#the one location we saw in the event was just a refugee city

[morpeko]

also i love that the Iberian's called the first Ægir who fled to Iberia "Islanders" because of course they wouldn't understand what the Ægir mean when they say they come from the ocean, the idea of whole cities existing underneath the waves seems fantastical, of course they'd reach the conclusion that they must really mean oceanic islands instead

[momo-de-avis]

How about CURSED portuguese history facts?

Holy shit I don't know who sent me this but it accidentally got burried under mounds of under asks and I think it's been sitting in my inbox for a year

I feel fully armed for a few cursed facts now given my job lmfao

Here we go

1. The Ginjinha of Lisbon (OF LISBON, not Óbidos) was initially created as a cough medicine. Recomended dose? 6 glasses a day. Ginjinha has around 23% of alcohol. Yeah that sure straightened you up really well (if you look at the posters they have on both doors, the door to the left actually says the recomended dose)

2. During World War II, Lisbon received thousands of jewish refugees. Despite the war, the fact remained that these people came from, compared to our backwards provincial country, progressive places. Do you know what the most shocking thing for lisboners were? Jewish women (who, again, were pretty progressive in comparison) were seen... At cafés. Hordes of men would actually gather around these women who were dead ass just having lunch at a café because portuguese women did not go to cafés alone, as it was considered indicent and a place jsut for men. This was between 1932-1945. There’s a super interesting account of a rare case of a Jewish family that actually stayed here, and the lady describes how she went out for lunch with her mother. Suddenly, the daughter says to her mother “I think we’re starting a revolution” and she turns and sees a row of men just fucking staring at them with their jaws on the floor (source: Lisboa Judaica the book, forgot the name of the author, but it’s Francisco something).

3. Praça do Municipio is where City Hall is located. It’s a late neo-classical building that, when it was unveiled, caused a huge scandal. If you look up at the building's pediment, you will see a bas-relief with several human figures. At the centre, there is a man with his whole dick out. Which, hey, that’s standard in classical imagery, the whole nudity standing for perfection if you follow the Roman canon of art and etc. But ah, my friend, this is Portugal in the 19th century, and my God, were we a backwards country, so this is exactly what generated a HUGE scandal. You see, the problem was WOMEN. They could not possibly see this dick. So, women were forced to cover their eyes when they crossed that square. It became such a scandalous thing, one guy actually set up stand selling fans and veils for women so they could cover their eyes and cross the square without having to look at this dude's genitals. Mind you, they're hard to spot. Rafael Bordalo Pinheiro did a caricature of the event. I can't find it online but I saw it in the book I am about to give you as a source: Lisboa Desconhecida e Insólita, by Anísio Franco.

4. John VI used to hide chicken legs inside his pockets out of fear of being poisoned. He died of poison.

5. Legend says when the statue of José I was unveiled, the one in Praça do Comércio, the queen allegedly said "he looks so ugly". Allegedly, that is why he is wearing a helmet. Yes, the sculptor did nothing about the ugliness, just sort of tried to disguise it. Reminding you that this is a legend. As far as I am aware, the statue was always made with the helmet, but I honestly prefer this version, so that’s the one I tell on my tours lmfao

6. In the 16th century, Manuel I loved collecting animals he knew nothing about, and then gift them to the Pope. We know about the rhinoceros already, which ended up being painted by Dürer, but did you know he also got an elephant? One day, though, he decided it would be a great ideal to have the rhinoceros and the elephant fight each other. He set up an arena in Praça do Comércio. People went buckwild for this. It was like WWE for them. And when the two animals confronted each other.... Nothing happened. Turns out elephants are not really made to fight and the two animals didn't really give a shit about each other. However, elephants are easily spooked, and with a sudden movement from the rhinoceros, that's what happened. The elephant took off from the arena and ran across the entire city back to his caretaker.... And miraculously, did not stomp a single person. The Rhinoceros was declared a winner but only because the elephant quit. People were a little disappointed at this, and ironically enough, it’s the elephant that’s reminded (he had a name but I forgot). Source: another ANísio Franco book, called something like Passeios por Lisboa, I forgot I’m sorry.

7. When the French invaded our country, they found John II's tomb... And beheaded him. No real reason, I guess. The body was put back together and properly buried again by some nuns who kind of felt bad about it.

8. This one is not funny at all. But I'll say this: don't ever look into the Braganza's involvement in slavery if you want to preserve your sanity. It's some of the most horrid shit you'll come across.

EDIT: a while ago I mentioned this in another context, and someone asked for a source. I remember now I said I needed to look it up but, as ever, I forgot. With all my due apologies, here it is: https://expresso.pt/sociedade/2015-12-08-O-segredo-dos-escravos-reprodutores

9. The Marquis of Pombal once stole the waters of Sintra, leaving the people with ONE public fountain in butt fuck nowhere. I've talked about this one on here before but it shows how fucking insane the man was.

10. The expression "ficar a ver navios", which means "to stand by watching the ships pass", is used when someone is waiting for something that will not happen (like, if someone is stood up on a date, you say they stayed there watching the ships pass). It actually comes from the expulsion of the jews in 1497. Manuel I promised jewish people who wished to leave ships to board and go to North Africa. However, he also knew, because he was a fucking idiot but not entirely stupid, that if he expelled the jews, the country's economy would basically collapse, because jewish people held a GREAT number of businesses in not just Lisbon, but major metropolitan centres. So, this was a lie. The ships he promised never came. For months, jewish people went to the Santa Catarina hill every day to look out for ships that would let them board and leave the country. The ships never came, thus, they were "watching the ships pass", but none of them stopping.

Okay this is all I can think of A YEAR LATER LOL

[strykingback]

EVENT TEASER 3: A Mystery In Shade Academy

Location: Shade, Vacuo Time: 10:30 AM (Vacuo Time Zone) Just A Few Days After The Temples Appearance In The Gashira Desert OST: Race Around The Shade!!! (Auto Play Warning!)

___________________

The streets of Shade were filled with people from all walks of life, Nomads making their way through the city to find rest after a long journey, marketers in the markets attempting make ends meet with their wares, and even the refugees of Atlas who were trying to find a way around this new city while also complaining. However, a bandit would immediately snatch a coinpurse from a young Atlesian child who saved enough lien to get their family something to eat. "Stop Thief!!!!!" They shouted with no one left to beckon to them.

This was the reality that the Atlesians had to face. They had no more comforts of the military. In Vacuo, it was and will always be a dog-eat dog world.

However, someone would walk up to the child placing a hand on their shoulder. As they looked to see someone with a light-darkish skin complexion with, dreads that were in a bob with cornrows, while also donning an orange scarf with a blue strip at the end of it. On both his pants and shirt having flame and lightning decor and lastly he was wearing nothing more but combat boots.

"Leave it to me kiddo." He would say to the young child winking at the them with his red eyes, while he glanced at the thief's path getting in a running position, feeling his heart begin to race as lightning marks began to show up around his face and arms. "Here we.... GO!!!!" Blade would say dashing off with a crackle of thunder, starting to run across the city.

Jumping from the streets up to the very rooftops he kept his eye on the thief who was running all with but a slight spot of glee in their eyes. Yet, even as Blade kept up with him there were times he needed to slow down because of the Levin part of his semblance so he wouldnt go into cardiac arrest trying to chase after him. But even so he found ways to keep the momentum going by using the runoff speed from him slowing down to jump off poles and keep running with a burst of life.

Finally, he chased the thief to an alleyway ready to talk about today's catch with his boys only for said theif to get a brutal clothesline from the Stryker who smiled seeing them get launched into a wall and already going unconscious. "Welp... thats that." He said catching the coinpurse as he began to walk back towards the route where he saw the child waiting patiently and excitedly running up to Blade, handing over the coinpurse to them.

"Thank you Mister!" They said running off to the Markets to now finally purchase some food for their family.

"Not a prob kid! Just a daily life of a Hunter trying to do-"

"GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Blade's thanks would be interrupted by a booming roar coming from Shade Academy catching his attention and everyone elses.... as they began to mutter and wonder what was that. While others began to think it was a way to keep the Grimm away by using the roar of a Desert-Hungerer.

"Huh... just whats going on in Shade Academy no less....... just who is in Shade Academy being capable of doing that!" Blade would say to himself....

Secrets of Sand Left Behind By Those Who Have Seen What Lies In Shade Academy. Yet, by the New Dawn secrets and mysteries lie in wait within the once beautiful oases of Vacuo now hides secrets in the very wastelands left behind by war.

[camslightstories]

Tolerate it - Part 8

Lena Luthor x reader, Kara Danvers x reader, Alex Danvers x reader. Baby Danvers.

Notes: Well I hope you like it, part 9 is going to be up on Saturday, i know it may not be the best one but I think is actually better than part 7. I hope you guys enjoy! Thank you so much for your support, it feels unreal. 

I loved reading about your theories and opinions. I will gladly received any feedback, comment, opinion or request. I hope you guys a have day! Thank you for reading! I hope you guys like it!

Taglist: @multi-images @captain-josslett

Russian Translations:

А Вы, Олли? - Do you, ollie?

Ты не сказал им, не так ли? - You didn't tell them, did you?

The darkness of the night made the hideouts easier. The persistent sound of the music coming through different places made it harder to focus. The cold and loneliness of the night made the two superheroes teams stand secretly behind the warehouse. 

Standing ready for the signal to invade the place, Oliver Queen and Kara Danvers, best known as the Green Arrow and Supergirl. With comms on their ears as Lena and Felicity gave information about the event. Alex arriving with Jonn, Diggle, Nia, and Brainly ready to enter the place. 

The Danvers sister shared a look of protectiveness and caring, as Felicity gave the signal to enter. The archer looked back at his friends before entering first, with the Kryptonian no long behind. 

With the lights off, they both spoke up. Oliver throws a bomb arrow to the middle of the warehouse. “You have failed this city!”

“Why do you guys do this, knowing we are going to stop you?”And your sister getting a look from your best friend for creating a pun. 

As both of the teams caught the majority of the people in question for minutes, the criminal that had been terrorizing National City and Star city was still on the loose. As both of your sisters ran where Sinclair’s bodyguards were being put down by a blonde. Oliver stood on the top of the stage watching the whole interaction with Anatoly by his side. 

Kara felt her world stop as she heard it again. The blood pumping sound coming from your familiar chest. Alex stopping looking back at her, as the blonde stumbled with her feet, slowly falling into the floor as tears started to come out. Desperately looking around the place with a foggy mind trying to find you. Alex tried to ground her pulling her into her, whispering calming words to your sisters. 

Your best friend had already recognized you, as you flipped the table and tried to cover, throwing a tranquilizer arrow immediately, hoping to make it before Roulette could shoot you. As Kara looked up where her friend stood throwing the arrow in direction of the tattooed woman, where you stood.

Shaking Alex as she got up. She watched Roulette firing at you and hitting you, making you fall to the floor. Your redhead sister looking at her confused before your name fell out of her lips as a whisper “Y/N”

All of the comms became quiet, for a second as all of them shared a look. Your archer best friend, already with you in his arms taking your pulse. As he put pressure into the wound, looking for a pulse, finding a faint one. He screamed, “We need to get her to our place now!”

You on the arms of your sister, with the rest of the teams not long behind. Some of them are still in shock. Alex and Oliver running into the medical bed where your ex-girlfriend and Felicity stood connecting you to the machines. 

Oliver rips your dress where the wound was located, only to find an open scar and various scars in the rest of your chest. Looking over to where Felicity stood checking your vitals, recognizing the tattoo that stood on the top right of your chest. He sighed, before grabbing Alex from her shoulders getting her out of the space where you were laying. “Alex! I need you to trust me okay!?”

“I'm a doctor and she is my sister, Oliver let me pass!” Alex yelled angrily, trying to push past the archer. 

Oliver looked at her before responding as he jogged to the med space again “I can't! You are not stable and we can help her, like this you can't”

Your oldest sister stood angrily and went to enter again only to be stopped by Kara evolving her in a hug. Both of them sat on the floor as the angry tears left their eyes, blaming themselves for the situation. 

-----

The pain was the only thing that you could feel as you started to gain consciousness. The brightness hitting your eyes the moment you blinked. With a clouded mind, you slowly began to look at your surroundings, when you felt various things attached to your body. 

Slowly closing and opening your eyes, as they adjusted to the white light that illuminated the room. You went to move, only to feel the IV in your arm and the tight bandage in your abdomen.

Groaning internally as the pain increased. You heard faintly familiar voices that you couldn't make of. The cold of the place made you curse internally as it felt that it was increasing the headache. Trying to clench your fits but failing when you felt all of your strength leave your body. 

Tossing around the bed, you noticed your cuffed hand into the bed. Furrowing your eyes as you look back now, in more pain and consciousness at your surroundings. Closed walls, small medical instruments, bright surroundings. Noticing your dress on the couch you looked down to see a familiar sweatshirt and shorts only to make you sigh in annoyance, putting the dots together. 

Moving around the bed, you grabbed the V1 and took it out slowly, putting it on the table beside you. Breathing multiple times, gaining all of the strength you could have the moment, you dislocated your thumb crying in silence as you did before getting your hand out of the cuffs.

Getting up slowly, you tried to look for your gun or anything in the space, only to find none. Breathing heavily the moment you tried to walk as the pain in your abdomen overwhelmed you and made you get support on the wall. Trying to conceal now your emotional and physical feelings you clenched your fits only to bandage around them. 

Nodding after gaining a part of your self-control you started to walk out of the med bed just to see Oliver with his arms crossed over his chest, stopping you.“Y/N, can't let you do that”

“For a former assassin, you do not take the right precautions, Queen” You responded with venom in your voice, trying to walk past your best friend only to be stopped as he got in your way. Showing your free hands. 

“I got things to do, and places to be, so get out of my way Oliver” You hissed when the archer made no move, and only stepped closer to you. Oliver examined your face as he did.

Your eyes that once were full of light now filled with darkness and wall. Your face that was once filled with smiles, now it was filled with voidness. Your once warm and caring expressions were now blank. A small scar on your cheek, almost unnoticeable if you weren't in the light. Everything had changed, and for the first time in a while, Oliver felt like he was just back on the island without any hope to save you, you were long gone and he knew it. 

“Where do you think you are going to go like that?”He claimed as he grabbed your shoulder, walking in the direction of a separate room. 

You concluded the struggle against his hold, even though the pain increased as you sat abruptly on the couch. “To take the fucking smirk out of Roulettes face with satisfaction”

You murmured loud enough for him to hear, as you moved around trying to get comfortable so the pain running through your veins could go away “Don't touch me”

“What are you gonna do? Fight me?” He sarcastically said before leaning on the doorway, watching your every move. 

“I may be not scared of anything anymore, Oliver but I’m not stupid enough to fight you,” You said before moving to lay on the couch. Ignoring his every try to speak to you. 

The silence became part of you in the past years, it helped to control your emotions, your wounds, and yourself. It became your solution to your problems. Now with it by your side, it refugees you as time passes. 

Oliver stood there for two whole hours, trying to find solutions in his thoughts. Memories that were buried inside came to play as he tried to find anything to get you back. But he knew that if you got into the Bratva organization there wasn't a single thing you haven't been through, and your scars confirmed his theories. 

All of the peace and calm was broken when your redhead sister burst through the door. Infuriated, and with a resentful expression on her face. Her breath got in her throat as she clenched her fits when she saw you. 

“What the hell happened to you?” Your oldest sister said, trying to hide the broken tone coming from her voice. Standing in front of you with fear in her eyes as she did, the fear of losing you again, the fear you saw more than once in her’s and Kara's eyes in any type of crisis. 

Kara came through the door no long behind, calmer than Alex but still tense. Both of your sisters shared a look when your silence became your answer. Ignoring them you kept looking at the ceiling, with a blank emotion. 

Kara walked closer to you, putting a hand on Alex as the redhead started to yell at you for leaving, for getting shot, for killing someone, for everything. Trying to relive the madness she had for you since you left. Your blonde sister shut Alex up, as she sat on the floor facing you like you did when you were kids.

With legs crossed and hands on your laps in front of the couch, when your mom wasn't home. Your sisters and you talked about what was wrong when you were kids. There wasn't anything you would hide from each other even when you moved to National City for college after so much time of disconnection between you three, it became natural. 

But the two of them sat there for hours and you didn't even move as the time passed, the only thing you did was breathe and stare at the ceiling. It was like you were trained to be in silence, you were completely void and both of your older sisters noticed. 

Trying to defuse the tension every now and then, Kara or Alex would speak up to ask you a question, but you remained silent. The rest of the teams stood in the Arrow cave, some of them more worried and confused than the others. Felicity had already spoken to Oliver. She had noticed the tattoo on your arm which did not pass by her remembering the same tattoo her husband once had on his left shoulder. 

Lena buried herself in her hands, as she tried to make sense of the situation. Many things had happened in the last few years, and many mistakes she had made, now we're basically feeling impossible to recover. Her foggy mind and unbalanced feelings all over the place.

Pulling herself up, Alex walked out of the room after sharing a look with Kara, when you kept silent and motionless. Oliver, Felicity, and Lena walked up to her as soon as she got out, with tears in her eyes, the redhead went to speak but was beaten by the archer. “She is not talking, is she?”

Alex nodded slowly before getting out of the way so the four of them could walk into the room. 

Noticing the now five standing figures in front of you, you remained in silence. The pain somehow became bearable as time passed, and with the control of your physical and mental feelings. You were basically the same person, Oliver once was. 

You seated back and examined each one of them. Oliver remained with a simple expression of worries, with his arms crossed, trying to find the words to get you to talk. Felicity stood on the far right with the table in her hand, as she searched for any part of your old self. Alex stood with her arms crossed, tears threatening to come out but still a desperate expression on her face. Kara was closer than the rest, with hope in her eyes, but a flash of pain and resentment in them too. Opening and closing her mouth multiple times as she cleaned the angry tears coming from her eyes. Lena stood upright looking at you like a ghost. Gripping to the sleeves of her sweater as she stared, biting her lip while trying to make the tears not come out.

“What do you want?” You claimed as you played with your hands, glancing at each one of them. Oliver remained calm, and not surprised when your cold and indifferent tone of voice hit them. While the three women felt their breathing get caught in their throats. 

Your best friend took a step closer to you, with a challenging look in his eyes as both of you connected glances. He was pushing your buttons so you would overwhelm yourself, but you knew better than that. You had seen him and your sisters do the same thing a lot of times, so you played along. “You know what we want”

“А Вы, Олли?” You said not looking anywhere else but his eyes. Your sisters and Felicity looked shocked, as you spoke while Lena understood you perfectly, furrowing her eyebrow in confusion. What were you hiding? 

When the archer didn't respond, you took your turn again, this time with a sarcastic chuckled as you did. “Ты не сказал им, не так ли?”

Oliver looked at you annoyed before rubbing his temples, Lena got closer only to be stopped when your oldest sister angrily yelled at you. “What the hell happen to you?”

If she would have done it three years ago, you would have flinched. Surprising your sisters and Lena when you didn't. Instead, you looked void, and with your eyes challenging Alex with determination and calmness with nothing to fear. No one had ever challenged your sister, everyone feared the redhead, except for you.

You had lost all of your fears in the past years. You weren't scared of death or anything else. You became blank, it didn't matter to you, if you died or if you were alive. You didn't have anything to live for, but you also didn't have anything to die for. So you survived. 

“Nothing of your damn business, Alexandra” You responded going back to laying on the couch. Your two sisters and ex-girlfriend exchanged looks, having a silent conversation. You had never called her that, it was always, Alex, Al, Allie, Bear Bear. That scared the hell out of both of them, tears coming out as they walked out of the room slamming the door as they did.

You weren't there, you weren't yourself, you weren't the person who had once loved them infinitely, you weren't the person they had once comforted after having a nightmare, you weren't the person who danced and sung around the kitchen as you cooked, you weren't the person who took their camera everywhere so you could captivate moments with them, you weren't the person who was an absolute child during each holiday, you weren't the person who would drop everything to make you sure they were okay, you weren't the person who cried themselves to sleep when you had disappointed them, you weren't the person who tried to be funny, you weren't the person who was distinguished for being clumsy.

You weren't the person they once knew, you were gone and deep down they all knew it.

[dailyadventureprompts]

For the adventure prompt thing: How about an inland city with a towering lighthouse dominating the skyline? Instead of warding ships from the coast, the lighthouse projects a magical field of energy every night to keep out the hordes of monsters in the wilderness. People need to venture out of the city for supplies, but woe to anyone caught outside the ward after sunset.

Oooh, lots to work with here, let me see what I can do: 

Adventure: A Fading Memory of Light

“On that terrible night when the beacon tower died, the whole city’s hope went with it. The Corpse-king’s ghostly legions, long denied the promise of conquest that bound them to the living world, were able to march against the fortifications that had so long kept them at bay. 

In a single night, the city was swept clean of life, drained to feed the corpse-king’s armies or tolled to the well of darkness from which his power sprang. Only a score of survivors managed to flee the fall of their home and cross the haunted waste to civilized lands. 

may this account teach us that there are limits to what we can accomplish under our own mortal power, and that there is some darkness in this world that not even our brightest light can withstand.” 

-A history of the strongholds of humanity, volume IV: Southeastern continent

Setup:  The party comes into possession of a most unusual object: the diary of a refugee who fled Svivolda, a magocratic city as it was overtaken by an army of undead. So traumatic were these events, that anyone who reads the journal ends up bodily transported into a dreamlike memory of the days leading up to the conquest, able to live and relive the city’s trials before being returned to their previously unconscious body, no worse for wear and only a few hours having passed. 

Little more than a ruin reclaimed by the wilderness in the present day, Svivolda was once a city ruled over by a powerful mages, that for all their power failed to prevent the rise of a conquest hungry necromancer called “The Cadaver-King”. Whatsmore, when the threat presented itself, the masters of the city refused to heed the call and join their neighbors in dispatching the foe, trusting instead in their walls and wards to ensure the safety of their holdings. This isolationist attitude saw all of Svivolda’s contemporary settlements wiped out, as the corpse-king’s influence spread  and turned the surrounding landscape into a haunted wasteland. They held out nearly a generation, before some agent of the corpse king snuck into the city and managed to destroy the city’s protective beacon tower in an act of cataclysmic sabotage. 

Today the city of Svivolda is known mostly for its tragic end,  spoken of by sages and skalds as one of the most obvious examples of what happens when good does nothing but bide its time in the face of an overwhelming darkness. 

Adventure Hooks

The party starts their first loop awakening in a disused tavern (as the isolated city has little need in way of hospitality for outsiders) after the conclusion of some kind of festival the previous night. they are granted a few days to explore the city before, at sunset, the city’s beacon tower explodes, leading to a night of furious resistance as the corpse-king’s forces appear out of the mist to besiege the now unwarded city. After the defenders fall, its a few days of panic and nightly purges as the city either flees into the wastes or attempts to hide from the phantom army. After a few days of carnage, the loop suddenly ends, kicking the heroes back out to the real world. 

It the players are wise, the book can be more than just a historical curiosity: as the rumors have it, the final, deepest vault of the magisters, with all their riches and wonders survived the corpse-king’s plundering, as well as his defeat some decades later. A smart band of treasure hunters can follow likely suspects and perhaps ascertain the location of the vault and perhaps a manner to circumvent its defenses. After that, all that’s left is to plan an expidition to the city’s ruins, through the blasted wasteland left by the corpse-king’s defeat. 

The barrier beacon of Svivolda is perhaps one of the greatest works of abjuration magic ever developed, and was thought to have been lost to the ages when the city fell. If the party can somehow steal its plans or otherwise reproduce its function, they may be able to shield their own holdings or vessels from powerful opponents as well. 

Challenges & Complications: 

While the events experienced while inside the book’s memory are only illusions, the characters present within those illusions act as if they were real: the populace are warry of outsiders, and the city watch is alert for those breaking the peace. If the characters aren’t careful, its likely that they’ll be apprehended as spies and spend the rest of their loop rotting in some dungeon. 

Somewhere in the city, the journaler is alive, a young man who works as a servant in one of the grand households and acts as an attendant to one of the city’s magister lords. Should the party manage to find the journaler and keep him “alive” during the days of fear and tumult, they can add extra time to their run. Doing so is easier said than done, as they’ll have to work backwards from the details left in what remaining journal pages they have. Unlike other changes made in the memory, these changes actually stick, resulting in new entries (though written in vaguer prose) appearing in the journals accounts and allowing the party to start earlier in the loop, or spend more time in the fallen, undead haunted city. 

Art Sources: 

https://www.deviantart.com/gerezon/art/Endless-Legend-intro-image-488261045

https://www.artstation.com/artwork/8ldvkE

[guardian-esper]

Entry #0: An Introduction

Date: I couldn’t reliably tell you in my current state.

Time: Late morning. Headache-o’-clock.

This might not practically be the best time to start writing, or rather this isn’t the best personal state of physical being, but it’s not like I can do much else when I’m this hung over. Gods, my head is pounding. I don’t think I’ve ever celebrated quite like I did last night. I went ahead to the infirmary and asked for a concoction to deal with this bottle ache, hopefully that’ll kick in soon.

Anyhow, let me back up a little here, remark on some context. Yesterday, I was awarded my first ever promotion in rank for the town guard. Last night, my new fellow sergeants decided to give me the usual rite-of-passage celebration for privates who rank up. I had, ah, to be honest, never touched a drink in my life. Not like that, at least. So uh, that’s two major developments: My first promotion, and my first drunken escapade.

I don’t really remember everything after the first few rounds, but right now I think I feel mostly regret, despite my excitement. Although, I do think I accidentally bumped into one of the women sergeants, in an accident of...inappropriate contact. I think I tried to explain myself through the alcoholic fog, but based on the faint stinging on my left cheek, I feel fairly certain of the strength her backhanding capability.

I uh, I don’t think I’ll be indulging in whiskey quite like that ever again. Need to remind myself to go and apologize later.

Ahem. At any rate, I’m here writing now at the recommendation of the lieutenant I’m now serving directly under. They said it would be good to keep a record of some kind, a source of reflection on any future operations or happenings. Not that I or they expect there’ll be all that much, considering how usually peaceful and calm it is in this little town. Still, I guess it might be worth it in a general sense, at least.

I think I’ve gotten a little ahead of myself, though. I’ve completely forgotten to record an introduction. Let’s continue this properly.

Name: Ivan Stavros.

Race: Human.

Age: 21. Born on the twenty-first day of the ninth month of the year.

Title: Sergeant of the town guard of Trelynshire.

Responsibilities: Second in command to my unit’s leader, Lieutenant B’jorn. In addition to making the usual town rounds and participating in the usual drills, I’ll be sometimes sent as messenger boy between the lieutenants and the captain. In more rare occasions, I’ll be put in charge of my unit. If circumstances ever demand it, that is.

...honestly, aside from a bit of a pay raise and some more authority, I don’t expect my new station to amount to too much. Other than a rare few major incidents, not a lot of particular danger ever comes knocking on our doors. Trelynshire is a pretty quiet town, with nothing but miles of wilds and forestry surrounding. So we’re a bit on the isolated side here, and in the context of the wider world...if I’m being honest, it’s rather boring. Peaceful, yes, and full of kind and hardworking folk, but you aren’t exactly going to find many thrilling stories about imminent danger threatening the townsfolk or anything.

Many, I emphasize. There have been a few. Including, I should mention, the events surrounding what led to my somewhat sudden promotion. Which, I will get into after my introductions here are finished. I need to fully recover before I start going over those more recent events again. Otherwise, Trelynshire itself isn‘t entirely boring, or empty of intrigue or mystery. Far from it, actually, though most of its secrets are kept rather hush-hush. Again, I will get into that, probably in a future entry.

Back to myself, however, I’ve got a solid 21 years of life to recount. At this point, they’re not something I’ve sat down to think about very much. There are...some things that aren’t very favorable to reminisce. Some things I’ve only spoken to a few people in confidence about; one of them being Lieutenant B’jorn, mentioned above. The man doesn’t like to pry too much, but he has genuinely tried to help me out, even with advice on personal matters. That might be another reason he recommended I start journaling: for the supposed therapeutic aspect of it. I mean, maybe he’s right, perhaps it would be good to finally sit down and take stock of my 21 years on this Earth, but...I’m not certain how easy that’s going to be.

I think maybe I should let this hangover let up first. Let me just sleep on it for a bit.

...

The time: Early evening, same day.

Right, I feel better now. That concoction’s worked wonders, and I’ve napped the hangover off otherwise. The rain and grey skies outside helped me sleep. Just a little worn-out still. Thank the gods that I was allowed a few days off to recuperate before taking my new station.

Anyroad, where was I? Right. The story of my life. Hmm...

Let me preface by saying that, I’m not taking stock of any of this for reader’s sympathy, not to say ‘poor poor me’ or anything like that. I don’t like to stay too hung up on the past. Growing up here in Trelynshire, my mentor would often tell me that the past need not define me or anyone, yet reflection is important all the same. That it’s to be learned from, or something. Honestly, I don’t know about that. The past is what it is, and can’t be changed. In my case, I prefer to just not hinge on it. Or think about it much at all, really. It’s not like I’m going to get closure or anything like that, and besides, there’s the here and now, and the future to think about. This town has been kind and patient with me, and gave me as good of a fresh start as I could have ever asked for. What good can really come from hinging on things that can’t be changed?

Damn it, I’m delaying. I told Lieutenant B’jorn that I would try to write, if at least to keep my head clear and focused in my upcoming post as a sergeant. He needs me focused, like everyone else. C’mon, Ivan, buckle down and get it done. It’s not like anyone else is going to read this anyway.

Right, then. I guess the very beginning of things would normally be the best place to start. Yet...I think it might be necessary here to jump around a bit. At least to better contextualize past events in conjunction with where I am in the present.

It would be most prudent then to start with the fact that Trelynshire is not my native home. No, I’m actually not from anywhere quite near here. I’m from a much more largely governed area, and Trelynshire is for all intents and purposes an independent town, as far as I can tell. As much as Trelynshire is (by a long shot) more home to me than my original home was, I feel the need to tell about my origins here.

To put matters simply, I am more or less a refugee. My home city is, as far as I know, currently in a severely war-torn state. I only saw a few days of a glimpse at this conflict before I, and many other children at the time, were rescued and extracted from the children’s boarding school we had been living in. Or rather, I should say, where we were frankly being kept and groomed. You see, according to what little I’ve learned, my home city-state has fallen into a state of fascism and borderline dictatorship over the last few generations. Growing up, I couldn’t really grasp what was going on around me there, especially being one of the ostracized lower-class kids, but in hindsight, the place is and has been a right mess.

For a more broad geographical and political context: Trelynshire is located deep within forested wilds, further inland on the continent, which all major maps call Eliostar. If one travels from Trelynshire far to the northwest, they will encounter a major desert region. This region extends into a major peninsular landmass, which is the geographical home to a major empire composed of a number of distinct city-states. Well, ex-empire, I should say. Over time, the political configuration become more democratic as the various city-states began to elect representatives to rule alongside the empress, and keep her power in check. If I recall correctly, this area is now officially called The Imperial Republic of Akkacia, formerly the Akkacian Empire.

My home city, Ireithett, is actually the capitol of one the Republic’s major city-states, Vortix, which lies near the mountainous threshold between the Republic and the desert separating the peninsula from the rest of the continent. As far as the past of this city-state goes, what I do know is that it has always been notable as one of the more militarily powerful of the states, second only to Sythemar further west. In the recent decades, however, Vortix has been the cause of tension through the Republic, and by the time I was around eleven years old, any political stability it maintained with the rest of the Republic had broken down. Whatever sparked it, an armed conflict broke out between Vortix and the rest of the Republic, who in time had fought their way across Vortix’s farmlands into Ireithett itself, intent to storm the capitol, take control, and force the leaders into some kind of agreement. I don’t know what the source of the conflict was, or even if it’s close to have been resolved yet, but that’s not currently high on my list of interests to know. As far as my life there goes, however...

Ireithett was always called the ‘crown jewel’ of Vortix, being the one major city to populate the otherwise overwhelmingly farmland structure of the nation-state. But if you were asking me if that was true, having grown up on the inside of the capitol, I could tell you that is actually far from the case. Most of the city is, frankly, overwhelmingly slums. There was always a more poor district in the outer areas, but in the past, it was much smaller. Where there was apparently an existing middle class region, there isn’t really anything left of that. I snuck in once, in fact, only to find that all of the housing was abandoned, decaying, and/or used for some governing or policing purpose by those in their unreachable ivory towers, which were separated from us common folk by tall, iron-wrought walls. In short, where I lived, and everywhere I could even go, were all slums. Even more bizarrely than this, we weren’t even allowed to leave the city itself, so I never saw much of the green fields and farmlands outside the city. A decaying capitol was all I knew, and as you might guess, it was rife with danger. Crime, homelessness, gangs, violence and substance abuse were common, and there were even rumors of trafficking. Of weapons, drugs, and...I loathe to think about it, but of people. As hard as it was being a growing kid in the slums, I shudder to think about how some less fortunate than I ended up.

In short, well, it was a shithole. I really can’t describe it any other way.

Ironically, though, the only thing scarier than thugs or traffickers was the city guard. A lot of brutalizing bastards acting at the behest of the elite, or whoever might be able to pay them more or do them the right favors. They knew little mercy and had just as little patience. Claimed to be acting in our best interests to try and get us to cooperate, but they were all the bloody definition of dirty law enforcement. And I was one of the kids unfortunate enough to be born in this city’s walls, under their monitoring.

Yet I was fortunate enough to eventually be rescued, just as all hell was breaking loose upon the city from the invading united armies that made their ways to the city gates. Obviously, it’s nearly impossible for me to look back in positivity at those days. My family didn’t have much to its name, and avoiding trouble (and resisting the urge to get into trouble for a scrap of anything better) was a monumental task all its own. I had seen my hefty share of street fights, brutality, fear and strife before I was free from it all, and it’s a difficult thing to look back on.

Honestly, though, it’s not that I don’t ever look back. I try not to, but...unfortunately, I’m not certain I can say all ties with the place are completely cut. I did, of course, have family and friends there when I was extracted and eventually brought here to Trelynshire. I don’t know, but I like to think I still do have said friends and family. The thing is, I have no idea where they are, if they ever broke free from that place, or if they’re even alive. And this was ten years ago. I don’t know what happened to my mother after I was separated from her and put in that bloody stupid boarding school. I never learned what became of my father, who joined the city guard apparently in hopes of bringing us into a better life inside the upper-class walls. And my friends...not a day goes by when I don’t wonder about them, if they’re okay or not. This kind of distance from them...it’s a thing that I loathe about how things have turned out.

Don’t get me wrong. I could not be more fortunate than I am to have been taken care of these past ten years by the folk here in Trelynshire. Despite the difficulties I’m (often, but in jest) reminded I posed to them, I’ve always been cared for and looked after here. I have a place in the world here, and it seems I’m carving out a future of some kind. But do you know how tantalizing it is to be suddenly whisked away from your home, downtrodden and hellish as it was, never to know what became of everyone you knew?! It sticks with you. Indefinitely. You feel things like guilt, even regret, regret for not finding out on your own before it was too late. Regret for not bloody fighting for it, even if you know there was little you could do.

Forgive me. I need another moment to cool off. Emotion is getting the better of me here.

...

Apologies. I’m alright. Let me try and wrap this up for the time being.

To shed light on what I was just talking about, I have indeed tried, once or twice, to learn about the goings-on in Ireithett the past ten years. Unfortunately, even if someone makes it through the desert to the border, it’s hard to be granted passage into Akkacia as a whole right now. Apparently the conflict is still going on, and the Republic’s government isn’t exactly keen on letting very many details out. In light of all this, I frustratingly only have more questions instead of answers. Still, the captain of  the guard here assured me that she would keep whatever line of information possible between here and there, and update me on any developments. There is at least that, and she has my deepest appreciation. Not that I’m really holding my breath for anything to come to light any time soon, but all the same it means a lot. I’ve thanked her, and in meantime, I’ve just tried to carry on and focus on where I’m going, not where I’ve been.

With that though, I’m getting a little too tired, emotionally and physically, to carry on with all this right now. It’s getting dark outside, and the post-nap drowsiness from earlier is really starting to weigh on me. There is more to tell, certainly, but at the moment, I don’t feel very up to the task. I do, however, have a few days of off-time left before my first official shift as a lieutenant, so maybe after a good night’s rest I can go into more detail tomorrow. For better or worse, there’s a lot left to unpack here, but I’ll try again perhaps in the morning. Hmm...mayhaps I’ll set up to write in the local cafe. I could use something strong to reset with, and the service there is always top-knotch. For now, if Hypnos would be so willing to give me an uninterrupted sleep, I’ll be up and going strong again in the morrow. Until then.

                                                                                                          -Ivan

[an-apocalypse-of-magpies]

On the world of Mortal Engines, class, and the metaphors of consumption

This is less an essay and more a collection of thoughts. Basically I just saw a video on the Mortal Engines film and its being a civilisation too stupid to exist. I got fed up, mainly because so many of the criticisms amounted to ‘the book did it better’ with little elaboration but also the arrogantly grating voice of the presenter got on my nerves, but I cannot deny the points made and in fact wanted to elaborate further on the worldbuilding of this series and, while unrealistic, look at why the books were so engaging.

Some background to start off - Mortal Engines is a four-book series (and three-book prequel sub-series) written by English author Phillip Reeve, and depicts a bleak post-apocalyptic world. North America is uninhabitable and lost to the sands of time, irradiated, poisoned, and flattened by war. Eurasia is mostly barren plains. And, of course, the central premise - towns and cities have raised themselves onto mobile platforms and trundle about. Well, mostly. A major antagonist to this system is the Anti-Traction League, a collective of nations hiding out in old east China, the Indian subcontinent, southeast Asia and some of Africa. They are seen as barbarians and heathens by much of the world for refusing to mobilise, instead hiding in stationary citadels behind their mountains. The Traction Cities near-universally engage in a philosophy of Municipal Darwinism, a savage system of bastardised pseudo-biology where cities literally predate each other and ‘consume’ each other for resources. Cities eat towns, towns eat smaller towns. Some towns and cities deliberately adapt to cheat the system and make themselves a less appetising target, or for that matter a more aggressive and efficient hunter.

THE TRACTION CITIES

The first three books tend to focus their action on one or two cities, whereas the last is a bit more of a road trip. The other consistent thread is multiple characters’ stories running concurrently, usually reconnecting near the end. This allows the books maintain an open, almost global scale - you’ll nearly never not be moving, even sitting still on a city, which reinforces the theme of unnatural life. The first book focuses on London, which has been sulking in what was once Britain (by sheer happenstance on their part and pure irony on ours), and is suddenly running at full pelt back into Europe and eastward as fast as her engines can carry her. Why? London’s not the biggest city around, and the vast expanse of Eurasia is now the Great Hunting Ground - it’s where the big boys play, and by play I mean ‘savagely predate each other’. It’s dangerous territory for a little city. But over the first book, it becomes increasingly apparent that Traction Cities are increasingly non-viable option for existence. Fuel is scarce, prey moreso, and what morsels London can confidently snap up will not sustain it for long. There is an ecosystem at play here - static settlements can farm resources, but are universally seen as food, either by small bandit settlements to raid for supplies or for larger towns to just straight-up eat. Small towns too small to hunt tend to be miners or gatherers, either mining minerals to use or trade, or gathering resources like wood from natural deposits or sifting through the waste heaps left by bigger cities. Most cities bigger than that are ‘urbivores’, or hunter towns, that hunt and eat smaller prey or opportunistically scavenge the ‘carcasses’ of dead cities. I mentioned specialisation earlier, and like in nature, species and cities can occupy a niche that gives them an advantage and thus increased chance at survival. Airhaven, for example, is a politically-neutral city in the air that floats around Eurasia seasonally and serves as a rest stop, fuelling station and trading exchange for airship pilots the world over, Tractionist or no. Tunbridge Wheels is a pirate-run town that has a lightweight wooden chassis and flotation devices to hunt amphibiously in a world where many small towns escape threat by setting up on islands.  Panzerstadt-Bayreuth is a conurbation of four massive cities, too big to survive long without prey, they banded together to take down the biggest of prey (it’s unclear whether they achieve this through sheer size or whether they decouple and become a pack hunter). Anchorage, the last American city, neutered its own jaws to increase mobility, skating around the frozen north too fast for threats to catch up with, and survives on trade. Brighton is a pleasure city that paddles around the warm Mediterranean, technically still a predator but with no real agenda and about the only city left that can be called a tourist city (it’s run on the back of brutal slave labour). And these are just the major ones. Throughout the books, cities are treated like living things ... like mortal engines.

And like living things, they need resources to survive.

A DYING WAY OF LIFE

The books are inconsistent on the origins of Traction Cities, as it turns out deliberately - history is written by the winners, after all. But it’s all closely tied to the ‘apocalypse’ part of the post-apocalytic I mentioned earlier. Long ago in-universe, long into our future, was a terrible event known as the Sixty Minute War. This war tore the world asunder with nuclear and quantum energy weaponry. America, the epicentre, is simply no more (it turns out there are some fertile areas in Nova Scotia, but for the most part America is dead). Entire new mountain ranges were born, notably the Tannhäusers in East Asia that shield the heartland of the Anti-Traction League. There was a long period of geological and tectonic instability. According to legend, Traction Cities arose to escape these instabilities. In other words, like animals will flee a volcanic eruption, cities first became mobile to escape and survive. Trade was likely facilitated by towns literally being able to park next to each other. Ironically, London was also where everything changed. After Nikola Quercus conquered (static) London with his mobile fortresses, he decided to upgrade and raise London onto wheels to become the first fully-mobile city. And he did it for war. After all, there’s no better comeback to ‘you and what army’ then literally rolling up with your entire city. By the series present, the idea had caught on and grown into the ideology described above. But herein lies the problem. Early Traction London was a tiny little thing. Now it’s not even the biggest fish in the pond, but it’s still HUGE. And, as we all know, big things need lots of energy to go. London is described as having a top speed of about sixty miles per hour at the height of a hunt. So, you need fuel. There is still oil in this world, mainly because they now have no qualms about mining Antarctica, but if you think there’s nearly enough crude oil to run a world full of cities like London you are sorely mistaken. Wood’s not much better off. And, of course, Traction Cities tend to run on some form of internal combustion engine - it’s only at the very end of the traction era that science has advanced enough for a town to experiment with magnetic levitation. So what do they burn? Well, bits of other prey towns. Do you see the problem? Use fuel to hunt towns, burn those towns for fuel. What next? And it’s not just fuel. London captures a little salt-mining town called Salthook at the beginning of the first book to introduce us to the concepts at play, and we see what goes on in the Dismantling Yards - part of a system literally called the Gut, in case the metaphor wasn’t clear yet. Everything is recycled. Bricks, mortar, steel, wood, everything. Because the state of technology is so weird in this world, Old-Tech (technology from before the SMW) can be incredibly valuable to history and/or science, and London is keen to snaffle that up too. The people are interred into refugee camps, though if you know anything about how real-life Britain treats refugees you can probably see where that is going. And it’s not enough. It’s never enough. Food is an even more pressing concern. Unless you’re very rich (more on that in a mo), food is mostly algae-based, then hardy vegetables that grow quickly like cabbage. And it’s running out fast. And London’s a big city with a lot of resources at its disposal. Most cities don’t even have that. A lot of cities are starving on the wheels, city and populace alike. A lot of cities run on slave labour, and feed those slaves as little as they can get away with. Shan Guo, home of the Anti-Traction League, is a green and vibrant land only because it doesn’t have cities running over or eating its farmlands every other day (and, again, city folk generally don’t know this - they’re given endless propaganda that Anti-Tractionists are barbarian warbands a la Mad Max). A lot of the A story is told from the point of view of Tom Natsworthy, who until the events of the book had never left London. He’s never seen bare earth or walked on mud before. He’s never seen a horse. The idea that you can survive, much less thrive, outside of a Traction City is alien to him. But on the city he came from, everything is rapidly running out, and some cities are turning to desperate measures to survive, including Arkangel openly bribing pilots to sell out the locations and courses of nearby cities. A chilling scene in the first book even has Tom see, from the safety of the air, the corpse of Motoropolis, a city not unlike London that literally just starved to death, running out of fuel and helpless as the scavengers closed in. It’s been weeks since the city stopped, and the narrative description evokes the grotesqueness and sadness of a whale carcass. Sheer Jingoism is about the only thing keeping Municipal Darwinism alive - Traction good, stationary bad.

CLASS, CLASSISM, AND OTHER SOCIAL OPPRESSIONS

In a world so starved as this, compassion is hard to come by. Cities still exist mainly by virtue of rigid social stratification, and often that stratification is literal - most medium-to-large cities have tiers, and will generally arrange those tiers based on social class. London, for example, has seven tiers. The bottom two tiers are dominated by the Gut, the engines, and homes and communities of the workers who keep them running. Tiers 4 and 3 are miscellaneous proles of increasing social standing. Tier 2 is mostly what I’d call ‘tourist London’ - lots of the nice bits and the establishments that London likes to be proud of. Because of his work at the London Museum, this is the quality of life Tom Natsworthy was most used to. Tier 1 is High London, where all the rich live and have their amenities and nice parks (and even that doesn’t last - London’s food shortage means even the High London parks are eventually, begrudgingly, turned over for food production). Katherine Valentine, the hero of the first book’s B plot, lives here. Finally there’s Top Tier, which is purely administrative. The only buildings are the Guildhall (the seat of government), St Paul’s Cathedral (which the Engineers’ Guild have secretly been installing a deadly superweapon in under the guise of ‘restoration’ work) and the headquarters of the Guild of Engineers, the most powerful of London’s Guilds. Social stratification is nearly non-existant, and people are shown to get very uncomfortable when out of ‘their space’. Tom is sent to work in the Gut during the capture of Salthook as a punishment before the plot ejects him from London, and he notes being actively intimidated by the claustrophobia, the dirt, the rough and burly labourers, and the noise. But despite Tom’s relatively privileged life - he lives near High London, above the heat and noise and smoke of the engines, in the care of one of the top four Guilds of London - he is of very low social status. Tom Natsworthy is an orphan; his parents were Historians, but were killed when an accident occurred and part of Tier 3 collapsed, crushing anything on Tier 4 beneath. Even before that, the Natsworthys were middle class at best, but being orphaned meant being left to the care of an orphanage run by the Guild of his parents, the Historians. The Historians were Tom’s only source of education, and eventually they would employ him, but with no parents or money, Tom can only afford a Third-Class apprenticeship. He has no upwards mobility within the Guild, and with no money he can’t leave and train with another. His dream of being a pilot trader, or better yet adventurer, will never come true under normal circumstances. The rich live in a completely different world yet. Katherine Valentine, daughter of the Head Historian and the Lord Mayor’s ‘right-hand man’ Thaddeus Valentine, has a positively bougie lifestyle with not a care in the world. Ironically, though, it is through Katherine’s eyes that the horrors of London’s class system are revealed. Trying to find information about her father’s would-be killer, Katherine finds herself regularly travelling to the Gut, eventually befriending an apprentice Engineer who witnessed the attack. But in the Gut, life is very different. It’s not just a life of hard labour and smoke - petty criminals and the aforementioned ‘refugees’ are tasked with working dangerous and sickening jobs like managing the city’s sewage. And by that, I mean ‘harvesting literal faeces to be converted into food and fuel’. The foreman overseeing their work admits they feed such criminals nothing else. And he has the gall to be annoyed that they keep dying of diseases like cholera and typhoid! These people are denied medical care, denied treatment, denied even basic food other than being told to literally eat sh*t. And when they inevitably die? They get sent to the Engineerium to be turned into robotic zombies that can never get sick, tired or unhappy. And, eventually, they’ll be put right back to work. The crimes these criminals did to deserve this, remember, include petty theft, criticising the Lord Mayor, and living aboard a town that got eaten. The foreman literally cannot fathom why Katherine would care about these people’s wellbeing - after all, they’re just criminals. The Engineerium’s end goal in all this is, again, to staff the entire lower tiers with robot zombie workers who will never grow tired, get sick, complain or protest their lot in life, and will never disobey orders, and just enough human overseers to keep things running smoothly ... because that’s what these people are worth to London, cheap, unending labour. Katherine can’t even bring herself to tell her high-class peers about what she learned down there, because it’s such a different world that they would never empathise, much less care. Again, slave labour is common in this world, especially child slavery - Brighton runs on it to maintain its image as a floating Caligula’s Palace, and in Arkangel slavery is so normal that we watch a rich man beat a slave nearly to death for the crime of bumping into him. In the second book, we see the logical end-point of this. Anchorage’s social structure has completely fallen apart due to a plague in recent years that turned to once-proud ice city into a ghost town manned only by a skeleton crew. The margravine, Freya, is only 14, but with her parents dead, she finds herself in charge of the whole city. She has no household staff, apart from Smew, who finds himself constantly juggling outfits to adopts the roles of steward, chamberlain and so on. His official role before the plague was ... erm ... the Dwarf. He was there in a manner similar to a court jester, for the amusement of the margrave due to being a little person. But the head navigator is just ... the woman who kept the maps. The head engineer is going half-mad, seeing his dead son staring at him from the shadows, and the only reason the town’s still going is because his systems are the best on the ice and can mostly run on automatic. They have no doctor. The only other people of consequence in Anchorage are the Aakiuqs, the Inuit couple who run the air-harbour. The common workers of Anchorage number in the mere dozens. And yet, because they’re so fixated on their traditions, nobody will drop the formalities and just admits that they’re trying to uphold a class system that doesn’t work anymore. No, that’s not quite right - everybody realises it’s pointless to maintain the artifice of Anchorage’s social heirarchy, but nobody wants to be the first one to say it out loud. Much like Municipal Darwinism, nobody want to address the elephant in the room, that the system is broken and that people hold onto it because it’s comfortable in the face of uncertainty. Only in Anchorage’s darkest hour, when everything has been turned upside down and the conquerors are on their doorsteps, do the agree to drop the formalities, drop the artifice of class, and address each other as people, say what they think, and work to save what they have left. And of course, there’s the racism in the world. Life on mobile cities has made cultures smaller and more insular, considering we mainly see this series from the point of view of culturally-English towns. Throughout the first book there is a clear west vs east divide - the Traction Cities are generally English-speaking or multicultural enough that English will get you by. The Anti-Tractionist League, meanwhile, are south or east Asian, or else African, and are commonly understood to be ‘those brown people’. The only ethnically white Anti-Tractionists are from ‘Spitzbergen’ (likely Scandinavia/Finland and northwest Russia) and Hester Shaw’s family, and the latter lived on a town that floated out to an island and gave up running from predators forever. The way Tom reacts to this attitude calls to mind the way racists might refer to ‘race traitors’. There’s even an in-universe slur for people who live in static settlements; ‘Mossies’, because ‘a rolling town gathers no moss’. However, when Tom is taken to Shan Guo itself, he realises that all the propaganda he’d been fed his whole like is exactly that - propaganda. Shan Guo is described as beautiful - an endless patchwork of rolling fields and farms, colourful, bright, vibrant, heaving with life and energy. The Anti-Tractionists aren’t vicious savages, they’re just ... people. Tom can’t understand it at first. He wonders how people can live without the hum of engines or the vibrations of deckplates - he subconsciously equates city life with, well, life, and the absence of that makes him uneasy. But he can also see this culture before him, thousands of years old, outlasting even the end of the world, and he realises there is another way. The next time he sees London, he sees it from outside, from the side of the hunted, and he realises it’s not beautiful or efficient, just dirty, and huge, wrapped in its own waste smoke and driven only by destruction. For the rest of the series, even with the rise of the radicalised Green Storm (Anti-Tractionists Lv2), large Traction Cities are consistently the enemy. Tractionism as a culture is understood to only represent imperialism, destruction, and consumption, literally and figuratively.

SCIENCES SANS FRONTIERES

It should be noted that science and technology are not universally reviled by the series. As a dieselpunk series, a certain degree of technology is fundamental to the series existence. But this is a very different world than the one we know. On the one hand, engines exist that can drive entire cities. On the other, computers basically do not exist. The rare few that still exist are not in working condition, and nobody knows how to restore them. Heavier-than-aircraft don’t really exist - the third book introduces some, but they’re small, experimental ... barely more than short-range toys designed for flashy air shows but not real travel. The main form of personal locomotion in this world is by airship, and this world’s airships are far beyond anything we’ve made in our time. But lost technologies are heavily associated with the hubris and destructiveness of the Ancients. Until now. Like I said, the most powerful Guild in London is the Engineers’ Guild. And they got that way under the leadership of now-Lord Mayor Magnus Crome. It should be noted that Crome genuinely loves his city and wants it to survive no matter the cost. But under Crome, the Engineers began to dabble in sciences considered unethical to downright taboo. Most notable is the MEDUSA Project. Through Thaddeus Valentine, London came into possession of an energy weapon from the SMW ... and, more importantly, the working computer that runs the thing. In terms of Darwinist Evolution, this is like giving a monkey a gun and teaching it how to use it. MEDUSA exhibits a level of power no other force on Earth can match, and London is forced to deploy it early in a crisis. Originally, the plan was to march up to Batmunkh Gompa, the Shield-Wall that represents the only break in the mountains around Shan Guo big enough to permit a city, and blast it to cinders. Unfortunately, London attracts the attention of a bigger, hungrier city about halfway there, and is forced to fire MEDUSA at it to save its own skin. The sheer terror of what that weapon represents is revealed then. Panzerstadt-Bayreuth was the fusion of four massive cities, each one bigger and more powerful than London. MEDUSA killed it dead in one stroke - the energy beam set the entire city ablaze and ignited its fuel stores. Her engines nearly immediately exploded. When the fires go down enough for an Engineer scout ship to investigate, the people had been almost flashed into glass. The flash of light from the attack is so bright that, hundreds of miles to the south, Tom and Hester see the sky light up like a new dawn. The people of London are relieved, of course, that they didn’t all die that night, but more than that the entire city become suffused with the excitement of just how easy it would be to kill ... well, anyone they like, really. London doesn’t even stop to devour Panzerstadt-Bayreuth, as the Engineers can’t afford for the Shield-Wall to prepare for their arrival. Appropriately, and karmically, the finale has an accident lock down the computer lock down, with MEDUSA unable to fire but unable to stop gathering energy, and London melts under the heat of MEDUSA’s glare. But that wasn’t the only scientific sin committed by London’s engineers. I’ve already mentioned London trying to repurpose faeces as food, but we need to talk more about the Stalkers. Stalkers are kinda like discount Cybermen from Doctor Who - dead bodies, threaded with weird old machines and coated in armour, their brains hooked up to simple computers. Originally conceived as soldiers, they were believed long dead. However, one survived to the modern by sheer survivor instinct - Shrike. Through negotiations that are not the purview of this essay, he allowed the Engineers of London to take him apart and figure out how he worked, and hoo boy they did. The Engineers figured out how to manufacture their own Stalkers. The first batch are used as law enforcement like the Worst Robocops, but, again, the plan was to have Stalker workers all over Low London. Katherine, learning this, likens it to London ‘being a city of the dead’ (Apprentice Engineer Pod, to whom she is talking, grimly notes that the Deep Gut Prison is so awful, so callous with human life, that it already feels like that). Logically, the end-point of this idea is to have all workers in London be the resurrected dead, with just enough living to keep things in order ... oh, and they’d all be loyal to the Engineers, because remember, no Freedom of Speech here, and you can be sent to do the worst form of prison labour for dissenting against the Lord Mayor. With Crome being both Lord Mayor and Head Engineer at once, the Engineers’ creed is as good as law - traditionally, London Lord Mayors forsook their former Guild allegiances to show their representation of all of London, and Crome’s refusal to do that caused a bit of a stir. The Engineers are also keen to arm their security teams with some form of energy pistols, despite guns being outlawed in London and the police are only allowed crossbows. Crome’s rationale is the same as every two-bit mad scientist villain, of course - that science should not be held back by moral restrictions, and that progress for progress’ sake is essential for London’s survival. Really, it’s the Engineer’s survival, as they’re rather loathe to share these advancements except to exert power on those around. London isn’t the only example of technology being used to leverage control and benefit the ruling classes. Grimsby is a sunken wreck of a city somewhere in the north Atlantic, yet due to a complex series of airlocks the interior of the city is a secret hideaway of the Lost Boys, a society of children stolen from aquatic towns and trained to be thieves under the watchful eye of the mysterious Uncle. They will then take submarine walkers, attach to passing towns, steal whatever tools, fuel, food and riches they can carry, and vanish back into the depths. Uncle, naturally, takes the lion’s share of the haul. But Uncle maintains his power by careful access to technology, only letting the Boys have what they need and juggling the power structure by choosing team leaders, and punishing insubordination harshly and publicly. Uncle sees and hears everything in Grimsby with his surveillance network, and can address any give Boy in a heartbeat, training the Boys to never expect privacy from him, so that when he demands a progress update from a mission, they never question him. He rewards Boys who do well on burglaries, but more importantly than that, he chooses team leaders according to apparently inscrutable whims. The Boys believe it’s a mark of favour from Uncle, and thus social status, to be trusted with the limpet command and all the tech that comes with. Really, Uncle carefully give command to people he can trust to remain loyal to him, even if that means passing over a more talented Boy who might get a bit uppity. Even in a more mundane way, higher status in the Lost Boys means you can move closer to the heart of Grimsby, where you’re less likely to wake up and find your bedroom wasn’t as watertight as you thought and flooded in the night. Uncle, naturally, doesn’t care if a few Boys drown, so long as he doesn’t lose anything useful. Technology, and in particular access to unusual technology, is the dimension on which power is really decided.

THE END OF AN ERA

We’ve already established that this world is not a sustainable one. There are only so many cities. The inherent entropy of Municipal Darwinism is really showing. Once upon a time, big cities could ‘reproduce’, creating little satellite towns that could grow and become independent - even London had some - but those are no more. In a greedy desperation to keep moving, the predators are not reproducing, and static settlements can’t spread and grow fast enough to count there. The attack of London, and MEDUSA, turned staunch opposition into outright war, with the Green Storm being willing to doublethink their way into using the weapons of the Traction Cities in their fight to stop the Traction Cities, even recruiting ex-London Engineers to make weapons and stalkers for them, and eventually even seeking out another ancient superweapon - an orbital laser called ODIN - without a hint of irony. The Green Storm eventually face internal resistance, from Anti-Tractionists who disagree with the outright terrorism angle, and eventually crumbles. The last great Traction Cities stop. The last mobile city is New London, no longer a hunter but a trade platform, and even that probably stopped hovering about at some point. The ending is told by the great survivor, Shrike, who has cheated Death again and again, who outlived Tom Natsworthy and Hester Shaw, Valentine, Magnus Crome, and a thousand other heroes and villains. When he awakes, long in the future, Traction Cities are not even ancient history. They’re a dream, a fantasy, too incredible to be true. But Shrike remembers, and he teaches people the story of London and Anchorage, Arkangel and Airhaven, Brighton and Harrowbarrow. Did they learn the right message from Shrike’s story? Did they learn that ruthless imperialism is like hunting faster than the food can come back, and that you will starve before you have everything you ever wanted? Did they learn that hoarding resources, gatekeeping knowledge, will lead to ruin? Did they learn, or will the repeat the same mistakes of the greed and gluttony of the Traction Era? Well, who knows.

[lifeisdabubbles-undersalmondean]

La Pomme ~ Chapter Eight

Pairing: Sam x OC (eventual Dean x OC and Dean x Castiel. And I mean eventual.)

Series summary: George is a casual French-Mistake-universe Supernatural fan living in no-COVID 2020, who's life is upended when she's suddenly launched between realities, two years into the boys' past (S13E22). What begins as an insane, immersive fan experience turns into more when Jack goes missing and George offers up her AU information to help track him down. Soon it's discovered that she and Sam may actually have history. But that's impossible, right?

Word Count: 3,900

Warnings: {smut, fluff, angst, show level violence, swearing, mentions of suicide} ***Detailed warnings will be tagged for specific chapters.

A/N: Following the events of my prequel Paradise and second story From My Eyes Off. Reading those first gives context but isn’t necessary to start this one.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Collapsing into one of the comfier library chairs set between some stacks, George took a sip of the small glass of whiskey she figured she'd earned. She'd just scolded a fucking demon from hell. What was she thinking?! It had been pretty cool, but pissing off an evil, powerful being was maybe not the smartest. She could have gotten herself killed!

It had been unavoidable though; upon realizing that Demon Tim must have been the reason they suspected her of being involved in Jack's disappearance, she had been furious. Not only was it not true, it was insulting, humiliating, and just plain rude. It was also simply a bad plan. So, she took it upon herself to enlighten him and to correct his offensive insinuations. Hopefully, it wouldn't come back to bite her in the ass.

Her focus shifted then to Jack. Reflecting over her time there, there were things she remembered having happened on the show. The refugees in the bunker, AU Michael attacking, Jack losing his powers, Lucifer dude being just a regular human dude now; all of it was familiar, even when it terrified her (see: AU Michael attack). But, when they told her Jack was missing, she was thrown off at first. It wasn't something she remembered seeing on the show. Then again, she'd only just finished binging from season 10 to the end of 13 a couple weeks ago and hadn't started 14 yet. So, maybe she was past the point of being able to tell when things were part of their prescribed timeline or not? Therefore, even if Jack had been kidnapped on the show, she wouldn't have any info for them, right?

The problem was, the more she thought about it the more she began to believe she had seen something about this storyline. Jack being missing, the three of them going to save him-

Was it Ryan telling you about some episode where they rescued Jack in the redwoods? They had filmed it on location at some tourist spot you went to as a kid all the time and she thought you'd think it was cool… where was that?

She couldn't remember, and it frustrated her. She was also worried that she was making this all up just to be helpful.

Taking another sip, she allowed her thoughts to wander between episode scenes like an internal microfiche as she tried to nail down her recollection, No, I can definitely picture all four of them in the woods and fighting. Someone had kidnapped Jack, wanting his powers for something… was it the angels?

"Well, that was interesting," Dean stated, startling her out of her thoughts. The three of them were walking into the library a surprisingly short while after she left them with Tim.

Looking up at them, she set the glass down on a nearby shelf and stood up. Dean didn't elaborate further while he poured his own glass. The expressions each one wore were indiscernible and she grew nervous.

"Oh?" George raised a brow and looked between them, "Did he talk? Because you know, I've actually been sitting here thinking about this whole situation and something about Jack going missing is very familiar. Now, unfortunately, I am a few seasons behind, and-""

Dean took a sip, looking at her with curious amusement, and interrupted, "I was talking about you."

George looked surprised and then grimaced, "No, no. I'm not interesting, not at all. I'm the exact opposite of interesting. I'm-I'm… I'm…"

"Uninteresting?" Castiel offered helpfully as she struggled to find the words. Sam and Dean rolled their eyes in unison.

"Right! Thank you, Castiel. I'm highly uninteresting." She gulped a bit and wrung her hands as the three of them kept watching her. In the silence, she nervously looked in Castiels direction and blurted quickly, "I'm also George! Hi! Really nice to meet you! Big fan!"

"Nice to meet you," Castiel smiled awkwardly and nodded a greeting, looking at the other two with a confused expression, "...fan of what?"

"Right, positively boring," Sam interjected sarcastically before he could stop himself. He definitely thought she was interesting. First she's just a beautiful woman, then she's a beautiful woman he may or may not have had a life altering dream about ten years ago, and now she was a beautiful woman from an alternate reality where his life was a prime time television show… who he may or may not have had a life altering dream about ten years ago. 'Uninteresting' was definitely not an adjective he'd use for her.

Dean snorted, "Yea, boring is the last word I would use to describe that scene earlier. You caused Tim to sing like a canary, by the way."

Her jaw dropped in disbelief, "Say what?"

"I almost say we hire her to be our monster torture hypeman," He joked, looking at Sam with a raised eyebrow.

Sam ignored him and addressed Geroge's question, "After you left, Tim-"

"Cleetus," Dean interjected sarcastically.

"Cleetus… well, he sort of... started crying? He said he'd tell us everything we wanted to know if we promised to keep you away from him." Sam looked strangely apologetic and she let a few nervous chuckles escape, unsure whether to believe what they were saying.

"We think you hurt his feelings," Castiel explained further. "Which fortunately seemed to motivate him to talk, so thank you."

"I guess his demon mommy didn't teach him about sticks and stones," Dean cracked, taking another swig.

"Huh. OK. Neat!" George didn't know what to say; she was confused and strangely proud of herself. But she didn't want them to think she wasn't chill, so she shrugged nonchalantly, "You're welcome, I guess. Anyway, as I was saying, I'm not caught up to the current season of my timeline but I think I remember this whole Jack-gone-missing thing a little bit. I want to say you all track him down somewhere in… Oregon? Washington? I'm getting a Northwest-ish feeling." She began unconsciously pacing around the room, gesturing energetically with her hands. "I can picture a battle taking place in the woods...Jack being in danger, you all being in danger, too...some fighting...maybe someone losing the fight? Or getting really hurt," She glanced worriedly at Castiel. He'd be the only actor they'd axe of the three of them, so it stood to reason he'd be the most likely to die if she was right.

Dean and Sam shared a look before Dean asked, "Fine, I'll bite. Do you know a city? A time-frame? Who we're fighting? Anything specific?"

George paused and then slumped a bit in defeat, "No. I've only really watched up through, like, literally now. Other than random things I've heard or seen in passing, I don't know anything that's happened since ya'll got back from the apocalypse world. Been purposefully trying to avoid spoilers, too, which is a decision I now regret, obviously."

"OK, well look, sweetheart, it's OK," Dean began, in an embarrassingly condescending, douchey tone, "We don't expect you to help us. I mean, we're grateful about the assist with Cleetus, obviously but this-" Dean vaguely motioned in her direction and she raised an offended eyebrow, "-was obviously just a weird magical mess that Rowena left for us to clean up yet again. So, you just sit back and relax, and once we find Jack we'll figure out how to get you back home in a jiff, OK?" He winked and finger gunned at her, adding, "Don't you worry your pretty little head about it." In his way, Dean was trying to convey to her a sense of ease and comfort that they would take care of things. But, unsurprisingly, he came off incredibly dismissive and patronizing. Her cheeks flushed an angry red; she'd had it up to here with him by now.

Sam and Castiel exchanged nervous glances at the look on her face and Sam tried to stop it before the inevitable happened, "Uh, Dean, mayb-"

Cutting him off, George slowly walked toward Dean, eyes blazing, "Listen sweet cheeks." She had a polite smile on her face as she tried her hardest to muster up the same condescending, silky, sweet Dean-tone, "I'm sympathetic to the fact that you can't help but be an insufferably arrogant ass most of the time-that's just how you were written," for a split second she saw Dean's cool-guy-smug-face falter and she relished it. She could tell she landed a blow, even if it was a small one, "but maybe you could do us all a favor and try to ignore your cro-magnon dated natural urges and attempt to be open minded for once in your life? Just try to consider the fact that, like it or not, I might not be a total useless red-shirt? That maybe I-once again the lone female in the entire world according to Supernatural-might actually be useful? Hmm? Might actually have useful-albeit vague-information for you? Or would taking your lead from a woman be too threatening to you overbearing, uber-macho, 'we-get-it-you're-totally-straight' masculinity?"

Dean's head jerked back in offense, "Now, wait a minute! What's that supposed to mean?"

"Don't worry your pretty little head about it," She mocked him in a deep, goofy tone, high-fiving herself internally. Nailed it! She'd always hated how damn smug his character was. Yes, fine, he was hot and charming and smart as fuck and right at least like 75% of the time, but he didn't have to be so fucking arrogant about it all the time. She preferred a man with some humility.

Sam was smirking at the look on Dean's face and muttered teasingly, "How does it feel, Cleetus?"

"Except, you actually don't." Cas interjected begrudgingly, as he thoroughly enjoyed watching Dean get verbally bitch-slapped. In fact, he could watch it all day, but they needed to focus on Jack.

"Scuse me?" She said, maintaining her sweet tone while staring daggers at Dean. "Don't what?"

"Have useful information for us," the angel said begrudgingly matter-of-fact.

"Er," Sam interjected seeing the look on her face, "Uh, well, it's just according to Tim-Cleetus-whatever, Jack is being held captive inside an old church in a small ghost town outside Butte."

Dean slapped his hands over his mouth in mock surprise and then, taking a few steps toward George, he mimed a balloon being popped by an impractically large needle. He had an impossibly large grin spread across his face.

"She still has a point, Dean," Sam sighed in an annoyed, if not slightly embarrassed, tone at his brother's display.

Cas nodded in agreement, "Yes, you were incredibly condescending and unfriendly in your attempt at being friendly earlier. Even though she's wrong about Jack, she's right about your inability to relinquish control-to anyone, though, not specifically women."

"You all suck." Dean said flatly.

George ignored him and shook her head. She was more and more sure about her information by the second; despite her doubts she could feel she was right. "Listen, I'm telling you, Jack is not in some bullshit church in Montana. He's…" She struggled to remember. "Erg, somewhere rainy and wooded!"

"Rainy and wooded, you say?" She cringed angrily at the sound of Dean's voice. "That's really great, very helpful. Say, maybe we should look up your little murder buddy-OwnsHisOwnAxe69, was it?-and ask if he's got Jack stashed in the Marin Headlands?" Dean's voice dripped with sarcasm.

George shook her head at him and closed her eyes tight in an effort to block out his negativity. Walking slowly away from him and into the map room, she started talking to herself, in a pointedly loud voice. Her focus bounced between episodes from the show and conversations with her friend, Ryan, a Supernatural Encyclopedia. She was hoping she could piece together something useful.

"OK, hang on, Jack is born, gets sucked into Apocalypse World, comes back, has his grace stolen but he's safely with you guys, he's happy, he's great-albeit, moody and not the best at video games. Then he disappears and you can't find him, yadda yadda."

While she rambled, her mind's eye began conjuring images of what she assumed were scenes from the episode she was trying to think of. While helpful, it was also disconcerting since she'd never actually seen it. She thought perhaps she'd seen clips on youtube while watching bloopers? She never could stay away from them, even if she hadn't seen the episode yet; they were just too funny. Maybe her overactive imagination was just creating scenes around what little knowledge she did have, "...and there's an epic-potentially deadly-fight scene at the end of one of the last episodes of the season. An episode that was, oh so noteworthily filmed on location iiiiinnn…" She tried to demand that her memories behave for her but it was challenging, considering she shouldn't have any memories of having watched the damn thing at all. "...where? Fuck me!" She snarled, chasing desperately after her murky visions as they swirled too abstractly for her to discern.

In a sudden moment of unusual clarity she could see the words displayed behind her eyelids. '...False Klamath? Where the fuck… why does that sound familiar? She flashed to the location in her memories and saw big wooden statues towering outside the scenic little tourist trap

Her eyes popped open with a gasp, "Johnny Appleseed!"

"Johnny Appleseed?" Dean teased, mock exasperatedly, "We're trying to find JACK."

"The Johnny Appleseed statue at The Trees of Enigma! Just outside False Klamath, Oregon!" She slammed both her hands down on the table in front of her in uncontrollably jubilant victory. "HA! Take THAT!" She jumped up excitedly and punched her fist in the air. "I did it! I remembered!"

"Sam, can you translate any of this?" Dean asked, annoyed.

"On the show," She started smugly, before Sam could say anything, "the battle that you two get into when you find Jack, takes place at a tourist spot called The Trees of Enigma. The episode was filmed on location at said tourist spot, in-say it with me now-False Klamath, Oregon. Oregon, Dean. A place that is known for being both rainy and wooded." Her finger was placed on the map table in the general area of Oregon, "that's where you'll find Jack. I'm sure of it." Her adrenaline was pumping and she was so stoked. It felt really good to be useful; like she was part of the show!

"Yea, that's great, sounds fun," Dean started dismissively, though toned down a bit, "but we're not risking Jack's life to follow your hunch."

"Excuse me. Why is my so-called hunch less believable than a demon's word? Especially a demon named Cleetus. Rude," George looked particularly offended now.

"Tim gave us real, solid intel and we've never had a problem when we've relied on our trusted resources in the past," He answered confidently. George's head jerked toward him like she hadn't heard correctly and she gave Sam and Castiel some crazy eyebrows.

"Sorry, you understand that I do watch the show, right?" She asked rhetorically, with a doubtful expression. When he rolled his eyes, she let out a frustrated huff. "Dean, think about this! He's a demon! He lies! Look, I know you have no reason in the world to trust me but you've got to; just think about it. Even IF it is demons that have Jack, don't you think it's possible that the prisoner demon you're threatening to torture might give you a false lead? Especially if he's naive enough to think he'll be able to escape and doesn't want to get in trouble with his bosses? C'mon, this is not-the-sharpest-tack-Tim we're talking about!"

Sam and Castiel had agreeably expressions but Dean's was stubbornly disagreeable, though she could tell he knew she was right. The thought of them going to Montana gave her a dreadful, suffocating feeling, like death.

So, she tried one more tactic and held her hands up in prayer, "Dean please, I don't know what and I don't know how I know, but I know in my gut that if you go to Montana, something terrible will happen. And Jack's not there, I promise you." She dropped all the bullshit and gave him her best seriously-just-listen-to-me face but Dean still wasn't budging.

"Christ, I knew you were stubborn but this is ridiculous, ugh. OK, fine!" She threw her hands up and turned on her heel, heading toward the dungeon.

"Wait, where are you going?" Sam asked quickly.

"Obviously I didn't hurt his feelings badly enough the first time, so I'm going to go have another chat with Cleetus and get him to admit that he's a liar, liar, pant-"

"Er-you... can't do that," Sam cut her off apologetically.

"Sam, he's handcuffed to a chair. I appreciate the concern but-"

"He means you really can't," Dean added. George looked toward him annoyed and Dean continued, "After he gave us everything we needed we pretty much, chk," he finished, slicing a finger across his throat in demonstration. When she looked like she wanted to strangle him, he shrugged and offered, "RIP Cleetus."

George rolled her eyes in exasperation, "But he was lying! Don't you confirm the information before you cut off the source?! Oh my god, why am I even asking? You're the Winchesters, of course you don't." The three of men looked between each other guiltily and she placed her hand on her hip, "What if that was just an act and Tim saw an opportunity. Feeding you some bullshit so that you couldn't actually find Jack? Or, maybe Tim has nothing to do with Jack at all, and sending you to Montana is just a good old fashioned ambush?!" She paused for a moment and gave a surprised, appreciative nod, "Hmm, maybe I underestimated ole' Cleetus a bit. Could have been smarter than I thought."

"She does have a point, Dean. The chances that he was lying are incredibly high," Cas conceded slightly, giving Dean a questioning look. "We have no proof that his lead is any better than hers. Demon's lie."

"Damnit, alright, fine," Dean said, sighing angrily. "Sam and I will go to Oregon to look for Jack; Cas, check out Butte-carefully, strictly recon, do not engage-and call us if you find any trace of him." He shot a quick warning look at George. "We'll turn around and come right to you. Sound like a plan? Great, let's go."

"Wait, no! Don't send him to Butte! Didn't you hear me? If it's an ambush, he'll get his ass kicked!"

"Hey." Cas looked hurt and George softened her face at him.

"Oh, I'm sorry Castiel. You're a total badass when the plot calls for it, otherwise, getting beat up is just kind of your MO." Ignoring the confused look on the angel's face, She turned back to Dean, "and besides you need Castiel in Oregon, Dean. I've seen it!"

"Oh? I thought you hadn't 'seen this episode yet'?" Dean said sarcastically.

"I-I… Well, OK, I haven't, but I've seen the three of you and Jack all together for this fight. Just trust me, you need him there. What if Jack is hurt when you find him? Cas can heal him, right?" She made a questioning face to Castiel; at the moment she couldn't remember the extent of his powers on the show and he was always losing one or another for whatever reason, anyway. But if she was right, she figured that even if Dean wouldn't trust her gut, he might trust that having a healing angel on their journey would be a benefit. "Is that a power you have? I feel like I've seen you do that."

"She's right, Dean. I can heal him if we find him injured," Cas offered her helpfully and she shot him a grateful expression, actually looking him in the eyes for the first time, albeit fleetingly.

"Have you seen Jack get hurt?" Sam asked her, trying to help, too. He remained a neutral party at this point, but if he was honest with himself, he believed her. Maybe a little too much, which is why he was trying to stay impartial. If he was being blinded by his confusing memories and the undeniable-yet-currently-being-denied feelings he was developing for her and ended up wrong, Jack could be killed.

"Uh… I mean, no… not definitively, but it's pretty standard for the show. You're all constantly getting hurt during fights and when it's close to a season finale the danger factor is skyhigh for anyone who isn't you two…" After motioning to the brothers, she trailed off, afraid that this reasoning was going to hurt her more than help her.

Sam gave her a long, contemplative look before finally offering, "I can have a small team go check out Butte. Maybe Garth can join? Last time I talked to him he was near there."

Dean's teeth and fists were clenched as he took a deep, exaggerated breath, "Fine. We'll send a group to Butte and call Garth from the road-No arguments!" He held up his hand to her as she opened her mouth to speak. "The three of us are going to Oregon, just as you demand, but I'm not leaving anything to chance on some alien's hunch. Garth can handle himself."

She made an indignant face at him-she wasn't an alien, she was from an alternate reality! Get it right. But, while she was afraid of someone getting hurt in the obvious trap that had been set for them in Montana, the thought of Garth going instead didn't give her the same full-body fear shudder. So, she figured she'd take what she could get and not push the issue further. Besides, she knew Dean wasn't going to be happy about her next move and she had to pick her battles.

[timeforelfnonsense]

Mistress Wit

Wyll x Criella

Rating: T 

Ao3

With Patch 3 out now, I decided to make another bg3 oc to romance Wyll! Dafni will still be the main character so to speak of my bg3 writing with Criella serving as a secondary protag & member of the party in Sunshine and Starlight. She and Wyll will also be getting their own little collection with Dafni & Astarion serving a similar role! However, as my writing is pretty ship centered you wouldn't really need to read one to enjoy the other!

                                                     Prologue

Criella brought her hands above her head, fists pounding against the transparent shield that kept her snuggly trapped in the mind flayer pod. If she could just find a weak spot…

Ah-ha!

It was faint but, Criella spotted a hairline fracture in the upper right portion of the glass. Perfect. Her tail dipped into the worn leather bag strapped to her thigh seeking her tinker’s tools. If she could just find her mallet she’d be able to shatter the glass and free herself from her confines. She reached for the top of her head, pulling her goggles over her eyes. With one precise strike, the mallet made contact with the pod’s lid. What had started as a single small fracture now spread across the whole surface in a spiderweb of spits and breaks. Carefully, her fingertips traced the somatic symbol needed to cast a gust cantrip.

“Ventus!” With the command spoken a small tempest broke free of her palms sending shards of glass flying across the clearing.

Her boots hit the ground with a soft thunk, the collateral of her escape crunching beneath her feet. She scanned her surroundings nose wrinkling with repugnance. This was definitely not Waterdeep. She’d crashlanded in some sort of hinterlands located god knows where. She brought her fingertips to her temples rubbing away the tension with little circles. She needed to locate civilization and quickly. It was only a matter of time before the dangerous effects of the tadpole squirming behind her eye would manifest.

She dug around her bag until her hand found its target. A spyglass forged of brass, runes of her creation glowing across the tarnished cylinder. Pushing her googles back up, she pressed the scope to her eye looking out into the forest. Her mind tingled, the Spyglass of Clairvoyance reveling a small settlement nestled in a nearby grove. It was no city of splendor but it was a lead. The only one she had anyway. Perhaps, whoever called the grove home would be able to point her towards the nearest healer if they didn’t have one of their own. Her body ached from the top of her horns to the tip of her tail. Even if they couldn’t see to the parasite they could ease the discomfort of being crammed into a pod had caused.

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Criella sat atop a traveler’s chest, her tail flicking idle from side to side. The groves healer had just set out alongside a mercenary band just recently. Meaning her only choice was to doodled among the druids until their Master Halsin returned. She let out a huff of air, blowing away a stray strand of straight, lilac hair from her eyes. If someone were asked to rattle off a list of locations they might find Criella Wit of Waterdeep, a druid’s grove would certainly not have been among them. She’d never been one for nature’s charms. Given the choice between a bustling market or a quiet glen, Criella would have picked the crowded walkways and noisy rabble of the city to the glen every time. At least she was among kin. All around her other Tieflings mulled about weary faced as they set to packing up what little they had. Criella’s gloved fingertips tapped out an anxious rhythm on the side of the chest. Criella knew better than most that right and wrong could be terms with objective definitions. But turning out helpless refugees and children? That was wrong by every definition. She had sat in Zevlor’s quarters discussing the events that lead his people to take refuge among The Oak Father’s servants. They had come from Eturel originally- Collateral damage in the wake of post-Decent xenophobia. People who had once been treasured friends and neighbors became easy scapegoats for the suffering Elturel’s people experienced in the hells. Her grip on the chest tightened. Were it not for the black leather gloves her pointed fingernails would certainly have left a mark on its suede surface. Well, if the druids weren’t going to help she would. She pulled out a well-weathered note pad and nub of charcoal. She could adapt her design for the Protector canon with relative ease. She’d have to find a way to streamline and simplify it given her the groves appalling lack of anything metal. What she wouldn’t do for steel and iron! Perhaps their smith would have some to spare though she doubted it by the state of his forge. “What are you drawing?” a tiny sing-song voice asked. Criella glanced up from her work. A little tiefling girl of no more than 10, was staring owlishly over the edge of her notebook. Criella’s lips quirked, tuning the book so the girl could get a better look at her scribblings. “It’s a diagram of an Eldritch Canon. I’ve made hundreds of the things but today I’m working on one just for you and your friends. To keep you safe.” She explained, tapping the tip of her finger to the sketch, “It’s sort of a… a mechanical cleric! If anyone gets hurt on the road it might be able to help.” “You can make that?” The child whisperer reverently. “I can make anything.” Criella winked, “Just give time and the right tools.” “Could you teach me?” She asked, her lower lip quivering ever so slightly, “I want to be able to make anything! I want to help! I’m not good at fighting or sneaking like the others maybe I’m good at making things!” Criella let out a chime of warm laughter. The little girl’s eyes were full of wonder and optimism despite all she and her kin had endured recently. She’d too had been more interested in tomes and tinkering as a girl. While her peers were swinging sticks and imagining themselves as knights and guardsmen, little Ella would climb the tallest tree in the yard and name it Blackstaff Tower. “Well I can’t teach you how to make everything in just one day but, I can show you a few things.” Criella brought her hand to her lips, sharp teeth tugging the grove from her left hand. With a heartfelt smile she extended her hand to her would-be apprentice, “They call me Misstress Wit of Waterdeep but since we are friends, you can call me Criella.”

Wyll walked the length of the makeshift training ground. Adjusting postures and offering up every word of tender engorgement he knew. The tiefling children had been ecstatic to meet a ‘real-life hero’, bombarding him with sweet, curious questions the moment he stepped through the gate. After such a warm welcome teaching a few sparing lessons while he waited for Halsin to return, was the least he could do. These children had already witnessed more than many noble old men would in their whole lives. They should have been chasing frogs, enjoying their childhoods without fear. Not training for battles they couldn’t win. Despite the cheerless nature of his thoughts, Wyll put on his warmest, bordering on a fatherly grin. “Not bad! Not bad! Now, remember not to keep yourself so open.” He instructed demonstrating his instruction for a little boy with rusty hair, “Like this.” “Keep it up little one. You’ll be a fine warrior one day!” A lovely voice called. The gentle, golden timbre belonged to a statuesque tiefling woman. Wyll’s heart sputtered a bit when her soft silver eyes fell across his face. A dazzling smile on her rose-petal pink lips. Walking beside her was a child- Nalia, the little girl with a missing horn. He’d invited her to spar but she’d only blushed and ran off. “Wyll! I look at what I made!” Nalia shouted dragging the pretty-pink woman along behind her. When she reached the ring she pulled free a small metal gadget no bigger than her palm. The steal contraption glowed with a soft purple light. It’s slivery surface marked with an inscription: Be Brave, scrawled in infernal. “Aren’t you clever!” He said crouching down to admire her handiwork, “What is it?” “It’s an eldritch canon!” She rolled her eyes as if it were the most obvious thing in the world The woman stifled a giggle, covering her grin with the back of her gloved hand. “Is that safe?” He asked cocking an eyebrow at the smirking beauty. “Yes! think of it as a mechanical cleric, Wyll!” Nalia said winking at her companion, “I’m going to be an artificer just like Mistress Wit!” “That’s right!” Wit nodded, “I think you’ve done enough work for today apprentice. Go on, take the rest of the day off...” As Wit trailed off a strange feeling began to unwind in Wyll's mind. The sights and smells of an unfamiliar harbor city danced across his senses. He could almost feel the sea breeze on his face. He saw a workshop so organized and meticulous it reminded him of his time with The Fist. He felt the uneven surface of cobbles stone under his feet as he tore after a thief, tears stinging at his eyes as the hooded figure mad off with the last project he and a half-drow woman had planned before she left. Lastly the memory of being confined to a pod and dragged to the hells. Wit blinked back at him dazed. Her slender nose wrinkled, her lips turned down in a worried grimace. “We should talk.”

Criella sat across from the Wyll at a shabby picnic table, poking at her gruel with a wooden spoon. The old woman had called it vegetable soup but remind her too much of the oil she used for in some of her machines to be palpable. “Not much for stew eh?” He teased taking a long sip of his bowl, “You haven’t spent much time in the wilds, have you?” “I am I that obvious?” she giggled, “I’m from Waterdeep- I’ve lived there all my life. Not much work out here in the woods for someone in my line of work.” Wyll tilted his head, bringing his chin to rest along the top of his knuckles, “Oh? And what is your line of work Wit?” He hadn’t heard of her? How strange. She was something of an arcane darling back home. If you asked someone where to inspired spellwork or magical mending. If they had any sense they would give you one answer: Wit and Wander. Well- Just Wit since Zoria had left for Neverwinter with her new wife…. “I’m many things; wizard, artificer, genius. Take your pick.” Wyll chuckled raising his tankard in approval of her assuredness, “Impressive.” “And what about you Wyll?” She said playfully, “Let me guess? You are a soldier. Mercenary? No, you are too upstanding to be a sellsword.” “They call me the Blade of the Frontiers.” He stated with a proud nod before continuing “Monster hunter. Hero. Protector of the common folk.” “The Blade of Frontiers? Now that’s a name!” She whistled, “And I thought Misstess Wit was a clever epithet! Now tell me Blade- How did you find yourself aboard the nautiloid?” Before he could respond the sound of a war horn rang out across the grove. Zevlor sprinting past them as shouting about a goblin siege at the front gate. Both adventures sprung to their feet as panic spread among the refugees. “Alright Blade.” Criella purred pulling her storm canon from the holster at her hip, “Let see if you live up to the legend.”

[introvertguide]

Casablanca (1942); AFI #3

I am very proud to present the next film on the AFI list, Casablanca (1942). It is truly one of the best examples of fine film from Hollywood's Golden Age. I was surprised to find out that the film only received 3 Oscars and none for the acting. Lead actress Ingrid Bergman was actually nominated for another film that she had made that year (For Whom the Bell Tolls), but it is was highway robbery to think that Humphrey Bogart did not get a Best Actor award for this film. On the bright side, the 3 Oscars were for Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Screenplay. But maybe it really isn’t a good idea to try and compare older films, but instead recognize a masterpiece for what it is. I would love to continue complimenting the movie, but first let me relay the story to you. Oh yeah. One other thing as well:

MAJOR SPOILER ALERT!!! WE GOT ONE OF THE GREATEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME HERE!!! GO AND WATCH IT!!! DON’T LET ME SPOIL IT FOR YOU!!! SERIOUSLY!!!

The film starts out with stock footage and a map showing the plight of many Europeans and how they were being herded to Casablanca and looking for a way out to Lisbon and eventually to America. It is December 1941 and it is the height of the exodus in an attempt to escape Nazi invasion of France and any French colonies. In Casablanca, Morocco, there is an expatriate American that owns a bar in the city that serves both refugees and locals, French and German soldiers. Rick Blaine (Humphrey Bogart) is the American and he is known for taking no sides and only looking out for his own best interest.

It is stated on the radio that two German couriers have been killed for their letters of transit and that people in Casablanca will pay top dollar (and by that I mean anything and everything) to get those papers so that they can leave the country. A conniving thief named Ugarte (played by the great Peter Lorre) entrusts Rick to hold on to the letters. Rick allows the local corrupt police captain Louis Renault (Claude Rains) to arrest the thief and Ugarte dies in jail before revealing who has the papers. Things are getting a little hot and Rick is considering leaving the country so he is very happy to have the letters. It would take a lot for him to even consider selling the letters...that is until...

The reason that Rick is so cold and cynical walks in the door and asks the piano player to play “As Time Goes By” and it becomes apparent that this women has hurt Rick and is his kryptonite. A flashback shows that the two had met and fallen in love in Paris. When the city was raided and Rick and Ilsa were supposed to leave together on a train, he only found a letter that said she could never see him again. Even worse, it turns out that the woman, Ilsa Lund (Ingrid Bergman), is with her husband, the notorious Czech Resistance leader Victor Laszlo (Paul Henreid) who is attempting to escape to Lisbon. A German major name Strasser has also arrived in Casablanca to make sure that Laszlo does not leave and ideally can be arrested or killed without making him into a martyr. 

To really exemplify how bad the situation has gotten, a couple of very short side stories show a young wife that is willing to sleep with the French captain in order to get a plane ticket for herself and her husband. At the bar, a proud French woman is drinking with a German soldier because she feels that some promiscuities might keep her safe and even get her out of Africa. Rick allows the young husband to cheat at roulette so that the wife can keep her honor and the two will have enough money to purchase a passport. Famously, the German that the promiscuous French woman is drinking with starts singing Die Wacht am Rhein and Laszlo asks the band to play La Marseillaise to drown out the German singing. Rick gives the OK, and the band plays the French nationalist song and causes a patriotic fervor, including the French woman who leaves her German partner and sings along with tears in her eyes. The German captain does not like this and tells Renault to close down the club, which he does.

Ilsa and Laszlo hear that Rick has the letters and she goes to try and get them. Rick does not want to give them up and she actually threatens to shoot him. She cannot follow through and she admits that she is still in love with Rick. It turns out that she was married before she met Rick and was under the impression that Laszlo had been killed when she was with Rick in Paris. She suddenly disappeared because she found out that he husband was alive and telling anyone where she was going would be a risk to both her and Rick. The bar owner finally melts off that icy crust. He is willing to give a letter to Laszlo and have Ilsa stay. However, Laszlo has been at a meeting that was broken up and he wants Rick to go with Ilsa to Lisbon to make sure she is safe.

Renault tries to arrest Laszlo on some fake charge that will only hold him the night, but Rick promises to set him up for a more serious crime. Rick pretends to turn on Laszlo, but he actually has used the time to arrange for Laszlo to leave on a plane that night. The German commander is informed and races over to the airport to stop everything and Renault is being held at gunpoint by Rick until Ilsa and Laszlo can leave. A final showdown occurs at the airport hanger where Rick is holding the two officers at bay while Laszlo and Ilsa leave. She is hesitant and that is when we get the famous “maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow” speech. It is beautiful and poignant, making for maybe the best couple of sentences of dialogue in American cinema. Strasser tries to warn the tower but Rick shoots and kills him. The French Captain tells his men to round up the usual subjects, not revealing who actually killed the German officer. Rick and the French captain walk away discussing what they will do next, ending the film with the famous line, “Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”

I am so happy to have watched this film again because it puts me in a great mood every time that I see it. Not surprisingly, the AFI has a strong affinity for this film and gave it accolades whenever possible. The film was #37 on the top 100 thrills, #1 on the top 100 passions, #4 greatest film hero for Rick Blaine, #2 song for “As Time Goes By,” 6 different lines on the top 100 movie quotes, and #32 on the top 100 cheer films. I have to be a little careful when I watch this films because it has a carryover effect and can make the films I see immediately before and after seem like garbage. Speaking of which...

I was surprised watching All the President’s Men with how close to the actual event that the movie was produced, yet Casablanca did it even closer in time and did a much better job. There are stories of soldiers that joined the military after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and saw the film before leaving to take part in Project Torch, which was the Allied mission to retake North Africa including Casablanca. The IMDB trivia mentions that some of the actors that played the extra Nazi officers were German Jews that escaped to America. The actress that played the French woman who was cavorting with the German officers is shown crying during the famous French National Anthem scene...that wasn’t scripted. She was a French citizen who had family fighting against the Germans back home and she was upset. The German singing was supposed to be a Nazi rally song, but the film producers could not acquire the rights without having to deal directly with Nazi representatives and possibly pay royalties to the group. That sure as hell wasn’t happening so they picked a royalty free German song.

There were a lot of Americans in the US at the time that did not think that the Nazis were all that bad and were more focused on the clear and present danger of Japan. There were many people that were confused why the US was fighting in Africa when Pearl Harbor was attacked by Japan. At some level, this film served as a form of propaganda to help drum up support for the war in Europe and Africa. It worked well. The beginning intro to the film that explained the volatile situation in North Africa was news to many moviegoers at the time (it kind of was for me as well). 

I have spent the week praising this film, but I do have to point out a couple of egregious flaws with the special effects. There is a scene of Rick and Ilsa back in Paris and, since the country was occupied, there was no way lo film on location or even get any up-to-date establishing shots. Therefore, all they had was old background roll for driving and at a café, so that is what they two characters did in France: took a terrible looking car ride and sat at a café. It looks pretty terrible, but luckily it does not last and accounts for a very short portion of the film. They also couldn’t get permission to fly planes so low over Hollywood lots so they just paper used cutouts layered over the film to show the planes taking off and landing at the airstrip in Casablanca. It is blatant, but the movie is so old and is otherwise so perfect that it is more charming to me than anything else. 

So does this movie belong on the AFI top 100 as #3? Sure does. This is one of the quintessential American movies that should be seen. There was some discussion amongst my group of whether the film was too high because of films like Gone With the Wind and The Wizard of Oz being lower, but there was no argument that it is Top 5 as far as greatest American films. Do I recommend it? Of course! It is a time capsule of the 40s, it is an excellent story, it has quotes that are excepted as part of American English vernacular, and it stars two of the biggest actors in all of Hollywood cinema history. Please go and watch it. And tell me what you thought, because I have not had anybody who was sorry that they took the time for a viewing. You will thank me later.

[knoughtwright]

Tatterdemalion Ch. 6: Hyacinth and Sorrel

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Though Amaranth had been born within Anpiel’s wheel, her mother Hyacinth and her father Sorrel were both immigrants. They had been priests, speakers to the dead, in a city where such heresies had been permitted. Their city, Hornblende, jealously guarded the souls of its dead, angering the angelic psychopomps which desired to take them to judgment. Hornblende warred against the angels for years but eventually succumbed. The chorus of its dead was broken, the spirits sorted and taken away to the nearest heaven or hell according to the angels’ determination, and the priesthood made to join them by the traditional method of a knife to the throat and a pyre. Hyacinth and Sorrel escaped but were forced to leave behind everything they owned and everyone they knew.

Anpiel had taken them in gladly. It did not oppose the angels of judgment but nor did it feel any camaraderie with them. It cared about its birds and only its birds. If someone could help it further its own part of the divine plan, it didn’t matter at all if they had acted in violation of some other part. The former priests, tired and hungry and on the run, were for their part more than willing to take on a new vocation.

My most vivid memories of Sorrel are as a storyteller. He would sit the children around him after our evening meal and tell us about Hornblende, about his travels before reaching our home, about the things he had seen while scavenging for Anpiel, about things he had entirely fabricated. He never equivocated, he never tried to conceal which stories were fiction and which were fact, but he told them in exactly the same way and it was a long time before I learned how to tell the difference. Sumac was more interested in the fictions and Amaranth only ever wanted to hear the truths, but I loved both the same. I loved watching the way his hands gesticulated as if sculpting the scene out of invisible clay, I loved the emotions expressed in his face and voice, I loved the vivid descriptions that made it feel like you had seen and heard and tasted everything in the story yourself.

All my early memories of Hyacinth are of her being unhappy. My mother told me that the loss of her home had broken something in Hyacinth which had never really healed. She was far from totally dysfunctional; she raised three children while surviving the dangerous conditions of working for Anpiel, which is a feat many healthy people would have struggled with. But often things I and others said would make her snap at us or start crying and I couldn’t understand why. Sometimes she’d lose her focus in the middle of a task or conversation. Amaranth told me she would frequently wake up crying and occasionally screaming. When she was out scavenging, the other adults said, she was reckless and showed little concern for her safety. She frequently came back with injuries.

I think she was as surprised as anyone else when it was Sorrel, and not her, who died on a scavenging expedition. He ran afoul of the weaver which had spared my mother and me, whose territory had crept significantly closer to Anpiel in the intervening years. His scavenging party had, like us, gotten lost in the fog of the weaver’s maze, but apparently the weaver was less inclined to show mercy to a group of three armed adults than to one tired and underequipped refugee and her three-year-old daughter. The rest of the party made it out alive; Sorrel did not.

When they returned without Sorrel, Hyacinth left to retrieve him within the hour. She went unarmed: The weaver was by far the greatest danger she would face in this task, she had no hope of actually defending herself from it if it came down to that, and not antagonizing it seemed like a much higher priority, especially given the mercy it had shown my mother and me. She took an offering: An insectile outsider which had crept in through a crack in the world, the length of her forearm, which she had killed a year previously but which hadn’t decomposed a bit since then. The thing was useless to Anpiel but could be quite useful to a weaver. The offering wasn’t a particularly effective bargaining chip, as there was nothing preventing the weaver from killing Hyacinth and taking the outsider’s corpse anyway, but at least it could serve as a show of good faith.

She returned a day and a half later, Sorrel’s spirit following behind her. Her plan had worked: She had gone into the weaver’s territory, presented it with the outsider’s corpse, and been permitted to retrieve her husband’s soul and leave unharmed. But on their return, Anpiel’s wall wouldn’t open to let them in.

Sorrel was almost certainly damned for his work as a heretical priest. If left outside, sooner or later he would be found by a psychopomp and taken to a hell, and Hyacinth was unwilling to allow her husband to meet such a fate. Anpiel, for its part, didn’t want to antagonize the angels of judgment by harboring a damned soul. The risk wasn’t really that great: It was unlikely that the angels of judgment would even become aware of Sorrel, and if they did Anpiel could fend off anything short of a small army, and they wouldn’t send an army for one soul. And even if it did come to that, Anpiel could always surrender the soul if necessary. But it was more of a risk than it wanted to take.

Hyacinth camped outside the wall for another two days. She made it clear to the angel that she wasn’t going to abandon her husband. If Sorrel was not permitted to enter, then Hyacinth would leave with him and try to find refuge elsewhere, and Anpiel would lose her as a worker. Eventually the angel caved, apparently deciding that the risk was a smaller cost than losing another pair of hands. The wall opened and the pair entered.

Sorrel was the first dead spirit I had seen. At a glance, he looked as he had in life, but closer attention made it quickly apparent that his image wasn’t consistent with a three-dimensional body taking up a specific location in space. My depth perception failed looking at him, making him appear to be a very large object very far away, even looking further away than objects which were clearly behind him. His appearance didn’t change in quite the right way when I moved to see him from a different angle. When I tried to touch him he seemed to recede away from me without moving, somehow remaining behind my hand even when my hand was right where I had been sure he was.

His interactions with me and the others became more limited. He could speak, but only things he had said before. He could carry out apparently normal social interactions, but only if they hewed closely to a script he had used in life, and the moment a conversation included anything novel, he either lost interest or his responses stopped making sense. He was utterly passive, allowing Hyacinth to lead him around everywhere.

Hyacinth explained the minds of the dead by comparison to dreams and memories. Their experience of the world was like a dreamer’s experience of their dream, in that they still felt and saw things and responded to them but all of it just... happened, without them having any kind of choice or control. They didn’t remember the past the way the living did; it would be more accurate to say that they were memories of the past. A living person could not interact with anything without being changed by it; a dead person no longer changed but was the crystallization of everything they experienced in life.

Sorrel still told us stories, but they were, word for word, the same stories he had told us before he died. There was no novelty and no variation and he couldn’t answer questions that would take him off his previously established track. After a little while Hyacinth tried to fill in for him and tell stories herself. She threw herself at the task with more passion than I’d ever seen from her, but she wasn’t very good at it. She couldn’t tell the story with much expressiveness and she didn’t know how to set a scene with her words, and her attempts always ended up feeling more like dry lists of facts than stories.

Then one night she and Sorrel sat together and she told us “Listen to what I say but how he says it.” They told us a story together, alternating sentences. Hyacinth would give an unembellished statement of what had happened, and then Sorrel would follow it up with a sentence from some other story, nonsensical on the face of it but capturing the feeling of the ongoing narrative better than Hyacinth could. At first I would try to tune out Sorrel’s words entirely, and just pay attention to his tone and gestures. But after a while I realized that his words fit the story too. Not literally, of course; they were about different events in different places. But they told you what it would feel like to be there, even if all of the details were wrong. Hyacinth and Sorrel continued telling stories this way the whole time we lived within Anpiel. Their stories had a beauty which even Sorrel’s stories in life had lacked, and even most of the adults ended up gathering around most nights to experience the new art form which the couple had created.

[thesilverdragoon]

Fae-cursed

Previous: Wicked White

Next: Tomorrow

The first color to fade back in was the color blue.

A peaceful, dark blue at that, with veining branches of lighter colors crawling up the walls between brass and gold trim that bordered the walls similar to windows.

And a humming sound.

A low, faint thrum.

Vesevont scrunched his nose up as he inevitably came to, sitting up slowly as he did so. His head hung forward as he waited for everything to stop wobbling back and forth. It did. He looked up and around at the strange circular room he was in.

“I see you’ve finally come back to us.” His ear twitched as a voice emerged from his peripheral. “A good thing, I didn’t know if you would make it through or not.”

The speaker was an odd looking fellow. And a very short one.

He wore dark robes, with a large cowl with ornate golden trim mysteriously draped over the upper portion of his face, along with a red and white sash each criss-crossed over his chest, all similarly colored and decorated as the room had been.

One arm bared the resemblance and same color of aetheryte, while the other seemed quite ordinary. The same crystalline features carried upwards towards the stranger’s neck, creeping ever closer towards his obscured face.

“How do you feel?” He asked.

The Ishgardian swallowed, his throat feeling dry and raw. “...Bad,” He croaked.

The man seemed rather unsurprised. “I see. The physical symptoms will most likely disappear as the day wears on.

You likely have many questions.” He continued, watching Vesevont closely as he patted around himself cautiously (though at this stage, one would have described it as ‘drunkenly’) as though he were looking for something. “But, should you require more rest then by all means, please, you are free to take all the time you need here-” “Here- here...where is here?” The elezen asked.

The robed man gazed at him for quite a long moment.

“Another world entire, my friend.” He answered slowly and quietly. Almost delicately.

“What?” Now Ves was sure he hadn’t heard him right. He thought he’d said another- “Wait- what do you mean??”

“There is quite a lot to explain, and I do not wish to exhaust  or stress you further, and needlessly.”

“Never mind me- tell me, please-” The knight begged.

The man paused, before nodding. “...Very well.

This place you have been brought to is called the Crystal Tower. An ancient Allagan device capable of quite much.”

Allagans?? It wasn’t a word Ves ever expected to hear. He knew nothing about the ancient empire that had once ruled Eorzea in the days of old, save for a few random tidbits often told by strangers headed to even stranger places.

“Around it lies a city of refugees from all parts of the world. A city that came to be known as the Crystarium.

Only, not from a world you might recall, meaning, our world.”

“Our world?”

“Indeed.” The robed man nodded. “Though this world bears resemblance to our own in some ways, it is not ours. This is the star known as the First, one of thirteen others, barring the one are hail from: the Source.”

Already Ves could feel his head pounding.

The Source… thirteen worlds-

Malarchy. Completely and utterly.

Yet with all that had been going on lately anyway… Who was he to say otherwise?

He decided to entertain it, for now.

“How did I...” Ves gulped audibly. “Get here then?”

“That, is what I am trying to figure out. There are hardly any beings that I could describe capable of breaking such barriers between worlds to begin with. And you don’t seem like any of the ones I am aware of.

Which… brings me to mention that I have several questions of my own. If you are willing.”

Ves’ gaze wavered as he looked away, only to notice a black and smokey figure standing nearby, staring at him.

He didn’t recognize it, and just the sight alone made the hairs on the back of his neck, and everywhere else, stand on end.

The man glanced over towards where he was looking at, frowning slightly. “...That was one of them, yes.”

“Y-you see it?”

“Yes.

Before I get too far ahead of myself, what might I call you, friend?”

Ves’ eyes darted back and forth between the two as he tried to focus on the prior. “V-...Vesevont,” He answered, unsure if even that much was still true.

“Vesevont.” The stranger nodded. “Many of the Crystarium over the years have oft referred to me as the Crystal Exarch, though, for our purposes, you may refer to me simply as the Exarch to save ourselves a breath.” He smiled towards the end.

“Exarch,”  Ves repeated. How strange.

This man reminded him so much of the miqo’te that had been traveling with them before-

The elezen’s breath hitched. “I was traveling- with a few companions- we were headed into the Twelveswood to do a job and we had run into a monster-”

“A monster?” “A black wyrm- with a large eye on top of its flat head, and many other smaller eyes along its body, and a long mouth like a river crocodile-”

The Exarch listened to him describe the strange creature, never uttering a word, much less a ‘hmm’ of thought of affirmation.

The trip to the Twelveswood to recover DeFleur’s papers.

The disaster it ended up being as the Garlean that hosted the strange eyeball-worm caught on and attacked them.

“I have not heard nor seen any animal or thing like this I’m afraid. I could not tell you what you saw.”

Ves’ expression fell.

He had to tell him about Puffy. None of it would make sense otherwise.

“...I… I have a companion with me- we- I had always thought maybe- maybe it was a voidsent but… now I’m not so sure,”

“The one with us currently I assume?”

“Y...Yes.”

The solid black shadow-figure (for lack of a better name. Maybe it was Puffy, maybe it wasn’t) paced back and forth behind the Exarch, almost as if entertained by their conversation. Or impatient about it.

“Tis no voidsent. I’ve had more than my fair share of run ins with them.

While appearing malevolent, I strangely feel as though it isn’t. And thus far, I have been correct, thankfully.” The Exarch turned to look back at the dark being. “Likewise, you, Vesevont, are quite peculiar as well.

You ran into a trusted and loyal friend of mine out on the road. She recounted to me the events that had occurred mere moments before I had arrived.”

Friend?

Immediately Ves saw the girl in his mind’s eye. The viera with the blue hair.

“I had sensed your arrival to the First initially, and it was only through various methods of scrying (in order to explain it simply) that I was able to even locate you. And even then, it was not you I had located.” The Exarch gestured towards the shadow. “Twas your… companion, here.

But please, continue. Tell me about your arrival, and what happened afterwards.”

Vesevont continued, describing his horrifying experience in the land of Il Mheg, as the Exarch soon explained to him the existence of pixies and their mischievous natures.

And then the trip down the road, where the sky overhead felt hotter than it should have been, and how Puffy had kept saying that it felt bad- and how he too felt horrendous the longer he remained out there.

And the white creatures… The terrible beasts…

“Sin eaters.” The Exarch named them. “Creatures that have been consumed by the overabundance of light aether. Animals, people, any living being with aether at its core. They’ve been corrupted into the twisted pale forms you witnessed outside of the city, and they search endlessly for others to corrupt, and feed off of.”

“Where did they come from?”

“A product of the Flood of Light. The calamity that befell this world nearly a century ago. Heroes in the name of Hydaleyn performing her deeds to the point where this world’s balance had tipped so far into the Light, that it had ultimately consumed it. Such a thing occurred on the world the voidsent hail from, only in the completely opposite way. You could say the sin eaters are quite similar to them in some ways.

Both parties seek aether to take into themselves.

But ah- forgive me. You were saying?”

“...Oh uh- yes…”

Vesevont continued, describing the appearance of the white maiden in heavy armor, with her weapons in hand, wings beating and staring down towards him, but never at him. “It was as though she...wasn’t able to see me. That or she was ignoring me entirely. It was so strange...”

And only when Puffy had emerged, did she react. And run him through.

“Everything turned white then- I couldn’t see- couldn’t hear either. And it felt like everything was burning. Almost like sticking your hand in an oven full of coals, only, it felt like that all over…”

Had he been in the process of turning into one of those marble beasts? What would have happened then? Would he even have remembered it? Would everything have gone??

“And then suddenly, everything turned black instead-”

Everything had gone dark. As though he’d fallen into the abyss. The abyss he’d seen many times in his dreams, where the shadow being he could only assume was Puffy had dwelled, deep within the confines of his psyche.

The experience had not been relatively peaceful like those times however.

The light hurt, the darkness hurt- everything translated to pain. Just different kinds. Whereas the white felt like fire, the black felt as though he were being torn apart.

And as soon as it had come, it had all come to an abrupt end.

Only for him to wake up here, in this Crystal Tower.

“I must tell you Vesevont that you are no ordinary…” The Exarch paused, wondering how to word what it was he wanted to say. “...That is, your aether, or lack of, is not ordinary by any means.”

The elezen cleared his throat a little, slouching just a little more. “So I’ve been told. When I had first met with...him,” He looked towards the pacing shadow figure. “And we had joined,” He mashed his hands together to illustrate. “A, er, well studied friend of mine had remarked that indeed, somehow I had been surviving without any aether at all. I’m not entirely sure what it means- but he told to me that every living thing has it inside them- like… a life force.

And to be without one- shouldn’t be possible normally.”

The bouts of exhaustion whenever he and Puffy were separated came to the forefront of his mind then.

“Your friend is correct. It is because of this that many are able to channel their aether into spells and the like in the first place. Save for pureblooded Garleans, as you are well aware. But you are no Garlean, clearly.

This being you speak of. Somehow it regulates your intake and output of aether, so that you remain in a stable state. This would explain why you experience debilitating symptoms when you are separated, so I assume.

When you were struck by the sin eater’s blade, had it not been for this system so to speak, then I’ve no doubt you would have turned. And there would have been nothing anyone could have done at that moment to aid you.”

He could have died.

Death was nothing knew to Vesevont. Not in the least.

But dying like that?

It made him nauseous, thinking about it.

“It was then, while you were ‘seeing white’, as you so described, that your vision turned to show you ‘black’ instead, correct? Which, is about the time that I was told that your body gained the likeness of our friend back there.”

“H...Had I?” Ves’ ears perked up.

“Yes.”

And thus the Exarch explained how he had turned into the shadow being, attacking the sin eater without hesitation, without any sort of mercy, inevitably skewering it in the same fashion it had attacked him, only with ink-like tendrils that had once been arms.

“Bear in mind these are all working theories I have been meditating on myself for the last several days now-” “Several days?!” Ves interrupted, looking around in a panic. “Yes- please! Be calm- you are safe here, and well. Or at least better than you were when you arrived.” The Exarch held his hands up to steady him. “But, as I was saying-

I theorize the sin eater’s attack overloaded your system, and that your companion used the enormous surge of aether in order to initiate the transformation to begin with, as, altering the physical body of anything takes quite a fair amount of energy to begin with, should it not prove impossible.”

Everything was starting to spin in the Ishgardian’s head.

Inevitably it manifested as a throbbing migraine. Ves let his head fall into his hands briefly as he sat there at the edge of the cot he’d woken up in. “What’s happening to me...”

The Exarch pursed his lips for a moment, before reaching out and putting a hand gently onto the elezen’s shoulder. “Forgive me, I did warn that it would be much. Did I not?” He said, with a light note of sympathetic humor in his voice. “...Nevertheless… You would have had to have been told eventually.

Let us come back to this again later, shall we? After you’ve recovered from this ordeal a bit more.”

Ves would have argued against it, were it not for the sheer amount of overwhelming everything he felt at that moment.

How would he get home?? Could he go back home? While those two questions were the most important ones he had had, he was sure he had about a hundred more buzzing around in his brain somewhere.

“Thank you, for having me brought here, and not left out there,” Still, he could thank the Exarch for that much. Living was much better than dying. Even if it was quite troublesome.

“I will deliver your thanks to Lyna, as she is the one who did most of the work in having you brought here.” The Exarch held a brighter smile then. “I will let you rest now.”

“Ah-” Ves raised a hand as the Exarch turned away. For a quick moment he glanced off to the side.

The shadow figure was gone.

“I uh… should I need to… have a walk around- am I free to leave?” As if he knew where the exit to the tower even was to begin with.

“You may. I will not keep you here like some prisoner.” The Exarch answered. “Though, with what the soldiers witnessed out on the road, I fear we need to come up with some sort of reasoning as to why you transformed into this terrifying shadow-creature that no one here has ever laid their eyes upon, that is capable of killing powerful sin eaters at that.”

The Ishgardian winced.

This man surely reminded him of the other hooded miqo’te in more ways than one.

“Seeing that you had stumbled out of Il Mheg, we could easily call it a curse, bestowed upon you by the fae.

A much more believable and easy-to-swallow account to the residents here, I wager.”

Fae-cursed?

Even Ves had heard stories of pixies and other dastardly creatures invoking curses on impolite or unlucky individuals. Though, they were usually tall-tales the elders would tell the children in order to get them to behave.

Still, it sounded better than saying he had a worm inside of him.

...Even thinking that sounded terrible.

“I take my leave, Vesevont. Thank you for sharing with me. Hopefully I was able to help you find answers, or at least begin to. If you’re in need of any assistance, please, let me know.”

The door creaked closed as Vesevont was left there in the small antechamber to think about…

Well… everything.

[violethowler]

Cutting and Padding: An Analysis of Season 7′s Pacing and Story Structure

Earlier this week, Team Purple Lion’s official website went live, along with their latest project – a video reconstruction of what S7E7 The Last Stand: Part 1 would have looked like before the creation of the MFE pilots late in production. This got me thinking about some of Team Purple Lion’s previous analyses and what the original Season 7 looked like, so I went back through the episode and took notes on how much screen time the MFEs have from S7E7 The Last Stand: Part 1 to S7E13 Lion’s Pride: Part 2.

To be clear, when I say “original season” or “unedited season” I’m not talking about some hypothetical unicorn of a season where Shiro’s the Black Paladin again while Allura flies the Atlas and there is no wolf because Shiro is the one with the cool teleporting powers. I’m talking about if you took out The Feud, removed or condensed every scene that featured or focused on the MFE pilots, and swapped back in the three Season 8 episodes that Team Purple Lion maintains were originally part of Season 7, how would Season 7 look in terms of pacing and story structure?

@leakinghate postulated in her Seek Truth in Darkness meta that the unedited version of Season 8 would have been 17 episodes long due to the prior editing of Season 7: The MFE pilots were added in after production of Season 7 was already close to being finished, and we know from interviews that the animators needed to do a lot of extra work animating scenes for them, resulting in the creation of The Feud as a filler episode to give them a break. Hate theorized that the episodes Battle Scars, The Grudge, and Shadows were originally written for Season 7 before they had to be pushed into Season 8 in order to make room for the MFE pilots.

There are four things that support this conclusion: storyline payoff, narrative consistency, redundancy, and pacing:

Story Payoff: A frequent complain I saw in Season 8 was that after we see the Olkari evacuating their planet from the robeast attack, we never see them again. There’s no payoff to Olkari evacuating their planet. But Olkari are visible in the background of the Rebuilding Earth montage in S7E13 Lion’s Pride: Part 2. Which would have been the perfect payoff if Battle Scars had been in Season 7: we find out Olkarion’s destruction early in the season, and at the end of the season, the survivors come to help rebuild Earth.

Narrative consistency: the reverse tractor beam Zethrid’s crew uses to pin down the Paldins in The Grudge is the same one they used at the end of The Road Home. But it only worked that first time because we were told that the lions were at low power and couldn’t break free. In Season 8, they had access to the Atlas and had spent the last few episodes operating at full power. So how could the tractor beam work now?

Redundancy: With its current placement in Season 8, Shadows doesn’t offer any new information to the audience, only spelling out what everyone had already figured out four months ago – that Honerva had taken command of the Altean colony using their loyalty to Lotor to get them to fight for her and had assembled an army of Robeasts piloted by Alteans. In Season 8, it’s a waste of time to spend an entire episode repeating what the audience already knows.

But if this was originally supposed to be part of Season 7, it would fit: the flashbacks of Honerva would fill in where she had gone after Acxa tried to shoot her in “The Black Paladins”. The last seven minutes of what is now “Shadows” would have made an excellent cliffhanger for Lion’s Pride: Part 2 – after Allura says “an Altean” we could have cut to Honerva’s arrival at the colony and the montage of assembling her army of mechs, ending the season with Luka flying off to destroy Voltron and bring the events of the Robeast fight full circle.

Pacing: One of the most frequent criticisms of Season 7 was that the space arc of the season rushed by too fast and the Earth arc felt like it dragged on too long. The first half of Season 8 received similar complaints regarding dragged out pacing, as Honerva is identified as a threat early on but they don’t go to Oriande to face her until Episode 6. Shadows is a redundant episode that spins its wheels repeating what we already know.

But if you were to imagine what things would look like without the MFE pilots, things would be a lot different. Having Battle Scars and The Grudge take place in the first half of Season 7 stretches out the space road trip arc and helps it to feel less rushed. If you took away The Feud and the scenes in the second half of the season focusing on the MFEs, the Earth arc would be shortened by one episode and helps tighten up the pacing of the episodes.

Battle Scars and The Grudge, in my opinion work best between The Way Forward and The Ruins. Reason number one being that it would give weight to the three-year time skip if the Paladins learned in the following episode that one of their closest allies had been attacked while they were gone. It would also fill in what happened to Acxa after the end of The Way Forward, as many of us were wondering why the Paladins just left her on the planet where she was holed up. If she accompanied them, possibly in her own ship, it would provide the opportunity for some more callbacks to Belly of the Weblum by having Acxa there for the Olkarion trip.

One possible explanation I’ve seen suggested that makes sense for why Shiro wouldn’t have been in this episode much is if he was injured during the escape in The Way Forward and needed a stint in the cryopod. Speaking of the cryopod, in the edited version of Season 7, it just disappears after A Little Adventure. But if we would have seen Shiro using it in Battle Scars before it was given away to save Ezor in The Grudge (because she’d still be alive), that would neatly explain why they don’t have it in The Ruins or The Journey Within.

The Ruins and The Journey Within would have been unaffected by the editing of Season 7 and thus would be unchanged.

The Last Stand Parts 1 and 2 are largely the same in terms of the Earth flashbacks, but in addition to the absence of the MFEs and the condensing of any montages they feature in, this would be the most appropriate place to have the scenes of Honerva from shadows intercut with the flashbacks on Earth. Aside from being set only a few months apart (Matt contacts Earth a year after Sam returns and says Voltron has been missing for six months, ergo Honerva’s flashbacks in Part 1 take place six months after Sam’s do), these scenes would visually and narratively contrast the warm, loving, and healthy dynamic of the Holt family with the Galra royal couple’s cold, controlling, and abusive relationship with their son.

With the MFE scenes swapped out and condensed to make room for Honerva’s flashbacks, the episode would still end right at the same place it did in the edited version of the season: with Sendak’s fleet surrounding Earth. But Part 2 would not have the same endpoint if you removed the MFEs. Without the MFE pilots, the scene of the MFE Ares fighters doing damage against Sendak’s fleet would be cut, along with the entire sequence of preparing to and then doing the raid on the supply depot that the MFE pilots and Veronica undertake. Without the raid on the supply depot, the circumstances of Veronica’s resitance network delivering refugees to the garrison change and would be condensed.

This would leave 8 minutes’ worth of space. The middle third of Shadows – the Kral Zera, the flashbacks to Lotor’s childhood, and Honerva using Kova to try and scry Lotor’s location – only take up about five minutes. The remaining three minutes, I believe would have consisted of the first three minutes of what is now Know Your Enemy. The music as the paladins climb out of the stolen Galra fighter to stare in horror at the ruined city feels like it’s building to an episode-ending wham moment. The cut off point would be around the 4:09 mark in Know Your Enemy (since the opening credits take up a minute, they don’t count, obviously).

Pictured above: the probable original ending of The Last Stand: Part 2

The original version of Know Your Enemy would pick up at what is now the 4:31 mark in the edited version of the episode (pictured below). It feels appropriate as ending an episode with a shot of a destroyed locale before the next episode opens with the protagonist walking among the rubble is a formula I have seen used in countless tv shows over the years.

There is another three minutes’ worth of exclusively MFE-focused content that wouldn’t be there in the unedited S7. When added with the missing three minutes now added to the end of The Last: Stand Part 2, we get a six-minute block in which we can pull content from the next episode.

I’m confident that that space would be filled with a condensed version of the reconnaissance mission to the Galran military installation, ending at the 9:43 mark of what is now Heart of the Lion and the reveal of the Zaiforge cannons. This sequence is seven minutes long in the edited version of S7 due to the inclusion of the MFE pilots, but without them, this sequence would be short enough to squeeze into roughly six minutes.

The Zaiforge recon sequence fits better as the final act of Know Your Enemy because it calls back to the main piece of the episode: the interrogation of Sendak’s A.I. Sendak’s A.I. says that if a planet refuses to surrender, then the Galra Empire destroys it. And that fate has only ever been dealt to Altea. Revealing the Zaiforge cannons at the end of “Know Your Enemy” (pictured below) should convey to the audience that because Earth refused to surrender, he plans to destroy Earth just as Altea was destroyed.

Heart of the Lion would still open with Shiro awakening from the surgery to attach his new arm. Not only does it preserve the intentional call back to show the differences between how the Garrison treated him after surgery compared to how the Galra Empire did, but it also neatly explains why Shiro wouldn’t be involved in the reconnaissance mission. From there, we would transition into the briefing scene where they work out the plan to summon the lions from Saturn. In the edited version of the episode, this happens around the 11-minute mark, and the scene for Shiro’s arm only takes the first two minutes, leaving a nine-minute window to pull material from the next episode. The scene of the paladins summoning their lions would be condensed without the MFE pilots there, expanding the gap.

The shot at the end of the edited version of the episode feels like there should be more after the Garrison’s reaction, and the opening two shots of what is now Trial by Fire are repeated from the ending of Heart of the Lion. The show has only ever reused a shot from the immediately previous episode three times up to that point, and in very specific contexts (following up from a season-ending cliffhanger, and to indicate episodes that are taking place simultaneously) so these two shots were most likely used as padding.

(Pictured above: one of the two shots re-used between Heart of the Lion and Trial by Fire) 

From there, we would have all of the scenes from Trial by Fire focused on the Paladins learning to pilot their lions remotely. Because this episode is called Heart of the Lion, after all. Why wouldn’t you expect an episode with a title like that to have the Paladins unlock a cool new ability. We would also have the Atlas launch during this episode, as the Atlas’s power problems were an excuse to have the MFE pilots get some action in while the Paladins were incapacitated. Without the MFE pilots, they would have gotten the crystalized Castle of Lions in there a lot faster. The ending of Heart of the Lion would be the ending for Trial by Fire, with Admiral Sanda’s death before the Paladins escape the ship.

You’ll notice that with the ending of Trial by Fire moved to be the ending of Heart of the Lion, there’s nothing actually left in Trial by Fire itself. This is because Trial by Fire didn’t exist before the creation of the MFE pilots. Of the three episodes nestled between The Last Stand and Lion’s Pride, only two titles are applicable to anything that happens in these episodes. “Know Your Enemy” refers to understanding how Sendak thinks and figuring out what his plans for Earth are. Heart of the Lion refers to the Paladins’ ability to call their lions from deep space and pilot them remotely.

But just like Hate pointed out about Uncharted Regions in Season 8, there is nothing in the Earth arc of Season 7 that can be accurately described as a trial by fire. The phrase trial by fire refers to someone performing well for the first time under intense pressure. However this is typically preceded by a previous attempt at achieving their goal that fails the first time (or first few times). This isn’t the first time that the Paladins have given the Lions directions remotely. They just did it in Heart of the Lion on a smaller scale. The MFE pilots aren’t piloting their fighters for the first time, they’ve been doing it since before the invasion. It could be referring to the Atlas, but this is the first time it’s being powered up, and the Atlas’ full capabilities won’t be tested until Lion’s Pride: Part 1 and Part 2. When you tally up the amount of screen-time the MFE pilots got in the back half of Season 7, it adds up to one episode’s worth of content. Therefore, before the MFE pilots were created late in production, Trial by Fire didn’t exist. 

Lion’s Pride: Part 1 would start exactly where it did in the edited Season 7, minus the transformation sequence. Roughly six minutes of the episode is focused on the MFE pilots and wouldn’t have been there during the original season. This means that the first six minutes of Lion’s Pride: Part 2 were originally the ending of Part 1. The most organic stopping point would be around 6:48 of the edited Lion’s Pride: Part 2, just after Pidge uses her Bayard to drive the Robeast off of Voltron when it’s using its Komar blades to drain their Quintessence. Part 2 would pick up with Shiro asking if the Paladins are okay, and Hunk responding that the blades had sapped their energy.

There’s about a minute of MFE pilot action in this episode, which adds up to a seven-minute space at the end that would be the prefect spot for the last seven minutes of Shadows, where just after we see the Altean pilot, we flash back to Honerva’s arrival on the colony and find out what happened to the missing Alteans.

The Earth arc dragged on for so long because having to make room for the MFE pilots so late in the pipeline forced the production team to rearrange scenes and create an entirely new episode to make sure they had room, throwing off the content of the other episodes from where everything was supposed to be, such that the title of each episode no longer matched its content. 

Even though each episode of Voltron is a piece of the larger narrative, every episode still has an arc within the episode itself. Every individual episode still has a clear beginning, middle, and end. But with the content in the second half of Season 7 rearranged to give the MFE pilots the spotlight, the ending of one episode became the middle of another. And instead of two tightly paced episodes that each had a clear beginning, middle, and end, we got three episodes that were just one hour-long middle.

Doesn’t what I just outlined above flow much better? With two additional episodes, the front half of Season 7 gets some more room to breathe instead of skipping through so much, and the Earth arc doesn’t feel like it drags on for so long. Plus, having Honerva’s flashbacks here makes for a better fit in terms of contrast and in what it reveals to the audience than when it’s repeating what we already figured out months ago.

TL; DR: Before the executive meddling that resulted in the creation of the MFE pilots, Season 7 would have looked like this:

A Little Adventure

The Road Home

The Way Forward

Battle Scars

The Grudge

The Ruins

The Journey Within

The Last Stand: Part 1

The Last Stand: Part 2

Know Your Enemy

Heart of the Lions

Lion’s Pride: Part 1

Lion’s Pride: Part 2

And after the creation of the MFE pilots, they were given enough screen time that a new episode Trial by Fire had to be commissioned to spread out the content that would have originally been two episodes. As a consequence, Battle Scars, The Grudge, and the content that would become Shadows had to be moved into Season 8 to compensate, with The Feud being made to fill the gap created in the first half of the season.

I’d like to thank the members of Team Purple Lion (@leakinghate @felixazrael @crystal-rebellion @dragonofyang and @voltronisruiningmylife) for all the hard work they’ve done reverse engineering what everything looked like before the executive meddling happened. I wouldn’t be able to write meta like this without their thoroughly research analyses to build on. 

[cultho]

Dororo Epilogue/Post-ending Standalone episode

*WARNING: SLIGHT SPOILERS AHEAD!!*

So I watched the ending and I had a lot of feelings about it, and I came up with a few ideas for a standalone post-episode to explore some concepts I would like to see from the show. Fyi, the pronouns I use for Dororo vary by situation, with a preference for he/him (my headcanon is Dororo is pretty genderfluid!).

About a year after Hyakkimaru went to find himself, aka end of the series (but before the timeskip where Dororo’s hair is long), the episode opens with opens with Hyakkimaru, feeling more at peace with himself, returning to the village Dororo was developing via dad's Harry Potter level of inheritance.

Dororo, who now basically rules this village despite being a literal 9 year old, hears word from his fellow villagers that a wandering stranger with a sword was spotted helping one of the rice farmers because their horse got caught in a ditch (or anything else of that nature). Of course, Dororo immediately comes running, and barrels straight into Hyakkimaru for the sibling reunion hug we deserve.

Then Dororo punches Hyakki on the arm and gives him a hard time for leaving for a whole year without even a ‘goodbye,’ asks 'So what made you decide to come back after a whole year, huh, punk?’

In response, Hyakki pulls out a small, worn, pouch and Dororo says 'woah - Mio’s rice seeds? I thought you would’ve planted them by now already.’

With a little smile, Hyakki goes 'I thought about doing that, but then I remembered you were close with her too, so you have as much of a right to these seeds… so I decided to wait until we could plant them together.’ 

The rest follows as one expects it to -  Dororo teases him for becoming an even bigger softie, and they set off back to the village to grab some farm tools who Hyakki the place, as the camera pans up until the brilliant blue sky fills the frame. That chapter of their lives ends the same way it began, with Hyakkimaru and Dororo - the latter chatting up a storm while the former quietly appreciates - side by side, wandering where they must. 

Then the camera pans back down, and where before there was bare paddy, the field is now golden and thriving (same as it was in the show's ending). After a half decade timeskip, Dororo is 15-16 to Hyakki’s 21-22, and the rest of the episode follows them dealing with a demon terrorizing their village, who turns out to be Daigo’s butthurt evil spirit. I don’t have a specific plot, but here are concepts that I’d love to see explored.

First, Grown up badass Dororo running her town, being like her own Alexander Hamilton, except not only does this Alexander Hamilton know finances, how to run a sovereign state, how to outsmart any opponent, rouse even the most downtrodden souls to action with just a few words, she also kicks major butt from training with her big bro. Shoutout to that one post that inspired the idea that her dad's Big Boy genes kicked in during puberty so she’s actually like... as tall as Hyakki. Maybe even an inch taller. She says to anyone who asks that her bro can 'die mad about it’ but they both know that he’s just happy she grew up big and strong. 

She totally runs the town and everyone adores/massively respects her; her city takes in the refugees, the poor, the women and children, the diseased, etc, because, in her words, screw samurai and screw their wars. They absorbed Daigo’a old land after offering food, shelter, and jobs to the survivors, thus their town became a pretty respectably sized settlement.

Now, the key to all this - since they don't want to rely on samurai for their power - is the money, right? So Dororo’s power is her knowledge of the treasures secret location (and all the other badass things about her, but I digress). Imagine at some point a small gang of newer villaghers got the bright idea to try and stalk her during one of her mysterious night trips out (she calls them a way to satisfy her wanderlust, but they’re a cover for her sailing to the treasure's location to grab some cash), and they only get as far as spying her enter the docks before their plan goes to heck when they get accosted by Dororo's more loyal villagers who saw them sneaking. ‘Oh sh*t,’ they’re thinking, Dororo sauntering over to them, ‘Oh sh*t, shes got a big sword, oh man oh sh*t this is the end for me - '

But Dororo’s been there before, at the end of her rope and desperate for any edge to survive, she understands how these guys think, and if there’s one thing she’s stubborn to death about it’s that she does NOT run her town like the samurai. Instead, she talks them out of their misdoing and helps them find an honest living, Tales of Ba Sing Se Uncle Iroh style, (except with more volume and verbal threats).

Another concept with Dororo is when Dororo dresses to look like a guy when he and Hyakki take a couple horses and venture into a nearby city (for whatever plot reason), similar to how he did when he was a lot younger.

It’s not fully a secret, but only the older residents of her city know about Dororo’s 'crossdressing' habit, and are accepting of it.

Dororo mentions that while he’s in no way ashamed of presenting female, it often feels more freeing to present male, especially when they're out adventuring - less questions and stares from strangers, etc. Dororo also just likes presenting as male! This way, he identifies with both genders at different times. (It goes without saying Hyakki does his best to use the right pronouns, he never had a strict concept of gender - re: Jukai is the best mom, so it never struck him as odd.)

As for the actual villain of the episode, when she first hears of the Jerk Dad Demon attacking the farms on the outskirts of the village, she only thinks ‘it's just another demon, time to gather the crew and kill this thing-’

It doesn’t go so easily, as the demon’s exceptional strength proves to draw out the confrontation, and it even ends up escaping the first time.

The first to figure it out was Hyakki - he’s most familiar with Daigo’s wrath and the foul creature reeks of the old man. However, everything happened so fast and he sort of… neglected to inform Dororo. When she does find out, they have a short confrontation about it in classic Bickering Siblings Style. It’s understandable that she’s slightly miffed the demonic incarnation of his own awful dad, yes that one, is who they’re fighting and he didn’t bother letting her know.

Hyakki, who, even after a decade of having his voice back, isn't that great at communication/vocalizing his more complex thoughts and working through conflicts with words and thus often comes off as awkward or silently stoic: 'You were busy... and I thought you figured by yourself already?’

Things escalate when the other villagers overhear, and they almost start a riot; angry shouts accusing him of being the reason the demon attacks their settlement from the all the tired men and women, haggard from fending off attacks of not only the demon but also rival bandits and clans who want to take advantage of the city’s time of hardship. Of course, Dororo gets everyone back in lineright before the crowd got to deciding to sacrifice Hyakkimaru, reminding them to focus on the real enemy instead of turning on eachother - but the situation was incredibly bleak. With everyone on edge partially, it was easy to use Hyakki as a scapegoat due to his pacifist tendencies and his stoic nature coming across as almost cowardice.

He taught Dororo how to fight and that's pretty much all the fighting he's done since he came back to plant Mio’s rice, he’s reluctant to pick up the blade again. But the moment a demon shows up he runs off on his own, risking life and limb to confront it head on. Combined with his character’s less than stellar communication skills, it frustrates Dororo in the 'he leaves for a year and doesnt even text me when he's going’ kinda way’ - she's frustrated when he continually refuses to understand that they're family, and at the end of they day theyre kind of all the other has left. So he needs to get it together better and tell her when he’s about to go off and do reckless nonsense. His behavior also presents an interesting dichotomy as Hyakki also struggles with trying to be emotionally detached (lose worldly desires, etc.) and pacifist in the face of attacks from both demon and humans, so he needs to reconcile fighting with the others against attacking clans and risking a redescent into the demon like madness of his teenage years or standing by non violent means of supporting his comrades while facing expectations that he should do more. He wants to atone for his past sins badly and help those who are still living best he can - but how? 

(And also make friends other than literally just Dororo.)

Dororo's arc is about her struggles to do the right thing as a leader - it is a lot, to run a whole city. Recent events have caused more deaths amidst her city than ever before, and moral questions about what to do with captured enemy survivors feed doubt into her mind if one day she’ll turn out as bad as the samurai, and how to continue on after having led people in battles that resulted in their deaths.

P.s. I also entertained the idea of Hyakki’s journey to find himself taking much longer, and so the first time Dororo sees him again ever since he got his eyes back is when she's 20, there's rain pouring from the dark sky as her men are carrying lamps around, accounting for the dead and defeated in a latest skirmish with a small rival band that was trying to access her city the non-peaceful way.

At first her men bring her hyakkimaru, thinking he was with the enemy (he happened to be in the wrong place, wrong time. He simply heard of a group heading to a big place that sounded an awful lot like somewhere he would find Dororo - and followed them).

And from the business end of her sword he's on his knees looking up when she goes 'nah. I know him. This bastard's got hell to answer for, but he's not our enemy.’

Events are more or less the same from there, but filled with way more tension and drama here since Hyakki basically dropped off the face of the earth for 10 ish years and Do’s mad about that because, again, he didn't even say 'bye'. So much has changed, but what hasn't changed is Dororo’s anikki's inability to grasp that if one day he went off without telling her and then died, she would have literally no idea where/when/how that was, she would never know if he was alive or dead, and the idea of living in that limbo would terrify anyone. The story being about them learning to come together again, only at the end do they plant Mio’s rice field together.

I ended up trying to flesh the first idea out more because Do & Hyakki’s relationship is all about the things that don't need to be said; that these two will always be there for the other without needing to be asked. The backbone of their relationship was built up as one that didn’t need explicit affirmation because it was already so ingrained to their characters it would be a disservice to them and a waste of time to contrive an entire plot trying to create unnecessary drama between them.

But then again... drama = satisfying character growth, so perhaps it could go either way! Let me know what you think! 

Thank you for reading all this way :) I also posted second part to this of other thoughts I had while pondering why I felt the need to write a standalone epilogue.

Bonus: these gems I had in the rough draft that unfortunately had to get cut:

“But it’s harder to kill bc jerk dad demon is a jerk”

“Dororo's like 'u mean to tell me ur punk bitch biological male progenitor's demonized soul is attacking our fields??? “

“they take down the big bad dad dude daigo”

“Dororo: - pshffyeahh, ur pissy pissfaced pissbaby dad”

[stephantasmagoria]

From the Team: Intervening in an Arrest

My submission to the “From the Team” section of the July 2019 Fearless Heart Newsletter by Miki Kashtan. This is about my experiencing witnessing and intervening in the arrests of two teenager at my high school alma mater in Fresno, CA. I use a framework created by Miki to review, investigate, and analyze nonviolence practice and theory in relation to the action. 

I jogged past the iron bars surrounding Fresno High School (FHS), my hometown alma mater. It was the Friday before the school’s spring break. The oppressive heat of a Fresno, California spring doesn’t punch like the fists of its summers. It is more like an open-handed slap, the kind that bruises a child’s skin as punishment for simply being a child.

As sweat dripped from my forehead, I saw a Black male teenager being arrested by two police officers outside campus. “If you see someone being arrested, it can be supportive for everyone’s safety if you stop and witness. This is especially true if the arrested person is a person of color, and even more true if you are white”. These words from my colleague and dear friend, Leonie Smith, echoed through my head at that moment. I first heard them during a Responsible Bystander training, an offering Leonie co-developed and facilitated at a meditation center last fall.

“There must be a reason for it. There’s probably nothing you can do. Just keep running”. This harsh voice followed Leonie’s. It is old and familiar. I attended FHS during the era of “No Child Left Behind”, a time when increasing numbers of children of color were forced behind bars. That harsh voice frequently controlled me as a student at FHS. Although I was in the statistical minority of white kids within the student body, white privilege protected me throughout high school. It influenced my decisions to turn away from my criminalized peers.

Since Leonie’s voice is far more beautiful than the played-out harsh voice, I decided to listen to her and witness the arrest. I was also able to prevent the arrest of a second teenager by applying nonviolence techniques I learned from Leonie and other activists at the Nonviolent Global Liberation retreat in Santa Cruz, CA. As I read Miki’s most recent newsletter, ‘Steps toward meaningful action‘, my understanding of the situation came into focus. I am sharing my account of the experience here, and using the steps as a framework to deepen my reflections.

My account of the experience:

Around 8:30am on Friday, April 12, 2019, I stop jogging to witness a white police officer arresting a Black teenager in front of Fresno High School (FHS). A Latinx cop searches the teen’s backpack on the hood of a police car. I do not hear anyone informing the arrested teen of his rights. A Latinx teenager approaches the scene and starts talking to his arrested friend. “We’re like cousins”, the friend tells one of the cops when asked why he is there. The white officer puts the arrested teen in the back of the police car, but both officers allow the friend to stay and talk through the slits in the car window.

A third police officer, who is also white, arrives around 8:45am. He steps out of his car and begins yelling at the friend within minutes. The friend tries to explain that he has a close relationship with the arrested teen. The third officer continues yelling, and the friend eventually yells back. The cop moves towards the teenage friend, stops within a foot of his face, and threatens to arrest him for truancy.

Recalling lessons learned from nonviolence activist trainings, I witness while actively working to transform my enemy images of the police officer. Holding the intention to support everyone’s safety, I step toward the situation. I recognize the Latinx teenager as more vulnerable,  so I focus my attention on him. “Hey, I know you’re worried about your friend”, I say to the Latinx teen. He briefly stops shouting and looks at me. The third officer continues to yell over my voice. “Can I have a moment to speak with him?”, I ask the officer.

“Sure, go ahead”, he responds. He walks away from the Latinx teen and towards the other officers.

I continue speaking to the Latinx teen. “I know you’re worried about your friend. I am too. That’s why I’m here. I am concerned that you might be hurt or arrested if you stay, though. I encourage you to go on campus”. The friend listens to some of what I say before shouting an expletive at the police officer. He then walks through the iron bars and on to the FHS campus. Blood rushes to my feet, and my heart beat rises when I realize the friend is safe in that moment.

The next moment, I turn my attention back to the officers and the arrested teen. I hear the officers explain why they suspect the Black teen of armed robbery, even though they didn’t find any weapons. They say he was in the neighborhood where the crime took place, he was sweating a lot, and he fit the description of the suspect. The third officer looks at me mid-conversation and asks, “Excuse me, are you a school official?”.

“No, I’m just concerned and decided to witness”, I respond.

“Oh, ok, well thanks for your help with that kid”, the officer says. I notice myself wanting to shout at him and blame him for escalating the situation, but I stay silent. I return to the practice of transforming enemy images, neither challenging nor affirming his misrepresentation of my intention.

The two white officers eventually leave in separate cars. The Latinx officer gets in the driver’s seat of the car holding the arrested teen. As the engine starts, I walk towards the slotted window. “Don’t say anything other than ‘I need a lawyer’. That’s all you say, over and over, until you have a lawyer. Nothing else! Ok?”, I say to the arrested teen. He looks at me and nods his head before the car pulls away.

Steps toward Meaningful Action:

Notice. I noticed the two voices in my head before I stopped to witness. When listening to the harsh voice, I noticed tension in my body. Memories of the many times I walked away from criminalized classmates plagued me. I recognized a rising sense of disempowerment and failing integrity. Leonie’s voice illuminated the possibility of using my white privilege in service to a nonviolent outcome. Making a conscious decision to stop and witness, I recalled specific lessons from many nonviolence trainings: maintain embodied presence, set intention, listen with empathy, transform enemy images, and hold safety for all while supporting those most vulnerable. That last one is a key component of Leonie’s Responsible Bystander model. These principles helped me hold the possibility of a nonviolent outcome as I made moment-to-moment decisions.

Mourning and Analysis.  It may appear paradoxical to combine the emotional process of mourning with the seemingly impersonal process of analysis, but they are profoundly intertwined for me in relation to this experience. Mourning happened in the moment, and it continues to happen. I mourn the past, knowing that my blind adherence towards the harsh voice contributed to disempowerment for me and my high school peers. I mourn the present, especially for these teenagers who are two of too many children detrimentally impacted by systemic racism. I mourn my silence when the white police officer misrepresented my intention. His words, “thanks for your help with that kid”, implied that I was a partner in controlling the teen rather than an advocate for his safety and freedom. I mourn that I failed to respond in clear alignment with my values.

Analysis and mourning are most obvious to me when I travel through my deep past. The pattern of hiding behind white privilege goes beyond my lifetime. My father, who was born and raised in Fresno by refugees of the Armenian genocide, embraced white identity and encouraged me to do the same. My grandparents’ terror influenced their decision to assimilate in a city where racism and xenophobia mingle with toxic air pollutants. My ancestors wanted safety, freedom, and belonging. They believed whiteness was the appropriate strategy to meet these needs. By the time I was born, the survival strategy of embracing whiteness while turning away from “others” became an entrenched behavioral pattern.

I must clarify that this analysis of my Armenian ancestry is neither comprehensive nor condemning. First, the factors contributing to assimilation of immigrant groups in the  United States is far more complex than I am presenting here.* Second, I hold immense love, respect and compassion for my dad and Armenian ancestors. Yet it is still important to investigate the impact of assimilation on my life. It enables me to mourn the pain of my family, reckon with my decisions, and make conscious choices going forward.

Reframe as needed. Miki’s description of reframing fits well with my experience of the police officers, especially the third officer. She says, “If we see the police as a part of the working class that was pushed into working for the elite we will act differently than if we only see them through the lens of the impact they have as instruments of the state, without holding in the mix their humanity, including their potential to shift”. A similar reframing happened for me at the scene. I made a conscious choice to transform enemy images of the police as I witnessed. Throughout this process, I noticed my nervous system settle in the intensity. I am convinced this helped me stay as calm as possible as I approached the escalating argument between the white officer and Latinx teen. Had I approached that encounter without connecting to the officer’s humanity, I believe the risk of further escalation and harm could have changed the course of events.

Discern and Care. I am gaining more insight into what I bring to this life as I age and mature. Although I do not always like to admit it, an important factor to consider is my social location. As an adult woman with white skin privilege, I have more status quo power than the two teenagers. Honest acknowledgment and rigorous discernment of my social location helped inform my role, and enabled me to advocate more boldly than I had in the past.

I also experienced discernment as a moment-to-moment necessity. This continuously informed my decisions to care for all, especially for myself and the teenagers.  Orienting towards embodied presence helped me gauge that I could step towards the escalated encounter with composure and effectiveness. It helped me feel my visceral reaction to the police officer when he mischaracterized my intention. Discerning that blaming and yelling might compromise my own safety, and therefore the ability to support the arrested teen, I made the best choice I could by remaining silent.

Because I was able to stay at the scene and continuously respond to each moment, I recognized another opportunity to intervene. I held knowledge about what the arrested teen might experience under custody. I also knew what he could do to protect himself from self-incrimination. It was vital to share this information with him before he was in an unknown situation alone. By discerning how to best take care of myself each moment, I was able to take the best possible care of everyone in the situation.

Support. I am fortunate to have many connections to NVC activists. Within hours of the incident, I received empathy from a friend who helped me celebrate the prevention of the Latinx teen’s arrest, mourn the Black teen’s arrest, and identify feelings and needs relating to my silence when the officer mischaracterized my intentions. She also encouraged me to do some shaking to help release residual trauma from the experience.

Leonie and I discussed the incident a few days later. She offered similar empathy, helped me understand that I did the best I could when I chose to remain silent, and helped me brainstorm other ways I could respond that were more aligned with my intention. These early conversations encouraged me to share the story with other friends, including non-NVC practitioners. As I recounted the story to more people, I received feedback that people were inspired to take a bystander training, witness arrests, and stay aware of ways they might intervene. It is my hope that this story will encourage others to act, to make mistakes, to learn, and to grow together. It is my hope it will support more freedom and peace in our world.

*If you are interested in learning more about the assimilation of Middle Eastern populations in the United States, I recommend John Tehranian’s Whitewashed: America’s Invisible Middle Eastern Minority.

[kingmaker-thac0hno]

Kingmaker: Houserules

This will serve as a collection for all custom houserules used in the Kingmaker campaign, and will be updated periodically as content is introduced or changes. Be sure to check back from time to time!

Variant Rules In Effect

Gritty Realism: We will be playing with a modified version of the Gritty Realism variant available in the DMG. 

A Long Rest takes 8 hours, but may only be taken when the characters are in a reasonably civilized location offering shelter, food, and protection from the elements. Access to study materials, prayer, the ability to replenish spellcasting components, repair armor and equipment, and a secure location not under threat of attack are all required.  An established basecamp, or fort, city, town, or village all qualify as valid locations for a long rest. Notably, camping overnight in the wilderness does not qualify. A Short Rest also takes 8 hours, and may take place anywhere the players are able to relax, sleep, eat, or meditate. 

Lingering Injuries: Any character reduced to 0 HP also gains one point of exhaustion. 

Wealth System 

There was a system I saw where your wealth was represented by a die. The larger the die, the more wealth you had. This will replace the coin-counting that is standard for the 5e system.

You could 'afford' anything that fell into die categories smaller than yours without doing anything, or having it affect your wealth level. Similarly, you just couldn't afford things that were in larger-die-categories, as they were just too expensive.

If you wanted to buy something that fell into your die category, then you would roll. Rolling a 1 meant it consumed a portion of your wealth, and you would drop a die size. Otherwise, you're good, and nothing changes. Similarly, finding treasure that possibly could alter your wealth would result in a dice roll. Rolling the maximum value for that die would result in increasing a die size. Otherwise, nothing changes. 

This system does a couple things: First, it eliminates bookkeeping for the player and more so for the GM. Second, it results in a decrease of trivial wealth rolls over time, only making rolls happen when they matter. Third, it emulates a stability of wealth as people get richer.

1d4 - your primary currency is copper. (1/100 gp) 

1d6 - your primary currency is silver. (1/10 gp) 

1d8 - your primary currency is gold. (1 gp) 

1d10 - your primary currency is 100s of gold pieces (100gp) 

1d12 - your primary currency is platinum (1000gp) 

1d20 - you are very wealthy, and can try and purchase anything. 

Some examples: A player with a wealth of 1d8 walks into a market. He skips the armorer's booth, since buying plate mail (1500gp) is just too expensive. He grabs a couple loaves of bread ( silver- 1d6 wealth tier, so no roll) to much on, then decides to go buy a new longsword (15gp). The GM calls for a wealth roll when buying the longsword, since it stresses the player's savings. The player rolls a 4 - no problem! He buys the sword and keeps his 1d8 wealth. If the player had rolled a 1, then he still would have bought the sword, but doing so would have used much of his wealth, causing him to drop to a 1d6. 

Minor Milestones

Occasionally, as the result of play, players will complete an objective or quest which merits a reward, but does not qualify for a Major Milestone (a PC level). These minor milestones are opportunities for the players to help shape the direction of the world, and will allow players to select improvements to NPCs in the game, making them more powerful, skilled, or knowledgeable, and therefore more valuable to the party as a whole. 

When granted a minor milestone, players may choose one NPC and apply one of the following improvements:

The NPC gains proficiency in a skill or tool they did not have before.

The NPC gains Expertise in a skill for which they already had proficiency. 

An NPC may not be an expert in more than one skill.

The NPC gains proficiency in a weapon (e.g. glaive) or armor ( e.g. chain shirt) they did not have before.

The NPC learns one new spell. 

The NPC must already be able to cast spells, and have spell slots available for the spell selected.

The NPC chosen must consider the party as friends or allies, (neutral parties do not qualify), and the improvement selected should maintain consistency with the NPC in the narrative. ( e.g. merchants don’t suddenly become archmagi. ) At minimum, the improvement selected must not contradict established canon.

Custom Character Backgrounds

Former Stag Lord Bandit

At one point in your sordid past, you ran with the notorious Stag Lord, who had commanded loyalty from all the denizens of the Stolen Land. Tough and rugged, there’s not much that makes you flinch. After the Stag Lord’s defeat by the Lords of Thornvale, you realized that banditry would likely lead to your early demise, so you set off for better opportunities. 

As the Criminal background, plus

Bandit Gang: A number of your former gang members have followed you on this quest. You gain a number of bandit followers ( CR 1/8 Bandit NPC statblock) equal to twice your charisma score (minimum, 2) .  In addition, you gain 1 lieutenant ( CR 1/2 Thug NPC statblock). These followers will not gain experience in the traditional sense, but certain events in the game may increase their powers or abilities.

Blackstag Survivor / Verdant Vanguard

You are a survivor of the horrific battle at Blackstag where the troll-king Hargulka was defeated. You saw firsthand how the viciousness of the wild trolls tore your friends and neighbors apart, as well as the heroic deeds performed by the Lords of Thornvale as they defended your village. This left an undeniable mark on you, and you swore to defend Thornvale with your life from that point forward.In doing so, you have banded together with others of like mind, forming the Verdant Vanguard. 

As the  Knight of the Order (The Verdant Vanguard) background, plus

You gain a modified version of the  Ranger ability Natural Explorer, which applies to all terrain types, but only within the borders of the Kingdom of Thornvale.   

Sootscale Kobold

You are a proud Sootscale Kobold, forever thankful to the Lords of Thornvale for their aid during the Great Mite War. Unlike most of your tribe, you feel trapped by the confining tunnels of your cave, and do not fear the sunlight. Inspired by the tales of Mikmek and Nakpik, you seek greater adventure out in the Stolen Lands. 

Must be a Kobold

As the  Acolyte(Kobold dragon-deities of Aspu and Dahak) background, plus

Sunlight Adaptation. You do not suffer the negative effects of Sunlight Sensitivity like your kin.

Pilgrim of Erastil

You have heard the wonderous tales of the discovery of the ancient Temple of the Elk, and have come to see the ruins with your own eyes. Among the faithful, word has spread across the region and you come from a faraway land, seeing to honor the Stag God with your journey.

Must be a follower of Erastil.

As the Far Traveler background, plus

TBD

Brevic Refugee

At first, the skirmishes were far off, and small. Clashes between the King’s loyalists and the Rostlandic secessionists grew more and more common until finally, they swept through your village. Narrowly escaping with your life, the soldiers destroyed everything they couldn’t take for themselves. Now, growing tensions threaten outright war, and Brevoy isn’t safe for anyone. Heading south, you can hardly believe that you’re fleeing to the Stolen Land of all places... 

As the Folk Hero background, plus

Hearty Stock: You gain the Tough feat as a bonus feat.

Greyforge Dwarf

Coming Soon....

Must be a Dwarf

TBD

Varnhold Settler

Coming Soon....

Must be a Dwarf

TBD