#it's really well translated and it's not like priest as a whole is niche

[grassbreads]

fucking cackling

[n3ver--more]

By popular request (one person), here is the crash course on some of my main oc lore! (Yes it is cringe, no I will not take criticism, please be kind)

So first, the cults. There are two overall, but one has two very different factions.

The Cult of the Dual Lords:

A cult that worships two distinct gods who together represent the whole of the universe and how everything works together in harmony. These two gods are gay married because of course they are. Both temples practice ritual sacrifice, and yes of course there is some cannibalism involved (consensually).

1. The Temple of Oscuro - Oscuro is the God of night, darkness, death, knowledge, etc. His followers are focused on improving life for the future, innovating, and preserving history. They have an extensive library and archive of as much history as they can gather, and it is their most guarded possession. Ayesha Khouri is the current High Prophet, so he spends most of his time pretending he knows what he's doing and trying his hardest to keep his people alive and doing well. Aaliyah Rahal is a priestess of Oscuro who spends most of her time studying and teaching classes on incredibly niche topics. Whatever interests her at the time. All members of this temple have sworn an oath of pacifism to their God with the only exception being defense of another person.

2. The Temple of Allumer - Allumer is the God of day, light, life, wealth, war, and hedonism. The "fun stuff." His followers spend their time living in the present, enjoying themselves to the fullest and amassing as much wealth as they can, because in the Temple, wealth directly translates to status. Their belief system could be summarized as "live fast, die young." Hassan Bila-Asm is their High Priest, and he does a pretty shit job at that. He's basically a culty Dorian Gray, chasing youth and beauty as well as clinging fiercely to the wealth that grants him his status. Malika Faheem is a priestess of Allumer, and she often ends up doing Hassan's job for him.

The Children of the Earth Mother

Another, very separate cult from the others. A society of eco-warriors (literally) who believe that anything that could harm the Earth (their goddess) is evil and must be destroyed. Because of this, they *really* don't like the temple of Oscuro and their pro-progress initiative, no matter if it's actually harmful or not. Given the oath of pacifism the Oscurans make, they are super easy to kill, and the Children have no qualms about doing so. Any missing parts of the historical records have been caused by raids by the Children.

Uhhh I will probably add to this later, but for now, this is the quick run-down on the two (three if you count the temples separately) cults in my OC universe!

@eyeball-creatures-boyfriend @some-froggish-lad (wasn't sure which to tag lolz sorry)

[cloudninetonine]

Who would like to explore more facts about Medieval England with me tonight because I'm currently trying to distract myself from the giant moth on the back of my laptop by learning about the education system and literacy rate? Because I somehow think that statistics is interesting.

Finding definite sources for education in the Middle Ages is surprisingly hard since the era spanned a whole 400 years. To paraphrase the rant I typed to myself (yes I write this out beforehand so I can re-check my facts later), the Middle Ages is different from the Medieval Era despite the fact it's used interchangeably and is because the Middle Ages is the European time period between 500 and ~1400 as 15th century scholars used it to distinguish the time between the fall of the Western Roman Empire and their modern century, while the English Medieval Era is from 1066 and 1485 - the time between William of Normandy's reign over England and King Henry 7th's victory in the War of Roses. Not my point but I went on a whole 3 paragraph rant and thought it would be relevant enough to mention.

As far as I can tell, however, most children were taught to read (mostly phonics) through ABC poems and songs and other literary texts for older children, both boys and girls. Most education was given to wealthy sons, though some noblewomen and nuns were allowed to participate. For most lower-class children, they were taught both domestic skills and manual work, as well as learning to work in the family business.

For wealthy boys, three main types of schools were available; elementary song-schools, monastic schools, and grammar schools. Song schools taught boys Latin hymns, and if an educated priest was available, how to read and write. Monastic schools trained boys to work in the church, meaning monks taught them religious studies. Sometimes poor boys would be taken in for lessons in exchange for being servants of the church. Finally, grammar schools taught Latin grammar, composition, and translation, along with the art of arguing (logic) and rhetoric (public speaking). They didn't really care to teach the sciences or maths.

When boys were considered educated enough (sometimes as young as 13), universities like Oxford and Cambridge may take them in to obtain a Bachelor of Arts by attending a certain number of lectures, and if attended for 3 more years, could get a Master of Arts degree. They would additionally have to teach at the university as well as partake in their studies. If there's any interest in her (since the topic is so niche as far as I can tell), I might talk about Elizabeth de Clare's contribution to universities and education for poor boys since I don't really have a lot of time to research her at the moment.

I went down a bit of a rabbit hole about literacy rates at first, and somehow ended up learning about schooling, so to answer my original question about literacy rates around the end of the Medieval Era, 10% of men could read and/or write, though was climbing quickly towards 20%, and 1% of women could due to the laws against women in education. Though I again ran into contradictory sources because some said that almost half of the population could at least read by the end of the Medieval Era.

HERE COMES RUSS WITH THEIR AWESOME FACTS!

Rando fact I know is 1066 is the year Willian the Conquerer was declared King of England! (He wasn't but there's this whole thing and stuff (which I've forgotten) so he was declared the first)

[tofindloveinpoison]

Iconic Fanfictions ive read two years ago and what I currently remember of them:

I will premise this by saying that these fanfics were famous only in certain specific niches of the internet, and that when i say that a work is badly written or i critique it in anyway it?s just my opinion from what i vaguely remember, whihch might not be correct. 

Fanfics below the cut: filthy lucre, asotm, twist and shout, the hat and lung fics, anatomy of a fall, throam, unholyverse. feelfree to add what you remember of “famous fanfics” you’ve read.

tw for mentions of: sexual assault, violence, animal abuse, pedophilia and some other upsetting topics. 

The Milk Fic

Oh my God this was bad but not nearly as extreme as other fics. An iconic and shocking read i do not recommend, but if you really want to read it it will not ruin your life, your month at most. 

From what i remember at least the sex was consensual aaaaaaand i don’t remember any other good/decent aspects about it. 

Very famous, a lot of ppl have read it, gerard way said it was “well-written” but honestly it wasn’t.

( original? ryden version) 4/10 because of lack of actual crimes.

Filthy Lucre

So bad i don’t remember the plot. They’re prostitutes i think? there definitely was an abusive relationship and the sex scenes were so bad i had to skip all of them, meaning i read the whole thing in half an hour.

Really terrible, they don’t end up toghether and that’s the only interesting element. I recomend no one reads this unless you are literally dying of boredom.

(frerard version) 1/10 because its a completed work, but at what cost

Twist and Shout

This is considered one of the good ones and you know what? for iconic fanfiction standards it’s not bad at all, decently-written with actual characters that don’t feel, like most fanfic characters, like bad ooc versions of the original.

How about the overcomplicated plot tho? I don’t remember a thing except for the homophobia (its set in the 50s-60s), the war, the Elvis songs, one cute sad beach scene and one of the protagonists dying of aids. Maybe they also watch star trek,idk; lots to unpack. 

If you want to suffer and you have lots of free time i recommend it, i skipped most of the sex scenes but there is an actual plot so that was not a problem.

(original Destiel version) 8/10 bc I don’t remember how they handled the aids thing but it made me uncomfortable, might be just bc of the upsetting subject matter but i don’t remember

The Hat Fic

DO NOT READ THIS THING. Go read the milk fic if you want weird but not this one please. A milk enema is NOTHING. Contains animal abuse and i don’t remember how consensual the whole thing was.

I CAN ASSURE YOU THIS MAKES ME WANT TO PUKE TO THIS DAY I FEEL SICK WRITING THIS. There is a whole subset of early phanfiction centered on being as disgusting and upsetting as possible and i think this started it.

I higly doubt anyone got off on this but still the possibility unsettles me.

(original phan version )  -8233983743764346/10 should be illigal to talk about it. We should all agree to Damnatio Memoriae this thing.

A splitting of the Mind

Some people insist on treating this as one of the good iconic fics but it’s bad. 

So bad its actually an interesting read if you feel like analizing some text, trying to see what is so appealing about it, despite its evident flaws.

The age gap is 19-16 so not as bad as the Other Iconic mcr Fanfic About Doves that i did not read bc from what i remember it was basically pedophilia/grooming but i might be wrong. God the bar is so low

Portrayal of mantal illness and trauma was truly a shitshow, the writing was not great but also not horrible. The sexual assault elements upset me greatly but it might be just bc of the subject matter

pros: unreliable narrator done decently, ray toro’s character saw the future looking in cereal, characters are characters and not merely names (not to be confused with actual good characterization), nothing else.

(original frerard version) 5/10 for the effort honestly, but i do not recommend this unless you are mentally ready for some heavy topics handled poorly.

The Lung Fic

This was written with the goal of shocking the reader, in the same vein as all hat fic/ milk fic copycats.

 Should be more upsetting, given it contains gore, pedophilia and a bunch of other disgusting madness (maybe mpreg?), but it just reads as a fanfiction taboo list.

Not worth reading at all, clearly intentionally designed to shock and disgust to the point where it’s obvious.

0/10 i don’te remember which version, irrelevant, don’t waste your time

Anatomy of a fall

Contains ghosts, high school au, possibly resurrection or death, idk.

I don’t remember this being particularly offensive in any way, but its been a long time. Then again i did not read the sex scenes so it might contain necrophilia and i wouldn’t know. (i checked and no necrophilia, just “weird supernatural sex”)

is it well written? no, but it’s not outragiously badly-written. Is it funny sometimes? yes.

 In the context of this list, this might be a good one, in any other context probably not. I might be biased bc i love ghost stories in general and this one does not contain sexual assault if i remember correcly. (The bar is soooo low)

(original? frerard version) 7/10 bc ghosts and funny aND IT HAS ILLUSTRATIONS (vietnamese translation available)

 The Heart Rate of a Mouse

Good but not in the classical meaning of the word. It contains some Hot TakesTM on human sexuality, substance abuse and unhealthy relationship(s).

Its set in the 70s so the homophobia is there and she is thriving. Wonderful internalized homophobia, really 10/10 for that.

The sex and the plot sometimes intersect, putting me in the uncomfortable position of having to  read smut or not knowiong what is going on (0/10 ).

Well written for the genre (=beloved fanfictions that are rarely redeemable); characters are original and flawed, even interesting sometimes.

The plot is three pubblished books worth of plot available for free on the internet and that is a blessing. I suggest reading this as if all the characters are OCs and you found this book forgotten on the train and decided to read it. 

But is it actually good as a story? idk its a lot honestly, if you have to quarantine for 14 days bc of covid and you don’t have anything to study, this will fill at least 4 full days of reading.

(original version)8/10 bc it has everithing but its still not a masterpiece of modern fanfic literature sorry

Unholyverse

Contains Demons, priests, scarfs, exorcisms(affectionate), vergin mary tatoos and much more. Not as carefully written as throam or tas, but it still makes it as one of the good  fanfics solely for the cool factor.

It would be so cool if this was better written and a comicbook or a grafic novel with original characters.( I skipped all the sex scenes bc they made me uncomfy, as usual so idkwhat was going on there)

If there was anything extremely upsetting about this one i forgot about it (i checked: they say “ warnings for religious themes, pain, trauma, blood, torture and death”). There is a lot of plot, its not even just one fic its a whole serie. 

Great for passing the time, I forgot most of it 7/10 for the demons (original version)

[period-dramallama]

A skim read of jean plaidy’s St Thomas Eve

For @thalassodromid bc this is our Niche

General thoughts on quality (TLDR)

-First off, I should give this book something of a pass because it was written 60+ years ago. Historical research, like science, Marches On.

-I skimmed it because i was not loving the style. There’s very little description, the pacing feels like This Happened And Then This Happened. With this story, you should have a sense of the stakes, the tension. It lacks atmosphere.

-This book really didn’t spark much emotion in me. I was heartwarmed and amused, but never frightened, horrified, fascinated or upset. I felt no panic when Meg got the sweat. 

-Honestly i was so bored I started wondering if maybe this is too difficult a story to tell, because i came in loving these historical figures and wanting content. How bored must the unobsessed reader be?

-Show don’t tell, Jean! Don’t tell me everyone’s very upset, show me them upset. Don’t tell me Meg loves Thomas, show their bond. Don’t tell me everyone loves Thomas for his honesty, show me him helping his neighbours.

-To be fair, there’s a lot to get through in 260 pages.

-I just love how historical fiction pulp novels have Book Club questions at the back. It just feels rather cocky, imo. Like you think your book is Deep enough for me to sit and ponder the characters. Like there was a question that was something like: “do you prefer Katherine of Aragon or Anne Boleyn” which was kind of hilarious because the whole book it was Poor Loyal Old Ugly Katherine and Six Fingered Anne Boleyn Is A Minx And Wants Thomas More Dead

Pet peeves

-at the beginning of the book, it says “Secretly Henry VII was unbothered by his wife’s death” or something along those lines. Given that Henry VII locked himself away after Elizabeth died and his mum had to step in and rule because he stopped functioning, this left a bitter taste in my mouth. Henry VII in this book is a Mean Evil Miser so of course he can’t love or be loved by a Good Woman.

-John More jnr being described as the family dunce. To be fair, maybe the book came out before we knew he was a translator too, but STILL. Don’t put John down to raise the girls up. He is valid too. 

-the language is what my old tutor would call ‘mock Tudor’. I think it was expected at the time that you had to try and make the language authentic- The Blanket of the Dark and the Man on a Donkey both use Tudor language. It really made the dialogue annoying. Lots of ‘tis and ‘twas and it was this close to beshrew me verily and hey fucking nonny nonny. Every time Alice said fuckign ‘Tilly valley’ I went AAAARGGGH. JUST HAVE HER SAY THE WORD ‘NONSENSE’. There’s a happy middle, imo, between too Tudor and too modern, and it’s quite a broad middle, you can move around a lot in it, but there are limits. 

-SPEAKING OF ALICE. Her character introduction was so good- first described as ‘an authoritative feminine voice’ *chef’s kiss* she stops a fainting Jane from being trampled at Henry’s coronation, accompanies her home and cares for her while simultaneously lowkey roasting her interior decoration. But then she becomes a bit of a caricature. When Meg gets the sweat she nags her for going near anyone who might have the sweat. The book club questions say ‘there’s more to her than meets the eye’ THEN SHOW ME MORE THAN ONE SIDE OF HER. Also Thomas loves her even though she’s ‘rude and stupid’ but Meg doesn’t understand why. Grr. 

-”mistress middleton will hear you [2 year old John] crying and box your ears” NO NO NO NO NO!

-also i get a 1950s Spanking Children Is Good Parenting vibe because Alice hits the Morelings with a slipper if they don’t study, and Tm’s described as too much of “a coward” (literally the word coward is used) to hit his children other than with peacock feathers.

-Utopia being described as an ideal state...it’s really more than that. I don’t like the idea that Meg and Thomas were okay with religious toleration but then Thomas became Consumed With Hate and he says “well religious toleration would be great in an IDEAL state...”

-Meg being horrified by heretic burning. Maybe the evidence of her views wasn’t yet available and so social mores of the 50s meant that writers and historians assumed that Of Course Being a Delicate Woman She Would Have A Natural Desire For Peace And Mercy. Grr.

-Too romancey. To be fair, Jean Plaidy wrote a lot of historical romances so maybe that’s just what she’s comfortable with (and these are historical figures that never get a chance to shine) but between Meg and Will, Clement and Mercy, Joan and Thomas, Giles and Cecily... it’s a bit like Pearl Harbour in that it’s hard to care about the cute romance when men are getting burned alive in the background. A good historical romance is more like Titanic: the lovers are directly connected with the Big Historical Events ongoing. Skip!

-in this book, Mercy thinks to herself that Meg would have Tm sign the oath, but Mercy would prefer tm to do as his conscience dictates...that feels like the wrong way round.

-Erasmus and Thomas More speaking in English...Doubt.jpeg. 

-Thomas More muses on how Complex men are because there’s Proud Cold Thomas Howard who is Soft for Simple Launderess Bess Holland...yeah given the multiple colossal power imbalances in that real-life affair, I’d be very surprised if it never strayed into abuse.

-baby Meg is a lil too precocious.

-dying Joan tells Meg to look after her father, no Joan stop I love you but don’t give a six year old responsibility, I don’t care if she’s six but acts eleven, looking after TM is Alice’s job not Meg’s. 

-Tm using the phrase ‘our little secret’ with Meg. The context is not abusive, but the phrase is so weighted, it’s like referring to something as “a final solution”: the famous meaning is too horrifying to feel comfortable with that combination of words in any context at all. 

-Joan’s younger sister being described as beautiful and flirtatious, and the whole bit about More fancying the younger sister but going for the older out of honour. The book says that More’s fascination with joan’s sister is the reason he realised he couldn’t be a priest. Given Joan’s 16, her sister’s 15 at the oldest, possibly 14. So a 26 year old can’t be a priest because he’s lusting after a 14-15 year old girl who is attractive and who has been flirting with him. Squick. 

-also no mention of erasmus at the end of tm’s life. Boo. I think a dude in the tower would think about his BFF of 30+ years who he hasn’t seen for 10+ years 

Good bits

-It’s obviously unintentional, but given how the word ‘gay’ has changed, i gave a little cheer every time a character was described as gay. Cecily and John are both gay, Thomas More is very gay, and later in the book wishes he could go back to being gay again. Loving the accidental representation 

-”a boy who is not worth the tossing” i have a dirty mind ok

-Joan getting something of a personality! She even feels insecure because she’s a normal person stuck in a family of geniuses.

-George Boleyn is described as being ‘a bright boy’ and later the girls joke that if they meet him they’ll probably fall in love THIS SO REFRESHING. Otoh, Mary Boleyn is slutshamed and Anne is a scheming minx so the double standard does spoil it a little. 

-Thomas More makes puns! At one point Alice says “more’s the pity” and then immediately says “don’t you dare make a pun out of that. i know u will. DON’T I AM NOT IN THE MOOD FOR PUNS” Granted, Plaidy stresses that his wit is never cruel or mocking (Doubt.jpeg) but i think this is maybe the funniest More. 

-It acknowledges the heretic burning! Not bad for 1950-something. At the end there’s a sort of Hm Thomas More Is A Complex Dude How Do We Approach Him page from H8′s POV.

-More’s father getting all misty-eyed when his son becomes Chancellor

-Henry VIII kissing tm’s forehead

-the flogging of the mentally ill upskirter being depicted

-Wolsey not being a caricature but a worldly and practical man. He’s explicitly described as “not a bad man”

-”He [TM] was no Erasmus, who, having thrown the stone that shattered the glass of orthodox thought, must run and hide himself lest he should be hurt by the splinters” not a very fair way to depict Erasmus (as he spent a lot of the last decades of his life arguing against Luther and trying to mediate between religious factions, esp in Basel) However, I like the metaphor

-Meg talking about how she and her sisters will always compare men unfavourably to their father... understandable.

-More explaining why Heretic Burning is Good Actually is done well

-Meg pointing out that More and Erasmus both criticised the Church, only it’s a bit half-baked because More never experiences any doubt or crisis over it. 

-Meg being torn between the Lutheran and the Catholic men she loves is at least some conflict and stakes when it finally shows up.

-Alice standing trial for dogknapping on page 195. A Big Lipped Alligator Moment, and I’ve no idea the source (i doubt Plaidy would make it up completely, it’s so out of nowhere) but it’s fun. It feels like one of More’s ‘merry tales’

“[Erasmus] read aloud to Thomas when he came home; and sometimes Thomas would sit by his friend’s bed with Margaret on one side of him and Mercy on the other; he would put an arm about them both, and when he laughed and complimented Erasmus so that Erasmus’ pale face was flushed with pleasure, then Margaret believed that there was all the happiness in the world in that room.” my emotions! my emotions! my ship is sailing, i repeat, the ship is sailing!

-”Meg, this is one of the happiest days of my life. it is a day I shall remember on the day i die. i shall say to myself when i find death near me: ‘the great erasmus said that of my daughter, my meg.’”

-”So the King likes verses!” said mistress middleton, her voice softening a little. 

“Ah, madam,” said Thomas. “What the King likes today, may we hope Mistress Middleton will like tomorrow?” Do I smell... flirtation...

-”His face was pleasant and kindly, [Alice] concluded....She would like to feed him some of her possets, put a layer of fat on his bones with her butter.” Does this version of Alice have a feeding kink I definitely think, in this ‘verse, Tm and Alice are 100% having sex.

-John Colet’s in it, though described as tm’s confessor (who i think was actually grocyn or linacre)

-Alice clearing a path for a fainting Jane with “Stand aside, you oafs.” alexa, play X gon give it to you. 

[shadowsong26fic]

The Family of Spies AU

AKA ‘Shadowsong should not have unsupervised access to multiple fandoms at once: Exhibit A.’

I kid. Mostly.

Anyway, it’s that time again--time for an AU Outline! It feels like forever since I’ve done one of these. …and by ‘forever’ I mean the last one was the SPN/Person of Interest crossover back in January.

This one is, uh, also a fairly niche crossover. It’s inspired and helped along by @tigerkat, who introduced me to one of the two fandoms and whose Star Wars OCs I’m borrowing to make it work. (Also, one or two bits in here are more or less lifted from our IM conversations on the subject

Basically, the short version is, I’ve been watching Nikita, and TigerKat and I have put together this whole extended family for Kallus and Zeb and one thing led to another, wires got crossed in my brain, and here we are.

Welcome to my Star Wars/Nikita fusion.

So, first, some relevant background:

In everything TigerKat and I developed, Alex and Zeb end up collecting/adopting four kids. (TigerKat, feel free to correct me on any details that are Off in any way!)

First kid they adopt is Mirah, shortly after the events of ANH.

Mirah is Human, and around three or four at this point; her parents were part of an extremely pacifist sect, of the kind where even defending yourself against someone trying to kill you is Not Okay. The sect was wiped out (probably not by the Empire, last I heard?) and Mirah was the only survivor; she watched her parents died right in front of her. Alex ended up there on an unrelated mission, and brought the little girl back to base.

Turns out, she’d gotten Attached and would not sleep without him close by.

(I mean. He’d gotten Attached as well but there is a Conversation to be had here, and he and Zeb haven’t actually had it yet, so…yeah.)

So, that’s how they get Kid #1.

Mirah later grows up to be essentially a mob boss/puts together a semi-legal syndicate. She doesn’t have a whole lot of faith in the law.

Second kid is Orryn, something like a year or two later, I think?

Orryn is a Donogh (species name subject to change; they’re basically like human-sized rabbit hobbits), and four or five years older than Mirah. His father and older brother were killed when he was born, and his mother eventually found her way to the Rebels after that. Donoghs tend to have very large families, so the fact that he’s an only child is a little Weird.

His mom is a friend of theirs, and when she dies, Alex and Zeb take Orryn in as well.

He is very Soft, both physically and metaphorically (like I said, rabbit hobbits), and like the sweetest kid you’ll ever meet.

(Mirah learns very quickly to weaponize her brother’s Sad Eyes. She’s very good at getting what she wants.)

The other three kids all end up taking Zeb’s last name; Orryn keeps his original one (his people are matriarchal and matrilineal).

He grows up to be a mechanic, and has a more typical family for his species with nine kids.

Third is Shamie, who’s roughly halfway between Mirah and Orryn; they get adopted a month or so before ESB.

I’ve written about them here; but the most important bits--

They’re Human, agender, and a former street thief/pickpocket. They help Zeb out when a mission goes sideways after his local contact fails to show up, and Zeb decides to keep them, because he really can’t leave them there for a long list of reasons. They’d been on their own for close to a year at that point, and were roughly eight or nine.

(The conversation where Zeb checks in with Alex about this is very entertaining, because he texts to confirm that a third kid is okay in the middle of a firefight. Alex is less than thrilled.)

Shamie and Mirah are basically platonic soulmates. There’s just a sort of click when the two of them meet.

They grow up to be a priest of a sun/fire deity.

Fourth is Hanula, better known as Hanny.

She’s a Lasat baby who they adopt a few months after Endor, after Zeb mentions to the elders on Lira San that he and Alex have been considering a fourth kid, maybe starting with an infant this time, and maybe someone of his own species this time…

Some time not too long after that, Hanula is placed in his arms and he’s told ‘good luck.’

She’s stabby, as in she likes to Stab Things as a baby (usually with, like, a fork), which later gets translated into cooking--she ends up as a Chef.

While she does turn up, of course, she’s not super relevant for this crossover, but she’s Delightful so I thought I’d share anyway XD

(There’s also Alex’s sister and her sons, plus, uh, the various grandchildren, but they’re also not super relevant to the crossover. I can share details about them if anyone’s curious, though.)

As a note, I’ve only seen like half a season of Nikita at this point; so while we’re starting from the same basic premise, I don’t really expect this to converge with actual future plot points like at all. So.

Also, as a result of that, this outline will probably also take on a certain resemblance to Alias and/or other similar Spy Dramas.

Anyway. So. Let’s get this show on the road.

Kallus takes on Nikita’s role in this--Death Faked For You; trained to be a super spysassin by a Shady Black Ops Group from his late teens/early twenties. Much like Nikita in her canon, he meets someone while on an extended cover assignment and falls in love.

Division is less than thrilled with this, and so arrange orders Zeb’s death.

(Obviously, this doesn’t take, because I am Not About That. But Kallus genuinely believes Zeb is dead, which is what pushes him to break free, much like Nikita’s reaction to Daniel’s murder.)

(Zeb also thinks Kallus is dead; he, of course, got picked up by the Ghost crew, but more about him later.)

Mirah will take on Alex’s role (which is why I started referring to Kallus that way, even though in my head and in this outline up to this point he’s mostly Alex XD).

Probably a blend of the two backgrounds--her parents/the sect she grew up in were taken out by Division; probably with the cover story that they were a Dangerous Cult, but the exact reason was more likely Profit or something. Since they mostly weren’t? At least not in the ‘need to be dismantled’ sort of way.

Kallus, like Nikita, was on hand and made sure that the little girl survived, but wouldn’t/couldn’t follow up since he was still a mostly-loyal Division agent at that point. He tracks her down after he breaks free, and they start working together.

She eventually talks him into the idea of her infiltrating Division, as that will better suit their plans to dismantle the organization.

(…really, most of this early part is not super different from Nikita and Alex. Mostly summarizing for anyone reading this who’s unfamiliar with the show.)

Shamie is an older/prior recruit; they’ve been here a few months. Their marksmanship is pretty much bottom of the barrel, so far as the current crop of recruits go, and their hacking skills could use some work, but they’re one of the best at hand-to-hand/other close-quarters combat, and they’re probably top third with explosives and other detail work. And they’re generally a pretty phlegmatic person. Not many of the other recruits keep cool under pressure as well as they do.

They’re probably fairly close to being evaluated and promoted to full Agent status when Mirah is brought in.

The two of them, as in their normal lives/timeline, immediately click. Mirah reports back to Kallus, confirming her infiltration was successful, and also mentioning Shamie.

“Remember what I told you about making friends,” Kallus warns her. “Losing them will be hard. And you can’t know how loyal this person is to Division. Be very careful.”

Mirah internally rolls her eyes, because she’s not dumb, she knows that.

A few more quick parallels, for the Higher Ups at Division:

Arindha Pryce stands in for Percy.

She just has the right blend of Genuine Competence buried under Not As Good As She Thinks She Is to match up with him.

Founding member and leader of Division.

Thrawn stands in for Amanda.

Like, okay. The two of them, for a variety of reasons, have vastly different management styles.

But in terms of his actual skillset and the role Amanda plays, at least on paper? Which is to say, supervising training/constructing covers/monitoring recruits and agents and their mental states?

(Plus, the whole…resident torturer/interrogator/etc. thing…)

Yeah, he could pull that off.

Pellaeon stands in for Michael.

Because I love him.

Also the Vastly Different Dynamic between the Head of Division, the Whatever Amanda’s Actual Job Title Is, and the 2iC/Head Field Operative with these three as opposed to Percy, Amanda, and Michael entertains me.

(Pellaeon is more loyal to Thrawn than Pryce, but only if it came down to an Actual Contest between the two of them would that ever be relevant. He’s extremely competent, but occasionally a little too involved with the recruits, in a fairly paternal sense. Especially since he’s probably a good twenty years older than Michael. But I digress.)

So, Mirah is successfully inserted. That goes pretty much the same as in Nikita canon, completely with Kallus making a splashy return to Division’s radars.

(Probably not at Zeb’s grave, though; if Zeb even has an actual grave.)

She starts interacting with other recruits, including Shamie. The two of them click pretty quickly, all things considered, but given the circumstances…yeah, they keep a certain level of distance, at least for now.

…well, at least on the surface, anyway. Mirah is even more determined to burn Division to the ground if they breathe harm in Shamie’s direction.

(For their part, Shamie may or may not start to notice a few anomalies, but they keep that knowledge to themself for now.)

For a few months, it’s pretty much the pattern the early S1 episodes have--Mirah will get details on an official Division op, pass them along to Kallus, he’ll be on hand to foil it. She gets activated briefly once or twice, but is mostly just working as a regular recruit for her cover.

Plus, you know, evading Thrawn’s suspicions; all that good stuff.

Pellaeon does take a liking to her--she reminds him of Kallus, who was one of the better recruits, and he keeps an eye out for her, much like Michael does for Alex in canon.

Shamie gets activated for their final evaluation/first kill mission about two or three months after Mirah gets recruited. They succeed, but some of the aftermath/followup confirms their previous suspicions about Mirah, and they’re left sort of struggling with what to do about it.

On the one hand, they’re a fairly loyal Division agent at this point, and what Mirah’s doing is probably going to get a lot of their fellow agents, maybe even some recruits, killed. And they know that probably some of what’s been reported as Kallus’s activities is exaggerated, or at least spun to make him look Evil and Division look better, but they know there’s a grain of truth to it.

On the other...they spent a few years, as a child, working for a thief-runner/gang. This was…not a good situation. Gotta keep the baby thieves in line. And they’ve seen other recruits get canceled before. As much as they don’t necessarily want to go against their superiors in Division (again, gotta keep the baby thieves in line; they know what the consequences of that would be), they also know that that loyalty does not go both ways. They are expendable. All of the recruits and agents are.

And they like Mirah. And if they don’t look out for each other…well, who will?

Besides. It’s not like they have any actual proof. Bringing this to Pellaeon, who likes Mirah, or Thrawn, who likes no one--let alone Pryce--seems like it’ll backfire.

So, they stay quiet about what they’ve guessed, and wait, and watch, and work.

Things change when Orryn is recruited.

Mirah and Shamie both take one look at this sweet, gentle boy and have the same thought--he won’t last. He’ll be cancelled within a month. Maybe sooner.

Pryce questions the choice of bringing him in, too; it was Thrawn’s idea. No, he’ll never make field agent, but the boy’s good with mechanics, and computers. If he can survive the training process, they can put him to use there.

Sort of considering him for Birkhoff’s role.

Shamie, even as a full agent, doesn’t have the access or the tools they need to spring Orryn, as much as they want to.

But Mirah--Mirah has Kallus, and a way to contact him.

“This isn’t about my friend. This is about a sweet kid, too sweet for Division, who will be killed or broken if we don’t do something,” she says. “And isn’t that part of what we’re doing here? Trying to make sure that doesn’t happen to anyone else?”

Kallus is torn. Because, on the one hand, she’s absolutely right--it’s why he was reluctant to send her in undercover (oh, yes, the thought had occurred to him) until she suggested it.

But on the other hand, getting a recruit out of Division without compromising Mirah’s emergency exfiltration strategy is going to be Hard. And as much as he wants to help this kid, he also wants to help/protect the one he has already.

He tells Mirah, eventually, that he can’t promise anything, but he’ll start working on a plan.

Mirah…

Remember what I said earlier, about Mirah tending to get what she wants?

Mirah gets to work on her end. The way she sees it, if she figures out a way to get Orryn outside somehow, whether it’s getting him temporarily activated like she was that one time, or some other excuse, then Kallus won’t have a problem rescuing him.

Of course, she’s just a recruit herself, and she can’t muck around with that without compromising her cover. She’s half-tempted to just shove Orryn out her escape tunnel, her own exit be damned, but Kallus specifically told her not to do that, so she holds back.

The opportunity comes when one of Mirah’s prior breaches is discovered, two or three weeks after Orryn’s brought in.

Possibly the shell program she and Kallus have been using to talk; possibly something else and she didn’t cover her tracks quite well enough (i.e., breaking into Pryce’s office). No one’s tied it to her, not yet, but things are Tense.

Kallus asks Mirah if she needs an extraction, and she again brings up Orryn. “I’m good,” she says. “But the sweet kid I was telling you about…”

“We talked about this,” he says. “And I am working on it, I promise.”

But before either of them can do anything, Orryn ends up at the wrong place at the wrong time, and one of the guards is convinced he’s the mole.

Thrawn points out that this doesn’t make much sense--the serious breaches started well before Orryn was brought in.

Pryce agrees, but insists on letting the situation run its course, to see if it can flush out the real mole.

And Mirah has a Thing about people she’s attached herself to getting hurt.

Mirah manages to somehow get Orryn out of wherever he’s being held. She sends a quick message to Kallus--“Sweet Kid coming out, they think he’s me”--and takes him to the exit tunnel.

They are pursued, of course. By the overzealous guard--and by Shamie.

Mirah gets Orryn into the tunnel and prepares to stand her ground.

Shamie catches up first.

And handles the situation Very Differently from the way Thom does in Nikita canon.

“I’m not turning you in,” they say. “You got Orryn out?”

“Yeah.”

They nod. “Good. Okay. They think he’s the mole, but they’re gonna realize someone helped him escape, unless--”

And then the guard catches up.

There is a Fight. The guard manages to shoot Shamie (not seriously; through-and-through in the upper arm), who tosses Mirah their gun, and she fires back, putting two in his chest.

“…we can work with this,” Mirah says, pressing her hands onto where Shamie’s bleeding. “If we…if we stage it so he pointed the finger at Orryn to cover his own crimes…”

“You have any evidence we can plant on him?” Shamie says. “M’good at that. Planting evidence.”

“Yeah,” she says. She has a key card, and a few other bits and pieces. Shamie, hands shaking slightly, positions them appropriately. “And Orryn…”

“Was also a plant,” Shamie decides. “Sent in when the guard’s cover got shaky, to extract him. But he managed to get away in the confusion. We underestimated him.”

Mirah thinks about this for a minute, then nods. “I think I can sell that,” she says, as more guards start heading their way.

“Good,” Shamie says. “…talk later.”

Mirah nods, and Shamie blacks out, leaving her to spin the lies they need to survive this.

A few hours later, Mirah touches base with Kallus to confirm Orryn got out safely, and to inform him he has another inside agent.

So, the situation has improved somewhat! Unfortunately, it’s also been damaged--since the shell program was found, Kallus and Mirah don’t have secure communications. That first message she got out, about Orryn and Shamie? Yeah, she can’t use that route again, or she’ll establish a pattern.

On the other hand, Shamie is a full agent, which means they have an apartment and the freedom to move around and set an in-person meet. Which Kallus wants anyway, to evaluate Mirah’s friend.

(And, if they check out, to spoof their tracker and give them freedom of movement. Always a plus.)

So, Shamie and Kallus use another one-off communicator to set an in-person meeting, so they can talk.

“You did help Mirah and Orryn,” Kallus acknowledges, after they’ve run through their prearranged confirmation signals. “That counts for something.”

“But you think it could just be me establishing a cover,” Shamie said.

“The thought occurred.”

Shamie doesn’t say anything right away. “I hear all kinds of things about you,” they finally say. “Some of it seems true. Some of it seems exaggerated. I know you’re Division’s enemy, but that…” They shrug. “I trust Mirah. And she trusts you. That’s good enough for me.”

“And Division?”

“I know how gangs work,” they say, flatly. “I used to work for one--they ran a bunch of kids, pickpocketing. Thing about gangs is, most of them do some good in their community--take care of external threats, or whatever. That’s how almost every gang started, anyway. Division may have more money and fancier gadgets and a bigger community, but they work the same way. And most gangs, even if they keep helping their communities sometimes…somewhere along the line, it turns out to be about profit and power more than anything else. But that’s not the issue. The issue is…you can tell, when a gang’s leadership, the loyalty they demand from their members…you can tell when they reciprocate.”

“And Thrawn and Pellaeon and Pryce don’t,” Kallus says.

“Pryce for sure,” they say. “Pellaeon does, but he’s more loyal to Thrawn than the rest of us. Thrawn…is harder to read.”

Kallus considers that for a moment. “You know, what we’re doing--it’s dangerous. I can’t protect you. I burned my one extraction route getting Orryn out.”

“All of my choices are dangerous,” Shamie says. “But like I said. I trust Mirah. She trusts you. I don’t trust Division.”

Another moment of silence. “Here’s our communication protocol,” Kallus finally says. Because Mirah trusts them. And I trust Mirah. If I don’t trust her--what am I even doing here.

Shamie also, as it turns out, has valuable information Mirah didn’t have access to. While not as successful as Kallus, there’s another group working to take Division down; getting involved and throwing off some of their ops.

“Should we reach out to them?” Mirah asks, when this filters back to her.

“No,” Kallus decides. “Most likely, they’re another mercenary group. Trying to be another Division, another Gogol, and take out the competition. There’s a slim chance that they’re actually on the level, but if they’re not…Best to stick to ourselves and avoid drawing in any outsiders.”

The kids agree, because he’s the expert, and drop the subject.

He does, however, ask Shamie to keep tabs on this other group as best they can without compromising their cover. Which should be easy enough.

(Of course, Shamie can only tell him as much as Division knows about them, which isn’t much. They’re a small group, probably a five- or six-person team, and they tend to ghost in and out of situations without leaving much evidence behind…)

The other new advantage they have is Orryn.

Remember why Thrawn wanted him recruited? He’s good with tech and gadgets?

Orryn gets a look at Kallus’s setup, particularly when he’s trying to figure out how to re-establish communications with Shamie and Mirah.

“I can fix that,” he offers.

Kallus blinks. “Plan was, establish an identity and get you out of the country, into hiding,” he says. “Which I will do, I’m working on it, but--”

“Division hurt me, too,” Orryn says. “And Mirah and Shamie are in trouble, and so are you. I want to help.”

Kallus eyes him. He knows, just as clearly as Mirah and Shamie did, that he cannot take this kid into combat. On the other hand…he would’ve been recruited for a reason. And Kallus is well-trained and skilled, but there might be something to said for raw talent and an expert touch.

“All right,” he finally says. “We’ll prep an exfil for you, just in case, but it’ll be some time for me to put it together anyway. We’ll see how things go.”

Orryn nods, and gets to work.

And so pass the next few months, with Mirah working her way up towards qualifying and passing the information she has access to, and Shamie and Orryn supporting Kallus in the field.

Eventually, Mirah goes on her qualifying evaluation, and passes with flying colors. She’s an interesting counterpart to Shamie--she’s a sharpshooter and just as deadly as they are in hand-to-hand, but she doesn’t work as well with the explosives and so on.

Meanwhile, Shamie is a very tactile person--if it’s a hands-on task, especially one that requires a lot of detail work (such as setting up a bomb), there are very few people who can match them. But they have issues with distance kills and with the computer stuff.

Mirah is set up in her apartment, not too close to Shamie, but enough that they can meet. They’re in the same city.

The two of them, on their own, are pretty terrifying assassins.

Shamie is fairly innocuous-looking; dark hair, dark eyes, skinny, blends into a crowd. They’re also the most chill/calm person in the known universe, so people tend to gravitate to them in a crisis. And they’re kind. Genuinely kind, in a way that invites people’s trust.

This is what makes them an excellent priest in another life. And in this one…Beware The Nice Ones is a trope for a reason.

Mirah, on the other hand, is much more overtly intimidating. Unless she’s making an active effort to pretend otherwise, she exudes Danger. She is ruthless and practical.

She is also extremely skilled, good at manipulating people, and very hard to convince to back down.

Now imagine the two of them working together.

Unstoppable and terrifying.

And Division (and Kallus) are both aware of this.

So, they actually end up partnering quite a lot.

The four of them are circling closer and closer to closing in on Pryce and taking her out permanently--Thrawn as well, and Pellaeon as a third priority, but Pryce is their top target--when things Change again.

Mirah and Shamie are put on a wetworks op that requires a team. Probably similar to that one prince dude and the museum.

They feed Kallus the intel, as always, and he comes up with a plan to foil it.

But there are a couple of issues.

He needs Orryn for this op, for one thing. And not just as background, on-site.

When he scouts around to do his own prepwork, there are some technobabble things he need handled, but they need to be within range. Twenty yards, twenty-five on the outside.

So, his first priority--well, maybe not first, but certainly Up There--is to plan out Orryn’s escape route if things go wrong.

The second issue is that Shamie thinks this might be another mission the Unknown Third Party may also crash. Since they still don’t have a lot of intel, that’s potentially another five or six people coming in.

And that’s if they’re correct in that it’s the mystery team, and not Gogol or someone already on the radar.

But the opportunity to interfere with Division and save a life or two is too good to pass up, despite these problems. Kallus plans his counter-mission, and they get to work.

Phase One of the mission goes fairly well. Shamie does confirm a third party is involved, but at first, their presence doesn’t cause too much difficulty for either Our Heroes or Division.

Shamie gets the assassination target pinned down somewhere Kallus and Orryn can extract them; Kallus gets the victim to the prepared escape route, and then returns to deal with the secondary objective; the one that required Orryn--some sort of hacking/virus/Planting Evidence type thing.

Well.

So my Art Skillz are far from up to par, but here’s a general overview of the layout of the scene where they do:

...so I can’t figure out how to make tumblr embed it without throwing off all the rest of my formatting so, click the link.

Where things go wrong is when Kallus gets a good look at the closest member of Team Unknown.

Who is very, startlingly, distractingly Familiar.

And he does the worst possible thing he can do in this situation.

He freezes.

Naturally, another member of the Division team sees the opportunity and takes it.

He gets hit three times in that second--chest, abdomen, upper thigh. Serious injuries.

Mirah immediately runs to him, laying down cover/suppression fire at her supposed Fellow Division Agents.

(…yeah, remember that whole bit about her parents dying in front of her? She’s. Uh. She’s come to view Kallus as a second father. This is Not Okay.)

Shamie follows, of course; she gets to Kallus.

They hesitate for half a second. “…get him out of here. I can handle this. Go.”

Mirah nods and drags Kallus back to the van--

--only to find that Orryn has been taken.

She can’t--she can only be in one place at a time. She’s good, but she’s not that good. And Kallus, her teacher, her unofficially-accidentally-adopted dad, is dying in front of her.

She gets into the driver’s seat and books it.

Shamie fires after her, but…well, marksmanship has never been their strong suit, so they fail to stop her.

This is basically Mirah’s worst nightmare made real.

Her dad is dying.

Her brother is missing.

Her other sibling is trapped and about to be probably tortured.

She is holding together by a thread and the only thing keeping her going is if she falls apart now, Kallus will die.

Okay. Time to do something about that. She can’t do much, but she can do even less about the other things, so. Time to do something.

She gets a tourniquet on his leg, pressure dressings on the other wounds, but she’s pretty sure his lung’s collapsed and she doesn’t know how much other internal damage there is. Her training in field medicine/dressings Will Not Cut It on this one.

Now, Kallus has a contingency--he always has contingencies, he loves contingencies--but Mirah doesn’t know his medical contingency and he’s too unconscious and bleeding-out to tell her.

She can’t take him into an emergency room, obviously, but there’s an urgent care center close by. And Orryn’s stuff is still in the van. Which means she can hack into their records find out who’s coming off shift--because there will be someone coming off shift--and stick a gun in their face.

Which is exactly what she does.

She drags the doctor into the van and points her at Kallus.

“Fix him,” she snaps, but she stops pointing the gun at her at this point--she needs her attention elsewhere to drive and fend off Division agents in pursuit, among other things, and surely this doctor will be overcome by that whole Need To Heal thing. Hippocratic oath. Whatever.

Doctor stares at him. “He needs a hospital, I can’t--” Even as she moves towards him.

(Because there’s that whole Need To Heal thing. Hippocratic oath. Whatever.)

Mirah starts the car. “I’m not gonna tell you again.” She tosses the doctor their first aid kit--which is pretty Extensive. Not on the level of the one at the safehouse, but still impressive. “Anything you need that’s not in there, I’ll get at a pharmacy. Now. Do your damn job or I swear to God.”

The doctor looks at Mirah one last time, then turns her attention to Kallus, and opens the kit.

“Good,” Mirah says.

(And then, while the doctor is stabilizing her dad, as soon as she can pull over for a second, she gets rid of her tracker. She has the standard one, in her thigh.)

(And probably kills a Division agent or two pursuing them along the way…)

When the doctor has finished patching Kallus up as best she can with the supplies on hand and what Mirah stole from a convenient pharmacy, she says, “He really should be in a hospital. He needs a transfusion, and should be on IV antibiotics. And I think there was damage to his femur I couldn’t fix without imaging.”

“I’ll take that under advisement,” Mirah says. Note to self: rob a blood bank. And a hospital. Saline won’t cut it. I wonder how hard X-ray machines are to steal…

“I’m guessing you know how to change the dressings, and how often to do it,” the doctor says.

“Obviously,” Mirah says. She grabs a handful of money, and shoves it at the doctor--she did her job, she should be paid for it; people should always be Appropriately Compensated for the things they do and in this case that means actual money--as well as the badge she’d pulled out of the doctor’s purse. “You can go. Oh, and, Doctor Sloane? This never happened. You never saw us.”

“Right,” she says.

“Because if you say anything,” Mirah says, “I will hunt you down and kill you. Clear?”

“…crystal,” she says, and takes the money and walks away.

Mirah takes a few more distracting turns (with a couple pit stops for those last few Necessary Supplies), a very roundabout route, and eventually makes it to the safehouse. She gets Kallus set up as comfortably as she can, under the circumstances, on one of the beds, manages to take thirty seconds to check for any messages from Shamie or Orryn, and then curls up in a corner and just…melts down.

Like I said Mirah’s Worst Nightmare.

Let’s check back in with Shamie, who is about to have an extremely rough several days.

Because they get to go spend some Quality Time with Thrawn in full interrogator mode.

And they get the works--torture, hallucinogens, manipulation, everything. To figure out how much they know about Mirah’s compromised loyalties, back to Orryn and everything.

When that comes up, they repeat their older story--that they spotted Mirah pursuing Orryn and the guard, and followed. They got there, there was shooting, and they were sure it was Orryn, or the guard, but maybe it was Mirah. They know she killed the guard, and Orryn was never good at combat skills, just tech…

After somewhere between three days and a week of this, Thrawn can’t get Shamie to admit anything incriminating, and leaves them in a cell to report back to Pryce.

“I would estimate there’s somewhere between a twenty and fifty percent chance that Mirah managed to turn them,” he says.

“So, we cancel them,” Pryce says.

“We could,” Thrawn says. “But that is not my recommendation.”

“Oh?”

“I recommend surveillance,” he says. “My prior sessions with Shamie indicate that they’ve had very little human connection or affection in their life. Even we, for all we provide them, have a tendency to view our recruits more as tools than as individuals. It is absolutely within their makeup to latch on to the first person to treat them and value them as an individual. Which may mean they joined Mirah and Alexsandr’s crusade--or may mean that affection blinded them to things they should have seen in Mirah. If the former, they will lie low for a while, but eventually grow complacent and reach out to their partners. If the latter, they will redouble their efforts to prove their loyalty. And their skillset is not one we can replicate at this time--there’s one recruit showing a certain promise, but they’re very new, at least a year away from graduation. Assuming that particular recruit actually lives up to their potential.”

“So,” Pellaeon cuts in, “letting Shamie live, either way, we gain something valuable.”

“Precisely,” Thrawn says.

Pryce considers for a moment. “Very well, I’ll bow to your expertise. Shamie can return to their prior status. Add more cameras to their apartment before sending them home. And I want to upgrade their tracker.”

“I agree,” Thrawn says. “This would be an excellent time to test out the kill chip program.”

So, Shamie is kept in medical for another day, to have the surgery for the new implant and patch up some of the more significant damage from their interrogation.

They use one of the Contingencies to send a quick message to Mirah and Kallus, confirming they’re alive, and that they have a new tracker and may not be able to keep in regular contact for a while.

So! Let’s see what became of Orryn in the meantime, shall we?

And to do that, we actually have to jump back five years, to the night that made Kallus leave Division and vow to bring them down.

Zeb was military, special ops. He met Kallus when the latter was living on extended cover, and Zeb was about to get out.

They met in some kind of dojo/gym/whatever, and had one of Those sparring matches.

(You know the ones I mean. Where it’s like 30% fight and 70% foreplay?)

They danced around the issue for a while; Zeb knew Kallus works for the government somehow, and is pretty sure he’s either CIA or NSA under some kind of NOC (non-official cover). Eventually, though, they get together.

They have about six months, with Kallus staving off Division as best he can, and Zeb going through the process of finishing out his military service/resigning his commission--as soon as he wraps up one last investigation--and then he proposes.

And, yeah, he thought about waiting until he was completely out, but then he figured--there’s only so much time in a life, and why waste it?

Kallus is getting everything together so the two of them can disappear, when the Cleaner comes.

I’m…not sure exactly how this all works, so we’ll handwave all this. Basically, each walks away thinking the other is dead, and can credibly believe this without a body.

I think probably Kallus saw Zeb go over a cliff or something after getting shot, and Zeb found a whole heck of a lot of blood when he climbed back up to where he’d fallen from, and figured it was Alex’s.

Ooooh, better idea--while he’s climbing back up to help Alex--he thinks this attack has to do with him. With that last investigation, which was actually into some kind of Hinky thing that was either Division or Gogol…

And now the building is on fire. And Alex was still in there.

He tries to run in, but the building is too unstable, and the entrance collapses in front of him. Burying Alex--or whatever’s left of him--completely.

Kanan finds Zeb kneeling in front of the rubble, and takes him home.

He and Hera patch Zeb up, and basically explain what they do--which is something to do with trying to uncover groups like Division; essentially terrorist/assassination/murder-for-hire organizations that operate under a thin veneer of government officiality.

“Modern-day privateers,” Hera says. “Only we’re not at war, and these people commit atrocities at least as awful as the ones they’re supposedly trying to avert.”

“We work in secret,” Kanan adds. “Because when we try to work out in the open…”

(Yeah, this is how Depa died in this AU. She started this operation, possibly with Cham Syndulla, and things went Badly.)

“We think you caught on to the operations of one of the groups we’re trying to identify,” Hera said. “We don’t have a name for them, but they’re US-based, with ties all over the world.”

“Most of…most of what I had on ‘em was in the house,” Zeb says.

“So, we start again,” Kanan says.

“But…at this point, Zeb, you’re legally dead,” Hera says. “We all are. You won’t have the access to intel that you used to.”

“I don’t care,” Zeb says. They killed my fiancé. What does it matter if they killed me, too? “I wanna bring them down.”

Kanan smiles, and offers him a hand. “Welcome to the Ghost Crew.”

So, for the next two years or so, the Ghost Crew, along with Zeb, does more or less the same thing Kallus has been doing--try to suss out Division operations and interfere with them as best they can.

Of course, they don’t have insider information.

They don’t even know the name of the organization they’re hunting.

Plus, Division isn’t their only target, even if it’s the one Zeb’s most interested in. They also interfere with Gogol when they catch on to their missions, and a few other organizations throughout the world.

So there’s only so much they can do, and while they are certainly a nuisance to Pryce et al, they don’t have the same level of impact that Kallus does when he comes out swinging.

Naturally, things shift a little when a mission goes slightly less than as planned.

It’s mostly under control--it was primarily surveillance at that point; Zeb was in a restaurant scoping out their target. Unfortunately, one of said target’s bodyguards ID’d him; maybe not specifically as Ghost Crew but certainly as a Threat to their principal.

That’s about when the shooting started.

Zeb can’t get to the front door; the bodyguards now actively trying to both kill him and extract their principal are in his way; so he heads for the kitchen instead.

Yeah, he could try to pursue and complete his objective, except it was a capture mission, not a kill, and he can’t get through that many guards and get out with the target. Not by himself.

He yells at the staff to get down and stay down, and most of them listen. There’s a couple of cooks, a waiter who was grabbing a couple plates to run out, and a kid washing dishes.

Of course, Zeb loses his footing somewhere along the line and skids. He recovers fast, but the closest guy chasing him did not have that problem and is too damn close for--

--or Bad Guy could get smacked in the face with a soapy cast-iron skillet, courtesy of Dish Washing Kid.

Split second to consider the consequences, but there are two other shooters in pursuit; so Zeb does the sensible thing and grabs the kid so she doesn’t get hurt, and finally makes it to the exit. Steals the first convenient car he sees, and books it.

Once he’s pretty sure they’ve lost pursuit, he turns to the kid, who’s--shit, he’s not good at guessing kids’ ages. Maybe twelve? Shit--anyway, an actual kid, which complicates things.

“Uh. Sorry about back there,” he says. “Listen, I’ll take you back to your parents in a couple hours, after the heat’s died down, I promise.” Pretty sure the bad guys aren’t gonna hunt you down if they couldn’t grab you right then and there…

“Foster parents,” she corrects. “They’re okay, I guess, but it’s not like they actually pay attention to me. They own the restaurant.”

“I should still get you back to them,” he says. “Better for you in the long run, kid.”

“Hanny,” she says. “My name’s Hanny.” She looks at him expectantly, but he doesn’t respond in kind.

“Right,” he says instead. “In the meantime, uh…” He pulls off--they need to switch cars anyway--and takes a second to text Hera.

“So I accidentally kidnapped someone.”

“…accidentally.”

“Yeah, there was shooting, had to run through the kitchen, she hit a guy with a frying pan, couldn’t leave her there.”

“Right,” she responds, after a few seconds where he can practically hear her rolling her eyes. “How much of a fuss is she making?”

“Uh. None at all, actually.”

“All right. Bring her here, we’ll figure out how to handle this later.”

“Thanks, I owe you another one.”

He gets Hanny back to the safehouse he and the Ghost Crew are currently using.

Hera glowers at him for a minute, then makes sure Hanny is settled in an inner room before going out to have A Word.

“Zeb? That’s a child. An actual child.”

“Yeah, I know,” Zeb says. “Still couldn’t exactly leave her there. I’ll take her back to her parents…well, foster parents…”

“Our rule is, we don’t hurt kids!” Hera says.

“Does she look hurt?” Zeb says. “Look, this wasn’t my fault. I went through the kitchen, she got involved all on her own. Not like I told her to bash the guy over the head with a skillet!”

“I know,” Hera says, and takes a breath. “I know, sorry. I shouldn’t’ve snapped at you. But you need to take her back sooner than later. Tonight, if you can.”

Zeb nods. “Uh. Soon as I get her to actually tell me who her parents are. She said they own the restaurant, but…”

“Yeah, you probably don’t want to go back there.” She considers a minute. “I’ll see what I can dig up, get you an address.”

“Good,” he says.

“Why can’t I stay here?” Hanny asks, from the door.

“…because you’ve got parents--”

“Foster parents.”

“Who are probably worried about you,” he finishes.

Hanny snorts. “No, they’re not. They’ve got six of us, and mostly use the money they get from the state to keep their shitty restaurant afloat. They won’t miss me.”

“That’s a shitty situation, I get it,” Zeb says. “It’s still better than staying here.”

“Why?” she demands.

“Because I’m legally dead, for one thing,” he says.

“But you’re not actually dead,” she points out.

“I also do a lot of really dangerous things,” he says. “What you saw in that kitchen back there? Ordinary Tuesday for me.” Which is, yeah, a bit of an exaggeration, but…

She rolls her eyes. “Not like I’m asking to come into another shootout with you. Just stay with you instead of the Smiths.”

“Why do you want to stay with him?” Hera cuts in. “And ‘because he’s not the Smiths’ isn’t a good enough answer.”

Hanny chews that over for a minute. “I like him,” she says. “He actually gives a damn about something other than his stupid restaurant, or self-image, or whatever. And he apologized for kidnapping me, which is sort of weird, but nice, I guess? I don’t know, I just do.”

“…that whole bit about doing dangerous things,” Zeb says. “I can’t really look after you.”

She rolls her eyes again. “I’ve been looking after myself for ages anyway. Besides. I’m seventeen.”

He and Hera stare at her.

“…would you believe fifteen?”

Zeb’s less sure about that one, but the look on Hera’s face is answer enough.

“Okay, thirteen, but still. Plus, I cook. I’m really good at it, too. Especially when I have access to decent knives. I’m guessing that’s not a problem here?”

Well, okay, it’s not like they have a lot of kitchen knives floating around, but he could--

…shit.

Zeb turns to Hera. “…sorta running out of counter-arguments here…”

Hera looks from him, to Hanny, and back again. “…fine. I’ll babysit when you’re out in the field.”

Jumping back to the present!

So, Zeb doesn’t actually spot Kallus at this point.

Or, rather, he sees that another party is involved, and does out of the corner of his eye spot the guy going down and then Division agents running at him, but not enough to actually identify him.

He alerts his team to the presence of the Third Party--who they’ve been aware of, since Kallus and his team went active a few months ago.

(It was Sabine’s idea to nickname the team Fulcrum. Since they seem to be a pressure point that really gets to the Shadow Agency they’re chasing, and might be enough pressure to move the lever and make actual progress…)

(Look, it made sense in her head at the time, whether or not the others bought the reasoning, and it stuck.)

Of course, they’re not sure if Team Fulcrum is actually on their side, or just looking to cause Generalized Chaos. Or take Shadow Agency down to take its place. After all, they seem to have an almost personal vendetta against the Shadow Agency and some of the tactics they’ve used…

Ezra and Kanan slip around to the Fulcrum van, and find Orryn inside. They see this sweet kid, assume he’s a hostage, and extract him. There’s no way their team will get through the firefight between Division, Mirah, and the reinforcements intact, so Kanan calls Zeb back, they get Orryn into their vehicle, and they go.

They get Orryn back to their base, and he makes it Very Clear that he was not, in fact, a hostage.

“The people that had you in that van--”

“Were not Division,” he says. “They’re the ones who rescued me from Division, after I was recruited.”

“…I’m sorry,” Hera says. “We made a mistake. Division--they’re the government agents who were attacking that building back there?”

Orryn blinks. “…you didn’t know that?”

“We’ve never had a name for them,” Kanan says. “Maybe we should start from the beginning. I’m Kanan, this is Ezra, Hera, Zeb, Sabine.”

“Orryn,” he says. “…you’re trying to bring Division down, too?”

“Damn right we are,” Zeb says.

“…okay,” he says, and fills them in on what he knows.

Which is, comparatively, not all that much. He didn’t see too much of the internal structure--he wasn’t there for long enough--but they have names and so on to attach to them.

He tells them how Division recruits people in their late teens/early twenties, and trains them as assassins. He tells them how Mirah went in as a double agent, and she and Shamie and Kallus broke him out. He tells them how they tried to get him into hiding, but he offered to stay and help with their tech, which is what led them here.

(He doesn’t, of course, know Kallus’s real/full name--not something shared readily; and even if it was, that might not be the full name Zeb knew him under, so Zeb remains in the dark.)

(Part of why Orryn’s being so open about this is because he’s gotten a pretty good idea of the kind of team Hera and Kanan are running here; he also…it’s something to focus on other than the Very Strong Probability that Kallus is dead, likely Mirah with him, and Shamie, and…)

(On the other hand, if his new family is somehow still alive, they could use all the help they can get. And maybe Kallus would’ve been more cautious, and Mirah would’ve been more suspicious, and Shamie would’ve held back a little more, but Orryn knows how hard this fight will be, and how much they need genuine allies. And so he makes the first move/takes a leap of faith.)

So, to sum up the last few sections before we move on, here’s where we stand after the FUBAR mission where Kallus finds out Zeb is still alive:

Kallus has been badly hurt--near-fatally--and is more or less out of commission for the foreseeable future; not to mention whatever long-term/permanent damage he might have sustained.

Mirah’s cover is blown, and while she pulled herself together after her meltdown once Kallus was safe, she’s still teetering a little on the edge, especially as more and more time goes by without hearing from either of her siblings.

Shamie is fighting desperately to maintain their cover, still deep in Division, but now with little to no support.

Orryn is with Zeb and the Ghost Crew, with no idea if any of his family is still alive, and missing a few Key Pieces of Information that might help smooth things over.

(Yeah, this day went Super Well for everyone.)

After a couple days, though, a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel--Kallus wakes up.

Okay, technically, he’s sort of half-woken up a couple times, but this is the first time he’s been lucid enough to actually process being awake and/or interact with Mirah.

She sees him trying to sit up and is instantly there.

“Stay down, you’re hurt.”

He sinks back without too much argument, and she takes a second to make sure he’s really awake, really back with her, and then, as people with her particular personality and background are likely to do, covers up her fear with “How dare you.”

“Mirah…”

“You got yourself shot! You froze!”

“I know, I--”

And then the look on her face, she’s clearly just barely holding back from bursting into tears (which, she’s done enough of that over the past three days damn it) and he just…wordlessly holds out his arms, offering a hug.

Very, very carefully, she curls up next to him and clings, and she does burst into tears at that point, and stays there until she’s cried herself out.

“…sorry,” she says, when she gets her breath back.

“It’s fine,” he assures her. “And…so am I. For scaring you.”

She nods. “I know it wasn’t on purpose.”

He laughs a little, which is a mistake, because that hurts, but manages to get out, “when I get shot on purpose, it’s generally not this…bad.”

“I know,” she says, then hesitates before blurting out, “Iloveyou.”

He’s taken a little bit by surprise--he was her handler as much as her friend, and that’s not exactly conducive to…but he can’t deny that he’s come to think of her as a favorite niece, or maybe even a daughter, and…

Between being caught off guard, and the pain, and the bloodloss, and the drugs she’s probably got him on, he can’t find the words to respond.

So, of course, she tries to backtrack.

He cuts her off, “love you, too, Mirochka.”

(LOOK fandom has decided he’s a Space Russian ANYWAY so for this AU either one or both of his parents was a first-generation Russian immigrant so FAKE RUSSIAN DIMINUTIVES FOR EVERYONE. Also it makes me smile. So there.)

She brightens and clings again. Very, very carefully.

But he can already feel the room start to spin and blur at the edges. “Probably gonna pass out again. Don’t be afraid.”

“Okay,” she says. “Just don’t die.”

“Of course not,” he says, already fading. “Still have work to do.”

“Yeah, well, you’re not allowed to die when we’re done, either.”

“Right,” he manages to say, before he’s out again.

The next time he’s fully conscious and lucid is just after Shamie finally managed to send word they’re alive.

Which is, naturally, his first thought. To ask about Shamie and Orryn.

Mirah tells him--Shamie’s at least alive and free enough to make contact, but Orryn is still missing.

Kallus, at this point, is half-convinced he hallucinated Zeb--it would make more sense, obviously; Zeb is dead, he knows that, he saw him die, and yet…

On the other hand, he finds himself desperately hoping it wasn’t a hallucination, for more than just his personal needs. If Zeb has Orryn, then he knows Orryn is safe.

“I tried to get him,” Mirah says.

“I know,” he says. “It wasn’t your fault. None of this was.” It was mine.

“What happened?” she asks, and the question had to come sometime, but he’s not sure he can explain. Not sure he should, as on-edge as she is already.

But she’s asking, so he does the best he can.

“I thought I saw…someone,” he says.

“…interesting pause there…”

“A ghost.”

“…cryptic. Are you gonna keep doing that, or…?”

He looks away. He can’t bring himself to say his name. “It couldn’t have been…I know it couldn’t have been, but I saw him, I was sure, and for a moment, I…I lost control. Again.”

I let you all down.

“…again?”

He struggles for a moment, then says, “I told you, before you went into Division…I told you why I left, didn’t I?”

It takes her a minute to get it. “…oh.”

“I only…I only saw him for a moment, and I may have been seeing things.” He takes a shallow, shaky breath, and blinks rapidly for a moment. “But if it was real, and Orryn’s with him, then he’s safe. I am certain of that.”

Mirah nods. “Then I’ll go find out.”

“Be careful,” Kallus cautions. “Division will be out in force, looking for you. And Shamie can’t--they have to keep their head down. Even if they’ve managed to satisfy Thrawn for now--” He starts to get up, because he needs to hit the ground running on this one, pain and shakiness be damned--

“Don’t you dare,” Mirah snaps, pushing him back. “I’ll be careful. Trust me. Papa.”

“I do,” he says; his head is spinning again and he’s gone chalk-white. “Just…don’t get overconfident.”

“I won’t,” she promises. “Go back to sleep. I’ll text every hour.”

“Please,” he says.

“I will,” she promises, and by the time she’s out the door he’s unconscious again.

Of course, by the time she gets back, he’s somehow managed to muster the strength to get himself over to the computer.

“What did I say?” she says, annoyed.

“I did sleep, for a while,” he says. A little breathless, but he’s still conscious, and it doesn’t look like he’s torn any of his stitches, which is probably a goddamn miracle.

(Of course, they are long overdue a miracle or two.)

“I found footage of the incident,” he says. “Target had security cameras all over. I wanted to see if…see if I could track Orryn that way.”

“And?”

He shakes his head. “But I can be sure Division didn’t take him. I accounted for all of them.”

“That’s good.”

“Yes,” he says, then hesitates. “Nothing more from Shamie, which…I don’t know. You find anything?”

“Maybe,” she says, and hands him a blurry photo, of Orryn--with Zeb.

The world spins around him again, just like it did back in that firefight, because there’s no mistaking it this time.

Mirah mistakes his reaction for him being about to pass out again; he vaguely hears her mention going to kidnap Dr. Sloane again; he cuts her off.

“No, it’s…it’s him.”

“Oh!” She considers for a moment. “Good. I’ll go get him.”

He nods; he can feel his heart beating erratically and knows he should probably do something about that--relaxation exercise, get horizontal, something--but first thing’s first. “Tell…no.” He can’t think of a good verbal code, but he has something even better.

Using the chair to hold himself up and keeping as much weight off his injured leg as possible, he starts over to the wall.

“Let me--” Mirah starts.

“Wall safe,” he says. “Keep forgetting to program your fingerprints.”

She makes a face. “And you’ll go to bed as soon as you get whatever it is?”

“Yes, fine,” he says. He makes it to the safe, and opens it, pulling out a fist-sized stone and handing it to her. “Show…show him this. He’ll know you’ve seen me.”

“I will. Now, bed.”

“Right,” he says. But his head is spinning and it seems so very far away right now. I possibly overdid it. “I’m just going to…sit here for a moment first. Catch my breath.”

“Fine,” she says. “I’ll be back soon.”

“I know.”

There is, of course, a slight problem with sending the meteorite instead of some kind of verbal message. One that, if Kallus had been firing on all cylinders, so to speak, he would’ve figured out.

A verbal message can’t be pulled off a dead body, after all.

…yeah, Zeb pulls a gun on Mirah when she shows up.

She restrains herself from responding the way all her training has told her to respond to a gun in her face, because she knows how important Zeb is to Kallus. “Rude,” she says instead.

Zeb snarls at her. “Where the hell did you get that.”

“From Papa,” Mirah says, like it should be obvious. “Are you going to let me in?”

Papa? Zeb had never imagined the monsters that killed Alexsandr--who did the kind of things Orryn described--would have children. “…no,” he says. “You’re going to take me to Papa.”

It’s the best, most solid lead he’s had in forever, more concrete than Orryn in terms of tracing back to the specific people who killed his fiancé, he finally has an actual agent, a string to pull to unravel Division and end them.

“Well, yeah,” Mirah says, because that is the plan. But not right now.”

Zeb glares at her. “No. Now.”

Mirah sighs. “ORRYN!”

Orryn, who heard the commotion and was already on his way, joins Zeb at the door. “She’s okay, Zeb. Really. This is Mirah, I told you about her?”

Zeb is…not at all sure what to make of all this. But he lets her in while he tries to figure it out.

(Keeping her covered with the gun, of course. As much as he can when the first thing she does is wrap Orryn in a flying tackle hug.)

“I’m so glad you’re okay,” Orryn says, clinging back so hard. “I was worried.”

“You were worried!” Mirah says. “You know what you’re supposed to do in a firefight! Keep your head down, and wait for Papa to come get you!”

“I know,” Orryn says. “But I saw him go down, and then…” I got grabbed, there wasn’t a whole lot I could do.

Mirah nods. “I already yelled at him about that.”

Which is not what Orryn would’ve done, but he knows his sister, so he’s not surprised. “And…and Shamie, are they with you? Are they okay?”

“They’re alive,” Mirah says. “They got in touch. But they’re still undercover. We’re working on it.”

“Touching as this reunion is,” Zeb interrupts, “you need to tell me where the hell you got that rock.”

“I already told you.”

“Not enough.”

“Well, then ask,” Mirah says. “I don’t know what you know.”

“Who the hell is Papa, and how the hell did he get that meteorite?” Zeb asks.

“No idea where he got it,” she says, which is true. “He just told me to give it to you.”

Zeb stares at her, for a long moment. “What the hell kind of sick joke--”

“What?” Mirah says. “Explain, because I have no idea what the hell you mean.”

“He’s taunting me,” Zeb says, flatly. “Whoever he is.” ...on the other hand, that means I’m close…or they know I have Orryn. He frowns, then shakes his head. “But to use this to lure me out…”

Now it’s her turn to stare. “Lure you? You’re the one who demanded I take you places!”

“Because you turn up, out of the blue, on my damn doorstep, holding that!”

“Because Papa told me to!” she says. “What’s so important about it, anyway?!”

“It’s something I gave to--” He stops. “Your people, Division, they took it off him after they killed him. I’ve spent the last five years trying to track down the bastards who did it.”

And SUDDENLY EVERYTHING IS CLEAR.

“You didn’t see him,” Mirah realizes.

“…what.”

“Okay,” she says. “We can go see Papa now. But leave your gun behind, he’s been shot enough this week.”

“No, seriously, what the hell,” Zeb says. “Saw who?”

“Papa,” she says. Obviously.

“You still haven’t told me who that is!”

“Because I love him, but he’s sometimes a secretive jerk and I don’t know his full name and that’s embarrassing, okay?”

Zeb just stares at her for a moment.

Mirah sighs, exasperated. “Orryn, do you know Papa’s full name? I don’t have any pictures, and I don’t want to wake him up by calling.”

Orryn shakes his head. “Never had that much access to Division’s computers, and you know he doesn’t talk about that stuff. …Shamie might know, but…”

“I’ll text,” she decides. “They won’t get it until it’s safe.”

“Like hell I’m waiting for that,” Zeb says. “Take me to him. Now.” “First, leave the gun behind,” Mirah says, and there is No Room For Argument in her face or her tone.

Zeb considers this for a moment.

He’s dealing with one guy who’s apparently been shot all to hell, and one baby agent…he’s got the raw physical strength to overpower her if it comes to that. Besides, she didn’t say anything about other weapons.

“Fine,” he says, and ostentatiously puts both the gun he already had out and the backup from his boot on the table.

“Thank you,” she says. “Orryn, you coming?”

Orryn hesitates for a second. “…someone should probably stay with Hanny.”

“Who’s Hanny?”

“My kid,” Zeb says. “…kinda. Long story. Can we go?”

“Sure,” Mirah says. “Hanny can come, too.”

“Hell no,” Zeb says. “I don’t bring her into potential danger if I can avoid it.”

“If you say so,” Mirah says. “Just a suggestion.”

So, Orryn and Hanny stay back at Zeb’s place. Mirah texts Kallus to let him know they’re coming.

He. Uh. Wakes up on the floor by the wall safe when his phone buzzes. Never quite made it back to bed…oops.

Part of him thinks he should probably correct that, but on the other hand, standing up sounds like Work right now. He’ll just…wait here. Gather his strength.

Oh, right, I should text back. “Fine, see you soon.”

As they approach, Mirah once again warns Zeb that Kallus has been shot, so he is not allowed to get him worked up or let him out of bed.

“Yeah, you mentioned.”

“It bears repeating,” she says. “And he is not allowed to die.”

“Copy that,” Zeb says, though he makes no promises. Whoever Papa is, he had Alexsandr’s meteorite, which means he Knows Something about the people who killed him.

She opens the door to the safehouse. “PAPA YOU HAD BETTER BE IN BED.”

…well, at least he hasn’t moved from where she left him last?

Mirah gives him her best Aggrieved and Disappointed Face.

“…I think I fell asleep here,” he says, wearily.

And then Zeb has a Moment.

Because he couldn’t quite see Mirah’s papa from this angle.

But he knows that voice.

“Did I or did I not tell you to go back to bed,” Mirah says, but she knows it’s gonna be a lost cause for at least a few minutes. “…I’ll lecture you later.”

“Alex?” Zeb says. Whispers. It takes him a few seconds to actually get the name out and it comes out strangled and disbelieving.

And even though he already knew Zeb was alive, he’d seen him in person and then the picture, something about it…he’s here now, it’s real--

Fortunately, before Alex can try to get up, Zeb is right there.

“You were…you were dead, I thought--”

For his part, Kallus cannot form words right now. He just reaches up, hand shaking, to touch Zeb’s face.

(Mirah, in the background, discreetly texts her siblings with an update.)

(Orryn, upon reading the text, asks Hanny if she’s ever seen The Parent Trap.)

(“Because I think your spy dad and my spy dad used to be together. Wanna go join them?”)

(Hanny doesn’t need to be asked twice.)

Zeb, at that point, just scoops Kallus up and, very gently, puts him back in the bed.

“Oh, good,” Mirah says. “Now we need to keep him there.”

“No arguments here,” Zeb says.

And this had better not be a dream, he adds, in the privacy of his own mind.

Of course, there’s a lot more catching up to do from there, and a creepy organization of spysassins to take down, but I think we got enough here for one outline, lol. XD Future developments, of course, involve Team Fulcrum (who keep the nickname because Why Not) teaming up with the Ghost Crew to actually take down Division and shoot Pryce in the face; getting Shamie’s kill switch removed; and then…whatever adventures the Family of Spies might have in the future. Maybe head down to Miami, run into another team of former spies. Or up to Boston, run across a team of thieves…

The point is, they’ve found each other again. The rest…well, the rest is just Details.

[scoutception]

Ys 1 & 2 review: the 22 year long journey to American computers

Falcom is one of the big underdogs of Japanese game developers, at least outside of Japan, a role pretty unfair for them considering they’re also one of the most important Japanese game developers to exist. Before names like Final Fantasy and even Dragon Quest were around, Falcom was pioneering action RPGs, JRPGs, and even innovating video game music as a whole. Dragon Slayer, the title that set the foundation for action RPGs, would eventually transform into the Legend of Heroes, better known as the Kiseki, or Trails, series, boasting some of the most detailed JRPGs out there, while the other big innovator, Ys, would remain true to its roots, while still taking steps to innovate as much as possible with every new title. Despite their games both being very influential and just plain great in of themselves, Falcom was basically unknown outside of Japan for decades due to very inconsistent localizations, and mostly being released on more niche consoles even when it did happen, like the Sega Master System or the TurboGrafx-16. The only Ys game to make it to American shores on the Genesis or SNES was Ys 3, which was barely recognizable as an Ys game in its original form, gameplay wise, and the first exposure America got to the Legend of Heroes was the Gagharv trilogy on the PSP, which recieved such awful localizations that they were actually released out of order, with the second game actually being released first, instead of the actual first, cause that certainly isn’t capable of causing problems. Thankfully, since 2010, XSEED has delivered fantastic localizations of many, many significant Falcom games released both before and after, giving fantastic games like Trails in the Sky exposure only dreamed of before. They’ve still got a ways to go, though, and so, it’s time for me to show my appreciation for these games by covering Ys 1 & 2, the games that refined the action RPG genre, farther than just starting it. The version I’m covering is Ys 1 & 2 Chronicles Plus on Steam and GOG, one of the most recent, and refined, versions available, and is based off the PSP version, which is based off the PC remakes. It’s a pretty crazy history for these games.

Ys 1: Ancient Ys Vanished: Omen

Story:

The story of Ys 1 is about the titular land of Ys (pronounced ees, like ease, or the middle part of geese), a mysterious floating island, which was, in ancient times, part of the island of Esteria. Ys was said to be watched over by twin goddesses and six great priests, named Tovah, Dabbie, Hadal, Mesa, Gemma, and Fact, until a mysterious evil forced them to raise Ys into the sky, with a few descendants of the priests and a gigantic crater being among the only remnants of Ys left in Esteria. 700 years later, odd things are happening in Esteria, with a wall of storms appearing to surround the island, cutting it off from the rest of the world. On the island itself, monsters have suddenly appeared as well, and something is stealing anything made of silver from the inhabitants, even resorting to assault. In the middle of this, the red haired swordsman Adol Christin, fueled partly by intense wanderlust, sets off to Esteria to investigate... only to predictably shipwreck against the Stormwall, washing up on the island and being rescued by the citizens of port Barbado, setting a fantastic standard for himself to repeat several times in future games. After setting out and reaching the town of Minea, Adol allies with the fortuneteller Sara, a descendant of priest Tovah, and sets off to collect the 6 Books of Ys, written by the priests, said to contain the secrets to the rise and fall of Ys, and the power to save Esteria, along the way meeting Feena, an amnesiac girl specifically imprisoned by the monsters, Reah, a troubadour with a silver harmonica, Luta Gemma, another descendant of the priests, and Adol’s future traveling companion Dogi, who has a hilariously small role considering his role in future games.

It’s definitely nothing too deep by today’s standards, not helped by the game’s short length, but having such an old game, we’re talking 1987, have an active focus on the story is pretty impressive, and to its credit, it does manage to make Ys genuinely mysterious, with an interesting explanation behind its fall, namely, the valuable metal of Ys, Cleria, caused the summoning of demons, and its discovery in Esteria, mistaken for silver, led to the island’s current troubles. While the characters as a whole aren’t anything special either, they have a likeable quality to them, and the main villain does have a fairly interesting twist to him; he’s also a descendant of one of the priests, Fact, out to collect the books for his own purposes. That said, the main strength of writing is just the general dialogue itself. For such an old game, the remakes added a lot of detail to the NPCs, giving everyone a name and a personality, and the translation gives a lot of life to them, making them pretty fun to talk to, turning what would otherwise be a lot of empty dialogue into amusing moments. They even gain new dialogue after certain points in the plot, which is another nice touch.

Overall, though, the biggest strength concerning the plot itself is the actual dedication put into it just relative to the time it was released. Touches like the Books of Ys being in a completely different language than what Adol knows, forcing him to find a way to translate them, and Luta Gemma’s mentions of guiding dreams, something that would become a much more common occurrence in the sequel. Speaking of which, this game was clearly betting on having a sequel with its plot, which is a pretty ballsy move even now. The deeper details to the downfall of Ys, the mysteries behind characters like Feena and Reah, and just what Ys itself is really like are left unanswered, with the game ending on an outright cliffhanger, with the books transporting Adol to Ys after saving Esteria, very likely one of the first video games to do so, at least in regards to following up on it. Overall, the writing side is still entertaining enough, and as long as it manages to be fun, that’s a success in my book.

Gameplay:

Here’s where stuff gets a bit, let’s say, contentious. Ys is played at a top down angle with you controlling Adol, and only Adol. Combat, compared to almost any other video game, even from the 80's, is rather unusual. You see, instead of using a dedicated attack button, Adol suffices with ramming into his enemies, swinging his sword and damaging them automatically on contact. This system, called the Bump system, may sound, well, dumb and overly simple, but it’s quite a bit more complicated than it may seem. Running directly into an enemy, rather sensibly, kills Adol dead in just a few hits, though he at least trades hits with them as well. In order to attack safely, you need to hit them at a vulnerable angle, such as to the side or behind them. Thankfully, you don’t need to pull hit and runs for every individual attack, as once you hit an enemy at a good angle, you can just keep moving forward and attacking, with them being unable to resist unless you choose to move away, or are knocked back by another enemy. While it can be difficult to put to use at first, it’s actually a fairly well designed system. It gives the game a fast and surprisingly intense pace, with enemies being able to kill you in just a few hits, and having telegraphed attacks of their own in addition to being able to hurt you just through collision. On the opposite side, being able to run into enemies and kill them in a second is pretty satisfying, and makes grinding for EXP and gold a lot less troublesome than usual in RPGs, considering you can just take things down on your way to something else. The game also takes mercy and allows you to automatically regenerate your HP on the overworld and in towns just by standing still for a few seconds, and considering enemies only respawn when you move the screen, it isn’t much of a risk to you either to just stop and take a breather.

Adol’s equipment consists of swords, shields, armor, and rings. The first three are pretty self explanatory, boosting his attack and defense, and acquired by buying them in shops, finding them in treasure chests, or even received from NPCs for free in a couple of cases, while the rings give effects like boosting attack or defense, slowing down enemies, or boosting health regeneration, either doubling it when Adol is outside, or allowing it in dungeons, where it is normally restricted, though unfortunately the rings do not work in boss battles. Adol also has a regular inventory, mostly containing key items, including a few equip able ones like a mask revealing secret passages, and a few other things like potions to restore health and wings to instantly transport him back to Minea. As this is an RPG, there’s also a leveling system, which gives Adol downright dramatic stat increases each time he gains a level. Problem is, these levels matter way more than equipment, and with the jump between each level, the early game consists of just grinding a few levels until you’re capable of taking on the next set of enemies somewhat safely, with several bosses in particular being outright immune to damage until you reach certain levels. At the least, you don’t have to do this many times, considering the level cap is only 10, which you need to reach to beat the third boss out of seven, after which you’re at the mercy of any equipment the game gives you to get any stronger. Speaking of which, bosses mix up the gameplay a bit by being vulnerable at any angle, meaning you just have to focus on getting to them in between their attacks. Unfortunately, most of the bosses aren’t exactly great, either being really easy, or really, really annoying, with special mentions going to the previously mentioned third boss, which spends most of its time as a swarm of bats capable of covering most of the screen, only being vulnerable when it reforms for the briefest of moments, and we’re talking barely a second. Sometimes it’ll reform almost immediately after transforming, but other times it’ll chase Adol much longer, and it stays as the bat swarm longer if you get hit. It doesn’t take much damage even when you do hit it, as a cherry on top, making for a very drawn out fight.

The 4 bosses after this one are a lot more fun, at least. From a giant mantis that constantly throws scythes at you, to a giant rock creature constantly firing projectiles at near bullet hell levels, to two giant floating heads bouncing around a room with barriers around them, forcing you to slip in between the barriers to hit while they swap between who is vulnerable, they’re legitimately intense, and a lot of fun, culminating with Dark Fact himself as the insane final boss, ping ponging around a room, firing near impossible to dodge projectiles, turning it into a game of rushing to meet him once you can predict his path and damaging him as much as you can, while he destroys parts of the floor for every hit he takes, killing you if you’re not on a different tile when he destroys it. It’s a nightmare attempting it at first, especially since you can’t even use your best equipment, as he is immune to any sword that isn’t the silver sword, and will kill you near instantly if you don’t use the silver armor and shield, and the instant death floor destruction is a cheap move, especially since you can outright get trapped if the right tiles get broken, nearly always forcing you to reload. Still, it’s actually pretty fun once you get the hang of it, and certainly lets the villain live up to the hype he built up. It should be mentioned there’s also a time attack mode that lets you go through a boss rush. It’s actually pretty fun, if let down by some of the roadblocks a few bosses present.

While at its core, Ys is an enjoyable time, there is one pretty difficult to ignore aspect to it: it is a very short game. There’s only three towns, a fairly small overworld, and three dungeons to go through. The first two dungeons, an old palace and a mine, are pretty decently lengthy, with quite a bit of stuff to find, but otherwise, it’s just a lot of backtracking and grinding. There’s not much in the way of puzzles, either, mostly only a few in the final dungeon. Once you’re forced into Darm Tower, with a full set of silver equipment and half of the books in your possession, you don’t think this last dungeon will be much. But that’s when the game throws you for a loop. Darm Tower is a behemoth of a dungeon, at a massive 25 floors you have to trudge through, with plenty of detours and backtracking. There’s new enemies every few floors, and 4 whole bosses are contained in this place. In the original versions, it easily took up half the game, and even in the newer versions, it’s a third of the game at minimum, if you spend enough goofing off. I have some mixed feelings towards this place. It’s miserably long and difficult, that mostly just has the same look to it in each floor, and even the music is the same until towards the end, not to mention once you go in, you’re stuck, and forced to keep on marching until you reach the top. On the other hand, I kinda like it just because of how unique it is. Darm Tower is hyped up even during the intro to the game, and plenty of NPCs say it to be an awful, fearsome place. If you’re savvy with RPGs, you might figure it won’t live up to that... but no, it lives up to all the hype it’s given. It’s utterly massive and exhausting, with tons of dangerous enemies that’ll hunt you down relentlessly. They’re even able to stick in plenty of plot and characters within, and seeing the day slowly turning to night as you make progress is quite a sight. In just living up to, and even surpassing, this hype, I kinda have to respect it. Overall, the gameplay of Ys works a lot better than you’d expect, successfully polished through over 20 years of remakes, but the short length alone could make it a difficult recommendation on its own.

Graphics:

Ys is actually a very pretty game to look at. The characters and regular enemies are in a sort of chibi style, which is pretty adorable, but not too detailed by themselves. The environments, on the other hand, look great, with lots of little details and allowing some fantastic views. While the enemy designs and locations aren’t anything too special, they still look quite good, especially the bosses, which are significantly bigger than normal enemies. Enemies also explode in a cloud of blood, bones, and body parts when defeated, which is both funny and satisfying, while not being anything too gruesome. You may have also noticed the border portrait in these screen shots, which I find quite nice to look at, if a bit restricting. You are allowed to go completely full screen, though, if it’s not to your tastes, but it doesn’t actually cut anything off.

The best aspect of the visuals, though, is the character artwork used when talking to important characters. It looks absolutely beautiful, and is a good contrast against the otherwise lesser detailed sprites.

This version also goes above and beyond in this regard by giving you options regarding this character artwork, namely a choice between using the newer artwork made specifically for this version, Ys 1 & 2 Chronicles, and the older artwork originally used in Ys 1 & 2 Complete, the PC remakes that have served as the basis for almost every port of these games since their release. Which you use comes down to a matter of preference, and while I do find the Complete artwork to look a bit odd at times, overall both options are beautiful. (Chronicles artwork is used first in these comparisons, and Complete artwork is used second)

Sound:

Ys 1 has an absolutely fantastic soundtrack, courtesy of Yuzo Koshiro, also known for the soundtracks for The Revenge of Shinobi, Etrian Odyssey, and, probably most famously, Streets of Rage, setting a standard for Falcom games in general, and providing quite an influence on video game music as a whole. This version again gives options in regards to the soundtrack, giving three different versions to choose: the original soundtrack on the PC-88, which holds up well even today, the Complete soundtrack, which gives a refreshing and different take on several songs, even if it’s very blatant in being in MIDI at times, and a new soundtrack recorded specifically for this version yet again, which is amazingly metal. It, again, comes down to preference, though while I like all of them quite a bit, I easily like the Chronicles soundtrack best, though it’s telling when the original PC-88 version of the title screen theme, Feena, is just as pretty as the other versions. Speaking of which, when it comes to individual pieces, some big standouts to me are Feena, again, for the title screen, Palace of Destruction, the theme of the first dungeon, Fountain of Love, Minea’s theme, Tower of the Shadow of Death, the maddening theme of Darm Tower, and Dreaming, played during a memorable maze section of Darm Tower. It is, overall, among some of the best music I’ve heard in a game, and is worth looking up even if you otherwise have no interest in Ys.

Ys 2: Ancient Ys Vanished: The Final Chapter

Ys 1 and 2 are so tightly connected to each other that I could not go without giving both games a proper looking through. Most releases of them nowadays can’t either, with almost everything bundling them together, which makes the short length of both a lot more acceptable, especially if you look at them as two split up parts of one game, like the acclaimed TurboGrafx-16 version did.

Story:

Ys 2 picks up right where Ys 1 left off, with Adol being transported to Ys itself. Unfortunately, his journey is not too smooth, resulting in him ending up unconscious and losing everything except for the six Books of Ys, eventually being rescued by a girl named Lilia and taken to her home of Lance Village. At least it wasn’t a shipwreck this time. But yes, as it turns out, people still live on Ys, and lived so in peace, until the same events that caused monsters to appear on Esteria caused the demons that once devastated Ys to reemerge. After being told that returning each tome to the sanctuaries of each great priest would open the way to the Shrine of Solomon, the former temple of the twin goddesses, and the current base of locations of the leaders of the demons, Adol sets off once again, to restore peace to Ys once and for all.

There unfortunately isn’t that much more for me to say regarding the writing. It’s about the same quality as the original when it comes to plot and characters, but overall, it’s a good conclusion to this tale, and the general dialogue is as entertaining as ever. I will say, though, that the tone works quite well, carrying a somber feeling reflecting the misery of the people of Ys, and their wish to return to happier times. Additionally, using a certain spell in the game, Adol is able to talk to the demons on friendly terms, and every one of them has unique dialogue. Not every type of enemy, every enemy has unique dialogue. Some of it is informative, but others just seem to be Falcom and/or XSEED going out of their way to prove how dedicated they are to detail, and I for one love it. Another notable thing to me is the setting of Ys itself. Esteria was a fairly normal location, but for such a mythical place... Ys itself isn’t too much different. It has some more extreme environments, like an ice wall and lava filled caverns, but it’s remarkably normal otherwise. While this may come off as disappointing, it fits quite well, considering Ys was never meant to be so grand and mysterious, and is a relatively normal place forced into an abnormal situation. Overall, again, it is a solid conclusion and step forward.

Gameplay:

The gameplay of Ys 2 is more or less the same as Ys 1, for the most part, divisive bump system and all. It does, however, feature several improvements, mostly to the combat. Firstly, the bump system has been changed so that ramming an enemy while moving diagonally will always count as a safe hit for Adol, making combat a lot safer, and enemies generally don’t deal as much damage either. The level system has also been revamped, going from the paltry level cap of 10 to a level cap of 55, meaning you’ll be leveling up and improving till the end of the game. Conversely, individual levels don’t mean nearly as much, but not only are they easier to grind for when necessary, they also make equipment much more important. The biggest gameplay addition, however, is the magic system. Over the course of the game, Adol gains several spells, most notably a spell to shoot fireballs, which can be shot rapidly or charged for a stronger attack, but also includes a spell to temporarily stop time, freezing enemies in place and leaving them defenseless, a passive, yet constantly active spell that reveals secret passages, a spell that allows Adol to appear as a demon, allowing the previously mentioned interactions, and even a spell that can warp him between various towns and other important locations, something that proves extremely helpful. This system alone adds so much to the game, and is a great way of expanding upon the rather limited system of the first game. Accessories have also been overhauled, as rather than just rings with simple effects, they’re various objects with much more unique effects, such as yet another ring that occasionally allows Adol to parry an attack, and an idol that gives homing properties to his fireballs. All bosses except for the last two now require the use of the fireball spell to defeat, making them a lot more reliant on skill than just being at the right level, making them a lot more fun as well, while retaining the frantic feel.

Another addition is the ability to give items like flowers and apples to NPCs as gifts. A few of them will reward you with valuable information, or even items, but for the majority, all you get is some amusing dialogue, all of which is unique, once again proving how insane these writers and localizers can be. You can also choose to throw fireballs at them, causing them to shout some pretty funny comments, which often include references to other games like River City Ransom and Final Fantasy 6. Still, it’s not very practical considering it lowers their affection, requiring more gifts just to get back to neutral. While it doesn’t affect normal dialogue, this little system is worth messing around with, just to see what laughs you can get from it.

Otherwise, the game is more fleshed out, with a lot more places to go to. You’ve got a shrine and a mine combined into one general dungeon, a beautiful ice wall, volcanic caverns, and finally, the Shrine of Solomon. Compared to Darm Tower, the Shrine of Solomon isn’t quite as dominating, but it’s still huge, and sadly still requires a lot of backtracking. I’d wager it’s about a fourth of the game in of itself, possibly a third if you’re quick enough with the rest, and can still get pretty draining. Still, it’s a lot more enjoyable than Darm Tower, having more interesting environments, such as plenty of outdoor areas and a subterranean canal, and certainly lives up to the hype itself had built up. There’s no overworld, but considering how you were gated off by anything you weren’t a high enough level to take on in Ys 1, combined with how tiny and featureless said overworld was regardless, this linearity is preferable, giving a nice sense of progression. There’s also 4 towns spread out quite nicely, giving some much needed breathers after some of the more expansive parts of the game. The game is a decent bit longer than Ys 1, especially if you allow yourself to goof off and take in all the detail, like I did. Overall, Ys 2 has some much improved gameplay, and is a lot more fun than the already enjoyable first game.

Graphics:

The graphics of Ys 2 are about the same level as Ys 1, namely, it looks great, especially the character artwork. One noticeable improvement comes in the area and enemy design, looking a lot more distinct than in the first game, making it all look a lot better. There’s also a dumb, but cute option that lets you hang a “mascot” on the screen, which just amounts to the sprites of various characters and enemies, more characters unlocking at maximum affection. Otherwise, I could just copy and paste I said in this section for the first game. Still, very good.

Sound:

The music, again, is very similar in quality to the first Ys, and is still amazing. Personally, I find the Complete remixes are a bit weaker compared to the first game, but the Chronicles soundtrack still hold strong. Some stand out pieces to me include Too Full of Love, Lance Village’s theme, Ruins of Moondoria, Ice Ridge of Noltia, Palace of Solomon, Tender People, Ramia Village’s theme, and this game’s remix of Feena, which is even better than the version in Ys 1. Overall, still a fantastic followup.

Conclusion:

Overall, Ys 1 & 2 Chronicles gets a recommended from me. It’s short length, questionable combat system, and overall signs of age can certainly be enough to make one wary, but getting past that leaves you with two games full of charm and passion. More than anything, they feel rather comfortable and relaxed. The shorter length, the various options for graphics and music, the general charm of it, and even the goofy and often context-less achievements, these two games manage to be memorable experiences.

This collection is a great introduction to one of the grandfathers of RPGs, a grandfather that’s still going strong after more than 30 years. Till next time, and apologies to anyone who reads this for how horrendously long this ended up.

-Scout

[rironomind]

The Little Priest (1/?)

Rating: G

Fandom: Yao Zai Sheng/Demons and Disasters

Sunmary: Yan Guang wears the earrings by choice. But he refuses to think about what he's chosen.

A/N: So, there's a sidestory about Yan Guang that hasn't been translated yet. It ends on a sad note so I was asked (and I also really wanted) to write a continuation. Will be updated as I write it.

Doctor keeps the house clean and tidy, despite having no servants. Yan Guang marvels at the quality of the guest bedding, though simple, they are more than comfortable. The chill of winter has just begun to recede, yet the room is warm and again, Yan Guang is impressed. It is difficult to find stability in this current climate, but Doctor has carved a niche for himself. The evening’s chatter was, as well, a reflection of Doctor’s good hospitality. “Have you been well?” “En, not bad. Yourself?” “Alright. There’s been a surge in demons recently.” “You must be busy.” “Yes, I’ve been sent out twice in the past month.” “Long journeys?” “Meaningful.” “You’re welcome here any time.” “Thank you.” It is easy to talk to Doctor. There are no requisites for him, he has no need to prove himself, nor is proving himself counterproductive. Doctor does not judge based on any one action, but the person on a whole. Therefore Yan Guang feels at ease. However, his friend, at times, irks him. He is contemplative and meditative, can afford to be contemplative and meditative, more so than Yan Guang himself. Sometimes Yan Guang envies the fact that he doesn’t need to take action, to participate in it. By choice, in fact, as Doctor had expressed through a pointedly neutral tone when the subject arose. It wasn’t through ignorance, the Doctor was a learned man In this respect, Yan guang had to deduce he had chosen, in lieu of some bitter experience in his past, a path free from politics. Yan Guang, as a seeker of justice, cannot do the same. He has already picked his side, has made it his life’s course, and cannot afford the philosophical impartiality Doctor so easily indulges in. It would be much easier to be impartial, to adopt a lifestyle as easily as one adorns a pair of earrings. But mindsets cannot be worn as much as spilled ink on paper can reassemble itself into words like broken promises.