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maxwell-grant · 3 years

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Can you write about the Shadow's disfigurement ? I read that originally he was supposed to have a bandaged injured face like Darkman but that changed later

(Fan-art by Ryan Thompson)

It's a great signifier of what kind of character The Shadow is and how interesting of a figure he is in that, even a detail as innocuous as just his face has a whole sprawling history of intrigue and contradictions to talk about, not even getting into the specific features of his like the eyes and the nose, just the face. It's really great how I never run out of stuff to talk about with this character.

The true nature of The Shadow's face is an interesting oddity from the early stories that was never resolved in them, and several stories later took for a spin. It was one of the bits of information about The Shadow that Gibson reserved for rare and critical occasions, but it never really had a resolution and seemed to have been ignored when it was time to reveal Kent Allard.

Thing is, though, it was never really officially retconned, and it wasn't something you could ignore, it played a crucial role in some stories. And Gibson wasn't at all the kind of author who forgets plot points, he was fond of keeping notes and occasionally referencing his own continuity, which makes it all the more odd that a detail as important as The Shadow's real face was just not brought up again past a certain point. So here's the story of The Shadow's "real" face:

In the very first story, when Gibson was still testing the waters of what the character was going to be, he included a passage that teases a backstory for the character, as a former aviator who was scarred in the war.

"I seen The Shadow..." said Spotter eagerly. "I looked for his face. I saw nothing but a piece of white that looked like a bandage. Maybe The Shadow ain't got no face to speak of. Looked like the bandage hid somethin' in back. There was a young guy once who the crooks was afraid of -- he was a famous spy in the War, and they say he was wounded over in France -- wounded in the face. I think The Shadow is this guy come back." - The Living Shadow

In many of the following novels, even past the point where Gibson would more or less drop the idea all together, The Shadow's face is repeteadly described as "mask-like", usually when he's Cranston, something that both refers to the fact that he's masking himself as Lamont Cranston as well as Cranston's general impassive character. Throughout the character's entire run, Gibson never drops the idea of The Shadow's face being mask-like.

Cranston's eyes were almost smiling, even though his lips weren't - Dictator of Crime

The Shadow's methods of disguise are vague, but usually described as him using make-up putty on his face, using wire contraptions or wire masks, or thin sheets that he drapes over his features, and etc, it usually changes depending on the story or is all of these at once. The idea that The Shadow's true face had some kind of bigger secret was brought back a couple of stories later, when a villain unmasks The Shadow for the first time.

An arm came from the curtain. It reached forward and plucked the black hat from The Shadow's head. A low sound of amazement came from the curtain when the face of The Shadow was revealed.

"The secret of The Shadow," came the monotonous voice. "At last it is understood! The man of many faces - with no face of his own!" - The Black Master

The events of this story were brought up later in a story called Green Eyes, and four months after Green Eyes, we got The Shadow's Shadow, a novel whose resolution incorporated The Shadow's face in the finale.

Zubian's snarl became a cry of triumph as he saw The Shadow roll upon the floor. The slouch hat was carried away by the bullet. The head of the Shadow lay obscured beneath the folds of his cloak.

Zubian was aiming to fire further shots, to make sure of the Shadow's death; but he never accomplished that final purpose. An arm swept upward from the floor. Behind it came those glowing eyes; but it was not the eyes that stopped Felix Zubian. He was staring into the face of The Shadow -- not the disguised features of Lamont Cranston or Henry Arnaud -- but the visage of The Shadow himself!

What Zubian saw there; what expression on The Shadow's countenance made even that fiendish villain gasp in horror; no one could ever know. For Felix Zubian knew his last moment of life in that fateful instant. His trembling finger faltered on the trigger of his gun. The Shadow's unfailing hand did not yield - The Shadow's Shadow

And then, a year after this story, we got The Black Falcon, which has the most overt usage of The Shadow's "horror" face as it's once again the secret tool that allows The Shadow to gain victory over the villain

"If you are not Cranston," he demanded. "Who are you?"

"You shall learn." The Shadow's tone was ominous. "It will be your deserved warning. For those who have seen the true face of The Shadow have never lived to recite their discovery."

The man's face was ashen. A whispered laugh came from The Shadow's lips.

Only The Shadow knew why the sight of his dread face had brought terror to this evil fiend who never before to-night had known fear.

The face of The Shadow! The face that was never seen except when disguised to represent some other countenance. Roland Ransdale had met The Shadow face to face. The Black Falcon, he who had terrorized the law, had lost all nerve when he had viewed the true visage of The Shadow!

Only brilliant eyes remained in view. Burning eyes that surveyed the gasping shape of a man who had once thought himself invincible. As the fierce crook caught the burn of The Shadow's eyes, that sight, he knew, had been his sentence of doom. His nerve had passed with that revelation."

Stooping above the body of The Black Falcon, The Shadow hovered like a monster of the night..." - The Black Falcon

The last time we'd get a mention of The Shadow's face undisguised came from The Python. After he gets attacked and falls on a river, he's rescued by a couple of fishermen, and the narration states that the Cranston make-up had been blown off.

Squarely in the center of the rowboat lay a form attired in black trousers and a bedraggled white shirt.

Most of The Shadow's make−up had survived; but his features were no longer a close resemblance of Lamont Cranston's. He was still disguised; but only in a fashion. A grotesque hollowness had come upon his hawklike countenance. To Tanker and Pete, however, The Shadow was no more than a chance swimmer exhausted in the river - The Python

For the most part, any and all references to The Shadow's face from that point onwards would only be about how he alters it when he disguises, a process that's vaguely alluded to and usually implies him using make-up or wire frames to mold his face. In The Man From Shanghai, he even switches from Henry Arnaud to Lamont Cranston in the span of a single cab ride, and apparently keeps the Cranston face underneath the Arnaud one.

Deft fingers, pressing against cheeks and lips, were molding the countenance as one might work with clay - Chain of Death

Opening the briefcase, he produced a make-up box. Surveying his countenance in a mirror, he laughed softly and began to remold his masklike features. His visage changed beneath the pressure of his finger tips - Cyro

So far, the things we'd learned about The Shadow's real face by this point were: whatever is in there is horrifying enough to terrify and even traumatize hardened criminals (even after The Black Falcon gets some nerve back, he still can't bring himself to look at The Shadow without shaking, and it ultimately kills him in a gunfight).

The first story stated it was wounded in the war, and word got out about said injury to the point even an American gangster in the 30s knows about it. However, this fact was never brought up again, and it doesn't seem like a debilitating injury, as his face is malleable to the point of being compared to clay, and he doesn't seem traumatized or upset about it, even laughing at those who see it (which raises the possibility that it wasn't a war injury at all and that's just the story that got out).

It's said to be like "a piece of white that looks like a bandage", and later it was described as something that doesn't even really constitute a face. The only parts of The Shadow's face that are consistent are his burning eyes and his hawklike visage and both of these are malleable, and the most of his facial features we ever get to see for ourselves are described as having a "grotesque hollowness" to it, which is a delightfully horrifying adjective to apply to a face.

7 years after The Living Shadow, we got The Shadow Unmasks, which established that The Shadow's real, undisguised face was that of aviator Kent Allard. There were no further mentions of there being a "horror face" in further stories. You'd think this would be it, but if you've followed me long enough, you should know by now that there is no such thing as an "end" to weird mysteries when it comes to The Shadow.

In some stories following this one, his abilities of disguise would acquire some strange aspects. He'd be able to disguise himself by actively contorting his face along with the make-up.

Steadily, carefully, he bulged the contour of his forehead; squared his jaw; added a putty−like substance to his cheeks. It required longer for The Shadow to shape his nose like Wadsford's. The Shadow faked a facial twitch that resembled Wadsford's manner. - The Radium Murders

His features squarer; more mobile. Only a slight contortion was required to give them hardness. Thus The Shadow posed as either a respectable pedestrian or a tough-faced thug, according to the places where his search has taken him. - Buried Evidence

In others, he wouldn't even need make-up at all to alter his face.

His slouch hat and his black robe slid away from him. The disguise was thrust into a hidden compartment with one swift gesture. The Shadow was now Lamont Cranston.

But a ripple passed over his mobile face. His mouth and features seemed to writhe. Without changing anything save the habitual expression of his face, Lamont Cranston also vanished.

In his place was a smiling stranger. A man whose mouth looked weak, whose expression seemed almost timid. Well−dressed, faultlessly groomed, he seemed like a harmless, good−natured citizen whose car had broken down on a lonely country road - The Crimson Phoenix

In Shadow Over Alcatraz, The Shadow is even able to even contort the rest of his body to squeeze himself through a seven-inch gap, which is physically impossible for a grown man to pass through without extreme injury

The window was about three feet high, two feet in width. It had two upright bars, dividing it into three spaces, each about seven inches across.

Thrusting one arm through the central sector, The Shadow turned his head sideways and poked it through. Bars grazed his ears; when he turned his head, they became a sort of collar. He was wedging outward, drawing his other shoulder.

Below, his hand gripped rock. The Shadow tugged. It was a tight squeeze for his body, but he seemed to elongate as he drew his chest in. His hips slid past. His tall form teetered outward.

Crime County even states that The Shadow had become adept at remodeling his face through touch alone, and I cannot find any lines in the story that mention he's using makeup.

He was remolding the features of Cranston when Sparrow looked up. It was a process that The Shadow could perform by touch alone, even in comparative darkness.

Cranston's face was not The Shadow's own; in itself it was a disguise. A spreading motion somewhat flattened the aristocratic profile; downward pressure added a bulldog effect to the jaw.

And as the magazine reached it's final stretch, we started to get mentions in story that alluded to The Shadow's "real" face, undisguised, being that of Lamont Cranston

If Jud had known that Cranston in his other life was The Shadow, he would have... A tug of The Shadow's hat brim and his own face, that of Cranston, was obscured - The White Skulls

The Shadow's eyes, yet strangely Cranston's, for this was one time The Shadow did not care to disguise them - The Whispering Eyes

Which only capped off the mystery of his real identity by bringing a loop around itself, as suddenly it seemed Kent Allard was Lamont Cranston who was Kent Allard who was The Shadow who was Lamont Cranston and so on.

So looking on it now, "disfigurement" isn't really accurate. It's how it's been utilized in some stories past the pulps, Michael Uslan's comic storylines in particular leaned more heavily into it as a war trauma for The Shadow and a dramatic backstory. I have mixed feelings on this and you could argue it's playing with some ugly and unnecessarily ableist tropes (like The Phantom of the Opera), but if you gotta give him a punchy superhero backstory, I definitely prefer that than what the movie went with. It works to emphasize a tragedy tothe character's background.

But "disfigurement" isn't really the right word for it, because we only got one mention, in the first story, that it was due to an injury, and it came from a third party who had only heard faint rumors about a guy who could have been The Shadow once. Being defined as someone who's sacrificed his identity to fight crime, it's easy to assume that The Shadow's face is horrible to look at because it was destroyed in the war which already took so much.

Maybe that's just what he'd like you to think. Maybe that's all you need to know.

Every other instance in the pulps where we got to peer into some secret of The Shadow's face, it was never played up as if it was an injury due to some dramatic past event, but rather as if it was some horrifying secret of his true self that we were only getting the barest glimpses of.

Something that's gotta be much grislier than just mangled features, if it gets hardened criminals to quake in abject fear. Something that somehow still allows him to distort his face far beyond what's humanly possible, with and without outside assistance. Something that allows his "real self" to be, at separate points in time, Kent Allard and Lamont Cranston.

Something that makes it so he can have many faces, and yet no true face of his own. The great secret of The Shadow, and one that's always going to have a different answer. One where he himself only has one thing to say about it

Those who have seen the true face of The Shadow have never lived to recite their discovery.

Y-You cannot frighten me, maniac! You are only a man!

Am I?

#replies tag #the shadow #pulp heroes #pulp fiction #the living shadow #green eyes #horror

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potassium-pilot · 3 years

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Prompt 14: Commend

“Uh…hey there, Haurchefant. You’re not mad, right?”

The Lord Commander told her how it took six knights to wrestle him back to his post, keep him from rushing to her side in the face of Shiva. He certainly looked as though he fought off a small militia, what with the ragged hair and the small bruises on his cheeks.

His arms were folded. A stern look fell over his face. This was not a happy man.

“What were you thinking, Dia?!” he exclaimed. This took her aback. For as long as she’d known him, he’d been quite polite, always using a gentle tone of voice with her. To hear him scold her so was…different, to say the least.

“Wagering your very being on a dubious theory which might allow you to enter Iceheart’s lair- knowing full well that she could have sufficient forewarning to complete her ritual to summon Shiva, anyway…? And then- And then- engaging the abomination in mortal combat?!”

“…Chief, that’s a morning warm-up for me.”

“By the Fury, Dia!” He was in no mood for her cavalier attitude towards her heroic actions. “‘Tis the stuff of ballads! A battle for the ages!” He slammed a fist on his desk and continued, “Would that I could have been there to fight by your side!”

“Haurchefant, you would have been tempered!”

“Yet, here I was, forced to wait- condemned to wonder at the fate of a dear friend for a veritable eternity! I would not wish such torture on my most hated enemy…”

The tension on his shoulders started to release, the fire in his words began to dim, and whatever appearance of civility he could muster returned. He let out a long sigh as if to release the anger through his breath, and said while attempting to sound calm, “…but you are here now, and that is what truly matters…”

“Chief…do you need a hug?”

He shot a devastating glare at her, making Alphinaud leave the room before the tempers would flare. “I’m serious!” she assured, “I wish I could have told you that I was going, but the moment sort of just…came together perfectly. Time was of the essence.” He shook his head. “I know. But truly, no reinforcements, Dia?! None whatsoever?!”

“Unless you have another fighter who can resist tempering, it’s hard to ask that of someone.”

“Ser Aymeric couldn’t even think of a contingency plan, should you have fallen?!”

Dia felt the crease of the missive from him in her pocket. She took it from the Temple Knight, who attempted to read it aloud for her, after pointing out to him, “I can read, you know”, and read it through silently before entering the amphitheatre.

“That’s the Scions’ job.”

“Well, what is their contingency plan should you have been mortally wounded? Is there a batallion of blessed champions that secretly lies in wait in the Rising Stones?” he questioned sarcastically.

“No, there isn’t.”

“Then how do they ensure your safety? Surely, they understand that if you go, so too does the future of the realm.”

She hesitated, feeling incredibly obstinate in the face of his challenges, but was ultimately forced to concede to that one with an “I don’t know.”

“There’s nothing that they do to make sure that the Savior of Eorzea can continue to save Eorzea?”

“There’s nothing they can do, I just go in and do what needs to be done.”

“But why?” he asked incredulously, “What good does it do for anyone to leave you as the only one capable of defeating these monstrosities?”

“I don’t know, Haurchefant! Okay?! I don’t know! But I am the only one, and there’s nothing that can be done to change that!” She reached the end of her rope with an argument that should have ended before it even began when she opened her mouth. It was his turn to express shock, his eyes widened and his eyebrows raised. His usually calm and collected dear friend, quick with a joke and happy to help, has put in place an impenetrable defense. She revealed a crack, however, when she took a breath and admitted, “A break would be nice.”

The two of them took a deep breath together to release the tension at the same time.

“What do you acquire from doing this, my friend?” he asked calmly, carefully tiptoeing about the topic to ensure they don’t fall back into hostility. She kept her cool and answered with a soft smile, “Adventure.” She let out a dharp breath from her nose. “I wish I knew why, but…there was always something about exploration that drew me. I love journeying into the unknown, I love seeking new paths…but sometimes, it’s nice to rest and know my surroundings.”

Haurchefant hummed in a tone that indicated both satisfaction and curiosity. “‘Tis interesting to hear your prerogative, Dia. Many take adventurers to be self-serving, glory-seeking ignoramuses.”

“That’s because a solid majority of them are just that.” She shook her head at the notion. “Glory feels rather hollow when you’ve seen just where it lands you. No, I’m an adventurer because there’s much to see and do…but I think I’ve seen enough for a while.”

He flashed his winning smile and assured, “None deserve respite more than you, my friend. Take heart, and enjoy what you have accomplished for now. I apologize if my venting of my anxieties have dampened your victory.”

She returned the smile and replied, “No, it didn’t. Call me weird, but…there’s something refreshing about someone close reminding me that what I do could kill me. Everyone always seems so sure that I’ll emerge victorious.”

‘Was there every any doubt that the Warrior of Light would succeed’, Alphinaud’s words rang in her head.

“There is never a guarantee in battle. I feel young Alphinaud should learn such a concept if he is to lead men.” Haurchefant shook his head and sat back in his chair. “You are indeed blessed as Hydaelyn’s champion, but you remain mortal, with limits. You have escaped the impossible on more than one occasion, but nothing that you’ve survived was incapable of killing you. I would much rather know that if you were in danger, that someone, preferably myself, would be there to do everything they could to protect you.”

She stared to the floor. “You very much are a knight, Chief. You couldn’t have protected me from Shiva.”

“Perhaps not, but it would be remiss of me not to try.” Haurchefant snapped back into reality when he reminded himself of orders he received. “Ah, Ser Aymeric wished to have words with you and Master Alphinaud in private. He awaits us in the Intercessory.”

“Ughhhh, do I have to?”

Haurchefant replied to her groans with laughter in his voice, “Is there something wrong with the notion?”

“I already had to accompany him back to Camp Dragonhead. If he needed to exchange words with me, he could have done so from Whitebrim, but we barely said a word to each other. We didn’t even look at each other. I don’t get it- I saved his people from a primal. Did I do something wrong here?”

Haurchefant knew exactly why the Lord Commander would do such a thing. A conference with the Warrior of Light was one thing, but a personal interaction? No work or other business to buffer? And with such a stoic hero (or so she pretends to be), seemingly larger than life? The man was probably a puddle.

“Perhaps he just wanted Master Alphinaud there to say these words to as well. Pray, go on ahead without me, Dia. Another matter requires my attention, but I shall join you anon.”

“Fine, but hurry up. I don’t want another awkward silence, especially if Alphinaud tries to harangue him into joining the Alliance again.”

“Halone be good, you must stop him if he tries again.”

“The kid’s tongue has a mind of it’s own, I swear. If he tries, maybe I’ll cast Repose on him.” Haurchefant laughed at what he hoped was a joke as she left the office to see for just what he requested privacy.

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

Would Minfilia yell at me if I kicked Alphinaud in the head, Dia thought. For whatever genius he proclaims to be blessed with, subtlety consistently managed to escape his grasp. That in mind, she was more than a little relieved to understand fully the intention of their dealmakers. All they hid was a desire to keep the Garleans away, a desire she shared personally.

With that done, she followed the young Brave’s Commander out of the intercessory.

“Er, Dia, if I may have a moment…”

Or she would have, had Ser Aymeric not stopped her from doing so.

“I have no idea if there will ever be enough thanks for what you’ve done, but… I would like once more to say it: Thank you, Dia. Your risk was unimaginable, and that you were so willing to do it for a country you barely know… it’s astounding. While we owe the Scions much, to whom we’ll begin to repay by delivering supplies to Revenant’s Toll, I would also like to find some way to repay you personally. Mere words feel insufficient.”

Dia felt unsure what to make of the Lord Commander, but she appreciated the thought.

“Don’t worry about it”, she replied with a soft smile. She nodded to him and turned around to finally return to Revenant’s Toll.

Once she was out of the building, she retrieved the missive from her pocket, and re-read it once more to herself.

Inside the intercessory, Aymeric turned to Haurchefant with a question in mind that the lord of Camp Dragonhead could read with ease with the expression he wore on his face.

“Haurchefant, you’ve grown rather close with her, have you not?”

“As one should expect with one’s dear friends, yes. Why do you ask?” Haurchefant attempted to bury any hint of amusement.

“Have I insulted her? Has she said anything to you?”

He failed to hide it and released a closed-mouth chuckle.

“Ser Aymeric, she asked the same of you!”

His eyes widened in mortification, and his jaw dropped slightly. That he should be perceived as being insulted by someone like her, as if he had the nerve, felt unsettling.

“I…”

“She mentioned the return trip to Camp Dragonhead was… not the most pleasant of exchanges, to put it nicely. Now, Dia tends to do more than say, so it can be hard to interact; I cannot fault you for struggling to communicate. She does take some time to warm up, but with all due respect, Ser Aymeric, you must offer the hearth. I did so, and now, I couldn’t ask for a better friend and ally. You might find the same results, and clear up any misunderstandings, an important step if you truly wish to express personal gratitude.”

Aymeric kept his gaze to the floor. “Thank you for your candor, Haurchefant.” Soon after, he turned and exited the Intercessory alongside Lucia.

Haurchefant stayed behind to think. Perhaps it would be best to refrain from further intercession; ‘tis so amusing to watch Aymeric like this, he mused.

#ffxivwrite2021 #ffxivwrite #ffxiv #haurchefant greystone #female wol #aymeric de borel #fanfiction #two of my three favorite ishgardians #anyways in this canon they’re besties

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skampi835 · 3 years

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Hell of the Living

I just read about the Unloved Characters Month event, hosted by @the-moonlight-dreams a few days ago and I really wanted to give it a try (besides having a good idea which left me giggling). Caution though, my english isn’t the best. You’ve been warned!

Fandom: Ikemen Sengoku

Language: english

Genre: dark

Warning: blood, angst

Prompt: Day 11 - The Tavern

Word Count: 1.150

This turned out way darker than I thought. Maybe it’s not the best example for an unloving character, writing some dark fiction about him, but let’s just say I show my affection for Motonari by appreciating his madness. Don’t we love him, just because of that? No? - Argh damn!

Still I hope you’re enjoying this, because I had so much fun writing something about Motonari (and a hard time with the research and grammar).

“Yer know, what I mean, aye?”

Toasting to himself, Motonari brings his glass he’s holding to his lips. The liquid burned his throat, drowning down into his stomach and leaves a refreshing warmth. It expelled the weariness that crept in his mind for some time by now. Why was he so tired?

Licking the drops, which had left on his lips, with his tongue away, he silently sat his glass down on the table he’s leaning. The crimson painted sky preludes the end of the day and welcomes the night with its raising shadows which were growing longer. The noises from afar jingles like music in his ears, accomplished to lift his spirits ever so joyfully, while leaving a rarely prickle on his skin.

Motonari weary and lazily searched the inside of the tavern with these unusual magenta coloured eyes of his. The dim lights of candles and lanterns reflected in them, leaving a shimmer, like gleaming rubies. But of course... he was aware since when he took seat on one of the stools at the counter. He knew all along that he was alone in here, besides of the innkeepers company of course.

“Bet ya knew at first sight, that I wasn’t in Sakai for a damn long time, eh?” Motonari asks with a wry smirk, leaning against the wooden table. Resting his head in a palm of his white-gloved hands, his eyes are watching the innkeeper. “Gotta say, a bunch has changed, don’t ya think?” He snickered almost gushing. “Lookin’ pretty vast, if yer ask me.”

The innkeeper doesn’t answer, his stoic expression plastering to the window, as if there was anything special to look at. But there was only the fading crimson light of the night. A soft sigh escapes Motonari’s mouth, ending in a hum. “Say, I’d some time to think.” He mutters, his eyes following the glance of the innkeeper. “Sakai is the front door to the whole country, aye? Like an entranceway.” He explains almost patiently. “Gotta feeling, this’ll be the best place to start, eh?”

Slowly Motonari spins the glass above the table, still leaning on his elbow, which is lazily cupping his cheek. “Better than rotten Aki. But... hell, everywhere’s better than Aki.” His phony laughter fills the air, which is soaked with the smell of iron. “Isn’t it ironic, the place, that’s still mine, I hate the most?” Motonari smirks, inclining his head slightly, facing the innkeeper. “Why, would yer ask? Sorry, but that’s a hell of a story to tell and I’ll not waste my time to some bloody landlubber.”

As fast as the dark clouds rose in Motonari’s mind, he sealed the thoughts of despair and sorrow deep in his heart back again, locking it firmly away. Aki carried a long span of his life, whereas he’d thrown into the depths of hell. The amount of unspoken things he’d done, desperately dragging him out of this hell, just to find himself in an even worse one. It was... anomalous painful. But this feeling lasted not for long, forged into blazing, consuming hatred, as he’d seen the truth on the edge of his own.

Motonari vacantly runs his fingers over his white-gloved hands, like they were armor, realizing a tiny spot of dotted red on the cloth. For a short time, the wounds behind this madman lay open, just beneath the surface. But he was all alone, besides the innkeepers company of course.

Lifting his head, Motonari gazes to the innkeeper. “Ya wanna say something?” He snarls. But the innkeeper remains silent. Suddenly the warlord’s laughing ill, nearly smashing the glass, as he raps one white-gloved hand, formed to a fist on the bar. “This festering cesspit of a world doesn’t deserve peace, aye? It can drown in its own filth.” His frigid magenta eyes were scowling at the innkeeper.

A wicked smile appearing on his face, Motonari slowly lifts his empty glass to the innkeeper. “Pour me another one.” He demands. But like before, the innkeeper remains silent, for he wasn’t the one who had spoken a word at all. His hollow eyes are still staring at the window, wherefrom the orange flicker of fire threw the shadows back.

With a heavy sigh, Motonari rose on his feet, sauntering behind the counter. With one white-gloved hand he takes the opened bottle of sake, pouring the liquor into his glass. “Disappointing.”, he grumbles. “Ya still don’t get it, eh? That might is right and life is war. If yer weak, you’re dirt. And if yer strong, you get to survive by eating the remains of the others. THAT’s the way it is.” Motonari takes a little sip of the glass, gazing resigned over the innkeeper, before filling his glass anew.

Strings of blood leaving the crushed body that lays halfway on the bar with its torso. Its lifeblood’s steadily running over the bar, dripping slowly onto the floor, blending to the amount of puddles and splatters, which had already painted the inside of the tavern red. The flames from the candles, lanterns and from the fire, spreading outside the tavern with cracking noises, are mirroring in the red of the pools, turning the atmosphere gloomy.

The air is thickening with the scent of smoke and iron. The music from afar keeps echoing in Motonari’s ears with the sound of terrified screams and dirty laughers from members of his crew.

After quietly placing the bottle back on its spot, Motonari takes his time, to drink. This is right, wasn’t it? Victory gives control over everything. The lives of the losers, even their deaths, their disgrace, their wealth and their worth...

“I don’t give a damn about it.”, Motonari disgruntled snarls, tossing the glass over his shoulders. With a splintering clang it shatters on the wooden floor, while he’s stepping over a pool of blood, to round the counter. His cloak waves lightly over his shoulder, although soaked with dried splatters of dotted red.

“Told ya.” Motonari draws his sword from its sheath with an metallic sound, looking over his shoulder to the dead bodies he’d leave behind, wearing a sick smirk. “Sakai’s the front door to the whole damn country. I started the party by setting fire in the entranceway for everybody to see.” His vicious smirk creeps among the bloody scene, before he's turning. “If yer all not willed to damn see I simply HAVE to put the hell of a show! And when the blood from your broken bodies turns to froth on the sea and this world shows its glory consumed by an ocean of fire, THEN you just have to realize, that we’re already living in hell!”

As he exits the tavern, Motonari’s maddening laughter echoed hauntingly in the night. It mixes with the raucous sounds of the crackling fire from the burning buildings around and the dreadful, eerie screams in the alleys from the people, while his crew mercilessly ravaged the village. The flickering crimson flaming lights are illuminating the night, while sparks of embers floating up into the dark sky.

#ikemen series #ikemen sengoku #ikesen #fanfiction #ikesen fanfic #ikesen writing #ikemen sengoku fanfiction #ikesen fanfiction #ikesen fic #unloved-otome-2021 #ikesen motonari #ikemen sengoku motonari #motonari mouri #ikesen motonari fanfiction #ikesen motonari fanfic

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bestworstcase · 4 years

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in the wake of once a handmaiden i’ve seen a few posts drawing comparisons between the final shot of cass in the ruined throne room and either (1) varian at the end of queen for a day or (2) varian and the saporians in the throne room mid-rapunzel’s return. which... sure, i guess, but to me both of those feel a bit superficial, as parallels go. they’re like the “hu hu hu gothel said ‘now i’m the bad guy’ and so did cass (but the context and meaning is completely different)!” of comparing varian’s villain arc to cassandra’s SO INSTEAD!—

the plot of handmaiden is best understood, imo, as kind of moral argument between cassandra and zhan tiri. cassandra’s side of the argument is “i am not a bad person; i did bad things, but i can fix it.” zhan tiri’s side of the argument is “you can try to fix it, but you will fail, because just like me, you are a bad person.” cass pursues a convoluted plan to “fix” things that involves very low risk to her (and also in no way addresses the bad things she has actually done) because she is, deep down, afraid that zhan tiri is right. all zhan tiri has to do is coax that fear to the surface, then gently place her thumb on the scale to ensure that the fear becomes reality, to make cassandra snap, thus “winning” the argument.

when cassandra exclaims “zhan tiri was right!” after breaking free from the amber, she’s talking about the existence of project obsidian, but subtextually, she’s also talking about this argument. that’s is why the next thing out of cassandra’s mouth is “you want me to be the bad guy? fine. i’m the bad guy.” using zhan tiri’s potion against rapunzel and taking over corona is cass lashing out in rage, yes, but it also has an edge of defeat: zhan tiri is right, cass is a bad person.

thus, this final shot with her in the destroyed throne room of corona is not a triumphant moment; it’s grim, and dark, and she sits heavily and hunched over in her stolen throne. this is cass at what i would argue is her lowest, most miserable moment thus far. here, cassandra has achieved everything she’s worked for this entire season: she has total control over the moonstone’s power, she has usurped rapunzel’s destiny, brought corona to its knees, and claimed her throne. she has her power. she’s won—but she’s still angry, still hurting, still lost, and now that she knows who her “friend” is, she’s beginning to understand the ways she’s been (figuratively) imprisoned and (literally) manipulated and thus controlled, and the worst part? she has wholly accepted that she is a bad person, that she can’t escape from being a bad person, and the only thing left for her to do is embrace it no matter how awful it makes her feel.

she has never been more powerful, or more trapped.

NOW LET’S TALK PARALLELS!

in this scene at the end of tangled: before ever after, rapunzel faces her father’s wrath and disappointment. her coronation was crashed by a group of criminals who wanted to kidnap everyone in attendance, including her father, and rapunzel beat them soundly and saved everybody. instead of celebrating her accomplishments, however, all frederic can see is the danger she is in: because her famous magical hair is returned, and because she threw herself into a high-stakes battle against his express commands. he demands an explanation that she can’t offer fully (because she has to lie about cassandra’s involvement in the black rock adventure, in order to protect her friend from being forcibly sent to a convent), then doubles down on “protecting” her by controlling where she goes and what she does, literally imprisoning her in her own home.

like cass at the end of handmaiden, rapunzel’s victory earlier in the day should have been a moment of triumph, as a culmination of everything she longed for at the beginning of BEA: freedom, excitement, the ability to live according to her personal values and truths. instead, it’s soured and becomes a source of misery.

and, just as cass’s hollow victory at the end of handmaiden is visually represented by the framing, so too is rapunzel’s. in both shots, the throne room is in ruins and looks dark, cold, and unwelcoming, and cass and rapunzel are both dwarfed by the enormity of the room. but there are also a few key differences:

in the handmaiden shot, the camera looks straight into the throne room, making the set symmetrical save for where the black rocks and rubble have disrupted the order of the room, and cassandra is positioned in the exact center. this emphasizes the power cassandra has over this situation. fundamentally, this misery is something she did to herself. zhan tiri has never forced her to do anything; manipulated situations, twisted facts, and blatantly lied to persuade her, yes, but even so, every step cassandra has taken along the road to razing corona is one she took of her own volition. she isn’t intrinsically bad; she does have a choice.

whereas in the BEA shot, the camera is set at a slight angle and places the tiara in the center of the shot such that it separates rapunzel from frederic. rapunzel isn’t trapped by her own hopelessness, as cassandra is; frederic’s authority is real, and the conflict between them hinges on his overprotectiveness and the expectations and responsibilities of rule, both represented by the tiara (this symbolism continues through the rest of the scene; when fred confines rapunzel to corona and orders her not to speak to the black rocks to anyone, he hands her the tiara. it’s a physical symbol of the weight of his authority). while the handmaiden shot establishes that cass is sitting in a deep, dark pit of her own making, the BEA shot shows the precarious balance of rapunzel’s relationship with her father, the authority he has over her, and foreshadows his role as the major antagonist of the season.*

(*varian is the villain of season one, but fred is the antagonist in the sense that he is the primary obstacle preventing rapunzel, the protagonist, from achieving her goals.)

further, the BEA shot is much brighter than the handmaiden shot, with lots of moonlight pouring in through the windows and the side door and the polished floor reflecting it back while in the handmaiden shot, the entire room is in shadow save for a tiny beam of moonlight filtering through a broken window pane. the comparative brightness of the BEA shot reflects the comparatively lower stakes (rapunzel is being confined against her will, but the kingdom is not in immediate danger, and rapunzel has friends/allies whom she can rely on for emotional comfort, whereas in handmaiden the kingdom is literally in ruins and cassandra has driven away everybody but her emotional support demon). at the same time, the handmaiden shot is not entirely without hope: that last, lonely beam of light falls through the window and lands directly on cass, symbolizing that she is not past the point of no return.

lastly, comparing these two shots side by side is interesting because they can represent the broader conflict between rapunzel and cassandra. rapunzel struggles against external forces that seek to confine her or steer her in directions she doesn’t want to go, and most of the time she comes out victorious (by the end of s1, the clash with her father set up in the BEA shot is resolved with him encouraging her to leave corona and find her destiny). in contrast, cassandra’s struggle has always been internal: she is fighting her self-doubt, her fear of abandonment, her inability to believe that she is loved, her discontent with her station, and her tragedy is that she keeps trying to fix this internal problem with external solutions, and failing because she is applying a bandaid to a hemorrhage. and the end result is that she is left like this: sitting on a broken throne, in the ruins of a palace, in the dark, completely alone, with nothing.

BUT WE’RE NOT DONE YET!

let’s talk about varian.

varian’s villain arc and eventual redemption gets compared to cassandra’s a lot, and that makes sense because there are some obvious similarities. they’re both friends of rapunzel who eventually become frustrated with her, blame her for their problems, and lash out violently out of anger. however, i would argue that in spite of this, they are much more different than they are similar, and to talk about why we’re going to talk about the real parallel between varian and the handmaiden shot. and that’s this:

this shot, when varian is being dragged away by the guards in the middle of queen for a day, does not take place in corona’s throne room, but it has the exact same visual symbolism as both the handmaiden and BEA shots. varian is made insignificantly small in the enormous but somehow still claustrophobic halls of the palace, and the lighting is dark and cold to reflect the emotional mood of the scene. he is rendered powerless visually (he’s minuscule compared to rapunzel, who occupies fully a third of the shot and is the character with all the power in this scene) as well as literally (because he is being dragged away by two guards who are twice his size).

and, like both cass and rapunzel in the handmaiden and BEA shots, a moment that should have been triumphant for varian—he finally made it to the palace after a grueling journey through a deadly snowstorm, and he found the one person who might be able to save his father!—goes horribly wrong, and he’s reduced to begging frantically for rapunzel’s help while the guards drag him away from her and, back home, his father dies.*

(*of course, quirin does not actually die, but varian has no way of knowing that a year and a half from now, rapunzel will be able to safely release his father from the amber. for purposes of this analysis, quirin is effectively dead.)

ANYHOW. the key difference between this shot and the handmaiden shot is that for varian, this moment of powerlessness is a) not in any way his fault and b) happening at the very beginning of varian’s descent into villainy, rather than at the end or very close to the end.

this scene sets the rest of varian’s villain arc in motion. his agency is taken from him at a critical moment, preventing him from fixing a horrible mistake that cost his father’s life. instead of collapsing and being eaten alive by his own guilt, varian funnels his anguish into rage directed at rapunzel, who is easier to blame than himself (especially because he is fourteen and doesn’t grasp that rapunzel did make the correct choice when she refused to leave corona). this blame and anger is exacerbated by rapunzel’s inaction after the storm; in failing to check up on him, she leaves varian to fester in resentment until he finally just snaps.

like rapunzel in the BEA shot, varian is up against an external force (rapunzel) preventing him from achieving his goal of saving his father, and his villain arc is a kind of counterpoint to rapunzel’s s1 struggle against her father; they both fight back against their antagonists, she against fred and he against her, but varian does so in a violent, destructive way and thus ultimately fails to achieve his goal; rapunzel by comparison fights back by asserting her independence and relying on her friends/allies to help her, and ultimately achieves her goal by persuading fred to see her as a capable individual rather than an object to be guarded.

like cass, varian lacks rapunzel’s extensive support network; he spends his villain arc alone, stewing in his resentment and guilt, spiraling deeper and deeper until he is unrecognizable as the innocent boy he used to be.

unlike cass, however, varian has a clearly-defined, straightforward external goal: he wants to free his father and punish rapunzel for her inaction. as i discussed earlier, cassandra by contrast is trying to fix an internal problem with external measures, which is why her villain arc is so much messier and more complicated than varian’s, and why it has been driven partly by cassandra falling victim to the manipulations of a demon who keeps passing her concrete goals to pursue with the promise that achieving them will fix her problem.

and this is why varian’s handmaiden parallel happens at the beginning of his villain arc while the handmaiden shot occurs at the end or very close to the end of cassandra’s: the QfaD shot is varian’s inciting incident, but the handmaiden shot is cassandra’s end result.

in the QfaD and BEA shots, varian and rapunzel both have choices taken from them, and everything they do from this point onwards is driven by their drive to fix that injustice. but in the handmaiden shot, cassandra has given up on her ability to choose, and this comes at the end of a long, self-destructive road. unlike varian, whose villain arc hinges on an external problem with an obvious, clear-cut solution (save his father), cassandra’s villain arc hinges on an internal problem (she is unhappy, anxious, and hurting) with no real answer, and because she is unable to seek comfort from her friends (who have spent a year not treating her well in general) and rapunzel specifically (because rapunzel doesn’t hear her when she voices her pain, and because a lot of her pain is connected to or outright caused* by rapunzel), she clings to the first source of emotional validation and comfort she encounters—which happens to be an ancient, evil being who’s really just using cass as a means to an end, and who keeps telling cass, “if you do this bad thing, you will fulfill your destiny (and your pain will stop).” and cass, because she doesn’t know how to fix her problem, and because zhan tiri starts with small, palatable ideas like stealing the moonstone, swallows this hook, line, and sinker.

(*to be completely clear, the pain rapunzel caused stems from their argument in the great tree, cassandra’s subsequent horrific injury, and the way rapunzel blamed cass for everything that went wrong in the tree. i am not talking about gothel’s abandonment.)

all of which is a somewhat long-winded way of saying varian’s villain arc and cassandra’s villain arc are not really comparable, because varian’s involves him turning to extreme, violent, desperate measures to save his father, while cassandra’s involves a self-destructive downward spiral exacerbated by the machinations of a demon, and the timing of when these parallel shots in QfaD and handmaiden occur in their respective villain arcs perfectly encapsulates that difference.

#rta #tts #cassandra #rapunzel #varian #tldr i rant about visual symbolism and framing and character arcs #for ... a long ... long time.#tts spoilers

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scoutception · 4 years

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Final Fantasy II review

One of the most interesting parts of the Final Fantasy series, and a big reason why I’m so fond of it, is that every main series game takes its own approach to the gameplay. From the job systems of III and V, the Materia system of VII, the Junctioning system of VIII, or the straight up action combat of XV, every game has a different focus that makes them stand out, and while the results can certainly fall short at times, it’s still something worth commending. For example, take the subject of today’s review, Final Fantasy II. For the second game in the series, and a game that came out in 1988, it’s a huge step up from the original game in a lot of ways. A much more detailed plot, containing several defined playable and supporting characters, a much more experimental battle system, the introduction of many elements, gameplay and otherwise, that would establish a true identity for the series, away from just being a ripoff of Dungeons & Dragons 1st edition, it’s an impressive and critical step forward for the series. Unfortunately for the game, it hasn’t been 1988 in over 30 years, and it’s now easily the weakest game in the series in my opinion. As for why that is, well, that’s what we’re taking a look at today. As with the first game, I’m reviewing the PSP version. Note I’ll be pretty lax with spoilers, so take caution, if you actually care to avoid spoilers.

Story: Final Fantasy II takes place in an entirely different world than Final Fantasy I, a tradition that every main series game would follow. The peace of this world is shattered after the rise of Emperor Mateus of Palamecia, who, bent on world domination, raises a fearsome army and unleashes the denizens of Hell upon the land, conquering a large portion of the world. The city of Fynn organizes a large resistance effort, only to be attacked by the Emperor’s army, forcing a small remnant to flee to the town of Altair, establishing the Wild Rose Rebellion, led by Princess Hilda. During the fall of Fynn, four youths, Firion, Maria, Guy, and Leon, attempted to escape as well, only to be attacked and left for dead by the Emperor’s soldiers, with Leon going missing as well. Rescued by the rebellion, and healed by the white wizard Minwu, Firion, Maria, and Guy, having nothing left to return to, and wishing to search for the missing Leon, join the rebellion to fight back against Palamecia. Meanwhile, the Emperor, his army having taken heavy losses taking Fynn, takes to devising much less conventional methods of establishing his rule, starting with a massive airship called the Dreadnought, meant to scare the populace into obedience, on threat of total destruction.

Compared to the very light plot of Final Fantasy I, the story here is much more involved. Instead of wandering between locations more or less aimlessly, there’s always an explicit plot reason to go to new locations, the party being given tasks like finding mythril to supply the rebellion with better equipment, or trying to recruit potential allies. Compared to the party in the first game just being completely blank slates, the party consists of the more distinctive Firion, Maria, and Guy, with the fourth slot being filled by various guest characters that come and go as the story goes on, such as Gordon, the prince of the fallen kingdom of Kashuan, and Ricard Highwind, the last of the dragoons, and there’s actually an established side cast, including characters like Hilda, the leader of the rebellion and princess of Fynn, Paul, a noble thief assisting the rebellion, and Cid, a former knight who maintains the world’s only airship, with this notably being Cid’s first appearance in the series.

Final Fantasy II is also very noticeably darker than the first game. While the plot circumstances of the first game weren’t exactly cheerful, with the world falling apart due to the influence of the Fiends, outside of a select few towns, this wasn’t very obvious, and the game overall carried a bright, adventurous feel. Not so with Final Fantasy II, where the Emperor is a much more prominent and ruthless villain who’s already conquered or ruined a majority of the world, always keeping another plan on standby, and staying one step ahead of the heroes. Many characters die over the story, from random NPCs to even temporary party members, and the game overall carries a prominent melancholic, empty feel to it, one that’s very impressive considering the time it was made.

To be honest, however, it actually goes a bit too far in this regard. Almost everything the protagonists accomplish comes at the cost of allies dying, or something preventing them from fully completing their mission. Many NPCs are pessimistic about the chances of humanity being able to win against the Emperor, and so much destruction is wrought upon the world by the end that it seems there’s not even much left to save. From the very beginning of the game, which starts with your party instantly being destroyed in an unwinnable battle, the game is nothing but a constant stream of death and hollow victories, with plenty of characters you can find mourning their losses, and there’s very, very few points in the story that offer any sort of relief from it. Combined with the Emperor barely seeming bothered by anything the party accomplishes, and running circles around them more than a few times, it’s very easy to simply lose any investment in the story.

The characters unfortunately only add to this lack of investment. It’s hard to hold it against the game, but the main party of Firion, Maria, and Guy is still easily the least developed cast in the series. They have little dialogue to themselves to begin with, and have very minimal personality traits, especially Firion, who pretty much only exists to be the hero by default. Additionally, whereas in most RPGs, the cast’s varying personalities and skills tend to gain importance, here, the only skill any of them have is Guy being able to talk to beavers, which only comes up once in a way that doesn’t even affect the story, and, again, they have nearly no personality otherwise, which totals out to each of them having, at best, 1 moment each throughout the story where they’re not completely interchangeable with each other, which barely elevates them above the completely blank slate party of FF1.

The guest party members and NPCs fair a bit better, but not by much. The guests tend to be at least mildly interesting, like the fatalistic Minwu, the cowardly Gordon, who learns to be courageous as the story goes on, to the pirate girl Leila, but they’re still nothing special, and there’s surprisingly few other NPCs, most of which aren’t too memorable either. Even the Emperor himself is about one of the most stereotypical evil emperor characters you could have, not helped by the very few scenes he gets. That’s not to say he’s a bad villain, though. His successfulness does create a presence that looms over the entire story, and he pulls off one of the coolest plot twists in the series; after being killed by the party in a very easy battle late in the game, he simply returns as a demon himself, having become far, far stronger than he had ever been in life, to the point of taking over Hell itself. It’s such a unique and unexpected twist on the seemingly weak political villain that it alone cements the Emperor as one of the more memorable villains in the series. Overall, while the writing of the game is quite impressive for the time, and laid a good deal of groundwork for the improved writing of future entries, it’s just passable at best nowadays.

Gameplay: Here’s where things really start falling apart. On the surface, not much the combat doesn’t seem terribly different from Final Fantasy I, with it still being a standard turn based system with basic commands like attacking, using magic, and defending. The big differences in Final Fantasy II’s combat lie in the character progression. The first game had you simply selecting a party of 4 classes at the start of the game, gradually making them stronger across the game by leveling them up and acquiring specific equipment and spells for each, like pretty much every normal JRPG. FF2, on the other hand, uses a much more complex system. Every party member is capable of using every weapon and learning every spell, in the process abandoning the D&D system of set spell charges and instead introducing the traditional MP system, and characters are not set in specialized classes and roles. Instead, FF2 discards the usual EXP based leveling system, and instead uses a stat leveling system, where the individual stats of each character level up separately depending on the course of battle, and while each character starts with predetermined stats that favor a particular role for them, with enough grinding, you can still reshape them however you wish. This stat growth system would later be used and refined for the SaGa series, and it’s a very ambitious attempt at improving upon the party building system the first game established.

In total, there are 12 main stats that can be increased through battle: HP, your health points, which is raised in regular intervals, or losing HP in battle, MP, magic points that allow you to use spells, which is raised by having MP reduced in battle, Strength, which determines your physical attack, and is raised by using the attack command, Magic, which determines how much MP you get when it is gained, and is raised by having MP reduced in battle, Spirit, which determines the strength of white magic spells, and is raised by casting white magic in battle, Intelligence, which determines the strength of black magic spells, and is raised casting black magic in battle, Stamina, which determines how much HP you get when it is gained, and is increased by losing HP in battle, Evasion, which determines how likely a character can dodge physical attacks, and is raised by being targeted by attacks in battle, Agility, which factors into evasion calculation, and is raised by having high evasion, and Magic Defense, which determines how resilient a character is to offensive magic, and is raised by being targeted by offensive magic in battle.

However, it doesn’t stop there, as individual weapon types and spells also have levels that can be raised, which is done so by gaining skill points in them by attacking or casting them during battle. Once enough skill points are gained, they advance to the next level, with the hard cap being 16. Gaining weapon levels allows that character to be more accurate and attack more times at once with that type of weapon, and raising spell levels increases their power and makes them more accurate. Each weapon type, consisting of swords, spears, axes, staves, knives, bows, shields, and unarmed, have different attributes, such as spears being a relatively balanced type, with lower individual power than swords and axes, but higher accuracy, while bows are allow characters to attack from the newly introduced back row, which makes them immune to physical attacks, but prevents them from attacking with any other weapon type. While focusing on one weapon type with each character would seem the most efficient, the game only tends to give you one or two weapons of each type at a time, many of which have good boosts in power or added effects, making focusing on a few different types a decent idea.

Shields are unique in that, while equipping them doesn’t raise your defense as might be expected, and actually lower your attack, they give large evasion bonuses that makes dodging attacks much easier, and have the chance of blocking a physical attack completely even if something does connect, all of which increases as you gain levels in it. As for other defensive equipment, you have heavy and light types of armor, with light armor giving less defense bonuses than their heavier counterparts, but not weighing nearly as much, and thus leaving you much more evade. As for spells, they start out very underpowered, and have awful accuracy in the case of buff and debuff spells, but become much more effective after a few levels, with the downside of them costing more MP to cast with each level gained. Characters can learn up to 16 spells, and are free to remove them at any time, at the cost of having to level them again from scratch if they ever relearn them. Instead of simply learn spells by buying them in towns, spells are instead learned from tomes, which can be bought from shops, found in treasure chests, or dropped from enemies. Using them on the field teaches a character that spell, while using the tomes in battle instead casts a high level version of the spell, at the cost of losing that tome.

Unfortunately, as creative as this all is, this system has some serious issues. The main one, which you have already guessed, is that the game is incredibly, incredibly grindy because of these mechanics, and in a much worse way than most other RPGs. While not every stat is going to be important for each character, depending on how you build them, there’s still a lot of things it forces you to keep track of. Even if you want to make a dedicated mage, sticking in the back row with a bow for the whole game will leave them with so little vitality and HP that they’ll just be uncomfortably fragile, and with the magic attacks enemies have by the endgame, you really want to keep them in the front row for a good part of the game. Most spells, including important ones like Life and Esuna, for reviving party members and removing status effects respectively, while extremely useful, have such horrible accuracy to start that they’re completely useless before you level them up, and the weapon distribution is quite unbalanced, with swords having easily the best selection even in the midgame, essentially leaving most other types as stopgaps.

While you might level your important stats a good bit just naturally going through areas, trying to deliberately level any of them is a commitment. While HP, strength, spirit, intelligence, and magic defense tend to come easily enough, increasing stamina often only happens through the loss of a large chunk of their maximum HP, which, obviously, preferably doesn’t happen on a regular basis. This goes likewise for MP and magic, which is rather irritating, as not only do you need more and more MP as your spells level up, but ways to restore MP are extremely limited and costly. The bizarre loop of agility factoring in to evasion increasing, while itself only leveling up based on your current evasion, means that the only reliable way of increasing either is to equip the lightest equipment you have. While leveling up weapon levels is easy enough, especially since you can dual wield different types at once, leveling up spells is a much slower process, with casting low level spells during random encounters, even those that won’t actually help at the moment, often being one of the only feasible ways to get them leveled quick. You may even be tempted to ignore magic beyond simple spells like Cure because of the individual effort needed, but the game will quickly hammer the importance of magic into you; from the randomly encountered flans and bombs that either have absurd physical defense or tend to explode if not fully defeated in one turn, with magic being the only reasonable way to take them out, to mandatory bosses that hit quite hard, and also have enough physical defense to make physical attacks nearly worthless without absurd grinding, you’re not getting through the early game without dedicating some time to magic. On the flip side, another early dungeon has a boss that outright absorbs magic, making physical attacks the only way to beat it.

The game has quite a reputation for being brutal, and it’s not inaccurate, with most dungeons being more than glad to beat you down without remorse, and there’s tons of troublesome enemies to be found throughout the game, doubly so if you try to go for all the treasure chests in the area, as many of them are guarded by encounters called monster-in-a-box, which are often much more powerful than other encounters around. Most bosses are more than happy to make your life miserable too, especially the infamous Lamia Queen and Behemoth. However, this difficulty is in no way fair or well designed. While the growth system can easily leave you unsure as to whether or not you’re prepared for a dungeon, since you have no easy guideline to go off of compared to standard leveling, that’s not even the worst of it. The design of the dungeons, and even the world map, are horrible. There’s tons of doors scattered throughout pretty much every dungeon, and 90% of them lead to dead end rooms with raised encounter rates. There is absolutely no way to tell which doors are dead ends and which are necessary to progress, so you’re reduced to trial and error, which is extremely exhausting when there’s so many doors per dungeon, and you’re almost guaranteed to get into an encounter before you can leave each one, and if you’re tempted to ignore any doors when they don’t seem mandatory to progress, in many of those cases, there’s treasure rooms hidden among them, once again with no way to figure out other than guessing.

The world map, on the other hand, is one of the best arguments against open ended world design there is. Compared to the first game, there are almost no physical obstacles barring where you can go, other than a few rivers that are only crossable by canoe, something you get almost immediately, and a few areas only accessible by boat. Instead, you’re kept out of where you’re not supposed to be through the Dragon Quest 1 method of having the random encounters kill you horribly. The problems with this method are twofold: not only are the borders between where you’re supposed to be and where you’re not very thin, to the point of running into late game enemies just outside of the first town if you go just a biiit too far to the left, compared to Dragon Quest 1 often using bridges as visible borders between areas, but it just doesn’t really fit with how the game is designed. Dragon Quest 1′s pacing is rather relaxed, as while you do have plot objectives, the game doesn’t rush you to fulfill them. You’re meant to just hang around the areas you can survive in, grinding your way up and getting whatever equipment you need until you feel confident to move onto whichever area seems to be designed for next. In Final Fantasy II, you’re constantly being sent back and forth between areas to get new orders or do whatever the plot wants of you at that moment, but while the game loves telling where to go, it’s pretty bad at telling you how to get there, with its often vague directions being spread out between NPCs in multiple towns, to boot. While there is a map of the overworld you can access, it can still get pretty annoying having to meticulously check where you’re going, and you’re still liable to being decimated just because you wandered into a harmless seeming area. One nasty example comes after completing Kashuon Keep, not too far into the game. You’re expected to head back to Altair, which is on the other side of the world and is quite a bit of a walk, but heading south soon loops back to the Altair area, making for a much shorter walk. Trying to put this idea into practice, however, sends you across the large Palamecian desert, full of enemies more than eager to tell you that this area is still a few dungeons away from being accessed. It’s not completely unsurvivable, and can be safely traversed by finding the nearby hidden Chocobo, but it’s still a nasty situation after a very irritating dungeon.

The biggest, and most frustrating, source of difficulty, however, is that the game stubbornly refuses to tell you anything about what’s going on behind the scenes. There’s so many mechanics left unexplained that cause a lot of difficulty if you don’t understand them. For example, every enemy has a stat called rank, which determines how many skill points for your weapons and magic you’ll actually get by using them on said foes. Essentially, if your weapon or magic levels are higher than the enemy’s rank, you need to use that weapon or spell more times in that battle based on the difference between the numbers to actually get any skill points. Not an unreasonable system, and you can view every enemy’s rank in the bestiary, but the game never directly addresses this, and even the most powerful enemies only go up to rank 10, effectively softcapping your skills and spells at 10, which often leads into having your party attack each other to bypass the entire mechanic, a depressingly efficient solution most of the time. Other stats the game never cares to explain are evasion and magic defense, which both display both numbers and percentages. For evasion, the number represents the number of attacks that character is capable of dodging, as physical attacks strike multiple times per round, and the likeliness of evading each attack. With magic defense, the number represents the number of attempts at avoiding a status effect can be made, and the percentage represents the chance of successfully doing so. Despite the name, the stat does not reduce damage taken from magic attacks.

On the subject of magic, the spells available to you are also plagued with unneeded complexity and vagueness. First off, the descriptions for many spells tend to only give you the barest idea of what they actually do; Aura “Enhances effectiveness against various foes.” It never tells you what enemy types count, or that it only becomes effective against certain types as its level increases, you just have to hope that it’s working whenever you use it. Barrier “Raises a barrier to defend against special attacks.”, again giving you no indication as to what it’s actually protecting against. Shell and Wall both claim to raise magic defense, but give no obvious indication how they’re actually different from each other, and Dispel claims to remove protective magical barriers, which lowers the target’s magic defense, even though you may infer that it removes buffs, like in later games. Other spells tend to be redundant or very situational. Basuna removes temporary status effects, compared to Esuna removing permanent status effects, which is near worthless since not only do temporary effects wear off after a number of turns, but they go away after battle regardless, and are rarely effective enough to waste a turn removing. Fear increases the likelyhood of enemies fleeing battle, which is not only rare to actually work, but is worthless, since you don’t get any credit for defeating any enemies that do flee. Sap reduces the MP of the target, which is not only rarely likely to work, but counterintuitive if you have the infamous Osmose spell, which saps large amounts of MP while restoring the same amount for the user. Status effects also have different elements to them, namely body, mind, and matter, with most enemies having different resistances. Some spells, like Stop and Paralysis, have the same effect, but different elements, and keeping track is both difficult, both remembering which spell is which element, and what enemies are actually affected by each element, and nearly pointless, since the effects are rarely worth bothering with in favor of just attacking. Matter elemental spells, however, are rarely resisted by most enemies, even bosses, and mostly comprise of instant death spells like Mini, Break, Teleport, and most infamously, Toad. Not only does this game make instant death spells effective, it makes them downright overpowered, with almost every encounter being capable of being solved through judicious application of Toad.

But the peak of all this is a special property that some enemies, like ghosts and the final boss, have applied to their physical attacks: a draining effect that not only restores their HP by the amount of damage inflicted, but specifically inflicts 1/16th of the target’s maximum HP per hit, with them eventually attacking 8 times per turn by the final dungeon. To sum this up simply, this makes heavier equipment worse than worthless. Not only will the defensive power do nothing to protect from this damage, but it actively weighs you down and destroys your evasion, guaranteeing you’ll take all those possible hits unless your did some extreme evasion grinding. You’d be protected better by not wearing anything at all, because at least then you’ll make use of all your natural evasion. Unless you want to constantly heal your characters for half their health everytime you run into specific encounters, you have to dedicate a lot of your time, or most of your run through the game, to getting their evasion leveled enough that this isn’t a problem. Knowing this can be the difference between fruitlessly blowing all your resources and breezing through effortlessly, and there is a certain weapon, the Blood Sword, that has this same draining effect, which can singlehandedly annihilate the final boss once you’ve figured this out. While there’s a few other smaller issues, like several encounter formations that cannot be ran from for no apparent reason, other than possibly being formations used in certain monster-in-a-box encounters, those are the main issues, and being aware of them, and having the information to circumvent them, makes the game much, much easier. If anything, it makes the game extremely breakable. From physical attackers that dodge everything thrown at them, to spellcasters that can wipe out encounters with a single cast, it doesn’t take much to erase the difficulty once you know what you’re doing.

As for bonus content, there’s Soul of Rebirth, a bonus mode unlocked after completing the main game, first added in the GBA version, which focuses on several characters who die in the course of the story finding themselves in what they think is the Jade Passage, the path to Hell. While a cool concept that has a really neat final boss of its own, namely the light side of the Emperor, who split off from his dark half after death and instead took over Heaven, it still has issues of its own, namely that most of the party are guest characters in the main game, and carry over the stats, equipment, and spells they had when they left the party, meaning if you didn’t bother training them and stripped them of all equipment before they departed, you’re in an absurd time. The mode is also quite short, and only consists of two dungeons that are just mirrored versions of the final two dungeons of the main game and a town. A neat addition, but not much more than that. Other than that, the only optional content to find in the main game is the Arcane Labyrinth, a bonus dungeon added specifically for the PSP release. The game uses a keyword system where you can learn important terms from NPCs, and ask about those terms to get directions or a bit more plot. It’s sort of neat in concept, but in practice it doesn’t amount to much other than make it slightly more annoying to find out what to do, especially if you manage to miss a keyword. The Arcane Labyrinth, however, revolves around its use. In order to progress past the entrance, you must select a keyword at the portal to the next floor, which then takes you to a specific floor based around the keyword you chose. Almost every floor has a little sidequest to solve, like defeating specific enemies or giving items to NPCs, which give you new keywords exclusive to the labyrinth, or hints for some of the trickier floors. While they can be kinda annoying to do, you only ever have to complete them once for their reward, and can otherwise run straight to the exit on subsequent visits.

Every floor requires you to select keywords for the next, with 45 different floors being available in total, and the Arcane Labyrinth is actually split into 3 sections, with the northwest section requiring four floors to be visited, the northeast seven floors, and the south ten floors, though while you can’t visit the same floor twice in the same section, you can choose repeats in separate sections. There is much more strategy than simply randomly selecting floors, however. Each keyword belongs to a different category, which cause different reactions depending on your next choice. Picking keywords in the same category in a row cause better treasure to spawn and lower the encounter rate, while picking something in a category that opposes it, such as a matter and materials floor after going through a magic and spirits floor, has the opposite effect. Even more importantly, each playable character has a set of keywords that resonate with them, to varying degrees. This becomes important after finishing all three sections, which unlocks the Arcane Sanctuary. Within is Deumion, the master of the Labyrinth, who summons a superboss, Phrekyos, to test you, with its strength varying depending on how many keywords you’ve gotten through the story, making it beatable even in earlier parts of the game. Beating Phrekyos allows you to get a reward from Deumion; if you picked enough keywords that resonate with a certain party member, you will be able to get their ultimate weapon, which not only have tons of power, but confer massive stat boosts when equipped. If your keywords didn’t resonate enough, you only get an elixir, something that you can buy, albeit with absurd amounts of money. The optimal keywords for the main party are only unlocked in the endgame, but it can actually be worth visiting early for the party members that are used in Soul of Rebirth, as the weapons make it much more manageable, though visiting too early can end with you being much too powerful compared to how you should be. A special set of keywords also allow you to see Deumion’s past, leaving you able to either peacefully receive from him the Revive spell, or fight him as the ultimate superboss for the Destroy spell. Both are disgustingly impractical, but it’s a neat idea nonetheless. Overall, the Arcane Labyrinth, though still rife with its own set of frustrations, is actually one of the more enjoyable bonus dungeons I’ve come across, with a very creative concept that actually leaves you curious as to what the next floor could hold.

Overall, while the gameplay of Final Fantasy II has some interesting ideas, it’s held back by an irritating lack of explanation as to how it works, the overly grindy design, and just plain poor design and execution. It’s a miserable experience that makes even other early JRPGs seem appealing, just because their grinding is so much simpler to handle, and I need to note, this is the most polished version of the game. Between bugs, a horribly limited inventory, and even more absurd design decisions, like stats sometimes decreasing instead of increasing, or weapons massively decreasing magic accuracy, and increasing skills taking even longer, any version earlier than the GBA version is even more infuriating and even less playable.

Graphics: Final Fantasy II is actually a quite nice looking game, as with the rest of the Final Fantasy releases on PSP. Locations have a lot of detail to them, like ambient effects like rolling fog, and noticeable lighting effects, with a few areas like Pandemonium having pretty fascinating designs, and there’s some pretty good looking cutscenes for bigger story events. Spell animations are pretty neat, and attack spells have a nice detail where their animations become more elaborate as you level them up more. Characters even finally look accurate to their original art by Yoshitaka Amano, unlike earlier versions, though that’s not necessarily a positive: between Firion’s random mishmash of materials and colors, Maria and Guy’s awkward, half complete outfits, and the terrifyingly gaudy Emperor, this is possibly the tackiest looking cast in the series. The monster designs, on the other hand, are top notch. After Final Fantasy I’s bestiary was lifted almost entirely out of D&D, this game introduced a lot of original and iconic enemies, like the coeurls, the bombs, the malboros, the adamantoises, and the behemoths. It even introduced chocobos, though it’s easy to miss their existence, as their confined to one spot on the world map that’s decently hidden. While there are still a lot of oddities like vampires and giant mantises, it’s still one of the biggest advancements in the series in this regard. The enemy designs also excel in that they look much more threatening than in the first game. These enemies literally come from Hell, and look the part. I’d even go so far as to say that this is the best looking Final Fantasy game on the PSP, and has some of the coolest enemy designs in the series.

Sound: Final Fantasy II’s soundtrack was composed by Nobuo Uematsu, as usual, and remixed by Tsuyoshi Sekito for the remakes. All things considered, it’s my least favorite soundtrack in the main series. That’s not to say it’s bad at all, and there are some great tracks like the Rebel Army Theme, the somber main theme which plains on the overworld, Ancient Castle, the Tower of the Magi, Battle Theme A, typically used for major boss encounters, and Battle Theme 2, the final boss theme. However, as an overall, it’s just not quite as good as the soundtracks for the rest of the main series, to me. It also contains my least favorite version of the Prelude, being just a bit too high pitched for my liking, and my least favorite battle theme, sounding way too intense just for regular encounters, and quickly becoming grating not too far into the game. The soundtrack is good in its own right, and is worth a listen, it just doesn’t quite reach the heights that some of the others do.

Conclusion: Overall, I give Final Fantasy II a firm not recommended. Though very ambitious and important for its day, its story, design, and mechanics have aged like milk compared to the other Final Fantasy games on the NES. While technically still perfectly playable, especially with deeper knowledge as to how the mechanics work, it doesn’t make for much fun at all. You’re better off keeping your distance from this entry. Now, with this absurdly long review finally done, finishing this game, and the subject of my next review, hopefully to be soon, have convinced me I need a break from older RPGs for a while. Till next time. -Scout

#final fantasy #game review #long post #jrpg #final fantasy ii #square enix

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alexanderlightweight · 5 years

Text

what doesn’t kill me makes me want you more

for @signoraviolettavalery

technically it started out as a part of whumptober no.4 (human shield) but it gained life because of a discussion a while back

warning: violence, injury, minor character death

ao3 link

Antar reigned supreme and Earth had finally relented, not a complete surrender but close enough to one that Antar had been appropriately gracious. Still, some rebellion remained and as leader of Antar’s armies, Michael was the primary target for discontent and revenge. What had begun as a routine security check had turned to politics and now, he was being forced to consider a human bodyguard. For some it would be an insult, others an annoyance and for Michael, he’d been prepared to find as much amusement as possible in it, until he’d seen who Isobel wanted as his bodyguard.

The son of one of Earth’s greatest rebels, the child of a terrorist who had supported genocide and the love of Michael’s life.

“You want him , to protect me?” Michael asked, derision dripping from his tone and he ignored the flash of hurt in Alex’s eyes. A decade of cat and mouse, of always being in the wrong place at the wrong time, of having the wrong parents and now this? He would hurt Alex as much as he needed to if it meant sending him away from this mess.

“Micheal, Alex Manes is one of Earth’s most prominent warriors?” Isobel asked in confusion, “his military accomplishments speak for himself even if his skill on the battlefield didn’t. I thought you were willing to have a human bodyguard as a show of trust?”

“Yes, well not him. Wasn’t it his father who nearly killed my mother? And you expect me to trust him to protect me? This is probably what they want.” Michael said and he crossed his arms over his chest, raising his chin just a little and making the room rattle, as if he were losing control at the very prospect of Alex Manes protecting him. The reality was vastly different and yet so dangerously close to the truth.

“That is why it’s important you let him protect you,” Isobel hissed quietly, looking around as if to make sure they wouldn’t be overheard. “If you’re that worried about it, I’ll look into his mind.”

“No!” Michael swallowed down the second protest, licking his lips nervously. “No, if you do that and they find out, it’ll make this whole thing pointless. Better for me to handle it.”

“So you’ll accept him?” Isobel was still worried about his outburst but he could tell she was relieved.

“I won’t accept him,” he said, louder than before and if the room shook, no one needed to know that it was because he definitely saw Alex’s flinch. “But he’ll do until I can replace him.”

“Good,” Isobel said and her eyes flashed with victory. “Manes, you’ll report to Michael’s head of security, understood?”

Michael bit back a curse as he watched Alex agree, this was one of his worst nightmares and he couldn’t even wake up from it.

Michael knew that if the assassins didn’t kill him, then being this close to Alex and having to ignore him would.

It was a torture that he bore with far less dignity than he should have but it was a torment designed to drive him mad.

How was he supposed to stay sane when protocol dictated that Alex enter any room first? Michael had to watch Alex stalk with a predators gait before him without being able to outwardly admire it. Had to imagine how it would feel, if Alex were shot. Would he stagger first? Or rally and go for the weapon that Michael had personally built and insisted that he use?

Michael had given it to him, claiming that he was worried about Earth’s inferior technology rather than admit he just wanted Alex to have something that Michael had created. They were almost never alone, surveillance or Michael’s own guards or Isobel’s spies and every time he thought they would get a chance to speak, to clear the air- they were interrupted.

At night, Michael would wake up thrashing and in the throes of nightmares. He’d lie there panting, the dream of Alex’s face paling from bloodless haunting his sleep and as much as he hated it, he would demand Alex’s presence. Force him to check the windows that were sealed with Michael’s powers, just to see him safe and alive and breathing.

If the worry of Alex being hurt was painful, then the dreams of him dying were the cruelest torment.

Michael faltered only once, half asleep by the time Alex had finally turned to go and Michael had reached out. Grabbed desperately at him with his powers, pulling him to the bed and wanting nothing more than to tuck Alex in next to him, to hold him in his arms and shelter him from the world.

He hadn’t been able to do any of that.

Alex had gone limp in his hold, head lolling back as he surrendered to what he thought was an act of self-defense on Michael's part and for one terrifying moment, Michael had thought he’d killed him. He’d been furious with himself and with Alex for that image.

In the nights that followed the incident, sleep did not come easily and when it did oh, how the nightmares followed.

Now, when Michael dreamt of Alex’s death, he dreamt of snapped bones and a brittle body. Of vacant, glassy eyes and the cracked and bleeding smile forming the words “as you wish. ” He dreamt that the grave he wailed over was one of his own making.

If Alex died, there would be no grave. Michael would bring him back to life if he had to use an entire city to do so and if Alex protested that, well, what was one more hurt between them at this point?

It was days after and Michael had refrained from calling Alex to his room, no matter how bad the nightmares got and how reassuring it would be to see him. Instead he soaked up Alex’s presence during the day, watched him without caring who noticed and of course, someone did.

“I thought you were trying to protect me, not kill me.” Michael muttered, rubbing furiously at his shoulder from where he’d walked into the doorway.

“Who said I can’t do both?” Isobel asked teasingly, “besides, I’ve seen the way you look at him. Consider this a gift from me, you get to enjoy some eye-candy before karma catches up with him.”

Michael swallowed and reluctantly turned to look at Alex. Alex who was wearing a new uniform that consisted of a black leather jacket and tight leather pants that had been specially modified to adjust for his prosthetic while still doing the utmost at framing his ass.

Michael wasn’t going to survive this and every time he turned around, he was reminded that no one expected Alex to either, they just happened to be for very different reasons.

The dart hit Alex first, he went down with it and Michael froze, watching his body hit the ground felt like a thousand fears coming true at once. It was only the beginning.

He and his men were targeted next, sharp needles piercing through armor and skin and Michael could feel the instant disconnect from his power, the nearly overwhelming wrongness of his skin.

He ached and Alex was too far away for him to hold.

“Sir!” One of his men called and Michael grit his teeth, gathering his balance as he remained standing even as others fell around him. He was stronger than them, stronger than his enemies and he would prove that.

There was a drop, a mere taste of his power still at his disposal and he readied it. He knew the darts were only the first part of the attack, a rare but effective way of subduing Antarans. Bullets were easier to apprehend but darts, those led the way for further destruction and brought death in their wake.

Just a few feet away, Alex got back to his feet and Michael heaved a sigh of relief even as Alex turned towards him.

Michael tasted it first, warm droplets of salty iron on his lips, even before he saw Alex stagger. His name fell like a desperate warning, a plea from Alex’s lips as he staggered. Michael caught him before he could fall, cradling him closer than he’d been allowed to for what felt like years. Alex’s body, so warm and so close and bleeding out in his arm. More shots rang out but he could only focus on Alex who was once again leaving him behind.

“We have the sniper,” one of his soldiers said, “but the area is still unsecured. Sir, we need to get you to the ship. Now!”

Michael ignored him, sinking to his knees as he gently lowered Alex’s body to the violet ground. “Alex,” he whispered softly and pressed his hands down on his chest, feeling the delicate creak of human bones protest beneath his palms. “Alex please, not like this. Not ever.”

“Michael, you need to go. I’ll be okay, but you need to go.” Alex said and Michael shook his head in protest. He felt numb, empty of everything but desperate fear and his breath hitched when a warm, wet palm pressed against his cheek.

It was a sick, twisted mimicry of a lovers embrace. How Alex used to cradle his jaw before gently tangling his hand through Michael’s curls to pull him down for ardent, adoring kisses.

“Michael, please. Go .”

He could feel Alex’s bloody handprint on his cheek like a brand to his soul, memorized the brush of his fingers through a few stray curls and could imagine how he must look. Hair stained crimson and face claimed by a dying lover, a cruel imitation of a promise he’d always craved.

“Get him to safety,” Alex said. A final command and they listened, Michael’s own warriors disobeying their leader, their ruler as they pulled him away.

“Alex,” Michael called and he fought the arms on him, “ Alex !”

Michael let out a litany of curses, his voice heralding threats of violence on both them and their families and vowing to destroy all that they represented but still they wouldn’t listen.

Betrayal.

“Someone will retrieve the body,” a soldier informed him, “as soon as you’re safely secured, Sir.”

Michael went limp, let himself be dragged just long enough for them to think that he’d listened as he reached deep within himself. It was a place he rarely dared go. That hallowed, hollow place inside where Rath resided.

They could contain Michael but Rath would never allow himself to be subdued. It was why Michael buried that part of him so far down that it was forgotten, even by himself at times. One should always have a contingency plan and Rath was Michael’s. Michael couldn’t be sure how this would end but if Alex lived then it would all be worth it.

Rath awoke from Michael as a swimmer surfaced from the deep, born anew and greedy for air.

Rath was not Michael or his men, to be so limited by something as fickle as a pollen filled dart. No, Rath was power and it could not be stripped from him.

The soldiers were pushed aside, batted away as easily as a child discards a useless toy. Across the divide his powers found Jesse Manes and they broke him, an afterthought that Rath barely took note of. There were things of far more importance than the death of an enemy.

Normally, Rath demanded his lovers to come to him but for Alex, always and only for Alex he would set aside his pride. Rath’s feet barely brushed the ground, power practically begging to be put to use as he finally reached the man he loved and oh, how beautiful but broken could one man be.

Where Michael would have asked and pleaded for Alex to stay, cajoled and sweetly begged him, Rath demanded. It took but one move for him to kneel and around him his soldiers followed, by no will of their own but by Rath’s command. For Alex, he might kneel but the world would crumble before he bent the knee for anyone else. Max sat on a throne not by his merit alone but by the grace Rath showed in allowing him to rule.

“You will not leave me,” he told Alex, “or the blood of a thousand worlds will water your grave.”

Alex laughed, blood bubbling against his lips and dyeing them the sacred red of life. Michael would have wiped it gently away but Rath claimed it for his own with a demanding kiss. Alex’s breath was too precious to be lost to the atmosphere. If they were to be his last than Rath would hoard them away, a treasure far too valuable to be wasted.

“You’re safe,” Alex told him, promised him. “Safe from my family, from my father and safe from me.”

“You tore my heart apart once,” Rath reminded him, “and it never healed the same. How could I ever be safe from you when everything I do is because of you?”

“Michael.”

“If you’re are lost to me, what reason is there to spare the living? If death takes you from me, why should the universe be allowed to thrive?” Rath and Michael asked both in agreement and both tragic in love.

“You always were overdramatic,” Alex said and he coughed, weaker still than before.

“You always did think too little of yourself.” Rath told him, “one of the many things I am going to change. No more pretending, no more hiding away from the truth.”

“What truth?” Alex asked and his eyes widened in alarm when Rath began to unbutton his shirt, pulling aside his armor. “You can’t heal,” he said desperately. But a dying man’s desperation was no match for a living god’s determination, “that’s not one of your powers. Michael, it could kill you. Stop, please.”

“One of my powers?” Rath asked almost thoughtlessly as he pressed his hand to Alex’s marred skin, “you don’t know the extent of my power, Alex. No one does. They will though, if it means keeping you then I’ll tear this galaxy apart and move on to the next. Once, the records named me a star killer. For you, I’ll let them remember why.”

Alex mouth, lovely and stained, opened to no doubt utter a protest and when Rath pressed down, he screamed instead.

It was a beautiful sound, full of pain and life and strength and it belonged to Rath. Every precious moment of it was a promise, a vow that Alex would not be taken from him, that he could not be taken from him. Rath was born to defy fate, he had conquered life and he had martyred death and he would not let the mortal downfall of compassion change that now.

It was Rath’s powers that brought Alex back to life but it was their arms that carried Alex to the ship, to safety and to their bed. Where he was placed with gentle reverence where he belonged and where he could be kept safe. Even healed Alex’s body was too still for his liking but he knew, from the handprint that connected them that he was still alive. He could feel every beat of Alex’s heart like an echo of his own.

From the moment Rath had connected them, he had felt everything that Alex had tried to hide. All this time Alex had pretended that his heart had hardened and that the love he felt for Michael had calcified and decayed but Rath knew now that the bitter, beautiful truth was that he loved Michael. That Alex’s heart beat for him alone, that he adored Michael with such a devout fervor that it had Rath’s own heart aflutter in aching, twinned sympathy. He’d never doubted Alex’s emotions but to feel them, what a balm to the soul it was.

“Michael!” Isobel called and she ran to him, a sister relieved to find her kin alive and well. It pinged something in him, a softening of his outward stoicism and he allowed her to embrace him. Wrapped his arms around her in return and held her close, knowing that things would change between them very soon.

“You’re alright?” She asked worriedly and stepped back, hand on his shoulder, “did Manes threaten you? They said you wouldn’t leave his body, someone even said you tried to heal him? Are you okay?”

“The enemy was dealt with. Jesse Manes is dead and retrieving Alex Manes body was simply a show of goodwill,” he said and tried to match his voice to hers. It was a little stiff, but he knew that it would be attributed to shock, “Earth can’t claim us callous with their warriors.”

“So he is dead?”

“It’s simply incredible what a skilled hand can do.” Rath said with a smirk and then smoothly added, “the armor he wore was well made.”

“That’s a relief,” Isobel said, “apparently he’s friends with Liz.”

“Really?”

“Yes, I didn’t want to alarm you but gods, can you imagine how annoying Max would be if Liz lost a friend.” Isobel gave a deliberate shudder, “the amount of consoling I’d have to pretend to be capable of.”

“You are capable of it,” he reminded her.

“Yes, but I’d have to pretend to be sad about her friend.”

Rath clenched his hand, the one that had given life back to Alex and pasted a roguish grin on his face, “you wouldn’t be?”

“For Alex Manes? Half the reason I let him be picked as your bodyguard is because I knew he’d do anything to prove he wasn’t like his father.” Isobel’s smirk was tinged with cruelty, “fair is fair after all. Mara and I both agreed that if he died to save your life, it would be

“My mother was part of this scheme?”

“I wasn’t about to let her find out from the rumor mill that the son of the man who tried to kill her was protecting her only child. She agreed that his death would be a fitting punishment for his families crimes.”

“And now?”

Isobel shrugged, “he’s proven himself but he’s still a Manes. Once the rebellion is crushed for good he’ll be discreetly sent away. I doubt Mara will have him killed, not after he successfully protected you. However there won’t be a place for him, not on Antar.”

“How tragic,” Rath mused, “that’s practically ruthless, Vilandra .”

Isobel turned, eyes sparking and defiant, “we’re not them, Michael . I have no need of that name. This was to protect you, to have justice that otherwise would never have happened.”

“Of course. As you say, it was merely justice.” He kept his tone light and even gave a gentle, playful tug on her hair.

Isobel relaxed and looked relieved, he knew that her abilities, the history that she could claim, it scared her. She ran from her legacy as did Max. Michael however had never truly ran from the truth, only hidden it until it was of need and now, if he was going to have Alex by his side and keep him safe, Rath would always be needed.

They both would.

For Alex, Rath would destroy the world and for Alex, Michael would rebuild it.

Michael had never been able to leave a mark anywhere on Alex but Rath’s, his would never fade.

“I should be dead.”

Rath scoffed as he shook his head, ignoring Alex’s absurd statement, “I don’t appreciate blasphemy being spoken in my own bed.”

Alex ignored him, narrowing his eyes in reprimand, “Michael.”

Rath ignored him, reaching to press his hand to match the print on Alex’s chest.

“Fine, Rath .”

Rath’s lips curled into a smirk, the victorious pleasure of his name being said blossoming between them, a fruitful garden of triumph.

“ Alexander ,” his fingers danced against their glowing match, “my ardent defender. Protector of my heart.” Alex gasped, low and soft and for his ears alone, just as this admittance was for Alex only.

“After all this time, why now?”

“If there were ever a reason for me to destroy the world, it would be you.” Rath promised and leaned forward, pressed a kiss to Alex’s brow and then resting his cheek against Alex’s jaw. “Will you deny the same?”

“How can I,” Alex asked as his hand joined Rath’s over their connection, “how can I lie to your face knowing you feel the truth.”

Rath kissed him then, a reward and a consolation.

“What about your family? Your duties? The politics of you being with a human are complicated enough but me, how will it even work?”

“We’ll worry about that later,” Rath promised, “first though, first we’re going away. Just the two of us. Everything else can wait, this time is ours.”

The ship was small and the stars before them seemingly endless as Alex stood on the observation deck.

“How are you feeling?” Rath asked, pressing a kiss to Alex’s bare shoulder. The wound he’d borne in defense of Michael had left no scar, but the handprint would remain. A stark reminder that he had almost died, almost been taken away and that by Rath’s power he’d lived.

“Good, healthy.” Alex said and turned, tilting his head and allowing himself to be wrapped in a tight embrace. “How are you?”

“Ready to show you the stars.”

“How do you know I haven’t seen them?” Alex asked, “we spent years apart. I could have seen all of this without you.”

Rath scoffed even as Michael’s petulant irritation welled, “then I’ll discover new ones.”

“You’re going to compete with the universe then?”

“I’m going to win against the universe,” Michael said and Rath settled, going nowhere but pleased and just as excited as he was. “I already have, after all I have you.”

#whumptober2019 #no.4 #malex fic #roswell new mexico #rnm #malex #violence #injury #michael guerin #alex manes #isobel evans #rnm fic #my fic #fanfic #fanfiction #Words of October

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delkios · 5 years

Text

Sick as a Dog (ToV)

Spent all day at work and forgot that it was Saturday oops. Title: Sick as a Dog Fandom: Tales of Vesperia Rating: PG Word Count: 1888 In Responds to: Fluri Week 2019: Sick Saturday Characters: Yuri, Flynn, Repede Summary: Pre-game. Few things can resolve a rocky relationship like sick family. "Repede, c'mon," Yuri's knees were aching from how long he'd been crouched on the wooden floor, back aching just as much from peering under the bed almost as long. "You need to at least drink." The dark lump under the bed made a noise that sounded surprisingly like a refusal while also sounding rather pitiful. Yuri growled and sat up so he could bang his head and a fist on his mattress. "Come on, Repede," he gritted out, worry fraying his patience to mere threads, "get out of there!" He'd tried to pull Repede out earlier but the dog had whined and snapped at him, struggling enough Yuri had let go, not wanting to risk hurting him in his already weakened state. As Yuri was contemplating the effort it would take to move his mattress and flip the bedframe on its side to get at Repede, there was a knock on the door. Both grateful and annoyed at the distraction, Yuri yanked open his door with a barely contained snarled, "What?"

Standing on the other side was Flynn, carrying two bowls on a tray. "I was told Repede is sick. And that I'm supposed to make you eat." When Yuri made no move to do more than stare blankly at him, Flynn pushed the tray into Yuri's abdomen, causing him to take it reflexively. He stepped inside the room, "Where is he?" Yuri looked down at the tray, recognizing it and the worn bowls as coming from the Comet's kitchen. One was a stew, chunks of potato and carrot floating in a dark tomato and wine-based sauce, the other a clear yellow stock that smelled like chicken. The scent of both made Yuri's stomach grumble. He set the tray aside hastily, some of the stock sloshing over the side. He closed the door and rounded on Flynn who was now crouched in almost the exact same position Yuri had been moments earlier. Flynn's hair was matted down though the ends curled slightly. It seemed he'd been in the misting rain long enough for it to actually soak in, droplets hanging from his chin and armor, the half-cape sticking against his back. Must have just gotten in from a patrol, though where on the palace grounds he'd be patrolling that would get mud tracking up his greaves, Yuri hadn't a clue. Yuri felt ridiculously self-conscious, even with Flynn in a more disheveled state than he. Keeping out of Flynn's sight, Yuri ran hands through his hair, trying to tame the flyaways and tangles he'd put in there earlier and surreptitiously dust off his clothes from laying on the floor he hadn't cleaned in who knew how long. Figuring he was as put-together as he'd ever get in this situation, Yuri asked in his most nonchalant tone, "Why are you here, exactly?" Flynn barely gave him a glance. "I care about Repede as much as you do." He pulled off his gauntlets, holding a hand under the bed while making as soft clicking noise. "You've been slacking on the child support." "Really? You want to have an argument about this right now?" There was movement under the bed and Yuri tilted his head slightly to one side. Repede had his face pressed against Flynn's scratching fingers. Traitor. "Have you had anyone look at him?" "With what money?" "Do you even know what's wrong with him?" Flynn asked, a bite of irritation in his words at Yuri's flippancy. Yuri's own mouth twisted as he said, "He'd been eating onions." Flynn sat upright, expression accusatory. "You know onions are dangerous for dogs!" "Yeah, I do," he snapped back, "Ted and his friends were sneaking parts of their lunches to him behind my back. I'm not a complete idiot, Flynn." After the uneasy truce that settled between them in the last year, Yuri had expected to feel insulted at the accusation. He hadn't expected it to still hurt so sharply, though. Flynn looked contrite about it, at least. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have accused you of being so irresponsible." He reached back out to stroke Repede's head. "That explains why Ted had been so adamant that I come here, at least." "Mm." Yuri would probably have to apologize to the kids at some point. He hadn't meant to snap at them as harshly as he had when he realized they'd been accidentally poisoning Repede but seeing his dog weak and shaking and throwing up had rattled Yuri considerably. For an entire night he had thought Repede might die and even now, with the worst of it passed, Yuri still couldn't help the fear that Repede would never get better. Flynn reached out with both hands, cupping Repede's jaw between them. Then Flynn closed his eyes, a line of concentration forming on his brow, and his hands began to glow a pale green. Repede's ear flickered, making a soft noise of confusion while Yuri stood there, shocked. He watched as the light deepened, struggling to form a glyph before the magic dissipated and Flynn let out a frustrated sigh. "I'm sorry, Repede," he stroked the dog's head, Repede's tail thumped weakly, "I still haven't gotten the hang of it." Yuri sat down, back against bed. "Was that a healing spell?" "An attempt." Flynn stood to grab the bowl of stock. "It's been slow going. Magic is tough to wrap my head around." Something tightened in Yuri's chest. Only officers were taught magic and even though he knew that was the track Flynn would have to take to fulfill their- his -dream, Flynn had managed to cross that huge gulf between ranks without Yuri realizing it. What else had he missed since he left the knights? What had Flynn accomplished that he hadn't thought was worth telling Yuri because he was too humble to mention them? Because he was too busy to talk with Yuri that often? Because he didn't want to seem a braggart while Yuri was stagnant? Because their relationship was on the rocks? "Here, Repede," Flynn said softly, setting the bowl down. "You need to keep hydrated." When the dog made no move to get up and drink, Flynn dipped two fingers in the bowl, letting them soak for a couple seconds before holding them out to Repede. Yuri held his breath- Repede seemed so fragile these last two days, unable to bring himself to eat and rarely drank -as Repede sniffed at Flynn's fingers. Then gave them a tentative lick. Then again, until every last trace of the stock had gone. "Come on," Flynn said softly, pushing the bowl a little closer. "Have some more." Repede crawled to the bowl, lapping it up slowly. Yuri let his breath out, simultaneously relieved and hurt. "He always listens to you," he said, unable to keep the bitterness from his voice. "Don't know why he came with me." What did Yuri offer him? Freedom to do what he wanted, sure, but it was always one aimless, struggling day after another. With Flynn, Repede would have a purpose, better care, better food. A better life. "Did it ever occur to you that Repede listens to me at times like these because I baby him when he's hurt?" Yuri looked at Flynn in surprise. "What?" Flynn returned that look with one that had a teasing gleam to it. "Sometimes, when you're not feeling well, affection helps you feel better." "I know that." It wasn't as if Yuri wasn't the same, memories rising up of pressing his face into Flynn's chest as if his best friend's arms would protect him from feverish misery. Of still pretending to be feeling unwell just so he had excuse to curl with Flynn for a little longer. "You're not exactly an affectionate person, Yuri." "I can be," he said a tad defensively. "Not easily. You act like being open and straightforward with your emotions gives you a rash." "You don't know that it doesn't," Yuri said mostly so he'd have the last word. Flynn rolled his eyes and let him have it. Repede, having had his fill of the stock, crawled out further and pressed his face into Flynn's lap. Flynn made soothing sounds, running his fingers through Repede's fur. Yuri's victory felt pretty hollow in comparison to that. They sat in silence for a few moments, Yuri not wanting to disturb the scene. He almost felt like an intruder in his own room, watching the comfort and connection between the two as if he'd never been part of it himself. Then Flynn gently shifted Repede's head away, wincing slightly as he moved to mirror Yuri's position against the bed, leaning forward to pull off his greaves, and pauldrons and half-cape. When he settled back, Repede moved around, pressing his body down the side of Flynn's leg, resting his head back on Flynn's lap. Yuri watched as Repede's eyes blinked slowly, barely opening each time as he verged onto sleep. "Did you ever think it a possibility," Flynn said softly, startling Yuri out of his trance, "that Repede is difficult with you when he's sick because he doesn't want to disappoint you?" Yuri's brow furrowed. "What do you mean disappoint me?" "By being a burden." "He's not like that with you." "I'm not his partner." He rocked back slightly because, when Flynn put it like that, it made sense. There'd been many a time in their past that Yuri would downplay an injury or hold in his emotions to keep Flynn from worrying, from thinking of Yuri as weak or pitiable or burdening Flynn with his own issues. And he knew Flynn had done that to him and it would drive the both of them mad whenever they caught the other doing it but they always did. Because Yuri never wanted Flynn to think badly of him. But could a dog understand such abstract concepts? Repede whined, moving his head to stuff his snout between Flynn's arm and side, as if to hide his face. Repede was a smart dog, seemed to understand what Yuri was saying or feeling. And even if he didn't... Yuri couldn't let what Flynn said go so easily. He slid over, arm brushing against Flynn's and Flynn moved his away so Repede couldn't hide behind it. "Hey," Yuri said in the gentlest voice he had, "I'm not going to be disappointed in you. I'll never be disappointed in you." He ran a hand over the length of Repede's head. "No matter how sick or injured you get, you'll still be my partner and I'll always have your back." Repede made a soft sound but he laid his head onto Yuri's lap, shifting his body to nuzzle tight into the space between both men. His eyes closed but his tail still wagged periodically, weakly. When Yuri looked up, Flynn was looking at him with a soft expression that Yuri didn't know how to respond to. The best he could do was lean in until they were pressed shoulder to shoulder, all while ignoring the heat threatening to creep over his cheeks. Sometime, after Repede's tail slowed to a halt and the only sound was a soft noise as he exhaled, Flynn shifted until he could rest his head on Yuri's shoulder. And Yuri, wanting this moment to last a little longer, pressed his cheek to Flynn's hair.

#fic 2019 #fluriweek2019 #fluri #tales of vesperia #yuri lowell #flynn scifo #repede

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illegiblewords · 5 years

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Stalemate

Nights in Ishgard are cold, have been since the Seventh Umbral Calamity so disrupted this realm’s aether. Breath steams in air that tastes ever-so-faintly of smoke, hearths lit against eternal winter.

A man takes his room in The Forgotten Knight, silent and withdrawn despite surrounding conversation. This is not where he is expected, and had he given notice his choice would assuredly have been challenged. House Fortemps is a home away from home, offering refuge even as his chosen Crystal Braves howl for blood. So had Haurchefant insisted, with a wide smile and open arms.

Dead, now. And with his family in mourning, unwilling even to resent him for their sacrifice… the Warrior of Light withdraws. Let them grieve in privacy, free of the leech who stole their kin.

Here, in his own quarters, the other guests are muffled. The mead he’d been given was too sweet for his tastes and it lingers. Sticks against his teeth. A faint hiss from the fireplace reminds him of time’s passage, of life continuing as if Aymeric de Borel had not been beaten and tortured under his father’s direction. As if the Archbishop had not betrayed his own people, his own faith, with open eyes. As if Haurchefant Greystone still lived and laughed and gave his unwavering confidence to one who had not earned it.

The greatsword rests propped near the entrance. His armor remains. Cleaned since the day’s events out of respect for his hosts, but not yet removed.

He’s allowed himself to get drunk, if only just, at Fray’s advice. The armored hyur had met his approach with crossed arms and a patient stare. Before he’d so much as opened his mouth, the dark knight informed him “I heard of your loss. We’ll make them pay, but not tonight. You’ll not slay them as you are, weary and worn. So take this night as your own. Drink, kill, fuck, it matters not. But on the morrow rest assured we will find them.”

It shouldn’t have made him feel better, but it did.

He might have requested any number of men or women for comfort. He refrained. Any partner he sought was sure to remember, even if he did not, and he had no desire to make a spectacle of himself. Nothing that would have caused the Silver Fuller shame or alarm.

His solitude ends somewhere after a bell, in a bloom of shadow that is all too familiar.

The Warrior has not seen Lahabrea since felling him before Hydaelyn, liberating Thancred at the Praetorium. That he proves so unmarked by the exercise is unsurprising. The red mask, with its permanent scowl and its twin points (fangs or mandibles, equally vile), perches above lips pressed thin. Chapped, he notices now. A strange detail he can’t recall with consistency. Gilded spines rise at either shoulder, giving larger impressions to a man of average build at best. Black from cowl to boots, clawed gloves still at either side.

His blade is on the opposite wall. Lahabrea has positioned himself, perhaps deliberately, between his foe and the weapon he wields.

The Ascian's expression twists into a sneer, exposing teeth. “So at last you know what it feels like, eikon-slayer.”

The Warrior is on his feet, knees bent, stance wide. Low center of gravity, gauntlets drawn to fists. No pugilist he, but the metal is sharp. Mayhap his lack of expertise will catch the immortal off-guard.

“I’d heard you survived,” he says bitterly. “I ought have anticipated a creature like you would show your face now, of all times.”

Lahabrea laughs, harsh and loud and barely high at the edges. It drags his head back, exposes the roof of his mouth. Doesn’t stop when the Warrior lunges, takes the front of his robes in his fists. Shoves him back against the wall of his room.

“Did you come here,” growls Hydaelyn’s chosen, knuckles white, eyes the color of scabs fixed on his adversary, “to amuse yourself at my loss?” Lahabrea, tittering, raises a hand beside the elbow which holds him pinned. A vague gesture, gripping nothing. It is only when he is slammed against the plaster again that he quiets, head bobbing slightly against the force.

“If that is what you would believe” says the Ascian, “why should I stop you?” He grins, jaw tight. It is an expression more familiar to Nabriales than the figure before him but no less insufferable for that.

The Warrior bares his teeth, snarling as he slams his head against the red brow. He hears, barely, a catch of breath against the resounding crack. Back of the skull will have received most force, his own forehead barely stinging at the blow. The mask has been knocked askew rather than off, and in Lahabrea’s surprise the Warrior tears it from him altogether—landing with a clatter on the floor.

He knows not what he’d expected.

Lahabrea appears to be only a man. Irises pale green, cheeks hollow, eyes bruised. Sandy hair, edged in gray, clings in places against his forehead.

Dazed, perhaps even stunned.

Rejecting his own confusion, the Warrior forces his mouth into reflection. A sneer to parody the one he’d received. “Your face, or just another you’ve stolen?”

Lahabrea meets his gaze, and it strikes the Warrior that there is a vacant quality to his scrutiny. It does not match the smile retaking his features.

“As if I’ve had an opportunity to take my own form in eons,” he says, condescending in spite of shoulders hanging limp. “Does it matter?”

Scowling, it occurs to the Warrior that the Ascian has done naught to stay his hand.

“What do you aim to accomplish in coming here?” he demands, fingers curling tighter. “I have no patience for your kind tonight. Stay and I will make you wish you were not immortal.”

It’s as if he’s cut through a taut thread. What traces of mirth remained in the man fade, leaving an expression empty as his eyes. Lahabrea, exposed, only looks at him in silence. Waiting.

The Warrior pushes him harder against the wall, enough that surely it hurts, and says with a quieter venom, “You think I bluff, Ascian?”

Lahabrea doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t move at all.

So at last you know what it feels like, eikon-slayer.

It would be terribly easy, like this, to hurl him to the floor. He could beat him. He could kick him breathless and bloody and none would dare intervene. The Warrior of Light, after all, deserves privacy.

But Ascians are more powerful than this. What he does here is because Lahabrea permits it.

Slowly, despite every urge to the contrary, the Warrior unfurls his grip. Steps back.

Lahabrea’s heels touch the floor. Though he doesn’t drop he does sink momentarily. Staggers, almost doubling over.

When he looks up at the Warrior he is too furious to disguise himself with humor.

“What,” he asks sharply, “that’s it?”

With those words, the true situation begins to take shape.

“You’ve been waiting for something like this to happen,” says the Warrior numbly. “You want me to react.”

“And does that matter?” snaps Lahabrea. “The ones you’d strike down are fled. An innocent man died for your sake, because he believed you were something better. We both know that isn’t true.” A pause. Again, that terrible smile crawls into place. “You’ve failed him.”

The blow catches Lahabrea in the side of his face, tears the corner of those chapped, narrow lips. Throws his entire body sideways, making him stumble.

They are, both of them, breathing hard. And to the murmurs of Ishgard, the fire that pops—a soft patter of blood on floorboards is added.

Slowly, with trembling hands, Lahabrea removes his hood. The hair beneath is tangled and unkept.

He straightens. Meets the Warrior’s eye.

“I can do as Nabriales did before me,” he says flatly. “Should you fail to cooperate, I will take those who remain.”

It should have been simple. Whether it is spite or the poor state of his opponent, even this satisfaction has been denied him.

Then it clicks.

Just before he strikes, something akin to a smirk crosses the Warrior’s face.

Palms find the front of Lahabrea’s torso, shoving him hard into the wall once more. Before he can speak again, the Ascian is silenced by a mouth colliding with his own.

Teeth on teeth, a muffled cry. Tang of iron. Claws and fingers scrabbling against pauldrons. Air whistling hard and fast through a sharp nose. Body going rigid at the contact. Rough, dry skin.

It is only gradually, in pieces, that Lahabrea’s breathing slows. As if he knows not what else to do, his own hands come to rest on the Warrior’s shoulders. Neither resisting nor encouraging.

Eyes wide and fixed and blank.

He does not move upon release, empty of words.

The Warrior swipes blood into his mouth with his tongue. Still smirking.

“…why would you do that?” murmurs the Ascian. Not looking at him at all.

The dark knight shifts, victory slipping. Folds his arms.

“Will it serve?”

Lahabrea, sightless, puts a hand on his shoulder. Gently pushes him aside and steps past. Makes his way to the cot's edge. Sits.

Eventually, the Warrior follows. Comes to rest beside him.

No taunts. No jeers.

“Look,” he says at last, and if Lahabrea hears he gives no indication, “I’m tired. It’s been a trying day. I’ve no inclination to… to do whatever it is you’d hoped I would do here. But if you’re willing to put your plans on hold for the moment, I am. You could stay with me tonight.”

The Speaker blinks. Blinks again.

And then slowly, slightly, inclines his head.

***

After not very long, he offers to get something to drink. Lahabrea, elbows resting on his knees, vision fixed to the armoire less for interest than need of an anchor, doesn’t respond.

“Oi.” This time, he looks up. “Want me to bring you something?” A frown, slight and marred by injury. The Warrior quickly adds, “Seems like you could use it.”

And, just like that, his attention is lost again.

“Surprise me,” says Lahabrea, resigned beyond inflection.

So he shrugs, and departs, and shuts the door behind him.

He could reach out via linkpearl. He could pass a message through one of the patrons.

Mayhap it is poor judgment, or weariness, or sincere want for truce. Whatever his cause, the Warrior of Light does as he’d said and no more.

***

In truth, part of him expected to find the room empty upon return.

Lahabrea’s mask remains on the floor. Though he does not understand its significance, there is an impression of almost-blasphemy in this position. Crumpled against the wall are his gloves, boots, and capelet. The habit of an Ascian. Their positions, though clustered, are so unkept that the Warrior suspects they were thrown.

His guest remains on the bed, though his position has changed. Resting on his side, knees tucked toward his chest, Lahabrea stays by the foot of the mattress with eyes half-shut.

The Warrior walks, quickly and carefully, to the windowsill. Sets a mug down before seating himself once more. Cradling the other.

Lahabrea offers no greeting. He does not rise, and though his gaze shifts that is the extent of his response.

“Are you hurt?” the Warrior asks, with the same gruff ease he might have used for anyone he deigned help.

No answer.

The cocoa is thicker than what he’d received at Camp Dragonhead. More cream, a trace of vanilla. Probably a difference between fortress provisions and urban luxuries. Still, it’s more alike than not. An appropriate gesture.

He sips in silence for somewhere over a minute before gradually, cautiously, Lahabrea eases himself upright. Holds his hand out in silent request.

The Warrior hands him the second cup. This is taken without thanks, without so much as a glance. Although he doesn’t hesitate, the Ascian cannot entirely hide his wince as heat brushes the split lip.

Green eyes close. For some time the two of them continue like that. Not-speaking, not-touching.

Then, as they come to a finish, Lahabrea responds.

“Yes.”

Replacing both mugs on the sill, his host pauses.

“Sorry?”

Lahabrea stares at his own knees. His expression is less tense than it is empty. “You asked me a question before,” he says. “The answer is yes.”

It takes a moment to understand.

The Warrior exhales softly. Folds his arms. “You want me to have a look?” he asks.

At last, this commands Lahabrea’s focus—mute and bewildered though it is.

Now, it is the hyur’s turn to look away. Hand at the back of his neck, exhaling. “Don’t have to make it weird,” he says. “But you’ll have to take your robes off for me to see if there’s something I can do. Not about to assume.”

More silence. Lahabrea opens his mouth as if to speak, shuts it again. Just flushed. Ducking his head, holding his elbows, in the end he settles on “Why?”

Searches himself.

Adds, after a beat, “As you mentioned so pointedly before, I am immortal. This is nothing I could not remedy later myself.”

And yet, the Warrior notes privately, he remains but a shell.

How much of the fidgeting man before him can truly be laid at Hydaelyn's feet?

“I regret attacking you for the crimes of others,” he says eventually, “and take no pride in being complicit with this particular scheme of yours.”

No response.

The Warrior sighs. “…Truth be told, I know little of you and yours. Just enough to oppose what methods you’d employ. Should you need it now though, I will hear you.”

A laugh this time, soft and bitter. Lahabrea shuts his eyes entirely.

Only after some moments have passed does he say, “That’s a way of putting it.” His brows knit. “What scraps you’ve gleaned regarding my… our, devotion to Zodiark amount to naught at all. You assume it is akin to the zealotry of your beastmen. Of Ishgard. As if He could be exchanged with some other deity and our situation would prove essentially the same.” Lahabrea seems about to continue only to cut himself off, a barely audible click as he swallows his words.

Eventually, haltingly, he persists.

“…doubtless such subjects only serve to test your patience. Moreover… moreover it is beyond me, to explain with any semblance of adequacy as I am now. Even if I’d remained as I…” One hand shifts, clutching his own forehead. Offering support even as Lahabrea folds over himself to reach it.

What he says next comes strained.

“…I was an orator, you know. A good one. Yet even at the peak of my abilities, even then it would have been an exercise in futility to entreat you. Naught I might say would seem so real as what you can see and taste and touch. I’ve…”

An instant passes. Then another. Lahabrea wrestles with his own voice alone in a room with the man he calls enemy.

The Warrior, watching, decides against any comment of his own.

“…They revered me, once,” says Lahabrea. “They elevated me for my speech, my creations, my…”

A hard stop.

He abandons the sentiment.

“Everything that made me worthy in their eyes, I’ve squandered. Every gift I once possessed, everything I brought to bear that I might… that some justice might remain where it is owed.”

A break then. A glance, fast and furtive. Waiting to be challenged.

This time it is the Warrior who shuts his eyes. “I said I’d hear you,” he murmurs. “That hasn’t changed.”

Lahabrea’s breath catches, something heard rather than seen.

He doesn’t continue for a long time.

“We Ascians,” he says at last, low as if being heard might prove shameful, “carry terrible things with us through necessity. And I… I can no longer deny that the weight has taken a toll. As ages pass I wear away every part of myself that once held value. Whatever excuse I make, in practice all it amounts to is burdening the others with my shortcomings. Shortcomings they are right to resent.”

Then, nothing.

Nothing that goes on and on.

“Nabriales made his own decisions,” says Lahabrea in the end, “it’s true. But what tasks he’d adopted were outside his normal sphere. Mine. His end would not have come to pass had I but…”

His throat works, making no sound.

“…I know," he says, voice breaking, "I know this is something I must… I will address it. Make it right. I’ll…”

Nabriales was nothing like Haurchefant. Nabriales was an angry, arrogant lech who strove for none but himself. The Warrior cannot regret slaying him.

And yet, like the elezen, his passing served to preserve another.

That notion, at the least, they have in kind.

The Warrior exhales.

“A moment,” he says softly, placing a hand at the Ascian’s shoulder as he stands. Lahabrea flinches at the contact, slight but clear. Watches as his opponent tugs his own gauntlets off absentmindedly, as he unbuckles the dark breastplate and slips from the mail beneath. Kneels at the satchel containing his supplies and begins rummaging through.

“You really ought remove your robes,” says the hyur, gaze flitting back. His tone has grown more serious, and he watches the Speaker with an expression of careful sincerity. “Truly. In this matter at least, I mean to help. You’ll be no more exposed than I am.”

This time, with great hesitation, Lahabrea complies.

His frame proves lean, defined by contours of bone rather than muscle. Beyond the blow to his face there are older indications of bruising at his forearms, mottled yellow-black on either side. As if he’d been gripped particularly hard there in days past. What can be seen of his back, curled forward as he is, proves interrupted in red as blood pools under skin. Empty of scars, each detail marking him in contrast to the Warrior of Light. His counterpart proves lined in the pale remnants of wounds healed over. Wiry from effort spent wielding a blade massive enough to match his height.

After brief study, the Warrior selects a vial. Roughly the size of a fist, its contents identified through both the ornate container and its hue. Blue, deep and clear.

“Drink this,” he says, passing the potion to Lahabrea. Seating himself once more at his side. “Not much, but it should help you feel more comfortable at least.”

The Ascian doesn’t move.

Medicine in-hand, not so much as tracing the gilded edges with his study. He sees without looking. Then his hold tightens, simultaneously drawing a level of severity to his expression.

It is a while before he says, in scarce more than a whisper, “You know why I came.”

This earns consideration less for the answer than how to express it.

“I do now,” replies the hero, and by comparison his tone is gentle. “You should still drink it.”

No movement. Naught to indicate he’s so much as been understood.

The change comes slowly. Less like a display of emotion than inevitable biology. An act of nature.

Against the tension of his mouth, the unhidden angles of his face, tears trickle forth from Lahabrea’s eyes. They come swift and soundless, doing naught to mitigate the harshness of his features.

The Warrior observes less like a companion than a witness. His attention earns no acknowledgment, and it is only when the stopper begins to tremble that he realizes Lahabrea’s hands are shaking badly.

Without comment, the dark knight places his palms where the other man grips. Steady.

It is only at contact that Lahabrea allows himself to breathe again, inhaling sharply. Numb, he removes one hand, the tremor lending obstacle even to something simple as opening a bottle.

Before he can spill, before he can change his mind, the Ascian brings it to his mouth. Downs the contents. At his arms, across his back, where lips meet glass, Lahabrea’s body slowly begins to mend. It is with the rise and fall of his Adam’s apple that the Warrior hears his foe whimper.

Only when the vial is empty, as it is plucked to find its own place on the windowsill, does the Speaker come to weep in truth.

***

As Hydaelyn’s favorite son moves to hold Zodiark’s most devoted priest, neither finds they can manage reservation in the act.

***

It is impossible not to notice Lahabrea’s restraint. His attempts at restraint. What escapes comes in soft, broken staccato. Wholly unlike how he laughs. With his arm thus encircled, the Warrior can’t help but feel how the composure Lahabrea strives for slips through his fingers like rain.

“Breathe,” insists the dark knight quietly. What his companion wrests with wracks him chest to fingertips. “Breathe. I’ll not begrudge you this.”

It feels as though he grips a shattered thing that will fall apart upon release.

Lahabrea can only sustain this for so long. He stops in increments, interrupted by the occasional catch to his lungs or shudder.

When the worst has subsided, he only mumbles, “My thanks.” Wipes his face on his arm without removing himself. His head hangs heavy, features partially obscured by hair.

“Don’t think on it,” says the Warrior, with the same ease he’d lend favor to a friend. After some study, he adds, “You don’t look so bad as you did.”

Lahabrea, red-eyed, turns to fix him with an expression that proves simultaneously exhausted and withering.

The Warrior smiles like a trick of the light, not-quite apologetic. He dodges the thinner man’s scrutiny and says, almost flippant, “…I’ve been told that I give a good massage, you know.”

“What.”

It should be a question.

It doesn’t sound like a question.

“You heard me,” says Eorzea’s champion. “Interested?”

Wide eyes. Mouth just parted.

“How— nevermind,” says the immortal. Too shocked for aught else. “But why would you…?”

The Warrior finds he cannot guess from whence Lahabrea’s disbelief stems. It might be that his adversary makes the offer. It might be that the offer is made to him.

Therefore, he considers his answer with care.

“When I was miserable,” says the Warrior at last, “there was someon… the man who died. He did what he could to help me find my footing. I don’t know what I’d have done otherwise.” A shrug, like his joints are loosely attached. “Seems like you’re pretty miserable too.”

Lahabrea looks down.

After some time, he murmurs, “I have no desire to be the object of your pity.” This statement comes with neither anger nor indignation. “Not when you’ve never… I am well aware you’ve never cared for me.”

Whatever excuse I make, in practice all it amounts to is burdening the others with my shortcomings.

Shortcomings they are right to resent.

A sigh. The Warrior squeezes him lightly.

“If I still found you so objectionable,” he says quietly, “I’d not offer. Don’t deny me license to change my mind.”

A beat.

Another.

“…in truth, what I grapple with myself is ugly,” the hyur continues, when further response is not forthcoming. “Angry. I’ve come to resent most who seek my aid. Who feel entitled to my obedience. Yet you’ll doubt yourself before the ones you serve.”

A hesitation longer still.

“I… I didn’t expect to admire your loyalty or commitment, but I do. In spite of your path. Though to my eye, we could both perhaps stand to allow ourselves some respite.”

This time his comments earn a snort—if a gentle one.

“Better men than you have made the suggestion, Warrior of Light,” Lahabrea informs him. “I’m given to understand it’s a fool’s errand.”

“You chose to stay,” says the midlander, lips quirking. “Might as well take your ease.”

And then, somehow, Lahabrea smiles back. A slight, frail thing that nonetheless reads true. “Don’t deny me license to change my mind,” he echoes, making no move to depart.

The Warrior leans in. Presses a second kiss to the Ascian’s brow.

Lingers.

Lahabrea’s eyes shut.

“For what it’s worth,” says the hero, “I mean this.”

There is no answer, but the Speaker exhales as he leans his head toward the contact. Lets his shoulders fall.

Seemingly content to remain exactly where he is.

***

“…Do you get offers of this sort often?”

Lahabrea’s mouth pulls taut.

“No,” he says after some moments, “Not I.”

The Warrior, looking upon the subtle ridges of his spine, the rise and dip of ribs under skin, considers how his usual robes keep these things from sight and imagination.

He wonders how long it's been since anyone bothered to touch him directly without violence. Without having it explained, he finds he understands perfectly.

“I… I know what must be done,” Lahabrea continues. “Distractions make our mission harder. I’ve… I’ve seen time and again what it does to the others, but even they…”

Despite this, when the Warrior nudges him to spread himself over the bed he does so without protest.

***

In past entreaties, there were oils and lotions and constant directions. As though being Eorzea’s savior qualified one to be a professional masseuse.

Not so, this time.

Offered freely to a man not in the habit of seeking attendance from passersby, the Warrior has naught to grant but his hands. They are admittedly callused from use, but in the moment also clean, and firm, and not unpracticed.

Lahabrea starts slightly when pressure is introduced. His rigidity is inconstant in a way that suggests he’s conscious of it and knows no way out. The Warrior doesn’t comment on this. Nor does he respond with greater force.

Instead he keeps his focus on one area at a time, sets to silently revealing his movements. A constant touch that lets the Ascian follow him slowly. No attempts at deception, nothing to exploit the vulnerability he’s been presented with. Simply providing an opportunity to relearn contact without pain.

He shifts his thumb back and forth, teases carefully at the base of Lahabrea’s neck. The Warrior finds him warm and smooth, feels rather than sees his nerves begin to abate. When Lahabrea exhales it is a hushed sound. If he notes this approach he gives no indication.

“It might surprise even you,” says the Warrior at last, filling the silence, “to know that the past times I’ve done this were by demand.” Gradually, gingerly, he sets about pressing harder. No immediate response. “A look about me, maybe. Always the strangers who seem to think I’d be right for it.”

A smirk, largely for his own benefit. It fades.

“…Beyond that though, people’ve been afraid to touch me for a while. Even my friends. Hold on.” He focuses his attention on a particularly stiff muscle. The air leaves Lahabrea’s lungs in a rush, which he sets to replacing in a sharp collection of gasps. These are small, carefully spaced to give an impression of regularity where none exists.

“Alright there?” the Warrior asks, leaning in. This earns only a nod, face down. Arms framing on either side.

So he continues.

“I’ve been noticing in pieces.” Heel of the hand. Slow, deliberate circles. “After the banquet, Tataru—Scion secretary, though come to think you’ll have met her—couldn’t keep herself from Alphinaud. He took it hard, we were all worried… didn’t realize ’til later none of them so much as asked me. Then I couldn’t help but see it everywhere.”

Low to high. In to out to in again.

He can almost taste the hearth smoke.

“Even subtle things like a touch on the shoulder, fingers brushed in passing… it almost seemed like they went out of their way. And it wasn’t just them, either.”

Memories of blood on his tongue, blood on his armor.

The white sclera of a merchant in horror.

A bitter smile.

“Been starting to wonder if it’s my fault. They’re not bad, none of them… but to be honest you’ve probably felt me more in fights than the rest put together.”

Lahabrea barely manages to start his reply before swallowing it back again. The result is unintelligible.

Breathing harder, now.

The Warrior waits, tracing a vertebra with his nail.

“As with…” he manages eventually, almost hoarse, “…with my case, as well.”

A moment passes. A sigh.

“That so?”

Moved by an impulse resembling affection, the dark knight trails a finger from the base of Lahabrea’s neck down his spine. Dips into the small of his back.

Khhhhck

The Ascian twitches, shoves his face into the mattress. Finds purchase in the blanket with both hands and twists.

Holding his breath, his voice. Holding in sound. Betrayed by his own racing pulse.

This time when the Warrior smiles, it carries warmth.

He bends. Finds Lahabrea’s shoulder blade and kisses him there. Lingers.

Hears himself rewarded with a faint, muffled moan.

Pauses.

Shifts lower, halfway down the Ascian’s torso, and tries again.

“If you mean to do something,” says Lahabrea harshly, strained, “just…”

The Warrior hums, as though in contemplation.

“…Well. If you insist.”

Toes lazily out of his boots. Climbs into bed, straddling the man before him at the ass. Leans forward in one fluid motion, too soon for Lahabrea to do more than sputter wordlessly, and takes each wrist in hand. Pins them in place with his weight.

There is something strangely innocent, thinks the Warrior as he steals another kiss (crook of the neck, he could sink his teeth in here if he felt like it), to find such a reaction when neither of them has so much as mentioned breeches. Without seeing his target’s expressions he travels according to sound and motion and vital signs chasing his will.

Heat finding heat, his mouth follows the crest of Lahabrea’s shoulder. Draws back and down, down against hitching respiration against unvoiced pleas against the way he arches closer fists clenched and trembling pleads desperately as he knows how without language.

When it comes, the Warrior does not misunderstand the confused stutter of hips beneath him or the way his breath catches as it happens.

Whatever form an Ascian might take or lack ordinarily, in a vessel Lahabrea appears subject to the same whims of physicality anyone might suffer. The Warrior, lips curving against him, wonders if he’s already hard or just starting.

Skating teeth experimentally, the Weapon of Light adjusts himself. Begins to grind, forcing Lahabrea’s pelvis down. Sucks hard. There is a loud, broken sound as the man jerks, knuckles going white. Repeated when his adversary’s calves weave under ankles dragging his tongue to what can be reached of a throat working ragged stiffening in each shift a grip growing tighter forcing wrists flat to emphasize pleasure for them both.

Aether lashes into the Warrior without warning, hot and scrambling graceless against his own. Impossibly dry and dark, a fire inverted to writhe without cease. This nonetheless hooks him, holds fast like an animal like a thing alive. More vast than he thought any life could be.

Lahabrea whines, his aether clawing frantic to find purchase to pour liquid night inside. Hydaelyn’s champion clenches his teeth, steels himself to prevent further entry. A cork to seal a river.

He’d thought himself immune to possession. He’d thought himself immune to the very attempt. This thought immediately followed by another no not what this is only—

A foreign idea.

Lahabrea’s.

***

For a moment the Warrior is still. Observing. Searching for stability against the inferno roaring through his head.

External, he holds his quarry pinned even now. Lahabrea lies interrupted by spasms beyond his ability to control. Sometimes he inhales a little deeper, as if intending to speak. He has yet to follow through.

Internal, what the Warrior finds comes not in not a single conscious stream but many. A collection of shadows flickering without light.

At the forefront, what is not spoken aloud. Information shared bereft of choice. Too fast, barely coherent as Lahabrea’s aether threads his own. Past arousal a black, gnawing shame that threatens to strip all else away. Not an apology but a regret, concentrated and searing. Taking too many directions to follow. From its shape the Warrior gathers that Lahabrea wants to withdraw in the same way a man heaving himself sick wants to do anything else. Such experience, he recognizes intuitively, makes it impossible for him to overpower anyone.

“…What is this, then?”

Speaking the question aloud brings no small relief—more affirmation that his voice remains his own. Lahabrea seems to shrink beneath him in response, aether turning frenetic. Plummets to the Warrior’s stomach, granting nausea and suffocation in equal measure.

The Warrior moves in, chest brushing the slighter man’s back. His own aether (ember at the heart of the abyss, pulsing red and deep and insistent) branches like veins to stay the trespasser.

“Calm down,” he whispers, forcing himself to breathe. It sounds more assured than he feels. After a pause, he shifts his grip to layer one hand over the Ascian’s. Laces their fingers. “I mean it. There’s no danger from me.”

Nothing.

Then, a hard exhale. Tremulous.

The Warrior finds his vantage.

Through aether Lahabrea clings to him the way a drowning man shoves his rescuer underwater to breathe. Less destructive perhaps, but like instinct.

“Since you’re here anyway, how about you show me why.”

He is presented with impressions of a horse, gaunt and fetid and decayed. Spreading ruin wheresoever it goes. Occasionally it sloughs off portions of its own flesh, which collect flies and blacken any land that surrounds. On its back rests a world, and alongside it does the herd struggle under their own burdens. But even beasts of such endurance have limits. Theirs are reached. When the rotten steed lags, its companions cannot afford to falter. Cannot turn. Without its ability to bear loads, this aberration has no place. Falling is inevitable.

Yet a heart still beats and lungs yet swell.

The Ascian shivers in his grasp, but does not attempt escape.

Here, something festers. Something bleeds. An old wound exacerbated over time.

Fevered, coated in a film of self-disgust, the core of Lahabrea convulses.

Don’t…

Don’t leave me like this…

Wanted as he is, Eorzea’s hero shuts his eyes. Tilts to find the Speaker’s cheek with his own.

“Enough,” he says quietly. “I’ve no desire to see you abuse yourself. Only explain this.”

There is a long pause. Eventually, Lahabrea seems to find his voice.

“Among… Among my kind,” he says thickly, barely audible, “to connect thus is an inherent part of… it’s the way we embrace one another. I haven’t…”

Something barren, something empty. In the same way that Lahabrea has removed himself from touch, this too remains beyond him.

The Warrior sighs. His expression softens.

“Alright,” he says quietly. “With me then.”

***

They each burn differently.

Forged red, sparks from a hammer, something that should have been unmovable transformed by temperature. Like magma, like cinders, like a mirage. The Eikon-Slayer radiates inward in waves.

Lahabrea is not like this.

A vacuum flaring through space, frenzied and desperate to consume. Exposed, feral, forever moving. He is a distortion of saline and smoke rippling through the air. Only with vague direction at first, darting across the nexus that is his rival.

This shifts as he is explored in-turn, twining where the Warrior comes to meet him. Having reclaimed most of his reserve, Lahabrea nonetheless can’t prevent a muffled grunt as he is forced into the mattress.

The Warrior has slowed his pace this time, hard and teasing. With his own thoughts yet unguarded he finds himself planning ahead.

He wonders what it will take to make the Ascian sweat. Make him shout. How he’ll move against him once he’s been stripped entirely, a mortal’s hand gliding over his cock. He wonders if he slips into his own language when he comes. He wonders if he'll beg.

Lahabrea, subjected to these speculations, chokes. Mouth slack, breath torn from his lungs. The Warrior feels across quickened flame how he’s drawn blood to the Ascian’s face. His groin. Throbbing heat, insistent.

Lahabrea moves rough and stilted against the bed, yet clutching the blanket as if it has any means to steady him.

“You… you won’t,” manages the Speaker, and there is a shrill quality to his words that eradicates any hint of challenge. Instead, his declaration is almost a question. Doubt brought to hysteria by desire.

I don’t understand.

The Warrior smiles, object of open need at last. Finds an unmarked space at Lahabrea’s neck and bites.

A cry cut short. Muscles straining between his jaws.

When a foreign set of lips finds his clavicle, Hydaelyn’s sword holds his place and offers no release.

***

Teeth and tongue. Lingering, wet, disembodied. Another finds his hip. Another his thigh, slipping beneath what clothes remain.

And another.

Warm, human, seeking. The Warrior tightens his hold, uses the moan crawling from his own chest as incentive. Barred by naught but fabric, driving close as he can manage. Lahabrea makes a strangled sound, his gasp crushed empty. A new mouth finds the dark knight’s ear in response.

These are parts of him no one dares touch, no one dares acknowledge. Slick now, attended with something like reverence. Supplication.

He resolves to fuck the Ascian senseless for this, presses his intent deep into Lahabrea’s aether. He is going to steal all his fancy words away. Make him squirm.

“I… I…” Tight, airless, like a plucked string. The Warrior feels Lahabrea’s voice reverberate against the roof of his mouth.

The feeling is difficult to describe. Cracked ice. A fraying rope. Such is Lahabrea's response, fumbling and disoriented as it is.

The Warrior lets go.

Lahabrea inhales sharply, spectral attentions fading one by one. Seemingly unable to catch his breath, to slow his pulse.

To focus.

This time, the hyur removes himself. Finds the edge of the bed and sets, with a curse, to removing his breeches.

“Can’t deny you got me with that,” he groans, freeing his erection. Glances back. “Still alright over there?”

No reply. The Speaker’s arms buckle as he pulls himself to a kneeling position. Doubled over himself, almost fetal.

Then a winded, stuttering sound barely recognizable as laughter.

“Lahabrea…?” says the Warrior, and after a moment’s consideration prods him in the ribs lightly.

“Such,” the Ascian wheezes, “such formality…” Another, somewhat steadier chuckle.

Stripped and not slightly puzzled, Hydaelyn’s champion rolls his eyes.

Catches himself grinning in-turn.

“Come on, then,” he says, helping the immortal upright. Lahabrea, meticulously unfolding his legs beneath him, nonetheless seems unable to silence himself.

His face more flushed than expected. Almost dizzy.

“Hey,” the Warrior says, cupping his jaw, “are you—“

Abruptly, with more force than anticipated, fingers knit at the base of his skull. Drag him into a kiss that is almost a collision, deep and uncoordinated and relentless. Sliding over his teeth to trace the grooves of him, as if trying to commit everything to memory. Bare chin against stubble. Lahabrea nips the Warrior’s bottom lip as he withdraws.

I will have my revenge.

The Ascian’s thought is almost giddy, disjointed. Both more familiar and less. Green eyes fixed to red, his abused mouth just parted and curling. A reminder that he hasn’t forgotten who initiated this.

The Warrior, for his part, can’t help but arch his brows in response.

“You will not,” he says, nearly laughing in surprise himself, and snares him again.

A muffled mmph as the Warrior makes contact, invades hot and uncompromising. Finds Lahabrea's waistband without looking and tugs it low, barely clearing his length before taking it firmly in hand. Slowly makes his way back and forth.

Lahabrea attempts vainly to fill his lungs, tightens his grip on the Warrior’s scalp even as the other arm flails behind him. Searching for support.

With what hand remains, Eorzea's hero comes to press back and forth over his Adam’s apple. Feels Lahabrea jerk, jaw slackening as he struggles to keep up. Struggles to press for more contact despite a steady pace.

When the Warrior gently, tentatively, constricts his hold the Ascian’s eyes slide back. Flutter shut. His breath comes harsh and fast. It strikes the Warrior, then, that in all likelihood Lahabrea hasn’t so much as touched himself for some time.

“M… Moment,” rasps the Speaker, snatched from a brief gap between them.

This time, the Warrior releases him.

Draws him back at the apparent risk of tipping over.

Therefore, Lahabrea instead finds himself supported by the Warrior of Light.

For a moment, his aether almost stills.

Settles.

Black lining red less for urgency than comfort.

Leaning hard, face downturned, the Ascian shakily brings arms to encircle the enemy who does not detest him.

Then, after only slight hesitation, the Warrior exhales.

Holds him in turn.

***

Elbow folded to hook over one shoulder. An unexpectedly delicate ribcage. Rhythmic expansion and contraction betraying a body no less alive than his own.

“You needn’t have been so generous with me,” says Lahabrea hoarsely, when at last he is able to speak. “There was no cause… but nonetheless. I would return the favor.”

The Warrior closes his eyes.

“You owe nothing,” he murmurs. “I’m glad to do this.”

A pause.

Lahabrea’s grip closes slightly. His silence fills the room.

“Look on me a moment,” says the Warrior.

Though not without kindness he thinks, initially, that he’ll be ignored.

When the Ascian complies it is in pieces. His attention comes as a weighted, fleeting thing.

Eorzea’s champion clasps the exposed face on both sides. Meets his eyes.

“Do not assume,” he says, “that I am yet through with you.”

The Warrior presses his lips once more to the Speaker’s brow.

Lingers.

“I meant what I said before,” he continues. “I’ve no desire to see you abuse yourself… be it directly or through me. I’ll accept what you offer so long as that is not the price.”

A shiver.

An exhale.

“It is my will, to give this,” Lahabrea replies. Almost a whisper. “Time is short.”

Neither of them says anything more at first.

Then, tentatively, the Warrior smiles.

“…Well in that case. Suppose it can’t hurt to let you know you’re not half-bad with your tongue, orator.”

***

On his knees, on the floor. All clothing shed.

The Warrior sits before him with parted legs. Leaning back on both hands. He can’t help but glance again at the mask.

It feels no less wrong now, discarded. A kind of violence worse than sacrilege. Sin against the self.

“Look on me a moment,” echoes Lahabrea softly.

The Warrior meets his eyes and is relieved to find warmth there.

It is not without weariness or grief, but nor is it bereft of humor.

A sincere smile.

“It’s been some few thousand years,” says the Ascian dryly, “but I wouldn’t have you think me a complete novice. Worry not on my behalf.”

“One of us has to,” replies the Warrior, though he smiles in turn. “You’re sure?”

A snort. Lahabrea maintains eye contact as he leans in. Envelops his adversary and smoothly, unabashedly begins to suck.

***

Head to the roof of the mouth. Hot wet sliding under tracing flesh small quick motions in repetition igniting the rest of him like a match. Rippling upwards in waves.

Green irises locked to his own. Feather-light sensation of breath on what skin wants for contact. The Warrior, in a sharp and graceless gesture, twists his fingers through Lahabrea’s hair. Thick, coarse, unmistakably male. Tugs him in, earning a faint catch as the Ascian fumbles.

Reproach, questioning rather than nervous. The hero meets this with a smirk and maintains tension as he plunges swiftly, deliberately into Lahabrea’s aether with his own.

***

Shadow layered upon shadow. Dark upon dark. He thinks at first it may be endless. Devoid of color. Constant only in how it moves.

Then, something crystaline. Something splintered. Firm as bone, set but not mended.

Lahabrea makes a sharp, thin sound—splays a hand on the Warrior’s thigh and grips.

This, he will avoid.

The aether is less inscrutable nearby. Here, it is possible to make out purples so deep and rich they can only be found in passing. The sky just before nightfall. A flower that will wither. Flighted creatures doomed to die.

There was a hole, not so very long ago. A wound.

Now, the light left behind reveals traces of who Lahabrea might have been had his god not stained him so completely.

Carefully, the Warrior reaches out

never wanted them to fear him senior member as he was when children caught sight peering past skirts of their elders he smiled waved answered questions however long it took remember always what newness felt like

collects what he can cradled covered as if failure might see it snuffed out completely

he’d been animated even then gesturing with his hands dwarfed by the room he addressed grinning unrehearsed ideas sparking ideas alight with opportunities posed by challenges posed by friends

draws the color back with him and lets go in a flood against the surface

this too is yours

concentrated between the Ascian’s lips pulling him forward strokes precise before sudden emptiness of pressure as Lahabrea’s sigil flares as his jaw loosens as his eyes go wide and his voice snags like a hook in the throat of a fish

***

The light lasts but a moment before going out.

***

Close but not complete, he could let this continue. Finish in the Speaker’s mouth. Watch him swallow.

The Warrior withdraws without resistance, breath knifing across his teeth.

Lahabrea, liberated, props himself against a kneecap. Struck dumb, stuck staring as aether scatters to black once more.

A little spit, just below his lip on one side. The Warrior leans forward and gently wipes it away.

For a moment, then, Lahabrea looks. And in spite of his body’s reaction there can be no avoiding how the Ascian’s expression falters.

Dims.

Gone… I need, I…

The Warrior trails a finger over his chin. Finds purchase.

Tilts up.

“Come back, Lahabrea.”

Confusion. Then, something like recognition.

The sound that comes next is beautiful. Not the harsh and twisting speech from the Thousand Maws of Toto-Rak but something akin to a chime.

It feels familiar, or like it should be.

“I haven’t forgotten you.”

***

The sound pricks like a needle, intricate and precise as a mathematical equation. Capable of searing or soothing, each syllable measured carefully against the other.

Without being told, the Warrior finds he understands what’s been given.

***

Only Lahabrea’s upper body is on the bed, the Eikon-Slayer entering from behind. One hand closes over his shoulder, steadying. The other circles once more the extent of him.

Lahabrea’s voice breaks at penetration, an indecipherable cry cut short by what shreds of control remain over himself. The Warrior’s hips jerk, stumble into their own rhythm. Drive deeper in a maneuver equal parts selfish and encouraging.

Hhhkkk

Silence.

Even so, he does not miss how he’s robbed the strength from his opponent’s legs.

Soaking, claustrophobic. The Warrior sets to mimic pressure he encounters in how he grips in turn. Pins Lahabrea in time between each shove, every stroke.

The immortal spasms, mouth moving empty as though he means to speak.

“Don’t… don’t think,” says the Warrior through gritted teeth, “that what I said was in jest.” Grinning wildly, madly, he finds with his aether the space where Lahabrea remains injured. Scalding now, a pool of violet stirred in place.

Like the tide, like a storm, he drags this back with him.

Of course he was there for the Sundering of course he was there when his plans came to naught it was he who sacrificed half that half would live then half again for a fourth so of course OF COURSE he witnessed his greatest failure.

Nothing left. None of them. And it was his idea his plan his acceptance that spared but three perpetrators to know their folly.

Lahabrea begged for them to kill him then. Could have begged endlessly.

But this too was more than he deserved.

Again.

He can never atone for this can never return all he’s destroyed (Hydaelyn destroyed, they remind him, Hydaelyn and the traitors who called her) but he can commit himself can spend the rest of his life fixing what is within his power to fix can become useful be an asset rather than deadweight. They all had faith in his appointment and so long as he lives there remains opportunity to prove worthy.

Strings torn from a harp. China crushed between eager hands. Lahabrea’s heart beats in his throat, unfastening from time and place as his aether finds something besides black unending.

The Warrior seeks the underside of Lahabrea’s cock, runs a finger back and forth as he rocks deeper. A light touch, deliberate.

“I want to hear you,” he says, abrupt against the waning world around them. “I'm… I’m still listening.”

What follows is neither a sob nor a laugh nor a shout, yet evokes all of these together.

Hazy, somewhere full and bright and familiar. Peace continuing outside as if they could live forever. As if this would be remembered as nothing more than a setback. A scare.

Lahabrea was beginning to understand then, with growing certainty, that they would not survive this unscathed.

He worked incessantly, searching for any alternatives he could find. Argued bitterly with his colleagues. With himself.

Of course one of them found him collapsed in the midst of it all. His rival even then.

Of course…

Despite everything, despite the choices they would both make, the Fourteenth took him home that night.

Returning Lahabrea’s name involves equal parts eloquence and aether.

He tries.

The response is swift, and loud, and violent. There are phantom nails, countless impossible fingers dragging across his back. What the Speaker shouts is cut off as he comes into his lover’s hand.

It sounds like broken glass, or crashing keys, or a melody misremembered.

As he finishes in the aftermath, the Warrior finds himself inexplicably tasting blood, and mead, and sickness.

***

The Ascian fades gradually, between what is seen and what is not. His hips still. His head falls. What tension allowed him to continue supporting himself scatters.

When the Warrior withdraws, sticky and spent, Lahabrea doesn’t get up.

“Hey…” says Eorzea’s exile, kneeling. Placing a hand on the other man’s shoulder.

A blank, glassy stare meets him.

“Hey!” the Warrior repeats, more urgent this time. Shakes the Ascian gently.

A blink. A smile, if a faint one.

“I said,” breathes Lahabrea, “worry not on my behalf.”

Rather than reassure him, this only gives the Warrior reason to frown.

“I,” he says, tucking a strand of hair behind the Speaker’s ear, “don’t quite trust you not to give me cause.”

Lahabrea shuts his eyes. His lashes are damp.

“…I am not beyond tiring, Warrior of Light. You've... you've caused no lasting harm today. I'm glad for your company."

The Warrior studies him. Rubs back and forth across an exposed temple.

"And I, yours."

***

There is little opportunity for Lahabrea to climb into bed himself. When the Warrior sets him in a position of relative comfort he doesn’t move. Doesn’t stir. If the gesture meets resignation, or indignity, or gratitude, nothing shows.

“Right. I’ll just… be in the washroom. Get some water while you—“

The Warrior stops.

Green irises fix to him. His hand held captive.

Slowly, with more strength than his posture would imply, Lahabrea pulls the Warrior’s palm to his mouth. Kisses him there once, then again. Gaze falling as he works his way to joints, to fingertips.

Draws him in.

Light’s champion, entranced, slowly takes his place at the Speaker’s side.

***

Collarbone. Pectoral. Nipple. A scar between two ribs where he’d been slow against a Sahagin. One just above the navel, lingering.

Lahabrea places his lips, slowly and methodologically, across the Ascian-killer’s body. Lying astride him, chin over warm muscle. Though he grunts and shifts as the Warrior strums his hip, there is no immediacy to it. Little energy.

“I want you to promise me something,” murmurs the hero. This earns a curious glance, but no comment. “Don’t… don’t run out when this is done. Not while I’m unawares.”

“You assume,” says Lahabrea softly.

“Of course I do,” the Warrior of Light replies. Feathers his companion’s hair. “Only know I won’t permit you to run off without saying goodbye.”

“You won’t permit…” the Ascian mumbles. His lids drift shut once more.

Another kiss.

When no further response seems forthcoming, the Warrior continues.

“No surprises or loose ends. Naught abandoned… merely set aside.”

At length, Lahabrea exhales.

“I can’t imagine whether you mean this to be more difficult or less… but very well. You have my word.”

***

At some point, aether mingled like a bed of embers, they lose awareness altogether.

***

With his breath coming soft and easy, with one ear pressed flat to the Warrior’s sternum, Lahabrea looks more exhausted asleep than waking. Skin interrupted by love marks rather than blows, posture relieved of tension at last. The strain he places upon himself becomes conspicuous now for its absence.

Easy to forget he lacks the frailty of mortal men. That as much punishment as he takes there will always be more he can—he must—endure. That his strength far exceeds what form he wears.

Despite this, Lahabrea willingly places himself at the mercy of one who could destroy him.

And the Warrior (possessed of such knowledge as he is) chooses to be gentle.

Mask, pauldrons, robes. These things make the Ascian appear untouchable. Not entirely real or human. Immune to anything so personal as doubt.

Perhaps they truly are alike.

***

If a smile better suits a hero, should it be any surprise that the villain weeps?

***

When he next wakes, Lahabrea is waiting. Aether coiled stubbornly about his own. Position unchanged.

A fingertip brushes the Warrior’s brow, glides to his cheek. His jawline.

“It’s a pity you use your voice so rarely,” says Lahabrea at last.

A peculiar enough greeting that the Warrior blinks. Squints.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

A thumb traces his lips. “Nothing of consequence… not a barb, lest you wonder,” the reply.

Lahabrea pauses at teeth testing skin.

Exhales.

Continues.

“I only wish I had more opportunity to hear you.”

A chuckle then, still dull with sleep. “Respectfully, I’m common as they come,” says the dog of Coerthas. He neither watches nor acknowledges his partner’s gaze when it falls. Experimentally, he continues to tongue the digit at his mouth—feels the Ascian tighten his legs but no more. “And I’ve heard you use the word ‘interesting’ five ways ‘cept the obvious so not like you’re missing anything.” After some hesitation, he adds, “Though… you could always stay, you know.”

A small, forlorn smile gives the answer.

It is that simple.

***

Even so, they linger.

***

The act of separating their aether is slow. Reluctant. There are instances when each of them tries to hold fast, when it falls to the other to remove himself from touch. Red tugs free of a darkening black, shadows flicker away as if blown. They do this through the mundane process of cleaning themselves.

The Warrior suspects Lahabrea could use magic to accomplish such ends. Upon being asked, the pretense given is to avoid waste.

In truth, these moments hold a comfort of their own. Sometimes they might just prove enough.

***

Damp, they re-assemble themselves side-by-side. Leather and mail. Gloves and gauntlets. Shoulders close enough to touch.

“This change things for you?” asks the Warrior without looking. He slides a boot into place.

“Not in the way you would have it,” Lahabrea’s reply, tone settling back into distance. His progress is steady. “There may be some relief in knowing you do not despise me.”

“Aye,” says the hyur, “that’s something.” He smiles. “What it’s worth, I’d rather not kill you given the choice.”

Unaware, Lahabrea nonetheless mimics the expression. “In this, we are in agreement. I would prefer not to be killed.”

A snort from the Warrior as he cuffs the Ascian lightly on the arm. Lahabrea grins, brief and sincere. Closes his eyes.

“…I would keep you too, given the option.”

The Warrior leans against him.

Remains there.

Takes his time before finding the mask that rests beside his companion.

Stands.

(Lahabrea had been the one to pick it up. He’d stared at it for some time, not as if it were something precious but a judge before whom he was guilty. His expression barren of protest or denial. It was with such acceptance that he positioned it alongside his things before moving on.)

With respect for what is inevitable, the Warrior returns Lahabrea’s mask to its place.

Neither of them reacts at first, made simultaneously foreign and familiar.

Then claws brush the hero’s cheek.

Bring him close.

The scowl seems a poor fit for what lies beneath.

“It may be that we are both of us removed from our own,” says the Ascian, “but I…”

The Warrior kisses him once more, long and easy. A farewell on their own terms.

“I understand,” he says at last, and there is warmth in his expression. “I’m glad I got to know you.”

And he says his name.

#final fantasy xiv #final fantasy 14 #lahabrea #ascians #DRK #Wanted to get this finished before posting it!#This is shipfic heads up #did this because I saw someone lament lack of WoL/Lahabrea fic and someone unrelated lament lack of WoL slash fics

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ghostmartyr · 5 years

Text

SnK 117 Thoughts

Action scenes!

All the wrong people achieving minor victories!

Fist fights that are Eren’s only means of honest communication anymore!

Brotherhood.

All this and more in another edition of Eren coming closest to checking himself while he wrecks himself.

-tosses confetti-

To be honest, the most worrying thing about this chapter to me is that Zeke shows up at the end. I figured that’s how this battle kept going, but I thought that would be the last ‘surprise’ of the volume. A next month thing.

If he’s already here, signs point to the handshake that breaks the world happening at the end of next chapter.

Even having no idea what Eren’s up to, but full confidence that he’s not a hundred percent on board with Zeke’s ideas for what they should be up to... Do Not Want. Zeke and Eren are like bulls in china shops (disregarding what Mythbusters says about that). Whatever’s coming, it isn’t going to be a tiny thing like brainwashing an entire island into forgetting their history. These are young men of vision.

That’s next month’s problem, though.

This month, we get another chapter that makes me think I’m going to go back to my Return to Shiganshina motto of wondering how pretty the anime is going to make all of this.

When we’re once again in Shiganshina. And Eren and Reiner are once again brawling.

This is not a critique, it’s just me pointing out that action scenes in this series are not the fastest way to any of the ongoing trauma elsewhere in the series being resolved. ...And my natural reaction to action-heavy chapters when I’m writing these posts is to kind of gesture at the chapter and be all, “you saw it, didn’t you?”

But that’s, of course, underselling all the emotional drama we still have to sort through. Starting with Eren’s upgrade to not just confusing his friends and the audience at large, now even Yelena is probably wanting to put her head in her hands and just wonder why the fuck.

With the answer apparently being that Eren feels like beating up Reiner.

Let’s put all that in the Later tab, because Eren and his problems of being Eren deserve a little more pondering before I say anything. ...Besides one reminder remark that Eren’s inherited the Attack Titan, and we haven’t yet really delved into hat it means that Titans seem to have their own outlines of a personality. With Paths moving to the forefront, that might be changing.

Or Eren just feels like beating up Reiner.

Moving on, it’s time for everyone’s favorite topic!

Fuck Marley.

This is one of those story elements I will be much less hissy at once the story is over. Unless the story does something stupid. But for now, every single time we focus on the non-Warrior conflicts of Marley, my only regret is that Zeke and Eren’s massacre in their country was so limited.

Hyperbole obviously in effect, but

Let me try to start somewhere that isn’t mindless screaming about how Marley can just go fuck right off, and how being relieved that a child soldier you’ve crafted has made it back to safety doesn’t actually make you a better person, you absolute fuckwit.

As the narrative stands, the people from Marley are the only ones with power who aren’t fucking over their personal allegiances. Zeke’s screwed over everyone. Eren has actively damaged his friends. The 104th is powerless unless they want Armin to start really making things explode.

The Warriors and Magath have a very straightforward mission, and they’ve kept to it. This is their military operation, and there’s a plan. It makes sense that they’re kind of rolled into the protagonist role of this battle. Eren’s being fucking Eren, the Warriors have legitimate grief, they’re trying to save a child behind enemy lines...

Here, as ever, is the problem.

Fuck Marley.

Just... just to try and find some words to my indignation that only this particular set of characters can capture so well, Helos. Helos the hero. The untainted, hollow hero.

The hero who secretly made a pact with both sides to end the violence and spend a century lying about how they found peace, leaving an immeasurable mark on the state of Eldians until Willy strolls up one fine day and decides, you know what, maybe we can cool it with all this lying, but we absolutely need to go after the same targets all that lying created.

Willy was willing to die for his beliefs.

His belief was that throwing Paradis under the bus was perfectly acceptable.

Marley is full of stubborn people determined to see their missions out, but every single time we approach their point of view, it drives me nuts that we are spending any time humanizing the desire for Marley to come out the winner here.

Galliard, you have a legit beef with Eren. He uses you to kill someone you could have counted among your comrades, and the trauma alone would make any desire for vengeance immediately acceptable.

But ah yes, your home town.

I know Marley keeps their people in ignorance. I know Eldians considering that their grandest aspiration in life is to die is possibly more dangerous than simply living that fate out. I know Galliard’s mostly been involved in wars that are about fighting people they’re at war with, and protecting his people.

Unless I’ve been paying even less attention than I think, they’re in Shiganshina.

Marley cracked the walls open like a nut. They used children to do it. They committed genocide without once getting their hands dirty in order to maybe drag out the Founding Titan.

All of this built on the backs of Eldians. Having the Founding Titan means having a compliant Eldian. Having Titans at all means having Eldians.

Eren’s assault on Liberio is awful. It mirrors the horror of Shiganshina, and nothing about how the plot progresses is going to make me okay with what he and Zeke went for there.

But in terms of the devastation caused?

Eren’s willingness to kill children to accomplish his goal of wiping out the top brass is disturbing, and can’t match Reiner, Bertolt, and Annie’s naive willingness to kick down a door when they’re 10-12.

Liberio is still only one town.

Opening up the walls kills a lot more than one town. Some of it through Paradis’ own tactics, but as much as I like Galliard, and understand how much he’s lost...

Marley destroys a third of Paradis because it can.

No declaration of war, no warning. They treat Paradis the way they treat all Eldians: As a resource Marley is so entitled to they have no need to recognize them as anything more.

What Eren does is appalling and wrong.

But Galliard’s continued focus on that is its own kind of sickening. These people have never been confronted with the horrors they’ve participated in. Your home town, Galliard? Your brother?

How about your home town, your mother, your friends, a third of your country, and watching your own government send out a further 20% of the remaining population on a suicide mission so the rest of them survive.

All from a completely unprovoked attack.

Eren at least waits to hear Willy’s declaration of war.

Galliard’s motives are honestly very understandable, but compared to the history we’ve lived through with the Paradis side, it’s nothing. It’s a whining child who hasn’t realized that a world beyond him and his exists.

Then there’s Magath, and his line about putting an end to a hundred years of resentment.

What, resenting the island? Thanks to a lie your hero agreed to?

Resenting titans? After using them as your primary military force since the second you were given back your autonomy?

You people fucked up your own world! Marley policy has kept the fear of titans alive. Marley’s current strategy is bringing the hatred focused on them back to an island that, as far as they know, hasn’t had any interaction with the outside world for a hundred years.

Paradis isn’t perfect. Entire essays written solely about how fucked up Paradis is would be very easy to write. Armin’s probably written about thirty, in-universe.

What they’ve done is still not comparable to what Marley’s done.

The characters might feel the emotional weight similarly, but the crimes are not anywhere close to the same.

So having these guys arguing that they’ll claim the Founding Titan and save the world? The world they didn’t think twice about breaking whenever it was convenient for them? The world they only now care about because the strength of titans is turning obsolete?

Fuck Marley.

Reiner’s honestly my favorite part of this chapter, even if he continues to cling to the wrong theme. He’s upset over Gabi and Falco, but he looks at Eren, and he actually sees Eren. Reiner is someone who has stopped trying to find a moral high ground in this fight. He has his mission, he has his people, and trying to work out the rest is insanity.

They’ll all be dead soon.

They’re all miserable.

“What do you get... from living any longer?! Eren... I’ll end this for you.”

I said a few chapters back that this is a series about suicide. It’s Zeke’s entire motivation; getting the rest of the world to the place he is. It’s time for them all to end. Here, Reiner, despite theoretically being on the anti-Zeke side, is expressing the exact same sentiment.

They’re all going to die anyway. They’ve all suffered enough. It can be over. Ending it can be an act of kindness.

Eren agreed with that once, too.

“At the very least… I want you to end it all for me.” --65

The answer he got then was very simple.

“When I see someone crying, saying… no one needs them… I want to tell them… It’s not true.”

What do you get from living any longer?

Whatever you want. It’s your fucking life. No one else has the right to decide when it should end.

Now we get to the fun stuff, because that look Eren has comes directly after Reiner spouts his big brother’s entire philosophy. Mentally, but this is a story. Eren’s most furious look comes from something he once asked for. Reiner trying to bring him to a peaceful end.

That thing Zeke wants for all Eldians.

That’s what comes before Eren’s emotions rise back to the surface.

Yelena and her merry crew don’t understand why Eren goes ahead and starts this fight, and really, neither do I. As a beacon for Zeke to follow, it’s a seriously dangerous one, and Marley knowing exactly where Eren is means they don’t have to worry about accidentally killing other human-sized bodies on the ground. Hiding and recollecting probably would have worked out better.

But we’re far enough into this arc that I’m really mostly fine with Eren doing things that don’t make sense. If the answer is just that he’s emotionally fragile enough that seeing Reiner meant he had to fight Reiner, I’d accept that.

Then Zeke shows up, and. Siiiigh.

I don’t know what happens next, but Eren looks so young when his big brother steps in to help. Eren’s been fighting alone this entire time. He doesn’t seem to like Yelena or Floch. He’s taken steps to make sure his friends stay away from him. He accepts the assistance freely offered, but his mission is his own.

My personal opinion is that Eren has very different plans for the Founding Titan’s powers than what the narrative has told us. His furious fight for life in this very chapter is a point in favor of that.

But whatever it’s used for, there’s one other person in the world who’s trying just as hard to reach him.

Zeke and Eren are doing, and will do, horrible things. Eren’s motives might not line up with Zeke’s, but Zeke is still his partner in this. Zeke knows what it’s like to cut off everything else except their mission. He knows what it’s like to be alone without an ally he can fully trust with his vision for the world.

They might have different visions, but Zeke understands everything Eren has gone through, and in Eren’s most desperate moment, he shows up.

Until the end of whatever happens, his big brother is fighting to make it to his side. He’s here to protect Eren and change the world with him.

Eren’s a disaster, but the look on his face sells how hard all of this has been. Since he was fifteen, he’s been shouldering the fate of humanity alone. Now, he has someone in his corner who’s held that burden for even longer.

It probably won’t go well. Even this bond might fall to pieces if their philosophical differences come out.

But for right now, Eren has his big brother.

Oh and in other news, Gabi paying attention to all the wrong things means that Marley knows the requirements for making the Founding Titan go zoom.

Next chapter is just going to end with Eren and Zeke’s hands finally meeting. The last page is a blank white one that says ‘the heart’.

...I do kinda love that while this is going on, everyone in the cells just assumes that the Wall Titans are now walking around. SURPRISE! you’re at war. That’s going to be fun to cope with when your building inevitably suffers a hole.

Next month is going to be... a lot.

#Shingeki no Kyojin #SnK 117 #Eren Yeager #shingeki no spoilers #SnK spoilers #spoilers #tl;dr #chapter post

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vibranch · 5 years

Text

The Keybearer’s Keychains (3/6) - Kingdom Hearts Fan Fiction

Rating: T Word Count: 1,938 AO3 link here (contains some author’s notes for those interested)

Part 3/6: The Crab Claw, Oblivion, and Lionheart Part 1 Next part

Summary: So many Worlds, and so many people. Each one was unique and an adventure to Sora. But one thing that was constant on his journey, was the keychains he received. An exploration of Sora's thoughts, experiences, and feelings for each keychain he received during his first journey in no particular order.

The Crab Claw

It was kinda funny that one of the most unique Worlds Sora visited, gave him the most mundane keychain he’d receive. Just a plain looking seashell.

“Just a little something to remember us by.” Ariel said to Sora as he was about to leave. Of course, Sora wasn’t going to say no to it. A gift was a gift, and it housed the feelings of friendship that had grown between them.

Ariel had no way of knowing Sora had grown up on an island. He’d collected hundreds of seashells over the years, and the one she gave him would be easily lost if he placed it next to his old collection.

Sora spent the majority of the flight back to Traverse Town converting it into a keychain for his Keyblade. And although he thought the new form his Keyblade took was pretty, he worried what Sebastian would say if he saw a crab was being used as the teeth of the key. For Sebastian’s feelings, Sora made a mental note to not use this keychain if he ever went back to Atlantica.

For the most part, Sora was content to leave the Crab Claw hanging in his room. It was one of his lesser used keychains, though it was never truly retired. Thus, it was spared from the drawer in his room that all retired keychains ended up, but the plain looking keychain also meant Sora rarely pulled it off the wall for an adventure.

So there it stayed, serving its original duty fine as a reminder to Sora of everything that happened in Atlantica and all the inhabitants who lived there.

The Oblivion

At what point had Sora’s playful rivalry with Riku stopped being quite so playful? It was a question Sora had asked himself multiple times on his journey across Worlds. He wanted to blame Maleficent, but that wasn’t entirely true.

She had certainly made things worse, but the actual deterioration of their friendship had started before they’d even begun building the raft. In the past, Riku would occasionally tease Sora, and Sora usually didn’t mind. But Riku had been doing it more often lately, and it didn’t feel like teasing to Sora anymore.

Sora knew Riku was always better at things than him. Riku was faster, Riku was stronger. And everytime Sora struggled to think of a comeback to one of Riku’s jabs, he realized Riku was cleverer than him too.

Sora felt like he was nothing more than a measuring stick to Riku. Someone for him to stand by, so others could see how impressive Riku was by comparison.

Not to long after the raft building began, Sora felt the need to keep score of how many times he or Riku won at something. But that only made Sora feel more desperate to beat Riku. Every time Sora failed to measure up to Riku, everytime Riku smirked or said something to showboat his victory, it felt more like he was twisting a knife. And despite how much it hurt, Sora still kept track of the increasingly large divide between the two of them.

There was one thing that Riku said that really got under Sora’s skin. “How about it, Sora? The winner gets to share the Paopu with Kairi?”

Why would he say that? Sora didn’t know how to respond when Riku asked him that. Riku definitely knew about Sora’s feelings towards Kairi, he had teased him about the fruit the evening before.

Sora just wanted the race to be fun. But it wasn’t. Not after Riku said that. Riku didn’t even give Sora the right to feel upset about it, instead claiming it was just a joke.

Sora worried it was his fault that things had gotten so bad. Was it his fault for noticing that Riku won more often than not? Was it his fault for letting Riku get to him? They were friends, right?

All these questions rose up again when Sora found a pitch-black crown keychain in Hollow Bastion. It was a mirror image of the crown necklace he wore. The dark side to the silver lined one around his neck.

Sora thought that he should’ve been disturbed by it. The form the Keyblade took when hooked up to it was frightening. Something about the teeth of this Keyblade forced the word Darkness into his head.

The Keyblade’s new form was trying to be a reminder of his time as a Heartless or maybe a reminder of Riku who gave into his Darkness.

Somehow Sora didn’t care. It was reminding him of his friend. And he wanted his friend back. He wanted to be able to hang out with Riku again without feeling like he had to win the next competition. Without feeling like he was being secretly judged or talked down to or belittled.

No, he realized, he didn’t just want his friend Riku back. What he really wanted back was his friendship with Riku. And now he was going to have to fight for it. Fight both the Darkness infesting Riku, and the Darkness inside himself that fueled his insecurities.

The Lionheart

By all accounts, Leon was Sora’s opposite. He was quiet, withdrawn, and he had difficulty showing any sign of human emotion, much less positive emotion. Really, Sora should have disliked him from the personality clash alone. But instead, Sora couldn’t help but respect him.

Leon had arrived in Traverse Town under similar circumstances as Sora. He’d lost his world and most of everyone he’d ever known. But even without a Keyblade, Leon was strong, and perhaps more importantly, he was able to make a difference in people’s lives.

The King respected him enough to make sure Donald and Goofy’s first stop of their journey was to see Leon, everyone in Traverse Town looked to him as a leader, he’d even found Pinocchio and Geppetto a place to live.

Sora didn’t know how he could ever compare to that. No matter what he might accomplish, someone else might look over to Leon and see all the similar things he’d done. And he’d done it without a Keyblade.

Maybe other people weren’t doing that, Sora hoped that might be true. But if Sora was already comparing himself to Leon, what were the odds that he was the only one making these comparisons?

Maybe that was why it was only after Leon said something at the end of the Pegasus Cup that Sora noticed just how much stronger he’d become.

Leon pressed his hand firmly into Sora’s shoulder as Donald and Goofy celebrated their victory. “Good job.”

It was the usual kind of Leon statement. Simple and efficient. And yet his tone said so much more those two words did. There wasn’t any resentment in it. Sora was surprised by how graciously he accepted his defeat.

Sora still half-expected Leon to spout something about how he let Sora off easy this time or that he’d gotten lucky. But instead, he stopped, turned around, and told Sora, “You’ve gotten stronger. Keep it up.”

And then he went on his way again. Yuffie’s voice filled Sora’s stunned silence, teasing Leon as she followed behind him, but he stayed silent to her verbal jabs.

All Sora could do was watch the two walk away. Leon almost sounded proud to Sora.

Even though he lost? Sora wondered.

He had a hard time believing it, but he also hoped that he wasn’t somehow imagining it. He was tired of constantly comparing himself to someone else.

Sure, he could cast fire and summon thunder from the sky, but he still felt like the same boy from the islands, lost amongst the Worlds with none to call his own anymore. For the first time in a long time, Sora noticed how far he’d come.

Sora would eventually fight Leon again in the Hades Cup. This time however, Leon teamed up with Cloud. Despite that, Sora had also gotten stronger and the result was once again the same as last time, with Sora, Donald, and Goofy winning once again.

“Here,” Leon said once the match was over. He pulled the lionheaded keychain from his Gunblade’s pommel and held it towards Sora.

“Huh?” Sora just stared at the silver keychain Leon held out in front of him. “What’s this?” He asked.

“It’s a keychain. Your Keyblade uses them, right? I’ve seen you around Traverse Town with all sorts of different kinds.” Leon explained as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

“Sorry, I just wasn’t expecting a gift,” Sora said, shortly before taking the keychain from Leon’s hands. “You sure it’s okay for me to have this?”

Leon gave a rare smile. He placed his free hand over his mouth in an attempt to hide the look from his face. “Like I said back at Hollow Bastion, we might never see each other again, but we’ll never forget each other either. I want you to have something to remember me by. And besides, it’s not like it’s one-of-a-kind or anything, at least not anymore. Not on my World.”

Sora examined the small silver keychain in his hand. Its features were faded from years of being exposed to the elements of whatever Worlds Leon had been to since he’d fled Hallow Bastion. But despite its age, there wasn’t a speck of dirt or dust on it. In fact, it looked recently polished.

“Are you really sure I can have it?” Sora asked again. He didn’t want to take away such a long-held treasure from Leon and have him regretting it later.

“Really,” Leon said resolutely. “I wouldn’t have my World back if it wasn’t for you.”

Leon could see Sora was still unsure. He placed his hand on Sora’s shoulder and spoke again. “Listen Sora, this keychain depicts a Griever. On my World it represents courage. You’ve proven that you’ve got enough courage as is, but I’d like you to have it anyway.”

When this keychain was equipped, a lion’s head appeared at the end of the Keyblade where the vague resemblance of the teeth of a key would normally be. The whole thing was made of a rough metal. Compared to most of the Keyblade’s other forms, this one looked drab by comparison. But Sora loved it regardless.

Sometimes, during their return trips to old worlds, Sora would equip the Lionheart keychain and pretend that he was Leon. He’d mimic his short and snappy sentences, would try to act nonchalant while fighting the Heartless, and would press his palm into his forehead whenever he stopped to think.

Donald and Goofy often noticed, but wouldn’t say anything. They let Sora have his fun and be the kid he still was.

Pretending to be Leon gave Sora the chance to reflect on their time together. The encouragement he felt when Leon told him if anyone could save Riku, he could. The excitement and surprise he felt when he unexpectedly heard Leon’s voice call out to him after defeating that Behemoth of a Heartless in Hollow Bastion.

But there was one other thing Leon said that kept repeating in his mind. “We may never meet again, but we’ll never forget each other.”

Forgetting everything he’d experienced with Donald and Goofy scared him. And forgetting all the people he’d met scared him even more. Sora didn’t just want to play pretend because Leon was cool or something like that, though he would admit that it was fun to pretend he really was as calm and collected as Leon.

But what Sora actually wanted was to solidify his memories of Leon more. He wanted to truly understand Leon’s mannerisms before it was too late and he might never see him again.

Sora told himself that if he kept doing this, he would never forget Leon, even if he never saw him again. So, Sora kept pretending.

#kingdom hearts #kingdom hearts fanfiction #Sora #Donald Duck #Goofy #Leon #riku #fan fiction #My Writing

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chiyoumen · 5 years

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Two Faced | Chapter 3: Inseparable

Angst | Hurt, no comfort | Jealousy | Denial

I wasn’t able to get to my computer to post chapter 3 here on tumblr, but here it is now (for anyone who is past meeting Ren and hasn’t read this chapter on Ao3 yet lmao)

Summary:

Neither of them expected their reunion to be so... Bleak. Distance had given them both false expectations and changes in perception. The contact high had faded, and so had their victories.

Ren keeps his stead fast desire for treasure, and Ryo keeps his desire for justice, and peace. The conflict lay in their want for one another... Of which they both further deny.

But, Ren knows he needs Ryo to reach his goals, whether he cared about him or not... Their disappointing reunion left them both feeling raw.

What happens when he eavesdrops, and finds how Ryo speaks about him to other people?

What happens when he hears him flirting with another man?

Notes:

There is, of course, major spoilers for Shenmue III from this point on. Future chapters are planned, and will hopefully make it out as I replay the game again.

This chapter is based on the meeting with Ren in Niaowu, which was far more mundane than I expected. But it gave me something to work with, so here we are. It also involved the scene after they meet, where Ryo talks to Shenhua about him, and then calling some people, since I had the international calling card.

Major thanks to everyone who's commented, left kudos, and sent asks to me about this, or generally read this and supported in any way. Your support keeps this alive and I greatly appreciate it!

Hope you enjoy!

[Inseparable]

"He really liked you, didn't he?"

Honestly, he wasn't so sure about Joy's observation. Whenever he was around Ren, there was a palpable tension. The kiss they shared, the memories... The moment he felt strongest was at the top of the yellow head building, Ren's hand upon his shoulder, staring off into the sunset sky as Lan Di got away. He felt nearly defeated when Lan Di had escaped. But there was much more in that moment. He felt so close - like he could truly accomplish finding his father's killer.

And now... He was beginning to feel more alone than ever. While his relationship with Shenhua had grown, and he felt safe with her, she was... Comfortable. He didn't know how else to put that. She was innocent, and he was scared of her seeing more of the world than necessary - but she'd made her choice to follow him. He couldn't blame her for wanting to save her father... And he absolutely wanted to help. She was by no means weak, but she was quite naive.

Ren following him to China was something he'd anticipated, but he hadn't allowed himself to think on it too much. What if he hadn't shown up? He couldn't let himself feel that disappointment.

But he had shown up.

"Is that really all I get!?"

Ryo's heart practically punched through his chest when he heard that abrasive voice slice through the crowds and busy vendors. Ryo saw him the moment he turned the corner and did not hesitate to approach.

"THIS much." Ryo watched him gesture a large amount, "I want THIIIS much."

"Ren-" He tried to push through Ren's argument with the vendor.

Finally, he was here again. But he didn't turn around. He was just shouting about noodles and how stingy the vendor was being... This wasn't surprising.

"Ren!" Ryo needed to be heard.

Ren turned and face him, his heart leaping in frustration over the situation, words slipping from his lips because he did not want this to happen now, "Oh, for crying out loud!"

Play it cool, play it cool. You didn't follow him across China only out of worry. Right, money. That was the main reason, duh. Screw any other reason, honestly. It was the truth, just... Not the whole truth.

"What are you doing here?" Ryo asked, as if he hadn't known Ren would follow him all along.

"What's it look like I'm doing?" Ren gestured to the stand multiple times, "I'm buying some chow mein!"

Ryo glared, "This is no time for jokes."

Ren drew his hands up, taking a step back, that scowl always made his heart skip, "Oh, there you go with that scary face again."

Ryo stepped closer, grabbing Ren's full attention, at least for a moment, "What the hell are you doing in Niaowu?"

'Say it,' Ryo plead internally, 'say you actually care for once, damn it.'

Ren stared at him for a moment, and the smirk that grew on Ren's face made Ryo scared to hear what he was about to say.

"You remember hearing Zhu Yuanda's story back in Kowloon?" Ren wagged his finger upward, and as he finished his statement, he couldn't bear to keep looking at Ryo, and darted his eyes away. Focus on anything else.

Ryo glared instantly, "About what?"

'Please don't say treasure.' Ryo thought, but it was cut off by exactly what he didn't want.

"Treasure!"

'Bastard.' he internally replied, glaring a little.

"I'm talking about treasure!" Ren hissed, briefly raising his fist to him to prove his sure, rock-steady stance on exactly what he was after. But he couldn't look at Ryo anymore, or that rock wall of a facade may crumble. So he turned away, unable to avoid the tension when Ryo lingered closer despite his move away, "The scent is so strong I can practically smell it..."

Ryo sighed, turning his head to stare at the ground. Ren really wasn't as good as he'd built him up to be. In the end, Ryo didn't give a damn about treasure. He wanted vengeance, justice, and eventually peace, and while he had thought Ren cared about that - he very clearly didn't.

"You..." Ryo's voice dropped, trailing off.

He shouldn't have been surprised.

Ren looked back to him, brow raising at Ryo's sudden downcast appearance. Damn. It worked. Ryo couldn't see through anything.

Ren stretched his arms back in the most nonchalant manner he could, deciding that he really didn't want to deal with the aftermath of this encounter. It wasn't his fault that Ryo showed up unexpectedly, he wasn't prepared! And now the kid was upset. Whatever. Ryo could handle himself.

"I'm gonna walk around some more." He flashed a fake, crooked smile at Ryo as he backed away, waving, abrupt and awkward, completely disregarding why he had been at the noodle stand in the first place, "See ya."

As Ryo glared at his back, he hadn't the faintest idea that Ren could be cursing himself mentally the entire time he walked away. Instead, Ryo was wondering how the Hell they'd gotten so close - only for it to be torn away to shreds and crumble so quickly... They'd only been apart a few weeks, but perhaps that was enough to put all their pain and differences in perspective. Or at least remind Ren what his real goal was.

"That Ren could easily pass for a red snake..." He sighed, mumbling to himself, "Guess I should head back to the bustling diner I go." He'd said it loudly in a last ditch effort to tell Ren where he'd be. But the man didn't even acknowledge him.

Ryo's heart had sunk into his stomach, any attempt at staying positive was gone, and he hadn't moved away from their meeting spot right away. He had a feeling that they both knew they'd see one another again - but this was not what he'd been anticipating... And Ren felt as cold as ever. That smirk of his was the same yet it felt so false and hollow. He felt more like the man he met the tried to stab him right off the bat... He felt like that same broken thug he distrusted, and needed to go to for help. He no longer felt the man who spoke up against his cool demeanor, the man who helped him when he didn't need to... the man he'd kissed.

He felt used.

Ryo's fists clenched tightly with his anger, rage brimming his eyes with tears. He'd tried to avoid disappointing himself with thoughts of their reunion - yet this was worse than he'd tried not to imagine. This hurt.

"Damn it..." He muttered inaudibly through gritted teeth, watching Ren's pony tail lightly chase him in the air as he walked away, "Damn you!"

Ren was thinking the same words.

There was nothing about their reunion that felt good - aside from the initial excitement of hearing Ryo call his name. But he was hungry and cranky, not only that, he hadn't expected Ryo to find him in the middle of a vendor's market. This was not going right. This was awful. He couldn't have possibly played it off any worse. Whatever, he really was there to find treasure! Not that he thought Ryo believed that anymore.

Did he care? Sure. Should he? Absolutely not. He had a job to do, and his number one goal was to become rich beyond his wildest dreams. It wasn't his fault that some dumb, passionate kid made him feel a thing or two. It's not like he hadn't slept with people or had brief flings without a second thought before. This was just like that. This was only that...

Being in an actual, public relationship with another man would be a scary prospect at best. Ren had a fondness for women too, but was by no means traditional, nor did he really care about the public opinion. He liked who he liked, despite sexual activity between men being illegal in his hometown. But fuck staying there, anyway, how boring. And since when did he care about any law he didn't want to follow? Boom, problem solved. But only the gods knew how Ryo might feel about that sort of thing. He had no idea how Japanese culture worked when it came to... All of that.

Gods, he was thinking too much. Headache central.

Although... None of it meant he had to be so cold to Ryo.

Maybe he should try again...? He already knew where Ryo was staying, perhaps he could try and stop by, change things. He didn't have to, and he had shit to do, but what good was any of this if Ryo remained pissed at him? There wasn't going to be any treasure, and there wasn't gonna be any glory if he couldn't tail it off the damn kid.

Yeah, that was his rationale.

Ren sighed heavily, pinching the bridge of his nose as he walked along the riverside. Yes, he fucked up. He had to do something. Like fixing a business partnership, right? Damn.

Not too long after their fleeting reunion, Ren made the decision to find Ryo in the Niaowu hotel. He'd been waiting for a while, and it was nearly nine. With a disgruntled groan, he headed into the lobby bathroom, annoyed at Ryo for making him wait so damn long...

Now, he wasn't usually the type to hype himself up, and he felt like an idiot doing so, mumbling under his breath. 'You can do this, he's just a dumb kid, he'll forgive you, this isn't a big deal. You don't even need to ask the idiot.' That was good enough right?

He stared at his hands for a moment, releasing a slow sigh. Gods, he was tired. Getting here hadn't been easy, and now, being here wasn't easy.

Adjusting his bandanna, he moved to leave the restroom.

He froze briefly when he heard Ryo's voice out front. Ren was about ready to push himself ahead, go catch him, talk to him, but he changed his mind the instant he heard a woman respond to him. He snaked against the wall, keeping himself pressed against it as he neared the corner, briefly peeking out to see Ryo sit down with a young, beautiful girl. How strange was that? A girl? Really?

Ren scowled, and moved back against the wall. He was in no way above eavesdropping. He hadn't heard the beginning of their conversation clearly.

Ryo was always awkward, but even more so when he spoke to women.

"Have you found anything?" The woman asked, a delicate, sweet voice reaching their ears.

"Hm. Nothing... New." Ryo replied.

She seemed disappointed, but resigned to patience, "Okay..."

"I..." Ryo paused on and off, as if he wasn't sure he wanted to tell her this, "Met someone... Unexpected, though."

Unexpected in the way he ran into him, not entirely unexpected, as he knew he'd see him eventually.

"Oh, who?" The woman replied.

"A man I met in Hong Kong, named Ren."

Ren's heart skipped, cold sweat beading throughout his skin.

"Ren, huh?" The girl seemed curious, "Is he a friend of yours?"

Neither of them knew the answer to that. But Ryo's response forced Ren into a state of anger that he had to swallow like a dry rock.

"Not... exactly.

Excuse you, kid?

"I keep my guard up when he's around."

'Seriously?' Ren glowered internally, 'After all I've done?'

"So..." She pushed for clarification, "He's a bad guy?"

"Uhm..."

Ren's entire body was washed over in a cold ice.

"Yeah, actually. He is."

Ren's hands balled into fists as he attempted to slow down his rapid breaths. He wasn't going to disagree when he was called a thug, or a jerk, or a snake. But he wasn't a bad guy! ...Was he? No! He was just trying to make a damn living in this harsh environment. One that he was born into and wasn't his fault to begin with!

Yet, his anger was lightly soothed, softened a little upon hearing, "But... We can trust him?"

"Well, yeah... We just have to watch our backs is all."

It was something. But not enough to completely quell the heaviness and heat weighing on him now.

"O...Kay?" She seemed just as confused about the two's relationship as they did.

So... Was that really how Ryo felt about him...?

Ren felt lost in a dizzying heart palpitation. He couldn't find his breath anymore, until he somehow forced a shaky one into his lungs. His nails were digging into his palms, only protected by the fabric of his gloves. He really was a bad guy, wasn't he? He's a thug, a villain, and Ryo had only needed him for help. Never took him for the using people sort, but maybe Ryo wasn't as innocent as anyone liked to believe...

With a start, Ren realized he needed to hide better as the girl passed by, toward the stairs. He slid down the hall, cautious, quick, and careful. He pushed himself off the wall to hide behind the corner in front of the bathroom door, still hidden.

He listened to Ryo and the girl bid each other a good night, and he peeked out very carefully to see if Ryo followed her. He felt some sense of relief when Ryo didn't tail her - but panicked when he almost turned his way. He hid again, and he wasn't spotted. All Ren ended up hearing was the sound of a phone being picked up - and Ryo beginning to dial a number.

Well, he certainly didn't want to apologize now anyway. If he wanted a bag guy, he was going to see one. Bad guys don't apologize, bad guys don't do rescue missions. But Ren had to stay put, there was no way he was going to sneak past Ryo while he was on the phone - Lords knew the damn hotel woman might say something.

But again... Ren was not above eaves dropping. Slowly, he lowered himself to the floor, closing his eyes as he sat on the ground and listened.

"Joy?"

Joy. Joy!? Why of all people would he call Joy? Either way, at first it was a typical greeting, boring the crap out of Ren already. He leaned his head back against the wall, and waited.

But his head shot up when Ryo began talking about him, yet again.

"I ran into Ren here..."

Yeesh, don't say it so dryly.

"Yeah..." He paused, "Play nice? With Ren?"

Ren grimaced to himself. But hey, he wasn't much one for playing nice either. Fair. But the next statement wasn't.

"Don't make me laugh. Nobody would make a great team with him."

'Wow, thanks.' Ren bit back that sarcastic statement, by literally biting his lip, 'Least I'm a leader. I've got people waiting for orders. Tsk.'

"He's only interested in treasure! Treasure is about the last thing I'm after."

Ren's hand hesitantly met his face, rubbing his temples with his thumb and forefinger. This was a nightmare. Ryo was both completely right and wrong at the same time. Ren's desperation for power and riches completely conflicted with the way his heart was beating right then, with the way he wanted to yell at him for being such a damn idiot, for disregarding his actions and taking priory over his words... Not that he was about to admit a damn thing.

Though the way Ryo spoke next put a dent in his lost thoughts, "A... blast? With Ren? Really?"

Ren peeked out again, nearly crawling to look that annoyingly far around the corner, too quickly, almost making a sound. It was difficult to see him, but he'd stepped back enough. Either the lighting had changed, or Ryo's face had become flushed with red... Ren knew his face matched.

But Ryo scowled, "Give me a break."

Oh, what Ren wouldn't do to hear Joy's side of the conversation. She knew him, she knew him more than he liked to admit... She was gonna weasel his feelings out without being blunt, wasn't she? But Ryo was convinced that he didn't care now, and Joy may have made him flustered, but that didn't change anything!

They shared a kiss! How the hell was he so damn convinced he didn't care? Gods, what kind of a mess had he gotten himself into... Sure, he was the type to run off and do reckless things... But chasing a boy across China? What the fuck was he thinking? At least his friends didn't seem surprised. Wong and Joy may have been able to read him like an open book, but any of his men? Nah. They expected him to chase the scent of money, hell, they trusted him to do so. Of course he'd go running off at the statement 'treasures of the Qing dynasty.' It was a priority to him... Ryo was merely a benefit to the chase. Yeah. That was all. It was better to look at a pretty boy (and potentially a pretty girl now, too) on the trail to gold than fight along side a ton of old geezers. Uhg.

Ren had been lost in thought, and he hadn't realized that Ryo was talking to someone else already. They had been talking for a moment already, and Ren hadn't caught on until he heard...

"Naturally, I didn't do it alone. I was with a few friends I made back in Hong Kong."

Ren peeked up a little again. But scowled, were they friends or not? And who was he talking to!? Yeesh. And he thought he was the hot and cold one.

Ren stood again, moving a little bit further in when he realized Ryo had moved closer to the phone, his voice more on a hush-hush level. Whoever was on the other end of the line must have been someone who knew of Ryo's path and all that was going on... He wanted to keep it private.

"They were at least trustworthy, but they couldn't hold a candle to you..."

Ren froze in place, staring at Ryo's profile with wide eyes and a sneer. Ohhh no. No, no. Ren knew that tone. That extremely subtle flirting. That damn tease - so similar to the way he spoke his name, the very thing that drove him up a damn wall. Ren gritted his teeth, knowing he was going to get a headache after all of this. There was no way he was talking to a girl, either. He could never be that suave with a woman.

"There were so many times when I wondered, what if I'd brought you with me to Hong Kong..."

Ren felt his stomach drop, every part of him washed with cold again...

That smile in Ryo's voice, that genuine care, who the hell was it on the other line!?

"Yeah, why?" Ryo muttered, a gentle lull to his tone.

No, no, maybe it was just a friend. Maybe he just knew that person really well. Maybe it was a brother or something? That had to be it. Ryo couldn't possibly talk to someone like that in a flirtatious manner... But he did hear a masculine tone on the other line as he stepped closer, pressed back against the wall.

"Are you blushing, Guizhang?"

Guizhang!? Who the fuck is Guizhang!? If he'd been told, he'd completely forgotten. But now, whoever he was, he had his scorn.

Ren thought he'd already heard the worst crap he could possibly hear while eavesdropping. He was wrong. This took the cake, and the presents, and the house. His ears were ringing, vision tunnelling, and his heart felt like it was about to give. All the fury he'd ever felt seemed to rise back into every single fiber of his being all at once. All over a stupid kid and a stupid mystery phone man and a stupid treasure! It was all stupid, worthless, useless crap!

It took all of his willpower not to stomp up to Ryo right then and there to confront him. Who the hell did he think he was!? How could this possibly get any worse!? He knew confronting him would be far worse than keeping his mouth shut, and pretending he heard nothing inside the wall of Niaowu Hotel... And that's what he would do. Erase this night, erase the ideals he had, erase any promises in a devil's heart.

But he wasn't going to leave Niaowu empty handed, and that meant shoving his heart as far down as it could go, deep into the crevices of his own personal hell in hopes that no one would ever find it again.

It was only a matter of time before Ryo would need him, and Ren was going to make it as clear as possible - he wanted treasure. Nothing more, nothing less.

#shenmue iii #shenmue iii spoilers #shenmue 3 #two faced #renxryo #ryo hazuki #ren wuying #fanfiction #angst #so much angst

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mst3kproject · 6 years

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Trained to Kill USA

Looking at my catalogue of Episodes that Never Were, I realize I have been rather biased in my choice of genres. It’s not something I did intentionally, I just happen to like monster and mad science movies, and such films are often my favourite episodes of MST3K, so naturally they’re the first thing I go to. But the show never limited itself by genre, and though I’ve managed to dig up a couple of Eurospy and 50’s Rebellious Teens movies, there are several things notably lacking. I have not yet tackled a proper western, for example, nor a biker crime spree picture. Time to pick up the slack.

I therefore present Trained to Kill USA, which I ran across quite by accident while searching for a copy of She-Gods of Shark Reef that didn’t make me want to claw my own eyes out (I never found one). It’s got Sid Haig from Wizards of the Lost Kingdom II in it and Richard Slattery from San Francisco International, and it’s a nihilistic revenge movie as depressing as The Sidehackers and featuring an incongruously cheerful opening theme song that makes me think of Girl in Gold Boots for some reason. I’m not sure why, but Trained to Kill USA particularly reminds me of the latter movie, maybe just in its general late-60’s-early-70’s aesthetic and Ted-V-Mikels-like incompetence.

We begin with a couple of thugs under the leadership of a man called Prophet, robbing a liquor store and then fleeing from the sheriff, to the accompaniment of a terrible song and some egregious pan-n-scan. They stop at a farm where they assault the owner, elderly Mark, break his stuff, and try to rape his daughter Mary, but then flee when the man’s son Ollie arrives. Mark wants Ollie to come with him and chase the two down, but Ollie refuses. Later, however, the gang decides to steal Mark’s gun collection so that they can rob a bank in town, and during this heist Mark shoots Prophet’s buddy Parrish. Believing Ollie to have been the killer, Prophet vows revenge.

That’s quite a truncated summary – a great deal actually happens in between the first and second attacks on the ranch, and almost all of it feels irrelevant. Prophet and his men commit crimes, and Ollie sits around and drinks and has flashbacks. I know these scenes are supposed to be establishing character and so forth, but they just come across as filling time before the final showdown. A family in a camper van get killed. Ollie’s army buddies beat up Prophet’s men at a gas station. Prophet fights with his girlfriend. None of it’s presented in a way that makes the audience want to care.

Like a number of other movies I’ve reviewed, Trained to Kill USA is not this film’s original title. It was released as The No Mercy Man. Multiple titles are a common feature of terrible movies, but what’s interesting here is how the change re-focuses the audiences attention. The No Mercy Man referred to Prophet – his friend Parrish uses that descriptor for him, and it suggests that this is his story we’re watching. Trained to Kill USA, on the other hand, is obviously a description of Ollie, which leads us to expect rather more of him than the movie initially offers.

The film is actually equally about both men and their inability to fit into society. Ollie is too damaged by his experiences in war to ever lead a normal life, while Prophet exists in a world where black men are automatically assumed to be criminals and there is simply no other role he can fill. I think we’re supposed to see them as a pair of tragic figures driven inevitably to a confrontation that destroys them both. It’s a little hard to say, because the movie is really bad at driven inevitably. When it tries to set up fate and forces beyond these characters’ control, all it manages are a set of coincidences. If there’s supposed to be a feeling that this all means anything, the movie misses it by miles.

Even more damaging to what I assume are the film’s ambitions (I’m really not at all sure what this movie is actually trying to do) is the fact that neither of these guys are characters we can root for. Prophet complains that his intellect could have taken him places were it not for his appearance: he is a tall, intimidating black man, and so people treat him as a thug. Yet Prophet is the very stereotype of that thug, gleefully and gratuitously violent and a rapist of white women. In both the RV theft and the bank robbery his original plan is to commit a crime in which ‘nobody gets hurt’, but in both incidents he drops this idea the moment something starts to go wrong. The movie tries to bring some depth to him in his apparently sincere affection for his girlfriend Sally (the moment when he leads her in a circle around the fairground is the only thing in the movie that feels like real emotion), but he turns on her in the end, too, blaming her for the loss of his job.

Then there’s Ollie – he is a steaming mess of PTSD and we feel sorry for him, but we do not like him. Actor Steve Sandor behaves like a robot and rather creepily looks like one, too. There’s something about his skin that makes him look like plastic. If he is to be a tragic figure we should really have some idea of who he was before the war hollowed him out, but we see him only as the damaged hero, surrounded by people who are making his trauma worse. His father is an old grouch living vicariously through his son, and his friends brag about his accomplishments in a way that triggers him repeatedly while they don’t seem to give a shit. The movie seems to want us to root for him to give in to the violence in order to protect his family, but that is exactly what Ollie himself does not want and, indeed, is the worst possible thing that could happen to his already fragile mental health. We do not want Ollie to be a hero. We want him to get away from all this and into an environment where he can heal.

I honestly think the writers were trying to do something with this movie. They believed they were going to make an important statement about war and racism and how both are damaging to the psyche. They were trying to give us a tragedy about two gifted individuals who could have been so much more than what the world forced them to be. All they managed, however, was Trained to Kill USA, and the movie sucks.

The photography was bad to begin with and the pan-n-scan did it no favours at all – many shots look bizarrely off-centre, as is evident in the screencaps. The characters are as flat as a creationist’s earth. Fight scenes are awful: I don’t remember a single punch that I believed hit anything. People go leaping over fences ahead of explosions that are obviously nowhere near them. The ‘Vietnam’ flashbacks are shot in front of some trees in someone’s back yard. The dialogue is terrible: characters say things like ‘Ollie, you’re the most decorated man in the state!’ and that’s supposed to be subtle exposition. The Oblivious Camping Family have ‘victims!’ written all over them, to the point where they seem to belong in the opening scene of some slasher movie more than they do in this. And at the time the film was made it didn’t matter that everything in it was outrageously, garishly seventies, but in the hindsight of a more fashion-conscious age, It just makes it that much harder to take any of this seriously.

The harder this movie tries to build tension, the worse it fails. There’s a scene in which the criminals confront the Sheriff outside the bank, and while we should be on the edges of our seats, waiting for the bullets to start flying, all we’re seeing is a bunch of guys standing around awkwardly, exchanging terrible dialogue that aims for ‘badass’ and falls on its face. The bank robbery itself is a free for all of guns and bombs. It’s hard to tell who’s on which side because we’ve never met half these guys before, and both the criminals and Ollie’s army buddies seem to take such joy in violence that it’s hard to care about what they’re fighting for. The most memorable bit in the scene is the stunt guy who does a perfect flip as he falls from a roof.

At the end, the criminals attack Ollie’s family and he is forced to relive all the things he most wishes to forget as he finally takes them on. This fight scene almost becomes effective in its brutality and crudeness. There’s no choreography or sense of justice, just Ollie and Prophet beating the shit out of each other for reasons that have almost nothing to do with either of them. When Ollie wins, it’s not in any way a victory. Under constant pressure to give in to the violence, Ollie has lost, and it’s impossible to tell what the movie wants us to feel about this. The ridiculously cheesy final song, with lyrics like no-one understands you ‘cause you can’t be understood, seems to agree with my gut instinct that this is a disaster, but didn’t we just spend the whole movie waiting for Ollie to kick some ass? Haven’t we been told over and over that he is the only one up to the challenge Prophet presents?

As the credits roll, we’re left in a similar place to where we were at the end of The Sidehackers – nobody won. Ollie will continued to be a shattered man held together by alcohol. Prophet, who was supposed to look redeemable, is now beyond redemption because he’s dead. What happened to the girlfriend Prophet blamed for getting him into all this trouble, we’ll never know. How Ollie’s family feel about what he’s now done we’ll also never know, which is particularly annoying because their opinion of him was so important earlier. Shouldn’t they come to understand why they’ve been treating him badly? If you try to take their stories at face value, Ollie and Prophet both deserved far better than this shitty fucking movie.

#mst3k #reviews #trained to kill usa #episodes that never were #tw: rape #fuck this movie #70s

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dalekofchaos · 6 years

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My problems with The Last Jedi

I did not like The Last Jedi, I strongly feel like it's the worst Star Wars movie ever made. It’s The Room Of Star Wars and worse than The Holiday Special, but let me tell you why I don’t like it and why I feel it killed the Sequel Trilogy for me

My other Sequel Trilogy Critical posts

My TFA critical post

The Incompetence Of The First Order

Why Kylo Ren being redeemed is a bad idea

My problem with Rey

The wasted potential of Captain Phasma

The lowsped chase. Now onto the chase, or as I like to call it “the dumbest bit of military nonsense since the Emu war.” You have the First Order Fleet chasing the Resistance flotilla, supposedly the Resistance fleet is “faster” but they aren’t opening the gap between them and the First Order because… it would burn more fuel (because inertia isn’t a thing in Star Wars Space)? So they stay just at the extreme range of the First Order’s guns, and the Raddus has to be on the receiving end of a potshot every once in a while. Meanwhile said Resistance ships are flying in a straight line, direct away from the First Order fleet, so why not just set course past them and Hyperspace in front of them and catch them in the middle? Are interdictors at play here? Are they content to just think the fleet will run out of fuel and they can just catch them? It bothers me to understand that the heroes are only alive because of the gross incompetence of the First Order, because it doesn’t speak well to the capabilities of the heroes. Let me ask you what would be more exciting? The Resistance and The New Republic uniting their forces and having a big battle while Leia is using battle meditation so she can lead The Resistance to victory? Or a boring lowsped chase that involves being low on fuel, something never being talked about in Star Wars at all and have a edgelord ending where The Resistance is in ruins and only has 12 members left just so The Resistance can fit on the Falcon? It was so STUPID. Hyperspace fuel is never talked about for a reason, it cheapens the greatness of hyperspace travel and is not needed. We watch Star Wars for oh I don’t know a war in space. We didn’t need a boring lowsped chase, we needed an actual fight between The Resistance/New Republic and The First Order. With Leia’s battle meditation up against Snoke’s battle meditation. Leia’s will against Snoke’s might.

The First Order reigns. I am just baffled at the crawl. “The First Order reigns” HOW??? They lost Starkiller Base and a huge majority of their forces. How are they in control of the galaxy? SINGLE DAY HAS PASSED, HOW DO THEY HAVE ENOUGH FORCES TO TAKE CONTROL OF THE GALAXY??? The New Republic just gives up? That’s like saying the terrorists took control over the world after 9/11. The First Order are a fringe terrorist group, they are not the Empire. They should not be in control. Unknown Regions resources or not, they should not be powerful enough to reign supreme over the galaxy. What should have happened is The New Republic’s forces should’ve joined forces with The Resistance and take the fight to The weakened First Order. It’s also complete bullshit The First Order would take over considering The First Order’s terrible tactics. It’s just...baffling.

The First Order’s Incompetence during the Evacuation of D’Qar. Hux is goaded into allowing a Starfighter into point blank range with one of their fleet’s more valuable assets, he doesn’t launch a fighter screen to keep that fighter at bay, and when a real danger is detected, still does nothing. Captain Canady is left to launch his own fighters from Fulminatrix, and gets no support from Hux or the rest of the First Order fleet. Hux doesn’t launch support fighters, direct their batteries to put up defensive fire covering the dreadnought, nothing, no he’s too busy massaging his bruised ego because some flyboy put him on tilt with what amounts to a practical joke, and an 8km long warship pays the price for their incompetence. Now onto said Dreadnought. They have this weapon that is capable of dealing planetary bombardment and chooses to fire on a nearly abandoned planet instead of targeting the Resistance ship that is used to carry The Resistance fleet. Destroy The Raddus and you can easily pick a part The Resistance easily. Instead of doing the most intelligent thing, they chose to do the stupid thing.

The horrible bombing run. The bombers chosen for the Evacuation of D’Qar are a goddamn liability. MG-100 StarFortress SF-17 or The Resistance Heavy Bombers is just bad. It makes no sense. The Resistance has updated X-Wings, so why wouldn’t they have Y-Wings, B-Wings, and A-Wings? They are more effective and less of a liability. Y-Wings would have been way more effective than those new ships, which basically all just flew around until they were shot down one after the other and accomplished nothing. Like, only one of them even achieved what they set out to do... Pitiful. Y-Wings are fighter/bombers, they would have destroyed the Dreadnought with no casualties whatsoever. Y-Wings upgraded with new proton bombs would’ve got the job done, but that would’ve been overkill. They are the ships that beat the Malevolence and cut through the Ryloth blockade like butter, after all. They pack a punch with proper support, and they can at least outrun the explosives they drop. Before anyone tells me the Y-Wings, B-Wings and A-Wings are outdated technology hasn’t radically advanced in Star Wars for thousands of years. The Y-Wing is relatively young compared to most other ship designs. The A-Wing is conceptually older, being a derivative of the old Aethersprite Jedi Starfighter that was in use before the Clone Wars, just like how the X-Wing is a derivative of the ARC-170 and Z-95 Headhunter, and the B-Wing was probably inspired by the V-19 Torrent, and everyone knows the Star Destroyers haven’t changed at all for probably thousands of years. There’s no reason why it couldn’t have just been refined and improved upon like every other starship in the universe has been. If we go with the assumption that they were outdated and ineffective, then there were far better replacements than some slow bombers made of paper. For example, B-Wings, which were supposed to be their replacement in Return of the Jedi and were brand new at the time, and K-Wings, which were a replacement for both of them in Legends, both would’ve been very viable options. They also wouldn’t have broken the “small, fast, and maneuverable” tenet of the Rebel/Resistance design philosophy. Anyway, the Resistance still didn’t need any specialized bomber. All the Resistance needed to do was replicate what they did to Starkiller Base in the last movie. The dreadnought’s “point-defense” turrets aren’t fast enough to target one X-Wing (lol, what a stupid movie), so there’s no reason why a squadron of X-Wings can’t just bombard the weak spot with enough proton torpedoes until the dreadnought gives up. It’d probably just take one or two, as well. Instead, we got a glass cannon sent to destroy another glass cannon, with no trace of escorting ships or other noticeable strategy beyond “FIRE EVERYTHING!!!”

The Treatment of Luke Skywalker. I will never forgive the treatment of Mark Hamill by Lucasfilm. Luke ALWAYS saw the light within Anakin. Darth Vader was evil and committed atrocities for decades but he saved and redeemed his father. But he gave up on Ben because he saw Snoke’s influence on Ben and read his dark thoughts and instead of helping him like Luke would actually do and what Leia wanted Luke to do, he goes with the intention of killing him but stops with the shame. But the problem is that Ben saw him with his lightsaber, what he saw was Snoke’s whispers proven right that Luke was afraid of his power and wanted him dead. My problem is the movie made it seem like his family abandoned him and it's their fault for his fall and actions. Kylo Ren is completely responsible for his own actions. Ben Solo was a grown ass man when he fell to the dark side.Luke would never give up on his family. Luke Skywalker would never try to kill Ben, his nephew and his family. Darth Vader committed countless atrocities and Luke still saved his father and brought him back to the light. I will never believe that Luke would try to even ignite his lightsaber on Ben. Leia gave him her son to train, allow him to control his raw force abilities, love Ben like he were Luke’s own child and to protect him from Snoke. Even if Luke sensed the darkness in Ben, he would have talked to him and try to meditate and do anything that would help Ben. But no, instead of doing what Luke would actually do he ignites the lightsaber and it’s too late and Ben sees what Luke tried to do. Luke is ashamed and sorry, but it’s too late. What’s even worse is that Luke continue’s the old ways of the Jedi, instead of reforming the Jedi Order. In Legends, Luke reformed and made the Jedi better. But instead he continued the old ways and just gave up. He is written to be broken and hollowed out by his past mistakes and painfully out of character. TFA kept on insisting he left a map behind. Lor San Tekka has it and said Luke’s return would make everything right. Han and Leia said Luke left behind the map. In TFA script “It is Luke Skywalker. Older now, white hair, bearded. He looks at Rey. A kindness in his eyes, but there’s something tortured too. He doesn’t need to ask who she is, or what she is doing here. His look says it all. Hold on Luke Skywalker’s incredible face, amazed and conflicted what he sees, as our music builds, the promise of an adventure, just the beginning” Luke looked touched at seeing Rey in TFA and Rey was on the verge of tears, finally someone to help her with the belonging she seeks. In The Last Jedi, no tears and Luke just tosses away his father’s lightsaber like it’s nothing. We are not allowed to see Luke react to Han’s death or Luke to grieve that his best friend is dead. Han was a big influence and friend it was dismissed as if he barely knew him. To quote Mark Hamill on the matter “They had time for me to milk that big alien but to show any human emotion? Nah" He does not even care that his sister’s life and the Resistance she is leading is in danger. He does not train Rey. Again, he gave up on Ben instead of trying to save him. He is sorry and regrets it, but it is too late. You might say that Yoda and Obi-Wan also gave up. But for those two, the Sith took over the galaxy, they had to go into hiding to protect and guide Luke and Leia. Obi-Wan wanted to save Leia and guide Luke. Yoda always wanted to train Leia as a Jedi and bring Anakin back to the light. He was reluctant to train Luke but he still did his duty as a Jedi Master. They did not just give up and wanted to die and they did not betray their characters at all. Luke spends most of Last Jedi on a windswept island, brooding in solemn silence and frozen by indecision. He doesn’t connect with Rey on any meaningful level, doesn’t impart wisdom or knowledge, and never reasserts himself as the powerful Jedi he once was. A brief physical duel against Rey ends with her as the undisputed victor, completely killing his deserved mythos and her potential character arc in one fell swoop. It’s clear in that moment that he has nothing to teach her, and nothing to contribute to the overall narrative. The boundless potential that seemed poised to explode at the end of The Force Awakens fizzles here but never ignites. And without any training at all, Rey defeats Luke Skywalker and Luke acts all cowardly and begs her to leave. When he goes to Crait. He does buy time for the Resistance to escape, but he is not allowed to display his power, he’s not allowed to wield his green lightsaber, he does not bring down all the AT-ATs, the transports, shuttles or bring down the star destroyers in orbit. He’s not even there thus making the goodbye with Leia and final confrontation with Kylo Ren ultimately pointless. He toys with Kylo, but we don’t see a lightsaber fight between them. Luke Skywalker is not allowed to be Luke Skywalker. The Hero’s Journey that he was following was ignored completely and he just gave up and wanted to die. And he dies instead of reuniting with Leia properly. Mark Hamill wanted Luke to live until Episode IX where he would pass on what he learned to Rey. No big battle with Snoke, no passing on, instead Luke dies and all we’re getting is force ghost Luke. Luke Skywalker was a hero to an entire generation. Luke was the true heart of Star Wars. His was the journey we followed from idealistic farm boy dreaming of adventure, to reluctant warrior, and finally to savior of the entire galaxy. The original trilogy built him up, and The Last Jedi finally broke him down. I for one mourn my hero’s passing.

Leia’s knocked out for half the movie. Leia is taken out 90% of the movie and it doesn’t feel like Carrie’s swan song and TLJ does absolutely nothing with Leia. Carrie Fisher is gone. The character herself does nothing to affect the plot. We all knew that Leia was strong and powerful with the force, but the way they decided to have it be shown is baffling. Instead of showing Leia using the force to send the missiles flying at Kylo’s wing men or use Battle Meditation to inspire the Resistance to fight, instead we see the most impressive, and stupid looking, display of force powers, nothing follows from that. Leia goes into a coma for most the movie and then just hangs around. Isn’t it weird that Leia, one of the most important characters in the entire franchise only sees her brother for a moment, never mentions her husband, shares no screen time with her own son and isn’t even the focus in the very rebellion she’s been fighting for her entire life. In the end, all of her loved ones are dead, her son is wants to destroy her legacy, her allies abandoned her, her soldiers were almost all killed, and due to Carrie Fisher’s passing, TLJ is her swan song and curtain call. The most iconic and empowering woman in all of cinema gets to go out as a supporting character and Mary Poppins meme.

The treatment of Chewbacca. This movie failed Chewbacca. Chewie is not allowed to mourn the death of his decades-long companion to whom he owed a life debt nor is he allowed a moment of forgiveness and reconciliation with Luke. Nor is he given a scene mourning the deaths of Han and Luke with Leia. What does Chewie get? Barely any screen time, Rey has to translate Chewie to Luke WHEN LUKE KNOWS HOW TO COMMUNICATE WITH CHEWIE and instead of just letting him eat in peace, he is made to feel guilty of his predator nature and is used as a bad “eating animals is bad” message. He doesn’t even try to talk Rey out of her dumbass plan and is used as a matchmaker tool for her and Finn. His biggest moment is a fucking comic relief scene with Porgs. In this new trilogy they don’t treat Chewie like a person. I was pretty appalled in TFA too, when Chewie and General Organa literally ignore each other, walk past each other without so much as a glance and then Rey gets a hug? Chewie was Han Solo’s companion and best friend for at least a half-century, stuck with him when Han and Leia broke up, and he’s not even allowed to mourn onscreen? Chewie and Leia don’t even interact during the end of TLJ at all. Chewie is not allowed to mourn for any of his best friends at all nor is he allowed to try and talk Rey out of her obvious dangerous plan by going to the man WHO KILLED HIS BEST FRIEND, in what way would Chewie even be okay with that? This is a day later, a single day and the wounds are still fresh. And he is mainly used as comic relief and is not used as a character and hero of the rebellion nor is he allowed to grieve. Chewbacca deserved so much better.

The lack of respect for Admiral Ackbar. The fans hated it and the puppeteer Tim Rose and actor Jamie Stangroom hated it. “So in The Last Jedi, I was quite looking forward to maybe them giving him something more juicy,” Rose said. “We were only given the script on the day when we were shooting that piece of script, so each day I would come to work going, ‘Is today the day when Ackbar gets something a bit more involving?’ And I looked at my script and I went, ‘Oh, Ackbar’s going out of the window. Well, that’s that then!’ I wasn’t quite dead yet.” “We finished all of our bits and they asked me to come down to camera. And I thought, ‘Oh well, maybe they’re going to say thank you for being one of the heritage characters and giving 30 years and all that.’ But what they did was, they gave me a Millennium Falcon sign that had the day and the date on it, the scene number, and they said, ‘Can you look at camera and say ‘It’s a wrap?’ Because that would be really funny.’ “I was actually in tears in the suit because I thought – after everything, after hoping there’d be something, after knowing there wasn’t going to be anything else, Ackbar’s final moment before he went in to the box was a big joke about ‘It’s a wrap.’ They just thought ‘Wouldn’t it be funny?’ And that was the sum total of my life as Ackbar.” Once again, absolutely no respect for the legacy characters, Rian Johnson doesn’t give a damn about the characters from the Original Trilogy. Ackbar was crucial to the Rebel Alliance, he is an iconic character and is given an off screen death and the actor is made to give a tasteless joke. Fucking garbage.

No emotional scene of Leia and Chewbacca. Leia lost her love and her brother. Chewie lost his two best friends. We don’t get to see the two of them grieve and comfort each other. It’s in the novel, but not in the movie. This is one of the moments where showing is better than telling.

The Death of Paige Tico. if you are a casual fan and have no knowledge of who these new characters are in TLJ, then you would have no idea who Paige is and why Rose is crying until you see their twin pendants. And the way they went about her death was just bad. The bombers they chose to have were so slow and clunky that it’s laughable. Why don’t they have Y-Wings? The Resistance has weapons and ships from The Rebel Alliance and you’re telling me there are no Y-Wings? More onto Paige. Killing Paige without establishing who she is or why she is important to Rose is just god awful. You establish characters and connections they might have before killing them or it’ll lose all the impact. What could have been done after destroying the Star Destroyer. Paige escapes and rejoins the fleet. We get a touching scene of Rose and Paige reuniting. We also get to see Paige mourn for the losses of her squad members. We see a love/hate relationship with Poe, but eventually Paige trusts Poe and sees him as a leader. While Finn and Rose go to Canto Bight, Paige and Poe work together on the Raddus. And if Paige has to die, then show her sacrifice herself to stop the canon. There you go, we have a tragic death that is just as emotional and you get to see why she is important and instead of being killed off so early we get to know her and her relationship with Rose and her death is not wasted potential. The worst part about Paige’s death is that Ngô Thanh Vân has no speaking lines and we never get to see Rose and Paige’s sisterly dynamic and a WOC with no speaking lines was fridged.

Rey has no character arc. Rey doesn’t learn anything and I don’t feel like she has a character arc or journey. She starts her journey in TFA and I was excited to learn where her character would go. And TLJ does nothing with Rey. I do love Rey, but I don’t feel like it truly tests Rey and forces her to grow as a character. Rey is intriguing and we care for her, but her journey feels non existent. Luke and Anakin had struggles and journeys. I just don’t feel it from Rey. I am really disappointed with how TLJ handles Rey. Rey doesn’t have any struggles. Rey is all powerful and she is the same character she is from TFA. Everything TFA was building her up was instantly ignored. How Maz got the Skywalker lightsaber? Never mentioned again. How Rey was drawn to the Skywalker lightsaber and what the force vision was meant to mean? Never addressed. Rey says that she’s classified information, “none of your business” Then her parents are revealed as junk traitors who sold her for drinking money and died in Jakku. If her parents were just junkers, how did they afford that space ship if they spent the money on booze? Also the best theory I thought was gonna happen is that Rey has ties to the Empire or at the very least because of the novels it is stated that Palpatine had secret labs on Jakku and the Empire was invested in Jakku, hell it’s last stand WAS on Jakku. Rey herself told BB-8 she was classified information. All that build up for nothing. The force can come from anyone, we all feel it but you build Rey up only to do nothing with her. I’m not upset that Rey is a nobody, I’m just upset that what TFA was building up for Rey was dropped entirely. My big issue with how TLJ handles Rey, is she does not learn anything. She was awakened by Kylo’s mind melding, but after that nothing. She doesn’t learn anything from Luke and she feels like the same character in The Force Awakens. We see Luke showing Rey to feel the force and the Jedi’s hubris. The third lesson was deleted, but we did not really get to see Luke train her as a Jedi. Rey doesn’t learn anything. In the end we see Rey has the sacred Jedi texts, but Yoda pointed out that those texts were holding back the Jedi and the Jedi Order needs to be reborn So really, Rey does not learn anything.

Finn is changed from one of the main protagonists to being a side character in his own trilogy. Finn’s character arc from The Force Awakens was dropped completely in The Last Jedi. He does want Rey to be safe, but Finn just wants to run away, despite the fact that he learned to be courageous, face his fears and stay and fight at the end of TFA. The First Order kidnapped Finn as a child, from his family(possibly killed his family) he was able to leave The First Order and resist the indoctrination. He no longer wanted to fight, he wanted to leave everything, he wanted Rey to come with him. When Rey was captured, Finn had something to fight for and when Kylo Ren pushed her. Finn finally stood up to his past and The First Order. He overcame his fear. So Finn should have been wanting to fight The First Order and become a big deal in The Resistance, we could have even seen Finn inspiring a Stormtrooper rebellion against Phasma and The First Order. Finn just wanting to leave is just bad writing and backtracks his entire character arc from TFA. Finn is the first Stormtrooper to show a real personality, child soldier, who risked his life to find his own freedom and save the known galaxy and ended up in a coma for it. Finn was meant to be a main character, instead he is a supporting character to Rose. Forced to be embarrassed and pointless. He already learned about being brave and truthful. What happened about his past? His brothers and sisters? The family he’ll never know? Why does he share close to no scenes with Rey and Poe? Why does he get nothing to do? Finn was the FO’s best Stormtrooper, one of the best, to the point where he was considered Captain material and because of this Finn would recognize the Hyperspace tracker. Finn also has an almost perfect photographic memory due to being able to memorize the layout of both Starkiller base and the Supremacy with extreme accuracy. Kylo Ren had been impressed with Finn‘s capabilities during their lightsaber duel on Starkiller to the point Kylo had to tap deeper into the dark side to beat Finn. Finn is one of the most compelling protagonists of the franchise, right along with Ahsoka and Luke, because while he is the most dangerous to both sides of the war due to his skills and knowledge, he actively tries to save lives instead of end them. Finn’s upbringing left no room for love. He was stolen away from his family before he could even make memories of them. He tried to dedicate himself to the the First Order, but couldn’t. Finn chose to leave the only life he had known because he couldn’t let even one innocent life be senselessly killed. Finn deserves to be known as one of the Sequel Trilogy’s main heroes and not shoved to the sides. Let’s talk about Finn in TLJ. My problem for Finn in TLJ is that he is reduced to Rose’s sidekick and is made into a racist slapstick caricature. The first real problem for Finn. He is reduced to a slapstick joke in his very first scene. Finn awakens from his coma, slams his face and it is revealed that he isn’t even on the medical ship or even in the medbay on the Raddus...he is in the cargo hold and is made to be a joke. This is the Co-protagonist of the trilogy, and he’s reintroduced as a slapstick joke. Then once again he wants to runaway. I am getting a real racist vibe that Rian Johnson sees Finn as the cowardly black man troupe. That’s just downright disgusting. Moving on. Finn is paired with Rose Tico, honestly I want to like her, but bad writing prevents that. Finn is put with someone who abuses him and we are supposed to root for this and see it as romance? Let me explain. Finn is then tazed by Rose, which is understandable, she thought he was running away and she was in mourning. He also was objectively posing absolutely no threat to her, wasn’t running away, and was even trying to explain himself. Additionally, just the threat of the taser seemed to have been enough to stop him from leaving. But Rose attacked him anyways. The difference between Rey and Rose attacking Finn is Rey subdued Finn just enough to stop and interrogate him, Rose went completely overboard by paralyzing him and knocking him unconscious. It was completely unnecessary and gratuitous. Rey and Finn have a real friendship and partnership from the last movie. Rose, on the other hand, spends the rest of the movie belittling Finn and talking down to him. The book also says that she thought about using violence against him more than once after the tasing (for annoying her) and even pushed him. This displays a really problematic pattern of violence and disrespect towards Finn so yeah, multiple uses of violence and expressed desire to inflict violence on him as being abusive. I would argue that she is undeniably verbally abusive with Finn. In the movie and in the book (more so in the book) she often belittles him by calling him names and using other put downs. It seems she wants to make him feel bad about himself and bring him down, which is abusive. Of course, it doesn’t really matter what her intent is, even if she doesn’t “mean to be mean” it still counts as verbal abuse. So, in summary, her repeated threats and use of violence against Finn and her continual use of insults and put downs causes me to come to the conclusion that she is abusive to Finn. Then Finn is made to fail. The only time he is allowed to be portrayed has the protagonist is him facing his abuser and taking him down. My only problem is they cut out Phasma’s better death scene. Finn reveals Phasma shut down the shields for Starkiller Base, and that gets the Stormtroopers to turn on Phasma. This is what I would hope starts a Stormtrooper Rebellion. Finn’s defection was withheld information by Hux and Phasma in fear of a full on rebellion. Humanizing Stormtroopers and having one become a hero is kind of genius, but the way they did it in Episode 7 made it seem like Finn was the ONLY good Stormtrooper, which has to be an impossibility. If one Stormtrooper can suddenly switch sides, what's to say that others couldn't? And since Episode IX will most likely see the fall of the First Order, I personally think that Finn should convince all (or most of) the Stormtroopers to turn against Kylo and Hux, leading to a cool final scene where the First Order is ultimately destroyed by their own henchmen, children who were abducted and indoctrinated take back their narrative. That would be cooler and more unique, I think, than another Resistance vs. First Order space shootout, or Rey and her possible Jedi apprentice army taking them down. The most insulting part of the movie is the last part. Finn’s suicide run. Finn was the best Stormtrooper and knows about The First Order’s weapons, he should know full well that speeder would be destroyed trying to destroy the mini death star. Finn’s attempted sacrifice was pointless, Finn was treated like garbage throughout the movie, he deserved better.

The lack of empathy and care for Finn in TLJ. He is constantly belittled and mocked throughout the movie. In The Force Awakens, Finn fights Kylo Ren. He does well, but is ultimately defeated. He is slashed in the shoulder and the spine by Kylo Ren and falls into the snow, unconscious. Now if this were in the first 6 movies, Finn would be dead or would be paralyzed. But because it’s a Disney movie, Finn heals up. Rey continues the fight and slashes Ren across the face, leaving him with a gash. The characters all escape, but Finn has to be carried to a medical station, unconscious until TLJ. Kylo Ren seems fine, ultimately jumping in a TIE fighter to try and kill his mom before getting patched up further. Finn, again, has to wake up before doing anything. Here’s the difference between Finn and Kylo’s injuries. Finn awakens in a medical bed wearing a bacta suit. His first instinct is to call out for Rey. As he jolts up, he slams his head against the medical container. He slams against it again. Regaining awareness, he opens up the medical container to find himself alone in a cargo room. He falls out of the bed, spraying medical fluids all over the place. He trudges down the hallway until Poe and BB-8 find him. His injuries are never mentioned, shown, or even referenced again. Kylo, on the other hand, is asked by Snoke how his wound is, to which he responds “it’s nothing.” He then takes that ridiculous thing off, complete with a close-up of a sad kylo Ren face, with his sutures framed to draw attention to them. This happens again in the elevator. Then we get a scene of him getting patched up soberly by a medical droid. Then we get a shirtless scene as a final showcase of his other two scars. Throughout the film, Kylo’s scars are present and framed as a constant reminder that he went through pain. Finn’s injuries are used as a joke once and promptly forgotten, and let’s not pretend that these injuries are one-to-one aside from how they’re framed. Remember Finn received injuries trying to protect Rey, while Kylo received injuries trying to murder Rey. Finn received a deep wound across his spine, which can often be fatal in the real world. Kylo received a gash across his face. Finn’s injuries were worse and nobly gained. Kylo’s injuries were comparatively tame and well deserved. Yet the movie uses Finn’s pain as a joke, and Kylo’s pain as a humanizing factor. That Rey, as well as the director, cinematographer, and a considerable portion of the audience sees a scar and is willing to find sympathy with the person, no matter what they have done, is pretty reprehensible. Not only is Kylo Ren’s scar not enough to be considerably a change to his appearance, as Rian Johnson specifically modified the location of his scar because, “it looked goofy,” the scar is not the mark of an accident or from an assault, but rather from a failed assault on his part. Also, I could get into how messed up it is that scars that don’t fit Rian Johnson’s preferred model are considered goofy. Is a scar that isn’t kept to one side of the face not worth showing? Is a person with a scar you don’t personally like somehow less able to be taken seriously? By treating Kylo’s minor wounds as a big, life-changing deal, and treating Finn’s life-threatening wounds as a trivial matter of no more consequence than a joke, The Last Jedi reinforces century-old stereotypes about Black people. Specifically, it implies that Black people are somehow less affected by pain, have higher pain tolerances, or cannot be physically damaged the way White people can. This is a demonstrated, dangerous trend, where white people actually perceive Black people as experiencing less pain than White people under the same situations. Older textbooks, including some used as recently as late 2017, suggest Black people over-report the pain that they are experiencing. Doctors have declined to give painkillers to Black patients expressing the same level of discomfort that would grant a White patients the same painkillers, and some surgeons even believe that less anesthesia is needed for operations on Black people. This, of course, goes beyond the medical field, where Black people are not believed when they speak about suffering, and are expected to take more physical abuse than their White counterparts. However as the injuries are framed in a medical setting in this movie, I wanted to primarily address the medical bias as in the real world. This has been referred to as an empathy gap. When two people are hurt, with everything except the skin colour being the same, and White people feel worse for the hurt White person, there is a gap in empathy. Now, when the conditions are not the same, and the White person deserves to be hurt, and is hurt much less, and is still empathized with more, and the White man’s acts of attempted murder are framed as romance, while the Black man’s friendship is framed as harassment. Let’s also talk about Finn’s treatment. He’s placed alone in a room filled with cargo, without any monitoring. It’s almost like the medical staff doesn’t even deem his injury serious enough to receive attention. He’s not on the medical ship, which we know they have. He’s not even in the Raddus’s Medical Bay, which, again, we know they have. Finn is isolated, left unattended, injures himself, and stumbles out into the hallway without any assistance. All for a joke. Finn’s injury should have been treated with respect and acknowledgement. A scene with the doctors examining his injuries, telling Finn he is medically clear to join The Resistance and Finn sorrowed by his inability to help his friends, would have been light-years better than a scene where Kylo looks sad getting hurt while trying to kill people.

Poe was changed in between movies for no reason. Poe started out as the most levelheaded, compassionate and trusted soldier in the entire Resistance, so trusted that he was given the mission to find the map to Luke Skywalker and leading the strike force to destroy Starkiller Base, why is it that he is suddenly a hot headed fly boy who ignores orders and is getting no respect from his commanding officers? The character change for Poe Dameron was unnecessary and so out of place. Poe before TLJ would not be okay with sacrificing lives to stop one ship that can be easily replaced. In all source material and the last movie he refused to let anyone die. Not even Finn, a man who was an enemy an hour before they met formally, even though Poe shot his squad mate before during the fight on Jakku. Everything about Poe’s portrayal in TLJ is so unnecessary. Poe Dameron went from a caring and experienced rebel pilot to an arrogant, hotheaded latino stereotype in the span of like…a day. That’s not subversive writing, that’s racist and bad writing. I just don’t understand why no one even tells Poe the plan. Poe is a respected and highly trained, top ranking rebel fighter, who had been covert enough to execute a highly delicate and secret mission to retrieve the Map to Luke Skywalker, responsible for destroying Starkiller base and the biggest asset to the resistance and biggest threat to the first order, anything about the plan? He’s literally a war hero and is more than likely only second to Leia. And honestly? Holdo didn’t just leave Poe in the dark, she left the entire Resistance in the dark. When Holdo meets Poe, she then proceeds to dress Poe down just for asking for his orders and the plan. Keep in mind that Poe isn’t just some grunt. Even with his demotion, he’s your second or third in command, and he has the respect of the entire crew, as evidenced by his later leading a majority of the crew in mutiny against Holdo. Holdo brought her personal crew from her ship and worked with them while snubbing the main rebel crew entirely. That’s a bit of a dick move, protocol or not. One of the biggest issues was not that Holdo wasn’t telling Poe the plan, but it was acting as if there was really no other plan. She was literally taking personal jabs at him when he was trying to find something out. If she said something like. “While it seems bad , we are working on a plan right now. We are not just going to stay here and have everyone die. Just have your pilots ready to go at a moment’s notice” But she didn’t even give him that. Remember up until Poe taking over, they were watching ship after ship being picked off slowly. The crew was given nothing and was told just to trust her. Blind faith in leadership is a horrible message. If that is the take away then why not just do what the First Order or the Empire wants. I mean seemingly they are in charge of stuff now. And we should follow orders blindly. Moreover they were down to < 1000 people, and from the POV of everyone else she was just watching people die. Rank be jammed. Anyone who cared about their crew would do something. He was a Commander and the flight commander there is NO way he should have been left out in the cold. Then I like how they talk about his spunk over his knocked-out body. How Poe was treated in TLJ was absolutely atrocious and a complete insult to Oscar Isaac, Poe deserves better.

Poe was right and Holdo’s incompetence. Poe was absolutely right. He was right on taking down the Dreadnought. He was right in sending Finn and Rose to find the codebreaker. He was right with the mutiny, but the film for some reason tries to paint Poe as a dumbed down trigger happy flyjockey. big portion of the drama would have been saved if she just informed her now second in command her plan, hell she doesn’t even tell Connix who is the expert in evacuation. She disrespected pretty much everyone on the Raddus and surprised when Poe starts a mutiny? This is why I believe that Poe did nothing wrong in The Last Jedi. - While he lost a lot of lives, Poe was right in trying to bring down that Dreadnought. Poe’s reasoning for this run is that the Dreadnought is a “Fleet-killer”, and taking it out now could save hundreds, if not thousands of lives down the line. Yes, they lose all of their bombers and some of their fighters. Maybe 50-60 soldiers. However, the run is successful. The Dreadnought, which we see obliterate the surface of a planet with a single shot, is destroyed. - Poe was revealed to be completely justified with the attack at the beginning, that destroyer was the only First Order ship with orbital bombardment cannons that have longer range, punch through the toughest shields and shred the biggest ships. If he didn’t do that, it would’ve followed them through hyperspace and destroyed the Raddus pretty quickly. Leia probably realized this which is why she gave her blessing to Poe to “jump in a ship and blow stuff up” just before the attack by the Supremacy. - Poe didn’t disobey an order, he had convinced Leia of the plan. She was always in command, the call was always hers, and she decided to go through with it. However, when the consequences of the run are made apparent, she blames Poe instead of taking responsibility for her own call. - The Resistance drops out of hyperspace and is followed by the First Order. Poe’s concerns are entirely vindicated, and I think it’s hard to deny that the following engagement would have gone far, far worse for the rebels had the Dreadnought still been in play. Even assuming they survived that, what were they going to do once they got down to the salt planet? We saw this thing kill a planet earlier in the film. - The only reason the rebels ultimately survive is because of this bombing run. This is never acknowledged, however, and Vice Admiral Holdo takes command and proceeds to dress Poe down just for asking for his orders and the plan. Keep in mind that Poe isn’t just some grunt. Even with his demotion, he’s your second or third in command, and he has the respect of the entire crew, as evidenced by his later leading a majority of the crew in mutiny against Holdo. - Finn and Rose come up with a plan to stop the Hyperspace Tracking. He knows The Supremacy will continue to track the Raddus no matter what, at this point Poe doesn’t really see any other alternative besides just possibly letting everybody die at the hands of an incompetent commander. It’s the only plan he’s been given, so he goes for it. -Holdo brought her personal crew from her ship and worked with them while snubbing the main rebel crew entirely. That’s a bit of a dick move, protocol or not. Continuing on Holdo. In Bloodline, Holdo doesn’t stand up for Leia when Leia presents evidence that the First Order is a real threat. Why would Holdo have a ranking position in the Resistance when she didn’t think there was a need for it? -Connix assisted in Poe’s mutiny and she is the “ultimate authority” on carrying out a retreat. Why was she not told about the plan? Her position and placement on the bridge next to Holdo is pretty “need to know”. -One of the biggest issues was not that Holdo wasn’t telling Poe the plan, but it was acting as if there was really no other plan. She was literally taking personal jabs at him when he was trying to find something out. If she said something like. “While it seems bad , we are working on a plan right now. We are not just going to stay here and have everyone die. Just have your pilots ready to go at a moment’s notice” But she didn’t even give him that. Remember up until Poe taking over, they were watching ship after ship being picked off slowly. The crew was given nothing and was told just to trust her. Blind faith in leadership is a horrible message. If that is the take away then why not just do what the First Order or the Empire wants. I mean seemingly they are in charge of stuff now. And we should follow orders blindly. Moreover they were down to < 1000 people, and from the POV of everyone else she was just watching people die. Rank be jammed. Anyone who cared about their crew would do something. He was a Commander and the flight commander there is NO way he should have been left out in the cold. Then I like how they talk about his spunk over his knocked-out body. -When Poe finally mutinies with a large portion of the crew, Leia stuns him and it’s revealed that the plan was to empty their fuel reserves and send the escape pods to a nearby salt planet. However, when the plan goes into action, Finn and Rose’s contact betrays them and tells the First Order about the escape pods. This results in many of the escape pods being destroyed.This is played up to be Poe’s failure, but I disagree immensely. It’s Holdo’s failure.She had literally no reason not to tell anyone the plan. Poe, while his plan ultimately failed, had no reason to believe that Holdo wasn’t going to get them all killed. Nor did the crew. She’d given neither of them any indication that she was a competent commander, or that she had anything resembling a plan. In the face of that, Poe had the choice of either possibly letting everyone die, or trying something that, while it probably wouldn’t work, might just save the lives of everyone on that ship. In the context of the situation, I think Poe absolutely made the right choice, and any blame for what happened falls firmly on Holdo’s shoulders for being an incompetent leader who never inspired her crew or gave them any reason to believe in her, and yet expected them all to trust her with their lives and just believe that she was making the right decisions. -Holdo’s plan was stupid. Based on the First Order not having any WINDOWS. And based on being unwilling to admit she HAD no plan, and WAS in fact just trying to bail everyone out and see how many, if any, survived. She didn’t ram the Supremacy until almost every escape pod had been destroyed. HOLDO caused the deaths of far, far more Resistance personnel and soldiers than Poe ever did. HOLDO let her vanity and vainglory get in the way of effective leadership – if the people ON THE BRIDGE, FUELING YOUR TRANSPORTS, are helping to organize a mutiny against you because your plan is bad and going to get them killed, that’s a bad plan. Holdo’s entire action was based on wanting Leia to be proud of her, and not Poe, honestly. And granted: that’s a perspective we know that Poe can have, too, but what Poe wants more than anything else is to make sure the Resistance survives and the First Order is brought down without a chance of restarting the way the Empire did. Holdo mainly seems to want to be in charge and restart the New Republic that failed to stop the Empire’s roots to grow into the First Order in the first place, and she was unwilling to ACT against the First Order until what, twelve Rebels were left? She could have saved all of those unarmed, unshielded escape pods if she’d rammed the Supremacy as soon as the last pod detached from the cruiser. But she didn’t, because she never planned to take any actual actions to stop the First Order. Holdo’s idea of resistance was so passive, so laissez-faire, that she might as well have been a First Order mole for all the good she did. The difference between “the fire that will restore the Republic” and “the fire that will burn the First Order down” is immeasurable. Holdo – quintessentially in a White Feminist move – wanted to “rebel” only as far as it restored her own place of power in the Galaxy as a Senator in the broken New Republic that ignored the growing threat of fascism until the NR itself was destroyed. (This New Republic she wants to restore being the same one that allowed slavery to flourish “in secret” across the Galaxy, allowed for poverty like that on Jakku, allowed for the immoral disparity of wealth and power on Cantonica). In the novel Leia Princess Of Alderaan, Holdo’s “rebellion” doesn’t actually exist – she cares about people, specifically her own friends and the people for whom she is the Junior Senator, on Gatalenta. Holdo doesn’t really care about the good of the Galaxy. She cares about herself. Poe doesn’t care about restoring the New Republic. The New Republic is who looked him in the face and said that deaths caused by the First Order didn’t matter – or didn’t exist. They were corrupt and complacent, and they refused to acknowledge that the ideals of the Empire had not actually died down. Their treatment of poor, disenfranchised Systems – those whom the Empire had most exploited, in some cases – caused those same Imperial ideals to take root again and blossom as an open secret. They allowed for the Centrists’ (literal) xenophobia to be communicated like a legitimate viewpoint, keeping some Imperial POVs mainstream when they could have been condemned. The New Republic did not deserve to be destroyed with Starkiller Base, but it also didn’t do enough good to warrant being restored as it was. Poe cares about ending the First Order. Holdo doesn’t.If Holdo doesn’t care about preventing the tyranny of the First Order, then what exactly is she resisting…? Poe Dameron did absolutely nothing wrong in this movie, and he’s by far the most competent commander the rebels have at the moment.

The wasted potential of Rose Tico. Rose could’ve been so much more. I wanted to like her, Kelly Marie Tran did an amazing job, but bad writing held the character back. From the promos and info about Rose, I was excited. She wax this underdog Resistance mechanic who along with her bomber sister, was going to do her part in fighting the First Order, I thought she was a welcome addition to the Sequel Trio, the Lando for the Sequel Trio. What we got instead was just...bad. Instead of actually using her mechanic skills to help save The Resistance and keep The Raddus flying, we got a sideplot takes place away from the central story, on some random casino planet that’s message I could get from any grade school understanding of the world while calling the sole black man/use to be male lead a coward the whole film, forgetting he helped come up with the plan that destroyed the last movie’s super weapon then fought space Neo-Nazis. Then her trying to stop Finn’s sacrifice, and “that’s how we win, not by fighting what we hate, by saving what we love.” That makes no sense and ignores the entire narrative of Star Wars and heroism of the saga. Paige, her sister sacrificed herself to save The Resistance. Holdo sacrificed herself to save The Resistance. The Rogue One sacrificed themselves. Finn's entire arc in the movie was learning not to just think about running away with Rey and fight for a greater cause and when the time comes for Finn to prove that he's grown as a character, he can't? What was the point of Finn's arc in the movie? And let's talk about Poe. Shouldn't Poe be sacrificing himself? Poe has spent the entire film watching others die and give their lives and he's never backed down, so shouldn't Poe be in Finn's place? And if Rose stopped Finn who would save The Resistance? We saw after Rose stopped Finn, the bunker was blown up by the battering ram. Absolutely NO ONE knew that Luke was going to make his surprise entrance and save everyone. For all we knew, The First Order would've moved into the bunker and killed everyone and The Resistance. I actually personally love Kelly Marie Tran, I just think her character was wasted and really hope they truly use Rose to her full potential in Episode IX. I want Rose Tico to appreciate and value not only herself, but her skills as a mechanic. Maybe even develop some computer skills and be The Resistance’s hacker. It’s not unrealistic for the Resistance to have one. She could still think her skills aren’t useful considering most Wars have been won by soldiers and Jedi, not hackers but grow and learn that her skills as a mechanic and hacker are valued.

Kylo Ren is downgraded from his amazing character in the Force Awakens. Everything about Kylo Ren in TFA is amazing. Kylo Ren was a well-rounded antagonist that broke the clichés of most of modern villains. Kylo Ren was a complex and layered character who wasn’t glorified or idealized for his morally wrong actions, so powerful in both the force and with his lightsaber. A hint that the lost child was still in there, but still chose to kill his father to reject redemption and chose to be who he was by choice regardless of his positive upbringing. Kylo Ren is exactly the right villain to succeed Darth Vader in this new trilogy despite not being a Sith. Had Chewbacca not shot Kylo, I don’t think Rey or Finn would’ve made it out of Starkiller Base alive. My problems with Kylo in TLJ is he is downgraded to the great character he was in TFA in TLJ. In TFA there was already a moral ambiguity with his character, but it was subtle. It was made in your face that he was sympathetic in TLJ. An interesting antagonist/villain isn’t a mustache twirling generic character that does things for no reason. Villains are meant to be the antagonist. We are meant to disagree with their actions and understand the flaws in them, to have a villain/antagonist who not only acknowledges what they are doing is wrong, but feels guilt about it. This is something that is extremely difficult for a writer to convey believably. Most of the time a director/writer will go out of their way to make their antagonist/villain sympathetic at the cost of the overall story. They only want the audience to relate to the antagonist/villain so they only put emphasis on that character’s sympathetic traits and ignore their negative ones. Ben has to earn his redemption, he doesn’t need it to given on a silver platter. His whole personality changed. While Han’s death would be enough, it just doesn’t work. In TFA his goal was finding and killing Luke Skywalker. In this movie I just don’t even know what his end game or motivation is. He went from this powerful dark side warrior and in TLJ he was downgraded and made weaker. And of course he is made into a meme cause of the shirtless scene. His bond with Rey was really the only good thing about his character arc in TLJ. The problem is everyone just assumes that this leads to redemption and Kylo turning back into Ben Solo, it was manipulation. And my issue is with how Kylo doesn’t explain why he killed Han. He doesn’t explain to Rey that he killed Han because he felt like he was being torn apart by the light and dark sides of the force and he thought killing Han would help him, but all it did was make it worse. It’s not explained that Snoke has been preying on Kylo ever since he was a child(though Kylo is responsible for his actions. There is no scene with Kylo and his mother. They never once interact. The sad thing is they will never get to interact because of Carrie’s passing. At the end of TFA Snoke said he was going to finish Kylo Ren’s training but no training is given to him. It doesn’t add up that Snoke does not train Kylo. Snoke said that he would complete Kylo’s training when he told Hux to bring Kylo Ren to him at the end of TFA. Yes, he did fail him and he sensed his father in him, but I really thought we’d see Snoke sending Kylo to Vader’s castle on Mustafar to allow the dark side energies in the castle and what remains of Vader to strengthen the dark side within him to snuff out the light. Killing Han broke his spirit, but he could use the castle to complete Kylo Ren’s training. Then we would see Snoke personally train Kylo himself. Snoke begins by telling Kylo the Sith code ” Peace is a lie, there is only passion. Through passion, I gain strength. Through strength, I gain power. Through power, I gain victory. Through victory, my chains are broken. The Force shall free me.” teaching him the ways of the dark side, using torture and force lightning to draw Kylo’s rage to bring out his full potential in the dark side of the force. We needed to see Sith training. We never once got to see it, so we needed to see it with Snoke and Kylo Ren. The throne room fight is just bad. Not even once do we see them displaying their powers is what cheapens the fight. Kylo Ren is powerful enough to freeze a blaster and a person in place and Rey herself unlocked Kylo’s powers, so the two of them could have easily ended the fight sooner than it was dragged out. Kylo is powerful in the force but he SERIOUSLY could not stop a Praetorian Guard choke holding him and Rey struggled with a guard? Rey and Kylo were stronger in TFA and are just made weaker in the duel with the Praetorian Guards. Kylo could have frozen half of the guards and Rey could have mind tricked the other half into killing the frozen guards and Kylo and Rey could have finished them. They are masters of light and darkness, but they are made weaker. As for their final scene together. Kylo’s proposal works because he’s a manipulative asshole. Kylo Ren doesn’t even have a clear motivation. He wants to kill Luke because he thought he wanted to kill him. There’s no reason why he killed the other Jedi, there’s no reason why he joined The First Order, What did he hope to accomplish by joining the First Order? It’s never even explained why he has Vader’s mask. He never explains why he killed Han or why he even wants to destroy The Resistance. He says “let the past die” yet continues to lead the First Order in the same direction that Snoke did. Snoke wanted the Resistance dead, so why take up his mission? He spent the duration of the movie as the most calm and collected and even most Jedi like character throughout the movie, but by the end he turns into a screaming lunatic again by the end. There is no motivation for why Kylo Ren is doing anything. He acts how the plot needs him to act and that’s it. Vader wanted to crush the Rebellion and turn Luke to the dark side. With Kylo Ren I just don’t understand, turn Rey and start a new order? He knows full well Rey doesn’t want anything to do with that, if that’s his plan, it’s a bad one. And if he doesn’t have one it hurts him as a villain. it’s not like he’s Michael Myers or The Joker where it works for them. But with Kylo Ren it just hurts him and the story and hurts the potential of The First Order. There is no motivation or a clear endgame for Kylo Ren or anyone in The First Order, if Kylo is to be redeemed, that hurts his entire narrative, that just makes his path as a villain bad since he has no motivation or endgame. and that just hurts Kylo Ren as a character.

Supreme Leader Snoke is wasted and there is no reason to care now that the villain you’ve been building your trilogy around is dead. Snoke’s death was too soon. Snoke is a dark side user. Calm and collected. Old enough to see the rise and fall of the empire. He takes no risks and does what it takes to win. He was different from Palpatine and I dare say he even had potential to rival Kreia. He was a mastermind and did not allow himself to be a slave to the dark side. He did not want his apprentice to die like the Sith masters of old. He did not want to keep power until his dying breath. Snoke was not the average Sith Lord, he was different. He was respectful, he was very powerful, and watching his scenes, even when faced with failure, he remained calm and collected because he was playing the long game and was not a slave to the Darkside like the Sith. He was invested in turning Kylo Ren into Vader’s heir and even has a ring from the catacombs of Vader’s castle. Snoke was so interesting, so many unanswered questions and this well thought out villain. And then TLJ turned him into a dumbed down Palpatine rip off. The claim that Snoke and his backstory is not important is dumb, considering that we know nothing on why this war is even happening or even why The First Order is doing ANYTHING! We want to know who Snoke is because we want to know how this random evil guy was able to destroy the lives of the entire original trio, corrupted Ben Solo and override the happy ending the entire original trilogy and prequels were fighting for. The struggles of the prequels, the clone wars, rebels, original trilogy, all of these stories and struggles were undone because of Snoke, so of course we have questions. Why do the remnants of the Empire follow Snoke and where did he come from? Not wanting to know the motivation of the villains is just plain ignorant. They completely wasted Snoke. Snoke is a power from the unknown regions. He was SO powerful that Palpatine sensed him, Palpatine was so focused and invested in Jakku in hopes of getting closer to the Unknown regions and he wanted to meet what he believed was the source of the dark side of the force. And they just kill him off so easy? Now there is no reason to care. Kylo Ren is not an intimidating villain and it’s pretty obvious he’s turning to the light in Episode IX. Hux is a bumbling incompetent fool and I’m pretty sure they already confirmed he will be more comedic in Episode IX instead of being a threat. There is a villain problem for the Sequel Trilogy. There is no menace in The First Order anymore and I really feel there is no reason to care. The only possible way The First Order will be an actual threat to the Galaxy is if Rae Sloane usurps Kylo Ren. Problem is, that would actually make the First Order a legitimate threat, and Disney could never allow that.

Tallie Lintra’s death. I did not know much about the new character, hell I didn’t even know her name until I played Battlefront II. But I loved this pilot. I loved how good she was and I wanted more of her and god killing her off was pointless. What’s the point of introducing these unique Resistance fighters if only to kill them off?

No Lando Calrissian in The Last Jedi. I read Rian Johnson’s reason for no Lando Calrissian that he would’ve taken DJ’s place. But Johnson wanted the plan to fail….for reasons. Like god forbid they make it all worth it by having the plan succeed and they get captured when they get to the escape pods. Here’s how I would have put Lando in The Last Jedi. Lando is the person Finn and Rose are meant to get help from. They leave with DJ, but Lando was expecting to meet two members from the Resistance, so he leaves Canto Bight and on his way out he gets Leia’s message and mobilizes old friends from the Rebellion(a cameo from Wedge Antilles) and goes to give the Resistance some reinforcements. We then see a little reunion with Lando, Leia and Chewbacca and Lando revealing that he was who Finn and Rose were meant to meet. That’s how I would have included Lando in The Last Jedi.

Phasma was wasted in The Force Awakens and she was completely wasted in The Last Jedi. While I love that we got to see Phasma and Finn fight, again they did not do anything with Phasma. In her novel she is a completely different and better character. In the novel which is a fascinating study of how utterly ruthless and selfish she is, how completely dedicated to her own survival at the expense of others, and how there is no one and nothing she would not betray to further herself. It’s about peeling back the layers of a seemingly perfect First Order warrior to show her morally empty core, and with it the rottenness of the First Order itself. The novel shows with unsettling clarity that, under all the pretty words about the ideals of justice and order, the First Order is a place where actual idealistic soldiers are used and then thrown away (see: Finn, Cardinal) while backstabbers, abusers, and murderers like the two Huxes and Phasma are actively shielded and rise to the top. Phasma is a survivor. She will always align herself with the most powerful force. Phasma is extremely intelligent and a brilliant battlefield commander. Outside of the movies, she’s lost approximately one fight. Ever. the movies portray her as a minor annoyance but in the book she is the most badass human to ever live and I’m upset with how they’ve treated her. But really, what would’ve helped Phasma is her deleted death scene

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General Hux, the man who caused the destruction of the Hosnian system and is shown to be a younger angrier version of Tarkin in TFA, is shown to be an incompetent bumbling fool and Captain Canady is the only intelligent officer in The First Order. He does not deploy the Tie Fighters, order the fleet to move in when The Resistance are evacuating D'Qar and vulnerable, instead orders the Dreadnought to move in, and instead of ordering the Dreadnought with it’s devastating canon to fire on the cruiser thus giving the transports nowhere to go, he orders an orbital bombardment to an almost empty planet. But does not fire because he sees Poe’s X-Wing When Poe arrives in his X-Wing, the only X-Wing in view. Hux does not order deploying the Tie Fighters or even ordering the Dreadnought to fire on Poe. They do absolutely NOTHING. How is Hux a general again? Did he just want to hear himself talk? The turrets are being destroyed by Poe and Hux tells Captain Canady to fire the Dreadnought, Canady responds it’s too small and too close of range to fire their turbolasers and orders the Tie Fighters to be scrambled which should have been done 5 minutes ago. Canady knows Poe is not aiming to penetrate their armor, he knows Poe is clearing out their surface cannons. Here we have it. The only intelligent officer in The First Order, everyone else including Hux are incompetent. How exactly is Hux a general again? Moving on. Hux is slapped around with the force by Snoke, okay understandable, it’s for failure. Vader did the same. But god it is done in almost every scene by Snoke and Kylo. When the Silencer pretty much destroyed all the X-Wing fighters, and The Resistance command is jettisoned in space, Hux just orders Kylo back. They have the opportunity to end The Resistance, just calls him back, a scene later Hux complains he let them go. Sure they can still track them, but the fact that they let them goes shows that Hux is a fool. The only time Hux is allowed to be villainous in the movie is when he is prepared to take out his blaster and kill Kylo Ren. Everything else he is either an idiot or someone’s toy to be slapped around. And you expect me and the general audience to believe Hux is going to be the villain in Episode IX?

The First Order’s incompetence at the Battle Of Crait. So now the Resistance is stuck on Crait, the First Order knows they are there, we know implicitly that the First Order has more than one dreadnought in their fleet, we also know the Resistance is fresh out of bombers. Maybe instead of calling for a costly ground invasion just call in another dreadnought and finish the job once and for all. This isn’t next level thinking, this isn’t superior tactics. This is using a rock to smash a bug levels of thinking. But they don’t, they land a ground invasion bigger than Hoth and bring a mini Death Star with them. Note again, that while Hoth was defended by more men with better equipment, Crait is defended by a quarter as many with rusting, dilapidated equipment… but it was enough to keep the Order stalled for Luke Skywalker to video-conference in.

The ending. The way they did end the last jedi, it leaves nothing to show that there is a reason to see Episode IX. There is no cliffhanger or showing anything of a Struggle. AOTC ended with the beginning of the Clone Wars. Empire ended with Luke learning the truth and Han was taken to Jabba. Last Jedi ends like the end of the trilogy. The Rebellion is saved and shows it can fight the First Order. It doesn’t feel like there is anything that can be done to make us feel like there is a reason to watch the next movie as it feels like everything was resolved. Doesn’t feel like there is anything to be fighting for or a reason to care.

#Anti TLJ #Anti Rian Johnson #Star Wars #Rey #Kylo Ren #Ben Solo #Finn #Poe Dameron #Rose Tico #Paige Tico #Finnpoe #Supreme Leader Snoke #General Armitage Hux #Star Wars Episode VIII The Last Jedi

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