#OH WOW did i just detached from my own feelings to analyze them | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

pinupgalore-lanadelrey · 7 years ago

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So "for... and for..." is "for Amy and for Whitney" oh wow. I never expected that, kinda gives a whole new meaning to Get Free.

I mean i had a feeling that her “birds of paradise” were about Amy, Kurt, Whitney but I love that she shared that with us.. it really gives me goosebumps.. because she really was struggling and felt so akin to them and she did wish she was dead.. Lana was living in her own dark world in her head.. and beautiful and amazing music came from it but she suffered so much. and now she’s really trying to bring hope and that just.. really solidifies it for me that Get Free is the most important track on Lust For Life.

“I wanted to summarize my whole experience over the last six years; and then I realized, I don’t want to reveal everything.” Once the initial version was “out of my system”, she says, the recording was “deleted completely then started from scratch”. The lyrics became vaguer and more hopeful. “I think it would have been hard for me to do interviews if I’d said a couple of particular things that I was thinking of,” she says of the original.

You told us a few years ago that you spend “a lot of time in (your) head”. Is that still the case?“I have opened up to others. But most of the time, I still have that inner dialogue with myself. However, I feel less apart, less different than the others nowadays. I have the impression that I have finally connected to the world. It’s comforting. I have analyzed my life since I was a teenager, with enough detachment.”

“I think I was feeling happy that I was present, and not afraid in a way that I couldn’t enjoy my everyday things.Maybe I’ve just had time to think about everything, process everything.” “All the tough things that I have been through – that I’ve drawn upon [in my work] – don’t exist for me anymore. Not all my romantic relationships were bad, but some of them challenged me in a way that I didn’t want to be challenged and I am happy I don’t have to do that now.”

“Through the last four records, I got out a lot of those stories and a lot of those feelings, and for the first time, I’ve caught myself up to real time. And now, I’m at this place where I feel like I’m really present whereas before I was a little bit in my own head. That brings on that lust for life feeling — when you don’t have all of those feelings about the past weighing you down.”

“I’m more settled in reality. I go out, I blend more with the others. After having been too intellectual, too existentialist.” - 2017

“I’ve had despair and grief in my life. In the past four years journalists have always asked me about death, icons and my persona. My own depressions and experiences have gotten miscommunicated as this need to be dark. Actually it’s not my preferred way of being. I love when things go really well. Anyone who knows me knows this.”

“I did not foresee the amount of chaos and confusion there would be when I became well known.” “I was, you know, a mess. I totally wanted to kill myself every day.” “Three years after my debut album, I’m still suffering from self-doubt and depression.”

“For a long time I was lodged in my head, wondering how things were gonna turn out, if things were going to be hard forever. And on a philosophical level, I was consumed with the idea that … what happens? Why are we here, What happens to us after we die? I did have a darker filter on sometimes, but that slowly lifted through doing a lot of different things.”

“Einstein said ‘your imagination is more important than intelligence,’ and I have a very, very big imagination.”“Basically, apart from the intricacies of my imagination and my mind there is nothing left of me, nothing personal.”“I found it hard to make friends in school, because I was a cerebral person.” “Since I started, my music has been described as “Lynchian”. It seems we both have dark hearts.” “It’s [writing] a form of escapism for me in some ways, now that I don’t go out much.”“I’m interested in the gorgeous side of life, but also familiar with the dark side too.” “At school, teachers quickly understood. I was free, they let me learn by myself, in my rhythm. I’ve always lived like this, in my head, asking me questions without answers. And I was afraid: of making music, of not achieving my goals.”

“Sometimes I do feel like I wish I was dead. I’ve been through a lot. And yes, sometimes I feel like I fucking wish I was dead. But The Guardian made it sound like I was obsessed with dying because it’s glamorous. Me being depressed sometimes has nothing to do with other people wanting to kill themselves.”

“This passion for words I own to my best friend Gene, my English teacher at the time. He showed me, when I was 15, the books by Jack Kerouac, Allan Ginsberg… Suddenly I no longer felt lonely, lost in my dreams. I finally knew that there were people like me, a bit weird, out of it. I really was saved by the beat poets. They opened a huge window for me, reassuring my mental health. In Lake Placid, there weren’t many people who shared my universe, so the books became my close friends.”

“It changed my world, which was a really solitary world. I didn’t have a connection to anyone in class and when I found these writers, I knew they were my people.”

“There’s nothing wrong being a dreamer, because I think that dreams are as important as reality.”“I don’t have the luxury of reveling in my sadness. It doesn’t usually do me any good.”

“I live in my obsessions and then the music comes from there. Living that way and writing from that place doesn’t make for a “color in the lines” mold. And yet, the songs and the videos and the image go together well because they all come from the same place. So, maybe I’m not deliberate about the packaging, but I am deliberate at trying to do things that I adore.”

“It was like an outlet. I needed to purge myself of my dark ideas. The result was wonderful.” - Lana on AKA Lizzy Grant

“Even before things got bigger, I hadn’t met that many guys who understood or who were as passionate about the grunge era, or cult bands, cult movies, as I was. For me, it was a lifestyle and a way of life. Living off the grid was important to me, not having much to do with people I didn’t feel I had a lot in common with. He was exactly like that. He lived and made music in his own room for like, 10 years, and I totally related to that.”

“I thought my tastes and likes were pretty normal, but then I met everyone and I was like, “These people don’t actually care about music and art. They want to be cool.” I never met anyone who cared about music as deeply as me and my boyfriend, or who really cared about poetry—who really lived it and breathed it. I haven’t met anyone so far.”

“The last one – before the boyfriend I’m with now – was pretty bad. It wasn’t good to be in it, but it wasn’t good to be out of it, either. He was like a twin. Not a facsimile twin, but a real twin.” “He is definitely a poet. I didn’t really know what being a poet meant until I met him. He has changed me in ways that I didn’t expect. On the one hand I have everything I’ve dreamed of in terms of a soul connection, it’s almost telepathic. But I would be lying if I said it wasn’t difficult. He is a much darker character than most people I’ve ever met.”

“I’m too focused to let myself go, I’m afraid of mistakes, so I control everything. When I see images of Jeff Buckley, this extraordinary freedom, I tell myself that he really incarnates music. I don’t. I don’t let myself evade. Music was his life. I constantly think about him.”

“There’s a huge universe in my mind I usually go to find shelter in. I may not be that lucky in my everyday life, but as far as my work is concerned – I’m blessed.”

“I love when I have those rare moments where I just turn off and don’t worry about anything““I’m an independent operator. It’s just fucking different. I never wanted to lead a normal life.”“I have a more alternative way of thinking.”

Have you ever been the “voice of reason” for a friend in crisis?“I have – I can be. It’s easier to do that sometimes … for someone who’s half-checked out.”

Meaning you. Yes. (Pauses.)

“I believe in Amy Winehouse. I know she’s not with us anymore but I believe she was who she was and in that way she got it right.”

“I’m a real fan of Whitney Houston’s early live shows where she had so many backup singers… I don’t know, I’m kinda ready to do something a little bit different“

#lana del rey #get free #compilation

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epacer · 5 years ago

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Story You May Have Missed

Crawford High more balanced racially now

SAT scores on verbal and math tests at Crawford in 1969 was 1015. In 1982 it was 871

After fourteen years I had only one uncomfortable moment, one feeling of small panic. It came halfway through the advanced English class I was monitoring as an observer. Maybe it was because the class was period two, home room — and since graduating from Crawford High School in East San Diego in the spring of 1969 I had forgotten all about the fact that we used to have home rooms. Or maybe it was that the day’s lesson on Greek drama was just the sort of thing that used to put a glaze over my eyes. Whatever it was, the teacher’s voice faded, and I became acutely aware of the clock on the wall, with its minute hand creeping upward one loud “click!” at a time. I heard the boy next to me ask his friend, “Did you find your homework yet?” and heard his friend answer, “I didn’t do it, so how could I find it?” And suddenly I felt lightheaded, as if I hadn't graduated at all, as if the teacher were going to call on me and I didn’t know the answer to the question.

I had come back to Crawford looking for a lot more than a feeling of deja vu. I wanted to find out what the students’ concerns and perceptions are, and how they differ from what ours were back in the days when the Rolling Stones were still young and the newspapers daily reported the latest total of American soldiers who had died in Vietnam. In a way, I suppose, I wanted to stash the school under my shirt, run off with it, pull it out once I got home, and leaf through it page by pungent page. Because you hear a lot of things about high school these days. You hear that students graduate without knowing the difference between words like “their” and “there.” You hear that sex is as common and meaningful as exchanging business cards, and that kids show up for class so saturated with drugs they can barely put pen to paper.

I had heard a few disturbing things specifically about Crawford, too. There were rumors of students threatening teachers for giving them bad grades, and of fights stemming from racial hostilities and gang rivalries. Some of the incidents were said to involve knives or guns. “I guess you’d need a gun to get by at Crawford now,” some of my old high-school chums would say, half jokingly, whenever the subject of Crawford came up. It sounded a bit different from the prim, strict high school I remembered, run like a cross between boot camp and a coed summer camp, where the most defiant act imaginable was to smoke (tobacco) in the bathrooms.

So I decided to go back and find out if all they can’t wear today “is a bathing suit or something,” joked Kelvin Ross, currently a senior at Crawford and a standout linebacker on its football team. Handsome and almost lanky, Ross carries 220 pounds on his huge frame and on the football field is the embodiment of the old saw, “For a man of his size, he has amazing quickness.” He was one of several students I talked to at length during a recent visit to the campus, and I found his mental quickness above average, too. But when I tried to explain to him how administrators used to measure girls’ skirts to see if they were inappropriately short, Ross simply shook his head incredulously and said, “Oh, wow.” (“We resisted liberalizing the dress code, but once you get away from the emotion of the issue, you have to analyze whether something like dress really has any impact on a student’s academic performance,” one district official told me not long ago. Apparently no relation between the two was found.)

Another striking change is the relationship between teachers and students. I saw a lot of students stop to banter with teachers in the halls between classes. At lunchtime the students are free to wander off the campus — and no one quizzes them when they return to see if they’ve been playing pool, guzzling beer, or smoking pot.

Near the lunch quad is a spacious drop-in counseling center and students are in it all hours of the day, talking with counselors or researching some career opportunity on their own. In the classrooms, many of the teachers wear casual shirts and jeans; they are no longer simply distant authority figures, and most of them seem to be having a genuinely good time with their students. “They treat you not as a student, but as a student and a friend,” explained Ross. “Plus, they seem to really care about what happens to you.”

It is a relationship we did not even hope for in 1969. We were a half dozen studious but restless individuals; we shared a grotesque sense of humor and a profound disdain for the educators who ran our school. In our view, they were unimaginative and hypocritical, and they gave us no measure of respect. They insulted us by saying we should attend proms and join the student government; what could have been more “irrelevant” (irrelevant was a key word that soon became a cliche) to the social and political turmoil engulfing the country? We thought the role of school should be to prepare us for life in the real world — and it was a world where people were getting drafted and sent to Vietnam to die for no clear reason at all. It was a world where college students were protesting the government’s policies in increasingly harsh terms; within eighteen months some of those students would be tear-gassed, beaten, and even shot while they were protesting. Blacks had rioted in the ghettos of Detroit and Los Angeles after 200 years of unequal opportunity. Elected officials were plotting coups and undermining foreign governments while publicly maintaining they were doing nothing at all — lying through their teeth, some of them. And in the midst of all this we were told that what was truly important was to keep our hair short and wear red, white, and blue to school each week on Spirit Day.

Our convictions were uncluttered by any real understanding of human nature. And they were definitely not shared by the vast majority of students at Crawford, who were caught up in the usual high-school concerns of dates, cars, and money. Those students accepted the role conceived for them by administrators, but we rebelled. We listened to the Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane instead of our teachers. We started a group called the Student Action Corps, modeled on the radical college group Students for a Democratic Society, and circulated a petition with a list of demands that would give us a lot more influence in school matters. Along with such things as an open campus, no dress code, and better food in the cafeteria, we slipped in a few bombshells: true decision-making power for the students, politically significant movies in the auditorium. Two thousand students signed the petition in three days, although surely most of them were more concerned about the food than the movies. Teachers and administrators instantly grew apprehensive. “They want to take over the school!” one friend of mine heard a teacher say.

But abruptly, we gave up the whole fight. We were cynical enough to believe that the school “Establishment” would never give in to us, and a true revolution was doomed (even if we had advocated the use of weapons, we didn’t have any). The demands in the petition crumbled. I had written many of them myself, and I’ve always regretted giving up the fight for them so quickly, because we had the right people on the defensive, and for all the right reasons.

Most of the changes we asked for became realities within a few years after we graduated. We happened to be the beginning of a huge wave of student unrest and rebellion that swept through the area’s high schools in the early 1970s. But changes take time, and tensions at Crawford continued throughout the Vietnam War, according to Marion McAnear. McAnear was a German teacher at Crawford when I was there; I was a student of his for three successive years. He is still at Crawford, still teaches German, and has become the school’s soccer coach, too. A burly man whose hair is now going gray, he was and is an excellent teacher and a thoughtful man. “When I first came here in the Sixties we were a lot more straight-laced than we are today,” McAnear told me when I looked him up on the Crawford campus. “Teachers wore ties and jackets; classrooms were a lot more formal. There was a gap between the students and the teachers, and that was the way it was supposed to be.

“But during the Vietnam War, the whole atmosphere here was one of tension. There were so many kids . . . and they were rebelling. Cherry bombs were being blown up in trash cans almost every day at lunch. The battle lines were drawn,” McAnear said.

“When I was going through high school, it was sort of us versus the teachers,” agreed Chris Miller. At thirty-three. Miller is one year older than I am, and he encountered many of the same rules and frustrations at his high school in Phoenix, Arizona. He currently teaches U.S. history at Crawford and is the head football coach, and his rapid-fire style of talking is full of a coach’s enthusiasm. “We had a strict dress code, and our student government was a body that had no power at all,” Miller continued. “The teachers were sort of detached. They didn't try to get to know students.

“Today, we’re still authoritarian figures, but we listen to the student government. We treat the students with respect.” Or, as another teacher at Crawford, Don Mayfield, puts it, “The students don’t see the administration as the ‘Establishment’ anymore. They see the individuals.” It isn't utopia, but from what I saw, the relationship between students and teachers beats the hell out of the one that existed fourteen years ago, and that’s a fundamental change.

But it is a curious kind of change. It has been accompanied at Crawford by a resurgence of the old bromide, “school spirit.” In the last few years, such things as taking fierce pride in the school’s football team, currently ranked sixth in the county, have become increasingly popular. As I talked with Miller he told me I should wear red, white, and blue to school the following day, Spirit Day — a lot of the students and teachers would be wearing those colors, he said. The Crawford team would be playing arch-rival Lincoln High School that Friday afternoon in a game that could decide the Central League championship, and Miller and a lot of other teachers and administrators at Crawford encouraged me to go. “The football games are a big part of the overall scene here,” explained Bill Fox, Crawford’s current principal.

I wound up driving out to the game at Lincoln the next day with Fox, a boyish-looking man of forty-five. He has been principal at the school since 1981, and he told me that the re-involvement with school activities such as dances and football games comes after a long period when such activities received little student support at all. “I think you’ll find that [in that sense] students today are more like the majority of students were when you were in high school,” Fox commented. The resurgence of interest is due in part to the encouragement of top school district officials, who are hoping that an increase in “school spirit” will lead to a decrease in vandalism, drug use, and other problems that have plagued high schools throughout the county in recent years. Fox himself vigorously supports the idea, partly, he told me, because he thinks it is important for students to be exposed to various high-school social activities. He also believes successful events raise funds that can be used to lower the cost of student activities, enabling less wealthy students to attend.

Increasingly, the students seem to be buying the idea. Margie McDonald, Crawford’s current Associated Student Body president, told me that the number of people who attend A.S.B. activities has increased noticeably in the last three years. Many more students are doing things such as wearing school colors on Spirit Day and showing more enthusiasm at pep rallies, she said. (Mayfield told me that a few years ago it wasn’t uncommon for some of his brighter students to show their disdain for “school spirit” by coming to class on Spirit Day dressed in black.) “It sounds trivial, but attendance at the football games is up, too,” said McDonald, an attractive young woman who has the precocious, oddly disconcerting poise that high school A.S.B. officers traditionally seem to possess. She admitted with a laugh that the renewed support of student activities may be due to the fact that “we have a good football team. But I think [such support) is important, I definitely do, because getting into supporting the school creates positive feelings, positive activities. If you’re hating school, not getting involved in anything, it creates negative activities — like hanging out more, maybe getting into drugs.”

Fox and I parked in Lincoln’s parking lot and walked down to the athletic field, where the two football teams were warming up. The Crawford players looked awfully big in their white helmets, white jerseys, and blue pants, and the faces had changed from exclusively white when I was a senior to a more balanced mixture of black and white. (Crawford now has a black student population of 17.5 percent, nearly double the 9.9 percent average for city junior high and high schools, and far more than the 2.9 percent it had in 1969. White students currently constitute just under half the total student population, and the balance is made up principally of blacks, Asians, and Hispanics.) The Colts were favored to win the game, but Lincoln, a high school located on South Forty-ninth Street in Southeast San Diego, has a long history of upsetting favored Crawford teams. I got the feeling that as far as the Lincoln players were concerned, the Colts were just upstarts from uptown. After the opening kickoff Crawford’s team moved methodically down the Field to score. Then a Lincoln player ran back the ensuing kickoff for a touchdown, and from then on it was a dogfight.

It was a hot day, but the stands on the eastern side of the field were jammed with Crawford supporters: teachers and parents as well as students. The students were wearing “Classy Colts’’ sweatshirts, “Go Colts’’ ribbons, and buttons that said, “Face it, Colts are Great,” exactly as their predecessors did fourteen years ago. The cheerleaders all had great legs, and they still had names like Andi and Buffy and Melinda. But you could occasionally smell marijuana smoke in the stands, and the cheers were a lot more soulful than the plaintive “Hey, hey, whad-dya say” stuff I remembered. They included things like “Boogie ’cross that line” and “Crawford don’t take no jive,” and more than once the crowd exhorted the team to “get down.” There was, in fact, a lot more cheering than game watching. The score at half time was 13-7 Lincoln, but in the second half, as the smog drifted in and the sun turned brown, the Crawford players finally put together another long drive. On a critical third-down play a tall Crawford receiver went up for a pass and managed to catch it despite the Lincoln player who tackled him instantly (he juggled the ball momentarily, but crashed to the ground clutching it firmly to his chest), and a few minutes later a muscular young player made a nice over-the-shoulder catch to give Crawford a 14-13 lead. The crowd screamed even louder, if that was technically possible, and I remembered that when I was in high school, I thought all this “school spirit” business was kind of dumb. I’m not certain I’ve changed my mind. If successful school activities somehow enable economically disadvantaged students to attend proms they might not otherwise be able to afford, I guess that’s great. What I object to is the small view that things like “school spirit” can engender. Shouldn’t we teach high-school students that compassion for your rivals is of far greater consequence than glee at having rubbed their noses in the dirt? And more than that, should we really be encouraging students to think that things like homecoming and pep rallies are important? It seems to me our time and money would be far better spent encouraging students to explore ways of bringing about nuclear disarmament, or easing world hunger, or putting an end to acid rain. Attitudes are important, and they’re certainly forming at the high-school level; why bother with “school spirit” when you can bring about changes that might save the human race from complete annihilation?

I suppose it’s part of our neurotic modem consciousness to be required by circumstances to face such questions, and to be simply unable to do it most of the time. I know I can’t. Hell, when Crawford scored that go-ahead touchdown, I felt a shiver of emotion, and I realized something: I wanted the Colts to win. It looked as if they were going to, too, right down to the point where only two minutes were left in the game. Then the Colts’ quarterback threw a low, flat pass that was intercepted by a Lincoln defender. Two plays later Lincoln’s quarterback scampered around left end, made a couple of neat zigzags, and was tackled at the two-yard line. The Crawford fans grew morose, and with thirteen seconds left, Lincoln scored to put the game away, 19-14. I felt kind of let down as I made my way out of the stands, but I noticed the girl next to me was crying. Down on the field some of the Crawford players were, too.

The changes in the ethnic makeup of Crawford’s students would be immediately obvious to anyone who attended the school in my era. We were a school that consisted of ninety percent white kids, nearly all of us middle class, and racial concerns and tensions were things that happened elsewhere. Today Crawford has achieved what school district planners like to refer to as racial parity; the remarkable thing is that the school has gone through this transition without having to resort to busing. Only about fifty students are bused to Crawford from other parts of the city, and they come to take advantage of special courses the school offers as a regional “magnet” school for business and accounting. “It’s very unusual to be balanced ethnically without a lot of busing,” noted principal Bill Fox. “Most schools are out of balance one way or the other” — that is, top-heavy with either minorities or whites. The reason Crawford is not seems to be coincidental; the school’s district, located smack dab between Southeast San Diego and the burgeoning suburbs north and east of San Diego State University, is a sort of melting pot of various ethnic groups. Housing in the district varies from run-down apartments to sprawling tract homes, and this is probably what has brought about the racial mix.

As Fox pointed out, one advantage of the district’s racial balance is that students of various ethnic groups tend to encounter each other as they are growing up, mingling in activities such as Little League. Their parents tend to see each other year after year at PTA meetings. By the time most of the students reach high school they are accustomed to mixing with people from other ethnic groups who are, after all, simply people from the same community. One teacher at Crawford, who formerly taught at Lincoln High School, told me that if I were to go to Lincoln I’d “probably find a lot of bused-in white kids sitting around in groups and hoping the black kids won’t beat up on them.’’ At Crawford most of the blacks and whites seem to get along fine. I saw them sitting together on the quad at lunch and joking together in classrooms when teachers were temporarily absent. Nevertheless, there is racial uneasiness at Crawford. “No, it’s not a cloud hanging over the campus, but yes, there are racial tensions,’’ as football coach Chris Miller sums it up. Nearly all of those tensions involve a new ethnic group in the area — the Indochinese.

The Indochinese, or Asians, as they are called in the school district’s official lingo, arrived in large numbers almost overnight at Crawford in the fall of 1981. Culturally and socially it was a shock wave the school is still struggling to absorb. The new students were Indochinese refugees, many of them “boat people’’ recently departed from refugee camps in Southeast Asia and resettled in the sea of stucco apartments and aging houses along University and Orange Avenues between La Mesa and North Park. “Within a matter of three months our population of Asian students skyrocketed from less than five percent to fifteen or eighteen percent,’’ said Fox (it is now about twenty percent, some 300 students in all). “It kind of rocked us.’’ With the influx of Indochinese refugees, Crawford became eligible for additional funds from the school district and the state, and administrators were given a week to prepare special classes and hire teachers and aides who can speak the native languages of the incoming students.

Many of the new students did not speak English, of course; some were illiterate even in their own language. It was not uncommon for sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds from Cambodia or Laos to show up for their first day of school at Crawford having never before attended a school of any kind. In the ensuing confusion, some of the new students were simply issued biology and history textbooks and told to start studying.

Things have become quite a bit more organized since then. The Asian students are now interviewed when they first enroll at Crawford to determine their educational level and knowledge of English. Some have performed extremely well academically from the start, and the list of students on the principal's honor roll now includes names like Pheuak Phanthao, Son Do, and Dao Hong Thi Tran. Most of the Asian students, however, are assigned to special classes designed to teach subjects such as biology, math, and U.S. history to students who are not fluent in English. The classes make use of simplified vocabularies, and material is covered more slowly. At the same time, the Asian students take special English courses to learn the language, moving up into increasingly advanced levels until they are fluent enough to transfer into the regular curriculum. But by that time, most of the Asians are already on the verge of graduating. There does not appear to be any immediate alternative to this method of educating the Asian students, but it is clear that most of them are graduating from high school far less proficient in almost every subject than their American classmates. The special classes (which many of the Asian students attend four out of six class periods a day) also tend to isolate the Asians from the rest of the student population — that is, even more than they already are.

Before school, the Asian students tend to hang out in clusters, often near the back of the cafeteria. During lunch hour they seem to disappear; there are small numbers of them on the quad, but almost none anywhere else on campus. There are no Asian students on the varsity football team (there is one, a halfback, on the junior varsity), and they are conspicuously absent from pep rallies and dances. Many Crawford students resent the Asian’s habit of hanging out in groups, but Ken Watson, a senior who works as an aide in one of the many English classes for Asians, explains that “they’ve just come over from Asia, so they want to stick together. There’s power in numbers. They can be intimidating if you let them, if you think of them as a dominant group. But I can see they might think of us that way.”

Watson said it is simply the language barrier that prevents many of the Asian students from mingling with others and taking part in school activities, a view shared by Katy Chang. Chang, a Laotian with coal-dark eyes and an eager, pretty smile, is currently a senior at Crawford. She has been in the United States for more than five years and speaks fluent English. “I try to go to things like, let’s see, homecoming?” Chang told me. “I should know about it. 1 like to have American friends so I can learn what they do and what they have. I’m going to graduate from high school and I don't know much about it.

“But it’s a problem. I think it might be an English problem. You have to study really hard [so you don’t have as much free time in the first place). And Asian custom is so different from American custom. [Americans’] personality is so different. They put on make-up, smoke ... I don't do those things, or go out with a boyfriend.” Nearly everyone agrees the friction between the Asians and other students reached its peak last year, and most of the incidents that took place involved black students and Asian students. Several teachers told me that the outgoing, high-energy personalities of many black students contrast mightily with the reserved, cautious personalities of most Asian students. But the differences go deeper than that; some of the black students also seem to resent the attention and money being spent on the Asians — an understandable if not exactly admirable reaction, considering the years of discrimination blacks have suffered. “From my viewpoint, [the Asians] are getting special classes and special teachers, and they’re taking away a lot of good teachers that could be teaching us,” one female black student pointed out recently. “Why don’t we have something like that? We need help, too. I’m not prejudiced or anything. But there is a lot of money involved ...” Whatever the differences between the two groups, fights between them broke out last year. One black student badly beat up an Asian whose locker was next to his, and not long afterward, five Asian students jumped a tall black student in one of the school’s bathrooms. Several other incidents were narrowly avoided. “More than one time I had to break up something because of what people thought was being said,” Fox noted. “Students would hear the Indochinese talking in their own language, and for some reason they’d assume [the Indochinese] were talking about them.”

Most teachers and students at Crawford say the tensions appear to have eased so far this year. But the school security officer, Don Donati, said he has been called to the scene of four near fights between black and Asian students in the last few weeks. One Asian student also told me that “just one week ago I was talking to a girlfriend, and this black guy came up and touched my head. I don’t like people touching my head. I tell him, and he started yelling. Not joking. I can tell he doesn’t like Asians or something.

“Some dark people are my friends. But many dark people, I don’t like their personality. They tease you, even though you didn’t say anything. They call you Nips. I try to get along with everybody, but sometimes I get depressed, and really mad.”

Some of the black and Asian students claim allegiance to bona fide street gangs, the blacks to the Crips and Playboy International, and the Asians to the Stray Cats. But Crawford is not considered a problem school in terms of gang activity by either the school district or the San Diego Police Department’s street-gang detail, and there has not been an incident involving known gangs reported from the school for more than six years.

Fox and other administrators insist the racial tensions at the school have not been that serious, and that they will fade in the coming years as the Indochinese refugees become more integrated into the cultural life of San Diego. Some teachers predict that the need for special classes will disappear in two or three years, too, partly because the Asian students come from a “success-oriented” culture and work hard to achieve what is expected of them. “It will take time,’’ said McAnear, the German teacher and soccer coach, “but I really believe that the Indochinese are going to put a shot in the arm of America. They’re polite, disciplined, relatively easy to teach . . .’’ He paused, and grinned. “And besides, some of them are damn good soccer players.”

One April night five years ago, an adult-school teacher was showing slides to a Spanish class on the Crawford campus when two sixteen-year-old boys sped up on a motorbike. One of the youths entered the classroom with a gun and got everyone’s attention by firing a shot into the blackboard in the front of the room. After that he robbed the students (mostly middle-age men and women) as well as the teacher, netting a grand total of about seventy dollars. He and his partner then fled on the motorbike, but were arrested two days later when an anonymous informant phoned police. Although McAnear was not present during the robbery, it took place in his classroom, and he told me with a shake of his head that his blackboard still bears a bullet hole from the incident.

The attempted robbery was a dramatic example of the trend toward violent behavior that occurred on many of the city’s junior high and high school campuses in the last decade. In that time, incidents of students threatening and assaulting teachers rose citywide, as did acts of vandalism such as breaking windows and looting lockers. Students sometimes walked out of classrooms en masse, and in at least one instance, a police car was burned at Lincoln High School. “For ten years violence was a big factor here,” McAnear said. At many schools, it still is. Although incidents such as burglaries and threats of injury declined throughout the district from the 1981-82 school year to the 1982-83 school year, incidents of battery and assault with a deadly weapon jumped sixteen and fifty percent, respectively, during that same time period. A spokesman for the board of education’s police services department also noted that throughout the district, violent incidents in October of this year have increased fourfold over the same month last year.

The police services department does not keep crime statistics for individual schools, but McAnear and other teachers and administrators insist that violence is currently decreasing on the Crawford campus. Still, the legacies of the past are everywhere. Crawford, like many high schools in San Diego, now has a security officer whose main function is to help prevent criminal acts from taking place on or near the campus. Most high school football games are played in the afternoons rather than at night, due to the number of fights that were breaking out after night games a few years ago. And a new law enacted by the state legislature last April has made a five-day suspension mandatory for any student caught fighting or possessing weapons or controlled substances on school grounds.

Fox thinks the increased violence stemmed from student frustrations with the slowness that characterized the response of school officials to the cultural changes of the ’70s. McAnear agrees; the violence was often a way of challenging authority, he points out, and challenging authority was a widespread phenomenon in all facets of society at the time. The school district finally adjusted to new concepts of behavior, appearance, and “relevant" curriculum, but McAnear isn't so sure those adjustments were always the right ones. “Discipline went out the window. We loosened up on too many things — homework requirements, for instance. Standards fell, and teachers got frustrated because a lot of kids wouldn’t do their homework. Eventually you were supposed to leave time to do the homework in class, but you can't do that, especially with thirty-five students” and the special attention that many of them require, McAnear complained. Attendance also became a problem as the school district placed less emphasis on being in class regularly. Fox explained that by attending summer school, some students at Crawford would complete twenty-four of the forty class credits needed to graduate by the end of their sophomore year. That meant they would have to attend an average of only four classes a semester (rather than the standard six) for the next four semesters, and many of these students would spend the two free periods a day wandering around the school or the nearby community. Simultaneously, the scores seniors were getting on standard tests such as the Scholastic Aptitude Test declined steadily. The average SAT score on combined verbal and math tests for a senior at Crawford in 1969 was 1015. In 1982 it was 871.

Today, echoing the swing back to more student involvement in school activities, there is increasing emphasis on the value of homework and attendance. Beginning this year, high-school students in San Diego are required to do two hours’ worth of homework each night, and attending six class periods a day is mandatory. At Crawford, teachers no longer greet students who are tardy to class with a shrug of the shoulders; they stand in the hallways between classes, exhorting the students to be on time and occasionally yelling at them when they are not. New districtwide guidelines for achieving minimum proficiency in English and math are being introduced, and next year, if seniors cannot demonstrate that they have attained these levels, they will not be allowed to graduate. Some of the students I talked to at Crawford are already grumbling about the homework and attendance requirements. “I’m a little offended by it,” A.S.B. president McDonald said. “It seems like they’re talking down to us.’’

But nothing ever comes full circle. Students have to attend six classes a day just as we did in 1969, but now they’re studying subjects such as computer programming and race relations. They still go to physical education classes, but now the girls’ and boys’ gyms are known as the male and female gyms. There has not been a single student cited for smoking marijuana on the Crawford campus so far this year, but drug use is still much more widespread than it was fourteen years ago. “It’s not the way it used to be,’’ McDonald told me emphatically. “There’s not a party without drinking. There are very few students who haven’t tried drinking or smoking pot]. There’s even a trend toward cocaine these days.’’

But administrators and teachers at Crawford insist that even though students are exposed to more information and experiences at a younger age, most of them still tend to make responsible decisions. They say students have, in effect, responded favorably to the increased independence they have gained since 1969. “The brighter kids don’t seem to get involved with drugs that much,” said Don Mayfield. “But they are, certainly, exposed to a lot more things [than high-school students used to be). They know a lot more. They know about homosexual bars, and the prostitutes along El Cajon Boulevard. But the kids are more open . . . and seem to be stronger.” Even Mayfield, however, conceded that high-school students “still have a lot of difficulty sorting it all out.”

“We’re taking a lot of steps [these days], but many of them are immature steps, like getting stoned or beating up other students,” senior Ken Watson agreed. “People are doing things like that just because they feel they can do them and no one will stop them. That’s kind of immature.

“Compared to Wally and Beaver, yeah, I guess I’m growing up pretty fast. I think it has gotten a little out of hand. Parents let their kids go out and get drunk. Some parents are even growing marijuana in their back yards. Maybe if they’d set some rules and regulations instead, [the current situation] wouldn’t have happened. But I don’t think we’ll ever return to the days when you come home from school and have cookies and milk. It’d be great if everyone could be like the Cleavers, but remember, this is the Eighties.”

And so it is. In the late 1960s Crawford administrators struggled to keep the controversy of the Vietnam War out of high school; today they struggle with the influx of Vietnamese students. We experimented almost daintily with drugs; today’s students seem either to worship them or consider them passe. We had to go to therapy groups to learn how to be “up front” and “get in touch with our feelings” (we even had to invent the terminology); students today are open and honest almost as a matter of course. They don’t talk about sex much — at least, not to reporters — but they do say it is a big part of the high school scene, another indication that things have loosened up considerably.

I did, however, discover one constant. During my recent visit to Crawford I made it a point to buy lunch at the outdoor window. We called it the cold lunch line back in 1969, and it was a place where you could exchange a few quarters for dry, stale sandwiches, grainy malts, and chocolate “cake squares” loaded with sugar and oil. On this visit I was surprised to discover for sale such “healthy” items as yogurt and pita-bread sandwiches. But my mission was comparison; I wasn’t interested in the contemporary stuff. I bought a piece of chocolate cake and a tuna sandwich. The cake was larger and fresher than the old “cake squares” we used to gobble up, and lighter in texture, too. But the tuna sandwich could have been left over from the last time I ate at Crawford: tuna-flavored paste compressed between two slices of doughy, alleged wheat bread, and decorated with a piece of aging lettuce. Some things never change. *Reposted article from the SD Reader by Gordon Smith of November 10, 1983

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authoratmidnight · 8 years ago

Text

Arc V Episode 140 Translated Script

Script and Translation from DMC3444 on NAC

Executive Meddling

Last Time’s Egao Count: 252

Leo: Our only hope to stop Zarc is lost… Reiji: There is still hope! Yuya’s soul is still inside Zarc! Otherwise, his friends wouldn’t have fought this hard. Crow: Yuya is definitely inside Zarc! SAWATARI-SAN: Reiji! Pull Yuya out of that monster! Reiji: Zarc is using Pendulum right now. That’s the proof that Yuya’s soul still exists! Narrator: The world is divided into four dimensions. Across these dimensions, there are four boys, who all share the same face, And the dragons they possess call out to one another, As if seeking out each other… (Opening Sequence) Reiji: The one who created Pendulum Summon was you, Yuya! Zarc: Oh? Pendulum? Reiji: I was always the top runner ever since I aspired to become a Duelist. Until the day you successfully Pendulum Summoned… It’s my turn! Reiji: After that, I spent my time researching and analyzing you… Until I was able to create those Pendulum cards! Using the Scale-2 D/D Savant Schrödinger and the Scale-8 D/D Savant Dirac, I set the Pendulum Scales! With this, I can simultaneously summon monsters between Level-3 and 7! Reiji: Pendulum Summon! Reveal yourselves, my monsters! The Tuner Monster, D/D Night Howling! Two copies of D/D Savant Nikola! And D/D Vice Typhon! Reiji: Everyone who is here has been profoundly influenced by you one way or another. You can move the hearts of many people! I’m sure you can overcome Zarc’s wicked heart as well! JACK: He’s right, Yuya. You moved the hearts of the people of the City! Reiji: Watch closely, Yuya! This is my Dueling! I overlay the two Level-6 D/D Savant Nikolas together! Xyz Summon! Be born! D/D/D Wave High King Executive Caesar Reiji: Next, I tune the Level-7 D/D Vice Typhon with the Level-3 D/D Night Howling! Synchro Summon! Be born! D/D/D Gust High King Executive Alexander! Reiji: Then, I activate the effect of Vice Typhon from the Graveyard! I banish this card and Night Howling from the Graveyard, And Fusion Summon! Be born! D/D/D Flame High King Executive Temujin! Ayu: Akaba Reiji is… Tatsuya: …trying to reach out to Big Bro Yuya. Futoshi: Hurry up and come back already, Big Bro Yuya! Reira: All right. Let’s go together, Ray! Reira: I can serve as your host. I’ll become a vessel for you! Zarc: From Pendulum to Xyz, Synchro, and Fusion, huh? You certainly are different from the other vermin. Reiji: If my voice is not reaching you, then… I’ll reach you with my Dueling! Executive Alexander’s effect activates! When there are two or more D/D monsters, Its ATK will be doubled! Kids: 6000 ATK! Futoshi: Then, even that monster will be defeated… Tokumatsu: It won’t work. No matter what you do, you can’t destroy Supreme Dragon King Zarc! Frank: Besides, even if you destroy other monsters, because of the Pendulum Effects... Amanda: Zarc can gain Life Point equal to the damage he would have taken! Tanner: Everyone had a tough time dealing with that! Reiji: I activate Executive Temujin’s effect! Until my Standby Phase, for every D/D monster besides this card, I can negate the effects of a Magic or Trap Card on my opponent’s Field! Reiji: I’ll negate the cards set in your Pendulum Zones. Supreme King Gate Zero and Supreme King Gate Infinity! Tokumatsu: Oh! Nicely done! Amanda: Now he can’t convert damage into Life! Tanner: Meaning he can be attacked! Even if Zarc can’t be destroyed, Reiji can attack Evil Odd-Eyes! Frank: He can only use its effect to negate destruction once per turn! Zarc: I’ll activate Supreme King Servant Dragon – Odd-Eyes’s effect! I return this card to the Extra Deck, and Special Summon two Supreme King Servant Dragon Darkwurms! Kids: Oh, no! Reiji: I detach one of Executive Caesar’s Overlay Units, and activate its effect! It negates Special Summoning effects, And it’ll gain the ATK of a monster whose Special Summon was negated until the End Phase! Reiji: I detach another Overlay Unit! Executive Temujin will gain the same amount of ATK that Caesar gained until the End Phase! Frank: Amazing! Just when you thought that Odd-Eyes was going to escape… Amanda: He sent the monsters that were supposed to replace it to the Graveyard… Tanner: …and boosted the ATK of his own monster! Two of them, to boot! Reiji: Battle! I attack Supreme Dragon King Zarc with Executive Temujin! Edo: All right! Sora: He damaged him! Tokumatsu: Even if he’s indestructible, he’ll still take damage! Crow: He can win this. SAWATARI-SAN: Get him, Reiji! GONGENZAKA: Open up Yuya’s heart with your fists! Reiji: I attack Supreme Dragon King Zarc with Executive Caesar! Captain Falcon: All right! Kaito: His strategy is working! Shuzo: That’s the spirit! Keep it up! Kids: Go for it, Reiji! We’re counting on you, Reiji! Allen: Take our feelings… Sayaka: …and deliver them to Yuya! Reiji: I attack Supreme Dragon King Zarc with Executive Alexander! Wake up, Yuya! Zarc: AAAAHHHH! Reiji: I end my turn. At this moment, Executive Caesar’s effect ends, and Caesar and Temujin’s ATKs return to normal. Zarc: HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! Reiji: Hmm? Zarc: Akaba Reiji. You were wrong about one thing! You thought that the one who created Pendulum Summon was my fragment, Sakaki Yuya, But you were wrong! Reiji: Wrong? Zarc: I’m the one who created Pendulum Summon! I, Supreme Dragon King Zarc, am the true creator of Pendulum Summon! Reiji: What!? Tatsuya: Zarc is the creator of Pendulum!? Shuzo: Yuya was the one who created Pendulum Summon! Yuya: No! NO! Zarc: I create Pendulum Summon to aid my quest for vengeance! Yuya/Zarc: That moment… Zarc: …was when my soul awakened! Yuya/Zarc: I swore that the next time I fight her… Zarc: I will definitely win! Reiji: The next time you fight her!? Could it be…!? Leo: RAY!? Reira: Tell me, Ray! How did you fight Zarc using the four cards your father created? Leo: The four cards I created were… En Moon, which contains the boundless energy of the cosmos. En Winds, which contains the energy of the sweeping winds. En Birds, which contains the vibrant energy of life. And En Flowers, which contains the energy of Mother Earth itself. By using those four Magic Cards, Ray was able to split up Zarc. However… Zarc: That’s right! That was when Pendulum was born! When I, an absolute and supreme being, was divided, The great power swaying back and forth inside me was also unleashed! Reira: I have to hurry. Brother is… Tsukikage: Reira-dono. Reira: EH? Tsukikage!? Zarc: I was revived with the new power of Pendulum Summoning in my hands! You damaged me, so I shall now deal out your punishment! Trap, activate! Wrath of the Supreme King! Zarc: On the End Phase of the turn I receive 2000 or more damage, I can Special Summon my servants from the Graveyard and Extra Deck! Come forth! Supreme King Servant Dragon – Odd-Eyes! Supreme King Servant Dragon – Clear Wing! Supreme King Servant Dragon – Dark Rebellion! Supreme King Servant Dragon – Starve Venom! Zarc: It’s my turn! (ZETSUBOU commercial. Brb) Zarc: Battle! I attack Executive Alexander with Supreme King Servant Dragon – Clear Wing! Futoshi: He’s attacking a 6000ATK monster with a 2500ATK one? Zarc: Clear Wing’s effect activates! It negates the battle, and destroys the opposing monster! The opposing player will receive damage equal to the destroy monster’s ATK! Reiji: D/D Savant Dirac’s Pendulum Effect! I Special Summon this card in Defense Position, And reduce any effect damage to zero! GONGENZAKA: As expected from Reiji! Zarc: Then, I attack Executive Caesar with Supreme King Servant Dragon – Dark Rebellion! Ayu: Is he going to destroy it through an effect!? Zarc: I detach one of Dark Rebellion’s Overlay Units! Until the End Phase, the ATK of the battling monster will be reduced to zero, And it gains ATK equal to the lost amount! Tatsuya: No way! Zarc: Go! Dark Rebellion! Reiji: D/D Savant Schrödinger’s Pendulum Effect! I Special Summon this card in Defense Position, And reduce any battlet damage to zero! Zarc: You insolent fool! Zarc: Supreme King Servant Dragon – Starve Venom’s effect activates! Until the End Phase, it will gain the effect of the Executive Alexander in the Graveyard! Reiji: What!? When there are two or more D/D monsters on the Field, Executive Alexander’s ATK will be doubled. Frank: 5600 ATK!? Himika: Reiji-san! Zarc: Go! Starve Venom! Bury Executive Temujin! Reiji: D/D Savant Schrödinger’s effect activates! Once during each turn, it can negate the battle damage! Leo: He has two Defense Position monsters left. Even if they are attacked, he won’t take damage. Zarc: Fool! I attack D/D Savant Dirac with Supreme King Servant Dragon – Odd-Eyes! Zarc: At this moment, Starve Venom’s effect activates! My monsters can now inflict piercing damage! Due to Odd-Eyes’s effect, the damage will be doubled! Himika: Reiji-san! Leo: Reiji! Ayu: That can’t be him… Big Bro Yuya would not do something like this, right!? Futoshi: Obviously! That monster is not Yuya! Captain Falcon: Does this mean that the world… GONGENZAKA: …will be destroyed? Zarc: I’ll personally deliver the final blow! I attack D/D Savant Schrödinger! Reira: Brother! Duel Disk: Intrusion Penalty, 2000 points. SAWATARI-SAN: Tsukikage! Crow: He’s revived as well! Tatsuya: That’s…! Reira-kun! Reiji: Reira! What are you doing!? Himika: Reira! Reira: I’m… I am… I am not Reira! I am Ray! Reiji: Ray? Leo: What!? Zarc: Ray! Reira/Ray: If you revive, I will revive as well! If you’re going to destroy the world, I will stop you! It’s my turn! I activate the Magic Card, Transmigrating Life Force! I send my entire hand into the Graveyard, And recover En Flowers, En Birds, En Winds, and En Moon from the Graveyard. I can then set them! Leo: The activation conditions have been met! Then… Zarc: You insolent girl! Reira/Ray: I activate the Continuous Magic, En Flowers! Kids: Wow! Futoshi: I’m getting shivers~~! Reira: When there are three or more Xyz Monsters in the Graveyard, and En Flowers is activated, I can activate the Continuous Magic, En Birds! Xyz Monsters that are on the Field, in the Graveyard or the Banish Zone, will be treated as Normal Monsters! Their Monster Effects are also negated! Kaito: The Xyz Monsters… Captain Falcon: Are now Normal Monsters! Reira: When there are three or more Synchro Monsters in the Graveyard, and En Birds is activated, I can activate the Continuous Magic, En Winds! All Synchro Monsters will become Normal Monsters, And their effects are negated! Crow: The Supreme Dragon King that gave us such a hard time… JACK: …Is now powerless! Reira: When there are three or more Fusion Monsters in the Graveyard, and En Birds and En Winds are activated, I can activate the Continuous Magic, En Moon! All Fusion Monsters will become Normal Monsters, And their effects are negated! Edo: Due to this, the Supreme Dragon King’s status of being Fusion, Synchro, and Xyz, has been removed! Zarc: Damn you! Reira/Ray: You’re finished! Due to En Flowers’s effect, the effects of all monsters on the Field will be negated, and they will be destroyed! And the controller will receive 600 damage for every card sent to the Graveyard! Reiji: At this rate… GONGENZAKA: Beautiful… Zarc: DAMN YOU! Reira: Yuya! Zarc: I’m not Yuya! Reiji: No, you’re Yuya! And also Zarc as well. Reiji: Your heart is always swinging back and forth. LIKE A PENDULUM! Zarc: Pendulum? Reira/Ray: The four cards Father created return all powers back to nature, And purify them! That’s why Pendulum was created! Reira/Ray: A being filled with only evil cannot make the Pendulum swing! Ray: He still exists inside you! The embodiment of your pure desire to pursue smiles! Sakaki Yuya! (Egao Count: 252+1=253) Zarc: NO! It was created by my will…! Yuzu: I believe in you, Yuya! Yuya: Yuzu! Yuzu: You’re not a demon! You’re a person who want to bring smiles and happiness to everyone in the world! (Egao Count: 253+1=254) Zarc: Shut up! I only bring fear! Yuya: Stop! What are you saying!? Zarc: My wish is to let the people who forced me to fight and treated me like a toy have a taste of what true fear is! Yuya: No! That’s not true! Zarc: I don’t need smiles or whatever…! (Egao Count: 254+1=255) Yuzu: You’ve left your home to save me! Yuzu: No matter how many times I got separated from you, you kept chasing after me! Yuzu: I’ve become stronger because of you! Yuzu: I was able to smile! (Egao Count: 255+1=256) Respond to them, Yuya! Respond to your friends’ feelings! And then, we’ll go back to our hometown together! Reiji: All right! It’s the last turn, Yuya! Yusho: If you let fear take hold of you, you won’t be able to do anything. If you want to win, you must be brave… Yuya: …and step forward! Yuya: It’s my turn! I activate the Quick-Play Magic, SMILE UNIVERSE! (Egao Count: 256+1=257) I can Special Summon as many Pendulum Monsters as possible from the Extra Deck, with their Monster Effects negated! GONGENZAKA: Supreme Dragon King has revived! SAWATARI-SAN: Then, he’s not Yuya!? Zarc: Pendulum Monsters are indestructible! No matter how many times they are destroyed, they will revive! Yuya: I won’t allow that! I will put an end to this! Zarc: You little…! You’re just my fragment! Know your place! Yuya: The monsters Special Summoned by this effect became Normal Monsters, and my opponent gains Life equal to their ATKs! Zarc: W-What are you doing!? S-Stop it! Yuya: I’ve made up my mind! I won’t ever become a demon again! Now’s your chance! Do it! Reira! Reira: Using En Flowers’s effect, I can negate the effects of all monsters on the Field, And destroy them! And for every monster sent to the Graveyard, the controller will receive 600 damage! Zarc: DAMN YOU ALL! I’ll definitely retur— Leo: The world is breaking into four again! Reiji: Zarc will be reincarnated in the four dimensions again, and the same things will happen all over again! Reira: I won’t let it happen again! I will seal Zarc away! Zarc: AAAAAHHHHHHHHHH! Reira: AAAAAHHHHHHHHHH! Yuya: Reira? REIRAAAAAAA!

#Arc V #arc v spoilers #Arc V Translated Script #Translated script

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the-sayuri-rin · 8 years ago

Text

In which everyone went, what.the.fuuuuuuuuuuuk?

Crdit to: DMC3444

Last Time’s Egao Count: 252

Leo: Our only hope to stop Zarc is lost…

Reiji: There is still hope! Yuya’s soul is still inside Zarc! Otherwise, his friends wouldn’t have fought this hard.

Crow: Yuya is definitely inside Zarc!

SAWATARI-SAN: Reiji! Pull Yuya out of that monster!

Reiji: Zarc is using Pendulum right now. That’s the proof that Yuya’s soul still exists!

Narrator: The world is divided into four dimensions. Across these dimensions, there are four boys, who all share the same face, And the dragons they possess call out to one another, As if seeking out each other…

(Opening Sequence)

Reiji: The one who created Pendulum Summon was you, Yuya!

Zarc: Oh? Pendulum?

Reiji: I was always the top runner ever since I aspired to become a Duelist. Until the day you successfully Pendulum Summoned… It’s my turn!

Reiji: After that, I spent my time researching and analyzing you… Until I was able to create those Pendulum cards! Using the Scale-2 D/D Savant Schrödinger and the Scale-8 D/D Savant Dirac, I set the Pendulum Scales! With this, I can simultaneously summon monsters between Level-3 and 7!

Reiji: Pendulum Summon! Reveal yourselves, my monsters! The Tuner Monster, D/D Night Howling! Two copies of D/D Savant Nikola! And D/D Vice Typhon!

Reiji: Everyone who is here has been profoundly influenced by you one way or another. You can move the hearts of many people! I’m sure you can overcome Zarc’s wicked heart as well!

JACK: He’s right, Yuya. You moved the hearts of the people of the City!

Reiji: Watch closely, Yuya! This is my Dueling! I overlay the two Level-6 D/D Savant Nikolas together! Xyz Summon! Be born! D/D/D Wave High King Executive Caesar

Reiji: Next, I tune the Level-7 D/D Vice Typhon with the Level-3 D/D Night Howling! Synchro Summon! Be born! D/D/D Gust High King Executive Alexander!

Reiji: Then, I activate the effect of Vice Typhon from the Graveyard! I banish this card and Night Howling from the Graveyard, And Fusion Summon! Be born! D/D/D Flame High King Executive Temujin!

Ayu: Akaba Reiji is…

Tatsuya: …trying to reach out to Big Bro Yuya.

Futoshi: Hurry up and come back already, Big Bro Yuya!

Reira: All right. Let’s go together, Ray!

Reira: I can serve as your host. I’ll become a vessel for you!

Zarc: From Pendulum to Xyz, Synchro, and Fusion, huh? You certainly are different from the other vermin.

Reiji: If my voice is not reaching you, then… I’ll reach you with my Dueling! Executive Alexander’s effect activates! When there are two or more D/D monsters, Its ATK will be doubled!

Kids: 6000 ATK!

Futoshi: Then, even that monster will be defeated…

Tokumatsu: It won’t work. No matter what you do, you can’t destroy Supreme Dragon King Zarc!

Frank: Besides, even if you destroy other monsters, because of the Pendulum Effects…

Amanda: Zarc can gain Life Point equal to the damage he would have taken!

Tanner: Everyone had a tough time dealing with that!

Reiji: I activate Executive Temujin’s effect! Until my Standby Phase, for every D/D monster besides this card, I can negate the effects of a Magic or Trap Card on my opponent’s Field!

Reiji: I’ll negate the cards set in your Pendulum Zones. Supreme King Gate Zero and Supreme King Gate Infinity!

Tokumatsu: Oh! Nicely done!

Amanda: Now he can’t convert damage into Life!

Tanner: Meaning he can be attacked! Even if Zarc can’t be destroyed, Reiji can attack Evil Odd-Eyes!

Frank: He can only use its effect to negate destruction once per turn!

Zarc: I’ll activate Supreme King Servant Dragon – Odd-Eyes’s effect! I return this card to the Extra Deck, and Special Summon two Supreme King Servant Dragon Darkwurms!

Kids: Oh, no!

Reiji: I detach one of Executive Caesar’s Overlay Units, and activate its effect! It negates Special Summoning effects, And it’ll gain the ATK of a monster whose Special Summon was negated until the End Phase!

Reiji: I detach another Overlay Unit! Executive Temujin will gain the same amount of ATK that Caesar gained until the End Phase!

Frank: Amazing! Just when you thought that Odd-Eyes was going to escape…

Amanda: He sent the monsters that were supposed to replace it to the Graveyard…

Tanner: …and boosted the ATK of his own monster! Two of them, to boot!

Reiji: Battle! I attack Supreme Dragon King Zarc with Executive Temujin!

Edo: All right!

Sora: He damaged him!

Tokumatsu: Even if he’s indestructible, he’ll still take damage!

Crow: He can win this.

SAWATARI-SAN: Get him, Reiji!

GONGENZAKA: Open up Yuya’s heart with your fists!

Reiji: I attack Supreme Dragon King Zarc with Executive Caesar!

Captain Falcon: All right!

Kaito: His strategy is working!

Shuzo: That’s the spirit! Keep it up!

Kids: Go for it, Reiji! We’re counting on you, Reiji!

Allen: Take our feelings…

Sayaka: …and deliver them to Yuya!

Reiji: I attack Supreme Dragon King Zarc with Executive Alexander! Wake up, Yuya!

Zarc: AAAAHHHH!

Reiji: I end my turn. At this moment, Executive Caesar’s effect ends, and Caesar and Temujin’s ATKs return to normal.

Zarc: HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Reiji: Hmm?

Zarc: Akaba Reiji. You were wrong about one thing! You thought that the one who created Pendulum Summon was my fragment, Sakaki Yuya, But you were wrong!

Reiji: Wrong?

Zarc: I’m the one who created Pendulum Summon! I, Supreme Dragon King Zarc, am the true creator of Pendulum Summon!

Reiji: What!?

Tatsuya: Zarc is the creator of Pendulum!?

Shuzo: Yuya was the one who created Pendulum Summon!

Yuya: No! NO!

Zarc: I create Pendulum Summon to aid my quest for vengeance!

Yuya/Zarc: That moment…

Zarc: …was when my soul awakened!

Yuya/Zarc: I swore that the next time I fight her…

Zarc: I will definitely win!

Reiji: The next time you fight her!? Could it be…!?

Leo: RAY!?

Reira: Tell me, Ray! How did you fight Zarc using the four cards your father created?

Leo: The four cards I created were… En Moon, which contains the boundless energy of the cosmos. En Winds, which contains the energy of the sweeping winds. En Birds, which contains the vibrant energy of life. And En Flowers, which contains the energy of Mother Earth itself. By using those four Magic Cards, Ray was able to split up Zarc. However…

Zarc: That’s right! That was when Pendulum was born! When I, an absolute and supreme being, was divided, The great power swaying back and forth inside me was also unleashed!

Reira: I have to hurry. Brother is…

Tsukikage: Reira-dono.

Reira: EH? Tsukikage!?

Zarc: I was revived with the new power of Pendulum Summoning in my hands! You damaged me, so I shall now deal out your punishment! Trap, activate! Wrath of the Supreme King!

Zarc: On the End Phase of the turn I receive 2000 or more damage, I can Special Summon my servants from the Graveyard and Extra Deck! Come forth! Supreme King Servant Dragon – Odd-Eyes! Supreme King Servant Dragon – Clear Wing! Supreme King Servant Dragon – Dark Rebellion! Supreme King Servant Dragon – Starve Venom!

Zarc: It’s my turn!

(ZETSUBOU commercial. Brb)

Zarc: Battle! I attack Executive Alexander with Supreme King Servant Dragon – Clear Wing!

Futoshi: He’s attacking a 6000ATK monster with a 2500ATK one?

Zarc: Clear Wing’s effect activates! It negates the battle, and destroys the opposing monster! The opposing player will receive damage equal to the destroy monster’s ATK!

Reiji: D/D Savant Dirac’s Pendulum Effect! I Special Summon this card in Defense Position, And reduce any effect damage to zero!

GONGENZAKA: As expected from Reiji!

Zarc: Then, I attack Executive Caesar with Supreme King Servant Dragon – Dark Rebellion!

Ayu: Is he going to destroy it through an effect!?

Zarc: I detach one of Dark Rebellion’s Overlay Units! Until the End Phase, the ATK of the battling monster will be reduced to zero, And it gains ATK equal to the lost amount!

Tatsuya: No way!

Zarc: Go! Dark Rebellion!

Reiji: D/D Savant Schrödinger’s Pendulum Effect! I Special Summon this card in Defense Position, And reduce any battlet damage to zero!

Zarc: You insolent fool!

Zarc: Supreme King Servant Dragon – Starve Venom’s effect activates! Until the End Phase, it will gain the effect of the Executive Alexander in the Graveyard!

Reiji: What!? When there are two or more D/D monsters on the Field, Executive Alexander’s ATK will be doubled.

Frank: 5600 ATK!?

Himika: Reiji-san!

Zarc: Go! Starve Venom! Bury Executive Temujin!

Reiji: D/D Savant Schrödinger’s effect activates! Once during each turn, it can negate the battle damage!

Leo: He has two Defense Position monsters left. Even if they are attacked, he won’t take damage.

Zarc: Fool! I attack D/D Savant Dirac with Supreme King Servant Dragon – Odd-Eyes!

Zarc: At this moment, Starve Venom’s effect activates! My monsters can now inflict piercing damage! Due to Odd-Eyes’s effect, the damage will be doubled!

Himika: Reiji-san!

Leo: Reiji!

Ayu: That can’t be him… Big Bro Yuya would not do something like this, right!?

Futoshi: Obviously! That monster is not Yuya!

Captain Falcon: Does this mean that the world…

GONGENZAKA: …will be destroyed?

Zarc: I’ll personally deliver the final blow! I attack D/D Savant Schrödinger!

Reira: Brother!

Duel Disk: Intrusion Penalty, 2000 points.

SAWATARI-SAN: Tsukikage!

Crow: He’s revived as well!

Tatsuya: That’s…! Reira-kun!

Reiji: Reira! What are you doing!?

Himika: Reira!

Reira: I’m… I am… I am not Reira! I am Ray!

Reiji: Ray?

Leo: What!?

Zarc: Ray!

Reira/Ray: If you revive, I will revive as well! If you’re going to destroy the world, I will stop you! It’s my turn! I activate the Magic Card, Transmigrating Life Force! I send my entire hand into the Graveyard, And recover En Flowers, En Birds, En Winds, and En Moon from the Graveyard. I can then set them!

Leo: The activation conditions have been met! Then…

Zarc: You insolent girl!

Reira/Ray: I activate the Continuous Magic, En Flowers!

Kids: Wow!

Futoshi: I’m getting shivers~~!

Reira: When there are three or more Xyz Monsters in the Graveyard, and En Flowers is activated, I can activate the Continuous Magic, En Birds! Xyz Monsters that are on the Field, in the Graveyard or the Banish Zone, will be treated as Normal Monsters! Their Monster Effects are also negated!

Kaito: The Xyz Monsters…

Captain Falcon: Are now Normal Monsters!

Reira: When there are three or more Synchro Monsters in the Graveyard, and En Birds is activated, I can activate the Continuous Magic, En Winds! All Synchro Monsters will become Normal Monsters, And their effects are negated!

Crow: The Supreme Dragon King that gave us such a hard time…

JACK: …Is now powerless!

Reira: When there are three or more Fusion Monsters in the Graveyard, and En Birds and En Winds are activated, I can activate the Continuous Magic, En Moon! All Fusion Monsters will become Normal Monsters, And their effects are negated!

Edo: Due to this, the Supreme Dragon King’s status of being Fusion, Synchro, and Xyz, has been removed!

Zarc: Damn you!

Reira/Ray: You’re finished! Due to En Flowers’s effect, the effects of all monsters on the Field will be negated, and they will be destroyed! And the controller will receive 600 damage for every card sent to the Graveyard!

Reiji: At this rate…

GONGENZAKA: Beautiful…

Zarc: DAMN YOU!

Reira: Yuya!

Zarc: I’m not Yuya!

Reiji: No, you’re Yuya! And also Zarc as well.

Reiji: Your heart is always swinging back and forth. LIKE A PENDULUM!

Zarc: Pendulum?

Reira/Ray: The four cards Father created return all powers back to nature, And purify them! That’s why Pendulum was created!

Reira/Ray: A being filled with only evil cannot make the Pendulum swing!

Ray: He still exists inside you! The embodiment of your pure desire to pursue smiles! Sakaki Yuya! (Egao Count: 252+1=253)

Zarc: NO! It was created by my will…!

Yuzu: I believe in you, Yuya!

Yuya: Yuzu!

Yuzu: You’re not a demon! You’re a person who want to bring smiles and happiness to everyone in the world! (Egao Count: 253+1=254)

Zarc: Shut up! I only bring fear!

Yuya: Stop! What are you saying!?

Zarc: My wish is to let the people who forced me to fight and treated me like a toy have a taste of what true fear is!

Yuya: No! That’s not true!

Zarc: I don’t need smiles or whatever…! (Egao Count: 254+1=255)

Yuzu: You’ve left your home to save me!

Yuzu: No matter how many times I got separated from you, you kept chasing after me!

Yuzu: I’ve become stronger because of you!

Yuzu: I was able to smile! (Egao Count: 255+1=256) Respond to them, Yuya! Respond to your friends’ feelings! And then, we’ll go back to our hometown together!

Reiji: All right! It’s the last turn, Yuya!

Yusho: If you let fear take hold of you, you won’t be able to do anything. If you want to win, you must be brave…

Yuya: …and step forward!

Yuya: It’s my turn! I activate the Quick-Play Magic, SMILE UNIVERSE! (Egao Count: 256+1=257) I can Special Summon as many Pendulum Monsters as possible from the Extra Deck, with their Monster Effects negated!

GONGENZAKA: Supreme Dragon King has revived!

SAWATARI-SAN: Then, he’s not Yuya!?

Zarc: Pendulum Monsters are indestructible! No matter how many times they are destroyed, they will revive!

Yuya: I won’t allow that! I will put an end to this!

Zarc: You little…! You’re just my fragment! Know your place!

Yuya: The monsters Special Summoned by this effect became Normal Monsters, and my opponent gains Life equal to their ATKs!

Zarc: W-What are you doing!? S-Stop it!

Yuya: I’ve made up my mind! I won’t ever become a demon again! Now’s your chance! Do it! Reira!

Reira: Using En Flowers’s effect, I can negate the effects of all monsters on the Field, And destroy them! And for every monster sent to the Graveyard, the controller will receive 600 damage!

Zarc: DAMN YOU ALL! I’ll definitely retur—

Leo: The world is breaking into four again!

Reiji: Zarc will be reincarnated in the four dimensions again, and the same things will happen all over again!

Reira: I won’t let it happen again! I will seal Zarc away!

Zarc: AAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!

Reira: AAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!

Yuya: Reira? REIRAAAAAAA!

#arc v #arc v spoilers

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simwoman2002 · 5 years ago

Text

Body Switch

“Why can’t you just be quiet and listen to me for a minute?!” Evie raised her voice a bit louder than her usual calm tone.

“Oh, my most sincere apologies, your Highness. I forgot you had to have absolute silence to speak. My mistake!” Mal shot back at her, stomping into their dorm room. Evie shut the door carefully behind her and Mal spun around to face her.

“Why are you acting like such a rotten little brat?” Evie asked with evident warning laced in her voice, and Mal could tell that Evie’s seemingly endless reserve of patience had nearly run out. But she didn’t care. She was in the middle of one of her angry rages and she was beyond the point of repair.

“Maybe it’s because that’s the way I was raised? I dunno, why are you such a whiny, perfect little mouse?” Mal sarcastically responded.

“You are not who you were raised to be! You are so much more than that, Mal! You’re better than that!” Evie shouted furiously, her eyes glinting with unshed tears as whatever was left of her patience completely dissipated under the stress of the argument.

Mal’s jaw slackened a bit, the realization of her wrong feelings beginning to dawn upon her. This quarrel was hurting Evie and Mal started to feel the beginnings of horrible guilt. But just as the seeds of forgiveness were beginning to root, they were harshly upturned by her burning rage.

This whole conversation was Evie’s fault, and Mal couldn’t understand why it was such a big deal that she belittled herself constantly. It went from Evie’s kind, caring concern to just plain annoying before Mal knew it. She just wouldn’t leave Mal alone. Constantly checking on her, worrying over her, and just being a terrible nuisance.

It all started because of what Audrey had done to Mal the previous week. Since Evie had found all of the horrible, ugly messages she wrote for herself under the bleachers and heard Audrey’s insults and jabs, Evie was like some kind of a perpetually doting mother hen.

“Since when do you have the right to tell me who I am or who I’m supposed to be? I’m a Villain Kid and it’s all I’ll ever be!” Mal brokenly exclaimed, her eyes burning with the flickering flame of her magic that was growing more and more excited with the rising of her temper.

“Stop it, Mal!” Evie protested, her entire posture reflecting her emotional pain.

“You don’t understand what it feels like to be constantly under pressure, Evie!” Mal retorted, her eyes glowing ever brighter.

“Yes, I do!” Evie insisted, her voice growing just a bit hoarse from all of her yelling.

“No, you don’t!

“Mal, would you shut up and pay attention to what I’m saying?!” Evie demanded, her cheeks growing wet with the stream of tears that were flowing down them.

But Mal was on the warpath, and she was determined to make Evie know what she felt- the stress of constantly needing to be perfect for Ben and the royal family, the disrespect she constantly endured from Audrey and others who hated her… The pain of not feeling good enough for Evie, Carlos, Jay, and all of Auradon.

“No, you shut up!!!” Mal turned quickly, snatched her spell book and began to read a spell.

“Walk a mile in my shoes, my responsibility now belongs to you! Understand it for at least a day, make all of this drama go away!” Mal yelled, her hands motioning.

She gasped as she felt her chest seize agonizingly, and she watched with a blank stare as Evie’s expression morphed to one of heart-wrenching terror and Evie’s chest began to glow blue. Mal tore her gaze off of Evie and noticed the purple light emanating from her own.

Mal’s eyes were forced shut before she could analyze the situation further. She felt an almost detached feeling, her mind going blank as she desperately fought to remember why she was currently so afraid.

It was like floating. Everything was gone. No negative emotion, no fight, and absolutely no one but Mal. It seemed to be an eternal bliss of emptiness.

And then, before she knew it, reality came figuratively crashing into her brain and she quite literally hit the floor. Hard.

She sucked in several gasping, shaky breaths as her eyes shot open. Mal stared at the ceiling as her chest quaked violently with the aftershock of whatever spell she had cast. She simply laid there for a while and waited for her senses to return to her. That experience had left her quite discombobulated.

“Mal?” Mal suddenly heard someone call. It was odd. She absently wondered if it was Evie. It surely couldn’t have been. The voice didn’t belong to Evie at all.

“What in the…” Mal struggled to raise her head to see who it was but allowed it to fall back against the floor. She decided she’d call for Evie and see if her sister was alright. She knew that Evie wouldn’t want that stranger to see her if the bluenette was in anywhere near the state that Mal was.

“Evie? Where are you?” Mal called out worriedly. She stopped quickly as she considered her voice. It was strangely sweet and calming to her somehow. It affected her in the same manner as Evie’s when Mal was afraid.

“Mal, what happened to you?!” Suddenly, right in Mal’s face, a purple-haired girl appeared with a freaked-out expression.

Mal stared at her very own visage for a few moments before she shook her head, chuckling lowly in a voice that was certainly not her own as she dredged her hand up to her face to rub at her eyes tiredly.

“Wow, this hoodoo didn’t just make my voice wonky, it obviously distorted my vision and good sense, too. If this is a hallucination, just slap me now so I can snap out of it and wake up in the looney bin. Wait, on second thought, help me think of how I’m going to convince them of my sanity first. That way I can actually get free after my logical normal thinking is restored,” Mal told the Mal leaning over her.

“Mal, I don’t know what your spell did, but it’s me, Evie!” the green-eyed girl declared. Mal raised an eyebrow as she moved her hand off of her face. However, just as she was going to speak, she looked at her hand and all of the breath was taken out of her.

That wasn’t her hand. In fact, as she slowly rotated the appendage, she noticed it was actually Evie’s hand. It was easy to identify simply because of the blue polish adorning the beautiful nails.

Mal shot up so that she was in a sitting position. She stared at the other girl.

After a moment of stupidly gazing wide-eyed, the person before her that was apparently Evie rolled her eyes and huffed.

“How did this happen, Mal?!!!” Evie demanded and Mal’s eyes widened as she watched herself talk to her. This spell was quite possibly the strangest she had ever seen. And she had seen a lot of strange spells.

“Well, I wanted you to understand how I felt. I didn’t know what would happen!” Mal defended, looking at her not-quite-so-pale hands as she was shaken from her stupor.

“Fix us back!” Evie’s green eyes glowed brightly in the midst of her unchecked irritation and anger. Mal rolled her now-mocha orbs as she carefully got up off the floor.

“Evie, if I knew how, I would,” she replied with a weary sigh. They shared a tense silence, each avoiding each other’s gazes. Mal looked around and absently noted that her spell book had flown under Evie’s latest dress.

Before she could make a move to go and get it, Evie started whining and wailing.

“Mal! Do you know what this means?! I can’t even wear my own clothes! I have to wear yours!” Evie cried. Mal recoiled, furrowing her brow and feeling her temper rise as she crossed her arms over her chest instinctively. She quickly removed her arms with a bit of a blush, and settled for placing her hands somewhere between her hips and waist in an awkward position.

“And why are my clothes so bad?” Mal offendedly demanded, her eyes narrowed.

“Because they’re your colors! Not mine!”

“Evie, my colors are yours now because you are me,” Mal groaned, not understanding how in the world that Evie couldn’t have realized this simple fact.

Evie was silent for a moment as she contemplated this. But, at some point, her eyes locked on Mal’s form and Evie began raking her eyes analytically over the body that Mal had now found herself in.

Evie squinted and walked closer to Mal, circling her. Mal was beginning to feel a little uncomfortable. It was almost like being sized up by her mother on the Isle before her mother launched into one of her hypercritical tirades.

But this was Evie, she reminded herself. And Evie would never hurt her. Ever.

“Y’know, I think I could really use you as a model. I could actually see what outfits look like on me before I put them on,” Evie smiled gleefully and Mal couldn’t help but notice how different Evie managed to make Mal’s face look.

Evie gave her a youthful innocence and sweetness that Mal had never had. Mal had always been firmly assured that she forever inevitably appeared mischief-filled despite any attempts to look otherwise.

She absently wondered if she ever looked genuine.

“E, number one is I’m only modeling one or two dresses at most- if I do at all,” Evie looked a little disappointed, but was still primarily excited.

“Number two: I need time to figure out how to reverse this or at least figure out how long it lasts.

“And number three: if this does last for very long, what’re we going to do about Ben?” Mal reminded herself subtly about Doug, and she carefully attempted to maneuver around that sensitive topic. It was almost second nature to bring up Doug as Evie’s boyfriend.

“Ben is always hanging on me. And I’ve got a date with him in just a few minutes! He’ll definitely notice something’s up with you. I mean me. Argh!” Mal struggled through her explanation, growing more and more frustrated with their confusing condition.

“I don’t know… You think we should just tell him?” Evie suggested, shrugging her shoulders nonchalantly, but Mal heard the gravity behind her statement.

“No! I don’t want him knowing that I’m still using my magic!” Mal desperately explained, moving closer to Evie. She couldn’t help but be a little shocked when she realized that she herself was taller than Evie. Granted, it was temporary, but it was surely nice not to be so terribly shorter than everyone else.

Evie looked down at her shoes, biting her lower lip. After only a second, her gaze shot back up to meet Mal’s.

“Mal, do you think I’ll have to…. Kiss him?” Evie questioned, a disgusted look creeping onto her face as she winced.

Mal’s eyes widened as she found herself caught between anger as well as jealousy at the idea and amusement at Evie’s own discomfort.

“I’m not sure whether I’m going to slap you or laugh at you for that comment,” Mal told her, shaking her head with a slight grin.

Evie chuckled in response, but her eyes widened as a perfect, Ben-sort of knock upon the door was suddenly heard.

Evie rushed over and hid behind Mal, her now-smaller frame crouched behind the taller of the two. Mal could feel Evie’s blunt fingernails digging into her back.

“Mal, what am I going to do when he comes in?” Evie frantically asked.

“Act like me. But avoid kissing him as much as you can, and if you absolutely have to, kiss his cheek. It’ll be platonic to you and romantic to him. And call me Evie, E. The act won’t be kept up for long if you call me Mal,” Mal told her, moving forward to open the door.

Behind the door was the most perfect-looking princely Ben that Mal had ever seen. He was wearing a black button-down shirt along with black dress pants and a silky blue tie hung from his neck. In his arms were a bundle of purple lilacs in a huge bouquet.

But perhaps what topped it off was that cute, boyish grin spread across his face. It inevitably made Mal’s heart skip a beat, and her jaw slackened involuntarily with the overwhelming desire to kiss him.

“Hey, Evie. Is Mal with you?” he asked Mal. She shook herself from her stupor, trying in vain to push down her feelings and play the part of Evie.

“Um, yeah,” Mal lamely replied, stepping to the side to allow her gorgeous boyfriend entrance. He smiled gratefully at her and he moved in the doorway.

Evie was trying the best she could to look busy, drawing something in Mal’s sketchbook. She looked up as soon as he came in as if startled from her intent work. Mal had to admit, Evie was a great actress.

“Mal,” he waved playfully. Evie returned the wave as he offered the hulking bulk of flowers. She flashed a bedazzling grin that was definitely not a smile Mal had ever had on her face and she took the flowers gently.

“Thank you, Ben,” Evie expressed, getting off the bed and hurrying over to her vanity in a very Evie-esque manner. Mal glanced at Ben and saw that he was slightly furrowing his brows, a bit of suspicion seeming to rise in his largely oblivious mind.

There were two things wrong with this situation: Mal never in her life walked like that and Mal certainly never made herself at home at Evie’s vanity. The vanity was generally a warzone Mal wanted to avoid at all costs.

Mal cleared her throat subtly, raising an eyebrow as she looked at the girl who was now comfortably seated at Evie’s vanity.

Evie’s eyes went wide as she realized how strange she must look to Ben. She returned Mal’s gaze with fake confidence.

“Evie, you don’t mind if I put these flowers on your vanity, do you?” Evie asked Mal. Mal suddenly came to the understanding that she was going to have to react like Evie would. She went over to Evie with a flourish, placing her hands on her shoulders and appreciatively sniffing at the flowers.

“Oh, no, Mal, you know I don’t mind at all. Actually, they’d really spruce up my workspace,” Mal forced a benevolent, sweet smile on her face.

“Cool. Well, I guess I’ll be seeing you, Ma- Evie,” Evie recovered quickly as she stood up, moving to Ben’s side and taking his hand in hers with slight hesitance. Mal chewed the inside of her cheek in a desperate attempt to suppress the jealous twinge.

Ben lovingly looked down at the girl that he perceived to be Mal and looked up at the actual Mal with a smile.

“See you later, Evie,” he told her, and the two walked out the door. Mal watched them intently as they left out the door, trying to avoid a groan at how Evie was unknowingly walking like herself instead of Mal.

No, Mal never, ever walked with such a prissy, swaying gait. It was actually very humiliating to think that people would be seeing her- or her body, at least- doing such a dumb walk.

Mal liked to think she had more swagger than that. Her walk was more of a confident, loose step. Not at all what Evie was doing. Ugh.

Mal shut the door with undisguised disgust adorning her features. Rolling her eyes, she turned to fetch her spell book from underneath Evie’s dress-covered mannequin.

She stooped down and grabbed it, shortly thereafter deciding that Evie’s heels that she was wearing had to go. Mal plopped down on her purple quilt, kicking off the ridiculously uncomfortable shoes as she settled in to find a possible solution to their huge problem.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

“Mal, you in there?” Ben lightly spun a lock of purple hair around his finger as Evie suddenly snapped to attention.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m here,” Evie replied, forcing a smile as they walked through the grass. He let go of her hair and she involuntarily let out a breath of relief.

So far, he had tried to kiss her twice and she had avoided it both times by pretending not to notice and by drawing his attention to something else. Evie was embarrassed beyond belief. She always thought of Ben as a friend and it left her highly uncomfortable when he did things that were certainly not in the friend category.

And the poor guy didn’t even know it.

“What’re you thinking about?” Ben asked, tilting his head as he tightened his largely gentle grip around her waist. She forced herself to lean into him so that he wouldn’t suspect anything.

“Nothing really,” Evie evaded with a smile, resting her head against his chest. It was so totally against what she wanted.

She felt so out of place in this new body. However, she couldn’t say that was necessarily a bad thing- sans Ben’s sudden romantic placement in her life.

Sure, Evie was now smaller than everyone else, and Mal’s nails, Evie had quickly noticed, were the victim of frequent biting. But the girly girl inside of her who so greatly desired to be a princess couldn’t help but feel absolutely giddy with all of the attention that she was receiving. Everyone turned their head as she went by, their gazes filled with reverent regard.

Evie just couldn’t understand why Mal didn’t love it.

But before she knew it, she was swarmed by reporters, cameras flashing and questions ablaze. Evie was shocked for only a moment before her face lit up in a show of her pure enthrallment.

“Lady Mal, how are you feeling about the party coming up on the weekend?”

“Lady Mal, is it true that you like to draw?”

“Lady Mal, where did you get your dress?” At that question, Evie rose to the occasion, proudly gushing about her own dress.

“I got this dress from my amazingly talented best friend Evie. She is quite possibly the best dress-maker I’ve ever known and she’s the only designer that I trust to make my dresses. I can always depend on her to create something unforgettably incredible,” Evie explained, her heart light with the pure enjoyment of it all.

“Lady Mal, what about my question from earlier? How do you feel about the party this weekend?”

“I’m super hyped, I must admit. The entire place is going to be absolutely glowing with hazy candlelight, the entire thing seeming like it has a soul, and it’ll almost have its own sort of heartbeat with all of the low, romantic music that’ll be playing. It’s going to be just absolutely mind-blowing,” Evie replied, completely forgoing any sort of act that would’ve even been slightly similar to how Mal would’ve reacted.

“Wow, I never knew you were so poetic,” Ben suddenly lowly whispered in her ear. Evie’s head snapped toward him and she realized just how much she sounded like herself. She grinned and scanned her mind for a good way to respond.

“I’ve been paying a lot of attention to my literature class. Some of that wordiness is rubbing off on me, y’know?” Evie quickly recovered. Ben eyed her appreciatively.

“I like it. You should consider Auradon’s writing class. You’d probably really enjoy it.” Evie nodded her head noncommittally in response. She didn’t want to get Mal into something that the girl wasn’t going to be good at in the least.

“We’ll respond to your other questions sometime later. Right now, we’ve got important business to attend to,” Ben announced, lacing his fingers in Evie’s as he guided them away. All of the reporters collectively protested, but several men working at the school ushered them away before they could make much of a move to stop Evie and Ben.

“You handled yourself well back there,” Ben spoke, and Evie quickly detected a hint of surprise and amazement in his tone.

Evie’s eyes widened a bit, but she looked up at him with a confident smile, secret wonderings of the implications of his emotions swirling in her head.

“Don’t I always?” Evie questioned, an eyebrow raised.

“Yeah, of course you do! It’s just that you’re normally a lot more uncomfortable and less willing to share so many details. It’s not a bad thing at all! It was a compliment,” Ben reassured her. Evie looked down at the ground as they walked, thinking about how Mal claimed she felt all the time.

Mal was a very private person and she didn’t do well with socializing outside of her comfort zone.

But it was nice having so many people think that she was important. Shouldn’t Mal feel the same way?

She returned her gaze to Ben’s face and a cheerful grin graced his features as he looked ahead. Evie followed his stare and spotted the picnic that was laying on the grass.

“Hey, we’re here,” Ben told her, smiling cutely as he looked down at her. Evie returned the smile, the corners of her lips quirking ever so slightly as she felt a deep pit of dread for what she was about to have to do.

Evie followed him obediently as he led her over to the blanket on the ground. He released her gently and sat down carefully. Evie lowered herself in a ladylike fashion, but about halfway down she realized that she needed to do as Mal would.

She forced a smile on her face as he offered her a strawberry. Evie took it and attempted to eat it like her best friend. Which entailed stuffing her face until her cheeks bulged out ridiculously huge.

Ben chuckled and Evie resisted the urge to spit out the large bite into the nearby napkin. She didn’t hate strawberries or anything, it was just that she never ever under any circumstances allowed herself to eat like some kind of a pig.

Well… Everything considered, Evie still didn’t see how Mal had a hard life. This was pretty nice. Even if she did have to eat strawberries practically whole.

“So, Mal?” Evie focused her gaze on him after a moment, taking a little while to realize that she was being addressed.

“Yeah?” Evie piped up, her response a bit delayed.

“Are you okay? You haven’t been acting quite like yourself,” Ben worriedly questioned. Evie flashed him a grin and laughed a bit.

“Oh, I’ve just been stressed, that’s all,” Evie told him, hoping it was a good enough excuse. Ben seemed to buy it, to her great relief, and they continued eating.

But then someone swept in at the speed of light, requiring his attention and assistance with some matter of apparent importance.

“I’m sorry, baby, I’ve got to go take care of this,” Ben apologized, swooping in and kissing her before she could avoid it. Evie allowed him to kiss her but refused to return any of the sentiment. He then rushed off to go and help with some royal issue.

“We’ll continue this later!” he called over his shoulder as he hurried away.

Evie waved, and once he was out of earshot, she sighed in relief. She got up quickly, staring in the direction that he disappeared in. After she was sure that he wasn’t coming back, Evie began subtly trying to escape, carefully hurrying away.

Just as she reached the place where she had previously been held hostage by the reporters, Evie was assaulted once again. She froze as the cameras flashed and she gazed stupidly like a deer in the headlights.

“Lady Mal, what is the status on your mother? Has she overcome her condition?” Evie widened her eyes. She knew Mal hated to talk about that more than anything. She had wordlessly moved her mother to their room and never ever acknowledged her unless she had to change her water or feed her. Any time Evie tried to bring up anything about her, Mal did her best to evade it.

“Lady Mal, any secrets about King Ben that you can tell us?”

“When are you two having kids?” Evie nearly choked on that one, inevitably imagining little angelic terrors running about. She swallowed hard, knowing that if that question were presented to Mal, it’d make her ridiculously upset.

Evie knew that Mal loved Ben a lot, but Mal didn’t even want to sleep in the same room with him so far, preferring to stay with Evie until she felt like she had known Ben long enough to move forward in their relationship. It’d likely be a good six or seven years before she ever even remotely thought about moving into the same room with him, much less even begin to consider children.

She was beginning to understand how these reporters could get very annoying very quickly.

Evie smiled and waved as she stepped backwards and made a run for it. She heard yells of complaint and urgency behind her, but all she wanted to do was get back to Mal.

It had been a stressful day.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Mal browsed through her spell book, trying desperately to find where she had randomly flicked to in her moment of rage. She knew it was somewhere deeper in the book, where all of the more… changing spells existed.

What was strangest to Mal was how she could have possibly found that spell when she had never even seen it before. It was almost as if her magic had control at that moment and knew precisely where to turn the page.

Mal glared down at the many spells jammed onto one page. She had read so many different ones now that she felt like she might go cross-eyed.

She felt a small strand of silky soft blue hair tickle her cheek and she brushed it away carefully. Unlike her own, it was not unruly and it went back into place just as she wanted it to. Mal couldn’t help but admire the color of it, too. It was beautiful, even if it wasn’t Mal’s favorite color on Evie.

It naturally grew in that gorgeous shade of dark navy blue that Evie rarely decided to keep it as. She always tried different ways to lighten it, and Mal truly wished she wouldn’t. Mal would kill to have hair like that. No tangles, not so outstanding as frickin’ purple of all colors, and no split-ends.

Mal contentedly took a bit of it and spun it around her finger, absent-mindedly drifting off from her studies of the book.

“Evie?” A knock at the door was heard. Mal looked up, panicked, and she shoved the book near the edge of the bed underneath a pillow.

She then hurried over to the door, opening it without hesitation, and saw that Princess Elaina, Queen Elsa’s daughter, was standing there, every bit as regal as her mother in stature.

Mal raised an eyebrow, wordlessly questioning the purpose of the girl’s sudden interruption.

“I’m sorry, am I disturbing you?” the girl timidly questioned. Mal’s eyes widened and she mustered one of those Evie-one-thousand-watt grins.

“Not at all! Please come in!” Mal poorly imitated Evie’s ridiculous looking hurry walk thing that she did when she was trying to get somewhere without running but not at a carefree pace either as she sat down at Evie’s vanity.

When she turned to look at the blonde, she saw that the girl appeared to be extremely nervous.

“I am so very sorry for bothering you, but Hannah wanted me to ask you when you expected to be finished with her dress. I can go now, though, if it’s not a good time,” Elaina trailed off into a murmur as she looked like she was going to run out of the room with her tail tucked. Mal forced herself to remain patient and kind with the girl. After all, her reputation as a newly reformed VK was on the line if her and Evie’s switch was revealed.

“Don’t worry about it in the least. You are perfectly fine. I’ll probably be done with Hannah’s dress in, umm…” Mal looked at the many cuttings of fabric that were lying on the desk and turned her gaze to the beginnings of a dress that was nearby the window. The truth was that she had absolutely no idea how long it’d take Evie to finish it and the bluenette, with her mysterious ways, sometimes finished and began dresses in one day and sometimes took a week to finish a dress.

“Well, I can’t really say at the moment, but I can certainly tell you that I will have it done when Hannah needs it,” Mal reassured, feeling pretty self-assured in her abilities to schmooze these people. It did help that she had Evie’s naturally charismatic face and voice that just seemed to have that effect on people.

“Oh, good… Hannah will be glad. She’s been driving me crazy,” Elaina awkwardly chuckled. Mal tilted her head curiously. “I keep telling her that you’ll definitely finish it before Monday.” Mal narrowed her eyes, thinking. Monday was two days away and Evie had barely finished the dress? That was surprising to say the least.

Mal couldn’t help but feel a little flare of jealousy at the prospect of having so much time on one’s hands that one actually had time to procrastinate. Sure, she had persuaded Evie to go to bed at the same time as her on several occasions, but she always assumed it was because Evie worked hard, not because she procrastinated.

“It’ll be done on time,” Mal replied. Elaina looked exceedingly relieved and she muttered several more apologies and farewells as she went out the door. Mal rolled her eyes, starting to raise up to go get her spell book.

But she was quickly interrupted by another knock. Mal turned toward the door, still seated.

“Hey, Evie! Do you think you could make me a dress for a date I have on Sunday? I know it’s short notice, but you’ve done it before, and it doesn’t have to be complicated,” Alicia, Princess Tiana’s daughter, entered calmly, spicy jazz music softly playing from her earbuds.

“Sure?” Mal agreed hesitantly. She didn’t know whether to agree for Evie or not. Oh, well. The bluenette most likely didn’t have that much to do, and it might help her get her rear end in gear. After all, Sunday was tomorrow.

“Thanks!” Alicia skipped out the door, humming to the music that was playing way too loudly in her ears.

Mal started to get up once again, but was quickly interrupted by Melody, Princess Ariel’s daughter.

“Hi, are you Evie? I’m new to Auradon, and I heard that you sell the best dresses… Could I get one as soon as you get a chance? I need it by Tuesday, but if you don’t have the time, just let me know,” Melody told her. Mal looked down at the vanity and quickly noticed a clipboard with a variety of names, numbers and dresses.

She stopped for a moment and picked it up, taking a closer look at it. It had a list of Evie’s schedule that week, and Mal’s eyes nearly fell out of her head upon the sight that she beheld.

Twenty-one dresses completed in one week. Mal was astonished. Evie really was covered in work to do. There was absolutely no room at all for anything besides dresses to be done, but she still managed to spend so much time with Mal- basically stalking her- and the boys, complete her schoolwork with A’s, and come out of it all with such great poise, never missing a beat.

Mal looked back up at the black-haired girl standing nearby, her eyes widened in shock as she worked to comprehend what she just read. Evie was anything but lazy and a procrastinator, and she certainly knew what it felt like to be overwhelmed by things to do. Mal began to feel a swarm of guilt overcoming her. Why, oh, why did she say those things? Why did she act so selfish?

“I can go somewhere else if that floats your boat, if you know what I mean, heh, heh,” Melody giggled, her tone reflecting her creeped-out feelings.

Mal stared at her blankly.

“Yeah… We’re booked, I’m afraid. Do come back, though, when there’s less spots filled up,” Mal muttered, returning her gaze to the clipboard once again.

Melody responded with some sort of agreeance and she then left. Mal quickly darted forward, locking the door before anyone else could come in.

With the vibrations from her heavy footsteps, the book slid off of the bed with a dull thunk.

She sighed, closing her eyes for a moment. Mal had to find the solution spell. She returned to the bed, and reached down for the book, grabbing it carefully.

Just as Mal was about to flick through the book once again, the television suddenly came alive with a fresh new broadcast. Mal watched, her brow furrowed, as Evie stared at all of the cameras with a very Mal-sort-of expression.

“Lady Mal, what is the status on your mother? Has she overcome her condition?” Mal raised an eyebrow, glancing over at her mother in the terrarium. Yeah… Definitely not overcoming the condition any time soon.

“Lady Mal, any secrets about King Ben that you can tell us?” Mal furrowed her brow, feeling a little strange watching herself- or her body- react to all of these questions.

However, the next question sent her mind reeling.

“When are you two having kids?” Her jaw dropped and she turned the television off quickly before she could hear any more of their invasive questions.

She had to find Evie so they could reverse this. And so she could apologize to her sister.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Evie rushed through the halls, practically sprinting in an effort to get back to their dorm. She turned the corner quickly.

It was a little too quickly, because before she could stop, she ran into someone full-force. Her and the other person fell to the floor, their bodies landing against the wood with a thunderous boom.

“Ow,” the other person mumbled, and Evie struggled to get off of them as quickly as she could.

“Oh, I’m so sorry! Here, let me help you,” Evie apologized, raising up and folding her legs underneath her as she attempted to assist the person she had so unceremoniously squished underneath her. Her eyes widened as green orbs met brown. It was Mal.

She smiled widely and brought the other girl into a hug without hesitation. Mal returned the gesture, squeezing tightly. Evie couldn’t help but feel like she sunk into the embrace a little, but she supposed it was largely due to her new body size.

“I’m so sorry, Evie. I shouldn’t have said the things I said. You do work hard and are obviously under stress all the time. I know that now,” Mal murmured, her voice so unlike herself that Evie had to think for a moment about who was speaking to her before responding.

“I’m sorry, too, Mal,” Evie apologized, hugging her tightly. “I shouldn’t have been so pushy lately, and I should’ve understood that you need space and time to think about things. You can’t stop being a VK overnight.”

“No, you have every right. You’re a great friend and an awesome sister because you do that,” Mal pulled away and smiled at her, a big grin on her face.

“I love you, M,” Evie told her, and was only a little shocked when it fell out. She had never openly told Mal that before and she was a little worried how the other girl would take it.

Of course, it was true. She loved Mal so much that it hurt. That was her sister, no matter what blood would indicate. From the way she scrunched her nose in disgust when Evie put on makeup for a date with Ben to the way that she fiercely protected the three of them the best she could- every piece of Mal was unique and wonderfully magnificent.

Mal looked at Evie, disconcerted for a moment, before her face that was definitely not her own blossomed into a wide smile, her eyes emanating fondness.

“I love you, too, Evie,” Mal then hugged Evie tightly once again. Evie breathed in deeply, reveling in the feeling of safety, warmth, and sisterly love.

But before long, another feeling was added to the mix. She felt a little light-headed, and her chest was tingling with an unnatural warmth. But the entire time, she could still feel the comforting touch of her best friend.

After a moment, it all stopped, and her eyelids fluttered open carefully. Evie looked down and saw a purple head of hair resting against her body. She raised her hand up, looking at it, and the most joyful feeling of recognition rose within her.

It was her hand. Slender, perfectly manicured, and definitely not pale. Not that she had an issue with that, of course. It was just more Mal’s thing.

The person wrapped in her arms raised up a bit, angling her head to look up at Evie.

After a moment of staring at each other, they shared a relieved smile and Mal chuckled breathlessly, the outstandingly emerald eyes sparkling with happiness. Mal lowered her head back down and pressed her head against Evie’s neck, seeming to be content to just stay with her for as long as she could. And Evie was content to hold her there in her arms for as long as she could.

They sat in silence for what seemed like an eternity before the green-eyed girl finally spoke up.

“You have no idea how glad I am to be me again,” Mal told her finally, giving her one last squeeze before releasing the taller girl. Evie laughed, nodding her head in agreement.

“Yeah, I know the feeling,” Evie admitted. Mal rose up from the floor and offered her hand to Evie. The bluenette gladly took it and Mal pulled her up.

“And- just thought I’d mention it- you need to learn how to walk cooler,” Mal critiqued, a mischievous look on her face.

“Uh-huh, sure thing.”

“Really, you were awful!” Mal insisted.

“And just how do I walk, Miss Perfect?” Evie questioned, a teasing tone lacing her voice as she crossed her arms over her chest.

“Well, you totally violated my body with this crap,” Mal replied, walking along in front of Evie while swaying her hips with ridiculously exaggerated movements. Evie rolled her eyes with a huff.

“It’s definitely better looking than that. And what do you want me to do? Stomp around like you do?” Evie started walking with Mal, stepping widely and swinging her arms.

They awkwardly made their way down the hall to the nearby dorm room, looking like complete morons as they both tried to imitate the other. The few people in the halls were actually beginning to stare.

Mal strutted through the door first, accidentally crashing her swaying hips into the doorway. Evie’s eyes widened as she placed a hand over her mouth.

“Ah-ah-ow!” Mal groaned, and Evie completely forwent all concern, collapsing into a puddle of giggles. Mal shot her a glare in the midst of her pain, and Evie tried to swallow the laughter at Mal’s expense.

“I guess we should’ve known better than to act like each other. One would’ve thought we’d have learned our lesson about that today,” Evie told her, rolling her eyes as she shut the door behind them.

Mal hobbled over to the bed and plopped down, grunting in agreeance with Evie’s statement. Evie followed her and laid down next to her with a sigh.

Evie closed her eyes, enjoying the quiet and the wonderful feel of being back in her own body. She grinned when she felt Mal’s hand find her own.

She opened her eyes and turned her head toward her sister. They met eyes and shared a smile as they both considered how great it was to be themselves again.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………

Ben sat at his desk, working diligently on a new agreement that- hopefully- was going to permanently settle disputes among the sidekicks of all of the heroes. He shuddered to think of what mess would be created if Grumpy didn’t stop causing trouble and angering all of the others. Even though Pascal was just a little chameleon, he was still scary when he wanted to be.

It was something about his tongue getting inside of one’s ear… Eww…

Before Ben could get much further, however, the door on the other side of his study shut. He jerked a bit and looked up.

To his great surprise and happiness, it was Mal rushing over toward him with the speed of a tempest.

“Hey!” he grinned, raising up from his chair. Mal didn’t stop, however. She marched right up to his desk, grabbed his collar firmly, and yanked his lips to hers.

It was ridiculously intense, and his eyes widened comically with shock. His eyelids fluttered shut quickly, and he returned the kiss with equal enthusiasm, touching her face gently with his hands.

Just as soon as he started to really get into it, she pulled away, staring at him with such heat that he almost felt his knees go weak. She smirked, still gazing into his eyes as she turned and left out the door, shutting it behind her as she disappeared as quickly as she came.

Ben stared dumbly after her for a while, still feeling the lingering effects of her presence as he tried to regroup. He swallowed hard, sitting back in his seat with a plop as a dumb smile made its way onto his face.

He was more confused than Pascal in a bowl full of skittles.

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