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newstfionline · 3 years ago

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Tuesday, August 24, 2021

Portland protests see clashes between far-right, far-left groups (Reuters) Protests by rival far-right and left-wing groups in Portland descended into violence on Sunday, as the opposing sides engaged in clashes and at least one man was arrested for firing a gun at demonstrators. Nobody was hurt in an exchange of gunfire—and by Sunday evening there was no word on any injuries in numerous other skirmishes that saw opposing sides brawling, dousing each other in what appeared to be bear spray and breaking car windows of rivals. Police Chief Chuck Lovell said during a briefing on Friday that officers would not necessarily intervene to break up fights between the groups. But he added that “just because arrests are not made at the scene when tensions are high, does not mean that people won’t be charged with crimes.”

Henri hurls rain as system settles atop swamped Northeast (AP) The slow-rolling system named Henri is taking its time drenching the Northeast with rain, lingering early Monday atop a region made swampy by the storm’s relentless downpour. Henri, which made landfall as a tropical storm Sunday afternoon in Rhode Island, has moved northwest through Connecticut. It hurled rain westward far before its arrival, flooding areas as far southwest as New Jersey before pelting northeast Pennsylvania, even as it took on tropical depression status. Over 140,000 homes lost power, and deluges of rain closed bridges, swamped roads and left some people stranded in their vehicles.

Classes starting, but international students failing to get U.S. visas (Reuters) Kofi Owusu occasionally waits outside the U.S. embassy in Accra to ask fellow students what they have done to secure a timely visa appointment. Classes for his master’s program at Villanova University in Pennsylvania are scheduled to start Monday, but his in-person interview appointment for a first-time U.S. student visa is still nine months away. It’s the second time the political science student from Ghana won’t make it to the United States in time for school. Visa processing is delayed as U.S. embassies and consulates operate at reduced capacity around the world due to the COVID-19 pandemic, leaving some students abroad unable to make it for the start of the academic year. The wait and the hassle threaten both the country’s standing as a preferred choice for international students and their economic contribution of around $40 billion annually to many universities and local economies. New international student enrollment in the United States dropped 43% in fall 2020 from the year prior, months after COVID sent the world into lockdown. The number of new students who actually made it onto campus in person declined by 72%, according to an enrollment survey by the Institute of International Education (IIE).

FDA approves Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine (Bloomberg) The pioneering coronavirus vaccine made by pharmaceutical companies BioNTech and Pfizer was granted full approval by U.S. regulators. The government imprimatur is expected to trigger a flood of mandates by municipalities, agencies and private employers that had been waiting for the Food and Drug Administration sign-off. Following the announcement, the Pentagon said it would make vaccinations mandatory for military personnel worldwide and President Joe Biden called for mandates by companies.

Hospitals and Insurers Didn’t Want You to See Their Prices (NYT) This year, the federal government ordered hospitals to begin publishing a prized secret: a complete list of the prices they negotiate with private insurers. The insurers’ trade association had called the rule unconstitutional and said it would “undermine competitive negotiations.” Four hospital associations jointly sued the government to block it, and appealed when they lost. They lost again, and seven months later, many hospitals are simply ignoring the requirement and posting nothing. But data from the hospitals that have complied hints at why the powerful industries wanted this information to remain hidden. It shows hospitals are charging patients wildly different amounts for the same basic services: procedures as simple as an X-ray or a pregnancy test. And in many cases, insured patients are getting prices that are higher than they would if they pretended to have no coverage at all. This secrecy has allowed hospitals to tell patients that they are getting “steep” discounts, while still charging them many times what a public program like Medicare is willing to pay.

‘A Beautiful Feeling’: Refugee Women In Germany Learn The Joy Of Riding Bikes (NPR) Like most Americans, I learned to ride a bike as a kid. I still remember the glee after learning how to ride a bike on a subdivision road where I grew up in Florida. But girls around the world don’t always get to experience the joy of a first bike ride. In some countries, conservative societies frown upon women and girls who ride bikes—it’s not considered dignified or appropriate—and gives a girl too much independence. Joumana Seif, a Syrian lawyer and activist, recalls riding a bike as an 11-year-old in the capital city of Damascus. “For the people [watching on the street], and even for the children, it was shocking to them that I was riding a bike. They started to say, ‘Oh, shame on you, you are a girl riding a bike,’” Seif says. “It just wasn’t in our culture.” But it’s never too late to learn. In Germany, a nonprofit group called Bikeygees is teaching refugee women from countries such as Iran, Iraq and Syria how to ride. Since the group first started, it has taught 1,100 women how to ride a bike, says founder Annette Krüger. “It is possible to change the life of a woman in two hours. It is really magical,” says Krüger, an avid cyclist. “It’s a beautiful feeling when a person is riding a bike,” one refugee says with a broad grin.

Gunfire at Kabul airport kills 1 amid chaotic evacuations (AP/Foreign Policy) A firefight at one of the gates of Kabul’s international airport killed at least one Afghan soldier early Monday, German officials said, the latest chaos to engulf Western efforts to evacuate those fleeing the Taliban takeover of the country. The shooting at the airport came as the Taliban sent fighters north of the capital to eliminate pockets of armed resistance to their lightning takeover earlier this month. The Taliban said they retook three districts seized by opponents the day before and had surrounded Panjshir, the last province that remains out of their control. The tragic scenes around the airport have transfixed the world. Afghans poured onto the tarmac last week and some clung to a U.S. military transport plane as it took off, later plunging to their deaths. At least seven people died that day, in addition to the seven killed Sunday. Tens of thousands of people—Americans, other foreigners and Afghans who assisted in the war effort—are still waiting to join the airlift, which has been slowed by security issues and U.S. bureaucracy hurdles. Meanwhile, Afghanistan faces a quickly deepening economic crisis, with financial hardships increasingly affecting those in Kabul and other cities. Banks remain closed, food prices are rising, and the value of the local currency has plummeted. The suspension of commercial flights to Kabul’s international airport has in some ways exacerbated the crisis, halting the flow of some medical supplies and aid.

US special operations forces race to save former Afghan comrades in jeopardy (ABC News) Current and former U.S. military special operations and intelligence community operatives are using their own networks of contacts to get elite Afghan soldiers, intelligence assets and interpreters to safety as they’ve become increasingly disillusioned and fed up with the U.S. government-led evacuation effort in Kabul, ABC News has learned. One informal group, dubbed “Task Force Pineapple,” began as a frantic effort last weekend to get one former Afghan commando into Hamid Karzai International Airport as he was being hunted by Taliban who were texting him death threats. They knew he had worked with U.S. Special Forces and the elite SEAL Team Six for a dozen years, targeting Taliban leadership, and was therefore at high risk of reprisal. The former elite commando was finally pulled into the U.S. security perimeter at the airport, where he shouted the password “pineapple” to American troops at the checkpoint. Two days later, the group of his American friends and comrades also helped get his family inside the airport to join him. Other former members of the military and CIA have consolidated their own efforts with a separate group calling itself “Task Force Dunkirk,” a reference to the massive evacuation of British and other Allied forces from France in 1940 under threat of the Nazi juggernaut. Task Force Dunkirk and the groups it has banded together with have helped get at least 83 at-risk Afghans out of the country.

Lebanese hospitals at breaking point as everything runs out (AP) Drenched in sweat, doctors check patients lying on stretchers in the reception area of Lebanon’s largest public hospital. Air conditioners are turned off, except in operating rooms and storage units, to save on fuel. Medics scramble to find alternatives to saline solutions after the hospital ran out. The shortages are overwhelming, the medical staff exhausted. And with a new surge in coronavirus cases, Lebanon’s hospitals are at a breaking point. The country’s health sector is a casualty of the multiple crises that have plunged Lebanon into a downward spiral—a financial and economic meltdown, compounded by a complete failure of the government, runaway corruption and a pandemic that isn’t going away. The collapse is all the more dramatic since only a few years ago, Lebanon was a leader in medical care in the Arab world. The region’s rich and famous came to this small Mideast nation of 6 million for everything, from major hospital procedures to plastic surgeries.

China changes law to allow married couples to have three kids (NY Post) China will now allow married couples to legally have a third kid amid concerns that its shrinking number of working-age people will threaten the country’s future prosperity and global influence. China has tried for decades to control the population, beginning with a policy imposed in 1979 that strictly limited couples to one child. Couples who didn’t follow the rule faced fines or loss of jobs—and in some cases, mothers were forced to undergo abortions. A preference for sons also led parents to kill baby girls, causing a massive imbalance in the sex ratio. The number of working-age people, meanwhile, has fallen over the past decade and the population has barely grown, adding more strain to an aging society. With growing fears that the country would grow old before it became wealthy, the family planning rules were changed for the first time in 2015 to allow two children.

Cases up down under (CNN) Australia, like China, New Zealand, and some other countries, has attempted to completely eradicate Covid-19 inside its borders. The strategy had largely worked until recently; Australia has just 44,026 confirmed Covid-19 cases and 981 deaths. But several major cities, including Sydney, Melbourne, and the capital Canberra, are again under lockdown as authorities struggle to contain an outbreak of the Delta variant. On Saturday, thousands took to the streets of Melbourne and Sydney to protest the long lockdowns; hundreds were arrested, and at least seven police officers were injured during violent clashes. In an opinion piece published Sunday, Prime Minister Scott Morrison hinted at an end to the country’s zero Covid-19 infections strategy, but warned Australians to expect a rise in infections as restrictions relax.

#headlines #news

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thesalemsaga · 4 years ago

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𝟭 — 𝗰𝗼𝗹𝗱 𝘄𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗿

— 𝙛𝙞𝙧𝙨𝙩 𝙘𝙝𝙖𝙥𝙩𝙚𝙧 𝙤𝙛 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙨𝙖𝙡𝙚𝙢 𝙨𝙖𝙜𝙖.

𝙬𝙤𝙧𝙙 𝙘𝙤𝙪𝙣𝙩 : 6.8k words

𝙨 : salem, the mistress of evil, has been made aware of a resistance group being made within the walls of the empire academy, valhalla. meanwhile, young seren has a bit of an epiphany.

the most unfortunate thing about the mistress’s palace, is that nobody will ever hear you scream.

in the black mountain, the darkness hardly distinguishes day from night. and they say that after losing a track of time, of days, going on without gazing at a clock or a calendar or even getting a peek at the stars, can drive a person to mere insanity. that was what many claimed happened to the witch when she was confined into this palace and was left to her own accord.

although light never shone once through those tainted, ebony windows, life still continued within the monolith. although not the healthy life that one might expect, not the life with clear morals or allowing a faith to carry you through your good doings, not even that flicker of passion towards pass-times and careers that keep you up and moving, nothing of the sort was ever seen in these walls. rather, it seemed like everything about humanity had abandoned the creatures from within.

the seemingly natural and human way of living had been lost within their countless decades here. time was not even a concept, they weren’t sure what use it was to count the hours and days and years you spend there, you’d just make it worse for yourself within the hope that tomorrow you will escape. and if not tomorrow, then in a week. and if not in a week, then in a month, two months, three. upon realizing that time might never come, you peer at those tallies drawn on the dark cobble walls and sneer and scream into an empty vacuum of space where nobody will hear you and save you.

it’s no use getting out either, not without the witch’s permission.

but even if you go out and are asked to return, you must pray to whatever deity remains on this cracked crater of a planet, in hopes that you return with good news. if not good news, decent news. but never bad news. bad news like, the fact that soldiers from the empire front seemed to have located the traces of one of salem’s henchmen.

yeah, good luck getting out of something like that.

inside one of the many halls of the dead palace, a sudden sound erupted. the scout wheezed and coughed as his head was lifted from the pool of water. tangled through raven locks and pulling and yanking, the gloved hands of the witch minded him like a puppet. they leaned over what could have been a pool, but the water was far from pristine or blue, it was a sea-weed green and at certain times, you might just spot a fin breaking through the surface before submerging once more.

this had been going on for nearly five minutes, but it felt like hours. having your head being forced down this certain pool would attract something ugly that lies in the deep end, the mere scent of your blood will put you in danger. but one could hardly care for the life of a mere scout when the mistress of evil has some minor, and by that, major problems on her hands.

“ m-my lady, please, show mercy! ”.

when she forced his head back down, salem’s eyes appeared fit to kill. two vermilion spots lacking any source of previous humanity, but even with the eyes, you wouldn’t take her for having been once a beautiful woman. the horns on her head were curled with ends as sharp as a double edged sword. her complexion was as lifeless as ash clouds summoned by an erupting volcano. salem hardly looked like a witch, she seemed fit to be a demon, a horned one, at that. and perhaps a part of her had some relation to the beings dwelling in the fiery pits below, especially once glancing at the limits of her ire.

minutes prior to this, the same scout she had sent out with about a dozen goblins had returned with news she had not been expecting. news regarding the empire, the people who have tried to take her down for the past two decades. there had been no success although salem was hardly an idiot, she was not one to underestimate the passion of vengeful humans, she was a vengeful human herself. it wouldn’t be long before they charged in with torches and pitch-forks to burn the witch.

resistance groups were growing within the walls, according to the chatter of some military men wandering between the boarder of what was the ukraine. the scout, a good fighter as well as an idiot, could have escaped without alerting the men of his presence and that of the dozen goblins he had brought with him, but he did not. the mere rustle in the bushes alerted the soldiers of a darker presence listening into their banter, and although killing was not on salem’s demand, it had to be done.

what could have been tyrants avoiding giving their status and identity away instead became an altercation that left one soldier cubed to pieces whilst the other fled, and to add salt to the wound, a stupid goblin who went after him was seen by the patrol ship they had parked in the area. checkmate for the empire soldiers.

to make a long story short, salem was fucked.

salem’s berserk force yanked the man’s head out from the mermaid pit and just a small flicker of pleasure manifested in those dead eyes. if there was one thing that she did love doing ( and she doesn’t love many things ) it was ensuing a well-taught lesson on consequences. and she was a rather strict teacher when it came to that.

“ listen to me, you filthy pig ”, she spat, sneering as the man found to catch his breath. her grip on his hair only tightened. “ you had clear instructions. you had them fucking written down, i even took some remorse since you have a god-awful memory and you want to tell me to have mercy, when you just fucking gave a major clue away to those empire fuckers?! ”.

the man continued to cough and wheeze as salem’s spat pure venom, “ what is it with you men, huh? can’t take orders from a woman? is your superiority alarm blaring so hard that you just won’t adhere to the fucking orders because a woman gave them to you? answer me, you pig! ”. he couldn’t. “ d-do you know how fucked i am? well not in the best way, i’ll tell you that. all of my efforts to make my location have gone to shit because you couldn’t keep your lousy ass out of trouble for five minutes. five years! five years stuck in this cold shithole and you gave it all away, you filthy animal. oh, i’m not going to show any mercy at all. ”

although the currents were disturbed by the abuse brought upon the scout, the waves did not fail to suddenly grow rampant, as if enraged. and around the same time, salem shoved his head down far enough for the water to engulf his shoulders. and it was not her who pushed him into the water, rather it was an unseen force yanking him into the depths.

as the witch rose and paid one last glance at the pool over her shoulder, she took note of a red hue that rose to the surface. after that, silence.

elsewhere . . .

principal arthur armsend was a man of honor.

being a principal and leader to a new era of the world, leading boys and girls and what lies in between into a new age, a renaissance period that would take the world from being a dark and bleak place that they were no longer familiar with, into the peaceful planet they had known it to be a hundred years ago. and he did so by a sharp discipline he gave to all of his students.

classes started at eight o’clock and go on until about four, and every day, something new is taught. from alchemy and martial arts, to care of mythical creatures and history. three meals were held every day at the immense cafeteria, free time started after classes in which students were able to enjoy the open-air yards of this floating monolith in the sky. in fact, they were so high up that you might reach over the edge and touch a cloud.

as opposed to many schools, the academy of valhalla was not one to waste time fooling around. third-year students and first-year students alike worked around the clock in order to harness the best skills in their arsenal in case the possibility of being sent out into missions came. and usually, when you were prepared, you might end up having the best results. students were told to be precise, to never make foolish mistakes, and to always remember why they were here.

although, nobody got it as bad as the principal’s daughter.

you’d expect the privilege to be very obvious; the ability to skip classes, to get out of trouble, to be an immediate social magnet, to be allowed out of the school and into the city to enjoy what it means to be young. any good parent with a somewhat loose way of raising their kids would spoil their child when they had the position they had. but for her, it was anything but that.

“ back straight, seren! ”.

she’s been at this for three hours. not joining her peers in the usual classes would mean that she would have to be doing something a little more different, a little more suited for her, and whilst many might role her eyes, they’d feel their stomach drop when they see the state that seren armsend is reduced to when brought into these private lessons.

at this point, her knees scrapped and legs clearly trembling, fatigued to the core, anyone could tell that seren was going through hell. these lessons tended to last three to four hours, but every time she so dared to look at the digital clock on the wall, her tutor would threaten to extend the time to fifteen minutes. ‘you wouldn’t take your eyes off your target in a real fight to see how long you’ve been at it’, he had said many times. and although it pained her, she had to agree.

her tutor, however, was none other than her old man. at the age of fifty, arthur still managed to maintain a certain posture to his stand whilst in battle that would trick anyone into aging him down a couple of years. he was a petite man, shorter than his daughter by two inches, and that most definitely did not stop him from butchering his daughter and bringing her to her limits in these training lessons.

how many times would seren have to be here a week, you ask? five times. fridays were generally the days in which she would have two of these sessions, one in the morning and the other placed right after lunch and she would only be back in her dorm at seven o’clock in order to crash, rest, and prepare for more lessons on a saturday morning.

iron thorn was clasped in her hand, arms tensing and aching to rest, her entire body ready to collapse the mere snap of the man’s fingers when he allowed her to rest but it wouldn’t be anytime soon. her training gear made her feel ten times heavier, and it was hot, boiling hot. but an armsend does not show struggle in the midst of a duel, they prefer to keep their enemies unsure of their condition to scare them or taunt them. you could only collapse once you’d finished what you started.

privilege, my ass. this is torture.

the clock was ticking towards the final bell which would dismiss all students but the ones in detention, and seren. “ finish what you started, come on. gaze up, for god’s sake fix that shoulder, and stop shaking your leg, you’ll stumble as soon as you lunge forward ”, she was used to receiving these comments, and she would take the feedback in an instant, because she knew arthur armsend when he was angry, a burden she shared in being his daughter.

iron thorn gave a minor whistle as she prepared to lunge once more, no essences were allowed to be used for the time being. if she did use something, the room might collapse. but she was tempted, oh young seren was tempted on pulling the trigger against the handle of her rapier and bring the ceiling to the ground. it would give her at least a minute to escape through the debris and run.

even upon lunging with a perfect posture and speed, the blade clashed against the cane her father wielded. stabbing, withdrawing, lunging, withdrawing, flicking and withdrawing. each set of movement took a mere second because of her semblance, yet her father caught everything and she was beginning to grow slightly discouraged. although not as many could fight as well as him, she knew that there would be someone out there who could. one person. and if she were to cross paths with that person, she cannot steer to being passive. even though it was meagre simulation of a fight, seren was asked to treat it like a reality. and that, she did.

arthur bore a sudden attack that left seren scrambling to get out of her thoughts, darting in withdrawal with a backwards somersault and landing clumsily on her feet, her legs nearly rendering her weak enough to collapse yet she still had a bit of sharpness left in her to know that landing on your ass would certainly mean a scolding from your father later.

this time, however, she did not have energy to raise her weapon to him as he pointed the end of his cane against her neck. she merely lifted her head and glanced upon his gaze that seemed rid of any emotion, meaning he was thinking, analyzing, arthur just wasn’t the type of man to wear his feelings on his face. he knew better than that.

seren didn’t. “ what was with that frown i saw? you know how many times i’ve taught you not to make your thoughts and emotions obvious on your face, your face has to be a blank canvas ”, he went on to say, lowering his cane and pressing the end against the ground. his posture straightened and he seemed to have dropped his defenses. she was not going to attack, however. “ seren. ”

“ m-my apologies, father ”, the girl gasped softly and blinked, verging dangerously close to the point of collapsing. something kept her awake, a part of her subconscious that wanted to keep her alive, her fight response. if not for it, then she would have perhaps been disowned or sent away just like her older sister.

now the only capable of heir in the family with the ripe age of eighteen, soon graduating from the academy, seren would have to carry the legacy of the cold armsend women who never once brought themselves close to failure. she would have to probably join the military route upon parting ways from valhalla, leading young soldiers to restore their lost land. although, if you ask her, if she had the choice, she would have picked the exploration route. unfortunately, being born in this family means that your fate is already decided for you from the moment your presence in your mother’s belly is announced.

needless to say, you have to stay on the route of perfection.

arthur sighed, it was clear he wasn’t happy. “ we’ll cut the lesson short today. you will make up for it with an extra hour tomorrow after class ”, he decided, and in order to avoid angering the man, the girl pursed her lips together and nodded. if one stared for just a moment, they would notice the trepidation in her eyes.

her tutor, father, and principal turned and left the training chamber they had been in for the past four hours. now vacant, the only sound echoing being the pants emanating from her cracked lips and although she wanted nothing more but to lay down on the floor, seren only averted her tired gaze to the immense windows giving her perhaps the best view she’s had of the world outside in a while.

although the empire had seen better days, the mountain of crete was a good place to re-build a city and make the public feel safer inside the walls. there weren’t many who wanted to venture out, probably because they had everything they could ever want in here. technology meant that they could produce food by cloning and distributing it to millions, money never seemed to be an issue as there were jobs for everyone, though it was said that there lived some people outside of the walls, in mainland greece who took care of farms and cattle and had a somewhat older way of living that would have been seen in the medieval times. they were closer to the truth of the world, and the fact that at least a dozen would apply annually to move within the walls said something.

but the talk of the wild never petrified seren as it did to others. they had returned to a time where they believed society was safer, and as soon as you stepped into a zone with no laws or mentions of morals, you’d be in danger. yet she’s read stories of people who lived just fine in these conditions, monsters or no monsters. and though she shared some fears with the general public, the wild was not one of them.

if anything, seren was infatuated with the idea of going outside, of seeing the world for what it was and not for what others claimed it to be. they hardly showed images captured by the military when they leave the walls and attend an expedition, only returning in a week after taking geographical calculations and hurriedly leaving. hardly the military you want protecting you.

seren claimed that with her father in line, things would change. the third year graduates from the year before had gotten good results, one of them had succeeded in establishing a base in almost every continent that remained. and although hardly anyone visited those bases, they were there in case you found yourself lost and in serious need of help. many other alumni valhalla students made technological advancements towards transport and population control, others went more of a political way and started working alongside governors to change the shape of their monarchy.

it was almost a guarantee that those who leave valhalla are destined for good things, but it felt as if seren would not be able to join her peers in that sense and it pained her to such an extreme where she wanted to jump out from those balconies, land in cold water and swim her way out of the city. yet she would have to return at some point, there is always a way back home after an adventure, even if it’s a short one.

seren looked down at her sword and tapped the floor with the tip for a moment, the blade had never once been blunt and yet it seemed like it was in desperate need of a recovery. it must have been caused by the countless daily training that hardly left her any time to catch up with her other subjects. her father was tempted on making a fighting machine out of her, and although she loved a good duel, seren was not a natural fighter. she was more of a diplomat, if you ask her.

lost in her thoughts, seren didn’t exactly hear the beeping sounds emitting from the door of the training chamber until it had come to her side and then began to feel a sensation against her leg. upon looking down, her frown disappeared and her eyes turned to crescents.

“ hi, ted. “

valhalla was known for having ‘familiars’, little creatures often used to advise students and although you couldn’t own them, you could befriend them. seren had known ted since he was made, which was roughly twelve years ago. he has been her friend long before he got signed up to be a companion to her school. at the age of six, ted was the robot she played with when she was alone.

smart, short and oh so adorable, ted-ee 012 mostly helped doctor lin with matters in computing lessons for those who lean more towards the technology route. but he was far from the war machine the school fabricated and more of a health robot, charged by water and able to detect sadness from students. it was probably why he had approached seren to begin with, pulling at her leg with his small hands.

he let out a happy beep as he waved at her, his eyes as pleasant and polite as always. “ i wasn’t sad, you know, i was just thinking ”, she said, crouching to his level. he stared at her, blinking for a couple of seconds with a disapproving sound. “ what, don’t believe me? ”. and then it clicked. “ oh, you got upgraded, didn’t you? ”.

ted hardly got any enhancements done to his figure, as he didn’t really have any flaws and his feedback from the students was always exemplar. but this time around, it was useful. because the upgrade enabled him to tell whether people were lying or not and it worked well during exam season where many would be asked whether they cheated or not.

seren let out a minor chuckle and shook her head, “ well there’s no point lying to you. but you never tell anyone, so i suppose it’s fine. ” she patted the top of his smooth head and then stood, holding iron thorn to her and then tucking it back into its sheath. “ care to get some fresh air? ”. on a happy note, seren left the chamber, ted hovering after her.

the halls of valhalla would usually be empty after classes were over, most students tended to flee outside and look for something fun to do, which was mostly seen in throwing frisbees, playing chess, going sunbathing. some returned to the lounge and played games or watched movies. others returned to their dorms to rest, and a small percentage fled to the library for some extra time studying.

a part of seren was almost glad that there weren’t many people to see her tired state. ted had offered her a mirror through his digital face and she was quick enough to adjust her cotton candy hair and adjust the blue bow pushing the locks of her hair back. she was boiling under this training gear, but she would be out of it sooner as her lesson was cut short, but it was clear she was going to owe her father an apology afterwards for her wandering mind. little things upset her father, but what majorly puts him off is when seren is not focused. it was the reason for most of their arguments and disagreements.

the dorms were in the lower parts of valhalla though the girl took a small detour outside to catch her breath. in the midst of a sunny afternoon, the sky was beginning to turn into hues of pink, purples and oranges as the sun thought about setting. the wind batting against her skin was all that she needed, especially as she neared to the open air yards with artificial grass, smooth concrete paths leading students around the perimeter of the entire yard that seemed to go on for miles and miles. some benches and picnic tables were scattered, mostly occupied by first years who wanted to catch up after their lessons.

seren hardly steps outside, held inside by her tasks, but stepping outside was a freeing sensation, her arms folded and rested against the balcony railings, the wind was best from where she stood and she could have stood there for hours if she didn’t keep telling herself to return to her dorm and get as much rest as she could.

out of everything that caught seren’s attention, a game of football stole it in the end. most of the boys tended to be relatively active and sporty, that was a given as they had to be active if they wanted to carry heaven guns or broadswords with them in battle. seren became immersed in it for a moment, not the type of person to find kicking a ball around for ninety minutes particularly interesting but this time around, she couldn’t really help it.

what mostly caught her attention was one of the boys playing, and as far as she was concerned, she knew who he was. not the person to read the ranks too deeply, seren would only glance at the names and the pictures and this one was one she recognized. kailen cassius, rank number six, an archer. perhaps the most remarkable thing about him, however, what his height.

he had an air to him, though, that of someone who could handle things himself but also relied on teamwork and seemed to be about unity and working things out in a more collective fashion rather than being selfish all the time. he seemed like a good person, she thought. someone she’d definitely befriend and would be able to trust when faced with danger, but being alone didn’t permit her to join any teams. her father said that the only time she’d ever really join her peers in something of the sort was if she served as a tutor.

seeing as how so many of the students were set into groups, she wandered whether being in one would ensure that she would leave and tread beyond the walls, but she doubted anyone would really want to be in a team with her unless if they wanted extra credit or wanted to dump all the work onto her. and since seren wasn’t one to say no to people so easily, she might have to deal with being the one carrying all the work since she had the skills and smile as everyone got the best results despite having done nothing. it happened once in her primary school, and it was what shaped her into the timid, goody-two-shoes of a person that she is.

but say if she were to tutor a group. she’s seen third-year students do it mostly with second-year students who needed some help, but it would work and be the only time where seren might be able to use her position to get what she wants. it might make her father trust her just a tiny bit more, but she never knew exactly when it came to arthur armsend, he wasn’t one to be pleased so easily.

still, she was willing to give it a go.

when ted suddenly beeped, seren was drawn out of her thoughts once more only to realize that she had potentially been staring at kailen based on the way that well, he was looking right back at her. she had totally zoned out and had not managed to snap out of it when she felt the confused gaze of the boy on her. thank god for ted, otherwise she would have made much more of a fool of herself than she already had.

seren blinked and leaned away from the railings as soon as she began to feel her ears and cheeks burning pink. ted let out a confused noise, “ why didn’t you snap me out of it as soon as i started staring? ”. the robot tilted his head to the side with a level of confusion. “ he probably thinks i’m a total weirdo now! ”.

when ted let out an apologetic sound, seren sighed and risked a look back at the boy who had returned to his game, seeming more carefree but not before their eyes locked for a moment and she felt a wave of realization.

seren is hardly one to have an epiphany, but what she will tell you is that the feeling cannot easily be described. connecting the dots, her blank expression was replaced by that of surprise as her eyes grew in size and her pursed lips parted only for her to turn on her heel and start pacing quickly back inside, ted following in suit with some confused beeps.

the top six students are all third-years, and although the top student was often taken out of lessons to engage in more practical work outside of valhalla, that still left five people who were very capable of what she had in mind. she thought the tutoring idea would be pointless, but after her thoughts rang in that training chamber, after she stepped outside and looked towards the walls, after realizing that the world might end up caving in on itself if nothing was done, after such an epiphany, she couldn’t possibly sit there and do nothing.

seren knew her father would never let her out to do something like this on her own, but she knew she could perhaps impose an idea he could not deny. he wanted a daughter that would make changes, and after the death of one possible heir and the marriage of another, the fate settled on seren when she did not wish for it. but she could not change this about herself. but she knew that if good results came out of this, if her epiphany was right and she had perhaps hit the gold mine, that the world would somehow improve. and that was something she was taught from a young age.

her mother left when she was eight but the moral lessons stuck with her for ten years and it is probably why her thirst for knowledge of the outside world and the drive to better things was not leaving her anytime soon. the action of doing good things was deeply embedded into her, perhaps it was a genetic thing or the way her mother shortly raised her. she was a rebel without a cause, a woman who ventured out and never cared for the warnings she got or the many injuries she returned with. because at least she was helping.

so perhaps it was time to start being a little selfish on her end. seren knew her father wouldn’t be in the best of moods after their lesson that afternoon, yet her blood remained boiling, adrenaline causing her heart to race after and her steps to quicken until ted stopped following her and let her run off on her own.

her father’s office was at the top floor, and after a long elevator ride to the top, seren stumbled into the room.

the porcelain tiles she stepped in were drawn with art she had never quite been able to name before. perhaps it was a renaissance-style painting, what with the figures and halos and clouds. every time she entered her father’s room, it felt like entering a museum. he was an archaic man with older, more traditional principles despite being inclusive. but he was one to separate his inclusiveness from his professional way of working, because no matter what you were, he still extended a hero out of you.

the mahogany desk was usually empty as he would have meetings on a friday evening but she had caught him seemingly before he could prepare for said meeting. he seemed to have turned on his record player, appearing blissful whilst listening to an opera piece seren has heard all too many times. the china cup in his gloved hands saw steam rising from what seemed to be his usual chamomile tea. three cubes of sugar, no less.

the minor ding of the elevator made him raise his head when seren approached his desk. he paid her a mere glance, raising a brow. “ why are you not changed? i thought we’d be having dinner together ”, he stated, blowing the steam from his cup gently. “ don’t waste time, seren. ”

“ i need your permission for something, father. ”

arthur let out a sigh. when seren approaches him with a request as such, he often knows what it will be. permission to head to town for the weekend, permission to continue her tap lessons, permission to head to the beach. almost all of those requests were never really granted for the mere reason that he did not want her attention diverting to something else when so much had to be done. but he seemed to sense something was different, he knew his daughter well known and one thing he was unfamiliar with was the glistening pair of eyes like his wife’s staring back at him.

“ although i may be only seven in the ranks, i feel like . . . i-i feel like i know what i want to do before i graduate ”. she quickly took her seat in one of the chairs facing him across his desk. she took notice of his cane resting on the side and gulped.

days ago, he had mentioned that her older sister had one final act as a valhalla student that marked her as a significant alumni. although she married shortly after, she still made history by being the student who uncovered many lost articles and items in other continents, items rich in cultural value as they carried history of their dying planet. and she had done this before graduating. arthur imposed the idea that seren should do something similar.

seren proceeded, “ might i suggest gathering the top five students and allowing me to tutor them? ”.

“ seren. ”

“ let me finish, p-please! ”.

the girl clasped her hands together and forced a meek gaze down, “ i have all these skills in my arsenal and i highly doubt i’ll ever be able to use them because i can’t apply them to the world outside like the others. but perhaps i can let someone else take the lead for me. i-i could teach them what i’ve been taught and hope that they’ll carry it on, l-like a legacy if they choose to step outside of the walls. ”

arthur put his cup down, clearing his throat. “ is this just a reason for you to step outside? you know what i’m going to say, seren ”, his tone appeared highly disinterested, but she was not going to be discouraged this time around.

“ father . . . you and i both know that we have the people needed to do something about what’s happening to the world outside ”, she inquired, still no response. silence lingered until the apprehension faded. “ you found salem’s whereabouts, did you not? ”.

the principal, although he didn’t appear shocked, gave it all away through the way he dropped his spoon into his cup. he rose his gave with a clenched jaw and peered at her, possibly questioning how she’d come to such a conclusion. but it was no rumor, it was true. the general said the men found one of her scouts spying on them near the ukraine, meaning she couldn’t be too far. five years of hunting salem after her escape, only to finally discover the continent she hid in.

“ seren, listen to me closely ”, he warned, leaning over his desk slightly with a grave tone. “ i understand you wish to be a hero. but you will not be the hero who died trying to kill the witch that brought the world to its end. no daughter of mine will do something of the sort. ”

seren continued to fight back, “ but i won’t be the one doing it, it’ll be five qualified people doing it on my behalf because i taught them what other teachers do not. ”

“ seren. ”

“ and you act as if the years of training has been for no reason. what, am i just going to have these skills at my disposal and never use them? did i just waste nearly sixteen years of my life being taught something in case there’s a war? ”, she spat. she had never spoken to her father like this, and in a dark corner of her mostly innocent mind, she was enjoying it. she felt like her mother. “ father, there will be a war regardless. especially if we stick around doing nothing about the clear danger. i’m going to have to use these skills but i could also use them to prevent it all. ”

the man grew quiet. somewhere in his mind, he probably felt something similar. she had heard the stories, her father wanted to be the valiant one in his family to carry the armsend name, but he was the one who deeply injured himself to the point where he had to give up his heroic hopes and let it become mere fable. he didn’t want the same thing happening to seren, but he knew that this time, matters would be different. she would have help.

and sending your kid into a world that is unknown to even the smartest men in the world was a horrifying thought, but it is in like every tale, the one holding the hero back will always have to let them go. that is how the best heroes are made, the ones who were given the chance to chase after their happy ending, not he ones ho were held back. what good is a sheltered hero?

besides, she might end up finding the worthy opponent she had always dreamed of meeting. and if it was salem, so be it. call her reckless or obsessed with heroism, but seren knew she wouldn’t be able to stay within these walls for much longer.

her father knew this as well, even if it was clear he didn’t want to.

“ are you certain about this, seren? ”.

no, she wanted to say. she had hardly given any logic aside from her own hopes and expectations which could be mistaken as mere childish fantasy and desperation to be outside, but it is better not to ask her how she knew it would work out. she just knew.

“ yes ”, the girl breathed and bit her lip slightly. “ i think mother would have wanted to me to do this. i’m an explorer just like her, father. you know that very well. ”

arthur chortled, glancing bitterly at his cup of tea. “ i wish you weren’t. i wish you were more like your older sister, at least you’d stay out of trouble. but you’re the only heir. after ophelia, i’m highly uncertain that there’ll be anyone else ”, he spoke. she felt her blood run cold. but when he looked up at her, he grunted. “ but you don’t have a single cowardly bone in your body. you’re not like isabella and not like me. you’re an explorer, as you’ve stated. ”

“ father . . . ”.

arthur rose a hand and stood, cup in hand and cane in another. he brought himself up from his chair and moved steadily towards the tinted windows, peering outside into a twilight sky. “ you ask a lot of me, seren. not only might i lose my daughter, but i might also lose five innocent lives if all of this goes wrong. and i will not let it be for your fantasy and mere childish heroism. and yet, a part of me knows that soon, salem is going to find a way to harm everyone . . .”

the indecisiveness from the man was making the girl think much more deeply about the matter than she was intending. if someone got hurt, it would be her fault mainly for putting them in danger, but that was why she planned on training them. they were capable fighters, whoever they were. it was a matter of luck and precision, two opposing forces that might have to work together to make all of this work.

“ seren. ”

the girl lifted her gaze to see the man she so dearly admired and loved, the father who was a professor as well as a friend and a leader. she loved him so dearly that she would not think to ask something like this unless if she one hundred percent meant it. and she did.

“ if you can convince them to join you, i will grant your request. but be weary of the time, because it has become of the essence.”

and so, her adventure begins.

#chapter one #original writing #fantasy #magic #futuristic #dystopian

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bountyofbeads · 5 years ago

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The 'economy first' approach toward reviving the moribund Israeli-Palestinian peace process could be a hard sell to a largely skeptical region

https://t.co/HvZ3lIS3r2

Brilliant plan and so easy to execute in a region that’s overflowing with goodwill, a fervent anti-corruption culture, freedom of religion, religious tolerance, and freedom of movement. Can’t fail, can it?

Weird that the plan says nothing about the occupation or the fact that all Palestinians live under military law, which bans or restricts all activity that the IDF sees fit to include in a military order, or its interpretation. All of are punishable w/ up to 10 years prison time.

The Kushner plan looks & reads as pie in the sky puffery. Two years of time & he writes as simplistically as a high school sophomore.

Nothing of government funding, or corporate partners who can help jumpstart retail businesses let alone infrastructure.

Thread by journalist Greg Carlstrom @glcarlstrom for The Economist in the region on Jared Kushner’s "Peace To Prosperity Plan" 👇👇🤔🙄😜

I'm reading the Kushner plan for economic peace—really, what else would I rather do on a beautiful Saturday evening in June?—and I'll tweet some thoughts on it as I go. https://t.co/rL28evnNzd

Just to start, the website for the "Peace to Prosperity" plan includes a glossy photo of Palestinians walking past a USAID-funded school. Donald Trump cut USAID funding in the Palestinian territories.

"Additional investment will finance the development of a transportation corridor directly connecting the West Bank and Gaza." Israel has undertaken to do this for decades. Never happened because, guess what, it's complicated! Not just a matter of building a monorail.

The plan will "help the Palestinians leap a generation forward in digital services" with 5G technology. Great! Except it was only last year that Israel let the West Bank install 3G (which the rest of us got in the aughts), for reasons no one can adequately explain.

It goes on to suggest developing Gaza's coast by "drawing from examples like Beirut," which suggests that none of the plan's authors have ever actually seen the concrete monstrosity that is Beirut's coastline.

"Just as Dubai and Singapore have benefited from their strategic locations and flourished as regional financial hubs, the West Bank and Gaza can ultimately develop into a regional trading center." Like Dubai or Singapore, just without an airport!

Kushner wants Palestine to achieve a World Bank Doing Business ranking of "75 or better." I sat with a Palestinian CEO last week who told me about having to transport his goods via donkeys when Israeli checkpoints closed the roads. That kind of stuff makes it hard to score well.

I could go on but, again, Saturday night. Suffice it to say this is a pie-in-the-sky document that presupposes Israel will agree to everything, the occupation will stop massively distorting Palestine's economy, and all the other political considerations magically vanish.

Oh one other thing. There's a whole section on the importance of sacrosanct property rights in the Palestinian territories which I simply lack the words to comment on 😂

Exclusive: White House's Kushner unveils economic portion of Middle East peace plan(VIDEO)

By Matt Spetalnick, Steve Holland | Published JUNE 22, 2019, 10:11 AM | Reuters | Posted June 23, 2019 |

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House on Saturday outlined a $50 billion Middle East economic plan that would create a global investment fund to lift the Palestinian and neighboring Arab state economies, and fund a $5 billion transportation corridor to connect the West Bank and Gaza.

The “peace to prosperity” plan, set to be presented by White House senior adviser Jared Kushner at an international conference in Bahrain next week, includes 179 infrastructure and business projects, according to details of the plan and interviews with U.S. officials. The approach toward reviving the moribund Israeli-Palestinian peace process was criticized by the Palestinians on Saturday.

The ambitious economic revival plan, the product of two years of work by Kushner and other aides, would take place only if a political solution to the region’s long-running problems is reached.

More than half of the $50 billion would be spent in the economically troubled Palestinian territories over 10 years while the rest would be split between Egypt, Lebanon and Jordan. Some of the projects would be in Egypt’s Sinai peninsula, where investments could benefit Palestinians living in adjacent Gaza, a crowded and impoverished coastal enclave.

The plan also proposes nearly a billion dollars to build up the Palestinians’ tourism sector, a seemingly impractical notion for now given the frequent flareups between Israeli forces and militants from Hamas-ruled Gaza, and the tenuous security in the occupied West Bank.

The Trump administration hopes that wealthy Gulf states and nations in Europe and Asia, along with private investors, would foot much of the bill, Kushner told Reuters.

“The whole notion here is that we want people to agree on the plan and then we’ll have a discussion with people to see who is interested in potentially doing what,” Kushner told Reuters Television.

The unveiling of the economic blueprint follows two years of deliberations and delays in rolling out a broader peace plan between Israelis and Palestinians. The Palestinians, who are boycotting the event, have refused to talk to the Trump administration since it recognized Jerusalem as the Israeli capital in late 2017.

Veteran Palestinian negotiator Hanan Ashrawi dismissed the proposals on Saturday, saying: “These are all intentions, these are all abstract promises” and said only a political solution would solve the conflict.

Kushner made clear in two interviews with Reuters that he sees his detailed formula as a game-changer, despite the view of many Middle East experts that he has little chance of success where decades of U.S.-backed peace efforts have failed.

“I laugh when they attack this as the ‘Deal of the Century’,” Kushner said of Palestinian leaders who have dismissed his plan as an attempt to buy off their aspirations for statehood. “This is going to be the ‘Opportunity of the Century’ if they have the courage to pursue it.”

Kushner said some Palestinian business executives have confirmed their participation in the conference, but he declined to identify them. The overwhelming majority of the Palestinian business community will not attend, businessmen in the West Bank city of Ramallah told Reuters.

Several Gulf Arab states, including Saudi Arabia, will also participate in the June 25-26 U.S.-led gathering in Bahrain’s capital, Manama, for Kushner’s rollout of the first phase of the Trump peace plan. Their presence, some U.S. officials say privately, appears intended in part to curry favor with Trump as he takes a hard line against Iran, those countries’ regional arch-foe.

The White House said it decided against inviting the Israeli government because the Palestinian Authority would not be there, making do instead with a small Israeli business delegation.

POLITICAL DISPUTES REMAIN

There are strong doubts whether potential donor governments would be willing to open their checkbooks anytime soon, as long as the thorny political disputes at the heart of the decades-old Palestinian conflict remain unresolved.

The 38-year-old Kushner - who like his father-in-law came to government steeped in the world of New York real estate deal-making - seems to be treating peacemaking in some ways like a business transaction, analysts and former U.S. officials say.

Palestinian officials reject the overall U.S.-led peace effort as heavily tilted in favor of Israel and likely to deny them a fully sovereign state of their own.

Kushner’s attempt to decide economic priorities first while initially sidestepping politics ignores the realities of the conflict, say many experts.

“This is completely out of sequence because the Israeli-Palestinian issue is primarily driven by historical wounds and overlapping claims to land and sacred space,” said Aaron David Miller, a former Middle East negotiator for Republican and Democratic administrations.

Kushner acknowledges that “you can’t push the economic plan forward without resolving the political issues as well.” The administration, he said, will “address that at a later time,” referring to the second stage of the peace plan’s rollout now expected no earlier than November.

Kushner says his approach is aimed at laying out economic incentives to show the Palestinians the potential for a prosperous future if they return to the table to negotiate a peace deal.

Kushner stressed that governments would not be expected to make financial pledges on the spot.

“It is a small victory that they are all showing up to listen and partake. In the old days, the Palestinian leaders would have spoken and nobody would have disobeyed,” he said.

TRAVEL CORRIDOR

Kushner’s proposed new investment fund for the Palestinians and neighboring states would be administered by a “multilateral development bank.” Global financial lenders including the International Monetary Fund and World Bank plan to be present at the meeting.

The fund would include “accountability, transparency, anti-corruption, and conditionality safeguards” to protect investments.

A signature project would be to construct a travel corridor for Palestinian use that would cross Israel to link the West Bank and Gaza. It could include a highway and possibly a rail line. The narrowest distance between the territories, whose populations have long been divided by Israeli travel restrictions, is about 40 km (25 miles).

Kushner said that if executed the plan would create a million jobs in the West Bank and Gaza, reduce Palestinian poverty by half and double the Palestinians’ GDP.

But most foreign investors will likely stay clear for the moment, not only because of security and corruption concerns but also because of the drag on the Palestinian economy from Israel’s West Bank occupation that obstructs the flow of people, goods and services, experts say.

Kushner sees his economic approach as resembling the Marshall Plan, which Washington introduced in 1948 to rebuild Western Europe from the devastation of World War Two. Unlike the U.S.-funded Marshall Plan, however, the latest initiative would put much of the financial burden on other countries.

President Donald Trump would “consider making a big investment in it” if there is a good governance mechanism, Kushner said. But he was non-committal about how much the president, who has often proved himself averse to foreign aid, might contribute.

Economic programs have been tried before in the long line of U.S.-led peace efforts, only to fail for lack of political progress. Kushner’s approach, however, may be the most detailed so far, presented in two pamphlets of 40 and 96 pages each that are filled with financial tables and economic projections.

In Manama, the yet-to-released political part of the plan will not be up for discussion, Kushner said.

The economic documents offer no development projects in predominantly Arab east Jerusalem, which Palestinians want as the capital of their future state.

What Kushner hopes, however, is that the Saudis and other Gulf delegates will like what they hear enough to urge Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to consider the plan.

The message Kushner wants them to take to Ramallah: “We’d like to see you go to the table and negotiate and try to make a deal to better the lives of the Palestinian people.”

Reporting By Matt Spetalnick and Steve Holland; Additional reporting by Rami Ayyub in Ramallah; Editing by Ross Colvin and Chizu Nomiyama

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