#i was taught that i should be performing at everything at a higher level than every single abled person i know

[camillathe6th]

I’ll take 1-50 for my BELOVEDEST hero but barring that, 6, 21, 28, and 42 💕

Hi!! I’m very late to reply to these. Thank you so much, I’ll try to keep it down to a normal amount of words (…)

6. What were they like at school? Did they enjoy it? Did they finish? What level of higher education did they reach? What subjects did they enjoy? Which did they hate?

So, Hero was taught at home until she went to the college of lore, and while she wanted to hate it (sending her there was in part a way to keep her out of the way and keep her existence on the down low), it was everything she wanted and the gateway into honing skills that would sceal her freedom. She did finish, and she loved music, spell work (her preference goes to psychic spells), storytelling and arcana the most; she also enjoyed religion, but in conflating religion with storytelling: the stories we tell ourselves can become shackles if you forget that truth is as flexible as everything else, and who bends it.

Hero loves learning and is studious: she didn’t really hate any subject, at school or at home, though she had beef with etiquette, since it was used to remind her of her place (placeless). It turned out useful for deception purposes though, so she’s made her peace with it easily; etiquette is only another way to play-act, and she loves performance.

21. Do they have a temper? Are they patient? What are they like when they do lose their temper?

Hmmm. Not a temper, per se, but Hero is very… petty. In most cases, if she is angry or vexed, she retaliates in venomous but not explosive ways (though some of those ways DO lead to murder). In that, she is patient — but patient to strike. Her temper is circumstantial; if she has the upper hand, if she’s taunted with provocations she enjoys (wit sparring, deception4deception, charlatanism), she’ll play the game with delighted patience; even defeat will be taken in stride, if the adversary played as well as her (her scenes with Raphael are a nightmare: they’re both having way too much fun with devil bargains).

All in all, she doesn’t mind being underestimated or insulted when it’s all part of the wider scene, a scene she has some control over. Someone else’s frustration or anger only sharpens her patience and her provocations: needling the temper of others delights her. However, if she showed a shred of bravery and sincerity in lending a hand or trying to comfort and is punished/disrespected for it, she turns viper-like immediately—when showed, her temper is tantrums, tied to surprise, underappreciation, or unexpected defeat. Putting her life at stake is not a duty, it’s a service she could have chosen to withhold, and ungratefulness or belittlement of her achievements make her bristle. Anything tied to her origins / her family would also make her snap, but she’s secretive enough about this that nobody really has that weapon in her arsenal.

Maybe Raphael… Maybe I should write Raphael talking to Hero about her daddy issues and watch her combust.

28. What is their biggest fear? What in general scares them? How do they act when they’re scared?

The loss of her freedom, for sure. Though she is not one to dream of death for glory, she would rather die fighting than being taken into slavery (or so she believes). She has lofty ideals of freedom, which have lead her into the life she lead in Baldur’s Gate before the nautiloid (charlatan bard, a face with many masks and connections which were never tethers), and have sustained her until now. However, both her adventure through Faerûn (the many faces of enslavement she sees first hand, and finds in herself the desire to fight, while she equated freedom with staunch individualism before), and learning to know Astarion, Karlach and Shadowheart, especially, are teaching her how simplistic her views were in that respect, and how easy the “prisons” she fled were.

BUT that’s not the question. Losing the capacity to wriggle free scares her very much: bargains, gods, devils, parasites and guardians, all of them excite her (the desire to beat them at their own game) and terrify her in equal measure; she’s pushed and pulled between arrogance and the awareness that she could become the toy of those more powerful than her. She’s good at masking fear, testing boundaries, projecting either weakness or insolence depending on what the situation allows; but if the situation is lost and fear takes over, she’s not above fleeing.

42. What are their goals? What would they sacrifice anything for? What is their secret ambition?

She had achieved her goals before the Nautiloid: it was to live as she did, free, unknown, unmoored, a sort of half-entity made of fantasy as much as flesh. In any eyes she could become wha she wanted to be, then disappear. She was not real, but that meant that she was not tied. She’s rethinking that now. Secretly (not so secretly—her name is Hero after all, and she chose that), she did wish to become a story rather than their conduit, one day, maybe, in a sort of fond, impossible dream way; you need people and trust and attachment to be worthy of a story, and you need to forget the story in favour of the real and the now, and she wasn’t planning on putting herself or her freedom at risk that way. This, too, has changed.

[willknightauthor]

The problem is that many teachers are just trying to get through their jobs, and are basically automating their own assignments. Standardized tests were created specifically to automate everything. Now the students have the power to automate too. If you have one of those teachers who makes genuinely good assignments I think you can make an argument that AI is just enabling laziness.

As with everything, I think we need less quantity and more quality. I question the whole idea of homework. One of my friends is one of the best teacher I ever met, and he never assigned homework. Yet any class he taught became one of the highest performing in his high school. His whole approach reflected Paulo Freire's writings: taking a subject matter, brainstorming with the students what about that area they had questions about or found interesting, and then using that as an entry point for self-directed project-based learning. Any time I ever tried to use an argument, including ones like this, he always had a clapback that boiled down to: "Our schooling systems don't prioritize education. If they did this wouldn't be a problem."

Kids aren't devaluing the educational content of assignments out of nowhere, they're just reading the room. Many teachers' assignments are just busywork. Even when they're not, society and the system itself is constantly sending the message that that's not what's important. What matters is performance on metrics.

It's one of the fundamental contradictions of our form of social organization which will eventually take it down. It already produces managers less qualified than their subordinates, all the way up to the highest levels. Finally the workers can fake it until they make it as much as their bosses! Eventually we'll no longer be able to coast, and the only solution will be to remake these systems from the ground up.

One of the best writing assignments I ever had was for a philosophy course in undergrad that took the whole semester. Each "assignment" was just a stage of the draft of the final paper. We would go over each other's drafts, mark them up, and talk about them. The next draft would reflect the corrections. Even if we had all used AI for the writing, the critiquing would've still taught us something. The end result was a much higher average level for all the final papers, and a course that inadvertently taught us how to reason, argue, and write through its assignments.

All busywork and grade-book fillers should be replaced with that: one giant assignment that you complete in stages over the course of the semester, with the assistance of your classmates, under the supervision of your teacher.

Zizek made a good point on this when he commented on how now both the teacher and the student were mindlessly disposing of the busywork of educational bureaucracy, so maybe we can get back to actual teaching. You'd need more systematic changes than that, but it gets to the root of it: a lot of education now is performative babysitting and credentialing. We might not want it to be that way, but it is. They use your motivation to do actual teaching to get you into the room doing the babysitting and credentialing for shit pay.

Until AI there was a huge industry in online essay writing, especially for college entry essays. The fact that people would want to pay for that, and that it would work, is a sign that maybe the fundamental logic of our systems is wrong. AI can't produce novelty or greatness on its own, but it can produce passable boilerplate.

We already automated all the other parts, turned most humans into cogs who can't make the important decisions, tied everything to numbers that oversimplify the underlying qualities, and prioritized "number go up" in every aspect of society including education. Now people have a button to make the number go up.

My experiences with education have long made me think credentialing for every field should be done the way lawyers do it, with a separate association from the school which is responsible for determining if you actually pass muster. Schools as such exist just to train you and provide you connections and recommendations. You can just go straight to the testing if you want. It eliminates the problem of grades meaning different things from different schools, and people from other countries who are highly trained not being able to get their qualifications recognized here.

Since entering the trades, now I think that combined with apprenticeship is the way to go. Direct, hands on training, supplemented with classes tied directly to skills you'll need, all supervised on site and in class by high level people from the field. Whether you pass is determined by whether they all think you met the standards, based on what they've actually seen from you. AI can't fake your trustworthiness and competence on the job.

High level academia should be exclusively for research. That's what PhD programs train you to do, and it's what all the grants are for. But we have these people who primarily care about research being forced to teach and often sucking at it, meanwhile adjuncts are doing the best teaching for the core classes and barely getting paid. Teaching physics isn't the same thing as doing physics research.

Basically, we should design our systems to prioritize actual use-value outcomes, overseen and judged by collectives of qualified people who directly observe you, not based on grades and metrics. Education itself shouldn't be a gatekeeping system, but a system for empowerment, which first gives you important life skills like critical thinking, and then trains you to do the things you actually want and need to do. And everyone should get paid well for doing it.

Absent that, we'll have the same problems forever, juster faster or slower.

(If you mass-produce shit short stories and flood short story and poetry submission boxes with them, fuck you tho. None of that shit gets through, it just makes life harder for the editors. More moneygrubbing bullshit intruding into a system very much not designed for making money.)

[skelingtonsderek]

You ever see something that causes you psychic damage?

They're talking about getting their kid tested for ADHD because the school recommended it and instead getting their kid identified as gifted and put on an accelerated track.

I love to be the bearer of news here for ya because accelerated learning tracks are GREAT accomodations for people with ADHD.

Turns out he was just bored? Respectfully, do you understand what ADHD is and how it works? Of course he's bored he has ADHD.

The "gifted" program's gift is actually just late diagnosis once your kid leaves the academic world and discovers that they have received zero actual skills, habits, or support to help them be successful as an adult.

I think the really fucking tragic part is that most of the time late diagnosis happens AFTER the new adult has crashed and burned trying to establish themselves after they leave the nest. Oftentimes going in for help for depression and coming out with an ADHD diagnosis because it turns out their depression is comorbid.

Tl;dr: Without knowing you have a disability, it is impossible to accommodate your disability so that you can still fucking function and learn how to flourish as yourself. End fucking stop.

[doubledgesword-2]

Can I get Vil Schoenheit x Rival Celebrity? They shoot insults at each other but end up flirting? Take it as far as you want! Any gender reader is fine lol

Oh, ma Gooosh!! This is the first Matcha Tea I've gotten, and I'm all for this. I had so much fun with this one, and I want to show you lil' sugar cubes the difference between characters I know and the ones that I don't. I do my research before writing a character that I'm unfamiliar with, but I will be sincere: I butchered the last request (Shalnark's). I will try to rewrite it, but other characters apart from the stated ones are a bit hard for me ( ˘︹˘ ).

I will always try my best for ya'll! Enjoy this steaming Matcha (❛‿❛✿)

“What a shameless potato,” nimble fingers scrolled down on their phone, looking at the menagerie of pictures from one single account: yours.

You and Vil were from the same industry, just not the same department per se. While he was a model and actor, you were a j pop star and actress. Your popularity and his were on the same level, but he was slightly higher if you asked him or his fans. Ever since the two of you met on set for a fantasy-like movie, you repelled each other’s presence like oil and water.

Amethyst eyes glared at your smiling picture, and a thousand critiques passed through his mind. Your make-up did not complement your features; what was your make-up artist thinking? That nail polish didn’t match with your skin, and your haircut didn’t go with your face and countless other thoughts. But that wasn’t his place to tell, and besides, you living in his head rent-free wasn’t good for his skin. Stress kills, and thinking about you was very stressful.

The subway doors opened, and Vil gripped his side bag, adjusting his beret and sunglasses and walking out with the amount of confidence and power it took to walk down the runway. The sea of people diligently coming and going parted for him without a cue. They just did like mindless fish around a predator. It was in their nature to give in, in the presence of something so regal.

Vil had a photoshoot to go, and he couldn’t miss a beat. His agenda was full and complicated; anyone who tried to follow it would surely lose their minds after the first three days of the same arduous pace. But he could handle it with the grace of a swan. He was the great Vil Shoenheit. He wondered if you could handle a week in his shoes. You probably would drop exhausted and disheveled, complaining about the hard work. The thought made him smirk smugly, and passerby fans who recognized him couldn’t even keep up to ask for an autograph.

He just couldn’t fathom how you had such a fan base with your attitude and manners. Sure, in front of the cameras, you were a sweetheart, stealing everyone’s hearts, singing like an empowered angel, and making them think you were as far from the villain he knew you truly were. Vil knew your kind and recognized it the moment he met you on set. Heck, you couldn’t even contain your disdain in interviews when the two of you had to sit side by side. It was uncomfortable, to say the least; the poor reporter was so painfully awkward trying to alleviate the tenseness in the room.

“So (Y/N), how do you feel being an actress in a big-budget movie while also singing and performing the next week? Is it exhausting?”

You sided glared at Vil, and gave the reporter a smug grin. “Well, I think I can handle a little bit of work. It’s not in me to sit around and look pretty, you know. But then again, I guess that’s what some people are into, so we can’t judge them. They might not understand hard work.”

Vil smiled with closed eyes. You were such an amateur. If it weren’t for the fact that you were actively throwing shade on him and being so annoying at it, too, he might think you were cute.

Of course, Vil wouldn’t back down; that’s not what he was taught. The crown was his, and he would take it with hard work and determination. Which means potatoes like you don’t really matter in the long run of things.

“Vil-senpai, how do you manage your modeling gig and your acting? I mean, it must be hard to run from one event to the next since they’re so close behind each other?”

“Well, dear, we models are more than just a pretty face. We represent big companies and events that many couldn’t even fathom getting into. My schedule might be a bit tight, but I was born into this lifestyle, and I have learned many skills to help me move and work in these types of environments. I can say one thing for sure not a lot of people can handle my agenda, one day in my heels, and they might slip if you know what I mean, darling.”

You scoffed under your breath, and it made Vil’s smile grow wider.

“Ahh, Vil-senpai is a hard worker for sure. Perhaps one day I could do an interview that can provide insight to one day of your agenda.”

“Anytime you want, darling, it would be lovely,” he knew with every word that came out of his mouth; you simmered even more.

“Are there any hobbies or activities that can fit into your schedules?

Vil was about to open his mouth when you beat him to it.

“Well, I don’t think he’s allowed to have any, you know, with his busy schedule. But I do love partaking in (hobby). I think it is a nice way to unwind and take my mind off of everything. Since stress it’s not good for your vocals, you know. I try to keep myself in top shape for my lovely fans.”

Vil was raging. How dare you interrupt him when he was clearly about to talk. Didn’t your parent taught you any manners, or are you so much of a spoiled brat to care for?

“Ahh, interesting. Does Vil Sendai have any hobbies in particular?

“As a matter of fact, I do” you were looking at him with an expectant smirk. You were genuinely curious to hear what he had to say. “I like to make beauty and make-up tutorials that are beneficial for a lot of my fans. I like to show them how to use brushes correctly what and what not to do with concealer. Those are bonding moments for me and my fans. I think they are important.”

At the end of that interview, a single question brought the anger and tense meter to burst. Now the tensions and dislikes weren’t palpable. They were visible.

“Oh, I’ve had some partners, but I like to focus more on my work, unlike some other artists who like to jump around; my projects come first, and I don’t want to ruin my partner’s and I relationship by not spending enough time with them.”

“Wow, he really doesn’t like to have fun.”

“I do just not with the likes of you.”

“Come on, pretty boy, you couldn’t handle me even if you were begging pretty on your knees.”

“Dream on, potato, you might be prettier than most potatoes, but you’re still that a potato with some potential. I bet if push came to shove, you wouldn’t last seconds with me.

“I bet you wouldn’t make it into the second round without having to retouch your make-up with me. Besides, it’s not like you’ll last long enough to even sweat that much.”

“Well, that’s a relief to know I wouldn’t have to put much effort into pleasing someone like you.”

The reporter was utterly flushed, and that was cut from the interview recording. Good thing that it was, or people might’ve gotten the wrong impression. That you liked each other or something.

Or something.

After that interview, rumors spread like they always do, and fans started gossiping about the two of you secretly together but having to hate each other in public to save face since it’s a big rumor that singers and models don’t actually go well together in the industry.

Such wild imagination and machinations fans have. It brought out a small chuckle.

Vil passed through the automatic doors telling the receptionist his name and guiding him to the set. Once there, he settled his stuff over the make-up table and sat back to look once more through his phone.

“Have you seen this?” A text notification annoying appeared on the screen.

Vil tch and opened the message to reveal a very well photoshopped photo of him and you sitting and drinking at some café. You were smiling like he just told you you were beautiful, and it was a good look on you.

This was outrageous. Who would go to such lengths? Suddenly a bag dropped right on the table next to him. He looked up to meet your eyes as you took off your sunglasses, slowly realizing who was sitting beside you.

“Oh no,” you faintly muttered underneath your breath but not faintly enough that Vil couldn’t hear you.

He scoffed and went back to look at the stupid picture, texting his manager as mad as he was.

“Oh, you saw it too,” you commented, sitting down and looking at your own phone.

Vil didn’t answer. He really didn’t care about your opinion on this; his credibility was on the line. He was supposed to hate you, and that’s how things should go.

“Well, at least they got a good angle of my face, not to mention I’m actually smiling for once.”

“Actually, smil- what are you talking about potato? All you do is smile in all of your pictures. That’s why you have to hide your wrinkles with make-up,” he said as if it was the most obvious thing.

“Well, as presumptuous as that was, proud little peacock, I actually never smile genuinely for the cameras. My genuine smile is reserved for good moments. I guess not anymore.”

At that, Vil felt like the two of you clicked. He knew the feeling, the invasive nature of fame, and the lack of privacy was very real in the industry. It’s the first thing you have to get through. But listening to you say made him realize you’re just like him.

“Well, if you behave during the shoot, I might feel inclined to reward you for good behavior” he grinned at you.

“Mmm, you make it sound as if you don’t like the way I make you crumble in front of everyone. It’s like you’re denying yourself the pleasure, and here I thought you liked the masochism.”

“Hahahaha, I’ll step on you once we’re done here. Maybe that and a little bit of discipline will put you in your place. However, your lack of manners and running mouth might be a problem; perhaps all you need is a nice pacifier. I can help with that.”

You both were so close to each other muttering salacious threats that you didn’t realize how flustered everyone else was in the room.

It was going to be another one of those shoots.

[vladdocs]

Dracula's Life from 7 to 14 - Part 1 By Lyzhina Svetlana Sergeevna (Лыжина Светлана Сергеевна) Original in Russian: http://samlib.ru/l/lyzhina_s_s/dracula_7_14_1.shtml Annotation: Dracula's life from age 7 to 14 is the darkest period in his biography. Most authors do not even try to look into this darkness, but jump straight from childhood in Transylvania to the Turkish captivity, mentioning growing up as far as it goes. I will not, however, do so... The period from age 7 to 14 is important primarily because this is when Dracula began to realize himself as a Romanian. Before the age of 7, the world is pretty narrow for a person: mom, dad, grandparents and other relatives. Before the age of 7, a child does not really care about his own nationality, because he does not yet fully understand what it is. But after the age of 7, the horizons widen, and such notions as "small motherland" and "big motherland" appear. Dracula saw his Romanian homeland for the first time when he was about 7 years old, and, apparently, this first meeting made a strong impression on him. First time in his homeland In the summer of 1436, Dracula's father took over the Romanian throne and moved his family from Sighisoara to Tirgoviste, the Romanian capital of that time, no later than the fall of the same year. As a result, the life of the 7-year-old Dracula changed abruptly: 1) he now heard Romanian speech not only from his household, but also from everyone around him. 2) Home services were replaced by visits to the temple, rich and beautiful, and the services there were conducted to the highest standard, as a well staged theatrical performance. 3) The attitude of those around him changed. Everybody bowed to little Dracula like to the king's son, and even his peers, 7-year old boys like him, were obliged to bow. 4) the way of life changed - many new servants appeared, and the dwelling became much more spacious. _ _ _ _ Historical note: The house in Sighisoara was relatively small - 25x11 m in length and width, if we do not count the inner courtyard and the side passageway. At the same time the palace in Targoviste in the mid 1430s was 32x29 meters in length and width. It is not difficult to calculate that in terms of area it was almost twice as big as the house in Sigishoara. And that again without taking into account the adjoining territory enclosed by a fortress wall of 250x20 m. On this territory there was a temple built specially for the prince and his courtiers, as well as household premises. In addition there were extensive gardens and vegetable gardens, as well as ponds for trout breeding. They were necessary because the palace regularly hosted feasts at which enormous quantities of all kinds of food were eaten. _ _ _ _ We cannot say whether Dracula accepted his new life with delight or was embarrassed, but the boy saw the mood of his parents, who were clearly happy about what was happening. This should have led the child to believe that he, too, should be happy. Intensified Learning The only thing that definitely did not make little Dracula happy was his studies, because after he moved to Targoviste, his education was taken seriously. In textbooks on the history of pedagogy, you can read that all countries that have adopted the culture of the Byzantine Empire, along with Orthodoxy, adopted the system of teaching children. Romania is no exception in this sense. As in all other Orthodox countries, teaching followed the principles formulated by John Chrysostom: 1) simplicity of life, without excesses (so that the child would not fall into a dependence on comfort); 2) education with an emphasis on spiritual values (and contempt for material things); 3) strict control (parents watch where the child goes, what he/she does, what he/she says) 4) possibility of corporal punishment in case of disobedience (Chrysostom suggests "flogging"). Education had three levels: primary, secondary, and higher. They began to study (I repeat) at the age of 6-7 years old. Primary education was completed before the age of 12. Secondary education was

completed at the age of 17. It turns out that Dracula never received a higher education, because he was sent to the Turks at the age of about 14. No one in Turkey followed the Byzantine system of education. Dracula's higher education was replaced by lessons in the Turkish language and Turkish customs... But back to Dracula's elementary education. Elementary School Elementary education included four subjects: - arithmetic (counting on fingers, on pebbles, and in mind), - grammar (in this case Slavonic), - rhetoric, - philosophy (philosophy in the Middle Ages was perceived as the first step toward the study of "higher philosophy" - theology). The process of teaching itself was a little different from today - the children sat together, but each student was taught separately by the teacher. The grammar was taught on the basis of the texts of the Holy Scriptures and the lives of the saints. Rhetoric was modeled on the works of the same John Chrysostom. In the beginning, during the lessons of rhetoric children were supposed to retell the contents of texts and tell them by heart, and when children accumulated enough knowledge, the teacher arranged eloquence contests between pupils, where they were supposed to support their words with appropriate quotations. It is difficult to say whether Dracula competed with his elder brother, because the practice of competitions existed only in Byzantium, but, for example, in Russia such competitions did not exist. In addition, all forms of rivalry between Dracula and his older brother should have been opposed by the tutors, because in the family of Dracula on the paternal line practiced a special system of state management - the king had a co-helper in the person of the younger brother. About this writes researcher M.Kazaku. Dracula's grandfather Mircea the Old was at one time co-ruler of his elder brother Dan, and when his brother died, Mircea ruled alone. Dracula's father, Dracul Sr. was at one time co-ruler of his older brother Mihai, and when Mihai died, Dracul Sr. ruled alone. Dracula himself must also have been indoctrinated from a young age to be his brother's helper. An assistant, not a rival! All training and education of Dracula should be subordinated to this idea - Dracula should be prepared to help his brother and carry out all his orders, and in case of his brother's death he should continue his work. That is to say, he should continue it, and not do anything on his own! Dracula could think of no other fate, for he had before him the example of his father and grandfather, and in the Middle Ages the power of tradition was unusually strong. Apparently, when Dracula was sent as a hostage to the Sultan, he was encouraged by the same words about the need to help the elders: "Living with the Sultan, you will help your father and older brother a lot. And Dracula must have believed it, but later, when his father and older brother died suddenly, Dracula could not immediately get his bearings. He found himself in a role as an older man for which he was not at all prepared. He had no time to be instructed what to do and how to do it, so he had to decide everything on his own, to break his usual worldview and generally learn to be a leader... But here we are, once again, off-topic. Middle School According to the Byzantine system, the secondary level of education included the study of three new subjects: geometry, music, astronomy. Geometry, Dracula and his brother, of course, studied. In addition, it is known that as early as the 11th or 12th century, a collection of quotations from Aristotle about mathematics appeared in Slavic. These quotations together formed a coherent system, so that children in Slavic countries studied from this collection as from a textbook. Music in those days meant learning church singing, but it is unlikely that Dracula and his brother had time for that, because the Byzantine educational system in the Middle Ages did NOT include physical training, and sovereign's children needed this training. The physical training in the case of Dracula and his

brother was military training, where the pupil had to master 3 skills: 1) the ability to fight on foot; 2) the ability to fight on horseback; 3) the ability to command an army so as to lead it to victory. Perhaps the list of disciplines Dracula had to study after the age of 12 also included history and politics. Perhaps, the list also included Latin, but here we can not say anything for sure, because according to the Byzantine system of education all this (Latin, history, politics) belonged to the higher level of education, which, as we know, due to a number of tragic circumstances Dracula did not reach. Practical results of "Byzantine" education In a number of articles about Dracula one can read that he was supposedly a savage and ignorant - a kind of Neanderthal, but not with a club, but with a stake, who got an idea of culture only thanks to the years spent in "enlightened" Turkey. However, all this is nonsense! Dracula was educated before Turkey, and everything I've said here about the Byzantine system of education used in Romania for the education of the sovereign's children - not just a guesswork. All of this is confirmed in historical documents. From the texts that have survived from the time of Dracula, we can see that the Romanian rulers were literate people, read spiritual literature and were able to speak beautifully. For example, the beginning of the charter from May 20, 1388, which was dictated by the grandfather of Dracula, Mircea the Old. This charter is a gift to the monastery, but before going on to enumerate what will be given to the monastery, the prince reasons about God as well as a theologian: "Whom the Spirit of God guides, they are the sons of God, says the holy apostle, and to him echoes every one who values truth and does good works, desiring to receive eternal life - to leave earthly things on earth for the reward in heaven. Blessed are those who have heard the good voice, for they hear it always: "Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. In the same way, I, believing in Christ God and Christ-loving and autocratic voivode and lord of all the land of Ugrovlakh, <...> as much as I can, want to follow this voice and glorify God, who glorified me and in glory enthroned me on the throne of my parents". That's how he bent it! Here are the results of the rhetoric lessons, which were part of the first level of education according to the Byzantine system! No wonder that everyone liked these words of Mircea. It is no coincidence that in his letter of December 12, 1424, uncle of Dracula, Prince Dan II, reproduces them, and then another relative of Dracula, Prince Alexander Aldea, does the same in his letter of June 25, 1436. Dracula himself quotes this statement in his charter of April 16, 1457. And here is how Dracula's father weaves verbal lace in his letter of August 2, 1439: "And who dares <... > violate my approval and command, such let the Lord God strike with his terrible and just judgment, and let the Holy Lady of the Theotokos speak against this man, and let him be damned on behalf of the seven holy ecumenical councils, and let him be counted among those who, like Judas and Arius, denied the Lord, and all those who betrayed the Lord to death". Of course, many edicts in those days ended with a standard curse on possible violators, but Dracula's father added to this curse, which most modern readers can appreciate only after they look in an encyclopedia. Can you tell at a glance what "ecumenical councils" and "Arian heresy" are? But Dracula's father could! And, apparently, he knew church history. That is, he was highly educated. As for Dracula himself, we can judge the level of his education by his statements, which, of course, distorted by numerous retellings, but the essence remains. For example, the episode with the Turkish ambassadors who did not remove their headdresses under the pretext that the "law" forbade. "And I want to follow your law," says Dracula, "so that you may hold fast to it. In doing so, he almost quotes

the Gospel, which says, "I have not come to break the law, but to fulfill it." And think of the burned beggars: "...I delivered them, so that they would not suffer in this world from poverty or from disease. The very course of Dracula's reasoning leads us to believe that this ruler in his time studied both the Holy Scriptures and rhetoric. Travels around the country In addition to "book sciences" and "warfare" in Dracula's education was one more component, and a very important one - study tours around the country, i.e. in Romania. However, Dracula had to perceive these trips in a different way than his older brother, because the older brother was prepared for the role of a ruler, and Dracula - for the role of an assistant to the ruler. Dracula's older brother perceived cities, villages, fields and forests as his future property. Dracula, seeing all the same, perceived it as his brother's property to be protected. If Dracula's older brother thought, "All this exists for me - for my needs and my pleasure," then Dracula thought, "I must take care of the preservation of it all. This is why in Dracula's behavior when he reached adulthood we find a motive not at all characteristic of the rulers of that time - the motive of service to one's country. Dracula was not brought up as a ruler, so even when he became a ruler, he did not get rid of the attitude that was hammered into his head throughout his childhood and adolescence - you were born to serve and help. He did all those things he did - eradicating crime, winning favourable trade conditions for Romanian merchants, waging war against the Turks - not for himself and not even for specific people. He did it all for Romania, which he called his "patrimony," not in the sense of his ownership of the land, but in the sense of his concern for it. This is how Dracula's notion of homeland was formed, which was Romania, although his early childhood took place in Transylvania.

[thatblackboianarchist]

Giftedness is a Spook

I personally think giftedness is a stupid concept. Basically, it’s the idea that certain children, so folks under the age of 18, are “smarter” in some general or abstract sense than others, or more competent, more talented, more skilled, “better thinkers”, whatever. This concept originated pretty much in the 19th and 20th centuries, where we began consolidating under the “intelligence” label and categorizing people based on “how smart” and “how dumb” they are. There is a lot of baggage associated with the term giftedness, a lot of it historical and bigoted, so let’s investigate and such.

The most used definition of giftedness is having an IQ score above 130, or two standard deviations above the mean of 100. Though this historical definition has faced lots of criticism, since it is clearly possible to have superior ability in some domain without having a conventionally high IQ score, such as in the arts, or debating and public speaking, or sports, or chess, or really anything really.

Due to the fact that the “IQ above 130” definition of giftedness falls short of actually capturing all high-achieving children, most modern gifted education programmes no longer use this as the sole indicator of giftedness, and rather adopt a more multidisciplinary approach. Now, most simply look for superior skill or talent in one or more key areas, which can be art, or sports, or leadership, and attempt to cultivate that, as well as looking for people with a generally higher IQ than the average in their age group.

The issue with this approach is that it views giftedness as some sort of intrinsic, fully general, conserved property that is only found in certain sects of the population, and thus categorizes people into “gifted” and “non-gifted”. This categorization falls short in part due to the existence of “twice-exceptional” students, who are gifted in one area, but require unique accommodations in other areas. So it appears that it is possible to be “gifted” and “non-gifted” at the same time, so just how useful is this concept?

What’s more, giftedness often focuses on general cognitive traits, such as gifted children have greater white matter density, or faster information processing speed, or hear sounds faster, or think more critically, but from my perspective, these just seem to be variations in human characteristics, in the same way that some children are taller than others or start puberty earlier than others. Everyone develops at their own pace and there are plenty of people who develop out of the norm, especially since concepts of child development almost always exclude neurodivergent children and their different cognitive and psychosocial milestones.

And they are not necessarily NATURAL or inevitable variations in human characteristics either. All the traits associated with intelligence - information processing speed, critical thinking, white and grey matter density, working memory capacity, creativity, executive functions, enhanced senses - are heavily influenced by societal factors.

For instance, a child that has been well-fed since birth is obviously going to have a more developed brain with a higher capacity for all those things than a child that has suffered chronic hunger. A child that receives nurturing and good parents is going to have a more developed brain a child that receives abusive and neglectful parents. A child that grows up in a war zone is going to be different cognitively and intellectually than a child that grows up in a relatively peaceful location.

And those developmental consequences aren’t always natural in the sense that they are innate, they are artificial, engineered by politicians, corporations, and a society that absolutely refuses to take the suffering of children seriously. Yet the children who have been disadvantaged by this abusive society are unlikely to be categorized as gifted. These children show lower scores on IQ tests and the school system thinks they’re dumb, or worse “average”. These children don’t show superior performance in any particular area, there must be something wrong with them, they’re not “special” like these gifted kids other here. They don’t need special help, they just have to follow the curriculum for the regular or the *gasp* dumb kids, geta 9-to-5 job, and wait 50 years to retire, they won’t be these gifted kids that change the world.

LAME. This is lame. This is the wrong way to think about the differences that exist between children. And what’s worse, it’s so definite and unchanging, as if the traits associated with intelligence cannot be changed. As if we can’t help children with their working memory capacity, or their creativity, or their critical thinking, or their executive functions. As if we can’t help children find something they enjoy and let them cultivate that activity. These are all skills that can be taught, but they aren’t taught at all. We just let the bell curve “form naturally” and then take the kids on the right-half of it and label them “gifted” and then discard the rest, even though we are capable of teaching them those skills.

Giftedness promotes two unhealthy narratives: (1) being average isn’t good enough and (2) being below average is bad. With regards to (1) and (2), it completely ignores all of the facets of a good life, or what can be a good life. In my view, a good life is one that you enjoy and are proud of. Where you have strong relationships with others, actual freedom and control over your life, where you have things that you’re good at or enjoy doing, where you are proud of what you’ve accomplished. It has nothing to do with “having a higher working memory capacity” what the fuck?

There is value in being “average” or “mediocre” or “below average” or “stupid”. You can still produce art that people enjoy. You can still be a good athlete. You can still get really good at a specific area of academia. You can still be a competent engineer. You can still connect with others and mean something to them. You can still travel the world, drink wine condescendingly, and have a good time meeting people and seeing things. You can still contribute to society, and you can even make innovations that change it, but you don’t have to make a “significant contribution” to a worthy member of society. You can still care about others. You already change society, just by being part of it, and that is enough.

Focus on the experiences you want to have, the relationships you want to build, and the skills you want to learn, not on “I want to be smarter” or “I want to have better memory” or “I want to be the best”. It’s okay to want to be smarter, or to have better memory, or even to be the best at something (since it’s not possible to be the best at EVERYTHING), but those things are relative.

When you become “smarter” at something, or the “best” or just better, at some specific domain, you will find that all the traits associated with intelligence tend to increase with regard to that specific domain. For example, when you get better at chess, you develop better problem-solving skills associated with chess, or more critical thinking in regards to games, or better memory for recalling chess piece arrangements or movement formation or techniques, or faster information processing speed in regards to processing your opponent’s and your own moves, or better “chess logic” or “chess reasoning skills”, or the ability to understand and reason about chess on it’s own.

Intelligence is relative and domain-specific, the superior memory you would develop in chess won’t cross over to, say, memorizing decks of cards, or generalize into just having a superior memory for all things. That’s not how human brains work, they are highly specific and skill-oriented. So when you focus on becoming “smarter in general”, you are essentially setting an impossible goal, because it’s not specific enough for you brain to be able to systemically learn and apply it. You have to be specific if you want to make any progress, after all, and this applies to our constructs of giftedness.

We have to be specific! We have to let children choose their interests and hobbies and help them develop natural talents, as well as explore their interests and help them reach a suitable level of competence, where suitability is determined by THEM, the child. When you let them develop interests and hobbies of their own choosing, they naturally will get “smarter” in that area, you know, better working memory and stuff in that regard.

And even if they don’t reach expert levels of performance, or perform averagely or even below average, it doesn’t really matter, since it’s not something they need to be an expert in. For knowledge that is universally relevant, like comprehensive sexual education, you should work on ensuring that your average is a high standard. But if the piece of knowledge or skill doesn’t meet “nigh-universally relevant” or “necessary to function in this society”, then who cares how will people learn it? Especially since they can always come back in the future and re-learn it, or improve on it.

We also have to address child suffering and ensure that all children have good and strong support networks, are well-fed, have medical care, are free from abuse, etc. This makes it easier for them to actually have the time, energy, and cognitive capacity to choose their own interests and hobbies, AND work at them. It also helps them make relationships, explore, learn, and make a good life for themselves.

Also, a quick note. Interests are just things that you like to do or have a feeling for; hobbies are recreational pursuits that you actively engage in. So, an interest can be looking at pictures of castles online, a hobby can be actively seeing castles in person. It’s more or less an arbitrary distinction, but I like to use them in tandem to cover all the bases.

[scrawnytreedemon]

Shit I’ve Been Winding Up For A Long Time Now But Am Very Aware Will Probably Hold No Relevance Should I Actually Go Into This More--

This is about Bhunivelze.

I.

You know, when I was chilling out, on my bed, that evening on that half term in early June, deciding to check up on ClementJ64′s FF retrospective because-- Hey! It’s been awhile, I wonder if he’s got around to doing the final bit of the FFXIII saga --You know, I was there, chilling, just for a laff. Just a laff.

The rest of that week was spent spiralling into a hyperfixation I absolutely did not anticipate in any way, shape, or form, because the way they introduced that character was “wwhdhfjjhHJDFJKHKJHW H A T??”

That retrospective and a good amount of wiki-scrounging is all I have as a basis for this. This is not a coherent character analysis-- Though I might tag it as that for ease of access. This is not, by any means, the thoughts of someone deeply familiar with FFXIII on the whole beyond plot synopses and overarching themes.

I don’t think I’m brave enough for that.

Reading the vast yet surface-deep lore on those wiki pages on my birthday while in a delirious state of mind was enough to make me somewhat nauseous.

Do you think I’m going to go through all of that in real time?

(Someday, someday.)

Ugh, I don’t know how to begin, but let us, I guess. I’d recommend you read this church-mime-demiurge’s FF Wiki page if you want the same level of base-knowledge I had, and maybe the aformentioned retrospective if you want the experience, because I don’t think I have the wherewithal to get into all of that from the bottom-up.

I am also, so, so fucking sorry for any remaining FFXIII fans in advance. There is like, a good chance I may be butchering the characterisation completely, so bear with me here.

With that... we begin?

Where do we even start with this guy?

How on earth to you begin to explain the absolute monolith you’ve constructed from crumbs of a Guy, some material no doubt spliced in from the Pale King, Sephiroth, y o u r  o w n  G o d  O C and other characters, and the mountains of religious trauma you carry around at all times that is probably the only reason you’ve been able to latch on as hard as you did?

I’m going to try.

What gets me, in summary, about Bhunivelze is how he’s a prime example of how love and concern can become deadly forces if in the wrong hands. His first acquainting with human emotion was by deceiving and possessing Hope, reverting his body to a teenage state, and planning to live among humanity through him. He sees human sorrow and suffering, and decides that, to End This(because it must be ended, you see) he’s going to destroy all the souls of the deceased that make up the Chaos that’s been eating this world for the past five-hundred years so they all forget and Are Happy. :).

Capital G God here hasn’t been present for the vast part of human history because he’s hidden himself away from Everything due to paranoia from killing his own mother and throwing her body into the Cosmic Basement, THEN creating the beings that would come to create humanity and OTHER beings because he didn’t have the keys to the cosmic basement. And also he believes death is a thing because she’d’ve somehow cursed all things to pass(including him) out of Spite.

Which explains why he’s so fucking averse to it and anything to do with it.

Bhunivelze, to put it lightly, is Shit at stepping into others’ shoes and Getting their experiences-- All the FalCie in FFXIII are, but him especially. It’s clear(again, in the f u c k i n g JP--) that he makes attempts to sympathise with them and does what he can to help, but it’s with such a loftiness and a complete inability to Understand why anyone would want grief, The Worst Fucking Experience In Existence, and even less why they’d be willing to Go Up Against Him And HisThe New Perfect World just for it-- And what would it matter, anyway, forgetting their loved ones. It’s not like you can grieve lost memories, right?

Right.

It reminds me of when at the end of the story of Job in the Bible, where, after putting this man through hell on earth, God rewards Job by giving him ten new children to make up for the ones that he lost. I. And that’s fucked! Nothing can replace the sheer uniqueness of each individual person you loved so dearly! But if you were a nigh-omnipotent deity high and mighty, with a cursory, almost mechanical knowledge on the functionings of the human psyche, that would seem adequete; enough.

Bhunivelze is doing that on a cosmic level.

I now want to get onto the romance: that being, his affections for Lightning. I don’t know how much I’m going to say, but it’ll probably be alot. It’s something that hits very close to home.

There is this... thing, within certain branches of Christianity, perhaps even in those of various Abrahamic faiths, where God’s love is posited to be the love-- The ultimate, most-fulfilling, all-encompassing love you could ever imagine --Because, well, he is love, so the story goes, and so often the best way to convey that is through the imagery of...

Marriage.

Giving up yourself so completely, to serve, to be the Bride; to be bound by him for all eternity; and for there to be no higher bliss than this.

This angle is pushed on young girls and women the most; from the mere parallels to the woman’s role in marriage, all the way down to downright-horrifying ultra-Evangelical purity pacts. With men, God is your dad, your best bud and confidant, your boss, your king, your this, your that, and the ‘marriage‘ as it were is relegated to a sort of half-thought; a metaphor.

For me, God was an attempt at all that, and my arranged groom.

(It was almost incestuous; was incestuous, that my own Divine Father would reach for my hand in marriage.)

Bhunivelze experiences Emotions™ for the first time through Hope, experiences Hope’s sheer overwhelming admiration for Lighting(whether there were any baby-crush feelings mixed in, I can’t say), and promptly falls into a nigh-romantic obsession with Lightning, deciding that she will be Etro(his all-but daughter)’s replacement, will be his Goddess of Death to-be-- He even calls her as such, before the final boss-battle--

...In the JP.

What happened in localisation, probably due to a number of factors, all the way back in early 2014, was that everything emotionally challenging about Bhunivelze was scraped off, like it was extra fat, and tossed aside, leaving us with the bland, clichéd shell of a foe-god we’ve seen time and time again. And I mean everything. I mean his very love for humanity; the fact his ploy was, in his eyes, to save them. Because if they’d left that all on, then it would raise the question of even if there was such a seemingly pure, all-knowing, loving being hell-bent on setting things “straight,“ would they truly be unquestionable? Would we have the right to fight for our humanity in the face of the Creator of the Universe?

To reject a love so personal?

That’s what gets me about FFXIII’s tackling of God, no matter how hackneyed and poorly-executed. It’s personal.

It’s from a feminine experience.

I know that terming is... vague, and problematic, but the way Christianity and much of the video game industry handle femininity itself is weird and problematic, so as it stands, I’ll have to simplify it. Apologies.

What sets FFXIII’s Let’s Kill God™ plot aside from most JRPG Let’s Kill God™ plots is that with our protagonist being a woman, and one who is very in touch with her femininity alongside her sheer strength; often, in these stories, God is reduced to Yet Another Foe, expected or unexpected, and you are tasked with taking him down unquestioningly for the Good of Mankind-- You will fight God, because you are right to, and you will go man-to-man-to-however-many-men you decide to bring along for the bloodbath.

And that just, doesn’t speak to me.

Even as an Extian.

Especially as an Extian. And an AFAB one with a deeply complicated experience with my gender, at that.

Leaving Christianity was painful. Questioning God was painful. Coming to terms with the fact that I had been mentally, emotionally, and spiritually traumatised under the guise of All-Encompassing Love was so, so fucking painful. I had been taught since I was five years old to devote myself to him, spent my life desperate to feel something, anything, to stay connected because I just, I never could Feel It on a deeper level, never could Give Up Myself, all I was, couldn’t Die A Spiritual Death And Be Reborn As His Eager Vessel, thus deeming myself to be worthless and a broken vessel for years and years on end... And for all that to have been... Nothing.

Lightning is hollowed out, the shards of her dead sister ripped from her in-stasis, leaving her emotionally numb for the majority of the game, Bhunivelze sweeps it under the rug, pretends he’ll perform a miracle and return Serah to life in exchange for her compliance, then sends her on her way to do his work, all the while knowing he’s going to pull said-rug from under her and elevate her such dizzying heights in the aftermath--

That he’ll deny her humanity.

Sand down all the rough edges that make her her, and polish her up afterwards, gild her as he is gilded, make her a Goddess.

And he’ll do it all because he loves her.

You can’t fight God like you can everything else. To fight It is the fight Existence Itself; FFXIII even conveys that by making Bhunivelze’s model part of the arena; it’s baked into the fabric of the game, no matter how minute.

While Lightning Returns is far from perfect in its execution of this concept, and that in itself makes me wince, not even taking into account the horribly botched excuse for a localisation Bhunivelze endured, it speaks to me more than anything else I’ve seen so far.

And it’s helped uncover some things within me. Helped me untangle them, just a little more.

So, yeah. I have alot of Thoughts on Bhunivelze, I want to share them, and I’m kinda really sad I have no one but my currently-absent friend Vee to share them with. I could get into alot more, like his very Fucked relationship with familial bonds, and how Lightning’s role as saviour so deeply parallels the overwhelming panic and never-ending guilt of Evangelical proselytisation, but I think I’ll leave those for another time.

In short, Bhunivelze is the epitome of Divine Love gone deeply wrong; on all fronts.

And if all of that isn’t enough to intrigue you, then, in Vee’s words, Lightning and Velze are literally canon endgame Sefikura lmaOOOOOOOOOOOOOO--

[vityuuwrites]

Know we didnt talk in a while and I hope u okk now... also wondering if u wanna do a vicuuri x never let me down?

Chose a random nr from my playlist and it was kinda lucky :)

ahhh i’m good now yeah, ty for worrying!! hope you are too <333 i’m sorry this is so late ASKSKS i hope you like it!! i might or might not have written most of it during a lecture whoops,,, also ty for the request! 

-

Victor is used to hiding everything behind a smile.

He never talks about his feelings – there's no space for them in skating. Maybe there was years ago, when he was still bright-eyed and hopeful, when love coloured his every move, his every jump and he was filled with indescribable joy after every performance. When skating was something he did because he loved it and not only because it was the only thing he was good at.

But now, Victor is Victor Nikiforov. He's Victor Nikiforov, the living legend, an untouchable god in skating no one could come close to, who was naturally good at it. Someone who never made mistakes, never faltered – he was the one person everyone wanted to catch up to, to push out of the top.

If they knew how lonely it was there, maybe they wouldn't want it because Victor is alone and he has to be alone. He has to be alone because he can't show any weakness to anyone.

Yuuri Katsuki is not like that.

It is almost like every single one of his emotions is etched onto his face, in the furrow between his eyebrows whenever he's anxious, or the shy turn of his lips whenever he's happy. His eyes sparkle when he's excited, his arms moving with the speed of his words. Victor feels warm whenever he looks at him.

He never thought that the man who swept him off his feet – quite literally – at that banquet so long ago would one day be moving in with him. He never thought that this level of happiness was possible. Not for him.

It made him want to be more open with himself. He wanted to share the parts of himself he kept hidden for so long – the lonely, broken parts of him that he never let anyone see – with the world.

Or just with Yuuri. There wasn't much difference to him, after all.

It was hard, though. His mind was, is and forever will be a dark, dark place that he sometimes sunk into. It was never as bad as Yuuri had it, he didn't think, but his thoughts were still hard to escape.

Victor Nikiforov is 28 years old. He is 28 years old which means his body is a ticking bomb just ready to go off at any seconds.

He knows he only has maybe one or two good seasons left. He can feel it in the hollow ache of his muscles all the way down to his bones, in the way his knees buckle when he lands a jump and his stamina is starting to get worse.

He only has one or two good seasons left in him and he doesn't want them to go to waste.

Maybe deciding to get back to skating was a bad idea. Maybe Victor should have let himself be blown out like a candle while he was still at his peak, suddenly and without a warning before people around him started noticing his weakness.

But he wanted to skate with Yuuri.

Him returning to the ice made Yuuri happy.

Victor lives for making Yuuri happy.

“Victor?” Yuuri says, breaking Victor out of his thoughts. Yuuri turns from the pan he is hunched over. His eyebrows crease with worry. “Are you ok?”

Victor forces a smile as he taps his fingers against the marble island stretching out over the middle of the kitchen. “Of course I am, Yuuri. Why’d you ask?”

Yuuri fully turns to him. “You’ve been awfully quiet since we’ve returned from practice.”

Victor hesitates for a second too long and he knows that Yuuri sees right through him. Still, he glances away as to not face his gaze. “I’m fine.”

Yuuri frowns but he does not pry, just turns back to the omelette he’s making.

Victor is grateful for that.

-

Victor is laying in the dark with the soft buzz of snowflakes hitting his window a backdrop to his thoughts. His hand is curled around Yuuri’s waist, rubbing the warm skin while Yuuri’s hair tickles at his chest and his breath strokes across his collarbones. He watches the cracks across his ceiling, like cracks under skates that split the smooth surface of the ice.

His eyes glance at his hand that spreads out across the sheet. The golden ring glints in the sliver of moonlight. His lips curl into a smile.

It is the only gold he ever won that does not feel like a shackle around his neck.

“Yuuri?” he whispers into the peaceful room. “Are you awake?”

“Mmm,” Yuuri murmurs and shifts in his hold. Bleary eyes turn to face him. Victor’s hand tightens on his waist. “I am now.”

Victor huffs out a laugh as his eyes turn back towards the ceiling. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you,” he whispers. “I was just checking.”

Yuuri’s hair tickles him through his silk pajama top as he shakes his hand. “It’s ok, I don’t mind. We don’t have practice tomorrow morning, anyway.”

“True.” He keeps his gaze on the ceiling. “I’m still sorry.”

Yuuri’s hand moves from the sheet to hold Victor’s. He gives it a squeeze.

“Yuuri?” he says again after a minute of silence that presses heavy against his chest. “Can I…” He bites his bottom lip as he struggles to say something. Anything. He knows Yuuri will not judge him if he does.

The words still get stuck in the back of his throat.

Yuuri lifts his head from Victor’s chest and shifts higher to tilt his head so their gazes meet. “Victor?” he says softly.

Victor loosens a shaky breath and searches his eyes. He squeezes his hand tighter. “I’m scared,” he finally manages to choke out and sighs as tears gather at the corners of his eyes. He roughly wipes them away with the back of his hand.

Yuuri blinks. His hand grips Victor’s and gently pushes it away in favour of wiping the wetness away himself. “Of what?” he whispers, hand lingering against his cheek.

Victor nuzzles into it like a kitten and gives another shaky sigh. “I don’t know,” he says, gritting his teeth together. He looks back up towards the ceiling so he does not have to face him. “Nothing. Everything.”

“Is this why you’ve been awfully quiet today?” Yuuri asks. His voice is soft and caring and Victor wants to weep. He does not know why; it is just pressing heavily against very being.

“Maybe? I’ve just been too stuck in my mind.” He presses an arm over his eyes to hide the tear that slides down his cheek. It feels freezing cold. “I hate it. I hate it so much.”

Yuuri’s hand squeezes the hand he’s holding. “Victor…” he leans in to wrap his arms around him, pulling his head against his chest. Victor’s shoulders shake and he burrows his face into his chest as he gives a silent sob.

“Is there anything I can do?” Yuuri’s warm hand strokes circles into his scalp. Victor releases another shaky breath.

“I’m scared,” he says again, voice tight as he attempts to gather his thoughts. “I’m scared, Yuuri.”

Yuuri presses a soft kiss against the crown of his hair. “It’s ok, let it all out, it’s ok,” he whispers and Victor feels something inside of him break. His tears flow out freely, and he hiccups as he clutches at him like a lifeline.

“ It’s just,” he starts and scowls, his tears staining Yuuri’s sleeping shirt. “It’s just… I’m scared this is my last good season. I’m scared because I’m 28 and skating is the only thing I’ve done for more than 20 years. I don’t know how to do anything else, I don’t want to retire but I also know I need to because I – I can feel it. I wobble on jumps, I get tired too easily, I’m one knee injury away from retiring anyway. But I also don’t want to retire yet because – because you taught me to love skating again and I’ve just started to enjoy it again and – and ---”

Victor grits his teeth together. Yuuri just silently holds him.

“And I don’t want to let you down,” Victor adds in a near whisper as he grasps at him tighter and curls up into himself. “I know you want to skate with me and I want to skate with you and even saying that I want to skate is amazing because I was going to retire this season but I really, really want to but I’m scared that if I return I’ll just let everyone down. Everyone expects me to be so amazing all the time but I can’t be and I know I need to retire before I’m forced to by an injury.”

Victor takes a deep breath and slumps against himself. He squeezes his eyes shut.

Yuuri’s hand moves to rub his back. “How long have you been sitting on that?” he asks, voice feather-light and gentle. Victor gives a little laugh.

“A while,” he admits. “I’m… not used to talking about my feelings. I didn’t think anyone would care as long as I skated alright.”

Yuuri’s lips find the crown of his head again. “Thank you for telling me,” he says and when Victor looks up at his face, bathed in pearly moonlight, he sees he is smiling. Victor closes his eyes when Yuuri brushes his bangs out of them.

“I hope I didn’t pressure you into returning to the ice,” Yuuri continues and cups his cheek. His hand is warm against his freezing cheek. Victor sobs and nuzzles into it again, trying to control his breathing.

“You didn’t, I did it because I wanted to skate alongside you.”

“Good, because I never want to pressure you into anything.” His lips find his forehead. “You’d never let me down, Vitya. Never. You can flub as many jumps you want, you can retire, hell, you can move to Antarctica and stay there to, I don’t know, study the penguins alone, I would always be in awe of you. I would always love you.” He hesitates. “You know that, don’t you?”

Victor sobs louder and presses his hand against his mouth. “I-I’m trying,” he admits. “I’m…Not used to that.”

Love always felt conditional to him. If he skated well, the audience loved him. If he behaved (though he rarely did), Yakov loved him. If he scored well, Russia loved him.

If he stays untouchable, if he overworks himself into exhaustion, if he stays the living legend, the world loves him.

“Oh, Vitya,” Yuuri breathes and squeezes him closer. His hands fist at the back of his shirt. “You don’t have to do anything special for me to love you. I won’t love you less if you fuck up, if you’re not always the best. You can never let me down. You saw me at my worst and you never ran away. Why would I?”

“I—I don’t know,” he says, voice shaking. He bites back another sob and takes a deep breath. “It felt like you would.”

“Never.” Yuuri starts stroking his hair again, hand shaking the tiniest bit. “You’re stuck with me, Vitya. I can’t promise you that you won’t fall and injure yourself tomorrow. I can’t promise you that your body won’t catch up with you.”

Victor glances up at Yuuri’s face when Yuuri’s hand urges him to look him in the eyes. He sniffles, another tear leaking down his warm cheek.

“But what I can promise you,” Yuuri continues and gives him a watery smile as he wipes it away. “Is that if those do happen, I’ll be here. If you decide you want to retire, I’ll be here. I won’t leave you. I could never leave you. I love you too much.”

Victor throws his arms around him and sobs softly into his shoulder, shaking as Yuuri’s hand warms him down to his core when it draws nonsense shapes Victor’s too lost to recognise.

“I love you too,” he answers shakily when a few minutes pass and his breathing starts to slow, his shaking a mere tremor compared to how he began. He pulls away only slightly, so slight their chests still touch, to give Yuuri a watery smile just as the moon peeks out from behind a thick cloud and sheds a sliver of light over Yuuri’s porcelain-smooth face. “I love you so much.”

He buries his head into the crook of his neck again, pressing a soft kiss to the warm skin he finds there. “What have I ever done to deserve someone as amazing as you?” he breathes in deeply to ground himself.

“Existed,” Yuuri says and brushes his hair away from his face before their hands twine again.

Victor starts softly weeping anew.

[fleetingfigures]

Mitigation made Manifest - A Scholar Analysis

Hello everyone, and welcome to the first part of my analysis series! Today we're going to be taking a look at the titular Scholar job, as well as delve into how it works, what it excels at, what it comes short on, and how well it is designed!

In an effort to keep everything organized, I'll section off this post into 4 main portions. If you're on a computer, you can use ctrl+f (or command+f if you're on a mac) to search for the following headings:

[ Basics ] [ How Scholar Works ] [ Gameplay, Tips and Design ] [ Final Evaluation ]

With that out of the way, let us begin!

[ Basics ]

Before we dive into Scholar, I believe I must go over a few things, the first being the issue of Scholar’s origin. Scholar, and by extension, its sibling, Summoner, have a unique system wherein they originate from the same base class, Arcanist, and also share each others’ levels (i.e if you level Summoner to 71, your Scholar will also be 71). As per most jobs, many of the base class’ actions translate to its advanced jobs, but the issue comes in its respective role - Arcanist is a magical dps. For Summoner, this is a fine transition as they share this role, but for Scholar, it is a tad awkward. At no point in your time as an arcanist are you ever really taught how healing in FFXIV functions, nor is it ever your ‘job’. The only real healer you can even start the game with is Conjurer, and beyond that, if you want to pick up a healer on the side without a level skip, only Astrologian and Conjurer are healers right out of the gate. As such, It’s hard to recommend Scholar as someone’s first healer as its levelling experience does not translate to how healers are played effectively.

Though, on this topic of effective healer play, I also feel the need to describe XIV’s healing design. At its core, a healer’s job is to obviously keep the party, and most importantly their tank, from dying. But, this is where some issues arise. In higher-end content, a healer is expected to also carry their weight in terms of DPS, and should have comparable RDPS (Damage taking into account buffs/debuffs applied) to that of a party’s tanks. This brings me to the focus of XIV’s healer philosophy: One is to balance the healing they must do with the damage they output. Spending all of your MP on healing is forsaking your duty to at least deal some damage, and only doing damage will obviously cause your party to die. Healing is essentially a game of ‘how low can I go?’, and as you gain more experience and comfort in the role, you can push that threshold lower and lower.

As for more general terms to be aware of, I shall make a small list!

DPS/ADPS/RDPS: Damage per second/Actual damage per second/Raid-contributing damage per second. These are terms used mostly by raiders to quantify how much damage is contributed. For classes that have buffs and debuffs, their DPS/ADPS do not accurately show their true damage, but their RDPS takes into account the bonus damage their buffs and debuffs have granted. Slidecasting: A term describing the leniency that cast times are given in this game because of server connection. For all spells, you do not have to be sitting through their entire cast bar, as they can instead be cut short so that one can still move while in the last bit of their cast. When one can slidecast a spell is dependent upon the cast time of the spell and the spell speed of the individual. HoT/DoT: Heal over time, Damage over time. GCD/OGCD: Global Cooldown/Off-Global Cooldown. Spells and weaponskills operate off of something called a ‘GCD’. A GCD is essentially a lockout until you can cast your next spell/weaponskill. For spells, as they have a cast time equivalent to their GCD, you can cast another right after you finish the first. By default, this GCD is 2.5 seconds for every class, and is reduced by abilities and skill/spell speed. But for weaponskills/spells that are classified as instant, that GCD lockout can instead be used to move or to use OGCD’s, namely abilities, that aren’t constricted by the GCD. The use of OGCD’s during a GCD lockout is called... Weaving: Using OGCD’s during a GCD lockout. Using just one in this timeframe is referred to as a single weave, and using two is referred to as a double weave. For SCH, you want most weaves to be double weaves. Ghosting: The bane of all arcanist-based classes. Unfortunately due to the AI of pets in this game, there is a delay between when you input an action and when your pet performs it, and a general delay in all pet actions if you are moving and they have to catch up. Sometimes when inputting abilities too quickly or using a demi-summon as actions are queued (like Summon Bahamut, Phoenix Trance and Summon Seraph), the queued action will either be delayed or never go off, but will still go on cooldown. Hence the term ‘ghosting’.

[ How Scholar Works ]

Now with the basics made clear, we can get to the actual meat of this analysis! In FFXIV, there are two denominations of healers: Shielding and Pure. Scholar falls into the prior classification as most of its kit is themed around the prevention of damage. Adloquium and Succor, for example, heal less than White Mage’s Cure II and Medica II, but apply a shield equivalent to 125% of the health restored. As such, Scholar is less of a reactive healer, but more of a proactive one; they set up their resources in advance so that the fight flows with less chaos. Scholar’s base kit is as follows:

Ruin/Broil I, II, and III: Your standard damage spell for a healer. Cast this when you’re not healing. Bio/Bio II/Biolysis: Your standard DoT spell for a healer, ticks 10 times over 30 seconds. Make sure to always have this on the enemy, that is unless the enemy is about to go away, or will die in 15 seconds or less. if this spell sticks to a target for more than 15 seconds, then it technically has outdamaged 1 broil, thus making it a theoretical gain! Physick: The basic heal for a healer; heals for about 400 potency. Once you get to a higher level, you should realistically never touch this heal again. Adloquium (Lvl 30): Scholar’s ‘big single target heal’; heals for 300 potency while erecting a shield equivalent to 125% of the healing done (technically 675 potency in total). Shields generated by this are denoted by the ‘Galvanize’ buff. If this crits, bonus shields will be added as another buff called ‘Catalyze’. This shield does not stack with itself, Succor, Seraphic Veil, or Nocturnal AST’s shields. Succor (Lvl 35): Scholar’s AoE heal; heals for 180 potency and erects a shield equivalent to 125% of the healing done (technically 405 potency in total). Shields generated by this are denoted by the ‘Galvanize’ buff. Like Adlo, it does not stack with what was listed above. Ruin II (Lvl 38): An instant cast version of ruin. It’s potency upgrades as you level, capping at 200 at level 72. This spell is mostly used to weave OGCD’s, or to just generally move while not missing too many casts. Art of War (Lvl 46): Your standard AoE spell for a healer. Deals 160 potency to all enemies in 5 yalms and is instant. Unlike Holy, this spell is a DPS gain on 2 targets or more. Deployment Tactics (Lvl 56): As an OGCD, spreads the target’s Galvanize buff to all nearby allies within 10 yalms. Does not spread Catalyze. Emergency Tactics (Lvl 58): Transforms the shields from Adlo and Succor into a flat heal. Useful in a pinch, hence its name, and gives Scholar a chance at outputting fat heals. Chain Stratagem (Lvl 66): Where Scholar’s RDPS comes from. Applies a debuff to a target that increases the chance they receive critical hits from all allies hitting it by 10% for 15 seconds. Multiple of these cannot be applied to the same boss, and will overlap. Keep in mind its 120 second cooldown as it is crucial to getting better at Scholar! Recitation (Lvl 74): Your next Succor, Adloquium, Excogitation, or Indomitability will always crit. In the case of Succor and Adlo, they will also not cast mana. In the case of Excog and Indom, they will not require an aetherflow stack. Mostly used to cast excog/indom through a double weave, and is immensely useful to make healing easier. 90 second cooldown.

To build off of my last point of resources, it’s high time to introduce two of Scholar’s best friends: Eos and Selene! Eos and Selene, as per SCH’s Arcanist base, are the pets for this job. Unlike carbuncles and egis, they do not deal damage, but instead use their actions to heal, and are crucial to Scholar’s gameplay. Also like the other pets, their action potencies scale differently as opposed to the player’s. For example, Eos/Selene’s Whispering Dawn skill has a listed regen potency of 120, meanwhile WHM’s Medica II regen has a listed potency of 100. One would think that Whispering Dawn would tick for more than Medica II, but through my testing, it is only about 86.8% as effective (due to number variation in FFXIV, this percentage is subject to change). The factor in which pet scaling affects your fairy’s heal is about 64%. With that little disclaimer out of the way, the Faeries’ kits are as follows:

Embrace (Lvl 1): A 150 (96 with pet scaling) potency single-target heal. This is what your fairy will do with its free time. Whispering Dawn (Lvl 20): A 120 potency regen over 21 seconds (537 potency heal in total with pet-scaling). Due to FFXIV’s server ticks, HoT’s and DoT’s hit every 3 seconds, and as such, WD translates to about 840 potency (in terms of your pet’s scaling that is). This ability is activated by the player as an OGCD. Fey Illumination (Lvl 40): A buff that reduces magic damage taken by all allies in range by 5% and increases their healing received by 10%. Lasts 20 seconds. Dissipation (Lvl 60): Munch on your Fairy to gain 3 aetherflow charges and +20% healing magic. This does NOT AFFECT THE POTENCY OF YOUR OGCD HEALING. Your fairy will automatically respawn after the 30 second duration. Aetherpact & Fey Union (Lvl 70): Designate an ally as an OGCD to form a tether between them and your fairy. Your Fairy gauge will then deplete by 10 every 3 seconds to apply a 400 potency (256 potency with pet scaling) heal. This tether will break after the target is 15 yalms away, if you cancel it by using aetherpact again, or if you use another fairy skill. Fey Blessing (Lvl 76): As an OGCD, spend 10 Fairy Gauge to have your Fairy perform an aoe heal of 350 potency (224 potency with pet scaling). Summon Seraph (Lvl 80): As an OGCD, replace your fairy with Seraph. Embrace now becomes Seraphic Veil, a 200 potency (128 potency heal with pet scaling) heal + shield. Consolation (Lvl 80): Essentially Fey Blessing, but only available during Seraph. Heals for 300 potency (192 potency with pet scaling), and shields for the same amount. Has 2 charges per every Seraph summon, and the shield stacks with your own shields as well as a nocturnal Astro’s shields.

Now that those are out of the way, you must be thinking, “The fuck is fairy gauge and aetherflow?” Well, I’m glad you asked, as they’re both intrinsically tied to each other! Starting at level 70, every time you spend an aetherflow stack, you gain 10 fairy gauge, pretty simple, yea? As for aetherflow itself, every 60 seconds you can cast the skill named, well, Aetherflow, to gain 3 stacks of it and recover 1000 MP. These Aetherflow stacks can be used on the following OGCD abilities:

Lustrate (Lvl 45): A 600 potency heal. Very straightforward, and often not used because of the value of the other options. Energy Drain (Lvl 45): A 100 potency damaging OGCD. If you don’t need to heal, and you don’t think you need to heal for a bit, this is your go-to aetherflow dump. Also, if you’re attempting parses on Scholar, have fun using all your aetherflow on this. Sacred Soil (Lvl 50): Create a bubble that reduces damage taken by all allies inside by 10% for 15 seconds. At level 78 this upgrades to offer a 100 potency heal (500 potency heal in total). Only costing 1 aetherflow gauge, having a 30 second cooldown, and lasting 15 seconds, this skill is INCREDIBLY GOOD, especially after the level 78 upgrade. Indomitability (Lvl 52): A 400 potency AoE heal. Straightforward, but very effective because of its numbers. Excogitation (Lvl 62): An 800 potency heal that triggers when the target falls under 50% HP, or if its 45 second duration ends. While it feels awkward to use for beginners, its usefulness is immeasurable. It is technically a higher potency version of Lustrate, with a slight cooldown and delay, but fills a more ‘fire-forget’ niche. Very useful inside of all settings but remember, it will not proc if the target will outright die to the damage before it triggers (i.e if a tank takes a tankbuster at 51% health, and the hit does 60%, excog will not proc.)

[ Gameplay, Tips and Design ]

Scholar, as I have stated, fills the role of a preemptive healer, especially with all of the mitigation present in its kit, as well as the existence of Excog. As such, this job sees a greater increase in effectiveness as you yourself learn a fight compared to a pure healer such as WHM/Diurnal AST. If you know when the party/raid-wide damage is coming, and you prepare accordingly with... Say, A sacred soil and a succor, that is a good chunk of damage you or your co-healer won’t have to heal, thus affording both of you more time to deal damage. Inside of higher end content, like savage raids, having said mitigation is both invaluable for progressing through fights, as well as streamlining and perfecting them. For a while, because of that fact, SCH was the unofficial ‘king’ of healers for a very long time, especially considering there used to be a lot more damage inside of SCH’s kit (rest in peace almost everything that made it unique lol). The start of Shadowbringers was when SCH was finally taken off of its throne, not by AST like many would think (also because it took quite the hit), but by WHM of all things. Thankfully through a series of buffs since 5.0, SCH would begin to see themselves slowly climb back and situate in a comfortable position, but while Scholar is in a good spot now, that does not mean it’s perfect.

Scholar’s ability to heal pure HP is a bit lacking, especially so when dealing with attacks that place the party or specific players at 1 hp. SCH’s find themselves having to use multiple resources in trying to recover that lost HP, often losing much more damage uptime in comparison to WHM or AST (Which is why the ideal healing composition involves 1 pure healer and 1 shield healer). This usage of multiple resources also makes SCH a fair bit more punishing to inexperienced healers than AST or WHM. With the HP recovery of fairies being nerfed in Shadowbringers, much more of the agency is placed back upon the player, who in turn must pay attention to everything that the class has to offer. Obviously not all content is going to necessitate OPTIMAL PLAY, but with all the moving parts present within its kit, Scholar demands a bit more attention to be paid towards it and its skills.

Outside of a learning curve and lack of pure healing, Scholars are punished heavily for dying. Not only must they spend a GCD in resummoning their fairy, all fairy gauge and aetherflow stacks are also lost on death, and if aetherflow was on cooldown at the time, A SCH is going to not have a majority of their kit for awhile on top of having reduced healing due to weakness/brink of death. This once again lends itself to Scholar being less beginner-friendly as opposed to the other healers, even with the existence of freebie heals from your fairy.

Hell, speaking about fairies, therein lies an issue itself - Scholar being a pet class. Conceptually it’s awesome, but with how FFXIV handles pets/demi-summons and their AI, it’s also quite the hassle. Like I mentioned above, ghosting is a problem when it comes to pet classes, and if you don’t properly adjust around it, some of your cooldowns can simply just go poof. Weaving both Whispering Dawn and Fey Illumination in the same double weave will cause the one that’s cast later to cast quite a bit later. On top of that, if you’re moving while you’re weaving them, there’s a chance you’ll have to wait for the fairy to catch up to you to finally cast them (which is why placing your fairy pre-battle is very useful). And as a general rule of thumb, never use summon seraph right after you use Whispering Dawn or Fey Illumination. Wait until after you see the buff apply on everyone as using Seraph will cancel the queued action.

With all that being said, however Scholar is still highly effective in what it does, it just requires a bit of experience. While I can’t offer tutorials on every fight, there are a few general tips I can give for aspiring scholars out there!

[ Tips ]

(General Advice + Combos)

Double weaving on Scholar is rather straightforward, but if you're using Ruin II to do so after your Broil, it will be a technical DPS loss if you do not use an energy drain within the weave window! Broil III has a potency of 290, Ruin II has a potency of 200, and Energy Drain has a potency of 100. In weaving without the use of energy drain, you will lose 90 potency in comparison to if you were to cast another Broil III. Using Energy Drain will add another 100 potency, thus gaining you 10 potency overall. Of course you shouldn't always dump an aetherflow on energy drain when you're weaving, but it is something to keep in mind when you are aiming to do more damage!

- Healing Combos -

[Single Target] If you are AoE'ing, replace ruin II/Biolysis with Art of War!

[AoE Mitigation] (Shield + 5% magic damage mitigation + 10% all damage mitigation)

[Panic AoE Healing] (1029 potency AoE Healing) As a bonus little tip in regards to this, remember Scholar's AoE healing spell/ability priority! The above combo is when you cannot afford time for a regen, but if you can, follow this list. 1. Whispering Dawn (if you can afford time for the regen) 2. Fey Blessing 3. Sacred Soil (if you can afford time for the regen) 4. Indomitability 5. Succor + Emergency Tactics 6. Succor

Scholars luckily have a wonderful mobility tool in Ruin II which allows them to position easily, though at the cost of DPS. However, this loss is minimal compared to its cohorts, wherein WHM either has to clip their Dia or use a lily, and AST either has to use Lightspeed, or slowly shuffle over with Malefics. This makes Scholar a bit easier to navigate when learning fights! Don't be afraid to use Ruin II if you're looking to push for a clear or learn a mechanic better, as a dead scholar is worse than one that is losing dps.

A crucial part of Scholar's kit is actually Chain Stratagem. While it loses much of its usefulness in public groups, or those who do not exactly care for proper rotations, when you can coordinate buffs and opening combos, it provides a large boost in DPS for the whole party. Typically, the ideal time to use Chain Stratagem is upon your 4th GCD, and everytime it comes off cooldown after, but this can change depending on your group. Here is an example 4th GCD Chain opener.

(Dungeons)

While AoE’ing mob packs, you can keep your focus target on the tank. It will make it much easier to heal them in a pinch.

Sacred Soil is essentially a free 15 second long cooldown for the tank, that ALSO heals at level 78 and above. It’s very, very useful.

Using Excog and adlo between pulls will allow you to spend more time AoE’ing mobs

Don’t forget about your fairy skills, especially fey union. Lazy mode is using fey union after whispering dawn, fey illumination and sacred soil and then proceeding to press art of war until the cows come home.

(Trials/Raid)

Recitation + Excog on your main tank pre-pull. Many use recitation+Adlo and then spread the shield with deployment tactics, but you don’t need to use recitation for that! Catalyze is the bonus shielding a crit adlo creates, and cannot be spread. Therefore save your recitation for a free excog and use a normal adlo+deployment tactics afterwards.

Please, please, PLEASE, if you are in a static or raid environment, make sure you allies stand in Sacred Soil when they can. It makes all of your lives easier.

Pre-placing your fairy in the center of the arena is a good habit to get in, but if you need your fairy AoE’s while you’re away from the center, make sure to press heel on your fairy hotbar to make it follow you again.

[Design]

Outside of all that, there is a collection of miscellaneous things that I do want to prattle off in relation to this category, mostly being some design choices and ideas I had for the class going forward. So, let’s begin!

Why does Fey Blessing not become Consolation when you have Seraph out? They are essentially the same thing, and you CAN’T EVEN USE FEY BLESSING WHEN YOU HAVE SERAPH OUT. WHY IS FEY BLESSING AND CONSOLATION SEPARATE BUTTONS. ANSWER ME SQUARE ENIX, TELL ME WHY.

There should be another way to dump Fairy gauge. It would make the system a bit more interactive (A lot like how lilies got an AoE version as well as Afflatus misery with SHB).

We should be able to cancel fey union in the middle of a cast. Breaking the tether does not have an animation nor any animation lockout, and in my eyes is technically not an OGCD. With this change, cancelling fey union can be done on the fly and not require a weave so as to not lose uptime.

The delay upon shield application is a tad annoying, especially so in the use of deployment tactics. Sometimes, if you cast too late, the boss’ Aoe will eat the heal, but not the shield. And in the case of the latter, if you use deployment tactics too quickly, you’ll spread nothing.

Bring back fairy uniqueness ;-;

[ Final Evaluation ]

Now comes time for my final grading.

Going forward with these Class Analyses, I will grade the class upon a set of categories unique to their role (DPS, Tank, Healer). As such, in my grading of Scholar, I will judge it based on the following categories, on a scale of F-S:

Damage (Personal) - The damage they bring to the table by themselves. Damage (Raid setting) - The damage they bring based upon their RDPS potential Accessibility - How easy is it to pick up and play? Mitigation - How well can they prevent damage? Healing - How well can they heal damage? Fun - Well, is it fun? Fantasy fulfillment - Does it fit the class aesthetics/lore?

Damage (Personal) [7] - While not as powerful alone as White Mage, Scholar is not entirely dependent upon team mates for damage like Astrologian.

Damage (Raid Setting) [8] - The addition of chain stratagem to Scholar’s already decent damage takes that one extra step beyond.

Accessibility [4] - Starts as a DPS in Arcanist, has many unique functions and is punished heavily if they die in the middle of a battle.

Mitigation [10] - They’re the originator of shield healers, and definitely keep the crown. Sacred soil is always going to be ridiculous.

Healing [6.5] - Scholar’s pure healing is a bit lacking, but with Square’s fight design, any healer should be able to make it through a fight. Therefore, I cannot rate Scholar all too low in this category.

Fun [7.5, almost 8] - Keeps you engaged, but lacks the pizzazz of Astro and the oomph of White Mage. Still a fun class at the end of the day, though!

Fantasy Fulfillment [9] - As tactical geniuses in the lore, the feel of Scholar gameplay fits that ideal! Through your mitigation, pre-planned abilities, and setting up of fairy abilities, you definitely feel like a tactician controlling the flow of battle, though it does falter a bit with a lot of their old options being removed in SHB.

[ End ]

And with that, we are done with this analysis! As for my personal conjecture with Scholar, it’s one of my mains, and used to be my go to raid healer, that is until my static needed a bit more upfront healing for e12s prog awhile back. If you were to look at my FFlogs, you’d probably see an absolute deluge of WHM parses since it’s uhh... Kinda technically my new healer main, but I still love SCH I swear! Another thing that made me switch from SCH to WHM was the inclusion of a DRK in our static. The ability to instantly remove Walking Dead with one button is so much easier than blowing cooldowns on both healers. Though, technically, from a savage perspective, the highest damage team setup is SCH + AST (Mostly because boosting teammate damage will always do more than just being good yourself, especially this late in the tier).

Anywho... This is the REAL end of the analysis. Hope you enjoyed and if you have any suggestions, questions or things to address, just comment and let me know!

Yabi, out~

[lovingthesweetestthing]

just enough

has anyone ever felt

as if the job they are currently performing,

is only as far as you're able to go?

I'm not talking physically

but mentally -

"is this all I can do?

does my talent end here?

am i able to perform at a higher level..

and make it?

is this the best i can do?

will i ever get out of this job

or is this as successful as I am able to go?

am i as great and smart as my mom says?

as my dad says?

or will i never make it in the professional world?"

like my aunt screamed

you'll never make it at a professional job.

you'll never be able to move away from family.

or how my college advisor explained

he can't see me succeeding outside of class.

am i just enough to get by in this world

or do i have more to offer?

people look at me like i'm nothing

when i grin from ear to ear,

pointing to my new college degree.

"graduated with communications,"

i would proudly say,

as they just stared.

looking at me and thinking,

you spent four years doing that?

you are taught at a young age

that you can do anything.

but what happens when

that little girl you gave hope

is all grown up.

followed her passion.

succeeded toward her dream.

just for you to tell her

she didn't choose a path

that you thought was important enough.

enough.

this word is cutting,

destroys hopes and dreams.

so you eventually look down on her

the same little girl who had the world in her hands,

and say

her talents aren't enough to keep moving up in the world.

that she'll never be as successful as her sibling or friends

the accountants and doctors,

all because she decided to follow her dreams.

all because her interest,

something she put her whole heart into -

didn't seem as important to the world like the others.

just like society wants,

"make lots of money.

go to this school.

pursue this field,

you'll never be successful like them.

that job will never get you anywhere."

i just want to feel like my job is important,

i want to be more than just enough.

i crave to be wanted by a business -

a business everyone looks up to.

somewhere the people see my talent

and say, "we need her on our team."

the business that screams,

"you did it, kid. you made it.

welcome to the big leagues."

to just feel enough.

but then again i'm just one of those people,

who did everything they said to do;

follow your dreams

go to college

score a job

it was only just enough.

just enough for a job to get by

just enough to pay the loans for college,

the same place they told me would be beneficial.

in their eyes, i am only just enough.

i've learned this world is a cruel, cruel place.

i've constantly been reminded -

how to deal with life's lessons.

"the world is cruel and so is everyone in it"

isn't that sad?

how little boys and girls see the world with an adventurous lens

only to grow up and learn how cruel the world really is.

how do you think people grow to learn these negative thoughts?

people

people tend to point out insecurities,

ones you can't control on your own.

sometimes, these people are around you with toxic motives.

and sometimes, these people are those you hold dear to your heart -

the ones you looked up to your whole life,

the ones who preach family first.

they'll give you the moon and the stars

until you're of no need anymore.

until you are weak and easy to control.

they'll preach family first, turn around and then tear you down with worse words your own enemy wouldn't even mutter to your face.

then they make you scared

of taking that job

or moving away.

scared to make life changing leaps

the same leaps they made at your age.

"it's different nowadays

you won't be able to afford it

do you really think you'll be able to pull that off?"

it's never confidence.

it's never positive love

or reassurance that you are more than just enough.

it's constant doubt

and all the reasons why it won't work.

now, imagine if we went back in time to that little girl

and told her all the possibilities she's capable of creating.

all of life's wonders she'll be able to explore.

instead of telling her all the reasons why she shouldn't,

we should boost her adventure.

tell her she can get that job three states away

tell her if she works hard enough she will be able to move away

to start her own life.

don't cage her in, by bringing her down -

it will only force the little girl to draw inside the same lines everyday,

preventing her from discovering new pages.

new pages that are waiting for her to create new colors.

so i ask myself again,

will i ever be more?

is this all i can do?

will i ever be just enough,

or will i prove them wrong and make the leap.

will i finally move away from family

and find my own independence?

will i finally make sure that I am happy

and not feel down about their feelings?

will i ever be just enough for the time being,

or will i find the courage

to have faith in myself.

[sazzafraz]

i’m probably truly never get back to crashing tide 

Taijutsu sucks. I want to die. Everything can eat my ass.

Moving from the Land of Song’s Sun Crane Style into the far more frenetic Moon-Walking Water one favoured by Lightning proved that I was a goddamn hack who should have kept up her yoga classes. Yes, the sharingan had made learning it easy but fuck if it wasn’t hard on the joints. The recall and fluidity of the motions was only as good as my personal understanding and flexibility. I was about 50-50 on both and positively dying. 

Not that the kid cared. “When can I learn those?”

“Thirteen.” I dropped low to stretch out my hip and then returned to practicing forcing chakra the opposite direction of my movements. It was sticky and sluggish but there was no way to get better other than to just keep going. “You can learn the lighter forms the hard way but until you start puberty the muscle mass necessary won’t be there.”

“I thought you didn’t fight.”

I did fight. Very close range or very long. I was a sitting duck otherwise. Dropping into a slightly messy Pigeon Pose I waved him forward. “You’re never going to have as much muscle mass as the Inuzuka or the Hyuuga. It may not seem like it but they build ‘em big. Just be glad you won’t have to fist fight a Senju.” Oh wait. He might have to fist fight a Senju. “And if you do, play dirty because they’re all muscle.”

“The Senju are dead.”

“The Senju have taken a long sabbatical from being decent contributing members of society. Follow me.” I stretched. Welcomed the sun. Threw in some warriors. Then went into the opening moves of Fire Over Air. In the manga learning the Great Fireball technique conveyed adulthood. In this splinter reality I learned that the Uchiha had spent six centuries or so developing specific fighting styles to fight every alignment. Mastering the opening sequences of those made you an adult. It made sense given what out bloodline could do and if it was complete it would go some way to explaining Itachi’s complete OP-ness. Fire Over Air I did every day because it forced me to use an element I was great at to control one I was abysmal with. 

Sasuke followed my physical position to a t. Legs in Warrior pose, hands switching between Bird and Tiger. The trick was to feel the moment where one nature became another and to force the power down smothering the emerging chakra. This was stop one of oh, about a thousand. 

I could feel the switch-dampen-switch happen between my hands. The tiny release of it was easy to control and not uncomfortable. Sasuke followed. I could almost feel his frustration with it. 

“Fire Over Air is one of the harder forms. We’ll try Fire Over Water in a second.”

“Fire Over what?”

“This form. It’s one of the Four Pillars of Suppression. Fire Over Air. Fire Over Water. Fire Over Earth. Fire Over Lightning. You start here with the basic release signs so you can learn how fire affects every release and over time you add steps. At the end you’re supposed to be like Uchiha Masaru, able to stop any technique with his will and a hand.” It also made using acquired jutsu easier. 

“Why are we standing like this.”

“Stand up straight and try again.”

He did. The second he went from Bird to Tiger a gust of air spun up and blasted his hands apart. “Why?”

“Grounding.” I changed my feet and dropped weight into them. “This position is used a lot in Earth and Air techniques -the really old school kind that’s more like dancing than brawling. The part of you that is Earth aligned automatically grounds the rest of you and disperses volatile energy.”

He frowned at his stinging hands. “I don’t have an Earth alignment.”

“Yeah you do.” I peacefully moved to Half Moon to do the fourth sequence of Fire Over Lightning. “Chakra exists as the physical manifestation of our spirit in space. It doesn’t follow logic very well. Hashirama, unhelpful genius that he sometimes was, invented a universal hand sign language that we use in Konoha. It gets rid of a lot of the hassle in remembering foot positions.” Move to Fire Over Earth in Crescent pose. “Before that there were variations in how each Clan and people performed any given jutsu. Our ancestors probably started this style to try and understand it.” Fire Over Water was a pain to transition to. All of it’s lower body movements were fierce and space consuming. I flowed down into one of it’s ending poses, a simple cross legged seat. 

“I don’t know any of this.”

He wouldn’t. “I got stationed with older kin a lot during the war. We traded secrets.” My mother taught me Fire over Lightning but it was the only one she ever learnt all the way through. I had the basic sets of all of them but like her I only learnt Fire Over Water all the way to the end.     

“So you’re going to teach me.”

“The basics. Most everyone only learnt the one.”

“I need to know all of them.”

I backtracked over the conversation, found the flaw and chastised myself. “It isn’t exactly like Great Uncle Masaru’s technique. For one he had Fuu Dog summons and god knows that scroll has been lost for awhile. It’s not a one shot.”

“Teach me.” He screwed up his little hand. “I need to know.”

Well. This is on me, then. “Fine. I can teach you the first five sequences of all of them and twenty four of Fire Over Lightning. I know all forty four of Fire Over Water but I will not show you more than the twenty ninth without the sharingan.”  

He blanched.

“Kid,” I said laughing. “We’ve had six hundred years to obsess. Cousin Sho needed about twenty days to let his thing for a Akimichi girl get all of us banned for life.”

A slash of white. A small grin. “That was funny.”

That was last year, I recalled. “Yeah. It was. If you’re betting on your brother knowing it, yeah, he probably does. It’s useful and we’re obsessive. If you think-”

“I just wanna know.” He replied in a much shyer, smaller voice.

I replayed the conversation again. 

“Okay.” Considering it through the prism of six hundred unbroken years of family. “Okay. But if I decide not to show you something it’s a medical decision. We’ve defanged a lot of these but they’re primarily analysis positions for fully trained shinobi with the sharingan. They’re combative, like you saw with the first move. You only work with higher levels of less stable energy as we go.”

Not that he’d ever know it but one of the main reasons, after the police and the eye stealing and the whole blood feud, that the Uchiha hated Tobirama was that he’d rendered large parts of the Pillar style obsolete by just mashing together new techniques faster than we could account for them. And then there was the Uzumaki clan throwing in some seals to just really fuck it all up. Certain strains of the sharingan -Madara’s, Itachi’s, Sasuke’s- had a hard on for sealing jutsu. Other’s -me, everyone else- got a horrible sense of vertigo if we tried to copy Uzumaki seals.

[ms-demeanor]

After reading your "ultra-long postivity post", now I have kind of a weird feeling because i relate a lot to pretty much everything you said, but i ended up approaching the "not everyone can x" from the opposite side, being the "gifted kid" teachers used to hold everyone to unrealistic standards (that i knew most couldnt achieve in the given timeframes), and now i get frustrated when i dont develop skills immediately, because i have done it before and feel like i should be able to and aaaaaaaaaa

Funny story: when I was a kid my parents had both my sister and I tested for learning and developmental disabilities. This testing included IQ testing.

It identified that we were both “gifted” kids* and that I’m dyslexic.

It totally missed my ADHD, though!

The problem with that is that my parents. Hm.

Okay my parents both grew up in very poor families. VERY poor. And they both wanted to go to college and knew the only way that they could was through scholarships. So they became debaters. They met at a tournament in high school.

Debaters are weird. You need an efficient working memory and strong recall and the ability to think quickly on your feet. Being witty and kind of an asshole are also good traits for debaters. Basically you’ve either gotta be really fuck-off smart to be a competitive debater or you’ve gotta at least *seem* really fuck-off smart.

And my parents were champion debaters at a national level. The Whittier College debate trophy has my mom’s name written directly under Richard goddamn Nixon. My dad was on the USC debate team and competed against Harvard and won. Not only that but he ended up coaching debate for USC and Cal Tech.

So as kids who grew up in extremely poor families and were able to go to college and get middle-class jobs and buy a house because of intellectual ability my parents placed A LOT of importance on intellectual ability.

So that IQ score became a large part of my life.

First we attacked the dyslexia. The approach was basically teaching me a bunch of sight words because sounding out phonics doesn’t work when the letters get screwed up. And because I was *gifted* we did a lot of really BIG sight words.

It took about six months to get me up to speed from “memorizing the pages of a story to match the pictures because I couldn’t read along in class” to “the first book I read on my own was The Hobbit.” I guess that counted as “cured” because that was the last time I got any kind of educational assistance.

At that time I was at a gifted school, a really tiny private school that was also an after-school daycare where we did full-day classes and then did gymnastics and swim from 3-6pm. I also was there over the summer because my parents worked.

So going from “tiny private school where the teacher has you stand up in class to read your failing grade in front of everyone so that she could shame you into performing better” to “fine public school in a suburb wealthy enough to have arts programs” was a major, major change. They did an aptitude test because I was transferring in from a different district and there was much discussion about whether or not to move me directly from the second to the sixth grade.

The district refused, thank fuck.

The public elementary school didn’t *have* a gifted program so it took very little time for me to become the Certified Weird Kid. My third grade teacher had me read aloud to our class for twenty minutes a day. I taught the class the multiplication table.

When it got to be time to go to the junior high school my mom went to a meeting for the school’s gifted kids program. APPARENTLY one of the kid’s dad’s basically said “I don’t understand why you’re wasting school funds on field trips for the stupid kids, the school should spend more of its resources on kids who have a chance of actually meaning something to the world” and my mom decided that while being gifted was important it was less important than making sure I wasn’t exposed to assholes of that caliber on a regular basis.

(thanks mom, I actually do really appreciate that reprieve)

Several teachers pushed me into advanced classes - my math teacher insisted that I take the advanced algebra classes in the seventh and eighth grade.

The GATE kids *WERE* assholes and were extra bonus special assholes to me because math was the only advanced class that I was in. (At my junior high school you had to pick your elective based on what level of classes you were in - to take the GATE classes you HAD to take a music elective; if you took art, drama, shop, or home ec you couldn’t take the smart kid classes. The algebra class was a new, separate addition to the program so *some* of the kids in the “electives for dropouts” program could take algebra. Schools are really fucked up, guys, in case you didn’t know schools are really fucked up and that was BEFORE No Child Left Behind).

I got a C in that algebra class and sat in my room for literally an hour screaming at myself for being such a selfish, distracted idiot that I let myself read my books instead of studying harder for the class. (clearly very healthy, normal twelve-year-old behavior)

When it was time to go to high school my teachers made a united plea to the district to transfer me into honors/IB/AP classes.

The kids in the honors/IB/AP classes continued to be kind of awful to me. I got extremely depressed and basically started doing the lazy-but-brilliant thing of completely ignoring homework or in-class work but performing spectacularly well on tests or essays in the classes that I wasn’t catastrophically failing

I was the only person at the school who got a perfect score on the vocab part of my SAT. I was the only honors kid who hadn’t been in SAT prep classes. There was only one other kid who graduated with the same number of units as I had, we’d outstripped the valedictorian and salutatorian but three classes each. I only applied to one college - I got accepted for painting but my interviewer urged me to move to the writing program and I got accepted for that too.

My financial aid didn’t come through and my dad wasn’t willing to cosign for loans on “an art program at a trade school.”

I got accepted to Pratt Institute on their Writing for Publication track which included an internship with the New York Times for third-year students in the program.

At that point I had a Columbia Scholastic Press award for my work on my high school yearbook.

Let me tell you, the community college that I went to and spent five years variously failing and succeeding at had a fucking *killer* newspaper and magazine when I was there. The local community newspaper that hired me when I was 21 was also much better designed and edited than it had any right to be for the three years I worked there (getting paid a whole eight dollars an hour and sometimes working 20 hours straight to get it in to the printer on time).

When I transferred to the state school I got perfect grades and worked full time and won every contest offered by the school’s English Honors society (which I couldn’t join because I was a transfer student and hadn’t done honors classes my freshman and sophomore years). I started a literary magazine with some friends when I graduated; we published four full issues online before it fell apart.

You know what’s also funny?

Even the food-service job I had to pay my way though the community college I felt terrible about attending was a skills test. I was a barista, so of course for a while I was a competitive barista.

I disappointed my parents a lot. I heard a lot of “we know you’re better than this.” I got told I was too smart to be screwing up this bad. I mentioned it a couple weeks ago but my results from that IQ test got compared to my sister’s and that was the justification for holding me to a higher standard. “You’re measurably brilliant, why aren’t you acting like it?”

Here lies the corpse of a gifted kid. Look on my works ye might and despair.

I am the perfect picture of a twice exceptional gifted kid and the reason I wrote all of this out is to tell you one thing:

“Gifted Kid” is a label that someone applied to you, it has nothing to do with who and what you ARE.

It’s very, very unfair that the adults in your life used you that way. I have an exceptionally terrible memory of being singled out as the only one who passed the first test in my IB World History class; “Why is Alli the only one of all of you who is writing at grade level? You’re supposed to be the smartest kids in the school, why did you all fail?”

That’s awful for the kids around you, that’s awful for you. It doesn’t do anybody any favors if people around you are being informed that you’re setting the curve they’ll be judged against. And it really, really doesn’t do YOU any favors because it doesn’t take long *at all* for your brain to learn that that’s all you’re good for. If you aren’t the best at a thing then what’s the point, you HAVE to be best because they already SAID you were best and if you aren’t then all these other people hate you for setting a standard that even you can’t keep up with.

You end up competing with past versions of yourself and focusing on those things that make the grownups in your life praise you because the grownups in your life has praised you in such a way that it’s turned all the other kids against you.

You know who bullied the fuck out of me? The kids I taught the times tables to, the kids I read to for half an hour a day.

Those kids were MEAN to me but the teacher who told me to read Boxcar Kids to the class after lunch everyday was NICE and she told me not to worry, they were just jealous and I should be proud of my gifts.

“Anon did this in three minutes. What’s taking the rest of you so long?” - what a terrible weight to put on a child. You’re right. Not everyone can do everything.

Fucking hell.

Adults what the everloving shit is wrong with us? Please don’t treat kids like that.

Okay.

Okay.

But here’s the other thing:

If there’s any time in your life that it’s easy to acquire skills with no apparent effort it’s when you’re a child surrounded by a support system that is engaged in making sure that you can acquire those skills.

It took three adults, two dictionaries, and several hours a day to teach me enough sight-words to throw me into “look at baby genius*” territory but from my perspective as a little kid I was just reading cool stories.

I spent four hours a day in the yearbook room and ditched and failed other classes so that I could work on the yearbook. I collected hundreds of magazines to get an eye for layout. But from my perspective as a teenager it was a fun activity that I did with the closest thing I had to friends.

I’m sure that there are some skills that you had a natural aptitude for, some things that came naturally. But I’m also sure that you didn’t learn those skills with no effort, it’s just that now as an adult with a life and other shit going on it takes more effort to learn to do things.

In all likelihood you weren’t a savant who did everything perfectly the first time you tried. It just seems that way because even really smart kids don’t know when they’re bad at things and are mostly being compared against other kids (with the few rare exceptions of music prodigies or math prodigies or those kids who end up in science grad programs at 12 and boy howdy do I think there’s a whole other can of worms when it comes to the way child prodigies* interact with the world).

You wanna know what probably saved my life in the last few years?

That “anti-capitalist love notes” tumblr post.

You are worth more than your productivity.

You are worth more than your productivity.

You are worth more than your productivity.

I was actually kind of offended the first time I saw that post on my dash. “No I’m not,” I thought. “You’re only worth what you can do, everyone knows that. People care about what you do for them.”

And why the hell would I think anything else? That’s what I’d learned for pretty much my whole life.

It took me a really long time to understand that I was wrong. I matter outside of what I can do for people or how well I perform. I matter more than being able to perfectly recite poetry from memory or do calculations on command or sit down at a piano and play a piece I’ve never played by sight-reading it.

And you matter outside of that too. You’re more than your performance, you’re better than being gifted. There are people who love you for the way you make them laugh and how you listen to their stories and for the simple joy of your presence.

It’s nice to be clever, it’s handy in a lot of situations even if it does come with a lot of baggage for some people.

But god damn, it’s important to be kind.

* Personally I have issues with the way that society constructs the concepts of giftedness, genius, and prodigies. There are a lot of “gifted” kids who were the kids who scored in the top 5% of their class in school but there are also gifted kids who were doing high-level math or reading novels as toddlers; there are prodigies who showed an aptitude for music young and who were then schooled in that instrument to the exclusion of all other activities (and I bet there are a fair number of kids who might be considered prodigies if they were trained to play flute for nine hours a day and didn’t have friends but thankfully we don’t *do* that to very many people - side note, ask me my opinion about olympic athletes some time). Words like “genius” and “gifted” are very nearly meaningless and almost *never* accurately reflect skills proficiency or long-term success or are reflected in income or respect. People think that geniuses are hypercompetent robots with their shit together but literally every adult I know with a genius-level IQ is some variety or other of total fucking tire fire.

[shenanigans-and-imagines]

We’re The Bad Guys: Part 7

We’re the Bad Guys: Masterlist

Poe Dameron x Reader (eventually), First Order!Reader

Summary: From the day you were born, you were taught the rebels and their New Republic were the bad guys. But, after you crash land on a remote moon with only the Resistance’s poster boy for company, things begin the change.

Based off of this drabble and headcanon

A/N: Look at me having another part up within the next week instead of the next three months. Sorry, no Poe in this chapter either, but he will be back in Part 8, pinkie promise.  And as usual COMMENT AND REBLOG IF YOU LIKE THIS! I NEED VALIDATION TO LIVE!!!

Word Count: 2.0K

          Getting to Takodana was easier than one might expect for a member of The First Order.

          For troopers or lower ranking officials, landing anywhere closer than the outermost rim of the galaxy was near impossible without clearance.  But for a Commander, slipping in and out of First Order space did not take much imagination.  A switched ship here, a bribe there and one could get as close as the inner rim if they put their mind to it.  Of course, most officers took it as a chance to visit a pleasure planet or two without word of a scandal getting sent up the ranks.  For your purposes, however, you risked a lot more than personal embarrassment. 

          You had started by taking leave on a small base not far from Rakata Prime.  It was a place common for officers in search of some relief from the stress and monotony of space travel.  It also was the perfect jumping off point to the outer rim.  The security was notoriously lax if not outright corrupt.  The right amount of credits in the right hand could get you just about anywhere.  

          It didn’t take long for you to track down a cadet willing to recommend a lovely little spaceport on some planet you never heard of. Apparently it had some of the best underground gambling one could find this side of Hutt Space, which meant pilots, but more importantly, pilots in need of fast, no questions asked, credits.  

          The cadet dropped you with the promise to pick you up in three days.  There was no need for him to follow. What you did while on planet was your business. The fact you had even left the base was blackmail enough. No doubt he was going to factor that into your service fee for the trip back. 

          After that, it was easy.  Within a few hours you were able to track down another ship heading in the direction of Takodana. Like any pilot bordering the Unknown Region, you couldn’t be sure where exactly the captain’s loyalty’s lay.  It meant a small risk every time money exchanged hands, but it also ensured anonymity.  

          You haggled a place in the cargo hold and by the next morning, you were walking down the ramp onto the forest planet. 

          It was beautiful.  Any word less would be a disservice.  The lush greens of the forest and clear shimmering lake water served as another stark reminder of where you came from.  

          No polished blacks.  No filtered air.  Just green and life. 

          You were so caught up in the moment, you almost forgot why you had come. A hard push from one of the crew members snapped you back to reality. Your eyes followed his path to the infamous castle just off in the distance. There was no going back now. 

          Securing the cloth placed over your nose and mouth, you kept your head low and followed. 

          The bar was just as crowded as you had expected with an assortment of humans and aliens from every point in the galaxy.  You would give this to Maz Kanata, despite her castle’s reputation for being a safe haven for pirates and explorers, the place was shockingly bright and clean. Cluttered and eclectic, but open and generally lacking the layer of grim that seemed to stain all spaceports along the mid and outer rim.  It left the impression that one could keep their blaster securely in their holster and actually enjoy a drink without fear of being taken off guard.  Still, you knew better.  This was a neutral space for Resistance and First Order alike.   Any one of the patrons could be a spy for either side.

          Making sure not to make eye contact with anyone, you made your way to the bar. 

          “I’m looking for Maz Kanata,” you said, in a low tone.  “I need to speak with her.”

          The bartender, an Artiodac, rumbled something in their native language you couldn’t understand. But, the dismissive laughter that followed was universal. 

          “It’s urgent,” you insisted.  “Commander Dameron sent me.” 

          “What trouble has that boy gotten into now?” a voice asked. 

          You turned around and immediately had to look down. 

          A small orange alien of a species you couldn’t name stood before you. Their head was huge compared to their small frame, wrinkles for days and eyes enlarged by giant magnifying goggles. 

          “Maz Kanata?” you asked. 

          “That’s my name, don’t wear it out,” she replied dryly. She then turned her attention to the Artiodac.  “Table five needs three more of the same.”

          The other alien nodded and quickly busied themselves with their task. 

          “Now,” Maz said.  “What trouble has Dameron brought to my door?”

          “No trouble,” you said. “I just need to get a message to him.”

          “Do you, now?” she asked, skeptically. 

          “Yes.”

          “And who are you, exactly?”

          “I’m a friend.” 

          “A friend who covers their face?” 

          Your hand went instinctively your mask.  Maybe it hadn’t been the best idea.  

          Maz gave a dry laugh. “Do you have a name at least?”

          You shifted uncomfortably. This was not going how you had pictured.  You had hoped to be half way off this planet by now. 

          “Not one he would know,” you admitted. 

          She raised an eyebrow. “Not much of a friend then.” 

          And with that she walked passed you out of the main room into the back. She must have assumed that meant an end to your conversation, but you hadn’t come all this way to be turned away now. She barely made it two paces before you followed after her. 

          “Fine, not much of a friend,” you said, “but certainly an ally.”

          “An ally?” she scoffed. “For what cause?”

          “To put an end to The First Order.”

          She paused. It wasn’t enough for her to turn to face you. She kept going about her task, moving a few crates, but you did get her attention. 

          “Bold words,” she said, “but why should I believe you?”

          “Because--”  You stopped.  

          Why should she believe you? Who were you, really?  A Commander for The First Order? A child solider? A pawn? Who were you to her? To The Resistance? To Dameron? 

          And that’s when you remembered. 

          “Because, I’m Pilot.”

          She turned to you, the surprise evident in her eyes. 

          “I’m Pilot,” you repeated, bolder this time. “The Pilot.”

          She stared more openly at you then, carefully examining your features.

          “Dameron’s Pilot?” she asked. 

          You shrugged, unsure how to feel about being called Poe Dameron’s anything. Still, it wasn’t entirely unpleasant. 

          Maz nodded in understanding.  Setting down the crate she was carrying, she silently indicated for you to kneel. 

          You felt a tug of uncertainty in your gut, but knew better than to question her orders.  You sunk down to your knees conveniently landing at the alien’s eye level. 

          She stepped closer to your, peering directly into your eyes. 

          You didn’t dare blink as she performed her examination, even adjusting her goggles to a higher intensity until the eyes reflected in them took over her entire face. 

          For a long moment neither of you spoke.

          “I see why he likes you,” Maz said, warmly as a wide smile spread across her face. “You have stars in your eyes.”

          You frowned, unsure of what to make of her comment.  Nobody had ever called your eyes anything before, let alone filled with stars. It made you think of naive thinking and childish dreams, neither of which you had associated with yourself at any time of your life.  But for some reason, you didn’t think that was what she meant. 

          Maz stepped back, her expression once again all business.

          “What’s the message?”

          You blinked, allowing yourself a moment to come back to reality.  Reaching down, you pulled the data card from your pocket.  

          “This is everything I had access to,” you said, handing the card to her. “Tie patrols, base coordinates, supply lines, everything. Make sure this gets to Resistance and...tell Commander Dameron that we’re even.” 

          She took the card, frowning slightly.  “Why don’t you tell him yourself?” 

          “I’m not joining The Resistance.”

          Her brows furrowed. “But you are leaving The First Order.” 

          “Yes.”

          “So what are you planning to do?”

          You shrugged, rising to your feet. “I’m a pilot.  I’m sure I can find something.” 

          Maz Kanata said nothing, but it was clear from her expression she wanted to say a lot of things.

          “You disapprove,” you stated rather than asked.  

          “Let’s just say, I don’t think the smuggler’s life is for you,” she said, dryly.

          Your lip pressed into a fine line. “And what do you propose? I’ve spent my whole life fighting a cause that wasn’t my own.  You would ask me to do the same thing, but for the other side?” 

          “It’s not the same thing if you choose to fight it.”

          “And what if I’m tired of fighting?”

          She shook her head, chuckling lightly.  “No. You were born to fight.”

          A sudden flash of anger fired in your heart.  It was a familiar feeling. The same one you felt towards Dameron when he had made certain presumptions about your family.  Of course, he had been right.

          “It wasn’t my choice,” you said, tightly.

          Maz shook her head again.  “No Pilot. Even if you were raised by peaceful monks, you would find a way to fight.  Maybe not by hopping in an X-Wing and blowing things up, but still fight.  You’re fighting The First Order right now.”

          “I’m settling a debt.”

          “By fighting,” she insisted. “You said it yourself; you are an ally to put an end to The First Order.” 

          She held up the card, waving it for emphasis. “With this alone you’ve just saved countless lives and struck a harder blow against The First Order than the entire Republic Senate has done in a year.” 

          “And now I’m done.”

          Maz let out a sigh, her bright expression fading to one of disappointment. 

          “Then you still fight for The First Order.” 

          “I’m fighting for myself,” you snapped.  

          “If one knows there is evil in the world and does not oppose it, that does not make them neutral,” Maz said, calmly. “There is no neutral stance.  Indifference, selfishness, this is what allows The First Order and all others like them to prosper.”      

          “So is every person going about their lives as bad as The First Order.” you said, sardonically. 

          “No. Most don’t have the power, or the means to fight.  But you do.”

          You scoffed. “So, I still don’t have a choice.”

          “Of course you do.  Everybody had a choice. But, it’s important to keep in mind that no choice is still a choice, just not an obvious one.” 

          You let out a sigh. This was what it was about, wasn’t it? Having a choice? It was proving to be a lot more trouble than people let on. 

          “Why are you so insistent I join The Resistance?” you asked. “You don’t know me.”

          She smiled then.  It was a knowing smile, like she was in on a secret; not one she was trying to keep, but one she was dying to tell. 

          “Like I said, you have stars in your eyes. Clouded over, faded, but still there; begging to shine.” 

          For the second time that day, you didn’t know what to make of it. You knew better than to ask.  Maz Kanata seemed exactly the type of person to answer anything as cryptically as possible. 

          “Seems to me Pilot, you have three options,” she continued. “Number one, you go back out there and ask if anyone needs a co-pilot.  You go off into the Outer Rim and nobody hears from you again.  Number two, you take this back and deliver it to Commander Dameron yourself.”

          You fought the urge to roll your eyes. “And number three?” 

          “You choose to fight in your own way.” 

          “By what? Freelancing as a fighter pilot?” 

          She shrugged. “As I said, there are more ways of fighting than hopping in an X-Wing and blowing things up.” She held up the data card with that same knowing smile.  “More effective ways.”

          You half expected her to hand the card back to you, but instead she tucked it into her vest and picked up the crate she had been carrying earlier.  

            “It’s your choice Pilot,” she said.  “It always has been.”

          And with that she left, leaving you alone with your thoughts and your choices.  

[risingsouls]

Recruited: Chapter 5

[I finally got a chance to finish this next chapter. Enjoy Nabooru having a moral crisis. :D]

Nabooru

Nabooru had never been more glad to exit a space than when they finally landed on the planet assigned to them and she climbed out of her pod.

"How have you guys flown in those all these years? And for days at a time?" She stretched her arms to the sky and bent backward, her spine popping luxuriously. Straightening once more, she pulled one knee to her chest, stretched it out long, and then repeated it with the other. "Especially you two. You're bigger than me and I felt cramped."

"Sometimes it's months, rookie," Nappa pointed out with a snort. His lips twisted into a smirk. "Depends on how much trouble we've caused lately."

Nabooru grimaced. The few day trip to Frieza Planet 6892--formerly known as Socandoria before the Empire took over, according to the reports she spent much of the trip memorizing thrice over--wore on her enough, the ache of sitting still for so long apparent in her tight muscles. She supposed that was why the pods were equipped with sleep-inducing technology. Forcing their pilots to sleep was probably the only way to keep them from going absolutely mad with boredom on longer flights. She considered using it herself when she only managed to doze, the weight of anxiety over not screwing up her first mission keeping her hyper aware and paranoid about forgetting some minute but somehow pertinent detail on the briefing that had been sent to their scouters. 

"Perhaps we should have caused more because this job is a joke," Raditz grumbled, his expression a near mirror of her own displeasure. He tapped the side of his scouter, the device beeping rhythmically as it performed a scan of the planet's power levels. "The reports all say this planet has been sucked dry and so far, I'm not seeing much to refute that."

Nabooru reached up to perform her own scan. Clusters of weak power levels cropped up here and there over the planet, likely congregated in the three larger cities and five work camps that still functioned and hadn't been abandoned. The higher ones belonged to the few remaining soldiers stationed there, either as peacekeepers of sorts or foremen. From where they landed, she could see next to nothing as far as the eye could see, save for a few lone what she could only call trees from their height. Their strange, dull pink to brown gradient from top to bottom and lack of leaves or fruit made it difficult to classify them confidently as such.  She heard no wildlife in the vicinity, either, and the ground beneath their feet lacked vegetation.

"Enough chatter. The quicker we deal with this mission, the faster we can leave and move onto something potentially more exciting." Vegeta perched himself on a rock, one leg bent at the knee and his forearm perched lazily over it. His brows and eyelids dipped with the corners of his mouth in evident boredom. "Raditz, get going on the recon. We don't have all day. Since there's nothing here, I expect you back here in a few hours."

Nabooru raised an eyebrow. "Wouldn't it be quicker if we all did it, though?"

His dark eyes narrowed and snapped to her, and his loosed tail stiffened at his side. Nappa, who had taken up a spot standing next to his perch cleared his throat and discretely shook his head. Raditz wore the hint of a smirk. Her first misstep already, it seemed. She could see Bruvi's disappointed but unsurprised expression in her mind's eye. They rarely went a day of her training all those years ago without Nabooru's stubbornness or quick tongue earning her some form of punishment. Apparently not much had changed.

"Is that what you think?"

A challenge, a threat. But Nabooru stood her ground, straightening her spine and resting her hands on her hips. "I do. It's only logical. You said you wanted out of here quickly, and recon is basically the only thing we have to do for now, isn't it? More people cover more ground. It's not difficult."

The prince's expression darkened. His tail lashed the rock behind him, sending debris and dust skyward. "Already questioning my authority, then? Perhaps I should have simply killed you after all." 

Reason reminded her of her people, of how their fate was tied to her performance and behavior. It chided her for her pride and willed her to bow her head and admit defeat. Instead, she lifted her chin in defiance. If she survived, she could learn her lesson another day. She refused to let one more person bully her. She had to compromise enough of herself in this position, and it would only get worse as time wore on.

"Maybe you should have. But you didn't. And you won't now."

Vegeta stared at her, unblinking and observing. Nabooru remained rigid, hoping she maintained a stalwart resolution and hid the wave of discomfort she felt beneath his burning gaze. The display would either impress him to what little degree he could be impressed or he would make good on the challenge she proposed. A gutsy maneuver that she had only successfully utilized a few times with her betters out of likely sheer dumb luck.

Finally, a growl rumbled from Vegeta, and his expression reverted back to boredom from venturing toward irate. "Whatever. If you're so concerned, you can accompany Raditz," he said, waving her off. "Question me like that again, and your punishment will be far more grueling than a horrifically boring tour of a dead planet."

"Can't be any more boring than sitting around here doing nothing with you two," Nabooru countered, the hint of a smile on her full lips when he cast her a withering glance. "Or at the very least a better learning opportunity. I need to learn everything I can to be a functional member of this team, right? I want to carry my weight and not be a burden."

She ignored Vegeta’s snort and turned to Raditz instead. "Guess you're my new trainer." Her feet left the ground and she hovered by his side. "Lead the way."

"Right." Amusement danced in his dark eyes as he nodded to the other two Saiyans and he took off, Nabooru matching his speed and remaining at his side.

"You've got a lot of nerve," he said once they were out of earshot. It didn't sound like he fully meant it as a negative. "You've realized that can get you killed around here, right?"

Nabooru shrugged. "Of course I have. But I'm not about to let Vegeta believe I'm a doormat if I’m to work with you three." She watched the numbers tick down on her scouter as they neared the first city. "It was stupid, I know. Nappa told me enough about him, so I knew the gamble it was. Don't tell me I had you worried about me already."

"Worry is a strong word if you're going to be a moron. No matter how funny that was." Dilapidated buildings rose over the horizon, and near unusable roads cropped up beneath them leading into the city. "I'm just hoping having a newbie on board will get me out of some of the grunt work like this eventually, so I can't have you dying on your first outing."

"And here I thought you might kind of like me."

They flew over the city and selected a point near the center to land, the few denizens milling about casting them little more than passing glances. Used to soldiers doing the same, Nabooru guessed. Close up, the buildings were in worse shape than she thought, many of them either in a state of full disrepair and boarded up, collapsing in on themselves, or the businesses near empty. Most of the stalls lining the street stood empty, shells of speedy and cheap commerce that livened up the streets once upon a time. Now those that manned the stalls offered their wares but with a wary or unenthusiastic air about them.

"What is it we're looking for?" Nabooru asked at last, watching as a mother with near translucent pink skin ushered a smaller carbon copy of herself past the pair of them as quickly as she could. Their clothes were in rags. "The state of things? Population?"

“If it’s a new planet, then that would be a few things we would look into, along with resources and the caliber of fighters if there are any.” Radtiz strode up the street and Nabooru fell into step next to him, observing their surroundings, the people they passed. None seemed all too thrilled to see them and if her lessons taught her anything, they had good reason to treat them with disdain and fear. Nabooru severed the line of thought before it could venture into the next phase, the reminder of what orders they would likely receive concerning this planet’s fate.

“For this one, it’s more confirming what has already been reported over the years. Finding out if there is anything worth salvaging after all,” he continued, slowing at a storefront that reminded her of the inns back in Hyrule. She heard glass breaking, laughter, and shouting from inside in a language she shouldn’t understand. “Looks like the only places that do remotely well here are bars and brothels after all.”

Nabooru peered into the window, wiping a layer of dust from the glass with her sleeve. Sure enough, the place was packed with all manner of patrons crammed along the bar, packed around tables, or fighting for a better view of the group dancing on stage. She stepped back and dusted her forearm off. “I guess when there’s nothing else to live for, it’s easier to drown yourself in...do they call it liquor here?” Raditz nodded confirmation and moved on, muttering notes of the city’s state into his scouter. She followed and waited for him to finish before continuing. “The briefing suggested most have just resorted to stealing and other ‘crime,’ too, if they’re not working the mines or at other camps. Guess they feel they have no choice if they want to survive here.”

A sentiment she was all too familiar with. When faced with starvation and death, her own people had to shift their skills as warriors to include thievery. They raided caravans that crossed into their lands from further west. They stole from the other races of Hyrule when they got desperate enough. When pointed out in talks with the monarchy, when the fingers were pointed at them for being no more than killers and thieves, she and other leaders of her race tried to show that their pleas for fertile land for farming and the like as well as less restrictive trade would make the need to steal unneeded for their survival. They either didn’t hear or didn’t care. 

And for that she had no doubt they paid the price. She only wished she could have been there. To be a part of that revolution. Part of her still hated that her people had been backed so far into a corner so as to rely on an outside source for aid as well as violence but...it was kill or be killed. What choice had they left them after years of failed negotiations?

Had these people tried to rebel like the Gerudo did?

Nabooru swallowed the lump in her throat, the all too familiar homesickness settling in her chest as it did when she dwelled too long on her home and people. She focused instead on the task at hand, on learning the ropes for this particular part of her job.

Without much to look at, they scoured a few more streets and discussed points of interests. They caught a Frieza Force soldier stumbling out of a bar and questioned him before deciding to move on to the next location, another city in much the same state as the first. Raditz “let” her take over with recording the notes they would send back to Vegeta and the commanders back at base for review in determining the next steps they would take with the planet. Their conversation revolved around the task at hand, with Raditz offering pointers or corrections for ensuring a full report. 

For this particular excursion, each one felt repetitive. Even the work camps offered little more information. Locals worked under the supervision of Frieza Force soldiers. She didn’t need the foremen to tell her that the resources at each one were all but tapped. One said they hadn’t actually mined anything for months but they kept the workers busy to give them purpose.

With their logs sent to the appropriate personnel, Nabooru returned to the other two Saiyans with Raditz. Nappa leaned against his pod, eyelids heavy and looking half asleep. Vegeta remained on the same boulder, head tilted to the side and a hand on his scouter, likely listening to their report. He spared them both a glance, but his gaze remained fixed on her for a few moments longer, scrutinizing as he listened to her voice in his ear. Her eye caught his tail swaying behind him in idle arcs, but it told her as little as his blank expression. She inwardly snorted at the passing thought that he must be great at cards.

Nappa yawned and stretched, calling her attention instead over to him. "How boring was it? The place as desolate as it looks?"

Raditz nodded. "A waste of time. They had all the information they needed already to make a decision." He shrugged. "Hopefully that means we get to the fun part sooner rather than later."

"Yeah. It's too bad their military was already absorbed into the force, and all the rebellions were taken care of years ago. I don't suppose you heard any word of one faction ready to change things, did you?"

"No. After the last one, sounds like they learned their lesson."

Nabooru rested her back against a nearby tree, crossing her legs at the ankle and folding her arms over her chest. She noted the disappointment in both males, the sag of their shoulders, Nappa's dejected grumbling under his breath. At first, their disappointment confused her when both seemed to like when their job was easy, clean, and quick. However, further consideration convinced her otherwise. They had pointed out the pointlessness of the recon on this planet, Raditz was more than ready to pawn the boring duties off on her, and now they would prefer someone to challenge them on whatever order they were given concerning the planet's fate. They wanted a quick response to quickly stave off boredom, not for ease. They preferred a fight over the simple monotony when presented little to no challenge on jobs. A sentiment she could understand, even though, with action looming, her nerves over the likely course had her nerves wound in tight knots. She instead tried to focus on the Saiyans, how she would compromise with her moral compass to do what she had to.

"Can't be helped, I guess," Nappa continued,  turning his attention on Nabooru. "Gotta break in the rookies somehow, huh? Though I'm sure you're gunning for some real action yourself, right?"

She nodded. "Of course." Not a complete lie; idleness didn't suit her. "It was interesting to see the planet. Being desolate aside, it's far different than what I was used to back home. Though I'm sure most sights I see from here on out will be."

Nappa grinned, apparently perked up from his near slumber not moments ago. "That's the spirit." He turned to Raditz. "We should celebrate while we wait for orders. You see any good spots for a drink or two?"

"That's about all that's left on this rock. Can't speak for the quality of them, though. Might be able to get into a brawl or two."

"Eh, good enough," said Nappa. "What do ya think, Vegeta? We got time for a drink?"

"Is that all you idiots think about? Booze and sex?" the prince growled. He hopped down from his perch, arms folded over his chest. "What is there to celebrate, anyway? She gathered intel, nothing impressive. Raditz can do that, after all."

She kept her comments to herself, the insult obvious but the truth in his words irrefutable. Outside of the month of lessons to teach her the ins and outs of the trade, training to control her ki better, and the spar with Vegeta, she hadn't really accomplished much to prove herself. The recon, while tedious, wasn't exactly all that difficult here. She could see how it would be more time consuming and complicated on other planets that had yet to feel the sting of the PTO or some other foul entity, and therefore found the snub to Raditz more unfair than the one directed at her.

"Fine. Is giving us something better than standing around like idiots a better excuse?"

"Barely." Vegeta waved a gloved hand, dismissing them. "Do what you want. But I expect the three of you back here as soon as I call. And you had best not be wasted. We still have work to do."

"You're not coming?" The question passed her lips before she could stop it, and the derisive snort he responded with before turning his back and heading to his abandoned pod only reinforced how idiotic the question was. Her cheeks burned, but she covered her embarrassment with her usual aloof confidence. "Mm, nevermind. Your loss, though."

If his response was nonverbal, Nappa's large hand slamming down on her shoulder made her miss it. Her knees buckled slightly under the force. "A hell of a fighter and fun. We really did luck out." 

Raditz's boots had already left the vegetation-bare ground beneath them. The smirk he wore revealed he was either unbothered by Vegeta's previous insult or used to them. "I'll judge that when we find out if she can hold her liquor." Energy surrounded him and he took off, Nappa following his lead. Nabooru lingered a moment longer, sparing a glance to their leader, before tailing after her new cohorts.

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

Raditz had chosen the least rundown of the bars they saw within the cities they scouted and somehow the quietest despite that. A few patrons lined the bar at the back, and a couple of tables were full of a rainbow of locals sharing drinks and conversing in low tones. She recalled a passersby earlier that day telling their buddy they should skip this one due to the price of drinks, so she supposed that's what kept the ailing citizens of the planet from packing the place. 

The three of them marched up to the bar, anyone within their path ducking out of it quickly. Raditz waved down the bartender who rushed over to them, leaving his current patron mid sentence and perturbed. "Ah, more soldiers and my favorite customers. You three must be new. What can I get you?"

"Whatever your strongest stuff is. One for each of us." Raditz nodded to a booth in the corner just off the bar. "Bring them over there when they're ready."

"Right away, sir."

The bartender hurried back the way he came and Nabooru followed the pair of Saiyans to the booth. She grabbed a chair from a table on the way, placing it at the end and seating herself in it. For comfort. Both men were quite large, and she wanted to ensure they would have room to stretch out as they pleased while also saving her the inconvenience of being crushed by pure muscle. 

"So, you two do this sort of thing often, huh?"

"When we can," Raditz answered. "We don't usually get downtime like this."

"Yeah, Vegeta is just being dramatic," continued Nappa, plucking a menu of the drink options from a stanchion at the table's center. Nabooru noted several red SOLD OUT stickers next to many. "Most of the time, we don't do recon like this. We're usually sent straight to planets for purging or putting down this rebellion or that. If we need to scout, it's more to understand the situation for battle than to help the big wigs tell us what to do with a planet like this job."

"Then it's back to base or off to the next planet, depending on orders. They tend to keep us busy."

Nabooru couldn't decide if she was happy about that or not. "That sounds a whole lot better than doing this every time. I'm not exactly the patient type. I like to keep busy." She folded her arms on the tabletop. "Are rebellions common on planets the Empire has conquered?"

"They're probably more common than we know, but most are settled by the soldiers stationed on the planet already," Raditz explained. "We get called in when they get too out of hand."

As much faith as she had in her people, she hoped Ganondorf's ambitious nature didn't convince him to seek out trying to take on Frieza and his armies. He had Hyrule like he wanted, conquered and taught a lesson for their mistreatment of their people. She hoped that was plenty for him until they could for certain break from the Empire. In truth, she would prefer to get away sooner rather than later. But Frieza's power was astronomical, and who knew how many of his lackeys could wipe the floor with even their entire army, ki training or no. Zarbon and Dodoria alone nearly doubled her power level, after all.

A nod. "That sounds more fun than this," she admitted. "Closer to what I spent my life training for."

The bartender arrived with three glasses of clear, carbonated liquid and set each glass in front of them. "I apologize up front for not having the usual fare we offer force soldiers. Shipments of imports have been scarce of late. But I assure you this is the finest beverage we offer at the moment."

He bowed his head for returning to his post, Nabooru lifted her glass and observed the contents. The Saiyans lifted their glasses and nodded for her to do the same. "To your first likely successful mission," Nappa announced with a grin, "and to many more that are hopefully more fun than this mudball."

Nabooru snorted and tapped her glass with theirs, the harsh volume of the clink leaving her surprised that each vessel remained intact. She watched both men take a large gulp of the liquid and their expressions slip from joyous to befuddled. They lowered their drinks and stared into the cups. Raditz even gave his a sniff.

"This is water." Raditz took another swig. "Are you telling me these people get wasted off water?"

"Seriously?" Nabooru tipped the glass and took a sip. Sure enough, she tasted normal water, the fizz the only thing setting it apart. She glanced from one bewildered Saiyan to the other, and her frame shook with her laughter. She rested a hand over her mouth. "I guess Vegeta doesn't have to worry about us coming back drunk after all, huh?"

Nappa and Raditz stared at her for several seconds before finally finding the humor in the situation themselves, both managing to chuckle. Nappa gulped down the rest of his water and wiped his mouth with his forearm. "Shoulda known when he said he couldn't get us the shit the other soldiers prefer. Guess it could have been worse…"

 "Like bad tasting."

"Or poisonous."

Nabooru opened her mouth to supply her own horrific possibility when each of their scouters sounded a series of beeps before Vegeta spoke in their ears: "To no one's surprise, we're purging the planet so it can be sold. Nappa and Raditz, take care of the area you're in and finish off the rest of the southern hemisphere. Nabooru, meet me back at the pods immediately. Don't make me wait." 

The connection dropped as suddenly as it opened, allowing none of them to respond even if they wanted to. Dread sank to the pit of her stomach, and she tried to pretend the rest of the patrons of the bar didn't exist. That the mother and daughter that scurried by them had been her imagination. That the workers and vendors and rough housing drunkards were no more than her mind making up a story for the desolate planet. For now, it was the only way she would complete the task at hand without a physical or moral interjection. 

Standing, Nabooru drained her glass of water, wishing it had the same effect as it did on the locals. "Guess I should get going. I'm already on his bad side." She tried to flash the pair a cheeky grin but the muscles of her mouth fought against it. She just hoped they read it as dread over dealing with Vegeta once more. "I'll see you guys soon."

Nappa and Raditz wished her luck, and part of her envied the excitement that radiated between the two of them. It beat the nausea and guilt that frothed in her stomach and weighed heavy on her heart, respectively. But she had a job to do. Purging planets, subjugating their peoples, expanding an empire, and filling its coffers was expected of her. Duty had a new meaning for her. To protect her people, she would have to destroy others. Nothing new in the grand scheme of things when war with the rest of Hyrule knocked on their door before Frieza discovered them; much of her life had been kill or be killed in some regards. Only now she had less wiggle room to avoid it.

She slipped out the door and onto the city's streets, taking a moment to marvel at the architecture. The tall buildings unlike she had ever seen before, plainer than Hyrule Castle but taller and still majestic somehow. Someone's hard work to be destroyed in moments by powerful ki blasts large enough to level the cities. She shoved the thoughts away and took to the sky, jetting back toward where they had left their pods and Vegeta behind.

Nabooru landed near the Saiyan prince just as the ground beneath her quaked and an explosion sounded from the way she had come. She glanced over her shoulder to see a surge of light encompass a large swath of land and debris shooting skyward in catastrophic destruction. The city she had just left wiped off the face of the planet, likely. She swallowed and returned her attention to Vegeta. The task at hand. Reminding herself that her people's lives depended on her compliance. She worked for an emperor that killed for less than failure she had come to understand.

Vegeta faced her, his feet leaving the surface. "Let's go."

She was grateful he didn't leave her any room to protest before taking off, and she followed behind him, silently working to clear her head. The next city rose on the horizon too quickly, a blessing and a curse. She wanted to get this over with, but she truly did not want to do it at all.

Nabooru halted beside Vegeta when he stopped, several meters above and outside the crumbling city. The planet was falling apart. She witnessed that. The people here had been suffering for years due to her employer's greed and negligence. A small comfort, but she supposed death meant an end to it. A conclusion she didn't care for, but a call she had no say in making.

"Well?" Her eyes shot to the Saiyan. His arms were folded over his chest, and he observed her with obvious impatience. "What are you waiting for? Or do you need a demonstration?"

"Surely you're itching for a little action by now," she responded, a touch too quickly that earned her a snort. She mentally cursed herself. "You can take the first one."

"Hmpt. You're stalling." He let one arm fall back to his side and raised the other, open palm aimed toward the city below. A smirk flickered over his lips, devilish and taunting. "I wonder...is it because of some silly morals or you simply don't wish to embarrass yourself so soon?"

Both, she wanted to respond, but red ki building in his palm stopped her. He fired the blast straight for the heart of the city. It exploded like a bomb on contact, the force of it spreading outward and engulfing the area in blinding light. Nabooru shielded her face from both the flare and flying debris with her arm and chewed her lower lip. When she lowered it again, a crater had replaced the city. 

"Check for survivors."

She balled her hand into a fist to steady it before raising it to her scouter. She pressed the button. Not a single reading for several miles. She felt his gaze on her once more, gauging her reaction. Searching for weakness like a predator waiting to strike. Another reason to see a failure rather than an asset to his team. 

"No survivors," she said, the words heavy on her tongue. "Guess you've had plenty of practice, hm?"

Dark eyes narrowed briefly, and the end of his tail tucked itself more securely at his waist. "A little," he replied without humor. "You'll take care of the rest now that you've had your demonstration."

She nodded and followed the scouter's reading to the next city, halting outside of it just as they had done before. Her palms were sweaty inside her gloves and her heart thrummed at a too quick pace. Despite it all, she forced her face into a mask of neutrality, her mind to a blank slate of nothing more than determining how much energy he would need to complete the task in one blow to avoid extra strain on her already fraying psyche. She sucked in a breath and raised both hands. The glow of orange-yellow ki surged around her palms. She fired. It swallowed the edifices in seconds as she expanded it outward to cover a wider area. When she cut the blast off and lowered her hands, nothing remained but desolation. She swallowed the hot bile that rose to her throat.

"Not bad," Vegeta rumbled beside her, hand raised to the side of his scouter. "You wasted energy, though, a testament to Nappa's careless training. He's too flashy for his own good."

Her mouth was too dry to respond, so she merely nodded. Her fingers itched to wind themselves in her ponytail and she wanted to scream or vomit or both but she quelled the urge; the less discomfort she showed outwardly, the better. 

"He said you learn quickly, though, so I'll show you once more and you can do as I do." He tilted his head toward the next destination, one of the work camps if she remembered right. "Go."

Nabooru didn't hesitate, the need to leave the destruction behind nearing overwhelming. She blinked rapidly to stave off tears and was glad Vegeta remained behind her. How she would spend likely the rest of her life perpetrating these atrocities without losing herself was beyond her in that moment. She would lose her mind if she didn't figure something out and soon. In a moment, her kill count had risen from a select handful that had forced her hand to hundreds of innocents. Thousands more would follow so long as she remained in Frieza's service. Her people's livelihood was at stake. Her every decision as a member of the force would secure their safety or destroy it entirely. Which brought to question the moral dilemma at hand: did others deserve to perish so her people could live? She could only weakly defend herself with the notion that, if not by her hand, some other would be doing so in her place. Another with a similar background to hers, forced to serve to protect loved ones. Someone who joined Frieza willingly and reveled in the bloodshed. Another who had lost their home and had no other choice. The cycle would continue as long as the Cold Empire and PTO remained intact.

And what hope did she have to dismantle that on her own? Hyrule had been one society on a single planet and she couldn't handle that with the Gerudo army and without outside help in the end. She had no prayer in releasing herself from the clutches of this deal by force. Not alone. Not without allies. 

But….somehow, she knew all the allies in the universe might not be enough to face Frieza. She would fail just like all the rest before her. Thus, for now, she would throw her morality out the window. She would pretend that those she destroyed were guilty of something heinous and horrible. Cling to a sense of duty to the empire that freed her people. Anything at all to keep herself from crumbling from the inside out.

[asheelnair]

PERSONAL BLOG :-)

 Asheel Nair (Me18b101)

Course - MS4100 ( Soft skills)

First of all thanks Viji Ma'am to teach this wonderful course and making me understand and help me to grow and realize my skills that will help me personally as well as in professional growth.

1)   Meaning and Purpose 

 It was a very great session to attend as it gave a lot of insights about life and insisted us to find our true worth and value of life in this world.

There is a statement which touched me very much- “Ultimately, man should not ask what the meaning of his life is, but rather must recognize that it is he who is asked. In a word, each man is questioned by life; and he can only answer to life by answering for his own life; to life he can only respond by being responsible.”

We are all hungry for meaning, for purpose, for the feeling that our life is worth more than the sum of its parts. We can find meaning in the sublime, in the absurd, in the dull and dreary, and in the perfectly wretched in life. That's when Viji came up with the word 'ikigai'- Combining the Japanese words iki, meaning life and gai, meaning value or worth, ikigai is essentially about finding your purpose in life.  for exampe- Ikigai means “the reason you wake up for in the morning”

Then Viji told us to write our purpose of life in our book :-

What i love most- Video Games, family, friends, dogs

What i am good at - Maintaining relations, consulting

What can i get paid for - Consulting job or maybe some unexplored fields(who knows xD)

what the world needs- world is selfish and everyone wants profit in each and everything they do, the current world needs humanity and needs to develop a sense of empathy and helping nature.

Always know your true worth and realize it because it is only you know your true worth and value and always be grateful for who you are.

2) The '5S' principle 

:- It was the first time i came across this principle and trust me it was worth it :)

What are the 5 principles of 5S?

 5S stands for the 5 steps of this methodology: Sort, Set in Order, Shine, Standardize, Sustain. 

5S is designed to decrease waste while optimizing productivity through maintaining an orderly workplace which will help you bring positive thinking and productive solution.

Application - I applied this principle in my room which was dirty and messes up. I cleaned everything and kept everything in a proper way. After implying this principle it felt very comforting and nice.

3) Time-Management 

 It is one of the crucial factors to live a peaceful life without any tension and stress. The person who has time management skills are very calm and comforting and always live a peaceful life. Everyone has the same 24 hours, however, some make better use of their time than others. This is one of the reasons why we have people who excel at the things they do. In other words, people may become busy; but that necessarily does not mean they are effective at their task. Hence, time management plays a crucial role in personal and professional life.

 Time management may be a conscious effort to spend a selected amount of your time to perform a task efficiently . Furthermore, productivity is the key focus here. The more productive the work, the higher are the results. Moreover, time management requires a careful balancing between business life , social life, the other hobbies or activities. From an academic perspective, time management is a necessity. Students have many subjects to hide , therefore, efficiently managing time is a crucial skill.

The main problem we all face is the lack of time. Having so many things to do and yet not enough time to do them all. Through my conversations with many, I realized that I was not the only one facing this issue. This was when I realized sharpening my activity management skills becomes important. Though many people may call it ‘time management, I believe activity management is a better term because we can’t manage time but we can manage our activities each day. The reality is many people drift through life and allow themselves to be carried by the waves. We all have a choice to take control of our activities and reach our fullest potential. 

so use your time wisely by sorting important things first by realizing the importance of time in your life and seeing the benefits of time management.

As it is said " Time and Tide wait for none" , make sure you make each and every second count and create a change for a greater tomorrow.

I even talked with few people who I believe is very efficient in time management and asked them their secret mantra :P , example - My friend :-

– All good things take time and so does your goal, some achieve goals faster while some take their time.  You need to be vocal and loud about your goal, aim and thoughts. Always have a positive mindset and be ready to face any challenges thrown at your goals. You should always be open minded and appreciate every small thing that makes you reach your goal. She thinks that the importance of setting goals comes with maturity and responsibility and you need to figure out what things comes first in your life.

4) Strength based Learning - All the above factors can be included while finding about our personal strength based learning. sit down for few minutes and think about your strengths and weaknesses. For me-Strengths-based learning involves a process of assessing which helps us to identify our greatest talents, and to then develop and apply strengths based on those talents in the process of learning, intellectual development, and academic achievement to levels of personal and professional excellence.

As it is said " champions are not born they are trained and nourished with care to become a champion", Skills do not naturally exist within us; they must be acquired through training and practice. The concept of strengths is based in each individual’s unique nature and building upon what he or she naturally does best. Takeaway-After this session  I realized I have strengths with which I can create a change for better tomorrow and life is too long to explore, learn and develop. I would always like to explore my strengths and work on it and inspire others to play on their strengths. Thanks Viji for this wonderful session :)

5) Communication  

It is something because of which I faced conflicts in past, For me -signaling benevolence in communication seems vital than harsh-naked truth as it can sometimes product in fright, strain or spite in developing long-lasting relationships with family or at workplace. Blunt honesty can sometimes be rebellious whereas benevolence aids in handling difficult situations ethically by breeding trust and in boosting one’s morale. It enables one to be mindful of consequences and frame things in a way that is different from complete unvarnished truth- which in turn fosters relationships and other developments.

Thanks to Abha ma'am and Viji ma'am to take up this session and making it a wonderful experience. Salute to both of you for your professionalism and are dedicated to your work, was truly amazed to see this.

Presentation- The three 's' -structure, style and substance were covered in this. There were many other factors that were taught which helped me to learn, incorporate those and make my skills even stronger. Learned a lot on how to communicate, make a presentation and how to present yourself in front of people, all thanks to Abha ma'am.

Assertive Communication - Assertiveness means expressing your point of view in a way that is clear and direct, while still respecting others. Communicating in an assertive manner can help you to: minimize conflict. The 3 C's Of Assertive Communication are Confidence – you believe in your ability to handle a situation. Clear – the message you have is clear and easy to understand. Controlled – you deliver information in a calm and controlled manner. Passive communication and behavior involves allowing your own rights to be violated by failing to express honest feelings, thoughts, and beliefs, or by expressing your thoughts and feelings in an apologetic manner that others can easily disregard.

Few steps for assertive communication :

1.Tell the person what you think about their behavior without accusing them. 

2. Tell them how you feel when they behave a certain way. 

3. Tell them how their behavior affects you and your relationship with them. 

4. Tell them what you would prefer them to do instead.  

6) Self Realization

This was a very good session and topic. During the first 5 min we were told to take out a mirror or front camera and look yourself in it for few minutes and write down whatever comes into your mind. when i saw myself i could see that there is a fire burning within myself that want's to achieve each and every goal, I realized i will soon conquer each and every challenges in my way and make my parents and myself proud.

 Then we came on the topic of 

 Body shaming :

   It is something that i feel is cheap and very immature. Without knowing what the other person is going through people criticize them and laugh at them. Individuals with a history of trauma, depression, self-harm, low self-esteem, or borderline personality disorder are more likely to be affected by body shaming and potentially develop an eating disorder or engage in self-harm behavior.

 Empowerment doesn’t just refer to professional success and financial stability but also the overall personality development of an individual. Empowering yourself requires you to confront your problems but not bow down to them. It involves you being open to changing your views based on your own personal experience. Hence, if you’re not changing and sticking to what you’ve been told by society, you’re keeping yourself away from empowerment.

 When it comes to our views, we have plenty of them pertaining to our own selves. A majority of them are concerned with how we look. From television to magazine, most women have grown up being told that the perfect girl is slim, fair, humble, docile and quiet.

But, what about those women who are plus-sized, have a deformity, have too many tattoos or are too outspoken? The society might not find them palatable enough to call them perfect but who gave society that right, anyway? The only person who gets to decide is you. You need to shed societal expectations and accept every bit of yourself.

Takeaway - Don't live by fearing of someone's judgement, Everyone has a beautiful body on this planet, all are different that is the beauty of this world. "Embrace it don't hide it"

Snake and Ladder in our life :-

Ladder here refers to all the supports in your life who encourage you to achieve something great in your life while snake refers to all the challenges that is stopping you to achieve your goals.

Ladder and goals - 

 Family, friends and dear ones

Get into a dream company that recognizes my     talent and reach a good position where one day i can become a leader

Want to buy a luxurious home to my parents and     want to give them everything whatever they ask for

Buy a dream car

Building shelter homes for animals

Do something for orphans and rural people

Reach at a height where i become a role model     for few

Build a dream  PC gaming set-up, xD 

Want to travel the world (each and every     corner)

Want to learn calisthenics

And many more.............  :P

 Snakes -

Negative people

Procrastination. “I will do it later” is often     equivalent to “I will never do it,” though that is never the real     intention behind procrastinating something

Fear of Failure

Ignorance

Lack of Purpose

Lack of Courage

Fault Finding

Lack of Self-belief             Takeaway -

[100dad]

The 6 things that crushed dads in the last 50 years.

The 6 things that crushed dads in the last 50 years.

This experiment is over. It is a complete disaster. A failure. Single moms are not the answer to a better society.  Stupid dads are not the answer for a more united America. Locked-up dads are not the answer.  Uninvolved dads are not the answer.

The studies are boring to read but unanimous. When dad is in the home (regardless of the quality of dad) kids perform better in school and achieve higher education than their peers with no dad in the home. Income is higher in a home with a dad in it than in homes without a dad. Poverty rates skyrocket when there is no dad in the home. Dependence on welfare skyrockets when dad is no in the home. Crime rates are crazy high in households that do not have a dad present. Kids raised in a home with dad present have much more opportunity in life.

Teenage pregnancy skyrockets in households without a dad, leading to a continued cycle. Mental health issues are much higher in homes where dad is gone. The odds are ever in your favor when Dad is home. Your odds tank when dad is gone. That is white paper research. Decades of studies. Government-funded. From many many different research organizations.

This is what we have done over the last 50 years to destroy the family unit and take Dads out of the home.

Shift in Workplace

The shift in economics was a real cause. Dads were home and their presence was felt. They were often farmers or local merchants. As the world shifted so did families. Small farms disappeared. Industrial Revolution called for workers to spend long, hard, dangerous days away from the home. Eventually, companies became bigger and bigger with national reach. Local shops shuttered in exchange for big box stores. Sales became a leading career. Dads traveled, they moved, they spent more time away from their families. No more working side by side in the fields. No more being taught how to fix things and make the farm run. No more stopping by dads store and spending time learning the family business. Now dad was either out of town or working for a company where having your family stop by would be frowned upon.

Let’s not forget more and more women going into the workplace. Which often meant more and more influence in raising kids not coming from the parents. Even with Dad gone, to some extent, mom kept his memory alive in the house. “Our” rules were still enforced. Our values. And Mom was gonna tell dad when he did get back home.

Move to Public Education As the world keeps on spinning most people go with it. And public education became and has become a massive influence in American lives. I’m not going to bash public education because education truly is important. There are other options, and our family has avoided the public-school route. Education in small schoolhouses was a much different picture of education than it is today. Today’s kids spend an incredible amount of time inside the school system and much of that time is not productive. Todays students graduate not nearly as educated as they should be. The US ranks very poorly in worldwide education standards despite being the heaviest spender. Regardless of my views here 2 things come from this shift. A massive amount of the day is spend being influenced by people who are not Dad (or Mom). And since teaching is a field dominated by women there are arguments that the shift of so much time without male role models is the reason masculinity has declined and become attacked.

Court Systems

Ask any dad that has had to go through the court system and he will admit the deck is stacked against you. Courts have predetermined that Dad is not important and his value is in check writing. “And if you force our hand then fine---here are some days you can see your kids. Be thankful for the scraps we just tossed you.” – Signed family judges everywhere

Family Courts have crippled Dad's influence in kids' lives. And its politicians that create the laws and incentives Judges follow. Did you know states receive federal dollars based on how much they are having to collect in child support. If you want to know why courts stack against dads and care mostly about child support.......there is some real incentive for states to get the child support number as high as they can.

My other target is Dads here. As much as I am disappointed in the judges. Dad allowed the situation to get to a point where a judge decides what he can and can’t do. I know moms are at fault too. But this is a dad page. Dad’s – Sex can make babies. Stop having sex with crazy women. Marry women you want to spend your lives with. Make sure you guys are on the same page with life- how to manage money, how to raise kids, how many kids, what faith you are and want to raise kids in, how involved in-laws can be in our lives…. these are some of the biggest issues. Some of these divorce stories I hear, ya’ll can do better.

Politician Passing Stupid Laws

I do not like politicians. I think they are all slime balls. Even the ones you like. Especially the ones you do not like. They make incredibly stupid laws. Lets call out these idiots for a bit, not that they will be held responsible or even accept blame.

Child support is collected by states and used as the measuring stick for how much federal money states get. States get more money from the federal government when they collect more child support. Wonder why dads don’t get custody when they should? Wonder why Dads get stuck with a heavy bill and limited contact?

Welfare rules and government incentives finance the breaking up of families because hell the government will pay you for that. Politicians create laws that incentivize the breaking up the family unit especially in low-income and minority families. There has been a real effort to replace the husband and the father with a government handout.

There is a lot of chatter about laws passed that disproportionately took minority fathers out of the home and into jail for relatively minor offenses. I haven’t seen enough to make a judgment, but I would not be surprised at all.

Remember while there is always someone to blame-- we can take power out of the courts and politicians' hands by making good decisions and not ending up reliant on government money or stuck in their courts. When dads step up and become great we make all this way less relevant.

Entertainment Finds Ratings in Crushing Dads

Gone are the true role models of Dads. The Leave It to Beaver type dads are gone. The Dad with high integrity, that did not get caught up in drama, and was always good for dispensing wisdom and seriousness.  Now the leading TV dads are the butt of the joke. While I admit it's often funny. I’m also certain we are a culture easily influenced by entertainment and the stigmas in tv influence generations and how they act. Now they are idiots. Mom is the smart one that really does everything. Dad drinks beer, watched tv, groans about doing any work, loves sports more than his family, and is clueless and clumsy. Luckily, mom is there to do literally everything. No respect, No honor, no integrity. Let’s be honest…. that doesn’t get laughs. Decades of that humor on top of not actually having dads in the home and a dramatic rise in how much we watch tv has reshaped what many men think a dad should act like and be like. It’s a wrong interpretation and families are paying the price. It must be recognized that tv dads are punchlines, not actual real dads that should be modeled after.

Feminism

Before I get torched let's clarify a few things. Women are great. Women are strong. Women are smart. Women are capable. I am not saying otherwise. Feminism was needed for the evolution of the world because there was no voting for women and workplaces shy’d away from women and certainly would not pay them well. And at higher levels of business, they were being turned down opportunities when they were more qualified and talented. It was needed. Some feminists have taken the cause way further. The ones saying women should be single and not get married. Single moms are better than married moms. Career women are better than stay-at-home moms. This is where the rest of the world rejects the cause. Now feminists divide and attack women. It's more that men are evil and toxic. These views attack marriage, child-raising, and healthy families. That’s simply wrong.

You tie all these together and you see how they feed each other. The feminist desire to put all women in the workplace means there’s more burden on school systems to raise kids. The courts and politicians feed the "see men are bad" crowd. Entertainment rears a generation that is not influential and present in their kids lives. The cycle turns and turns spewing out more and more kids born out of wedlock. Not raised in the family unit. More likely to be raised and influenced by underperforming schools and disappointing entertainment options.

Dads – Break the cycle. Avoid this fate. Be a prominent and influential role model. Stay away from the courts and politicians. The more we know and recognize the more we can fight against this rigged system. Just because the deck is stacked against you doesn’t mean you won’t come out on top. Shoulder back, head up high, power forward. You got this.

And to the rest of the world. This is a stupid trend. If you want to make a world a better place with less crime, poverty, less welfare, fewer taxes (because of reduced crime and welfare), better communities, better education….it goes on and on….DO EVERYTHING YOU CAN TO KEEP FAMILIES TOGETHER!!!!!!

Make Dad the center of the family. Make dads the source of wisdom and influence. It solves so many problems in this country!!

Follow 100% DAD on www.100dad.com & Social: Instagram: @100Dad Facebook: @100Dad TikTok: @100Dad YouTube: 100% Dad Twitter: @The100Dad