#in SO many ways he has lost himself and he's given in to ambition over his own morals over love and over friendship

[dontwanderoff]

girl who is too obsessed with haunted houses: i think dale’s new house should be haunted

[volotheism]

𝐇𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐥𝐝 𝐨𝐟 𝐃𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧; Conplecte Abyssum. ☽

Name: Volo Age: 27 (as of the end of PLA) Height: 6'3" Date of Birth: Unknown, within the Year of the Garchomp (Dragon) Hometown: Remote village in the borderlands of Johto and Kanto. Current Location: Anywhere, everywhere, whenever, however.

Pokémon (Team): Spiritomb, Roserade, Lucario, Garchomp, Hisuian Arcanine, Celestican Togekiss(Dragon/Fairy). Additional Pokémon: Multiple Togepi, Giratina (when properly channeled)

TRAITS

Positive: Persuasive, action-oriented, resourceful, strong people skills, curious, ambitious, observative. Negative: Impulsive, impatient, self-serving to a fault, manipulative, prone to hubris, penchant for lying.

MBTI: ESTP (The Entrepreneur) Alignment: Chaotic Neutral Sexuality: He has no clue.

BACKGROUND

❛ You see, ever since I was young, whenever I met with something painful or heartbreaking... I couldn't help but wonder why life was so unfair. Why I was cursed to live through such things. Of course, I imagine we all go through something like that. Eventually, I chose to direct all my energy into my own natural curiosity and ambition. And what tickled my curiosity more strongly than anything were the mysteries to be found in legends, in history, in ruins... You see, I fancied that by unraveling these mysteries, I could find out how the world itself came to be–and with that knowledge, maybe even forge a new, better world. ❜

' Before we were gifted names, Before we were men, We were 𝐦𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬. Before men crowned themselves as the authority of the land, We saw the eyes of the gods posed above the same teeth that were bared by fellow beasts.

To be a 𝐦𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫 was to be closer to 𝐂𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐨𝐫. '

The story of the world nearly collapsing atop Spear Pillar, begins not in Hisui-- but across the sea, in the land of monsters. Villages crumbled as earthquakes rocked the west. Monarchs were humbled at the capital east of the mountains. Hubris against supernatural forces larger than mortal men was deemed a death sentence. Clans and individuals residing in Kanto's plains and Johto's mountains were beginning to flee and seek refuge elsewhere from the great surge of rampaging beasts, and the natural disasters that resulted from their power.

Volo was only a child when he learned that the old ones still held absolute power over their domain, though it took a willingness to understand their tongue in order to hear their messages.

The reverence of spirits both minor and major was common practice in the time that Volo lived. Every living thing had a soul, and all souls were connected in one way or another. He supposed that was why the collective attitude of his village drew more and more grim as the community struggled with a wave of disease that they simply could not shake off after a particularly dry summer, leading into a bitter winter. He recalled being told by an older villager that the land itself was sick because it was full of anger-- that it was rippling into the monsters and people that called it home. And Volo truly believed this man-- a hardened elder who had lost his arm while defending himself from an aggressive, territorial Tyranitar in belly of Mt. Silver.

Pokémon were, quite frankly, mysterious and dangerous creatures in the eyes of many people. There was very little that the average person understood about these monsters, and those who were brave and skilled enough to tame one, were held in high regard. People paired with Pokémon partners were given the task of protecting the village from larger threats-- be it other Pokémon, other people, or even natural disasters.

This village, cradled in a valley just between Johto and Kanto, was what Volo had called home since he was born. He'd always been there, living an unassuming, but calm life. Both of his parents were appreciated by the village for their agricultural knowledge and skill, growing produce for consumption, and other wonderous fruits such as the apricorn-- the apricorns, highly valued by the traveling Ginkgo Guild, were a favorite of the merchants, who often bought as much of the family's stock as possible whenever it was time for a harvest. This reliable stream of income was appreciated, especially as the village's population seemed to fluctuate.

"Lots of the young ones leave once they reach a certain age. Not a bad thing at all, there's a whole world to explore. Oh, but it does get dangerous-- nobody knows everything that Pokémon are capable of," mentions a calligrapher, sitting up from where he was hunched over his paper, wincing and cracking his back.

"Those Ginkgo Guild folks, they sure do paint traveling around in a positive way."

"Tch, says you, why do you think they're always recruiting? Because they go west, or up north, and slip off of a cliff, or get killed by a vicious beast. If I was losing workers left and right to disasters, I'd be recruiting all day too!" Scoffs a carpenter, wiping the sweat from his brow as the summer sun beats down on him. A Wartortle sways her tail, and cools off her irritated companion.

Volo was only a child when he learned the power of 'want.' The value of working for your wants was instilled in him by his parents, and by the village residents. 'Anything you want can be yours if you work hard enough for it,' was something that he was told very frequently.

"-- I think I'll go out there!" Pipes up Volo, once he turns 11. "I want to see what types of Pokémon and people are outside of this place."

Pensively, his parents agree to it, and wave off their only son as he departs on his first trade route with the guild.

Volo took to the lifestyle very well. He had the opportunity to travel across the lands, searching far and wide with the guild for supplies and goods to sell in villages, and budding settlements. The distribution of a brand new technology, the Poké Ball, was one of the Ginkgo Guild's newest claim to fame, and Volo was able to practice with this tool a great deal on his travels.

Goods and services was not Volo's passion, however. No. He had always been a naturally curious boy, fascinated with the monsters that inhabited this world, and the legends behind them. He dreamt of chance encounters with mythical beasts, and of treasure hunts that ended in fateful meetings with powerful monsters. Since his youngest years, Volo had devoured every last bit of mythos and knowledge that he could get his hands on, whether through storytelling from his mother, grandmother, or travelers in the village-- or from the books that were in his father's possession.

From the western territories of Johto, to the eastern shores of Kanto-- across the channel to Hoenn, the Ginkgo Guild had a large foot print. It was only natural that their trade routes would eventually expand into wilderness of Hisui to the north, where more and more people were choosing to settle for a quieter life. This, naturally, piqued Volo's interest greatly.

"I've never been to the land of Hisui. My grandfather was born there, but, his father took him and the rest of his family away from the region when he was just a boy. I want to go there."

Perhaps-- this would be an opportunity for one of those chance encounters that he had been dreaming of.

Volo was 14 by the time the Ginkgo Guild had finally established a strong enough repertoire with the people living in Jubilife Village, and 15 once he was capable enough to make the long journey to Hisui himself. Though he had been with the guild for some time, staying on a multi-regional trade route was physically and mentally exhausting-- entire seasons would pass without Volo returning to his home, and it was not unusual for the guild to only appear in certain places when seasonally appropriate. Summer was harsh in Kanto, and winter was unforgiving in Hisui. They needed to be certain to always return to Johto for the apricorn harvest as well.

But, there did come the day that Volo had the opportunity to wander Hisui himself-- of course, when he was not tending to his duties.

He was quickly warned of the dangers that were present in this region: Pokémon that were far more powerful than anything he had ever encountered occupied every last corner of Hisui. The land itself was rugged too, and difficult to navigate solo. He was informed of the survey work performed by the Galaxy Team and the respected Professor Laventon, along with the established authority of the Diamond and Pearl Clans.

But, what drew him in the most, was the whispers of a witch of sorts, who lived in a secluded space in the northeast.

"I want to meet her. She should be able to tell me anything I could possibly want to know about this land!"

It took some convincing (and, perhaps, a lot of wares sold at a tremendous discount), but Volo would eventually be told where to find the witch called Cogita at the Ancient Retreat. This journey would had to be made alone though, for nobody wished to bother the powerful woman themselves; Cogita prefer to keep to herself, toiling away at her work, and minding her own.

After an incredibly arduous journey, Volo would be overjoyed to find the fabled retreat--

And Cogita would be shocked to see the face of what she could only describe as a ghost from the past.

Once a painfully shocking and awkward exchange is had between the two of them-- Volo, who was far too enthusiastic for his own good, and Cogita, who was prepared to knock this intruder out cold-- a proper conversation begins.

Cogita remembered when the last of her remaining family had made the decision to leave the retreat, and the entirety of Hisui. It came to no surprise for her: as the years passed, the younger generations wished to know what was outside of this seclusive land-- there was more to this world than Hisui, her wilderness, and her crumbling ruins. But Cogita had to remain, for reasons that she had kept close to her chest for many, many years.

Cogita's son had been the one to make the decision to leave with his wife, his sister, and her only grandchild. This boy, Volo, who appeared nearly a century after that had happened, wore the same face as Cogita's late husband.

Naturally, when she explains this to her guest, he is struck with disbelief.

"But my grandfather left Hisui when he was still a child. Your story doesn't make any sense, that would make you easily, that would make you-- HUNDREDS of years old."

Cogita could only narrow her eyes and frown. The boy really knew nothing of where he came from, what he came from, nor who he and his family were.

"Time is a manipulatable construct," is all Cogita would say to that. There wasn't a need to go into great depths about her apparently lack of aging.

"Did you only come here to bother me? Or did you have actual questions to ask? Tell me what it is you want."

And with that wondrous expression, Volo says:

"I want to know everything."

There is a pause as the old witch stares upon the boy, and then smiles with crinkles in the corners of her eyes.

"Very well."

The Celestica people once inhabited this land of Hisui. Considered to be blessed and veiled by The Great Unknowable and all of Creation, their people flourished on this land, communing with the gods, and connecting with the Pokémon that lived on the land as well. A wildly curious society, they studied anything and everything: sciences, art, transportation, language, and many concepts that would be considered arcane and esoteric by the modern man. The Celesticans had a rich, vibrant culture, owed to their deep connection with Pokémon, and the spirits that they allied alongside with. Their civilization fell, though-- and it is uncertain what exactly brought the Celestica to their knees. The full story has been lost to time, but several preserved verses from their written history suggest multiple tragedies that led to their disappearance: some allude to war thanks to the greed of a ruthless emperor, others, to plague. One tells of the sun being swallowed, the light no longer gracing the land. A darkness fell upon Celestica, fear filled the hearts of every man, woman and child. Some fled. Many more died. And then, one day-- the Celestica were no more, and this was a land only occupied by Pokémon.

"That still doesn't explain why you've lived this long," Volo would furrow his brows in confusion.

And Cogita sighs, chin resting in her palm, spoon stirring a cup of tea sat in front of her.

"I've been Chosen, you see, to assist someone on a mission delivered from above. Who knows how long I will be kept alive by the old ones? Another 1000 years, or however long it takes for this fabled person to arrive on their mission. Who that someone is. . ."

Another pause.

"I am not certain yet."

Could he be that someone--?

It would not take much further persuasion for Volo to get Cogita to take him as an apprentice in arcane practices, knowledge of the Celestican roots, and the art of wielding Pokémon. For the next decade, he would choose to remain in Hisui, calling it his home.

During the day, he would fulfill his duties to the Ginkgo Guild, assisting them creating a permanent establishment in Hisui and a great relationship with the settlers of Jubilife Village. Even the Diamond and Pearl clans would begin to conduce business with the trading guild.

At night, and while he was not saddled with responsibilities, Volo dedicated his time and energy to absorbing everything he could about the legends and teachings that Cogita offered him. He was diving into fantastical work, and into a world where the might held by Pokémon was not far removed from humans as well. He participated in rituals that had long been forgotten by most, and communed with entities that he came to know as the old kamuy. With every hidden secret that Volo learned, he grew more and more capable, and Cogita truly thought that this was the young individual that she had divined as the one with "the mission from The Almighty Unknowable."

Volo would still find time to occasional return to Kanjoh to visit his parents and extended family, though he chose not to share with them what he knew about Cogita, and the remarkable journey that he had embarked on. After all, had it not been his past lineage that chose to leave their connection to Hisui behind? Why should he reveal the secrets that HE had worked hard to obtain-- to those so far separated from it? It simply did not concern them, in Volo's eyes, and he truly believed that sharing this information would be more than either of them could handle. They were content in their life, and there was no reason to disturb that.

Over some time though, Volo's hunger for knowledge was drawing him towards darker, more deranged information. He became completely obsessed with the mythos of The Mighty Unknowable, and The Void: Arceus and Giratina. After everything that he had come to understand, the countless secrets, the fantastic knowledge, Volo would not be satisfied until he learned everything, and SAW everything.

Cogita cautioned Volo against attempting to dive into the depths of Giratina's knowledge, and strictly forbade him from make any effort to contact the vast abyssal deity.

"There is nothing that The Great Old One has to share with us, it's best not to antagonize it. Your best option is to continue your work with searching for the old plates of Sinnoh."

. . .

"But I want to know it and Arceus."

Driven by an obsessive need to meet these eldritch forces, Volo began to neglect his duties with the Ginkgo Guild. Without realizing the passage of time, he also failed to return home to see his family for many, many years. Every thought he had, every breath he took, was a part of his deranged focus of communing with these Old Ones.

And he WOULD eventually commune with the old king of distortion, deep in the depths of Turnback Cave-- from there, Volo found himself on a path that he no longer had full control of. By creating a pact with Giratina and being chosen as its herald, Volo surrendered his human life, and was removed from the mortal coil entirely; existing in an in-between state beyond time and space, he accepted a pseudo-immortal reality, where he was simply not effected by the passage of time and space. In exchange for the eldritch truth, Volo agreed to be a vessel of the void, to be used when need be.

Yet, he was not satisfied. Truthfully, if he could create a strong enough bond with the mighty Giratina, the one who had been sealed away by its creator, then perhaps he AND the king of distortion could draw Arceus out of hiding, and finally, Volo could have the satisfaction of seeing and understand EVERYTHING at his fingertips.

At least-- that was his motivation initially. All he wanted to do was see. And understand. And know. It wasn't until Volo's consistent exposure to Giratina's madness, and the eldritch truth that was instilled into him, that Volo saw visions of calamity in the future and harrowing omens from the past. He began to see himself as something greater than the average man, experiencing a delusion of divinity, that HE ALONE could alter time and space itself, and that HE ALONE could not only commune with Giratina as its liege, but also convince Arceus, The Mighty Unknowable, to heed his word.

"I saw something, I was plagued with the most disturbing vision, a world where all life has been wiped out, no people, Pokémon or monsters could set foot in this world without being wiped away completely. I saw the gaping mouth of extinction, its hands stretched out to smother. It cannot be stopped. And it will not stop in just THIS world, it will do the same elsewhere. There is no solution to preventing this reality-- the only choice is to disobey the creator, and erase this universe destined for destruction. A new one can be born from this divine obliteration. A world where the demiurge does not allow that evil miasma to destroy us, and the next universe, and the next, and the next."

Volo's meddling with the fabric of reality, as if it were nothing but a clothe for him to cut and mend at will, resulting in the space-time distortions across Hisui, and the massive rift tearing the sky over Mt. Coronet open. With the help of power granted to him by Giratina, he hoped that the disturbance would bring Arceus down from his heavenly pedestal, going so far as to bring people from other points in time to Hisui, and stirring up the Noble Pokémon into frenzied states.

Yet, there was no sign of the Creator.

The story would go on as a strange child would be the next to fall from the rift in the sky, with only one statement left in their mind before they woke up in the Hisuian Wilderness: Seek out all Pokémon.

The tale of the young hero who would quell the frenzied Nobles, compile the first complete index of Pokémon, prevent certain destruction of Hisui by creating the Red Chain and meeting the legendary "Sinnoh," and eventually reaching the summit of Mt. Coronet, is remembered by many. Though most do not know of Volo's continued mental decline as he feverishly realized that he was not the 'one with the mission' that Cogita had thought he had been-- it was this mere child. His purpose began to collapse, his identity falling apart all around him. But his divine delusion remained true. HE had to be the one to commune with Arceus, HE was the one who connected with Giratina and became his herald, HE was the one burdened with the eldritch truth and the visions of the past and future. There was no way that this outsider could take the helm of this job!

What he could do, was continue to mask as a simple helper on this hero's journey, and manipulate them into collecting artifacts and objects that he needed in a last ditch attempt to draw down the creator. Sabotaging his connection with Cogita, who was already highly suspicious and critical about her descendant's behavior, Volo spiraled.

"My desire to meet Arceus cannot be contained any longer! I need to know what it is! I MUST know what it is! If I can meet Arceus myself, then I may also be able to subjugate its power. . . And using that, I will attempt to create a new, better world! Of course, if I create a brand-new world, then the Hisui region that we currently exist in will be undone and returned to nothing. You, everyone you know, and all the Pokémon living here will vanish in an instant, as if you'd never been."

How harshly Volo would be humbled, as he was struck down atop Mt. Coronet, when Giratina itself turned its back on its herald's deranged mission. Ripped from the sky and cast aside, there were no other options that Volo could use to claim victory. His false mission was over. He was not Arceus' chosen-- the man that had become obsessed with the sun, was destined for the void.

And while he accepted that this was the end of his mad journey, Volo still had ambitions to meet Arceus.

' Someday, I'll solve every riddle in the legends of Hisui's Pokémon. And on that day, I'll stand before Arceus at last—No, I will CONQUER it! No matter how many years, how many decades, how many centuries it takes me! '

. . .

What has become of Volo since his loss atop Mt. Coronet? The man still wanders the earth, coming and going from varying points in time. Some believe that he manipulates events in history out of pure curiosity. As the continued herald of Giratina, Volo comes and goes from the Distortion Realm. When he occasionally allows Giratina to use his body as an avatar, Volo falls into statis afterwards, and slumbers in the Great Old One's plane until his body recovers, sometimes for years at a time. Therefor, Volo has disappeared from history, only to emerge at the most bizarre times.

And while it took a great deal of time, Volo has come to terms that his role as the Herald of Giratina is enough of a crown for him to wear, despite it not being the destiny that satisfied him initially. Giratina's pact had elevated him to what some would even consider to be a demi-god. Though, Volo still acts very much the same way he did as a simple human.

There is still a deeply seeded ambition to prevent the calamity that he saw in his vision all of those centuries ago. And it is his belief that if he were to take up an apprentice in his lineage in the same way that Cogita had done to him in the time of Hisui, that his successor could be victorious.

It should come to no surprise then, that one of the most fearsome and respected trainers in modern history is a woman with a fascination for mythos and legendary Pokémon-- and is the current seated champion of the Sinnoh league. Her resemblance to her ancestor is quite uncanny, it is as if the two have already known each other.

Perhaps they have.

But one thing is for certain: Volo's influence is still alive, and until Giratina itself is no more, there is no ridding the world of the man who had once loved the sun. The eldritch truth must be bestowed upon another so that Volo's vision was not gifted to him for nothing.

[twistedtummies2]

Heyo, what opinions do your twst bois have about their Housewardens?

Oooooh...this is hard, because with a LOT of my OCs, I don't have really solid development towards the relationships they have with their housewardens. It's one of the points of character development on the bois that I'm weakest with, to be perfectly honest. I'll try to give you what I can without rambling too much... Something common with ALL of my OCs is that their relationships with their Housewardens are frequently...unusual. Billy is the one who has the most developed relationship with his Housewarden, so I'll start with him and attempt to be succinct. When he and Vil first met, they didn't get along at all. Because, frankly, Billy does not fit the obvious standards of Pomefiore: he's a hulking mass of blubber and muscle who is utterly shameless on many levels, and frequently seems to possess the mental faculties of a child. He is, in many ways, the diametric opposite to EVERYTHING Vil personally stands for. HOWEVER, over time, Vil has come to, at worst, tolerate Billy...and, at best, actually develop an affectionate fondness for the big oaf. He recognizes that, deep down, Billy does have the ideals of Pomefiore in his heart, he just expresses them differently; Billy, for his part, respects Vil immensely, and even looks up to him, always trying to please him, sometimes despite himself. He's one of the few people at NRC who can truly keep Billy in order. Nakoda and Leona have a relationship that is difficult to describe. Nako is something of an outlier in Savanaclaw; he's not a very good "team player," and isn't someone who enjoys following another person's rules. He's also someone who effectively is lost at sea, life-wise: he has ambition, and he has strong desire, but he doesn't know how to use them. I think, in some ways, Leona sees a little bit of himself in Nakoda: someone who has never been fully accepted by others, and who yearns for respect, admiration, and control. While the two often argue, Nako is always the one who ends up backing down first, and he will, eventually, do what he's told. Since it's bound to come up...Nako does think Leona is one hot number, but despite the physical attraction, he has no desire to eat Leona, and...well...SUPPRESSES the desire to get him into bed. This is mostly because he feels he has absolutely no chance with the latter (and he's entirely correct), and he pretty much has it figured out that he won't SURVIVE attempting the former. XD

Next, Reno and Idia at Ignihyde. On the one hand, Reno - just like Billy - doesn't really fit in with the typical standards of Ignihyde: he's not a media junkie, he's not a scientific mastermind, and he's at least somewhat more extroverted than the infamously reclusive housewarden. So whenever the two are in the same room together, sparks will inevitably fly: Idia gets frustrated with Reno's slowness to respond to things and crude behavior, and Reno just sort of rolls his eyes at a lot of Idia's...um..."Idia-isms," if you will. HOWEVER, there are two things that keep the relationship from truly being inimical. First of all, Reno is surprisingly dependable: his power is one Idia can use to his advantage in certain circumstances, and while he's not very good at UNDERSTANDING a lot of scientific stuff...he IS good at APPLYING things. Like, Reno can help BUILD machines or mix formulas, so to speak, he just won't fully understand why or how they exactly WORK. But if he's given good reason to obey, and is put to the task, he'll get it done. Second of all, Reno - just like Idia - is a gamer of all sorts. Idia is shown to love video games, board games, dice games, and I THINK card games, too (I'm not sure about that one, forgive me if I am incorrect); Reno is the exact same way, and I think the two get along VERY well when it comes to shared interests there. I imagine they actually do like gaming together pretty frequently. Heck, maybe Reno occasionally joins in on Idia's streams...double-heck, maybe Idia gets Reno to do some streaming on his own, much to Reno's delight. So they aren't enemies, nor even "frenemies," but they work best when their mutual strengths combine. James and Smitty are "problem children" for Riddle. Especially James. Riddle, of course, is a well-organized, orderly person who seeks total control, and has a hard time dealing with change or anything that doesn't go with his ideals and laws of conduct. He is a stickler for the rules, and even after the events of Chapter 1, it is hard for him to bend them TOO much without breaking, so to speak. James, really, is more like Azul than anybody else at NRC: a scheming ne'er do well who is very, VERY good at finding loopholes and exploiting things to his own selfish ends. As a result, he's often causing headaches for Riddle: he doesn't exactly IGNORE the rules or outright BREAK them, but he gets juuuust close enough that it's annoying. However, much like Reno with Idia, James is dependable in a pinch...and one thing he does have over Azul is that, when it comes to Riddle and his dorm-mates, specifically, he actually WON'T expect recompense. Why? James sees Heartslabyul as his "crew," and he feels it's important for the crew to work together when times get tough. The clash between himself and Riddle, essentially, is wondering which of them is REALLY the Captain. On that note, Smitty and Riddle get along a LITTLE better, mostly because Riddle understands that anytime Smitty DOES cause trouble, it's only because he's trying to do good by his best friend. When Smitty is independent from James, he is obedient, helpful, cheerful, and tries his hardest to be a good student, and Riddle respects that...it's just upsetting to him that, whenever James decides to act up, Smitty almost always goes along with that without question.

Maelstrom and Azul I've actually been trying to figure out a bit more. I don't have a lot to say on this one's front. Suffice it to say, Maelstrom - despite his own ego and the fact that sperm whales and cephalopds don't exactly get along in the wild - is actually quite respectful of Azul, and will do as he's told, most of the time, without much argument. He acts as muscle for Azul on many occasions, as he is the first to admit Azul is much more crafty and strategic than he is, and he does see this as a good thing. Azul, meanwhile, appreciates Maelstrom's strength and appetite much in the way he appreciates those elements in Floyd...and unlike Floyd, Maelstrom is less likely to go off the rails on a random tantrum. The remaining three bois in my roster - Elias and Theo in Diasomnia, and Grit Gravelle in Scarabia - I don't really have solid concepts for, in terms of how they get along with their dorm leaders. I know that Theodore and Malleus have a rocky relationship, and that will actually be explored when I get to Theo's "Chapter Story" in...you know...five billion years or so. 'XD But beyond that, there's not much I can say for any of them. These relationships, more than all the rest, definitely require development.

[mysterycharacterflowers]

Round 1; A bouquet of white chrysanthemums, orchids and blue hydrangeas Vs Forget-me-nots

If you know who they are, or are pretty sure of it, please don't tell until this poll has ended!

First, let's talk about the bouquet of white chrysanthemums, orchids and blue hydrangeas

Meaning: White Chrysanthemums: represent grief and are a way to pay respects to the deceased, especially family. Orchids: represent strength and beauty in the face of adversity. They can symbolize his resilience and the beauty he brings to the lives of those around him. Irises: are a symbol of hope and wisdom. They can represent his ability to persevere and make wise decisions despite the difficulties he has faced. Blue Hydrangeas: can symbolize deep emotions and understanding. They can represent both the grief he feels due to losing his family and the understanding to push through regardless. Description: This is a young man who has faced a series of hardships in life, lacking guidance and living day-to-day without clear goals or ambitions. He has lost both his parents and his older sister in car accidents, leaving him with no immediate family except for his goddaughter. Despite not even having a girlfriend previously, he now has to adapt to caring for a baby without much, if any, support. It's heavy, but he carries it extremely well. He's a very loving person and has been a great father thus far, all things considered. He's hard working, compassionate, and above all else wants to do his family proud. He is so tired though. He doesn't find himself smiling often. Poor thing.

Check their post here

Now, let's talk about the Forget-me-nots

Meaning and why this flower was chosen: For one it's kind of an association thing; he's a very soft and gentle person, but also upbeat and dedicated to the people he cares about. He would also like the color and shape of the flowers, and he'd enjoy having a bunch around his living space just because they're pretty. Symbolism wise, too, he loves deeply and is loved deeply and is missed deeply. In a sense he's like a personification of the flowers, almost, but not quite. I just associate forget-me-nots with him a lot. Description: He's cheerful, excited to be alive, and loves the world deeply, always wanting to know more about it. He's very good at seeing the brighter side of things, and is endlessly encouraging and supportive, though not overbearing and pushy about things. He's also deeply curious, and will dedicate himself to learning more about what he's interested in at any given point, and he has many passions he's developed over the years besides his main one. He's almost kind of cheesy with how he expresses his affection because he's very genuine with it, but his loved ones know that about him and only love him all the more. Also he's agender. No gendered terms like 'brother' or 'boy' for him pls

Check their post here

[plscallmeeren]

SUMMARY

" She's a delinquent...

...Yeah. But he's a freak "

Raven works hard to look after her siblings - the selfless survivor. Eddie is formulating his exact words for the principle when he graduates - ambition with no plans.

Raven has long since given up her sense of self. Eddie thrives on being only himself.

Raven has no hope for the world - Eddie wants to change it.

Behind a pretty face the Harlequin hides years over years of hardship and abuse, troubles and wave after wave of hopelessness, denying her wish to stand again. Who wouldn't go mad?

Beyond his confident show at school 'the freak' lacks hope. Hope that he will achieve his many dreams, his love will prevail, the world can change. Who could possibly deal with all of that?

In which Raven Crown and Eddie Munson find each other and learn to love anew. In which Raven must accept her past and move on to survive, no matter how hard it seems.

In which two untameable, confused, rough, beautiful souls must seal an unspoken pact. A pact to each other.

Crazy can't love, they say, but that's not true. The love's only more intense.

" I'm not calling you a liar

Just don't lie to me

I'm not calling you a thief

Just don't steal from me

I'm not calling you a ghost

Just stop haunting me "

• Disclosure •

Violence

Gore

Smoking (cannabis)

Alcohol Consumption

Depression (depressive episodes)

Death

Physical and Verbal Abuse

Witchcraft (in case Pagan belief offends anybody)

Language (no, Steve, not just English)

Overdoses of Eddie Munson

Mentions and / or Flashbacks of:

Self-harm

Suicide Attempts

Sex

EPIGRAPH

For all those selfless dreamers who can't accept who they are but work with it, anyway

For all those romantics who are destined to smoke weed on a candlelit meadow under poetry of the moon and stars

For anyone who ever wondered what happened next

•

Copyright ©️ 2023

All rights reserved. / (CC) Attrib. NonCommercial

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronically or mechanically, including photocopying, recording or by any other information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the author (me).

Then again, if anyone has the crazy idea to write some sort of one-shot, drabble or translation, upon notification to the author and given permission (I am sure to give you), this may be done with full credentials.

Where is the life we have lost in living?

- T.S. Eliot

THERE ARE MANY REASONS I SHOULD NOT KISS HIM. AS MANY, NO DOUBT, AS LEAVES FALL FROM THE BLOSSOMS OF THE CHERRY TREE BESIDE MY WINDOW. HERE ARE FIVE:

1. He is not thinking straight. His mind is damaged if what I see before me is true. I shan't take advantage in a moment of weakness or vulnerability - whatever led him to look at me the way he does.

2. The scars I bear and hidden turmoils I pursue are in no way worthy of holding him. I deserve none of his touch - his skin on mine as he looks at me as if I'm the one in need of comfort. These scars shall not hurt him. If my nature is to follow such ancient and deadly acts, then I will not let him watch me do so and fall as I abandon him.

3. He is perfect and some things were not made to be broken. Surely, when I let him go, he will shatter. I could never forgive myself. And I cannot always be there to hold his flawless glances.

4. My mind is also damaged. By the past and by a distant blood relation whose genes I now weave through every little thing I do. If neither can think clearly, you should not interact at all.

5. He does not deserve to be tethered to the ground by his own hands, controlled merely by the notion of a fairytale love he believes in. A love I doubt exists. My bounds were tied remotely, by others and in turn. I refuse to be the reason why someone should rob themselves of their own freedom. The reason the night sky may be perceived as a magnificent shade of navy and not simply black.

THERE IS ONLY ONE REASON I SHOULD KISS HIM. IT LOOMS LARGE ABOVE ME LIKE THE CHERRY TREE BESIDE MY WINDOW:

1. He is waiting, his eyes closed, his lips slightly parted, the longing in his heart for mine unrivalled and he is leaning in. I am on the cusp of being a fallen woman. He has long fallen. I know this. I could not save him. And who am I to say no to such a plea?

[blackswaneuroparedux]

Anonymous asked: I enjoyed reading your posts about Napoleon’s death and it’s quite timely given its the 200th anniversary of his death this year in May. I was wondering, because you know a lot about military history (your served right? That’s cool to fly combat helicopters) and you live in France but aren’t French, what your take was on Napoleon and how do the French view him? Do they hail him as a hero or do they like others see him like a Hitler or a Stalin? Do you see him as a hero or a villain of history?

5 May 1821 was a memorable date because Napoleon, one of the most iconic figures in world history, died while in bitter exile on a remote island in the South Atlantic Ocean. Napoleon Bonaparte, as you know rose from obscure soldier to a kind of new Caesar, and yet he remains a uniquely controversial figure to this day especially in France. You raise interesting questions about Napoleon and his legacy. If I may reframe your questions in another way. Should we think of him as a flawed but essentially heroic visionary who changed Europe for the better? Or was he simply a military dictator, whose cult of personality and lust for power set a template for the likes of Hitler? 

However one chooses to answer this question can we just - to get this out of the way - simply and definitively say that Napoleon was not Hitler. Not even close. No offence intended to you but this is just dumb ahistorical thinking and it’s a lazy lie. This comparison was made by some in the horrid aftermath of the Second World War but only held little currency for only a short time thereafter. Obviously that view didn’t exist before Hitler in the 19th Century and these days I don’t know any serious historian who takes that comparison seriously.

I confess I don’t have a definitive answer if he was a hero or a villain one way or the other because Napoleon has really left a very complicated legacy. It really depends on where you’re coming from.

As a staunch Brit I do take pride in Britain’s victorious war against Napoleonic France - and in a good natured way rubbing it in the noses of French friends at every opportunity I get because it’s in our cultural DNA and it’s bloody good fun (why else would we make Waterloo train station the London terminus of the Eurostar international rail service from its opening in 1994? Or why hang a huge gilded portrait of the Duke of Wellington as the first thing that greets any visitor to the residence of the British ambassador at the British Embassy?). On a personal level I take special pride in knowing my family ancestors did their bit on the battlefield to fight against Napoleon during those tumultuous times. However, as an ex-combat veteran who studied Napoleonic warfare with fan girl enthusiasm, I have huge respect for Napoleon as a brilliant military commander. And to makes things more weird, as a Francophile resident of who loves living and working in France (and my partner is French) I have a grudging but growing regard for Napoleon’s political and cultural legacy, especially when I consider the current dross of political mediocrity on both the political left and the right. So for me it’s a complicated issue how I feel about Napoleon, the man, the soldier, and the political leader.

If it’s not so straightforward for me to answer the for/against Napoleon question then it It’s especially true for the French, who even after 200 years, still have fiercely divided opinions about Napoleon and his legacy - but intriguingly, not always in clear cut ways.

I only have to think about my French neighbours in my apartment building to see how divisive Napoleon the man and his legacy is. Over the past year or so of the Covid lockdown we’ve all gotten to know each other better and we help each other. Over the Covid year we’ve gathered in the inner courtyard for a buffet and just lifted each other spirits up.

One of my neighbours, a crusty old ex-general in the army who has an enviable collection of military history books that I steal, liberate, borrow, often discuss military figures in history like Napoleon over our regular games of chess and a glass of wine. He is from very old aristocracy of the ancien regime and whose family suffered at the hands of ‘madame guillotine’ during the French Revolution. They lost everything. He has mixed emotions about Napoleon himself as an old fashioned monarchist. As a military man he naturally admires the man and the military genius but he despises the secularisation that the French Revolution ushered in as well as the rise of the haute bourgeois as middle managers and bureaucrats by the displacement of the aristocracy.

Another retired widowed neighbour I am close to, and with whom I cook with often and discuss art, is an active arts patron and ex-art gallery owner from a very wealthy family that came from the new Napoleonic aristocracy - ie the aristocracy of the Napoleonic era that Napoleon put in place - but she is dismissive of such titles and baubles. She’s a staunch Republican but is happy to concede she is grateful for Napoleon in bringing order out of chaos. She recognises her own ambivalence when she says she dislikes him for reintroducing slavery in the French colonies but also praises him for firmly supporting Paris’s famed Comédie-Française of which she was a past patron.

Another French neighbour, a senior civil servant in the Elysée, is quite dismissive of Napoleon as a war monger but is grudgingly grateful for civil institutions and schools that Napoleon established and which remain in place today.

My other neighbours - whether they be French families or foreign expats like myself - have similarly divisive and complicated attitudes towards Napoleon.

In 2010 an opinion poll in France asked who was the most important man in French history. Napoleon came second, behind General Charles de Gaulle, who led France from exile during the German occupation in World War II and served as a postwar president.

The split in French opinion is closely mirrored in political circles. The divide is generally down political party lines. On the left, there's the 'black legend' of Bonaparte as an ogre. On the right, there is the 'golden legend' of a strong leader who created durable institutions.

Jacques-Olivier Boudon, a history professor at Paris-Sorbonne University and president of the Napoléon Institute, once explained at a talk I attended that French public opinion has always remained deeply divided over Napoleon, with, on the one hand, those who admire the great man, the conqueror, the military leader and, on the other, those who see him as a bloodthirsty tyrant, the gravedigger of the revolution. Politicians in France, Boudon observed, rarely refer to Napoleon for fear of being accused of authoritarian temptations, or not being good Republicans.

On the left-wing of French politics, former prime minister Lionel Jospin penned a controversial best selling book entitled “the Napoleonic Evil” in which he accused the emperor of “perverting the ideas of the Revolution” and imposing “a form of extreme domination”, “despotism” and “a police state” on the French people. He wrote Napoleon was "an obvious failure" - bad for France and the rest of Europe. When he was booted out into final exile, France was isolated, beaten, occupied, dominated, hated and smaller than before. What's more, Napoleon smothered the forces of emancipation awakened by the French and American revolutions and enabled the survival and restoration of monarchies. Some of the legacies with which Napoleon is credited, including the Civil Code, the comprehensive legal system replacing a hodgepodge of feudal laws, were proposed during the revolution, Jospin argued, though he acknowledges that Napoleon actually delivered them, but up to a point, "He guaranteed some principles of the revolution and, at the same time, changed its course, finished it and betrayed it," For instance, Napoleon reintroduced slavery in French colonies, revived a system that allowed the rich to dodge conscription in the military and did nothing to advance gender equality.

At the other end of the spectrum have been former right-wing prime minister Dominique de Villepin, an aristocrat who was once fancied as a future President, a passionate collector of Napoleonic memorabilia, and author of several works on the subject. As a Napoleonic enthusiast he tells a different story. Napoleon was a saviour of France. If there had been no Napoleon, the Republic would not have survived. Advocates like de Villepin point to Napoleon’s undoubted achievements: the Civil Code, the Council of State, the Bank of France, the National Audit office, a centralised and coherent administrative system, lycées, universities, centres of advanced learning known as école normale, chambers of commerce, the metric system, and an honours system based on merit (which France has to this day). He restored the Catholic faith as the state faith but allowed for the freedom of religion for other faiths including Protestantism and Judaism. These were ambitions unachieved during the chaos of the revolution. As it is, these Napoleonic institutions continue to function and underpin French society. Indeed, many were copied in countries conquered by Napoleon, such as Italy, Germany and Poland, and laid the foundations for the modern state.

Back in 2014, French politicians and institutions in particular were nervous in marking the 200th anniversary of Napoleon's exile. My neighbours and other French friends remember that the commemorations centred around the Chateau de Fontainebleau, the traditional home of the kings of France and was the scene where Napoleon said farewell to the Old Guard in the "White Horse Courtyard" (la cour du Cheval Blanc) at the Palace of Fontainebleau. (The courtyard has since been renamed the "Courtyard of Goodbyes".) By all accounts the occasion was very moving. The 1814 Treaty of Fontainebleau stripped Napoleon of his powers (but not his title as Emperor of the French) and sent him into exile on Elba. The cost of the Fontainebleau "farewell" and scores of related events over those three weekends was shouldered not by the central government in Paris but by the local château, a historic monument and UNESCO World Heritage site, and the town of Fontainebleau.

While the 200th anniversary of the French Revolution that toppled the monarchy and delivered thousands to death by guillotine was officially celebrated in 1989, Napoleonic anniversaries are neither officially marked nor celebrated. For example, over a decade ago, the president and prime minister - at the time, Jacques Chirac and Dominque de Villepin - boycotted a ceremony marking the 200th anniversary of the battle of Austerlitz, Napoleon's greatest military victory. Both men were known admirers of Napoleon and yet political calculation and optics (as media spin doctors say) stopped them from fully honouring Napoleon’s crowning military glory.

Optics is everything. The division of opinion in France is perhaps best reflected in the fact that, in a city not shy of naming squares and streets after historical figures, there is not a single “Boulevard Napoleon” or “Place Napoleon” in Paris. On the streets of Paris, there are just two statues of Napoleon. One stands beneath the clock tower at Les Invalides (a military hospital), the other atop a column in the Place Vendôme. Napoleon's red marble tomb, in a crypt under the Invalides dome, is magnificent, perhaps because his remains were interred there during France's Second Empire, when his nephew, Napoleon III, was on the throne.

There are no squares, nor places, nor boulevards named for Napoleon but as far as I know there is one narrow street, the rue Bonaparte, running from the Luxembourg Gardens to the River Seine in the old Latin Quarter. And, that, too, is thanks to Napoleon III. For many, and I include myself, it’s a poor return by the city to the man who commissioned some of its most famous monuments, including the Arc de Triomphe and the Pont des Arts over the River Seine.

It's almost as if Napoleon Bonaparte is not part of the national story.

How Napoleon fits into that national story is something historians, French and non-French, have been grappling with ever since Napoleon died. The plain fact is Napoleon divides historians, what precisely he represents is deeply ambiguous and his political character is the subject of heated controversy. It’s hard for historians to sift through archival documents to make informed judgements and still struggle to separate the man from the myth.

One proof of this myth is in his immortality. After Hitler’s death, there was mostly an embarrassed silence; after Stalin’s, little but denunciation. But when Napoleon died on St Helena in 1821, much of Europe and the Americas could not help thinking of itself as a post-Napoleonic generation. His presence haunts the pages of Stendhal and Alfred de Vigny. In a striking and prescient phrase, Chateaubriand prophesied the “despotism of his memory”, a despotism of the fantastical that in many ways made Romanticism possible and that continues to this day.

The raw material for the future Napoleon myth was provided by one of his St Helena confidants, the Comte de las Cases, whose account of conversations with the great man came out shortly after his death and ran in repeated editions throughout the century. De las Cases somehow metamorphosed the erstwhile dictator into a herald of liberty, the emperor into a slayer of dynasties rather than the founder of his own. To the “great man” school of history Napoleon was grist to their mill, and his meteoric rise redefined the meaning of heroism in the modern world.

The Marxists, for all their dislike of great men, grappled endlessly with the meaning of the 18th Brumaire; indeed one of France’s most eminent Marxist historians, George Lefebvre, wrote what arguably remains the finest of all biographies of him.

It was on this already vast Napoleon literature, a rich terrain for the scholar of ideas, that the great Dutch historian Pieter Geyl was lecturing in 1940 when he was arrested and sent to Buchenwald. There he composed what became one of the classics of historiography, a seminal book entitled Napoleon: For and Against, which charted how generations of intellectuals had happily served up one Napoleon after another. Like those poor souls who crowded the lunatic asylums of mid-19th century France convinced that they were Napoleon, generations of historians and novelists simply could not get him out of their head.

The debate runs on today no less intensely than in the past. Post-Second World War Marxists would argue that he was not, in fact, revolutionary at all. Eric Hobsbawm, a notable British Marxist historian, argued that ‘Most-perhaps all- of his ideas were anticipated by the Revolution’ and that Napoleon’s sole legacy was to twist the ideals of the French Revolution, and make them ‘more conservative, hierarchical and authoritarian’.

This contrasts deeply with the view William Doyle holds of Napoleon. Doyle described Bonaparte as ‘the Revolution incarnate’ and saw Bonaparte’s humbling of Europe’s other powers, the ‘Ancien Regimes’, as a necessary precondition for the birth of the modern world. Whatever one thinks of Napoleon’s character, his sharp intellect is difficult to deny. Even Paul Schroeder, one of Napoleon’s most scathing critics, who condemned his conduct of foreign policy as a ‘criminal enterprise’ never denied Napoleon’s intellect. Schroder concluded that Bonaparte ‘had an extraordinary capacity for planning, decision making, memory, work, mastery of detail and leadership’.  The question of whether Napoleon used his genius for the betterment or the detriment of the world, is the heart of the debate which surrounds him.

France's foremost Napoleonic scholar, Jean Tulard, put forward the thesis that Bonaparte was the architect of modern France. "And I would say also pâtissier [a cake and pastry maker] because of the administrative millefeuille that we inherited." Oddly enough, in North America the multilayered mille-feuille cake is called ‘a napoleon.’ Tulard’s works are essential reading of how French historians have come to tackle the question of Napoleon’s legacy. He takes the view that if Napoleon had not crushed a Royalist rebellion and seized power in 1799, the French monarchy and feudalism would have returned, Tulard has written. "Like Cincinnatus in ancient Rome, Napoleon wanted a dictatorship of public salvation. He gets all the power, and, when the project is finished, he returns to his plough." In the event, the old order was never restored in France. When Louis XVIII became emperor in 1814, he served as a constitutional monarch.

In England, until recently the views on Napoleon have traditionally less charitable and more cynical. Professor Christopher Clark, the notable Cambridge University European historian, has written. "Napoleon was not a French patriot - he was first a Corsican and later an imperial figure, a journey in which he bypassed any deep affiliation with the French nation," Clark believed Napoleon’s relationship with the French Revolution is deeply ambivalent.

Did he stabilise the revolutionary state or shut it down mercilessly? Clark believes Napoleon seems to have done both. Napoleon rejected democracy, he suffocated the representative dimension of politics, and he created a culture of courtly display. A month before crowning himself emperor, Napoleon sought approval for establishing an empire from the French in a plebiscite; 3,572,329 voted in favour, 2,567 against. If that landslide resembles an election in North Korea, well, this was no secret ballot. Each ‘yes’ or ‘no’ was recorded, along with the name and address of the voter. Evidently, an overwhelming majority knew which side their baguette was buttered on.

His extravagant coronation in Notre Dame in December 1804 cost 8.5 million francs (€6.5 million or $8.5 million in today's money). He made his brothers, sisters and stepchildren kings, queens, princes and princesses and created a Napoleonic aristocracy numbering 3,500. By any measure, it was a bizarre progression for someone often described as ‘a child of the Revolution.’ By crowning himself emperor, the genuine European kings who surrounded him were not convinced. Always a warrior first, he tried to represent himself as a Caesar, and he wears a Roman toga on the bas-reliefs in his tomb. His coronation crown, a laurel wreath made of gold, sent the same message. His icon, the eagle, was also borrowed from Rome. But Caesar's legitimacy depended on military victories. Ultimately, Napoleon suffered too many defeats.

These days Napoleon the man and his times remain very much in fashion and we are living through something of a new golden age of Napoleonic literature. Those historians who over the past decade or so have had fun denouncing him as the first totalitarian dictator seem to have it all wrong: no angel, to be sure, he ended up doing far more at far less cost than any modern despot. In his widely praised 2014 biography, Napoleon the Great, Andrew Roberts writes: “The ideas that underpin our modern world - meritocracy, equality before the law, property rights, religious toleration, modern secular education, sound finances, and so on - were championed, consolidated, codified and geographically extended by Napoleon. To them he added a rational and efficient local administration, an end to rural banditry, the encouragement of science and the arts, the abolition of feudalism and the greatest codification of laws since the fall of the Roman empire.”

Roberts partly bases his historical judgement on newly released historical documents about Napoleon that were only available in the past decade and has proved to be a boon for all Napoleonic scholars. Newly released 33,000 letters Napoleon wrote that still survive are now used extensively to illustrate the astonishing capacity that Napoleon had for compartmentalising his mind - he laid down the rules for a girls’ boarding school on the eve of the battle of Borodino, for example, and the regulations for Paris’s Comédie-Française while camped in the Kremlin. They also show Napoleon’s extraordinary capacity for micromanaging his empire: he would write to the prefect of Genoa telling him not to allow his mistress into his box at the theatre, and to a corporal of the 13th Line regiment warning him not to drink so much.

For me to have my own perspective on Napoleon is tough. The problem is that nothing with Napoleon is simple, and almost every aspect of his personality is a maddening paradox. He was a military genius who led disastrous campaigns. He was a liberal progressive who reinstated slavery in the French colonies. And take the French Revolution, which came just before Napoleon’s rise to power, his relationship with the French Revolution is deeply ambivalent. Did he stabilise it or shut it down? I agree with those British and French historians who now believe Napoleon seems to have done both.

On the one hand, Napoleon did bring order to a nation that had been drenched in blood in the years after the Revolution. The French people had endured the crackdown known as the 'Reign of Terror', which saw so many marched to the guillotine, as well as political instability, corruption, riots and general violence. Napoleon’s iron will managed to calm the chaos. But he also rubbished some of the core principles of the Revolution. A nation which had boldly brought down the monarchy had to watch as Napoleon crowned himself Emperor, with more power and pageantry than Louis XVI ever had. He also installed his relatives as royals across Europe, creating a new aristocracy. In the words of French politician and author Lionel Jospin, 'He guaranteed some principles of the Revolution and at the same time, changed its course, finished it and betrayed it.'

He also had a feared henchman in the form of Joseph Fouché, who ran a secret police network which instilled dread in the population. Napoleon’s spies were everywhere, stifling political opposition. Dozens of newspapers were suppressed or shut down. Books had to be submitted for approval to the Commission of Revision, which sounds like something straight out of George Orwell. Some would argue Hitler and Stalin followed this playbook perfectly. But here come the contradictions. Napoleon also championed education for all, founding a network of schools. He championed the rights of the Jews. In the territories conquered by Napoleon, laws which kept Jews cooped up in ghettos were abolished. 'I will never accept any proposals that will obligate the Jewish people to leave France,' he once said, 'because to me the Jews are the same as any other citizen in our country.'

He also, crucially, developed the Napoleonic Code, a set of laws which replaced the messy, outdated feudal laws that had been used before. The Napoleonic Code clearly laid out civil laws and due processes, establishing a society based on merit and hard work, rather than privilege. It was rolled out far beyond France, and indisputably helped to modernise Europe. While it certainly had its flaws – women were ignored by its reforms, and were essentially regarded as the property of men – the Napoleonic Code is often brandished as the key evidence for Napoleon’s progressive credentials. In the words of historian Andrew Roberts, author of Napoleon the Great, 'the ideas that underpin our modern world… were championed by Napoleon'.

What about Napoleon’s battlefield exploits? If anything earns comparisons with Hitler, it’s Bonaparte’s apparent appetite for conquest. His forces tore down republics across Europe, and plundered works of art, much like the Nazis would later do. A rampant imperialist, Napoleon gleefully grabbed some of the greatest masterpieces of the Renaissance, and allegedly boasted, 'the whole of Rome is in Paris.'

Napoleon has long enjoyed a stellar reputation as a field commander – his capacities as a military strategist, his ability to read a battle, the painstaking detail with which he made sure that he cold muster a larger force than his adversary or took maximum advantage of the lie of the land – these are stuff of the military legend that has built up around him. It is not without its critics, of course, especially among those who have worked intensively on the later imperial campaigns, in the Peninsula, in Russia, or in the final days of the Empire at Waterloo.

Doubts about his judgment, and allegations of rashness, have been raised in the context of some of his victories, too, most notably, perhaps, at Marengo. But overall his reputation remains largely intact, and his military campaigns have been taught in the curricula of military academies from Saint-Cyr to Sandhurst, alongside such great tacticians as Alexander the Great and Hannibal.

Historians may query his own immodest opinion that his presence on the battlefield was worth an extra forty thousand men to his cause, but it is clear that when he was not present (as he was not for most of the campaign in Spain) the French were wont to struggle. Napoleon understood the value of speed and surprise, but also of structures and loyalties. He reformed the army by introducing the corps system, and he understood military aspirations, rewarding his men with medals and honours; all of which helped ensure that he commanded exceptional levels of personal loyalty from his troops.

Yet, I do find it hard to side with the more staunch defenders of Napoleon who say his reputation as a war monger is to some extent due to British propaganda at the time. They will point out that the Napoleonic Wars, far from being Napoleon’s fault, were just a continuation of previous conflicts that arose thanks to the French Revolution. Napoleon, according to this analysis, inherited a messy situation, and his only real crime was to be very good at defeating enemies on the battlefield. I think that is really pushing things too far. I mean deciding to invade Spain and then Russia were his decisions to invade and conquer.

He was, by any measure, a genius of war. Even his nemesis the Duke of Wellington, when asked who the greatest general of his time was, replied: 'In this age, in past ages, in any age, Napoleon.'

I will qualify all this and agree that Napoleon’s Russian campaign has been rightly held up as a fatal folly which killed so many of his men, but this blunder – epic as it was – should not be compared to Hitler’s wars of evil aggression. Most historians will agree that comparing the two men is horribly flattering to Hitler - a man fuelled by visceral, genocidal hate - and demeaning to Napoleon, who was a product of Enlightenment thinking and left a legacy that in many ways improved Europe.

Napoleon was, of course, no libertarian, and no pluralist. He would tolerate no opposition to his rule, and though it was politicians and civilians who imposed his reforms, the army was never far behind. But comparisons with twentieth-century dictators are well wide of the mark. While he insisted on obedience from those he administered, his ideology was based not on division or hatred, but on administrative efficiency and submission to the law. And the state he believed in remained stubbornly secular.

In Catholic southern Europe, of course, that was not an approach with which it was easy to acquiesce; and disorder, insurgency and partisan attacks can all be counted among the results. But these were principles on which the Emperor would not and could not give ground. If he had beliefs they were not religious or spiritual beliefs, but the secular creed of a man who never forgot that he owed both his military career and his meteoric political rise to the French Revolution, and who never quite abandoned, amidst the monarchical symbolism and the court pomp of the Empire, the republican dreams of his youth. When he claimed, somewhat ambiguously, after the coup of 18 Brumaire that `the Revolution was over’, he almost certainly meant that the principles of 1789 had at last been consummated, and that the continuous cycle of violence of the 1790s could therefore come to an end.

When the Empire was declared in 1804, the wording, again, might seem curious, the French being informed that the `Republic would henceforth be ruled by an Emperor’. Napoleon might be a dictator, but a part at least of him remained a son of the Enlightenment.

The arguments over Napoleon’s status will continue - and that in itself is a testament to the power of one of the most complex figures ever to straddle the world’s stage.

Will the fascination with Napoleon continue for another 200 years?

In France, at least, enthusiasm looks set to diminish. Napoleon and his exploits are scarcely mentioned in French schools anymore. Stéphane Guégan, curator of the Musée d'Orsay in Paris, which, among other First Empire artworks, houses a plaster model of Napoleon dressed as a Roman emperor astride a horse, has described France's fascination with him as ‘a national illness.’ He believes that the people who met him were fascinated by his charm. And today, even the most hostile to Napoleon also face this charm. So there is a difficulty to apprehend the duality of this character. As he wrote, “He was born from the revolution, he extended and finished it, and after 1804 he turns into a despot, a dictator.”

In France, Guégan aptly observes, there is a kind of nostalgia, not for dictatorship but for strong leaders. "Our age is suffering a lack of imagination and political utopia,"

Here I think Guégan is onto something. Napoleon’s stock has always risen or fallen according to the vicissitudes of world events and fortunes of France itself.

In the past, history was the study of great men and women. Today the focus of teaching is on trends, issues and movements. France in 1800 is no longer about Louis XVI and Napoleon Bonaparte. It's about the industrial revolution. Man does not make history. History makes men. Or does it? The study of history makes a mug out of those with such simple ideological driven conceits.

For two hundred years on, the French still cannot agree on whether Napoleon was a hero or a villain as he has swung like a pendulum according to the gravitational pull of historical events and forces.

The question I keep asking of myself and also to French friends with whom I discuss such things is what kind of Napoleon does our generation need?

Thanks for your question.

[tricksters-captain]

Bucky Barnes imagines - Some Sunny Day Part 2

AN: I’m splitting episode 3 into two chapters because so much happens. 

Summary: Before the Blip, you and Bucky were close. After you both returning and Tony’s funeral, you decided to go back to your home town to spend time with your family. When duty calls, you return.  

In this chapter: Despite your protests, Bucky seeks out Zemo (Based on S1 EP3)

(PART 1 HERE)

Pairing(s): Bucky Barnes x Fem!Reader, Sam Wilson x Platonic!Reader

Word Count: 5,196

Warnings: Spoilers for episode 3, violence, strong language. 

You watched Bucky as he sat beside you on the aircraft. 

“Do you mind?” Bucky’s side eye didn’t make you look away. 

“I’m just trying to see what’s going through that head of yours.” You confessed. You were all on your way to Germany to visit Zemo. It wasn’t a plan you were happy with but it was the plan. 

“Don’t bother.” Bucky frowned, looking down at his hands on his lap. “And don’t ask me if I think this is a good idea again.” 

“I wasn’t going to ask that.” You turned away from the man.

“What was it then?” Bucky asked. 

“I was going to ask if you were sure you wanted to do this.” It was another question you had already asked 20 times or more but you couldn’t shake the overwhelming feeling of anxiety about this trip. 

“She has a right to be worried, Buck. The last time you were alone with Zemo, you ended up putting (Y/n) through three windows.” Sam reminded you both of what happened the last time you were in Berlin. 

“It won’t happen this time.” Bucky tried to reassure you both but you still felt uneasy. 

After another hour or so Sam announced that you were almost there. 

It was a short drive to the prison from the airport but once you were inside, you felt your chest begin to tighten again. 

“He’s just through that corridor.” The German guard gestured up ahead and that’s when Bucky stopped you. 

“Alright. Give us a sec.” Bucky instructed the security guard before turning to you and Sam. “I’m gonna go in alone.”

“Why?” Sam asked, 

“You’re Avengers. You know how he feels about that.” Bucky said as he looked between the two of you. 

“It’s not like you two were known for frolickin’ in the sun together.” Sam felt he needed to remind Bucky of the past again. However, Bucky stood his ground. 

“He was obsessed with HYDRA. We have a history together. Trust me. I got it.” 

“Buck...” You started, 

“I got it.” He repeated himself before you could say anything else. 

You watched Bucky head through the doors alone. 

“Let’s wait outside. This place gives me the creeps.” Sam encouraged you to follow him to which you didn’t do without hesitation. 

Sam brought you a hot drink as you sat on a bench outside. 

“I forgot how worried he can make you.” Sam admitted as he sat down beside you.

“I’ve seen what he went through, Sam. All of it leading up to Zemo. I just... I don’t want it happening to him again.” You knew you couldn’t explain the extent of why you cared for Bucky. 

“You love him.” Sam said. It wasn’t a question but rather a statement. “I can see it clear as day. Anyone could if they stuck around long enough.” 

“Why are you bringing this up, Sam?” You sighed, looking away from him. 

“Because it’s also obvious that he loves you too. You run around driving each other crazy with worry but you have none of the good stuff that comes with being in love with someone.” 

“What do you know about love, Don Juan?” You chuckled as you tried to lighten the tone.

“I know it when I see it.” Sam smiled but there was a sadness behind his eyes. 

“Things are complicated, Sam.” You muttered, “You already know that.” 

“Well I also think that if Bucky got some he’d be a whole lot less angsty all the damn time.” You knew Sam only said it to make you laugh but you still gave him a whack for the comment. 

“Shut up, Sam.” You shook your head, trying not to smile at the inappropriate comment. 

Sam kept you entertained by a couple of silly games of rock, paper, scissors before Bucky returned. 

“Come on, I got some information. We gotta go.” Bucky hurried you and Sam along. 

“Just like that?” You were surprised that Zemo even spoke to Bucky at all. 

“A location. I’ll explain everything once we get there.” Bucky wasn’t giving you much information and it was making you a little suspicious. 

“Hey, hey, hey...” Sam ran after Bucky, stopping him. “You gotta give us a little more than that.”

“Zemo agreed to help us after hearing that there were more super soldiers. It was his life ambition to stop the winter soldier programme and he’s given us a lead.” Bucky explained. 

“And you’re just gonna trust his word?” You probed. 

“There’s not much else we can do.” Bucky did make a point. 

It didn’t take long to reach the large warehouse/garage that Bucky wanted to go to. 

Bucky on the way had started rambling about breaking Zemo out of jail in order to help you guys which sounded ridiculous to you. 

“Tell me you’re joking, Buck.” You pleaded, unsure whether he had lost his mind entirely. 

“He’s our best shot at finding who is making the serum and he’d be a lot more useful out than in.” Bucky opened the door to the building and you followed him inside.

“What are you talking about? You wanna break Zemo outta jail? Where are we, Buck? Have you lost your mind?” Sam was just as lost as you were as he shot questions at Bucky. 

“We have no leads, no moves, nothing.” Bucky sighed as you made your way in with your flashlights. 

“What we have is one of the most dangerous men in the world behind bars.” Sam argued. 

“We also have eight Super Soldiers that are loose.” Bucky retorted. 

“Anyway, I thought this was a lead?” You tried to look around but the place was badly lit. There were mainly mechanic tools and lots of storage scattered around. 

“It’s complicated.” Bucky frowned.

“What’s complicated is Zemo. He’s gonna mess with our minds. Especially yours. No offence.” Sam shone his flashlight at Bucky as he spoke. 

“Offence.” Bucky didn’t look impressed as he found the light switch. “Super Soldiers go against everything he believes in. He is crazy, but he still has a code.” 

“I’ve been on the wrong side of that code and so have you. He blew up the UN, he killed King T’Chaka and framed you for it. Did you forget that? You think the Wakandans forgot about it? It’s a rhetorical question. They didn’t. I know why this matters to you, but it’s pushing you off the deep end.” Sam stepped closer to Bucky. You couldn’t deny that Sam had a point. Zemo was the one who tore the avengers apart by framing Bucky.  “We don’t know how they’re gettin’ the serum. We don’t even know how many of them there are.” Bucky couldn’t give up. “Let me just walk you through a hypothetical. Can I?”

“What did you do?” Sam narrowed his eyes at Bucky. 

You were busy looking inside the car that was revealed by the lights coming on. 

“I didn’t do anything.” Bucky shook his head before he continued with his ‘hypothetical’. 

“The weakest point in any system isn’t the software, the hardware, it’s the meatware. The human element. Now, in this lockup, it’s nine to one, prisoners to guards. And if two prisoners start fighting, then the protocol says four guards have to respond.”

“So why would two prisoners randomly start fighting at that moment? Who knows?” Sam questioned. 

“There could be many reasons…” Bucky shrugged. “But the point is, these things escalate. Lockdown procedures would have to be initiated, and with all those bodies flying around left and right, wouldn’t be hard to slip down a hallway or two.

At this point, you stopped looking around and looked over at Bucky with your arms across your chest. You weren’t liking how thought out this plan was sounding. 

“And if the fire alarm got tripped while the prisoners were being separated someone could use the chaos to their advantage.” Bucky continued. 

“I don’t like how casual you’re bein’ about this. This is unnatural. Are you… And where are we, man?” Sam gestured around the place with confusion locked on his face. 

“Bucky, I’m with Sam on this one. I’ve got a bad feeling and–––” A door opening behind you cut you short. 

You turned around to see Zemo walk through the plastic door curtains. 

“Woah, woah, woah!” Sam jumped forward instructively. Bucky managed to stop him but he didn't stop you. 

You rushed towards Zemo and held the tip of one of your knives to his Adams apple as he held his hands up. 

“What are you doing here?” Sam shouted at Zemo before snapping back to Bucky.

“I didn’t tell ’cause I knew you wouldn’t let this happen.” Bucky admitted. 

“What did you do?” Sam pointed at Zemo in shock.

“We need him.” Bucky stated to which you chuckled harshly, pressing your knife a little harder. 

“You’re going back to prison!” Sam called over. 

“If I may..? “ Zemo tried to speak but you all shut him up with a unanimous ‘No.’

“Apologies.” Zemo mumbled. 

“(Y/n), put the knife down.” Bucky came towards you and wrapped his hand round your wrist. “Please?” 

You did. Slowly. 

“Look, when Steve refused to sign the Sokovia Accords, you both backed him. You broke the law, and you stuck your neck out for me. I’m asking you to do it again.” Bucky looked back and forth from you to Sam. 

“I really think I’m invaluable.” Zemo spoke again. 

“Shut up.” You rose the knife again to which Zemo took a step back and pretended to zip his mouth shut. 

“Okay.” Sam sighed after a moment of contemplation. “If we do this, you don’t make a move without our permission.”

“Fair.” Zemo nodded. 

“Bucky... You understand what this means right? If they find out we took Zemo, specifically you. We’ll be on the run again and I don’t know if there will be a pardon this time either.” The concern in your eyes made Bucky frown. 

“It’ll be alright. He's the only shot we got to stop these guys.” Bucky wasn’t sure if he believed his own words but he was praying that this was the best thing to do. 

“Alright.” You turned to Zemo. “So where do we start?”

Zemo gestured for you to follow him before taking you into another dark room. You kept your knife in your hand just in case.

He reached for the light switch to reveal a mass of classic cars. 

“So our first move is grand theft auto?” Sam cocked his eyebrow at the impressive collection.  

“These are mine. Collected by family over the generations. I spent years hunting people HYDRA recruited to recreate the serum. Because once it’s out there, someone can create an army of people… like the Avengers.”  Zemo entered one of the cars and pulled out a bag. “I ended the Winter Soldier program once before. I have no intention to leave my work unfinished. To do this, we’ll have to scale a ladder of lowlifes.”

“Well, join the party. We’ve already started.” Sam told the man.

“First stop is a woman named Selby. Mid-level fence I still have a line on. From there, we climb.” Zemo took his bag and headed into another room. 

“Jesus... How big is this place?” You looked around to see it was full of clothes. 

“First I change and then we head to Selby.” Zemo placed the bag down before filing through one if the rails of clothes. 

“How are we supposed to get anywhere with Zemo on our hands? We can’t exactly call Torres and ask for a ride but please ignore the fugitive that’s coming with us.” You looked between the boys. 

“I will get us there.” Zemo told you. 

“Great.” You pressed a fake smile onto your face which Zemo chose not to acknowledge.

Before you knew it you were at the airport at Zemo’s private jet.

“So all this time you’ve been rich?” Sam’s eyes went wide at the sight of the plane.

“I’m a Baron, Sam. My family was royalty until your friends destroyed my country.” Zemo spoke as if it was well known information. You felt a pang hit you in the chest, it happened every time you thought of Sokovia... it was guilt. 

You watched Zemo greet an elderly man in a suit before you entered the jet. 

You sat furtherest away from Zemo, still feeling very uncomfortable about him being free and under your custody. 

You watched him sip on a glass of champagne like he had no worries in the world. 

“You don’t know what it’s like to be locked in a cell. Oh. That’s right you do.” Zemo reminded you of the time Tony had locked a lot of the avengers up. 

“Why don’t you tell us about where we’re going?” Sam suggested. 

 “I’m sorry. I was just fascinated by this. I don’t know what to call it, but this part seems to be important. Who is Nakajima?” 

Before you could blink, Bucky had lunged forward and taken Zemo by the neck.  

“If you touch that again, I’ll kill you.” Bucky kept hold of Zemo for a second longer before sitting back down. You had fought the urge to get up and take hold of his arm to calm him down.  

"I’m sorry. I understand that list of names. People you’ve wronged as the Winter Soldier.” Zemo made no attempt at a sincere apology for the invasion of privacy.  

“Don’t push it.”  Bucky warned him.

“I’ve seen that book. It was Steve’s when he came out of the ice. I told him about Trouble Man. He wrote it in that book. Did you hear it? What’d you think?” Sam smiled as he thought back on the memory. 

“I like ’40s music, so…” Bucky shrugged. 

“You didn’t like it?” Sam seemed more shock to hear this than when he saw Zemo. 

“I liked it.” Bucky proclaimed. 

“It is a masterpiece, James. Complete. Comprehensive. It captures the African-American experience.” Even Zemo had to get involved. 

“He’s out of line, but he’s right. It’s great. Everybody loves Marvin Gaye.” Sam turned back to Bucky after giving side eye to Zemo. 

“I like Marvin Gaye.” Bucky repeated. 

“Steve adored Marvin Gaye.” Sam couldn’t drop it but you didn’t bother getting involved. 

You looked at the book in Bucky’s hands. You knew Steve had given it to him before but seeing it again after all this time brought up a hundred thoughts. You remembered the many things you had told Steve to watch or eat or listen to like ABBA, Mochi ice cream and pranking him by suggesting the twilight movie as must see. 

“You must have really looked up to Steve.” Zemo mentioning Steve made you look up again. “But I realised something when I met him. The danger with people like him, America’s Super Soldiers, is that we put them on pedestals.”

“Watch your step, Zemo.” Sam warned him. 

“They become symbols. Icons. And then we start to forget about their flaws. From there, cities fly, innocent people die. Movements are formed, wars are fought. You remember that, right?” Zemo looked over at Bucky. “As a young soldier sent to Germany to stop a mad icon. Do we want to live in a world full of people like the Red Skull? That is why we’re going to Madripoor.” 

“What’s up with Madripoor? You talk about it like it’s Skull Island.” Sam asked but you already knew of Madripoor. Anyone with links to the underworld of crime knew of Madripoor. 

“It’s an island nation in the Indonesian archipelago. It was a pirate sanctuary back in the 1800s.” Bucky informed him. 

“It’s kept its lawless ways. But we cannot exactly walk in as ourselves. James, you will have to become someone you claim is gone.” Zemo looked down at his duffel bag of clothes that you had watched him pack before.

“What do you mean by that?” You finally chimed into the conversation. 

“James will have to retake the person of the Winter Soldier. You both will have a role to play also.” Zemo explained, turning to face you as you sat in the chair by the back wall of the jet. 

“Bucky, can I speak to you privately?” You looked past Zemo to Bucky. Bucky gave you a look to ask where would you go so you stood and opened the cabin toilets door. 

Bucky huffed before following you in.

“Bucky I’m not okay with this.” You whispered as you pressed yourself up against the wall so you could try and fit both you and Bucky a little more comfortably. 

“This isn’t up to you.” Bucky sighed. 

 “Everything about this situation is making every nerve in my body scream this is a bad idea.” You folded your arms across your chest as you stared up at Bucky. 

“How many times do I have to tell you that this is the only plan we got?” 

“I don’t trust him.” You kept your voice low as you threw your hand up in the direction of the door. 

“Do you trust me?” Bucky asked. 

“I’m starting to question it.” You muttered. 

Bucky just stared at you in response. 

“Yes, I trust you.” You grumbled, caving in. 

“Anyway I have you if things go bad.” Bucky tried to make light of the situation but you weren't impressed. 

You left the bathroom and remained silent until you drew closer to Madripoor. 

Upon your arrival in Madripoor, you were handed some clothes to change into. 

“You’ve got to be kidding me?” You held up the small material dress that you were meant to wear. 

“I had to choose a disguise that would cover your face. Too many people here would know you from your days before the avengers and after.” Zemo defended his choice of ‘costume’ for you. 

“So I’m assassin barbie?” You scoffed before taking to the bathroom to change. 

You slid on the black leather playsuit and boots, along with the mask that Zemo gave you. 

You felt exposed and uncomfortable. You managed to hide a few knives in your boots and you slid on a thigh holster to hold some more to make you feel like you were protected at least. 

“Loose the knives.” Zemo instructed. 

“Are you serious?” You were growing more agitated by the minute with this man. 

“You are playing an escort. You can’t have knives on show.” Zemo pointed to your holster. 

You bit down on your cheek as you removed it. 

“Fine.” You then left the plane to Sam and Bucky waiting outside. Bucky’s eyes went wide at the sight of you but he tried to hide it by clearing his throat and looking away. 

“We have to fix this. I’m the only one who looks like a pimp.” Sam was wearing a red patterned suit and chains. He didn’t look too bad in it either.

“Only an American would assume a fashion-forward Black man looks like a pimp. You look exactly like the man you’re supposed to be playing. The sophisticated, charming African rake named Conrad Mack, aka the Smiling Tiger.” Zemo handed Sam his phone revealing a picture of Conrad Mack.

“He even has a bad nickname. Hell, he does look like me, though.” Sam took the phone and looked down at the picture. 

“(Y/n) is playing your partner for the night. Conrad is known for his appreciation for the finer things in life and often has a woman on his arm Therefore, (Y/n), you must be attached to Sam’s hip the entire night.” Zemo filled you all in on the reason behind your disguise. 

“Excuse me, what?” Bucky almost choked at the idea of you having to be Sam’s woman for the night. 

“Well it is the only disguise that makes sense. She can’t be your girlfriend as you are the Winter Soldier. She can’t be mine as everyone knows I am loyal to my wife. She has to be the smiling tigers current whore.” 

“Watch your mouth.” Bucky hissed. 

“We all must play a part.” Zemo defended his choice of words. “You smell this?”

“Yeah, what is that? Acid?” Sam asked. 

“Madripoor. No matter what happens, we have to stay in character. Our lives depend on it. There’s no margin for error. High Town’s that way. Not a bad place if you wanna visit, but Low Town’s the other way.” Zemo gestured across the city as a car approached you all. 

“Let me guess. We don’t have any friends in High Town.” You sighed as Zemo opened the car door for you. 

“Not if we want the answers we are looking for.” Zemo climbed into the car after you and then the boys followed. 

It didn't take too long to find the way to low town. You had been to Madripoor before but it had been years ago. 

You did as you were ordered when you all exited Zemo’s car. You stuck by Sam, walking in the middle of Sam and Bucky. 

The air wasn’t cold but it felt thick, you could feel it sticking to your bare skin which gave you the desperate urge to take a long shower. 

“Here we are.” Zemo had brought you to a bar. It was busy and filled with a lot of men.  

“Ready to comply, Winter Soldier?” You heard Zemo ask Bucky in Russian. 

You heard whispers around you questioning if Bucky was who everyone thought he was. It made your gut clench with nerves but you didn’t let it show. 

“Hello, gentlemen. Wasn’t expecting you, Smiling Tiger.” The bartender greeted Sam and Zemo but barely brushed a glance over you.

“His plans changed. We have business to do with Selby.” Zemo spoke for Sam. You then felt Sam wrap his arm around your waist. You leaned into him, batting your eyelashes first at Sam and then the bartender. 

“The usual?” The bartender asked Sam. He nodded, afraid that if he spoke then it would give away the facade. 

You were thankful you were wearing a face mask when you saw the drink made for the Smiling Tiger. You grimaced at the dead snake being cut open and then again when one of its organs was dropped into Sam’s shot. 

“Ah, Smiling Tiger. Your favourite.” Zemo picked up his own drink as he looked down at Sam’s. 

“I love these.” Sam forced himself to speak. 

“Cheers, Conrad.” Zemo and Sam touched glasses before Sam hesitantly shot back the drink. You could tell Bucky enjoyed watching that. 

“I got word from on high. You ain’t welcome here.” A man suddenly approached from behind and tapped Zemo on the shoulder. You felt Sam’s grip on you tighten protectively. 

“I have no business with the Power Broker, but if he insists, he can either come and talk to me...” Zemo held his hand out to show his new bodyguard. 

“New haircut?” The stranger looked Bucky up and down. 

“Or bring Selby for a chat.” Zemo gave him the other option. The man retreated. 

“A power broker? Really?” Bucky spoke once the stranger had left.

“Every kingdom needs its king. Let’s just pray we stay under his radar.”

“Do you know him?” Sam asked. 

“Only by reputation.” Zemo admitted honestly.

“In Madripoor he is judge, jury, and executioner. You can’t visit low town without appearing on his radar.” You spoke up as you let yourself look around the room and take in just how many threats were around. 

“And you know this why?” Sam looked down at you. He must've forgotten your past. 

“I was a free agent before the Avengers. I've been here undercover a few times especially when I was a young teenager. Surprise Surprise evil guys like little girls.” You kept quiet in case anyone around was listening. 

Zemo suddenly spoke a command for Bucky in Russian once again and that’s when another stranger put his hands on Zemo. 

You watched Bucky follow orders and he didn’t hold back. 

He grabbed hold of the strangers wrist and pulled him off Zemo before attacking him and several others around. 

You took notice of those around with their phones out. Cameras...

You went to step forward when you felt Sam squeeze your side. He gave you a look that told you no. 

“Didn’t take much for him to fall back into form.” Zemo muttered to you and Sam. You wanted to punch him. 

Bucky slammed another man onto the bar and that’s when you heard the wave of guns cocking. 

Sam took hold of Bucky’s arm when Zemo told him to stay in character. 

Instead Zemo told Bucky to stand down once you were informed you could see Selby. 

Sam took hold of you hand and dragged you along side him as you all left the bar. 

“She isn’t welcome.” One of the guards stopped you before you could enter the room. 

“Excuse me?” Sam scoffed at the guard. “She’s with me and so she is welcome.” 

“Let her in!” You heard an English accent call from ahead. 

“You should know, Baron. People don’t just come into my bar and make demands.” Selby was an older woman with a white pixie cut and a sly grin. Sam remained stood and so did Bucky but Sam had commanded you to take a seat next to Zemo. 

“Not a demand. An offer.” Zemo was impressing you by how cool he was playing this. It also worried you. 

“A lot has changed since you were here last. By the way, I thought you were rotting away in a German prison. How did you escape?“ Selby asked. 

“People like us always find a way, don’t we? I’m sure you’ve already figured out what I’m here for.”

“You’re taller than I’d heard, Smiling Tiger.” Selby ignored Zemo as she eyed up Sam.” What’s the offer?”

“Tell us what you know about the super-soldier serum. And I give you him, along with the code words to control him, of course. He will do anything you want.”Zemo had risen from his seat and held Bucky by the chin. 

“Now that’s the Zemo I remember. I’m glad I decided not to kill you immediately. Yeah, you were right to come to me. Arrogant, but right. The super-soldier serum is here in Madripoor. Dr. Wilfred Nagel is the man you wanna thank...Or condemn, depending on what side of this you’re on. The Power Broker had him working on the serum, but… things didn’t go as planned.” Selby fed you what she knew. 

“Is Nagel still in Madripoor?” Zemo questioned. 

“Oh. The bread crumbs you can have for free, but the bakery is gonna cost you, Baron. And before you get all cute, don’t think you can find Nagel without me.” Selby pushed herself from her seat and walked across the room. 

That’s when Sam’s mobile went off. 

“Answer it. On speaker.” Selby ordered. The gun behind Sam made him pull out his phone. 

“Hello?” He answered. 

“Hey, um, we need to talk about this situation. It’s been drivin’ me nuts.” A woman’s voice came through. 

“What situation exactly are you talkin’ about?” Sam tried his best to keep up his persona. 

“Are you high? You know what situation, it’s the only situation me and you have.” The woman’s attitude was not helping Sam’s case. 

“What situation, Sarah? Say it.” Sam demanded. 

“The damn boat. And watch your tone. Okay? I let you slide at the bank.” Sarah snapped back. 

“The bank. Yeah. Laundered so much...” Sam chuckled. “Yeah, they’ll come around.”

“If that was the case, then why’d they dog you out, Big Time?” Sarah asked. 

“Yeah, you damn right I’m Big Time. You’ll see when I have that banker killed.” Sam tried to seem intimidating but at that moment you knew you were screwed. You reached down into your boot to take a knife just in case. 

“Cass! What’d I tell you about the Cheerios? I don’t have time for this! Sam, I’m sorry. I’ll call you back.” Sarah had used Sam’s name and that was the end of it. 

“Sam? Who’s Sam?” Selby looked pissed. “Kill them!” She ordered but before her hired men could react, a bullet came through the window and shot Selby down. 

You snatched two knives from your boot and sent them into the guard behind Sam. 

Bucky immediately reacted with taking out the other guard. 

“They’re gonna pin this on us.” You took the knives from the body as the boys took the guns. 

“We have a real problem now, so leave your weapons and follow my lead.” Zemo’s order made the boys put their guns down but you just wiped your knives and placed them back in your boot. 

You left the club in a hurry. Text chimes went off around you and you knew the power broker had seen what happened. 

You were well and truly fucked. 

“This is not good.” Zemo’s last words before the shooting started. 

You took off alongside Bucky and Sam, cursing the fact that Zemo had put you in the most uncomfortable shoes on the planet. 

“I can’t run in these heels!” Sam shouted which almost made you laugh. 

“Down here!” You took a turn into an alley to get off the road as two mopeds appeared behind you. 

Before you could spin around to fight, a shooter had taken them out. 

“You seem to have a guardian angel.” Zemo looked just. as confused you felt. You weren’t aware you knew anyone who was in Madripoor at the moment. 

“Well, this is too perfect. Drop it, Zemo.” A familiar face soon revealed itself from the shadows. 

“Sharon?” Sam furrowed his brow at the woman. 

“You cost me everything.” Sharon ignore Sam as she spoke to Zemo. 

“Sharon, wait. Someone recreated the super-soldier serum and Zemo had a lead.” Sam stepped ahead of Zemo to protest him. 

“That explains why you guys are here. And Selby’s dead.”Sharon glowered at the four of you. 

“So what are you doing here?” Bucky asked the question on everyones mind. 

“I stole Steve’s shield, remember? I also took the wings for your ass, so that you could save him from him. I didn’t have the Avengers to back me up. So I’m off the grid in Madripoor.” Sharon informed you.

“Don’t blow smoke. Both (Y/n) and I were on the run, too.” Sam didn't bother with feeling pity. 

“Was. Is. Big difference. I don’t speak to my family anymore. I can’t. My own father doesn’t know where I am.” Sharon shot back. 

“Listen, Sharon, we need your help.” Bucky interrupted her before she could say anything else.  

“Please.” You added. You and Sharon were friendly for a time before the world went to hell. You figured she’d help you at least. 

“This isn’t over. I have a place in High Town. You’ll be safe there for a while.” Sharon sighed, giving in and lowering her gun. 

“Thank you.” You pressed a small smile onto your face but Sharon didn’t reciprocate. 

She managed to get you to a car safely and you headed out of low town for the night. 

(PART 3 HERE)

Bucky Barnes Tag List 

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[dumbledore-and-grindelwald]

I love the question even though I disagree with many points.

Let's start by Newt. He had been infatuated by Leta, but he had already started to move on and he loved Tina before Leta's death. Throughout CoG he is chasing Tina to actually explain to her that his feelings have changed and that nothing is going on with Leta. His suffering is indeed not shown, but it's been 5 years. Even Kama, whose pain is specifically addressed, does not show his pain. It's given to us when Queenie sees it in his head.

As for Theseus, he has not moved on and in SoD the only implication that he and Lally may end up being something more is the fact that they arrive at the wedding together. Before that, the only conversation between them is their introduction to each other. That said, I do believe that this may be indeed set up for these two. Nevertheless, we DO see Theseus' loss. When they're at the German ministry, he HEARS that they are absolving Grindelwald which should be a big hint that he doesn't have a chance of getting his followers within a ministry that supports them, but he can't think straight and not engage because they are people who were involved in Leta's murders (it's actually mentioned in that scene). He held back during Grindelwald's rally in Paris until things got out of hand, but he can't now because he's not thinking straight. And Minerva mentions that Theseus was captured to silence Leta's death. People can be functional and slowly move on with their lives without that erasing their grief. Also, we see that Theseus is the last one who lingers after everyone else has left when Gellert disappears, and it's important that HE is the one who asks Albus to find him and stop him because he is not just acting as an auror, but as a person who lost a loved one and does not want the murderer who took his fiance away from him hurting others.

As for Albus, I don't think that 'love' is the reason he didn't get over Grindelwald. I think it was trauma. Theseus lost Leta, a woman who loved him and would die to protect him, because she was murdered. On the other hand, feeling betrayed and that he was a fool for love was part of Albus' tragedy. He felt that his love ended up with him neglecting his sister, blinded him to Gellert's anger and resulted in his brother's torture, enabled and promoted ideology that could be destructive for the world and ultimately left him with a broken heart, abandoned by the man he love who pursued alone dreams they build together while he had to deal with his bottomless well of grief and guilt. In old interviews, Rowling has mentioned that because of the way things went with Gellert, Albus became very mistrusting of himself in those matters and lost any interest. So it's not just about him pining for Gellert. It's about the fact that his misjudgement made him loose faith in his ability to evaluate partners and have relationships. Moreover, I'd argue that Albus seems quite grayromantic and graysexual in the first place. Not to mention that his connection to Gellert. rather than just being about looks, was largely related to their common interests, their intellect, their ambitions and exceptional abilities. Albus and Gellert were extraordinary and that's part of what made them feel seen by each other and not feel the loneliness they experienced with everyone else. On the other hand, Theseus was a boy in love with a girl who loved him back. He may find a loving soul to love again. It's an easier situation.

[padawanlost]

Hello there! I just wanted to ask about something that’s been confusing me real quick: did Anakin lord over others with his Chosen One status or not? Because I thought he was insecure, disliked all the expectations that came with it, and didn’t really believe in that old prophecy to begin with. But, in Jude Watson’s books he thinks he deserves all these things because of it and rubs that status in other faces? I just need some clarity please lol thank you so much and I adore your blog ❤️

No, not at all. If anything, one of Anakin’s biggest difficulties was to assert himself in front of others (specially people in power).

This is a man who is considered a hero of the galaxy, of the most powerful jedi ever, married, soon to be father, beloved and respect by his men and even complete strangers…yet…look at how easily he submits.

If Anakin had been anything like some ‘fans’ like to pretend he was, he wouldn’t be the character portrayed on screen. He’d more like characters like Tony Stark, someone who is completely confident in his abilities and is not ashamed to admit it. But that’s NOT the character we see on screen, or anywhere else for that matter.

The Jedi Council didn’t want me, either. Being the Chosen One didn’t count for anything. Master Yoda wouldn’t train me, or Windu. Every member of the Jedi Council had had something more pressing to do than help him work out what this terrible, galaxy-changing power of his meant, and how he should live in its shadow. He still wasn’t sure. Anakin recalled standing there in that grand, polished Jedi Council Chamber, surrounded by what felt like fear, and disdain, and bewilderment—who were those Masters to feel bewildered, that the only person there who cared if he lived or died was Master Qui-Gon Jinn. And they stopped him training the Chosen One. Qui-Gon hadn’t cared what the Jedi Council said. He’d trained him anyway, a Padawan in all but name. Why am I thinking of all this now? Haven’t I put it behind me? Haven’t I had enough bad memories since then to take their place? Haven’t I vindicated Master Qui-Gon? [Karen Traviss. The Clone Wars]

Anakin enjoyed praise from Obi-Wan, but often became sullen when he was reprimanded. Obi-Wan assured him that he himself had been frequently reminded by Qui-Gon to be more mindful of the Force, but somehow even the slightest criticism managed to leave Anakin feeling stung. First they tell me to do my best, then they tell me I’ve gone too far! ANAKIN SKYWALKER IN THE RISE AND FALL OF DARTH VADER BY RYDER WINDHAM

Despite Anakin’s desire to distance himself from the slave he had once been, he was unable, or unwilling, to shed the other aspects that had defined him on Tatooine. He still dreamed of glory, still craved adventure, and never lost his appetite for high-speed thrills and the desire to prove himself in competition. THE RISE AND FALL OF DARTH VADER BY RYDER WINDHAM

Anakin was liked by the other students, but he had no close friends. He was not loved. Obi-Wan told himself that Anakin’s gifts naturally set him apart. But in his heart, he grieved for Anakin’s loneliness. JUDE WATSON [JEDI QUEST: THE WAY OF THE APPRENTICE]

Just when Anakin thought he’d passed that elusive finishing line that said adult, experienced, seen it all, he realized he was still twenty, Jedi or not, and the wounded boy in him still rose to the surface—provoked into angry violence, scared of abandonment, and still in need of approval. KAREN TRAVISS [STAR WARS: THE CLONE WARS NOVELIZATION]

[Obi-Wan] knew, glancing at his Padawan’s eager face, that Anakin meant well from the bottom of his heart. If Obi-Wan saw a shadow on that heart, he knew it would pain his Padawan to know it. In many ways, Anakin was still a boy. A wounded, loving, anxious boy with great gifts he did not fully understand. Yet he was also a young man, close to maturity, who could do great harm. To others, yes. To himself, most of all JUDE WATSON [JEDI QUEST: THE SCHOOL OF FEAR]

“I just…” Anakin stopped. He took a ragged breath. “I thought you would be proud of me.” I am proud of you. Obi-Wan wanted to say the words. They were true. He was proud of so much in Anakin. But now was not the time to tell him that. Or was it? JUDE WATSON [JEDI QUEST: THE SCHOOL OF FEAR]

Fixing broken machines was like a meditation. Fixing broken machines was an antidote to every pain, every loss, every fear, every defeat. Fixing broken machines kept him from going mad. CLONE WARS GAMBIT: STEALTH

You are very observant, Ferus, but you must accept that I know him better than you,” Obi-Wan said carefully. “Anakin can be arrogant. I know that. But he is also learning and growing. He is respectful of his great power. He does not abuse it. He is younger than you, but he has seen much injustice, many terrible things. I do not think it so wrong that he wants to change things. You must understand that it isn’t ambition that drives him. It is compassion. OBI-WAN KENOBI IN STAR WARS – JEDI QUEST: THE CHANGING OF THE GUARD BY JUDE WATSON

Taking them, she looked up at him and shook her head, even though it still ached. “It’s odd. You’re nothing like I expected.” “Why?” he said, perching on the edge of the nearby chair. “What did you expect?” “I don’t know,” she said, floundering. “I can’t say I’ve ever given the Jedi much thought. I mean, not as individuals. I never expected to meet one—let alone two. I don’t tend to go places where your skills are needed. But—well—you’re gentle.” That made him smile. “As opposed to what?” She swallowed the pain-tabs, washing them down with a mouthful of water. “Oh. You know. The HoloNet news—it portrays as you as this—this—heroic warrior. Larger than life. Charging into battle, lightsaber flashing. Scourge of the Separatists. That kind of thing.” She shrugged. [Karen Miller. Star Wars: Clone Wars Gambit: Stealth]

“Ten years in this place, and still he was an object of interest. Of speculation. All their hopes and dreams hanging on him like decorations on a bantha skeleton at Boonta Eve. He hated it.” [Clone Wars: Wild space, Karen Miller]

[Anakin] did not like the fact that he had won. It seemed wrong that he had stepped so far out of line, and yet had been retained as a Padawan. He did not like the unease this victory, if victory it was, produced in him. Above all weaknesses, arrogance was the most costly. They keep me here because I have potential they’ve never seen before. They keep me in training because they’re curious to see what I can do. I feel like a rich man who never knows whether his friends are true-or whether they just want his money. This was a particularly galling thought, and certainly neither true nor fair. Why do they put up with me, then? Why do I keep testing them? [Greg Bear’s Rogue Planet]

The only piece of media where Anakin is more ‘openly’ arrogant is in The Clone Wars (2008) but even then, he doesn’t flaunt his alleged ‘status’ over everyone. His arrogance is reflected more through his disobedience, not open defiance and antagonist behavior towards his peers.

But hey, what do Hayden Christensen, George Lucas and most Star Wars writers know? lol

PS: thank you! <3

[robininthelabyrinth]

Prompt - Nie Mingjue's temper is already not great at the Phoenix hunt, so when they haul out men and women, some who look a great deal more like frightened peasants than cultivators he snaps, this is not how you treat POWs, it turns into a riot/battle and Jiang Cheng has had enough of kowtowing to the Jin and he and the new Jiang sect members and Wei Wuxian all rally to Nie Mingjue, does anyone else? Where to the Lan fall? Was nie mingjue's snap directly at jgy or more in general?

ao3

Nie Mingjue was, probably for the first time in his life, tired of fighting.

He’d fought in secret against the Wen sect for years, thanklessly defending the other sects that had refused to even acknowledge Wen Ruohan’s actions for years on end, and yet it had not prepared him for the brutality that was open warfare, for the difficulty of being the general of the entire Sunshot Campaign, for the burden of knowing that so many lives depended on him and him alone. He’d fought battle after battle, won tremendous victories, and yet the last hope had seemed out of reach – he’d eventually resorted to a desperate stratagem that had gone wrong – he had been tortured, mocked, his men killed �� and at the moment of when all seemed lost, he was saved.

Saved…only to realize that it was Meng Yao being credited with it, with being their spy, and Lan Xichen had not told him.

He’d limped back to his camp, but they’d chased after him, and the news of what Meng Yao had done got out – not really a surprise; given the man’s ambitions, if someone else hadn’t spread it he would have done it himself – and in the end, politics had meant that there really hadn’t been much of a choice about swearing sworn brotherhood with the two of them, binding them together in life and death, not unless he wanted to risk another war.

Nie Mingjue very, very much did not want another war.

He had still not fully recovered from his injuries by the time the Jin sect had set up a celebration in the Nightless City, with Jin Guangshan using Nie Mingjue’s refusal to take on any of Wen Ruohan’s ridiculous trappings as an excuse to all but name himself Chief Cultivator in the man’s place. Nie Mingjue knew he should have protested then, but he was tired, his sect in need of rebuilding – they had been the ones bearing the brunt of the war, as they always had, and the only reason they were not the worst off of the Great Sects was because of what the Wens had done to the Cloud Recesses and the Lotus Pier – and he’d never really wanted personal advancement, anyway.

After what had happened with his father, he’d had a lifetime’s worth of being promoted.

Besides, as part and parcel of their self-granted promotion, the Jin sect had promised to take care of the worst of the clean-up, including dealing with the prisoners of war, and that had seemed fine, even a good result. After spending half his life doing things for other people, Nie Mingjue would return home to focus on that which matter most to him, and for once someone else would take the lead in caring for the rest of the world.

It wasn’t like the Jin sect couldn’t afford a few more mouths to feed. 

It wasn’t like their coffers were anywhere near empty, or that they needed to rebuild; it wasn’t as though they’d ever stopped trade with Qishan or actually led in a major battle or - he should stop thinking about it before he became angry. 

He’d been angry for so long. It would be nice to stop for a while.

Of course, it felt as though he’d barely settled in back at home before he was being summoned for yet another celebration hosted by the Jin sect, this time at Phoenix Mountain. A hunt, no less, and it was so pointedly designed as the sort of thing that the Nie sect favored that it would have been impossible to turn down the invitation. Not to mention, the invitation had oh-so-casually mentioned that Jin Guangyao, his sworn brother, would be the one in charge of setting up the hunt, meaning that any disruption or failure cause damage not only to his own reputation but to Nie Mingjue and Lan Xichen’s, for having sworn with him.

Jin Guangshan would either have his day in the sun or a reason to tear everyone else down - a win-win situation for him, lose-lose for everyone else.

Fucking politics.

Still, there wasn’t anything for it. They had to go, so they went.

Nie Mingjue felt himself drifting back into that disconnected state that had allowed him to survive years of discussion conferences hosted by his father’s murderer. It was a strange sort of state, that allowed him to do the things he had to do to support his sect while feeling as though the world was separated from him by a window through which he watched everything happen. Anything that occurred beyond that window – all sounds and sights and even emotional reactions – was dulled or even muted; he could look Wen Ruohan right in the eye and think to himself of how much he longed to slaughter the man where he stood for his crimes, look at Jiang Fengmian smiling quite sincerely at Wen Ruohan and Lan Qiren bowing to him as if he was a man worthy of respect, as if they weren’t hypocrites that took Wen Ruohan’s money in trade and said apologetically that there wasn’t anything anyone could prove about Nie Mingjue’s father’s death, and yet, no matter how much he hated them all, his body would do nothing. 

He would drink tea, and nod, and he would not breach etiquette, he would not bring war down on his sect’s head, he would do nothing.

Sitting in a place of honor at Phoenix Mountain felt much the same: yet another burden to bear, a torment that he could only hope passed quickly.

(It wasn’t healthy, but then again, what was? His entire life was grist for the mill that was his sect’s well-being, shortened by excessive cultivation and stress and endless rage, and knowing it didn’t change anything.)

He saw in the corner of his eye the way his little brother’s eyes flickered to him and then frown – he’d never liked it when Nie Mingjue went quiet and passive, knowing how alien the feeling was to him, knowing through fellow-feeling what it felt like, though perhaps he was wondering why the state had come upon him now again when Wen Ruohan was already dead and gone, even though it had never really just been about Wen Ruohan. 

Perhaps because of that fellow-feeling, Nie Huaisang found a conversational interlude hat allowed him to slide over a little closer than politeness dictated, casually putting a hand on Nie Mingjue’s arm as if to beg for something. He knew that Nie Mingjue took comfort in the touch, in the reminder that with his saber at his side and his brother within arms’ reach, Nie Mingjue felt as thought he had everything he valued most in this rotten world close enough that he could try to protect it.

And then the Jin sect – using Jin Guangyao as their mouthpiece, though whether it was because of his skillful silver tongue or simply because they didn’t think he was worth anything more than that, only he would know – announced that they would kick off the hunt with some entertainment.

Nie Mingjue lifted his cup of tea to his lips, feeling pained, and his eyes briefly met with Lan Qiren’s across the hall, no longer in the place of the sect leader but slightly behind, his expression making clear that the same thought was on both their minds – anything but the prostitutes again.

(Surely Jin Guangyao had a bit more self-respect than that…?)

When a bunch of people in chains were marched out, Nie Mingjue had only enough presence of mind to be briefly relieved that the presence of mixed genders meant that they were probably not prostitutes – Lanling Jin abided by rules relating to birth gender and sexuality that seemed nearly as strict as the rules they were always criticizing Gusu Lan over, and according to them no one ever switched or was misaligned or deviated at all, which frankly seemed more than a little bizarre and unbelievable – and then uncomfortable because, well, they were in chains. Weren’t they supposed to be done with war?

And then Jin Guangyao started announcing the rules of some sort of ridiculous archery contest that the younger generation would engage in, and for a moment that seemed almost a relief as well – as a sect leader, Nie Mingjue was excluded from the younger generation despite being only a few years older than the rest of them, and of course there was no point in expecting his brother to participate in any competition of martial skill, and so for a moment it seemed as though this could be another part of this torturous endless experience that he could just tune out.

Indeed, that he was obligated to tune out. No matter how idiotic it was, whatever it was, whatever he thought about it (and he wouldn’t like it, he knew he wouldn’t like it, he’d never liked anything Wen Ruohan – no, that Jin Guangshan, insofar as there was that much of a difference – he’d never liked anything Jin Guangshan had set up in nearly ten years of working together, and odds were good that he wouldn’t like this), Nie Mingjue still had to think first of his sect and the consequences of making a fuss, and that meant he didn’t. He didn’t want a war, and so he had to be polite, restrained, quiet, no matter what he thought.

It wasn’t that hard to simply pull back even further. Nie Mingjue had been suppressing righteousness in favor of etiquette at these horrible conferences for such a long time that it came naturally to him, the way all bad habits did.

Only this time he’d brought Nie Huaisang with him, which he’d always resisted before, and his brother’s hand tightened on his arm to the point of pain.

Nie Mingjue’s first thought, stupidly enough, was to be pleased by the discovery that Nie Huaisang actually had some arm muscle underneath all those prissy frills he favored. His second was concern that Nie Huaisang had suddenly taken ill – with admittedly a bit of hopefulness that perhaps it would be something they could use as an excuse to leave early, as long as it wasn’t that serious – but when he turned to look at him his brother didn’t seem sick.

He seemed – angry?

Not Huaisang, Nie Mingjue thought, heart abruptly seized with an ancient fear. He knew perfectly well what he’d gotten himself into when it came to the saber spirits, had accepted years ago that he would die young, die early, die horribly and alone with nothing but his rage, but that was not going to be Nie Huaisang’s fate, not if he had anything to say about it. 

The fear curdled in his chest, and it felt as though a crack appeared on the window that shielded him from all sensation, all pain and desperation forced far away.

No one was talking, other than Jin Guangyao droning on and on about whatever the new entertainment was – Nie Mingjue had stopped paying attention long ago – and so he couldn’t ask Nie Huaisang what was wrong, but he looked at him and furrowed his brow, trying to convey the question silence.

Nie Huaisang caught the glance and understood, and his mouth moved, shaping silent sounds – it’s an execution, they’re going to kill them –

What?

Baxia, lying by his side as she always did during these meetings, shifted a little, her rage nudging against Nie Mingjue’s mind as it always did – sometimes he thought she hated these meetings as much as he did, other times he was sure of it – and the crack in the window got a little wider, let in a little more light and color and sound, and Nie Mingjue found a thread of willpower to force himself to listen to what the entertainment Jin Guangyao was proposing actually was.

He replayed the words in his mind, turned to look at the people in chains – Wen sect, apparently, and though he couldn’t tell on sight whether they were civilians or cultivators, that didn’t matter. Not even criminals were executed like this, by standing at a distance and waiting to die, not even able to hope for an expert aiming to kill quickly and cleanly, but through a misplaced arrow that could strike them anywhere, cause them a lingering and painful death…this was supposed to be a game?

This was meant to be their entertainment?

The window between Nie Mingjue and the world shattered.

And suddenly all he felt was rage.

“What,” Nie Mingjue said, even as Jin Zixuan got up with a set expression on his face to accept a bow from his servant, “are you doing?”

Jin Zixuan paused, looking puzzled – and no surprise, since Nie Mingjue hadn’t said anything beyond the most mundane greetings when he first arrived. “Sect Leader Nie..?”

Nie Mingjue rose to his feet, his brother’s hand falling off of his arm as if he’d shaken him off like a dog. “What are you doing?” he demanded, louder this time. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

“Da-ge –” Jin Guangyao said, an obvious hint, a reminder of their relationship – Nie Mingjue was the one bound by it, the older brother responsible for setting a good example, and for all that Jin Guangyao was supposed to listen to him and follow his lead Nie Mingjue had never seen a hint that he’d ever planned to do so – but Nie Mingjue didn’t listen to him.

He was angry.

It felt good to be angry – a clean anger, a righteous anger, anger at injustice being perpetrated right before his eyes.

(Something so poisonous as rage shouldn’t feel this good.)

“This is an abomination,” he said, a touch of the battlefield in his voice so that it would be audible throughout the hall, would spread far and wide for all to hear. “Those are people you’re putting on the line.”

There was a moment of awkward silence.

Jin Zixun, Jin Guangshan’s nephew, broke it with an abrupt laugh. “Sect Leader Nie,” he said, pretending to smile, “surely you don’t think so little of us to suggest that my cousin would miss –”

“I don’t care even if he does strike true,” Nie Mingjue snapped. “You do not play with the lives of men.”

“Hardly men,” a minor sect leader, closely affiliated with the Jin sect, said. Sect Leader Qin, if Nie Mingjue placed him right. “Perhaps you did not hear, Chifeng-zun –” It was always his title they used when they wanted to avoid calling him sect leader, when they were trying to make a point about how young and angry and foolish they thought he was. “– but those are Wen-dogs.”

“I don’t care who or what they are,” Nie Mingjue shouted, and now he had fallen back into his body, back into the battlefield, because this was a battlefield; it was only that he had allowed himself – through tiredness or shock or a desire for peace – to forget it for a moment. “Is this not a celebration of peace, the end of war? If they are criminals, sentence them; if they are condemned, execute them with a sword. Even a rabid beast deserves to be put down cleanly, not to be used as target practice by children for the entertainment of others!”

There was movement in the crowd, multiple people shifting from one side to the other, the audience abruptly uncomfortable when faced not only with a gory spectacle but their own complicity in it.

“Sect Leader Nie, calm yourself,” Jin Guangshan said. His voice was stern, irritatingly condescending – as if he thought that styling himself as Chief Cultivator gave him the right to act as if he were Nie Mingjue’s father. “You go too far for proper etiquette; will you not give any face to me, as your host? Naturally, if you have a complaint, I will hear it –”

“I don’t recall the moment I yielded to your authority in matters of ethics, Sect Leader Jin,” Nie Mingjue snapped. “Please, feel free to remind me – the last I recall it, you were the one begging me for assistance.”

“Sect Leader Nie!” Jin Guangshan shouted, rising to his feet with his face starting to purple.

Nie Mingjue saw the furious glance he sent at a frantic Jin Guangyao – control him already! – and it makes his own rage surge even higher. It was not that he didn’t know that his sworn brother was being used as leverage against him, but to have it shoved right into his face like that, to think that they thought that etiquette and brotherhood would be sufficient to make him complaisant – to allow Jin Guangyao to run roughshod over his morality – to think that it had nearly worked –

“Sect Leaders, please.” That was Lan Xichen, standing up as well, his hands outstretched. “Is this not meant to be a celebration of peace?”

For a moment, Nie Mingjue thought he was standing up for his sake, supporting him in decrying what was happening in front of them – something he despised as much as Nie Mingjue did, that much was obvious from his stance – but then his eyes flicked from Nie Mingjue to Jin Guangyao as well, silently beseeching Nie Mingjue to remember how his actions could hurt Jin Guangyao’s standing, and Nie Mingjue felt cold.

So much for brotherhood, it seemed. How much was he supposed to bear on behalf of Jin Guangyao without receiving anything in return?

He turned his face away.

If the Nie sect had to make this stand alone, so be it. Even if it meant war, war against the rest of the cultivation world, war that would be ruinous to his sect...

There was no choice. The Nie sect stood for refusing to tolerate evil; to do any less would be to throw off the traditions of his ancestors more wholly than Nie Huaisang’s refusal to train the saber had ever been. Even on a personal level, he had long criticized others who stood quiet when evil was happening, and he  would not let himself become the hypocrite that so many others had been. 

Nie Mingjue had never before willingly backed away from doing the right thing, the righteous thing, simply because it was hard to do – he would not start now.

“It seems strange that a celebration of peace would begin with death.” That was Jiang Cheng standing up as well, the fourth of the Great Sects. His sister had once been engaged to Jin Zixuan, and she had been invited to the hunt as Madame Jin’s special guest – popular thought had it that the Jin sect would snap her up soon enough, allying with the last remaining sect, and leaving anyone who opposed them to stand alone. But even if that was the plan, it hadn’t happened yet, and Jiang Cheng was putting his voice on Nie Mingjue’s side – Nie Mingjue would have to find a way to repay him for his support later. “Weren’t the Wen sect supposed to be resettled somewhere peaceful? Or was the news I received incorrect?”

“The innocent branch members and civilians were of course resettled,” Jin Guangyao said, and his smile was strained – or was it? Was it actual concern, or some sort of show? Nie Mingjue could never tell with him, not now that he knew how easily the snake changed its skin. “These however are war criminals, sentenced to execution in the manner of our choosing. I hope you all understand: their deaths are in no way comparable to their crimes –”

You would know, having participated in so many of them, Nie Mingjue thought, and levelled a glare at his youngest sworn brother to remind him of that fact. It briefly interrupted the smooth flow of words, making them catch in Jin Guangyao’s throat; at least he had that much shame.

“Can I see?” Nie Huaisang asked in the brief interval, his high voice just as carrying as Nie Mingjue’s shouting – all those music and singing lessons had clearly been worth something.

“See what?” Jin Zixun sneered, stepping forward – and interesting that it was him that did so, while Jin Zixuan, the heir, remained still and silent. His expression was frosty, but he hadn’t yet spoken up in his own father’s defense; hardly filial, but given such a father it was difficult to see what else he could do. “See their crimes? Do you want a list, or for us to drag out their victims to testify? Is this how little your Nie sect thinks of our Jin sect?”

A strong effort on Jin Zixun’s part – it put the burden on them to prove that these were not evildoers and criminals who deserved what was coming to them, made the issue their rudeness and lack of etiquette, made it seem as if they were the ones looking down on everyone.

But for all that Nie Mingjue despaired of Nie Huaisang’s skill at arms, he had never doubted his skill with words.

“You misunderstand me,” Nie Huaisang laughed nervously, hiding his face behind his fan in a gesture of shyness – he made it look as though he were being bullied by Jin Zixun, rather than debating him. “I just meant, well, they’re criminals, right? They must be truly impressive cultivators to fight against the brave soldiers of our Sunshot Campaign…could we see their strength?”

Nie Mingjue knew a cue when he heard one. “Such strength must be considerable to deserve such a fate,” he said scornfully. “Even Wen Ruohan, who killed hundreds, was merely cut down, rather than tormented in the same manner he tortured so many of our cultivators…Or do you think to emulate him in this manner as well?”

“How dare you?!” Jin Guangshan was florid with rage – as if rage would ever stop a Nie. “You come to my home and accuse me with no basis –”

“I do accuse you!” Nie Mingjue shouted, letting his voice trample down Jin Guangshan’s. “But by your own acts you are condemned, by your own callousness and indifference. So much Nie blood was shed to stop Wen Ruohan from running rampant over us all – I would die rather than have spent that blood to buy us nothing more than the same dominion in a different color!”

And then everyone was talking at once, shouting, yelling, and Nie Mingjue took the opportunity to turn on his heel and stride over to Lan Xichen, standing there looking lost. Lan Wangji was beside him, only a step behind, and he caught Nie Mingjue’s eyes as he came over and nodded – he, at least, was with Nie Mingjue in this, and his support gave Nie Mingjue more confidence in what he was about to do. What he had to do.

“Will you abide by your Lan sect’s values and stand with me in this?” he asked Lan Xichen in a low, clipped tone. “Or was my oath of brotherhood only worth the benefits it could get for Meng Yao?”

“Da-ge!” Lan Xichen exclaimed, looking horrified. “Don’t think that, please. Of course I stand with you in this – what they were planning for the Wen sect members goes beyond bad taste and into the horrific.”

He hadn’t meant it the way Nie Mingjue had taken it, then. It must have only been Jin Guangyao’s pleading looks that had led him to take a stand the wrong way, seeking peace and friendship over justice.

“One should not look away from righteousness simply because it would be easier,” Lan Wangji added smoothly, sounding almost as though he were agreeing with his brother and not subtly scolding him. He saluted Nie Mingjue. “You have our full support, regardless of who is on the other side.”

Nie Mingjue continued to look at Lan Xichen who hesitated – no doubt thinking of the tough position they’d just put Jin Guangyao into – but in the end he nodded.

That was fine. Okay, no, it wasn’t fine, but right now he needed Lan Xichen’s support, regardless of his level of enthusiasm; the rest could be dealt with later.

He turned again and went to Jiang Cheng – Wei Wuxian was there as well, having appeared at some point, and he was vociferously yelling at some minor sect leaders. In Nie Mingjue’s favor, at least.

“Sect Leader Nie,” Wei Wuxian said, turning to him before Nie Mingjue could say anything to Jiang Cheng – not that he really need to confirm his support, given the public display from earlier, but it was only polite to come convey his thanks. “There’s something else you should know. I’ve heard some things about the innocent members Wen sect that were supposedly ‘resettled’ – and what’s been happening to them…”

Nie Mingjue glanced at Jin Guangshan, still shouting, and did a quick calculation. “Take Lan Wangji and go check it out at once,” he ordered. “They were supposed to be resettled by the Qiongqi Path. If Sect Leader Jin has been treating these ones so cruelly as this…I’m willing to believe anything right now. But whatever it is, make sure it’s both of you that see it with your own eyes, to make it harder to doubt your words.”

Wei Wuxian saluted him and headed towards Lan Wangji without even seeking approval from his sect leader. Nie Mingjue abruptly felt awkward and looked at Jiang Cheng, but the other man nodded his agreement before he could apologize for commandeering Wei Wuxian as if the other man was still his subordinate.

“At least he listens to you,” Jiang Cheng said, a rueful smile on this face. “Can I convince you to talk some sense into him when all this is done..? I must admit I wasn’t expecting another war so soon.”

“I had hoped we wouldn’t see one for another generation,” Nie Mingjue admitted. “I still hope we can avoid it – it depends on how the smaller sects fall out, and how determined the Jin sect is to dominate the rest, rather than willing to accept equality. But no matter how it goes, we can’t turn our faces away from injustice.”

“Agreed,” Jiang Cheng said with a sigh. “I think we have the better of the argument, and hopefully it sways the rest of them. But have you considered what happens if we win?”

“What do you mean?”

“Sect Leader Jin has been setting himself up as Chief Cultivator. After something like this, even if there’s no actual fighting, that’ll be impossible. You need respect to lead. So who will it be?”

Nie Mingjue experienced a brief moment of horror at the thought of having to take it himself – but no. It was a reasonable solution, of course, but it would also taint the whole thing. It would make his decision to stand up into a tawdry political play, designed to increase his power, rather than a genuine outburst of offended principle.

He might have proposed Lan Xichen as a compromise – he would have, even a shichen earlier. But after that display of weakness from earlier, however brief, he feared that it would somehow end up with Jin Guangyao (and Jin Guangshan behind him) pulling the strings from behind the scenes, using Lan virtue as a cover for their iniquity…no, that wouldn’t do at all.

The only other option was –

Well.

Nie Mingjue had thought to himself that he needed to do something to pay Jiang Cheng back for his support earlier, hadn’t he?

(And at worst, he’d owe him yet another favor.)

Nie Mingjue put his hand on Jiang Cheng’s shoulder. “You have my full support,” he said solemnly, and ignored the sudden look of panic on Jiang Cheng’s face. “Think it over before you say no.”

Being Chief Cultivator would do more to restore the Jiang sect to prosperity than anything else Jiang Cheng might do, and he’d put that together himself sooner or later even if the idea of that much responsibility had to be fairly terrible. But before they could decide things like that, they needed to win.

One more fight.

He could do that much.

[bird-of-fyre]

Empires SMP x Wynncraft AU

Been playing a bunch of Wynncraft (an MMO in MC co-owned and I think also created by Grian) and the two BIG plot devices in it are Corruption (Wyyn Province) and Decay (Gavel Province). Both are similar and have ties to the same catalyst.

What’s going on in Empires right now? Corruption. So my brain went brrr and we have this. Feel free to write for, make fanart, etc. with this AU just tag me so that I can see it!

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There are 2 realms in Wynncraft that are constantly at odds with each other. The Realm of Darkness (Dern) and the Realm of Light. When the two forces meet, corruption is formed and the battlefield of their war took place within the Nether. In Wynn, Human miners unearthed a Nether portal and entered, the magic within corrupting and changing them; they returned leading armies of undead that still terrorize the province today. In Gavel, a parasitic entity emerged from a Dern portal and began to infect the magic-enriched land with the Decay.

Corruption spreads like a weed through roots spanning under the entirety of Wynn; the only known force to stall it is Ice Magic. Decay spreads like an infection and slowly consumes the land, it is weak to Light Magic.

The land Empires SMP takes place on is going to be known as Empiria because I feel it deserves a name for this AU. A strange magic protects this land that is believed to be a result of the banishment of Corruption by the Gods before they fell into slumber. Empirians call it "Respawn Magic” as upon dying one is revived at perfect health (though scars may remain depending on the cause of death). Death to age is still a thing, however lifespans of most inhabitants are extended two decades with the exception of elves who live even longer.

Several Empires already existed  before the present day crew, these being the following: Rivendell, Mythland, The Overgrown, The Ocean Empire, The Lost Empire, and Smallhold. The rest only came to rise in the past decade

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Characters:

Fwhip: A human that hails from the Wynn province. Him and his sister Gem lived in Detlas together as their parents died in a battle against the endless armies of undead. Fwhip was fascinated by the corruption in their land and sought to study it, perhaps maybe even find out a cure. Gem stopped him from this obsession, reminding him that those that went down that path all ended up becoming harbingers of the corruption. They moved to the land of Empiria shortly around the present day where Fwhip found the Grimlands and the crystalized redstone that tainted it drew his attention. Gem wasn’t fond of the idea but it was a different kind of corruption than that back home so she let him study it. Somehow manages to come off as unhinged yet still in complete control.

Gem: Hailing from Wynn, Gem and Fwhip left for new lands to escape the corruption and undead armies. She settled in a mountainous biome full of amethyst crystals so that she could keep an eye on her brother as his fascination with volatile crystalized redstone worries her. She knew basic fire magic pre-Emperia but now is a bit more adept in her powers and has also learned many more spells. She joined the Wither Rose Alliance with Fwhip and Sausage simply to keep the two chaotic gremlins in line.

Jimmy: A Cod-Hybrid from the Ocean Empire and the adopted brother of Lizzie. He left home to found his own empire in the nearby swamp with his sister’s well wishes. His kingdom is small, but he is a kind and generous ruler that doesn’t see himself above his subjects. While working on paths he found a human washed up on the shore in poor condition; this individual was Joel, a nobody from a far away land who really had just given up on any form of future. Jimmy tends to be the person that generally gets picked on by other rulers for having the smallest empire and because he’s very gullible. Close friends with Pix, who he eagerly loves hearing stories of Corkus from.

Joel: Originally from the port town of Nemract in Wynn, Joel tried to start a religion called Jeremyism in memorium of a donkey he lost to the corruption that never took off due to the Bovemists and their own religion. He cheated some pirates in gambling so they took him hostage and forced him to be part of their crew, not that he was complaining, it was way better than the life he had before. Unfortunately, this didn’t last very long as a battle against some rival pirates during a horrible storm ended with him getting tossed overboard. He awoke on the shore of a swamp where he encountered a cod-hybrid who, with their sister, helped him get back on his feet. After experiencing the Cod and Ocean Empires he decided to start his own in the mesa across the ocean so that he can remain close allies with the duo that saved his life. Him and Lizzie marry a few years later.

Joey: A parrot-hybrid that rules over the Lost Empire as its emperor. He is extremely flirtatious and has questionable morals, but despite this he does care for his people. Fascinated by supernatural forces such as immortality and corruption and also always is looking to grow more powerful in any way he can. He has wind magic but doesn’t tend to use it very much.

Kathrine: A fae whose ancestors were originally from the Realm of Light in a time before the Decay took root in Gavel and Dernic forces made their way into the said realm. When she learns of the origins of several new rulers she is surprised as she had only ever been told of Gavel and Dern. Her and Scott are close, given both their ancestral homes were in Gavel.

Lizzie: An axolotl hybrid who rules over the Ocean Empire. She is a generous and humble ruler who takes pride in he empire and her people. She found a young cod-hybrid caught in a fishermans net when she was still a princess and saved him, declaring him her new brother (which he was happy about). When she was asked to help with a human that had washed onto the shores of Jimmy’s empire she had not been expecting to fall in love with the stranger and is now married to Joel. Wields powerful water magic and takes nonsense from nobody (including her husband).

Pearl: The carefree ruler of Smallhold, an Empire that originally started out as a poor farming village that was struggling on hard times. Pearl is a nymph who took pity on the town and used her magic to help the village through hard times, eventually having them elect her as their queen. Despite her title, she prefers to see herself on equal terms as her people.

Pix: A human from the province of Corkus with great enthusiasm, ambition, and taste for the occasional mischief. He left the island province for new beginnings after accidentally breaking several Corkian laws that would have ended him in prison. His dedication to The Vigil is something he learned from interaction and time spent with the Avos; a race of bird humanoids that were the only inhabitants of Corkus before humans settled there. Pix is fantastic when it comes to metallurgy and uses this knowledge to his advantage when it comes to the copper and other metals he uses in his Empire.

Sausage: Born in the province of Fruma to a poor family Sausage always desired more and often had dreams about becoming a royal and learning magic as only they were allowed the luxury of such. He acted as the robin hood of Fruma for a time before he was eventually caught by the Fruman army and shipped off to Wynn as a soldier to aid the said province in their eternal war against the undead. Unlike most Fruman humans entering Wynn, Sausage did not loose his memories and took the first chance he got to stow away on a ship to new lands. Unfortunately, the ship in question was destroyed in a storm and he washed up onto the shores of Mythland (a smaller town without leadership at the time) and was made its king a year or so thereafter. Given he has no magical abilities of his own due to his origins, he turned to Blood Magic as it’s the closest he’ll ever get.

Scott: The elves of Rivendell originally hailed from Aldorei in Gavel, leaving to escape the Decay. Scott was young when they left for the new lands and, unfortunately, several of the fleeting group were lost to creatures of Dern and Decay; including his older brother, Xornoth. There had been no time to retrieve the bodies of the fallen so those that were left behind were assumed dead or infected. While cold and normally detached from the affairs of others, he does care about his fellow empires. He has light magic but struggles to wield it properly.

Shelby: Gone from her village Shelby returned to find it overun by the Decay and the monsters that come with it. Unable to do anything for her people, she left for new lands. Gavel’s best and brightest couldn’t find a cure for the Decay in their homeland so she hopes that maybe, in this new one, that she might find something to save her people.

Xornoth: Once an elf, now a twisted demonic entity with a lust for destruction. Wounded and separated from his family in an attack while attempting to leave Gavel, he was captured by an acolyte of Dern named Bak’al who brought him back to the realm of darkness. It is here that Xornoth was slowly and painfully corrupted in both mind and body, becoming yet another agent of the beast that governs the dark realm.

[felikatze]

give me the a brainworms i am deeply invested in this man

(0) (2) (3) (4)

okay first of all you asked for this. second of all if i am a little off track from the game that is explained by me just building thoughts like building blocks without looking back. third i was supposed to be studying for an exam but this counts as practice right? it's character analysis anyway lmao.

buckle the fuck up, my dearest anon, because I have sub headings.

1. A as the Player Character

Let me begin with why I am obsessed with this horrid little guy in the first place: he's a silent protagonist. I am always obsessed with protagonists. It's a law of nature. I love taking hollow characters and dissecting them for scraps. It's a long standing practice of mine.

Being a silent protagonist, A, as X, does not have a set personality. However, there are patterns. Firstly, as any semi-silent protagonist, A is a reactive character. He does not start incidents, he only responds to situations, presented by the Sephirah, as they arise. He does not actively seek out new information, merely going about the routine of expanding departments, but expresses curiosity when information is presented to him.

I'm aware fandom likes to characterize X and A differently, likely because they are initially presented as different characters. I, on the other hand, would like to pose the theory that they are more similar than expected.

I believe that A is also a reactive character, rather than active. Despite the fandom wiki describing him as stubborn, the goal A pursues with such fervor, the completion of the Seed of Light, is not actually a goal he set for himself. Carmen is the one who set this goal for him by leaving him her legacy.

Throughout the backstory we get relating to the Cogito Project, A is Carmen's assistant, whereas Carmen is the driving researcher. This is how many of the City's inhabitants seem to be; going with the flow of goals set for them by superiors. Yes I will get into his attachment to Carmen later.

The above is not to say A isn't stubborn. Once he has accepted a goal as his own, he will pursue it at all costs, as is obvious from any and all flashbacks leading to horrible deaths. But the point isn't his pursuit of the goal, but where that goal comes from. Even Lobcorp itself supports this, despite what Hokma may say; A as X follows the "simple" task of managing the Corp's day to day activities, and executes any mission given to him by the Sephirah. He outranks them, and doesn't actually need to do their missions, but does so anyway. Players are driven by the reward offered by those missions, of course, and A might be the same in that regard. Nonetheless, at no point in gameplay do you do anything somebody else hasn't told you to.

The overarching narrative of the Script would be the most obvious example. Every single person in the game follows the script, whether they know it or not.

Lastly on this note, a phrase we hear attributed to A, "Machines must behave as machines." Now, Angela may be attached to this phrase because it bears significance to herself as a machine, and informs most of A's unjust treatmeant of her. However, what if it doesn't just apply to machines? The phrase reads as such, "Everyone must act according to their own role."

2. A, Carmen, and the disease of the mind

So, A will at any cost pursue goals Carmen set for him. Question is, why? The obvious answer would be saying he's in love with her, which like, true. But also, how did Carmen come to be so precious to him?

Let us return to the comparison, "This is how many of the City's inhabitants seem to be." We don't really know why exactly most characters joined Carmen, excluding mainly Daniel and Benjamin. But this does not mean we can't have theories.

Carmen's ideal was curing the "disease of the mind." What is the disease? Complete hopelessness. The inability to form aspirations and dreams, to think of a better future. A is a very reactive character who does not set goals for himself. Therefore, I personally conclude, that initially, Carmen's ideology resonated with him because he could identify with the disease.

This is the point where I start rewatching Lobcorp story clips. Dear god.

So, by briefly binging day 27 onward, I've come up with lines that very much support this lil theory of mine:

First, from Carmen, a description of the disease, "People lock away their own potential."

Second, a line from Angela, after the memory synchronization, "You've locked yourself in this prison without bars."

Carmen describes A as humble, and Benjamin thinks he is warm. If I suppose A was one of the diseased initially, Carmen would be the catalyst for this change. Carmen was someone with big aspirations, with plans to heal what is wrong with the City, and it gave him hope. He was one of the diseased, but through time with Carmen, with that relentless optimistic spirit, he may have been cured, for a time. It's not a stretch to say that she was his light.

But lor shows us what happens when the seed of light sprouts wrong, doesn't it? It distorts. A grasped hope for the first time and then it is ruthlessly crushed. Carmen was everything. Yes, A is described as a jack-of-all-trades, as a genius in all pursuits he puts his mind to, but what does that matter in the face of someone who can unite people? Who can give them hope of a better world? Who can inspire them to actually use the talents they have?

And what kind of pressure is it to put the legacy of a messiah in the hands of the diseased?

3. A and the Perception Filter: A is weak to White damage

No, I am serious about that. He's extremely weak mentally. Obviously death of a loved one is a changing experience for absolutely anybody, but Carmen's death destroyed him.

Not only did he refuse to confide this grief to anyone and bottled it up, now everybody looked to him to lead the project, but he just isn't Carmen. He isn't an ambitious person, he doesn't have the same optimism, he can't bring people together, but people expected him to, and he failed. Hard.

While he was without a doubt talented in science, he was also just an average guy.

After her death, A grew to hate humans. He lost trust in them. He refused to confide in anyone, and be confided in by anyone. Thus, the team fell apart.

In both lobcorp and lor, we get interesting tidbits about precations taken to protect the manager.

Firstly, Lobcorp's perception filter. The cartoony art-style of the game is a result of the game being in first person. Through the eyes of the manager, everything is cartoony!

This is a measure undertaken to specifically protect the manager's psyche. Angela tells us that, before it was deployed, the manager would frequently go insane, one notable incident including the manager trying to hang himself. When we first hear this, the previous managers and X are still separate in our minds. However, they're all A! A went insane multiple times without it.

This is understandable, considering that employees also frequently go insane and try to kill both themselves and others. But they're there in action, confronting the Abnormalities directly. Just watching them made the manager go mad. They could not handle the responsibility for the employees' deaths.

In lor, Angela explains why she picked the Rabbit Team from R Corp as their main contractor instead of any other team. One team was simply too big for L Corp's narrow hallways, and the other team... dealt in psychic damage. It was simply too big of a risk for the manager. But the manager is always secure behind the cameras. Would that teams methods just be that brutal visually, or would their attacks have reached the manager?

Combined with his immense grief at all of his friends and coworkers dying in part because of him, A cannot bear to look at death.

4. A's greatest flaw: Avoidance

A common thread during Core Meltdown flashbacks: A refuses to look at suffering. He just can't. Whether it be looking away from Elijah writhing on the floor or hanging up on Daniel's panicked report of death.

This is actually the thing Angela takes the biggest issue with, and what hurt her most. A would never look at her, acknowledge her, and she did not understand why. But I think A did not refuse to look at her out of maliciousness. Rather, it was out of grief over Carmen. He could not look at her without being reminded of what he lost.

Angela's creation came about because A wanted someone to guide him, someone like Carmen. He threw himself into the project to the point it made Benjamin happy that A was passionate about anything again. But as soon as the project he distracted himself with is complete, he is filled with regret. Carmen cannot be replicated, and he breaks again.

Furthermore, tying this back to my first point about A being a reactive person, we see Angela take charge over A. She's the one recruiting employees and leading the business. It was likely a relief for him to be able to step down from the leading position.

But avoiding it made everything worse. He did not act when he saw Elijah's unchecked ambition, he did not act beyond a simple check at Gabriel's decay, he gave Giovanni the same hope he clung to to no avail, et cetera et cetera.

Avoiding his problems is making them worse and sending everything down the drain (including his psyche), so he deals with it the only way he knows how, avoiding them more!

Biggest example of A's big avoidance problem as his psyche crumbles: the memory wipe. A, in perhaps his one singular moment of acknowledging his emotions, recognizes that he is incapable of fulfilling the Script in his current state. His grief is just too much.

By erasing his own memory, he could start fresh without his grief, because he might've really killed himself otherwise. His suffering became bigger and bigger, and he coped by avoiding it.

The memory wipe allowed him to distangle his problems. Through his interactions with the Sephirah (which I will not individually detail for the sake of my sanity and because I dumped all this on a friend on discord already), he can deal with and actually process his issues one at a time.

As the motto describes, only by facing the fear can he build the future. Only by finally facing his grief and acknowleding it, seeing that the past cannot be changed and he has no choice to move forward, can he actually do so.

5. The Sephirah as ghosts

Lobotomy Corporation feels like a ghost story. I've touched upon this in my previous A post.

As you reach the Corp's lower levels, there are less Sephirah. First there are four. They act like normal employees, and do not breach into the story's underbelly until you reach their core supressions and the facade breaks. Second, counting Tiphereth as one, there are three. They still go about their duties, but they know what they are. Third, there are two, and the facade is gone. They know what they are, and they will tell you about the sins of the past.

And finally, you reach Keter, and there is only one.

This gradual decay of the facade is what really gets to me. I said that by interacting with the Sephirah, A deals with his issues one by one, but that's what the Sephirah are, in this case. Representations.

The people the Sephirah used to be are dead, and the Sephirah are their ghosts. The core supression involve putting these ghosts to rest. Doesn't it match the progression of a typical ghost story? Find the ghost, find what they used to be, and help them move on.

So, if everyone is a ghost, then A is alone.

But, behind the scenes, the Sephirah are still there. They are still people, and they have changed for the better, too. As always, A simply does not look.

(Does he even see the good others see in him? Does he look away from praise, too? Did he even realize Benjamin's admiration for him? Will we ever know?)

6. A's end.

A's progression of moving on would be fine and dandy if it did not end as thus: A does kill himself.

A sees himself beyond the point of no return. Everyone is dead. He is alone. Carmen is never coming back. He can't call it quits now, or else everything has been in vain. (Even if the last days show us a part of him wants to just quit, so badly.)

So, there's only one thing left to do: follow the Script to its ending. Fulfill Carmen's legacy at all costs. Death as the ultimate release.

This is the point where I admit I do not like the death as release trope. But the game does a good enough job as presenting it as the only option A had, or the only option he saw himself as having.

However, I've mentioned it before, I'll mention it again: A was not alone. Death was his release, but he left wreckage. In order to end his own suffering, he inflicted the same pain he went through on others.

Throughout the game, he moves on and pushes through. The ending shows that in reality... he didn't.

At least in lor the characters stick together and help each other heal.

This has been most of my thoughts on A, amounting to my longest analysis post ever, having taken me approximately two and a half hours to complete, and clocking in at 2337 words including up to this paragraph.

Thank you anon for giving me the incentive to verbalize all of this, so I can finally be at ease having inflicted my thoughts on everybody else.

[author-morgan]

Okay, I haven't watched Vikings... but please, tell me about Harald Finehair? :3 ❤️

Oh, Harald. Harald, my love. I'll try to keep this short because I could go on for ages about him (and Halfdan) and Vikings in general. Spoilers ahead for Vikings.

So, Harald Finehair rolls up early in season 4 ready to help raid Paris looking like a full meal (see gif below —look at that smirk, he knows he's hot shit). He's outspoken, he's charming, he's a leader, he's got a lot of charisma, he's ambitious. And he has BIG ambitions. Harald wants to make himself King of all Norway, why you may ask? For love (in my humble opinion, he's kind of a hopeless romantic who wears his heart on his sleeve and that makes it really easy for women to make a fool of him). When he was younger, Harald fell in love with a princess, Ellisif, who rejected him for not being 'important' enough. What better way is there to become important than unifying the petty kingdoms of Norway under one crown? The ambition to become king and prove himself to gain his princess's affections is a primary motivator for his character, driving many of his actions. Emotion over reason also gets the better of him a few times. It also yields one of my favorite scenes, which is a conversation between him and Queen Aslaug, who is Ragnar Lothbrok's wife and is very telling about the kind of man he is (@ Hirst, drop your location, I just wanna talk about season 6, because y u do that).

Aslaug: Why didn't you just take her? Harald: That's a good question, Queen Aslaug, but, uh, I don't know. I liked her spirit. I decided I had to be worthy of her.

Harald's also a very skilled warrior (you don't get to call yourself a king back in the day without having to survive and win a few battles), even as he gets more silver in his whiskers, his battle prowess never diminishes. Sigh, what a man. He often has his brother, Halfdan the Black (♥), around during battles. Their combined skills and general joy/enthusiasm before and during the heat of battle is why I (and a lot of others) call them the murder bros. Just look at them, both thrilled to kick some Saxon ass. Look at my boys, off to destroy people, I love you both. Another point I enjoy about Harald is he knows when's beat, and can admit it —as well as admitting when others are better strategists (e.g., Ragnar and then Ivar). He’s somehow both humble and arrogant.

If you know something about history, then you might know Harald Finehair was the first King of Norway, and the show embraces this piece of history, though it is a pyrrhic victory for Harald in many senses. He's lost so much along the path to finally wear the crown and title of King of all Norway and realizes maybe, in the end, it wasn't worth it. Harald makes it known that he regrets killing Halfdan (often), that he mourns his wife (which is a whole other topic. And maybe I'm in the minority, but even given the questionable circumstances of their marriage, I liked Harald and Astrid together, it shows that for the most part, he'd be a good husband in a better situation), mourns his unborn child (even though it's implied to not be his). Harald's story in the show makes me immensely sad that they did not include Ragnhild the Mighty, or at least allow him to be in a truly happy marriage.

But alas, Harald was Viking. He lived as Viking and died as a Viking, and he surely feasts in Valhalla with Halfdan now. And thus, I will leave you to ponder the wonder of King Harald Finehair with my favorite quote from him in the show:

Harald: I will not bargain for my life. For a Viking that would be demeaning. To us, death is bliss, and I rush to bleed.

[incorrectwutheringheightsquotes]

Sometimes people think that Heathcliff does not care about worldly matters at all, that his only concern in life is his spiritual love for Cathy and that even his revenge is either just a distraction or a way to feel closer to Cathy. It is definitely true that Heathcliff is mainly motivated by his love for Cathy, but there are indications that he has ambitions unrelated to it:

-Heathcliff and Hindley’s rivalry does precede Heathcliff’s separation from Catherine, and is actually initially focused on more by Nelly in her narrative than Heathcliff’s friendship with Cathy. The horse incident at the end of Chapter 4 showcases Heathcliff being acquisitive and manipulative regarding a matter completely unrelated to Cathy.

-Contrary to popular belief, Heathcliff does seem to have had a love for learning as a child:

“In the first place, he had by that time lost the benefit of his early education: continual hard work, begun soon and concluded late, had extinguished any curiosity he once possessed in pursuit of knowledge, and any love for books or learning. His childhood’s sense of superiority, instilled into him by the favours of old Mr. Earnshaw, was faded away. He struggled long to keep up an equality with Catherine in her studies, and yielded with poignant though silent regret: but he yielded completely; and there was no prevailing on him to take a step in the way of moving upward, when he found he must, necessarily, sink beneath his former level.”

Heathcliff did once possess a curiosity regarding learning and knowledge, and he only had given up on it because of Hindley’s abuse. Heathcliff is smart and I think he thought that he could benefit from being educated, and his only concern wasn’t just impressing Cathy. If he were the personification of Nature or the personification of Cathy’s “wild self” that many people think that he is, he wouldn’t be so spiteful about not being given an education and he wouldn’t try to take revenge on Hindley by keeping Hareton uneducated. His later hatred for books and learning could be a defense mechanism. Heathcliff did actually spend a good part of his childhood being the favored “son” of a middle class man and Catherine was the primary source of mischief and wildness in the house, not him.

-When he returns to Gimmerton after getting rich Heathcliff doesn’t actually know that Cathy loves him back. He technically got rich to impress Cathy but he doesn’t really have hope that they could ever be together at this point (either in life or in death) and his final goal is to just kill Hindley and then himself. His hatred for Hindley is of course partially caused by him having caused the separation between Heathcliff and Catherine, but he still hates him so much that killing him is the next best thing to being with Cathy.

-There is this line that Heathcliff says to Nelly:

“You suppose she has nearly forgotten me?’ he said. ‘Oh, Nelly! you know she has not! You know as well as I do, that for every thought she spends on Linton she spends a thousand on me! At a most miserable period of my life, I had a notion of the kind: it haunted me on my return to the neighbourhood last summer; but only her own assurance could make me admit the horrible idea again. And then, Linton would be nothing, nor Hindley, nor all the dreams that ever I dreamt. Two words would comprehend my future—death and hell”. (bolded part mine)

Of course this is another declaration of the intensity of his love for Cathy by Heathcliff, but the bolded part makes clear that he has other dreams of less importance, and that these dreams are related to his revenge on Hindley and Edgar, which means that his revenge is not just caused by his anger at losing Catherine but also by his hurt pride and ambition. Though admittedly it could also mean that his revenge would be meaningless if Catherine didn’t love him, I am a bit conflicted over this quote. Wuthering Heights: The novel where you have to ponder over the possible interpretations of a single line to learn the motivation of the main character.

-Far from completely giving up on his worldly life after losing Catherine, Heathcliff does have hopes and plans for his son:

“Yes, Nell,’ he added, when they had departed, ‘my son is prospective owner of your place, and I should not wish him to die till I was certain of being his successor. Besides, he’s mine, and I want the triumph of seeing my descendant fairly lord of their estates; my child hiring their children to till their fathers’ lands for wages. That is the sole consideration which can make me endure the whelp: I despise him for himself, and hate him for the memories he revives! But that consideration is sufficient: he’s as safe with me, and shall be tended as carefully as your master tends his own. I have a room upstairs, furnished for him in handsome style; I’ve engaged a tutor, also, to come three times a week, from twenty miles’ distance, to teach him what he pleases to learn. I’ve ordered Hareton to obey him: and in fact I’ve arranged everything with a view to preserve the superior and the gentleman in him, above his associates. I do regret, however, that he so little deserves the trouble: if I wished any blessing in the world, it was to find him a worthy object of pride; and I’m bitterly disappointed with the whey-faced, whining wretch!’” (bolded parts mine)

Losing Catherine to marriage and death might be Heathcliff’s primary motivation for his revenge but his anger at the class system and the inferiority complex that was caused by this oppression are clearly also important factors. As the latter bolded part makes clear, he also had hopes of finding his son a worthy object of pride, of course he is haunted and in a deep depression, but he still could wish for a blessing in the world, he hadn’t completely given up on worldly concerns.

-He does try to get richer by renting Thrushcross Grange or by being close-handed and mean to his tenants. He does not seem to do much with his money, he does not care for luxury or goods, but he clearly does like having money.

-Even after starting to become obsessed with Cathy’s ghost and wanting to join her, Heathcliff initially does not think of or hope for dying: “Afraid? No!’ he replied. ‘I have neither a fear, nor a presentiment, nor a hope of death. Why should I? With my hard constitution and temperate mode of living, and unperilous occupations, I ought to, and probably shall, remain above ground till there is scarcely a black hair on my head”.

Even after being completely absorbed in Cathy’s ghost, he still does think about his will: “When day breaks I’ll send for Green,’ he said; ‘I wish to make some legal inquiries of him while I can bestow a thought on those matters, and while I can act calmly. I have not written my will yet; and how to leave my property I cannot determine. I wish I could annihilate it from the face of the earth”.

I think this is more impressive than Heathcliff just wanting to die. You can see him gradually being completely convinced that he should die to be with Cathy. At one point he does care about worldly matters, later he cares about them less, at the end he does not care about them at all. You read this guy being gradually haunted to death by a ghost and it is psychological horror.

Conclusion: Of course him having lost Catherine is Heathcliff’s primary motivation for revenge, but I think these make clear that he is a character with other mercenary and vengeful ambitions and that it is ridiculous to say that he is a pure manifestation of Nature’s anger or just the wild side of Cathy.

[skyeventide]

my trsb fic has so many notes to the text that they didn’t fit within the ao3 notes’ section character limit lmao, so here is the lengthier version of it. you can consider it a teaser I guess? but either way, I need some place to store these and link them back in the fic.

contents here, cut for length

on the matter of the mother of Gil-Galad

Celebrimbor’s names

shibbolething all over Thauron’s name

actual quotes and canon

On the matter of the mother of Gil-Galad

Meril-i-Turinqi is a Book of Lost Tales character, lady of Tol Eressea, kin of In(g)we but also similar to the Solosimpi, which is to say the Teleri.

The character of "Meril" on the other hand, is a proto-Amarie, Finrod's love interest. In the early draft of Meril's appearance, Finrod is married and is father of Gil-Galad: this draft is obviously discarded and Finrod becomes childless, while Meril transforms into Amarie, who does not join the exile. Gil-Galad is instead transferred to Orodreth, which iirc is Tolkien's last word on the matter (I don't count the Fingon thing as even canon-adjacent, ChrisT was quite clear in admitting the mistake). Now I recall Orodreth is said to be married to a Sinda; why did I discard that? Cause I initally forgot it. Rip to me and Orodreth.

However, what I had was: a proto-Amarie, who is a Vanya, and a BoLT character who is of the family of Ingwe (so a Vanya), but also like the Teleri (so of the third clan, even though not a Sinda). And so Meril-proto-Amarie became Meril-i-Turinqi, wife of Orodreth.

The full headcanon on Meril here would have her as daughter of a Vanya who is kin of Ingwe and of Telerin nobility (or royalty? they're all big on intermarrying between royal families), which fulfills both sides of the coin and also stays true to the statement that Elenwe is the sole full-Vanya to join the exile (I'm gonna assume this excludes any non-royalty followers). Now regarding the parentage of Orodreth, he is here son of Angrod, as I feel that is a better option in almost all respects. This poses some issues with regard to age, as I recall Orodreth-son-of-Angrod and Idril as being named the only two non-adults to do the journey to ME (again... this surely excludes any non-royalty youngsters, but nonetheless). Obviously these issues grow even further if one also includes the matter of Celebrimbor being Aman-born to a wife who doesn't follow Curufin (and therefore the matter of his age at the time of exile), but reconciling these versions is borderline impossible with how the origins of Celebrimbor keep changing throughout the conception of the legendarium.

Long story short, I up the age of Orodreth to be at least old enough to speak softly with Finarfin (here his grandfather) during the flight of the Noldor, but I have him already married though childless. Finduilas is born early into the exile and Gil-Galad is her younger brother.

Meril returns to Aman at the end of the First Age and rules Tol Eressea for the exiles who are stuck there until the Ban is fully lifted.

Celebrimbor's names

FN = father-name, MN = mother-name

I do not claim to have come up with "Tyelperinquar is an epesse", that headcanon, which nonetheless I'm sure happened separately for other people, is one I first read in a fic by Tyelperintal on AO3. That of course means that I could no longer go with the FN Curufinwe MN Tyelperinquar option, and needed another mother-name, which I also borrowed from the same story, and went for Ilvanon, "the perfect". It's pretty, and also speaks of a mix of high expectations and love.

What in this story made me accept the epesse headcanon is the matter of the origin of "T(y)elperinquar" as a name. Vinyar Tengwar (and most recently also NoME) explains how "silver fist" is a name common among the Teleri, famous for their ability to smith silver even among the Noldor, and it is also mentioned how other similar names, such as Tegilbor "calligrapher", are given to people based on their skill. This, however, directly contradicts the fact that elves don't give the same name to more than one person. That statement is problematic in itself (impossible that all elves across all time are aware of all names that ever have been used -- and also of course there's the usual royalty exceptions, that however may well be exceptions because they are royalty), but if it is a common name among the Teleri and we are to keep the duplicate names lore in mind... my only solution is that it's a coveted epesse, given to the very skilled.

Celebrimbor picks it as his chosen and preferred name over FN, already shared by two people and preferred as chosen name by his father, and the potential arrogance of picking his MN with its meaning.

This still led me to problems of both spelling and language choices.

As far as spelling goes, there's several variations. I'm marking with * the one that is not canonically attested, but can be inferred.

Pure Telerin: Telperimpar

Quenya-Telerin compound that maintains the Telerin spelling of silver: Telperinquar

As above, but shortened: Telpinquar

Pure Quenya: *Tyelperinquar

Pure Quenya, shortened: Tyelpinquar

I use all these except the last one at various stages: I decided (though I go back and forth on this) that his household might have used pure Quenya, and his mother sticks to it; the person in Tirion panicks and uses the shortened version Telpinquar, which together with Telperinquar (Telerin spelling maintained) was more common among the Noldor. The Tirion passage exemplifies the uses and applications of these names, how they were given and altered.

This leads me to problems of language and POV, Celebrimbor vs Tyelperinquar. His mother, in her POV, always uses the latter, but Celebrimbor himself uses the former. The true problem here was adapting my feeling that Celebrimbor would be far more used to thinking of himself as Celebrimbor (as opposed to the Quenya name) vs Tolkien's statement that elves do not use names in another language when speaking in X language. This doesn't stay wholly true through the legendarium and the texts, so it's something I've decided to partially ignore when it comes to POV, though I tend to stick to it in first person dialogue. Something that again I try to tackle in the text itself -- when Galadriel tells Celebrimbor which language to speak and which name to use for her.

I am not entirely satisfied with all my choices here and I might revisit them in the future, but for the moment, here we go.

Shibbolething all over Thauron's name

Another language and spelling headache. As I encountered the problem of Sauron, I encountered that of the spelling of his name: the eternal TH/S issue. Were I to have Celebrimbor's mother, and Celebrimbor himself, stick to the Shibboleth? I initially attempted to circumvent this by using Gorthaur, but the issue described just above, about mixing languages, yet again bit me in the ass.

Of course it comes down to characterisation: would Mrs Curufin stick to the Shibboleth, and would Celebrimbor? The matter with Celebrimbor was that I don't believe he spoke Quenya with any real frequency after the Nargothrond business, not as a choice but rather due to circumstances and preferences of those around him. With Ercasse, the conflict is part of the character, and that sadly meant that the TH/S choice became less of a personal choice and more of a political one, as usual.

That got me thinking about the circumstances around her and something interesting came to me: Finarfin spoke Quenya with the Shibboleth, because of the Teleri. And in the Darkening he becomes king in Tirion, and also has to adjust things with the Teleri -- not an easy task, imo, when he turns back only after the pronunciation of the Doom, and not just after the kinslaying occurred. Additionally, the Vanyar spoke preserving TH. Additionally x2, by the Fourth Age, Exilic Quenya (which uses S) is associated with those who rebelled and returned to Aman -- meanwhile any Sindar preserved TH naturally, as it's a sound that never went out of use in Sindarin.

So I chose to take these things and make something of it. If Finarfin maintains TH to keep the Telerin influence; if the Noldor who remain in Aman decide to step closer to the Vanyar in an anti-rebellion reactionary manner and to conform to the speech of the king; if Exilic Quenya gains the lower status of language of the exiles; and considering the canon fact that in later ages the elves are more likely to preserve language rather than change it -- what are our chances that Shibbolething gains opposite connotations as time passes? My conclusion was high chances. So I decided to implement it.

And so Ercasse doesn't have to think about her personal allegiances anymore and has a path built in for herself in these social changes. And Sauron is Thauron. (Unless Galadriel is talking: she doesn't Shibboleth, and uses “Sauron” and “Sindarin”.)

Quotes and canon

Many things I wrote are based on canon snippets. Here I tried to collect them.

On Celebrimbor and the mention of the bath of flames in his speech. It isn't, in fact, a corny lineage reference, but rather a metaphysical or pseudo-physical concept of purification from the Lost Tales:

Yet now the prayers of [their parents] came even to Manwe [the highest Valar], and the Gods had mercy on their unhappy fate, so that those twain Turin and Nienori entered into ... the bath of flame... and so were all their sorrows and stains washed away, and they dwelt as shining Valar among the blessed ones, and now the love of that brother and sister is very fair;

On the naming of Mithril (appears in the upcoming Nature of Middle Earth, as well as already published in Vinyar Tengwar):

[Celebrimbor] was a great silver-smith, and went to Eregion attracted by the rumours of the marvellous metal found in Moria, Moria-silver, to which he gave the name mithril.

On Celebrimbor's ambition and assorted choices, from Letter 131: 

In the first we see a sort of second fall or at least ‘error’ of the Elves. There was nothing wrong essentially in their lingering against counsel, still sadly with the mortal lands of their old heroic deeds. But they wanted to have their cake without eating it. They wanted the peace and bliss and perfect memory of ‘The West’, and yet to remain on the ordinary earth where their prestige as the highest people, above wild Elves, dwarves, and Men, was greater than at the bottom of the hierarchy of Valinor. They thus became obsessed with 'fading’, the mode in which the changes of time (the law of the world under the sun) was perceived by them. They became sad, and their art (shall we say) antiquarian, and their efforts all really a kind of embalming – even though they also retained the old motive of their kind, the adornment of earth, and the healing of its hurts. […] But many of me Elves listened to Sauron. He was still fair in that early time, and his motives and those of the Elves seemed to go partly together: the healing of the desolate lands. Sauron found their weak point in suggesting that, helping one another, they could make Western Middle-earth as beautiful as Valinor. It was really a veiled attack on the gods, an incitement to try and make a separate independent paradise.

Legolas and Aragorn and my choice to use the word love:

"[...]Yet whatever is still to do, I hope to have a part in it, for the honour of the folk of the Lonely Mountain." "And I for the folk of the Great Wood," said Legolas, "and for the love of the Lord of the White Tree [Aragorn]."

Celebrimbor and the Elessar. It must be noted that this Celebrimbor is not Celebrimbor son of Curufin, but I still liked the tidbit of lore. From there my choice to have three different Elessar stones, one made by Feanor, one by Enerdhil of Gondolin, one by Celebrimbor (in the fic redressed to Celebrimbor son of Curufin, and without the romantic love for Galadriel):

But he did not say to Galadriel that he himself was of Gondolin long ago. Therefore he took thought, and began a long delicate labour, and so for Galadriel he made the greatest of his works (save the Three Rings only).And it is said that more subtle and clear was the green gem that he made than that of Enerdhil, but yet its light had less power. For whereas that of Enerdhil was lit by the Sun in its youth, already many years had passed ere Celebrimbor began his work, and nowhere in Middle-earth was the light as clear as it had been, for though Morgoth had been thrust out into the Void and could not enter again, his far shadow lay upon it.Radiant nonetheless was the Elessar of Celebrimbor; and he set it within a great brooch of silver in the likeness of an eagle rising upon outspread wings.

On the vale and the stream where Formenos is located, I utilised this passage from Lost Tales:

[...] here the entire people of the Noldoli are ordered to leave Kor for the rugged dale northwards where the stream Híri plunged underground, and the command to do so seems to have been less a punishment meted out to them by Manwe than a pre-caution and a safeguard. In connection with the place of the banishment of the Noldoli, here called Sirnúmen ('Western Stream') [...]

Relevant LotR quotes about the Eregion passages, used for soil description extrapolations and other elements:

Suddenly Gimli, who had pressed on ahead, called back to them. He was standing on a knoll and pointing to the right. Hurrying up they saw below them a deep and narrow channel. It was empty and silent, and hardly a trickle of water flowed among the brown and redstained stones of its bed; but on the near side there was a path, much broken and decayed, that wound its way among the ruined walls and paving-stones of an ancient highroad. ‘Ah! Here it is at last!’ said Gandalf. ‘This is where the stream ran: Sirannon, the Gate-stream, they used to call it. But what has happened to the water, I cannot guess; it used to be swift and noisy. Come! We must hurry on. We are late.’ [...] "...there is a wholesome air about Hollin. Much evil must befall a country before it wholly forgets the elves, if once they dwelt there." "That is true", said Legolas. "But the Elves of this land were of a race strange to us of the silvan folk, and the trees and the grass do not now remember them: Only I hear the stones lament them: deep they delved us, fair they wrought us, high they builded us; but they are gone. They are gone. They sought the Havens long ago."

More TBA if anything comes to mind.

[emergingsentiments]

Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha: Episode 10 (Repost)

Loneliness must have drawn you back here, says Hwajung to Chohui. But these could have been words for Dusik and Hyejin, too. The past and current entanglements of Gongjin’s love affairs, after all, run parallel to each other. For Chohui, her mother’s death and her brother’s migration left her solitary, so it only seemed natural to return to somewhere familiar. Hyejin, on the other hand, visited the seaside town to reclaim the memory of happier times, when her mother was still alive. Dusik’s reasons are still obscured but the glimpses into the wakes he’s stood vigil by are compelling reasons behind his return.

Home, as I observed in the first episode of Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha, is where the heart is and the hurts are.

Episode 10 unfolded like the turning point that it is. As the previous chapters tackled the inner workings of all our characters, especially the progress of Hyejin and Dusik both as individuals and in their romantic engagements, we saw how people began to confront their fears. Whether it’s Cheonjae’s anxieties as a has-been singer and as a single father to a rebellious Juri or Gamri’s quiet suffering in her empty nest, the melancholy that undergirds the town’s surface pushed each one to face their scars and losses. For all the comic relief she brings, even Miseon had to brave confusion and rejection.

In this page of Gongjin’s tale, however, the theme of battling life’s greatest antagonist is truest among Dusik, Hyejin, and Seonghyun.

Poor Seonghyun, so new to the town yet so quick to have been thrown into the maelstrom of Gongjin’s charms and tragedies. His greatest fear was being late. He missed opportunities before, including in the postcard-perfect moments of his youth. Always an observer but never the one observed; always watching over Hyejin but always a step behind others in the line. If he were dancing, he’d be out of rhythm, too busy trying to memorize the choreography.

He has rehearsed his lines a thousand times. Will they come out right? Here, Lee Sang-yi gives Seonghyun his most graceful and yet graceless moment. Making an abrupt u-turn on his way to Seoul, he returns to Gongjin — late once again. Hyejin, attacked by a wandering sexual predator in town, has been saved by Dusik. If the shock of the night’s crime were not enough, he confesses the next evening to a Hyejin that had just mistakenly implied her growing affections for Dusik. She’s just had dinner, too.

Full and formal, Hyejin listens to Seonghyun’s lonely and tense confession. Sangyi delivers the lines Seonghyun has held onto for years. It’s a speech marked by jitters, fretful glances, and a slowly growing blush. Once out, he tries to stop the tension by marking the scene as a take. But the clapperboard humor isn’t enough. Hyejin watches him eat alone. She has no appetite.

Hyejin, for her part, couldn’t be blamed. She never really saw Seonghyun other than a senior to be admired. Yes, he’s saved her from a jerk before. But years of absence have made the heart grow duller instead of fonder. She’s also just come from an equally awkward dinner with Dusik, who is celebrating his grandfather’s death anniversary. There is no room for another meal. The night before — the night of the attack — she had slept in Dusik’s home for the third time as well.

At the first visit to his home, she kissed Mr. Hong on impulse and alcohol. On the second, she carried the weight and fears of an inebriated Dusik. On the third visit, she is traumatized from the night’s break-in, so now slips in to Mr. Hong’s clothes and stays over, unable to sleep unless Dusik’s around with poetry. He reads to her...It is my job to fall in love with you while waiting for you the next day. The antidote to Hyejin’s fear, after all, is Gongjin’s son.

But what does Hyejin fear? Well, it’s simple. She fears what she lost — her childhood, to be who she is. As a young girl who lost her mother, she had to grow up fast given her father’s alcohol-tinged coping mechanism. As a young woman, she had to build walls after a harsh rebuke of her lowly appearance. So she covers her scars with pretenses — and fancy shoes. Her clothes are her walls. Her life has been planned out. She steers this career with distinct professionalism and ambition. But it’s never ruthless. A woman-child, her core reveals a soft, compassionate heart.

This is what Dusik brings out in her. It’s not something Dusik necessarily gives. The two, after all, have their losses but they are whole persons, too. Dusik’s unconventional lifestyle and ways have eroded the surface of Hyejin’s fortress. Like salted sea slowly breaking down cliffs. With Dusik, she regains the lost child, the one who laughs when pieces of crab meat are flung to Dusik’s face. If that was Seonghyun, Hyejin would have been profusely apologetic and formal. But Mr. Hong is different. Around him, Hyejin can be unguarded, vulnerable.

Dusik, on the other hand, always saw her in a different light. Carrying the weight of unexplained grief, Dusik knows exactly what’s hidden behind Hyejin’s front. But for all his bravado, he’s afraid, too. The people he loved the most have left him, leaving him with an unimaginable sense of guilt. It’s what keeps him tethered to the idea of boundaries. He only likes Hyejin as a friend. But his eyes, his actions — they speak otherwise. If he admits to loving Hyejin, then the prospect of fresh losses cripple him. He’s an engineering graduate, so he has made the calculations. And yet, this strange woman who has returned from a childhood memory is urging him to take those risks and forget those probabilities.

He took a stab on the shoulder, one that nearly cost his life. Isn’t that love — or even the semblance of it? Why does Dusik need to certify his affections with assurance? Gamri, Gonjin’s wisest daughter, sees through Dusik’s barricades. Life’s brevity, she says, demands risks but most of all, honesty with oneself.

These are words worth ruminating in the evening breeze at the town’s breakwater.

It’s the same place where Hyejin finds him.

After a trip to Seoul to forget the town’s powers over her and Miseon, she realizes the city’s offerings were no longer attractive. Everything reminds her of Gongjin. She can’t stop thinking of Dusik. As a grown-up, Hyejin had sought security. Her instinct of self-preservation made her hard. Drenched in a sudden downpour in Seoul, she remembers her rain-soaked self with Dusik at the beach. It is enough for her to understand.

These realizations surge from Hyejin’s adrenaline-filled confession. Unable to deny her growing affections any further, she takes the plunge.

The child faces reality with simple acceptance. In the presence of a vulnerable Hyejin, things freely move and are themselves. The effects are immediately clear. Like any sensible woman, Hyejin knows Dusik could all but reject him, too. Who drives back from Seoul to rant about love, right? But Dusik understands. The hours waiting for her return were sooner than he had anticipated. But the man had made his calculations. The formulas are no longer useful.

True to himself, Dusik fulfills his new duty. It is my job to fall in love with you while waiting for you the next day. So he returns the confession with the most reasonable declaration: a kiss, first tender, one that leaves Hyejin breathless. He speaks but yearns for more. So he lets his lips touch hers for a second time. A kiss now free from all the tentativeness of the night.

A few weeks ago I read several criticisms about Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha. It’s cliched. People only watch it because the actors are popular. There’s nothing exceptional about a love story.

Cliched, true. But there is a reason why there are cliches because they are true. Do people only watch because the actors are popular? Perhaps. Perhaps not. A love story doesn’t hold a candle to the more intellectual and uncomfortable narratives available for consumption, right? You know, the stories that deal with war and violence, politics and its lack of virtue, the more profound tales that explore humanity or its degradation. But I fear this is an effort to leave the commonplace, the domestic, and the personal materials unattended for the sake of what seems profound. Yet, the production of these “better” and more profound stories does not offer any solace from suffering.

For over a year now, we’ve been fighting the wrath of an invisible virus. It might even be true to say that for many of us, we’ve lost someone dear, someone deeply loved. If not, we know someone who has dealt with these losses. Given the lockdowns and restrictions, even grieving has been abbreviated. Our reality is sobering. We fear many things. So while I don’t hold it against people to choose the more elevated tales, it would be a shame to dismiss those who gush over a love story as uncritical and frivolous.

Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha resonates with and appeals to many because it reminds us of the things we’ve lost to the pandemic. Face-to-face conversations. The stability of a job. Family. Friendship. The pat on the back. Our grandparents. Our first love. A hand to hold. Dinner with friends under the warmth of incandescent light. Office conversations. Senseless chatter. The thrill of falling in love. The smell of the sea, and the sand on our feet. Our best friend. The normalcy of a leisurely walk. Dancing in the rain. People. Our community. The words we wanted to say. A kiss.

In a world where physical intimacy and closeness are dangerous, we feel our lips with our fingers watching Hyejun and Dusik kiss. And we remember the way we were. Kim Seon Ho was right in saying Hometown Cha-Cha-Cha is a healing drama. To love and be loved, after all, remains the ultimate catharsis.