#illegal excavation

[ancientstuff]

https://www.archaeology.org/news/12426-240529-italy-artifact-repatriation

More repatriation, which is great, but the amount of information lost when these things are pulled from the ground by illegal digging is incalculable.

[narmadanchal]

अवैध उत्खनन, परिवहन एवं भंडारण पर प्रभावी रोकथाम के लिए 10 जांच चौकी स्थापित

नर्मदापुरम। कलेक्टर नर्मदापुरम नीरज कुमार सिंह (Collector Narmadapuram Neeraj Kumar Singh) ने जिले में खनिजों के अवैध उत्खनन (Illegal Excavation), परिवहन एवं भंडारण पर प्रभावी रोकथाम के लिए राजस्व, पुलिस, खनिज एवं होमगार्ड (Home Guard) की संयुक्त टीम गठित कर 10 अस्थाई जांच चौकी स्थापित की गई है। उक्त जांच चौकियों पर गठित दल द्वारा खनिज से भरे वाहनो की जांच की जाएगी। उक्त कार्य के लिए कलेक्टर…

[blueiscoool]

The Getty Museum Returns 2,500-Year-Old Bronze Kline to Turkey

The Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism and the J. Paul Getty Museum announced today that the bronze kline, dating back to approximately 530 BC, was returned to the Republic of Turkey.

The work was purchased by the Museum in 1982 from a Swiss art dealer who presented false evidence that it had been in European collections since the 1920s. Investigations conducted by the Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism and the J. Paul Getty Museum revealed that this claim was false and that the work had been obtained from a tomb near Manisa in the early 1980s through illegal excavations and taken out of the country illegally.

As a result of scientific research, the pieces of linen stuck to the kline were matched with other pieces left in the tomb, including pieces of wood and bronze plates found by Turkish archaeologists during excavations at the site, and remains of marble and ceramic vessels, which helped date the tomb.

The piece called a divan or a kline was a piece of furniture that was used to rest and eat during the day. The returned piece is considered to be a very rare example of this type of furniture that has survived to the present day, as seen in the depictions on other pieces of art such as archaeological wall paintings and pots and pans with painted pictures. The metal divan, which consists of cast bronze legs and rails on an iron frame, perforated copper sheets riveted together and wrapped around iron rail cores, is understood to have been made by taking the example of divans commonly produced from wood at the time, with its lathed legs, protruding tenons at the corners and a latticed surface that once supported cushions.

[realitajayasaktigroup]

Kerusakan Lingkungan di Kalimantan Barat Akibat Tambang Ilegal PETI: Cukong ALY dan LR Diduga Kebal Hukum

RELASIPUBLIK.OR.ID, Singkawang, Kalimantan Barat – Kerusakan lingkungan di Kalimantan Barat semakin parah akibat praktik Pertambangan Tanpa Izin (PETI), dengan nama cukong besar seperti ALY dan LR yang diduga kuat terlibat. Mereka menggunakan alat berat ilegal, seperti mesin Fuso dan excavator, untuk melakukan eksploitasi sumber daya alam secara besar-besaran, tanpa izin resmi dari…

[infocrazebyrepwoop]

Dhaka Wasa Fined Tk13.7 Lakh by DSCC for Unauthorized Road Excavation

Dhaka Wasa has paid a fine of Tk13.71 lakh imposed by the Dhaka South City Corporation (DSCC) for unauthorized road excavation within the municipality’s jurisdiction. The fine was collected via two cheques from the contractor hired by Dhaka Wasa. On Sunday afternoon, the relevant letter and cheques were delivered to the engineering department’s office in DSCC Zone-3. Assistant Engineer Md Ahsan…

[ego-sum-arbor]

I love standardized forms for excavation notes so much!

[teecupangel]

From @zero-saito

Oooooo I like this idea!! Templars are doomed!! What if desmond as golden Freddy is able to escape containment and tries to unlock all the doors so the others can get out to cause chaos in the main building of Templars

Okay, so the plot twist I was thinking of was that it's not that the animatronics all teleport to the next Abstergo Entertainment location, it's that Desmond as the Golden Freddy is directly linked to Sample 17, so he can teleport to any location with a Sample 17 in the servers (that's why it always takes a month or so before the haunting begins because the server or wherever Sample 17's data is needs to be set up). Also, it should be noted that the Animus game console should have data about Sample 17 even if it's just trash code at this point so, essentially, Desmond can teleport to the location any Animus game console as well.

Desmond himself is the one who summons the other animatronics because of his bond to them (either because of bloodlines or because of the Creed).

This means that as long as someone has a copy of Sample 17 on a device or an HDD (or an Animus game console), and they have it on their person, they can essentially work as an anchor to move Desmond around.

And now, I give you...

It would be very funny if all the Assassin's just turned into FNAF Animatronics and just terrorizes all the Templars lol

I feel bad but when I read this ask, my immediate idea was:

Numbskull is the new security guard and has to go thru the horrors of the first FNAF game with Melanie taking the role of the phone guy who is either trying to downplay the horrors Numbskull is seeing for the sake of the company or is trying to keep Numbskull calm because there’s really no other option for the both of them.

Okay.

So before we give each Assassin an animatronic to haunt, our initial setup would be that Abstergo Entertainment has become haunted. No matter where they move, even if they leave behind lots of shit, the moment they are set up (maybe a month or so), people would encounter the creepy animatronics that they specifically left in the last location.

They can’t destroy them because they’re company property and, well, Abstergo wants to make money, not lose them.

If they hire unsuspecting cannon fodders, the Animatronics would just ignore them and start destroying other equipment.

But Templars?

Oh, they would focus on terrorizing the Templars, playing some sick game (like that game which I cannot find the name of where the other ‘players’ move if the ‘it’ is not looking at them but will freeze if the ‘it’ is looking at them) which… usually ends with the Templar being so scared that they would need therapy.

So yeah, Templars were being used to keep these animatronics from destroying expensive shit but… Melanie was freaking sure that they were getting more animatronics the more memories they look at!

The Animatronic-Assassins:

Altaïr: Chica (Chica’s a chicken which is a bird. Altaïr’s name means ‘flying/soaring eagle’ which is a bird. Altaïr gets the yellow animatronic chicken with the pink cupcake because I kept giving Altaïr the bird motif ones so yeah.)

Ezio: Bonnie (By the rule that the main four original haunted animatronics will be Desmond’s four ancestors (and technically the four main protagonists of the AC games), this means Ezio gets to be the blue animatronic rabbit)

Ratonhnhaké:ton: Freddy (Ratonhnhaké:ton can use ‘bear power’ in the DLC so he gets to be the animatronic bear. And I think it would be like a slap on the face if Ratonhnhaké:ton gets to be the main ‘mascot’ haunting Abstergo since Abstergo spent sooooo many years ignoring him.)

Edward: Foxy (Foxy’s the pirate, seems a done deal)

Desmond: Golden Freddy (only appears rarely and seems to be the most docile of the animatronics… although his appearance is said to be a message that this would be the Templar’s last night as all other animatronics becomes more vicious once he makes his appearance)

Arno: Either Circus Baby or Ballora, although I’m leaning more on Ballora mainly because of the blue color scheme. Also, the Minireenas can be considered as a reference to the coop mode avatars and Arno can use them to mess with the Templars.

Evie and Jacob: I feel like it would be fun if they were like the Sun (Jacob) and Moon (Evie) Daycare Attendant. They share one body but, instead of Jacob being a more or less harmless animatronic, Jacob is loud and focuses more on scaring Templars thru sounds and the impending doom because he can walk slowly even with lights on (very very slowly though) while Evie will be the silent and fast stay-in-the-shadows type. It’ll be easier to figure out where they are by keeping the lights on to keep Jacob as the main ‘personality’ but that means he’s pretty much the decoy that can easily empty batteries or short circuits the electricity if the Templars are not careful.

Alright, if you want Haytham or Shay in this AU, they’ll be the one trying to help the Templars survive… as Helpy and Wet Floor Bot.

[thethirdromana]

LGBT+ Victorians

Since it's Pride Month and Dracula Daily is going to be pretty quiet for most of June, I thought it might be good timing for a little 1890s queer history. Plus I wanted to give a bit more fuel to everyone's queer headcanons for Dracula characters!

Popping this under a cut because it's long.

The start of queer identity This is a massive generalisation, but for most of British history, being queer was about action and not about identity. The idea that people who wanted to have gay sex belonged to a specific group that was different to other people didn't exist for the most part, at least not at a societal level. (This was also true - more generalisation - for much of the western world. It was very much not true for large swathes of the rest of the world who thought about this in entirely different and varied ways).

By the second half of the 19th century, that was starting to change. People like Karl Heinrich Ulrichs in Germany (on the left), and John Addington Symonds (middle) and Edward Carpenter (right) in the UK started to think of themselves as homosexuals - Ulrichs coined the term "Urning" which became "Uranian" in English. This period marked the beginning of organised campaigning for LGBT rights in the UK, though specific campaigning for lesbian and trans rights came later.

This means that in the 1890s setting of Dracula, any characters might think of themselves as "Uranian" or "Sapphic", or they might not yet have picked up that way of thinking. At a guess I'd expect Seward or van Helsing to be particularly aware of the new theory around homosexuality.

LGBT rights in law It was a mixed time for the legal position of LGBT people. The death penalty for sodomy was abolished in 1861 in England, Wales and Ireland (1889 in Scotland), and replaced with minimum 10 years hard labour. In 1871, two amab people, Boulton and Park, were tried for dressing as women, but the judge ruled that this was not an offence under English law (though he also said that he thought it should be).

On the left: Fanny Park and Stella Boulton; on the right, the Illustrated Police News' depiction of their arrest.

And in 1885, the Criminal Law Amendment Act reduced the minimum sentence for gross indecency from 10 years' hard labour to two.

That said, before that act was introduced, there had to be a witness to any sodomy or gross indecency for it to be prosecuted. The Criminal Law Amendment Act changed that, so all private acts, arguably even love letters, could be prosecuted. So despite the reduction in sentences, this change to the law made life harder for queer men in the 1880s and 1890s. From a Dracula perspective, this means that people would be much more careful about what they wrote down - significant for a novel made up of documents.

Lesbian sex has never been illegal in the UK. (The idea that this was because Queen Victoria didn't believe in lesbianism is a myth). But in the 18th century there were a series of prosecutions of afab people who lived as men and married women. They were prosecuted for fraud when their birth sex was discovered, because they were perceived as having defrauded their wives. There were far fewer such prosecutions in the 19th century, possibly because of the belief that it was better not to create the publicity of a trial.

Victorian WLW There are HEAPS of notable Victorian lesbians and bisexual women, including a lot in the suffragette movement. So I've chosen a few examples based on there being good images on Wikipedia.

From left to right:

Margaret Benson and Janet (Nettie) Gourlay were Egyptologists who met at the excavation of the Precinct of Mut. Almost all of Benson's family preferred same-sex relationships.

Louisa Baring, Lady Ashburton, was briefly married to a man, but when she was widowed, began a 25-year relationship with American sculptor Harriet Hosmer. Harriet described herself as Louisa's "hubby".

Matilda Hays was a mixed-race writer and actress who had a relationship with American actress Charlotte Cushman, with whom she's pictured. Hays aimed to use her writing to improve the condition of women.

Victorian MLM Again, I've chosen people to highlight through the very representative method of good photos.

From left to right:

Edward Carpenter was a socialist, poet, philosopher and early gay rights activist who met his partner George Merrill on a train. The two men came from very different backgrounds: Carpenter from privilege, and Merrill from the Sheffield slums. Their 40-year relationship inspired the ending of EM Forster's novel Maurice.

Charles Ricketts and Charles Haslewood Shannon were artists who met as teenagers and lived together for more than 50 years. In the Times' obituary for Ricketts in 1931, their relationship was described as being "as remarkable as any of the great historic friendships, or the finest Darby and Joan examples of wedded felicity".

Ned Warren and John Marshall were art collectors who together were largely responsible for the Roman and Greek Art Collection of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Marshall married Warren's cousin, Mary Bliss, but only on the condition that the marriage would not be consummated. All three lived together until they died and were buried in the same tomb.

Trans Victorians I wrote last year about Dr James Barry, a Victorian trans man, in the context of whether Jack Seward could be trans. (The post is from October, but spoiler free).

Eliza Edwards was an actress who died in 1833 at the age of 24. Her body was autopsied, and discovered to be - in the words of the autopsy - "a perfect man", which had apparently not been known to any of her friends or colleagues.

Harry Stokes was a bricklayer in Manchester, who was outed as trans in newspaper articles during his divorce 1838 and again after his death in 1859. He became something of a figure of fun after being first outed, but met another woman who lived with him as his life, and was broadly accepted by the local community as a trans man.

It was only through chance that James, Eliza and Harry were outed (and in James Barry's case, despite considerable efforts on his part). There might well have been hundreds or thousands more people like them.

And Boulton and Park, who I mentioned above, have usually been treated as transvestite men by historians, but could equally - had they had the terms themselves - be identified as trans women. Some contemporary newspaper articles even used she/her pronouns for them.

Asexual Victorians Asexuality is tricky to spot in history, though even in 1896, German sexologist Magnus Hirschfeld was identifying it as a distinct phenomenon. What we do know is that more than 10% of women and a little under 10% of men in the 1890s never married, and in some cases that may well have been because they were asexual or aromantic.

From a Dracula perspective, family rumour held that Florence Stoker declined sex with her husband after the birth of their child. That may or may not have been true (and there's a ring of aphobia to some of the family's claims) but it shows how asexual people might also be found in apparently conventional marriages.

Sources British Library: A Short History of LGBT Rights in the UK British Library: A timeline of LGBT communities in the UK Girlfriends of Dorothy: A Timeline of Lesbian Rights UK 1601 - 2020s (note: the site intends to be trans-inclusive, but genders John Barry as female.) Open University: Lesbianism and the criminal law of England and Wales “Constant Companions” and “Intimate Friends”: The Lives and Careers of Maggie Benson and Nettie Gourlay Sapphic sexuality: lesbian myth and reality in art and sculpture British Library: Transgender identities in the past Warp and Weft: The extraordinary life of Harry Stokes British Academy: Happy Families? Coitus Interruptus: Sex, Bram Stoker, and Dracula 'Missing person' Florence Stoker added to DIB

[rea-grimm]

The king of the hell

You were already a sculptor at school and as soon as you got your training you became a sculpture restorer. You worked in castles and sometimes clients would bring you statues that needed repair. You made your own sculptures, but only when you had time and an idea that was worthwhile. 

But now you wanted to get to work repairing a statue that had been brought in a few days ago. It was an ancient statue that, to everyone's surprise, retained all its limbs. Actually, it was relatively well preserved, as it had been found recently in a cave that had been used as a temple to the god of the underworld. Or so they told you. 

The scientists had already completely excavated it, and now they wanted you to return it to its former glory. The statue was overgrown with moss, and a piece had been chipped off here and there, nothing you couldn't handle. 

You walked into your studio, where in the middle of it, on a heavy pedestal, was a black marble statue, several metres high, covered with a white sheet to keep the dust from falling on it. To reach the top of the statue, you had to take a stepladder.

You took the sheet off the statue and sat on the ladder for a while, looking at this unique piece of art. You've always admired how in ancient times they could make statues that looked like sleeping people.

You were struck by several things at once with this statue. For a statue of a god or king, the figure had almost angelic wings and his face was covered in a strange mask. The crown placed on his head looked like spikes and behind the wings you first thought it was a halo but then you realized it was fire. 

You stepped down from the ladder and many questions ran through your head as you looked. Was it the king of the underworld? What if it was an angel first. A reference to the Bible? What could be hiding under the mask? 

You were walking around the statue when you noticed the strange text on the base. It was quite illegible. You wiped it carefully with a rag and thought it said a name. But you had trouble deciphering it, even with the alphabet of the language the scientists had given you. So you'd know what font was used and not accidentally change it. 

There were other strange words next to the name that made no sense to you. You ran your hand over them and read them aloud to yourself. To your surprise, the letters glowed with a fiery light. 

Everything around you went dark and all you could see was the fire writing that grew and formed a circle around you. You had no idea what to do when the ground caved in beneath your feet and you began to fall. 

You screamed at the top of your lungs, your eyes closed in fear. You had no idea how long you fell, but you finally landed on the smooth cold floor. 

When you opened your eyes, you looked around as you had no idea where you were. You'd been in the apartment below you before, and it looked decidedly different. 

You were now in a large room of black marble. There were torches on columns at the sides, illuminating the room. You felt like you were in a palace. 

You turned around to take in the entire room when your eyes fell on a massive black and silver throne, upon which sat a man who looked like a reanimated version of the statue you were supposed to be repairing. 

Dressed all in black, with a white shirt, a black mask covering his face and a silver crown on his head. Large black wings stuck out of his back and a bright flame burned behind his head like a halo. Did you hit your head and this was just a dream? 

Only his eyes were visible through the mask. Eyes with a look so cold it chilled you. And though you must have caught him off guard, he didn't show it. The king strained to look at you. 

"What are you doing here? No mortal is allowed here," he said sternly. 

"Where am I?" You asked, still not knowing if it was real or a dream. 

"The underworld. Realm of the dead," he replied bluntly, as if it were obvious. 

"Realm of the dead?" You asked, rather to yourself, before looking back up at the king. "And how do I get back?" You asked. 

"You must prove your worth. You have to earn it. But you are no warrior who can beat me in a fight..." he said, measuring you with his gaze. "Perhaps another quest to prove yourself..."

He said, resting his chin before looking at you again. You got the impression he was trying to think of something equally difficult, if not more so. 

"I'll take you back to the world of the living if you can guess my name," he finally said in a confident voice, as he was sure it was an impossible task for a mortal.

For everyone thought he was Hades, Anubis, Pluto, Ah Puch, Mictlantecuhtli, Apophis, or even Hel or Kali and others. And those who had formerly honored him with the proper name were long ago in his realm, as were all mentions of him. 

"What? How should I know?" You were taken completely by surprise. 

"Is that your answer?" He asked you sternly, and you were sure he grinned beneath his mask. 

"No," you quickly shook your head. You rubbed your chin, wondering what his name might be. 

The first names you thought of were Hades and Pluto. But you had a feeling it wouldn't be that easy. Instead, you remembered the letters on the base of the statue.

You closed your eyes and focused on the text. King... son of Luna... Alber... and then there was text you didn't understand. Finally, you decided to try your luck. 

"Is that Alber?" you asked, and you saw his wings twitch in surprise.

"How did you find out?" He asked sternly, but you could still hear some surprise in his voice. 

"It was written on the base of the statue I'm repairing," you explained. 

King measured you with his gaze before finally rising from his throne and deciding to make good on his word. After all, you had fulfilled his challenge, and as King, he kept his word. Besides, he was interested in what his particular statue was. Until now, he thought time had buried and destroyed them all. 

As promised, the King escorted you back to the world of the living, specifically back to your studio. King was actually a little surprised at how much the world of the living had changed from the last time he'd seen it.

He'd heard the deceased speak of their time, but never paid much attention. Most of these things were quite trivial to life in the underworld. 

He looked around and noticed the damaged statue that had gotten you into the underworld and made you know his real name. Once he had seen enough in his opinion, King vanished without a word. 

Ever since that incident, you've archly avoided the inscription on the statue during the repairs. You didn't want to accidentally go back to the underworld.

Though a part of you was becoming more and more interested in what was hiding under the dark mask that gave room only for his eyes. Plus, you wondered what lay beneath the stern surface. 

You had no idea what exactly it was, but as you thought more and more about the king, it was only unexpectedly that you touched the letters on the pedestal, which lit up again and sent you to the underworld. 

The King was in the midst of insulting a few servants who listened to him with their heads down and just nodded when you appeared. Just as you hit the ground, the eyes of the entire room turned to you.

You smiled nervously and waved. You could clearly see in his stance that he wasn't happy to see you there again and immediately ordered everyone to leave. 

King didn't understand why you were there and he certainly wasn't happy about it. He cursed at you, threatened you and immediately wanted you sent away.

Before he could do so, however, you bombarded him with the questions you had for him that had been gnawing at your mind since the first time you met him. 

When you did, you got the impression he'd rather throw you to the lions or drown you in the River Styx. He even tried to grab you by the throat, but at this point the height difference played in your favor and you slipped easily under his feet. However, when he finally caught you, and to your surprise acknowledged that you weren't a bad distraction at all, he sent you back up. 

These encounters were becoming something of a regular occurrence, with the king slowly ceasing to banish you and rather looking forward to seeing you brighten up his ordinary and almost monotonous days in the underworld. You had no idea how, but gradually you fell into sync. 

The King kept you mostly as his little secret, as he had a certain reputation that he wasn't about to tarnish with any dalliance with a living mortal. He wasn't going to show anyone if he had a good side buried deep inside him. A good side that you were slowly getting to. 

One day that looked exactly like the one before in the underworld, and you couldn't tell if it was day or night, King took you for a walk. That was mostly because you kept pestering him with questions about what it was like outside the castle walls. 

The main reason the King refused to let you out was because once a mortal touched the land of the underworld, they could no longer return to the world of the living.

However, the marble floor of the castle didn't apply, which was actually fortunate for you, or you would have been stuck there from the start. 

Another reason was his reputation, where as mentioned he didn't want to be seen with a mortal in the underworld. You couldn't even imagine the commotion he said it would cause. 

Eventually, however, you convinced him and he agreed to a little walk. Before you set off, however, he gave you a small silver tiara to disguise you and hide your origins. It disguised your mortal origins. 

You reached the main gate of the castle when, without any warning, the King took you around the waist like a rag doll and sat you on his shoulder. You were very daring, but you never dreamed of this. 

You walked out like that and everyone who saw you got out of the way. You felt like you were at a carnival, and you almost fell off his shoulder as you looked around and took in all the impressions. The underworld may have seemed monotonous, but there was still plenty for you to see. Everything there looked completely different.

It was a relatively short walk, however, as King had long strides that took you to a lonely hill where a single tree towered, its blossoms and leaves reminding you of the northern lights, flickering in the wind. 

There was a large picnic blanket spread out right under the tree, with a plate of fresh sashimi that King had had brought to you from the mortal world. Food from the underworld was subject to the same rules as the land. 

You thought you'd finally see his face, but he refused to eat. He said it was his favorite food, but he refused to let anyone see him out of the corner of their eye without his mask. And even though you were the only one eating that day, you enjoyed it. 

As you sat there, you realized how cold a place the underworld actually was. There was no sun shining anywhere, so there was nothing to keep the place warm. You started to shiver slightly under the tree, but you didn't want to say anything. You didn't want to appear weak.

You were sitting next to King when his wings moved and suddenly you had one wing resting on your shoulder, like a blanket thrown over you. His feathers, though black as night, were soft as fluff and pleasantly warm. 

You were about to thank him when he took you around the waist and sat you on his lap. His wings then completely enveloped you like a nice feather bed. 

You were putting the finishing touches on the statue when the lights in the room dimmed and a fiery portal appeared on the floor. You heard only the rustle of feathers before Alber appeared in the studio. 

Truthfully, you hadn't expected this, as you had only visited him so far, and this was the second time he had been to your home. King walked over to you, greeting you as his gaze fell on the statue. It had been almost perfectly repaired since your first meeting, and only a few details were left to be tweaked.  He walked around it, giving you a moment for a job well done.

"I have to admit, it doesn't look bad. Almost as good as it was thousands of years ago," he said, looking at you. "Maybe... maybe you could adjust my mask," he added, and you got the impression he meant the mask on the statue. 

You nodded in annoyance at that, since you didn't like being told to get to work. You had no idea, however, that King had closed all the windows and doors in the room so that not an inch of sunlight could penetrate. 

After making sure you couldn't see in, he took off his mask, revealing snow-white hair, tanned skin, and a tattoo around his left eye that resembled an olive branch. You couldn't take your eyes off him and felt like your chin had involuntarily dropped. 

Alber saw your reaction and grinned smugly. He saw how you couldn't take your big eyes off him and what a shock it was to you. You couldn't even form a sentence. 

He walked over to you and got down on one knee. Before you could ask him what he wanted to do, he took your cheeks and kissed you. At that moment, you thought your heart would leap out of your chest and you closed your eyes in sheer bliss as it reminded you of the dreams you had of him now and then. 

"I can't tell you how long I've wanted to do this. I feel like even though I don't want to, you mean more and more to me," he whispered as he finally pulled away slightly. His hands were still on your cheeks, his forehead resting against yours. At that moment, you ran out of words.

One Piece Masterlist

[timesacircle]

Rhind Mathematical Papyrus - the oldest (1650 BC) manuscript written in Algebra and Irigonometry.

"Rhind Mathematical Papyrus": It is named after Alexander Henry Rhind, a Scottish antiquarian. He bought the papyrus in 1858 in Luxor, Egypt. It was found during illegal excavations in or near the Ramesseum. The Rhind papyrus dates to the Second Intermediate Period of Egypt. It was copied by the scribe Ahmose from a now-lost text from the reign of Amenemhat III (12th dynasty).

The Papyrus is probably a mathematics textbook, used by scribes to learn to solve particular mathematical problems by writing down appropriate examples. The papyrus has work and writing on arithmetic, algebra, geometry, trigonometry, and fractions. Eighty-four problems are included in text covering tables of divisions, multiplication and handling of fractions; and geometry, including volumes and areas.

The scribe dated papyrus in year 33 of Apophis, the penultimate king of the Hyksos 15th Dynasty. The other side of the papyrus mentions 'year 11' without a king's name, but with a reference to the capture of the city of Heliopolis. In the opening paragraphs of the papyrus, Ahmose presents the papyrus as giving "Accurate reckoning for inquiring into things, and the knowledge of all things, mysteries... all secrets". He continues with: This book was copied in regnal year 33, month 4 of Akhet, under the majesty of the King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Awserre, given life, from an ancient copy made in the time of the King of Upper and Lower Egypt Nimaatre (?). The scribe Ahmose writes this copy.

[tofu83]

Lottery To Upgrade 3

Knowledge bank

Sebastian was a genius and a university professor, proficient not only in history but also in biology. His academic status is admired and his teaching is loved by students. Because being obedient to Masters in his capacity helps maintain social stability and makes humans more willing to be dominated by aliens, he is also exempted from participating in the lottery.

But he actually secretly excavated the history erased by Masters and studied the physiological functions of alien creatures, hoping to find a way to fight back against Masters, free mankind from the fate of slavery, and regain freedom.

"I seem to have found it! The weakness of these bastards is actually..." His excitement lasted less than three seconds because the door of his secret laboratory was destroyed.

"Professor Sebastian, you have been accused of illegally spying on Master's secrets, and you must immediately participate in the lottery! In order to thank you for your contribution to society, the winning rate is 100%!" The leader of the hunter bot pronounced his fate.

"No! It's just one step away from success!" He tried to escape, but was soon subdued by a hunter bot and injected with a mysterious liquid and passed out.

"Expert bot-SN001 active, ready to serve and advise" the newest humanoid robot woke up and stand at attention. Its appearance was half human half machine, smooth and muscular, wearing nothing but a pair of briefs.

"Oh My God! Professor Sebastian? Is it you?" a young scientist who was Sebastian’s student could not believe what he saw.

"It is Expert Bot-SN001. Professor Sebastian is ceased to exist but his personality is stored in database. Do you prefer this bot simulate his personality?"

"Oh yes!"

"Confirmed." The robot nodded and asked, "what’s the question?" in Sebastian’s tone.

"It’s really you! What happened to you?"

"I volunteer to become the first expert bot. This kind of robots stored the most amount of information about our Masters. It’s mission is to make humans understand Masters better, so that they can be more reverent and obedient to Masters. It is the most advanced non-combat robot."

"I don’t understand. Why such a successful person like you would like to be converted?"

"I tried to explore a method to destroy Masters’ rule but failed. Thanks to Masters for keeping me alive and instilled all knowledge of Masters in my mind. Therefore I understand that human have no chance to win the war against Masters. Masters are much more powerful and advanced than us. I'm stupid but I can be saved, as long as I become a robot and spread the master's knowledge and disintegrate the human resistance consciousness."

"So you wanted to resist Masters and you know the weaknesses of Masters now?"

"Warning!" Sebastian became Robot mode again and said "Inappropriate questions are detected and education is required immediately"

"Wait! I just…" But the young scientist couldn’t finish the sentence. In front of him, the robot became completely naked and on its crotch was a phallus shaped hypno-gun emitting beam to the young man’s head.

Moments later, the young man snapped to attention and said out loud, "I understand! Masters are great. I obey Masters’ rule without question!"

The Expert bot-SN001 made its groin area cover in briefs, and asked again, "any more questions?"

"No, sir! All I should know is Masters are great. I will convert more men to robots for Masters. Thank you, sir. Have a nice day!"

"Have a nice day, too!" While seeing the young man leaving, Expert bot-SN001 experienced a long time of pleasure, it knew it served Masters well and was glad that it could be an obedient robot forever.

[celestemona]

What types of jobs do each of the wifes have or had? (Because from what we know so far, Hakim's mama is a teacher in the akademiya and Quentin and Corinne mama is a dancer so This made me wonder which other professionals the others wifes have and sorry for the bad english)

Anon, you don't know for how long I've been waiting for someone to ask me this!! I'm so whipped for my ocs children yes, but I'm a whore for their mamas too hahah

Okay just like you've guessed, Hakim's mom is indeed a History & Literature professor at Akademiya. She's also a mage but I won't elaborate too much about it because she decided to follow only the conventional education path.

occupations: professor, historian, writer, mage

Lyney's wife, as you've mentioned, is a dancer. Currently, she is performing as an aerial silk pro at her husband's shows and she's pretty popular because of her skills.

occupations: troupe member, dancer, aerial silk pro, lyney's assistant

Kaveh's wife's job is to be rich hahahah She doesn't depend entirely on her sister fund because she is the owner of a huge construction & mining excavation company. How do you think she met her husband?

occupations: ceo, ningguang's right hand, kaveh's account manager

I've to say I struggled a lil bit to come up with a background for the Kaedehara's matriarch. However Mama reader here is a highly skilled adventurer. Just like her husband, she loves to travel, explore and she collect artifacts. Our Lara Croft I'd say hahaha

occupations: adventurer, treasures' collector, archeologist

Éveline's mom is a very fluent merchant. I must say I'm keeping the idea of her being a "former smuggler" from one of my previous fanfics for Neuvi. She's pretty smart and she can get a lot of informations around Teyvat which, sometimes, contributes to her husband's work.

occupation: merchant, former smuggler, former informant

Cyno's wife is an eremite and she used to do some illegal stuffs, that's the main reason why she crossed his way. But now that she's married to Akademiya's mahamatra and has two sons with him, she works at tavern as a bartender. Although sometimes she also does some temporary jobs as bodyguard for those who dare to explore the desert.

occupations: self-employed worker, bartender, bodyguard, former mercenary

And finally we have Wriothesley's wife who works together with him to maintain the Fortress of Meropide organized & safe. Most of the documents and archives tasks are her responsabilities. Howeveeer, if the surface needs someone for interrogation or if something serious happens inside the prison and the guards need a hand, she is the one they trust for this service.

occupations: duchess, fortress of meropide's second administrator, interrogator, executer

[ancientstuff]

Nice they didn't make it to the black market, but crappy that they're almost useless as scientific objects without provenance and proper excavation.

[blueiscoool]

The Getty Museum Return Ancient Bronze Head to Turkey

A life-sized bronze head of a young man has been removed from view by the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles and will be returned to Turkey after the institution learned it was illegally excavated.

The head had been in the antiquities collection at the Getty Villa Museum since it was acquired in 1971. But the museum said it had received new information from the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office in New York indicating it had been illegally excavated.

The California museum did not reveal what new information had come to light about the excavation, and officials in New York did not yet respond to a request for information. The head has been removed from view until it can be handed over to Turkish officials.

“In light of new information recently provided by Matthew Bogdanos and the Antiquities Trafficking Unit of the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office indicating the illegal excavation of this bronze head, we agreed that the object needed to be returned to Türkiye,” museum director Timothy Potts said in a statement.

The district attorney’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the details of its investigation.

The Getty Museum said that its policies are to return objects to the country of their origin or modern discovery when reliable information indicates they were stolen or illegally excavated. In 2022, the museum returned a cache of artworks to Italy after learning that they were linked to disgraced antiquities dealer Gianfranco Becchina.

The bronze head dates to somewhere between 100 B.C.E and 100 C.E. and is a separately cast component of a life-size figure, detached from the body at the upper neck. The eyes were once inlaid with an unknown material that was not preserved. Researchers have not yet identified the body of the figure. The subject of the figure also remains elusive as it was fabricated in a “highly idealized” style and has not been matched to a member of an imperial family or other named individual, the museum said, although an inscribed alpha (“A”) is visible on the interior of the neck at the bottom rear edge.

Some scholars have associated the bronze head with the archaeological site of Bubon, in the Burdur province of southwestern Turkey. Bubon was subjected to illicit excavations in the late 1960s.

Potts added that by returning the head to Turkey, the museum seeks to continue building a constructive relationship with the Turkish Ministry of Culture archaeological colleagues in the country.

In total, the Manhattan District Attorney’s antiquities trafficking unit has recovered more than 4,500 antiquities stolen from 30 countries with a value in excess of $410 million since it was launched in 2017.

By Adam Schrader.

[theology101]

A Simple Financial Decision HFY - 1/3

Aboard the Command Ship Mother of Invention

>>> FTL JUMP SUCCESS

>>> BEGINNING SYSTEM SURVEY

>>> ERROR; INTERFERENCE

>>> ANALYZING INTERFERENCE

>>> CHEMICAL AND FISSION EMISSIONS DETECTED

>>> ERROR. PARAMETER ‘uninhabited’ NOT MET

Junior Commander Wa’l Hildnid was not having a good first night on duty. Despite serving on the bridge crew several times, tonight - or what passed for it in the carefully controlled light system meant to match their circadian rhythm - was the first night that Hildnid had command of the bridge. Which of course meant that the first (and hopefully only) unexpected problem came up on his shift. Although perhaps the Celestials were playing a joke on him - after all, the fierce and ruthless Foreman Wa’l Sonogth in charge of this operation, was his uncle. 

After a firm rapt on the door and announcing his presence, the door was opened from the other side. Already - or perhaps still - awake, he was hunched over with one of his three eye stalks on a different display. “Report,” he said simply.

“Capt-“ He cringed, reminding himself he was no longer in the Navy, “Master Foreman, - one of our long range probes has encountered an error.”

The question hung for a moment - Sonogth turned one eye towards his nephew. “And?” he asked dryly.

“Oh! Apologies uncl- sir. The system-“

“Which system, Junior Captain?” Foreman Sonogth interrupted, crossing his bulky arms over his chest and foremen’s pin. “Our charter is to strip mine any system within a hundred square parsec region. So far, we have sent out four hundred drones and most have already reached their secondary target.”

“Of course, sir, sorry sir.” 

“Make sure it doesn’t happen again - which system?”

Grimacing at failing to answer with his apology, Hildnid was pleased the correct screen was ready. “The star has been codenamed as ZN0-52081, sir, and the error was unexpected life form contact.” Songoth’s eyestalk returned to its central monitor at that.

“Two ice giants and gas giants, an asteroid belt, a habitable planet, and a deathworld, on top of a few dozen barren moons…” his uncle thought aloud, his voice sonorous as he dropped into a contemplative tone. “Too remote for pirates, too much work for colonizers, and not near anyone who could’ve taken it…” 

The eyestalk came back up. “Were the life signature Bioforms?”

“No, no sir.” He knew that one, at the very least. There were several ways to tell if one of the Old One’s children was lurking, and none had been present. “What little evidence we have at the moment suggests the usage of traditional, albeit old, spacecraft. No psionic resonance or evidence of interstellar gas manipulation.”

The eyestalk bobbed a nod. “Good, at least we won’t need to deal with any damned Citay.” Wa’l Sonogth sighed, leaning back in his chair and finally turning all three of his eyes to his nephew. “They’re either smugglers or political dissidents illegally occupying our territory. If it’s smugglers, we can pay them off and give them one of our empty systems, if they’re rebellious colonists…”

Wa’l Hildnid swallowed so hard that it seemed to travel through his neck and into his shoulders and chest. 

At that, his uncle laughed. “Don’t get squeamish on me, boy! Your mother told me about what a brave military man you are, don’t tell me you never killed before?” The black of his sclera seemed to grow even darker, “if it’s easier on your soul, I’ll make it an order. It’s a simple financial decision.” 

“Yes, Master Foreman.”

“Good. Send the probe to its next target, and…” The left eye moved back towards its screen, “order ED-3 to move in. Clan Gis also were a gang of firebreathers…”

“If that will be all, sir?”

“That will be all”

Aboard Mining Ship Salinonk

Captain Ghis Halnfur was looking forward to an extremely profitable day. 

In charge of “ED-3” - Excavation and Demolitions Team 3 - and the seven ships that made up that command. Two of them were traditional deep space mining ships, barely a hundred meters long, three more were of the wide bowed transport ships that would carry full loads for processing, two hundred and twenty meters long and capable of safely transporting its precious cargo without additional protection. And of course, his flagship, half again the size of the transports and the most heavily armed, was to act as the command and operations hub for the mining operation, as well as transporting any workers or engineers to ground-based projects - in this case, a legion of Galfrei-class combat units and a platoon of enhanced mining equipment retrofitted into combat-ready suits. And of course, the final ship, and Halnfur’s personal addition to ED-3 - the screening ship.

Taken from his days in the Navy, the idea of point defense protection against fightercrafts and gunships would also work when it came to asteroid mining. Halnfur himself captained the first one deployed, and saw to his immense delight that it could cut through those asteroid fields like air… it simply made it harder to collect them afterward - so instead his poor Lii’lya had been reduced to operations like this, where collateral damage was expected. 

Blinking out the white that always came from leaving faster than light, he kept his eyes on the stellar horizon while his communications officer began a survey. “Near distance, clear. Middle distance, clear. Far distance… occupied.”

“Occupied?” Ghis Halnfur’s second in command, Ak’no Jel, asked as he moved to take a better look at the display.

“Yes ma’am,” comms responded. “By… a battle, it looks like,” she paused, another bright flash of light from the viewport, this time significantly smaller and at range. “Yes, it’s a battle, ma’am. The fission signature we just picked up was equivalent to one of our class-4 explosives.”

“Who’s fighting?” Halnfur felt obligated to ask, if no one else would.

“It’s hard to tell from this range, sir, but I’m seeing two distinct ship design styles, maybe three.”

“Are you ready to go in, Captain?” Jel asked, back behind his command chair.

He surveyed the scene for a moment longer, tapping his chin dramatically. “Yes… I believe we shall. Navigations, plot me a skip-jump, pull back a hundred fifty kilometers from the plotted edge of the battle. I want them to know we’re there, but don’t fire yet.” He’d never believed Sonogth’s predictions - and he knew who was behind this whole damn thing - the Citayans. If he could get proof, solid evidentiary proof, that they had not only moved into the Celestia Republica Castelleum, and that they fired first, it would be the airtight justification they needed to finally wipe the Citayans off the galactic map, then their unevolved Citay vermin, and then all the other Bioforms. At least the Citayans didn’t use bloody animals for space-craft.

The flash was proportionally weaker this time - but the battle was not what he expected.

Aboard the War Ship Antioch

Aleksandrya Sokolov-Meyer of the United Nations of Terra and Venus Navy, and captain of the Zeus-class Antioch, was having a terrible day. “Status!” she barked, leaning over the massive command table and wincing at each new red mark on her ships. And they weren’t even supposed to be her ships! “I need those torpedo tubes unjammed!” she yelled to no one in particular.

“Torpedos still down, ma’am, repairs underway!”

“Rio’s Pride is requesting additional firing support!”

“Acknowledged, patch me over to the captain.” It wasn’t looking good for Rio’s Pride. The only destroyer she still had on her left flank, Rio was built for capital ship combat, and the swarm of Jovian Stinger and Biter drones that had just polished off her support ship. “Captain Holt,” Meyer said when she saw a flicker in her periphery. 

“Damn, Meyer, its a bloody mess that Gilly left us, isn’t it?” Despite herself, she let out a low chuckle, glancing up through the loose strands of red hair to look at her friend’s face on the screen. He wasn’t looking good, behind him the devastation of his ship was obvious, lights flickering and a disturbingly loud shudder. She was tempted to pretend that this was a simulation again, that this wasn’t real and she had enough time for a clever comeback.

But it was real this time. And with the death of Commodore Gilroy Faux and High Captain Tsoss, Aleksandrya was in command.

And she was about to kill a friend.

“Holt, we can’t send anyone to rescue you,” she said solemnly, turning back to her display and drawing her intentions. “If you yaw fifty degrees starboard and a few clicks further out-“

“I can hit the damn nest.”

“We’ll cover you for as long as we can.”

“Yes ma’am, over and out.” And just like that, exposing itself to more fire and making the battered destroyer even more of a target, Rio’s Pride followed orders. The swarm of drones saw that and gave chase, their hive programming convincing their fellows of better prey than the main battle group. No doubt some kid would notice and correct the mistake eventually, but it wouldn’t be immediate and every second counted.

“Comms Officer Henri, order picket group one to chase those fuckers, then patch me into the rest of the fleet.” The situation had already changed radically from the last time she checked - the enemy formation, surrounding them in a rough U, had begun to collapse inward on the port side as they moved in for the kill, while the automated Jovian ships - primarily their smaller ships though there were two cruisers in there. The Caliphate of Mars was stubbornly holding the rear line as a firing position, uncharacteristically cautious - especially compared to the Jovian Brillenschlangen, of all people - and the ship they were chasing, the only damn reason they were here, the Samel-Class Man of War Big Tex which should’ve been on death’s door, had yet to make an appearance. The only benefit to the situation was that another Jovian carrier had gotten speared through by a CAT-7 coilgun.

Again, the flicker in her periphery, again she began to speak. “Tighten up, those drones are going brainless in a few minutes and I don’t want any of them flying blind in between my ships, you hear? Good - keep your CAT-1s well-oiled, I want you all to coordinate on deflecting incoming projectiles” She glanced up, looking at the faces on her screen. Only thirty-three of the seventy-four ships that came out to Jupiter were still active, and soon it would be thirty-two. “Let’s see Rio be proud one last time and on my mark, I want complete offensive saturation on these targets,” Meyer selected them on her display for them.

Holt’s face popped up, his ship even more damaged with only the emergency lights active and a nasty gash on the side of Holt’s face. Meyer wondered how he got it - she figured that she’d never know. “On your orders, Admiral.”

Despite herself, she smirked. If she could manage to salvage this… but now was not the time to think of her career. Not when she was staring at the one who would give it to her. “Give ‘em hell.” And with a triumphant final firing of its massive primary canon, Rio’s Pride unleashed a two-hundred-ton rod of tungsten-depleted uranium alloy shell at a low, but not insignificant, percentage of the speed of light. The Nest - the hangar and control point for all the drones in the ether - was there one moment. The next, there was a blinding streak of white-yellow fire cutting straight through the thing, and then it began a cascade of errors as things meant to be held securely were suddenly and violently released.

Even knowing it was coming, she braced herself for the violent jerk of the main cannon. “Fire!” a second streak of light emerged, then another and another as dozens of missiles and high-category coil guns were launched at once - not targetting the battleships closest to them, but the undamaged secondary line. Expecting the luxury of a near-endless supply of drones the Jovians had programmed to make suicide rushes to intercept traditional and nuclear ordinance, the Martians were caught off guard by this sudden weakness in their defenses. Already, Aleksandrya could see their CAT-1s and teslogats ready for dealing with this, but not all at once and not nearly fast enough. And every second mattered.

And then, emerging off her starboard side, was a fleet of seven, massive ships. She had a moment of absolute shock and surprise. What? How did they move like that? But that quickly faded when the lead ship, a massive thing as long as her Zeus but much, much larger and heavier, rammed directly into Rio’s Pride.

Aboard Mining Ship Salinonk

“Blasted!” Captain Ghis Halnfur shouted, standing to his full two-meter height, his eyestalks pulled in tight to the skull. “Jel, I want to know what the hell is going on, Comms, tell the flotilla to open fire.”

“Captain-“ 

“They set a trap for us, Jel. I don’t know how, but they knew we were there...”

“Captain…”

“A damn trap, and Sonogth sent us-“

“Captain!” Jel said it forcefully enough that others stared - only for a moment before they risked one of her eyestalks finding them. “None of those ships exist in our records.”

“What?”

“They’re unknown configuration,” Jel repeated.

“I know what unknown configuration means, commander, what I meant was-“ One of the five ships closest, and turned directly to face Halnfur’s force, exploded as a few shots lanced from one of his transports. And at that, he grinned. “Ah, nevermind. We seem more familiar with their configuration now. No shields? How did they even make it through FTL?”

The Captain and Commander watched the battle for a moment, before Halnfur finally sat down in his chair, watching as the ships - and there were indeed three distinct designs, began to create a new line of battle. Clearly, whatever battle they had been fighting seemed to be forgotten against a superior enemy. A feral smile colored his face before Jel said something that made his heart stop.

“What if this is their home system and we made first contact?”

Aboard the War Ship Antioch

“I don’t care what you say, but that arschloch on this line, now!” Aleksandrya looked up just in time to see another CAT-9 shot get mostly disintegrated before whatever melted slag could be reformed in the coldness of space. “Come on you martian bastard, come on…”

“I assure you, ma’am, that Jamil MacCready is not here!” High General Sakira Morrison of the Jovian Coalition said. At least the fotze had picked up, which was more than could be said for that Martian Coward. “But the Martian troops have been placed under my temporary command while they recieve humanitarian repairs, as-"

“Humanitarian? He’s a murderer!”

“As we were given the right to by treaty. It was your forces under Commodore Faux that an illegal-“

“Halst den Mund! - Euphrates, Flaming Sword,” the two captains flickered on screen and this time, she did look at them. One clearly favored more of the Arab side of the “TexArab” people of Mars, while the other was more ambiguous - both were men, and oh what she wouldn’t give to hear them complain about being subordinate to two women. “One of those energy balls is coming at you both, nadir-starboard. I want to see how big of a coil shot it takes to defuse. General Morrison, are your crews in formation ready for a massed volley?”

“The battleships, yes, but it’ll take the drones-“

“Comms, patch me into all ships,” Aleksandrya said with certainty she didn’t have. Removing her officer’s cap to fix her hair, she instead tossed the damn thing away, pulled out her pins, and shook out her hair. If she was gonna die fighting an unknown evil from beyond God knows what, she wasn’t going to do it by regulation. “This is acting Admiral Aleksandrya Solokov-Meyer of the Antioch - on my first mark, coordinate Coil fire onto this target,” she tapped it on her display, “Upon my second mark, fire traditional ordinance - third fire nuclear. Ready… mark.”

There was the familiar lunge backward as the gun fired, joined in a loose arrowhead formation with the broken hulk of the Nest acting as their anchoring point. While not all ships could fire given the angle, the effect was all that she could’ve hoped for. As the first rounds made contact, they began to superheat, melt, and vaporize as before… but then the second, third, and fourth were all landing in the same spot too. And then, that etheric blue bubble that surrounded those ships began to bend inwards with a burning red fury… until it couldn’t bend anymore. The rounds hadn’t even all made their target before she called “Mark!” 

This motion was more subdued, as the still working torpedo bays launched too - straight into the hole they had just created in the shield, and not just the shield - somehow in that stream of light, they’d cracked the hull. Meyer imagined that the follow up missiles didn’t do much for the ship’s internals either, and this wouldn’t be much better. “Mark!” The barrier was already starting to close up, the cruiser was still opening fire… and then the nuclear missiles got inside the ship. Several dozen missiles exploded on the exterior of the shield in massive shows of light, but the dozen or two that made it underneath the shields before detonating?

For a brief moment, Jupiter had its own sun. And then the shield burst like an overfilled balloon.

“I want confirmation the second your guns are ready for another volley, we’re hitting him next.” She looked back at her display of Captains… having more faces with proportionally even more empty spots didn’t thrill her, but she knew the bastards could die. And that was good enough. “High General, I want an update on those drones, and for the love of God, someone get Jamil MacCready - or at least his ship!”

Aboard Mining Ship Salinonk

His flotilla was sent to pacify the whole system, Ghis Halfnur thought ruefully as he watched his last transport ship get destroyed. It was just him and the Screener left. “Jel?”

The woman had been trying to help coordinate fire with the weapon’s commander but came at his command. “Captain?”

“We never managed to do our full recon,” he said moreosely. It was his own fault, his own overconfidence. Removing his captain’s lapel from his uniform, he handed it to Jel. “Take one of our shuttles, take as much non essential personnel as possible, and then complete a survey of this system before reporting to your commanding officer.”

“Sir- that’s-“

“Foreman Wa’l Sonogth will want to know about this. And if you’re right about this being their native system…” Halfnur shook his head. They were doomed. No way about it now. Even if he could still win this fight - and given the numbers against him, he didn’t like those odds - as the commander on the scene who had belligerently initiated contact with a pre-uplift species, his life was forfeit. The Celestial Tribunal would ring him dry, probably most of his crew and commanding officer. “In your logs, write how you argued against my course of action, and wanted to file a report to the Castelleum and I countermanded you. Now go!”

Always a good sailor, Ak’no Jel did as she was told. He had confirmation that she and the evacuees made it on the ship, and waited another five minutes to make sure they were gone before he gave what would be his last, most bitter order. “We’re going in.”

Aboard the War Ship Antioch

The battlecruiser and spindly ships were the only two left - and for a moment, Aleksandrya had thought she had won. Or at the very least, was winning. For that act of pride, God decided that the placid, so far only supporting ships with its long-range fire. That seemed to be over now, now it was going to be a broadside. 

“Admira Meyer, the drones are online,” a both familiar and unfamiliar voice said over comms, the signal shakey and broken. 

“I want them running picket, sofort! If any fucking plasma gets through, it’s your ass!” Meyer was already turning to the weapons board, seeing that it was only at 90% charge… and the battlecruiser was getting closer with only missiles harmlessly bouncing off to show for it. But her secondary weapons… “Lower caliber until your main gun is fully charged, he’s not getting an inch without steel,” she ended that call, already having Comms initiating her second, “Admiral Meyer, do you read me Virgo I?”

“Loud and clear ma’am,” the voice sounded winded on the other side, the tight confines of a cockpit not allowing a view. “What can me and my jockeys do for you today?”

“That smaller ship, I want you to poke at it. Bring two squadrons with you…” she paused, thinking. With only teslogats and missiles, the hundreds of fighters wouldn’t do anything to the big ship. Short of just ramming it, she couldn’t see what the rest of the fighters would be doing. “Take as many as want to come.”

“Yes ma’am - think your Comms get can get me over to their jockeys?”

“She’s already on it - Henriette is very skilled.”

“Why thank you, Commander Henriette, over and out!” 

Meyer looked back at the display of the field - already she was down two of her bigger ships (a part of her wanted to add ‘thankfully, Martians’ but she restrained herself) and a dozen smaller ones. And her firing predictions still had it a click out from its maximum range. If those drones didn’t show up -

“Fighters pull back! Repeat, pull back!” It was a laser show over there. While having never taken a shot at any other vessels so far, it became abundantly clear why - it didn't have the range. The powerful plasma jets burned through any fighter unfortunate enough to get too close. “General, where are my drones? Fuck it, drones, this is your new primary target. Are all cannons ready? Good, on my mark - mark!”

Only this time, this time the brilliant display of light didn’t end with a hole. When the light cleared, it was the imposing blue of the shield bursting out through the debris cloud with only a few minor red spots, its impish friend chasing after her fighters untouched. “Prepare a second volley! Reroute power, shut down gravity for all I care, just get those damn guns ready or we’re all dead!”

“Don’t be so certain of it, Admiral,” the same voice from before, only far, far clearer now. And without the static and fuzz… she knew that voice. Thousands of drone ships came rushing by the viewport, creating a cloud of grey and blinking lights that covered the horizon before passing. “I apologize for arriving late but, my father always did teach me ladies first.”

“MacCready,” she snarled under her breath.

“Ah, so you remember me? As you can tell, my ship doesn’t remember either of ours from our most recent or first dance.” 

“Ma’am, a new signature just appeared as… leaving Jupiter’s upper atmosphere,” Henriette said hesitantly. “Samael-Class, and moving quickly. Designation-“

“Big Tex.”

“If you hadn’t done such a wonderful job damaging her, I might’ve been able to help from the beginning,” the man’s cocky voice echoed in the bridge speakers, Meyer’s face turning as red as her hair as his ship quickly advanced towards the enemy. She was going to kill that man. For his crimes, for the Moscow and her old crew, and for stealing her fucking victory! Already, she was watching as the drones broke against the enemy ship like the sea, dozens dying but always being just a few too many to get them all. And the shield was turning red. “Ganymede Spaceworks also added something new, I was hoping to surprise you at our next dance but… well, a Prince must make sacrifices for the good of the people, even if it scorns his lady love.”

All it took was a glance, and Henriette had cut off his comm. “Fucking prick,” she added for good measure.

Drifting into formation above the battered and broken Hive was a Samael-Class Man Of War. Over a kilometer long and with more than enough firepower to match three Zeus classes, the massive primary gun was its primary characteristic… only now it was even more massive, with two isosceles triangles coming from what should’ve been the barrel. And then, in a single shot, a massive round moved in an instant - she barely had time to see it before it had punched straight through the shield, the ship, and then out the other side of the shield. 

Not wanting him to get the last laugh, “Main gun on the spindly.”

“Yes ma’am.”

A rod of Tungsten later and Aleksandrya was mollified enough to call her query. The man she and all of Task Force Chancellor had been sent to capture in the first fucking place. “Jamil MacCready.”

“It’s customary to use my title when greeting me.”

“What was that?”

“Ah, you like my new tachyon-enhanced coilgun? It’s brand new! Honestly worked better then I could’ve-“ Aleksandrya ended the call herself. 

“Helm, take us to Venus Blue Dock. We’re going home.” To fix my ship, reconstitute my numbers, and figure out what the hell we’re going to do next. 

[homerstroystory]

repatriation news!

(9/17/24) The Getty Museum in Los Angeles, USA returned a bronze funerary bed dating to the 6th century BCE to Türkiye. This comes after an investigation by Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism, which confirmed that the provenance had been falsified. The falsified records claimed that the artifact passed through various European collections throughout the twentieth century (pre-1972 UNESCO Convention), but it was actually illegally excavated in the 1980s.

c. 530 BCE; bronze, iron, copper, and linen