#so far it's actually gold uniforms that have suffered the most losses

[hordeofcorvids]

I decided to start actually watching Star Trek like three weeks ago and being me I have to start with the Original Series.  And never has growing up watching old tv stood me so well.  The acting, the camera angles, the paper mache rocks.  It all fills me with a sense of joy and wellbeing.  I should have started watching years ago, I have deprived myself.      

[sushibeth]

When Sanemi is first introduced, it’s safe to assume that plenty of people would find the way his character is designed to be a bit unsettling. His has skin that’s littered with scars, blood shot eyes, and a smile some would find terrifying. He looks like a scary guy, and this first impression of him can be solidified through his actions during his first scene coughcoughstabbingnezukocoughcough.

But his brother Genya certainly says otherwise when he says “’Nemi is the nicest person ever”. Of course Genya would be one of the characters who would know him best, and it can be argued that Sanemi is actually one of the most caring characters in the series, despite his questionable actions.

The core of Sanemi’s character is his obsession with protecting others from demons and how he’s failed to do so in the past. With this being said, his character design involves several elements that revolve around protection, the loss of his loved ones, and the trauma behind it.

Scars

Of course the first thing to discuss when talking about Sanemi’s character design would be this. Design wise, the feature that stands out the most would be the scars that cover his body. 

In Demon Slayer, body markings are extremely important. They are usually used as a foreshadowing technique (ex. Tanjiro, Uzui) or are from an important event in the character’s life (Sanemi/Genya, Gyomei). When speaking of scars specifically, characters will only keep them when it’s important to their character in some way. Lots of characters in the series can be seen getting cut up, but won’t have a single mark on them after recovering. This goes to show that Sanemi’s scars aren’t just there to make him look unhinged or “bad ass”.

His scars are a symbol of protection. The first scars Sanemi ever received were the ones on his face, which happen to be from fighting his demon-turned mother. When his mother came home as a demon, his first instinct wasn’t to run, but to fight her in hopes of saving his younger siblings. He even pushed her, along with himself, out a window to try to keep them safe.

As the eldest son in a home with no father, he felt it was his and Genya’s responsibility to care for and protect the family. 

Sanemi’s main concern as a character is keeping people safe from death and will go to any length to do so (even if it ends up not working in his favor). He’d much rather be cut to shreds if it means someone else doesn’t have to. This ideology is shown through his scars and how he’ll proudly show them off. 

Also, as an artist, I’m also quite fond of associating Sanemi’s scars with kintsugi. I feel as if this pottery technique is well known, but I’ll explain for those who aren’t familiar. Kintsugi is a Japanese method of repairing pottery by using lacquer mixed with powdered gold, silver, or platinum. Through this, the item is able to be used again and its beauty is found in its imperfections.

While it’s not uncommon to associate characters who have scars with this technique, I feel as if it’s more significant in Sanemi’s case. His scars are seen as beautiful. Not only does he show them off, but when he’s first introduced, Mitsuri even gushes about them and how great he looks with them. Much like how people find kintsugi to be beautiful.

Besides that, Sanemi has had to go though numerous traumas revolving around the multiple cases of losing his loved ones. This causes him to feel broken and guilty for outliving all these people even when he’s put his life on the line time and time again. But a major wrapping point for his character is to keep going and be happy like Genya wanted. Even after all the guilt and suffering he’s experienced, he still deserves to live on in happiness, much like how a kintsugi pot still has the opportunity to be in use. 

Tsuba & Slayer Mark

The tsuba, or the hand guard, on Sanemi’s blade is shaped like a pinwheel. Of course this is directly related to his breathing style, seeing as how he’s the wind hashira and a pinwheel’s main function is to catch wind. And while this could be me looking for meaning, I feel like it’s not a terribly far stretch to say that pinwheels could mean more, considering this isn’t the only example of one being used to represent him. Sanemi’s demon slayer mark is also a pinwheel, so I figured it’d be of some use to look into them a bit further.

The symbol of a pinwheel could also be a direct reminder of his younger siblings. Not only are they a toy commonly used by children but it’s also not uncommon to find them on grave sites.

Additionally, here’s a quote on pinwheels I found on a website about cemetery symbolism.

This new phenomenon brings motion to otherwise still graveyards. First appearing on the graves of children, pinwheels now can be seen on the graves of adults. The continual movement suggests constancy, perhaps of affection. The wind which propels the tiny mills evokes the spirit.

Clothing

Another prominent feature of Sanemi’s design other than his scars would be his haori. This doesn’t come as a surprise, seeing as this sort of thing is shown with other characters having clothes with a specific pattern in relation to their loved ones (Tanjio/Nezuko with checkers, Zenitsu with triangles, Giyuu with his half and half haori). But Sanemi’s doesn’t seem to have any immediate relation to his family at a first glance. 

The important feature of Sanemi’s haori is the character on the back which is significant enough that when he first shows up in the anime, it’s shown even before his face.

When watching on hulu, the translation for the character “殺” is “kill”. This doesn’t come across as super odd, especially for English readers, seeing as how the demon slayer uniform has “滅” on the back, which can be translated to “destroy” or “destruction”. Close enough, right?

Though, it’s odd that he would bother having a different character that’s exceptionally close in meaning to a character the corps already uses for everyone. One would think that if he really wanted to sport the idea of killing demons on his back, he’d just not wear a haori at all (and show off more scars) or just use the same wording.

This is where the “familial” importance comes in. The character “殺” can also be found in the word for murder/murderer. Of course, when using a translator there are multiple variants for a similar meaning, but they almost all use that character. The use of it on his back is most likely a subtle nod to when Genya called him a murderer after the death of their mother. This means Sanemi took what Genya said to him and plastered it right onto his back. It represents his dedication and how he’ll kill ANY demon to protect someone, even one that was his mother.

Along with the haori, the belts on Sanemi’s legs are an interesting addition to his design. In contrast to other leg wraps shown in the show, belts seem like a rather odd thing to wear on your calves. Though these don’t seem like any ordinary belts, but look just like the belts that are part of the demon slayer uniform.

Like stated before, Sanemi is obsessed with keeping people safe, which leads to how he also has an extremely difficult time letting go of loved ones who have passed. With this being said, it wouldn’t be a stretch to say he’d want to keep items in remembrance of the people he’s lost. This means that it’s extremely plausible that these belts are taken from slayers who he fought alongside with and felt particularly emotional towards. I wouldn’t be surprised if he had Masachika’s belt wrapped around his leg as well.

At the core, Sanemi Shinazugawa is an extremely caring person. Despite his harsh exterior, the most important thing to him is protecting the people he loves, and this is shown throughout his character design.

[mst3kproject]

The Atomic Submarine

I’ve had this one sitting around for a while. It’s a pretty dull 1950’s White Men vs the Saucer People movie, which attempts to differentiate itself from the crowd by taking place underwater instead of in outer space.  It features Brett Halsey from The Girl in Lover’s Lane and a few moments of Jean Moorhead from The Violent Years, and has parts for Jack Mulhall and Paul Dubov from The She-Creature.

It is… the future.  The US and the USSR are friends now, and passenger submarines regularly run between the two under the polar ice!  But all is not well – the USS Sturgeon, largest of this arctic fleet, suffers a reactor meltdown somewhere just shy of the North Pole, resulting in the loss of all hands.  The Pentagon convenes some guys in suits, and decides to send another submarine, the Tiger Shark, to figure out what happened.  When the Tiger Shark encounters a mysterious electrical phenomenon, their scientists conclude that the only possible answer is creatures from outer space!

I seem to be making a tradition out of starting with the shitty science, so here’s a good one: the Flying Saucer’s source of power is stated to be magnetic – that’s why it has to return to the North Pole every time it sinks a ship, to recharge.  Except… that’s not how the magnetic field works.  In the late fifties and early sixties, the north magnetic pole was somewhere near the southern end of Bathurst Island in Nunavut (as of 2020, it’s on its way into Siberia and is actually closer to geographic north than it’s been in centuries).  Sailors would definitely know that, making this plot point kind of hilarious to anybody actually in the navy.

I mentioned Moorhead… she and Joi Lansing (who was once in a movie called Queen of Outer Space) are the only women in the entire movie.  They occur in the same scene, which seems to serve only to remind us that women exist, and have no effect on the plot whatsoever.  Once we’ve entered the submarine where most of the film is set, the cast is entirely similar-looking guys in uniforms, and there are no romantic reunions at the end.  The Atomic Submarine couldn’t even give us the requisite 50’s movie Cute Girl Scientist.  I guess they were going for realism in their story about trans-arctic Soviet passenger subs and one-eyed semi-aquatic aliens.

On to the actual movie.  The first ‘character’ we hear from is the deep-voiced 50’s narrator, who sounds exactly like the guy rhapsodizing about radar at the beginning of The Deadly Mantis, but I looked him up and Patrick Michaels has never narrated any other movie.  I guess there’s just a category of men that have 50’s Movie Narrator Voice. His job is to sound portentous as he talks about things that are either irrelevant or else stuff the movie could have showed us but chose to tell instead.  He falls silent for long stretches of movie and then pops up again, interrupting the flow of the story every time.

The special effects in The Atomic Submarine are okay – they’re nothing ground-breaking, but considerable effort seems to have gone into them.  The saucer and the submarines are obviously small models but they’re nice and the underwater photography is quite atmospheric.  I especially like the little submersible the Tiger Shark carries, the Lungfish, which was clearly designed based on ideas for such machines that were in the works at the time.  There’s a shot of the saucer breaking through the ice cap and rising into the air which looks really good until the saucer itself actually emerges, wobbling on top of a rod.  The one-eyed alien inside the saucer is nice and gooey and parts of it look like they’re made out of living sea creatures.

Like many movies on MST3K, The Atomic Submarine has some germs of good ideas in it, and like the rest of them, fails to do anything much with it.  The flying saucer – maybe we should call it a swimming saucer – is described as a living organism, possibly the same organism as its pilot.  The aliens themselves are biological engineers who will use humans as a template for altering themselves to live on Earth.  That’s pretty cool, but is ultimately not important to the plot. Besides the pilot, who seems to have been assembled by a variety of marine organisms, the inside of the saucer doesn’t look particularly organic.  If nothing else they had an opportunity for some really neat visuals here, but let it slip through their fingers.

The alien intelligence remains unseen and inscrutable for much of the movie.  This theoretically builds suspense but there’s honestly not a lot of suspense here. A plot summary makes The Atomic Submarine sound like an exciting adventure, but the impression one gets from actually watching the film is that it’s kind of a day at the office.  In a way, that’s fairly realistic – the crew of the Tiger Shark aren’t a ragtag group of misfits, they’re professionals doing their jobs which just so happen on this particular day to include saving the world.  Unfortunately, this doesn’t make for a very exciting movie.  An awful lot of scenes are just suspenseful music over footage of men in uniforms frowning at things.  Rather than feeling any excitement, the audience just wants to get to the damn aliens already.

The movie’s only about half over by the time we do enter the swimming saucer to meet the one-eyed, tentacled beast within, but it feels like we’ve been here for hours.  Once the boarding party enters the craft, some things do happen but they’re still not exciting.  Three of the four men die, one by being cut in half by a sliding door and two getting melted by intense radiation – these deaths are surprisingly explicit and gruesome for a 50’s movie, but they’re drawn out far too long and don’t serve a plot purpose.  If the alien killed the men to stop them cutting the Tiger Shark free of where it rammed the vessel’s hull, that would be one thing, but it appears to do it just because.

The main characters all sort of look the same, as lumpy-faced white guys in old movies tend to do.  The only one who really stands out from the crowd is Dr. Nielson, the son of the scientist who invented the Lungfish and an avowed pacifist who’s only on this mission because he knows his father wanted to see the sub used.  He has a running beef with an old friend of his father’s who thinks he’s a coward, all talk and no action.  This is supposed to be the movie’s main arc and yet it fails to go anywhere on just about every level.

Neilson spends much of the movie insisting that he isn’t a coward, which one would assume is a lead-up to him doing something heroic.  It’s not. He’s just here to drive the Lungfish and that’s literally the only thing he does – he takes the boarding party to the saucer, and then sits there and waits for the sole survivor to return.  There’s a bit where the captain of the Tiger Shark decides to ram the saucer with the sub in order to get through its defenses, and Neilson speaks up, pointing out that this is a suicide mission.  Nothing ever comes of this, and it might be evidence of his ‘cowardice’ but I’m not sure… the movie is not nearly as interested in his character as it ought to be.  At the end he seems to have decided that war is cool after all… or maybe the guy he was arguing about has agreed that we need to set aside war with other humans in order to focus on war with aliens.  It’s very unclear.

If there’s a regular passenger service between Alaska and Siberia, doesn’t that suggest that in this future we’ve already set aside war with other humans?  I’m not sure this movie thought very hard about its worldbuilding.

In fact, watching the ending I don’t even know if the guy Neilson talks to at the end was the same man he was arguing with earlier, because, as I mentioned, the actors all look similar. Until that final conversation I thought the other dude had died aboard the saucer and honestly I’m still not convinced he didn’t.  What mainly makes me doubt the idea is that it would mean there’s no closure to the feud at all, which would be the height of poor writing.  I’ve seen movies where I would buy that they were just that careless, but other aspects of The Atomic Submarine are competent enough that I want to give them the benefit of the doubt.

So what does this movie want us to think about war and the military?  It certainly suggests that they’re necessary, since after all we have aliens to defend ourselves from.  One of the scientists on board is British and another has what I think is supposed to be a Russian accent, so perhaps its extolling the virtues of international cooperation.  This would fit with Neilson’s statements about how we need to leave war behind, but if that’s the movie’s point it hobbles itself by never talking about it in that light.

This is all made that much more annoying because, as I said, the effects are decent, the cinematography is pretty good, and while none of the actors are stellar they all do their best.  There’s no real reason why The Atomic Submarine had to be so dull and messy, unless they were just saddled with a half-assed script. Even then, they made a pretty good effort to get some gold out of the dross.  You might find The Atomic Submarine worth watching even if only to think about what might have been.

[meetthetank]

Peccatum Chapter 17: Denouement

Rating: Mature Archive Warning: Graphic Depictions of Violence Category: F/M Fandom: NieR: Automata (Video Game) Relationships: 2B/9S (NieR: Automata), Jackass/The Commander (NieR: Automata) Characters: 2B (NieR: Automata), 9S (NieR: Automata), 6O (NieR: Automata), 21O, Jackass (NieR: Automata), The Commander (NieR: Automata) Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe, genre typical violence, long fic, Slow Burn, War, Chapter 13 is rated E

Adam stands on the beach just out of reach of the surf. His long, flowing white hair is pulled back with a crude tie to keep the sea breeze from blowing it into his face. Crimson eyes watch seabirds, rodents, felines, and canines scavenge the corpse of Grun, the child of the sea. Though his cold expression betrays no emotion, part of him feels that the demon deserved more than this. But it had failed in its task, and therefore must be recycled. Humans have their rituals and rites when it comes to the dead. Demons do not. It would be pointless anyway, since the fallen would simply be rebuilt or repurposed.

A lone councilor staring at a demon corpse in the dead of night would be suspicious, were anyone around to see him. The humans were busy indulging themselves, though, celebrating their victory. There wouldn’t be a human left not inebriated or seeking pleasures of the flesh. Besides, Eve was not far away. His simple brother would leap into action the moment something went awry.

Though...it might take him a bit longer than normal, seeing as how he is currently rooting around in Grun’s stomach.

It’s vile work, but necessary. To rebuild a demon in a similar way, or to pull the valuable memories of combat from their minds, the core is needed. Grun’s core especially holds great value. The memories of a demon that old and one that was separated from the Terminals are truly unique among their kind.

Grun’s open throat shifts and shudders, then gives way to reveal Eve, naked and covered in viscera. He bounds over to Adam with a wide, childlike smile on his face.

“Brother! I found it!”

He wades through the surf and presents an irregularly shaped crystal no bigger than an apple that glows with a soft, deep blue light.

“Excellent work, Eve,” Adam says, taking the Core and beginning to clean the rotting flesh from it. “Go rinse off now.”

Eve huffs and crosses his arms over his chest, “Do I have to, Brother? The ocean is so cold at night…”

“Yes,” Adam snaps, but keeps his tone soft so as not to upset Eve. “What would the people think if they saw you like this?”

“I guess they’d be scared…” Eve mutters, his brows pulling together as he thinks. “Okaaaay, I’ll go I’ll go.”

“Thank you.”

Adam sighs. His “brother” had his uses, but he was a simple creature. He was unmatched in combat, but when it came to behavior and etiquette he had the attitude of a human child. Fortunately he stayed silent during most interactions with the human’s governments, which allowed Adam to show his own strengths. Eloquent language and half truths were his weapons of war, and up until today they had never failed.

Idly, he turns the Core over in his hands, feeling its strange irregularities dig into the soft flesh of his palm. Cores of this nature are rare. They’re supposed to be perfectly round and free of blemishes, accentuating uniformity among the Demon Hierarchy. However, the more a demon deviates, the more deformities spread across its surface. Grun’s core is barely recognizable as one, looking more like a lump of unpolished crystal instead. Countless untold experiences of a demon who lived alone for centuries at the bottom of the ocean lie within, and Adam can’t suppress intense jealousy for whoever gets to unearth them. The centuries of memories are priceless to a relatively new creation like himself.

“I can’t believe the humans actually did it,” Eve says, lazily pulling on a set of dry clothes.

His brother’s statement causes Adam to grit his teeth. Admitting that the Apes managed to defeat his carefully deployed troop of flying demons is a blow to his pride he did not expect. He maintains his composure in front of Eve, but the internal fury burns within him, as it does with all demons. Though Homunculi like himself and his brother are designed to lead humans astray with deception and cunning, he laments his restrictive position and longs to face them in a real fight.

At least in this case he can attribute the Ape’s victory to their new weapon and their unforseen ally.

“It seems we may have underestimated them, and their Equalizer. Even so, the human’s suffered great losses today. Even with their...dragon.” Adam muses, his gaze lost in the core, “They celebrate and believe all will be well,” he chuckles darkly, “They will return to the city completely unaware of what is to come.”

“Grun did break a lot ships…” Eve stares up at the sky, oblivious to Adam’s ramblings, “But, why are they celebrating if so many of their soldiers died?”

Adam hums to himself as he wraps the core in a thick cloth, “Perhaps they are celebrating as a way of honoring the dead.”

“That doesn’t make any sense, brother.”

He laughs a little and ruffles the short white hair of his twin, “Humans are strange and fascinating creatures, Eve. One day we will dissect them and reveal their mysteries.”

“And then can we play?”

“Yes, Eve. Then we can play.”

“Three ...two...one ...HEAVE!!”

11S’ cry rings out across the beach. At his command, 9S, 801S, and 42S all pull on long hooked poles with all of their might. The steaming piles of flesh slough off of Grun’s corpse, splashing into the surf and spraying the scouts with congealed blood and seawater. They grimace and groan but do not gag, as they are already covered with gore and soaked to the bone. The morning sun does little to warm their shivering bodies.

“Ugh…” 801S moans, “This thing isn’t gonna budge. Why the hell are we doing this!?”

“Cause Jackass told us to.” 11S grumbles.

“Jackass was drunk, asshole.” 801S snaps, “She tells us to do all kinds of shit when she’s been drinking. Remember when she told us all to drain that lake? Or collect all the brown rocks in camp?”

Silence passes between the scouts as they take a moment to reflect on the futility of hauling a multi-ton rotting demon out of the ocean.

“So,” 9S says, “I don’t know about you guys, but my stitches broke again and I don’t want to keep doing this.”

“Agreed,” the other scouts respond and toss their hooks into the sand.

9S tenderly peels off his coat and sets it on a nearby log of driftwood. Sure enough there are little specks of blood on his undershirt in a fine line across his chest. He sighs, knowing the verbal beating 6O is going to give him later.

“Did the sewing break again?”

He whips his head around to find 2B, her head tilted curiously as she stares down at him.

“Stitches,” he corrects, “and yeah. I guess this stupid errend Jackass sent us on was too strenuous.”

“We told you to sit this one out!!” 801S shouts from further down the shoreline.

9S waves off 801S with a low huff before turning back to 2B, “I’m fine, it just stings a bit...11S went to go get 6O, but it’ll be a while before they get here.”

He sighs and unbuttons his undershirt, hissing as the fabric brushes across the tender skin around his wounds. Looking down at his chest he sees that they are irritated and slightly red, a sure sign of oncoming infection. With a small cloth he begins to dab away the trails of blood.

“Here.” 2B says, moving his hand away from his body and kneeling down in front of him.

“Huh? What are you- Gah!” 9S yelps and jerks himself back, almost falling off of the log, the second 2B’s tongue makes contact with his skin. “What was that?!”

“Hold still,” she commands. “Coatyl saliva has minor healing properties,” She holds his gaze for a moment, then averts her eyes shamefully, “I’m sorry. Did I overstep?”

“I-....” He wants to object, but some lewd section of his mind holds him in place. “...No, you’re fine. It’s...different. Go ahead.”

With a quick nod, 2B lowers herself back down to his chest. She licks around the outside of his wound, careful not to disturb the more inflamed portions. A slight tingle spreads across where her tongue trails. Right before his eyes, the angry swelling begins to dissipate and the slight ache fades away. It doesn’t totally heal the wound, not like 6O’s magic, but it does make it a little more comfortable. He figures her saliva might be some kind of disinfectant rather than magic, but with this woman anything is possible.

9S leans back a little, sighing with relief. However it’s when 2B shifts ever so slightly between his legs that he becomes acutely aware of where she is and what she’s doing. His shoulders tense and he inhales sharply. Suddenly it feels like his body is on fire, and even the smallest movement from 2B sends shivers down his spine. He runs his hand through 2B’s hair, feeling the soft, downy feathers hidden beneath. In return, she gazes up at him with curious blue eyes that makes his heart stop for a split second.

Something pulls at the back of his mind as he holds 2B’s gaze, something that starts out formless but turns into words. Commands, instructions, suggestions. They start to flow from his mind and pour into 2B’s when 9S catches himself. He blinks furiously, forcing those thoughts from his head. 2B shakes her head as well, clearing the hazy, slightly gold tinged, look in her eyes.

What did he…just do?

“Wow, Nines. That’s a reeeeal scary bear, huh?” 801S jeers with a wide smirk plastered across his face.

“S-Shut up!!” 9S yelps and hastily scrambles away from 2B, who looks back and forth between him and the scouts with a slightly annoyed expression.

“So ferocious,” 11S says, making mock claws with his hands, “Careful 9S, it might maul you again!”

9S’ face flushes red as he fumbles with his undershirt and coat. All the while, 2B seems nonplussed at the scout’s teasing. For a moment he’s confused, but then he recalls the conversation they had just before their “encounter” in the woods. At first he thinks its because she has no shame, but it seems more along the lines of cultural difference.

He sighs, pulling on his coat. He couldn't be too mad at them, for now at least. After all that’s happened, he could let them poke fun at an easy target.

“Oi! OI!” Jackass slurs, standing on a wobbling table that barely supports her weight, “Listen up! I’m making a speech!!”

The tavern full of soldiers and workers miraculously quiet down. 9S, the other scouts, 21O, 6O, and even 2B gather around the table Jackass stands on, setting their pints of ale elsewhere so she wouldn’t knock them over in her half-drunk stumbling.

“I cannot begin to tell you guys how amazing you are,” Jackass begins, swinging her arms wide and spilling ale over unsuspecting spectators, “We did the impossible. A bunch of nobodies went and blew up the biggest demon ever recorded!”

Cheers and the clanking of steins echo throughout the tavern before Jackass motions for them to quiet down once more.

“Without all of your hard work, this town would be fuckin’ underwater or covered in demon shit or whatever,” she pauses to take a long drink from her stein, “Without y’all, there wouldn’t be anyone to sit here and listen to me scream about how fucking cool that fight went. Sure, we lost a lot of good folk,” another pause as everyone bows their heads in a brief silence to honor the fallen, “Hell, without all of you I wouldn’t be standing up here in the first place. I give you guys a ration of shit all the time, but in all the honesty I have in my shriveled up husk of a heart, you deserve to go fucking wild!”

The tavern erupts with cheers once again. Jackass throws her arms out wide and cheers along with them spilling more ale and almost making herself lose her balance.

“And- Shut up!” she shouts. “And! White turned in early for the night! So no rules!”

A drunken soldier gets up next to Jackass, face already red as a beet. “LET’S START A FIRE!”

“There’s one rule!” Jackass hastily amends and shoved the soldier off of her pedestal.

2B fails to suppress a giggle as the scouts around her break into laughter. She had only had a few sips of her tankard but she already feels lightheaded and warm all over. 9S had told her what exactly she was drinking but she doesn’t remember right now, nor does she care. It makes her feel good, so she goes in for another sip.

Though alcohol is nothing new to her, she’s never had something this strong. Back home eating large quantities of fermented fruit would bring on a similar but not as intense feeling, and even then it would take a lot. The only time she had any was a few times in her youth and her sibling’s betrothal celebrations. Technically she shouldn’t be having any now due to her apprenticeship, but…

Oh yeah, she left and can’t come back. So she’s no longer an apprentice anyway. That’s why she let 9S put this tankard of...something...in her hand. Whatever it was that humans drank, it certainly put fermented fruits to shame.

The scouts beside her distribute small cups to each other and fill them with a little bit of a sharp smelling liquid. 11S puts one in her hand with a grin, “Come on, you’re part of the gang. By association anyway.”

The scent of the amber fluid burns the inside of her nose, making her recoil from it. Even so, she follows along with 9S and the rest of the scouts as they hold their glasses up above the middle of the table. 9S gives her a comforting smile, but it doesn’t mask the sadness lurking behind it.

“To 32S,” 801S says solemnly and gestures to the empty chair beside him. “May the gods rest his soul.”

“To 32S,” the others and 2B repeat, bowing their heads.

They tap their glasses on the table twice. 2B mimicks them up until they all throw their heads back and gulp down the foul smelling fluid. She hesitated for a moment, then brings the cup up to her lips and takes a sip. The second the bitter drink touches her tongue she almost gags, but holds herself together with a grimace and a shiver.

“Oi! Don’t sip it,” 11S explains. “Open your throat and down it all at once.”

“Yeah, like this!” 42S pours himself another cup and tilts his head back in the same way as before. The boy doesn’t even flinch, just smiles broadly and presents his empty cup to the group.

2B takes a deep breath, then throws her head back and nearly launches the cup up to her lips. The drink burns as she swallows the lot of it, but it feels strangely warm in her stomach. She’s able to savor the unique oaky flavor of it before her world begins to blur even further. The warmth of the drink spreads from her gut, to her face, and out to her fingers.

“Whoa…” she mutters, wiggling her rapidly numbing fingers in front of her face.

“Ooohh boy, here we go,” 801S laughs.

9S puts his hand on her shoulder to steady her, “Easy there 2B,” his voice is laced with concern but she can see the grin just beneath, “I think that’s enough alcohol for you.”

“N...nuh,” she grumbles, waving her hand in his face. “M’ fine.”

The scouts chat amongst themselves about something that can’t hold 2B’s attention. Her eyes drift around the tavern. Her instincts tell her to scan for danger, though there’s nothing dangerous here except the rowdy drunken soldiers. She spots 6O off to the side of the main mass of people, practically draped across 21O who turns redder and redder the more 6O says. Meanwhile, in stark contrast to minutes earlier, Jackass sits in a lonely corner, surveying her handiwork with a cold gaze and a second tankard beside hers.

2B isn’t sure how long she had been sitting at the table, staring into the crowd, but a quiet sniffling next to her breaks her out of her alcohol induced daze. She looks down to see 9S rubbing his face with the back of his hand as he quietly sobs into a tankard of ale.

“Wh?” she mutters. “Wh’s wrong?”

“H-...I couldn’t...I should’ve…” 9S slurs before taking another drink. “I could’ve saved ‘m….”

“Who?”

“Thr-...2S…” he hiccups. “32S…”

“Oh…”

“He was right there…” Tears begin to stream down his face. “I could’ve done something but I just sat there. I was so useless...He died ‘cause of me…”

“No, the demons got him,” 2B mumbles. “You didn’t kill him.”

“But I didn’t save him!” he moans. “I was so helpless! I just laid there on the floor while he-...he…”

9S buries his face in his hands and sobs quietly. “He got taken...and I just sat there….”

She clumsily puts her hand on his head and runs her fingers through his hair with all the grace of a lame cow. “You did what you could... “

“Did I? What if I could have done more… What if-...” He can’t finish his thoughts as another wave of intense sobs wrack his body.

“It’s okay…” 2B mutters, putting her arm around his shoulders. “It’s okay…”

“2B…” He looks up at her with tear filled eyes. “Are you sure? Are you sure it’s okay for me to...keep going-”

“Shh, shut up.” 2B shoves her hand into his face. “Don’t blame yourself for that, you did everything you could.”

His brows knit together as he studies her face. She sways back and forth with a glazed look in her eyes. “....Are you drunk?”

“No I’m-” She tries to hold back a damning hiccup, but the pressure inside her chest turns it into a small burp. “I’m fine.”

9S’ face scrunches up. “Ugh, your breath says otherwise…”

“Dragons cannot get dr-” Another hiccup. “Drunk...I am an apprentice of temperance and...something something…. No indulgence for me, no sir.” She grumbles her half remembered creed with a lazy roll of her hand.

“What kind of apprentice has to abstain from ‘indulgences’?” 9S asks, slyly moving 2B’s tankard away from her.

“I was ah-..uuh...Ex…” She hiccups again. “Ex-....” She becomes distracted by 9S and her eyes glaze over. All thoughts leaves her mind as she becomes lost in his boyish face. “...You’re...cute.”

9S giggles and playfully taps 2B’s nose. “I know. You’ve told me before.”

2B huffs, but doesn’t resist when 9S practically flops on her lap. He looks out to the thinning crowd of soldiers and civilians as they continue to sing and drink with each other.

“You know...this is the happiest I’ve seen everyone in a while...It’s nice.” He looks up at 2B who hums in agreement, and continues to comb her claws through his hair. “I’m...I’m glad you’re here to share this with us...with me.”

“Yeah…” 2B mutters, a smile beginning to form. “I’m glad, too.”

Though the party itself was beginning to die down, 2B and 9S simply sat together in silence, enjoying a moment of peace and quiet with each other.

It would turn out to be their last for a long, long time.

[winterinwhiskey-blog]

Brawls by Anatomy.

“Can romance actually be beaten out of you?”

A swipe of worn out cotton turns into a swab as some other’s phrase turns its punctuation to transform into some half erased format of a full-stop written onto my motions over the bar’s veneer, and don’t get me wrong, I didn’t stop but it was a slur, bleeding out like that borderline tug of control you keep by iced out logic when everything else is burning Tennessee Fire in your mind. You fake your sobriety better than you act when you’re sober — unaware, because feeling filtered would actually not screen for your pain in projection this time.

But you don’t ever really stop doing what you do, not anymore, anyway, That control doesn’t get to slip you.

Muddled waters on mahogany, reflections colouring on amber in ripples that wouldn’t wave in a tide and I look for shades of purple in the faces that wave on by, perhaps kissed with the tempered blue in hue of a Bailey’s Comet — more over flesh than in one tablespoon of Rum and a sprinkle more of salt over someone’s wounded pride than over lemon of a shot of vodka.

Inebriation, came in so many colors than the tenured tones of honey that glazed over empty glasses that filled up one too many hearts — black for eyes, brittle blue for bones, red for shots of blood that flooded sockets as reason drained out of eyes; and here I was, some regulated or regulating enabler for miseries profound or liquids that over-dramatized pain into an excuse for harm.

Ironical, really.

But it was a shrine of lies, in ways. Jabs of half-honesty as we drank disgust to wash out the loathing that lurched up our own throats. Picking drinks in our name of tolerance to evade someone else’s as our lips soured up to forget kisses in fashion no intent of pucker could beg to relive but we tongue down over and over again to forget. But well, sometimes, it was in the name of remembrance with the exclusion of the fancies or the tails in a mixture fruited up one too many as you stick to the harsh honesty — those doses of separation to leash out the well-bred bitch in your barks of whiskey than to lash out in some poison that bastard breeds boiled on to live up to the name of being a dog, excluding loyalty; or well perhaps the loyalty lay to suffer out the sickness that they pissed themselves in.

Pain drinks to forget, suffering drinks to be understood.

And a diagnosis superior — trauma drinks to understand.

I’d know.

Inherent green-flecked blues fall onto the silhouette of personal therapists on some top bottom row, lines by lines of identical matrix marched black uniforms with those starred badges across — Jack Daniel’s, by the army. Signing off or out of each infliction of imagination or trip down acid lane to streets that wind far away from the backdoor in spirals of multiplications of nightmarish grog in fumes that snap the door by the hinges open onto the ruins of ecstasy, not by definition but by the pace of some reel that was sped up by double and we all about onto someone else’s home, spiralling in dances as the disgust clogged the insides of your throats to drinking what he would have been, or perhaps would pick up to touch by his incarnation of disgust and the only spiral onto maven avenues of hostile grounds, shrapnel by loss of pride by the feet over the pour of ribs or the firework splatter of glass against the matching strike of your scalp and you drink, the only bit he didn’t so you don’t ingest what he does — no more snarking worms of his presence griming the veins between your flesh and skin, heating up like rust over water, coagulating and suffocating like the bubble of clotted blood by to bring out that cherry sparkle of your eyes that leafed out your irises like some trampled flower shoved by bloody ends of fingernails into your sockets and you rely, on that one bottle of whiskey in winter; to keep you clean on a carpet you no longer lay on bloody.

Only, physically.

Unwinding the razor wire of thoughts that left the tracings in rectangular rent of cuts by the payment of my flesh, only in memory over the fences of the heart in its defences and I look about again, tracing the upheaval of romance or its beatings as my hands kept at the violent swipes of cleaning the bar for the girl who asked up such triggers; but some charade we played, answer the least by the face of what you know the most. Your own muscles should be the last in line to betray you in a run but well, betrayal beckoned by instinct within guts more than any outlier outcome.

“I swear, it’s like he bangs me up so fucking hard... who the hell even needs romance after sex like that?”

A single shaped brow has its inquiry in distasteful amusement at the speech privileged humans in all the riches of unadulterated expectations of life — tongues can only be under practice for getting choked up until wounds needed to be licked.

Moments innumerable uncounted do pass as what a crude altar of abuse and its fascinations truly abided for the shrine of sex.

But perhaps, I had grown sensitive to all misguidances of such religions.

“Kevin!”

Several eyes dart over in search for some Male recipient to answer for the name but they never really expect this shapely, kinda thinly, somewhere between a tomboy and a proper lady walk through with a carved up face for a name like that.

It had been some months since I had been working at my brother Cain’s bar, managerial creativities while the fucker chased away Hollywood dreams or just finally swapped the nightlife for a bit of Dawn. He was occupied, to say the least and I neededto be occupied so may as well.

I put aside the towel from my shoulder like some silk falling off of bones, but in an aggression of an impatient temper that set fire to the essence of any fabric of tenderness; shifting onto on booted feet under denim clad long legs with this rusted green of battle verdant hugging about subtle enough curves, fire breathes seemed to defy in appearance for lungs of ice and as confused and appealed on on-lookers of fascination Look onto my steps as I go on to Abe, a wrestler-built cashier here, veins grow frost under bite as his finger points back with the appraisal of, “Someone’s got a delivery for you, and he’s outside.”

Face and cheeks in form of confusion as a single brow raises in inquiry of a demand everyone knew to answer without a word and Abe just swings up his shoulders with palms in surrender and my eyes take a roll.

“Backdoor!”

Temperamental scowl set in place, I tread through.

And the metal hinges of the heavy door open up and as the winter ice blows in a harsh exhale to battle out whatever I was inhaling, whatever content ever found up on this face flies in spirals onto the warmth of the world of gold behind me, and I stand on the threshold of darkened blue, fourth degree of a bruise, I’d call it. And the berry black of a blood-bound bayou of fists of five by the dips of the curves; separation in contract and contrast of what was champagne on ice and damage on grind.

I stand, scowl-settled that takes half a flight into a relaxation of muscles for an inch of movement for the face that came into view wasn’t a tax I was paying under any governing of mutiny even if a hand was lain on me.

“You got some fucking balls but that was the point you were overly intent on showing, weren’t you, you fucking bastard.”

That twitch goes off over that thin sweated forehead, I see the struggle in the vein like a thinly worm trapped in a pipe smaller than its width, trying to breathe or still instead of explode and it was funny how beyond behaviour you could fall into seeing with bashing blurs.

“Kev, we need to—“

“You need to separate my conjunctions in person from your name before—“

“K— listen—“

“Showing up isn’t the daring part but doesn’t it disgust you to your guts to even come about—“

“I just want to—“

»

“— K—!”

I shut the door.

Metal cuts out the cords, only by sound.

I bump into Cain, he wasn’t supposed to be here, and wavering arms brush him aside as I stumble on, only in mind as my balance knows its grips in anxiety.

Blank.

My eyes roam for all the dust and dunes in golden tunes that hung from this bar with each step I take back in, people abuzz with the bubblies they popped from champagnes or the colourless compassion that masked their kindnesses and I appreciate Cain the Dickhead’s hard work by his own feet instead of having my concentrations fall onto the ripples of deluxe rich cotton, the pretentious spares over the bones of this dickhead’s torso.

Reels on reels of past project in films of spins that aren’t on roll but are on hold against the case of your skull, some shelves your trauma builds on, categorised to drop in loops without escape once it plays on.

Arms on arms of struggles in reflexes.

Wall wars.

Couch crushed potato.

Glass shattered doll.

Carpet corpse.  

Static.

Contemplation into and away to not contemplate on each bad memory that whispered up by the claws of some silent song out of by mind’s eye, subverted out to scream dreams of fantasies out my reasons.

And I only called them fantasies for the scenarios came on as imaginative, more to be done in some dystopian domination out of the box of creation of what was already broken. Pieces onto bones.

Well, I was merely killing myself in my own head repeatedly by hands that wouldn’t ever resemble my own.

But it had gotten to some point now where my nails could take up a pound of flesh from any merchant that charged up for more.

It’s a coil around the lungs, constricting in so that the flaky clumps of flesh fall out through the sliding gaps in rolls up, suffocating cutting through but the shallows of your eyes fell for the heartburn even if no face seen blurs down the youth that slipped in tension taut by the muscles every second.

Noise.

“KEVIN.”

A dazed “hmm?” finds sound as I turn by the head over the shoulder.

“Some new-act bikers are fighting to change onto whatever the fuck but it’s Grey’s hour.”

“Borrow some balls.

For Christ’s fucking sake. Where’s Abe?”

“Don’t be so mean. He went out somewhere to deal with something.

But Kev, you already got so near to charges and that police officer last time said he wouldn’t—“

“I’ll see you when I’m in court, Judge Judy.”

Warranted steps are taken against precautions and maples ways are made over to the black-leathered riot that took up the rackets over actual proper civilians and not rats dressed in human-skin. Or some tattooed up sorry excuse for flesh.

“Boys.”

It wasn’t a scream but the coldness always seemed to cut through like an icicle in decided departure through the noise.

Tired eyes blink up to widen through the sleepless adventures of yet another weight unregistered but I’ll process when I woke up. Or something.

Some fucker turns, toothpick in chew by the edge of the jaw and my mouth has an inward-upward, nearly negligible curl of distaste at the phantom feel and thought of chewed up wood by the teeth.

Reasons to gag, the counter wouldn’t stop up.

“Man, we won’t be changing channels if we got to look you over all night.”

My gaze assesses, some bored and nearly non-receptive recession within my mind as I see the remote in the asshole’s hand.

You had one job, Abe.

“Respectfully, sir.

Hand the remote back. We follow a strict rotation of shows here and our regulars don’t like interruptions.”

The man takes a step forward, or two. And I calculate in coldness and mechanisations of preparations of the seven streets of probabilities this would be taking and I feel the intake of held air on behalf of the entire room — having sucked all the air in for this vacuum ring of battle and blood and speculation, clearing up for the tension in the air before the thunder struck in all its peace.

“Baby, we all could become a regular for you.”

“The whore house is down the main road and if you confused addresses, I can write it down for you.”

The man tuts, tossing the remote back onto his crew, that awkward moustache or beard masking manic onto that dire smile as an arm rounds about to have a palm smacked onto my ass and statue-still marble, —

“You’ve got a tongue on you, don’t you? How about—“

A panic flutter of ‘fuck’ comes about in a tone that coloured on knowledge of my behaviours. And Fucking Hell, it was that second of silence before the ring slips off the slit of a bomb before shrapnel showers in engulfing atoms of losing ligaments and shattered limbs.

— and the cracks appear, after one second of composure as a thin arm slides up back against the gruff of his neck to lead the the pressure point by the elbow while a knee unleashes its wrath onto his guts, spilling balance over to lean his gravity over my shoulder as I side step to let the pull decelerate him onto the ground and the groans in pain subsides.

Just instincts onto its coldness, a thin sheet of emotionless ice.

Robotic programming onto nerves of humanity, not to brim over the consoles of control on another program to avoid technical errors of an outburst.

I turn around, a breath not seemed to have been lost.

“Remote.”

My palm tells for its property back in a calm that raged out in waves of instilled rage itself and —

“You fucking bitch.”

— Fingers tangle onto the back of my skull with no intent of anything but beat indications and some blinded blurs of sightless runs as my head has its impact onto the edge of a counter, the brow bone in detriment alongside the shelves of recorded events of trauma rattling to fall from organisation and I sit a minute in the daze of crimson that rolls in syrup dense moments over an eye and the man keeps on his walk, that glory on his heels adding that misogynistic shine from that exhalation of power over what seemed fragile that seemed to be modelled after Hermes’s steps one too many times and I did think of innocence lost in flashbacks of Percy Jackson renditions or whatever seemed suitable one too many times.

It’s a mechanical bull, the number one.

And long legs graduate themselves onto a stand before slanting themselves onto a run with arms in a quarter envelope of measurement of his hips; the disgust of touch creeping in by thought but not now as I degree onto a barrel from behind with every fragment of strength I will into muscle energy into this thinly body and it has customers flying from their tables as the wooden legs give away from the weight of the crash over.

You take a ride, from anyone.

And I think in technical flows. Mechanical, perhaps. The worst manifestation of rage where its presence was just absence; hollow, a ghost, grabbing onto some chair by its dangling legs and smashing whatever it had to splinter over the man’s head.

Everyone, wants to ride.

White rage, it was a sheet of snow, truly for me. Some song in Chilli Peppers, lacking Red and more on its absence as claws and bottles break in some slashes unforeseen and screams tearing through pain in sockets —

And pulls away, oh.

— until some set of arms find their ripples in fixative contact over the downpour of my curves as the bullets of punches don’t get to infill their magazine and the trigger finally sets in close contact, chest on my spine and my entire nervous system seems compromised by contact of cotton and skin and I scream and legs wade for kicks to barrel against the winds and wage backwards as the sirens in wails cry through my chaos as whoever was holding me back strategically but honestly blindly hit the barrier behind.

And I hear Cain’s loud call and the bustle of doors.

From you.

A spin and a flash of ash-lined, light eyes and somewhat a familiar face, perhaps by some silhouette; before some other fucking male voice finds further dominance over assistance of a megaphone.

“Kevin Reed, put your hands in the air.

You are under arrest.”

( end. )

[secretagentspydetectiveninja]

The Misadventures of Prince Kim - chapter 71

The second-last chapter of the fic, and BY FAR the longest and most dramatic, because we all need to suffer.

Here on AO3, where the Morse code doesn’t auto-format and screw things up like it does on tumblr, thanks a lot tumblr

Adrien was frozen on the spot. Surely he must be dreaming, or hallucinating, or something. This couldn’t be real. Perhaps the long journey had taken a toll on him, perhaps he just needed a good long rest.

But seeing the look in Marinette’s eyes, a mix of terror and fury as she looked past his shoulder behind him, his worst fears were confirmed. He braced himself and turned around, dread settling into his stomach.

There, right in front of him, stood his father. Emperor Gabriel of Agreste, the ruler over millions of people worldwide, was a tall, imposing man. It was unnerving to see him in a corridor usually populated by scrawny noble teenagers. He was decked out in his military uniform, dozens of badges gleaming on his chest, the gold buttons polished enough to shine brightly even in this dark, dreary atmosphere. In fact, Adrien could not remember the last time he saw him in more casual clothing.

Emperor Gabriel was watching Adrien with those cold eyes of his, the tiniest of triumphant smiles on his face. Adrien was still in too much shock to move – he had not seen his father in person for what must be well over a year now. And he had expected that he would at least have a little respite before the inevitable confrontation. In all his speculations, he had never considered that he would come face to face with his father as soon as arriving at school.

“Son, I’m glad to see that you have finally returned. I’ve been waiting.”

Gabriel had spoken again, his superficially kind words doing nothing to mask the anger in his voice. He began walking towards Adrien – only for Marinette to step in between them, an arm out to protect Adrien.

“Please step aside,” Gabriel commanded. “I would like to speak with my son. This does not concern you.”

Adrien had known that when it came down to it, Marinette would ignore the commands of the world’s most powerful emperor for him without hesitation. But seeing her glare at Gabriel, refusing to move in spite of direct orders, almost brought tears to his eyes. He clenched his fists. Enough of this catatonia – if his friends could stand up for him, then he could stand up for himself too.

“I don’t know what delusions you are under,” Gabriel continued, annoyance seeping through his otherwise controlled demeanour, “but I am not going to harm Adrien.”

“Perhaps not physically,” Marinette retorted, though Adrien saw her warily glancing at the sword hanging at his Gabriel’s waist.

“It’s okay, Marinette,” Adrien said, gently putting a hand on her shoulder. “I’ll talk to him. I’ll have to at some point, it may as well be now.”

“Fine. Be careful.” She stepped back and allowed him in front of her.

He looked up at his father, bad memories flooding back into him so fast he could feel his destruction powers bleeding right through his fingers, threatening to destroy the air itself. In the past, seeing Gabriel or even just hearing his voice was enough to subdue Adrien, restrain him into obeying the rules of his dull, cruel, imperial lifestyle. But now? Now it was filling him with anger.

“What do you want, father?” He noted with satisfaction that Gabriel seemed taken aback by the fire in his voice, at least for a few seconds. He had never spoken to his father like that before. Not directly. It felt good, so good! His very fingertips were tingling with destructive energy, waiting to be unleashed.

“Adrien,” Gabriel said, attempting to sound kinder, “I have missed you. Do you know how worried I was when you recklessly ran away from home like that? I am glad you have come to your senses. Now, we can return home together and forget that this all ever happened.”

He reached out an arm, but Adrien instinctively pulled away. For years and years he had wished to hear his father regard him with such affection – but in these circumstances, it just made him sick. Gabriel had missed him? Perhaps it was true, in its own twisted way, but he didn’t care.

“I will not be returning home right now,” Adrien said. “I’m here to complete my education. And I know if I go back, you’ll just put me under house arrest again.”

“I would not refer to it as house arrest. This school has caused you to become rebellious, and I would like to keep you within your palace quarters until you are back to normal.”

“Being repressed isn’t normal, father! I want freedom! And it doesn’t matter if you put me back under house arrest, or whatever you call it. I’ll never be like you.”

Gabriel sighed, rubbing his forehead. “This is what I meant by ‘rebellious’. It is exactly why I asked Nathalie to keep you in the palace while I was away. The longer you stay away from home, the more commoner-like you become. This time, however, I will see to your education myself. You will return home with me, now, and I will not tolerate your disobedience any longer. You’re really trying my patience.”

It was Adrien’s patience that was reaching its end now. Every single word his father said was grating on him more and more, and he couldn’t take it. He just couldn’t take it!

“I’m not going back with you!” he snapped. “And anyway, no amount of house arrest and propaganda shoved down my throat is going to change anything! If you try to take me back, I’ll fight every step of the way. And when I’m emperor, I’ll undo all your cruel work. If you disown me, then you won’t even have any heirs. Your precious empire will splinter away into nothing once you’re gone, and all your conquests will have been for nothing.”

“Adrien–”

“No, let me speak! You never listened to me, ever, did you? You were a terrible father. You had me, your own son, locked up! Out of a twisted sense of love! Blaming maman leaving for everything that’s wrong with you! And… and you tried to kill my friend. Prince Kim. Yes, he’s my friend, my very good friend, and you tried to kill him, all because you want to add his country to your special collection, as if the lives of the millions of people who live there, or anywhere else in the world, mean nothing. But I won’t be part of your worldly chess game, no matter what you do. The people of the world deserve better than being forced against their will to assimilate into the orders of a person like you. And… I deserve better too. My life is my own to live, and I’m not letting you take that away from me.”

All the way through his outburst his voice had grown louder and louder, and now he had stopped, leaving the torrential rain as the only sound filling in the ensuing silence. Adrien glared at his father, more furious than ever. He did not regret losing his temper, raising his voice – and for the first time in quite a while, he did not feel afraid at all.

It took several moments before Gabriel spoke again, his voice much more level than Adrien’s fiery rant.

“Your loss, son. You would have made a great emperor, had you just been like me. But I suppose you are too sensitive for that. Just like the commoners and lower royalty and nobility that you cherish so much. You simply do not understand the true ruthlessness of the world, and therefore you cannot thrive in it. Are there any other empires as strong as mine? No, because there are no other emperors like me.”

“No other emperors as hated as you, you mean.”

“You underestimate my power, Adrien. Every battle won is a step towards winning the war. By the time I die, the whole world will be in my hands. And if it breaks after I’m gone? Then people will look back at me as the one who held it all together, upholding my legacy. It is a win no matter what. My conquests will live forever, with or without your help.”

Had he really spent so much time amongst his own armies, amongst his own supporters, that he really believed all this?

“You don’t know anything about the world at all,” Adrien said. “Everyone will remember you as a dictator. Because that’s what you are.”

“The commoners need guidance from a strong-willed leader. If they cannot appreciate the help I am giving them by being that leader, then that shows why none of them are fit to rule. And if you and your friends here at school do not understand that, then none of you are fit to rule either. Speaking of which: tell me, where is the prince of Lê Chiến?”

Adrien, having only just arrived at school himself, had no idea. But evidently his father did not know that. “I won’t tell you. Why would I betray him to you, when I know you’ll just kill him and take his country while it’s weak?”

“You do have a talent for putting things in a way that makes them sound bad, don’t you? I am saving his country. My intelligence reports that the boy is far too impulsive to be a good ruler. I am doing his people a favour. Now, tell me where he is.”

“Kim has changed, father. He used to just be a silly kid, like lots of people. But he’s a good prince now. And more importantly, he’s a good person. He doesn’t try to kill innocent people just because he wants their land, unlike someone else I know. He’s going to be a wonderful king. I actually used to have a crush on him, did you know that? He was my first kiss and everything. I hope that annoys you.”

“There are much more ‘annoying’ things I am concerned about right now. Such as his whereabouts.”

Adrien folded his arms. “I’m not telling you.”

“Well then, you’re no son of mine. I will find himself, and end this once and for all.”

With that, he turned to leave. At this point Adrien’s fury was so strong that his powers of destruction were practically leaping out of his hands, raring to go. To think that his father was going to kill Kim, having given up on sending assassins – he was going to outright, directly, kill him! It riled him up so much that the very world around him seemed to have a red tinge to it.

Adrien raised his hand, watching his father’s retreating back. It really was time to end this once and for all.

All he had to do was run up, put his hand on the back of Gabriel’s pointlessly intricate uniform, and watch as his powers disintegrated all his problems into dust. It would only take a second. It was that easy. Gabriel was right there, within range.

Now was the time to do it.

Right now.

And yet… and yet…

He hesitated. Half of his brain was screaming at him to just go for it, and he wanted more than anything to listen to it.

But the other half, sentimentality was trickling in, filling his boiling blood with ice, rooting him to the spot.

He took a half-hearted step forward, but it was already too late. Doubts were clouding his mind, the anger melting away into frustration. His hand, wavering in the air, slowly lowered on its own accord. All his motivation was flooding out of him before he could stop it.

No… no, he couldn’t… he couldn’t do it…

“Adrien?” He heard Marinette’s footsteps running up from behind, then her arms closing around him. “You were… that was…”

He had almost forgotten that she was there. But right now, he couldn’t even bring himself to feel a shred of relief. Thrusting his face into his hands, he let the tears start running out of his eyes.

“Marinette, I… I can’t kill him! I know I should have! To save Kim. But… I j-just couldn’t…”

He groaned in frustration, tugging at his hair. The urgency of the situation was dawning on him. Sure, Gabriel was his father, but a terrible one! One who neglected him for years, restricting him on every front in the same totalitarian ways he ruled his empire, then had him locked away! And now that terrible, terrible man was going to go and kill his friend – and yet Adrien couldn’t even bring himself to end his life first, even when the world depended on it!

“We’ll find another way,” Marinette said firmly. “There must be a way. We can go find Kim first, and warn him. Smuggle him out of here or something.”

Adrien lifted his face away from his hands, grateful to see the supportive look Marinette was giving him. “Do you know where he is?”

“No, unfortunately I don’t, and without Lila or Alya here I’m not sure if there’s a quick way to find out, but I suppose I could try using my luck powers or something…”

“Will he be in his dorm? Should we check there first?”

“That might be a good idea, though he usually goes for runs at this time of evening so it’s unlikely–”

Their conversation was interrupted by shouts from across the corridor, towards the entrance.

“MARINETTE! ADRIEN! THERE YOU ARE!”

They turned to see some rather bedraggled-looking people running up to them. Once they were closer, however, Adrien realized that these people were none other than Alya and Nino. They were alright – oh, thank goodness! A stroke of happiness hit his heavy heart, cheering him up ever so slightly. He had missed his friends so much, and at this point in time, was fully expecting something terrible would happen and he would never get to see them again.

He ran over, only to be knocked down in a hug from the both of them. Only when he pulled away did he notice their injuries.

“What happened to you?” Marinette asked, helping them all up off the ground.

“Pirates, long story,” Alya said. She was out of breath. “But we have a warning. We saw a ship from the Agreste Empire on its way here earlier today. Looks like Gabriel’s sent someone to come fetch Adrien.”

“Gabriel is already here. He just talked to us, actually.”

“Really?! What did he say? Where is he now?”

“He wanted me to go home with him,” Adrien said. “But I refused. And yelled at him. And then he said he was going to go find Kim, and… and I should have killed him with my destruction powers, but…”

“It’s alright,” Marinette insisted. “Alya, do you know a quick way for us to find Kim? This school is huge and there are so few people here right now, he could be anywhere, even out for a run or something, and we can’t let Gabriel get to him first!”

Alya thought for a few seconds, but then shook her head. “I can’t really think of anything, since most of my spy network left before the spring holidays, even Lila…”

“What about your powers?” Nino suggested to her. “Illusions, right? You could make a bunch of Kim illusions to distract Gabriel, or… or use illusions to like, I dunno, send distant Morse code messages to his friends to ask if they know where he is, or…”

“Nino, that could actually work! Alix and Markov both know Morse code, right? And that snake? Their dorm windows are visible from the area of the courtyard that we’re near… yes, yes, this might work! Come on, let’s hurry!”

She began running over to the nearest door, and the others all followed, even Plagg running along behind the group. Alya opened the door to the courtyard and stepped out into the heavy rain, looking up at the windows on the distant opposite wall.

“I’ve only used my powers once so far,” she called over the rain to the others, who were standing just inside to watch. “But I think I know how to do it. In situations where it’s urgent, it just sort of… comes naturally, I guess.”

Putting her hands together, she furrowed her brows and focused hard. Within a few seconds, a blindingly bright light shone out of her palms, so bright it made the overcast sky look bright and sunny.

“Got it! Now, my Morse code is a little rusty, but I’ll start sending a repeating message and hope they see it.”

There was no doubt that they would see it if they were in the dormitories, considering how bright the light was. It would be impossible not to notice. Alya began flashing the light over and over, getting soaked to the skin but not caring one bit. The others just watched in silence, waiting for a reply somehow, perhaps someone running down to the courtyard to find them and answer their question, hoping that somehow this would work…

-

-

-

Max sat in his dorm room at the desk, looking over his little sleeping robot by flickering candlelight. The lack of reliable electricity was so frustrating! Not only could Markov not charge his batteries, meaning it was best for him to remain in sleep mode, but the overhead lights barely worked either! Occasionally they’d alight for a few brief seconds, only to shut off again and leave the building in darkness once more. It was enough to give someone a headache.

At least he had Alix for company while he tinkered with Markov, trying to do something useful such as improving his battery life or giving him extra features. He may as well. So far he had added a radio connection, an LED torch, and had even begun plans to waterproof him so that he wouldn’t have to stay out of the rain. Markov had indeed been complaining about being unable to swim like humans did – and Max very much suspected that Ondine had something to do with that.

“I think Adrien’s just arrived,” Alix said, perched up on the desk to watch Max’s work.

“Oh? How do you know?”

“Because he’s just made it back to school in the exile timeline, the one where I’m with him.”

Max smiled. “Excellent. It would be good to see him again, wouldn’t it?”

“Yeah. Ooh, in the other timeline he’s just run into Marinette, and the other me has decided to go off and leave them alone because she wants them to get together, like how they are in this timeline…”

“Are they not together in that timeline then?” Max did not want to admit that he could not keep track of everything going on in all these confusing timelines, but it was true. The only ones who seemed to be able to truly tell what was going on were Alix and her pet snake.

“No, but hopefully they will be. Hey – the other me just ran into Count Wayhem! Okay, she’s telling him to go find Adrien and give him the cat, ‘cause it’s his guardian animal so he needs to protect it and needs its help to control his powers properly.”

So Adrien didn’t have the cat already in the other timeline either? This really was a mess. “What else is happening? Please continue this running commentary, it’s entertaining.”

“Of course it is. So yeah, Wayhem’s run off with that cat to go find Adrien, and the other me is on her way up to the dorms… she’s knocking on your door now… you just opened the door, and…”

“And what?”

Alix grinned. “The other me is kicking herself for thinking that you wouldn’t be happy to see her, ‘cause you really are. You hugged her and told her how much you’d missed her. And now you’re gonna show her Markov, since she hasn’t met him.”

“I’m glad to hear that Markov exists in that timeline too.”

“Yeah, me too. And now…”

She trailed off, looking towards the window. Max did too – there seemed to be some sort of very bright light shining through it, illuminating the entire room. What on earth was that? He stood up and walked over to take a look.

Over in the corner of the courtyard he could just about see someone, though he couldn’t tell from here who it was. They seemed to be creating the bright light from their hands alone! Was it someone with superpowers? Max could not recall anyone who had superpowers like that.

The light had begun flashing now, lighting up the room in spurts like fireworks.

..- .-. --. . -. - // - .... .. ... / .. ... / .- .-.. -.-- .- // .-- .... . .-. . / .. ... / -.- .. -- // --. .- -... .-. .. . .-.. / .. ... / .-.. --- --- -.- .. -. --. / ..-. --- .-. / .... .. --//

He turned to look at Alix, who had come over to watch too. After a minute or so of internally translating, she spoke.

“It’s an urgent message from Alya. She says that Emperor Gabriel’s here, looking for Kim, and she needs to know where he is…”

Gabriel was looking for Kim? Max’s brain immediately went into protection mode. “We can’t let Gabriel find him.”

“Well where is he? Do you know?”

“He went off to the big balcony in the new wing.”

“Damn, I really am psychic. I had a bad feeling about that place ages ago, I totally called it.”

Max looked back down out of the window. “How are we going to tell Alya?”

“I guess I could skate down there as fast as I can, but she’s all the way on the opposite side of the courtyard so it’ll take forever…”

“I have an idea.” Max walked back over to the desk. “We’ll use Markov.”

“What, are you gonna make him fly down there or something? It’s raining. He doesn’t even have much battery left.”

“No, we’ll use his LED lights.” He pressed the power button and waited a few seconds. Markov’s eyes opened, looking around.

“Max? Alix? You turned me back on? Is the electricity working again?”

“Not consistently, no. But we need you for something important. I’ve installed you with powerful LED lights, and I’m not sure that you have enough battery power left for you to use them for too long, but we need to send an urgent Morse code message to someone down in the courtyard and this is the quickest way.”

Markov propelled himself out of Max’s hands and into the air. “Of course I’ll help you with that! What’s the message?”

Alix had already been writing it on a piece of paper, and now handed it to Markov. “Here. Go to the window and then use your power lights, or whatever.”

“Okay!”

Markov flew over to the window, then used the newly installed torch to begin shining bright messages back. His light seemed just as powerful as Alya’s. Both combined were enough to need sunglasses for prolonged periods, surely.

-... .. --. / -... .- .-.. -.-. --- -. -.-- / .. -. / -. . .-- / .-- .. -. --. !

He repeated the message a few times, just to be sure. Alya’s light had shut off, and after a repeat or so she seemed to have gone back inside, presumably to the balcony to go warn Kim.

“So, what’s going on?” Markov asked, flitting back over.

“Emperor Gabriel has arrived at school and is searching for Kim,” Max said. “I can’t let anything happen to him. No – I won’t let anything happen to him. We’ve all had enough of this. I’m going to the balcony to find him.”

He started heading towards the door at top speed. Adrenaline was rushing through him, more than ever before – he would do absolutely anything to protect Kim, anything. There was no way he’d let Gabriel do anything to hurt him. Not after everything they’d all been through. He loved Kim too much to not be there to protect him when he needed it.

“We’re coming with you!”

Alix and Markov zoomed over to join him, to his relief. He knew it was reckless to go face a ruthless emperor all alone, if that was what was going to happen. But whenever Kim was involved, everything he ever did seemed reckless, and he wouldn’t trade it for anything.

“What are we even going to do?” Max mused.

“I could fist-fight Gabriel with my bare hands,” Alix suggested. “Or get my snake to bite him. Or something.”

“Well hopefully we won’t have to face him at all, and we’ll get to Kim before he does. Or perhaps Alya will get there first. And then we have to find a way to get Kim out of here…”

But even as he said it, his heart was sinking. They could help Kim escape, but then what? If Gabriel had been determined enough to come to this school, despite the fact that the Bourgeois Empire was no longer accepting of him, then where would he stop? Would he ever give up?

Surely there had to be a better way to end things.

-

-

-

Kim stood at the edge of the balcony, his hood up to protect his hair, holding his phone in his hands and seeing if he would get any signal here. Surely there had to be somewhere at this school he could make a phone call from! He hadn’t spoken to Kagami in ages, and he’d promised he would call Ondine, and he wanted to see if the telecommunication lines to his country were working again so he could talk to his grandmother…

Well, if he wasn’t getting signal here, out on the very edge of the school, then he wouldn’t get it anywhere. Resigned, he put his phone back in his pocket and leaned on the balcony railings, looking over the edge. The “moat” was flooded, turbulent, and more dangerous than he had ever seen it. Even Ondine wouldn’t be able to swim through something like that. And the more it rained, the worse it got.

Bad weather, no electricity, hardly anyone here… Kim was already in a sour mood, and he’d only been here for a day. At least it couldn’t get any worse.

“Prince Kim – I have found you at last.”

Oh, apparently it could get worse. That deep voice sounded like it was probably a teacher or some annoying official or something, and he didn’t even want to know how he could possibly already be in trouble. He sighed and turned around – only for his heart to suddenly drop.

That was… no, surely it couldn’t be. No way.

But Kim had seen plenty of portraits, adorning the walls of the school before being taken off, painted into history books, even occasional black-and-white photographs. Kim knew what Emperor Gabriel of Agreste looked like.

And this guy, standing in front of him, just far enough away to be under the roof of the school and out of the rain… that was him.

Kim had no idea what to say. Part of him was convinced he was dreaming. Was Gabriel really here? At this school? Right now? Maybe it was, like… an imposter or something? But he had on that Agreste military outfit that Adrien used to wear when he first started at school, and all those medals and badges, and he was so tall and terrifying that even Kim, as fearless as he tried to be, had a chill run through him.

What to say? What to say?

“Uh… hey.”

He was hit with the immediate urge to smack himself in the head. To think that finally he was face to face with the person who’d been making his life hell for the past few years, and that was all he could say?! Hey?!

Gabriel ignored it anyway. “I believe you know who I am, despite addressing me incorrectly.”

Kim just nodded.

“Good. And I believe you know why I am here, too.”

That part hadn’t quite hit Kim yet, but now it did. Gabriel was the one who had sent those poisoned chocolates, the one who had probably arranged the death of his grandfather, the one who had sent troops to invade his kingdom and pillage the borders. Gabriel was here to kill him.

His knees felt weak.

“I am here to negotiate the terms of your surrender,” Gabriel continued. “Your kingdom is weak, and if you want it to prosper, it would be better to have in the hands of an experienced leader. Agree to pass over your rulership to me, and I will not harm you.”

Oh, so he wasn’t going to kill him? For a second Kim was relieved – until he remembered that Gabriel had already tried to have him killed in the past. Someone like that was not to be trusted.

“No offence, but I don’t wanna give my country to you,” Kim said. “Sorry.”

Unexpectedly, Gabriel smiled. “I understand. Someone like you needs better terms, such as a challenge. So let me put it that way. I challenge you to a mortal sword duel. If I win, your country will become part of my empire. If you win, you keep your country. The loser will not live to see the result either way.”

“A… a duel to the death?”

“Yes. I hear you never turn down a challenge. You won’t start now, will you?”

Well of course Kim didn’t turn down challenges, but usually those challenges were things like tennis matches or rollerskate races! Not fatal duels with high stakes against a trained military commander.

“What will you do if I do turn down your challenge?” he asked.

“If you do, it will prove you unworthy to be a true leader, in which I must take matters into my own hands and take your country by force. If that includes your demise, well… that’s just unlucky for you.”

Kim gulped, aware of the sword hanging in the sheath on Gabriel’s belt, the rickety chandelier in the room ahead, and the deadly river waiting below. Dying here would be just too easy.

In his first year he had challenged Adrien to a duel over something similar, hadn’t he? Not a duel to the death, of course, but still. It was to do with a weakened kingdom fighting back against a cruel empire. Adrien had managed to dissuade him from that. Surely Adrien’s father must have some good in him too, enough to convince him to stop all this?

“We don’t have to fight,” Kim said, internally cringing at how lame and cliché that sounded. “We could like… have a meeting or something.”

“There have been negotiations between our two domains, and they achieved nothing. It is clear that Lê Chiến and Agreste want different things. If it cannot be sorted out peacefully, then there is only one way to settle it.”

“But what about the International Alliance?” Kim asked quickly, noticing with alarm that Gabriel’s hand was already going to the hilt of his sword. “My country is part of that now, so they’d be really annoyed if you took over.”

“Defectors from the crumbling end of the Bourgeois regime are joining my ranks as we speak. Even the International Alliance cannot compare to my vast military, and they don’t even know it. I will be able to defend my territory, don’t you worry about that. I’ve worked too hard to let them stop me now. And in any case, with no witnesses around, no one will know if the untimely end of the prince of Lê Chiến was an accident or not…”

Kim shivered, and not from the cold – it couldn’t end like this. Were there any guards around? Usually they would be taking rounds of the school, but what with Chloé cutting the budget, perhaps there weren’t enough left to be patrolling this area. Gabriel really had him cornered.

“I can’t accept the duel ‘cause I don’t even have a sword anyway,” Kim said, wondering if stalling him long enough would change his mind, or at least that someone else might turn up by chance and help him out.

“This school has plenty of swords that you could be lent, I’m sure. Though I’d thought better of you. From what I’ve heard, Prince Kim is fearless and never shies away from challenges, no matter what. In reality, you are a coward.”

“No I’m not!”

“Then prove it.”

Gabriel pulled out the sword and stepped out into the rain, ready. He was purposely trying to goad Kim into accepting his challenge, wasn’t he? That way any tragic death could be attributed to a completely willing duel, and any consequences for the murder could be avoided. But the truth of it was, Kim knew he would die either way. There was no route to survival now – except stalling.

“First of all,” Kim said, trying to sound as smart and logical as Max always did, “there’s different kinds of bravery. It’s not all about fighting and physical strength and stuff! I used to think it was, but I was wrong. Standing up for what’s right counts as being brave too. So you, an evil emperor guy, challenging me, an innocent little prince, to a sword duel to the death, is way less brave than me refusing it. Just saying.”

“With friends like you, it’s no wonder my son became the way he did. Only the weak talk like you do, in order to make yourselves feel better for not having my kind of strength.”

Gabriel was advancing slowly now, and Kim was already backed up against the balcony railing with nowhere else to go. He had to keep stalling.

“Second of all, I’m not the idiot kid I used to be. I used to be a jerk who picked on people ‘cause I thought it was fun, and didn’t think before doing anything. But I’m not like that anymore. Adrien helped, actually. I even asked him out once since he’s really cute and–”

“Yes, he already informed me just now, thank you.”

“Wait, when? Is… is he here? At the school?” Kim’s spirits lifted from the deep pit they had settled into.

“He is indeed.”

“Well then, there’s no way you’re gonna win and take my country! He said he was gonna come back to stop you. And my friend Marinette too, she wants to stop you as well. So you’ll lose, no matter what. I trust them to team up and take you down.”

He very carefully mentioned nothing about their superpowers. If Gabriel did not know about that yet, that was better. In any case, Kim was not lying – he did trust Marinette and Adrien. No one else had stronger powers than them.

“You are incredibly naïve,” Gabriel said. “I will always win, and I have a way to make sure of it.”

Sword still in one hand, with the other he pulled a little bottle out of one of his many pockets. It seemed to have some kind of little purple insect in it.

“See this little butterfly? It is a special animal, one that gives the carrier magnificent powers.”

He put the bottle back in his pocket. Kim’s spirits were sinking again, dread washing over him – that butterfly was Gabriel’s guardian animal? And he had superpowers too?

“Perhaps you are educated enough to have heard of the butterfly effect,” Gabriel said now. “I can use it to ensure that no matter what, I will get my way. There will always be an outcome where I am victorious. I can split the very universe itself, again and again, until I get my way. I have done it before, and I can do it again. For every universe in which I lose, there will be one in which I win. If my son and his friend try to stop me, I will simply split apart the universes, and there is nothing you can do to stop me.”

So it was him. Gabriel was the one with the power to split timelines, the one causing all the messes in the first place, the one ruining everything. And judging by what he was saying, he was about to do it again.

In one timeline you will be able to go home this summer, and in the other you won’t. At present it is impossible for me to tell you which one you will end up in.

Fu had been right…

“So it’s your fault,” Kim said, so many emotions flooding him he wasn’t even sure what to do. “It’s thanks to you that in one timeline Max got poisoned by those chocolates you sent, or that Alix and Adrien are commoners, or that Alix got bitten by a venomous snake…”

“I don’t know the specific details. And in any case, those things are all your faults. I merely changed the circumstances in which your lives happened. Anything that occurred was a result of your decisions. Clearly, those decisions were bad.”

“Personally I think sending poisoned chocolates halfway across the world to kill a kid you’ve never even met is a much worse decision, but whatever.”

Gabriel sighed. “I tire of this pointless talk. Considering you will soon be no longer, I’m merely allowing you some amusement. But enough of that.”

He pointed his sword directly at Kim, taking another step forwards, far too close for comfort now.

“If it’s any reassurance, I’ll make it relatively painless.”

Oh yes, because being run through with a sword was painless, of course…

“And I will take good care of your country. Well, soon it will be my country. Your torment and eternal futile evasion will be no more. So close your eyes, Prince Kim, and say your prayers. This is the end of the line.”

Kim’s survival instincts were kicking in at full force – it couldn’t end like this! There was no way Gabriel could win, not after he’d worked so hard to stop him! What could he do? Grab the sword blade with his bare hand? But no, Gabriel wasn’t scared of him, and he didn’t have a venomous pet to back him up… Carry on talking? No, Gabriel was tired of that… Jump into the river? If he did that, he’d die for sure!

There was nothing for it. He just had to hope that something was going to happen, that by some miracle someone would save him, that somehow he would live to see another day – and see his grandmother again, and Max, and Alix, and everyone else –!

-

-

Marinette, Adrien, Alya and Nino were all out of breath by the time they reached the corridor outside the big room where the balcony was located. From the other end of the corridor they saw Alix, Max, and the snake zooming towards them on a skateboard, with Markov flying alongside them.

“My father’s already got him cornered!” Adrien gasped, looking through the window of the door. “I’ll go stop him, but what if… what if I can’t use my powers on him… what if I chicken out again…”

Ignoring everyone else, Marinette went and looked through the window, concentrating hard. There had to be a way to sort this out. There always was.

Right. The room was large, with an open balcony on the far side of it stretching across most of the wall. The balcony hung over the sheer cliffside leading to the “moat” – actually, a river. The door to the room was high up near the ceiling, with a staircase leading down to the floor. A chandelier hung near the top of the staircase. The electricity was not working, other than occasional flickers, so theoretically it would not be too hot to touch, as long as one avoided the frayed open wires that had not been fixed due to the school’s limited budget.

Marinette frowned, her eyes darting across the room frantically. How could she make the setup of this room work to her advantage, and quickly? She doubted Gabriel would be kind enough to wait for her to formulate a plan before stabbing Kim and tossing his corpse in the water.

She had the powers of good luck, Adrien had the powers to cause catastrophe to anything he touched, Adrien was reluctant to cause any direct harm to his father, Gabriel and Kim were both on the balcony…

That was it!

“I have a plan, and you don’t have to cataclysm your father!”

“Cataclysm?”

“Oh – it’s a nickname I came up with for your powers! But anyway, you go in, run to the bottom stair, then use your powers to destroy the floor of the room and the balcony. Gabriel and Kim will fall, but I’ll use my luck powers to save them. Then Gabriel will see that he’s outnumbered and outmatched, and maybe surrender, or something, I haven’t thought out that part yet but we don’t have time.”

“How will you get close enough to use your powers? Are they long range?”

“I’ll jump onto the chandelier. That’ll put me close enough, and also I’ll avoid falling when the floor breaks. Sound good?”

Adrien nodded. “Well we don’t have anything else, or any time, so yes, yes – let’s go!”

-

The rain was still pouring heavily, so heavily that neither Gabriel nor Kim heard when the door opened. Marinette took a running jump off the landing, just about managing to cling onto the chandelier and pull herself up so that she was sitting on it, carefully avoiding the frayed wires just in case the electricity had a momentary spurt again.

Adrien ran down the steps two at a time. As he did so, he pushed into his mind every negative thought he had, every terrible thing his father had done to him or other people, forcing himself to actually go through with it this time. The anger of the world was coursing through his veins. The entire planet was counting on this. He couldn’t let them down! And he couldn’t let Kim die.

Reaching the bottom step, he reminded himself of things that Marinette had secretly told him, though she was not supposed to – about how Gabriel had sent poisoned chocolates to Kim, that Max had suffered that grisly fate in another timeline. He reminded himself that if he failed, more assassinations were waiting for his friends. He reminded himself of the house arrest he had suffered before his powers had surfaced, so suffocating that he had run away all by himself.

And he reminded himself that according to his oracle session in his first year, by the summer he would be free. No matter what.

With that thought in his mind, he let out a war cry and thrust his power-infused hand onto the floor.

-

Marinette, up on the chandelier, waited for the exact opportune moment. She only had one shot at this, and she had to make it count.

Adrien had used his powers on the floor, which buckled and crumbled into black dust, spreading across the room like ripples to leave nothing but a bare expanse of sloping rock beneath. Within a few seconds the destruction had reached the balcony too. It melted away to reveal the rocky outdoor ground disappearing into the steep cliffside, leading to the river far below.

Now!

Marinette focused hard, holding out her hand and using her power to a bigger extent than she had ever used it before. This was going to drain her, she could just tell – but that didn’t matter right now. What mattered was saving Kim, and the rest of the world along with him.

-

Adrien watched the floor disintegrating in front of him, heard the screech from Marinette as she put her own powers into effect. The balcony itself collapsed, and his heart leapt into his throat when he saw both his father and Kim seemingly fall – then sighed in relief. Both of them had managed to cling onto the edge of the cliffside and were still holding on for dear life. Gabriel had dropped his sword, which clattered down the rocks and disappeared into the water below.

“I can’t – I can’t hold them – hurry!”

Marinette’s voice was strained. Adrien immediately leapt off the stairs onto the rocky ground, running over towards the edge of the cliff at top speed. He heard a thunk behind him, and turned to see that Marinette had fallen off the chandelier in exhaustion.

“Marinette!”

“D-don’t worry about me… go save…”

She raised a finger to point towards the cliff edge, but then dropped it and fell unconscious. Her power really must have taken a huge toll – it had seemed impossible that anyone could fall off the balcony and still manage to hold on without ending up in the river, yet it had happened. Marinette’s lucky charm truly was miraculous.

But there was no time to think about that. Adrien turned back towards the cliffside to see that both Gabriel and Kim were slipping, without Marinette’s powers to stabilize them. Both of them held on with just one hand now. The rain was only making it worse.

Did Adrien have time to save them both before one of them fell? He wasn’t sure. He didn’t even have much energy left. Chances were, he would only be able to save one. The other was doomed.

“Adrien!” his father called out. “Son!”

He had never, ever heard such emotion in his father’s voice before. Or at least, not since before his mother had left. If he saved him now, would things be… different?

He shook himself out of it. Things wouldn’t be different at all. He was done with his father’s manipulation. He could never let it get the better of him again.

Anyway, did Gabriel ever treat him like a son? Surely it was not fatherly to lock up one’s child for having differing opinions, or trying to kill their friends. Gabriel was no father of his. Not truly.

It hurt to admit it, though, it hurt so much that Adrien just wanted to break down into tears and never have to make a difficult decision in his life ever again. With all his anger spent in his powers, all that was left was sadness. That he had to run away to find a family who loved him, that his friends had suffered, that the world could be such a cruel place.

And sadness was not what he needed right now.

He looked at Kim, his heart filling with resolve. If he did abandon his own father to fall off a cliff, he was doing it for the right reasons. To give the world a chance with better leaders, ones who didn’t conquer other countries just to take their land. To save his friend.

Yes, Kim had been a wonderful friend to him these past few years. And he deserved a chance to live, a chance to prove himself. Saving Kim was an act of friendship – something that Emperor Gabriel would never understand. And that would be his downfall.

Adrien ran over to the very edge of the cliff. Gabriel looked up at him with hopeful eyes – but he shook his head.

“Sorry, father,” he muttered. Then he leaned down and grabbed Kim’s hand.

The rescue was a blur. It was impossible to properly focus – Gabriel’s expression was haunting him, full of disbelief, betrayal. Never before had he seen his father so emotive. Never would he see it again.

And when Gabriel finally ran out of strength and let go of the cliff edge, Adrien did not watch.

He eventually managed to pull Kim up to the top with a lot of effort, despite the rain making everything slippery, and was immediately swamped in a huge hug. So many emotions were tearing his heart apart, he couldn’t even bring himself to hug Kim back, or even listen to what he was saying. As soon as Kim let go, Adrien’s remaining lifeforce failed him. He collapsed onto the ground and passed out, just as Marinette had done.

-

The others were running into the remnants of the room now, rushing down the stairs. Kim, shaken though he was, picked up Adrien and managed to carry him under the cover of the roof, laying him beside Marinette.

He had almost died – he had almost died for real.

And yes, this wasn’t the first near-death experience he’d had. But nothing else had ever come so close.

He was trembling, unable to stop himself. First Gabriel had nearly impaled him with a sword, then he had almost fallen off a cliff, and then he had been certain that Adrien was going to faint before being able to get him to safety…

And Gabriel had fallen into the river. Could he swim? Was he…?

Sitting down on the rocky ground, Kim allowed the tears to roll. Somehow, some way, he was alive.

Imperial Prince Adrien had picked him over his own father, and saved his life.

Fu had been right about the power of friendship, then, as stupid as that had sounded at the time. Fu had been right about everything.

Hands shaking too much to keep still, Kim hugged his knees to his chest and closed his eyes. It was over. Finally, it was all over.

“KIM!”

He was glomped by no less than four people, one snake, and one robot simultaneously. All of them were stating their heartfelt relief at knowing he was alright. He could hear Alya and Nino’s voices too – they were here now? He was glad for that, though right now in far too much of a state to be able to express it.

After what felt like forever, he opened his eyes. Alya and Nino were now tending to Marinette and Adrien.

“They’re still alive, don’t worry, they’re just exhausted…”

“Yeah, they must be, I saw that through the window – that was so hardcore…”

“I can’t say the same for Gabriel, though.”

“What do you think will happen to him?”

“If he’s lucky, he’ll drown quickly before the sharp rocks downstream, or he’ll survive and make it onto land… but I wouldn’t count on it, considering the state the river’s in…”

Kim noted that Max and Alix were still hugging him. He put his arms around them and pulled them closer, so grateful to still have them here with him, so relieved that things were alright, and that finally, their problems were at an end. The three of them had been through too much. Way too much.

“I’m so happy you’re alive,” Max mumbled, sounding as if he was about to start crying too. “I love you.”

Kim was not sure he could reply without more tears, so he just pulled his precious sweetheart into a kiss. He had been so close to never being able to do that again. Too close.

Remembering something important, he pulled away and tried to dry his tears – though considering he was drenched from the rain, it didn’t make a difference. “Guys, I found out – well, Gabriel told me – he’s the one splitting the timelines. It’s his fault.”

“Somehow I’m not surprised,” Max said. “It would be him, wouldn’t it? Considering that he’s caused all our other problems too.”

Still so emotionally overwhelmed, Kim managed a small chuckle. “Yeah…”

“At least we won’t have to deal with that problem any longer. The threat has gone.”

“But wait, didn’t Fu say the timelines were gonna split again before summer? What happened with that?”

He turned aside to look at Alix, only to jump in surprise when he saw that she looked far, far more murderous than he had ever seen her before – and that was really saying something, considering her volatile personality.

“They did split,” she muttered.

“Really? When? What happened?”

She wiped her eyes with her sleeve. “When Adrien used his powers. The timelines split, and in the other timeline there was a moth up near the chandelier, and it made Marinette sneeze, and she accidentally hit an exposed wire and got an electric shock, and she fell off and couldn’t use her powers, and y-you…”

She refused to finish, instead just curling up into a ball. She didn’t need to finish, though. Kim could easily figure out the rest.

In this timeline, he had survived and could go home for the summer. In the newly split timeline, he had fallen into the river and lost his life.

“Well… at least we’re in the good timeline,” he said, though he knew that was no consolation. He could hear Alix crying away into her arms, the snake wrapping itself around her tightly in comfort – they had seen Kim’s death with their own eyes. He couldn’t even begin to imagine how it must feel – especially after having to experience all the other timeline deaths too.

But as bittersweet as it was, there was one important silver lining.

Gabriel was gone.

Even in the other timeline, if Kim had fallen into the river, Gabriel would have too. It didn’t matter that Kim was not alive, because Gabriel was not either – the rest of the world would be okay. His country would be fine. Adrien would become the new emperor of Agreste, and no one would have to suffer anymore.

And that… that was what really mattered.

[lostcauses-noregrets]

Lostcauses Fic: The Commander’s House

Yeah.  Still not over it.  Sorry.  

(Any similarity between Levi Ackerman and Emma Hamilton is entirely coincidental.) 

It doesn’t get any easier.  The pain doesn’t dull.  It’s as sharp and bright as it was four years ago in Shiganshina.  It’s just buried deeper.  Carved into his bones, woven into his sinews, twined around his heart, his lungs. Some days it feels like it’s strangling him, suffocating him from the inside out.  Other days Levi knows it’s the only thing holding him together.

But he keeps on going.  He does his job, leads reconnaissance missions beyond the walls, accompanies the surveyors and cartographers as they map every inch of the island.  Strange to think that all this time they have been on an island, and that out there, across the ocean, is a world vast beyond their comprehension. He wonders what Erwin would have made of it all.

There are settlements outside the walls now; farms and villages, homesteads dotted along the rivers and valleys, straggling along the coast.  But Levi always returns to the walls. To Shiganshina.  

He buys the house.  The one where they laid Erwin to rest.  Repairs it with his own hands.  Hanji had it cleared out, burning every last stick of furniture when they removed the body. His body.  When they took Erwin away.  “We can’t risk spreading disease, Levi.”  He knew that of course, he’s not a fucking idiot. Growing up in the Underground, he saw first hand how quickly disease could spread. But he saves the bottle from beside the bed, washes it carefully, and every time he visits, he fills it with fresh flowers.

People call it The Commander’s House now and the local children whisper that it’s haunted. It is, but only by Levi.  He inhabits the house like a restless spirit.  He doesn’t really live there.  He doesn’t really live anywhere. He just exists.  

Levi moves some of Erwin’s belongings into the house; his books, personal papers, a few clothes.  He claims a worn uniform and weathered cloak, the threadbare shirt with the ink stain on the sleeve, old boots, worn and scuffed by wear.  They hang in the wardrobe in the bright upper room now.  Erwin’s dress uniform, the one with the gold braid and the sleeve pinned back, is in the museum at the cenotaph.  Levi tries not to think about tearing open the buttons of that uniform, tries not to picture it lying in a crumpled heap of gilt and braid on the floor beside the bed, tries not to feel the weight of his Commander, lying hot and heavy on top of him, slick with sweat and consumed with desire.

Levi, fuck…Levi…

Sometimes Levi sits in the room at the top of the house and reads or just listens to the sounds from the street below; children playing, a dog barking, the notes of a blackbird singing somewhere.  But if he closes his eyes he can still smell the blood and the ash and the entrails.  Still feel the titan blood evaporating from his skin.  Still hear the words “teacher…how…find out…don’t exist?” more real than the sounds of laughter filtering in through the window.  That was Levi’s world, not this one.

~~

“Levi!” Hanji yells.  “What the hell are you doing?”

He lands heavily beside them, ankle giving way as he hits the ground awkwardly. Fuck.  That’s been happening more often these day.

“Training.” He replies as he dusts himself off. “What does it look like?”

“Actually it looks like you’re trying to destroy the training course.  I thought I said I didn’t want to see you here today? Didn’t I order you to take the day off?”

Levi looks away and lets the silence stretch between them.  Eventually Hanji sighs.  

“We missed you earlier.”

“Who’s we?”

“Me.  I did, Levi.  And the Queen, and the Corps, all of us.”

Levi doesn’t reply, so Hanji continues.

“Historia asked for you.  She wanted to know how you are.”

“What did you tell her?”

“I told her I didn’t know.”  

Levi snorts and rolls his eyes.  

“I’m fine.”

Hanji gives him a flat stare.

It’s the fourth anniversary of their return from Shiganshina. Historia has designated it a public holiday, not a celebration mind, a day of reflection and remembrance, and it’s marked each year with a service at the cenotaph.   The cenotaph is an imposing monument in the heart of Mitras.  A somber memorial surmounted by an everlasting flame of hope.  The only adornment is the Survey Corps emblem, the Wings of Freedom, and the simple inscription “They Gave Their Hearts”.  To the right there is a bust; white marble, a remarkable likeness people say, dignified and noble.  Levi has seen it only once.  He wanted to scratch at the cold smooth surface of the stone to see if it bleeds, to see if it suffers, like he suffered.

“I thought you’d have wanted to be there,” Hanji continues quietly.

“Why?”

“You know, honouring his…” they stop, “honouring their memory.  Remembrance and all that.”

Levi rounds on them, snapping like an open blade.

“You think I need to stand in front of a fucking block of marble to remember?” he spits. “You think I don’t remember every day?  Every fucking second of every fucking day?”

He knows it’s unjust.  He knows Hanji remembers. Of course they do.  Hanji carries their own wounds.  They lost more than just their eye that day and the pain of their loss is etched deep in their face.  But right now he doesn’t care, he wants them to feel that pain.  To feel the pain that he feels.  Keep it burning fierce and hot and bright.

Hanji stares at him for a long moment, before removing their glasses and rubbing their eye.  They look tired.

“Give it a rest Levi, the recruits need to train.”

“Why?”

That earns him a glare.

“You know this war is far from over Levi.”

“Has it even begun?”

“Ha!” Hanji barks a mirthless laugh. “Get the fuck out of here Levi and let the kids do their thing.”

“I’m not stopping them,” he shrugs.

“Yes, actually, you are.”

“How?”

“They’re terrified to come out here while you’re flying around like the spirit of vengeance destroying everything in sight.”

It’s only then that he bothers to look at the small group of cadets huddled miserably on the perimeter of the training ground.  One catches his eye and looks away hurriedly.

“Levi,” Hanji places a hand on his shoulder, “just…go home.”

~~

It’s late when he reaches Shiganshina.  The sun is setting but the streets are still busy, taverns thronged with people who have shrugged off the somber mood of the morning and are taking they opportunity to celebrate the fact that they are the ones that lived.

He stops at the bar at the top of the street to buy a bottle of wine.  A few old soldiers salute as he enters.  They all remember him, to some he’s still a hero, still Humanity’s Strongest, to most he’s a pariah, but he will always be Survey Corps and that is enough to command respect. On this day more than most.  The bartender refuses his money, insists on giving him the wine on the house. “For the Commander,” he adds.  Levi thanks him and leaves.

It’s a short walk to the nondescript house at the far end of the street.  It’s silent when he enters.  This house is always silent.

“I’m home,” he says to no on in particular.

His leg aches as he climbs the stairs and he stifles a groan as he drops gratefully into the chair by the bed.   He pours a glass of wine and lifts it high in salute.

“Erwin you old bastard.”

Then he drinks.  The wine is thin and bitter.  

“I miss you.”

Tomorrow, he’ll replace the flowers.

[flauntpage]

DGB Grab Bag: Goodbye Jagr, Hello Whalers, and Brad Marchand, Comedy Star?

Three Stars of Comedy (All-Star weekend edition)

The All-Star weekend is weird. It's pretty much the only time all year that NHL players are allowed to show any personality, or at least try to. Some jump at the opportunity. Most don't. And the results are always hit-and-miss.

It's been especially tough to find a good laugh at the event ever since the NHL dropped the breakaway challenge that had some of the stars playing dress-up or otherwise getting creative. And no, we're not going to go with this year's Wes McCauley's offside review announcement, because the fact that the NHL had an offside review in an all-star game was just sad. But even if we're grading on a curve, we'll hand out some points for effort at this year's event.

The third star: Erik Karlsson and Victor Hedman – Their pirate costume routine was fun, at least as long as it wasn't foreshadowing a Karlsson-to-Tampa trade that would basically guarantee the Lightning a Cup. But the real star was this quote from Karlsson.

The second star: Brian Mach's grandmother – Mach is an NHL linesman who got to work all-star weekend for the first time. Grandma was not impressed.

The first star: Brad Marchand – Yeah, he wouldn't have been my pick to steal the show either. But by embracing the heel role, Marchand at least looked like he was having fun. From his sarcastic waving to to his over-the-top injury faking, Marchand came across as… well, not remotely likable, but at least vaguely self-aware. In the NHL, that's something.

Overall, we'll give the weekend a C+. Ah well. While only a few of their All-Stars were all that interesting, at least we still have Jaromir Jagr, right? Now to take a big sip of water and move on to the next section…

Outrage of the Week

The issue: Jaromir Jagr has been released by the Calgary Flames and signed with a team in the Czech league, all but certainly spelling the end of his NHL career. The outrage: NOOOOO! Is it justified: We knew it was coming. We had plenty of time to prepare. We should be OK with this.

We are not OK with this.

And I feel pretty safe saying "we," because over the years Jagr somehow morphed into a universally beloved figure among hockey fans. He'd basically taken over Teemu Selanne's role as the guy that just about nobody disliked. Even Penguin fans who weren't over the whole 2011 bait-and-switch, or Capitals fans still trying to figure out how he went from perennial Art Ross winner to "guy it makes sense to trade straight-up for Anson Carter" overnight were mostly OK with him by now.

That's a weird twist on a memorable career, given how Jagr arrived in the NHL. Back in the early 90s, when he arrived as Mario Lemieux's sidekick and immediately won two Cups in his first two seasons, plenty of us didn't like him. He was the poster child for a certain kind of flashy European player that we were having trouble getting used to. The NHL was a league where you weren't supposed to smile if you scored a goal; having your own trademark celebration was basically a felony violation of The Code. So even when he took over from Mario as the league's best player, we loved seeing him get his comeuppance.

He just didn't get it very often. The Washington debacle seemed to spell the end of him as a legitimate superstar, but then came his rebirth with the post-lockout Rangers. Little did we know he had another dozen years left. He spent a few of those in the KHL, and that and the two seasons' worth of time he lost to Gary Bettman's lockouts might have cost him a run at the all-time goals crown. The fact that we can even conceive of that for a guy who played 80 percent of his career in the Dead Puck era is ridiculous. Even better, he emerged as one of the game's better personalities, and both he and we loosened up over the years.

But now it's over. Probably. Nobody would be completely shocked if Jagr showed up again some time next season for one more run. We've been here before, after all. But this time feels different. This really does feel like the end.

So thank you, Jaromir. Father Time catches up to us all eventually, but you sure made him work for it. We'll see you in the Hall of Fame in three years or so. And until then, we'll always have your awkward draft day and your ridiculous highlight-reel goals and yes, the image of your injured groin slathered in peanut butter. It's been a trip.

Obscure Former Player of the Week

Today marks the 41st anniversary of one of the weirder record-breaking performances in NHL history: Maple Leafs defenseman Ian Turnbull's five-goal game. Not surprisingly, it's the only time a blueliner has ever scored five times in a single game; even hat tricks by defensemen are relatively rare, with only 42 players managing the feat in the last 30 years. Many of those names are the ones you'd expect, like Al MacInnis, Paul Coffey, and Shea Weber. A few are not, including this week's obscure player: Deron Quint.

Quint was a second-round pick by the Jets in the 1994 draft. He made his debut during the 1995-96 season, the team's last in Winnipeg, and held down a regular roster spot in Phoenix before being dealt to the Devils for Lyle Odelein at the 2000 deadline. His stay in New Jersey didn't last long, as he was dealt to the expansion Blue Jackets that offseason. He'd spend two years in Columbus before bouncing around the league for several seasons, making stops with the Blackhawks, Islanders, and Coyotes (again). His NHL days ended in 2007, but he continued his career in Europe for another decade, earning all-star honors in the KHL.

Quint was never much of a goal scorer, at least at the NHL level; he had only 46 in his career, and his high for a single season was just seven. But he briefly found his scoring touch on March 9, 2001, recording the hat trick in a 7-6 Blue Jackets win over the Panthers. All three goals came in the second period.

Oddly enough, that's not even the strangest Deron Quint goal-scoring feat. As a rookie in December 1995, Quint matched a six-decades-old NHL record by managing to score two goals in four seconds. How does a defenseman pull that off? As you'll see below, a little bit of luck helps.

The NHL Carolina Hurricanes Actually Got Something Right

The Hurricanes have a new owner. He's a 46-year-old billionaire named Tom Dundon, and so far he's been saying all the right things about wanting to win and keeping the team in Carolina. That's a positive development for a long-suffering fan base, but for the most part it doesn't really matter much to anyone else. The Hurricanes will continue their playoff push, they'll keep being that one team you always forget is in the Metro, and Canadians will continue to make up stories about them being on the verge of moving to Quebec. New ownership is a nice enough development, but that's about all it is.

Well, until this week. Because now we know that Dundon is toying with the idea of bringing back the Hartford Whalers.

Well, not the actual team. But Dundon would apparently like to reestablish the team's ties to its own history. That means selling Whalers merchandise, and maybe even playing games wearing the old uniforms (which were recently voted the league's second-best ever).

And, by far most importantly of all, the glory that is Brass Bonanza. It's back.

Hell yeah. In a sports world where retro is all the rage, this just seems like common sense, and it's a surprise that the NHL's various relocated teams don't do more of this sort of thing. You can understand not wanting to jump into right away, when fans in your old city are still recovering from the loss of a team; you don't want to wipe their face in it. And in cases like the Coyotes and Stars, where the old city eventually got another team, then you may not want to step on any toes.

But at this point it feels pretty safe to say that the NHL isn't heading back to Hartford anytime soon. So bring on the green and white. Find out what Pucky the Whale is up to these days. And by all means, blare that beautiful Brass Bonanza every chance you get.

(And be sure to crank it up extra loud whenever Brian Burke and the Flames are in town.)

Classic YouTube Clip Breakdown

We're one week away from the start of the Winter Olympics, which won't feature NHL players for the first time in 24 years. That's disappointing, and it's going to make the tournament a tough sell, no matter what those intellectual eggheads in the New York Times try to tell you. Still, we might as well make the best of it. So today, let's look back at the last pre-NHL gold medal game from 1994, as Canada and Sweden face off in one of the most memorable games in international history.

Oh yeah, we're doing this in Swedish. I probably should have mentioned that up front. Or not mentioned it at all, and just let you go through the whole clip thinking you were having a stroke.

But yeah, this is the clip from the Swedish broadcast, because everything sounds better in Swedish. Don't worry, though, I'm sure the announcers will be professional and stay impartial.

Our clip begins with about two minutes left in regulation. Everyone knows this game for the shootout, but not many remember that Canada had scored twice in the third period to take a 2-1 lead and were less than two minutes away from winning gold. Poor Derek Mayer. He scored the second Canadian goal that would have been the winner if the lead had held. Mayer was two minutes from being a national hero. Instead he's the guy who played 17 games for the expansion Senators. This sport can be cruel.

Sweden is on the powerplay because international hockey is always rigged against Canada. Man, those benches are in a weird place. One of those Team Canada players could reach over and grab the Swedish guy as he works the boards. Probably should have, in hindsight.

Sweden ties it on a goal by defenseman Magnus Svensson, which is 100 percent the name you'd come up with if you had to make up a fake Swedish identity for the cops and you panicked. It's very subtle, but you can pick up a little bit of excitement from our announcers, one of who screams a very aggressive "YEAH." Or I guess it's "JA." Either way, he seems happy.

We cut ahead to the shootout, and it's Magnus Svensson again. Or maybe it's not the same guy and most of the Swedish roster was just named "Magnus Svensson." I kind of hope it's that. Anyway, he scores on a gorgeous deke, leading to another "JA."

Wait, a defenseman got to take a turn in the shootout? What kind of Olympic coach would ever let something like that happen?

Next up is Forsberg, although this isn't the famous shot we all remember. He does score, though, beating Corey Hirsch on a nifty move. It's so nice that we skip the traditional "JA" and go straight to "OY YO YO YO." I don't care what language you speak, that's a flat-out fun thing to yell. I'm using that in my everyday life.

Next up is Forsberg again, because the Swedes snuck him in for a second shot even though it's against the rules and they should have to forfeit and Canada retroactively wins gold WHOOO! [checks earpiece] OK I'm being reminded that international hockey allows players to shoot more than once. You win this round, Sweden. Literally, as it turns out.

Forsberg beats Hirsch with the Peter Forsberg Move, which… I mean, how do you not see that coming, am I right?

This is the famous goal that would wind up on a postage stamp. Fun fact: The goalie in that stamp is wearing blue instead of Team Canada red because Hirsch refused to let them use his likeness and threatened to sue. He's since said that he regrets that, but I always liked it. It's the equivalent of making your friend delete that embarrassing photo of you looking stupid, except at an international level. I can respect that.

Needless to say, Forsberg's goal gets an extended OY YO YO YO from our two announcers as we head to the replays. I forgot how close Hirsch was to stopping that. Usually when The Forsberg works, it's into a wide-open net. But Hirsch is right with it the whole way and gets his glove down in the perfect spot. He's just a fraction of a second too late. Hockey, man.

That's it for our clip, which doesn't show Paul Kariya's game-ending miss and the subsequent celebration, presumably because our two announcers dove out of the booth to join it. It was Sweden's first ever gold medal; they'd win another with (mostly) NHL players in 2006. Can they do it again this year? Nobody knows, because we have no idea what to expect from this tournament. But if it's as entertaining as the 1994 gold medal game, will it be worth watching? I'm going to ahead and say ja.

Have a question, suggestion, old YouTube clip, or anything else you'd like to see included in this column? Email Sean at nhlgrabbag@gmail.com and follow him on Twitter @DownGoesBrown.

DGB Grab Bag: Goodbye Jagr, Hello Whalers, and Brad Marchand, Comedy Star? published first on https://footballhighlightseurope.tumblr.com/

[amtushinfosolutionspage]

DGB Grab Bag: Goodbye Jagr, Hello Whalers, and Brad Marchand, Comedy Star?

Three Stars of Comedy (All-Star weekend edition)

The All-Star weekend is weird. It’s pretty much the only time all year that NHL players are allowed to show any personality, or at least try to. Some jump at the opportunity. Most don’t. And the results are always hit-and-miss.

It’s been especially tough to find a good laugh at the event ever since the NHL dropped the breakaway challenge that had some of the stars playing dress-up or otherwise getting creative. And no, we’re not going to go with this year’s Wes McCauley’s offside review announcement, because the fact that the NHL had an offside review in an all-star game was just sad. But even if we’re grading on a curve, we’ll hand out some points for effort at this year’s event.

The third star: Erik Karlsson and Victor Hedman – Their pirate costume routine was fun, at least as long as it wasn’t foreshadowing a Karlsson-to-Tampa trade that would basically guarantee the Lightning a Cup. But the real star was this quote from Karlsson.

The second star: Brian Mach’s grandmother – Mach is an NHL linesman who got to work all-star weekend for the first time. Grandma was not impressed.

The first star: Brad Marchand – Yeah, he wouldn’t have been my pick to steal the show either. But by embracing the heel role, Marchand at least looked like he was having fun. From his sarcastic waving to to his over-the-top injury faking, Marchand came across as… well, not remotely likable, but at least vaguely self-aware. In the NHL, that’s something.

Overall, we’ll give the weekend a C+. Ah well. While only a few of their All-Stars were all that interesting, at least we still have Jaromir Jagr, right? Now to take a big sip of water and move on to the next section…

Outrage of the Week

The issue: Jaromir Jagr has been released by the Calgary Flames and signed with a team in the Czech league, all but certainly spelling the end of his NHL career.

The outrage: NOOOOO!

Is it justified: We knew it was coming. We had plenty of time to prepare. We should be OK with this.

We are not OK with this.

And I feel pretty safe saying “we,” because over the years Jagr somehow morphed into a universally beloved figure among hockey fans. He’d basically taken over Teemu Selanne’s role as the guy that just about nobody disliked. Even Penguin fans who weren’t over the whole 2011 bait-and-switch, or Capitals fans still trying to figure out how he went from perennial Art Ross winner to “guy it makes sense to trade straight-up for Anson Carter” overnight were mostly OK with him by now.

That’s a weird twist on a memorable career, given how Jagr arrived in the NHL. Back in the early 90s, when he arrived as Mario Lemieux’s sidekick and immediately won two Cups in his first two seasons, plenty of us didn’t like him. He was the poster child for a certain kind of flashy European player that we were having trouble getting used to. The NHL was a league where you weren’t supposed to smile if you scored a goal; having your own trademark celebration was basically a felony violation of The Code. So even when he took over from Mario as the league’s best player, we loved seeing him get his comeuppance.

He just didn’t get it very often. The Washington debacle seemed to spell the end of him as a legitimate superstar, but then came his rebirth with the post-lockout Rangers. Little did we know he had another dozen years left. He spent a few of those in the KHL, and that and the two seasons’ worth of time he lost to Gary Bettman’s lockouts might have cost him a run at the all-time goals crown. The fact that we can even conceive of that for a guy who played 80 percent of his career in the Dead Puck era is ridiculous. Even better, he emerged as one of the game’s better personalities, and both he and we loosened up over the years.

But now it’s over. Probably. Nobody would be completely shocked if Jagr showed up again some time next season for one more run. We’ve been here before, after all. But this time feels different. This really does feel like the end.

So thank you, Jaromir. Father Time catches up to us all eventually, but you sure made him work for it. We’ll see you in the Hall of Fame in three years or so. And until then, we’ll always have your awkward draft day and your ridiculous highlight-reel goals and yes, the image of your injured groin slathered in peanut butter. It’s been a trip.

Obscure Former Player of the Week

Today marks the 41st anniversary of one of the weirder record-breaking performances in NHL history: Maple Leafs defenseman Ian Turnbull’s five-goal game. Not surprisingly, it’s the only time a blueliner has ever scored five times in a single game; even hat tricks by defensemen are relatively rare, with only 42 players managing the feat in the last 30 years. Many of those names are the ones you’d expect, like Al MacInnis, Paul Coffey, and Shea Weber. A few are not, including this week’s obscure player: Deron Quint.

Quint was a second-round pick by the Jets in the 1994 draft. He made his debut during the 1995-96 season, the team’s last in Winnipeg, and held down a regular roster spot in Phoenix before being dealt to the Devils for Lyle Odelein at the 2000 deadline. His stay in New Jersey didn’t last long, as he was dealt to the expansion Blue Jackets that offseason. He’d spend two years in Columbus before bouncing around the league for several seasons, making stops with the Blackhawks, Islanders, and Coyotes (again). His NHL days ended in 2007, but he continued his career in Europe for another decade, earning all-star honors in the KHL.

Quint was never much of a goal scorer, at least at the NHL level; he had only 46 in his career, and his high for a single season was just seven. But he briefly found his scoring touch on March 9, 2001, recording the hat trick in a 7-6 Blue Jackets win over the Panthers. All three goals came in the second period.

Oddly enough, that’s not even the strangest Deron Quint goal-scoring feat. As a rookie in December 1995, Quint matched a six-decades-old NHL record by managing to score two goals in four seconds. How does a defenseman pull that off? As you’ll see below, a little bit of luck helps.

The NHL Carolina Hurricanes Actually Got Something Right

The Hurricanes have a new owner. He’s a 46-year-old billionaire named Tom Dundon, and so far he’s been saying all the right things about wanting to win and keeping the team in Carolina. That’s a positive development for a long-suffering fan base, but for the most part it doesn’t really matter much to anyone else. The Hurricanes will continue their playoff push, they’ll keep being that one team you always forget is in the Metro, and Canadians will continue to make up stories about them being on the verge of moving to Quebec. New ownership is a nice enough development, but that’s about all it is.

Well, until this week. Because now we know that Dundon is toying with the idea of bringing back the Hartford Whalers.

Well, not the actual team. But Dundon would apparently like to reestablish the team’s ties to its own history. That means selling Whalers merchandise, and maybe even playing games wearing the old uniforms (which were recently voted the league’s second-best ever).

And, by far most importantly of all, the glory that is Brass Bonanza. It’s back.

Hell yeah. In a sports world where retro is all the rage, this just seems like common sense, and it’s a surprise that the NHL’s various relocated teams don’t do more of this sort of thing. You can understand not wanting to jump into right away, when fans in your old city are still recovering from the loss of a team; you don’t want to wipe their face in it. And in cases like the Coyotes and Stars, where the old city eventually got another team, then you may not want to step on any toes.

But at this point it feels pretty safe to say that the NHL isn’t heading back to Hartford anytime soon. So bring on the green and white. Find out what Pucky the Whale is up to these days. And by all means, blare that beautiful Brass Bonanza every chance you get.

(And be sure to crank it up extra loud whenever Brian Burke and the Flames are in town.)

Classic YouTube Clip Breakdown

We’re one week away from the start of the Winter Olympics, which won’t feature NHL players for the first time in 24 years. That’s disappointing, and it’s going to make the tournament a tough sell, no matter what those intellectual eggheads in the New York Times try to tell you. Still, we might as well make the best of it. So today, let’s look back at the last pre-NHL gold medal game from 1994, as Canada and Sweden face off in one of the most memorable games in international history.

Oh yeah, we’re doing this in Swedish. I probably should have mentioned that up front. Or not mentioned it at all, and just let you go through the whole clip thinking you were having a stroke.

But yeah, this is the clip from the Swedish broadcast, because everything sounds better in Swedish. Don’t worry, though, I’m sure the announcers will be professional and stay impartial.

Our clip begins with about two minutes left in regulation. Everyone knows this game for the shootout, but not many remember that Canada had scored twice in the third period to take a 2-1 lead and were less than two minutes away from winning gold. Poor Derek Mayer. He scored the second Canadian goal that would have been the winner if the lead had held. Mayer was two minutes from being a national hero. Instead he’s the guy who played 17 games for the expansion Senators. This sport can be cruel.

Sweden is on the powerplay because international hockey is always rigged against Canada. Man, those benches are in a weird place. One of those Team Canada players could reach over and grab the Swedish guy as he works the boards. Probably should have, in hindsight.

Sweden ties it on a goal by defenseman Magnus Svensson, which is 100 percent the name you’d come up with if you had to make up a fake Swedish identity for the cops and you panicked. It’s very subtle, but you can pick up a little bit of excitement from our announcers, one of who screams a very aggressive “YEAH.” Or I guess it’s “JA.” Either way, he seems happy.

We cut ahead to the shootout, and it’s Magnus Svensson again. Or maybe it’s not the same guy and most of the Swedish roster was just named “Magnus Svensson.” I kind of hope it’s that. Anyway, he scores on a gorgeous deke, leading to another “JA.”

Wait, a defenseman got to take a turn in the shootout? What kind of Olympic coach would ever let something like that happen?

Next up is Forsberg, although this isn’t the famous shot we all remember. He does score, though, beating Corey Hirsch on a nifty move. It’s so nice that we skip the traditional “JA” and go straight to “OY YO YO YO.” I don’t care what language you speak, that’s a flat-out fun thing to yell. I’m using that in my everyday life.

Next up is Forsberg again, because the Swedes snuck him in for a second shot even though it’s against the rules and they should have to forfeit and Canada retroactively wins gold WHOOO! [checks earpiece] OK I’m being reminded that international hockey allows players to shoot more than once. You win this round, Sweden. Literally, as it turns out.

Forsberg beats Hirsch with the Peter Forsberg Move, which… I mean, how do you not see that coming, am I right?

This is the famous goal that would wind up on a postage stamp. Fun fact: The goalie in that stamp is wearing blue instead of Team Canada red because Hirsch refused to let them use his likeness and threatened to sue. He’s since said that he regrets that, but I always liked it. It’s the equivalent of making your friend delete that embarrassing photo of you looking stupid, except at an international level. I can respect that.

Needless to say, Forsberg’s goal gets an extended OY YO YO YO from our two announcers as we head to the replays. I forgot how close Hirsch was to stopping that. Usually when The Forsberg works, it’s into a wide-open net. But Hirsch is right with it the whole way and gets his glove down in the perfect spot. He’s just a fraction of a second too late. Hockey, man.

That’s it for our clip, which doesn’t show Paul Kariya’s game-ending miss and the subsequent celebration, presumably because our two announcers dove out of the booth to join it. It was Sweden’s first ever gold medal; they’d win another with (mostly) NHL players in 2006. Can they do it again this year? Nobody knows, because we have no idea what to expect from this tournament. But if it’s as entertaining as the 1994 gold medal game, will it be worth watching? I’m going to ahead and say ja.

Have a question, suggestion, old YouTube clip, or anything else you’d like to see included in this column? Email Sean at nhlgrabbag@gmail.com and follow him on Twitter @DownGoesBrown.

DGB Grab Bag: Goodbye Jagr, Hello Whalers, and Brad Marchand, Comedy Star? syndicated from https://australiahoverboards.wordpress.com

[takebackthedream]

Hillary Clinton Tries to Explain ‘What Happened’ by Robert Borosage

Hillary Clinton’s book-length reflection on the 2016 presidential race, What Happened, struggles to answer the haunting question of how a highly experienced candidate with a massive political machine lost to Donald Trump and his vile clown campaign. The book is less interesting when it talks about the campaign, and much more so when Clinton is assessing the future.

Clinton accepts responsibility for her loss, and allows that she might have “missed a lot of chances.” Most of the book, however, is about casting blame and settling scores: Putin did it, Comey did it, and so did Bernie, the media, Fox News, sexism, Clinton fatigue, Electoral College, partisan loyalty, voter suppression, and many other factors. With Trump losing the popular vote and drawing an political inside straight to win three critical states by 77,000 total votes, thus winning the Electoral College, any of these plausibly might have made the difference. But as Hillary admits, none helps explain how the contest with Trump’s bizarre candidacy was close in the first place.

Many chapters have a title describing a human trait or state of being: “Perseverance” and “Resilience” and “Frustration.” Missing is the trait that most bedeviled Clinton: credibility.Clinton acknowledges the criticism that she didn’t have an economic message, but claims she talked about the economy in every speech. Her problem, however, was that many voters wouldn’t believe a word she said.

Part of this stems from her own admitted inadequacies as a candidate. Her “message”—poll-driven and focus-grouped to death—lacked authenticity. The book is full of 20/20 hindsight concerning what she woulda, shoulda, coulda done or said but didn’t. She wrote that she constantly suppressed her own instincts because of focus-group findings or staff cautions. Most revealing was the scene her publisher released as part of promo for the book: the debate where Trump acted like a “creep” stalking her across the stage. It was “one of those moments,” she wrote, “where you wish you could hit pause and ask everyone watching, ‘Well, what would you do?’ Do you stay calm or turn as say ‘Back up you creep.’”

Hit pause and poll the audience? Why not just react humanly? She was too disciplined, packaged, and cautious for that. Much to Hillary’s frustration, this contributed to the absurdity that, as Allen and Parnes put it in Shattered, Inside Hillary Clinton’s Doomed Campaign, their own reported version of last year’s campaign, “[Trump] could be genuine while lying; she came across as inauthentic even when she was telling the truth.”

Of far greater importance is the credibility problem that establishment Democrats suffer generally. Clinton’s loss can be treated as idiosyncratic, but under Obama Democrats lost over 1,000 state legislative seats and control of both the House and the Senate. Putin, Comey, and Bernie didn’t do that. Hillary isn’t to blame for that.

For Hillary, this deep-rooted credibility problem was far more debilitating than the effects of aggressive Republican attacks. She had been on the political scene for 25 years, and a central player in two Democratic administrations. She was the candidate of the Democratic establishment, and presented herself as an experienced and practical politician “seeking to build on eight years of progress.”Voters have, sensibly, grown skeptical of politicians. They believe that elected officials are bought and sold and that they tell voters what they want to hear but act as their donors and powerful interests demand. After two “recoveries” that did not lift most Americans, many were looking for someone to shake things up.

As a result, she couldn’t escape “being pigeonholed as the candidate of continuity rather than change.” She attributed this to people’s widespread anger. She writes that “her instinctive response” when she meets people who are “frustrated and angry” is to talk about how we can fix things. “But in 2016 a lot of people didn’t really want to hear about plans and policies. They wanted a candidate to be as angry as they were, and they wanted someone to blame.”

But voters are looking for more than someone to blame. They want to know if a candidate sees them, understands their struggles, and is prepared to call out and take on those who rigged the rules against them. Detailed policy promises—think-tanked, poll-driven—don’t mean anything, unless the candidate can be believed.

Given Hillary’s history, overcoming their skepticism was virtually impossible. Trump made trade—and the shipping of good jobs abroad—a centerpiece of his appeal. Bill Clinton campaigned against NAFTA, but pushed to pass it in office and went on to pass most-favored-nation treatment of China and the World Trade Organization. Barack Obama claimed to be against those deals, but reverted to peddling more corporate trade deals, including the Trans-Pacific Partnership, right in the middle of the campaign. Hillary claimed to be against the TPP, but had celebrated it as the “gold standard” while secretary of state. Even if she were serious about getting tough on trade, who could believe her?

Trump railed against Wall Street, Goldman Sachs, and corrupt politicians. Hillary claimed she had a strong agenda for reforming Wall Street. But Bill Clinton had championed the disastrous deregulation of Wall Street. Obama had continued Bush’s policy of bailing out the big banks, while not prosecuting the banksters for what the FBI called an epidemic of fraud that led to the financial collapse. Hillary not only pocketed big bucks from speeches to Goldman Sachs and others; she also opposed Elizabeth Warren’s call for a new Glass-Steagall act and Sanders’s call to break up the big banks. Her insistence that she had a better plan to reform Wall Street fell on deaf ears.

Throughout the Midwest, communities were devastated from plant closures and job flight. Hillary promised a plan to get them back to work. But neither her husband nor Obama had done much for these communities. Voters had every reason to be skeptical.

Trump didn’t have any plans to speak of. But he was willing to savage his own party’s support for corporate trade deals. He mocked Hillary and his Republican opponents as corrupt politicians who didn’t have a clue. He promised that he would bring back jobs, take on China, and revive coal. He bragged about funding his own campaign. And he was just enough of an outsider that people believed he might actually try to shake things up.

For Hillary, voter skepticism was deepened by the heavy millstone of Clinton fatigue. This is less about the unending Clinton scandals—some invented, some self- inflicted—than it is about Clinton’s achievements. Hillary defends her husband’s presidency from the charge that it was about “small-bore initiatives such as midnight basketball and school uniforms,” and argues that “Bill’s impact on our party and our country was profound and transformative.”

But what kind of transformation? Clinton’s New Democrats came to office tacking to conservative winds. Twenty-five years later, many of his reforms and compromises turned out to be destructive: His embrace of harsh sentencing led directly to grotesque mass incarceration, particularly of young black men; his welfare “reform” ended with impoverished mothers with children getting less aid in the Great Recession; his deregulation of Wall Street opened the doors of the casino that blew up the economy; his embrace of austerity furthered a disastrous decline in basic public investment; his celebration of the United States as an indispensable nation and extension of NATO led to wars without end, and Hillary’s own Libyan misadventure; his tax and corporate policies contributed to our extreme inequality.

Hillary complains that she “never managed to convince some skeptics that I really was in it to help working families,” or to overcome the “false perception that I was a defender of the status quo.” To do that, however, would require far more than a file cabinet packed with earnest reform ideas. It would require, at the very least, a forceful analysis of how the economy got rigged against working people, who did it, and what she would do to take them on. That would require repudiating, in fact if not in name, much of her husband’s legacy.

Clinton’s claim to pro-worker populism was directly challenged during the Democratic primary. Clinton is bitter and churlish towards Sanders throughout the book. She clearly thinks it presumptuous that Sanders—not even a Democrat—would challenge her so fiercely in the primary. She argues he didn’t get in “to make sure a Democrat won the White House, he got in to disrupt the Democratic Party.”

She accuses him of reacting to her proposals by promising bigger, bolder, and impossible ideas. She implies that he doesn’t believe we “should fight both for more equal economic opportunities and greater social justice.” In interviews promoting the book, she’s been even harsher, telling NPR that Sanders “didn’t support Democrats. He’s not supporting Democrats now.”

This is remarkably disingenuous. For someone who didn’t set out to win the Democratic nomination, Sanders came pretty damn close. He chose to run in the Democratic primaries rather than as a third-party candidate precisely to avoid the Nader problem. The notion that his agenda was a reaction to hers is risible: Sanders has been championing these ideas for years. The claim that Sanders is not “supporting Democrats” is preposterous. He endorsed and stumped for her. The most popular politician in the country, he’s been tireless endorsing and supporting progressive Democratic candidates across the country since the election.

Clinton isn’t aggravated that Sanders doesn’t support Democrats, but rather that he and his supporters are trying to transform the Democratic Party. Her problem isn’t that he’s staying outside the Democratic Party. It’s that his movement is staying in.

Sanders-inspired activists are pushing to take over party structures from the local to the national level. They are recruiting and supporting insurgent candidates. Sanders is championing a bold agenda—most recently single-payer health insurance—that is gaining ever-greater traction inside the Democratic Party. While Clinton published this book about the last election, Sanders published Our Revolution, a guide to the future agenda, and introduced his “Medicare for All” bill.

Ironically, Clinton acknowledges the force of Bernie’s position when she looks to the future. “He was right that Democrats needed to strengthen our focus on working families,” she writes, adding that “Bernie deserves credit for understanding the political power of big bold ideas. “His call for single-payer health care, free college and aggressive Wall St reform inspired millions of Americans, especially young people.”

Clinton admits she’s come to a “new appreciation for the galvanizing power of big simple ideas” and she admits that “Universal programs are even more appealing that we previously thought.”

“Democrats should redouble our efforts to develop bold, creative ideas that offer broad-based benefits for the whole country,” Clinton writes. “We should be unafraid to kick the tires on transformative ideas.”

That’s good advice. If only she had embraced it as a presidential candidate.

[flauntpage]

DGB Grab Bag: Goodbye Jagr, Hello Whalers, and Brad Marchand, Comedy Star?

Three Stars of Comedy (All-Star weekend edition)

The All-Star weekend is weird. It's pretty much the only time all year that NHL players are allowed to show any personality, or at least try to. Some jump at the opportunity. Most don't. And the results are always hit-and-miss.

It's been especially tough to find a good laugh at the event ever since the NHL dropped the breakaway challenge that had some of the stars playing dress-up or otherwise getting creative. And no, we're not going to go with this year's Wes McCauley's offside review announcement, because the fact that the NHL had an offside review in an all-star game was just sad. But even if we're grading on a curve, we'll hand out some points for effort at this year's event.

The third star: Erik Karlsson and Victor Hedman – Their pirate costume routine was fun, at least as long as it wasn't foreshadowing a Karlsson-to-Tampa trade that would basically guarantee the Lightning a Cup. But the real star was this quote from Karlsson.

The second star: Brian Mach's grandmother – Mach is an NHL linesman who got to work all-star weekend for the first time. Grandma was not impressed.

The first star: Brad Marchand – Yeah, he wouldn't have been my pick to steal the show either. But by embracing the heel role, Marchand at least looked like he was having fun. From his sarcastic waving to to his over-the-top injury faking, Marchand came across as… well, not remotely likable, but at least vaguely self-aware. In the NHL, that's something.

Overall, we'll give the weekend a C+. Ah well. While only a few of their All-Stars were all that interesting, at least we still have Jaromir Jagr, right? Now to take a big sip of water and move on to the next section…

Outrage of the Week

The issue: Jaromir Jagr has been released by the Calgary Flames and signed with a team in the Czech league, all but certainly spelling the end of his NHL career. The outrage: NOOOOO! Is it justified: We knew it was coming. We had plenty of time to prepare. We should be OK with this.

We are not OK with this.

And I feel pretty safe saying "we," because over the years Jagr somehow morphed into a universally beloved figure among hockey fans. He'd basically taken over Teemu Selanne's role as the guy that just about nobody disliked. Even Penguin fans who weren't over the whole 2011 bait-and-switch, or Capitals fans still trying to figure out how he went from perennial Art Ross winner to "guy it makes sense to trade straight-up for Anson Carter" overnight were mostly OK with him by now.

That's a weird twist on a memorable career, given how Jagr arrived in the NHL. Back in the early 90s, when he arrived as Mario Lemieux's sidekick and immediately won two Cups in his first two seasons, plenty of us didn't like him. He was the poster child for a certain kind of flashy European player that we were having trouble getting used to. The NHL was a league where you weren't supposed to smile if you scored a goal; having your own trademark celebration was basically a felony violation of The Code. So even when he took over from Mario as the league's best player, we loved seeing him get his comeuppance.

He just didn't get it very often. The Washington debacle seemed to spell the end of him as a legitimate superstar, but then came his rebirth with the post-lockout Rangers. Little did we know he had another dozen years left. He spent a few of those in the KHL, and that and the two seasons' worth of time he lost to Gary Bettman's lockouts might have cost him a run at the all-time goals crown. The fact that we can even conceive of that for a guy who played 80 percent of his career in the Dead Puck era is ridiculous. Even better, he emerged as one of the game's better personalities, and both he and we loosened up over the years.

But now it's over. Probably. Nobody would be completely shocked if Jagr showed up again some time next season for one more run. We've been here before, after all. But this time feels different. This really does feel like the end.

So thank you, Jaromir. Father Time catches up to us all eventually, but you sure made him work for it. We'll see you in the Hall of Fame in three years or so. And until then, we'll always have your awkward draft day and your ridiculous highlight-reel goals and yes, the image of your injured groin slathered in peanut butter. It's been a trip.

Obscure Former Player of the Week

Today marks the 41st anniversary of one of the weirder record-breaking performances in NHL history: Maple Leafs defenseman Ian Turnbull's five-goal game. Not surprisingly, it's the only time a blueliner has ever scored five times in a single game; even hat tricks by defensemen are relatively rare, with only 42 players managing the feat in the last 30 years. Many of those names are the ones you'd expect, like Al MacInnis, Paul Coffey, and Shea Weber. A few are not, including this week's obscure player: Deron Quint.

Quint was a second-round pick by the Jets in the 1994 draft. He made his debut during the 1995-96 season, the team's last in Winnipeg, and held down a regular roster spot in Phoenix before being dealt to the Devils for Lyle Odelein at the 2000 deadline. His stay in New Jersey didn't last long, as he was dealt to the expansion Blue Jackets that offseason. He'd spend two years in Columbus before bouncing around the league for several seasons, making stops with the Blackhawks, Islanders, and Coyotes (again). His NHL days ended in 2007, but he continued his career in Europe for another decade, earning all-star honors in the KHL.

Quint was never much of a goal scorer, at least at the NHL level; he had only 46 in his career, and his high for a single season was just seven. But he briefly found his scoring touch on March 9, 2001, recording the hat trick in a 7-6 Blue Jackets win over the Panthers. All three goals came in the second period.

Oddly enough, that's not even the strangest Deron Quint goal-scoring feat. As a rookie in December 1995, Quint matched a six-decades-old NHL record by managing to score two goals in four seconds. How does a defenseman pull that off? As you'll see below, a little bit of luck helps.

The NHL Carolina Hurricanes Actually Got Something Right

The Hurricanes have a new owner. He's a 46-year-old billionaire named Tom Dundon, and so far he's been saying all the right things about wanting to win and keeping the team in Carolina. That's a positive development for a long-suffering fan base, but for the most part it doesn't really matter much to anyone else. The Hurricanes will continue their playoff push, they'll keep being that one team you always forget is in the Metro, and Canadians will continue to make up stories about them being on the verge of moving to Quebec. New ownership is a nice enough development, but that's about all it is.

Well, until this week. Because now we know that Dundon is toying with the idea of bringing back the Hartford Whalers.

Well, not the actual team. But Dundon would apparently like to reestablish the team's ties to its own history. That means selling Whalers merchandise, and maybe even playing games wearing the old uniforms (which were recently voted the league's second-best ever).

And, by far most importantly of all, the glory that is Brass Bonanza. It's back.

Hell yeah. In a sports world where retro is all the rage, this just seems like common sense, and it's a surprise that the NHL's various relocated teams don't do more of this sort of thing. You can understand not wanting to jump into right away, when fans in your old city are still recovering from the loss of a team; you don't want to wipe their face in it. And in cases like the Coyotes and Stars, where the old city eventually got another team, then you may not want to step on any toes.

But at this point it feels pretty safe to say that the NHL isn't heading back to Hartford anytime soon. So bring on the green and white. Find out what Pucky the Whale is up to these days. And by all means, blare that beautiful Brass Bonanza every chance you get.

(And be sure to crank it up extra loud whenever Brian Burke and the Flames are in town.)

Classic YouTube Clip Breakdown

We're one week away from the start of the Winter Olympics, which won't feature NHL players for the first time in 24 years. That's disappointing, and it's going to make the tournament a tough sell, no matter what those intellectual eggheads in the New York Times try to tell you. Still, we might as well make the best of it. So today, let's look back at the last pre-NHL gold medal game from 1994, as Canada and Sweden face off in one of the most memorable games in international history.

Oh yeah, we're doing this in Swedish. I probably should have mentioned that up front. Or not mentioned it at all, and just let you go through the whole clip thinking you were having a stroke.

But yeah, this is the clip from the Swedish broadcast, because everything sounds better in Swedish. Don't worry, though, I'm sure the announcers will be professional and stay impartial.

Our clip begins with about two minutes left in regulation. Everyone knows this game for the shootout, but not many remember that Canada had scored twice in the third period to take a 2-1 lead and were less than two minutes away from winning gold. Poor Derek Mayer. He scored the second Canadian goal that would have been the winner if the lead had held. Mayer was two minutes from being a national hero. Instead he's the guy who played 17 games for the expansion Senators. This sport can be cruel.

Sweden is on the powerplay because international hockey is always rigged against Canada. Man, those benches are in a weird place. One of those Team Canada players could reach over and grab the Swedish guy as he works the boards. Probably should have, in hindsight.

Sweden ties it on a goal by defenseman Magnus Svensson, which is 100 percent the name you'd come up with if you had to make up a fake Swedish identity for the cops and you panicked. It's very subtle, but you can pick up a little bit of excitement from our announcers, one of who screams a very aggressive "YEAH." Or I guess it's "JA." Either way, he seems happy.

We cut ahead to the shootout, and it's Magnus Svensson again. Or maybe it's not the same guy and most of the Swedish roster was just named "Magnus Svensson." I kind of hope it's that. Anyway, he scores on a gorgeous deke, leading to another "JA."

Wait, a defenseman got to take a turn in the shootout? What kind of Olympic coach would ever let something like that happen?

Next up is Forsberg, although this isn't the famous shot we all remember. He does score, though, beating Corey Hirsch on a nifty move. It's so nice that we skip the traditional "JA" and go straight to "OY YO YO YO." I don't care what language you speak, that's a flat-out fun thing to yell. I'm using that in my everyday life.

Next up is Forsberg again, because the Swedes snuck him in for a second shot even though it's against the rules and they should have to forfeit and Canada retroactively wins gold WHOOO! [checks earpiece] OK I'm being reminded that international hockey allows players to shoot more than once. You win this round, Sweden. Literally, as it turns out.

Forsberg beats Hirsch with the Peter Forsberg Move, which… I mean, how do you not see that coming, am I right?

This is the famous goal that would wind up on a postage stamp. Fun fact: The goalie in that stamp is wearing blue instead of Team Canada red because Hirsch refused to let them use his likeness and threatened to sue. He's since said that he regrets that, but I always liked it. It's the equivalent of making your friend delete that embarrassing photo of you looking stupid, except at an international level. I can respect that.

Needless to say, Forsberg's goal gets an extended OY YO YO YO from our two announcers as we head to the replays. I forgot how close Hirsch was to stopping that. Usually when The Forsberg works, it's into a wide-open net. But Hirsch is right with it the whole way and gets his glove down in the perfect spot. He's just a fraction of a second too late. Hockey, man.

That's it for our clip, which doesn't show Paul Kariya's game-ending miss and the subsequent celebration, presumably because our two announcers dove out of the booth to join it. It was Sweden's first ever gold medal; they'd win another with (mostly) NHL players in 2006. Can they do it again this year? Nobody knows, because we have no idea what to expect from this tournament. But if it's as entertaining as the 1994 gold medal game, will it be worth watching? I'm going to ahead and say ja.

Have a question, suggestion, old YouTube clip, or anything else you'd like to see included in this column? Email Sean at nhlgrabbag@gmail.com and follow him on Twitter @DownGoesBrown.

DGB Grab Bag: Goodbye Jagr, Hello Whalers, and Brad Marchand, Comedy Star? published first on https://footballhighlightseurope.tumblr.com/