#if i join its for my old instructor | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

threeletterslife · 1 year ago

Text

33 | Legends of Darlaria

⨰ summary: You wake up in yet another unfamiliar place. This time, however, these strangers seem to recognize you. With your previous judgments and aspirations thrown out the window, you're now forced to face where your loyalties really lie. Who will you betray? And which General will you choose to stand by his side?

⨰ pairing/rating: yoongi x reader & jungkook x reader | PG-15

⨰ genre: 70% angst, 30% fluff | war!au & magic!au

⨰ warnings: profanity, depictions of violence

⨰ wordcount: 6.9k

⨰ join the taglist! (pm/send in an ask/reply/reblog)

⨰ previous | series m.list | next

⧖⧗Many, Many Circas Ago⧗⧖

That night, Instructor Shin came to you in your dreams—quite vividly too, for your dream worlds have always been picturesque.

She was staring at you with her sharp eyes, but her gaze was strangely gentle. It felt so real—especially as she held her black pointer bedazzled with her emerald birthstone, which twinkled in white light. May you one day change Darlae for the better, she whispered, her ruby-red lips moving just enough to enunciate her words.

You tossed and turned in your sleep.

She smiled at you—it was one of her rare smiles that brought slight wrinkles upon her face, but it made her look incredibly kind. And may you one day still remember me, your strict, old, incompetent instructor, who nearly stopped you from achieving greatness in the Darlaean Army.

When you woke up at the break of dawn, there were dried tear streaks on your face and a new fire burning inside of you. You’d forgotten your dream for a moment—amongst all of the fuss with the rankings and the training and the duels. Your life had picked up its pace and while living in survival mode, you’d simply unremembered what made you join the Darlaean Army in the first place. But Instructor Shin’s words reignited what you lost.

She believed in you and so did Hajin, her father, and even General Son, who was willing to give you a second chance. So how could you so easily give up on your dream? How silly of you to simply let go of all the efforts you’ve put into your training! General Son was right; there was no place for cowardliness in his army. Heroes got nowhere from fear!

But perhaps you could compromise. Sometimes, fear drove people to do great things; you couldn’t exactly think of any examples, but maybe you could be the first instance. Maybe you could leverage your fears—your fear of hurting others, your fear of getting hurt yourself, your fear of dying unaccomplished, your fear of losing the life you’d built for yourself in the 12th city—to drive yourself to stay in General Son’s army.

You gritted your teeth. You had exactly three days to pull yourself together and rise from the deep end, so you decided to put yourself through hell to prepare.

The only problem was, fear was a damn hard thing to shake off.

“Okay, okay, that was good, Y/N,” Hajin said, nodding her head as you masked a flower petal into a pebble and threw it hard at the wooden dummy before you. “But it was a pebble, Y/N. No one in their right damn mind would surrender to a tiny piece of rock.” She hummed, circling around you in the small practice arena. “It was an improvement, though.” She sighed. “Try to think bigger. Think, what is a showstopper?”

You nervously tugged at your necklace. The dirt arena was littered with harmless objects that were standard when it came to these duels. Cadets were expected to use alchemy to create non-lethal weapons to force their opponents to surrender. But to you, the term non-lethal truly meant something that couldn’t harm anyone. “I’m sorry,” you sighed, wiping the sweat off your brow. “It’s just… if I turned that pebble any bigger… I mean, what if I accidentally give my opponent a concussion?”

Hajin snorted. “It happens. They shouldn’t take it personally. And if they do, it’s on them. You’re dueling! Something like that is expected to happen! Look, I gave someone a black eye last week, but they healed it in several days! So don’t worry too much about hurting someone.”

You bit your lip. It was much easier said than done. You wished with all your heart that you could stop giving a shit about hurting your opponent, but there was always a degree of unpredictability in these duels—you never knew what arbitrary objects would be placed in the arena and you never knew who your opponent was until the duel began. What if something happened and you seriously injured them? What if something happened and you were seriously injured? It was such a selfish thought to have, and you hated yourself for it.

The truth was, there were soldiers out there, sacrificing their lives for Darlae and here you were, unable to participate properly in a small duel. On the battlefield, no arbitrary objects were littered on the ground for Darlaean soldiers’ ease of use. On the battlefield, Darlaean soldiers survived on pure instinct and adrenaline—at least that was what was rumored amongst your squadron, for no cadet truly knew what a soldier went through when they marched to battle. On the battlefield, it was kill or be killed.

But this wasn’t the battlefield, thank Guseul, it was a damn little arena. You weren’t expected to kill anyone, and now that you thought about it, your primary goal technically wasn’t to injure. In fact, your real goal was to make your opponent surrender.

“Look,” Hajin said, breaking you out of your thoughts, “you need to win this damn duel because I’m not letting my best friend leave me. So, you’re going to take this very, very seriously, all right? It’s just like when you taught me alchemy, Y/N. You told me to stay true to myself when I cast my whims. You let me continue to use light magic; you honed my strengths. You made me embrace them. So do the same!” She grinned. “What kind of alchemy are you best at? What can you use to make your opponent surrender? Surely, masking some rose petal into a pebble isn’t the best you’ve got. You’ve ranked first amongst 100 cadets before! You have it in you, Y/N!”

Hajin’s words of encouragement made you feel a little better.

“You’re the masking master!” Hajin cheered you on. “You can mask everything into anything!!!”

That wasn’t exactly true as of yet, but you were trying to get there anyway.

You smiled, a new idea suddenly materializing in your head. “Thanks, Hajin. You’re the best.”

She grinned. “Now get to work, cadet! Time’s ticking!”

The sunlight was too bright. The dirt was too loose. And there were one too many spectators. You could feel their gazes, boring into your back, and in that moment, you felt so small, so tiny, so insignificant. Your hands were shaking, and you hoped no one was observant enough to notice.

“YOU CAN DO IT, Y/N!” Hajin yelled from the crowd. You couldn’t find the energy to smile, but her words did ease off a little bit of the tension. Still, your heart felt like it was in your guts, and you could barely see past arm’s length.

You clutched your trinket, trying to feel the magic course through your veins and calm your nerves. While taking deep breaths, you carefully surveyed the objects scattered around in today’s arena. There were cotton balls, a few towels, a roll of gauze, an apricot seed, a mug from the dining hall, and what looked to be someone’s lost sock to name a few. You looked away from these objects, not even bothering to study them at all.

Instead, you looked ahead to study your opponent, who was all the way on the other side of the arena. Unlike you, she didn’t seem too nervous at all, which made sense since rumor had caught on that you automatically surrendered every duel you were put into. For a second, you felt a little guilty that that wouldn’t be the case today—that was, if you were able to pull off what you spent countless hours practicing. Your opponent—Eunhae was her name—began studying the objects on the ground, which made you sweat just a little more. She was ranked fairly high—somewhere amongst the top 20 cadets—so you knew she wouldn’t surrender so easily. You could practically see her already calculating what to shift and what to mask.

Nervously, you looked to the stands, glancing momentarily at General Son. He rarely came to these duels—his officers were the ones who usually supervised them—but he was undoubtedly here for you today. Even worse, the man was staring straight at you, your eyes making contact with his sharp ones. You jumped a little and looked away.

For a split second, you wondered if this was all a good idea.

But there was no time to second guess yourself.

A vivid purple streak shot up in the bright noon sky, courtesy of one of the judging officers.

The duel had officially begun.

Your ears began to ring.

Eunhae charged at you, her long, brown hair flying behind her. She had her teeth gritted, her fists clenched.

But everything felt like it was moving in slow motion.

You watched as Eunhae laggardly crouched down, carefully picked up the mug from the dining hall, then gradually size-shifted it, where it became the size of her head. Your eyes widened slowly as she sluggishly heaved the giant mug at you with all of her might.

Your breath hitched.

Then all at once, everything was moving too fast.

Every bone, muscle, nerve in your body screamed at you to surrender, to make it stop, to feel that sweet sense of relief and comfort that you were going to be safe. Instead, somehow, somewhere, something in you made you jerk away, and just in the nick of time, you managed to dodge the attack as the mug crashed into the arena’s walls behind you.

There was an ear-splitting crack!

You felt like you were going to throw up.

Eunhae picked up one of the gauzes.

You were stumbling away, attempting to avoid being cornered, but your feet felt so heavy; were you imagining it, or were your black leather boots sinking into the dirt? When you looked up from your daze, you saw an arrow—where the spearhead was the harmless white gauze—spiraling straight at you.

You frowned.

Eunhae cursed under her breath.

Failed masking happened rather often during duels when the stress levels were high. You let the gauze-arrow hit you on the arm, trying not to expend energy unnecessarily. While trembling, you rubbed the impact area with your hand, not because it hurt, but as if to calm your nerves. It wasn’t exactly working.

Somehow, you were already panting. The breathing echoed in your ears in slow, loud huffs. A single drop of sweat rolled down your face, over the hill of your cheeks and down the slope of your chin.

It felt like you were running out of time.

Any minute now, after she recovered from the shock of her failed masking, Eunhae was bound to attack again. You knew you wouldn’t be able to keep up—stamina wasn’t your greatest strength, but it was definitely hers.

Your trembling hand reached up to clench the pendant of your necklace.

Immediately, just a tiny bit of courage flooded back into you.

Right.

The plan.

The plan that you weren’t so sure was allowed.

But you didn’t exactly have many options now that you were already here.

Focus, now…

Deep breaths in, deep breaths out…

And soon, the world fell silent, save for the loud beating of your heart.

The only thing in your vision now was Eunhae, running towards you in slow motion once more. Her face was contorted, and there was sweat beading on her forehead. She was already holding a new object—ready to attack you with it—but that didn’t matter to you at the moment. She was so close to you now that you could see the splash of freckles across her nose. Her lips were parted, and her dark eyes seemed to see no one but you.

But more importantly, she wore the standard cadet uniform—the black, stiff cotton material, the silver and purple stitchings, the shiny leather boots. It was identical to yours and that of the 70 other cadets left in the program. It was the uniform you saw every day, the uniform you hand-washed, the uniform you folded, ironed, and donned each morning. You spent more time in your uniform than not; thus, you knew every stitch, every crease, every stretch of the fabric like it was on the back of your hand. You could recreate the uniform from memory if you wanted to—even with brand-new material: velvet, corduroy, wool… It wouldn’t be so challenging, considering how well-versed you were in designing apparel.

Perhaps you could even recreate it with more untraditional fabrics like chenille, taffeta, or brocade.

Or what about with outrageous material like rubber? Wood? Perhaps stone?

Yes, stone—that was perfect! You could practically feel the cool, hard sleeves, the stiff body of the uniform, the heavy boots… The smoothness, the dark gray color, the sheer heaviness… Yes, that charcoal color would suit Eunhae quite nicely—possibly bringing out her freckles. Gone would be the cotton and the silver purple stitchings, and gone would be the leather on the boots, too. Everything would be stone.

Dense, immovable stone.

Somewhere along your vivid train of thought, you must’ve closed your eyes—it happened often when you were attempting to mask something big. There was that familiar migraine seeping in, too. When your eyes finally fluttered open, relieving yourself from the darkness, you came nearly face to face with Eunhae. Her eyebrows were deeply furrowed, and her teeth were gritted in concentration. Her forehead was now wet with perspiration. And her eyes, they were screaming with what looked like anger.

You let out a tiny squeak, your whole body tensing up as you squeezed your eyes shut again—too afraid to face your impending doom. You waited for the blow to come, to feel some sort of pain in your side, but when nothing happened after several seconds, you slowly opened one eye, then the other.

Less than an arm’s length away from you, Eunhae was wobbling from side to side, on the verge of losing her balance. She grunted, her face completely red as she struggled with the new weight of her uniform. The sweat from her forehead began rolling down her face.

Your lips parted in shock.

“Y-You!” Eunhae stuttered, trying to move forward, but when that proved to be futile, she tried another tactic. With all of her might, and with a mighty scream, she swung her arm at you. You flinched on instinct, but her arm fell limp before ever reaching you from being encompassed in a stone sleeve. Eunhae was struggling to keep her arm up—she was trembling from head to toe—and she was successful for perhaps half a minute before her whole body collapsed onto the ground.

With a loud groan, she heaved her body forward, straining her muscles in an attempt to move, but she could barely keep her head lifted from the ground. Her face was growing near purple now as her stone uniform kept her pinned to the ground. Sweat continued to roll off of her body, streaking the gray stone with a darker charcoal color.

You watched her struggle, which felt so incredibly wrong, but there was nothing else you could do. You would lose everything if you lost—you had to make sure you walked away victorious. So you stood your ground before the poor girl, staring down, shaking in your uniform boots.

Sweat rolled down your neck, disappearing underneath your cotton uniform. The masking had to hold until Eunhae surrendered. It was all you needed to win. You couldn’t bear looking her in the eyes, so you closed your own, your fists clenched at your sides.

“You can’t keep me like this forever!” Eunhae shouted, but she sounded desperate.

For a second, you feared that she would somehow be able to unmask her uniform material back into cotton, but the logical part of you countered that with a simple fact: Eunhae was an expert at size-shifting, not so much masking. But, if she just so happened to be angry enough to unleash powerful light magic, that would also be a different story.

Nervously, you cracked open one eye, wondering if this was even enough to stop a cadet like Eunhae. There was unbridled rage in her eyes as she lay on the ground, unable to move. But the longer you stared at her, the look gradually morphed into one of capitulation.

Finally, Eunhae let out a long, labored sigh. “I’ll give you this one, then.” She was completely limp. “You win. I surrender. Now get me out of this thing!”

You collapsed to the ground in shock, and it was your loss of concentration—not quite exactly her request—that unmasked Eunhae’s uniform. As the stone eroded away and the familiar cotton material faded into existence, you stared at the dirt, unblinking. Grumbling, Eunhae sat up, stretching her limbs and brushing herself off while looking quite disdained at her loss.

There was an eerie silence.

Normally, there would be clapping by now.

Now you were shaking, though you didn’t know why, and suddenly, it felt like you were the one donning the stone uniform. You could hear your breathing echoing in your head, and your legs refused to listen to you anymore. It was as if all of the energy in your body had been zapped away.

Were you allowed to do this? Was masking your opponent’s uniform on the grounds for disqualification? Is that why everybody was so silent?

But then, you heard a joyous cry from the audience.

“YOU DID IT, Y/N, YOU WON!”

It was Hajin—bless her—and in no time, others followed the princess’ lead. Your victory was welcomed with a roar of applause. The world began spinning. You were still shaking, but when you turned slightly to the side, you saw General Son, standing up with the rest of the audience, clapping for you. He wasn’t smiling, because he never smiled, but he was nodding in approval, and that was all you needed for all of your worries to wash away.

You were safe.

You could stay here.

Who knew that the Fashion Studies class you took years ago would be so useful in the army? From your first victorious duel, you learned that you didn’t have to resort to violence if you didn’t want to. There were definitely officers who didn’t approve of that notion, but they couldn’t do anything about it since General Son never found it wrong, though he did later admit it was unorthodox.

Still, he confirmed that you were no longer on probation, and with the momentum of your first victory, you went on to win a majority of the rest of your duels. As a year flew past, your ranking gradually, gradually increased until one day, your name was next to that shiny, silver number 1 once more. But you never really gave two shits about the rankings. In your mind, this was all for a bigger cause—the cause of one day changing Darlae for the better. The change that Instructor Shin believed you could make.

But you did have to admit, though a bit begrudgingly, that it always felt good when your opponent would take one look at you from across the arena and surrender right away. You didn’t let those instances get to your head, though; you worked hard, just like everybody else. If it just so happened that your masking skills were more advanced and your hexes were mostly successful, then that was that. There was no need to make a big deal out of it. But Hajin always liked to, anyways.

She was your biggest supporter, attending every one of your duels and cheering you on the whole time. As more circas passed, she grew into her light magic, and though she still occasionally cast an unpredictable whim, she was a much stronger alchemist than before. Her father was proud of her as any father would be, but he was just as proud of you, who he practically took under his wing as his second daughter.

And then there was General Son. He was always watching you with those sharp eyes of his, not saying much in both words and expression. But you knew he had a lot of thoughts—whether they were good thoughts or bad thoughts, you were never too sure. Still, he seemed satisfied with your performance in his army, and you liked to imagine that he looked mildly pleased every time you saluted him when he walked past.

Just like that, your life as a cadet in the Darlaean Army became routine once more, with the occasional ups and downs, but nothing life-changing. And before you knew it, you were already 17.

Hajin slumped over her bed in a deep pout. “I can’t believe he’s making us wait another two years, Y/N. Two! I swear on Guseul’s heart that I’m going to die waiting for the day we can finally go to battle!”

“Your father’s just trying to protect you,” you said, patting Hajin’s shoulder. “You’re his only daughter. Also his last living family member.”

Hajin let out a loud sigh. “Everyone else in our cohort has already been moved to the 1st city!” She groaned, hiding her face in her silk pillowcase. “We’ll be the oldest ones in the new cohort! It’s going to be so embarrassing!” She suddenly sat up, turning to face you. “This isn’t fair! We were ranked in the top ten!”

“I know, I know,” you said, patting Hajin’s back. “It sucks, but I mean, we’ll be able to explore the tunnels for two more years, isn’t that the good part? Why do you want to go to battle so much, anyways?” You didn’t mean to sound so exasperated when you asked the latter question because you knew full well what Hajin was going to say. But before you could open your mouth to apologize, Hajin was already speaking.

“I just need to avenge my mother’s death!” she announced valiantly as predicted. She sighed, looking out the window, where the dim moonlight filtered in. “That’s all I want. I just need to be out there and fight the same bastards who killed her.” Her voice grew quiet, which happened quite rarely and only when she was dead serious, which was also a rarity. “You didn’t have to stay with me, you know, stuck in this damn training program. You finished first in our cohort; you should’ve graduated and marched on to the 1st city.”

The truth was, Hoseok had invited you to another private chat in which he’d given you a few options. One of them was, of course, graduating from the training program for adolescents and moving on to becoming a true soldier who would march to battle. But the other choice, the one that Hoseok wanted you to choose, was to stay in the 12th city with his daughter before he finally deemed her ready to leave the royal nest.

“She still casts unpredictable whims from time to time,” was his biggest worry. “She must be absolutely formidable before I let her on that battlefield.” You knew it would break Hajin’s heart if she found out her father withheld her from graduating due to her erratic alchemy skills—when those who were far worse than she had already graduated—so you never mentioned it to her. The plan, if you stayed, would be to help train Hajin’s light magic skills until her alchemy was sound, and that would all be under the guise of her father’s protectiveness over his only daughter, which was also true.

“But I don’t want to hold you back either, my dear. I don’t want to withhold such a promising soldier from my nation; General Son tells me he sees the future in you. But ultimately, my dear, the choice is yours.”

And you’d chosen to stay. Mostly because the prospect of going to battle terrified you, though you never admitted that to anyone—not even Hajin. It was too humiliating. But another part of you couldn’t bear the thought of leaving Hajin, of leaving her father, of leaving the secret tunnels, too. It would be like entering a new chapter of your life, which wasn’t always the worst thing that could happen. But you simply didn’t feel ready. What good was an unprepared hero, anyway?

You sighed, staring outside at the moon along with Hajin. “Well, I wasn’t going to leave you here. And besides,” you said, a small smile forming on your lips, “we can eat all the deviled eggs we want for two more years. Isn’t that paradise?”

Hajin didn’t laugh at your joke; she was too lost in her thoughts, which was something that you usually did and not the other way around. Then, she spoke in a quiet murmur: “Y/N, why do you want to fight in the war?”

Your eyes widened. “Oh, I mean, um… it’s…” You sighed, not having expected Hajin to ask such a question. “It’s going to sound silly.”

Hajin finally turned to you, and it looked like she was finally back to her old self because she was grinning madly. “Try me,” she snorted. “How silly can it really be?”

“Well…” You hesitated. “Okay, fine. Ever since I was little, I’ve always wanted to be some sort of hero. I guess I just read too many fairytales, but that’s beside the point. I want to accomplish something big, you know? Make a difference. I dunno. How cool would it be if I could contribute even just a little bit to Darlae’s freedom from the war?” You tugged on your necklace. “It’s stupid, I know. Your reason is much cooler—”

“No way!” Hajin’s eyes widened. “Your reason is so… mature. It’s high level, you know? Above seeking vengeance and all that crap. Oh, Y/N,” she laughed. “You could definitely do it. You’ve already made a difference in my life! I just know you’re going to do something great. Oh, I know! You’ll become an officer—I don’t need to be a divinist to know that!”

You laughed along with her. “Aw, thanks, Hajin. I wouldn’t say it’s a mature reason—I mean, I’m 17 and I’m still dreaming of heroes. But thanks. Really. That was kind of you to say.” You nudged her playfully. “You’re more officer material than I am. You’ve got the energy and charisma. You’re a people magnet!”

Hajin beamed. “You really think so?” She plopped back down on her bed, rolling her eyes. “Tell that to my father, will you? Then maybe he’ll let us go to war.”

You laughed, plopping down on the bed right next to your best friend. “I don’t think he’ll budge.”

“Bummer,” Hajin sighed. “Whatever.” Then, she turned to her side, grinning at you mischievously. “Wanna have a late-night deviled egg party?”

You would be crazy to resist.

Even though you and Hajin weren’t technically allowed in the 1st city as both of you were still cadets in the training program, that never stopped the two of you from simply using the secret tunnels to infiltrate the 1st city’s sewers. But all there was to see in the 1st city was soldiers training. Though you found it fascinating, Hajin found it boring.

“What’s so fun about watching a bunch of soldiers train?” Hajin sighed. “We see that in the training grounds all the time.”

“No, but they train so differently,” you answered, your voice tinged with excitement. “Look! They don’t do the stupid duels at all. They’re focusing on masking scraps of junk into weapons! See how that soldier just masked that blade of grass into a dagger? See how it pierced through the wooden block without unmasking itself? Amazing,” you breathed. “That’s not easy to do.”

“I’d rather watch a duel. They’re more exciting,” Hajin snorted. “Come on, let’s get back to the 12th city before anyone finds out we left.”

“W-Wait!” you said, eyes widening. “Look! We can’t miss this—they’re practicing formations! See how impenetrable it looks? It’s a formation meant for defense! And see how perfectly identical every soldier’s stance is? That must take hours and hours of practice!”

Hajin just laughed. “Only you could be so excited by army formations,” she teased.

But it wasn’t just you.

General Son also had a penchant for formations, which he made obvious to you after he caught you and Hajin snooping around the 1st city. He wasn’t angry, only stern, but when he found out that you had been drawing out his army’s formations and studying them on your own, he invited you to his study in the 12th city to “discuss”—though what about, you weren’t quite sure. But the invitation, of course, only came after you and Hajin ran a couple of laps around the training grounds for breaking regulations—it was only a formality.

The discussion ended up being hours long and was more like a lecture than anything else. The General asked you to explain what you had gleaned from snooping around the 1st city and observing the different formations, and though you were nervous, you were able to explain each one and the purpose you believed it had. He had no discernible expression on his face when you finished, but you must’ve done something right because he began to spread out a few of his own battle plans, which were a work in progress.

“See this, cadet?” he asked, running his fingers through the five obvious sectors drawn into the paper in black ink. “This is the battlefield. Memorize it by next time,” he said. “A good soldier must know the terrain she fights on.”

The mention of a next time filled you full of excitement, and you spent the following several days thinking about nothing but the battlefield. You woke up in the morning and stared at the copy of it that the General had given you. During your training—which was now too easy for you—you tried to draw it from memory in your mind. And at night, you dreamed of it—the five sectors, the soil, the hard dirt, and the soldiers charging through it.

General Son didn’t show much of a reaction when you completely redrew the battlefield from memory during your next “discussion.” But the more time you spent under his guidance, you realized that he had particular ways of showing his praise. When he deemed you ready, he simply moved on to the next thing he wanted you to learn. He pushed you harder than any other person in your life—nearly rivaling your own spirit—always sending you back from his study with a stack of books to read for the next discussion, along with formations to review and comment on. You spent your days training—though you always finished early—and your nights studying battle plans and formations.

Hajin found it tedious.

“You look like you’re having fun,” she snorted, staring at you hunched over, studying your books in the moonlight streaming through her large window. She shuddered. “On second thought, I don’t think I could ever become an officer. I can’t handle the logistics! I would never want to spend my free time studying battle plans and doing extra reading. But you’re fit for the job, Y/N. I think General Son thinks so too.”

You didn’t want to believe that at first. It seemed impossible to you that the General of the Darlaean Army could ever see someone like you as an officer. You weren’t even sure if you could handle it! What kind of officer was afraid of going to battle? What good was knowing the battlefield like the back of your hand if you were too afraid to fight?

Despite your doubts, the General believed in you—at least it seemed like he did. He began granting you special access to the 1st city to observe the soldiers’ training. He also invited Hajin as a formality, for she was also a well-respected cadet yet to graduate from the training program, but she declined. “I’d rather give up a week’s worth of deviled eggs than go sit and watch soldiers train for what feels like an eternity!” she told you quite vehemently.

So, by yourself, you diligently traveled to the 1st city once a week to study the applications of the formations you’ve read about and to learn about the different charms that the soldiers used. Most of these charms were cast as whims because in a battle, where anger and passion drenched the air, light magic became much more powerful. It was still difficult for you to get rid of that scholarly instinct of using dark magic, and since the General never commented on your tendency for casting hexes, you continued to use the magic that brought comfort to you.

Sometimes, you wondered what the General saw in you to privately teach you the ways of battle planning. You often wondered if you deserved the treatment. Hajin was aware of your self-doubting tendencies, and she was always kind enough to point out that you were, indeed, a talented cadet, and you have been, for circas now, ranked first on the board—that the newer cadets feared dueling with you because you never lost.

But you weren’t as charismatic as the majors, captains, sergeants and privates you observed in the 1st city. And you sure as hell would never be as charismatic as the General. There was something about him that elicited fear and respect. He never had to raise his voice; just one look from him and he could have even the strongest soldiers cowering. He was brutal out on the battlefield, you’ve heard. Perhaps actions spoke louder than words.

Of course you knew not to compare yourself to the damn General of the Darlaean Army, but self-doubt was in your nature. Still, your fear of disappointing the General was somehow greater than your self-doubting tendencies. You continued to make an effort in your private discussions and visited the 1st city with a fiery passion in your eyes, ready to commit everything you saw into memory.

And slowly, as you began to catch up to his expectations, General Son became just slightly amiable. He no longer watched you with his sharp, discerning eyes, and he gave you short, laconic compliments when you deserved them. You had the feeling that he was warming up to you. Perhaps he wasn’t sure if he could trust you before, especially with the stunt you pulled when you had refused to participate in duels.

He asked you quite often about Hajin and her progress with her light magic, which you suspected Hoseok put him up to. It was no secret that General Son and Hoseok were quite close. You’ve heard them call each other by their first names, which was shocking considering one was the king and the other was the general of the nation. You don’t think you’ve ever heard anybody else refer to General Son as Taegi except Hoseok.

Though General Son didn’t exactly show you the same kind of warmth that Hoseok did, he showed you generosity and patience. The discussions no longer felt like lectures; they were truly discussions—an exchange of ideas and feedback. Sometimes, General Son invited over a few of his majors to participate, which made you incredibly nervous, but every time self-doubt sank in, you reminded yourself of Instructor Shin’s words: may you one day change Darlae for the better. You were going to do it—someday in the future. This was simply your journey of mentorship and preparation.

It became increasingly clear that General Son trusted your opinions, and you naturally trusted him, for he commanded the entire army with a steady hand. Gradually, things fell into a routine again. You still had your moments of diffidence, of course, but that was part of the routine, too. And soon, before you knew it, seasons passed until the leaves of the trees reddened and the weather became chillier.

You would never forget this particular day in Circa Opal. The day that altered the routine of your life.

You were walking back to the castle from a long discussion with General Son. In your uniform pocket was the smaller, size-shifted stack of books he’d assigned you to read and the shrunken scrolls he wanted you to annotate. The air was brisk and the sun was setting, which were all the more reasons for you to quicken your pace as you promised to meet Hajin for another one of your secret tunnel exploring rounds, which had become rare with your busy schedule. The plan was to explore Hajin’s favorite: the 6th city. She was undoubtedly already waiting for you, wearing her purple pantaloons that you’d gifted her two years ago—her “exploring pants” as she called them. You could just imagine her pacing around her room impatiently, wondering “Where the hell is she???”

You smiled to yourself, practically running now to get to the castle faster. The red leaves made a satisfying crunch underneath your feet as you sprinted. But in your haste, you bumped into someone nearby and the force of the collision caused both of you to fall to the ground.

You felt a dull impact on your behind and winced, but you’ve been through worse during training. Luckily, your miniature textbook and scrolls didn’t fall out of your pocket, which was a better outcome than what you would’ve hoped. But the stranger—the boy—whom you’d bumped into wasn’t so fortunate. He’d been carrying a large bag of what seemed to be filled with all sorts of equipment, which dropped to the ground from the impact and landed with a raucous crash! At the same time, a twinkling blue stone slipped from his pocket and landed on top of a few fallen leaves on the grass.

“O-Oh! I’m so, so sorry,” you said, quickly scrambling to pick up the sapphire from the ground and wiping it clean from the dried leaf debris. “I wasn’t looking where I was going! Here, you dropped your birthst—”

Your breath hitched as your eyes met his. The rest of your words became lost in your throat.

He was beautiful.

As the two of you slowly stood up together, you couldn’t help but notice his big, doe eyes, perfect nose, gently tousled hair, delicate, pinkish lips… The warm glow of the setting sun backlit his face, softening his features, and the mild autumn breeze mussed his raven-colored hair, where strands of it fell over his dark brown eyes.

Time slowed down as he reached out to take his birthstone from you. And when his hands brushed yours, there was a shy spark that ignited in your chest. Your eyes widened as you looked up at him in shock.

His own tender eyes met yours, and he blinked slowly, his lashes long enough to kiss his face. It was as if you were in a trance.

“Thank you,” he whispered. His voice was quiet, silvery, perfect as you would expect from someone like him.

Your lips parted as you readied yourself to respond, but no words fell from your lips.

Who was he? Why haven’t you seen him before?

He surely wasn’t a soldier, for he wasn’t wearing the uniform, which meant he most likely worked for the royal family or perhaps even for the army. He looked too kind to be a soldier, anyway.

A soft splash of rosy pink emerged on his cheeks as the two of you continued to peer into each other’s eyes. His hands began fidgeting with his birthstone. “You…” he said, face brightening in recognition. “You…” he whispered again, eyes softening.

Did he know you?

You surely didn’t know him; you would’ve remembered if you did.

“You…?” you barely managed to get out when the boy suddenly picked up the bag he dropped from the ground and began stepping backwards, though slowly.

You wanted to tell him to wait, to at least ask for his name, but how could you? He was already walking away from you. Maybe something about this encounter terrified him. It was rather odd. He was a complete stranger, but he strangely felt like comfort. There was this foreign tug on your heartstrings—a fleeting feeling that maybe you will get to know him in the near future. Did he feel this too? Was that why he left?

You couldn’t help but watch him walk away, your head tilting as you stared at his back. It was stupid to think such a short encounter could blossom into something more. But…

No. Nothing was going to happen. This fate-like encounter was nothing more than a figment of your imagination—perhaps it was acting up after all of those tales of romance you read when you were young. Perhaps the boy left because there was nothing to stay for. With a sigh, you turned around and began walking away, towards the grand castle and to Hajin, who was undoubtedly waiting for your arrival.

But unbeknownst to you, soon after you turned around, the boy stopped in his footsteps to watch you leave. He had a bright look in his eyes, a look of mostly curiosity, really, but there was another thing. A look of longing. It was gone in a second, however, when he finally blinked. Then, he began walking away too, as if the encounter had never happened at all in the early days of Circa Opal.

⨰ previous | series m.list | next

⨰ a/n: sorry for the short delay! had to attempt to proofread :') but hehe we finally get to meet jk!!!

please consider telling me your thoughts with a comment, an ask or a reblog :) i love hearing readers' impressions/rambles/predictions! if you want to join the taglist, send in a private message, ask, reply to this post or reblog with your request!

52 notes · View notes

treepan0 · 11 days ago

Text

screw it rambling about my Xenoverse group "the D team" because why not, of course more below the cut. and I will include those related to the teammembers.

the D team gets its name from one of my favorite childhood shows, albeit in a subtle fashion. More often than not outside of the original Xenoverse questline, the D team storyline wise takes unwanted quests.

going from normal life pre-timepatrol and onwards.

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

Snails:

the oldest of the group creation wise is Snails, I made him while sketching out of boredom. he's a calm and reasonable type with a deep and passionate love for machines, especially planes. his name was a joking place holder, originally just "Snail" as a joke on Slug's, but became plural due to Nail.

his back story is he simply chose to travel off of Namek well before the drought ever began, only to join the time patrol later on. most of the time he's written wrangling the rest of the team in order with Sparrgal, mainly because of Shiver and Spring.

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

Spring:

a mischievous majin, she found her normal life before the time patrol boring. she's inspired off of old cartoons in design, and gets her name from something I feel nostalgic for. she likes food, rain, learning random things, stories and adventure.

she's a cheerful goofball who's known for surviving, off of sheer dumb luck.

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

Rasp:

her name was created by messing around with Raspberries, but Rasp is also a verb and a noun so it works. she has some anger issues, and can be loud at times, but means well.

well before the time patrol she was a street brawler, however it was a near death brush from King Piccolo that made her become a proper fighter. which would later give Rasp her role on the time patrol much later down the line.

she found Sparrgal cute but needed someone to tell her; he liked her back in order for her to finally mull over taking the next move, as she didn't want to push him into anything.

when she originally came to conton city she chose to learn under Raditz first, now he's her instructor and close friend.

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

Sparrgal:

he used to be a guard and then a bounty hunter, until he got recruited by the time patrol. he's a more calm and closed of personality, sometimes even being silent for entire missions.

he used to carry a spear around with him, until he accidentally broke it the same day he unlocked super saiyan. (if you didn't catch on yes he is the saiyan passingly mentioned in August's backstory, no they haven't encountered each other since that day.)

his name comes from spargel which is the German name for white asparagus, the usual green is called grüner spargel and is valued less. as a result most germans get upset if you compare the two, this actually affects his character in a way as he despises Paragus for obvious reasons, and despises anyone who dares to compare them.

at the end of the day Sparrgal genuinely cares about others, and would rather not be compared to such a heartless monster. only Rasp and Spinn have seen his softer side, he doesn't like physical affection with friends and mainly reserves it for his family. (yes that does include found family, he's not a monster like Paragus)

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

Shiver:

the elder son of a lesser baron below King Cold, however he was raised in a situation where he was ignored or afraid, leaving a lack of the traits and skills expected of him. he thinks less of himself but that doesn't mean he takes no action, He'd rather do something rather than nothing.

he hasn't told a soul his past Chronoa had to look into it herself, if only to ensure he does as he's asked. It's his timeline's version of Cooler that keeps him in control, but most have no idea why. In reality Shiver is overly sentimental and only listens if you listen to him in turn, Cooler has listened to him many times before and has gotten Shiver attached to him, whether he wants to admit it or not.

he's very emotional and often quiet when he doesn't know you, he can accidentally cause trouble due to his sentimental nature, as well as his habit of taking others under his wing in an instinctual manner. (in other words he's secretly a mom friend in nature, even if he acts like a trash gremlin at times)

though most don't know this as he struggles to express himself properly, and comes off grumpy and sad without meaning to at times. usually you can tell when it's genuine when his expressions are strong, as his more diluted expressions rarely mean much as he's a more expressive person.

gee kind of makes you wonder why his relationship with Frieza isn't great, not at all like Frieza would totally use that to seriously hurt someone in a canon compliant timeline. (I usually treat it as a subconscious imitation of cold though)

If it was not the combined efforts of Snails, Sparrgal and Cooler he probably would have tried to adopt so many people on sight. he's direct and straight to the point, he never hides his intentions in his words like Frieza and Frost.

In general to summarize Shiver & Cold is squabbling leading into a fight as Shiver defends Cooler, Shiver & Frieza is how he ended up dead and indebted into the time patrol.

Shiver & Cooler is a very loyal and determined friend that is a fraction of the other's height, Shiver & Frost is everyone holding Shiver back because they know Shiver will try to earn his trust, and shower him in affection.

And Shiver & Kuriza is surprising a child's father with how you interact, because he definitely thought you were a heartless monster that would hurt children.

the reason I have never called August or any other character a self insert, is because that's Shiver's role and no one else's when it comes to dragon ball, and as you can tell I'm more of a platonic focused self shipper. with the exception of Raditz, but that's a given.

how I am as a person I don't care for my self insert not being the same gender either, because I don't actually care how I'm perceived. not like it's easy to explain either, my autism just affects my relationship to gender to a severe degree that, I feel a detachment from it at times.

aka I just went pronoun default and never thought in detail, I've been mistaken for a number other things, and never felt offence for that mistake specifically. (only when it comes from being denied certain things or being undermined, which I think is reasonable)

he got his name because you can shiver from the cold, and in reaction to being afraid. There's also a joke about his name, but he sadly struggles with social situations to the point it doesn't work, just know his name can be taken in the wrong context.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

related characters

Spinn:

Spinn is the daughter of Sparrgal and Rasp, she's inherited a lot from them both. she's often found either messing around with Trunks and Goten, spending time with Broly, or she's terrorizing Nappa. honestly Turles is thankful she's never come up to him, she'd probably try to terrorise him as well.

she has a slight lisp that affects her 'B's and 'V's, and calls Broly uncle despite not being related. she's named after spinach, and spinning.

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

Gallanthus:

unlike his brother, Shiver, Gallanthus is still alive he's simply banished to Earth. Gallanthus doesn't remember much of his life before he was banished, but he respects Yamcha greatly as he was the first person to give him a chance.

he's a pretty kind and softer personality, who enjoys exploring the nice stuff from earth. gets his name from the scientific name for snowdrops, that translates to "milk flower", which says a lot about him.

to summarize the name choice he looked up to the Ginyu force as a kid, and still sees Frieza as a dear childhood friend, despite everything that happened between them.

So in a way he very much reflects the usual symbolism for the flowers, as he is a very hopeful, kind and sweet personality. The factor of innocence is more of being oblivious to the reality of some people, as he did with Frieza when they were younger.

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

Perr:

Rasp's cousin who she hasn't interacted in a long time, as they've grown distant. the ability she has to take other's energy, so she's never felt physical affection before, maybe there's someone out there to change that.

she has two versions one that is an antagonist that relies upon manipulation, and another that's just genuinely kind. the time patrol does not advice letting the former iterations interact with Z Broly, the later however is fine.

the genuinely kind one tends to be my main focus for her, despite the fact I made the mor antagonistic version first. Perr's kinder version often takes on the role of a friend that listens without judgement, and occasionally teaches different techniques for calming one down alongside Sparrgal.

I don't wanna talk about her awful version, she's just terrible in my opinion and needs to chill. anyway you can often tell the difference because the good one has solid emotional control, the bad one gets really mad if you roast her to an extreme degree.

I like to imagine that's how the time patrol weeds the good ones from the bad, they let someone like Baby, Frieza or Cell talk to her because most versions of them don't have emotional attachments for her to manipulate like that. (like I said the bad one is awful)

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

Auggy:

originally a what if fusion between my oc August and Baby, she's affectively a bad outcome for them both. Both components are still kind of there, leaving her mind conflicted causing her to be irritable at times.

in my main writing whenever I need to use the time patrol, she's often used the the conton city hero. (Huh I wonder why lol)

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

Additional stuff

Shiver apologizes constantly whenever he's on a mission with Cooler as an enemy, it's almost to the same effect as using Ginyu against Frieza in FighterZ (because I often apologise for what isn't my fault, it's a side effect of the emotional abuse I endured)

the time patrol has Broly listed as Sparrgal's instructor, when it's kind of the other way around. sadly Sparrgal, Rasp and their family are the only time patrollers who actually genuinely care for him at the moment

If Shiver is really annoyed with Cell he will start whistling, a weakness he knows from his time spent with Snails. Unlike Gohan however Shiver cannot tune his whistles well so everyone finds Shiver whistling annoying, not just the namekians this time

Spinn has called Broly on Nappa when he tried to scare her, to this day most mentors in conton city are afraid the the half saiyan screaming uncle, now that they know who that is to her

Spinn wouldn't see Goten and Trunks as friends in a normal timeline, nor any of the canon kids but I don't see a lot of time patrollers having children, due to the complications that might come from it

Gallanthus' existence is inspired from someone I actually care about, but with a personality of his own instead

#shiver (oc)#spring (oc)#snails (oc)#sparrgal (oc)#rasp (oc)#Gallanthus (oc)#spinn (oc)#perr (oc)#auggy (oc)#dragon ball #dbz #dragon ball z #dragon ball super #dbs #dragonball xenoverse 2 #dragonball oc #ocs #original characters #lore dump

4 notes · View notes

kalevalakryze · 1 year ago

Text

Baylan Skoll was never chosen to be a padawan, in this essay I will...

(this is only going to look familiar to a handful of you)

Warning, long post below with excerpts + notes about "The Jedi Path" by Daniel Wallace

"Everybody thinks they know what a Jedi is-that we all serve in the Army of the Light and fight the Sith Lords, or that we're all lightsaber battlemasters and starfighter aces. It just isn't so. Jedi can serve the Republic in other ways too. The Jedi Service Corps is an honorable alternative for any graduating Initiate, and he or she should be proud to serve among its ranks. When most initiates hit early adolescence, they seek to pair up with Masters to begin their Padawanship apprenticeships. If you are not selected, then what? You can try again the following season, but eventually, the Temple Instructors may tell you that you've run out of chances-and then the Reassignment Council steps in. So I'm thinking there was just something Baylan couldn't get; Maybe even the connection to a Jedi Master, he just didn't seem like the kind of Jedi that should have been on the battlefront, he was more of a homebody Jedi, like Yoda, or even Jocasta Nu. Maybe, after failing so often, the Reassignment Council steps in, and I see him joining the Educational branch, staying at the temple to help teach and to help in the archives, one of these devouts of the pillar of knowledge. A Note in the Book From Palpatine: "I imprisoned the surviving Jedi Service Corps Members on Byss. Even the strongest were easy to turn to the dark side." Maybe Baylan was one of these survivors, and while it's clear he didn't go full dark, what did he have to do to survive? Knowing that the younglings he'd so caringly guided were lost to the Force, that the world he'd devoted himself to studying and understanding was gone, and that this new world was just dark, and it was an 'adapt or die' situation The Jedi Path section about the EduCorps: The Education Corps, or EduCorps, consists of Scholars, teachers, and archivists. All Jedi are expected to be teachers to some degree, but the EduCorps goes far beyond that. They work under the supervision of the Temple's Chief Librarian and spend most of their days cataloging and translating. So my thoughts here are, as an archivist who spends his days combing through Jedi Holocrons, he would hear about the Mother, or Abeloth, would read about these Mortis Gods and have an intimate understanding. And when the Jedi were killed, he could recall these stories, he was the last one alive who'd ever heard them from the holocrons, after all. He would be able to remember the powers these holocrons detailed the gods as having, would trust that if anyone could save their history, it would be them, but only the Mother sounds powerful enough to stop the Empire. Finding Shin was a mistake. He was no Master, after all. He'd been granted the rank of General in the republic like all the others, yet he didn't command an army, he worked in libraries and traveled to conquered/liberated worlds to read their texts and to enter their stories into the history of the republic. He goes to a planet in the expansion zone, and he meets a child, there are so few left in this world, no one for him to share his stories with, that when she displays force sensitivity, he takes her, just as the Jedi had done to younglings all those years ago. And he trains her, he gives her a Padawan's braid and he calls her Initiate, and when it's time for her Initiate Trials, he is happy to accept her as his Padawan, like no one had ever done for him. And Shin is so attentive and an amazing student, just like the younglings in the temple, but he cannot burden her with the knowledge of Abeloth. Does not want to ruin the perception he knew she was creating of the Jedi, but he also keeps her training limited, 'The old ways led them to ruin so we will create our own,' 'yes,master' etc etc

#just some thoughts that have plauged my mind this fine morning #baylan skoll #shin hati #star wars #the jedi path #the jedi #educorps #ahsoka series

14 notes · View notes

lotus-flower-writes-history · 1 year ago

Text

The Unofficial Black History Book

Janet Collins (1917-2003)

The history of ballet began around the 1500s in Italy. The term "ballet" stems from the Italian word "Ballare," meaning to dance. When ballet was introduced to America in the early twentieth century, it was a new form of art. Unfortunately, African Americans couldn't be part of ballet culture for many years, saying that our bodies were wrong for ballet.

Until one woman broke one of the last major color barriers in classical ballet,

This is her story.

Janet Faye Collins became the first African American prima ballerina and one of the very few prominent black women in American classical ballet. And the first black prima ballerina to perform with the Metropolitan Opera Ballet in New York City, New York.

She broke one of the last major color barriers in Classical Ballet.

Janet Collins was born on March 2, 1917, in New Orleans, Louisiana. Her mother was a seamstress, and her father was a tailor. They moved to Los Angeles, California, in 1921, when she was four years old.

She started taking private dancing lessons at a Catholic community center, and ironically, Collin's parents urged her to study painting rather than dance. Because at that time, art seemed to offer more opportunities to gifted African Americans than classical dance.

Collins studied art on a scholarship at Los Angeles City College and later at the Los Angeles Art Center School.

But she continued her dance training and attracted the attention of Adolph Bohm, Carmelita Maracci, and Mia Slavenska. All prominent dance instructors agreed to work with her. She continued her dance training with Carmelita Maracci, who was one of the few dance teachers at the time to accept black students.

At the age of 15, Janet prepared to audition for Leonide Massine and the De Basil Ballet Russe Company. The company was performing in Los Angeles during its American tour and advertised for an aspiring young dancer to audition for the company.

When it was Janet's turn, she was one of the best to audition. She moved with such beauty and grace that all the other ballerinas applauded her.

Massine saw her talent and accepted her into the company. But only under one condition...

He told her she would have to paint her face white for performances.

Going further into my notes, she was told that she would either need "special roles" created for her or dance with a white face to disguise the fact that she was black.

Collins left the audition in tears and vowed to perfect her art so that race would not be an issue.

In an exchange quoted in U.S. News & World Report, she responded, "I thought talent mattered, not color."

Collins found a cold reception in professional ballet, despite her training. However, she didn't let that set her back, and she continued to perform.

In the 1930s, when she was still in her teenage years, she performed as an adagio dancer in vaudeville productions.

In 1940, she became the principal dancer for the Los Angeles musical productions of "Run Little Chillun" and "The Mikado in Swing". At this time, she worked with the Katherine Dunham Dance Company.

In 1943, she performed in the musical film "Stormy Weather," and in 1946, she appeared in the film, "Thrill of Brazil."

In 1949, Collins made her New York debut after performing her own choreography on a shared program at the 92nd Street NY. In the same year, and after two more performances, Dance Magazine named her "The most outstanding debutante of the season."

Collins made her debut as a prima ballerina on November 3rd, 1948, at the Las Palmas Theater in Los Angeles, and critics praised her as a one-of-a-kind performer.

Zachary Solov, the Metropolitan Opera House's ballet master, noticed her in a Broadway production of Cole Porter's "Out of this World" in 1951. Solov then invited Collins to join the Metropolitan Company when she was 34.

November 13th, 1951: Collins broke a color barrier after her performance of ‘Aida'. She was the first African American prima ballerina with the Metropolitan Opera after a year of joining the Corps de Ballet. It marked the first time a black artist had joined the permanent company.

Unfortunately, Collins faced racism on the road as the company toured southern cities, despite her success in New York.

She was kept off stage due to Race laws, and sometimes her parts were performed by understudies who were white.

She remained at the Met until 1954. She would then go on to tour across the United States and Canada. She then began teaching ballet, which included using dance in the rehabilitation of the handicapped.

She also taught at the School of American Ballet, the San Francisco Ballet School, and the Harkness House.

Janet retired from performing and teaching in 1974. She spent the last years of her life painting religious subjects in her studio in Seattle.

Janet Collins died on May 28th, 2003, in Fort Worth, Texas, at 86 years old.

Despite all that was thrown at her, Janet Collins made a legacy for herself by becoming the first African-American Prima ballerina with the Metropolitan Opera and breaking its color line.

The 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing

Juneteenth

___

My Resources

14 notes · View notes

mywifeleftme · 1 year ago

Text

196: Earth // The Bees Made Honey in the Lion's Skull

The Bees Made Honey in the Lion's Skull Earth 2008, Southern Lord (Bandcamp)

The most money I’ve ever spent on a vinyl record is on the stupid fucking quadruple LP Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness boxed set, but that was only because I allegedly scuffed the first track on the first side of LP1 of my friend’s copy while putting it away at a party, so I had to buy him a replacement and got his old dinged one—but I’ll write about that another time. The most money I’ve ever spent on a vinyl record I wanted was on Earth’s The Bees Made Honey in the Lion’s Skull, and specifically on one of the editions bound in faux Bible leather that Southern Lord reissues from time to time. From the first time I heard the record back in 2008, from the first time I read the title really, Bees has held a strange fascination for me. Despite being a broke college kid, I ordered a Bees Made Honey hoodie using my first credit card and hemmed and hawed over whether to snag the leather record, though I didn’t even know how to use a turntable. I didn’t end up actually scoring a copy till more than a decade later, by which time I’d already pretty well carved the thing’s grooves so deep in my brain I didn’t need to listen anymore to hear its contents.

The inner sleeve.

Still, there’s the pleasure of handling it, opening up the gatefold and reading the hoary language in elaborately-filigreed gold text:

“from strength sweetness from darkness light the bees made honey in the lion’s skull”

A1. Omens and Portents 1: The Driver A2: Rise to Glory B3: Miami Morning Coming Down II (Shine) B4. Engine of Ruin C5: Omens and Portents II: Carrion Crow C6: Hung from the Moon D7: The Bees Made Honey in the Lion’s Skull D8: Junkyard Priest

youtube

I grew up just religious enough to really fear God and love His language, especially as filtered through all the fantastical art that’s borrowed the diction of the King James Version to command a sense of gravitas. It’s a tone of voice that still compels me, and it’s the perfect dressing for this era of Earth’s looming, desertified music. Starting with 2005’s comeback Hex; or Printing in the Infernal Method, Earth has been working on a form of Western-inspired instrumental post-rock that looks to the Bible and fire-and-brimstone writers like Cormac McCarthy for words to match the weathered lurch of Dylan Carlson’s lithic guitar. Bees continues this direction, and it’s broadly considered the best of the band’s later efforts: something elemental captured in the songs; extra pristine production; sterling contributions from Steve Moore on a variety of pianos and organs, plus famed jazz guitarist Bill Frisell; and above all the languid pulse of drummer Adrienne Davies, the sheer weight of her pauses (best exemplified on the title track).

When Davies joined the band in 2002, she became the long-term musical partner Carlson had never really had, and her playing has become as distinctive a signature of Earth’s sound as his. In the exhaustive 2023 documentary Even Hell Has Its Heroes, her interview is the most enlightening from a musical perspective. An amateur when she began casually jamming with Carlson, she soon found that all of the drumming instructors and guides she consulted emphasized focusing on how to refine the angles of her playing, minimizing the time and effort required to play a beat. But for Davies, playing in a band whose rhythm swells and resides like the breathing of a massive steer, this advice ran counter: her arms wave in slow, swooping arcs, drawing out the tempo in the air before falling into the drums, letting gravity provide the consequential force.

Despite the band’s mugshot stares and stupendous volume, that signal phrase holds: “from strength sweetness / from darkness light.” There’s no violence in this songs, only some obdurate quality of endurance; no aggression, only flickers of the transcendent among the amps. That’s the notion embedded in its title, a nourishing work transpiring within sinister ruins.

youtube

196/365

#earth #halloweek #drone #drone metal #post-rock #ambient americana #dylan carlson #southern lord #'00s music #minimalism #music review #vinyl record #seattle music #adrienne davies

8 notes · View notes

cienie-isengardu · 1 year ago

Text

@nereiix said to Jango Fett and Walon Vau: Age Difference and Childhood Trauma:

Interesting, as always. I just noticed one minor mistake: Vau was not depressive on Kamino. I can't find where it's said in the books, but it's near the passage where we learn Mird hunted and killed a Kaminoan.

Thank you 🙂

As for Vau, I assume you mean this paragraph from True Colors:

Vau hadn't actually disliked Tipoca in the eight years he'd been cooped up there. Inside the pristine stilt-city, it could have been any urban environment; he didn't miss shopping and entertainment, so it was largely indistinguishable from Coruscant, although the lack of hunting troubled Mird. The strill stalked Kaminoans instead. It even caught one once, but its prey was just the blue-eyed variety, the lowest genetic caste of Kamino, and the gray-eyed elite seemed only annoyed at the loss of a menial. Yes, that was probably the day Vau's ambivalence toward Kaminoans evaporated, and he joined Skirata in thinking of them as aiwha-bait.

Of course this is up to personal interpretation, but for me Vau is solely making a point about Tipoca City as a place of his and Mird living (and why his ambivalence toward Kaminoans changed). He doesn’t need to hate Kamino (planet) to be depressed about seeing two(four) years old, tiny kids bred for war so Republic citizens won’t dirty their hands and bleed for whatever cause Jedi had in mind when commissioning a clone army.

It is hard to tell if Vau was truly depressed about that at any given point - especially when there is Kal to compare - but I wouldn’t cross out this possibility as the books pointed out quite often that the training took its emotional toll on both clones and their instructors. And sure, Kal is the main example of that as he is generally speaking an extrovert whose emotional state is hard to miss but though Walon was always presented as the most detached character, even he wasn’t immune to seeing his tiny cadets for the first time - something he admitted himself in the same book. He said he already had a “midlife crisis”[1] - that from my calculation fits the year of starting commando training - which may as well mean he had an indefinite depressive period of time that could last few days, weeks or months but in contrast to Kal, Vau had better grip (control) of his emotion and did not let them interference with what he was paid to do.

At the end of the day, it all comes down to people’s individual feeling toward Vau - I personally give him benefit of doubt because the series showed he cared more than he let himself show and when things take emotional toll on him (the news of Sev being MIA), he is more prone to shut down to the point it may look like he doesn’t care at all while in fact he is deeply affected.

[1] midlife crisis sounds as something easier to admit for Vau than depression that could be also influenced by his guilt about Galidraan but in all fairness I don’t trust RC book series when it comes to characters’ mental illness, depression or broadly understood (lack of) mental health nor the characters' approach to it.

#star wars #my replies #walon vau #a person doesn't need to hate a place to be depressed about situation they are in #or so i believe #anyway #thank you for pointing this possibility #and i hope you don't mind me making a separate post to answer #i just avoided word limit of comment lol

15 notes · View notes

tinyozlion · 1 year ago

Text

Suggested Policy of Ignoring Stupid Shit

(the following section contains *Minor Spoilers*)

[ -Back to Part 03]

Everyone in this show is too goddamn young. They are simply too goddamn young. This is my hill, and I will die on it.

It’s one thing to have a cast full of troubled but highly marketable teenagers in a show aimed at teenagers– it’s a whole other thing to try and convince me that all the influential *adults* in the series are under the age of 25. These are characters who we are to understand have led full lives, and had active careers in the military before the start of the show– you know, during their literal infancy.

For example: Treize is meant to be 24 at the start of the series. He’s a colonel in the Alliance Military, a position that usually requires about 20 years of service to attain. He also has a daughter that I’ve seen quoted as being either 7 or 9 years old. It doesn't matter which is true, because there is no positive integer you can subtract from 24 that makes a good age to father a child. (…Alright, okay, in the great variety of human experience, that’s an exaggeration.) What’s of more significance is that at the time, Treize was an instructor or sergeant in the military academy, in charge of a squad of mobile suit cadets.

So which is a more reasonable age for that scenario, 15 or 17? Keep in mind that the minimum age requirement for enlistment in the US army is 17, with parental consent.

--Ah! But this is Animé, where only teens and pre-teens are fully alive. Those who turn 20 become old, and venerable, able to draw on the rich wisdom of experience that comes with being not quite of legal drinking age. And if you’re over 30 obviously you must fade and go into the West, your time has ended. No, no, better to have characters too young for the events of their own lifespan to have occurred than to suffer an OLD PERSON on television.

--Up with this, I will not put. It is bullshit. Please join me adding *at minimum* two years to everyone’s age, up to a suggested 5-10 years to the age of adult characters– if ONLY so that we don’t have to stretch our suspension of disbelief to include a preternaturally articulate 4 year old receiving full military honors.

___

Gundam Wing would like us to believe that everything in the series happened over the course of a single year. MS Gundam probably set the precedent for this with its One Year War, but MS Gundam also lets people get older and change hairstyles and be subject to the effects of linear time. While Wing certainly had more constraints on its production length, it really would have benefited from some believable time-skips.

…Mind you, after 2020 I think we can all attest that A LOT CAN HAPPEN IN ONE YEAR. But that doesn't account for all the downtime that happens in Gundam Wing-- times when everyone had to lay low, times where characters had to heal from massive physical trauma, times where everyone was stuck in a stalemate waiting to see what happened next, times during which whole space battleships had to be built and global armies had to be mustered.

On this I call bullshit a second time. In addition to giving the characters more realistic ages, we should also be allowed to expand the time frame of major plot events, based on vibes.

--That concludes my suggestion. May this policy serve you well, in this and other fandoms!

#Parsing Post #Gundam Wing #TinyOZlion PGW

16 notes · View notes

the12thnightproject · 2 years ago

Text

Chapter 39: Unwanted Advice. Shingen's POV of last chapter, and new scenes, in which Yuki, Kenshin, and Yoshimoto all attempt to convince him to seek immediate treatment.

Shingen x OC; Kenshin x MC (Mai)

Previous Chapter (posted earlier today): Here

Logline - Disguised as a boy, Katsuko finds herself working for Shingen, but her dangerous masquerade becomes difficult to sustain when she falls for the man with a fatal secret.

As a student of tactics Katsuko proved to be as bright and eager in front of a desk as she was when she joined him in bed. Sometimes, Shingen would set a problem to her simply to hear what solutions she came up with. “Oftentimes, your initial first instinctive plan will be the best one – never discount that – but it’s always worth working out what could happen if you enacted your second, third, or fourth plans.” Her first and second plans were generally solid. Her third alternated between awfully brilliant or brilliantly awful… her fourth… unworkable, inelegant, but highly entertaining.

“I wish my instructors in school had been more like you.” They’d been strategizing solutions to hostage scenarios, and she had just rescued the pastry that was standing in as the ‘hostage.’ “I might have skipped school less often.”

“Is this a prelude to a teacher – student fantasy? If so, let me get through a couple more reports and we can explore that.” Shingen wondered what she would say if he told her how he’d once considered bending “Katsu” over the desk and-

“It wasn’t.”

Too bad. She’d wiped her face clean of any expression, but he thought he’d caught a gleam of interest. Another time, perhaps. He stole the pastry back, knowing that she wouldn’t eat it anyway, and popped it in his mouth. It still tasted delicious, none the worse for wear from its stint as a war hostage… although Katsuko did look a bit traumatized that the hostage she had worked so hard to rescue had met such a violent end.

“I’m learning so much more from you than I ever did in school. You make it all interesting, even things I never would have been interested in before, like the flood management.” There was a considering tone in her voice… of course after her experience in the river, he imagined she had incentive to be interested in flood prevention.

He wondered what she had been like in her own time… or for that matter what education was like in the future. It sounded like it might be formalized. “What were you interested in, Devil… also, what does skipped school mean?”

“Um, well, it means instead of being in school like I was supposed to be, I was out doing something else.” Ah… so she had been a naughty teenager – and still could be. Such as when she had stolen his clothes and dumped them in the dry garden… leaving him to negotiate with Mitsuhide to get them back. “What I was interested in, and what I skipped school to do, is go snowboarding.”

Snowboarding? Before he could ask, she filled him in.

“Um, when you were a child, did you ever use a large piece of wood and slide down a snowy hill on it?” She gestured with her hands to mimic the action of sliding down a hill.

“No, although it sounds like something I might have enjoyed.” However, not an activity that would be worth the risk of getting caught in misbehavior.

“Snowboarding is something like that, except you stand on the board, it goes a lot faster, and there are snow parks that build courses you can ride. It’s the closest thing to flying without an airplane.” Once again, she mimed sliding down a hill…and up a hill… and upside down?

And there was that look she got on her face when she was climbing trees. Where were her parents during these escapades? He’d noticed that she avoided discussing any family aside from her brother. “I’m not completely picturing it, but I believe I have the general concept… it sounds dangerous, and therefore something you did every moment you could, Devil.”

Damn, he’d sounded like an old man there. Hopefully she hadn’t noticed any disapproval in his voice.

“I wore a helmet.”

She noticed.

Katsuko picked up the report she’d been looking at before and asked something about the Kamanashi river. But her voice faded into a swirl of vertigo as he felt a familiar tightness in his throat and lungs. Not now! He tried to order his body to function normally, but already the breathlessness was taking over. Damn it, normally this happened when there was no one about – the last thing he wanted to do was alert Katsuko to the-

“What is it? Bad news?” She peered over his shoulder.

Get her out of here before it’s too late.

“No.” His voice sounded rough even to his own ears. He cleared his throat. “Thinking… time for a break.”

“Alright.” She got up and turned toward the hearth. “Tea?”

He seized upon that as an excuse to send her out of the room. “I’m… out. Run to the kitchens… and beg for more leaves?” Again, the spasm in his chest as his lungs struggled to find air.

“Of course,” Katusko smiled at him and headed out the door.

Fingers gripping the side of the desk, Shingen managed to hold on until he could no longer hear her footsteps. Only then did he allow the coughing to overtake him.

Would it not stop?

Feeling the telltale metallic taste in the back of his throat, he grabbed for his hand towel, knocking the puzzle off the desk in the process. An instant later, Katsuko was at the door. She locked eyes with him, then rushed back outside for a moment. He thought he heard her accost someone, but the words were inaudible over the sound of his own coughing.

Then Katsuko returned, and carefully put her arms around him. He could feel her hand hesitantly rubbing his back. Which didn’t help… but didn’t hurt either. “Sounds worse … than it is, Devil,” he said as he tried to get control of the spasms radiating through his chest.

Then Yuki rushed into the room and took in the situation in a glance. “I knew it.”

“What should I do for him?” Katsuko asked. He imagined she was worried, but at least that didn’t come through her voice.

“Let’s get him to the futon,” Yuki said as he ducked under Shingen’s arm, using his body to prop up Shingen’s weight.

“No,” Shingen said. That was the last thing he wanted. Ashamed of his weakness in front of them, he tried to straighten, but another spasm jolted his ribs, and for a moment the vertigo returned and there were two Yukis and two Katsukos.

All four of them were frowning. “Stop pretending you’re ok!” Yuki practically snarled the words.

“I’m not�� Breathing is…. easier… when I sit up,” Shingen explained. At least the spasm seemed to be easing up. He closed his eyes and concentrated on getting air in. For a while, no one spoke, but he felt their warmth on either side of him. He would have preferred that no one learn of these… episodes… but since that horse was out of the stables, he admitted to himself that there was something comforting about have the two of them with him.

“How often does this happen?” Katsuko asked a question he’d been dreading. “This can’t have been the first one if you knew sitting up is better for you.”

“Not very often.” He edged the blood-flecked towel under the desk.

“We both saw it … My lord.” That aggrieved edge was still in Yuki’s voice.

“I’m aware of that. It doesn’t mean I want to continue looking at it.” Then, because he knew Katsuko would be even more suspicious if she had to ask again, he turned to her and said. “Not very often at all.”

“Specifically, how many days a week, and do you have more than one a day?” She sounded impatient, and, clearly suspicious anyway. If he hadn’t been the object of her questioning, he might have admired it more – someday, she might be good at interrogating prisoners – she didn’t miss a trick. Rarely had, in fact.

Still, he downplayed it. “Two maybe three times a week. It’s usually when I overexert myself.” He looked up in time to see Yuki and Katsuko exchanging a meaningful glance. “Both of you, stop that. These spells are intense but brief.”

“We’re allowed to care about you,” Yuki said. He leaned over and put the burr puzzle back on the desk. “You scared the hell out of Katsu. She was shaking when I got here.”

Shingen filed that away to think about later. Not much scared his Devil.

And, already she was defending herself against Yuki’s comment. “I was startled, that’s all. Now that I have a better idea what to expect and what to do, I’ll handle it better next time.”

“God. The two of you deserve each other,” Yuki muttered. “This incident proves you need to be treated sooner, not later.”

Again with this? Days like today aside, he could manage to hang on until they could go through the time doorway at Togakushi. The future could wait until Katsuko could be there with him. “I do know what my body can and cannot handle. In the greater scheme of things, three months is not very long.” He put his arms around their shoulders. “And I’d prefer to spend that time with the people who are closest in my heart.”

Katsuko got to her feet. “I’m going to see if there is any willow bark tea in the kitchen.” She gave him a long, firm look. “When I get back, you will drink it.”

“What will you give me if I do?” Though he tried to ease the mood back to playful, Katsuko wasn’t having it - she simply whirled around and zipped out of the room.

“Now there are two of you treating me like a child,” he muttered once he was sure this time that she had gone and wasn’t going to return immediately.

“Don’t act like one.” Yuki stood up and put the kettle back on the brazier – likely so the tea water would be hot by the time Katsuko got back.

“I’ve lived with this curse longer than either of you have been aware of it.” Neither of them had been with him when he’d realized that the lump pressing into chest, rather than disappearing, was growing bigger. Neither of them had to wake up every morning and try to determine whether it would be a good breathing day. “I’ve gotten used to knowing what I can or cannot do.”

“Or maybe you’ve gotten used to the daily worsening of your health to the point where you no longer notice it,” Yuki pointed out. “I remember how you used to be – how long has it been since you trained on a daily basis?”

A… while. He ignored the implications of that. He’d been busy. As a response, he gestured to the pile of reports on his desk. “You can’t have it both ways, Yuki. Either you think I am pushing myself, or I’m not training?” Yes, he knew full well that that wasn’t Yukimura’s point – but he also knew that he could out-argue his young friend any day.

Yuki sighed and scrubbed his hands through his hair. He looked like he was gritting his teeth. “I don’t understand why you don’t want to go for treatment immediately – look, I know you are concerned about Katsu, but there are people here who will look out for her. Mai’s all but adopted her as an honorary sister, which means that Kenshin thinks of her that way too.”

“Katsuko can be impulsive. It’s entirely possible that she’ll ride off to see her brother as soon as she can.” Yuki started to say something, but Shingen cut him off. “Ikuno is a mining town – she might think she can handle herself, but her overconfidence could get her into trouble.” Even here, she had gotten into trouble with the Shogun’s men. If Kennyo’s ninja hadn’t been on hand to help, the result could have been far worse than the black eye she had received.

“That’s possible, but… those silver mines are now under Oda control, and Toyotomi Hideyoshi recently took charge. Say what you like about the man – and I’ve said plenty – but he’s about as law and order as they come. Katsuko might be safer there than you would be,” Yuki said.

“Unless they find out she’s… mine.” At which point she would be a valuable hostage. But not wanting to dwell too deeply on his own claim to her meant to him, he added, “I want to be the one to take her to her brother. She’s met those whom I consider to be family,” he nodded at Yuki. “I’d like to meet hers.”

“Tell her that, then. If you phrase it like that, I bet she’d be happy to wait. ‘Meet your family’ seems to be one those things women get all giggly over.” In his typical Yukimura fashion, he rolled his eyes.

What if I don’t come back?

Katsuko and Sasuke’s world might boast better medicine, but neither of them claimed that Shingen would be cured. Only that he might be. But… this wasn’t a conversation he was willing to have with Yuki. Or even Katsuko. “If, as you say, and I agree, that Katsuko is a strong and competent woman, then you should trust her to help me get to the future via the time door that will open for her.”

“I do trust her… but she shouldn’t have to do that.” Apparently feeling like he had capped the argument, Yuki bowed to Shingen and left.

The best thing to do would be to go back to work as if nothing had happened. That should prove to his persistent daredevil that he could recover quickly from these attacks. By the time Katsuko returned, Shingen was calmly sitting at his desk, working away.

She quietly prepared the tea with the hot water Yuki had started for her and set it next to him. Was she trying not to disturb him or… he got a look at her face. “You’re angry with me because I don’t want to go with Sasuke.”

“I’m angry with you because you’ve been hiding how bad it is.” She settled down across the desk from him.

He could point out that deception, hiding, and lying were things that she was familiar with and regularly practiced herself. But… if he did that, there would be no returning from there. He was trying to avoid an argument, not make the one that was brewing worse. “I thought to spare you exactly that kind of scene,” he replied. He patted the cushion next to him. Come over here and let me help you forget what you just saw.

“You can’t shield me from everything. There’s no need to. I’ve been crisscrossing this country by myself for years – I can handle things – if I know to prepare for them.” She crossed her arms and gave him a steady look. “Drink the tea. I know you don’t have a fever, but it should help with the pain.”

Ugh. Must he? But to prove that he would do what was necessary to keep himself well for another three months, he sipped the tea. It… wasn’t terrible. He thought maybe she’d put some honey in there to cover the taste? “At least it’s not as awful as chewing on bark.”

Katsuko watched him finish off the tea. “Am I understanding correctly that you don’t have an objection to going to the future for treatment, but only to the timing of the journey?”

Once again, she showed an ability to see clear to the heart of a dilemma. “Yes, that’s it exactly.” Although he didn’t want to get into the why that was, any more than he had wanted to with Yukimura. “I drank it all. Where’s my reward?” Maybe he could get her to tell him another one of those folk – fairy tales.

Instead, Katsuko shook her head. “I’m sorry… I need to be by myself for a little while.” She gave him a quick kiss, then hurried out.

That was not supposed to happen.

An hour later, she had not returned. The next person through the door was Kenshin, who, rather than take a seat, stood in front of the desk and looked down at him. “What is this I hear about you turning down a method of treatment for your illness?”

Shingen wondered if it had been Yukimura or Sasuke who had tattled. Katsuko, at least, knew how to keep a secret. “I haven’t turned it down. I’ve simply postponed it.”

“You’re a fool.” Kenshin rattled his sword in his scabbard, and Shingen started the mental countdown to the moment he unsheathed it.

“I disagree with that assessment, but even if it were accurate, I don’t recall giving you a say in the matter.” Damn it, he felt another cough starting. He cleared his throat, hoping to force it back.

“I don’t recall being given a say in the matter when you started stirring up trouble in Echigo when I locked myself away after Isehime… died.” And there went the sword. Kenshin swept it through the air a few times, before bringing it close to Shingen’s throat. “If you die before I am able to kill you, I will kill you.”

Apparently, he felt like he had said his piece, and he turned and marched out.

Shingen barely had a moment to grab another cup of tea – Katsuko had been correct that the willow bark tea made him feel a bit better – before he was cursed with another visitor – Yoshimoto, who, like Kenshin, walked in without announcing himself. “Katsuko’s not with you?” his cousin asked. “I expected to find the two of you cuddled up in an overt display of domestic bliss.”

“We’ve had… a slight difference of opinion.” More than slight, but Yoshimoto was the last person he wanted to discuss his personal life with. Or perhaps second to last – Kenshin was low on that list as well. “What brings you here?”

Yoshimoto’s acquisitive eyes lit upon the puzzle box that Katsuko had given him. He picked it up and ran his fingers over the inlay wood. “I ordered one of these for myself. Tokuro is an exquisite craftsman.” At Shingen’s impatient sigh, he added, “Do I need to have a reason, other than to visit?”

“You generally have a reason.” Shingen resigned himself to spending the next chunk of the evening dancing around whatever topic Yoshimoto wanted to discuss.

“I may have had one when I left my room, but it has flitted out of my head like a butterfly now.” Yoshimoto folded himself onto the cushion that Katsuko had recently abandoned. “Which opinion do you have and which does she have, and how different are they?”

“What are the odds that this particular line of questioning will flit out of your head as well, if I decline to respond?” Shingen replied. Aside from not particularly wanting to discuss this with Yoshimoto, there was the fact that his cousin wasn’t aware of the time travel issue.

Yoshimoto again fondled the puzzle box, and Shingen’s fingers itched to snatch it out of his hands. “It has taken root.”

“Like a weed?”

Yoshimoto inclined his head. “If you say so.”

Weeds could be yanked out of the ground forcefully, but Shingen didn’t feel like making the effort. “There is a possibility that the healers in Katsuko’s home … village… will be able to treat my illness. However, there are only two possible ways to make the, er, voyage, and the first one, for various reasons, is too dangerous for Katsuko. I could make that journey with Sasuke. But I prefer to wait for the second -.”

“You’re talking about the time travel?” Yoshimoto spoke as if time travel was as common as travel by palanquin.

“She told you?” Not that he minded her sharing the information, but considering how difficult she apparently found telling him, Shingen was annoyed that Yoshimoto had been so easily brought into the secret.

Yoshimoto smiled. “She did not. It was something I suspected of Sasuke and Mai. Recently Mai said that Katsuko was from the same ‘village’ as she was, so it was not difficult to put that together.” He shrugged. “I might, possibly, in my wanderings in search of art and antiquities, encountered a person not of this time… and as they say, ‘there are more things on heaven and earth, than are dreamt of in your philosophy…. Er, that last bit is from a stage play, that… might not yet be written, but the person I encountered, enjoyed quoting from it.” He fluttered his fan. “That’s neither here nor there. You were saying?”

There were several comments and questions Shingen considered posing to Yoshimoto, but it was too much effort. Discussing anything with his cousin felt like chasing after a piece of paper that had been caught in the wind. It would flap about, changing direction without warning, and then suddenly blow back and hit you in the face. “If I were to go to the future for medical treatment, I must either leave Katsuko behind to travel with Sasuke in a few weeks from a Honno-ji, or wait for another three months and travel with Katusuko from the Togokushi Shrine. I prefer to wait. Katsuko and Yukimura believe I should go with Sasuke.”

“Ah.” Yoshimoto nodded. “What does Sasuke say?”

“Aside from mentioning that the earlier trip would be optimal, he has declined to press an opinion on me forcefully.” Although for Sasuke, that probably was his way of being forceful. “And you?”

“Are you asking for my opinion?” Yoshimoto seemed flattered.

“Rather I am bowing to the inevitability that you plan to share it whether or not I ask.” Not that he intended to put any more stock in it than anyone else’s.

“It seems to me that when it comes to illness, treatment should be sought sooner, rather than later,” Yoshimoto said. “If your concern is being parted from Katsuko, waiting too long might result in a more permanent separation… although I expect she might not be alone for terribly long in the latter scenario.”

Well.

Shingen sat up straighter and fixed a glare on Yoshimoto. There was that piece of paper, changing direction and slapping him in the face. He realized that Yoshimoto had only chosen those words for effect, but that didn’t stop him from asking, “You?”

“Oh, no. I was speaking in generalities not specifics. While I like Katsuko very much, she is not a restful person. I wouldn’t have the energy.” Yoshimoto punctuated that statement with a theatrical yawn. “But as I’m sure you are aware, there are many who will find that spiritedness very attractive.”

Apparently deciding that was enough conversation for the time being, Yoshimoto got up and flitted away like the butterfly he had recently compared his memory to.

So… that was four people in a row who had claimed the last word in a discussion and taken themselves off before he could respond. Not wanting to suffer a fifth instance, Shingen gave up and went to bed. It didn’t look like Katsuko was planning to return anyway.

He’d been deeply asleep at the time, but at some point in the middle of the night, Katsuko had decided to come back. Rather than try to determine when, he was simply grateful that she was there, curled into him like a kitten. He supposed his body had recognized her coming home, because his arm was around her, hand resting on her stomach. He felt her deep even breathing against him.

Some lingering tension from the previous afternoon and evening slowly drained from his body. He closed his eyes again, floated back into the soft fog bank of sleep, until the sunrise tugged him into awareness.

Katsuko muttered something about a … half… pipe? Which made little sense, but fairly typical of her. Though he’d once teased her with a made-up story about sleep-narrating an intense session of lovemaking, it was true that she could carry on long, nonsensical conversations in her sleep. Once of these days, he would break that news to her, but for the time being, he was having too much fun knowing something she didn’t.

She continued to chatter for a while, until he sensed that she was moving into wakefulness. “Are you sleeping?”

“Half,” was her adorably sleepy mumble.

Hm. He wasn’t much more awake than that either, except for... “Do you want to be sleeping?” Her eyelashes were fanned out on her cheeks. Shingen lightly tickled her eyelids.

She lazily batted away his hand. “That depends on the other options.”

He decided to give her a hint and moved his hand back to her stomach. With intent, stroked her belly, dipping lower and lower with each circle. “I do have another option,” he said.

Her answer was to turn toward him and tug him closer. Her tranquil acceptance of his overture was a balm to him, and he whispered his joy and thankfulness into her ear. He eased into her, or maybe more accurately they eased into each other, a long, extended, intimate hug. This was not an explosion of passion, but something quieter, something… essential.

@bestbryn

#TBT12Lies #throwback thursday #twelve lies i told shingen takeda #ikemen sengoku #shingen takeda #ikesen shingen #fanfic #ikesen yukimura #ikesen kenshin #ikesen yoshimoto #tw serious illness

15 notes · View notes

thecapturedafrique · 2 years ago

Text

HLAW: Day 2—Skills v. Passions/Chocolate

I hope everyone has been having a fantastic HLAW so far! I was out of town on vacation this past Juneteenth weekend and am definitely late to the party, but I wanted to share my idea of how Hana’s extensive skill set came to be! This post covers not only the skills we’re shown directly in canon but also the subjects she’d have been expected to be educated in as a noble lady. While it was originally intended to be a list of bullet points, I ended up adding more elaboration (and a little bit of the second theme there at the end lol).

Tagging @hanaleeappreciationweek and its awesome hosts @lizzybeth1986 and @sazanes!

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

In my version of Hana’s backstory, she was educated from ages of 5 to 10 primarily by her Taiwanese governess Tài Luó, named after the character Miss Anne Taylor from Emma. This included the basics such as reading, writing, and arithmetic, as well as some local history and folklore alongside the life sciences.

Under different tutors, Hana began additional lessons in French and Italian as well as the fine arts. This included painting and singing but began with the piano, when 3-year-old Hana first demonstrated her talent by repeating a section played by her mother, leading Lorelai to seek the best piano teacher money could buy.

Lin Changsong (parodied after the real pianist Yin Chengzong) agreed to instruct Hana after hearing her play, teaching her musical theory as well. He also encouraged her to take up another instrument after she demonstrated an aptitude for composition, and so she was also to a far lesser extent taught to play the violin.

After her tenth birthday, Hana’s governess was exchanged for an etiquette coach to prepare her for her first high societal appearance at the upcoming English Social Season. Named after the tutor from Barbie in the Princess and the Pauper, Lady Julianne de Montfort is the heiress to the extinct IRL duchy of Brittany.

Under her tutelage, Hana became fully fluent in French and thoroughly instructed in all of the social graces like conversation, decorum, and courtly manners. Lorelai also enrolled her in the Shanghai Dance School for additional lessons, where she learned ballet and classical Chinese dances from the instructor Shi Zhongyi.

Though having already been taught to sew by her grandmother Lee Bao, Hana was sent to the Shanghai Embroidery Institute, where she had to take supplementary knot tying lessons after finishing early. Bao encouraged her to take her skills further, first for dressmaking and later on for fashion design in general.

Hana’s academic studies were furthered as well by various instructors in world/cultural/ancient history, philosophies of multiple doctrines, classical literature (both Western and Chinese), advanced mathematics, and the physical/social sciences (including astronomy, chemistry, economics, political science, and sociology).

Her instruction in the equestrian arts took place while abroad in England for the Social Season, where she joined the riding club at Wimbledon Village Stables and learned dressage as well as the various riding styles. Hana was led by her parents to partake in other “noble” sporting activities like polo, ice skating, and archery.

She also learned some tai chi from Bao, who passed soon after her 15th birthday. This also ended Hana’s lessons with both Lady Julianne (which had evolved into fencing practice) and Lin Changsong, as they had both been financed by her grandmother after receiving the blame for her last public piano performance at age 12.

Hana was given a laptop to attend the online Balissande Finishing School, where her social education shifted to focusing on developing her skills as a hostess. This included courses on interior decorating and the history of art and furniture, which ignited her genuine interest in historical interior design.

One of the conditions to be a debutante for the Queen Charlotte's Ball (the finale of Hana’s official court debut) was entering a university program. While Lorelai and Xinghai did limit her options to areas of study they deemed would increase her appeal to noble suitors, Hana was still excited to choose the culinary arts.

She attended the Culinary Arts Academy Switzerland to earn her Swiss Grand Diploma in Pastry & Chocolate Arts, and her internship at Le Cordon Bleu Shanghai further refined her palate. Her graduation at the age of 18 marked the end of Hana’s formal training period, and thus began the search for an eligible husband.

#the royal romance #trr #hana lee #hanaleeappreciationweek #hlaw 2.0 #hlaw day 2 #head canons #i’m just happy it actually ended up being short enough i can justify not using a readmore lolololtear

10 notes · View notes

all-the-things-2020 · 11 months ago

Text

Further Along the Way - Chapter Five

Summary: In which Din learns about staff meetings.

Rating: PG

The staff meeting was held in a lecture hall just off the administration building. Din ducked into the closest ‘fresher on his way to make sure his shirt was still wrinkle free and his hair hadn’t escaped from the carefully combed style Mariana had fussed over that morning. “I swear, cyar’ika,” she said, “your hair has a mind of its own.”

Satisfied that he looked presentable, Din walked into the lecture hall. It was about half full, which meant he wasn’t too early or, more importantly, too late. Colonel Braxden waved him over to a seat in the first row. Garrick was seated a few rows back and gave Din a friendly nod. Most of the staff were male, but there were quite a few women already in the hall, and Din was certain that more than one was eyeing him in a very unprofessional way. I should have brought the helmet, he thought idly.

Braxden stepped behind the podium, called the meeting to order and ran through some routine business before he gestured to Din to join him. “Ladies and gentlemen, I’d like to introduce our new weapons master, Din Djarin. Mr. Djarin will be starting next week but I asked him to join us today so I could introduce him to you. I’m sure you’re all aware how difficult it is to begin in the middle of term, so please extend any assistance you can offer.”

Din felt the staff sizing him up. He sized them up right back. It was an old habit, and as his eyes drifted over the assembled staff, he saw some of them stiffen, some of them shrink down in their seats, and more than a few of the women smile boldly. He ignored all of them, concentrating on the few who looked him dead in the eye. Those were the ones who would try to challenge him. Except for Garrick, of course, who gave him a genuine smile.

Braxden signaled for Din to sit back down, which he did gladly. The rest of the meeting droned on and Din was at a complete loss since he had no frame of reference. When the Colonel dismissed them, Garrick found him immediately.

“Don’t worry, they get better once you know what’s going on,” he said. “Still not exactly the highlight of the week, though.” He laughed. “Are you sticking around all day or will you just come back for the afternoon assembly?”

“I’ll be back about an hour before the assembly. We’ve still got a few errands to take care of,” Din replied.

Garrick nodded. “Uh, oh, here comes Sergeant Honnal.” He tilted his head toward a tall, red-haired woman who was striding forcefully toward them. “Tress said she’d be the first one to pounce, like a querral-duck on a June-bug. Good luck!” He chuckled and slapped Din on the back. “See you later.”

“Mr. Djarin,” said Honnal, extending her hand. “A pleasure to meet you. I’m Sergeant Amalie Honnal, military history and theory instructor.”

Din shook her hand. “Nice to meet you, Sergeant Honnal.”

Honnal stepped in front of him, blocking his path. She smiled brightly. “If you need anything, just ask. It can be intimidating at first, I know. And please, call me Amalie.”

“Thank you,” he said carefully. She must have seen the holovid, considering the way she was looking at him. Damn you, Garrick, why’d you have to leave me here alone?

“So you’re a civilian,” Honnal said. “I was surprised the Colonel didn’t hire a military officer. You must have some very good qualifications.” Yes, she’d definitely seen the holovid.

“I was raised as a Mandalorian,” he said simply. “And I was a bounty hunter for many years.”

Honnal raised her eyebrows. “Mandalorian? I thought you all wore armor and helmets and all that.”

“I did. But I’m dar’manda now.”

“Our gain,” she said, looking up at him through her eyelashes. “It’s a shame to hide that face under a helmet.”

“That’s exactly what my wife says,” he told her. The look of disappointment on her face made it hard for him not to laugh. Mariana was going to tease him about this, but he knew she’d love to hear the story.

“Ah,” Honnal said. “Well, she’s a lucky woman.”

“I think I’m the lucky one,” Din said quietly. “Again, it was nice to meet you, Sergeant. If I need anything, I’ll let you know.”

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

Mariana took pity on Din and accompanied him to the Academy for the student assembly that afternoon. Tress had commed her that morning to say that the girls were already clamoring for another playdate with Ad’ika, so it was no problem getting her to watch him for a few hours.

“Stop fussing with your jacket,” she admonished him as they approached the campus gates. “You look fine.”

“I’m nervous,” he admitted. “I’ve never done this before.”

“You survived the staff meeting,” she reminded him. “I’m sure you can survive a room full of students.”

“An auditorium full of students,” he clarified. She slipped her hand through the crook of his elbow and hugged his arm tight. It was quite endearing to see her big, bad bounty hunter so worried about facing a bunch of teenagers.

She knew he would be fine, but he was still a bit thrown off balance by the reaction to the holovid. He’d told her about Sergeant Honnal’s attempt to hit on him, and the looks he’d gotten from some of the other women at the staff meeting. It clearly embarrassed him, even though she’d assured him he’d done nothing wrong.

It was her first time on the Academy grounds, and she took a moment to admire the sleek stone buildings. It was much newer than the Collegium she’d attended, but it had the same scholarly feel. A good school always felt like a school, no matter the style of the buildings.

They stopped by Garrick’s office on the way to the auditorium. The lieutenant jumped up from his chair with a grin. “Brought reinforcements, eh, Din?”

Mariana laughed. “Well, Tress said it might be a good idea to make myself visible on campus …” She’d even gone out and bought a new dress to wear, one that simultaneously flattered her figure and showed off her baby bump. It wouldn’t be very long before she’d have to resort to loose fitting maternity clothing, but for now, she could still pull off a moderately sexy look.

“He told you about Honnal?” Garrick asked.

Din actually blushed, and Mariana leaned into him, slipping her arm around to rub reassuring circles on his back. “Yeah, poor baby,” she said, making a pouting face.

Din rolled his eyes at her. “You won’t think it’s so funny if she tries it in front of you,” he said.

“I hope she does,” Mariana shot back. Din raised his eyebrow and she smirked at him. “You’re not the only one who likes to fight, cyar’ika.”

“Didn’t know you were so feisty, Mariana,” Garrick said. “Remind me to stay on your good side.”

“You don’t know the half of it,” Din muttered, which prompted Mariana to jab him in the ribs with her elbow. “Ow!”

Garrick laughed. “Stars, you two are hilarious!”

“We try,” Mariana said with a shrug. She was in quite a good mood today. Maybe it was the dress. Or maybe it was finally feeling like their life together was beginning properly. They had a home, a steady income, no one was actively trying to kill them or steal Ad’ika … just a normal couple with a kid and another on the way.

They chatted with Garrick for a while longer until an announcement came over the PA system reminding all students that the weekly assembly would begin in precisely fifteen minutes. “Have fun,” Garrick said with a chuckle. Mariana was glad he’d befriended Din; he needed someone to help him loosen up a bit. Around her and Ad’ika, he had no problem being himself, but around others, he still acted like he was encased in beskar. Having someone to pal around with would be good for him. She suspected he hadn’t done much of that in his life.

The auditorium was behind the administration building. Students were already streaming in through the main doors, but Din led her around to a side door, where the Colonel was waiting to greet them.

“Mr. Djarin,” Braxden said with a nod.

“Colonel Braxden, this is my wife, Mariana.” The Colonel shook her hand cordially.

“A pleasure to meet you,” he said. “My wife and I give a dinner party once a month and we rotate which staff members are invited. I’ll have her put you both down for the next one.”

“That sounds lovely,” Mariana said. “And thank you, Colonel, for giving my husband this incredible opportunity.” Din started to fidget a little out of embarrassment but she gave him a surreptitious kick. He always got uncomfortable when the situation called for charm and diplomacy; his previous modus operandi had always been to shoot first and ask questions later. She loved him dearly, but subtlety was not his strong point.

“I think he’s going to be a valuable addition to our staff,” the Colonel said. “I hope the students feel the same way.” He gestured for them to enter the auditorium and followed them in, then led the way to the side of the stage. A podium stood at the front of the stage, with a short row of chairs behind it. “Usually, it’s just me and the administrative staff up on stage for these assemblies,” Braxden explained, “but I’ll have you join us this time, Djarin. Normally, you’ll be supervising the cadets with the rest of the staff.” He turned to Mariana. “You can have a seat there in the front row; we always reserve it for parents and visitors.”

A few other people were sitting in the front row, including a snooty looking couple and a military officer with so many medals on her uniform jacket that Mariana was surprised the woman wasn’t listing to one side from the weight of them. “Good luck,” she said to Din. She fixed his hair, which was starting to stick up a bit in the back, and pressed a kiss to his cheek. He squeezed her hand and tucked her hair behind her ear. Oh, stars, this poor kid is going to have crazy hair, she thought, not for the first time.

“I love you,” he whispered, kissing her just in front of her ear. Then he turned and followed the Colonel up the steps onto the stage. Mariana took a second to calm her breathing — a kiss in that spot always got her worked up — before settling down into an empty seat. It was a nice auditorium, with plush velvet seats, but they still weren’t the most comfortable.

She looked behind her at the rapidly filling seats. The students were all in spotless uniforms and the staff were a mixture of military and civilian, but again, everyone was neatly dressed and looked highly polished. She spotted a red-haired female officer standing at the end of one of the rows, ushering cadets to their seats, but also shooting looks between her and Din. Sergeant Honnal, she thought. Mariana leaned back in her seat and rubbed her hand over her belly. Honnal’s eyes narrowed and Mariana bit back a smile. Oh, yes, definitely her.

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

Din surveyed the auditorium. Close to five hundred students, a score or more instructors, and a handful of guests. Beside him sat the Academy physician, Dr. Killian; the Colonel’s assistant, Major Langley; the military liaison officer, Captain Plensol; and the civilian liaison, Ms. Dawkins. The Colonel stood at the podium and began addressing the students at 1530 on the dot.

“Cadets, welcome to this week’s assembly. Examinations are only four weeks away, so I advise you to start revising now to avoid last minute cram sessions. We all know how that worked out last term for the second years.” There was a subdued chuckle from some of the students that was quickly hushed by the staff stationed around the auditorium.

The Colonel went on with a few more routine announcements before glancing back at Din. “As you are all aware, we have been without a Weapons Master for two months, after the sudden departure of Captain Dunbar. Some of you have been enjoying the respite from training, but I can assure you, that respite is over. Cadets, please welcome our new Weapons Master, Mr. Djarin.” He gestured for Din to stand. “Mr. Djarin will be starting next week and I would like to remind you all that even though he is a civilian, I expect you to accord him the same respect you would give to any officer on staff. You will address him as Mister Djarin, or Sir, at all times. Is that understood?”

The cadets nodded and a murmur of “Yes, sir, Colonel, sir” rose from the crowd.

“I’ll leave it up to him to acquaint you with his rather … unique … qualifications, but suffice it to say that you’re all going to learn quite a bit from Mr. Djarin that not many people in the galaxy have the opportunity to learn.”

This prompted a few giggles from the female students, which abruptly cut off after a glare from the Colonel. Din glanced down at Mariana, who winked at him. He felt his mouth twitch as he fought back a smile. Glad she’s enjoying this, he thought wryly.

Braxden thanked him and Din sat back down while the assembly continued. He tried to pay attention to the Colonel, but kept stealing glances at Mariana, who was watching him intently. He felt quite warm under her steady gaze, and nearly fell out of his chair when she mimed a kiss, which made Langley chuckle under his breath.

When the assembly was finally over, she bounded up the steps onto the stage and slid her arms around his waist. “Sorry,” she said quietly. “You just looked so uncomfortable, I couldn’t resist. I shouldn’t have teased you.”

He wrapped his arms around her and pressed his forehead against hers. “Don’t worry, I’ll think of some way to pay you back, cyar’ika,” he said.

Her eyes flashed. “Ooh, I’m scared,” she said, scrunching up her nose. He couldn’t resist kissing the tip of it, but before he went any further he realized they were still on the stage and very few people had left the auditorium. He glanced up to see a large portion of the cadets watching wide-eyed, poking each other in the ribs and smirking.

“Um, cyar’ika, we have an audience,” he whispered.

“As long as Sergeant Honnal is part of it,” she said, sliding one hand along the waistband of his pants, which almost caused him to yelp.

“You are positively wicked,” he said, letting his own hand stray toward her hip.

“Just staking my claim,” she replied, taking his other hand and pressing it to her belly.

He gently rubbed his hand across her stomach. “How long is Tress keeping Ad’ika?,” he murmured.

She laughed. “As long as we need her to,” she replied.

“Good,” he said. “Let’s go home.”

#the mandalorian #star wars #grogu #baby yoda #pedro pascal character fanfiction #din djarin #din djarin fanfiction #din djarin x original female character

2 notes · View notes