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astradrifting · 3 years ago

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While Tyland seems to mirror Tyrion, the latter has already experienced all that in the book, hasn't he? Serving the wrong regime, being hated by the people, being badly disfigured etc. But now he's bringing an enemy with dragons to Westeros. Isn't that far beyond Tyland? I keep thinking the Lannister in the service of a rotten regime and for the wrong reasons (Cersei) might be Jamie. He too is disfigured. Is there a parallel for him in DoD?

(referencing this post)

Well, Tyland was sent across the Narrow Sea to Pentos to get sellswords for the Greens but failed, so maybe Tyrion bringing Dany across is meant to be him succeeding where Tyland failed. But you��re right, the foreshadowing events have already happened for Tyrion and it seems repetitive for his story to progress in exactly that way again. The show seemed to indicate that this was his endgame, but I could see D&D giving him this ‘happy ending’ purely because he’s their favourite, maybe swapping his ending with another character’s to facilitate it. The removal of the Tysha reveal so completely stagnated Tyrion’s character arc, which might be why D&D seemed to have no idea what to do with him post s4 aside from get him sucked into the Dany-cult.

There’s definitely meant to be a link between Ser Criston Cole and Jaime, though more of a mirror reflection than parallels. Cole was known as the Kingmaker, for his crucial role in playing Aegon II and Rhaenyra against each other at the start of the Dance, and was later made Aegon’s Hand. He was once Rhaenyra’s loyal sworn sword, until one of them spurned the other before her wedding to Laenor Velaryon. Either he asked her to run away with him to the Free Cities and she rejected him, or she tried to seduce him (for a second time) in the White Sword Tower and he rejected her. Either way, they clearly had a falling out, after which Rhaenyra turned to Ser Harwin Strong and Cole became a supporter of the Greens and Queen Alicent’s new sworn sword. This is similar to Jaime turning away from Cersei for her infidelity, though he doesn’t go so far as supporting the younger brother that will kill her and keeping her from the throne just yet.

Cole’s death is clearly a reference to the Red Wedding - at the Red Wedding, Robb was hit by three crossbow bolts, before Roose Bolton killed him while saying “Jaime Lannister sends his regards.” Criston Cole died at the Butcher’s Ball, a battle in the riverlands near the God’s Eye, killed by three arrows. The man in charge of the archers, and one of the men who killed him, was called Red Robb Rivers. His head was later put upon a spear and marched to another battle. But considering this is already a reversal of Robb’s exact fate in the books, I don’t know if Cole’s death is meant to provide foreshadowing for Jaime’s ending. He seems to be more of Jaime’s foil than a true parallel - Cole appeared to truly hate Rhaenyra in the end and worked to destroy everything she had, but I think Jaime is going to find it harder to give up on Cersei no matter what he says.

Some of Tyland and Tyrion’s parallels could actually apply to Jaime too, in some ways mapping closer to Jaime:

- Tyland was the younger twin of Lord Jason Lannister, as Jaime is Cersei’s younger twin.

- both were tortured and disfigured by the opposite side in war.

- Tyland’s policies benefitted lords, but made him hated by the smallfolk - similarly, Jaime’s slaying of Aerys actually benefitted the nobility, since it was they that Aerys tended to target, but has made him reviled by the smallfolk as the Kingslayer.

- Tyland advised Aegon II to kill his nephew Aegon the Younger instead of just gelding him or sending him to the Wall, because he would always be a threat to his reign. Tyrion has never threatened Bran (yet, at least), but Jaime has already tried to kill him, and later said that he should be killed, ostensibly for mercy but really because Bran was a threat to his and Cersei’s secret.

I’m still more inclined to think that Jaime and Cersei’s endings are linked in some way. But there’s also a lot of possible foreshadowing for Jaime being Hand within the books - @fedonciadale wrote a meta about Jaime possibly becoming Hand before s8. He also spends much of Feast riding around the Riverlands trying to clean up the war, during which he dreams of becoming known as Goldenhand the Just, instead of the Kingslayer. Of course, right now it’s incomprehensible why exactly either Bran or his council of regents would choose to make Jaime his Hand, aside from possibly appeasing supporters of the old Lannister regime, but Tyrion becoming Hand is pretty baffling too. I’d think that either of them would be especially insulting to both Sansa personally and the Martells, but if both the North and Dorne go independent at the end they probably wouldn’t have a say in who becomes Hand in the remaining kingdoms.

I don’t know why it would happen politically, but I could see why it might happen thematically. It might be a bitter, full circle of sorts for Jaime to end up loyally serving a king he’s already wronged.

In Jaime’s last AFFC chapter, he makes plans to eventually return to KL, but not for Cersei. He intends to separate Cersei from Tommen and find him a new small council, considering a slew of lords who could become the new Hand (even Baelish, bizarrely enough), but conspiciously not including himself, even though he’s already planning political manouevres and there have been previous Lord Commanders of the Kingsguard who have served as the Hand e.g. Ser Ryam Redwyne, and Ser Criston Cole during the Dance. He even wants to tell Tommen that he’s his father.

And he had done his own part here at Riverrun without actually ever taking up arms against the Starks or Tullys. Once he found the Blackfish, he would be free to return to King's Landing, where he belonged. My place is with my king. With my son. Would Tommen want to know that? The truth could cost the boy his throne. Would you sooner have a father or a chair, lad? Jaime wished he knew the answer.

(AFFC, Jaime VII)

He seems to want a second chance, with Tommen after years of not truly acknowledging him as his son, and as a knight of the Kingsguard. The last king he truly served, he ended up stabbing in front of the Iron Throne. Robert barely even counts, because Jaime never had any real loyalty to him. Now he has grand plans to guide Tommen as king that will ultimately be disrupted, first by Lady Stoneheart, then likely by Aegon coming out of the woodwork and taking the crown from either Cersei or Tommen. If Jaime survives to the end of the series, he might end up serving a final king.

Bran and Tommen have often been linked to each other and contrasted throughout the series. They’re the same age, both second sons, and Sansa thinks explicitly that Tommen reminds her of Bran in ACOK. At the very beginning of AGOT, they have a sparring match, in which Bran knocks Tommen down:

There was a shout from the courtyard below. Prince Tommen was rolling in the dust, trying to get up and failing. All the padding made him look like a turtle on its back. Bran was standing over him with upraised wooden sword, ready to whack him again once he regained his feet.

(AGOT, Arya I)

There’s a more oblique link made when the Lannisters are discussing Bran’s fall:

“[...] There is nothing Lord Eddard can do for the boy in any case."

"He could end his torment," Jaime said. "I would, if it were my son. It would be a mercy."

"I advise against putting that suggestion to Lord Eddard, sweet brother," Tyrion said. "He would not take it kindly."

(AGOT, Tyrion I)

In AFFC/ADWD, Jon bitterly remembers the spar between Bran and Tommen:

"At Winterfell, Tommen fought my brother Bran with wooden swords," Jon said, remembering. "He wore so much padding he looked like a stuffed goose. Bran knocked him to the ground." He went to the window and threw the shutters open. The air outside was cold and bracing, though the sky was a dull grey. "Yet Bran's dead, and pudgy pink-faced Tommen is sitting on the Iron Throne, with a crown nestled amongst his golden curls."

(ADWD, Jon II)

Except Bran isn’t dead, and it’s Tommen’s prospects that aren’t looking good. By the end of the series, their positions will likely have reversed entirely from Jon’s statement - Bran will be the boy with a crown in his curly hair, while Tommen might be the one tragically killed in his home.

There would be something bitter and darkly ironic in it, if the boy-king Jaime gets a second chance with isn’t the son he desperately wants to know, but the boy he threw out of a window.

#astra rambles #not sure I totally believe it but it’s an interesting possibility #of course if jaime is the hand then tyrion's ending must be entirely different #i vote he takes jon's shitty show ending and be exiled #jaime lannister #ados speculation #speculation #asks #meta #dod parallels

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princepondincherry · 4 years ago

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The Tragedy of “The Wrong Jedi”

The first time I watched the Jedi Temple bombing arc in Star Wars: The Clone Wars, I was kind of uncomfortable with how it played out. I felt like it misrepresented how the Jedi Council would have handled the situation, that Anakin was going too far and uncomfortably close to the Dark Side, and that Ventress was handled strangely. But after reading a whole bunch of posts by tumblr user gffa and others about how the Jedi didn’t handle it too terribly, I’ve had to rethink my view. Thinking about it more, it’s definitely even more tragic than I realized.

I’ve got a lot to say (seriously, a massive wall of text) and, even though this is a really old show, I might as well put spoilers under the cut.

Okay, first of all: Ahsoka might not have been found innocent if she stayed in jail, but I bet she would. Barriss knocked out the guards and left Ahsoka a keycard to break out of her jail cell. As soon as she used it to break out, Ahsoka fell into the trap. If she’d just sat in the cell, eventually order would have been restored in the prison, and there would have been some sort of evidence that someone else was trying to frame her. Unless Barriss managed to spin it so it looked like Ahsoka broke out, killed some clones, and then returned to her jail cell? Seems unlikely. The genius of the trap was that breaking her out was exactly the sort of rule-breaking she’d expect Anakin to do, so I can’t blame her for falling for it.

Actually, taking a step back, the frame-job only worked because Ahsoka was an impulsive Padawan. I tried imagining how other Jedi would have reacted, and a few of them would have ended up much better. Anakin probably would have been screwed too, but a lot of more-experienced Jedi would have just begun meditating calmly in the cell and been able to follow the promptings of the Force to end up with a better outcome. In particular, Obi-Wan probably would have laughed about the key card and managed to talk his way to some sort of advantage with the clones who came to investigate. (And, of course, someone like Yoda might have just sensed Barriss like Tarkin said Ahsoka should have been able to.) None of this is Ahsoka’s fault, of course--she’s a great Jedi; she’s just in training still, and not the calmest.

Moving on, the Jedi Council expelling Ahsoka *really* bothered me, and I don’t think that’s an uncommon opinion. Other people (gffa, again) have talked at length about how they were under great pressure from the Senate, and so it wasn’t entirely their fault, but I still thought it was a terrible, if understandable, decision. They brought that the Senate was concerned they wouldn’t be impartial, but I thought, “Let the Senate be concerned. The Council *know* they’re impartial, so if Padawan Tano is guilty, they’ll find her guilty and punish her. Which, of course, is what the Senate wants. And if she’s innocent, they should support her no matter the political consequences.” But then I realized that the evidence against her was so strong at that point that the Council was probably assuming any trial would find her guilty, and the only real point of contention would be the punishment. The Jedi would probably decide on a punishment that wasn’t strong enough for the Senate’s liking. So instead, they decided that expelling her from the order *was* their punishment. It’s my opinion that this was either discussed in offscreen Council deliberations or just understood by the Councilmembers, who’ve worked together for a long time. The episode probably just didn’t make this explicitly clear because we’re intended to emotionally be on Ahsoka’s side, feeling betrayed like her, and only figure out the larger implications later with more thought and analysis. If this is true, it totally worked on me. You could definitely make a good argument that they still should have made a stand, but with public opinion and the opinion of the Senate turning against them, they had to pick and choose their battles.

THE TRIAL

The real thing that convinced me to write this post was the emotions and framing of the end of the trial, when Anakin brings Barriss forth and gets her to confess. The whole trial makes masterful use of oppositions. First, Tarkin and Padme are prosecutor and defender. They literally enter from opposite sides. Symbolically, since we know these characters, this is Grand Moff Tarkin supporting his vision of punitive control (he calls for the death penalty!) versus Senator Padme Amidala, supporting the rights and freedoms of an innocent. The symbolism and conservation of characters is nice enough that I can overlook how stupid it is that an Admiral and a Senator are the ones arguing this case or that the Chancellor of the Republic is also overseeing a trial. (Also, a Jedi accused of sedition is a BIG DEAL.)

Palpatine, of course, gives a grand speech about how Separatists have fooled the Republic before, laying on the irony as thick as he can as he accuses Ahsoka of being part of a plot to tear the Jedi Order apart. There’s an interesting interaction when Anakin breaks his stride right before he declares Ahsoka guilty, and I imagine he was torn between annoyance and his desire to have Anakin like him. And then when Barriss starts her big speech about how the Jedi have lost their way, he must be thrilled that these sentiments are getting such traction among the populace that even a Jedi espouses them and gets such a public stage to proclaim them.

Because--and this is the important part--Barriss is WRONG. - “The Jedi are the ones responsible for this war.” -- INCORRECT - “We have so lost our way that we have become villains in this conflict.”--INCORRECT. One thing that bothered me is that so much of the anti-Jedi argument is that they’re killers, but we almost always see them fighting droids. This is the most bloodless war ever, even assuming there’s a ton of offscreen collateral damage. ONSCREEN we see the Jedi avoiding collateral damage as much as possible. - “We are the ones that should be put on trial; all of us.”--No, literally just Barriss should be put on trial, for her senseless crimes. - “My attack on the Temple was an attack on what the Jedi have become--an army fighting for the dark side.”-- Incorrect on two counts. Others have explained how the Jedi are CLEARLY the good guys in this show, and more than that, her attack on the Temple was pointless murder that failed to even make a clear statement. She killed Jedi, non-Jedi workers, and clones, so I guess she was just symbolically opposing the war effort, but considering she had to explain herself before anyone guessed her motives, I don’t think she did a very good job.

Once you accept that Barriss is wrong, this becomes extremely tragic. - Anakin’s clearly struggled with the dark side over this whole arc, but he hasn’t Fallen. He’s still firmly a Jedi, firmly rooted in the Light. He lets Ventress go when he realizes she’s not responsible (which may have been a bad decision ethically, but it was probably better than just killing her), tries talking calmly to Barriss first, and sees justice done. He works within the system by making sure Ahsoka is arrested. - The music is just SO GOOD. When I was believing Barriss, the dark, dramatic music just made me more uncomfortable (”ahh, the bad guy is right?!”), but now it’s just sad. - This trial has been taking place in a Senate courtroom with the Imperial logo prominently displayed on the wall, Tarkin prosecuting, and the future Emperor presiding. But when justice is truly served, it’s by Anakin Skywalker, a Jedi Knight opposing Palpatine, and four Jedi Guardians escorting a prisoner. And...look, in terms of iconography, those guys are awesome enough to challenge all the Imperial paraphernalia, with their masks, armor, and special yellow lightsabers. Seriously, I’m surprised over the strength of the feelings I’m having about the clash of icons here. The failing Republic/future Empire is about to perpetrate a great injustice, but in march the traditional guards of an ancient peacekeeping order in full dramatic procession to bring true justice.

Barriss and everyone else taken in by anti-Jedi propaganda fail to realize that the Jedi aren’t the cause of the problem--they’re just a bandage struggling to help people like Padme hold a failing Republic together as crime syndicates, the Sith, and more base forms of evil such as corruption tear it apart.

I’ve written waaaay too much already, so I won’t talk about it too much, but Ahsoka’s arc in season 7 supports my thoughts. Basically, that arc starts with her realizing how the common people often have at least semi-legitimate reasons to dislike the Jedi, and it ends with her realizing that she’s been acting like a Jedi the whole time (and the one hostile Martinez sister realizing that since Ahsoka’s basically a Jedi, she’s been judging the Jedi too harshly).

#star wars #sw the clone wars #in defense of the jedi #the wrong jedi #the jedi who knew too much #to catch a jedi

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natsubeatsrock · 3 years ago

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The Rewrite of Fairy Tail: Part 30 (Fairy Tail)

What is the purpose of the Fairy Tail guild?

This is another post that looks different from my very first draft. This was originally a collection of changes I would make regarding specific characters in the guild. However, I realized that would be useless. A lot of it would be more about how little I'd change characters. I've talked about nearly every character in the guild I would want to change already. Some of the posts I've made involving Fairy Tail characters focusing on defending them from fans.

This was going to be a much smaller focus than I originally intended. I've expanded it because I feel that this is the more interesting and important aspect of this post. It will be helpful to have this post as we talk about other minor characters in the guild. It's also worth recognizing what the guild means to bigger characters. However, I have to talk about this from a more apologetic reason for this focus that we'll get to.

A few times in this series, I've referred to the Strongest Team (or Team Natsu) as "a team of five protagonists". I've meant that each member has an arc reminiscent of a different type of protagonist in a story. The story focuses, to varying degrees, on their progress through the different arcs. For example, Phantom Lord plays with Lucy's connection to the guild and touches on Erza's view of her strength and Natsu's search for Igneel. Of course, the focus of the series, most of the time, is on Lucy and Natsu serving as the sort of Watson and Holms for their series, respectively.

However, the series isn't about any of their individual goals. It's not about Lucy's acclamation to the guild, Natsu's search for Igneel, Erza's shift in perception of strength, Gray's acceptance of self, or Wendy's growth as a mage. It's not even about stuff like defeating the Balam Alliance guilds, stopping Zeref's followers and demons, or saving the world from either Zeref or Acnologia. As important as those things are to the series, they aren't what the series itself is about.

Though, this isn't anything new. I've already said that the focus of the series is the guild. That was in part 1 of this series. While it's been 2 years since then, that much is still the case, and I haven't lost sight of that. I compared this to Durarara!!, but Fairy Tail is different because it actually has a group its story focuses on within the guild, as opposed to the multiple groups in Ikebukuro.

Here's where I have to make a clarification of a point made by Mashima. He said that it's up to the reader to decide who the main characters are. I don't interpret that to mean that Mashima didn't write the series with any main characters in mind. Among the female characters, the focus is definitely on Lucy. That grows to include Erza and Wendy as the series continues. While we'll follow Mira or Cana every now and then, the series isn't focusing on them as the focus for the series. I feel a generous interpretation of this is that fans are free to focus on characters outside of the main cast.

But, now we're back to the main question: What is the purpose of the guild?

A few different YouTuber personalities have tried to get at an answer to this question.

Nux Taku made the case that Fairy Tail as a guild is the main character of the series. I think this is close to the right answer. The threats of the series are usually first and foremost threats to the guild first and others second. Even in a case like Tartarus, where they are trying to affect the world, Fairy Tail only gets involved when their own interests or members are at risk or have been hurt. As far as I know, the only exception is Oracion Seis. Fairy Tail works with other guilds to take them out. And even then, they get hit by the Oracion Seis first.

The issue I have with this view is that the series focus is clearly on Team Natsu. The series starts as Natsu and Lucy meet and ends in chapter 545 on the team's plans to take on the Century Quest. I can't say that the focus on them doesn't exist. However, this is a great look at what the guild means, in a positive light.

Naturally, there are more negative views of the guild's function. Craftsdwarf said that the idea that the guild is as big as it is was a mistake and detriment to the series. Mashima couldn't follow through with establishing the wishes and goals of all the characters in the guild. To be fair, no series is ever going to flesh out the desires of every single character. However, Fairy Tail is unique because it focuses on a large group of characters it portrays as a tight-knit group. This makes the fact that Mashima didn't do this worse.

Despite other sketchy statements (Lucy's treatment in the guild is apparently comparable to her treatment from Jude), there is an interesting question brought up. Why would Lucy want to join the guild? I could point to OVA 3 as an explanation for Lucy wanting to join Fairy Tail.

However, I feel that there is a more interesting question to ask. Why would Lucy want to stay in Fairy Tail? To its critics, Fairy Tail is a hilariously rambunctious guild with a notoriously terrible reputation. What's so great about this guild? Why would anyone want to be a part of this guild?

I think Craftsdwarf has it wrong. (Shocking, I know.) I think we can identify as members of the guild because of its size. When I think of a group like the Black Bulls in Black Clover (a group another YouTuber contrasted to Fairy Tail), I think that they're cool as a group, but I don't know that I'd like to think of myself as someone who could be a potential member. Fairy Tail has a low bar for entry, doesn't care for its rambunctious members, and is still an elite guild, willing to go to war for its new members? Why wouldn't I want to join them? I could be a low-ranking member, fly under the council's radar, and get the same type of camaraderie that S-Class mages get.

"But what about the fact that only ten percent of the population can use magic?" (I ask this as if I didn’t already address this in talking about magic on the continent.)

Let's get one thing straight. Exclusivity, forced or otherwise, doesn't deny the possibility of camaraderie. Most colleges don't accept everyone that applies, and not everyone that gets in goes. That doesn't mean that you can't form serious lasting bonds on campuses, even among large groups of people. Even still, it's not as if there aren't examples of mages who use magic items as opposed to the magic in their bodies. People outside the ten percent capable of magic can still join magic guilds and work as members, even Fairy Tail. (Think Mystogan, and technically Porlyusica) You could be a part of Fairy Tail even if you can't use magic.

The function of the guild is to serve as a place for the audience to identify with. We ought to see the guild and rejoice as it rejoices, hurt when it hurts, and cry when it cries. At the very least, we should sympathize with the members of the Strongest Team as they seek to protect, save, and work on behalf of the guild.

This is why we get arcs like Edolas where the focus is returning the guild to normal. This is why one of the biggest arcs of the series involves members fighting to prove their worth after being ridiculed for seven years to almost absurd degrees. This is why the final war arc is framed, at least initially, as Fairy Tail vs Alvarez Empire and Acnologia. This is why the sequel found a way to involve the entire guild, even as our main focus ought to be on the Strongest Team.

What this means on a wider scale is keeping the guild's place as important. In arcs like Galuna Island or Daybreak, it's not as if that's a big concern. However, it's worth keeping in mind when arcs such as the Grand Magic Games and Tartarus come up.

I personally feel this strongest in rewriting the x791 arc. That arc is where I get to play with the feelings of the various members of the guild. What really ties some members to the guild? Prestige? Money? Secure jobs? What happens when that's taken away but the guild is still around?

And on a smaller scale, I have a good framework to address those minor characters of Fairy Tail. I don't know that every character needs to have a serious in-depth reason for joining and staying in Fairy Tail. That's especially true considering a lot of characters will leave halfway through the series. But, it's definitely worth thinking through what even small role folks like Kinana and Warren get out of being in the guild. If not for any reason but to shut the critics up.

#the rewrite of fairy tail #part 30 #this almost wasn't part 30 #i still have things to edit #read: finish writing #fairy tail month: seven of these?

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choicesfanatic86 · 4 years ago

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Almost: Chapter 7

DISCLAIMER: All characters belong to Pixelberry Studios, except characters unique to my story. Those belong to me. ;)

PAIRINGS: Liam x Riley (MC)

SUMMARY: Riley Lawson didn’t believe in second chances, until one night a face from her past makes a shocking reappearance in her life.

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Need to catch up? Check out my Master List.

06/08/2020 - Ahhh here it is! A long awaited updated. I’m always so busy, but with summer starting and some much needed vacation days on the horizon, I’m updating everything. If Only & TTS will be coming along shortly. :)

Thank you! As always if you want to be tagged, send me a message!

Chapter 7

It didn’t take long for Riley to jump into action when Liam agreed to her offer to see the Statue of Liberty. She started to text furiously on her phone, and when she wasn’t getting a response quick enough, she resorted to actually calling up the friends she knew would still be up at that hour. After all, she lived in the city that never slept, and a good chunk of her friends were in line with that mentality. At first it seemed like she wouldn’t have any luck making her plan happen, but eventually one of her friends pulled through. Matt Dennison had owed her a favor from ages ago. She had never expected to actually stake a claim on said favor, but here she was at some god awful hour staring at the boy that had stolen (and ultimately broken) her heart eight years ago, and all she wanted to do was make his dream come true. So, desperate times called for desperate measures and she had absolutely no qualms about waking Matt up from his beauty sleep.

Matt was a frequent patron of the bar, and he and Riley had struck up a bit of a friendship. He was a lot nicer than a lot of the regulars, because he never tried to make any sort of pass at her. That in and of itself had won him a bunch of brownie points. One night last October, an out of towner had come into the bar already reeking of alcohol. Daniel had refused to serve him the three tequila shots he had ordered because he couldn’t bring himself to serve the guy any more alcohol when he had already stumbled into the bar clearly intoxicated. The out of towner didn’t take too kindly to being told no and started to scuffle with another patron, sucker-punching the guy in the stomach for no apparent reason. Seeing this, Matt tried to intervene. His Good Samaritan behavior landed him with a black eye and a set of handcuffs. It didn’t matter who did what, when the cops had shown up; everyone got taken in, leaving Matt in a very serious bind. He had no money to post bail, and everyone he thought would come through hadn’t even returned his calls. Riley swung by the jail at the end of her shift in the hopes of explaining things to the arresting officers. She was an eye-witness after all, but no one wanted to take her statement. She couldn’t see Matt spending the night in jail, so she decided to come to his rescue. She bailed him out and posted the thousand dollar fee without even spending a second to think about it. Ever since then, he had been eternally grateful to her. A month later, he paid her back in full plus interest and told her that if she ever needed anything, he’d make it happen for her. She had brushed the comment off, never really intending to take him up on her offer, but tonight . . . tonight she was ready to cash in.

Matt owned a small boating business that offered tours of the harbor. It was a great way to get some pretty nice scenic photographs of the New York City skyline. His business wasn’t at all like the fancy ferry lines that also ran their own tours out of the docks, but Matt’s tours were a whole lot more inspirational and weren’t the cookie-cutter spiels that the other ferries tried to sell. It also helped that he didn’t price gouge the hell out of the tours that he sold. So, although he wouldn’t be a multi-millionaire anytime soon, he did all right for himself. He had always offered to take Riley on a free tour . . . but he probably never meant for it to be well after midnight. Regardless, he had come through for her, and was on his way to the docks to take them to see Lady Liberty in all her glory.

“Ha!” She exclaimed giddily. “You’re in luck,” she beamed, a large grin forming on her lips. “My friend Matt is going to help us out,” she explained. “The thing is . . . we’re going to have to walk . . .” she said hesitantly. “It’s about a twenty minute trek to the docks. Think you can handle that,” she looked down at his dress shoes.

“Perhaps I should be asking you that question,” he motioned to her high heels. “This isn’t the easiest terrain to take a hike on,” he reasoned. “Especially in those,” he pointed out.

“I’ll be fine,” she said confidently, brushing off his concern. “I’m a New Yorker, remember? Walking around in heels is a thing here,” she chuckled.

Liam glanced back briefly at his friends. They were still entirely wrapped up in what they were doing. They didn’t even seem to notice that Liam and Riley had wandered off on their own.

“Do you think they’ll be angry that I left without telling them?” He asked hesitantly.

Riley took a quick peek behind her shoulder. She didn’t know them well enough to say either way, but based off of the earlier conversation that she had with Drake, this was definitely something that Liam needed to do – regardless of whether or not his friends would be angry with him. He needed to put himself first for once in his life, especially if, for whatever reason, he wouldn’t have the opportunity to come to New York again. She shook her head. “I’m pretty sure they’re having a grand old time without you,” she murmured.

Liam’s eyes shifted to their direction once more. Riley could see the hesitation building in his eyes. He was having second thoughts about the whole thing, and she couldn’t let that happen. “Hey . . . don’t look so guilty,” she nudged his shoulder playfully. “You wanted to see the Statue of Liberty, and it’s going to happen,” she assured him. “Besides, if they get antsy and want to head back to the hotel, you left the car with them. You can always meet back with them later if they’re still on the whole party roll,” she reasoned.

Liam nodded, finally pulling his gaze away from them. “You’re right. I should take full advantage of the fact that this is my last night in New York . . . and . . . well I’ll have more responsibilities after I go back, so maybe it won’t be so bad being a little selfish tonight,” he said simply.

Riley pondered his words thoughtfully for a moment. Oh right, he was getting married. He wouldn’t just be able to hop on a plane on a whim. He’d have a wife’s opinion to consider. She thought on his words again, and she couldn’t help but think that he was giving his words served more as a confidence booster for him to actually go through with it he was trying to rationalize his decision to take her up on her offer. The Liam she knew in Germany would never turn down an adventure, so it was a bit surprising to see him behave so cautiously. She supposed getting older and being swamped down with more responsibilities had changed his outlook a bit. It was strange to think that over the years she had become more adventurous and outgoing. She supposed that it was her time with him in Germany that had really allowed her to branch out and experience new things.

“Exactly,” she agreed.

They walked in silence for a few minutes. She could feel his gaze wander over her a few times as they walked, and she briefly wondered what was running through his head as they walked together side by side.

“So, why did you stay in New York?” He asked, trying to engage her in small chit-chat.

“What do you mean?” She looked back at him.

“Well . . . you weren’t always a New Yorker, right? If I remember correctly, you were from Virginia?” He said thoughtfully. “Or was it New Hampshire,” he said uncertainly.

“West Virginia,” she corrected him. She licked her lips anxiously. “It just wasn’t home anymore,” she shrugged. “I made a life for myself here,” she responded simply.

“Right. West Virginia,” he nodded. “How are your parents doing? Did they end up moving out to New York, too?”

Riley stiffened at the mention of her parents. They had a falling out shortly after she came back to the States from Germany. She had been devastated after everything that happened there, and she had hoped that going home and spending time with her family would help her clear her head, pull the shambles of her life together, and figure out where to go from there . . . but it hadn’t. Instead, she came home to judgment and disappointment, and she felt her life fall apart all over again.

“We don’t talk anymore,” she shrugged, becoming a bit uncomfortable.

Liam’s eyes widened in surprise. “You don’t?” He paused for a moment, trying to formulate the right words. “I’m sorry. You were always so close to them,” he said, a look of regret in his eyes. “Did something happen?”

Riley frowned. She hadn’t intended for the conversation to stray in this direction. It wasn’t something she was necessarily ready or willing to talk about. “We had a disagreement about my life choices,” she said vaguely. “I did what I thought was best, and they didn’t agree with me,” she shrugged. “Case closed,” she said coldly.

Liam studied her carefully. She hated the way he was analyzing her. She knew he could probably sense that she was keeping something from him, but in that moment, she just couldn’t bring herself to get into things right then and there.

“I just find it so odd that you wouldn’t be in contact with them,” he frowned. “You spoke with them nearly every single day while we were in Germany . . .” he trailed off.

“Well, Germany was a long time ago, Liam,” she said a bit shortly. She started to feel tears form in her eyes. He was right. She had been exceptionally close to her parents, especially her mother. It killed her to not have a relationship with them, especially after everything she had been through. She just couldn’t bring herself to forgive them after everything that was said and done.

She turned to Liam, ready to tell him to just back off and drop the issue about her parents, but when she met his gaze, she saw the concern in his eyes. She bit her lip. He was worried about her. Even after all this time, there was still a part of him that wanted to make sure she was all right. She debated letting everything that was on her mind flood out from her right then and there, but she knew that once she spilled her heart out to him, there would be no taking the words she said back. She’d likely never see him again after tonight. So why should she bother? What good would it do except to stir up unnecessary pain and heartache of something that had long happened years ago?

He slumped his shoulders a bit, the concern never leaving his face. “I’m sorry. I didn’t intend to upset you,” he said quietly.

She shrugged. Her family was a sensitive issue. He was right. They had been exceptionally close. Her parents had always been wonderful . . . until, well, they weren’t. She remembered the screaming battle they had when she had gone back to West Virginia. Her life had changed so much in a few short months, and they couldn’t understand that she was her own person . . . who was able to make her own decisions. The life she had decided to lead didn’t correlate with the live they had envisioned for her.

“If it makes you feel any better, I’m at odds with my family as well,” he sighed.

“Not speaking to them?” She asked in surprise. Liam had always spoken very highly of his parents. He admitted that they were a bit overprotective, but she had never gotten the feeling that things were strained between them.

“Oh no, we’re speaking . . . let’s just say that it’s all . . . an act,” he sighed wearily. “I play my part, and hell doesn’t get raised,” he said vaguely.

“That sounds like there’s a story there,” she commented. Her curiosity was piqued. Just moments ago she had wanted him to butt out of her personal affairs, yet here she wanted to know about his own rift with his parents.

“You have no idea,” he sighed as he tried to keep pace with her. “So whatever happened with your parents may be minuscule compared to what I’ve been dealing with my father and Regina,” he sighed in frustration.

Riley snorted. “I doubt that.” She sighed, letting the topic drop. Talking about her parents always put her in a foul mood, and she had a sneaking suspicion that Liam now felt the exact same way about his parents. “We’re here,” she motioned to the rickety dock in front of her.

He looked at her in surprise. “Really? That didn’t take too long . . . this doesn’t really look like an actual dock area,” he said as he looked around.

“That’s because it’s not,” she explained. “Well, it used to be, but no one ever really uses it anymore. This is one of my favorite spots in the city,” she said quietly as they waited for Matt to show up. The dock overlooked he entire city’s skyline. Over time, newer docking areas were built on the opposite side of the river, and boats started to frequent the newer docking stations. The older docks sort of just got left behind. Riley gazed out into the night sky - the different towers were all lit against darkness. There was faint music playing in the background from one of the yachts off in the distance. It was actually a really nice spot to just think. Riley supposed that’s why she had enjoyed it so much. Because no one really used the dock anymore, there wasn’t really all of the hustle and bustle like the main dock areas.

“I can see why you like it so much,” he said, gazing out into the sky. “The view is spectacular.”

She nodded in agreement.

“Now what?” He asked, looking around.

“We wait,” she said simply.

“For?”

“A magical boat I’ve summoned just for you,” she smiled. “Just enjoy the moment, will you? The old Liam would have embraced every second of this adventure so that he could remember everything about it,” she said.

“Yeah, well the old Liam also learned that sometimes being adventurous can lead to loads of trouble,” he sighed. “The new Liam tends to err on the side of caution nowadays.”

“That’s too bad,” she said sullenly. “Old Liam was a pretty fun guy,” she said nostalgically. “So . . . what made you want to see the Statue of Liberty? You talked a lot about it back then, but I don’t think you ever told me why you wanted to visit it so much.”

He shrugged lightly. “You of all people should know why.”

She arched her eyebrow in question. “What do you mean?”

“She represents something that I so desperately want,” he sighed.

She looked at him curiously. “Freedom?” She guessed.

He nodded sullenly.

She furrowed her forehead in confusion. “And why would you want freedom, Liam?”

He stuffed his hands in his pocket, his eyes gazing out onto the skyline. “It’s not easy when your life is under a microscope,” he explained.

“I’m not sure I understand,” Riley said as she stepped closer to him.

“The life I lead is under constant scrutiny. Every decision . . . every action may reflect poorly on myself and my family. Something I’m never allowed to forget no matter how badly I might want to,” he said sadly.

“Liam . . .I’m sorry . . . I didn’t know things were that difficult for you,” she cleared her throat. “That sounds awful,” she reached out placing her hand lightly on his shoulder. “It must be difficult for your fiancé to live that sort of life, too,” she commented.

There eyes meet for a lingering moment, before Liam tears his gaze away. “Riley, I – “

The horn from the boat blares, and a man dressed in worn overalls and a torn up hat waves haphazardly at them from the side. The moment between them wanes as Matt pulls the boat as closely to the dock as possible

“Riley!” He called out to her. “When I said I owe you one, this wasn’t what I had I mind,” Matt chuckles loudly. “Leave it to you to call someone at one o’clock in the morning. I had to refuel and everything,” the man bellowed.

Liam’s words became forgotten as Riley snapped back into high gear remembering the mission set before them. “I know! You’re the only one who picked up,” she shrugged. “I know this is a bit . . . unusual . . . but my friend here leaves tomorrow and he’s never seen Lady Liberty. We’re hoping you can make that happen for him?” She asked.

“Of course I can make it happen,” he smiles broadly. “Just wish we were doing this a tad bit later in the morning than one o’clock,” he laughed. He started to pull down a plank onto the deck so that Riley and Liam could board the ferry.

“Is that?” Liam looked at her with concern.

“Our ride,” she nodded.

Liam looked at the large, rickety ferry, his face turning into a frown. “Are you sure he’s reputable?” He looked at Matt and the ferry with skepticism. “I mean . . . I hear the horror stories about these sorts of situations that go awry,” he whispered. “I have a . . . thing about boats,” he trailed off.

“Beggars can’t be choosy, Liam. Besides, I know Matt looks a bit rough around the edges, but he’s a decent guy . . . Just don’t think about how it all looks . . . push that aside and think about the bigger goal . . . you want to see Lady Liberty don’t you?”

“Well, yes,” he nodded. “I just didn’t imagine it would be on this sort of vessel.”

“It’s now or never, Liam. You leave tomorrow. Who knows if you’ll ever make it back to see her,” she motioned behind her. “Do you really want to live with the regret of not having at least tried? What if your wife doesn’t want to travel to the States? Or if you have kids right away? This could be your last shot to ever see something as grand as the Statue of Liberty. Are you really going to let the shape of Matt’s boat turn you around?” she asked.

He shook his head. “I suppose not,” he admitted.

“Excellent,” she beamed. Hop on. You’re about to see Lady Liberty in all her glory.”

As Riley and Liam boarded, Matt pushed the ferry into high gear. “Hang on, guys. Next stop, the Statue of Liberty.”

They stood on the edge of the ferry, and after ten minutes of not so smooth sailing, they could see the Statue of Liberty gleaming out in the distance.

“Wow,” Liam murmured.

“Aren’t you glad you decided to take a chance?” Riley chuckled as her own gaze lingered over the majestic beauty of the statue.

He nodded, his eyes never straying from the sight of Lady Liberty in all her glory. “She’s amazing,” he murmured.

“Isn’t she?” Riley sighed, she too couldn’t help but be mesmerized by the sight of her.

The boat neared closer and closer to the statute’s base, and Liam’s smile was absolutely blinding. He pulled his cell phone out, snapping different photos at different angles. He was acting as if he’d never see it again.

Riley paused with the thought. That very well could be true. After all, she had said the very words to him only moments ago. What if he never did come back to New York? Let alone back to America? Whatever it was that waited for him back home seemed like an anchor. At least, that’s how he seemed to describe it. Life under a microscope? She couldn’t imagine spending every single day of her life worrying about what other people were thinking about her choices. It made her wonder why Liam’s life was like that. Had he been some sort of celebrity back home? Riley watched him with intrigue as Liam happily gazed up at the towering beauty. For a brief moment, she saw the carefree Liam she had fallen for back in Germany. She didn’t see the boy who broke her heart and left her without even a single word. Instead, she saw a man, so bogged down with secrets and troubles that such a simple thing like seeing the Statue of Liberty brought him so much joy. She almost felt sorry for him. How troubled was his life that he couldn’t even steal a few moments of enjoyment for himself back home?

“I didn’t think you could pull this off. I should have known better,” he let a small chuckle escape as he turned to face her.

Riley snapped out of her thoughts. “What do you mean?” She looked at him a bit puzzled.

“Admittedly, I may have had some skepticism about this whole thing working,” he smirked. “Especially when I saw the state of his . . . . boat,” he cringed looking around.

“It floats,” she chuckled. “And it’s given you the chance to see your life-long dream,” she eyed him. “Be grateful,” she chuckled, nudging his side slightly.

“I am,” he held his hands up. “I just . . . well, I suppose I haven’t done anything this . . . impulsive in quite some time,” he mused. “It feels odd.”

“Yeah . . . tonight is full of impulsivity for you,” she smirked.

Liam burst out in a hearty laugh. “Says the girl who doesn’t have an impulsive bone in her body.” He rolled his eyes jokingly.

The playfulness in his tone caught Riley off guard. Riley feigned offense. “I’ll have you know I’ve done tons of impulsive things in my life. You haven’t seen me in eight years,” she pointed out.

“I suppose . . . I guess I have a hard time reconciling the you now with the you back then,” he shrugged.

She looked up at him, completely understanding what he meant, and nodded.

“Hey . . . “ he said a bit excitedly. “Do you remember back in Germany when you tried to convince me that you were a rebel? You told me about this time when you were in high school and you held a protest against your schools’ science program because one of the teachers scheduled an assignment to dissect a rat?”

Riley’s face flushed in embarrassment. “Of all the things to remember, that is something you bring up?” She sighed heavily. “Hey, don’t judge me for the stupidity of my youth,” she forced a chuckle, but the embarrassment was still going strong. “At that point in my life . . . yeah that had been the craziest, most rebellious thing I had ever done. You were always so worldly and daring . . . I just wanted to impress you,” her blush deepening.

Liam chuckled more. “Oh, you’ve certainly proven to me that you have a rebellious streak, Riley Lawson. You’re certainly a lot more adventurous and fascinating than I remember,” he commented.

“And you’re not,” she mused. “The Liam I knew eight years ago would have dropped everything at the chance for an adventure. He wouldn’t even think about a rough looking boat stop him,” she pointed out.

Liam’s smile and playful demeanor changed suddenly. His back stiffened, and eyes saddened a bit. “I’m afraid that Liam grew up a bit over the years,” he murmured.

The boat began to take a slow u-turn, heading back in the direction they had come from. Riley looked up toward Matt in the captain’s control cabin. “Going back so soon?” she called up to him.

He nodded from the control cabin. “My first tour is at 8 am tomorrow. Don’t want to be out too late so that I sleep through it,” he said. “Don’t worry, next time your friend comes back to New York, I’ll give him the full tour . . . during the waking hours of course,” he laughed.

With Matt’s words, Liam’s shoulders slumped a little.

Riley nodded slowly. “Got it. Thanks for bringing us out here, Matt. Now I feel like I owe you one for waking you up at this hour,” she chuckled lightly. Matt waved her off, before turning his attention back to the wheel.

“Well, I suppose our adventure has come to an end,” Riley sighed. “But at least you got to see her . . . maybe not all up in person, but now you can go back home with a pretty cool story from your bachelor party. It would totally blow to go back home and tell everyone that you sat at a table in a club by yourself all night while your friends partied without you,” she joked.

She turned to face him when he didn’t respond and noticed the forlorn look on his face. “What’s wrong? I was just joking about the whole club thing . . .” she trailed off.

“I just can’t believe its over,” he said quietly. He sighed heavily as he leaned against the boat’s railings. “I always thought I’d have more time.”

“Hey, maybe you can convince your fiancé to come to New York for your honeymoon . . . unless that’s already planned . . . then maybe you guys can plan a vacation or something down the road?” She tried to say cheerily.

“I’m never coming back to New York, Riley. At least not without being on a tight leash,” he raised his voice. There was an underlying sense of anger in his words. It took Riley aback.

She paused, not really understanding the shift. He had been so happy only minutes ago. “Liam, you’re being really cryptic. You sound as if you’re going to be put to death once you return home,” she said concerned. “I mean . . . okay maybe that’s a bit dramatic . . . but still. Do you not want to go back? I know this isn’t my place to say anything, I don’t know what you’re going through right now, but if I were the one getting married, I’d be over the moon with excitement. And it is clear to me that you’re not. I don’t know if it’s cold feet or something else, but it’s not fair to your fiancé if you suddenly don’t want to get married. Tell her. Talk to her about how you’re feeling,” she reasoned.

“If only it were that simple,” he sighed.

Riley’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion. “Why isn’t it simple? I feel like I’m missing something major here, and I can’t help you if you don’t tell me what’s going on,” she said angrily.

“Do you remember my brother Leo?”

Riley nodded. “He was a thrill seeker, right? Always bouncing from country to country . . . He was always a bit reckless about it though,” she nodded. “Well, so you told me,” she shrugged. “What has he got to do with anything?”

“Well, let’s just say he hasn’t changed and his recklessness has forced me into a bit of a predicament,” he sighed. “His choices inadvertently solidified mine, if that makes any sense,” Liam murmured.

“It doesn’t,” Riley shook her head.

“My family is important to me, Riley. Our legacy . . . the business that we are in . . . all of it . . . it means the world to me. My brother . . . well, he’s never been one to follow the rules. I envy him a bit. One of us had to become the responsible one, especially after . . . well, let’s just say that my family went through a rough patch and needed all of us to step up and help. Leo couldn’t . . . more appropriately, didn’t want to do it. He enjoyed his adventures too much, and being stuck to one place for the rest of his life would have killed him. So . . . my family turned to me.”

“Liam, that still doesn’t make much sense,” she murmured.

“Getting ready to depart,” Matt yelled from up above, interrupting their conversation.

Riley’s looked up and saw that they were pulling in near to where Matt had picked them up from earlier. Her heart suddenly felt very heavy. She didn’t want this night to end. Not when something was clearly bothering Liam. How crazy was it that after all this time, she still felt something for him? A sense of protectiveness . . . a sense of worry. She paused, was she falling for him again? No. She shook her head, trying to make sense of everything that was happening.

“Forget I mentioned anything,” Liam said, clearing his throat. “I got a bit sentimental back there, and my judgment became clouded. I’ve got a lot on my mind, and shouldn’t have burdened you with my problems,” he explained.

“Liam,” she started before Matt blew the boat’s horn.

“Alright, guys. Back to land,” he called out to them.

Riley looked back up and saw that they had docked, and Matt was already situating the plank to let them off. Liam was waiting patiently and stepped hurriedly off the vessel as soon as the plank was down. She headed toward them, and clasped Matt on the shoulder.

“Thank you, for doing this,” Riley said softly. “I know I mentioned this before, but he has wanted to see the Statue of Liberty for ages . . .” she sighed.

“He got his wish,” Matt nodded toward Liam. “But something tells me he’s wishing for something else now,” Matt nudged Riley’s shoulder.

Riley looked at him puzzled. “What?”

“Uh . . . you and he? Aren’t you a thing?” Matt asked.

“Nope, it’s nothing like that. We just knew each other from way back when. It was purely a coincidence to run into him tonight,” she brushed off his hinting with a wave. She didn’t need another person’s thoughts adding to her own jumbled emotional mess.

“Well, I’m thinking he’s seeing you in a whole new light,” he said, pressing on. “That guy has eyes for you, Riley. The way I saw him looking at you . . .and you looking at him . . . could have fooled me,” he shrugged, patting her on the back.

Riley bit her lip, even more confused than before. She trudged toward the plank shaking her head at him. “I’ll see you around, Matt. I better get this guy back to his friends.”

She walked off the plank toward Liam who was gazing at the New York skyline deep in thought. The worry lines on his forehead were prominent, and his eyes looked deep with sadness.

“Hey . . . we were having a pretty deep conversation on that boat . . . then Matt interrupted and you seemed to close yourself off again. I don’t want to forget it, Liam. We were friends once. More than friends,” she sighed, closing her eyes at the memory. “I don’t want to spend another eight years wondering about you . . . wanting closure . . .” she trailed off.

“Why do you care so much?” He asked.

“Huh?” She questioned.

“Several hours ago you were dumping a pitcher of water over my head. After that, I assumed you never wanted to see me again . . . then I saw you at the club . . . and then you took us to the cove,” he trailed off. “You went through all this trouble to make this happen for me tonight . . . then you tell me you’re worried about me . . . about my happiness,” he shakes his head as if in disbelief. “What changed?”

“I – I don’t know,” she shrugged. “I can say the same about you,” she turned it back on him. “Eight years, Liam. Eight years without a single word. I sent to hell and back after you left, then you waltz back into my life and I’m finally ready to tell you off for leaving me back in Germany,” she sighed. “So yeah, at first . . . well I guess my anger got the best of me. Then,” she trailed off. “I guess I wanted closure,” she said softly. “I mean, back at the cove, you talked about your family obligation, but then something changed. You seemed sad and lost and I don’t know . . . I just wanted to do something for you to make you feel better,” she shrugged. “I suppose talking to Drake may have triggered me being a bit more open-minded about things . . . and well, how you saved me back at the club certainly opened my eyes about a few things,” she reasoned. “I guess I built up this terrible image of you in my head, and you’re just . . . you’re not. You’re not terrible, Liam. You weren’t a terrible guy, then either. There was a reason why I cared about you so deeply . . a reason why you leaving without saying goodbye hurt me so terribly . . . I cared for you,”

She loved him then, but she certainly wasn’t going to admit that to him. Not when he had warned her that they could never be together. It was her own fault. He had told her that they could only have the summer together, that realistically anything beyond that summer would lead to something that could never continue. At the time, she was okay with that, but then, he left before the summer had even ended, then her world turned upside down and she just crumbled.

“We should talk,” Liam said lowly, his gaze turning steely. “You deserve to know the truth . . . about everything. Why I left, why I couldn’t stay in touch . . .” he trailed off, his hand suddenly reached for hers, and she felt a tingle as their skin touched. Her body hummed in anticipation and longing.

Riley looked up at him, tears beginning to form in her eyes. The emotional whirlwind of the night was finally catching up with her. There were so many emotions that she had pushed away for far too long. Now, they were all bubbling back to the surface, and she didn’t know how to feel? What was she doing? He was engaged. He was going to leave her again. This little reunion was exactly as she had told Matt – a pure coincidence. There would be nothing beyond tonight. She wasn’t the type of girl to cheat and she certainly didn’t want to cause any turmoil between Liam and his fiancé. It didn’t matter if she loved him first. It didn’t matter what happened between them. She just wanted to make him happy, and mission accomplished. He saw the Statue of Liberty. Now it was time to part ways and go back to their lives . . . separately. She pulled her hand out of his grasp, shaking her head.

“I can’t do this. I should go home,” she said hesitantly. Here he was offering her everything she had wanted – an explanation. Not some bullshit about some sort of family obligation, but a genuine, honest to God explanation about why he left her shattered in Germany all those years ago. She finally had her opportunity to confront him about everything that had happened, and here she was chickening out. Perhaps not knowing was better? She’d wanted an explanation for so many years, she was suddenly afraid to have it. Or more appropriately, she was afraid of what was now happening between them. Talking to Liam had always been so easy . . . too easy. She remembered being able to tell him anything. She remembered feeling so comfortable around him. She was feeling it again. This thing between them was dangerous. It would hurt too much to fall for him again. That would be the worst thing to happen . . . considering he was emotionally and physically unavailable to her. He was about to be married for God’s sake. It was time for her leave.

She shook her head quickly. “I have to go,” she murmured, taking a few steps back. “I take it you can find your way back to your friends?” She asked, without really waiting for him to answer.

“Riley,” he said softly.

“I’m glad that we saw each other again . . . but maybe it’s better if we just leave things as they were.” She started to wobble down the path, overwhelmed by the surge of feelings that flooded over her. “I am going to call myself an Uber, go home, sleep this night off, and start fresh in the morning,” she rambled on to herself as she walked away.

“Riley James Lawson,” he called after her, she paused, too afraid to turn back.

“Riley James Lawson,” he called out after her again. “I owe you an explanation . . . I owe you a whole lot more, too . . . It might be eight years too late, but I’d still like you to hear it. If you’d like,” he added.

#almostseries #theroyalromance #trr #choices trr #trr fanfic #trr fic #Royal Romance #choices the royal romance #choices fanfiction #liam x riley #trr au fanfic #trr au #choices: stories you play #playchoices #liam x mc #second chances

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gunnerpalace · 5 years ago

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hey there! so i used to be a huge fan of bleach, and loved ichiruki, and i was reminded of them today but i haven't been involved with the fandom since the series ended. however, i've heard of different variations of why the series ended/ships happened the way they did, and was wondering if you knew or could direct to me a post that explains that? i apologize if i'm bringing up bitter feelings, but i've always been curious if bleach's ending was a big FU from kubo or if he always intended rr/ih

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a post that really goes over it structurally in that kind of way (from a shipping perspective). I’ll get back to what you actually asked me after some asides, because it’s not so simple to just analyze the ships in a vacuum.

I’ve had my own post about why the ending was a fuck you moment, thematically, because it failed to resolve any of the themes and momentum of the series in a way that would be appropriate (either internally or in the context of the supposed genre of shounen.)

I would also say that the ending was a fuck you moment in terms of lore, backstory, and mystery, because all of the historical and political dimensions (i.e., things involving the Soul King and Great Houses) were unceremoniously shuffled off to Can’t Fear Your Own World. Not that any of those things were ever brought up properly in the manga to begin with; the proper and natural time for that would’ve been at the conclusion of the Soul Society arc, when Ichigo and co. spent a week there, which we saw none of. So I would say that everything in CFYOW is basically retconned bullshit hung off prior convenient plot hooks, and that the same was true of TYBW and LSS/TLA/Xcution as well. There may have been some notes and forethought, but it’s about as “valid” as Kevin J. Anderson and Brian Herbert’s Dune works are compared to the original Frank Herbert ones; it’s second-hand, at best.

(This is setting aside that Bleach was clearly made up as it went along. For example: Noriaki literally admitted that he didn’t know who had killed Aizen in Soul Society until he realized that Aizen not being dead was the most shocking answer; the clear baiting and abandonment of Kisuke as the villain hinted at through various means such as his unclear and later retconned reasons for being exiled, and so on. Bleach was very much a J. J. Abrams-style mystery box work that was made as it went with, at best, rough notes, which is why its themes and focus change, for the worse. I also have a post about why it stopped being special, which is part of a running series I intend to write on how to rewrite it to fix and preserve that)

The best recent thing to compare it to is, really, HBO’s adaptation of Game of Thrones, wherein D. B. Weiss and David Benioff openly admitted to removing or deemphasizing story elements, and ignoring themes in adapting the work. The difference is that Bleach was not being adapted from anything; it degraded due to its own creator not understanding what he had created.

(To put it very simply, because this would be the point of Hyperchlorate Part II and would take a whole post to explain: the ending of the Soul Society arc did not properly establish and flesh out Soul Society as a place with a history, space, and purpose. Instead, the Arrancar and Hueco Mundo arcs decided to be a thematic inversion and deconstruction of the Karakura and Soul Society arcs. This again had an ending that did not establish or flesh anything out after Aizen’s defeat, with an even greater diffusion of focus onto ancillary characters. The Xcution arc tripled down on this by addressing something entirely new and retconned in, only to abandon it midway through in favor of going back to invoking Soul Society. And Thousand-Year Blood War took all of these problems to 11. tl;dr: Noriaki tried themes, people hated it, and so he just shoved in more and more dumb sword fights between people nobody cared about, half of whom hadn’t previously existed.)

So, let’s get back to your question. Let’s talk about ships. I’ve clicked a lot of keys and spilled a lot of ink on this subject over the years, but I no longer particularly feel like searching my own archives (really ought to go back through and organize them better) beyond this post and my own follow-up to it about the chronology of IR interactions, so I’m just going to repeat myself.

First, let’s say that Bleach was not ever a manga about ships.

I’m not disavowing that what Rukia and Ichigo had was special. That was called out multiple times through the focus of the art, the dialogue, and by the characters themselves. (Directly by, for example, Orihime’s outright statement to the effect in Soul Society, and her later jealousy regarding it. Indirectly by, say, Uryuu’s acknowledgement that him saving Rukia first would piss Ichigo off. In fact, the biggest indirect indicator doesn’t even involve Ichigo and Rukia; Shunsui asks Chad why he’s there and Chad says he wants to save Rukia, Shunsui calls bullshit that two months isn’t enough time to risk your life for that, and Chad agrees and says he’s there because Ichigo wants to do it. Shunsui moves on, but his argument is left hanging: why was two months enough for Ichigo? Because, as Orihime will later say out loud, Rukia is special.)

What I’m saying is that that was never the focus. It was explicitly constructed that way.

How do I know? The Grand Fisher fight. The Grand Fisher fight is emotionally charged, bringing up both Ichigo and Rukia’s greatest traumas, and is their one real moment of not understanding each other for a time. It was a triumphant moment that made them truly glad to know one another, and you can see it in their reactions afterward (Rukia thanking Ichigo for not dying, Ichigo asking Rukia if he can keep being a Shinigami). There was a lot to unpack there, and you can see it in the way they look at each other.

What happened immediately after the Grand Fisher fight? Noriaki skipped a whole month. We go from June 18th of 2001 to July 17th of 2001. He deliberately skipped all of the emotional impact of that event, and Rukia being around for Ichigo’s 16th birthday. Just never happened. We never hear about it. Wasn’t his focus as a writer.

Now, I’m convinced that was because he was scared of what he had on his hands. He wasn’t willing to commit to either a couple’s battle shoujo or a shounen with male and female seemingly-heterosexual co-equal deuteragonists who clearly had a strong emotional bond. More specifically, he wasn’t willing to make Rukia a centerpiece of the manga despite having designed her first, having made her the moral and philosophical core of his manga, and having based Ichigo entirely around completing and complementing her. But hey, that’s just my opinion, right? Except it kept happening.

From the Grand Fisher fight onward, the name of the game in the manga, structurally, became keeping Ichigo and Rukia apart.

The moment she was taken back to Soul Society, her prominence dropped. We got emotionally charged scenes of them regardless. Right at the conclusion, after yet another emotionally heavy set of Ichigo and Rukia interactions, we again skip almost a month, from the end of the first week in August of 2001 to September 1, 2001. (Due to some completely unnecessary timey-wimey bullshit with the Precipice World.)

In the Arrancar and Hueco Mundo arcs, they have roughly a day together over the course of three months. What happens after every meeting? They’re shuffled apart and split up, and we cut away. This time, for over a year!

Ichigo and Rukia again have a very emotionally charged meeting in the Xcution arc. And what happens at the end of that arc? We skip ahead another month to TYBW. (Xcution ended sometime in May of 2003, TYBW starts June 11, 2003.)

And in TYBW, Rukia and Ichigo barely meet up at all. Indeed, the focus is scarcely upon them.

In CFYOW, neither of them even appear, let alone have any relevance to the plot.

The implication, in my opinion, is pretty obvious: Noriaki was deathly afraid of dealing with the outcomes of their interactions, and that ultimately became him being deathly afraid of allowing them to interact at all to begin with. Why? Well, as I said in one of the last linked posts:

As an author, sometimes you will find your characters will do things you didn’t anticipate or plan for, and you’ve got two choices: you can go with the flow and do what’s natural and deal, or you can fight it and try and impose your vision anyway.

He refused to let his art take the direction it needed to go in.

Now, some people might say he got bored of them, or of having them together. I say that’s bullshit. And the reason I say is down to three things:

He didn’t ignore them, he did his best to keep them apart. I outlined this above.

He did not emphasize anything or anyone else instead. His focus was all over the place. While, admittedly, Ichigo’s prominence also declined, so did everyone else’s.

It would have served him well to focus on their interactions to expand his universe and explore its lore. The things that were detailed in the databooks and CFYOW could’ve been presented naturally and easily if they were together. But that came with a cost of shifting the focus. A cost he refused to pay.

Let’s talk more about (2) and (3) now.

Regarding (2), Chad and Orihime are inextricably linked in Bleach, because they essentially have the same relationship to Ichigo. “But Orihime loves Ichigo, and Chad is his no-homo bro!” someone proclaims. So what? They’re presented as equal and parallel at every step.

They both gain their powers at approximately the same time.

We are told they gained their powers due to the Hogyouku (in Rukia at the time) interpreting their wishes (and no one else’s, such as Tatsuki, Keigo, or Mizuiro), meaning they probably had the same strength of desire.

They both go to Soul Society “for Ichigo.”

They both utterly fail against Yammy and Ulquiorra.

They both spend most of the Hueco Mundo arc doing nothing.

They are both featured prominently in the Xcution arc, and both fail to see through Tsukishima’s powers despite their love for Ichigo. (Meanwhile, Byakuya coolly tries to murder someone who he thinks is his mentor, in Ichigo’s name.)

They both get sidelined in Hueco Mundo with Kisuke in TYBW, doing little to nothing.

They both are utterly ineffectual in the final fight in TYBW.

They are often portrayed together, they are often as effective as one another, and they are equally as developed in their relationship to Ichigo going forward, which is to say: not at all. The loss of focus on IR did not come with an attendant rise of focus on IH, any more than it did with the sudden rise of IchiChad. Nothing was built in IR’s place. There was no emotional or human content which filled its gap.

This is where the IH ending coming “out of nowhere” stems from: it indeed came out of nowhere, because Ichigo was never shown to have any interest in Orihime in all this time, nor an especially close relationship with her. He never hangs out with Chad or shows a bond with him either. He never hangs out with anyone, in fact. (Indeed, “friends” in Bleach do not do any of the things that friends actually do in real life. Nor do parents. You might say that interpersonal relationships and communication largely don’t exist in Bleach. But that’s its whole own topic.)

I would honestly say that more time and emphasis was given on Ichigo’s pseudo-surrogate mother relationship with Ikumi than was spent on him interacting with Orihime. (I would say Noriaki has serious hangups about relationships of any kind, be they romantic, familial, or friendly, and also has some severe hangups regarding mothers and fathers, but that is also its whole own topic.)

Regarding (3), Noriaki apparently wanted this big, Game of Thrones-style world with a long history and political machinations and so on. This is the whole point of TYBW and CFYOW. Trouble is, early Bleach was successful because of its small-scale intimacy. So how do you go from one to the other? You have to lay the foundations at every step. And Noriaki steadfastly refused to do so at every step. Having Ichigo and Rukia interact, and focusing on Rukia while Ichigo was sidelined without powers, would’ve permitted that organically. Indeed, if RR was the endgame, it would have given time to establish that, were it his desire. (Because Rukia never showed any interest in Renji, and frankly Renji always seemed way more preoccupied with Byakuya.) It didn’t serve his goals, but he did it anyway.

It’s much simpler to say he lost focus, and that he started to hate the manga as a whole. Why else would you have Mayuri fighting a giant hand when that achieved nothing, and Kenpachi fighting Thor when that achieved nothing? It became empty. Hollow, you might say.

But that takes us back to the question you posed: where did the ships come from? Nowhere. IH, RR, and fucking TatsuKeigo weren’t established anywhere. They just appeared. Why?

Well, why did every single character wind up doing the exact opposite of their intended and stated goals in the end?

Why did Soul Society revert to its previous attitude and rebuild the Sokyouku?

Why did nothing get resolved?

Why did nothing change?

Why was it all revealed to have been completely and utterly pointless?

In my view, it’s because that ending was a giant fuck you to the readership and Shueisha. There is no other way to interpret an author pulling a 180° and completely nullifying their characters’ arcs, and their work’s themes. Aizen’s little speech at the end is the cherry on top. I read it as Noriaki saying that he’s showing “courage” in telling us all to fuck off.

As to why? That’s an open question. His relationship with Shueisha was contentious, so maybe he was mad at them. (They gave him a deadline once he was dragging his feet, and reclassified Bleach as a joke manga.) His readership was on the decline after the Soul Society arc ended, so maybe he was mad at the audience. I don’t know. I also don’t really care. What I am convinced of is he decided to blow up his franchise and to not leave a single stone unturned when he did so.

That’s where that “ending” comes from, which is why despite it featuring IH and RR, both are thoroughly unsatisfying and without setup: it was the only way to piss absolutely everyone off, including people who wanted that outcome.

In a way, it was his greatest success since the early days of the manga.

Anyway, this was messy, but it’s not a simple topic to address. The tl;dr is that Bleach was a trainwreck from the very beginning that only succeeded on the merits of its characters, and that Noriaki deliberately avoided the promise it had to be something unique and grand. The ships are just a part of that, and cannot be understood in isolation from it.

#Asks #Bleach

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pepperstrawberry · 6 years ago

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While I am slowly working on art things... have a bit of fiction?

So, I did a post earlier about Elly, and figured that I should post this maybe for amusement. It’s a drabble I puttered on after being inspired by @wearepaladin‘s post that I linked up there... There is more that is starting to form. I was originally going to add her to my ‘Dragon Quixotic’ story (and she still kinda is, but becoming less and less direct so), since the main city I came up with has a strong history of Paladin stuff (now thanks to this drabble is called ‘Mithvalor’... for now at least XD )

Going to put it under a cut cause it’s like a few pages long on the googledoc XD

Note: This was tossed together as a sort of ‘character moment and background’ thing… Feel free to make any commentary, but please do it in the light that a) I haven’t really tackled Paladins until very recently in any tangible way and b) this is more or less a rough draft take on a scene that popped in my head.

Note the second: One of these days I -will- make a straight forward paladin, but I’m still in that beginning ‘break all the things/see where things stretch to phase of character creation ^_^;;; (I do have a whole story that plays with the idea of gods, paladins, right and wrong, good and evil, and all that where the heroes do end as more or less proper pallys, but the start isn’t what it seems… at the moment that idea is on the back burner though)

The Gods are fallible.

This statement was the backbone of her faith.

Elizabeth Camilla Makeda had come to distrust any priest that would proclaim the perfection of any single god. Not in that she hated them or thought they were leading people wrong. It was more that they had blinded themselves to the bigger picture.

In a world where there were multiple gods, each with their own domains and focus, she could not believe that any single god could understand enough of the universe on their own to be anything but a flawed, incomplete creation. For many, this revelation would bring a deep distrust in the gods if they believed in them or even a complete rejection of any value in religion if they didn’t. But for her?

It brought her a sense of relief.

If the gods were fallible, then it just meant that the problems of the world, how sometimes monsters could win, how children could die from plagues, or how people could fall to their own vices made more sense.

Some gods would show a streak of hubris just as man does. Other times, it was pettiness. Some gods tried so hard but their domain was limited in scope, and thus was their ability to change things.

If she viewed the gods much as she viewed her fellow man, it made a lot more sense.

It was these thoughts she took into the academy of her city of Mithvalor. Paladins were a traditional position in her home, a place of many faiths, working together to make a stronger world. Her home, a hub city of trade and community, had once housed a council of seven paladin kings known in legend as ‘The Faith’. It had been many generations since The Faith was broken, but the grand tradition of this land to be a bridge between countries as well as the material and the ethereal worlds made being a Paladin both a privilege and an honor.

While she had a leg up thanks to her mother being a Paladin of the God of Courage, it didn’t mean she had a free ride either. Her family had always been about hard work and helping others. Her father had helped her train her body by working the fields of their farm on the outskirts of the city. She was put to work during festivals to help bring food around to those that needed and deliver parcels of ingredients to cooks preparing the big feasts.

Her father was big on the God of the Harvest and while her parents where in a bit of a bet of who she would chose, they knew she would make the right decision for her and continue the proud traditions of both the city and her family.

And so it was that her training began. And trouble soon showed it’s head. When it came to lessons on the gods, she would ask strange questions. Not improper ones, only ones that kept everyone guessing with which god would she finally plague her oath to, let alone what that oath would even look like. Many thought she might side with either the God of Knowledge given her persistent questions, the God of Wisdom due to how they were worded and thought out, or even the God of Mischief given how vexing some of the questions could be.

It would be the day she found her weapon that would reveal all…

---

“Come on, Elly. I know you have been paying attention to your lessons.” Sir Dulgear sighed.

Elly was once more on her butt. Her sword and shield to either side of her, the result of being so astoundingly disarmed. Again.

“It… It’s just doesn’t feel right, Sir.” She growled.

Dulgear knew that growl well. It was not directed at him in the least. It was directed inward. Her mother, the Lady Gallamir Pearl Makeda was one of the absolute best with a sword and shield. Having actually been her training partner when they were in Elly’s position, he could confirm it without any doubt. And he could see some of the parent’s talent in the child. Hell, she was worse with a warhammer or even a mace. They had tried many other combinations and while she wasn’t bad with any, she was never that great either.

And the forces she might have to face needed to be met with greatness in all aspects.

This girl had something in her, he knew it. It’s why he kept as an instructor. His best was in seeing through the rough bits to the shining gems that were waiting to be revealed. Still, he was getting worried. While she excelled in all other areas, she needed to be able to protect those around her as well as herself. And right now, she was barely above a regular great of soldier.

“Come on Elly. I know you can do this. Remember…”

Elly stood, picking up her arms and took her stance. “Think around the problem, then push through” she repeated. It was Sir Dulgear’s way of saying ‘stop and think’. She rather liked it, and it had fit her own way of thinking very well.

And thinking was what she was doing. Dulgear stood ready. She was to make the first move, so she had time, not forever, but some. She, too, stood. It was a perfect stance, the forms where never an issue. She could swing any weapon as is with just as much aptitude as any other recruit. Of course, those were also practice weapons designed to do little damage and be primarily for training and nothing else.

In her hand was a live sword. A dull blade, sure, and her trainer had protections all over him. But it was still a live blade.

A blade can cut with ease, sometimes too easily. She had seen even veteran guards accidently do too much damage to someone they were trying to subdue during a tavern fight. A mace can disfigure or even cause permanent brain damage with a strike to the head. A warhammer can crush unenchanted platemail with ease.

Deadly. All her options were decided to kill as their primary function, with little thought to what other potential these things might have.

Of course, staves, saps, and other blunt weapons didn’t quite feel right to her either, but they rarely served as good weapons for a Paladin. Those you would more often see in the hands of a monk or a cleric. Not that she didn’t try them. Still, a stave felt too ‘reed’y to her and even a sap felt like it would be better just to…

She had an epiphany.

Dulgear saw Elly square her shoulders and then charge him. He could already see the sword strike a mile way. Infact, there was even less finesse then before. Could Elly be getting tired? Or maybe she was about to try something? He smiled and brought up his shield rather than dodge. This lesson was about getting used to live weapons and focusing the potential of using a Paladin’s most universal and signature attack: Smite.

Sure, the magic the trainee’s were bless with only simulated the power, as they had yet to take their oaths, but the mook smite could be used against anything with a nice pop of pressure to give positive feedback for a success.

The sword hit the shield as was intended by both parties. Dulgear flicked his gaze to the shield being raised. For a split second, he wondered if she was going to try to bash him with it. She was always a touch more defensive minded then many of the other recruits, and while exceedingly rare, it was not unheard of for a paladin to make their weapon of choice some modified take on a shield.

However, he discarded that notion as soon as it came to mind. With how quick her bulky frame was, he would have been already feeling it. Clearly she was assuming he would strike back, and he did so not wanting to disappoint.

His sword came down and she moved the shield to properly block him. The clang didn’t have time to fully echo when he noticed something felt off about the block. She twisted and pulled to her right. That didn’t make any sense. That was her sword hand, and you don’t get another chance to strike if your opponent has locked swords with you.

The moment Elly felt her trainer’s sword make contact, she flicked both shield and sword down to her right, letting them go. Her foot work shifted, sliding her right foot back and around her left, before left followed along. She turned her entire body around, a clockwise spin, bringing her out of danger of counter attack as her shield was still between her and Dulgear’s sword.

The first weapons she learned would always be her most trusted. She had to use them against thieves in dark alleys when they tried to catch her unawares when on errands for her mother. She had employed them against drunks that would get a bit to roudy when she visited her uncle’s tavern. And she made plenty of use of them in play with her elder brother.

Spinning her body completely around was a showboat move, but it was the easiest way to allign her attack and make sure it connected. With concentration, she pushed the energies down her arm. Her right fist clenched within the gauntlet.

Dulgear had a split second to see Elly had already fully turned herself around, and her fists up near her face. His eyes widened in complete surprise.

Elly’s feet finished their turn and she planted the ball of her left foot to the ground, twisting her hip, continuing the force of her spin, drawing power from the earth, through her leg, the alignment of her hips, her upper body leaning into the motion and finally the strike.

The last thing Dulgear saw was the golden energy collecting at the knuckles of her gauntlet as Elly’s left fist fired out. The strike connected right against the side of Dulgear’s helmet right at his cheek. And then a burst of light blinded him as he felt his entire body followed with the arc of his head being thrown back. He flew through the air and landing square on his back several feet from where he once stood.

Pieces of her gauntlet floating in the air as her fist made it’s follow through, the armor not built to handle power flowing through it in such a fashion. The glove under was smoldering from the radiant fire that exploded from impact.

Many of the other students that had been watching, as well as a few of the teachers, were rooted to the spot in shock. They had never seen something like that from a paladin before. All of them stared save her mother, who had subbed in that day for a friend. Her smile was incandescent.

Elly didn’t mean to knock him back that hard. She ran over quickly, checking her instructor for injury. While the side of his helm was dented a bit, the magic protecting him was still intact. Fortunately for him, the wards on his armor were ‘one size fits all’ in that they didn’t just keep it to the power level that should have come through the pseudo-smite effect, but from a full attack. Of course, the enchantment was also one shot, so the helmet needed to be repaired and re-enchanted before the next time it’s used. But that was just working as intended.

What was less expected was being thrown that hardback by a punch from a girl a spare few years from full adulthood. Even one as strongly and stoutly built as Elly.

Dulgear was surprised, “That… wasn’t the test spell. You… used the power ‘Smite’. The actual ability…” It wasn’t unheard of for those that had already taken an oath to seek formal training here. Hell, he was one of those sort. When he had sworn to his god, the divine being specifically led him here for training. But no one was aware that Elly had taken any oath. In fact, by all accounts, no god seemed fit for her in any direct manner, at least if her many questions during lectures and her interesting debates with some of the scholars was any indication. “When did you take the Oath? And with whom?”

As Dulgear took her hand, Elly smiled warmly, “I took no single god. The gods are fallible. I do not deny their greatness, but nor will I ignore that if all the stories are true, they are no less weak to lying, cheating, avarice, or any other vice known to mortals. I could not swear any more devotion to a god then I would to any man.”

Once her trainer is standing again, she holds his hand in both of hers, turning his hand palm up, “Faith in a friend is a powerful thing. I have that faith in many gods. But I can not worship them. I do not worship anything. For many, worship is liberating. For me, it’s stifling.”

She looked back into his eyes, “Sir Dulgear, I swore my oath on the roof of my home, laying and staring at the stars. I had thought to myself, ‘The gods are fallible’ and I was not afraid. I was happy. A god is like a king, a force for good or ill, a seat of wisdom and a source of authority and hope. But a king can fall.”

Dulgear wanted to say something, but he remained quiet. This wasn’t just one of her debates with a scholar, she was speaking her oath. “If an Angel can fall, a Devil can transcend. A god can make a mistake just as a mortal can. And we work together, we strive for better. So to do the gods together. I seek no one master, but I vow my word to the very heart of what a Paladin is: the hand of the gods in the world of man. A hand to help, a hand to defend, and when needed a hand to bring low the true monsters of the world.”

She looked back at her sword, “Blades kill too easy. But my fists are my hands. A sword must be sheathed to be seen as peaceful. I need only open my hand and offer it to do the same.”

Having spoken it out loud for the first time in years, Elly was able to start to form a more codified version. Stepping back, she held her hand out, palm down, “The gods are fallible as are men. My oath is to the very concept of Honesty, Compassion, Honor, and Duty. That I might serve the needs of all gods, all men, all that have good will and the need of help.”

She turns her hand palm up, “The Angel can fall, and the Devil can transcend. I will give quarter to any that ask save a true monster. A true monster is that which has actively rejected all light from their heart. Such beings, whether in heaven or hell, deserve my full wrath.” She punctuates her statement by clenching her fist and punching it into her left palm.

She spread her arms wide, hands open again, “I pledge to help any that I can. To do the least harm I am able. To strike down the true monsters. To lead the fallen and the lost to the light, and I look to all the gods and all my friends to help me stay in that same light.

“My oath is to the Hallowed Hope that springs eternal in every heart”

Sir Dulgear smiled, “Unorthodox, and while I don’t fully agree, I can’t see any personal fault with your view point. Such an oath would normally be a tenous thing. Swearing to the very nature of things. So nebulous. But… you don’t look at it that way. Your faith is in a deeper ideal.” He offers his hand, “I hope you find strength in your oath always and that the gods find favor in your devotion, even if it’s not directly to them.”

Dulgear smiled. Sure, a paladin could get silly with their speachafying, but it was also a part of what they did. It wasn’t so much pageantry of words as much as their words guided by their faith and hearts. “Elizabeth Camilla Makeda of the Sacred Oath of Devotion to the Hallowed Hope. I welcome you.” He grinned wider, “Now, let's look into designing you some ‘hallowed knuckles’ to go with that oath of yours.”

#Pepper Writes #Elly #Elizabeth Camilla Makeda #Hallowed Knuckle #Paladin #Pass a fist pally

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snarktheater · 7 years ago

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Ready Player One — Level Two (Chapters 17-18)

“I’m not crazy about reality, but it’s still the only place to get a decent meal. —Groucho Marx”

Hey, at least the book isn’t quoting a fictional text that only exists in its own universe this time. That said, you know, when the quotes you give the biggest highlight to all have to do with how much the world sucks, it’s kind of killing my buzz about the whole “being alive” thing. Oh, and I guess it makes it look like you’re trying too hard to be edgy.

But I guess these are all shallow, surface problems. Let’s dig deeper as we enter Level Two and find out how much worse the infodumping gets. Because yes, it’s back in full force.

See, the book actually does justify splitting itself in multiple parts. At least for now. Specifically, it does so by way of a time skip. Well…sort of. More of a compressed time frame of a few months, which is mostly summarized to us through Wade and Artemis’s chatlogs.

Because, yeah, they’ve been chatting. Or, I should say, Wade has been harassing Artemis until she caved in and agreed to talk to him.

Parzival: Yes! Hey! I can’t believe you finally responded to one of my chat requests. Art3mis: Only to ask you to cut it out.

I will skip over the ensuing banter, because yes, of course they start bantering in spite of Artemis making it very clear she does not want to talk to him. Banter which pretty quickly takes a deep, hard dive into…questionable territory.

Parzival: So you’re telling me, definitively, that you are a female? IRL? […] After analyzing the available data, I’ve concluded that you must be a female. […] Because I don’t want to find out that I’ve got a crush on some 300 lb. dude named Chuck who lives in his mother’s basement in suburban Detroit.

I think there should be a ban on men using the word “female” as a noun. Preferably until the end of time. The correlation between that and misogyny is too high. Although, I don’t know, maybe it’s a useful alarm bell.

Artemis challenges that, and expresses suspicion that he wouldn’t care about her personality, and not “the package it comes in”. Parzival claims that he totally does, and…put a pin in that, we’ll get back to it in a short moment. But first, Artemis flat-out rejects the idea of engaging in romance with Wade, mostly on the grounds that he doesn’t really know her, only the side of her she lets him see. Which is fair, although I’m not sure if you can really act like that’s only true online (or even more true online, in their world at least).

But if you think rejection is going to deter Wade “I have stalked this girl for years on her blog” Watts, well…I mean, refusing to take no for an answer is how this chapter started, so you know that’s not happening.

So he insists. And insists. And insists some more. Oh, and did you know the Sixers tried to blow up Wade’s trailer?

Art3mis: You shouldn’t reveal stuff like that! I could be a Sixer spy trying to profile you. Parzival: The Sixers already profiled me, remember? They blew up my house. Well, it was a trailer. But they blew it up. Art3mis: I know. I’m still freaked out about that. I can only imagine how you feel. Parzival: Revenge is a dish best served cold.

You sure sound torn up about it, Wade.

Yeah, the book is basically going to flat-out ignore the ramifications of Wade’s house blowing up and him being forced to move to a new location and forge himself a new identity. No consequences—not practical ones nor emotional ones. It’s especially weird, because…moving to Columbus on the money he earns through his endorsement deals was already his plan to begin with. If the only purpose was to get Wade from point A to point B, the setup was already there. But since there’s no other consequences to IOI blowing up his home…what was the point of IOI blowing up his home? From a pure storytelling perspective, I mean? I’m just puzzled at this point.

Somehow, Artemis is still talking to Wade, so they start playing a game of one question each. We do learn that Artemis is 19 years old, studying poetry and creative writing in college. Not very important information, but it’s something. Assuming she’s telling the truth, but I’m sure she is.

And now, we get back to that “Wade doesn’t care about the package Artemis comes in, only her personality”. With bonus transphobia!

Parzival: […] Now, spill it. Are you a woman? And by that I mean are you a human female who has never had a sex-change operation? Art3mis: That’s pretty specific. Parzival: Answer the question, Claire. Art3mis: I am, and always have been, a human female.

I…hopefully don’t need to explain the problem with this, right? It’s basically transphobia 101: he states that trans women aren’t women, or at least not “really” women; he overfocuses on their body and specifically genitals (using some outdated and offensive terminology even by 2011 standards, I’m fairly certain); and they both equate genitals with gender, since Wade acts like you can only even be a woman post-transition, and Artemis’s response implies that pre-transition trans women aren’t women.

But it’s even worse in the light of that thing I told you to put a pin on. Because if Wade doesn’t care about her body, only her personality…shouldn’t it not matter that she’s trans? Hell, shouldn’t it not matter that she’s trans and pre-transition? And if he does care about her genitals, shouldn’t it still not matter that she’s trans if she’s post-transition?

I’ll stop this discussion here before I myself get too close to talking about trans people’s genitals. All I’ll say is this: if you think the transphobia is an isolated issue, you’re not thinking hard enough. With this statement, Wade doesn’t just prove he doesn’t consider trans women as real women, he also establishes that he does care about Artemis’s body.

It’s easy to make a grand statement about how you love women no matter how they look. It’s much harder to maintain that stance in how you actually talk to and about women. It’s a similar problem that plagued the Nerd Porn Auteur poem: it’s one thing to say you want all women and all body types to be viewed as attractive, but when the rest of your poem clearly establishes that you just want to enforce your own standard, it belies your thesis statement.

For the record, I knew this quote was coming, but it’s still awful to read, especially in the context of this guy harassing her into talking to him in the first place, and repeatedly making advances at her in spite of her constant rejection.

You’d think there would be some lull in the misogyny in this book, but apparently that’s a tall order.

Finally, Artemis says she has to go, and says they shouldn’t talk again until one of them finds the egg. Wade’s reaction?

Parzival: Can I at least keep e-mailing you? […] You can’t stop me from e-mailing you. Art3mis: Actually, I can. I can block you on my contact list. Parzival: You wouldn’t do that, though. Would you? Art3mis: Not if you don’t force me to. Parzival: Harsh. Unnecessarily harsh.

You’re literally saying you’ll harass her more, so…no, clearly it’s not “unnecessarily harsh”, it’s exactly the right response.

So of course, after a scene break…

I started e-mailing her.

Yup. He starts emailing her weekly, and Artemis, for some reason that’s totally unrelated to being written by a man who’s likely never experienced that kind of harassment and also has no empathy for the people who do, replies to him. Well, not just replies to him; she starts going back and forth and goes all the way to meeting him in private chatrooms.

We played vintage board games, watched movies, and listened to music. We talked for hours. Long, rambling conversations about everything under the sun. Spending time with her was intoxicating. We seemed to have everything in common. We shared the same interests. We were driven by the same goal. She got all of my jokes. She made me laugh. She made me think. She changed the way I saw the world. I’d never had such a powerful, immediate connection with another human being before. Not even with Aech.

For the record, while this is still pretty shallow character and relationship development, I feel like this might be the closest we’ll get to fleshing things out in this book. This is as good as it gets. Or…as good as it’s gotten so far, I should probably say. I have my expectations for what comes next, but it’s wrong to assume, kids.

Speaking of rushed relationship development, we’re now in full skimming mode, to the point where Wade and Artemis now share their research regarding the Hunt, even though that’s basically antithetical to both their established characters. Is this what love is for straight people, becoming the opposite of who you were before? No wonder they have so many hang-ups about marriage.

Wade also tells us about how he missed his graduation and got his diploma by email, and…you gotta wonder at which point the Sixers will catch on to him still being alive, you know. I mean, the endorsement ads with Parzival, I can get that these could go on with Wade dead. But school? Did nobody even bother to identify the corpses in the stack?

If you think I’m asking this for something utterly trivial, don’t worry, we’ll get back to that too. But enough about the plot; I guess we’re giving up on it now.

When I finished school, I’d intended to devote all of my time to the Hunt. But all I really wanted to do was spend time with Art3mis.

Yeah. The girl’s what distracted you from the Hunt. Not the attempt against your life, though. That barely registered as a blip on the radar.

We also get a brief recap of Wade leveling up to 99, the maximum level in the OASIS. This includes a description of a quest where he and Artemis play as characters from the Goonies. And you might be wondering: wait, weren’t the flicksyncs supposed to be this revolutionary new feature? Well, apparently all the quests in the OASIS (or most of them, anyway) are also based on just…replaying the story of existing properties. In fact, it’s starting to look like the OASIS has two types of planets: the ones built by players, like IOI’s planets, and the ones that are built to match existing properties. Which begs the question: what was the OASIS’s launch content, when it had neither of these? Just the starting planet and Ludus?

Anyway, the book suddenly remembers about the Easter Egg, in the most random of fashions imaginable: by having Wade go on a rant about how there are no longer toys in cereal boxes.

It was a tragedy, in my opinion. Another sign that civilization was going straight down the tubes.

Yeah. Toys in cereals, the true canary in the civilization coal mine. Good job there.

But anyway. From this, Wade remembers a hacker from the ’70s (and…yeah, the 70s are fair game all of a sudden) who took on the moniker Captain Crunch, who used the toy whistle from the eponymous cereal to hack into analog phones. From this, wade decides that “the captain” and “the whistle” in the Quatrain are references to…the cereal. Not the hacker. Sure sounds to me like you’re stretching the guess a little far there, book.

I mean, even if he’d stuck to just making the connection, this is still just the character getting divine inspiration to solve the puzzle. Nothing of actual import causes this reveal. This passage is literally introduced as “Then, one morning” and him thinking of the connection. Because, you know, it’s not like giving your readers a riddle they’re able to solve along with the characters would keep them engaged or anything.

And with that random epiphany out of the way, we’re back to a whole lot of nothing, since Eureka moments are apparently the only way Wade solves any of the riddles. And by “nothing” I mean more obsessing over Artemis, and how he wants to meet her face to face, even though earlier this chapter he wouldn’t even send her a picture of himself.

I was certain she had strong feelings for me, but she also kept me at a distance. No matter how much I revealed about myself to her—and I wound up revealing just about everything, including my real name—she always adamantly refused to reveal any details about her own life. All I knew was that she was nineteen and that she lived somewhere in the Pacific Northwest. That was all she would tell me.

You know, the impression I’m getting from this is that you misread her completely and she’s not interested. I mean, she keeps rejecting your attempts at communication unless you pressure her so much that it’s easier to just talk to you, and she won’t give any personal detail. That does not strike me as someone who’s into you.

Wade also grows distant from Aech in this time, because fuck friendship now that he has a woman to stalk, I guess. I mean, of course, they barely qualified as friends in the first place, so…no big loss there.

Somehow, without my realizing it, my obsession with finding Halliday’s Easter egg was gradually being supplanted by my obsession with Art3mis.

I was informed that I used the “Big red flags” gif too soon last time, and…yeah, I’m seeing why now. This is just the worst case scenario. You’re romanticizing some really unhealthy behavior there, book.

And it keeps going. They go on dates now! In the OASIS of course. And they do so in spite of Artemis protesting that it’s not safe for Wade to make public appearances, since, again, IOI wants him dead. Plus, they’re afraid of tabloids.

But there was one exception. One night, she took me to see the Rocky Horror Picture Show in a huge stadium-sized movie theater on the planet Transsexual, where they held the most highly attended and longest-running weekly screening of the movie in the OASIS.

Oh dear. Let’s…let’s move on. I’m not touching the fact that the book dropped Rocky Horror in the same chapter as it featured an incredibly transphobic statement. Someone more qualified will have to take that one.

That night was easily the most fun I’d ever had in my life up to that point. I told Art3mis so afterward, and that was when she leaned over and kissed me for the first time. I couldn’t feel it, of course. But it still set my heart racing.

Yes, yes. I know. Obviously the book means for her to be into him and all my earlier ranting about her not being interested was wrong. Ha, ha. Except, you know, not. Of course she’ll fall for him—she’s designed to, as the love interest. The issue is with what the book chose to portray as her being interested. That is to say, her showing every sign of disinterest. Which is rape culture. No, I’m not mincing words—it is. Equating a woman’s constant rejection to her being into you is exactly what rape culture is about. If you look at what rapists say when on trial, the defense is almost always a variation on “I thought she wanted it”. So this book, providing a fantasy where she really is into it, deep down…yeah, it’s rape culture. And if that phrase sets off your triggers and you have a problem with that, big whoop, just re-read the paragraph and skip them this time. The message still stands.

Thankfully, we don’t have to deal with them being together for too long.

And then one night, like a complete idiot, I told her how I felt.

Well, mostly because the book probably couldn’t handle writing a romance where the characters actually are together for very long, what with its inability to write emotions. But sure, let’s go with “telling someone how you feel about them is an idiot move”. There’s no way that could feed into toxic masculinity or some bad relationship advice.

So, after this line, we get a chapter break, which I guess is supposed to act as a cliffhanger of sorts, since after that the book backtracks a little to set the stage. I’ll go over this quickly: remember Ogden Morrow, Halliday’s best friend? He hosts his birthday party in the OASIS every year, and it’s a big exclusive event, and of course the High Five are invited. Aech is busy, Daito and Shoto never enter a PvP area unless necessary, which leaves Artemis and Wade. Artemis wants to go, and Wade decides to as well to impress her or something.

She said she couldn’t pass up an invitation from Og himself, despite the obvious risks. So, naturally, I told her I would meet her there at the club. It was the only way I could avoid looking like a total wuss.

Wow. You big strong manly man. I’m sure she’ll swoon right into your arms and—oh wait, you ended the previous chapter by telling us you were gonna confess your feelings and it’d end badly. You kinda blew your load early there to be trying to milk some tension out of this there, buddy.

And I hear you. Back up, you say, a PvP zone? Yes! Ogden Morrow has his party in “the Distracted Globe, shortened to ”the Globe". No Shakespeare involved here, since he’s not from the 80s; instead, it’s a zero-gravity dance club. Except you can swim and dance in zero gravity, because this book for nerds didn’t think to research its physics properly. I mean, what are the odds that a bunch of nerds would criticize the science of your science fiction book, right?

And it’s also a PvP zone. I guess Ogden’s party runs on the honor system and hopes that no one is going to attack anyone here.

The book spends a massive paragraph describing Wade’s car to us. It’s a modified DeLorean crammed with references to other sci-fi movies, because apparently, the book doesn’t understand class. And yes, I’m forced to point out that Cline has a very real version of this car:

Which…okay, not the worst thing ever, I guess, but don’t you think it’s a little on the nose?

After this (and another paragraph telling us how everyone will want to steal his car, but it doesn’t matter, because he has a miniaturizing spell and keeps the car on his person, because MMORPGs letting you put your mounts in your inventory is not a concept that the author has heard of), it’s on to the party. In which Artemis and Wade name-drop a bunch of songs, and…dance. Kind of.

Her avatar lost its human form and dissolved into a pulsing amorphous blob that changed its size and color in synch with the music. I selected the mirror partner option on my dance software and began to do the same. My avatar’s limbs and torso began to flow and spin like taffy, encircling Art3mis, while strange color patterns flowed and shifted across my skin.

Is this someone’s kink? I’m extremely confused that this is the imagery you chose to go for, especially when the book tells us everyone else on the (spherical, zero-gravity) dance floor starts following suit and dancing as colored blobs.

After this, it’s time for the cliché slow dance, and Wade tells Artemis he’s in love with her.

“You aren’t in love with me, Z,” she said. “You don’t even know me.” […] “You only see what I want you to see.” She placed a hand on her chest. “This isn’t my real body, Wade. Or my real face.” “I don’t care! I’m in love with your mind—with the person you are. I couldn’t care less about the packaging.” “You’re just saying that,” she said. There was an unsteadiness in her voice. “Trust me. If I ever let you see me in person, you would be repulsed.”

Such foreshadowing. As for his statement…see my earlier rant about his transphobic statement.

Once again, Artemis keeps telling him no, Wade keeps insisting, and she decides they have to stop hanging out.

“Are you breaking up with me?” “No, Z,” she said firmly. “I am not breaking up with you. That would be impossible, because we are not together.” There was suddenly venom in her voice. “We’ve never even met!”

She’s right, of course. But before the book can linger on that detail for too long, let’s have the Sixers randomly attack the club! Which they do by sending troops inside, even though we established the game has nukes already and they could just make the whole place explode without wasting any avatars. Whatever. Fight scene time.

Then I realized that most of the Sixers’ incoming fire seemed to be directed at me and Art3mis. They were here to kill the two of us. […] I knew my own recklessness had brought them down on us. I cursed myself for being so foolish.

…Are you implying Artemis wouldn’t have been a valuable enough target? No, of course it’s all about you. Dick.

This scene, by the way, goes nowhere. It’s devoid of tension. Mostly because, before anything really major can happen, Ogden reveals that he apparently has god mode turned on, and fries all the Sixers in the club. Thus also making the attack entirely pointless. Well, unless Ogden does turn out to be the main villain and this is a showcase of the threat he is. Which I’m still somewhat convinced he might be. Or should be.

But anyway, when the dust settles, Artemis is gone, and Wade is sad, I guess. Boo hoo. Whatever shall he do, the object of his obsession is gone.

#ready player one #ernest cline #book reviews #ya books #young adult #books #young adult books #ya #reviews #book #book review #review #st: ready player one

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dfroza · 3 years ago

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the importance of communicating truth.

and to trust that our faith has overcome this world with its death and despair.

Today’s reading of the Scriptures from the New Testament is the 1st chapter of the Letter of 1st Timothy:

Paul, an emissary of Jesus the Anointed commissioned by order of God our Savior and Jesus the Anointed, our living and certain hope), to you, Timothy, my true son in the faith.

May the grace, mercy, and peace that come only from God the Father and our Lord Jesus the Anointed mark your life.

As I said that day I left for Macedonia, stay in Ephesus and instruct the unruly people in the church, once and for all, to stop teaching a different doctrine. Tell them to turn away from fables and endless genealogies. These activities just cause more arguments and confusion. Instead, they should concern themselves with welcoming in and bringing about the reign of God, which is all about faith. Our teaching about this journey is intended to bring us to a single destination—a place where self-giving love reigns from a pure heart, a clean conscience, and a genuine faith. Yes, some have walked away from these traits and have fallen into a life of endless blabber and nonsense— they wish to become scholars of the law, but they don’t know what they are talking about, and they make these grand pronouncements but clearly don’t understand what they just said.

You and I know the law is good (if used in the right way), and we also know the law was not designed for law-abiding people but for lawbreakers and criminals, the ungodly and sin-filled, the unholy and worldly, the father killers and mother killers, the murderers, the sexually immoral and homosexuals, slave dealers, liars, perjurers, and anyone else who acts against the sound doctrine laid out in the glorious, holy, and pure good news of the blessed God that has been entrusted to me.

I thank our Lord Jesus the Anointed who empowers me, because He saw me as faithful and appointed me to this ministry. Despite the fact that at one time I was slandering the things of God, persecuting and attacking His people, He was still merciful to me because I acted in ignorance apart from faith. But He poured His grace over me, and I was flooded in an abundance of the grace and faith and love that can only be found in Jesus the Anointed.

Here’s a statement worthy of trust: Jesus the Anointed, the Liberating King, came into the world to save sinners, and I am the worst of them all. But it is for this reason I was given mercy: by displaying His perfect patience in me, the very worst of all sinners, Jesus the Anointed could show that patience to all who would believe in Him and gain eternal life. May the King eternal, immortal, and invisible—the one and only God—now be honored and glorified forever and ever. Amen.

Timothy, my dear child, I am placing before you a charge for the mission ahead. It is in total agreement with the prophecies once spoken over you. Here it is: with God’s message stirring and directing you, fight the good fight, armed with faith and a good conscience. Some have tried to silence their consciences, wrecking their lives and ruining their faiths. Hymenaeus and Alexander are among these; I have had to hand them over to Satan so they might learn not to speak against God.

The Letter of 1st Timothy, Chapter 1 (The Voice)

Today’s paired chapter of the Testaments is the 27th chapter of the book of Jeremiah that warns the people against following lies:

Early in the reign of Zedekiah son of Josiah king of Judah, Jeremiah received this Message from God: “Make a harness and a yoke and then harness yourself up. Send a message to the kings of Edom, Moab, Ammon, Tyre, and Sidon. Send it through their ambassadors who have come to Jerusalem to see Zedekiah king of Judah. Give them this charge to take back to their masters: ‘This is a Message from God-of-the-Angel-Armies, the God of Israel. Tell your masters:

“‘I’m the one who made the earth, man and woman, and all the animals in the world. I did it on my own without asking anyone’s help and I hand it out to whomever I will. Here and now I give all these lands over to my servant Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon. I have made even the wild animals subject to him. All nations will be under him, then his son, and then his grandson. Then his country’s time will be up and the tables will be turned: Babylon will be the underdog servant. But until then, any nation or kingdom that won’t submit to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon must take the yoke of the king of Babylon and harness up. I’ll punish that nation with war and starvation and disease until I’ve got them where I want them.

“‘So don’t for a minute listen to all your prophets and spiritualists and fortunetellers, who claim to know the future and who tell you not to give in to the king of Babylon. They’re handing you a line of lies, barefaced lies, that will end up putting you in exile far from home. I myself will drive you out of your lands, and that’ll be the end of you. But the nation that accepts the yoke of the king of Babylon and does what he says, I’ll let that nation stay right where it is, minding its own business.’”

Then I gave this same message to Zedekiah king of Judah: “Harness yourself up to the yoke of the king of Babylon. Serve him and his people. Live a long life! Why choose to get killed or starve to death or get sick and die, which is what God has threatened to any nation that won’t throw its lot in with Babylon? Don’t listen to the prophets who are telling you not to submit to the king of Babylon. They’re telling you lies, preaching lies. God’s Word on this is, ‘I didn’t send those prophets, but they keep preaching lies, claiming I sent them. If you listen to them, I’ll end up driving you out of here and that will be the end of you, both you and the lying prophets.’”

And finally I spoke to the priests and the people at large: “This is God’s Message: Don’t listen to the preaching of the prophets who keep telling you, ‘Trust us: The furnishings, plundered from God’s Temple, are going to be returned from Babylon any day now.’ That’s a lie. Don’t listen to them. Submit to the king of Babylon and live a long life. Why do something that will destroy this city and leave it a heap of rubble? If they are real prophets and have a Message from God, let them come to God-of-the-Angel-Armies in prayer so that the furnishings that are still left in God’s Temple, the king’s palace, and Jerusalem aren’t also lost to Babylon. That’s because God-of-the-Angel-Armies has already spoken about the Temple furnishings that remain—the pillars, the great bronze basin, the stands, and all the other bowls and chalices that Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon didn’t take when he took Jehoiachin son of Jehoiakim off to Babylonian exile along with all the leaders of Judah and Jerusalem. He said that the furnishings left behind in the Temple of God and in the royal palace and in Jerusalem will be taken off to Babylon and stay there until, in God’s words, ‘I take the matter up again and bring them back where they belong.’”

The Book of Jeremiah, Chapter 27 (The Message)

A link to my personal reading of the Scriptures for Thursday, September 9 of 2021 with a paired chapter from each Testament of the Bible along with Today’s Proverbs and Psalms

A post by John Parsons about sowing and reaping:

"Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap. The one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life" (Gal. 6:8). Here we see the importance of feeding the divine nature given to us in Messiah - to "sow" or "plant" truth within our hearts so that we will yield the "fruit of righteousness." However, feeding the lower nature, gratifying the desires of the flesh, disregarding the truth of eternity for the sake of temporal pleasure, and so on, leads to corruption and to death. Spirituality (רוּחניוּת), then, is of utmost importance to us, as we learn to "renew our minds" and yield ourselves to the truth of God (Gal. 5:16).

We are engaged in the battle daily - an internal struggle to direct our hearts and to make the decision to be awake to the Lord’s Presence or to surrender to our fallenness, fear, and despair. The Lord has promised us his very strength for the battle, but we must choose to believe in order to receive the blessing. Since God will surely help us as we seek to do His will (see 1 John 5:14), let us therefore draw near to the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need (Heb. 4:16). God makes the way of escape (1 Cor. 10:13). The LORD God Almighty says to your heart: "Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God: I will strengthen you, yea, I will help you, yea, I will uphold you the right hand of my righteousness (Isa. 41:10). [Hebrew for Christians]

and another about Atonement:

Rosh Hashanah is called Yom Ha-Din (יוֹם הַדִּין), the “Day of Judgment,” whereas Yom Kippur is called Yom Ha-Rachamim (יוֹם הָרַחֲמִים), or the “Day of Mercies,” which suggests that God is first revealed as our Creator and Judge before He is known as our merciful Savior. This is hinted in the two accounts of creation, where God is first revealed as Elohim (Gen. 1:1), but later is revealed as YHVH (יהוה) when He breathed life into man nishmat chayim, the breath of life (Gen. 2:4). It is somewhat odd, however, that during Rosh Hashanah we do not approach God as our Judge, beating our breast in sorrow during confession of sin, as we do on Yom Kippur. Some say the reason we celebrate, eating special foods, rejoicing, listening to the shofar, is because we rejoice in the kingship of God as His royal children, and only later do we appeal to Him as merciful Judge in light of His revelation as YHVH, our Savior, Redeemer, and Lord. As believers in Yeshua, we have all the more reason to rejoice on Rosh Hashanah, since at the cross Yeshua took upon Himself our judgment to give us everlasting mercy from God. [Hebrew for Christians]

9.8.21 • Facebook

Today’s message (Days of Praise) from the Institute for Creation Research

September 9, 2021

God's Remnant

“It may be the LORD thy God will hear all the words of Rabshakeh, whom the king of Assyria his master hath sent to reproach the living God; and will reprove the words which the LORD thy God hath heard: wherefore lift up thy prayer for the remnant that are left.” (2 Kings 19:4)

These words were part of King Hezekiah’s plea to Isaiah for help in prayer against Rabshakeh and the Assyrian army besieging Jerusalem. It marks the second time in which this particular word is used for “the remnant,” the first being in Genesis 45:7, when Joseph assured his brothers that God had sent him into Egypt to preserve for Israel “a posterity” in the earth. However, this word (Hebrew sherith) is prominent later in the writings of the prophets, who frequently refer to the faithful Israelite “remnant” during times of apostasy.

The same doctrine appears in the New Testament. Speaking of the children of Israel during the time of their dispersion among the nations because of their rejection of Christ, Paul says: “Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace” (Romans 11:5). There are many Jews even today who have received Jesus as their Messiah and personal Savior, even though Israel as a nation still rejects Him.

This biblical doctrine of the remnant applies especially to faithful Israelites who witness to God’s truth even in times of national apostasy. Nevertheless, the principle seems also to apply to so-called Christian nations as well—such as the nations of Europe and America. Although nominally “Christian,” each of these nations, like the church at Sardis, “hast a name that thou livest, and art dead” (Revelation 3:1), as far as true biblical Christianity is concerned. Nevertheless, in each, there is still a remnant of real, believing Christians, and these have the great responsibility to maintain a true witness for Christ in just such a time as this. HMM

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jbankai89 · 7 years ago

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Do You Believe in Fairies? [2/5]

A/N: Posting this a little earlier than I intended. Enjoy! :)

Chapter Two – The Companion's Song

“Your highness,” Guang-Hong said uncertainly, “forgive me, I still do not understand...what am I doing here?”

The human looked up at the Fairy Tree as he spoke. It hugged the edge of the river, and its branches grew out like a living spiral staircase into the grand home that was built high in the canopy. Guang-Hong regarded it nervously, as though his eyes were being cheated by some spell. Yuri had heard that many humans feared high places, though it was also possible that Guang-Hong had never been invited to the home of one of the Royal Court before, and was thus intimidated by it.

“Did King Oberon not tell you why I called for you?” Yuri asked as he touched the human's cheek, and he watched as the human flushed a deep scarlet, and took a small, nervous step back.

“He just said you wanted me, your highness,” Guang-Hong replied in the same soft tone, “he did not say why.”

“I want you as my Companion,” Yuri said gently, as though he was speaking to a skittish deer, “do you know what that word means?”

“In the human world, it has many meanings,” Guang-Hong replied, though his nervous tone did not abate following Yuri's brief explanation. “With Fae...if I remember, it is something like a familiar?”

“Essentially, yes,” Yuri said as he nodded. “A human Companion is a friend, sometimes an advisor.” Yuri waved his hand invitingly, and he led Guang-Hong up the tree's branches and into the high canopy.

High above, planks of highly polished wood rested upon the sturdier branches, creating square flooring beneath the leaves of the trees, protecting Yuri's various belongings—food, furniture, and his mementos from his grandfather from the elements. There were no confining walls like one might find in a human home, though there was a partition in the sleeping area to provide a little privacy while they changed clothes. Birdsong filled the air, but none dared land in Yuri's home without his express permission. Despite Viktor taking over the throne, he was still a prince, and that still garnered a certain level of respect from both the birds and the beasts of the forest.

Yuri climbed higher, stopping in the area of the tree that served as the kitchens, and he produced a platter of seed cakes and maple water for his guest. Guang-Hong accepted the food and drink graciously, while Yuri sat down across from him to watch him eat and speak further on what he wanted of the pretty young human.

“What I want from you, quite simply, is to teach me about humans,” Yuri explained, and ignored Guang-Hong's look of mild surprise as he continued. “The human that I want, he does not believe in Fae. I do not wish to take him in the ways of my people, by kidnapping or trickery, or by striking a bargain with his family. I wish to have him only if he chooses to have me.”

“How strange,” Guang-Hong said in that same soft, delicate tone of his, and tilted his head to the side. “I mean no offence, your highness, but it's just that I have never met Fae before that wished to not kidnap their beloved.”

“None taken,” Yuri replied, and touched Guang-Hong's hand gently. “You needn't be nervous, I will not send you away as frivolously as some of my kin.” He paused and poured himself some of the maple water, which he sipped while he thought on how to best answer the human's remark.

“It does not make sense, even to me, why I wish to do this for my human,” Yuri said after a moment of contemplative silence, “he is...special. He exudes such strength without lifting a finger, and I am always impressed by the books he reads. I do not know where he gets them, he dresses like a commoner, and they are clearly books for the higher classes. He comes so close to the territory of Fae without fear—even most nonbelievers avoid this place, but he doesn't. Nothing frightens him, and I do not wish to take his strength from him by kidnapping or tricking him. I want his strength to remain. I just don't know how to make him see me, or how to court him in the way a human might.”

“If it is not too bold to say, your highness, I think it is very noble of you to treat your intended with such...respect,” Guang-Hong said, and his expression brightened when Yuri did not take offence to his statement. “If you wish it, I could go to this village as a travelling Bard, perhaps befriend your intended, and go with him to his reading place, and play. Is music not one of the few times Fae may show themselves to anyone, even the nonbelievers, and dance?”

“This is true...” Yuri paused as he cradled his chin in his hand thoughtfully. He had no concerns that Guang-Hong might double-cross him and use it as an excuse to flee the Court. He had been theirs for many centuries, and was as close to kin as he could be, but so too did Yuri know how lovely his beloved was. Humans, so full of love, both sexual and emotional, sometimes cannot control these feelings; not how a Fae child could. “I will let you go to him, but before I do, I need to ensure that you will behave yourself before my intended.”

“Anything, your highness,” Guang-Hong said at once, his voice just on the side of breathless, and watched as Yuri produced a small crystal vial in one hand, while the other he twirled through the air with a flourish, ending with his fingers pointing skyward, as though he was holding something delicately in his empty hand. Guang-Hong's breath caught, and a light pink, iridescent smoke trickled from between the human's lips, ambled slowly through the air, and poured itself into the vial. Yuri corked it, and stowed it carefully in the pocket of his breeches.

“Your—your highness...what did you do?” Guang-Hong asked, his eyes wide, and he pressed a hand to his chest. “I feel...I feel...cold.”

“I took your love from you,” Yuri explained, and brushed his fingers across the back of the human's hand. This time, he did not react to the intimate touch. “I left enough that you would not become a creature without conscience, but your romantic and sexual love are mine, temporarily. I do not want you falling in love with my human.”

“Your highness, I would never—!” Guang-Hong protested, his eyes widening with shock, but Yuri merely offered him a rare smile.

“It is merely a precaution. You have not met my human yet, and soon you will see why it would be so easy to fall in love with him.”

~*~

The following day, Yuri went with Guang-Hong to the gardens, and he helped the Fae pick out a rose for his intended.

“I like this one,” Yuri said as he lifted the long-stemmed bloom. It was perfectly formed, its petals a deep red, and its fragrance was sweet, but not cloyingly so.

“It's perfect, your highness,” Guang-Hong said with a small smile, “any believer will know where such a bloom comes from; perhaps they will be able to aid in swaying the beliefs of your intended.”

“Perhaps, but my faith is in your plan. If all else fails, I know your ability with a lyre will aid in opening his eyes.” Yuri spoke as he cut the rose, and with a delicate brush of his fingers, he removed the thorns one by one. He then crouched to the ground, and chirruped.

Out of the woods darted a cat. It appeared to be a simple domesticated feline; long of body, with thick, light brown fur, but a darker shade on his paws and face, as though he'd stepped into an ink pot and drunk from it.

The little creature stopped in front of Yuri and mewed, bowing respectfully before it sat down and gazed up at the Fae with a look of inquiry in its brilliant blue eyes.

“Take this to my intended,” Yuri said as he pressed his fingers to his temple, then moved them to the cat and tapped it just below the ear. “Can you see his face in your mind?” The cat meowed again in affirmation. “Good; go to him.” He offered the rose to the feline, and it bit down gently upon the stem before it wove back into the trees and disappeared.

Yuri straightened up, and strode over to Guang-Hong. The human mirrored him, and regarded Yuri with equal parts fear and respect. Yuri cradled his cheek in his hand, and pressed a kiss to his forehead.

“Go in good health,” Yuri said, and pressed something into into the human's hand. Guang-Hong looked down curiously, uncurling his fingers to see a small cloth parcel resting against his palm. Guang-Hong tugged on the twine, and inside the cloth he found a small pile of ruby red, teardrop-shaped berries.

“If you find yourself struggling to befriend my beloved, offer him some of these after eating a few yourself,” Yuri explained, “they are wolfberries, and invite friendship to those who eat them.”

“Thank you, your highness,” Guang-Hong said with a small smile before he tied back up the little bundle and pocketed it carefully. “I will not fail.”

“I have every faith in you,” Yuri replied immediately, and kissed Guang-Hong's cheek. Even without his love, the small show of friendly affection brought a bashful smile to the human's face.

Yuri walked with Guang-Hong to the edge of the wood closest to the village. He kissed his Companion's cheek one last time, and watched him walk away, knowing that his love of the Fae and his fealty to Yuri would keep him from abandoning his task.

The Fae Prince had every confidence in his newfound friend.

~*~

Guang-Hong was gone for three days.

On the first day, the Reading Man returned to his usual spot near the forest alone, but instead of a book for reading, he brought with him four things—a journal, a pen and ink, and a familiar-looking rose.

Yuri bit his lip nervously was he watched his human sit down with his knees brought close to his chest, and he pressed the journal against the dark material of his breeches. He balanced the ink pot on a flat rock, and rested the rose on the grass next to him. After he dipped the pen in the ink, he sketched the rose roughly, and yet despite his clumsy human hands, he managed to capture the beauty of the bloom without even trying. It was little more than a coarse line drawing, and the wet ink seemed to sparkle in the midday sun.

Below the drawing the Reading Man began to write, and Yuri bowed over his shoulder to read.

Who are you?

Of all the strange events to happen in my life, none compare to a cat wandering into my father's smithy and resting this rose upon my anvil, only to scurry off as quickly as it had come.

Had my father not witnessed it, I doubt he would have ever believed me otherwise. He and Mother are very excited by this, and they say that I have won the affection of a Fairy. They say it will bring good fortune on our lives, and they urged me to accept this offering, because Fae are quick to anger, and would not look kindly upon a refusal of such a heartfelt offering.

Fairies? Ridiculous.

The whole town is enamoured with the concept of Fairies; it's maddening. Whoever sent this rose is a real person with a well-trained cat, not some sort of magical demigod. I do hope that it is a man, at least, for my interest in the fairer sex is spotty, at best.

A newcomer came to town today, and approached me at the inn's tavern. He bought me a tankard of mead, and broke bread with me. He was kind, but something tells me that he was the sender of the rose.

I sincerely hope that it is not the soon-to-be king. I know that Prince Jean-Jacques only showers me with material affection because it infuriates his father and his fiancée. Nothing would come of it I'm certain, which is a blessing. I hold the same feelings for him as I do hair lice—that is to say, little more than an annoyance that is difficult to get rid of.

The Reading Man sat and wrote almost continually for most of the afternoon. He paused to discard his shirt when the flecks of ink began to dot his sleeves, and Yuri felt his mouth go very dry at the sight of him.

His beauty of the face was matched only by his godlike physique. Muscle straining against tan flesh, it spoke of his work as a blacksmith, and Yuri yearned to touch him; feel him, watch his face in the throes of pleasure.

His beloved was perfect, of that Yuri was certain.

As the afternoon passed, his human paused in his scribblings to wander to the stream to clean his hands of the ink, have a drink, and then search for some food.

Like last time, he did not seem to question the existence of a fully-grown peach tree, heavy with fruit, so close to the edge of the wood, nor that it was the wrong season or clime for such a thing. He plucked the fruit from the tree, and Yuri gritted his teeth in frustration.

After his human ate, he returned to his journal, and continued to muse about who may have sent him the gift. He came back to Guang-Hong several times, and scoffed at the suggestion that it was Fairies. Each negative remark made Yuri ache with sadness, and at dusk when his human blew gently on the ink to dry it before he closed the journal, packed up, and headed home, Yuri learnt something new, for the Reading Man had signed his name.

Otabek Altin.

~*~

On the second day, Otabek returned to his usual spot, but this time with someone else in tow.

Yuri smiled when he recognized Guang-Hong.

“You're quite brazen for a h—erm, for coming out here, I mean,” Guang-Hong said, his gaze fixed resolutely upon Otabek as he spoke, but Yuri did not miss the brief flick of his eyes over to where Yuri watched, smiling and nodding encouragingly to his Companion as he refocused his eyes on Yuri's intended.

“Why's that?” Otabek asked, his voice rumbling from his throat in a mild, almost emotionless tone of voice.

“Well, aren't these woods supposed to be the realm of the Fairy King and his subjects?” Guang-Hong asked innocently, “they always want firstborn sons when they can get them.”

“There is no such thing as fairies,” Otabek said firmly, his voice quivering as though he was just barely keeping his anger in check. “I wish people like you would start seeing sense. Little wingèd creatures who flutter around stealing children and cobbling shoes? It's ridiculous.”

“Well, if you are so certain that they do not exist, why not lure one out?” Guang-Hong asked in the same honey-sweet, innocent tone, and he arched a brow at Otabek in challenge. “What do you have to lose? If you are right, nothing will happen. If I am right, well, I think you will have a lot of apologies to mete out.”

Otabek hesitated; Yuri held his breath.

“All you need to do is bring a few leaves of foxglove with you back to this place,” Guang-Hong explained quickly, “and I will bring my lyre. All Fae love music and dance.”

Otabek did not speak for a long moment, but crossed his arms as he narrowed his eyes at Guang-Hong suspiciously.

“How do I know that this is not some sort of trick?”

“Trick?” Guang-Hong asked, and cocked his head to the side.

“Yes, trick,” Otabek said, “how do I not know if you planned this with someone from the village, and if we do this...thing, all I will see is one of your companions with false wings pasted to his back?”

Yuri bit the inside of his cheek to stifle his laughter at Otabek's very apropos use of the word companion. Guang-Hong seemed to be having a similar experience, and he was pressing his lips together hard enough that they had turned white. When he'd calmed down, he spoke with the same air of challenge in his voice, one Yuri knew that Otabek would not back down from.

“Well, that's just a risk you'll have to take, now isn't it?”

~*~

The third day arrived, and Yuri rose with the sun to prepare for his dance with his human.

Yuri used his opal comb to free his hair of tangles, and he plied the sprites with fresh cream and clover honey in order to have them help him braid it. They wove threads of white gold through his hair, and he dressed in a silvery-grey tunic and white breeches, ending in fitted silver slippers and white stockings.

Yuri completed his look with the diadem that he had never before worn outside of the Royal Court. It was a simple circlet of moonstone dotted with tumbled jasper and tiger's eye, the crystals standing out starkly against his yellow hair.

As he descended from his home and made for his human, Yuri could hear the gentle, excitable whispers of the other Fae of the Court follow him as he strode from the fairy ring and towards the edge of the wood.

“...going to court a human...”

“...I've never seen Prince Yuri put so much work into his appearance before, he must be quite taken with this human...”

“...I hear it's a nonbeliever, one he has been trying to shift the views of for quite some time...”

“Scandelous!”

“Don't they have anything better to do than gossip?” Yuri muttered to himself as he passed another cluster of whispering Fae.

“Well, it is uncommon for them to see their prince so immaculately dressed,” a voice said, and Yuri ground his teeth together in annoyance as King Oberon fell into step with him. “I hear you even sent off my son that I gave to you to try and sway your human. He must be something quite special if you put this much effort into claiming him for yourself. Maybe I should—”

“—no, Viktor,” Yuri interrupted, his voice just short of a growl, “if you see him, you will want him all for yourself. I saw him first. You already took the throne from me,” Yuri's voice wavered for a moment, and dropped to a whisper. “Please...don't take my human too.”

Yuri bit back a curse when his voice cracked. Before he could blink, Viktor dragged him into a bone-crushing hug, and he pressed a kiss to Yuri's forehead.

“You know that I cannot control the lines of succession,” Viktor said gently, softly enough that they would not be overheard. “My ascension to the throne was predetermined, you know that.”

Yuri debated the pros and cons of debating with the king how predetermined it actually was, given that many the mystics had been uncomfortably close with the current king, even before he took the throne. However, Yuri did not want to darken this day of all days with such talk, and instead he chose to not answer. Viktor seemed to understand, and kissed his temple lightly.

“Go in good health,” he said, and Yuri nodded.

“And you, your majesty.”

Yuri resumed his walk, and as he ventured farther from the Court, the whispering stragglers, both human and Fae alike, petered out. He was left to walk alone, save for the occasional curious woodland creature who would join him for a time.

As he approached the edge of the forest, Yuri felt his skin tickle in an irresistible pull towards Otabek's usual spot. Yuri smiled to himself; this sensation was proof enough that his human had brought the foxglove.

Barely ten feet from the break in the trees, Yuri could clearly hear two distinct voices speaking to one another.

“Did you bring the foxglove leaves?” Guang-Hong asked.

“Yes,” Otabek groused, “this better be worth it. It cost me my entire morning's wages for these things.”

“Are you telling me you're beginning to believe?”

“I'm telling you that you'll owe me fifteen silver pieces when nothing happens.”

“Fine, fine, you'll be eating your words soon enough, my friend,” Guang-Hong said teasingly. “Are you ready?” Yuri heard the soft plucking of a stringed instrument being tuned. He heard Otabek grunt in affirmation, and slowly, a sweet, tinkling melody floated through the air.

Yuri recognized the music easily; it was a simplified version of Procession of the Fae, a common song played within the court, which invited all to dance. It was a melody no human outside of the Fairy Court was permitted to hear, and Guang-Hong was taking a great risk in playing it for Otabek.

The sweet, sweeping melody lifted Yuri's spirits, and even if Otabek had not been present, already Yuri felt the compulsion to dance. He took a deep breath to steady his nerves, and as silently as a summer breeze, he stepped through the foliage, and lifted the veil.

At last, his human would finally be able to see him.

“Nothing's happening,” Otabek said over the music, and Guang-Hong exchanged a smile with Yuri.

“Oh really?” he asked lightly as he continued to play. “Turn around.”

Otabek turned, the expression on his face giving Yuri the impression that he had just rolled his eyes, but the look of minor annoyance and disbelief crumbled when he saw what stood before him. His mouth dropped open in shock, and Yuri held out a hand to him.

“Will you dance with me, son of Altin?” Yuri asked, his voice shifting to a more regal tone that he used with the lower beings of the Court, and it seemed to add to his ethereal quality as Otabek's eyes shifted from abject shock and disbelief to awe.

Mutely, Otabek reached for Yuri's hand, and their fingers intertwined. Yuri marvelled silently at how their hands seemed to fit together like the pieces of a puzzle.

Yuri pulled the human to him, and Otabek went willingly. His dumbfounded expression never left his face as Yuri led him in a dance, twirling him effortlessly across the grassy plain, alternating between leading and being led, and marvelling at how good and right it felt to finally be in the arms of his beloved.

Otabek met Yuri's graceful movements easily, and matched them with those of his own design. When Yuri took to the air, Otabek did not flinch away as they danced on the wind. He took Yuri in his arms, spinning him and drawing him back into a warm, all-encompassing embrace, and regarded him so intensely that Yuri almost lost himself in his gaze.

Yuri had the forethought to remember that most humans could not match Fae in stamina. As the afternoon bowed to the evening and they danced upon moonbeams that rained down from Lady Moon's swell, Yuri caught sight of the moisture on his human's brow, and the way his chest had begun to heave. Without a word, he led Otabek back down to the welcoming earth.

When they landed, Guang-Hong slowly stopped playing, stood up, and offered Yuri a short bow before he disappeared back into the trees. Yuri saw the bow out of the corner of his eye, unwilling as he was to turn his gaze from Otabek, and broke the vial in his pocket, returning Guang-Hong's love to him. All the while, Otabek stared at him with wide eyes, his lips dampened and pink as he tried to catch his breath, and after several long moments of silence, he finally spoke.

“You're real,” Otabek said with breathless amazement, and reached up uncertainly to touch Yuri's cheek with his rough hands. “You're really real.”

Yuri smiled warmly.

“Oh, yes, my precious Otabek,” Yuri said after a moment's pause, “I am very real.”

Yuri closed the distance between himself and his human, and sealed their lips together in a kiss.

A/N: If you like my work, please consider throwing a few bucks into my Digital Tip Jar. I am a starving artist, and I like not actually starving to death :P

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lovehaswonangelnumbers · 6 years ago

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New Post has been published on https://lovehaswonangelnumbers.org/karmic-tools-weekly-forecast-may-12-18-2019/

Karmic Tools Weekly Forecast: May 12 – 18, 2019

By Kelly M. Beard

The video version of this forecast, as read by Kelly, is available here.

The Karmic Tools Weekly Forecast covers the current planetary transits which affect people in different ways and to various degrees of intensity. Take notice when it is a Personal planet (Sun / Moon / Mercury / Venus / Mars) interacting with a Social (Jupiter/Saturn) or Collective planet (Uranus / Neptune/Pluto). And pay extremely close attention when it is a Social planet interacting with a Collective planet because that means something *big* is brewing that will move large groups of people along their evolutionary paths. Tuning in to the energy and rhythm of the planets can serve as a useful *guide* as you move along your Individual Path. It also helps to understand your place within the context of the larger Social & Collective Story. Below, you will find out how these energies tend to manifest, as well as guidance and direction.

*NOTE* There are some days when there are NO CONTACTS (besides the Moon), please note that there are no missing entries, we just list the actual Activations of each week + the day they happen.

Weekly Forecast: May 12 – 18, 2019

5/13 ~ Sun (core essential Self) ~trine~ Pluto (purification & transformation): This energy makes you want to get things done, by any means necessary and you may tend to come on a little strong – but it’s all good. The work you want to do, is work that needs to be done and in doing it and facing things head-on, you will gain insights about your Self that fortify your foundation so that your life can evolve to the next level organically. This intense and powerful energy is transformative in nature and will provoke you to think very deeply about your own life; what you need, desire and deserve. You may find that some aspects of your life need to be reformed or released – go for it – this energy makes reform and release easier than usual. It’s a good time to make an impression or an impact on others, but be sure to keep it on the Highest level possible. Any actions or statements used to manipulate others for selfish gain can/will backfire on you in a big way. This is a positive, uplifting, transformative energy – use it as such to clear the debris and create the life you were born to live.

5/14 ~ Venus (feminine values & priorities) ~sextile~ Mars (masculine desires & actions): This energy is good for creating the balance between self & other. It is good for trying new things & meeting new people, if/when possible. It creates a good vibe and balanced masculine/feminine energy that allows a nice exchange between self and other. This is a good time to be creative, so be cognizant of any ideas that come to you right now, even if you cannot implement them right away. This is a happy, upbeat energy, so if you can be sociable, by all means, get out and mingle. It’s possible to attract someone under this influence as well. The best thing to do with this energy is get involved with new and progressive projects or people. It’s all very positive.

5/15 ~ Mercury (expression) ~sextile~ Neptune (dreams): This is a great energy for imagination, consciousness and intuition, however, keeping a good filter to distinguish between your own perceptions and what you are picking up from those around you will be crucial to your success. Your mind may be on a different channel than usual and you may have to rely on other senses, like your feelings or intuitive hunches. You may be very perceptive, picking up on the thoughts & feelings of others, which if/when you are clear (and your filters are working) can yield some surprising revelations about where their consciousness is, at this time (for better or worse) and reflect an aspect of your own that you may not have been aware of. Try to avoid work that requires any attention to detail. Allow your creativity to flow freely without censoring what comes through you at this time. You can organize it later. This is the energy to explore, create and free-flow!

5/16 ~ Mercury (your thinking) ~trine~ Saturn (structure & organization): This energy is good for deep thinking. You are sharp and your standards are high because you are in ‘strategy mode’. This is a more solitary energy though, so communications with others may be hampered a bit because it is time for you to hold your own, at some new level. It’s time to focus on the details that hold the big dream together, all the little things that make the grand vision work. Some respect that attention to detail while others may consider it nit-picky but it is what the energy supports at this time so don’t worry if others don’t understand. By the same token, you may also feel a little overwhelmed by the many “little things” that cannot be denied or delayed and thus a sense of urgency to get it all done. Beware of a tendency toward pessimism, depression or overwhelm. Try to stay focused on all the blessings that you do have and all that you have accomplished instead of what’s still on the list of things to do (in life). This energy is not intended to make you feel bad about all the things left yet to do, but encourages you to begin the necessary steps for manifesting your dreams. This energy just makes you focus on the practical side of manifesting. Clear the debris, and begin to lay a new, clean, solid foundation beneath your goals. Saturn gets you present to the necessary steps and Mercury helps you think clearly.

5/18 ~ Mercury (ideas, thoughts & concepts) ~trine~ Pluto (rebirth & transformation): This activation makes any deep delving within easier and more fruitful. It encourages you to ask the deeper questions, clarify your deeper feelings and trust your intuitive gut feelings that are telling you something has to die so that some other aspect of your consciousness can live. You will want to explore your inner Self, sort through recently gathered information and try to understand better what your natural process really is. It is best to be alone for such research. Take a day or a weekend and grab your most powerful books & music and get somewhere beautiful if you can, if not, then your bedroom will do just as well – and dig deep! You are finally ready for a deeper truth, and you will be transformed by what you learn. If you must communicate with others, plan on that being deep as well, so best to talk to a trusted advisor or wise elder. Nothing superficial today. The only warning with this energy is not to become obsessive about one particular idea – and certainly don’t try to force any ideas on others. If you feel the deep need to focus on one particular thing, that is fine but try to keep some perspective or write down all your revelations so you can reflect on them at a later time when you can be more objective and prioritize better.

5/18 ~ Venus (relationships, love & money) ~conjunct~ Uranus (awakening & liberation): This is an initiation of some radically new values & priorities which have actually been bubbling within you for a while now. You are supported to shift, without apology. Remember, when you change, everything/one around you naturally changes or goes away. Same-old, same-old will not do at this time and you are supported for thinking outside the box, especially where conscious equal partnership is concerned. We are in a new era, the Aquarian Age, that supports the individual within the context of the whole. We are all learning how to do that on micro-levels, within our own individual relationships, as well as on macro-levels in the world. Use this activation to release resistance and open to the new, shake things up and look at your life from a completely different perspective and see if you don’t find renewed value in some places and others that have completely run their course and can easily be released. Finally, pay close attention to any innovative ideas that come up around this time – they could be useful down the line.

5/18 ~ SCORPIO Full Moon: The Scorpio Full Moon always shines a bright light on that which we may have overlooked, suppressed or postponed that will no longer remain hidden. Scorpio Moon can also be a very emotionally intense Moon to experience and navigate, so rather than let it plunge you to the depths of the Underworld, try to consciously choose an aspect of your Being or your life that you are ready, willing and finally, able to truly *release* and ask that the Universe support this process with ease & grace. Humans are creatures of habit and generally, resist letting go but honestly, that will only intensify & prolong any pain you may already be experiencing. Take your power back by choosing to allow whatever it is to go from your life so that it can either come back in a higher, purified form or something even better can grow up in its place that would better suit your needs at this time anyway. Remember, Scorpio is RAW Truth, don’t try to make sense of it until next month (the Sag Full Moon brings in the Higher Truth), right now, just work on surrender & acceptance as well as reclaiming your own power to direct your life. This is a potent time for consciously co-creating with the Life/Death/Life Cycle. What in/around you needs to “die” so that something new can be seeded to come into existence? This Full Moon asks you to define your deepest, core values (Taurus) and then asks: What are you willing to sacrifice (Scorpio/Power) … for something of greater value to you (Taurus/Garden)?

*****

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whittlebaggett8 · 6 years ago

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Chelsea Manning says in her first TV interview after being released from jail that the Trump administration ‘clearly wants to go after journalists’, Defence Online

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Chelsea Manning appeared on CNN’s “Reliable Sources” for her very first job interview soon after currently being introduced from jail.

resource

Twitter/@Trusted Sources

The previous Army intelligence analyst and whistleblower Chelsea Manning warned Sunday that the Trump administration “clearly needs to go following journalists.”

She mentioned to be expecting more indictments, particularly towards national safety reporters or “disruptive” push.

Manning was introduced Thursday just after paying 62 days in jail on civil contempt costs, just after she refused to testify to a grand jury relating to WikiLeaks.

The Justice Department’s rates towards WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange have sparked debate in excess of irrespective of whether his prosecution has press independence implications.

Take a look at Defence Online’s homepage for much more tales.

Chelsea Manning, the former Army intelligence analyst turned whistleblower, reported Sunday that the Trump administration “clearly wants to go immediately after journalists.”

Manning spoke to CNN’s Brian Stelter in her initial televised interview after leaving jail. She was released Thursday immediately after 62 times in a Virginia jail on civil contempt expenses, soon after she refused to testify to a grand jury concerning WikiLeaks.

Her remarks occur amid fierce debate more than no matter whether US prosecutors’ prices versus WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange quantity to an assault on press liberty. The Justice Division has accused Assange of conspiring with Manning to hack into a authorities computer, and To start with Amendment advocates have fretted that this kind of fees set a perilous precedent.

Read through additional: The DOJ’s indictment of Julian Assange ignited a fierce discussion in between First Modification advocates and nationwide-stability authorities, and it’s a harbinger of what lies in advance

“This administration obviously desires to go immediately after journalists,” states Chelsea Manning @xychelsea.

Manning was just produced from jail but faces an additional subpoena and quite possibly much more jail time for refusing to testify about her disclosure of strategies to Wikileaks https://t.co/so8MiPQYQH pic.twitter.com/HiCYUOIF3M

— Responsible Sources (@ReliableSources) May well 12, 2019

“I feel that the Japanese District of Virginia is now turned into a rubber stamp for all these different prosecutions. I imagine that ultimately what they truly want is they want to go immediately after journalists,” she said. “This administration obviously would like to go after journalists.”

Manning said people need to anticipate to see indictments against national stability reporters, especially presented President Donald Trump’s hostility towards the media.

“I believe that if the administration receives its way, as its laid out in recurring statements, like the ‘media is the enemy of the people’ form of thing, I imagine that we’re heading to see that countrywide safety journalists and a ton of disruptive push – we’re possibly heading to see indictments and prices,” Manning reported. “There are so a lot of federal offenses, the common American commits a few felonies a working day. So every time a journalist helps make a misstep, I imagine they’re set on notice now that the FBI and the Section of Justice are going to go after them on the administration’s behalf.”

Go through additional: Following 62 days Chelsea Manning was released from a Virginia jail – but her independence could be short-lived

Manning could pretty effectively finish up again in jail in the coming times, as she advised Stelter she intends to refuse to comply with a further subpoena from a various grand jury concerning WikiLeaks.

“They’ve previously stipulated that they want to inquire the very same issues,” Manning explained. “So this is not about everything new. They’re not even asking just about anything new. I have currently laid all of this out.”

Manning was at first sentenced to 35 several years in navy prison for leaking documents to WikiLeaks in 2010, but previous President Barack Obama commuted her sentence soon after she had served seven a long time.

The post Chelsea Manning says in her first TV interview after being released from jail that the Trump administration ‘clearly wants to go after journalists’, Defence Online appeared first on Defence Online.

from WordPress https://defenceonline.com/2019/05/12/chelsea-manning-says-in-her-first-tv-interview-after-being-released-from-jail-that-the-trump-administration-clearly-wants-to-go-after-journalists-defence-online/

#Chelsea Manning #Julian Assange #News #Press freedom #Trump administration #Wikileaks

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todaybharatnews · 4 years ago

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via Today Bharat Novak Djokovic was kicked out of the U.S. Open for accidentally hitting a line judge in the throat with a tennis ball after dropping a game in his fourth-round match Sunday, a stunning end to his 29-match winning streak and bid for an 18th Grand Slam title. As he walked to the Arthur Ashe Stadium sideline for a changeover, trailing Pablo Carreño Busta 6-5 in the first set, Djokovic — who was seeded and ranked No. 1 and an overwhelming favorite for the championship — angrily smacked a ball behind him. The ball flew right at the line judge, who dropped to her knees at the back of the court and reached for her neck. During a discussion of about 10 minutes near the net involving tournament referee Soeren Friemel, Grand Slam supervisor Andreas Egli and chair umpire Aurelie Tourte, Djokovic pleaded his case. “His point was that he didn't hit the line umpire intentionally. He said, ‘Yes, I was angry. I hit the ball. I hit the line umpire. The facts are very clear. But it wasn't my intent. I didn't do it on purpose.’ So he said he shouldn't be defaulted for it,” said Friemel, who made the decision to end the match. “And we all agree that he didn't do it on purpose, but the facts are still that he hit the line umpire and the line umpire was clearly hurt.” Friemel didn't see what happened, and said he was not allowed to check a video replay, but was given a rundown by Egli and Tourte. Friemel said that even if Djokovic didn't intend to hurt the line judge, she was hurt, and that was enough to merit the ruling. Eventually, Djokovic walked over to shake hands with Carreño Busta. Tourte then announced that Djokovic was defaulted, the tennis equivalent of an ejection. “I was a little bit in shock, no?” Carreño Busta said later at a news conference done via video conference because of social-distancing rules at the U.S. Open, the first Grand Slam tournament staged amid the coronavirus pandemic. Djokovic quickly left the tournament grounds without speaking to reporters, posting an apology on social media hours later. “This whole situation has left me really sad and empty. I checked on the lines person and the tournament told me that thank God she is feeling ok. I‘m extremely sorry to have caused her such stress. So unintended. So wrong,” Djokovic wrote. “As for the disqualification, I need to go back within and work on my disappointment and turn this all into a lesson for my growth and evolution as a player and human being,” he wrote. “I apologize to the @usopen tournament and everyone associated for my behavior.” Asked whether he thought Djokovic should have been allowed to continue to play, Carreño Busta shrugged and replied: “Well, the rules are the rules. ... The referee and the supervisor (did) the right thing, but it's not easy to do it.” Indeed, the U.S. Tennis Association issued a statement saying that Friemel defaulted Djokovic “in accordance with the Grand Slam rulebook, following his actions of intentionally hitting a ball dangerously or recklessly within the court or hitting a ball with negligent disregard of the consequences." The USTA went on to say Djokovic forfeits the ranking points and $250,000 in prize money he earned in the tournament — “in addition to any or all fines levied with respect to the offending incident.” “Novak was angry. He hit the ball recklessly, angrily back. And taking everything into consideration, there was no discretion involved," Friemel said. “Defaulting a player at a Grand Slam is a very important, very tough decision. And for that reason, it doesn't matter if it’s on Ashe, if it’s No. 1, or any other player on any other court, you need to get it right.” This was the latest example of Djokovic finding himself at the center of the tennis world for a reason other than his best-in-the-game returns, can’t-miss groundstrokes and body-contorting defensive prowess. Djokovic tested positive for the coronavirus — as did his wife, one of his coaches and other players — after participating in a series of exhibition matches with zero social distancing he organized in Serbia and Croatia in June. Then, on the eve of the U.S. Open, he helped establish a new association he says will represent men's tennis players. And, of course, there's been his dominance on the court. Djokovic began the day 26-0 this season and with an unbeaten run that extended to his last three matches of 2019. He had won five of the past seven Grand Slam tournaments to raise his total to 17, closing in on rivals Roger Federer, who has a men's-record 20, and Rafael Nadal, who has 19. With reigning U.S. Open champion Nadal, who cited concerns about traveling amid the pandemic, and Federer, sidelined after two knee operations, not in the field, the 33-year-old from Serbia was expected to claim a fourth trophy in New York and gain on them. But it all came apart so suddenly Sunday. Djokovic wasn't looking in the line judge's direction when his racket made contact with the ball, and there was concern on his face as soon as he realized what had happened. Players who hit a ball out of anger and make contact with an on-court official have been defaulted in the past. In 2017, Denis Shapovalov — the 21-year-old Canadian scheduled to play his fourth-round match Sunday night — was defaulted from a Davis Cup match against Britain when he accidentally hit the chair umpire in the face with a ball. At Wimbledon in 1995, Tim Henman hit a ball into the head of a ball girl and was defaulted from a doubles match. “Very unlucky for Novak,” said No. 5 seed Alexander Zverev, who will face No. 27 Borna Coric in the quarterfinals. “If it would have landed anywhere else — we’re talking a few inches — he would have been fine.” Among the many oddities about the 2020 U.S. Open, which has no spectators, is that only the two largest arenas — Ashe and Louis Armstrong Stadium — have full complements of line judges. Elsewhere, chair umpires are aided by an electronic line-calling system. Djokovic’s mood had soured over the preceding few minutes Sunday. In the prior game, he wasted three consecutive break points, then whacked a ball off a courtside advertising sign. On the second point of what would become Djokovic's last game at this year’s U.S. Open, he stumbled and fell, clutching his left shoulder. Play was delayed for a few minutes while a trainer checked on him. On the second point after they resumed, the 20th-seeded Carreño Busta hit a passing winner to break Djokovic’s serve. That’s when Djokovic got himself into trouble. His departure means there is no man left in the field who has won a Grand Slam singles title. Whoever emerges as champion will be the first first-time major trophy winner in men’s tennis since 2014, when Marin Cilic won the U.S. Open. Plus, each of the last 13 Grand Slam trophies had been won by a member of the Big Three of Federer, Nadal and Djokovic. “Going to be a new Grand Slam champion, (that's) all I know. No Grand Slam champions left in the draw. Now it gets interesting," said Zverev, who beat Alejandro Davidovich Fokina 6-2, 6-2, 6-1. "Now I think is the time when it gets really interesting.”

#IFTTT #Today Bharat

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mehlsbells · 5 years ago

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I’ve written before about the myriad of things which would go into Perfect TV Pilot Bingo, including shows like Glitch and The Night Of which set up mysteries, shows such as Doctor Who which have mini-pilots every few seasons, even TV shows which shoot a mid-season episode first to sell the show but still need to make their actual first-airing episode work as an introduction.

Let’s take a look at Stumptown‘s pilot and how it functions to deliver an incredible amount of information in a very short space, while serving a self-contained story and setting up the season’s arc.

The cold open establishes the iconic PORTLAND sign before panning to two tattooed heavies driving a car mostly held together with duct tape and curse-laden invocations. In a moment we’ll discover they don’t mind beating strangers unconscious and stuffing them in a trunk, but first the show is going to plant tongue-in-cheek: the criminals ruminate on coffee tasting notes before sing along to Sweet Caroline which distracts them as Dex escapes from the trunk and fights for control, launched the car off a bridge. This tells us Stumptown is happy to fight small and dirty but throw a little money at old-school stunts. Casting helps, too, the singing heavies reminiscent of 101 Dalmations and Home Alone hired muscle.

The credits card is stylised in a nod to the source material, then the next scene pulls a classic “three days earlier.” This device is a gimmick to wring the most bang-for-buck out of an action sequence, or easily set up a ‘how did they get here’ mystery (Breaking Bad‘s favourite use), but it works here both because a pilot is almost expected to pull this sort of stunt, and because it pulls a fakeout later (more when we get there).

Three days earlier, a detective sits in a bar drinking whiskey. So far, so typical. Dex being played by Cobie Smulders, she’s immediately hit on by a smarmy out-of-towner, and her response is a doozy of character and exposition. The first scene briefed us on Dex’s resourcefulness, good taste in distressed denim jackets, and ability to fight with a seatbelt and fire extinguisher, but this is the first real sense we get of Dex as a person. Within 90 seconds we learn she has a quick-patter repartee and strong deductive reasoning, is a military veteran who served in Afghanistan, speaks at least one other language, and doesn’t tolerate smarmy pricks.

The scene itself is a version of the Sherlock Holmes Introductory Scene. Every Sherlock Holmes adaptation gives Sherlock a reason to show his powers of deduction, and many contemporary detective shows follow suit. Take the two most recent TV adaptations: Sherlock introducing John and Watson in a medical lab which underlines John’s bonafides while establishing Sherlock’s macabre fascinations. Elementary leads Joan to Sherlock’s screen-filled living room (the better to inform us how this modern Sherlock consumes visual data) before quickly getting to a crime scene (the better to show off both his deduction powers, and Watson’s medical knowledge).

Point being, showing Dex’s powers of observation is important, but location can convey information, too. Dex gets hit on by McDouchy at Whispering Winds Casino, which isn’t just for production design’s sake. The casino bar allows the show to seamlessly transition to Dex gambling, which gives her one of the multiple character flaws all noir detectives must be in possession of, and also good reason to be called into a back room for a chat with casino owner Sue Lynn . . . who happens to have an existing and somewhat prickly relationship with Dex.

Sue Lynn gives us more specifics about the broad strokes we already got; Dex is in more debt than just losing at craps in the prior scene; not only was Dex in the military, but specifically military intelligence; Dex dated Sue Lynn’s son. All this comes in the midst of a conversation where Sue Lynn sets up the episode’s central mystery by asking Dex to find her granddaughter Nina.

Dex drives home, accompanied by a perfectly serviceable establishing shot with her beat-up car we’re familiar with, and greets her brother Ansel. Family in unusual iterations feels like it’s going to be a running theme with this show, but Ansel also serves to remind / guilt Dex about needing a job. Ansel provides our first sense of how the theme of family will run through this show, and also a fantastic selection of Portland Timbers gear.

After calling Sue Lynn to accept the job, Dex spends an appropriate amount of time in her appropriately-cluttered kitchen staring wistfully at a picture of herself and a handsome man we can infer is her ex and Sue Lynn’s son. How much Dex is driven by debt and how much by nostalgia / sense of duty / obligation / love we don’t know yet, but that’s setting up a season and character arc question: for this episode, all that matters is Dex takes the case.

And to reiterate, we cut to Grey setting up his bar and giving Dex (but mostly the audience) a ‘so let me get this straight’ reset. They also establish their rapport and Dex’s noir detective proclivity for alcohol.

Less than ten minutes and we’ve received an incredible amount of information, gotten a feel for the tone, and met some characters who, while it’d be a stretch to call them ‘colourful’ since they’ve only had a couple lines, are at least sketched out enough to make them entertaining.

Now Dex heads off to start cracking the case. Because the pilot has a lot of other work to do, this case is simple, mostly serving to show off Dex’s street smarts. The opening car bit showed Dex’s physical resourcefulness, this scene lets Dex play mental games, egging a witness to call Nina then driving around the block before snatching the witness’s unlocked phone. On the phone is a picture of a motel, where Dex goes and – with a little elbow grease and disregard for protocol and procedure – finds Nina and Nina’s dumb boyfriend.

Driving Nina back to the casino, Dex is rear-ended and beat up by two thugs who run off with Nina. From the moment the little guy hits Dex we assume they’ll take Nina and put her in the trunk along with Dex: the bad guys often take our hero’s car, plus we remember the opening sequence from a mere 13 minutes before, so it seems obvious . . . but then they don’t. This tells us not too assume too much, that there’s another twist to come.

Before that twist, Dex is going to meet a very Hot Detective, get questioned up at the station by said detective and Chief Camryn Manheim Lieutenant Cosgrove, get bailed out by Grey, realise something is Very Wrong with Sue Lynn’s statement, double back to talk to the dumb boyfriend, and find a food truck cook named Tookie to get some info on who might have it in for Nina and/or Sue Lynn.

Quick pit stop; Tookie and Dex’s casual rapport and exposition friendly banter about that one time Dex helped out as line cook establish Tookie is clearly an old friend, but he’s also got a lot of knowledge of Portland’s grimy ongoings. Though this is the only time we see him in the pilot, he has clear Recurring Character Vibe and establishes his usefulness by giving Dex a lead (and some legit tasty hot sauce).

At the nightclub Tookie pointed her towards, Dex runs into a bouncer whose name she misremembers; this establishes her penchant for casual sex, which sets up another scene with Hot Detective in just a few minutes. The bouncer isn’t just there to let Dex banter, he lets the story show us something about who she is.

A little misunderstanding about a hot car which riffs lightly on various noir / procedural tropes, a little grand theft auto via driving in a small space, and Dex goes back to Sue Lynn to return her cash advance. While the scene lets her get a bead on the fact Sue Lynn was lying, it also gives us a picture of her Ideals, which all stubborn noir detectives have varying degrees of, which often operate in shades of grey* but which they hold to tightly.

Leaving the casino, Dex experiences PTSD flashbacks to her military stint. While we don’t need to be reminded of her service again, this reminds us she’s got a heavy mental load, which underlines the emotion of a gut-punch which will get served by Hot Detective approximately 60 seconds later, just after a wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am round of sex is PG-13ly insinuated.

The dialogue bridging* ‘post-coital flirting’ and ‘reminder that you blame yourself for your ex-boyfriend’s death by IED’ is . . . well, I knew Michael Ealy was attractive and talented, but I didn’t know he was a magician. He actually manages to make the scene work, with just a little assistance from a perfectly fitted black t-shirt.

The remainder of the story is mostly about wrapping up the Nina mystery. No surprise: Dumb Boyfriend is a bad guy. Slight surprise: the cops actually manage to do something helpful to our detective. No surprise, Dex gets to be belligerent and pretend to Not Care while actually Caring Very Much. Day saved, Dex goes to Grey’s bar where she toasts with her tiny chosen family, and just before the closing shot, Hot Detective shows up to give her a case which ‘may help keep her out of trouble’ and definitely will launch a season’s worth of sleuthing storylines.

You’ll notice every scene does something to establish tone, tell us about character(s) and their relationships to each other, tells us about Dex’s backstory / personality, and forward the episode’s central mystery. A few scenes only do three of the four, but that’s still plenty.

If this post feels very “then this happened, then that” – it is. A pilot is often paint-by-numbers because it has a lot to accomplish. You don’t need to mess with proven formulas, just make sure the characters and story, and the cinematography and wardrobe and actors you paint them with, are fascinating enough.

Stray Observations

*pun intended

– Dex and Ansel’s ‘hey sis’ and ‘hey sib’ is the most eye-rollingly-obvious bit of exposition, especially since ‘sis’ was enough. I’d even buy ‘Sib’ was a slip of the tongue / actor’s nickname, but they sure didn’t ADR it.

– In addition to giving Soccer City continual plugs, Ansel’s love of soccer is an easy device to have him wherever the story needs; in this case, kicking a ball just out of danger when Dex gets abducted. Clever.

– I’d kill to see them include some Thorns gear in Ansel’s mix. Plus, a Christine Sinclair jersey would continue their wink to Cobie Smulders’s Canadian origins (they riff on this further in Ep 2).

– The backseat of Dex’s car is covered not only in unpaid parking tickets, but empty energy drink cans and cassette tapes. Props to the set dressers who also had to set up a bar before-and-while it opened, multiple rooms of Dex’s house, a skeezy motel, a casino backroom, and more.

– My favourite running gag is the number PORTLAND’S BEST ESPRESSO claims:

#Stumptown's pilot is the perfect Economy of Storytelling example. I've written before about the myriad of things which would go into Perfect TV Pilot Bingo…

#exposition #Stumptown #TV Pilot #writing for TV

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movietvtechgeeks · 7 years ago

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Latest story from https://movietvtechgeeks.com/donald-trump-goes-russia-twitter-rant-presidents-day-sale/

Donald Trump goes on Russia Twitter rant while having President's Day sale

Donald Trump is making sure that America knows it's President's Day with a thirty percent off sale on his merchandise while using Robert Mueller's Russian investigation indictment to clear him from collusion. The president blamed everyone for the Florida shooting to the Mueller indictment except Russia, of course. https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/965212168449941505 The messages shed light on a President who has been almost entirely focused on the past -- how the Russian allegations impact the legitimacy of his presidency and accusations against his 2016 campaign -- and not how he will work to stop Russia from meddling in the future. In a written statement released Friday, Trump's prescription for combating Russia was for the country to "come together as Americans" and "stop the outlandish partisan attacks, wild and false allegations, and far-fetched theories, which only serve to further the agendas of bad actors, like Russia, and do nothing to protect the principles of our institutions." The statement did not detail how his administration would penalize the country for their 2016 efforts. The weekend messages also show that there is little Trump won't use to undercut Mueller's investigation. Late on Saturday night, Trump linked the admitted mistake by the FBI around last week's school shooting in Parkland with the Russia investigation. The Wednesday shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School killed 17 people. https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/965075589274177536 "Very sad that the FBI missed all of the many signals sent out by the Florida school shooter. This is not acceptable," he wrote. "They are spending too much time trying to prove Russian collusion with the Trump campaign - there is no collusion. Get back to the basics and make us all proud!" https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/965079126829871104 Trump's reelection campaign sent out a massive email campaign over the weekend with a link to their official website featuring "45" sweatshirts, "Build the Wall" t-shirts along with those infamous "Make America Great Again" baseball caps. “From the birth of the Father of our Country to Abraham Lincoln’s leadership that brought our divided nation back together, our country’s history is studded with many heroic leaders whom we are proud to honor this President’s Day,” the email said. “From George Washington to Donald J. Trump, we’re celebrating the great patriots who’ve led our nation,” the email pitches. “CELEBRATE President’s Day with 30% off ALL official Presidential merchandise with code POTUS. ” Trump has held sales before on the site during the campaign and on Black Friday before the holidays. Proceeds from the merchandise sales go to the Trump campaign and the Republican National Committee. This weekend, President Donald Trump's fired off on a range of topics, including the Obama administration's dealings with Iran and his belief that hackers are responsible for election interference. His latest salvo on Twitter began Friday and rolled out in a series of 16 posts, peaking early Sunday morning with a tweet about Russia. “I never said Russia did not meddle in the election, I said ‘it may be Russia, or China or another country or group, or it may be a 400 pound genius sitting in bed and playing with his computer,’” Trump posted early on Sunday morning. “The Russian ‘hoax’ was that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia — it never did!” On Friday, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein announced that a federal grand jury had indicted 13 Russian nationals as part of special counsel Robert Mueller's ongoing probe and charged them with fraud, conspiracy, identity theft and other crimes. According to the indictment, some of the methods the Russians used included supporting Trump's campaign and "disparaging" then-Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. While Trump has emphasized that his campaign did not collude with Russia, the president has never condemned Russia since his inauguration more than a year ago, and lawmakers say it’s more than concerning. “That we don’t have a president speaking out on this issue is a horror show,” Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders told Chuck Todd on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday. “We got to bring Democrats and Republicans together — despite the president — to go forward and protect the integrity of American democracy.” Sanders went on to call Trump’s continued opposition to the Russia investigation “one of the weirdest things in modern American history,” and said, “people are asking what is going with this president?” “The main point to be understood is that what everybody understands except Donald Trump is that this was not just the 2016 campaign,” Sanders said. “[The Russians] intend to do this in 2018.” Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., also said that the president’s current position was problematic, but he later added the Department of Homeland Security was working to secure state election systems. Nevertheless, he said, Russia had clearly made a push to undermine American democracy with a pattern of attempted influence that stretched back to 2014. “Russia has clearly tried to advance their agenda into the United States,” the senator said. “The president has been very adamant to say that he didn’t collude. He’s very frustrated that people seem to accuse the fact that the only reason he’s president is because of some sort of Russian collusion. But I would say the clear message here is Russia did mean to interfere in our election.” Others in Congress also were scratching their heads on Sunday as the president continued to press against the Russia investigation. Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., the ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee, said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” that Russian interference “is now overwhelming and unequivocal.” He also expressed his belief that Trump had dropped the ball in his role as president. "It is inexplicable that the president of the United States continues to sit on sanctions that Congress passed — that Congress wants enforced against Russia over this interference," Schiff said, referring to the Trump administration announcement released late last month. [pdf-embedder url="https://movietvtechgeeks.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/robert-mueller-russian-investigation-social-media-indictment-2018.pdf" title="robert mueller russian investigation social media indictment 2018"] The Mueller indictment should be enough proof to the Trump administration, Schiff said. "It ought to put to rest, for anyone, including the president, who continues to call this a witch hunt, that the evidence is now overwhelming and unequivocal," Schiff said. Schiff also made an appearance in Trump's Sunday morning tweets, as the congressman said, following the release of Friday's indictment, that the Obama administration may not have been tough enough on the Russia's interference during the 2016 election. Sanders on "Meet the Press" Sunday touched on Obama's response, as well. "Look, Obama was in a very difficult position," Sanders said. "He did not want to make it appear that he was favoring Hillary Clinton. Maybe he should have done more." Sanders’s 2016 campaign — along with Trump’s — was named in Friday’s indictment as one that the Russian nationals used to sow discord in the election system and buoy criticism of then-Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. Sanders said, to the best of his knowledge, no one in his campaign was interviewed in the ongoing Mueller probe, though he said they attempted to warn the Clinton campaign that something fishy was going on. “One of our social media guys in San Diego actually went to the Clinton campaign in September and said, ‘Something weird is going on. Bernie's not in the campaign. Hundreds of these people are now coming onto his Facebook site,’” Sanders told Todd. “So I think we already knew that it was an effort to undermine American democracy and to really say horrible things about Secretary Clinton.”

Movie TV Tech Geeks News

#Donald Trump #Featured #Robert Mueller #Russia #Vladimir Putin

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beingmad2017-blog · 8 years ago

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Small Business Computer Security, the Basics

New Post has been published on https://beingmad.org/small-business-computer-security-the-basics/

Small Business Computer Security, the Basics

Anyone in business today realizes both the natural dependency on computers in the workplace and also the potential dangers associated with storing important data on them. Today’s business owners are constantly being reminded that their company’s data is at risk by the daily reports on various news stations or even their favorite business-related website.

But what can a typical small business owner do to protect their network from these threats that are broadcasted in so many ways? Dangers lurk at every turn on the Internet. There are thousands of attacks or areas of security that could be discussed, but I am going to try and focus on three general nuisances associated with today’s computers: viruses, spyware, and traditional “hackers” that will intentionally try to exploit your computer systems for various reasons. All of these attacks, although different, serve a specific purpose for the attacker, yet basically translate into three things for a business: lost productivity, lost data, and the end result… lost money.

Here are brief descriptions of what the aforementioned attacks are, consist of, and what a typical small business can do to protect their technology investments.

Virus: A computer virus shares some traits with an actual virus that gets people sick. A computer virus must piggyback on top of some other program or document in order to get executed. Once it is running, it is then able to infect other programs or documents. Obviously, the analogy between computer and biological viruses stretches things a bit, but there are enough similarities that the name sticks. A computer virus can have many intentions. One common goal is the virus’s desire to infect as many machines as possible. Some are harmless and are no more than an attempt for a hacker to spread their name and get recognition amongst their peers. However, this can still lead to slow computer performance or programs acting up. On the other side of the coin, viruses can be extremely harmful and delete data, cause complete computer interruption, give someone unauthorized access to your company data, or even be used in conjunction with thousands of other infected computers to launch grand-scale attacks. Viruses are still mostly transferred via email; however newer attacks will entice you via an email to a malicious website that will exploit a flaw in your computer to install the virus.

Protection from Viruses: If you are reading this article, and you still do not have current (this is very important) anti-virus software running on EVERY single computer you own, then shame on you. With all of the marketing commotion that surrounds viruses, you should already have antivirus software on all of your computers. If you don’t, then hurry to the store and purchase it. Popular software in the antivirus market is made by Symantec and McAfee. Larger companies may look into a system that will scan emails prior to the email getting to a user’s inbox for viruses. Also, be wary of what you open in your email. Do not open emails from people you do not know, and even if you do know the sender, take extra caution, as most viruses today will trick you into believing that the virus is sent from someone that you know.

Spyware: You may know spyware by one of its many names, adware, malware, track wear, scumware, the thief were, snoop were, and sneak are. Because of its stealthy nature, most Internet users are more familiar with the symptoms of spyware infection: sluggish PC performance, increased pop-up ads, unexplained homepage change, and mysterious search results. For virtually everyone surfing the Internet, malware and adware are a nuisance, but if you do not detect spyware on your PC, it can lead to much more serious consequences such as identity theft. Many people wonder how they get spyware installed on their computer in the first place. Typically, spyware is installed onto your PC without your knowledge because the programs are usually hidden within other software. For example, when you are browsing a website, and a pop-up appears to install the latest online Casino game, it probably will give you that game, but you’ve also just installed spyware along with that. Another avenue for Spyware to infect your machine is through popular Peer-to-Peer File Sharing software such as Kazaa. The financial impact on a business that is plagued by spyware can tell very high. Costs paid to computer consultants to remove spyware, and a user’s overall loss productivity from a slow-performing computer can add up very quickly.

Protection from Spyware: Spyware is a huge problem in today’s computing environment. Fighting Spyware starts with the smarter use of your computer. The best defense against spyware and other unwanted software is not to download it in the first place. Here are a few helpful tips that can protect you from downloading software you don’t want. Only download programs from websites you trust, read all security warnings, license agreements, and privacy statements associated with any software you download, and never click “agree” or “OK” to close a window. Instead, click the red “x” in the corner of the window or press the Alt + F4 buttons on your keyboard to close a window, and be wary of popular “free” music and movie file-sharing programs, and be sure you clearly understand all of the software packaged with those programs. If you do happen to install Spyware on your computer, there are some tools available to assist in the removal of spyware. Be careful however when downloading these “free” spyware removal software, as even some of the removal tools incorporate spyware into their software. A popular product that does a good job of removing spyware is Lavasoft’s Adaware (www.lavasoft.com). Larger organizations can look to companies such as Computer Associates for enterprise protection. There are instances when there is simply just too much spyware installed on a machine where these tools cannot help, and you’ll be forced to format your hard drive and reinstall your operating system.

Hackers: The term hacker has many different meanings to many different people. A dictionary might define the word hacker as follows, “A person who breaks into, or attempts to break into, or use, a computer network or system without authorization, often at random, for personal amusement or gratification, and not necessarily with malicious intent. 2. [An] unauthorized user who attempts to or gains access to an information system 3. A technically sophisticated computer expert who intentionally gains unauthorized access to targeted protected resources, loosely, a computer enthusiast. 4. A person who uses a computer resource in a manner for which it is not intended or which is in conflict with the terms of an acceptable-use policy, but is not necessarily malicious in intent.” As you can see, a hacker is someone with a very high aptitude in computing. By studying the inherent design of computer systems, a hacker will then attempt to compromise those systems for a purpose. Typically, they use a collection of tools easily downloadable on the Internet to exploit a flaw in a program or hardware system. Hackers do what they do for various reasons. Some do it for simple prestige amongst their peers, others for financial gain, and others do it to make a political statement. The impact of your network’s security being breached can lead to very serious financial losses. Imagine your customer database being sold to a competitor or even what public response would be if you had to tell your customers that their personal information was stolen?

Protection from Hackers: I was once told, that no matter how good a safe you buy, there will still always be a locksmith that can unlock it. The same goes for protection against hackers. However the amount of people with the expertise to bypass most security defenses, available to companies, are few and far in between. To keep your network safe, the following three items are an absolute must. A quality firewall at your network’s perimeter to filter what goes in and out of your internet connection, desktop level firewalls to keep internal company computers safe, and the importance of performing updates to your computer’s operating system and applications. Firewalls simply stated, filter data passing through them. They are in essence, inspectors that allow and deny data to be passed through them based on certain rules. Most quality firewalls will protect your network by letting the good data through and keeping the bad out. Recommended firewalls for small businesses can be purchased from companies such as Cisco, Watchguard or Sonic Wall. Firewall vendors typically have many different models available, so consult with your network security professional on what to buy. The important thing is that you have one in place. Desktop level firewalls provide a true multi-layered approach to security. This added level of protection strengthens your computer systems defense and is especially helpful to companies that have remote workers. Most companies today do have firewalls on their corporate network; however, no one ever thinks about the company president’s laptop that gets brought home every day. The president brings his laptop home and sets up his trusty remote connection back into his office over his broadband home Internet connection. The once protected laptop is now completely unprotected and connected directly to the corporate office, which gives a direct avenue for virus and hackers onto your corporate network. The great thing about desktop firewalls is that you can get some great ones for free! If you use the Microsoft Windows XP operating system, simply upgrade to service pack 2 and it includes a free and easy to use the desktop level firewall. If you do not have Windows XP or just do not want to use their firewall, Zone Alarm offers a great desktop level firewall. The last level of defense is to keep your networked systems up to date with the latest patches and fixes from their respective manufacturers. I will assume that most companies use Microsoft Windows products for most of their computing needs, so to keep your system updated simply go to. You should check for updates twice a month.

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