#Fatal Obelisk

[dagreb]

Codicil is released!

Metal I guess. Maybe Psych Rock, maybe Acid Rock. Is it Doom? Is it Graveyard Sleaze? Who can say...

It has fuzzy guitars, it has piercing guitars, it has twangy spy guitars. There's pipe organ, combo organ, smooth jazz organ. Choirs, sound effects, eveh a baritone ukulele!

[pushing500]

Being attacked is never fun. I can only imagine how scary it would be to be attacked by yourself, and how guilty you'd feel after finishing the fight so fatally. Mechi is having a really rough quadrum :(

People say "dig your own grave", but nobody ever says "build your own marble sarcophagus". Oh well.

I do not like seeing my brothers cry, and I don't think Kwahu enjoys seeing Mechi so shaken up. He'll do whatever it takes to prevent this incident from being repeated.

Goodbye, cool clone obelisk. It's time for you to go. Thank you for Kwahu <3

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[saltfield]

Gathering of Books

Erudition was my employ,

Reviving what was once contrived,

Illuminating disarray,

Scholared words where minds derived.

.

An eternal thirst broke my desire,

Set my soul and heart on fire,

And a hunger for the soul's release,

Unguarded my will to tire.

.

As a phantom of the obsolete,

I feasted like a famished beast,

As a lance through the obelisk,

The greatest became my least.

.

A gratuitous vat, now deposed of will,

Awoken to stagnation, whole,

Reviling what had been revealed,

That my wisdom now condemned my soul.

.

To gather every kind of fate,

Required my fatality,

Where wisdom wished in confidence,

Untruth became reality.

[kobold-sanctuary-buss-island]

BLUE MOON BALL DAY FIVE/SIX: "Fine dining"

While i was in the bathroom, i disgorged about twenty five large chunks of cobaltite, which completely demolished the (thankfully clean) bowl and tank of the toilet, and left a rivulet of greywater flowing out under the door to soak into the floorboards. I left the poisonous and dodecahedral rocks to their own business, alongside the toilet's ballcock, laying pathetically on the floor, and headed to the dining room.

I was starving after a long night with no snacks to speak of (apart from a couple of oranges and a mouthful of brass), so i sat down on a wooden chair near the end of one of the tables. Though, as soon as i sat down, my tail erupted in pain from touching the back of the chair, so i was forced to sit on the chair side-saddle, hiding my tail under the tablecloth so nobody touches it. My entire torso hurt from the fight with the automatons.

A silver call-bell was waiting for me. I rang it, and a small charcuterie board floated over to my position on the table. I consumed its minature yet vast arrangement of hard cheeses, hams, sausages, pastrami, forcemeats, mushrooms, prawns, savory pies, bread, crackers, grapes, olives, lettuce, peppers, radishes, carrots, cucumber, and celery, though i shunned the miniature pickles. Small dishes of vinaigrette, caviar, blue cheese, and honey were provided alongside the starter.

The next course of the meal was a most abhorrent combination. Which was, according to the little plaque that came with it, the meat of a lobster and a whole Kobe steak together with Pule, Stilton, Parmigiano Reggiano, Västerbotten, and Halloumi cheeses, tuna, black truffles, seaweed, jalapeño, ghost pepper, guineafowl, pheasant, alligator, quail eggs, beef tomatoes, spaghetti, onions, lettuce, banana, saffron, foie gras, vanilla, rice, fugu pufferfish, and a most unpleasant concoction of sauces i can't all remember, all stuffed between the buns of a burger, sous vide, baked into a pastry shell, deep fried, and finally bathed in a different seething mixture of liquids.

The other people near me at the table glanced with concern as i choked down the Ozymandian ex-Soviet apartment complex of the "Four Elements sandwich", one thin and inesculent slice at a time. Serbian cheese and Japanese fish waged total war upon French duck and Vietnamese shrimp paste. None of the flavours mixed well, the fillings spilled in every direction once i broke through the bomb-proof exterior with my woefully non-vorpal knife, and if i couldn't get the "horrible safari-themed barbecue inside the Deepwater Horizon" taste out of my mouth, i feared that i might have developed a fatal case of Reggae Reggae Sores. My bleeding nose was not helping the situation, and it peppered the aftertaste with a generous hint of sweaty pennies.

My face was covered in various sauces after eating that crude obelisk dedicated to the pharoh of conspicuous consumption, so i made haste and re-entered the bathroom to wash it all off. The dessert was a pleasant variety of chocolates with strawberry ice cream.

After the meal, we all walked outside into the gardens, and down the main path towards a small french-style pavilion building. Behind the building was a wonderful view, as the treeline was short, and the Blue Moon was finally visible. I took a picture on my camera, of course. We were then seated on wooden benches facing the river, and the fireworks were set off. The display went on for ten minutes, but i was in too much pain to really care about it.

Those were my fifth and sixth logs of the Blue Moon Ball. Everything hurts. I'm tired. I want to go home.

[brookstonalmanac]

Events 2.22 (before 1950)

1076 – Having received a letter during the Lenten synod of 14–20 February demanding that he abdicate, Pope Gregory VII excommunicates Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor. 1316 – The Battle of Picotin, between Ferdinand of Majorca and the forces of Matilda of Hainaut, ends in victory for Ferdinand. 1371 – Robert II becomes King of Scotland, beginning the Stuart dynasty. 1495 – King Charles VIII of France enters Naples to claim the city's throne. 1632 – Ferdinando II de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, the dedicatee, receives the first printed copy of Galileo's Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems. 1651 – St. Peter's Flood: A storm surge floods the Frisian coast, drowning 15,000 people. 1744 – War of the Austrian Succession: The Battle of Toulon causes several Royal Navy captains to be court-martialed, and the Articles of War to be amended. 1770 – British customs officer Ebenezer Richardson fires blindly into a crowd during a protest in North End, Boston, fatally wounding 11-year-old Christopher Seider; the first American fatality of the American Revolution. 1797 – The last Invasion of Britain begins near Fishguard, Wales. 1819 – By the Adams–Onís Treaty, Spain sells Florida to the United States for five million U.S. dollars. 1847 – Mexican–American War: The Battle of Buena Vista: Five thousand American troops defeat 15,000 Mexican troops. 1848 – The French Revolution of 1848, which would lead to the establishment of the French Second Republic, begins. 1856 – The United States Republican Party opens its first national convention in Pittsburgh. 1862 – American Civil War: Jefferson Davis is officially inaugurated for a six-year term as the President of the Confederate States of America in Richmond, Virginia. He was previously inaugurated as a provisional president on February 18, 1861. 1872 – The Prohibition Party holds its first national convention in Columbus, Ohio, nominating James Black as its presidential nominee. 1879 – In Utica, New York, Frank Woolworth opens the first of many of five-and-dime Woolworth stores. 1881 – Cleopatra's Needle, a 3,500-year-old Ancient Egyptian obelisk is erected in Central Park, New York. 1889 – President Grover Cleveland signs a bill admitting North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana and Washington as U.S. states. 1899 – Filipino forces led by General Antonio Luna launch counterattacks for the first time against the American forces during the Philippine–American War. The Filipinos fail to regain Manila from the Americans. 1904 – The United Kingdom sells a meteorological station on the South Orkney Islands to Argentina; the islands are subsequently claimed by the United Kingdom in 1908. 1909 – The sixteen battleships of the Great White Fleet, led by USS Connecticut, return to the United States after a voyage around the world. 1921 – After Russian forces under Baron Roman von Ungern-Sternberg drive the Chinese out, the Bogd Khan is reinstalled as the emperor of Mongolia. 1942 – World War II: President Franklin D. Roosevelt orders General Douglas MacArthur out of the Philippines as the Japanese victory becomes inevitable. 1943 – World War II: Members of the White Rose resistance, Sophie Scholl, Hans Scholl, and Christoph Probst are executed in Nazi Germany. 1944 – World War II: American aircraft mistakenly bomb the Dutch towns of Nijmegen, Arnhem, Enschede and Deventer, resulting in 800 dead in Nijmegen alone. 1944 – World War II: The Soviet Red Army recaptures Krivoi Rog. 1946 – The "Long Telegram", proposing how the United States should deal with the Soviet Union, arrives from the US embassy in Moscow.

[bybloods]

cerion finds himself rooted to the place in which he stands. as she approaches, he feels a repellant force pushing against him, willing him to retreat. the battle that he had balked from time and time again over the years was upon him, taking the form of all it was that he feared. when he had left all those years ago, he had aligned himself with her pain, a familiar enemy. as time slid by in a languid ribbon, cerion had managed to avoid thought of her. in her place, he had accepted angry loneliness — a life devoid of love. it had become his armour, fused to his skin as if he had been born with it. the blood of his affections for her had been drained empty, and in its wake it had left behind a beast. he tests his own waters now, forcing himself to look at her and allow his memories to be once more ushered onto the stage in his mind. there, cerion finds a numbness that disappoints him. it had been he who had salted the earth, and yet now he found himself questioning why nothing would bloom in his wake. he watches her bleed with the indifference of a soldier. the indifference of his father's son — he who was a tool for violence before he was a human being. if cerion allowed himself concern for her, he would lose what meagre control he wields over himself. he would beg forgiveness. he would disgrace himself by going back on his word. so he remains an obelisk in the face of her theatrics, even as they are borne of the suffering he had put her through. "those days are gone," he reminds her, and an unintentional softness of tone peeks out from between his words of finality. he resents himself. "you bleed carelessly. we are at war." it is a hollow admonishment, and he wraps his hand around the hilt of her blade as it is proffered. valyrian steel. how he burns with envy of a material object, even as they stand locked in emotional turmoil. he drags his irises to hers, impatiently waiting for her to release it — to end her display. "the woman i once knew was not so heedless." he would not kill her. it was a suggestion beyond absurdity. even as he had wounded her fatally long ago, leaving her to bleed in solitude, he winces internally at her marring of her own skin. scars were not frivolous, to him — to bleed was to require a motivating reason to. he was no such reason. his heartbeat picks up only slightly, impatience making its ever-commanding entrance.

The way he says her name still has the power to shred through every defense and each solid wall built as if the defenses to a great city. If he were to whisper it to her, press his scared face to her neck, and whisper her name just once, how a vengeful sun would forgive. Bleed his poison into her and she would take it like a shot to the heart. She would suffer the cruelest of fates - she would tempt a day in the sun with the lion's teeth around her neck, welcoming the bite to tear her apart. Delicate steps remember how they danced around him as a child, the little flowers she'd hide for him, words she would never regret writing, firsts that would only ever belong to him as they rightly belonged to the man Elia determined as the children that he was the only one she imagined ruling with when the idea of being princess of dorne was a vague possibility. The dark sun and her roaring lion and how they would carve a world just for them of claws and soft sweetness in the dark but dreams would always turn to ash in her mouth lit by the match he would hand her or had she just wished to burn all her days only finding the flames of ambition kissed her skin better when they were finally his ruined lips?

"Solve my quarrel with violence, lion of mine?" She says with a familiarity as if he never left and stole the air out of her lungs to run no where but back to his rock. Elia would've given him that rock on a platter, the heads of his enemies, and she would've curled contently into the venomous embrace and furies and she would be content. Hips sway like the sands of Dorne, and without hesitation, she crosses the divide she never thought she would walk, daring him to flinch or flee at her presence and the decreasing distance. She smells of spiced oranges, of sweat that could only ever be described as sweet, and if you spent wild things and doomed lovers. Her hand gracefully retrieves her blade, and she offers it forward, the handle facing outward. The valyrian steel cuts into her hand, and even with the delicate grip, she offers it out to him. Is it a heart or a blade she gives? You can't give what you no longer have, so it was the blade. Could Cerion not even pick up her blade? "You - submit to my will? There were days I only needed to whisper your name to the dark, and you would be there to submit to my will. Don't pretend as if you still wil, only your pride demands you answer a challenge given to you. Prideful lion."

Elia stops mere inches from him, close enough to see a face she loved once, older but still the same. Fingers resisted the urge to reach out and touch the place where he'd been kissed by the lions claw, remembering an age she would kiss them as he slept in her arms to whisper of him the love she held, to tell him he was beautiful, to tell him he was hers and no one elses. Elia doesn't. Elia's hand bleeds, and she breathes. "You drew the blade for me long ago. You can't put it back unless you take the life it was intended to. I am the blade. End me or take me if you dare. Violence, though, against you, tsk? You forget the promise a foolish girl made you once when both of us weren't so full of death? Oh, Cerion. You've changed but so have I"

[rabbitcruiser]

U.S. president William McKinley was fatally wounded by anarchist Leon Czolgosz at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo on September 6, 1901.

[dagreb]

Listen/purchase: Jump Out Your Skin by Fatal Obelisk

I’ve got new music out!

[artbyblastweave]

The background detail about how the absurd jockeying, politicking, and posthumous stunts at the post-endbringer funeral services forced the cape community to come up with the most non-denominational, non-specific memorial monument possible in order to avoid a media clownshow every three months, and that they’ve now got a warehouse full of these obelisks ready to get inscribed with the names of the fallen and deployed at the attack sites before the fires are completely out- this is, not exactly parody, but it is, like. Deeply deeply deeply fucking funny. 

Tragic! And an excellent synedoche for the larger co-ordination problems and ingrained cynical fatalism facing the setting. But also darkly funny, and in a way enabled by the logic of the superhero tropes in play even though it’s hard to read it as an attack on any specific trope.

[werewolfetone]

Hiiii anon idk if you are still there and I know everyone is probably sick to death of me talking about this but I have more information for you now.

The so called "second Irish famine," usually referred to as "Bliain an Áir" ("the Year of Slaughter" in english), took place from december 1739 to about autumn 1741. No one is quite sure what caused the initial frost but basically in winter 1739 an EXTREMELY irregular frost hit Ireland which was so severe that the Boyne and Shannon completely froze over and water turned to ice indoors. At the time the potato crop would be stored in the field, i.e. farmers would harvest them and then just... leave them in the ground until they were needed for food &c, so that year's harvest was totally destroyed. A drought hit in spring 1740 soon after the frost ended, which had a disastrous effect on cattle and other livestock, and the oat + grain crops were also deeply affected by the irregular weather patterns, so even after the Lord Lieutenant banned the exportation of those products to anywhere but Britain there was still not enough food. Mass starvation and food riots began to set in.

The frost returned in winter 1740 and the famine deepened in spring 1741, this time accompanied by a variety of epidemics (typhus, dysentery, etc), with a lot of the same disturbing scenes of death more familiar from the Great Famine playing out in an incredibly rapid fashion. The one thing you didn't have was the mass emigration which happened during the Great Famine -- there WAS emigration, but it was like. just the normal amount and the only account I've come across of an 1840s style coffin ship was treated as exceptional news, so they likely weren't very common if they ever happened again outside of that one case. Large scale relief measures were now attempted. They were for the most part too little, too late, but they did help some people. Most famously (if u can call anything about this famous lmao), aristocrats hired peasants to build them Obelisks in a very Great Famine-like 'work for your charity so you are not idle™️©️®️' scheme, soup kitchens were set up, the Quakers helped people, etc. A few people in the Irish government (NOT the British government, the British completely ignored all of this save for the aforementioned export ban, as per usual) set up a food stamp type system where people were given tickets for one meal a day at certain poorhouses. Finally, the harvest of 1741 rolled around, plenty returned, and, while the peasantry was scarred permanently, everyone in power pretty much instantly and very fatally completely forgot that all of that had happened, at least until a mysterious fungus was discovered affecting the potato crop just over a century later, in 1845.

To look at the crisis overall Munster was probably the hardest hit area -- David Dickson in his book on the famine describes Cullen, Co. Tipperary in particular as "the Skibbereen of the famine" if there is to be one -- and Ulster was definitely the least hard hit due to a variety of factors including the intricacies of the linen industry and the fact that Ulster had experienced multiple mini famines in the early eighteenth century already and therefore its peasantry was not as caught off guard as nearly the entire rest of the country was. However it's important to remember that this famine was so long ago, so poorly documented, and so long ignored that very few records relating to it survive, and so many of the details about deaths &c are hazy. I will leave u with the fact that it's thought that 310,000 - 480,000 people, or 13 - 20% of the population of Ireland at the time, are thought to have died as a result of the famine over a little under 2 years. It's a devastatingly sad period of Irish history & I really think the best we can do is to remember it 👍

Sources under the cut

Dickson, David. Arctic Ireland. White Row Press, 1997.

Cullen, L. M. “The Irish Food Crises of the Early 1740s: The Economic Conjuncture.” Irish Economic and Social History, vol. 37, 2010, pp. 1–23. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/24338619. Accessed 2 Mar. 2024.

KELLY, JAMES. “Coping with Crisis: The Response to the Famine of 1740-41.” Eighteenth-Century Ireland / Iris an Dá Chultúr, vol. 27, 2012, pp. 99–122. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/24389559. Accessed 2 Mar. 2024.

Trevelyan, Charles E. The Irish Crisis. 1848. Accessed 29 February 2024.

Anonymous. The Groans of Ireland, in a Letter to a Member of Parliament. George Faulkner, 15 November 1741.

There were TWO famines in Ireland!?

Well I mean there have been more than 2, but in terms of "horrifying instance where the potato crop died and hundreds of thousands of people starved + also there was a plague of loosely defined 'famine fever' due to the conditions caused by it which also killed loads of people, pre-1900 but within the 2 centuries before that and also weirdly in the 4th decade of the century it happened in," as specific as that seems, yeah there's also this one

Although ☝️ please keep in mind that it was completely different from the great famine in that the initial problem was caused by a climate crisis rather than a parasite + due to that it wasn't JUST the potato crop that died (hence why such a high percentage of the population died) + things improved relatively quickly after it was over + didn't last as long + you apparently didn't get the mass migration that famously followed the famine of the 1840s. wish I could provide more information but I don't know very much about this yet so I can't atm

[bawkrya]

The Stone Guardians of the Lepisma Clan.

The Lepisma Clan is an Obelisk clan discovered underneath the Scarred Wasteland, at around the same time others of the same breed were discovered in Dragonhome. These Obelisk aren't to the same standards of those in Dragonhome, with most being "stuck" in their statue-like state and unable to become completely mobile. The Stone Guardians are a prime example of this-- but despite them seemingly being unable to move, they are among the most dangerous of the Clan, hence them being given the Guardian position.

These Guardians never leave their posts, given they don't need any form of food or water, and stand guard at every hour of the day. When members of the Lucilia attempted to approach these guards, most were injured upon reaching a certain radius, and unfortunately, one researcher who persisted ended up being fatally wounded. For those who spectated, there was no movement from the Guardians themselves and no traceable magic being put in use.

Having to abandon the deceased for their own safety, the Lucilia have stopped trying to directly interact with the Lepisma out of respect for their want to be left alone. Though, they still keep watch. It seems the Lepisma is all too aware of this, as the deceased's body was recently returned as a form of 'Warning' to the Lucilia researchers, months after the initial attempt at interaction. The body is still in the same state it had been left in, yet there are no traces of magic, or any other form of embalming, used on the body to preserve it.

[agaraugur]

I started Dungeon23 a little early. Dungeon23 is a room-a-day ttrpg megadungeon writing project. The premise so far is that there’s a floating chunk of mountain I’m calling “the Clod” that houses the megadungeon. I’m not attached to the name, but the etymology of “cloud” is related to “clod,” as anglo myth imagines clouds as floating rocks where you might, for example, encounter a giant after climbing a beanstalk.

Room 1 28Dec2022 A dozen mythril braids anchored the Clod to the valley. One mythril braid anchors it today. Most are either scavenged (mythril is valuable) or their anchors in the valley have broken in the intervening years. One way to get to The Clod is to climb 600 feet on the surviving cable and then to scramble from there to the vines and odd perches. This involves at least one reasonably difficult check, whose primary dangers can be avoided with a climbing kit.

Room 2 29Dec2022 When the wind catches it, the Clod collides with the side of a mountain. Where it connects, both the Clod and the mountain are worn smooth. This has exposed a mining tunnel in the base of the Clod. Entrepeneurial sorts have dug foxholes into the side of the mountain, which offer an element of safety (being in one during a collision does modest thunder damage, preferable to instant death.) From the highest foxhole, one can leap into the mine tunnel. The darkness, tendency of moisture to freeze, smoothness of the contact surfaces, and angle of the slope renders the space between foxholes difficult terrain.

Room 3 30Dec2022 On the north face of the Clod, a conspicuously large hallway large enough for a gargantuan creature is visible. This is accessible to flying creatures, or to characters making the lengthy climb from the western cable to the hallway. Inside is a thick basalt door, and a series of levers and a button set in the wall, and the long-ruined remains of a camp site. The wall containing the levers has been partially opened, exposing the mechanism which has itself fallen into decay. Repairing the mechanism or finding a bypass requires an appropriate skill check. Blood inside the mechanism indicates the previous party attempted such a thing before being fatally attacked, though no bodies are visible.

Room 4 31Dec2022 The top of the Clod has copses of evergreen trees growing in irregular spots upon an eroded slab brick surface, and a gilded obelisk covered in draconic boasts. A dozen perytons exist up here, living off the wild goats, bears, deer, and other wildlife. Perytons, by their nature, take a special interest in humanoid travelers, and attack at night. At dusk they will harass humanoids with dropped stones, pulls and shoves with hooked sticks, and occasional attacks. They maintain smaller nests on nearby peaks and ridges, out to two days out, but return to the Clod regularly. Their continued harassment prevents restful sleep, and locals know to avoid this valley. Once a prey is deemed suitably vulnerable, they will commit to a fight to the death.

The golden obelisk proclaims the Clod as the property of Gozpoditakel, a dragon that boasts of their most valued hoard: the chiefs and nobles they hold for literal kings' ransoms. A history check against the names, or the obvious age of the space, indicates that the dragon seems to be gone. There is probably a direct way from this perch to the "hoard" itself, but it's not obvious.

Room 5 01Dec2023 Mt. Dlagan is to the southwest of the Clod, and it's peak sits about 400 feet higher than the apex of the Clod. 200 feet below the apex, observing the Clod, is a carefully obscured shelter. It houses two fraternal twin dwarven adventurers - Grake and Yurrow Ironboot. They are the hired guides of the party that failed to repair the door in the north hallway. They have a spell scroll of Fly which neither can use. Their deftness with mountaincraft is how they survive, but they don't have a clear plan out of the valley entirely. They have the skill to lasso a peryton, but they don't have the nerve or people to try the gambit. They may attempt to sign their location to players with a hand mirror at a distance.

Room 6 02Dec2023 A now closed entrance, covered in snow and moss, appear on the south side of the Clod. Once used as an exit for detritus from the mine, it has been closed with a round copper plug that has tarnished green over the years. A reasonably high passive perception score will notice a roughly circular patch of green-stained snow against the moss and rock. Climbing from the western cable, flying, or gliding from a higher point can access the spot, and clearing the snow reveals a five-foot threshold safe for standing. The plug has a fist-sized hole in the center and numerous matching holes near its circumference. Inset in the leftmost hole is a pin. Removing the pin and setting it into the center allows the plug to roll sideways, opening the space.

Room 7 04Dec2023 Sitting a bit north of the Clod's current location in the Ka'ahli Valley is an abandoned dwarven mining camp. What remains of it would require an organized excavation, but some features are visible and potentially useful. An earth and stonework ridge, once used for water diversion, surrounds the camp and sits three and a half feet tall. A large freestanding domed furnace can provide emergency shelter from the elements. Inside the furnace are lead pellets (suitable for use as sling bullets), bronze molds, bowls made from crushed bonemeal, and a short flat adamantine bar with a bifurcated hook on one end, and a hole in the other. Once used to fish material out of the furnace, the bar can now be used as an improvised grappling hook or as an adamantine sickle that does piercing damage.

[brookstonalmanac]

Events 2.21 (before 1950)

1076 – Having received a letter during the Lenten synod of 14–20 February demanding that he abdicate, Pope Gregory VII excommunicates Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor. 1316 – The Battle of Picotin, between Ferdinand of Majorca and the forces of Matilda of Hainaut, ends in victory for Ferdinand. 1371 – Robert II becomes King of Scotland, beginning the Stuart dynasty. 1495 – King Charles VIII of France enters Naples to claim the city's throne. 1632 – Ferdinando II de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, the dedicatee, receives the first printed copy of Galileo's Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems. 1651 – St. Peter's Flood: A storm surge floods the Frisian coast, drowning 15,000 people. 1744 – War of the Austrian Succession: The Battle of Toulon causes several Royal Navy captains to be court-martialed, and the Articles of War to be amended. 1770 – British customs officer Ebenezer Richardson fires blindly into a crowd during a protest in North End, Boston, fatally wounding 11-year-old Christopher Seider; the first American fatality of the American Revolution 1797 – The last Invasion of Britain begins near Fishguard, Wales. 1819 – By the Adams–Onís Treaty, Spain sells Florida to the United States for five million U.S. dollars. 1847 – Mexican–American War: The Battle of Buena Vista: Five thousand American troops defeat 15,000 Mexican troops. 1848 – The French Revolution of 1848, which would lead to the establishment of the French Second Republic, begins. 1856 – The United States Republican Party opens its first national convention in Pittsburgh. 1862 – American Civil War: Jefferson Davis is officially inaugurated for a six-year term as the President of the Confederate States of America in Richmond, Virginia. He was previously inaugurated as a provisional president on February 18, 1861. 1872 – The Prohibition Party holds its first national convention in Columbus, Ohio, nominating James Black as its presidential nominee. 1879 – In Utica, New York, Frank Woolworth opens the first of many of five-and-dime Woolworth stores. 1881 – Cleopatra's Needle, a 3,500-year-old Ancient Egyptian obelisk is erected in Central Park, New York. 1889 – President Grover Cleveland signs a bill admitting North Dakota, South Dakota, Montana and Washington as U.S. states. 1899 – Filipino forces led by General Antonio Luna launch counterattacks for the first time against the American forces during the Philippine–American War. The Filipinos fail to regain Manila from the Americans. 1904 – The United Kingdom sells a meteorological station on the South Orkney Islands to Argentina; the islands are subsequently claimed by the United Kingdom in 1908. 1909 – The sixteen battleships of the Great White Fleet, led by USS Connecticut, return to the United States after a voyage around the world. 1921 – After Russian forces under Baron Roman von Ungern-Sternberg drive the Chinese out, the Bogd Khan is reinstalled as the emperor of Mongolia. 1942 – World War II: President Franklin D. Roosevelt orders General Douglas MacArthur out of the Philippines as the Japanese victory becomes inevitable. 1943 – World War II: Members of the White Rose resistance, Sophie Scholl, Hans Scholl, and Christoph Probst are executed in Nazi Germany. 1944 – World War II: American aircraft mistakenly bomb the Dutch towns of Nijmegen, Arnhem, Enschede and Deventer, resulting in 800 dead in Nijmegen alone.[ 1944 – World War II: The Soviet Red Army recaptures Krivoi Rog. 1946 – The "Long Telegram", proposing how the United States should deal with the Soviet Union, arrives from the US embassy in Moscow.

[esfersart]

Soon you'll understand happiness is a road leading forward So leave your home at the edge of the Universe And let these sounds of constellations fly by Beyond this blue darkness is the Horizon Of Events It weaves Our interstellar strings into Its threads

My thoughts will guide your ships the way And we’ll stay inside this eternal ocean of dreams Our stars will become grains Growing on the black earth of this warmed Universe

Your feelings will become mine Very first fatal songs We are from the most different The most distant planets Are you not here?

Thousands of years slipped by Us We were striving for blue, but We were drawn in with a net Of Our past mistakes, at the end of the fight And all the lava of Our guilt is glowing with red Take a look We can see Time from here It left behind nothing but obelisks It seems We are next to those Who were once so close

Are we not?

Leave your home at the edge of the Universe And let these sounds of constellations fly by Beyond this blue darkness is the Horizon Of Events It weaves Our interstellar strings into Its threads

[higuchimon]

[fanfic] One More Time

One more time. Again. Samejima sat back in his chair and observed the monitor that showed the practical exams. The exams that he’d seen so many times and could practically recite how they would go from memory. Faces that were familiar to him – but they would not have recognized him - showed, along with the varied fates they’d endured.

So, so many of them fallen to the Light, far too many times. Should they survive that, then other fates awaited them. Dead of starvation and thirsts in a world of sand. Captured by spirits and worked to death or worse – and he knew very well how much worse it could get.

He’d seen it all, so many times. He’d lost count of how many times he’d watched the world burn or fall to darkness – that hideous wrong darkness, not the one that he knew could save them all, if only matter turned out right this time.

Where was he? Was he going to show up this time?

Samejima hadn’t forgotten the thousand or so timelines where Yuuki Juudai never came to Duel Academia and they’d never managed to get through the Seven Stars. In a tiny handful of those, someone managed to face Kagemaru – he could not forget the one timeline he’d thought would work out when Johan Andersen came to his school instead. That had been amazing but for all of his skills, Johan couldn’t manage what needed to be done on his own.

He’d truly hoped then. Johan had a way of sparking that in people. But that timeline convinced him of one thing – that Yuuki Juudai was who they needed.

So he’d done his best. Everything always cycled back to when he was a young man, before Duel Monsters itself ever exited. He fought timeline after timeline to make certain that Yuuki Juudai came to Duel Academia and he tried so very hard to make certain that Marufuji Ryou learned the right things about respect. He’d managed to get good at the first one, connecting to the boy’s parents and suggesting that he attend the school.

Sometimes he wondered if they knew what was going on as well. It was easier sometimes than others to convince them. One time they’d practically packed up and left Japan, making certain that Juudai went with them. Samejima hadn’t heard about them after that, and in that timeline, everything fell to light so much sooner.

When he thought about it, he wondered if he had heard about Juudai. Because the harbinger of the Light in that timeline hadn’t been Saiou Takuma.

Making sure Ryou knew about respect had differing results. It seemed that being Hell Kaiser was integral to Marufuji Ryou’s proper timeline, for reasons that Samejima couldn’t properly understand. So he stopped trying to stop that.

As the timelines ticked by, he got very used to pretending that he didn’t know what was going to happen. He had more than enough experience to be able to fake it all, and sometimes he got surprised anyway. He couldn’t control every outcome – he really only had influence on events that happened at Duel Academia and a little at the Cyber Dojo – and often things happened that were outside of his sphere of influence.

Such as the time when the plane bringing the new students over had suffered engine failure and fell into the ocean, resulting in the death of everyone on it. That had not been a fun timeline. In fact, most of them weren’t. Something always went wrong along the way. Something always failed and he searched over and over for what he could do to stop it.

He’d made a list of everything he could remember. He kept the list where only he could access it – he’d never seen any solid proof that anyone else remembered the way time looped back on itself. It started when he was a young man and always, always ended the night of graduation – if they even survived that long.

He was always one of the last to die. He didn’t know why. He’d learned a great deal but not who started him on this loop or why. He suspected that he would have several words for them if he ever learned.

For now he watched as the students went through their exams. Marufuji Shou just managed to squeak through – Samejima hopped matters would work out better for him than in the last timeline, when he’d been converted to the Society of Light and ended up – well, he wasn’t going to think about that.

It would hurt to see Marufuji Ryou become Hell Kaiser once again. Perhaps this time he would survive the heart surgeries and go on to a life of some sort. So far no timeline had gone on long enough for him to have an idea of what might happen to him after his brother’s graduation.

He also wondered what fate had in store for Misawa Daichi. He’d tried a few time to get the boy upgraded to Obelisk Blue, but those timelines always failed for reasons unknown. The most successful ones he’d seen were where he stayed in the other world to be with Taniya. Perhaps that would be best for him.

Samejima tried very hard not to get nervous as the time clicked closer to the end, and there still wasn’t a sign of Yuuki Juudai. He didn’t want to see another one of those timelines where something interrupted him before he arrived – there had also been too many of those. Once he’d seen a timeline where the treatments to block his memory of Yubel ended up being fatal…

Then Juudai raced inside, a bit unkempt, but there. Samejima forced himself not to sigh in relief. No one would hear him here in his office but he preferred not to take chances. Not now.

He’d seen Juudai defeat Chronos so many times. A tiny part of him anticipated it again – Chronos needed this loss.

Here they started, one more time.

The End

Notes: I like Samejima. I had this idea ages ago, where he was caught up in a timeloop and the things that are often claimed as “bad decisions” are the result of him knowing the “smart decision” would make things actually worse. Doesn’t invite Orgene to Genex? Ok, Saiou just goes to Misgarth directly and Juudai’s not there to stop him. World burns. I could go on.

[alexboehm55144]

Alex Final Wars 2: Dark Alex, Chapter 28 - Trackdown

“Yikes, what the hell happened to him?” Jack said, looking at a red panda slumped against a wall, the Chinese spy having sustained fatal damage from a powerful force.

“Looks like a much larger mammal got their hands on him,” Skye said.

The 2 walked to the security room of the stadium, where a lynx ZIA technician had the camera footage from last night's concert pulled up on a monitor.

“God, look at that, it’s horrible,” Skye said, watching footage of Chinese spies gunning down civilians.

“*sigh*, fucking bastards,” Jack said.

The technician rewound the footage to show the Chinese spies disembarking trucks outside the building.

“We see them disembarking, and we have footage of vehicles moving through the streets towards the concert.” the technician said “but before that, the vehicles appear from nowhere. We don’t see them on any other traffic cameras before that, and we can’t trace them.”

Jack thought for a moment. “Nick once told me about utility and service tunnels that run all over the city. There are no cameras in those places, so maybe they used one of those. Get us a map of the city superstructure, and send it to me, along with that camera footage.”

The technician nodded and set about his tasks, as Jack and Skye exited the building. The pair wound their way through the parking lot, which was filled with ZIA and ZPD vehicles, and a bunch of agents and officers from both organizations. The fox and bunny made it to their car, a sleek but unassuming DB7 Aston Martin painted in black. Although the color scheme was variable, allowing the car to change its color on the fly to throw off anyone who was taking notice of the vehicle.

The fox got in the driver's seat and started up the vehicle, while her companion activated the heads up display on the windshield, finding the video files had just been received by the car’s computer. Jack backtracked through the footage, tracing the route the Chinese vehicles took and directing Skye.

“Ok, straight ahead.”

The fox stepped on the gas and the car got up to speed, moving through the city.

“Do you think we have counterparts?” Skye said.

“What do you mean? Keep going straight.”

“Do you think an evil Jack and Skye are running around out there?”

Jack paused and thought for a moment.

“I think we would have seen them by now. But, you do have a point.”

“We should be ready. They might come crawling out of the woodwork one day.”

“Your right, but if the previous doppelgängers were any indication, we probably have them beat, as long as we stop them before they do damage. Go left up here.”

“Our friends in heroes will probably help us, so we can count on them for backup.”

The car continued through the streets, arriving at the location where the last bit of footage that showed the Chinese vehicles was taken.

“Look, over there,” Jack said, pointing towards a chain-link gate that was strung across a tunnel. A sign on the gate said “authorized personnel only” and had the city seal on it.

“Locked,” Skye said, pointing towards a chain and padlock that was wrapped around the gate.

“I got this,” Jack said, hopping out of the Aston Martin and running towards the gate.

The agent pulled a set of lock picks from his coat, and set to work, carefully inserting metal implements into the padlock. Skye watched, happy to see her companion enthusiastically at work like this.

Jack listened closely, and soon enough, the padlock came undone. He then took off the chain and opened the gate. Skye pulled forward and Jack hopped in, before driving off down the service tunnel.

It was dark and dingy in the tunnel, with a few drops of water dripping from above, and steam from pipes and equipment occasionally floated through the air. But then the ZIA agents came upon light at the end of the tunnel, and another gate. Beyond this barrier was another section of Zootopia, filled with buildings that served as homes or businesses to many mammals. This second gate was unlocked, allowing Jack to quickly hop out and open it.

“Let me see if I can get footage from the jam cams in this area,” Jack said, getting back in the car.

“Wait, I don’t think this part of the city has traffic cameras.”

“Hmmm.... then maybe the Chinese based their spy ring here, as there’s no surveillance from those cams.”

“If they are, then we should look around.”

Skye drove the car into a side street, next to a complex that was surrounded by a tall barrier and contained two large buildings.

However, there was a garage door that leads from the complex onto the street. Skye parked the car and the pair looked into the garage, seeing a few vehicles covered in protective tarps. Then a small ground of mammals appeared, heading towards the garage door from deeper inside the complex.

One mammal motioned to another mammal, telling him to close the garage door. The door slowly came down, but just before it closed, someone impatiently removed a tarp from one of the covered vehicles, revealing a truck that looked exactly like the ones the Chinese had used to get to the concert.

“Did you see that?” Skye asked.

“I saw it.”

“This may be their HQ. This might be where the spies came from!”

“We need confirmation, there aren’t any traffic cameras, but maybe there are privately owned security cameras.”

Skye pulled the car back out onto Main Street, and both mammals looked through shop windows in an attempt to spot any establishment that had security cameras. Although it was considerably difficult to try seeing inside the establishments of tiny mammals.

But then Jack spotted a camera inside a cafe that was friendly to mammals of all sizes. Skye stopped the car, and the pair went inside and walked up to the cashier.

“ZIA,” Jack said, holding up his badge. “We need to take a look at some footage from your security cameras.”

000

“Right there,” Toothdee said, using a laser pointer to highlight a portion of the security footage.

The Heroes in the briefing room leaned in and focused their eyesight. The camera was inside the cafe, pointed towards the entrance of the establishment. There was a large glass window at the front of the building, allowing the camera to get a view of the street, and the buildings across the street.

In the footage, a group of figures moved out of the building on the other side of the road and jumped into a waiting truck.

“This footage is from the night of the concert attack. As you can see, the mammals coming out of this building match the spies that attacked the concert. A quick look at records reveals that the 2 buildings in this compound are owned by....”

Toothdee stole a quick glance at a piece of paper.

“....Mousowitz Ltd, a cleaning service company. And Herdings IT services. However there are no other records of these companies, so we’re pretty sure they are fronts.”

Fabienne Growly stood in the corner of the room, typing down notes.

“We’re going to be raiding this compound in 2 teams, and we have determined there are personnel in the buildings.”

The display screen changed to a blueprint of the compound, showing the two buildings. Next to each building was a list of names.

“Alex, JayJay, Kion, Jasiri, you’ll take the building belonging to the cleaning front company. Me, Judy, Nick, Jack, and Skye will take the building belonging to the IT company. We are to capture as many hostiles as we can, & collect any data we come across. I suspect as we go higher up in the buildings, their defenses will only get tougher.”

“Sounds like it’s going to be a tough fight,” Jack said.

“No doubt. But if we clear out those spies, then we take a big step towards securing Zootopia.”

000

Nick and Judy managed to procure two armored ZPD vehicles for transport, and after gearing up, the teams hopped into their respective vehicles.

As Kion headed into his transport, he spotted a familiar face sitting inside.

“Fabienne? What are you doing here?”

The snow leopard was dressed in semi-casual clothing, but she also had on a bulletproof vest, protective pads, and a helmet. There were large white pieces of tape on the helmet and vest, both of which had ‘press’ written on it in permanent marker.

“You know this is going to be a dangerous mission,” Kion said, his friends climbing into the vehicle.

“I’ve been in war zones before.” The snow leopard said, examining a TV camera in her lap and making sure it was functional.

“We’ll try to look good for you.” Alex joked, a small chuckle sweeping through the transport, as the ZPD Officer in control of the vehicle started driving towards the hostile compound.

After a short drive, the pair of transports pulled up to the entrance of the compound, which had two guards posted on duty. A panda guarded the entrance for large mammals, and a sheep guarded the entrance for smaller mammals.

“What’s that over there?” The sheep asked his coworker, spotting the two armored vehicles pull up.

The Heroes got out, and Fabienne crouched behind one of the transports, switching on her camera and turning it towards the guards.

“Detain them,” Toothdee said, pointing to the pair of guards as the team approached.

Kion and Jasiri took the initiative, heading forward and putting the two guards in zip ties.

“What?! Hey, don’t you need a warrant or something?” The panda guard asked as his pistol was taken away from him.

“What, no. We’re a military unit.” Kion said.

Jack spotted a pair of security cameras above each entrance and quickly destroyed them with his pistol.

“Let’s go,” Toothdee said, both teams heading through a small lobby area, before emerging into a courtyard.

The teams moved through the courtyard, passing by a tall metal decorative obelisk with a polished finish that shimmered as it sat in the center of the complex.

“My team left.” Capitan Boehm said.

“My team right,” Toothdee said.

The group split, as Alex’s team, headed into one of the buildings, coming across a wardrobe room filled with coveralls for many different species. Fabienne followed behind them, camera at the ready.

“Look here,” Jasiri said, pointing out a bunch of patches on a table in the room. The patches were logos from many different corporations, alongside many different name tags. “Switchable name tags and logos for their uniforms. They could get access to any building they want.”

Kion moved some of the uniforms to the side and noticed a handle in the wall behind the coveralls. It was small, and the same color as the wall, making it difficult to notice. He pulled it, opening a compartment in the wall and revealing Chinese military uniforms.

“The same type of uniforms from the concert,” Alex said.

Fabienne panned over the patches and uniforms with her camera, before the team continued forward.

“Two guards up ahead.” JayJay signaled, pointing forward at a pair of otters with guns on their belt,

“PAWS UP!” Jasiri yelled.

The two guards jumped and spun towards the team, drawing and aiming their weapons. This forced Alex to open fire on one of the otters with his sidearm. Kion charged forward and swung his sword, slicing clean through the smaller mammal.

“Stairwell, over there.” The Heroes captain said, and the team ascended to a floor that contained offices.

Three more mammals stood on guard, but the instant the team entered the room, the mammals drew their weapons and opened fire.

Fabienne hung back and filmed, while the young heroes moved forward and engaged, downing the guards.

“More hostiles incoming!” Jasiri said, a few more mammals entered the area, one armed with an SMG. But the warriors were ready

A goat ran at JayJay, horns ready to slake into her and break bones. The wolf dodged, and the goat slammed into a window. The glass broke, and the mammal plummeted down to the ground.

Kion and a bear engaged in melee combat, the bear wielding a baton and Kion with his sword. The bear was unyielding in her assault, managing to get the lion in a headlock. Seeing only one way out, Kion stabbed the bear in the stomach, pulled away, and cut him down.

Jasiri took cover and engaged the guard armed with an SMG. Bits of paper flew up into the air as bullets struck desks in the room. Jasiri took careful aim and put a few shots into the guard.

Alex grappled with a mountain lion that charged at him, trying to knock him out. The two fought hand to paw, exchanging rapid and forceful blows. The mountain was able to kick the human back, and the captain pulled out his pistol and was about to order the mountain lion to surrender, but the lion had already ended himself with his own sidearm, no doubt seeing that the fight had turned against him and refusing capture.

“They refused to be taken alive,” Kion said, looking at a fox who had taken the easy way out with his sidearm.

“This will make it harder to gather information.” Alex said, “Let’s hope we can find someone with more sense, or a paper trail or computer.”

Fabienne moved into the room and looked around with her camera. But then, her keen eyes spotted something outside the building.

000

Toothdee and her team moved up a stairwell, keeping their weapons ready. They moved out of the stairwell and into a room, which had some guards in it, who had their guns drawn.

Toothdee pointed forward and the team advanced. Skye and Nick aimed their weapons and fired, hitting the weapons of the guards. The enemies jumped in surprise, but before they could react, Jack and Judy had already delivered powerful kicks that knocked them out. Toothdee on the other hand ran forward and bashed a wolf guard with her rifle before he could shoot back at her.

With all the guards knocked out, the warriors put handcuffs or zip ties on them.

“Hey uh Toothdee,” Jasiri said through the radio. “I think you guys have a problem over there.”

“What kind of problem?”

The question was answered a few seconds later when Toothdee opened the door to the next room and was greeted by an office that was filled with bright orange flames and furniture swallowed by burning fire.

“Like a fire problem.”

“Keep low.” Toothdee instructed her team, and they all crouched as they progressed forward.

“There’s gotta be a fire control box around here,” Skye said. “Keep your eyes peeled.”

The sounds of shouting reached the team’s ears, and they saw a pair of guards moving through the smoke-filled room.

Nick and Toothdee moved ahead of their friends, keeping in cover behind furniture, before emerging behind the 2 guards and subduing them with either a punch or cutting off their oxygen so they passed out.

After cuffing the 2 guards, the group pulled them to an area of the building that had not been consumed by fire. This area appeared to be some sort of hub, with hallways leading in all directions.

“Split up, but be careful. There might still be enemies, but find and activate that firebox.” Toothdee said, before directing her allies in different directions.

Judy moved down a hallway that doubled back towards the area of the building that was on fire. However the hallway she was in appeared to have already been burned, and the fire in it had since gone out or progressed on to another part of the building. The walls weren’t enveloped in flames, they only glowed brightly with embers, and were covered in ash.

“Ouch!” The bunny said, the hot floor burning her exposed feet. She tried to move forward by only touching the cooler parts of the floor.

But then, she spotted a figure, standing in a room adjacent to the hallway. The entire room glowed with embers, but one side of the room had been completely destroyed by fire, with the wall and part of the ceiling having collapsed. Where the wall had been, was now just open-air that led out to a perilous drop down into the courtyard below.

Judy recognized the figure, it was her dark counterpart. She stood with a pistol in her hand, gazing out of the building and almost waiting for her enemies to come to her. She turned around, knowing who greeted her, based on the voice she heard down the hallway.

“It’s a shame my troops didn’t kill you at the concert” Dark Judy said.

“That was you?! Why would you do such a thing?!”

“Why? Because you thwarted our invasion, and in the process, you killed someone I love.”

Judy thought for a moment and then remembered.

“What?! .....You mean Nick’s counterpart? On the boat?”

“Exactly, that’s why I had to punish this city, to make it suffer.”

“I don’t understand how any version of me could do such horrible things.”

The counterpart raced forward, aiming her gun and firing. But Judy dodged grabbed her enemy’s arm, trying to open fire with her own pistol. But the counterpart was ready for this, kicking Judy’s arm away just as she pulled the trigger.

The two fought, close quarters, with punches and kicks. Whenever one warrior lined up a pistol shot, the other bunny would either dodge out of the way or push the shooter’s arm so the weapon fired harmlessly in a different direction. Eventually, both guns ran dry of ammo, prompting the pair to toss them away so they wouldn’t hinder their melee combat.

Dark Judy kicked her enemy with her powerful legs, sending her enemy staggering back into one of the walls. The counterpart then charged forward and pinned Judy against the wall.

“This is for everything you’ve done to us.” The counterpart said, reeling back for a powerful punch.

Judy grabbed part of the burned wall and ripped it out. Then she stabbed her counterpart with the burning end.

Dark Judy screened and stumbled back, distracted, and allowing Judy to charge into her. The counterpart was pushed further back, before Judy performed a drop Kick, and sent her adversary falling off the building, and plummeting to the ground below.

The rabbit dropped, down into the courtyard, along with burning debris from the flaming building. As she fell, she reached upwards at her good-hearted counterpart and screamed, still desiring to inflict harm upon her. Her mind was consumed by fury and rage.

But then she hit the obelisk in the courtyard, the sharp metal point at the top going right through her body. Her screams and rage lingered for a moment longer, before ceasing, the dark warrior now laying transfixed, halfway up the obelisk.

She was gone, and a deep red liquid slowly dripped down the decorative structure.

Back at the top of the building, Judy sighed in relief. The rabbit’s counterpart was defeated, and with her, the ring of spies in Zootopia.

000

It was done, the entire compound had now been secured by the ZPD and ZIA, and Heroes was now heading home, their mission complete.

As the team members chatted and joked with each other, Toothdee pulled Alex off to the side, while JayJay looked on from nearby, curious as to the conversation.

“You went too far,” Toothdee said. “We were supposed to capture as many of them as we could! Your team captured no one, besides the two guys at the front gate! And we were with you then!”

“Hey we tried to take some of them alive, but they either forced our hand or refused to be taken alive.”

Toothdee groaned in disapproval and walked off.

The captain sighed, while JayJay gave him a look of sympathy.

Toothdee was his best ally, he didn’t like disagreeing with her. But, sometimes things just didn’t work out. He hoped she didn’t give him the cold shoulder for too long.