#death to rendered art i am busy <3

[saltseashark]

✌ trios and duos ✌

the first three poses taken from mcnuggyy's ot3 art meme (x)

[mtgbracket]

Tiebreaker - Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest vs Polukranos, Unchained

Hi folks!  Yesterday, these two cards both got 177 votes in Batch 2.3, leading to a tie.  I don’t vote in the polls so that I can be the tiebreaking vote when it’s needed.  So here I am doing that.

I am going to be using the same format as I did for the ties in the original Magic Bracket - see this old post for an example.  Essentially I will provide a written analysis on each card over five categories, and then finish with scores.  If the scores also tie then my personal favourite gets the nod.  The categories are:

 - Quality of design, scored out of 10  - Power level, scored out of 5 (overpowered cards will score lower)  - Flavour, scored out of 5  - Art, scored out of 5 (combined across multiple arts if there are any)  - Place in Magic history, scored out of 5

Let’s get stuck in.

Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest

Design

Fittingly for a death priest, Mazirek cares about death - specifically, he’s one of the relatively few cards that care about sacrificing.  While we’re more used to seeing this on black-red cards in recent years, Mazirek was printed in Commander 2015 and the sacrifice-matters element is perfectly at home in black.  While it doesn’t feel green, the reward you get - +1/+1 counters on all your creatures - certainly does, and Mazirek has a solidly black-green feel as a result.  And by both caring about death and growth/life, he also feels specifically Golgari - which matters as the Kraul are a Golgari insect group.  Sacrifice-matters probably does play better in black-red (where red’s ability to sacrifice its own stuff lines up nicely), but it’s not massively out of place here.

Having flying (which makes sense for an Insect) but a measly 2/2 body for 5 also guides the player to imagining growing him into a massive threat through adding lots of sacrifice effects.  The design is also kept light by not having Mazirek provide any inherent way of sacrificing things or making sacrifices happen - the player has to provide their own.  This is pretty common for these kinds of designs, but is good because it means the rewards can be a bit juicier, as the player has to provide a sacrifice payoff, an enabler, and likely some fodder - although making your opponent sacrifice things also works!

One ding against the sacrifice trigger is that it does require players to handle a small bit of rules knowledge - specifically, identifying the “sacrifice” keyword action and understand which things are and aren’t sacrifices.  And effects that make temporary tokens are annoyingly inconsistent about whether the tokens are exiled or sacrificed, which sets up a bit of a reading debt.

Power level

Fittingly for a card from a Commander precon, Mazirek is pretty potent.  He can grow your team quite substantially with a few triggers, even if he doesn’t provide you an in-built way of getting them, and promises unbounded payoff.  Combined with a sacrifice outlet and something with Persist can even make infinite combos, which is pretty compelling as a power option.  Mazirek is technically legal in Eternal formats, but isn’t up to grade there - but that’s not a mark down on him as few cards are.

Mazirek ranks #278 on EDHREC, as the Commander of 424 decks, and as a card appears in 4% of decks on the platform.  This indicates a potent and popular Commander card.

Flavour

Mazirek, as mentioned above, is the leader of the Kraul, the Golgari insect race.  His card name certainly conjures up a lot of what’s going on with him - “Death Priest” is quite a title, and gets across both the death-focused aspect of the Golgari as well as the Kraul’s society - Mazirek was the leader of the Kraul race until his death in the War of the Spark storyline.  His name is also fun to say - and feels quite insectile.  It’s a shame that the “priest” title, which feels more like a Cleric, is not matched with his typeline, where he is a Shaman.  There are plenty of green and even black-green Clerics, so this does feel like a minor ding.

Mazirek’s flavour text reinforces the “insect” thing nicely, with talks of clicks and buzz, and the very Metal “incarnation of decay”.  Overall the picture of a rotten, death-feeding entity is well sold.  Being empowered by death is a flavourful concept, but “sacrificing” specifically is hard to convey as a flavourful concept - it’s a bit too mechanical.

Art

Mathias Kollros’s piece revels in the black-green colour palette we’d expect from a Golgari legend, and shows the central figure suggestively in dark greens and yellow highlights, but with the details hidden by strong green-white backlighting.  The posing emphasises the many additional limbs that Mazirek has over a humanoid figure, with his wings and extra legs, as well as his elevated position.  Some drippy, slimy looking moss decorates his podium and the darker edges of the piece give us the sense that we’re in the Kraul’s tunnels.  After adjusting to the main image we also see the eggs at the edges of the image, adding to the insect / creepy vibe for an overall very effective piece.

Note that the colour palette appears to have been significantly darkened from the original printing for the later Double Masters version for no clear reason.  I think the original printing is the superior.

Place in Magic history

Other than a supporting role in the Ravnica / War of the Spark storyline, Mazirek doesn’t have much to write home about here - no particularly unique or interesting things about him.

Polukranos, Unchained

Design

From this year’s Theros: Beyond Death, we have the zombified version of Polukranos.  Originally gaining infamy as Polukranos, World Eater, this hydra is now presented in a black-tinged version - our second black-green card.  He starts out with square stats as a very undercosted-seeming 4-mana 6/6, before later promising to escape as a 6-mana 12/12.  The “permanent damage” drawback here is something originally seen on Judgment’s Phantom creatures, which only ever lost one counter per instance of damage; the counters-per-damage version was premiered on M11′s Protean Hydra as a “heads” metaphor, and was also seen on Ugin’s Conjurant.  Conjurant and Polukranos share an important improvement - they only apply the replacement effect while they actually have a +1/+1 counter, which stops them becoming invincible if you raise their toughness some other way.

As well as being a big reservoir of power and toughness, this newer version of Polukranos connects mechanically to the original by including a fight ability - and a very rare repeatable one at that.  This opens up some interesting options whereby if Polukranos has shrunk too much, you can fight him off in order to have him die and then be able to escape and reset him with his final Escape ability.  Polukranos has the highest card-cost for any Escape card, needing six other cards to come back - justified by his massive size upgrade when you do so.

The design overall hits some of the right notes for the established Polukranos power set - beefy and activated-ability-fighting - while adding some interesting play patterns with the Escape mechanic.  It doesn’t do a great job of feeling green-black to me instead of just green however - monogreen has Escape cards and that’s all that black is really bringing to this package other than a generic multicolour power injection and the Zombie creature type.  And the design is very busy, with a lot of text and moving parts that is a bit confusing to play.

Power level

While being a Limited powerhouse, Polukranos hasn’t managed to get anywhere in general constructed thanks to competing for resources with the far superior Uro, Titan of Nature’s Wrath, which is commonly played with black.

In Commander, EDHREC shows Polukranos, Unchained at rank #494 as a Commander of 170 decks, and appearing in 3% of decks.  The combo with Vigor is particularly nice - you can choose to apply Vigor’s replacement effect instead of Polukranos’s own one and have him grow every time he fights instead of shrinking!

Flavour

The name is straightforward enough - and connects with the art - but not inspired.  The lengthy rules text doesn’t even leave room for Escape reminder text, let alone flavour text.  The character of Polukranos is of a dangerous monster that Elspeth had to defeat in the original Theros storyline as the champion of Heliod, but the new version is just “that same guy from before, only he escaped from the Underworld”.

Art

Chris Rahn is one of Magic’s most notable current artists, with a great ability to render detailed fantasy images with beautiful details.  The purple-and-grayish hues of the underworld are used here to show the location, and nicely we see the upper purple head of Polukranos blending with the beautiful night sky.

And those purple heads are shown coming from the same root - I believe they are actually regrowing at the time of the art!  There are a lot of nice visual indicators of this - a pinkish glow showing where the stump was, the purplish colour of the two new heads, and the fact that those are a little smaller than the other four.  The new heads both have collars on so I imagine these are magical collars designed for a hydra - but the art also shows that the chains weren’t strong enough, as the name tells us.  A close look shows a loose chain breaking a statue in the foreground - and the other foreground figures help sell the size of the monstrous creature in front of us.  The overall mood is “Oh s***, the monster has got loose!”.

Place in Magic history

We have a minor storyline character here and the card has no particular resonance or important part to play, so not looking at a whole lot here.

Final verdict

Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest

Design - 7/10 Power level - 4/5 Flavour - 3/5 Art - 5/5 Place in Magic history - 2/5 TOTAL - 21/30

Polukranos, Unchained

Design - 6/10 Power level - 3/5 Flavour - 2/5 Art - 4/5 Place in Magic history - 2/5 TOTAL - 17/30

Good luck to Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest in Round 3!

[artificialqueens]

Urgent Exit Required (Diamond Chaney) - Ortega

fic summary: "She’d always thought, really, how bad could a relationship between two colleagues ever be?

She supposes now, standing on the flyover with a rifle in her hand, she sees exactly why that rule is in place. Usually she has problems falling for straight girls, this time her error’s been falling for a bent one."

(In which Lawrence works in anti-corruption, and Ellie is the corrupt officer wrapped up in an organised crime gang.)

a/n: please in the name of Jesus, Mary and Joseph and the wee donkey, read the trigger warnings!!!!

this is a Line of Duty AU based entirely off of the final episode of season 3 because apparently i'm unable to consume any media without turning it into a fic! big big thanks to Juno who was chill about me posting this as she's also concieved of a Line of Duty AU that looks like it'll be AMAZING so keep an eye out for that!!

if you enjoyed then feel free to leave some love, even if it's just to scream at me xo

trigger warnings: because it's based off a gritty tv show, please be mindful that this fic features gun violence, injury and death (to be absolutely clear: one of them dies) so if you feel this fic is not for u then don't force it and please click off it!

if uv made it this far then pls enjoy this heavy slice of angst that has absolutely 0 grounding in reality whatsoever xo

***

Lawrence doesn’t think she’s ever been more aware of her heart than she is now.

She means that in every sense. Physically, it’s all she can feel; it’s swollen in her ribcage as it batters in her chest, working overtime to keep up with the adrenaline that’s coursing through her veins like a forest fire as she pounds across the dual carriageway, hurdles over the central reservation and sprints past cars as though they’re nothing less than flies that simply need swatted away. She’d normally conduct more of a mental risk-assessment before essentially playing professional chicken on a busy main road. She’d normally think through every move carefully; strategise, stack up the options, Sherlock in slow-motion. It’s what’s got her to where she is today, but today isn’t a normal day. And where she is now is on a road bridge, positioning an AR-15 onto a high railing so it looks down onto a near-silent residential street. The blood’s roaring in her ears and her mouth’s so dry that she can taste the inexplicable tang of metal and her heart , Jesus Christ she never knew it could beat this fast.

Lawrence has been in situations like this before. It’s not like she’s never held a gun; in anti-terror she’d become as desensitized to them as one human could be, and she’s come to regard them as a grim necessity to her job just like her badge, her lanyard, her pocketbook. As stress levels- adrenaline levels- go, she’s been exposed to her fair share. High speed chases, hurtling through the city in a Vauxhall with an ART on her way to arrest a potentially dangerous criminal. She’s been ambushed in a warehouse and tied to a chair and had her hand forced into a vice by a gang of men in balaclavas, and that still , as insane as it sounds, didn’t have her heart beating like it is just now.

Because this is all different. Because she knows it’s only a matter of time before that car appears, and she knows who’s travelling in the passenger seat.

She’s not religious, so she hopes instead of prays. For what, she doesn’t know.

For both of them to come out of this alive, perhaps.

***

It’s always strange to watch one of their own crack in the interview chair. The bravado they begin with, the smug cushioning of their own status within the ranks rendering them completely disbelieving of the idea they could ever be brought down.

Then comes the little telltale signs. The sipping of the water, the clearing of the throat. The slight pause that starts to come before their answers, on stage in the middle of the dress run forgetting their script and the only lines they’ll be fed are the standard infuriating “no comment”. And then comes the shattering of the glass. When the three of them kick down the sandcastle and watch it crumble and whichever bent bastard they’re charging this time leaves with their tail between their legs and metal around their wrists.

Except it’s not the three of them. It’s just Superintendent Black and DC Chaney. Because DS Boyle (Aurora), her colleague (her friend), is being held in a cell. Framed for the armed robbery she hasn’t organised, framed for the attempted murder of a woman Lawrence knows she’d never even so much as say a bad word about, let alone lay a hand on. The fake number plates on her car, the drug money banknotes found in the boot.

Things that Lawrence would never in her wildest nightmares have considered Ellie Diamond to be capable of orchestrating. Things that don’t match up with the Ellie who bought her coffee and left it on her desk in time for her starting work. The Ellie that wrote shite jokes on pink post-its and stuck them to her monitor (What do you call a happy penguin? A pen-grin). The Ellie that held her close and whispered condolences and apologies and words of comfort after they’d interviewed and arrested Aurora.

Lawrence has tried to separate the two in her mind, but she knows she can’t. She knows that the Ellie she’s come to know and the Ellie that’s done all these things are one and the same, and that’s still something she’s trying to wrap her brain around. But she’s in the chair in front of her in a muted baby pink suit, the colour clashing so violently with the matter at hand, with her solicitor and a glass of water and her pink acrylics tapping against the table, and she’s cracking just like they always do. The evidence against her is piling up, and suddenly she is just another criminal.

Joe leans forward against the desk, eyes narrowing. “DI Diamond, I think we have earned the right to ask you the question...will you kindly tell us your whereabouts between ten and eleven am on the morning of the fifteenth?”

The morning that Tayce Szura-Radix was struck by Aurora’s car in a brutal hit-and-run. The morning Tayce had thought she was about to meet Aurora. The morning that Tayce emailed Joe a list of names linked to the OCG. They all know it wasn’t a coincidence.

The morning that confirmed all of Lawrence’s worst fears.

Ellie holds Joe’s gaze, the stubborn glint in her eyes contrasting with the tense energy she’s emanating from every pore. There’s a silence before she answers in which Lawrence holds her breath.

“I don’t think I need to answer that question.”

The urge Lawrence fights to roll her eyes is a battle between David and Goliath.

“Don’t you?” Joe smiles patiently at her, blinks calmly in an almost reptilian way. Joe knows they’ve not played their ace yet, and the pair of them have got all the time in the world.

(Well, they don’t. They’ve got an hour until Aurora is either charged or released, and it’s looking like it’ll be the former. Lawrence can’t let that happen, even if it is Ellie in the chair opposite her.)

“It’s a voluntary interview,” Ellie explains. Her voice is fast and breathy as she speaks again, almost choked with nerves. “And I’m only here because it’s my lawful duty as a police officer to assist in a criminal enquiry.”

“Of course, DI Diamond, of course you are,” Joe nods, calm and placating. “In fact, we can stop this interview right now if you like, but of course it would leave this question hanging over you, hanging over your career. Or you could do the honourable thing and offer us an answer. Exclude yourself from our enquiries. That’s assuming you have nothing to hide.”

Ellie looks down at the table, frozen for a moment in time. She looks to her solicitor as if he’s the last liferaft off the Titanic, leans over to him for advice. What she receives doesn’t even seem as if it’s the equivalent of a rubber duck from the way she reaches across for her glass of water again, sips for a second, clears her throat.

As she leans back in her chair and folds her arms, Lawrence finds herself wondering if Ellie’s ever played poker. She hopes she hasn’t, for her dignity’s sake if nothing else.

“I was at my flat,” she says quickly, as if she’s trying to make up for the time she’s spent in silence. “I was on surveillance until late the night before, and I slept late.”

Lawrence’s heart jumps as Joe continues questioning.

“So you were in during those hours.”

Ellie nods quickly. “Yes.”

Lawrence can’t help herself. She’s bitten her tongue through most of the interview, not trusting herself to speak. Silence is a virtue she rarely possesses, and somehow she’s managed to keep her resolve til now. But whatever Ellie was to her before, whatever her feelings were (are?), she’s still a detective that’s being handed an opportunity to catch a criminal on a silver platter.

“Say that again,” Lawrence says, calm but insistent. When Ellie’s gaze is ripped from Joe to fall onto her, Lawrence can’t read her expression. Her mouth moves slightly as if she’s about to speak, then clearly elects not to.

Lawrence keeps her own face blank as she continues, no telltale signs of her broken heart on display. “You’ve just said you were in your flat between ten and eleven am on the fifteenth. We’ve got that on tape.”

Ellie’s eyes dart between Lawrence and Joe. “Wh…”

Joe, for her part, is still fixing Ellie with that patient expression. “It’s a very simple matter, DI Diamond-”

“No, no. DI Diamond’s already answered the question,” Lawrence interrupts, leaning forward against the desk. She selfishly allows an angry glint to appear in her eye, one that sets off a flicker of fear in Ellie’s in turn. “Haven’t you?”

Ellie’s like a statue as she stares at Lawrence, unable to answer. The only sign she’s still sentient is her sporadic blinking with her long lash extensions that Lawrence examines every detail of as she continues to stare at her. Eyes that Lawrence had once looked into and felt butterflies that now only turn her stomach in the worst of ways.

“You’ve mentioned, when questioned, something you later intend to rely on. In court,” Lawrence states, the ‘t’ of ‘court’ bouncing through gritted teeth and making Ellie’s gaze dart back to Joe, clearly a less threatening option.

There’s a silence where Ellie sits, slack-jawed and cornered, before she shakes her head, rubbing her perfectly made up face with her hands quickly. “No, look...I might have made a mistake, just...give me a second to think.”

“Take your time, DI Diamond,” Joe says, humouring her. They both know there’s no hope for Ellie to pull an alibi out of her ass at this stage of the game.

“I’d been up late, so I…” Ellie stammers.

Even after everything, Lawrence still fights the urge to feel sorry for her.

There’s a moment where Ellie freezes for a second, then looks to Joe with what appears to be renewed confidence. She reaches into the inside pocket of her suit jacket, pulls out her phone.

Lawrence narrows her eyes, question marks immediately appearing in her mind.

“If I just check my phone...you know, times of texts I sent and that. That’ll probably help me remember…” Ellie mutters, looking down into the screen.

She keeps staring at it. Her finger is poised over something, something she’s waiting to press. Something she’s waiting to send? Immediately there’s a red flag wrapped around Lawrence’s thoughts.

Ellie’s eyes are stuck to her phone as she opens her mouth again.

“You wouldn’t, um. You wouldn’t have gone into my flat that morning, Lawrence?”

The red flag is joined by alarm bells. She knows. She knows that Lawrence knows that she wasn’t in her flat that morning. Lawrence can see Joe look to her, but she’s not answering. Instead, she’s got her eyes on that phone just as much as Ellie. Watching. Waiting.

And then Ellie’s finger hits the screen and she looks up at Lawrence. There’s an assurance to her gaze that Lawrence doesn’t like. “Like...alone?”

Lawrence isn’t answering her. She doesn’t owe her anything. They’re staring at each other- no warmth, just steel- and it’s so intense that Lawrence almost doesn’t hear anything.

But then there’s the unmistakable sound of a gun cocking outside that cuts through the silence. The starting pistol for all hell breaking loose.

***

Lawrence supposes a lot can happen in a minute. She rests the rifle against the railing of the bridge, flicks the safety off with her thumb and holds her breath as she waits for the blacked-out Range Rover to appear from its hiding place within the identical red brick houses. She wonders how she'll live with herself if her shot hits Ellie. She's a good aim, but she's not that good. Regardless, if the car appears she's taking the shot, decision-making process be damned.

She also supposes a lot can happen in a year. Ellie's transfer from the AC-9 Witness Protection Department to AC-12 in order for her to help aid the investigation into the ambush of former DI Tayce Szura-Radix was an unwelcome one at first. It had always been Lawrence, Joe and Aurora, the dream team with insurmountable trust in each other. A new girl from outside that circle wasn't exactly going to assimilate well into that, no matter how cheerful or friendly she was.

Or how beautiful.

But, little by little, Ellie fell in with the department as naturally as the seasons changed. The more interviews Lawrence conducted with Ellie she got to see how sympathetic she could be towards victims and indeed how steadfast and unforgiving she could be with witnesses. The more time Lawrence worked with Ellie she got to see how efficient she was, the quick turnaround on any of her tasks and the way she followed up enquiries like a dog with a scent easily impressing her. The more late-night surveillance ops they spent together Lawrence got to find out how funny Ellie was, the other girl making her snort with hysterical laughter as they played silly games of snog, marry, avoid in the lull between any suspicious activity.

The thing is, there’s only so much time someone can spend with a girl like Ellie before they start to fall for her. At least that’s Lawrence’s theory, although maybe she’s just talking from experience. As much as she’s committed to her career and as much as she wants to rise through the ranks (and yeah, she’s earned the right to boast about how much she’s achieved so young), she’s still a lesbian in her twenties who’s never had a girlfriend. Okay, she’d never do what Aurora did and spark up something with a witness and disgraced corrupt officer, even though she supposes it doesn’t matter now that poor Tayce is fighting for her life in a hospital bed, God love her. But she’d always thought, really, how bad could a relationship between two colleagues ever be?

She supposes now, standing on the flyover with a rifle in her hand, she sees exactly why that rule is in place. Usually she has problems falling for straight girls, this time her error’s been falling for a bent one.

It hurts to remember. As much as those memories of falling for Ellie make her happy, they’re tainted now. Knowing the girl she’s fallen for could’ve ended someone else’s life. Knowing how much she’s wrapped up in armed robberies, drug trafficking, organised crime. But there’s still the ridiculous part of Lawrence that screams, she’s just a pawn. She’s not to blame. She’s small fry, and there’s bigger fish out there.

Fighting past those thoughts and digging deep, Lawrence narrows her eyes at the street below her and curls her finger around the trigger. A lot can happen in a minute. A lot of memories can fly through her head.

***

It all happens so fast. One guard turning his firearm on another outside the interview room and then shooting through the glass walls, the gunshots loud and pummeling Lawrence’s ears as she ducks down under the desk. When they stop, she can only look up to see Ellie sprinting over the carpet of broken glass, running across the office with the guard following behind her. Not in pursuit. As protection.

Lawrence doesn’t think. She dashes up from behind the desk, snatches up the assault rifle from beside the guard who’s bleeding out on the ground and sprints after Ellie, only stopping to snatch up her tactical vest and shrug it on whilst she’s running.

She is not letting her get away.

As she leaves, Lawrence can hear Joe shouting; ordering someone to CPR the wounded guard, to lock down the building. When Lawrence reaches the balcony of the atrium just before she takes the stairs, she can see Ellie hurtling through the main doors, the police officer following behind her pointing his gun at anyone in their way.

She can’t believe Ellie’s wrapped up in all this. Still, that’s the nature of the job. Sometimes it’s the ones that were blatantly bent from the start, sometimes it’s the ones you’d never expect. Sometimes it’s the girls who wear the diamante hair clips and sing along to the radio in the office and squeeze your hand with a gentle smile when you’re tired and flagging. Life’s not like the kids’ movies Ellie loves so much, the bad guys aren’t always clear cut. Although she supposes Ellie’s the perfect modern-day Disney twist-villain if ever there was one.

As Lawrence runs out into the street her heart sinks to find that Ellie and the guard are already a fair distance down the road, their guns ensuring that shocked passers-by leap out of their way quickly. She doesn't think she's going to be able to catch them on foot, and her mind makes the risk assessment of trying to shoot at them in such a public setting.

The truck that's fast approaching on the road makes the decision for her.

Lawrence runs out into the street, wielding her badge (as if the driver can see it from high up in his cab) but luckily the truck stops anyway, and she hoists herself up to cling to the side door, commands the driver to follow Ellie and the guard as fast as he can and not to stop.

The driver obeys and Lawrence shouts directions at him through the window as Ellie frantically pounds the pavements in the rapidly decreasing distance. The lorry keeps up well thanks to the lack of traffic lights on the road, and Lawrence eventually hops off as Ellie sprints down a pedestrianised side street with the guard at her tail.

Lawrence narrows her eyes, aims…

And then a family steps into her path. Dad, Mum, boy, girl. Perfect little nuclear setup smack bang in front of her target line. Lawrence curses loudly, sprints past them and down the scrub of industrial wasteland parallel to the one Ellie disappeared down with the guard. With a pang to her heart, Lawrence considers the barren dirt that frames the path and the washed-out colours that surround her. Old warehouses and scrap metal and the brown of old grass. Insipid and sepia and so Not Ellie.

She skids to a halt, though, when she sees two figures running across the way; baby pink suit, firearms uniform. They’ve slowed to a jog now, it’s no longer the fast-paced marathon it was before. Lawrence takes advantage of their unsuspecting position, and she cocks her gun as she shouts from the distance between them.

“Armed police!”

Both of them whip their heads round as they freeze in fear, and as the guard aims his own gun Lawrence fires two shots towards him in panic. She knows any injury (or death, God forbid) would be lawful, but it never makes it any easier. The guard falls to the ground, disarmed and no longer a threat.

And then it’s just her and Ellie.

Ellie’s got her glock trained on Lawrence as she stands rooted to the spot, blinking at her with those huge lashes and breathing heavily. Her eyes are wide and frantic, panicked. She shouldn’t be in charge of a gun.

“Drop your weapon!” Lawrence shouts, adjusting the gun for emphasis.

“Drop yours!” Ellie retorts childishly, not backing down in any sense. It’s fitting, Lawrence supposes, that they’re still bickering to the bitter end.

They could both fire at each other. Well, Ellie could fire at her. But as Lawrence keeps her aim steady, Ellie suddenly drops her arm to her side, sprints off as fast as she’s able down the alley again. Lawrence could shoot her like she did the guard. But the evidence Ellie can give is too valuable, too precious. She needs her alive.

And as Lawrence runs after her in pursuit, she pretends that’s the only reason she’s sparing her.

***

Selfishly, Lawrence allows herself to think about what could’ve been. She still judges herself heavily for how much she thinks about that night; the night of Ellie’s commendation award, when Ellie had been tipsy off free champagne and Lawrence had been drunk off just walking her home, the pair of them sharing a styrofoam carton of chips with their arms linked together. Ellie had been wearing this mid-length silver dress that seemed to drip with little jewels, and the way she sparkled under the streetlights had matched the stars in the sky and the twinkle in her eyes as she agreed with Lawrence about how these didn’t compare to the chips in Scotland.

As the empty carton was chucked in a bin, Ellie had begun to chat about how much she missed her home city. She told Lawrence about how she’d always dreamt of opening a hair and beauty salon on the high street in Dundee, or maybe even moving to Glasgow and opening it there. Her lips had taken on a dreamy, wistful smile as she spoke about how she’d wanted to paint the outside pink and have hanging baskets with plastic flowers hanging over the windows. How she’d keep glass jars full of sweets on top of the desk and a gingham-patterned feature wall where she’d take pictures of her clients’ hair for Instagram.

“And then I became a police officer,” Ellie had laughed humourlessly, and Lawrence hadn’t missed the disappointment in her tone. It had been Ellie’s big night, a highlight of her career. A commendation for defending herself alone against a member of the OCG with a firearm.

(Lawrence now knows that the situation had been manipulated to fit Ellie’s agenda and that self-defence couldn’t have been further from the truth.)

But it didn’t make sense that Ellie had been so hung up on this pipe dream of owning a hair salon.

“So why didn’t you?” Lawrence had tilted her head, struck by the beauty of the girl by her side all over again.

Ellie had turned to blink in confusion at her, Lawrence immediately snapping her gaze to the pavement in a show of uncharacteristic shyness. “Why didn’t I what?”

Lawrence had laughed, unable to resist the urge to poke fun at her friend-slash-colleague-slash-crush. “You are a fuckin’ goldfish! Three-second memory! Why didn’t you open the salon? Y’know. What made you join the force instead?”

When Lawrence looked at Ellie again, there’d been a frown making furrows between her perfectly carved-out eyebrows. There was a pause as their heels continued to clack against the concrete paving slabs of the street, a pause filled with words Ellie hadn’t seemed to be able to say.

“Sometimes life just has different plans for you, I guess.”

Something in her answer had troubled Lawrence but, as ever, she deflected with a joke. The night had been so perfect, and she hadn’t wanted to shatter the unspoiled crystal moment just yet.

“What a classic fuckin’ Ellie Diamond answer. No grand speeches about wanting to protect the vulnerable, no humble brags about wanting to help people, no Miss World speech about preserving life. Just life having other plans. Like your whole career’s been an inconvenience in the way of you getting to play hair salons with people like they’re fuckin’ Barbie dolls.”

Ellie had snorted a giggle, shaking her head as she brought her other arm up to rest in the crook of Lawrence’s elbow. “Playing with Barbie dolls. Girl, I am the Barbie doll!”

Lawrence had laughed along, the smile still on her face as she spoke again. “Nah. She’s plastic and out of proportion. You’re far too pretty to be her.”

“Jesus,” Ellie had muttered, the ghost of a smile still there on her lips. “An actual compliment from DC Chaney. Fuck a commendation, that’s the highlight of the night. Maybe I can take early retirement.”

Lawrence’s heart had fluttered as she’d looked at Ellie with a smirk. “Quite frankly flattered to know a compliment from me means so fuckin’ much to you.”

Ellie had only returned her smirk, a brazen glint in her eye that turned Lawrence’s insides to butter. “Too right, hen.”

Something electric had begun to charge between them from there, something magic and organic and real. Lawrence has spent a lot of time since she discovered Ellie’s involvement in the OCG trying to figure out what between them had been real, and she still argues in favour of the authenticity of that moment. The memory of reaching Ellie’s door and standing beside her as she fumbled under the mat for her spare key (having lost her original somewhere in her clutch bag) is so searing that it almost throws off Lawrence’s concentration. She grits her teeth, trying to ground herself as she adjusts her aim so that it’s right in the middle of the road. Any second now…

But the way Ellie had looked at her from under her lashes with a coy smile on her face when Lawrence had asked her if she’d had a good night still remains branded in her mind.

“I mean, apart from the fact I had to spend it with you,” she’d teased, laughing as Lawrence’s mouth had dropped open in outrage. “...yeah. I had a good night.”

“Stop talking shite. I was the highlight of your evening,” Lawrence had poked her in the arm, stupidly delighting in the way Ellie giggled in response.

“Yeah, a chippy in the middle of the street! You really know how to charm a lady. Remind me why you’re single?” Ellie had joked, Lawrence choosing to roll her eyes dramatically instead of growing offended.

“Ellie Diamond, a lady? That’ll be right,” Lawrence had snorted, only prompting Ellie’s grin to grow bigger. “And I’m single by choice, I’ll have you know. Obviously I’ve got lassies throwing themselves at my feet, but none of them meet my outrageously high standards.”

Ellie had giggled, but her laugh had faltered as she’d met Lawrence’s eyes. There’d been something unsure in them, something nervous, but even looking back Lawrence is sure they’d held a certain amount of honesty that couldn’t have been acting.

“I know you’re taking the piss, but honestly…” Ellie had said quietly, breaking eye contact to look down at the ground and the glittery silver heels on her feet. “...I don’t know how you’ve not got girls falling over themselves to be with you. Because, well. Fuckin’ look at you.”

The butterflies in Lawrence’s stomach had sprung to life so hard she’d felt ever-so-slightly ill. Deflecting, she’d shaken her head in self-pity. “Aye, right. Think it’s looking at me that’s causing the problems, doll.”

“Fuck off , Lawrence. Have you seen yourself tonight?” Ellie had laughed breathlessly. Lawrence can still remember how close they’d been, how little distance there was between them.

“Unfortunately.”

Ellie had shaken her head in disbelief, and when she’d moved to take Lawrence’s hands in her own Lawrence still swears the world had stopped turning on its axis. “Oh my God, shut up.”

Maybe that had been another time Lawrence had been so aware of her heart, the way it had thumped violently in her chest in a way that made it seem it was about to give out. She couldn’t stop the way she’d flicked her gaze down to Ellie’s lips for a split-second even if she’d wanted to.

“You gonny make me?”

And just like that Ellie had leaned in and kissed her outside her door in the pitch dark with only the streetlamps to illuminate them, a scene from a movie that Lawrence had always thought only happened to other people. The kiss hadn’t felt fake; the way Ellie had dropped one of Lawrence’s hands to cup her cheek and the intensity after the split-second of initial hesitation had only driven home how much it had seemed to mean to Ellie. How much Lawrence seemed to mean to Ellie.

Lawrence wonders if that’s still true.

Lawrence had known she should’ve pulled away sooner. She knows it would’ve helped maintain the illusion of professionalism, the illusion that the kiss had somehow been a mistake. But the smoke had been cleared and the mirror had been shattered (and Lawrence supposes now she’s got the bad luck to show for it) and she’d kissed back, matched the other girl’s longing because Christ knew she’d wanted the same thing for months.

She’d made sure to pull away first, though, and at least that had been something she’d done right, but the way Ellie had smiled sheepishly at her and loosened her grip on her hand only made Lawrence want to take it all back, hit pause instead of stop and lean in to meet her lips again.

“Sorry,” Lawrence had said, before trying not to pull a face because, Jesus Cartwheeling Christ, Chaney, apologising to the girl right after you kiss her? Nae fuckin’ wonder you’re single.

Ellie, in fairness, had shaken her head. “No, you’re fine. I’m sorry, I know how seriously you take all the regs and stuff-”

“Yeah,” Lawrence had agreed, regret coating her words. “But, y’know, we can...we can see what happens. Who’s to say further down the line…”

“Sure, sure,” Ellie had nodded, smiling as she turned back to her front door, turning the key in the lock and pushing it open ever-so-slightly. “Well. Thanks. For walking me home. And, uh. I’ll see you at work, I guess?”

“Yeah,” Lawrence had nodded, looking from the ground and back to Ellie.

It must have been the way they were looking at each other that had made Ellie begin to lean in again but Lawrence, in all her ridiculous, law-abiding glory, had stepped back awkwardly, not trusting herself to meet Ellie’s lips again only because she knew that once she started kissing her she’d never be able to break away. They’d blushed awkwardly at each other, and as Ellie pushed her front door she smiled gently.

“I do really like you, Lawrence.”

Lawrence hadn’t been able to trust herself to speak in case she said something she’d regret. Instead she’d smiled bashfully at her shoes before Ellie finally said a quiet goodnight, and then Lawrence had disappeared down the road to hail a cab, not daring to turn back and look at Ellie’s door.

She wonders if Ellie meant any of it. Felt any of it at all. If it was all just a plot to get the sad, fat wee lesbian onside, to try and get her into bed so the stupid cow would fall in love with her and tell her all the department’s secrets. She wonders if Ellie closed the door behind her that night and laughed at how simple it had been, made some calls to whoever low-life she reports to and had a good giggle about how easy it was to wrap her round her finger.

But then under the bridge not even two minutes ago…

Well. Ellie had still got in that car and sped away.

Lawrence’s arm is stinging in pain but before she can dwell on it, something enters her line of vision. A blacked-out Range Rover making its way across the road she’s pointing the rifle at.

Her finger is pulling the trigger before she can even pray the bullet doesn’t hit Ellie, and in the distance the car swerves out of control and out of her sight.

***

The first thing Lawrence sees when she rounds the corner is Ellie. Middle of the road, under the bridge, houses on either side. Her blonde hair in her face, mouth slack as she breaths frantically. She’s scrabbling at the screen of her phone with one hand- of course she’s impeded by those fucking pink acrylics- while the other is curled around the glock at her side. Lawrence knows she writes with her right hand. She’s chosen it to send the text, meaning the gun’s in her non-dominant hand.

Lawrence throws all hope of strategic thinking out the window as she skids to a halt, points her own gun at Ellie, and all of a sudden she’s shouting across at her.

“Drop your gun, drop your phone!”

She’s only managed to get two words out when Ellie’s arms switch position and the gun is suddenly trained on her. Her blue eyes are wide and panicked, but her arm’s straight. Steady. The distance between them is metres and yet it seems like nothing at all.

“Lawrence,” she says, her voice flimsy and paper thin and without any conviction. It makes Lawrence’s heart want to crack in two, but it’s past that. It’s already broken, as is her trust.

“They’re not here for you then,” Lawrence sneers, casting a glance down the empty road.

“Not yet,” Ellie scowls, a fresh sense of confidence to her words. “But they will be. So you should run while you still can.”

“I am too fuckin’ shattered to run, drop the gun!” Lawrence insists with a yell, keeping her aim steady despite her heavy breathing.

Ellie’s still got the glock trained on her, but her eyes are filled with something that doesn’t match the hardened criminal image Lawrence has to acquaint herself with. It’s something akin to betrayal, and Lawrence would snort at the audacity if the situation wasn’t so tense.

“You went into my flat that morning. You saw I wasn’t there.”

Lawrence pauses, shrugs slightly. “Not like I needed a battering ram, I knew where you kept the spare key.”

Ellie seems to remember that night as well, judging from the way her stony expression falters and the betrayal on her face only becomes more apparent. “When did you know? About me.”

Lawrence refuses to crack under the kicked puppy expression Ellie’s choosing to deploy. Instead she only hitches her rifle so it’s steady in her grip. “A lady never tells.”

Ellie gives a single snort, regret painted on her face like her perfect makeup. There’s a smirk on her lips and a slight sadness to her gaze as she speaks again. “Well now I see why we never slept together.”

If she wanted to hit Lawrence where it hurts, she’s succeeded. Lawrence pauses before weighing up her tactics, willing that Ellie’s feelings for her were real enough for her own words to touch a nerve.

“Wasn’t that I didn’t want to.”

Ellie falters. The gun’s limp in her hand now, and she takes a few steps towards her before seemingly remembering they’re both holding firearms. “Look, please. Just go before they get here.”

“I get it,” Lawrence disregards her, keeps her talking until the ART (where the fuck is the ART?) can get here before Ellie’s guys can. “Frame Aurora Boyle as the bent copper, as the one who pulled the hit and run on Tayce. She goes down and you can retire at the tender age of...thirteen and three quarters, Adrian fucking Mole. With the emphasis on mole.”

“I'm not bent!” Ellie protests in anguish, beginning to grow visibly upset. She’s cracking just like she’d done in the interview room, only this time it’s ten times harder to watch. “Tayce Szura-Radix was...I had to, she was going to leak the list of names and I...I couldn’t let her do that. It was going to be bribery originally, but then they told me to get rid of her and-”

“And she still managed to hit send on the fuckin’ email before you hit her with the car. So how did that work out for you?” Lawrence bites back bitterly. Ellie squeezes her eyes shut, her arm lowers ever so slightly. It’s the picture of a girl who’s too wrapped up in a world she knows so little about, a kid in the deep end with no armbands. She regrets hitting Tayce. Lawrence can see that.

“They picked you out,” Lawrence continues. “Made you feel special, made you feel clever, guided your career. I know what it’s like, Ellie, we're young, this is a tough fucking game. But you know everything. You really think they’re going to let you just stop, let you go have your wee happily-ever-after fairytale ending?”

“Lawrence, I know what I’m doing,” Ellie sniffs, switches the arm that’s holding the gun and aims it steadily at her with only the slightest tremble.

“Bimini,” Lawrence says simply, and Ellie’s face flinches in recognition. “They’re saying they’re going to get off their charges. You know names, dates, places. You know as well as I do they’re not at the top of that fucking tree. We’re so close to cracking this whole OCG. Money laundering, drug trafficking, more armed robberies.”

Ellie is faltering. Her eyes dart down the road behind Lawrence and when there’s no relief to her expression, Lawrence continues.

“You were just a kid. They picked you up off a Dundee scheme, got you into the force and then you had access to operations, evidence rooms, kilos and kilos of currency that can get used to frame people, blackmail people, get them off the hook and make them money. Ellie, do you honestly think you were the only teenager they’ve trained up? You know how wide-reaching this is. How many other kids lives’ have they ruined? How many other dreams have they thrown on the scrapheap? How many other wee girls aren’t ever gonny get their hair salon?”

Ellie’s expression is blank, supposedly steadfast apart from the tears that’re making tracks down each cheek. Lawrence can feel the lump in her own throat before she swallows it, narrowing her eyes to stop the tears that are threatening to spring up in them.

She’s part of the OCG. She’s corrupt. Her actions have resulted in lost lives.

And yet she’s not a killer. She’s in too deep and she’s drowning. She deserves a second chance.

“Do the right thing,” Lawrence pleads, having to readjust her own gun as she realises she’s lowered it while she’s been talking. “Tell us everything you know. Confess.”

There’s a flicker in Ellie’s eyes that makes Lawrence think perhaps this is it. She’ll put the gun down and run away with her, back to AC-12 and then to a protected witness safehouse and maybe Lawrence can still visit her, maybe they’ll work something out.

And then there’s a screeching of brakes and tyres behind her, and before Lawrence can turn around she’s struck to the ground, the side of an ugly blacked-out Range Rover scraping her left arm. Lawrence can hear herself groan in pain, couldn’t prevent her own cries even if she wanted to because fucking Jesus she’s hurt, and as the car screeches to a halt she’s willing herself with every fibre of her being to get up, catch the fuckers because she can’t let them away with this.

She can’t let them away with what they’ve turned Ellie into.

As she rolls over onto her side, though, the sight that’s in front of her is strange. The car hasn’t yet sped away, and Ellie doesn’t appear to be in a rush. Instead she’s rooted to the spot, staring at Lawrence with her jaw slack and helplessness smacked across her face.

They lock eyes, and Lawrence knows she wants to help her.

Then something takes over; whether it’s a realisation that she can’t help her or a change of heart, Lawrence doesn’t know, but suddenly Ellie’s wrenching open the side door and scrambling into the back seat, and the accelerator is getting slammed as the car drives away in too low of a gear.

Lawrence looks at the bridge she’s just run down the stairs from and knows that this isn’t over yet. Not by a long shot.

***

She’s audibly gasping. How pathetic. Countless years in the police service, the exertion she’s had to go through in fitness training, and yet this is the thing that’s got her the most out of breath in her whole career.

Sprinting down to an OCG car to see if she’s killed the criminal she’s fallen in love with.

The Range Rover has crashed into a parked Citroen, and there’s a car alarm piercing through the air as Lawrence runs up to the scene. Which car it belongs to, Lawrence doesn’t know. She supposes it doesn’t matter. There’s smoke pouring out of one of the vehicles under the bonnet which makes her panic, wonder if suddenly one of them is about to burst into flames action-movie style. She supposes the last hour couldn’t be much more beyond parody if it tried.

The doors to the Range Rover are closed. That is until Lawrence runs up parallel to the vehicle and the passenger door swings open, Ellie falling out of it with a pained grunt, bent double with her palms against the ground. There’s a nasty cut on her head that blood is already pouring out of, but Lawrence knows it’s not a gunshot wound. That seems to have been reserved for the driver of the car, and Lawrence is grateful with every embryo she possesses that Ellie wasn’t the target.

Even in Ellie’s shaken state she’s still holding her glock, so Lawrence keeps her rifle trained on her as Ellie aims messily, sways from left to right a little like she’s drunk. Even though Lawrence wants nothing more than to just drop her weapon and wrap Ellie in a hug. To tell her it’s over now, that she’ll be okay. Protected, safe.

Although the illusion that she could be any of those things is beginning to crumble to the ground as the gravity of the situation hits Lawrence like a freight train.

“Ellie, drop the gun. Put it down,” Lawrence commands from behind the gun.

Ellie disobeys her, stubborn til the bitter end. They look at each other, their gazes challenging but holding an equal amount of hurt and regret. As Ellie stumbles towards her and lowers her weapon, Lawrence in turn lowers hers. She’s giving nothing away on her expression, but the action lifts Lawrence’s heart. As she catches her breath her heart is in her mouth, wondering if Ellie’s going to drop the gun, if she’ll say something, if she realises this whole mess could be over if she just-

Click.

Lawrence’s face drops as she seems to take in what’s happening at a thousand miles an hour. The passenger seat of the Range Rover, a man in a helmet with the visor up aiming a rifle straight at her. This is it. Ellie was just a decoy to distract Lawrence long enough to be offered up like a lamb to slaughter. The dread and panic and sheer realisation that her life’s about to be ended by a round of bullets grips Lawrence to the point of paralysis.

And then she sees Ellie’s head turn, and where once before everything was fast, events suddenly slow to half speed.

There’s a raw, visceral, almost animalistic “ NO!” that’s ripped from Ellie as she steps in front of Lawrence, and then the BANGBANG, BANG of three bullets that fire through Ellie’s body before she falls to the ground. Without any prior thought and as though her body is being controlled for her, Lawrence aims her gun at the man who’s just killed the girl she loves and fires three right back, only satisfied when his helmet thrashes against the passenger window in defeat.

Lawrence’s face contorts into one of horror and disbelief as police sirens enter her consciousness, and the ART arrives. She stumbles a little on the spot as firearms officers spill out of the van and aim at her. Her voice shakes as she produces her badge.

“I’m AC-12!” she yells over to them, her words cracking as she lowers her weapon and finally, finally rests it on the ground. “I’m AC-12.”

She can barely stand to look at Ellie, but she does. Her body isn’t horrifically mangled or contorted; there’s just three red circles that’re bleeding through her baby pink suit and crisp white shirt. Her eyes have fluttered half-closed, and Lawrence’s heart shatters at the thought of never getting to see that blue again.

She races to her side, presses two fingers against her neck. She’s no paramedic, but she thinks there’s a faint pulse.

And then Ellie’s lips are moving.

“Lawrence,” she whispers near-silently, and Lawrence kneels down next to her, brings her face close.

“It’s me. It’s me, Ellie.”

Ellie takes a heavy, laboured breath. “...’m sorry.”

“It’s...it’s okay, you’re safe now. You can get to hospital and we can get you a safehouse and you can help us and we’ll help you. And we can…” Lawrence takes a second to breathe, swallowing her tears as she fights the helpless feeling that all her hopes are dying in front of her. “...we can be happy, the pair of us. I mean you canny fuckin’ die on me, you bitch, eh?”

Ellie takes another shaky breath in, not a single trace of any emotion apart from a dying light on her face as she speaks. Her eyes seem to shut further. “Loz, look at me. I’m fucked.”

Lawrence feels her face fall and her heart drop. “No, Ellie…”

“Declaration,” Ellie says quietly, and like an obedient fool Lawrence just nods, fishes her phone from the pocket of her vest.

“Get away from her!” one of the firearms officers yells at her; cold, professional. Lawrence supposes they’d never understand.

“I’m taking her dying declaration, for fuck’s sake, Sargeant, you will stand down!” she shoots back. She turns all her attentions to Ellie now, and her heart hurts and her chest aches and she’s forcing herself to look at her painted face and the wings of her eyeliner and every little lash that frames her eyes and the pink of her lips and not the ugly, leaking holes in her body because Ellie isn’t ugly, not a single part of her.

Lawrence is ashamed to admit it, but she still loves her for everything she is.

And as if she reads her mind, Ellie’s eyes flutter slowly open as if the action takes all the strength in the world, and she looks deeply into Lawrence’s as she gropes blindly for her hand, which Lawrence rushes to take. “Before...the recording. Want you to know that...us. It was real. To me.”

Lawrence doesn’t know when she began crying, but suddenly her cheeks are wet and her tears are dripping onto the lapel of Ellie’s suit. She leans close to Ellie’s side, murmurs into her ear.

“I forgive you. And I love you.”

Lawrence hears Ellie as she whispers out. “I love you too.”

And as Lawrence tells herself she needs to get it together, and that she’s still a police officer in the field and she needs to get evidence from a key witness before she…

Well. Before the worst case scenario.

...she turns her face, presses an urgent kiss to Ellie’s cheek that she doesn’t give a fuck about anyone witnessing. The implications of that can be something for her to worry about once she’s healed, grieved for a girl she both knew inside out and didn’t know at all. Instead, she sniffs, straightens up and holds the phone to Ellie’s lips.

“Come on, Ellie. Say it.”

And as Ellie’s eyes drop closed and her lips move, Lawrence tunes out the chaos of the police presence around her and condenses the moment to Ellie’s hand in hers, and the gentle wind that plays with her hair splayed out on the grass, and what could very well be her final words.

“DI Eleanor Diamond...in the hopeless expectation of death...I record my dying declaration…”

[steve0discusses]

The Full Metal Alchemist Live Action Movie Part 8: Watch This Episode Covered in Butts be the Only One Not Flagged by Tumblr

Gonna be risky business and not only upload all of these caps the way I screenshot them--which has just SO MANY poorly CGI’d butts but also gonna do it on the Tumblr Drafts folder, which I have been assured works now.

I’m so worried about so many things, but considering all the fears I have about like...everything else in the world right now...I guess I’ll take a risk on tumblr.

Edit: I cannot believe that I had 8ish episodes of Kaiba’s tall dueling tower get flagged but not this movie. I just....wow I cannot.

So anyway, last we left off, General Hakuro stepped in and was like “Hi guys, you like my wily plans that no one in their right mind would have ever guessed???”

Yo remember this part of the anime? Where the bodies drop from the ceiling and it’s a hunk out of the final arc--it’s here. In this movie. This movie that can’t possibly afford to do that. Lets get some CGI animated bodies in here ASAP.

(see some texture regrets under the cut)

It’s like a Monet, as the Mean Girls say, because far away and shrinked to 500 pixels this looks kinda neat. They sort of look more like those slime ball that grow in the back of your throat rather than human bodies, but they still look pretty gross hanging up there.

But then.....we zoom in. Remember again that this was full screen on my computer, and at one point was on a freakin movie screen. This level of 3d...was on a movie theater screen.

The mind boggles. The mind boggles!

Like as you know, I am an artist, and I’ve dabbled in...basically everything in my pursuit to make a dollar...and I have taken about 2 years of classes in 3D art with Maya and all those. I’m not thaaat great at it--I’m much more an illustrator/painter--but I feel like I have that reference point. Can I just say--the model is...fine...you can do a lot with layers of bump maps so you don’t need a truly detailed model (not like they did that, because they didn’t do that, but I can figure that maybe they had an intention to do that and forgot?)

But, there’s no connection of the wires to bodies. They just kinda float? The bodies are also all the same shiny-ness? To the point that it looks like a copy paste? (I don’t think it is, the wires are slightly different on a few of them) There’s just not much in the way of a texture map or a bump map. It just...there’s also something missing from the skin.

Skin is actually kind of rough to render, so when I did it back in the day, I followed like a checklist to make sure I had all the layers and steps to make someone look...clammy. Some things are kinda translucent, they reflect light a different way...especially white skin like this wouldn’t be just...white like putty. Dunno if you ever saw a white person, but we got so many veins...there was so much potential to make something really gross and fleshy.

Instead we got silly putty. It’s fine. I’m fine.

So General Hakuro decides to just...kill everyone right now.

This makes no sense to me.

That means that the whole thing of Lust killing Hughes was completely unrelated to General Hakuro. All Hakuro needed was Shou Tucker, who has been in prison for...I assume months since Ed shipped him off. And Shou was only released today? Just now? Just now when Hughes was shot?

So this all just happened at the same time by accident?

I mean the General sent us to the wrong lab initially, so he didn’t actually want us to be here, and now that we are here, he’s going to set off an entire army as a reaction to three people walking in and going “oops”?

So, lets get a look at our army.

Oh it was so disappointing, this reveal. Not just the eyeball that has a bounce light coming from below the top lip there (how did that even happen???) but also when it opened it’s mouth, it had a flat animation of skin breaking--it wasn’t actually rendered 3d skin, it was like a jpg wrapped around it or something (or at least that was the illusion I got. That is fine for a video game or a TV show, but this is a movie. This is shot so that it can be displayed in a size bigger than your own house.

What happened to the animation team on this one? Not saying I can do better, cuz no, I can’t, that 3d chapter in my life was a while back, but I’m just one guy. This was an entire animation studio and they just...didn’t render 3d face ripping (which is their entire job, to work in 3d) and then they kinda just turned on the stock physics dynamics and dropped em instead of animating them.

The way they fell was like fish from a bucket--the same amount of speed, too. they all ragdolled like a 3D shooter, their rigs just hanging on for dear life (and yes, you could see the deforming happen on the joints of these models.) I’m fine with having a computer program render something out with a physics engine...but there is a balance.

You do have to still go in there and finangle it back because...real life is hella stupid. Real physics? So stupid. It was hilarious how nonthreatening it was, too because they’re like...the size of shrimps in that zoom out image. The scale is just so wild!

It was like one bored guy in a sound booth and they multiplied his voice three times. Golden. Absolutely golden.

So these guys stride over, all of them with the same amount of speed (leading me to think it was probably a recorded walk cycle they all share with slight alterations between all of em) and they kinda just...pile on eachother in a weird way.

I will give them this: I was happy to see something that wasn’t physics or procedural. They mo-capped and animated that part for sure. It had the touch of an artist’s hand. It was also a very funny way for Hakuro to die because this guy was on screen for like 5 minutes, and maybe 7 minutes of this whole movie.

Youknow...I think it really says a lot about your nude 3d models if they’re not disturbingly human enough to trigger the tumblr filter, youknow?

Anyway, Envy looks on.

And then Gluttony saves the city.

Meanwhile, they decide to bust out the fire effects and Mustang becomes the most useful person in this entire movie. Like honestly this movie was poorly named, because it should have just been “Mustang saves the FullMetal Alchemist’s Entire Ass.”

The next part seems like I forgot a cap, or maybe missed something. I swear to you, I did not.

First off, Al becomes fullmetal and makes this happen without an alchemy circle. The show doesn’t really care to talk about that though, it’s just a thing he can do now, and you’d only notice it if you were writing a Tumblr post about it.

I swear to you, Winry is just inside of Al and there is no explanation.

There is no explanation for this.

She was on the couch...why is she not on the couch? What?

And then when you think they might have a moment, Ed’s like.

Damn.

For reals what the hell was that entire scene except for a way for Ed to get his arm stitched back on in like 2 minutes?

Outside, Envy and Lust are just strolling around the back-alley of this red brick building we have seen used for this entire movie.

And like...it’s so funny to me because they weren’t trying to run or hide. It makes complete sense why they got shot. This is what happens when you just...walk away when the whole military guard wants to kill you.

Now lets go see how Hawkeye is faring.

Luckily, all of the ambling bodies have decided to walk slowly through this one weird grass section between extremely long buildings.

And Hawkeye tells everyone “You have to shoot their heads off” and I want you to look at that scene and tell me how many of those bodies still have heads.

Oh, all of them. Don’t worry about it.

Kinda hard to see, but Ed shows up to give Mustang a hand, which was fully unnecessary but we’ll get to that in a bit.

This movie is such a gem.

Ed goes big brain and realizes that Envy is still burned up, and thus is about to pass on.

And whatever, I’ll take it. It’s not like the movie has told us that they are made out of 1000000 lives, for all we know, in the movie universe, they really are only 4 lives. Like half a cat. Maybe Father only killed half a cat instead of an entire city.

Yugi Muto would be so freakin proud of Envy for how often this guy gets hit square in the chest with fire balls. It’s basically every scene where Envy and Mustang share screen time.

And don’t worry, I don’t think Envy died? But they sure made it look like he did, which I’m sure everyone everywhere was really happy to see, since Envy’s death was one of the climaxes of the whole series. Like people used to make these lists of “top 10 saddest anime deaths” and how many people had Envy on there? Like everyone? People freakin love Envy and they did him so much dirty in this movie.

Again I have no explanation for Winry.

So Mustang is like, Ed, you make sure Winry doesn’t biff it in that corner, and I’ll do my actual job over here on this side. And yo, he did.

And so then that’s it, Lust is dead, and now we have a Sorcerer’s stone.

Man it looks delicious, right?

I’d eat the hell out of that.

Anyway, we only have one more update and we’re done with this movie!

I know!

I know! They only have 10-15 minutes to resolve pretty much everything, and that’s assuming that the credits don’t take up a heap of that. Hell, I might only have 3 caps next episode if that’s all credits. I honestly don’t remember.

Anyway, hope y’all take it easy this February, here is a link for people who just got here to read these FMA recaps in Chrono order.

https://steve0discusses.tumblr.com/tagged/fma/chrono

[engineeredfiction]

Space Is a Harsh Mistress Ch 3

AU: A blend of 1984, Rollerball (1975), Prospect, and We.

Warnings: Nothing in this chapter. Future warnings…violence, smut, angst, Ezra being Ezra.

Notes: I’m just doing this to break writer’s block but I hope it’s mildly entertaining. Part 3 of purposed 7 parts.I’m winging this! Also the formatting is shite.

Summary: Ezra is tasked to a life altering and nearly impossible task for a group of rebels.

There’s no starvation, no poverty, no suffering, and no wars.  All that is asked for is your full cooperation.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 4

   Ezra thumb the pages of his copy of We by Yevgeny Zamyatin and he happened to land on a particular page with the following quote:

...Those two, in paradise, were given a choice: happiness without freedom, or freedom without happiness. There was no third alternative…

  He reread the lines until they were burned into his memory. Hard copies of books were hard to come by those days as products made from paper were heavily regulated in hopes to preserve Earth's entire tree population. The book Ezra held had yellowing around the borders of the stiffened pages. There were his pencil notes within the lines and an ink message on the first page to a person named Orielle from the book's prior owner. A loud buzzing sound from the shipping docks grabbed Ezra's attention. 

   He had been sitting where Dax told him to wait for the past thirty minutes on one of Mars's commercial docks. He scanned the docks until a familiar figure caught his eye. Aloisa was short and stocky compared to the group of men she was conversing with. Ezra could see through her tough persona wardrobe there was physical softness, but underneath was a system of muscular strength that has been fine tuned from years of training. She’s not physically weak and certainly not mentally weak, he thought.  Her dark auburn hair was in the usual high bun he’s seen her wear previously. Even from his distance he could see her clear grey eyes and flirtatious smile. What is she talking about with them? She made eye contact him and smiled. Ezra closed the book, wrapped it in soft cloth, and placed it into his canvas satchel. Her approach was slow and deliberate. He recalled to himself:

...Those two, in paradise, were given a choice: happiness without freedom, or freedom without happiness. There was no third alternative…

   Without removing her gaze from his face Aloisa asked, “Was that a book I saw? A bound book?”

   “It is indeed a bound paper book,” Ezra hummed.

   “Such a rare commodity. Honestly I wouldn’t have guessed you as a reader type, let alone own a physical book.”  Ezra stiffened his lips and looked away. “I’m sorry I didn’t mean to come off as an asshole. It’s just that many people don’t read...literature. I’m being presumptuous. What were you reading?”

   “Well you have presumed correctly. A suitable work of art by Yevgeny Zamyatin,” Ezra shot at her.

   “Russian literature, impressive. A subversive piece of literature if I recall correctly,” she beamed. “Your ship is ready. Would you like a tour?”

   “You wrap your demands in a cloak of pleasant inquiries?” Ezra wearily smiled at her. He was sure he could run off at any time and they would be forced to find someone else. Yet, he knew too much now. The business of sneaking human commodities away from The United Corps had one exit and it was death. 

***********************

   The Opportunity was a few decades old, but still highly functional and offered more space and amenities than Ezra’s antiquated ship. Ezra’s hand glided along the seats of the flight deck. His fingers lingered on the control panels. His calloused fingers felt every button, knob, and lever. He felt out of his element as he took in the aged grandeur of Opportunity’s technology. 

   “I don’t know if I can fly this,” he choked.

  “I can,” Aloisa rebutted, “so that’s not an issue.”

   Ezra turned to face her, “You’ll be gracing me with your presence?”     

   “Of course,” she laughed, “You can’t fly my ship.”

   “It’s yours?”

   “Officially I am the prime owner and you’re the sub. I don’t have the mining credentials to get through The Final Wall. Mining credentials...are out of our league to fake apparently and we have no friends on The Final Wall, yet.”

   The Final Wall was a term dubbed during the early days of The United Corps for the perimeter between Pluto and the Kuiper Belt. More than a dozen of Final Fleet ships were scattered about with military personnel and weapons stationed to make sure no one escaped the paradise of The United Corps. Rendering a ship untraceable to pass the The Final Wall is impossible and a fleet ship could detect a rebel one from a far off distance. Only certified ships and their operators with proper IFF transponders could go beyond. Ezra’s prior long standing certifications proved to be valuable.

   “Where do we need to go?” Ezra asked as he plopped down in the pilot chair and swivelled around to face Aloisa.

   “We need to drop off the payload...at Proxima Sol Alpha base. With this ship it’ll take us two years. We put the payload, so to speak, in hypersleep. It’ll save on resources and there’ll be no noise to pick up on by the Final Fleet. We could take turns in hyper if you prefer.”

   “And that is it? We take a two year vacation to transport...goods and come back?”

   “Yes, exactly.”  Aloisa waited for a response from Ezra, he was deep in thought and no longer made eye contact with her. “Would you like to see the kitchen and quarters?”

   The kitchen was outfitted in white streamline furnishings and a garden wall. Ezra thumbed a basil leaf, it was soft and crushed easily between his fingers. The heavy aroma stimulated his senses. Garden walls were a real treat in ships. They provided fresh food, oxygen, and were visually pleasing among the many dull walls that kept them safe from the vacuum of space. 

   Ezra knew Aloisa was observing him, it didn’t bother him. She stood in the corner with her arms crossed, her eyes followed him as he moved through the kitchen. A stove, a sink, coffee machine, electric kettle,  cupboards, a variety of utensils, and packaged spices. This ship has been lived in and taken care of, Ezra thought. This ship has been well loved and it’s apparent from the state of the kitchen. He appreciated it. His hand guided him around the counter space and Ezra met Aloisa’s gaze. She looks disquieted.

   The quarters were spacious for a ship of Opportunity’s size due to some of them being converted to hold extra hypersleep pods. There were four small quarters the size of walk-in closets and two large ones with decent sized beds. 

   “The mattresses are firm, so I hope you like to sleep on a rock. It’s good for the back supposedly. The lights are dimmable, you have a closet, a safe, smart mirror, and the lavatories are just down the hall with a shower. Rooms are soundproof,” Aloisa stated as if she had memorised a speech. 

  Ezra gave the personal quarter a final look. The light gave a warm glow that soothed and comforted him if only temporary. The glow radiated across Aloisa’s face, he found he couldn’t take his eyes off her face. She propped herself up against the door frame and was staring at an imaginary spot on the floor. She had a scar perpendicular on her left eyebrow, faded by time. Her scarred eyebrow raised when she felt him.

   “What’s your verdict? You haven’t said it to me yet,” she declared.

   “I know I’m not the most moral man in the universe. I have done questionable things Kevva only knows. But this is a venture that is bigger than I have ever done. It’s bigger than my scope. I’m not familiar with extravagant transportation, missions, or danger that could potentially bring innocent people to a demise. I’ve known Dax for nearly a generation and he gambled on me,” Ezra admitted. He wasn’t sure why he said what he did to a stranger.

   “Do you think he made an erroneous gamble?”

   Ezra hung his head down. Clearly Dax thought highly of him to trust him with this mission. Twenty lives depended on being transported to Proxima Sol Alpha safely and without notice.

   “I’ve been in peril before,” he nodded to where his right arm should be, “I’ve been shot, poisoned, abandoned, and this task should not be weighing on my mind as heavy as it does.”

   “Do you think it’s because this is the first time you were made aware that the system is not a favourable one to so many while it’s been extremely favourable to you even though it may not have seemed that way? That if caught, you would be sentenced to the fighting ring until they deemed it was your time to go?”

   “To think being stranded on a death-dealing planet with little food was a privilege. You are willing to risk your own life for these people?”

   “At times like this we have to make a choice between what’s morally right and the law. I like to think I’m making the morally right choice, are you?” She straightened her posture as Ezra bit his lower lip and moved closer to her, he could feel her breath against his chest. “Dax will be depositing an extra five thousand credits into your account today.”

   “So I can get a new arm?”

   “You can do whatever you want with it, but you should definitely say yes out loud to me. I know you already made up your mind, but I need to hear you say it to me, to my face,” she insisted.

   “How do you know I have resolved to do this mission? I know I didn’t give Dax an affirmative,” Ezra retorted.

  “You’re reading a Zamyatin novel. You’ve been a rebel all your life and you never knew it,” she said sternly.

   Ezra conceded, “My answer is a yes, I’ll use my highly valuable certifications to get you and a sleeping payload to Proxima Sol Alpha safely.”

[everlasting-gospel]

New Post has been published on Present Truth

New Post has been published on https://presenttruth.info/fear-not-coronavirus-precautions/

Fear Not! Coronavirus Precautions!

“Grace be with you, mercy, and peace, from God the Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father, in truth and love” (2 John 3).

I pray that you are doing well despite the perilous times in which we are living.

I am a first responder with our volunteer fire department. I just wanted to share a few things with you about the caronavirus that were shared with our department.

First of all, Thus saith the Lord, “Fear not!” This phrase is found 63 times in the Bible.

“Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom” (Luke 12:32).

“Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they? Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature? And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith? Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? (For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you. Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof” (Matthew 6:25-34).

“And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell” (Matthew 10:28).

“He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the LORD, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust. Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence. He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall be thy shield and buckler. Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by day; Nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness; nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday. A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee. Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold and see the reward of the wicked. Because thou hast made the LORD, which is my refuge, even the most High, thy habitation; There shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling. For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone. Thou shalt tread upon the lion and adder: the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet. Because he hath set his love upon me, therefore will I deliver him: I will set him on high, because he hath known my name. He shall call upon me, and I will answer him: I will be with him in trouble; I will deliver him, and honour him. With long life will I satisfy him, and shew him my salvation” (Psalms 91:1-16).

“No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD, and their righteousness is of me, saith the LORD” (Isaiah 54:17).

“But now thus saith the LORD that created thee, O Jacob, and he that formed thee, O Israel, Fear not: for I have redeemed thee, I have called thee by thy name; thou art mine. When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee” (Isaiah 43:1, 2).

“Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness” (Isaiah 41:10).

For a study on trusting the Lord for everything, please read the following article.

The Faith of the Son of God – Jun-Jul 2018

Paul exclaimed, “I live by the faith of the Son of God” (Galatians 2:20). Wait a minute, I know we are to “…walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7), but Paul talks about “the faith of” God’s Son, not his own faith. …Read More

Some Precautions

1) Wash your hands often. Hands are the number one carrier of germs and viruses.

2) Avoid touching your mouth, nose, and eyes.

3) Drink lots of water. The caronavirus first attaches in your throat, and cannot survive well in warm temperatures. It can be washed down to the stomach by warm water where it will be killed by your stomach acid. If you have a sore throat gargle with warm salt water, and drink lots of water.

4) Monitor yourself and others with a thermometer, preferably one that does not need to touch the patient.

5) Stay at least six feet away from anyone who has symptoms of caronavirus without protection. Protection will include gloves, mask, eye protection, and a gown. Even with these precautions, limit all contact, and carefully remove and dispose of the protection, then wash your clothes, shower, and change into clean clothes. Spray the bottom of your shoes with a disinfectant like Lysol, before entering your vehicle or house after you have been exposed to coronavirus.

According to the CDC Website here are some things you should watch for.

Watch for symptoms Reported illnesses have ranged from mild symptoms to severe illness and death for confirmed coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) cases. The following symptoms may appear 2-14 days after exposure.*

Fever

Cough

Shortness of breath

*This is based on what has been seen previously as the incubation period of MERS-CoV viruses.

If you develop emergency warning signs for COVID-19 get medical attention immediately. Emergency warning signs include*:

Difficulty breathing or shortness of breath

Persistent pain or pressure in the chest

New confusion or inability to arouse

Bluish lips or face

*This list is not all inclusive. Please consult your medical provider for any other symptoms that are severe or concerning.

If you suspect someone to be a carrier of the caronavirus, they will probably not be transported to the hospital unless they have emergency warning signs.

Currently, President Trump is requesting that you avoid gatherings of more than ten people, and avoid unnecessary travel.

I am not giving you everything you need to know about this, so check your trusted news sources for more information.

The best preparation you can make is to draw near to God. “Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded” (James 4:8).

There are a lot of promises of protection in the Bible for us, claim them and believe them for you and your family. If there is known sin in your life, ask God to remove it, then ask Him to reveal more light. Watch and pray is the instruction Jesus gave His disciples before their faith was severely tried.

As students of the Bible we should not be surprised by things like this. There are a lot of potential events behind the scenes that might explain why this is going on right now. The bottom line is, Satan is behind it all.

“…Woe to the inhabiters of the earth and of the sea! for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time” (Revelation 12:12).

The final conflict will be over worship. Read Revelation 13. God’s Ten Commandments are split into two sections, 1-4 deal with worship to God, 5-10 deal with how we treat people. The primary commandments that will be involved in this final conflict revolve around commandments 1 and 4.

On February 18, 1890 there was a Breckenridge Sunday Bill presented to the House of Representatives in the United States. Here is a portion of what this bill entailed.

“Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That it shall be unlawful for any person or corporation, or employee of any person or corporation in the District of Columbia, to perform any secular labor or business, or to cause the same to be performed by any person in their employment on Sunday, except works of necessity or mercy; nor shall it be lawful for any person or corporation to receive pay for labor or services performed or rendered in violation of this act…”

JO Corliss testified before the house in opposition to this bill saying,

“…In this connection let me say, gentlemen, that the District of Columbia has just the same kind of a Sunday law as that of Ohio. This law of the District of Columbia was in force when this book was issued which I hold in my hand, which was April 1, 1868; and I am told that this law (which I will read) was re-enacted in 1874. I now quote from the law. Section 1 provides that- ‘If any person shall DENY THE TRINITY, he shall, for the first offense, be bored through the tongue, and fined twenty pounds; … and for the second offense, the offender being thereof convict as aforesaid, shall be stigmatized by burning on the forehead with the letter B, and fined forty pounds; and for the third offense, the offender being thereof convict as aforesaid, shall suffer death, without the benefit of the clergy.’ Section 10 of the same law has this:- ‘No person whatever shall do any bodily labor on the Lord’s day, commonly called Sunday …’ Now, gentlemen, that law has never been repealed.” (Arguments on the Breckinridge Sunday Bill, by AT Jones, pages 3,13).

Friends, we are living in perilous times. The Lord is coming soon. The final crisis will be over worship, and the two primary aspects that will be brought to law will cause people to violate God’s Ten Commandment Laws on the true God we worship, and the day on which we worship. How those will be brought to play in forbidding people to buy or sell unless they violate these Laws is yet to be seen. But pay attention, friends, it is coming. Make sure you know who you worship, and worship Him in Spirit and in Truth, and worship Him in part by resting “the Sabbath day according to the Commandment” (Luke 23:56).

Please read these booklets: God’s Love on Trial, National ID and the Mark of the Beast, and The Mark of the Beast.

Farewell my Brothers and Sisters. God bless you and keep you.

“For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God. Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen” (Ephesians 3:14-21).

In Christian Love, Your Brother in Christ, Lynnford Beachy

[amydancepants-peralta]

we won’t run (ch 3)

and I’m bleeding right before the lord

(ao3)

From her position above her prey, Rosa snarls - baring her teeth in a perfect white line before bearing down with her fist, rendering the man below unconscious with one swift punch.  Smiling in triumph as his body falls limp, she raises herself up, reaching for her favourite weapon and swinging high.  The sharp blade catches onto its target, slicing easily through the rope that anchored a tapestry to the palace wall and she watches as the drapery falls, covering several of the fighters in a heavy blanket of dust and fabric. 

The peaceful melody of string music quickly disappears, musicians running for cover as the sound of clashing metal begins filling the great hall.  Dresses spin as women push through the crowd - the once calm evening of restraint now diverting into a swirl of chaos as war begins to rage.  The people of Brooklyne were here to reclaim what was rightfully theirs, and they weren’t going to back down without a fight. 

One hour earlier ... 

“Sir Charles.”

A long held habit kicks in and Charles drops his head towards the stone floor, bending at the waist before returning his sights back to the man in front of him.  “King Holt.”

“I apologise for my over the top reaction.  It’s safe to say that I am surprised to see you here.  Stunned even.  Absolutely flummoxed.”

Charles nods politely, fighting back a smile.  The total lack of visual reaction (save for a brief smile) from his king was exactly how he remembered things being.  He raises his dagger, pointing it towards the chain holding Holt down, and raises his eyebrows in silent offering.  Seeing the curt nod in response, he quickly drops to his knees.  

“I need you to tell me everything.  Start from the beginning, and leave no detail unturned.”

His head pulls back slightly at the unexpected request.  Shrugging, he begins.  “Well, I was born out in a field that my great-aunt Susan had been growing herbs in -”  Holt raises his hand, breaking the conversation.

“No.  Not since your beginning.  Pembroke.  Tell me everything that has happened since my departure.”

He can feel his skin heating up as the embarrassment rushes through him, and Charles nods again, hands busy with working on unlocking the padlock that kept his ruler captive.  Swiftly, he ran through the story as he knew it - the duplicity of Pembroke’s rule; the story about Holt’s death that he had so easily crafted; the reports of his greed coming in from various provinces …. Resting for a moment, he tells Holt of Jake’s disagreement with Pembroke, and how it had resulted in his best friend walking away from the only thing in his life he had worked hard for.  After that, Charles explained, all he had known was the inside of his own cell.  

Holt is quiet for a moment as Charles goes back to work on the chain, his eyes taking on a faraway look.  “I’m not surprised that Peralta did that,” he said quietly.  “There were many times that his cavalier attitude towards situations left me in a great state of frustration.  But there is a sense of honour to Jacob, a belief in a life where all is fair and equal, that led me to believe that despite his weaknesses he would turn into a truly admirable member of the Royal Guard.  If Pembroke had made him follow a law that he didn’t believe in, I can absolutely see him walking away from it all.”

Charles nods eagerly, letting out a sigh of relief as the padlock on Holt’s chain releases, hitting the stone floor with a heavy thunk.  “Jakey is the best, he really is.”

Rubbing the skin that had finally been freed from rusty metal, Holt turns to Charles with a serious nod.  “Good work, Sir Charles.  Now, tell me about this passageway you came through.”

“Honestly, Sir, I’m not sure where it’s going to lead us.  Just before I’d gotten to you, I had reached a juncture.  And there was a small torch lit about halfway along the walkway that brought me to your cell.  I began searching the stones, just like I had before, and then … there you were.”

He nods slowly, pursing his lips as his eyes roam over the cell that had been his home for far too long.  “I believe, Sir Charles, that the benefits of exploring these mysterious caverns outweigh the costs of staying stagnant.  I say we continue on.  Do you concur?”

“I do, your majesty.”

“I am not your King anymore, Sir Charles.”

“With all due respect sir, I disagree.”  Boyle’s heart quickens a little in fear as Holt stares back at him.  “As far as I’m concerned, you never stopped being my King.  And now that we can prove that Pembroke stole the throne, I am certain that the people of Brooklyne will agree.”

The older man nods, the faint whisper of a smile lifting the corners of his mouth.  “One can only hope.”

*

It had been several months since Jake had stepped foot within the castle’s walls, and as they move through the forecourt and into the keep his eyes scour the room, taking in all the changes King Pembroke had made. 

Holt’s palace had held banners of all five precincts on proud display in every hall.  It had been a home for art of various creators within the villages, regardless of whether the piece had been widely lauded or quietly discussed.  Representation had been important to him, and the people had loved him for it.  Pembroke’s palace had mirrors at every corner, dotted by painted murals of great battles he claimed to be a part of.  His crest, which looked remarkably similar to that of an earlier King’s, was emblazoned onto thick hand sewn banners, manipulating every room with its ostentatious colour scheme.  

He shifts uncomfortably, tugging on the lapel of his jacket to bring it slightly closer to his chest.  It should be warmer, now that the brick walls sheltered them from the nighttime chill.  But it was bitterly cold.  There was a distinct lack of joy in the air, similar smiles of ignorance and obligation stretching across each guest’s face as they made their way through.  In the corner, a quartet of musicians strummed their lutes and citterns to an uplifting melody, forced merriment falling on deaf ears, fading forgotten into the night.  

As he shuffles along Jake shifts his gaze towards Amy, having recently been pulled away from him by Gina.  They were huddled together, whispering about something, and as he stood watching Amy raised her head, eyes locking immediately on his with an unreadable expression crossing her face.

The memory of yesterday’s confession was still clear in his mind.  Truth be told, when the day had started out there hadn’t been any intention for him to let his heart bleed out like he had.  But standing in the field with her, discussing their plans for the night, his mind had begun to consider all the things that could go wrong, and how there was the very real possibility that it could end without him ever being able to tell Amy how he really felt.  And the pain of that was greater than anything else he could imagine, and so he’d put it all on the line.

To see the shake of her head at his words had hurt more than he was willing to describe, but oddly he found that he still didn’t regret saying them.  She was, after all, the greatest thing to come into his life in the longest time, and if the only way to ensure that he could still be around her was to be her friend, then so be it.  

The fact that his heart had become fully invested in her was something that he would just have to learn to live with.    

An obnoxious voice roars over the quartet from a room to their left, demanding their presence within The Great Hall - a room within the keep that he’d only seen once before.  Jake clenches his jaw as he runs through a mental checklist of the night’s plan, reaching instinctively for Amy as the role of Johnny and Dora come into play.   

He glances at her briefly as she grips onto his offered arm, turning away before he finds himself getting lost in her gaze again (while he may not be able to help how he felt, he certainly wasn’t going to make Amy feel bad about it).  His mouth feels dry, and he takes a heavy swallow to try and encourage the chance to speak once more.  

If there was anything that was certain about tonight, it was that The Great Hall was definitely living up to it’s name.  A rich red tapestry covered the floor, gold damask smothering the fibres.  Tall brass urns burned a healthy fire from their holders high above the guest’s heads, and the ceiling held home to numerous chandeliers, all lit with robust candles.  

A larger orchestra stands in the corner, their thin and ill-rehearsed repertoire fighting with the acoustics of the hall.  Their faces turn nervously towards the King’s throne with every pluck of the strings, obviously fearful of the ramifications of displeasing their master.

To the right of them sat a banquet, covered in an array of food far more extravagant than necessary.  Brass goblets, encrusted with gemstones and other delusions of grandeur were scattered around the surface, accompanied by bottles of wine both white and red.  In the middle of it all sat a mural of the King himself, depicted through the contrasting colours of seasonal fruits.  From the safety of his mask, Jake rolls his eyes at the display.  It was ridiculous, the lengths that Pembroke’s narcissism went to.

At the front of the room, four steps higher than the crowd, stood an ornate throne emblazoned with The Vulture’s name.  A cushion, covered in red velvet and embroidered with his initials, sat waiting for the royal caboose.  A step below, and on either side of the throne, sat a long line of bench seats that began filling with his stolen women, each face looking sadder than the last as they enter and take their place.  Hidden in the shadows underneath the bench ran a long and heavy looking chain - shackles open and waiting for their victims.

Jake feels Amy stiffen beside him as a woman in a green dress covered in peacock feathers makes her way to the edge of the seats, and he turns his head just enough to whisper - “Kylie?”  She nods, chewing on her bottom lip, and he finds himself resting his spare hand against hers.  Seeing her safe and sound was probably no consolation to knowing that her friend was still under Pembroke’s control, and it is all Jake can do to not throw caution to the wind, pull out a dagger and declare war right there and then.  His mind represses the mental image of Charles, hidden somewhere under lock and key, and runs through the plan once again.

A quiet rumble runs through the room as more guests appear, various aristocrats reaching out gloved hands in well-practiced greetings that held no real warmth.  Threads of silver and gold, red, violet and all the shades in-between fill the floor as everyone’s costumes fight for dominance amongst the sea of egos.  He turns back to Amy, noting the wonder in her gaze as she takes in the palace’s opulence for the first time.  Not for the first time, he grows wistful that they’d hadn’t met before the recent few month’s activities.  He was certain that King Holt would have been very fond of her.

A blush grows across her cheeks as she catches him staring, and she glances around her before leaning in closely.  “I knew that the inside of the palace would be amazing, I mean … it’s a palace.  I guess I was just expecting …”

“Less arrogance, more elegance?”

She nods, mouth twisting into a wry grin.  The gold filigree that surrounded her mask glinted against the candlelight, but still held no competition against the sparkle in her eye.  “This place has changed a lot since Holt,” he explained, shrugging one shoulder up in defeat.

“You know, I never thought I would say this, but there is such a thing as too much.” Gina whispered as her and Rosa sidled up next to them.  

Amy nodded in agreement, throwing a well-rehearsed smile at another couple as the four of them walked through the crowd.  Her dress flowed out gracefully behind her as they progressed, and she moved with an elegance that some who had been born to privilege would never be able to match.   Even under the circumstances, Jake was endlessly proud to have her on his arm.  

The loud screech of a score of horns at the front of the Great Hall pulls Jake from his thoughts, and quickly the crowd swivel toward the sound, knowing that such uproar undoubtedly signalled the impending arrival of The King.

Pembroke’s smirk reeks of arrogance as he shuffles along the velvet carpet that led to his throne, head remaining high as he ignores those that kneel before him.  He winks at a few of the women that were now chained to their positions, passive to their smiles turning into sneers as he passes.  The room remains quiet as he ascends, and he turns to face the crowd from the top, scouring the room disinterestedly before dropping into his ‘rightful’ place.    

He raises one hand high, gesturing for the music to begin.  Like scenes from a well-rehearsed play, each of the guests turn and reach for their partners, falling into line on the dance floor as the drawn-out notes of the vielle begin to ring out.  Reaching out to Gina without hesitation, Rosa pulls her into the fray, the two of them quickly becoming indistinguishable (save for the plumage surrounding Gina’s mask) amongst the crowd.

An awkward silence stretches over the remaining two, the lingering memory of “I’m falling in love with you, day by day … and I don’t want to stop” ringing in both of their ears.  Jake can feel her gaze from the corner of her mask, and instinct kicks in.

“Okay look, there’s something that I need to ask you.”  Jake begins, turning to Amy with a serious look falling over his face.

She gazes back at him, mouth falling open slightly as she visibly struggles to find the right words.  Before she can try, he raises his hand, pointing towards a tall woman dressed in white, standing out from the crowd by her oversized headpiece.  “I gotta know,” he continued – “Is that supposed to be a swan?  Because honestly, all I see is a stork.”

Amy’s shoulders drop as the tension leaves her body, drawing her hand to her mouth to conceal the giggles that threaten to escape.  It really did look like a stork, munching on the feathered ‘grass’ that surrounded the woman’s voluminous creation.  Money truly didn’t buy taste. 

 He can feel himself relax in turn as her laughter escapes, despite her best efforts at suppression.  These kind of moments, where they turned silence into laughter, were his favourite.  And only served to remind him of what they were fighting for – a greater future for Brooklyne, yes; but also, a future where they can stay together, even as friends.  

There’s a brief pause, and then the melody of the music changes, a slower tempo falling over the room.  Clearing his throat nervously, Jake offers a hand to Amy.  “Shall we?”

Her hands shake a little, he notices, and he gives her fingers a gentle squeeze as they join his.  He pulls her closer as they move towards the centre of the dance floor, giving her an encouraging smile as his free hand rests gently against her waist.  Tentatively, they begin moving to the beat, both doing their best to ignore the awkward space that was building between them.

Jake glances towards the front of the room and notices The Vulture sitting on his throne, one knee bent up with his foot against an armrest.  In his right hand he holds a chalice, and he stares at the vessel, already distracted by his reflection as the crowd move below him.  Turning back to Amy with a tiny shake of his head in the ruler’s direction, she looks over and huffs at his lack of interest.  “All of this work, and everything that had been stolen for this night, and he doesn’t even care enough to pretend that he’s enjoying it.”

He nods in agreement, squeezing her hand quickly again as they turn across the floor.  “There’s nothing in this hall that could ever surpass his interest in his own reflection.  That is Pembroke, right down to his soul.”

She laughs softly at that, blushing slightly when he smiles back at her, and for a moment they dance together in silence.

Finally, she speaks.  “Jake, there’s something that I have to tell you.”

He winces as the pointed tip of her shoe hits the edge of his toes for the fourth time.  “Is it that you’re a terrible dancer?  I mean, no offence Ames, but this is not your strongest skill.”

Her face turns a bright red and she shakes her head, gold chain shifting slightly against her chest as she lets out a huff.  “We didn’t do a lot of dancing in Fumera, and it’s all really confusing.”

Slowing down the pace, Jake throws her an apologetic smile and tightens his grip on her waist, locking his frame so their outstretched hands act as a support.  “Here.  Follow my lead.”  He takes slower, more deliberate steps, increasing the pace in small increments as confidence begins to creep onto her face.  Together, they move carefully around the floor, smiling at the other guests as they let the music was over them.  He could definitely get used to this.  

Just as friends, Peralta.   

Too long for Tumblr .... find the rest on AO3!

[noramoya]

Starting going through the Revised Version of Vogel’s brilliant book “MAN IN THE MUSIC : The Creative Life And Work of Michael Jackson”. Let’s see what’s the difference from the 1st version... #HonorMJ🤩 #MJ4EverInOurHearts♥️

“PREFACE OF THE 2019 VINTAGE EDITION.”

... “The first edition (2011) had a great run, but for years after its publication I was anxious to tweak, revise, and improve it. So I went back to work. Over the years, I had accumulated an enormous library of Jackson-related materials. My Google docs were packed with interviews, notes from the artist, obscure articles, track sheets, session calendars, and other pieces of the puzzle.

In addition to my own work, a wave of new books, documentaries, think pieces, academic articles, and monographs on Jackson were released. Filmmaker Spike Lee directed two critically acclaimed documentaries,”BAD 25” (2012) and “Michael Jackson’s Journey from Motown to Off The Wall” (2016). Scholar Susan Fast published an outstanding book-length treatment of the Dangerous Album, as part of Bloomsbury Academic’s popular 33 1/3 series. Forbes journalist Zack O’Malley Greenburg published an insightful book (“Michael Jackson, Inc.”, 2014) on Jackson’s business acumen. Rolling Stone writer Steve Knopper published a compelling new biography (“MJ : The Genius Of Michael Jackson, 2015).

In addition to this new content, musician and journalist Questlove taught a “classic albums” class on Jackson, at New York University. Scholar and author Mark Anthony Neal began offering a regular course on the Artist, at Duke University, titled “Michael Jackson & the Black Perfomance Tradition”. Mean-while, an array of new platforms arose dedicated to exploring his life and work, including “Michael Jackson’s Academic Studies”, “The MJCast”, And “Dancing With The Elephant”. I am grateful to so many fellow Michael Jackson authors, biographers, researchers, and fans for their contributions and insights (their names , too many to list here, are cited on in the Acknowledgments).

“... Not only did many of these individuals talked to me for hours about their time working with Jackson, for the first edition; many also helped with my follow-up questions as I prepared this second edition. This book would not be what it is, without their invaluable stories, insights, notes, session calendars, demos, track sheets, and other important documents. So what’s the difference about this new edition?

First, it contains many more behind-the-scenes details from the studio. From further research and conversations with those who worked closely with Jackson, I was able to fill in a lot of gaps and present a much more accurate timeline in terms of how, when, and where his albums were made. This is perhaps the most important addition. I felt it was critical to make the history as vivid and accurate as possible.

Second, I’ve tried to set the record straight where possible. There is a lot of mythology surrounding the work of Michael Jackson; it can be difficult to separate fact from fiction. I got some things wrong in the first edition, which have been corrected and fleshed out here, based on my most credible sources. Sometimes collaborators tell conflicting stories or remember things differently. In those cases I have either told both sides or gone with what makes the most sense, given the evidence available.

Third, it truly focuses on the music. The first edition was mostly about the music but also included information on Jackson’s short-films and performances. Ultimately, I felt that coverage was too thin, so I decided, for this book, that it would be better to use that space to go more deeply into the music. This book, then, is entirely about the songs and albums – not the short-movies, tours, performances, business dealings, or other activities. If any of these other things are mentioned in the book, it is simply to provide context.

And, fourth, it omits any assessment of posthumously released work. Posthumously albums are notoriously difficult – by nature they can never be what the artist would have created. The 2010 album “Michael” – reviewed in the appendix of the first edition of “Man In The Music” – was particularly challenging because of the controversy surrounding the so-called Cascio tracks – songs submitted by Eddie Cascio and James Porte, shortly after Jackson’s death (three of which appeared on the album). Given the serious questions surrounding the origin and authenticity of the vocals on those tracks, I do not acknowledge or assess them in this book.

More broadly, this book does not review any of Jackson’s work after “Invincible” – the last studio album he saw to completion. The epilogue does mention music he was engaged in, during his final years, but those songs are not explored or assessed; their mention is merely intended to give a sense of what the artist was working on. But the overarching concept of the book remains much the same of the first edition: an album-by-album exploration of Michael Jackson, the Artist.

The goal was to make it all come to life: the historical context, the creative process, the work in the studio, the vitality of the songs.?That last point is important . Sometimes in fixating on the minutiae, the power and meanings of the music are lost. I didn’t want this to be a trivia book, nor did I want to impose my own interpretations too strongly onto his music. That is why I draw from an array of other critics. Ultimately, as with the first edition, I try to present Jackson’s music to the reader with as much curiosity and openness as possible. As historian Carl Van Doren put it : “The measure of the creator is the amount of life he puts into his work. The measure of the critic is the amount of life he finds there.”

The year 2019 marks ten years since Jackson’s death. It was expected to be a celebratory moment , yet that has been complicated, to say the least, with the release of the controversial 2019 HBO “documentary” Leaving Neverland, in which “new” allegations of sexual abuse have been leveled against the artist. Important information, conversations, and context surrounding those allegations are currently being examined and will no doubt continue. I have researched and grappled with them personally. The people I interviewed for this book talked to me for hours, on and off the record, about Jackson. They spoke candidly about his flaws, his virtues, his habits, his struggles. But none gave any indication of the Michael Jackson portrayed in Leaving Neverland. I say that, not as conclusive proof of his innocence but simply to represent the perspectives of my sources.

Given my area of focus – Jackson’s creative work – this book will not attempt to render a verdict on the accusations, for the reader. However, chapter 5 offers an account of the 1993 allegations, since they are contextually important for the HIStory album. The 2005 Trial, in which Jackson was acquitted, is likewise covered in the epilogue.

Whatever one concludes about his personal life, Jackson’s Art will live on, like the work of countless other controversial icons, from... to ... How he is viewed , at least for the foreseeable future, will vary widely from person to person, culture to culture, and, perhaps generation to generation. As James Baldwin observed in 1985, very few figures in modern history have attracted as much polarizing attention. For more than half a century, Jackson has been a lightning rod for questions about: race, gender, sexuality, innocence, guilt, truth, deception, media, fame, childhood, identity, capitalism, Art, and genius . It is a complicated legacy that will, no doubt, take many more books to begin to unpack.

Man In The Music is a historical account of his music and how people have responded to it . It is the story of how a young black boy from Gary, Indiana, honed his craft in a cramped living room, in the wings of stages, in the studios of Motown, and went on to become one of the most influential artists of all times. “

— Joseph Vogel, 2019.

PS. From my point of view, up to the point I’ve read, it’s even better than the first version ! I copied part of the PREFACE TO THE 2019 VINTAGE EDITION. No inappropriate intentions at all on this, but the promotion as a clarifying point for the fans who are in doubt of its value . — Nora Moya .

[houseofvans]

SKETCHY BEHAVIORS | INTERVIEW WITH NICOLE MOMANEY 

Through beautifully depicted and realistically rendered images of flora and fauna, LA based artist Nicole Momaney’s paintings are both dark, peaceful and highly symbolic. Interested in ideas of death and transformation, Nicole’s paintings are meditations on death and dying, and through her process of creating this art does it become not an idea to be feared or avoided, but rather something that is natural, approachable and beautiful. With works in La Luz de Jesus’s 33rd annual group show, Laluzapalooza, opening Friday, March 1st, Nicole is busy busy, so we’re excited to catch up with her to talk more about her art and process.

Take the leap! 

Photographs courtesy of the artist.

Introduce yourself.  My name is Nicole Momaney.  I work under the name Spirited Animals as a painter in the lovely city of Los Angeles in a rad studio space called Bill’s Bar with several other artists.

What’s your background as an artist? Were you self taught or did you attend an art school? I went to school for Illustration at MassArt in Boston.

How would you describe your work to someone who isn’t familiar with it? What would you say your art is about? Or rather what topics and themes do your works tend to touch upon? I’d describe my work as a little dark and highly symbolic.  Everything I paint is based on reality, mainly flora and fauna, that I reconstruct/reorient in ways to drive home the meaning of the painting.  Most of my artwork deals with death and transformation.  I feel that culturally the western world has essentially swept death under the rug.  This is, of course, a privilege many other people in the world don’t have, but it comes at a great price that directly feeds our disconnection to the natural world and encourages insane levels of fear based thinking.  We don’t openly grieve.  We barely discuss it.  We have neat little gatherings where hardly anyone cries, and we make perfectly curated speeches about our loved ones that may or may not reflect the reality of who they were.  And then we are buried under the ground in a box where, rather than feeding the milieu and cultivating new life, we quietly decompose, completely separated from the place we came from. (I am speaking generally here of course, I recognize there are exceptions.) Through it all, there is this shadow lurking in the corner waiting for you to acknowledge its hand in the situation, and even honor it, because someday that hand is going to touch you, too. Most of my paintings are my way of trying to come to terms with this and meet death in a place that I find approachable and beautiful in a sense.  

What do you think made you gravitate toward painting as a medium? What about painting do you enjoy overall perhaps other mediums? Maybe the paint chose me? Hahaha.  I guess for me color is HUGE.  I love color and paint is the ideal way to express that.  I also really enjoy linework but in the context of a rendered image.  Nothing makes me happier than taking that tiny 0 round brush and adding the final flowing detail lines to an image.  It’s seriously my happy place.  Lana Del Rey, Cadmium Red Light and a 0 round brush...heaven.

Is there a medium you’ve yet to try and you’d love to one day explore? Tattooing actually!  I love the idea of the body as canvas and marking it with something permanent. The entire process is very alchemical/ritualistic to me.  I love getting tattooed and am really into the idea of experiencing the other end of that exchange.

When you’re working on a new piece, what’s the process like for you? Do you work from sketches or models or various references? My process starts out a bit scattered. Sometimes I have a particular animal or plant that has a connection to my personal mythology I’d like to explore. Other times I’ll have a specific idea in mind and will research flora and fauna that appropriately supports the concept symbolically.  

I then source images and do a bit of digital collage and painting.  This is how I create the initial image.  I then transfer that image onto canvas and start painting.  Sometimes the finished painting will look almost exactly like the digital, sometimes I’ll make tons of changes during the actual painting process.

In your studio or creative area, what type of things do you keep around to inspire you or keep you motivated? Currently I have a nautilus shell, a beautiful emerald green scarab I found, a few crystals, a mini taxidermied leather elk, a deer leg and my Tibetan prayer flags I got in the Himalayas.  I’m also lucky enough to be surrounded by other artists and their work which is energetically inspiring.  I worked alone in my room for years and years.  Having a studio space with other people has been awesome.

What’s your best art tip you can share with folks? Best art tip - if it isn’t working don’t force it.  Don’t be afraid to change something.  

What kind of advice would you give someone who is interested in becoming an artist? I’d say do whatever you can to put yourself in a place where you’re doing something artistic as much as possible. I can’t overstate that the more you put in the more you’ll get out. For me that meant making a lot of sacrifices and opting out of a lot of comfortable situations.  Art is uncomfortable.  Growth in general is uncomfortable really, so art is fantastic for people who want to continually grow and push themselves.  

When you’re not making art, what else do you do that you find creatively satisfying? Or how do you just like to spend your quiet time? I love hiking.  Spending time in nature, particularly the mountains, is essential to staying balanced for me. It’s like a recharge. I also love going out and supporting my friends in their creative endeavors–music, art, food, drink etc.

What are you constantly inspired by? And who are some of your early and current art influences? I’m forever and always inspired by nature.  Early art influences (and still very relevant to me): Mark Ryden, Odd Nerdrum, Dave McKean, Joe Sorren, Walton Ford. Current influences: Allison Summers, Lauren Marx, Martin Wittfooth, Elizabeth McGrath, Tiffany Bozic, Adrian Baxter, Aaron Horkey...tons more

Who would you love to see interviewed for our next Art School? That’s a tough question!  Keep it coming with the ladies though.  It’s awesome to see so many women being recognized and lauded in the art scene now.  

What are your FAVORITE Vans? Definitely slip-ons.  I lived in checkerboard slip-ons for years.

What do you have coming up that you can share? I'm showing paintings at Laluzapalooza at La Luz de Jesus opening this Friday 3/1 from 8-11 pm. I have a few paintings I’m working on for upcoming shows in 2019. So keep posted!  

FOLLOW NICOLE | INSTAGRAM | ETSY

[pengychan]

[Coco] The Bedside Ghost, Ch. 8

Title: The Bedside Ghost Summary: The bell falls but, instead of waking up in the Land of the Dead, Ernesto de la Cruz finds himself with a broken spine - and an unwanted guest at his bedside who claims he can let him have the sweet release of death, if he gives back what he took from him… Characters: Ernesto de la Cruz, Coco Rivera, Héctor Rivera, Julio Rivera, Imelda Rivera. Rating: T Status: in progress [This is the fic’s tag for all chapters up.]

[Also on Ao3]

A/N: I mean, we all knew this realization was coming. (Also there is art of a scene in chapter 3 look at this guys look I love it)

***

When her papá comes home, Coco is asleep on the windowsill.

She snuck to the window in the middle of the night, as she does most nights, to wait for her papá. She doesn’t know how much time she’s spent straining her eyes in the dark, hoping to see him suddenly step out of the shadows and under the light of the moon, smiling, with the guitar in his hands to sing her their secret song. She often hums it very quietly as she stares out of the window, hoping that it will bring him home.

But it never did so far and always, without fail, she falls asleep well before dawn despite her best efforts to stay awake. Always, she awakens in the morning in her mother’s bed, in her embrace. And each time, her mother doesn’t say a word - like she hasn’t found her asleep at the window, and taken her to bed. She will comfort her, but never talk about it.

Coco suspects it hurts her mamá even more than it hurts her, but she doesn’t know how to help. All that she knows is that everything will be better when papá comes home, so she keeps waiting by the window - and this time, she doesn’t awaken in her mamá bed. When her eyes snap open she’s still there, the world outside still dark, and the door is rattling. She almost shrieks, but then a voice rings out on the other side, and it’s a voice she knows.

“Coco, plase! I’m so sorry! I wanted to come back!”

“Papá!”

There is joy, but there’s also fear. Her papá is crying out, his voice thin and frightened, like he’s trying to get away from something dangerous out there in the dark. She can’t see him from the window, can’t see anything, and the door rattles again. He’s trying to get in and can’t, he’s locked outside and calling out for her to let him in.

“Coco! Let me come home!”

She tries to open the door to let her papá in, but she can’t: she’s too small and the door’s handle is too high up, it shakes and rattles just above her reach. “I can’t reach!” she cries out, and turns to grab a chair to climb on, or call for her mamá and her uncles, or both - but the room is gone, the house is gone, and around her there is nothing but darkness.

She takes a step back, shrieking for her papá to come in, come in right now, and that is when the door stops rattling… and finally, slowly, creaks open.

Moonlight spills on her, and there is a moment of relief, the simple certainty that all is going to be well - but when she turns, it’s not her papá she sees. Before her face, there is a grinning skull with a golden tooth; it takes her a moment to recognize it as his guitar.

But her papá is not the one holding it. She can only see his shadow, but it’s slightly too short and much too broad. She knows who it belongs to. “… Tío Neto? Where’s papá?”

A few moments of silence, and then Ernesto de la Cruz - who’s not really her tío but may very well be, her papá always said he’s his hermano in all but blood - sinks on one knee, one hand still holding the guitar. With the other, he’s handing her a songbook with a red cover that seems to be dripping color, turning his hand just as red.

“He’s never coming home, Coco. Take this back.”

She doesn’t want that dripping songbook, she wants her papá and she wants to scream as much, but words stay stuck in her throat. In the end, she just starts crying.

“You took our song,” she chokes out.

“Lo siento.”

“I want him back. Where is he?”

Ernesto bows his head, and says nothing. Something red drips from his hands and from the eyes of the skull guitar, like it’s weeping along with her. Somewhere outside a train whistles, pulling into the station, and Coco knows that her papá is not on it.

***

“What do you mean, there will be no trains?”

To be entirely fair, Imelda hadn’t meant to shout. Not so loud, at least; she was perfectly aware that the little man before her, overseeing a small station in the vast middle of nowhere, had no more power to get trains moving than she did.

But she had travelled through most of the day to get there, and was supposed to catch her connection, a night train to Mexico City. Only that everything had been delayed, over and over, and now - in the middle of the night - they were telling her that was apparently no train was going to show up at all.

It had proved to be too much for her patience, which was already wearing thin. She was tired to the bone and was stuck there, with no idea how long it would take to get to her destination - all while being entirely cut off from both Coco and the rest of her family. Jesus Christ himself could have descended from heaven in a cloud of light and glory to explain her what was wrong with the trains, and would have received the same amount of shouting.

“Señora, please. We are doing our best to resolve the situation,” the man, whose name was indeed Jesus, was explaining. “A tree fell on the tracks, and a railroad switch has been damaged. It needs to be repaired, and no trains can run until then. The technicians will keep us updated - they hope trains can resume running by morning.”

That’s not good enough, Imelda wanted to say. By morning she was supposed to be in Mexico City already, not still halfway… but even if she said as much, it would change precisely nothing. So she breathed in, and forced herself to calm down.

“I understand. How long would the train ride to Mexico City be?”

“That depends on the route. A direct train would take no more than three hours, but…”

“But the first trains will have to pick up passengers from other affected stations on the way.”

“Precisely. That means there will almost certainly be diversions. It’s unlikely we’ll have any direct trains again until tomorrow afternoon, so a morning train would likely still get you there earlier. I am truly sorry about this. Do you have urgent business in Mexico City?”

The most urgent that there could be, Imelda thought, but didn’t say as much aloud. “I see. I’ll wait here and get on the first train.”

“At the station? That may not be ideal for a woman travelling alone. There is an inn, not far–”

“I want to be on the very first train to Mexico City that runs through this station. I will wait here,” Imelda cut him off, and went back to the waiting room. There were a few more passengers who had decided to do the same, but not that many: most had probably checked into the inn for the night. Imelda found a seat at the far end of the room that put some distance between her and everyone else, put down her suitcase, and opened it.

Rosita had packed her something to eat, muttering that she wished she’d had more forewarning to make her a proper meal for the journey. Imelda hadn’t touched any yet, but that seemed the right moment. There was bread, some cold cuts, hard cheese and fruit; more than enough to see her through until she reached her destination. Still, when she reached for the food, her eye fell on something else entirely, causing her hand to still.

Amongst her spare clothes, there was a shoe with button eyes: the bizarre doll her brothers  had made for Victoria. She must have slipped it in her luggage while she wasn’t looking.

She never goes to bed without it. How is she sleeping now?

The thought brought back a memory, little Coco trying to stay awake to wait for her father, and suddenly she wasn’t hungry anymore. Imelda found herself unable to put the doll back in her suitcase; she just stared at it, wishing to go home and waiting for the next train to bring her further away from it. 

She hated having to wait, but at the moment it was all she could do.

***

“There is nothing else we can do, is there?”

Doctor Rojas shook his head with a sigh, his expression grim, as he kept putting his instruments back in his bag after cleaning each of them with rubbing alcohol. On the table, the basin full of hot water was still steaming weakly. The water itself was tinged with blood.

“I took away as much infected tissue as I could see. I am afraid there is little else that can be done, other than keeping him comfortable,” he said. “He won’t feel pain, at least.”

Griselda nodded, and her gaze paused on blood-stained towels. “The ulcer on his elbow–”

“It is likely where it started, yes,” the doctor replied, and heaved out a long sigh before turning. In the harsh sunlight that had begun creeping in through the window, he looked almost as tired as she felt. “If he were in better health I would probably suggest we proceed with amputation - but now, in all conscience, I cannot do it. I fear the infection is already in his bloodstream, and that would render it useless - or worse. Surgery itself could kill him.”

“If there is a chance, isn’t it your duty–”

“He is very weak, Griselda. I was almost expecting his heart to give out the moment I gave him the first injection. God forgive me, part of me hoped it would. I fear we’ve reached the point when fighting a lost battle to keep him alive is no longer a humane thing to do.”

There were a few moments of silence, then Griselda slowly nodded. It was nothing she hadn’t expected to hear, after all. She looked down at Ernesto de la Cruz, still unconscious but no longer crying out. Doctor Rojas had injected him with some anaesthetic to help him rest, as well as a mixture of drugs and antibiotics that Griselda had never thought she’d see used on anything short of a horse. Much of what had followed had been grim, and it had been a relief when she had bandaged his ulcers again, hiding them from sight.

He was resting on his back again, on clean sheets, with an oxygen mask firmly over his mouth and nose and another IV needle in his arm. Griselda reached to brush his hair off his forehead. He was still warm, but not enough for her to recoil. “The fever has gone down.”

“It is a temporary relief. I have little hope that these antibiotics will be more effective than what he’s been having so far, in the long run,” doctor Rojas said, and closed his bag with a loud clack. “Either way, I will leave you some bottles and a prescription. I have done all that I could possibly do, Griselda, and perhaps more than I should have. My suggestion is that you let it run its course. If he wishes to be brought outside, allow it whatever his condition may be. Let him enjoy what he can. You will know the end is nearing when–”

“I know what will happen,” Griselda cut him off, her voice tight. A memory emerged from the back of her mind, one of her own brothers sweating and trembling as his skin went clammy and cold, gasping that it had been all his fault, that he should have let them cut off his leg.

Jorge had died without getting to see a priest, but he was a good man, had always been a good man; perhaps sisterly love had blinded her to some of his flaws but the fact stayed that, even without the last rites, Griselda had never feared for the fate of his soul.

For the restless soul before her, things were very different. “I’ll have Padre Fernando come in for the last rites. Will he be able to speak?” she asked. She knew a priest could give absolution to an unconscious man, too - she’d seen it happen countless times - but would it be enough to absolve him of murder without a proper confession? She feared it wouldn’t.

“He should be, yes. Give him some time to awaken, first. He’ll be confused for a while.”

That was all she needed to know, at the moment. Griselda thanked doctor Rojas for all of his help and watched him leave the room for the last time before she sat again by de la Cruz’s bed. She placed a cold compress on his forehead, adjusted the pillow beneath his head, and waited in silence for him to wake up.

***

For a long time after awakening Coco sat by the window and stared at the bustling street outside, so very different from the darkness in her dream.

It was far from the first time she dreamed of waiting for her father at the window, as she had when she was a little girl and still hoped to see him walking through the door again. And sometimes, in the dream, he did return; then there would be smiles, her mother’s the brightest of all, the biggest hug, and music. It was a happy dream, most times, if painful upon awakening - but that night, it had turned into a nightmare the light of day couldn’t shake off.

She couldn’t remember all details, but what she did recall clung to her. Perhaps leaving the room and going out for a walk would help, but she dared not do so. There was a phone on the small table by her bed, a marvel that surpassed even the luxury of hot running water in the bathroom, and she’d been told that any call for her would be put through from the lobby.

Someone could call any moment with information about her papá’s whereabouts; she couldn’t bear the thought of missing that call, even though of course they would leave a message for her. Her father’s return home had been delayed enough as things were.

After about a hour’s wait, Coco had dared make one call to Santa Cecilia to leave another message for her family - a very short one, because she didn’t want to hold the line for too long. She’d told Paula that she was well, that she sent everyone her love, and that she would be back soon - again. Then she had put the phone down, and the wait continued.

Having nothing to do was the hardest part of it all. She wasn’t used to staying idle and, most of all, she had nothing to distract herself from her own thoughts and the nebulous memories of the dream that had plagued her night. A hour passed, then two and three; as lunch time approached, she began fearing that perhaps they had called just as she was calling the inn in Santa Cecilia. Maybe they had left a message. Maybe she should go downstairs and ask.

Or maybe she was simply being paranoid, and too impatient. Isabella had been eager to help and had said she would do her best to get the records found as soon as possible, but that didn’t mean she could work miracles. It may very well take another day, or maybe two, or three or even a week, before anything concerning her papá could be found in the archive.

And you can’t stress out like this for a week, a voice that sounded much like Rosita’s chided her from the back of her mind. You didn’t even finish your breakfast. This isn’t good for you. Or your baby, if there is one.

The thought caused Coco to bite her lower lip, and reach to rest a hand on her stomach. The more she thought about it, the more certain she became that she was, indeed, with child. Looking back and counting the days, she could very well be in her tenth week or even further along… and she hadn’t told her family yet. She hadn’t told her husband yet.

It would serve no purpose but to make the worry at the moment, she told herself, and she knew it was true: Julio especially may downright panic if he knew. But at the same time, keeping it to herself made her feel more alone than she ever had before. Perhaps she should see a doctor right away, really. If she asked in the lobby where she could find–

A sudden, loud ringing noise caused her to recoil. It was a harsh and unpleasant sound, and it took her a moment to realize that it had come from the phone. Coco rose quickly, almost stumbling on her way to it - one of her legs felt numb, served her right for folding it beneath her - and grabbed the receiver before it could ring a third time. “Yes?”

The voice on the other side was wonderfully familiar, and the one she’d most wished to hear, aside perhaps from that of her daughter. And her husband. And her mother.

“Socorro, dear, is that you? It’s Isabella. We believe we have found his folder. It matches what you said, but we need you to confirm it for us. How soon can you make it here…?”

***

“Padre Fernando will be here soon, señor de la Cruz. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

Griselda waited in silence as he stared at her for a few moments and then, slowly, tilted his head in what she supposed was an attempt at a nod. He was still slow on the uptake, but he seemed to understand what was going on.

“Can you talk, señor?”

He swallowed. “Yes,” he rasped. “Water.”

She poured some water from the pitcher, and held up his head to help him drink. Even so, it took the better part of a minute and some water spilled. Griselda settled his head back on the pillow and put the glass down; she was about to speak again, but he got there first. He seemed slightly more aware, more alert, his gaze no longer as clouded.

“What happened?”

“You became sick last night,” Griselda said, reaching for a tissue. I feared you’d die in my arms, she thought, but didn’t say as much aloud. “Very sick. Don’t you remember?”

He seemed to think if over for a few instants. “Heath,” he finally mumbled. “I remember I was burning. It thought I was in Hell. Wasn’t too far off, I guess.”

Griselda barely restrained from crossing herself. “You had very high fever. It has gone down some now. Doctor Rojas was here, to give you some more antibiotics and–”

“And now you have called a priest,” he cut her off. “It’s almost… almost over, isn’t it?”

There was a pleading quality to his voice that made Griselda’s heart clench. She nodded as she wiped his chin dry with the tissue, avoiding his gaze.

Fighting a lost battle to keep him alive is no longer a humane thing to do.

“Sí, señor. It’s almost over.”

“Not yet, though. We both go home, or neither does. Héctor told me.”

It was far from a cold day, but Griselda found herself shivering all the same, wondering what nightmares had ravaged his mind before doctor Rojas had given him an injection to let him rest. Part of her wanted to ask, but she found she didn’t quite wish to know. “Regardless, you have little time. With everything else settled, you need to worry about your soul.”

“Why? You’re doing such a good job on my behalf,” he muttered, and gave a weak grin at the unimpressed look that gained him. “I will see the priest, if it’s so important to you.”

“It is. Will you confess–”

“I like priests. I fucked one, once. And a nun. Not at the same time, though.”

“… Are you trying to get a rise out of me just now?”

There was a rasping sound that might have been a laugh. In a way, it was a relief. “Maybe,” de la Cruz said, then, “I’ll confess what I see fit. The secret of confession and all that.”

Fair enough, Griselda supposed. It was not up to her to question what he would or would not confess. She would get him a priest; the rest was up to him. “Of course. I didn’t mean to pry.”

El señor de la Cruz closed his eyes, and let out a long sigh. “I’d really rather sleep,” he murmured, and he did sound dreadfully tired. It stirred some pity in her chest, and Griselda reached to brush back his hair. She glanced towards the drugs she used to help him sleep.

“After your last rites,” she promised, and was about to ask him if he wished her to close the window when he opened his eyes again and spoke.

“There is something I need you to do. Once I’m gone, if… if I’m allowed to go.”

“You told me already, señor. The tapes–”

“No, not those,” he cut her off, and swallowed a couple of times before speaking again. When he did, his voice was little above a whisper and his gaze was fixed someplace above her left shoulder, as though he was looking behind her rather than at her. “It’s about a guitar.”

***

“What do you mean, she has left??”

This time, at least, Imelda had fully meant to shout. She felt as though she would explode otherwise, all of the worry and frustration and exhaustion that had been building up suddenly too much for her to handle. The journey to Mexico City had been hell, the cab ride to the mansion - thank God everyone and their dog seemed to know where it was - vomit-inducing, but she could have dealt with all of that. She had.

What she could not deal with was a weasel of a man looking at her through the gate, refusing to let her in and telling her that her daughter was not there anymore.

“Señora, please,” the man said, holding up his hands. It would only occur to Imelda later that her reaction may not have been the kind that would make him want to open the gate between them. “I’m telling you, she took a cab two days ago and–”

“A cab to where?”

“I don’t know! Maybe el señor de la Cruz–”

“El señor de la Cruz will tell me himself, then,” Imelda spat, anger threatening to choke her.

It was a curse, wasn’t it? Forget music, he was her problem. Had that man taken it upon himself to break her family apart? First he’d taken her husband away from Santa Cecilia, filling his head with childish dreams if glory, and now she’d lured her daughter away, too, with the nebulous promise of news about her good for nothing father.

I should have slammed the door in his face when he first suggested that tour of Mexico. I should have burned that letter when I received it.

“Señora Rivera–”

“El señor de la Cruz will see me now, ” Imelda cut him off, gripping the metal bars of the gate so tightly her knuckles turned white. “Open this gate, and–”

“Juan? Who is it?” a woman’s voice rang out. Imelda tore her gaze away from the man - who, unbeknownst to her, let out a long sigh of relief - to turn towards its source.

Two were people walking away from the mansion and up to the gate: a tall, imposing woman who had to be well in her sixties, and a priest who was maybe a few years older than that.

For several moments Imelda could only stare in silence, her eyes fixed on the priest, on his grim expression, on the small suitcase he was carrying. She had seen priests with that same look on their face and a similar suitcase leaving dying men’s homes before, after giving them their last rites. Realization hit her like a bucket of cold water and caused her anger to sputter out, replaced by a sense of sudden incredulity.

“Ernesto,” she found herself saying numbly. She had known that he wasn’t well - he’d hinted as much in his letter - but somehow she hadn’t thought for a moment that the situation could be that desperate; she hadn’t thought she would arrive to find him at death’s door.

It felt wrong on a fundamental level to imagine him on his deathbed, even though she knew what a dreadful accident he’d had and how many years had passed. In her memory he was still twenty-five, eager to travel Mexico to play for crowds, full of bluster and bull-headed optimism that never failed to rub off Héctor - and that sometimes, just sometimes, she had even found somewhat amusing herself. But now he was dying, or already dead.

The thought made her feel sick; she had never wished him ill. Not that much, at least.

“Señora? Can we help?” the woman asked, a concerned frown on her face.

“Ernesto,” Imelda repeated, finally tearing her gaze away from the priest. “Is he… did he…?”

The woman shook her head. “No, not yet. He’s sleeping now, though, so I’m afraid he won’t be able to see anyone for a few more hours,” she said, and gestured for the man - Juan - to open the gate. “May I ask…?”

“My name is Imelda Rivera. He wrote to me about a month ago.”

The woman’s expression lit up in recognition. “Oh! You must be Coco’s mother,” she said, and some of the numbness faded away, replaced by a sort of relief. Maybe she would know where her daughter was, after all. “I’m Griselda Lopez. I’m truly sorry you were faced with such grim news as soon as you arrived,” she added, and tilted her head towards the priest. “This is Padre Fernando.”

“My pleasure,” he said, and Imelda acknowledged him with a polite nod before turning her attention back to Griselda.

“I came looking for my daughter,” she said, trying to keep her voice as calm as possible, and her eyes darted to Juan, who flinched. “He told me she has left, but she never said she was coming home, either. Do you have any idea…?”

“Oh, yes. She’s still in Mexico City, but she had to stay in a hotel, for…” the woman paused, and Imelda could see the hesitation crossing her features before she spoke again. “I am certain she’ll be more than happy to explain you everything,” she finally said, and gestured for Juan to leave.

She waited for him to be on his way back towards the mansion before she poke again, and that told Imelda that whatever she was about to say, she didn’t want anyone but herself and the priest to hear. And was it her, or did that Griselda keep glancing at the priest, as though she was trying to guess something from his expression alone?

Unaware of her quizzical glance, or  perhaps all too aware of it, Griselda spoke again. “I have called a cab to bring Padre Fernando back to the city. I am certain he’ll have no objections if you take advantage - it is all paid for,” she added, and Padre Fernando smiled.

“I don’t mind at all. I would like some company on the way back. Giving a man his last rites is always rather taxing on one’s heart.”

Imelda bit her lower lip. Part of her still wanted to march inside and demand explanations right away, but she was willing to hold her tongue and wait another while if that meant she would be able to see Coco soon, and ask what in the world was going on to her directly.

Plus, she found she didn’t want to see Ernesto, or whatever had become of the man she’d known, on his deathbed.

“I believe I will take you up on that offer, thank you,” she said, and glanced towards the mansion. It was in the middle of a large garden, and white as marble; it made her think more of a mausoleum than a home. Fitting, for a dying man. “… I had no idea he was that sick.”

That caused Padre Fernando’s smile to fade. “His suffering is almost over. I find some comfort in thinking about it this way.”

“Of course,” Imelda said, and turned away from the mansion, trying to ignore the stab of pity. Perhaps she was supposed to say something, leave a message for him when he woke up - if he did wake up. But she could think of nothing to say; too many years had passed since they had been… not friends, never quite friends, but close enough acquaintances. Too many years, over half their lives, and Héctor was no longer there to bind them in any way.

There was nothing she could do to help him, anyway. Best to leave him in peace. All that she could do - all that she should focus on - was finding Coco and bringing her home. So she said little more until the cab arrived, until she climbed on it and told the driver the name of the hotel where, according to Griselda, Coco was staying.

As the cab pulled away she did not look back, not expecting to see that mansion again - much less to set foot in it.

Then again, she expected nothing of what was about to hit her.

***

“Sit down, dear, sit. It’s dreadfully hot outside, isn’t it? Have some water.”

Coco smiled, agreed that it was unseasonably warm, and had a few gulps of water - but all of it felt forced, like someone else was pulling the strings to make her go through the motions. It had taken the cab forty minutes to get Coco to her destination - the longest, most agonizing forty minutes she had ever lived through. She had waited for her father her entire life, and now that the end was so close time seemed to stretch on and on.

“Eduardo wanted to start searching on Wednesday, that lazy bum, but he owes me a favor or two and that got him going. I’m sure that he’s nowhere as busy as he claims he is all the time. And this dust allergy of his that comes and goes - excuses, excuses, excuses,” Isabella was muttering, searching through her desk drawers. If they were as messy as the rest of her office was, it was no wonder she had trouble finding what she was looking for.

That thought, and her words, got a small smile out of Coco despite the tightness in her stomach. “Muchas gracias,” she said. “It means a lot to me.”

“Oh, it was nothing,” Isabella replied. “It doesn’t say where he was buried, but - oh, no, dear, it is all right!” she said quickly, clearly noticing the dismay on her face. “There is a reference number. It might take some time to dig out the old register and find out what the matching lot is, but it can be done. It will be done as quickly as possible, if you confirm this is him,” she added, and finally put something in front of her - a yellowish folder, stained by humidity and still smelling like dust. Coco faintly wondered how much longer it would have taken for it and its contents to be eaten away by rats and mould, and the thought made her nauseous.

But it’s here. I have it. I made it on time, she thought, and she forced herself to ignore the insidious fear that perhaps they got the wrong folder, or maybe something had happened to that register. Rats, mould, perhaps a fire, any kind of damage to make it unreadable–

No. Don’t. It will be all right. It must be.

“You can open it, dear,” Isabella spoke, her voice gentle, and Coco recoiled. She hadn’t realized she’d been staring down at the  folder for several moments in complete silence.

“Oh. I… my apologies,” Coco said quickly, and reached to take the folder with shaky hands.

“No need to apologize, this must be very stressful for you. Take your time. I am afraid you cannot take it away - it is for identification purposes, you understand - but you can look all you want while here. A couple of pictures there may not be very pleasant to look at, I fear.”

“I understand,” Coco said, marveling at how firm her voice sounded despite everything. She drew in a deep breath and opened the folder, expecting to see a dead body.

Her papá smiled at her. For a moment everything stilled, and Coco forgot how to breathe.

The face looking up at her wasn’t that of a corpse: Héctor Rivera, aged twenty-one, was giving her that boyish grin of his she had never forgotten. He looked so much like her in that photo, with the same smile and cheekbones… and he was so, so young. It struck ever even harder than it ever had before that he’d been little more than a boy.

“This photo…” she whispered, her throat tight. Her fingers reached to stroke its surface, tracing his features, and she almost feared her touch alone would make it crumble to dust.

“It was found on him,” Isabella said, very gently, and refilled her glass with some more water. “It is him, isn’t it?” she asked. Coco nodded, unable to force out any words.

“We should be able to release that photo to you, once the formalities are all taken care of.”

With another nod, Coco put down the photograph - it took an effort, it truly did - and looked at the next sheet in the folder. There was an inventory of what the body had been found with, which wasn’t much. A salmon-colored charro suit, as she’d known; a few pesos in his pockets, as well as a photo of himself in the breast pocket… and that was all, or almost.

An empty bottle of tequila, resting in the crook of his right arm.

Coco paused, and read the sentence again - first with a sort of numbness, and then with growing confusion. That didn’t make any sense; Ernesto had said that her papá had felt sick on the way to the station, collapsed, and died within minutes. He’d said that he’d taken his songbook and guitar, and left. Why would her father have a bottle on him when found?

And why was his suitcase not mentioned anywhere in the list? Surely he must have had one with him, if he was about to travel home. Had Ernesto taken the entire suitcase, too, along with the songbook and guitar? It was possible, she supposed, but something about that scenario felt wrong… though not as wrong as that bottle. It didn’t fit Ernesto’s tale at all.

“Dear, is everything well? Do drink something, you’re so pale…!”

Isabella’s voice sounded distant, her words inconsequential. Heart beating somewhere in her throat, Coco turned the page with hands that were surprisingly firm - and found herself looking at two more pictures, taken from different angles: her father’s body, as it had been found the following morning. The photographs were old and slightly grainy, but she did recognize him; he looked like he was sleeping, slumped against an old brick wall, with his head head bent over his shoulder.

And sure enough, there was a bottle tucked in the crook of his arm that had no reason to be there. It looked wrong; it looked staged. But why….?

For the songs. They made me famous. It was all I had ever wanted.

“Señora Rivera? Socorro? Ay, are you all right? Do you need–?”

Whatever she said next, Coco did not hear. The world around her seemed to spin, and that photograph was all she could see clearly. On its own, it showed a travelling musician who had drunk himself into unconsciousness and death. With what she knew now - with what Ernesto had told her - it gave a different story. With the mind’s eye she saw her father’s best friend, his hermano, propping his body up against a wall and placing the empty bottle on him before running away into the dark, with his guitar and songbook, like a thief. Like a murderer.

He never made it, but he always meant to go back home.

With the songbook. He’d tried to return home with his songbook, with their song, and Ernesto wouldn’t let it happen. He hadn’t let it happen. Was that why he’d been so sure she was in danger over that accursed thing, that his manager would go as far as harming her? Because he, too, had stolen a life to keep it? How had her father really died, so suddenly, so young?

No, Coco thought desperately, no. She was going loca, it couldn’t be.They’d been children together; they had gotten into all sort of mischief, grown up, played, drank, sung together. Ernesto had been her papá’s best man at the wedding, the one he had chosen as her godfather, who had told her all those stories about him. He’d wept with her for him, tried to fix what he’d done. He may have stolen his songs, but not his life. He would have never…!

“I know how far a man can go when he thinks he stands to lose everything,” he’d said.

“Even a rat becomes dangerous when cornered,” he’d said.

Nausea hit her like a physical blow, and she felt bile rising in her throat. Coco let go of the folder as though it had caught fire and tried to stand, to walk away, to get outside and breathe in some air, but she never managed to take more than a few steps.

The world around her spun, her insides clenched, and her knees hit the floor before Isabella could get to her. Bile burned her throat and mouth, her eyes watered, and the room became dark - almost as dark as in her dream, when Ernesto had loomed over her.

In the darkness she hadn’t seen his face but, she now remembered, she had seen his hands - holding her papá’s songbook and guitar, and dripping with blood.

***

“What do you mean, she’s not here?”

“It means what I said, señora. The only Rivera we have had as our guest in the past month is Diego Rivera, and I am fairly sure he’s not your daughter,” the clerk added, so haughtily that it took all of Imelda’s willpower not to take off her boot and give him a lesson he wouldn’t ever forget. “Now please, lower your voice before I–”

Whatever he threatened next - call the security, most likely - was entirely lost to Imelda. She didn’t care how fancy that hotel was and how superior that clerk thought he may be: that was the place where she had been told Coco was staying, so she had to be there - and if not, they must have some idea of where she may be now.

She didn’t care if that man decided to call the army on her: she was not leaving that lobby without an answer, and she was not leaving that city without Coco. What would she even tell to Victoria and Julio if she returned alone, with no clue as to where–

Wait. Julio.

“… Would be quite a regrettable incident for this establishment, so I will once again–”

“Martinez,” Imelda muttered, caused the man to pause and blink.

“Excuse me?”

“She’s married. Socorro Rivera-Martinez,” she said, and stared at the man in the eye. “She may be under her husband’s name. Did a Socorro Martinez check in in the past two days?”

The clerk blinked, taken aback, then his gaze brightened as though something in his mind had just clicked. “Oh! Yes, now that you mention it, there is a Señora Martinez… let me see…” he mumbled, and went to check the booking. His demeanor changed so quickly it was almost unreal. “Yes, indeed. Socorro Marinez - she’s staying in room 217.”

“Good. I’ll be going upstairs.”

“She’s not in - she asked us to call a cab for her earlier today. B-But she will return!” the clerk added quickly after Imelda gave him one, long look. “She didn’t take her luggage, did not check out… she might be back shortly. Perhaps you’d like to wait in the lounge, or–”

“… Mamá?”

For a moment, Imelda didn’t register the voice coming from behind her as her daughter’s. Coco was a woman, approaching her thirtieth birthday; her voice was softer than her own, her tone gentler, but she certainly didn’t sound like a scared young girl. Not anymore.

Mamá… is papá ever coming home?

Imelda’s stomach sank, and she turned slowly, barely registering the look of alarm on the clerk’s face. Coco was standing only a few steps away, and she looked ill. Her skin was ashen gray with red blotches, her eyes puffy, her lower lip trembling; when she blinked, tears spilled down her cheeks. Imelda had never seen her in such a state, and it caused her anger to vanish, her worry to turn into something closer to terror. Within a second she regretted all of the sharp words she had uttered when they had last spoken, every minute of cold silence.

“Coco,” she called out, dropping her small suitcase and taking a few quick steps forward. “What happened? What’s wrong, mija?”

She reached out to press a hand on her forehead and see if she had fever, but Coco moved first. She threw herself at her like she hadn’t since she was only a little girl with scraped-up knees, buried her face against her shoulder, and let out a gut-wrenching cry of grief. For a time she just kept sobbing, unable to utter a single word, and Imelda could only hold her tight, mind reeling with questions she couldn’t ask - not yet, not until she’d calmed down.

But even amongst that confusion there was one certainty, solid as stone: her daughter needed her, and she was exactly where she was meant to be.

***

[Back to Chapter 7]

[On to Chapter 9]

[pamphletstoinspire]

The Church's Year - INSTRUCTION ON THE SIXTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

At the Introit of the Mass implore with great confidence the mercy of God in the words of Ps. LXXXV.:

INTROIT Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I have cried to thee all the day; for thou, O Lord, art sweet and mild, and plenteous in mercy to all that call upon thee.

Bow down thy ear to me, O Lord, and hear me, for I am needy and poor. Glory be to the Father, etc.

COLLECT Let Thy grace, we beseech Thee, O Lord, ever precede and follow us, and make us continually intent upon good works. Through etc.

EPISTLE (Ephes. III. 13-21) Brethren, I pray you not to faint at my tribulations for you, which are your glory. For this cause I bow my knees. to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom all paternity in heaven and earth is named, that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened by his Spirit with might unto the inward man, that Christ may dwell by faith in your hearts: that being rooted and founded in charity, you may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth, and length, and height, and depth:, to know also the charity of Christ, which surpasseth all knowledge, that you may be filled unto all the fulness of God. Now to him who is able to do all things more abundantly than we desire or understand, according to the power that worketh in us: to him be glory in the Church and in Christ Jesus, unto all generations, world without end. Amen.

EXPLANATION In the epistle of the following Sunday St. Paul tells us, that he was at the time of writing this letter in prison at Rome, whither he was brought' upon the false accusations of the Jews. From prison he wrote to the Ephesians, whom he had converted to Christianity, and who zealously obeyed his counsels, in order to confirm them in their zeal and to console them in their grief on account of his sufferings which he bore for Christ's sake. These sufferings which I bear, he writes, redound to your honor, since I, your spiritual father, am considered by God worthy to suffer like His Son; yes, I thank the Father of our Lord Jesus for it, and beg Him on my knees, that He vouchsafe to strengthen you with His Holy Spirit, so that you overcome, your evil inclinations and passions, cleanse your hearts more and more, and sanctify your souls, that if you live thus according to your faith, you may be made the habitations of Christ. He begs God also to. give them a well-grounded charity, which not only loves God on account of the reward, but also on account of our sufferings, thus to become like to Christ, the Crucified. By this constant love for Jesus, even in adversities, we only comprehend with the saints the greatness of the love of Jesus, the Crucified; its breadth, since all the members of His body, all the powers of His soul were tormented with all sorts of tortures, on account of the sins of all men; the length, since He had all these sufferings for thirty-three years before His eyes, and bore them in His soul; the depth, since these tortures surpassed in intensity all which men ever suffered or will suffer; the height, since Christ on the cross saw, with the most perfect knowledge, the malice of each single sin, and the terrible insult offered to the sublime Majesty of God, and He bore the punishment for them in Himself and did penance for them. Other holy Fathers say that by these words the w hole mystery of our, redemption is to be understood, and, indeed, the breadth thereof is, that it is for all men; the length, that it lasts for all centuries and reaches into eternity; the height, that its contemplation takes us away from earth and raises us to heaven; the depth, that it even penetrates. the kingdom of the dead. By contemplating these mysteries we learn to know the infinite love of God, to love Him more and more, and thus make ourselves partakers of His graces. - Obey the teaching of this holy apostle, contemplate the suffering Saviour and His love, endeavor to become like to Him by suffering, and when you see how the Church, her ministers, ,the bishops and priests, are persecuted and in tribulation, be not disheartened, but consider that the discipleship of Jesus consists particularly in suffering, that therefore, the Church and her ministers -must suffer, since their Head, Jesus, has suffered. The holy Church has borne the crown of thorns of Jesus for eighteen hundred years and drank from His chalice; but like Jesus, her Head, she will triumph over all her enemies, and whilst these are hastening to destruction, she will continually live victorious until the end of time and will triumph eternally in heaven.

GOSPEL (Luke XIV. 1-11.) At that time, When Jesus went into the house of one of the chiefs of the Pharisees on the Sabbath-day to eat bread, they watched him. And behold there was a certain man before him that had the dropsy. And Jesus answering, spoke to the lawyers and Pharisees, saying: Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath-day? But they held their peace: but he taking him, healed him, and sent him away. And answering them, he said: Which of you shall have an ass or an ox fall into, a pit, and, will not immediately draw him out on, the Sabbath-day? And they could not answer him to these things. And he spoke a parable also to them that were invited, marking how they chose the first seats at the table, saying to them When thou art invited to a wedding, sit not down in the first place, lest perhaps one more honorable than thou be invited by him; and he that invited thee and him come and say to thee: Give this man place: and then thou begin with shame to take the lowest place: But when thou art invited, go, sit down in the lowest place: that when he who invited thee cometh he may say to thee: Friend, go up higher. Then shalt thou have glory before them that sit at the table with thee; because every one that exalteth himself shall be humbled, and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.

Why did Jesus eat with the Pharisees?

To take occasion, as St. Cyril says, to instruct them that it is allowed to heal the sick on the Sabbath, and to show how those who give invitations to a supper, and those who are invited, should conduct themselves. The Pharisees' invitation to Jesus was not actuated by kindness, but by the desire to find something in His actions which they might criticise; Jesus; however, approaches them with meekness and endeavors to inspire them with a better intention. Beware of the spirit of criticisms and like Jesus make use of every occasion to do good, even to your enemies.

Who may be understood by the dropsical man?

The debauchees and misers; for the more a dropsical person drinks the more his thirst increases, so the debauchee never succeeds in satisfying his shameful lusts; the same is the case with the miser. And just as the dropsical are hard to cure, so the debauchee and miser are difficult to convert.

Why is covetousness classed among the seven deadly sins?

Because it is the root of many evils, (I Tim. VI. 10.) for it leads to usury, theft, ,to the employment of false weights and measures, to the suppression of justice in courts, to perjury, to the oppression of widows and orphans, nay, even to the denial of faith, as was the case with Judas. Therefore the apostle says: They that will become rich, fall into temptation, and into the snare of the devil, and into many unprofitable and hurtful desires, which drown men into destruction and perdition; and admonishes us: to fly these things: and pursue justice, godliness, faith, charity, patience, mildness. (I Tim. VI. 9, 11 .)

A powerful remedy against avarice is to consider that we are not owners of what .we possess, and can take nothing with us in death, but must render a strict account of the use we made of our riches. (I Tim. VI. 7.)

INSTRUCTION ON KEEPING SUNDAY HOLY

Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath-day? (Luke XIV. 3.)

Why did Christ put this question?

Because the Jews, particularly the Pharisees, were so very superstitious in keeping the Sabbath, they would not recognize Jesus as the Messiah, while He healed on the Sabbath, which was really a good work. But, if the Jews were so conscientious, through superstition and hypocrisy, and considered the performing of an external good work on this day as a sin, some Christians, on the contrary, blinded by avarice and worldly pleasure, place themselves heedlessly, nay, insolently above the commandment to observe the Sabbath, and do not consider those things as wrong which are sometimes very grievous sins.

Consider, my dear Christian, you serve your body the whole week, you use all your powers for temporal business, to support yourself and your family, and God blesses you, if you work with a good intention. Now God chose one day in the week, Sunday, and in the year several other holidays, which you should devote to His service and the salvation of your soul; is it not, therefore, the greatest ingratitude to steal these days from God and your soul, and employ them to gain a transient good, or to indulge in vain, sinful pleasures? At certain times man gives rest to irrational animals, and you give the powers of your body and soul none of the rest they would and should find in quiet devotion, in prayer and meditation, in attending divine service, in receiving the holy Sacraments, &c. If you inquire whence come these shameful violations of Sundays and holidays, you will find that there is no other reason than love of gain and avarice, sinful love of pleasure, and often complete want of faith and confidence in God's providence. We wish to become rich by all means, and we do not reflect that. this will not happen without the blessing of God, and that wealth is a net, in which thousands entangle themselves to their eternal, perdition. We wish to live merrily and enjoy ourselves, but we do not consider that our life is only a time of penance, to attain that eternally blissful rest, of which Sunday is an emblem. We spend Sundays and holydays in idleness, vain conversations, buying and selling, servile work, or in still worse things, without experiencing the slightest scruple. But God will cover the violators of His sacred days with confusion and shame, (Malach. II. 3.) and permit many temporal evils to come upon them, as proved by daily experience. The blessing of God can never rest upon those who never care for it, but rather make themselves unworthy to receive it, by violating days consecrated to God. Let this be a warning to you.

PRAYER O good Saviour! how manifest are meekness, and wisdom in all Thy words and actions! O, grant, that we may regulate all our actions in such a manner, that they may be acceptable to Thee and tend to the edification of our neighbor. Give us the grace to employ all the days, consecrated to Thee, for Thy honor and our salvation, that we may never raise ourselves above others, but follow Thee in all humility.

[araitsume]

Prophets and Kings, pp. 340-348: Chapter (29) The Ambassadors From Babylon

In the midst of his prosperous reign King Hezekiah was suddenly stricken with a fatal malady. “Sick unto death,” his case was beyond the power of man to help. And the last vestige of hope seemed removed when the prophet Isaiah appeared before him with the message, “Thus saith the Lord, Set thine house in order: for thou shalt die, and not live.” Isaiah 38:1.

The outlook seemed utterly dark; yet the king could still pray to the One who had hitherto been his “refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.” Psalm 46:1. And so “he turned his face to the wall, and prayed unto the Lord, saying, I beseech Thee, O Lord, remember now how I have walked before Thee in truth and with a perfect heart, and have done that which is good in Thy sight. And Hezekiah wept sore.” 2 Kings 20:2, 3.

Since the days of David there had reigned no king who had wrought so mightily for the upbuilding of the kingdom of God in a time of apostasy and discouragement as had Hezekiah. The dying ruler had served his God faithfully, and had strengthened the confidence of the people in Jehovah as their Supreme Ruler. And, like David, he could now plead:

“Let my prayer come before Thee: Incline Thine ear unto my cry; For my soul is full of troubles: And my life draweth nigh unto the grave.”

Psalm 88:2, 3.

“Thou art my hope, O Lord God: Thou art my trust from my youth. By Thee have I been holden up.” “Forsake me not when my strength faileth.” “O God, be not far from me: O my God, make haste for my help.” “O God, forsake me not; Until I have showed Thy strength unto this generation, And Thy power to everyone that is to come.”

Psalm 71:5, 6, 9, 12, 18.

He whose “compassions fail not,” heard the prayer of His servant. Lamentations 3:22. “It came to pass, afore Isaiah was gone out into the middle court, that the word of the Lord came to him, saying, Turn again, and tell Hezekiah the captain of My people, Thus saith the Lord, the God of David thy father, I have heard thy prayer, I have seen thy tears: behold, I will heal thee: on the third day thou shalt go up unto the house of the Lord. And I will add unto thy days fifteen years; and I will deliver thee and this city out of the hand of the king of Assyria; and I will defend this city for Mine own sake, and for My servant David's sake.” 2 Kings 20:4-6.

Gladly the prophet returned with the words of assurance and hope. Directing that a lump of figs be laid upon the diseased part, Isaiah delivered to the king the message of God's mercy and protecting care.

Like Moses in the land of Midian, like Gideon in the presence of the heavenly messenger, like Elisha just before the ascension of his master, Hezekiah pleaded for some sign that the message was from heaven. “What shall be the sign,” he inquired of the prophet, “that the Lord will heal me, and that I shall go up into the house of the Lord the third day?”

“This sign shalt thou have of the Lord,” the prophet answered, “that the Lord will do the thing that He hath spoken: shall the shadow go forward ten degrees, or go back ten degrees?” “It is a light thing,” Hezekiah replied, “for the shadow to go down ten degrees: nay, but let the shadow return backward ten degrees.”

Only by the direct interposition of God could the shadow on the sundial be made to turn back ten degrees; and this was to be the sign to Hezekiah that the Lord had heard his prayer. Accordingly, “the prophet cried unto the Lord: and He brought the shadow ten degrees backward, by which it had gone down in the dial of Ahaz.” Verses 8-11.

Restored to his wonted strength, the king of Judah acknowledged in words of song the mercies of Jehovah, and vowed to spend his remaining days in willing service to the King of kings. His grateful recognition of God's compassionate dealing with him is an inspiration to all who desire to spend their years to the glory of their Maker.

“I said In the cutting off of my days, I shall go to the gates of the grave: I am deprived of the residue of my years.

“I said, I shall not see the Lord, even the Lord, in the land of the living; I shall behold man no more with the inhabitants of the world.

“Mine age is departed, And is removed from me as a shepherd's tent: “I have cut off like a weaver my life: He will cut me off with pining sickness:

“From day even to night wilt Thou make an end of me. I reckoned till morning, that, As a lion, so will He break all my bones:

“From day even to night wilt Thou make an end of me. Like a crane or a swallow, so did I chatter: I did mourn as a dove: Mine eyes fail with looking upward: O Lord, I am oppressed; undertake for me.

“What shall I say? He hath both spoken unto me, And Himself hath done it: I shall go softly all my years in the bitterness of my soul.

“O Lord, by these things men live, And in all these things is the life of my spirit: So wilt Thou recover me, and make me to live.

“Behold, for peace I had great bitterness: But Thou hast in love to my soul delivered it from the pit of corruption: For Thou hast cast all my sins behind Thy back.

“For the grave cannot praise Thee, Death cannot celebrate Thee: They that go down into the pit cannot hope for Thy truth.

“The living, the living, he shall praise Thee, As I do this day: The father to the children shall make known Thy truth.

“The Lord was ready to save me: Therefore we will sing my songs to the stringed instruments All the days of our life in the house of the Lord.”

Isaiah 38:10-20.

In the fertile valleys of the Tigris and the Euphrates there dwelt an ancient race which, though at that time subject to Assyria, was destined to rule the world. Among its people were wise men who gave much attention to the study of astronomy; and when they noticed that the shadow on the sundial had been turned back ten degrees, they marveled greatly. Their king, Merodachbaladan, upon learning that this miracle had been wrought as a sign to the king of Judah that the God of heaven had granted him a new lease of life, sent ambassadors to Hezekiah to congratulate him on his recovery and to learn, if possible, more of the God who was able to perform so great a wonder.

The visit of these messengers from the ruler of a far-away land gave Hezekiah an opportunity to extol the living God. How easy it would have been for him to tell them of God, the upholder of all created things, through whose favor his own life had been spared when all other hope had fled! What momentous transformations might have taken place had these seekers after truth from the plains of Chaldea been led to acknowledge the supreme sovereignty of the living God!

But pride and vanity took possession of Hezekiah's heart, and in self-exaltation he laid open to covetous eyes the treasures with which God had enriched His people. The king “showed them the house of his precious things, the silver, and the gold, and the spices, and the precious ointment, and all the house of his armor, and all that was found in his treasures: there was nothing in his house, nor in all his dominion, that Hezekiah showed them not.” Isaiah 39:2. Not to glorify God did he do this, but to exalt himself in the eyes of the foreign princes. He did not stop to consider that these men were representatives of a powerful nation that had not the fear nor the love of God in their hearts, and that it was imprudent to make them his confidants concerning the temporal riches of the nation.

The visit of the ambassadors to Hezekiah was a test of his gratitude and devotion. The record says, “Howbeit in the business of the ambassadors of the princes of Babylon, who sent unto him to inquire of the wonder that was done in the land, God left him, to try him, that He might know all that was in his heart.” 2 Chronicles 32:31. Had Hezekiah improved the opportunity given him to bear witness to the power, the goodness, the compassion, of the God of Israel, the report of the ambassadors would have been as light piercing darkness. But he magnified himself above the Lord of hosts. He “rendered not again according to the benefit done unto him; for his heart was lifted up.” Verse 25.

How disastrous the results which were to follow! To Isaiah it was revealed that the returning ambassadors were carrying with them a report of the riches they had seen, and that the king of Babylon and his counselors would plan to enrich their own country with the treasures of Jerusalem. Hezekiah had grievously sinned; “therefore there was wrath upon him, and upon Judah and Jerusalem.” Verse 25.

“Then came Isaiah the prophet unto King Hezekiah, and said unto him, What said these men? and from whence came they unto thee? And Hezekiah said, They are come from a far country unto me, even from Babylon. Then said he, What have they seen in thine house? And Hezekiah answered, All that is in mine house have they seen: there is nothing among my treasures that I have not showed them.

“Then said Isaiah to Hezekiah, Hear the word of the Lord of hosts: Behold, the days come, that all that is in thine house, and that which thy fathers have laid up in store until this day, shall be carried to Babylon: nothing shall be left, saith the Lord. And of thy sons that shall issue from thee, which thou shalt beget, shall they take away; and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the king of Babylon.

“Then said Hezekiah to Isaiah, Good is the word of the Lord which thou hast spoken.” Isaiah 39:3-8.

Filled with remorse, “Hezekiah humbled himself for the pride of his heart, both he and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, so that the wrath of the Lord came not upon them in the days of Hezekiah.” 2 Chronicles 32:26. But the evil seed had been sown and in time was to spring up and yield a harvest of desolation and woe. During his remaining years the king of Judah was to have much prosperity because of his steadfast purpose to redeem the past and to bring honor to the name of the God whom he served; yet his faith was to be severely tried, and he was to learn that only by putting his trust fully in Jehovah could he hope to triumph over the powers of darkness that were plotting his ruin and the utter destruction of his people.

The story of Hezekiah's failure to prove true to his trust at the time of the visit of the ambassadors is fraught with an important lesson for all. Far more than we do, we need to speak of the precious chapters in our experience, of the mercy and loving-kindness of God, of the matchless depths of the Saviour's love. When mind and heart are filled with the love of God, it will not be difficult to impart that which enters into the spiritual life. Great thoughts, noble aspirations, clear perceptions of truth, unselfish purposes, yearnings for piety and holiness, will find expression in words that reveal the character of the heart treasure.

Those with whom we associate day by day need our help, our guidance. They may be in such a condition of mind that a word spoken in season will be as a nail in a sure place. Tomorrow some of these souls may be where we can never reach them again. What is our influence over these fellow travelers?

Every day of life is freighted with responsibilities which we must bear. Every day, our words and acts are making impressions upon those with whom we associate. How great the need that we set a watch upon our lips and guard carefully our steps! One reckless movement, one imprudent step, and the surging waves of some strong temptation may sweep a soul into the downward path. We cannot gather up the thoughts we have planted in human minds. If they have been evil, we may have set in motion a train of circumstances, a tide of evil, which we are powerless to stay.

On the other hand, if by our example we aid others in the development of good principles, we give them power to do good. In their turn they exert the same beneficial influence over others. Thus hundreds and thousands are helped by our unconscious influence. The true follower of Christ strengthens the good purposes of all with whom he comes in contact. Before an unbelieving, sin-loving world he reveals the power of God's grace and the perfection of His character.

[aion-rsa]

Cobra Kai: How the Show Tackles Bullying in Season 3

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At its heart, The Karate Kid has always been about standing up to bullies. Actually, when it comes right down to it, almost every high school drama is about standing up to bullies. It’s just that The Karate Kid responds with a crane kick to the face. High school bully versus underdog stories are easy to tell, and they resonate with anyone who survived their teenage years. That first major pubescent dose of testosterone or estrogen makes us all want to assert ourselves, and in that search for identity, many find it in bullying. Whether it was Johnny Lawrence (William Zabka), Chozen (Yuji Okumoto), or even Terry Silver (Thomas Ian Griffith), they all bullied poor little Daniel-san (Ralph Macchio).

Or did they?

Cobra Kai has fleshed out Johnny’s character to new depths, redeeming his shallow portrayal in the original movies. Through the Netflix series, Johnny has had the rare opportunity to explain his odious actions. Everyone is the hero in their own story, and Johnny sees Daniel as the bad guy. In the eighth episode of season 1, “Molting,” Johnny tells Miguel (Xolo Maridueña) his side of the events in The Karate Kid. “Out of nowhere he sucker punches me,” whines Johnny about their first fight at the beach. 

And it’s true. Johnny pushed Daniel first, but Daniel caught him back with a sucker punch (Daniel relies heavily on sucker punches throughout the films). Daniel stole Johnny’s high school sweetheart Ali (Elisabeth Shue). Daniel drenched Johnny with water in the bathroom at the high school dance (as he was rolling a joint – something he omits from his retelling to Miguel). Daniel won the All-Valley Karate Tournament with an illegal kick to the face. In Johnny’s eyes, he’s the victim of Daniel’s bullying. And this is perpetuated in Cobra Kai. Daniel is now in the position of power, the head of a successful business and living in a mansion with his wife and kids. Johnny is now the underdog and must cope with some of Daniel’s microaggressions. 

It may seem far fetched to some, but the notion that Daniel as the bully isn’t new. Barney (Neil Patrick Harris) from How I Met Your Mother thought so too, and that was back in 2003. In the season 8 episode “Bro Mitzvah,” Barney’s dream was to have the hero of The Karate Kid attend his bachelor party. However, when his friends arrange for Ralph Macchio (playing himself in a hysterical cameo) appears, Barney is disappointed because to him, the real hero is Johnny for exactly the reasons that he outlined in “Molting.” It’s a standout episode with Zabka also making a cameo appearance as himself. And while Barney could be accused of being a bully in a manner of fashion too, this notion is upheld within a contingent of the Karate Kid fanbase who now feel validated by Cobra Kai’s take on it. 

Johnny’s story arc is one of the most engaging aspects of Cobra Kai. Over the course of the first two seasons, he has transformed from being a stubborn loser to a sympathetic antihero. Even though Johnny was raised as a privileged kid living in an Encino mansion, his stepfather Sid (Ed Asner) is horribly abusive. Johnny’s sins are the perpetuation of Sid’s bullying behavior, exacerbated by Kreese’s (Martin Kove) merciless Karate lessons. While Johnny’s backstory doesn’t redeem all his nefarious actions, it does provide some insight into his motivations. And in his heart of hearts, Johnny still wants to do the right thing. 

Cobra Kai has really shined in how it represents bullying. Bullying has become a global crisis, so much so that in 2018, the UNESCO Institute for Statistics released data showing that one third of young teens around the world have experienced bullying. In the United States, bullying is linked to low self-esteem, anxiety, and depression in childhood. And although bullying isn’t typically the sole cause, it can be contributing factor in teen suicide and school shootings. Undoubtedly, bullying has always been a social issue, however nowadays there are new factors to consider. Currently we live in a world of cyberbullying. Racism, exclusion, harassment, are all regular headlines of our daily newsfeeds. The youth of today face a more complex world, especially when it comes to bullying.

Cobra Kai has been engaging the high school bully trope from multiple perspectives well beyond the ongoing 30+ year feud between Johnny and Daniel. Back in the 80s, Johnny, Chozen, and Terry were the bullies. Now with Cobra Kai, it’s become far more complex. The new generation of teenage characters all grapple with their shifting social standings and relationships. Take Eli Moskowitz (Jacob Bertrand). At the beginning of the series, he’s a victim of bullying, picked on for his cleft lip scar. But as he becomes empowered through his Karate training, he heeds Johnny’s advice to ‘flip the script’ transforming into Hawk, a mohawked tattooed bully. But after seeing his character’s trials, is he really a bully at heart? 

“It’s kind of a loaded question,” says Bertrand of his character. “Honestly, I would say he’s more of a bully. I think everyone has the opportunity to make choices. And I think, yes, he definitely has been a victim in the past, but that doesn’t really excuse his actions for what’s transpired. Especially for Season 3 being under Kreese’s wing and having him leading Cobra Kai, I think that furthers some of his bad guy tendencies.”

Another leading villainess from season 2 is Tory Nichols (Peyton List). Tory is a troubled teen who comes from a poor family. According to Tory, her mom worked as a waitress but was fired for taking some discarded food to feed her family. Always looking out for number one, Tory’s background is a little mysterious because she has had some previous martial arts training, leading many fans to wonder if her previous sensei was a character from the original series, perhaps even Terry Silver. But is she a bully or a victim of circumstance?

“I think a victim,” says List hesitantly. “I mean… Yes. Both. 50/50. I have to admit, I justify everything she does. I don’t really like the victim mentality though, and I don’t think Tory would either. So I don’t think she would think of herself as a victim, but I do think after a certain amount of abuse and tearing down from the world, that it just gets wearing, and it’s easy to act out, but that is the easy route. 

“So it’s both. You see how conflicted I am?”

No matter how you slice it, the lineage of bullies traces back to one man – the founder of Cobra Kai, Sensei John Kreese. Kreese has always been a sociopath. He was a Green Beret during the Vietnam War who earned the rank of Captain, as well as a U.S. Army Karate championship title. In Ssason 2, Kreese tells some stories about serving in Operation: Desert Storm and other U.S. military actions, however Johnny’s top student Miguel (Xolo Maridueña) confidentially points out the errors in his tales to Johnny. It motivates Johnny to follow Kreese, only to discover that he’s been living in homeless shelters for the past decade or so. Kreese admits that he tried to re-enlist but was rejected, alluding that it might have been because of failing the psychiatric evaluation. The implication is that Kreese suffers from PTSD. 

Does this redeem Kreese’s heinous behavior? Not really. Kreese has been poisoning the minds of teenagers for three decades and that’s utterly unforgivable. As Daniel’s mom Lucille LaRusso (Randee Heller) once said about the Cobra Kai Dojo, “They’re nothing but a bunch of bullies,” and there’s no one to blame more for that than Kreese. But at least Cobra Kai gives it some reason for his mercilessness. Rumors have been circulating that there will be some sort of redemptive arc for Kreese in Season 3. But honestly, that’s going to take a lot of redeeming before Kreese gets any sort of pardon. 

What’s more, the season 3 trailer revealed that Chozen will be appearing in Cobra Kai. In The Karate Kid Part II, Chozen was a special kind of over-the-top psycho bully who went so far as to push Daniel-san into a death match over ‘honor.’ Might there be some redemption coming for Chozen too? No spoilers here. Wax on, wax off and tune in. 

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Cobra Kai season 3 premieres Jan. 1 on Netflix.

The post Cobra Kai: How the Show Tackles Bullying in Season 3 appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[dailyofficereadings]

Daily Office Readings September 25, 2020

Psalm 88

Psalm 88

Prayer for Help in Despondency

A Song. A Psalm of the Korahites. To the leader: according to Mahalath Leannoth. A Maskil of Heman the Ezrahite.

1 O Lord, God of my salvation, when, at night, I cry out in your presence, 2 let my prayer come before you; incline your ear to my cry.

3 For my soul is full of troubles, and my life draws near to Sheol. 4 I am counted among those who go down to the Pit; I am like those who have no help, 5 like those forsaken among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave, like those whom you remember no more, for they are cut off from your hand. 6 You have put me in the depths of the Pit, in the regions dark and deep. 7 Your wrath lies heavy upon me, and you overwhelm me with all your waves.Selah

8 You have caused my companions to shun me; you have made me a thing of horror to them. I am shut in so that I cannot escape; 9 my eye grows dim through sorrow. Every day I call on you, O Lord; I spread out my hands to you. 10 Do you work wonders for the dead? Do the shades rise up to praise you?Selah 11 Is your steadfast love declared in the grave, or your faithfulness in Abaddon? 12 Are your wonders known in the darkness, or your saving help in the land of forgetfulness?

13 But I, O Lord, cry out to you; in the morning my prayer comes before you. 14 O Lord, why do you cast me off? Why do you hide your face from me? 15 Wretched and close to death from my youth up, I suffer your terrors; I am desperate.[a] 16 Your wrath has swept over me; your dread assaults destroy me. 17 They surround me like a flood all day long; from all sides they close in on me. 18 You have caused friend and neighbor to shun me; my companions are in darkness.

Footnotes:

Psalm 88:15 Meaning of Heb uncertain

New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (NRSVCE)

New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1989, 1993 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Psalm 91-92

Psalm 91

Assurance of God’s Protection

1 You who live in the shelter of the Most High, who abide in the shadow of the Almighty,[a] 2 will say to the Lord, “My refuge and my fortress; my God, in whom I trust.” 3 For he will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence; 4 he will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness is a shield and buckler. 5 You will not fear the terror of the night, or the arrow that flies by day, 6 or the pestilence that stalks in darkness, or the destruction that wastes at noonday.

7 A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you. 8 You will only look with your eyes and see the punishment of the wicked.

9 Because you have made the Lord your refuge,[b] the Most High your dwelling place, 10 no evil shall befall you, no scourge come near your tent.

11 For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways. 12 On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone. 13 You will tread on the lion and the adder, the young lion and the serpent you will trample under foot.

14 Those who love me, I will deliver; I will protect those who know my name. 15 When they call to me, I will answer them; I will be with them in trouble, I will rescue them and honor them. 16 With long life I will satisfy them, and show them my salvation.

Psalm 92

Thanksgiving for Vindication

A Psalm. A Song for the Sabbath Day.

1 It is good to give thanks to the Lord, to sing praises to your name, O Most High; 2 to declare your steadfast love in the morning, and your faithfulness by night, 3 to the music of the lute and the harp, to the melody of the lyre. 4 For you, O Lord, have made me glad by your work; at the works of your hands I sing for joy.

5 How great are your works, O Lord! Your thoughts are very deep! 6 The dullard cannot know, the stupid cannot understand this: 7 though the wicked sprout like grass and all evildoers flourish, they are doomed to destruction forever, 8 but you, O Lord, are on high forever. 9 For your enemies, O Lord, for your enemies shall perish; all evildoers shall be scattered.

10 But you have exalted my horn like that of the wild ox; you have poured over me[c] fresh oil. 11 My eyes have seen the downfall of my enemies; my ears have heard the doom of my evil assailants.

12 The righteous flourish like the palm tree, and grow like a cedar in Lebanon. 13 They are planted in the house of the Lord; they flourish in the courts of our God. 14 In old age they still produce fruit; they are always green and full of sap, 15 showing that the Lord is upright; he is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him.

Footnotes:

Psalm 91:1 Traditional rendering of Heb Shaddai

Psalm 91:9 Cn: Heb Because you, Lord, are my refuge; you have made

Psalm 92:10 Syr: Meaning of Heb uncertain

New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (NRSVCE)

New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1989, 1993 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Esther 8:1-8

Esther Saves the Jews

8 On that day King Ahasuerus gave to Queen Esther the house of Haman, the enemy of the Jews; and Mordecai came before the king, for Esther had told what he was to her. 2 Then the king took off his signet ring, which he had taken from Haman, and gave it to Mordecai. So Esther set Mordecai over the house of Haman.

3 Then Esther spoke again to the king; she fell at his feet, weeping and pleading with him to avert the evil design of Haman the Agagite and the plot that he had devised against the Jews. 4 The king held out the golden scepter to Esther, 5 and Esther rose and stood before the king. She said, “If it pleases the king, and if I have won his favor, and if the thing seems right before the king, and I have his approval, let an order be written to revoke the letters devised by Haman son of Hammedatha the Agagite, which he wrote giving orders to destroy the Jews who are in all the provinces of the king. 6 For how can I bear to see the calamity that is coming on my people? Or how can I bear to see the destruction of my kindred?” 7 Then King Ahasuerus said to Queen Esther and to the Jew Mordecai, “See, I have given Esther the house of Haman, and they have hanged him on the gallows, because he plotted to lay hands on the Jews. 8 You may write as you please with regard to the Jews, in the name of the king, and seal it with the king’s ring; for an edict written in the name of the king and sealed with the king’s ring cannot be revoked.”

New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (NRSVCE)

New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1989, 1993 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Esther 8:15-17

15 Then Mordecai went out from the presence of the king, wearing royal robes of blue and white, with a great golden crown and a mantle of fine linen and purple, while the city of Susa shouted and rejoiced. 16 For the Jews there was light and gladness, joy and honor. 17 In every province and in every city, wherever the king’s command and his edict came, there was gladness and joy among the Jews, a festival and a holiday. Furthermore, many of the peoples of the country professed to be Jews, because the fear of the Jews had fallen upon them.

New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (NRSVCE)

New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1989, 1993 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Acts 19:21-41

The Riot in Ephesus

21 Now after these things had been accomplished, Paul resolved in the Spirit to go through Macedonia and Achaia, and then to go on to Jerusalem. He said, “After I have gone there, I must also see Rome.” 22 So he sent two of his helpers, Timothy and Erastus, to Macedonia, while he himself stayed for some time longer in Asia.

23 About that time no little disturbance broke out concerning the Way. 24 A man named Demetrius, a silversmith who made silver shrines of Artemis, brought no little business to the artisans. 25 These he gathered together, with the workers of the same trade, and said, “Men, you know that we get our wealth from this business. 26 You also see and hear that not only in Ephesus but in almost the whole of Asia this Paul has persuaded and drawn away a considerable number of people by saying that gods made with hands are not gods. 27 And there is danger not only that this trade of ours may come into disrepute but also that the temple of the great goddess Artemis will be scorned, and she will be deprived of her majesty that brought all Asia and the world to worship her.”

28 When they heard this, they were enraged and shouted, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!” 29 The city was filled with the confusion; and people[a] rushed together to the theater, dragging with them Gaius and Aristarchus, Macedonians who were Paul’s travel companions. 30 Paul wished to go into the crowd, but the disciples would not let him; 31 even some officials of the province of Asia,[b] who were friendly to him, sent him a message urging him not to venture into the theater. 32 Meanwhile, some were shouting one thing, some another; for the assembly was in confusion, and most of them did not know why they had come together. 33 Some of the crowd gave instructions to Alexander, whom the Jews had pushed forward. And Alexander motioned for silence and tried to make a defense before the people. 34 But when they recognized that he was a Jew, for about two hours all of them shouted in unison, “Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!” 35 But when the town clerk had quieted the crowd, he said, “Citizens of Ephesus, who is there that does not know that the city of the Ephesians is the temple keeper of the great Artemis and of the statue that fell from heaven?[c] 36 Since these things cannot be denied, you ought to be quiet and do nothing rash. 37 You have brought these men here who are neither temple robbers nor blasphemers of our[d] goddess. 38 If therefore Demetrius and the artisans with him have a complaint against anyone, the courts are open, and there are proconsuls; let them bring charges there against one another. 39 If there is anything further[e] you want to know, it must be settled in the regular assembly. 40 For we are in danger of being charged with rioting today, since there is no cause that we can give to justify this commotion.” 41 When he had said this, he dismissed the assembly.

Footnotes:

Acts 19:29 Gk they

Acts 19:31 Gk some of the Asiarchs

Acts 19:35 Meaning of Gk uncertain

Acts 19:37 Other ancient authorities read your

Acts 19:39 Other ancient authorities read about other matters

New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (NRSVCE)

New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1989, 1993 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Luke 4:31-37

The Man with an Unclean Spirit

31 He went down to Capernaum, a city in Galilee, and was teaching them on the sabbath. 32 They were astounded at his teaching, because he spoke with authority. 33 In the synagogue there was a man who had the spirit of an unclean demon, and he cried out with a loud voice, 34 “Let us alone! What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are, the Holy One of God.” 35 But Jesus rebuked him, saying, “Be silent, and come out of him!” When the demon had thrown him down before them, he came out of him without having done him any harm. 36 They were all amazed and kept saying to one another, “What kind of utterance is this? For with authority and power he commands the unclean spirits, and out they come!” 37 And a report about him began to reach every place in the region.

New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (NRSVCE)

New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1989, 1993 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

[misssophiachase]

So I officially suck at AU Week and timelines (this I’m reminded of EVERY time this event comes along). This was supposed to be a day 3 update for sci-fi but now it’s just another chapter update. If you’re still reading I hope you like it.  Thanks to the awesomely brilliant Nicole @romanoffsbite for the beautiful cover. 

Synopsis: Caroline Forbes takes a post-graduation camping trip in the mountains with her friends only to return to nothing and no one. Can she find out what's happened, especially with arrogant Klaus Mikaelson along for the journey? You can read from the beginning HERE.

Chapter 4: Fader

Her high pitched squeal was enough to render him practically deaf but Elijah didn’t really notice until Katherine’s lithe body was firmly nestled in his arms. 

If he was being honest it didn’t feel entirely foreign but unfortunately they had so much more to worry about. The fact her house was bathed in darkness and there was no sign of human life was just another reason to believe the worst.

“Any reason why you jumped into my arms?”

“It was dark and I thought I felt something?”

“Me, perhaps?”

“Well, what do you expect it’s pitch black in here,” she complained, freeing herself and straightening her denim mini shorts that had managed to ride up further in the process.  “You know it wouldn’t hurt if you could be a little less judgmental..”

“Judgemental?”

“And robotic...”

“Robotic?” He huffed. “We are in the middle of a crisis but you’re too busy trying to type cast me and by the way you are way off the mark, Miss Pierce.”

“Sorry,” she conceded. Even in the darkness he could make out her downward gaze. “Call me stupid but I spent the whole time travelling here telling myself they were going to be okay.”

“It’s not stupid,” he murmured sincerely. “I did the same thing earlier to be honest. But there has to be some explanation to all of this, people don’t just disappear so suddenly. Our parents can’t just disappear.”

“But they have, Elijah.”

“There must be some explanation,” he repeated desperately. 

“I spent so much time rebelling against my parents which is why they sent me away,” Katherine admitted sadly. “I guess I didn’t really appreciate them and now I’ll probably never see them again to say I’m sorry.”

“Don’t say that,” Elijah ordered, his hands finding their way to her shoulders in the darkness. “They’ll be fine; everyone will be fine. We just need to find out what happened and then we can fix this.”

“How can you be so calm during a crisis?” Before he could respond she continued. “Let me guess, it’s all that Tai Chi you practice?”

“That and having to grow up in the Mikaelson household. It was either fight with stubborn, know-it-all idiots or relish in the peace and quiet whilst always knowing I was actually right.”    

“Suddenly, it doesn’t seem like such a bad choice,” she smiled knowingly. “So, what exactly happens next?” Klaus couldn’t miss the hope reflected in her brown eyes and was suddenly scared to disappoint this beautiful girl he barely knew. 

“We’ll see what supplies we can collect here and then head to Bonnie’s place, she’s the closest right?” Katherine nodded by way of response. “I’m sure...” 

“Thanks,” she interrupted his hurried spiel, placing her soft hand on top of his briefly. “I’m just glad I didn’t have to walk in here alone, you know given everything that’s happening.”

“I couldn’t agree more.” Although it was dark, the feeling of her touch was enough to know he wasn’t alone either and to take some form of much needed comfort on his part.  

xxxx

“I’m not sure why I’m surprised,” Bonnie whimpered. The kitchen was dark as much as it was lifeless and Kol was struggling with what to say to comfort his girlfriend. “I just somehow hoped that…”

“It’s okay.” Kol attempted to offer some form of support but was standing way beyond arms distance.

“How can you say that?”

“Well, the sooner we accept what’s happening, the sooner we can work out the best course of action.”

“Wow, I don’t think I’ve ever heard you sound so incredibly clinical,” Bonnie conceded, the disappointment evident in her tone.

“Well, what do you expect?” He asked incredulously. “My parents are missing too. The whole town has disappeared and we are facing a hidden threat, Bonnie.”

“I get that, I get all of that,” she sobbed. “But just for once I’d really appreciate something much more sympathetic and a lot less cold from my own boyfriend.”  

“It’s difficult,” Kol conceded, his lips pursed.

“I’m just so scared.” He felt his chest constrict, knowing that he’d been so selfish without much of an explanation. He had never been the best person in crisis, that’s what his eldest brother Elijah was for, after all.  

As Kol attempted to encircle her waist in comfort, they noticed a flash light shine into the bay window. He froze thinking the enemy had finally found them and scampered behind the couch to avoid detection. Bonnie was frozen to the spot before finally dropping to the floor in fear.  If he could have played that better he would have. 

“It’s just us!” A familiar voice cried out into the darkness. As much as Kol usually dreaded his older brother’s voice this time he more than welcomed it. 

In the end it wasn’t Kol that unlocked the back door, it was Bonnie. And it wasn’t him that comforted her inside, it was Katherine.  Elijah was regarding him seriously and he wasn’t sure whether he was trying to ascertain what had happened or whether he was disappointed in his little brother. By Bonnie’s subsequent behaviour towards him, Kol knew it was probably the latter.    

xxxxx

“It seems so dead,” Caroline murmured, her eyes glancing over the main street of Storm Lake. Even if it was a small town she was at least used to some activity. “Where is everyone?”

They’d taken brief shelter above, their bodies laying outstretched on the grass in wait. The fact she accidentally rubbed up against his left leg every now and again and sharing the warmth wasn’t completely lost on Klaus. 

“Too dead,” Klaus murmured suspiciously, his blue eyes taking in the view from the hill they were using as a vantage point to spy.

“We need supplies, Klaus, otherwise...”

“I know,” he replied gruffly. “But walking into town might be a death trap. I wouldn’t want to put you in that position.”

“You’re scared?” She asked, her gaze unflinching even in the brief morning light as the sun began to rise slowly from the east. 

“Is that your way of trying to prove I am the wuss you always imagined me to be, Forbes?” 

“Sounds like someone has a complex,” she uttered, unapologetically. Klaus was beginning to realise that Caroline had a problem with being too honest. But so did he and given their possible dire circumstances it wasn’t completely unwelcome at this point.

“What can I say? You always had this way of making me feel a little intimidated.”

“And what exactly did I do?” 

“Student body president, debate captain, cheer captain, tennis captain, do I need to go on?”

“I always was an overachiever, from birth, blame my parents,” she replied gruffly. “As bad as it sounds I just wanted to get out of small town Iowa and make something of myself. The way I saw it, extra circulars were my ticket.”

“You hated this place that much?”

“Maybe not as badly as you did,” she shot back. Klaus had to admit she had a point. “You wore that intense hatred like a badge of honour.”

“I was resentful,” Klaus baulked, wondering how their conversation had reached this point, especially given what they were possibly facing. “No one likes being held against their parent’s will.”

“Maybe so,” Caroline agreed. “But last time I checked you were going to RISD.”

“And how did you know that exactly...”

“Everyone was talking about your amazing art portfolio..” Klaus didn’t want to address that given her picture played a big role in that particular decision. In fact it was probably the main reason given the extreme feeling behind it. 

“Last time I heard you were going to North Western, love.” 

“Maybe.” Klaus lowered his head sadly, the undefined word resonating in his own future too given their horrible predicament. They held each others gaze, their hands intertwined tightly in anticipation of what was to come. 

“If you stand in line you won’t get hurt,” an automated voice bellowed via a loud speaker below. It was then a spotlight illuminated main street, highlighting a long line of helpless and scared residents. 

“No, not them too,” Caroline whimpered in response to seeing her family, her head hitting the grass and trying to stifle her sobs. Klaus noticed his parents there too but was too focused on Caroline’s pain to process his initial grief. 

“It’s going to be okay,” Klaus offered, his hand finding his way onto the small of her back and rubbing it slowly. She cried and he continued to apply pressure hoping it was providing some form of comfort. It was something his mother had done from when he was a little boy and if he could do the same he would. 

Her whimpers seemed to steady eventually with every stroke. Klaus had fantasised about her for months but suddenly all he wanted to do was hold her tight, tell her everything was going to be okay and never let her go.  

“I’m sorry,” Caroline offered, swiping at the stray tears and facing him. 

“Me too,” he offered shakily, his hand moving swiftly away from her bare skin even though every fibre in his being was willing it to stay longer.  

“I’ve had enough of being a victim,”

“Funnily enough, me too,” he growled, trying to rid the image of his parents captured helplessly from memory. 

“Let’s go make ourselves known,” she replied confidently, her tears and grief practically non-existent now. 

“Show them who runs this town you mean?”

“If I knew you’d better I’d say you were declaring war, Klaus Mikaelson,” she offered. 

“Correction, we’re declaring war, love,” Klaus confirmed, grasping her hand and moving in step towards main street. There was no way in hell they were getting away with taking over their town. They had too much to live for after all. 

On FF HERE

[glendowen]

Big Bang

So, my big bang posting date was technically the 28, but I was at camp for the last week, and the wifi blocked tumblr and Ao3, and I ended up with a lot less free time than I was supposed to have, and it all boiled down to me not having the time to finish or post my fic by Friday (thanks to me scrapping my first draft completely changing my writing style two weeks before the deadline, because I’m so smart.)

So, my solution is to share little snippets every day until it’s all done, and by the end of the week, the whole fic will be posted. It wasn’t my original intention, but someties life doesn’t go exactly how you want it to. 

I want to thank the mods at @aftgbigbang for putting this wonderful event together. I’m so sorry this isn’t exactly how it was supposed to be posted, but thanks for the opportunity anyway. 

I also want to thank my wonderful artist @jojen-hewitt . Maaya put up with my crazy schedule and my internet break and made some truly incredible art for this fic, and I am absolutely amazed by everything she did. 

So, here are the first ~2000 words. I’m really hoping to have the rest for you as soon as possible.

The mutant games were messy, a violent clash between humans with “extraordinary” abilities trying to prove that they were worth something in a world that only found their value in entertainment.

The games’ creators, Tetsuji Moriyama and Kayleigh Day, were just two mutants who understood the world’s obsession with violence and used it to reserve them a spot in history books. The mutant games were nothing more than a feeble excuse for validity in a cruel world that managed to catch on spectacularly.

They were a perfect convoluted combination of violence and acceptance. In a world overwhelmed by the existence of mutants, the games provided a way to let them exist without being normalized; they gave a marginalized group a voice, but not one strong enough to be heard.

The court was a place of acceptance, but it was still a cage.

It was the perfect setup for Kengo Moriyama: it gave an acceptable outlet for his mutant brother and second born son to succeed without being directly involved with the main branch of the family and provided the best mutants to work for him. It was a sea of profit and power, and he was Poseidon.

Mutants were desperate for the ability to just exist in a society that perceived them as a monster, and Kengo was willing to provide that if they were willing to do his dirty work. He took the best of the players in his brother’s game, used their skills and their ruthlessness, and sent them to work.

One of his favorites was Nathan Wesninski, a man with a taste for blood and an ability to manipulate metal with just his mind. He could slaughter entire buildings full of people without leaving a trace or feeling an ounce of remorse, and he was so useful Kengo could even overlook his involvement with the Hatfords.

The mutants games were useful, and Kengo Moriyama could appreciate useful things.

Nathaniel Wesninski grew up learning his importance was strongly founded in the mutant games. The only way he could exist was if he, along with the other kids on his team, could manage to sustain fewer injuries in the hour they were on the court than the other gaggle of children across from them.

Most eight year-olds played little league soccer and football and thought about running away when their parents made them eat spinach and only changed their names when they were playing make-believe with their friends.

Nath—Alex, was not an average eight-year-old. Alex could change his looks with just a thought, could steal people’s powers if he saw them in use, and could quite literally inhabit other people if he touched them. Alex changed his name almost every other month as he ran around the world with his mother, who could make people think or feel whatever she wanted them to, away from his father, who could manipulate metal. Alex was forced to fight other eight-year-olds who could do who-knows-what, and when he got too good at fighting other mutant eight-year-olds his mother panicked that his dad’s boss was going to kill him, and stole him from a fancy mansion in West Virginia in the middle of the night.

Alex really missed fighting. He would reminisce about it when he was pressed up against his mother with his hand wrapped around the gun under his pillow, living in a place where no one knew that his name wasn’t actually Alex, or Stephan, or Christopher, and where he didn’t quite speak the language. But if you asked him what he wanted most, he’d tell you that he’d give anything to be average.

Neil was alone.

He was a nobody kid with no parents, squatting in a house in nowhere, Arizona, playing in the mutant games for some no-name high school.

His mother’s voice was screaming at him, reminding him that no matter how far he distanced himself from Nathaniel Wesninski it wasn’t safe for him to go anywhere near that world; that a new body and a pretend power (He told them he could manipulate fire. Useful, but not too uncommon for people to raise an eyebrow at it.) weren’t enough to protect him, and that a moment of adrenaline wasn’t worth death.

He ignored her. She might be right, and playing in the mutant games might be a death wish, but she had forced him to watch her die in Washington and had abandoned him at eighteen without his consent, so he figured acting out a little was fair.

So he pretended to be adequate at manipulating fire, so he could play for some average mutant team in Millport, Arizona and tried to keep his head down as much as possible.

It had worked perfectly until they lost the championships in May. They had been doing surprisingly well, and now Neil was watching them tear down the only place he had felt at home at in years.

As he watched them tear up the floor, he planned his next life. He figured he could pick up some unassuming looks from someone in the airport and actually fly back to France like his mom had planned before she went and died on him. He would stay away from the mutant games for the rest of his life and everything would work out like it always had, until his dad found him for good.

It was the perfect plan until David Wymack showed up in his life.

David Wymack was the mutant coach for Palmetto State University, a group of college kids who would have been incredible at the games if they could ever get along. They had the reckless abandon needed to succeed in such a violent atmosphere since Wymack only recruited mutants who had lived through some genuinely terrifying shit.

Mutants like Neil.

Except, there was no reason that he should know just how fucked up Neil’s life was, nor that he should have any interest in recruiting him. Neil had spent most of his time in Millport acting as if nothing was out of the ordinary; the Jostens were rich, busy business owners who had no time for their son, and stuck him in the mutant games after moving to the small town as a way of helping him make friends. He had no prior experience in fighting, and Millport wasn’t exactly a place known for its athletes.

None of that mattered, though, because Wymack was here and he was offering Neil a place on his mutant team after his last member was “unable” to maintain her contract.

(She had attempted to kill herself and was now locked up in an inpatient facility somewhere. Neil had read the article online about her.)

Neil tried to escape, to give up on dreams of a high school diploma and create another brand new identity before Wymack could drag him back into the world of the Moriyamas. He knew joining the foxes would put him close to Kevin, and that even if he didn’t recognize Neil and it was all a coincidence, the moment he let his guard down his true powers would slip out and he would be dead.

It had been tempting, to reach out and grab the opportunity for a real life Wymack was dangling in front of his face; to become a permanent fixture in the world, to have a name more substantial than dust. But taking the bait was dangerous, and Neil hadn’t let his guard down enough to do something quite that stupid.

So, he ran.

He booked it past a shocked Wymack and an even more shocked Hernandez and pushed towards the exit, his hand tight on the strap of his duffel bag. He had the papers, the plane tickets to France, the money to make it for a few more years. He would swipe the unassuming looks of his English teacher (the dirty blond hair, the hazel eyes, the generic face structure) and disappear, leaving Neil Josten in the cosmos, just as he had all the other identities sitting in between him and Nathaniel Wesninski.

He would disappear once again, and the world would continue to spin.

Which was a wonderful plan that he had every intention of following, until he felt a solid hand wrap around his wrist and pull so hard Neil could feel the bruise forming, and suddenly the world fell away.

Not in the overly sappy, romantic way, where you meet your soulmate and suddenly you are the only two in the world. No, Neil meant that his facade was stripped from him piece by piece, and he was suddenly facing someone a mere three inches shorter than him, a crazed smile taking up the majority of his assailant’s face. He couldn’t see himself, but if the glint in the eye of the maniac midget (he belatedly identified him as Andrew Minyard, defensive player for the PSU foxes) was anything to go by, he was most definitely standing at a solid 5 feet 3 inches tall, with shocking blue eyes and hair the color of blood.

The psycho’s smile grew impossibly wider, and he tipped his head to the side as if in thought.

“Isn’t this interesting? I’m going to have a lot of fun with you.”

The crazed laugh that slipped out after the statement threw Neil off once again, and he was suddenly rendered useless as he tried to compose his thoughts into a semblance of order.

His slip up had left Wymack enough time to catch up, and after making some quip about not having nice things to Minyard, his attention was back on Neil, making sure that he wasn’t injured or incapacitated.

He brushed the larger man off with a solid “I’m fine,” and moved to separate himself from what felt like a pack of wolves surrounding him.

Andrew opened his mouth, most likely to make some witty response that would once again piss Wymack off when another voice cut him off.

“Great. If you’re fine you can sign the forms and we can head back to South Carolina with a full lineup.”

Neil’s heart stopped, his blood froze in his veins, and he suddenly wished that he had the power of invisibility or spontaneous combustion.

He hadn’t heard that voice in ten years, but no matter how much deeper it had become, Neil knew who was about to appear in front of him.

Kevin Day hopped down from Hernandez’s desk, closing up a file with a picture of Neil, with brown hair and brown eyes and a few added inches of height, taped to the front. He took up his place behind Andrew, his green eyes flashing to the pint-sized psycho he had adopted as his bodyguard following the “skiing accident,” and then towards Neil.

Kevin had hardly changed at all over the years, the only stark difference the permanence of the number two under his eye; Riko Moriyama’s 18th birthday had begun with the sharpie being wiped away and replaced by a tattoo gun. His eyes were far more sunken into his face, and the cloud of anxiety that had followed him was more subdued, but Kevin Day was still the recognizable son of Exy.

Neil felt trapped with all of the pairs of eyes on him; he knew that only Minyard could see him stripped down, but he still felt too seen. Up until this moment, Neil could categorize his memories into fight or flight, but for once his only response was to freeze.

Wymack seemed to be unaware of Neil’s internal dilemma, or purposefully ignoring it, but he shot a dirty look at Kevin and Andrew and spat out some harsh words that he couldn’t hear, and the pressure around Neil’s wrist disappeared.

Pleased with the privacy they had achieved, Wymack shot him a look that screamed exhaustion; he had seen a lot over the years of coaching his team of misfits, and one man can only have so much patience.

He gave Neil one last chance, reminded him that they could protect him from whatever he happened to be running from, just like they protect Kevin. They wouldn’t announce his name until the last possible minute, would provide him housing for the summer, would guarantee him at least five years of permanence, and would let him participate in a game that he had been desperately missing for a decade. Kevin obviously didn’t recognize him yet, and Minyard was far too interested in him to reveal his secret just yet.

He signed the papers and counted down the days until May.

Neil Josten was going to be real for as long as possible, and Mary Hatford was too dead to do anything about it.

He realized that he didn’t need to catalog any new faces in the airport, knew that he was actually going to look the same for a decent amount of time, but old habits die hard. People watching hadn’t just been Neil’s main source of entertainment as a child, but an integral part of his survival and airports were the perfect place to do it.

He found one of the Minyard twins and followed him out to the parking garage, deciding that it had to be Aaron because his apathetic look could never be achieved by his heavily medicated counterpart.

He followed him out to the parking garage and climbed into the passenger seat of a vehicle that looked far too expensive for an orphaned college student.

Their wrists’ bumped lightly together as Minyard reached for the pack of cigarettes in his pocket; his eyes met Neil’s, and they silently agreed to keep quiet.

Andrew pulled the car out of the parking garage, and they headed towards PSU.