#but its the fact their views on us having biological kids is apparently us 'killing ourselves off'

[mx-paint]

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[theghostpinesmusic]

Seeing as how I haven't done a music-related write-up for a bit and how it's currently 4:30pm and therefore too late in the day to start on another work-related project of actual substance...I'm going to tell you about this version of "Bathtub Gin" that I like!

As I said (threatened?) in my last Goose post, I'm consciously branching out a little between now and whenever the hell the next Goose show will be. In my own personal listening, "branching out" means I've been listening to a lot of stuff I've never heard before, both stuff that's totally new to me and stuff that's been sitting ignored on my "Try this!" list for a long time. In my blog writing, "branching out" apparently means "writing about the band I've listened to the most by an entire order of magnitude for the last twenty-five years."

Hey, if I can't be perfect I'm sure as hell going to stop trying.

I am not going to start this post with a primer on Phish because a) if you're reading this you either already know them or you don't know them and don't care, and b) there are literal books about this out there because these guys have been playing for forty years and every little thing they do is steeped in weird mythology and inside jokes and as much as I love all of it, I don't love it enough to write a hundred thousand words about it.

If you're somehow entirely new to the band and also feel an obsessive need to learn/dive in, my super idiosyncratic recommendation is to listen to their album A Live One a few times, and then buy and read through this very short book by Walter Holland, who in my humble opinion is sort of like the Hunter S. Thompson of writing about Phish jams.

I will henceforth only be writing in the micro- and macro-cosms about this particular version of Phish's "Bathtub Gin" and my reactions to it, despite not being the Hunter S. Thompson of writing about Phish jams.

Biologically speaking, I almost certainly, technically have THC in my bloodstream right now if that somehow makes you feel better.

So, Phish was one of the first places I turned at the beginning of this little Goose hiatus. For a lot of reasons, despite being the band that most immediately jumps to my mind when the phrase "favorite ever" is used in a variety of contexts, I haven't listened to Phish much over the last few years. I wrote a little bit about why in this previous post, and to keep my promise of staying focused and save myself some time typing, I won't say any more for the moment: suffice to say that I overdid it a little bit with The Phish and The Phish's Internet Fandom, which soured me on the band's music and left me sitting on the sidelines for years, wondering if it was the band that had come, over time, to suck ass, or whether it was just me.

Well, I'm relieved to report that it was, in fact, me who was doing the ass-sucking.

I learned this, in large part, by diving into the band's recent New Year's Eve (NYE) run at Madison Square Garden (MSG). I actually started my Goose Interregnum concert-viewing here only because the run had just ended and I'd seen online that the band had played all the way through its storied, elusive, and utterly dorky "Gamehendge" saga on 12/31, for the first time since 1994 (or maybe 1995, kill me in the comments Phish fans, I'm ready to die).

I wanted to see this, even if after the fact and from my couch, because back in my early Phish fan-Hood (see what I did there?) Gamehendge had been a big part of what drew me to the band, and I was excited by the prospect of being a grown-ass, middle-aged man bawling his eyes out on his basement couch because in a video another old man was on a stage singing a song about a bulldog and a cat fighting to the death while a comet crashed into Earth, bringing about the end times.

When you're a straight, white kid growing up in suburbia, you either become an absolute monster or your brain finds really fucking weird things to care a lot about. I like to think I fit into the second category.

Anyway, with a more-than-usual amount of spare time on my hands, I decided to try watching the entire MSG NYE run, starting with 12/28 instead of jumping straight to 12/31. I thought, maybe, I'd have a decently fun time and get a good sense of where Phish was at musically (an important thing to know when all the band members are sixty-ish years in age and you haven't heard or seen them play since 2021). Then I watched 12/28 and it destroyed me. Like, this band of aging dork-rockers literally lit the entire arena on fire with their instruments and it burned down around them while they just kept jamming. I'm not sure how anyone escaped MSG alive, let alone how there were concerts there for the next three nights.

12/29 was just as good, if not better, and 12/30 was an incredible show that only paled in comparison to the previous two. My reaction surprised me, and so that's why I cranked up the ol' typing machine, shoveled some fresh coal into the boiler, and sat down to write about...wait, what was I actually writing about, again?

Oh, yeah. "Bathtub Gin."

I'm not gonna give you a lengthy history of this song, for all the same reasons I cited above for not giving you a long history of Phish as a band. I will tell you it's a "classic" Phish song in that it was played live for the first time in 1989 and has been played three hundred and four more times in the one thousand, seven-hundred and fifty-one shows the band has played since. There also a studio recording of it on Lawn Boy, which I always forget because who the fuck listens to Lawn Boy?! The song is used frequently, but not always, as a jam vehicle, and I tend to enjoy hearing it live due to its quintessentially Phish-y sound: Phish writes and plays songs that sound a lot like many of their influences, but they also have songs that sound only like Phish, and this is one of them. Well, it sounds like Phish and Gerswhin, I suppose. "Bathtub Gin" is also my wife's favorite Phish song, but I'm not entirely sure if that's because she likes it or because she knows that liking "Waste" or "Shade" or "Farmhouse" more would put her firmly in the "Stereotypical Phish Wife" realm.

This 12/28 version of the tune is a great one for jamming, but as usual I'll (mostly) refrain from commenting until the point in the video where the composed portion of the song leaves off and the improvisation begins.

I do want to start by saying I love the retro feel of this year's "Live Phish" intro/logo sequence. Also, yes, Page's opening keyboard banging is supposed to sound like that. It's how he lets you know he's having fun! Gershwin tease at 2:26 if you're keeping track. Otherwise, this is a pretty straightforward reading of the composed part of the song. I absolutely love the sound mix here, as you can hear all four members' contributions to the song more or less equally. It blows the old days of tapes essentially mixed to make Trey's guitar 80% of the band's sound out of the water. It also leads to me basically just listening to Mike Gordon play bass for the entire show because if you can, why wouldn't you?!

It often sounds like the band might be singing actual, English lyrics during the outro portion of the song, but I don't think they ever are.

The jam starts at 4:50, and basically immediately Fishman is playing stuff on the drums that my simple brain can barely comprehend. This is perhaps one significant difference between Phish and the Goose jams I've been covering previously: the rhythm section of Phish is much more directly involved in the direction of the band's improvisation, whereas it often feels like the drums and bass of Goose are just laying a foundation for the melody players to improvise over. One is not inherently better than the other, but I do often feel like there's a lot more to listen to with Phish, despite them having fewer members.

Anyway, this first chunk of the jam feels a lot to me like being lost in a fuzzy, pleasant labyrinth: the tempo is slow and the playing is soft, but there's an undercurrent of tension there. By 5:30, things have started to straighten out a little, though the lights have gotten absolutely weird. Fishman starts playing a more straightforward beat, and the rest of the band falls into a rock-sounding jam that makes me think of what Goose might sound like if their fingers were thirty years older.

Trey starts to sit back a little bit at 6:45, and the jam mellows out in response. It feels a little bit like he can't figure out where he wants to go next here, but Mike and Page take some turns adding ideas to the mix in the meantime. Eventually, Trey joins back in the fun, but still in a restrained way. For awhile here, everyone's just sort of playing together, with no particular standout or soloist, which is great.

Whatever keyboard tone Page switches to at 8:58 is fantastic. He follows it up pretty quickly with some weirder synthesizer stuff, and at 9:40 this pushes the jam in a more sinister direction. At 10:20, Trey switches over to a very Portal To Robot Hell guitar effect, and now we're in full-on latter-day Evil Phish jamming territory. Fishman is, of course, keeping a beat here, but it's odd and off-kilter (not a drummer, sorry to be imprecise) and makes the whole thing feel like it's just barely hanging together in the best way.

This kind of "almost-falling-apart" sound is, paradoxically, when Phish often hits their stride in jamming. I think it's what makes them sort of a love/hate proposition even among people who listen to a lot of improvisatory rock music. It's not particularly fun or comfortable, but I've never come across another group of musicians that can improvise with each other consistently in this way.

Trey's playing finally comes a bit to the fore starting at 13:00, but even here this doesn't feel like a rote jam "peak": instead, the backbeat that Fishman is playing keeps things feeling a little out of sorts and not entirely resolved. Trey and Page playing off of each other at 14:15 is nice. I'm not sure what's going on with the lights at 14:30, but I do know these guys consistently have my favorite light show in show business. There's some almost Allman Bros-sounding playing from Trey at 15:15 as we reaching peak craziness...

...then some initial teasing of the "Bathtub Gin" theme at 16:30 or so, teasing a return to the song proper to wrap things up!

The video fades out on a segue into what would turn out to be an excellent version of "Ghost," for those keeping score at home.

Anyway, thanks for reading my first (at least lately) Phish write-up. I'm going to try to do a few more of these from the run, including (I think) two new songs: "Oblivion" from 12/29 and "Life Saving Gun" from 12/30. Should have those up soon!

[argentdandelion]

Undertale: The Perks of Being Literally Not Human Author Patreon - Author Ko-Fi (Possible human reactions: “Oh! Dogs!” “So that’s what it would look like if the high school mascot costume were a monster...” “Oh gosh they're delightfully close to my fursona”.)

At the end of Undertale's Pacifist Route, monsters go to the Surface and live a life under the sunlight. It probably would not be perfect: the fact they are not literally not human would probably fuel some discrimination.

But it might be really convenient for them, too.

Cultural Familiarity

The very fact monsters are literally not humans means they won’t face the same psycho-social obstacles as, say, a group of human immigrants that look very strange to the eyes of locals.

If one can assume the Surface world of Undertale is just like the real world (circa 2015), then people are familiar with the notion of nonhuman sentient beings, and the sheer breadth of nonhuman-sentient-being images in media means it would be easy to make sense of monsters. Those who resemble beloved animals (e.g., rabbit monsters, dog monsters) would be especially comforting their familiarity. However, many people find even animals which aren’t conventionally cute (e.g., sea cucumbers, spiders) utterly adorable and likeable; now imagine these delightfully strange-looking creatures could talk.

Certainly, there’s a lot of media where nonhuman beings are villains, but also a lot of media (especially kids’ media) where nonhuman beings (even explicitly “monsters”) are good guys: Sesame Street (or an in-universe parallel) is a particularly long-standing example. Battle-monster franchises (e.g., Pokémon, Digimon) would make people familiar with the idea of befriending monsters, and make it seem really cool to have a monster friend, even though, obviously, it would work differently in the real world of Undertale.

Movies

People spend quite a lot of money creating monsters for shows or films, whether using CGI, puppetry or elaborate costumes. It would be much quicker, cheaper (and often more convincing) to use a real monster actor, and add makeup or CGI effects as necessary.

Indeed, the cheap, ready access to nonhuman, easy-to-train actors would probably amplify non-human representation across genres and budgets of films. Furthermore, the practicalities of accommodating monster actors means areas with movie studios (e.g., the state of California) would logically implement monster rights before bringing monsters into movie studios. Monsters being in lots of movies would drastically increase human awareness of monsters’ very existence, and so concern for their political rights.

Psycho-Social

Psycho-socially, monsters would provide three things for humanity: proof humans aren’t “alone” in the universe, an alternate sentient species for social interaction, and the validation of strange or unpopular beliefs.

Alternate Species for Socializing

Some people hate, fear, or distrust other humans, whether from misanthropy from developing social anxiety disorder after being mistreated by humans too often. Having concluded humans as a whole are cruel, petty, or untrustworthy, misanthropic or socially anxious humans might view monsters as a second chance for socialization.

Others may consider monsters exciting social opportunities...for romance. For similar reasons as misanthropy or social anxiety disorders, some humans fall into a state of despair after repeated failures starting romantic relationships with other humans. The fact monsters literally aren’t human will make such humans more optimistic about their chances, since the same standards might not apply.

Furthermore, “cruel intentions” make attacks on monsters hurt more. If this information becomes public, humans nervous about getting attacked by love interests might date monsters, if only because it is easy to take down monsters with cruel enough intentions and an improvised weapon. (Though this information would endanger monsters, too.)

Yet, even those who have had no severe negative experiences with humans may find monsters romantically appealing. Though furries and cutesy, mammalian-looking monsters is an obvious pairing, all the real-life media werewolf/alien/vampire/monster romantic inclinations show that even non-furries may find appeal in romantic relationships with non-human sentient beings. (Most of the time said beings look like humans, but, still, it’s a start.)

Validate Strange and Unpopular Beliefs

People have long believed in strange beings who are “higher” than or superior to humans in some way, whether in peacefulness, technological sophistication, compassion or a connection with nature. Monsters’ magical technology and the idea their souls are (supposedly) made of love, hope, and compassion may encourage this perception. Less skeptical humans may consult monsters on their presumed superior ways.

Indeed, if “superior alien beings” are rebranded as “actually monsters of Mt. Ebott”, it might spur a pilgrimage to places with great numbers of monsters, specifically in the hopes of social enlightenment. Humans admiring monsters, even in some distorted sense, could benefit monsters...though it might also be annoying to be put on a pedestal or have to mesh with humans’ beliefs.

People who believe they've seen ghosts, Bigfeet or, in some broad sense, monsters, may be unable to persuade other humans that their claims are true, becoming frustrated pariahs. Monsters emerging from Mt. Ebott would give their claims more validity, though not outright prove them. Depending on how much the general human population knows of the how the barrier was destroyed, paranormal enthusiasts may assume "Bigfoot" was a monster who absorbed a human SOUL (unbeknownst to anyone else), or a monster that never was sealed Underground. And if anyone says, "Monsters aren't real", the paranormal enthusiast can just point to a nearby monster.

The existence of magic itself, even if its methods and limitations are little-known to humans, would validate a lot of paranormal enthusiasts. Even if humans learn that humans can't do magic, ("they will never know the joys of expressing themselves through magic") they might reconcile that with the story of "humanity's seven greatest magicians" or suppose they have some subtle quirk in their SOULs. (Or suppose that they themselves have no magic, but their objects do)

Speaking of online communities, people in the otherkin/therian communities of Undertale’s Surface world would also love associating with monsters. In the words of Wikipedia:“Otherkin are a subculture who socially and spiritually identify as not entirely human.” Though in real life (at time of writing), humans are the only indisputably sentient beings, the very existence of non-human sentient beings on the Surface might itself validate otherkin/therian beliefs. Such communities might look at, say, the character Ice Wolf and say: “Aw, gee, when I said I was a werewolf I meant wolf monster.”

Monsters are likely to keep the details of human-monster SOUL fusion a secret, in case humans get paranoid again and kill them off preemptively, or just crave absorbing a monster SOUL themselves. However, the very fact human-monster fusions exist would give otherkin/therians a supportable framework for their impressions and beliefs. Perhaps otherkin humans might assume their ancestors absorbed monster SOULs at one point, and passed down some trace of a non-human essence to their descendants.

Biological

Monsters’ bodies are made of magic, or at least made mostly of magic in the same way human bodies are made mostly of water. Their biochemistry is likely very different to humans, so it is roughly as likely they could catch human diseases as seaweed could catch tuberculosis. Therefore, monsters would be very useful for studying or treating human diseases.

Furthermore, since monsters can eat monster food (which converts immediately into energy and has no waste) with seemingly no problems, it may be useful to employ monsters in places where it is impractical or very expensive to install a toilet. (e.g., a space station, a fighter jet, a submarine) Furthermore, since monster food is apparently tasty, doesn’t spoil, converts immediately into energy, and is known to be safe for monsters, the military might be interested in monster soldiers or military adjuncts. (Whether the monsters would volunteer is another matter.)

Conclusion

Cryptid hunters, ghost hunters, occultists, Wiccans, paranormal enthusiasts in general (and possibly alien enthusiasts), (fictional) monster design appreciators, animal rights activists and animal enthusiasts in general, furries, otherkin, movie makers, misanthropes and socially anxious people, NASA employees, and the military all very likely to rush to give monster rights. While some level of prejudice against monsters is very likely, monsters would have many allies almost immediately...especially if communities which overlap with the mentioned ones ally with monsters. (e.g., naturalists, environmentalists, video game makers, LGBTQ+ people, non-NASA astronomic scientists…)

[wonderfulworldofmichaelford]

Psycho Analysis: Ego

(WARNING! This analysis contains SPOILERS!)

Years ago, comic book movies were absolutely, totally afraid to be even a little weird. Raimi carried the weirdness torch for a while thanks to the success of the Spider-Man trilogy, but for some reason he was the only person unafraid to be goofy; even Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, a movie about one of the more fun and campy classical hero teams, was completely and utterly afraid to show a big man in purple armor who eats planets and so instead opted to show us an intergalactic fart cloud. The precedent set by franchises like Blade, X-Men, and Nolan’s Batman films lingered for a long time.

Then along came James Gunn.

Gunn is a man unafraid to be weird, and Guardians of the Galaxy really changed the game in 2014. There’s a gun-toting raccoon, a talking tree, a bald blue cyborg woman, and an alcoholic duck, and the movie is a smash hit critically and financially; there is now no excuse not to put the wierdest stuff from the comics faithfully into film. And for the sequel, Gunn apparently saw fit to bring in one of Marvel’s most bonkers bad guys: Ego, the Living Planet.

Ego is the perfect example of how to adapt something utterly bizarre from the comics, changing some major elements while still staying true to the nature of the character himself. Ego here is Peter Quill’s father, something that isn’t true in the comics, as well as a Celestial, something also not true in the comics… but he is still a sentient planet, and he is still completely and utterly evil.

Actor: Kurt Russell, 80s superstar and the reason Solid Snake exists, plays Ego to perfection. Ego is a character with, well, an ego; he’s selfish, self-centered, and lacking in empathy, but he also needs to come off as charming and friendly or we the audience would see through him immediately. Russell is the exact perfect man for that job; this is a guy who managed to play a character who was mildly transphobic and still have them come off as likable. Russell is also able to switch from affable and charming to scary and furious with ease, which is a big help after the reveal when Ego drops all pretense. Russell just kills it, there’s no other way to put it.

Motivation/Goals: Ego has an almost sympathetic goal, one that, from a certain point of view, makes him come off as a bit sympathetic. The guy was drifting alone in the void for eons and had to piece himself together, so is it any wonder he was horrifically lonely when he was finally able to set out to find life? Of course, that loneliness and isolation led to him developing some really nasty personality traits, and so he decided the best course of action after finding out other intelligent life was “boring” was to plant seeds on every planet, sire a child with powers just like him, and then wipe out all life and turn all the planets in the universe into extensions of himself. It is a plan truly befitting a character with the name “Ego,” and while it is true his motivation is at least a little deserving of sympathy, his goals and how he goes about trying to ameliorate his pain is what makes Ego an irredeemable monster.

Personality: Ego is perhaps one of the most aptly named characters in all of fiction, and he’s also one of the few characters one could make the honest claim that his ego is literally the size of a planet. Ego puts forth this identity of a charming, fatherly figure, happy, affable, jokey… just really sweet and charming. But much like the avatar he uses, it’s all just a mask.

Look at how he talks about what he did to Peter’s mom; he says it with such a wistful, resigned melancholy flavored with this “I did what I had to do” smugness that is a twisted reflection of how one might recall their first date, and then follows it up with a horrifically callous response of “I know that sounds bad.” Ego is such a monstrous, unrepentant sociopath with so little regard for life that is beneath his lofty stature that I just don’t think he really comprehends things like empathy. He is the ultimate psychopathic manchild, an arrogant egotist who hides behind this friendly veneer until the moment things don’t go the way he wants, at which point he starts screaming, ranting, and raving. The fact he is completely and utterly taken aback that Peter would unload multiple shots into him after being told Ego gave his mother a brain tumor is really telling of just what kind of person he really is.

Final Fate: The bomb Groot planted on Ego’s brain goes off, and Ego’s avatar crumbles to dust as the planet begins to blow up, seeing as its brain just got obliterated. The beautiful karma of this moment makes it extra delicious; after putting that tumor on Meredith Quill’s brain, is it not fitting he die after having something planted on his brain?

Best Scene: Ego just really dominates every scene he’s in, but I think the big reveal, where he shows just what a sick and depraved villain with a lack of care for life as he reveals what he did to Meredith Quill, is one of the MCU’s finest scenes.

Best Quote: It took only one single line to cement Ego as the most horrible, evil, disgusting monster in the MCU: “It broke my heart to put that tumor in her head.”

Final Thoughts & Score: Ego is fantastic on so many levels, but one level I think should not be overlooked is on a meta level. As I mentioned, for the longest time silliness and weird concepts were out the door when it came to superhero films. One needs only look at the X-Men franchise to see how dour things were, with their dull black costumes and overwhelmingly miserable and unfun atmospheres. More lighthearted or sillier fare did not go over well, as Iron Man 2 and Green Lantern can attest, and magic was totally absent for a while in the MCU probably because of fears audiences wouldn’t take it seriously. But James Gunn changed all that, and I think Ego definitely played a huge role in cementing that audiences will embrace and love in the weirdest stuff out of comics. Thanks to Ego, I think a lot of other creators became unafraid to let that freak flag fly and put things in movies they might have been too worried to put in before, with the ultimate and best example being Mister Mind joining the DCEU in the end of Shazam! It gives me hope that Tawky Tawny might show up there in a sequel.

On a character level, Ego is without a doubt the most punchable scumbag in the entire MCU, with only Mysterio coming close. The fact he casually admits to killing Peter’s mother and expects him to be okay with it… Can you really blame Peter for immediately unloading his guns into his father? I mean, when faced with a man who is utterly unrepentant in killing a loved one that they also claimed they loved and says they had to do it to further their goals, would you not also have a knee-jerk reaction like that? Yes, I am getting at this being a canon moment that shows Peter’s reaction to Thanos in Infinity War was not a stupid moment, it was a moment that was built up by what he did to Ego. And I think that just adds to Ego even more, because he helped cement a character trait of Peter’s that would lead to one of the most horrific gut punches in cinematic history.

Ego is an easy 10/10, and is one of the MCU’s greatest villains. He’s a perfect “love to hate” character, and he’s also a perfect villain for a story about family. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 has family as a focal point of the story, with the arcs of every single character revolving around the idea that family doesn’t have to be blood ties, it can be with the people who love you and who you’ve bonded with the most. Yondu’s line of “He may’ve been your father, boy, but he wasn’t your daddy” is what really sells it, honestly; Ego is Peter’s biological father, yes, but Yondu raised him and even if he didn’t always do right by him, in the end he showed himself to be a better man and better dad than Ego ever could have hoped to be. I suppose that’s a bit off topic from Ego himself, but I feel like it’s important to note just how deeply thematic he is as a villain, tying into the core message of the story while also letting loose in utter sociopathic villainy.

I think there is a great irony in Ego’s ultimate plan; for all his claims of being lonely and desiring others like him, what exactly does he think would happen if the entire universe was nothing but himself? Would he truly have been satisfied? Perhaps; he was a narcissistic to the highest degree for sure. But I like that there is some ambiguity to things about Ego, I like how there are some things to think about, I like how a villain who has a plan that is not clearly thought out by them yet that they believe is the proper course of action is something of a setup for what Thanos would be.

And really, out of every other villain in the MCU, Ego is most like Thanos. The obvious part is the plan, though only Endgame Thanos really wanted to reshape the universe in his image; still, as I mentioned, their plans are both something they believe is the true and righteous course of action, though Thanos is far more sympathetic in this regard. They also both felt the need to sacrifice loved ones in pursuit of their goals, and they both have incredibly poor relationships with some of their kids. I think the main difference is that Thanos, for all his faults, does have some empathy, he does have some sympathetic traits even if they don’t redeem how much of an awful person he was. Ego has none of that. Ego squanders any sympathy he could have gained by being utterly unrepentant and casual about his misdeeds, which include slaughtering his other children and killing Peter’s mother despite claiming to have loved her dearly. At least Thanos openly wept at what he did to Gamora, at least he felt sadness,  guilt, and regret. Ego just doesn’t care. He did it because whatever he really felt for Meredith, there was only one person he could ever truly love: Himself.

In short, Yondu was right: that guy was a jackass.

[ardenttheories]

Pesterquest Volume 7 notes, all locked under the cut as usual. As a side note, I once a fucking gain didn’t get my achievement for completing the Route, this time Terezi’s, so. Fuck me, I guess.

EQUIUS

Reader’s remembering more without truly remembering it now. The trees, garden, caves, and mall were some of the “most recent” places they’ve been to in Friendsim. 

Oh. Reader’s home is the shitty little crumbling building they stayed in during the events of Friendsim. I don’t know what’s sadder; that they still don’t know who they are enough to know where home is, or that everything they know about themself is centred around Friendsim - the events of which they still don’t remember. 

The bitterness they feel at that is sad. They really don’t have a home outside of that, huh?

“You freeze like an anime protagonist” - hm. HM. I don’t trust like that. 

Equius freaking out at the sight of Reader and actively trying to NOT punch them is sweet. Also, funny as hell.

Oh. That’s. That’s a lot more horse than I was expecting.

AURTHOUR. MY GOD YOU LOOK A LOT BETTER LIKE THIS. Although, nice hint to the theory that Reader is a lusus-like being, with the Reader comparing themself to Aurthour. 

Did Equius just fucking growl? This poor fucking idiot doesn’t know how to react to Reader’s non-apparent bloodcaste. You fucking himbo just relax.

Of course they made the fucking “there are two wolves inside you” meme about horses and Equius wanting to get yelled at/yell at

How to befriend Equius: like milk and horses, because apparently that makes you High Status, and not just a very lonely idiot who’s so stuck up his own ass about the Hemospectrum that he can’t see the people around him through the bullshit.

Equius has a lot of gamer shit? Interesting. 

Two points:

Reader’s typing style is so fucking cute, and this is the first time I think we’ve seen them type proper. This seems significant. Like, they’ve got a voice now, and it’s distinctive and them and not us. Looks like they might be taking control a little?

Additionally, we just got to see Karkat’s Knight of Blood powers at work; essentially enforcing that Equius befriend Reader and complete the Bonds that they’re trying to desperately to set up, while also allowing Equius someone to be “real” with by stating that Reader exists outside of the Hemospectrum. It’s also just really sweet to see Karkat talking about Reader like that. 

Equius really just. Doesn’t know how social interactions work. I think he relies on the Hemospectrum to explain shit for him, because he seems genuinely uncomfortable with the idea that there’s no formula to follow. Especially since he’s giving that power to Reader - that says a lot about how out of his depth he is. Even the dumbass little “I command it” is funny. He’s so out of his depth and he’s trying to pretend that he knows what he’s doing still. 

Equius doesn’t have it in him to actually kill people, which is genuinely sweet but also says a lot about why he’s so conflicted with the Hemospectrum. He’s really not cut out to be a Highblood the way it says he should be. 

Oh. Oh my god, he’s so excited to see Nepeta. He was shaking with excitement at the prospect of being able to see her. 

OH NO HE COULDN’T GO. But how interesting. “Stop trying to skip ahead”. So why did that work with Gamzee (albeit Karkat then chickened out)? Because we never actually saw Gamzee, and it’d probably work with Nepeta? 

The text wasn’t coloured but I’m curious if this is Dirk now. Doc Scratch sure as fuck doesn’t swear like that, and as far as I’m aware he’s the only one with narrative control within the main canon/fanon, besides Alternate Calliope. The fact that the thing is trying to keep everything to a strict plot would definitely suggest it. Though if Dirk is T-Posing in a hallway on the Theseus just to talk to Reader, I’m going to flip off the handle. 

Equius knowing what narrative control is just threw me through a fucking loop, but I’ll play along. Lets pretend that actually makes some sort of sense, because either he figured it out in that short moment without even knowing what Retconning is or why they were being blocked, or he just. Knows. Which, I suppose as an Heir of Void he might? He inherits Secrets and the Unknown - so maybe him knowing isn’t so odd at all.

Confirmation that Equius doesn’t know how to act outside of a society and is, in fact, very uncomfortable with not knowing but envies how the Reader is just somehow capable of that: confirmed. “How do you know where you belong, or if you belong.”

That’s. Some good advice from Reader, honestly, but also sad? They’re defining themself through their relationships again. I hope this means they’re figuring more out about themself this time. Also that this helps Equius - to figure out that he can define himself and not allow other shit he doesn’t really vibe with define him. Especially if he makes his own community. 

Oh. Equius tries to hone his strength in order to figure out why he’s a biological freak. “Reigning in an aberrant traint and defining” himself by it. And he doesn’t know which rules he likes following and which he doesn’t know how to ignore - he’s just as lost about himself as he is about everything else. 

“He looks like he might be about to tell you the story, but somehow you keep not learning the lesson where you should just chill and experience something instead of leap to try to figure it out before it happens” - is it just me, or does this narrator not sound like any of the others. Usually they sound like “Reader”, or like Hussie in the comic, or sometimes like the characters, but this... doesn’t. This is that narrative figure admonishing Reader for the previous timeline. Which is a little more interconnected than the last ones have been, and a whole lot more obvious.

“It’s like there’s narrative precedent for this moment existing in more than one plane of truth”. I actively love how that shows A) that there’s multiple timeline-based reasons for the loss of Equius’ horn and B) that trying to view a Void Player’s past isn’t easy because they’re just that naturally hidden.

TEREZI

Oh my god. Terezi that’s so fucking extra.

I’m assuming that means she’s talking to Vriska? She’s seriously mad. Madder than in the comic. I like the fact that we get to see more of her emotions during this whole phase now that there’s no plot to hinder.

Reader pointing out that the Alternian legal system is brutal in a way that’s just completely fucked up and also not typical of how Terezi seems to be as a person, but also highlighting that she doesn’t seem to see that there’s an issue with the system because of its laws and logistics she knows to a T that perfectly align with what Mind is? HELLA. That’s what a Seer do, babey! She learns her Mind from the law, THAT’S her Benefactor, and then she figures it out for herself!

Terezi being confused about the game, expecting him to ask about team leaders and shit, shows that - potentially - Reader’s actions have irrevocably fucked up her powers as a Seer of Mind. Or at least that she’s not looking at the right Options anymore, because she doesn’t know what they are.

(Also, Karkat not shutting up about Dave? Valid.)

TEREZI KNOWS THE HYPOCRACY AND IS JUST DOING THE SAME THING AS TYZIAS I’M GOING TO DIE. She can’t save everyone but at least she can save them for now, until she gets to a point where she can save everyone.

So that weird ass area is “an ambiguous nexus of metaphysical realities”. Definitely a place that doesn’t really exist yet sort of does. Interesting that they haven’t been thrown out yet, though. Maybe because Reader wasn’t really trying to go anywhere? They just remembered, and aimlessly used their powers. 

Gamzee called Reader a “themster” and I am wheezing.

Terezi realising she blamed Vriska for shit they did together when she knew it was something their fucked up society made them do, and realising she’s not exactly innocent herself, is really fucking sad. Kids shouldn’t have to go through this sort of shit. 

The thing watching them is approving of Reader taking Terezi back to Vriska? I’m wondering if it’s either happy because they’re continuing the plot, or because they’re fixing things. That hulking T-posing figure isn’t there anymore - and it seems a lot more demure. So maybe this entity is something else?

Oh, Terezi admitting she had fun hurting other people and getting upset over it is sad. Shows a lot about how screwed up Alternia is that they make murder fun for kids until it’s just completely normal for them to do. 

Best way to explain a Seer of Mind: behind the person everyone calls the Leader, controlling the spotlight. 

Oh FUCK yes. Vriska and Terezi are Scourge Sisters again, but this time against the people who really goddamn deserve it. I think this was cathartic for both of them. The blame they’ve been placing on themselves isn’t entirely gone, but it is a little better, and they’ve got no reason to go killing innocent trolls anymore against their own desires. 

Hints towards VrisRezi are also back, and I think they both really needed that. They don’t have to be rivals, as fun and as tale-told as it’d be. They can work together and be themselves and go against the shit they’ve been told is normal and that they’ve been justifying their whole lives. And these girls are gonna be healthier and happier for it!!

Not as much external plot in this one, but I get the feeling that Nexus is going to be showing up a lot more and becoming much more important. Interesting, too, that there’s (I think) two entities out there; one trying to stop Reader from skipping ahead, and one that was just watching to see what’d happen. That, or it’s the same entity - but I get the feeling one wants to stop Reader while the other wants Reader to progress in their own way?

On top of that, I really don’t know how to feel about how much of this narrative felt Dirk-esque. I might be paranoid, since a friend of mine pointed out that Friendsim led up to the Epilogues/Hiveswap and onward into Pesterquest, so Pesterquest must be leading into something, too. She thinks it’s Homestuck^2, and I kind of hope so, because if we get ANOTHER game after this I might die... but I wouldn’t be surprised, either. 

[racefortheironthrone]

Thoughts on Powers of X #1

Well, I did this for the one, might as well do it for t’other...

Well, any thought that this mini-series might be less weird than its companion was completely blown away by the very first page, which revealed that Powers of X (pronounced Powers of Ten) is going to be taking place in four different times:

Year One (X^0)

Year Ten (X^1)

Year One Hundred (X^2)

Year One Thousand (X^3)

...with each segment increasing by a power of ten, because apparently Hickman has decided he’d like to drive us all mad with math puzzles. That first page is a doozy of design, I must say, laying out four key moments (and four or three key players) in the past and future of mutant-kind, with the layout suggesting a parallel between all of these characters (as well as a suggestion that the guy in the Cerebro mask shares Charles’ lower facial features exactly.

Year One

We then get an un-interrupted six page sequence which, on the surface, seems the most normal but is anything but. The first page shows Charles Xavier strolling through a fair and sitting down on a bench to enjoy the weather and his good mood, although the symbolic connection between the dwarf ringmaster and the strongman and Xavier’s dream of mutantkind is quite ominous. Then someone who looks a lot like Moira McTaggart sits down next to Xavier, and this is where x-fan’s expectations all of the sudden get flipped upside-down. On the face of it, Charles meeting Moira around the same time that he first has his Dream of mutant/human co-existence would be quite normal...except that Moira’s tarot cards are depicting people and places in the Year One Hundred (more on this in a bit), and Moira is talking to Charles very familiarly, but he hasn’t actually met her yet. 

This is where a little alarum bell goes off in my mind shouting “TIME-TRAVEL SHENANIGANS!” 

This much-hyped scene turns out to be Charles reading Moira’s mind, but it’s very clear from what we’ve just seen that this is not the Moira we know. And if this Moira is a clone from the future (I’ll get into that in a bit), the publicity tag-line would make sense: after all, time travel to avert a bad future goes way back in X-Men, and often that time travel has involved things happening to Charles Xavier before he could get his X-Men off the ground. 

However, we’ve never see anyone go back just to tell Charles what happens in the future, even though that would profoundly change the timeline just by changing his mind. Is this what turns Charles Xavier into the be-helmeted man in Year Ten with the very different dream? Or would informing him of the future change or prevent the events of Year Ten?

Year Ten

Probably the most straightforward sequence - and the best argument for why HoX and PoX should be viewed as two halves of the same story - this sequence shows us exactly what happened to Mystique after she went through the Krakoa portal in Washington Square Park in HoX #1. 

It turns out that, as much as even Magneto is feeling the “hope-y, change-y” vibes, he, Mystique, and Professor X all have their own agendas regarding the information - note the running theme of the issue - that she pulled out of Damage Control’s servers. 

Further ominous notes: Charles Xavier has never been a telekinetic, and yet here he clearly uses telekinesis to grab Mystique’s thumb drive. That’s very ominous, especially given what we learn about cloned mutants have multiple, spliced-in mutant powers. Also, Professor X’s comment about “everyone who would live in...a better mutant world...owes something” echoes ominously with the interstitial material’s description of Omega class mutants as a natural resource for the state.

Year One Hundred

The most conventionally super-heroic segment, this section shows us an all-too familiar dystopian scenario, with cyborgized humans and cerberus-like sentinels working together to not merely kill mutants but violate their minds and bodies. Further signs of what they’ve been up to comes in the literally black-brained ex-Hound who was genetically designed for infiltration and subversion of her own people. 

A sign that mutants have adapted to this conflict by abandoning moral principles as well comes in the fact that the dead mutant in question is not only programmed to mind-wipe on death, but is repeating Professor X’s speech from Year 10. In a parallel to that era, it turns out that the mutant group who’ve been interecepted were downloading information from the Nexus 

We also meet our two main characters in this epoch - the red-skinned Nightcrawler lookalike Cardinal (whose Tarot card is the Devil, “the red god and the lost cardinal of the last religion” (no idea what that means)) and the metal-skinned Soulsword-slinging Rasputin (whose Tarot card is the Magician, “the metal metapmorph, the great sword, and the girl with one foot in two worlds” (no idea what that means)). As we will learn later, these are not names but clone-types, because war has its own way of getting us to dehumanize ourselves in the pursuit of victory. 

Important Interstitial #1: The Sinister Line

It wouldn’t be a Hickman comic without infographics, and this one was a doozy: at some point after Year 10, a crisis rocked the mutant nation which caused “the almost universal death or disappearance of senior leaders.” This crisis apears to have been engineered by none other than Mister Sinister in order to motivate the remaining mutant leadership into approving “breeding pits” located on Mars, where he could breed and clone mutants for “aggressive, militaristic traits,” to counter-balance the humans’ HOUND program. That’s a hell of a fall from grace.

We then learn that there were four generations of Sinister clones before the whole thing fell apart in a horrific calamity and yet further declension occurred:

First generation: straight-up clones of existing x-men, although the language of “divergent copies of a...pure, uncompromised X-gene” is as disturbing as you might expect from a Victorian eugenicist. (Are these the mass-produced units following from the prototypes we saw emerging from Krakoan cocoons in HoX #1?) Anyway, they all got turned into child soldiers to defend Krakoa until it eventually fell 30 years later. (Keep this date in mind.)

Second generation: combinations of only two x-genes, “mostly predictable.”

Third generation: combinations of up to five x-genes, apparently were wildly successful against the “Man-Machine Supremacy” and about to win the war, when...

Fourth generation: apparently were “produced with a corrupted hive-mind,” went rogue, destroyed 40% of all mutants, destroyed Krakoa, and then killed themselves taking out Mars and the Sinister pits therein.

And now we learn what our protagonists are: Rasputin is (seemingly) a fourth generation mutant with the combined powers of Quentin Quire, Piotr Rasputin, Unus the Untouchable, Kitty Pryde, and Laura Kinney, rather than Kitty and Colossus’ kid as some had feared. Notably, however, Rasputin doesn’t have the same gifts in the same strength as her progenitors: she’s half as strong a telepath as Quire, half as good as phasing as Kitty, half as good at healing as Laura, and about half as good at force-fields as Unus. The only places where she equals them is in turning into organic steel. BTW, if those powers seem somewhat redundant - why would you need to be intangible, made of organic steel, force-fielded, and self-healing all at the same time rather than focusing on just a few of those - well, clearly the intent was to create a tank and a half.

Meanwhile, Cardinal is a (seemingly third-generation) “outlier,” a failure in the breeding program that gradually got worse and worse. All Cardinals - and it’s not clear whether all Cardinals look like Nightcrawler - are pacifists and have “an obsession with creation myths,” and are extreme communitarians who reject individual identity. (Incidentally, Cardinal is where we get the religious through-line of the issue.)  One question: if he’s a pacifist, why is he carrying a rapier? Genetic holdover from Kurt Wagner?

Which raises an important question...given that more than 60% of generation four were pacifists, how exactly did they carry out so thorough a massacre of their own people?

And finally we learn that all of this was Mister Sinister’s plan...which ended with his execution. I remain skeptical, because while I absolutely buy that Mister Sinister would arrange things so that he could run his eugenics programs, I don’t get why he’d self-sabotage in order to defect to such an unrelentingly hostile enemy. 

Year One Hundred, Part 2

Here’s where we see the structure described as “the ower, the axis, the pillar of collapse and rebirth, the monolith of ascension.” (Keep your eye on that word.) Here we meet Nimrod the Lesser and Omega, and see the other side.

And what we find is a society where the machine is clearly beginning to become the dominant part of the Supremacy, despite a formal pretense at equality, a society where Nimrod makes polite noises at decency (”I am embarrassed and ashamed at what we did in the name of both expediency and annihiliation”), but then claps with childlike glee at the thought of getting to turn mutants into biological databanks.

(In a much less important interstitial, we learn that the HOUND program turned out to be a failure, with the scary ones being “ineffective hunters of their own kind,” and the majority of the black brains defecting en masse.)

Finally, we see an old man Wolverine, along with a green-suited Magneto, a very tree-like Black Tom Cassidy, and a Xorn, rendezvousing with the team to receive the data and bring them in touch with “the Old Man.” Which raises all kinds of questions as to when this happened vis-a-vis Mister Sinister’s betrayal.

Important Interstitial #2

In the wake of the fall of Krakoa, we learn that the once-burgeoning mutant population has been reduced to less than 10,000 refugees living in Shiar protected territory, with only 8 mutants left in the solar system...presumably the group we saw in part 2. 

Year One Thousand

And now we find out what happened to our poor Hound, namely that she’s been stuck in a tube for 900 years, a crumbling historical manuscript beyond the ability of the Librarian to preserve.

As we move outside, we learn something critically important: that the “human-machine-mutant war” ended, with humans reduced to zoo animals kept in a nature preserve. Does this mean mutants won? Or did the machines do away with both their enemies and their allies? 

[msephy]

Upbringing chap 13/13

Chapter 1 - Chapter 2 - Chapter 3 - Chapter 4 - Chapter 5 - Chapter 6 - Chapter 7 - Chapter 8 - Chapter 9 - Chapter 10 - Chapter 11 - Chapter 12

Cross-posted to AO3

And here is the last chapter! I hope you enjoyed the story. If so, please let me know ;) Any comments are welcome!

###

Earth 53 - Jason Todd

Of fucking course Bruce would like this Jason Wayne. Weren’t they palls, smiling to each other and hugging each other? Bruce. Hugging someone. Who wasn’t Dick.

And Jason was not jealous. He didn’t need Bruce’s approval, he didn’t need anything from him. He was a grown man.

It was just… unfair.

He thought about hiding in the shadows, but too late. The Doppelganger noticed him on the top of the stairs and nodded at him, indicating his presence to Bruce as well. Jason smirked. They could both go to hell.

“We will stay the night and head back home in the morning,” Bruce announced suddenly.

Jason felt himself tense all over. His smirk widened. “What, already? And here I thought you loved it here!”

Bruce seemed taken aback by the comment, but the Doppelganger understood what he meant by it, and rolled his eyes.

“If you want to hug your father, go ahead. I mean, it’s not like he’d fight you.”

“I don’t need…!”

“Sure, I can see how much you don’t need his attention. Provoking him has nothing to do with it, either. Jesus, how old are you? You still communicate like a teenager which,” he added, turning to Bruce, “by the way, you do, too.”

Bruce frowned. The attack to the Big Bad Bat softened the one to Jason himself only so much, though. Communicating like a teenager? Seriously? As if Bruce ever listened!

“It’s not because he does it that you have to do it too,” the Doppelganger concluded, still aiming his words at Bruce but echoing Jason’s a bit too well. Damnit. And damn him, too, and his perfect life, his perfect personality, his perfect Gotham!

The Doppelganger and Bruce both turned to Jason, making him realized he’d shouted that last part out loud. The Doppelganger smirked, a smirk that Jason knew only too well for seeing it in the mirror every morning.

“Ooooh, poor little Jay whose life was hard,” he jeered in Jason’s own vicious tone. “That’s why he became a bad guy, because he had a hard life.”

“Shut up,” Jason warned.

“Yes, that’s right,” the Doppelganger kept going. “A hard life, like his old da’.”

“He wasn’t even your father!” Jason exploded. “What would you know about it?”

“So? Catherine wasn’t your mother yet you loved her, didn’t you? Our paths only diverged when Alfred found out about me, back when my biological father died, and by then, I was thirteen. You know how it was, being us at thirteen.”

Jason froze. The Doppelganger smirked. “Yeah, I thought so. And yeah, apparently, for you, it only became better later. And then you died. Buhu.”

“Jason,” Bruce tried to interrupt, but the Doppelganger didn’t take any of his shit.

“No, Bruce. He’s excusing his own behavior in ways he doesn’t the behavior of others.”

“I know alright?” Jason exploded. “I fucking know that what I do doesn’t get a pass, but someone has to do it.”

“Has to? Really? Because look by the fucking window, you unbelievable moron. Look at that perfect Gotham of mine, and take a good, hard look at yours. Do you really still think that you took a better path than Batman?”

Jason felt the words like a blow. Fuck him. Fuck him. He was taking the hard decisions, someone had to help the people who didn’t have anybody, the ones Batman wouldn’t help, wouldn’t avenge, someone who would stop those who would never, otherwise, be stopped.

“Some people don’t deserve help,” Jason finally managed.

The Doppelganger shrugged. “Obviously. Take the Joker, for example. Ah, is it him who killed you?” The fucking jerk nodded, as if understanding. Jason felt livid. “Of course. He tried to push Bruce toward his most extreme, and it worked rather well, too. So I broke both his knees.”

Bruce gasped at that. He hadn’t been looking too well, either, while the Doppelganger was talking about his way of doing things, now that Jason thought about it. Did he think he’d been wrong, too? To create Batman?

“His knees? But…”

“Bruce, I like you very much, but the Bruce from this world is my brother and no one hurts my brother. Considering the life he’s living, I consider myself rather restrained. Also, don’t worry, the Joker still manages to cause havoc all the same.”

But he wouldn’t be killing any Robin. Jason’s eyes went up to the empty wall of the cave, where the card would be hanging, back in his world. Maybe that would be an acceptable solution. He craved the clown’s death but… Justice, not revenge. Or maybe a balance between both. Batman already played that game, after all, ignoring the law where it suited him.

Jason didn’t quite relax. It was too late for him, for the Red Hood to be a good guy. He’d never be Saint Jason Wayne. And their Gotham would never be this Perfect Gotham, either.

Or would it? The Doppelganger had had to start somewhere. He’d had to face the Joker, and Ra’s, and all the other fucking lunatics who were attracted by the city and, even more, by Batman. Could there still be hope on their own Earth?

Yeah, no. It wasn’t Jason’s way.

He might still like to work at the Martha Wayne Foundation, though. He’d trusted those people, back when he lived in the streets, at thirteen. Would he manage to find a compromise with Bruce? Without the two of them going at each other’s throats?

“I don’t think I can stop,” Bruce admitted out loud, in a matter-of-fact tone that sounded like defeat.

“You don’t have to,” the Doppelganger said. “Just, you know, also invest in people? I’m sure you do. You have a huge family. All of you put together…”

“We could do it,” Jason heard himself say.

Bruce looked up at him, an indefinable expression on his face. Jason glared back. “We could do it. The replacement already works for Wayne Enterprises. The demon brat and I can take care of the streets.”

Bruce frowned. Of fucking course. He wouldn’t trust them. He…

“I’ll think about it.”

What? No, wait. He was going to come up with an entirely different plan, for sure. Or Jason would do something he didn’t approve of, and they would be back to square one.

And yet. If it had even a remote chance to ever work, if Gotham could even become a better place… Fuck. That would be so worth it.

He looked at his doppelganger, and nodded. Then back at Bruce. “Tomorrow? We can go back, like, now.”

“Bruce will be sorry to miss you,” the local Jason said, but he was smiling. “I’ll pass your excuses along.”

“Yeah, right.” Jason hesitated. “Tell him that, you know. The visit wasn’t too bad. I’m glad the kid is alright.”

“Thank you, by the way,” the Doppelganger said. “You know. For saving my nephew’s life.”

Jason shrugged. “Hey. He’s family.”

He doubted he’d even manage to produce a grin as wide as Jason Wayne’s while meaning it. However, that might be a goal worth aiming for.

###

Earth 53 – Jason Wayne

The next day was quiet. Jason stayed home, spent time with the kids. He asked them both to stay home, despite it being a Friday, pretending it was because he’d missed them. He had, of course, but he mostly thought Damian could use the break.

He did miss the other Bruce, though. The jackass of other Jason… He hoped he’d do well, but he wasn’t in a hurry to see him again.

Once the kids were suitably distracted, Jason grabbed the week’s newspapers and started reading. He wasn’t supposed to work but nobody back at Wayne Enterprise would believe it if he wasn’t up to date with everything that had happened during the week.

There were a lot of different newspapers, from The Economist to the Gotham Gazette, all showing vastly different levels of analysis and opinions. It was always interesting to compare, especially putting the points of views in perspective with the average reader of each. A nice exercise.

Then his eyes stopped at the small ads, specifically at the renting section. He didn’t need a flat in Gotham center, of course; they owned several. Until now, he’d never thought about moving there. Bruce needed him at the manor.

Except he didn’t, not really. Bruce was an adult. His choice of becoming Batman – well, if he needed help, he could call. He knew Jason would always come, if he needed him. Hell, Batman spent more time in central Gotham than at the Cave.

As for Bruce, as an entity apart from Batman… He was an adult. He had his kids here. He didn’t need Jason around. Besides, if he did, going out of the manor for visiting would do him good.

And there was also another point they should discuss.

Jason put the newspaper away and got up, heading for the library. Bruce was, of course, down in the Cave. From the look of it, samples of soil needed to be analyzed, maybe in order to determine where someone had been killed before their cadaver being transported elsewhere – or maybe to determine the amount of fertility, who knew.

“Hey. Everything alright?” Jason asked.

“Mh.”

“I distracted the kids this morning, you can take the afternoon.”

“I’m busy.” Bruce winced. “But I’ll come upstairs as soon as I’m done.”

“Good.” Jason hesitated. It was uncharacteristic enough for Bruce to actually look up from his Erlenmeyer.

“Yes?” he prompted.

“I thought about something.” Jason sighed. “Don’t be upset?”

“I can’t be if you don’t tell me anything.”

“I want to take over Wayne Ent.”

That got a reaction out of Bruce. He put away the pipet he was using to pour chemicals on the soil, and straightened.

“Explain.”

“Bruce, you’re the CEO, but we both know you don’t invest yourself as much as you should. Part of that is my fault. I took over most of your responsibilities when I became COO. More than I should have.”

“Mhn.”

“But you let me. You are not interested in Wayne Ent., not the way you should be. And that’s alright. I can take care of it. I actually like it, too. But the company deserve better from its CEO.”

“I could invest myself more.”

Jason snorted. “You could. Or you could spend more time with your kids.”

“I do…!”

“I’m moving to Gotham proper,” Jason announced. “I’ve been thinking about it for a while.”

Bruce carefully didn’t say anything. Jason sighed.

“You know I love you. You’re my brother. And I love Dick, and Damian, and Alfred, and the manor will always be home. But I need some room for myself, too.” He hesitated again. “Maybe adopting my own children, someday.”

Jason didn’t talk about a relationship. He wasn’t ready to let someone close enough to him to contemplate it. Not even thinking about all the secrets and baggage.

Damnit. Jason really meant what he said, yet he couldn’t help but to feel guilty.

“Would it be alright?”

“Yes,” Bruce said abruptly. “You deserve some place. Something to yourself.”

He looked like he wanted to say more, but he’d never been good with words. It didn’t matter; Jason understood what he meant. That Jason had worked hard to get where he was and should keep going. That he’d taken care of Bruce until now, and still would, but that he had the right to have his own life.

Bruce hadn’t wanted Jason to follow him, back when he’d went training. Back then, Jason had followed only for Bruce, even though he’d loved their trip, and learning how to move, how to fight, how to think like a warrior. He’d loved meeting Talia, and other men and women as dangerous as she was. It was part of him, now.

But he wouldn’t have gone, by himself. To be a vigilante was not his path. It was part of him, he’d always relish in flying over Gotham at night, and there was no fucking way he wouldn’t have done everything to be able to protect his little brother, even though Bruce didn’t need much protecting.

Yet he should, too, follow also his own path.

“You already have some things in one of the flats, I’ll have to put to your name,” Bruce decided.

“Maybe I can come back on week-ends?” Jason snorted. “Like a student, I guess.”

“That would be nice.”

Jason smiled. Bruce did the same, offering him one of his rare smiles, faint on his lips, shining in his eyes. Jason hugged him and felt his brother’s arm close around him, keeping him close. Bruce was a great hugger.

They separated only after several minutes, both smiling still. Well, Jason, at least, was grinning. Bruce was back to looking mostly serious.

“I’ll announce the change next week, to Wayne Ent. I mean,” Jason said. “The moving can wait a couple of weeks after that.”

“Good. You only just came back.”

Jason bumped into Bruce’s side, just to feel his brother close again. “I’ve been reading the newspapers. What about you tell me what happened in the more underground parts of the city? I’ve started reading your reports while waiting for you to come back with Damian, but a summary would help.”

“Sure.”

They sat at the Batcomputer, side by side, their faces reflected in the dark screen. The Wayne brothers. Jason knew, suddenly without doubt, that if he saw them now, their father would be proud of them both

The End

[murdocsmacattack]

the reason im not afraid of 3x10/3x11 and the reason 3x10/3x11 needs to happen

so ,the name at the very least ,for what will ether be ep 310 or 311 has been revealed "mac+fallout+jack" and for pretty understandable and obvious reasons its left 99.9% of the fandom with a seance of foreboding especially given mac and jacks interactions resent episodes ,

however im not afraid , and, i may be giving the writers to much credit with what we've been getting and all, but last time in season 2 when i gave the writers some credit , we actually  came pretty cloes to what i was thinking , so im going out on this limb again , and i hope you'll hear me out , because were dealing with the bromance slash surrogate father relationship of jack and mac , and this area at least the writers have always gotten 99.9% right ..with ..a few hiccups here and there but you get what i mean , so what am i getting at?    

the offness were apparently ALL picking up when it comes to mac and jack..is being done on purpose.

why do i think this ? well its a bit long and briefly personal , but art imitates life and there is a point so i hope you bear with me,a little while back around 302 i did a post about the reaction of the fandome to mac leaving, coming back , and still wanting to leave again , where i basically stated the former

"i think the problem is a lot of people are looking at the situation through “mac” colored glasses so to speak like “oh macs so sweet and so strong , so clearly this isn’t him , this is childish ,his friends are going to easy on him , hes a compartmentalize mac would never do this , hes not allowed to act like this!”"

and im not saying everyone whose coming to the “macs being a dick ” conclusion is completely wrong , but i truly still stand by the believe that his actions are more of a gray area then were giving it credit for , and ill get into that and why its important in a sec but first , lets look at jack  

the thing is , after reading a lot of my fellow fans feelings and reactions and mulling over my own thoughts , i think people are seeing jack through jack colored glasses as well, see jack discovered something about himself in 301  when it comes to mac , something i just assumed everyone else saw even tho it was subtle, and its something about himself that knowing jacks character he doesn’t much care for      

in 301 it was ether riley or bozer who stated "jack didnt care where you were , as long as he knew you were happy " witch as far as there relationship has gone thus far , has been the assumed status quo between them and towards each other, but then we see jacks actions, and hear his own words when he finally comes face to face with mac after there months apart

"I was gonna hunt down and capture Walsh.Yeah, I kind of figured if I collared your old man's ex-partner, I don't know, he'd just retire.And-and then you could return to the Phoenix."

"You know, you did save my life, pal, but I could argue that I'm saving yours as well.Rescued you from a life of misery, - wasting your talents. '

" the world needs you, Mac.And you owe it to the world to work for the Phoenix."

jack goes on to tell mac his main reason along with the ones stated above was jack was doing what he always does , protecting him , but having had this short conversation and hearing his thoughts out loud AND judging from jakcs reaction to mac coming to find him at the airstrip in the next episode , jack realized somethings after having time to mull over his own words

1 that mac being happy , alone, isn't enough

like riley said ,jack knew mac was relatively happy, he had his first steady girlfriend that hasn't tried to kill him , and tho not in any war zones , was still using his gifts to help people , he was healing and happy to the point he was considering not coming back , and i honesty don't believe this was an easy choice or taken lightly on macs part, whose the type of person who wont leave a house he loves despite the fact its literally unsafe, mac had to be happy in a real kinda way to come to this decision , and jack must have known that

but jack still cant fully accept that , hed rather have mac happy AND be with him , then only the former , jack assumes mac is "living a life of misery " because jack is miserable without him , and in that dialog jack admits this to mac and himself out loud for what is probably the first time  

this revelation is so hard on jack , because knowing jack he no doubt thinks this is very wrong of him to feel , jack views riles and mac as his children , but because he hasn't had biological kids of his own for a long and continues amount of time , jack doesn’t understand that theses feeling of a parent in relation to there child are completely normal ,every parent struggles with the balancing act of wanting there child to be happy , and also wanting the child they've raised to be near them

in jakcs mind hes come to the unwanted conclusion that when it comes to mac , he can be greedy and even a little selfish , even if that isn't entirely true and even if mac himslef may not actually feel that way , its how jack is seeing himself now and its put him on edge in concerns to mac

2 jack thinks macs dads physical presence is the only problem

jack and his own father had a completely different relationship in comparison to mac and his dad , but its influencing a lot of jakcs actions , jakcs convinced if big mac is out the building mac will have no problem walking back in , but that's not the real issue ,witch brings us to mac himself and the main problem when it comes to him and his relation to the people around him ,witch is ?

mac is emotionally distancing himself..because his emotions are being disregarded .

macs life was truly torn apart last season after what his father did, hes left  feeling the crushing weight of looking at any and i mean any aspect of his life , and feeling like it doesn’t belong to him ,most likely to the point were doing anything that reminds him of those feelings may even be physically painful , no really , i want you all to imagine building something real that you thought was amazing for years and then having someone tell you “no you didnt do any of that , none of that’s real , you’d have nothing without me ”

god guys its..skin crawling ,and mac was crawling in his own to the point he felt he had to leave the continent to get away from it,of cores macs not acting like who he is , he suddenly has to question every aspect of what that is, mac was faced with a real identity crisis ,and i know for people who haven’t run this kinda race that’s a hard thing to understand , to understand having such a great support system to fall back on ,and not being able to reach out to it , but its a real thing ,and its actually a pretty accurate picture of someone not being able to see past it when there in that much pain , because that’s what this is its pain ,and quite frankly macs handling it better then i did      

i did what mac did to the people around me ,only i didnt have to leave my room to do it, but i was given that space and all the time i needed  to mentally and emotionally heal, the problem is, mac wasn't, not really , mac thought hed found a woman and a purpose, and that was it, hes good , but that's not who mental health works , and it really doesn’t help , that macs kind of the martyr of the group , thanks to his dad mac was pretty much a parentified child from the time he was 10 hes been putting everyone else’s feelings and well-being before himslef for a looong time

and because that was his default setting within the group , it became a shock when mac did something drastic for his own good that put himself first , and weather we or the characters like it or not , that distance was needed, and the slow healing that was happening was cut short, and then he comes back and jack tells him in his own words that he wants him with him to the point of putting him self in harms way , because he knows mac will turn around and put himslef last to save him ,and mac doesn't know what emotionally to do with this , because macs not used to being so wanted , but hes still not healed and being around his father is still hard so he goes to leave again , but then murdoc happens  and mac puts himslef to the back again because someone died , witch brings us to the big point of why "mac+fallout+jack" needs to happen

mac and jack still arn’t right with themselves..and there not talking about it 

mac tries , weakly , at the end of 302 , but jack cuts it down and says there fine , and mac in turn says the same , becaues both of them don't want to acknowledge that something no matter how tiny between them has fractured , but this moment where they both chose not to talk is what sets the tone going forward , jack doesn't let himslef be as close to or open with mac as he was before , and macs feelings, especially when it comes to his father , continue to be pushed aside or misinterpreted ,so mac emotionally distances himslef from everyone and everything and says nothing ,and why would he , mac put his own feeling first , for the first time ..and it was met with a very negative reaction

but they need to have this conversation , and the only thing that may very well bring that about at this point with them playing pretend ,is that mac needs to have an emotional blow up ,hes been pushing all this shit down from all sides and its really been fucking with him , its been a long time coming and there needs to be screaming and crying and yelling , and it may be painful to watch and painful to hear , they may not talk for a day or 2 , but this needs to happen , they need to lay it all out and get themselves right so they can be right together  

mac and jack have both been disillusioned with there seance of self , even if the things they now believe about themselves arnt exactly true , its made them loose the equilibrium within there relationship that has been there constant , their off ,and they need to find each other again.

[thetygre]

Dark Souls Lore Rambling #8

Hey, remember when I said these mini-lores were going to be shorter to write? Or shorter at all? Ha ha ha ha what a liar I am

The Lesser Lords

Now that we’ve covered Gwyn and the Lords in general, I wanted to take a break and cover some of the minor divinities in Dark Souls before we get back into the meatier subjects. There’s a bunch of lesser deities mentioned in passing in Dark Souls, so I thought I’d try to shine some light on them. Please note, I’m only covering the gods referenced in Dark Souls 1; the rest are just going to have to wait.

Flan

What we know about Flan is equal to almost the sum value of bupkis. He is apparently married to Gwynevere and is a god of fire. Also, his name means ‘red haired’ in Gaelic. That’s it; everything else is a mystery. Was his marriage to Gwynevere an arranged one, or did they meet naturally? Is Flan now the King of the Gods by virtue of Gwyn being dead, bereft of male heirs (sorry, Gwyndolin), and Flan being married to Gwynevere? Is he even alive? Who knows.

I think it’s worth noting that Flan is the fire god. That could potentially have a lot of connotations, given that fire is central to the Dark Souls universe. All civilization and life stem from fire. The very cosmic order of duality is set in motion because of the First Flame. So does Flan have some tie to the First Flame? Or perhaps he has some ties to Izalith and pyromancy? Maybe Flan’s marriage to Gwynevere was the sealing pact between the Lords and Witches? Interesting theories, but still just theories.

The only thing I can speculate on for certain is the interesting juxtaposition of divine portfolios in Gwynevere and Flan’s union. Gwynevere, as established earlier, is a benevolent and providing goddess of sunlight, representing the nurturing and feminine aspects of her father Gwyn’s purview. Flan is simply a god of fire; rawer, unrefined, and more elemental. In a way, Flan fills in for the Nameless King as the warrior-prince deity, complementing Gwynevere in a dual relationship. United with Gwynevere, Flan represents not just fire in its elemental aspects, but also fire in its domestic uses, including smithing and the hearth. Or, at least that’s how I envision it.

 Allfather Lloyd

Lloyd. Not much of a deity name. Barely edges out ‘Greg the Thunderer’ and ‘Karen the Earth Mother’. The lore states that Allfather Lloyd is Gwyn’s uncle, was the founder of the Way of White, and his clerics are noted Undead hunters. His face is emblazoned on coins which are apparently currency outside Lordran, which travelers cling to as mementoes of the outside world. That alone indicates that Lloyd is a pretty big deal. It might even give us some details about economics outside Lordran; maybe coins are minted in one of the more theocratic countries, like Astora of Thorolund.

Lloyd’s clerics are even given a certain amount of respect for their Undead hunts, which tells us how the outside world views the Undead; at best cursed and unnatural, at worst slavering zombies. (Which, to be fair, isn’t exactly one hundred percent unfounded.) When everything is taken into account, Lloyd is a figure of central importance to not just the Way of White, but the whole world outside Lordran.

But things get interesting when you start to break down his name. ‘Lloyd’ is easy; it stems from the Welsh ‘llwyd’, which means both ‘holy’ and ‘grey’. But the meat of Lloyd’s etymology comes from the important part of his name; ‘Allfather’. Those of you who have been paying attention might recall that Dark Souls draws from Norse mythology a smidge. And in Norse mythology, ‘Allfather’ (or Alfodr and/or Aldafoor, if you’re feeling fancy) was one of the more important epithets for Odin, King of the Gods. Allfather has two applicable meanings for Odin; first, he and his brothers Villi and Ve are responsible for slaying the primordial frost giant Ymir and using his body to construct the cosmos, as well as the human race. In this capacity, Odin is literally all things’ father in that the universe would not exist without him. Second, Odin was the king over all the other gods, or Aesir, and his word was law. And in between is the fact that Odin is listed as the literal father of some of Norse mythology’s more famous deities, including Thor, Balder, and Tyr.

The thing of it is, when you take these meanings, a creator deity and a divine patriarch, and apply them to Lloyd, old Lloyd starts to turn up short. For starts, Lloyd didn’t create anything. The world existed even before the Lords did, so he wouldn’t be in the running as a creator deity anyway. Adding on to that, he’s listed as Gwyn’s uncle, not Gwyn’s father; if he was going to be called a creator deity by association with Gwyn, he would at least need a paternal link. Lloyd isn’t even the king of the Lords, Gwyn is. Lloyd might still have some kind of ruling position, but he definitely isn’t top banana. And, as far as we know, Lloyd isn’t the biological father of any other important Lords. So what gives?

All these inconsistencies, and a little bit of the lore from Dark Souls 3, point to Lloyd being a fraud. Lloyd started the Way of White touting himself as some distant relative of the Lords from on high. This even ties into my theory that the Way of White wasn’t always the religion of Lord worship, but originally the name for the alliance between humans and Lords during the war with the Everlasting Dragons and against the demons. Lloyd took advantage of, or may even have been responsible, for the shift to a more traditional church. The Undead Hunts are just a way to garner favor with the people and direct attention on a common scapegoat; people won’t notice that the Way of White is rotten from the inside if they’re too busy hunting Hollows.

But for old Lloyd’s sake, let’s consider a second option, and accept Lloyd’s story at face value. Even as only Gwyn’s uncle, that still gives Lloyd a lot of leverage with both humans and Lords. Lloyd might have been the one to oversee relations between humans and Lords during the Age of Ancients and the Age of Fire. The Undead Hunts are genuine efforts to protect humanity and/or to contain the Undead curse. His Allfather title is a religious one, associated with the pseudo-Catholic structure of the Way of White (Havel is a bishop, etc.). ‘Father’, after all, is the title given to a priest in Catholicism after all. So it might be that, as the head of the church of the Way of White, Lloyd is equivalent to the Pope, the high priest to whom all other priests defer; the All-Father.

Of course, these answers aren’t mutually incompatible. Lloyd still could have been the founder of the Way of White and still been a fraud as well. He might even have still been a Lord, a rogue deity like Velka. Either way, by Dark Souls 3 the Way of White has gotten so old that old Lloyd has fallen to the wayside completely.

 The Nameless Blacksmith God

There’s surprisingly more to the Nameless Blacksmith God then you would think, especially if you look at the Dark Souls meta and concept lore. The canon lore on the deity is actually very sparse, but pretty straightforward; the Blacksmith God was the Lord that forged the armor and weapons for the other Lords. I generally take this to mean the Blacksmith God did not literally craft every arm and armament for the Lords, or invented the process of smithing; rather, like how Seath is the father of sorcery, the Blacksmith God was a pioneer in his field, exemplary in his profession. He was the Lord who spearheaded the arming work during the war with the Everlasting Dragons, and may even have been the one to discover titanite and how to use it.

At some point, the Nameless Blacksmith God died, though nobody knows when or how. For a while, I entertained the theory that maybe Gwyn killed the Blacksmith to keep his secrets out of enemy hands, but I’ve come to reject that now. Gwyn’s a dick, but he’s not a stupid dick, and the Blacksmith God was a bigger asset than liability. I kind of like the idea that the Blacksmith was assassinated during the war with the Everlasting Dragons; dragon forces tried to weaken the Lords by cutting off their biggest arms supplier. There’s nothing to even remotely back that up, though.

When the Blacksmith God died, he left behind two things; the titanite demons, and the titanite slabs. I doubt that these were meant to be the Blacksmith’s legacy because I frankly doubt the Blacsmith ever planned on dying. The demons might have been made as servants for the Lords, but I’ll cover them later. Why the Blacksmith God made titanite slabs, I don’t know. There’s obviously writing on the slabs, and Dark Souls 3 actually has the slabs have translatable runes on them that tell the story of the Lords. It is entirely within reason to assume that the Blacksmith God did not leave behind the titanite slabs as resources at all; they were records, preserving history and knowledge in the strongest material available. By the time of Dark Souls, however, titanite is so scarce and so valuable that humans have started cannibalizing what would otherwise be historical artifacts, maybe without even realizing their true value.

 Gwyn’s Wife

We know even less about Gwyn’s wife than we do about Flan or the Nameless Blacksmith God. The Blacksmith God is at least referenced; no one even mentions Gwyn’s wife. It’s assumed he had a wife; he fathered his children, after all. We’re operating on the assumption that the kids actually are biologically Gwyn’s, and not just extremely devout disciples. So unless something is radically different about Lord biology from humans, then Gwyn must have bumped uglies with someone at some point.

We keep seeing a statue of a woman holding a child throughout Lordran. The statue is of a woman wearing a crown, indicating royalty; Queen of the Gods is as good a queen as any. The child she’s holding is grasping a sword, which indicates that he’s meant to grow up to be a warrior. Maybe the Nameless King? I like to think the statue depicts Gwyn’s wife. She’s worshiped as a general maternal goddess, a deity of home, family, women, and fertility. She represents renewal, and the providence of the future. Basically equivalent to the Greek Hera or Juno. Or maybe it’s some random female saint from the Way of White. Maybe there is no explanation for the mother statue, just like there’s no explanation for the statues of Athena in the Undead Parish. It’s just there for the aesthetic.

 Fina

Fina is another deity mentioned in passing reference. The only real detail we get about her as that she is described as having ‘fateful beauty’. Her name is most likely derived from the Celtic ‘Fiona’, which means ‘blond’ or ‘fair’. So, established; she’s pretty, and maybe blond. The ‘fateful’ part of her ‘fateful beauty’ description makes me think that there’s a history of people becoming infatuated with her and driving themselves to their own doom trying to serve her, kind of like our boy Lautrec. It could be that it is literally referring to the concept of fate, however, which means that Fina is also associated with destiny in some capacity. The symbol on the Ring of Favor and Protection is also the symbol of Venus, associated with the goddess of the same name, femininity, and copper. This points to Fina being roughly analogous to the Greco-Roman goddess Aphrodite/Venus, but even that is kind of self-evident.

I was originally going to propose that Fina herself was a Fire Keeper, only worshipped as a god and conscripting men like Lautrec to hunt Humanity for her, but that got thrown out the window when I realized Lautrec leaves the Fire Keeper Soul of Anastacia of Astora behind when he kills her, which is a valuable nugget of Humanity. But that in itself raises a question; if Lautrec was just hunting for Humanity and Fina is only his matron, why leave behind the valuable Fire Keeper Soul?

Maybe Fina is a jealous goddess, vain like the Greek gods, and has any woman she deems too beautiful killed, no matter how far away they are. She could also be acting on her potential purview as a deity of fate, condemning Anastacia of Astora specifically for being a heretic. Or perhaps Lautrec simply didn’t know about Fire Keeper Souls, and left behind the soul the same way he left behind the Black Eye Orb out of ignorance. I’m still partial to my theory of Fina as a Fire Keeper and Lautrec as a kind of alternate Kirk of Thorns, but I have to admit, it’s a theory standing on some pretty shaky ground.

 Old Man McLoyf

I’m gonna’ level with you, I’d completely forgotten about Old Man McLoyf until about twenty minutes ago. His face is on the Copper Coin, where he’s mentioned as the god of drink and medicine. From his name, we can gather that he is both A.) a man and B.) old. ‘Mc’ means ‘son of’, and ‘Loyf’ means ‘to praise’; both parts are Scottish. We can infer from his placement on the Copper Coin that he comes from the same general pantheon as Allfather Lloyd, revered in whatever potentially theocratic state made the coins.

And… that’s about it. I’ve seen it posited that McLoyf might have some connections to Catarina, with his connection to alcohol for celebration and medicine for healing combat wounds. I’ve even seen a theory that he might be Gwyn’s father, but there’s nothing to really substantiate that. It’s possible that, like Lloyd, he might not actually be a Lord and instead be a hero-deity or charlatan. I doubt that he’s a chaotic and wild deity of drinking like Dionysus or Bacchus. The connecting thread between medicine and alcohol is that they both cause chemical alterations within the body, so I suppose that’s McLoyf’s root purview. In that capacity, he might also be a god of bravery in the face of harm, which really only reinforces the idea that he might be popular in Catarina. Another mystery god.

 Velka

And of course I saved the best for last. There’s a lot of controversy surrounding Velka in the Souls lore community. I think it’s best to start by laying out the facts. And by ‘the facts’, I mean ‘a summary of the lore with some of my thoughts sprinkled in’. Velka is described as a ‘black-haired witch’, as well as a ‘rogue deity’. Right off the bat, this gives some cause for speculation; ‘witch’ in Dark Souls can refer to either a female practitioner of magic or the specific race of people inhabiting Izalith. I want to err on the side of simplicity and say that she’s just a woman capable of spellcasting. The ‘rogue’ part makes me think that she operates outside of the standard pantheon of gods. Velka is stated to be the goddess of sin; not of sinning itself, but of defining sin and meting out justice to those who do it.

Her priests are also pardoners, where, similar to Catholic priests, an individual can confess their sins and be told how to atone, or offer one’s self up for punishment. Also like medieval Catholic priests is the practice of indulgences with Velka’s pardoners, where one can simply pay to be absolved; however, this may be unique to the pardoner in the Undead Parish. She also appears to a goddess of magic, both performing it and countering it. She is so closely aligned with sorcery that she allows the usage of intelligence instead of faith for her followers. Her name is either Czech for ‘great one’ or ‘famous, or Finnish for ‘debt’; both meanings are appropriate to Velka’s character, but it’s more likely meant to be the Czech meaning since that is the language Dark Souls draws more from. Finally, she has black hair and is associated with ravens. Ravens already have mystical significance in both European and Asian mythology, but are universally associated with death and the presence of the gods. It’s also worth noting that Velka’s connection to ravens and witchcraft gives her some parallels to the Celtic Morrigan; however, Morrigan is a goddess of warfare and sovereignty, not justice.

Velka’s rogue status might tie into her purview as the goddess of sin and justice. The theory I subscribe to is that Velka’s sense of justice was universal, and so she indicted the Lords as well as humanity. This didn’t sit well with the Gwyn et al, and so Velka had to be disappeared into the Painted World of Ariamis, with all the other undesirables of the gods. Clearly, the Lords were not wholly successful in banishing Velka; she appears to still have some presence in Carim, or at least one surviving pardoner from Carim, and some of her items and spells are still in Lordran. As of Dark Souls, her exact portfolio is trying to be absorbed by Gwyndolin, and the two appear to have a standing rivalry; or, more correctly, Gwyndolin still has a standing bounty on Velka’s worshipers. Velka may have once had control of the Blades of the Darkmoon, but the very name indicates that they’ve shifted allegiance to Gwyndolin.

We now descend into the realm of complete conspiracy, where I state my stance on some of the theories surrounding Velka. First and foremost; no, I do not believe the Chosen Undead is an unwitting pawn of Velka’s to strike back against the gods. True, a giant raven carries the Chosen Undead from the Undead Asylum to Firelink Shrine, but this entire plot thread just seems too tenuous to me. It is placing an undue amount of agency and significance on a character that, for all intents and purposes, is barely more relevant than the Nameless Blacksmith God or Allfather Lloyd. Miyazaki has a history of letting characters directly confront their manipulators; the Fool’s Idol in Demon’s Souls, Gwyndolin in Dark Souls, the Amygdalae in Bloodborne, etc. The importance of Dark Souls is that the Chosen Undead is not significant beyond the fact that they are a person and they control their own fate; an unknown manipulator seems contrary to that philosophy.

That being said, I can’t help but see the giant raven as somehow being tied to Velka. Perhaps, once, long ago, it did indeed serve Velka. But with her disappearance, it now acts on instinct and more like an animal rather than an active agent. The raven, with the hindsight of Velka’s lore, becomes symbolic of the inevitable karmic cycle that comes to Gwyn and the other inhabitants of Lordran. If nothing else, it’s a powerful visual; ravens in the West are considered birds of death and ill omen (before we began associating them with being preternaturally smart). In Japanese folklore, ravens are the servants of the gods and act on their behalf. Given that Dark Souls is distinctly aiming for a European aesthetic, however, I think Miyazaki was going for a more Western signifier with the giant raven. It is both death and justice.

Second, I do not think that Velka is Crossbreed Priscilla’s mother. While Priscilla’s Dagger does do Dark damage and Velka’s rapier also does dark damage, I operate on the general assumption that Seath is Priscilla’s father/creator. Velka, once again, was the goddess of sin and punishment, which means that ‘Weird Science’ Seath would probably want to avoid her. At the very least, he would be in some hot water for betraying the Everlasting Dragons. If she wouldn’t discriminate for the other Lords, she certainly wouldn’t discriminate for a dragon.

Third, I do not believe that Velka was involved with the Four Kings and New Londo. True; the darkwraithes do dark damage with their Dark Hand, and they have what appear to be raven feathers on their armor. But we have no way of knowing if that material is supposed to raven feathers; it could very well be fur. Furthermore, connecting the darkwraithes of New Londo to Velka because of an aesthetic feature seems like a mighty leap to conclusions. By that logic, the darkwraithes also have something to do with Gravelord Nito because their armor looks like skeletons. The presence of the same statue that is in the Painted World is also circumstantial at best; there are also giant rats with Humanity in the Painted World as in the sewers, but nobody calls them part of a greater plot.

And finally, I do not believe Velka is the narrator at the beginning of the game. This ties in especially with the theory that Velka is the grand mastermind behind the Chosen Undead, and perhaps even the Dark Sign. And that’s just silly; the bad guy is not the narrator. That was a stupid plot twist in RWBY, mildly effective in God of War 2, and just out of place here. Dark Souls is known for its subtle storytelling, but this is just esoteric. And I say that as someone who has just written 3300 words about some astoundingly esoteric entities. What purpose does it serve for Velka to be the narrator and mastermind of the game? What does it say about Dark Souls’ broader themes? Humanity, the cycle of life, the rise and fall of civilization, empathy, hope, loss, decay, the inevitability of entropy and the ephemerality of life; those are the themes of Dark Souls. Gwyn is usurped because it’s part of an uncontrollable and inexorable cosmic cycle that repeats endlessly and meaninglessly; the concept that divine justice plays into that is simply counterintuitive.

With all that out of the way, I do think Velka used the Dark. The Dark did not originate with her, and she did not try to push the Dark to act a certain way, but I do think she used it. The pardoner’s rapier does have dark damage, after all, and the Dark Ember mentions specifically that it was used to forge weapons that could hurt the Lords. It could be that, growing desperate to mete out divine punishment to the other Lords, Velka drew on the Dark and taught her priesthood how to do the same. And this, ultimately, is the straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back and got Velka banished to the Painted World. Velka, in her own way, became was broken down by the passage of time, as all things are.

And now that I’ve had my fill of lesser Lords, stay tuned for when we turn our sights back to the main stage. Darkmoon Tomb, here we come!

[mydeardeath]

A dragon’s hoard (part 1)

on AO3

summary :  Dragons had always been part of tales in Gotham. They were fascinating creature after all. But they weren't supposed to be real. Nobody, except the old Lady Drake, believed in them. That is, until Crown Prince is taken by one of them during his birthday party.

The Drake was one of the most powerful families of the Kingdom of Gotham. They owned the largest land, one that had once been mostly inhabited by savage that refused to follow the rules of the King, that nobody had dared to venture to until the Drake had conquered it. The life on this land was harder than in other counties with the rude winters in the mountain and the arid plains where almost nothing grew, but people had started to come, reassured by the Drake presence. Part of their fame and success was due to their competence as Dragon Hunters. Dragons had been one of the reasons why leaving in this land was dangerous and the Drake had eliminated this threat. They had explored the fallen Dragons lair and taken their hoard for them, becoming richer than anyone in the kingdom. The King himself often consulted the Drake on the kingdom matters, to ensured their support.

Emboldened by his parents' triumph, Charles Drake had wanted to slay a Dragon himself but there wasn't any left in this land. So when he reached adulthood, he left Gotham to find one. He returned with a Dragon scale to prove to everyone his victory over the beast and for a fortnight after his return all was well. They celebrated his success with a grand feast and dances for a few day and his wife gave birth to a healthy boy : Jack Drake.

But their happiness didn't last long. In his quest for reconnaissance, Charles had gone after an innocent Dragon, one that hadn't hurt anyone and that didn't deserve to die just to satiate a man's ego. So, one day the Drake family was visited by a spirit that cursed Charles, his wife, and son. They themselves became dragons and were to stay in this form until they learned to respect the ones they had hunted.

So Charles fleed with his family, afraid they would be killed. His parents stayed behind, still humans. They helped Charles built a house high in the mountains, away from humans villages. Their tragic fate spread in all the kingdom, yet the rumor was never confirmed. The only thing people knew for sure is that nobody ever saw Charles Drake from this day on.

***

This was ridiculous. Damian didn't understand why they had to go through this, they were royalty after all, they didn't owe anything to anyone. Yet, here he was dressed in white silk of the highest quality, covered in jewels and paraded in the street. Today marked his coming of age and the entire kingdom seemed to have come to the capital to celebrate it. Well, at least all the nobles and the wealthy, all with the same hope : marry their daughter to the prince. His father had refused any engagement, telling everyone that Damian would get to choose once he was eighteen. And obviously, they all had remembered. To be fair, they had started to fight for his hand far before his eighteenth birthday but before they had least tried to be subtle. Nothing seemed to deter this vultures. He had tried the gay card which wasn't at all effective. His preference didn't seem to matter as he would need an heir if he was to be king. They just proposed him to take a paramour, all their daughter ready to "accept it". As if he needed their authorization ! But even his father had agreed that he would need a child, need an heir. Some had suggested he renounced to the throne, probably hoping that Dick, the king oldest ward, would take it instead. They took Dick gentleness as naivety and thought they would be able to manipulate him more easily. Nobles were ridiculous.

After the march through the capital, he was to endure a ball, one he could not evade as it was in his honor and his absence would quickly be noticed. So he stayed in the ballroom, dancing with all the unmarried girls and groped by the older ones. And despite the growing need, he didn't touch more than one drink so the kingdom wouldn't worry about his "apparent alcoholism" like they had done with Jason after he had been sighted in a pub the day following his own coming of age. Most of the girls he waltzed with were insipid and boring. Thankfully, due to his reputation; he didn't have to bother with a faux smile. He didn't try to pretend to be interested in anything they were saying which did nothing to deter them. They did not care about it, only his status mattered. He was saved from his suitor by the member of his father council. Not that they were any better. They kept praising him, his strength and his intelligence while just a few months ago they had criticized all his idea until they had been reminded of his age. They all wanted his favor to gain power in the council. Some even went to propose him to teach him everything about "lovemaking" with a man so he could have a blooming sexual life when he chose a paramour. As if he would want so old decrepit man that probably didn't know how to please anyone but himself.

The only one he didn't mind talking to was Lady Drake. She was a really old lady, but not one to pinch his cheek telling him he looked precious or "a beauty worthy of being taken by a dragon" (one of the most frequent and stupid "compliment" used by dodderer toward young ladies and exceptionally young lords.). And nobody dared come bother him when she was with him, she was far too powerful for that. Her lack of heir had enhanced said power, as all hoped for a part of her wealth when she would inevitably die.  And despite her advanced age, she was still quick-witted and they could discuss for hours without Damian getting bored. Sometimes she would wander to fantasy, talking about dragons as though they were real creatures and not just tale to scare young children. But Damian, while he thought the idea of dragon ludicrous, didn't mind her oddness. She was good at telling stories and it was often a welcome distraction.

Lady Drake eventually retired from the party, not able to stay awake at wee hours as she used to in his youth. Damian didn't have to wait long after she had left his size to be assaulted anew by nobles. He was envious of the lady, he would have liked as well to escape from the room and its dull people. But he was discouraged from doing so by his father gaze. He had promised to stay at least until two in the morning and had still more than one hour to go at.

Ignoring several offers to dance, he started searching for his "big brothers". They liked to call themselves that, always talking about their duty as older brothers. It was mainly an excuse to baby him, they had barely changed the way they treated him in the last six years even if he had grown from kid to adult. Dick took seriously his role as big brother but Jason mostly did it to rouse him. Damian had hoped to take advantage of it tonight, using his brothers to shield him from the dangerous predators that were the young ladies in attendance.

However, to Damian despair, it seemed that Dick didn't have more luck than him, surrounded by his own crowd of invasive aristocrats. Two women were splattered to him, each one to a hip, their hands on his chest like a sign of ownership. The competition was tough as they were a dozen of women in Dick's company, all of them trying to catch his attention by miscellaneous means. Some of them had corset so tightly bound that their breasts seemed about to burst out of it. Yet, as much as they could bend toward Dick to give him a better view, his brother eyes never wandered below their faces.

So Dick wasn't an option at the moment. He scanned the crowd for Jason, careful to never stop. Being still for just a few seconds could be perceived as an invitation. He searched the entire room, not forgetting a single corner, before it became clear that Jason had managed to sneak out unnoticed. Lucky him. It also meant that he would get no help from his brothers. His father wasn't either an option and Cassandra wasn't even here. She was rarely in the capital nowadays. She had always been discreet and, apparently, it allowed her to go explore the world without the court noticing her absence. Maybe he should have done the same. But considering he was the king only biological son it seemed unlikely that nobles could have under any circumstances forgotten about his existence.

Damian didn't have much choice but to resign himself to endure innocuous highborns for one more hour. An opportunity presented itself to him when a tray full of glasses shattered to the ground. The commotion was loud enough to attract everyone attention and he took this occasion to slide through a balcony door and close it behind himself. He couldn't leave as he had to make a final appearance that would signal the end of the party. If his father found out he had been hiding on a balcony, he could just pretend he had been here for only five minutes to take some fresh air. Nonetheless, he was careful to blend in the shadow so no one would see him from the inside and join him. The isolation offered by his hideout could make some people bold. Well, bolder than some already were.

The cold air of the night hit him, his clothes were doing nothing to warm him. In fact, they were supposed to keep him from getting warm so he wouldn't overheat in the ballroom. But Damian didn't care in the slightest, the bite of the cold was more pleasant than the party going inside.  Plus he had his glass of whiskey, still half full, to warm him. He started to sip his drink slowly when he heard a strange noise behind him, as if something had scratched against the brick of the roof. Damian didn't see anything when he looked up, yet he had the sensation of being observed. He was probably getting paranoid after the event of the evening, so he dismissed the feeling and went back to his drink.

Just a few minutes later he heard a deep huff of breath that couldn't have come from a human. He tensed automatically, his feet moving to face the unknown threat. He didn't manage to get a look at the beast as its claws had already ensnared his waist and before he knew it, his feet weren't touching the floor beneath him. He struggled in the creature grip, his legs battling uselessly in the air, and his glass slipped from his fingers when he tried to free himself from the beast clutch with his hands.

He should probably call for help, but he didn't want anyone to see him in such a state, unable to defend himself. Dick would without a doubt tease him mercilessly if he was the one to save him. If only he had brought his sword. His father had forbidden him from taking it, fearing that he would snap at one point while having to go through an entire day surrounded by stupid people.

Damian was still trying to loosen the creature grip on his waist when a cry pierced the silence. A middle-aged woman had opened the balcony door and was frozen in its entrance. Then two things happened at the same time : all the party seemed to gather at the windows, some shouting the word"Dragon", and he was violently projected in the air as the beast (dragon ?) jump in the sky. He heard his father calling after him in a horrified voice. His father was strong and a knowledgeable man but he had never encountered any dragon. Bruce was known, by his family and friends at least, to have contingency plans for everything. Almost everything. Dragons had never been something they took seriously. So, for the moment, Damian was on his own.

The strength of the sudden move cut the prince breath for a few instant, leaving him with a searing pain in his chest. The speed at which they were going didn't help either. Damian felt as if he was going to throw up, his inside being shaken in all direction. This wasn't the only thing he had to worry about. If he had been cold on the balcony, it was nothing compared to now. He was completely frozen, covered by thin clothes and flying at high speed in the glacial wind of the night. At this rhythm he wouldn't have to worry about the dragon intention, he was going to die from hypothermia before that. His fingers were already starting to go numb and soon he would be too weak to move. He was on the verge of passing out when he began to feel warmth where the dragon skin was touching his own. Between the scales of the beast, he could see its skin glowing slightly as if a fire had been lit inside him. And why not ? If Dragons were real, so their rumored ability to spit fire could be too.

Despite the dragon apparent effort to keep him alive, he had been too dizzy to stay awake and had drifted slowly to sleep. He didn't know how much had passed when he woke up. As he had no mean to know for how long they had flown and in which directions, he had no idea where he was. It would make his return home harder. But it wouldn't be enough to deter him. He was a prince, he wouldn't end alone in a strange land, eaten by a fucking dragon !

He wasn't really sure that the Dragon planned to eat him. He had been laid on soft furs, near the hearth where a fire was still slightly burning. The whole room was pretty cozy, entirely covered in enough furs and pillow that the floor had disappeared. It was like a giant bed, and maybe it was. Maybe this was where the dragon usually slept.

For the moment Damian was alone, an opportunity he couldn't waste. He got up on his shaking legs and went for the door. Although he had difficulty opening it, it wasn't locked just old and rusty. The door led to a wide hall illuminated by the cold light of the winter sun entering through the large windows. He just took a glance for Damian to realize that he was on a mountain, at a high point. The forest outside the castle - he could be nothing else than a castle judging by the size of the rooms and the quality of the wood flooring - was bare. The trees had lost their foliages thus he would have to move fast and never stop if he wanted to escape as the forest would offer no cover from the sky. The tree trunks would probably break like little wood under the beast weight.

He didn't have the time to plot his evasion before the rustling of wings echoed outside. The dragon was already back and running into the forest was no longer an option. But he could still evade the creature. Surely, dragons were gigantic being. So the one that had taken him couldn't possibly have access to all the room. He would just have to hide in one with a small door.

Damian went to the first floor, the rooms downstairs were made for holding parties and were generally bigger than private quarters. He chose the narrower corridor and picked a room without a window opening onto the front yard so the dragon wouldn't break it to grab him. It was a small bedroom, perhaps for a maid, with a single bed and basic furniture. Everything was covered in dust, making his nose hitch in discomfort. He restrained himself from making any noise to not betray his location. He tried to open the closet but it creaked too much so he gave up. He had hoped to find other clothes as he had started shivering again. There was no fire to warm him in here.

He waited for the dragon to come for him, tear apart the door and snag him but nothing happened. The castle remained silent. No roar of anger. No claws scratching against the wall.

Hours passed and the sun declined, and the dragon never came to find him. Tired and freezing, he shook the sheets and pillows before settling on the bed, fold back on himself.

Part 2

[ecotone99]

[SF] [RO] Wings of the Quantum Angel

"Once upon a time-" my father began as I cut him off. Age was the primary factor as to who heard it first, being seven the wings flapping above us was heard by me first. "D-Dad..." I said nervously. He glanced towards the roof as it creaked. He was unable to hear it move but the area's around it he could hear, the creaking, splintering wood above us was easily heard by the thirty two year old man.

"Stay quiet..." he told me, a hushed tone, dread sapping the confidence out of his normally powerful voice. I knew the drill, we all did. My older brother, who was only ten at the time, cocked the military issued delta rifle. It was better to have a child, as twisted as it sounded, on the front lines against angels as they could perceive them better than adults for an unknown reason. It didn't have anything to do with them being invisible to adults, rather, somewhere after the age of twenty five, the human mind begins to degenerate, not so drastically that it kills them but just naturally. Angels, what the military had deemed them, used this to their advantage, somehow with sonic and psionic pulses, tricking an adult into thinking that nothing was even there. Angels have existed for centuries, forming around before the 1700's, bogeymen, bigfoot, Lock Ness monster, all technically angels. What are they? Many people back in the late 21st century speculated they were magical monsters, but science has proven otherwise. They are the physical manifestation of human delusion and fear, an accidental side effect of the Salem Witch trials. As explained by Dr. Francis Dale in an article he wrote twenty years before my birth, “Human beings are the most intelligent thing that has ever existed on the planet. Our intelligence as a side effect can and has effected reality. Human perception of fearing others has, somehow, effected our reality in a way we do not fully understand. If enough people, for an unknown reason, believe in something, it becomes reality.” That monster under your bed as a child was real for the sheer fact you believed it was real. For unexplained reasons, angels manifested in the middle of the 21st century, enough people most likely fearing World War II as the first World War and original World War II was deemed two parts of the same war, renamed probably due to people’s extreme terror about nuclear war, somehow the words “World War II” being less terrifying than “World War III.” I don’t make changes, I just follow them. All three of us in that tiny rural Russian cabin focused on the angel moving away from us, trying to force our perception of the creature to become its reality. It is far, far too complex of a process to explain to anyone not living with angels. To put it simply, if humans perception of fear and delusion can turn into a biological creature, then those same delusions and in this case hopefulness of the creature leaving, can affect its actions. Even though it has been tried, scientists cannot erase the creature’s existence as the fear of them is far, far too prevalent throughout the world. If the twelve billion people in the world all believed none of them existed, then they would cease to exist, but no way in hell anyone is convincing that many people to do that.

A thin, inhumanly long oily arm reached through our window, Class III, six jointed fingers, stiffer than usual elbow. Many might think it was a huge, skeletal rotten mass but most angels, unless injured, were fully covered in relatively healthy, if not sweaty, skin. This one had a deep caramel color, strange considering we were in one of the coldest countries in the world, its skin was stretched over its shoulders, the bones of its ribs exposed as per usual of a class three. The spinal column of it easily seen through the ribcage, lungs and a two beating hearts moving in gross, twitching motions. It was mostly humanoid, about nine or ten feet tall, the skeleton of the creature stretched instead of just being a larger version of humans. Class 3’s generally didn’t have eyes, nor did this one, just a fat nose with teeth in black gums that resembled tooth picks tightly packed together in almost a fence-like structure. On its feet and hands it possessed only for fingers, a claw on its upper leg and upper arm instead of the little digit, also par for the course. The creature was completely hairless, lacking pores, its skin appearing slightly smoother than a human’s. Bizarrely enough, despite no female counterpart had ever been found, most angels possessed a penis, this ones looked like it had been torn in half, probably by barbed wire, it would regenerate it in the coming days if it lived this encounter. However, the most bizarre thing about the beast was, even though my brother and I both heard wings when it landed, the wings were two black turbines of black matter, extending over eighty feet out the window. In the back of the creature it had organs scientists couldn’t wrap their head around that created the turbines that didn’t obey the laws of physics in the slightest. They, for lifting up something this large, didn’t make any sound, didn’t provide any lift for anything around it, not picking up paper or anything but against biological mass it would burn it, similar to a radiation burn. The only time feathers were heard was when it wasn't in human view. “Take the shot…” My dad told my brother. He aimed the barrel of the gun against the creature’s cheek, pulling on the trigger. My heart stopped as the echo of the shot shattered throughout the room, a green flash and the creature fell, dead in a heap. My dad could see it now, grimacing at the beast.

16 Years Later

So, here I was, finally, years of training graduating from SAFRIM, Secrete Angelic Facilitators Indigo Marauders. I was officially an Indigo Soldier, an angel killer. We had been trained to ignore our survival instincts regarding the creatures as that was how they hunted us. We weren’t just here to defend against them, we were here to destroy them… it was my duty.

Travis was an American who I had trained with. He started out as some scrawny kid and I watched him evolve, I couldn’t help but smile at my friend’s progress, he was 182 centimeters of pure muscle now. I was proud of him, I was glad I got my first mission with him. I always enjoyed his wisecracking, even to the trainers who beat him into a bloody pulp on more than one occasion, he grinned the entire way through.

Lily, a stoic girl who would probably be great for hunting angels regardless of training, it was what she had been doing in France for years before as a twelve year old, only joined to get physically better. When I joined, I thought she might have a soft spot but she was basically an emotionally dead girl, cute if she could actually express some emotion.

Kaine Snow, the guy who insisted I call him by both his first and last name or just Snow, he apparently hated his first name, but he hadn’t ever actually opened up about it to anyone aside from Lily who claimed she told him, could be her version of fucking with us.

Finally, Kyle, a roided out American who believed in the good ol’ American dream. I wanted to punch him in the throat 20% of the time as his ego was larger than the moon. Couldn’t stop hitting on me despite how many goddamn times I told him I wasn’t into guys, not that he’d be my type if I was.

I hate the desert, its like a bipolar child, freezing at night, boiling in the day. The spiders didn’t help, our mission, Class 4 angel. Kill it, we’d get our first pay check. Easy enough, right? Wrong, very wrong. The fact that we knew what we were looking for with the intent to kill it meant we didn’t fear it, meaning it could be hard for us to actually perceive. “You alright?” Travis sat next to me with a grunt, way, way too big for my tent. “Yeah, just nervous,” I smiled at him. I didn’t fear angels, I dealt with them on a near weekly basis in Russia, I was just nervous about screwing up. “Honestly… same,” he chuckled, handing me a beer. I thanked him, taking a sip. “This is warm,” I groaned. “Leave it outside for twenty minutes, I’m sure it’ll be good then.” I slid past him, inviting him to follow, a bright light five meters away. My eyes needed to adjust from the white light of my phone to the flickering orange of the flames. Lily sat on a log, a tired look on her face. She probably didn’t see I saw her like that since her face snapped back to normal once I sat next to her. “You alright?” “Hm? Why wouldn’t I be?” She turned to me, expressionless, impossible to read. “Big day ahead of us,” Travis grunted as he sat in the sand across from us. He knew I had a thing for Lily, he just didn’t get it, “Son of a bitch!” He stood up, a huge tan bug hanging from his leg. He slapped the thing off, “Fucking camel spiders can go to Hell!” I couldn’t help but chuckle at his stupidity. “What was rule one? Oh, right, don’t sit in the Goddamn sand!” I laughed. “Real funny,” He grinned, sarcasm thick in his throat, chucking the beer against the camel spider, shattering the bottle. “I’m going to bed,” Lily said, getting herself up and walking into her tent, zipping it behind her. “You’re terrible at this…” Travis sighed, sitting next to me. “What am I supposed to do? She doesn’t open up at all!” I hissed at him. “I mean you’re lowkey flirting with me in her eyes…” He whispered. I wasn’t worried about her hearing me as the tents were purposely lined with high quality sound dampeners, bad for normal soldiers but great for angel hunters, no sounds in the night to get someone paranoid for the mission ahead. “What the fuck are you talking…” He was right. Goddammit. “Talk to her tomorrow, only talk to me as a friend or an ally, alright? You got this.” He put his hand on my shoulder, smiling.

The sun was absolutely blinding, especially after waking up in my tent which was nearly pitch black, “Fuck!” Kyle shielded his eyes, “Who turned on the LED sun?” “You’re not funny,” Lily told him, already dressed for the mission. “Wasn’t tryin’ to be you short bitch.” “HEY!” Travis barked, “Enough of that shit, it’s one angel, we kill this and we can assign ourselves to new battalions, you two bantering just makes it more likely for it to run off.” “I want to be in whichever one lets me gut him,” Lily snarled, her face twitching almost angrily, uncommon for her. “Fuck you!” “STOP!” Travis barked again, they both stopped. Kyle and Lily never got along, probably why the higher ups put them together. If they could help complete this mission, despite their differences, it would be a great sign for both of them. The five of us walked through the molten air, military equipment digging into us. All of us had gotten used to that sweat soaked feeling of straps digging into uncomfortable places but the heat made it six hundred times worse. “So…” I said, walking next to Lily, her black hair covered by her helmet... I wanted to run my fingers through it sometimes. “What?” She grunted back. “Pretty hot, huh?” “I guess,” She replied. A pickup line like that would’ve worked if I just met her, going with something like kinda like you. I didn’t think she was hot, I thought she was cute. “You ever been to the middle east before?” “No.” Right… She very dry when it came to replying. Maybe I should just give this up, “You?” I almost grinned but stopped myself. That was the first time I had ever heard her ask a follow up question to someone else’s that wasn’t a trainer. She was more skilled than me so I didn’t see me as that. “I went to the Gobi when I was a kid if that counts,” I chuckled. “Just as gross, sand. Annoying, gets everywhere, my ears, my nose, my eyes, my mouth—” She cut herself off. What? No, no, no, no… Did she realize I was trying to get her to open up? “Someone’s up ahead...” I turned my focus, sure enough, she was right. It definitely wasn’t the angel, someone with a thin male form, could be a mannequin for shooting practice. My shoulder erupted in fire, thick gooey red liquid dripping from the tips of my fingers. “Zena!” Lily yelped, her face turning white before dragging me out of the way. Odd… was she actually worried? “Did she just get shot?” Travis exclaimed. Kyle and Snow bolted toward the direction, hiding behind dunes as other loud blasts echoed through the desert. The mannequin shook twice. “It was an accident…” I groaned, pulling back my coat, letting Travis see the wound. “Uh… Lily, can you handle this? I’m gonna go help the guys?” Lily nodded. “We may need to get you back to camp.” “I’ll be fine, we need to kill the angel.” “Okay…” she said, digging through her pouch for a bandage and rubbing alcohol. Another two blasts. Someone was doing target practice with a sniper or other high caliber gun. I wasn’t particularly mad since it wasn’t like they were expecting people to be out here, “uh…” She dabbed my wound with the towels that were gripped by her shaking hands. Why was she panicking? She dressed simulation wounds before? “Lily… You need me to get that?” I asked. She shook her head as two more blasts fired off. I heard something whiz by us. For fuck’s sake, they were firing snipers, how hard was it to aim? Terror wrapped around my heart as two enormous black turbines erupted behind the dune a few hundred feet away. I quickly shoved it down but Lily looked terrified. Fuck! We should’ve killed the thing first, she was worried about me and that transformed into fear and now the bastard knew exactly where we were, smelling her fear, her perception of losing me… oh fuck… The tan skinned angel blasted over the dune, two glowing white eyes with sockets darker than night. That was a class 4 all right, an extra joint in its arm, gaping mouth. A shriek escaped its mouth as it saw me, the wings changing direction rapidly, coming right for me. Fuck! I was so dead! It reached forward with its arm, the tendons in the limb tightening… hang on… where were the fingers? Where was the entire lower arm!? The thing was riddled with bullet holes. Wait… that was the angel they were shooting at? Another two turbines exploded around the dune and I heard the echo of delta rifles. There was two of them!? My pulse quickened again, and the angel turned its attention to me once again. Lily was fumbling for her rifle, fearing for my life instead of her own. She didn’t fear death, she feared mine. That was what the angel was latching onto. “Eat this you piece of shit!” A grenade was shoved down its throat by Kyle before punching it in the ribs, sending it backward. The thing’s head exploded, shrapnel of bone and metal landing in the sand near us. All three of us knew the only thing that could take it down for good was going to be a delta round but that gave us enough time to bolt toward Travis and Snow as it swept its oversized limbs around, grasping for anything. It probably couldn’t sense anything as its fear senor was in its head, which was there, and there, and there, and there…

The twin turbines of black matter near where Travis and Snow were remained, sweeping through the area. They were definitely alive as the turbines hadn’t stopped sweeping, but for how long? The angel behind us was stitching itself back together, black matter similar to its wings fusing its face back together. Another gunshot whizzed past my shoulder, the angel behind us exploding into blood and guts. That wouldn’t kill it, but it would slow the regeneration. Another gunshot, this one slamming into Lily’s chest, causing me to pull away from Kyle, screaming, “NO!” She groaned, the bullet landing in the sand as she sat up. Right, we wore bulletproof armor. It was still covered in blood since that was definitely a sniper round, but she didn’t die. “Can you walk?” Kyle asked me. I nodded. Instantly, he picked up Lily and began running, following close behind him. Why had one bullet hit the angel and the other hit Lily? “Oh fuck…” The black turbines turned to white crystal. That angel had just evolved to Class 5. Another gunshot whizzed next to my ear, missing the angel completely. At least two people, one was trying to protect us, the other was trying to kill us. Why? Why? Why!? The crystal pillars fell, nearly falling on us. Kyle threw Lily to me as I slid down the dune, his arm being caught under the pillar. He screamed, tears streaming down his cheeks as the crystal burned and mutilated his arm. The angel behind us rushed under the sand, ripping into Kyle. I quickly ejected the round of bullets I had into his head since neither Lily or I were in any shape to fight the angel head on and I didn’t want to hear his screams and feel like I had left him in agony. Mercy... “There you are…” The angel’s foot turned the sand beneath it to crystal. What… It spoke? That never happened… EVER! “Go to Hell!” Lily shot it in the head, pulling the trigger the second time to have the wing of it block the bullet, partially crystal. Angels didn’t ever block either, they didn’t need to as they were unkillable by traditional means. A truck pulled in front of us, an Arabian kid with a grin on his face, a pistol pointed at the both of us. The angel stopped at the wave of his hand, its damaged form standing limp, the wings turning back to black matter before vanishing into nothing. “That’s enough R-Rodney,” He chuckled, “Y-Y-You’re lucky that I don’t normally kill g-girls… you’re more useful for other things.” Lily aimed his gun at him the second he was distracted with stepping off the truck. A standoff, “I can take off your arm before you can pull that trigger with a thought.” His neck and eye twitched unnaturally, a huge scar covering the left side of his head, he definitely had brain damage, “Now, put the gun down or I’ll do just that!” He laughed, “Oh… a-and hand over any delta weapons you have t-too!” He was far too confident for bluffing. I nodded to Lily and she carefully place the gun down. “We don’t have any delta weapons on us, they’re back there…” I pointed. The angel and him both looked in the direction. “You guys S-SAFRIM?” The kid asked. We nodded, “Well, with this angel alive, they’ll assume you’re d-dead. My name i-i-is Niles, your new master.”

END OF PART ONE

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[notbemoved-blog]

Inaugurations & Protests -- Then and Now

At my first Presidential Inauguration, I attended as a protester. It was January 1981. Hollywood’s Ronald Reagan had defeated the ineffective and then-uninspiring Jimmy Carter, and the world—much like today—was shifting from moderately progressive to what we then considered radical right wing. (Boy, were we naïve about how far right the conservatives could go!) I had voted for the third party candidate John Anderson, calling a pox on both of the houses of the establishment. Much like the youth of today who decided to throw in their lots with Jill Stein or Gary what’s-his-name, I was seeking an alternative to the constant bickering that went on in Congress and hoping that someone with sensible, unencumbered views could take us in a fresh, new, untried direction. Anderson got seven percent of the vote (about a percentage point higher than Jill and Gary combined) and Reagan, of course, clobbered Carter and took the oath of office while I stood with my wonderfully designed yellow and black sign in the freezing cold.

Ronald Reagan takes the oath of office as Jimmy Carter (r) looks on.

“America, Your Own Bombs Will Kill You” the sign read. I had splattered red paint across the stick-on large black letters to give the placard a mild feel of horror without trying to scare the Reaganites—just send a message. (Reagan had campaigned on a stronger nuclear defense system—the Star Wars initiative, remember?—and I abhorred the idea of an expanding nuclear arsenal.)  I was one of a very few who dared attempt to spoil the movie star’s coronation. As I stood hour after hour at my chosen post near the fountain that adorns the west side of the Capitol—Reagan’s first inauguration was also the first time the West Terrace was used for the swearing-in ceremony—I was given the hate stare, derided, and generally scoffed. “What are you doing with a sign like that down here on a day like this?” one annoyed Reagan supporter asked me. “Free country?” I shrugged.  

Our tolerance for dissent had waned since the heyday of the Vietnam War protests in the early 1970s. I was surprised and a bit dismayed that there were so few willing to come out and offer a bit of opposition to what would become known as the Reagan Revolution.  Those few others who managed to wrest themselves from their day-off lethargy donned simple cardboard signs with magic marker messages. My friend and political protest mentor Robert Hoderny carried a sign that said “The Moral Majority is Neither.” We were more like the merry pranksters than a mass movement attempting to block the takeover of government by hostile forces. We were going along with the joke, knowing that the rule of law would be (mostly) followed and we would have a chance to redo the abomination in four years (or twelve, as it turned out).

The first sign to greet us as we exited Union Station into Columbus Circle.

How things have changed. At yesterday’s inauguration of the #RealDonaldTrump, protesters of the new President nearly outnumbered his supporters. My friend Terri and I emerged from Union Station after overnighting with her brother on North Capitol Street (we had attended the Peace Ball the night before) to a throng of demonstrators, both funny and scary. Bullhorns were raging, music was blaring, and people opposing the incoming President’s agenda were out in full force. Quite a change from, no, could it be … 36 years earlier? I don’t recall getting any older, but I guess I am. Maybe a bit wiser, as well. At least I didn’t throw away my vote this time, and Hillary took my home state of Virginia.

Some protests were whimsical, but thoughtful, just outside Union Station.

But who were these people we were encountering?  The first group seemed straight out of the 1930s. “Build A Revolutionary Workers Party” the sign read, “To Fight Trump … AND the Democrats.” It was signed “Internationalist Group.” My head was spinning trying to figure out the historic implications. We had a Russian President interfering with the U.S. elections so DJT could get elected, and now a Russia-inspired socialist group was demanding change? Does the right of the right circle around and meet the left of the left? I couldn’t figure it out and was too afraid to ask, though I did wonder if the kids holding the obviously pre-made signs were getting paid to do it.

Some protests seemed funded by foreign governments. Putin? Why?

As we made our way through Columbus Circle, Terri told me how The Trump team had requested that all of the Don’s Johns strategically positioned around town have their signs covered over so as not to create too much of a connection between his inauguration and the biological movement of people’s bowels. As Terri’s brother Jay told us just as we were leaving, “We’re going from sugar to shit today.” Well put, brother. Terri engaged in some playful civil disobedience by pulling back one of the cover ups to reveal “Don’s Johns” to the delight of all around. Merry pranksters.

Terri playfully pulls away the covering to reveal the offending signage.

We made our way down to D Street and up to where the non-ticketed commoners could view the ceremony. As we traveled, we were intoxicated by the level of protest to the man Congressman John Lewis (D-GA) had called an “illegitimate” just days before. At the entrance to one of the ticketed seating areas (the RED Zone, as it turned out) a group had formed pledging to block ticketed attendees by building a wall around the perimeter. “You said you wanted a wall!” they chanted. [Apparently groups like Democracy Spring and the ANSWER Coalition had teamed up to try and block all of the ticketed entrances.] But police had the situation well in hand and no ticketed supporters were delayed, at least not from our vantage point.

Protesters make it known they are not happy about DJT’s inauguration. They were out in force throughout the inauguration ceremonies.

I was happy to see that at least in this location (around 3rd and D Streets, NW) the protest was spirited, but there was no violence. One could see, however, how things might get a little testy. Apparently they did further down the street, where nearly 200 were arrested for burning trash cans and causing other disturbances. What’s unfortunate about that, besides the belief that violence in the service of protest is OK, is that the entire protest community gets labeled as incendiary. That was not at all what Terri and I witnessed on our stride toward … participation and inclusion?

Attendees had to pass by protesters on their way to DJT’s inauguration.

About half an hour before the swearing-in ceremony was to begin, we found an entrance point for the non-ticketed folks and walked in. The crowd was pleasant as we waited to get through security. And we waited. And we waited. The line hardly moved. I looked more closely and saw that there were only two screening areas for what was turning out to be several hundred people in line. Not good. They couldn’t have paid for a few more screeners for the commoners?

The line to get into the cheap seats was seriously jammed just half an hour before the swearing-in was scheduled to take place.

As the swearing-in time approached (I was listening on my iPod Nano radio), Terri and I made our way to a little coffee shop across the street and found a quiet corner. We tuned in, turned on, and listened through a shared pair of earphones.

Terri and I recreate our listening strategy. We sat in a coffee shop about four blocks from the Capitol and tuned in on my iPod Nano. Radio rules!

The speech that Trump delivered was shocking in its crassness, its hyperbole, and its takedown of the establishment politicians who were sitting directly behind him. Though we couldn’t watch their faces, as some at home might have been able to do, we clearly could feel their discomfort as this guy who will need to work with them to get ANYTHING done was demeaning them publicly for their inability to get things done. Typical DJT. Blow it all up and redo it my way. I wondered what Andrew Jackson’s speech must have sounded like nearly 200 years ago. Probably equally as jarring to the political class assembled then. But we survived it.

DJT takes down the political class during his first official speech as President as Paul Ryan and Mitch McConnell suck it up.

Terri and I bantered back and forth about which parts of the speech Trump had written and which parts had been added by others. I was most heartened by the line “When you open your heart to patriotism, there is no room for prejudice.”  I appreciated the sentiment no matter who came up with it. The rest, for me, was all Trump blah, blah, blah. I didn’t really recognize the country he described, full of gangs, violence, and poverty. Those things certainly exist, as author Ta-Nehisi Coates artfully attested in his searing “Between the World and Me” last year. But that is not all of America. Trump’s depictions sounded more like someone who had heard about these things rather than someone who had actually witnessed them, almost like a caricature of the problem rather than the problem itself.

Trump supporters celebrate after the swearing-in ceremony.

But I had to agree with him on several points. His description of how we have poured our wealth into overseas conflicts while our own infrastructure has languished in disrepair certainly resonated (Thanks, Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld). In the next paragraph, however, he suggested that “the wealth of our middle class has been ripped from their homes and then redistributed all across the world.” Huh? The wealth of the middle class was ripped from their homes and provided to the bankers on Wall Street who illegally packaged faulty mortgage-backed securities and marketed them first to the corrupt ratings agencies and then to American investors, causing a housing and financial crisis of mammoth proportions that had to be cleaned up by President Obama when he first took office. Facts matter, Donald. And so do words. But whatever.

Democracy Spring and other groups staged a protest during the swearing in ceremony. They had found a way in to the up-front seats. Creative non-violence at work.

The speech had little poetry and no uplift. It mirrors Trump’s dark America that he peddled to an unknowing rural populace who listen too much to Rush Limbaugh and rarely get out of their dwindling towns to see the broader good that is happening in the “urban sprawl” of the urban centers. His “America First” strategy may make good headlines, but his inability to comprehend the global interconnectedness of business and the economy will hurt America long term and will do nothing to bring back industrial-age jobs. We need to retool for the 21st Century, not retreat to the mid-20th Century. His narrow view of how the economy works does not bode well for the future. Sorry.

After the speech, Terri and I made our way back to Union Station, which was not overrun by the crowds we had seen during Obama’s two inaugurations. In fact, it seemed like a normal business day, both at the coffee shop and at the train station, despite The Donald’s bravado that more than a million people had been in attendance. (The comparative photos of DJT’s crowd as compared to Obama’s first inaugural are shocking—and telling. Then again, it’s all a media conspiracy, right Donald?)

High school students greet visitors to Union Station after the inauguration of Donald John Trump.

As we grabbed a quick bite before heading home, we spotted some high school kids who were protesting the Trump inaugural with signs, holding them up as Trump supporters, fresh from their inaugural experience, came through the train station. I was impressed with this group of kids. At one point, a mini-celebrity, World Wrestling Entertainment’s Triple H, the son-in-law of our new Small Business Administration head Linda McMahon, came in and sat next to them. One bold and courageous student, recognizing the celeb (you couldn’t miss him with his DJT-look-alike-red tie) and realizing his connection to Trump’s cabinet, stood up and began singing “We Shall Overcome.” To his credit, Triple H kept his steroid-infused cool and mostly looked at his phone for the entire time. But the message was clear. We, the little people, the oppressed, the ones most challenged by your link to power, will not back down and we will creatively and nonviolently confront your party’s attempts to take away our rights and our freedoms.

Wrestling celebrity Triple H (l) and wife Stephanie McMahon (r) try to ignore a quiet protest as they wait at Union Station. Linda McMahon, Stephanie’s mother, now serves in Trump’s cabinet.

It was a quiet but powerful moment, seen only by a few. In minutes, the Triple-H entourage, including an imposing body guard who tried to stare me down as I taped the scene, left for the inaugural after-party, as the students celebrated their show-down with the (somewhat) powerful. It was unfortunate that Triple H and his people ignored the kids rather than engaging them in dialog. Their posturing mirrored Trump’s Inaugural Address—no outreach, no let’s work together. Just, “We’re here. Deal with it.”

Trump supporters, fresh from the inauguration, engage with young protesters about their concerns.

Just moments later, I was heartened to see that some regular Trump supporters came by and actually DID talk to the kids about their thoughts and hopes for the future. It’s that type of engagement that will be needed as we try to move forward together as the UNITED States. Unfortunately, those calling the shots don’t seem to have that kind of openness and creativity, which will make it harder for them to govern.

The Obamas leave in a helicopter after the Inauguration of DJT.

Terri and I headed for our car and our suburban lives. It was the end of an era and the beginning of something totally new and unpredictable. (As if to punctuate this point, we had witnessed the helicopter carrying the Obama family away as it lifted off from the Capitol grounds immediately following the inaugural ceremonies.) I hope we can survive what is coming, but there’s something ominous and threatening in the tone and tenor of how the new Administration has chosen to begin. All top down; no listening, just telling. That may have worked during the Reagan years when America was weary of division; but given the level of protest I witnessed on the streets of Washington during the Trump inauguration, it’s highly unlikely that approach will work now.