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eclipsednodes · 4 years

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SHADOW WORK SIMPLIFIED

What is shadow work?

If I had to describe shadow work in one word, it would be introspection. Introspection is the examination of your own mental state and is necessary in order to learn more about your fundamental nature. Although it may sound off-putting and even scary at first, shadow work is a necessary component in the process of healing. We all have aspects of ourselves that we’ve rejected and hidden away out of fear. Through shadow work, we’re able to reflect on our thoughts, emotions, and habits so that we can find the root cause of our suffering and heal ourselves. By reincorporating those aspects of ourselves that we’ve denied, we feel more fulfilled and can begin to love ourselves fully.

Where does shadow work come from?

The concept of the shadow self comes from Carl Jung who believed that our shadow self is the subconscious aspect, or “dark side”, of our personality that our conscious ego doesn’t identify with. However, I would like to clarify that “dark” does not imply or equate with bad. That which resides outside of our consciousness can be either good or bad, but aren’t inherently reflective of our value or “goodness” as a person.

Although these repressed aspects of ourselves can manifest negatively, it isn’t because those parts of us are “bad”, but that the process of repression is inherently painful and toxic. This is reflected by Jung when he states, "Everyone carries a shadow, and the less it is embodied in the individual's conscious life, the blacker and denser it is.” He believed that until we’ve merged our conscious and subconscious selves, that our conscious would be “the slave of the autonomous shadow”. This is due to the shadow self overwhelming our conscious selves by falling victim to our own self-imposed traps.

Through assimilating this shadow self, not over-identifying with it, Jung believed we go through the process of enantiodromia, thereby integrating the subconscious by reincorporating our shadow selves into our personality and allowing us to solidify ourselves through wholeness. He best described this by stating "assimilation of the shadow gives a man body, so to speak.” However, don’t fall into the misconception that shadow work is a short-term practice. Shadow work is a continuous practice and integration of the shadow self is a will take place throughout your life.

How do I do shadow work?

In the last question, I identified that practicing self-reflection is a key component of shadow work, but what does that mean? What am I supposed to be reflecting on? Well, the first thing that you should focus on is being present throughout the day. Identify feelings that come up throughout the day and observe them objectively. What situation or interaction triggered these emotions? How did I react to those emotions? Were my emotions controlling me or was I in control of my emotions? Why did this situation or interaction cause me to feel this way? How did I cope with those feelings (self-harming, lashing out at others, communicating my feelings, journalling, etc.)? Did I punish myself for getting upset? If so, why?

There are numerous ways to reflect on your feelings and experiences in order to get a better understanding of yourself. Through evaluating how you react to situations, which situations upset you, and how you managed those feelings, you’re able to build the foundation to understanding your emotions and bridge the gap between your subconscious and conscious mind.

Once you’ve done this, you’ll find that the emotions you feel in the present are reflective of unhealed emotions from your past. Perhaps the reason you feel that you’re unable to set boundaries as an adult is because as a child, your parents never respected your boundaries by going through your phone or diary, yelling at you when you said no to a request, forcing you into situations that made you feel you had no choice.

By identifying the root cause of your emotional pain, you’re able to address it in the present and heal from the trauma. The simplest way that I’ve found to address them is through journalling. You can purchase a physical journal or even use your notes app, either way, you’re writing out your feelings and reflections to gain deeper insight. It’s important to remember that this looks different for anyone and that the best way to approach shadow work is by doing what feels most natural! You can choose to stick to self-reflective journal prompts, vent about whatever is upsetting you, write letters to whoever has hurt you, etc. Ultimately, you can guide yourself based off of what you feel you need and where you are in your journey.

What parts of yourself do you find yourself rejecting the most? Many of us have experienced the pain of rejection in some aspects of our lives and sometimes, it’s incredibly painful and leaves us with long-lasting wounds. We end up going through our lives carrying baggage that we don’t even know we have! Many times, I’ve found myself wondering why I felt so repulsed by aspects of myself and why I felt so strongly that they needed to be locked away forever. I couldn’t allow myself or others to see my truest self, my whole self, out of fear. I was scared of being rejected, shamed, humiliated by the people around me. I was scared of hurting other people by being myself and of being hurt by others. That’s no way to live, is it? When we tell ourselves that aspects of ourselves aren’t good enough, we end up going through life devaluing ourself. We’ve broken our own trust by rejecting ourselves, we’ve told ourselves that we aren’t good enough or worthy of love. In shadow work, you’re called to go inward and unpack everything that we’ve kept hidden for years and sometimes even decades.

Bring the parts of yourself that you’ve repressed to the surface and nourish them with love, allow yourself to see that ALL OF YOU is deserving of love and support. For you, that could mean unlearning your unhealthy beliefs about food or eating, allowing yourself to be emotional around the people you love (despite how much you were told that you were too emotional, a crybaby, too sensitive in the past), allowing yourself to relax without feeling guilty about not being productive because you recognize your needs (even though you feel your sense of worth is tied to being productive at the cost of your own health).

Common misconceptions about shadow work?

Shadow work is evil or bad, the shadow is evil or bad

The purpose of shadow work is healing through working with your subconscious to release repressed aspects of yourself and heal from painful, traumatic experiences. Your shadow side is simply your unconscious and to believe that it’s bad is to believe that you are bad. It’s merely the part of yourself that you aren’t aware of consciously and shouldn’t be feared.

Certain emotions are “bad”

When you let go of the idea that emotions are either good or bad, you’ll allow yourself to just be and stop putting so much pressure on yourself to feel “good” all of the time. Happiness isn’t a constant state of being so stop expecting to be all of the time, we have a range of emotions for a reason so stop being ashamed of them. Your feelings are natural and if you feel like they’re out of control and something to be ashamed of, there is nothing wrong with that! It’s okay to feel like your emotions are controlling you because that isn’t permanent. Your feelings aren’t permanent and are completely manageable with proper guidance! The reason you feel like your emotions are controlling you is because you probably don’t have the knowledge to cope with them in an effective and healthy way. It’s helpful to sit with your emotions alone and look at them objectively without placing any judgement on them, this will help you calm down and assess your feelings. From there, you can identify what you need to relax and recover as well as acknowledge to yourself that your feelings are natural. When you stop categorizing your emotions as bad, they’re no longer shameful to experience and therefore you can see with better clarity how to cope with them and move on.

I’ve already released it so…

Why am I still upset?

Why does it still keep popping up in my head?

Why haven’t I moved on?

Why am I not making progress?

With the rise of self development and spirituality, I find that more and more people are rushing to complete their healing. Healing is a continuous, life-long cycle and not a destination. Putting the pressure on yourself to reach the place of ultimate healing is not only toxic, but it impedes your ability to actually heal anything. Healing is about love, compassion, and patience and it’s not going to happen according to a timeline. Allow yourself the time to experience your emotions, see them objectively, forgive yourself and others and move on without the pressure of expectations.

Another reason that you could be experiencing this is that despite the work you think you’ve done, it hasn’t been sufficient. I’ve found that a lot of journal prompts provided online are surface level at best and can be more pacifying than revealing. If you’re not feeling anything while doing your inner work, you’re not doing it correctly. Ultimately, this is about uncovering what makes us UNCOMFORTABLE and moving through those feelings. When you allow yourself to experience the sadness, hurt, anger, and/or frustration than you’re telling yourself that these feelings are okay and don’t need to be suppressed. The reality is that no matter what you’re feeling, you are allowed to experience those emotions and it’s only human! Unfortunately, many people associate lower vibrational emotions as bad, but this is a huge misconception! Telling yourself that anger, sadness, etc. are “bad” implies that you shouldn’t experience these emotions and that you have to get rid of them which is not only wrong, but unhealthy. There is no right or wrong emotions so don’t buy into the belief that you should feel a certain way, simply allow yourself to be and you’ll find that it’s much easier to navigate your emotions and needs. The only way to make it to the other side is by wading through the water, be patient and know that you’re feeling exactly what you should be. When you stop censoring yourself, you’ll discover a newfound sense of freedom and wholeness.

If you find yourself circling back to certain topics, for example, your ex-boyfriend than perhaps there are triggers in your environment that remind you of the situation, you have more that needs to be addressed that you may not have been ready for or aware of previously (hence why shadow work is a practice that is ongoing), or they’re representative of a deeper issue that you’re repressing. Whatever the cause is, the same methods as earlier will apply and can be discerned through your own intuition.

What are some basic journal prompts that I can do?

What feelings come up when you think of ____?

How did that experience make you feel emotionally? How did it make you feel about yourself? How did it make you feel about the other person or people?

Write a letter to yourself, your inner child, the people who’ve hurt you, and the people you’ve hurt. Express how you feel honestly, without holding back and then forgive yourself and the other person.

If you could say anything to yourself or another person for closure, what would it be?

How have these situations and experiences impacted your mental health? How have they affected your belief system about yourself, other people, and the world?

What about yourself are you ashamed of? What about yourself are you embarrassed of? What about yourself makes you angry? What do you regret? Why do you feel this way about yourself and where do these feelings stem from?

What makes you feel most alone? What makes you feel most loved? How can you incorporate that knowledge into your life to make it better?

What’s the most hurtful thing someone has said or done to you? Why did it hurt you so much? How does it still affect you now? How can you heal from it and allow yourself to move on?

What do you need to forgive yourself for? What do you need to forgive others for?

Where do you feel you lack security in your life? Why? How does this impact your life and your relationships?

This is a list of generic prompts for you to start with, but feel free to message me if you need help with more specific topics or I can make another post altogether for journal prompts.

#shadow work #spirituality #witchblr #carl jung #witchcraft #energy work #healing #shadow self

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joshslater · 3 years

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Cross Contamination

Similar stories and bonus material on my Patreon.

I'm fucking furious. To most people Jack Wilson is a hockey hotshot, but to me he is just my wife's ex that can't let go. She said they had another encounter, but wouldn't go into details, saying it wasn't just his fault. She couldn't help herself, she said. Knowing how much she loathes him I suspect she was afraid of him turning violent. He is a star athlete after all, known to have punched more than a few players on the ice.

I know he's training at the stadium right now. That's how bad it has gotten, that I even know his schedule. I'm probably speeding getting there, but nothing else is important right now. I park the car in the huge, but almost empty parking. Neverending slabs of concrete to allow for the cars of thousands of cheering fans during game day. Well, I'm certainly not a fan. Still fuming as I exit the car and heading towards the arena I see him and a few others from his team running towards the same building from across the car park. They must be out for cardio or something. I stop and shout towards them "Hey! Jack!"

I can see them slow down a little, Jack saying something to them, and then breaking apart jogging in my direction while they continue at speed towards the stadium building. I remain still, just glaring at him as he closes in on me. He slows down quite a bit away and saunters towards me, still panting. He has an aura of smug superiority. He's good looking, despite his matted, sweaty hair and week-old beard. It's not just because he's in top shape, but he has that classic athlete chin cut, and mesmerizing eyes to go with it too. He's quite a bit shorter than me, and way denser and muscled, but I would bet my weekly martial arts practice can match him if needed. "Hey, cocksucker! You managed to find your way here," he yells back at me.

"I want you to know..." "Shut up"

I don't know why, but I can't look away from his intense eyes. It's like they can see into me, see every part of me. I'm frozen in place just watching him getting closer. "I said hey cocksucker. What are you waiting for? Go ahead and suck my cock." He says this as calmly as he can, never breaking eye contact. I don't think he blinks. I don't think I blink. I slowly go down on my knees, grabbing the hem of his sweatpants, and pull down. I still keep eye contact, so I have to feel my way for the waistband of his underwear to pull it down too. I can feel the heat radiate from his steaming body. There's a smell of sweat, not the stale, musky kind, but from someone who showers every day and uses fresh clothes for each workout. He's professional and they got staff. I can hear his heavy breath as he is still recovering from the sprint. And I can feel a rather large cock in front of me that is erect, or at least a good way there. I grab it in my hands and guide the tip to my lips and begin to lick it. It doesn't really taste of much. I open my mouth and get more and more of his compression shirt wrapped abs and pecs in my view as I stare into his deep eyes, and take his big cock deeper and deeper into my mouth.

The tip reaches some point at the back of my mouth and I start to gag, making horrendous gurgling noises. I move back from him. "All the way. I want to be balls deep down your throat, cocksucker." I do as he commands, and push it in again, further. It's somehow much easier this time and my lips are tickled by his moist bush of pubes. I then start to work it, in and out, in and out. The noise I'm making is still horrendous. A wet, sloshy sound, and I hate it. "Yeah, you like that, cocksucker. Now, faster." I grab him by the hip and increase the pace. I get lost in the actions, like nothing matters but his cock, the noise, and his eyes.

I don't know for how long I was in a trance, but I feel him tensing up, pulling me tight to him, and shooting a big load of his cum down my throat. Suddenly the gaze that had held me like a vice breaks and he looks at my face rather than into my eyes. The spell is broken. I'm kneeling in a parking lot with Jack Wilson's cock down my throat, and my nose nuzzled into his pubes. His eyes suddenly widen, and his face turns into horror, like he is looking at a monster. Everything is going like in slow motion. I begin to push him away, to get his disgusting cock out of my mouth as he shoots his second load. Somehow in shock I manage to breathe in his cum. He pulls away from me as well, and his third load ends up just next to me on the concrete. "Fuck!" he says, visibly upset. "It's still in the bloodstream. Spit it out! Spit it out!"

I'm not sure I even have any in my mouth to spit out. It just went straight into my belly and into my lungs. Lungs that are desperately trying to cough up his spunky goo in phlegm-filled, deep whoops. "Fuck!" he shouts one last time, pulls up his sweatpants, and runs towards the Stadium building with one hand holding the pants up. I'm just folded over on my knees coughing and coughing while my mind is racing to make sense of what just happened. My chest is burning and I feel nauseated. There is the salty, bitter taste of cum in my mouth and a stench of athlete sweat as I gasp for air in between the coughs. I keep coughing, but less and less of substance is coming up. I spit out specks of Jack's spunk on the concrete in front of me, and realize what she had meant when she said she couldn't help herself. Did he fuck her? After what just happened I wouldn't put anything past Jack, and there is literally nothing I wouldn't forgive her for having done. She would have been helpless to stop.

I can feel my whole body burning as I get up from the concrete. I'm very aware how my clothes rubs against my body, like my senses have just gone into overdrive. Everything, every single muscle in my body feels sore. My head is spinning. Still coughing I stagger towards my car and get in behind the wheels. As I close the door the world goes silent. I can only hear my own exhausted panting. I'm confused about what is happening and feel sick as shit, but at least the world isn't spinning anymore. Somehow I must have been poisoned. What did he mean with "in the bloodstream?"

I start the car and carefully drive from the parking lot and out in the direction of home. Perhaps I shouldn't be driving at all. Crashing while driving is worse than crashing while sitting in a parking lot, but I really don't want to have to call anyone for help. Not after what I've just been through. I so sympathize with the movie cliché of a girl sobbing in the shower. I only want to cleanse myself in any way possible. To get rid of Jack from me. Even now I can feel the smell of athletic sweat, like it was clinging on to me.

There is a big pop accompanied by one of the chest buttons on my shirt shooting off in the car. The pop isn't so much heard as felt, as a reverberation in my body like someone just punched me in the chest, with dull spikes of pain in the joints. I swerve dangerously close to the side of the road. It feels like my shoulders pops into their sockets, like my chest just suddenly expands and the rest of my body catches up. There is no mirror I can look in, but I can clearly see something is off just by looking down at my body. What little movement I can make while driving the car feels different.

There is another big shift. Knees and hip joints this time, I think. I'm a little more prepared to handle that one without swerving, but this time I'm instead missing the brake pedal like the seat is set wrong. I scoot forward on the seat and reach the pedal. Now I'm getting real nervous what is happening. I'm almost home though, but I can feel my thigh muscles involuntarily flexing, my feet are hurting, and my stomach is gurgling like bad plumbing.

Her car is not home yet, thank God. I park mine as calmly as I can, screaming inside that I need to get inside and see what the fuck is going on. As I step out of the car I get a first inkling about the enormity of the changes. I almost trip stepping out of the car, and sit down again on the edge of the seat. The fabric on the trousers are straining, and I realize that my feet are probably hurting because they have swollen up inside the shoes. I try to kick off one of the sneakers, but it's stuck enough that I have to untie them. My movements feel off. It's not that it is hard to move. The opposite in fact, but different somehow. Me feet thanks me in relief as they are freed,

With the shoes off I awkwardly make my way into the house and step into the nearest bathroom. It's me in the mirror, of course, but me 5-10 years younger. I'm touching my face in disbelief. But this isn't just me regressed a decade in time. I was way taller than this then. Curious I unbutton the remaining buttons on my shirt and throw it on the floor. The chest and abs are not me 5-10 years ago. I've never looked this buff before. For one I've never had washboard abs, and the pecs and shoulders are wide and meaty. The arms more slender, though still muscular, and the core is built more for function than aesthetics. A bit too dense for the show off V shape. Dense, with a low center of gravity.

It's the body of a hockey player.

I rip off the straining trousers and the socks. Sure enough, massive leg muscles, big thighs, big ass, big feet. Jack the fucking cheater is a fraud in all areas. Whatever the fuck he is taking must have concentrated in his balls, shot into my lungs, and from there gone straight into my bloodstream to do whatever the fuck it's done to me. And there is nothing I can do to hurt him with it. Who would believe me? This is so far from any science I've heard of.

I take a closer look in the mirror again. Perhaps it isn't all bad after all.

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willidleaway · 3 years

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OK, let’s talk about Deltarune Chapter 2. Right off the bat two things:

Toby Fox could have been charging 20 USD for this or asked people to pre-purchase the remaining chapters to play Chapter 2, and I’m frankly very surprised (if delighted) that he didn’t.

Soundtrack’s bopping. If you don’t feel like playing two free chapters of a game, which by themselves will give you nine hours of a brilliant time in an absolutely insane world filled with mad characters that all still manages to hold together somehow, I can still recommend giving the OST a listen and then a buy if you are so inclined.

And with that and the spoiler-free lead image out of the way, let’s actually (largely incoherently) talk about Deltarune Chapter 2 below the Read More line. Spoilers galore, including for a bonus enemy ...

OK, so this guy is still a card:

But some non-positive observations to begin with: the Castle Town is nice to look at but maybe a bit uninteresting for the moment, since it’s a completely separate Dark World from the main underworld of Chapter 2. It seems perhaps like a decent hub world for people who haven’t replayed the previous chapter and need some refreshers, especially with the dojo challenges. But some of the other mechanics associated with the Castle Town like recruiting, fusing items, and so forth are as yet unclear. But perhaps it hints at more interaction between chapters through the Castle Town.

And that’s all the non-positive observations I have about Deltarune Chapter 2. It’s not even a negative observation, just taking note of potential seeds being planted for the remainder of the game.

Now. Now now now now now.

I don’t know how Toby Fox manages to continue coming up with such a diverse array of antagonists all so ridiculous and insane in their own special way, but he continues to outdo himself. And not only is Queen insane but so is literally everything that happens in Cyber City and then in Queen’s Mansion, like the layers of truces across Queen and her quasi-willing peons:

and indeed, ye Triumphant Returne of Rouxls Kaard, absolute card:

But the madcap side of things doesn’t mean there isn’t real attention to fleshing out everything introduced in Chapter 1, in tandem on both the narrative side and the gameplay side. As far as the latter, we can (finally) get party members other than Kris to undertake at least basic standard non-magical actions on their own that don’t cost Tension Points, which is very much welcome. But at the same time managing TP well is even more important than before. A lot of careful grazing makes certain fights a great deal easier, in a way that I didn’t really notice for most of Chapter 1 (with the possible exception of Jevil, who I still haven’t successfully pacified). The attacks are correspondingly far denser and often don’t leave too much margin for error, but as someone with minimal hand-eye coordination I still had a reasonable time completing Chapter 2.

Well, except for one particular enemy.

oh god this fight used up every single recovery item I had

Spamton NEO is an interesting enemy, arguably more so than Jevil, and I’m not just saying that because I managed to spare Spamton but still haven’t had any success with Jevil. For one, finding the pieces of the key for Jevil’s cell is straightforward, whereas finding the Empty Disk for Spamton is itself a nightmarish dodge-fest. But more importantly, you actively have to seek Jevil out in Chapter 1, whereas your first encounter with Spamton is actually mandatory as part of the main story and then you optionally follow up on Spamton’s lead later to be able to face off against his NEO form.

Perhaps relevant to the forced nature of Spamton’s introduction is his relevance to Deltarune as a whole despite his bonus boss status. Compared to Jevil’s dialogue, Spamton’s babblings seem far more directly tied to the central themes of Deltarune around choice or agency, or rather a lack thereof (in stark contrast to Undertale’s general ethos). Jevil mostly just wants to wreak mischief and chaos; Spamton is fuelled by a need for freedom, to no longer be a puppet of ... something. And facing him in this way obviously clearly affects Kris, whose own free will is in real question ...

Oh yes, it seems now we’re really getting into the real core of Deltarune’s story, with all of the lore about the Roaring and more talk of the Knight leading up to this ending. But are Kris and the Knight one and the same? Or is Kris a puppet of the Knight? Or ... is it even the other way around? (No idea if that makes any sense but it sounds like a cool thing to throw out there.)

And another thing: this staticky smile ...

I would guess that’s Chapter 3′s boss once we actually go through this new Dark World, but why does this static remind me of the static you see behind Spamton’s glasses in some of his creepier shop dialogue? Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but there’s certainly an embarrassment of riches to over-analyse, even around Chapter 2′s bonus boss.

And I haven’t even talked about every other character being amazing. Susie of course continues to undergo really positive development, but Noelle seems to get the bulk of the attention honestly—we not only get her to finally interact with Susie, but we also learn more about her past as well her family, both about her lost sister (strongly implied to be named December) and her mother. The latter we get not only through more dialogue with her father Rudy but also in an implicit sense through her interactions with Queen, which may well mirror her fractious relationship with an overbearing mother.

Ralsei’s characterisation doesn’t try to expand as much, instead continuing to detail what’s already been planted throughout Chapter 1—his rule of the Castle Town, his awareness of the danger posed by the potential dark/light imbalance, and so forth—but nothing quite as revelatory as with Noelle. It doesn’t mean I can’t try my best to ship Kris with Ralsei though ...

Anyway, fluffy boys and mean girls aside, it’s also nice to see characters like Berdly—who seemed like a completely incidental one-note gag character in Chapter 1—get fleshed out with reasonably compelling (although obviously insane) motivation and backstory, and one wonders which other characters may get this sort of treatment in future.

Speaking of other characters as well, how cute and/or cool are all of the new enemies and enemy-adjacent characters???

Part of me suspects Tasque Manager in particular is actually carefully engineered to break the Internet. But my favourite is Swatch, who gives off weirdly Tuxedo Mask-esque vibes to me:

And an additional bit of speculation: I strongly suspect we’ll see some persistent things across the chapters that aren’t necessarily linear in progression. When I brought Spamton’s shadow crystal to Seam, they basically chided me for not having Jevil’s crystal (for god’s sake Seam it’s not for lack of trying), but then said this:

Is it possible that the game’s keeping track of certain global things outside of any of your individual saves, and some of these certain global things might not just have to do with optional bonuses ... ? Is it possible that some of these certain global things may enable cross-chapter nonlinear gameplay to accompany all of the other Castle Town mechanics introduced in Chapter 2?

Or do I just not want to replay all of Chapter 2 if I manage to pacify Jevil?

Time will tell. How much time?

Only time will tell on that front too, I guess.

Overall: Chapter 2 of Deltarune is another spectacular episode in Toby Fox fleshing out this unbelievable yet somehow credible world in his madcap way, and you can bet I will be watching for future chapters with great interest.

PS: I finished Chapter 2 of Deltarune to have a good time and I’m honestly feeling so attacked right now—

look expiration dates are important okay

#undertale #deltarune

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sapphixxx · 3 years

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I've been interested in gentrification and urban planning and economics for a long time, after living in Seattle and seeing how these things impact daily living. The progression of events is often understood as such:

In the beginning of the 20th century American cities had a diverse population, with cities hosting both white people and people of color, with a lot of segregation between neighborhoods.

Post WWII due to a large number of factors suburban development boomed, white people fled cities in droves, city tax revenue suffered, jobs disappeared, upkeep suffered, life in cities got worse, life in suburbs got better, segregation between these two was still high.

Due to a number of factors including rural and suburban jobs disappearing, college education becoming more common, rising tech industry jobs in cities, changing values, etc, younger generations of people who grew up in suburbs wanted to move into cities. Cities got an influx of white residents, cost of living increases to the point that many people of color who had lived there before are priced out and move to the suburbs.

This is typically where the story ends because it's where we currently stand, with a variety of interpretations about how this should be understood and what should be done about it. One thing I see often, though, is a sense that hey, gentrification sucks of course, but at least the suburbs have gotten more diverse and the services in both cities and suburbs have improved so it kind of sort of works out, right?

Well, I've been reading some stuff recently that makes it seem like we're hurtling towards a repeat of what happened with urban decay in the 20th century, except potentially even worse.

See, American suburbs are wildly hilariously inefficient, economically speaking. Having such a low density of housing in residential areas and low density of businesses in economic areas means that the suburbs bring in a pretty small revenue per mile. With long winding roads through neighborhoods and massive multi lane thoroughfares and highways punctuated by enormous parking lots, all connected by sprawling power and water lines, the latter of which also require tons of pumps and treatment plants, all of this area also requiring disproportionately expensive trash, fire, and police services to cover it all, means the maintenance cost of suburbs is ENORMOUS compared to the revenue they actually bring in. Many suburbs have survived up until now basically as a Ponzi scheme, where the city gets a lot of money from the government and from developers to build infrastructure which brings in money for a while, but once that infrastructure wears out and needs to be fixed or replaced there's nowhere near enough money to do so. So suburbs have just kept sprawling out and out to keep the money coming in, but it's just kicking the can down the road.

As well, the things that have been getting built--big box stores, huge parking lots, multi lane roads, are very difficult to repurpose into something more economically productive. Those winding suburban neighborhoods, too, are very hard to adapt because doing so would require building denser housing which will be lobbied against by homeowners, allowing multi use zoning in neighborhoods, which will be lobbied against, and making those roads more accessible by bus, bike, and on foot, which would likely require bulldozing some of those houses which will be lobbied against.

In our current climate this is often chalked up to purely a matter of cutting funding to unnecessary things like schools and libraries and street lights or raising taxes to account for the difference, but often times the upkeep costs are so large that doing these things will barely put a dent in them. It comes down to a fundamentally flawed model of city planning and funding. As cities become unable to pay for these things, increasingly the burden of debt is put on individual residents.

What all of this together means is that as people of color have been priced out of the cities and pushed into suburbs, those suburbs are reaching a straining point where pretty soon the roads and sewers and power lines and schools and so on that look fine now are going to expire. And with little revenue to fix them, the quality of life is going to tank. Which puts us right back to where we were in the post WWII boom except with the locations reversed: well off white people in the cities with nice services and jobs, people of color stuck in decaying suburbs with increasingly poor services and jobs prospects. Which is bad enough on its own, but cities are far more modular than suburbs in terms of development. With money flowing back into cities it's been pretty straightforward making them turn a high revenue. It is much harder to pull the same trick with suburbs.

#and this isn't even getting into how when poc are priced out of cities often times they find themselves in incredibly hostile suburbs #with white supremacist neighbors and so on #and the tight knit communities of color that may have existed in the city gets separated which can make it hard to find support #not to say those communities don't exist in the suburbs of course #i know north of Tacoma there's a large pacific islander community that my friends gf is part of #and where she teaches in mount lake terrace has a big population of Marshallese people #but it's often harder to find each other let alone find common spaces to host things and get together #for as much as this is a commonly recognized problem for the queer community it's really troubling they there's #so little recognition that this is true for any kind of minority group

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thefinalcinderella · 3 years

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Kaze ga Tsuyoku Fuiteiru Chapter 6 - The Sound of a Shouting Soul (Part 3)

Wanted to get this out a lot sooner but life got in the way

Full list of translations here

Translation Notes

1. So there’s like rankings for how much someone can hold their drink. Waku (which includes all of Chikusei-sou) are people who don’t get drunk no matter how much they drink. Zaru are people who only get a little bit drunk after drinking. Geko are people who can’t drink at all.

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They had to completely get rid of their summer fatigue and they had to rest their bodies gradually before the meet; they trained a lot during the fall, but they didn’t run as much as they did during the training camp. Even so, as expected, even Kakeru began to feel both physically and mentally tired.

It was from the pressure of thinking “What if we do all this and it doesn’t go well on the day of the meet and it ends up being all for nothing?”

Unlike the previous meets, the qualifiers were a one-round competition with no redos; if you didn’t get the time you wanted, you couldn’t just bet on the next one, and that tension weighed heavily on Kakeru’s mind and body.

The training regimen had become denser. Twenty kilometers was the norm for cross-country, and build-ups were introduced into track practice. For instance, if you ran seven thousand meters, you ran the first thousand meters at a pace of less than three minutes and ten seconds, and then worked your way up to two minutes and fifty seconds at the end.

As they ran long distances faster and faster, the pain was not negligible. The inability to breathe during the endurance runs and the violent palpitations of the heart after running as fast as you can assailed you at the same time. It was like playing water polo while drowning, and Prince and the others threw up many times. However, every time Kiyose would caution, “Endure as much as you can.”

“You’ll get into the habit of throwing up. Hold it in and run.”

“I can’t do it.”

“I’ll choke on my own vomit.”

Prince collapsed onto the grass next to the track, and the twins, who were trying to look after him, also threw up with him. It was a miserable situation.

However, sandwiching the proper amount of rest needed between training sessions, the residents of Chikusei-sou gradually became able to keep up with the build-ups and the twenty kilometer cross-country runs. They went to the Showa Memorial Park in Tachikawa, where the qualifiers would take place, and everyone did a trial run of the course.

One day, less than half a month before the qualifiers, Kiyose gathered everyone after they had finished a cross-country run. A chilly wind blew through the open field in the approaching sunset. The tips of the grass had lost their vigor, and there was no trace of summer left. The fruit on the swaying persimmon trees, which no one was picking, were the same color as the setting sun.

“It’s a battle of concentration from now until the qualifiers,” Kiyose said. “Focus and control yourselves so that you’ll be at your peak both physically and mentally on the day.”

“Well that’s easy to say.” Nico-chan sighed. The stress from the tension was giving him an unusually large appetite these days and he was having a hard time regulating himself.

“I feel like my delicate heart has already reached its peak.” King couldn’t help but get stomach cramps during training. “I wonder if I can last until the qualifiers.”

“Don’t be afraid.” Kiyose’s tone was calm, reassuring everyone. “You’ve all done more than enough training; all that’s left to do is use that pressure to hone yourselves. Envision yourself as a beautiful blade running in the qualifiers, and sharpen and polish it well.”

“What a poetic expression,” Yuki said.

“But I get it,” Prince said. “You don’t want to sharpen it too much or you’ll snap before the qualifiers, but if you keep it too dull, it will be useless if the blade still seems cloudy on the day of the competition. It’s something like that, right?”

“Exactly,” Kiyose nodded. “You can’t get there just by recklessly practicing; it’s a battle within yourself. I want you to listen closely to your mind and body, and sharpen yourselves carefully.”

I see, Kakeru thought. This might be one of the strengths that’s required for long-distance.

Long-distance didn’t require explosive power nor was it something that required extreme concentration during a competition to perform a technique—all you did was send forth your legs alternately and plainly moved forward. All you had to do was sustain the simple act of “running”, which most people had experienced, for a set distance. The stamina needed to sustain that was cultivated during daily training.

In spite of that, Kakeru had seen runners whose health broke down during or right before a competition many times: they ran well at first, but suddenly their pace was thrown into disorder; their bodies were in good shape, but three days before the race, their times during practice suddenly stalled; there were those that caught colds even though they were very careful, and ended up getting taken off the lineup on the day of the competition.

Kakeru couldn’t help but feel confused. Practice makes perfect. Why did people ruin themselves when all they had to do was run? Kakeru himself had gotten diarrhea at the last Inter-High he participated in. He hadn’t eaten anything cold or rotten, but his stomach suddenly took a bad turn. He was still able to run, so there were no problems, but he kept wondering, “Of all days, why did I get a stomach ache right before the race?”

He understood now. It was described as a “failure to adjust”. The reason for almost all of them was pressure; the anxiety of suddenly wondering “Is this enough?” no matter how much you trained; the fearful thought of “What if I still lose?” arising as soon as you were confident that it was enough. The more you sharpened your body and mind, the more fragile you became; you got colds and stomach pains more easily, like a precision instrument that breaks down abruptly from just a little bit of dust.

Honing yourself until you were sharp and smooth enough to overcome fear and anxiety and withstand any dust—that power was probably one aspect of the “strength” Kiyose talked about.

Kakeru understood all that, but there was still the question of whether or not he could put it into practice. The more serious you were about running, the less easily you were able to free yourself from pre-competition nerves, and confronting your own body and mind was a very lonely process. You always had to fight alone in the space between compromise and excess.

Kakeru eventually stopped thinking about everything. The more he thought about it, the more fear would arise, because he could only imagine bad things.

People were afraid of ghosts because they thought about and imagined them. Kakeru hated those sorts of ambiguous, vague things; he didn’t want to be bothered by the irritating dullness of “If I think it exists, it exists”, he wanted clarification on whether it was “there” or “not”. Just like being able to move forward if you simply moved your legs, one foot in front of the other.

Kakeru ran without thinking anything. He threw himself into training and repeated the act of “running” as he remembered it with his body. He didn’t know any other way to overcome pressure.

The other members of Chikusei-sou, unlike Kakeru, were inexperienced, so they hadn’t yet established a way to relieve tension. Some, like Kakeru, practiced harder and harder, some burned incense and slept, and some reread sports manga from beginning to end. Everyone was working hard to make their final adjustments for the qualifiers.

With two days to go before the qualifiers, Kakeru felt that his concentration was improving at a good pace.

Practice that day was light, as they shouldn’t be tired on the day of the competition. Of course, each person did their morning and evening jogs, but there was no real practice scheduled on the day before the qualifiers either. They had done everything they had to do, all that was left was relaxing their bodies while keeping an eye on their health while raising their fighting spirits and concentration.

“Let’s do one last finishing touch.”

At Jouji’s suggestion, everyone at Chikusei-sou decided to have a small drinking party two days before the qualifiers. For this group, drinking was the easiest way to relieve tension and solidify their bonds.

The landlord was invited as well, because he was more or less their coach, but there was a problem: the landlord had entrusted Kiyose with the money to fix the hole, but Kiyose had given that money to Shindou to put aside for the Hakone Ekiden; with the transportation and lodging costs, they never had enough money.

As the landlord stepped over the threshold of the front door, Jouta crossed in front of him while looking at the gravure page of a magazine. Distracted by the photo of a woman in a bathing suit, he took off his shoes without looking up at the ceiling and kept close to Jouta as they went upstairs. The tactic was a success. Kakeru and Jouji, watching the situation from the kitchen, gave each other a small high-five.

It was arranged for Prince to sit on top of the hole. You must not stand up as long as the landlord is here, not even if there’s an earthquake or you have to go to the bathroom. Given that strict order by Kiyose and Shindou, Prince obediently hid the hole while reading manga.

“Now, we would like a few words from our coach,” Kiyose said when the liquor was flowing well. The landlord, hugging a large bottle, got up unsteadily. Wondering if he might see him act like a coach for the first time, Kakeru looked forward to what he was going to say.

“It’s finally time for the qualifiers…let me tell you the secret to winning,” the landlord solemnly stated in his hoarse voice. “Move your left and right legs one after the other and go forward!”

The room fell completely silent. The landlord seemed to have sensed the overflowing disappointment and despair.

“…You do that, and you’ll reach your goal one day. That’s all!”

“’That’s all’?!” King roughly put down his cup.

“Is this person okay?” Yuki said.

“Can’t we get a coach who’s a little bit better?” Nico-chan said.

“Ah, my motivation has completely gone down now,” Jouta said.

Quiet unsatisfied voices filled the room. Kakeru hurriedly turned to Kiyose.

“Haiji-san, from the beginning, you believed that this team could definitely make it to Hakone. I thought it was more than impossible, but…why were you so confident?’

“Mm?” Kiyose looked up from his cup and smiled. “Because everyone can handle their liquor.”

“What?”

Everyone immediately stopped complaining about the landlord and now turned to look at Kiyose.

“There are many long-distance runners who can drink a lot. I guess it’s thanks to their internal metabolism. You guys have surpassed being heavy drinkers, you’re bottomless pits, aren’t you? (1) I’ve been observing your drinking habits for a long time and I thought, ‘This could work.’”

“There are plenty of heavy drinkers in the world.”

Shindou looked up at the sky as though to say “I can’t believe this.”

“You dragged people into this thing for that reason!?” Yuki’s voice cracked with anger. Kakeru groaned. He had wanted Kiyose to get everyone motivated again, but it had had the opposite effect.

“Did we really come all this way based only on how much we drink?” Prince, shocked, was about to get up, but Shindou restrained him with his eyes and he hurriedly sat back down. “That’s like building a skyscraper on top of mud with just willpower.”

“Of course that’s not the only reason,” Kiyose said, but his articulation was a bit odd. “I noticed the spark of talent that had been sleeping in all of you.”

“Haiji-san’s drunk,” Kakeru sighed.

“Aaah, isn’t there anything livelier to talk about?” King fell onto the tatami, looking up.

“By the way, how are things with Hanako-san?” Musa asked the twins.

“Hana-chan?”

“What do you mean by things? We get along well?”

The twins both answered innocently.

They don’t know. These guys really don’t know at all. Everyone else muttered to each other.

“By the way, you guys don’t have girlfriends, right?” Nico-chan, who had been nibbling on a piece of dried squid since earlier, said as though it had just occurred to him. “If you do, you’ll have to get them to cheer for us the day after tomorrow.”

It was rare to hear such a topic discussed at Chikusei-sou. Part of it was because their living spaces were so close, they were careful not to deliberately step into each other’s private lives, but it was also because they would all somehow know even without being told expressly.

However, for almost half a year, all of them had been busy training and weren’t able to keep track of each other’s love lives at all. Of course, no one had ever brought their girlfriend to their room before—their conversations and anything else could be overheard, after all.

The twins said, “We’re recruiting one!” in unison. If you’re recruiting, then you should be aware of the existence of applicants, Kakeru thought. King silently curled his back.

“What about you?” Yuki asked Nico-chan.

“I don’t have that kind of energy left right now,” Nico-chan scratched his stubbled chin.

“Same here,” Shindou hung his head. “I’ve been going all around negotiating with the supporters’ association and the school, so I’m afraid that she’ll run out of patience with me soon.”

“You’re dating someone?” Kakeru was surprised. He couldn’t quite connect the reserved and honest Shindou with the brilliance of love.

“Shindou-san has been in a relationship with a woman since he started school,” Musa explained. “It is hopeless for me. I cannot find anyone who will come to my hometown.”

You don’t have to suddenly go all the way there… Kakeru thought.

“Don’t you have a girlfriend, Kakeru?” Musa asked. Kakeru shook his head.

“I’m not popular, after all.”

“It does not seem that way, though.”

“Um, what about you, Prince-san?” He hurriedly shifted targets, but Prince’s eyes were still on his manga.

“I’m only interested in 2-D girls.”

Even though he was born with an idol-like face, it was like pearls before swine. Prince glanced at Kiyose.

“Leaving that aside, I sometimes hear rumors about Haiji-san in the literature department, you know? He looks like that, but there’s all kinds of…Ow!”

Crying out in pain slightly, Prince shut his mouth. A peanut flicked by Kiyose had hit him right between the eyebrows. There was no one brave enough to press Kiyose more than that.

Kiyose laughed slightly and asked, “What about Yuki?”

“I’ve got prospects, a good personality and my looks aren’t bad? Of course I have one,” Yuki answered calmly. King curled himself up more and more.

“Aren’t you going to ask me?” As the landlord was pouring shochu into his teacup right to the brim, a phone rang. It was Yuki’s. Excuse me, Yuki said and left the room.

“What, was that his girlfriend again?” Nico-chan said. Kakeru also noticed that Yuki’s phone had been ringing a lot these days.

“But Yuki has been looking somewhat somber recently, has he not?” Musa tilted his head in worry.

King seemed to have decided to drown his sorrows in alcohol. “There’s no ice,” he said, shaking the empty bowl. Kakeru, who was near the door, stood up and said, “I’ll go get some.”

He went downstairs and saw that the entrance’s sliding door was open, and that Yuki was outside on the phone. He could hear his voice slightly. It seemed like he was arguing about something, and although Kakeru was curious, he crept into the kitchen, concealing his footsteps so that he wouldn’t disturb him.

He transferred the ice into the bowl and refilled the fridge’s ice maker with water. Judging by the way everyone was drinking, it might not be ready in time. Kakeru turned the fridge’s temperature knob to “strong” and left the kitchen with the bowl.

The front door was still open. But there was no sound of talking. After some hesitation, Kakeru put on his sandals and peeked outside.

Yuki was squatting next to the door, looking up at the night sky.

“I made ice,” Kakeru called out to him softly. “Let’s go back and keep drinking with everyone.”

“‘Kay,” Yuki answered, but he made no attempt to stand up. He looked absentminded, his left hand gripping his phone.

“Did you get some kind of bad news?” Kakeru stepped over the threshold and squatted down next to Yuki while holding the bowl.

“No,” Yuki said. “My parents saw the news story and nagged me about showing up back home once in a while.”

“Where do you live?”

“Tokyo.”

If that’s the case, then it wouldn’t take much time to go back home, and there’s no need for him to lodge in a rundown apartment like Chikusei-sou in the first place. That reminds me, Yuki-senpai said he didn’t go back home for New Year’s, Kakeru recalled, and sensed that there were some circumstances behind it.

Insects were buzzing loudly in the grass of the yard.

“Kakeru, why aren’t you excited about getting interviewed?” Yuki asked.

“Umm,” Kakeru said. “I’m resented a lot. I think my parents and the guys from my high school team probably don’t want to see my face, so that’s why: I want to be as inconspicuous as possible.”

“You’ve been through a lot, I see. I thought you were just a track maniac,” Yuki’s words were biting, but he didn’t pry any deeper.

“Thanks to being a track maniac, I ended up having to keep secretly running away from interviews,” Kakeru laughed.

Noise suddenly erupted from the twins’ room. There were sounds of people running around and shouting something.

“What’s going on?” Kakeru and Yuki looked overhead and stood up.

The window facing the yard opened. “Yuki! Are you there!” Kiyose shouted.

“Yeah, what’s wrong?”

“Call an ambulance!” Kiyose recognized Kakeru and Yuki and waved his arms to hurry them. “The landlord’s throwing up blood!”

Kiyose got on the ambulance and accompanied the landlord to the hospital, and then finally returned to Chikusei-sou some time after the next day had already started.

The early to bed and early to rise routine was so ingrained in everyone that they couldn’t keep their eyes open, but they were all worried about the landlord’s condition, so they had stayed up and waited. Kiyose, surrounded by the residents at the entrance, gloomily told them the news with a tired expression.

“He’s got a stomach ulcer, so he’ll stay in hospital for a week. Apparently the reason is stress from extreme nervousness.”

“Stress!?” Jouji shouted hysterically. “Why was he stressed?”

“He was a carefree coach with no sense of responsibility though?” Jouta tilted his head. He definitely just drank too much, Kakeru thought.

“I also have a lot of questions about the reason, but…the landlord was probably worrying about us in his own way,” Kiyose rubbed his temple. “For that reason, the day after tomorrow—or rather, tomorrow—we will do the qualifiers without the coach there.”

“I don’t really mind, though.”

“It’s not like he’s ever there.”

The twins stated their candid thoughts, and Kakeru nodded.

“Didn’t you say we can count on him when we need it?” Kakeru muttered.

“I said ‘probably,’” Kiyose responded, and as though to say “good grief,” took off the hoodie he had on.

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#Kaze ga tsuyoku fuiteiru #kazetsuyo #kazetsuyo translations #run with the wind

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maydaymadier · 4 years

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Genasi Headcanons for Reasons™

Air genasi are deceptively light, they appear to have the same weight and density to them as any other humanoid but if you actually try to lift one it’s shockingly easy

Air genasi have a thin layer of wind that constantly courses over their body, the speed/turbulence of it fluctuates with emotional state (i.e. Ghibli Hair, air genasi just have Ghibli Hair)

Air genasi can feel when there’s a storm coming, the effect is more pronounced if there are going to be high winds/gale/potentially become a tornado, it makes them fidgety and restless

Air genasi and water genasi are frequently collaborators in various diving jobs since air genasi can hold their breath indefinitely and water genasi are amphibious

Air genasi are also sometimes seen collaborating with fire genasi to either empower their fire by feeding it oxygen or quickly snuffing it out if things get out of hand. Overall, in an adventuring party, air genasi are considered great support, if a party has a fire genasi, they likely also have an air genasi and vice versa

Earth genasi don’t appear to walk while barefoot, observers will claim that their feet become one with the earth to glide smoothly along the ground. The effect is considerably lessened by wearing shoes.

Earth genasi, in direct contrast to air genasi, are frequently far denser/heavier than they look though it’s not as extreme as their air cousins, the effect varying with what type of earth they appear to be. i.e. A sand-based earth genasi is the most common subtype with a similar density to other humanoids.

Earth genasi are said to not be ‘born’ in the typical sense, a majority of them claim to have simply emerged from the ground one day, while others claim to have been ‘grown’ like a plant in a garden. (How much of this is true and how much of it is in the same vein as ‘well you see, mr stork brings the baby’ is up for debate)

While exceedingly rare, there are claims that some earth genasi are marble statues brought to life by extreme fluctuations in planar energy, only the word of shocked sculptors and the presence of chiseled earth genasi support this claim.

Earth genasi are in high demand in mining endeavors, especially as part of rescue teams in the case of cave-ins and collapse, being unhindered by the terrain. Some claim that it’s because earth genasi can feel the presence of mineral veins but if this trait exists there’s no evidence, anecdotal or otherwise, to support the claim.

Fire genasi absorb heat, making the air immediately around them much warmer than the surroundings but their skin itself is actually cool to the touch

Fire genasi darkvision is in shades of red because of yellow-blue colorblindness

Fire genasi do have hearts however if you try to listen for a heartbeat, all you can hear is the crackling of a fire, this can make them a challenge to treat for anyone unfamiliar with this magical quirk of their biology. This has also led to the misconception that they have a core of fire in their chest that fuels them.

Fire genasi frequently wear sturdy gloves to keep from accidentally scorching their handprints onto surfaces, it’s more common among spellcasters since they’re already in tune with the magical energy around them and so it takes a lot less of their own elemental magic for them to heat up their skin enough to scorch.

Fire genasi skin is close enough to fire that they can use various salt compounds to make multicolored designs on their skin, the most common is plain salt for making orange patterns, though potassium (purple) and copper (green) salts are the most sought-out

Water genasis’ skin come in a dizzying amount of types, while some are constantly wet, others are ‘waterproofed’ water simply rolling right off them, fish scales are also common but less common is shark skin, some have shifting patterns like light reflecting off the surface of water

Water genasi blend in with water while fully submerged, becoming nearly impossible to distinguish where the person ends and the water begins when observing them from above

Water genasi gills vary in appearance along with what type of skin they have, the more fish-like in appearance the more pronounced the gills are, being actual anatomical structures. The genasi that are simply always moist or something to that effect are also amphibious but it seems to stem from an inherent magical effect, not anything to do with their anatomy

It’s rumored that some powerful water genasi (mostly high-level druids) can replenish themselves by floating in a river/lake/etc for a few hours in lieu of sleep

Water genasi can melt/freeze under extreme circumstances

#my post #tal plays dnd #dnd #dungeons and dragons #genasi #look genasi need more love #also i've just been writing abt my air genasi sorcerer a lot recently so it's on my mind #long post #headcanon

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starryknight09 · 3 years

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It’s cold in space

Febuwhump Day 19: sleep deprivation

Read on AO3.

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The stars shone brightly twinkling outside the windows of the Benatar. More stars than Peter could even imagine, some coalescing to form beautiful swirls that danced together, becoming denser and brighter in the center as they created galaxies so close it was like he could almost reach out and touch them. Great nebulas composed of luminescent dust and other bright orbs in shades of red and green and orange were scattered as far as the eye could see. Peter knew the colorful spots were planets. Other worlds, maybe some with alien life. Beings he had no idea even existed a month ago. And now he’d fought alongside some of them. Watched them die.

He shivered thinking about the disaster on Titan. The way the Guardians had faded away into nothing. Instead of falling into a downward spiral ruminating over it again, he focused on the engine humming beneath him, the only sound in the middle of the night as everyone else slept. Well, as Tony and Nebula slept. The only other two who had survived Titan. For a moment Peter had been worried he’d been about to turn to dust like the others, his spider sense screaming at him as he clung desperately to Mr. Stark, too afraid to care that he was acting like the kid he was. But it’d passed, and in the end, he’d been left standing stranded on an alien planet along with Mr. Stark. And Nebula. Thank god for her or he had no clue what they would’ve done. She’d led them to Quill’s ship and they’d started the journey back to Earth.

Any other time he would’ve been freaking out in excitement over being in space, but if Thanos hadn’t been enough to put a damper on the mood, then the whole limping home while slowly running out of food, water, and air thing had definitely done it. He brought his knees up to his chest and hugged them as another shiver ran through him. They’d been traveling for two weeks and no matter what they’d tried, they hadn’t been able to make the engines to go any faster. At the rate they were going, there was no way they’d make it home before the oxygen ran out. It put the constant pangs in his gut into perspective. It didn’t matter that he was slowly starving. He’d suffocate long before the lack of food killed him.

Mr. Stark had no idea Peter had worked it all out. That this entire trip was a doomed farce. Usually he’d be mad at his mentor for keeping something like this from him, but this time he understood. Mr. Stark still smiled and joked and acted like everything was fine. And Peter let him, because he didn’t want to talk about it either. Didn’t want to admit he knew, because admitting it would make it real, and then he’d have to face it. So for now, he just tried not to think about it even as the knowledge gnawed incessantly at the back of his mind.

Maybe it’d be for the best. If he died here, he’d never have to face the possibility that May might have been in the fifty percent of the population that’d been dusted. Then again, maybe she was alive, his mind always whispered traitorously. After all, there was an equal chance that she was still there, waiting for him. Whenever he imagined making it home, which had been happening less and less, he clung to that likelihood instead. It was a nice dream.

In the beginning he really had tried to hold onto the hope that maybe they’d make it. Maybe they’d somehow figure something out or someone would come save them. But as the days had passed, his hope had faded, along with the warmth in the cabin. He knew they weren’t going to make it home. At least he had the small comfort of knowing how he was going to die. Most people didn’t get that. And he had some time to come to terms with it. A lot of people didn’t get that either. And overall, running out of oxygen wasn’t such a bad way to go. It’d be relatively painless. Like falling asleep.

His teeth chattered. They’d siphoned as much power as possible from every possible system into the engines, including the environmental systems, which meant Peter had been absolutely miserable the past few days. He’d hidden it from Mr. Stark. It hadn’t been so bad during the day when he had things to do to distract him, but the nights were nearly unbearable. He’d tried layering Quill’s clothes that Nebula had given him and curling up under the threadbare quilt but it hadn’t helped. He’d spent the last couple nights miserable, shaking with cold and barely sleeping, drifting in and out. But tonight he couldn’t take it anymore, so he’d tiptoed out of his room to retreat to one of the chairs at the front of the ship. At least he couldn’t complain about the view. It was to die for. He snorted and let out short laugh. It really was.

“Care to share with the class what’s so funny?” Mr. Stark’s question broke the silence.

Peter jumped. He hadn’t heard the other man sneak up on him. He couldn’t remember the last time that had happened, and he didn’t think it was a good thing, but he didn’t have the energy to examine that train of thought much further.

“So?” Mr. Stark prompted.

Oh right. He wanted to know what Peter had found funny. Peter knew he should lie, but the lack of sleep had eroded his filter and he was tired, oh so tired, of silently carrying the burden of their fate alone.

“I was thinking the view’s to die for.” He gestured out at the stars. “Literally.” He smiled and let out another borderline hysterical laugh.

Mr. Stark’s face crumpled and Peter instantly regretted being so honest.

“Sorry.”

Mr. Stark sighed as he stepped forward to drop a hand on his shoulder. “So you know.”

“Of course I know.” He said. “You’re the one always saying how smart I am. You really didn’t think I’d figure it out?”

“I’d hoped you wouldn’t.” Mr. Stark said. “But you’re right. I should’ve known better.”

Peter sighed, staring out at the stars. “It doesn’t matter. Knowing doesn’t change anything.”

Mr. Stark hummed and followed his gaze out at the stars. “It is a hell of a view.”

“Yeah. I suppose there are worse places to die.” Peter whispered.

Mr. Stark’s head bent forward, looking as if the words had caused him physical pain. Maybe they had. The gash in his side still hadn’t healed, and although he wasn’t in any danger of dying from it, it wasn’t a minor wound.

“Don’t lose hope yet kid.” Mr. Stark squeezed his shoulder.

Peter looked up at him and frowned. He’d never considered his mentor an overly optimistic person.

“It’s not over until it’s over.” Mr. Stark continued. “I’ve been in my fair share of tight binds and somehow I always seem to come out on top.”

“Worse than this?” Peter arched an eyebrow at him.

Mr. Stark considered it for a few seconds before nodding. “Maybe not worse, but some just as bad. And here I am, still kicking.”

Peter gave him a wan smile. “That’s comforting.”

Mr. Stark nodded. “It is.”

Peter wished he could find some solace in his mentor’s words, but he couldn’t. Their situation seemed fairly hopeless unless some kind of miracle occurred, and after the luck he’d had in his life, Peter no longer put any stock in miracles.

“So, is that why you’re out here?” Mr. Stark asked when Peter didn’t pick up the conversation again. “The view?”

He shrugged. “I couldn’t sleep.”

“I know the beds aren’t the most comfortable but—”

“That’s not why.” Peter shook his head, although it was more than a little weird to be sleeping in a dead man’s bed.

“Ok, then what’s the deal?”

“It’s too cold.” He admitted.

Mr. Stark stared at him like he didn’t understand.

“After I got my powers, I noticed I was more sensitive to temperature.” He explained with a shrug. “I get cold or hot really easily compared to before. Ever since we diverted the environmental system’s power to the engines, I haven’t really been able to sleep.”

“That was three days ago.”

“Yeah.”

“And you’re just mentioning this now?”

“It’s not like it matters. You can’t do anything about it. The engines need all the power we can give them.”

“Kid.” Mr. Stark sighed, sounding put out. “We could’ve thought of something else.”

Peter scoffed. “Like what? I’m pretty sure I’ve thought of everything.” He gestured to all the layers of clothes he had on.

“Well I don’t think you have, because I have an idea.”

“Really?” Peter didn’t even care if Mr. Stark had a solution he hadn’t thought of. He just wanted to be able to sleep. Which in retrospect seemed silly since pretty soon he’d be dead and he’d get all the sleep he wanted. But he couldn’t help it. While still alive, his body craved rest.

“Really. Come on.” Mr. Stark gave his head a sideways jerk to indicate they should go. Peter uncurled from the chair and stood, allowing the other man to guide him back down the corridor toward their rooms, but instead of leading him back to Quill’s room, Mr. Stark led him to the room where he’d been staying.

Peter stopped up short just past the threshold, not understanding.

“Get in kid.” Mr. Stark said, pointing to the bed.

Peter tried to hide his disappointment but did as his mentor said. If Mr. Stark thought his bed was warmer than he owed it to him to at least try it even though he didn't think it would work. He realized the mistake of his assumption a second later when Mr. Stark crawled in the other side of the bed.

“Um what are you doing?” He asked with wide eyes. The bed wasn’t tiny, but it was smaller than a queen size. Two adults sharing would be more than a little crowded.

“Conserving body heat.” Mr. Stark explained as he rolled Peter over, wrapped his arms around him, and pulled the covers up over both of them.

Peter’s cheeks flushed. In the years he’d known Mr. Stark, they’d definitely gotten closer and he was almost starting to view him as a sort of father figure, but he had no idea what the man thought of him. Mr. Stark still avoided showing emotion or affection whenever possible, so this was definitely uncharted territory.

“Uh I didn’t think we were there yet.” He joked, trying desperately to dispel the extreme awkwardness that’d befallen him.

“Don’t make it weird.” Mr. Stark ordered.

“Ok.” He stared at the opposite wall wondering if it wouldn’t be lack of oxygen after all, but absolute mortification, that would kill him.

“Are you still cold?” Mr. Stark asked after a few long minutes had passed.

Surprisingly, he wasn’t. The incessant shivering had dissipated. It was the first time in days that he wasn’t freezing.

“Yeah.” He sighed in relief.

“Good.” Mr. Stark let out his own sigh and it tickled Peter’s hair. “Then go to sleep. And agree to never speak of this.”

“Right. Of course. Never.” He readily agreed before closing his eyes, and even though they were probably still going to die, he felt oddly safe at the moment, and that feeling combined with the fact that he was no longer uncomfortably cold, let sleep come easily.

#febuwhump2021 #febuwhump #Irondad

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haberdashing · 4 years

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Labyrinth

Statement of Avery Horner regarding her experiences with an unusual patch of forest in a local park.

on AO3

Statement of Avery Horner regarding her experiences with an unusual patch of forest within a local park. Original statement given February 6th, 2020. Recording by Artemis Lee, archival assistant for the Usher Foundation.

Statement begins.

Okay, before I get into what happened to me specifically, I should probably give you guys some background. I mean, you’ll probably dig up a lot of the same information eventually--I assume, anyway, I don’t really know a ton about how all this works--but I might as well save you the trouble, right?

So, this is about a park right by my house called Old Pines Park. You’ve got my address from the intake forms, shouldn’t be hard to find from there, it’s literally right down the street from me.

The first weird thing about the place is that there are no pine trees in Old Pines Park. As far as I know, there never have been. There aren’t too many pine trees in the surrounding area, either; just not the right climate for them, I think? Could be named after someone named Pines, I suppose, but the time I tried looking into it I didn’t find much, certainly not detailed information about some famous person from my boring suburban hometown with that surname. That’s just... what the park’s called, for whatever reason.

Also, despite the park being, like I said, right down the block from where I live, I don’t have much in the way of childhood memories associated with the place. There’s a fair few parks in the area, though, so maybe it’s just that all the other parks had bigger playgrounds or nicer scenery or more sports equipment or whatever. It’s not the biggest park around, and I wouldn’t be surprised if some people didn’t even know it was tucked away back there, just an old playground and a grassy field with a small, dirty pond in it.

And the woods.

That’s the main thing I want to talk about--the woods there. Calling it “the woods” is probably- no, definitely overstating things, but I’m not sure what else to call it. It’s on the edge of the field, just a somewhat-thin strip of land where the trees are much denser than elsewhere, to where you can’t see through to the other side.

When I was growing up, my mom always told me not to go in the woods there. She claimed they’d found a woman’s body there once, though I never really believed her. I looked it up not too long ago, though, and sure enough, there’s a news article from when I was a kid about a body being found in Old Pines Park. Didn’t say it was in the woods, but I believe it. Didn’t say what had happened to the body, either, or whose body it was. Just a brief blurb, “jogger finds body,” end of story, apparently.

Come to think of it, I’ve never seen anyone jogging in Old Pines Park, especially not in the woods--the landscape’s not exactly the most conducive to exercise--but the news article definitely said it was a jogger who’d found the body. Why’s it always seem to be joggers who find dead bodies like that?

Anyway.

I actually listened to my mom about not going in the woods for longer than you’d probably expect. I never had much of a rebellious teenager phase, and what little rebellion I did attempt didn’t involve the park just down the road. I think I went in the woods once with a friend when I was a kid, but I barely remember any of it, and I don’t think we went far. It wasn’t until after I’d gotten back from college that I decided to see what the woods had in store. (Yes, I live in the same house after college graduation that I did throughout my whole childhood. Not proud of it, but it is what it is, I guess.) I didn’t tell my mom what I was doing, didn’t tell anyone, just went out exploring by myself.

There’s a clear entrance to the woods on the end of the park closest to my house, an opening where the trees part and you can walk through without any difficulty. The ground dips down a bit where the rest of the park ends and the woods begin, and depending how much it’s rained sometimes there’s a bit of water there, but it’s not hard to get past.

I didn’t get very far the first time, though. Just a few feet from this entrance and the sometimes-stream beside it, there’s a chain link fence that blocks off part of the way--and more importantly, there’s a hole in that chain link fence that’s plenty big for a person to get through. On the other side of these strange, mysterious woods is... a strip mall. There’s a few fast food restaurants, a furniture store, a bunch of storefronts for sale. Nothing that exciting, really, except...

Okay, don’t laugh, but I’m really into Pokemon Go, even now. And that strip mall has a Pokestop in it--one of the places you go to get more items in the game. Dunno why, since there’s nothing that neat there, but it does. So for months I’d occasionally go through the woods just far enough to get through that hole in the fence, spin the Pokestop in the strip mall, and head back. I’m not exactly the most adventurous person out there, so even that was a bit of a thrill to me, especially knowing that it’d been forbidden back in my childhood.

At some point I noticed that the hole in the fence that let me cut through to the strip mall had changed--before it was just like a bit of fence had been torn out entirely, but now a metal bar around shoulder height was still in place, so I had to duck down when making my way through. Still plenty of space to get through, though, so it didn’t really bother me; it was just a bit odd, especially since I hadn’t seen any in-between stages where the fence got built up before being torn down again.

One day I was out walking my dog, Biscuit, and after I popped through the fence and back I decided to go further into the woods, see what I could find.

First off, I didn’t notice it so much when I was just ducking in and out, but while the area’s objectively pretty small, when you’re in the woods of Old Pines Park, it really feels like... well, like you’re in the middle of the woods. The foliage is dense, and there’s not too much to remind you of civilization besides that fence on the side and the occasional garbage wrapper.

Biscuit and I followed the fence along for a bit--I figured it’d be easy enough to find our way back with that as a landmark--and we found a decent-sized stream that must lead into the park’s pond, but where it comes from I’ve got no idea, since everything’s built up around here and there’s not much in the way of rivers. I vaguely remembered seeing the stream before, maybe that one time I went with a friend, but it was still an interesting sight. It didn’t look like some pristine bit of nature, though--the water was discolored, and the wrappers and similar debris I’d noticed before seemed to be clustered around the stream.

We kept going, and before too long I found a second hole in the chain link fence. This I definitely didn’t remember from my one foray into the woods in childhood. Looking through it, I saw a white building that looked pretty big, and kind of industrial? It was pretty nondescript, and I’ve forgotten most of the details of it by now, I just know it was big and white and I had no clue what it was or what could be inside, even though basic geography suggests it must only be a few blocks from my house at most. I thought about going through, but it looked like the sort of building where you could get in trouble for being on the premises without permission, and I wasn’t looking to get arrested for trespassing, so I just kept going.

I think this was about the time I checked my phone--I still had Pokemon Go open, I usually do whenever I leave the house, I’ve joked with my mom before about how convenient it is that I always have a GPS in my hand--and noticed that it wasn’t getting a signal. Specifically, the game still showed, but there were no features on the map, no Pokemon, nothing to indicate where I was. It didn’t say that it was having trouble with the GPS, though, it just... didn’t load the map at all.

The woods got thicker and denser as I moved on, and eventually there wasn’t much of a path left to follow alongside the fence as there had been. The only thing close to a path, inasmuch as I wouldn’t be attacked by tree branches if I followed it, led away from the fence and deeper into the woods. I figured what the hell, and I followed the sort-of-path further in, even though it took me away from the fence, from the one major landmark this place had.

I went kind of slow at first, but Biscuit kept pulling me along. She was loving it. Maybe she’d just gotten sick of taking the same path every walk and was glad for the chance to explore, smell new things, wander a bit. A few times I had to pull her back and remind her that while she could get through that tiny gap in the trees, I couldn’t, so we’d have to find another way around. (Biscuit’s a pretty small dog, so she’s good at fitting through narrow spaces like that.)

As I kept walking, the path, such as it was, got less and less clear, and I stopped seeing any garbage laying around, any signs that this place had been touched by human hands before. I had to do a fair bit of ducking and weaving to keep going without getting scratched up too badly, but Biscuit was so excited about the whole thing that I felt it was worth it.

Then the path went from hard to find to just straight up not there, and I went to turn around, and... I couldn’t see the fence behind me. I could swear we hadn’t gone that far--I didn’t think the woods were even spread out enough that we could go that far--but apparently we’d managed to leave the fence behind.

I did my best to backtrack, but it was slow going, especially since the “path” had never been an actual path with clear markings, just the way that was most devoid of trees that would slap me in the face. Also probably doesn’t help that I have a horrible sense of direction--that’s one reason I like having a GPS in my hand at all times, but the map on it still wasn’t working. Biscuit didn’t seem to get what I was trying to do but then, hey, that’s dogs for you, am I right?

I felt like I kept going in circles, like I wasn’t getting anywhere, and I still couldn’t see the fence, and I was succeeding less and less in my “don’t get scratched by stray tree branches” goal, and I had no idea where the entrance I’d gone through was from here, or the garbage-laden stream, or any other landmark I could use for guidance...

What I ended up doing was just letting Biscuit lead the way. I figure dogs have a good sense of smell, maybe their sense of direction is good too. She always seems to know which way to turn on our usual walks, too, so maybe this would be the same? At the very least, it couldn’t hurt... well, it could, but so could continuing to wander around aimlessly on my own devices. It sounds ridiculous, I imagine, but... I trust this dog, and I know she trusts me too, and I figured if I couldn’t get us back home, maybe she could.

And it worked. Not too long after I just did my best to give in to Biscuit’s pulling and let her be the guide, she led me in one direction, and sure enough, the fence reappeared, and I could see one of the holes in it in the distance.

You’d better believe we stayed right up against that fence for the rest of our trip in the woods, up until we stumbled back out of the entrance.

My phone buzzed right as we left the woods, and the map was back, everything displaying just fine. But as I looked at my phone more closely, I noticed the time on it was only three minutes after I’d decided to go further into the woods than I normally did. I don’t know how long I spent in there, but I am damn sure it was longer than three minutes.

Since then, I’ve gone back to only popping through to reach the strip mall, and even that I’m not doing as much as I used to... and last time I went to do that, the hole in the fence was different, with some metal wiring still in place near the foot of the hole as well as that metal bar. More importantly, though, there was a No Trespassing sign up. I don’t know how many other people know about the hole in the fence there, how many other locals have figured out that little trick, but I couldn’t help but think that sign was put there specifically for me. Still don’t feel like getting arrested for trespassing, so I just turned around and left, Pokestop be damned.

The sign only forbids crossing the fence into the strip mall, though. It doesn’t forbid walking deeper into the woods again.

And part of me wants to go back, to go even further into the woods. I want to see if I can find my way out the other end all by myself. There must be a way, right? I mean, that stretch of land only goes on for so long, it’s not that big of a park. I’ve been resisting the urge for a while now, but I keep thinking about it. I feel like it’s not a matter of if I’ll go back in the woods, it’s when.

I wouldn’t bring Biscuit along, though. Partly because I want to see how much I could do without her help and without her pulling me through gaps I can’t pass through, but partly because... if anything happens to me when I’m in there, if I end up like that woman whose body got found in there all those years ago, I want to make sure Biscuit doesn’t get in trouble with me.

It’s one thing to take risks like that for yourself, but I wouldn’t do that to someone I love. That’s going a step too far for me.

Statement ends.

#tma #tma fic #tma fanfic #the magnus archives #the magnus archives fic #the magnus archives fanfic #personal #my writing

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red-winters · 4 years

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The worldbuilding for Krypton in Man of Steel is amazing!!!

• They designed their own script and language for the film!

• Krypton’s background (which focuses on how the Kryptonians stripped their planet rather than the comic version where their sun swallows everything) is also fleshed out in the special features!

• The armor and hand held weapons are made of a bone like material! Everything from weapons, buildings, and tech is designed/shaped in a way inspired by organic and biological forms. The design of Krypton just before their destruction incorporated a more desolate and decaying aesthetic to symbolize the Kryptonian’s status as a dying race.

• Snyder called the tactile fluid metal Kryptonian tech uses for displays and defense “liquid geo.” The metal fluid is shaped by magnetic fields and examples include Jor-El and Lara’s bots, the history display Jor-El’s Artifical Consciousness brings up on the colony ship, and the defense system in the World Engine that fights Superman (though this is a more militarized version).

• You can see the remains of Joe-El’s other scientific experiments in the lab he launches Kal-El from.

• The armor Zod, Faora, and Jor-El wear in the beginning tend to be kept in the family/dynasties to be passed on to the next generation! Many Kryptonians “live in” their armor, like Zod. The skin tight body suit is very common, though Kryptonians layered clothes, robes, and armor on top of them.

• The cities are built into and under the rib-like caverns that are the remains of Krypton’s surface, a result of their reckless harvesting of their natural resources.

• Since a big part of Krypton’s culture is its warrior caste, even scientists like Jor-El share the same basic training as Dru-Zod. When you watch the hand-to-hand fight between them, you can note that they share a few simple moves.

• The High Council’s robes are made to look amazing, decadent, and old because they are from an older era of Krypton, passed down through the generations. Because they stripped their planet of natural resources, they lack ways to really maintain them or make more. As such, the robes and other heirlooms became infinitely more precious as the remnants of a grander and more plentiful Krypton. The costume department and director picked and created types of cloth that looked decadent and distinctly alien but whose texture ALSO mimicked decaying things when they made the council’s extravagant robes.

• The Kryptonians used technology similar to the World Engine to harvest their planetary core and “make Krypton denser.” The way the planet explodes in the film shows that it was, and I’m quoting the special features here, “a failed neutron Star.” The planet explodes a little but there is a “ghostly light” at the center of what used to be Krypton that freezes the debris in place after the explosion instead of pushing everything away to be scattered across space.

• The plasma guns Kryptonians use are, like previously stated, inspired by organic things. The inside of the barrel contains tiny “hairs” that help propel the plasma and a “jaw-like” cover at the front of the barrel that snaps open and closed and coats the escaping plasma in some sort of mucus that allows it to be used as a projectile. When it hits somebody, it disperses throughout the body, unlike a bullet (and I guess fries it?), and is generally a “very nasty” weapon.

• Kryptonian society around the time of Kal’s birth is a culturally ossified society. According to the special features, nothing really new has been created since they turned to isolationism and abandoned space exploration altogether.

• Space ships, even the older ones, are inspired by bugs according to the designers.

• Like Jor-El, Zod and his soldiers retrofitted the phantom drive tech to travel across space. It makes sense that the Kryptonians of Zod and Jor-El’s time didn’t really have long distance spacefaring capabilities due to Krypton’s isolationist status.

• Krypton, just before its destruction, had several remaining moons, with one destroyed.

• Kryptonians have a LONG tradition and history of writing. Culturally, they put emphasis on their mythology and history. They have several types of script: some symbols were ancient and reserved for ceremony, tied to specific phrases, ideas, and deities, some symbols could mean lots of different things, and some were used for spelling things phonetically. The glyhps representing the Houses are just some of the older ones. The scripts have a simplified form and a fancier script form—the symbol on Superman’s chest is the simplified symbol of the House of El. In the film, the Kryptonian script and phrases the filmmakers designed are inscribed on everything from armor, weapons, clothes, jewelry, the High Council’s chairs, council room, and the interior of their buildings—if you look closely, you can also see script inscribed on the walls of Jor-El’s lab/citadel with the symbol of the House of El amidst them.

• According to the linguist they brought on board and the producer, Kryptonian society during Jor-El’s time is a very “selfish” society. They built the language around that idea—the language shows a self-centered and possession-oriented approach to life—and so, Kryptonian sentences tend to follow the Subject-Object-Verb structure.

• The armor and tech Zod and his followers use following the destruction of Krypton are different from the ones they used during the attempted coup. They salvaged them from the failed Kryptonian colonies and outposts, which is why it looks less elegant and organic than their previous armor. It is more metallic than bone-like, showing the more mechanical leanings of Krypton during their Expansionist age 20,000 years ago. They’re also sightly bulkier as the armor also functions as environment suits instead of just being armor, which makes sense as the colonists were space-explorers and Zod and Co. lived on Krypton.

• The majority of Krypton’s natural flora and fauna have been wiped out due to their lack of natural resources.

• Jor-El, as Krypton’s foremost scientist, had more insight than most about just how dire their circumstances actually were.

* BONUS: After all the examples and info the special features cover about how Kryptonians dress, I must conclude that by Kryptonian standards, Kal-El’s Superman suit is hilariously casual and exposed but also, bafflingly, includes a cape. Almost, but perhaps not entirely, the equivalent of wearing your underclothes in public, and ONLY that, with a scarf or jacket on top, maybe? Jor-El, why did you dress your son like that. Why.

Oh. This puts the scene where Faora introduces herself to Kal-El after he surrenders himself in a slightly different context—did she think it was a show of humility? A “I come to you unarmed” gesture in a way Jor-El strikingly didn’t in his last appearance? Hmmm...

Also, the Zod/Superman fight at the end. I think this makes it slightly funnier, too.

Can you imagine what the other Kryptonians (that hadn’t lived with Zod for the last 30+ years scavenging for resources) would have thought about the Superman suit and Kal wearing it everywhere to save people? He’s representing an entire culture in his underclothes. Can you imagine what EARTH would think if they ever found out the two aliens who fought it out and destroyed multiple buildings in Metropolis were basically having a brawl dressed in their underclothes. Can you.

#man of steel #worldbuilding #krypton

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fly-pow-bye · 4 years

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DuckTales 2017 - “Double-O-Duck in You Only Crash Twice!”

Story by: Francisco Angones, Madison Bateman, Colleen Evanson, Christian Magalhaes, Bob Snow

Written by: Christian Magalhaes

Storyboard by: Sam King, Kathryn Marusik, Rachel Paek, Stephan Park

Directed by: Jason Zurek

"My name is Pad. Launchpad. McQuack. My name is Launchpad McQuack."

The episode seemingly begins in medias res, as Launchpad is infiltrating a casino. He has on some spy glasses, as he has become Double-O-Duck, super spy. He gets a call from Dew-ble-O-Duck, because Dewey Duck cannot even function if he doesn't choose an alias without the word "dew" in it, letting him know the secret code he needs to tell Enemy Agent Red Feather.

Dew-ble-O-Duck: Pastrami on rye, hold the mustard!

Double-O-Duck: Mmmm, yummy!

We can tell already that Launchpad is more Maxwell Smart than James Bond. Would anyone be surprised if he wasn’t?

As Dew-ble-O-Duck, also wearing cool glasses, distracts everyone in the room with a song fitting for this James Bond parody, Launchpad, even with his lack of any kind of intellect, manages to spot Agent Red Feather. She literally has red feathers. Unfortunately, he didn't exactly remember what tasty item he was supposed to use as a secret code.

Red Feather: Can I help you?

Launchpad: Ham and cheese!

Alas, Enemy Agent Red Feather is not exactly a fan of that smart refrigerator scene from Duncanville. She gasses Double-O-Duck before Launchpad could suggest chocolate pudding or french fries, giving a one-liner about how the kitchen is closed. It's like one of those Sierra adventure games, though they end up referencing something more modern.

YOU DIED

Yes, like Dark Souls, though they use a generic retro game losing a life sound. Even when shows involve video games with cutting edge technology, parents might not get that it's a video game if it isn't bleep bloop bleep bloop.

The entire last scene was just a new and sophisticated augmented reality game at Funso's Fun Zone: Double-O-Duck, a reference to a DuckTales '87 episode where Launchpad had to impersonate a super spy that happened to look just like him. It's a neat reference; the game even features OddDuck, the villain of the week of that episode, as an enemy.

Webby and Scrooge are at Funso's as well, though Scrooge does not appear to be interested in anything around him, never mind a room with a fake adventure in it. In an attempt to borrow money from Scrooge, Dewey tries to convince him that the game is cool, because one could use the power of virtual reality to go on an amazing adventure.

Scrooge's expression says it all; he doesn't even need to say anything to that.

Needless to say, Dewey only has one more chance to beat that Casino Royale, as that chance will be the last his allowance could afford. He also knows that he can only play this with Launchpad, because "they're a team"! Launchpad reluctantly agrees, using the famous last words of anyone before something goes terribly wrong: "what could possibly go wrong?" We then zoom into the ball pit, where we find a hidden base owned by F.O.W.L.

Yes, this is the beginning of this season's F.O.W.L. plotline that was teased at the end of Season 2. DuckTales 2017's version of Darkwing Duck's rogues' gallery is led by Bradford Buzzard, originally of Scrooge's Board of Directors before he decided to call it quits after Louie used their funding to bring back his favorite TV show. It's a long and, to be honest, kind of eh story. Now, he leads many of the villains that appeared in previous episodes, and he has made a new base.

Alongside the also named after her feather color Black Heron is Steelbeak, who comments that he wanted the base built on a sattel-lighthouse to nobody's approval. This continues the trend of James Bond references, as he is the Jaws parody from Darkwing Duck. Steelbeak is not exactly the brightest bulb at F.O.W.L., but he is completely confident and gets really offended at the accusation that he is stupid. From what I've heard, he wasn't meant to be any denser than the other villains in the original Darkwing Duck, but for the sake of giving Launchpad an evil counterpart, it works well with this plot.

Black Heron is taking the Gyro Gearloose role here, as she is working on the Intelliray, powered by a diamond from the F.O.W.L. archives. With a little more work, this ray can be used to make Scrooge dumber than the dummies! Honestly one doesn't even need any kind of ray for that to happen; seems like all you need to do is steal a couple coins from him for that.

How would she know this ray even works? Simple, she used it on a lab rat.

Not just any lab rat, either, but they turn this ordinary rat into this rather intelligent rodent that is more anthropomorphic. In fact, one may recognize this rodent from a different show from the Disney Afternoon. There's a funny story about this, actually.

Of course, this is the opposite effect of what Black Heron wanted, and she needs to work on the ray some more to make the Intelliray that makes dumb rats smart make smart ducks dumb. Steelbeak doesn't seem to get any of this, and is way more focused on how that rat managed to make clothing for herself. That's actually not a bad question, though not one relevant to the situation. There's a lot of interactions with the bright heron and the not-too-bright rooster, and it builds throughout the episode.

In order for any of those evil plans to happen, they need to get Scrooge and his family out of Funso's. It doesn't seem like it really matters, as nobody, not even the adventurer of adventurers, suspects that this place they're under is suspicious, but that was the Buzzard's orders. Bradford Buzzard may not be a bright bulb either; in the very first episode, he wanted to turn off the magical barrier that kept the Bombie from continuing his unending journey to kill his boss...actually, that makes a lot of sense now. Black Heron orders Steelbeak to get the Scrooge family out without Scrooge getting suspicious about this new conspiracy against him.

That won't be too difficult, as Scrooge has different plans than trying to figure out if there's a conspiracy against him. There's a B plot about Scrooge getting convinced to go into the arcade section and getting addicted to Skee-Ball. Webby even calls it Skee-Ball, which is a trademarked term for the rolling ball game, even though the game itself calls it "Prospector Pete's Goldrush Bonanza!" They could have avoided any trademark issues, but they went with the brand name anyway. Well, if Disney could pay for DJ Khaled, anything is possible.

Again, this is a B-plot where there isn't that much to it, though I can't say I wasn't entertained by Scrooge taking this Gold Rush as an adventure and treating the tickets it spits out as actual gold. There is also a point to this: he becomes so addicted, that, say, if a kid and a bumbling idiot get kidnapped by a group with a vast conspiracy against Clan McDuck, he wouldn't know because his quest for tickets is the only thing on his mind.

Totally not speaking of which, Dewey and Launchpad play their last game of Double-O-Duck, and they do manage to get past the "secret code" part by the way of Dewey taking over for him. They get to the "win the card game" part, except the usual opponent has been replaced by some special boss. At least, that's what they assume. He's also wearing the glasses, but neither of them take that as a clue that this person may be a not-so-fellow player.

They have to play a game of baccarat chemin de fer, and Launchpad pretends to know what any of those words mean. The good news for him is that it was gibberish to Steelbeak, too. as both of them end up just saying random card terms while slamming the cards down, convincing each other that they got the upper hand. This all ends up leading to Steelbeak changing the game to 52 Teeth Pickup. That, of course, means a fight scene.

During this fight scene, we get a shot of what is happening in the real world, where we see the carnage this unscripted fight scene is causing. Why are there little kids in the middle of the AR room, clearly not playing the game judging by their lack of glasses? We see a little bit of this earlier, too, where Dewey takes off his glasses to reveal that one of the characters was just the Funso's mascot standing in the middle of the room. There is at least one enemy to fight in the game even if it was played as intended; I can imagine someone accidentally walloping a real person while fighting the fake one. Maybe I shouldn't think about this too hard.

If I were to nitpick some more, one of the hits randomly has a hit flash, even though there's none in the other punches. There was nothing different about that hit; I could understand using a hit flash if Steelbeak actually hit someone with his namesake, but it was just another punch. Was the censors just not happy with that particular one, but the other punches were okay?

The fight does go outside the AR room, leading them to the restaurant area where confused onlookers are looking at these weird glasses-wearing people fight as if they were special agents. I do like this shot where we see Steelbeak punch Dew-ble-O-Duck and Double-O-Duck out of a window in the AR world, and then it cuts to the real world, where the pool this lead to was actually the ball pit. The same ball pit they zoomed into to reveal the new F.O.W.L. Lair, in fact!

When Double-O-Duck and Dew...alright, I'm getting tired of calling them that already even if that's the roles they were given. When Launchpad and Dewey wake up, they're locked in a glass cell. That could mean only one thing: they finally beat the casino level! This leads to an interesting dynamic: they think they're still in a video game, despite being in the very real F.O.W.L. lair. This is good for the plot, as we'll soon see.

Meanwhile, we see that Black Heron managed to get the ray to work as it should, making the minions so dumb, they think a generic puzzle cube, they didn't want to tread on Mr. Rubik's toes even if Bay Tek was fine, is food. I mention this because it's a running gag.

Back to the cells, we see that all the other smartened up lab animals, including that rat from before, another much larger rat, a housefly, and two chipmunks, decide to help this large duck out of this situation. Alright, I'll drop the act: these are the Rescue Rangers. They're not named, but they're the Rescue Rangers; they're even constantly followed by an instrumental of their theme song.

There is an interesting behind-the-scenes story here: alongside the mascot of the biggest entertainment corporation in the world, the Rescue Rangers were supposed to be off-limits to DuckTales 2017 for various reasons. They were originally just going to have the small Gadget reference, referring to her only as "the intelligent rodent", but they kept building and building it to the point where the rest of the Rescue Rangers made it in, too. Once the executives caught on to the scheme, they decided to just allow it.

What possibly helps this is that we never focus on them. For starters, we never get to hear them talk. The audience always sees their scenes from the duck's point of view, and, in the rules of the Rescue Rangers, humans, or ducks in this case, can't communicate with rodents even if they are smart. This is not to say they never do anything major in the plot; it's thanks to them that that all important "cell release" button was pushed, freeing Launchpad and Dewey and getting them to "the next level". Dewey does seem to think that Launchpad came up with the solution to teach a mouse to fly a plane, and Launchpad just goes with it. It may not be out of malice, it's probably just because he's Launchpad.

That next level? Find the secret weapon!

Those wielders of the secret weapon are not exactly in good terms with each other at this point. Black Heron isn't too happy that Steelbeak interpreted getting rid of Scrooge's family is to get two of his family members and lock them up right in F.O.W.L.'s headquarters. This is because Black Heron knows that this is a perfect way to lead Scrooge McDuck right to them, as Scrooge would eventually figure out they're missing and figure out exactly where they went. She is that genre savvy.

Not savvy to anything is Steelbeak, and after Black Heron decides to insult him again and again for his mistake, he finally has enough and snatches the Intelliray right out of her hands, and shoots her with it. That takes out Black Heron out of the whole episode, actually, as the most that happens with her after this is that, when Dewey and Launchpad get to the room she's in, Dewey rightfully assumes the bad guy who is trying to figure out how her robot arm works is way too easy for the mission right after the moon logic puzzle of teaching rats to fly planes. How unbalanced!

Enter Steelbeak and his army of generic puzzle cube-gnawers, armed with the Intelliray and a bunch of one-liners that Dewey wants him to skip. I debated with myself on whether or not him not saying "where's the 'skip dialogue' button" was a missed opportunity or not. Another small fight happens, this time with no random hit flashes. With one hit, Steelbeak drops the Intelliray to the ground.

He then picks it up and attempts to shoot Dewey with it, Launchpad getting in the way with the classic "take the bullet for him" trope. Dewey does the "big no" trope, only to tell him that this must have been his last life. Wait, there were no lives before, the video game seemed to be "you died, game over" in the first scene. Dewey can't be consistent with what video game he was playing!

But wait, if all hope is lost, why is the ray blue? Well, it appears that Steelbeak forgot to check if that gun was set to "make smart rat dumb", or "make dumb rat braindead" in this case. Instead, we get a James Bond reference I actually recognize.

(special thanks to martosi231234 for this GIF)

Okay, maybe I should have made this a GIF; they totally do the James Bond intro parody here, complete with a maybe too obvious parody of the "dah dah" part of the James Bond theme. No shooting the screen, though; TV-Y7 does have its limits.

Inner Double-O-Duck: I'll take it from here, chum.

This inner Double-O-Duck shows up a couple times, mostly acting as his new intelligent guardian angel. Dressing up as one of the minions, thanks to knocking one out earlier, he sneaks into a large computer room and deals with the minions by telling them to go to Sector 13. They don't know what that means, but with his newfound intellect, Launchpad persuades them to go there anyway.

It's here where Launchpad finds out everything about the newly revived Fiendish Organization for World Larceny's conspiracy against Mr. McD. It's also here that he finds out that Steelbeak kidnapped poor Dewford, trapping him with rope and boating him across town. Since Dewey isn't a superhero, there's no way he can just get out of the rope. Well, maybe not every superhero can get out of the rope. Oh, and yes, Intelligent Launchpad always calls Dewey Dewford, but Scrooge is still Mr. McD. That nickname is that ingrained in him.

Most importantly, he finds out he's no longer in a video game...actually, I am not sure when that was supposed to happen. We know it does happen because it comes up later in the episode. A little before this point, I was almost expecting a rather disappointing ending where it was revealed this whole episode was just the video game, but this scene proves that can't happen because the game wouldn't known about the F.O.W.L. plan.

The boat chase is on. While the new far-more-intelligent Double-O-Duck chases the bad guy, he also tries to call Mr. McD and tell him all about what he learned, potentially progressing the plot arc much too early.

Unfortunately for Launchpad and indirectly himself, Scrooge is busy counting the tickets. I can imagine not wanting to trust the ticket counters. He also questions why he can't just keep the tickets and presumably have a giant ticket bin to swim in, and Webby convinces him that the tickets expire at the end of the day. The cashier attempts to explain that isn't the case, and Webby holds up a pizza tray and shushes him. There's some really good expressions in this episode.

After Launchpad tries to let Dewey know this isn't a game, to no avail due to the loud boats, and a pretty action packed chase scene where, fitting for Launchpad, he crashes his boat and, not so fitting for the usual Launchpad, makes a makeshift water skii out of two of the boat's boards and a grappling hook, unfortunately failing to get to him, Steelbeak makes it to his destination: the sattel-lighthouse. See, everything is connected; he even got to go to his dream lair!

This reveals his ultimate plan: turning the sattel-lighthouse into a giant Intelliray, and this time, he did know to check the dial to make all of the rats and other animals in Duckberg as dumb as he is. Launchpad tries to convince Steelbeak to reconsider this plan, as this would make Duckburg so dumb that they would forget to breathe, but...

Steelbeak: That fancy speak won't work on me, Dummie-O-Duck! Hah, classic.

He makes his own fistbump jokes, he's a villain I'd love to hate. How does he get out of this situation? Well, I'll give a giant hint on that: after Launchpad gets saved, he says this.

Launchpad: Thanks for the...

(3 seconds later)

...rescue.

They might as well have put it in giant text, put fireworks around it, and have a choir sing the word "rescue". Good thing this isn't a Cartoon Network reboot. As forced as that scene was, it's still an amazing scene.

I will spoil this, though: before that previous scene happened, he did manage to activate the Intellisatellite, and it's almost about to fire. Anyone could guess that Launchpad's newfound intellect is not going to survive past this episode, and him getting in the way of a giant endumbening laser is the way to do it. And yes, I know endumbening is not a word, but I bet Steelbeak didn't know that. As the song from the first scene plays again, this time showing that it had way more meaning than it did before, Launchpad questions if this is the way to go.

Launchpad: But I can't sacrifice my intelligence! There's so much more I can accomplish! Stop the evil conspiracy out to get us! Solve world hunger! Land a plane!

Oh, his intellect is definitely not going to survive. Also, there's a more personal reason for his questioning, and it was a theme throughout the episode: Launchpad wants Dewey to see him as a competent person to look up to, and, unlike Steelbeak, he usually doesn't have the confidence that this newfound intellect gave him. This makes this a rather heartfelt scene.

Somehow, they get back to the arcade with Dewey still thinking this was the game. There is no explanation for this whatsoever, and even Launchpad questions if it was a game...wait, is this actually that "it was all a game" ending I didn't want? What happened? Why are they here now? How are they here now? What happened to Black Heron? Eh, maybe I should take Dewey's words, from a previous scene, into account.

Dewey: Why are you overthinking this?!

I will say Dewey believing this was all a video game does at least give us a high stakes F.O.W.L. plot without advancing the arc too far this early in the season. Not even Launchpad could do that, as, in the end, Launchpad is back to his old self. He completely forgot about everything he saw, so he couldn't warn Mr. McD about all the misfortune that's going to happen. I will say that I am glad to see that there is a slight hint that the events of this episode did happen, as they do return to that puzzle cube running gag. A running gag that, while not having a real payoff, does have a point to it, how wonderful!

Oh, and as for Scrooge McDuck, with all of those tickets...he only managed to get a very, very small prize. Pretty accurate to the world of redemption games, I'm afraid to say. Don't want to anger that certain powerful rat.

How does it stack up?

The AR glasses do lead to some plot holes, and a lot of the episode relies on references, but none of that ruins the episode. Even the vague ending works in the episode's favor. Hell, maybe it will be explained in the future; this is the kind of show where I can expect that. Maybe not.

With great spy action, some great one-liners, a good villain, and some fantastic cameos from a fellow Disney Afternoon staple, this is another fantastic episode.

Next, suspicious mermaids!

← Quack Pack! 🦆 The Lost Harp of Mervana! →

#fpb dt 2017 #ducktales 2017 #ducktales #disney #fpb reviews

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spacetimewithstuartgary · 4 years

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HOW GALAXIES DIE: NEW INSIGHTS INTO THE QUENCHING OF STAR FORMATION ** A simple model explains a wide range of observations by describing the contest between galaxy halos and their central black holes that eventually turns off star formation. ** Astronomers studying galaxy evolution have long struggled to understand what causes star formation to shut down in massive galaxies. Although many theories have been proposed to explain this process, known as “quenching,” there is still no consensus on a satisfactory model. Now, an international team led by Sandra Faber, professor emerita of astronomy and astrophysics at UC Santa Cruz, has proposed a new model that successfully explains a wide range of observations about galaxy structure, supermassive black holes, and the quenching of star formation. The researchers presented their findings in a paper published July 1 in the Astrophysical Journal. The model supports one of the leading ideas about quenching which attributes it to black hole “feedback,” the energy released into a galaxy and its surroundings from a central supermassive black hole as matter falls into the black hole and feeds its growth. This energetic feedback heats, ejects, or otherwise disrupts the galaxy’s gas supply, preventing the infall of gas from the galaxy’s halo to feed star formation. “The idea is that in star-forming galaxies, the central black hole is like a parasite that ultimately grows and kills the host,” Faber explained. “That’s been said before, but we haven’t had clear rules to say when a black hole is big enough to shut down star formation in its host galaxy, and now we have quantitative rules that actually work to explain our observations.” The basic idea involves the relationship between the mass of the stars in a galaxy (stellar mass), how spread out those stars are (the galaxy’s radius), and the mass of the central black hole. For star-forming galaxies with a given stellar mass, the density of stars in the center of the galaxy correlates with the radius of the galaxy so that galaxies with bigger radii have lower central stellar densities. Assuming that the mass of the central black hole scales with the central stellar density, star-forming galaxies with larger radii (at a given stellar mass) will have lower black-hole masses. What that means, Faber explained, is that larger galaxies (those with larger radii for a given stellar mass) have to evolve further and build up a higher stellar mass before their central black holes can grow large enough to quench star formation. Thus, small-radius galaxies quench at lower masses than large-radius galaxies. “That is the new insight, that if galaxies with large radii have smaller black holes at a given stellar mass, and if black hole feedback is important for quenching, then large-radius galaxies have to evolve further,” she said. “If you put together all these assumptions, amazingly, you can reproduce a large number of observed trends in the structural properties of galaxies.” This explains, for example, why more massive quenched galaxies have higher central stellar densities, larger radii, and larger central black holes. Based on this model, the researchers concluded that quenching begins when the total energy emitted from the black hole is approximately four times the gravitational binding energy of the gas in the galactic halo. The binding energy refers to the gravitational force that holds the gas within the halo of dark matter enveloping the galaxy. Quenching is complete when the total energy emitted from the black hole is twenty times the binding energy of the gas in the galactic halo. Faber emphasized that the model does not yet explain in detail the physical mechanisms involved in the quenching of star formation. “The key physical processes that this simple theory evokes are not yet understood,” she said. “The virtue of this, though, is that having simple rules for each step in the process challenges theorists to come up with physical mechanisms that explain each step.” Astronomers are accustomed to thinking in terms of diagrams that plot the relations between different properties of galaxies and show how they change over time. These diagrams reveal the dramatic differences in structure between star-forming and quenched galaxies and the sharp boundaries between them. Because star formation emits a lot of light at the blue end of the color spectrum, astronomers refer to “blue” star-forming galaxies, “red” quiescent galaxies, and the “green valley” as the transition between them. Which stage a galaxy is in is revealed by its star formation rate. One of the study’s conclusions is that the growth rate of black holes must change as galaxies evolve from one stage to the next. The observational evidence suggests that most of the black hole growth occurs in the green valley when galaxies are beginning to quench. “The black hole seems to be unleashed just as star formation slows down,” Faber said. “This was a revelation, because it explains why black hole masses in star-forming galaxies follow one scaling law, while black holes in quenched galaxies follow another scaling law. That makes sense if black hole mass grows rapidly while in the green valley.” Faber and her collaborators have been discussing these issues for many years. Since 2010, Faber has co-led a major Hubble Space Telescope galaxy survey program (CANDELS, the Cosmic Assembly Near-infrared Deep Extragalactic Legacy Survey), which produced the data used in this study. In analyzing the CANDELS data, she has worked closely with a team led by Joel Primack, UCSC professor emeritus of physics, which developed the Bolshoi cosmological simulation of the evolution of the dark matter halos in which galaxies form. These halos provide the scaffolding on which the theory builds the early star-forming phase of galaxy evolution before quenching. The central ideas in the paper emerged from analyses of CANDELS data and first struck Faber about four years ago. “It suddenly leaped out at me, and I realized if we put all these things together -- if galaxies had a simple trajectory in radius versus mass, and if black hole energy needs to overcome halo binding energy -- it can explain all these slanted boundaries in the structural diagrams of galaxies,” she said. At the time, Faber was making frequent trips to China, where she has been involved in research collaborations and other activities. She was a visiting professor at Shanghai Normal University, where she met first author Zhu Chen. Chen came to UC Santa Cruz in 2017 as a visiting researcher and began working with Faber to develop these ideas about galaxy quenching. “She is mathematically very good, better than me, and she did all of the calculations for this paper,” Faber said. Faber also credited her longtime collaborator David Koo, UCSC professor emeritus of astronomy and astrophysics, for first focusing attention on the central densities of galaxies as a key to the growth of central black holes. Among the puzzles explained by this new model is a striking difference between our Milky Way galaxy and its very similar neighbor Andromeda. “The Milky Way and Andromeda have almost the same stellar mass, but Andromeda’s black hole is almost 50 times bigger than the Milky Way’s,” Faber said. “The idea that black holes grow a lot in the green valley goes a long way toward explaining this mystery. The Milky Way is just entering the green valley and its black hole is still small, whereas Andromeda is just exiting so its black hole has grown much bigger, and it is also more quenched than the Milky Way.” IMAGE....A new theory explains how black holes grow as a function of galaxy mass and eventually quench star formation in their host galaxies. The images on this graph, taken by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, are of nearby galaxies at the present era chosen to represent galaxy evolution. The graph shows how the evolution of small, dense galaxies differs from that of larger, more diffuse galaxies. The denser galaxies have larger black holes for their mass and therefore quench sooner, at a lower mass, whereas the more diffuse galaxies have smaller black holes for their mass and must grow more before quenching occurs. (Credit: Sandra Faber/Sofia Quiros/SDSS)

#space #science #Astronomy #physics #news #galactic evolution

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let-it-raines · 5 years

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Rising from the Ashes (18/21)

When her husband died, Emma wasn’t sure that she could ever move on. He left her with a broken heart and a baby who was only three-months old. It’s enough to take most people down, to make them not want to keep going, but Emma Swan isn’t most people. She’s stronger than she has any right to be. And after years of heartache, she’s found ways to move on…one of those being in Neal’s best friend, Killian Jones.

As she’s always known, however, things are more complicated than they ever seem to be.

Rating: Mature

A/N: shout out to @wellhellotragic for reading through these next few chapters to make sure they make sense and for being an all around good human being. So many stories come from her encouragement, so she deserves all the praise 🎉

Anybody ready to start finding out secrets? It’ll take a few chapters to get all of them, but you’ll get them!

Found on AO3: Beginning | Current

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Tag list: @ultraluckycatnd @jamif @artistic-writer @cs-forlife @qualitycoffeethings @resident-of-storybrooke @captainsjedi @captswanis4vr @teamhook @ekr032-blog-blog @mayquita @bmbbcs4evr@wellhellotragic @kmomof4 @jennjenn615 @onceuponaprincessworld @shady-swan-jones @snow-into-ash @andiirivera @mariakov81 @shireness-says @kristi555 @facesiousbutton82 @superchocovian @jonirobinson64 @thejollyroger-writer @tiganasummertree @blowmiakisscolin @snowbellewells

-/-

“You’re right,” he sighs, his lashes landing against his cheeks when he closes his eyes and tilts his head toward the ceiling, trying to muster all of his courage to talk to Emma. He desperately needs it. “I’ve got some things to talk to you about.”

He hasn’t even truly said anything yet, but telling Emma that he needs to talk to her, letting her know that he’s been holding things back, it lifts a slight weight off of his shoulders, as if that helps. He’s heavy, his limbs weighed down by lead, and he’s so damn tired that sometimes he thinks his body might stop working completely, all of his vital organs shutting down until he’s just done.

It’s been one of the longest days of his life. The only ones that he remembers that are longer were days at sea when the sun never seemed to rise, everything shrouded in a heavy darkness that made the air feel denser and the breeze cooler, chilling him to his bones even under his thick jacket. Those are days he doesn’t want to remember, but they’re the ones etched at the front of his brain, mixed in with memories of a vibrant blonde with a laugh that sounds of music and a smile that would have brought light to those lightless days.

One outshines the other, always, but right now he’s not sure of anything except for the fact that he’s about to break down his family, and it’s the absolute last thing he wants to do. He’d rather hoard all of this away, keep it to himself and to David, but he set that ball in motion weeks ago, and it’s been a whirlwind ever since, everything tumbling and falling down much faster than he ever could have imagined. A part of him wishes that he could go back, that he could take it all back and have never started any of this, but at the end of the day, this is for the best.

Even if it’ll be for the worst first.

Bloody asshole. He’s a bloody asshole.

There’s no way he could have ever kept any of this to himself when Emma deserves so much more than to be lied to.

Again.

Rubbing his hand against his forehead, trying to work away the stress and the lack of sleep, he takes the last few steps to the living room and sits down on the loveseat across from Emma, still trying to muster the courage to look at her and look at the hurt in her eyes that he knows is his fault right now and that he’s only going to make worse.

He would give everything he has, every part of his being, to never have to hurt her or their children again.

He can’t believe he missed Henry’s soccer game today. That seems like such a small thing, but he made a promise that he broke.

“Where have you been?” she questions, curling herself into a small ball and pulling the blanket up over her shoulders, her bun bouncing on the top of her head. She looks like she’s settling down to watch a movie with Henry, not like she’s about to have this conversation that’s going to change their lives. “Were you – ”

“God no,” he finishes for her, not even letting her entertain the idea of him being unfaithful to her. He knows that’s where her head must have been all day even though she likely doesn’t truly think that. She must have been somewhere between him being an asshole, cheating on her, and being dead in a ditch on the side of the road. He’s not sure which thought he prefers. “I would never. I’m – I’m sorry about today. I’m sorry that I didn’t get a chance to call you and that I made you worry. I’m sorry that I missed Henry’s game. I know he must be so mad at me, and I will try to make it better with him, okay? I would never do anything to intentionally harm either of you.”

She nods her head, shuffling a bit more underneath the blanket, but her lips stay in a firm line. “But where were you?”

“I was with David.” Her brows furrow, and he takes a breath, centering himself and trying to keep all of his organs intact as he bites the bullet. Or, at least, tries to. “Emma, sweetheart, I’m going to tell you something that sounds absolutely insane, and I need you to listen to me, okay? I know that you’re mad at me, as you should be, but there’s good reason for it.”

“What are you talking about? And what do you mean you were with David? He was working today. That’s what Mary Margaret said. Oh God, are they having issues? Is that what this was?”

“No, no,” he promises, his heart breaking a little at her thinking that her brother was having issues in his marriage. “They’re fine. David really was working, and I was with him.”

“Why?”

“I’m trying to get there, love. I am. It’s simply hard, and I don’t know how to tell you.”

“Just tell me, okay? We’re not supposed to lie to each other, yeah? We’re a team. That’s what we say. We’re on the same team.”

His eyes slam shut to hold back tears, her words already too much for him when he has been lying to her after saying he wouldn’t, after working so damn hard for their relationship to get back to this point. She’s been hurt so badly in the past, and nearly every day that he’s been with her he has tried to make sure that he wouldn’t hurt her the same way. He’s not perfect. He’s screwed up many times, but she deserves so much more than the circumstances of her past.

Than the circumstances of her present too.

“I’ve been lying to you,” he whispers, too cowardly to open his eyes to see her face. “I didn’t want to, but I couldn’t say anything until I knew for sure. I’ve – Emma, I’ve been losing my mind since February thinking that I’m crazy and delusional and that my mind has run wild on one too many theories.”

“Killian, what the hell are you talking about?”

“Neal is a fucking liar,” he blurts out, the words tumbling off his tongue without hesitation as one weight is lifted off of his shoulder while another is pressed down, crushing him further into the ground. With everything he says he feels momentarily lighter before feeling heavier once more. “His past, Emma, the missing years, they’re all lies.”

He opens his eyes and watches her process his words, watches the lines on her forehead appear, watches the gaping mouth, watches her eyes twitch as she looks around the room at anything but him. And if he could see under her blanket, he’d know that she’s tapping her fingers against her leg on the couch cushions.

“What do you mean? They’re not lies. He was captured. He disappeared. I know this. You know this. It’s been drilled into our heads over and over again through every news channel and every briefing we got before he came back. He was captured and tortured and has been through hell, and it took eight years for someone to find him and bring him home.”

“It’s not…Emma, I know that’s what we’ve thought. Why wouldn’t we? It has been our truth and our driving force to what has kept us sane, but it’s not true. I – ” he hesitates, reaching up to run his hand through his hair, fingers harshly tugging at the strands as his stomach twists inside of him, nausea beginning to take over like it’s been threatening to since David called him while he was in the middle of the supermarket this morning and asked him if he could meet him at the precinct as soon as possible because a federal agent wanted to talk to him. It was the last thing he expected when he went to David weeks again. He doesn’t know exactly what he expected. All he knows is that it wasn’t really this, and nothing was supposed to happen this quickly.

Really, all he wanted was for David to tell him that he was crazy and that nothing was wrong with Neal.

He left the cart of groceries in the middle of the frozen food aisle.

“Do you remember when you took Ada to her nine-month check-up? How I took Henry to therapy that day and gave Neal a ride as well?” She nods in response, and he continues. “When I was in the lobby after dropping Henry off, I saw Neal get into a random car despite the fact that he was supposed to be in therapy. At first, I thought maybe it was nothing. He’s a grown man. He can make his own choices, and maybe he didn’t want to go to therapy anymore but simply hadn’t found a way to tell us. But then I got a little paranoid, and I just had this feeling in my gut that something wasn’t right, that all of these little things about Neal since he came home weren’t adding up.”

“He got into a car? That’s not…that’s weird, but I don’t understand why that’s a big deal.”

“There was a possibility that it wasn’t, love. It could have been nothing, but it wasn’t. Neal has hidden a lot from us, and I had been letting go of all of the little inconsistencies up until that point. But then I started to piece them together, started to do a map of things like when I’m at work, and after that man came up to us at the zoo in DC and thought he knew Neal, I broke down and had to tell someone all of my thoughts and how I was going crazy.”

Emma’s lips part, and he knows that he’s losing her. She thinks that he’s insane, that he’s lost it, and she deserves to think that right now. She does. He thought the same thing. He simply hopes that by the time he finishes explaining, carefully working his way through this so that she can best understand, have her hear it from him instead of some federal agent like she’s going to have to in the next few days when she’s also pulled in for questioning.

Tears continue to sting behind his eyes as he thinks of all Emma is about to go through and all their son is about to go through as well and for the rest of his life. All he wants is to take the woman he loves and the children he has with her to a quiet house on the coast, the ocean in their view, and hold them to keep them away from the situation they’ve found themselves in.

“Who did you tell?”

“David.”

“Why didn’t you…what did you tell him?”

“I asked him if he could help me or if I really needed to get my shit together and stop hyper-fixating on something that was nothing. But he agreed. He thought something about Neal was suspicious too, that he knew a little too much of what had happened in the past eight years, that he was acting strangely, and agreed to try to look into it for me as a favor.”

“What the fuck?” Emma groans, tossing her blanket to the side and standing up from the couch, pulling her leggings up and tugging her t-shirt down. “Killian, seriously. What the fuck are you on about saying Neal is suspicious and that he wasn’t really captured the entire time? Of course he was. And yes, I know that he does shady things and that he can be a shitty person, but that doesn’t mean any of it is suspicious. I mean, seriously. He’s just a douche sometimes. Did you know that he tried to get Henry off of calling you his daddy because he doesn’t like that I’m with you and not him all of the sudden? I mean, what kind of jackass move is that when he’s been so good about things?”

His stomach twists again, the nausea settling itself down, and he feels anger flicker across his skin, goosebumps rising across each centimeter of flesh. He didn’t even think that it was possible for him to feel more.

“He did what now?”

Emma groans and presses the heels of her hands into her eyes, rubbing them a bit as she paces back and forth in front of the fireplace.

“Today has been awful, babe. Just awful. Henry couldn’t find his shin guards, and we were running late to his game. And while we’re looking, Ada decides to melt down. Like screaming and crying and yelling so loudly that my ears wanted to burst. So obviously this upset Henry and I said something…I don’t even remember, but I said something about texting you and asking if you were on your way home to help. And he just yells at me that you’re not his daddy, that you’re his step dad which I think broke my heart until a million little pieces which only got worse when you didn’t show up to his game and when you didn’t answer my calls. I – ”

Emma stops her rant to straighten her shoulders, her chest visibly moving with her breath as she wipes at the tears under her cheeks. He has no idea what’s happening, no idea what kind of mess he’s wandered into on top of the one he’s created. All he knows is that he has to brave this storm until it’s over.

“- I haven’t felt that alone in months,” she finally continues, pacing again, and he knows exactly when she last felt that alone. “Our kid needed you today. I swear there is nothing he loves more than having you cheer for him at those games. But you weren’t there, and you didn’t bother to let me know where you were. That hurts, Killian. You can’t lie to me because I have to be able to trust you. I have to be able to trust that one day you’re not going to turn on me and decide that I am not enough or decide that our kids are not enough. I need to be able to…I can’t have you treat me like Neal did, like he still does sometimes. You’re my best friend who I rely on for everything, and I don’t know how to reconcile whatever it is you’re trying to tell me with my real life when I’m still reeling from the emotional whiplash of my day. It’s two in the fucking morning.”

He can’t help himself when he stands, stepping around the coffee table so that he can pull Emma into his arms despite the fact that she’s got her arms crossed over her chest and isn’t returning his embrace. She’s pissed at him. It’s understandable. She should be. He should have been here today. He should have called. He should have done something to let her know that he was okay and that he wouldn’t be home so that maybe she wouldn’t have felt so alone. There’s so much to unpack with what she’s saying, complications that he never saw arising when he prepared himself for this conversation. They’re tired and emotional, and they still have so much more to talk about. He still hasn’t been able to tell Emma the real, whole truth.

He's barely touched the surface, and he’s terrified.

“You, Emma Swan,” he starts, rubbing his hands up and down her back in soothing circles as she hiccups into his shoulder, “will always be enough. Not just for me but for everyone and hopefully, if you believe it, for yourself. I will never want to leave you or our children. I cannot express enough how the three of you are my world. I screwed up today, screwed up these last few months, but I promise I had the right intentions behind it. I simply need you to listen, and if you want to kick me out of the house afterwards, you can. But I promise every word out of my mouth is the truth. Use your superpower. Use your trust in me.”

She nods and wraps her arms around his waist, squeezing tightly enough that he can feel his breath escape him.

“So tell me.”

And he does.

They both make their way into the kitchen and start a cup of coffee, the two of them knowing that it’s going to be a long night without much sleep, if they get any sleep at all. Whether she believes him or not they still have things to talk about, and it’s all happening whether they like it or not.

He hates it.

So over a cup of coffee he tells Emma all about how David started poking around and using his resources as a detective to figure out all of the inconsistencies that Neal has shown since he got back. Emma still looks distraught, confused even, and he wonders just how much all of her muddled feelings for Neal are causing her to be resistant and in denial. He understands. The same thing happened to him.

The same thing is still kind of happening to him.

David couldn’t find out much, especially since it wasn’t a case he was assigned to and most of the things Killian had mentioned were circumstantial that honestly couldn’t be looked into, but he did manage to track down traces of a Neal Gold in London between two thousand and twelve and last year. It wasn’t much, just a few trails on Facebook, but there were photographs online of a Neal Gold being pictured at the Three Kings Pub after a United game, just like Kyle Thomasson had said. Kyle ended up being the key in it all, oddly enough, and Killian still can’t decide if running into him at the zoo in DC was a blessing or a curse. To him, it seems like something akin to fate, and he’s not quite sure if he believes in that.

Kyle was in university three years ago and active on Instagram, seemingly documenting everything with his mates. He had several pictures of all of them in the pub wearing Manchester United jerseys, and in one picture timestamped March tenth, two thousand and sixteen, Neal was in the background sitting at a bar counter staring almost directly at the camera.

Decidedly not a prisoner of war in Iraq.

David said he’d nearly fallen out of his chair at work, the wheels rolling underneath him, and he’d had to catch himself on his desk as he stared at the picture for nearly an hour before shaking his head and realizing that Killian was right, that something wasn’t adding up.

That Neal wasn’t adding up.

David hadn’t really been sure what to do with that information, had mulled over it for a few days when fate seemed to knock on his door in the form of FBI Agent Graham Humbert. Apparently, every prisoner of war, especially those who were captured for an extended period time and then released, are monitored when they come home. There have been incidents in the past of men and women who come home seemingly normal and then end up in terroristic plots. It’s all very secretive and hush hush, but it happens for select veterans.

Neal has been one of those.

The FBI and the CIA have been keeping tabs on him since the day he came back.

Fucking insane. It’s all insane.

“They’ve been watching us?” Emma asks quietly, wiping away some of the sleep in her eyes as she comes back to herself a bit, some color returning to her cheeks. Good. he feels a little less nauseous too.

“Aye. Mostly Neal, but also us.”

“That’s all very big brother-ish. Is that even legal?”

He shrugs. “Apparently so.”

“I still don’t…I don’t understand. Are you saying that Neal is a terrorist? That he was turned against the country?”

“No, no, love,” he assures her, tapping his fingers against the table, even if that’s only true in the most technical sense. “But he isn’t – Neal isn’t – he isn’t…Neal has been living in London with his father for most of the past decade.”

“Neal’s dad is dead.”

“He’s not,” Killian sighs. He was shocked by the information too. Emma must be even more so since he knows that being orphans is something Emma and Neal once bonded over. It’s something the two of them have bonded over themselves. “Neal’s father is Robert Gold. That’s Neal’s real name. It’s Gold, but he changed it to Cassidy about twenty years ago.”

“None of this is making any sense.”

“I know,” he promises as he reaches across the table and places his hand over hers, wishing he could work away the worry lines on her forehead. “It will, though. I promise. You just have to trust me.”

“I do.”

Thank the heavens.

So he tells her that Neal’s mother is actually dead and really had been from Boston. That part is true, but his father is a businessman in London who owns an engineering firm. The thing is that within the engineering firm is what is suspected to be an illegal weapons manufacturer. Interpol and Scotland Yard have been surveying it for years, but they’ve never been able to find any proof that the weapons were stemming from the business. It’s all been well covered to the point that they nearly gave up, but then several shipments of illegal weapons started popping up in America in October of last year.

And Neal Gold isn’t quite as good at covering his tracks as his father is.

“I don’t understand,” Emma murmurs under her breath, picking her legs up and settling them in her chair.

“He’s been illegally selling weapons to criminals, Swan, and he’s been caught. Almost.”

“No, no. It’s…” She takes a sip of her coffee and lingers with it on her lips before placing it on the table and rubbing her fingers between her brows to work out the lines. “I understand that bat shit crazy thing. I still feel like I’m having a fever dream and you’re going to kiss me and I’ll wake up in bed and none of this will be real, but I don’t understand…I’m missing the connection between him being deployed, somehow escaping captivity from terrorists, and then going to work for his apparently alive father who is some kind of criminal mastermind. And then coming back here to us. Like, that doesn’t make any sense, and I’m not entirely sure that I don’t need to have you admitted to a mental institution.”

“I’m not crazy, sweetheart.”

“Her eyes roll. What you’re saying is.”

“I know,” he sighs, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath before looking at Emma. He’s only had a few hours to truly process this even when he’s had suspicions for weeks, and he’s still in disbelief. Mostly he’s angry, angry enough to want to punch the bastard hard enough to knock all of his teeth out and break his nose, but that has nothing to do with how he’s been aiding in violence across the world for money and everything to do with the fact that Killian knows that Neal left Emma and could have come back home.

But he didn’t.

He didn’t come home for years, and he could have.

He abandoned his wife and his son, and Killian has never felt more hatred coursing through his blood than he has at that thought.

“Emma, my love, we don’t know all of the details yet. Agent Humbert and his associates, they won’t tell us everything because we’re civilians. We don’t have that kind of clearance, but they’re involving us because they think we might be able to give them information on what Neal has been doing since he came home or that maybe we can tell them more on why he came home.”

“He came home because he was rescued. That’s what happened. He couldn’t have been living in London all of those years. He couldn’t have because if he has been, that would mean…oh God, that would mean…h-he left me,” she sobs, hand going over her mouth as he entire body shakes, large tear droplets falling down her cheeks in a steady stream that he thinks may stain her skin forever. “He left us.”

-/-

He watches her walk down the stairs, his eyes scanning up from the black stilettos and dark tights to the gray and white plaid skirt with a fitted black turtle neck tucked in, the sweater fitting all of her curves. It’s not at all what he was expecting her to wear tonight, especially since he saw this sinful red dress hanging in their closet last night. If he’s honest, he was looking forward to that knowing the way that it hugs Emma’s curves, but he’s not idiotic enough to not appreciate the way his girlfriend looks right now. They spend most of their time together in joggers and t-shirts, usually with a mysterious stain from something Henry did despite the fact that he’s six years old and should only be staining his own clothes.

“Hot damn, woman,” he whistles, stepping forward to grab her hand so that he can help her down the rest of the staircase. She smiles in return, a little blush coating the apples of her cheeks. “I do believe I’m the luckiest man in all of Maine.”

“I’d think so,” Emma laughs, finally stepping down on the wooden floor and releasing his hand. “I mean, there’s no way you could do better than me, Jones.”

“And yet you say I’m cocky.”

“You are.” She looks up at him and raises her brows, the corners of her red-painted lips curving up even more. “But you don’t get to have that term all to yourself. You have to share.”

“I’ve never been very good at that.”

“That’s a lie.”

“Is it?”

“Definitely.” She reaches forward and places her hand on his chest, her fingers tapping against his shirt. “So I had this red dress – ”

“I saw.”

“Did you now?”

He raises a brow and hums in response, placing his hands on her hips and tugging her a little closer. “I did, and though I told myself not to be stupid enough to ask, I figured since you brought it up – ”

“ – that you could ask why I’m not wearing it for our date?”

“Yep.”

“Well, it’s a funny story,” she starts, her hands snaking up his chest until they land on his shoulders, fingers curling into the cotton of his dress shirt. “You see, I woke up with this awfully large bruise right in the center of my chest because it seems that someone got a little overenthusiastic last night. Some would say possessive, but that’s not true because he wouldn’t be dumb enough to try to mark me.”

He has to hold in his laugh as the tips of his ears heat, most likely going red, and he waggles his brows. “I did say I wasn’t very good at sharing.”

“Asshole. You – ”

“Momma,” Henry interrupts, somehow stepping between them despite their proximity to each other, “I don’t feel good.”

“What’s wrong, kid?” Emma soothes, stepping back and reaching down to move Henry’s hair off of his forehead. He’s weird about people touching his hair, but he always lets Emma do it.

“My tummy hurts.”

Her eyes glance toward him for a moment, brows furrowed together, and he watches Emma flip her hand around and press the back of her it to Henry’s forehead. “You’re burning up. How long have you felt bad?”

He shrugs his shoulders. “I don’t know.”

“Okay, okay,” Emma sighs. “Let’s get your temperature taken and then get some medicine in you. Babe – ”

“You want to stay home with him?”

“Yeah. I just…don’t call David and Mary Margaret to cancel just yet, but he’s really warm. I don’t want him to get Leo sick or for them to have to deal with a sick kid. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” he promises, stepping to the side so that he can move into the kitchen with them following him. He opens the cabinet where they keep the medicine and pulls out the thermometer and a bottle of ibuprofen before stopping to think. “Lad, do you want the medicine that you drink or that you chew?”

“What flavor is it?”

“Both are bubblegum.”

“The kind I drink.”

He nods his head and puts back the chewable to grab the liquid while handing Emma the thermometer so she can take Henry’s temperature. Both times it comes back just over one hundred degrees. It’s not the worst temperature in the world, but it is a temperature above normal. Besides, Emma has already made up her mind that they’re staying home tonight, so while she toes out of her heels and gets Henry medicated and changed into his pajamas, he calls David and Mary Margaret and tells them the change of plans, insisting to Mary Margaret that it’s fine, that they’ll have date night another day when Henry isn’t feeling under the weather.

After he’s finished all of that, he grabs two water bottles out of the fridge and moves to the living room, settling down next to Henry on the couch as Emma puts on the movie Robots. It’s a bit older, but Henry is absolutely obsessed with it. Killian believes that they’ve watched it at least five times in two weeks, and a part of him wonders when that phase is going to be outgrown.

“Why does he say making the baby robot is the fun part?” Henry innocently ponders, looking up at him with those big brown eyes that he swears could melt the ice caps. “It didn’t look very fun.”

He nearly chokes on his own lung, the adult joke in the movie going over Henry’s head even if he still asked about the joke. It’s times like these where being a dad is both mortifying and hysterical.

“People like different things, lad, and they happened to like making their baby robot. It was fun for them, so that’s what matters.”

“That’s weird.”

“One day you won’t think so.”

Emma reaches over and slaps his shoulder, but he doesn’t care as he laughs to himself and keeps watching the movie, answering all of Henry’s questions along the way. The finish Robots and start the Lion King, which Killian has seen infinitely more times than any other movie they own, but even after Henry has fallen asleep with his head resting on Emma’s chest, they keep watching in silence until he hears a small sniffle beside him.

Twisting his head, he looks at Emma to see her wiping at her eyes, and he’s just about to tease her for crying at a movie she can (and has) recite when he realizes that her tears are not simply tears from watching the movie, the sobbing far too intense.

“Hey, hey,” he whispers, his heart constricting a bit as he watches Emma’s eyes fill with tears, “come here, love.” She nods her head before gently getting up from the couch so as not to disturb Henry and slowly settles down on his lap, crossing her legs over each other and resting her head on his shoulder as her arms become a heavy presence on his waist. He’s not exactly sure what’s happening right now, so he simply wraps the arm that’s not around Henry around Emma and rubs up and down her back. “What’s wrong, Swan? Tell me what’s wrong.”

“I get nervous when Henry gets sick. I don’t – I can’t explain it. I mean, this obviously isn’t the first time he’s been sick or the worst of it, and it’s certainly not the worst you’ve seen but I – ”

“ – you get nervous,” he finishes for her when she stops talking, pressing a kiss into her hair. “Sweetheart, I understand. I don’t like when he’s sick either, but he’s going to be just fine. It’s simply a little cold.”

“I know, I know,” she sniffles, her voice barely audible with her mouth pressed into his shoulder. He can feel the vibrations of her voice more than he can hear her, and it’s likely a good thing with Henry right next to them snoozing away. “It doesn’t make any sense, but I’m so scared of something happening. He is my baby, and for a long time, he was all I had. It was me and Henry against the world, and I would do absolutely anything to protect him from the world. I don’t know – I…it’s the anniversary of Neal being deployed soon. I don’t have a death date for him, so I’ve always gone with when he was deployed, and that’s tomorrow.”

“I didn’t even realize.”

“That’s because I never told you that was the day I remembered it.”

“Why not? You know that I understand, that I miss him too.”

“Yeah, but…he was my husband, and I loved him. I know that he wasn’t perfect, but I did love him. He made me happy a lot of the time. He gave me – I have Henry because of him. It’s been six years, and sometimes it feels like I just lost him yesterday.”

He gulps back his sigh, gulps back a lot of his words. Talking about Neal can either be the easiest thing in the world or the most difficult. Some days he and Emma share lighthearted stories, but other days she grieves him like she’s doing right now. She grieves his death, grieves him missing Henry’s life, grieves him missing her life. Emma is hands down the strongest person he knows. He’s been through shit in his life, seen friends and family die, has had his heart broken, but he’s never been left with a newborn and told that his spouse died. He’s never…he lost a friend. He didn’t lose someone who was supposed to be his lifelong confidant.

But he can imagine. If he ever lost Emma, he doesn’t think he’d be able to move on. He wouldn’t want to. He’d never love again if he lost her. He’s young. He has a long life ahead of him, but if he lost Emma, he would never recover from that. He’d do it for Henry, be there to raise him and to be there for him, but the loss of Emma would destroy him.

No part of him is as strong as Emma is, so when he sees her break down like this, it breaks him. He wants to be strong for her, though. She makes him stronger, and he can find the words to help her through tonight and every other night where she’s scared and possibly even a little lonely missing Neal.

“Time doesn’t heal all wounds,” he promises, holding her a little closer as he remembers his mother’s death. “It certainly helps, but it doesn’t heal them. It doesn’t matter that it’s been six years. It doesn’t matter that Henry is older. It doesn’t matter that we’re together. You’re hurting Emma, and you should never feel ashamed by that.”

“I do, though,” she sobs, the tears getting loud enough that he encourages her to wrap her arms around his neck so that he can stand from the couch, lifting her in his arms to carry her out of the room. He’ll come back and get Henry later. She usually doesn’t let him do this outside of in a passionate embrace, but sometimes in moments like this she allows herself some weakness that is truly strength.

“You’re fine,” he promises as he sits them down on the bed upstairs, letting Emma cry into his shoulder. He already knows that she’s going to be embarrassed later, that she won’t want to talk about it again, but she shouldn’t feel that way. She usually doesn’t, but it’s always this way when she’s missing Neal. “You’re fine, my love. You can miss him all you want. I want you to miss him. He loved you so much, Emma. Probably more than anything in the world, and he didn’t leave you because he wanted to. He was doing a very honorable thing, and he would be so proud of the woman and the mom that you are. Oh, he would be so proud of you.”

She nods her head, her entire body shaking as she curls herself further into him. She’s still got on her outfit she was going to wear on their date tonight, but the difference between three hours ago and now might as well be the difference between the moon and the sun. Of all the twists and turns that tonight has taken, this is the last one he expected.

“I love you,” he continues, pressing the words against her forehead and nudging her back so that he can make an attempt to wipe away the tears, the black mascara likely making it too difficult as she blinks up at him, “and I will always, always be by your side.”

Her bottom lip quivers a little bit as she wipes at her own tears and the snot that’s beginning to run. “I love you too. God, I’m such a mess. I just spiraled out of control there, didn’t I?”

And there’s that Emma deflection, even if this isn’t the worst one he’s ever heard.

“No, it was totally understandable. You had a bad night. Your son is sick, and you had to cancel a date with the most handsome man in the world. I think I’d cry too.”

She snickers, her lips almost forming a smile, before she reaches down and pulls the cover up over her shoulder and his lap. “You’re such a ridiculous flirt.”

“I simply wanted to see you smile. It seems like you needed it.”

“I did. I don’t – will you sit with me for a little while longer? I think I’m going to have a few more breakdowns before I’m finished.”

“Of course. Though I do think that I already used up all of my good words of advice.”

“They were very good words.”

“I know. I should be a motivational speaker.”

Emma leans a little closer to him and presses a kiss onto the underside of his jaw. “I love you. Thank you for falling in love with the crazy lady who has far too many issues. I’m sorry that I – ”

“Emma, I never want you to be sorry for any part of your past,” he tells her as he brushes her hair behind her ear, feeling her soft skin underneath his fingertips. “You should never apologize for having loved someone who made you happy.”

-/-

“How could he have l-left me? How could he h-h-have left H-henry? I…I – ” Her words stop when her cries become too much, and even as tears sting behind his own eyes and he watches as Emma’s world burns down in front of his eyes, watches as every truth she’s ever known turns out to be a lie, he cannot sit here and not hold her. He cannot let her think that his love for her has ever been a lie because it never has been and never will be.

“Emma,” he whispers, pushing back his chair and ignoring the harsh scrape of it against the wood while he squats down in front of her, placing his left hand on her shaking arm and rubbing up and down while his right hand rests on her knee in an attempt to coax her into looking at him. “Emma, darling, why don’t we go sit down somewhere more comfortable, okay? Let’s go upstairs to our room, yeah?”

She nods her head up and down while he listens to the heartbreaking sounds of her sobs. He feels sick to his stomach, especially since all of this is so far from over, but right now his only concern is to make sure that Emma is as okay as she can possibly be. He stands from the ground with aching knees and holds his hand out to her to take. She does, her entire body still shaking, and to see this woman who embodies strength be but a shell of herself as they slowly walk up the stairs, the wood creaking underneath their steps, is by far the worst thing he’s ever seen.

This is one of Emma’s worst nightmares coming to life.

Emma gets into bed first, not bothering to pull to covers down to get under them, and without even bothering to take his shoes off, he tentatively crawls into bed after her, aligning the front of his body with the back of hers and wrapping his left arm over the curve of her waist and his right under the pillow that’s supporting her head. He has no idea if Emma wants his comfort, and he fully experts her to reject him until she gently takes his hand and holds onto it, pulling it up to rest between her breasts so that he can feel the erratic beating of her heart that does not match up with the coolness of her skin.

They sit in silence for so long that he loses track of time, loses track of what he’s supposed to be saying and what he’s supposed to be doing. The only sounds he can focus on are the occasional sniffle from Emma, the ceiling fan rotating above him, and the sound of his own heart thumping so loudly that practically all of his thoughts have been forcefully removed from his mind. He can’t think. He can’t breathe. He can’t…all he can do is hold Emma and try to prepare himself for the fact that this is so far from over that it’s barely even begun.

Of all of the awful things that he knows that Neal has done now, he wonders just how that man could have ever let this woman and Henry go. They are just…they’re wonderful, and they bring him so much joy. He thought they brought Neal joy long ago, and he thought that they did now. Neal loves Henry. There’s somehow no doubt in his mind about that.

Neal loves his son.

So why did he do any of this?

Why, once he was released from captivity and able to live in freedom because his father sells weapons to Al-Qaeda and brokered a deal with terrorists, did Neal decide to work for his father? The father who he most likely hated enough to cut ties from and change his name decades ago. Why would helping a man aid in creating violence and destruction in the world be something that Neal wanted when Neal had been serving and protecting his country for good for a decade?

Why would he want that when the scars on his back are real?

Why wouldn’t he want to come home to his family?

Would he really have stayed in England for money and for the ability to start again with a new life where he wasn’t attached to two people?

And if so, why come back?

Killian still has so many questions swirling around in his mind, each one garnering another, and he wants answers to every single one of them. He wants answers, and he very much doubts he’ll ever get them.

Mostly, though, he wants answers for Emma. She’s lived her entire life never knowing why her birth parents adopted her. She lived for nearly eight years wondering what exactly happened to Neal. She can’t get answers to one, but she can to the other.

Hopefully.

Neal doesn’t have to own up to anything that there’s no proof of, but since it’s happening, he might as well. He’s not an evil man. Killian is convinced that he’s not, that there is good in his heart, and if it’ll help Emma move on and help Henry move on when he’s older and realizes everything that he’s about to go through.

“Why is all of this happening to us?” she whispers what seems like hours later, her voice so quiet that he almost believes that he’s fallen asleep and dreamed of her speaking. But then she twists a bit in the bed, presses herself further into his body and tucks her bare feet between his calves so that they’re nearly completely intertwined. It comforts him that she feels safe in his arms when she knows that he’s broken promises to her too.

Not all promises can be kept, but no one realizes that until the broken pieces are laid out in front of them with few, if any, ways to put them back together.

“I don’t know,” he whispers back, pressing his lips into the skin at her shoulder and burying his nose there so that he’s enveloped by her.

“I just don’t understand.” Her voice is cold, almost no emotion behind it, and he thinks that scares him more than the hysterical sobs earlier. Emma is not emotionless, even when she tries to be. “I’m no one. I’m a mom and a high school guidance counselor in Maine. I’m not someone who gets wrapped up in international arm trafficking or whose ex-husband is apparently a criminal who faked his fucking death to get away from me.”

“You are not no one,” he reassures her, speaking the words just below the shell of her ear. “You have never been no one, and I need you to understand that none of this is on you, okay?”

“It’s not on you either.”

“Love – ”

“It’s not,” she insists, her voice a little louder this time. “Killian, how long have you been killing yourself hiding this from me? Why wouldn’t you tell me?”

“Emma, you barely believed me tonight, and you don’t even know everything yet. What would it have been like if I’d come to you when I knew nothing and all I had were the wild theories in my mind? I have hurt you so much when you’ve trusted me to be the one to hold your heart, and I could not unnecessarily hurt you again. Sins can be forgiven when someone loves you, but that only goes so far.”

Emma twists around on the mattress, quietly turning herself until her nose brushes his, the tip of it cool again his skin, and until her hand rests on his cheek and his on her hip, their bodies still intertwined.

“There is nothing to be forgiven.”

He closes his eyes and clenches his teeth together, swallowing all of the words of protest that he wants to say. “You are too good for me.”

“I see the best in you,” she whispers though her voice sounds as sure as ever as her palm runs across his skin so that he opens his eyes. “I love you with my entire heart, even if I feel utterly broken right now. What do you always tell me? If it can be broken, it still works, right? And you cannot…you were simply trying to protect our family. That’s what you’re always doing to the point of you hurting yourself, and I don’t want that. I want you to trust me, to come to me, and we’ll work through things together. We don’t need to do it separately.”

The sincerity in her eyes doesn’t surprise him, but the lack of water does. They’re still red rimmed, puffy, and she looks much older than her years, but amidst all of that is a vibrant green that could bring light into the darkness and guide any sailor lost in the depths of the ocean home.

They did for him.

“I love you, my darling,” he sighs, pressing a bit closer so that his lips brush against hers. “Do you think you can go to sleep?”

“No.”

“I still have…there’s still more to talk about, love. I have things I haven’t told you yet. David and Detective Humbert want us to meet them at the station tomorrow. They want to bring you up to speed so that we can help them.”

“I know.” She nods her head up and down against the pillow before her lips press into his in the slowest, most languid kiss he’s felt in the entirety of his life. No part of it is hurried or passionate or desperate. It is a simple press of lips against lips, soft skin mixing with an untrimmed beard, and before it ends, he feels salt against his lips that he is not sure if it stemmed from Emma’s eyes or his own. “I can’t turn my mind off right now, but I don’t think I can handle anymore tonight. I simply want you to hold me for a little while.”

They can deal with everything in the morning light where the depths of darkness cannot reach them as easily as it can now.

#rising from the ashes #cs fic #cs ff #captain swan #captain swan fic

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crqstalite · 4 years

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SHADOW OF THE SITH. Ch. 4.

NAJI_RISHI.

"Do we stop her?" Nadia whispers under her breath, concern written all over her face and wrapping both women in an anxious blanket, as the two can feel every death the Wrath had caused as a ripple through the force. It's terrifying, as they'd only just begun their trip on the island and already there was fire after fire to put out, trying to get slaves off the island, and also babysitting their new comrade, "We were here to save people, not kill them."

"She's...surprisingly not killing everything in sight. She's being methodical about who she kills, the slavers." Naji admits, careful not to let her robes drag in the bloody path her new...ally is leaving on the ground. Another shot fired, and another body falls to the ground with a hard, lifeless thump. This time murdered by her companion, who smiles wickedly behind his rifle, "We should be lucky it's not us and the slaves she's chosen as her targets."

"I'll...try and remember that..."

An unsure frown passes her face, crinkling her young face in a way that makes Naji's insides cold, before they catch up with the woman. A fire burns beneath her eyes, kicking a body away with the tip of her durasteel boot. Smears of alien and human blood alike decorate her uncovered torso, stains on her porcelain white skin. Another slaver writhers on the ground in pain, still just barely alive and attempting to shimmy away, and with a flick of her wrist, his neck bends at a horrifying angle. A loud snap is audible just as it happens, and Naji is quick to try and cover Nadia's eyes, but the sound of a pained whimper is still audible.

The woman has the nerve to chuckle at her padawan's expense, the light of her red kyber crystal resheathed in her lightsaber's hilt, and she turns over her shoulder. Her face is surprisingly free of scars (for a Sith, she's still extremely pale, even on the god-forsaken jungle planet. Naji would've thought the woman would've seen some sun at the very least), except for one that runs along her neck that she can see from the neckpiece, and blonde strands of hair hang down in front of her face, her surprisingly cerulean eyes with flecks of gold near the pupils staring back out from the curtain of hair, "Afraid of a little blood?"

"Do you have to kill everything that moves?" Naji asks, hardening her voice to seem more assertive. She'd let the Wrath take the reins for most of the mission on Rishi (something about the native species made her deathly ill, so any choice that the Wrath made she'd have to accept until they made it out of the Cove's denser places, or at least until Lana had time to find her something to counteract the allergies), but she wouldn't let the continued violence be detrimental to their mission, "We're here to free people, not kill them."

"I thought this is what you squishy-hearted Jedi liked. These slavers tortured others who couldn't protect themselves, and now they've met their deserving end." The Wrath quips in response, rolling one of her sabers over her wrist as she uses a teasing voice deserving of a reprimanded child, "Am I not serving your petty Code?"

"No." Naji grumbles, crossing her arms as the Wrath shrugs. She even had the nerve to comment on her Code, which didn't improve her opinion of the woman. This wasn't justice, or anything even near what the Jedi followed. Mass murder wasn't their way, "No it doesn't."

"Oh, and what would?" She narrows her eyes into yellow slits, angry or even possibly annoyed by her, "You killed the Colonel on Rakata Prime, didn't you? Wasn't that for justice as well? An arbitrary decision, don't you believe?"

Naji nearly flares at the notion. The death of the colonel hadn't been intentional, if she could let him live, she would've. Whether he was a traitor or not, he should've lived, even if only for questioning. The blood that dripped from her hands, she still hadn't fully forgiven herself for. What Theron got into trouble for that she had done, what should've been hers to shoulder. Something she should've admitted to the Council. Even if she had lost her position, the emotional loss was worse, having the two go into hiding, "That wasn't justice." She whispers.

It was self-defense.

Her chest pangs just at the thought. He'd shot her square in the chest, and had she not had enough adrenaline coursing through her veins, she wouldn't have been able to pull herself up and stab him through to keep him from getting another one off. Felix had carried her back, believing the worst, and after the trek through the rest of the planet, Naji was already sure she wouldn't make it. The scar was still raised and rather angry, even after the years past.

Just looking at the wound made her sick. Still visible just above her bra and below, it had been an ugly burn from a blaster especially, but the high powered rifle Darok carried, especially at such short distance, had made an already horrible wound worse. She was in and out of consciousness after being in a kolto tank for half a week, and struggled to breathe for months afterwards. Reminding her of the fight that had caused it didn't bode well for the warrior.

"Bah, apologies m'lord but the sun's going down. 'Fraid if we stay much longer they'll regroup and make this mission a lot harder on us." The gruff voice of the soldier snaps her out of her thoughts, and Nadia puts a reassuring hand on her shoulder, "You think they're organized enough to have snipers?"

A lingering look from the Sith before she turns to her companion, "With how easy they fall, I doubt it Pierce. But if we must, it wouldn't hurt to kill a few more while we wait for the Jedi to finish."

As if it's only their responsibility to free the slaves. As if she's only along for the ride and they're inconviencing her. She can see quite a few more slave cages just over the ridge, and she deflates her rigid spine once the Wrath is gone. Out of sight, sadly not out of mind. Running a hand through her hair, she turns over her shoulder to look at Nadia properly, "I apologize, this isn't the way our missions were supposed to go. I didn't believe the bloodshed would be so heavy."

"You're doing your best, master. You've never directed me wrong before, and you aren't now. This isn't your fault." Nadia says, her blue eyes twinkling in the setting sun. Her white hair is pulled up, severely away from her face, a delicate but sturdy braided bun atop her head. She's so much older than she was when Naji had first met the girl, but the same childish innocence remains sometimes. Not today, it seemed. She seems worried for her master, her training robes traded for armored pieces requisitioned from the Temple. So much has changed, so quickly.

For the millionth time in her life, Naji's afraid of what will come next. Revan -yes, Revan- was rising again, a cult in his name running around and committing dangerous missions left and right. It was supposed to be a simple happily ever after, especially after the mending of the Rift Alliance and continued hunt for remaining Children, but even she could sense the cloud of danger hanging over the Republic when she entered the operations room that fateful day. Nothing would ever be the same again, and she was afraid that would warrant a loss of everyone that become important to her.

She wouldn't let anyone take the crew of the Polaris from her, not if she didn't die first.

"I suppose there isn't much we can do about the Wrath..." Nadia trails off, rolling her eyes, "Are all Sith like her? Bloodthirsty with no regard for other people?"

"You'd be best asking a real Sith." Naji responds, trying to smile, "The slaves are safe for the moment, but I think they'd be happier on a transport, don't you believe?"

It's late into the night when the four return to the hidden alleyway, Pierce (as she's learned the bulky soldier's name), makes notes with the Wrath of places to enjoy the night instead of sleeping (she's beginning to think the Wrath is really involved with him and is playing Theron like a chindinkalu), and her nose is beginning to itch again. She's afraid Theron and Lana are gone before she hears the tinkling laughter of a woman. The Wrath has a hand on one of her sabers and Pierce picks up his rifle before Naji puts up a hand to stop in front of them with a tired and entirely distrustful look on her face.

"Theron, Lana?" Naji asks, peaking inside before their procession makes themselves known, "I apologize for being out so late, but the mission's been complete. There are quite a few former slaves safely returned to freedom tonight." She says proudly, a tight smile on her face once they're aware of their presence. Theron is leaning against a holoprojector while Lana is standing nearby, ready to debrief them on their progress. Albeit, both of them are smiling as if sharing an inside joke, but it's good to see them after such a long day.

"And plenty of their dead captors to go along with it." The Wrath interjects, making her presence rather loud as she pushes through Nadia and Naji, a smirk on her face and a well-hidden look of horror on Theron's face as he registers just what her triumphant declaration means, "A successful mission after all."

"We'll..go with that." The SIS agent responds, turning his attention from her to Naji (almost hopefully), "Chatter's picked up though, whatever you two did caused a major stir among the Nova Blades."

"I'm glad." Naji says, nodding as she turns to the Sith woman standing nearby, "Then we'll be able to finish up with the Blades soon then?"

"Not exactly." Lana responds, "Though we are growing closer to attacking the Aggressor soon. It's late, and it's been a long day. Better we finish this debrief in the morning, when all of us are of right mind. Agreed?"

"I'd second that!" Nadia pipes up, a tired smile on her face. Lana seems taken aback for a moment (Nadia isn't typically shy, but this has been the first word she's exchanged with anyone but Naji while here), before a softer smile replaces her surprise, "Maybe we can finally head back to the Polaris?" She asks hopefully.

"I suppose finding some food off-planet wouldn't be horrible. I'll call Zenith and have him join me tomorrow, so you can relax and find something, okay?" She asks, once the Wrath strikes up another conversation with Theron, effectively distracting her. She presses a light kiss to her forehead, Nadia giggling and then sighing in relief as Naji floods their force bond with happiness. She's tired, exhausted even, and a few nights away from Rishi would take care of the problem and get her back into high spirits, "Don't do anything stupid while I'm away, understood?"

Nadia nods happily, before questioning, "Aren't you coming back with me?"

She throws a look over her shoulder before frowning, "I need to be on-planet in case something happens and they need me. Give my regards to everyone, yes?"

"Felix is going to be disappointed." Nadia says, nearly naggingly, "Why don't you bring him out instead of Zenith?"

"I don't want Felix hurt anymore than he already is, and Zenith is going absolutely stir-crazy without any other missions to pass the time. You know how he gets." She and Nadia laugh good-naturedly, knowing the sniper rather well. "I do hope Bisauur doesn't miss him too much."

"It's his birthday soon, you know. She's going to want to spend it with him, even if she doesn't directly say anything." Naji has to hold back from rolling her eyes, her padawan (recently turned Sage) was exceptionally horrible at hiding her feelings for the sniper, and it was painfully obvious at times. No one made jokes about it, but because she took the Code so seriously (though she had to explain multiple times that it was still okay she was married to Felix), she acted as if her advances were simply friendly instead of having romantic intentions behind them.

"I would take Qyzen, but he's out on a hunt right now. And Tharan, well you know he's up to something in the cargo bay. I'd rather he not bring whatever chemicals he's collected here." Naji gives her a look that says 'I'm your master and that's final' before lightly embracing the girl, "I'll see you soon. Sleep and eat well, and be careful on your way out."

Nadia offers her one last smile and wave before heading out of the safehouse, and she can sense Lana approaching, "Barsen'thor."

"Beniko." She says softly, as not to make the woman presume she had any malicious intent, "I am genuinely glad you and Theron are alright. I do apologize for what happened all those years ago."

"Why would you apologize?" Lana asks, almost dumbfounded, "What happened on Rakata Prime wouldn't have been easily prevented as it was. I understand what you did, and I wouldn't blame you for...well this." She says, waving a hand around to the dark but still humid safehouse, "If anything, you and the Wrath did us a favor by doing so. Arkous and Darok were dispatched before they could turn anyone else or do any more damage inside their respective factions. In essence, that was a win."

"I still...I still feel just a tad horrible about you both. Having to uproot your lives because of something I and the Wrath did?" Naji knows she's delving into topics she shouldn't be discussing with a Sith lord, but the boundaries seem to have already fallen. Lana may have been Sith, but they were also allies for the time being. It didn't mean she wasn't still extremely uneasy about it.

"It was unfortunate, yes. But Jakarro and C2-D4 didn't have family. They weren't leaving anyone, not anyone we knew about. Theron...well I figure you can assume better about him than I can, and as for myself..." she trails off, the conversation inherently finished. They didn't have anyone to leave behind, "We let you both continue living your lives because you were much higher up in the ranks of both factions than we were, you were more productive in the long run. You both had crews to go back to who depended on you for your ship and to survive. In the Wrath's case, she has family on Dromound Kaas who would be suspicious if she suddenly went missing. I'm sure you have your connections as well."

"It was more theoretically plausible and safer if you both were out of commission rather than us." Naji finishes, wringing out her hands, "It doesn't make me feel much better if I'm being honest."

"I didn't say it had to." It has a rougher bite than she thought it would, that's the cold hard truth of what happened, as whether it made her feel good wasn't supposed to be Lana's concern. The woman pauses, sighing, "Though it is nice to operating with someone other than Theron and Jakarro again. It gets a little stuffy with just men."

"I can imagine." Naji smiles, and they share a laugh, before she queues up another answer, "Nadia. That's my padawan's name. I sensed your curiousity earlier, though you hide it extremely well."

Yet again, Lana is taken aback, surprised by her observant nature. "She's pleasant to be around, smart, crafty. She likes you. You've met Lieutenant Iresso, he accompanied me on Rakata Prime." Like always, she almost says my husband as she always introduces him, before figuring Lana doesn't need to know just yet, "You'll meet Zenith tomorrow I suppose, he's a strong personality, and it takes quite a bit to get used to, believe me." As soon as the words are out of her mouth, she wonders if she should tell her that Zenith may not work well with her or the Wrath. Stars, that's even worse, they'd be working rather closely with the Wrath, and it was hard to hide she was staunchly Imperial.

"If you're concerned about his alliance with us, I'm sure there's something Theron could say to keep her here while you and him work alone." A shiver runs up her spine, it's rather spooky that if Naji isn't actively thinking about it, others have an easy time reading her. Not even her mind, just her. Her force signature is easy to decipher, which she should probably put a better lock on.

"No, If I lie to Zenith, what kind of person would I be?" Naji asks, "He'll work with both of us, begrudgingly if anything."

"If you say so." Lana says, residing to accept and drop the conversation, "You didn't return with her?"

Naji shrugs lightly, "I'll stay here for the time being, but believe me, as soon as you give me a break you won't see me for weeks."

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