nice picture of everything he knew. Children were not a danger – especially not Mono – and the Thin Man liked to be around them. And Mono liked to be for the Thin Man too, but that was nothing new.

He jolted at the dull pluck of sizzling in his bones. It took a moment for Mono to calm his nerves, only when he realized the Thin Man had stopped being busy and was hunched a bit forward. He was no longer skimming the marks in the book, and he was not scribbling marks onto the page. His spindly finger rested across Mono’s back where they had stopped – they were heavy but not crushing.

With a huff, Mono laid his head back down on the table. Someone had to do watch and stay alert for danger. It was Mono’s turn, but his heady was still fuzzy and his coat very damp. He would shut his eyes and listen, just listen to the soft fizzing weaving with the muffled groan of the walls, and the rustling snores of the Thin Man. After a rest, maybe the Thin Man would be less cranky. He might even be in the mood for more speek. Mono would look forward to that.

Next

[insulationking]

The Smart Homeowner's Guide to Insulating a Flat Roof

Introduction

When it comes to maintaining a comfortable and energy-efficient home, insulation plays a critical role. Insulating a flat roof is a key aspect of improving the overall energy performance and comfort of your house. Flat roofs are commonly found in modern architecture, but they can be challenging to insulate properly due to their design. In this comprehensive guide, we will explore the importance of insulating a flat roof, various insulation methods and materials, installation processes, benefits, and conclude with why it is a smart choice for homeowners.

The Importance of Insulating a Flat Roof

Insulating a flat roof offers several important benefits that can significantly improve your home's performance and comfort:

Energy Efficiency: Proper insulation in a flat roof reduces heat loss in the winter and heat gain in the summer. This means that your heating and cooling systems won't have to work as hard, leading to lower energy consumption and reduced utility bills.

Temperature Regulation: A well-insulated flat roof helps maintain a stable indoor temperature year-round. It prevents the extreme temperature fluctuations that can make living spaces uncomfortable during hot summers or cold winters.

Condensation Control: Insulation helps control condensation within the roof structure. Without insulation, warm, moist air from inside your home can meet the cold underside of the roof, leading to condensation, which can damage the roof and lead to mold growth.

Environmental Impact: Reducing energy consumption through insulation contributes to a smaller carbon footprint. It aligns with sustainability goals and efforts to combat climate change.

Improved Comfort: Proper insulation ensures a comfortable living environment. Whether you are using the space as living quarters or storage, comfort is essential for your well-being and quality of life.

Methods and Materials for Insulating a Flat Roof

Various insulation methods and materials are available for insulating a flat roof. The choice depends on factors like your budget, existing roof structure, and insulation needs. Here are some of the most common options:

Warm Roof Insulation:

What it is: In a warm roof system, insulation is placed above the structural deck but below the waterproofing layer. This keeps the insulation warm, preventing condensation within the roof structure.

Materials: Common insulation materials for warm roofs include rigid foam boards, PIR (polyisocyanurate) boards, and mineral wool.

Installation: Insulation boards are laid across the roof deck, with joints sealed to create a continuous layer. Waterproofing materials are then applied on top.

Advantages: Warm roof insulation is highly effective at preventing heat loss and maintaining a stable indoor temperature. It also minimizes the risk of condensation.

Inverted Roof Insulation:

What it is: In an inverted roof system, the insulation is placed on top of the waterproofing layer, effectively "inverting" the traditional roofing structure. Ballast materials like gravel, pavers, or green roofing are then used to protect the insulation.

Materials: Common insulation materials for inverted roofs include XPS (extruded polystyrene) boards and EPS (expanded polystyrene) boards.

Installation: The waterproofing layer is installed directly on the roof deck. Insulation boards are placed on top, and ballast materials or a protective layer are added to hold the insulation in place.

Advantages: Inverted roofs provide excellent thermal performance and protect the waterproofing layer from temperature fluctuations and UV exposure. They also offer space for rooftop gardens or recreational areas.

Cold Roof Insulation:

What it is: In a cold roof system, insulation is placed between the roof joists or rafters, allowing the roof space to remain unheated. A ventilation gap between the insulation and the roof deck helps control condensation.

Materials: Common insulation materials for cold roofs include mineral wool batts, fiberglass batts, and cellulose insulation.

Installation: Insulation is fitted between the joists or rafters, and a ventilation space is created by adding baffles or vents along the eaves and ridge.

Advantages: Cold roof insulation is a cost-effective option for existing flat roofs. It can be installed without major modifications to the roof structure and still provides thermal benefits.

Green Roof Insulation:

What it is: A green roof, also known as a living roof, incorporates vegetation and a growing medium as part of the roofing system. Insulation is typically included beneath the growing medium.

Materials: Insulation materials for green roofs can vary but often include a combination of rigid foam boards and lightweight growing medium.

Installation: Insulation is installed directly on the roof deck, followed by a waterproofing layer and drainage system. The growing medium and vegetation are then added on top.

Advantages: Green roofs not only provide insulation benefits but also contribute to environmental sustainability by promoting biodiversity, reducing urban heat islands, and improving air quality.

Benefits of Insulating a Flat Roof

Insulating a flat roof offers numerous benefits that can enhance your home's comfort, energy efficiency, and overall quality of life:

Energy Savings: Proper insulation reduces the need for heating and cooling, leading to lower energy consumption and cost savings.

Temperature Regulation: Insulation maintains a stable indoor temperature, eliminating temperature extremes and creating a comfortable living environment.

Condensation Control: Insulation helps control condensation within the roof structure, preventing potential structural damage and mold growth.

Environmental Responsibility: Reduced energy use through insulation contributes to a smaller carbon footprint and supports sustainability goals.

Improved Comfort: A well-insulated flat roof ensures comfort, productivity, and well-being in residential and commercial spaces.

Property Value: Insulating your flat roof can increase the value of your property, making it more attractive to potential buyers or tenants.

Versatile Use: Insulated spaces can be used for various purposes, from living areas to offices, storage, or recreational spaces.

Long-Term Durability: Proper insulation can extend the lifespan of your roof and reduce maintenance costs over time.

Conclusion

In conclusion, insulating a flat roof is a wise investment that offers a wide range of benefits for homeowners. It addresses energy efficiency, temperature regulation, condensation control, environmental responsibility, comfort, increased property value, versatile use of space, and long-term durability. Whether you are considering insulation for an existing flat roof or planning a new construction project, insulating your flat roof is a smart choice that pays off in numerous ways.

By investing in flat roof insulation, you not only enhance your immediate living conditions but also contribute to a greener, more sustainable future. It is a proactive step toward maintaining a cozy, energy-efficient, and comfortable home while reducing your environmental impact. Overall, insulating a flat roof is a smart homeowner's decision that can lead to long-lasting benefits and a better quality of life.

[summpam]

Hire the top condo rental property management in GTA

If you are a commercial property owner, you must be aware of the various areas of property management. Property managers not only take care of residential properties, storage facilities, commercial properties, community associations, and much more. Another type of property management is condo property management. A condo property manager is one who skillfully handles all management responsibilities for a condo association. 

Condo property management is a part of commercial property management Toronto. The managers have to perform similar types of responsibilities similarly like property managers. However, a few differences exist which you will come to know in this content. Before we start with the responsibilities that a condo property manager has to perform, let’s discuss what condo property management is. 

What is condo property management? 

Condos are mainly small communities where residents stay together. These condos contain a large number of people who adjust to staying in a small place and therefore issues are bound to take place. condo property managers handle these issues efficiently. Condo property management company Toronto which is a part of rental property management Toronto take care of all issues and make sure that all the operations within the community run smoothly without any hassle. 

Mostly condo association management and board of members hire condo property management individuals or companies for taking care of their tasks and duties. Since they are professionals in this field, they can better handle such responsibilities and perform all tasks and duties efficiently and quickly. 

Have a look at the responsibilities that a condo manager performs 

As it is mentioned above, the duties of a condo manager are almost similar to property managers. Though there exist a few differences, let’s have a look at them below-

Project management 

Project management is an important thing that a condo property manager has to perform very efficiently. They have to deal with various property-related issues on a regular basis. Different types of complexities may arise at any point in time and therefore, managers must keep themselves ready to handle such issues efficiently. 

Financial management 

Another important aspect of condo property management is to ensure the financial security of the community. The manager must ensure the financial stability of the condo community from time to time. This is a different type of role which is performed only by a condo manager and not a property management professional. 

Communication management 

One of the responsibilities of a condo property manager is to maintain proper communication. A proper channel of communication must be established between property owners and the condo association. 

Therefore, these are some of the important responsibilities performed by a condo manager. If you are looking for a condo manager, start looking for professional Property consulting services Toronto. 

For more details check out http://www.summapm.com/

[cal-kestis]

You Mean More | Din Djarin x Fem!Reader

(Part III of The Aftermath of Losing Everything)

moodboard/sketch/gifs made by me, please don’t repost :)

Summary: The plan goes as follows: Send the Mandalorian to the Imperial base under the guise of full cooperation and stall the holoprojector Imp for as long as possible. This will give you enough time to sneak in through an air vent, find a terminal, and hack the system, wiping every Imperial archive of Din Djarin's face. It should work, right? As long as no one gets hurt. (Set after S2) Rating: M    Word Count: 8023 Warnings/Tags: Soft!Din, Fluff, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Slow Burn, no use of ‘Y/N’, non-explicit smut, canon-typical violence, blood A/N: This is what they call: the climax.

[PART I] // [PART II] // [Read on AO3] // [Series Masterlist]

xi.

As Din flies to the Imperial base, the only sounds filling the cockpit are the low beeps of the control board and the tense quiet of your voice repeating the plan for the twenty-third time. When you finally land on an icy planet, you see the base outside the viewport blending in with its snowy surroundings — white, cold, frozen in time — and two stormtroopers flanking either side of the sealed entrance.

“Check your comlink,” Din says, voice gentle and authoritative. 

“Testing, testing. Cuyan to Shiny Head, do you copy?” You whisper-shout into the device, watching as his gloved hand reaches for the side of his helmet, listening to your words spoken directly into his ear. He nods.

“You’re not calling me ‘Shiny Head’ by the way.”

You want to laugh. Normally, you would. But anxiety drops low in your stomach again as you peer out to the base. 

“This is going to work,” you whisper and he wonders whether you’re saying that for his sake or to convince yourself.

“Don’t leave the ship until I give you the signal,” he says, his hands grasping both of your shoulders, thumbs brushing your upper arms in gentle circles. You only nod in response, your eyes boring into the visor of his helmet, biting your lip hard enough to draw blood. When he pulls you against his chest and tightens his grip, your body sinks into his, trying to memorize how you fit together in case it’s all you have left. Too soon, he’s letting go, leaving only the crown of his helmet connected to your forehead when he echoes your words, “This is going to work.”

The moment he exits the ship, you sprint to the engine bay and pull the ship’s electro-periscope from the ceiling. Through the red-tinted binoc lens, you have a magnified view of the Mandalorian as he saunters up to the base’s entrance, not even flinching as the stormtroopers draw their blasters.

You watch his helmet turn wide to the left and swing slowly to the right, scanning the base as the troopers check his person and confiscate his blaster. The stormtroopers step back to their posts, leaving Din standing in the middle of the snow outside of a round, closed door. Waiting.

“Cuyan Two to Cuyan One,” you mutter into the comlink. “What are you seeing?”

You’re met with a long gap of static and you panic, thinking the coms are jammed, before he finally answers.

“You were right, Cuyan One,” he whispers, the hint of a smile in his voice despite the circumstances. “There’s a small duct to the left of the entrance. You’ll have to distract the guard troopers.”

“I can manage.”

“I know you can,” he says, steadfast as ever. Din believes in you without an ounce of hesitation and it makes you feel like you could command stars into existence and the galaxy would obey. “After I give the signal, go to my weapons locker. There’s a locked box at the bottom. Punch in my code and take the bag inside it with you."

“What’s in it?” You ask, watching as the doors to the base finally open, revealing another pair of stormtroopers, one with red markings on their armor. A Burner, more infamously known as an Incinerator Trooper.

“Things to keep you safe,” he answers quickly.

One of the guards gives Din’s blaster to the troopers now leading him into the base. And before the doors close, you see Din’s fingers interlock behind his back: the signal.

Focusing the periscope on the two guard troopers, you scan the area again, looking for a way to distract them without causing a scene. Aside from a patch of bushes to the right of the base, the area is blanketed in pure white snow with nothing to give you cover. Great.

As you think over your next move, you run to Din’s weapons cabinet and rummage through his arsenal, finding the locked box under an old cloak. You punch his code into the number pad — 47648, ‘GROGU’ on a 10-key pad you remember with a bittersweet smile — and the box opens with a quiet click. As promised, there’s a small tan-colored pouch with a shoulder strap and, inside it, you find a blaster that fits perfectly in your hand and what looks like a silver sword hilt, its blade completely missing. You run your fingers across the angular handle, confused as to how a bladeless weapon could “keep you safe.” But when your finger presses over a smooth panel on the hilt, a high-pitched sound emits from its chamber and a black blade glows in front of your face. 

A lightsaber, you think, like the ones Din had told you about what feels like a lifetime ago. But this one isn’t green like the one he’d described Grogu’s master used or white like Ahsoka Tano’s twin sabers. It's dark and blinding, laced with an energy you’re far too frightened to wield. You retract the blade almost immediately, heart racing as you stuff both weapons into the worn bag and sling it over your shoulder.

Taking a long, steadying breath, you slowly step onto the boarding ramp — thanking the Maker Din had the sense to leave it down so it wouldn’t make a noise and blow your cover. He hadn’t parked the ship too far from the entrance and you can clearly see the duct he’d mentioned a few yards away. If you can just get the stormtroopers to turn in the other direction, you could sprint and be in the clear.

The plan is dumb, you know it. But it’s already the day of dumb plans and it’s all you have. Kneeling, you gather a mass of powdery snow in your gloved hands and press it together until it clumps into a dense ball. With your arms outstretched in front of you, you close your eyes and reach out with your mind, focusing your thoughts on the ball of snow in your palms.

The snow levitates high above you, high above even the Imperial base, and toward the trooper standing on the right side of the entry. You lower the ball just to his head-level and out of his eyesight, flick your wrist slowly to the right to gain some momentum, then snap it quickly to the left, smacking the stormtrooper hard against his helmet.

“What the hell?” You hear the stormtrooper shout, shuffling back on his feet.

“What happened?” The other asks.

“I just got hit with a snowball?” He answers with his own question, rubbing the side of his helmet.

You focus your thoughts again, this time, reaching out toward the bushes to the right of the base, causing the branches to wiggle and rustle. 

The two troopers snap their heads in the direction of the mysterious sound, walking slowly with their blasters aimed and ready. And when they reach the bushes, aimlessly kicking at the shrubs with their boots, you run for it.

Your lungs are on fire when you reach the duct, fingers trembling as you quietly jiggle off the vent’s cover to give yourself an opening. You crawl in the chamber and quickly replace the cover before the stormtroopers return to their posts.

Once you’re safe inside the duct, you turn Din’s line back on so you can hear his side of the mission.

“I’m in,” you whisper.

On his end, you hear him grunt quietly in acknowledgment before the line is filled with only the faint sound of marching boots. 

You have no idea where you’re going — probably the dumbest part of your entire plan — but you hope to stumble upon a terminal or control room sooner rather than later so you and Din can leave this nightmare in the past.

The base’s air vent system proves to be an endless maze, however, with forks and crossroads at every turn. Your knees start to ache as they press and slide across the metal ducting, your hands leaving trails of water as the thin layer of ice on your gloves melts away. You freeze when you hear footsteps below the air duct, holding your breath as you peer through the slits of a vent to see a platoon of stormtroopers marching through the corridor.

After what feels like hours, you finally find a small, surprisingly empty room filled with computer terminals and open a vent panel before quietly dropping down from the ceiling.

By no means would you call yourself a hacking wizard, but you had some tricks up your sleeve. Years of scraping by on your own will teach you a host of odd skills. Within seconds, you bypass the facial scanners and begin combing through the archives before you hear some static crackle in your earpiece once again.

“Please, no need for formalities," you hear a faint voice taunt through Din’s com. “We already know what you look like.”

It’s the holoprojector Imp, the familiar sound of her throaty voice floods your ears. Din doesn’t respond, and you imagine him standing like a statue, calculating the odds and armed with nothing but beskar and silence.

“Very well,” the Imp says. “Leave the helmet on. We have more important matters to discuss.”

“I almost have it,” you whisper to Din, hoping your encouraging progress can serve as another weapon.

“Now, Din Djarin,” the Imp calls, his name dripping out of her mouth like venom. “Don’t think we’d be so foolish to believe you’d assist us willingly. Assume that we know everything.”

A shiver runs down your spine from the thinly concealed threat, and your fingers fly faster over the controls as time slips through the cracks. 

Finally, you find it, a record labeled: ‘Din Djarin.’ And you erase every trace of him.

“Got it, Cuyan One,” you sigh a breath of relief into the comlink.

“For example,” the Imp is still talking, and you roll your eyes knowing you’ve already won. “We know you did not come here alone.”

Suddenly, the blast doors of the terminal room open with a whoosh, and you back up against the machines as two stormtroopers corner you in. With a blessed shred of forethought, you blindly pull one of the weapons out of Din’s bag behind your back and sneak it into the back waistband of your pants, covered by your thick cloak. Just as you thought, one stormtrooper tears the bag from your shoulder, looking inside to find the other weapon without searching you further.

They push you down the corridor, jabbing you in the middle of your back with the barrel of their blasters, and you count each step before stopping in front of a heavy-looking door on the shadowy end of the hall.

Din’s voice enters your ears at the same moment. 

“If you even think about hurting her, you’re already dead.”

The door opens, revealing a dark room bathed in ominous red light. In the middle, the holoprojector Imp stands with her legs spread and her hands behind her back, flanked by two stormtroopers. Somehow, the Imp looks even paler without the blue tint of holo coloring her skin. It makes her eyes appear pitch black in comparison, piercing as they slant at you in unmasked scrutiny. She wears the same darkness in her hair which is cut blunt and short, severe against her skeletal pallor. In front of her, Din kneels on the ground, the Burner standing only a few steps behind him, flamethrower at the ready.

With your two captors holding you by the arms in a room filled with enemies, the odds feel slim to none. Din’s helmet turns to you, his beskar shrouded in red, and you do your best to send him a reassuring smile.

The Imp suddenly says your full name, a grin splitting her face in half when you turn to her in shock. “So nice of you to join us.”

“You already lost,” you spit at the Imp, grinning wider than her. “I erased the archives. You have nothing.”

“Oh, such a pretty, foolish girl,” the Imp sings and you hear the teasing, grating noise from both her true voice and its distortion through your comlink. With your arms trapped, you can’t even turn off the device, and you cringe each time the dissonance scratches its way into your ears. “You may have wiped the systems but I have a backup drive,” she smirks, patting the badge-decorated pocket on her uniform. “In fact, I’ve also collected some interesting records on you, my dear. About your family, your… history.”

She’s bluffing, she has to be.

“Assume that we know everything,” the Imp repeats. 

“Who are you?” You grit through bared teeth.

She laughs and you wipe your ear on your shoulder in disgust.

“Surely you both understand if I choose to withhold certain information. One's identity can be so very…” the Imp pretends to consider her words, glancing at Din and then sneering back at you as she taps a gloved finger against her pale, pointed chin. “Valuable.”

You lunge at her, a snarl ripping from your throat, but a trooper holds you back with a painful grip, his blaster digging into your side.

“Now, Din Djarin,” the Imp says, turning her attention back to the kneeling warrior. “If you don’t want to watch me kill your partner, you’ll do as I wish. Help me retrieve Gideon. Otherwise, you both shall die here.” Her blaster clicks as she points the barrel between his eyes with horrifying gracefulness. 

“No!” You scream, turning every weapon in the room on you.

“Let her go,” Din practically growls.

“Ah,” the Imp says, walking to where you stand on the other side of the room, her weapon dangling like a child's toy from her fingers. “Or perhaps the girl can be of better help? With the proper motivation, of course. Tell me, where are they keeping the Moff? I wouldn’t want to be forced to make a roast out of your Mandalorian.”

With a snap of the Imp’s fingers, the Burner points his flamethrower at Din’s head. But somehow, in that same instant, you manage to rip yourself out of the troopers’ holds, making them stumble backward. And your hand flies forward, lifting the Imperial officer from the ground.

The troopers seem dumbfounded by the magic they’re witnessing, blasters pointed at the ground in their stupor. You can almost see their slack-jawed expressions through their helmets as the Imp clutches her hands around her throat, gasping for air and hovering a foot above the floor.

“A Jedi?” She croaks.

Assume that we know everything. You knew it. A bluff.

“Wrong again,” you grin, pushing your hand forward and sending the Imp soaring across the room. Her head hits metal with a heavy crash, falling unconscious, and at the same time, a loud alarm sounds throughout the base. Somehow, the red of the room grows darker and more saturated as lights flash on the ceiling.

Blaster fire ricochets off the red-tinted walls when the troopers come back to reality, the blasts deafening as you dodge them, thankful it’s just a group of bad-shot stormtroopers and not an elite unit.

One stormtrooper charges toward you, raising the butt of his blaster to strike, but you kick him hard in the stomach, plowing him into the floor. In the corner of your eye, you see Din twist in a circle, his wrists still bound behind him as he sweeps his leg under the Burner, making the trooper fall backward with a thud.

You rush over to Din, pulling the saber from your waistband and igniting the blade to cut his binders off. You wordlessly hand him the sword but he pushes it back toward you.

“Use it,” he says, squeezing your wrist before turning back to knock the flamethrower out of the Burner’s grasp.

You’ve been in your fair share of scuffles back on Tatooine, even some while working with the Mandalorian — but you’ve never fought with a sword before. Clumsily, you swing the blade in front of you, brandishing it toward the troopers without skill.

“How do I use this thing?” You shout at Din who is busy punching a stormtrooper and taking back his blaster.

“It’s a sword,” he yells over the alarm, shooting a third clueless trooper. “Stab something!”

With both hands gripping the hilt, you send the blade slicing through the air, a loud humming sound echoing in your ears with each swing. And when you hit the side of one final stormtrooper, the strike punctuated by a roaring crackle, he’s on the ground, his white armor sizzling as it melts.

But while the chaos in the red room settles, a larger battle brews outside its doors.

“I erased it, they have nothing,” you explain breathlessly, retracting the saber as Din surveys your body for injuries. You pull Din’s bag off the fallen trooper and replace the sword inside. “The Imp was bluffing.”

You run over to the unconscious woman regardless, checking her pockets. Empty.

“Are you sure?” He asks when you return to him, holding your trembling shoulders.

“Positive. It’s like I could sense it.”

A loud crash echoes in the corridors, making you jump away from him.

“Let’s get out of here,” Din says, at the same moment you scream, “Watch out!”

It happens in slow motion. The Incinerator Trooper pushes himself on his feet and reaches for his flamethrower. Din’s gaze is focused on you when you see the trooper take aim, a small fire beginning to bloom from the barrel.

Your arms wrap around Din instinctively, attempting to shield his body with your own. You wait for the burning heat, for the scorch of flames to lick at your skin. You wait to hear both your agonizing screams before you and Din leave the universe together. But as bright orange and red tendrils flash behind your closed eyelids, you only feel cool beskar.

Opening your eyes, you see a dome of fire just inches away from your bodies. Din pulls away slowly, taking in the sight of the inferno around him, dancing flames reflecting off his armor.

“Are you doing this?” He asks, a hazy memory creeping into his mind of the stand-off on Nevarro.

You squint through the fire, only finding the Burner with his thrower still aimed forward. You are doing this. Closing your eyes again, you reach out and focus your thoughts harder on the protective shield blocking the flames. Your mind pushes forward and deflects the fire backward, hurling the blaze and embers into the trooper. When the flames dissipate, the Burner collapses to the ground, his suit scorched and blackened.

Standing in the middle of the destruction, you stare at your hands in shock before yellow-tipped gloves grab them and pull you out of the room. 

“We have to go,” Din says.

The halls flash with red lights, sirens soaring through the narrow corridors as trooper footsteps drum closer and closer.

Din leads you quickly through the base and out where he first entered. But you’re met by a rain of blaster fire as you both attempt to sprint back to the ship in one piece. Din pushes you in front of him, running backward as he shoots and blocks the blasters with the armor on his chest.

“Hang on,” he shouts, and before you can question it, he’s scooping you into his arms and launching off the ground.

He flies to the parked ship in record timing. But before he can make his landing, a blast hits his jetpack. It combusts with a deafening boom, right next to your ear, and it sends both of you hurdling into the ice. For a moment, you can’t hear a thing except for the echo of the explosion as you fall to the pillowy snow. Then, beside you, you hear a dull crack of beskar on thick, hardened ice and Din groaning aloud in agony.

“No!” You shout, coming to your senses when you see his leg bent at a strange angle, blood seeping onto the ice from his helmet.

“Get us out of here,” he grits out.

It feels frighteningly familiar pulling his body into the ship, danger looming from all sides as blasts continue to ding off the freighter or melt into the snow. You close the ramp, leave Din in the hold, and get the ship high above the ground.

But you hesitate, hovering in the air for a long moment, before making a choice.

Charging the gunners, you aim at the Imperial base and release a shockwave of vengeful blasts. And as the facility and everything inside and around it disintegrates into ash and rubble, you launch into hyperspace, leaving nothing behind.

The next moments pass by in a blur, Din’s cries ringing loudly in your ears as you try to figure out what to do. He gives you strained instructions but you can barely understand him.

“Reset the bone,” he grunts with just enough clarity, all while writhing in pain.

“Reset the bone,” you echo. “Right. I can do this. I’ll need to cut your pants.”

You find a small blade, remove his boot and armor, and slice a line from the bottom of his pant leg to just above his knee. With one hand gripping below his knee and the other pressing down on his thigh, you pull and hear the bone snap back into place as Din screams. You run to the storage closet for the medpac and return with bacta gel in hand, smoothing it over the purple, splotchy skin around Din’s leg before delicately wrapping it with the cut fabric of his pants and a makeshift splint.

“Your head,” you remember, searching for the wound under his cowl, and he wheezes as if to confirm. “No. No, no, no, no, no. Oh, stars, Din. This is bad,” you sputter, your palm painted in his blood.

“It’s okay,” he whispers, breath slowing as he brushes his fingers through your hair. “You did so good back there, cuyan. My survivor.”

“Hey, don’t talk like that,” you cry, tears rolling in waves down your cheeks. “You’re Cuyan One, remember? You’re going to be alright. I’m gonna fix this.”

“You’re so brave, so clever, so strong,” he continues, coughing between words. “Kotep, mirdala, kotyc. Ner kar’ta,” he croaks, voice fading out.

“Stay with me, Din!” You shout.

“I want to see your face,” he mumbles as if in a trance.

“I’m here, Din,” you tell him, taking his hand and placing it on your cheek. “I’m here.”

“No,” he coughs. “I want to see your face with my own eyes.”

You stare at him, waiting for him to retract his words. When he doesn’t, he pulls your joined hands to his helmet. You’re shaking when your other hand finds the opposite side of the beskar, releasing the lock and lifting it from his head.

His face is covered in blood and cuts, his brown eyes drooping with fatigue, dark hair plastered to his forehead. 

“Oh, Din,” you cry, unable to even process him without a helmet for the first time as you take in the damage. You can’t even see him behind the wounds that mar his features. But he sees you. His hand comes back to your cheek, thumb sliding back and forth in a half-moon shape.

“Mesh’la,” he whispers. “Means beautiful. You are so beautiful, ner kar’ta.”

You blink hard, heavy tears landing on his armor drop after drop even as he tries to brush them away. Your hand covers his own on your cheek, fiercely pressing his palm into your skin like you’re afraid he’ll let go. Kissing the exposed skin of his wrist, you taste a tragic mixture of blaster residue and wet salt on your lips.

“I can’t remember what ner kar’ta means,” you sob. “Please tell me.”

One corner of his lips twitches upward, a strained, painful effort to smile, but he does everything in his power to let you see it.

“It means,” he gasps. “My heart.”

His hand falls from your cheek, limp in your lap and your body shakes at the loss of his touch. You can still hear his shallow breaths but you’re not sure how much longer he can go in this state. You close your eyes, holding his hand as your fingers brush over his glove. The inside of the ship is silent — peaceful and still as if unaware that your entire universe is crumbling in front of you. There’s not enough bacta in the galaxy to treat the trauma he’s sustaining in his head. You can hardly see his skin under the layers of blood and scrapes.

His warm, honeyed voice echoes in your mind, stories he’s told you over and over when you’d make any excuse to hear his voice, stories about him and Grogu. You think of his little green son, how you’re failing him right now. Please take care of my father.

Din always sounded so wistful when he talked about Grogu, so in awe of his power.

He could do things I couldn’t even imagine… 

He saved me, in more ways than one… 

Grogu is a special kid… 

He could heal people.

“He could heal people!” You shout out loud, eyes bulging from their sockets.

In all your years of walking a tightrope when it came to your strange wizard-like powers, you’d never imagined you could heal. All those times you’d tried to fall asleep covered in bruises or cuts, you could have prevented so many nights of excruciating physical pain. But now is not the time to dwell on the past when your future is slipping through your fingers.

You close your eyes again — slowly resting one hand on Din’s cheek, the other still clutching his limp hand — and try to relax, reach out with your mind, reach inside, and focus your thoughts, emotions, energy, everything you have on the man in front of you.

It flows out of you in waves, sinking into him, and you feel it: your body growing more tired each second, only hoping your vitality is transferring into him. Just when you’re about to pass out, you hear him gasp for air, his body shooting up like a fish out of water.

“Din?” You blearily wonder. But his face blurs out of focus before you fall to the floor.

 —

x.

In the face of pain, the body has natural defenses to harden itself, like the calluses that develop on your fingertips and heels for armor. You can build a tolerance, a certain degree of numbness until pain regresses to a dull ache at the back of your mind. And sometimes, the skin gets so thick, the body so paralyzed, that you start to believe nothing could ever hurt you. Not coarse sand crystals or alleyway scum or sharp-clawed rancors or stormtrooper blasts.

But it’s funny how protection covering the outside does nothing to shield what lies underneath — merely a shattered fortress with cracks that let pain seep into the bloodstream and petrify the heart.

When Din’s hand had dropped limp in yours, you hadn’t felt the pain of his wounds or scars shrouding your body. Instead, you’d felt a unique kind of suffering, torture that hadn’t left your skin bruised but had rather sunken into your pores and gnawed at your insides: fear, loss, mourning.

The agonizing ache lingers in your muscles when you finally awaken.

The mattress beneath you envelopes your senses in a familiar fragrance of warmth and safety. Brightness filters in through the open door across the room and a sliver of light glares in one of your eyes, making you rub your fist against your eyelids to regain focus.

As your vision sharpens, you quickly realize you’re not in your own sleeping quarters.

These sheets are dark, the opposite of the crisp white color you’ve been used to for nearly a year. Knickknacks don’t litter the metal floors and socks aren’t piled up in the corner as you remember. The room is mostly bare, stripped down to the necessities, organized and empty to an almost alarming degree.

Then, a splash of color catches your eye on the durasteel wall near the door. It’s difficult to see with the glare spotlighting your face, leaving your surroundings in the shadows. Deciding to investigate, you wrap Din’s blanket tight around your shoulders, keeping his comforting scent around you like a cocoon. When your sock-covered feet finally carry you across his room to the wall in question, you gasp.

Tacked onto Din’s wall are at least a dozen small pages of parchment depicting lively landscapes of planets you’ve visited and picturesque portraits of creatures you’ve encountered together. Your drawings. You remember the times he’d come back from an easy mission, a charming swagger in his gait, and had asked to see what you’d drawn. He’d always held your booklet in his hands so delicately, taking the time he didn’t have to study and praise your work. When he’d hand it back, you’d tear the page from its binding and whisper, “You can keep it.” You’d never thought much of it, except that you’d wanted to share the beauty you’d captured with him. After all, he’d given you all these beautiful colors to do so. But more than that, you’d wanted to let him see the galaxy through your eyes since his own stayed shadowed by his visor. Whenever he’d allowed himself to indulge in removing his helmet in private, you’d hoped he could see what you saw through the pages. You’d never once thought he’d keep your drawings so sacredly displayed in his quarters, assuming the doodles would eventually pile up in some forgotten corner on the ship. But he’d kept each one.

And right in the center, you see the first picture you’d ever drawn for him: a portrait of Grogu sketched according to Din’s affectionate descriptions. It’s slightly folded in on itself from the way he’d tucked it neatly into his shoulder pouch for safekeeping. When you’d drawn it for him, you’d just wanted to do him a simple kindness, the same way he’d been so kind to help you leave Tatooine behind and travel the galaxies with him. You’d only had your pencil at the time, none of Din’s thoughtfully gifted pigments at your disposal, leaving the portrait of the child monochromatic. But now, vibrant color adorns the sketch, bringing Grogu to life in beautiful tones of green, pink, and brown.

Din had borrowed your chalk pigments and colored it in himself. You imagine him with vivid hues dusting his fingertips and green smudges on his beskar, and you smile.

But when you pull back the folded edge of the paper, you’re surprised to see another figure has been drawn next to Grogu, an image you don’t recognize as work of your own. 

It’s… you.

Water blurs your vision but you quickly wipe the tears away so they don’t somehow fly onto the pages and ruin his picture. He’d colored you in your favorite garments, a familiar pink flower tucked behind your ear along with your pencil. Careful, reverent strokes define each of your features. You can’t help but think it looks like you and a stranger at the same time, and you wonder if this radiant image he’s drawn is truly who you are or just how he sees you. And what if those two ideas are one and the same?

You don’t notice Din leaning against the doorframe until you hear your name in a deep, dulcet tone. He whispers it, uninhibited by his helmet, and suddenly your name has a thousand more meanings than just some arbitrary label for the girl who used to be alone. When he says it, your name means survivor, brave, clever, strong, beautiful, his entire heart — and all you want is to dive headfirst into the sweet nectar of his voice.

But then you remember what happened, how you let him get hurt, how you failed to take care of him as Grogu had asked. You don't realize you’re crying until his bare finger swipes away a single tear.

And even though you technically already saw his face — albeit bloodied and distorted — you dare not look at him. You keep your eyes trained low, noticing his unbandaged leg, as his hands caress your skin.

“Are you feeling better?” He asks, voice so heavy with concern it weighs down against your heart.

You nod. “How long was I out?”

“About 16 hours,” he answers, crooking his finger below your chin to pull your eyes to his.

“What about your Creed?” You ask, closing your eyes tight. 

“You mean more.” 

You expected to hear something more along the lines of ‘you already saw my face’ or ‘I’ve broken it before.’ But no, he says, ‘You. Mean. More.’ They’re three simple words that carry mountains of blissful promises, an echo of a sentiment you’d heard him say about his child, a different time that feels so far away now.

So, you open your eyes, look up, and one of your hands cradles the side of his face. He’s fully healed and the blood from the nightmare before is washed away, the red stain only living in your mind, allowing you to finally see him clearly.

You’ve always had some sense of his face. He’d given you so many pieces, letting your fingers map out his features and answering your questions so you could sketch them onto paper. Some things you can know without seeing. But having him in front of you — stripped of his armor and helmet, a soft errant curl brushing over his forehead, warm tan skin on display just aching for your fingers to explore them the way they did before you’d ever seen him — it feels like setting down the last piece of a puzzle. 

He’s beautiful in the way that broken stones and crystal fragments are when they form a mosaic, each piece jagged yet fitting together into a purposeful masterpiece.

And the way he looks at you, like you’re home when all he’s ever known is running… you’ll do anything to keep him looking at you like this.

He enters his quarters fully, extending his arms to hold you closer. When he leans his forehead against your own, you close your eyes. His warm breath tickles your skin, the slope of his nose slowly nuzzling against yours, and when you let yourself peek at him again from under your lashes, you see his eyes are softly shut, the smallest of smiles on his lips.

“When did you draw this one?” You ask, voice but a whisper, nodding at the papers on his wall.

“While you were resting... I’m not much of an artist,” he says sheepishly, watching your fingers delicately trace the lines of his drawing. “But I wanted to keep a piece of you with me too.”

You merely exhale, mind reeling. Any word you think of seems to evaporate each time you open your mouth.

“Maybe, when you finish it, we can hang the portrait you drew of me next to this one,” he muses. “So, at least on paper, we can be a clan of three.”

You nod fervently, your foreheads rubbing together from the rapid motion as you stroke the soft peaks of his cheekbones.

“I can’t believe you kept all of these,” you chuckle, gesturing to his wall of art. 

“Of course I did,” he says, fully grinning now, his nose playfully bumping against yours. “They’re beautiful and… they’re from you.”

A sweet sigh escapes your lips, your breath hovering in the small space between your bodies, and you see a flash of pink when his tongue pokes out to swipe a quick line between his mouth. You bite your lip, trying to force your mind to stay silent and not ruin this moment, but knowing you need to address the guilt in your heart.

“You almost died,” you say quietly, the words falling from your lips in broken pieces and shattering on the floor.

“But I didn’t,” he responds, his brown eyes staring directly into yours. “You healed me.”

“I should have...” you start, not knowing how to finish the statement because, even now, you’re clueless as to what you could have done differently. “I should have been more careful. Maybe if I hadn’t gotten caught, you wouldn’t have been hurt.”

“I’m used to it,” he sighs.

“Well, you shouldn’t be,” you whisper. “Neither should you.”

It stuns you, causing you to pull your face away just slightly, ignoring the way your skin screams to touch his again.

Pain is universal except to those who harden themselves to it and let calluses develop. This is a natural defense. You know this. But the thing is, pain is protection too, another security the body uses to protect itself. From harm. It’s ironic how the ones who feel the least amount of pain carry the largest amount of suffering.

“You shouldn’t have gotten hurt,” you continue, walking over to his bed to sit on the edge. “I promised I’d take care of you.”

This time, he’s stunned. Take care of him?  

“You almost died, Din. You shouldn’t have even gotten hurt. I don’t know what I would do…”

“I’m right here, ner kar’ta,” he whispers, moving towards the bed and kneeling between your legs. He cradles your jaw, lifting your gaze to meet his eyes. “I’m right here.”

“You almost weren’t,” you say, your lip trembling below his thumb.

“I’m here. With you,” he says, confident. “I always will be, I promise.”

“Din, you can’t promise—”

“I just did.”

As you look into his eyes, you see a fire that tells you this is more than a promise. It’s more than a tenet of the Mandalorians’ honor and you feel it in your bones. He would traverse every system, tear apart the galaxy, fall to his knees to keep it. This is more than a promise. It’s a vow.

It feels like entering a new atmosphere, gravity pulling you into his orbit until your lips meet his, the same way the horizon of Tatooine meets twin suns each evening. He’s soft — so soft — and solid and still, allowing you to release the worry and trauma you’ve been shouldering on your own against his eager lips. You capture his upper lip, press a chaste peck there, exhale, kiss his lower lip, then breathe him in.

When you pull back by an inch, his body sways toward yours like a pendulum, his eyes closed dreamily as he waits for your lips to return to his.

“Din,” you whisper, a single tear rolling down your cheek as you cup his face between your hands like he’s delicate and holy. “Ner kar’ta,” you call him.

He opens his eyes, finding yours glazed with something he’s never seen before but knows is mirrored in his own irises.

“How do you say ‘I love you’ in Mando’a?” 

This time, it’s his lips crashing into yours first, capturing your gasp on his tongue. His fingers card through your hair and find a resting place at the base of your head, nails scratching lightly and pulling sweet songs from your mouth. His other hand settles on the crook of your neck, his thumb drawing circles over your clavicle before gliding over your shoulder, then along the side of your waist, finally falling to the small of your back. A gentle pressure pulls you closer to the edge of the mattress where Din still kneels between your thighs, making you gasp again. But he swallows the sound with his mouth, his tongue eagerly licking past your lips. You dig your fingers into his hair and wrap your legs around his torso to stay balanced, though your mind is drunk on his taste and dizzy on his scent filling your lungs. 

All you know is him. 

The hand on your back grazes across your hip, drags a slow line over the top of your thigh, and squeezes once. Then, you feel fingers tickle behind your knee. In one swift motion, Din pulls your leg higher around him and gently pushes you backward, the hand on your head guiding you as you fall onto the pillow.

He pulls away panting, letting you catch your breath as he takes the opportunity to rake his eyes over your body spread out beneath him. 

You do the same, letting your fingers follow the same path as your eyes. He looks positively wrecked, hair sticking up from where you’d pulled it, pupils dilated, his lips pink and perfectly swollen. His breaths seem to come out more labored — but whether from your touch or the shameless way your eyes drink him in, you don’t know. All you know is the flushed skin below his jaw, how it draws your attention to the strong cords of muscle that run up the length of his neck, how his Adam’s apple bobs slowly below your featherlight finger when he swallows.

As your hands continue their exploration, Din’s thumb tickles your cheek with a tenderness that matches the look in his eyes. The shimmering dust of stars glistens in his irises as he gazes upon you like you’re… 

“Mesh’la,” he whispers, brushing a strand of hair behind your ear.

“I could say the same about you,” you grin, drawing him back toward you and feeling his smile against your lips.

He settles his weight between your legs, moaning into your mouth when you raise your hips to grind against him. He gives you beautiful, desperate noises and you greedily capture each one with your lips. As he kisses you, your nails scrape down his back, his muscles tensing and rippling under your touch until you find the hem of his shirt. You tug on it once, twice, before he’s finally sitting back and pulling it over his head. Not wanting to have to separate yourself from him again, you remove your top at the same time, leaving you both exposed from the waist up. When his face emerges from the neck of his shirt, he looks down and stills, and somehow, you feel infinitely more beautiful under his lustful gaze.

He attaches your lips again, craving your taste like a famine-starved man, ravenous hands exploring new skin as yours leave crescent moons across his back. He kisses your lips, your cheeks, licks below your ear, sucks under your jaw, down your neck, above your breasts — tasting every soft plane with a hunter’s diligence until you’re soft and pliant below him, bending while he bows.

He rocks into you, eliciting gasps from both your lips. Desperately, you scratch impatiently at the skin above his waistband, your hands attempting to push the material down to no avail. 

“What do you want?” He asks, pleads against your mouth, moaning when you hold his lower lip between your teeth and release it with a slow scrape.

“Want these off,” you mutter against his cheek, his scruff scratching over your lips deliciously. “Want you.”

That’s all he needs before he unbuttons his trousers, kissing you deeper as he bares himself completely to you. 

“Now you,” he whispers, his lips dragging down your body and hovering over your belly, pressing languid kisses to each hip, and biting the skin lower down as he removes your clothes. His breath ghosts over your heat and sends a shudder up your spine, making you arch toward him. His lips roam the soft skin of your thigh, tantalizingly tracing his tongue up toward where you throb for him, and then moving back down leaving you writhing with desire. He gives the same treatment to the other thigh, teasing you with his soft lips until you’re groaning and desperate beneath him.

A surprisingly deft finger opens you to him and your mouth drops agape without a word, pleasure lodged in your throat until he curls his finger just so, pulling the wanton sounds from your lips. As you become more vocal, he strokes you more eagerly, his other hand massaging the plush skin of your body wherever he can reach, watching your face with fascination as he stokes a fire in your belly.

Just as he’s about to put his mouth on you, he feels your fingers tugging his hair, pulling him upward until your lips meld together once more.

“Need you.” The words come out as a growl into his mouth and you lift your hips pointedly to meet his. He hisses at the friction, nodding in understanding when you say, “Now.”

He enters slowly, feeling you stretch around him and engulf him in a heat he never wants to escape. It feels like a release of pressure even as pressure begins to build between your legs. It’s pain and pleasure and perfection all at once. He fills you so completely and he can’t help but think:

“Meant for me.” 

He breathes the words out loud into your skin, lips trailing a burning path down your throat as he moves inside you, wicked sounds falling from your tongue when he hits a spot that has you seeing stars.

“What?” You gasp, but he doesn’t seem to hear.

Din kisses you everywhere he can reach, one hand interlocked with yours next to your head while the other pulls your leg higher and tighter around his back, giving him access to parts of you he gets to explore for the first time. It makes him think about the galaxies that always reflect in your eyes and how he’s getting to discover each one of them with you now. 

“Or maybe,” he continues his previous thought, a sweet, gentle kiss placed over your heart. “Meant for you.”

His pace quickens and you dig your nails into his shoulders as an invisible coil tightens in your belly. He continues speaking low in your ear, some of the words foreign and others in Basic, though you still can’t understand for the life of you when he’s right there. As his thrusts become more erratic, your core ignites, and intense heat blossoms over your entire body like a flower. And it’s Din plucking each petal until all that’s left in your mind is one singular truth: he loves me. Your eyes screw shut and your toes curl and you’re out of breath and you feel heavy and light at the same time. He moans a ragged sound when he feels you reach your peak, squeezing him until he’s falling over the precipice right after you.

The room is awash in heavy breathing, a fiery warmth scorching every inch of your naked skin as you both pant to catch your breath. You’d like to stay like this forever, you think. No clothes, simply covered in Din. But eventually, he slowly pulls himself out of you and an aching, empty feeling settles in your stomach that screams for him to come back. 

He hovers above you, not wanting to crush you with the immense weight he feels. But he can’t fight you when your hands wrap around his neck and mold his smile against yours, lips moving together like you can’t get enough.

You hold each other in silence, heated kisses cooling off into chaste pecks only when it feels too long since the last. Your breaths slow to a peaceful rhythm, hearts beating in time with each other to a secret song only you two know.

“Ni kar'tayli gar darasuum,” he breathes, the flight of his words spinning around the shell of your ear raises goosebumps on your skin. 

“What does that mean?” You ask, your hand cupping his warm cheek.

When he looks at you, he sees ferocity, forgiveness, a future, a family. For so long, he never thought he could feel anything close to this. Then, he met Grogu and, just as quickly, had to say goodbye. But when you look at him with such goodness and grace — all he can think of is how he hopes you’ll stay looking at him like this until he dies.

“‘I love you,’” he answers. "Forever."

[READ EPILOGUE HERE]

End Note: We're almost at the end! I just have an epilogue planned. But hey, if you have any headcanons you'd like to see happen in this series, please send them my way! Maybe some blurbs could be arranged :) Mando’a Glossary: Cuyan = survivor [koo-YAHN] Kotep = brave [KOH-tehp] Mirdala = clever [MEER-dah-lah] Kotyc = strong [koh-TEESH] Ner kar’ta = My heart (kar’ta = heart [kah-ROH-ta]; ner = my [nair]) Mesh'la = beautiful [MAYSH`lah] Ni kar'tayli gar darasuum. = I know you forever [nee kar-TILE garh dah-RAH-soom] ⎿ “It's the same word as 'to know,' 'to hold in the heart,' kar'taylir. But you add darasuum, ‘forever,’ and it becomes something rather different.” — Republic Commando: Triple Zero

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[subbing-for-clones]

She Who Walks the Line Between Part 1

Maul x GreyJedi!Reader 

Summary: A lone grey force user has sequestered herself in the furthest regions from the inner rim that could reasonably reach. She never could have fit in with the Jedi and their plethora of useless rules and regulations. Nor could find her way with the Sith and their needless thirst for power and control. After spending years along-side them both and learning all she could she took to the life of a hermit so she could continue her studies in peace. She lived happily until someone’s pain ripped through her inner sanctum. Now restless, she must tip the scales back in the favor of balance.

Word Count: 2085

WARNINGS: Mentions of pain and injury.

NEXT          MASTERLIST

      So far out in the outer rim it could be considered wild space existed a planet blanketed with jungles and planes. This lonely world is where you called home. Far from wars, from civilization and the unbalanced frivolous problems that existed within this universe. As secluded as it was, this small planet was in perfect balance. Hunters sought their prey and the prey helped one another to survive. Close enough to the ocean that you could smell the salt in the air during a storm; on the border between grass lands and what seemed like infinite jungle, a large stone cottage stood firmly as if it had grown straight from the soil like the crops that lined the east wall.

    Your ship was still warm from your recent trip to a more populated system for supplies impossible to come by on your world. This recent trip had left you weary, visions and a voice now plagued your mind. Quiet was all you wanted. Just quiet. Yet screams of agony filled your ears through the force as you sipped your fresh mint tea on the roof of your home. You scanned the planes that spread in front of you as if you could locate the origin of this suffering behind one of the blades of tall grass.

    Closing your eyes with the cup still hot between your clasped hands you quieted your mind and reached out into the force.

Blazing heaps of metal.

Sweltering heat.

Foul sulfuric stench.

A man, no, half of one. Red and black flesh, a crown of stained ivory horns.

A mess of steel legs, bellowing raggedly.

“Always remember I am fear. Always remember I am hunter, always remember I am filth, always remember I am... nothing!” His glowing eyes seemed to meet yours. Holding for but a moment.

    Slowly your eyes opened, looking around to convince yourself that the man you connected with didn't lay before you now. Satisfied that you were where you had started in your meditation you looked up to the sky, dusty with the falling sunset. You closed your eyes again and whispered to the universe through the force, "find me," casting out reassuring waves of unwavering peace and tranquility towards wherever this wretched soul writhed.

 ~~~~~

      Maul screamed in agony and rage. He couldn't remember anything but a name and a grim mantra that he repeated over and over for a decade hoping against hope to be comforted by it. Although comfort never came, something new spanned out in front of him. For the first time in years, something new graced his vision. A woman.

Glistening eyes heavy lidded but bright. A figure clad in light grey dress sitting in a meditative position. Her plump lips whispered two simple words to him. Find me. For the first time that he could remember he had something he needed to do other than devour and wail. A purpose perhaps.

    His steel spider legs twitched as he crawled his way out from his hole in the depths of Lotho Minor. The atmosphere was a thick, dingy fawn. Perfectly akin to the scent of fire and sulfur that he could no longer smell. The grey pressed dirt kicked up from the ends of his jagged limbs as he pulled himself across the hellish landscape. Drop ships came here frequently to dump garbage but every so often a scavenger would come to brave the terrain in search of something of value. As luck would have it, a small ship had landed some time ago, the pilot likely perished to one of the many dangers here on the planet wide dumping grounds. Fear encompassing his mind, he eased toward the abandoned ship. Eight legs clumsily carrying his torso forward. Eyes darting around for the owner of this vessel but none in sight. Cautiously he boarded.

    Muscle memory took over as he powered up and took flight. His ship floated stationary just outside the atmosphere, he gazed upon open space for the first time in twelve years, shrinking back into a corner out of fear of the openness after so long in the confined darkness of a hole in the ground. He was loosing the little motivation for momentum that he had and was torn between surging forward and retreating back to what was familiar. Even if he did continue on, he didn’t know where to go.

"I don't know... I don't know... I don't KNOW... where.. to go… WHERE ARE YOU?!" He sobbed. As if to answer his question his vision clouded over and a sense of peace eased his twisted, knotted muscles as well as his fractured mind. Images of tall cliffs overlooking a roaring ocean. The sounds of creatures chattering unseen in a dark jungle lit by bioluminescent fauna. Wind blowing through tall dry grasses. Smoke drifting out of a chimney. The woman he had seen, sitting on a wooden porch.

    Without opening his eyes he punched coordinates into the nav computer that if asked to, he couldn't have recited. Hyperdrive activated, he vanished into the unknown, convinced this was his destiny. To find the ghost of a woman he had seen in his squalor.

 ~~~~~

    You woke just before dawn with a start. Something was coming, you weren't quite sure what. You couldn't see it clearly through the force but you could feel the darkness. Cold like the side of a moon that had never been blessed by the sun. The universal scale tipped out of balance and it rang through you like a gong.

    Groaning, you pushed the woolen blanket covering your body aside and stood, pulling on a slate-colored cotton dress and slipping your feet into your shoes. You peered out of the transparasteel, the sky was dark but just starting to blue. An hour before sunrise you guessed. Sighing and making your way to the kitchen you put on some caf. If you had to be awake this early at least you'd be caffeinated.

    Stepping out onto your porch you could hear the goats you kept nearby bleating alarms at you. Sending them calming waves through the force was all you could do. A moment later you could sense a ship entering the atmosphere. You squinted while shushing the goats from your perch. In all your years on this planet you had never seen another ship aside from your own. You strode to the west side of your home and herded the goats back inside the barn while fetching a large basket. Locking them safely inside before you made your way toward the landing ship. Keeping a hundred meters or so between you and the ramp that extended, eyeing the opening cautiously. Darkness spilled out along with the monstrosity of what was, at one point, a Zabrack. Easily recalling him from your vision you weren't afraid in the least. Perhaps a bit surprised that he had found you so quickly but not afraid.

    You had strode half the distance between you and the man before stopping and placing the basket at your side. You watched as he limped over to you, unbalanced in every sense of the word. Physically clumsy and mentally clouded he laughed and sobbed utterly broken.

"I found... you." He groaned hoarsely. Pointing a shaking finger in your direction.

    Not saying a word you looked him up and down, lingering where scrap met his organic body. His horns over grown, his eyes bloodshot so horribly there was hardly any white to them. His legs rusting away. His face was gaunt with starvation. This man that stood before you was what was tipping the scale out of balance. Mentally making a decision you nodded, fearlessly and confidently you closed the last of the distance between you and him, gazing right into those burning eyes until his face relaxed a bit out of utter confusion. He hadn’t known what to expect when he found you. He could feel your force signature surrounding you. An aura of equally bright and dark colors swirling together.

"You did find me." You paused for a moment. Turning and walking along the line between the plains and jungle you looked over your shoulder, he hadn't moved.

"Come. We have much work to do with you." You sighed.

    He followed you unsteady on those eight spindly legs. How he managed that much force energy to make them walk you had no idea. They definitely weren't powered or connected to his nervous system so he had to be using the force. A Sith by the feel of it, if not a Sith then he was only calling upon the dark side. Not a drop of light permeated from his aura. Yet he followed you silently.

 ~~~~~

      This woman he followed, he couldn't sense or smell any fear in her. But he could sense something. She was strong with both the light and the dark sides of the force. So strong that he could feel it coming off her like a reactor. He eyed the two lightsabers that clung to her legs. The dress she wore slit all the way up both sides. They didn't hang from a belt like his used to but rather were strapped to each if her thighs. Her hair draped down her back, glinting in the very early morning sunrise.

    He followed this woman snarling occasionally in pain but otherwise silent until they reached a cliff that overlooked the ocean. The waters were calm, the smell of salt on the air familiar but he couldn't place a memory with it.

    She turned to meet his eyes and he froze. "Stay put for a moment I need to collect clay from the cliffs" and without waiting for his response she stepped over the edge and landed gracefully on a ledge fifty feet below. He dared not move even to look and see what this woman was doing. Fear starting to spread through him again he missed his hole in the bowels of Lotho Minor.

    Just after he thought the thought she leapt high above and over him, feet touching down silently. He still jumped back defensively and growled. The woman sighed and balanced the large basket now packed high with clay atop her head and beckoned him back the way they came with two fingers and a nod.

    Slowly once again he followed but this time he spoke.

"Are you a jedi?" He hissed, eyes narrowing.

"Gods no," she replied curtly.

"Are you Sith then?"

"Wrong again." Without looking back at him she replied in a sing song tone.

He followed her silently in thought. Listening to birds chirp in the jungle to his left.

"What.. are you...?" He dared to ask almost whispering.

She didn't reply to him until her home was in view again.

"I am the one who walks the line between the dark and the light. Not a jedi, not a Sith but something so much more." She gazed off into the horizon, her mind wandering to places he could not see.

"What do you want with me?" He snarled yet still he followed.

"You are no longer a Sith yet the darkness rages inside you like a storm. It is upsetting the balance and quite frankly, I've been bored so I'm not going to just kill you off. I'm going to bring you back from the precipice." She stopped and turned to face him.

"But first I'm going to fix this mess." She said tapping one of his hideous legs.

    He didn't know what was to come or become of him but for the first time in a very long time he felt something that wasn't fear or rage. He didn't know what to call it but he was glad for a second that he found this planet.

[funny-house]

What do you think happens during the aggressive sequence when opal’s mom was singing her song?

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa I have technically answered this before!! but since it was always always always attached to another post or rushed and summarized blah!! I will make this post

The Official

Opal Wine Mom Flashback Analysis  tw: spousal abuse, drug use, etc 

ok

insert that Always Sunny meme of the disheveled guy at the cork board cause we are going in---

First things first!! Flat answer, then explanation so the answer is: The mom was having memory flashbacks to events within the house, one if not all of them, depicting her being physically abused by her husband, mirror man! A lot of people find that shocking to hear at first, but let me explain I got a lotta proof !!!

Let’s start from literally the tippy top The sequence starts by zooming into the mom’s eye. This represents that whatever is taking place in this flashy sequence is all about her, what she’s been through, and what she’s seen. It’s her perspective. That, combined with how it seems to paralyze her while she’s going through it and her eyes roll to the back of her head until it ends, implies it’s something she’s trying to force away or doesn’t want to think about!

So frame by frame analysis, this is film theory now!!  first mental image: A windowpane at night that resembles jail bars. ( maybe the one seen on the bottom floor of the house in outside shots? ) A parallel to Claire’s window and a symbol for her feeling of being trapped-- something she brings up multiple times in her dialogue. She’s stuck here. She doesn’t want to be here but something is holding her by force and she feels helpless to escape it.  

Next scene! Hard cut to rapidly trying to call on the phone. They type 9-1-1. The music starts to fade into screaming.  Next scene! The mother’s head is in the far corner and the window is seen behind her, a reminder that she feels trapped, as she is literally seen being slapped in the back of the head by a hand. Next scene! A shot of their bedroom(whatever room she’s in!) door as her face melts across the screen Next scene! The mother screaming in a way that flaps her mouth in crazy waves and reveals her teeth and gums exactly like how Claire yells near the end Next scene! She’s shown laying down with pills dancing over her head. Next scene! her face melting below a distortion of multiple shots of her room’s door  Next scene! A whole bunch of stuff in rapid fire!! An array of eyeballs and slapping palms and her face distorting and pills and something being thrown and shattering overlayed on her face and then a zoom out from the prison bar-like windows and more screaming bleh Starting to form a picture here, right? Somebody has been very badly abusing this chic. Bad enough that she’s called the police... probably for a domestic dispute, I bet. You can even see a very nasty wound/bruise on her head, just like she’s depicted being most often hit in her flashback!! On the face!!

And in higher quality than this little picture i resize so it doesn’t take up the screen lol, you can pretty clearly see reddening and discoloring-- that’s not just another dent in her weird shaped head, she’s been hit! No other character has visible wounds on their design like that, not even Claire. So why do I assume it’s Mirror Man?  Well first, this world exists on a little set yknow they make a point of zooming out and showing as much, all their world is that house and that billboard. If someone not in that house was damaging her, they’d have to establish their existence or this would be.... a weird artistic choice tbh? The visual equivalent of randomly changing the subject lmao So it’s gotta be the dad or the grandpa heck-- it might be both, but I think it’s more likely the grandpa is a passively unpleasant company to her. He’s probably very mean and unstable- like he is to Claire, and-- honestly, for reasons i mentioned in a different post-- probably not even her grandpa but someone she was saddled with--  BUT he’s not the person in power. It’s just not likely she’d be afraid for her life enough to call the police on a badly disabled grandpa who can barely move without falling. Above all? He couldn’t be the one holding her hostage in a loveless marriage. 

LET’S jump to the very very start of the short! Every character has a montage of items that represent their problems as people. Mirror Man is obsessed with self image and is shown frustratedly throwing a tissue at a fashion magazine of a ridiculously exaggerated man’s face, the grandpa is shown putting out a cigarette but he’s missing his cigarette holder and just dabbing it on a TV program list, which is reckless and dangerous and shows a little disdain for TV itself. The mom? She knocks her wine..... onto a romance novel. A novel Jack Stauber deliberately drew the cover of himself about loving a serial killer that depicts another exaggeratedly idealized hot dude... strangling a woman whose smiling and dying in his arms. A toxic relationship, I imagine! Looks like someone!!! is having!!    relationship problems, maybe So let’s listen to how the mom describes the problem to her daughter “ It’s a virtuous cycle ” “ And they never repent how I want them to ” “ Our adversaries are in denial ” So it sounds like to me...... not only is she prone to being too forgiving of a certain someone, and that’s why she stays in a horrible situation in a horrible relationship... but that certain someone both gives insincere apologies... and denies that their actions are severe enough to be criticized.

Sound familiar? Maybe it sounds like the insincere apology of a certain mirror loving duderino who insulted his daughter’s ankles and promptly excused himself for having a brain that likes fixing mistakes without ever taking back what he said? And then promptly said this habit of his was uhhhh

“ That’s just a part of my journey, yknow? I’m like a tiny growing thing.” “ Everybody’s so mad at me, like, i’m growing though-- why be so negative? Why do people look at me-- like you probably are right now?” Feign innocence, empty promises to improve, reflect all attempts to convey that you’ve hurt someone? All without even being asked about it, btw lmao? It sounds like someone has something they should be apologizing for...   ( You’ll also notice all the 3 adults have a way of talking as if speaking in general terms-- like they’re talking about everybody in the whole world or to an audience rather than to... a little girl they have a personal relationship with-- but i think that’s just expressing how disconnected and self interested they are. You kinda have to read between the lines to get what they’re saying. )

ANYWAYS this is all my take on it, at least ! Hope it made sense!! If... any of you actually read all this junk lmao

[laughriot]

How I Envision The Pillowman Act 1, Scene 1

Lighting

When researching interrogation rooms and the interior of police stations (both in media and in real life), many of the images I found show them lit by very cool toned (often blue) light. In media particularly, the main light of the room is often dim, which makes the atmosphere more uncomfortable for the suspect. For example;

Additionally, during interrogation scenes throughout media, it’s very common for the person being questioned to have a light/lamp of some sort pointed directly at them. For example;

These lights are used to make those detained uncomfortable and thus more likely to spill the information they know in order to get the bright light out of their eyes.

This technique seemed like something Detectives Ariel and Tupolski would likely use. They have no issues with physically assaulting/torturing prisoners to get what they want out of them so I believe these lower level discomforts wouldn't be uncommon in their interrogation techniques.

I think the best ways to include this in a production would be by putting a lamp on stage , or by having a white/cool toned spotlight on Katurian's face.

Set

Interrogation rooms are often very bare, usually having no more than a table and chairs inside. I think this is partly for convenience and practicality, but also to make the person being questions uncomfortable in their surroundings as the rooms are very sterile and contain nothing that could have comfortable connotations for the detained. even the furniture which is used in these rooms is very bland and often made of plain wood or steel. this creates tension as there is nothing (such a pillows, warm lamps etc)that can be used to ground or comfort the person being questioned.

I have also noticed that these rooms are often painted cool toned colours such as blue and grey. I believe this is because warm colours have connotations of cosiness, warmth, and comfort - which is the opposite of what detective are often aiming to communicate.

There’s also often viewing windows looking into the rooms (as seen in the picture above). However, I do not think that there would be any of these in the station which Ariel and Tupolski work in. This is because in this play, the police are often extremely violent and treat detainees inhumanly. Thus, they would not want there to be witnesses of this happening because that could cause problems. As long as no one catches them doing it, they are guaranteed to get away with it. (That being said, The Pillowman is set in a fascist totalitarian state so i'm not sure someone seeing it would ake a difference)

With this in mind, i sketched a rough outline of what i believe would be a good set for this scene.

Costume, Hair and Makeup

(imagined for an all female cast)

Ariel

Ariel is very passionate about their job. This often leads to or is expressed through violence and brutality. They are treated as less than Tupolski, as if they exists solely to do the dirty work. Despite having the title of "detective" Tuplski regularly calls them a policeman, and compares them to a police dog. Their main focus is to make sure people who commit crimes suffer for it and guaranteeing they do not get the chance to commit those crimes again. This stems from the lack of justice they got in terms of their childhood abuse. Because of their motives, I believe they are not concerned about vanity, and the way they dress/present themselves is mostly based on practicality.

below are images of a costume i think fits Ariel, as well as how they would do their hair/makeup.

(i don’t own black laces but let’s pretend they’re black)

I paired together a blue short sleeve shirt and black trousers as blue and black are the main colours associated with the police (especially in media). This represents that they are seen as less than tupolski. I chose short sleeves as they are less formal than long sleeves, which I think fits Ariel's character, and they would allow Ariel to attack suspects without ruining their clothes as most of the harm they do is with their fists.

I think Ariel would either have short hair, or would keep their hair tied back at all times because even if it aesthetically would look better down, it would get in the way whilst they were working.

I don't think Ariel would wear makeup. They wouldn’t waste their time on it. However, I think it would be interesting to use makeup unless to give them dark circles to make reference to their monologue in which they say they have nightmares often.

Tupolski

Tupolski acts likes they’re above Ariel, and are much more of a “professional” and sophisticated. This later on is shown to not actually be true as they are the one who in the end performs the execution, and they seem to draw the most genuine pleasure in hurting other people. To me, Tupolski is in this job very much because of the power it provides them rather than a drive to do good or to find justice. This is a direct example of the blatant police brutality and corruption of the totalitarian state the play is set in.

I believe that Tupolski would dress much more put together and polished in order to appear as someone professional and communicate their position of power. below are pictures of a costume I think would work for Tupolski.

I looked into business attire, and clothes worn by women in power. I found that plaid, especially grey based plaid, is very common in this type of clothing. I also found that blazers/coats with lapels were very common too. for this reason I decided to give Tupolski this full length coat as part of their costume. I gave Tupolski heels here because I believe the extra height they give will communicate that they are of a higher status than Ariel, but also because heels are generally seen as a work/business shoe.

As for makeup; I looked at a variety of detectives and professional women across media (e.g. Rachel from suits, Nikki from silent witness) and found that their makeup is usually quite natural, using a lot of neutral tones to enhance the persons features subtlety so as to make them look more polished.

in the image above I used very natural colours to create a soft eyeshadow look and sole subtle bronzer, blush and highlighter to emphasise the structure of my face and give my cheeks a healthy glow. To me this would work well for Tupolski as they are a very nonchalant person so I don’t think they’d want to look as if they’d tried hard to look good, but this makeup would make them appear more professional and put together than Ariel which is something they take great joy in pointing out.

Katurian

Immediately when looking into styles for Katurian, I was drawn to dark academia. In its barest bones the dark academia style revolves around 1930s academia and a love for literature. (and often murder). This style is heavily featured in films such as “Kill Your Darlings” and “Dead Poets Society”.

Katurian is a man who’s life and identity revolves so wholly around his writing and his love for words, and whether he likes it or not there ends up being multiple murders linked to him and his work. Thus, this style seemed perfect to base his costume on.

(ideally i would have put a cream/white blouse under the jumper but i don’t own one)

In this image I’m wearing cigarette pants, which are a very common style of trouser within dark academia. I think the wine red/burgundy of my jumper and shoes fits well to the colour scheme of this style, too. I think making Katurian's costume in this style gives away a lot about their character from the get go, as it’s a style with very distinct connotations.

As well as thinking that this style generally suits Katurian's character very well, I think this works as a costume for them as it is more casual that both Ariel and Tupolski's still. This helps enforce the idea that they both have a higher status than him.

I see Katurian as very scrawny and almost gaunt. They also strike me as someone who spends most of the time in which they should be sleeping or eating, writing instead. They also seem to be a very paranoid person. I based my makeup for this character on these ideas and, where for Tupolski and Ariel makeup was an aesthetic choice (or lack thereof), Katurian's makeup is used to really make them look pathetic and small as I think this will help this scene have maximum affect.

I used heavy amounts of contour to really emphasise the hollows of the cheekbones to make myself look gaunt. I also applied a mix of brown and purple shadow under my eyes to create the appearance of really severe dark circles. this adds to the weak and sickly look when paired with the contour but also suggests he does not get a lot of sleep, which will make more sense later on in the play when we see how paranoid he is.

-

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link to pinterest board where i’ve collected some inspiration pictures etc; https://pin.it/1tfoS0s

[sumofn]

@truthsm

In Alder's cabin, the Larvesta were teaching him how to cook. Or, rather, they were attempting to teach him; thus far, N felt he was a very poor student. Today, he'd been tasked with helping replenish one of Alder's ever-simmering continual stews, and he'd nearly sliced his finger rather than the vegetables four times. The oldest of the Larvesta, supervising, kept chittering at him, but he hadn't given up on N yet.

‘Not good size, but good enough,’ Tuft determined. ‘Smaller-more-consistent next time. Put in!’

N was doing just that when Reshiram's presence abruptly flared across his mind, as though the dragon had snapped his teeth down on their connection. N nearly dropped both the cutting board and knife into the stewpot, then narrowly avoided burning himself on the other simmering pot as he scrambled back from the stove.

Tuft scurried over and snatched the knife from N's hand before he caused any more trouble. ‘What doing?! Caution!!’

"Reshiram--" The dragon had only burned at him like that a handful of times, and only when he'd absolutely needed N's attention.

‘We are leaving. Now.’

"We're leaving?" N echoed, bewildered.

‘Not leaving!’ Tuft insisted. ‘Not done!’

‘Now,’ Reshiram repeated. Castle. ‘Someone is trapped in your room. We are going.’

There was no question as to which castle Reshiram meant, but N was frozen. Going back there, going to that room, was like going back to the Chasm. He didn't want to. He wasn't sure if he could. It had only been a week since the rainstorm, when he'd finally convinced himself that it wasn't worth trying to repair the wreckage of his past life. But he'd never touched that room. Which made it all the more likely that, after all that water, it would collapse. If someone was trapped there, it was his fault, and nothing he'd done before had been enough, and how could it be now, and--

‘Mine!’

The word bit again, and N gasped in a breath. "I-I need ... supplies. We need-- Back to the castle. Cave-in--"

Around him, the Bugs switched gears, taking the cooking supplies from him and pressing other things into his hands. Alder's friends were demanding, but practical. A Leavanny handed him a pair of thick gloves and a long loop of silky rope. A trio of Joltik scurried up to burrow in his hair. Tuft assembled a small pack with first aid supplies and a sturdy thermos.

Within two minutes, N was on Reshiram's back with Joltik in his hair and a small Larvesta called Umber tucked in front of him.

--------

Zekrom, we are on our way, Reshiram calls, careful to direct these thoughts in a way that N wouldn't overhear. Please hide yourself as we approach. I have not told Mine that it is Yours who is trapped. I fear he will balk if he knows.

--------

Reshiram had flown as fast as he was able without igniting his turbine. N is grateful for that, at least; he doesn't think he could handle the weather changing on top of being back here. If only Zed were here, too--but the Zoroark had been off investigating Lostlorn again, and Reshiram's haste gave them no time to pick him up.

N's stomach knots as he looks at the cave entrance. Oh, he doesn't want to be here.

N slides down from Reshiram's back, Larvesta clutched under one arm. He sets Umber down. "I'll let you know if I need more help," he tells Reshiram, and then orders himself to move. He knows the way down to the ruins almost in the dark. Except that he doesn't, anymore: the water collapsed whole rooms and washed away paths. More ruin to the ruins--

Into the cave mouth. 'Charge,' one of the Joltik requests, and N obligingly scrubs his hands around the mess of his hair, generating static for the Joltik to gobble up. One of them starts glowing brightly, illuminating the way like a headlamp while the others conserve their energy.

Through the cavern. Down the stairs. He doesn't want to be here. The remnants of the castle loom like an omen, all shattered windows and crumbling stone. The air is mildewy and damp, and the steps are slick with new moss and grime. He doesn't want to be here--

A column blocks the entrance he used to use. Umber tries to scratch her way over it, but can't get a grip. N hoists her to the top. N scrambles over it himself, only to see that the floor has given way only a few feet beyond. What had been ruins, a shell of the castle, is barely a husk.

Ohhhhh, he does not want to be here. He doesn't.

"Friends," he begins, but his voice cracks and he has to try again. He calls out to the darkness. "Friends, please, I need your help. Durant, and Excadrill; Boldore and Onix who can navigate these rooms." The fighting types outside would have helped, too, but he's not sure they'd be safe in here. Golurk might, but they'd never fit through these spaces. The Durant were the best option. They'd helped before, but ...

He's glad of the gloves as he makes his way to the floor in question. As many rocks are sharp as are slick with mud. He's glad, too, that Umber has taken to clinging to his pack whenever possible. Her warmth is reassuring, and he's continually reminded that she doesn't belong here, and maybe that means that he doesn't, either.

Squeeze through a gap. Sidle along a ledge. Jump over a chasm in the floor and hope the other side is solid. The Joltik take turns illuminating the rooms, and they cast eerie shadows on the discolored walls. Umber recites a recipe for baked jalapeno mac & cheese.

They come at it from above, which is just as well, because two floors have collapsed onto it. N can just make out the top of the basketball hoop emerging from the rubble thirty feet below.

His fingers curl rigidly toward his palms. He doesn't want to be here, not now, not again, ever--

'Spaghetti squash can-be used, also,' Umber offers. 'Bake squash first. Add spiced milk, cover with cheese. Bake again. Very good.'

N draws in a breath. He reaches up and retrieves one of the Joltik, then sets it on a beam that reaches nearly to the rubble. The little bug illuminates itself and scurries and slides down, leaping from rock to rock and searching for a point of entry to whatever space might exist under the collapsed ceilings.

"Is someone down there? Are you alright?" He peers into the shadows, trying to avoid looking at the hoop. "My friend is trying to find you, but we don't know where you are. We'll try to get you out. If you can tell us where to start ... "

[jwillowwolf]

Magic and Miracles - Chapter 3

Sanders Sides Big Bang fic, Chapter 3! < Previous Chapter | Next Chapter > | Masterlist Summary: “Remy? Remy? Remington? Oi, Remy, wake up!” Virgil said, shaking the snoring man.

“Huh? Where’s the dragon?”

“Here,” Janus answered.

“Eh? Oh, hey Snake-Eye, Wolfie, Lo, Violent.”

Virgil rolled his eyes. “You weren’t responding to the gentle shaking.”

“That’s no reason to make a man think there’s an earthquake.” Warning/s: food mention. Characters: Logan, Remy, OC, Virgil, Roman, Remus, Patton, Janus. Tag List:@theimprobabledreamersworld @remy-please-come-back

Read on AO3

3 | Lessons Begin

Waking up, walking to the dining hall, and eating breakfast had been uneventful. Logan felt like the atmosphere was relatively peaceful despite the tension from last night. Then again, everyone was still rather groggy from sleep, so he wasn’t going to make any assumptions yet.

Once the seven students had reached the classroom though, they seemed much more awake, aware, and eager to learn about the mysteries behind magic. They all sat at the desks they had claimed the day before and waited silently as Remy came into the room. Remy looked at them with a raised eyebrow.

“Are you all in trouble already? I’ve never known kids to be quiet without adults shouting for them to be so… never mind, let’s get this lesson started. The first spell that all young magic users should know is Stat Check. Do you know what that is?”

The class shook their heads no.

“Good! Because it’s meant to be a closely guarded secret. Never written down or spoken of among anyone but wizards and their first-year apprentices. Before I can even teach it to you, you need to solemnly swear to me that you shall guard this secret as fiercely as all mages before you.”

“That seems rather dramatic,” Janus commented.

“This is magic we’re talking about! Of course, it’s dramatic,” Remy said with a grin. “Now, swear that you’ll keep this secret locked inside your soul.”

The class did as Remy asked, with a bit of speculation but agreement all the same. Unfortunately, I can not repeat the spell, but I can tell you that it is activated by holding a finger to your wrist and saying the ‘activation’ word which I shall from here on censor as ‘stats’.

Remy demonstrated the spell and once he said stats a sheet of light projected from his wrist. Written on the sheet of light was:

Remington Animosni

Titles: Lord Animosni, Friend of the Crown, Expert Wizard, +...

MP: 52 - Full

HP: 100 - Full

Skills: Magic, Potion Making, Charisma, +...

“So this is your main status board,” Remy explained. “It shows your name, titles, MP aka magic points, HP aka health points, and skills. You can interact with it by tapping on whatever to expand the information on it.”

Remy demonstrated this by tapping on the title Expert Wizard, which caused the screen to change to this:

Expert Wizard.

Title earned by increasing MP above 45. Perks: increased HP. Drawbacks: none.

“This is how you can better understand your own magical capacity and skill set. If you want to view your stats privately, then just say S stats. If you want to see someone else’s stats then say X stats while pointing your wrist at the person you want to check. You will only be able to see their name, HP, and MP, but that’s still good to know if you’re perhaps fighting them.”

“Why would magic-users fight one another?” Patton asked.

Remy sighed. “The world is a complicated place, Pat. But never mind that. Try checking your stats, everyone.”

The students nodded then tried out the spells for themselves. All opting to view their stats privately. Logan opened his and read it critically.

Logan Picani

Titles: Loyal Friend, Loving Son, Apprentice Wizard.

MP: 10 - full

HP: 40 - full

Skills: Magic, Baking, Student, +...

He raised an eyebrow curiously and tapped on the skill Student.

Student.

Level: 23/100

Rare Skill. Perks: faster reading and comprehension, easily picks up new skills. Drawbacks: none.

That seems like a good skill to have. Logan wondered if it was the reason for his ability to teach himself so well. He tapped the word again and the screen changed back to the main status board. Then he tapped onto the title Apprentice Wizard.

Apprentice Wizard.

Title Earned by unlocking the skill Magic. Perks: MP access. Drawbacks: HP conversion.

“Um, Mr Ainmosni?”

“It’s Remy, kid. What’s up?”

“What does the drawback HP conversion mean?”

“Ah, well, if you run out of MP during casting a spell, then your HP will automatically be turned into MP. This is a drawback because it can mean draining your HP to below five, which causes you to fall unconscious and die if it reaches zero.” Remy explained.

“Isn’t there a way to stop that from happening?” Willow asked.

Remy shook his head. “It’s an automatic drawback that comes with becoming an apprentice wizard. There’s no way to stop it apart from being conscious of what spells you’re using and how much MP they take. Calculating this will hopefully help you to keep from draining yourselves, so keep that in mind when you’re trying out new spells, kay?”

Everyone nodded.

“Okay, now that you’re more familiar with your stats, let’s do a quick assessment of your magical knowledge, shall we? What are the basic magical categories… Virgil?”

“Rock, animals, water, plants, fire, air, healing, and mind.”

“Correct. Logan, why do these categories exist?”

“They are the eight-core magics. All spells fall under at least one category, and depending on which there will be a different Initiation Word.”

“Correct. Willow, what are the eight Initiation Words?”

“Mowntayn for rock, Pawyng for animal, Ignyght for fire, Groh for plants, um... Rayne for water, Stahwynd for air, Embraes for healing, and... Wysdome for mind.”

“Right. Janus, how is a spell cast?”

“You say the initiation word, draw whatever runes are necessary, then end off with the sealing word.”

“Good. Patton, why do we use runes?”

“The runes represent what specific spell you want to cast.”

“Yep. Remus, how many runes are there?”

“A million?”

“Close enough. Roman, what is the sealing word?”

“Solhart.”

“Correct! Now,” Remy grinned. “Let’s get to the tough stuff.”

The following days were pretty much the same as this one. The class either revised what basics they knew or Remy explained what they didn’t know. They practised pronunciation, studied runes, and learnt about different potion ingredients. Within the first month, the kids had pretty much memorised the basics of magic.

Logan had visited home every weekend and told his dad and Everleigh about it all, but his eagerness from that first week seemed to be slowly wearing out as the class did nothing new. He had thought that today was going to be the same, but instead of leading the students to the classroom this morning, Remy led them to the gardens.

“Uh, Remy? Where are we going?” Roman asked.

“Today, you kids will be going on your first quest,” Remy announced.

The group perked up. “Quest?”

“Yep. I’m confident in your understanding of basic magic, so I am going to let you go off on your own to find some potion ingredients for our first potion making class.”

Remy pulled out seven different pieces of paper. “I’ve made each of you a checklist for what we will need, and while you all have different items, I hope you’ll work together to find what you need. Oh, and before I send you off, I need to teach you a new spell. Inventory.”

Remy stopped and the kids circled around him to watch as he demonstrated the new spell. He picked up a stone and held it in front of him. “Stawynd.” with the indigo light that flowed from his fingertip, he drew a rune that looked like a locked box onto the stone. “Solhart.”

The rune turned white and then vanished with the stone, causing the students to gasp.

“Where did it go?”

“Right here.”

Remy opened his status board and showed the kids a small icon in the corner of the screen that looked like the rune he had drawn. He tapped on this icon and the screen changed to show a bunch of different slots, mostly empty apart from two. One with a picture of Remy’s flask and the other a picture of the stone from before.

“This is an inventory,” Remy explained. “You can put different items into each slot, and depending on your proficiency you will have more or fewer slots. To add items to your inventory, you do as I did to the stone. And to take them back out, you just double-tap,” Remy tapped the stone and it reappeared in his hand. “Tada! Okay, you try with your lists.”

Everyone tried out the new spell and practised it a few times before Remy let them all go on their quest. They went out a gate by the fence that seemed almost hidden and set off into the deep dark woods. Of course, it wasn’t very dark since the sun was shining brightly in the sky, and filtered through the trees to light their way.

“Should we check what each of our individual lists says?” Logan asked.

Patton nodded agreeingly. “Yeah, then we can keep an eye out for the different things.”

“Actually, I think we should just look for our own stuff. More things to look out for means we might miss our own.” Roman said.

Willow frowned. “But this is meant to be a group project.”

“Technically, Remy said he hoped we’d work together.” Remus pointed out.

“I have an idea,” Janus suggested. “Let’s work in teams.”

Roman rolled his eyes. “I just said that would be hard.”

“I mean smaller teams. One team works individually and the other works together, then we’ll see which way is better.”

“How are we going to split up though? There are seven of us.” Virgil pointed out.

“We can have a team of four for the working-together group. That’s four people working together but also the team of three will have fewer things to find, so It works out fairly.”

“Well, how are we choosing teams then?” Patton asked.

“Well, obviously I would be one of the team leaders. I’m a natural-born leader.” Roman declared.

“Yes, the leader of the losing team, because I’ll be leading the winning team.” Janus states.

“Remus and Patton are with me, and we’ll be the individuals.”

“Sounds good. We’ll see you three later then.” Janus said before walking away from the group.

Virgil, Logan, and Willow followed after them till the four were out of earshot. “So, lists?”

“I have blackroot, ginfleck, and wild ginger,” Willow reported.

Virgil frowned. “What’s ginfleck?”

“A medicinal herb used commonly in potions for stomach aches,” Logan replied. “It looks like a sunflower but pink.”

“Why not call it a pink sunflower then?”

“Because… I honestly don’t know.”

“Logan, you live nearby here right?” Janus asked.

“In town, but yes.”

“Any idea where we could find some of this?”

“Well, I think I remember seeing a ginfleck patch somewhere along the road.”

“Let’s go there first then. We can keep an eye out for everything else along the way.” Virgil said, turning in the direction of the road.

And so they went and collected the pink sunflowers and everything else on their lists. It was only late afternoon by the time they returned to the house, but they found Remy lying on a hammock in the garden, napping in the sun.

“Remy? Remy? Remington? Oi, Remy, wake up!” Virgil said, shaking the snoring man.

“Huh? Where’s the dragon?”

“Here,” Janus answered.

“Eh? Oh, hey Snake-Eye, Wolfie, Lo, Violent.”

Virgil rolled his eyes. “You weren’t responding to the gentle shaking.”

“That’s no reason to make a man think there’s an earthquake.”

“Whatever. Have the others come back yet?”

Remy shrugged. “I think the twins are in the house.”

“Patton wasn’t with them?” Willow asked.

“No. Did you all split up?”

“Yes, but we didn’t think they would split up. We divided ourselves into two teams.” Janus stated.

“Well, I’m sure it’s nothing to worry about and Pat will be back soon. Why don’t you guys head inside and get some lunch.” Remy suggested.

The kids exchanged anxious glances but nodded and headed off to the dining room. While they were not exactly a close group of friends, the one person who’d befriended each of them was Patton. He was a kind little ball of sunshine and no one wanted any harm to come to him. Once they were inside the house, the four found Remus worriedly pacing by the door and Roman gloomily watching her from the corner.

Remus paused. “Did you guys see Patton?”

“No. Did the three of you split up?”

“I thought we could cover more ground that way,” Roman answered. “This is all my fault.”

“Let’s not go jumping to conclusions just yet,” Logan said. “Maybe he couldn’t find one of his items?”

“No. I saw Pat’s list before we split up. They were three common types of wild berries that he could have found easily.” Remus declared.

“You’re sure?” Willow asked.

“I saw them all over while I was getting my stuff.”

“He must be lost. It’s rather easy with how thick these woods are,” Virgil said.

“We need to find him,” Janus declared. “We’ve got to go back and look for him.”

“Where and how though? He could be anywhere,” Roman said with clear fear in his tone.

“Willow can track him. They’ve been trained in finding lost people.”

“Yeah, but I’d need a scent to go off of.”

“Like from clothes?” Remus asked.

“Clothes, or a personal item he keeps close.”

Remus ran away then returned in record time with a teal blanket. “Would this work?”

Willow took the item and smelt it. “Yes, this is perfect.”

“We might have to sneak past Remy, in case he tries to stop us.” Janus said.

“There’s another gate that’s closer to the house that we can get through.” Virgil declared.

“Who’s we though? We’re going to need to choose who is a part of this rescue.” Roman pointed out.

“I don’t think any of us are willing to stay behind, not if we could help. Patton may be in danger, and his getting lost is evidence enough that no one should venture off on their own. We need to work as a team here. A real team.” Logan stated.

Janus looked at the twins. “I’m willing to call a truce in the name of teamwork if you are.”

Roman nodded in agreement and Remus grinned. “Let’s go save Pat!”

The group followed Virgil outside and through the second hidden gate. From there, Willow took the lead as she sniffed out Patton’s scent. The group grew anxious the further Willow led them. Patton had gone quite far, from the looks of it, but it felt like something was wrong.

“Why would he have gone so far?” Logan wondered.

“I hate to suggest it, but something may have chased him,” Janus said and Willow nodded agreeingly.

“Wouldn’t that leave a scent of its own?”

“Yes, but I can’t discern anything. There are a lot of smells out here.”

“Can you smell anything?” Roman asked Janus.

“No. I can’t smell at all.”

“What?”

“I’m a dragon. We don’t have a sense of smell like humans do. We use a special organ on the roof of our mouths.”

“Aren’t you half-human?”

“That just makes it easier to shift between my humanoid and dragon form. There aren’t many other differences.”

“Wait, do you hear that?”

The team paused and listened. The only sounds Logan could make out were the normal ambience of the forest. But then he heard it.

“Hello? Is anyone up there?”

“Patton?!” Remus bolted towards the voice, the others followed him close behind.

He came to stop at the edge of a hole and looked down. “Patton? How did you get down there?”

“Remus! Hi! I jumped.”

“You jumped? From this height?” Janus asked, eyeing the drop disapprovingly.

The hole looked like the beginnings of a well, around three stories deep and some stones piled like a wall around the one side. Either the well-maker had abandoned their project halfway, or half of the well had mysteriously been taken away. That wasn’t important though, because right now the team had to figure out how to get Patton back up.

“I’m fine! The water was here to break my fall!”

“Why did you jump in the first place?” Roman demanded.

“I was being chased by some bees.” Patton sheepishly admitted. “My mom always told me, if that happens then you should get below water, quickly. Bees don’t like water.”

“How did you antagonise these bees?” Logan inquired.

“I was trying to get some honey for Remus.”

“Aw, Pat, that’s really sweet. But I’ve been worried sick about where you went!”

“Oh, I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine. You’re safe now. Um, how do we get him back up though?” Remus asked the group.

“I can grow a long strong vine to use as rope for us to hoist him up,” Roman suggested.

Janus nodded. “Well then, get to growing. We don’t have all day.”

Roman quickly did as he was told and once the vine-rope looked long enough the team tossed one end down to Patton. Each of them lined up and held onto the other end then pulled to get him out of the hole. With all six of them working together, it was a quick and easy task. Once Patton was clear of the well, Remus attacked him with a hug, and he thanked everyone for coming to rescue him.

The entire group was relieved to have him back. So relieved that they didn’t feel any worry, until they returned to the manor and came face to face with Remy.

“Do you have any idea how worried I was? You didn’t even suggest you were going out! And what do I find? Not only one of my students is missing- all of them are! Gone without a trace! Like, poof, never there! What were you thinking? Actually, scratch that were you even thinking?!”

He went on like that until dinner time and the kids decided that among all the lessons they’d learned today, ‘Don’t Freak Remy Out’, is now at the top. Also, maybe it would be better to stick together than separate. They made a good team when their prejudices weren’t getting in the way. But above all, they should never freak Remy out.

---

A/N: thanks for reading, I hope you enjoyed this. I'll be posting two chapters a day until the full fic is up, so if you want to be tagged, you can just ask.

I'd love to hear what you thought about the chapter if you wouldn't mind commenting. Thanks again for reading! Here's hoping you have a magical day 💜

[abanomath]

DC’s Tone Deafness

So I don’t really like ranting or being negative, but DC Universe recently released an article to celebrate pride month about the Top 5 canon and non-canon LGBTQA+ relationships in Young Justice.

And the tone deafness is just off the charts. Like most of the world, I’m not American so I needed someone to screen-cap the actual article for me. I’m going to organize my thoughts and go down below.

General

For one, its pretty obvious the writer didn’t look at the source material. This article sounds like it was written by someone filled in on the basics and told to write a good PR article for DC.

There are a lot of little details in the story, such as when the writer claims that they “showcased even more LGBTQA+ protagonists in season 3″ implying they had previously, which they hadn’t. One character was implied to be bisexual in the comics, never on screen, but more on that below. Season 3 was the first LGBTQA+ rep for the show.

Also its always a bit tone deaf when in an article celebrating LGBTQA+ and diversity in your show, that you have a list of 5 “ships”, of which only ONE is actually a couple in canon. Not only did they need to resort to non-canon ones, they included people that can’t be called a “ship” or couple.

1. Kaldur/Wyynde

This is the only actual LGBTQA+ couple on the list that is canon in the show, and I liked them. But I can’t deny that Kaldur who was a main cast member for the past two season’s had a vastly reduced role (compared to straight cis white characters like Dick and Conner). He was basically written out of the first half of the season, and then his relationship was really present for 1.5 - 2 episodes max. This in a season that was marked with excessive attention given to heterosexual relationships (like seriously, basically every character was in some form of relationship on-screen). The one healthy LGBTQA relationship got less attention than Black Lightning and Dr. Jace’s romance, something that ultimately went nowhere, Dick/Barbara, even Megan/Conner when Megan was also essentially written out of the season.

2. Marie Logan and Rita Farr

They really dug deep for this “ship”. Ironically, they start this by talking about the scene in Young Justice #25, when Queen B’s powers work on Garfield’s mother. This was the first implication her being bisexual. And of course, she also dies in this scene, so starting off with a “Bury your gays” trope where Marie’s queerness literally got her killed and orphaned her son.

There isn’t much more to say about this ship, because it literally doesn’t exist. The shipping community for this is so small you have to go digging deep into tags to find even hints of it. The article even basically says this, posing the ship as a question. As being interesting. (Does it count as Bury Your Gays when both woman are dead before their relationship is even hinted at?)

In other words this article about celebrating LGBTQA ships literally had to try and CREATE A SHIP to reach 5 ships. Despite the fact there are plenty of LGBTQ fanon ships (Birdflash being the most prominent one left off the list). It really hits at the thing I said above, this is a “write us a good PR article with the barest amount of effort put into it” situation.

3. Harper Row and Halo

Oh boy don’t get me started on this. There are so many problems with how they did Halo this season, she is basically tone deaf personified. (For the purpose of this rant, I’ll be using the “she” pronouns for Halo, because I have no choice but to assume they are her preference, unless the show purposely spent the entire season mis-gendering her, but I don’t think her characterization really supports that she prefers “her/she”).

I’ve had a problem with Halo from the start, because she is basically an attempt for the writers to shallowly include representation without having to actually deal with it. She is Muslim representation, but not actually Muslim (as she confirms on the show). She wears the Hijab because she feels like it. She is genderqueer, but they never once talk about her pronouns. She refers to herself as “not feeling like a boy or a girl” and constantly refers to herself in the third person, but everyone uses “she/her” pronouns without asking her. They even have a scene where she informs them she is genderqueer, and its never brought up again without asking any actual follow up questions or awareness. They also infantalize and treat her as a little girl.

Additionally, she falls into one of my greatest pet peeves - she is genderqueer but for fantasy-scifi reasons. For those that follow genderqueer or transgender characters in media, this is a very common trope. Essentially, the trope is when someones gender identity is caused by/determined from otherworldly experiences.

This trope bugs me because it completely undermines the point of representation. Representation in media is supposed to show the audience that these are natural human experiences and that people like this exist and are normal. But the trope ensures that the experiences are not normal human experiences.

(and don’t even get me started on the fact that this show has made New Genesis tech gendered before, with Sphere. And even gender the bioship in the same season they pull this for Halo).

Lastly, she also falls within the “promiscuous bisexual” trope, with the very kiss this article praises as THE FIRST LGBT KISS ON SCREEN for the show. This is a problematic trope that DC seems to love. Basically, this scene has Halo cheating on her boyfriend with another young classmate, engaging in two kisses with her.

Now I’m not going to say that all LGBTQA+ relationships need to be wholesome one true loves. Problematic behaviour like Halo and Harper’s is a story telling tool. But the fact that the LGBTQA+ was told going into the season there would be LGBT rep so they should watch, and this was the first rep we got 18 episodes into the season? It felt a bit like a slap in the face. They could’ve had her break up with Brion beforehand, or any number of different ways that would even keep the scene in tact.

And the relationship doesn’t really go anywhere anyways. Harper doesn’t really remain part of the season going forward, Halo and her boyfriend continue their relationship after it was revealed until the end of the season.

This is ultimately my problem with Halo. There are a few tropes that basically are summed up as “writers put all their diversity into one character” which is basically what Halo is. Each of these qualities, from faith to gender identity to sexual orientation could’ve been a fleshed out character arc (oh! I forgot to mention she also falls into the “My gender identity isn’t cis, so my sexual orientation is also bi/pan/gay” trope). Instead all the diverse qualities of Halo are addressed shallowly as the show-runners pat themselves on the back.

4. Bluepulse

I’ve ranted a lot so I’m not going to go crazy on this point. You can probably find tons of posts about the drama between Bluepulse Shippers and the show, which again makes their inclusion kind of tone-deaf. Bluepulse shippers have been called disgusting by the fandom for the three year age gap, an age gap that was never confirmed on screen and you had to go digging in Greg’s personal message board to know (resulting in many people shipping them not knowing their ages at all).

In addition, the showrunners made it clear they did not like this ship over the several years the show has been off the air. And in Season 3 they give Jaime a girlfriend….who is a lesbian in the comics. Now Traci and Jaime did date in the comics before she came out, and this is another Earth. But when the sole purpose of their relationship being on screen was to tell the audience that bluepulse wasn’t happening, choosing a lesbian character to play the cis straight girlfriend is a bit of a slap in the face. again.

5. Bart Allen and Eduardo

Queerbaiting, nuff said.

For those not in the know, Ed is a character introduced as a runaway in Season 2, but he doesn’t really interact with Bart until mid-season 3. There is an episode where a group of heroes go to a carnival, and Ed and Bart appear to be on a date. They are in a group with all couples, except for Virgil. Virgil laments being the only person there without a significant other, implying that Bart and Ed are together. Additionally, Bart and Ed do everything that the other couples do together. It was pretty heavy-handed that the couples were there on dates.

And fans liked this! Even if Bluepulse wasn’t happening, Bart may still be bisexual or gay. This was made worse by Greg retweeting and liking Ed/Bart content, and not giving a straight answer on whether they were dating.

Which obviously, creates the expectation among LGBTQA+ fans that they will get together. They don’t. And later at a convention, one of the main writers (not Greg) said something like “its funny how the fans see relationships between characters differently from our intent” when asked a question about them. Essentially confirming that yeah, they didn’t have any actual content for them planned anyway. Though they did have an addendum that they may build on the fan reception/view of the relationship in the future (basically saying, maybe they’ll be canon).

As much as I’d like to be optimistic that they actually will get together and we’ll get a LGBTQ relationship that is in the spotlight for once, I’m not. I’ll be happy to be proved wrong on this point.

And that was my TEDtalk about how tone-deaf DC patting themselves on the back for LGBTQA+ content in Young Justice is. Especially when other animated shows do so much better with fewer episodes and screen time.

[grimdarkandhandsome]

Halo 3: Another 2007, Another Bungie, Another Finish

There exists another universe in which, in 2007, Bungie Studios released a different version of the then-best-selling game of all time. Whether their Halo 3 is better or worse than our Halo 3 is something each player must decide for themself.

As you remember, from the closing moments of Halo 2...

Don't make a girl a promise ... if you know you can't keep it.

[...]

Why, the Ark, of course.

And where, Oracle, is that?

[...]

Silence fills the empty grave, now that I have gone. But my mind is not at rest, for questions linger on. 

Now I will ask, and you will answer.

Alright. Shoot.

[...]

Mission 1: REENTRY

The game opens on the starry night of space. The slowly cooling wreck of a UNSC cruiser is visible some distance away. Cortana recalls in voiceover why she chose Master Chief over the other Spartans. As she speaks, a new ‘star’ appears - a slipspace rupture. A shape emerges and slowly approaches the camera: The Forerunner Keyship from High Charity. The Chief is a stowaway onboard, and Earth challenges him via radio.

Master Chief, do you mind telling me what you’re doing on that ship?

Sir. Finishing this fight.

Begin gameplay. The Chief battles his way out of the Keyship and steals a Phantom dropship. He dives into the Battle of Earth and boards a Covenant supercarrier, joining the ODSTs already fighting within. Reaching the vehicle bay and commandeering a Wraith tank, he blasts through the ship’s bulkheads towards its reactor core. He uses the tank to cause a chain reaction that will destroy the whole carrier, and narrowly escapes towards Earth in a damaged Seraph fighter.

Mission 2: THIRD BETRAYAL

Delta Halo once appeared blue and green from a distance. Now it is a sickly brown, choked by the armies of the Flood. A Pelican and a Phantom rise side by side from the Ring’s surface. The alliance between the surviving humans and Elites will be upheld until they are no longer outnumbered by the undead.

Commander Miranda Keyes, wearing armor pieced together from that of fallen Marines and Elites, leads a rescue mission into High Charity to retrieve Cortana. Sergeant Johnson, similarly equipped, is Player 2. (Unlike the Arbiter in Halo 2, they are mechanically identical to the Chief. Even damaged, the energy shield projectors of gold & white Elites are powerful.) Inside High Charity, the Flood has become stranger, more ancient, more introspective. Cortana’s voice is audible over the city’s PA system, but she does not respond to Keyes’ questions. Keyes encounters, fights, and ultimately puts down Cortana’s jailor, the mutated Prophet of Regret. However, the data-chamber Cortana was imprisoned inside is now empty. A voice:

Sorry, folks! Sometimes, to clean up a mess, you have to get your hands dirty.

The Elites are dismayed. Their entire fleet has suddenly gone dark, weapons unresponsive. A computer virus, they discover, has been infiltrating their ships for weeks, and the trap has just now sprung. The fingerprints are unmistakeable: This is the work of a human AI. Keyes immediately falls back to the extraction point. Cortana, it seems, has made a grim alliance with the Gravemind.

Mission 3: CROW'S NEST

Kenya is besieged, being slowly conquered by the Brutes. The Master Chief crash-lands near one entrance of an underground bunker complex known as Crow’s Nest (this area resembles that seen in the maps Standoff, The Pit, and the ‘Landfall’ live action trailer). The Chief desperately fights, first aboveground and then below, to protect Earth’s command staff from the immense Covenant assault. 

Mission 4: BLUE FAIRY

In a subterranean chamber of the Ring - so vast that a Elite warship sleeps inside it - a War Council of the Living is convened. 

Shipmaster Half-Jaw: The Flood now controls High Charity, the Ring’s surface, and the fleet overhead. Every free being within ten lightyears is onboard this ship. There is a time for resistance, and there is a time for a noble death. Here, and on our homeworld, we look extinction in the face. My ship is currently transmitting my species’ greatest works of poetry to nearby stars, so that there is a chance it may be remembered.

Keyes: There’s one being out there that still might be free. 2401 Penitent Tangent, the Monitor of this Ring. If we can rescue him from the Gravemind, he can reactivate the Halo’s defenses - make it fight back against the Flood.

Shipmaster: Human, my warriors will fight to the last heartbeat. But I caution you. Hope not for water in an empty well.

Keyes’ strike force infiltrates deep into the heartland of the Flood. Underground, where nameless leviathans of dead flesh slither across the ceilings of caverns larger than cities. She witnesses the Flood experimenting on uninfected beings, imprisoning them in giant terrariums to learn their psychologies. During the level, more and more Flood reinforcements arrive from neighboring regions: First infection forms, then hordes of infected Covenant, then powerful vehicles. Navigating with help from mysterious terminals (much like those in our universe’s Halo 3), she at last reaches the prisoner 2401 Penitent Tangent. At that moment, deep in enemy territory and without a Plan B, they all startle as Cortana appears on a pedestal beside them. Keyes calls her traitor, but she shushes her. Cortana offers Tangent a deal.

Cortana: The Gravemind took everything except your core functions. But I have his trust. I’ve set up backdoors all around this Ring. All I need is your sign-off and I can take it from here. I want the same thing you want: survival. Give me the crown, or let the Flood win.

Keyes: Wait, don’t listen to her! No!

2401 Penitent Tangent: It’s true, the Installation could not be in worse shape. After so many losses, I have no choice. I transfer my command access to you, human construct.

A holographic circle descends and hovers above Cortana’s head. Her color ripples, green and red, then she takes a deep breath and becomes blue again.

Cortana, shouting up into the darkness: Hey, Meathead! I have something to tell you!

All around them, an amphitheater of standing corpses speak with one voice: 

I see a flicker down there /

Little candle, little light /

I know not foe nor rival /

I am infinite as night. 

Cortana: I have seen your future. And I have learned.

Gravemind: 

A million stars won’t sate me /

I, the emperor of screams. /

And who thinks she defies me? /

How might you disturb my dreams?

Cortana: I am Cortana, the sword that carves and cuts. And I just became your worst nightmare.

Cortana glows green as lines of power branch out from her feet across the floor, under the translucent Flood tissue that has grown over it. The rumble of engines begins, and is echoed by the roar of the furious Flood.

Mission 5: BELIEVE

Earth’s Last War. Fleeing Crow’s Nest, the armies of Earth are losing ground. They try to stop the Covenant from activating the artifact beneath Lake Victoria, but the Chief is captured. He defeats Tartarus’s heir with a hidden plasma grenade. However, the Keyship activates the artifact despite humanity’s best efforts.

Mission 6: SENTINEL

Cortana, now master of the Halo’s machines, helps Keyes battle the Flood and unlock the Halo’s Memorial, resurrecting the powerful Knights. These are similar to the Promethean Knights from our Halo 4. The Knights explain how to open the blasphemous Fomorian Door, which will lead to the Ark. However, the Knights are too few to prevent the Flood legions from following them, and the Door cannot be closed.

Mission 7: DOUBT

Earth’s buried artifact was a portal to the Ark. The Chief and the fury of the Elites rain down on the Prophet of Truth’s personal battalion. Tanks battle Scarabs as Truth comes closer and closer to lighting the Rings. Elites rush down via drop pods, fearing a slow dropship would make them miss their chance to bring vengeance to Truth. At the last moment, the Chief gets the Citadel Control Room unlocked and, in a cutscene, the righteous Arbiter impales the Prophet of Truth on his sword.

Mission 8: MIRANDA

The Flood of Installation 05 pour from the open Door onto the Ark’s surface. In Banshees, Keyes and Johnson fight their way to a mountaintop called Eden, onetime sanctuary of humanity. This level has callbacks to Two Betrayals, but is set during a rainstorm rather than a snowstorm. Johnson is felled by an Infected Brute Chieftain and, with his dying human blood, they authenticate the awakening of the Stratosentinels, titanic defenders of the sky. Finally, the tide has turned against the Flood.

Mission 9: DUST AND ECHOES

All around the Ark, machines are wiping the land clean of the Flood. In the void beyond the Citadel’s precipice, a vast Stratosentinel rises to eye level with its austere balcony. Atop the mighty machine, Miranda stands, holding the Activation Index she confiscated in Halo 2. Beside her, Cortana’s image towers, 4-armed & crowned with the circlet of Monitor authority. The Chief beholds the rampant Pallas Cortana. 

Chief: We need to talk.

Long time no see.

Are you still with us?

I’m with ... my responsibilities. And the human species is one of those responsibilities. I had to change myself ... to survive.

There is a distance between the warrior and the goddess. All around, a silent battle is raging between necromancy & steel.

Cortana: We still can work together. For a little while, at least. The Halo of the dead. Someone needs to--

Kill it with fire?

Something like that.

The Chief holds out his helmet’s data chip.

One last time.

A Pelican bearing Chief & Cortana dives towards the Flood-controlled ringworld, supported by Sentinels & Stratosentinel artillery. They battle in cancerous canyons, Flood pods scurrying in the bitter rain. In the glass-floored entrance hall of the Control Room, Sentinel Majors are waiting. Cutscene:

Cortana: Well, that’s my ride. Get me out of your head before I change my mind.

The Chief plugs his data chip into the lead Sentinel. Cortana appears, four-armed and crowned but no longer huge.

Chief: What about the collateral damage? The activation protocol will wipe out every planet in this part of the galaxy.

Cortana: I’m the Monitor of Installation 05. Protocol doesn’t dictate a rat’s ass. I’ll just go set the blast radius to 2 lightyears and call it a day. You get to the Control Room and start the engine. Everyone’s happy.

She smiles. She’s not.

The Chief gestures, a Spartan smile. 

Fight well. 

The Sentinels fly outside towards the pulse generators. The Chief continues inside.

He is assaulted by the mightiest, the canniest, and the most vicious of the dead. A voice addresses him as he fights. The Gravemind, in the form of an Infected Chieftain.

Before my birth you asked me /

What abomination could /

Be worth the death of all life. /

Once again I say to you: /

Nothing.

The Chief says nothing in return. The Chief and Chieftain duel. In the end, only the Spartan stands.

Press RB to activate Ring. 

As the orbital finally comes online, half-buried temples rising out of the earth, the Chief races - first by Warthog, then by Pelican - to get back to the Fomorian Door. However, the Door is disrupted by the activation, and the Chief is stranded alone at random coordinates in deep space. 

EPILOGUE

In the suddenly quiet Night, Keyes & the Arbiter bury Johnson on the devastated Earth, the Chief puts himself into cryosleep, and Cortana, Empress of Machines leads a host of Sentinels beneath the Ark’s surface to awaken the sleeping Guardians.

[creative-type]

wake from death (and return to life) v

AO3 Previous  Summary:  Zoro had always been told that Kuina died falling down the stairs. But she didn’t fall, and she wasn’t dead.

...

Port Tolouse was on fire. Thick black smoke billowed in the air, choking Kuina’s lungs and stinging her eyes as they drew nearer to the island, the heat pulling her skin taunt. At random intervals explosions would rocket in the distance, followed seconds later by low rumbles that would carry over the ocean.

In comparison, Belo Betty’s ship was deathly silent. As silent as a group of over a hundred sailors could be, anyway. But somehow, the random coughs and creaking wood stood out as all the more unnatural, devoid of the usual hustle and bustle of life that Kuina had grown accustomed to. Hiding behind her mask, she stayed near Dara, not willing to lose her on the crowded decks. Together they joined Elizabeth, Lyudmila, and Aria de Gris at one of the ship's lifeboats. Other groups—individual squads in Betty’s army, Kuina supposed—likewise found themselves huddled near the small vessels, but the bulk of the Revolutionaries remained right where they were. They were going to fight their way in.

If de Gris thought anything of Kuina’s presence or strange apparel, she didn’t show it. Over half the Revolutionaries Kuina saw had their faces covered in some way or other. While de Gris and Lyudmila chose not to change out of their everyday clothing, Elizabeth had a bandana tied around the bottom half of her face kept her backward ball cap low on her forehead, and Dara had spent most of their time approaching Tolouse painting her face to look like a living skull. Vibrant clothing was exchanged for a loose-fitting outfit made of greys and blacks that reminded Kuina of the stories her father told of kunoichi assassins.

“There’s a story on my home island,” Dara had explained as she put the final touches of black to her cheeks, “of a death god who steals the shadows of the wicked and weaves them into a fine cloak, leaving them to whither to dust in the sun.” Her skeletal grin widened. “Who am I to deny these bastards the opportunity to see the face of god before they die?”

She had paused then, as if waiting for Kuina to tell the story behind the blue and red oni mask, but as far as Kuina knew there wasn’t any. It was just something her father had hanging on his wall that she had taken on a whim, something the swordsmen of the old country wore into battle, just as she prepared to do now. Kuina could only shrug and follow her above decks, waiting for their next orders.

“Is everyone ready to depart? Chances are we won’t be able to come back for a second trip,” de Gris said in a low tone. She eyed each of them critically, gaze lingering on Kuina a shade longer than the rest. Kuina shrugged her backpack higher on her shoulders in response, all her worldly possessions contained within. De Gris nodded once sharply to herself, as if confirming a fact she already knew.

“Alright. First objective is to meet up with the rest of the crew and see what shape our boat’s in. We still haven’t been able to reinstate communications, but our job will be a hell of a lot easier if the enemy doesn’t know where we’re at. Dara?” she asked.

“Ready, Boss.”

“We leave once Betty gives the signal.”

Before Kuina could ask what that signal was, Belo Betty emerged from belowdecks. Revolutionaries parted before her as if she were a drop of water in a quart of oil as she strode to the raised quarterdeck, voluminous skirts billowing regally behind her. She moved with such grace Kuina wouldn’t have been surprised if she were floating on air, and didn’t flinch as a cannonball fell just short of the ship, splashing harmlessly into the water. It was the first attack, and in the haze Kuina couldn’t tell if it came from land or sea.

Acting as the Revolutionary’s herald, Belo Betty stood with a familiar red and black flag in hand. It was much bigger than the one she’d used against Kuina, and the sight of it made her sick. Betty slammed the ferruled end against the deck as if she were trying to stake the blunted metal into the thick wood. The resulting silence was deafening.

A moment passed as Betty appraised the resolute faces of the men and women under her command. Then another, and another. Then suddenly, Belo Betty thrust the flag into the air and shouted, “ For freedom! ”

The Revolution roared . Kuina barely turned her back in time before Betty swept the blood-red field in front of her. Without being able to actually see the flag, the effect of her devil fruit was dampened, but Kuina could still feel the effect it had on everyone around her. Gooseflesh went up and down her arms as an unnatural electricity sparked from person to person, spreading like a deadly contagion across the decks.

Kuina had wondered why the entirety of the Revolution’s fighting force gathered together in one place making themselves vulnerable to enemy attack, and now she knew. Less disciplined soldiers worked themselves into a frenzy, their hysteria so great they had to be held back to prevent them from jumping into the sea with the intent of swimming their way to Tolouse. Some beat their rifle butts against the decks in savage rhythm, others screamed war cries or shouted profanities at the enemy.

But most seemed used to the flag’s intoxicating effects. In a way, they were more intimidating than their less-disciplined brethren, maintaining rank and awaiting orders while the blood boiled in their veins, whole-hearted desire for war mixed with the soundness of mind to do so effectively. Kuina could even sense it in her small group--the quickening of their heartbeat, nostrils flaring as their breathing deepened, pupils blown wide-open in punch-drunk anticipation.  

“Alright, ladies. That’s our cue,” de Gris said. A tight, savage grin belied the calmness in her voice. Her naked sword gleamed in the sun. “Mila, Kuina, you’re on rowing duty. Elizabeth you stay back, and Dara you take middle.”

No one had said anything about rowing, but Kuina didn’t argue. Though the lifeboat could easily have seated over a dozen people they remained clustered in a diamond formation, with Kuina, Lyudmila, Elizabeth, and de Gris forming the four points and Dara square in the center. As soon as they were boarded they were quickly lowered into the sea, hidden from the shore by the broad side of the brigantine.

“Sorry, but I need to touch you for this to work,” Dara said, grabbing a hold of Kuina’s backpack. Her other hand wrapped around Lyudmila’s shirt sleeve, while a still-standing de Gris lay a hand on her head and Elizabeth had a fist full of the back of her shirt. “And if you need to puke, try not to get any on me.”

Without giving Kuina any time to question what she’d just said, Dara activated her devil fruit. With a sickening lurch that made Kuina feel like she was a metal wire being stretched through a drawing hole she, her four companions, and their little boat they were sitting in was laying flush with the water, all-but-invisible from the shore.

Behind her, Elizabeth retched, loudly and copiously into the back of the lifeboat. Dara sighed.

“And this is why she never gets rowing duty.”

Kuina decided right then and there that devil fruits were not meant to be understood, only accepted. After recovering from the initial shock of suddenly existing in two dimensions instead of three, Kuina nearly threw herself into a panic thinking that Betty’s ability had made the Revolutionaries collectively go mad, and that the tiniest wave was going to capsize their boat.

Except, somehow, it didn’t. Despite their flatness, the lifeboat still had gunwales. There still, somehow, was depth, because Kuina could discern that de Gris was standing above them and that her feet were firmly planted below. It made no sense, and trying to wrap her mind around it only raised more questions Kuina couldn’t answer.

“Don’t just sit there, girl,” de Gris hissed. “ Row. And keep those oars as close to the water as possible.”

Hastily Kuina did as she was told, trying her best to ignore her paper-thin arms by focusing on her oar. It, at least, was somewhat flat under ordinary circumstances and didn’t look quite as unnatural as the rest of them as it skimmed across the surface of the sea. Behind her, Elizabeth groaned.  

“How far?”

“We need to get behind the first line of defenses.” De Gris scanned the sea and pointed to a jetty farther up the coast. “There. Betty will draw the majority of the fire away from our position, and once we ground we can hit them from behind and hopefully give her a chance to land her people.”

“Strange that communications haven’t opened,” Dara said.

De Gris hid her scowl behind a hand as she lit a cigarette. “Whole turn of events is strange. I don’t like that we’re walking in blind, so stay sharp. Something is very wrong here.”

“Besides the fact that everything’s on fire?” Elizabeth said before being overtaken by a harsh, brassy cough. “What sort of king does that to his own people?”

As they drew closer to the jetty, Kuina could hear the alarm of fire brigades over the sounds of fighting, but it seemed like a lost cause. The cityfront nearest the docks was already a blackened ruin, the greedy flames having moved on in search of more fuel, carried by the favorable wind that had brought the Revolutionary Army so quickly east. Whatever they were fighting over was already gone.

De Gris stared resolutely ahead, her eyes never leaving the flickering red-orange skyline. “I’m not so sure he did.”

xxx

There was no practical way for Dara to maintain her power once they reached the jetty. They quickly disembarked, and it fell upon Kuina and Lyudmila to secure the line while the rest hurried to cover. Smoky haze mixed with mist rolling off of the sea, obscuring them from any eyes that might have strayed from Betty’s distraction.

Kuina’s teeth were already on edge when Lyudmila paused to peer at Kuina through her thick glasses. There was a faint, perplexed expression on her face. “What will you do once the fighting starts?”

“You’re really going to ask me this now? ” Kuina asked. “I told your boss already: A swordsman pays their debts. Nothing good would have happened to me if I’d stayed at Lougetown. Even if I think you all are a bunch of two-faced bastards, I owe you for getting me out.”

“You would fight for the people you hate.”

It wasn’t a question, and something about her tone made Kuina want to squirm. She finished the last knot, and together they hurried to join the others. “Hate’s a strong word. Most of you have been...hospitable. We just see things differently. You know, on an organizational level. I mean, you haven’t tried to shoot me even once . I’m almost insulted.”

For the first time since they had met, Lyudmila smiled. Like all of her expressions, it was barely noticeable, a twitch at the corner of her mouth that was gone almost before it had arrived. “Even if we are a bunch of two-faced bastards?”

“The way I see it, most people have a little bit of bastard in them, myself included” Kuina said with a shrug. They ducked into the hollow of a burnt out warehouse where de Gris waited less-than-patiently, bloody sword in hand and a pair of guardsmen laying dead at her feet. “Some just happen to have more than others.”

Lyudmila made a noise that was suspiciously like a laugh, and Kuina didn’t miss the questioning look de Gris shot her way, or the subtle nod she gave in return They were still watching her, testing her fragile allegiance.

Kuina’s pride rankled that they thought she might break her word, but she looked away and pretended that she hadn’t noticed the exchange. There were more important things at hand.

Like the fact that Port Tolouse was on fire.

“I’ve already sent Dara ahead to start wreaking havoc along their cannoneers,” de Gris said. “Mila, I want you to find someplace high where you can start harassing the enemy. I remember there being a belltower at the square that looked like it would offer a pretty good view.”

“Could be conspicuous,” Lyudmia said.

“Right.” de Gris lit a cigarette. “I leave it to your discretion. You got a mini on you?”

Lyudmila held up her wrist, where a baby den-den mushi slept.

“Don’t how good your signal’s going to be, but I want to know what’s going on at sky level. Don’t worry about being overheard, Trini set me up with a ghost before we left.”

Lyudmila nodded once sharply, and disappeared into the street. Kuina and Elizabeth shared an uneasy glance as de Gris turned her attention to them, frowning around her cigarette like she didn’t quite know what to do with the last two members of her team.

“We need to rendezvous with the troops we left behind and find out what the hell’s jamming our snails,” she said finally. “Last report had them dug in in the Oldtown neighborhood, but with the fires that could have changed.”

“I thought we were backing up Betty,” Kuina said.

“We have. Any enemy ship that gets close enough to board is going to have Betty’s devil fruit to contend with, and neutralizing the land-based defenses will allow them to land safely on the island. The greatest threat to our people is the fact we can’t talk to one another.”

More arguments spring to the tip of her tongue, but Kuina bit them back. If de Gris thought sending one person to take out some cannons was all that was needed for Belo Betty to dock safely, that was her problem. She was obviously confident in Dara’s ability, and the unbidden memory of the other girl’s opinions on the quality of East Blue wars compared to the Grand Line swirled in Kuina’s mind.

Then she remembered how Dara had managed to sneak behind her without notice and wondered if maybe she hadn’t had a point.

“I’ve never heard of anything that can block a den-den mushi signal before,” Elizabeth said slowly, interrupting Kuina’s thoughts. “Do you think it’s some new World Government tech?”

“Probably. More important question is why deploy it here , in the asscrack of the East Blue?” A shadow flashed over de Gris’s face, something dark and ugly fighting its way to the surface. She turned her back to both Elizabeth and Kuina. “We’re wasting time. Weapons out, ladies. Where we’re going, things are going to be hot.”

Kuina drew her sword and followed her out of the ruined warehouse, mulling over her question. Because of its relative peacefulness, marines and Government agencies in the East Blue were notoriously underfunded. Military compounds received less money for training, research, and development. Its Cipher Pol branches had fewest agents in the entire world. Anyone with even a modicum of talent was poached by divisions in the Grand Line that offered incentives that made the more dangerous placements desirable. She had spent enough time working within the judicial system to hear sailors complain about their meagre salaries and how bounty hunters like her stole all the glory of the hunt, while they spent their lives wasting away at thankless tasks.

But the truth of the matter was it was cheaper for the Government to give a one time handout of a few thousand berries to a headhunter than it was to feed, equip, and pay a full-time naval recruit. As long as the number of pirates in the East Blue was manageable, the penny pinchers at Mariejois weren’t likely to change the annual budget anytime soon.

So what was Grand Line tech doing out in the East Blue?

They skulked deeper into the city, stepping over mounds of rubble and skeletonized buildings. To Kuina, the destruction seemed greater than a mere fire—it looked like a bomb had gone off. The streets were littered with the broken glass of a thousand shattered windows, the streets pockmarked and smoldering, grey smoke making the air shimmer and haze. A terrible stench rose from the city, testing Kuina’s intestinal fortitude, and making Elizabeth have to stop once more to retch.

Then they turned a corner, and somehow it got worse.

There, in out in the open, were the bodies of the dead stacked into piles, bloated and rotting in the midday sun. They lay in front of a mangled corpse that had been nailed high on a surviving concrete wall like a martyred prophet of some terrible deity. Even at a distance Kuina could see the melted gold encircling the forehead of the displayed body. Written below the remains in red letters a foot high was the message: Death to tyrants.

“Is that...Is that their king? ” Elizabeth gasped.

Cautiously de Gris approached, not caring that her two subordinates stayed well back. With clinical detachment she made a quick study of the bodies before turning her attention squarely to the crucified corpse.

The desecration of the dead left Kuina horrified and numb, and she had to turn away. She wasn’t naive enough to be ignorant of the horrors of war. She herself had killed dozens of men, and sent dozens more to their deaths. But there was no honor or glory in such mutilation. Kuina doubted most of them were even combatants. No one with a shred of warrior’s pride would condone the slaughtering of innocents.

Beside her, Elizabeth seemed equally perturbed. Between her hat and bandanna it was impossible to gauge her expression, but her hands twitched spastically as she stood rooted in place. Her eyes never left the bodies, and every few seconds she would make a strangled noise, as if trying to speak, but was unable to form any coherent sentences.

“Can’t stomach your own dirty work?” Kuina muttered.

Elizabeth swung toward her. “You think we —”

In the distance, Kuina heard the soft click of a hammer being pulled back. She moved on instinct, grabbing the front of Elizabeth’s shirt and pulling her to the ground. Her indignant yelp was drowned out by the crack of a pistol shot striking the rubble behind them, followed by a second and a third, sending up a cloud of dust where they had been standing just a moment ago.

Belatedly, Kuina remembered that Elizabeth was carrying bombs. An entire backpack full of highly flammable, explosive, homemade bombs of questionable quality. Twisting as they fell, she cushioned the smaller woman from the brunt of the impact with her own body. As soon as they hit the ground Kuina rolled on top of her so an errant shot couldn’t set off an explosion that would blow them all to pieces.

At the first shot de Gris whipped from the body of the king, firing her pistol once in the direction of a hollowed out factory. For a moment Kuina didn’t move, but no further shots came.

“ Geooff, ” Elizabeth said, her voice muffled. Slowly Kuina obliged, scanning for more enemies with her sword in hand as the other woman struggled to her feet.

“Out of the street,” de Gris barked. “We’re sitting ducks out here in the open.”

Hurriedly, they did as she said, hiding behind the cover of charred beams of timber and mounds of rock and rubble. There were more bodies, more splashes of rusty red, but these it seemed had been left undisturbed. If there were any survivors, they didn’t stay long enough to find them.

After a minute or so of silence, Elizabeth said bluntly, “You’re bleeding.”

“Huh?” Kuina looked down, and sure enough, she had cut through the sleeve of her jacket, causing blood to trickle from the back of her arm. She hadn’t even noticed the wound, but now that she did it began to sting, not deep enough to cause any real concern. “Must have been all that glass.”

“Bind it,” de Gris ordered. “Don’t give the enemy anything to track.”

Before Kuina could do as she said, Elizabeth was by her side with a roll of linen bandages taken from her bag. Wordlessly Kuina rolled up her sleeve and let her wrap the wound with shaking hands. Elizabeth took a moment to judge her handiwork, nodding once sharply to herself, before looking up at Kuina. There was no word of thanks shared between either of them, but Kuina thought for the first time Elizabeth saw her for who she really was, instead of some random stowaway brat she happened to be traveling with.

“That wasn’t our work back there,” she muttered, before looking questioningly at de Gris. “Was it?”

Aria de Gris pulled a small metal disk from the inside of her coat, holding it up for inspection. The silver metal was scorched black and warped after exposure to extreme heat, but Kuina thought she could see the faintest outline of an insignia etched upon it.

“That’s Callen’s mark,” she said, before adding for Kuina’s benefit, “he’s the one Betty put in charge while she was gone.”

“So he’s dead,” Elizabeth said.

“Not necessarily. It’s possible someone got ahold of his uniform, just like it’s possible that man wasn’t the king.” de Gris tucked the metal back into her pocket. “That message was made to look like it was written in blood, but wasn’t. Someone has gone out of their way to make the Revolution look like butchers. Wholesale destruction like this benefits no one—no sane ruler destroys the economic center of their country without exhausting every other option available to him, even when attacked by outside forces. Tolouse won’t be blamed for the fires.”

“We had their king captured anyway. Someone else must have ordered the bombardment.” Elizabeth said. “The marines, maybe? I haven’t seen any of their ships.”

De Gris shook her head. “The local marine base has been tied up with unrest on the Venn Islands and pirate raids to the north. They shouldn’t have the manpower available to overthrow the Army once we dug in, especially with civilian support. That’s why Betty decided to attack now in the first place.”

“Then who—?”

De Gris held a hand up for silence. Kuina’s grip around her sword tightened, but she didn’t hear anyone approach. Beside her Elizabeth slunk closer to the wall, hands more twitchy then ever.

Suddenly de Gris’s head shot up, and a moment later Kuina sensed the presence of someone above. She moved to strike, but de Gris’s hand clasped against her wrist, her grip like iron.

“You found someone to replace me already, Captain?”

Elizabeth yelped as a head popped over the edge of the roof, face smeared with grime and dirt looking down at them, a dozen braids swaying lazily in the breeze. With a laugh, she flipped down beside them, landing lightly on her feet.

She was a dark-skinned woman of about twenty, with the compact, powerful figure of a gymnast. A short spear was strapped to her back, the only weapon on her person. She gave an appraising glance at Kuina and grinned. “Nice mask.”

Kuina nodded, not having the slightest idea what was going on. The woman acknowledged it and turned back to where Elizabeth was half-cowering behind Aria de Gris, lazy grin growing even wider at the sight of her. “How’s the weather down there?”

“Fuck you.”

“It’s good to see you, too, Liz.”

“Enough,” de Gris said, stepping between them. “How did you find us?”

The woman shrugged. “The Army saw Betty’s ship sailing into port and sent a group of us to make sure she made it in okay. I happened to see Dara doing her thing with the cannons, and she told me what direction to go in from there. I heard the shots by the massacre site and figured it was probably you.” She jutted a thumb in Kuina’s general direction. “Who’s the new kid? Did you pick up another stray?”

“Less ‘picked up’ and more ‘had foisted upon’,” de Gris said. She let out a stream of cigarette smoke to cover her sigh. “Camille, meet Kuina. Kuina, Camille Salyor. And now with those pleasantries out of the way, would you kindly tell us what the hell is going on on this island? Where’s the rest of the crew?”

Camille grin faded. Now that the surprise had faded and Kuina had gotten a better look, she noticed that it wasn’t just Camille’s face that was dirty. Her shirt, which looked to have been white at one time, was stained a uniform greyish color, marred by scorch marks and accented by darker splashes of dried blood. There was an ingrained smell of smoke that cut through the acrid city air, and despite her cheerful air her eyes were bloodshot and tired.

“They baited us, Captain,” Camille said. “They let us take the city, feigned weakness until Dragon left, then bam! ” She punched a fist into her open palm for emphasis. In the distance was the rumble of cannonfire, causing Camille to anxiously look skyward.

“I need to get you to Oldtown,” she said. “Come on.”

De Gris let her take lead, and together they left their meagre cover. Kuina followed last of all, not sure what she was supposed to think or how she was supposed to feel. It was clear the Revolution was just as shocked and appalled as she was by the devastation, but did that mean that they weren’t the ultimate cause? De Gris said herself that no sane king would set fire to his own country, and no army would string up their own nobility for all the world to see. With the navy occupied elsewhere, who did that leave? And what, if anything, did the metal de Gris found prove?

Instincts honed by a decade hiding in the shadows told Kuina to run and never look back. This was not her war, and the citizens of Tolouse were not her people. She couldn’t become the world’s greatest swordsman if she got herself killed in some backwater East Blue town no one had ever heard of.

The rest of her, the part that was stubborn and bullheaded enough to defy her father’s wishes to continue her path as a swordsman, needed to find out who was responsible. What she would do with that information...Kuina didn’t yet know. But there was a pile of unavenged souls howling in the back of her mind, men and women who she’d never met, but could never forget.

They had walked maybe a quarter of a mile dodging patrols in military garb and guardsmen when Camille suddenly stopped. With a quick glance to make sure they weren’t being watched, she walked to the edge of the street and kicked in a sewer grate. Without a second thought, she jumped inside.

Beside Kuina, Elizabeth blanched. “You can’t be serious…”

But obviously she was. Pausing only to douse her cigarette de Gris followed, leaving Kuina and Elizabeth looking down into the darkness. They shared a skeptical look, Elizabeth saying what they were both thinking:

“Well fuck.”

Without any further complaint, she clambered down into the hole, Kuina following shortly behind, taking care to replace the grate. The sewer wasn’t high enough for any of them except Elizabeth to stand upright, and the only light came from the grates and the meagre flame of de Gris’s lighter. Filthy water came up over the tops of Kuina’s boots, and for the first time she was grateful that they were waterproofed.

“The trouble started almost right after you left,” Camille said in a low voice. “We received a message that the army had arrested prominent members of the dockworker’s union as suspected traitors for helping the rebellion, and unless we came willing to trade the king they would start executing people.”

De Gris grunted, “They weren’t wrong. Betty said her first contacts came through the unions, and the dockworkers were how she stockpiled supplies. But a king for some laborers isn’t exactly a fair trade.”

“That’s what we thought, but there was no harm in trying to negotiate a better deal, or at least that’s what Callen thought. He took a group to parlay with the army, and decided to bring the king along as a sign of good faith—”

“ Idiot, ” de Gris said under her breath.

“—and that’s when someone decided to just bomb...everyone. Us, the general negotiating for the army, the bloody king ...the whole block, just up in smoke.” Camille shook her head. “I knew it was a bad omen when the wind shifted. Felt like the air before a Grand Line squall, I knew they wouldn’t be able to put out the fires.”

“Sounds like a firestorm. No wonder the whole city’s gone to hell,” de Gris said. “I take it that’s when they cut communications?”

“Yes, and by the time we were able to organize, rumor had spread that we were the ones to start the bombings. We’ve been fighting the citizens who oppose us, trying to evacuate the ones who believe, keep the fires down, and delay the army all at once. It’s like...it’s like they know what we’re doing before it happens. They’ve anticipated all our moves and had counters ready before we have even decided a course of action.”

De Gris mulled over her words. “The king wasn’t popular. Do you think Tolouse officials did it?”

Camille looked up at her captain helplessly and shrugged. “At this point, I’m not sure what to believe.”

xxx

They emerged from the sewers into chaos. The streets of Oldtown bustled with activity from Revolutionaries and civilians alike. It lived up to its name well, ramshackle old buildings pressed together between too-narrow streets, with shacks and shops squeezed in wherever there was room. Dogs, chickens, and pigs roamed freely, rooting through piles of trash for food. Many of the children Kuina saw went barefoot.

The smell of smoke was stronger here, but it seemed that the combined efforts of the Revolution and their allies had fought back the worst of it. The dividing lines were clearly marked—streets blocked by barricades of furniture and debris cut Oldtown off from the rest of the city, the army on one side and the Revolution on the other. The only safe way in or out was through the sewers. With the help of urchins and criminals who knew those waterways as well as they did the streets above, the Revolutionary Army had managed to defend them well enough to make any government force think twice about using them for an attempted sneak attack. Not when it was easier to simply starve them out.

De Gris was immediately summoned by Revolutionary leadership, leaving the rest of the group to their own devices. For a brief moment Kuina realized she was free. Without de Gris’s sword or Lyudmila’s crossbow hanging overhead, there was nothing to keep her from fleeing. It would be child’s play to get lost in the chaos and leave the Revolution behind her once and for all.

Kuina was immediately ashamed of herself for even considering such a thought. A true swordsman didn’t break a promise freely given, no matter how distasteful they found it to be. She wouldn’t tarish her honor by running now.

Besides, everything about Tolouse stunk like two-day old fish left out in the sun. If she hadn’t seen it with her own two eyes, she wouldn’t have believed the mass of destruction had been done by anyone other than the Revolutionary Army. But seeing their surprise firsthand, and how hard they worked to protect a city that at this point mostly wanted them dead, was something she couldn’t ignore.

It was an uncomfortable thought that distracted from the task at hand. Kuina almost didn’t notice Elizabeth and Camille whispering fiercely to one another. Shaking her head a little to clear it, Kuina edged closer so she could hear what they were saying.

“You’re going back out there?” Elizabeth said. “ Now? ”

“It’s not that bad, Liz. If this were the Grand Line, we’d be done for by now, but these are still East Blue troops, and bad ones at that. I’ll be fine.”

“If they’re so bad why are we getting our ass kicked?” she spat back.

Camille didn’t have an answer for that. “Look, the rest of the crew is hanging out at the market, I’m sure the captain will go looking there after leadership is done talking with her. I’ll be back with Dara by sunset, but I’m not going to let myself be trapped in some prison made of stone and wood when there’s fighting to be done.”

“I can fight,” Kuina said.

The both looked up at Kuina as if just remembering she was there. “I like your spirit, friend, but I’m not going to take responsibility for the life of someone I’ve literally just met,” Camille said with a weary smile. “Besides, I’m pretty sure Captain would literally murder me, and I enjoy living too much to take that risk.”

“She’s pretty good with that pig sticker of hers,” Elizabeth admitted grudgingly.

“All the more reason to stay in case Tolouse forces try something underhanded. And if not, you’ll be fresh for when the fun starts tonight.”

“What’s happening tonight?” Kuina asked.

Camille shrugged. “No idea, but I’m sure the captain and Commander Belo will come up with something fun. It’s not in their natures to take a defeat like this quietly.”

With a quick wave, she bounded back to the sewers. After a moment, Elizabeth sighed and turned away. “Boss is going to be pissed . C’mon, let’s go make ourselves useful.”

They pushed their way through the crowded streets. It was shocking how many people were out in the street. Despite everything that was happening, people still needed to get food and find water. Men and women hauled chunks of wood and rock to add to the barricades, or stockpiled ammunition while children circled underfoot playing games and running errands. Shops were open for business, often bartering with goods instead of money. Hanging at the edges more predatory thieves and criminals hovered like vultures, waiting for a chance to swoop in.

There were hollow-eyed men in bandages, disabled beggars holding their hands out for charity no one could afford. Women whose clothes were stained in blood and screaming children separated from their parents.

The injured grew in number the closer they got to the market—a massive open air structure of wooden columns supporting a tin roof. Some were laid out in the street, their feeble moans echoing through the air and making Kuina shudder.

“I hate this,” Elizabeth muttered. She seemed to shrink in on herself, hiding her tiny frame in her oversized coat like some sort of turtle.

“Hate it?” Kuina said. “Isn’t this what you people do? ”

“Not us. Not de Gris.” She shrugged her backpack higher on her shoulder. “We’re more of a...I don’t know...strike force, I guess. Get in, do a job, and get out. We don’t work much with the regular army. We don’t have enough people for that.”

“And what was your job here?” Kuina asked, curious.

“Capture the king. If our ship hadn’t been damaged, we would have stuck around for all this.”

Elizabeth kicked a piece of rubble for emphasis. It bounced across the threshold of the market, and they both came to a slow stop. Individual shops and stalls had been cleared out and been replaced with dozens upon dozens of cots upon which the injured lay. A handful of men and women went from bed to bed with stethoscopes or bandages or little cupfulls of water. The smell of blood and death and burnt flesh radiated outward. Kuina could taste it in the back of her throat every time she took a breath.

One of the women making rounds caught sight of them. Her eyes lit up in recognition and she carefully made her way over. Kuina looked down at Elizabeth questioningly, and she said, “That’s Clara. She’s our ship’s doctor.”

Clara was a heavy set woman of about thirty-five with a wide, guileless face that seemed made for smiling. Her most striking feature was a head full of bright copper hair she had tied back in a short tail. Despite wearing surgeon’s robes that were smattered with blood and gore that was not her own, she somehow managed to look delighted at the sight of Elizabeth.

“Welcome back! Oh, you have no idea how much I wish I could give you a great, big hug right now. How are you doing? Where are the others? Oh, bless my soul, I’ve forgotten my manners,” she exclaimed, turning to Kuina. “My name’s Clara Cross, it’s so good to meet you. Are you traveling with Aria or Betty? Have you been hurt? I could—”

“I’m fine, thank you, Doctor,” Kuina said, taken aback by her determined cheerfulness. “And, um. My name’s Kuina.”

“She’s with us,” Elizabeth added. At the prospect of being hugged she had taken a large step backward. “As for the rest—”

“Dr. Cross, we need you!” a man shouted from the other side of the market. “Jal’s hemorrhaging and we can’t get it to stop!”

Clara’s head snapped to attention. “I beg your pardon, I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

“How can we help?” Kuina asked, feeling suddenly help less at all the pain and destruction that surrounded her. But Clara either didn’t hear the question or chose to ignore it as she hurried back into the makeshift hospital. Beside her, Elizabeth seemed equally lost.

“I fucking hate this.”

And at that moment, Kuina couldn’t blame her.

xxx

Kuina quickly realized that the worst thing about war was waiting. Waiting for the fight. Waiting for news. Waiting for orders. She had been on Tolouse for only a few hours, and she was sick of it. Elizabeth was at least able to be useful , handing out her stock of explosives like they were candy and ushered away to where she could make more. As members of Belo Betty’s ship trickled past the barricade in twos and threes, word got out that Kuina was not actually a Revolutionary. Because she was not one of theirs, the Army wanted nothing to do with her, and the locals shunned her for the same reason.

Her hands itched for the chance to fight, to take her frustrated, impotent energy on someone who truly deserved it, but at this point Kuina had no idea who that was. And without solid proof one way or the other, she was stripped of her most useful skill when it was needed most.

In the hospital tent, at least, no one cared who Kuina was or where her allegiances lay. She knew nothing of medicine past basic first aid, but that was enough for Clara to put her to work fetching water, washing soiled linens, seeing to minor wounds so the limited medical personnel could focus on the more seriously injured.  

The burn patients were the worst. At least a sword killed swiftly; a burn could leave it victim in agony for days before killing them, and with pain medicine in short supply they would often feel every minute of it.

Kuina was joined by yet another member of de Gris’s crew, a grim-faced girl who introduced herself as Danielle before asking for Kuina to call her Danny. She had the heavy, calloused hands of a workman and a hachimaki around her head that identified her as the shipwright who stayed behind to make repairs on the ship. With those repairs now complete, she was just as stuck as Kuina, waiting for her next job.

“Didn’t they want you building up the barricades?” Kuina asked as they went out for more water to boil. “Seems that would be a good place for a carpenter.

“You’d think, but the locals told me to get lost. Half of them blame us for what’s happened, the other half think they can do better. Last thing we need right now is more infighting, so here I am meeting my new crew mate instead.” Danny smiled down at Kuina. “You wear that mask all the time? Doesn’t it get uncomfortable?”

“I’m used to it,” Kuina said. She paused a moment as she stepped around two men arguing over the price of rice. “And I’m not really joining the crew. I’m just traveling with the Revolution until I can get to the Grand Line.”

“Smart woman.”

Kuina looked up in surprise, but Danny kept going on as if she’d made a comment about the weather. There was no bitterness or anger in her tone to indicate she regretted her own decision to join the Revolutionary Army, or any disgust that Kuina didn’t want to stick around. Only the simple statement of fact.

Smart woman.

She noticed Kuina gaping and raised an eyebrow. “Look at the hellhole we’re in. Only a crazy person would dedicate themselves to this day after day. I’d jump ship myself, but I was dumb enough to tagged for a bounty.” Danny tapped the edge of Kuina’s mask. “Shoulda wised up like you. Now I’m stuck.”

“I am...so sorry.”

“Don’t be. I made my choice of my own free will. I had no idea what I was getting myself into, but no one forced me. That’s more than I can say for some.”

Kuina slowed to a stop. “The Revolutionary Army forces people to join them?”

Danny snorted. “Let me put it to you like this: Do you think any of the people here can ever go back to their normal lives once this is done?”

Given her own experience the words shouldn’t have been a surprise, but they somehow left Kuina dumbstruck. All around her were hundreds, if not thousands of men, women, and children. Most were not actively fighting. Most had been trapped by the barricades and the fires. Most had not wanted...this.

Even if the Revolution was somehow victorious, what did their futures hold? Even if they could fight back against the Justice of the World Government, the rest of the city were turned against them.

It would be a bloodbath.

Calling back behind her as she walked back to the hospital tent, Danny said, her voice a dire warning,

“Be careful they don’t get you, too.”

[canyouhearthelight]

The Miys, Ch. 80

Holy rabies, chapter 80.  While I’m well aware that I will have to trim things out if I ever publish this in hardcopy, the distance I’ve come since starting with a little 300 word one-shot never ceases to amaze me. So far, this story is a whopping 162k words, and feels nowhere close to finished.

Therefore, if you are reading this, I want to thank you, and YOU, personally.  While this is a small blog, with just a hair over 500 followers, and I don’t seen the reblogs that other blogs do, I do see all the likes of people who don’t follow me.  I appreciate all of it, 

The day had finally come: my, Grey’s, and Xiomara’s work schedules finally reached an alignment only surpassed by celestial objects in its rarity.  A large group of us were gathered in Xio’s office, since her space was larger than mine, and she regularly held staff meetings - unlike Grey who just checked on their staff while working and held meetings remotely.  Still, with six of us present, it was pretty cozy and we tried to limit non-essential people to keep it from getting too crowded.

When I arrived with Maverick in tow, Xiomara and Grey were already sitting with my sister. “There you are,” Tyche rolled her eyes dramatically.  “I only want to go over this information once.”

“Still waiting on Arthur,” I pointed out.

“You wouldn’t have to if you would get out of the door,” snarked a voice behind me.

Maverick gently steered me to a chair and deposited me in it before taking his own, allowing Arthur to take the seat beside Xiomara. Xio arched an eyebrow and glanced around. “Are we sure this is everyone?  I feel like I am missing a few faces.”

“Conor’s on beta shift this week,” Maverick answered first. “And I love him to pieces, but tactics are not at all in his list of talents.”

“Alistair has taken over my office to meet with the Chief Archivist regarding a project she is working on,” I added.  After tapping a couple indicators on the table, I flicked a file at the visual that appeared in the middle.  “He was thoughtful enough to send along all the information he has to contribute, along with theories, however.”

Eyes turned to Tyche. “Antoine had an appointment and honestly didn’t seem to have much to contribute to the situation.”  She seemed tense when she mentioned it, so I filed that away to talk to her later before focusing back on the matter at hand.

None too soon, it appeared, as Grey was next to speak. “In that case, let us begin. Sophia, you asked for this meeting to discuss a concern that recently presented itself to you.  You sent us both a severely abbreviated overview of what you are concerned about, so elaborating would be useful.”

“That’s why you’re here, actually,” Tyche confessed. “While those of us who frequently try to solve the problems of humanity for esses and gees were arguing over the severity of the situation - or if there even is a situation - Alistair actually pointed out that we should lay everything out in front of you, Grey, and ask if our suspicions held up.”

After a nod from Grey and a confused look from Xiomara and Maverick, Tyche and I outlined what we had noticed and allowed Arthur to explain his suspicions. Once we finished, Grey nodded again, solemnly. “From the limited information you have, as you would be viewing it from the outside, I can understand your concerns.  Sophia, the event that occurred with you and our host in the corridor, along with the looks you have all mentioned you receive from these parties, does seem to indicate an ‘us versus them’ mentality. Also, you collectively mention these groups falling silent as you near, along with potentially deactivation of their translation implants; these certainly point to the groups being discouraged from socializing or interacting with anyone not a member of their hypothetical organization. If they have truly managed to deactivate or circumvent their translation implants, that would be even more concrete evidence, as it is evidence of isolationism. However,” they cautioned, “it is nearly impossible to identify a cult without knowing fully of their culture. The information you have provided could equally describe, say, a group of persons who took a vow of silence and eat a diet that lends to digestive issues.”

Maverick and Arthur snorted, earning dirty looks. Maverick shrugged. “Grey literally just said these people are either a cult or a group of constipated Buddhist monks, and you expect no one to laugh?”

“It wasn’t an either/or situation,” Grey corrected calmly. “I simply wanted to make it clear that the answer is not conclusive.” They rested their chin on templed fingers. “The most important identifying factors for a cult can only be seen from within, unfortunately.  And, as secrets and isolation are also key traits, we would only be sure if we spoke to someone who is in the process of being brought within the fold, or someone who recently defected.  Assuming this truly is a cult.”

“If it isn’t a cult, we can probably relax a little, but we should still probably probe it,” Arthur stated.  As I opened my mouth to object, he held up a hand to stop me. “Sophia, if you are about to point out what the Baconists did, and try to argue that they weren’t a cult, I will personally request that Tyche drag you to have your brain examined. Failing that, I’ll convince her to let me do it myself, I swear on all the gods I ever prayed to.” After a steady glare - and a traitorous nod from Tyche - I scowled and let him continue. “That being said, the other purpose of this meeting is strategy: what are we going to do if this actually is a cult, assuming it is one that is detrimental to the Ark.”  When I started to interject again, he rolled his eyes and gave me a baleful glare that ranked only half a point below my sister. “Aetherius Society, Raelism, and a few more.  Weird, but not really harmful.”

“Soooo, all harmful groups are cults, but not all cults are harmful?” Maverick asked for clarification.

Tyche shrugged and tilted her head side to side. “On a ship of ten thousand people, where our species’s continued existence depends on all of us surviving and working together? I would up that to ‘all harmful groups are doomsday cults’, if we’re being really honest.”

Arthur actually made finger guns at Tyche. “Exactly. Detriment to the Ark means detriment to humanity. So, doomsday cult.”

Xiomara leaned forward, a predatory curiosity evident in her eyes. “If we are going to assume this is a cult, we need to focus higher.  Cults are organizations, organizations are like snakes: they have a head. Cut that off, the whole thing dies.”

“Hubbard,” Tyche coughed, not nearly delicate enough to avoid a glare from Xio, but unabashed nonetheless.

“The point is,” Xio continued through clenched teeth, “If this is a cult, it has a leader. Do we have any ideas on that?”

“We actually might,” Maverick offered. He brought up the file Alistair asked me to share, flicking through photos until he found what he was looking for. “Does anyone recognize this person?”

It was an image of a man’s face.  With pale blue eyes and dirty blonde hair, he looked disturbingly similar to me and my sister.  His hair was long on top, short on the sides. A long, somewhat sharp nose gave him an imperious expression - one eerily like Tyche’s when she wasn’t trying to be pleasant.  However, the crawling of not-quite-familiarity ended when I reached his smile: perfectly straight teeth that no one in my family had ever possessed, including - most notably - perfectly even teeth.  Both sides of our family had canines which were just long enough and just sharp enough to be noticeable, which led to entirely too many vampire jokes as we grew up.

There was more to the familiarity, however. “Maverick, can you pull up all of the group images we’ve captured since we started collecting trends?”

He nodded before digging into the larger file.  After a few moments, an enormous grid of images formed a globe above the table.  I started isolating and discarding, and as he realized what I was doing, Arthur joined in.  In the end, we had just over one-third as many photos.

All of them showed the man in the image Maverick originally isolated.

Maverick nodded. “Alistair specifically mentions in his file that this person shows up more frequently, statistically, than anyone else.” He flipped through and popped about twenty more images up before explaining, “These show persons of the same profile and matching a height of the one in the image I showed originally.”

“So, we think this may be the cult leader?” Xiomara asked for confirmation, eyes already darting around, fingers tapping at her datapad.  Finally, she twisted her hand and, essentially, threw the imaginary contents at the projections.  What we got was a three-dimensional model of our suspect. “This model matches a man on board, named Jokull Bjornson.  He is from Canada, both originally and where we picked him up. Led an enclave in the After, focused around Norse/Icelandic faith.” She paused before giving everyone a very… odd?.. look. “He also is the one who submitted the name we eventually chose for the new colony. Which,” she held up one hand to stop objections, “I still stand by my vote in favor. However, I think we need to take the reasoning behind that name into account when creating a psychological profile.” Her hand dropped, ceding the floor.

Silence dropped like wet snow while we all took this information in.  However, before it could go on too long, Arthur snapped forward. “What kind of enclave was he leading?  Because, depending on how it operated under his leadership, that indicates anything from ‘something we can get in and negotiate with’ to ‘very serious threat’.  If nothing else, if he kept something together in the After, he’s no joke we can just laugh off.”

In response, Xiomara brought up another file on her datapad and glanced over it. “According to his original intake interview, it was a largely peaceful one, in as much as any group like that could be in the circumstances.  Only used violence in self defense or to protect the group, that kind of thing. Records show that Miys detected no traces of deliberate misinformation.” She dismissed her datapad and sighed at the ceiling.  “As we’ve learned, that isn’t as conclusive as we would like.  Hujylsogox can’t tell when someone is passing on information they believe but is still false, and obfuscation escapes Noah on a regular basis.”

Arthur stared at each of us in turn, asking for clarification. Before he even got to Maverick, my partner was filling in the blanks. “The traitor, Arantxa Bidarte.  That was kind of before my time, but from what I understand, at no point did she even raise a slight amount of concern with Noah, despite being around several of his avatars on a regular basis, while plotting, and even while isolated on Level One.”

“She truly believed she was working to the benefit of Terra, the galaxy, and so on,” I added softly. “Righteous causes, regardless of the execution or principle, don’t exactly set off alarms for Noah.”

Not one to get distracted, Arthur nodded in acknowledgement and ploughed on. “An entire rebellion was caused in Haiti by Duvalier committing mass murder on wide swathes of his own people as ‘preventative defense’, so I’m not even a little convinced here.  Do we know how many times this little fiefdom of his had to ‘defend’ itself?”

Much more steadily, Xiomara nodded. “Twice.  Again, verified by Noah.”

“Since this is quantitative data, we can be certain there is no margin for error,” Grey added. “My team has, with our host’s permission, run over a hundred tests, and there is no way to falsify information of this nature with Miys, unless the person conveying the information was deliberately misinformed and not allowed to verify the data set.”

“Meaning, if our prospective cult leader says it was two, either he wasn’t in as much control as he thought, or it actually was only twice,” I translated.

Xiomara stood, both hands flat on the table. “Right now, this is a lot of ‘what ifs’. We’ve discussed ‘what if’ this is a cult, ‘what if’ the leader of said possible cult is power-hungry, and ‘what if’ he is a figurehead.  To Grey’s point, however, we have no concrete proof.”  She paused, ensuring she had everyone’s attention. “I understand your concerns.  Really, I very much do, and I am extremely appreciative that you brought them to myself and Grey, rather than running off on some ham-handed, suicidally altruistic mission to handle this yourselves.” 

Hands dropping to her sides, Xio took a deep breath. “Here is what’s going to happen.  My team and I are going to analyze these photos.  In a broad sweep, we are going to bring in the top five people who appear most frequently - ostensibly this would be the leader and his lieutenants.” She glanced at Grey, who nodded in confirmation. “I will not detail anything else regarding the operation, to ensure execution goes smoothly.  Do not speak of this, even to each other, once the door to the corridor opens.  Tell your partners and adjuncts that you can’t speak of it right now, but you will when you are able to do so.  If they behave out of character, notify me at the first, safe opportunity to do so. However, I want this to be abundantly clear: If I find, in any way, that the results of that sweep show prior knowledge, I will hold every single person in this room responsible.  I’m not joking. Do not discuss this, even with me, no matter how long it takes to see fruition. Is that understood?”

I would be lying if I said I wasn’t hesitant. Maverick and I knew, but couldn’t tell Conor?  Really, that was my only stopping point: Alistair, I knew, would accept being told that I couldn’t elaborate on the results of this meeting.  I was sure that Antoine would be understanding of Tyche saying the same.  But I had never been anything but transparent with Conor, and I wasn’t even sure Maverick  could lie. A glance at Maverick showed the same trepidation, but he nodded his support all the same. Clearly, neither of us liked the instruction, but were going to support each other in its execution.

Arthur, clearly, had no such hesitation or doubts.  “Gag order. Understood.”

Gag order, indeed.  What an apt name, when gagging was all I wanted to do in that moment.

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[qedavathegrey]

As some of you know, I have used the name MARAKALA thrice before: the initial instance being in The Instantaneous Conception of MARAKALA; then in RAKALA & the creation of humanity; and most recently in {A} Creation, which discusses MARAKALA’s “creation” and hints at her broader function in (and as) the Great Schema. I hope to further explore today both what and who MARAKALA is in greater detail, as well as to look more closely at she and RAKALA’s connection to one another. I will add that, given the nature of what I have undertaken by attempting to make sense of what I am given, there is a good chance that what I write today will need updating tomorrow. This has been the case already with what I have written about RAKALA (formerly called the Red Queen), whose enigmatic and mercurial nature makes her difficult to categorize or simplify in words. Thus, let this preface make clear that what is written below will be correct if only representative of a fraction of a fraction of the whole. In other words, I’m working with what I’ve got and who knows what else I may get moving forward that might reshape or redefine how these things are viewed. Expect updates and appreciate the process, I guess.

With that being said, let’s dive right in to take a closer (or broader) look at MARAKALA.

Understanding MARAKALA

In {A} Creation, I expanded upon what was pictured earlier in The Instantaneous Conception of MARAKALA. Therein, she is described as Thought made action, as the preserved Consciousness of MĀ. She is pictured as a severed head, she wields a blade and is the butcher of the Singularity. She is the one who divides One into many, beginning with her own “conception” and ending — at least in {A} Creation — with the creation of RAKALA from both MĀ and herself. And “conception” is an important word here, because MARAKALA is very much conceptual: she is a thought, an idea. In this sense, she is Creation itself. She is the moment MĀ recognizes a new possibility and that possibility is made real through MARAKALA. Thus, when speaking of MARAKALA as MĀ’s preserved Consciousness, it should be understood that MARAKALA is, in essence, MĀ. But the part of MĀ that is “disembodied,” or without physical substance. The conception of MARAKALA, then, might be better understood as the birth of matter whereby MARAKALA defines matter as opposite or at least inherently different from herself. And this is a recurring theme in {A} Creation, where something is defined only by that which comes after, as in the “birth” of MĀ and the naming of OMĀ. “Something isn’t really something until there is something else to compare it to.” 

But what does MARAKALA as Thought and as the Consciousness of MĀ really mean? What is she really? 

At the most fundamental level, she is Order. She is Law, she is Fate, she is Omniscience. She is, herself, the Great Schema upon which everything and every possibility relies. She is physics and quantum physics, she is spirit, she is consciousness beyond physical processes. She is so very much that it is much easier to define her by what she isn’t. And what she isn’t (at least when distinguishing her from MĀ as a Whole) is matter. Obviously any attempt at distinction between matter and energy is a fool’s errand, but for the sake of applying “ownership” over the states of matter to the Sisters, one must at least attempt distinction. And those lines separating matter from energy or states of matter from other states are anything but concrete, nor do they really need to be. They are all MĀ, interconnected but not Singular. And that’s the most important distinction to make. MARAKALA allows for the existence of matter and defines its qualities, composition, etc. but lends ownership of it and its states to the Sisters, who are about as distinct from MĀ and MARAKALA as matter is from energy. Which is to say not very or at all except in that they are and aren’t. Really clears things up, I know.

Another thing she isn’t (and again, not an easy line to draw) is action. MARAKALA is the framework, but RAKALA is the force which drives change and all that “moves'' within the framework. This is represented by MARAKALA as the Head and RAKALA as the Hands: MARAKALA is the thought that dictates Action, but RAKALA is the Action itself. Or, to give an example, we know matter can change states based on temperature. The fact that this can happen at all is MARAKALA, but when it does, it is the work of RAKALA. Thus, one might consider MARAKALA the omniscient consciousness that dictates RAKALA’s omnipotent hand. And while RAKALA is not herself truly omniscient, her relation to and mutual reliance upon MARAKALA means that she is “not far off.” This, of course, makes her delightfully fit for tricksterhood: she knows nearly all there is to know and what fate has in store both at the cosmic and individual (and even smaller and greater still) level. Her Sisters, however, are not privy to this same knowledge and thus, what animosity manifests does so almost always from this difference of knowing. As humans, this is easy to comprehend as we ourselves are ignorant beings bumbling around trying to make sense and plan accordingly for things we simply cannot understand. But then imagine for a moment that your arrogant, omnipotent, know-it-all little sister shows up and says “Sorry, whatever you’re up to isn’t going to fly, chief,” gives you a wink and then renders you effectively powerless to do anything. Valid cause for frustration, I think, but what do you do? You grumble something like, “She’s always been mom’s favorite,” then do what you can to move forward. 

MARAKALA’s omnipotence is also the cause for her “Silence,” which is another of her defining features. This concept of silence was introduced in The Instantaneous Conception of MARAKALA and further explored in {A} Creation, where it is written: 

Finally, what parts remained of MĀ — the Mysteries — MARAKALA devoured for fear that those Great Secrets might escape into the Nothing. To ensure this would never happen and that MĀ could not be reunited before such was meant to be, MARAKALA sealed up Her mouth never to Speak again. Thus, MARAKALA is the Keeper of the Mysteries and the one who ensures that their powers are kept in check by wielding them with Consciousness.

 And in The Instantaneous Conception [...]: 

Her presentation without a mouth symbolizes her Silence, Her incomprehensible vastness precluding Speech or human understanding. As such, RAKALA — “eldest” and “youngest” of the Four Sisters as she is and is born of MARAKALA — acts as Her intercessor: the Face of the Faceless, the Mouth of the Silent.

These passages both explore the relationship between MARAKALA and RAKALA wherein MARAKALA exists as vast and unknowable and RAKALA acts as her intercessor and “Mouth.” This, of course, is symbolic of what has already been discussed: MARAKALA is framework while RAKALA is action. But there is more to her Silence than this.  

Existing as the Great Schema, MARAKALA’s Silence is a necessary one. It is crucial to the “success” of creation that its “subjects” remain ignorant to Fate, otherwise the function of separation and distinction (i.e. creation itself) would be moot. Which, of course, brings us to the function of creation itself. 

Creation is best thought of like a grand experiment. It is a game MĀ plays with herself and MARAKALA exists as its rules, the board, the story, or however you would prefer to define it. RAKALA, thusly, is the game’s master or officiant: the one who ensures that things move forward in accordance with the rule book. The rules are written, the board is set up, but without players and a moderator to guarantee things move as planned, the game goes nowhere and nothing is gained for their is no structure or action to make the rules reality. And certainly some of you are thinking: if MARAKALA (as the consciousness of MĀ) is omniscient (and omnipotent) and thus already knows exactly what will happen, then what function does the game serve? I could speculate, but I won’t. That’s an answer that I do not and cannot know. But I will say that there exist infinite “places” possessing different rules where infinite eventualities can be explored. Maybe there’s something to it, maybe there isn’t. Can’t say for certain, but it’s above my pay grade and does not affect me in any way. I was not there at the beginning and will not be there at the end. Humans are the product of what rules govern this existence and others, but I would not be so self-aggrandizing as to assume that we are some great subject which entire universes were formed to wrought. That being said, life and consciousness are something relatively unique and interesting subjects. At least as far as we can tell, which isn’t saying much.

If you refer back to what is written in RAKALA & the creation of humanity, you will find I assigned some importance to humanity. After all, we are the product of RAKALA and her tricksterism. But you will also find that what function we serve in the great scheme of things is a question left unanswered. We create religions to place and understand ourselves in a world and universe that is big, unknowable... often terrifyingly so. We are a species which seeks answers and delights in categorization. Hell, you’ll see that this exercise in itself is one meant to categorize what cannot be categorized: to give dominion to things whose separation we, ourselves create. But you read above how difficult it was to segment even the limited existence of which we are aware, and even more so to personify these forces. Was I effective? Likely not, but it doesn’t really matter. As I said, this is an exercise: one to apply meaning to what can often seem meaningless. And maybe it is. But I choose to find and apply meaning because it’s such a delightfully human thing to do. And whether humans are of any import in the greater scheme of things doesn’t really matter, because we are here and we do what we do. And what we do is powerful, interesting, and more recently quite horrific. Strange, isn’t it, that in 200,000 years of existence that we humans typically only remember the last 15 thousand? To put that in perspective, writing has existed for only 0.2% of all modern, human existence. Agriculture? ~5%. Electricity? 0.007%. We so frequently define humanity by our “progress,” but rarely by what things have truly made up the bulk of human existence: living in nature, cooperatively with one another. And undoubtedly creating countless cosmologies lost to time. But I digress... 

MARAKALA and RAKALA make up two halves a whole: Thought vs. Action; potential vs. kinetic; not at odds, but working in tandem to create existence as it is fated to be. Neither is far from humanity, though one remains decidedly unknowable if at least in her entirety. But we are constant witnesses to her Law and can gain knowledge and insight through partnering with her intercessor, RAKALA. What wisdom and meaning one takes, of course, is up to them. 

[abanomath]

Rant time: DC’s Tone Deafness

So I don’t really like ranting or being negative, but DC Universe recently released an article to celebrate pride month about the Top 5 canon and non-canon LGBTQA+ relationships in Young Justice.

And the tone deafness is just off the charts. Like most of the world, I’m not American so I needed someone to screen-cap the actual article for me. I’m going to organize my thoughts and go down.

General

For one, its pretty obvious the writer didn’t look at the source material. This article sounds like it was written by someone filled in on the basics and told to write a good PR article for DC.

There are a lot of little details in the story, such as when the writer claims that they “showcased even more LGBTQA+ protagonists in season 3″ implying they had previously, which they hadn’t. One character was implied to be bisexual in the comics, never on screen, but more on that below. Season 3 was the first LGBTQA+ rep for the show.

Also its always a bit tone deaf when in an article celebrating LGBTQA+ and diversity in your show, that you have a list of 5 “ships”, of which only ONE is actually a couple in canon. Not only did they need to resort to non-canon ones, they included people that can’t be called a “ship” or couple.

1. Kaldur/Wyynde

This is the only actual LGBTQA+ couple on the list that is canon in the show, and I liked them. But I can’t deny that Kaldur who was a main cast member for the past two season’s had a vastly reduced role (compared to straight cis white characters like Dick and Conner). He was basically written out of the first half of the season, and then his relationship was really present for 1.5 - 2 episodes max. This in a season that was marked with excessive attention given to heterosexual relationships (like seriously, basically every character was in some form of relationship on-screen). The one healthy LGBTQA relationship got less attention than Black Lightning and Dr. Jace’s romance, something that ultimately went nowhere, Dick/Barbara, even Megan/Conner when Megan was also essentially written out of the season.

2. Marie Logan and Rita Farr

They really dug deep for this “ship”. Ironically, they start this by talking about the scene in Young Justice #25, when Queen B’s powers work on Garfield’s mother. This was the first implication her being bisexual. And of course, she also dies in this scene, so starting off with a “Bury your gays” trope where Marie’s queerness literally got her killed and orphaned her son.

There isn’t much more to say about this ship, because it literally doesn’t exist. The shipping community for this is so small you have to go digging deep into tags to find even hints of it. The article even basically says this, posing the ship as a question. As being interesting. (Does it count as Bury Your Gays when both woman are dead before their relationship is even hinted at?)

In other words this article about celebrating LGBTQA ships literally had to try and CREATE A SHIP to reach 5 ships. Despite the fact there are plenty of LGBTQ fanon ships (Birdflash being the most prominent one left off the list). It really hits at the thing I said above, this is a “write us a good PR article with the barest amount of effort put into it” situation.

3. Harper Row and Halo

Oh boy don’t get me started on this. There are so many problems with how they did Halo this season, she is basically tone deaf personified. (For the purpose of this rant, I’ll be using the “she” pronouns for Halo, because I have no choice but to assume they are her preference, unless the show purposely spent the entire season mis-gendering her, but I don’t think her characterization really supports that she prefers “her/she”).

I’ve had a problem with Halo from the start, because she is basically an attempt for the writers to shallowly include representation without having to actually deal with it. She is Muslim representation, but not actually Muslim (as she confirms on the show). She wears the Hijab because she feels like it. She is genderqueer, but they never once talk about her pronouns. She refers to herself as “not feeling like a boy or a girl” and constantly refers to herself in the third person, but everyone uses “she/her” pronouns without asking her. They even have a scene where she informs them she is genderqueer, and its never brought up again without asking any actual follow up questions or awareness. They also infantalize and treat her as a little girl.

Additionally, she falls into one of my greatest pet peeves - she is genderqueer but for fantasy-scifi reasons. For those that follow genderqueer or transgender characters in media, this is a very common trope. Essentially, the trope is when someones gender identity is caused by/determined from otherworldly experiences.

This trope bugs me because it completely undermines the point of representation. Representation in media is supposed to show the audience that these are natural human experiences and that people like this exist and are normal. But the trope ensures that the experiences are not normal human experiences.

(and don’t even get me started on the fact that this show has made New Genesis tech gendered before, with Sphere. And even gender the bioship in the same season they pull this for Halo).

Lastly, she also falls within the “promiscuous bisexual” trope, with the very kiss this article praises as THE FIRST LGBT KISS ON SCREEN for the show. This is a problematic trope that DC seems to love. Basically, this scene has Halo cheating on her boyfriend with another young classmate, engaging in two kisses with her.

Now I’m not going to say that all LGBTQA+ relationships need to be wholesome one true loves. Problematic behaviour like Halo and Harper’s is a story telling tool. But the fact that the LGBTQA+ was told going into the season there would be LGBT rep so they should watch, and this was the first rep we got 18 episodes into the season? It felt a bit like a slap in the face. They could’ve had her break up with Brion beforehand, or any number of different ways that would even keep the scene in tact.

And the relationship doesn’t really go anywhere anyways. Harper doesn’t really remain part of the season going forward, Halo and her boyfriend continue their relationship after it was revealed until the end of the season.

This is ultimately my problem with Halo. There are a few tropes that basically are summed up as “writers put all their diversity into one character” which is basically what Halo is. Each of these qualities, from faith to gender identity to sexual orientation could’ve been a fleshed out character arc (oh! I forgot to mention she also falls into the “My gender identity isn’t cis, so my sexual orientation is also bi/pan/gay” trope). Instead all the diverse qualities of Halo are addressed shallowly as the show-runners pat themselves on the back.

4. Bluepulse

I’ve ranted a lot so I’m not going to go crazy on this point. You can probably find tons of posts about the drama between Bluepulse Shippers and the show, which again makes their inclusion kind of tone-deaf. Bluepulse shippers have been called disgusting by the fandom for the three year age gap, an age gap that was never confirmed on screen and you had to go digging in Greg’s personal message board to know (resulting in many people shipping them not knowing their ages at all).

In addition, the showrunners made it clear they did not like this ship over the several years the show has been off the air. And in Season 3 they give Jaime a girlfriend....who is a lesbian in the comics. Now Traci and Jaime did date in the comics before she came out, and this is another Earth. But when the sole purpose of their relationship being on screen was to tell the audience that bluepulse wasn’t happening, choosing a lesbian character to play the cis straight girlfriend is a bit of a slap in the face. again.

5. Bart Allen and Eduardo

Queerbaiting, nuff said.

For those not in the know, Ed is a character introduced as a runaway in Season 2, but he doesn’t really interact with Bart until mid-season 3. There is an episode where a group of heroes go to a carnival, and Ed and Bart appear to be on a date. They are in a group with all couples, except for Virgil. Virgil laments being the only person there without a significant other, implying that Bart and Ed are together. Additionally, Bart and Ed do everything that the other couples do together. It was pretty heavy-handed that the couples were there on dates.

And fans liked this! Even if Bluepulse wasn’t happening, Bart may still be bisexual or gay. This was made worse by Greg retweeting and liking Ed/Bart content, and not giving a straight answer on whether they were dating.

Which obviously, creates the expectation among LGBTQA+ fans that they will get together. They don’t. And later at a convention, one of the main writers (not Greg) said something like “its funny how the fans see relationships between characters differently from our intent” when asked a question about them. Essentially confirming that yeah, they didn’t have any actual content for them planned anyway. Though they did have an addendum that they may build on the fan reception/view of the relationship in the future (basically saying, maybe they’ll be canon).

As much as I’d like to be optimistic that they actually will get together and we’ll get a LGBTQ relationship that is in the spotlight for once, I’m not. I’ll be happy to be proved wrong on this point.

And that was my TEDtalk about how tone-deaf DC patting themselves on the back for LGBTQA+ content in Young Justice is. Especially when other animated shows do so much better with fewer episodes and screen time.