#Drone School UK

[trevlad-sounds]

More tags:

For the birds 024

25.10.2024

Intro 00:00 Erik Wøllo-Disc 2: Forever River 01:19 https://projektrecords.bandcamp.com/track/disc-2-forever-river David Cordero-El mismo día 08:31 https://davidcordero.bandcamp.com/track/el-mismo-di-a Keigo Tatsumi-ma 12:12 https://mysterycircles.bandcamp.com/track/ma ['ramp]-seven swans 13:04 https://cyclicaldreams.bandcamp.com/track/ramp-seven-swans Heiko Maile, Julian DeMarre-Serengeti Ostinato 23:54 https://heikomaile.bandcamp.com/track/serengeti-ostinato Hélène Vogelsinger-Entreaty 28:36 https://helenevogelsinger.bandcamp.com/track/entreaty Moss Garden-Floating In Memories 39:33 https://neotantra.bandcamp.com/track/floating-in-memories x.y.r.-side B 44:14 https://xyrmusic.bandcamp.com/track/side-b Outro 1:05:59

[hollowed-theory-hall]

Revisiting population size in the Wizarding World

So, I wrote about this subject in the past (here and here), and I was of the belief the Wizarding World is pretty small (~300 students at Hogwarts, ~6,200 wizards in the UK). However, I wanted to challenge my own notion with book evidence that there are more students at Hogwarts in Harry's time, working under the assumption that there are more students in Harry's year we just never hear about.

I was somewhat inspired by this post by @perilousraven that calculated the capacity of the coaches that take the students up to the school. As I wanted to revisit my estimates on the wizarding population and Hogwarts population anyway, I decided to calculate the capacity of the Hogwarts Express to see if it matches the stagecoaches' capacity. Plus bringing up book evidence that my estimate for the Hogwarts population was low but I was correct about the size of the overall wizard population due to their distribution by age being different than in my earlier posts (a case of the "math was wrong but the result was right-ish").

So, let's start with evidence that there are more than 280 students at Hogwarts:

“No more’n four to a boat!” Hagrid called, pointing to a fleet of little boats sitting in the water by the shore.

(PS)

4 in a boat for 40 students will be 10 little boats. I'm not sure if Harry would call that a "fleet". Technically it could be considered a fleet, but I think there would be more boats for Harry to refer to it as a "fleet".

They followed Professor McGonagall across the flagged stone floor. Harry could hear the drone of hundreds of voices from a doorway to the right — the rest of the school must already be here 

(PS)

Professor McGonagall led the first years up here, so that they came to a halt in a line facing the other students, with the teachers behind them. The hundreds of faces staring at them looked like pale lanterns in the flickering candlelight.

(PS)

Harry left the castle and set off in the dusk toward the Quidditch field. He’d never been inside the stadium before. Hundreds of seats were raised in stands around the field so that the spectators were high enough to see what was going on. 

(PS)

But it was too late. A rumble, as though of distant thunder, told them that the feast had just ended. From either end of the corridor where they stood came the sound of hundreds of feet climbing the stairs, and the loud, happy talk of well-fed people; next moment, students were crashing into the passage from both ends.

(CoS)

One casual wave of his wand and the long tables flew to the edges of the hall and stood themselves against the walls; another wave, and the floor was covered with hundreds of squashy purple sleeping bags.

(PoA)

Harry got to his feet, trod on the hem of his robes, and stumbled slightly. He set off up the gap between the Gryffindor and Hufflepuff tables. It felt like an immensely long walk; the top table didn’t seem to be getting any nearer at all, and he could feel hundreds and hundreds of eyes upon him, as though each were a searchlight. 

(GoF) - when Harry is chosen as a champion

He was falling through cold blackness, spinning furiously as he went, and then — He was standing in the middle of the Great Hall, but the four House tables were gone. Instead, there were more than a hundred smaller tables, all facing the same way, at each of which sat a student, head bent low, scribbling on a roll of parchment. The only sound was the scratching of quills and the occasional rustle as somebody adjusted their parchment. It was clearly exam time.

(OotP)

more than a hundred seats, but they are both fifth and seventh years:

Once breakfast was over, the fifth and seventh years milled around in the entrance hall while the other students went off to lessons. Then, at half-past nine, they were called forward class by class to reenter the Great Hall, which was now arranged exactly as Harry had seen it in the Pensieve when his father, Sirius, and Snape had been taking their O.W.L.s. The four House tables had been removed and replaced instead with many tables for one, all facing the staff-table end of the Hall where Professor McGonagall stood facing them.

(OotP)

So the over a hundred we see above in SWM is both seventh and sixth years, meaning each year in the Mauraders' generation is about 70 students, so then we'd have ~110-120 students in the Great Hall in the exam in SWM. Since not all 7th-years are taking the NEWT exam in DADA, I assume most of these students are 5th-years.

“I would like each of you to place yourselves now so that you have a clear five feet of space in front of you.” There was a great scrambling and jostling as people separated, banged into each other, and ordered others out of their space. The Heads of Houses moved among the students, marshaling them into position and breaking up arguments. “Harry, where are you going?” demanded Hermione. But Harry did not answer; he was moving quickly through the crowd, past the place where Professor Flitwick was making squeaky attempts to position a few Ravenclaws, all of whom wanted to be near the front, past Professor Sprout, who was chivying the Hufflepuffs into line, until, by dodging around Ernie Macmillan, he managed to position himself right at the back of the crowd, directly behind Malfoy, who was taking advantage of the general upheaval to continue his argument with Crabbe, standing five feet away and looking mutinous.

(HBP) - when the 6th years are taking the apparition exam they are a considerable crowd

When Harry describes the Great Hall or a crowd of the entire school, he's talking in the hundreds. The above phrasing would be odd if the "hundreds" talked about are 3 max. So, the implication is that there are more students, probably not a thousand, but closer to it.

Now, I wanted to know what number of students we're talking about, so I could have an estimate of the population size. There are two available avenues:

A hundred horseless carriages stood waiting for them outside the station. Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Neville climbed gratefully into one of them, the door shut with a snap, and a few moments later, with a great lurch, the long procession of carriages was rumbling and splashing its way up the track toward Hogwarts Castle.

(GoF)

A hundred (or over a hundred in PoA) coaches to the school only for the older years, plus the boats for the first years. In the post I linked above from perilousraven calculated the capacity would be for 700 students or more at the school (I think the estimate of the older, smaller coaches is probably closer to the case in the books and would work with what the Hogwarts Express would allow).

But I wanted to look at the Hogwarts Express, as well, to see if we get a different number of students or if we're around the same estimates since the train should have all students, including first-years traveling by it:

They struggled off down the corridor, peering through the glass-paneled doors into the compartments they passed, which were already full. Harry could not help noticing that a lot of people stared back at him with great interest and that several of them nudged their neighbors and pointed him out. After he had met this behavior in five consecutive carriages he remembered that the Daily Prophet had been telling its readers all summer what a lying show-off he was. He wondered bleakly whether the people now staring and whispering believed the stories. In the very last carriage, they met Neville Longbottom

(HBP)

So we have at least 6 passenger carriages (potentially more if we're talking about a newer 20th-century steam engine, which I assume we are since the earlier Victorian ones only had up to four carriages).

Now, there might be a 7th perfect carriage:

“We’re — well — Ron and I are supposed to go into the prefect carriage,” Hermione said awkwardly.

(OotP)

But earlier Percy mentions Prefect compartments:

“Can’t stay long, Mother,” he said. “I’m up front, the prefects have got two compartments to themselves — ”

(PS)

So, we have at least 6 regular carriages and another carriage just for the prefects' compartments and the large compartment Slughorn used for the slug club (possibly he used a prefect compartment, as I assume that first car is designed differently).

(I will note the prefects have a place to sit on the train (Ron and Hermione rejoin Harry later in OotP) and we see Lupin has a place to sleep on the train in PoA:

This had only one occupant, a man sitting fast asleep next to the window. Harry, Ron, and Hermione checked on the threshold.

(PoA)

Although the train is apparently "full":

Harry, Ron, and Hermione set off down the corridor, looking for an empty compartment, but all were full except for the one at the very end of the train.

(PoA)

So, while all compartments are usually in use, there are likely quite a few that aren't completely full but still don't have a place for 3 more students.

Now, the number of carriages varied a lot throughout the years. The early steam engines that were around when the Hogwarts Express was first established (circa the 1830s) were weak and the trains were pretty small, only carrying at most 4 smaller carriages most of the time (either when the Hogwarts Express was established there were way fewer students or there was more than one train). In the early 20th century we see Express trains with stronger engines (such as the Flying Scotsman) that would regularly carry 8-12 carriages but could carry up to 14 on busier days. So, let's say the Hogwarts Express has 13 regular carriages and another prefect carriage that isn't part of this calculation for the reasons mentioned above.

Each carriage is divided into compartments with 6 people fitting per compartment:

Too soon, it was time for the journey home on the Hogwarts Express. Harry, Ron, Hermione, Fred, George, and Ginny got a compartment to themselves.

(CoS)

This gives an idea of the layout (with a large enough corridor for the trolly lady):

(Using diagrams from the Flying Scotsman which is my closest analog)

Which lands us with 7 compartments per carriage. That being said, as Harry says this:

Firstly, Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle, who had clearly been waiting all week for the opportunity to strike without teacher witnesses, attempted to ambush Harry halfway down the train as he made his way back from the toilet.

(OotP)

This implies only the first carriage has a toilet (the prefect carriage), which seems weird to me since you have a few hundred students on that train for around 9 hours. But, the books imply there is only one toilet at the first carriage (maybe it's more than one stall. I hope it's more than one stall), so the train cars would look slightly different from the ones above —two more compartments and everything shifted a little to the side to accommodate. There will be one less door leading outside from such a carriage and slightly narrower compartments (which did exist, there were 6-person train compartments that were 6'1 wide instead of the pictured-above 6'6. These cars came with a toilet though so I edited the above picture. Why do they only have a toilet in the first compartment? Makes no sense):

9 compartments * 6 students * 6 cars = 324 for the minimal amount of space for students on the train.

9 compartments * 6 students * 13 cars = 702, which is spot on to the lower stagecoach estimate of about 700 students at max capacity of the train.

Potentially even more seats would be available if the prefects' carriage is sometimes replaced by a regular carriage (with a toilet) when there are more students. This would explain why Percy described two prefect compartments in PS, but in OotP and HBP the prefects have a whole carriage. This extra car will give us space for another 48 students. The fact they needed to remove the prefect carriage in PS to allow more space for students suggests Hogwarts was practically at its full capacity in 1991. (And that in 1995 there were ~50 less students in the school than in 1991)

So, at the maximum capacity (which seems to be the case in most of the books), the train is pretty much in the range of @perilousraven's stagecoach estimate.

So, what does it change about my estimates of the wizarding population? Not much actually.

Let's say there are around 700 students at Hogwarts when Harry is there (700 makes sense, it's 7 and it divides nicely, it's a round and pretty number. A little lower than the stagecoach estimate, but it makes more sense with the train. I actually think for most of his years it's a little less than 700, but I like round numbers):

700 students at the school -> 100 students per year -> 25 students per house per year -> 175 students per house.

(This also means Harry has more of an excuse not to know people in his year)

Which leads to the distribution of the population to be something like this approximation (The percentages are loosely based on 1992 UK population distribution by age, adjusted so there will be higher percentages for 90+ people due to the supposed longer lifespan of wizards and I made the generations born in the 1970s larger in percentage due to the first war's baby boom. Note that the number per house/year is inaccurate in the older generations since they're dying out):

(The percentages above are rough estimates cause I hate math and I like round numbers)

This keeps us at a wizarding population of about 6,000 wizards in the UK and Ireland (in the range of my former estimate of 5,700 - 6,200).

My former estimates were made with an adjusted distribution by age I explained here and here, due to the wars in the wizarding world being a little different from the muggle one, but I think that former distribution is wrong. I disagree with my past self on that, hence why I'm making this post and will edit a link to it in the relevant former theories. I came to the conclusion Harry's generation is actually one of the larger ones and that their population is younger. After all, most of his grandparents' generation is dead. The 1980s came right after Voldemort's defeat — so it's likely it brought a baby boom with it. Additionally in the 1970s (especially the latter half), we see couples marrying young and having children young (Arthur & Molly, James & Lily, probably Frank & Alice, and others) and we see this pattern of marrying during the war happening again in 1997-1998. So, I think the war years will also come with a baby boom compared to the generation of the Mauraders. Which, all in all, is closer to irl UK population distribution in the early 1990s.

So, my estimate now is still at around 6,000 wizards in the UK and Ireland (a bit less than 0.01% of the population) in the 1990s and 700 of them are at school with Harry since his generation is actually the largest one presently.

(Unfortunately, this changes some of my older percentages and estimates. It means that less than 5% of wizards in the UK are muggleborn and that below 12% of students get Os in most OWL exams, for example. Though, luckily the population remains in my former estimate range so it doesn't change everything. So I might slowly go back to add edit comments. I'm not planning to rewrite them for now, but just to add a little comment about this.)

[motherofplatypus]

Record of Genocide (Pt. 2)

[Part 3]

The List

Upon Children

Deaf man's son killed by Assrael

Leg of a girl Assrael blown up

A man carrying his baby that's killed by Assrael

Babies killed by Assrael

Two kids killed by Assrael

A girl had to be amputated after Assrael attacks

Assrael bombed civilians in their home

A doctor testimony on how Assrael killed a kid

Assrael killed a father's son

US doctor's testimony that assrael deliberately sniping children

A child amputated because of assrael

What Assrael did to children

Assrael killed a father's child

A dog eating a child killed by assrael

Assrael taking civilians to concentration camp and abuse women and children

Assraeli soldier kidnapped, stripped a boy naked, and abuse him

Toddler amputated because of assrael

Assrael justify detaining, torturing, and sexually abuse 12 years old children

Children that Assrael murdered

Assrael sniped 11-months old baby

Baby murdered by assrael

Multiple children injured from assrael targeted attack

Upon Palestinian in general

A doctor likely raped to death by Assraeli

Journalist spoke about the condition in Gaza

Assrael killing aid workers

Assrael airstrikes killed a journalist, killing him and severed his hand

Assrael opened fire and killed a man at a refugee checkpoint

An American citizen using tourist visa to commit war crimes in Gaza for two months

Assraeli justifying bombing civilians

Rescue worker killed by Assrael when he tried to save people

Assrael dropped bombs on UNRWA school

Assraeli soldier confessed their goal of occupation and ethnic cleansing.

Former USMC Captain and State Department Officer's testimony of assrael war crimes

UK doctor's testimony of Assrael war crimes

Assrael accused of poisoning food for civilians

An AI created to target people at home

An Assraeli drone dropped bomb on civilians home

Assrael ran over a woman alive with a tank

Assrael bombing praying site

A man holds a severed hand of a martyr that Assrael murdered

A man holds a severed leg of a martyr that Assrael murdered

Assrael replaced humanitarian aid food with C4 explosives

Assrael replaced humanitarian aids with sand and stole food from UN aid trucks

Assrael bombing university

Assrael bombing civilians tents

Assraelis assaulted a family

Three Assraelis ganging up on a man and abuse him

Assrael shooting ambulance

Mass grave from Nakba 1948 massacre uncovered under Tel Aviv

Assrael burn humanitarian aid

Assrael bombed a shop, killing multiple civilians

Assrael use quadcopter emitting baby's cry to lure civilians out and kill them

Assrael raided a hospital to steal the bodies of the people they killed

Assrael bombed residential building, killing 6 civilians

Assrael bans anaesthetic, crutches, dates, leading to people being amputated without anaesthetic.

Assrael destroying synagogue

Upon Lebanon

Assraeli soldier filming themselves blowing up a village in Lebanon

Assraeli soldiers sings while destroying an entire village in Lebanon

Assrael destroying Lebanon

BBC reveals Assrael lie about Hezbollah

Targeting residential building in Beirut again

Scottish journalist's testimony of assrael crimes in Lebanon

Assrael carpet bombing Lebanon

Assrael bombed civilians in Lebanon during a ceasefire deal

Assrael attacked a Lebanese footballer and put her in a coma

Assrael desecrates a church and mocks the Virgin Mary

Assrael violates ceasefire deal and attacked Lebanon at least 100 times

Outside of Palestine

Rabbi Shmulley's confession

Western media lying about what happened in Amsterdam

Rabbi Dovid Feldman was attacked by a zionist in New York

Zionist harassing people in praying site in Texas

Assrael official admits it was never about the hostages

Zionist making death threats and confirming of colonialization of Palestine

Assrael threatens to kill people everywhere (from November 2023)

Billionaires attack on anti-genocide protesters

Assrael attacked American ship in 1967, killing 34 and injured 174 others.

US vetoed another ceasefire, deepening their participation in genocide.

The US refuse to comply with ICC order

Assraeli soldier attacked UNICEF worker

Anti-African rally in Assrael

Christopher Bollyn comment about zionism

Assrael weaponizing Judaism for genocide

How zionism violates Judaism in every way

Testimony from the taxi driver assrael hooligans attacked

Jews and Assrael are two separate things

Assraeli Rabbi Yosef Mizrachi threatens the US

Former Assraeli Minister testimony about assrael (from 2002)

Assrael made Jews hated by the world

Jewish Rabbi burn assrael flag as protest against genocide

Nelson Mandela on assrael illegal occupation

Assrael stealing babies from Yemeni Jews since 1950s

Australian politicians pressured by US to vote against ceasefire

How US's "best ally" treat the US.

US cops assaulted unarmed peaceful protester

How bibi sees the US

Zionism is not Judaism

Assraeli using Judaism to justify murdering children

Assrael murdered three WCF workers, adding more deaths to the previous one

US-funded bombs being used to kill civilians in Palestine and Lebanon

Assraeli minister admits of wanting to illegally steal a land

This is not a complete list.

[sgiandubh]

Good morning to you...as always, this person is very indignant and enraged.

https://www.tumblr.com/maximumwobblerbanditdonut/748583730081333248/the-unexpected-guests?source=share

Dear (returning) Mythomaniac Anon,

Sorry for the delay and see below why. Well, then: how was that, at their end of the rope, across the street?

I know, I am quoting BIF (that petty, nasty, condescending woman), their Main Intellectual Luminary (LOL for years), but see how easy it is to boomerang anything?

And I will even suit myself and quote her some more, lookie here:

I am not even sorry. Karma is a bitch, like that and it seems to have backfired badly on BIF's comadre, 'Max'. You see, I can immediately tell when people who have NO idea about what LAW really is, start talking about it. They will always be oh so damn literal and oh so damn mechanical in their 'reasonings'. I mean, if law were to be read as is, why would we even bother going to law school, right? Why not have AI sort it out, literally and mechanically, too (and boy does 'Max' sound like an android when she starts droning her maximum wobbling bullshit)? You see, in law, it's never enough to copy/paste something, because this is about people, money and interests, being those individual or collective. Timelines are important (and indispensable in any legal approach), but never enough: what makes the difference is always the particular context and the interpretation of facts - that is, by the way, called jurisprudence, when it becomes a legally binding precedent (not our modest case, here), in common law system countries (the UK, the US) or a complementary source of law, like in Roman/Civil law systems, such as the French and Romanian ones, which I know best. There is a technical distinction between those two concepts (legally binding precedent and complementary source of law) and I once passed a whole year written exam in Public French Law with honors, picking this exact topic, but I won't bother you with it, Anon. In a nutshell, tread carefully when you open that droning mouth and leave no stone unturned, if possible. Otherwise, you'd make a fool out of yourself, with bullshit like this:

There is no Midhope Distillery Company Ltd, you fool. There once was the Midhope Castle Distillery Ltd, as I have abundantly shown in not one, but two posts. It did not 'change its name' in 2023, it was dissolved by voluntary write-off (third time might be a charm, across the street, maybe the coin would drop?). And one more time, for you Mordor people in the back: there is no way to know who the shareholders of a given company are, based on the Company House records, nor the amount of their participation. This is confidential information, as shown also in the Planning Proposal - once more, I repost the screenshot:

' The Business Plan, submitted (...) under Private and Confidential cover, provides background information on the applicant'. Including, but not limited to, the existing investors/shareholders - it is essential to show the local authorities your business project is not a whim or a dream.

She also writes confidently stuff like:

That is simply not true. As I have also shown in my last post, Outlander is explicitly mentioned in both the first and the revised Planning Proposals, as a strong argument for the entire business project. It may serve to remember that one of the elements justifying it was to provide the 20k seasonal visitors of the Midhope Castle Grounds an opportunity to access the (vastly) improved interior of the castle, along with a whisky related experience/discovery activity, accommodation and high-end dining opportunity. Again, I repost the screenshot, because those people are mendacious by nature and it is perhaps the only way to show them some facts (not useless factoids):

That being said, we can speculate and deduct a simple correlation between a company actively looking for investors to support their now vastly revised, ten-year project and an actor-cum-entrepreneur who might be interested/already involved in that project. Unless he'd make a formal announcement himself, at some point in time, there is no way to confirm. 'Max' should perhaps learn to water down her confident tone, sometimes, especially when it is obvious she did not look at the documents herself, used only Google in the arrogant and foolish hope 'those tinhat shippers are stupid' and has 0 (zero) legal expertise.

This whole thing might be pending approval, but let's not forget the first Planning Statement was approved back in 2020 (which is a good starting point), that they have secured a business partnership with the owner of the land, Lord Hope (the 4th Marquess of Linlithgow) and that as far as I could read during those past two days, all the reports seem ok, at least up until this point in time. I see no reason why they wouldn't meet and talk about it: on which planet is that such a big deal and on which planet could that be construed as 'conflict of interest' (another one of 'Max's' arguments), given the organic link between OL and Midhope, since 2013?

I also have made a hasty mistake, in my previous post, when dealing with Ken Robertson's participation to the project. He continued to be involved, as my penned timeline shows, in both Hopetoun Estate Distillery Ltd and Hopetoun Estate Whiskies Ltd, as a Director, continuously from May 2017 until their dissolution, in December 2022. Again, it's all on the timeline - see what I just did, here? LOL for a century and a half.

And for Marple's 'Sorry' clip, I have the perfect reply. Especially the chorus, of course - ignore the rest, it's about some Seventies playboy, quite an Alternate Universe from hers:

I will stop now, Anon. With the MPC Gala just round the corner, all the eyes will be on that one. This drama will probably draw to a fizzled denouement, as they always do, in this fandom. But I will follow that business project and report from time to time. I bet the farm we'll have news, rather sooner than later.

[pancake-cat22]

The Hockey AU characters pt. 2

I’m back with the second part! This time I’ll be going over the members of the Shadows team :)

Etho Slab

He and Gem are cousins but he really considers her more of a younger sister

He’s from Canada

When he lived in Canada, he was stuck in one of the lower hockey leagues and was having difficulties getting anywhere in his career, which is one of the reasons he accepted the offer to play in Shadows (the other being that Gem was there)

He sometimes wears a mask in public when he’s more self-conscious

He started playing hockey when he was 7 years old

He’s terrified of planes and dislikes going in taxis

He’s interested in engineering and considered it a possible future career path if hockey didn’t work out

He built himself a drone once and proceeded to accidentally fly it into a lake

He never met his father, which is partially why his family was around Gem’s so much (his mother needed some support from them)

Bdubs

Moved from the US to play in Shadows

He has absolutely no cooking skills. He once burnt water.

He regularly tries to convince Skizz of increasing more ridiculous things. It works most of the time

He likes to get meddle in things that are none of his business for his own entertainment (see: literally the matchmaker group chat)

Lives with Impulse and Skizz in an apartment (in Crosscheck the apartment is being renovated which is why they stay in the hotel)

When asked by a reporter what he thought about a team that had just beaten them by two points in a match, he cursed the team (and the reporter) out for five whole minutes before their pr manager had to literally drag him away. He got in quite a bit of trouble for that one but still proceeded to do the same thing about two weeks later

He knows Impulse since high school

Impulse Esvee

Moved from the US along with Bdubs to play in Shadows

He used to repair electronics as a side job to support his hockey career

Though he’s subtle about it, he often helps Bdubs in any mischief

When he was in middle school, he released his class’s pet frog into the local forest after seeing a nature documentary and thinking the frog belonged outside

Lives in an apartment with Skizz and Bdubs

Skizz Man

Moved from the US to play in Shadows

In high school he crashed his parents’ car into a stop sign before even having his drivers license

He was actually quite popular in high school just because of his surname

During the first match he had in the Shadows, he scored four goals

When asked by a reporter what drove him to play hockey once, he asked her what hockey was (he didn’t understand her properly because of her accent) The interview went quite viral for a few days and their pr manager, who at first scolded him for it, was very happy with the attention it got them

Because of Bdubs, he is now fully convinced that unicorns used to exist

Tango Tek

Moved from the US to study mechanical engineering London and stayed in the UK since

He used to repair cars as a full job, now he buys old cars and restores and fixes them to be resold

He’s dating Jimmy and even lives with him

When he was a child, he had an imaginary friend called Torchy. It was literally just a torch. His parents were a bit worried for him at the time.

He’s the Shadow team’s photographer

Ren Dog

The Shadows team’s mascot (he’s basically dressed as a king, aka the ‘Shadow King’)

Has a weird thing with Martyn where nobody knows what they are, not even them

He was a theatre kid

He plays in the local tiny theatre sometimes just for fun

He regularly donates to school to support their art and theatre departments

He met Martyn in college (the uk college) (and yes, they have done their theatrical weirdness since then)

Scott Major

The Shadow team’s manager

He has known Cleo since secondary school

He’s the kind of person who knows everyone

He met Lizzie and Jimmy when he was 15 through their parents

He dyed his hair his classical blue when he was a teen as an act of rebellion to his parents, only for them to compliment it and for him to love it. He never changed it back since

He was always very involved in the art department when he used to go to school. He ended up painting a mural for the school in his final year of secondary school. He still paints sometimes in his spare time

Cleo Zombie

The Shadow team’s coach

She knows Scott since secondary school

People never believe their real surname is really ‘Zombie’ until they show them their drivers license. She considered changing it once but decided they like it too much

They tutor kids in their spare time for free. They’re much nicer to them than they are to the Shadow players

When a reporter once asked her if she’s sure she’s a good fit to coach hockey players as a woman, she punched him. The team’s pr manager didn’t even get mad at them for that one.

Well, that’s it! I’ll hopefully post the third part about the characters who are not on either team soon :)

[probablyasocialecologist]

According to research by the Campaign Against the Arms Trade (CAAT), the UK has licensed more than £472 million in arms exports to Israel since 2015. This includes tank components, armour-piercing ammunition and small arms, but, in keeping with the structure of the British weapons industry, aerospace components for fighters and drones predominate. It’s difficult to get clear numbers from the arms industry. The headline figure is taken from the value of standard licences, but the UK also operates a system of open licences that permit transfers of unlimited – and unspecified – quantities of particular military goods. Since 2015, 57 such licences have been granted for export to Israel, ten of those in 2022. They include British components for the American-designed F-35 aircraft, which campaigners estimate have been worth £336 million to the companies (primarily BAE Systems) producing them. Because the quantities of goods issued under open licences are not made public, groups such as CAAT have to back-engineer their value. In recent years the government has become increasingly hostile to Freedom of Information requests on arms, but there is enough publicly available data to be certain that the planes currently flattening apartment blocks and refugee camps in Gaza rely on components engineered and manufactured in Britain. There is little appetite in Westminster for reform of the domestic arms industry. For one thing, it is a rare economic success story. The UK is the second largest exporter of defence items in the world and, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Initiative, the sixth largest exporter of major conventional weapons (which means everything short of weapons of mass destruction), primarily aircraft. The total value of standard licences issued in 2021 was £10.7 billion, and the industry depends on its aerospace sector, which accounts for 72 per cent of export business. More than half of all British defence exports go to the Middle East – but to Saudi Arabia rather than Israel. Human rights organisations, including Amnesty International, accuse BAE Systems of being party to Saudi war crimes in Yemen, where BAE-supplied (and serviced) fighters have bombed schools and hospitals.

James Butler, Up in Arms

[girlactionfigure]

🟦 Sunday - events from Israel  

ISRAEL REALTIME - Connecting to Israel in Realtime

( VIDEO - Fadi rocket damage in the Krayot, north of Haifa. Large rocket, large damage. )

♦️IDF: During the night and morning hours, about 150 rockets, cruise missiles and UAVs were launched towards Israel.

♦️COUNTER-TERROR OPS - SHECHEM.. forces in action in Shechem today, during a routine counter-terrorism operation in the Kasbah of Shechem, IDF fighters opened fire on terrorists who threw stones and Molotov cocktails.  A number of terrorists were wounded by security forces.

♦️An Israeli military official: "The operations in Lebanon prevented a more difficult morning, we will intensify the attacks.”  The IDF is preparing to intensify the attacks in Lebanon not as part of a response, but part of the war plans.

♦️GAZA.. fighting continues all over Rafah, in recent days there are still pockets of resistance even in places that the army cleared months ago.

▪️ENGLISH HOSPITAL NAZARETH.. four victims of rockets from Hezbollah, two from shrapnel and two from anxiety, were treated and released.

💩HEZBOLLAH SAYS.. A senior member of Hezbollah:  The meeting in which Akil and the top officials of Hezbollah (and the Radwan invasion force) were killed in Da'ahia, Beirut was intended to examine a plan for a ground invasion of Israeli territory in response to the beeper bombs.

💩THE ROCKETS.. Hezbollah is firing Fadi 1 and 2 rockets, 220 mm and a range of up to 85 km, and 302 mm with a range of up to 105 km, respectively.  Best guess on comparative rockets puts the warheads at around 100 kg and 150 kg.  In comparison the Katyusha, which they have been firing large quantities of at the near-border towns, is about 10 kg warhead, and the Grad, also being fired in quantity, is 21 kg.  So these rockets have medium range and moderately heavy damage.

They are not a precision weapon.

▪️ ISRAEL ON THE UK.. President Herzog on Sky News: "There is a sense of disappointment in Israel with the conduct of the new government in Britain towards it."

▪️US SENDING.. Against the backdrop of the escalation in the north: the US is sending another aircraft carrier to the Middle East after having sent one of the two in the area back home.

▪️US VICTIMS SAY.. Relatives of Americans who were murdered in Akil's attacks against the US embassy and marine barracks in the 1980’s in Beirut: "Israel has a long memory, justice has been done.”

⭕20 rounds of ROCKET and SUICIDE DRONE fire from Hezbollah so far since 6:00 this morning.  And a particular round may now include 10-30 targets.

🇮🇱HOME FRONT COMMAND - alert level 3 - HAIFA, TIBERIUS, and north, including the Golan, Safed, etc.   - School: closed, Workplaces: only where it is possible to reach a protected space in 1 minute, Restriction of gatherings - in a building up to 10 people, in an open area up to 100 people, the IDF also cancels agricultural work in the areas near the border in the north.

🔸ANXIETY / MENTAL HEALTH HOTLINES: experiencing issues? Hotlines & help is available..

.. in English : Tikva Helpline by KeepOlim, call if you are struggling!  dial 074-775-1433.

.. in Hebrew & other languages (and English): Eran Emotional Support Line - dial 1201 or chat via eran.org.il  

[dickgraysonwayne]

Underneath

Ao3

Summary: Agent 37 seems familiar, but nah…he couldn’t be.

@dickgraysonweek 2024, Day 5: Dick (Helen) of Troy | Batfam Meets Agent 37 | Polyamory

Jason fucking hates Tuesdays.

Fuckin’ Tuesdays, he stews, kicking a can at his feet. Fuckin’ Batman. Fuckin’ drug dealers. Fuckin’…

“Hey,” Tim says, adjusting his baseball cap over his forehead. “Are you blaming Tuesdays again?”

“No,” Jason grunts. He doesn’t make eye contact. “Aren’t you annoyed, though? That we had to come all the way here…”

Tim shrugs, all smarmy-like. “Hey,” He says. “I get to miss school this way, so. I’m not too bothered.”

“But,” And Jason gestures around the alley they’re in. The mist hands low over his face, leaving him with a permanent vaguely damp feeling. “We’re not even in Gotham.”

“So?” Tim says. “I like travel. Anyway, it’s not even that different from Gotham…”

“We’re not even in the country anymore!” Jason hefts his backpack on his shoulder, irritation growing.

“Dude,” Tim says, summarily unimpressed. “What’s with you? So we do a little trip to the UK to investigate some drug operation Scarecrow’s running. What’s wrong with that?”

“I just…” Jason’s face screws up, pushing back at the memories in his head: the heat, the exhaustion, the pain. “I…I don’t like travel. That’s all.”

Tim sighs. “Well,” He says. “You better pull yourself together. Unless you wanna tell Babs you’d rather come back home and not do the mission she asked you to do? Or Bruce?”

“No need to go that far,” Jason mutters

“And,” Tim says. “Do you want to take shit from Damian about not being able to handle a ‘simple fact finding mission’ that even a ‘fool’ could complete?”

“That one,” Jason says, shrugging. “I don’t particularly care about.”

“Well, I do,” Tim says. He looks through the alleyway grimly before pushing forward. “So let’s go. The sooner we’re done, the sooner we come back anyway. So. We headed in the right direction?”

Japan glances back down at the phone in his hand. “Yeah,” He says. “Building should be showing up soon. It’s a bakery, top floor.”

Tim nods. “Okay then,” He says. “Plan confirmed?”

“Reconnaissance,” Jason drones out. “Get a sense of the operation and get out. Yeah. I know.”

“No tipping them off,” Tim says sternly. Jason hears a tinge of Bruce-inspired gravitas in his tone. It’s not quite as effective in a just-hit-puberty vocal range. “I mean, we can probably develop something to counteract the drug now, but still…don’t risk it.”

Jason grins. “Aye aye, Captain.”

He can practically feel Tim’s glowering frown. “Hey,” He says. “Why do you always—” He pauses. “Oh. Hear that?”

“Oh, yes,” Jason says, the feeling of being watched prickling over his back. “Think they’ll attack?”

“Well,” Tim says. “They’re still following, so.”

Jason nods. “Yeah,” He says. “Get ready..”

He barely has time to pull out a weapon before all hell breaks loose.

-

“I. Fucking. Hate. Tuesdays!”

Jason rolls, dodging a sword (a sword?) that clangs heavily against the cobblestones of the alleyway.

He looks up. A veritable gang of people seem to have rolled up on them in the last couple minutes, all outfitted in the same dark outfit and face covering.

They’d been ready for them. This is an ambush.

“Stop it with the Tuesday thing already,” Tim says, whacking a man around the head with his staff. “It’s obnoxious at this point.”

“You’re obnoxious at this point,” Jason kicks another man in the chest, then zaps someone else with an escrima stick. “You know what else is obnoxious? Not having a fucking gun.”

“I guess you—oomph—missed the point of a covert operation,” Tim says, staggering back at an attack, but recovering quickly.

Jason, about to go help him, is stopped by three attacking him at once. “This look covert to you?” He asks, zapping at someone else. “And anyway…shit!”

There’s too many people. It’s taking all his concentration to stay alive, stay uninjured, and he senses more than sees someone start to make his way around them, to the vulnerability of his back.

Jason grits his teeth, doing a final large sweep before turning back. “No you don’t—”

But he turns to see a nozzle pointed directly at his face, and stumbles back automatically. “Shit..”

He flips through days worth of research in his head substance distribution memory issues side effects no treatment yet magic involved and holds his breath, swearing internally…

A crossbow bolt suddenly embeds itself in the man’s chest, who gives a kind of choked gasp, shudders, then collapses onto the damp cobblestones, twitching a couple times before going still.

Jason doesn’t have time to react. He whirls back around, lifting a stick to protect himself from a blow to his head. Tim is standing nearby, still fighting, still upright.

He sees another man aim a knife at Tim from behind, then draws in a breath to warn him, before…

A gunshot rings through the air, and the man screams, clutching at his bloody hand and dropping to his knees.

Guns? Jason thinks frantically. He dodges a blow to the head, feeling weirdly vindicated. He draws an arm back, ready to zap another person, before—

A large figure runs in from the side, tackling the person in front of him and taking him both to the ground. They collapse into the shadows, tussling in a smaller alleyway to the side.

“What—”

Jason whirls around back to Tim, and sees someone else jump into the fray next to him. It’s a woman this time: face uncovered, clothing casual, and punches lethal.

Who the hell…

He feels something sting at his shin. His leg buckles, and he swears as he stumbles to his knees, trying to find his bearings.

The sticks drop from his hands and roll, and he dives frantically to try to grab them back. He looks up to see another nozzle aimed at his face, and…

Time slows down. Jason sees the finger on the nozzle tighten, then push, and he knows that there’s no stopping it, that he won’t have time to move backwards or to the side…

Suddenly, he’s looking at a gray t shirt covering a broad back, and it’s so unexpected that he thinks there’s something wrong with his sight at first. Instead, he hears the nozzle being deployed and then a cough, and he knows that it isn’t coming from him, so…

A woman’s voice cries out “You idiot!”

The back in front of him bends, then falls, revealing the startled eyes of the masked man that Jason had been staring at earlier, still holding the spray bottle. This snaps Jason back into movement, and he picks the sticks back up and delivers a hard thwack to the man’s head.

He hears the thrmmm sound of another crossbow bolt, then keeps fighting, mind whirling. He notices almost instantly that the crowd seems to have thinned out, but he doesn’t know if that means that they won or that they lost.

It feels like minutes, but the alleyway empties out, save for a few of the men that they had taken down. The woman with the crossbow stows it away then runs, falling to her knees in front of Jason, pulling at the downed man in front of him.

Tim follows close behind, looking tired, but cautious. Jason nods at him, then waits for Tim’s answering nod.

“So,” Jason says eyeing the duo in front of them. “You think they bulk ordered all those ninja outfits or did they have them laying around?”

Tim gives a tired laugh. “Maybe they got them from the Minion Coat Factory,” He suggests,

“Not your best work,” Jason comments, before the woman gives a loud sigh.

“You idiot,” The woman hisses again to the downed man. She pulls at the man on the ground, who slowly goes upright, head bowed. “What are you doing?”

The man looks up. Jason literally feels the color drain from his face.

“Dick?”

Tim stops in his tracks at the word, drawing a quick, choked breath.

Dick looks him in the eye (it’s him oh my god it’s him it’s him it’s him), and then, with a slight air of confusion, says:

“Who?”

-

Jason’s blood freezes in his veins. “That’s…” His kind is whirring in all sorts of different directions, not knowing where to stop, and how. “That’s…that’s you. That’s you, right? It’s you?”

Dick’s (maybe?) eyebrows furrow. “I…” He says. “No. I’m…” He looks up at the woman with him, who gives him a curious stare. “Who are these people? Do we know them?”

“No,” The woman says, giving him a furtive look. “What’s wrong with you?”

It’s at this point that something in Jason snaps.

He surges forward, grabbing Dick by the shoulders and pulling him close. He stares intently into his face. “It’s you, isn’t it? It’s you. It looks like you. What happened? How is it you?”

Dick’s startled eyes darken quickly. A hand quickly latched onto his wrists and bodily throw him off. “Get off me,” Dick says, voice dangerous. “Don’t do that again.”

“Stop being a dick,” Jason yells, trying to get closer. “What was it? Lazarus Pit? Did it make you forget or something? Did it—”

A hand yank at his shoulder, pulls him back. He startles, looks down and Tim, white-faced and tight lipped, holding onto him for dear life.

“Stop,” Tim says, and it comes out quiet. “This is…look, we don’t know what’s going on, okay? But we need to find out. Obviously.”

Here, the woman with Dick steps in. “We all need to calm down,” She says. “Look. I’ll introduce myself, okay? My colleague,” and here she points at Dick (it’s him!) “And I represent a global organization that specializes in, hm, covert operations, let’s say. I shouldn’t be telling you any of this at all, but,” And here she gives him a searching look. “I have a feeling you would have found out about us either way.”

“I don’t really give a shit,” Jason begins, but Tim squeezes his shoulder tighter.

“Let her continue,” He says quietly. His eyes are fixed on Dick, and his hand is trembling.

“There’s not much more than that, really,” The woman says. “You can refer to me as Matron, and this,” She gestures at Dick. “Introduce yourself.”

Dick nods. “I’m Agent 37,” He says. “I would say pleased to meet you, but…”

“Yes, okay, fine,” Jason says, impatient. “Let me guess. You woke up somewhere and were told that you were this agent guy at this organization and that you’ve always been there, and you rolled with that, right?”

“Hey,” The woman protests, but Dick waves her down.

“No,” Dick says. “That’s incorrect, actually. I’m pretty sure I’ve only ever been Agent 37. That’s just who I am.”

Jason’s eyebrows raise. “Oh yeah?” He says. “Can you tell me anything about your childhood?”

“I…” Dick’s voice trails off. “Why would I tell you that? I don’t know you.”

“Come on,” Jason says. “You very clearly don’t remember a childhood. So what does that tell you? Either you popped into existence as an adult or you’ve been brainwashed in some way. And, since you were fucking dead, my guess would be on a Lazarus Pit.”

“Dead?” Dick asks.

“What the hell is a Lazarus Pit?” Matron says at the same time.

“Fuck it,” Jason says. He grabs at Dick’s arm again. “Come on. Let’s take you home, and we can try to get your memory back. And then when you remember us we can talk for real instead of going in circles like this.”

Dick yanks his arm back again. “I don’t know you!”

“Oh yeah?” Jason says, voice rising. “Then why did you—”

“Let’s talk for a sec,” Tim interrupts, pulling him off to the side. “Stay there, please.”

“What are you doing?” Jason hisses as he’s dragged off. “That’s Dick. You know? Your brother? The one that’s dead? That brother? How are you not…how are you not reacting to this?”

“We don’t know that it’s him,” Tim says, and his voice cracks on the word. “We can’t…we can’t be sure until we can confirm it. And I…I don’t want to say that until…”

Oh. Jason feels kind of bad for snapping. “Hey,” He says. “I get it. But, come on. That’s Dick. It’s very clearly him. And he’s alive and he needs a kick in the ass to remember who he is. And we’re the only ones who can help him.”

Tim sniffs. “Yeah,” He says. “I guess you’re right.”

“Of course I’m right,” Jason says. “Look. This is good news. He’s alive! We just need to get all of him back is all. And this isn’t our first go around with resurrection, right?”

Tim nods.

“Excellent,” Jason turns back to the two agents. “Now. As I was saying. If you didn’t know us, why did you jump in and save us from those guys? There’s no reason to do that for completely random strangers. Especially not for jumping in front of someone who was about to—”

He cuts himself off. “Oh. Hold on. You got hit by…oh my god. Oh we’re so stupid.”

“Oh,” The Matron says, snapping her fingers. “You’re right! The spray. Or whatever that was. That’s probably what’s going on here.”

“What spray?” Tim asks, eyes narrowed.

“I don’t feel any different,” Dick says, but Jason ignores him.

“Dick got sprayed by something during the fight,” He explains to Tim. “And…hey, remember what we came here for? Scarcrow’s whole operation?”

Tim stares at him for a second before understanding fills his gaze. It’s a second longer than it would normally take. “Oh!” He says. And then, quietly, again, “Oh.”

“Yeah,” Jason says grimly. He turns to the other two. “We came here to investigate a drug operation, with some sort of magic involved—it’s a long story. The drugs have a…memory issues side effect. And since Dick here lost his memories after getting hit, then—”

“He must’ve ingested the drug,” Matron continues. Her eyes tighten. “Amateur hour, 37. How do you let yourself get hit like that?”

“I didn’t!” Dick protest. “I…” His eyes glaze over. “I…”

Tim interrupts him. “The memory loss seems targeted,” He says thoughtfully. “His whole sense of self is gone, but he still seems to be able to function like he normally does. He has a persona left, but only his primary identity is gone. This is new, we should look into this more.”

“And get you back,” Jason says, staring Dick down.

“And get him back,” Tim agrees. He gestures towards them. “We probably have a formula that’ll be helpful here, to counteract the drug. And that thing Constantine gave us…Anyway, if you’ll all come with me, we can take you back home and—”

Dick shakes his head, speaking before Tim’s even done. “I can’t leave,” He says. “I have work to do here. I can’t leave.”

“You have to,” Jason cuts in. “You need to get your memory back, don’t you? And then, maybe…” His voice trails off. “We can find out what happened to you.”

“He’s not leaving,” Matron cuts in. “We have resources here you can use. A lab, everything. We’ll take you to HQ: we need the real 37 back, so consider yourselves hired. On a temporary basis.”

“No,” Tim says, voice firm. “All our research…we have everything set up at our base. We can take it from here.”

Dick shakes his head. “I’m not going,” He repeats and man does that stubborn expression look familiar. Jason had thought he was never going to see it again. “I don’t know you.”

Tim looks at Jason helplessly.

Jason sighs. Fucking Tuesdays. “Fine,” she says shortly, then tilts his head to Tim. “You got the folder with all the info? And all the solutions and stuff?”

Tim grits his teeth. “Yeah,” He says. “I do. But—”

“We kinda don’t have a choice, here,” Jason says. He glances at the two agents again. “Fine. Lead the way. We’ll go to your HQ.”

“Right,” Matron grabs Dick’s hand, helping to pull him to his feet. “Follow us. 37, you remember the way?”

Dick nods. “Yeah,” He says, then sets off without another word.

Jason swears under his breath, then rushes to follow, Tim right next to him.

-

It doesn’t take long before Tim breaks.

Jason had known it was coming, had seen it in the twitching of his fingers and the telltale furrow of his brow, so he just waits.

He doesn’t want long before he feels him elbow his arm. “Jason,” Tim hisses, clearly trying to remain out of earshot. “We have a problem.”

“You think?” Jason says, eyebrows raised. “What could’ve clued you into that idea? What, with the drug ninjas and resurrected amnesiac brother?”

“Shut up,” Tim mutters. “Anyway. We probably blew the mission. I’d guess the drug operation’s packing up and leaving as we speak.”

Jason sighs. “Get ready for that earful from Damian.”

“You said you didn’t care about that!”

Jason shrugs. “I lied. He’s a tiny little shrimp and his royal shrimpiness gets soooo smug when he’s right.”

“Yeah,” Tim says, but his heart is clearly not into it. “I guess so.”

Jason waits a little more.

“It’s just that,” Tim begins, voice hesitant. “Dick…he got hit by the memory spray thing right? And he got hit because he was saving us, right?”

Jason nods. “He stepped in front of me,” He says. His throat tightens. “He took the hit.”

“So,” Tim says. “He knew to do that. He knew who we were, before he got sprayed. So…he was alive this whole time. Here. And…and we thought he was dead.”

Jason sits with that for a while. A spike of anger and confusion pools up in his head.

“We thought he was dead,” Jason repeats. “And he’s alive. And…and we don’t know why…”

“But he still…” Tim swallows. “He must’ve known. What that would do. And…and he still did it. Why?”

Jason grits his teeth. He stares at the back of Dick’s head. “We’ll find out soon enough,” He says.

A sign in the distance catches his eye. He squints. “Does that say girls’ school?”

-

“Welcome,” Matron says, sweeping an arm out at the entrance. “To HQ.”

Jason eyes the building, skeptical. “Girls’ school?” He repeats.

Matron shrugs, smiling. “The children are our future, and all that,” She says.

Jason waits for Dick to chime in, make a lame joke, continue the song lyrics…

But he just stands there, face blank, waiting.

Matron gives him a look. “Wow,” She says. “You’re really not yourself, huh?”

“Yeah, like we’ve been saying,” Jason says, a little irritated by her overfamiliarty. “So can we speed this up already?”

“Jason,” Tim hisses, sounding embarrassed.

Matron shrugs. “I’ve had worse,” She says. She leads them through hallways, the sounds of laughing women echoing in the distance. “I just need to take you around—ah. Here we go.”

She stops outside a door with ROOM 84 emblazoned on a large sign stuck to it. She creaks it open then peers in furtively before ushering them in “Come on,” She says.

Dick goes in robotically, without comment. Jason follows, seeing a pretty impressive and fully equipped lab on the inside.

“Huh,” Jason says, looking around. “Nice setup you have here.”

Dick, finally, speaks up. “Are you sure about this?” He asks Matron, with only a hint of doubt in his voice.

“Yes,” Matron says. “We gotta get you back to how you were. And, you know,” She gives him a significant look. “I’m going to need you fully with me for what’s coming.”

Dick’s face clears up. “Ah. Right.”

“You don’t have much time,” She says, backing up towards the door. “Try to get it done quick. I’ll keep watch. Good luck.” She nods, then snaps the door shut.

Tim instantly leaps into work, pulling out his file and starting to decipher it. “I’ll need a while,” Is all he says, before his focus narrows and he zones in on the problem in front of him.

Jason sinks into a straight backed chair. “All we can do is wait,” He feels compelled to tell Dick. “I’m gonna nap, I think.”

Dick’s face is blank. Disturbingly so. He nods.

It disturbs Japan so much that he wants to try to wipe it off. “What do I call you?” He asks him. “Agent? 37? Full name? What?”

A bit of emotion leaks back into Dick’s face. “Agent 37 is fine,” He says. He falls silent again.

“So,” Jason says, trying to goad out the emotion again. “What do you like to do? You have any hobbies, anything like that?”

Dick stays carefully blank. “Not particularly,” He says. “I’m too busy for that.”

“Doing what?”

“Top secret,” Dick replies. “Can’t tell you.”

“Then why were we okay to be let in here?” Jason asks. “You sure didn’t put up much of a fight to take us right into the heart of your operation.”

Dick shrugs. “Matron made that call,” He says. “I followed her lead.”

“Yeah,” Jason says. “But that wasn’t very international man of mystery of you, was it? What do you think that means?”

Dick frowns a little. “Can’t say it means anything,” He says.

Well. He’s just as frustrating without his memories as he is with them. “Then why are you still talking to me?” Jason demands. “What do you gain? Is that what you’re drawn to do? Have you thought about why that is?”

“You’re very angry,” Dick says, looking a little curious now. “Why?”

“Don’t try that on me,” Jason says. “I know you. That won’t work. And anyway, I’m not angry. I just want answers.”

“And I can’t give them to you,” Dick pins him with a searching gaze. “Look. I know it sounds…illogical, but I think you may be right. Maybe I am the guy you say I am, and the gaps in my memory hold the person you’re looking for. But I’m not that guy right now. And I can’t tell you what you want to hear.”

Jason laughs disbelievingly. “You sure about that?” He asks. “You sure sound like him right now.”

“Maybe,” Dick says. “But I’m not him. I’m Agent 37. You’re going to have to wait for this other guy to come back.”

“Hey,”

They both turn. Tun stands there, a glass bottle in his hand. “It’s done. It was mostly done anyway, because of the magic involved, I just added the—never mind. It’s done. You can take it.”

Dick stands up, slowly taking the bottle from Tim’s hand. Tim doesn’t make eye contact, and steps over to Jason’s side as soon as the bottle leaves his possession.

That…that definitely seems like a problem.

“So?” Jason asks. “You ready for the other guy to come back?”

“I…” Dick says. He pushes, drawing in a deep breath.

Jason waits, heart pounding.

Dick breathes out slowly, then says “Okay.”

“What,” Jason says, disbelieving. “Just like that?”

“I guess I trust you,” Dick says. Before Jason can reply, he downs the liquid in one swallow.

-

Jason waits.

Time ticks by, and Dick just sits there, eyes screwed shut.

“What’s wrong with him?” Jason whispers to Tim, eyeing Dick critically.

Tim is so tense he’s about to snap in half. “It probably tastes gross,” He says. “Give it a second. It’ll work. I’m sure it’ll work. Give it a second.”

Jason waits a second. And then another. And then another.

When Dick opens his eyes again, alive, teary, scared, Jason knows. He knows.

He stands up.

“Dick?” Tim asks, voice a tad wobbly. “You back?”

Dick takes a shuddering breath. “Hi guys,” he croaks out. “Long time no see.”

Tim lets out a soft oh noise, then runs toward Dick is one quick motion. He slams into his torso, almost knocking him backward. He wraps Dick in a tight hug, face mashed into the gray t shirt. “You’re alive,” Tim says, voice teary. “You’re…you’re here.”

Dick wraps his arms around Tim, squeezing just as tight. “Yeah,” He says, choked. “I guess I am.”

There’s a part of Jason that wants to join them, to give in to the need to give a hug, to allow a few tears to fall, to let go of that weight on his shoulders.

There’s a bigger part, though, that’s too full of rage to do much of anything else.

Jason crosses his arms. “So,” He says, voice deceptively calm. “Can you explain how you’re alive? When we all saw you die? And why, if you were alive this whole time, you’re here instead?”

Tim freezes, then slowly lets go of Dick, backing up next to Jason.

Dick’s face falls into a devastated expression. He stays silent.

“Dick?” Tim says. His voice is quiet, confused. “Can you answer his question?”

Dick audibly swallows. “I…” He says. “Look. I’m still a little out of it because I just got all my memories back, so—”

“Excuse,” Jason says shortly. “You have your memories back? That means you have your reasons back too. So. Explain.”

Dick sighs. “Look,” He says. “I didn’t want to. I promise you, I didn’t want to. And…and I wanted you to know I was okay. But…I couldn’t. I’m sorry.”

Jason gives a disbelieving laugh. “That’s barely an explanation,” He says. “Total bullshit, to be honest. Did you even die? Or was that a lie too?”

Dick’s voice softens. “No. That was real. It’s just…I didn’t stay that way. Obviously.”

“Obviously?” Jason says, eyebrows raising. “That’s what you have to say right now? Unbelievable.”

Dick raises his hands in surrender. “I didn’t mean it that way,” He says. “I promise. I…I really am sorry, it’s just…”

“How could you?”

And there’s the Tim explosion.

“You knew. You knew how upset we’d be! You knew. And you still let it happen. We mourned you! We…we had to deal with that all by ourselves! Us, and Babs, and Alfred, and Damian—” and here Tim’s mouth clicks shut, a look of horror on his face. “Oh my god. Damian. Do you know?”

Dick actually smiles. “Yeah,” He says, a heavy sort of relief in his voice. “I…I saw him. On the news. I about passed out when I did.”

Shitty way to find out. Jason thinks. But really is there even a good way? Or just a bunch of really bad ways?

“Then you know! How could you?” Tim’s voice is hoarse by now, his volume increasing with every word. “Not to mention what it’s doing to Bruce!”

Dick’s expression flickers, just barely, at Bruce’s name. Jason knows the signs, and knows exactly what that must mean.

“Tim,” Dick says, voice heavy, but Jason doesn’t let him get that far.

“Bruce,” Jason repeats. “He knew, didn’t he.”

Dick makes eye contact with him, and Jason knows that he’s right. “He’s…he’s the one who sent me here.” He says. There’s an air of resignation in his tone, a total surrender to his situation. It’s disquieting, seeing him like this.

“Of fucking course,” Jason mutters. “Let me guess. He saw an opportunity to use your whole situation and he took it. Motherfu—”

“But you went along with it!” Tim bursts out. He’s still angry (so angry) but not as explosive now. “If you didn’t want to, you should’ve just refused! If you really thought it was wrong, you should’ve just said no!”

Dick chuckles darkly. “You’re right,” He says. “I should’ve. That one…that one’s on me. I’m sorry, I really mean it. And if you can’t forgive me, I understand.”

Something’s still off. Jason frowns at him. “You’re telling me you woke up from near death, Bruce asked you to do this, and then you said yes? Just like that?”

Dick hesitates. “Well…”

Jason swears under his breath. “What did he do?” He asks. “To make you go. What did he do?”

Dick shakes his head, disbelieving. “What makes you think he did anything?”

“Because I know you,” Jason says. “And I know him. And that story doesn’t track, for either of you. Unless you went fully dark side and decided to embrace being his perfect little soldier? You’re telling me that you would ever do that, in a million years?”

Tim’s eyes are on him, a slow understanding dawning in his eyes. “Of course,” He says, voice still a little hoarse. “There’s gotta be something more to this. What happened?”

“Look,” Dick begins, voice heavy. “I’ve worked with Bruce a long time. Ever since I was a little kid. There’s certain things with him that I understand, and if he asks this of me, then, well…”

“Bullshit,” Jason repeats. “And what’s with this little kid shit? You were sixteen when you became Robin. Don’t lie more.”

Dick frowns. “No, I was…” He trails off. “I was…was it eight, or ten? I can’t remember.”

Jason frowns. “Huh? What’re you saying?”

“What’s wrong?” Tim demands. “Are you feeling off again? Your memory?”

Dick shakes his head. “Nah,” He says. “Sorry. Anyway. You know how it is. When it’s something really important, it’s important. Like, world-ending important.”

“Was this world-ending important?” Jason asks. He sees the answer clearly on Dick’s face. “Or was this daddy issues important? Or Bruce being a piece of shit important?”

“You lost the metaphor there,” Tim mutters.

“Shut the fuck up,” Jason responds. That’s back to normal, at least. “So. If this wasn’t world-ending important. Then why? Because the Dick I know wouldn’t have let Bruce force him to do anything just because.”

Dick just shakes his head again. He laughs, but it’s hollow. “I didn’t even say anything,” He asks, almost wonderingly. “How do you know this?”

“Because I know you,” Jason says. “Idiot. How many times have I said that already? So? Stop stalling. What happened?”

“You don’t want to know,” Dick says. His face is stuck between a small smile and a grimace. “Trust me.”

“Oh, we really do,” Jason says. Tim nods his assent.

Dick just sighs. “Okay,” He says. “I’ll tell you. I promise. But for now,” He looks around. “We have to get you guys back, okay?”

“You’re coming too,” Tim says instantly.

“What, already?” Jason asks. “You trying to get rid of us?”

“No,” Dick insists. At Tim’s protest, he raises a hand. “I want to go with you, but I can’t. Listen. There’s things going on here right now…I need to see them through. A lot of lives are at stake. But the first chance I get, I’ll come. Promise. I promise. And trust me: you guys knowing I’m alive already lifts a huge weight off my shoulders. Bruce’ll have little to no issue with letting me come back if he knows that you guys know.”

“Letting you?” Jason asks, eyes narrowed. “Also. What makes you think we’ll be okay with doing that? Just up and leaving you here?”

Dick’s face softens. “I know it’s a lot to ask. But, look. We need to make sure to get you guys out of here as soon as possible. It’s…well. I want to make sure the people here don’t get you in their radar.”

“Will you be okay then?” Tim asks, concerned about this development. “Staying here? It doesn’t look like you trust them.”

“I don’t,” Dick says. “And I wouldn’t stay unless I felt like I had to. And…I’ll keep in touch, okay? You won’t be leaving me entirely like that. Bruce has a way to contact me, you can bully him into using his. Tell the rest of the family, okay? I want them to know.”

This, more than anything, convinces Jason that Dick means every word of his promise. “Fine,” he says, over Tim’s protest. “We need to clean up here first, anyway. Which would be faster if I had my gun.” He eyes Dick’s belt. “Hey, can I—”

“No,” Dick says instantly.

“Come on,” Jason whines. “How come you get one and I don’t?”

“If I had the choice,” Dick says. “I’d switch with you. But alas.”

Jason raises an eyebrow. “Hey,” He says. “Does Bruce know about that? The gun?”

Dick laughs, strangely bitter. “He had to deal with it,” He says. “If he sends me here, he has to live with those consequences.”

Jason knows Dick isn’t the biggest fan of guns either, so this is probably hitting on a sore spot. Kind of his expertise, to be honest.

“I’m still mad at you,” Tim interrupts, staring Dick down. “Really mad.”

Dick’s mood changes again. “I know,” He says softly. “I’m sorry. Really.”

Tim surges forward suddenly, hugging Dick tightly again. “Really really mad,” He mutters into Dick’s tshirt.

Dick hugs back, pats him on the head. “I know,” He says. “Missed you.”

Tim makes a small, wounded sound. “Me too.”

Dick looks up, making eye contact with Jason. “You too, kiddo.” He says.

“Kiddo?” Jason says. He swallows around the lump in his throat. “Yeah. Me too, I guess,” He clears his throat. “I’m waiting for that full explanation. The minute you get back. We’ll decide what to do with Bruce from there.”

“You don’t have to—” Dick says, and Tim lets go of him again. “Look…”

Tim walks to the back of the room, quickly starting to gather up everything they brought with them.

“Shut up,” Jason says. “We’ll handle it then. We’ll head back now, contact you later. Deal?”

Tim pops back up, shoving things into Jason’s backpack. “Done,” He says.

“Deal,” Dick answers him. He gestures at them both. “I’ll lead you back, okay? Follow me.”

He walks them to the door, then pushes ahead, directing them to follow. “Matron,” He says quietly. “We’re good to go.”

She pops back around the corner. “You back now?” She says, giving him a searching look.

He grins. “Like a bad penny,” He says.

She rolls her eyes. “Yeah. It’s you all right,” She gestures at the rest of them. “Right. Let’s go.”

They walk down the hallways, quietly striding through the creaking building, before Tim whispers. “We’ll need to regroup on this mission. How bad do you think we’ll get it from Damian for failing it?”

“We’re bringing Dick back,” Jason says, eyeing him. “I’m sure he’ll forget all about that.”

“I doubt it,” Tim mutters, but he grins just the same.

They head out the door, following Dick through the hallways. He walks different here, not like a Dick, not really. Like Agent 37.

Jason shakes the unease out of his head.

“Hey,” Tim says. “You still hate Tuesdays now?”

Jason snorts. “You kidding?” He says. “They’re still the worst. Although…” He glances up to see Dick ahead of them. “Gotta say. It’s about…20% less bad than it was.”

“Only 20%, huh?” Tim asks, amused.

“Yeah,” He says, then “Shut up.”

“I didn’t say anything!”

“You didn’t have to,” He keeps his eyes forward. “I know you.”

“You do,” Tim says. He smiles again. “You really, really do.”

[canmom]

GQuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuux (it's prounced ジクアクス Jikuax)

due to shenanigans, I had the kind of odd experience of being completely alone in the theatre for Gundam GQuuuuuux (the 'movie', which is pretty much just a concatenation of the first four episodes of the show). I think the theatre is probably all automated and if I hadn't shown up, they'd have been screening it to an empty room. we're pretty near the end of the UK theatrical run before it goes to streaming, but it was kind of a surreal experience. anyway!

love letter to gundam '79 it certainly is - but thankfully not terribly inaccessible for it. it opens with a pretty extended version of its alt timeline in which Char steals the Gundam and uses it to win the war for Zeon, only to accidentally cause some kind of psychic reaction that lets him "see time" and maybe sends him into the future.

the real gundamheads will have already seen this and they'll have been able to be like 'oh it's that minor character from episode 39'; for me it was sufficient to be able to recognise that they were riffing on the first episodes of '79 at the start, and know who the hell Char is and why it's a big deal when he kills everyone on a certain spaceship. as cool as it was to see the robot battles done up with all the Studio Khara swag you'd hope, this part was definitely the most indulgent, and I'm glad the timeskip moved past it.

so in the present! we're on one of those big O'Neill cylinder space colonies that gundam likes to have, its politics loosely sketched: nominally independent, controlled by callous Military Police who will happily tear roofs off refugee houses; there's a secret underground of mobile suit battling but mostly peaceful enough that characters can have concerns like 'going to cram school'. Zeon are around and the top dogs of the solar system, but when a Zeon spaceship goes into the airspace it's a diplomatic incident.

after a botch job of a capture mission, Zeon's experimental Gundam GQuuuuuux and the time-travelling Red Gundam (which probably has Char's soul in it or something) end up in the hands of, respectively, a very energetic schoolgirl and an airy homeless femboy. and like, it's Khara so we have to make the inevitable comparison, the logic of the Gundams here has a strong flavour of Eva, both in the silhouettes they are given, and also in the special psychic system which lets newtypes fly the gundam with their miiiiind if they're attuned enough - there's also a heavy emphasis on the difference of scale between robots and humans (even a 'run along the arm' shot at one point).

narratively it bounds from setpiece to setpiece with all the energy you'd hope to see from the Gainax diaspora. its use of pop music definitely calls to mind the other side of the split over at Trigger, especially works like KLK - I can tell this is gonna be one whose soundtrack I'll listent to later.

remains to be seen how far they'll take the yuri vibes between Machu and Nyaan, especially since they gave her a blush reaction to meeting Shuji, but they had two "jump into each other and fall on the floor moments" between the girls already, so...

anyway, for all that it's by-way-of-Khara, there's still plenty of Gundam flavour to this. particularly striking is the setting: the action arranges us to go in and out of the surface of the O'Neill cylinder and there are some absolutely gorgeous shots of the cityscape curving up and around. plenty of dorky uniforms and space politics too. there's especially some real love put into the ways the robots move - it's got that 2D sensibility of hitting dramatic poses while things blow up, but also the way the Bits (tiny drones) fly around with little RCS thrusters getting them lined up is gorgeous. the space battles are colourful, energetic and mobile in all the ways you'd hope - as we've seen in the Eva rebuilds, Khara are really good at making their cel-shaded 3DCG feel good alongside 2D animation, and maintain the crucial sense of scale and weight.

I don't know how heavy they're gonna take it, emotionally. watching this was a blast, but so far more the Diebuster end of the Gainax/Khara spectrum than the Eva one, so I'm not sure how much substance we're gonna have. it's a huge amount of fun in that ridiculous Gundam way, though, giant robot spectacle from the best in the biz, so I'm extremely eager for the rest to arrive‚ especially if it stays looking this cool for the whole cour.

[trevlad-sounds]

More tags:

Invisible Club 36

23.10.2024

Intro 00:00 Oceanographer–Moon Flower 01:24 Parallel Worlds–Just Strange 06:40 Nacht Plank & Futuregrapher–Sky High 9.06 10:10 The Home Current–Mini Drifter 16:03 Receptor Modulator–Invade 19:35 Battaglia–Fight 26:23 Psycho Kick–Black sky 27:19 Bernard Grancher–Courir pour rire 30:46 Gaudi Kosmisches Trio–Luxury Squat 36:04 gribbles–Childer 43:07 Aerophobia–RT. Corps 46:13 Town and County–Salcombe Surge 50:13 Peltiform–Jitr ft. Room of Wires 54:24 Garber–First Contact 58:35 Tadhe–Unwanted Evil 1:06:15 Kayla Painter–Ice Shells 1:11:06 Outro 1:15:22

[butisittho]

@questioningqueerfangirl hey, so because you disabled comments this is the only way i have of answering you

1. It's very telling to me that you consider any type of support for palestinians trapped in Gaza as support for Hamas. Hamas is a group with an estimated 20.000 members, there are approximately 2 MILLION palestinians in Gaza. When I say "Free Palestine" I am not saying "I'm pro Hamas". Those are two different things. I wouldn't equate jewish people with zionists, and I also wouldn't equate palestinians with Hamas supporters/members. That's silly and simply false.

2. We cannot put Hamas and the IDF at the same level. One has much more power and international support than the other. The IDF has more than 500 thousand members in total and receives billions of dollars yearly from countries like the US and the UK, not to mention private companies who also support them. They even have NUCLEAR weapons. The amount of damage they are able to cause if they choose to do so is unimaginable. For example, they bathed palestinians and lebanese white phosphorus

3. You say "Hamas started this war". Hamas was formed in 1987 by Sheikh Yassin. The United Kingdom, being the colonialists that they are, promised to build a jewish homeland in Palestine during WWI, in 1917. While this may at first sound relatively harmless and like a way to protect jewish people (which is good), that's not what it was. British troops invaded and took the land. They killed and harmed countless people. I ask you: What right did the UK have to sign off someone else's land? What kind of holy homeland can be built on other people's graves? Palestinians were never asked or consulted what THEY wanted their home to be, what independence they would like to exercise after the fall of the Ottoman Empire.

More than 250 thousand palestinians were displaced so that the Israeli state could be formed, but you say Hamas started the war.

Since the formal establishment of Israel on 1948, it has forced palestinians to suffer under an apartheid state. Here's another video.

If that wasn't enough, Israel bombed and killed more than 200 palestinians on june of 2023, way before the October 7 attack.

4. "The ONLY people justifying murder as a form of resistance is the FREE PALESTINE MOVEMENT. I really don’t see Israel doing it.". Then you must not have watched Israel's defense on the ICJ. Here's a link.

If that wasn't enough, here's some screenshots from Israel's official twitter account and Netanyahu's:

5. Lastly, Israel has not only bombed palestinians, but also Lebanon. Where's the logic in that? Why would they kill innocents not only in Gaza, but also in other countries?

I don't say any of this to make you angry, or because I'm "hateful". I want to tell you all of this because a genocide is happening right now, and we can't ignore it. If you watch the videos that both journalists and palestinians in Gaza are uploading, then you'll see all they ask for is for us not to forget them. To help, in whatever way we can, so that they can finally be free and have a life without bombs, starvation, dehydration, drones, snipers, no hospitals, no schools, constant displacement, etc.

I saw a video of a kid putting his mother's remains on a backpack, because they couldn't even afford to have a funeral with the ongoing bombings and displacement. It has to stop. That's what I mean when I say Free Palestine.

[gaijin-fujin-resonance]

How Buck-Tick Found Me: A Fan Origin Story

I though I had written this all out before, but probably on a more ephemeral format.

Buck-Tick discovered me by accident in early 2022. I don't even known how many near-misses I must have had. The only time I had ever previously heard them was Aphex Twin's remix of In The Glitter on 26 Mixes For Cash in 2003. (Why, oh why didn't B-T release Shapeless in the UK in 1994, when I was into many of the artists on it!?!?) But despite having many friends who were into the noisier end of J-Rock (and tried force-feeding me bORIS or Boredoms), not once did anyone suggest B-T. I'm still mad about that!

On 25th February 2022, I was idly reading an interview with a K-Pop producer on The Guardian, who mentioned his teenage obsession with Visual Kei. The picture (of Versailles) on that linked article intrigued me. So I went straight to Spotify and looked up "Old School Visual Kei". The fourth song in grabbed my attention to the point where I looked up the artist - the combination of trip-hop beats; ethereal, shoegazey guitars; and deep, breathy, slightly gothic vocals immediately sucked me in. Yes, like most western fans, my introduction to B-T was ドレス.

I listened to a couple more Visual Kei songs, but none of them did for me what that one Buck-Tick track did. I went back and hit play on their Spotify profile, and ended up listening to them for the rest of the night, until way past my bedtime. I listened to nothing else for the rest of the week, absolutely captivated by everything I heard. It was like someone had taken every single genre of music I had ever cared about from the age of 15 - positive punk, new wave, goth, techno, industrial, cyberpunk, shoegaze, electro, spacerock, drone - and just simmered them in a crockpot with distinctive Japanese flavouring.

This seems crazy to admit now, but I listened to B-T for over a year without ever even knowing what they looked like. I was vaguely aware that they were still going (the latest release at that point was Go-Go B-T Train - I love trains with all my middle-aged British heart so that was a winner for me.) But the singles from Izora started popping up on my Release Radar. Every time one came on, I would find myself sitting upright, paying attention and going to check who it was by. Oh, wow, that old Japanese band has got a new album out? Cool!

I started following the tags on Tumblr. I liked the look of the singer; he reminded me of a cross between Blixa Bargeld and Brett Anderson. In May 2023, shortly after the release of Izora, a gifset wandered across my feed. No source, no tag of what video or song or even album it was. Just the most AESTHETIC images I had ever seen.

The singer was beautiful, but it wasn't the singer that captured me, it was the visual world that this video hinted at.

I spent the next two months chasing down every B-T video on YouTube, trying to find the source of this snippet. Annoyingly, it wasn't in the official videos on their channel. I went on a Deep Dive, until I found it was Love Me, in a fan-assembled playlist of all their early videos. Honestly, whoever compiled this thing: you CHANGED MY LIFE. I wish I could pinpoint the moment that I switched from "wow, I really like this band" to "OH MY GOD THE NEW HYPERFIXATION THAT WILL CONSUME ME FOR THE NEXT FEW YEARS" - maybe it was somewhere between Love Letter and Heroine on this playlist?

I honestly thought I was going to fall in love with the handsome singer, like everyone else on earth. I started devouring Cayce's blog and BT Zone, looking for clues. I read the Japanese Wikipedia entry through Google Translate back when the EngliIh language version was little more than a stub. (Honestly, there was more information about the band on TV Tropes when i started researching.) But the more I read, the more I watched, the more I listened, the more I found myself drawn to the little blond guitarist. Interviews and fact sheets revealed we had a huge number of random, coincidental commonalities. But when he whipped out a theremin during SSL (inbetween commanding said singer to lick his boots) I was lost. You don't choose your Honmei, your Honmei chooses you. He chose hard. I can remember my oldest friend, around her birthday in August, laughing at me, saying "this Imai person has eaten your brain, huh?"

So I guess I had about a year and a half of liking the music, and about 3 or 4 months of being in the fandom before Atsushi collapsed onstage, and everything changed.

...

So although I'm no longer a New Fan, I feel like I have more in common with that experience. I wish I had decades of Deep History with the band - listening to their albums in order, I can hear all of the places in their long history where their taste and aesthetic aligned perfectly with whatever music I was listening to at the time. I do have that Deep History with many of their influences, enough that I feel I have secondhand familiarity with what they were doing.

I certainly understand why fans with a 30+ year history with the band might feel unsettled about the future and trepidation about B-T Mk II. (Except... among the people I follow, it doesn't seem like it's the long-haul fans who have already weathered so many changes, who are having the most trouble with it? The 30+ year fans seem to be the most loyal to the whole group as a concept, with or without Atsushi's corporeal presence.) But that's not where I am.

I had a 35 year history thrown at me to absorb in a few months. I've had 20 months of B-T with Atsushi, and 13 months of B-T without. Change is inevitable. So I feel like I am completely open to a second chapter of my fandom which is different from the first?

Note: Your Mileage May Vary. The way I do fandom is not the only way of doing fandom. All approaches to fandom are valid. You do you, and allow me to do me.

[sparksinthenight]

Save the Children UK:

“It is an unspeakable tragedy that innocent children continue to be killed by Israeli forces in Gaza, with another 20 children becoming the latest victims of this conflict. A school being used as a shelter in central Gaza was shelled, killing at least 22 people, including 15 children. In a separate incident, five children were reportedly killed by a drone strike while playing on a street corner in northern Gaza. We simply cannot accept the violence that Palestinian children continue to face as normal. We are continuing to urge the UK government to use their power and influence to secure an immediate, definitive ceasefire, and suspend all arms sales to the Government of Israel.”

[girlactionfigure]

🟧  Sunday afternoon - events from Israel  

ISRAEL REALTIME - Connecting to Israel in Realtime

♦️LEBANON.. The IDF announces it eliminated in an airstrike yesterday in Beirut Nabil Qaouk, commander of Hezbollah's Preventative Security Unit, and deputy head of the group's executive council.

♦️LEBANON.. Lebanese media: The fate of Hashem Safieddine, the current Hezbollah council head and expected successor to Nasrallah, remains unknown.

♦️IDF ATTACKING LEBANON.. Air force attacks continue all the time in all of Lebanon.  Relatively low intensity compared to the past few days.

♦️GAZA.. IDF installing huge observation poles on the Philadelphi border corridor.

♦️GAZA.. Destroyed: an underground route about a kilometer long in a civilian area.  In the tunnel, several rooms and facilities were found that were used byHamas to hide for extended periods, as well as weapons storage.

♦️GAZA.. airstrike against a group of Hamas operatives operating out of a former school in the northern Gaza Strip a short while ago. Hamas terrorists were using the Umm al-Fahm School in Beit Lahiya to plan and carry out attacks against IDF troops and against Israel.

♦️SYRIA.. air defense systems activated in Homs, Syria - which has been a frequent target of the IDF.  Syrian media reports that before noon the IDF attacked positions of the pro-Iranian militias in the area of ​​Wadi Hana near Al-Qusayr in Homs.

🔹LEBANESE PM.. Prime Minister Najib Mikati at a press conference: ready to implement UN resolution 1701.  The number of displaced people may reach a million.

🔹US ADMIN SAYS.. The Biden administration continues to call on Israel to refrain from a ground operation in Lebanon - and claim that such a move would harm attempts to weaken support for Hezbollah inside Lebanon, per the Washington Post.

🔹NOTING CHANGING TONE.. in the international press: (Amit Segal)

1. Israel has the most impressive army in the world

2. Israel is winning the war on terror

3. Israel exposed the hypocrisy of Biden's & UK’s Starmer’s policy

4. Were the hawks in Israel right and is it possible to achieve a complete victory?

Articles in the Daily Telegraph ->

Israel has exposed the lie at the heart of Starmer and Biden’s foreign policy - https://archive.md/6peFD#selection-2369.4-2369.81

Israel has proved it has the most impressive military in the world - https://archive.md/Ge9kB#selection-2369.4-2369.70

 ❗️AIR TRAVEL.. the EU Aviation Safety Agency really did issue an airspace warning for Israel warning airlines away from Sept. 28 until Oct. 31.  “Considering the current conflict between Hezbollah and Israel, there is a high risk to civil aviation. The conflict involves rockets, missiles and drones launches from Lebanon with Israeli airstrikes and artillery fire, including systematic activation of air-defence systems… Although, until now the Civil Aviation Authority of the State of Israel has been efficiently managing the risks to civil aviation in its airspace through a tactical deconfliction, it is considered that the current intensity of the conflict represents an overall high risk to civil aviation.”

Official statement:  Ben Gurion Airport is open for takeoffs and landings. Those leaving Israel should take into account there may be difficulties in their return to Israel (due to flight availability.)

▪️ECONOMY.. The price of fuel at the beginning of October will be NIS 7.16 per liter, a decrease of 0.13 per liter.

▪️WAR POLITICS.. Arab MK Ahmed Tibi: from the Ra'am-Ta'al faction “Israel excels in assassinations. Killings do not bring security, agreements bring security. The worst thing about the killings is when families and children are killed.  There is no worse criminal situation than those not involved being killed.”