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roanniom · 4 years ago

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The Night That Follows

Poe Dameron x Reader

Word Count: 8,000~

Summary: While celebrating a successful mission, you and Poe accidently ingest a mysterious beverage that makes it hard to resist one another, helping you forget the stress that weighs you down and the friendship that you’ve been holding between you two as a shield.

Note: This is my first ever non-ADCU fic and it is dedicated to the ever lovely and supportive @paper-n-ashes who urged me to get out of my comfort zone and cheered me on.

Warnings: NSFW, dirty talk, alcohol consumption, sex pollen, drugged drink (it’s drugged with the sex pollen by a 3rd party and not with malicious intent but it still might be triggering), masturbation (f/m), PIV sex, unprotected sex, war-related angst

When people talk about war, they often discuss the paralyzing fear, the numbing depression. Hopelessness that spreads through your veins like cold water as you face immeasurable odds and stare death in the face day after day. And you can attest to these feelings. You experience them with each dawn that breaks, muddy in the sky regardless of the atmosphere shrouding whatever planet you find yourself waking on each morning. Your life is transient, full of ships and bases and camps. The constants are the clothes on your back, the friends in your squadron (those who survive), and the x-wing you hop in each time danger calls.

The other constant is the part of war that people do not discuss. The rush of adrenaline every time you make it out of a tough scrape. Adrenaline that burns your veins, evaporating the icy hopelessness that had flooded you up until the minute your boots hit turf and your jellied knees catch up to the reality that you are still very much alive. The euphoria that crackles in your brain when you spy your best mate zooming down from above, finally landing and throwing themselves into your arms in the hug you never thought you’d experience again after their coms had gone down in a fire fight. The absolute debauchery of a night of celebration after such a fire fight. Because nobody needs to live quite as much as those who may die.

Which is how you find yourself here, on this non-descript jungle planet, the name of which you didn’t catch during your descent because honestly there have been so many jungle planets and they have all become little more than coordinates on a screen to you at this point. You and your squad have been set up with a mini-festival by the resistance-sympathizing locals as a thank you for your recent decimation of their First Order oppressors. The operation had been pretty seamless, thanks in no small part to the excellent teamwork between you and a one Poe Dameron.

Your flying today had rivaled some of his best, which is certainly saying something since Poe prides himself on being the best pilot in the resistance. You certainly gave him a run for his money, outflying TIE fighters and swiveling shuttle cannons in a perfectly choreographed tandem maneuver wherein the two of you manipulated your assailants to ultimately destroy themselves.

As you knock back a burning shot of the local alcoholic beverage, the liquid tingling and warming you all the way down, you search the triumphant crowd for the cocky pilot who had helped you set the stage for this celebration. You wouldn’t dwell on the earlier events of the day much more tonight. Wouldn’t think much of the comrades you’d lost in the struggle. That was an ache that would throb back to life tomorrow. Tonight, the priority is living.

It is then that you lock eyes with Poe Dameron through the throngs of semi-drunken revelers. His handsome face splits into a wide, cocky grin, so you adopt an exasperated smirk in response as he pushes his way towards you. Such is the game you play. A dance, if you will. Poe plays the role of the self-assured, overly confident golden boy while you, his long suffering partner, humble him with your good-natured criticism and ever rolling eyes.

“Alright there, Sweets?” Poe practically drawls as he reaches you, the nickname both a term of endearment and a teasing reference to the sweet tooth that keeps you hoarding candies of all kinds in your bunk, much to Poe’s own benefit. You beam up at him and upend your little glass to demonstrate its emptiness.

“On my way there, Fly Boy.”

“Looks like you’re falling behind, rookie. Like you did on that triple barrel twist today.”

You throw a punch that lands a little too lightly on his shoulder to produce the grunt and showy flail that he graces you with.

“First of all, you’re not allowed to call me rookie anymore. Your dumb ass might need to be constantly reassured that you’re ‘best pilot in the resistance,’ but by now I am, at worst, second best.” Your gut warms and you’re not sure if it’s the drink or Poe’s deep, full-bodied laugh in response. “And second of all, we don’t talk about the day if we make it to the night.”

Poe almost seems to sober at your words, a phrase of his tossed back at him. The smile remains, though, and he tosses an arm around you before dragging you over to the table that’s been set up with refreshments.

“Right you are, Sweets,” Poe agrees quietly. Louder now and injecting you two into the crowd surrounding the cluster of bottles, he continues, “as for you being second best pilot, I’d rather let the squad decide before you go getting a head too big to fit in your helmet.”

This receives a laugh from the crowd as well as another smattering of slaps thrown towards Poe’s chest.

“Dameron, we all know you already have your own helmet custom made so you can stuff that massive ego in there,” your friend Myrna.

“And those curls,” you add, reaching up and ruffling your hand through his hair in that way that always makes his nose scrunch up in mock anger.

“If you must know, there’s something else they also have to custom make me…” Poe says, grabbing your wrist and forcing your hand to slide down his chest towards the bottom of his flight suit zipper and wiggling his eyebrows. You shriek and yank your hand away.

“In your dreams, Dameron.” Poe leans down toward you so that his face is close enough for you to feel his breath fan across your cheeks.

“Or perhaps in yours?”

Suddenly a small, wrinkled face appears between you. It’s an elderly female member of the local alien race and she’s beaming up at you, holding two steaming mugs and smiling around a garbled statement in a language you don’t recognize.

“Oh I’m sorry, I’m not sure I…” you interrupt her, glancing awkwardly between her massive eyes and Poe’s confused ones.

“I might be able to translate!” Myrna cries out, stumbling forward with a newly refilled glass in her hand.

“You sure that’s not just the liquor talking?” Poe asks with a chuckle. Myrna waves him off and kneels unsteadily to listen to the old woman. More garbled speech issues forward as the woman gestures between you and Poe with her mugs. Myrna nods several times and gives little hums of agreement and affirmation. You and Poe trade glances of amusement during the interaction, but you have to look away when the upturned corner of Poe’s mouth begins to distract you.

“Alright alright,” Myrna pipes up. You turn back in time to see Myrna standing back up to her full height, now holding the two mugs, while the woman waddles back into the crowd.

“What’s the deal?” Poe asks, slinging his arm back around your shoulders. You resist the knee jerk actions that come to mind, both to slap his touch away and to lean into it, standing rigid instead.

“She said these are for you,” Myrna says, pushing the steaming mugs into your hands and Poe’s.

“Did she say why?” You peer at the milky, opalescent contents curiously. Myrna has already moved on, however, turning back to the pilot she’d been hanging on before you and Poe had approached. You look to Poe but he shrugs.

“I don’t know, something about you guys deserving it.” Myrna waves her hand dismissively, obviously ready to get back to her own evening. You look up at Poe, unsure, but he’s nodding and smiling.

“Hear that, Sweets? Seems like word travels fast that we’re the top two pilots,” Poe says cheekily, clinking his mug to yours before throwing back his head and downing its contents in one gulp. Your insides ignite at his acknowledgment, as well as the bob of his adam’s apple, but your eyes still flit warily to your beverage.

“We don’t even know what it is and you’re drinking it?”

“Honey, I’m pretty sure that liquor we were taking shots of earlier was actually jet fuel, I don’t think we need to be too worried about this.” Poe smacks his lips and runs his finger around the inside of the mug. “And besides, it’s really kriffing good.”

Watching the way his cheeks hollow out as he sucks the last dregs of his drink from his finger makes a heat boil in the pit of the stomach. You decide you actually are quite thirsty, and since your curiosity is stronger than your apprehension, you knock the liquid back yourself.

“Atta girl!” Poe cheers you on, nudging you. The drink is sweet and thick on your tongue like a melted version of the ice cream you’d tasted once, many years ago. You can still remember the creamy texture, very much worth the credits paid to the traveling vendor who’d brought it to your village during the hottest summer of your childhood. As you swallow this liquid down, however, its cold temperature changes into a burn, similar to alcohol, though smoother than any liquor you’d ever had.

“Good, right?” Poe asks, eyebrows raised. You nod and lick your lips, sure that you’re imagining things when Poe’s eyes flicker down to your darting tongue.

“That was actually pretty good,” you concede with a grin.

“So what have we learned tonight?” Poe prompts, grabbing your mug from your hands and placing it next to his on a nearby table. You shake your head.

“Your cockiness extends to believing locals on a miniscule planet find you special?”

“The correct answer was ‘always give things a chance,’ Sweets, but you can continue being closeminded if you want,” Poe responds with a chuckle. He stuffs his hands in his pockets and makes to walk away.

“Fine!” You reach out and grab his arm before he can leave. When he rounds back on you with a wide smile you roll your eyes and refuse eye contact. “And just so you know, I’m a lot more open minded than you think, Dameron.”

“Is that so, rookie?” You bristle but as the glee raises in his eyes at your reaction you do your best to tamp it down.

“I’m…flexible,” you say, your grin begrudging. A hubbub breaks out beyond you in the crowd as the makeshift band that had assembled to play party music transitions to a particularly festive song, causing both you and Poe to watch as people begin forming an impromptu dance floor. When Poe turns back at you and raises his eyebrows, expectant, you throw up your hands defensively.

“No. Don’t look at me like that, Fly Boy,” you’re quick to say, but Poe’s even quicker, having already grabbed you by the hand and pulled you to him. Your body collides with his and his other hand finds the dip of your waist.

“Oh I’m sorry, what was that I just heard someone say about being open minded?” Poe asks. In a sudden fluid motion he dips you, bending you over so that your back is parallel to the ground and his face hovers over yours. “Being flexible?”

You let him pull you back up and steady yourself with a hand on his chest to catch your balance, dizzy now, most likely from the suddenness of the motion. You’re about to toss back a witty retort, possibly something that will knock him down a few pegs, but then you catch the glint in his eye and a smile spreads across your lips unbidden.

“You get one dance, Dameron.”

~*~

One dance turned into many, as it turns out. The band, upon realizing their audience’s appetite for raucous music, had begun a steady rotation of upbeat tunes. The dance floor had expanded, spilling out of its original confines in the center of the town square and into the concession areas on the perimeter. Resistance members danced and drank, their bodies jumping and moving to the beat in one chaotic mass of excess energy and euphoria. Bodies writhe against one another in all directions as people seek out friction that can confirm to them that they did indeed survive the day’s trials.

You’re experiencing friction of your own in your little portion of the dance floor. Where things had started out innocently – energetic bouncing to the beat and moving in unison – the tone had long changed. At this point Poe is behind you, arms slung dangerously low on your hips to hold you against him, hands pressed right above your pelvis. The feeling of his chest pressing against your back, his hips bracketing your ass – you’ve lost yourself in the sensations. The rhythm of the music shakes through your muscles but instead of tense and tired, they’re loose and buzzing.

Though truth be told, they aren’t the only thing buzzing. The proximity of Poe’s hands to your lower body feels charged like a magnet. Without thinking you press your hands over the backs of his, encouraging pressure on your lower abdomen. You swear you hear Poe growl behind you has his hands pull you further to him, but it could also be the roar of the crowd. Your hips move in sync, your ass grinding against him in time with the music. Escapism in its purest form is what you’re experiencing in Poe’s arms, held against Poe’s body, matching Poe’s motions. It’s heady and distracting and everything you could ask for to make living feel like living, especially in the aftermath of a day centered on death. You’re content to let this moment last as long as the universe allows.

That is until you realize that the increasing beat you’d thought was a shift in the music is actually the rapid crescendo of your own heartbeat.

Swallowing you find your throat is thick, saliva pooling in your mouth inexplicably. You take a deep breath and allow your mind to reel. How long had you been feeling like this? Why hadn’t you noticed these feelings coming on?

One of the large hands at your hip begins sliding up along the plane of your side and you get your answer. The weight of his touch lights your skin on fire as it drags up and across your collar bone. Your breath feels ragged, rattling around in lungs that can’t seem to take in oxygen no matter how high your chest rises and falls. Poe’s hand lingers on your throat for a second so you swallow again, with even less luck than before. His hand reaches up to grip your jaw which he uses to turn your head back toward him.

Oh.

Poe continues to move behind you, his motions controlling you both on the floor, but his face is strained. Sweat dots his temples, gleaming in his curls, and his teeth seem gritted, making his jaw set at a striking angle. His eyes pin you down, however, and they keep your attention as you gaze back, wide-eyed.

“You okay, rookie?” Poe’s voice is deeper than normal, huskier. The way it reverberates through your body makes a rumbling bubble up deep inside your chest. The beginnings of a moan, perhaps? You’re quick to gasp a response before such a sound has a chance to make its way into the air between you.

“I’m…feeling quite strange.”

The hand still at your waist tightens its grip while the other rejoins on the opposite side. You have to gasp again to keep from moaning. Suddenly you’re being maneuvered forward, Poe’s guidance weaving you through the crowd with ease despite the congested revelry.

Neither of you see the way Myrna is watching you both with a knowing smirk from her place draped around her own handsome pilot beau. Or the way the little old woman who’d gifted you the beverage hovers on the outskirts of the dance floor, a proud look on her wrinkled face as she eyes your retreating figures.

~*~

You’re not really able to follow where Poe is directing you, mainly because of how the imprint of his hands on your body seems to be searing into your skin through your flight suit. While your accelerated heart rate was the thing you had been most worried about, now you are equally worried about the dull ache that has seated itself in the pit of your stomach. You bite down hard on your lip to keep the moan from spilling out, the one you’ve been suppressing since the moment you became conscious to your current discomfort.

When Poe’s stride finally slows to a stop only then are you able to take in your surroundings. Blinking, you’re surprised to find that you’re now outside of the town, far from the lights and bustle of the party, walking into the silent clearing that contains the squadron’s parked aircrafts.

“Why are we all the way out here?” you ask, unsettled by how deep your voice sounds in the darkness.

“Needed to get away from the crowd.” You’re even more unsettled by how breathless Poe’s voice is as he says his first words since the dance floor. So unsettled that you turn in his arms so you can finally take in his disheveled appearance fully.

“Are you okay?”

“I don’t know, it’s the weirdest thing. One minute everything was fine and the next…”

“You can’t catch your breath,” you finish for him and he nods gravely. Both of your chests are practically heaving, pressing into each other with each exhale. When you become aware of this, it also brings awareness of the way his chest pressed up against yours is also adding pressure to your nipples. Since when were your nipples hard? The night is balmy, a cool breeze barely able to disturb the moist warmth that settles in the jungle terrain. You feel sweat begin to collect on the back of your neck and your hairline, much like the sweat causing Poe to shine a bit in the moonlight. And yet your nipples are hard and a shudder runs through your body, nerve endings clearly ten steps ahead of you, taking in some experience to which you’d yet to catch up.

“Wait a minute, look at me,” Poe suddenly orders, his fingers wrapping around your chin to lift your face toward his. You freeze as he stares down at you, eyes widening at whatever he sees.

“What is it?” you ask, voice urgent, almost frightened.

“Your pupils are wide as planets,” he mutters, distracted fingers drawing up the side of your jaw to press to the pulse point at your throat. “Your heartbeat is out of control.”

“I haven’t been able to calm down,” you say, nodding but getting more worried by the second. “Why can’t I calm down? Are you feeling the same way?”

Poe’s mouth presses into a hard line and he turns away abruptly, head tilting down.

“Oh fuck.”

“What?” You try to pull him back toward you but he doesn’t budge.

“I think…we’ve been drugged.”

Your blood runs cold and a hand flies to cover your mouth. You’d known tonight was too good to be true. Your mind races, making connections out of thin air, trying to place when and where you could have possibly come in close enough proximity to First Order agents to be compromised.

“But what – how – what can we do? What is it? Is it deadly?” You’re cut off by a sound issuing from Poe’s now curved body. You wonder at first if it’s a sob, which makes sense because you’re about ready to cry yourself. But then you realize it’s a chuckle.

“I wouldn’t say deadly. Just exceedingly inconvenient.”

“So you know what it is then?” you prompt, tugging at his shoulder some more to try and see his face. “Tell me!”

“Well for starters I’m pretty sure it was that drink the old woman gave us.”

Fuck.

Of course. What was the one suspicious thing you’d ingested all day? The fact that you hadn’t thought about it sooner makes you want to kick yourself, but you press on instead, anxious to have the matter dealt with.

“What does it do?” You hate the tremor that colors your voice. At that Poe finally turns around and you take him in all at once, trying to assess what he could have been hiding. His tall, wide-legged stance makes it easy to notice after a few seconds. As your gaze moves lower on his body you finally see the massive tent forming below the zipper line of his flight suit.

Without even being able to mentally process what you’re looking at your body responds immediately. A rush of warmth and wetness floods the apex of your thighs and the moan that you’d so far been able to hold in finally makes it way out of your throat. Poe’s eyes, which had recently gone hooded, widen in response to the lewd sound. You clap a hand over your mouth and snap your eyes back up to his face, away from the rigid shape that had made the muscles inside you contract wantonly around nothing.

“It’s made from a plant that’s meant to accelerate sex drive,” Poe says matter-of-factly.

You almost don’t hear him because your eyes have already slid back down his body, feasting on the sight of his impressive bulge. You’d heard stories of Poe’s sexual prowess, many from the man’s own loud mouth. You knew he’d satisfied many members of the Resistance, male and female alike. But you had never truly let yourself consider what he’d be like. What he’d look like. What he’d feel like…

“Why would she possibly give that to us of all people?” You feel like you’re going to cry. The feelings coursing through your body are overwhelming.

“Maybe she went around spiking many people at the party. Maybe she just thought you and I would look hot together? You can’t blame her for that one.” Poe winks at you and it diffuses some of your angst. You let out a tense laugh and shake your head.

“How do we make it stop?” you force yourself to ask, just as you force yourself yet again to look back up in his eyes. Poe averts his own, a sheepish look overtaking his face. When he doesn’t answer you step forward and grab his arm in alarm, trying not to consider the way his bicep bulges under his sleeve. “Poe?!”

“We have to…take care of it.”

You’re launching yourself away from him before he can finish the sentence. You probably knew the answer before you’d even asked the question, but his words still sent electricity through your spine.

“We can’t. That’s…that’s crazy – you’re crazy, Dameron!”

“Hey, you think I like this? Standing here like an idiot with my dick so hard I can barely see straight?”

The sexual nature of his words, spoken so plainly and without euphemism for the first time, makes a new wave of wetness pool between your legs against your will.

“Don’t….talk about it,” you say through gritted teeth, closing your eyes in an attempt to center yourself.

“What? Don’t talk about my aching cock?” he asks, almost as a challenge. He’s frustrated now, egged on by your attitude.

“Stop it.”

“Are you about to tell me you aren’t wet right now?”

You turn your back on him in a childish and fruitless attempt at blocking out his words. When you don’t reply you hear his footsteps as he approaches from behind.

“If we’re both having the same reaction, and I’m certain we are, then I’d imagine you’re practically dripping right now.”

His words would have made your eyes cross if you didn’t have them shut so tightly. A hand molds around your hip while the other grasps at the side of your neck, both working in tandem to pull your back flush against his front. The impact, though gentle, knocks the wind out of you. Or whatever wind had been in you in the first place. His lips are at your ear then and you melt into his touch.

“If we take care of this together we’ll go back to normal.”

“…back to normal?” you ask, simply repeating and not really aware of your words.

“Exactly.”

“I…I don’t know.” Poe’s hardened length is pressing into your ass now, insistent and firm behind you. The hand on your hip migrates lower to pull you against him. A swivel of his hips causes your own to follow the momentum, gyrating in their own right.

“We can be quick,” Poe coos, his voice vibrating over your earlobe where his lips are making contact with your skin. Another low chuckle sounds. “Or I can take my time if you want. Either way, I can promise you’ll enjoy it.”

There’s your cocky Fly Boy.

You wrench yourself from his grasp and take a few steadying steps away before gaining the wherewithal to turn back and face him once more. He looks supremely disappointed, arms still outstretched in the place where you had just been.

“Does this really have to be a…team effort?” you ask, face screwed up with discomfort. Poe runs a hand through his hair and casts a distracted glance about your surroundings.

“I mean I guess theoretically one could take care of themselves – ”

“Great!” you cut him off and stalk around to the other side of his x-wing. Of course he’d brought you to his ship. You look around for your own but when you can’t find it you plop yourself down on the ground.

“Are you kriffing serious?” comes Poe’s angry voice behind you as he stomps over. “We could bang this out and feel better but you’re just going to – ”

“Oh ‘bang’ this out? Real nice, Dameron.”

“You know what I mean.” You can practically hear his eye roll.

“The other side,” you say simply, lowering the zipper on your flight suit. When you don’t hear the sound of his retreating footsteps, however, you pause. “Stay on the other side of the ship, Dameron.”

He grumbles but does as you say. When you finally hear the sound of him throwing himself to the ground, you lift the tab of your zipper again. However, the loud and sudden ziiiip indicating that he’s yanked open his own garment seems ring out then in the clearing and you’re inundated with mental images of what that must look like. Poe sprawled on the ground with his flight suit open and askew. You imagine the expanse of his chest, the way the muscle would ripple in the shadows of the jungle. You’d seen him without a shirt before, the arms of his flight suit tied at his waist as he reclined beneath his x-wing making repairs. Covered in sweat and grease. The memory and the subsequent lurid thoughts have you dipping your hand down into the small opening you’ve made in your clothes, not fully comfortable enough to expose yourself entirely to the elements. When you reach the place between your thighs you have to swallow the gasp that bursts forth at the realization that Poe had been right. You’re not just wet. You’re dripping.

“Fuck.”

You think you say it quietly but a chuckle from the other side of the ship proves otherwise.

“Need any help over there?”

You ignore him and try to focus in on your own body, closing your eyes. You allow a hand to ghost over your breast as you ease a finger through your folds. You feel the insistent thrumming of your pulse even down below and your breath is shallow in your chest. The images dancing behind your eyelids show you flashes, glimpses of things you try to banish from your mind. The angle of Poe’s jaw. His faint, ever present stubble. The arch of his eyebrow. The curve of his smirk. His ass in those pants.

“Sweets…”

Poe’s voice interrupts a whimper you hadn’t even realized you were releasing.

“Poe.” Your voice is small and it cracks around his name. Your muscles are contracting but nothing you do eases the sensation. It just continues building within you. “It hurts.”

“Just come over here. I don’t even have to touch you. Just let me help you through it.”

You ponder the darkness before you, the way it envelops the other aircrafts in this makeshift parking zone. You hear a shick shick shick behind you and your cunt aches. Completely in response to the siren call of Poe Dameron’s building pleasure. You’re immediately intensely jealous. Jealous of the way that, you assumed, he was having more luck getting himself off than you were, despite the fingers inside you right now. Jealous of the way his voice didn’t crack when he beckoned you over.

But most of all jealous of the fact that he’s the one currently touching his hard cock. Not you.

You will yourself to stand up, pulling your hand out of your flight suit but not bothering to zip it back up. On jelly legs you make your way to the other side of the ship. The far side, facing away from the town square and the distant glow of the party you’ve now forgotten.

As you round the edge of the x-wing you bite your lip at the sight before you. Poe is indeed sprawled out with his suit zipped all the way down. His thick member protrudes from the bottom of the opening, a fist moving up and down rapidly, pulling from root to flushed tip in skilled motions. However the eyes that gaze up at you from under his unruly mop of curly hair are not doused with pleasure and satisfaction as you’d imagined. Instead he looks pained, almost agonized. At the sight of you he sits up a bit and does his best to give you a reassuring smile though it comes out as more of a grimace.

“Fuck, you’re beautiful, rookie.”

“That’s the drink talking,” you dismiss, despite the way your stomach swoops as you move to settle yourself down next to him, careful not to make contact. “And you know I hate you calling me rookie.”

“I’ll call you anything you want, baby, as long as you start touching yourself.”

Your cunt pulses at his words so suddenly that you almost double over. Your breathing, already ragged, speeds up as you feel the overwhelming urge to have something deep inside you. Dropping your hand into the opening in your suit you halt, however, watching Poe warily in your peripheral vision. He catches you looking and reluctantly stills the hand moving on member.

“Would sitting back to back help?” he sighs. You nod, scrambling over so that your back is to his.

This is better. This is much better, you think as you dip your hand back between your legs and into the waiting slick. You drag a finger in tight circles over your clit and do your best to calm the racing thoughts that flit back to images of Poe’s body.

The body that is currently pressed to yours, though not at all in the manner you would prefer.

Poe grunts then, making you lose your rhythm.

“This isn’t the first time I’ve wanted you, you know.”

You cut your answering gasp off at the source, not daring to make a sound lest it interrupt this information that you desperately needed to here. He interprets your silence correctly and continues.

“I’ve thought about you. When I’m in the cockpit on my way to some distant planet. When not even hyper speed can get me there quick enough before thoughts of you creep in.” He almost sounds mad, but you get it. The emotions coursing through your body along with the hormones are driving you wild and you don’t know how to feel.

“What…what are the thoughts about?” you can’t help but ask.

“I’d love to say it’s your smile or your brains or something sweet like that. And I do think about those things too, don’t get me wrong,” he says on a hoarse chuckle. “But it’s mainly your body.”

You slip a third finger inside your cunt as he says this, his words and the feeling mixing to cause you to let out an unchecked moan. You feel Poe’s body shudder against you.

“Shit Sweets you’re killing me.” You feel him tense as his hand begins moving faster. “I think about how you look poured into that flight suit. The way your tits and ass jiggle when you hop into your x-wing – fuck.” Another shudder wracks through his body and you can’t take it anymore. The way you’re touching yourself isn’t the way you usually do it. Not in those rare moments where you’ve got the sleeping quarters to yourself and you’re able to get yourself off in your bunk to images of a chiseled jawline, a clothed bulge, rippling muscles, soft, curly hair…

You abruptly pitch yourself forward to balance yourself on your knees and one hand while the remaining hand redoubles its efforts between your legs. The shift in position ends your physical contact with Poe and he swivels to see.

“What are you – ”

“Don’t turn around,” you gasp out. Your new angle works in your favor as your swollen clit becomes more sensitive, pulled down by gravity so that every swipe of your finger becomes more potent. “But for the love of gods, don’t stop talking.”

Poe is taken aback by your sudden forwardness, but he doesn’t let it faze him for long. Instead you hear his renewed efforts at jerking off as the sound of skin swiping across skin, made smoother by spit and precum, gets louder behind you.

“What do you want me to talk about? How much I wish it was your tight little pussy I was fucking instead of my fist?”

The whimper you release at that statement is unlike any sound you’ve ever made and it only spurs Poe on.

“And I just know you’re tight. I know it. And wet too, just like I guessed you were. I can hear it, baby,” he practically growls and you become intensely away of the slick, creamy sounds coming from the rapid in and out, in and out rhythm of your fingers delving into your cunt. “You’re dripping, aren’t you?”

“Yes.” You close your eyes and hear his words and wish the fingers inside you were harder, thicker, him.

“You wish it was my cock inside you, I know you do. You don’t want to admit it but you wish I was pounding into you, making you feel good. Making the ache go away.”

Your answering whine confirms his beliefs and he lets out a triumphant grunt.

“Fuck, baby. I want it, too. Bury myself deep inside of you and fuck you till that drink wears off and you’re still screaming for me, that’s how good it would be.”

“Oh gods.”

“Tell me who you’re wet for.”

“Y-you.” It comes out small. You’re shocked that you even say it, especially with how much you’ve been fighting all of this. You want it. You want it in your bones and in your blood and in your tight, spasming cunt. But you also want Poe’s friendship. Want him to tousle your hair on the way to the hanger. Want him to keep sending you funny messages over your data pad, constantly trying to outdo your own silly riddles and jokes. Want to tease him and eat dinner with him in the mess hall and slap him when he says something stupid and yell at him when he does something dangerous and cry when he doesn’t come back on time from a mission…

A sob finds its way out of your body, sandwiched between two moans. You’re not sure Poe even heard it until his voice reaches your ears again, this time gentler.

“Sweets? Is this working for you?”

You take a shuddering breath before answering.

“No.”

You practically hear Poe slump in defeat, the rhythm of his hand on his length slowing down. You bite your lip before continuing.

“Take me, Poe.”

“What?” Poe whirls around so fast you feel the air woosh over you as he disturbs it. You jump to your feet, still facing away from him and yank your flight suit over your shoulders and down your body, stepping out so it pools on the ground. He watches as you get back down on your hands and knees before him in your underwear, ass in the air, waiting for him to catch up.

“I need you, Poe. Just…just please get inside me,” you say, reaching back to pull the damp fabric of your panties aside, exposing your glistening, swollen folds for him to see.

You don’t have to ask him a third time. He’s on you so fast that you’re confused by his motions. It takes a few seconds before you realize that he’s taken your discarded flight suit and stretched it out on the ground, positioning you over it so that your hands and knees are protected from the dirt. The sweetness of this considerate action is offset by the way his fingers dig harshly into your hips, maneuvering your ass so that it lines up with his pelvis. You tilt forward, aided by pressure on your lower back which raises your click cunt to the level of his cock.

“I’m going to make you feel so good – ”

“No more words, Dameron. Just shut up and get your cock inside – FUCK.” He spears you mid-sentence and you immediately fall down onto your elbows. Your ass still in the air, held in place by his hard grip, receives a smack and you cry out, feeling no pain. Only pleasure as the sting ripples through you and into your clenching cunt. He feels it deep inside you and groans.

“Maybe you’re the one who needs to shut up, baby.” His words issue forth from gritted teeth. “Always fucking teasing me with that fucking mouth.” His hips rut into yours, taking up an unforgiving pace, while the rest of his body folds over yours so his chest pressed flush to your back. One hand closes tightly around your chin, wrenching up your head and dragging a finger over your bottom lip which has grown plump from biting. “This beautiful, bossy fucking mouth. Always telling me off, telling me what to do.”

Your tongue darts out to meet his skin and his other fingers caress your chin in response. It’s a stark contrast to the almost feral way he is still clutching your hip and driving into you over and over.

There’s almost no resistance. You’re tight, cunt clutching onto his throbbing cock in an effort to keep him buried inside, but you’re wetter than you’ve ever been and it’s making his thrusts effortless. You assume it’s a side effect of the drink. But in some part of your brain you can’t believe that a plant could possibly make a man’s cock feel as good as Poe’s does right now inside you. How a plant could cause you to feel pleasure that is not simply rooted in the way his hand drags down from your jaw to wrench your breasts out of the cups of your bra. How a plant could in any way magnify the surely already intoxicating feeling of Poe’s mouth working at the side of your neck, the curve of your shoulder.

“This working, baby? This doing it?” Poe checks in then, not relenting in his thrusts. Never relenting. “You’re squeezing me, so I know your little pussy likes it.”

A shuddering gasp kicks through you before you can answer his question and he laughs. The vibrations go straight from his cock to your clit and you whimper some more.

“Your sounds. I want to record these little sounds you’re making and play them back when I’m flying. Have you fill the space in my x-wing till I can’t take it any more.” Poe presses a kiss to the back of your shoulder, nipping and then laving the skin over with his tongue. “I’m going to hear these sounds in my dreams.”

“It’s…just…the drink,” you practically hiccup, barely able to form thoughts from the way your body has focused all energy, all recognitions of nerve endings to the space between your thighs. Poe slaps your ass again and you keen.

“Just listen to yourself, baby. No drink is making you sound this hot. That’s all you, Sweets.”

Before you can argue further you do take a second to listen. To the way your shallow breaths mix with whimpers and whines. The gurgle in the back of your throat when his cock bounces against your cervix. He’s right. It is hot. You are hot. You reach a hand down to your clit, desperate to increase the already mind-blowing stimulation, greedy for more.

“You feel so good. You’re sosososogood,” you barely manage to slur. Despite your inability to fully speak you make the attempt because you assume that if hearing your gasps is egging him on, your words will amplify it. And amplify it they do. Poe’s hips stutter for a second before he drops down heavier on you, thrusting deeper and from a more primal place. A hand savagely kneads at one of your breasts, playing with the nipple.

“I’ve never been this full. I can’t take it, I can’t…”

“Seems like you’re taking it pretty well, baby,” Poe coos, pressing more kisses to the side of your neck.

“I need m-more,” you gasp, realizing with urgency that the pressure in your core is finally building past the plateau of the last…hour? Half an hour? How long had this been going on? All night? It doesn’t matter because Poe’s inside you and he’s listening to you and suddenly you’re being slammed into with all the force he can muster. He expertly wrings pleasure from your body and you feel yourself careening toward a release that you can’t describe. Just out of reach and full of all the potential energy inherent in an object rocketing toward the moon only to soon plummet back to the depths.

“Poe! I…I…oh fuck…oh gods…I…”

“Go on, baby. Cum.”

“You ha- ahhhh. But you…y-you…” You’re babbling. You’re incoherent, not wanting to leave him behind in the blinding ache that comes before release. Your hands are fisting in the flight suit below you, desperate for something solid, something substantial to hold onto.

“Don’t wait for me, Sweets. Let go.”

And then his hands are closing over yours, fingers interlacing and squeezing down, pinning you to the ground with white knuckles that would hurt if you weren’t squeezing him right back, finally grounded in the way you needed.

And you’re cumming.

And cumming.

You feel every muscle in your body seize and spasm and bliss roils out through you in waves. You shake and stutter under him, feeling fresh wetness gush down around his cock as he fucks you through the feeling. You keep waiting for it to stop but it doesn’t, it only intensifies. It must be a side effect. Of the drink not the man. But when you feel yourself transcending the moment, the way your soul feels like it is literally floating above you, you use the out of body experience to take in the man who is causing this pleasure. The way he cages you in, bracing you through the storm of your orgasm, giving more and more to keep the flame burning as long as possible.

His muscles ultimately seize sometime around when your soul seems to sink back into your body and you’re one again enough with your senses that you can feel him paint your walls with sticky, hot cum. He doesn’t drop his weight on you like other men have after the completion of such exertions. Other men who had focused more on the destination than the journey, leaving you as wanting for release as you were wanting for air under the pressure of their body weight. Instead, Poe pulls you of you and flops to his back in the grass beside you. Without him holding you up you crumble down, face pressing into the fabric of your rumpled flight suit instead of the dirt, thanks to Poe.

A few minutes pass, silent except for the sound of your slowing gasps for air. When your breathing evens Poe sits up on his haunches to guide you back into your flight suit. You’re sticky from sweat and your combined cum, but you couldn’t care less with your bones liquified and your eyelids heavy. Gone is the buzzing ache, in its place a heavy sleepiness. When Poe lays you, now clothed, gingerly back down on the ground you automatically curl into him, allowing him to wrap his arms around your body.

Neither of you shares another word. You don’t have to.

Because shortly after you doze off. And for the first time in a long time your final thoughts before sleep overtakes you are not of the dread the morning will bring, but the solace you found in the night.

~*~

When you wake it’s to a dawn as grey as all the ones before it. Hazy with receding fog and with the promise of all the danger that looms ahead in the hours soon to follow. One of the planet’s suns has already breached the horizon, and you raise a hand to cover your eyes as you peer out from under the x-wing’s protective wing. Looking down you take stock.

Your flight suit is on but fully unzipped, leaving your chest and stomach entirely exposed, all the way down to your lower belly. A large hand covers one of your breasts, fingers twitching against your flesh as the man attached to it continues to dream. You follow the length of his arm to take in his body, tucked close into your own, equally unzipped, his broad torso showing through the gaping fabric. You watch Poe’s abdominal muscles contract with his inhales and exhales for a moment while you check in with your body.

The humming from last night is gone, that much is for certain. This makes you believe that the effects of the drink have worn off. You’re quick to question this hypothesis, however, when Poe stirs in his sleep and his hand squeezes down a bit on your breast. Your breath catches in your throat and fire shoots through your veins. A lingering symptom, you wonder. Or perhaps just a normal, biological reaction to sexual stimuli. You kick yourself mentally because of course it has to be the latter. It couldn’t be the third option which you won’t even allow yourself to fully consider.

You require a shower urgently, it occurs to you suddenly. And food, a realization that coincides with a rumbling in your empty stomach. Knowing you’ll never have a good enough excuse to extricate yourself from this gorgeous man’s arms you steel your nerves and pull away. When you stand, Poe groans and allows an eye to crack open, his hand flying up to shield his eyes from the rising sun. You’re silhouetted against the dawn and he takes in your outline. The curves of you.

“Morning, Sweets,” he says, voice hoarse with sleep this time instead of sex.

“Morning, Fly Boy,” you reply simply with a small smile. You feel a buzzing in the pocket of your suit then and pull out your mini com unit, even more portable than your usual data pad. The message that blares across the screen and you relay it before Poe can reach his own device which had similarly vibrated.

“We’ve got a new mission. Briefing is in an hour and then we take off.” The information feels stilted as it leaves your lips. How can you feel so entirely, earth-shatteringly changed and yet in many ways everything is still the same. The sun still came up. The war still rages on.

You look down at Poe and his intense expression as he watches you makes you think that he’s wondering the same thing.

Your heart thumps in your chest, this time unaided by any drugged drink or the eyes or hands of a man whose existence seemed both your making and undoing. Routine is the only thing that can calm these nerves. Routine is what is required to survive war. Routine and protocol and boundaries.

You zip up your flight suit with finality.

“See you at the briefing?” you ask, though its more statement than question.

“Of course.” Poe’s response is quiet as he continues to watch you from his reclining position. You’re still above him and at a distance, a position he often associates with you.

You smile and give him a good natured salute before turning and making you way back toward the town where you know the rest of the Resistance members are already bustling about and preparing for the day.

Another day you hope you, and Poe, will be lucky enough to outlive.

~*~

Doing a smaller taglist since it’s a Poe fic and I’m not sure if everyone on my usual taglist is into it (Please let me know if you’d like to be added or removed for future work!): @paper-n-ashes @mariesackler @tlcwrites @foxilayde @mylifeisactuallyamess @sacklerscumrag @jynzandtonic @millenialcatlady @barbers-glimmerin-darlin @hopeamarsu @direnightshade @leather-flannel-liquor @fizzywoohoo @aliveandlonely @wayward-rose @safarigirlsp @emeraldsiren20 @finn-ray-nal-beads @maryforyou @maybe-your-left

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becomewings · 4 years ago

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BTS Universe Timeline

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TIMELINE GUIDE

Content warning: contains references to death, suicide, suicidal ideation, child abuse, domestic violence, blood, homicide, depression, trauma, PTSD

This guide contains major spoilers from all BU media

Revisions and additions will be made as necessary, so please visit the original post for the most up-to-date version (update log is included at bottom of post)

All names are provided as fully as known

Bracketed dates are inferred or calculated from references in the text

While the timeline is presented here as objectively as possible, I acknowledge that there is a level of subjectivity in choosing which information is significant enough for inclusion and in certain connections drawn between entries

Please inform me of any suspected errors; I will investigate and correct them

Do not repost, copy, or quote without permission

School Years: Together & Apart

- March Year 19 through 10 April Year 22 -

2 March Year 19 Notes 1 (SJ)

Ten days after returning from the U.S., SeokJin and his father visit the principal’s office at his new school. SeokJin learns that he will start one grade lower due to the different education systems. SeokJin’s father grips his shoulder while the principal explains that school is a “dangerous place” that needs to be “tightly controlled.” He asks: “You know you have to keep me informed, right? You’ll be a good student, right?” SeokJin squeezes out a “yes” and his father lets go. Both ChangJun and the principal laugh. SeokJin looks down at their shining shoes, wondering from where the light is coming.

Note: SeokJin’s 25 June Year 19 entry in Notes 1 specifies that his father attended the same high school. JiMin’s 23 July Year 22 entry in Notes 2 reveals that, according to a comment he finds on an online news article, ChangJun and the principal were in school at the same time and fought with each other “as if it would only end when one of them dropped dead,” but they appeared to get along later due to politics.

3 March Year 19 BTS Universe Story: The Boy on the Threshold, ep.1

On the first day of school at Songju Jeil High School, the Dean of Students berates the six latecomers lined up outside: SeokJin, NamJoon, HoSeok, JiMin, TaeHyung, and JungKook. YoonGi arrives even later. The Dean assigns them one month of community service as punishment. When he notices SeokJin, he clears his throat and says he is letting them off because it’s the first day: they must all assemble after classes to clean the annex, a classroom turned into a storage room. This room becomes their meeting place and hideout even after their punishment is finished.

Note: Their punishment for being late is referenced in JiMin’s 12 March Year 19 entry in Notes 1, when he escapes to the old classroom again and finds the others already there. He observes that it feels as though they’ve been “hanging out together forever.” The punishment scene is also similar to a moment in the BTS Begins Middle Scene VCR. Although it includes a few extra students and cannot be confirmed as BU content, it does mirror the canonical detail of YoonGi arriving last.

28 May Year 19 Notes: Answer

In the classroom hideout, JungKook asks everyone what their dreams are because he has to write a paper about future hopes. SeokJin wants to become a good person, and YoonGi says it’s okay to have no dream. TaeHyung poses on a chair and says he’s going to be a superhero. HoSeok scolds him and adds that he wants to find his mom and live happily. JiMin asks him if he is unhappy now, and HoSeok pulls an exaggeratedly worried expression. “Is that how it works?” JiMin is flustered when HoSeok asks what his dream is and remembers that when he was in preschool he wanted to be president, but didn’t know what he wanted after that. Everyone looks at NamJoon, who shrugs and confesses that while he wants to say something nice, he doesn’t have a dream either and just wishes that his part-time job pays more. JungKook looks down at his assignment, divided into sections for “student” and “parent,” and wonders what he hopes to become. He can’t think of anything to write.

12 June Year 19 — The Sea Notes 1

YoonGi’s entry:

All seven boys cut school and decide to go to the sea. They have little money between them, so they must walk to the train station. As they leave, YoonGi almost bumps into JiMin and realizes that he is standing frozen with a trembling face. JiMin stares at a sign that reads “2.1km to Grass Flower Arboretum.” YoonGi flatly tells him that it’s too hot to go to the arboretum. He has an “instinctive feeling” that they should avoid it. He observes that JiMin walks away like a little kid, head bent and shoulders hunched.

JungKook’s entry:

The boys arrive at the beach. They hang around under a torn parasol until HoSeok holds up a discovery on his phone: a large rock that is supposed to grant your dream if you stand atop it and shout your dream out to the sea. TaeHyung encourages them to go. While they grumble in the heat on the long trek, JungKook reflects on how he had recently asked the others what their dreams were. (See 28 May Year 19.) None of them really have a dream to pursue.

YoonGi tells JungKook to stop biting his nails or else they’ll become like his. Then he asks JungKook what his dream is. Having never thought about it, JungKook doesn’t know. He hesitates and then asks what a dream is. HoSeok rattles off a few definitions from his phone. YoonGi questions, “How can something that you want to achieve most in your life and something that is unlikely to come true both be called a dream? … Don’t ever try to have a dream.” JungKook asks why. At his glance, YoonGi stops biting his nails and puts his hands in his pockets. “Because it’s tough having one.” JungKook is curious about why YoonGi bites his nails but doesn’t ask. He recalls that it has been a habit since his childhood to hurt himself. He remembers cutting his finger on a knife badly enough that his mom took him to the hospital, but she didn’t take care of him after they went home. His wound healed slowly because he kept pressing it; the pain helped him feel awake. Even now, he sometimes feels hollow.

TaeHyung asks how much longer they have to walk. HoSeok is puzzled, saying they should be close. They gaze around the empty, pebbled beach. JiMin sighs and reads aloud from an article on his phone. A resort will be built on this beach, and the construction company blew up the rock. They notice the cordoned off construction zone. They try to reassure each other to remain positive, but they all feel the disappointment of walking all that way for nothing. JungKook notices YoonGi biting his nails again and tries to stop him, but he is interrupted by a loud drilling noise. JungKook looks past him at the sea and all that remains of the dream-granting rock, the pebbles under their feet. “Is the world tough for you, too?” he asks, but YoonGi can’t hear him. JungKook screams again. “Do you want to give up on this world, too?” HoSeok and TaeHyung laugh at their mimed conversation. They all look out to the sea and shout their dreams. The drilling is so loud that they can’t hear each other. JungKook cannot even hear his own dream. When the noise stops, they cut off abruptly and laugh. SeokJin suggests that they take a photo. He sets the timer and runs to join their row, the sea behind them. They walk back to the train station. JungKook asks if he can keep the photo. SeokJin writes “June 12” on the back and gives it to him, telling him that his dream will come true. JungKook asks if SeokJin knows what he shouted to the sea, and SeokJin merely taps his shoulder and strides ahead.

BTS Universe Story : The Boy on the Threshold, ep.3

JungKook’s memory of the beach trip follows a similar structure to the scene in Notes 1, plus a notable addition. After they fail to find the dream-granting boulder, JungKook climbs up on the pier railing. He thinks: “I’ve always liked walking on the edge of walls or on top of lines. Focusing on centering my gravity means that I don’t really think of anything else, and the boundary—not quite a part of either place—always felt like where I should be.” Someone grabs his arm while he precariously balances. YoonGi tells him not to do that, and JungKook assures him that he won’t fall.

“YoonGi would often grab my arm when I walked on railings. The others would look after me, too, after seeing him do that. I liked their helping hands. It felt like they were telling me that I should go to them. That this wasn’t my place. Maybe their hands were why I walked on the railings.”

25 June Year 19 Notes 1 (SJ)

Alone in the classroom hideout, SeokJin finds a plant by the window. He takes pictures with his phone but doesn’t think they capture what the human eye sees. He notices that “HoSeok’s plant” is scribbled on the floor beneath the pot and then realizes that the window sills, walls, and ceiling are covered with graffiti and drawings, messages left behind by the students who once passed through that room. He wonders if there were past teachers who used violence and endless tests or students like him who ratted out their friends to the principal. Since his father also attended that high school, SeokJin looks for his name on the walls and finds it with a phrase written underneath: “Everything started from here.”

Note: TaeHyung, JiMin, NamJoon, and YoonGi discover several other familiar names near Kim ChangJun (SeokJin’s father) on the classroom wall in TaeHyung’s 23 July Year 22 entry from 7’s album Notes and the extended version in Notes 2.

30 August Year 19 Notes: Her

JiMin plays in HoSeok’s shadow while he is on the phone, reflecting on how HoSeok has accompanied him on the two-hour walk home since the beginning of the school semester. JiMin eventually realized that HoSeok didn’t live in the same direction but never questioned him, simply hoping that their time walking together would stretch the day out a little longer. HoSeok finishes on the phone and chases after him while the cicadas sing and their ice creams melt. Suddenly, JiMin is afraid, wondering how many of these days are left.

20 March Year 20 Notes 1 (TH)

TaeHyung sneaks up on NamJoon in the hallway by their classroom hideout. He stops when he hears SeokJin’s voice inside, apparently informing the principal about how TaeHyung and YoonGi had ditched school and got in a fight over the past few days. SeokJin throws open the door, phone in hand, and looks flustered to see NamJoon standing there. TaeHyung hides in a corner and is shocked to hear NamJoon assure him, “It’s OK. There must’ve been a good reason.” HoSeok and JiMin find TaeHyung in the hallway, and HoSeok pulls him into the classroom. NamJoon beams at TaeHyung as though nothing strange has happened. Believing that NamJoon “must have his reasons” because he is more intelligent and mature, TaeHyung decides not to tell anyone about the conversation he overheard.

15 May Year 20 Notes 1 (NJ)

NamJoon visits the classroom hideout on his last day of school. Two weeks prior, his family decided that they needed to move due to complications with his father’s health and their overdue rent. NamJoon tries to write a message on a piece of paper. He scribbles “I must survive” before the pencil lead snaps. He crumples the paper and writes in the dust on the window instead.

“No farewell message would be enough to let the others know how I felt. At the same time, no farewell message was needed to make myself understood. ‘See you again.’ It was a wish, rather than a promise.”

Note: “I must survive” is a recurring message tied to NamJoon in the BU MVs. See also 17 December Year 21.

7 June Year 20 Notes: Persona

TaeHyung’s two month old puppy Dubu slips out of the leash and disappears while he is distracted on his phone. TaeHyung runs around the neighborhood looking for him, first angry at the puppy and then blaming himself. When Dubu returns on his own, TaeHyung is filled with the unfamiliar feeling that he is someone who can be relied on.

11 June Year 20 BTS Universe Story: The Boy on the Threshold, ep.5 Everyone’s Place

In the classroom hideout, JungKook listens to YoonGi playing the piano. The sound of the music makes him feel as if YoonGi understands how he feels and is trying to console him. The Dean of Students forces the door open, demanding why they are there. He berates and slaps JungKook, knocking him to the floor. YoonGi steps between them and shoves the teacher’s shoulder. The dean warns him that he had better be prepared for the consequences of putting his hands on a teacher and then leaves. Despite his throbbing cheek, JungKook smiles because it is the first time someone has protected him, and the feeling of getting closer to YoonGi makes him giddy. For the next two weeks, YoonGi does not come to school.

25 June Year 20 Notes 1

JungKook’s entry:

JungKook tries to play the piano in the classroom hideout, unable to make it sound like YoonGi did. He reflects on the rumor that YoonGi was expelled after the events of 11 June and wonders if YoonGi would still be here playing the piano if JungKook had not been there that day when the teacher appeared.

YoonGi’s entry:

Breathing hard, YoonGi arrives at his bedroom, removes a half-burned piano key from an envelope in his desk drawer, and throws it into the trash can. He remembers a day four years ago when he returned to their burned down home and found a skeleton of the piano where his mother’s room used to stand. He noticed several piano keys on the ground and took one of them, wondering what note it was and how many times her fingers touched it. In the present, YoonGi thinks how unbearable living under his father’s rule is and recalls what happened that day: he is officially expelled from school. He picks up the piano key again and hurls it out the window.

“I couldn’t hear the piano key hit the ground. Now I’d never know what note it made. It’d never make a sound again. I’d never play the piano again.”

17 July Year 20 Notes 1 (SJ)

At the end of the last school day before summer vacation, SeokJin tries to leave quickly but is hailed by HoSeok and JiMin. No one knows that he was pressured by the principal and revealed their hideout, which led to JungKook and YoonGi being discovered (11 June) and the latter’s expulsion (25 June). HoSeok wishes SeokJin a good vacation and to keep in touch, but he can’t reply.

“My first day at this school crossed my mind as I passed through the school gate. We were all late and got punished. But we were together, so we could laugh together. I had ruined all those memories we shared.”

Note: Variations of the sentiment “we can laugh when we’re together” recur throughout BU.

15 September Year 20 Notes 1 (HS)

In the hospital emergency room, HoSeok wants to explain how JiMin had a seizure at the bus stop to his mother, Sim SeonMi. When the doctors wheel JiMin’s bed out, HoSeok begins to follow until SeonMi thanks him and touches his shoulder. He feels like she has drawn a line between them that he cannot cross. He falls to the floor, and when he looks up, JiMin’s bed is gone.

Note: The name of JiMin’s mother is specified in his BTS Universe Story arc, Stopped Time. JiMin’s 11 May Year 22 entry in Notes 1 reflects that he blacked out at the bus stop after seeing the window of the Grass Flower Arboretum shuttle bus open. His 12 August Year 22 entry in Notes 2 reveals the real cause of JiMin’s seizure at the bus stop: he sees the boy that he left behind at the arboretum warehouse on 6 April Year 11. Though the boy’s empty eyes no longer speak to JiMin, this chance encounter awakens his memories of that day.

28 September Year 20 Notes: Her and Smeraldo Books Twitter

JiMin, heavily medicated, has lost track of how long he has been back in the hospital. But he considers this a special day because he lies to the doctor for the first time about not remembering anything.

Note: He is lying about not remembering what triggered his seizure at the bus stop on 15 September and/or what happened at the Grass Flower Arboretum when he was a kid (see Notes 2 comments above). This lie is also referenced in his 11 May Year 22 entry in Notes 1.

30 September Year 20 Notes 1 (JK)

A teacher hits JungKook with an attendance book when he refuses to admit that he still visits the classroom hideout, reminding him of when YoonGi was beaten. Later, JungKook stands outside the room and imagines that the others are waiting for him on the other side. He opens the door to only find HoSeok, clearing out what remains of their belongings. HoSeok walks him out, and JungKook realizes that those days are gone and will never come again.

25 February Year 21 Notes: Her (HS)

HoSeok watches himself dance in the mirror. He has danced since he was around twelve and discovered an ecstasy that came from inside himself. Outside of the mirror, HoSeok is a person who collapses everywhere and takes medicine he doesn’t need, who smiles even when he hates it and isn’t happy. But when he dances, he truly becomes himself, casting away all that weighs him down and feeling that he can become happy.

2 May Year 21 Notes: Persona (JK)

Biking along the Yangjicheon riverbank, JungKook thinks about how his friends left him one by one and that no one at home or in the world smiles at him anymore. He stops in the shadows under a bridge. Nobody comes to this kind of ruined place, and maybe that is the reason no one comes to him either. He feels most comfortable alone in the complete darkness where no one will look for him and wants the moment to never end.

9 August Year 21 Notes: Persona (SJ)

SeokJin walks along a Los Angeles beach and photographs the ocean. It has been a year since he fled Songju and moved to his mother’s family’s home, where he grew up as a child. He doesn’t photograph people anymore and didn’t bring any photos from high school with him, afraid to remember who he was at that time or to wonder about how his friends are doing and whether they still think of him.

17 December Year 21 Notes 1 (NJ)

This lengthy entry details events that transpired since the autumn of Year 20 when NamJoon’s family moved to the village, framed by moments on 17 December itself as NamJoon leaves on his own. His family chooses this village because it has a nearby hospital for his ailing father and employers who will hire someone without a high school diploma. NamJoon serves as a delivery boy for an eatery, competing for work with the other local boys. They grow a strange sense of solidarity, and he privately dubs one of them “TaeHyung,” even though the boy’s discontent, outward behavior is more akin to YoonGi��s. (Quotation marks added to the name here for clarity.) Competition slackens when snow falls in winter. NamJoon and “TaeHyung” are the only ones poor enough to risk the road up to the mountain town’s rest area when orders are phoned to the village below. On an afternoon forecast to have heavy snowfall, the restaurant owner dismisses “TaeHyung” due to his bruised face and gives the deliveries to NamJoon. The old delivery scooter fishtails on NamJoon’s third trip down the mountain, throwing him off. More anxious about the scratched scooter than his cut ankle and aching body, NamJoon finally gets it to restart and returns to the eatery. “TaeHyung,” who has been hanging around this whole time, approaches and asks for a favor. Before he can answer, NamJoon receives a call from his mother relaying that his father went outside alone and fell, requiring a trip to the hospital. NamJoon understands that his father was only trying to keep his dignity but is still frustrated because he can’t earn any more much-needed money this day. He hands “TaeHyung” the keys and leaves to take his father to the hospital.

The next day, NamJoon learns that “TaeHyung” was in a fatal accident during one of the deliveries up the mountain. The police officer blames him for being a poor driver and not wearing a helmet. NamJoon does not speak up that he has never seen the helmet the owner now has placed out on the counter. He visits the scene of the accident, thinking that the white outline on the road could be his if he was the one to make the next delivery—just as it could be his family mourning in the village instead of “TaeHyung’s” mother. On a later trip carrying his father home from the bus stop, NamJoon pretends not to hear his father’s frail voice over the noise of barking dogs. A week after that, NamJoon is making steady deliveries up the mountain. During what is ultimately his last delivery, he speaks with a stranger at the rest area, who cautions him to take care. “Do you know what’s really dangerous? Calcium chloride and wet leaves, not the snow itself,” the stranger blurts as NamJoon departs. NamJoon drives carefully back, not looking at the scene of the accident. This is not out of safety, as he tries to convince himself, but guilt: guilt for surviving, for his relief of being the one alive, for not defending “TaeHyung’s” driving skills. He also wonders if he is “a hypocrite pretending to have a guilty conscience.” Because he scattered wet leaves and sprinkled calcium chloride to prevent the road from icing over where he fell that afternoon, believing that he would be making the next delivery. If he did not do both those things, would “TaeHyung” be alive?

Mind and body numb, NamJoon makes it home from the delivery detached from the world around him. The barking dogs snap him out of the daze, and he remembers his father’s words that he pretended not to hear and dwelled on daily despite trying not to think about them: “Go, NamJoon. You must survive.” The next morning (17 December), NamJoon sneaks away to the bus stop. He is running away from his family’s misfortunes, from his own resignation to his fate, from poverty. The bus is scheduled to arrive in Songju in a few hours—the city he left with no notice and is returning to once more with the same. NamJoon wonders if his old friends still live there and how they are doing. On the frosted window, he writes with his finger: “I must survive.”

Note: The village boy’s real name is JongHun according to NamJoon’s 12 June Year 22 entry in Notes 2, which also reveals that he visited JongHun’s home to give his condolences before he left town.

1 February Year 22 Notes: 7 (SJ)

Summoned by his father without explanation, SeokJin flies back to Korea from Los Angeles. Although he has addresses in both LA and Songju, neither place feels like his home.

———————————————————

Update Log

Posted May 5, 2021

Do not repost.

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nerdythebard · 3 years ago

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#27: Athena, Goddess of Wisdom

She had to make her appearance eventually, Gods and Goddesses.

Athena is probably one of the most famous deities. Daughter of Zeus, born despite his schemes, ready to defend the people and Olympus. Contrary to Ares's bloodshed, she represents strategy, military wisdom and careful planning. Spoiler alert: we're not making her a Battle Master ;)

Next Time: HAVE YOU EVER HEARD THE JAGUAR CRY TO THE BLUE CORN MOON!?

Let's see what we need for the SMITE version of Athena to appear in our D&D game:

Ultimate Defender: Even bigger protector than Artio, Athena is a Guardian with High Crowd Control and High Defence.

Reach for the Sky: Athena uses long-reach attacks and her Ultimate allows her to appear by her companion's side for some extra protection.

You and what Army: Athena can summon the Defenders of Olympus to form a shield wall around her, as well as taunt and goad enemies into fighting her.

---

I know I've done this before many-a-times, but I really have no choice here. Athena is a guardian, she has the divine blood of Zeus in her veins... I have to make her a Protector Aasimar. We get a +2 Charisma and +1 Wisdom, 60 feet of Darkvision, resistance to necrotic and radiant damage, ability to speak Common and Celestial, the Light cantrip, and Healing Hands, which lets us recover Hit Points equal to our level once per long rest.

We're going to take the City Watch background, which gives us proficiencies in Athletics and Insight, two languages of our choice, but we're actually going to customize it and replace the Watcher's Eye feature with Legal Authority from the Inquisitor background. This allows us to become a representative of the law, pass judgments and sometimes even carry out the sentence. Basically, we can now tell those who attempt to invade Olympus

ABILITY SCORES

Strength will be first, our weapon is a spear and those are not labelled as finesse. Next is Constitution, we need to be able to take hits. Follow that up with Wisdom, it's kinda our thing, especially when it comes to strategy.

Charisma will be next, it's important for a good leader (and a proud crafter). Dexterity is a bit lower than I would like it to be, but in SMITE Athena is not the quick-and-nimble type. Finally, we're dumping Intelligence. We really need other abilities more, plus it wasn't a smart decision to punish Arachne for winning a competition.

CLASS

Once again, I'm putting a small twist on the prediction and I think this is the first time on the blog we're doing this.

Level 1 - Paladin: We start with the divine warrior. Paladins get a d10 Hit Dice, [10 + Constitution modifier] initial Hit Points, proficiencies with light armour, medium armour, heavy armour, shields, simple weapons, and martial weapons. In the artwork, we see that Athena is not turtled-up in armour, so giving her a half-plate in addition to a spear and a shield seems like a good option. Our saving throws are Wisdom and Charisma, and we get to choose two class skills (Intimidation and Persuasion).

We start by getting Divine Sense, which informs us of any celestial, fiends, or undead within 60 feet of us. We know the type, but not what the creature actually is.

Lay on Hands is similar to our racial ability, Healing Hands. We have a pool of healing energy, equal to [our Paladin level x5] which restores itself at each long rest. As an action, we can touch a creature and restore its Hit Points by whatever points we have left in the pool. Alternatively, we can spend 5 points to remove one disease or poison from the target.

Level 2 - Paladin: We get Divine Smite. Whenever we hit a creature with a melee weapon attack, we can burn a spell slot to add extra 2d8 radiant damage (+1d8 for each spell slot above 1st-level to a maximum of 5d8). Damage increases by 1d8 if the enemy is a fiend or an undead.

We also get to pick a Fighting Style. To fulfil Athena's role as a guardian, we're once again going to pick Interception. Whenever a creature within 5 feet of us is hit by an attack, we can use our reaction to reduce the damage by [1d10 + our proficiency bonus]. We must be wielding a shield or a simple/martial weapon.

Paladins also get Spellcasting. Charisma is our casting ability, and we do not learn cantrips or rituals. Paladins have access to their full spell list and can each day prepare [Charisma modifier + half of Paladin level rounded down] spells. We start with two 1st-level spell slots:

Divine Favour bathes us in divine light and power, allowing our weapon attacks to deal extra 1d4 radiant damage for 1 minute (concentration).

Heroism increases your allies' morale. Until the spell ends (1 minute, concentration), one willing creature we touch is immune to being frightened and gain Temporary Hit Points equal to our casting ability modifier at the start of each turn.

Shield of Faith surrounds one creature of our choice within range (60 feet) for 10 minutes (concentration), granting it a +2 AC bonus.

Level 3 - Paladin: With Divine Health we are now immune to disease. We also get to pick our subclass, our Sacred Oath. Athena is a devoted protector of her city and the gods, so making her take the Oath of the Crown, to uphold the spirit of the nation and service to law seems fitting. We start by getting some Oath Spells; those are always prepared for us and don't count against the total number of spells known:

Command forces a Wisdom saving throw onto one creature within 60 feet of us, as we utter a single-word demand. On a failed save, the target is compelled to execute that command to the best of their ability at the beginning of their next turn. The command cannot force the target to harm themselves.

Compelled Duel forces one creature within 30 feet to turn their attention towards us and fight one-on-one, provided they fail a Wisdom saving throw. For the duration (1 minute, concentration), the compelled target has a disadvantage on attacks made against targets other than us and must make a Wisdom saving throw when attempting to move more than 30 feet away from us.

We also gain access to the Cleric's Channel Divinity. Once per short or long rest, we can use one of the two effects listed below:

Champion Challenge acts similarly to the Compelled Duel spell, as it prevents creatures who fail a Wisdom saving throw to move further than 30 feet from us. The difference is, this ability affects every creature within 30 feet radius.

Turn the Tide lets us use our bonus action to bolster the injured. Each creature of our choice within 30 feet of us regain [1d6 + our Charisma modifier] Hit Points, provided they have no more than half of their Hit Points.

Level 4 - Paladin: Time for our first Ability Score Improvement. We will, however, take the Spear Mastery feat instead. We gain a +1 to attack rolls made with our spear, the damage dice of the spear change from a d6 to d8, we can use our bonus action to extend the spear's reach by 5 feet until the end of our turn, and finally, we can prepare ourselves for a charge. If a creature that we can see within 20 feet of us gets within our spear's reach on its next turn, we can use a reaction to make an attack against it that deals additional 1d8 damage. If the creature used Disengage before, we're not getting the opportunity.

We can also grab another spell: Protection from Evil and Good grants one willing creature we touch protection from aberrations, celestials, elementals, fey, fiends, and undead. Attack rolls against the target are made with a disadvantage, and the target cannot be charmed or frightened by the aforementioned creatures.

Level 5 - Paladin: With Extra Attack we can now attack twice instead of once during a single Attack action.

We also unlock 2nd-level spells and gain two spells from our subclass spell list:

Warding Bond ties up to one target within 60 feet of us. For 1 hour the target gains a +1 bonus to AC and saving throws, and resistance to all forms of damage. Additionally, whenever the target takes damage we take the same amount of damage.

Zone of Truth creates a 15-foot-radius sphere at a point within 60 feet of us for 10 minutes. Creatures inside the sphere must make a Wisdom saving throw or become unable to lie as long as they remain within the sphere's boundaries. They are not compelled to answer, however.

Level 6 - Paladin: We get our first Aura option. With the Aura of Protection, whenever a friendly creature within 10 feet of us must make a saving throw, it gains a bonus equal to our Charisma modifier.

We also get another spell: Magic Weapon transforms our non-magical weapon into a magical one, for the purpose of overcoming resistances and immunities. Until the spell ends (1 hour, concentration), we also get a +1 bonus to attack and damage rolls done with the weapon.

Level 7 - Barbarian: Surprise! I believe it's the first time we jump into the rage machine. I can already hear you saying 'Ares should've been a barbarian!'. Maybe. Maybe not. Hear me out, though: Athena's rage is cold and calculated. Precise and bottled up, to be unleashed only when necessary.

Multiclassing into Barbarian doesn't give us any new proficiencies or skills, but we do get the Unarmoured Defence. When we're not wearing armour, our AC equals [10 + our Dexterity modifier + our Constitution modifier]. Unlike Monks, we still get this benefit even if wielding a shield.

We also get access to the Barbarian's key feature...

As a bonus action, the Barbarian can Rage and gain the following benefits (provided they're not wearing heavy armour):

Advantage on Strength checks and Strength saving throws

Bonus to damage rolls (+2; changes as we level up) for weapons that use Strength

Resistance to bludgeoning, piercing and slashing damage

The rage lasts for 1 minute (unless we dismiss it earlier, are knocked unconscious, fail to attack a target on our turn or taken damage during such) and while it's on, we cannot cast spells. For now, we can Rage twice before taking a long rest.

Level 8 - Barbarian: We gain Danger Sense, to better detect hostility. If we're not blinded, deafened or incapacitated, we have an advantage on Dexterity saving throws for effects we can see, such as traps and spells.

We can also forget about defence when making a Reckless Attack. When making our first attack on our turn, we can choose to do it recklessly. This gives us an advantage on melee weapon attacks that use Strength on our turn, but until the end of our next turn, all attacks made against us also have an advantage.

Level 9 - Barbarian: We can now Rage three times per long rest.

We also get to pick our second subclass, our Primal Path. And this is the moment where we get our Athenian warriors with the Path of the Ancestral Guardian. With Ancestral Protectors, we can call upon spectral warriors of the past which hinder the attacks of the first creature we hit while Raging. Until the end of our next turn, the target has a disadvantage on all attacks that aren't against us and when other creatures attack the target, they gain resistance to the damage type of the attack they make.

Level 10 - Barbarian: Halfway through the build and we're getting another ASI. We're gonna raise our Dexterity by 2 points.

Level 11 - Barbarian: Normally, we would've gained Extra Attack here, but we've already got it from our Paladin levels and they do not stack. We do, however, get Fast Movement which increases our movement speed by 10 feet provided we're not wearing heavy armour.

Level 12 - Barbarian: We can now Rage up to four times per long rest.

We get a new subclass upgrade. With Spirit Shield, our ancestral spirits now provide aid to those we defend. While we're raging, and a creature we can see within 30 feet of us takes damage, we can reduce the damage by 2d6.

Level 13 - Barbarian: At this point, our Feral Instincts are so sharp we have an advantage on our Initiative rolls.

Level 14 - Barbarian: Time for another ASI. Let's round up our Strength and put the other point into Dexterity.

Level 15 - Barbarian: Our additional damage while raging now becomes a +3.

We now get a Brutal Critical. Whenever we score a critical hit (Natural 20), apart from doubling our weapon damage die, we roll one more of the same die and add it to the score.

Level 16 - Barbarian: At this point, our Spirit Shield reduces the damage dealt to our allies by 3d6.

We also get another subclass upgrade. With Consult the Spirits, we can now use our ancestral warriors to cast either the Augury or Clairvoyance spells without a spell slot or material components once per short or long rest.

Level 17 - Barbarian: With Relentless Rage, we can now fight despite death. If we drop to 0 Hit Points while raging (and don't get damaged enough to insta-kill us), we can make a DC 10 Constitution saving throw and gain 1 Hit Point on a success. Each time we use this feature after the first, the DC raises by 5 and resets after we finish a short or long rest.

Level 18 - Barbarian: We get the final ASI of the build and we put two points into our Dexterity. We can also now Rage five times before rest.

Level 19 - Barbarian: Our Brutal Critical increases to two additional dice when scoring a Natural 20.

Level 20 - Barbarian: We end with Barbarian 14, which ends with another subclass upgrade. With Vengeful Ancestors, we can truly pull the Uno Reverse Card. When we use our Spirit Shield (which now reduces damage by 4d6), besides just reducing damage, the spirits now deal force damage to the target, equal to the damage prevented.

---

And that is Eda Athena, the Owl Lady! Let's see what we got:

To start off, we're a tank with many protection options for both us and our allies. With increased movement, advantages on initiative and damage-dealing rolls, plus some protection spells, we can easily lead and strategize.

With a half-plate and a shield our AC is 17, we have a +2 to our Initiative, 40 feet of movement, and an average HP of 175.

Unfortunately, our spell repertoire is not great, negative modifier to our Intelligence (if you want to fix that, be sure to hunt for the Headband of Intellect), and no ability maxed to 20.

---

Okay, I think this is not a bad build. As always, treat these as suggestions and modify your own builds as you please. I hope you've enjoyed yourselves and I'll see you in the next one!

- Nerdy out!

#smite #hirez smite #protector aasimar #aasimar #dnd build #dnd #d&d 5e #dungeons and dragons #greek gods #athena #paladin #oath of the crown #barbarian #ancestral guardian

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gumnut-logic · 4 years ago

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Callisto (Arrival - Bit 2)

Prologue Incident - Bit 1 | Bit 2 Fallout - Bit 1 | Bit 2 | Bit 3 Voyage - Bit 1 | Bit 2 | Bit 3 Arrival - Bit 1 | Bit 2

Well, these posts seem to be getting longer. I’m pondering if I should make them shorter and more often.

As always, many thanks to @tsarinatorment @scribbles97 @janetm74 and @onereyofstarlight for their amazing support and who without putting up with my crazy this fic would likely not exist.

We are finally there and things can start happening. Wow, planning makes for longer fics apparently.

I hope you enjoy it ::hugs you all::

-o-o-o-

As the rest of the family exited the cockpit, Michael watched John deploy the last of the long chain of communication buoys into orbit around Callisto and held his breath.

The space monitor was frowning at his console as they both waited for that final connection to click into place.

A moment and John’s face relaxed.

And Michael with it.

His own board flashed up with a connection confirmed through the chained micro-tunnel drives.

John hit his comms. “Tracy Island, this is Thunderbird Excel. Do you copy?”

They waited.

A heartbeat.

“Thunderbird Excel this is Tracy Island. Great to hear your voice, John.” Even Michael could hear the smile in Kayo’s voice. “I have a lot of green and pretty lights here. Send me the tests and I will bounce them back.”

“Sending now.” John’s fingers darted across his board and Michael watched the system take on the workload and churn data all the way back to Earth. “And I must say, Kayo, it is lovely to hear your voice, too.”

“Looking forward to hearing yours often. Data incoming. Will apprise results.”

“Looking forward to it, Thunderbird Excel out.” John’s fingers flicked again and the comms signal closed.

“Thunderbird Excel?” Michael arched an eyebrow at the astronaut.

John shrugged. “Well, I think she’s earned it now, don’t you?”

“Mmmm.” He looked back down at his board. The thought of having contributed to creating an actual Thunderbird...

He was startled when a shadow passed over his hands. “You’ve done well, Michael. Thank you.”

He looked up at the red-headed Tracy floating beside him. John was an enigma. He was a brother like any Tracy, but unlike the eldest who hated him with a passion that saw no border, John was quiet, even kind. Michael had been working alongside Brains and John and occasionally the youngest, for over a year now, and while he doubted he and John would ever be close friends, there was a mutual respect.

Plus, the distinct feeling that if Michael ever laid a finger on any of John’s brothers ever again, he would not survive the attempt.

It was definitely the quiet ones who should be worried about.

Not to mention Eos.

Michael really wished he could get his hands on that piece of code.

But again, he felt that it would be his last action in this universe.

Not that John had ever threatened him.

He didn’t need to.

“Are you feeling okay?” Turquoise eyes were peering down at him.

“I am well. No need to worry.”

The astronaut smiled. “Good. Monitor the comm network and liaise with Brains regarding the T-Drive’s performance. Let’s see if we can cut down on the jumps on the way back. I’d prefer to go through as little of the nausea as possible.”

“Agreed.”

John arched an eyebrow and his lips curled up. “I’ll be in Thunderbird Five assessing the danger zone and coordinating with Thunderbird Three.”

“FAB.”

The astronaut stared at him for just an extra moment longer before pushing off Michael’s console and throwing himself towards the cockpit exit.

“Thank you, John.”

A flicker of a smile and the last Tracy disappeared through the door, leaving Michael alone.

-o-o-o-

Virgil hated the IR spacesuits. They were far too tight and left nothing to the imagination.

Also, the red baldrics clashed horribly with his green stripe enough to rip his eyeballs out.

But although his standard uniform was satisfactory for short forays into space, it was not enough for a space mission of this magnitude as it did not have the survival and safety mechanisms needed in an emergency. So, here he was dressed like some kind of spandex wearing superhero, his heavy lifting muscles providing a great anatomy lesson to any within eyesight.

“Looking good, Virg.” Gordon’s eyes were laughing.

“Shut up, Fish.” The aquanaut was used appearing all but naked in front of thousands. Hell, Virgil had nothing to be ashamed of, it was just difficult to keep a straight face in a professional capacity.

How the hell John lived in one of these things was a mystery Virgil had no interest in exploring.

The alternative was wearing something like Alan’s spacesuit, but that had its own issues regarding his exosuit and despite the...exposure, this was the best option.

At least he had a little security with the addition of his exosuit support padding and his harness – never leave home without it. That and his baldric covered a little of his modesty.

Didn’t stop his brothers’ comments though.

Alan actually snorted in laughter.

Scott raised an eyebrow, but then their commander was dressed the same and, much like John, was giving the Greek gods a run for their money in the process.

Virgil felt like a dwarf from The Lord of the Rings. What was his name? Gam? Gim? Gimli? Standing next to that bleached elf.

Virgil grunted. “Let’s do this, already.”

Okay, the grin on Scott’s face was both worth it and damned annoying.

Dad had chosen a version similar to Alan’s suit. Due to his health concerns, Virgil had recommended extra support with arm guards and greaves built into his boots. He had glared at Virgil, but Virgil was a Tracy and just as stubborn as his father and if he wanted to go on this mission he could damn well meet him halfway.

Dad wore the protection.

They had Uncle Lee’s ‘space skivvies’ measurements on file and the IR fabricators had churned out an IR uniform echoing their father’s. Considering the astronaut’s skillset, Virgil had coloured his baldric stripe as green as his own and thrown in some of his own kit.

The colour combination still ripped out eyeballs.

Thunderbird Three was nestled into the Excel much like she had been into the XL, but higher up, leaving the massive thrusters behind her and nestling instead of providing the main superstructure of the craft.

To compensate for the loss of One and Two, the Excel now had a third engine on her dorsal plane to offset the two massive pectoral lightspeed engines. Together the three engines provided the huge ion thrust needed to propel them vast distances. And when the T-Drive was required, the third would go dark, the original two engines would flare up and give him his next case of nausea.

Three still connected with Five for extra stability, but she was no longer mandatory for the Excel. Where the XL had basically been an exosuit for Three to break the lightspeed barrier, the Excel was now more Five’s exosuit as she was the one Thunderbird the Excel needed to operate at her best.

Johnny’s ‘bird now had wings.

Very, very big ones.

The cockpit was crowded but quiet as Alan smoothly disengaged Three from the bigger craft, spinning her in space and pointing her towards the moon.

Virgil shifted in his suit, uncomfortable as hell. Not enough to be world ending, but annoying. Beside him, his father glanced in his direction with a concerned frown.

“Are you okay, son?”

That, of course, prompted an equally concerned frown from Scott in front of him.

“I’m fine.” It wasn’t a complete lie, he could live with the suit. His arm was still aching and his stomach had yet to forgive him despite the food he had shoved into it, but he could probably get away with that.

The worst of it was the lack of sleep.

Scott’s eyes were far too knowing.

The medic in him knew that they were going into a potentially dangerous situation. Hell, they were in space right now, not exactly Tracy Island’s pool patio for relaxation. They needed to be alert and ready.

He had tried to sleep. He had sent all of his brothers to nap during the voyage out here. But he doubted any of them managed much.

He certainly hadn’t.

Scott knew because Virgil could see it reflected in those blue eyes of his. He still looked worn, though he tried to hide it, ever the professional.

Dad.

Dad was still looking at him with questioning eyes.

Virgil sighed. “I’m just tired. I can manage.”

Those lips pressed together, obviously displeased.

Typical.

His father was so like Scott in so many ways that having both of them to contend with on this mission was going to send Virgil grey.

It was okay for them to go out on a limb, risk their lives for the greater good, but if someone they cared about did the same, they were all worry and you can’t do that.

As if to emphasize that thought, his father’s frown fixated on Scott. Virgil followed his gaze, but from his angle could only see the back of his brother’s head.

Another glance at his father and the concern was clearly there.

Perhaps something was starting to sink into Dad’s head. Maybe he was realising what he was risking.

Who he was risking.

Three shook a little as she breached the minimal atmosphere of the moon. Alan was muttering orbital calculations. Each large planetary body was different and required a catered approach.

The Base had sent vectors and the conditions that constituted ‘weather’ on the barren moon, but there were many firsts in this mission and this was one of them.

For the benefit of the rest of them, Alan threw up a hologram of their approach.

The massive crater known as Asgard swelled on the screen. It was very bright, even in the weak sunlight. Probably ice. To the north of it lay an even brighter splash of white, rays extending out across the heavily cratered surface for miles.

As they sank, the horizon formed in a sharper curve than Virgil was used to. Sharper than Mars which was the only other planetary body beyond Earth’s Moon Virgil had ever set foot on.

“There it is.” Alan, ever enthusiastic in his element, pointed out a spot quickly growing on the display. “Callisto Base.”

It was a white cross with a massive airlock at its centre. Surrounding the arms of the cross was machinery, storage tanks and energy production facilities. It shone ever so bright, like a blunted star plastered on the side of the moon.

As they drew closer, the Tracy Industries logo could be seen branded across the airlock doors.

The base was a massive endeavour. Almost entirely underground taking advantage of a small crater in the Doh crater wall, it had capped the landform and sealed off the space creating a series of caverns to house the transport ships moving between the Base and the Jefferson or any other destination they chose.

Entirely self-sufficient, TI’s hydrogen technology gave it power, TI’s heavy duty excavation equipment gave them the power to dig the base out of the rock and ice. It had helped to find unexpected caves under the surface. All and all the Base was a robust structure, protecting its fifty-odd inhabitants from the hazards of living on an exposed and radiated moon.

“Callisto Base, Thunderbird Three requesting permission to dock.” Virgil was suddenly irrationally proud of his little brother.

Commander Walters answered immediately. “Permission granted Thunderbird Three. Hold in the airlock for repressurisation and permission to proceed.”

“FAB, Callisto Base.”

“One of these days, Jeff, you are going to tell me what that means.”

Both Alan and their father snorted.

As they approached, the big airlock doors slowly began to open, splitting the TI logo in half. The hologram stayed fixed on their destination, but Three pivoted her nose to the darkness of the sky bringing the ever-hovering presence of Jupiter back into view through Three’s windows. Alan flicked a wrist and the Thunderbird started lowering into what was now a gaping maw below.

Three slipped into the airlock and the doors closed behind them.

-o-o-o-

Alan was a professional, but he had to admit that he was internally bouncing around in joy. The air was still thick with tension, his family caught up in this thing with Dad, but Alan was doing his best to ignore it and focus on his job.

And oh my god, he was landing on his second moon of Jupiter! This had to be a first. He could go down in history as the first person to land on several moons, another planet and multiple random comets and asteroids.

Okay, so Virg and Scott had been with him, even Gordon on Europa – that had been one hell of a mission that still gave him both dreams and nightmares – but he had been the only one to land on all of them.

Alan Tracy, astronaut extraordinaire. He couldn’t help but grin as the airlock repressurised and the Callisto Commander finally gave him permission to land.

He slowed his ‘bird to a perfect touchdown as the secondary airlock doors closed above him.

He killed her engines and let her begin her cool down sequence.

The whole cockpit sighed a little in relief. A pause as if to reset and then everyone was moving.

-o-o-o-

Gray Walters rubbed the back of his neck as Thunderbird Three coasted smoothly from the decontaminating airlock into the main hangar. The pilot of that ‘bird had to be a Tracy. The huge red rocket barely fit nose to tail with only inches to spare between the two massive sets of doors. After all, they had never expected such a large craft needing to dock.

He had Kate to thank for arguing the hangar’s size...with Ju backing her up as usual.

The thought of his wife froze him for a split second. Ju was going to be okay. Jeff was here now. He had always been their good luck charm. Hell, the guy had survived eight years in space alone. Ju could manage a few days.

Couldn’t she?

“She’s docked.” Mary, his second, looked up from her station. “Shall I shunt her into a bay?”

“Leave her in central for now. We’re not going anywhere and they may need to leave in a hurry.”

“That will piss Benji off.”

“Benji can stew. His team still has a week left of their Jefferson rotation.”

“He will cite regs.”

Gray turned away. Let him cite regs. “This is an emergency and takes priority.” He sighed. “Run decon in the central core. Anyone not crucial to this operation is to steer clear of International Rescue. Lock off environmental systems. Keep the two crews contained to keep the risk of contamination as low as possible. We can’t afford an accidental bug in the system.”

“Will do.” She paused before bringing up the topic he knew she would. “What about Jeremiah?”

“What about him?”

“You need to tell them.”

“One thing at a time, Mary.”

“But-“

“First we find Kate and Ju.” He swallowed. They had to find Ju.

They had to.

-o-o-o-

Stepping onto a new world was never as grand as it appeared. Hell, landing on Mars for the first time had been a trip over his own toes’ moment.

Stepping onto Callisto was no different.

It was Scott who grabbed him before he could flip head over heels across the gantry. Changes in gravity always took time to get used to and less than twenty-four hours ago, it had been Earth oppressive.

Callisto gravity was a relief…if a little disorientating.

His eldest’s strong grip wrapped around his arm and held tight. Jeff looked over at Scott and was pinned with such worried bright blue eyes that his heart clenched.

All the tension, the argument, the resistance to his presence on this mission boiled down to the emotion in those eyes.

Love.

And fear.

Scott was terrified.

Jeff did it without thought or care for what anyone would think. He grabbed his son and yanked him into a hug, holding him close. The squawk across comms and the scrape of their helmets against each other did nothing to stop him.

“I’m sorry, son.”

“Uh...”

Scott’s arms wrapped around him, ever so hesitantly.

That hesitation hurt almost as much.

He clung that much tighter.

“Dad?” It was breathless.

He clung a second longer, but… Yes...right.

It was a moment stolen.

Because they were on a mission.

Jeff let Scott go.

His son pulled away slowly, not quite fully releasing him, and again those blue eyes were fixated on him in worry.

So much worry.

“You okay, Dad?”

Jeff straightened with more ease than he had managed in a long time and became aware of all the other eyes on him.

The ever-present echoes of Lucille’s beautiful brown eyes were assessing him. That was a given. But another two pairs of blue and a frowning fishy amber had him targeted as well.

He looked at each of them before turning back to the massive cavern around them. A mix of rock wall, structural support and storage, the docking cavern was lit with strong lighting, the red of Three reflecting on patches of frozen water embedded in the walls.

They were standing on a walkway that had been extended out to Three’s hatch. It was obviously of variable height and length and Jeff couldn’t help but admire the design.

He wondered who was responsible.

He wondered if it was Kate.

Her green eyes smiled at him at the back of his mind.

His lips pressed together as his sons and brother-in-law continued to shoot concerned expressions in his direction.

A breath.

“Let’s do this.” And he led them out and into Callisto Base.

-o-o-o-

#thunderbirds are go #thunderbirds #Virgil Tracy #Scott Tracy #Alan Tracy #Jeff Tracy #John Tracy #the mechanic #callisto #Gordon Tracy

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number9robotic · 5 years ago

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9-24-19 Update

The long-awaited sequel to my 9-22-19 Update!

(plugging my newest pic as an artist tax)

Short version: I’m in physical danger right now.

Long version: My relationship with my parents are breaking down significantly because changes to plans of my living situation, my inability to cope with my depression, anxiety, and other mental/emotional compromises, and the resulting inability to do anything outside my comfort zone like finding a proper job/source of income or going to school.

As a result, my mom over the course of a few days have been physically threatening me (in public, no less) to send me back to my home in Vancouver while also shaming me for ruining their lives, and I feel legitimately unsafe being in my own home because I don’t know what they’re gonna do to me. All while this happens, my ability to stay motivated as a creator is really being tested.

Fuller version is below this line because I don’t wanna flood the feed and my account with walls of unpleasant text:

Please read my 9-22-19 Update for full context and backstory, there’s a lot of text and I don’t wanna retype it all.

1. THE REAL-LIFE CIRCUMSTANCES GOT WORSE

Yesterday as I was in my weekly therapy appointment, my parents had a renegotiation with each other about that plan I mentioned for my dad to come here and basically repeat the process of my legal anchoring to LA away from my home in Vancouver. Even though I responded with a (resigned) “sure, I’ll do it for you,” suddenly my dad made a conscience decision and told my mom that he changed his mind, because he’s really concerned about my mental well-being and the complete stagnation of my life because of my time here in LA.

This... didn’t go well with my mom, because as usual, this is ultimately about her, I guess. Later that evening, she took me to a Starbucks because she wanted to talk with me about something important, partially as a result of her indeed getting her travel permit document that day. She told me she also talked to her lawyer earlier that day, who said that as it stands, while the case isn’t expected to be finished until April 2020 at the earliest, I’ve technically done all I need to do to be declared a resident of the US, and my job is effectively done. Combined with my dad’s newfound desire to not keep me here any longer, I was told that I could return home.

buuuuuuuuuuuut

She was VERY clearly not happy about this. Despite being the one who decided to talk about this publicly, she had a very loud meltdown as she was explaining this and decided to erupt all of her frustrations not just with herself, but also of me.

To summarize her very long and confusing tirade, she started to outright force at me “JUST GO BACK TO VANCOUVER! GET A TICKET AND MOVE BACK TOMORROW! JUST GO!!!!”, yet was simultaneously also venting about how much damage this would do to HER and her career; that my lack of presence is a sign of failure on her part as a parent, because she hasn’t been able to get me to go to school or a “real” job or even learn how to drive. Keep this one little bit of info in mind.

A third argument she was trying to convince me of is that the return to Vancouver for me is only going to fuck ME up, because she doesn’t believe that me returning back to a comfortable place where I’m familiar with and am actually able to get around using public transit (which is so much better than LA, it’s not even a fair comparison) would be better for me and my personal health. She also said that Vancouver’s ability to help me with my mental health is so much worse than that of LA... which... that’s incredibly laughable on so many levels, the least of which is the fact that we spent a several-month assessment process to apply for job assistance because of my autism, only for the result to me to deem me and my autism diagnosis as invalid, but whatever, I guess...

I responded by telling how incredibly irrational she was acting in her hysterical state (again, in a very public area) with her a bunch about what I felt would help me through this, which I’ll talk about later. Reason not now is because she promptly forgot about it and this morning, SHE DID THE SAME THING AGAIN. This time she invited me to talk at a different Starbucks, asked me about my future, and then had ANOTHER very public meltdown screaming about her and my life problems, but this time it was at a time before McDonald’s stopped serving its breakfast menu.

Once again, she slammed me in my inability/refusal to try anything that would apparently help justify me being here in LA, me ruining her life no matter where I go in the world, and also threatening to send me away to Vancouver. This time I just had to outright leave the conversation because she was getting violent this time; I’m currently typing this in a library and she hasn’t found me yet. This isn’t an entirely new feeling, but currently I am legitimately scared for my future and physical safety.

2. EMOTIONAL HEALTH AND PARENTING

I (re-)explained to her that my problem with all of these personal development hurdles -- my inability to try anything where it feels like the failure of which will be utterly emotionally devastating -- is because I flat-out do not have the ability to deal with it. The entirety of grade school and post-secondary have collectively been the most emotionally devastating times of my life to me, I failed my written exam that’s the first step to get a driver’s licence 5 TIMES, and I have a smattering of emotional, communicative, mental, and physical hinderances preventing me from finding work.

And here’s why that affects me so much: my parents are not emotionally supportive. Mom and dad have outright admitted that due to “Chinese parenting”, “it’s just not my personality”, “I don’t know how to help reassure you” they don’t wish to help me with my emotional problems directly, often times finding it to be the job of others they can then shunt that duty off to, such as therapists, psychologists, counselors, or others. This ignores the fact that my meetings with them are weekly, whereas my greatest exposure to other people come from them, my supposed “loved ones”. I feel like I should be able to go to them for emotional strength. I do not, either because they aren’t capable of or just simply don’t want to be that.

Just to note how little they care about my feelings, I came out to them as nonbinary a few months ago, explained to them what that actually means, that I don’t like my pronouns or birth name at all, and asked for them to respect that. They have yet to comply despite me broadcasting my discomfort constantly, because they simply won’t “get it”.

Yknow... as someone who’s failed a lot in life... I can safely say that the resulting emotional wreckage isn’t fun.

The thing about being emotionally wrecked is that without any reliable source to go to like family or friends, my only solution is to just wait for my depression to pass... which if anyone knows anything about it, you’d know it’s super-unreliable and can take either a week or a month for me to feel better again, and is incredibly destructive. What I’ve recently realized is how much it utterly fucks with my perception of time and continuity -- depression cuts off my ability to feel anything significant or optimistic, including my ability to perceive a future worth looking up to. As a result, I feel like I’ve wasted A LOT of time in the last few years because nobody has been able to help me with that, at least in my actual time of need.

I’ve made this point to my parents many times throughout the year, and I’ve been desperately trying to communicate to them that the easiest solution to my mental trauma? To actually be there emotionally as loved ones; to help me through that potential sense of failure that I’m so afraid of experiencing again, and for them to comfort me as their child.

This request has pissed off my mom on multiple levels: the first I established already is that she’s constantly claiming she doesn’t know how to/isn’t capable of doing it because “it’s just not me” or “I’m not white mom” or some other crap. The second however is where things got super-confusing: she was also offended that I would ever think that she doesn’t support me on that level, and shared me a bunch of wechats to our extended family supporting my minor hobbies, even though they’ve been sucking really bad (again, please consider my patreon, this is a super-hard time to be motivated as a creator)

So I was like... “You ARE capable of being emotionally reassuring! I want to actually hear it myself!” because she almost never expresses positive emotions; it’s either complete ambivalence or negative frustration. She continued to express negative frustration at this, and at that point I just gave up because at this point it struck me that she just outright doesn’t want to help me with it because she felt like she can shunt the duty to someone else... even though she’s pissed about having to pay them therapy bills to do so. Ugh...

3. EVERYTHING BITES

To summarize: this entire breakdown and my future is emotionally fueled not about my needs like my dad wished, but about my mom’s, who believes that it is far more simple for me to be sent back to Vancouver at her blatant behest, and for me to just “get over” my depression and anxiety to do all the shit she expects me to do which she also believes me to be incapable of doing, than to just... be a caring parent who expresses positive feelings.

And during all of this, she’s also shaming me as a failure who ruins her life no matter what I do.

I am... so exhausted... and it’s super-difficult to stay motivated as a creator these days as a result of it. Fuck, I barely feel safe returning home either in LA or in Vancouver, because I know my mom hates me for it.

I still don’t have friends, and I still have depression and anxiety... and I can’t even ask my mom to be there for me in my time of emotional distress... thanks.

#vent #art #artist #need help #artists on tumblr

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sebeth · 6 years ago

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Young Justice: “Fears” and “Drop-Zone”

Warning, Spoilers Ahead…

Issue 6: “Fears”

We left off with Superboy declaring the thought of “destroying Superman” is constantly on his mind.

While Superboy’s teammates reel in shock, Dick decides to narrate his origin recap. But internally since Batman won’t let Dick share details about his personal life

We flashback to four years ago, the Flying Graysons (John, Mary, Dick, Aunt, Uncle, and Cousin John) were performing at Jack Haly’s Circus. Dick mentions he was nine-years old.

Dick mentions that “I never knew either of my grandfathers. They died a long time before I was born.” He also comments “I was the youngest of the troupe, so father said I wasn’t allowed to be involved with the most dangerous stunt the Flying Graysons performed.”

Dick continues “I was jealous of my older cousin, secretly wanting to be in his place. He would always mess up my hair and say ‘Don’t worry, squirt, you’ll get a chance sooner than you think. He always knew the right thing to say.”

We know what happens next: Zucco – tampered ropes – bodies hitting the floor.

“A lot of things happened after that. Most of them were a blur, even if I could concentrate, I didn’t think I would be able to say exactly what order things happened in. The next crystal-clear thing I do remember was Bruce Wayne.”

“My mother and father dead. My aunt and cousin dead. My uncle alive but paralyzed for the rest of his life. The only living family member I had was unable to take care of me.”

“Bruce Wayne came to my rescue and let me become part of his family.”

We know the rest – after training, Robin is born and Zucco is brought to justice.

This is the only instance I can recall of Dick having relatives other than his parents. Discounting generations-back Talons.

An odd choice to leave the uncle alive since he’s never mentioned again. The extent of the paralysis isn’t mentioned. Since it appears that gaining custody of Dick was never an option, I would assume the paralysis is from the neck down. It’s a safe bet that Bruce provided the best medical care for the uncle.

Poor Uncle Grayson. He lost his wife, child, brother, and sister-in-law! And, as an aerialist, he is now paralyzed. All in one night. Talk about your worst nightmare coming true. I wonder if Dick maintained contact with his uncle. He could use the support but he was dealing with multiple traumas and depression – would he have even wanted to see his nephew?

Wally interrupts Dick’s ruminations: “Robin, did you hear what he said? He just said that he wants to take down Superman!”

Superboy clarifies: It’s how I feel…sometimes. What if that’s why I was created? What if that was the only reason I was created? I just feel…I don’t know what I feel. Sometimes…thoughts happen.”

Dick agrees Conner has a valid point: “We really don’t know anything about what they did to him yet.”

Wally defends his friend: “We know he’s one of the good guys and we know he’s part of this team. In my world, actions speak louder than words. Superboy has proven his intentions with actions.”

Wally checks in with his other pal: “Hey, what’s with you? Not like you to zone out like that.”

Dick admits to being lost in thought.

The writers seem to be taking a nod from the Justice League cartoon and are establishing Wally as the heart of the team.

Wally asks Megan about her story. Megan gives a few selective details:

· Martians live underground as the surface is uninhabitable.

· Family lives are very entwined.

· Martians mostly communicate telepathically.

· Telepathy helps large Martian families maintain a sense of community.

· Martian families are usually quite large.

· Megan has 12 sisters, 17 brothers, and over 300 cousins.

· M��gann mentions that Martians are green, white, or red.

· Megan claims that her parents were green Martians and she was raised in a liberal environment.

· “Others were not as tolerant and the treatment of white Martians was especially horrible.

· M’gann states that she was the closest to uncle J’onn: “We had a great relationship.”

· We discover J’onn is the most famous Martian in history: “He grew to be a true beacon of hope and stood for what our society could achieve. Upon his return to Mars it was declared a day of planetwide celebration. When he came back it was not just for adulation. He also had a specific purpose in mind. Having learned about all of you, J’onn decided now was the time to introduce a younger Martian hero to earth. J’onn J’onzz came to Mars and decided he would hold a competition to find the next Martian champion that would be returning with him to fly among the heroes of earth.”

· Megan enters the contest – very shades of Wonder Woman and wins.

· “At first, Uncle J’onn seemed as if he didn’t want me to compete.”

M’gann has revised significant parts of her background as we discover later in the season.

I wish we knew more of J’onn’s Young Justice background. In the traditional comic book-verse, J’onn is the sole surviving Green Martian accidentally brought to earth by a scientist. The Green Martians were wiped out by a telepathic plague. White Martians were imprisoned/banished before the plague but small numbers turn up to cause trouble for J’onn and the Justice Legue at various points. White Martians are very barbaric and warlike. “Red martians” are an alien species found on Titan/Saturn – the most famous member is Jemm, Son of Saturn.

Taking Megan’s account at face value – which is hard as she is a very skilled liar – it seems as if Martians are thriving on their home planet. The white Martians don’t seem to have been banished or imprisoned but are not accepted by the green and red Martians.

I’m assuming the white Martians are still very barbaric and warlike which causes their isolation.

Megan states she was raised in a “liberal environment”. Does this mean her parents were White Martian versions of hippies – make love, not war. If her parents did adopt a more peaceful approach it could explain their isolation from the white contingent and the suspicion of the red/green groups.

M’gann’s White Martian nature explains her lax morals when it comes to her telepathic powers. The White Martians abuse of their powers was one of the main divides between the greens and whites. Assuming Megan’s parents left the “white nature” behind it doesn’t mean they were instructed in the strict guidelines the green/red follow. If the parent isn’t taught, it becomes hard to instill it into their children.

Megan’s desperation to escape her environment – and her hero worship of J’onn – is easy to see. The later reveal of Megan’s White Martian adds another layer of “J’onn didn’t seem to want me to compete”. It’s important to note that the other competitors were all green Martians. Megan, of course, is drawn as green as the big reveal hadn’t happened yet in the cartoon.

I’m curious if the White Martians ever attacked the Justice League in the YJ-universe? It’s the only reason I can think of as for why Megan is so desperate to have everyone believe she is a green Martian. Otherwise, there could be a whole rainbow’s worth of Martian colors – no one on Earth is going to know. It would also explain why J’onn brings in M’gann as his “niece”. It would eliminate any wariness the members of the Justice League might have about a White Martian being on their protégé’s team.

Does M’gann really have that huge a family? As I said earlier, she’s a very convincing liar prone to living in her own fantasy life – is this extensive family yet another lie/fantasy? Does her parents’ “liberal environment” cause her to be ostracized from this extended family?

Finally, how did J’onn arrive on earth? Was he accidentally transported by a scientist or did he arrive on earth as an explorer/ambassador? Is his wife and daughter still alive? How long was J’onn away from Mars before he returned?

The issue ends with a Cadmus flashback. Superboy dreams of confronting and killing an out-of-control Superman. A scientist informs Roland that the dreaming Superboy has cracked another containment pod.

Roland orders the scientist to “Keep him under and get a new containment pod in here!”

Another scientist comments “What the G-Gnomes make him see must be pretty real to him.”

We return to the camp fire as Superboy ruminates: “These are my thoughts. This is what they put in my brain. I remember…this is why I was created.”

We now return to “Drop Zone”. I mentioned the apparent time screw-up in an earlier post. Kobra’s invasion of Santa Prisca begins on June 19th. The next scene has Young Justice headed to Santa Prisca on June 21st – almost a month before the team actually formed.

I’m going with the assumption that June 21st was meant to be July 21st. Otherwise, we would have 1) missed a whole year’s worth of the team’s adventures, and 2) it only took the Justice League 48 hours to discover the Light’s plans for Santa Prisca. The Light would have a hard time passing itself off as criminal masterminds if they can’t even keep a plot secret for 48 hours.

Robin recalls Batman’s instructions to the team: “This is a covert and recon mission only. Observe and report. If the Justice League needs to intervene, it will.”

Robin asks the important question: “So who’s in charge?”

Batman and Red Tornado glance at each other: “Work that out between two.”

Robin’s smirk indicates he believes he should be in charge.

Dick put Bruce in an awkward position. Bruce can only feel one of two ways: 1) He believes Dick should be in charge but doesn’t want to “play favorites” or 2) He doesn’t feel Dick is ready but doesn’t want to tell him that in front of the others.

Covert costumes make their first appearances.

“No capes. No tights. No offense.” – Superboy doesn’t need your stealth tech, thank you very much. And all he needs to do is switch his shirt inside out in order to achieve stealth mode.

“It totally works for you.” – Megan is as subtle as Wally when it comes to flirting.

“Knew I didn’t need a line.”

“And yet creating a seismic event may not have helped us much with the covert.”

Give Conner a break – he’s still figuring out the extent of his abilities.

Conner and Wally aren’t well-suited for “covert” – they don’t have the temperament for it.

“Did you hear that?”

“You do have great ears?” – Wally and Megan need to have a flirting contest – points given if they actually achieve the “subtle” art of flirtation.

Aqualad, dropped off at a different point on the island, is the only one attempting to come up with/adhere to the plan. Dick’s already splintered off to do his own thing and Wally’s totally going to follow the plan as soon as he “finds Rob”.

Bane and his henchmen are having a shootout with Kobra operatives. Wally stumbles into it: “So much for the stealthy.”

Superboy jumps into the brawl. Bane tries a power attack but discovers it doesn’t work on a Kryptonian. Poor Bane is having a horrible time this episode – his strength is one of his top assets but this is the second time it’s failed him. It must be humbling to think of yourself as a physically powerful man only to discover you can’t compete with the real powerhouses of the DC Universe.

Robin launches into the fray: “What is wrong with you guys? Remember covert? Why didn’t you follow my lead, vanish into the jungle?”

To be fair, the Flashes don’t do covert – they are brightly colored heroes much loved by the public. Superboy is fresh out of the containment pod and doesn’t have the temperament or training for covert missions. Miss Martian’s powers are perfect for these situations but she’s a total newbie plus her entire race consists of telepaths – is “covert” even a concept on Mars?

Wally explains to Robin that they’re not mind readers – they didn’t know Dick’s plans.

Megan pipes in: “You told me I could only read the bad guy’s minds.”

Aqualad reunites with the group.

Robin recognizes the Kobra goons’ outfits. Kaldur and Dick agree Batman wasn’t aware of Kobra’s presence on Santa Prisca. Batman had to suspect something was different on the island. Why else would he send in the team – Bane has been running Santa Prisca/producing Venom since before he “broke the bat”. Unless this mission was only supposed to be a “training wheels exercise” in covertness.

Wally says it’s time to radio Bats: “Mission accomplished>

Dick disagrees: “These cultists aren’t on venom. Kobra’s hoarding the stuff. We don’t leave. Not until I know why.”

Wally and Dick argue over who should be leader of the team. Wally correctly points out that Dick is only 13-years old and ducked out on the rest of the group as soon as they arrived on the island. Dick counter claims that Wally isn’t that mature at 15-years old.

The boys continue to bicker. Superboy makes it clear that he has no desire to be a leader. Miss Martian forfeits herself due to the Mr. Twister fiasco.

A tied-up Bane and henchmen discuss plans while Dick and Wally continue to argue. Superboy overhears and the small smile on his face indicates Conner understands Spanish.

Wally and Dick wrap up their argument:

“Duh. You’re not Batman.”

“Duh. Closest thing you got.”

Bane bursts out laughing at this point: “Such clever ninos.”

Yeah, arguing like a pair of toddlers doesn’t help your credibility with bad guys. And in front of one of your dad’s villains! Shame, Dick! You know Bane’s bringing it up to Bruce the next time they fight.

Miss Martian attempts to read Bane’s mind but he’s “not that easy”: “He’s mentally reciting football scores en Espanol.” The moment is a testament to Megan’s youth and inexperience as a resident of earth. J’onn wouldn’t have been dissuaded by the “foreign language” trick.

Bane proposes the old “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” routine.

Bane and the team head to the factory. Dick is still throwing jabs at Wally’s expense. Wally again calls out Dick on his behavior: “A real leader would focus on getting answers.”

Dick is rather petty but he is only 13-years old. Not the most mature time of anyone’s life.

The group enter the Venom factor via a secret entrance. Robin promptly disappears.

Bane: “Has the young fool already been caught?”

A resigned Aqualad: “No, he just does that.”

Kid Flash decides he’ll get the intel and be back before Robin. Ignoring Kaldur’s “Wait”, Wally speeds off.

A sarcastic Bane: “Great chain of command.”

Robin and Kid Flash are in a control center, looking at chemical compounds. Wally’s love of science is demonstrated as he recognizes one chemical compound as Venom and the other one as the Blockbuster formula from Cadmus. The two combined make a powerful combination – and a permanent one.

Sportsmaster arrives on the island. Yes, the Sportsmaster! He’s a rather obscure Golden Age villain that I don’t even think has been used in the comics since the All-Star Squadron/Young All-Stars/Infinity Inc days. I’ve mentioned before that I love the creators’ knowledge and fondness of the complete scope of the DC Universe – this is just another example.

Off topic, the main reason I hate re-boots and re-sets are because of all the characters and elements of the DC Universe that are lost every single time. It’s the same reason I hate all the senseless deaths in comics. Boo to all of that!

Did the Justice Society and its respective foes still debut in the World War II era? Or was their debut pushed into a later decade – say the 1970s or 1980s? Sportsmaster is looking rather young for a non-meta who debuted in World War II. Not that aging is a problem for comic book universes – with all the magic, chemicals, radiation, and cosmic craziness it wouldn’t take much to explain the slow-aging of every inhabitant on earth.

Miss Martian spies on Kobra and Sportsmaster’s conversation. Aqualad attempts to reach the Justice League but the coms are jammed. Kaldur decides they need a plan.

Bane: “I have a suggestion.” Bane leaps down and starts fighting Kobra henchmen.

Mammoth storms into the factory but finds Superboy isn’t as easy a target as Bane.

Bane leaves the chaotic scene.

Wally and Dick enter the fray. Miss Martian telepathically links the team. Robin has – once again – disappeared from the scene. Robin intercepts Shimmer and Lord Kobra at their helicopter. Kaldur demands Robin return – and, surprisingly, Dick listens.

Kaldur orders a strategic retreat.

Dick wonders “How could my first mission as team leader go so wrong?”

Kaldur diplomatically points out: “You do have the most experience. But perhaps that is exactly what has left you unprepared. Fighting alongside Batman, your roles are defined. You two do not need to talk. But this team is new. And a leader must be clear, explicit. He cannot vanish and expect others to play parts in an unknown plan.”

Dick completely misses the point: “So I’m supposed to hold everybody’s hands.”

Dick doesn’t take criticism well. Not even the constructive kind.

Dick concedes: “You lead us, Kaldur. You’re the only one who can.”

Superboy chimes in with “Could have told you.” I’m guessing Conner thought Kaldur was the leader the entire time.

Kaldur graciously accepts, informing Dick “I accept the burden until you are ready to lift it from my shoulders. You were born to lead this team. Maybe not now but soon.” Kaldur’s not only the team leader but the team diplomat.

Lord Kobra finds his helicopter has been sabotaged.

Bane betrays the team. Shocking, I know.

Bane monologues while Aqualad devises a plan. Bane discovers he’s horribly outmatched against Young Justice including receiving a one-punch knockout from Superboy. The day has not been a good one for Bane’s ego.

Young Justice storm Kobra and his henchmen. Lord Kobra orders Sportsmaster to leave with the shipment. Sportsmaster is very perceptive as he’s gotten the drop on an invisible Megan twice in this episode. Kid Flash claims another souvenir.

Robin battles Kobra but is outmatched. Aqualad puts down Mammoth – a nice testament to Kaldur’s skill. Sportsmaster keeps Miss Martian and Superboy occupied which should be a nice testament to his skill but feels a bit ridiculous. He shouldn’t be able to last two seconds against a Kyrptonian or a Martian much less both at once.

Sportsmaster escapes in a helicopter but Megan planted an explosive device causing the copter to crash.

Lord Kobra now faces the entire Young Justice team and decides to exit stage left: “Another time then”. The team simply stands there and lets him escape?

Batman reads the team the riot act: “A simple recon mission. Observe and report. You’ll each receive a written evaluation detailing your many mistakes. Until then…good job. No battle plan survives first contact with the enemy. How you adjust to the unforeseen is what determines success. And how you choose who leads determines character.”

Sportsmaster meets with the Light: “All I recovered is a single ampoule of the Kobra venom.”

The Light intones “Enemies of the Light must not stand.”

One member of the Light is speaking French. I’m blanking on French bad guys in the DC Universe – the only ones I can recall are Monsieur Mallah, Madame Rogue, and Warp.

#Young Justice #Dick Grayson #Miss Martian #Aqualad #Superboy #Kid Flash #Robin #Wally West #Conner Kent #Bane #Sportsmaster #Kon-El

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stillthewordgirl · 7 years ago

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LOT/CC fic: Date Night (Ch. 2 of 5)

Len and Sara finally get that date. But nothing ever goes smoothly with the Legends. (Sequel to Second Chances. I recommend you read that one here at AO3 or here at FF.net first to meet this Len Snart.)

Thanks to LarielRomeniel for the beta! Can also be read here at AO3 or on FF.net, which isn’t letting me link right now.

As I said before, this will be four chapters and an epilogue. And I’ll actually be sticking to that for once, because the complete story is already done! Rated T mainly for language.

They’ve moved out of the city center at this point, out of the tourist district, but it’s still a decent little business district, the sort with lots of smaller businesses, independently owned stores, small galleries. Most of them are closed at this hour and there aren’t really many people around, but it’s not really a place Sara would have expected trouble. She whips around, pinpointing the sound as coming from a narrow alley between a closed lawyer’s office and an equally dark boutique.

Her bo, collapsed and tucked up a sleeve, is already sliding into her hand, and she’s released the hidden catches on her forearm sheaths, just in case she needs the knives there. She glances at Len, uncertain for a moment. Cynical Earth-1 Leonard would probably have helped. Probably. If she’d asked. After he’d gotten a little better read on the situation.

But Len’s…Len’s already at her side, unbuttoning his cuffs to shove his shirtsleeves as far as possible up to his shoulders.

“I like this shirt,” he tells her defensively, even as his hands and forearms start to ice up. “Lead on, captain.”

She leads on.

They’ve fought together often enough at this point to know the other’s moves. Sara charges into the alley a few steps ahead of Len, but she knows what he’s going to do. As soon as she can, she cuts to the side, extended bo clobbering a dark-clad man who’s watching his cohorts circle a woman a few feet away. Even as she does so, she hears the crackle of ice behind her, the ambient temperature of the alley dropping a few degrees. She knows a streak of ice, moisture pulled from the air itself, is running down the center of the alley, making it tough for anyone, good guy or bad guy, to keep their footing.

“Well, we can always sort ‘em out later, right?” he’d explained it once. “Chances are a slip isn’t going to hurt someone too much. At any rate, it’s less risky than hurling actual ice blasts around if you don’t know precisely what’s going on. Still working on fine control, but in an emergency, it ain’t happening yet.”

Sara couldn’t argue. In fact, she’d had him ice down the floor of the training room a few times so she could practice on a slick surface and also see what footwear worked best on ice. Gideon had complained mightily about the mess as it thawed.

But Sara isn’t wearing her new boots today, the ones with the soles designed for fighting with a teammate who can throw ice around like she flings knives. That doesn’t mean she can’t deal with the ice—or even use it to her advantage.

So, turning, she takes one step, two, and hits the ice in a controlled slide, tearing through the men who’ve turned in confusion to try and figure out what’s going on. Within a moment, she’s reached the woman, who’s still standing there shrieking--though she’d at least had the presence of mind to pick up a board that’d been propped up against the dumpster at the back of the alley.

“It’s OK,” Sara hisses. “Shh! We’ve got this.”

The woman, who’s younger than Sara and a bit frail-looking, stares at her, then drags in a quick breath as if to tell her something or scream again. Sara shakes her head, though, and she stops, still wide-eyed. The captain of the Waverider nods, then pushes her back to a corner, half-hidden, before turning to continue taking care of whatever she needs to.

But Len’s already dealt with the other men, who are partially iced to the buildings on either side of the alley. She’s given him enough time and space to reach for the control he’s been working for, and he’s reached it enough to confine without overtly harming. He’s standing there, sleeves still rolled up and forearms still coated with ice, watching her, eyes bright and intent, and she takes a step toward him…

“Snart!”

They both whirl, but the man backing out of the dark back of the alley is only looking at Len—which doesn’t speak well for his survival instincts. The unknown has his hands up, but he seems to be gaping at Len’s face, not his icy arms, and Sara notices that Len obscures them as soon as he can, stepping back a little into the shadows himself.

“We didn’t know you were back,” the thug protests, a note of fear in his tone. “We didn’t know, Snart!”

The man is trying to edge toward the street, but Sara moves to cut off his path. Len glances at her, then squares his shoulders, moving forward again. His arms are now bare of ice, and his sleeves are covering them again.

In a weird sort of twist, Gideon had told them at this Snart is physically a handful of years younger than the one from Earth-1, but it’s difficult to tell that at a glance. From things he’s said to her, she’s pretty sure he has fewer scars, but no two-bit hitter is going to know that.

“Ignorance,” he tells the thug in what’s apparently meant to be a cold…and Cold…voice, “is no excuse.” And he doesn’t sound quite like Leonard either, in some indefinable way, but apparently that’s only obvious to her right now. Certainly, the other man still believes he’s who he seems to be.

“It’s all Monteleone,” the man says, keeping his hands up, voice a little desperate as he takes another step back, watching Len, but now glancing back to check Sara’s location too. “He’s kinda … kinda the boss in town now. I…”

“Monteleone. Jack Monteleone?” Len’s voice drops a little, anger touching it, and he sounds more like his Earth-1 doppelganger than Sara’s ever heard him sound before. Sara, surprised, studies him as he stalks toward the thug, who looks rather intimidated.

“Y…yeah.” The man swallows and retreats another step. “Snart, I’ll tell people yer back in town, Monteleone would talk, cut a deal, just let me…”

“What’s he running?” Len’s voice is low, dangerous, and Sara feels the temperature drop a little again. He’s going to give up the charade if he loses control of his powers, she thinks, then makes a noise, trying to get his attention. But he’s focused on the other man, rage flickering in his eyes, and Sara’s starting to get an inkling why.

“Don’ know, just…stuff…”

Len’s hands tighten into fists and the temperature drops a little more. But before Sara can say anything, the young woman, the one whose screams had started this whole thing, emerges back into the relatively dim light and lets out a strangled sound when she sees the man standing there and the others scattered about.

But to Sara’s surprise, she doesn’t fade back into the shadows or otherwise quail. Instead, she rushes toward them, toward the man with his hands out, distress and anger on her face.

“Where are they?” she cries. “What did you do with them?”

Sara and Len both blink at her, and the man takes that opportunity to try to dart past them, toward the mouth of the alley. Sara turns and almost casually clips him with her bo, sending him sprawling. She hadn’t meant to knock him out, but he hits his head against the concrete surface himself and goes limp. Sara shakes her head, checking his breathing, then rises to look back at Len.

Len has an armful of weeping woman, and while he looks distinctly awkward about it, she can’t even imagine Earth-1 Leonard doing such a thing. She shakes her head again to chase away the memories, moving toward them.

“They took my little boy, and my husband,” the woman sobs. “And it’s all my fault. I didn’t know what they had me carrying. We needed some money…when I found out, I got rid of the…the stuff…and they want it back!”

Len, eyes narrowed, puts his hands on her shoulders and moves her away from him, holding her there at arm’s length.

“Drugs,” he growls, “in my city. The hell?”

The woman stares at him with distressed eyes, but his demeanor isn’t threatening, just irritated.

“I didn’t know,” she says brokenly. “I didn’t know. I guess…I guess I didn’t want to know.”

Len shakes his head at her. “Honey,” he growls, “if somethin’ seems too good to be true, it usually is.”

Like this whole date thing, Len thinks, although he’s trying to keep that thought off his face. Definitely too good to be true. Shoulda known.

Still, he may not be a shiny, ride-in-on-the-white-horse good guy, but he’s not letting a kid suffer the consequences of a stupid decision like this. And he’s not letting this world’s version of the goddamned Candyman run drugs in Central City.

He’s also not going to let this world’s version of the Flash off the hook for letting it get this far in the first place. But first things first.

Besides him, Sara sighs, and he might be imagining that the sound contains as much regret as he’s feeling for the wreckage of their evening. “They took them, you said,” she says to the other woman. “Who? When? Where? What precisely did they say?”

“We were out…we went to Big Belly Burger. It’s my son’s favorite, I thought…”

“Focus!” Len’s trying not to sound irritated, he really is, but it leaks out anyway.

She barely seems to notice. “…I saw them, I tried to get Jonathan to take Michael and run, but he wouldn’t…then there was another group, and they…”

“They herded them down here,” Sara finishes. Len glances at her and sees her studying the alley, the buildings on either side. “It’s a dead zone. There are cameras all over Central; you can see them if you know where to look. But there are no cameras here.”

Len nods to himself. Sara notices things, too. “So, no Flash. Even he’s gotta see or hear about stuff somehow.” He looks at the woman, who’s wringing her hands. “So it was right before we heard you?”

“Yes, they grabbed Jon and Mikey and just…took them. They said they were…” She swallows. “…going to, to give me a taste of what would happen to them if I didn’t get the stuff back. But it’s gone. I threw it in the canal! I didn’t want it anywhere around us.”

While he can’t argue with her distaste, it really wasn’t the brightest move. “I’m sure the fish are very appreciative.”

Sara cuts in again. “Where are you supposed to take it?” She sighs as the other woman blinks at her. “Look, I know this is hard. But we’re trying to help, and you need to give us information, at least.”

Something about Sara’s exasperated patience gets through. The other woman straightens, looking hopeful. “The old hotel, by the piers,” she says. “The one that partly burned a few years back? That’s what they said.”

“How long did they give you?”

“By 9!” The woman looks like she’s going to cry again. “Either the…the stuff…or the money.”

Len’s lost patience. “Drugs,” he snaps. “You were carrying drugs for them. Have the nerve to say the word.”

“I didn’t know!”

“You knew,” Sara tells her, a touch of ice in her own tone. “On some level. You just didn’t want to know.” She glances at Len again. “If we flag down the Flash, we can figure out what to do from here.”

Yeah, dinner’s just not happening now. “Right. I want a word with him anyway.” Turning, he stalks to the entrance to the alleyway and casts about for a camera, which isn’t difficult. Double-checking that the folks around are pretty much minding their own business, he waves at it…and then, icing down his hand, flips it off.

That would get his world’s Barry Allen speeding over. From what he’s heard, this world’s Barry isn’t so different. Given that the Team Flash he’s heard about monitors the city’s network of cameras, the combination of suddenly plummeting temperature readings, the clear view of a former nemesis and the smartass gesture should get someone’s attention.

He’s barely made it back to Sara and the distraught woman when there’s a golden blur flickering around them, a blur that then resolves into the figure of a red-suited man, who stares at him like he’s seeing…

Like he’s seeing a ghost.

Sara speaks before the speedster can, though. “I have the information we need,” she says, her tone clearly warning him…them…not to get into any talk of alternate Earths or secret identities just yet. “Flash, can you take her somewhere safe? Get her out of this.” She turns to the woman before Barry can do more than blink at her. “We’ll get them back. But you need to stay put. OK?”

The woman is crying again. “I will. I will. Thank you…”

For his part, Barry…it must be Barry, right?...takes a deep breath and then nods, apparently deciding, wisely, that it’s better not to argue with Sara. He takes the woman’s arm and speeds off again in that flicker of golden light.

Leaving Len and Sara standing there looking at each other.

There’s regret in Len’s eyes as he watches her, but Sara has noticed that he hasn’t even once suggested reluctance to do something about this situation. Hell, his anger at the notion of a drug ring like this—headed by someone he’s apparently somewhat familiar with—suggests completely the opposite.

Still. Regret. On both their parts.

After a moment, Len shrugs, offering her that lopsided grin again.

“Well,” he says lightly, “at least we’re not bored.”

“Hmm.” Sara smirks at him. “True. But you think maybe the Flash can handle it without us?”

He snorts in derision. “If he hasn’t yet, he probably can’t. Some things are apparently true in all the worlds.”

“Like you giving Barry Allen shit?”

“Even so.”

And just like that, the golden blur is back, stopping in front of them and resolving into the red-suited speedster, who stares at Len with a stunned expression (after a glance at Sara, who’s at least a known quantity). After a moment, he pulls off his hood, and the two men blink at each other.

Len, typically, doesn’t remain flat-footed for long. “You’re the Flash?” he drawls, sauntering in a slow circle around Barry, who turns to keep him in view. “Huh. You…look different on my Earth.”

“I do?” The hero looks a little baffled by the whole thing. “Um. How?”

“More blondish. Older.” Len waves a hand. “We’re more…contemporaries.”

“Do you flirt with that one like you do this one?” Sara mutters, grinning. Len winks at her. Barry, catching the byplay, turns a little red, but sticks his hand out to the other man.

“Uh. Hi,” he says sheepishly. “I heard you were…visiting. Pleased to meet you. I think.”

Len considers the hand a moment, then shrugs and shakes it. As far as Sara can tell, he doesn’t even bother lowering his body temperature to give the hero icy fingers. Barry, regaining his equilibrium a little, glances at Sara then.

“Sara?” he asks. “I know you guys were back visiting--Ray stopped by earlier--but why are you and Snart…this Snart…”

“Len,” Len supplies helpfully.

“…uh, Len doing here?”

Sara’s lips twitch. “Well, we had dinner plans.”

Barry blinks again. “What?”

Sara rolls her eyes. She can understand, she thinks with amusement, why any version of Leonard likes to mess with Barry Allen. It’s so easy.

“You heard me,” she tells him drily.

“We had a date, Allen,” Len chimes in, tone dripping with annoyance. “Although you hero types have kinda dropped the ball and messed it up at this point.”

Barry’s jaw drops.

Sure, it’s always fun to mess with Barry—any Barry--but Len’s not sure he likes how dumbfounded the man seems to be at those words. He’s not sure if it’s because the other man is used to him being a villain or because he thinks Sara Lance is out of Len’s league.

Personally, Len knows Sara Lance is out of his league. But he’s not happy Barry Allen seems to think so too.

The—he’s just a kid, really—picks his jaw up after a moment, staring at Len. Then he shakes his head.

“You’re dating Sara Lance?” he manages, glancing at Sara. “Seriously?”

Hey, now, that’s just insulting. Len glares at him, folding his arms.

“Well,” he says accusatorily, “I’m trying.”

Sara snickers at that. Len throws her an amused look, then glances back at Barry. “No thanks to the hero who’s supposed to be doing all this shit,” he adds. “Sleeping on the job, Flash. Jack Monteleone’s running drugs in your city. He’s bad news. What the hell?”

Barry has the grace to look a little sheepish. “Well, the thing is, I’d never heard of him until a week or two ago. We haven’t been able to figure out where he’s based. And for some reason, he’s been able to stay off our radar,” he says, rallying. “Kinda literally. We just can’t get a good fix. It’s giving Cisco fits.”

Len frowns. “Cisco?”

But Barry’s rolling on. “I mean, I’ve tried.” He shakes his head. “He’s been a step ahead of me.”

“Well. We know by the hotel at the docks now.”

The kid looks skeptical. “But it’s a wreck. That’s not his base.”

Len has his doubts, but he shrugs. “So at any rate, we gotta get the guy and kid outta there and then take Monteleone out, since you can’t.” Len snorts. “Peachy.” He lifts an eyebrow as Barry stares at him again. “What? You think I’m leaving him there to fuck up my city? No.”

Hesitating a moment, he eyes Sara. “Canary? I know it’s not what I promised, but you in?”

“Hell, yeah.” Sara frowns, though. “But we don’t have much time, and it sounds like just rushing the place isn’t a good idea…”

“No,” Barry says fervently.

“…but that hitter. He was not happy to think you…Leonard was back.” She shakes her head. “I know Mick said he never held with drugs on his turf…”

“It’s one of the reasons a lot of stuff never caught on here,” Barry starts, even as Len mutters, “Well, there’s another thing we had in common.”

Sara’s quiet a moment. Then she sighs and looks right at Len.

“You think you could be, well, him for a bit?” she says quietly. “Just to get us in there? To give us a chance to rescue them?”

#date night #captain canary #sara lance #leonard snart #legends of tomorrow

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exilesofembermark · 8 years ago

Text

Game Dev Update | 6.9.17

Who is that? What’s he so sad about? What’s that on his head? Read on...

Welcome back to the Exiles Game Dev Update, wherein we cover all things happening in the world of the game and its development.

Last time, we covered a bunch of content, gameplay experiments and visual evolutions on the Exiles UI. This Update goes across the board with a look at the way we’re setting up battle environments, a new NPC, lootz (as always) and an introduction to the fellow that will guide you through your early experiences in Embermark.

ENVIRONMENT BREAKDOWN: VANISIR

We’ve mostly shown our classic foresty Wildewoods battle environment in the past (or the Arena), but we’ve been quietly working on many different Battle setups for different Zones and situations all the while. This time, let’s take a look at Vanisir, the southwest Zone known for arid land and DANGER (ok, fine, every Zone in Embermark is dangerous-- it’s a fantasy-post-apocalyptic landscape after all). You can see from this setup that we’re taking several 2D paintings and arranging them in UE4 to achieve our 3D-but-hand-painted look:

AMA TRANSCRIPT

We had a rousing discussion in our 2nd-of-many Ask Me Anything a few weeks ago on the Exiles Discord Channel, with subjects ranging from Abilities to Stats to World Events & Houses tackled. Besides lively banter, several Exiles won coveted items when the game launches via “rolls” in chat.

In case you missed it and want to get all the info & shenanigans, you can find the entirety of it here for posterity (our gratitude goes out to community stalwart Drakythe for capturing the AMA and posting the transcript).

BANDITS!

A Faction exists in Embermark that doesn’t really acknowledge (or respect) any leadership other than its own-- the Raiders. If called to fight as a unit or untied Faction, they probably wouldn’t fare well, but when encountered in Quests or random encounters in Exiles, they can be deadly.

Of medium build and questionable (read: awful) morals, the bandit can be found in Wildewoods and Askala among other Zones.

Don’t like the red bandanna? FINE...

Now, a significant constituency of the Exiles community are Rogue-friendly (yes, that is a term), and I’m not saying this Bandit here is reminiscent of what you might expect your player-Rogue to be like... OR AM I.

What I can say is that because we’re using the player models for creation of NPCs, we have the ability to appropriate their equipment for YOU. So a shout-out to you Rogue-friendlies out there-- consider this gear a bit of a preview to what kind of gear you might outfit yourself when gameday comes...

ABILITIES UI REDESIGN

UI 2.0 is on its way as we watch people play the game and discover optimizations ourselves. One we attacked this month is the switching of Ability Sets (remember, Ability Sets in Exiles can be 4 Abilities in the basic combat we’re testing and 8 in the “Deck” version we’re also testing). Using a list view to toggle between what becomes quite a few saved Ability Sets for an advanced player becomes cumbersome, so we added in some additional options for ease of use:

Ability Set title at the top

Arrows (and swipe, of course) for switching between your saved Ability Sets

Pips below the current Ability Set to show both which one is active and how many you have

This underscores some things that we’re experiencing in play sessions

THE ELF IN ACTION

We’ve shown the evolution of Exiles’ wood elf characters since the beginning of this project (here, here & here), so having him in the game now is really exciting for us. We’re doing a little extra fudge factor to get his arrow to do different things (stay tuned for additional VFX we’re working on), but you can see his Sharpshot Ability here:

With a sideview of same here:

And Gunslinger’s animator-extraordinaire Andrew even used the arrow as a comedy device in the elf’s death:

Found all over, but concentrated in Wildewoods, Feral Moon and Askala, these wood elves are no fans of their brethren in the southern island Zone of Queviel. Those elves made an exodus during the Collapse to get away from the destruction, leaving their wood elf cousins to fend, adapt and evolve into the wilder, more martial elves that you will encounter often.

HELMS & TELLS & TUNICS

Each month, we increase the Exiles library of loot and show a few choice pieces to illustrate both our stylistic choices as well as our experiments in gameplay. As we turned the dwarf I showed last month into a formidable foe (and sometimes ally), his gear was adapted into player-wearable items, and we gave it the color-tell treatment (go here for explanation). We’re in the process of figuring out how far we need to go to get the effects telegraph across to players, cuz where this helmet definitely says “green” to the opponent...

...this one has a certain style...

You’ll see where we landed when closed testing begins, and I will likely address this whole system in a later update.

It also occurred to me that we’ve never shown (or even mentioned) TUNICS before, and what’s a fantasy RPG without that word (or item)? Well, it’s not going to deflect much in the way of damage, but here are three tiers of a mage tunic for your wearing pleasure:

And of course, the latest in power-fashion magery:

All of the items that I’ve shown in the last few updates are now in the game, and we’ve been upgrading and improving our backend system that pushes content into the game in real-time. I’ll be starting to post video of more extended gameplay and battles once we get more finish on the feedback systems, but for now, take a look at another GIF of equipping, featuring the Spear, Axe, Shield and armor set show in the past 2 or 3 updates. Please note the now-working rarity icons!:

(click here for a much longer and better GIF unbound by Tumblr’s file size limits)

THE NARRATOR (& HIS MANY HIDDENS)

The backstory and Lore of Exiles has been a fun and evolving part of the project, and as the preview stories started coming together with Bound, we realized the need for creating a character who acts as the voice (check out the Pocket Gamer article on Bound’s announcement of award-winning writer Andrew Saxsma as the talespinner on Exiles). We needed bit of a narrator. So we went through a process of coming up with who/what we wanted him to be and do. We went through many iterations of look and feel and reference to get something that nailed the tone of someone who would engage in telling you these stories...

(With great respect to GRRM, who sees Jorah Mormont in the above? Which one?)

Then we started playing with the type of fellow he might be, what he would be equipped to do, to survive and to know...

Until we arrived at a backstory and personality that we’re pretty excited about, but...

...then we SHROUDED HIM IN MYSTERY.

Har. So I’ll say little else other than there are no less than 2 major signals about who and what our Narrator is in this illustration. We shall reveal those items in due time. For now, I give you:

NARRATIVE - A GLIMPSE

There are quite a few episodes of the Exiles storyline in the can now. If you’re just joining us, we’re telling some of the backstory of the game before it’s available, and once the game launches, we’ll be telling the story of YOU. By that, I mean we’ll be reporting on the storyline as players play out their adventures, using the data from the game and the choices you make to direct the ongoing narrative.

Very soon, our friends at Bound will release early episodes of the backstory (told by our haunted friend above), so now-- have a read through of the very first mid-episode snippet from our coming Tales...

A farmhand and his wife, who had been pulling behind them the few belongings left of their home, mentioned in passing that there had been an attack against House Resolute that morning, before the sun had risen.

They described a horror of the loudest thunder and the hottest fires that rained down from the skies over the gulley of central Siege, barraging the fortress at its heart. Mages, it was rumored, of a rival House had rallied against the hoarding House Resolute. These Mages, I learned, wanted retribution for the deprived territories and as I neared the mountain’s peak, I witnessed fires devouring the countryside and ash falling as snow from bloated dark clouds.

Though Hurinyl withstood its aggressors, neighboring encampments were leveled and homes and farmland for miles vanished.

More troubling was that a message of blood and destruction was delivered that morning, one which would resound for ages to follow. That message, my friend, was quite clear: Man had lost his abundance, his satisfaction. His eyes, and all they desired, had turned upon his neighbor.

The rise of the Houses was signaled. War was coming.

What?! What was Resolute hoarding? What mages? Who’s the “bad guy?” Who had the power to engulf the whole countryside? Stay tuned, Exiles...

REMEMBER

We’ll keep sharing details as we head into testing (remember to PM TheWizard on the Exiles forums with your device type if you want in on closed testing & beta later), and you can count on early impressions from the testers throughout our various channels.

If you haven’t already, follow along with the Exiles development on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook. And if you haven’t, I’ll find you. And SMITE you.

THERE’S CHAT CHATTER EVERYDAY AS WE READY TO BATTLE

If you want to hear about the game, ask questions or connect with others who are helping the development team think about features, design and narrative, hop into the Discord Channel for live chat and say hi– it’s a friendly lot with plenty of daily shenanigans (there’s even a Shenaniganizer).

THE BONUS: A TURNAROUND

Lots of “Fs” in this one...

#gamedev #hearthstone #rpg #ue4

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kyberled · 8 years ago

Note

📖

Send 📖 for my muse to tell yours their favorite story! || Accepting

“My favourite? I dunno, I mean, as a Jedi, I know a lot of different stories, since, you know as well as I do that we see a lot of stuff, when we go out to our missions, but, I can probably think of something…” He pauses for a moment, right hand reaching up to stroke at his chin. After a moment, he seemed to perk up, and folded his hands behind his back.

“Alright, I think I have one,” he says, settling into a more comfortable position. “A while back, I’d say about four rotations, I was on a mission with Master Kenobi, and it was a solo mission, in that it was just us and our men. No other Jedi accompanied us. It was a nice little planet, not as big as Coruscant, but it wasn’t as small as a standard dwarf planet would be, somewhere in between… And it was a really beautiful place to be, actually. Kind of like the jungles of Kashyyyk, really lush jungles, but the trees weren’t as tall as that. I remember it was really hot, a bit humid, but, it wasn’t too bad. – Not for us, anyway. I know the men didn’t like it much… And we were there to find out what had been messing with so many ships’ nav systems. We initially thought it was because of a magnetic field or something natural like that, but the fact that it only happened sometimes, and we couldn’t happen to find a pattern made us start to wonder… You might have heard about it, so, if I start telling you stuff you already know, just let me know.”

He pauses, here, scratching at the back of his neck for just a second before he shrugs and carries on.

“So, anyway, we thought we might be looking for some sort of magnetic field, or what-have-you, on… Numikaar, I think it was called? Numikaar V. And we’d been there for a few days, we thought we had everything figured out, and I was just happy to be heading home… And right as we were getting ready to leave, our ship stopped working. I don’t mean just the engines, either - we couldn’t even get the caf machine working. I remember pouring over the notes I’d made with Gr- Uh, Obi-Wan, and we’d gotten only a few paragraphs or so into them when we both felt something. … Or, didn’t feel anything, at the same time. … You know how droids don’t have a presence in the Force, but, when you lift them with the Force, you can still feel their weight? And, for the more mobile kinds, like the B1s the Separatists like, when they move around, you can feel their weight shift, even if you don’t feel the droid? It was kind of like that. We both felt something there, without actually feeling what was there. There was a moment where neither of us said anything, and I remember holding my breath, trying to keep the Force as still as I could… And then I was trying to stand up and Obi-Wan was pulling me to my feet, and we were both running as fast as we could and yelling for the men to do the same. The good news was that we’d all been outside; Like I’d said, it had been a hot day, and, when the ship broke down, the cooling units went with it, and the men were baking in their plastoids, so we’d all decided to wait outside, where there was at least a breeze. … The bad news was that us being outside did nothing to stop our ship from exploding. We didn’t lose anyone in the blast, thankfully, but there were a few injuries, and some of them were pretty serious. So, I was bouncing back and forth between trying to help the men get to a safe distance away, just in case, helping the medics prevent any casualties, and trying to figure out what had just happened, and… Everything was just happening all at once, which happens a lot in war, but it never really gets any more enjoyable…”

“So, we were hiding out in the jungle, just until we could figure out what be happening, and just on the edges of the outskirts of the jungle, since we didn’t want to just run as deep as we could without due cause. The men had their scanners out, and I was searching out in the Force to see what was going on, and if I could feel that thing again, and I could. I could feel its weight through the Force again, but it was sort of serpentine? If that makes sense? I could feel its weight moving and slithering through the Force, and it… It was kind of really gross, actually. I don’t… Really like– Ah. Anyway. I could tell Gramps could feel it, too, ‘cause he was looking exactly where I felt it being, and he looked less than happy, and not just because our ship blew up. He told everyone to be still, and so we were, and I swear, as weird as it sounds, I could hear it moving, but, not, at the same time. Kind of like how when you think something, you hear it, but don’t? But it wasn’t in my head, or even in the Force around me- More like, I felt like I should be hearing something, and knew what the sound should be, but, that sound just wasn’t there, like an audio version of having a word on the tip of your tongue, if that makes sense… Kind of like this thing, and everything about it, was blank, like it had been erased… … I’m sorry, I’m probably spending way too much time explaining how strange this thing was, but I just need you to understand what it was like. It was so weird… I’ve never experienced anything like it since.”

“Anyway, once that not-noise started, all the men got agitated, and Obi-Wan yelled at us all to move, and there was this sudden burst of the Force, like all the blanks had suddenly been filled in all at once, and then there was another explosion. … We lost a couple men in that one. Their names were Skip, Dura, Gloss, and Riley. It took me a moment to realise what was going on, though, ‘cause I thought I’d gotten caught under some kind of debris. Turns out Gramps and Cody had both gotten the idea of making sure that I didn’t get hit by the explosion. And, I appreciated the gesture, still do, but I couldn’t really feel my ribs. We went to check out the site, and aside from the usual explosion stuff, there was a hole, right in the middle of the blast zone, was a hole, impossibly deep, but only about as big as my fist,” he paused, here, holding up a fist to illustrate his point, before extending his arm outwards, locked straight, on a downwards forty-five. “And on an angle, like this.” Satisfied with his demonstration, he let his arms fall to his sides, then clasped his hands behind his back. “And, the area around it was charred black, but the hole itself, and the area right around it was melted down to glass, same black as the soot, except little veins, I guess, of glowing-hot bits that hadn’t cooled off yet. There were more of them closer to us than farther, so, whatever it was had to have come from underground in our direction. I could feel the Force surge for just a second, and then it was back to normal. No blank spaces, no surges, nothing out of the ordinary at all, and I had no idea what to make of it. I don’t think any of us did. Obi-Wan just frowned down at the hole, and Cody was running a scan, and just when the scanner pinged and Cody looked up and said ‘sir!’ to get Gramps’ attention, Obi-Wan stood up and told us that we should get moving, and gather the men up and take them with us, and you didn’t have to tell me twice. Gramps and Cody walked up at the front of the group, talking about… Something, I couldn’t tell what, from where I was. We’d taken on a lot of damage, thanks to the two blasts, and I was helping along one of the men who’d hurt his leg, so I couldn’t keep up… Dodger, that was his name, so it was the two of us and the rest of the men in a group, and Gramps and Cody up front. A bunch of the men had their blasters out, and Gramps had his saber drawn. I had mine ready, but not on, since I didn’t want to stab Dodger, but.. We were all on edge, I guess, is what I’m trying to say, but even then, I sort of zoned out for a moment, and, I know, it was careless, and dangerous, and I put myself and others at risk and I must always be focused when in a hostile environment, I know, but I couldn’t stop thinking about the absence, and I was trying to see if I could find it again… I wound up passing Dodger off to one of the other troops, since I was worried I’d drop him, or stumble since I wasn’t really paying attention, and once he was looked after, I jogged to catch up to Gramps and Cody. We talked for a while, about how the men were doing, what had just happened, and where we were going - there was a friendly village up ahead, and Obi-Wan thought we could have the men rest up there while he and I contacted the Council, and told them we needed at least one other ship, and that our mission wasn’t quite as finished as we thought it was.” He cleared his throat, shifted his weight to spare his legs the stiff discomfort that had begun to set in. He hadn’t meant to speak for so long, but, he hadn’t been stopped, so he took that as an invitation to continue.

“We decided we were going to deal with it ourselves, and not take the men with us, though Cody somehow convinced Obi-Wan to let him come, too, and I was relieved to have an extra set of hands to help us out, but also worried about what might happen to him, since at least Gramps and I had the Force to keep us safe, and Cody didn’t, but I doubt we could have kept him away if we tried.”

“So, the three of us made the call to the Council, and it was pretty standard fare, and set out to find what was going on after the men were settled. Obi-Wan lingered for a few minutes while Cody and I were finishing preparations, but, this’ll only be important later on. We were walking for a while, and we had lapsed into silence while we walked. We were in the middle of a huge field, with this tall, dried-out grass, when I felt that absence again. Gramps and I froze for a second, and then both of us grabbed Cody and ran. While we were running, and Cody was having the opposite of a good time, I noticed that the absence was moving at a consistent speed, except for when it turned - it had to slow down, then. I told this to Obi-Wan - sort of shouted it at him while we were running - and he suggested we should turn around and run towards it. … Honestly, I feel like, if Cody were the type to desert, that would have been the moment he’d have thrown down his blaster and quit. But, neither of us had any better ideas, so, we did. I remember I got this weird feeling when we ran over it, like electricity, and it was really uncomfortable, but it wasn’t like I had much time to think about it. I mean, Obi-Wan had been right, of course - it did buy us a few minutes to get away. I felt another surge, and I was set to join the Force right then and there, but Gramps pivoted and turned one-eighty, and pushed out with the Force, and the surge shifted and there was an explosion from underground, and a small earthquake and a jet of flame, like a really badly-made lightsaber, just straight up in the air, but, we didn’t really have time to be impressed. I just remember being grateful for all the laps I’d run back home. ‘Course, all the laps in the galaxy wouldn’t make me able to run forever, so we all knew we had to do something.”

“There was a lake up ahead, and we all had an unspoken agreement to jump into the water, and I was just about to ask Obi-Wan if he had actually had a plan for what we were going to do when we found the absence, but before I could get the full sentence out, it stopped moving, and there was this pause, then this creak like a ship about to go down, and the ground exploded. It– The absence– was coming from this giant train-thing, like a massive centipede made of metal, but each- Segment, I guess, housed a battle droid, with a pretty big blaster on each side - kind of like a mobile, digging fortress, and it reared up, and looked like it was about to charge up and fire some kind of cannon, and right before it could… Master Plo and Master Skywalker’s fighters came in, along with the rest of their men, and they just lit up the sky. Swooping in and unleashing Chaos, and… People aren’t kidding when they say Anakin’s the best pilot in the galaxy. Anyway, once the three of us got out of the water, we joined in best we could, focusing on the parts closer to the bottom while the ships took out the top.”

“Turns out the cannon it was about to fire was powered by kyber crystals - small ones, taken from the lightsabers of fallen Jedi, from what we could tell. That was why the Force felt so strange whenever it fired; It was attuned to Force signatures that no longer existed, and more than one, at that…” He pauses, sighs, and glances at the ground for a moment before shrugging and running a hand through his hair.

“Long story short, we ended up uncovering an underground Separatist weapons lab, and Gramps, Anakin, Ahsoka, Plo and I - and Wolffe, Cody, Rex, and the men, of course - had a grand time getting rid of that one and destroying their research. … It was a weird day.”

#long post //#kuatiisms #&& best foot forward; ic #&& brave new worlds; padawan #&& far far away; drabbles #&& as best i can; answers

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johnchiarello · 8 years ago

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Monday

MONDAY- 5-29-17

James 4:1

From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members?

In Context | Full Chapter | Other Translations

https://www.google.com/search?q=famous+picture+of+vietnamese+man+being+shot&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjAz4LMwZXUAhWlzIMKHSeSAZEQsAQIQQ&biw=1366&bih=662

Memorial Day- https://youtu.be/evGFb5-k410

http://wp.me/a4V5qQ-AT

.Question everything

.Caller Times

.Uncle Bruno- POW

.His plane crashed in the Hackensack river

.Iraq- Libya- …

.Media manipulation

.Weapons of mass destruction?

.911

.Where is the media coverage of Black slaves being sold on an open market in Libya today?

.War Pigs [Ozzy] https://youtu.be/LQUXuQ6Zd9w

Isaiah 2:4

And he shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.

In Context | Full Chapter | Other Translations

Museum- https://youtu.be/iZXGutEE84A

http://wp.me/a4V5qQ-AU

.Kingdom view

.Lexington

.War no more

.Military Industrial Complex

.Saudi Arabia

.Truman

.Manchester https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/may/28/donald-trump-theresa-may-very-angry-about-manchester-bomb-leaks

Mark 10:15

Verily I say unto you, Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, he shall not enter therein.

In Context | Full Chapter | Other Translations

The Park- https://youtu.be/HBMMSugiQLE

http://wp.me/a4V5qQ-AV

I made the last video [above] at the park. I showed up to see my friends and some nice ladies were serving food to my homeless friends. Claire asked me to speak- so I did. You get to see some of the guys and girls. After I shut the video I had a good talk with some of the guys- about the subjects I covered thru out the day.

I hope you had a good memorial day- God bless all. John

John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

NEW- I had no plan on speaking today- but the plan changed. Today we honor those who died as Americans- in war. We often feel that honoring our fallen men and women is to simply remember the great sacrifice they made for our country. But to truly honor them is to also question those in power- who have made decisions about war- that were based on false pretense. I tried to cover a little of the history of war- and the role the media has played by deciding to cover some things- and not cover others.

They too do a great disservice to our fallen heroes when for political bias- they choose not to cover a story because it does not fit with their political view.

Today we will hear the famous words from Jesus quoted-

John 15:13 [Full Chapter]

Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.

Remember- Jesus was speaking about dying for others- not killing others.

Our men and women who died for a good cause- we honor today.

The wars that were justified- and killing took place- we honor our men and women who served well.

But we do a dishonor to our men and women when we refuse to examine the wars that were done for solely political reasons.

Actually- we honor them today by asking the questions that need to be asked- and covering those bad choices those in authority made- that led to their deaths.

On the videos I simply tried to challenge our mindsets.

The Kingdom of God is something we are to ‘receive’ it is not just a place we go to when we die.

Jesus said we must receive it as little children.

It takes humility for people to realize their views- though strongly held- might actually be wrong.

It takes the faith of a child to simply believe what your father has said.

And yes- God- our Father- has said some very plain things to us about war-

Will we really listen?

New International Version "Put your sword back in its place," Jesus said to him, "for all who draw the sword will die by the sword’’ Jesus- the Christ of God.

PAST POSTS- [ Past teaching that relates to today’s ‘roll out’ ]-

https://ccoutreach87.com/john-complete-links-added/

https://ccoutreach87.com/james-2015/

https://ccoutreach87.com/russia-u-s-world-events/

[1605] WATER FROM THE ROCK [plus comments on the present atrocities in Libya] - Before I get into the chapter [Exodus 17] let me overview the latest world events. First- I do not think the majority of Americans realize the ‘bigness’ of what's going on right now in the Arab/Persian world- the events of the last few weeks are major world changing events that will play a major role in every aspect of American life. The recession? More than likely it will be extended [or double dip] because of the oil situation [unrest and war in and around the major oil producing nations of the world]. Arab allies? Over [at least in the short term]. Last night Gadhafi used the military against his people. The major eastern city of Libya [Benghazi] has fallen [the govt. is no longer in control] the eastern capitol city- Tripoli- is in a war like situation. Gadhafi’s son went on national TV and basically told the country that they are not like Egypt and Tunisia- they will fight back. The son is smart, educated in the West [London- geographically north of Libya- ‘West’ in the sense of the western world- that is London] he told the people ‘do you think the Americans/Brits want you to revolt? This country [Libya] will fall into chaos and the hands of radicals- the West depends on our stability [for oil] and they don’t want you to succeed’. Understand- this is a brilliant power play in the game. Is he telling the truth? In a way- yeah. In all the revolutions taking place- some nations are Arab- others Persian. Some are majority Shiite [Bahrain] with a minority ruling Sunni dynasty. Iran’s leaders are Shiite- they would be glad to see the fall of Bahrain- so the Shiite majority could overthrow the Sunni kings and have more support from Bahrain. Some Arab nations are ‘pro west’- Egypt, Jordan- and even Yemen are/were working with us- many of our friends in the area were shocked that we publicly called for the ouster of Mubarak, because he was our number 1 ally in the Arab world. They thought ‘what the hell are you doing! You picked the wrong king!’ Libya, Iran and Syria are anti western nations- they hate us- we them [in politics]. Yet without a doubt Gadhafi is crossing the line in violent responses to the protestors- yet president Obama has not called for his ouster- not like the way he did with Egypt. The protestors in these countries are confused and see the west as being sell outs. We have protests that seem to be breaking out of the Arab regions and even affecting Asia. There are reports of protestors in China. I obviously am not advocating the apocalypse- but I don’t think we [western society] realize the import of all these events- our world is changing and there is nothing we can do about it- but try and act justly! We [president] can’t go ‘public’ with a king who is bad- but not 1-100th as bad as Libya’s leader- and then go ‘silent’ on him [the president and U.S. position has been to speak out against the violence- good- but we have decided to not go public in support of the people and the call for the leader to step down]. So all in all we need to act justly- love mercy- and walk humbly with our God [Micah- Old Testament prophet].

[parts]

DEMOCRACY?

I read a statement from the French President- Nicholas Sarkozy. He was speaking about the dire situation in Syria [Syria has been fighting rebels in a city called Homs- they have been using deadly heavy artillery to bomb buildings and homes- many civilians have died].

Sarkozy said a military response [Like what he- and we- did in Libya] was no longer a legitimate solution.

I found this insightful- France was thee number one supporter of the ‘no fly zone’ in Libya. France had their planes bombing many spots- they were more ‘pro war’ than the U.S. and the Brits.

Many in the political scene in France have accused Sarkozy of wanting to develop the image of a mini Bush- that is a leader who is willing to engage in violence in order to defend ‘just causes’ in the world.

Right after the Libyan action began- some in the Arab/Muslim world began saying that France and NATO should be seen as the enemy- not Gadhaffi.

In Afghanistan- where France has troops like us under the NATO banner- they just had an Afghan soldier- one who is supposedly on our side- gun down a bunch of French troops in cold blood.

The French president then called for a quicker withdrawal of forces than the U.S. wanted [2013- instead of 2014].

Sarkozy realized- that no matter how just your cause might seem- there are never any situations where one side is 100 % right- while the other 100% wrong [let's say rarely].

In Egypt- Libya- and now Syria- you do not have [did not] complete agreement on the protests. Many who had stable lives and lived for many years in these countries- they felt like the rebels were wrong about the way to have their ‘revolution’.

Many in the Christian minority saw the revolutions as dangerous to their own survival. Our actions in Iraq have decimated the Christian population there.

Though we did not mean to do this- the result is we have installed a more anti Christian regime in the country.

The same has now happened in Egypt- the original Tahrir square protestors might have been a majority of simple pro- democracy groups- but after the recent parliamentary elections- the Muslim Brotherhood took over about 50 % of the parliament.

Though this group has rejected violence and terrorism as a means to gain power- yet they still advocate for an extreme religious view if they gain power.

They want Shariah law as the law of the land- and this type of ‘democratic govt.’ is really not good- even if it is voted in by a majority.

We in the West have different values than some in other parts of the world.

We tend to side with those who want to ‘throw off the shackles of dictators- free the voice of the people’.

Yet we underestimate the very real danger of sounding this mantra every time a nation has rebels rise up in the streets.

Say if all you saw on the news every night was the Occupy Wall street protests. And say if there rose up a few hundred thousand that marched nightly on Washington [which we never want to happen!]

But say if that’s all you saw every night- and it got so dangerous that troops- or cops- had to actually shoot some protestors.

We would understand why we had to do this- we would not be calling for the president to step down- or for his family to be submitted to a trial by ‘right wing’ conservatives who just might execute you and your kids.

Now- I am not saying all these leaders in these nations are equal to the American system- but it’s foolish for us to look at all these situations thru the lens of Western style Democracy.

We [the West] seem to think that when we side publicly with the rebels [whoever they be- Libya- Syria- etc.] that we are on the ‘right side of history’ that we are a part of a true democratic movement that will spread thru the world and in a few years down the road we will be living n a world with many truly just democracies.

That picture- that hope- as just as it might seem to those who keep using this type of language [like John McCain- who I like!] is simply not a realistic view.

Where did the idea of Democracy come from? Did world governments have democratic style govts for thousands of years?

No- the idea rose up during the Enlighten period [17th- 18th century] and was promoted by men like John Locke.

If you remember- we studied the philosophy of Locke this past year.

Locke played a key role in the transition of popular philosophy from Rationalism to Empiricism.

We covered that in the posts- don’t want to do it again.

But Locke- like other thinkers of the time- began writing on a new idea of govt- a govt ‘by the people- and for the people’.

Many people living at the time resented the rule of kings- and the role religion [Catholic countries] played in society as a whole.

One of the first experiments with people saying ‘we will throw off the church and king’ was what we call the French Revolution.

It took place right at the end of the 18th century- right before the Napoleonic wars.

It was a Secular [non religious] effort to depose the rule of govt we call Monarchy [King and Queen] and it resulted in the Guillotine and beheading of many Catholic priests and leaders.

It was truly a rebellion that got way out of hand.

Yesterday- one of the current Repub candidates for president made headlines when he compared Obama’s recent ‘anti religious’ actions to the French Revolution.

One commentator [CNN] said the rebels were all Catholics and that to say the revolution hurt the church was wrong.

This man [Paul Begala] had no idea what he was saying- its sad that they say misinformed statements like this to such a wide audience.

Some of our founding fathers were fans of John Locke [Jefferson] and our country drew up the founding documents during a time when these ideas were ripe and were seen as a new type of govt. for the people.

Thus- we have our Democracy today- for which I am grateful- do indeed think it’s the best in the world today- but it is not inherently ‘more just’ than all other styles.

The govt. we see in the bible is Monarchy [mostly- Rome was Imperial- did have a senate and all- but in no way was it a democracy like we think of].

The point?

When we try to help these countries- when people rise up and protest- we must not simply jump to the conclusion that all of these rebellions are seeking- or will end up like the U.S.

We must not condemn all ‘monarchies’ as evil- the bible says there are just ones.

Kings can rule justly- be fair- and do good.

We should not assume that all ‘non western style democracies’ are evil- they are not.

Most of these present uprisings are in countries where you have what’s called Autocratic rule- not full ‘kingdoms’ with kings in the way we think.

Yes- I do think our experiment- based on the Enlightenment idea of govt. by and for the people is the best- but we must not assume all other types are inherently evil- nor should we be so quick to side- militarily will all rebels- like some already calling to arm the rebels in Syria.

The end result of these protests are not secure at all- it is highly doubtful that any of them will become ‘little U.S. of A’s’.

So we should call for non violence on all sides- we should stand on the side of innocent victims- be against all regimes that use military force on their people- but be realistic about the situation- violence [on all sides] is very rarely the answer- Sarkozy learned this lesson the hard way.

www.corpuschristioutreachministries.blogspot.com

Note- Do me a favor, those who read/like the posts- re-post them on other sites as well as the site you read them on. Thanks- John

[parts]

I read a piece form the N.Y. Times- they went into Libya and investigated the reports of the deaths of many civilians caused by NATO and the U.S. during the ‘no fly zone’ debacle.

They found evidence of many civilians that were killed. They presented the report to the new leaders of Libya- they could care less.

In Benghazi- the main city in the eastern half of Libya- they were openly flying the Al-Qaida flag. We just spent 10 years and many lives fighting in Afghanistan. Why? Because they gave territory to Al-Qaida- they gave them a place to work out of.

We fought the Taliban for 10 years over this. Yet in a few months NATO and the U.S. gave Al-Qaida their own capitol to fly their flag- I mean the terrorists must be thinking ‘if we knew these guys were this stupid- we would have never bombed the towers’.

In Tripoli- the real capitol of Libya- the various militia groups [terrorists] are all claiming they are the security/armed forces of Libya. I heard a doctor- on N.P.R. - not a right wing radio show- he said in his hospital these various militias are all trying to take charge- they walk around with guns- sometimes walk into a room and shoot a patient who they think is not on their side- and the doctors say they have no security at all.

Under Gadhaffi things ran well- like a normal society- now their country is a terrorist haven- run by these guys.

I could go on and say the same for Egypt- and tell the stories of how the military have been killing protestors in the street. All these things are being done under people that the West [we- NATO- France] have enabled by removing their former leaders.

And France this week passed a law making it a crime to deny the genocide that took place in Turkey in the early part of the last century.

Yes- the Ottoman Turks did slaughter many Armenians- Christians- at the time. And getting Turkey to officially admit this has been a problem for years. But France passing a law to make it a crime to deny it- while they just finished committing ‘crimes against humanity’ themselves- by killing all the Libyan civilians- it’s just too much.

Okay- let’s start a brief overview of some church history. Over the next few weeks I want to hit on the 16th century Protestant reformation and try and cover some of the key figures of the movement.

Martin Luther- the German reformer who had the most influence in the movement was born and raised in Germany.

As a boy his parents were peasant farmers and eventually his dad became a miner and became a very successful businessman- he would go on and eventually own 6 foundries.

He sent his son to law school- and young Luther excelled. At the age of 21 he accomplished more than many of his peers. One day on his way home from the university a thunderstorm broke out and Luther was almost struck by a bolt of lightning.

In fear he cried out to Saint Ann [the mother of Mary] and said ‘Saint Ann- if you save me I will become a monk’ [Ann was the patron Saint for miners- thus Luther was familiar with her].

He was spared and off to the monastery he went. Luther eventually became an ordained priest and even though his dad initially was upset that his son became a priest- yet he was proud of his boy later on.

Luther would eventually make a Pilgrimage to Rome- on foot [a few month walk from Germany to Rome!] and what he saw devastated him. Rome- and the Vatican- were in bad shape. Many of the priests lived in open sin- and the city that he saw as his headquarters for the faith- well it was a mess.

Luther made the famous penitent walk/crawl up the stairs of the Lateran church [this church was the most famous church before the construction of St. Peters. The actual stairs of the church are the same stairs that Christ walked up during his trial under Pontius Pilate. Yes- you hear many ‘stories’ while studying church history- things like the relics or left over pieces of the Cross- well these stories are usually fake. But the stairs of the Lateran church are indeed the same stairs that Christ walked on- the early ‘church’ builders dismantled the stairs at Pilate’s court in Jerusalem and installed them at this church building in Rome].

When Luther got to the top of the stairs- it is reported that he questioned the faith- he had a crisis of faith and thought that maybe the whole thing was a sham.

Okay- as we do a few more posts over the coming weeks- I want you guys to see that the main players of the Reformation were sincere Catholic men who had many questions about what they saw as corrupt in their own church. These men did not want to start a breakaway church- they simply wanted to reform the church they loved.

Keep in mind that Luther excelled during his legal studies- he had a keen legal mind- this will be important later on when we see the debates he has with Rome over the doctrine of Justification by faith- the letters of the apostle Paul [Romans- Galatians] use lots of legal language- and his early education will help him in these debates.

Okay- that’s it for today. Maybe do a Google search on Luther and familiarize yourself a little with the history.

The ‘readings’ for this week are 2nd Samuel 6-7 and Psalms 89. See what they have in common.

www.corpuschristioutreachministries.blogspot.com

Note- Do me a favor, those who read/like the posts- re-post them on other sites as well as the site you read them on. Thanks- John

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REVOLUTION- NOT ANARCHY! As of last night many streets in the Arab world are experiencing protests- Iran has launched 2 battleships to head towards Syria [right off the coast of Israel] and there are reports of oil prices spiking because of the unrest. These last few weeks I have been reading thru some chapters in Exodus- the book that records the historic liberation of Gods people from Egypt. Those of you who are bible readers will remember that the initial cause for revolt was actually an economic injustice; the children of Israel were under the oppressive regime of Pharaoh and they were grumbling about the poor economic conditions- the leader heard their ‘protests’ and he oppressed them more! He required them to produce more bricks and mortar [for the building of his own wealth] and yet they were to do this from the same amount of natural resources they had all along. In many of these states where the protestors have taken to the streets- they survive on 2 dollars a day- or less. These same people are now required to survive off of the same measly amount- even as the cost of food soars- many of them are indeed going hungry- for real. In the biblical story God sends them Moses [a type of Christ] and as you know Moses confronts unjust authority and the people revolt. Now- one of the key ingredients to a successful ‘revolt’ is a just constitution! God gives them the 10 commandments [rules on treating each other justly- and loving God] at the start of their journey- they will eventually conquer the Promised Land and grow as a society- yet the rules of the game were laid out early in the revolt. What do I think is happening right now? I believe our people [the president and U.S. govt.] are seeing these revolts as the major danger in the world right now- the level of world instability has not been like this in many years- the news media have tried to ‘manipulate’ the environment. After CNN and a few others chose to hone the cameras in on the thousands of protestors in Egypt’s square- yet they initially would not show/report the thousands who were revolting in Iraq. Why? They obviously want to push the narrative of ‘change’ in one place- while pushing the narrative of ‘Obama ended the war and all is well’ in another. The reality is there are major dangers taking place in the world right now- do I think Iran wants to invade Israel? To be honest- yes. What? All these leaders are shaking in their boots- from ‘the shores of Tripoli’ [Quadaffi] to the ‘kings’ of Bahrain. I assure you- if the protestors topple the Iranian leaders- it will not be a ‘peaceful’ exodus to some vacation spot [like Mubarak did] it will be Saddam Hussein all over again [strung up in the streets- or on TV]. Now- do you think the Iranian madman would attack Israel as a last ditch effort to save his skin? You bet ya! [Okay- too much Palin]. Remember- before all the recent developments- there were some major movements in the Middle East that spelled danger for Israel. For years they faced opposition on their northern border from Lebanon. For many years Hezbollah was a political force in the area- for the first time ever they recently elected someone from Hezbollah to high office- deposing the former leader. In the south and on the West bank there was also lots of turmoil right before these revolts took place. The leader of the Palestinians came under tremendous pressure because the Wikileaks ‘leaks’ revealed that Abbas [Palestinian leader] agreed with Israel to kill some Hamas leaders [Hamas is the radical pro Palestinian group- branded as terrorists by Israel and the U.S.] When the leaks got out there was rage in the streets- the chief negotiator [Saeb Erakat] had to step down. So all these events were seen as major threats to peace in the region- add to that the fall of Egypt- and the current uprisings in the other Arab/Persian states- yes indeed- we have not seen a time like this since our world wars [yes that’s strong- I do believe this to be true]. Okay- should we be afraid? No. How should we view the young people who are the primary demonstrators on the streets? I think it would be a mistake for the older generation [especially in the West] to view them all as potential terrorists- remember- Iran wouldn’t be sending her ships to Syria unless they too felt like they needed to hedge their bets. So we want to hear the cries of the younger generation- people who have felt oppressed for years- who were told ‘make do with the same resources- yet make it go further’ these people have indeed been wronged in many ways- many of them feel this is their only chance to ‘escape’- and finally- the advice to the protestors- you need a ‘law’ constitution- a statement of just principles that you will hold each other accountable to- maybe an ‘on line’ statement of beliefs to go along with the ‘days of rage’ that are being posted on facebook- some type of open rejection of radical terrorism and holding accountable those who would like to ‘hijack’ the protests for their own purposes. It’s really too late for the West to say ‘okay- we liked the Egypt thing- but now we want to hold up on the rest’. It’s so sad- right after the Egyptian uprising- news organizations like CNN and others- who were actually ‘parties’ to the success of the revolt [yes- watch carefully and you will see] they then ignored the other protests and were headlining their shows with the Grammy winners- yes- whole hours of not mentioning any of the other protests. Or MSNBC making the stop story about Rumsfeld or how 50 % of the Republican primary voters think Obama is a Muslim- I mean a whole hour on this stuff? The media do ‘play the fool’ lots. Just a note- in some nations there are actually protestors [not govt. cronies] who are protesting against the ‘protestors’- that is some more stable economies [Bahrain, Qatar, etc.] many of these nations- though not democratic- have ‘shared the wealth’ with the people- many successful businesses thrive in some of these countries- these more stable people do not want the Egypt revolt to spread- some have pointed out [very legitimately] that when the media focuses the cameras of the world on a few hundred- or thousand protestors- they need to remember that there are many millions who are not protesting [the population of Egypt is 80 million- some did not want revolt] so the media has to be careful that they are not showing the wrong ‘narrative’ in some of these places. All in all- the cats out of the bag- some regimes are indeed going to shoot their protestors- others will try and start a war with Israel- yes- these are very serious times. Lets pray for the safety and freedom for all people- when the children of Israel were under an oppressive regime- the bible says God heard their cry and sent them a deliverer- the New Testament says Jesus is the ‘Moses’ of this day- even Gandhi used the non violent principles of the Sermon on the Mount to have a successful revolt- I hope the present protestors will do the same.

[By the way- in many of these present revolts the citizens are revolting against the autocrats who were installed after their countries broke away from their colonizers- like India from Britain- yet they never transitioned into real democracies]

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PHARAOH- KING OF EGYPT- I had an interesting experience yesterday- as I was doing the early morning prayer routine [I get up at around 3-3:30 and do about a 2 hour prayer time- I walk in my yard and cover a bunch of things- world situations, natural disasters, war areas- etc.] I got to a spot where I pray for world leaders. I start with president Obama and his wife and kids and then pray for world leaders. At one point I pray for all those in authority who are Christians- I ask the Lord to give them wisdom- help them make right decisions- I also pray for non Christian rulers- I don’t pray ‘against them’ I ask the Lord to also help them to rule justly- to not oppress their people. Then I pray for a 3rd category- let me quote it to you ‘Lord- for all those in authority who are persecuting believers- those who rule oppressive regimes- I ask that you would remove them for these positions and replace them with just leaders- and until that happens- that you would be glorified in them like you were with the rebellious leader of Egypt- Pharaoh’ the thing that surprised me was the realization that the only nation I mention every time I pray [besides the U.S.] is Egypt. The other nations get mentioned [Iraq- Israel- Palestine- etc.] but only as world events would warrant it- but Egypt is actually part of the prayer format. Now- I’m not saying that Egypt ‘fell’ because of my prayer- but it kinda did freak me out a little. Okay- in the last note we ended with Iran. In the past few days there have been uprisings in Yemen, Algeria [formally a colony of France- they too have been independent for around 30 years- yet many of these nations have not translated into Democracies], certain Persian Gulf states [Bahrain] and there are a number of nation/states that are foreseeing trouble [the more stable wealthy gulf states- United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia- are taking preventative steps to ward off any massive demonstrations- many of these countries are flatly handing out one time cash benefits as a sort of early tax return- geez- they are blatant about buying off the people.] So how are the Revolutions doing? Remember- the 1st domino to fall was the African nation of Tunisia [remember- Africa is a continent- so the nations/states in her are separate ruling governments] these past few weeks many thousands of refugees have fled Tunisia by boat and have landed on a port city in Italy. Italy is having major disruptions trying to deal with the crisis. Of course they are dealing with problems of their own- let’s see- what’s the big scandal story in Italy? Oh yeah- Berlusconi paid an underage Moroccan girl for sex. I remember watching the news a month or so ago- as the Italian leader was dealing with all his ‘girl’ scandals- he comes out and says ‘hey- it’s better than sleeping with the gays’. I guess their level of political correctness is a little different than ours. And for Egypt it’s too soon to tell how well the Revolution will end up. Now- at the same time we had the Taliban attack the police in Afghanistan- killing 18 people. There was one protestor killed in Iran- and the news media showed full coverage of the body- top of the world news- yet a few weeks ago while reading the paper- I read a story of 51 people killed by a suicide bomber right outside of Baghdad [Iraq], the next day I read the story again- the headlines were the same- the same amount of people killed- I thought they accidently ran the same story twice- as I read the article it wasn’t the same story, it was indeed the 3rd batch of more than 50 people killed in suicide bombings in 3 days. They said how in the last few weeks many hundreds were killed in these attacks- many more hundreds injured- yet not one top news media story- I found this story hidden on the back pages of the paper in a very obscure spot. Why? Is it because the media ran with the recent celebration of the so called end to our war in Iraq? I remember how MSNBC [yes- Matthews again] spent 3 days trying to make it sound like the end of WW2 – nobody bought it. So the media does pick and choose what they will run with. I’m glad they are covering the protestors- and I’m glad they covered the 1 person killed in Iran [even though they weren’t even sure who killed him] but we need to be very aware of the role the media plays- for them to have ignored 2-300 hundred suicide deaths in Iraq- because they want to show us a particular picture [war is over- let’s celebrate] and to have showed 1death as top major news in Iran- well you get the picture [I hope!] Yes- it’s too soon to tell how the Revolutions will turn out- Tunisia is a mess, and Egypt has a long road ahead of them- and yes- Berlusconi has his problems too. Lets pray for the nations, mention them by name- who knows- maybe one day you will wake up and say ‘geez- I’ve been praying for the removal of corrupt Pharaohs in Egypt for years- and sure enough he ‘got removed’.

NOTE- When the media tried to ‘spin’ the end of the war in Iraq- they showed their obvious bias in the way they reported the story under one president [Obama] versus the other [Bush]. What happened in Iraq was we left 50 thousand ‘non combat’ troops in the country [who by every account- even a local boy who is serving their right now wrote in our editorial- have said our guys are still engaging in combat on a regular basis]- we are building the world’s biggest ‘embassy’ in the country [it has been described as a giant permanent military base] and the uptick in attacks from the enemy have gone up- their country just installed one of the most outspoken enemies of the U.S. in their official govt. and like I said we just had hundreds of innocent people blown apart by suicide bombers in just a few days. During the Bush years- a single death with a burned out vehicle made national headlines- top story for days- showing all the various positions of the vehicles that were blown up- the Democrats regularly questioned the competence of the president- publicly stating that the wars were lost [Harry Reid] and accusing the president of willfully lying- in public- and being responsible- personally- for the deaths of both Iraqi innocents and American boys and girls- yes- senator Kerry went around the country- publicly saying ‘Bush lied- your kids died’. Now, none of this was seen as ‘raising the level of discourse too high’ the media did not freak out about any of this- a movie even came out called ‘the assassination of George W Bush’ the media did not roundly condemn this, not in the same way they spent weeks covering the ‘target’ story from Sarah Palin’s political sight. Can you imagine them not covering the story of a right winger who produced a movie called ‘the assassination of Barak Obama? Nor were the presidents enemies blamed for lowering the discourse and allowing stuff like this to happen. When a certain Democrat was asked ‘do you think it’s wrong that you described the president as an idiot in public’ he said ‘he is one’. The point being this same media- when Joe Wilson said ‘you lie’ some actually said this statement was so dangerous that it put the president’s life at risk [because it lowered the bar of respect]. Now- even though I agree with the need to stop using all this type of language- the point I’m making is the media has an agenda- even if it’s not a ‘secret’ underground thing [like Beck thinks]- never the less they report more favorably about a situation if they like the president- they report more negatively if they don’t. For the media to have reported the ‘end of the war’ in Iraq was a joke- and to have not even covered the hundreds who were just killed- while making 1 death in Iran the top news story- this too is a joke.

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EXODUS 20- God gives the people his law- the famous ’10 commandments’. In Greek it is Decalogue [meaning 10 words] and these laws are actually in the form of an ancient treaty type document- in essence God was not just saying ‘do this- don’t do that’ but he was telling them if they wanted to survive as a people, a society- then they needed law, just principles from which to govern themselves by- and also to hold each other accountable to their government and God.

As I continue to write and post about current world affairs- I also do lots of actual scholarly studying- I try and ‘mix’ world events in with historical perspective and keep my thinking in line with others who have gone on before us- stable thinkers, people who represent a broad range of thought. It’s too easy [and dangerous!] to view all things from a limited perspective- and then to see your view confirmed by your limited reading of the events. I saw a minister on one of the history channel shows speaking about his view of the ‘end of the world’. It was obvious that the program was allowing him to share his view- not because they thought it to be accurate- but because they wanted to show how people can see their beliefs confirmed by world events- if that’s what they want to see. Now- let me give you an example; during WW2 the church in Germany was divided- some wanted to work in accord with the state [Hitler] and others said they wanted no type of ungodly alliances with the state. Men like Dietrich Bonheoffer would reject Hitler’s ideals and be part of ‘the confessing church’ [those evangelicals who would not work with Hitler]. Another very famous theologian [scholar] would sign his name to an important document that stated the same idea of not condoning Hitler’s regime- his name was Karl Barth [considered by many to be the most influential theologian of the 20th century] the document was called The Barmen Declaration. In these cases the church felt she needed to speak out about world events- to side with those who were being oppressed- and to condemn those who were oppressing.

As I write this morning- we come off a day where our forces accidentally killed 9 Afghan boys who were out collecting wood for fire. Gen. Petraeus publicly apologized. Hamid Karzai is livid [rightfully so] and we are rapidly losing the support of the people [and I don’t blame them]. Yemen's president gave a very revealing speech- he told his country that he was going to ‘reveal a secret’. He said there is a secret operations room in Tel Aviv [Israel] and the purpose for it is to conspire against the Arab world and that the U.S. and Israel regularly meet to plan the overthrow of the Arab world. He obviously feels the heat [like all these other nations- he has protestors in the streets] but the fact that these leaders are actually speaking like this openly- our ties to these Arab nations are over. At the airport in Germany- a Muslim employee opened fire on 4 people- killing 2 American soldiers. Reports are he shouted ‘Allah Akbar’ [God is great] while firing his weapon.

In the media there are 2 narratives you can see; some ‘news organizations’ have made the top stories about Rumsfeld and any past mistakes/possible crimes committed under the Bush administration. Now- I guess there is a proper time for this- but not during the same day when the current administration and U.S. forces are involved in so many real-time scenarios, actual things that can change our world for years to come. Other news channels focus on the worst case scenarios- seeming to leave no room for any hope at all. I think both of these extremes are dangerous for our country- and we need to be realistic about the very real dangers- including our countries financial problems [there is talk in the world about dropping the U.S. dollar as the world reserve currency- and some analysts believe that China and others will stop buying our debt- financing us] These are very real dangers that we face as a country.

So what should the church do? First- I believe the ongoing killing of civilians [even by mistake!] is something that has to stop. Many Americans see the shooting of our soldiers at the German base as ‘terrorism’ and view the accidental killing of the 9 boys as ‘collateral damage’. We must understand- that the mothers of these boys don’t see it like that- and the rest of the Arab world as well. When God gave the people the ‘10 laws’ he was telling them there are some very fundamental rules that all nations will need to abide by if they want to survive. Most of us are familiar with them- and most of us know what the big one is ‘thou shalt not kill’- I think too many of us have stepped over this line one too many times.

www.corpuschristioutreachministries.blogspot.com

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Just finished reading ‘Coming to Grips With Genesis’ by Terry Mortenson and Thane Ury, probably the best argument for a young earth view put out in the last few years. Though I am still an ‘old earther’ it’s a good read. I am in the middle of ‘Last days Madness’ by Gary Demar [Preterism] and yesterday the book I ordered last ‘Why we’re not Emergent’, by Kevin Deyoung and Ted Kluck, showed up at my door. I am about 1/3 rd thru it. I recently read a quote from one of the famous philosophers that said ‘it is the mark of a mature intellect to be able to read and grasp another persons view, to understand what they are saying and where they are coming from, without fully embracing their view’ [paraphrase] I am applying this wisdom to all three of the above books. Not because they are not good, or because I disagree with everything in them, but because all people share from a limited view of the things they are seeing from their perspective [yes, me too!] that’s why God tells us there is safety in a multitude of counselors [not all counselors from your limited group either!] Okay, in Luke 3 John the Baptist is baptizing and calling people to repent [obviously not an emergent brother, or post modern or neo orthodox- yes, this can go on for ever- he told them what was right and wrong!] Look at the three groups coming to him; he tells the regular people ‘sell what you have, give it to the poor, share your stuff with those who are in need’. He tells the tax collectors ‘stop taking more money than you’re supposed too! It’s okay to collect a normal amount, but don’t go overboard’ and he tells the military ‘don’t use your power in an unjust way, when things go wrong, don’t bear false witness. Don’t cover it up’. I think all of these areas can apply to our lives today. There is somewhat of a resurgence of liberal social justice issues emerging in the church. It’s not out of the mainstream to talk about ecology, or ‘the military industrial complex’ and things of that sort. But we also must realize that in order to have these types of discussions there are times where we say to people ‘yes, we are not perfect, we have our faults. But it is still wrong to kill babies, or to discriminate against minorities, and to neglect our neighbor’. Would you tell a backslidden Christian who was hiding Jews in Nazi Germany ‘who do you think you are hiding these Jews, you are just as bad as Hitler’! Though the church has made mistakes, and Christians have been hypocrites, yet the reality of the ‘wrongness’ of killing Jews is not effected in any way by the perceived hypocrisy of the religious right. It’s still wrong to kill Jews whether or not Jimmy Swaggart messed up! The point being as the church tries to cast off the image of moral superiority that offends the world, we at the same time need to tell the world ‘yes, these things are still wrong, and these other things are still right’. When society came to John in the wilderness, he told them ‘what they must do’ he did not engage them in a long discussion on whether or not we can even determine what they need to do! He simply called them to repentance and back to the original intent of the law, he was preparing the way for Messiah.

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DRUNK WITH THE BLOOD OF THE SAINTS- Wasn’t sure which way to go today? It’s strange that I have been thinking about covering the sad story of the Christians in Iraq; since the war they have been persecuted severely- a few months back one of their main churches was attacked, many have fled to the northern region of the country [Kurdish area] and many are seeking asylum in our country. Saddam Hussein protected the Christian church in Iraq- he was not considered to be a radical Muslim leader- like the Mullahs in Iran. So it’s sad to see the Christian church possibly being eliminated from this ancient country. The church in Iraq dates back to the 1st century- they still speak Aramaic [some of them] which was the actual language Jesus spoke. Anyway- the thing that seems strange is I felt like I should read Revelation chapter 17 this morning- and in the chapter the apostle John has this vision of Babylon [which is Iraq- geographically. In the chapter it’s a symbol of the Roman Empire] and as he sees Babylon he says ‘she is drunk with the blood of the saints’- yes indeed, much Christian blood has been spilt in Iraq.

Okay- the other day I was watching some show about a group of people picked from all over the world who were chosen to participate in a sort of round table discussion where each person would spend so many months just sharing in conversation with these other people. Some were from the U.S., others from Muslim/Arab countries- some were from Israel. The conversation they had was really revealing- they were not scholars, but they showed you the point of view from other perspectives. One of the questions they asked was what should happen to Iran? Should the U.S. intervene in their desire to obtain nuclear weapons? One of the Americans said we should- because they might be a danger to world peace [a common ideology among many Americans] then one of the students from a Muslim country said ‘then why do you not feel it is also wrong for the U.S. to have nuclear weapons’ and the American gave some type of simple answer. Why does the Muslim world have a problem with the U.S. seeming to play the role of arbiter- who can have- or not have a nuclear arsenal?

Are there any Muslim/Arab countries that have them today? What about other countries who are also unstable? Let’s see- Pakistan [the most unstable of the bunch right now] India [Pakistan’s rival, also a major reason why Pakistan will not eliminate the Taliban from the mountainous region of her nation- they see the Taliban as playing a major role in the future govt. of Afghanistan and they need some ties to the Taliban in order to balance out any power play between India and Afghanistan] Egypt, Israel, North Korea, Saudi Arabia- well as you can see there are a bunch of nations who already posses nuclear weapons- or are on the road to getting them. So when the average Muslim sees our attempt to intervene in who gets nukes, they see it as a hypocritical game.

What is the world history on nuclear attacks? How many countries have actually used nukes to attack/respond to other attacks? One. Who dropped the first Atomic bomb in the history of the world on another country? We did. Okay- let’s give this another shot. Who dropped the second Atomic bomb? Okay- us again. One more time- who dropped number 3? No one. So let’s see this from the perspective of the Muslim student who questioned the reasoning of why the U.S. has nukes- but doesn’t want other nations to have them. The student was told that if other nations [Iran] has them- they might use them. Yet they see us as the only country that has ever actually used them. Look- I know why we used them- and many have questioned the morality of what we did in WW2. Were we just in dropping the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki? We killed around 200 thousand people- civilians- not military [not counting the many who died in the following years from radiation sickness]. One of the definitions of terrorism is the purposeful targeting of civilians for a political/military goal. To the Muslim world- we targeted these civilian cites [they were not collateral damage- the civilians were the target] for a political/military goal- to end the war. The point is we [Americans] have a tendency to view things from one perspective- we rarely see the end result of our actions. Who would have thought that our war in ancient Babylon [Iraq] would have contributed to one of the fulfillments of John’s prophecy ‘Babylon- you are drunk with the blood of the saints’.

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WHERE’S THE CONFESSING CHURCH? During WW2 the German church was split on how she should respond to the rise of Hitler and the racist tendencies that were beginning to be revealed as time went on. Many German Christians initially embraced his ideas- they seemed to join a nationalistic/patriotic spirit in with the practice of their religion. Germany was coming off of years of national inferiority after their loss in WW1 and many Christians embraced the new felt spirit of ‘exceptionalism’ that was surging thru the land. On the other side you had men like Dietrich Bonheoffer who resisted what he saw as unjust govt.- others took his stance, these were called ‘the confessing church’ they believed it was their responsibility to speak out- to ‘confess’ the things they saw as unjust. Bonheoffer would get executed for his role in attempting to assassinate Hitler.

As we continue to read the release of the Wikileaks documents- we see more and more how our govt. has lied, deceived, been involved in the deaths of many civilians- and both the media and the govt. have denied these things- until they actually were exposed. Yemen. The last few years there were many attacks in the country of Yemen- when these attacks first started the U.S. govt. vehemently denied any involvement at all. The official reports and the N.Y. times ran stories that said ‘Today in Yemen- Yemeni fighter planes struck a terrorist compound and possibly killed some high level Al Qaeda terrorists’. During a press conference- state dept. spokesman P.J. Crowley was point blank asked ‘are we involved in ANY military activities in Yemen’- he point blank said no. There was speculation that we were doing secret drone attacks in the country- our govt. said ‘NO’. On average about 50 civilians die for every target we hit- quite a cost. So obviously these innocents demand to know the truth about why/who killed their kids. Yemen and the U.S. simply saw it in their best interest to lie. I mean- these people are just pawns on the grand stage- right? What rights does the average person have to really know what’s going on? So the Wikileaks revealed that yes indeed the U.S. did do the strikes- yes indeed we did kill many innocents- and yes indeed Yemen said ‘you do the strikes, and we’ll tell our people it was us’. They were caught in the act. So what is our govt. saying now? P.J. Crowley- the state dept. spokesmen who lied- he is now saying ‘well, I meant we weren’t involved in a specific attack’. When you read the actual transcript of the press conference- he was asked ‘are we involved IN ANY military activity in Yemen’? His answer- NO.

Last week our military began trial hearings against a team of U.S. soldiers for their involvement in what’s being called ‘a death squad’. This group of young men were caught killing Afghan civilians- they shot a farmer in a field- cut off his finger for a souvenir and eventually were caught. Now- do these guys represent the majority of our troops in the field- of course not! Yet this story runs as top news in the Muslim media- have you even heard about it?

How should the church respond to these types of things? Should we be the silent majority- like Germanys nationalistic church who saw ‘church and state’ as one big patriotic cause? Should we just keep ‘preaching the gospel’ while our govt. carries out hidden agendas and lies to us and the people who are being killed? Should we question the ridiculous strategy of engaging in these never ending campaigns? What’s out strategy? Do we believe that after more than 10 years- and thousands of lives- that eventually we can set up Democratic governments that will be allies to the U.S. ? What’s to prevent these radical religious countries from voting in some nut- like the president of Iran- and we spent all our time dying and killing for this?

We tried this in the West Bank- we helped the Palestinians set up some free and open elections. We wheeled and dealed with Israel and Palestine- we gave much aid and effort- after all was said and done they finally held their democratic election- and they elected Hamas!

What is the primary cause for terrorism amongst radical Islamists? They see our forces in their ‘holy lands’ as the number one cause for resistance. After our initial war [Bush 1] to expel Iraq from Kuwait- we for the first time established bases in Arab countries. Saudi Arabia- Iraq- etc. Bin laden and the rise of Al Qaeda were a direct result of what they saw as Americans’ ‘defiling’ their sacred land. Do you remember any car bombings and these types of efforts before that time? Yes- you always had some type of fighting- but not to the level that ratcheted up after the first gulf war. So, the number one reason these radicals are carrying out this insane agenda is because they see us as invaders in their land. So how do we respond to the threat- WE INVADE MORE LAND! Overall the strategy is not going to work. Right now we are fighting the Taliban- who are these people? They are ethnic Afghans who have NO WORLWIDE AGENDA. They see themselves as ‘freedom fighters’ who simply want to ‘restore’ their land to a religious theocracy. Not good- but no real threat to the U.S. So why are we fighting them? They gave space for Al Qaeda to operate out of their country. Okay- Al Qaeda’s been long gone- yet we keep fighting this group who sees themselves as defending their homeland. Its nuts! It’s like if some gang attacked you, they lived down the street in some hotel. So you start a war with the hotel owners and the gang leaves. Instead of spending all your time and resources hunting down the gang- you start a never ending war with the hotel owners! Not only is this stupid- but the gang is laughing at the strategy- it actually helps the gang to recruit more members- because the gang points to the fact that we are in their ‘holy land’ which after all is the original justification for the existence of the gang! All this would be laughable if it weren’t so sad.

So what does the church say about all this- not much. We keep hawking our religious wares on our TV channels- we keep appealing for a never ending need for money- and all the time the world is going to hell in a hand basket. It’s time for us to become ‘the confessing church’ to speak truth to power- because our govt. seems to have a hard time telling us the truth.

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HOW SHOULD WE RESPOND TO UNJUST GOVERNMENTS? One of the most famous dissidents of the soviet era was Alexander Solzhenitsyn; Alexander was a simple school teacher who would serve in the military when Stalin was in power. He had written some critical things about Stalin in a letter to a friend and was put in the communist prison camps. While doing time he met believers and returned to his early faith as a Christian. In the year I was born [1962] he wrote the famous ‘A day in the life of Ivan Denisovich’ it was a fictional account of a man in the prison camps and how he dealt with his captors. The main character would meet a Baptist believer while doing time and sort of represented Alexander’s own plight. Alexander came to fame when Khrushchev would permit him to publish his book, Khrushchev was advancing his own program of Destalinization and he underestimated Alexander’s criticism of all communist type systems, not just Stalin. He would also expose the evils of the prison camps in his other work titled ‘The Gulag Archipelago’. Eventually he was exiled to the U.S. [Vermont was his home] and received much notoriety as a prophetic voice who spoke out for justice. He gave a controversial speech at Harvard [1978?] and the western media came to dislike him; he was critical of loose morality and the evils of western society as well, he was not the sort of liberal crusader that they mistook him to be. Eventually he would return home to Russia and live to see the fall of the system he despised. History is filled with people who stood for what was right against all odds and impacted society for the better, Alexander was a school teacher whose life took a turn of events that he simply followed; he was not ashamed of the gospel and did not tailor his message to please the audience. I like that style; it reminds me of another revolutionary who gave his life to save the world.

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I mentioned Augustine on video 3 [Just war theory] here are my past teachings on him-

PROTESTANT REFORMATION CONCLUSION

Today let’s finish up the study on the Protestant Reformation. We left off on Luther disputing with the church over the doctrine of how a person becomes just in the sight of God- is it by works or faith?

Now- to the surprise of many Protestants [and Catholics!] both sides agreed that a person cannot be justified by works.

Yes- the Catholic Church rejected what was known as Pelagianism. In the early centuries of the church there was a Catholic priest- named Pelagius- who taught that people had the ability within themselves to obey Gods law and become saved that way.

He rejected the doctrine of original sin and another famous bishop- Saint Augustine- would refute Pelagius and teach salvation comes by the Grace of God. The official Catholic position was to reject Pelagius and accept Augustine.

Okay- then where’s the difference?

The church council that spells it out is the Council of Trent [named after the Italian city where the council took place in the 1500’s- Trento].

This council is often referred to as the Counter Reformation. The church rejected the Protestant line- but also acknowledged the need for reform and made some changes.

This is the council where the church rejects Pelagianism- and also says the position of Luther [Justification by Faith ALONE] was flawed.

The church appealed to the New Testament letter of Saint James- where James uses an example from the life of Abraham [found in Genesis 22] where Abraham obeys God and is willing to sacrifice his son Isaac on an altar.

Of course this never happens- God was simply testing Abraham- but James says this act of obedience justified him in Gods sight.

James says ‘see how a man is justified by works- and not by faith ALONE’.

The argument from Rome was Faith played THE major role in justification- but was not sufficient by itself- there had to be righteous works eventually associated with it in order for God to say ‘you are just’ [saved].

Luther disagreed and said God justified Abraham before he had good works- we find this in Genesis 15. God says to Abraham ‘look- count all the stars- so shall your offspring be’ and Walla- the bible also says Abraham was justified in God's eyes the moment he believed the promise.

Who’s right?

Actually they both are.

I have taught this a few times over the years- and it would take too much time to re-do right now.

But I believe James and Paul [the 2 who debate this in the bible] are simply looking at different aspects of salvation/justification.

Paul emphasized faith- and James showed us how true faith always has works with it.

When you read the statements that came out from the council of Trent- some of them do seem to indicate that both sides might have been talking past each other at some points.

In the heat of the day they were too quick to condemn the other side- without really trying hard to achieve unity [like politics!].

The 6th session of Trent was the one where the church dealt with justification [how we become saved in Gods sight].

Rome made a distinction between mortal and Venial sin in the council- the church said that Baptism is the INSTRUMENTAL CAUSE of justification. Yet faith is the Root- Foundation and Initial act that justifies.

Rome also taught that Mortal sin kills the grace in the soul that brings justification- and when a person commits a mortal sin- they need the ‘2nd plank of justification’ in order to be brought back into a state of Grace.

This 2nd Plank is the Sacrament of Penance [confession]. Catholic Moral Theologians use an example to show the difference between Mortal and Venial sin.

Drinking- if you take a drink [alcohol] not a sin. If you get tipsy- Venial- and if you get flat drunk- mortal.

This is a true teaching by the way- not making this up.

Catholic scholars are not in total agreement on all the Mortal/Venial sins.

Some teach that missing Mass on Sunday is a Mortal sin.

I just threw this in to show you the debates that take place.

The teachings from Trent are referred to as Tridentine.

The Protestants [early on] rejected the belief that a person can lose Gods grace once he has it- later on the Protestants would divide- severely- over this teaching- Predestination and the Perseverance of the Saints.

But early on all the major Reformers did indeed teach this.

Luther believed in the doctrine of Predestination just as much- if not more- than John Calvin.

But sometimes in these history shows they get this wrong and say Luther and Calvin disagreed on it- that’s a common mistake that you hear every so often.

Luther actually wrote a book dedicated to the subject [The Bondage of the Will] Calvin never wrote a book solely on the subject.

Okay- as we end this brief study of the Protestant Reformation- you could also call it a primer on Catholic doctrine [short one].

Why is it important that we study this?

In John chapter 17 Jesus said that he desired unity for all of Gods people- and many of these divisions- which date back 500 years- are commonly misunderstood on both sides.

It is common in our day to run across an ex Catholic who might say ‘you know- I left the church because I don’t believe I need to confess to a priest’ or ‘the Catholic church teaches you are saved by works’.

The original Reformers did not have a problem with confession- the Lutherans carried the practice over into their communion.

And like I just showed you- the Catholic church rejected the doctrine of being saved ‘by works’ [Pelagianism] and simply emphasized the teaching found in the bible- the book of James- and focused more on James than Paul [who the protestants focus on].

So yes- there are still differences- but if we are not informed- then it makes it harder to strive for unity- and at the end of the day God does desire unity for all his people.

The other day I quoted the great Civil rights leader- MLK. In one of his famous speeches that’s played when we celebrate his life- you hear Martin say that not only was he seeking unity among the races- but also in the church.

He said he wanted to see Catholics and Protestants- as well as Blacks and Whites- sit down together- he referred to us all as Gods kids.

I think we should strive to achieve the desire of Martin- and Jesus.

Amen.

www.corpuschristioutreachministries.blogspot.com

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thecoroutfitters · 8 years ago

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Will another world war happen anytime soon?

Tensions between the great powers of the world are increasing. And if they are going to burst, how would a world war would look today?

World War II was a world-changing event. While not all the countries of the world were involved in the war, it affected most of them to some extent.

More than anything, it affected the industrialized nations of the world, what are known as the “first world countries,” a term that you don’t hear all the time.

It is this wide-reaching impact that made what was thought of by some to be a European war, into a world war.

There have only been two world wars in the world’s history and both of them were fought largely in Europe.

Considering that the European countries, especially the British Empire, controlled 30% of the world’s landmass until World War II, it’s really not surprising that those wars became world wars.

But things have changed. One of the major, but little talked about results of World War II was that the British lost their empire. This caused the British Empire to drop from being the world’s greatest superpower to being just one more European country, amongst many. The United States of America took its place as the world’s premiere superpower.

This leads me to think that any future world war would have to center around the United States. That’s not pride and patriotism talking, but merely an analysis of the facts.

No major war (defined as involving more than two countries) happens today, without the USA being involved in some way.

Of course, being the strongest and richest country in the world has its price. Part of that price is that we accumulate enemies much faster than other countries, with many countries claiming that the US government tries to dictate to the rest of the world. Of course, the countries who complain about that either want to invade others or want the USA out of the way for other nefarious purposes.

So, like the Japanese in World War II, these countries turn against the United States. The Japanese never intended to invade the USA during World War II, they just attacked Pearl Harbor to keep the United States from interfering with their plans of conquering the Far East and creating an empire.

What is the Threat?

Predicting the next war is an inexact science that baffles even the best informed. Throughout my years in the military, I heard talk about how the Soviet Union was going to come barreling through the Fulda Gap, launching World War III. That was the war we prepared for, and the war that never happened. The Berlin Wall came down, the Soviet Union collapsed and the world went in a different direction.

That next war turned out to be in the Middle East. I suppose I could say “I told you so” to all my old military buddies, but I’ve lost contact with them in the ensuing years. Even if I could tell them that, the satisfaction would be tempered by the fact that I successfully predicted a war, not something more profitable or enjoyable.

Some of today’s threats are akin to that of the Soviet Union, but others are smaller, even if they are more dangerous. What makes them more dangerous is their unpredictability. Those smaller threats don’t follow the rules the rest of the world does; in fact, it’s hard to say if they follow any rules at all.

Our Current “Threat Board”

Russia – the world’s second largest power and one with imperial ambitions

China – the largest country in the world and one that historically has no love for the United States

Iran – a sworn enemy who has previously declared war on the USA

North Korea – headed by a despotic dynasty, North Korea has also declared war against us

ISIS – while not really accepted as a nation, the Islamic State calls themselves one. They are also the most dangerous nation on the face of the Earth, murdering thousands of people in their “holy war”

There are other countries that we could add to this list, but these would have to be the major players. Our other enemies are either too small, too weak, or smart enough to not make too much noise about attacking America.

Of that list, we can identify four different types of threats that we face:

Conventional war, with Russia or China trying to invade the United States. Not a very likely scenario.

Cyberwarfare, again with Russia or China being the attackers, trying to take down the US government, military, power grid or financial network. Any of those would cause us serious harm and none are adequately protected.

Nuclear War; while Russia and China actually have the ability to attack the USA with nuclear weapons, it is doubtful that either of them will do so. On the other hand, both Iran and North Korea are actively working on the development of nuclear weapons and the intercontinental missiles to deliver them. However, they would be better served by an EMP attack, which would have much wider impact on the United States.

Terrorism, propagated by ISIS or by another terrorist organization, funded and supported by Iran. This is already happening in many parts of the world. Extending it more aggressively into the United States would be child’s play, especially with our porous southern border.

The greatest threats come from the most unstable countries. So, while a war with Russia or China might be more devastating, the reality is that we are at more of a risk of attack from Iran, North Korea or ISIS. Each has declared against us and would love to take us out of their way.

Aren’t We Already in the Midst of World War III?

Some have said that we are already in the midst of World War III; specifically referring to the jihad being waged by ISIS and other radical Islamic terrorist organizations. In one sense, they are absolutely right; radical Islam has declared a war of conquest against the rest of the world, and it appears that they have no intention of stopping until they have succeeded.

With 1.3 billion Muslims in the world today, a fair percentage of which support the idea of jihad to conquer the world and convert every living soul to Islam, it doesn’t look like this war is going to stop anytime soon.

But the Islamic jihad has a number of problems as a war of conquest. First and foremost, Islam itself is divided. More than anything, Muslims are killing other Muslims over doctrinal differences. As long as that continues, it is doubtful that they will succeed in conquering the world.

But that doesn’t mean that they won’t continue trying. Between jihadic terrorism and what I like to call “social jihad” Muslims are making inroads in many countries, especially in Europe, using the Syrian refugee crisis to infiltrate the European countries. Even social jihad has its violent element, as we’ve seen in Europe: supposed Syrian refugees have attacked citizens in Sweden, Germany, France and England.

This makes the central focus of this world war Europe at the moment, just like it was for the last two world wars. Not only is Europe involved in it, but a number of other countries, such as the Philippines, Malaysia, India, Kenya and Tanzania, to name a few. Islam is even making inroads into China, Serbia, Albania and Serbia. Unless something is done about it, the expansion of Islam will continue to take over more and more of the world.

We have felt little of this war here in the United States. But that is about to change. As Europe closes the doors to Syrian refugees, more and more are entering Mexico, first to start the Islamification of that country and then to move into the United States.

Border Patrol is seeing more and more Middle Eastern men crossing the border with Mexican names. They are taking on Mexican identities and even marrying into Mexican families, so that they can come to the United States as Mexicans, rather than Syrians.

In this, they are once again using our own laws against us. While the problem of illegal aliens coming into the United States from Mexico is one that concerns Americans, it is nothing compared to the problem of unveted Muslims. The invasion is on and it is only time until they start to do the same sort of violent acts here in the USA, that they are doing in Europe.

Escalation of the Islamic Threat

While there is a very real war being waged by radicalized Islam today, it is a slow war; one that is intended to last for years. These invaders are patient in their conquest and have centuries of experience in taking over countries through a combination of social jihad and violence.

The tricky thing about this third jihad is identifying when it moves from being a nuisance to being an actual war. It is clear that the jihadists themselves have declared war on us. But many of the methods they use are known to us, defining whether they are acts of war or simple criminal actions is difficult.

Part of the methodology of social jihad is making the areas that Muslims occupy ungovernable, so that the legally constituted government abandons the area, turning it into a “no-go zone” and allowing the Muslims to “self govern;” or institute Sharia Law.

But while the low level warfare of jihad is a clear and present danger to the United States of America, it is nothing compared to what is going on in the Middle East. There, ISIS and other terror groups are killing people by the thousands, some through warfare, but even more through gristly executions. We’ve all seen the videos of ISIS executioners beheading people, setting them on fire and even drowning them because they would not convert to their version of Sunni Islam.

While we have seen the violence of terrorism at work here in the United States, it is hard to quantify it. The previous administration refused to acknowledge that many of the deaths caused by Muslims were acts of terrorism, even while the killers declared their loyalty to ISIS or Mohammad. Instead, they were labeled “workplace violence” denying us accurate data on how bad the situation is.

Hopefully this will change. Unlike the former president, Trump has no ties to Islam, nor reason to give them preferential treatment. Therefore, it is highly likely we will see an upswing in reported Muslim terrorist attacks. Not because there are more, but because they will be reported honestly as what they are.

But I think we can probably expect to see an upswing in actual attacks as well. ISIS is learning from their mistakes and is constantly looking for new means of infiltrating soldiers into our midst. Not only that, but their online recruitment is continuing, seeking marginalized youth that they can convert to their work.

These young terrorists get all the technical and emotional support they need from their Muslim handlers, who encourage them to engage in acts of violence, including taking their own lives as holy warriors.

When we see these attacks, either from misguided youth or infiltrated soldiers on the upswing, we will know that the war has truly reached our shores. But that war is not our biggest danger.

Video first seen on Fox News.

Nuclear War on the Horizon

While the threat of Islamic terrorism isn’t something we can ignore, it is not the biggest threat on the horizon. While they are horrible in and of themselves, terrorist acts hurt few people compared to what nuclear war can kill.

Even the most effective terrorist attack in the history of the United State, the destruction of the twin towers in New York, only killed 2,996 people. An atomic bomb, exploding over Los Angeles, could kill millions.

Chances of an enemy invading the United States are minimal. As Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto is reputed to have said during World War II, “You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind every blade of grass.” While obviously an exaggeration, this statement is based upon a very real truth. That is, the American people, especially conservatives, own a lot of guns.

“You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind every blade of grass.”

Any invading force would not only have the problem of defeating the United States military, which is the most powerful military on Earth, they’d have to deal with all the armed Americans out there, many of whom are hunters.

The only two countries in the world who have the military might to even attempt it would be Russia and China, and neither of them can muster enough troop transports to make the assault and support it logistically. On top of that, our countries 10 aircraft carriers are more than all the aircraft carriers of all the other countries of the world combined.

But that’s not to say that enemies couldn’t attack the United States and do so effectively. One such attack would be a cyberattack, taking out our communications and the electrical grid. The defenses of our electrical grid are probed regularly, as if potential enemies are seeking weaknesses to exploit.

Both China and Russia are far ahead of the United States in developing cyberwarfare. We ignored this new battle front, at a time when China was creating their fist cyberwarfare division. Their capability today is largely unknown, but it is clear that they have the capability of taking down much that we depend on, without firing a shot.

Should China ever choose to initiate cyberwarfare against the United States, we would probably lose. But then, so would they.

China holds over a trillion dollars of the US federal debt, something that they wouldn’t want to lose. Besides, they wouldn’t want to lose the 347 billion dollars in trade deficit, money that their economy needs to receive, or their country plummets into worse poverty than they’ve ever known.

So, while the risks of invasion or cyberwarfare are real, they are not the biggest risk that we face. Rather, the risk of nuclear war is.

For over 40 years, the United States and the now defunct Soviet Union stared at each other across the world’s oceans, with both sides wondering if that day would be the last. At its height, the two countries held a total of over 70,000 nuclear warheads between them; many more than the approximately 15,000 that exist today. We could have destroyed the world in less than an hour.

Fortunately, we never reached that point. The closest we came was the Cuban missile crisis of 1962. The only reason why John F. Kennedy was able to stare down the Kremlin and put that crisis to bed was that we had intelligence which confirmed that the missiles were not ready for use. This caused the Kremlin to back down and defused the situation.

While we never shot a nuclear tipped missile at Russia and they never shot one at us, the threat of nuclear war has never really left. Our mutual nuclear arms stockpiles make it unlikely that we ever will.

However, there are two countries who are actively seeking to build nuclear arms and the missiles to turn them into weapons of mass destruction, North Korea and Iran; two countries that have declared themselves to be against the United States.

It actually goes deeper than that. Kim Jong Un, the North Korean dictator, has threatened the United States of America with nuclear holocaust over and over again. While his military has had trouble with their missiles, they are continuing testing, seeking to build a missile that can be used against us.

Video first seen on Fox News.

Likewise, Obama’s deal with Iran literally gave them permission to go ahead with their nuclear program, working towards developing their own capability to build nuclear bombs.

Both of these countries are dangerous, due to their unstable leadership and their hatred of the United States. Either could attack with little to no notice, as the preparations for a nuclear strike aren’t something that can be seen by satellite, as the buildup of troops for a conventional invasion is.

What looks like another simple missile test could easily turn out to be the launch of nuclear war, and we wouldn’t know it until the missile was on the way.

It is almost a certainty that both North Korea and Iran will become nuclear powers with ICBMs in the next five years. The question is, what are these countries going to do with that nuclear power? Will they be content with saber rattling or will they feel a need to use it and attack?

There is no real way to predict the answer to that question, but I would not put my faith in either country or their leadership. Their hatred for us might easily overcome their common sense, causing them to attack. Such an attack would of course require retaliation, a retaliation which would make their countries the ultimate losers in that war.

Neither country is likely to have the nuclear might to fight a full-fledged nuclear war, but they could do us considerable damage. Even the destruction of one city, such as Los Angeles (the most likely target for North Korea), would have a huge impact on the American people and on American politics. Regardless of how we responded to that attack, it would scar the country deeply.

But attacking one, two or even 20 cities in the United States would not destroy our country. While it would be a major blow, the United States is too big a country to be destroyed like that. Yes, millions would die and billions in capital would be lost, but the country would survive.

On the other hand, an EMP attack would be much more effective. It quite possibly could spell the destruction of our country, if properly planned and executed. It does not take thermonuclear weapons, ICBMs or miniaturization to create a Nuclear High-Altitude EMP (HEMP). Actually any country that has nuclear weapons and can orbit satellites has the technology and ability to carry out an EMP attack on the USA.

The very nature of this sort of attack would give the attackers the element of surprise, and foreknowledge wouldn’t do us much good anyway.

Regardless of how much notice we had, there is little that any of us could do, or even that our government could do, to prevent the destruction of an EMP. Our power grid would be down, much of our electronics destroyed, and the United States set back by about 150 years.

This is the most likely and the most dangerous scenario for an attack by another country.

Will it happen? Nobody knows. But to ignore the possibility and pretend that everything is okay would be foolish. Learning the error of that mistake would be too expensive to contemplate. Till then, keep preparing!

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This article has been written by Bill White for Survivopedia.

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