#Extension of Continuing Appropriations and Other Matters Act | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

backjustforberena · 1 year ago

Note

the daughter’s wake gif set!! i’m admittedly not super knowledgeable about hotd outside of the basics (i mostly just watch eve’s scenes oops lol) but. BUT. the way corlys seems so obviously resigned to the truth of the matter, while rhaenys is so obviously poised to do everything in her power to guard her grandchildren———even if it means she will die for it, and even if it means she will fail to protect all of them. i think part of this lies in the fact that rhaenys has already suffered disenfranchisement and turned to living her life as a princess settled in her position rather than as a potential queen (since that potential is gone).

having said that, she’s still entrenched in the traditions of this royal world and often acts within those parameters as appropriate. i think that her true dedication to her grandchildren above anything else is most evident to others only once she - for all intents and purposes - throws herself into battle and dies for them. now arguably, she would have had to have gotten involved regardless due to the strategic placement of driftmark and the sea snake’s hold on other territories (correct me if i’m wrong !!!) but she didn’t have to volunteer herself for rook’s nest, especially alone. to me, this is the true mark of her loyalties: not to the targaryen name, not to rhaenyra as the image of what could have been had rhaenys been crowned, but to her grandchildren.

conversely, i believe (again correct me if i’m wrong akmdcjkskr i don’t know anything) that corlys is one of the only key figures to survive to the end? and i think his survival is what really reflects his strategy and response to “that means everyone is dead”: acceptance, and a dedication to not necessarily preserving the line but to continuing it at any expense (which may seem counterintuitive but i really think his insistence concerning the velaryon name has less to do with protecting the grandchildren and their blood, and more to do with protecting his house’s name and securing its place in history even if it means it dies WITH HIM).

basically i think they both care for their grandchildren but corlys is dedicated to the continuation of their name while rhaenys is dedicated to the continuation of their physical survival. another example of this divergence would be how each of them treats the potential match of laena and viserys: corlys seems to want this match because it will be good for the house; rhaenys, imo, doesn’t necessarily want her daughter to go thru the throes of marriage so young, BUT knows it will secure her place and hopefully protection as queen, so she does what she must. i think then the grandchildren are an extension of that. in some ways, the distinction in their familial loyalties has always been there even before the deaths of their children. does that make sense?? 😭😭 SORRY FOR THE RAMBLE

DO NOT APOLOGISE FOR THE RAMBLE, WE LOVE A RAMBLE. In fact, we love a ramble so much that I'm going to ramble straight back at you and my apologies that this took me a couple of days to get to, I wanted to give it the right amount of time to answer.

I have been on the record before to say I love the positioning of Corlys and Rhaenys during the wake and during the funeral and all of that because it gives us such insight into how both of them are feeling and both of them are reaction to Laena's death before we actually hear them properly talk about how they are feeling with one another in their next scene together, which is so monumental unchanging the dynamic between them and display the cracks in their marriage which are eventually overwhelming after they then lose their son as well.

I think you're bang on the money when you say that Rhaenys has "already suffered disenfranchisement and turned to living her life as a princess settled in her position" - as I like to say it, she's been humbled already. She's reached for something and been destroyed by it, and that was wayyy back at the Great Council. She knows that it's not going to be fixed. That was a personal hurt and cannot be healed, so all she can do is live for the present and for the future, and not try and fix the past. Corlys's relationship with the Great Council is just different. They both disagree with it, they are both disappointed by it, but Corlys can see it as something to be fixed because the hurt isn't his. The slight is. So he thinks if he can secure his legacy - their legacy - it'll make up for it. So his humbling comes later.

At this point, when talking to Lucerys, Corlys is in the process of having all of his chickens come home to roost. He's about to be shown his failures in the next scene. Already something catastrophic has happened with the death of his daughter, then we've got the royal family drama on top of that. The implications of how much that marriage had to do with Corlys's ambitions are vague to say the least.

But Rhaenys is blaming them both and is happy to take that blame so long as it means change (to priorities, to attitude, to succession, to them, whatever). Only, Corlys is still trying to cling on to a future he thinks will be worth it - this idea of legacy - as a way to turn away from his grief and to justify his moves and, ultimately, justify his failure towards his children. So he sticks with Luke and reaffirms that his brother will be King and Luke will be Lord of the Tides because to admit anything else is to admit failure and he needs this to not fail. He needs this all to be worth it because he's lost his daughter now. Instead, he has his grandson say that it's not worth it. Everyone will be dead. Which is devastating to Corlys.

But back to what you were saying - Rhaenys is in it for her grandchildren. Absolutely. She's in it for, as much as anyone can be, pretty selfless reasons. You're correct in that Driftmark would have had a really difficult time being neutral, given its position, given their familial ties to both sides, and given the resources they have (a Fleet & at least one dragon, depending on how you want to look at it). But, in the show, it's Baela who persuades Rhaenys to stay. And it's Jace, Luke and Joff that Rhaenys gives as reasons to Corlys. Furthermore, afterwards, it's Jace that will persuade Corlys to stay. The relationship with the House Velaryon and Rhaenyra isn't a particularly personal one in either book or show. It's more about duty, oaths, honour and political gain, and the grandchildren, than it ever was about Rhaenyra personally.

Again, you're right, Corlys was one of the key figures to survive the Dance. My own personal opinion is that the thoughts that Corlys displays in my gifset... they don't last long. Even when he says "history remembers names" etc etc, it's a grief response. He believes it, but only because he wants to end the conversation and he needs to believe it because it serves him: sure those grandkids are not his blood, but they have his name, that's what matters, that's what will be worth it because that will what will be written down. He will be the Grandfather of a King, the slight from the Great Council will be rectified. His son will be King-Consort etc etc. Whereas Rhaenys is just like: we can give them all the safety in the world, but they're miserable. And, also, in the end, that safety isn't enough. Power isn't enough.

His mindset changes a little, after losing Laenor and nearly losing his life. He wants to retire with the grandchildren. That's not seeking power, for once. That's not seeking glory or legacy. And then his mindset will then change again once he loses his wife. Corlys is going to experience loss after loss. Once you get to that point, you start trying to hold on to what you have/need, rather than reaching for what you want.

So, yeah, I suppose the main takeaway from the gifset for me is that Corlys is trying to comfort himself by comforting Lucerys. His talk focuses on a dream that is fast proving to be a false one, or just flat-out not worth it. He's acting like it's all normal and going according to plan because that's how he's coping. Rhaenys, meanwhile, is facing reality and is already disillusioned. She turns herself away from the funeral and focuses on her granddaughters, and simply soothes them. Not to absolve herself, but just to take care of them. And she knows there's nothing she can do to make it better.

3 notes · View notes

chinalawyerxu · 2 months ago

Text

When can you sue for patent infringement in China?

As an intellectual property lawyer with twenty years of experience practicing in China, I will provide a detailed overview of the relevant matters related to suing for patent infringement in China. This article will discuss when you can sue for patent infringement in China, the statute of limitations for patent infringement, and the expertise of Michael Xu's legal team in this field.

I. When Can You Sue for Patent Infringement in China?

Discovering Infringement

Direct Infringement: If you find that someone is manufacturing, using, selling, offering to sell, or importing your patented product without permission, or using your patented method and selling, offering to sell, using, or importing the product directly obtained from that method, you can consider it direct infringement and take legal action immediately.

Indirect Infringement: If someone assists or induces others to commit patent infringement, such as providing production equipment or materials for infringing products, it can also be considered infringement, and you can sue.

Sufficient Evidence

Evidence Collection: Before deciding to sue, you need to collect sufficient evidence, including samples of infringing products, purchase records, sales records, advertisements, etc. Ensuring the evidence is solid can support your infringement claims.

After Administrative Procedures

Administrative Enforcement Results: In some cases, you may first file a complaint with the China National Intellectual Property Administration or local IP offices through administrative channels. Once the administrative procedures are completed and the results support your infringement claims, you can further file a lawsuit in court to seek compensation.

II. Statute of Limitations for Patent Infringement

General Statute of Limitations

Two-Year Limitation: According to the Chinese Patent Law, the statute of limitations for patent infringement lawsuits is two years from the date when the patentee or an interested party knew or should have known about the infringement. Therefore, after discovering the infringement, you should take legal action promptly to avoid missing the limitation period.

Extension of Limitation Period

Continuous Infringement: If the infringement is ongoing, the statute of limitations starts from the date of the last infringing act.

Other Special Circumstances: In certain special cases, such as concealed infringement where the patentee genuinely could not have discovered it in time, the statute of limitations may be appropriately extended.

III. Professional Services of Michael Xu's Legal Team

Michael Xu's legal team has over 15 years of extensive experience in patent infringement legal services in China. We are dedicated to providing comprehensive patent protection and enforcement solutions to help clients effectively safeguard their patent rights in the Chinese market.

Team Background

Michael Xu's legal team comprises experienced lawyers and patent experts specializing in patent infringement legal services for 15 years, accumulating extensive experience.

We have accumulated rich experience in handling patent infringement cases for well-known domestic and international companies, providing clients with the best legal solutions.

Professional Expertise

We stay abreast of the latest developments in patent protection laws and practices both domestically and internationally to provide clients with cutting-edge legal advice.

We excel at handling complex patent infringement investigations and claims, ensuring maximum protection of our clients' legal rights.

Success Stories

We have successfully managed numerous patent infringement cases for well-known domestic and international companies, effectively safeguarding their intellectual property.

Our professional services and outstanding results have earned unanimous recognition and high praise from our clients.

Through our professional services, foreign companies can ensure their patents are fully protected in China and receive the most professional legal support and solutions when facing patent infringement issues.

#china lawyer #chinese lawyer

0 notes

arranbert · 2 years ago

Text

Improve the Reach of Your Business with the Leading Australian Business Directory

An online presence is essential for companies to succeed in the modern digital age. You are in luck if you are an entrepreneur looking for strategies to increase the exposure of your company. The Best Melbourne Blog, a remarkable tool created to help your company soar to new heights. This extensive Australian Business Directory acts as a bridge to link your company with clients and partners throughout the country. Let us explore how this directory could hold the secret to your success.

Australian Business Directory -

It is impossible to exaggerate the significance of a company directory. A strong online presence is now essential given that more and more customers are using the internet to locate goods and services. There are several advantages to including your company in a reliable Australian Business Directory, including -

Increased Online Visibility: The Business Directory acts as a digital center for your company to flourish. Being listed increases the likelihood that prospective clients will discover your company when they search for relevant keywords.

Enhanced Credibility: Appearing in a reputable directory fosters a feeling of dependability and confidence. Businesses having a presence on these platforms are more likely to get interaction from customers.

National Reach: Looking outside your immediate area is possible with a business directory in Australia. It enables you to reach a wide audience in the country that is interested in your goods or services.

Exposure to a Specific Audience: The directory's capacity to classify companies helps you to draw in the appropriate clientele. Your firm is more likely to get clients who are truly interested in what you provide when it fits into a certain category.

Local Business Directory -

With such a wide audience, your company may draw interest from prospective clients all around the nation. Both consumers and companies may easily navigate the directory. Users may quickly locate the goods or services they are seeking using a user-friendly interface. The business directory makes it simpler for your company to show up in search engine results by using smart optimization strategies. By doing this, you make sure that people who are looking for what you have to offer will continue to notice your company.

Melbourne Blog's Business Directory -

Visit bestmelbourneblog.com to go through the listings in the directory.

Go to the "Business Directory" section or any other relevant link to add your company.

Include complete and accurate information about your company. The more information you provide, the clearer it will be for prospective clients to grasp what you have to offer.

Select categories that most accurately reflect your company. This phase makes sure that the correct audience sees your company.

Overall, as a company owner, you are aware of how important it is to take advantage of growth possibilities. You are opening the door to a broad range of opportunities by adding your company to our prestigious Australian Business Directory, from enhanced exposure and legitimacy to a national reach. The advantages of a business directory entry are apparent, regardless matter whether you are a startup, a tiny local firm, or an established corporation. Utilize the Best Melbourne Blog's Business Directory now, and watch your company reach new heights both inside Australia and beyond. Your listing serves as your entryway to extraordinary accomplishment; it is more than simply a listing.

0 notes

coweye · 4 years ago

Text

Guys My Age - PT.1

Pairing: Francisco ‘Catfish’ Morales x Miller!Reader Word Count: 1.5k

Summary: After four years away, you return home to realise that maybe everything you’ve been looking for was right in front of you all along.

Warnings: Mention of depression, Slow burn - no smut yet but it will eventually be horrifically filthy 18+ only pls gang, LEGAL Age Gap.

Note: This bad bois been worming its way to the surface for a while now, hope you enjoy! 💕 I apologise in advance for the slow burn.

⇢MASTERLIST

Life was strange sometimes.

Here you were, back in the hometown you’d sworn never to return to after four years away, flanked by your older brother Benny.

Two thirds of the Miller gang back together, reunited or at least you had been.

“I’ma get us a table, you order the drinks.” Ben muttered distractedly whilst scouting out potential tables.

“Hey, I’m supposed to be destitute, the least you could do is get the first round in.” The sad thing is, you’re only half joking. He rolled his eyes at your expense, before handing you his credit card and continued on his journey to get a table, presumably with a great view of the blonde woman he’d spotted upon entry to the bar. Benny was predictable if nothing else, it was part of his charm.

So, you pushed your way forward through the throng of warm bodies, Friday night at Flanagans was a nightmare but you had agreed to be sociable as Santiago was in town, so you’d made the sacrifice and took a night off from your crushing depression to don a nice t-shirt and apply makeup for the first time in the two weeks since moving into Will’s back room.

You smiled what you hoped was a somewhat friendly lift of your lips at the bartender and ordered two beers, as you were waiting you heard the familiar call of Santiago Garcia - the man who you’d spent your teen years obsessed with.

He was gorgeous inside and out, though your crush had morphed into something a lot more wholesome and you had a genuine platonic love for the man, as an extension of your brothers.

“How have you been, guapa? God, long time no see!” He all but cried, clearly already a couple of beers in as wrapped you in a strong hug, pulling you onto your tiptoes. He wasn’t lying, you hadn’t seen Santiago in two maybe three years ago now.

Time had gotten away from you and your visits had become less and less frequent, especially with the boys being deployed, you couldn’t say you were happy to be back, but it was certainly nice to see them all again.

“I know, damn, you got old!” You chuckle as his face straightens out in feigned hurt. “Like fine wine, Santi, Fine wine!”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Stop flirting, you two.” Will grumbles as he slides through the crowd to lean on the bar beside you, lifting three fingers up to the bartender who had already placed the pints of beer before you.

“Where have you been?” You question raising an eyebrow “I’ve been back at least two weeks.”

“I’ve been in Australia for a little while, it's nothing serious but-”

“Pope’s got a girlfriend now, Squirt.” The low voice is a new one, but only one person used to call you that awful nickname.

You turn to see Francisco Morales behind you, his eyes are older than the rest of him but still irrevocably kind and he has an easy smile painted on his lips. You can’t quite remember him being this handsome as your eyes drink him in, perhaps you’d been blinded by the effortless beauty of Santiago as a teen but my god, Catfish had almost floored you.

“Frankie!” You smile - all teeth, trying somewhat successfully for an air of normalcy despite your brain processing the change that five years has had on your taste in men and pulling him in for his own hug.

You tried to stop yourself, you honestly did but as you breathed in, the smell of him overtook you, the spicy scent of cinnamon and sweet vanilla; the man somehow smelled like a goddamn cupcake and you had the biggest sweet tooth.

Locking your inner sex offender deep down inside a box so as to not assault the man you’d held in a hug for what was becoming longer than appropriate, you pulled away.

“A girlfriend?” You question, your brain scrambling for something to talk about other than those brown eyes. You can’t help the smirk that sneaks its way across your lips as you tease the man before you. “Santiago Garcia, have you gone soft on me in your old age?”

He huffs as he grabs his beer. “Fuck off, baby Miller.”

The three of you chortle in response to his defeated tone as he walks towards the table Ben has secured. Will grabs at his wallet, hand coming out to stop you in confusion when you hold out a card to pay.

You shake your head and shrug. “Ben’s treat.”

That kills any argument on his tongue as he picks up his drink and follows Santi’s lead. You can’t help but chuckle at your brothers, you had missed them both so much.

You’re very quickly aware of Frankie lingering to your left, waiting for you to finish paying, ever the gentleman.

You turn to him as the machine processes the transaction.

“Your-”

“How-” You both chuckle, the two of you have always been the quiet ones of the group, more observant with witty one liners thrown in than the loud mouths currently chatting at your table.

It seems years apart haven’t helped either of your awkwardness.

“You go…” You dismiss with a quick laugh when he waits for you to speak.

“I was just gonna say, it's nice to have you back!” He shrugged before gesturing to side of him “After you,”

Frankie creates a barrier with his body for your fellow thirsty patrons who want your spot at the bar. You pick up yours and Bens drinks and turn to find the guys.

Frankie’s hand finds your lower back as he guides you through, its innocuous enough, hell if you hadn’t been drooling over the man minutes before you wouldn’t have given it so much as a second thought, but that palm guarding you from the brunt of the crowd was like molten lava slowly burning your flesh.

“W-Well, it’s good to be back! I’m not going anywhere in a hurry!” You pretty much shout over the deafening ambient chatter around you. His low voice is in your ear when he replies, you force yourself not to close the distance and push your spine into his chest, Frankie isn’t like that; Hell, he has a girlfriend and baby at home.

He’s just being friendly - he’s known you since you were seventeen.

“You miss your friends back home?”

“They’re not my friends. None of those assholes let me sleep on their goddamn sofas.” Trying to break the tension only you seemed to be feeling with a joke, it seems to work as he chortles.

“Well you’re more than welcome to my sofa if Will ever gets too much, Squirt.” You couldn’t explain the things that this man saying the word squirt to you was doing. No matter the context, even if it was because you squirted slurpee from your nose when laughing too hard when you were a teenager.

“I may hold you to that - he bit my head off the other day because I didn’t wash a glass the second I used it, I swear-” You’re cut off when you find the booth rather quickly, the raucous laughter from the rangers acting as a siren call. You slide in beside Ben and turn to your other brother “-I was just telling Frankie, how much of a control freak you are.”

And because God hates you, Francisco slides in beside you.

…

You were a grown woman and you had a ridiculous infatuation.

It wasn’t for a lack of trying either, after sitting in that bar you had made an effort to block out the sensation of his thigh against your own or when he leaned back against the plush fabric and wrapped his arm around the back of the booth.

But so help you god you were only human, you couldn’t help but laugh a little harder at his jokes than the others or the warmth that flooded your belly when you’d meet his eyes as you told a story and find his chocolate orbs transfixed on you as if you were telling a great tale - rather than an anecdote about how you dislocated your tailbone last year when you were drunk on some stairs.

It wasn’t even as if it was just his looks - though you were big enough to admit that initially that had been a large part of it. It was the ease you felt around him, the kindness you could see clear as day painted on his face.

Though you knew, deep down in your toxic heart of hearts, buried beneath your daddy issues and depression, this deep desire was because he wasn’t all that interested.

It wasn’t as if he ignored you, no. He was friendly, but he had no interest in you besides just that, being a friend.

He had a baby and a girlfriend and you weren’t a home wrecker.

He was your brother's best friend, an extension of your family.

These were all things you reminded yourself about as you lay in bed alone staring up at the ceiling the morning after.

You could just be his friend, right?

⇢ Next Part

#frankie morales x reader #Frankie Morales #Francisco Morales x Reader #Catfish x Reader #Frankie Morales x You #Pedro Pascal #Triple Frontier Fanficiton #I said I was gonna have atleast 4 parts before i posted... I lied #Francisco Morales x You #Benny Miller #Will Miller #Santiago Garcia

221 notes · View notes

yuyupowers · 4 years ago

Text

aristocrat!yunho

aristocrat!yunho x fem!reader

genre: fluff, angst

trigger warning(s): description of an anxiety attack, brief description of death, memory loss. let me know if there’s anything else!

author’s note: i swear this wasn’t supposed to be this long sdkjflds

none of the pictures are mine!

for reference, i’m using british peerage (hierarchy). there are five ranks: baron, viscount, earl (count), marquess, and duke - the highest being duke, and the lowest, baron.

eldest son of a duke

okay, so

among nobility, the jeon family are well respect but considered to be a bit,,,eccentric

they adhere to all the social expectations expected amongst nobles, but their attitude towards non-nobility is what sets them apart

though most noble families are polite when interacting with non-nobility, they generally try to keep their distance; avoid their company, if possible

not the jeong’s

it wasn’t unusual to see duchess jeong knitting in her tea room with maids, merchant’s wives, or whoever else wanted to come

to see gunho running around with his friends, a pack of street urchins, low, and middle class children

to see yunho in the market helping one of the many older couples haul their cart into place

his family had managed to find the delicate balance of being “normal” enough not to suffer social ostracization, yet “odd” enough for people to dismiss their “peculiar actions” as “typical jeong behaviour”

now, onto the loml yunho

perfect gentleman pt. 2

extremely charming and a great conversationalist

no matter how awkward or shy the other party may be, yunho has this way to draw them out of their shell

(just ask mingi)

excels physical and hands-on activities (i.e. hunting, horseback riding, swordsmanship, etc,,,)

average in terms of book smarts

so while wasn’t about to lead the next technological revolution, he wasn’t “stupid” either

rather, i’d argue that yunho’s brilliant in non-traditional ways

his quick wit and ability to think on his feet is part of his charm

but his greatest strengths are his observational skills and emotional intelligence

able to discern people’s emotional state easily and quickly

he’s someone who’s kind, bright, and genuinely cares about other people’s problems (sometimes a little too much)

a natural leader - people tend to flock towards him

between him and mingi (who despite not acting like it, is extremely book smart), they’ve got all bases covered

(+ yunho’s willingness in using unconventional methods to gather information)

that’s actually how he met you

or rather, “found” seems more appropriate

see, he has an excellent rapport with the street children

being six foot one and offering shoulder rides does wonders

and because he wants to stay updated on what problems the people around him are dealing with, he gets the children to “report” to him if they find or hear anything unusual

(the children are more than eager to play spy, especially when there’s candy involved)

one day while taking a stroll, one of his kids ran up to him totally out of breath

he wheezed something about a “mysterious lady” before grabbing yunho’s hand and dragging leading him to an alley quite far away

to say he was surprised was an understatement

most of the time, his kids brought amusing but mostly useless information to him

(even if he is more than content listening about the cute squirrel they fed earlier that day)

usually they didn’t lead him to an unconscious woman lying in the middle of an empty alley

(yes, that’s you)

hurrying to your side, he drops down and checks to see if you’re alive

other than being unconscious and getting some dirt in your hair and on your clothes, you seemed to be okay

gingerly scooping you into his arms, he tells the little boy to fetch the doctor and bring him to the jeong manor

fast forward a couple hours and you’re roused from your unconscious state by the sharp smell of ammonia mixed with lavender

blearily, you rub your eyes and blink once, twice, before your vision finally clears

then panic

you don’t recognize where you are or the two faces that hover by your bedside

sensing your anxiety, yunho smiles warmly speaks in a soothing tone

“hey, hey, it’s okay, you’re in a safe place. my name’s yunho and this is dr. adley. i found you unconscious in an alley.”

and though you’re very confused and still mildly unnerved, you can tell this yunho guy is genuine

“,,,okay.”

so you settle into the (extremely comfortable) four poster bed and let the doctor examine you

except now it’s time for panic pt.2, but ten times worse because why the hell can’t you remember anything?!

you can’t even remember your own g*d damned name !!

to make things worse, there doesn’t seem to be a reason why you can’t remember anything

no bumps or injuries anywhere on your body

and chances of a robbery gone wrong, a kidnapping, or a failed assassination attempt were very unlikely since you were dressed in commoner’s clothes

disquieted by your alarm and the doctor’s confusion, yunho slips out of the room and returns after several minutes

the doctor, offering apologies to both you and yunho, says he has no idea what’s wrong or what could’ve happened to you

all he can suggest is to rest and hope that your memories eventually come back to you

your burry your face into your hands, a whirlwind of frustration, confusion, and fear brewing in you

apparently nobody, including yourself:

knows who you are,

where you came from,

why you were unconscious,

and why you lost your memories

to top it off, you have no money

…

just when you were about to idk,,,scream and/or punch something-

you feel two large hands engulfing yours, lowering them from your face

taking a seat on the edge of bed, yunho offers a faint smile as he idly traces lines from your wrists to your fingertips

a surprisingly soothing gesture

“,,,i know you’re overwhelmed right now, but please don’t feel as if you have to do this on your own. i talked to my mum and dad; you can stay here until either someone finds you or your memories return. in the meantime, we’ll help you out as much as we can, yeah?”

and though you’re in no position to argue, your first instinct is to decline because though you’re amnesiatic, you still have common sense

what kind of family, wealthy or not (actually, especially wealthy), lets a complete stranger stay in their house?

do these people have no sense of danger?

but yunho is as stubborn as he is kind, and this was how you ended up staying with the jeong’s

(you insist on working to earn your stay, much to yunho’s dismay. in his head, unless it helped in recovering their memories or, unfortunately, was necessary for survival, who would make an amnesiac work?)

the first couple of days were awkward

duke and duchess jeong had briefed everyone in the manor about your situation, but when making casual conversation, lapses in memory and uncomfortable silences were inevitable

“oh, i adore this purple! hey, what’s your favourite colour?”

“,,,i uh,,, don’t know.”

“,,,i’m so sorry-”

but awkward has never a problem for yunho, and you quickly grew fond of the gentle giant

“since we don’t know your name, can i call you little sun? since i found you on a sunny day and you’re little-”

“yunho, not everyone can be six feet tall”

“six one, actually”

“,,,”

true to his word, he does his best to help you recover your memories

roped mingi into helping

when you finished your tasks for the day, he’d bring you to all sorts of places, trying all sorts of things

on a hunting trip with yungi, you discovered that: a) you’re proficient in horseback riding, b) you have astounding aim, and c) you’re surprisingly agile

yunho, who’s always been penchant towards athleticism, was delighted to have someone to compete with

mingi just grumbled. sure he was clumsy, but how did someone with no memory beat him?

while helping the gardener, you found out that you have a rather extensive knowledge of flora

yunho jokingly (kinda) suggested that maybe you were a huntress

mingi bombarded you with questions and quizzes about plants

find out what kind of plant you are by decorating your dream room

hoping that you’d run into someone or somewhere familiar, yunho would take on walks all over the city

during your walks, you learned that you preferred nighttime (while he preferred the day), that you found solace in being alone (while he preferred company), that you liked sweet things (while he preferred chips)

a month,

two,

six months passed liked this

you made progress, but you couldn’t stop the bitterness from bubbling in your chest; negativity spreading through your veins like toxin

sure, you consider your favourite colour to be a precious memory in its own right

but who cares about what your favourite colour is when you can’t remember your own name?

you were vexed by the fact that, at this point, you know more about yunho than yourself

even if learning about him made your heart flutter

just a little

and the nightmares

the nightmares

they drove you crazy

you never remembered what you’d dream of, but every night, without fail, you’d wake with tear stained cheeks and sweat soaked clothes

tonight was particularly bad

normally, when you woke, you’d force yourself to take several deep, calming breaths until your breathing evened, grab a glass of water, then crawl back to bed

today, you couldn’t breathe

no matter what or how hard you tried, your heart wouldn’t stop pummeling against your ribcage;

your blood wouldn’t stop rushing between your ears, creating a cacophony no one else could hear;

wave after wave of nausea would slam into your gut

your vision’s blurring

oh god

you’re gonna pass out

you’re gonna pass out and forget the memories you worked so hard to remember and all the memories you made and you’re gonna forget yunho and mingi and-

suddenly, much like the first day, two large hands engulf your own, idly tracing lines from your wrist to your fingertips

“little sun, it’s me, yunho. your yunho. focus on my hands and voice, yeah? i’m right here.”

he continues to murmur sweet nothings until finally, finally, your heart settles back in your chest, your breathing levels, and your vision clears enough to see yunho

your yunho

and in this state, one look at his kind eyes is enough for the tears you’ve been holding in all this time to spill over

because though you cry in your sleep, you never let yourself cry when you’re awake

too focused on chores, too focused on remembering, too focused on trying to get some semblance of control over this uncontrollable situation

without a word, he pulls you into his chest and runs his fingers through your sweaty hair, offering the sound of his heartbeat to anchor you back to this four poster bed when you were ready

but g*d, does it break his heart to see you cry

he expected to hear you wail, to take the brunt of your fists as you pound his chest

but he hears nothing

instead, he feels your tears soak his shirt, feels how you tremble in his arms

and that is so much worse.

it takes long minute for you to stop crying, and another for you to feel composed enough to detach yourself from yunho’s (now soggy) chest

you’re sure you look awful

puffy eyes, blotchy cheeks, and a runny nose

(and you feel embarrassed that yunho witnessed your breakdown)

but he thumbs away the remaining tears from your cheeks and murmurs that he’ll be right back, returning with tissues and a glass of water

and a new shirt

he hands you the glass of water, tosses your used tissues in the garbage, and climbs underneath your (technically his) covers, patting the space beside him

when you too find refuge in the warm blankets, he pulls you back into his chest

his arm acts as your pillow as he kisses the crown of your head, murmuring into your hair

“wanna talk about it?”

it takes you several moments, but you eventually tell him about the negativity seeping into every inch of skin

the nightmares you never recall keeping you up at night

the irrational feeling of stupidity because you can’t remember who you are

yunho silently, attentively listens to you as you spill your heart

and if he hadn’t pulled you so close, you might’ve seen the weariness in his usually carefree features

the conflict and hollowness brewing in his normally inviting eyes

but by the time you finished talking and pulled back, the expression was gone and the familiar smile you adored so much was back in place

“tomorrow, let’s go to the place where i found you.”

a faint smile bloomed on your lips because though this wasn’t the first time you visited, it was a reminder that you weren’t alone

that no matter how the chances dwindled, yunho would remind you that it was never zero

it was hope that got you through the night

the two of you have never done anything that could be considered anything but platonic

much to mingi’s irritation

but just for tonight, yunho decides to be a little greedy

he kisses your forehead, your cheeks, your nose, your eyelids, you wrists, your palms, your knuckles, your fingers

anywhere he can reach,

except for your lips

you’re emotionally exhausted and vulnerable; he’d feel like a dick if he forced a decision - especially an emotionally fraught one - onto you right now

he threads your fingers together, murmuring soft promises: you’ll remember who you were, you’ll be okay, you’ll find your way again

and you finally let the exhaustion, the steady rhythm of his heart, the rise and fall of his chest, and the warmth and comfort that is yunho lull you to sleep

the next morning is a cold one

gusts of wind bite into your skin as you curl in on yourself, trying to preserve any remaining shred of body heat

noticing this, yunho tucks you under his arm with a sheepish smile and flushed cheeks that were definitely red because of the cold and not because he was flustered

cute

a peaceful silence falls between you two as he leads you to the alley

and since it was early, the only sounds that accompanied you was the quiet patter of your footsteps and the chirps of birds reluctant to travel south

feeling like it simultaneously took too long and not long enough, the two of you arrive

an odd smile settles on yunho’s lips

,,,was that bitterness?

“,,,here we are.”

interrupting your train of thought, he takes your hand and leads you to where he found you

g*d

you could feel it

somewhere in the back of your mind, something almost tangible was shoving its way forward

you’re so close, just a little more and-

suddenly, a chill that had nothing to do with the weather ran down your spine

before you could understand what you were feeling, yunho shoved you behind him and parried the dagger aimed for his chest

a gruff looking man only a little shorter than he stood before him

his clothes tattered and dirty, skin littered with scars, hair and beard scraggly and matted, he looked like one of the many men that inhabited the slums

but those men were sagging skin and bones, never knowing where or if they would get a next meal

this man was muscular

and judging by the familiarity of his actions, this clearly wasn’t his first assassination

the two men, unable to disengage, snarl as they continue to press into each other

much to your surprise, when you were about to jump into the fray, the assassin screams at you

“YOU ‘UCKING WHORE, WHAT ARE YOU DOING?! KILL HIM!”

big mistake

because not only is yunho clever and athletic, he’s one lucky bastard

in the brief second the assassin’s attention was diverted, yunho ducks

his weight and moment carries him forward, and he stumbles,,,right onto yunho’s blade.

yanking both his blood soaked short sword and body away from the assassin, the man crumples to the ground

but until life is drained from his eyes, he bores holes into your head, message clear: kill him

a deafening silence weighs down upon you when the man stops breathing

even the wind stills

yunho stands there, a far away look in his eyes as he grips the short sword

blood is splattered all over his hands, across his cheek

it trickles from the hilt, down the blade, and eventually drips onto the ground beneath him

snow begins to drift from the gray skies, landing on his hair, his cheeks, his eyelashes, his coat

as if trying to comfort him

as if trying to wash the blood away

and you?

you couldn’t move.

not when the floodgates had opened and a torrent of memories threatened to pull you under

you knew who you were

you were yn, born to a peasant mother who died at birth and a father that abandoned you soon after

a ghost of a person, and unknown assassin raised by an unnamed noble who resented the jeong’s for their wealth, their nobility, and their favour with the royal family despite their peculiar attitude

nothing but a tool

a tool told that if successful, he’d grant you wealth and freedom

but that if you failed, he’d kill you himself

…

the assassin wasn’t after yunho, he was after you

a warning to finish the job, or else

…

you couldn’t stop your hands from shaking

and yunho,

your gentle giant, yunho

envelops your hands in his, idly tracing lines from your wrist to your fingertips

there’s no comfort this time.

not when he drew lines of blood across the back of your hand, not when you searched and couldn’t read anything expect for this sad smile on his ordinarily open features

“,,,do you remember?”

“,,,”

“,,,you knew.”

he did.

his suspicions appeared early on, spurred by your unusually good marksmanship, agility, and uncanny knowledge of plants

specifically poisonous ones

he turned to this “unconventional” ways of gathering information

starting off with his kids,

then some trusted tclose contacts

but when nothing - and he meant a questionable amount of nothing - turned up, he left the legal sphere and delved in the underground; the black markets

yunho has people who owe him favours - people who’s debts he’s paid off, who’s fights he’s fought on their behalf

it took a few months, but eventually he got the information he wanted

marquess yoo who openly showed his distaste for the jeong family “released his pet into the wild”

but the jeong’s were not stupid, and they were loved

when yunho’s father confided to some close acquaintances about the predicament they were facing, they took matters into their own hands

they never meant to hurt you

only to capture you and talk you out of killing, bribing you with money, protection - threats, if necessary - if you testified against marquess yoo

but somewhere along the way, things got messy

it ended with an unconscious girl lying in the middle of an abandoned alley; three grown men running away because oh dear lord, she’s dead; and a child leading yunho straight to you

letting go of your hands, yunho goes to kneel beside the man he just killed

closing his eyes, he mutters a prayer for the (not so) poor soul who unknowingly got himself tangled in this mess, and grabs the dagger

it feels like someone doused you in ice as yunho walks back to you

horror morphs on your face as he gently - why was he always so gentle? - wraps your fingers around the hilt and places the blade against his neck

the smile that you love so much but currently hate rests on his lips as he cups the side of your face with his free hand

his thumb idly brushes against your cheek, eyes twinkling with adoration as he drinks in every last detail of your face as if,,,

as if,,,

he’s ready to die

“no one knows we left this morning and no one knows we’re here; not even mingi. if you kill me, you’ll have enough time to collect some of your reward and run away.”

by now your hands were shaking so much that if yunho didn’t have his hand wrapped around yours, you would’ve dropped the blade

but as the snow floats down and lands in your hair, in his eye lashes, in the fog of your shared breaths, in the space between you,

here to witness a great tragedy

you both knew,

that one of you has to die.

#ateez yunho #yunho #jeong yunho #ateez #ateez hongjoong #ateez seonghwa #ateez yeosang #ateez san #ateez mingi #ateez wooyoung #ateez jongho #ateez fanfic #ateez fanfiction #ateez fluff #ateez angst #ateez smut #ateez headcanons #aristocrat!ateez

80 notes · View notes

januaryedgelordess · 4 years ago

Text

I'd like to discuss a SnK theory with someone, it's on the possibility of a different (or expanded) AnR theory.

Disclaimer: Perhaps you should read this post with the lyrics for Akatsuki no Requiem by Linked Horizon in mind, but I also don't stand by the original reddit theory a 100%.

One of the questions that lingers around the fandom is: "who would've survived the Rumbling had it been done as originally implied by the themes and foreshadowing of the story?". Some believe only Eren and Historia would have had that chance, but they might be mistaken.

The first proof I have in order to back this claim is AnR's official art as drawn by WIT Studio during the production of season three of the anime:

(Note: these are originally four different images, the source of this collage is vaguely anitwt).

Just as shown in the original PV by Linked Horizon, each of these characters are standing by a gravestone while holding a bouquet and looking conflicted. Now, to counter the original AnR theorists, I propose that Eren —and by extension, Historia— weren't the only ones to live on with regret in their hearts, instead, Levi and Hanji survived as well.

Why did they survive? Is my conclusion solely based on these pictures? Well, just in part.

I believe Attack on Titan was never meant to be a one-sided story, and that one of the various themes that weren't thoroughly explored in the later chapters, a theme which was instead rushed and swiftly overlooked, is that of the conflict between "Nationalism" and "Internationalism". It's obvious and needless to point out that Yaegerists were the former, but the latter never take a name for themselves. However, we get a rough idea of who they might be, one of them is clearly Hanji Zoe:

Another internationalist is obviously Onyankopon:

Another one is Armin and so on, and so on.

Are they the only type on people on Earth? Of course not. Notably you also have those who have egotistical motivations, like Jean, who just wants to get married and live a peaceful life in the inner cities; or the Hizuru ambassador, Kiyomi, whose motivation is monetary gain. The world isn't black and white in AoT so, to clarify, it's unnecessary to classify every character in the dichotomy here presented.

Now, if Yams hadn't downplayed this interaction, we may have had a better thought out plan to stop the Rumbling and, possibly, a less moronically cringy way for "The Alliance" to be presented.

Why is that? It's because of various reasons. First, one of the most observant characters, Hanji, is notable for having spied on some of Eren and Historia's interactions (the "You look happy — that's because I am" scene for example) but by the end of the story the audience never got a reason as to why this observant behavior happened. If Hanji really is as cunning and observant as she is portrayed to be, she should've been the first character to suspect that Eren is the father and, therefore, that Historia's pregnancy's due date was off. Instead of the survey corps discussing this info, we get some random officers discussing irrelevant rumours about it. Isayama I mean, Kawakubo played Hanji Zoe dirty, in my opinion, in this scenario.

If Hanji had noticed that important information, and if that info had been shared with the Survey Corps, as was natural for her character to do, "the Alliance" may have had been able to act sooner against the AT.

Now, would more prep time save the world from devastation? No, I don't believe so. I believe it would, instead, make them have a slightly more realistic last fight by a) having them recruit actual soldiers and weapons for the final showdown, heck, if they have enough time even other countries would chime in, vs Hallu-chan and the Attach Titan; and, therefore, b) not having them rely on a Deus Ex Machina to defeat Eren.

That way, Hanji would live on with regret, knowing the Alliance did everything in their power to defeat the Attack Titan but failed miserably in the end. Instead of having her smile as her ghost-self at whatever the hell the canon battle achieved, she'd mourn the world that's been lost, and she'd feel regret for not being able to save it.

Now, for Levi I haven't done a thorough analysis yet, but I believe it's not difficult to see why humanity's strongest soldier would survive this ordain. I'd really like to hear someone else's thoughts on that matter.

Also, I'm in no way trying to imply LeviHan was supposed to be part of a kino ending, but I'm not too into that ship so I'd like to hear someone else's thoughts about it and on why they were the only two members of the alliance to survive according to WIT Studio's AnR official art.

Now, onto the second part of "who survived the Rumbling?". The next piece of information contradicts previous statements, and it also contradicts an AnR ending to some extent, but bare with me, please.

Exhibit A, Mikasa and Armin should have survived:

However, for Kruger's prophecy to succeed, I stand by my previous statement that "the Alliance" should've acted sooner, and that Armin is part of the Internationalist faction ready to "save humanity". Why do I believe that? It's easy, first, let's remember this quote from the moment Erwin died:

Note how, not only does Eren say Armin will save the humans, he also implies Mikasa will know it'll happen (so she'll be alive by the time the battle ends).

And, piggybacking on that moment as well, Armin would've been able to use his intellect to make a plan to divert the Rumbling titans. I'm adding this here to stress something that can't be stressed enough: Armin shouldn't have had to fistfight Eren twice, and he shouldn't have had to steal someone else's kill. Now onto that kill...

Should Mikasa have been the one to deal Eren's final blow? In the canon version of the story it's shown, in a rather cringy way, how she has to make up a whole different scenario inside her mind to get the mental strength to kill him. To me, Mikasa instead should've used the devastation caused by the Rumbling to completely break away from Eren's character and to be able to see past the "you're being brainwashed" narrative. Now, besides some of Isayama's interviews, there's other proof to back this up: the Historia-Mikasa parallels in Ending 4 and Ending 1:

Ending 1: https://youtu.be/O4wezNlsxB0

Ending 4: https://youtu.be/o05UK9lXtC0

We see some petty similarities in both: how both girls seem to be inside a pond or a lake, a snip of them running when they were young, etc.; but we also see some more important things for this theory: their growth as a person (how they survived whatever the past cast upon them), and them catching up to the people who they look up to and love.

Now, two things we know about Historia are that her beloved Ymir left her and she had to learn to accept it and move on; and that her sister, Frieda, died and she, without initially knowing even that she'd lost her, had to learn how to live on her own when she was young. Would Mikasa and Eren be able to have an end like that? I think it was implied that it was possible, but other than that, as part of any healthy development of her character, it is important for her to move on just as the Eldian Queen did: even if Eren chose to live a life apart from her (like Ymir did to Historia's early knowledge) or even if he were to die (like Frieda did).

Also, I have some doubts about Mikasa being the one who was supposed to kill Eren, since the one who was foreshadowed to be a Helos' parallel, and who'd fit the role just as well is Reiner, but I won't discuss that here.

So, to me, Mikasa was never an Internationalist, but for the sake of her character, a break-away from Eren should've been a good conclusive act.

As to some other parallels between Mikasa and Historia we have this part:

In which it is implied that they share the same burden by birth, and the same destiny, possibly. Mikasa is shown to be embarrassed about it but Historia seems to be thoroughly delighted.

With this parallel I'd also like to recall two other threads left undone: the Azumabito clan and the Ackerman mystery.

First, the Azumabitos. It's implied that their land is to "the Orient", and we also get a small snip during the Rumbling which implies they have a coast (it's obvious their country is a direct reference to Japan, needless to say). All of which would imply that, as it does in the Real World ™️, Hizuru is almost the Eastern-most Nation of AoT's world as well, and therefore, it may be one of the last countries that the Rumbling would have reached. If you add that they were the first people to send an ambassador to Paradis, you get: Hizuru being the first nation to be included in a possible Internationalist "Alliance" (had it been done in the appropriate time) against the Attack Titan; and you also get that this would increase their possibilities of surviving, at least just in part, the Rumbling.

Why is this important? Because AnR's lyrics do not imply the world will be completely and absolutely obliterated. AnR's lyrics imply the world will live on but the power dynamic of the world will be reversed: Paradis will rule, while the rest will be forced inside the cage.

https://www.musixmatch.com/lyrics/Linked-Horizon/Akatsuki-no-Requiem-TV-Size

Now, the Ackermans. Just as Historia and Zeke posses a special particularity by virtue of birth (they are direct descendants of Ymir), which make them valuable assets to "breed" for whoever is using the Eldians (be it Marley, the Azumabitos, or the First King), I believe the outside world would be interested, at any part of the story, to have an Ackerman in their line of defense against the Eldians. In this case the Mikasa-Historia parallel is strengthened, simply because it would be interesting to see Levi or Mikasa confront that part of their destiny (to make the Ackerman clan continue for the sake of a plan, while acknowledging they're the only survivors). Perhaps Hizuru would've been the country to try and make use of that potential? This parallel was, of course, never used, but it would've been delightful to see it exploited at some point in the AoT timeline. However I acknowledge that continuity is impossible in a world without titans, unless one of the surviving countries on Earth are in serious need of Olympic competitors, of course, so perhaps it should've been mentioned before The Rumbling arc.

Well, this turned out to be more like a vent or a rant than a theory now, and I wish I could've had discussed it quietly with someone instead of just posting it here. There are some other nuances to this analysis that I would like to explore in the future (since this isn't thoroughly thought out) In the meantime what do you all think of a new AnR theory like this one? Does it make a little sense? At least a bit? I hope so. Thank you for reading and sorry about the grammar mistakes.

TLDR: I believe Armin, Mikasa, Eren, Historia, Hanji and Levi should have survived and also it's possible for Hizuru to have survived. Please feel free to point out any flaws.

#Eren #Attack on Titan #Armin #Mikasa #Levi #Hanji #AoT Theory #AnR Theory #just my personal thoughts #snk spoilers #aot spoilers #attack on titan spoilers #shingeki no kyojin spoilers #Historia Reiss #Ackerman clan #akatsuki no requiem #linked horizon #anr

56 notes · View notes

govtshutdown · 1 year ago

Text

The Roll Call, as promised

#government shutdown?#continuing resolution #congress #house of representatives #stopgap #kick the can #cr #appropriations #vote #roll call #FY2024 #HR 7463 #budget #laddered cr #one week extension #two week extension #less than 36 hours left #Extension of Continuing Appropriations and Other Matters Act #ECAOMA

1 note · View note

thebibliomancer · 4 years ago

Text

Essential Avengers: Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars #1-3

May, 1984

THE WAR BEGINS

Oof, here we go.

Just gotta replicate the pace that let me do the Hawkeye miniseries in one go, three times in a row.

This is probably too much effort considering its Secret Wars (or more accurately Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars) and maybe there’s not going to be a lot of big changes from this in the Avengers book to really justify it.

But we’re getting Jim Shooter writing the Avengers and his non-consecutive runs were a lot better than I had remembered. And it continues the theme he had from the Avengers book.

It just makes sense in a nonsense way to cover this story.

Last relevant time in Avengers! Acting Completely Normal Vision warned the Avengers about some weird, possibly hostile energy surges right in time for an energy surge to surge energetically in Central Park.

When the Avengers went to investigate, they found a weird structure that looked like a techy coliseum maybe. When some of the Avengers wandered into it (apparently the most bankable Avengers? Sucks to be Vision and Wanda, shrug) they vanished.

In the next issue, after several days, these heroes returned, speaking of a secret war they fought. Weird stuff like She-Hulk taking the Thing’s place on the Fantastic Four happened. In other books, Spidey got a cool new suit.

Would you know more?

After being raptured in their various books, the missing superheroes all end up on one of those distinctive structures like the one that appeared in Central Park, except IN SPACE.

Its cool that the Avengers will have some company.

We’ve got a terrific 3/4ths of the Fantastic Four, the X-Men (including Lockheed but not including Kitty Pryde for some reason), the Avengers, Iron Man, Spider-Man, the totally Articulate Hulk, and hilariously Magneto is also here.

Maybe Secret Wars is just setting up the most awkward moment in the universe, as a prank show.

I think I’d enjoy a big event that turned out to be a prank show at the last minute. The fan discontent. Imagine.

Everyone introduces themselves to each other but mostly the audience and Ben Grimm claims his new codename as the Easter Bunny.

Checking, marvel wiki doesn’t have Easter Bunny listed as one of Ben’s known aliases. Cowards.

Looking up into space, Captain America spots another one of the totally cool constructs and Professor X scans that it contains EEEEEEEVIL.

Specifically Amora the Enchantress, Ultron, the Wrecking Crew, the Absorbing Man, the Lizard, VICTOR VON DOOOOOM, Kang the Conqueror, Doctor Octopus, and Molecule Man. Also, hilariously, Galactus is there.

I’m more convinced than ever that this is a prank show.

You know what would be more hilarious? If Punisher ended up on this construct.

The distribution of villains is kind of odd though. Galactus and Doctor Doom map to the FF. Doctor Octopus and the Lizard to Spider-Man. Ultron, Molecule Man, and Kang are Avengers foes. The Absorbing Man and the Wrecking Crew can go a couple ways but started off as Thor villains. And Amora is usually a Thor villain but supposedly has chilled out around this time or at least is less of a pain than her horny sister.

No X-Men villains. Because Magneto is chilling with them in the generally heroic pod.

Also, all the heroes were raptured from Earth while the villains were grabbed from Earth, from space, from Asgard, resurrected just to be here, or from the FUTURE.

I know marketing is wagging the dog but be consistent, secret organizer who we don’t know yet.

The Thing points out that Magnet is off-sides, re: being in the hero construct, and Magneto is like ‘hey, chill out dudes’ and denies specifically doing murders.

Magneto: “I know not what power transported me here from my secret lair, nor why I was placed among you -- but I find it more appropriate to ask why such as you were judged fit to be placed in my presence!”

Oof.

Burn.

Then the conversation is put on halt on account of the wildest shit any of them have ever seen.

An entire galaxy vanishes but probably not due to a wave of anti-matter.

Thor: “It’s gone! Gone -- ! Swept away like dust before some unseen, giant hand!”

And then around that last star left unswept, various chunks merge together to form some sort of world, perhaps for battle.

A nice touch for later is that you can definitely see that one of the chunks is a stray chunk of city.

Some of the villains start squabbling because close quarters, ego, etc.

But Ultron goes hey we’re allowed to fight? I’m the best at that.

Ultron: “I am Ultron! I do not understand the events transpiring! I do not understand how I came to be resurrected... nor how I came to be here! Nothing computes... Insignificant! I am Ultron! My purpose is to slay that which lives. You are all living things, ergo -- Ultron must destroy you!”

With the benefit of having read all the Avengers up to now, I feel that Ultron got up on the wrong side of the resurrection a little.

He’s not not like this but he’s not usually this turned on?

(Then again, maybe he just came back cranky)

DOOM grabs and shakes Molecule Man to do something about this because given enough time even the mighty DOOM might fall before Ultron.

Ultron is famously annoying to defeat, what with that adamantium.

But Molecule Man is in therapy after the Avengers kicked his shit and Tigra yelled at him for being a punk. He doesn’t want to hurt anyone.

So Doom with all his brilliant genius tells MM a cool way to help out that won’t hurt anyone. Directly.

Using his Molecule Man power over molecules to lightly toss Ultron into Galactus.

So that Galactus goes ‘who the fuck scuffed my boots’ and rips out all the energy in Ultron’s Ultron.

He can do that.

Why wouldn’t he? If he can do that to a planet, he can do it to a pissbaby robot. Even one apparently containing more power than an atom bomb.

Then, because this is one of those plots where things are always thenning, a rift opens in the nothingness of space and a heavenly esque light shines out. A warbly voice commands the action figures beat each other up.

I mean. Its more like

The Beyonder: “I am from beyond! Slay your enemies and all you desire shall be yours! Nothing you dream of is impossible for me to accomplish!”

But you have to admire that this toy commercial of a comic book is being honest and upfront about being a story where action figures bonk off of each other.

Galactus just hears ‘i can finally shake off these persistent forever munchies’ and flies off to demand prepayment for action figure bonking, with DOOM following behind him.

The Beyonder speaks up warning Galactus that hey, personal space. And that a guy that can effortlessly wipe out a galaxy is gonna have a sweet barrier but Galactus wants the hunger pangs gone and does not listen.

DOOM recognizes a bad idea when he sees one once in a while and hangs back but still gets blown out of space by the force of Galactus bonking off the Beyonder’s barriers.

Captain America: “They were swatted back like flies!”

Professor X: “To the Beyonder, even Galactus is less than a fly, Captain!”

Interruption dealt with, the Beyonder gets the show on the road and sends the two constructs to different parts of the patchwork planet.

The Marvel Super Heroes And Magneto land on some hill and quickly make sure that there are no villains excepting Magneto around.

With Magneto around, the non-X-Men raise an objection to Magneto being around.

He sank a Russian submarine with all hands back in X-Men #150 but he insists that it was self-defense and also they started it.

The X-Men’s position is ‘hey he’s a jerk but he’s our jerk plus we could use his help? The bad guys get GALACTUS, how is that fair?’

Well, they don’t say it but they’re probably thinking it.

And Hawkeye decides to be a little racist today.

Hawkeye: “You mutants stick together, huh? Well, sticking to a blood-soaked maniac like him doesn’t speak well of you, pal!”

Dude, Clint. Your dear old friend is Wanda.

Wait, why ISN’T Wanda here? Did the toy people really not want her? Fools. Her husband is toyetic as all get out.

Also, point of order, Wolverine? If anyone qualifies as ‘hey he’s a jerk but he’s our jerk!’ here its you.

Johnny “good life choices” Storm decides he’ll just kick Magneto’s ass and end the debate but yeah. Yeah, no. Magneto makes a fool of him.

And then Magneto decides eff this noise and flies off.

With Magneto alienated (good job, guys), Professor X decides this group needs some dang leadership and throws a nomination to Reed Richards. Reed defers since he’s thinking of Sue, left at home and not able to participate in the event.

Wasp, the cool leader of the Avengers, nominates instead Captain America.

Wasp: “We’re off in a strange land, up to our ears in a little secret war that may decide the fate of the universe! Some people don’t know me well! They might have doubts... and there’s no room for that!”

I’m baffled that there’s people here who don’t know Wasp who has been heroing since the 60s but sure. Cap(tain America) probably gets more crossovers and whatever.

I mean, heck, we’re talking a group of heroes consisting of the Avengers (who she already leads), the Fantastic Three (who she’s well acquainted with), and the X-Men (who I’m sure she’s met, although awkwardly its going to later be revealed that Wasp is in the Hellfire Club, but only the sex parts).

And I guess Wolverine’s extensive backstory with Cap doesn’t exist yet because Wolverine isn’t keen on him being the leader, describing him as the least of the assembled heroes. When Hawkeye is right there!

I kid because I love.

Meanwhile, DOOM wakes up adjacent to Galactus ankle and heads to a nearby fortress which he correctly assumes is where the villains have ended up.

Wait, the heroes get beamed down to a random hill while the villains get sent to an advanced fortress with weaponry and we later learn vehicles sold separately?

Kinda stacking the deck, the Beyonder.

You gave the villains GALACTUS and A FORTRESS PLAYSET right out of the gate.

The other villains tell Doom that they’ve (mostly) decided that he should be their leader. But Doom has bigger fish to fry than the prizes that the Beyonder is offering.

In typical Doomesque fashion, he wants the whole kettle. But the other villains what with their petty concerns think he’s too afraid to fight.

So he ditches.

He goes to steal-borrow a spaceship and even though he hates the thought, takes off to go talk to Richards. And then Kang shoots him out of the sky with a GIANT GUN THAT THE VILLAIN FORTRESS ALSO HAS? to stop him from allying with the heroes.

Said (marvel super) heroes see the distant explosion and fly as a group in the most hilarious way possible to check it out.

God, I have always loved this image. Its squished down into the bottom third of the page but its a delight.

They find Doom sprawled in the crash site, rambling that he’ll only speak to RICHARRRRRDS and about the Beyonder’s power. But Cap offends Doom mightily but offering him a hand up and because Doom sees pity in Cap and RICHARRRRRRDS eyes.

So he blasts the heroes and fucks off.

How very Bakugou of him.

And right as the heroes recover from that, a bunch of villains arrive to get this secret war started.

I have a fondness for this particular issue. For a long while, issue 1 was the only issue of Secret Wars I could find. So I just had the start of this story with all these non-Spider-Man non-X-Men heroes I barely knew cliffhangering into an attack by villains I really didn’t recognize except for Doc Ock and the Lizard.

It was a window into another side of the Marvel Universe. And for child me, this first issue worked perfectly to intrigue me. All these characters, the very straightforward conflict, all the complications that immediately pop up like Magneto, Galactus, and Doom. Alas, small child resources.

June, 1984

PRISONERS of War!

The heroes react slowly to the sudden villain attack but thankfully, the villains aren’t working together well. Unthankfully, half of the heroes were already knocked out by the first attack.

Meanwhile, over at Doctor Doom’s side of the plot, he flies back over to where Galactus just in time to see him finally rouse from being slapped down by the Beyonder.

Galactus floats to his feet and wanders off.

Doom: “He ignored me! As though I were a gnat buzzing at his feet! And so I am... Just as all of us, even Galactus himself, are but insects to the all-powerful Beyonder! Thus, the others have chosen to play the Beyonder’s simple game -- thereby, in effect, paying homage to him. Should I, too, pay homage? Should I worship at the feet of this god-like being -- or chose another path... one only Doom would dare!”

I think anyone that knows Doom knows which option he’s gonna choose.

He heads back to the villain fortress and finds Ultron’s deactivated body and decides Doom can use this.

Meanwhile, back at the first secret battle of the secret war, the heroes rally and start fighting back under Cap(tain America)’s leadership.

She-Hulk even gets a designated girl fight with the only female villain on the villain team.

I’d complain, I would. But at least She-Hulk isn’t the only heroine on the hero side.

She-Hulk: “Hiya! I’m the She-Hulk! You must be the Enchantress! Gee, I’ve heard so much about you -- ! You’re a not-nice lady!”

Enchantress: “A green woman? Is there no end to the varieties of mortals?”

The Enchantress magic slaps She-Hulk away and comments that she could crush She-Hulk physically but its beneath her.

Yeah, all Asgardians have some level of super strength, that’s right. Even the squishy wizards.

But all She-Hulk heard was, ‘someone I can really punch!’

She-Hulk: “I don’t often duke it out with someone solid enough to really unload on -- and slow enough to let me! Oh, wow! That was, like tubular, you know -- to the max!”

Uh. Jen, are you okay? Did you have a stroke? You don’t usually talk so much in Mario World secret world levels.

I think maybe Jim Shooter didn’t have a good grasp on her. I don’t think he’s ever written for her. And the other heroes mostly don’t vary too much from generic hero speaking patterns. Add some smart for smart characters, add some rude to Wolverine, and so on.

The battle wraps up with Kang, the Enchantress, and the Wrecking Crew captured and the rest of the villains fleeing when the battle didn’t go their way.

Cap sends Storm off to scout for a cool playset that they can use as shelter and she does so, noting that the winds on Battleworld are super easy to control. Like Battleworld was created to create ideal fighting conditions for everyone. Pretty neat, the Beyonder.

Storm finds a particularly rad fortress (”Bigger than fifty-four and a half Pentagons, I’d estimate!” Wow!) and the heroes move in.

I unironically enjoy how toyetic this story is with the fortresses and the vehicles and the weapons. Because I’m almost positive that Mattel barely capitalized on it.

There were only two playsets. Pitiful.

Over in their new headquarters, Reed stashes the captured villains in some form of psychostasis which “works by controlling aggression through brainwave modulation!”

He also sticks Enchantress in a healing pod to address that nasty case of being She-Hulked right in the face. Nothing will salve her ego though.

Captain America: “It’s no wonder that the name Mister Fantastic is renowned for compassion as well as courage! You give added meaning to the word hero, Richards!”

Whenever someone loudly announces that Reed is super compassionate, it makes me feel like they’re overcompensating.

Nobody ever makes note of, say, Captain America’s compassion.

With the prisoners (of war? Is that the whole reason for the title?) accommodated, Cap calls everyone for a meeting in a cool meeting dome he found which has a small waterfall for aesthetic and so everyone has to yell to be heard.

Wolverine yells that they should mop up the rest of the villains and get this over with.

Not mentioning that in order to “win it” they’d have to kill the villains, which none of the heroes have shown any interest in doing so far.

Cap(tain America) replies that A) planet big and they have no idea where the villains got to. And B) the remaining villains slash antagonists are Galactus, Doctor Doom, Molecule Man, Doctor Octopus, the Wrecker, the Absorbing Man, and Magneto. Not really people you mop up.

In a fun logistics bit, Cap sends out a patrol to make sure the area is secure but he also sends out two additional groups to find if there are any places in this fortress they can sleep and whether there's any... food.

Makes me imagine a Secret Survival War where the sides have to wrestle over limited resources.

Hours later, the villains that escaped the fracas arrive back at their fortress.

I’m sort of confused here.

Maybe it took so long because they had to make sure they weren’t followed. Or maybe because they didn’t have the sweet tripod vehicle anymore. But think about the flow of events of: everyone beamed down to Battleworld > Doom ditches the villains and gets shot down > heroes investigate and Doom ditches > villains show up for cliffhanger fight.

The villain fortress should be pretty close to where that fight took place. And then the heroes find a nearby fortress of their own so their fortress should be pretty close to the villain fortress. Maybe not in the same neighborhood but surely the same zip code.

Anyway, they find that while they were gone, Doom swanned in and renamed the place the Doombase.

If they have problems with it, they can talk to his Ultron.

Which I’m surprised he didn’t rename Doomtron.

Doom also tells them that he’s in charge now.

Absorbing Man: “Aw! Who gives a hoot! I need a meal an’ sleep! You wanna be in charge, Doom? Okay by me!”

If you think about it, this is just some steps added what the villains wanted all along.

They wanted Doom to be their leader but he told them he had bigger fish to fry and fucked off. Now he’s fucked back on and told them all that he’s their leader. They initially object before reconsidering due to Doomtron but, yeah, its all gone full circle.

Doom is a lot more cordial to Molecule Man though.

Doom: “Molecule Man... uh, Mr. Reece, I believe it is? I trust you were not inconvenienced.”

Molecule Man: “Well, being absolute master of molecules I can just assimilate molecules when I want, so I never have to be hungry, and I can just shoo away dirt molecules, so I’m always nice and clean -- but I am tired!”

Doom: “I have prepared a special chamber for you! I hope you like it!”

Molecule Man: “If not, I can always reconstruct the molecules -- !”

Heh.

Nice to see Jim Shooter able to follow up on the trajectory he sent Molecule Man on.

The rest of the villains head off but Doctor Octopus, the only other brain cell in this group, hangs back to talk to DOOM.

He wants to know what he plans to do about Galactus and then shows Doom on the biggest screen TV that Galactus is standing on a mountain glowing with an awesome power.

Doom just retorts that his plans are for his forces to triumph.

Doctor Octopus: Something tells me he’s got ambitions that dwarf merely triumphing in the Beyonder’s little contest! The question is whether he will destroy us in trying to achieve them -- or immediately after fulfilling them?!

Like I said, the only other brain cell in this group.

Meanwhile, while Magneto secretly sneaks into the hero fortress for Reasons, the heroes have a quiet moment that lets this Secret Wars biz really sink in.

Wasp: “I’d be having tea in my studio now, Jenny... And lunch on my patio tomorrow... This... um... situation we’re in... is kind of... much, you know? I feel there’s just a little thin wall inside me holding back a flood of despair!”

Its a nice touch, if intentional, that Wasp only admits this kind of thing now that she’s passed off the leadership responsibilities to Captain America. Its been a recurring character beat that she’s been keeping these sorts of worries to herself as chairwoman.

Over in another part of the fortress, Cyclops complains that he was right in the middle of his dang honeymoon when he was yanked into this event.

Cyclops: “I don’t know about you, Richards, but more than angry or afraid, I feel cheated! I -- I was on the verge of real happiness...”

Oof. This really sets the tone for his marriage with Madelyne Pryor.

Spider-Man and the Human Torch even have a little conversation.

Spider-Man: “You mean it doesn’t shake you, Torch, being here? What if we don’t get home?”

Human Torch: “The Fantastic Four have been off on space missions a couple of times, Spider-Man! We’ll get back! Believe me!”

I like when they’re friends.

So, I’m not sure what Magneto’s plan actually was. He was going to sabotage the fortress’ fusion generator as a distraction but Spider-Man’s Spider-Sense Spider-Alerts him to shenanigans afoot and he runs off to the power plant while Johnny Storm goes to get the other heroes.

Magneto decides to abandon whatever his plan was and captures Wasp as a consolation prize.

Gasp, another prisoner of war!

The Thing tries to give chase but inexplicably turns back to normal, smooth skinned Ben Grimm.

Also, Magneto escapes with the Wasp.

It’s like the aardvark says, you can get what you want and still not be happy.

Captain Marvel is holding the randomly anti-mutant ball for Hawkeye here and comments that none of the X-Men showed up to help stop Magneto.

Cap(tain America) tells her to belay that.

Captain America: “Let’s keep our minds on solving problems, not creating more!”

And they can’t even go after Magneto or rescue the Wasp right now because they have bigger problems: Galactus glowing with an awesome power and a massive storm that’s forming on Battleworld.

July, 1984

TEMPEST WITHOUT, CRISIS WITHIN!

The Beyonder has thrown in a nice stage hazard to keep things fresh in the form of a massive storm raging on Battleworld, with lighting that shatters mountains and winds that could tear someone’s limbs clean off.

Or perhaps its the unintentional result of just slapping a planet together out of random stuff you have lying around. The climate must be shot to shit.

I like it either way. Secret Wars has a lot of very toyetic collisions between groups of characters so its nice when Battleworld itself manages to be an obstacle.

Over in his giant U-shaped fortress, Magneto finally unwraps Wasp from the ball of random metal crap he has her in.

He lets her wander around until she finds him so that he can be all casual and eating a space scone.

Magneto: “Do not bother trying to attack me, my dear! My person is magnetically shielded!”

Wasp: “Well, la-de-da!”

Wasp: -blows up his space scone- “You think I have to strike at you directly to hurt you, monster?”

Hilarious spite, thy name is Janet van Dyne.

She also makes the point that magnetic shielding or no, she could bring this whole room down. Her being able to knock over a small house with her pew pew hasn’t stopped being true.

Magneto hastens to ask her not to do that because neither of them want to be out in the storm outside.

Besides, he just wants to talk! And flirt!

Magneto: “You are obviously a woman of intelligence and understanding as well as great beauty -- and I am not the monster you believe I am -- which is precisely what I wish to discuss!”

Wasp: “Oh? My intelligence, understanding and beauty or your non-monsterhood?”

Magneto: “Why... both!”

Back at the hero base (which is apparently ROUGHLY THE SIZE OF CHICAGO?? I want that playset), the storm has almost completely flooded the area, leaving just the top dome and such poking above the water.

The storm keeps dropping chunks of mountain at the base but Thor is standing on top, protecting it while grinning like a loon.

Captain Marvel even speculates that Thor could calm the storm but is whipping it up into a greater frenzy instead. Those storm gods, amirite?

Hawkeye is also standing by, with his explosive arrow, thinking to himself that if Thor fails, Hawkeye will totally save the day.

I don’t know whether that’s sad or endearing.

Mostly though he’s trying to distract himself from thinking about the new wife he left behind.

Cap, Reed, and Hulk are watching the villain base because apparently they do know where it is. The storm is keeping the villains in too but Cap figures they’ll pull one desperate attack as soon as the storm breaks.

They’ve already lost four of their dudes. Plus, Galactus isn’t a team player.

Spider-Man is just swinging around, enjoying how good for swinging the random technological pipes and tubes and whatsits are when he stumbles upon the X-Men having a secret meeting.

Professor X has decided, possibly on the basis of two (2) rude comments from Hawkeye and Captain Marvel, that the X-Men just don’t belong here and that they’d be better off going and teaming up with Magneto.

This... sure is a take.

Rogue comments that the Avengers don’t trust her because of that time she kicked their asses collectively. Which, hey, very possibly. They haven’t really had a thing to say about you though. They’ve mostly been grouchy about Magneto.

Which is kinda born out by the way he tried to blow up their base and definitely kidnapped the Wasp?? And is even now aggressively eating scones at her?

That’s the Magneto you guys want to go join because he’s more your people than the Fantastic Avengers and friends are?

You know, there’s a pattern I sometimes see with the X-Men where they loudly insist that the other superheroes don’t help them and don’t care about mutant stuff while at the same time doing shit like this.

“Should we get Reed Richards, smartest dick in the world to help with the legacy virus or the techno-organic virus Stryfe shot into Xavier? NAHHHH Beast can handle it.”

“Should we stick with the other superheroes or go hang with Magneto instead in a cool mutants only U-shaped fortress? Well, U is the coolest letter that isn’t X...”

If you squint, you can definitely see Krakoa all the way in the future.

Anyway, Spider-Man overheard all of this and goes ‘I’M TELLING!’

Wolverine tries to tell him that snitches get stitches but the thing is?

Spider-Man is ridiculous. He’s a ridiculously good combination of skills and powers which lets him make chumps out of entire groups at a time.

He’s embarrassed the Fantastic Four, the Avengers, and now he’s about to embarrass the X-Men.

After making them all feel foolish, Spider-Man gets away and goes to tell Reed what that doody-head Xavier said when Xavier uses his psychic powers to just wipe the entire encounter out of Spider-Man’s memory.

Yeah, it’s to cover their imminent blowing off but also? I don’t think he wants anyone else to find out how badly his X-Men just got stomped.

Psychics are too OP, I tell you what.

In fairness IN FAIRNESS, the X-Men kind of have the right to fuck right off if they wish. I don’t even know what it had to be in secret. In fact, doing it in secret is a massive dick move of its own for reasons.

What would the Fantastic Avengers have done if the X-Men had just said ‘hey we’re heading out’? Would they have put them in stasis tube jail? I doubt it.

Professor X made the decision to handle this the stupidest way for whatever reason. That scamp.

Speaking of Magneto, he’s over at the U-Lair turning down a partnership offer from DOOM. So, hey, he has standards.

Wasp has become less ‘i’ll blow up this room and your breakfast’ about him over the course of whatever the hell they discussed in their offscreen chat.

Magneto even starts to make out with her and Wasp is like ehhhhhhhhhh what the fuck why not.

Why is this happening?

I guess he has a...................... magnetic personality?

Eh? Eh??

No, but seriously, I do have a theory that I heard someplace but it’ll have to wait.

What’s weird is that there’s a Marvel What If about some spinoff babies that come about if the heroes and villains got stuck on Battleworld and never managed to leave.

Wasp has a son with Human Torch. Which is pretty weird and comes from nowhere. I guess a lot can happen during a massive time skip. My point being though, its weird that they didn’t have a Wasp/Magneto baby instead given the weird chemistry they have here.

Meanwhile, over at DOOMBASE, DOOM has some women in giant tubes.

That’s So Doom.

Doctor Doom: “All is ready -- ! This alien technology, so rich, so subtle... so easily harnessed to serve my purpose... Energy, tapped from the raging tempest... And two mortal subjects who dare to gamble for power -- knowing that to lose is death, for truly, here I shall test the limits of power a human body can contain! With the throwing of a switch... so -- the die is cast! Hear me -- ! Power must be seized -- ! Crave it! Welcome it! Drink it in, despite the pain... or it will destroy you.”

And thus are Volcana and Titania created!

Talk about lasting effects of Secret Wars! Titania is going to be around forever! Mostly annoying She-Hulk!

Where did Doom find two random women to give superpowers?

Denver, Colorado.

No, seriously.

That city chunk we saw as Battleworld formed? That’s Denver, Colorado, USA, EARTH.

Why isn’t there a miniseries or one-shot about a normal ass civilian from Denver having to deal with OH MY GOD WHERE DID EARTH GO?

I actually read an interesting thing re: this scene. It exists because Mattel asked Marvel to introduce some new female characters so Shooter wrote in these two and a third who I’ll get to when I do.

Mattel then promptly used none of these characters for the associated toyline.

The toyline, in fact, used none female characters at all. It made toys of characters who weren’t in the story but did not have a single female character.

So its very weird that they asked Marvel to introduce some but I’m not going to knock the results.

Doom introduces these two new characters to the other villains.

Hilariously, Absorbing Man guesses that Doctor Doom just made women from scratch. Because doesn’t it sound like something he could do?

Volcana and Molecule Man immediately hit it off, her being attracted to his sensitivity and him being attracted to... positive attention at all, I guess?

He muses that he could easily stop the storm outside, because molecules, but his therapist told him to let nature take its course. “Unless Doom asks me to!”

And Titania and Absorbing Man. They don’t hit it off. She either wants to hit him or hit that and its not clear and it might be both.

(Spoilers: Its both)

Titania: “You! Absorbing Man! You look like the toughest man here! Get up!”

Absorbing Man: “Whatcha got in mind?”

Titania: “I’m going to do anything I want to you! Everything I always wanted to do to everybody who used to be bigger and stronger than me! Maybe I’ll just play with you... or maybe I’ll make you eat dirt... or maybe...”

Absorbing Man: “Woman, if you got somethin’ to prove, prove it tomorrow against the guys we’re fightin’!”

Titania: “You’re backing down?”

Absorbing Man: “Nope! I just ain’t getting up! I got nothin’ to prove... to a dame!”

Would you believe that they become one of the healthiest and most stable romantic relationships in Marvel?

Speaking of weird relationships, back over at hero base, Thor goes and pops the lid on Enchanteress’ healing tube because he’s bored and wants to talk to a peer. A god peer.

Enchantress is at first more characteristically worried about what her face looks like after being She-Hulked.

But she then creates a portal so she and Thor can go have a chat.

Later, it’s morning and Hulk has been too busy stressing over losing his Banner smarts to actually keep watch or wake up Cap for watch like he was supposed to.

So when the villains ram an airship into the hero base, the heroes are not at all prepared.

Titania hurls a giant slab of wall through the room the Terrific Three are sharing, breaking Johnny Torch’s arm and ribs and knocking out the other two. He manages to get himself and co out of danger by melting through the floor.

Meanwhile, She-Hulk is carrying a big heavy as she’s been doing since the previous night and is caught unaware by Volcana who blasts her off her feet and then collapses the room on top of her.

Doctor Octopus knocks out Captain Marvel who is in the hot springs dome but gets chased away by Hawkeye, claiming that long-range firepower is his weakness.

I’m stunned at the implication that Doc Ock is one of Spider-Man’s most dangerous foes but could be scared off by Hawkeye while Spider-Man could pretty easily drop Clint’s ass. There’s some rock-paper-scissors nonsense at play here.

Spider-Man and Iron Man are also taken unawares by Ultron but manage to hide under some rubble.

Hulk leaps into the fray at Molecule Man and Doom but Cap convinces him to fall back to a defensible position.

The villains reconvene with all the captured villains freed except Enchantress (since she fucked off to have a chat with Thor) and the heroes scattered and buried under various rubbles. How the fortunes of Secret War turn.

Sure would have been nice if the X-Men had been around to help or if they mentioned they wouldn’t be. Sure would have been.

Doom: “We have accomplished much here today! And to finish it, we shall level this place so that no stone remains on stone!”

No wonder Mattel didn’t make a playset of this base! Dammit Doom, you’re ruining the merchandising!

Follow @essential-avengers for more of Secret Wars! At this same pace! Its sustainable! This is fine! Like and reblog too!

24 notes · View notes

jordanianroyals · 4 years ago

Text

Princess Haya: Dubai ruler had ex-wife's phone hacked - UK court

By Frank Gardner (BBC Security Correspondent), 6 October 2021

The High Court has found that the ruler of Dubai, Sheikh Mohammed Al Maktoum, interfered with British justice by ordering the hacking of the phone of his ex-wife, Princess Haya of Jordan.

The phones of her solicitors, Baroness Fiona Shackleton QC and Nick Manners, were also targeted during their divorce custody case, according to the court.

Princess Haya said the discovery had made her feel "hunted and haunted".

Sheikh Mohammed denied any knowledge of the hacking.

He said the court's findings were based on evidence that was not disclosed to him, and that they were "made in a manner which was unfair".

The judgments are a blow to the sheikh and a further revelation as to his treatment of female members of his family.

'Serial breaches'

The High Court judgments, which were published on Wednesday afternoon, referred to the hacking as "serial breaches of (UK) domestic criminal law", "in violation of fundamental common law and ECHR rights", "interference with the process of this court and the mother's access to justice" and "abuse of power" by a head of government.

The president of the Family Division of the High Court found that "the mobile phones of the mother (Princess Haya), two of her solicitors, her personal assistant and two members of her security staff had been the subject of either successful or attempted infiltration by surveillance software. The software used is called Pegasus software and was that of an Israeli company, the NSO Group."

The court concluded that the surveillance was carried out "by servants or agents of the father (Sheikh Mohammed), the Emirate of Dubai or the [United Arab Emirates] and that the surveillance occurred with the express or implied authority of the father".

Difficult to detect

The extent of the hack is shocking in what data it gave the hackers access to.

NSO's Pegasus software, often referred to as "spyware", is able to track the location of the individual using the phone, read their SMS messages, emails and messages in other apps, as well as eavesdrop on their phone calls and access their contact list, passwords, calendar dates and photographs. In other words, it gives the hacker complete access to all the data they want to see in their target's phone.

It also allows the hacker to activate the target's phone without their knowledge, recording their activity and even taking photographs and screenshots.

Similar spyware is alleged to have been deployed by Saudi government agents, working on the orders of the Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman, against dissidents living abroad, including associates of the murdered Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

It is extremely difficult for a victim of such spyware to even detect that their phone has been infected with Pegasus.

'Very substantial amount of data'

In the ongoing custody case between Sheikh Mohammed and Princess Haya at the Family Division of the High Court, her legal team said the hacking took place with his "express or implied authority".

The president of the court concluded that "in relation to the mother (Princess Haya), it is clear that the [hacking] attempt succeeded with a very substantial amount of data (265MB) being covertly extracted from her phone".

Sheikh Mohammed denied any knowledge of the hacking and said he did not instruct anyone to use NSO "or any software in this way". His legal team said he was not prepared to enter into any debate in relation to what security systems the UAE might have.

The allegations against Dubai's ruler were supported by testimony given by an expert technology witness, Dr William Marczak, who is based in California and is a senior research fellow at the University of Toronto's Citizen Lab, which researches digital surveillance.

He told the court he had no doubt the phones were hacked using NSO's Pegasus software. He also concluded "with high confidence" that the phones were hacked by a single operator in a nation state. He concluded with medium confidence that it was most unlikely to be any state other than the UAE.

Alarm raised by Cherie Blair

Princess Haya's legal team first became aware that they had been hacked after an urgent phone call made by Cherie Blair QC, the wife of former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, to Baroness Shackleton. Mrs Blair acts as an adviser to NSO Group on business and human rights related issues.

A senior member of NSO's management team called Mrs Blair from Israel on 5 August 2020 to inform her that "it had come to their attention that their software may have been misused to monitor the mobile phones of Baroness Shackleton and HRH Princess Haya".

The NSO staff member then told Mrs Blair that those phones could no longer be accessed using NSO software and they asked for her help in contacting Baroness Shackleton.

NSO, which has previously been accused by human rights groups of enabling autocratic states to carry out intrusive surveillance of dissidents and journalists, has insisted in public statements that it only supplied its spyware to enable governments to counter criminals and terrorists.

NSO is believed to have terminated its contract with the UAE.

'Living in fear of her life'

The hack took place during a critical phase in Sheikh Mohammed and Princess Haya's divorce custody case at the High Court in the summer of last year.

The guardian appointed for her children said it "impacts crucially on the mother and her wellbeing. It is a very pernicious experience if the mother has been subjected to surveillance of the type that she understands that she has been".

Princess Haya's legal team told the court that "the mother has been living in fear of her life frankly, and in fear of the children's security since April of [2019]".

The court also heard how Sheikh Mohammed had attempted to buy a property in Surrey, Parkwood Estate, so close to his ex-wife's home at Castlewood, that "if anyone chose to use it, it is in prime position for direct or electronic surveillance".

Her legal team said "there is a powerful objective case as to why the mother should be genuinely in fear if the father has access to a property overbearing her own".

Referring to the proposed property purchase, Princess Haya told the court: "It feels as if I am being stalked, that there is literally nowhere for me to go to be safe from (the father), or those acting in his interests. It is hugely oppressive."

Hacked during 'significant events'

Princess Haya, a daughter of the late King Hussein of Jordan and half-sister of King Abdullah II, fled Dubai in 2019 for Britain along with her two children after learning that her husband had ordered the abduction of Sheikha Latifa and Sheikha Shamsa.

She has since said she is living in fear of her life after receiving threatening messages from agents of her former husband.

Now her legal team is accusing agents of the Emirate of Dubai of acting on his behalf in hacking the phones of Princess Haya, her solicitors, Baroness Shackleton and Nick Manners, as well as her personal assistant and two members of her security staff.

The hacking took place in July and August 2020 "at a time of significant events" in the court proceedings when hearings were taking place over the welfare of the children.

The judgment concluded that "the allegations of hacking came before the court at a time when it had already made very serious findings against the father".

'Terrible life or death game'

During the long-running custody case at the High Court, Sheikh Mohammed has tried on several occasions through appeals to keep details of the allegations against him out of the public eye. But both in March 2020 and now, in October 2021, they have been made public, although he did not seek to appeal the most recent order permitting publication of these judgments.

Wednesday's ruling that, despite his denials, a sovereign ruler has interfered in the course of British justice by ordering the hacking of UK phones, including of a member of the House of Lords is both shocking, embarrassing and damaging to Sheikh Mohammed's international reputation.

Summing up the hacking allegations made by Princess Haya, her barrister Nicholas Cusworth QC told the court: "It is now clear, essentially, that the mother is engaged in a terrible game, a terrible life or death game of grandmother's footsteps in the dark. While she seeks answers about property purchases, hackers apparently get to work interfering with her privileged communications."

After the publication of the judgments Sheikh Mohammed said in a statement: "I have always denied the allegations made against me and I continue to do so. These matters concern supposed operations of state security.

"As a head of government involved in private family proceedings, it was not appropriate for me to provide evidence on such sensitive matters either personally or via my advisers in a foreign court."

He added: "Neither the Emirate of Dubai nor the UAE are party to these proceedings and they did not participate in the hearing. The findings are therefore inevitably based on an incomplete picture.

"In addition, the findings were based on evidence that was not disclosed to me or my advisers. I therefore maintain that they were made in a manner which was unfair."

Embarrassing as this is for Sheikh Mohammed, there is little or no prospect of his ever having to face any police questioning.

As Dubai's sovereign ruler, he remains a huge figure in the equestrian world, he owns extensive properties in the UK and has been photographed with the Queen at race meetings such as Ascot. The emirate of Dubai is home to around 100,000 British expatriates and both he and the wider UAE government are considered close allies of the UK.

The story is unlikely to get much coverage in the government-monitored media in the UAE, and here in London the UAE Embassy has declined to comment on the case, saying it is a private family matter.

The sheikh himself has sovereign immunity from any future potential prosecution.

#Princess Haya #Dubai Princely Family

7 notes · View notes

min-sugar-7 · 5 years ago

Text

DAY 4: “What are you hiding, Merlin?” + Fun

Merlin clenched his fist, hiding it behind his back. He stood, silently fuming, as Agravaine continued prodding Arthur’s feelings, manipulating them. Merlin sent silent glares towards Agravaine as Arthur let his uncle manipulate him.

How dare Agravaine doubt Arthur’s rule? Arthur is a better man than he will ever be, that lying, gold-digging, backstabbing bastard. He is using Arthur’s father against him- making Arthur doubt his self-worth.

Agravaine finally met his eyes over Arthur's shoulder, freezing. Merlin glared harder. Arthur followed Agravaine’s eyes and turned back. Merlin schooled his expression and morphed it into a bored one. All he had to do was think of the grain reports that they discussed at the beginning of the meeting.

Tomorrow, Agravaine would enter the council room with a black eye and a limp. He would explain how an old man ambushed him on the stairs, punching him and sending him toppling down.

Merlin silently chuckled. Arthur’s back was in a tense line, clearly not believing the story. Little did he know, the story was one hundred percent true. Arthur looked like he was trying not to smile, asking Agravaine to describe his old assaulter.

Merlin denied having anything to do with the encounter. Arthur gave him a disbelieving look but let the matter drop. It could have been anyone. It’s not like Merlin’s the only one that can turn into an old man. Morgana’s almost mastered it too. So who knows what exactly happened?

...

While Merlin’s and Morgana’s magic remained a secret to the court, he knew that Arthur had already started drafting and revising the magic ban. Agravaine just had to find it, which led to him questioning Arthur’s morale.

He used the oldest trick in the book: bringing up Arthur’s parents. Merlin was already drafting his next attack.

Merlin muttered a single spell, one that he had found hidden in the library. The Goblin’s section (as he’s come to call it) was a door to endless possibilities. It contained books on everything from dark magic to light, protective spells to offensive enchantments, and the best of them all: pranks.

Agravaine was in for a treat.

Not an hour later, Agravaine pounded Arthur’s door, almost knocking it down. He dragged Arthur, and by extension, Merlin, to his room, all the while spouting nonsense about how his furniture was stuck to the ceiling.

“Uncle,” Arthur began, “I see no problem here.”

All three men stared at the perfectly normal and appropriately placed furniture. Agravaine gaped like a fish. Merlin pinched his own arm to keep from laughing.

“Perhaps a visit to Gaius, my lord?” Merlin perked in. Arthur didn’t turn around. Agravaine shot him a dirty look.

“There will be no need for that. Good night, Arthur,” Agravaine bit back, embarrassed. He strode into his room, slamming the door behind him.

“Wonder what that was about,” Arthur said, barely concealing his amused look. Merlin simply shrugged.

Merlin once again stood behind Arthur, silently fuming. It wasn’t directed to Agravaine this time.

...

Instead, it was Prince Karl, visiting Prince from the North. What started as a night of friendly fun and talk dissolved into very unfriendly jabs and gloats.

Prince Karl had no sense of manners. He dared to compare Arthur’s rule to Uther’s, calling him soft. Arthur was not soft. Arthur is a fierce warrior, honorable Knight, and a renowned King, adored and respected by all.

Well, perhaps Arthur was a bit soft, but in an honorable way. He is righteous and just; sentencing punishments that fit the crime. Arthur is fair and compassionate when the occasion calls for it. Arthur is Merlin’s King, the only one he will ever serve, ever love.

Merlin sunk back into the shadows, blending in with the darkness. He let his magic take over, looking straight at Karl. An obnoxiously loud burp left the Prince’s mouth. And then another.

Morgana turned back, as if she knew, and caught Merlin’s eyes. He couldn’t get rid of the evidence fast enough. A knowing look crossed her face.

She smirked and turned back, lips moving in a silent spell. Her eyes flashed gold, but nothing happened. She caught Merlin's eyes again and winked.

Prince Karl excused himself later that night, saying he was required back in his kingdom, immediately. He didn’t make it far into the courtyard before his hood got knocked off, revealing a flashy mop of pink hair. He hurried into his carriage, but the damage was already done.

Merlin passed Morgana in the hallway, giving her a nod and a high-five. It wasn’t long before the two dissolved into laughter, clutching each other for support, trying and failing to look cool.

...

“What are you hiding, Merlin?” said Arthur’s voice from behind him. Merlin jumped and, in a moment of panic, magicked away his beautiful work of art. Dammit.

“Fuck- Nothing!” Merlin turned around. A glance in the armory told him that his spectacular self-sabotaging crossbow wasn’t magicked into the abyss. It was hanging from the ceiling. How the hell is it still hanging on?

Arthur raised his eyebrow, seeing through Merlin’s lie.

Merlin shrugged and stepped aside, presenting the empty table. A bit too empty. Very empty. It seemed like Merlin had magicked Arthur’s swords along with the bow. Merlin trailed his eyes towards the crossbow, but Arthur’s other weapons were nowhere to be seen.

Arthur, on the other hand, let out a long-suffering sigh, following Merlin’s line of sight. He eyed the crossbow hanging from the ceiling with an exasperated look.

“Context, please?” Arthur asked, all straight-faced and unamused. Merlin swallowed nervously, his mind racing with excuses he could use. “The truth, if you will,” Arthur added.

Merlin sighed, resigned. “Well, as you can see, it is a crossbow.” Arthur gave him a pointed look. “A crossbow that backfires on the fifth shot.”

“Why would it do that, Merlin?”

“To make it look like an accident.”

Arthur placed his hands on his hips, waiting for an explanation. Merlin refused to give in. Arthur finally barked out, “Why?”

Merlin pursed his lips together, nodding. “Well, Lord Marco called you unfit to rule because you knighted commoners and then invited you out for a hunt, so I thought it was a great opportunity. Since knighting commoners was the best thing you’ve done. Not because he insulted you, obviously.”

Arthur pinched the bridge of his nose, rubbing his face afterward. “What will I ever do with you?” he asked, and Merlin tried not to feel offended.

“Well, you can start with helping me get that crossbow down-”

Arthur interrupted him with a chuckle, which then turned into full-blown laughter. “Agravaine? That was you, wasn’t it? Also, Lady Annabel and her feathers! Oh, and Prince Karl and his pink hair. And Sir Laurve’s flimsy sword!”

Merlin ducked his head, feeling his face heat up. “Prince Karl was Morgana,” he protested.

“Should have known,” Arthur said, voice laced with delight? When Merlin looked up, he did not recall being this close to Arthur. He still had a stupid grin plastered on his face.

“Um- Well, they had it coming!” Merlin frowned. “Being a prat is no excuse for them to insult the King-”

“And you’re allowed to?” Merlin didn’t get to answer because the next thing he knew, there were soft lips pressed against his. All that he could think of was the fact that Arthur’s pressing his lips against his, kissing him-

Arthur’s kissing him. Oh, Gods, Arthur’s kissing him.

Soon the initial shock wore off, and Merlin remembered that kissing is a two-way street. Merlin brought his hand up to thread it through Arthur’s hair, marveling at its silky texture.

Arthur broke off the kiss sooner than deemed acceptable, according to Merlin. So Merlin pulled Arthur into another kiss, letting it drag a bit longer.

“God, you’re like an angry adorable cat,” Arthur mumbled against Merlin’s lips, providing no further explanation. Merlin snapped out of his post-kissing cloudy haze, realizing that Arthur’s tormenting him again.

“I am not adorable. I am the greatest warlock to ever-”

“See?” Arthur cut off, “adorable.” Arthur pulled back far enough to boop Merlin’s nose. “Now, promise that you won’t kill nobles? I don’t pay them much mind, you know?”

Merlin was about to say yes because he can’t deny Arthur anything right after he managed to compliment and insult Merlin in the same sentence. No matter what he says, Merlin is not adorable. And Arthur should not have to go through such treatment from other nobles. He deserves better.

“Fine,” Merlin conceited. Arthur never said that he couldn’t injure them. Plus, Morgana has promised no such thing, and Agravaine is still strutting around the castle, acting like he owns the place…

Whatever happens, Merlin can confidently say that Agravaine had it coming.

#merthurweek2020 #day4 #prompt fill #fic #merthur #bbc merlin #fun #fluff #protective!merlin #stupid!nobles #adorable!merlin #arthur knows about merlin's magic #arthur knows about morgana's magic #good!morgana #morgana and merlin are magical besties

59 notes · View notes

janeyseymour · 4 years ago

Text

The Puzzle Of Life

Life is a puzzle. And Jane Seymour is more than confused as to where her puzzle piece fits. As she finds, it fits somewhere, just perhaps maybe not where she thought it would. Life works in mysterious ways.

WC: 3273

Jane Seymour was more than confused as to where she fit into this crazy puzzle that she found herself in. Growing up was hard for the young lass- having been one of the younger siblings in a family of twelve and as shy and quiet as she was, it was quite difficult for her to fit in with her family. Even when she was put in front of Henry, the blonde knew that it was not where she fit into the puzzle of life. As queen, she did her best to appear queenly and fit into this picture perfect family that He wished to show to the public. Ultimately though, she knew she would never fit into the puzzle piece. If he had thrown away Catherine of Aragon’s puzzle piece that seemingly fit for twenty four years as well as Anne Boleyn’s piece after three years, he would surely throw hers away. She never gave him the chance, for she had gone and died- throwing away her own puzzle piece to his puzzle of life in the process.

Five-hundred and some years later, Jane Seymour- the former third wife of Henry VIII- was reincarnated. Five-hundred and some years later, the meek and mild woman found herself in a house with the five other wives of her beloved. Five-hundred and some years later, she was back to trying to make her puzzle piece fit into the craziness of the world- a world that was much different than the one she was used to. It was hard to do- the women in the house had already found their places and their spaces, and Jane was left to try to figure out where she fell into the puzzle. Catherine and Cathy had paired off, Anne and Kat paired off with Anna joining them and creating “the chaotic 3” as they loved to call themselves. Where was Jane to fit? Everyone else had found where their puzzle piece had fit, and the blonde was convinced she would never find where her piece fit. Why would she?

The woman secluded herself for some time after they had been brought back into this new century. Knowing she had a temper, she stayed away from the women who had someone forged a family without her, for she didn’t want to startle them and break any good that the five others had forged. Once, she lashed out and startled the entire house. Katherine Howard would not come near her for weeks apart from in the show when they had to interact. Even then, the third queen noticed the way the fifth would seemingly be relaxed with Catherine and Anne before getting to Jane. Once she stood before the third queen, something shifted in her, and she was stiff as a board and her roast fell flat amongst the audience.

Slowly, the woman began to get control over her temper- participating in meditation practices and the power of time together helped mend together the “broken” woman. She began to infiltrate herself into the family that they had created, but the feelings of being an outsider had only dissipated slightly.

Jane Seymour had found herself growing close with Katherine Howard, forming a bond that was about as close to a mother-daughter bond as she would find.

“Katherine, we have to leave for the show in about seven minutes. Please be outside in five,” Jane knocked on the door lightly, not wanting to startle the young queen who had only just begun to relax (as much as the fifth queen could) around her.

“Did Anne not tell you?” the pink queen opened the door to reveal herself still in pajamas, her nose and cheeks a dusty pink. “I’m not feeling well, so I’m staying home tonight. Have a good show though Jane.” The woman offered a meek smile before breaking into a fit of coughs that rattled her lungs. Unexpectedly, the teen pushed past the blonde at the door and made a dash for the bathroom. She threw herself at the toilet, only barely getting there before heaving into the bowl.

“Cathy?” Jane called for the woman who intimidated her the least. When she heard the blue queen pop out of her bedroom, she continued, “I’m calling out today. Someone’s got to take care of Katherine.” The blonde shocked herself at how much maternal energy was radiating from her at that moment, especially given that Katherine was throwing up- one of her biggest fears and triggers. Then and there though, it didn’t matter.

The third queen took a deep breath before following the fifth queen into the bathroom and kneeling down beside her.

“Let it all out darling, you’re okay,’ she offered sweet nothings as she tied the girls hair back.

“Y-you don’t have to-” the sick queen began heaving again. “S-stay. I’ll be okay.”

The third queen only continued gently rubbing the girl’s back before replying gently, “It’s okay love. Let someone take care of you for once.”

The other four queens would come home that night to see Katherine curled into Jane sleeping peacefully.

“Thank you for taking care of her,” Anne expressed her gratitude begrudgingly.

“Of course. It wasn’t a problem.” The silver monarch allowed herself to feel the warmth coming from the teen curled into her side. She could get used to taking care of someone like this.

And indeed she did. Jane found that her puzzle piece fit with Katherine’s. From that moment on, Katherine followed Jane around like a duckling, much to the annoyance of the second queen.

By extension, this meant that Jane Seymour would have to bury the hatchet with Anne Boleyn. Anne Boleyn, her predecessor and a woman who still occasionally shot glares at the woman for getting close with her cousin. The two would work it out in the end.

“Anne, can we please talk?” Jane knocked on the green door, tired of walking on eggshells around the green queen and ready to put any hard feelings to rest.

“What is there to talk about Seymour?” The second queen opened the door and leaned against the frame.

“May I come in?”

Anne thought for a second before standing to the side and allowing the silver queen to enter her room. Jane wasn't quite sure what to do with herself, so she stepped in a few paces before stopping and standing awkwardly.

“Stop doing that,” Anne commanded as she pushed past the other queen and flopped onto her bed ungracefully.

“I beg your pardon?” the silver queen replied, although there was no malice in her voice. She had come to talk to her predecessor in a civil manner, and was determined not to lose her temper no matter how the second queen acted towards her.

“Stop being so awkward,” the green queen demanded from her successor. “Stop walking on eggshells around me, and take a seat.” Anne watched in amusement as the third queen quickly scanned the room for a place to sit before settling herself on the ground in a ball.

“Sorry,” Jane dropped her eyes to the floor. The second queen watched her carefully for a few beats before realizing the third queen was not about to continue talking.

“Well, you came to me. What was it you wanted to talk about?” The woman began to take out her space buns.

“Oh,” The woman on the floor looked up bashfully. “That’s right. I just-” she paused to mull over how she wanted to word what she was about to say. “I think we need to bury the hatchet. For us, for Katherine, for the house. So, I’ve been trying to figure out how to tell you this: I’m sorry for what happened in our past lives. To begin with, I never wanted to marry him in the first place. I was twenty-eight, and at that point quite old to have never been married before. I didn’t mind not having a man, but you know how it was back then. My father and brother pushed me towards him, trying to move up classes. And, I never in a million years thought that Henry courting me would end with you being- you know. If I had even thought that idea would cross his mind, I never would have been with him in the first place. I wholeheartedly thought he would divorce you like he did Catherine, but-”

“Catalina,” Anne interrupted.

“I don’t think I’ve quite made it to the point where she would want me to call her Catalina. Maybe back then, but certainly not now, but that’s besides the point,” Jane rushed out. Boleyn opened her mouth to rebut, but Jane continued on.

“I thought he would divorce you. When I found out he was going to execute you,” Jane paused to take a deep breath. “I tried so hard to stop him. I knew we had bad blood then, but I knew you were innocent. I did everything I could to try to convince him otherwise, but he wouldn’t hear it. The last time I tried, he threatened to take my head off too for treason.”

“Jane, I forgave you a long time ago for that whole...” The queen in green searched for the appropriate word as she crossed the room and settled next to the blonde. “...situation. I know you never would have done that to me. And please, seriously... know that it wasn’t your fault at all. It was all his fault.”

“Well,” Jane twiddled her thumbs nervously. “But I was the-”

Anne intervened, laying a steady hand over two shaking ones. “If it wasn’t you, it would have been someone else. I guarantee it.”

“Okay then,” the nervous woman sighed as she mustered up the courage to ask her next question. “If you’ve forgiven me, why are you still harsh towards me?”

“If I’m being honest Seymour, it’s what’s expected from us, right?”

“It- it doesn’t have to be that way. I’d like to make amends,” Jane whispered quietly.

“Well, that isn’t all,” the second monarch admitted. When the blonde’s head tilted in confusion, she continued, “Kat’s really taken a liking to you. I suppose I’m jealous. It’s silly, I know but-”

“I never meant to take her away from you. I can back off,” Jane was ready to relinquish the first bond that she had made within the household for the time being if it meant her predecessor and her could bury any hard feelings between the two.

“Now, I never said that,” the green queen chided gently. “I know it’s silly. And besides, I know that Kat needs someone who will reign her in when she’s getting a little wild. She needs someone to look after her, and-”

“You look after her just fine Anne,” the silver queen complimented.

“Well thank you, but, as I was saying before you so rudely interrupted me,” Anne giggled, a mischievous glint in her eye. “I look after her the best that I can, but she needs someone who has maternal energy. Let’s face it: I am not one to radiate that sort of energy. I’m like the cool older sister. You, on the other hand, exude mum energy.”

“I-”

“It’s not a bad thing. It’ll take some time for me to get used to Kat not following me around constantly, but you’re good for her.”

“Thank you,” Jane shot her a grateful smile.

“So, for Katherine’s sake, are we good?” Anne held out a hand.

“For Katherine’s sake.” The third queen took the second’s, shaking it before adding, “But for what it’s worth Anne, I do hope we’re good for our sake too.”

“I’m sure we will be Jane. I’m sure we will be.”

Over time, Jane began to extend her olive branches with the fourth and sixth queen as well. It was Anna who was next. There weren't any revolving issues that fell between the two women. Cleves was just an intimidating woman to the demure queen.

“Oi Seymour, you got a second?” the red queen asked as she knocked on the grey door.

Jane opened the door, somewhat surprised to see the fourth queen standing before her before smiling softly (albeit a nervous one), “Of course. You can come in if you’d like.” With the invitation, Anna stepped into the room and looked around.

“Take a seat if you wish,” the blonde gestured to her bed and then the desk chair, giving the woman in front of her options.

Once the two were settled, the red monarch spoke, “So you’ve made good with Howard, and now amends with Boleyn too?” Jane nodded. “That’s good,” she hummed.

“Yes, it’s quite nice,” the third queen agreed.

“So I guess I’m here to ask, are we good?” For the first time since they had been back, the confident Anna of Cleves looked nervous, refusing to make eye contact.

“I’d like to think we are, yes?” Jane was confused. “Why wouldn’t we be?”

“Oh, I’m not sure. You’ve just kept to yourself quite a bit until these last few weeks. I wanted to make sure we were good, you know?” the fourth queen stated, although there was no accusatory tone laced in her voice.- it was genuine.

“Yeah we’re okay. It’s just been hard adjusting to these new times. I know it’s been a while but-”

“Everyone has their own timeline. It’s cool Seymour. Really.”

“Thank you,” Jane sighed with relief. “I needed that.”

“No problem.” Anna stood up from her spot. “So we’re good? No hard feelings over anything?” She stuck her hand out awkwardly; the gesture resembled Anne’s.

“For sure,” Jane grabbed the hand quickly, a smirk appearing on her face.

She was well on her way to finding out where her puzzle piece fit.

Catherine Parr was a mystery to Jane Seymour. But the two had found their common ground- or their difference that would allow them to bond- as well.

“Catherine?” Jane knocked lightly on the blue door at the end of the hallway. The signature poof of hair with a pen stuck in it haphazardly made an appearance.

“Hey Jane, what can I do for you?” It was a surprise to see the third queen outside her door; she never went past the pink room- not an unpleasant surprise, but a surprise nonetheless.

“Uh, I’m- you know what? Nevermind, I can just ask Kat for help. I’m so sorry for interrupting your time.” The silver queen went to close the door, but the writer’s hand caught it quickly.

“It’s not an issue. How can I help you, for real?” Jane studied the woman’s face for a few seconds. There was no sense of impatience or lying to be detected; Catherine Parr was an earnest and honest woman.

Deciding to bite the bullet, the much less educated queen rushed out, “I’m having a bit of trouble with the changes in the script and I was wondering if you could help me, but now I realize it’s foolish to ask the writ-”

“I’d be more than happy to help Jane. I was actually just going over it myself. Would you care to come in?”

The script had been sorted out a long while ago, and the two had fallen into casual conversation.

“So, Anne tells me that you’ve made amends?”

“I have,” Jane smiled a bit proudly. “It’s nice to have... a friend.”

“She said the same.”

“Can I be real with you for a second?” the third queen asked candidly. At the gentle nod of the head from the sixth queen, she continued. “This whole ‘being reincarnated 500 years later’ thing is hard. I know the five of you have this sort of found family idea circulating, but I for the life of me... Well I fear that I’m not sure where my puzzle piece fits.”

“I understand that,” Cathy offered sympathetically. “It’s been really hard on all of us, especially when you consider the way the six of us have been put up against each other for centuries now.”

Jane couldn’t help but agree.

“But I think it’s really nice that we all have each other now. I’ve noticed that you’ve got quite a bond with Kat. And you’re civil with Anne and Anna now.”

“And you, I’d like to think,” the blonde added.

“Yes,” Catherine agreed. “And me.”

“So,” Jane hummed, trying to pick the conversation back up, for there had been a lull in it. “You married my brother?” Jane laughed lightly.

That left one queen left: Catherine of Aragon. Catherine of Aragon, who she had served under. The one who had left the castle and never came back.

A knock on the door wasn’t uncommon for the blonde anymore. The four queens she had made amends with often came to visit her throughout the night.

“Come in!” Jane beckoned. When the door opened, she was faced with the last woman she expected to be there: the golden queen. “Oh, hi Catherine. What can I do for you?” Her tone shifted immediately. There was no malice within her voice, but it certainly wasn’t as warm as it was when she thought it might have been one of the other queens.

“I wanted to have a quick chat Jane, if that’s alright,” the first queen seemed nervous. What for, the third queen couldn’t tell.

“Sure,” the silver queen moved over on her bed and patted the spot next to her.

“You’ve made nice with the other four queens. Why not me Jane? I thought we were okay,” Catherine admitted weakly as she lowered herself onto the bed.

Jane was stunned. The Catherine of Aragon, the elegant and poised queen of England, was sitting before her admitting that she was hurt by the blonde’s actions- or more accurately, lack thereof.

“Catherine, I never meant to upset you,” Jane sighed.

“Then, why haven’t you attempted to reach out to me? I mean, you’ve been good with Boleyn for a month now!” The first queen was clearly upset.

“Lina,” Jane whispered for the first time since they had been in England over 500 years ago. “I-”

“If it’s something that I did back then, I-”

“You couldn’t help what you did, but-” Jane bit her tongue. “But you left. And I’m terrified that if we grow close in this life, you might have to leave again.”

“Oh.” The golden monarch looked into the younger woman’s grey eyes with sadness. “Oh carino.” Catalina pulled the woman into a hug. “I’m not leaving. Ever. Not as long as I can help it.”

“Promise?” The third queen mumbled at her elder in an almost child-like tone.

“I promise you love. I’m not leaving. You are my family, and family doesn’t just leave.”

Since that day, Jane Seymour had found many things. The most important thing to note however, was that she did indeed find where her puzzle piece fit.

It did not fit into the tudor life that she had lived once before. It did not fit into the greyscale puzzle she had begun to create. No, her puzzle piece fit into this life- this wacky, silly, absurd puzzle of family with the other ex-wives of her past.

On many days, as the others would find, Jane Seymour’s puzzle piece completed their puzzle of life.

“So Jane,” Cathy laughed quietly as she leaned against the doorframe, the two watching the chaos that was unfolding in the house from a distance. “Think you found where your puzzle piece fits?”

“I think I did,” Jane smiled happily. “Wanna go finish today’s puzzle?”

“Let’s.” The writer offered a hand to the third queen, and together they joined in on the mayhem.

#six fanfic #six musical fanfiction #six the musical fanfic #six the musical fanfiction #six fanfiction #fanfic #six jane seymour #jane seymour six

13 notes · View notes

framecaught · 4 years ago

Text

Transmedia Storytelling: A Perspective on the Homestuck Epilogues

First of all, thank you for reading my first post! I created this blog to document some of my research for a directed study project. I’ll be looking at Homestuck from an interdisciplinary lens but focusing especially on its formal artistic qualities and place in art history. The blog will contain various points of analysis which I develop over the course of the project. For my first piece of writing, I wanted to tackle (from a new perspective) what I view as a complicating factor in the controversy surrounding the Homestuck Epilogues.

Rather than critiquing the Epilogues’ content or making a judgement about their overall quality, I want to explore a specific criticism which has been echoed time and time again by fans. In an article for the online journal WWAC, Homestuck fan-writer Masha Zhdanova sums up this criticism:

“No matter how much members of the creative team insist that their extension to the Homestuck line of work is no more official than fanwork, if it’s hosted on Homestuck.com, promoted by Homestuck’s official social media accounts, and endorsed by the original creator, I think it’s a little more official than a fanfic with thirty hits on AO3.”

Between attacks on the Epilogues’ themes, treatment of characters, and even prose-quality, fans have frequently referenced the issue of endorsement and canonicity as summarized above. Although the Epilogues and Homestuck’s other successors (including Homestuck^2 and the Friendsims) attempt to tackle themes of canonicity within their narratives, critics of the Epilogues contend that this philosophical provocation falls flat. While the creators argue that the works should form a venue for productively questioning canonicity, fans point to issues of capital and call the works disingenuous. In Episode 52 of the Perfectly Generic Podcast Andrew Hussie explains that, to him, the Epilogues are “heavily implied to be a piece of bridge-media, which is clearly detached from the previous narrative, and conceptually ‘optional’ by its presentation, which allows it to also function as an off-ramp for those inclined to believe the first seven acts of Homestuck were perfectly sufficient.” As Zhdanova paraphrases, a critical view posits that this “optional” reading is impossible. The company ethos and production of capital inherent to the Epilogue’s release—their promotion, their monetization—renders their “fanfic” backdrop completely moot, if not insulting.

Why does appropriating the “aesthetic trappings” [1] of AO3 strike such a chord with critics, though? What’s wrong with the Epilogue creators profiting from their work? Other officially endorsed “post-canon” materials, including the Paradox Space comics, Hiveswap and Friendsim games, have not inspired such virulent opposition. The issue comes down to the association between the AO3 layout and the separation from canon. The Epilogues ask us to read them as “tales of dubious authenticity,” but critics assert that this reading makes no sense in the context of their distribution. It’s not exactly the endorsement or monetization that prevents a “dubious” reading, though. After all, Hiveswap is also endorsed and monetized, yet fans have no problem labeling it as “dubiously canon.” So what is it about the Epilogues’ presentation that seems so incongruous with their premise as “dubious” texts?

I’ve come to understand this issue through the lens of transmedia storytelling. First conceptualized by Henry Jenkins, “transmedia storytelling” involves the production of distinct stories, contained within the same universe, across different media platforms. [2] This allows consumers to pick and choose stories across their favorite media outlets, since each story is self-contained, but superfans can still consume All The Content for a greater experience. The Marvel franchise with its comics, movies, TV shows, and other ephemera, is a great example of the transmedia phenomenon.

How does Homestuck fit into this theory? In an excellent article [3] for the Convergence journal, Kevin Veale lays out a taxonomy for Homestuck’s role in new media frameworks. Rather than dispersing different stories across multiple media platforms, Homestuck combines the “aesthetic trappings” of many media forms into one massive outlet: the Homestuck website [4]. It’s almost like the inverse of transmedia storytelling. Veale describes this type of storytelling as “transmodal.” He further defines Homestuck’s storytelling as “metamedia,” meaning that it manipulates the reader’s expectations of certain media forms to change the reading experience. So, despite its multimedia aspects, Homestuck structures itself around one monolith distribution channel (the website), the importance of which directly feeds into what we know as “upd8 culture.” The Homestuck website itself, as a “frame” which encapsulates Homestuck and the other MS Paint Adventures, takes on a nostalgic quality; the familiar grey background and adblocks become inextricably linked with the production of the main, “canon” narrative.

Homestuck itself—the main narrative—is a transmodal venture. However, as of writing this post, the Homestuck franchise has taken a leap into transmedia waters, starting with the Paradox Space comics and continuing with Hiveswap, the Friendsims, and Homestuck^2. All four of these examples fit the definition of transmedia ventures: they contain distinct stories still set in the Homestuck universe and are distributed through fundamentally separate media channels from the main comic. Which is to say, crucially, none of them are hosted on the Homestuck website.

This is where I think the issue arises for the Epilogues. The Epilogues, from what I can tell, aimed to present themselves as a transmedia venture rather than a transmodal one. Firstly, they try to act as a “bridge-media,” or self-contained story. They can be read as a continuation of Homestuck, but can also be separated or ignored. Secondly, they take on a distinct format (prose). Hussie notes in PGP Ep. 52 that the Epilogues were originally only meant to be published in print, functioning as a “cursed tome.” In short, they were intended as a transmedia venture: a self contained story, distributed through a separate medium (prose) and separate media channel (print), to be embraced or discarded by consumers at their whim.

Instead, when the Epilogues were released through the main Homestuck website, readers couldn’t help but interpret them as part of Homestuck’s long transmodal history. Rather than interacting with a new distribution channel, readers returned to the same nostalgic old grey website. The AO3 formatting gag makes no real difference to readers, as Homestuck patently appropriates the aesthetics of other platforms all throughout its main narrative. This issue of distribution (print versus website), which in turn produces either a transmedia or transmodal reading, is the crux of the criticism I mentioned before. Despite the creators’ protests, readers failed to see any “question” of canonicity because the Epilogues fit perfectly into the comic’s preexisting transmodal framework, supported even further by the nostalgia of the website’s very layout. The Epilogues read as a transmodal contribution to Homestuck’s main channel rather than a post-canon, transmedia narrative (like Paradox Space or the Friendsims) as they were intended. This created a profound dissonance between the fans’ experiences and the creators’ intentions.

How things might have turned out differently if the Epilogues really had been released solely as “cursed tomes,” the world will never know. In PGP, Hussie cites the importance of making content freely accessible on the website as a reason for the online release, which is certainly a valid consideration. Even though the print format offers a much clearer conceptual standpoint as a transmedia “bridge-story” [5], issues of capital and accessibility may still have come to the forefront of discussion. As it stands, though, I think the mix-up between transmedia and transmodal distribution was a key factor in the harsh criticism the Epilogues sparked.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

If you liked this post, you can follow the blog on tumblr for updates or, if you don’t frequent tumblr, sign up for the mailing list to receive an email whenever I publish a new mini-essay!

------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] I love this term, “aesthetic trappings”, which Masha Zhdanova uses, so I’ve overused it to some degree in my post.

[2] Henry Jenkins, Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide, 2007: pg. 98. You can also find a description of transmedia storytelling on his blog.

[3] Veale, Kevin. “‘Friendship Isn’t an Emotion Fucknuts’: Manipulating Affective Materiality to Shape the Experience of Homestuck’s Story.” Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies 25, no. 5–6 (December 2019): 1027–43. https://doi.org/10.1177/1354856517714954.

[4] Although the Homestuck website shifted branding from mspaintadventures.com to homestuck.com before the Epilogues’ release and has shifted its aesthetic somewhat (re: banners and ads), I treat the core “website” as the same location in my post

[5] Hussie points to numerous fascinating experiences which might have arisen from the print distribution. He describes a tome as “something which maddeningly beckons, due to whatever insanity it surely contains, but also something which causes feelings of trepidation” and references the sheer size of the book and “stark presentation of the black and white covers” as elements which produce this trepidation. The ability to physically experience (through touch) the length of the Epilogues and the impact of the book cover were lost in the online format. Although the Epilogues have been released in their intended book format now, the printed novel still won’t be a “first reading experience” for most fans.

#essay post #homestuck analysis #homestuck epilogues #transmedia storytelling #media studies

28 notes · View notes

skjebne-a · 4 years ago

Text

Yakuza Culture / misc headcanons for hanzo shimada

Tradition of Service

The old Yakuza code emphasized respect for the common people. In their eyes, a victim of the Yakuza had to choose to become a victim. No one forces somone to buy drugs from the Yakuza or spend their money at one of their brothels or gambling dens. A citizen whose home is burglarized, who is mugged in a back alley, or has his wallet taken by pickpockets in turn is considered to be a victim by the Yakuza because they were not given a choice. Some of the Yakuza continue to subscribe to that tradition and will police their territory to prevent violent crimes. Most of the Yakuza though have abandoned that practice and now take a cut of any street crime in the districts they control.

Back in the day, the Yakuza provided the population a kind of “justice for hire” service. In which those whom believed themselves wronged by another person or group would take his or her case to the oyabun in that area and request that they help. If the oyabun decided to help, kobun would “exact justice” from the offender. The wronged party would be charged a fee which for the service which was based on their ability to pay. It is one of the reasons that in Japanese society there is sympathy for the Yakuza, even among the authorities who usually decline to prosecute its members or even investigate crimes related to the Yakuza. Unless they commit murder (except if it was the only “appropriate” action) or kill civilians in which case the Japanese police take action.

Code of Honor

The Yakuza code of honor is shaped by Japanese culture and consists of three major elements; giri, jingi, and ninjo. “GIRI” means “obligation” or “duty”. Which requires the Yakuza to repay their debts and follow the dictates of obedience and honor. Debts may be repaid in money but usually are done through loyalty and service. Failure to fulfill their duty or obligation brings shame on the Yakuza member, his gumi (clan), and the oyabun (boss). Yakuza take the concept of duty seriously and never forget when a favor is done for him, and will repay the debt.

“JINGI” is deference and respect for a superior. All Yakuza are expected to practice jingi and act in a proper and civilized manner. Some of the oyabun are of the opinion that only Japanese humans deserve to be treated in a civilized and proper manner. Other oyabun believe otherwise and will harshly punish any members of their gumi who fail to act in a proper manner toward other (meta)humans.

“NINJO” encompasses things such as compassion, feelings, sympathy, and emotions. It is a quality that makes a man sympathetic to the plight of others and is instilled in an individual early in their life. Yakuza who have it are motivated to protect those who seek justice and the concept of ninjo is still upheld by some of the more honorable and traditional Yakuza.[

Tattooing

Irezumi is the tradition of full-body tattooing, which the traditional clans are deeply into. Especially the expensive full-body suits of tattoos which are done manually via the old techniques. Each full-body tattoo suit takes years to finish if ever, and each session can cost up to 6K nuyen. The Oyabun and senior officers may award good service and loyalty by subsidizing their trips to get tattoos.

Traditionial hand-inked tattoos are the most common medium in the Yakuza for quickened spells, though it’s still uncommon due to the requirement of having a master tattoo artists and a powerful sorcerer. Other Yakuza, prefer modern techniques such as biotattoos and nanotattoos, which the Sons of the Neo Chrysanthemum are famous for with thier glow in the dark bioluminescent tattooos in night clubs.

Sake-Sharing

Sakasuki is the ancient Shinto ritual which the Yakuza use to seal promises and most importantly bonds of loyalty. Newly recruited Yakuza are inducted into the clan and their relationship with the Oyabun is established with Sasauki ceremonies. It’s a pretty simple ceremony but one that is highly ritualized, which may at times require a third party (usually a Shinto priest) who makes sure all is set up correctly, pours the sake, delivers the prayers, and so on.

Finger-Cutting

Yubisume, is the ritual of cutting off one of your fingers on pain of dishonor, shame, and worse at the hands of the Oyabun. It consists of a ritual which is attended by the Oyabun. Binding your smallest finger on the right hand with a white cloth, then with a sharp blade cutting off a joint or even a complete finger. You aren’t supposed to show any emotion or pain as that would bring you even more shame. The piece is then offered to the Oyaban. If he accepts it, then it’s over but if not, you are supposed to cut more. Your not permitted to replace them with prosthetics. It is also used on extremely rare occasions as a form of protest. Since it is considered rude for a member of the Yakuza to speak against the boss, cutting off your finger and presenting it to him is used.

Ritual Suicide

Seppuku is practiced by the Yakuza, which is ritual suicide by using a sword. The way it is done is thrusting a blade straight in and then across. If done right, you’ll be spending the last minutes in horrifying pain with the intestines unraveling and spilling out, and blood, fecal matter, and bile everywhere. Respectable Yakuza bosses will have an executioner nearby to quickly end the poor man’s suffering

Cultural Conflict in the Yakuza

Old School

In the Yakuza it is the Old School which is dominant. Most of the clans subscribe to it, and most importantly the largest, wealthiest, and most powerful Yakuza clans are all of the Old School. These clans are often multi-generational with members who are lifelong criminals, born and raised in the Yakuza. Old School clans have quite a bit of public support.

The traditionalists of the Old School believe in Japanese superiority and are racist, xenophobic, and misogynist ultra-nationalists. They are also firm believers of honoring the Yakuza traditions and in the Yakuza code, and are the most likely to protect their community and provide the traditional “services” to the lower classes which the clans historically were known for. They are admired for their dedication to their enemies’ destruction, their violent skills, the principles by which they live by, and the social protocols to which they adhere.

New Way

Within the Yakuza, it was the younger generation of Yakuza who founded started the New Way. They were tired of waiting to inherit the established clans as due to technology and medicine, the geriatric bosses were running the clans for decades. They also believe the Yakuza has to evolve and change its ways to survive and prosper in the Sixth World. Those clans which follow the New Way for the most part are newly established clans (relatively speaking) and none are at the top of the Yakuza hierarchy. New Way clans are often more aggressive, violent, brash, and arrogant. The are usually more concerned with making nuyen than honor.

The reformers of the New Way embrace and accept the Awakened, metahumans, women, technomancers, homosexuals, and those whom are part-Japanese. It is not consistent across the board though. It varies widely among the different clans which follows the New Way. One clan accepts women and homosexuals, another clan recruits metahumans, and yet another is open to half-Japanese members. These clans often maintain some restrictions against one or more groups.

Ideological Factions

The WATADA-RENGO are fully Old School, as every member syndicate is required to follow that path when it comes to membership. Their main rivals, the SHOTOZUMI-RENGO has left it to its members to decide what policy to follow, therefore some syndicates are Old School and others are New Way.[60] Four Oyabun Rengo has taken a firmly neutral position when it comes to the ideological dispute.[61] The newly established and growing WANIBUCHI-RENGO of NEO-TOKYO is solidly New Way, and has been recruiting extensively from the formerly proscribed classes of people.

#headcanons (m.hanzo)#tw long post #tw yakuza mention

7 notes · View notes

linkspooky · 5 years ago

Text

Ten Favorite Female Characters

I was tagged by @midnight-in-town, so now I have to show them how much I love my favorite women.

Name your favorite female characters from 10 different Fandoms and tag 10/or the amount you wish people

Tagging: @hamliet @amonmahboi @inumaqi @thyandrawrites @kaibutsushidousha @harostar.. yeah, I don’t know ten people.

Enoshima Junko

“Hope is harmony. A just heart, moving toward the light. That is all. Despair is hope's polar opposite. It is messy and confusing. It swallows up love, hatred, and everything else.”

Junko wishes she was a psychopath. She’s spent her entire life pretending to be a crazy psychopath, because living that life is just so much more interesting than the one she’s stuck in. Enoshima Junko is just too smart for the world, and everything is too easy for her, and rather than try to dumb herself down a little bit she’s decided to knock everything else down. She’s a girl kicking down sandcastles because building them out of sand all alone is no longer doing it for her.

Junko’s interesting because of the weird logic and loops she runs her brain into. There’s a complex character behind the whole “I exist only to spread despair” thing. She’s perfectly capable of forming emotional attachments to people, and genuinely caring. But the people she likes are generally far worse off than the ones she doesn’t care about.

Junko wants so badly to, just not be human. She does the most inhuman things possible to prove that she’s not human. What really made me love her is the lengths she’s willing to go, to the point in Dangan Ronpa Zero where she basically took a screw to her own brain and started acting like a normal girl only when all of her memories were removed.

Junkos relationship with Matsuda shows two conflicting sides of her character. How much she's humanized by her love of him, and also how much she wants to completely destroy that part of herself. It's like she physically can't be a normal girl. Or rather she doesn’t want to be to such extremes she’ll break everything and then herself.

And if she can’t be normal than Junko decided that self destruction is her next best bet. There’s just nothing that will satisfy Junko, and it’s interesting to watch someone that empty decide the world is going to end, or she’s going to end herself and she doesn’t really care which.

Ajimu Najimi

“Call to me with affection, Anshin’in-san. Well, I don’t really care what manga characters call me.”

Hey, I put Junko on this list twice. Both Ajimu and Junko live in a world that is too easy for them, and therefore they have no reason to get emotionally invested in others or try to attach themselves to anything. Which is why it’s fun to see Ajimu attempt the same thing as Junko to kill herself in style and eventually get saved from herself.

Medaka Box is such a meaningful manga to me because they take the weirdest characters and no matter how deranged they are they find the parts of them that are relatable and go, well guess what you’re human too. Ajimu literally calls herself a non-human and she’s just as human as all the rest in the end.

The best part is it’s not her good points that make her human, it’s all her flaws. It’s easy to feel like the world isn’t real, that nothing in the world is worth living for, to feel no emotional attachment. Those are all human emotions. Not because they’re good and shining, but because they’re petty and terrible. Ajimu is this brilliant character, but she’s also kind of just a petty little girl using a ‘fiction is reality’ lens to cope. She’s not that special actually, she’s just suicidal, and kind of awful in general. It’s nice to see that human side behind the mastermind character.

Azula

“My own mother thought I was a monster. She was right of course but it still hurts.”

Azula is someone thoroughly dehumanized by everyone even the “good” members of her family (Uncle Iroh, Zuko, her Mother). I like how Azula in some part seems to be aware that both her brother, and mother seem to kind of consider her the “bad sibling” and she just decides to embrace it. Like it’s... not emotionally healthy in any way and it’s terribly tragic but there’s something about characters who actively make the decision to be a monster that gets me.

There’s something about Azula’s writing that makes me uncomfortable, and it makes me sad that Zuko like... continually associates her with his father’s abuse, and demonizes her like she wasn’t also a kid going through the exact same situation, but Azula getting increasingly unstable is at least an appropriate response to that.

Even if her brother, her mother, or her father won’t see her as her own person and they all see her as an extension of her father’s abuse on her, Azula is just so determined to be her own person even if it means burning the world, or herself A common theme I guess, but a lot of these characters have narratives about not being allowed to be their own person or shown any kind of humanity or normalcy.

Morrigan

“Well, well, well what do we have here?”

Morrigan is mean, and nasty, and grumpy and bitchy and witchy. She’s allowed to be unlikable, because Morrigan never bends to anyone. Her survival, and freedom will become first before anything else.

It feels like Morrigan is the main character in her own story, and you just happen to be a part of it for a short while. You may even be an important character to her, she may be attached, but ultimately you’ll never be more than support to her.

Morrigan is such an ambitious an singular entity that her character development is letting you be a part of her life and not the other way around. She'll always survive on her own. Morrigan is irrevocably shaped by her environemnt, and yet she craves freedom in that too because she doesn’t want to be bound by her past or shaped by her mother. So much of herself is dedicated to being better than the environment that she was raised in that she defeats her mother not by killing her, or freeing herself, but rather by being a better mother than her.

Raven / Rachel Roth

“Azarath, Metrion, Zinthos...”

Raven is fun, because a bunch of monks thought the best way to teach her to handle her emotions was to never allow her to feel any emotion ever. So, Raven is eternally running on a zero. She’s terrified even a small amount of happiness will end the world. She’s not allowed to be her own person, neither her bastard father, nor the monks treat her like one.

Raven is so gentle, and selfless, and emotionally perceptive and sensitive to others needs but she can’t ever display almost any of these good traits because she’s internalized the idea that she’s such a bad person. She always believes all the time that she exists to hurt others and that makes it so difficult for her to connect to others.

Which is why her true friends bond with the Teen Titans is so meaningful, because Rachel found a family in spite of all of that. She has friends who think she’s a good person unconditionally despite the fact that Raven continually tells herself she isn’t. There are people in the world willing to navigate the maze of walls that Raven has built around herself, and that her environment forced her to build and closed up, and she’s so happy to have them.

Midna

“Some call our realm a world of shadows, but that makes it sound so unpleasant... The twilight there holds a serene beauty... You have seen it yourself as the sun sets on this world. Bathed in that light, all the people were pure and gentle...”

Midna just steals the show. Her story now. The game’s not called Legend of Zelda anymore now it’s Legend of Midna. Not only is she the most important character in the game she appears in, but she’s also in character someone so selfish she’ll always prioritize herself over everyone else. However, only because she feels that she can’t exist as anything other than the princess of the twilight and has to prioritize her survival for the sake of her people. Midna even says so at the start of the game, she can’t be kind because she wasn’t spoiled like princess Zelda in the bountiful kingdom of the light.

Midna is so selfish and yet doesn’t really have her own wants and needs as a person outside of the role she has to play for her people, which is why she’s so terribly lost without it and just because this terrible selfish little gremlin. Link and Zelda affect Midna so much because they humanize her. They both sacrifice themselves to save Midna the person and she doesn’t get why. She doesn’t get why two people would help someone who has been so unkind to them and who has failed them this much so far.

That act of selflessness moves her, and also freaks her out. She even says she didn’t want to be saved by either of them. Which is what makes her redemption in the second half of the game so interesting, because Midna really improves herself so she can become someone worth their kindness. She doesn’t want the selflessness of people like Zelda and Link to go to waste, and because of that begins to care about things outside of her kingdom and her role as princess

Vriska Serket

“After all of this is over. Do you want to go on a d8?”

Unfortunately one of my top 3 favorite characters of all time comes from a really terrible source material. Vriska is everything I like in a character. She's a mess. She's really hard to swallow. She's a character that's not meant to be liked.

Nobody really likes Vriska and it's all her fault for being such a horrible person, nobody wants her damage. Which is so interesting because usually main characters get forgiven over and over again. Everyone leaves and if they don't Vriska will burn those bridges herself. No character better embodies what it's like to be stuck in a self harming cycle

Authors are always so obsessed with making characters look good or showing what a good person they are few characters are allowed to be just plain unlikely in ugly ways. It’s what lets Vriskas genuine desire to be better actually seem like a struggle.

Kocho Shinobu

“Are you angry? Yes, I’m angry Tanjiro. I’ve always been angry.”

Shinobu is just all pleasantries on the surface, but so full of negative emotions in ways women aren't allowed to be. I love the medicine / poison dynamic to her character and how it rots her to the core. Too much medicine is a poison, while poison can be a medicine when applied to the right situation.

Shinobu is, two faced. She’s beautiful and kind, and full of ugly emotions and empty. She nurses people back from the dead, she sees no point in living herself and purposefully throws herself into a suicide in her plan against Doma. There’s just such a destructive dance between extremes for her because Shinobu is such a unique individual, trying to deal with all of these emotions she just can’t deal with. She can’t be noble, or better than her trauma, she just pretends to be a good person while she slowly rots away inside.

Shinobu can put on smiles all day -

But she can't be like her sister. She can't love people like her sister can. Maybe she could once but all that's left now is anger. Bitter, unpleasant, and completely in denial of it and still masquerading as a good person. The most beautiful kind of poison of all.

She’s not her sister, but she’s also not really her own person. She doesn’t know who Shinobu is, doesn’t know who Kocho Shinobu lives for. She just doesn’t imagine herself living past her revenge, and even though she’s surrounded by love she’s just so cracked it all pours out of her and absolutely nothing could be worth prolonging her life after everything she’s lost.

Toga Himiko

“What exactly is a normal life? I also live a normal life, you know.”

Himiko Toga is a girl who lives entirely on her own terms. Which is just so rare for a female character, you know? It’s so genuinely subversive to know that Himiko was once a nice girl, who always smiled, always put other people’s feelings first, and that sort of ‘good girl’ behavior drove her completely insane.

Toga deciding to be true to herself is an act of rebellion against the world.

For Himiko everything is flipped. What others regard as psycho behavior is her normal. She doesn’t let other people define her story as a tragedy, and even murders the one person who tries to control her story. In a story where female characters constantly downplay their own importance to support the male characters Himiko is the only character important enough to be the center of her own story. Himiko’s story is so subversive as well, both of how society treats her, and how the story treats characters like her.

Himiko is such an excellent yandere, all yanderes wish they were himiko. She comes off as this batshit stabby girl, but then you find out that shes actually emotionally perceptive. She first comes off selfish, bratty, and self-centered but she turns into one of the most sensitive characters in the manga. She eschews the ideals of being a good girl that was forced down her throat, but that doesn’t mean she’s not empathic, or that she’s not capable of goodness. She’s good to twice. She’s good to the people who accept her.

Himiko no matter what will always be a deviant. Always be an outsider. Instead of trying to make room for her her parents forced her to lie and wear a mask until her identity became completely shattered. I like Toga because under the knife wielding psycho she's a normal girl. Then under that normal girl there’s also a knife wielding psycho ready to fight back, and both of them are the real her.

Ihei Hairu

“I saw the reaper, he was very beautiful.”

Every character from the garden is just fundamentally broken. Hairu and Rize are interesting foils, because if you think of about it a loveless childhood turned them both into ruthless killers. It’s just they decided to live for different things, Rize lived rejecting love and Hairu lived chasing after love. However, fundamentally they are the same. They are children starved for any kind of love or nurturing. Hairu is so desperate she devotes her entire life to the first person who acknowledged her. However, the same sort of desperation to live, that tragic need to make the most out of the few short years they have exists in all garden children.

Hairu wants so badly to be a person, but she’s not a person. She’s half ghoul.

There's just something about a girl who was never meant to be born and never meant to live, still trying. There's a dark side to her character, she's violent and inhuman exactly like the environment she was raised in but she was also still a child at heart seeking love.

Which is why though her narrative is a thoroughly unhappy one, it does make me happy that there was someone who loved her in the form of Koori Ui. There is someone who wanted her to live longer. Her life was short, but she did live, and it’s that struggle to connect to others that made her truly alive.

#hairu ihei #ajimu najimi #enoshima junko #toga himiko #kocho shinobu #midna #rachel roth #raven #azula #vriska serket #morrigan #morrigan dragon age #meme #spooky speaks

157 notes · View notes