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thebibliomancer · 4 years

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Song of the Dark Crystal liveblog pt 20

Song of the Dark Crystal by J.M. Lee because I guess we’re finally going to Ha’rar? There’s been a lot of false alarms but I think Naia is actually, really, and truly going to Ha’rar?

Last times on book: Kylan, Naia, and Tavra have traveled to the Tomb of Relics with the help of Amri the Grottan to find the magic firca of Gyr the Song-Teller. Unfortunately, it’s broken. This particular source of hope lost, they finally agree to do what Tavra wants to do and go to Ha’rar.

Chapter 20

Amri gets to travel on the surface, Kylan discovers a startling thing

The group of Gelfs reach the cave-in urLii had told them about.

Amri goes to squeeze through the rocks first, since he has the most experience navigating dangerous rocks. And since they don’t know how steady the boulders are and whether the wrong pressure or sound could make them shift and squish the whole party.

They picked their way silently and delicately, weaving through the spaces between the rocks. There was no way urLii could have made it, and in some places Kylan thought even he might not be able to squeeze through. With some scrapes and a lot of patience, in time they finally stumbled out of the rubble.

Oof. Sounds tense.

Was this really a better idea than going a longer way that didn’t require squeezing through a pile of rocks? Really? I know Kylan was sick of being in the dark but this was the better option?

Anyway, they exit onto a grass covered ledge and the world is so beautiful, the world is so damn beautiful. There’s a wood-filled valley right in front of them and the sky is early evening amber.

A beautiful sight that you’d love to take a moment to drink in.

Amri is still lurking in the cave mouth, squinting at the beautiful vista.

“It’s so bright,” he said. “I’ve only left the caves at night before. Snuck out, I mean.”

Naia frowned. “The Brothers are setting. It’ll be twice as bright tomorrow during the day.”

“Maybe my eyes will adjust,” Amri said. He pulled the hood of his cloak on, so far that it covered most of his face. Draped in the black cloth as if he might bring the shadows of Grot with him, he emerged from the caves. Even with the hood on, he held his hands out for balance. Naia took one and put it on her shoulder.

Awww new friends!

And, yeah, Deet had a problem with the brightness on the surface too. Had to wear a blindfold for a while but her eyes did adjust, possibly because it would be harder for her to puppet emote if her eyes were covered the whole show.

Naia suggests that maybe they could travel at night to help Amri but Tavra vetoes.

“We will travel at all hours to make up the time we’ve lost,” Tavra declared. “Starting now.”

Geez, Tavra.

They set out and Naia has to help Amri walk but they eventually learn to match strides.

Kylan could see that Amri’s cheeks were pink where they were visible beneath his hood.

Hmmmm exertion or shiptease?? Definitely exertion. Guy is having a difficult time.

Once Tavra is satisfied that everyone is moving at an acceptable pace, she takes to scouting ahead of the other three and adjusting their path.

Geez, she’s tireless.

But before long they can see the Black River in the distance.

Sigh. I remember the Black River. Good times back in chapter 7. Wow, right before they met Tavra again! And now she’s taking them back there. What a full circle journey.

“The air is so dry,” Amri remarked. “And there are so many noises! I feel like I can hear the whole world from here.”

“I thought it was dry, too, when I left the swamp. You’ll get used to it!”

After the suns set, Amri was able to pull his hood back. He marveled at every tree and rock, and especially was enamored with the sky. Though he could see, he kept his hand on Naia’s shoulder so he could walk with his head tilted back, staring upward in awe.

“This is why I used to come to the surface. The sky! Oh, look! The Sisters!”

Hey. Amri is endearing as heck. I love this underground elf.

And I’m living for his journey of discovery.

Kylan tries to let Amri’s excitement infect his own worldview but he’s still too down on finding the firca broken. He tries considering what urLii said about weaver and woven “but he was tired of trying to find the best in everything and exhausted from hoping and hoping and being let down.”

So since his insistence on going to visit Aughra and looking for the firca were both such disappointments, Kylan decides that Tavra is the real protagonist and he “was just a minor character in her story now, and he would do as she directed.”

Kind of a meta take on things but if anyone would think it, it’d be Song Teller Kylan.

During a period when Tavra is scouting up ahead, the three reach a landing and all decide to just take a breather. Amri especially who comments that he’s getting blisters. And, yeah, that’ll happen if you walk around all day without shoes, which Amri has been doing because they left without Amri picking up any traveling supplies.

He starts rubbing some salve on his feet.

“What is that?” Naia asked, wrinkling her nose. “It smells like maggots and slime!”

“Yes! Though it is some other things, too. Do you want some? It’s one of my concoctions.”

“No! Absolutely not.”

Hee.

Argot did mention that Amri was an alchemist.

Kylan declares that they should probably rest. They agreed to follow Tavra without further detours but they didn’t agree to make the trip in one night. They just can’t match her pace.

Naia and Amri agree so Kylan goes off ahead to let Tavra know. Which is mighty nice of him. It was his idea so he’s going to take the brunt of Tavra’s annoyance.

Kylan isn’t trying to be sneaky, and is even walking conspicuously because he values not getting stabbed after surprising someone with a sword, but manages to do a sneak anyway.

He overhears Tavra talking to someone in the woods. And even though there’s any number of good explanations for who she could be talking to, Kylan’s gut tells him to be sneak.

Kylan crouches and creeps forward to pick up the conversation.

And he hears her apologizing “Forgive me, Lord. I know. We are back on track. I won’t let you down.”

He can’t see anyone else with her in the darkness but he hears the reply.

“You have already let us down. We took a great risk in entrusting the Drenchen boy to you, and what did you do? Lost him! We regret our trust. We regret it dearly!”

!!!!!!!?

I KNEW SOMETHING WAS AMISS

I mean, its been getting increasingly obvious. BUT I KNEW IT.

The patchy story about how Tavra and Gurjin got away from the castle! I knew it!

The unseen person Tavra is speaking to asks if anyone suspects but Tavra says no. They haven’t said anything and she can sense when they dreamfast.

.... Hmmmm. Dreamfast sensing.

“This body won’t last, my lord. It is beginning to fail. I need a new one if I’m to continue.”

“Then you should not have allowed Gelfling to waste so much time! Bahhhh... take the Spriton or the Grottan. Or kill them, if it is easier. We do not care.”

“The Spriton is so weak! I would rather have the Drenchen -- ”

“Lay one of those prickly little legs on the Drenchen and we’ll crush you ourself!”

!!!!!!!!!!! definitely a spider oh no tavra is definitely a spider and Spider-Tavra wants to take Naia oooooooooh noooo

I knew it and I don’t like it!

Granted, it’s been getting more and more obvious that something was up and I had the show to give me clues.

STILL THO oh nooo

Kylan accidentally cracks a twig by Arthur clenching his fist apparently, letting Spider-Tavra know someone is out there. She assumes that someone is coming vs someone is lurking which is a tiny bright side of the bad situation.

(Fun note but Tavra twists her ears about trying to pinpoint the sound so that’s another fun body language Gelfling can do. I can’t do that.)

But Kylan freezes, not knowing what to do. Does he confront her here? No, she could kick his ass. Does he run to warn the others? No, she could kick all their asses. Does he try to dreamfast? Dangit, he can’t do that from a distance!

She had nearly reached his location. In moments, she would pass by close enough to touch. urLii said one could be the weaver or the woven. Were there really only two choices? Or was there a third?

He gathered his courage and steeled himself.

I’ll be both.

So what does best boy Kylan do? Instead of just running into Spider-Tavra, he trips into her to build up her disdain of him and claims that he came to find her but lost the path.

And then when she asks where the others are:

“Amri had to stop. I came to get you to let you know we’re making camp back up the trail. I hope that’s all right...”

“No! It’s not all right. We don’t have time. Where are they?”

And then she storms off ahead to yell and maybe threaten them with her sword into walking again.

I still feel a little bad for Spider-Tavra’s inability to herd these cats. Imagine you have an evil plan that keeps getting thwarted because your targets keep chasing shiny sidequests.

Following behind Tavra, Kylan puts together some of the clues to realize that this isn’t Tavra. She had said ‘this body’ instead of ‘my body’ when talking to her unseen master. The DO NOT TRUST HER dream-etched into the rocks but covered in spider webs. That S on the firca box.

It seems like someone was trying to warn them but weirdly the most likely candidate for that was Tavra herself.

Weird weird situation.

But a mystery he doesn’t have time to poke at because he needs a plan for what to do about the imposter.

No wonder the Skeksis haven’t shown themselves in person — they’ve known where we were every step of the way!

Spyders

Aughra does them one better than that on the show, heh heh

Although, hmm I wonder when the crystal bats get invented.

Kylan realizes that only he was going to be able to fix this. Which I’m pretty sure isn’t what he meant when he wanted something only he could do.

But there was no time to feel sorry for himself. He had to decide what he was, not what he wasn’t — and what he knew, not what he didn’t. In the last moments before they returned to the campsite, he raced to recall everything that had happened up until then, searching for any seed that might be able to grow into a solution. The song he’d made up for Rian. The blue mouth. Aughra’s observatory and the destroyed firca, urLii’s words, and the Spriton tapestry.

Then he had it, and afforded himself a taste of hope.

This would be a confrontation of a different kind.

Kylan just had a How Far We’ve Come AMV moment play out in his head.

I wonder what his plan is! And I wonder who Spider-Tavra was talking to! And I wonder whether Spider-Tavra is the final boss since there’s still eighty some pages left. There’s definitely a final feel to Kylan having to draw his experiences of the whole journey together but the first book didn’t draw out the confrontation against skekMal nine chapters.

Point being: I’m hype

#dark crystal #the dark crystal #Song of the Dark Crystal #liveblog #Kylan #Naia #Amri #Tavra #???#a new challenger #?

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skippyv20 · 4 years

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APCs=Article Publishing Chrage$ by Magazines & More!

Hi Skippy & Friends-Pilgrim here. In an effort to try to figure out why MegNut is constantly streaming silly stories by usurping todays news with old photos of her…I researched publishing once again to try to understand how things work in the 21st century. The term Fake News has never been more accurate with this megalomaniac. Today, with an article all about JM dissing someone, MegNut actually has a photo of her from Africa speaking at a podium as the lead!? Publishers like Meredith Corp. (tons of popular mags here) said in 2019 they plan to reduce the amount they print to cut costs, while making greater investments in its online platforms…like MSN? Publishers use all kinds of automation now to make their processes more efficient, freeing up the limited staff to work on tasks that require a more human touch. Hmmmm…. APCs stands for Article Publishing Charges. Article publishing charge is really slick at Meredith Corp. Click on Marketing Capabilities and instantly see photos of the gathering of unhappy people blasting out! Under Marketing is their Content Licensing Advantage Program. It looks like they will develop and do whatever you order-is this news anymore? Here is one description they have for online efforts called Content Strategy: “Meredith Content Licensing offers all levels of content strategy services — from curating content to fill gaps to creating a comprehensive content road map designed to drive consumer engagement. Once we understand your business objectives, content needs, technical-integration requirements and project budget, we work closely with all agencies, brand and technology teams to define and curate your content package. As needed, our team customizes content to meet your unique editorial and brand requirements. As part of Foundry 360 we also offer the option for fully custom programs. Contact us to learn more." This is a built in ad agency, claiming they create content, while telling our partner’s story that inspire and drive action while data-driven. Next is Account Services: "MCL offers day-to-day client services as well as content optimization and regulatory support. From kickoff to delivery and beyond, we approach project management with a client-centered focus, applying creative solutions to challenges big and small." MegNut must be driving them nuts 24/7 it would appear. Next is Technical Integration/Delivery says, "Our development process ensures that content integrates seamlessly for our partners. Our Licensing Delivery System provides tailored JSON, XML and API services. We also offer turnkey hosted solutions, tools and integration services. Robust content tagging supports flexible search and content personalization.” Oh-don’t forget to read their Sales Guarantee…“In today’s marketplace, it’s more important than ever to see the return on your media investment. In partnership with third-party vendors, the Meredith Sales Guarantee is a proprietary toolkit of measurement solutions that answers key questions critical to the success of a campaign. Exposure to Meredith advertising resulted in: Sales lifts ranging from +1% to +150% vs. the control; Positive ROI* up to $69 for every media dollar spent—for a total gain of over $1 billion." This is based on the sacred circulation rates/readersip that must be certified for advertisers to trust they are getting what they are paying for. Prices for advertising is found in each magazine’s site under media kits. They have the price for print advertisements and then mention the aforementioned Custom programs if you want more attention, call the VP. I checked out 2 print prices. InStyle-color ads-the most expensive is a one time fee of $327,700 for Cover 4-back outside. For People, rate for cover 4- is $567,100 and $583,700 for their feature issues. One time! I can’t imagine what a custom program runs. Today alone I saw her mug 3 times on MSN from US Weekly published by American Media, Inc. (AMI) International Licensing Department currently manages international brand development of 4 modern lifestyle and health and fitness magazines: Men’s Fitness, Muscle & Fitness, Flex and Muscle & Fitness Hers. AMI has expanded into 22 markets worldwide: our assets include 44 Licensed Editions distributed in 53 territories in Europe, Asia, South America and Australia.” “We work with our Licensees to deliver the AMI unique brand content across print and digital platforms, customize domestic content for international audiences, design brand extensions, and maintain the flow of information on the company’s best creative and business practices.” “AMI’s approach to licensing is based on enabling our international partners to develop their publishing ventures into full scale media enterprises." Their rate card offers multiple pricing. Color ad for a full page 12x’s is $256,530 each time, reduced from $298,285. Great discount eh? So, who pays for her so called stories? I doubt PC or the royal family is willing to do this much. I thought she and Just Harry were broke. Then who is? What backers are this rich for such paltry stuff…OR, are the publishers paying her? Redoing her awful photo shopping, childish writing and insane story ideas knowing the uninformed public will like it? If so, then she is getting very rich, I would say. Will someone please help me understand why her mug is in our face 24/7? We know there is a money trail…which one is it?!

Fascinating....thank you so much! Great stuff!😊❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️

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firebirdsdaughter · 5 years

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Random Writing Hmmmm…

… Huh. Now I’m wondering if this needs an epilogue.

But for now, all hail! In order to stave off anxiety, behold the third part of Resolution!

Part 1 Part 2

Please forgive any typos or errors. To quote something a former classmate once said: ‘A writing major and a lit major sit down to write something and neither of them can spell anything.’

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He was waiting for them in the hall, leaning against the wall with his arms folded, staring at the ground.

“Fuwa!” Yua rushed up to him, expression slightly concerned despite herself. “Are you alright? What happened? Where is-”

Isamu didn’t speak, merely jerking his head toward the door beyond him, then straightening up to slip past her, his face dark. She watched him for a moment, frown deepening worriedly, beginning to reach for his back—but then the rest of the agents arrived, and she quickly snapped back to professionalism. Gesturing for the regular agents to watch the hall, she turned and headed for the door Vulcan had indicated.

Isamu was still ignoring the others, scowling at the floor, when Aruto arrived. Seeing Valkyrie disappear through the door, Zero-One moved immediately to go after her—only for Vulcan’s hand to shoot out and grab him by the arm, bringing him up short, when he tried to go by the other Rider. Aruto turned to stare at him, while Isamu’s gaze stayed riveted on the floor. “… Fuwa-san?”

“You don’t want to go in there.” The other Rider muttered gruffly.

“But-”

“You were with a HumaGear during Daybreak, right? When the explosion hit? As a kid?” Hesitating for a moment, Aruto nodded slowly. Finally, Isamu raised his head, meeting Aruto’s eyes—and he looked honestly like he was about to shatter completely if poked with a feather. “Trust me,” He whispered grimly, fingers curling tighter around Aruto’s arm, “You do not want to go in there.”

Aruto stared back at him, watching the mess of emotions swirling in his gaze. Slowly, he raised a hand to cover Isamu’s on his arm, squeezing gently. “Fuwa-san…”

Before he could say anything else, Yua reappeared from the room, her expression just as bleak. She took a moment to take a few deep breaths, then walked briskly back over—pausing at Isamu’s shoulder, she briefly made a face like she wanted to say something… Then didn’t. Turning toward the ZAIA agents that had come with her, her expression froze over once more. “Call the others off and lock down the area.” She announced, voice level, though just barely. Regardless, the agents quickly scurried to do as she said. Valkyrie watched them for a moment, then looked sideways to see Aruto watching her with an anxious expression, Vulcan’s hand still on his arm. “… It’s done.” She told him simply, then hurried off to over see the proceedings.

——————————————————————————————————

Isamu refused to let Aruto anywhere near the door until the room had been cleared out, and both the HumaGear’s bodies were laid out and covered with tarps. By that time, Izu had arrived, and was close behind him when he entered, her head swivelling to take in the scene. The moment he stepped through the door, his stomach churned—blue painted the floor, and one of Jin’s hands was poking out from beneath the cloth, mangled and broken, some of the fingers burned through to the mechanics. Abruptly, he was extremely grateful that Vulcan had held him back, and tried to turn and send an appreciative glance at the other Rider—but Isamu had elected to huddle against the wall by the door, arms folded tightly and eyes pointedly on the floor.

Yua was kneeling beside Horobi’s body, holding the tarp up to examine it, but when Aruto came closer, she lowered it back over the HumaGear’s face quickly with a sigh. Steeling himself, and trying to keep his eyes on Valkyrie rather than Horobi, he stepped up to her as she stood. “So, what’s ZAIA going to do?” She looked sharply at him, but he’d already had too long of a day to care, “I assume you’ve already contacted Amatsu.”

Yua looked away, scowling slightly. “… He’s on his way.” She admittedly softly, then sighed again. “He’s not going to be happy, though. Our hope was to try and figure out the cause of the the issue via Horobi’s memory But…” She moved carefully around the HumaGear’s body to look pointedly at Isamu, “… That’s a little hard to do when someone put a bullet through his central hard drive.” Aruto blinked in surprise, then whirled around to stare at Vulcan.

Isamu glanced briefly up at them, expression still as dour as before. “Don’t start, Yaiba.” The words were a growl.

Yua ignored them, striding over to him, annoyance creeping into her expression. “If he wasn’t a threat, you should have just waited for us. There was no need-”

“I said,” Vulcan snarled, shouldering himself up from the wall to face her, meeting her judgement with a glare of his own, “Don’t. Start.”

Valkyrie, however, did not back down, her voice a furious hiss. “It wasn’t your call to make!”

“You’re right, it wasn’t.” Isamu’s voice just as intense, and uncharacteristically quiet. “And I didn’t make it.”

Yua started, surprised out of her irritation. She stared at him. “You… You mean…”

He heaved a deep sigh, slouching back like he was folding into himself, his own glare breaking into the same stricken look he’d had before. “I just pulled the trigger for him, Yaiba.” He murmured, shaking his head slightly, voice beginning to tremble. “That’s all I did.”

Aruto bit his lip, turning away to look back down at the covered body at his feet. He could just see the fringe of Horobi’s hair poking out from beneath the top edge of the tarp, and blue-stained fingertips were visible under the side—near Jin’s exposed, damaged hand. Izu, finished scanning the room, came over and knelt between the two bodies, tilting her head, earpieces and eyes flashing.

She stared at Horobi for a moment. “… Unit inoperable.” She announced, finally, voice as calm as always. “Severe shock damaged detected on head and abdominal areas. Irreparable damage to main hard drive.” Yua gave Isamu a pointed look, but said nothing. Izu rotated her head to gaze at Jin. “Extreme heat and shock damage detected. Unit is inoperable and beyond repair. He is also missing his core processing unit.”

Yua frowned. “What?” She crossed the floor to stand beside Izu. “The explosion shouldn’t have caused that…” At a small sound, they all looked over at Isamu. He was looking at the floor again, scuffing a foot and scowling even deeper. “… Fuwa?”

Vulcan didn’t look at her. “… I need to make a call.” He grunted, then spun around and disappeared out the door without another word.

Silence filled the room. Izu stayed kneeling between the other two HumaGear, and Aruto crouched down beside her while Yua moved off to talk to one of the techs about how the processor could be missing. After a long stretch of awkward quiet, Aruto took a deep breath, glancing over at his secretary. “Ne, Izu.”

She blinked, looking back at him. “What is it, Aruto-shachou?”

“Is…” He swallowed, “… Is there really nothing we can do about ZAIA?”

The Hiden HumaGear tilted her head to the side in her usual tic. “Amatsu Gai and ZAIA Enterprises hold exclusive legal rights to the unit currently known as Horobi. The only way for another party to attain those rights is for ZAIA to willingly relinquish them.”

Aruto groaned loudly, then punched the ground hard enough to scrape his knuckles. “Damn it!” Scowling deeply, he looked back over the bodies. “… It’s just wrong…”

“That’s not for you to decide, Hiden-shachou.” The condescending tone was immediately identifiable, and it was no surprise when they turned to find Gai, white suit infuriatingly immaculate, standing by the door. He paused briefly in smirking snidely at Aruto to look down at the floor, lifting his feet to check the bottoms of his shoes. “Really wish you’d cleaned up a little, though. This stuff is incredibly difficult to get out of shoe soles…”

Aruto surged to his feet, looking ready to start swinging, but Yua appeared immediately between him and the other President, positioning herself like a wall. She was so perfectly equally between them that it was impossible to tell if she was trying to protect Gai or buffering Aruto’s anger like she so often did Isamu’s. “Amatsu-shachou.” She greeted politely, bowing slightly. “Sorry for the trouble.”

Amatsu smirked over her shoulder at Aruto’s glare, then turned his attention to Valkyrie. “Not at all, though your message was concerning,” The smirk slowly changed into a frown, something that made Aruto feel particularly smug, though he’d had absolutely nothing to do with it, “You said we can’t access Horobi’s memory?”

Yua shook her head. “His hard drive was damaged in the explosion.” She lied smoothly. “As was the entirety of his equipment. If he was keeping backups, they’re gone now, too.”

Gai’s frown shifted into a proper scowl. Skirting around Yua, he walked over to examine the covered bodies—then he crouched down, careful to keep his white suit pants from touching the blue smeared on the cement floor. Pulling a handkerchief out of his breast pocket, he used it to take hold of the edge of the tarp covering Horobi with the very tips of his fingers, peeling it back. Unlike Yua, he didn’t hold up the cloth to shield the HumaGear’s body from view, merely dropping it as quickly as possible so that it was folded over, revealing Horobi’s face and most of his torso.

Aruto started slightly at the sight, though mostly at the abrupt dismissiveness with which Gai completed the action. Horobi’s wounds were actually quite simple—a crack-like cut on the side of his forehead where his head wrap had usually been had smeared blue down the side of his face, and even the heavier damage on his abdomen wasn’t so bad as long as Aruto didn’t look at it too long. The bullet exit wound in his forehead was a clean one, just below his hairline, and his eyes were closed peacefully. Aruto glanced sideways at the condition Jin’s hand was in, and was silently grateful that Amatsu had elected to pull back the tarp over Horobi and not the other HumaGear.

His thoughts were interrupted by Gai himself. “… That looks like a gunshot.”

“Remarkable coincidence.” Yua replied, without missing a beat.

Gai gave her a look, but didn’t press, instead rising without bothering to recover Horobi’s body, stuffing the handkerchief back in his pocket like it disgusted him. “Well,” He announced with a sigh, “No matter.” Jerking his head towards Jin’s body, his smirk returning. “We have that one, anyway.”

Aruto opened his mouth to speak, but someone else behind him cut him off. “If you’re not interested in Horobi…” Everyone, even Gai, jumped slightly, and turned to look back toward the door. Isamu had come back in without any of them realising. He seemed more collected now, and there was a tablet tucked under his arm as he strode over to join them by the bodies, “… Then would you mind signing his rights over to AIMS?”

Aruto gaped at him. “Fuwa-san-”

But Isamu cut him off again. “It would be easier for everyone,” Vulcan explained, voice carefully level, “He’s a major violation of AI law, so we need to impound him, and if you’re still the legal owner… Well, we’d have to be bothering you for permissions constantly.” Isamu held out the tablet to Gai. “It’s easier for everyone,” He repeated—then, “Trust me.” Though Vulcan’s gaze did not waver from Amatsu, Aruto couldn’t shake the inexplicable feeling that the last two words were meant for him.

Gai considered the device being offered to him, then glanced at Yua. She considered, then nodded. “It would be advisable. That way we can avoid any trouble later.”

With a sigh, Amatsu nodded, then took the tablet from Vulcan. He signed multiple times, then handed it back. Isamu made a few taps and swipes himself, then put the device back under his arm. Gai raised his eyebrows. “All done?” When he got a nod in return, he smirked again and took a step back. “Very well, then.” Turning to look back at the two HumaGear, he gestured with his arm toward the still-covered body, beginning to move away, “Then we’ll take Jin-”

“Just a moment.” Isamu’s voice was still calculatedly steady, but there was also another edge to it that sounded almost… Smug.

Gai turned slowly to face him, an eyebrow raised suspiciously. “What is it now, Fuwa-taichou?”

Isamu’s stony expression flickered, cracking to show a small smirk of his own “You just signed over your legal rights to Horobi to AIMS.”

Gai’s head tilted slightly, and he sidled a step back towards Vulcan, eyes narrowing. “… So?”

Isamu, however, merely stared back at him, apparently unruffled by the position of the person before him, who was radiating brewing annoyance and suspicion. “That includes Horobi himself, and all related assets.”

Amatsu groaned loudly, rolling his eyes before hissing, “Is there a point to this, Fuwa-taichou?”

“Horobi built Jin.” Vulcan said the words in the same even tone as before, as if it were not unusual in the slightest. As the others, from Yua to Izu, started and spun to stare at him, he ignored them, merely meeting Amatsu’s gaze, stare for stare. “Therefore, in the eyes of the law, he is classified as an asset related to Horobi.” Isamu was speaking slowly, as if he felt he needed to spell out the situation, but his tone was steadily becoming more smug. “And therefore, part of the rights you just signed over to us.” The smirked played across Vulcan’s face once more, and stayed there—he even shifted forward slightly, leaning in a bit like he usually did when he got aggressive. “You’re not taking either of them.” Each word was carefully emphasised.

Amatsu was positively shaking with anger. “Then I-”

“You can’t take it back.” Isamu interrupted, almost cheerfully. “It’s already being processed by our legal department. The deal can’t be rescinded without the permission of both parties—and, as the Captain of AIMS, I refuse your request.”

Eyes blazing with rage, to the degree that it was almost hilarious to see—Vulcan the calm one while Gai surged closer to spit in his face, “Do you have any idea how far back you are setting our research?” The ZAIA President snarled.

Remarkably, however, Isamu remained impassive. “Go take apart a smart fridge.” He replied simply, then paused, frowning in thought for a moment. “Or… Maybe not, because I wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out your could drive a fridge homicidal, too.”

Gai’s hands were fists at his side. “You’ll regret this, Fuwa Isamu.”

“No,” Isamu answered lightly, I don’t think I will.”

Amatsu had had enough. With one last angry hiss, he shoved past Isamu and stormed out the door, slamming it behind him. Silence clung to the room for a long time, Aruto and Izu still staring at Isamu, Yua watching after Gai.

After a while, Valkyrie broke the quiet. “Clever.” She murmured, sounding genuinely impressed. “You took advantage of the fact that he was distracted by the success of the mission to sneak the clause by him.”

Isamu rubbed the back of his neck self-consciously. “If he’d had time to think about it,” He admitted, “He’d’ve realised the loophole. The only chance was to act fast.” Sighing, he looked up at her. “And what about you? You know the laws and contracts even better than I do, and you didn’t warn him. You even pushed him into it.”

Yua was quiet for a moment, heaving a deep sigh of her own, still staring at the door. “… I was the first one in the room, remember?” She asked quietly, at long last. Then, “… You’re right.” She continued, thoughtfully. “He could drive a fridge homicidal.” Stepping around Isamu, she started toward the exit as well.

“… Yua.” She paused, looking only slightly over her shoulder when Vulcan called after her. Isamu turned to face her, his expression slipping into fondness. “I… I know I’ve never really said it before, and it’s really not my business, but…” He rubbed the back of his neck again, “… Whatever reason you work for that guy… You’re too good for him.” Yua said nothing, merely hesitating for another moment before continuing on her way out—but Aruto would swear he saw her smile.

As the door closed behind Valkyrie, Aruto bit his lip, glancing anxiously sideways at Isamu. “… So…” He began cautiously, “… What are you going to do with the rights?”

Isamu was quiet for a moment, turning slowly around to gaze down at the two HumaGear, specifically Horobi. Finally, he sighed deeply—then held out the tablet in his hand to Aruto. The Hiden President stared at him, then at the device, then back up at the other Rider holding it out. Eventually, Vulcan made an irritated sound and shoved the tablet into his chest, snapping his hand back to force Aruto to catch it so that it didn’t break. “… AIMS will cooperate with Hiden.” Isamu grunted, still watching the HumaGear on the ground rather than the human beside him. “Once we’ve certified that they’re not outfitted with malware or something, we’ll turn them over to you.” Aruto continued staring at him—at last, Vulcan glanced self-consciously sideways at him. “… What?”

“… Nothing… Just…” Aruto hesitated, biting his lip. “I just… Didn’t expect you to stand up for HumaGear like this.”

Isamu scowled, looking back down at Horobi. “… To prove him wrong.” He grunted—then he moved over and crouched down. Taking hold of the tarp, he pulled it carefully back over the HumaGear’s face. Then he rose jerkily, and turned on his heel to trudge toward the door.

“Oi! Wait!” Aruto very nearly stumbled trying to rush after him, and they only just barely reached it at the same time. Aruto suddenly froze with his hand on the knob when he realised Izu wasn’t behind him, and turned back to look for her.

She was still kneeling between the other two HumaGear, head bowed, her body angled in a way that he couldn’t see what she was doing. Beside him, he was aware of Isamu looking back, too. “Hey.” Vulcan didn’t sound angry, at all, just curious. “What are you doing?”

Instead of answering, Izu rose, folding her hands at her waist again and crossing over to them. “I apologise for the delay, Aruto-shachou, Fuwa-taichou.” With a small bow, she deftly slipped past both of them, taking the door from Aruto to open it and step through, then continued to hold it open from the other side, waiting expectantly. Aruto and Isamu exchanged glances, then looked back at the bodies. Tears abruptly stung Aruto’s eyes, and he heard Isamu make a sharp intake of breath.

Izu had pulled Horobi’s hand out from under the tarp and tucked it over Jin’s damaged one, curling his fingers around it.

Both Riders stared at the HumaGear’s newly connected hands for a moment. Finally, Aruto tore his eyes away first, turning and leaving the room, reaching out to hold onto Izu’s arm for comfort as he did so. Isamu hesitated a little longer, still staring, his eyes faraway in a painful memory. At long last, he, too, turned away and stepped through the door, brows furrowing again—but when Aruto handed Izu the tablet and reached over and put his other arm around his shoulders, Vulcan accepted the contact without protest, even leaning slightly into it.

Together, the three of them slowly made their way back towards the stairs.

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

Izu is cute, what can I say.

Also I cannot, for the life of me, write for Gai w/out making him an arse. ^^; At least Isamu puts him in his place a bit.

Disclaimer: I know jack about AI laws and legal rights. ^^; Oops.

#Random Writing #Kamen Rider Zero-One #Kamen Rider Zero One #my precious angry wolf dad #my precious evil cutie falcon son #my precious evil stoic scorpion dad #sssshhhhhh #I know they're dead okay! DX #it's #it's no happy end #but at least it's not ALL bad #Binary Retro Rider

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hellyeahnerdout · 6 years

Text

Here’s my Truth or Dare fic!

It was the Friday night after finals week and everyone had decided to let their hair down and have a bit of a celebration party. Mina had somehow convinced Iida to let her supply the drinks, the majority of them being alcoholic of course; and Jiro had set up an awesome sound system in the common room and was currently blasting loud dance music. Everyone in class 1A was already a few drinks in and having a blast.

Uraraka flopped down on the couch a drink in her hand and a smile on her face as she surveyed the lively scene. She couldn’t believe that they were all so close to finishing school. Her smile turned bitter sweet at the thought that in a short time they would all be moving on, either to colleges or getting signed to pro hero agencies.

“Why the long face Ochaco-chan?” Came the singsong voice of Yiyun as she sat down next to Uraraka, a drink in both hands and a bubbly smile on her face. Di Yiyun was a foreign exchange student who had transferred in to UA half way through their first year when her father had become stationed at a small army base in Japan. A shock to the whole school when it had first happened, Di quickly made it known how she had achieved the spot. Even though she was a petite delicate young girl with a truth telling quirk that made her seem the furthest thing from a top pro hero, she had proved everyone wrong. She was deceptively quick and agile from years of acrobatics and gymnastics classes, and from a young age her father had drilled combat training into her, showing her how to use her opponent's strength and size against them. And through her quirk was more suited to gathering intel and helping the police with interrogations, she was quick witted and often thought outside the box which led her to start using it as a way to distract and disorient whoever she fought against. A small touch was all it took and her opposition was forced to answer any direct question she or anyone else asked them for a set amount of time. And she was not above using crass low blow questions to distract and embarrassed her foes. That was something no one ever expected from the normally sweet bubbly little curly haired blonde. All of this combined made her a formidable hero with many sidekick apprenticeship offers already rolling in from high ranking pro hero’s.

“Oh I’m just thinking about how were all going to be graduating soon Yui. It just got me a little sentimental is all.” Ochaco told her friend.

“Oh no! Ochaco-chan, don’t think of it that way! This is a happy thing, a new beginning. Plus its not like we’ll never see each other again. I’ll always be just a quick phone call away, and I’m sure more than a few of us will be working at the same agencies.” She told her with a big tipsy smile before leaning in and half whispering with a slight blush, “Guess what I heard? You, Izuku-kun, and Bakuchan are all being scouted by the same agencies. Aaaaaand, Shoto-kun and I are gonna get offers from a few of the same agencies, including his father's!”

Uraraka laughed at that and asked, “And how did you come by this information?”

“I have my ways.” Yui told her wiggling her eyebrows for emphasis.

The two of them sat together and talked for a while as the party began to wind down, and the majority of their classmates went off to find their beds. The only ones left had all gathered around the common room couches quietly conversing and siping their drinks. The musics had been dimmed to a low background noise and the mood had shifted to something almost somber. Then out of nowhere, Di who had been lounging across Ochaco and Tsu’s laps, quietly but adimantly talking to the green girl, suddenly shot up and proclaimed, “Oh oh oh! Guys we should play this old kids game I used to pay when I was in America! Truth or dare! It’s so much fun.”

“We have that game here too airhead” Bakugou told her gruffly.

“Oh good! Then I won't have to explain it to you Bakuchan.” Yiyun said with a smile. “Come on guys, it will be super fun, pluuuus I can make it so no one can cheat!” She told them waving her finger in the air.

The group let out sounds of agreement and arranged themselves in an oddly shaped circle. The games members consisted of; Uraraka, Midoriya, Asui, Todoroki, Bakugou, Kirishima, Ashido, Di, Iida, Jiro, and Kaminari. Yui made her way around the gathering touching everyone gently on the nose with an accompanying “boop” noise, touching herself last as she sat back down between Tsu and Ochaco.

“I can keep my quirk up for about an hour and a half with this many people, so who wants to go first?” She asked the group.

Denki’s hand shot into the air and he said, “Oh I will.”

“Hold on, I think we should lay down some ground rules before we begin.” Iida spoke up. “First, no dares that force people to have sex or do anything too demeaning. Second, there should be a penalty if someone chooses not to do a dare; I suggest kissing someone the person who gave you the dare tells you to. And third, nothing we say or do here leaves this circle of trust.”

Everyone spoke up in agreement to the rules and the game began.

Denki looked around the group for his first victim, eyes eventually locking on Mina. With a wicked smile on his face he asked her, “Mina, truth or dare?”

“Man you’re gonna make me do something really stupid if I choose dare, aren’t you. So you know what better make it truth.” She said.

“Okay… If I kissed you would you kiss me back?” He asked after a moment of contemplation.

“Yes!” Mina exclaimed instantaneously, eyes widening as her hand shot up to cover her mouth. “Oh shit Di, that quirk of yours works quick.” She complained her cheeks turning pinker than the rest of her face. Yiyun gave her a little shrug and a smirk as if to say “what did you expect”.

Kaminari had a huge grin on his face as he made kissy noise toward Mina. “You like me don’t y-” he was about to ask her before Jiro smacked him on top of his head.

“New rule only one question per person.” She stated.

“I second that!” Mina said. Another round of agreement from the group followed. “Okay, my turn now. Hmmmm, Kirishima, truth or dare?”

“Dare of course! It’s the only manly answer.”

“I dare you to sit in Bakugou’s lap for the next five turns.” She said with a snicker.

“Put your ass on me and I’ll blow you sky high shitty hair!” Bakugou told him threateningly.

“If you don’t do it I vote he has to kiss Bakuchan then!” Yui called out with a laugh. Mina nodded in agreement to that. Everyone burst into giggles as Katsuki and Eijiro turned beet red.

“Fuck it fine, just don’t move around too much idiot.” Bakugou grumbled. Kiri quietly climbed into his lap still blushing furiously. “Don’t get any ideas.” He whispered into Kirishima’s ear. This made Eijiro blush even more again.

“Oi, are you just gonna sit there flustered or are we gonna continue this game?” Jiro asked.

“Both.” Kiri blurted out, flushing an even deeper red. “Shit! Ummm, quick Di, truth or dare?”

“Truth!” She said with a wide smile.

“Um, do you have a crush on anyone?”

“Man you should have asked her who instead of if. Ribbit.” Tsu told Kiri.

“Yes I do.” She said with a little blush. “Iida, truth or dare?”

“Dare.” He said without hesitation. “I've been on the receiving end of your questions before, and it is not something I would like to repeat.”

Yui laughed at that. “Awww, Tenya-kun, our match at the school festival was fun though. But fine, I dare you to run a lap around the outside of the campus buildings in just your underwear, without using your quirk.” Gasps and laughter filled the room at her suggestion.

Iida straightened up a slight flush coming to his cheeks before he asked a series of questions. “Do I get to still wear my glasses? Can I hide if someone comes along? Will everyone be watching me? And who must I kiss if I refuse?”

“Yes, no, yes, and I think you should kiss Izuku-kun!”

“What why me?” Midoriya asked in alarm.

“Cause I know Iida won’t kiss you, and I think it would be really funny to watch him do my dare.” She stated frankly.

“Yiyun-chan is correct. I can not bring myself to kiss you Midoriya.” Iida said as he stood up and began to remove his shirt. With a sigh he removed his shoes and socks, unbuckled his pants and let them drop quitely muttering the whole time that this was “just like being in his swimsuit”. The room erupted in cat calls and laughs as everyone got up grabbing their drinks, and followed Iida out to the front of the building.

“Nice bottoms, speedy.” Jiro teased noting the ingenium boxer briefs that he was sporting.

Iida, instead of acknowledging that statement and the following chuckles, took off running on his voyage around the buildings. The night air was rather chill, and everyone knew that it would be at least a few minutes before Iida made it back, so everyone started to huddle together for warmth. Uraraka had convinced Deku to share his sweatshirt, and was happily nestled under his chin with his arms wrapped around her. Di had dragged Todoroki over to stand next to them and waved Tsu over as well.

“Shuoto will keep us warm!” She told everyone snuggling up to his left side where he was emitting a low wave of heat. She opened her arms and let Tsu into the little circle of heat. “I wonder how much longer Iida is gonna be.” She mused out loud.

“Probably not too much longer, but I don’t mind, this is kinda nice.” Izuku said, resting his chin on top of Ochaco’s head. Yui and tsu exchanged a quick glance and smiled at each other knowingly.

Just after that Iida rounded the corner of the building next to them and everyone sent up a triumphant cheer. Shouts of encouragement and claps filled the air and he made his way back toward the group.

“How was the victory lap, Tenya-kun?” Di asked with a laugh as they all followed him back inside, still stuck to Todoroki’s side.

“Brisk, embarrassing,and uncomfortable. Now shall we continue the game.” He said as he got dressed and sat back down. The rest of the students sat back in their seats with Kirishima still in Bakugou's lap, and Di now sitting next to Todoroki on the floor instead of where she was previously. “Well then, Jiro, truth or dare?”

“Let’s keep the dares rolling, give me your worst, class prez.”

“Very well then, I dare you to let Yui-chan pick out the girliest dress that she, Uraraka, or Tsu has, and you must wear it for the rest of the evening; and on the next group outing we go on.”

“Shit, that’s evil Iida. I don’t think I could physically bring myself to do that, so tell me, who do I need to kiss?” She asked thoroughly defeated.

“Tsu.”

Both Kaminari and Mina let out gasps as Jiro simply shrugged and made her way over to Tsu. “You okay with that Tsu?” She asked before leaning down.

“Yes, we did all agree to the rules of the game.” She answered with a little blush.

Jiro hesitantly closed the distance between their lips and gave her a chaste little kiss. It lasted for no more than a second but even so Denki let out a cheer and Kiri gave a wolf whistle. Kyoka’s face flushed even more as she sat back down and quickly asked, “Uraraka, truth or dare?”

“Oh umm, I guess truth?” She said a little flustered.

“Alright, what’s the weirdest dream you’ve had about someone here?”

“We were all in class and Bakugou had spiders coming out of his eyes. And Senpai, who was a giant flying pork bun, said that the only way to stop it was to have someone kiss him, and he said I should do it. But I said I can’t. So then Deku kissed him instead, and he really kissed him, like they really went at it for a while and everyone was just watching this, and then the spiders stopped after they finished kissing. But because I refused to kiss him I got expelled and spiders started coming out of my eyes, and no one would kiss me, and it was all very weird and scary and I didn’t like it at all.” She told the group as they all sat there in stunned silence. She quickly hid her face in her hands as her cheeks grew pinker than normal.

The silence was finally broken by none other than Bakugou when he burst out laughing and said, “Man round cheeks, you really need to check your imagination. I wouldn’t let Deku’s lips near me even if I had spiders coming out of every hole in my body.”

Everybody else soon joined him, cracking up at the bizarre dream. Uraraka even found herself laughing along too. Finally they all calmed down and she was able to ask, “Bakugou, truth or dare?”

“Eh, give me whatever lame ass dare you can think of.” He told her.

“Okay, I dare you to kiss Kirishima whenever someone says the word dare for the rest of the game.” She stated smugly.

“Why do we always get grouped together for this.” Kiri lightly complained.

“Cause you're always together.” Denki told him.

“Cause you two are so cute together.” Kyoka added.

“Cause you’re the only one Bakuchan likes enough to allow it.” Yui continued.

“Cause you li-” Mina started but was cut off by a very red and flustered Kiri.

“Okay! I get it! Enough!” he choked out.

“Who would I have to kiss?” Katsuki asked begrudgingly with a small blush.

“Deku, of course.” Ochaco stated with and evil grin.

“Fuck fine, looks like I’m kissing shitty hair. Fuck, half and half, truth or dare?” He asked Todoroki before giving Kiri and quick little peck on the lips. Both of them turned bright red. Neither of them had even realized that Kiri’s dare was over, too preoccupied with this new situation.

A small malicious smirk crossed Shuoto’s lips as he began to muse aloud, “Hmmm, should I pick truth or dare. If I pick dare, you’ll probably give me something stupid to do for a dare, but I really think I want to pick dare, dares are more fun. I really like dares. I think I might go with dare.”

Bakugou’s anger grew in him with each word, and by the seventh kiss you could practically see steam rising from him. “You think your really funny don’t you bastard. Fine you want a good fucking dare,” kiss “I’ll give you a good fucking dare!” kiss “Go swap clothes with airhead there, and I mean swap everything underwear and jewelry and all!” He demanded.

Todoroki gave an indifferent shrug and took a stunned Di by the hand and lead her to the bathrooms. They came back to the group minutes later, Di with a bright pink coloring to her cheeks, desperately trying to hold up Todoroki’s way too big jeans. She had rolled up the bottom of Shuoto’s pants to keep from tripping and his shirt and sweater engulfed her small frame, one side falling off her shoulder and the ends of the sleeves flapping uselessly beyond the reach of her hands. She had too much clothing and didn’t know what to do with it; Todoroki had the exact opposite problem. Yui’s white off the shoulder sweater was certainly being stretched to its limit, the sleeves only came midway down his forearms, and the edge barely made it to the top of his naval. The thigh high stockings came to rest tightly just below his knees. Her short pink ruffled skirt managed to cover everything necessary but it was no way decent. And to top it off he was now adorned with a little floral headband and pink ribbon collar necklace. The group went wild with laughter at the sight.

Yui quickly grabbed Todoroki’s arm as he made to sit back down on the floor in his cross legged position like before. Her face flushed brightly as she whispered, “If you’re gonna sit the same way as before can I be in front of you so no one else sees my panties?”

“Oh yeah, sure. Sorry, I didn’t even think about that.” He responded a small blush coloring his cheeks.

“Thanks.” She told him sitting down first then letting him settle in behind her.

“Man, Todoroki you should wear that more often.” Kirishima teased with a laugh.

“I don’t know, I mean I like it and all, but pink's just not really my color.” Shouto joked back with his deadpan sarcasm. “Asui, dare or truth. Oops sorry, said that wrong, truth or dare?” He asked.

There was two quick kissing noises accompanied by low grumbling from Bakugou, and the sound of snickering from Mina and Kyoka. Tsu ignored them and thought for a moment before choosing dare.

“I dare you to camouflage yourself, sneak into 1B’s dorms, and steal a pair of Monomo’s boxers, and if you can’t complete the dare you have to kiss Iida.”

“How do I know which room is his?”

“Oh! I know which one! Third floor first room.” Di told her excitedly. “I may or may not have gotten the info from Pony-chan so I could do a little prank on him last year. Us transfer students gotta stick together, and she may have wanted a little vengeance from all the weird things he taught her to say.” She explained at everyone’s look of confusion.

“Okay, no problem then, ribbit.” Tsu said getting up and making her way towards the door.

While they waited for Tsu to return, Mina topped off everyone’s drinks. After Denki slyly asked her about it, Yui told them all about what the prank had been and how she pulled it off. Then Iida began to scold her on proper school edicate and how she shouldn’t take class rivalries so far, causing her to go into a fit of giggles. But before he could finish is lecture a triumphant Tsu returned, a pair of hot pink boxer shorts in her hand, her face entirely red.

“What happened, did you get caught?” Uraraka asked worried.

“No, ribbit. He wasn’t sleeping alone, and I don’t want to talk about it.” She stated, tossing the underwear onto the coffee table before sitting down. “Midoriya-chan, truth or dare?”

“Oh, um, dare I guess.” He told her before really thinking about it.

“Good, then I dare you to call All Might sensei and leave him a detailed voicemail about how you just lost your virginity.”

Midoriya let out a shocked noise and couldn’t help the intense blush that came over him. “Oh my god Asui! What kinda dare is that?” He asked all flustered.

“A pretty fucking good one! Finally, greenie over here’s really stepping it up.” Bakugou said barking out a laugh after once again kissing Kirishima a few times.

“You know I can’t do that, right Tsu? Wh-who do I have to... kiss?” Deku asked reluctantly.

Tsu pretended to think it over for a moment, even though she already knew what she wanted to do. “Ribbit. I guess you could kiss Ochaco-chan instead.” She told him with a little smile.

A nervous peal of laughter was ripped from Uraraka throat and her eyes widened. “What?!” She asked dumbly. She had to have heard wrong. Her sweet friend Tsu wouldn’t have set her up like that. Sure all the girls occasionally gossiped about which boy they had a crush on, but she never expected to have that information used against her so blatantly. Tsu just sent her a little knowing smile, not even trying to play innocent. Ochaco looked around the group for help, to no avail. Both Mina and Jiro were snickering quietly and Yui and a huge unashamed smile on her face that just screamed this was all planned out. It wasn't like she wasn’t super excited about this, she had been pining after Izuku for years. Her crush secretly tucked away whenever the two would hang out together. But this, actually being able to kiss him, even if it was just a dare was almost too much for her. Without the added courage of her drinks she was sure she would have fled the room by now. unable to face the reality of something she had fantasised about countless times.

While Uraraka was having her internal dilemma, it was clear to the group that Midoriya was doing the same exact thing. He had that dark aura of overthinking that he constantly got when planning or worrying over something. He began quietly muttering to himself, “Crap, what am I supposed to do I cant call All Might and tell him something so embarrassing, especially when it’s not true, and i'm not sure I can kiss Uraraka in front of so many people, and what if she doesn't want to kiss me, and what if I kiss her weird, what if she doesn't like it and never wants to kiss me again, what if she tells everyone I kiss weird and then no one will ever kiss me again, how can I become the number one hero if everyone knows i’m a bad kisser…”

Yui leaned over from her spot in Shouto’s lap and gently poked Midoriya on the side of the head. “Hey Izuku, stop worrying and just kiss the girl, it’ll be fine.” she told him gently as he finally snapped out of his trance.

A look of determination came over his face as he nodded and stiffly got up from his seat and walked over to Ochaco. He leaned down and hesitantly put a hand on her shoulder snapping her out of her thoughts and she looked up at him with wide eyes. “I- Is it okay if I kiss you?” he asked.

She gave him a very small almost indiscernible nod not trusting her voice in the moment.

The room was silent all eyes on the two of them as Midoriya slowly closed the distance between their lips. He had ment it to be a quick little kiss like what Jiro had done to Tsu, but all his thoughts and plans when out the window the moment his lips met hers. Ochaco seemed to melt into him, her hands instinctively reaching up to grasp the front of his hoodie pulling him closer as a small gasp parted her lips against his ever so slightly. His body reacted to her automatically, one hand coming up ro cradle her face the other moving from her shoulder to the base of her neck angling her head for better access as he deepened the kiss. His tongue swept across her bottom lip gently asking to be let in, and she happily accepted, determined to explore every inch of her mouth, searing the feel and taste into his memory. Uraraka made a small noise of pleasure and he just about lost himself, forgetting about everything around him.

Then all too abruptly reality came crashing back in as mina called out “Woo! Get it girl!”

The two of them immediately broke apart, eyes wide, flushed from head to toe, and sporting big happy yet embarrassed smiles. It was adorable to say the least.

“Oi Deku! You done sucking face with round cheeks over there?” Bakugou asked with a snicker.

“No.” he blurted out and flushed again before saying “Yes! Yes I can be done.” He sat down next to Denki on the sofa, still rather stunned, and snuck a quick glance at Ochaco who seemed to be in the same state.

“Well then let’s get on with it nerd. Ask short circuit over there the question, he’s the last one left.” Katsuki urged.

Midoriya nodded his head absentmindedly, and asked “Kaminari, truth or dare?”

“I think we’ve had enough dares for a while.” he said giving a suggestive look at Izuku and Uraraka. “I’ll go with truth!”

“Laaame.” Ashido teased.

“Dude, you picked truth too.” he retorted.

Izuku thought for a moment for a question, but all he could come up with was one, his brain really wasn’t functioning properly right now; if it had been he would have asked some interesting questions about Denki’s quirk and how it worked. But what came out was, “Sorry Kaminari, this is the only question I can think of, are you a virgin?”

Denki flushed and tried to cover his mouth before anything could slip out, but Di’s quirk was too quick and a strangled “Yes.” fell through his lips. He slumped forward and muttered, “That as a low blow Midoriya my man.”

Both Jiro and Bakugou started to laugh, and Katsuki barked out, “You’re so full of shit! Always bragging about getting ass! Ha!”

“Alright alright, let's just forget about this and move along. Jiro, truth or dare?” Denki asked, quick to cover up his embarrassment.

“Give me a dare, Mr. innocence, i'm not revealing anything about myself tonight.” she told him with a smirk.

“Okay, go around the room and lick everyone.”

“Man, that’s gross, does it matter where I lick them?”

“Dealers choice.”

“Whatever then.” she started and before he knew what had happened she lent over to her left and licked Bakugou on the cheek.

“What the fuck!” he shouted while Kiri laughed in his lap.

Kyoka shrugged and said, “Dares a dare.”

He scowled at her as he gave Eijiro two quick kisses, still forced to complete his previous dare.

She quickly moved around the group liking everyone in various spots. Kirishima, Iida, Tsu, and Shouto all received little licks to the hand; Uraraka, and Midoriya also got licks to the cheek; Mina got a very showy and intimate lick to the side of her neck, causing Kiri and Kami to wolf whistle and Mina to laugh; Yui got a lick to the tip of her nose and she started to giggle. She saved Kaminari for last, she took his hand like she was about to lick it normally but instead lick his index finger in the most sensual way she could, just to tease him, know he would get super flustered. She left him red faced and sputter as the group laughed, and took her seat again before turning to Bakugou and asking, “Truth or dare?”

“Eh, i'm tired of having to do shitty dares, give me a truth.” he said gruffly.

“Alright, do you like kissing Kirishima, and why?”

“Yeah, he’s got soft lips and he really hot.” Katsuki said to everyone's surprise as his cheeks and ears turned red. “Oh fuck you that was two questions!” he yelled at her.

“It was technically one, I just asked for an explanation behind your answer.” she told him smuggly.

“I- Just- Fuck! Oh whatever, lets just keep playing.” he said quietly. “Ashido, truth or dare?” Bakugou asked and immediately took Kiri’s face in his own hands and pulled him roughly to meet his lips in a searing kiss. “No point in denying it anymore.” he muttered to a shocked Eijiro.

Mina smiled at them and said, “I guess i’ll choose dare.”

This time Kiri wasted no time in pulling Katsuki's face to his and kissing him.

“I think you’ve all inadvertently created a monster.” Todoroki muttered.

Bakugou flipped him off lips still attached to Kirishima’s. Then he said, “Pinky, since this games started to loose its steam, why don’t you do a little stip tease. Or you could kiss sparky over there, I know he’s dying for it.”

“Well someone's in a nice mood now.” she said with a laugh, and got up to walk over to Kaminari. She sat down on his lap, threw her arms around his neck and gave him a big showy kiss on the lips. She quickly hopped off him with a wink and retreated to her own seat. “Ochaco, truth or dare?”

Uraraka had only been vaguely paying attention to the game since her kiss with Deku. She shook her head slightly to snap out of her thoughts and said, “Oh, um dare?”

A wicked smile passed over Mina’s face. “I dare you to do a body shot off of Midoriya!” she exclaimed happily.

“I can do that. If you explain how its done.” Ochaco said with a smile, “If that’s okay with you Deku?”

“Yeah that’s fine.” he said a little too quick.

“Okay! Everyone, grab your drinks off the coffee table.” Mina commanded, and everyone followed. She pushed the discarded and forgotten pair of pink underwear off the table with her foot then said, “Izuku lay down on your back and lift up your shirt!”

He did as he was told with a small blush. Mina ran off to the kitchen to grab what she needed for the dare, and came back a moment later with a bottle of tequila, salt shaker, and a lime wedge. “Okay, so what you do is drink the shot out of Midoriya’s bellybutton, lick the salt off his stomach then take a bite of the lime that he will be holding with his mouth.” Mina explained step by step as she put everything into place.

“That’s what a body shot is? I thought I was going to have to take drink from a shot glass off of him.” Uraraka said a bit surprised.

“That’s the lame way of doing it, this ways more fun.” she explained. “Oh and you’ll want to do it was together as quick as you can.”

Ochaco took a deep breath and steeled herself for the task ahead. She quickly leaned down, not letting herself think about what exactly she was doing and just went for it. Her mouth wrapped around his navle and she slurped up the small amount of alcohol in there immediately moving to run her tongue along the ling of salt that traveled up his well defined abs, the finally moved up to his mouth where she took the lime from his and bit into it. She just a quikly stood up after completing her task, a blush coating her cheeks, and took the lime from her mouth.

Midoriya got up, once again blushing as well, wiped off his stomach, and sat back down next to Denki.

“Well, that was something.” Ochaco said quietly and mostly to herself with a smile as she sat back down as well. “Um, Kirishima, truth or dare?”

“Give me a truth, I don’t feel like moving.” he told her with a big toothy smile.

“Would you want to date Bakugou?” she asked bluntly.

“Hell yeah I would, especially if he keeps kissing me like he has been.” he told everyone without a hint of embarrassment or hesitation.

“Well fuck it, I guess that settles it shitty hair, you’re mine.” Bakugou replied.

“What? Really?”

“Yeah, why not.”

Kirishima broke out into an even bigger smile, practically bouncing in Katsuki’s lap.

“Dare!” Yui shouted at them with a little laugh.

Bakugou gave Kiri the most amazing smirk that was just full of promises before claiming his lips.

“Dude, release your boyfriend and lets get back to the game, then you can continue sucking each others faces.” Denki complained lightheartedly.

Bakugou flipped him off, and Eijiro gave him the ‘in a minute’ finger.

“You were right, we’ve created a monster.” Di told Todoroki with a laugh.

“This right here,” he said gesturing vaguely to the two young men making out, “is all your handiwork.” he retorted.

“Were kissing not deaf.” Bakugou barked at them when he finally pulled back.

Kiri laughed and said, “Hey Tsu, truth or dare?” and gave Katsuki a kiss on the cheek.

“Truth. Ribbit.”

“Who was Monoma sleeping with? I’m really curious.”

“I think it was Kuroiro-san, but i’m not sure, all I saw was white hair, and thats all im gonna say.” she told the group.

“No!” “No freaking way!” “That's ridiculous!” “I thought he had a thing for Kendo!”, Kirishima, Ashido, Kaminari and Di all spoke at once, practically jumping at Tsu for this bit of gossip.

“I said, I’m not saying anything else.” she told them all again. “Now, ribbit, Iida, truth or dare?”

“Im feeling rather adventurous tonight, lets go with dare again.” he told her with bravado.

Tsu thought for a minute, a small blush coming to her face. She looked at Yui for a moment asking a silent question that she knew the other girl would understand. Yiyun got the message and gave her an enthusiastic nod and semi discrete thumbs up. Asui took in a big deep breath and slowly let it out before she turned to Iida and said, “I dare you to kiss me.”

Iida sputtered, turned bright red, and became very stiff. “Asui-san… I-I didn’t know… are you certain you want your dare to be that… I certainly wasn't prepared for that…” he said stumbling over his words.

“Please, call me Tsu-chan, ribbit. You know I prefer that, and yes, that's my dare for you. I’ve been trying to work up my courage to confess to you for a while now class rep.” she told him shyly, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear and looking up at him.

“Well, I suppose it is only proper that you call me Tenya then.” he told her still flushed.

A big smile spread across her face. “Okay, I dare you to kiss me, Tenya.”

“Very well… Tsu-chan.” Iida said before slowly leaning down and giving her a gentle kiss on the lips. He pulled back just as slowly a soft surprised smile on his face. Yui let out a happy squeal, clasped her hands together, and started bouncing in her seat from excitement for her friends. Shouto had to placed a hand on top of her head to keep her from moving so much.

Iida cleared his throat and said, “Kaminari, truth or dare?”

“I’m not answering anymore truths tonight, so give me your worst Prez.” he said.

Iida sat there for a minute trying to think to no avail before saying, “I apologise, i’m having a bit of difficulty coming up with a dare.”

“Oh don’t worry! I’ve gotcha covered.” Mina told him as she bounced up and went over to whisper in his ear.

“Oh! Well that is a very interesting dare. Thank you Ashido. Alright, Kaminari, I dare you to strip down to your underwear and go profess your love to Sero.”

“Please tell me I can kiss Mina as my punishment instead.” Denki begged.

“I’m afraid not. If you don't do your dare you'll have to kiss Bakugou.”

Kami groaned and looked to his friend with pleading eyes.

“Don’t even think about it pikachu.” Katsuki said.

“Sorry, bro. Not happening.” Eijiro told him.

“Awww what is this, pick on Denki night?” he complained.

“Suck it up, strip down, and go tell Hanta how much you love him already.” Jiro teased him with a laugh.

Kami stood up and started to grumble under his breath as he quickly stripped down to his heart covered boxers. “Well you guys coming or not?” he demanded as he began to walk to the dorms. Everyone got up and began to follow him to the fifth floor. He trudged down the hall and banged on Sato’s door. “Oi, Hanta, wake up, its important.” he called out.

There was the muffled sound of a moan and shuffling around in the room before the door was pulled open and a half asleep Sero peaked his head out rubbing his eyes.

“Denki, what the hell man, it’s like two am. What’s going on? And where are your clothes?” Sero asked with a yawn.

“Were playing truth or dare, and my clothes are in the living room. Now shut up, I gotta tell you something.” he said before falling silent.

“Dude, go on.” He prompted rubbing the back of his head, desperate to go back to bed.

“I’m in love with you. Desperately, wildly, head over heels in love with you man. I don't think I could live without you in my life. You’re my soulmate. You’re the first thing I think about in the morning and the last thing I think about at night. I just love you so much. I never want to be without you. I love you, I love you, I love you.” Kami proclaimed overly dramatically.

Sero laughed and said, “Dude, you’re wild, im going back to bed.” and turned around and shut the door.

“Good enough for you guys?” he asked with a raised eyebrow to the group huddled down the hall.

“That was beautiful, and I’m gonna cherish this video for a long time.” Mina told him with a wicked smile.

“No, you didn’t. Tell me you didn’t record that.” He begged.

“Recorded, saved, and uploaded onto my backup device.” she said still smiling.

“You delete that right now Ashido!” he demanded stepping toward her to do it himself if necessary.

“Nope!” she said merrily and took off running back down to the common room, Denki right behind her.

Everyone else took their time getting back down stairs, and thankfully the two had settled down by the time they got there. Kami had even managed to get redressed. Everyone settled back down into their seats, and focused on Denki to continue the game.

“Hey Di, truth or dare?”

“Oh lets do dare this time.” she said excitedly with a big smile.

Kirishima thought for a moment then got a mischievous gleam in his eyes. “I dare you to take back your underwear from Todoroki.”

Her smile faltered for a second before she asked, “Do I physically have to take them from him, or can he just give them back to me?”

“Oh my darling Di, where would be the fun in that, you have to take them.”

“Who do I have to kiss as punishment?”

“I’ll go easy on ya, you can kiss Midoriya.”

“Shit, I can’t do that.”

“Why no-”

“Don’t ask that question. It’s not my reason to tell, and I don’t want to spill someone else's secret.” She told him cutting him off before he could ask. “Can I give Todoroki his underwear back?”

“That’s up to Bakugou, seeing it was his dare that made you swap in the first place.” Kami said enjoying this all too much.

“Hell no.” Katsuki told them.

With a resinged sigh Yui stood up and grabbed Shouto by the hand. “I’m sorry about this Todoroki.” She said her face burning as she pulled him along to the bathrooms. They reemerged a minute later both faces bright pink, with Shouto holding down the front and back of the skirt.

Bakugou, Mina, and Jiro were all in hysterics over this. Katsuki even looked like he was about to tear up from laughing so hard. The rest of the group tried to restrain themselves but ended up laughing lightly as well. Todoroki really did look ridiculous.

“Well where's the proof?” Kaminari asked Yiyun.

“I don’t actually have to show you my panties do I?” she asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Yes you do.” he said smugly.

“Pervert.” Yui teased him. She sighed and pulled out the light blue lace panties she had in her pocket. She held them up for everyone to see her face flushing again as she asked, “Satisfied?”

“Yep!” Denki said still all smiles.

“You’re an ass you know that.” She told him as she put the underwear back in her pocket, but there was no malice in her words.

“Hey, come on, this was my last chance to see some girls underwear tonight, I had to go for it. Plus, you saw mine, only seemed fair.” Kami said with a laugh.

“Whatever.” She said rolling her eyes at him, but her smile was back to its full force. She quickly skipped over to the kitchen and poured two shots, coming back and offering one to Shouto. “Liquid reinforcements.” she toasted as he took the glass, and they both drank it down. “Plus, who knows, with enough of them, maybe we can forget how embarrassing what I just did to you a moment ago was.” she teased him with a laugh.

“You’re gonna need another one of them before you can sit down aren't you?” she asked him quietly and sincerely. With his quick nod of affirmation she ran back over and just grabbed the bottle of clear liquid, bringing it back with her before pouring them both another shot and knocking it back. She looked up at Todoroki and gave him a reassuring smile. “Don’t worry, i’ll make sure you don’t flash anyone else.” she told him with a flirty wink already feeling the effects of the added alcohol in her system. They both somehow managed to sit down again without incident. Shouto pulled Yui as close to him as he possibly could without letting anything indecent touch, thankful to have her there to keep his modestly intact.

“Okay! Let's continue, my quirk’s almost at its limit, but I think I can stretch out one more round after this one. So, Shouto-kun, truth or dare?” Di asked, twisting her body halfway around so she could look at him.

“As long as I don’t have to get up, i’ll choose dare.” he told her.

Yui hummed to herself for a second, debating what to do. She really shouldn't have had that second shot on top of all the other drinks she had had that evening. Because of it, she was about to do something that would either end really badly or really really well. She hoped for the latter. Pivoting on her butt, she turned herself fully around to face Todoroki, still making sure that she was shielding everyone else from what needed to be covered. She felt her cheeks heat slightly as she smiled up at him with what almost looked to be an innocent smile.

“Don’t worry, you won't have to get up for this dare, yet.” she told him sweetly. Yui beckoned him to lean down so she could whisper the dare in his ear.

The only indication of the nature of the dare that the group got was the slight widening of Shouto’s eyes and the way his cheeks flushed just a little darker. When she was finished speaking he pulled back a skeptical look on his face. “Is that really your dare?”

“Yep, take it or leave it.” she told him with false bravado.

“I’ll do it.” he told her much quicker than she thought he would answer.

A radiant smile spread across Di’s face. She once again quickly turned around to face the group. They were all looking at the two of them with open curiosity on their faces.

“What was-” Izuku began to ask, but was quickly cut of by Yui.

“Nope! Nope nope nope. Neither Shouto or I will be answering that question. But I can tell you that I have stuck to the original rules of our game, and there was never a rule in place saying that the dare had to be announced to the group, so this is a secret dare. And if any of you guys even think about trying to ask either one of us I will shut my quirk down quicker that you can say ‘plus ultra’.” she told them all.

“Awww you’re no fun Yui.” Kami complained.

“Yeah, but you still love me.” she shot back.

“I’d love you more if you’d tell me what you just whispered in Todoroki’s ear.”

“Not gonna happen sparky.”

Shouto cleared his throat, and said, “I believe it’s my turn to ask Midoriya a question. Truth or dare?”

“I’m going with truth, I couldn't handle another dare like the one Tsu gave me earlier.” he said.

Before Shouto could say anything Di turned halfway around in his lap and beckoned him closer so she could whisper in his ear once again. Ochaco watcher her friend do this, a queasy feeling in her gut. This was bad, she knew her friend all too well, and she knew that whatever question she was telling to Todoroki was going to be either really blunt or really embarrassing and more than likely had something to do with herself. To her it really seemed like Yui had suggested this game just to play matchmaker.

Todoroki raised an eyebrow at Yui, but with her encouraging nod asked, “Midoriya, are you in love with Uraraka and do you want to have sex with her?”

Ochaco was going to die of embarrassment, she just knew it. She would drop dead any moment now and her spirit would watch the chaos unfold before her as she slowly drifted away into sweet safe oblivion. She barely had time to glare daggers at Yui and prepare for the inevitable catastrophe.

The room was filled with absolute silence for half a second, all eyes swiftly shifting from Todoroki to stare at the green haired boy in question. The heavy anticipation in the air broke as Izuku blurted out, “Yes! And god yes!”

He immediately stood up, red from head to foot, stiffly bowed, quietly apologising profusely to the group yet completely unable to acknowledge Uraraka, and practically ran out of the room and up to his dorm. It was the most painfully awkward anyone had seen Midoriya in years.

After Izuku’s form disappeared around the corner, all eyes flew to Ochaco who was staring off into the distance in a daze as if her spirit had feld her body. The girls in the room exploded into a cacophony excitement, eager to shake her from her befuddlement.

“You need to go after him!”

“Ochaco, let him know how you feel!”

“Go get him!”

“Oh my god we told you he like you back, now we officially know!”

“Snap out of it, and go to him.”

All of this clamoring barely registered with Uraraka, she was so lost in her own head. She had never thought that her feelings would be reciprocated. She had resigned herself to just be Deku’s close friend, told herself she didn't want to get in the way of his training, of his ultimate goal to be the number one hero. Told herself that he wouldn't feel the same way for her; but there it was. He had just confessed to loving her and wanting her, and she had no idea what to do with that information.

Yui signed and quickly stripped off Shouto’s sweater, placed it in his lap, and got up and made her way over to Uraraka. She knelt down in front of her best friend, took her face in her hands, and forced her to look at her before quietly but firmly saying, “Ochaco-chan, you need to go up and talk to Izuku-kun. You know how he feels, but he doesn't know how you feel, you need to tell him. This is the opening you’ve been hoping for. Yes I know it’s not quite what you expected, and I apologize for that, I really didn’t think he was gonna respond like that. Now get your tushie up and go talk to your man!”

Yui’s little pep talk was exactly what she needed. She nodded to the smaller blonde in front of her eagerly and said, “You're right I need to talk to him. I’m going to talk to him!” She gave Di a quick hug before jumping up and making her way to Midoriya’s room with a newfound determination to let him know exactly how she felt in every possible way.

Yui stood up with a satisfied smile brightening her face. “ Well my quirk is thoroughly diminished. Sorry to anyone who wanted to keep playing, but I’m done for the night. I’m pooped.” She announced to everyone before turning to Bakugou and Eijiro. “E, Bakuchan, congrats, you’re now my favorite power couple, but for the love of god please get a room.” She teased them with a laugh but a sincere smile, then turned to Iida and Tsu who were sitting just ever so slightly closer together she winked at them and said, “You two don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.” Di bid a simple night to both Mina and Kyoka.

She walked over to Todoroki with a devilish smile. “Come on Shouto, you’ve got a dare to fulfill.” She told him as she took his hand and pulled him to his feet. They started to quickly retreated to the dorms, but Yui stopped and and pointed a finger at Denki, “Kami you better not blow my phone up in the middle of the night, I will tell you nothing, and if you try I’ll make you tell me all your dirty dark secrets.” she threatened but patted him on the head the next second and told him to have a good night. Yiyun and Shouto then quickly disappeared upstairs.

“Man for someone who’s ‘pooped’ she sure seemed lively.” Mina said with a snicker.

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journeysintowebcomics · 7 years

Text

Worm Liveblog #24

UPDATE 24: The Life and Times of Gregor the Snail

Last time the fifth arc, Hive, had ended. Now it was time for an intermission before the sixth arc starts. Five arcs done, twenty-six left. Not too bad of a pace, right? I think I’ll be done in...a year and half, perhaps? Anyways, interlude 5, go.

Hmmmm...well looks like this interlude won’t be like I expected. I had thought it’d be some sort of reaction from the ABB or the superheroes about what had happened during Arc 5, but looks like that’ll be left for...later? Hopefully? For now this is a rather normal scene, just receiving stuff given to him by a teen. The character of the day is Gregor the Snail. Not the first character I’d have thought of, that’s for sure! I wonder why Mr. Wildbow chose Gregor as the focus here? Hm...

As pretty much everyone may have guessed, a character whose name is Gregor the Snail because of his appearance and abilities isn’t exactly supermodel material. There’s a rather detailed description, I can imagine how the guy looks like...it’d certainly be unnerving to look, at least until one gets used to it. Gregor’s skin is encrusted with snail shells as if they were barnacles, golly.

Turns out Gregor can’t simply wander into a convenience store and buy stuff. Yeah, no surprise there. That’s why he hires errand boys, and apparently he pays them quite generously. The teen here asks for how long he’d have to do this. “Until I called and you were unable or unwilling to run my errand. If this happened more than once, or if the reason was not good, I would find someone else, as I did with the last individual.” That sounds ominous. You didn’t mean to make it sound ominous, right, Gregor? It’s just an errand boy. Nope, apparently the guy just decided to stop doing this for Gregor, nothing more than that.

It does sound like this is a wholesome deal. Nothing illegal, just everyday stuff. “So you call me, I run out and grab you groceries, or clothes, or take-out, or shampoo, or whatever, and you pay me three-” No, not shampoo, but yeah, that’s the gist. There’s always a chance someone would try to reach Gregor through his assistant, but it’s not likely. All in all, it sounds like an easy job, and for good money, too. This is the classic ‘sounds too good to be true’ thing. The worst part is that I’m not sure I’d reject such offer just like that. What can I say, it does sound like a simple enough thing to do, and the ridiculous amount of money for that is quite an allure.

This teen accepts the job, and it doesn’t seem like things are going to go too bad for him. Nice. Gregor starts walking towards a club, ‘Palanquin’, the third-person narrating how everyone avoided Gregor while on the street. Gregor hides his skin and face, but since he’s also rather obese, well, that doesn’t get people to approach. It had taken him years to come to peace with this. With being one of the monsters. And looks like Gregor doesn’t like the pariah status very much. Hmmmm...what was his trigger event, I wonder? What led to his current physical appearance? Whatever it was, there’s no doubt it wasn’t the kind of thing anyone would wish on anyone.

Palanquin is a popular club, and Gregor can enter without waiting, for some reason. It doesn’t take long to find out why, in the second floor Newter is there. Given that Newter is rather young – at least the text here does state that – I really doubt he’s the owner of this club so...could this be a hideout for Faultline’s team? That’d explain it.

Heh, it does seem like Newter and Gregor are rather close to each other. Even though Newter is younger than Gregor, he’s all ‘Gregor, my boy’. Birds of a feather flock together, as I said in reply to that ask like a week ago.

Newter is bragging about his jobs as part of Faultine’s crew. Hah! These people are rather carefree about that! Even Faultline had joined the discussion not too long before Gregor arrived. I guess that they’re not really concerned about things like secret identities or staying undercover, if they’re welcoming third parties into their inner sanctum and bragging about their jobs. They include fighting capes in Philadelphia. Neat!

“It was a close call,” Gregor added his own two cents. “Chevalier is leader of Protectorate in Philadelphia. Myrddin leads Protectorate of Chicago. These are people whole world recognizes. They got positions protecting big cities in America because they are strong, because they are smart and talented. We got the job done, as we always do, and we walked away.”

No way! This is a story I have to hear about. You mean to tell me Faultline’s team defeated two famous capes that protect big cities? That’s hella impressive! Now I’m curious how they did that. I won’t ever hear about it, will I? Oh well.

Looks like what these people came her for is to get drugged in Newter’s fluids. Golly, that’s gross. Newter gets water, dips the tip of his tongue in it, and passes it to the girls so they get high. I’m getting shivers down my spine, I’m a bit surprised at how blasé Newter is about all this.

That right there,” Newter pointed to the spoon with the tip of his tail, “Is a little less than an hour of psychadelic tripping. No hangover, no side effects, it’s not addictive, and you can’t overdose on it. Trust me, I’ve tried to make someone overdose before, combat situation, and I couldn’t make it happen.”

So Taylor didn’t have to worry about overdoses and the such? From touching his blood and all, I mean. Then again, falling into a psychedelic stupor would have been inconvenient and Newter would have died. I guess this also means Lung will be okay once he wakes up, after the ‘inconveniently long time’ is over. Could be hours, could be days...he got Newter’s blood in his eye, after all.

One of the gals gives Gregor her number before falling into the psychedelic daze, but Gregor isn’t really going to take the chance for human interaction, he throws the number away. “I do not think she liked me because I am me,” Gregor said, “I think she liked me because I am a monster.” He may be right, that may be what’s going on here. I don’t know what this Laura girl thought, buuuuut I imagine some people would be giddy at the chance of hooking up with a cape, no matter who it is. Gregor thinks she showed interest because of how he looks. “No way. Maybe she likes you because of the person underneath.” They crossed like twenty words, Newter! Oh well, doesn’t matter, the number was thrown away and I don’t think Gregor will bother to talk to Laura again, so that doesn’t matter now.

What’s for sure and the one thing I got from this is that Gregor is very cautious about getting close to people, not only in the physical sense, but also in the emotional sense. All this time looking like he does, unable to even do everyday things like going to a store to buy groceries, that must have taken quite a toll on him. I feel bad for this guy...

Gregor shows concern for Newter’s happiness. No, he’s not getting all philosophical, all he wants to know is if Newter is okay with everything. “Dude. Look at me. I have money to burn, I’ve got the hottest girls in the city begging to get a taste of me. Literally wanting to taste me! What do you think?” I think you could have phrased that last part a bit better, but yeah, sounds to me that Newter is ecstatic about his life right now. Is this all Faultline’s work? Because if so, boy is she the best boss so far, compared to Kaiser and the Undersiders’ anonymous benefactor. Then again, anonymous benefactor is rather nice too, generous with the money and all.

Now that he confirmed Newter is okay, Gregor goes to another room, where there’s someone there, a girl lying on the bed and another one, who seems to be like a caretaker.

They had learned the hard way, that the more distant the girl was, the stronger her power. This made her particularly dangerous when she was so lost that she might not recognize him. Cruel irony, Gregor observed, that she had virtually no power at all when she was most herself. It was a problem they hoped to find an answer to, someday.

Damn that’s rough, poor girl...I bet it’s a consequence of her power, another power that brought awful changes to the person. Maybe that’s what Faultline’s crew is all about, finding those who got a bad hand once their powers got triggered, and give them a better life – so to say. That’s the common ground I see between Gregor, Newter and Labyrinth. The girl lying down here doesn’t sound like Labyrinth, her power didn’t seem like the type that’s more useful the more distant she is. A prospective member, perhaps? It doesn’t sound like she’s an active part of the team, at least.

There’s a bit of backstory, but no word about her power or her identity. If she was Labyrinth, I think the narrator would have said it. Anyways, going to see Faultline now. Faultline has many cover businesses in Brockton Bay. Now that I think about it, what is your power, Faultline?

As Gregor watched, she closed her eyes, then swiped her hand across the top ends of the rods. Red and blue energy crackled, and coin-shaped pieces of wood, metal, stone and plastic fell to the desktop. Other rods, several of which were green wood, were untouched.

Right, um...I’m not sure what that was. I know what the definition of ‘faultline’ is, but other than that, I’m pretty clueless. Faultline seems rather frustrated about the green wood rods not being affected at all, and mentions the Manton effect. Does that mean these rods she can’t affect are imbued with biological matter? That’s what I think this all means, at least.

Also the freckled girl who’s watching over Unnamed Distant Girl was Spitfire. There she is, the one Faultline stole from the Undersiders. Nice to finally meet her!

I’m such an idiot. Wood is already an organic material, isn’t it.

What Faultline is trying to do here is to bypass the Manton effect, she’s testing the theory that it’s all a psychological block instead of a, hm, physical one. If she can trick her own brain to affect organic material...eeeeeh, I’m pretty sure it’s not a psychological block. If I had to guess, it may be due to the components of organic matter. That sounds like it’d be possible to bypass, although with a lot of work.

Faultline requests Gregor to line up the rods again, but he does something else. Betrayal!

Gregor stepped around the desk, grabbed her by the throat with his left hand, and pulled her out of the chair. He shoved her to the ground and climbed atop of her so he was straddling her, his knees pressing her arms down. His grip tightened incrementally.

Things are getting rough around here! Par for the course for Worm, I guess, but this is not what I thought I’d see in this interlude! And indeed, thanks to Gregor’s unique biology, nothing Faultline can do would stop him. Right before she’s choked to death, he lets go. Oh. Guess it wasn’t betrayal, after all. Honestly I’m glad it wasn’t, I like what I have seen of Faultline so far. Besides, it’d be rather callous of Gregor to betray the team like that.

He waited patiently for her to recover. When she looked more or less in control of her own breathing, he spoke, “Months ago, we were talking about this subject, the Manton effect. You mentioned how it might be possible for someone like us to have a second trigger event. A radical change or improvement in their powers as a result of a life or death moment. Such might explain how one broke the Manton rule.”

Something like that would explain what happened to Taylor – if the power up was permanent. But it isn’t, I had the feeling Taylor’s improvement in her powers was a temporal thing. If this theory about a second trigger event is true, it’ll need a lot more than a life or death moment like this one to activate. If facing death by bombs used by one heck of a psycho isn’t enough for that, what will be enough? I almost fear what it’d be.

Then again, since this was mentioned, I feel this is foreshadowing of some kind. With some luck, if someone in Worm undergoes a second trigger event, it’ll be someone on Taylor’s side and not a villain.

Faultline forgives Gregor for his extreme measures. He wasn’t going to kill her, it was a way of helping. “What if it had worked, you big lunatic? What did you expect me to do to you? Cut off your hand? Kill you?” Hmmmm...who knows, maybe any lost limbs would grow back. Can’t say I know for sure. Then again, I performed a Google search, and looks like snails can regrow their tails and shells. An arm may not be any of those things, but I’d say it isn’t out of question that Gregor regrows a hand! Thanks for compelling me to learn something new, Mr. Wildbow.

Thank goodness, Faultline isn’t willing to put herself in dangerous situations that go further than being choked and almost dying. Thank you for having some restraint! And Gregor remarks on how grateful he is to her. I feel bad for thinking even for a moment he was betraying her. I bet any readers who read that cringed, or something.

So, turns out Gregor is giving some of his earnings to Faultline, so she can answer some of the questions they have. Can you give a bit of exposition here, Mr. Wildbow? What kind of questions? Whatever they are, Gregor is going to find out before the rest, thanks to him being the one who pays the most.

...looks like the tattoo wasn’t a sign of comradeship or something. Huh. I didn’t think it’d be anything else, but I was wrong. It seems to be more like something that happens on parahumans as mutated as Gregor and Newter? They’re not the only ones with it. Other people have them too.

“You and Newter, you already know, aren’t alone. On a steady basis, parahumans have been turning up across North America. Retrograde amnesia, all marked by that same tattoo as you are on various parts of their body. Each was dumped in an out of the way location in an urban area. Alleys, ditches, rooftops, under bridges.”

Okay, there’s no way that’s an accident. Then...does that mean someone’s giving a bunch of people powers? Because this doesn’t sound natural at all, like it happened to Taylor and Grue. The amnesia doesn’t fit; the tattoo is pretty much a dead giveaway on that regard. If that’s the case, then...who is doing this? And why? Why to make capes? It’s not to make some sort of army, that’s for sure, because if it were, they wouldn’t be tossed around like yesterday’s trash. Maybe it’s just for the sake of having more people with powers around, for one reason or another? Wow, this all is something I’ll have to mull for quite a while! Interesting!

There’s one anomaly in the pattern, one ‘Shamrock’ who looks completely normal, has powers that manipulate probabilities, and has the tattoo.

“That’s puzzle piece number one. Given the dates, and you’re free to look them over in your own time, going by the first sightings, the people that are showing up with these tattoos are getting less and less monstrous with each passing year. Not always, but it’s a trend. Then, boom, we get Shamrock. No strange features to speak of.”

Nevermind, more than one anomaly. So, whatever’s going on may be being perfected. I see...this is definitely something to look into. Who else may know what’s going on, I wonder...just Faultline? This sounds like the kind of thing other capes should be aware of – uh, heroic capes, I mean. Chances are they know too, though.

To make things even more complicated, there’s someone three months ago in Florida who may or may not have dealt powers to anyone who could pay it. It’s amazing something like powers can be replicated like that, I thought it was something born out of stress and horrible situations like Taylor and Brian’s. There may be differences between these artificially obtained powers, and those that are happening naturally. I don’t have enough information to know yet, but there’s no way something as important as this won’t be the focus of an arc! Or more than one arc! Seriously, this is big!

Gregor and Faultline get to the same conclusions I did, that whoever is doing this was experimenting and the process is being perfected. This investigation is going to continue, and for that, Faultline wants to find Shamrock and offer her a spot in the team, or at least get information from her. Oh boy, another powerful member for Faultline’s mercenary crew. This crew is seriously interesting to hear about; my curiosity is piqued.

And that’s the end of this interlude. Well this all went in directions I never imagined. Faultline’s crew, Gregor, the whole thing with the tattoos...it was a blast to read. I completely forgot what I thought this’d be about, I really got into this interlude! And now there’s a new factor to consider when one thinks of Worm. This is looking like a sizable development; I wonder how long it’ll be before Taylor hears of it? I mean, Mr. Wildbow has many talents as a writer and all, but I don’t know if he can handle two big plots like Taylor’s and now this one at once. Chances are the two will be intertwined at some point. Maybe next arc, maybe later...

...for now I’ll just keep reading and see what happens. I had intended to start the next arc today, but this interlude seems good to have by itself. That’s why I’m stopping now. Next time arc 6 will be started. For now, thank you for reading!

Next update: four updates

#worm #worm liveblog #liveblog #story liveblog #book liveblog

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trickstercaptain-archive · 8 years

Note

❌ (for the relationship meme)

love & sexuality headcanon meme | accepting!

❌ What is the biggest mistake they make in their relationships?

oh damn where do you want to begin this is a long list. I kid lmfao he’s not that bad but hmmmm I feel like his biggest one could well be his independence and the fact that he’s naturally not very clingy when it comes to his partners, which can come across as him being somewhat disinterested because he’s not one to outwardly show much jealousy or territorial behaviour over his significant other. Jack’s pretty chill, basically, and he likes his own breathing space as well, which all comes down to the fact that he values his own freedom immensely ( and that of his partner ), and absolutely to a selfish degree in the sense that he still wants to feel a measure of independence over his own life and doesn’t want to feel smothered by anyone else. Except in particular circumstances, Jack is extremely sensitive to the idea of being controlled by someone because his early life is a whole series of individuals trying to control and manipulate his trust only to later betray him. Also, Jack isn’t the sort to offer much in the way of verbal affection and proclamations of ‘I love you,’ so that’s another thing that can definitely distance himself from those he’s in a relationship with if they don’t understand that’s just the way he is.

also there’s the Pearl. she’s not necessarily a mistake Jack makes in his relationships but she’s certainly an obstacle that has to be overcome for anyone trying to enter into a serious, committed relationship with him. She’s basically the third wheel lmfao for the lack of a better word; in order to accept Jack, any partner of his also must accept the fact that he loves his ship too. It’s not that he loves his ship more than he loves his significant other; they’re two completely different kinds of love and they can coexist without one needing to usurp the other, but his love for her will always be unchanged and it’s just something that has to be dealt with lmao. boat envy is a real thing.

I feel like another thing worth mentioning is Jack’s somewhat difficult relationship with the idea of commitment lmfao. So long as there’s a mutual understanding that he’s in a committed, exclusive relationship with someone, then Jack’s absolutely fine – but lifestyle choices mean that he’s much more inclined to be polyamorous ( since he rarely stays in one place for very long and moves on very quickly, so he sees no point in exclusivity with women/prostitutes/whoever he may meet in one port and then may never see again once he leaves, depending on the strength of their connection ) and this can obviously be interpreted as being unfaithful if that understanding isn’t there between both parties. He absolutely lives in the moment, and rarely thinks ahead to planning any sort of future with the person he’s with simply because the unpredictability of his lifestyle means that he might not even be alive tomorrow.

#;anonymous #;plays things closer to the vest now ( headcanon. )#;meme response #I could have written more lmfao jack is far from perfect when in a relationship

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jcoin7 · 8 years

Text

And You Look The Other Way

A friend of mine posed the following question: “Who would trust Trump to be alone with their young adult daughter?”

Hmmmm....Obviously this is someone who doesn’t trust Trump in general, and knowing him I can say with certainty that he is firmly on the Liberal side of the political spectrum. Which I am not. Well, not until recent events caused me to find myself labeled a Liberal by people whose leanings I realized were so far right that they can’t go fishing for fear of capsizing every boat they are in. But then something interesting happened, and by interesting I mean something that caused my hair to catch fire I was so mad at the jackass who responded with the following: “In the White House with Trump, yes. In the White House with Bill Clinton or Hillary Clinton, no.”

See what happened there? The respondent (Let’s call him “Jack”) somehow decided that not only is Trump trustworthy enough to be left with a young woman alone, but that both Bill and Hillary Clinton are NOT. And when he was questioned on his statement he went even further, stating, “Only 2 presidents have a history of grabbing the pussy or letting sperm fly in the White House, and they are Kennedy (D) and Clinton (D).” That’s an exact quote so don’t blame me for the shitty writing, I do well enough with that on my own.

With that comment Jack has done two things. First he has implied that Presidents Clinton and Kennedy’s affairs make them LESS trustworthy for young women to be around than a man who has been caught on tape admitting to grabbing women’s genitalia and getting away with it because he’s famous, and admitting to walking in on underage girls in beauty competitions he funds while these underage girls are in various stages of undress. Second he has implied, by including the aforementioned Presidents’ political affiliation, that Democrats are somehow less trustworthy around women than a man who between 1987 and 2012 changed his Party affiliation FIVE TIMES (1987 Republican, 1999 Independence Party, 2001 Democrat, 2009 Republican, 2011 No Party Affiliation AKA Independent, 2012 Republican). And that’s just since he moved to Manhattan back in 1987).

So I decided to tell him that no, he wasn’t correct. And a LOT of “NO” wound up coming out.

No, other Presidents have had numerous liaisons both in and outside of the White House.

No, they were not all Democrats. Like Thomas Jefferson, a Democratic-Republican (the ideological predecessor to the modern Republican Party), who had an affair with a slave and fathered five children with her. Can you imagine if he’d have been a Democrat? NO ONE would have let their slaves near him knowing how lecherous those pesky Dems could be! Or Warren Harding, a Republican, who allegedly had TWO affairs, and whose second mistress was actually paid $50,000 BY THE REPUBLICAN NATIONAL COMMITTEE so that she would not come forward and expose their affair as Harding had just won the Republican nomination to run for President. Boy, if he’d have been a Democrat I’m sure that he’d have dies much sooner from his untrustworthy ways than the manner in which he allegedly DID go - poisoned by his wife for cheating on him just three years into his Presidency! Whew! Good thing he was a Republican!

No, you were not asked to elaborate on the question so as to draw attention away from President-elect Trump's proclivity for physically assaulting women. You may (and I’d venture a guess WILL) continue the current Trumpist strategy of “Defense By Distraction,” but I would also venture a guess that such a tactic will eventually blow up in your collective faces.

No, it is not okay to state that "Only 2 presidents have a history of grabbing the pussy," since it completely ignores the fact that President-elect Trump has a history of doing just that, which is known because HE HIMSELF SAID SO. That’s right, you remember don’t you? He actually said that himself, it wasn’t someone claiming that he heard it, or some “11th hour victim” as you and others have called them, who you claim only came forward to try to hurt Trump’s chance of being elected. Even though a number of those women have been either attempting to get their story out for years or had previously told their story only to have it ignored because, well, the man wasn’t running for President at the time. Excuse me for a moment.

Okay, I’m back. I felt the need to wipe the feeling of disgust off of myself, for having to explain such things to a fellow human being who is apparently fine with slandering possible assault victims as well as blatantly making things up to suit his guy’s case. It’s sickening. And now to continue....

Yes, you can and probably will spend the next four years defending a man who, before he has even taken the Oath of Office, has reneged on many of the campaign promises that you voted him into office because of. A few quotes, and their current state of being: “I WILL build a wall, and Mexico will pay for it!” NOPE. “I will appoint a special prosecutor to investigate Hillary Clinton.” NAH. “I will repeal Obamacare and replace it with something much much better.” SORRY. “I will drain the swamp.” HAHAHAHAHAHAHANOOOOOOPE!

Yes, other Presidents have made mistakes.Clinton slashed both military spending and Intel spending to the point that the Agencies that collected Intel hoarded it and kept things from each other in order to make themselves look important, which indirectly led to the failure of Intel that was 9-11. But I’m sure his affair with an intern was MUCH worse since that is ALL YOU EVER TALK ABOUT when Trump’s sexual misadventures are brought up. And Obama spent so much time trying to get social programs through Congress that he ignored a large swath of the American public who were also hurting but felt that they had no voice anymore, which indirectly led to Secretary Clinton losing votes and helping Trump get elected. But hey, HILLARY STOOD BY BILL EVEN AFTER HE HAD AN AFFAIR! WHAT A BAD PERSON! That’s way more important, since you remember THAT but not that Trump is on his third marriage after cheating on his first two wives, while Bill and Hillary are still together even AFTER all that they went through. Family values, only Trump understands them.

No, you will not actually be able to point to the mistakes of these and other Presidents for the next four years in order to distract from the dumpster fire on top of a train wreck that is ALREADY becoming the Trump Presidency.

So there are my nos, along with some yeses just to keep it positive. But you may ask at this point, “Preacher, exactly WHY do you feel that the impending Presidency of Trump will be suck a massive clusterfuck?” Well, here are just a FEW things that I told good ol’ Jack when he continued to try defending the sweet potato with legs that is about to take charge. Mind you, ALL of these are FACTS unless I otherwise mention, and I DO mention it if it’s simply speculation or opinion for the sake of fairness:

The man admitted to grabbing female genitalia and getting away with it because he's famous and to intentionally walking in on young women while they were getting dressed. It’s him, on tape. And you looked the other way.

The man berated and belittled women. He called a former beauty queen “Miss Piggy,” he alluded to Megan Kelly having her period to explain why she, in his words, treated him “unfairly.” And you looked the other way.

This man mocked a reporter with a disability on national television. And to DEFEND HIM, right-leaning news outlets showed videos of him mocking OTHER PEOPLE. So the argument was that he wasn't mocking the disabled (which the video actually shows that he WAS), he just MOCKS LOTS OF PEOPLE. Which is unconscionable in a Presidential candidate, let alone the actual President. And you looked the other way.

The man pointed to completely fake news stories in order to besmirch the names of his political opponents. He actually cited an article in the Enquirer to explain how Ted Cruz’s father may have tried to kill Kennedy. On television. And you looked the other way.

This man got the news that the last true Socialist dictator, Fidel Castro, had died the same time the rest of the world did. And while the sitting President released an eloquent letter on what Castro's death and the ongoing normalization of relations between our two countries meant for Cuba and for the world, YOUR man tweeted, "Fidel Castro is dead!" That's it. From the next leader of the free world. And you looked the other way.

The man used hatred in order to incite violence among his followers. He once told a crowd at a rally that he loved “the old days” because a protester who was interrupting him would be “carried out on a stretcher, folks,” and told another crowd in reference to a man who was punched and kicked for protesting that “maybe he should have been roughed up, because it was absolutely disgusting what he was doing.” The man was protesting. Nothing else. And you looked the other way.

The man showed on national television that he was unaware of some of the key aspects of our national defense strategy. When asked about our nuclear triad, the man SIMPLY HAD NO IDEA WHAT THE HELL THAT WAS. HE flailed about speaking on various topics from his opposition to the Iraq war (sigh - you’re on tape with an opposite statement there too guy), President Obama being wrong about global warming being important, and, oh yeah, his commitment that nuclear proliferation should be halted. And if that last one sounds great, it would except that shortly after this interview he went on record saying first of all that OTHER NATIONS SHOULD HAVE NUCLEAR WEAPONS, and that he himself was not opposed to A NUCLEAR STRIKE IN EUROPE in order to win a war. Which. I’m sorry, is as terrifying as it is absolutely fucking insane. And you looked the other way.

The man stated numerous times during his campaign that he would release his tax returns after the election. Then after the audit was completed. And most recently that it doesn't matter if he releases them because only the media cares. Which is completely false as well as a smack in the face to people, like Jack, who ACTUALLY DEFENDED TRUMP by saying that after he WON, the tax records would come out and then “boy will you Liberals look stupid!” And yet here we are. And you continue to look the other way.

The man stated, in clear language and in NO uncertain terms, that he would build a wall on the border between the United States and Mexico, and that he would make Mexico pay for that wall. Unequivocally, without any reservation, with no room for gray area, he told the American people that Mexico would pay for the wall. And within a month of his being elected he stated that the United States would build the wall and that Mexico would "reimburse us," which is COMPLETELY DIFFERENT than what he said would happen. And the SAME DAY that he announced this, the President of Mexico reiterated AGAIN in a statement that Mexico will NOT PAY FOR A WALL. And you looked the other way.

The man said that if he won the Presidency that he would put his businesses into a blind trust run by his children. Which is NOT A BLIND TRUST. Not by the business definition and CERTAINLY not by the legal definition. These are holdings that CAN and in fact already HAVE caused ethical issues stemming from the fact that foreign nations could show preferential treatment to his businesses in order to get preferential treatment from OUR NATION. And you looked the other way. But wait, this one gets worse. Because now that you have elected him, he has gone back on the promise to divest himself from his business holdings or come even CLOSE to putting them into a blind trust, instead openly stating in his first press conference that the day-to-day running of his businesses will be done by his sons, and that he and his daughter will have nothing to do with the running of said businesses. He will STILL OWN THE BUSINESSES THOUGH. Which, yes, is actually against the United States Constitution. That, in case you forgot, is the document that you and others like you were afraid that President Obama and Secretary Clinton if she were elected would tear to pieces, the same document that YOUR GUY is about to violate. And his daughter is as of today still in talks with a Chinese company about a Trump project in China, a company that is majority owned BY THE CHINESE GOVERNMENT. Neither she nor her father have made any move to cut her out of these negotiations. And you continue to look the other way.

The man stated that he would repeal Obamacare and replace it with "something much better." his own words. He also stated that no one would be left without coverage when Obamacare was repealed because he had "so many ideas" (again, his own words) for what to replace Obamacare with. And Congress has just moved to begin the repeal of Obamacare, something of which Trump approved, with NO REPLACEMENT AT ALL. AT ALL. Let me say that again, NO REPLACEMENT AT ALL. Because of this, over TWENTY MILLION PEOPLE will at least temporarily and over half of them permanently LOSE THEIR HEALTH INSURANCE. This is tantamount to murder, as one of the biggest provisos of Obamacare has always been the inability to be turned down due to preexisting conditions, which is ALSO coincidentally one of the FIRST things that Congress JUST VOTED THE OTHER DAY TO END. And you continue to look the other way.

The man, AND the sitting President, were briefed on CREDIBLE INTELLIGENCE that members of President-elect Trump's campaign had DIRECT CONTACT with the Russian government during the election. This is not the bed-pissing nonsense, I could not care less about whatever deviancy he practices or does not practice in his bedroom or in a Russian hotel room, for that matter. This is a detailed report based on real Intel that has caused the FBI to begin an investigation into whether members of the Trump election team colluded with the Russian government to sway a United States Presidential election. And you continue to look the other way.

But hey, at least he’s surrounding himself with “good people, smart people.” Once again, his words. How’s that going....

The man said that he would "drain the swamp," and that he would begine to rid Washington of lobbyists, insiders and big-business types who were only there for their own good and not the good of the people. And once he was elected he proceeded to nominate two Goldman Sachs executives, the CEO of the largest corporate entity in the world (Exxon-Mobil), and a handful of lobbyists to Cabinet and leadership positions. And you CONTINUE to look the other way.

The man appointed Stephen Bannon, who is responsible for articles such as “There’s no hiring bias against women in tech, they just suck at interviews” (totally misogynistic and written in such a gender-biased way as to be laughable), “Trump 100% vindicated: CBS reports ‘swarm’ on rooftops celebrating 9/11″ (completely debunked to the point that CBS ran a story just to let people know that this was false news), and “Racist, pro-Nazi roots of Planned Parenthood revealed” (a hit piece written with such a slant that there is not an ounce of verifiable factual information in it). And when the man had his first press conference, he berated a CNN reporter and called the network “fake news” for reporting NOT that Trump likes to pay Russian prostitutes to pee the bed (that was Uproxx and others after that), but that he and President Obama had been briefed on “unverified intelligence from a credible source” that the Russian government might have information that could be used to blackmail the President-elect. That’s what CNN reported. NOT the pee-pee diaries. And your man conflated them with Uproxx. And then Trump took a question from Breitbart News. I shit you not. And you looked the other way.

The man nominated a man who has a questionable track record regarding civil rights, who opposed repealing Don’t Ask Don’t Tell to give people of all sexual orientations the right to serve their country and who supported a Constitutional Amendment to ban same-sex marriage to head our nation's largest law enforcement body. Senator Sessions lost a bid to be a Federal Judge due to racist comments, and led his State’s defense of a school funding bill that was eventually found to be UNCONSTITUTIONAL due to its favoring of wealthy, mostly white schools over poor, mostly black ones. And you looked the other way.

The man nominated a man to run the Office of Housing and Urban Development who has publicly stated that he DOESN'T THINK HE KNOWS HOW TO RUN SUCH AN ORGANIZATION. Ben Carson has ZERO experience running such an Agency, and has just as little experience in government. Oh yeah, and you and your friends AND TRUMP made Carson out to be a complete idiot during the Primaries who couldn’t run a Burger King. And you looked the other way.

The man nominated a man to run the Department of Energy who has publicly stated that he would DO AWAY WITH IT, though he COULDN'T REMEMBER THE AGENCY'S NAME WHEN HE WAS ASKED IT. Former Governor Perry is a climate change denier, and is STILL ON THE BOARD of the company that is trying to build the Dakota Access Pipeline. And you continue to look the other way.

The man nominated a woman to run the Department of Education who has a long and vociferous history of OPPOSING PUBLIC EDUCATION. Betsy DeVos is a billionaire who advocated for charter schools and the privatization of the public education system, something that has been repeatedly proven to favor the wealthy and to disproportionally affect the poor. And you continue to look the other way.

In a few days this man will take the Presidential Oath of Office under a cloud of possible ethics violations, under a cloud of question over his leveraging of national power to make money for his businesses, under a cloud of suspicion over whether he will keep ANY of his campaign promises, most of which he’s already broken, and under a cloud of doubt as to his ability to actually do the job of President. The United States will have a possible Constitutional crisis on its hands from day one.

The fact that he has admitted to inappropriately touching women without their permission and to walking in on underage young ladies in various stages of undress are only two of MANY reasons that I would not trust the man alone with ANYONE, least of all my daughter. And she’s not even a year old yet. Which is good, because at least I can hope that by the time she understands stuff like politics, the Trump era will have become just an extremely embarrassing memory.

- Preacher

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kapitanwingter · 7 years

Text

Chapter 5 - Hear me roar!

Ever told you how forgetful I am?

Setting the alarm clock to wake me up at seven even though I need to wake up at eight. Even though it's Saturday sensha-dou classes are after school every day and at weekend mornings and Saturday afternoon, though we can visit the hangars and tinker with our tanks any time. They may be the possession of the school but the school's sensha-dou committe (Emese and the deputy commander) knows best how to handle them so they leave it to them. However they think the best is to let the crews customize the tanks. Well maybe not the crew of the Tas yet since we're newbies, maybe if we proove ourselves they will trust us enough for that too.

After choosing me as commander we all headed home and Cap told us to go back at nine in the morning. She said the deputy commander will walk us through the operation of the tank and she will instruct us on our first lesson. Everyone else from the club will be training on the grounds which is next to the forest so we will have the entire area for ourselves.

She told us to come in the school's sports outfit because we have some serious cleaning to do. True that, when I drove the tank the inside was...well...it had filth of unspeakable amount. We would also get our equipment and tankwomen clothing. I'm so excited.

I packed some water and sandwiches into my bag which had the union jack on and went to the hangars.

I saw Reiko and Jitsuko was already there with somebody else.

"Hey girls" I said.

"Morning Tami" they replied.

"Good morning miss Tamara" said the girl with long orange hair in twintails. She was wearing the same coverall as Emese yesterday with tanker boots and I saw her leather coat and tanker hat lying on the Panther near her - which I assumed was her tank "I'm Reizei Rin, they call me Lili. I'm Emi's second in command, I look forward to working with you"

"I look forward to working with you as well" I said.

"I heard a great deal about you already. Did you seriously cranked this piece of junk in five minutes?"

"I think it was six"

"Aren't you a modest one"

I giggled a bit.

"I hope we haven't missed the party!" yelled Eimi from the distance who was coming with the missing crew members.

They introduced themselves after.

"So" started Lili "Shall we start?"

"Lemme guess it's dusting the tank time" said Aoi.

"Pontosan [exactly]" said Lili.

"Üssenek meg kővel ha ez nem magyar volt [Punch me with a stone if that wasn't Hungarian]" I said.

"Tanulgatom [I learn it-ish]" she replied "Okay girls, the tap is over there, get some water and the sponges on the table and let's start scratching off the rust and dirt"

Thus we did. For an hour or two. After the tank turned into a nice deep olive colour. It had some japanese markings on it, probably from the previous users.

"So anyways" I said "Why didn't you use the tank for this long?"

"It got set on fire by itself" said Lili "The operating crew barely escaped in the middle of the match which was called off after it. The fire almost caused the ammo inside to explode which they menaged to prevent. After they repaired it and started it again but after five minutes of running smoke was coming out of her so they poured some foam in the engine, washed it out and left her in the courner"

"Hmmmm" I reacted "I guess we're lucky"

"How so?"

"Right you haven't heard. My Dad does this for a living, making vehicles safe and operable. He hasn't had a single incident with the refurbished tanks yet. I'm gonna give him a call then"

Lili nodded approovingly.

I talked to Dad for something ten minutes while I looked through the tank thoroughly as the others were starring at me working.

"Don't just stand there y'all we gotta get this engines out now" I said to them.

"Plural?" asked Eimi.

"Yeah this stuff has two Turán engines inside"

The club is well equipped so we menaged to get the engine block out in half an hour with the jacks then I called Dad again. After close inspection from every possible angle we concluded first that the oil was leaking which was to be expected but I also noticed that fuel was leaking from the combustion chambers at three pistons. I poured some in exactly because of this and not water because it's not the same.

"Gotcha" I said "Even though we need to take apart engine two it's not the most serious problem"

"You guys are professionals" said Lili "Not even the automotive club could figure this one out. Now that I think about it they didn't want to take it apart because they feared it would do it again while taking it out of the tank"

"That was a possibility" I said

"What" asked Reiko.

"Nothing" I replied.

It was noon so we took a lunchbreak before taking apart an entire engine block. We were already exhausted except for Lili so we didn't talk much. After resting for half an hour I sent Jitsuko and Aoi to see if the automotive club members were in their clubhouse today. We got lucky so I asked Eimi and Reiko to look for the Tas's blueprint in the headquarters.

Reinforced with the automotive club's professionalism and equipment we menaged to seal the problematic places away and put it back to it's respectful place. I sat in the driver's seat - and I must admit Fusako did a number on the inside, I couldn't imagine it could be this clean - and hit the ignition button. She had a lot better voice than before. I rolled out with her on the field and hit the pedal to the metal. The Tas accelerates like a mother trucker. For a medium-heavy tank it's really fast and agile though I have a feeling the tracks might get tricky if the road is not stable enough but should perform well in snow and dust or sand. I rode her for ten minutes and nothing happened so I went back after stirring up the dust heavily.

"This should do" I said to everyone "Cheers guys, thanks for the help!"

"It was a pleasure" said the automotive club's main engineer and they went back.

"What a way to waste the day" said Reiko "It's already two PM..."

"Tired already?" said Lili sarcastically.

"Hell no" she replied.

"Good, because the real fun begins now. As you may or may not know this is a tank. What does it mean? It means you don't operate it alone - duh. Time for a role-call, I heard you already chose Tamara as your commander. Well then commander, time to sorte out who does what"

The girls were all looking at me. They each had the place they wanted to be but were too shy to say it out loud.

"Okay" I broke the silence "First we need a driver. I vote for Eimi since she really is into cars"

"Good call" said Fusako.

"Shooter should be Reiko then because of her sport and hobby"

"Couldn't agree more" said Reiko.

"Loader should be Fusako. I saw your handy work on the inside of the tank, I see you can orientate well inside already and you seem to be very agile and tall enough to have no problem loading the cannon"

"I'll do if you want me to, Tami" she said.

"So that leaves the radio operator and the maintenance personnel..."

"Excuse me" said Aoi "I really enjoyed taking that engine apart. If you teach me everything there is to know I would really much like to be the crew's most important support" then she bowed.

"I'm glad you feel like that. I guess that makes Jitsuko our radioman"

"Seems fine to me" she said.

"Glad you could sort it out this quickly" said Lili "So what are you waiting for? Watabe! Check the loadout with Fusako and also check the engine's parameters, everyone else: battle-stations!"

I told Aoi what to look out for and what to check when inspecting the tank. Before we could jump in the tanks:

"Hold on a sec girls! I almost forgot" said Lili "Come in the HQ"

We went in and saw folded clothes on the chairs with boots in front of them and tanker hats on them.

"First let's get geared up" she said.

We each got the 38M tank hat, a light-olive coverall with a brown belt and the respective undershits with tankmen boots. Luckily I was prepared and brought...some of my own.

My everyday clothes when the weather allows include a 65M Surranó - a Hungarian military leather boots - and a leather jacket. I also brough my grandfather's leather gloves who passed away before my birth, and a dark-brown, Hungarian version of the german M43 tanker hat..

I took them on or instead of the given equipment. Turned around and said:

"Allright girls, this is the point of no return. Is everybody ready to make history?!"

"YEAH" they yelled back.

Lili was smiling while we took positions inside the tank. "They sure look promising" she must have thought to herself.

Now that I think back things really escalated fast on my first week. It was my third day in school and I already was commander of a 44M Tas in the sensha-dou team. I never could've imagined I would make this progress so fast, not to mention that they would choose and accept me as their commander. The real trial is in front of me but this is the kind of challange I love to tackle head on.

The hat had a built in radio. It was modern technology so it was wireless and had a long-lasting battery inside. Everyone had access to the radio which was between each other in the tank, I could use the short range radio from my neckpiece on top of the tank radio and I also had a smaller headset under my hat, and Jitsuko was the long range operator. I think these hats are upgraded from the original, made into the likes of the soviet tanker ushankas.

"All right Eimi, all yours now" I said over the radio "Előre!"

"Which means..?" she asked.

"Forwards" I said "Also take it slowly for now"

Lili was observing us from the tower next to the garages.

"So uhm...44M Tas, sorry we don't have a codename for you guys yet..." she said.

"Any ideas?" I asked the crew.

"This one's on you" said Fusako.

"Turul" I said on the short range radio.

"Allright. Turul, go forward and in the forest, follow the road which will lead you to where the others are having their training. Be careful not to go in the firing range but no don't worry they are facing towards the ocean and the range is at the edge of the ship"

"We still haven't set sails you know that, right?" I asked her.

"Uhm...yeah...of course" she said with uncertainty in her voice "But anyways just go where I told you, the short range radio has the range of about two kilometers. The range is three away so if I don't reply switch to long-range. I can see you from up here with my binaculars. Good luck girls"

"Acknowledged" I replied "Tamara temporarily out. Ei we can go a bit faster"

"Understood" she said.

At the edge of the forest it suddenly hit me. I didn't explain to her how to drive a tank. I mean it's pretty straightforward: gas, break, clutch, gears - eight of them forwards and two in reverse - and one break for the left track and one for the right. She's a natural besides her knowladge of cars.

Fusako's job was really easy she just didn't need to drop the ammo and reload fast. Maybe I should explain the breech mechanics to her later, there is a lever which is basically the safe switch in the cannon, she just needs to pull that.

Reiko will need to learn how to estimate distances but otherwise her job was rotating two wheels and the horizontal one has a hydraulic stance so the turret traverses fast.

Jitsuko's job will be an other matter. I'll have to read the manual with her. Thankfully all the manuals for this tank are naturally in Hungarian so it must have been a bit difficult to figure this tank out for the previous operators. This radio will be a tough one though but I'm sure we'll solve it.

I just told Aoi a couple of stuff to check, not even thoroughly but I think she might be an explicit observer as we were tinkering with the engine. I'll send her to the automotive club and I'll tell her everything I know as well. She'll menage very well. In the end she'll menage all the tanks and not just ours.

We did as we were told to and followed the road. Eventually ended up on the training grounds. There were the the shooting grounds which was at least a kilometer long and it really did face towards the side of the ship. To the left there were different kinds of paths which simulated different terrains. To the right I saw a couple of big tents which I assumed were for resting and strategy meetings.

"Lili this is Turul, we're here what do we do now, do you read me?" I asked through my short-range radio. I heard some buzzing so I was about to tell Jitsuko to fetch the manual for the long range.

"Not Lili but I think I'm fine as well" said somebody over the radio.

"Who is that?" I asked.

"Just your superior"

"I apologize, Százados, 44M Tas "Turul", commander Ötvös Tamara reporting for duty"

"Very nice you guys made it there in on piece, Lili already told us your progress on the Tas and frankly you guys did a splendid job"

"Thank you Ma'am"

"Get your asses over here, time to meet the team"

We parked the tank in front of Emese and got out of the tank. The rest of the sensha-dou class was there with the basic team: two Tigers, two Panthers, four Turán Is, four Turán IIs, five Panzer IVs, four Zrínyi 105s and four 75s, one Toldi I and two Toldi IIs. Which made it hundred and twenty eight people in this class. No way I would ever remember that many names. Every one of them gathered around us.

"Ladies" started Emese "These girls got the Tas running again. I would like to introduce you commander Ötvös Tamara and her crew: driver Toyota Eimi, gunner Royama Reiko, loader Katsura Fusako, radio operator Ban Jitsuko and however she's not here but our new general maintenance personnel Watabo Aoi"

"Nice job on the Tas, girls!" said somebody from the crowd. Somebody else whistled one and the rest followed with a big applause.

We bowed.

"I am looking forward working with you" I said.

"Allright girls get to know the new ones after class, back to work everybody" said Emese and the rest listened to her.

She turned to us.

"You on the other hand have been working hard, park your tank there next to the other by the shooting range and go get something to eat from the tent"

"Thank you Captain" I said as I saluted.

She returned the salute and went back to training.

"Százados!" I yelled.

"Hmm?"

"What do we do now?"

"Read the manuals, teach the others and each other how to operate the tank effectively, learn the radio, how to rangefind and shoot accurately, the codes used by us and get closer to each other"

"Understood!"

She smiled and climbed up on the nearest Tiger.

"One more thing" she said.

"Yes Ma'am?" I replied.

"If you have any problems come see me, Lili will be arriving soon and she'll be your instructor until you guys menage on your own"

"Yes Ma'am!"

I climbed up the engine and looked around and I took some time to take in the environment.

"Well then" I said to myself "Let's get to work"

#chapter #chapter5 #girlsundpanzer #girls und panzer #fanfiction #fan fiction #Winged

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