#and now I don’t trust anyone in leadership apart from my direct manager

[didsomeonesaybuffet]

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[itsybitsylemonsqueezy]

Hey, it’s me again! ^_^ I hope I don’t bother you too much with my requests, but your posts are so cool I just can’t help it. Upon completing Yakuza 4 I’ve had a lot of thoughts and feels about Daigo and how his character was handled across the series. To be honest, at first I didn’t like him much, because he seemed pretty bland (and his screen time leaves much to be desired), but soon enough he’s really grown on me. What is your opinion on him if you don’t mind me asking?

I definitely do not mind requests! Meta is my bread and butter c: I’ve just been busy for a few days, sorry ^^; And... my opinions on Daigo are not going to be as mindblowing or exciting as my opinions on Kiryu, I’ll be real ^^; And there’s a big advantage in Kiryu being the protag, All of the content is about him ^^; I do love Daigo, I think he’s a super interesting character, but his tragedy is just what you pointed out, he’s underutilized. And he isn’t set up very well to have the position he holds. 

But, so saying, let’s get into my essay on Daigo ^^; 

So, we meet Daigo properly in game 2. There’s little side stories with baby Daigo in Zero which helps build Daigo’s and Kiryu’s relationship and set up for what would later happen, but we don’t really know him until game 2. And game 2 is a LOT about Daigo and his arc and what he’s meant to be! There’s a tumblr text post meme somewhere with a pic of Daigo depressed in his little puffy white coat that says “And I’ll probably become the next chairman of the Tojo Clan. Things like that just happens to guys like me.” and that is totally accurate! Like, it’s a funny thing to complain about, but that’s obviously the struggle Daigo’s having, understanding from a young age that it was obviously his destiny to succeed Sohei, the only problem is uh... well... Kiryu. 

I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Dojima Sohei never became chairman of the Tojo Clan. And that’s really wild thinking back to Zero and how powerful he was, he was all but a shoo in for chairman. But then, uh... Kiryu. Kiryu happened. Kiryu, and Majima I should say, are the reason Sera becomes chairman, not Sohei. Forever upsetting the wheels of fate. Given where we see Sohei next, I can’t imagine that he ever really recovered from that upset ^^; And I’m SURE it made him bitter towards Kiryu the rest of his life. And considering, again, where we see him next, I think the canon supports this ^^; 

So what becomes of Daigo’s destiny then? His father had victory snatched away, destiny denied, and everything he had slowly crumbles over time, leaving his son with less and less to inherit, but still with the ideology that he should take this over. That’s an awkward position to be in. 

And then Sera dies. Ooh, golly, I wonder who the next chairman’s gonna- it’s Kiryu. Of course it’s fucking Kiryu, how could it not be? It OBVIOUSLY should be Kiryu. He’s the strongest, the bravest, and who inspires the most loyalty. It doesn’t matter that Kiryu’s never been in leadership before, he TURNS people. Kiryu could get anyone on his side through sheer force of personality, which is hilarious to say about a guy with maybe 3 facial expressions. But tell me I’m wrong. I cannot count the number of part-time antagonists who turned on a dime because Kiryu beat their ass. And anyone who can do that can rule the world. Kiryu was absolutely the best pick for chairman and I will fight the world on this.

(Abbreviated for length, this is a LONG post)

But... then Kiryu makes the stupidest decision of his entire fucking life and renounces the chairmanship. And he has his reasons, feeling unworthy, traumatized from the events of Kiwami 1, unsure if he even wants to stay in the yakuza or if there’s maybe something else he wants to do with his life... he’s going through a lot of intense self-reflection and self-doubt and, I hate to harp on it, but fucking trauma. His brother blew himself up in front of him in a bid for redemption after all but telling Kiryu that all of his mistakes are Kiryu’s fault. Yeah, no, I’m sure Kiryu’s doing FINE with that. So, like, I can see why Kiryu said no, but it was still... fucking nuts. And it irrevocably changed the trajectory of everyone in this universe. Which Kiwami 2 goes out of its way to explore. Kiryu’s leaving? Majima fucking retires, Terada’s suspect, there aren’t any old, loyal hands left to lead the families, and we see how vulnerable the Tojo clan is on every side because Kiryu just up and fucked off. 

(I have A LOT of feelings about Kiryu being chairman and someday I will have the strength to write the AU we all deserve where Kiryu stays as chairman)

So... the wheel of fate turns and oh yeah remember Daigo? Dojima Sohei’s son Daigo? The kid who’s been raised his whole life to take over the clan only to be denied at every turn? How’s he doing? Not great! It turns out, not great! Kiryu, his father figure, killed his ACTUAL father, but didn’t really, took the blame for some other weird guy, leaving Daigo with one badass mother and very little direction in life. Daigo’s been brought up thinking he’ll take over a great kingdom but all that’s left now is a broken wreck about to be demolished and picked apart by scavengers. Great, yeah, just what any kid wants to inherit. And he wasn’t trained to fix this, it’s kinda shitty to saddle him with destiny and then not train him for the thing that actually has to be done and then do it anyway. It’s real shitty actually. And not many people help Daigo. 

Daigo couldn’t have taken the chairmanship directly from Sera, he was still just a teenager then. But it probably would have been nice if Kiryu checked in with him even fucking once since getting out of jail. But no, we never explain on screen to Daigo what happened as far as I can remember. Which, I feel, is a pretty fucking big oversight. How the fuck is Daigo supposed to trust you Kiryu? Or we’re supposed to believe he just figured it out off screen and holds no grudges? Like, I’m sure knowing Kiryu didn’t kill Sohei helps, but he couldn’t fucking tell you that himself? He couldn’t trust you with that information or that conversation? Fuck this. Very understandably, Daigo has his own crisis of faith about the yakuza, very much in parallel to Kiryu’s. Why the fuck SHOULD he go to bat for a crumbling organization that has only proven itself to be a dog chasing its own tail, willing to devour itself at the slightest provocation? It took his father, both his fathers, and he didn’t really get either of them back. Why the fuck should he try to fix that? 

And to its credit, Kiwami 2 does a decent job of articulating Daigo’s motivations there. I could have done with even more, but I think they do him credit in showing him as disenfranchised and lost. And I think it’s refreshing to see someone have to confront the consequences of what’s happened since Kiryu left. Because the games don’t do a good job of showing that this is Kiryu’s direct fault. They never like to make Kiryu’s decisions have consequence, which is poor use of a protag. Rightly or wrongly, their decisions ALWAYS have consequence, or they’re not the protag. You can’t have it both ways. If this person is going to matter then, guess what, their consequences matter. Kiryu turned away. Rightly or wrongly, he did that. Daigo will never get that opportunity. Child of destiny. Not only was he bred and raised for this, he doesn’t know how to do anything else either. He doesn’t have other options the way Kiryu does. And we’re in a terrible vacuum of power. Terada’s namely in charge, but no one’s loyal to him. Even if he wasn’t deliberately fostering this, the Tojo Clan can’t survive without faith in their leader. Daigo, by fact of being his fathers’ son, can bind what’s left. And he has to because Kiryu won’t. Which is... really shitty. So either Daigo does this, or we all hang. And we never quite articulate that this is on Kiryu’s say so. Kiryu could still take over now and fix it he just... won’t.

And on top of this already comfortably stressful situation... we set Daigo up to come into a stable situation of power, where his transition would be smooth. We didn’t give him the tools to know how to salvage. He’s not practiced negotiating with hostile entities or even just people who will resent him because he’s young. And he’s lost a lot of faith, without even charisma and willpower on his side, this is a massively uphill battle. If he doesn’t believe, who else will believe him? Daigo knows this. And we watch that struggle go on, all while Kiryu just cheerleads. He hasn���t decided yet if he’s gonna stay in the yakuza either and he’s lowkey depressed after Kiwami 1. Lowkey he’s just suffering depression and can’t do as much as he normally would. Not an excuse, but I think an important way to read how tired and reluctant he is. Some therapy would really fucking help. 

Anyway, we manage to get through Kiwami 2 and install Daigo as chairman, at which point Kiryu fucks off for good. Now, he kinda/sorta leaves some supports for Daigo, in Majima specifically, but also in Kashiwagi and I wanna believe in Daigo’s mom too. She was so cool and then we just... never talked about her again ^^; Laaaame *sigh* So, I guess, Kiryu did try to fulfill his remaining responsibilities as Daigo’s living father, but mostly it was just an excuse for him to leave and not feel guilty. Mostly it was him foisting off his duties onto someone else. He didn’t stay to teach Daigo everything he knew about the people Daigo would have to control. He didn’t teach Daigo and Majima how to talk to each other, a thing which REPEATEDLY comes back to bite us in the ass. He’s not there for Daigo to ask advice and help. Kiryu is full of confidence for Daigo, he’s not TRYING to make him fail, but Kiryu’s so caught up in his own need to leave, he neglects to people who need him. 

And Daigo, to his everlasting credit, does his best to get by without Kiryu’s help. As much as possible, he never calls to ask Kiryu for help. And he does grow into a quite competent chairman! He does successfully rehabilitate the Tojo Clan, he makes them profitable again, he insists on respect and people don’t run amok under him. He does it, he salvages a dying organization. And he may not even really believe in it, but he has such a sense of responsibility, he does it anyway. He knows there’s no one else. He knows if he goes to Kiryu and says I don’t want this, Kiryu won’t help him. Kiryu didn’t mean for it to happen this way, he didn’t mean to be selfish and put others in a bad position. But he wasn’t there to listen. And I think Kiryu eventually comes to rue that. 

The very unfortunate thing about Kiryu is... he is a dragon. Even though he is kind and generous and not greedy in a conventional sense, he is greedy. As much as Kiryu is a powerhouse because come hell or high water, he does what he thinks is right... this also makes him extremely selfish. He can be blind to other people’s needs and refused to be tied down. Again, for the best of reasons, because he’s trying to raise a family, because this environment is triggering for him, but he just hauls off and does things instead of talking to anyone which... makes him impossible to have a working relationship with. He has to learn to talk and to listen and that he can’t make all of the decisions by himself. The great irony being, Kiryu never wants to, but he doesn’t know how to ask for help. He’s so used to have everything put on him, he doesn’t realize it doesn’t have to be that way... but anyway, I’m getting caught up ^^; The point is, he thinks because he ditched the Tojo Clan they no longer care about him. Which is... naive at best. Of course people still care about you dumbass. Which makes Kiryu a massive vulnerability to the Tojo. In 3 and 4, Daigo makes stupid calls trying to protect Kiryu and trying to protect his interests. And because Kiryu hasn’t left open an avenue for them to talk, Daigo has to make these decisions on his own with bad information and he does his fucking best. But... he doesn’t know how to make the best of what he has, not like Kiryu would, and he fucks up sometimes. 

I really, really love game 4 for that reason. Daigo’s fuck up is SO understandable, SO reasonable. It sounded like a good idea, it sounded like peace and harmony. And he was left without a leg to stand on before he knew it. In many ways, it wasn’t his fault. Kiryu himself says as much. And I may never forgive the end of 4 for letting Kiryu REALIZE he defaulted on his responsibilities but then, instead of changing his behavior in any way, he fucks off back to Okinawa. God... *siiiigh* ANYWAY. 

And this struggle, this lack of communication, but unstated loyalty, comes full circle in game 5. When Daigo is literally drowning, literally knows he’s going to fail this time and there’s nothing he can do, and even when he’s with Kiryu, he can’t bring himself to ask for help. He knows Kiryu won’t or can’t. Instead he asks for absolution. He tries to tell his dad he’s just been doing his best and... he’s sorry for the terrible things that are about to happen. How gutting that Daigo can only see himself as a failure because... he’s not Kiryu. No one’s Kiryu. Even Kiryu refuses to be Kiryu. But Daigo knows if he was just Kiryu, things would be better. He’s not a legend. He’s not a god. He’s not all-powerful or crazy or impossible. He’s just a guy, doing his best because he had to. Because there was no one else. And some days Daigo does great, but a lot of days, he doesn’t measure up. And that eats at Daigo like mold. Kiryu would NEVER look at Daigo this way. Heck, most people at that point would never compare them. It’s in Daigo’s head, but it still hurts. He’s still, even now, looking up to Kiryu and he’ll just... never quite get there. 

This is the only good thing I will ever say about game 6, and it was still 2 or 3 games too late, but Kiryu finally acknowledging Daigo as his son was good. Kiryu saying he was proud and saying he was grateful was good. Again, several games late, but... it still mattered. It still mattered that, in the end, Kiryu recognized his legacy in Daigo. That he understood so much of what Daigo did and does and is and was is for him. That mattered. 

Daigo is a great chairman who takes care of his clan. But he was robbed of his relationship with his father. The games never work on the relationships that exist, strong relationships, for reasons I will never understand. Games 3, 4, and 5 would have been SO much more interesting if we had just like Kiryu talk to his fucking friends. Two would have been SO much easier if Kiryu had just been fucking chairman like he was fucking supposed to be and the transition of power to Daigo came later and smoother, with Kiryu helping to make it. Daigo tries his hardest every day and he’s an incredible negotiator and savior after all the shit he’s had to pull the Tojo Clan through, kicking and screaming and fighting to tear itself apart every damn day. The generation above him is all legends, Majima and Saejima and Kiryu. Daigo isn’t one of them. But he’s better because he was here and because he tries and because he succeeds. We need Daigo. We deserve him. 

[chaoticspacefam]

OC Worldbuilding Tag Pt 2!

...electric boogaloo! I’m sorry I know this joke is old now but I cannot help it, it’s ingrained in my brain XD

I got another tag for this from @a-master-procrastinator , thank you! :D

I think all my friends & mutuals have already been tagged for this one? But I’ll throw a couple out here if you want to, no pressure as always!: @mercurypilgrim​ , @actualanxiousswampwitch and @sleepswithvillains maybe?

Some more Saarai, because I love her. Some very slight spoilers for some of the differences in the Subterfugeverse plot points but nothing major! ;3 Long post warning again, as well as some brief mentions of Valkorion being a dick and causing a mass-genocide but all on the same level as the presented game canon.

- Saarai is psychometric and has been since she was pretty young, a Force power she inherited from D’leah’s mother, Saa’thri, because it “skipped” D’leah and Saarai got it instead. Though she didn’t realise it at the time and it wasn’t until she brought it up to her mother and D’leah went “oh yeah, your grandma had that too :)” that she realised it was actually A Thing.

- She’s not always good at recognising when a vision is from the Psychometry and when it’s just “her imagination”, particularly when she’s younger (which gets her into some trouble, see: the whole Tsâhis thing). Even after she gets used to it, sometimes it still hits her out of nowhere and if it’s a particularly nasty vision she’ll sometimes lose her footing and hit the deck - thankfully, because of their Force bond, Ni’kasi can usually figure out what’s happening and react fast enough to catch her before she smacks her head on something.

- Nathema was...not fun for Saarai thanks to the Psychometry. She’d wanted to go with them to protect them and ended up having to be dragged back to the ship and wait there because the moment she tried to touch anything there the Force went “Oh hey!! would you like some Detailed Flashbacks About What Happened Here!!” and yeah...she did not have a good time. Going to Nathema was kind of a mistake for her. Woops. (She gets through it though, Lana gets her back to the ship and she gets a handle on things but definitely doesn’t go all the way into the facility with Vano and Lana. Probably a good thing, too, if she’d picked up that toy of Vaylin’s I think she would’ve found those visions quite upsetting to watch, too.)

- She and Lana don’t share a Force bond, only because she has one with her sister, Ni’kasi instead. Neither of the twins are exactly sure when it formed, but they’ve had the connection for as long as they can remember. When they’re separated while Saarai and Ty are on Rishii, it’s harder for them to communicate because of the distance between them and Kas putting up barriers “just in case” the Sith tried to interrogate her at any point, she didn’t want to give Saarai away. They knew enough to know the other twin was probably still alive, but not to know exactly what was going on with each other until they finally reunite with the first Coalition on Yavin IV. That was the final relief for the twins, actually getting to see the other one standing there and definitely very much alive, there were hugs and a lot of tears, absolutely. <3

- Saarai is very much a “reluctant leader”, she never wanted to be a figurehead in the Alliance nor did she want to be telling people what to do, but circumstances “forced” her into the role and she had to stumble around awkwardly and adapt. With Vano gone and stuck in carbonite, somone had to step up and make sure the people that were working with Vano stuck together and didn’t fall apart (Not all of Vano’s crew disperse, Broonmark, Pierce and Jaesa always remain with the Alliance. Quinn ends up in jail after the Quinncident and Vette goes missing during one of their attempts to search for Vano’s whereabouts only to reappear as in canon later ;)) With Marr dead and the rest of the Dark Council under Zakuul’s heel or missing, that left Lana, Ni’kasi and Aria as alternative “leadership” figures. Lana lacked the ambition for it and was more tooled to be an advisor and while both Ni’kasi and Aria are bossy enough to delegate tasks, they’re abrasive and people don’t like them. But they like Saarai and they listen to her. So everyone kinda went “Okay cool you’re in charge now :)” I’m sorry, Saarai, you’re symultaneously the most and least qualified for this job but you got it anyway :P She settles into it eventually, though, but will be the first one to adamantly insist that it’s a team effort between not only herself and Vano once they have her back, but Lana, Koth, Theron and all the other trusted members of the Alliance acting as advisors in their respective fields of interest.

- In Subterfugeverse, I headcanon that Vano and Saarai share the command of the Alliance once Vano returns. Vano has the Commander title and handles most of the battle tactics and strategy, whereas Saarai handles things like conflict resolution and public relations, as well as controlling the Eternal Fleet. Things work very differently in Subterfugeverse in terms of the Throne so I’ll try to keep it brief but essentially:

Valkorion “took over” the Sith Empire from the Ahaszaai, Saarai’s ancestors. It was a very hostile takeover and currently Saarai, Ni’kasi, Ty, eventually Ni’kasi’s kids, and their uncle Vowrawn are the only four Ahaszaai left in the entire galaxy.

While they didn’t technically have claim to the Zakuulan throne, the original Sith homeworld before Valkorion’s bullshit was Medriaas (which is canon, I’m just borrowing this part because it fits in nicely ;)), which became Nathema after Valkorion did his whole “planet eating” thing.

Vano is initially the only one who can control the Throne and the Fleet via the whole “Valkorion is in her head” loophole. However, that loophole becomes defunct once Valkorion gets yanked out of her mind since it was Valkorion that gave her the ability to control it in the first place.

I’m assuming for the sake of plot flow that it’s based upon two specific “checks” and that’s 1) direct blood ties to the Emperor(ess) in power and/or 2) said Emperor(ess) currently controlling the throne directly and willingly passing their authority over the throne to a successor - which is how Valkorion is able to give the Outlander/Vano control of the Fleet while he’s in her mind, even though she’s not blood related to him.

They’re able to, with some research, deduce that they can exploit this apparent loophole in the system, to avoid losing control of the Fleet entirely and risking any of the GEMINI droids turning into another SCORPIO; and Vano essentially rescinds control of the Throne/Fleet to Saarai, everyone (including Ni’kasi herself) agrees that Saarai is the responsible choice because she’s not going to get a bee in her bonnet and with an errant thought accidentally set the Eternal Fleet on the Jedi or something of the sort.

Since Saarai has direct blood ties to the original ruling Sith before Valkorion userped the title from them, and Vano willingly gave the Throne up to her, the Throne can’t throw a tantrum about it and just has to deal with it. XD

- Once they do manage to track down where Vano is, before Lana and Koth head to Zakuul to actually break her out, Lana comes to Saarai for help with that. Ni’kasi has to stay to watch Ty and also try and keep a tenuous line with the other Sith thanks to her position on the Dark Council, Aria’s too emotionally charged to think straight and Lana is rightfully worried she might make a mistake that puts the whole rescue mission in jeapordy, so they ask Saarai instead. It’s kind of awkward and she and Koth rub each other the wrong way at first, they bicker for two thirds of the entire trip there and Lana almost throws them both out of the airlock for it, but eventually do find a way to bury the hatchet before they actually arrive at Zakuul to rescue Vano.

- By the time they find the Gravestone, Saarai and Koth have made up and though they are not yet involved with eachother at that time, have both agreed that fighting over Lana is stupid and they can make this work without making things difficult for anyone else, so the whole interruption in the Gravestone’s cargo hold, for Subterfugeverse, is genuinely an accident. Saarai heads up to check on him afterwards and they have another amicable and productive conversation and end up growing a little closer. Their side of the relationship is a little slower to form, but they do eventually end up developing deeper feelings for each other, though it’s strictly non-sexual between Rai and Koth and they are both 100% happy and okay with that.

[marsupials-of-mars]

Logan's Diary

(Second in my sides' diaries series, eight excerpts from Logan's Emotion Journal experiment picked and curated for your viewing pleasure)

Age 12:

Event: Patton suggested I begin journaling

Emotion: Thoughtful

Context: Patton has brought to my attention that I may be having trouble understanding my own emotions, and suggested i write my feelings in a diary. I assured him that he was being ridiculous, but it prompted in me the idea that as logic, I should have a full understanding of all topics, including emotion, in it's most technical sense. I will not be referring to this as a "diary", and I will not be speaking to it as if it were an individual, as it is a book and can not read or respond. Therefore, I will refer to it as my "Emotion Journal", as that is what it is.

Age 14:

Event: Puberty

Emotion: Overwhelmed(?)

Context: I'm so incredibly fed up with this. Nothing is as it should be, and nobody is willing to listen to reason. Each side has become unruly and chaotic in their own way. Most noticable is Anxiety, who has taken up a position of leadership in the mind. He has no place there. He makes extremely unhealthy decisions due to social pressures or personal worries which have begun to isolate Thomas or cause him to lose his sense of self. He doesn't seem to like the position, but it seems he's been forced into it anyway as his influence has built due to the dreaded neural changes of adolescence. Thomas has begun to wear very dark clothing. However bad all of that is for Thomas, the most unbearable change effecting me personally as a resident of this mind has been Remus. He is absolutely unbearable. Every word or movement he makes causes immense discomfort not only to me but to anyone nearby. Patton has been overly emotional, either crying or unable to sit still, occurring minutes apart from each other in violent mood swings. Roman has been working overtime, attempting to help Thomas through escapism. He creates stories and drawings which distract Thomas from his troubles, but these are momentary fixes, and will become unhealthy if continuous.

Overall, it has been, for lack of a better or more accurate synonym, a clusterfuck, and I'm counting the days until it's over.

Age 15:

Event: Thomas has been questioning his sexuality

Emotion: Annoyed

Context: I don't understand Patton and Roman's persistence in making everything so needlessly complicated. There are many physically attractive girls and yet they decide that they would rather be difficult about it. I don't understand them sometimes. They seem apologetic, but when one is sorry the appropriate action to follow would be to cease one's poor behavior. I've decided to cut contact with both of them for the time being as my feelings toward them at the moment make me prone to irrationalities. I'm always partial to curiosity but high school is already giving me a lot to think about and I don't appreciate having to factor in such a development. I will make the decision to ignore it for now. Perhaps it will eventually cease to be an issue.

Age 18:

Event: Thomas is a legal adult

Emotion: Elated

Context: Thomas turned 18 today, which means as of now he is legally allowed control of his own person in nearly every sense. I've been preparing for this my whole life, and I have a clear view of the many paths we could take from this point onward. Thomas has always been proficient in chemistry, therefore I believe a major in the scientific field would be appropriate. I can hardly contain my excitement. However, Anxiety has been making this transition quite difficult. He keeps insisting that we have no idea what comes next and are entirely unprepared, and somehow this sentiment is drowning out my attempts to guide Thomas. He can be incredibly frustrating to manage, and he's been more and more active as of late. But no matter how much he tries, he will not succede in putting a damper on my good mood.

Age: 25

Event: Thomas insists on continuing to make "Vines"

Emotion: Confused

Context: I will never cease to be entirely bewildered by Thomas's desire to "act", particularly in such small, insignificant, and comical portions. I can somewhat understand his drive for theater, as it is professionally directed and offers a feeling of purpose as well as a decent amount of enrichment both socially and cognitively.

However, these six second looping goofs are of no gain whatsoever. They don't promote social interaction, they don't fill any free time, and there is no true talent involved. Somehow, Roman is enjoying them nearly as much as he appears to enjoy acting onstage. Patton is also quite active lately. I will never truly grasp the appeal of this thespian characteristic of Thomas. Most of his Vines make no logical sense, and are unabashedly ridiculous. He is making a fool of himself. But I do like to see him happy, so I've decided to let this slide, as a benefit to his mental health. However insufferable his Vines, he is always smiling as he makes them, and that is always paramount.

Age 28:

Event: Virgil revealed his name to us

Emotion: Proud

Context: As of late, Anxiety has grown more and more tolerable, and seems to be settling in as one of the light sides. He has been making some real rational arguments, and even when he doesn't succeed, one can tell he is putting effort in, rather than reverting to his usual feigned apathy. It was made clear to me when he changed his jacket. In accepting his color more openly, which he had previously seemed to feel ashamed of, he showed trust and a feeling of belonging. This trust was made even more clear just today, when he revealed his name, Virgil. I feel as if this reveal marks a success in his social progress. There will always be a probability of relapse, but at this moment in time, I pride myself on having put my trust and belief in him. He is quite intelligent when not panicking, and provides a comforting relief from the exuberance of the other two.

Age 30:

Event: I'm nothing but a joke to them

Emotion: Furious

Context: This is why I don't often let my guard down. I trusted them to understand who I am and how I want to be treated, so I presented some of my guilty pleasures: Crofters, singing, poetry, onesies, and the occasional dad joke. I of course took precautions to not overindulge in such nonsense, but I assumed I could allow myself some comfort around who I assumed were my friends. However. They continuously pick at my flaws, they tease me relentlessly for every mistake. To them it's all in good fun, it's some awful game. To me it's not. I feel even more trapped in my outward presentation than before, and they don't seem to notice. It's not my job to tell them how I feel. I manage objective intelligence, they are emotional intelligence. It's their job to understand what I feel for me, they should know what would upset their friend. They know I'm vulnerable, they have to, and they continue to drag me into their silly hijinks and refuse me my objective purpose if I do not conform entirely to it. We have become a joke, we are getting nowhere with this career, we are only plummeting further into the role of some commercialized funnyman, a one dimensional character, and this is what Roman desires that we become. I won't allow it. I need to become who I should be, I cannot allow any further divergence.

Age 30:

Event: Thomas called me "cool"

Emotion: Validated

Context: After helping Thomas manage his introduction to Remus, we had a moment that I can only describe as heartfelt. He called me "cool", something i never really strived to be, but feels wonderful to be described as. Whether or not I am "cool" in an objective sense, what I truly gained from this interaction was appreciation, admiration, respect, and I believe that that is what resonated with me. I always aim to help Thomas, as a side should, and the purest way the favor can be returned is with simple validation. I feel I have an opportunity to employ an expression I've come to enjoy: "on cloud nine". I feel as if I am on cloud nine. That is the best way to describe this feeling. As much as Remus proves himself a nuisance, I have him to thank for providing the grounds for this event to take place. I have reached a balance of who I am and who I want to be, both comfortable and respected. Of course, Thomas doesn't need to be gushed to, and I'm not one for gushing. Therefore, I will now resume my duties as his cool teacher.

[iridescentrey]

Two lonely, disparate pieces coming together

(Me and @mysonkylo did a lot of episode IX speculating yesterday and I see some people already coming to the same conclusions. I just wanted to develop it a bit more, put it all in one place to reblog in 2 years and see how much we predicted.)

What do we actually know about episode IX so far? We know nothing but the working title and the setup from episode IX. It might go in a completely different direction, but we think this is the most logical way the story will go. This is a bit long, so I’m putting it under Read More.

Rey and the Resistance:

·       For a long time everybody has been assuming that Rey would find her belonging with her Resistance friends, that they would become her family, that she would fight with them for the cause. I think this idea is going to be thrown out of the window pretty early in the movie.

·       Think about it, nobody in the Resistance actually knows what Rey has been up to, they probably think she came to Crait right after leaving Ahch-to. They have no idea that she ever interacted with Ben, they don’t know what happened on the Supremacy or what happened to Snoke. And I doubt she’s going to be quick to tell everyone the truth. All everyone might know are rumors about Snoke’s death.

·       Once everybody finds out Rey went to the Supremacy all by herself, what if they assume she did kill Snoke on her own? Snoke, the most powerful dark side user at their time. They will start viewing her as a Resistance hero, the poster girl for the cause. At this point she will be the only force user in their ranks, and not just any force user but an incredibly powerful one. They will see her as their only hope in battle with the First Order and will expect her to become Luke 2.0 in approximately five seconds. Can you imagine the pressure she will be put under? She’s just beginning to explore her power. She’s nowhere near being in full control.

·       And all that happening while she’s hiding her connection with Ben from everyone around her. What if everybody just assumes she will be the one to defeat Kylo Ren? I imagine they won’t be thrilled after she turns out not so keen on the idea. It will make everybody suspicious and distrustful of her.

·       From what we know, they will probably kill Leia off during the time jump. With all of the leadership dead, it leaves the entire Resistance in the hands of Poe. As much as I love Poe, we know he’s single-mindedly focused on the cause and would do anything for it.

·       We know the force bond between Rey and Ben won’t go away that easily. I don’t have my mind set on how they’re going to reconcile… But I think it might have to do with one or both of the two things: Leia’s death and/or Rey’s power getting out of control. The Raw Power ™ talk has been kind of dropped at the beginning of TLJ. What if the pressure from the Resistance will awaken those powers? What if she will give them a reason to be afraid of her? She might have to swallow her pride and ask Ben for help, as he’s the only person in the galaxy that could possibly know what she’s experiencing and know a way to help her.

·       One thing I’m 99.9% sure will happen, is someone will find out about Rey and Ben’s bond. If they manage to reconcile and get close enough for the hut scenario to happen again. Anyone could just walk in and see her having a chit chat with the Supreme Leader of the First Order. In everybody’s eyes he’s the enemy number one, the most dangerous person in the galaxy. I can’t imagine ANYONE in the Resistance being very happy. Especially if that person happens to be Poe. As we saw in TLJ, he was quick to call Holdo a traitor simply for doing something he didn’t agree with. Rey might already be distrusted and feared at this point, but someone seeing her with Ben would be a breaking point. What would Poe assume? That she’s a traitor? That she’s giving all the information about the Resistance to the First Order? That she’s being manipulated by Kylo Ren? No matter what conclusion he came to, Rey would be completely cut off from any important Resistance information or plans. That is IF she was even let go freely. If there’s any risk she’s being manipulated, it would be dangerous to just simply let her be. Would Poe listen to anything she had to say? Is there any chance they would believe her? I don’t think so.

·       At this point there would be two possible scenarios. One, where the Resistance would distrust Rey completely and either imprison her or force her to leave. Two, they would want to use her as a weapon against the First Order. She’s the only person in the galaxy that can get this close to Ben and I bet my ass the Resistance will want to use this.

·       What I’m saying is, she will quickly end up on her own, imprisoned or exiled. While I think Finn will choose to trust her in the end, it’s crucial for her to be left completely alone at this point.

 Ben and the First Order:

·       While we’re lead to believe Kylo Ren is now the big bad in this story, I think it’s much more probable this role will ultimately fall to Hux. This is a man with an “unquenchable thirst for power” and no remorse. He killed his own father because he posed a threat to him. Unlike Ben, he wasn’t torn apart by what he did in the slightest. He despises Ben with all of his being, he already tried to murder him while he was unconscious in the throne room. He’s just waiting for a good moment to take over.

·       The perfect moment to do that will be if he manages to discover what actually happened in the throne room. No matter if he sees that it was actually Ben that killed Snoke or that he simply helped Rey who he thinks killed his Supreme Leader, both of those count as treason in his eyes. The only reason he hasn’t taken over already is because he’s scared of Ben’s power. But he’s just waiting for a moment where he’ll be vulnerable. He won’t be able to protect himself all of the time, especially not against big numbers. The rest of the First Order won’t hesitate to turn on him if they find out what happened to Snoke. My best guess is he will be sentenced to death for it. I would live for a scene where both, Ben and Rey sit in their cells and they connect through the force.

·       Basically, we end up with our two space idiots not being able to turn to anyone but each other. This is what has been set up all along.

Can I tag some people? I hope you guys don’t mind. @the-reylo-void @daxcat79 @existentialcomfort @ben-solo-needs-a-timeout 

[apromisetoyou]

Alone

Being consumed by a fear of the unknown once more because of my disappointment and anger amplifies the feeling of myself feeling alone. Having to bear the responsibility of an opportunity lost and the regret of having my hope bubble burst made me wonder why I am so unlucky, and why I didn't choose to leave earlier in spite of everything. I felt abandoned by someone whom I had tried looking up to, and this only served to impel me to validate all the negatives thoughts I have about her.

Demonising her, and the desire to make her pay, such thoughts started appearing and I almost feel justified for wanting to choose 'payback' as a way to end my relationship. I was prepared to trust her, to believe that she was also prepared to give me opportunities, but I see that up till the end, I would never be an employee she would think about taming. Ruthless impartiality - I can remain as just an intern, given that there will be others who can fill up the slots.

Yet, the underlying problem has always been this - I am aware that I could never fully bring myself to trust her and she could never fully trust me as well. I could trust her as my boss, but not as who she is in her totality. She could trust insofar in my role as an intern, but probably not as a full-time employee in the future. Perhaps it is the case that we did not fully trust ourselves enough to be able to deal with our ability and readiness to handle differences, just like my relationship with Gwen. We were not sufficiently motivated to take the risk that we can continue supporting each other.

Does this show that I am always a step too late to improve? I never let go of my concern for Gwen even after breaking up, until I decided to prioritise myself over her. I knew that I love her but I was not prepared to chase her back because I wanted her to stay true to herself and not confuse her feelings any further. I sensed her inability to embrace me as someone she could wholeheartedly support and I knew it would not be right for both of us to continue with a unbalanced tilted relationship, where my love for her would be stifling and overwhelming. Above all, I wanted her to be brave and not hurt anymore so that she didn't have to cry again. As I tried my best to move on, I was able to rationalise that she and I were not meant to be because we were both insecure and not ready to deal with the demands of our relationship. We ended up hurting each other unintentionally with our innocence, values and beliefs. I was resentful for not feeling validated by her and she was upset that I could not change enough for her and her parents. We saw our vulnerabilities as a mistake but the truth is, a relationship stays only because there are moments and pockets of vulnerabilities that we reveal to one another. Love and pain are 2 sides of a coin, and connecting them together is growth and support through healing. Sometimes, separation is necessary.

Still, I will not give up on our bonds, no matter how pathetic it may seem. Because she taught me love and I came to make sense of love in my own way thereafter, even if flawed and incomplete.

Back to a professional setting, my traineeship experience showed me and reminded me again that not everyone in a leadership position will turn out to be a good leader to all. Inevitably, there will be leaders who cannot meet the needs of some subordinates so a good leader will always be mindful to assign mentors who can step in to meet those needs. I could never find that mentor here, despite giving my best. Perhaps I didn't ask enough, perhaps I wasn't confident to do more, perhaps I was just lazy. But through it all, I was only told that everyone is just too busy and what I saw only confirmed what I was told. So I recalibrated my pace and I soon found my passion being slowly extinguished. While I don't think that I can arrive at the state where I can fully trust myself to handle differences, I think I have come to trust the process of journeying by myself and to trust in my ability to withstand stress from societal and my self-expectations with patience and kindness. I can trust in myself to handle criticism and be more independent at work. I appreciate the importance of caring and relying on my team of colleagues but I can still do more to show initiative in order to be more independent in my own learning - such as by asking a question everyday and consolidating my knowledge through applied practice.

Therefore, my 'payback' is in becoming a leader that anyone deserves, no matter who they are. I will never treat anyone as a means to an end nor will I see what I am doing as only a means to an end. Guided by the right intention and experience, my actions are an end in themselves (becoming; changing; connecting) because they embody my values, beliefs and principles to be who I want to become. Instead of ruthless impartiality, I'll choose ruthless optimism and hope to enact and practise practical idealism even as I see the larger picture. I will never want to 'disable' anyone through the lack of sincere open tough communication - feelings and thoughts. To do so, I will always put aside time for communications that would allow me to process and integrate my perceptions, knowledge and feelings of a person together, no matter our status.

So where do I go from now? Having processed my thoughts, I think I can finally mention her name V. It is valid that I felt anger and disappointment with her due to my belief that she has let me down but I do not want to always feel let down by her. What I perceive to be a personal injustice should not distract me from my intention to focus on cultivating my own inner disposition to embody the values I cherish. V is a mother with 2 children and it is enough knowing that she will love them and will do her best to make PRL an inclusive library with the support of both the current and new members. I can accept with peace my decision to take the gamble because it has helped me to confront my own evils with support from my friends, who once again reminded me that the feeling of being alone does not have to cause permanent suffering or hurt. It will help me to see myself clearly, warts and all and choose from a position of vulnerability to understand that someone out there can empathise with my perspective, and this is enough for me to construct a new narrative of hope and acceptance with what is. I have to continue strengthening, disciplining and regulating myself so that I can continue to pass on the shared hope of connecting with others. My experience is unique and not unique at the same time, just like how I am a part and apart at the same time.

I do not wish to cause harm and hurt to others by projecting my own experience of suffering and pain onto them and neither do I need to start a personal vendetta just to seek satisfaction. My loved ones are here to ground me and I am fine just being alive and 'living hard' with them. 别辜负自己也别辜负生命因为有一天你打自内心所发出的光和热会带给你周边的人继续活下去及改变的力量。请记住今天你选择了善良宽待自己，也从此更相信爱并且接受这个世界的好与坏。因为我有好也有坏，我必须继续理解，继续沟通，继续相信自己，相信希望-成长的变化会带出真善美的可能性。

Besides following up on my handover, I think I can take whatever remaining time to consolidate my learning before applying them to Bilberries Blue. Hereon, I want to seek out my personal atelier - empathetic communication and recover my joy in living, no matter how long or challenging it may be. Right now, it is better to draw clearly the line between NLB and me. I do not think it is an organisation that I can find myself investing in or belonging to but this does not mean I cannot learn from the people there and what they are doing/thinking of. Innovation is neutral and no one is any less deserving to change this world through innovation and creativity, not withstanding one's intention/motivations.

There are colleagues whose professional and personal identities I respect, but V's role as a manager in NLB is one which I cannot come to respect. The only professional takeaway I have is the recognition of office politics and trade-off - mind games to put it bluntly. Still, I respect her competency and her efficiency and I will acknowledge her choices and ruthless impartiality with grace. Slowly, I may come to lose my disappointment and anger with her as I continue to trust myself more. I see that I only have to forgive myself for demonising her and not her because unlike my relationship with Gwen, I did not treasure/trust her enough to expect anything from her as a manager. My expectations came about because of my friends' experiences and the social knowledge of what a traineeship would deliver. The tension with V only came in because I felt that she ought to do something about my learning, but I also recognise that she is not obliged to because she does not owe me anything from this traineeship. It is part of my unconscious bias (due to my lived experiences) to project any misforgivings I have to a person in power but thanks to sociology, I remember now that I can direct my energy and feelings to the larger structural systems in the civil service which have shaped our interaction in order to avoid turning this into a static situation that is personal. I choose to end our relationship as RO and employee, rather than mentor and student.

As V rightly puts it, a relationship should be helpful to each other. I am not looking at this as a win-win i.e. extrinsic motivation but as an intrinsic motivation to develop my character according to my values. I understand that her personal accountability towards me will inevitably be shaped by her professional responsibilities to the team, NLB and her career aspirations in the civil service. Care is a choice that no one can institute. Even for myself, I need to acquire and commit to the discipline to care for myself and others - hence my personal atelier: empathetic communication.

In all, V did not try to sabotage my learning and she has helped me to acquire knowledge in her own utilitarianistic/functional way. Most importantly, she listened and shared about her personal self, which is what I valued above all, as well as her honesty with the team. Not her recommendations, nor her testimony. I hope she continues to stay honest, albeit not strategically but authentically. So that she will become a better leader for PRL and the incoming new staff as well as the PwDs she will interact with in future.

And this is what I will do with any lingering expectation/feelings for Gwen too. We may not care for each other as friends now but I'll trust the process of self-discovery, seek out and commit to my atelier while practising compassionate mindfulness until one day, I know I can fully trust myself to acknowledge Gwen with purity of intentions and the joy of wishing her well, as long as I live. Until then, I will continue to struggle and face more pain/hurt but I will know how to respond better and stick to the values that I wish to embody.

My writings and reflections saved me. My friends saved me. My family and the unfairness in this world motivates/drives me. I may feel alone but I know where not to go to. No one is truly alone, both physically and mentally, when he/she/they understand that we are all a part of this world shaped by the circumstances not of their doing, much as we feel apart sometimes. Not all of us may become master of our own fates but we can certainly take hold of our agency and keep on trying to negotiate with the circumstances while being attuned to and regulating our emotions agilely. Just like love and pain, freedom and structural forces will always come together as flip sides of the same coin. That is the journey of life and it is also where meanings are co-constructed through diversity and inclusion.

This is my praxis and my way of healing.

I love you Hong Kai, aged 26 years old. To the future me, I hope when you read this, you see how much you have struggled with disappointment and how much you have grown by choosing love and hope because of the pain you went through. You will look back and remind yourself - you are enough because you have made it all the way here without falling into despair, regardless of the lost opportunities, failed relationships, and guilty self-indulgent choices. You are still tender and also naive in your idealism, though mindful of the practicalities. If all else seems lost/bleak, please always choose kindness and ruthless optimism for yourself and this world because I know you value the good in humans and you are strong enough to accept the suffering and pain that we cause to one another, be it intentionally or unintentionally. In short, never give up on the values you want to embody nor on living in the many worlds you inhabit. By choosing to live with kindness and gratitude, you already belong to a group - inclusive humanity. Your innocence will materialise in a different form each time you fail, confront and learn to become wiser and kinder.

I hope and trust you will continue to go on many adventures of your own making while striving for balance, groundedness and peace bravely, freely, simply, kindly, contentedly, sincerely and justly. Happiness will follow in many different ways (: <3 Wishing the same for every living being in this world because we are connected by our experiences.

[samrosemodblog]

I’ve actually made several commission’s in the past. Back in my Powerpuff Girl’s fandom day’s, I got into Snafu comics so much I asked for several on Deviantart. (now that’s a nostalgia trip)

Sadly had to choose between video game’s and art. And I’m a born gamer. But yeah, went through all the proper step’s. Wrote up a general idea, described the color scheme for character’s and background. Described as much detail as possible. And left room for artistic alteration.

Those are, by my standards and the people I commissioned anyway, the basic’s. It wasn’t professional, nor did I make thing’s like diagram’s and pie chart’s. But I was asking for a picture, not a building.You hire people for thing’s like that and give strict instruction’s, hire people to oversee the project when you can’t, and work out the problem’s as they arise. Otherwise you could end up with a skyscraper in the suburbs because that’s what they were specialized at building.

“ALL IDEAS START OUT SUPER BASIC. Every single one.”

Yes, that’s how they start. Then, Before you hire a professional, you iron out the kink’s as much as possible. Make it presentable, so the people who are looking over it understand your intent. Otherwise they’re going to end up not believing in what your doing and try to fix it, or not do it all.

“Fluttershy’s idea was actually one of the more detailed I’ve seen, where she had pictures and details and written concepts. Was it all super professional? No, but she wasn’t a professional builder, and the whole point of the episode was that she was HIRING the people to make her dream a reality.”

I suppose we have very different views on detailed. If someone was hiring me for a project that required several people to work with, and that was presented to me, I would have walked out before it even started. You don’t hire people to make your dream. You hire them to Work on it.

“WHEN SHE HIRES PEOPLE IN THE EPISODE TO TURN THEM INTO BLUEPRINTS INTO REALITY.”

You see, that’s actually the other thing I have wrong with this episode. Because the thing is, when you get down to it,

she didn’t Hire anyone.

She asked her friend’s for help, which was understandable. Her freind’s then recommenced other more Experienced people to assist her. At which point she agreed.

In the end, she hired her friend’s friend’s, who assisted her project (possibly with no intent to pay), failed to properly communicate her intent’s, left them to they’re devices, and out of the kindness of her heart, fired them without even trying to compromise.

yeeeeeah, I’ve seen real life bosses who run company’s like that. It’s generally never a good situation to be in.

“No, most of them have pictures or concepts of what they’d LIKE their picture to look like, and some of them only have a PARAGRAPH of what they want and I have to interpret it from there.”

Well that’s actually impressive. I’m assuming you must have live chat’s through discord or twitch stream’s to help, because no artist I ever knew back in the day would have been able to make what I asked for with just a paragraph. All we had were email’s back in the day. Ahh, this generation. (so lucky)

“What did Fluttershy’s ‘professionals’ do in that episode?”

After they’re boss gave them a basic idea, they then decided to try and compromise when what they asked for wasn’t reasonable. At which point the rebuttal was “Just do it”, and left without compromise. Without alternative’s or direction, they had no choice but to fall back on what experience they had and work with what they could.

At which point, management came it Mid project development, and complained when the product failed to meet they’re standard’s. HR wasn’t going to like the outcome, therefore taking the only action available, they’re boss fired them without pay claiming negligence on part of the development team.

Thus granting the boss impunity and allowing all misconduct of the situation to be swept under the rug, damaging the reputation of everyone else involved. Possibly preventing any positive work force hiring them under false pretenses of negligence.

That is, unfortunately, a reality that happens far too often.

“CONSTANTLY being corrected about being wrong IS a dickbag thing to do.”

There’s an old saying, “Opinion’s are like Asshole’s. Nobody want’s them, we all have them”. 

Ill intent isn’t always given from blunt response. Some people just live they’re life that way. Yeah, alot of people become jerks because of it, heck, even my brother was(is). But that doesn’t mean they’re all that way. Blunt criticism is important to some people. Luckily we have the internet for this generation, so we see it all the time. 

“adsfsadfasrfawe I know I can be ranty but my god did this set me off aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa”

Good thing I’m not a troll, I’d be really good at it. :P

You SAY you’ve gotten commissions before but I’m more convinced than ever you have no idea how they work? At all?

What is this ‘back and forth communication’ you’re talking about? MAYBE if there’s something the commissioner wants fixed with the base sketch, but no, an example might be, “I want my OC doing this. Here is a pic of my OC, please draw that.” and I’m like “Cool!” so I draw the base sketch and send it back for approval. They either approve or want fixes, I make fixes, then when it’s approved ONLY THEN do I move on to ACTUALLY START the project!

No. At no point did the professionals look at Fluttershy’s basis and make blueprints, hand them to her, and go “How about this?” and get her approval. You can build a house from scratch this way. If there are important structures that have to be in the house you work with the person who wants that specific floorplan until the house is exactly the way you want it AND feesable to be built by the construction.

And you can be kind of vague like “Okay over here I want this to be an open and sunny room, and here I want the master bedroom to feel this way, and the kitchen needs to pop” and the professional goes “Okay I think I have an idea, let me sketch out the blueprints” and then they do and you approve it together.

If the person building the house just starts BUILDING THE HOUSE without your approval, then you’re going to have issues! You can’t just skip this step! You can’t just assume you know better than the person hiring you! It doesn’t matter how much expertise you have! YOU DON’T BUILD APARTMENT COMPLEXES FOR ANIMALS!!! It doesn’t MATTER if you think Apartments are awesome, they’re NOT WHAT IS NEEDED and you are an ASSHOLE FOR BUILDING THEM WITHOUT APPROVAL.

You go on and ON about Fluttershy’s lack of leadership or her lousy ideas or the fact she did EVERYTHING POSSIBLE WRONG when all you’re doing is shifting the blame of everyone else to her! Sure, maybe even if it is true they weren’t being paid and were volunteering, you still don’t just start doing with no idea what you’re doing!?

Let’s go volunteer at the hospital, but let’s not LISTEN to what any of the staff members say we can and can’t do while doing so. After all, WE volunteered! We can do whatever we want! Let’s shoot fireworks in the tiny rooms and make giant fires to cook food on in the middle of the rooms because WE know the best way to have a cookout for the patients! Who cares if they die of smoke inhalation or we potentially burn the whole building down? WE’RE the professionals here! Not the staff in the hospital!

That’s what you sound like. You sound like Fluttershy should’ve just let them build Apartment Complexes for a Nature Reserve, that animals were supposed to live like Ponies and that somehow that would be okay. That she trusted these people who knew about construction and fabrics to follow her design philosophy and come back to her with ideas on how to properly raise her preserve, when they didn’t know JACK SHIT about any of it!

At no point were the professionals incapable of doing what Fluttershy requested, seeing as the nature preserve gets built to her EXACT SPECIFICATIONS BY PEOPLE WHO DO NOT DO THEIR JOB FOR A LIVING. They literally disobeyed her and did whatever they wanted for the sake of conflict for the plot, even though there was absolutely no point in having conflict at all.

You are simply wrong about all of this. Commissions don’t work the way you think they do, hiring professionals doesn’t work the way you think it does, YOU DO NOT JUST START WORKING ON A PROJECT WHEN YOU DO NOT HAVE THE GO AHEAD TO DO IT, ESPECIALLY SOMETHING AS HUGE AND PUBLIC AS A NATURE PRESERVE FOR ANIMALS.

I’m not even convinced you’re not a troll. I must’ve actually smacked my head against my desk several times just reading your replies and ‘arguments’ as if you have no idea how the real world works. I don’t know how you got commissions in the past, but hey, you even said it in your own message!

“ Well that’s actually impressive. I’m assuming you must have live chat’s through discord or twitch stream’s to help, because no artist I ever knew back in the day would have been able to make what I asked for with just a paragraph. All we had were email’s back in the day. Ahh, this generation. (so lucky) “

GUESS WHAT FLUTTERSHY’S ‘PROFESSIONALS’ NEVER DID? THEY NEVER COMMUNICATED BACK AND FORTH WITH HER ON WHAT TO DO OR WHAT SHE WANTED. SO THEY JUST STUFFED THEIR HEADS UP THEIR OWN ASSES AND DID WHATEVER THEY WANTED.

I am done arguing about this. I am so BEYOND done arguing about this and I am doing everything in my power to try and not just insult you because my god my brain HURTS. I’m just going to go back to drawing and any further discussion on this will be mute because I won’t reply. Feel free to think you ‘won’ with your next reply, I’m just done and tired with this.

[kiatastic]

Winter: Declaration of Dependence

"…and so I wouldn’t get a big head, I was given the gift of a handicap to keep me in constant touch with my limitations. At first I didn’t think of it as a gift, and begged God to remove it. Three times I did that, and then he told me, 'My grace is enough; it’s all you need. My strength comes into its own in your weakness.'

Once I heard that, I was glad to let it happen. I quit focusing on the handicap and began appreciating the gift. It was a case of Christ’s strength moving in on my weakness. Now I take limitations in stride, and with good cheer, these limitations that cut me down to size—abuse, accidents, opposition, bad breaks. I just let Christ take over! And so the weaker I get, the stronger I become."

Branches of encumbrance, insecurity and uncertainty hovered high over my head – stemming from giant trees of circumstance and plight. The sun was inconspicuously placed behind overcast clouds of grey and white. Hues of red, yellow and green that once bounced off the sun’s rays onto autumn leaves were now withering to a faded brown. Plummeting temperatures continued downward like a free fall not to strip me of comfort - but to teach me how to appreciate the Warmth that was present all along. On the coldest days of winter, my Warmth was found in 2 Corinthians 12:9.

In retrospect I know it was not by accident that I started my career in a role with the nature of drastic change every six months. A new job, manager, city, apartment, circle of friends, church, and hair stylist… an entire change of pace several times for two years straight. It was not a reminder - but a new lesson each rotation about why I did NOT have life figured out. Why I would be completely in over my head to think for a split second that I could accomplish anything lucrative within the small confinement of my own abilities. Why the very breath I exhaled was actually dependent on something – some One bigger than just the two lungs in my body. And so, each rotation was a declaration of dependence. John 15:5 is pretty clear:

“I am the Vine, you are the branches. When you're joined with me and I with you, the relation intimate and organic, the harvest is sure to be abundant. Separated, you can't produce a thing.”

So, it was time to start from scratch. Again. The movers cleared out my apartment in Nowhere, Tennessee as I packed the few remaining valuables in the back of my Honda Accord. I made an 11-hour trek from Selmer, TN to Houston, TX for my second role as an Engineering IT Security Projects Leader. On day one of the job, that title seemed so daunting to me. How on earth was I supposed to lead a team of well-seasoned engineers when I was only seven months deep into my IT career? Though I knew very little on day one, I learned so much about IT security & risk, engineering, and finance during that rotation. It was trial by fire. Challenges at work lead me to prayer over and over again. I knew I needed Help to deliver the results expected of me. Life on my own continued to provide nothing but space and opportunity to get to know the Lord and trust Him for myself.

Before I knew it, it was time to submit preferences for my next role. For once I did not care what my responsibilities would be or what my title was. I had a serious case of home-sickness and (I thought) the cure was living in a city with a short, drive-able distance back to Atlanta. "Lord, I really have no idea where I'm supposed to go next", I said as I threw myself on my hand-me-down sofa. I needed His direction - and I wasn't hearing a word from Him. I asked God to clearly show me where He wanted me to go next.

Two days later, I shuffled into my cube at 8:06 A.M. I was greeted with an unusually titled email from my manager that read "Call me". I immediately went into instant-replay mode - thinking back to everything I could have possibly done wrong over the past several months. "Oh great, what did I do?" I loathed. My manager proceeded to ask me if I would consider moving to Paris for my next rotation. "Don't trip, Nakia. Surely she means Paris, TX" I said to myself. That is actually a city just a few hours from where I was living in Houston. As she kept talking, she quickly briefed me on applying for a Visa, brushing up on French and how many bags I was allowed to take on the plane. "Oh shoot. She's definitely asking me to move to France”, I thought in my head. In addition to talking to myself, I was also speaking with my manager and the Lord all at the same time. I said to Him, "Are you serious, God? Is this the answer to my prayer? I asked to go closer to home and you want to send me 4,000 miles further away?” I was in complete disbelief.

A few moments of silence passed. "So, what do you think?", my manager asked. After pulsing with a few people I trusted and reconsidering my prayer to the Lord for direction, I decided to go for it. I cannot tell you what God's audible voice sounds like – but I know beyond the shadow of the doubt that He speaks through prayer, people and situations (just to name a few). Proverbs 3:5 says to “trust in the Lord with all your heart. Never rely on what you think you know. Remember the Lord in everything you do, and He will show you the right way”. There’s a reason why the Lord does not give us every step of the path at once. By giving one direction at a time, we learn to trust and rely on Him. It’s the Lord, not your process that you need to trust.

As I prepared to move to France, I was required to take a two-week graduate level course on data science and analytics in Budapest, Hungary. As I entered the lecture hall on day one, a serious case of déjà vu hit me as I sat with my incredibly brilliant colleagues from around the globe. I have always had a bit of an inferiority complex. My confidence was easily threatened by anyone who even appeared smarter, more successful, or just all-around better than me. Once again, I was studying extra hours to keep up with the brainiacs in my class who complained that the material was not hard enough. For the life of me I could not understand why those students could not just take their "A’s" and have a seat. Whenever I felt that inferiority creeping up, I had to constantly remind myself what God's Word says about me. No, I may not know five programming languages. No, I may not have come from an ivy league school. However, I had to drill Truth into my heart until I believed it. I wrote reminders in the back of my notebook until I believed them: “I am more than a conqueror in Christ Jesus – His strength shines brightest in my weakness”.

One week of lectures, exams and assignments passed; we started our capstone projects and I was grouped with some of the smartest people in my class. My inferiority complex rose to an all-time high as I began initial conversations about the project with my team. Time passed and I continued to struggle with sharing my ideas. I knew my teammates were incredibly smart - but I grew very concerned we were not on the right track. Our Tableau dashboards seemed to have the most bells and whistles with no business value behind them. After all, I was in a group with very technical software engineers and developers. Could it have been possible that my business background was added to this group for a reason? At the time, I could not see it.

Days went by and I remained silent. When I finally mustered up the confidence to say something, we were already preparing for the final presentation. "What does this really tell us about the dataset?”, I inquired of my group leader. “I'm not sure I understand what story we're telling." After going back to the initial requirements, it did not take me long to convince my teammates we had deviated from the main objective of the entire project. "Now what?", a different teammate said in frustration. I felt guilty. Guilty that I allowed myself to remain silent when I knew I was withholding the value I had to offer to my team.

"We can fix this”, I said to my team. “We just need to revisit the hypotheses we're drawing based on our dataset." Suddenly, I had everyone's attention. I was stumbling over myself - sure of what the solution should be and somehow still uncertain as ever about my own ability to lead my team. I saw my business-oriented education as a weakness among computer scientists and engineers - but it ended up saving our group. In fact, the guy who initially led our group insisted that I lead our presentation. At the end of our demo on presentation day, I was sure my group nailed it. However, we were hit with all kinds of cynical, trick questions from the professors and CIOs once we concluded our presentation. I had just done an entire 360; from apprehensive to assured to downright afraid all over again.

My entire class of nearly 200 filed back into the lecture hall to hear the top performing groups announced. My heart sank to the pit of my stomach. "We had a lot of outstanding projects today", our professor said. “But one group went a step beyond all the others. They really had a strong correlation between their final solution and the business case. There was a true story behind the data they were showing us and there was a lot of relevance to the current state of our business". My eyes lit up - realizing those were some of the exact words I said to my group while explaining my initial concerns with our project. He called our group and asked each of us to stand. I was in complete disbelief - not because we won. I was expecting to win because I knew my teammates were smart. I was amazed because I never considered myself to be among them - nor capable of playing a key role in our success. Once again, the Lord taught me what His strength in my weakness really looked like. Before departing from the campus, I was asked to film a short segment on my experience in the Digital Technology Leadership Program.

Class ended and I was nothing short of elated. I was walking away from my third master's course with an A and an award for the best capstone project. Since our class was held in Budapest, my friend Rachel and I planned a vacation to visit Paris, Madrid and Barcelona. As excited as I was, I could not have picked a more inconvenient time to have my first experience abroad. I reached into my pocket after hearing a notification alert from my news app. The title read "Truck plows through French streets killing dozens". I was petrified. Not only was I off to vacation in France, but I had also just signed up to work in France per my manager’s request. Did I really just volunteer to live in a terrorists’ playground? As my vacation continued, at least one new attack was reported daily in Europe. The attacks ranged from bombings to shootings to stabbings on public trains. I was afraid everywhere I went - frantically jumping at the slightest brush against my shoulder on every European train, plane and sidewalk.

Before I boarded the plane for my layover in Germany, a shooting was in the news at a nearby German Mall. On my way to Barcelona, a fatal stabbing took place on a train in Paris. Before I arrived in Barcelona, an attack was reported. It was almost as if each stop on my trip was strategically arranged to shield me from the attacks happening every day. One day sooner or later and I could have found myself among any of the attacks I saw on the news. A few days into vacation, I tossed and turned repeatedly as I miserably failed to take a nap. "Lord, don't tell me you brought me out here in Europe to die”, I said in dramatic prayer. I finally made it overseas and found myself barely missing terrorists attacks everywhere. I didn't want to do any more touring. I didn't even want to fly home.

That afternoon, I tuned into a church service hosted virtually with my friend, Rachel. The scripture referenced by the pastor (Psalm 11) was a direct answer to prayer about my fear of the ISIS attacks:

I trust in the LORD, so why did you tell me to run and hide? Why did you say, “Fly like a bird to your mountain?” Like hunters, the wicked hide in the dark.   They get their bows ready and aim their arrows. They shoot at good, honest people. What would good people do if the wicked destroyed all that is good? The LORD is in his holy temple. The LORD sits on his throne in heaven. He sees everything that happens. He watches people closely.

Through these scriptures and prayer, the Lord reminded me Who He is and that He had everything under control. His Word says to cast all your cares on Him – because He cares for you. There is no problem too big or small for Him to tend to. From that day on … I took each step in Europe like the Lord was walking in front, behind and on each side of me. The beautiful thing about that is, He was.

Through these scriptures and prayer, the Lord reminded me Who He is and that He had everything under control. His Word says to cast all your cares on Him – because He cares for you. There is no problem too big or small for Him to tend to. From that day on … I took each step in Europe like the Lord was walking in front, behind and on each side of me. The beautiful thing about that is, He was.

There's never a time where we need the Lord "now more than ever" - just times when we are more aware of our daily, desperate need for Him. Those situations are necessary to remind us Who we are dependent on. When the God calls you to do something, it will be God-sized. He will never ask you to do something you can achieve with your own abilities, resources, or strength – because it will teach you nothing about who He is. I have learned that I must depend on Him.

Earlier this week, I was awaken from a pretty dramatic dream. I was hosting a few friends over celebrating the New Year when I glanced out the window and noticed two small fires burning on my patio. I had a decision to make: call 911 or try to put out the fires myself. After convincing myself it would take ten minutes before any fire fighters would arrive, I grabbed my brother and went to work. We started running back and forth from my kitchen to my patio with buckets of water - trying to put the fires out ourselves. After all, the fires were small. As soon as we finished putting the fires out, we turned around and noticed more fires growing. Instead of calling for help, we found ourselves exhausted and frantic - trying to do something we could not do on our own.

I believe that even if I was successful trying to do everything myself, I would be exhausted and burned out all the time. I am so glad Jesus offers a better solution. Here’s what His invitation to you says:

Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. Matthew 11:28-30

A yoke is a wooden beam that is normally used between two animals. It allows them to distribute the load while working as a pair. Imagine Jesus walking beside you – interlocked in a yoke with you and helping you carry your load. Though the burden was never supposed to be His, He helps us because He loves us. When we pray, read His Word and spend time in His presence, we create room for Christ to uplift us. Whatever load you may be carrying today, know that God never requires you to carry it alone. When you commit your plans to Him, you cannot lose. Declare your dependence on Christ in all you do. Though your strength may seem invisible, you will be made invincible through Him.

[odanurr87]

My thoughts on... The Last Jedi

Sigh. I really don’t know where to start. Should I open with my background on Star Wars so you know where I’m coming from? How I grew up watching the original trilogy (even though they were before my time) and loved it? How I then embraced its Expanded Universe in the form of the excellent comics (some more than others) from Dark Horse and the neverending string of novels that would often have me question Star Wars continuity? How the prequel trilogy, which was probably my generation of Star Wars movies, left me more than a bit disappointed with the execution of Anakin Skywalker’s story? (it did get better with Revenge though) How it pained me when Disney bought Star Wars from George Lucas and decided to get rid of the Expanded Universe I had invested so much time and money in? (although, if we’re being honest here, the EU had already become a bit of a mess)

In any case, this was my situation when The Force Awakens was released and, to be perfectly frank, I was a bit disappointed with the movie. Given everything I knew about the EU, all of the different characters and stories, I had expected Disney would make better use of the material at hand to tell a new chapter in the Star Wars saga. What we got instead was, essentially, a remake of A New Hope. An entertaining remake to be sure, with likable protagonists in the form of Rey, Finn, and Poe (Kylo, meh), but a remake nonetheless. It made me more than a bit mad to realize that the state of the universe thirty years after Return of the Jedi was about the same as in A New Hope, with a new Rebellion (the Resistance) trying to overthrow a new Empire (the First Order) that had somehow accrued the resources to build massive armies and an even bigger Death Star (Starkiller Base). 

It also irked me how Rey, a character who had had no Force training whatsoever that we knew of, was able to so readily use the Force and handle herself in lightsaber combat against Kylo Ren, a character who was shown to be a very strong Force user (if a little unhinged) from the opening shots of the movie, where he not only freezes a blaster shot midair but also does something very similar to Poe, and who had also been trained, to some extent, by Luke himself when he founded the Jedi Academy. Evidently, this did not turn out well for him. There are a few other issues I had with the movie (such as that gratuitous Rathtar chase) but we’re here to talk about The Last Jedi so let me end this bit by saying my expectations for Episode VIII were carefully measured: having made an updated version of A New Hope, presumably to lure audiences in, I expected its sequel to go in a different direction than Episodes V and VI. I didn’t care very much for the destination so long as it took me somewhere. Unfortunately, it didn’t.

It’s a long read so brace yourself.

Needless to say, spoilers follow.

To lead a Rebellion: Holdo vs. Poe

The movie opens up with the Rebels (Resistance fighters is way too long) evacuating their base as the First Order moves in for the kill, something that could be seen as somewhat reminiscent of Empire but, personally, I see it as more similar to the evacuation of Yavin IV after the Rebels blew up the Death Star, something that took place in the EU. There are a few things I can gripe about this opening, such as the use of extremely slow bombers (that are bound to be cut to pieces before they ever reach their target) instead of the faster Y-Wing craft or how the bombs are supposed to fall in a zero-g environment but, in the end, I decided to roll with it. After all, if I already got caught up in those details this early, the film wouldn’t stand a chance. This entire battle is meant to serve one purpose only, to depict Poe as a hotheaded commander who, instead of following Leia’s prudent advice/order to pull back once the evacuation was complete, decided to press the attack against an Imperial dreadnought, ultimately succeeding but losing many lives in the process. Thus is Poe’s arc about learning how to become a better leader (something he should’ve picked up from Leia by now) established. A new character, Vice Admiral Holdo, played by Laura Dern, is then introduced to act as a foil and role model for Poe but, to my mind, it misses the mark by a wide margin.

First of all, I would question the necessity of introducing a new character to play the part at all. After all, Poe has been working with Leia for years now and I don’t think anyone could ask for a better mentor on leadership. Failing that, why not make use of another character this movie had so unceremoniously killed off? I’m talking about the legendary (pun intended) Admiral Ackbar, who led the Rebel attack on the second Death Star. It would’ve been an excellent opportunity to expand on the old admiral’s tribulations since Jedi as well as his views on leadership (personally, I would’ve suggested Mon Mothma but she’s not around for some reason). Or better yet, why not both? Leia and Ackbar might have had different opinions on what makes a great leader that Poe could benefit from. Instead, the movie introduces a new character that shows no leadership skills at all.

Throughout the movie, Holdo seems to want to purposefully piss off Poe, undermining his authority and character (something that is earned to some degree), and sparking a needless conflict between them, through her stubborn lack of communication, that eventually devolves into mutiny. The first thing I can sort of understand. While not an approach I am fond of, sometimes leaders will tear apart someone, defy their preconceptions, deflate their egos, so that that person can get out of his/her own way and mature, with a few pointers here and there from the (wise) leader figure. Unfortunately, this is not the case in The Last Jedi. Holdo is very intent in keeping Poe at arm’s length and out of the loop, what leads into my second point. Despite Poe’s insistence numerous times (he’s practically begging her at one point) Holdo stubbornly refuses to disclose how she plans to get the Rebels out of their predicament. In fact, the movie strongly suggests she has no such plan, and the dismay shows on the Rebels’ faces. The arguments I’ve read in support of her attitude usually come down to these two: the weaker a) Holdo is Poe’s superior officer so she needn’t disclose any plans to him; and the stronger b) Holdo might’ve been suspicious of a traitor in their midst which is why she didn’t tell Poe about it. Both are easily tackled.

As for a), any leader who held this view under these circumstances has no business leading troops in the Resistance. After all, the Resistance is not the First Order, its members won’t blindly follow orders like stormtroopers, to expect otherwise is, quite frankly, stupid. Furthermore, these are the same people who are openly defying the (New) Republic. More importantly however, demoted or not, likable or not, Poe is a hero of the Resistance and, in the eyes of many, a leader figure, someone they trust and will readily rally behind and follow no matter what. The mutiny itself proves this, of course, but the situation shouldn’t have gotten to that point for Holdo to realize this. The fact that she did proves she was not fit to lead the Resistance at this juncture. What she should have done instead was involve Poe in her schemes. After all, and to address b), the odds that Poe would be a traitor are zero (a plot the movie doesn’t even consider). Furthermore, to pull off her plan she would’ve certainly had to involve more people, likely less unimpeachable than Poe, reckless though he might be. Had she involved Poe from the start the mutiny would’ve never taken place, we would’ve been spared 20 minutes of pointless melodrama, and we might even have avoided an even more unnecessary plot altogether: the adventures of Finn and Rose on Canto Bight.

Canto Bight: From the adventures of Finn and Rose

Let’s backtrack a bit. While the Rebels manage to jump into hyperspace and escape the First Order, their reprieve is only temporary, as the Empire (I’ll just call it Empire from now on, it’s shorter) has developed the means to track vessels through hyperspace. The Empire soon catches up to them and so begins the slowest chase in the history of movies. The worst sin this plot commits is that there’s no reason (that I know of) why the Empire couldn’t have accelerated and destroyed the Rebels in an instant. Failing that, why didn’t they send a squadron of TIE fighters or two? We saw the damage Kylo Ren and his two-fighter escort did, surely more fighters would have been more than capable of finishing the job. In any case, a slow chase is now established and it’s evident to everyone that as soon as the Rebels run out of fuel the Empire will slaughter them. However, onboard the Rebel flagship, Finn and newly-introduced engineer Rose, played by Kelly Marie Tran, figure out that the Imperials are tracking them through a device located in Snoke’s flagship. If they can get to it and disable it, the Rebels will have six minutes to escape. Okay, I thought to myself, things are starting to pick up. I should have known better.

In order for the plan to work, Finn and Rose would naturally have to infiltrate Snoke’s ship. However, since it’s shielded they need an expert hacker so they can slice their way in. Okay... so we’re looking for another Rebel who’s a hacker, right? I mean, you could’ve made Rose the hacker and killed two birds with one stone but whatever, who’s joining the party? Oh, some nameless guy on the distant casino planet of Canto Bight (actually, it’s a city; the planet’s name is Cantonica). Finn and Rose will have to travel to the planet through hyperspace, recruit the hacker, return to the Rebel fleet, and enact their plan, thus allowing the Rebels to escape. My jaw could’ve literally dropped when I realized this. Putting aside for a minute the fact that you’re about to kill whatever tension and momentum this slow chase has been building up, you’re telling me that in order for the Rebels to escape the Empire, Finn and Rose will previously have to do that very same thing? Then why not put everybody on transports and have them scatter in multiple directions? Why are we going to waste a good 20 to 30 minutes with this plot that ultimately goes nowhere?

Because it really does go nowhere. The only point this needless detour serves is to get across a few hamfisted messages about slavery and animal cruelty being wrong (no fucking kidding), and the apparently bold (but it’s actually very light) statement that war profiteering also exists in the Star Wars universe, surprising no one. I would have expected such a pointless diversion from George Lucas (actually, even the podrace scene from The Phantom Menace serves a purpose), and indeed this detour has been unfavourably compared with the prequels, rightly so. To make matters worse, not only do Finn and Rose not find the hacker they were supposed to, but even when they do find a substitute (DJ, played by Benicio del Toro) and carry out their mission, the Empire ambushes them (reminds me of Vader getting the drop on Han and Leia in Cloud City) and the mission fails. The only thing Finn and Rose accomplish as they eventually make their escape is to kill Phasma, a character who would’ve been better off dead seeing as she’s resurrected for the space of a few minutes only to get shafted once again. Brilliant storytelling right there. It would not be unfair to say that this movie could’ve cut off Finn and Rose entirely with little to no impact, freeing up more time to dedicate to the more interesting plot of Luke’s (marginal) training of Rey or even Snoke’s non-existent training of Kylo.

The Force: Balance and Mastery

Well, this is a fun topic to discuss. Mighty large too so I wonder how I’ll start.

I don’t quite get how Rian Johnson decided to approach The Force in this movie. The concept of ‘balance’ in The Force was first introduced in the prequels with the prophecy of “the Chosen One” who was destined to bring “balance to The Force.” In the context of the prequels alone, we would be hard pressed to say exactly what that was supposed to mean, considering there’s a vast Jedi Order and the Sith are, supposedly, gone. 

There’s a really funny short story in Star Wars Tales (which took several liberties in an Infinities-type universe) where Mace Windu and Yoda discuss this very thing over coffee. Windu suggests the Chosen One will bring light in the same way one pours milk on a coffee. Yoda makes the more shrewd analogy of the Jedi Order being thousands of grains of salt that get blown away to match the sole two grains that represent the Sith. Going by Lucas’ own statement that the prophecy was, in fact, fulfilled when Anakin Skywalker turned against his master, Darth Sidious, in Return of the Jedi and killed him, and considering how he had previously contributed to extinguish the light of the Jedi Order between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope, one could make the case that maybe both were right.

A panel from the story ‘Force Fiction’ (Star Wars Tales #7)

In any case, the reason I went out of my way to talk about the Chosen One prophecy and balance is because Snoke makes a similar reference in The Last Jedi when he says that Rey has grown stronger in The Force (or some such) to rise up against Kylo and bring “balance.” Luke himself refers to the concept of balance when he talks about the light and the dark sides of The Force when he’s training Rey (one of the few times he actually does). Except that even Anakin, who we’ve now established was “the Chosen One who will bring balance to The Force,” had to train, and struggle, and train some more, and struggle some more. Rey’s reluctant master, Luke, also had to train and struggle throughout the original trilogy. He was arguably not as gifted as Anakin, and certainly older when he started his training, making him a difficult pupil for Master Yoda to train. 

Rey? Rey has no such difficulties mastering The Force, even without any training. Luke offers her three classes where they mostly discuss philosophy (more on that later) but she learns how to expertly wield a lightsaber on her own over the space of a couple of minutes and she readily dispatches Snoke’s Praetorian Guard (who I’d assume had been thoroughly drilled in combat for years) after joining forces with Kylo onboard Snoke’s flagship, not to mention she can lift hundreds of rocks with ease (suck it, Skywalker!). Yoda himself pops up in this movie and kind of dismisses Luke’s training of Rey arguing, “she has everything she needs” (by which he could be referring to the Jedi books in her possession, but I would argue that if one could learn through books alone we wouldn’t need any teachers, would we now?).

I still love you, Rey.

But why stop at Rey? Leia herself shows an impressive out-of-nowhere display of Force powers where she either: a) managed to resurrect herself in the vacuum of space, endure said vacuum, halt and reverse her momentum, and return to her flagship; or b) managed to create some sort of Force shield around her before she was expelled into space, halt and reverse her momentum, and return to her flagship; or c) a variation of the above. We all know Leia’s strong in The Force, Empire was the first movie to suggest this, but you can’t go from zero to epic Force god without any training whatsoever. Even if she did have the training, I’d argue you’d have to be nothing short of a Jedi Master to be able to keep your composure and call on The Force so quickly under those circumstances and I think we can all agree that, however cool Leia might be, a Jedi Master she’s not.

So what’s the message I’m supposed to gather from this? Training’s for suckers? Unless you’re good at something from the very beginning don’t waste your breath trying to get better? Females are naturally better at the whole Force business? (curiously, I believe it is suggested in the EU -I think it was in Dark Empire- that Leia’s stronger than Luke in The Force) There’s a reason we empathize with people struggling over something, anything, in their lives, it’s because it rings true, it feels authentic. We’ve all been there and we’ll all be there several times for the rest of our lives. The heroes from all of our favourite stories struggle, they stumble and fall, but they pick themselves back up and eventually overcome the obstacles in their path. This is perhaps the most distinguishable trait in a hero, the strength of their will, their perseverance to not give up when things look bleak and most others would. Heroes are not defined by how many enemies they defeat or how many rocks they lift. And most importantly, heroes aren’t born, they’re made or, rather, they make themselves. The Last Jedi denies Rey the opportunity to stumble and fall, to pick herself back up, and to forge her path as a hero, and it’s a shame.

The Jedi Teachings

“It is time for the Jedi to end.”

Strong words coming from Luke Skywalker, Jedi Knight, and ones that caught my attention (and everyone else’s I’m sure) when I first watched the trailer. I thought that maybe, just maybe, The Last Jedi would make a case against the Jedi, and against the Sith, reminiscent of the one Kreia makes in Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords. Even without resorting to such a specific example, the notion that there might be some inherent flaw in the Jedi teachings can be found simply by looking at how many from their rank and file have turned to the dark side, and brought a great deal of suffering to the galaxy in so doing. Exar Kun, Ulic Qel-Droma, Revan, Malak, Count Dooku, Anakin Skywalker, Jacen Solo, to mention a few, these were all Jedi who, for one reason or another, turned away from the light. Having experienced this firsthand with Ben Solo (aka Kylo Ren), it would make sense for Luke to ponder this question and indeed he does.

Unfortunately, the case he makes to Rey advocating for the Jedi’s end doesn’t go beyond the example with Anakin Skywalker, incidentally one of the few where the Dark Jedi/Sith is redeemed, a fact Rey is quick to point out. It also sidelines the no less important fact that, just as Ben Solo was manipulated/influenced by Snoke, Anakin Skywalker was similarly manipulated by Palpatine. Thirdly, it also seemingly denies the choices made by the people being manipulated (Anakin and Ben) and ignores the circumstances of their situation, abscribing their fall to the supposed failings of the Jedi teachings alone, failings that Luke conveniently never expounds upon. What made Anakin turned to the dark side? A series of events, to be sure, but what tipped him over the edge was his love for Padmé and his stubborn refusal to let his loved ones die, something over which he’d sacrifice anything and anyone. What made Ben turned to the dark side? To be honest, we’re given very little context beyond “Snoke manipulated him” (The Force Awakens) and “he thought Luke was trying to kill him” (The Last Jedi). How you go from there to teaming up with the same people your parents fought a war against and trying to conquer the entire galaxy (again) I’ve no idea (yes, Jacen did it too; no, I didn’t like it; yes, it was handled better than Ben Solo). And here I thought I’d never see the day where I’d praise Anakin’s story-arc throughout the prequels (but mostly the last two).

What case should Luke have made instead? Or, perhaps rather than instead, as well as. I’ll give you one example and then, just because I can, I’ll tell you why it wouldn’t make much sense. I won’t take the credit for it as it was actually Mon Mothma, as written by Roger MacBride Allen, who said it to Luke, Jedi Master, in Ambush at Corellia. Allow me to quote a brief excerpt from the chapter in question. For reference, it’s Chapter Four: The Dangers of Peace, and I really recommend you read it in its entirety ‘cause Mon Mothma has some harsh truths for Luke.

Mon Mothma smiled. “How much of your life so far has consisted of what you wanted to do? But let’s talk about the Jedi, what I most wanted to talk with you about. What are the Jedi to become?”

“I’m sorry,” Luke said. “I don’t understand what you mean.” It seemed to him that the whole conversation had been little more than riddles of one sort or another. If the Jedi were the most important thing on her agenda, why had she waited until now to bring them up? As for her question, the Jedi were-Jedi. What else would they be?

“All right,” Mon Mothma said. “Let me put it another way. In the years to come, as the Jedi grow from a handful of students into an order of thousands of Knights, will they set themselves up as an elite priesthood or as a band of champions? Are they to be cut off from the people by privilege and mystique, answerable to themselves alone? Or will they act in the service of the people, be intimately bound to the people? Will they be part of the people, the citizenry, or outside them?”

Luke had never considered the question in quite that way before. “It’s obvious what answer you want,” he said, “but I think it’s the answer I would choose no matter what. It seems to me that an order of Jedi that isolated itself from the population would be a very dangerous thing indeed. It would be very easy to forget the ways of ordinary folk if you never experienced the things they did.”

“Precisely,” Mon Mothma said. “I believe, and believe strongly, that the Republic needs Jedi that get their hands dirty, that are part of the Republic’s daily life. Jedi that live in ivory towers might be more dangerous than no Jedi at all. You need look no further than our very recent history to see that it has been the Dark Jedi that have sought isolation. To be a Jedi of the Light, a Jedi must be one with the people. There must be a Jedi on every planet, a Jedi in every city-not a few planets full of Jedi and nothing else. There must be Jedi doing what ordinary folk do, Jedi who are ordinary folk. There must be Jedi doctors and judges and soldiers and pilots-and politicians.”

“And you believe that my path will guide me into politics,” Luke said.

“Yes. If for no other reason than because it is your duty to set an example-and you have always been a slave to duty. If you wander off to brood on a hilltop somewhere, your followers will head off to find their own hills to brood on. If you are out in the world, so, too, will they follow that example.”

Putting aside for a moment the fact that TLJ’s Luke does indeed wander off to brood on a hilltop somewhere, it occurs to me that this was one of the flaws of the Jedi Order during the time of Anakin Skywalker. The Jedi were, in general terms, cut off from society. Normal people regarded them as immensely privileged, not to mention quite powerful (sometimes exaggeratedly so), and resented them for it. The Jedi were thus disconnected from the people they were supposed to serve and protect. In Mon Mothma’s words, when you live in an ivory tower it’s much easier to fall prey to the delusion that you alone know what’s best for everyone, not to mention you can be more easily manipulated. The Luke Skywalker from Ambush at Corellia agrees with her, and why wouldn’t he? Luke wasn’t raised as a Jedi in the old Jedi Order that forced padawans to cut all familial ties and forego emotions, such as love, as temptations that could lead to the dark side. 

Another EU reference, this time from Star Wars: Union, where Luke discusses whether Jedi should marry or not.

Luke was given the bare tools he needed to fight a very specific battle that neither Yoda nor Obi-Wan could (or would). It wouldn’t be unfair to say he was shaped to be a weapon that would end the Sith once and for all. However, as depicted during his training in Empire, he refuses to abandon the people he loves and races to save them... only to realize it was all a trap. Even then he refuses to turn to the dark side and attempts to commit suicide, although everything turns out fine in the end.

What I’m getting at is that Luke, the Luke from the original trilogy, would likely not rebuild the Jedi Order as it was in Anakin’s time but instead draw from his own experience and set of values as well, thereby making Mon Mothma’s worry null and void. Ben Solo wouldn’t be cut off from his family as Anakin was, so I doubt Luke’s other trainees would’ve either.

But, like I said, this is just one possible example out of many, a factor that I believe contributed to the overall fall of the Jedi Order. Perhaps Luke was more concerned with his failure as a teacher in The Last Jedi? As I said before, Obi-Wan and Yoda shaped him to be a weapon so maybe he wasn’t wise enough to move past that by the time he set up his Jedi Academy, something that could’ve adversely affected his students.

Unfortunately, it may be something as simple, and yet as complex, as what the film suggests, that light will always bring about darkness and so a ‘balance’ must be maintained. I would counter that that is true of life. Beyond the Jedi and the Sith, the struggle between light and dark, good and evil, is one that takes place inside each and every one of us, if on a different scale. After all, it wasn’t the Sith the ones who developed, built, and fired the Death Star. It wasn’t the Jedi the ones who crossed their arms and allowed the First Order to flourish while the Republic grew weaker. This is such a simple and universal truth that I am having trouble reconciling Luke would’ve spent ten or more years believing otherwise. Neither the Jedi nor the Sith are (entirely) to blame for all of the galaxy’s problems.

As you can see, this is clearly a rich subject that can be discussed at length and explored from many angles, which is why I was so disappointed when the film barely even broached it. Luke’s arguments are fairly weak for someone who’s spent a good chunk of his life pondering the matter. I guess it’s nice that they tried but as Yoda used to say...

Luke Skywalker: Last of the Jedi

We arrive at last to yet another point of contention many fans, myself included, have with this movie, and that is its depiction of Luke Skywalker, Jedi Master. Simply put, I wasn’t thrilled with it but, to be fair, it’s an issue I already had with the previous movie, The Force Awakens, and it stemmed from the fact that it felt like a pointless repetition of the Darth Vader storyline, only this time around Anakin was Ben and Obi-Wan was Luke. Furthermore, it felt out of character that Luke would just give up after failing one of his students and let the galaxy pay for his mistakes. Mark Hamill put it best when he said, “A Jedi never gives up.” I would add to that that Luke Skywalker doesn’t give up either. Equally puzzling is that his friends and family would allow him to do so for so many years but that is another matter.

The Last Jedi further compounds this issue by suggesting that, while training at the Academy, Luke fleetingly considered murdering his nephew when he realized he was slowly turning to the dark side. Bear in mind this is the same person who went on a suicide mission to try and convince his father, Anakin Skywalker, now turned Darth Vader, to come back to the light in Return of the Jedi. Are we supposed to believe he would do less for his nephew? The only son of his sister and best friend? If that’s the case, Kylo did us all a favour when he killed the rest of Luke’s pupils because Luke would’ve probably murdered them himself eventually. No, even if Ben had been turning to the dark side, Luke would’ve done his utmost to convince him otherwise. After all, Yoda said it himself, “Always in motion, the future is.” So, yeah, I disagree with this interpretation of Luke Skywalker and I’m not at all surprised Mark Hamill did as well.

As if that weren’t enough, I wasn’t taken with the way they wrote off his character. That’s correct, I don’t mind (much) that they killed him, that was to be expected, but the way they did it was, frankly, confusing, and I’m being kind. Basically, it comes down to a simple question, if you were going to kill Luke anyway, why bother having him Force project to a planet and appear as though he were fighting Kylo Ren? Indeed, why not have him actually travel to said planet and let him go down fighting, showing us the extent of what a fully trained Jedi, with The Force as his ally, can do? People have been raving about this movie subverting our expectations and, in this case, I was ready to concede the point when Luke pulled a bait-and-switch with The Force... That is until he collapsed and died seemingly of exhaustion a few seconds later. So let me ask yet again a question I find myself repeating over and over, what was the point? Was Rian Johnson worried Luke might steal the spotlight from Rey? ‘cause he does anyway (for a few seconds at least) and, to be perfectly frank, one tends to want to see his heroes go out with a bang, not a whimper. It’s as if this movie doesn’t quite know what it wants to be or where it wants to go and, in fact, it goes backwards.

Back to square one... again

Perhaps one of the most frustrating things about this movie is precisely how it undoes most of the foundation laid by Abrams in The Force Awakens and resets the state of the galaxy to the time of A New Hope (again), if not earlier. Let’s recap:

The Republic is now apparently gone, having been completely erradicated by a single shot from Starkiller Base in the previous movie, something that was painfully stupid then and is compounded even further now.

The Resistance, which was extremely small to begin with, has been reduced to maybe about a dozen rebels in a single ship, the Millennium Falcon. I can’t wait for JJ to explain how twelve people are going to defeat the Empire without a timeskip.

Snoke, who had been set up in The Force Awakens to be a powerful and sinister figure modeled after Darth Sidious, and indeed shows off his impressive Force powers in The Last Jedi, gets killed in the most pathetic and comedic way possible, in a scene that is heavily derivative of Return of the Jedi. I only bring up the latter point because people keep saying Rian Johnson took Star Wars “in new and unprecedented directions” or some such.

The movie toys with the idea of Kylo and Rey being conflicted about their respective roles, but by the end of the movie Kylo’s back to his old self, wanting to kill everyone, and Rey’s back to being the one who’ll defeat him. Neither has grown much insofar character development is concerned. Rey wants to kill Kylo because he’s bad, and Kylo’s bad because the script needs him to be. If you had actually wanted to subvert my expectations here, Kylo and Rey would’ve switched sides or maybe joined forces even. That would’ve been an interesting twist.

As I’ve mentioned before, I’m not a fan of Abrams’ remake of A New Hope, but I would’ve expected Rian Johnson would continue and improve on the story laid down by his predecessor rather than make his own version of the same story with only one more episode to go to round things up. The Last Jedi makes it abundantly clear there was no planned story-arc for Episodes VII to IX. Again, some people have lauded Johnson for ditching some (I’d argue all) of the more important plot threads from The Force Awakens, but I wonder if they would still feel that way if Abrams were to do the same in Episode IX. After all, something like Rey’s parents being no-one (she said it, not me) could be easily explained away as some clever manipulation on Kylo’s part (he does love his mind games). Abrams could borrow from the Dark Empire series and easily resurrect Snoke in a clone body or, better yet, taking over an existing character’s body (also from Dark Empire). He’s almost certain to bring Luke back as a Force ghost to complete Rey’s training (or else Yoda’s last words to him would be pointless, but that’s kind of a running theme in this movie). Would this then be another case of Star Wars subverting our expectations? Or the more believable case of poor storytelling?

Porgs in the wind

Before the verdict, here are a few more random thoughts on the movie I wanted to share:

Finn’s almost sacrifice. Why didn’t we let the guy kill himself again? Honestly, it would’ve been a noble sacrifice in the vein of Holdo’s own and the most productive thing he’d done in the movie. That line about winning by “saving the things we love” and not by “destroying the things we hate” doesn’t fly with me, not in this particular context. The whole point of this suicidal (because it was suicidal) rebel attack was to destroy the Empire’s battering ram cannon in order to buy time for help to arrive. I was frankly stunned Poe decided to change his mind halfway because his people were getting slaughtered, what else did he expect? And when Finn has the chance to actually destroy the cannon Rose crashes into him in order to stop him. What?! Oh, and they make out under full sight of the Imperial walkers that, conveniently, don’t shoot at them.

Another argument I’ve heard is that one of the strengths of The Last Jedi is that it turned The Force into something everyone could have instead of something being tied to your bloodline. Frankly, this argument is so ludicrous I’m forced to believe whoever made it has: a) never watched a Star Wars movie before; and b) yet somehow thought only the Skywalkers could use The Force. Never mind that we knew as far back as 1977 that other people could use it too (hello, Ben Kenobi?). Furthermore, the Jedi clearly existed long before Anakin Skywalker was even born.

Why is Hux still an idiot? I’m starting to feel sorry for the both the character and the actor who plays him. I’m quickly running out of characters to be afraid of in this saga as they are all being turned into a punchline.

I was a bit let down by Yoda’s return, mostly because it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. Firstly, he seems not to mind that Rey is about to turn herself over to Kylo and Snoke and has even less training than Luke did when he took off for Cloud City to save his friends. Whatever happened to “Only a fully trained Jedi Knight, with The Force as his ally will conquer Vader and his Emperor. If you end your training now - if you choose the quick and easy path as Vader did - you will become an agent of evil.”? Secondly, when he shows up, Luke is about to burn the old Jedi tree, what could be seen as a metaphor for letting the Jedi die. Yet he hesitates, what could be interpreted as him finally realizing that the fight between light and dark will always exist, regardless of there being Jedi or Sith. At the same time, Yoda summons lightning (WTF?) and burns the tree for him, and suddenly this scene now becomes about Luke stubbornly clinging to the old Jedi ways. Wait, what? Where did that come from? That goes against what Luke’s been saying this entire time, that the Jedi need to end, that they need to stop having a monopoly on The Force (what in reality isn’t true, they merely have a monopoly on Jedi training). It’s a nice throwback, master and apprentice reunited, but it feels more than a bit gratuitous.

Nobody came to their rescue? Seriously? The Empire should be less powerful than it was at the time of A New Hope, shouldn’t it? And it’s one Death Star short. Surely those are better odds than those of the Rebellion during the original trilogy. Could’ve been a great way to bring back Lando leading an attack on the Imperial forces. Oh, well.

I guess all of Abrams’ setup about Kylo somehow knowing Rey has now evaporated. Remember that scene in The Force Awakens when he almost strangles an Imperial officer who reports “a girl” was helping Finn escape? That scene strongly suggested Kylo might’ve known a girl who was strong in The Force, before Rey showed up.

I’m a bit pissed off that the movie wasted a perfectly good shot of Luke’s submerged X-Wing on Ahch-To. That could’ve easily led into a scene where Luke, after his conversation with Yoda, raises the X-Wing while Yoda’s song plays in the background, blatantly ripping off Empire (if you’re going to steal, might as well steal from the best), as a symbol of Luke Skywalker, Jedi Master, returning to fight the good fight. I can’t think of a better scene that would’ve screamed, “Yeah, Luke’s coming, bitches!

Please don’t force a Finn/Rose romance. I was perfectly content with Finn/Rey.

Please don’t force a Poe/Rey romance either.

Can’t believe I almost forgot this one! So apparently you can just take out entire fleets by ramming a single ship into them as you jump into hyperspace. Wish the Rebels had known this earlier. A bit odd considering something remarkably similar happens in Rogue One but Vader’s fleet comes out unscathed.

Another one I forgot. How come nobody noticed the planet the Rebels eventually evacuated to? It should’ve certainly come up on sensors when Poe led his mutiny, if not within actual visual range (Poe clearly sees the planet when he wakes up on the transport ship and he wasn’t that far away from the flagship). This leads into...

How did DJ know that the Rebels were escaping to the planet in smaller transports at that precise time? I don’t recall Finn or Rose ever knowing about that particular plan seeing how Holdo kept it from everyone.

Conclusion

By this point, you should’ve already guessed I wasn’t as taken with this movie as critics seemingly were. I hinted as much at the beginning of this review. More importantly, I hope I’ve been able to explain why I think that is. As a movie, The Last Jedi suffers from a lack of coherence and character development, and doesn’t advance the narrative at all. Too many times I thought to myself that this or that was pointless, and that the movie could’ve easily been 30 to 40 minutes shorter and benefited from it. As a Star Wars movie it plays a bit loose with the lore and handles the character of Luke Skywalker rather poorly. 

I must admit I feel a bit sorry for Abrams who is now in the unenviable position of either going along with Rian Johnson’s take or retconning some of his more controversial choices. On top of that, he has to provide a satisfying conclusion to this saga, not to mention he’ll have to explain away Leia’s absence. He certainly has his work cut out for him.

How would I rate this movie? At present, I’d rank it lower than The Force Awakens, and that’s saying something given my thoughts on that movie. From a strictly narrative point, I’d rank it even worse than some of the prequels, although it does have better acting overall (which is one of the weaker points of the prequels). If you favour the latter over the former, maybe you’ll like it better.

On the bright side, it can only get better from here, right?

[lumifuer]

Burn The Witch

Pairings: Donald Pierce x Reader Words: 1493 Warnings: Swearing, implied smut Request: Could you do a Donald Pierce imagine where the reader is a mutant (and has scarlet witch power) and he captured her when she sacrificed herself for laura and logan. And Donald flirts all the time with her but starts falling in love with her. Could you also include his point of view please!? Ps I love your writing! 😍😍💕 A/N: I have a feeling it will end up having multiple chapters, of course, if you like it! Thank you for the request! 

Summary: The reader is a powerful mutant captured by Donald during Logan and Laura’s escape. Being the only person she talks to, he has to look after her even if her powers make his heart skip a beat. But is it really fear causing all this commotion?

My steps echoed as I crossed the empty corridor. Rice wanted me to check on his newest trophy I'd captured a month ago since she was thoughtful enough to open her mouth only in my presence.

Working for Transigen meant having to deal with a bunch of fucked up and borderline terrifying shit on a daily basis. And most of it didn't bother me anyway. The kids, for one. It was a nightmare fuel for some while I was left unfazed most of the time. I could compare it to walking into a minefield, you watch your every step and even if you screw up at least you know what happens next. But the new girl? Hell, she was something different.

Imagine treading on a thin ice, one misstep and the ice breaks consuming not only you but everyone who was moronic enough to trust your leadership. But with her, there's yet another twist, there's not simply freezing water underneath, it's the darkest, coldest pit filled with something that makes your skin crawl.

That could explain my slight discomfort every time I had to pay her a visit.

But I'd be lying if I said I wasn't intrigued by her at the same time. Her powers, that is. From what I've already seen, she could manipulate reality with a mere snap of a finger or get into anyone's head successfully making her the most dangerous mutant I've had the questionable pleasure of meeting.

I stopped in front of the door leading to her cell. I looked around to make sure I was alone and took a deep breath, trying to remain calm.  Rice didn't spare any expenses on making sure she doesn't get out and yet my heart was beating faster and faster as I was getting closer.

"Fuck that," I said under my breath and pushed the door before my instincts forced me to turn back and head into the opposite direction.

The room was shrouded in darkness save for the faint red glow coming from inside her cage.

"Hi, sweetheart," I said, trying to hide my uneasiness under a smile, "how are you doing today?"

The glow became bright enough to illuminate her face, scarlet light reflecting in her big eyes.

I lost the track of my thoughts for a second. She looked intimidating but at the same time, I couldn't take my eyes off. There was something so strangely beautiful about her.

"Oh, I am surprisingly well, considering my position. Thank you for your concern," she said with a grin so easily mistaken for a sincere one.

"So how is it gonna be today, baby? Feeling like telling me where might the girl be?"

She tilted her head in response and smiled patronisingly. The steady glow turned into a flickering light show. I couldn't say if she was getting nervous or just more amused by our incompetence.

"And if I don't?" she teased, pacing around her cell like a lioness in a cage, ready to attack at any given moment, "You're going to choke me?"

"If you're into that kind of stuff."

I came closer to the pane of glass, the only thing separating me from her. She imitated my movement and placed her palm on the material.

"Honey, you know it's against the rules," I sighed but had to keep my hands behind my back to prevent myself from accepting her silent invitation, "we wouldn't want you to end up in those handcuffs again."

"Why? You seem to be very fond of the thought."

Fuck.

"We should leave that for another occasion," I replied, the playful smile never leaving my lips even as they begun to tremble.

"That's a promise?"

I couldn't recall the last time I was so nervous around anyone. I tried to remember the fact that she was nothing more than an experiment that I was trained to deal with. But it was tough, especially when she was putting all those images in my head.

Seeing the lack of reaction on my side, she took her hand off the glass and started to carelessly play with her powers. A red wave of energy originated at her fingertips and was then sent down to her palm, creating a pulsating orb.

"You're just going to stare now?" she asked after a while, her voice was filled with amusement.

"Gotta admit, you make it hard to look away," I admitted.

"Me or my powers?"

"Both," I said before I had the chance to think this through. I was hoping she would at least appreciate my honesty.

"You don't seem to be scared of me," she said, staring me down.

I was trying my best to hold my gaze but it became too tiring since it felt like she was trying to drill her way into my skull and read all my thoughts and secrets. I looked away and she let out a disappointed sigh.

"The glass between us does make it easier," I pointed out, scratching the back of my head.

"Don't bother, it's really easy to shatter," she shrugged and to prove her words she touched the material with the tip of her finger. The whole thing fired up and then disappeared in red waves within a matter of seconds.

I froze in place, trying to guess if she's going to kill me or play with me first. For some reason, I was less scared of her in an open space compared to when I had to face her locked down in that cell.

"They will hurt you if they find out you're on the loose," I warned her. It didn't sound like a threat. It rolled off my tongue with a note of concern to it and I couldn't tell who was more surprised because of that.  

"Will take them long enough, the camera's been showing the same thing for a while now."

She walked right past me and sat on the couch, patting the seat next to her. I didn't dare to move. I was feeling completely helpless.

"Be a good girl and get back into that room," I asked nicely.

"I'd prefer not to," she frowned like a kid refusing to go to bed.

"Don't make me use the handcuffs again," I smiled but I could feel my heart pounding against my chest.

She replied with an innocent smile.

"You really want to try them on me, don't you?"

I didn't know how to reply and she rolled her eyes at me. She got up and slowly walked up to me, stopping inches away from, her lips dangerously close to mine. 

She was about to say something when the door flew open. I turned in the direction, seeing a few of my squadmates standing in the corridor with their guns ready to fire. They must have caught up on the record at last.

"Stand down, I got this," I said, raising my human hand.

They looked at each other, visibly confused and left the room without a word. I looked back to where she was standing but there was nobody there. I turned on my heel and felt a shiver going down my spine.

She moved back in her cell, standing right in the middle of it, with a bored smile on her face. There was no trace of her escape, even the red glow was left.

That girl was a fucking menace but for some reason, I felt a relief that we managed to avoid a shooting. I didn't want her to get injured even if she was more likely to rip us apart before we'd get a chance to as much as touch her.

I left the room, unable to grasp what was going on around me. She's buying time for Logan and Laura, the voice of reason was clearly heard in my head but I decided to ignore it. Closing the door behind, I leant against the wall, the cold texture of stone soothing my skin and helping me collect my thoughts. The only thing I could hear was my spasmatic breathing echoing in the hallway.

Hundreds of questions appeared in my mind at once but one was more striking than the others.

Why the hell did I want to protect her if she was the threat? And why didn't she snap my neck right when she had the chance? Seeing what she could do I no longer believed in Rice's precautions. She was an unstoppable force.

I was drawn to her in a way that I couldn't resist.  The feeling in the pit of my stomach wasn't caused by fear. I realised that when she was standing so close to me.

And it was much worse than being afraid.

Thank you for reading! Comments are greatly appreciated! ♥

[thisdaynews]

Garth Crooks' team of the week: Pulisic, Perez, Maguire, Vardy, Mane

New Post has been published on https://thebiafrastar.com/garth-crooks-team-of-the-week-pulisic-perez-maguire-vardy-mane/

Garth Crooks' team of the week: Pulisic, Perez, Maguire, Vardy, Mane

It is the first time I have included three players who have scored a hat-trick in my team of the week.

The goals started to flow on Friday night when Leicester thrashed Southampton 9-0, before Chelsea beat Burnley 4-2 and Brighton won 3-2 against Everton on Saturday.

Manchester City kept the pressure on Liverpool with a win over Aston Villa but the Reds responded with a big victory over Tottenham on Sunday.

Here’s my team of the week – have a read and select your own below.

Goalkeeper – Ederson (Manchester City)

Ederson:Two great first-half saves by Ederson from John McGinn and Douglas Luiz during the same phase of play against Aston Villa kept Manchester City alive. There is no doubt about it, City have issues in defence and it has taken Ederson in goal these past few weeks to pull them out of some very difficult situations. However, the Brazilian is not only capable of keeping clean sheets when it matters but spotting when the opposition is vulnerable. His long-ball delivery for Jesus to flick on for Raheem Sterling to ram home made a mockery of the notion that City over-indulge and cannot play a direct game. This is the best goalkeeper in the Premier League on current form.

Did you know?Since the start of the 2017-18 campaign, Ederson has kept more clean sheets than any other goalkeeper in the Premier League (41).

Defenders – Trent Alexander-Arnold (Liverpool), Harry Maguire (Manchester United), Jamaal Lascelles (Newcastle)

Alexander-Arnold: Trent Alexander-Arnold’s pass on the run for Sadio Mane in the first half was out of this world. There are very few full-backs who have such an acute appreciation of the sort of pass a striker needs but Alexander-Arnold is certainly one of them. More importantly he has the ability to provide the pass. Quite apart from anything else he is back to his best after what I thought was a shaky start to the season for such an accomplished youngster. As for Spurs, when are they going to learn that Serge Aurier, as good a player as he can be on occasions, cannot be trusted? He is rash and unreliable.

Did you know?Alexander-Arnold has provided 14 assists in the Premier League since the start of last season – the joint-most by any defender alongside team-mate Andy Robertson.

Maguire: Since the arrival of Harry Maguire in the back four at Old Trafford there has been a calm in defence. This was no better illustrated than against Liverpool at home and again away at Norwich where VAR did its best to disrupt, confuse and irritate just about everyone. While his team-mates were being awarded penalties and missing them, Maguire remained composed and played the game with a quiet authority. He may have cost £80m but I’m beginning to think he is worth it in the current climate. He might even save Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s job.

Did you know?Maguire has won 39 aerial duels in the Premier League this season – 15 more than the Manchester United player with the next most (Victor Lindelof, 24).

Lascelles: After a poor start to the season Newcastle responded to some very sharp criticism. Their performance away at Spurs was probably the catalyst to their resurgence. Leadership has been the key both on and off the pitch. Jamaal Lascelles has been quite brilliant in that department for Newcastle. He takes responsibility in defence and is not afraid to attack in the opponent’s box. Wolves, on the other hand, looked the better side in the second half but Newcastle held the fort and with 10 men. Newcastle displayed plenty of bottle.

Did you know?Lascelles has made more clearances (48) and more headed clearances (23) than any other Newcastle player in the Premier League this term.

Midfielders – Christian Pulisic (Chelsea), Mateo Kovacic (Chelsea), Ilkay Gundogan (Manchester City), Scott McTominay (Manchester United)

Pulisic: I said last week that Frank Lampard’s ability to bring on the youngsters at Stamford Bridge was starting to make an impact and I never even included Christian Pulisic. The scream of delight after the United States international scored his first Premier League goal for the club told only part of the story. When he arrived at the club I thought “what’s the game coming to; we’re now spending £58m for an American!” This hat-trick against Burnley is starting to suggest that this was money well spent. As for Lampard, how many more of these impressive youngsters does he have waiting in the background ready to explode onto the scene?

Did you know?Pulisic became Chelsea’s youngest hat-trick scorer in Premier League history (21y 38d), while he also became the first player to net a ‘perfect’ league hat-trick for the Blues since Didier Drogba against Wigan in May 2010.

Kovacic: I normally don’t care for statistics – they are for statisticians – but when I saw the pass rate for Mateo Kovacic and Jorginho against Burnley I suddenly paid attention. The performance of Kovacic in particular has been a revelation since the departure of Maurizio Sarri and the arrival of Lampard. The way he used the ball to cut Burnley to shreds was cruel at times. It’s hardly surprising Chelsea fans are enjoying their football so much these days. They have developed a generation of players desperate to play for a manager who, along with his players, are going places.

Did you know?Kovacic has completed more dribbles than any other Chelsea player in the Premier League under Frank Lampard (22).

Gundogan: If it’s not David Silva, Kevin de Bruyne or Raheem Sterling dominating the headlines, Man City still have players who can turn a game on a sixpence. This time it was Ilkay Gundogan who ran the show against Aston Villa. The Germany international is often perceived as the junior partner in comparison to the players previously mentioned. Nevertheless, Pep Guardiola may well find himself relying on Gundogan’s services as he tries to get City to their first elusive Champions League final while still trying to retain the title.

Did you know?Gundogan has completed 318 passes in the opposition half in the Premier League this season – the only Manchester City player with more is Rodrigo (343).

McTominay: I’ve watched this lad a lot in recent weeks and couldn’t work out why Solskjaer keeps playing him. He runs about a lot and is certainly not afraid to put his foot it – but a Manchester United player? Against Liverpool he was excellent and after his performance against Norwich he finds himself in my TOTW. He’s also bright enough not to get involved in taking penalties for Manchester United. I think I might have misjudged him.

Did you know?McTominay’s opener was Manchester United’s 2,000th goal in the Premier League, with the Red Devils being the first team in competition history to reach this tally.

Forwards – Ayoze Perez (Leicester), Sadio Mane (Liverpool), Jamie Vardy (Leicester)

Perez: There have been players who have scored great goals, even had great games, and missed out on being in my TOTW because other players have had a greater impact on a match. However, what I will always acknowledge is when a player scores a hat-trick in a Premier League fixture. Ayoze Perez has scored two in his career against Southampton, the latest inflicting the most telling destruction of a football team I have seen in years. Would Leicester have had such a devastating effect on the Saints had VAR not interfered in proceedings? I think not. Read more about what I have to say on this affair in the Crooks of the Matter below.

Did you know?Leicester’s Perez became the first player to score a hat-trick in back-to-back Premier League appearances against a single opponent since Luis Suarez against Norwich City in September 2012.

Mane: Two seasons ago it was Mo Salah who was carrying Liverpool. Last season it was Virgil van Dijk who had a massive influence on the success of the team. This season it’s Sadio Mane who is carrying Liverpool on his shoulders. His speed, power and strength have been a feature of Liverpool’s play this season and without the Senegal international, life at the top would be considerably less comfortable. It was Mane who caused mayhem in Tottenham’s ranks the entire match and the reason they lost. With a little help from Serge Aurier, of course.

Did you know?Mane has scored more goals in Premier League home games than any other player in the competition in 2019 (15 at Anfield).

Vardy: There is a ruthlessness to Jamie Vardy’s finishing that sometimes makes you have to look away. Vardy started his scoring tirade when Southampton were 4-0 down. He completed his hat-trick to make it 9-0 with the last kick of the game. The delight on Vardy’s face was as if he had just scored the winning goal in the final seconds of a cup final. Is it any wonder Brendan Rodgers is looking so pleased with himself when he has a striker in his team with that kind of attitude. It’s hardly surprising Vardy is so unpopular with opposition supporters.

Did you know?Vardy has scored 18 goals in the Premier League since 3 March (Brendan Rodgers’ first game) – the most of any player in the competition in this period.

Now it’s your turn

You’ve seen my selections this season. But who would you go for?

Crooks of the Matter

I thought at the time the sending-off Ryan Bertrand was a harsh decision but when I discovered Mike ‘clever clogs’ Dean was behind VAR in the Southampton versus Leicester fixture I wasn’t surprised.

Anyone who has played football at any level, and especially in the conditions both teams had to contend with, would have made allowances for the players.

If Dean has played the game (and I rather suspect he has) then he should know what defenders have to cope with and therefore I can only assume that he wasn’t a very good player.

There wasn’t one pundit in the BBC Match of the Day studio or anyone on the pitch at St Mary’s who would have sent Bertrand off for the challenge on Perez. And why? Because they recognised and understood the conditions.

Quite apart from destroying what would have been a perfectly good contest for the viewing public, he’s instigated huge embarrassment to the club, its players and put a manager’s career on skid row – all on a whim. You would also be very wrong to compare Newcastle’s Sean Longstaff’s dismissal against Wolves to Bertrand’s. Longstaff was reckless.

The long-held tradition in football that the referee’s decision is final is no longer the case. Andre Marriner gave Leicester the advantage by letting play run on and they took it. To punish the Saints further with the ultimate sanction and a sending-off, as opposed to a booking, was double jeopardy and, in my view, not in the spirit of the game.

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[branflakes82]

Hard to Trust ch. 11

Here’s ch. 11 written by the beautiful @pathybo Enjoy!!

When morning had come you were more tired than before going to bed. Still, you got up, showered and got ready. Alicia was with you the entire time. You told her what happened; Jordan, Eric, Four, geez what a mess you put yourself into. “Sweetie, you just have to give it some time, everything will be fine. You will be fine. Yesterday me and Chris were at the pit after you left and Eric stopped by the bar to get two bottles of whiskey and just disappeared. Zeke told us that he usually does that when he has issues or is facing some problems, he goes to the bar, gets some booze and just goes home to drink by himself.” She told you. “Thanks for being so supportive, honey.” You said to her and you both went to the cafeteria to meet Chris and then  choose jobs and living arrangements. Four was by the door when you arrived. “So, do you know what job to choose? You got second, you can choose a good one!” He told you. “I have an idea, but it's a secret, you will find out later.” You smiled. After you ate your breakfast, Max stood up from the leaders table and asked for everyone's attention. “To our new dauntless members, you will be called by ranking position and you must come to the leaders table to discuss your job and living arrangements.” He announced and called Chris up right away. You noticed Eric sat beside Max looking extremely tired. Alicia told you that she and Chris were getting an apartment together, you were happy for her but you still had hopes she would live with you. “Y/N” Max called out. You sat down on a chair in front of Max with Eric by his side measuring you up the whole time. “Congratulations, Y/N, you're second in rankings so I suggest you choose a job in leadership. We don't have any leader positions available here, but there are other leader positions as research, council, adviser or leader trainee, I think your father will be pleased with any one of those choices.” He placed a paper in front of you with other options. Max made it clear to you that those other options were for people ranked below you. “Thank you so much, sir, but I'm not here to please my father. I'm here to find my new home and my future, and I want to do this.” You said placing your finger on the paper in front of you showing the position you were willing to accept. “Patrol, really? Are you sure?” He asked you. “Y/N, you can't possibly be considering patrolling, who's going to protect you out there?” Eric was clearly not happy about it, you could see the anger burning inside him. “I'm dauntless, I can take care of myself. It's what I want.” You finished. “Ok.” Max said. “Do you have any living arrangements, any roommates?” He asked. “No, I would like to live by myself, sir.” You said. “We have a few single apartments, I will assign one of them for you. Here is your code. Just type it on your lock and it will allow you to change the password for one of your choice. Present yourself on Monday morning at 8 by Patrol supervisor to meet your team. You're the second one asking for Patrol today, so I guess you will be working with your friend Chris.” He shook your hand and you joined your friends to wait for Alicia. Eric was so mad that you could see the flames in his eyes and his ears turning red as you left. You told Chris that you probably would be working together and you two were thrilled about it. Alicia came back telling that she was going to work with Kate at the infirmary. You two ran to see your apartment while Chris was meeting the guys at the pit. You were going upstairs and you heard some voices whispering in a nearby hallway. Both of you got silent and before you knew you were already listening. “Jordan, I told you that it would work. She believed that he was actually making out with me! For crying out loud the guy spat at me, literally. He's lucky I love him.” You heard Amy's snickering. “Aw babe, come here. We are going to get them separated, Eric will go back to you and I will have Y/N back, but in the meanwhile let's have some fun.” That was Jordan's voice and they were clearly making out. You then remembered Eric telling you that they had set him up, and you thanked God Alicia was with you, because if anyone told you that, you certainly would not believe it. And you realized that Amy was the informant Jordan told you about. The two of you went in the opposite direction and towards your new apartment. Your apartment was already furnished and the bed was brand new. You just needed to buy sheets, covers and pillows. The couch was cozy and you and your friend stayed there talking for a while. “I should talk to Eric, he will never forgive me for not believing him.” You confessed to your friend. “I don't think so, Y/N, I've seen the way he looks at you, the way he drools over you. I'm pretty sure if you talk to him he will be happy to have you back.” Alicia said. The two of you went down to a store to buy some things for your new places. Alicia then went back to her place with Chris to set things up and you stopped by the library before going back to your place. You grabbed a few books and went upstairs to make your bed and take a good long private shower. Your bed was perfect with new black sheets, comforter and pillows. You sat on your couch ready for bed with a sports bra and shorts and started to read a book you got. You kept thinking about talking to Eric, but you were sure he wasn't going to forgive you so easily. You were entranced in the book when you heard your door lock beeping and the door opening. “How did you get in here? I changed the password.” You asked when Eric made his way into your livingroom. “I'm a Dauntlesss leader, I can have access to any apartment code I want.” Eric sneered at you. He sat down beside you on the couch. Closing your book and putting it on the coffee table you sigh. “There's beer in the fridge if you want. If you're so comfortable and feeling at home, you can help yourself.” Eric stood up and went to the fridge to grab the beer, he got one for you as well. When he sat down by your side you noticed his hand resting on his knee all bruised and the knuckles were busted open. You repositioned yourself pulling your knees into your body so you could reach for his hand. Your fingers surrounded his hand as you caressed it. “What happened? It looks pretty bad. I bet the other guy didn't have a chance, huh?” You said lacing your fingers in his. “It was nothing, he deserved much worse.” He said placing his beer on the coffee table. You placed your own beer on the floor and sighed. “Eric, listen, I'm sorry for not believing you when you told me they set us up.” You confessed. “I didn't came here for an apology. I know I will have to prove to you how much you matter to me, and I will do it because I care about you. And because I don't tolerate any other guy near you. You're mine and no one will take you away from me.” He said bluntly. You knew there was no point arguing to that, so you told him about what you heard Amy telling Jordan and that they were together on it, also that they were making out at the hallway. Eric looked at you side-eyed, he then turned his body towards you, grabbed your knees and pulled you to him. He was on top of you, his body laying against yours and kissed you like there was no tomorrow. He was kissing your neck, licking and biting and you were seeing stars. “Eric, wait, slow down, please.” Your mind was playing tricks on you, making you remember your last night with Jordan, all the broken promises. You giving yourself to him and him breaking your heart. “What?” He asked you, out of breath. He looked you up and down, his eyes full of lust. “Bedroom. Take me to the bedroom.” You whispered not giving your brain a chance to argue. You hadn't finished talking and Eric already had you in his arms carrying you to your bedroom. He placed you on your bed and got undressed in lightning speed. You were under the covers when Eric joined you and remove your sports bra. He took his time on your plump breasts kissing, sucking and licking. You were moaning his name louder and louder. He came back up and kissed you with so much lust that you practically melted under him. You kissed his tattooed neck open mouthed and it was his turn to moan. You were already feeling his excitement on your thigh as he was fully naked on top of you. He went down your stomach trailing kisses down it until he reached your shorts. As he removed them your breath was stuck in your throat and a frightening feeling was taking control over you, but you didn't want to stop him. He placed kisses all over your inner thighs and to your wet aching core. He took his time sucking and nibbling you and every time you tried to move he placed his hand on your belly to hold you still. You were on fire, that was a feeling you never had before as Jordan had been pretty selfish and fast with you. Now you understood that all he wanted was to take your virginity, to claim you. As Eric licked and sucked your pussy and played with your clit you were loosing control, until everything went numb and you had your first orgasm. He felt you trembling under him and went back to you kissing your belly all the way up. He kissed you passionately bringing you back to him. “Have you done this before? Can I go on? If you want me to stop, now is the time. I don't want you to do anything you don't want to.” He whispered in your ear. “Once, I did it once. P-please, don't stop.” You muttered back. “Oh, baby, you're so mine.” And with that he thrusted hard into you. One thing was pretty clear to you, Eric was not gentle and you were loving it. He was slamming into you with no mercy, it was painful at first and then you began to surrender to him. “Oh baby, you feel so good.” He managed to grunt out. Right before Eric reached his orgasm your second wave came on and you both collapsed on the bed. He pulled you to his chest and you laid there listening to his incredibly fast heart beat. “I just want to set a few things straight first.” He said between breaths and got you worried. Raising yourself up on one arm you look him in the eye. “And what is that?” “From now on no more hanging out with Warren. No way in Hell are you getting close to Jordan. I can only tolerate Four because he helped you and he cares about you, and if it wasn't for him I would have never met you. But you are mine, and mine only.” He informed you. “Are you mine as well?” You asked him, holding your breath. “With all my heart and soul.” You smiled at him and then layed your head back on his chest and fell into a blissful sleep.

[secondstartotheright-imagines]

Game On.

Request from @avengersrulez1536:  Hey I have come up with another idea- it's a pan x reader where the reader is Tiger Lily and she was born on the island  and now that pan is there they fight for the throne of neverland.

Note: Now I’m not sure how people would see Tiger-Lily as she hasn’t been introduced to the OUAT verse yet; however I know a few people that would see her just as dark and unforgiving as Peter but, unlike him, she truly cares for the girls under her protection - the ones that have found their way to the island. I hope you enjoy this and if you want her written differently for your request then please just let me know <3

Peter Pan x Tiger-Lily!Reader

Words: 1,916

Warnings: Well this is Peter and Tiger-Lily so I guess I should probably put violence here.

Disclaimer: None of the GIFs used are mine. All credit goes to their creators <3

Neverland had never been as glorious as it was during the days of Tiger-Lily. You had been here for as long as the island itself had and over the centuries that have passed whispers have travelled among the girls that ended up on the island….whispers that would suggest that you weren’t born of man and woman but of the very soils of Neverland. It has been so long and there have been countless different stories of your origins fabricated that no one actually knew the real truth and you weren’t one to speak of it to others either.

The girls that came to your island had often lost their way in life or had wished to come here because of the horrors they were experiencing and each one of them grew to quickly admire you. You were connected to the island in a way that you could control each and every plant that grew, use them for whatever advantage you needed, but most important of all you could use your magic to provide healing medicine and food for the ones who relied on you.

If you gave to the island than the island would provide. There was only ever one rule for those under your leadership too: You looked out for one another. No one here would be out for themselves and if they proved to be selfish in their ways they would be banished.

Life couldn’t have been any simpler or any sweeter….

….but then a boy found his way to an island. A boy who held so much darkness inside of him that the island immediately reacted and the once vibrant colours that covered it turned more miserable and dark. It hurt your very soul to see the island you loved so much disintegrating before you. Even some of the flowers that had once brought you joy had turned deadly.

This boy had to leave.

                                         * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

“But Tiger-Lily you don’t know who this boy is. What he’s capable of.”

Your faithful right-hand girl, Lizzie, was blocking your path out of the camp you all resided in trying to stop you from going after him. No one had come face to face with him as of yet but after witnessing what had happened to the island from his presence alone they knew that nothing good would come of meeting him.

“He is a boy Lizzie he won’t be capable of much more than whining about this island being full of girls. I’m not afraid of him.”

Your friend bit down onto her bottom lip as she began to hear the conflicting thoughts inside her own mind as to whether she really should let you go but you were, well, you…..incredibly stubborn and once you had a plan in your mind you wouldn’t rest until you had carried it out. Short of knocking you out there was nothing she was going to be able to do to stop you.

A sigh laced with a hint of defeat fell from her lips as she held up both of her hands and stepped to the side so that she was no longer in your way.

“Okay but please be careful. I know you can look after yourself but the newest girls to the island need you. They’re not used to this way of life…..so you have to make sure you come back.”

“I will be fine. I will see you all soon.”

You wrap your arms around your friend, pulling her into an embrace, before you made your way into the dense jungle of the island. With each step that you took your eyes looked at your surroundings with an intensity you’d never had to use before, with the island changing as quickly as it was you couldn’t trust everything you came across – there was a particular plant that had decided to appear at the same time as this ‘Pan’ did and she already knew too well about its poison.

Luckily for her when she had been scratched by it her magical ability had allowed her to dispel it straightaway; had it been one of the other girls it would have been an entirely different situation.

“What the hell is a girl doing on my island?”

A voice you had never heard before spoke out from some nearby bushes and instantly the smirk crept up onto your lips. He was already proving to be quite the coward with the fact that he was speaking while hidden from view.

“You are mistaken little boy. You have been present on this island for all of five minutes. I, however, have been here since its creation.”

A boyish laugh rang out around you and although you knew he was close you couldn’t figure out exactly where he was. But you are Tiger-Lily.....you have a connection with this island like no other....so you don’t need to wait for him to come out willingly. All you needed to do was call upon your friends.

The ones that had been there for you from day one.

“You are messing with the wrong person here boy. You are about to learn that there are forces on this island you can’t even begin to comprehend.”

You closed your eyes and with the smallest flick of your wrist you forced the poisonous flowers that were new to the island into the area where you were stood and heard the sound of them ripping through the nearby bushes until they wrapped themselves around the intruder that had come here.

Only now did you open your eyes so that you could finally see his face, although you were much more bothered by the fact that he didn’t seem to be struggling at all in the vines that were currently wrapped around him – the thorns should have been piercing through his skin, administering their poison. You furrowed your brows in confusion as the boy simply threw a playful wink in your direction.

Playful......bordering on flirtatious.

“Sorry sweetheart but that’s not going to work on me. You want rid of me you’re gonna need to try harder than that.”

So he was cocky as well as irritating? Your girls were going to have so much fun tearing him apart.

“That poison s-“

“Should be causing me pain? Lead to an agonising death? Tell me something I don’t know. They are here because of me. They EXIST because of me so the last person they are going to affect is me.”

Without even so much as a twitch of a muscle from the boy each of the vines wrapped around him tore apart as though some invisible force had just come into play. You narrow your eyes as your suspicion towards the boy increases. He would seem he had magic too which now meant that he wasn’t going to be easily rid of. Maybe it was about time some rules were set out here.

“I don’t know who you are, or why you are here, but I want to make it very clear that this is MY island, not yours, and if you wish to stay then it would be better if you simply accepted that.”

The look in his eyes darkened now as a more malicious looking smirk took over his lips. His fingers crept over to his hip where you could quite plainly see a small dagger sheathed inside a leather holster. There was a sarcastic comment just begging to come out but before you could say anything he had disappeared…..into thin air….it was a magic you had never seen before and you only knew where he had reappeared when you felt the cold blade of the dagger against your throat.

“Little girls shouldn’t start fights they have no hope of winning.”

His lips brushed themselves up against your ear, invading every inch of personal space you had, which made your very blood boil at his audacity.

“I am no little girl which you will quickly find out if you don’t remove that blade from my throat.”

His laugh cruised down your ear when he made it very clear he wasn’t about to go anywhere anytime soon. Why would he? As far as he was concerned this was the first bit of fun he’d had here.

“By all means do what you want to me, you will never beat me, this island has made me powerful; more so than you…..which is why I will be its King. Peter Pan never fails sweetheart.”

Peter Pan. So that was his name then? A gut feeling was beginning to tell you that this name would fast become one that you would loathe intensely. It was time to knock him down a peg or two.

“We’ll see about that Pan.”

The ground underneath your feet sounded out a groan as it shifted itself in an unnatural manner, causing the hold he had on you to falter enough for you to be able to duck away from the blade and stand a few feet away from him.

If he wanted to play dirty than that is what you were going to do too…..quite literally.

The shifting ground didn’t affect you at all as your feet continued to remain firmly on top of it but for Pan it was a whole other story. The once solid ground that had been beneath him and now turned into a fast-moving quicksand type consistency and the more he struggled to get out of it the faster it acted.

“I think it is you who needs to make sure he doesn’t start fights he can’t win. I will always make sure I am one step ahead of you so that I keep what I have here.” Your eyes turn dark now as for the first time since meeting him a true anger radiates from you. “I will not lose my island to anyone....especially not some STUPID LITTLE BOY!”

The louder your voice became the more your entire surroundings shook as though an earthquake was rippling through the whole of Neverland. Peter’s smirk had turned into a vicious snarl as he threw his dagger at you, not caring where it hit, which luckily for you it just grazed past your arm. It managed to spill only the smallest of blood but, unknown to you, it was all he needed.

The ground stopped swallowing him up when it had reached his shoulders and once you knew he wouldn’t be getting out anytime soon the darkness inside of you subsided and made way for a triumphant smirk instead.

“Have fun trying to get out of there and remember......I’M the ruler of this island and if you don’t obey then you will find yourself meeting many more disastrous ends like this.”

As a final insult you placed the tips of your fingers to your lips and then blew an imaginary kiss in his direction before turning your back on him and disappearing into the dense vegetation. You couldn’t wait to tell the girls how much fun they were now going to have. Initially you had gone to rid the island of the boy but, actually, he was quite the entertaining little creature.

Peter himself, despite being stuck rather effectively in the ground right now, was also intrigued in you. He want to overthrow you, of course, maybe even kill you when he got the chance but he was looking forward to the fun that would happen along the way.

[spockandawe]

I am torn between Starscream and Rodimus and Starscream and Bumblebee for the symbol ask, so chose the one that appeals the most.

OH HO HO. Both. Both is the answer. Let’s do this.

Starscream/Rodimus

In a versus fight, I think.... Starscream takes the day. Just because he is so dang good at fighting for his life and scrabbling for survival. Rodimus is good, but Starscream is just next-level survival skills. It’s hard to beat him.

And in a favorites fight, ahhhh. I feel bad, because I love Rodimus. But Starscream definitely wins. Both my pretty boys, they have some parallel issues re: leadership, that tie back in pretty heavily to Megatron and Optimus Prime. Megatron was more cruel and aggressively talked down to Starscream about how worthless he was, and Optimus (probably not intentionally) strung Rodimus along with scraps of attention when Rodimus was pretty desperate for his approval, fails to acknowledge the good things Rodimus has done, brushes him off when Rodimus tries to talk to him, and sweeps him aside when something serious is happening and we need a real leader, don’t you worry your pretty little head about it. And they both want so badly to lead. Rodimus hurts, but Starscream has been actively, viciously hurt, and has clawed his way up from an awful position to where he is today. He’s just been through so much, with so little support, and even though he’s an ass, he really does want to be a good leader. How could I not love him?

Shipping, oooooooooh. So those parallel issues up above. Those things. And depending how much they know about each other, it’s a real great point to connect on. Not actively, because Rodimus is like hahaha sad feelings what? And Starscream is the same thing, but with less of a laughing mask. But they’re each so hungry for approval and respect that I think they’d be able to recognize that in each other. And it’s a thing they can hardly talk about, maybe with brain ghost bumblebee, who you think isn’t real, or maybe little moments with minimus ambus, or trying to reach out to optimus before he brushes you off. But if they can recognize it, and recognize parallels, this is a huge weight on each of their shoulders, and just knowing someone understands is such an important thing.

Plus on an outwardly more frivolous level, these are two people that I really, really, really think need to be vocally appreciated. In bed. Maybe not in bed, but sexual settings are a nice natural place to bring that kind of thing up, where it might feel forced out of the blue, especially with two emotionally constipated dorks. Rodimus is.... liked. But everyone around him is under his authority, he’s aware of the times that he, personally, has failed them. Especially right now, with a mutiny happening specifically because of his leadership. Starscream is.... technically liked, if he won the election. But he’s really not very liked at all. Even if it’s not deeper praise like ‘I think it’s really wonderful that you’re working hard to prioritize the protection and survival of all your citizens, not just making sure that you personally have a way out,’ having someone appreciate you on ANY level can be such an important thing.

Starscream/Bumblebee

Oooooh, these two. In a versus fight, Starscream. Again, Bumblebee is good, but Starscream is just something else.

And again, in terms of favorites, it’s still Starscream :P I like Bumblebee in a similar way to how I don’t-exactly-like Optimus. I couldn’t connect with his character at all for a while in phase two, the snark was nice, but he just seemed worn out and exhausted, and it was kind of exhausting to read. But when I went back to phase one and saw him not-volunteering to be the leader, being chosen as leader anyways, and IMMEDIATELY getting slammed with all these problems where there isn’t a good solution and everyone is pressuring him for one and it’s impossible to make everyone happy and that’s when people are even respecting his authority to begin with-- I feel really bad for him. With Optimus, we mostly only see him already exhausted. With Bumblebee, we see him being worn down. In early phase one and the brain ghost scenes, we can see him being bustling and bossy, really good with people on a personal level, genuinely concerned and friendly and helpful. And when he’s a leader, we see him stretched way too thin trying to take care of all these things that are his responsibility, he has to deal with it, even if it makes him miserable. Bumblebee is chronically incapable of saying no when it’s framed like ‘but we’re depending on you!’So I love him a lot. But... Starscream :P I’ve talked enough about him here and in previous asks, but it is really, really hard to beat Starscream.

AND SHIPPING OuO Ohhhhh, this ship. Once the brain ghost scenes started happening, I was a lost cause. Bumblebee has seen Starscream at his absolute most vulnerable. Maybe apart from when Starscream tried to reach out to Megatron in spotlight: megatron (and was immediately repaid with a fist in the face), this is the most open he’s ever let himself be. With Wheeljack, his emotions and happiness pop through for a moment, and even though some of that still shows through, he pulls himself back under control fast. And even in depression, you can get some really nice highs that lift you up for a moment... before you’re dragged back down into the pit.

Bumblebee has seen the pit. He’s been able to freely hate Starscream for millions of years, and now he’s getting a better view than anyone else at the depth of unhappiness and despair that Starscream is hiding so carefully from the rest of the world. He’s seeing what Starscream drags himself out of every day just to put on a functional face for the rest of the world. He’s seeing Starscream be self-serving, sure, but also genuinely pouring so much work into trying to be a decent leader for the planet. Starscream has been open with him in a way that he hasn’t been open with anyone else. It’s only because he thinks Bumblebee isn’t real, and that he’s losing his mind on top of everything else, but it would take one hell of a set of circumstances to get him to be open like this at all, and he’s only barely holding himself together as it is (all the more reason to hide it! can’t have people knowing about that), but he’s still sharing his honest, bitter, despairing thoughts. And Bumblebee is watching him push past that, every day, trying to do his best by the planet.

Let Bumblebee connect to him on that personal level that he’s so good at. Starscream is dreadful at people, but he’s good at calculating. Let him direct the planet, make the necessary, sometimes-cold calls, let him make the hard decisions because all the options are bad, what is least bad and most likely to get us the results we need. Bumblebee would hate that. He’d hate knowing that he was sending people off to die, that it was his decision driving them forward. But he’d also have emotional support while this was happening. He has friends. He’s well-liked. Starscream has none of that. He is incredibly alone. Let Bumblebee reach out to him, in a setting where Starscream can’t refuse to listen because Bumblebee is just a hallucination telling him the things he wants to hear, none of this is real, hahahahaha.

But Bumblebee has that in to Starscream’s thoughts and feelings that Starscream wouldn’t have given anyone voluntarily. Bumblebee has been able to freely hate him for ages as one of the leaders of The Bad Guys, and now he sees Starscream as a person. If Tailgate is someone who’s a pretty undirected force of innocently-thinking-the-best-of-people-and-wanting-to-be-friends, Bumblebee is a directed force. He’s got a better grasp of realism and limits than Tailgate, but he’s also able to aim those skills better and reach out to people more meaningfully and directly. Starscream doesn’t trust him? Okay, that’s fine, Bumblebee understands where he’s coming from. But you know, you can talk to me if you need to. And Bumblebee has a better idea than anyone else of what Starscream’s emotional needs are right now.

Annnnd I realize I’ve mostly talked about this in a single direction :P But once Bumblebee does managed to drill through Starscream’s defensive exterior and Starscream begins to maybe possibly tentatively sort of trust him, like... we see how happy he gets with Wheeljack and the way he just shines. And that’s just after Wheeljack saying ‘I trust you and think you deserve a chance.’ So imagine how Starscream would react to a genuine, mutual, tested-by-time connection. So, kind of like Pharma where like-- i enjoy seeing how selfishness in the moment is reflected in a character as circumstances expand. I wrote Pharma as being devoted and intensely protective of someone who is his person. Once Starscream decides you’re his person, then all that self-preservation, all those planning and fallbacks and watching for threats and protection, at all costs, that expands to cover you. It’s an... aggressive kind of devotion, in some ways. There’s a level of adoration that comes across directly, but you can really see the depth of feeling in those indirect ways. I want that, so badly. I want Starscream to have a person who he wants to protect. I want his world to expand to something past him, and at this point, he’s been burned so, so many times he’ll struggle to reach out on his own. I want that determined understanding and affection that wears down his defenses until he feels like it might be safe enough to open up and care.

[skittelsen]

My Secret Origin as a Super-Fan

*This post is my personal story. It does not represent the opinions or views of NetherRealm Studios, WB Games, or DC Entertainment. 

What a week!

My first game as Narrative Lead, INJUSTICE 2, launched worldwide, and the response from fans and critics has been overwhelmingly positive—as in I feel overwhelmed by all the positivity. This week also marked the tenth anniversary of my NYU graduation. Finally, there’s the MOST important milestone of all, my son’s third birthday. For me, all these events are connected.

Of all the reactions to Injustice 2 out there, I love most when someone remarks that the people who made this game must really love DC Comics lore. Trust me, they do. Everyone on the I2 team has a favorite DC character, from the iconic to the obscure. My favorite is Superman.

It might come as a surprise that the Narrative Lead on a game in which Superman is portrayed as a lethal tyrant would profess to be a Superman fan, but I am. 

Here’s why. When I was about 4 years old, my parents told me that I was and would always be their son, but that I didn’t come out of Mommy’s tummy like my sister. I was adopted. My birth parents, whoever they were, couldn’t raise me, so they sent me away to find a family who could provide a better life for me.

This kind of news can really mess with a kid’s head. I was an indoorsy, deep-thinky emo boy, and I would dramatically stare into the bathroom mirror and wonder whose eyes were looking back at me. Fortunately, my Mom and Dad were a real life Ma and Pa Kent, equipped with big hearts to manage my drama. They loved my sister and I as much as any kids could be loved, and they never treated me any differently on account of my secret heritage. 

Superman: The Movie was on TV a lot in the 1980s. I don’t remember when, but at some point not long after my parents told me I was adopted, I made the connection that Superman was adopted. Superman was just like me! 

From then on, my personal identity as an adopted kid was still fraught with complications and insecurities, but it wasn’t always a source of trauma. In my mind, I had a secret origin, a source of strength. And how cool would it be if I found a spaceship buried in the basement? 

My parents reinforced this imaginative coping mechanism by indulging my every superhero fantasy. They took me to every comics and collectibles shop in upstate New York looking for special issues and rare action figures. Mom sewed more than one Superman cape (and a few Batman capes, too), and she and I binge-watched George Reeves in Adventures of Superman. For my 18th birthday, my Dad bought me the S-shield tattoo that’s still on my shoulder. A year later, he got the same S-shield tattoo on the same shoulder as me. He sat in the inker’s chair wincing from the needle, quoting Marlon Brando as Jor-El, “The son becomes the father, and the father becomes the son!” 

Without my parents’ support, I may never have gone to Metropolis for college at NYU. They were so proud at my graduation, but I wasn’t proud yet. I wanted to be a writer, but instead, I found myself working as the Corporate Files Administrator at the HBO Legal Department and taking an LSAT prep course by night. I was lost. 

Then, two things happened that set me back on course. First, I was hired by an indie producer to write a screenplay, enabling me to quit my job at HBO. Second, at my wife’s urging, I sent a fan letter to one of my favorite writers, author and educator Douglas Rushkoff, asking if he needed any help.

They say don’t meet your heroes, but in Rushkoff, I found a mentor and a lifelong friend. Working as his editorial assistant was a dream come true. I learned more in one year working Rushkoff than I had in four years studying at NYU. 

Then my screenplay deal fell apart, the global economy tanked, and like a lot of recent college graduates, I faced the real possibility of going broke and moving back in with my parents. Rushkoff couldn’t pay me a full time salary, but he offered to help me get an inside track at DC. 

Applying for a job at DC Comics without a personal recommendation is like throwing rocks at the moon. For years, from sophomore year of college on, I had applied for every DC internship and entry-level position available. Never got a response. Rushkoff recommended me and I got a call from WB HR within a few hours. It certainly helped that I now had a few more bullets on the CV. It also may have helped that the person Rushkoff recommended me to was Paul Levitz, then President and Publisher of DC Comics.

An extensive interview process later, I was hired as Assistant Editor - Interactive at DC Comics. My family was with me when I got the phone call. We all went out for dinner and celebrated, and I got so drunk, I ate a bowl of unpeeled shrimp with the shells intact. That hurt in the morning, but it’s still one of my favorite memories.

Little did we know how much that job would change things. Less than a year after I started at DC, Paul Levitz stepped down and Diane Nelson arrived as President. DC Comics became DC Entertainment, and the office was split between New York and California. 

It was a great deal of change in a relatively short period of time for a company invested with decades of tradition. That made for a controversial and upsetting time for many of the employees who had been at DC for years. I had the benefit of being the newbie, and my wife grew up in California, so were were excited to relocate to Los Angeles, even though it meant leaving our beloved city and so many wonderful friends behind. I accepted my offer to join the new team in Burbank, and off we went.

Working at DC was a dream job. I considered my colleagues like family members, and I got to work with more talented creators than I can list here. One of my favorite collaborators, though, was NetherRealm Studios. 

Working with NRS on Injustice: Gods Among Us felt like a big deal. Mortal Kombat was a formative games franchise for me growing up, and the team was just coming off an amazing 2011 reboot of the MK franchise with an incredibly ambitious cinematic Story Mode. 

Plus, this would be the AAA game in which my favorite hero, Superman, could finally take center stage. He would be the villain of the story, but a villain motivated by good intentions in response to a horrific tragedy. 

The results were nothing short of awesome. From that first game through five years of comics and a blockbuster mobile adaptation, the Injustice universe took off like a bullet train. 

I left DC before Injustice launched. It was a dream job, to be sure, but I still had that other dream of being a writer, and for HR reasons, that wasn’t possible while I was a DC employee. So when a Burbank creative agency offered me a leadership role, a better salary, and the freedom to write for anyone I wanted, I knew it was time to go.

Leaving DC felt like a big risk. It doesn’t get bigger than Superman. What would I find in the great beyond? But after getting comfortable in my position at DC, disrupting my routine and transitioning to games marketing was a challenge I needed. My partners and I built a crack team of creatives and account managers. That team pitched and executed campaigns for clients all over the world, and went on to win award after award after award. 

My risky marketing venture was now a successful career. It was possible to envision a future where I never wrote again, living comfortably off all those marketing dollars. I had co-written a screenplay since leaving DC, but apart from that, I no longer made the time to write. My wife was pregnant, we’d just a bought a house, and I was traveling on a weekly basis. There were only so many hours in the day, and I needed to make those hours profitable.

But all the money in the world couldn’t fulfill my goal to be a writer. It was at this time that some close friends challenged me to write. Well, not just to write, but to finish something. One comics editor friend put it to me, “If you can’t write a 12-page backup, what can you write?” That put the fire in me. So I wrote a short story that editor, then a short story for another. Then I sold an original comic series (still upcoming!). And then I got a call from an old colleague.

At DC, I worked with an incredible woman named Victoria Setian, or as we call her, Tory. She had been part of Team Interactive with me, and since I’d left DC, she’d also moved, across the street to WB Games, where she was a budding producer on Mortal Kombat X, which of course was being made by some of our favorite developers, NetherRealm Studios.

Tory asked if I wanted to throw in a pitch for an MKX comic series. I knew the lore, I knew the team, what did I have to lose? So, in between agency work and preparing for a new baby, I wrote my pitch.

Then my son was born. A big deal for anyone, an extra big deal for an adopted person who’s never laid eyes on a blood relative before. My son opened his eyes, and for the first time, I saw myself in another human being. The experience was psychedelic. Becoming a father profoundly changed me in ways I’m still figuring out.

Everyone who knew me knew that I wanted to name a son “Clark” someday. Didn’t want to force that on my wife, though, so we came up with an alternative name, and she picked from both names once she saw the baby and got a sense of his personality. He was quiet for a newborn, a little gentleman, she said. She named him Clark Eric, taking his middle name from my father, which was an added surprise. Suffice it to say there wasn’t a dry eye among the Kittelsen men that morning.

The call from my editor at DC came that week while I was still home with the family. I got the gig. How soon could I turn around a new outline?

Thus began the most difficult summer of my life. New house, new baby, new writing gig, and I still had to pitch, travel, and manage the creative team for the agency. There was pressure coming at me from every direction. I became depressed. Something had to give.

Alan Moore gave an interview once where he talked about taking the leap to freelance. He came home to tell his wife he was quitting his industrial job, but when he got there, she told him she was pregnant, so he went back to work. But in time it occurred to him that no matter how poor his writing career might make the family, the baby would survive. They’d find a way. The only question was, would the baby grow up with new shoes and a miserable father who resents his lot in life, or with secondhand shoes and a father who can honestly tell that child she can be anything she wants to be.

This was the choice I faced. Fortunately, I didn’t have to make it alone. I had my wife, my partner, to work it out with me. She drafted a household budget, figured out how lean we could live, how long we might survive, and together we put together Humble Wordsmith, LLC, my freelance business.

I quit the agency job, reduced my monthly expenses to bare minimums, and started working from home. Beyond the comics, I had freelance gigs as a copywriter, a marketing consultant, whatever I could get paid to do. I busted my hump, but no matter how hard I tried, I never seemed to build momentum. That first year, our household income went down by over 75%. 

Things picked up a bit when I got hired by WB Games to write story and in-game content for the DC Legends mobile game. With that under my belt, I looked for more games writing gigs, but they were hard to come by. I focused more of my time on Feral Audio, a start-up podcast network was growing steadily. 

That’s when I got another call from another old colleague, Senior Producer Adam Urbano. NetherRealm Studios was looking for a writer to join their team and work on the story for Injustice 2. Would I be interested and available? After years of working with NRS on various projects in various capacities, this was the ultimate compliment.

The rest, as they say, is history. Writing for the game is the best dream job I’ve ever had the privilege of working. There was so much work to be done, I handed off my Feral Audio duties to my partners at the network. For the first time since I graduated from college, I could focus on one job title: Writer.

Becoming a father was wonderful but disruptive. Writers are selfish people, we like having lots of time to ourselves to “think” and “be creative” and sometimes even to write. But I can’t be selfish anymore. So with each year since I started freelancing, I’ve worked harder at balancing my family life with my work. The more quality time I spend as a Dad, the more fulfilled I become. I’ve been around for all Clark’s achievements, from walking to talking to his first tantrum. At the agency, I feared I would miss all those priceless memories. Now I have a treasure trove.

As if all this weren’t enough, there was one more surprise waiting for me in the lead-up to launching Injustice 2. 

**MINOR I2 SPOILER WARNING** In the game, Superman meets his cousin, Supergirl, for the first time. It’s the first time he’s ever laid eyes on a blood relative. The first time he sees himself in someone else. Just like the first time I saw Clark.

Writing that scene was obviously somewhat personal and emotional for me. Now, a couple years later, I get to live that scene out for myself.

See, ever since my wife became pregnant, I’ve been taking DNA tests, trying to decode my secret origin. They never yielded any close results, but the ethnographic results they provided me were interesting, and I never knew what they could yield, so I kept taking them. Then, just this March, I got a match to a distant cousin. On a lark, I sent her my adoption info, and within hours, she sent me the name of my maternal grandfather. Then we found my grandmother.

We did not find my birth mother. In a soap opera twist, my birth mother was given up for adoption, just like me, so her identity is still a mystery. But I can’t complain. I’ve found new uncles, aunts, and cousins, they’ve welcomed me to the family with open arms, and they want to help find my birth mother. 

By finding the birth family my mother never knew, I’ve found another missing piece of myself. Now I can look in the mirror and see the pieces I gave to Clark, as well as the pieces my grandparents gave to me. Sometime soon I’m going to meet my cousins in person for the first time, four Supergirls who share my blood. The game becomes the writer, and the writer becomes the game.

So there it is. My life story as a Superman fan, a writer, and a father. This week I got to celebrate as all three. Remember when I said I graduated from college and my parents were proud of me, but I wasn’t proud of me? I’m proud of me now. I just checked off my bucket list by the dozen.

How am I possibly going to top this experience? I’ll have to figure that out. For now, I’m going to savor this moment with gratitude and satisfaction. After 10 years of professional ups and downs and always searching for the next opportunity, I’m happy where I am, and on the whole, I think it’s just swell. ;)

[euphoriccalliope-blog]

The Play’s the Thing: Choose Your Own Adventure

It’s nearly a given that others have already figured this out, but apart from its homage to Hamlet’s Mousetrap,I just realized that the play that is actually unfolding onstage in Dale Pike’s AO3 meta-fic “The Players,” published Sunday 2.26, is Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest, originating in 1895. To verify this, Google in quotes any of the italicized lines Molly says in the story (before S. and John take the stage in response to the bomb threat, and start messing with it). When the story starts for us, the play is already in progress, and Act II is unfolding onstage. Molly is playing Cecily Cardew (full character explication here X). Cecily loves fiction. . .

What Does It Mean for BBC Sherlock Fandom & ARG Players?

I’m taking this extra bit of meta as a push that we need to ourselves be earnest, and stop Bunburying (X) about engaging with this story via the ARG. Time to choose a side. (Keep in mind there may be more than two.)

Ultimately, the fact that TIoBE is layered within this fic is one more reason why I think it’s time to collectively join forces and play the game the way we’ve just been asked to, re: March 1, via The Skull. They’ve been asking nicely, I think, especially given that we’ve basically been crying out for clear directions; this whole thing could have gone another way if we’d had a proactive leadership and cohesive vision of our own a few weeks ago. (I know; we’re all exhaustimicated. Our collective culture in this corner of the Internet is based on passive absorption & close-reading of work, followed by further active generation of new works that follow our own rules. We are not much at home when smooshed into an active ARG gamer culture of try-and-break-stuff-to-see-what-works-and-thereby-figure-out-the-rules-of-engagement. We chafe; as world-builders, we each want to make the rules. That’s somewhat but not entirely possible here, where the ARG is generating its own reality.)

We’re Looking for Guidance From . . . Moriarty? Je Refuse. 

I believe JM’s Tweeted skull tale from early February is a red herring -- if anything, it’s a code related to setlock skull fuckery, and he may be appropriating that meaning for his own ends. (X Thanks, @CharCubed / @alwaysanoriginal​ for compiling in one thread.)   Moriarty likes to double-bluff and leave confusion in his wake; whether we let fear of him unduly shape our actions is up to us and very much in our control. Within the show, the characters we admire refuse to let fear of Moriarty freeze them to inaction. I refuse to believe we are meant to stand, trapped mice too frightened to move, in this scenario -- moving sets off the bomb, but that is what needs to happen, I think.

Back to “The Players”: Before the mirror-well, circumstances correspond near-exactly to the patience-bomb scene at the beginning of S4′s TFP -- the bomb which set itself and which is triggered by the motion of actors and the knowledge of those observing them. The countdown continues from the stopped time signature of the TEH train-carriage bomb under Parliament. Interestingly, in the fic Pike the stagehand thinks there will not be a bomb (and tells John so), whereas the TJLC Tumblr BNF writing from backstage (looking from a different vantage point than most fans in the house seats) is convinced the theater is going to blow up. Perhaps the bomb is wholly metaphorical for the audience out front watching The Players onstage/backstage -- we theatergoers who are also The Players of the greater game -- but more actual for other characters within the narrative, even and especially if some of those characters are actually the showrunners? Makes sense; I suppose in a real way it’s their careers on the line here. Since we’ve been plaintively asking to play for weeks now, they’re trusting us to pick up the metaphorical ball and run with it, but some of us are standing around complaining that the ball is not the size, shape and texture we were expecting.

It’s a Book! It’s a Play! It’s a Playbook!

The fact that “The Players” as a piece of meta-fiction also manages to encapsulate fandom in-fighting and wankery is . . . astute . . . at a moment when this corner of the fandom is divided (again!!) over whether or how best to pursue the ARG, even in the face of clear instructions from a breadcrumb trail that leads directly back to TPTB. Dale Pike’s thrilling meta-fics lead to direct association with @contactWSSH via Pike’s AO3 riddle, which results in direct contact via Twitter with the riddle guesser, who then receives direct instructions. Hints that @contactWSSH is not only The Skull, but also Eurus Holmes a.k.a. Sherlock’s subconscious. (Reread “The Therapist” and then look closely at the @contactWSSH description tagline on Twitter. Participant observer.)

Conducting Our Own Light

What more do you need to get excited about this? It’s a game. Games entail action, and risk. Perhaps those who have been going too hardddd to feel playful anymore should have a good long nap and a nice meal, and enjoy some relief from the pressure of “always on” commenting? Remember, if you don’t want to play the game, don’t spoil it for others. If you’ve been carrying a fully- or semi-lit torch for ARG followers nonstop for weeks and need a break, take one! Creative energy requires positive reinforcement and feeding; passing the baton is OK. And if you don’t trust others to run as well or as hard as you have been doing, I invite you to reconsider, or help us know what you deem necessary to get there collectively. What kind of conspiracy doesn’t trust its own members? The best secret societies all know the code, and keep to it. Doubt has no place in a group united by the courage of its convictions. Play or don’t play. I promise I will not make you look foolish.

If you’re interested in playing the game, read all of Pike’s stuff on AO3, then follow @CharCubed on Twitter (@alwaysanoriginal​ on Tumblr) and catch up. We have a lot of running to do because we’re late. We’re going to have to coordinate. Short and clear. SAME THING, at the SAME TIME! Our collaborative One-Word Test: not a cacophony of voices, but one voice. Impossible for this fandom? I dunno. I can’t sit on my hands any more.

If “The Players” is predictive, our collective mobilization on Twitter may somehow trigger specific action from the Sherlock/John Twitter show personae we’ve been observing; a “phone call” they have to notice, even if they don’t pick it up in real-time. (Or perhaps to the public Twitter personae of S. and M. & the Beebs.)

This is why I’m inclined to follow the plan laid out yesterday for Wednesday, March 1, and why I’m glad to have it -- and why I think it’s really important that anyone who feels inclined & able should act together on it. If you’re anxious about that plan, feel free to ask me more about why I’m not. (Like, really not.) I genuinely don’t understand the widespread reticence. I have yet to see a rational argument not based in vague fear.

If you remain interested but are nervous, soothe your nerves by educating those around you about how to play. For explicit pointers on how I think tomorrow could unfold positively, re: engagement with Mr. Takei’s Twitter stream, please see here (X). Choose your own adventure! 

@worriesconstantly @arglocked @whimsicalethnographies @sherlockshite @tjlcisthenewsexy @tjlc @jenna221b @sherlock-overflow-error @the-7-percent-solution @alwaysanoriginal @teapotsubtext