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stillness-in-green · 4 years ago

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Ahistorical, Absurd, and Unsustainable (Part Three)

An Examination of the Mass Arrest of the Paranormal Liberation Front

Introduction and Part One Part Two

PART THREE: Ethical Problems

Law Enforcement Conduct

The first thing that jumps out—the thing everyone talks about first and foremost about the raid—was Hawks’ murder of Twice. Murder is a controversial word in this context, I know, but I stand by it: regardless of his guilt or his intent, Bubaigawara Jin was a fleeing man who Hawks made a cold, rational decision to quite literally stab in the back. In that moment, Hawks appointed himself as an executioner of the state and murdered a man without due process—no trial, no judge, no nothing. It was an extrajudicial killing,[26] and while I know many people in the U.S. have gotten kind of jaded about that sort of thing, let me assure you that police brutality is still police brutality even when it’s being exercised against people who have committed crimes.

To illustrate this, allow me to share a few more excerpts from the Penal Code:

Assault and Cruelty by Specialized Public Employees: When a person performing or assisting in judicial, prosecutorial or police duties commits, in the performance of their duties, an act of assault or physical or mental cruelty upon the accused, suspect or any other person, imprisonment or imprisonment without work for not more than 7 years is imposed.

Abuse of Authority Causing Death or Injury by Specialized Public Employees: A person who commits a crime prescribed under the preceding Article and thereby causes the death or injury of another person is dealt with by the punishment for the crimes of injury or the punishment prescribed in the preceding Article, whichever is severer.

The punishments for Criminal Injury are imprisonment for not more than fifteen years or a fine of not more than 500,000 yen or, if the injury results in death, imprisonment for not less than three years. That’s really what Hawks ought to be looking at for Twice's murder, save that apparently heroes just aren't liable for this stuff, otherwise they'd be up against it all the time in the course of “fighting villains.” Certainly, Hawks doesn’t seem to have faced any repercussions thus far, beyond having to apologize in a press conference.

Now, again, many American readers of My Hero Academia are deeply embedded in a culture that normalizes police violence, and so there is a lot of callous handwaving about how Hawks did the right thing because Jin was a significant threat. In response to such dismissal, let me provide a few more numbers:

In the U.S. in 2019, law enforcement killed over a thousand people.

In the same year in Japan, law enforcement killed two. Two people.

In the U.S., a major factor in how police keep skating on these deaths is the legal doctrine of qualified immunity, which is nominally intended to protect officers from frivolous lawsuits in cases where they’re ruled to be acting in “good faith,” a vague ruling which has made successful prosecution of police brutality and negligence all but impossible.

Japan, and I cannot stress this enough, does not have this doctrine. The significance of law enforcement taking a life is not so casually brushed aside in other places in the world, so please don’t try to tell me that Horikoshi was trying to get across the idea that Hawks did the right thing, easy as that. The critical depiction of heroes and Hero Society dehumanizing their enemies is all over the manga.

When the Tartarus guards discuss what the government is doing about Gigantomachia, one of them complains that the higher-ups can’t use missiles—missiles!—on him because he’s quote-unquote-human.[27] During their battle at Kamino, All Might tells All For One that this time, he’s going to put him in a prison cell—he characterizes his attempt to kill All For One six years ago as a mistake. Even in the spin-off manga, Vigilantes, designated police representative Tsukauchi[28] looks absolutely aghast at Endeavor’s willingness to use lethal force against Pop Step, an innocent-until-proven-guilty minor, even though, at that time, they have all the evidence in the world that she is actively engaged in setting off bombs in populated areas.

Most prominent is the series’ treatment of the High End Noumu. The heroes rationalize them as corpses, monsters, inhuman, all in order to kill them guilt-free,[29] and this rationalization spills over to Shigaraki during the War Arc, as the chasm of understanding between heroes and villains reaches its most stark. Yet, that same arc was proceeded by the reveal of the truth about Kurogiri, which had Tsukauchi directly acknowledge that they may have misunderstood the Noumu as the series dangled the possibility that Kurogiri possesses lingering awareness from Shirakumo Oboro. Earlier, we had Ending, a man who wanted Endeavor to kill him and thought Endeavor would do it specifically because Endeavor killed the High End, and this act set him decisively apart from the non-murdery heroic norm. Even into the War Arc itself, we were getting new information on the Noumu: to wit, we were shown incontrovertible proof—in the form of Woman’s internal monologue in Chapter 268—that the High End Noumu do think.

Even if we assume the government has relaxed its prohibitions about public servants assaulting people in the course of carrying out their duty, it does not follow that Hawks’ extrajudicial execution was totally fine. Heroes are not supposed to kill because police are not supposed to kill, and in Japan, it isn’t assumed that they will the moment they run into resistance.

And look, this is not to say that Japanese police never get away with police brutality. Obviously, the country has its own problems with the issue, typically involving racism and ethnocentrism. But the way that some people in the fandom just brush off Jin’s death does a disservice to the way the series frames Hawks’ actions and what that framing is communicating to a Japanese reader.

Also, even putting aside the matter of his death, openly taunting a mentally ill man about how easy it was to fool him definitely pings me as an act of mental cruelty, though of course there’s no one to sue Hawks over that one, seeing as he murdered the victim and only witness. (Chapter 264)

That all said, there are other issues with the heroes’ actions during the raid. One is called out right in the text: Midnight acknowledges that the use of chemical agents is illegal, but calls upon Momo to engineer knock-out drugs to use against Gigantomachia anyway. Is that an action Momo will face any repercussions for at all? And if not, what does it imply about the setting that she won’t?

Here’s another big one: what’s the legality of heroes using their quirks against civilians? Because that’s what the vast majority of the PLF are, civilians. Oh, they’re suspects, sure, but throughout the manga, “heroes” aren’t set up as people who just fight any and every tiny crime they come across. From the very first chapter, heroes are set up as a specific counter to “evildoers” designated as “villains”—legally defined as people who use their quirks illegally two or more times.[30]

There is a very illuminating scene in the second chapter of Vigilantes in which Aizawa confronts Knuckleduster for his assault of a random businessman and, the moment he realizes Knuckleduster is quirkless, apologizes for the misunderstanding and walks away. If Knuckleduster doesn’t have a quirk, Knuckleduster by definition cannot be a villain, and thus, Aizawa is not authorized to throw down with him.[31] It’s somewhat unclear, not least because a lot of the evidence is in the more-interested-in-systemic-worldbuilding Vigilantes, but there is reason to believe that heroes are not allowed to use their quirks against people who are committing mundane crimes.[32] If anything, I should think that heroes only using their quirks on people who are using their quirks illegally is part of the philosophical scaffolding that gives heroes their moral authority—you see this argument from the first bearer of One For All, who loudly espouses that people not only should not use their quirks selfishly, but that quirks should only be used to help others. This kind of supposed selflessness is what MHA’s current society is built on.

To see the relevance here, consider Trumpet. Oh, he absolutely was using his quirk illegally, but can the system prove that?[33] After all, he only ever used it on allies—do you think they're in a big hurry to snitch on him? Do you think Mr. Compress is going to? And if the police can't prove Trumpet used his quirk illegally, then is he even a capital-V Villain? What about all those other rank and file types? Certainly we saw the ones at the villa fighting back with quirks, but what about those supporters at bases scattered around the country? Did they fight back, and if so, did they do it with quirks? If not, was it legal for them to be targeted by heroes?

More importantly, can they mount an argument on that, be it a legal or a moral one?

The Scope of the Operation

The next big ethical problem actually predates the raid itself, and it’s this: how did the Commission know where to target their raids? How did they obtain that information? Specifically, how many privacy violations were involved? It strains credulity well past my personal breaking point to imagine that Hawks and the Commission were able to get every name, every base of operations, especially given the limitations they were under—the fact that Hawks couldn’t communicate openly, the hard time limit before the PLF put their plan in motion, making sure they didn’t tip off someone in the massive secret organization that had people working in heroics, the government, the infrastructure, etc.—but let’s consider the sorts of avenues the HPSC did have available to them.

So to start with, they send in Hawks, who’s specifically trained to extract information from people without raising suspicion about his motives. Doubtlessly, he’s able to get all sorts of names,[34] starting with the higher-ups—not just Re-Destro and his inner circle, but also any of the advisors that e.g. run businesses that they invite him to patronize, MLA heroes, and so on. And with a decent crop of names in hand—let us assume for the sake of argument that Hawks had some way to communicate those names to his handlers—the HPSC can start doing background checks and digging in.

Where do these people come from? Where were they born, and, if they moved, where did they settle? Where do they work? What are their social pastimes? Trace the commonalities, look into publicly available records, use wiretaps…

Yes, the police in Japan can totally use wiretaps if they suspect organized criminal activity—it was one of the powers expanded significantly under that controversial 2017 law I footnoted earlier. One thing to note is that this does require a warrant, or at least the expectation that a judge will grant a warrant.[35] But how far does that go? Can they get a warrant for financial records? How about phone records? E-mail accounts?

Can they wiretap people for no reason save their association with a name Hawks provided? If a PLF member attends a Jazzercize class on Thursday mornings, does every member of that class start noticing a weird little reverb on their phone calls for a week? Does Re-Destro’s hometown have an influx of people poking around evaluating its potential as a place to live? If Slidin’ Go once snatched your dog out of traffic and you subsequently bought a Slidin’ Go keychain, are you and your family now under investigation?

Getting details on people like the CEO of Detnerat and the head of the Hearts & Minds Party is probably pretty straightforward; heck, investigating Kizuki Chitose’s publication history was probably a goldmine in and of itself. That sort of surveillance gets more complicated and difficult to justify—and to make credible to the reader—the further down the chain of command you go, though. Sooner or later, the HPSC would have had to make a call: knowing that they don’t have the time, freedom, and resources to perfectly get only and exactly everyone that’s a real threat, do they overcompensate or do they undercompensate?

You only have to look at Hero Society to know which answer they were going to go with.[36]

To be fair, undercompensating, while it clearly would have been easier on their strained resources, ran the risk of leaving threats out there to come back to bite them later. They likely thought that they’d done enough undercompensating for Shigaraki Tomura, compounded by the fact that apparently there hadn’t been enough done about Destro’s followers back in the day, either. I mean, better to grab everyone and then let the courts sort it out, right? Rather than risk innocents getting hurt?

Well, let’s talk about innocents. Innocents, and the costs of overcompensating.

Pictured: a man who was in daily close contact with the leader of the movement and who was at one point in time in possession of a copy of the movement's manifesto. (Chapter 218)

The problem with grabbing everyone in a group, even the most obviously PLF-aligned groups, is that there are always going to be both people who don’t seem to know anything because they’re very good at living double lives and aren’t particularly active on the recruitment front, and people who don’t seem to know anything because they legitimately don’t know anything.

The Gunga Villa is straightforward enough—on paper, it was probably reserved for a business retreat for four months, because you certainly wouldn’t want some random newlywed couple booked for a nice mountain honeymoon recognizing Shigaraki Tomura wandering around. Same story for the employees; the MLA wouldn’t have put the League up at the villa if there was a chance that anyone there would rat them out. So I think we can assume relatively fairly that anyone in the building the day of the conference is solidly implicated, whatever their claims might be otherwise.

Of course, plenty might well try to claim that they were just there for the vacation, or just started work last week and had no idea the place was a nest for conspiracy, but that was where Hawks spent most of his time, and most of the people at the villa presumably fought back against the heroes. It might be a complicated process, matching hero eyewitness testimony to every person there, but you can at least sort of see the path to it.

Other groups, however, are a lot less straightforward. Consider the following categories:

The Liberated Districts

As I discussed earlier, Deika was presumably a high watermark on societal saturation, but Deika still only counted 90% of the population as “Liberation Warriors, lying in wait.” That leaves 10% unaccounted for. So who are those 10%? Are they children?[37] Some children too young to know anything about the PLF, and some old enough to know but not yet old enough to be considered warriors for the cause? Are they instead elderly people, maybe remnants from when the MLA first started to infiltrate the town that have just never had enough close family or social life to get pulled into the Liberation Army by the usual vectors?

By far the worst option is if Trumpet’s 90% accounts for anyone even remotely connected to the MLA—that would mean one out of every ten people in Deika is legitimately completely ignorant of what the powers that be had brought in. How on earth are you supposed to tell those people apart from the other 90% when the heroes sweep in and arrest absolutely everyone? Or are we to believe that the HPSC had time to get in an agent to flash a covert L-sign at everyone in town and they only arrested people who visibly acknowledged it?

These problems only get worse for our hypothetical town that’s 70% PLF. That opens you up to far more people who have only recently started getting drawn in. Consider the disaffected twenty-something whose family has no idea what’s been keeping him out so late in the evenings. The young mother who met the nicest and most convincing people via the daycare, but whose husband is always out of town on business trips so she hasn’t had time to introduce him to anyone. The working parents who just joined up and whose kid, away at hero school, doesn’t know anything—yet.[38]

Evaluating these peoples’ social circles and financial history for other PLF attachments is going to turn up a ludicrous number of false positives unless the Commission can narrow down exactly when and where such people crossed paths with the ideology of Liberation. So many people would have been raised to it, people whose entire lives are suspect, but mistaking even one new recruit for a lifelong loyalist gives you exponentially more avenues to baselessly suspect people—and as established, the Commission just doesn’t have the time to be overly discerning.

Detnerat, Shoowaysha, and Feel Good Inc.

This is another line of attack that seems like it should be a bullseye, but is actually quite the opposite. Detnerat is a business that is run by the leader of the entire movement, yet the fact that not everyone who works there is a member of the MLA is one of the very first things we find out about them! Miyashita was something akin to a personal aide or secretary to Rikiya, someone Rikiya liked well enough that he was on the verge of introducing Miyashita to his other friends—and Miyashita didn’t know the first thing about his boss’s true affiliations. It’s patently obvious from that alone that not everyone at Detnerat is PLF, and it's likely that the numbers of the faithful are even thinner at Curious and Skeptic's outfits, where they're high-ranked executives but, crucially, not actually in charge.

This is, of course, complicated further by the fact that people who work at e.g. a publishing house are probably there because they agree with that publishing house’s politics, whether or not they know what’s going on behind the scenes. Ditto with Detnerat—certainly there would be people there who just needed a job and could charm their way through an interview without an inner passion for the work, but loads of people probably work there because they legitimately believe in the company’s ethos. So how do you tell people who have relatively radical personal politics without having any idea about the terrorism apart from the people who are absolutely PLF/ex-MLA but who are now lying about it because their organization's cover is blown and the response to that is, “Well, time to go back underground!”

The Hearts & Minds Party

Membership of this party would seem to be a good indicator, but using it that way too unquestioningly is also very flawed. This is because the HMP particularly is probably an excellent recruitment tool for the MLA/PLF. The note above about having radical political beliefs but still being ignorant about the planned acts of terror is especially true for the HMP. The Commission cannot just pull the voting records and arrest all of them because plenty of them are going to be totally ignorant of what was really going on with the heart of the party, only joining up because they believed in the kinds of things the HMP was platforming on—less repressive quirk use laws, prison reform, very possibly issues like the abolishment of the legal category “villain” or greater social safety nets. Just because someone votes for those things, doesn’t mean they know about or would support the MLA’s violent extremism or the PLF’s anarchic goals.

So at what level of initiation does the Commission call a cut-off? How long does someone have to have been voting straight-ticket HMP for them to be considered condemned by that association?

Over and over again, the question arises: how did the heroes and the police distinguish the initiated from the uninitiated? And given that Japan’s legal system at least nominally requires that guilt be proven, what are they going to do when huge numbers of those people claim innocence?

The Presupposition of Guilt

Let’s take a few minutes to circle back to what I talked about earlier, the presumption of guilt and how it relates to arrests, convictions, and the perception of arrestees in Japan. This is going to swerve hard back towards real-life Japan issues for a bit, but it is exceptionally relevant when examining what’s likely to happen to the people arrested in the raids, innocent and guilty alike, so thanks in advance for bearing with me.

In Japan, the rate of conviction is extraordinarily high—if you’re in anime fandom and active in social justice circles, you may have seen the tumblr posts about the country’s famed 99.9% conviction rate.[39] There are a range of explanations for this. Defenders argue that, compared to police in many other countries, police in Japan are very cautious and don't move to prosecute unless a case is all but airtight; thus, many who are arrested may well be released without charge if there is even the slightest doubt that the case will hold up in court. One can easily see truth to this by looking at the numbers on how many people are arrested in Japan versus how many are actually charged: Wikipedia notes (albeit without citation) that in the U.S., roughly 42% of arrests in felony cases result in prosecution, while in Japan the figure is only 17.5%.

Conversely, critics note that a major feature of convictions in Japan is the confession, and confessions can be coerced, particularly in the sorts of conditions that those imprisoned in pre-trial detention are kept—no legal representation, no contact with their families, loved ones or employers, no requirement that they be informed about what they’re being charged with, potential weeks upon weeks kept in isolation, sessions of questioning that can extend for most of the day.

There have also been cases in which confessions have been found to be falsified, for example by having the suspect sign a paper and then filling in or altering other details after the fact.

There are some other factors about confessions to be aware of here:

In Japan, it is not legally permissible for a suspect to be convicted solely based on their confession. The constitutional provision in this regard is something called himitsu no bakuro, the “revelation of secret.” The revelation of secret is something in the confession that is factually verifiable and which, at the time of the confession, only the suspect could have known. Common examples are things like the location of a previously undiscovered body or the time and location where a weapon used in the crime was purchased. The majority of verdicts that are overturned in Japan are overturned because of issues with a confession.

Sentencing is also very lenient compared to the U.S., particularly if the suspect was cooperative with police and admitted guilt (seen as showing remorse). Thus you wind up with a situation in which suspects believe that they’ll lose a case if they go to trial (because practically everyone does) and prosecutors—rather more aware of the weaknesses in a case than a confused and vulnerable layman—don’t want to bring a shaky case to trial, and thus both parties are invested in whatever will get the suspect out with a minimum of effort. The result of this is a high number of people released on “suspended prosecution,” which is an admission of guilt, but with a prosecutor's decision to show lenience while still establishing precedent for possible later offenses warranting more severe punishment. This is a particularly common result for first-time offenders, especially in non-violent crimes.

Note that suspended prosecution is not at all the same thing as being released for lack of evidence; a suspect is conceding their guilt by accepting the arrangement. However, many suspects who the police might not be confident in convicting are known to sign confessions and accept the arrangement regardless, because, along with fear for their livelihoods, it’s known that judges tend to view extended time in detention as a sign of guilt. Also too, if admitting guilt is seen as showing remorse, then maintaining one’s innocence is often perceived as a lack of remorse—leading to fears that fighting the charges will result not only in defeat, but also in harsher sentencing!

All of these factors combine into a problem with perception of guilt that feeds on itself endlessly at all levels. Let me use a run-on sentence to summarize: the general public views anyone who is even arrested as probably guilty, because the police are seen as generally only moving on those who are guilty, because police specifically only prosecute those who they can all but prove are guilty, but guilt can be “proven” by a sufficiently detailed confession, and while confessions are required to have some corroborating evidence, they can easily be falsified and may well be offered up with minimal resistance because the suspect is also convinced that judges will only be harsher on them if they put up a fight because suspects also believe that they will be convicted at trial because everyone knows the conviction rate is unbelievably high.

Japan likes to think of itself as a “safe” country, which is in large part why its deeply concerning arrest and detainment procedures have held up repeatedly in court. These things help keep people safe, after all, and who wouldn't want people to be safe?

Returning, then, to the matter of My Hero Academia and the Paranormal Liberation Front mass arrest, I don’t think it’s overstating things to claim that the dehumanization of villains and the glamorization of heroes has probably exacerbated these problems.

Cruel punishments are illegal under Article 36 of the Japanese constitution? But what if someone really, really deserves it, though? (Chapter 94)

You can see that willingness to shrug off civil rights violations as long as it means safety in the symbol All Might represents, a hero who is there to beat up baddies, not ask questions about why they're being bad. Ditto Tartarus, where the Bad People get put, regardless of whether their Bad really warrants so awful a punishment or whether the severity of such a punishment serves as an effective deterrent.[40]

As to the presupposition of guilt, if a hero thinks they saw someone Doing A Bad, and confidently testifies to that effect, who’s going to doubt them? It’s blunt to the point of headache-inducing that Midoriya Izuku, the boy who will be the greatest hero, who’s treated by the story as if he’s the first person in history to think about “saving” a “villain,” doesn’t even start to think about such a thing until he literally experiences a psychic impression of a five-year-old crying within the heart of Shigaraki Tomura.

At the press conference in Chapter 306, it’s illustrated numerous times that huge portions of society don’t particularly care about Dabi’s accusations. They don’t ask for Hawks to face justice for the murder he openly admits to committing; they don’t ask for apologies for the heroes’ wrongdoings. They ask for heroes to make them feel safe. Even if it means lying to them; even if it means asking Endeavor to go out there and “take down” his firstborn son. People are uneasy about the accusations, certainly, but what they want is not for heroes to take responsibility for their actions, to atone for them, but rather to deny that there’s any truth to the accusations at all.

This is not a society that, in the wake of Gigantomachia’s rampage, is going to be open to the possibility that some people caught up in the mass arrest are legitimately innocent and that everyone, even villains, deserves to be afforded the full extent of their rights.

The Dissolution of the HMP

Speaking of rights, let’s go over one that we can immediately see has been flagrantly violated in the manga compared to the state of real-life Japanese law—the overnight dissolution of the Hearts & Minds Party.

As discussed earlier, it's unlikely that every member is a dyed-in-the-wool terrorist. There are bound to be perfectly innocent people in the country who just so happen to agree with the HMP’s campaign platforms. Now, all of those people are going to turn on the evening news[41] and be blindsided with the news that their political party has just been dissolved and some enormous percentage of its membership arrested. This was not publicized or forewarned; it just happened, in a matter of hours. Do you think those people—people who are members of a party that specifically opposes the current status quo—are just going to nod and say, “Oh, wow, that sucks, but who am I to question the wisdom of the government and its agents? Time to find a new political party, I guess!” Would you?

I can assure you that you wouldn’t, because let me be clear: under current Japanese law, what we’re told happened to the HMP is unbelievably illegal—not only because they were dissolved at all, but particularly the speed with which that dissolution was carried out.

I mentioned earlier, in the section “Japan and Illegal Organizations,” that there were methods by which organizations can be dissolved. Now I’d like to look at that in more detail.

Any organization that’s been flagged as a potential threat—that “terroristic subversive activity” designation—can come under investigation from the Public Security Intelligence Agency. Their recommendations are then passed up for evaluation by a member of the Public Security Examination Commission,[42] who can pass a variety of prohibitions—the bans I mentioned earlier on printing activities, public assembly, and a few others. These prohibitions are issued in periods lasting up to six months, at which point they are re-evaluated and can be dismissed or renewed.

If the Public Security Examination Commission decides that the comparatively soft-pedal restrictions on freedom of the press or freedom of assembly are not sufficient to deter the organization in question from committing terroristic subversive activity continuously/repeatedly in the future, the Commission can elect to order the organization dissolved. This revokes their rights mentioned above entirely, and further stipulates that they liquidate their assets,[42] and that no member of or representative for the organization can take actions in the organization’s interest (e.g. things like opening bank accounts or buying property). The only exception to the latter restriction is a designated representative for the organization who is granted the right to manage its assets in the process of overseeing the dissolution.

Any of the designations above can be appealed, but dissolution is permanent until specifically overturned.

Now, it might well seem that the HMP could be targeted under the “advocating for subversive terroristic activity” criteria, but here’s the problem with that: that criteria is based on the organization engaging in/advocating for such terroristic subversiveness as an organizational activity—that is, the activity in question is a foundational, core aspect of the organization’s endeavors. And I simply don’t think that’s how the HMP operates. To reiterate, I believe they’re a recruitment tool, meant to siphon people into the MLA (later the PLF) proper, but otherwise a perfectly legitimate political party with real political aims, outreach, goals, and so on.

Of course, I can easily see the anger over all the destruction leading the Ministry of Justice to being heavy-handed in its response to the Paranormal Liberation Front and any organization even suspected of being associated with it, of which the HMP is the most prominent. I could also simply be wrong about what the HMP says at their rallies. Regardless of either of those possibilities, however, there is still the matter of the timetable.

There was a period in Japanese history that organizations—political parties especially—could be dissolved on the spot. The Meiji Constitution granted that right to the Minister of Home Affairs, a Cabinet position appointed by the Emperor, and indeed, any number of socialist, communist, or labor-oriented parties were banned and dissolved within scant months of their establishment for their alleged leftist or subversive leanings.[44] The Farmer-Labor Party of 1925 was dissolved three hours after its establishment! So clearly there’s some precedent—or at least, there was. Like many things, the power to summarily dissolve organizations did not survive the Meiji Constitution’s transformation into its modern-day incarnation after World War II.

The Subversive Activities Prevention Act, the same one that lays out the causes for dissolving an organization, also details a legally mandated process by which this dissolution is carried out. Most prominently, organizations cannot just be dissolved with no notice, no chance to defend themselves. Any disposition curtailing an organization's activities, from the bans on their printed material to complete dissolution, is required to be announced both via the government's official gazette[45] and, if the residence of a chief officer or representative of the organization is known, also via written notification. These notifications must be sent at least seven days before the hearing date—a hearing which, further, the organization has the legal right to send agents to in order to present statements and evidence in their own favor, as well as examine the evidence being presented against them.

This clearly did not happen. Bare minimum, Hanabata Koku, as leader of the Hearts & Minds Party, should have had an address the Commission could get ahold of, especially given all the snooping they so obviously must have been doing to unearth the extent of the PLF’s reach.

It’s instructive, in this regard, to look to history. To wit, I’ve said a lot about how gun-shy Japan is to dissolve organizations outright, thanks to its history of governmental repression—but how true is that really? If the government really wanted to, couldn’t it just decide to crack down on something and ride out the controversy? Has it done as much before?

To put all this into proper perspective: no. It hasn’t. The government has invoked the Subversive Activities Prevention Act against a group rather than individuals only once in all the time since the act was passed in 1952.

It was against Aum Shinrikyo, and it didn’t happen until seven months after the subway attacks. Even with nearly unanimous desire to prosecute, even though Aum had been under police surveillance prior to the attacks, even though lawsuits against them were and had been ongoing, meaning at least some measure of investigation was being done openly, it still took seven months to gather the evidence, submit it to the Public Safety Examination Commission, allow Aum their appeal, and enact the ruling. That’s because, in a society ordered by democratic processes, these things take time.[46]

But the HMP? No one who wasn’t a member knew about their affiliation with the League of Villains—much less an underground army!—until Hawks got the word out, and the Hero Public Safety Commission had to be rigorously careful that news of their investigations not leak because they knew they had their own moles to deal with. So far as we know, the Hearts & Minds Party remained a legit organization right up until the day of the raid. It is functionally impossible under current Japanese law for them to have been dissolved in the scant few hours between the commencement of the raid and the attack on Tartarus in which the two guards mention the dissolution.

Even if the relevant agency in the Ministry of Justice submitted their paperwork the absolute minimum of time in advance, there is no way the HMP and Trumpet—and therefore Re-Destro and the League and everyone else—shouldn’t have known that the government was moving against them. The only answer is that the Ministry of Justice was evading its legal obligation to notify both the public[47] and the HMP itself, or that the Japanese government, in the wake of the Advent of the Exceptional, throttled back on constitutionally guaranteed freedoms exactly the way human rights activists today are always warning about.

Stigma and Recidivism

In the same way that In Custody is not (or shouldn't be) a magic status effect preventing villains from escaping from police, In Jail is not an endgame state. Most people in prison are not there for life (or death) sentences, particularly not in Japan. Even if the majority of the PLF gets stuck in prison for decades, there will, eventually, be an “after” for them. So what happens “after”?

Well, like many countries, Japan has made efforts in the modern day to offer training classes and parole officers to help reacclimate ex-convicts into society once they’ve done their time, but it remains a difficult process, and the country has a relatively high recidivism rate. Given the stigma against criminals—present to a degree in all countries, but particularly exacerbated in Japan—it is frequently difficult for released prisoners to find stable housing or employment—both key factors helping to prevent recidivism.

So does MHA’s Japan have similar programs? Well, it’s hard to say, given that the only prison we’ve actually seen is Tartarus, which is obviously a poor model to base a lot of judgement on—save, of course, that any country that could develop a place like Tartarus is a country with an appalling deficit of care for criminals’ human rights, which doesn’t bode well for their other prisons.

Speaking of things that don’t bode well, though, we have two obvious examples in the canon of how convicted criminals fare: both Gentle Criminal and Twice are, it’s suggested, prosecuted for their foundational fuck-ups—Tobita for obstructing public duties[48] and Jin for his traffic infraction. It’s unclear whether they went to prison or not—given the relative lenience shown to first-time offenders, I’m inclined to think probably not—but even given these very mild offenses, their lives were turned completely upside-down, and no apparent efforts were made to help them through chaotic periods that saw Tobita apparently disowned and Jin losing his job.

Consider the harsh reactions they garnered and the apparent lack of assistance from any social structure despite the relative mildness of their wrongs, and things start to look very bad indeed for the PLF. Will there be any steps taken at all to deradicalize them? Does taking such steps seem likely, given what we've seen of MHA’s legal and carceral systems thus far? Further, if there is no plan for deradicalization, how exactly do the heroes propose to stop this from happening again (and again, and again and again and again)?

Here’s another alarming thought: what will be done with the children? There’s no way around the fact that the MLA, and therefore the PLF, included children[49]—and I don’t mean it in the tumblr sense of describing a sixteen-year-old as “a literal child,” though there would be some of those, too. No, I mean the grade-schoolers, the toddlers, the babies. Maybe some of them will have non-PLF family they could hypothetically go to, but as I have written about in the past, there’s a very real bias about orphans and other children separated from their parents in Japan, and even blood ties are not always enough to overcome that stigma. Alternative care is in a woefully sorry state as it is in Japan, and this would only be compounded for PLF kids—damned first for their criminal associations and again for being the children society doesn’t want.

However many thousands of them that may be.[50]

So here again, a question recurs. Where before it was, “How do you tell the guilty from the innocent?” here it’s, “How do you stop the societal backlash from ruining countless peoples’ lives both now and for decades into the future?” What kind of stigma will all these people—rank and file who come out of prison deradicalized and ready to rejoin society, children who were too young to understand why heroes took their parents away, ignorant family and friends who just lost loved ones to a massive government sweep, innocents swept up in the net and imprisoned for crimes they didn't commit—going to be facing? How long, then, before that stigma sees them radicalized in turn?

You cannot sweep 115,000 people under the rug and not expect there to be a stain—and given the narrative themes of the rest of My Hero Academia thus far, it’s absurd to think that’s even an option.

Next time: how scrapping the ex-MLA portions of the PLF undermines MHA's narrative integrity.

-----------------------------------------------------

Footnotes (Part Three)

[26] And in the legal sense, murder in the second degree.

[27] For the monstrous callousness of his comments in that conversation, said guard is immediately murdered by karma All For One. I very much hope we ever get Shishikura’s opinion on this, because I’m pretty sure the guard was his dad.

[28] Who, in Chapter 35 of that series, leads a group of police firing rubber bullets at an active villain, emphasizing that the police are trained in non-lethal tactics, and any escalation from that is not to be taken lightly.

[29] Indeed, you could make a fair argument that that’s exactly why the manga included the Noumu to begin with, though the lower-tier ones wind up captured as often as not.

[30] Vigilantes, Chapter 74.

[31] This sidesteps the matter of “rescue heroes,” those who focus on disaster response and evacuation. Note, however, that this is not a categorization that pits those heroes against non-quirk-abusing civilians. Non-quirk-abusing civilians are criminals for police to deal with, not heroes of any stripe.

[32] This would be in keeping with real-world de-escalation tactics. So for e.g. the purse-snatcher in Chapter 1, where we’re told he didn’t use his quirk until he’d been backed into a corner, I would bet that Kamuy Woods or whoever confronted the thief didn’t start actually using their quirk on the man until he went into giant mode. That is anyway a kinder interpretation than noting that he was a heteromorph and would have been using his quirk automatically just by virtue of existing in public.

[33] After digging him out from under the stairway it had a teenager drop on top of him, I mean. Did he even have much of a chance to use Incite at the villa, do you think?

[34] Though given that literally every member of the MLA we’ve met is addressed solely by their code name, I don’t for a second believe he could have gotten real names out of everyone he talked to.

[35] And judges virtually always grant warrants. It’s that presumption of guilt thing again.

[36] But that panel of the normally taciturn Edgeshot shouting at a bunch of high schoolers not to let a single person escape is pretty damn telling too.

[37] 14% of the Japanese populace is under 14 years old, so that’s not too far off, though I’d be inclined to think, based on everything we know about them, that the MLA was having more kids than Japan at large, not fewer.

[38] This should have been Uraraka, by the way.

[39] An exaggeration, but only by a handful of tenths of a percentage point.

[40] Though until recently, it’s served as a great check on recidivism, clearly.

[41] You know, assuming that they weren't all arrested in the middle of their workday or cleaning house or going to university or what have you.

[42] Both are among the agencies that make up the Ministry of Justice. I’d be willing to bet that, in-universe, the Hero Public Safety Commission is also under the Ministry of Justice umbrella.

[43] The funds are then remitted to the National Treasury.

[44] Though one thing to note for our current context is that, even when those parties were dissolved, it did not automatically follow that any duly elected representatives were expelled from office. Unless there was legal reason to remove them, any elected officials were simply rendered “Independents” rather than being affiliated with a political party. The constitution stipulates that Diet members can only be expelled by a two-thirds majority vote, though in such circumstances, most politicians choose to step down from their positions before it comes to such drastic measures.

[45] A newspaper or other bulletin officially authorized by the government to publish public and legal notices—in Japan these days, it’s an online site/newsletter.

[46] And they’re often still controversial with progressive activists, as the invocation against Aum was even contemporaneously! Incidentally, Aum’s dissolution lasted for a mere two years before the government panel ultimately declined to make it permanent.

[47] And if you don’t think the HMP had someone watching the official Japanese government website, you’re clearly not taking them seriously.

[48] And possibly more besides; the dialogue in question trails off in a way that suggests that the obstruction charge is only the first in a list.

[49] Start at Yotsubashi Rikiya being inducted when he was still in schoolboy shorts and continue right on up through the people we see in school uniforms in various mass battle scenes involving the MLA rank and file.

[50] And it easily could be thousands. If, say, even 10% of the PLF are minors, that’d be well over 10,000 kids, and thus we’re right back to overcrowding problems, except this time they’re about Japan’s child services programs, and the last thing they need is a new group of kids that numbers a full third of the number of children already in their care in real-life Japan. Naturally, the number only climbs if you think Re-Destro wasn’t counting kids in his initial reckoning of the MLA’s membership.

#bnha analysis #bnha meta #paranormal liberation front #meta liberation army #boku no hero academia #my hero academia #bnha #bnha spoilers #my writing #plf arrests #stillness has salt

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solarscholarsofmagick · 5 years ago

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10 Things that EVERYONE Needs to Know Before Starting the Craft

1. Wicca and Witchcraft are Not the Same Thing

This is a pet-peeve of mine when people use those words interchangeably. So, what’s the difference? To put it simply, Wicca is a religion, while witchcraft is a practice. It’s like saying that prayer and Christianity are the same thing. Wicca is a relatively new invention, being created in the late 1950’s by Gerald Gardner after he spent a lot of time in Asia and became enthralled with their spirituality, which he merged with various occult practices that he came across in his travels. Witchcraft, on the other hand, is defined, at least by this author, as the act of manipulating the energy around you to achieve a goal. You can be either or you can be both, but they are not mutually exclusive.

2. Witchcraft Does Not Need to Kill Your Bank Account

If you follow many big-name witch influencers, more than likely, you will get caught up in the aesthetic of hundreds of beautiful crystals, perfect altars, sculpted candles, and much more elaborate and expensive things. Now, I want to make it clear, that there is absolutely nothing wrong with that, but it is not always feasible to have (or afford) everything required to fit that aesthetic. Rough, unpolished crystals will work just as good as the one you saw that was professionally polished and carved into the shape of a skull. You can get candles at thrift shops, not just at the website that sells specifically anointed candles for every specific intention. Remember, it is not the tool that makes the witch, but the witch that makes the tool!

3. Know the Difference Between a Coven and A Cult

While it is not necessary, there are definitely some benefits that come with finding a coven that welcomes you with open arems. So, first off, what is a coven?

A coven is a group of like-minded witches that help each other out magickally and hold a special bond or connection. They will often perform rituals together. Please keep in mind that there is a difference between a coven and a cult.

A coven is rewarding, full of (usually) great people and potential friends, while a cult is dangerous, toxic, and filled with people who often prey on the vulnerable or unaware.

Here are some potential warning signs of a cult:

They encourage you to cut off ties with your friends and family.

They try their best to make you dependent on them.

They pressure you into engaging in sexual/criminal/drug activities.

You feel as if it is dangerous to leave.

The “leader” equates themselves to a deity or is a “my word is law” type.

You feel as if you are walking on eggshells around them.

There is some “divine” goal that you must behave a very specific way in order to reach.

Those who manage to escape are demonized and/or are made into examples.

If you suspect that you or a loved one are in a dangerous situation, please contact the appropriate authorities.

4. Witchcraft Can Become Mundane

Pop culture has a bad habit of sensationalizing witchcraft. As cool as it looks, witchcraft isn’t all lightning fingers and demon-slaying. You most likely won’t become a soldier of a magickal war, facing down an ancient evil that was recently released. Sorry, I didn’t mean to burst your bubble!

That being said, witchcraft is extremely rewarding and can be as fun as you make it!

Just like with any other art, it requires discipline! It requires study, practice, and essential tasks (or as they are often fondly called, witchy chores). Some of these “chores” include cleansing, charging, decorating, meditation, and more. Unfortunately, as we all know, these tasks may feel tedious, but they are often very necessary. Again, it is as fun as you make it, and you will be less likely to burn out/hate performing the tasks if you view them as the essential tasks they are rather than unnecessary chores.

5. Learn As Much of the Basics That You Can

As much as we want to immediately jump into more flashy things such as astral projection and elaborate spells or hexes, you must learn the basics first. Why? Because, without a strong grasp of the basics, your magickal work can be unstable and reap results that you may not have intended, including ones that cause harm to you or those around you. To quote a cliche, you must learn to crawl before you can walk.

Here are some basics that I recommend you begin with:

Visualization

Meditation

The history of witchcraft

The elements of a spell

Color/stone/common herb correspondences

Grounding

Different types of the craft

6. Elitism Exists and it’s Bullsh*t

Unfortunately, no matter what community you are in, there will always be a few bad apples, but I will be referring specifically to elitists. Elitists in the witchcraft community tend to preach that their way is the only true way to be a witch, that you must have the most expensive of tools, or that witches who come from a family of witches are better than those who do not. If there is one thing that I want you to take from this article, it’s that, no matter what anyone says, you will NEVER be any less of a witch because of your bloodline, ethnicity, skin color, religion, spiritual practice, or socio-economic status!

7. You Don’t Need to Choose Between Religion and the Craft

One of the most common reasons of being apprehensive towards starting your journey through the craft that I see is a fear of retaliation within your own religion. For example, a lot of Christian witches will initially be afraid of going to hell for their practices. As someone who grew up in the Bible Belt of the Southern United States (poor Awen still lives there), I can definitely relate to this feeling. However, I, as well as several other religious witches, can say that you can have both. You do not need to drop one to have the other. In my eyes, your relationship with your god(s) is between them and you and is nobody else’s business.

To make things a little easier, however, I recommend sliding into the craft slowly. Dip your toe in the proverbial water. Try starting by engaging in activities that aren’t necessarily tied to witchcraft such as meditating, grounding, growing plants, or even just collecting pretty rocks. I also recommend reaching out to practicing witches within your faith for advice. It also may be a good idea to truly research religions of interest and make sure that your religion is a good match for you. It is okay to realize that the religion you were raised to be in, like being raised to be in a particular political party, does not have to be your religion. If it is and it causes you and others around you no harm, then I am truly happy for you and support you.

8. Learn to Listen to Your Intuition/”Gut”

We tend to have a 6th sense for danger or the presence of another being. You may recognize this feeling when you can feel that someone is watching you. Our instincts are built into us to keep us alive. Personally, following my gut has saved my life more than once. In one particular incident, my gut told me to stop at a crosswalk despite not seeing any nearby cars and the sign telling me to walk. Seconds later, a truck sped by, running the red light at full speed.

If you feel that a spell has taken a turn towards the unwanted, find a stopping point and seal it away. Feel as if a deity is calling you? Take the time to research them and their calling cards. However, please take the time to learn the difference between a negative gut feeling and general nervousness, as it does feel different.

9. Learn the Difference Between Good and Bad Resources

Misinformaion and toxic ideologies can be dangerous when it comes to witchcraft. You can read extensively about the difference between the two in my previous post about it here.

10. It’s Okay If the Craft is Not for You

If you decide to try out the craft and later feel as if it isn’t clicking… that’s okay. The initial decision to explore is not one for life. Just like how certain sports, hobbies, music, et cetera are not for everybody, witchcraft is not for everybody. Anyone who decides to judge you for that is wrong and not worth your time.

Please consider supporting us by viewing the original post on our website, here!

#witchblr #witch #witchcraft #witches of color #witches of tumblr #wiccablr #wicca #wiccan #wiccans of color #wiccans of tumblr #pagan #paganism #pagans of color #pagans of tumblr #occult #spiritual #spirituality #spiritualism

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sabraeal · 4 years ago

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Sic Semper Monstrum, Chapter 5

[Read on AO3]

Written for @vfordii‘s birthday which was....five months ago. BUT LISTEN, it’s still better than last year’s six months so like...improvement. IMPROVEMENT.

“You know why I called you here.” The Marshal’s voice is soft, barely louder than the hum of the fluorescents. “I presume.”

Shirayuki catches herself at the edge of her seat, chest pitched forward, neck craning to decipher every word and--

She settles back with a frown. Even a PhD isn’t a defense to the cheapest tactic on the pop-psych bookstore self-help shelf, it seems. Worse, Izana knows it, his mouth tipped so subtly toward a smile. And now he knows she knows it, and--

Her mug has gone cool, but it’s at least a credible distraction, a convenient way to buy some time and save face. Not something she ever expected she’d care about. Doesn’t mean she won’t take the opportunity.

“Zen.” The ceramic clacks like a shot as she sets it down. “You want to talk about the drift.”

“Yes.” He breathes, long and labored. “And no. I want him back in the cockpit.”

Come see me at your earliest convenience, his email had said, practically polite by PPDC standards. Manners atrophied when a body spent so much time in the higher altitudes of the chain of command. I’d like to discuss a few things with you.

She’d known what this would be about. What it was always going to be about. And still--

Shirayuki is still disappointed. “You have to be joking. It took him three years to get him into a jaeger at all, and you want to just...push him right back in.”

“No,” he hums, fingers still and steepled over his desk. “I want you to do it.”

There are rules of engagement for tangling with the Marshal. Voices are to be kept low, steady. Think before speaking. Don’t react. Showing an emotion in front of Izana Wisteria would be as good as handing him a rope to hang her with. “I’m not his commander.”

His fingers knit, knuckles popping in the silence-- “I know that, Doctor.”

Her own are curled into fists; at least then he can’t see them shaking. “Then I don’t know what you expect me to do.”

“I wouldn’t presume to tell you how to do your job,” he tells her, with only a pause for breath before he does. “I am merely suggesting that it is far past time to remove the kid gloves you have been handling him with.”

Her fists clench, hard enough to leave vivid crescents in the meat of her palms. “I believe I’m the judge of that.”

“Of course.” Every word drips with insincerity. “But I’m sure a little encouragement from you would--”

“I’ll do what’s necessary for the health of my patient,” she informs him, words clipped. “You’re not my commander.”

Izana stills, gaze riveted to her. “I am well aware of that, doctor. But I need him in a jaeger yesterday.”

“You’ve needed him in a jaeger for the past three years.” Shirayuki bolts to her feet, and oh, if only she could locate at least another foot of height, she might be able to finally have the high ground in one of these arguments. “I don’t see what the rush is now.”

His voice doesn’t raise above a pleasant chat, but bitterness weighs down every word. “You should.”

Shirayuki doesn’t believe in violence. Or rather, violence is a choice, and she doesn’t believe in choosing it unless no other option remains that causes less harm, but, well--

She’s got a very short list of people who deserved a black eye, and Izana Wisteria sorely tempts her to put his name on it. “What do you mean by that?”

The Marshall is all tense lines behind the battlement of his desk, a buttress against the fall. “Aren’t you a part of K-Science?”

The only distinction that mattered in the dome was between combatants and non; that a licensed therapist fell more into the ‘administration’ box rather than ‘research scientist’ was the least of their concerns. At least as far as the placement of her office. “Tangentially.”

“Well then.” His tension washes away like debris after the storm. “It’s all in the numbers.”

Shirayuki has been trained extensively in conflict resolution, in effective communication, in managerial manipulation, and still, still-- annoyance dogs her every step, nipping at her heels as she loses herself in the dome’s labyrinth of corridors. For once it would be nice to leave the Marshal’s office with something more like a sense of purpose and less like a reprieve in shoving boulders up a muddy hill in Tartarus, but this far into her tenure with the PPDC, she knows better than to hope for impossible asks. It’s not a new feeling by any means-- there’s certainly a hole worn in her heart for just this sort of fruitless anger and a monkey on her back with Izana Wisteria’s face, but he’s certainly devised an entirely new way to get her hackles up today.

Long limbs insinuate themself next to hers, a white-clad arm weaving its way around her elbow. She looks up-- not far-- into a pearl white, movie star grin.

“Well, well,” Yuzuri lilts, halfway between a drawl and singsong. “Someone’s looking stormy.”

Shirayuki doesn’t know how tall a person has to be to be considered thunderous, but if the crinkle to Yuzuri’s eyes are any indication, she’s well below the mark. “I was meeting with the Marshal.”

Yuzuri swings a single, impressed note. “Yeah, that’d do it. Or, I’d imagine it would. Not like he asks to see many of us in K-Science.”

Funny, she doesn’t say, since he’s so comfortable quoting your data. “You should probably count yourself lucky on that one.”

“Oh, yeah.” Yuzuri waves a hand, bangles jangling down her wrist. “Garrack handles him. Honestly, I think she enjoys the aggravation.”

Knowing Garrack like she does, Shirayuki certainly wouldn’t discount it.

Slender fingers flick out a sharp snap. “Hey, maybe you can send her the next time you need to deal with His Majesty. I’m sure she’d kill for a distraction just about now.”

“Oh, no! I’m-- I don’t need any help, it’s just...” She frowns, rifling through the satchel slung over her shoulder. She hardly has anything in it-- lip balm, her notes, a pack of tissues, her civilian identification, her wallet-- but still, her keys are shifted underneath the whole of her life, jingling just out of her reach.

It’s a metaphor, probably, but her love affair with literature is at too much of a standstill these days for her to bother unpacking it. Not when it’s probably going to end in her storming back into the Marshal’s office and demanding he show her some form of respect if he expects her to do her job.

Yuzuri’s mouth curls into a sly smile. “He’s top brass that’s used to having full grown adults ask how high rather than why?”

“That’s part of it,” she admits begrudgingly. “But it would also be nice if he could say what he means, instead of--youch!”

Metal teeth digging painfully into her palm, but she holds on anyway, dragging the ring right out, hair ties and all.

“Instead of...?” Yuzuri prompts, far too amused.

She heaves a sigh, plucking rubber bands off her hand. “Making it all some sort of...logic block word puzzle.”

Blonde brows slant skeptically. “I thought you loved those things.”

“For fun. Not for...” She waves a hand, keys jingling and brightly as Yuzuri’s bangles. “...Professional conversations. I’m not here for his entertainment. I don’t have time for-- for games!”

“Not when you could be doing your actual job.”

“Right.” Her actual job, which has almost exclusively been managing Zen’s feelings regarding Izana for months now. “And now he wants me to...“

She hesitates, teeth sinking into her lip. Outside the dome, patient confidentiality is the backbone of her profession, but here, when everyone eats and breathes and lives on top of one another--

“Lemme guess,” Yuzuri drawls, “get that boy in a pilot seat?”

-- it’s impossible. “I just wish he would show some faith.”

“In you?”

“No.” That’s asking far too much from a man who has only ever trusted as far as the drift could take him. She heaves a sigh, flyaways fluttering in her peripherals. “In Zen.”

A laugh huffs out of Yuzuri. “That’s asking a bit much from an older brother, don’t you think?”

Shirayuki has never, strictly, had a sibling. Ryuu certainly straddles the line between friend, colleague, and family, but she’s never doubted his drive, or the rigorous course of his research. He wouldn’t be her first choice to stand in front of the PPDC committee and defend her findings, but in a pinch, she would trust him wholeheartedly, with no reservations, to do the job.

That does not seem to be the unifying sibling experience. “Is it?”

Yuzuri grins. “You are definitely an only child.”

She restrains her scowl to a disapproving frown. “Maybe, in this case, that’s a good thing.”

They turn down a corridor, and relief floods into her-- this is it, the hall that holds her office at the end. She takes a step forward, but Yuzuri holds her back, gaze fixed leagues away.

“Do you really think he’ll do it?” She blinks, eyes finally focusing down on Shirayuki. “You really think he’ll get back in that jeager?”

“Yes.”

Yuzuri recoils, blinking. “Wow, no hesitation on that one, huh?”

“None,” she agrees, a smile lingering at the edge of her lips. “I know Zen might be hurting right now after--” the most disastrous drift she’s witnessed in her entire career-- “everything, but he...”

She takes in a breath, putting her back to her door. “No matter what happens, Zen always does the right thing.” It’d been that unwavering moral compass that had drawn her to him, a shining bright light among the downtrodden heart of the dome. “He may need a little time to pick himself back up, dust himself back off, but he knows that one day, he’ll have to sit down and talk this out, not run--”

“But not today, it looks like.” Yuzuri’s hand darts right over her shoulder, plucking something off her door.

Shirayuki blinks, letting the yellowed square of paper come into focus.

Something came up. Rain check ~Z

She stares, fingers numb as she swipes the scrap out of Yuzuri’s hands.

“That sunovabitch,” she grits out, paper dinting beneath her grip. “He’s avoiding me.”

“So.” Yuzuri cocks her head, mouth stretching wide. “Wanna grab some grub?”

“I’m just saying.” Suzu’s hand scribbles across a napkin, dropping symbols more arcane than any rift. “If I could just get any of the brass to take a good look at this, things would be different.”

“Different how?” Kazaha drawls, accusation dripping from every word. At least, that’s how it sounds-- it hadn’t taken Shirayuki long to realize that’s just how the man speaks, every phoneme meant to cut glass. The asshole accent, Yuzuri calls it. “Does this somehow improve the quality of life in the dome? The world? The--?”

“It’ll certainly improve my quality of life if I don’t have to hear about it,” Yuzuri deadpans. “C’mon, we’re eating dinner. Let’s put the toys away.”

“It’s not a toy, it’s a tool,” Suzu grumbles, finishing it with a flourish. “And if we used it, we’d know when the kaiju would show up, instead of just waiting for them to wade into the Sea of China or whatever.”

That, at least, gets the team to bow their heads over it, passing around frowns and furrows alike.

“If that was the case,” Kazaha sniffs, pushing it away. “Garrack Gazelt would have already put this in front of the Marshal.”

Suzu scowls, yanking it back. “You know that none of those jarheads appreciate good science! Until I get this paired up with some pretty little graphs, I might as well be speaking Japanese.”

Izuru perks up at that. “Doesn’t the Marshal speak Japanese?”

“That’s besides the point.”

“Hm.” Ryuu squirms next to her, craning his head over the napkin. “I think you’re missing a variable.”

“Impossible.” Suzu stares down at it. “Just look here--”

Shirayuki glances down, letters and numbers do-si-doing between roots and over fractions. Izana might shove her office all the way down in K-Science, but that certainly didn’t give her the training to decipher this little bit of mathematical prognostication.

Suzu pitches forward, felt-tip pen rolling across his knuckles in a bit of sleight-of-hand she would have never thought him capable of. “--you’ll see that by putting ‘a’ over ‘n’ squared--”

“All right.” Yuzuri’s fingers knit in the cotton of his button-down, dragging him back down onto the bench with a thump. “I think we’ve had quite enough of that.”

With a lift of his brows, Suzu’s face shifts from fox to puppy in eight muscles flat. “But, Yuzuri--”

“No buts.” Her fingers pluck the pen out of his, dropping it back into a pocket with a firm, warning pat. “Now, as I was trying to say: His Highness is avoiding you.”

Shirayuki blinks, gaze dragging up to where Yuzuri waits with an impatient smirk. “N-no! That’s not it at all. Something probably came up--”

“Izana’s avoiding you?” Suzu swings a wide, gaping stare at her. “Didn’t you just have a meeting today? What did you do to him?”

Her hands fly up, waving off the accusation. “Ah, no, I didn’t--”

“No, not His Majesty, His Highness,” Yuzuri corrects, blowing on a spoonful of the mess’s finest chicken noodle. “And he is avoiding you, which is bullshit.”

She has to bite her cheeks to keep her lips from peeling back into a grimace. “Zen has lots of work to keep him busy--”

“What work?” Kazaha scoffs, meticulously cutting his chicken into bite-sized pieces. “He’s a ranger without a co-pilot. It’s not like he can just jump into a jaeger and fight kaiju with half a working mecha.”

Yuzuri swivels toward him, hands held out with a level of emphasis Shirayuki can’t help but feel is more than the situation truly deserves. Especially since some of the rangers are starting to peer over their way. “See, even Kazaha knows it’s bullshit.”

His mouth purses into a tight frown. “I don’t know why it’s even Kazaha--”

Yuzuri’s brows make a dubious stretch toward her hairline. “I’m pretty sure you do.”

“--I’m very socially astute, even Shidan--”

“--just because he lets you out of the lab doesn’t mean you don’t offend people by breathing--”

“I dunno.” Suzu’s forehead furrows, tapping a spoon on each of his oyster crackers, drowning them in broth. “Zen seems like a real upright guy, you know? Forthright. If he had a problem, he’d say something, not just ghost you.”

Yuzuri stares at him. “He buys you one bubble tea, and now he can do no wrong.”

“Do you know how hard those are to get out here? He had to go all the way out to--”

Whatever else Suzu means to say, it’s lost in the siren.

This isn’t Shirayuki’s first time in the dome-- far from it-- but it’s never easy.

The siren’s moan shivers through the air, something she feels rather than hears. Her teeth rattle in her mouth, and there’s nothing she wants to do more than curl up beneath the table and ride it out, eyes squeezed shut and hands over her ears. She wouldn’t be the only one; already half of K-Science is on the ground, tears streaming down more than one ashen face.

Man’s worst enemy is fear. Grandpa had told her that, letting her dip her toes into the bay. She’d been small, young enough that she still wondered if kaiju might lurk under the surface, waiting to pull tasty little girls beneath the depths. Kaiju can only kill you once, but fear kills a hundred times. His hand sits heavy on her shoulder, a comfort, a cage; and she--

She gets up.

Pilots and personnel scramble; one tech stands up too fast, boot hooking on the bench’s edge and sprawling face-first into the floor. It’s only ranger reflexes that keep her from getting trampled, dodging around the splay of her fingers with a dexterity that would make Shirayuki’s jaw drop if she wasn’t trying to keep all her molars from jittering out of their sockets.

There’s a hand on her shoulder. She hadn’t just imagined it, a goad to get her standing. She traces the hand back, up ranger fatigues to dark hair, brows raised, and beneath them--

It’s violet eyes, not gold. Not Obi, but a ranger she’s never seen before, his mouth quirked with cold consideration.

“It would be safer,” he says, voice somehow Altantic-crisp over the cacophony, “if you stayed in your seat.”

Her mouth opens, working around the sounds to thank him, but he’s already gone, disappeared into the crowd of PPDC personnel around her. Shirayuki’s eyes shift over the mob, trying to-- to find him, maybe, or at least a face she knew, someone that she could talk to, someone to memorize one last time--

She finds one, silver-blond hair shimmering at the door, too pale to be anyone else. Zen. It’s Zen looking right at her, those deep blue eyes inscrutable, mouth carved into a line more grim than he’s ever shown her.

He turns away.

“It’s too soon, though,” Suzu murmurs, staring down at his napkin. The screens are on now, muted by the siren’s wails, and there’s a Kaiju on it, frill rigid around its reptilian face as it tears a city to twisted metal ribbons. It’s just buildings, streets, impossible to tell which one, but all that matters right now is not here.

“As I said,” Ryuu says, only just audible over the drone. “You dropped a variable.”

What hurts most, once her teeth stop rattling and her heart ceases to pound in her chest, is that Yuzuri is right-- Zen is avoiding her.

“The sessions are his choice.” Labeling tubes isn’t quite how Shirayuki had envisioned her evening going, especially with her mind half-away, pondering over the Pacific, but it’s something to do. “No one can force him to come.”

“Sounds like that’s half the problem,” Garrack mutters, forehead pressed to the hood, leaving a faint, oily smear across the glass. “Free will. Foils gods and men alike, doesn’t it?”

Her mouth pulls down at the corners, a bow stretched too tight, just like her patience. “I don’t want him to be forced. Therapy only works if the patient wants to change.”

Which, by Zen’s conspicuous absence, tells her he doesn’t. He’s happy as he is, wearing the fatigues but never getting in the cockpit, waiting for a copilot that’s already shown how little he cares about anything but lining his own pocket.

“Of course. You can lead a horse to water, but you’ll never make it drink.” It’s impressive to watch Garrack work; even in rubber sleeves, her grip never trembles, never slips. In the same position, Shirayuki can barely close a fist, but Garrack’s got the same dexterity in the hood as she does out of it. “Good thing you get paid regardless.”

Shirayuki flushes, heat pricking at her pride. “I’m not worried about that.”

“No, I wouldn’t think you are,” Garrack murmurs. “I’m just saying it’s nice. Salaried, with room and board to boot.”

Her frown falls further, flirting with a glower. “I’m aware that I’m in the unique position of not having to care in an official capacity if he bothers to come back. But personally--” her breath catches, stomach doing one, solid somersault-- “I do. I want him to want this.”

Garrack hums, not an agreement or judgement, but an acknowledgement. Tactic permission to proceed.

“Izana wants me to tells him to climb into a jeager, to use my-- our personal connection to manipulate him into the cockpit, regardless of what his personal feelings are.” Her breath rushes from her lungs, suddenly ragged, frayed at either end. “No, encourage. That’s what he told me. That it’s my job to do it for humanity.”

One thick eyebrow arches under Garrack’s cap, her eyes bright with interest. “And how do you feel about that?”

It’s strange being on the other side of this question, to be the analyzed instead of the analyzer. She squirms, teeth worrying at her lip, mind racing with possibilities.

“C’mon now,” Garrack chides, mouth hooking into a smirk. She picks up her rack, rattling the small tubes in their holes. “I gave you those for a reason. Idle hands are the devil’s playground, you know-- at least, that’s what people say when they’re afraid of what you’ll get up to if you start thinking.”

She tosses her a wink, ejecting the tip of her pipette into the trash before fitting on another. “Too bad they don’t know that drudgery clears your mind. Have all my best ideas when I’ve got a sharpie and a hundred two-mils to get through. So come on--” she grins, all conspiracy-- “tell me. What do you think of our illustrious leader’s idea?”

Her teeth click shut around her first opinion-- saying Izana Wisteria should go suck eggs would not only please Garrack far too much, but would be around the rest of the base by morning. The last thing she needs is the Marshal inviting her into his office and reading that off one of his hundreds of emails. “...Think that’s beyond my professional scope to comment on.”

“Oh please.” Garrack waves her off, one rubber arm flailing behind the glass. “I’m not asking you to issue a formal complaint about the marshal’s policies. I want to know if you think that kid should get in that steel coffin and kick the closest kaiju in whatever passes for their balls. If throwing another body at the breach is what’s best for humanity.”

“I...”

It shouldn’t be. There’s more rangers on this base than jaegers to fit them; one career pilot pulling back to fill the ranks shouldn’t be more than a drop in the bucket, a chair to fill. But this is no ordinary jaeger-- this is Rex Tyrannous, the most advanced piece of machinery to roll out of a PPDC facility before or since. Rebuilt from the same blueprint as the Mark I, reconfigured with the best technology the Mark III could offer, the Mark IV’s older, more deadly brother, and--

And the money for it hadn’t come out of Defense Corps coffers. No matter how many hopefuls washed up at the dome, the King of Kaijus wouldn’t come out of its box for anyone less than a Wisteria, not as long as at least one was still standing.

“Yes.” She spits the word out like poison, but still she feels unclean. “There’s no one else that can do what he needs to.”

Garrack’s mouth twists in a wry curve. “Then there you go.”

“It’s a conflict of interest!” Shirayuki insists, the sharpie in her hand shaking as she tries to form a 4. “If there was anyone on this base that had the credentials, I’d-- I’d put in the referral myself. He deserves someone that’s impartial--”

“Shirayuki.” With exaggerated care, Garrack pulls her arms from the hood, letting her hands fall down to her lap. “Do you think there is a single soul in this dome who could do the math you did and not be partial?”

Her mouth works, opening once, twice, before settling shut with a snick.

“I didn’t hire you because you lacked bias.” Garrack’s voice pitches low, softer than she’s ever heard her, knuckles white where they clasp her knees . “You wrote a paper about PTSD in rangers that lost a partner in the drift. A paper, might I add, that showed a great deal of knowledge in jaeger production and use. The sort of thing no one learns unless they’ve been locked up under a dome for years before being released in the wild.”

It’s not an accusation, not yet, but Shirayuki’s hands still anyway, clammy beneath latex.

“Because of that useless wall, we’re years behind in jaeger production. We need new mechs, and Rex Tyrannous is the best model we got left, whether it’s been sitting in its box for half a decade or not. ” She settles back, brow arched. “But I don’t need to tell you that, now do I?”

No. Her fingers clench hard around the sharpie. She doesn’t.

“Shirayuki, I know you’re a good kid, but you do get to be selfish sometimes.” Garrack grins, too pleased at the prospect. “You’re human, just like the rest of us. There’s no one who doesn’t have skin in this game.”

“I know,” she murmurs. “But it’s my job to do what’s best for him as my patient, not just--”

Garrack snorts. “Oh, is the discontinuation of the human race not going to affect him?”

Shirayuki frowns, opening her mouth to-- well, to say something quelling, no doubt. But-- “Oh.”

Garrack hunches over her lap, forearms braced on her thighs. “I know the Wisterias put on a good show of being gods, but they’re flesh and blood like the rest of us. It doesn’t do anyone good for them to sit out the apocalypse. Not even themselves.”

“But, I...” She sets the tubes down, gloves crinkling into fists. “I don’t know what happened in the drift, just what the readouts said. It could have been a failure on Obi’s side just as much as his, and if they’re not compatible--”

“Then just ask him,” Garrack sighs, swiveling back toward the hood. “You don’t need to try to read minds.”

“But he’s not talking--”

“Not that Wisteria prick.” She chucks her chin toward the door, toward the vague direction of the dome beyond. “The other one. Seems like the real problem there might be getting him to stop talking.”

“Obi?” She blinks. He’s friendly, sure, but she wouldn’t say he’s been one to volunteer information.

“If that’s the one that’s down here every other day, talking my ears off with Suzu, then yes.” One rubber arm flails at her through the glass. “Now get out of here, and get those two little shits inside their tuna can before a Cat 5 can make it down the coast and make us regret it.”

When she steps into the hall, Shirayuki has every intention of following Garrack’s advice. It’s solid, after all; in a two-sided problem where one solution makes itself unavailable, the obvious answer is the best approach-- especially when in this labyrinth of a dome, there’s only so many places where he can hide.

She stops by the mess for a peace offering. Obi might be disposed to be friendly toward her at the moment, but she knows all too well how far good will will get her if she’s going to start rummaging around in things he’d rather keep cooped up behind that smile. Quality coffee and some contraband cookies might not mend the bridges she burns, but it’ll at least keep them standing while she’s walking over it.

It’s a good plan, a solid plan; she just doesn’t anticipate the company.

“Shirayuki.” Dark circles ring dark eyes, but Mitsuhide smiles just as warm as he always does, sprawled stiffly on the bench. “It’s good to see you.”

“I should be saying the same thing!” she gasps, her and her tea sliding in across from him at the formica table. “I thought you’d be out...” in your tuna can.

She bites her cheek, just hard enough to keep the words from spilling out. Sometimes she really, truly wishes she didn’t listen to Garrack quite as much; her mouth and Garrack’s words made a volatile mix. The sort that would get her a dishonorable discharge, if she weren’t a civilian-- or careful.

“We were. I mean, I was. Both Kiki and myself.” His body twists with a good, solid shake, eyes clearing. “Sorry, just had to exorcise the ghost. You know how it is.”

She doesn’t, but she does. There’s papers on the subject; reams of them-- Longevity of neural imprints in active rangers had been a favorite when she’d been in undergrad, as well as the far more entertaining, Ghost Drifting: How does one leave a ghost while still alive? It’s still novel to witness it, to see that spectral presence cling to the neural stem so long after--

“We just got back a little while ago.” He shifts, his right leg stretching long across the floor, knee bucking stiffly. “Kiki hit the rack, but I needed to, ah, take a walk.”

That’s his-- his good leg, as Kiki likes to call it, the half of him that becomes Redwood Dancer to pair with her left. That’s what makes them first line defense, even in an older Mark III; Kiki’s a real lefty, not one made by the drift. When Dancer throws a punch, both sides come full powered.

That’s what you get being the best of the best, Zen would say, envy and wistfulness thickening his voice, everyone knows they can count on you to serve.

That seems less like a good thing as Shirayuki sits across from it, watching the shadows shift in Mitsuhide’s eyes.

“Did you see it?” she asks, voice a whisper in the cavernous lair of the mess. “The kaiju?”

Mitsuhide grunts, shaking his head. “No, we were kept on standby. Got there after some of the boys in Hong Kong did, and they handled it.”

He doesn’t offer how well; she doesn’t ask.

“Ah,” she hums instead, hunching over her mug. “So it was out that way?”

“When they get that far down, yeah.” One of his large fingers wraps around the handle of his mug, bringing it to his mouth for a long, steady drag. “Not many wander out this way.”

“Alaska--”

“Yeah, there’s a few up north, and I think Seattle always has a good sweat when that happens, but...” His brows furrow, just a small wrinkle in the center of his forehead. “Not so much down here. Not anymore.”

Her palms press against warm ceramic, lips curling into a thin smile. “I guess we don’t have what they want. Whatever that is.”

His mouth gives a wryly twitch. “Thank God for small blessings.”

It would be nice to let the silence between them mellow, to allow herself a companionable respite after swallowing around her heart for half a day, but--

But there are things that won’t keep, no matter how much she’d like to set them aside, set them down even for just a moment. “Mitsuhide...”

He stiffens, the way a dog does when it hears its name shouted in the key of trouble. There’s two ways to respond to conflict, they used to say, fight or flight; years later they added freeze with as begrudging a reception as any change to common wisdom was given. But Mitsuhide does none of those; he just hunkers, eyes warm and dark and wary when they meet hers, hedged by hunched shoulders. The sort of man who grew up in a place where natural disasters are weathered in bathtubs and basements, or else watched from afar on front porches.

“I meant to talk to you.” Her fingers knit into the natural ridges of her mug; the only way to keep them from trembling. “After...after. I mean, not this, but before. The, um...”

It’s ridiculous how many calamities can cluster in a few hours. She’ll need to start numbering them to keep them all straight.

“The drift,” he rasps wearily. “Zen's talked about it with you, hasn’t he?”

Her mouth works; her duty to her profession says to keep it shut, to keep her patient’s business confidential, but her duty as a member of the human race, of a species that is growing more endangered by the year-- “He skipped his session.”

Shirayuki couldn’t have moved him if she hit him, but this rocks him back in his seat. “I’d been hoping...” He shakes his head, mouth curling into a rueful smile. “I thought I’d be the one trying to work something out of you.”

“Ah.” She bows her head, watching the leaves swirl in her tea. “So you haven’t had any luck either?”

Her shakes his head, disappointment stark in every sway. “He won’t talk about it. After he got out of the hanger he went and locked himself in his rack. He only agreed to come to the mess if we promised to drop the whole thing.”

Shirayuki winces. “I’d normally never ask, but when he didn’t show up to our usual appointment...”

Mitsuhide lets out a noise somewhere between a laugh and a sigh. “I don’t know why he’d do that. I’d give some of my teeth to let someone else listen to my head sometimes.”

She blinks. “You’re always welcome, if you wanted to.”

“No.” His mouth rucks up in a rueful curve. “I really couldn’t.”

“But--”

“The thing they don’t tell you before you get into that cockpit is--” he takes a deep breath, the air emptying out the tension in his shoulders-- “is that the second you hit the drift, all your secrets aren’t your own anymore.”

“Oh.” The drift is two minds laid bare to one another, the deepest form of trust, but in all her studies, she’d never thought what that meant. How tangled and deep a mind could become in things that weren’t theirs to know, weren’t their secrets to carry. “Can I ask you something?”

His eyebrows ruffle up an inch, curious. “Of course. Anything I can answer.”

“When you first came to the dome, you were...” Shirayuki bites her lips, considering. “You were Zen’s copilot. But then Kiki came...”

The PPDC might be the one that’s stamped on the letterhead, but the Wisterias are the spine of the jeager project as well as its face. Their neural net stretches far and wide through the Corp’s hierarchies, fingers in every pie, and although Zen might not be in the upper echelons of leadership, the sort of state secrets someone might glean from the casual details rattling around in his head...

Well, it’s a good thing the Seirans were just as entrenched.

“Why did you do it?” she asks finally, though it’s miles away from what she means. “Why change when you already...?”

“Ah, well...” Mitsuhide’s shoulders heave awkwardly. “It was an emergency, at first, and then...I don’t know how to explain it. We just fit. Not that I didn’t with Zen, but this was...”

He hesitates, smile edging towards a kind of self-deprecation that doesn’t quite fit him. “It was different. If that makes sense.”

“It doesn’t,” she admits. Not to her, at least, someone who has never been in a cockpit, who has never drifted over a set of pons and tried to make a connection. But to someone who has, who has spent the last half decade rotating through a list of hopefuls and throwing them all in the trash-- “But I think...maybe it could.”

Shirayuki would love to say that she’s experienced a perception shift, that a few words with Mitsuhide gave her a clarity that she needs to pore over before acting on, but the fact of it is-- she’s too anxious to approach Obi, pure and simple.

Not that he’s given her much cause; he’s scarce after that failure of a drift, but his absence lacks the marked purpose of Zen’s. It’s hard to find anyone after an attack; everyone’s on high alert, hypervigilant, waiting for another call to come like an aftershock. It’s never happened before, but to assume that means a double event is out of the question--

Well, humanity stopped making assumptions about what lurked beneath the Pacific the day Trespasser ripped the Golden Gate off its moorings.

She catches a glimpse of him every once and a while, always going the wrong way but with a smile to share before he disappears. He’s not avoiding her, he’s avoiding everyone else, and she’s just too much of a cog in the dome’s machinery to not be a casualty of it. It’s nothing personal, she’s sure, but with all the people giving her a wide berth lately, it’s hard not to feel that his absence is pointed.

Still, there are things that just won’t keep. She can’t just keep avoiding this because she’s afraid of one more rejection.

And that’s how she finds herself in the middle of the dome’s combat room, on the business end of Obi’s smirk.

“Doc,” he hums, kicking the end of his staff up to yoke his neck. He makes it look easy, like the jo is an extension of him rather than a separate piece. She can’t help but think of what he might do with a hundred tons of jeager strapped to him, how easy he might make it move. “Funny seeing you here.”

She nods, rocking on her toes. “It’s been a while.”

He swaggers toward her, stopping barely an arm’s length away, hip cocked. Sweat dews along every inch of him, his tank damp and clinging to the hard planes of his stomach, tighter than the lycra in her own gear. His pants swing low, leaving a sliver of skin between it and his shirt, and she--

She should really be looking elsewhere. He’s not a giant, not like Mitsuhide, but when she looks up, it’s a long way to meet his eyes. They’re laughing at her when she does.

“You’re not gonna get anything out of me, you know,” he says as if he’d like to see her try; a challenge rather than a defense. “What happens in the drift stays in the drift.”

Her mouth works; this time stuck less on the sweat crawling over his skin and more on how quickly she’s been made. “I didn’t say I was going to.”

“You had the look.” He shifts, hips drawing her gaze with them. When she glances back up, he seems to find that funny too. “Besides, why else would you come in here? Most shrinks I meet aren’t, hm, combat ready.”

“I-I work out!”

His eyebrows raise, mouth following suit. “That so?”

She flexes arm, baring what, in her humble opinion, is no small bicep. Kiki might have her beat, but in K-science terms she’s practically buff. “See?”

Obi slinks close, hunching over, jo and all, to give her offering a good squint. With a hum she’d like to think is at least mildly impressed, he straightens, suddenly so close she can smell the sweat on him and the faint whiff of his deodorant.

“Well then, I stand corrected.” His smile stretches Cheshire-wide as he steps aside, sweeping out a hand. “Don’t let me stop you.”

Shirayuki peers past him, fighting to keep the grimace from her face. She works out, sure, but more along the lines of slow and low. Yoga. Tai chi. Pilates. Things that promote mind and body balance. But even in the gym, all the equipment is meant for bulking muscle, for building the sort of bodies that can bear up a skyscraper. And the combat room...

Well the only equipment here is the jo in their rack and the tatami on the floor. This isn’t for people looking to do a pull up, it’s for rangers looking to spar.

“Tell you what, Doc,” Obi says, no small amount of amusement or pity in his voice. “I could use a cool down.”

His jo whips down from his shoulders, lightning fast, hands thrusting out in the air, and she--

Her hand rises to match, catching the jo mid-air. She sags under it, a little heavier than she expected from a stick that size, but keeps her feet under her. She glances back at Obi, wide-eyed, but he just lifts his brows, impressed. “How about we go a round, you and me?”

It’s a normal request-- maybe not to her, but the rangers certainly aren’t shy about taking conversations to the tatami. But Obi’s voice does something with it, pushes it down into a register that feels more mattress than mat, and she shivers as she lets the jo drop more naturally into her grip. “Me?”

“Well, I really thought you wouldn’t catch it.” His chin juts toward her staff. “But it looks like you at least know how to hold it.”

Her finger flex around the wood, settling against its smooth surface. “I’ve done it once or twice.”

A half dozen years ago, but he doesn’t need to know that.

His mouth twitches. “Great.”

Obi’s not a mountain of a man, not like Mitsuhide, but when he falls into stance, he could make himself one. It would take an earthquake to move him, and she has the world’s smallest lever. “Come at me.”

Shirayuki shuffles awkwardly on the mat, twisting the jo to rest on both her hands. It feels like she’s got two left ones holding it-- neither one of them are as good as Kiki’s-- but muscle serves her better than memory. Center yourself, Grampa told her, yanking her chest above her hips, feel the earth come to meet you. You’ll be part of it one day, and it’s ready.

Morbid, but it works. Her spine jolts into a straight line, weight teetering between her feet, and she takes her swing.

Obi doesn’t try to dodge. He could-- even in that split second, his muscles twitch, goading him to flee-- but he just raises his staff, a jolt she feels right down to her shoulders. The puny clack echoes in her ears. It’s nothing even close to how him and Zen were sparring.

“Go ahead.” He shifts his weight as she recovers, bracing himself. “Again.”

Right. Her feet flatten against the mat-- or at least they try to, pressing instead against the foam of her sneakers. Her sneakers that she’s still wearing, since she came in here thinking there would be an elliptical, or weights, or not this.

That won’t do at all. She toes them off, setting them at the edge of the tatami, the only spectators to her impending humiliation.

She hesitates, fingers peeling socks over her heels. Obi’s already said she won’t get any information out of him; she doesn’t need to do this. She could walk away right now, and the only consequence would be his teasing. And yet--

And yet, Shirayuki walks back, feet grounding against the weave beneath them. The jo settles between her hands. Obi grins.

When she moves again, it’s with more confidence, memory fueling her strike. He catches it again, but this time it doesn’t rattle her. At least, not until he moves too, viper fast, and then she’s scrambling again. She’s no noodle-armed K-science geek, no matter what Obi might say, but when she thrusts her staff up overhead to meet his swing, her arms tremble, teeth jangling in her mouth.

Obi retreats, amusement clinging to his lips, and she huffs. Maybe she can’t take the same sort of beating Kiki can, but she isn’t about to be some pushover.

She comes at him again, lower this time, on the outside. He’s not prepared-- she can tell the way his eyes widen-- but reflexes smooth his response, drawing her back with a few of his own strikes, and then--

Then it’s just trading blows. Not like his spar with Zen; he’s too skilled and she’s too inexperienced for this to be anything but a planned draw, for him to do anything but go easy on her. But still, still-- there’s a strange electricity every time they meet, more than just their jo rising to meet each other, an anticipation--

Obi steps back, brow furrowed. “Hm.”

Shirayuki’s panting, drenched, and he’s barely broken a sweat. “Is something wrong?”

It certainly doesn’t feel wrong to her.

“N-no.” He plucks her jo from her grip, the swagger gone from his hips as he mounts it on the wall beside his. “Just. Interesting.”

“Interesting?” she prompts hopefully.

Obi shrugs, like there’s an itch between his shoulders. “Did you need anything else, Doc?”

“I...” She bites down on the impulse to ask, to demand to know if he felt it too. “No. I should, um. Get going.”

“Nowhere to go but people to see, huh?” he laughs, but it’s weaker than his usual, stilted.

“Yeah,” she breathes, turning away. “Something like that.”

We just fit, Mitsuhide said with that strange look on his face, a yearning she knows now. If that makes sense.

“Obi?” Even to her own ears, her voice sounds distant, like it’s coming from another mouth, not her own. Maybe it’s just because she’s bent in half, working cotton over sweaty toes. Maybe it’s because it feels like she’s only working with half a body.

His head swivels, chin peeking over his shoulder. “Yeah, Doc?”

“It wasn’t you, was it?” He blinks, head tilting with confusion, and she clarifies, “It wasn’t your failure.”

His breath tumbles from his like wind over water; she swears she can feel the ripples of it even where she stands. “No,” he says, so soft it’s nearly lost over the rattle of the vents. “Not yet.”

The static fizzles on her skin, belly rocking as she bends to slip on her sneakers, and oh, Mitsuhide’s words might not have made sense before, but--

But she’s worried they’re starting to now.

#obiyuki #akagami no shirayukihime #snow white with the red hair #pacific rim au #my fic #this chapter ended up being much more of a beast than i thought #and this is WITH some scenes getting moved to next chapter for like...SPACE #but that's pretty much what took this so long #trying to rearrange this to cover some of the big points that HAD to be covered by Shirayuki POV #so that this was only like...6K instead of 8K and double the chapter length of any one before it #DEEP SIGH #this is a hobby i choose to do for fun

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sodomit · 3 months ago

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I am not gonna do the quote by quote thing, because I'm on mobile and that's exhausting, but I'll still point out what you have wrong with your response (the numbers don't necessarily match the order in which you put your comments, although I try to, they're mostly for my convenience to mark the start of a new topic):

1. You don't understand trans men's position under patriarchy. We are not offered a "leg up" in a misogynist society, we are not invited to participate in normative men's social hierarchy.

2. Intersectionality is not oppression + oppression or oppression + privilege, intersectionality is about new positions that arise for people on the overlap of some identities, and that sometimes results in a typically privileged identity becoming an amplifier for someone's oppression. I will probably elaborate on that in a separate post.

3. I am explicitly calling for not treating terms like "misogyny", "transmisogyny", "transandrophobia" as not exclusive to a specific gender identity or gendered experience. Implying that I said trans women are "women and men" because of being victimized by misogyny and misandry is either inattentive on your part or bad faith.

4. No kind of a trans person has affiliation with the patriarchy or benefits from it. I am really not sure how you're getting "trans women are associated with the patriarchy" from "no trans person has gendered privilege".

5. Your comment about "reduce" and "discuss" is just unnecessary nitpicking and somewhat drags down the quality of your comment overall. I think it's pretty clear that I meant reducing the behaviors, not the amount of attention given to these behaviors.

6. The terms "powerjacketing" and "malgendering" were not defined by me, and I guess it's on me that I didn't find and link more detailed posts. I feel like there's a longer conversation to be had here, and I'll also make a separate post for this later.

7. Your comment about my usage of words "trans people who were assigned male" is again either bad faith reading or inattentive - I was giving an example of things people need to say less, not stating my own opinion. I included that part there, because I've seen such sentiments in discourse previously and wanted to denounce them before someone who believes in such a thing shows up on my blog.

You're also not correct on "transfeminine" being a more applicable term for this situation. Some people are transneutral or have a configuration of identities and transition paths that cannot be conveniently explained in this terminology.

8. I did not mean that "transmasculine" stands for "trans and masculine" and so forth. I believe a transmasculine person typically is a person who has an identity with man/boy adjacent components, that is transgressing the enforced gender position. The same principle works for transfeminine and transneutral. What does "transgressing the enforced gender position" mean? Many things, depending on the person. I am not a judge here, and I find nitpicking and calling identities "problematic" to be a very useless and destructive practice.

9. On the day that I made that post, I saw a screenshot that referred to nontransitioning nonbinary people as "she/they cissexuals". Which wouldn't be the first time I've seen it used like that.

10. The idea that a kink or a headcanon can be a form of appropriation is just fucking bizarre, excuse me. A specific way to engage with contemporary media or to sexually fantasize can't be appropriated because there's no cultural group that it belongs to.

11. I don't think using gender identities like externally assigned outgroup labels is a good idea. I think we need a different kind of language for these things, because like that we end up in a situation where we force gender labels on unwilling individuals just on the basis of the position they occupy in the society.

It's better to say that there's no exact equation between identity and experience with oppression, because identity is claimed internally and oppression is assigned externally (often, although not only, on the basis of expressions of the identity).

I'd say that a trans woman who is trying to enter the social category of manhood for whatever reason (e.g. exploring a nonbinary identity) may be affected by transandrophobia if her transition or self expression circumstances will cause people to see her as unfitting for this category. But also I won't say she must use this word for it, because arguing with people over how they label their own oppression is a waste of time, and if she has reasons to label it otherwise, these reasons are worth listening to.

12. "This oppression targets an externally defined group" and "this oppression doesn't target someone who looks like a member of a certain group" are contradicting statements unless you're implying that the entire category of trans womanhood is externally defined. In general, the normative society doesn't use the same categorization principes as we do, it groups people we'd perceive as pretty different (e.g. a cis woman who's a butch lesbian and a trans man) in the same group on the basis of external aspects they don't like. That doesn't mean butch lesbians are men or transmasculine inherently, and that doesn't mean trans men are inherently lesbians. It just means that oppression doesn't strictly follow identities.

I also don't think the idea that "not primarily targeted by this oppression" equals "exempt from this oppression" equals "benefitting from this oppression", and vice versa. First of all, we're not creating affected/exempt duality for everything, nobody's saying someone is "exorsexism exempt", why is this one different? Or do you think we should do this with every thing? And second, benefitting from a type of oppression is extremely conditional and may occur to people within this specific oppressed group too. The difference is that people who are commonly at risk of transmisogyny (which includes all gender categories of trans people, plus intersex people) are not benefitting from it systemically.

13. With relation to "sex based" language, I am again reacting to things I saw in discourse and denouncing things I found unfitting. I saw "sex based" conversation in the form "trans men and afab nonbinary people have sex based oppression", so that's what I'm criticizing. I'm not just saying things I came up with myself. I'm referencing things other people said and explaining why I don't like them.

14. And finally, with the nonbinary position, I believe that 1) there exist normative ideals for binary male and female, but they're not attainable for any kind of a trans person, because being trans is inherently a non normative experience, and trans people who are actively trying to integrate in the society are limited to fringe positions in manhood and womanhood, 2) there currently does not exist a normative ideal for being nonbinary, but there exists an inherently deviant role for someone who doesn't perform womanhood or manhood in a way that passes the bar the society set, and this is where most trans people, regardless of the gender identity, are placed socially.

Overall, I feel like you're heavily pushing for the equation between "is a trans person with a specific identity and transition path" and "is affected by this type of oppression", which implies more awareness and analysis on the side of the society than there is in practice and erases many people's experiences.

I also don't want to make a distinction between transandrophobia and anti-transmasculinity. I chose to use the word that's easiest to render in other languages (my first one not being English), but they essentially mean the same thing.

TRANSUNITY

Transunity is a political theory that was actively talked about on Tumblr a couple of years ago, but has since fallen out of the public spotlight. And this is unfortunate, because it could have really improved a lot of the discourse around gender.

There exists a blog under that name ( @transunity ), but it has been inactive for a year. I am not affiliated with that blog anyhow, I never had any personal contacts with its mods, but I want to get their general ideas to circulate again, so I'm trying to bring this back up in a semi organized fashion. My take on transunity is just my take, if you're one of the original coiners, and you disagree, I encourage you to talk about it, because we still have much more in common with each other than different.

GENERAL VIEWS

I believe that one of the fundamental ideas more trans people need to understand is that we're all more or less in the same place in the eyes of the society (when other factors, such as ethnicity or disability, are considered). To be trans is to fail the gender role system, from the point of view of cis people we can no longer be proper men or women. All kinds of trans people regardless of identity are affected by misogyny and misandry (not a type of marginalization by itself, but turns into a vector of oppression when overlapping with a different marginalization), which forms the foundation of transmisogyny, transandrophobia, and exorsexism*. These types of bigotry are not exclusive and unique to specific gender identities either and may be applied to any trans person for as long as it's convenient to the oppressor.

Trans people do not have gendered power over each other, and intra community bigotry is better conceptualized as a form of lateral aggression.

Gender assignment and sex are never strictly binary (especially with inclusion of intersex people, who belong in gender conversations even if they don't identify as trans) and need to be understood as much more fluid and not strictly correlating with one's actual position in life.

WHAT WE NEED TO REDUCE

The following things should be discussed more critically:

- "Powerjacketing" - implying someone has gendered privilege as a means of delegitimizing their words, while in reality they do not have this privilege;

- Malgendering - forcing trans people to choose between being gendered correctly and speaking up about their mistreatment (e.g. questioning trans women's womanhood on the basis of them aggressively defending themselves or trans men's manhood on the basis of them asking for help) or implying there's something wrong with them in a way that reinforces gender stereotypes;

- Assuming that some trans people are exempt from some forms of oppression on the basis of gender assignment/sex (e.g. by calling all trans people who were assigned female "tme"** or claiming trans people who were assigned male are inherently incapable of understanding fear of sexual assault);

- Assuming that oppression of trans people is rooted in gender assignment/sex (such as, calling reproductive oppression "sex based oppression"***);

- Gatekeeping certain identities, such as "transmasc", "transbian", "femboy" as exclusive to any gender assignment/sex;

- Creating a duality out of "transsexual" and "cissexual", where not medically transitioning trans people are assumed to have some kind of a gendered privilege, or to not be trans in any meaningful material way. Various transmed ideas about dysphoria and transition go there too;

- Accusing trans people who take inspiration from each other of appropriation (trans headcanons, kinks, drag culture, etc).

SYMBOL

The following image is the official transunity symbol developed by the original transunity bloggers. Sorry about the glitch effect, I wasn't able to find one without it.

* Transmisogyny, transandrophobia, and exorsexism are not exclusive to specific identities, although they do primarily target traits associated with these identities. They can be conceptualized as bigotry and oppression towards people who are recognized as incorrectly entering respectively womanhood, manhood, and a status beyond gender binary (for the latter no normative form exists****). However, it's not wrong to use them to mean "oppression of trans women" and so forth, for as long as you're not claiming it's exclusive.

** Labels like "tma" and "tme" still may be used, but solely in a self assigned manner. I believe that an individual trans person is capable of evaluating whether they're affected by transmisogyny and in what way, and they should be trusted on this. However, no gender assignment and no current gender identity makes anyone inherently tme.

*** "Sex based oppression" instead of "reproductive oppression" reinforces the idea that people who share a specific body part (e.g. an uterus in context of conversations about abortion) are inherently of the same sex. This type of essentialism is desperately needed by terfs in this discussion, as they're trying to sell the ideas of "sex based oppression" and "sex based privilege" to people they want to recruit in their ideology. Invoking the idea of "sex" as something trans men and some nonbinary people are oppressed through is not the correct way to respond to people who say we don't experience any gendered violence besides "just transphobia", it has shitty implications and helps shitty people.

**** Lack of existence of normative nonbinary gender does not mean that these genders are not recognized by the society as a deviant, marginalized identity, and that binary people cannot be pushed into this zone.

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iturbide · 4 years ago

Note

Seeing the Sumia breakdown reminded me no one asked about Chrom, so... Chrom character breakdown so the whole trio is together? :D

You know what, you’re right, we do need the whole trio together

How do I feel about this character?

He’s just. So amazing. I didn’t go into Awakening completely blind, but I had no idea what Chrom was really like when I started, and within basically five minutes I knew that I wanted to marry him. (This was a problem because I went with the beanpole on my first run and was playing the game straight, meaning I had no gay romance options; I consider this a travesty and it may have contributed to Future Built). I showed a friend of mine the opening movies, and when we got to the one with Chrom and Lissa, right after Chrom helped Robin up off the ground and smiled she said, entirely unprompted, “I feel like I’m being seduced.”

And what’s so amazing about him is that it’s entirely uncalculated. He’s not trying to charm people, he just has that way about him: he’s open and earnest and wants to help people, even if that means getting into dangerous situations -- and on top of that, he wants to trust people even if he’s told he shouldn’t. He and Lissa might make fun of Frederick and his wariness, but honestly the man has a point; the fact that Chrom would rather let Frederick watch his back for him and give people the benefit of the doubt, rather than letting that mindset infect him and distrusting strangers, is so heartening to me, and one of the many things I really do love about him.

He’s also flawed, though: he’s by no means a perfect person, and is susceptible to doubt and anger both. Even if the game doesn’t give it the attention it deserves he has conflicting legacies that he’s trying to measure himself against: his father the warmonger, who he doesn’t want to be like but fears he’s becoming...and his sister the pacifist, who he wants to live up to but fears he’ll never manage. It makes a fascinating internal character conflict and helps round him out further into his own person, rather than being just another generic blue-haired Lord.

Who do I ship this character with romantically?

ROBIN. From day one it has always been Robin, because the entire game revolves around the bond between these two people. Even if you don’t marry Chrom, the fact is that he and Robin trust one another implicitly, such that Lucina’s herself knows that the person he trusted most in the world took his life; she might not immediately put the pieces together, but it speaks volumes for their relationship. And honestly, the way it’s built, especially in the M!Robin supports, is so incredible: the trust and care between these two people who want to help each other and who can and do rely on one another is incredible, and makes a rock solid foundation for romance down the line. They’re just amazing together and I love it.

Also I wholeheartedly ship him with Sumia because she’s wonderful and brings an entirely different set of skills and outlooks to the table that I think can and would be very useful to the halidom as it continues to grow under Chrom’s watch. And yes, it’s improved 5,000% when he’s with both Sumia and Robin together (because I stand by my OT3).

Who is my brOTP for this character?

Sully, hands down. I’m pretty sure in their supports they talk about how they’ve known each other since they were kids, and I really love the idea of these two growing up together, training together, becoming super tight as friends and being constantly ready to have each other’s backs. Sully also makes a fantastic wingman for Chrom, let’s be real here. Vaike is another that I really enjoy, because the idea of them having this friendly rivalry where they’re constantly sparring and trying to one-up each other is really fun. Having them be just a chaos trio together is one of my favorite things and I really need to find a place to put that in because it’s arguably hilarious to think about Chrom getting terrible advice for how to flirt with someone from Vaike and getting smacked upside the head later by Sully after failing spectacularly with it.

What’s my Unpopular Opinion™ about this character?

He’s really not that dumb, you guys. Fandom loves to play up that one line from Gaius’ support with Olivia about Chrom eating an unpeeled orange (which may not even be true, it could have just been Gaius trying to make Olivia laugh), and conflating it with the idea that he’s dumb as a box of rocks. There is very little that frustrates me more than the whole “moronsexual” joke that runs around fandom with regards to him and Robin, and it’s just not fair to Chrom as a person. He’s not an idiot: he can do dumb things, like most people, but he is also a very capable and considerate person, and an accomplished fighter: if he were really as stupid as fandom likes to play up, he’d have been dead before getting any kind of proficiency with a sword. Just because he can lose focus and mess up doesn’t mean that he’s a hopeless idiot.

What’s one thing I wish would have happened with this character in canon?

Okay so this is probably weird but I honestly wish that he’d tried to talk to Grima in the end. Most of the conversation after Validar’s death at the Dragon’s Table is between Robin and Grima, and the final battle starts with the call to arms rather than any attempt to engage with the Fell Dragon; basically Chrom writes Grima off as unreachable and a force that needs to be destroyed based solely on Grima’s words, Lucina’s news of the future, and Naga’s insistence that it has to be done...even though Grima doesn’t actually hurt them at any point before the final battle.

Do you see how weird that is? Grima could, logically, have gone ahead and shot Chrom through the heart with a Thoron at the Dragon’s Table, since they state flat-out that they were the one who killed Chrom in Lucina’s timeline and that they share the same Heart of Grima with Robin, so it arguably would have fulfilled the same purpose regardless of whose hand summoned the spell -- but they didn’t. They talked a big game and the giant dragon came back but Chrom at no point took fire from Grima -- heck, even after raising the dragon form Grima lets them go, flying off past Origin Peak and letting them parley with Naga.

Considering the fact that Chrom made an attempt to talk Walhart into a laying down his arms and forging an alliance, and willingly engaged twice with Validar in good faith (once after the events at Port Ferox, once after returning in hopes of acquiring Sable), it seems bizarre to me that he wouldn’t do the same with Grima. He’s been trying so hard to hold true to his sister’s virtues of peace, of trying to talk rather than going immediately to arms the way his father would have, that it feels like he’s backsliding in the final battle when his quote facing Grima in combat is literally “I come to end you.” I just wish he’d remembered Emmeryn’s ways in that moment, and at least tried; even if it failed like it did with Walhart, it would have been a powerful reminder that he’s still trying to live up to the best influence in his life.

Give Me a Character

#answered #unsuspecting-person #meme #fire emblem: awakening #chrom #wow this got long #i have a lot to say about chrom apparently #but then he is pretty great all in all

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dawnsrose · 4 years ago

Photo

BASIC QUESTIONS

first name? aurora

surname? capulet

middle names? josephine antoinette

nicknames? briar rose / rose ... i guess heh

date of birth? february 26th

age? twenty - five

PHYSICAL APPEARANCE

height? 5′6ft / 1.70m

weight? 121lbs / 55kg

build? slim

hair colour? very light blonde, golden - like

hair style? straight and lightly curled at the end, with bangs

eye colour? violet, kind of a purple-ish blue

eye shape? almond

glasses or contact lenses? neither

distinguishing facial features? the color of her eyes, but also her lips are naturally a really pretty pinkish color

which facial feature is most prominent? i don’t think there is one ? her face is very well balanced, although i guess her eyes are the most attention - catching part

which bodily feature is most prominent? her waist, it is quite small!

other distinguishing features? nope

skin? fair , and her skin do be clear af we love to see it

hands? small and dainty

make up? she doesn’t really wear makeup, but she thinks its fascinating! her favorite items are mascara and lipstick

scars? none

birthmarks? none

tattoos? none

physical handicaps? none

type of clothes? dresses , though she would love to incorporate some pants into her wardrobe . usually wears neutral / earthy tones , unless it’s a special occasion , in which she’ll wear either pink or blue . loves a nice skirt . think cottagecore outfits !

how do they wear their clothes? again , light and cottagecore outfits . think of outfits like these: 1 2 3 4 5

what are their feet like? (type of shoes, state of shoes, socks, feet, pristine, dirty, worn, etc) aurora takes really good care of her feet , so they’re pristine ! she really hates wearing shoes , but wears them when she’s in public so as not to seem weird . she really enjoys the feeling of her feet touching the grass though , as it reminds her of home

race / ethnicity? caucasian

mannerisms? classy , delicate and polite . very ballerina like , except her gestures aren’t as grandiose . i would say a good example of her demeanor is audrey hepburn , or the movements in old / classic barbie movies like nutcracker or swan lake .

are they in good health? for the most part ! she has a bit of anxiety when surrounded by many people , but it’s getting better .

do they have any disabilities? none

PERSONALITY

what words or phrases do they overuse? little expressions of surprise like “ goodness! ” or “oh!”

do they have a catchphrase? none

are they more optimistic or pessimistic? optimistic for sure

are they introverted or extroverted? ambiverted leaning towards introverted

do they ever put on airs? not at all !

what bad habits do they have? sleeping in heheh she may be an early bird , but aurora really enjoys sleeping in and napping

what makes them laugh out loud? philip being a clown. honestly it’s not hard to make aurora laugh, especially over silly things

how do they display affection? gentle touches, words of affirmation, poetry, tender gazes

mental handicaps? none

how do they want to be seen by others? as someone who cares about them and that can be trusted

how do they see themselves? as someone who still has a lot to live and learn and give, but who appreciates every little thing around her. she sees herself as a good person who is just trying her best

how are they seen by others? i think people see her as someone kind and full of life. something like the embodiment of hope. maleficent probably sees her as a nuisance though

strongest character trait? i’d say it’s a tie between how much she believes in goodness and kindness, and how perserverant she is

weakest character trait? she dispairs quite easily, but always ends up collecting herself

how competitive are they? not very ! it’s about the experience , not the result

do they make snap judgements or take time to consider? it depends on the situation, i think. but more often than not, aurora is capable of thinking things through before reacting --- except for when it comes to her feelings.

how do they react to praise? lots of blushing and dismissal , though she appreciates it always

how do they react to criticism? lots of self doubting and crying at first, but she’s thankful and appreciative of it all, because she assumes it means the other cares about her improvement and well being

what is their greatest fear? being alone

what are their biggest secrets? that she doesn’t hate maleficent , and wants to meet and talk to her

what is their philosophy of life? treat others as you wish to be treated and have faith in love

when was the last time they cried? when she first saw philip in elias

what haunts them? fear of never meeting her parents

what are their political views? she knows nothing about politcs, just wants everyone to be treated with respect and equally

what will they stand up for? prejudice , unnecessary rudeness , racism , homophobia , mysogyny , literally anything that puts someone in an uncomfortable spot .

who do they quote? probably her aunts heh

are they indoorsy or outdoorsy? outdoorsy !

what is their sinful little habit? she’s very secretive and sneaky about her thoughts , and likes finding little loopholes in things

what sense do they most rely on? touch and hearing

how do they treat people better than them? with respect , would like to learn from them as well

how do they treat people worse than them? also with respect , tries to find common ground and understand why they are that way

what quality do they most value in a friend? kindness and support

what do they consider an overrated virtue? detachment

if they could change one thing about themselves, what would it be? how dependent of others she feels . it’s not her fault of course, but she wishes she had more control of her life .

what is their obsession? the feeling of being loved

what are their pet peeves? loud sounds / people arguing over silly things

what are their idiosyncrasies? she tends to panic and overthink things at times, which can be bad

FRIENDS & FAMILY

is their family big or small? who does it consist of? i’d say it’s decent sized / kind of big , considering she still considers the good fairies family . plus , philip’s also become part of her family , and his family is huge .

what is their perception of family? any and everyone who is there for you when you need them most and cares for you as you care about them

do they have siblings? older or younger? none .

describe their best friend. i don’t think she has one ? give her a best friend :( philip can’t be both okay that’s too much.

ideal best friend? just someone she can be a silly romantic with, who’ll watch movies and read books and sing or dance with her, maybe go on walks / play with animals too !

describe their other friends. most of aurora’s friends are really sweet , nice people . she’s also protective of many of them , like dani for example . there’s others she actually looks up to , like penelope for example or emily . she thinks they’re both absurdly glamorous and beautiful .

describe their acquaintances.

do they have any pets? not really, but aurora loves animals and gets along with them so well so ... who knows heheh she had lots of animal companions back home though

who are their natural allies? the charmont family

who are their surprising allies? not too sure but thackery binx and i think hercules zevrous would be an ally to her as well!

PAST & FUTURE

what was your character like as a baby? as a child? not too different from how they are now. aurora was a very lively, happy child! she was also absurdly kind and was full of life, while being naturally graceful and poised. i don’t think she was one to cry a lot either, and was most grateful for everything the good fairies did for her.

did they grow up rich or poor? while she wasn’t poor, aurora had a fairly modest upbringing, since she did live in a cottage in the glen back home, but nothing lacked for her in terms of essentials and etc.

did they grow up nurtured or neglected? nurtured by the good fairies! aurora grew up knowing nothing but love.

what is the most offensive thing they ever said? i legit don’t think aurora has ever offended anyone like that? if she doesn’t have anything good to say she’d rather not say anything at all, and nothing has annoyed to the point of doing so. at least not thus far.

what is their greatest achievement? i think still being alive lmao

what was their first kiss like? oh i don’t know yet 👀

what is the worst thing they did to someone they loved? i legit can’t think of anything other than her argument with the fairies about philip, but she came around soon enough.

what are their ambitions? to be reunited with her family, to have a big wedding with philip, to understand maleficent’s ideals, to become more independent.

what advice would they give their younger self? to just believe in herself, and that everything will fall into place.

what smells remind them of their childhood? fresh flowers and grass.

what was their childhood ambition? to find love.

what is their best childhood memory?

what is their worst childhood memory?

did they have an imaginary childhood friend? nope! she had a fair amount of animal companions, so there was never any need for imaginary ones.

when was the last time they were crushed with disappointment? that brief moment when meeting philip in elias where she thought she would have to ignore him for the rest of her life due to being engaged to someone.

what past act are they most ashamed of? arguing with her aunts over love and being so sad/crying so much about it. still, she doesn’t think she could have behaved any other way.

what past act are they most proud of? i think she’s extremely proud of how she’s been living in elias so far, not relying on others for help and taking good care of herself.

has anyone ever saved their life? i think in a way, everyone who’s been involved in keeping her away from maleficent has saved her life.

strongest childhood memory?

LOVE

do they believe in love at first sight? OH HELL YEAH

are they in a relationship? yes ! happily married :`)

how do they behave in a relationship? not much different from how she normally does, but she definitely blushes and sighs a lot more every time she thinks of philip. also loves to talk about him, please ask her about her man.

when did you character last have sex? ... never 👀

what sort of sex do they have? none lmao

has your character ever been in love? OH YEAH

have they ever had their heart broken? yes, but it wasn’t his fault.

CONFLICT

how do they respond to a threat? by keeping composure and trying to reason with the person.

are they most likely to fight with their fists or their tongue? tongue !

what is your character’s kryptonite? her loved ones, children and animals.

if your character could only save one thing from their burning house, what would it be? a letter from her aunts, which they gave her before she came to elias.

how do they perceive strangers? as something she has to be on the lookout for despite nothing they’re not always dangerous.

what do they love to hate? cold weather.

what are their phobias? being alone in a large crowd/surrounded by unfamiliar people, losing her loved ones, being in a completely unfamiliar situation.

what is their choice of weapon? words, but i think aurora would secretly love to learn how to use a sword. Let Her Fight.

what living person do they most despise? i guess the easy answer would be maleficent, but aurora really holds no hatred towards her. if anything, she sympathizes.

have they ever been bullied or teased? no.

where do they go when they’re angry? wherever there’s lots of flowers and warmth. or to philip.

who are their enemies and why? maleficent, and that’s because of her father’s clownery !

WORK, EDUCATION & HOBBIES

what is their current job? n/a.

what do they think about their current job? n/a.

what are some of their past jobs? n/a.

what are their hobbies? dancing (she’s been learning ballet in elias! ), singing, gardening / caring for her flowers, reading.

educational background? homeschooled by the good fairies, i’d say she has a good grasp on history, mathematics and a few languages, plus other things she’s learned on her own.

intelligence level? slightly above average.

do they have any specialist training? no.

do they have a natural talent for something? singing ! she’s very gifted when it comes to music and dancing, but singing is definitely where her talent lies.

do they play a sport? are they any good? nope, and no, but she could be !

what is their socioeconomic status? despite still leaving a fairly common life in elias, aurora is a princess, so she is extremely wealthy. her family is in charge of her expenses in elias, yet she doesn’t spend a lot.

FAVORITES

what is their favorite animal? she loves all fauna, but bunnies and birds hold a special place in her arms.

which animal do they dislike the most? crows. for some reason they give her a bad vibe, though she likes birds. snakes and dragons also make her shiver.

what place would they most like to visit? honesty ... her home lmao.

what is the most beautiful thing they’ve ever seen? sunrise ! aurora loves waking up in the morning and watching the sky’s pretty colors. she also adores sunset.

what is their favorite song? love dance by sergei perkofiev, fee des lilas by tchaikovsky, quelqu'un m'a dit by carla bruni, moon river by audrey hepburn.

music, art, reading preferred? all sorts of music but espeically clasical and old love songs. she loves classic literature, but also mystery and romance novels, and her favorite art movements would be romanticism and renaissance.

what is their favorite color? pink , but don’t tell merryweather !

what is their password? briarrose59

favorite food: i feel like aurora would absolutely love pasta if she tried it.

what is their favorite work of art? springtime by pierre-auguste cot

who is their favorite artist? jean-honoré fragonard

what is their favorite day of the week? wednesday

POSSESSIONS

what is in their fridge? a number of juices, some fruits like watermelon and strawberries, milk, ice cream.

what is on their bedside table? a lamp, lavander oil, a difuser , perfume bottle and a novel

what is in their car? doesn’t have one !

what is in their bin? paper bags, crumbled up paper balls, a couple of candy wrappers

what is in their purse or wallet? a credit card, some dollar bills and she always has a coinpurse around, just in case.

what is in their pockets? i think some seeds for birds to eat.

what is their most treasured possession? a gold necklace with a heart pendant, the letter the good fairies gave her.

SPIRITUALITY

who or what is your character’s guardian angel? OK LETS GO. i would say the good fairies or thackery are her guardian angels, but if i had to name an actual angel, i think it would be chamuel.

do they believe in the afterlife? yes, she believes everyone that leaves is going somewhere else.

what are their religious views? she doesn’t really follow any religion in particular, but believes a lot in karma and in the whole “do no harm but take no s***”, “treat others as you want to be treated” way of life. she does, however, believe in a higher power.

what do they think heaven is? a place where there’s no sadness, no pain, no evil. somewhere where there’s nothing but love and joy and people are able to live in eternal bliss.

what do they think hell is? a place where people who hurt others and lived a selfish life learn from / are punished for their mistakes and hopefully become better. maybe one day they’ll reach heaven.

are they superstitious? a little , but not to the point where it clouds her judgement .

what would they like to be reincarnated as? a bird or a beautiful flower .

how would they like to die? peacefully , before philip , hopefully in her sleep and surrounded by her loved ones

what is your character’s spirit animal? a swan or dove

what is their zodiac sign? pisces

VALUES

what do they think is the worst thing that can be done to a person? i think lying/keeping someone in the dark all their life as was done to aurora is something she would never want anyone to go through. that and betrayal.

what is their view of ‘freedom’? to be able to follow your dreams without fear or worries, to live the life you want.

when did they last lie? she doesn’t lie !

what’s their view of lying? incredibly wrong and hurtful. please don’t lie to her.

when did they last make a promise? not sure.

did they keep or break their last promise? she always keeps her promises.

DAILY LIFE

what are their eating habits? she’s very healthy, eats all her greens and fruits and veggies, but will allow herself to indulge in sweets every other week. aurora grew up healthy, but there’s a lot of delicious food in elias and out in the world, and she would like to try it all !

do they have any allergies? she’s allergic to a few metals, which results in all of her jewelry being real gold.

describe their home. i suck at words so here’s a few pictures that i think fit the vibe of her home ! bedroom / bathroom / random wall / kitchen / corner of living room

are they minimalist or a clutter hoarder? minimalist !

what do they do first thing on a weekday morning? shower !

what do they do on a Sunday afternoon? she usually goes for strolls around town, the library or mama odie’s for a nice snack !

what do they do on a Friday night? relaxing bubble bath and netflix, no joke

what is the soft drink of choice? none

what is their alcoholic drink of choice? she doesn’t usually drink alcohol, but isn’t opposed to a bit of wine

MISCELLANEOUS

what or who would your character dress up as for halloween? i can definitely see aurora dressing up as titania or a fairy of sorts.

are they comfortable with technology? it was a bit difficult at first, but now she’s much better at it ! still messes up quite a bit though.

if they could save one person, who would it be? i think philip, since the fairies probably wouldn’t need her help.

if they could call one person for help, who would it be? in elias, probably thackery and if not him, philip. however, if she’s panicking, philip will probably come first.

what is their greatest extravagance? she has a

what is their greatest regret? doubting her family’s concern for her even if for just a split second, as well as arguing with the fairies.

what is their perception of redemption? she thinks everyone deserves a chance at it.

what would they do if they won the lottery? charity. everything goes to charity.

what is their favourite fairytale? steadfast tin soldier.

what fairytale do they hate? the little match girl, for it just makes her cry a lot.

do they believe in happy endings? absolutely !

what is their idea of perfect happiness? to be surrounded by people who love you just as much as you love them.

what would they ask a fortune teller? if her family and kingdom will be alright , and if maleficent will change for the better.

if your character could travel through time, where would they go? i think the day of her baptism, just to see what really transpired.

what sport do they excel at? i feel like she could be very good at tennis, equestrianism and fencing !

what sport do they suck at? i can’t see her being good at anything that overly relies on strength, as aurora is too graceful and delicate. she legit doesn’t wanna do anything that’s too brutal or something.

if they could have a superpower, what would they choose? to fly or to properly speak to animals. maybe shapeshifting / changing her appearance so as to hide with easy could be helpful.

#watask #bOI THIS TOOK SOME TIME but its here :`)

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cumbunnywitch · 1 year ago

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I'm pretty sure the actual words of what she was trying to say here were actually something more along the lines of "I'm doing what I want to with my transition and identity in a way that makes me feel good, and anyone who says that trying to pass is either invalid for a trans person to do, makes them less trans, or makes them transphobic. There are so many bad faith takes on this from like 3 people trying to smear the shit out of Demily.

Secondly, in her first post, while it lacks punctuation to make it more clear what's actually being stated, she's actually taking the quoted part and then responding directly to it.

Example: "People hate oranges" but I like oranges

It's clear to see the distinction in the message here. "People hate oranges." is the initial, quoted or exemplary message, and then "but I like oranges" is the reply.

Demily's message follows this same pattern, calling out a negative thing. Some people say "trying to be a passing transfem is actually transphobic." To which Demily directly replies, and I'm translating the message here, with "Actually I try to pass because it makes me feel better about myself, and by saying this I think you're making a bad faith argument about wanting to pass."

It could have been worded differently, but this is the hellsite where people self-identify using slurs. Literal interpretation is not only a bonkers thing to do, but anyone who thinks that Demily, in this engagement, is being transphobic or using her perceived privilege in a negative way, is not actually interpreting anything here literally.

And @saintjosie I'm sorry but I'm calling you out a little bit here. Reread the first post with good faith, with the explanation I've given, and tell me it doesn't sound different.

I get that this is the no voicetraining no passing no apologies website but like, if you can't invalidate someone's identity because they make the choice not to pass, can't pass, or can't transition, then you can't invalidate someone for wanting to pass. "Better at being transgender" isn't literally "I'm better because I pass" it's "I'm better because I understand that passing is my goal and I don't put people down who do or do not also want to pass."

I kinda love it when people I hated for vague and petty reasons before turn out to be massive pieces of shit actually

I feel so correct and vindicated etc.

#fucking seriously y'all

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wisteria-lodge · 4 years ago

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bird primary + unburning lion secondary

Hi there!! Happy new year– hope you’re well and keeping safe <3 and I hope it’s all right to send you this long wall of text– I meant it for an anon ask but it got way, way out of hand. (You can tell pandemic isolation got to me a long time ago.) I’ve rewritten it a couple of times, but I think this is as far as I’ll get with it; I can only hope that it’s remotely organized and comprehensible, and apologize if it’s nonsense.

Just an observation… I usually get these apologetic preambles from slightly charred secondaries…

Essentially, I find myself a bit conflicted; I don’t know if i’m a Bird, a Lion, either of those but burned, one modeling the other, or something else entirely! (Definitely an Idealist; I’ve got that far.) I’m hoping you can shed a bit of light on the subject. Normally I’d try to think it through myself, but I’ve been doing that and I keep leading myself in circles. For reasons you’ll see later, also, I think it would help me a great deal to talk to another person (someone who’s demonstrated insight!) and know what your take is.

So, I’d tried thinking through it on my own, and I thought I’d come to a pretty definitive conclusion. I was pretty damn sure I was a Bird! Lion morality makes me really uncomfortable, actually! Anecdotally I’ve seen a lot of Lions talking about consulting the data and the research, but going with their gut over the evidence if there’s a conflict, and (I’m only talking about my own life here, not casting judgment about anyone else) I would feel gross if I tried to do that. I need that sweet sweet evidential corroboration baby! and I’ve actually experienced the very Birdlike thing of having my entire worldview debunked and – being fine, you know? Several times, actually. I don’t regret being wrong, but I couldn’t simply continue to be wrong in the face of all the new evidence.

Yep, you sound like one hell of a Bird to me.

I’ve been thinking about @missbrunettebarbie’s idea about favorite characters reflecting Sortings, though, and that’s thrown a spanner in the works a little bit. Most of my favorite characters are ones with capital-M Missions or capital-P Purposes that they dive into with their whole being: Lion types, in other words. That’s actually the single most important metric of whether I like a character or not. But I’m not like that at all! I want to be, desperately (that’s why I like the characters so much) but I’ve never found a cause or a position that I couldn’t find some fault with (and believe me, I’ve been searching all my life!)

I probably don’t need to tell you that it’s just a thing that Birds love Lions. I think the main difference between the two is just that Birds do most of their processing with the logical, conscious part of their brain, and Lions do most of their processing with the unconscious part. So Birds think it’s cool and sort of magical how Lions can generate these answers out of nowhere, and Lions love how Birds can shift, change their mind, and back up their reasoning.

I’m a(n aspiring) historian, and I’m perfectly capable of committing to a scholarly position. I believe that the models I’ve built for factually understanding the world work, at least for now– but when it comes to personal philosophies and ethics, I pick everything apart. It usually starts with me sensing a contradiction or discrepancy and assuming that I must be wrong, and that whoever came up with this idea I’m trying to engage with must SURELY have corrected or accounted for it, and I’m just not seeing it, or I’m misunderstanding something.

That’s so often not the case, though. People believe things for all sorts of reasons, not just their perfect logical or practical completeness. Some people even take pride in believing things in spite of the lack of evidence– that’s what many people believe faith is. But I simply cannot do that. (My parents aren’t religious, but I grew up in a majority Christian community. Suffice to say I had few friends as a child. I was more comfortable speaking my doubts and objections then than I am now.)

You’re almost certainly a slightly burnt Lion secondary. Which makes you a Bird Lion, and that makes perfect sense. You guys are the searchers, the grail knights. A description which seems to fit you perfectly.

I’ve been learning to trust my own mind a little more lately, and to be more comfortable pointing it out when I notice things like that instead of automatically assuming I’m the idiot. Basically trying to train myself to argue.

Oh yeah. Fire up that Lion secondary.

That phenomenon I describe, though, where I silently entertain doubts and objections until they’re reflected outside of me, has been the case every time I’ve had my worldview altered, too! It’s never been– this is a completely new criticism I had no idea about. It’s always– i was RIGHT to question, i was RIGHT to doubt, I’m not the idiot. I just didn’t trust myself enough to act on it without external corroboration. I can’t even commit to my own doubts until someone else validates them for me. I’m disgusted with myself about it, honestly. Sometimes i think the only thing I know how to do is doubt.

Okay, that’s your burnt Lion secondary talking. You sound like Hamlet.

Kierkegaard has a great quote: “What I really lack is to be clear in my mind what I am to do, not what I am to know, except in so far as a certain knowledge must precede every action. The thing is to understand myself, to see what God really wishes me to do: the thing is to find a truth which is true for me, to find the idea for which I can live and die. … I certainly do not deny that I still recognize an imperative of knowledge and that through it one can work upon men, but it must be taken up into my life, and that is what I now recognize as the most important thing.”

Kierkegaard is probably also a slightly charred Bird Lion. Who kind of loves the way that Lion primaries engage with the world.

This is almost exactly how I feel. I already know what I need to know– like I said, my scholarly work bears up, and I love my work! But I can’t live and die for an academic historical model, no matter how effective it is. I have no idea what to do, what to be, how to get comfortable with my existence in the world. I don’t want to be a brain in a jar, you feel? I want a purpose, I want to be more than myself, I want to use the knowledge I have in service of some great work. I wanna take that leap into faith! But I just don’t have it in me to believe in anything. I need to know that I’m right before I can act on anything.

I become more and more suspicious of the doctrine of some great work. I know it’s my Badger secondary talking, but I do see work as fundamentally cumulative (and Lion secondaries very much don’t, I know, I’m just waxing philosophical now, it’s your fault, had me reading Kierkegaard.) It’s a “what wound did ever heal but by degrees” thing. I am amazed, constantly, by how much the little things I do, the things I didn’t put much thought into, seem to ripple out. And being a historian is that. Constructing the way the past is understood (and taught, my god) - that effects an entire people’s self-narrative, and what could possibly be more important?

So I don’t know where that leaves me. Is this just the typical bird hard-on for Internal Lion primaries?

Of course you already considered that possibility.

Am I burned?

Nah. Your Bird primary sounds like it’s in good shape.

Is it an issue of my secondary, somehow?

Yep. You’ve got a burnt Lion secondary that isn’t sure which direction to run in. But you’ve definitely started the process of unburning.

I don’t KNOW and I’m increasingly uncomfortable about it. I completely understand if you’re like ????? but if you have any insight, i’d really appreciate it. Thanks so much!

#sortinghatchats #sortme #wisteria sorts #bird primary #lion secondary #burnt lion secondary #bird lion #soren kierkegaard #philosophy stuff #submission

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seafleece · 5 years ago

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Hey, random question, but what do you think are the M9's love languages?

oh, anon, you absolutely did not sign up for this and i am so sorry, but here we are. i had to look up the five types and keep them in the google doc to remind myself what they were, but uhh here’s almost 4000 words of character analysis and discussion of debatable quality

jester:

my initial thought was quality time— an obvious and painful one, as it’s the one her mother wasn’t able to provide. i think the sleeper, though, for jester, is acts of service.

with beau, this especially shows up in reference to healing— jester having a more healing-focused cleric around is a big relief, especially for someone so close to warlock status that she almost was one, but very notably, she very much wants to heal beau. she specifically apologizes for not doing so in the chantry, and attributes that to beau’s absence rather than anything else; more generally, there’s a huge amount of distress on jester’s part when beau is hurt, and that she wants to be the one to heal beau (notably, with the gorgon, she RAN to beau, was immediately upset both times beau started getting petrified, and even dissuaded caduceus or caleb from using their turn to heal beau so she could instead, making sure to be Right There even while nott was applying the oil). she also seems to really value the instances when beau does things for her, especially since there are specific acts that beau reserves for jester (engaging with religion in any capacity, wearing a dress for jester and more broadly allowing jester to pick her clothes, a concept which beau probably has an explicitly negative association with from her mother).

it’s also muddled jester up the worst when it comes to relationships she understands less— the “kiss” with fjord in the temple that was a vehicle for giving jester air, most specifically, comes to mind— and she’s really come to terms with this by realizing that romantic feelings weren’t really what he was expressing, and that it wasn’t necessarily what she was feeling, either. it’s noticeable in how she describes her relationship with the traveler— she feels like her service to him is doing little things for him, and asks, when she’s unsure, when the traveler failed to act on her behalf when they were kidnapped, if she did something wrong to make him angry, and literally desecrates a temple to make up for it as soon as they’re back in town.

and the thing is, quality time isn’t really what was lacking in her relationship with marion— marion probably did have time to spend with jester for at least a little while every day. the problem is that marion simply couldn’t provide jester with things that she needed: access to the outside world and companionship. she had to learn from near-scratch how to navigate relationships of varying intensities, and it shows with her initial zeroing in on fjord as an iteration of the dashing sailor her momma told her about, as well as her more slow-burn come to trust and really invest in and love beau, because she’s never had a relationship like that with a girl, and maybe didn’t even know it was something she could have, or something she could want.

jester’s her proudest when she’s doing things for other people, even if they maybe wouldn’t love her doing it if they knew— threatening beau’s dad because she hates that he hurt her, hearing that beau was thinking about leaving and marching in to modify memory a hag, writing astrid a letter because caleb seems like he liked her, asking essek if he likes caleb because caleb seems to like essek, painting yasha’s room in the xhorhaus, finding outfits for everyone. she struggles with how to rein in showing it and thinking first about the potential consequences, and is unsure how to navigate what it means when she’s shown it in return, but it’s messy and heartfelt and sincere. with her mom, she really clearly appreciates when her mom does do things for her— providing a home for her friend’s family, allowing the m9 to stay in the chateau, coming to the party with them despite her agoraphobia. i’m sort of banking on a scene where jester talks to her about it, apologizes for leaving, and reaffirms that it means a lot to her that marion is stepping out of her comfort zone for her.

beau:

words of affirmation. this is NO DOUBT something her parents didn’t give her, maybe ever. this is baked into her relationship with them— she knew that her father wanted a boy, he probably Told her this, and she wasn’t one. it’s something she could literally never be, an aspect she would be forever resented for, that would tinge everything her father ever said to her. her mother also probably didn’t give her much if any affirmation, as she was trying to police and fix beau’s behavior to avoid thoreau’s anger for both of them, and never properly elaborated to beau that her intention was to keep beau from being punished (not that it would have made it okay, for the record). it’s also why her conversation with her parents in 92 immediately threw her off, because for once they actually told her she’d impressed them, that she’d done good, and it’s rough as hell to see that.

unfortunately, it’s also the thing she’s least likely to get from everyone else unless she’s at her worst, because almost everyone else, including fanon, seems to have profoundly absorbed this idea that beau is rude and abrasive and sarcastic and she’s just. not. she might have been at the start, but she’s always been especially soft with jester, she and caleb are very mutually assured about the sort of affection they show each other, she’s always been either openly flirting with or just sort of tenderly awkward with and trying around yasha, she and caduceus have a fun and pretty peaceful dynamic i always love to see, and we know caduceus, for at least a while, considered beau his favorite.

then, there’s the characters she’s known for butting heads with the most: fjord, with whom she’s developing a sibling dynamic to rival hers with caleb and really obviously is ride or die for; nott, who used to openly insult beau and just about everyone else, and who is now 1/3 of the chaos crew beau is also in; and molly, whose death was a HUGE turning point for beau in terms of a) taking stock of her morals and how she intended to act on them and b) expressing love for someone so you know they know it, before it’s too late.

jester seems to see this the most, no surprise there, and dairon also sees a lot of potential in beau not because she’s strong or fast (she’s from a martially focused monastery), but because she’s smart. dairon talks about and to beau very affectionately compared to other mentor/guardian figures she’s had, and i think it means a lot to her coming from both jester and dairon. she certainly returns the favor for both of them.

fjord:

this one isn’t immediately apparent, so i’m gonna start by talking about the nature of his relationship with caduceus (and see where it gets me).

okay, i lied, i’m starting with molly.

fjord and molly had a thing. it’s clear in retrospect, and i’ve talked about it, but i think it has to do with where fjord was in his quest to reinvent himself. molly was someone who, for all intents and purposes, had flawlessly become a new person— not necessarily because of a concerted effort to change who lucien was, but a different person nonetheless. fjord wanted desperately to believe that that was attainable for him, and thus saw a lot in investing in molly. molly was a silent affirmation that fjord could really pull this off, could really reinvent himself and be fine.

also, molly was hot. enough said.

caduceus, on the other hand, offered something different. caduceus came along right before fjord’s willingness to help uk’otoa was first tested— fjord rose to the occasion, but the whole time there was someone new along, someone whose faith in his deity seemed assured. assured, that’s something fjord never had.

afterward, he got to see what it meant to believe in a god like that, and he started to want in. caduceus seems like a very honest person— though really, it’s just because m9 doesn’t know the right questions to ask him— and his god is the god of the sea, too, right? fjord really lost a rock in molly the way i don’t think a lot of people realize, and it’s why his swallowing the summer’s dance felt so meaningful. he was keeping a part of molly with him, and i wonder if he misses that part of his falchion. after he lost his inspiration for recreation, he started to put stock into authenticity as the answer, and caduceus as the vehicle. and the wildmother was very accepting, too, took him in like a lost sheep.

where fjord is now, i think he values the covenant (which i realize i actually define later, so if i forget to reorganize these before i post, then oops) in a similar way to caleb. more specifically, though, he decidedly the word owe in talking to beau about the group’s relationship, which, among other things, speaks to acts of service. fjord has work to do to earn his place as a paladin of the wildmother (and a good amount of work to do indeed, if getting trounced by darrow was any indication), and he feels the need to repay caduceus for his help, companionship, and guidance. fjord also gets hurt and KO’d. a lot. i think he takes it on the chin as his role in the group— that’s his job, and he has faith in caduceus and jester to keep him up. they’re not done yet, they haven’t finished serving one another, so beau leaving is of considerable offense (near-mutinous, to be specific).

caleb:

words MEAN SHIT to caleb, you can tell in the way he talks. everyone remembers the times he’s told nott he loves her, he responds best to beau because i think he really loves the way she talks, he shows his feelings in really passionate speeches to nott, to beauregard, and most recently to essek. there’s absolutely a reason why so many goddamn quotes from campaign 2 are attributed to this dude, and it’s because he monologues like a fucking champ. their group is named after his accent.

as for receiving love, though, i think it’s a little different. we know from talks that he’s placed a lot of value on the things jester has done for him, and moreover to be herself as someone who gives recklessly, but as far as we know he doesn’t intend to do anything with it. with nott, i’m tempted to create a new category that’s something like a covenant? he and nott agreed to travel together and help each other under the worst conditions, and they’ve stuck to this fastidiously. this covenant, this commitment to the group, is something he extends to everyone— he is not willing to walk away from this, and hasn’t been for a long time, he believes in all of them, truly, what they can do— and cherishes the fact that everyone has kept this, except for two very specific moments. beau, when she introduced the threat of her leaving the party, and yasha, when she was taken over by obann. for beau, he actually seemed fairly quiet compared to fjord, and i’m not sure yet on why this is, other that i think he trusted fjord and jester to talk her down. as for yasha, he seems to be really invested in commiserating with yasha as two haunted ones (literally), and sees her as someone who also really values the group but sees her ability to belong as tarnished by what she’s done.

for the purposes of this, i’m gonna refer to it as that, as a covenant (yes i’m a failed church kid, what of it) and as separate from acts of service, because it’s more akin to the promise of one major, permanent act of service to each other. i wonder if it’s this steadfastness in that idea that partially led caduceus to continue and develop the idea of his role, because caleb and the rest of team cockroach, as i call them, were gonna keep that covenant if it killed them, and caduceus could keep them from getting killed, at the very least, if he entered into it.

but anyway, that covenant now extends to essek, if he decides to take it. and if he does, that will mean something infinite to caleb, i think.

caduceus: acts of service.

okay. i wanna talk about caduceus and danger.

caduceus doesn’t heal himself. we know this. he heals everyone else, and not himself.

i’ve been checking critrole stats on this, and if i’m reading correctly, he has taken the most damage (157) in one episode than anyone else. and it’s not a small margin. the closest is yasha (129) and i’m almost certain that’s from the episode where she decided to literally get attacked until she passed out. i was trying to guess which episode this was from, and then it hit me: probably the episode where he fucking died, right? because it really just never came up again.

caduceus has: started to drown at least 3 times in his first month on the job, been killed by nott, been beaten near to death when yasha was charmed, and been very quietly and very badly stabbed in the back by a disappearing assassin. he’s also died at home, as a family tradition.

there’s a million better meta posts about caduceus’s relationship with death, or even about him not healing himself, but I just want to set it as potential precedent for the idea that caduceus, to some degree, sees value in himself as someone who doesn’t mind dying in a fight. for one thing, it’s been a temporary thing almost from day one with m9, as jester immediately invested in diamonds when they got back to town. it’s not his first rodeo, either, and his family has normalized death to an, and i say this more because of how it’s affected him rather than because i dislike the idea of normalizing death, an upsetting degree.

giving healing, that’s his job, but eliminating himself as someone who needs help or healing, well, that’s healing in a way, too, right? if he doesn’t get healed, it’s more for everyone else. worst comes to worst, jester can heal him if need be. or, y’know. not heal him.

caduceus’s relationship with m9 has noticeable transaction rhetoric, and i wonder where that really fits in with his family. obviously, his role in the family was implied as the one who stayed behind, and his parents definitely imparted a need for him to be stable, a role he’s continued to fill for m9 to his quiet detriment but i think he’s also jumped on the opportunity to finally be the older one, the wiser one, of the group. there’s a power caduceus has over the group that’s really understated— they just sort of listen to him, even if what he’s saying doesn’t actually make sense, because he started with nott, beau, and caleb as a wise savior, a protector, and upon finding the others, it’s not like jester, fjord, or yasha were filling that role. molly certainly wasn’t either— it’s funny, how in retrospect caduceus seems inevitable to the group because they really didn’t have anyone like him. the closest thing to a voice of reason they had was fjord and caleb, and early on, caleb was not in great standing because of his and nott’s perceived standoffishness, and fjord threw up ocean water, so like, what’s up with that, right?

at the very least, he definitely believes he owes the mighty nein something, a role to fill, a job to perform. a service to act out, if you will. his job is to heal, and he does less healing if he heals himself. he seems to view him taking a hit as a win, in a way— it’s a hit that someone else doesn’t take.

i have a lot of hope that reconnecting with his family and seeing how he’s grown while they haven’t allows him to revisit his notions of what he needs to be, and i have a lot of hope that moving forward, he’ll be able to invest more in the other motif he’s developed, which is gift-giving: fjord, with the star razor; his sisters, with the hat (which seems small but like. boy’s had it for a while) and the flute; and, most recently, in helping jester pick out everyone’s outfits. it allows him to feel like he’s giving something to the people he cares about without it hurting him.

yasha:

truly everything. it’s hard to get a read because yasha really just soaks in all the love m9 wants to give her. if i had to guess further, i’d say we should look at her and molly’s relationship, because molly’s the only character we’ve seen her unabashedly love, and the thing that stood out most to me was physical touch. that echoes really depressingly with her “fight” in 89— she got something out of being that close to someone, even if it felt like reparation or atonement, and i think the only person in m9 who’s been really unafraid to touch yasha is jester.

i’ll admit i have a soft spot for yashter, but, like, it’s there, right? the obvious trust, the faith jester has in yasha and the fear and turmoil when that was tested? i remember really clearly jester giving yasha a piggyback ride in zadash in an early ep, and like— when’s the last time someone was strong enough to do that? when’s the last time someone wanted to do that for yasha? everyone’s mistrusted yasha to some degree for the entire run of the campaign, and, like, how much did her hopes to get close to everyone else just evaporate after the king’s cage? does she really even believe she can have it again? she was so close— jester trusted her fully, she and beau were in a comfortable mutual place with flirting, she’d talked to caduceus and jester about zuala, she even felt comfortable picking up nott and throwing her around (which, by the way, i love their dynamic).

she seems to have leaned more into the protective, threatening stance since they got her back, which, if she’s comfortable with it, is just fine— maybe she’s shifting more towards acts of service, but i just hope it isn’t her just accepting the idea that everyone will always be afraid of her, that she won’t be close like that again. because molly wasn’t afraid of her. jester wasn’t, and i don’t think she is, now— but fjord showed a lot of distrust, and i think yasha’s scared of the degree to which she hurt beau and how to even broach that discussion, and she attacked them, how could they ever forgive her or trust she wouldn’t do it again?

(i wish i had a happier end to this, so i’ll just say that she did seem comfortable last ep, and that she may or may not have interest in getting a tattoo from jester? interesting stuff.)

veth:

on a person to person level, veth definitely feels she and caleb are acting on the promise they’ve made to help each other— now she’s reached it, things are a bit more nebulous, but it’s obvious she wants to stick around for him. i’ll admit, her words to everyone in 97 were a bit surprising to me— she hasn’t really been good at conveying emotion like that before unless she’s desperate or really upset, and i imagine it was something she started planning in her head to say to everyone as soon as the first ritual didn’t work. that might be, i think, what she felt as relief, just not being able to articulate what she wanted to say to everyone.

as for her family, veth believes she owes her best self to yeza and luc— she kept herself from them not because she couldn’t have gone back, but because she felt like someone else, like someone worse, and the exaggerated tendencies from her previous life only reinforced this— she didn’t believe she deserved to be around them, before now. before caleb, i don’t know if she had any hope for returning to them at all, and he changed that entirely.

i’m also very interested in why veth is able to reconcile her marriage with yeza as veth with her loving caleb as nott, and if she sort of considers herself as two different people. we’ve seen so little of what she feels comfortable expecting from other people— for now, i’d say acts of service seems appropriate? but maybe something closer to just. fulfilling promises.

bonus: for the other two who are considered part of the mighty nein

kiri:

words of affirmation. i’m a HUGE kenku stan, anyone who’s played d&d with me knows this, and i’m especially fascinated with the relationship with words when you can only speak the words you hear/remember. on the most basic level, if you speak to kiri, you are giving her a gift, you’re giving her the ability to speak, too. and if those words are affirming, then she can say them back! and you’re giving them to her, in a sense, to use as she pleases and repeat them to herself, even, and i just love that image— her, to herself, saying “i love you” in other people’s voices. i’m ride or die for kenkus, and kiri started it.

essek:

okay, so almost everyone in the m9 could be read as needing words of affirmation, because it’s so clear that they need more love and knowledge of love than they’ve received, and have found it in each other. essek has quite literally found it in m9 for the first time. he absolutely needs all of these, like, ASAP, but i think it’s what everyone says to him that get him the most. caleb’s speech, obviously, but it’s also them casually referring to him as their friend, it’s jester’s messages, even if he’s busy. it’s important to say, though, that i think it’s a specific type of affirmation: things that have nothing to do with his magic ability (and moreover, any of these gifts that have nothing to do with it). essek’s built his entire life on the idea that he is someone incredibly powerful and smart for his age— m9 are probably the first people to make him feel like he was more than that, because they want to know about the rest of him, and in becoming friends with them, he’s confronting the fact that he doesn’t really believe there is a rest of him. they want to know a part of himself that he at best has neglected and has been neglected by others, and at worst that he believes does not exist. when they talk about him as a friend, it adds to who he can be. he’s seeing, for the first time, that he can exist as someone else than his abilities and his ambition.

i initially started off with words of affirmation and he clearly needs that, but i think he really just needs all of these in a very specific way: he needs to feel love that is not based in merit, that pertains to who he actually is in this life rather than what he can become in the next, that values the life he’s living right now, because he’s not getting that from the dynasty. it seems like a low bar, maybe, to people who only have the one life, as far as we know, but his arc this campaign shows that it really, really isn’t.

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petersasteria · 4 years ago

Text

168 Hours - Haz Osterfield (13)

Pairing: Haz x Reader

Haz Osterfield Masterlist || Ultimate Masterlist || 168 Hours Masterlist

DISCLAIMER: *This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.*

𝐒𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: In which your son’s wish comes true and it turns horrible. Now, he has to fix it in 168 hours.

Special thanks to: @blueleatherbag and @dudethisvoid for being so helpful

Click the pictures for better quality

𝐎𝐧𝐞 hundred and forty-four hours are now consumed out of one hundred and sixty-eight hours. This means Amadis and Harley only have exactly twenty-four hours left. Today is the day Amadis will be coming home from Prague. If he were being honest, he truly missed Y/N, Harrison, and Harley.

He wouldn't admit it, but he's grown attached to the kid. He missed the times when Harley would wake him up because he was thirsty and wanted a glass of water. He missed the times when he and Harley would stay on the couch and order some take out after a long day. He missed going out with Harley, not knowing what the day may hold. He missed everything.

"You won't be an ocean away, you will only be a moment away..."

Amadis turns around and gives Saint Thomas Aquinas a dirty look. Saint Thomas Aquinas shrugged, "It seemed appropriate for your mood. Just that lyric, anyway."

"He's right." Saint Christopher pipes up as he fixes his hair in the mirror. "You'll be with Harley in just a few hours. How will you greet him when you get back?"

"I don't know, to be honest." Amadis sighs. "Besides, I don't even know how I'll tell him the news."

"Oh." Saint Thomas Aquinas says. "I forgot about that."

"Harley will be truly devastated." Saint Christopher frowns.

"Exactly!" Amadis huffs. "There's truly no easy way for me to tell Harley that his hero is actually a villain."

"No easy way indeed." Saint Thomas Aquinas says.

"Anyway, let's go." Saint Christopher says. "Saint Maria Goretti asked me to go with her somewhere as a favor."

"She's a legendary story." Amadis says as he takes his backpack and puts it on. "Imagine being stabbed fourteen times!"

"She's so brave to forgive Alessandro like that." Saint Thomas Aquinas says as he glanced at Saint Christopher, "Please give that child my regards. Tell her she's been missed by me, but I'm sure she's having fun with her friends right now as we speak. That kid is like a family member of mine."

At only eleven years old, Saint Maria Goretti died in the hands of her next door neighbor, Alessandro Serenelli. She was stabbed fourteen times after he tried to rape her. Alessandro was twenty at that time. Little Maria forgave him on her deathbed and now, she's considered the patron saint of the youth.

"May God bless her." Amadis says. He takes a deep breath and holds on to Saint Christopher's shoulder. "I'm ready to go."

Saint Christopher nods. Saint Thomas Aquinas grabs Saint Christopher's arm and in just a blink of an eye, they're back in London, on the rooftop of the apartment building where Amadis and Harley are staying at.

"Thanks, Saint Christopher. I'll be looking forward to have another trip with you." Amadis smiles and embraces his new friend. He pulls away and hugs Saint Thomas Aquinas too. The two saints could clearly see that Amadis is in a hurry to see Harley again. After all, their time together is almost up.

"There is nothing on this earth more to be prized than true friendship." Saint Thomas Aquinas calls out causing Amadis to turn around to face him.

"What?"

Saint Thomas Aquinas laughs, "It's one of my quotes, dude."

"Yes, I'm aware. But why are you saying it?" Amadis asks.

"You seem to really care about Harley. He's lucky to have you on his side; you're his true friend. Now, go to him. I'm sure he's excited to see you just as much." Saint Thomas Aquinas says.

"Hey, let's all take a photo together! I don't know when I'll see you again and I don't know when I'll get back here on earth." Amadis says as he pulls out his phone from his pocket. They squeeze in together and Amadis takes the photo.

"Thank you." He says after taking it. He turns to leave the two saints.

"Good luck!" Saint Christopher says.

Amadis rushes downstairs. Upon reaching the floor of his unit, he frantically knocks on the door. While waiting, he posts his picture with the saints on Instagram.

The door opens and Amadis quickly puts his phone in his pocket. He looks up and sees Harrison with a smile on his face. "Welcome home, man!" Harrison greets and pulls him in for a hug.

Amadis hugs back and asks, "Where's Harley?"

"In the room. He's getting dressed for the day." Harrison says as he pulls away. Amadis fully enters the apartment and Harrison closes the door. "Your friend, Finn, dropped off your daily allowance just now. It's on the counter."

"Thank you!" Amadis says as he puts his backpack down. "How was everything while I was gone?"

"Alright." Harrison shrugs. "Nothing out of the ordinary. Although, Y/N and I couldn't babysit Harley yesterday, so I asked Timmy if he could watch him and he agreed. They had fun apparently. Harley was sad that their day ended yesterday."

Amadis nodded, "Tell your friend I said thank you. Anyway-"

"AMADIS!" Harley shouts as he runs to him and gives him the biggest hug. Amadis would've slightly pushed him away if it were someone else, but he didn't. Amadis hugs him tight and says, "I've missed you!"

"I've missed you too." Harley chuckles and pulls away. "Dad made breakfast and it's on the table." Harley walks to the couch and watches tv.

Amadis turns to Harrison and chortles, "Dad?"

"I'm shocked too." Harrison chuckles and whispers, "The other day, he called Y/N, 'mum' by accident."

"Ooh, interesting." Amadis nods and makes his way to the dining area.

"Um, Amadis. I have to leave now. My other job wants me at work." Harrison says with a sad smile. "I'll miss both of you a lot!"

"Same here and thank you! We'll keep in touch." Amadis says. It's obviously a lie, but he didn't want to explain the really long story as to why he and Harley won't be keeping in touch.

"Of course! You know my number and if you want to drop Harley off, I'll text you my home address and the places I work at."

"That'll be very convenient, thank you." Amadis says. "Harley, say goodbye to Harrison!"

Harleys gets up from the couch and runs to Harrison to give him a hug, "Bye! I'll see you soon."

'Real soon, dad. Real soon. We'll be together again... in the right year, this time.' Harley thinks.

"I'll see you soon and behave, little guy!" Harrison pulls away and ruffles Harley's hair before thanking Amadis for letting him stay at the apartment and leaving.

"How was Prague? Did my uncle Tom do something cool?!" Harley asks excitedly.

Amadis slightly frowns and clears his throat, "Harley, there's something you have to know. I think it's best if you sit down for this."

Harley looks at him curiously, but sits down next to him anyway. Amadis looks at Harley and runs his fingers through Harley's hair before lightly patting his shoulder, "Your uncle Tom... he did something bad."

"What did he do?" Harley asks. "He's my hero! Heroes can't do bad things."

"Yes, but maybe he isn't actually a hero." Amadis says softly. "He cheated."

"...On a test?" Harley asks innocently.

"N-No, he, uh... he wasn't faithful to Y/N. He, um..." Amadis stammers. He didn't know how to explain what Tom did to a ten year old boy. Amadis struggles to find the right words, but Harley seemed to catch on.

"Do you mean that he dated someone else in Prague?" Harley asks again.

'Not exactly dated. He had sex with someone else, but I don't want to corrupt your innocent mind.' Amadis thinks.

"Yes, he dated someone else. It's wrong because he's engaged to Y/N. They're getting married tomorrow."

"So... he hurt my mommy's feelings?" Harley's bottom lip starts to quiver and Amadis knew that in a few seconds, Harley would start crying.

"...Yes, he did. Heroes don't do that, Harley." Amadis says. As predicted, Harley begins to cry. Amadis immediately wraps his arms around Harley and tries to calm him down.

"He's still the same person, alright? He's still the same man who buys you gifts, who takes you to different places, who buys you food, and who hangs out with you. I believe that people change over time and the uncle Tom that you know is a changed man and I believe that." Amadis coaxes as Harley cries even more.

"Yeah, but he still hurt my mum's feelings. It's not okay." Harley sniffs and cries even more.

Amadis didn't know what to do. He never encountered a crying child before. For now, all he could do was hold him and whisper sweet things in his ear in hopes to make him feel better.

𝐀 𝐋𝐔𝐗𝐔𝐑𝐈𝐎𝐔𝐒 𝐇𝐎𝐓𝐄𝐋 𝐈𝐍 𝐋𝐎𝐍𝐃𝐎𝐍...

Y/N is sitting alone in her hotel room as she relaxes. After all, tomorrow's her wedding day and she needs to rest so that she'll be good to go for tomorrow. She watches a random show on tv as she sits on the couch with her feet propped up on the coffee table. She has a flute of champagne in hand and a bowl of strawberries on her lap. They were, of course, sent by Tom from his room.

They were told that it was bad luck for both of them to be together before the wedding. Hence, the different rooms. Y/N wasn't complaining, though. She needed a break from Tom. Even for just a short time.

Just as she's about to change the channel, her phone rings. She looks at it and her eyebrows furrow to see that it's an unknown number. "That's weird. I don't remember giving my number to anyone." She says out loud.

Despite not knowing who's calling her, she answers her phone anyway. Tom wouldn't allow her, but Tom wasn't with her right now. So, she answers.

"Hello?"

"Hi! Is this, uh, is this Y/N?" The person asks.

"Who's this?" Y/N asks.

"I'm Tom's friend, Chloe." She says. "Is this Y/N?"

"Yes, speaking." Y/N says as she mutes the tv. "Tom's never mentioned you before, actually. How do you- how do you know each other? And more importantly, how did you get my number?"

"I have something really important to say, so I'll answer those quickly." Chloe says. "Tom and I used to be fuck buddies and I got your number from Brad."

"Whoa, whoa, wait. Fuck buddies?!" Y/N shrieks.

"Yes, but that's not the point. We stopped when he met you. Anyway, I have something to tell you." Chloe says.

"Okay. What is it?" Y/N asks.

"Tom cheated on you in Prague." Chloe sighs.

"I'm sorry, what?" Y/N says in shock.

"It's true. He was bragging to me about it. Knowing him, he wouldn't man up and tell you. So, I figured that as women, we should look after each other and that meant telling you this information. I'm so sorry, Y/N." Chloe says sadly. "Are you alright?"

"The person I'm engaged to cheated on me while he was on vacation and our wedding is tomorrow. Do you think I'm alright, Chloe? I feel so betrayed and heartbroken." Y/N cries.

"If there's anything I can do to make you feel better, I'm right here. You can save my number. Tom's an ass." Chloe huffs angrily.

"Thanks for, uh, telling me." Y/N sniffs. "I appreciate it. I'll call you back, okay?"

"Oka-"

Y/N hangs up and cries hysterically. She's hurt and heartbroken. She doesn't know who else to turn to. Saoirse would just tell her to suck it up and her parents would freak out. Her dad would definitely kill Tom and she didn't want anyone to die or commit a murder. So, she calls the only person she could talk to; one who won't judge. Her new friend, Harrison.

She clicks on his contact and calls him. It rings a bunch of times and she heavily sighs, "Please pick up."

Just as she's about to hang up, Harrison answers, "Hey Y/N! I'm sorry for not answering fast enough. I went to the bathroom and-"

"No, no, no. It's okay. It's, uh, it's fine." She smiles a bit despite the tears streaming down her face. "I'm just glad you answered."

"Well, I'm glad you called." Harrison smiles. "I actually thought we'd never talk to each other again."

"Really? How come?" She asks and wipes her tears.

"Well, let's just say that your future husband strikes as the jealous type... and he's kinda not... nice." Harrison bites his lip as he sits comfortably on the couch, waiting for Timmy to come home so he can confront him on why the dishwasher is broken again.

"That's actually a nice way to say it." She chuckles lightly. "He's not nice at all."

"Why? Is he beating you up or something?" Harrison's eyebrows furrow as his anger rises. "Did that bastard hit you? Did he make you do something you didn't want to do? I can come down there and give him a piece of my mind! I'll, uh, I'll bring back up. Timmy's gonna be home in a minute."

"Harrison-"

"You can stay with me and Timmy and if you're not comfortable, I'm sure Amadis and Harley can make you stay there. I'll help you pack. And to think that your wedding is tomorrow! The nerve of that bastard!"

"Harrison!"

"Yeah?"

"He's not beating me up. Thank god, he doesn't. He's not violent. He didn't make me do something I don't want to." She sighs. Before she knew it, tears start streaming down her face again.

"Then what's wrong, love?" Harrison asks softly. "You can tell me anything, right?"

She holds back her sobs and nods even though he couldn't see her. She takes a deep breath and says, "He cheated on me while he was in Prague." After saying that, she lets out the sob that she's been holding back and Harrison's heart breaks upon hearing it.

"I-I know this is a stupid question, but I'll ask anyway. How are you feeling?" Harrison asks. Harrison stays silent as he listens to Y/N's cries on the other line. "If you don't want to talk, it's fine. I can-"

"I want to talk! I do. It's just- It's really hard to accept that he had the nerve to cheat on me days before we sign up the rest of our lives." Y/N sniffs. "Can I- Is it alright if I come over?"

"Oh, sure!" Harrison says. As soon as he says that, Timmy comes in and with furrowed eyebrows. "You can come over, Y/N."

"Are you kidding me?! I just got home!" Timmy whisper-yells. "You're inviting your girlfriend as second I walk through the door?! Come on, man."

"Shut up!" Harrison mouths.

"Thank you. Text me your address. I'd invite you here, but I'm not at home and I'm staying at this stupid, but fancy hotel."

Harrison chuckles, "Okay. I'll see you in a bit, yeah?"

"Yeah. Bye." Y/N sniffs and hangs up. Harrison immediately texts Y/N his address and turns to Timmy who's taking off his shoes and walking to the small kitchen.

"Why is the dish washer broken, Tim?" Harrison calls out.

"It's not my fault! It just broke." Timmy explains and emerges from the kitchen with a bottle of cold water. He sits next to Harrison and says, "You gotta stop blaming me for things, man. It's not cool."

"I'm not blaming you. I'm asking you." Harrison corrects. "If you think I'm blaming you, you must be guilty."

"Wow, lawyer of the year!" Timmy rolls his eyes. "Are we seriously fighting about the dish washer again?! It's always breaking. Let's just get a new one."

The doorbell rings and Harrison gets up to open the door. He smiles sadly when he sees Y/N. She gives him a small smile and says, "Turns out, it's just a few turns from the hotel I'm staying at."

"Come in." Harrison opens the door wider and Y/N walks in. She looks at Timmy and walks up to him and offers a handshake, "Hi, I'm Y/N."

Timmy shakes her hand, "I'm Timothée, but call me Timmy. Any friend of Haz is a friend of mine. Come sit." Timmy pats the space next to him and Y/N sits down.

"I take it, you're here for girl talk." Timmy says.

"Timmy, don't be rude." Harrison hisses and walks to the kitchen to get a glass of water for her.

"He's right." Y/N says. She turns to Timmy and smiles, "I just found out that my fiancé cheated on my while he was in Prague. It was only a few days ago."

"Oh, yikes. I'm sorry to hear that." Timmy frowns. Harrison enters with a glass of water for Y/N and she thanks him before taking a sip of water.

"I relate, though. I've been cheated on too." Timmy huffs. "Haz got cheated on too. I guess that's why we're such good friends."

"Yeah, Colette was her name." Harrison says bitterly. "She apologized, though. I forgave her."

"Why?" Y/N asks.

"Because forgiving is the biggest act anyone could ever do." Timmy answers. "I told him that. Forgiving takes a lot of courage and it's not always easy."

"That's true." Y/N nods. Timmy stands up and says, "I'll leave both of you to it. I'm tired and I'm opening the shop tomorrow."

"Timmy works at this fancy café where rich people eat." Harrison mentions as Timmy walks to his room.

"Oh, I see." Y/N nods. They sit in silence for a while and Harrison clears his throat, "So, what'll happen?"

"I'm not sure." Y/N sighs. "I've always felt that our relationship was failing, but I didn't expect him to cheat on me."

"If your relationship was failing, why are you still with him then?" Harrison asks her. She shrugs, "I honestly don't know. I love him. No, I loved him."

"So, you don't love him anymore? Is that it?"

"I'm not even sure anymore. I still care about him. After all, he did take care of me and he did a good job in taking care of me. I will forever be grateful for that. And the media isn't always right. They always portray him as this arrogant fucker just because he's young, but he's so much more than that."

"Oh?"

"Mhm." Y/N nods. "He's passionate about his job. He takes care of his employees. He covers for them in front of his father. He's not an attention seeker, I'll tell you that. He's just used to the attention. That's why it ticks him off when people aren't paying attention to him. He never wanted to be a CEO, because he wanted to be an actor and he still does."

"That's why he's bitter all the time, but he's a good guy. Err, he can be a good guy. But after hearing that information, maybe he's just so good at acting like a good guy. It's a shame, though. My heart used to be just set on him and now- now, I don't know. I'm not sure. It's complicated."

Harrison doesn't say anything. He just listens. They stay quiet for a minute or so and Harrison breaks the silence, "Where's your heart now?"

"You want an honest answer?" She lets out a breathy laugh. Harrison nods, "Yeah."

"My heart's with you." Y/N looks at him and smiles. "It's been with you for awhile now and I don't think it wants to leave. I think it wants to stay because I think we might have a shot if we tried."

"Are you saying... you like me?" Harrison asks carefully.

She nods, "Yeah, I do. I don't think I'll stop."

"I like you too." Harrison says.

"I sense a 'but' coming."

"But-"

"Hm, I was right."

Harrison chuckles, "But you're engaged and your wedding's tomorrow. We can't do anything about it. What made you admit that you like me?"

"Aside from the fact that you asked? Well, it was simple. You answered the phone awhile ago and from that moment, I knew that I was with the wrong person all this time. What about you? What made you admit your feelings?" Y/N asks.

"You were crying on the phone and I realized that I wanted to be there for through everything. The good, the bad, and the ugly. I want to love you and hold you and do all those cheesy stuff with you, but that's Tom's job. I'll still be here, though. I'll be your friend and your shoulder to cry on." Harrison says.

"I wish things could be different." She sighs and holds his hand.

"Same here."

She lets go of his hand and stands up, "I better get going. I need to get up early tomorrow."

"Right." Harrison stands up too. "Big day tomorrow. I'll walk you to your car."

"Thank you."

Harrison grabs his keys to the apartment in case he gets locked out again by accident. They quietly walk to the elevator and they stay silent the whole ride down. They reach Y/N's car which was parked outside the building. She unlocks the door and gets in the car. She sits there and rolls down her window to look at Harrison, "Hey Harrison?"

"Call me Haz." He chuckles. "We've known each other for, like, a week. Call me by my nickname."

"Okay, Haz." She smiles. "Um, I know this is kind of informal. But I'd like to personally invite you to the wedding tomorrow. I would love for you to be there. You mean something to me, Haz."

He smiles, "As much as I love to be there, I can't. I have errands to run tomorrow and I think Timmy and I need a new dishwasher. So, I'll shop for that."

"Oh. That's alright." She frowns slightly. "I'll miss you tomorrow."

"I'll miss you too and I hope you get things straightened out with Tom. He's such a... man."

"He's not you, though." Y/N says.

"You've known me for a week and you've known him for years. Besides, he can give you a better life and I can't even get a permanent job. He can give you so many opportunities and when you have kids, they'll be secured for the rest of their lives."

"He's still not you." Y/N states. "Where does this leave us?"

"Friends that like each other who aren't together, but they have a special place in the other's heart." Harrison answers. "I'd settle with that instead of nothing."

"Same here, I guess." Y/N trails off. "I'll go now. Wish me luck for tomorrow."

"I shall." Harrison smiles.

Y/N starts the car and drives away. Harrison stands there and watches until her car disappears when she turns a corner. He walks back inside the building and goes up to his shared apartment with Timmy. As soon as he opens the door, Timmy stands there with his arms crossed.

"You're still awake?"

"Yes, and you're making a big mistake?" Timmy retorts. "I have this feeling that she's the one for you, y'know. Both of you are good to Harley too. You're like a real family."

"Thanks, but she has Tom. They'll start a family soon." Harrison says and sits on the couch. "I like her a lot, Timmy."

"I know you do."

"It's too late. She'll be Mrs. Holland tomorrow." Harrison sighs. "Here's another heartbreak."

"I'm sorry, man." Timmy frowns.

'I'm too late.' Harrison thinks.

Or is he?

* * * *

𝐇𝐀𝐙 𝐎𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐅𝐈𝐄𝐋𝐃 𝐓𝐀𝐆𝐋𝐈𝐒𝐓: @abrielleholland @silencetheslaves @imeanlifesabitshit @joyleenl @hjoficrecs @blueleatherbag @poguesholland @harryismysunflower @justanothermarvelmaniac @lonikje @lizzyosterfield @itstaskeen @ilarbu @turtoix @badreputationlove @starlight-starks @swiftmind @sovereignparker @pearce14 @justanamesstuff @chewymoustachio

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schraubd · 4 years ago

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ACES Wild

Last we encountered the "Alliance for Constructive Ethnic Studies" (ACES), they were pushing fabricated evidence and wild screeds against "critical race theory" in a failed attempt to derail the California Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum after it was reformed in accord with tremendous efforts by a range of California Jewish (and non-Jewish) organizations.

Now they're back in action, and this time their target is California's new draft Mathematical Framework. What horrors are contained inside? Let's look!

The first draft of the California Mathematics Framework is out for review, and it includes as a resource "A Pathway to Equitable Math Instruction," a guide that labels teaching practices like "addressing mistakes" and "focus on the right answer" as "white supremacy culture."

This is critical race theory.

This is discrimination.

(Is this "critical race theory"? Nope, not going to get sucked into that).

Unfortunately, as was the case in the ESMC debacle, we are given only the thinnest possible citations to the primary sources for the alleged offending content. The link to the CMF draft goes to a website offering a thirteen chapter document, all in separate documents, comprised of hundreds of page, with no indication of where in the morass the "Pathway" document is included. The link to the Pathway itself, for its part, goes to a site that contains five separate documents, again totaling hundreds of pages, with nary a clue as to where this language about "addressing mistakes" might be found. All of this, I suppose, is left as an exercise for the reader.

Well, I may not be a math expert, but I have gotten familiar enough with the strategies of ACES and its friends to know better than to accept what they say on faith. So I went in search of this resource and this language, to see if it is as scary and offensive as they say.

I want to begin with some good news: unlike the Ethnic Studies case, ACES and its allies do not appear to have completely fabricated the inclusion of the putatively offensive material. Congratulations, ACES! This is a big step forward for you as an organization, and you should give yourself a hearty pat on the back.

Alas, if we ask for more than "not fabricated" and stretch all the way out to "not abjectly misleading", things get dimmer.

Start with the CMF draft. From what I can tell, the section they refer to (where the Pathway document is "included as a resource") is on page 44 of chapter two (lines 1010-13). Here, in its totality, is what's included:

Other resources for teaching mathematics with a social justice perspective include... The five strides of Equitable Math.org: https://ift.tt/3qNG3O2

That's it (The website "Equitablemath.org" is titled "A Pathway to Equitable Math Instruction"). It is mentioned, unadorned, in the "other resources" conclusion -- and as far as I can tell, nowhere else. Wowzers. I can feel the racial divisiveness cracking up from here.

One thing I'll observe on this is that often times one hears critics of "critical race theory" (or whatever random buzzword they're using today to connote "scary left-wing idea with a vaguely identity-politics kick") say that their problem isn't that the idea is included, but only that its indoctrinated -- it's not one perspective of many, it's the only perspective on offer. This protestation was always rather thin -- the many many bills banning "critical race theory" are decidedly not about ensuring viewpoint diversity -- and one sees just how hollow it is here. The raw, unadorned inclusion of the Equitable Math resource -- as part of a broader whole, not even quoted from directly -- is too much for these people to tolerate. This is not about ideological heterodoxy. This is about censoring ideas, full stop.

But maybe Equitable Math is such an awful or inane document that it would be wrong to include it, even as one resource among many. The way it's described, after all, makes it sound like Equitable Math is a group of hippies saying "2+2 = 4 is the white man's answer, man! Fight the power!" Is that what's happening? Is this a fever dream of post-modernism where nothing is true and everything is permitted?

Once again, I had to dig for myself to figure out where this content was so I could see it in context. The answer appears to be the first document on the site, titled "Dismantling Racism in Mathematics", on pages 65-68. Do they deny that there are such things as "right" answers in math? No: "Of course, most math problems have correct answers," but there are math problems (particularly word problems, but also data analysis) that can be interpreted in different ways that yield different "right" conclusions, and students and teachers should be attentive to that possibility. Do they say one should never "address mistakes"? No again, but mistakes should not simply be called out flatly but rather used as "opportunities for learning" with an emphasis on building on what the student does understand to lead them to recognize what they misapprehend.

I don't teach math, obviously, but there are many occasions where I'll say "such-and-such is the doctrinally correct answer -- but if we look at the problem from this other vantage, doesn't this other position become more plausible?" So when the Equitable Math site suggests, as an alternative to obsessive focus on the one correct answer, classroom activities like " Using a set of data, analyze it in multiple ways to draw different conclusions" -- well, that doesn't seem weird to me. Certainly, as someone who is also trained as a social scientist, I can say confidently that it's quite valuable to anyone who has seen how the same dataset can be deployed by different people with different priors to support different agendas.

Even more than that, the suggestions around "addressing mistakes" resonate with how I try to teach in my classrooms. Sometimes my students say something wrong. When they do so, for the most part I don't say "bzzzt" and move on, instead I try to guide them to the correct answer by having them unpack their own thinking. There's a lot of "I see what you mean by [X], but suppose ..." and ask questions which hone in on the problems or misunderstandings latent in what they're saying. And eventually they get there, hopefully without feeling like they've just been put inside an Iron Maiden for daring speak up.

Admittedly, I've never thought of what I'm doing as "dismantling White supremacy" -- I just viewed it as good pedagogy. But then again, that's kind of what I've always thought when asked about such subjects -- we act as if there's this deep magic to fostering equity and inclusion in the classroom, when really it's employing the basic strategies of being a good teacher, one of which is declining to engage in a measuring contest where you prove you know more than the student does. Obviously I know more than the student does. I don't need to prove anything. So if they say something wrong, I do not gleefully pounce on them for it, I do my best to build on what they do know to get them to a position of right. Is that so outrageous?

Finally, ACES in its tweet identifies one other area of crazy-lefty-craziness in this resource: "the incorporation of 'Ethnomathematics'". What does that mean? They don't say, correctly surmising that fevered imaginations will produce something far worse than anything they might quote. So I'll do the quoting for them (this comes from page 8):

Center Ethnomathematics:

• Recognize the ways that communities of color engage in mathematics and problem solving in their everyday lives.

• Teach that mathematics can help solve problems affecting students’ communities. Model the use of math as a solution to their immediate problems, needs, or desires.

• Identify and challenge the ways that math is used to uphold capitalist, imperialist, and racist views.

• Teach the value of math as both an abstract concept and as a useful everyday tool.

• Expose students to examples of people who have used math as resistance. Provide learning opportunities that use math as resistance.

I know, I know -- we're all going to pitch a fit about challenging "capitalist views". But apart from that, this seems ... very normal? We all know, to the point of cliche, that a barrier to getting kids interested in math is that they fail to see how it's useful to them or "in the real world". So they advise that math be taught in a way that resonates with real world experience. And likewise, sometimes, for some people "in the real world", math can feel like an enemy (think "am I just a statistic to you?"). So figure out ways to name that and challenge that. For the most part, "ethnomathematics" just reads as a particular social justice gloss on "being a good teacher", as applied to teaching in diverse communities.

Now perhaps one disagrees with these concepts as pedagogical best practice. I'm not a math teacher, I'm not going to claim direct experience here. But that goes back to the intensity of the backlash -- that these ideas need to be banned, that they are outright dangerous and unacceptable and neo-racism. Can that be right? Surely, these ideas are not so outlandish that we should pitch a fit about their being (deep breath) single elements of an 80 page document which is itself part of a five part series being incorporated as a single "see also" bullet point in the second chapter of a thirteen chapter model state framework. Seriously? That's where we're landing? That's what's going to drive us into a valley of racial division and despair?

It's wild. The people engaged in this obsessive crusade to make Everest size mountains over backyard anthills are nothing short of wild.

via The Debate Link https://ift.tt/39P79OA

#academia #education #math #racism

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