#maybe it’s flashbacks…. this term last year there were only two working machines in the entire college it was fucking hell

[sugarsnappeases]

mentally preparing myself to do a load of washing…. why does it always feel like such a Task

[streetlight11]

Less of you

Summary: He lost the love of his life 4 years ago in a car accident. If he had stopped her from going to that party with her friend, maybe she would still be with him till this day. He tried hooking up with other girls but none of them could fill his void. All until he met you. A girl who worked at a café to pay for your school and house bills. You were completely the opposite of his late girlfriend but you look exactly like her. Who are you and would he have the courage to get to know you?

Theme: doppelganger au, strangers to lovers 

Genre: fluff

Warning: death, accident (please don't drink and drive people!)

WC: 3.9k

Pairing: Bang Chan x Reader

a/n: I write when I’m bored so I may not be good. I hope you like it. I didn’t intend to copy anyone if this storyline has been written before! Also, the words in italics are a flashback! :)

“Hey babe, is it okay if I go to the party with Jiyeon?”

“I don’t know babe, I have a bad feeling about this.” Chan said.

“What? Why?”

“I… I’m not sure. I think you should stay home.”

“But babe, it’s Seori’s birthday party. I’m sure she would want me there.” She tried convincing him.

“Lucy-”

“I’ll just be there for a while, I promise I’ll text you when I’m heading home okay?” She smiled, cupping his cheek softly before disappearing down the hall to go to their shared bedroom.

Hours later, Chan was growing tensed and anxious. There was an unexplainable feeling of discomfort settling in the pit of his stomach which he doesn’t know why. He had already texted his close friends about this. All of them said the same thing. And that was to go fetch Lucy from the party. However, before he could leave the comforts of his shared apartment with his girlfriend, his cell phone began to ring obnoxiously on the kitchen island top.

It was from an unknown number but he decided to pick up the call anyway in hopes that he would hear Lucy’s voice. But what he heard next, wasn’t exactly something he thought he would hear. 

“Hello? Is this Mr Bang Chan?” The female voice spoke up on the other line.

“Uhh, yes? Who is this?”

“This is Lee Haneul speaking. I’m calling from Seoul's National Police Station. Can I confirm with you if you are related to Miss Lucy Hale?”

“I’m her boyfriend.”

“I’m really sorry to inform you that your girlfriend was met in a fatal car crash. We are still investigating the accident to find out what’s the cause. But in the meantime, we will need you to come down to the hospital and identify if the victim is indeed Miss Lucy. Will that be okay?”

“Yes. Yes, absolutely.” Chan said, letting the woman give out the address of the hospital he needed to go before hanging up the call.

Right after he clicked the red button, he instantly collapsed to the ground unable to feel his legs. Chan could feel the tears streaming down his face as he hugged his frame tightly. He couldn’t believe he just received that call. He wanted it to be a prank so badly. He didn’t want all of that to be true. 

Nevertheless, he went to the said hospital in search of the love of his life.

The nurse brought him to a female officer who was standing outside a closed hallway with a doctor, where Chan clarified himself to them. The three individuals soon entered the closed doors, letting the doctor lead them straight down to the basement where the mortuary was located.

Once inside, the doctor walked up to one of the silver units. After reading the name on the side of the unit, he opened the unit door only to pull out the metal stretcher that had a covered body in it. Chan had to close his eyes for a second, too afraid to look forward.

He carefully made his way to the doctor. The man proceeds to unzip the top part of the bag. The moment he pulled the bag apart, Chan immediately covered his mouth with one hand desperately as he gripped onto the metal stretcher. He broke down in a matter of seconds, enough proof to the officer that it was indeed who the victim was said to be. She carefully placed a hand on top of Chan’s shoulder while the doctor pressed his lips in a straight line.

“I’m so sorry Lucy… I’m so sorry I didn’t try harder to stop you from going… I’m so sorry…” Chan whispered as he stared at the pale, blood covered female body that he used to call his girlfriend.

With that being said, the doctor proceeded to zip the bag while the officer and Chan left the mortuary. She let out a silent sigh, knowing exactly how he felt at the moment.

“Thank you for being strong and seeing her for the last time. I hope you’ll feel better soon. She’s in a better place now.” She gave him words of comfort. Even though his mind wasn’t really there with him at the moment, he appreciated the officer’s kind words.

He went home that night feeling nothing but utter loss and grief. It took him at least 4 hours to accept the fact that she’s gone and that there was no way of seeing her again.

He broke the news to his close friends, all of which shock and sympathy was mixed together.

They went to her funeral but Chan felt empty.

He thought his life was going to be dull and miserable now that he lost her. He wasn’t sure if he could continue to live but his friends made it a point to let him go on his days without feeling at a loss. They were truly the friends anyone could ask for.

4 years went by where Chan still tends to miss her presence. But instead of grieving about it, he finally accepts the fact that she was no longer on this earth. Despite meeting new people, new potential partners in his life, none of them could seem to fill the void that has been eating him alive for the past few years.

There were some who he had genuine interest in. But somehow, that relationship never worked out and he wasn’t one to dwell on things for too long. For he just simply moves on with his life and goes about his daily routine.

It was a bright Saturday morning, Chan had already promised Changbin and Jisung to have a morning workout session together.

“So… Hyung, are you contacting anyone?” Jisung asked as he turned to Chan who was currently lifting weights.

“No. I haven’t contacted anyone in months…” Chan sighed. Dropping the barbell onto the ground.

“Why not?” Changbin asked out of curiosity.

“I don’t know. I just don’t feel like anyone’s of my interest.” Chan shrugged his shoulders. The two boys looked at each other only to exchange a knowing look which Chan couldn’t bother to even notice. After they were done with the workout session, the boys left the gym to make their way to a nearby café that they had been going to every time they ended their workout.

They had just entered the café, strong coffee bean aroma filling their nostrils as they walked up to the counter. Only for Chan to halt in his steps when he saw just who was standing behind the counter, taking orders. Both Changbin and Jisung also came to a stop when they saw who Chan was staring at.

“No way…” Chan whispered under his breath. Jisung desperately clinged onto Chan’s arms only to ask in a confused tone.

“Umm… Hyung, is that…?”

“No… It can’t be.” Chan said as they carefully made their way closer to the cashier. The three of them queued up behind the rest of the customers but their eyes couldn’t seem to leave her.

After the customer in front of them walked away, the person standing behind the counter finally locked eyes with all three of them before flashing them a warm smile.

“Good morning! What can I get for you today?” She said. Chan was too dumbfounded that he couldn’t even speak so Changbin did it first.

“Hi, can I get one Iced Americano.” She keyed in his order before turning back to the remaining two.

“Anything else?” She asked with a smile.

“Umm, can I get one Iced Tropical Passion Tea?” She nodded as she entered his order into the machine. Just then, the minute she looked up, Chan had the most prominent frown on his face and she wondered why.

“Is there anything I can get for you?” However, when she received no particular reply from him, she decided to joke around.

“You know, if your order is written on my face, I would so gladly take them down for you.” With that, Chan finally snapped out of his trance. He shook his head, letting his brown locks shift from side to side.

“Uhh… right. S-Sorry. I’ll just have a regular Iced Strawberry Lemonade Green Tea.” She smiled and proceeded to key in his order, only for Changbin to hold his card out. After he was done paying, she asked him for his name or initial. Telling him that she will call out to him once the drinks are made.

The guys went over to a table right next to the window but Chan’s eyes were glued on her. Watching as she made their drinks while she joked around with her co-worker.

“She might look like her but she’s definitely not like her.” 

Changbin commented softly before Jisung hummed in agreement. But Chan still couldn’t seem to let this new information digest into his brain. This girl looked exactly like Lucy except maybe her style and her hair colour but her face was like a copy paste of Lucy.

Lucy was slightly girly and definitely more fashionable in terms of the things she wore. She always loved branded items. She wore mostly dresses or skirts everyday, with designer clothes. She normally wore heels and tends to look richer than she really was. However, Lucy can be very arrogant towards people she doesn’t like or doesn’t know. She would never openly smile to just anyone, nor would she talk to anyone aside from Chan and her close friends. 

Unlike Lucy, this girl was nothing like Lucy and Chan could see the vast difference.

Lucy would never work at a café shop because to her, these kinds of jobs are for people who are not able to support themselves financially. This girl not only works as a barista at a café, her sense of fashion is definitely more laid back compared to Lucy.

She wore a plain white shirt with denim skinny jeans and a pair of Nikes with her café apron on. She had her hair in a low messy bun to keep her hair from falling into customer’s drinks while making them. Character wise, she was a lot more friendlier than Lucy. She had quite a bubbly side to her when she greeted new customers at the cashier.

Chan was just too absorbed in his thoughts that he didn’t even hear her calling out to Changbin. The latter went back to the collection point, not forgetting to get a glimpse of her name on her nametag.

“Thanks… (Y/N).” Changbin smiled, making her return the favour with a small nod.

Chan knew he shouldn’t do it but he wanted to. He wanted to get to know her a little better. Which is why he decided to come visit her again the following week. She was currently leaning against the counter top, facing the café entrance while her co-worker and close friend, Moonbin was fooling around with her since the café was sort of empty with only 6 tables max being occupied.

She had just punched his abdomen softly when he threw a balled tissue onto the top of her head.

Just then, the sound of doorbell chiming caught their attention. She turned towards the door, only to see Chan enter the café. She immediately smiled after remembering his face from last weekend.

Moonbin went to go hide behind the coffee machine, pretending to be busy.

“Hi, welcome to Daisies Café. What can I get for you today?” She greeted Chan with a smile, making him mimic her expression.

“Umm, hey. I think I’ll just have an Iced Berry Mint Tea.” She keyed in his order before asking him if there was anything else he wanted. When he said no, she nodded and proceeded to charge him for it. After she was done, she took the cup and asked him for his name or initial.

“Chan.” She let his name roll off her tongue quietly before smiling at him. She went over to Moonbin only to see the boy grinning like an idiot.

“Why are you smiling at me like that?” She asked her same aged colleague.

“Nothing… He’s kinda your type, no?”

To that, she glanced over to Chan who was seated near the window. He had his laptop on the table with a headphone on his head. A smile graced onto her lips, ignoring Moonbin’s comment and instead, focusing on making Chan’s drink. She knew if she called his name, he wouldn’t be able to hear so she opted to bring his drink over to him instead.

She brought him his drink only for Chan to smile at her, his cute dimples coming to view.

“Oh! Sorry!” 

He apologized before taking the glass from her, feeling her fingers brushing lightly over hers. She got visibly flustered as she pulled her hands back a little too quickly. Chan simply let out a soft chuckle when she excused herself to continue working when he gently gripped her wrist to stop her.

“Hey, umm, are you free later?” He asked.

“I… yeah. Why?”

“Do you… maybe wanna grab dinner with me?” She got quiet for a moment, making him feel bad.

“Uhh, you don’t have to agree! It’s okay.” He reassured her. But there was just something about him that made her smile, a warm feeling blossoming in the pit of her stomach.

“I finish at 5.” She said with a small smile on her face.

“Oh… uhh, great. I’ll come pick you up then.”

“Okay.” She giggled before leaving his table.

7 months was definitely longer than what he had in mind about being friends with her. All the girls that he has dated or contacted ever since Lucy passed wouldn’t last for more than a month. During the last few months, Chan got to know about her background a little better.

Although he does know that (Y/N) can never be Lucy, he slowly started to like (Y/N) for who she is and not just because she looked like Lucy.

In fact, he wouldn’t admit it to anyone, but he actually likes (Y/N)’s personality slightly better.

It was a sunny Saturday evening and she was having a day off. She was just mopping her living room when her phone began to ring. She placed her mop on the bucket only to go to the desk right beside the hallway where her phone was sitting.

It was Chan’s caller ID.

“Hello?” She said.

“Hey! What are you doing?”

“Oh, I was just cleaning my apartment.”

“Do you need an extra hand?” She could hear him chuckle on the other side of the line.

“If you don’t mind getting down and dirty.” She laughed.

“Sure. Then afterwards, I was wondering if you’d wanna meet my friends and hang out with them?” Chan asked softly, making her pause.

For the past few months, (Y/N) had gotten closer to Chan when he kept coming back to the café only to become a regular customer there. However, she has never met Chan’s friends properly simply because she was shy and slightly nervous around a huge crowd.

Chan seemed to read her concerns through the silence. Hence, the reason why he was telling her that she didn’t have to agree to it if she didn’t want to. But she didn’t want to keep rejecting his kind offer of meeting his close friends. She wouldn’t want him to feel bad for asking her so she decided to go with it. About an hour later, Chan came to her place as promised before, only to help her with her spring cleaning.

They joked around with each other a few times, earning soft laughs from them both.

They were just moving their legs back and forth on the ground, dancing along to the music she played in the background when she accidentally slipped. She lost her balance and almost fell backwards but he caught her in time.

Chan wrapped his arms around her waist, pulling her back up against him. A soft gasp left her lips as he asked her if she was okay. But all she did was laugh out loud from her clumsiness. 

He smiled down at her, letting her press her forehead against his shoulder.

After her laughter had died down, she pulled away from him when she felt his arms still securely wrapped around her body. She glanced up, tilting her head to meet his. What she wasn’t ready for was the close proximity of their faces. She could feel his warm breath hit her lips. 

Chan’s eyes naturally fell down to her lips, letting it linger there for a second too long. Before anyone could do anything, Chan’s phone rang in his back pocket. He pulled away not forgetting to apologize to her. 

“Hey. Yeah. I’m at (Y/N)’s house. Yeah. Yeah sure, I’ll be there. Bye Minie.”

Chan hung up the call only for (Y/N) to ask who it was. He said it was Seungmin asking if he was coming to Hyunjin’s apartment later to hangout. She gave him a small smile. About 2 hours later, they were both making their way to Hyunjin’s apartment in Chan’s jeep. She changed into a slightly more casual outfit which was just a fitted shirt, a large flannel, denim skinny jeans and a pair of her favourite sneakers.

When they arrived at Hyunjin’s apartment, Chan walked with her beside him the whole time. They were talking about school projects when he stopped in front of the wooden door.

He gave it a few knocks only to turn to her with a slight frown.

“Are you sure you’re okay with this?” He asked again to make sure she was really okay. But when he received a nod and a smile, Chan’s shoulders relaxed for a bit before the door swung open to reveal a tall blonde boy whom she had never met before.

“Hey hyung!” Hyunjin’s eyes then met hers. She noticed the way his mouth hung open slightly as he took in her features.

“Woah.” He whispered under his breath before he quickly shook his head and welcomed them in. She saw the amount of shoes by the doorstep, making her feel slightly anxious and Chan seemed to notice this. Hyunjin had already re-joined his other friends in the living room when she felt Chan’s hand on her back.

“Hey, you okay?” He asked.

“H-Huh? Oh… Yeah, I’m okay. Sorry… I just… I tend to get anxious when there’s too many guys around me. I’m not used to it.” She said in a hushed whisper.

“We can go home if you want?”

“No! No, please. I’d love to meet your friends, I just need… a little time to get used to this.”

With that, Chan smiled as he cupped her face with one hand only to whisper a soft ‘okay’ before leading her into the living room. That’s when she finally met his friends in person properly. All 7 pairs of eyes were now staring at her with bright expressions but she seemed to feel small under their gazes.

Chan giggled when he felt her gently grip his forearm with both hands, making him speak up to his friends.

“Guys. This is (Y/N). (Y/N), these are my friends.” Chan introduced, only for her to smile to them shyly, partially hiding behind Chan’s larger frame. Some of them couldn’t help but chuckle. They found her quite adorable to say the least.

It took her about an hour or two to warm up to them but eventually, she did. This only made Chan even more proud of her. They were all gathered in Hyunjin’s living room, currently watching a Marvel movie. She was seated on the couch in between Chan and Jeongin, with Changbin right beside her feet on the floor.

They were watching the movie, Jisung and Felix occasionally making comments during the show. Minho was starting to drift off to Lalaland at the side. Hyunjin, Jeongin and Changbin were playing a game on their phones and Seungmin was busy reading an online book.

(Y/N) and Chan were watching the movie in silence but he did notice her getting closer to his side every time she shifts or adjusts herself on the couch. Not that he was complaining.

Just then, Jeongin suddenly flinched harshly beside her.

This was enough to make her jump. However, this caused her to accidentally lean against Chan who had his arm around her waist.

She blushed at this sudden contact. Jeongin apologized to her for scaring her but she simply laughed it off and told him it was fine. But the minute she turned back to Chan, she could feel her breath hitch in her throat with how close his face was to her.

Unfortunately, he was close enough to hear it but he didn’t mock her for it. In fact, he actually giggled thinking it was cute. 

“You okay, love?” His soft voice sultry to her ears.

She hummed in response, only to look forward to the tv screen. Chan chuckled beside her but she ignored it, knowing he probably saw the pink tint on her cheeks. A few hours later, they finally called it a night where Chan sent her back home.

Once they were outside her apartment door, she turned to him to speak up.

“Thanks Chan, for bringing me to meet your friends. They’re really genuine people.”

“No worries. I knew you’d love them.” He chuckled. Suddenly, the air became hot as she struggled to find the right words.

“Chan…”

“Yeah?”

The room fell silent for a moment as they both just stared at each other. Trying to decipher what the other would do next. But she was one step faster than him when the next thing she did was literally what he planned on doing. In one swift movement, she leaned forward to press a chaste kiss to his soft full lips. Chan stood there completely bewildered, unable to take in the fact that that really just happened.

She wasn’t sure how long he would stay like that so she took this chance to hide from him. Wanting to avoid any awkward situations if he doesn’t feel the same way for her. Right when she was about to say goodbye to him and enter her apartment, Chan quickly caught her wrist. She turned around to him with a slightly baffled look. But Chan was cheeky. He used his other hand to pull her closer by her waist only to press his lips on hers again. 

This time, letting his lips stay there slightly longer than before.

She melted into the kiss as soon as he kissed her, making him smile against her lips. She slid her hand up his chest, tangling her fingers in his soft brown locks.

Chan guides her gently back until she is pressed against the door, hugging her waist securely in his arms. She pulled away for air, feeling him press his forehead against hers softly. A few seconds later, Chan whispered softly just loud enough for her to hear.

“I’m really happy to have met you.”

She could feel the butterflies erupting in her stomach at his words. She smiled as he continued.

“I thought my life was over after losing who I thought would be with me forever. But I was wrong. And I realised it when I first saw you at the café that day. Thank you for being there (Y/N). I honestly don't know how my life would have turned out if I didn’t meet you that day.” 

With that being said, she smiled. Cupping his face with both hands gently only to speak up.

“I’m glad I could be the source of happiness for you, Chan.”

Chan kissed her again sweetly before pulling back to say the 3 words he had been wanting to say to her. Only for her to return the favour.

“I love you, (Y/N).”

“I love you too Chan.”

[duhragonball]

Battle Tendency Liveblog JJBA Ch.48-52

This is the “Joseph vs. Straizo” arc, so I’ll just lead off with one of my favorite moments from the entire JoJo franchise, when Joseph furiously declares war on Straizo with tears in his eyes.   In the anime, voice actor Tomokazu Sugita delivered this with such intensity that it actually overshadowed the machine gun.

None of the dubs or translations can do it justice, including this panel from the JoJo’s Colored Adventure scanlation project.   This is a faithful translation of Joseph’s line, as far as I can tell, except they always leave off the last part: “宣戦布告だぜ!!”  In romanji, that’s: “Sensen fukokuda ze!!”    And it means  “This is war!!”  

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Last time, we saw the Joestars treating their new friend Smokey Brown, to dinner at a fancy Italian restaurant.   Some mafia jerk caused trouble, Joseph whooped his ass, and then a second mafia guy apologized and shared a rumor he recently heard: Robert Speedwagon was found dead in a Mexican riverbed, apparently killed by a Tibetan monk.  

From there, we see that Joseph immediately realizes that this must have been Straizo, and Erina suspects that it must have something to do with the Stone Masks and the battle with Dio fifty years ago.   Smokey warns Joseph to consider the source, but Joseph is pretty sure it’s credible information, since mafia guys are all about money.   I’m not sure what that has to do with whether he’s telling the truth, though.   Either way, Joseph slugs the guy for just blurting out such terrible news in front of Granny Erina.  

Now, at this point, Joseph and Erina are making all these Phantom Blood references, and Smokey has no idea what they’re talking about.   And I think seeing this panel helped me understand Smokey’s role as a viewpoint character.  When the Part began, it seemed like Smokey was sort of the narrator for the thing, which works because he’s a good viewpoint character, and he seemed to be settling in as a sidekick like Speedwagon and Poco in Part 1.   But shortly after this he just vanishes from Battle Tendency altogether, and then he shows up at the end like it’s no big deal.   I never quite understood that, and I think this is the sort of thing that fuels the “Araki forgot” memes, but it actually makes a lot of sense.  

See, Smokey’s primary function is to be the viewpoint character, specifically for the readers who missed out on Phantom Blood.    BT is a direct continuation of the previous part, in a way that none of the other JoJo parts are.   Most of the main BT cast was deeply affected by what happened in Part 1.   A few of them lived through it, and the ones that didn’t have personal connections to it.    So they constantly talk about Stone Masks and Dio without really stopping to explain any of it.   Well, if you don’t know what they’re talking about, you can take heart in the fact that Smokey doesn’t know either.   So as long as he can keep up with the story, so can the uninitiated readers.  For now, all that matters is that he’s impressed by the Joestars’ great kindness, and he’s intrigued and disturbed by these hints of a tragic past in their family.  

And eventually, Smokey learns just what happened to the Joestar Family, or at least everything that the reader needs to know to follow Part 2.   But that doesn’t happen until near the end, which is why he shows up to hear the secrets revealed.   But for most of the story, he steps aside, because that’s mostly about Joseph dealing with events in the here and now, so Joseph can act as his own viewpoint character.  

But is Speedwagon truly dead?   The story flashes back to the previous night, after Straizo killed his own disciples and clobbered Speedwagon.   They’re in this temple where Speedwagon discovered more Stone Masks, like the one Dio used, but Speedwagon also discovered an immortal man petrified in a stone column.    Straizo was enlisted to destroy this “Pillar Man” with his Hamon power, but instead he wants to use one of the Stone Masks to turn himself into a vampire.  

Before he does this, he reads Speedy’s translations of the writing on the walls of the temple.    The ancient Aztec cultists who built it said that the Pillar Man was immortal and had many powers, but he was vulnerable to the sun, just like the vampires from Part 1.   But the writings warn that the Pillar Man created the Stone Masks because of this weakness, and one day, “when he befriends the sun, the world will be his.”  That doesn’t seem to follow, since the only thing the Stone Masks seem to be able to do is make new vampires, who are just as vulnerable to sunlight as the Pillar Man.   

Anyway, Straizo doesn’t seem to care.   He just doesn’t want to die of old age, and he’s become disillusioned with the Hamon power he has, so he’s turning heel and going full goth on us.   To avoid Dio’s mistakes, he plans to eliminate any witnesses, including Joseph and Erina.  Then he’ll go into hiding and figure out a long term plan, with the rest of the world unaware of his existence. 

You know, now that I write that out, I’m amazed by how similar that plan is to what Dio ends up doing in Part 3.   In Part 1, he set about turning a whole town into zombies, and planning to unleash them on the world without any real agenda.    But in Part 3 he eventually holed up in a swank mansion in Cairo and took great pains to stay hidden while he acquired more power.   Parts 5 and 8 carry that same idea even further, with villains who go to great lengths to cover up their very existence.   

At any rate, we only see Speedwagon pass out in this scene, so it’s unclear whether he actually dies or not.   Really, using Speedwagon in this way is a pretty smart play.   He’s an old man, and he was never going to survive another 50-year time-skip into the next part, so it’s safe to assume that Part 2 is his swan song.   But how will he die, and when?   It could be at the very start, or maybe somewhere in the middle.  

Anyway, Straizo just walks up to a cafe in New York to confront Joseph, and Joseph whips out a machine gun and shoots his ass.   This whole time, Straizo had assumed that the untrained grandson of Jonathan Joestar would be easy pickings, but Joseph’s a lot more skilled with Hamon than he expected, and he’s tricky too. 

As Joseph fires on Straizo, he recalls how worried Erina was about all this.   The story kind of glosses over it, but Joseph seems to have worked out Straizo’s entire plan.   I guess that’s not much of a stretch.   He and Speedwagon were together with a temple full of Stone Masks, and then Straizo turned on Speedwagon.    Why else would he do that, unless he used the Stone Mask to turn into a vampire like Dio did?   And once you arrive at that conclusion, it isn’t hard to figure out what Straizo’s next move would be.    And that’s how Joseph was so prepared for this.    After the shooting stops, Smokey freaks out about Joseph murdering a dude, but Joseph was expecting a vampire the whole time. 

I also like Joseph’s line in the flashback.   Erina isn’t worried for herself, but for Joseph, because it looks like he’s being pulled into this same tragic fate as the rest of the family.   But Joseph resolves to face this head on.    “If this is my fate, then I accept it.”  Pretty sure Will Zeppeli said the same thing when he discovered that he would die saving Jonathan.  

There’s similar “call-to-adventure” moments in the other parts.   Jonathan has his when he accepts Zeppeli’s offer to train him to battle Dio again.  Jotaro has his when he defeats and saves Kakyoin, then learns what’ll happen to his mother if he doesn’t go.   Josuke has his when Angelo shows up and he has to avenge his grandfather.   Giorno kind of always had a hankering to take on Passione, but I think things got serious once he had a choice between killing or sparing Bruno.  There could be no turning back from that point.  For Jolyne, it was the moment she had a clear path to escape the prison but decided to go back in because that was where her enemy was.    For Johnny, it was that one battle where he chose to crawl towards the danger to save Gyro instead of withdrawing to safety.   For Gappy... I’d have to study that a bit.   

But for Joseph Joestar, it’s this moment.  Erina never sent Joseph to learn the Ripple from the Hamon monastary, and she seems to have taken great pains to keep him out of trouble, but now trouble has come to them, and Joseph isn’t about to back down.   

So yeah, bullets don’t actually kill vampires, but Joseph was hoping to destroy his head with some of those shots, or at least slow Straizo down long enough to finish him off.   Instead Straizo reveals that he has the power to shoot high pressure fluid from his eyes, the same move Dio used to kill Jonathan at the end of Part 1.   He calls this “Space Ripper Stingy Eyes” which is either stupid or brilliant depending on your mood, I guess.   He used it to protect his head from the machine gun fire, and then he uses it again to shoot Joseph... except he hits Joseph’s reflection in a nearby mirror, and I guess he didn’t notice the real thing standing behind him.

What makes this fight so awesome is that these two are determined to kill each other, and they each have extremely simple moves to defeat one another, but they have all these tricks and schemes to protect themselves.   Joseph manages to hit Straizo with Hamon, but it does nothing... because Straizo was a Hamon master before turning into a vampire.   He can’t use the Ripple without destroying himself now, but he still knows how to defend against it.   For instance, he’s got this scarf woven from dead bugs, because it conducts Hamon energy far more effectively than his own body.    So it just absorbs Joseph’s attacks and disperses the energy harmlessly away.   

Does it really have to be made of dead bugs?   I feel like Tonpetti just told him that as a prank.   “No, really (snort!) the only thing that works is dead bugs.  (tee-hee!)   It smells awful but you have to wear it (ha!).”

But Joseph has his own tricks, like... putting a dozen grenades on his opponent’s back when he isn’t looking!  Seriously, there was zero opportunity for him to do this.    One moment he steps over Straizo’s body to see if he’s still alive, and the next moment he supposedly planted all these things on his scarf.   I get that he could pull a string connected to the pin without being noticed, but that’s the only part that makes sense about this.   It’s still awesome, though.   If Jonathan had access to explosives, Part 1 would have been a lot shorter.  

I really think this was the battle that set the tone for Stand Battles in later Parts.   Araki loves these off-panel tricks in combat, and they’re a lot easier to explain when all of your characters have magic super powers.   If Joseph had Hermit Purple in this fight, there’d be no problem at all.   He could just use Hermit Purple to snake through the ventilation shafts and hook up all the grenades.   In fact, it’s tempting to suggest that Joseph was unconsciously using Hermit Purple throughout Part 2, but I don’t want to get into that right now.

Anyway, explosions don’t stop vampires any more than machine gun fire.   Straizo’s body is in pieces, but the pieces just slither back together and regenerate.   Wait, wouldn’t his head have been vaporized in that blast?   Also, Straizo spends the rest of this battle in the nude, so we know that stupid scarf is out of the equation.   Why didn’t Joseph just go back in the cafe and finish Straizo off while he was still in pieces?

Again, it’s easy to say “lol Araki forgot”, but I think it’s a lot more sensible to suggest that Joseph forgot.   As clever as he is, he went in with the Ripple, a machine gun, and a dozen grenades, and Straizo had an answer to all three.   He doesn’t want to press the attack because he’s out of tricks.   All he’s got left is another Hamon attack, which means Straizo will see it coming.   Or he’s still worried about the scarf, and hasn’t realized that it’s gone now.    In any event, he’s running away, creating some distance before Straizo can make his next move.

Also, there’s a lot of bystanders gathering around, so it makes sense to take the fight elsewhere.   Some guy named “Bruty” tries to stop Joseph to impress his girlfriend, but that backfires spectacularly.  Was Bruty in the anime?  I feel like he wasn’t, but I don’t want to check. 

The one I do remember is this girl photographer.   Spider-Man hadn’t been invented yet, so in those days photographers just sort of wandered around with their camera, waiting for Spidey to debut.   This exploding vampire diner is the best she could do in 1938.  

I just really like this lady.   There’s a spark in her eye and I just assumed she would end up being Joseph’s love interest by the end of the story.    Well, we’ll get to that.  

Instead, she’s a hostage.  Joseph and Smokey run to the Brooklyn Bridge?   I guess?   It’s a bridge, I’m sure of that much.   Anyway, Straizo catches this lady and takes her with him to intercept them.   He threatens to kill her unless Joseph faces him again.   But Straizo offers to spare Joseph and never trouble him again if Joseph runs away.   This is because Straizo figures that if Joseph chickens out now, then he’ll never be a threat to Straizo in the future, no matter how powerful his Hamon abilities become. 

Joseph tries to call his bluff, but then Straizo rips out one of the girl’s teeth to prove he means business, and Joseph gets furious all over again.  I don’t think he was ever planning to abandon this fight, but he was probably hoping to get Straizo to give up his hostage at least.   Now he’s just pissed, and Straizo is impressed.  Joseph tries to act cool, but he just can’t hide his passionate feelings.    This is in stark contrast to Jotaro, who wagered his own soul in a poker game and bluffed his way to victory. 

So Straizo tries again with the Space Ripper Stingy Eyes, but this time Joseph blocks it with two shot glasses charged with Hamon power, and then he lands the decisive blow.   But before Straizo dies, Joseph demands to know why Straizo dumped Speedwagon and the others in the river.   Not only does Joseph want to give him a proper burial, but he doesn’t understand why Straizo would have dumped them in the river, since that was how Joseph knew to expect him.  

Wait, I thought Straizo wanted Joseph to know he was coming.   Oh well.

Anyway, Straizo explains that he had to do it, because the Pillar Man was absorbing the blood from his victims.   Straizo was worried that the Pillar Man might awaken, so he put them in the river instead to be safe.    Nevertheless, he suspects that the Pillar Man will reawaken eventually anyway, and Straizo now realizes that it will be Joseph’s destiny to face him some day.    Then Straizo just uses the Ripple one last time, and self-destructs. 

It always seemed strange to me that Straizo saw the danger of the Pillar Man and just left things the way they were.   Maybe he planned to deal with him later, or maybe he just didn’t know or care about it until Joseph defeated him, and he felt a moral obligation to warn someone. 

I guess he could have destroyed the Pillar Man like Speedwagon wanted him to do in the first place, but it seems like Straizo didn’t realize that blood would wake him up until after he was already a vampire, and unable to use the Ripple.  For that matter, it remains to be seen if Hamon will work on Pillar Men.   

Anyway, what else is going on?   Oh, yeah, Europe is getting closer and closer to World War II.   The official start of the war is usually considered to be September 1, 1939, but Italy invaded Ethiopia in 1935, and Japan invaded China in 1937, and Germany annexed Austria and conquered Czechoslovakia in 1938, the year Battle Tendency is set.  So we’re in this weird time period where there’s Nazis in the story, and the British-American protagonist doesn’t care for them, but isn’t trying to kill them on sight.   I’ll be coming back to this topic later on. 

I think the main reason for including Nazi Germany in this story was to draw parallels between their goals and those of the fictional villains.    The Nazis believed themselves to be the “Master Race”, the most “evolved” people, and this made them worthy to rule the world.   Araki notes that they turned to all sorts of sci-fi/occult/fantasy stuff in their war.   Similarly, you have villains like Dio and Straizo turning to mysterious Stone Masks for spooky powers, and then you have the Pillar Man himself, who apparently sought the means to “befriend the sun” and rule over the world.    So the Nazis fit into this theme of trying to claim some sort of supremacy over other beings.  

But what’s their role in this story?   Well, the Germans have an “information base” in Mexico, run by a guy named Stroheim.   He makes pretty ladies shave him with a straight razor, and if he gets a nick he makes them lick the blood off, and then he threatens to cut off their tongues.   Also, he trained his dog to not eat treats until given permission. He’s a sick fuck, is my point. 

Wait, no, my point was that his staff discovered the bodies that Straizo dumped in the river, including Speedwagon, who’s still alive, somehow.      I guess Straizo was going to finish him off but he got in a hurry when he saw the Pillar Man absorbing the blood from the others.  Not sure how Speedwagon survived that ordeal, but Stroheim’s men have been taking care of him this whole time, and he was unconscious until recently, so it might have been touch-and-go for a while. 

            Back in New York, Joseph doesn’t know what this is all about, but he decides to go to Mexico himself to get to the bottom of it...

[walaw717]

Single trees are extraordinary; trees in number more remarkable still. To walk in a wood is to find fault with Socrates’s declaration that ‘Trees and open country cannot teach me anything, whereas men in town do.’ Time is kept and curated and in different ways by trees, and so it is experienced in different ways when one is among them. This discretion of trees, and their patience, are both affecting. It is beyond our capacity to comprehend that the American hardwood forest waited seventy million years for people to come and live in it, though the effort of comprehension is itself worthwhile. It is valuable and disturbing to know that grand oak trees can take three hundred years to grow, three hundred years to live, and three hundred years to die. Such knowledge, thoughtfully considered, changes the grain of the mind. - Robert Macfarlane, The Old Ways: A Journey on Foot Recently we drove to Couer d’Alene. North of town, I saw a strikingly handsome building set in a grove of old-growth trees. It was not a natural landscape, but when the building was constructed, the developer had left some ancient Douglas fir and ponderosa pine and created the impression of a long solidity in the landscape for his construction. It is rare for a builder to go to such trouble because it is simpler and more economical to clear a lot and build than to build around trees and other natural landscape elements. As we sat at the traffic light and I studied the property with its balance of trees, the stone and woodwork of the building, I wondered how the trees had experienced this construction and the loss of so many other trees in that particular stand. Two years ago, I witnessed a tree apparently doing something that I suspect I was not meant to see. Marilyn had just placed a planter full of new young plants on a deck rail, which was under the canopy of a very ancient willow. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught movement and turned just in time to see the willow purposely lift a frond and stroke the young plants. The action was like an arm lifting and then stroking the plants, and the movement occurred twice, lifting and returning, lifting and returning like a parent might stroke the head of a much-loved child. I have had the privilege of many odd and spiritual experiences – especially after I moved to New Mexico. Still, this particular moment in the pacific northwest haunts me as maybe the most significant spiritual moment of my life. I feel as though I saw a moment we are not privileged to see, and if we do see, it is under the influence of a mind-altering chemical like LSD, a moment when our ego is de-potentiated and no longer in control of our perceptions. I have had such experiences using LSD, but that was 50 years ago, and I doubt that I was having a flashback at this late date. Humanity suffers incredible hubris. We speak of looking to space to find intelligent life when we are actually looking for life like us. I suspect if we ever do find life like us, it will be terrifying – it will be a life driven by insularism and an attitude that cannot see us as an equal and will more than likely only see us in terms of our utility or see us in terms of something in the way, much like we see trees, wolves and everything else on this planet. We now scientifically know that trees and plants in forests have a massive communication network of mutually sustainable interactions. “In the 1960s, CIA interrogation expert Cleve Backster experimented with polygraph machines when he stumbled onto something novel. He noticed what appeared to be a change in electrical resistance with one of the plants, to which he connected the polygraph equipment whenever he removed a leaf or even “threatened” to harm the plant by intent alone. He likened this sudden electrical pulse to a “scream” emitted by the plant in response to endangerment. While Backster’s theory was considered a crackpot idea, many would follow similar, unusual observations about the behavior of plants, which seemingly represented a sort of “communication” they might be capable of.

For instance, a 1989 AP article discussed what one physicist, named Ed Wagner, believed were evidence he found of plant communication via what he called “W-waves”: Physicist Ed Wagner says he has found evidence that trees talk to each other in a language he calls W-waves. “If you chop into a tree, you can see that adjacent trees put out an electrical pulse,” said Wagner. “This indicates that they communicated directly.” Explaining the phenomenon, Wagner pointed to a blip on a strip chart recording of the electrical pulse. “It put out a tremendous cry of alarm,” he said. “The adjacent trees put out smaller ones…. People have known there was communication between trees for several years, but they’ve explained it by the chemicals trees produce,” Wagner said. “But I think the real communication is much quicker and more dramatic than that,” he said. “These trees know within a few seconds what is happening. This is an automatic response.” Wagner has measured the speed of W-waves at about 3 feet per second through the air. “They travel much too slowly for electrical waves,” he said. “They seem to be an altogether different entity. That’s what makes them so intriguing. They don’t seem to be electromagnetic waves at all.” Another physicist, William Corliss, also took an interest in Wagner’s discovery, noting that, “The voltage measured by electrodes implanted in trees goes up and down as one goes higher and higher up the trees… incidentally, electricity does seem to affect plant growth.” In more recent years, the idea of plants capable of forms of “communication” has been considered a bit more thoughtfully and is not outright shunned by the scientific community. One leading modern researcher and advocate for the varieties of ways plants communicate is Suzanne Simard, whose work with plants has helped set new precedents for how interactions between various species of flora occur. Simard’s research began to coalesce around what became a doctoral thesis two decades ago, in which she argued that a variety of communication methods were used by trees to achieve everything from expressing their needs to sharing nutrients “via a network of latticed fungi buried in the soil.” She further studied the varieties of ways that fungal filigrees were exploited by trees in ways that allowed them to send signals to other plants nearby about changes in the environment and even “helping” endangered plants by transferring and sharing nutrients with them. Speaking with “Yale Environment 360” last year, she talked about how, as she puts it, a forest “is a cooperative system,” saying: “To me, using the language of ‘communication’ made more sense because we were looking at not just resource transfers, but things like defense signaling and kin recognition signaling. We as human beings can relate to this better. If we can relate to it, then we’re going to care about it more. If we care about it more, then we’re going to do a better job of stewarding our landscapes.” Despite having communicative abilities, plants generally aren’t deemed to have any sort of intelligence. However, there are still some members of the scientific community that argue this is not necessarily the case. Author and researcher Michael Pollan, who studies the field of plant neurobiology, argues that plants are more perceptive than many would think: “They have analogous structures… They have ways of taking all the sensory data they gather in their everyday lives … integrate it, and then behave appropriately in response. And they do this without brains, which, in a way, is what’s incredible about it because we automatically assume you need a brain to process information.” Understanding how various life forms on earth communicate and cooperate with each other gives us a much broader sense of what “life on Earth” is truly about. It also challenges us to consider whether more complex interaction systems exist between organisms, including those that aren’t deemed intelligent or even responsive, by humans. In the case of plants, it seems unusual that these organisms, while deemed

to be very much alive, have long been relegated to being unresponsive and “vegetative,” in the most literal sense. Maybe it’s indeed time we start paying closer attention to our floral kindred and the subtleties of their interactions with each other and their environment.” Trees That Talk: The Bizarre World of Plant Communication Micah HanksJuly 2, 2017 As I come closer to the ending of my own span of years on this earth, I have become more acutely aware of the commonality I have with all life. Fear and suffering appear to be the same across all species, and I am beginning to wonder if love is also – not romantic love, but the deep logos love spiritual people have written about for millennia. I understand there are reasons we avoid seeing these connections and being aware of the “intelligence,” love, and fear of life around us. The Danish/Inuit Arctic explorer Kund Rassmussen once wrote, “The greatest peril of life lies in the fact that human food consists entirely of souls. All the creatures that we to kill and eat, all those that we have to strike down and destroy to make clothes for ourselves, have souls, souls that do not perish with the body and which must therefore be pacified lest they revenge themselves on us for taking away their bodies.” That is seen as a very primitive view, yet I wonder in our confusion of scientific methods for technological growth and exploitation if we are the primitives and the barbarians. I suspect our blindness to the intelligence of life here on earth, intelligence other than ourselves, is summed up in that statement. Maybe all intelligence really is is the knowledge that everything is connected and what we call intelligence is a form of narcissistic blindness. Perhaps the natural intelligence is in the willow, lifting a frond to stroke young plants that came under his/her/its protection and scope. Maybe the only innate intelligence is displayed in how we honor, respect, and care for everything. In addition to slowing me down in my interaction with the world, I find that this view brings me a sense of greater peace and a change in focus about what is and is not essential and how to express that “essentialness.” I also have greater clarity about what the ancients meant when they wrote of a fear of God. It is not a fear full of the pain of punishment – it is an awe that is hard to express and is likely to bring tears and an awareness of the pity of things and our oneness with everything.

[nika-the-hunter]

House of Mist [Ch. 10]

So I apologize for the massive delay. This chapter was going to be a flashback POV from the Archon, but writers block and the current world events have sort of driven that to a halt. In an effort to move the story along, I'm setting the flashback aside for maybe a future chapter/project. I reordered some of the storyboard to fit these changes. Hopefully other chapters will take less time, but I said that last time... so we'll see.

Northern Seattle Ruins, Pacific Northwest House Mist Territory +157 Days

---

Nicole sighed. "The House of Devils seem to have been a real thorn in your side for a long time."

The Archon let out a deep chuckle. "Yes, yes, they have been. Even back on the initial fleets, the Devils were the worst of the worst. Hence their name in your tongue." Marakis sighed and shook his head. His tone dropped. "They've been responsible for many atrocities against your kind, we hear a lot from the humans around here."

"I do want to hear more about the humans here... but... what did you do to draw the Devil's anger?" she asked.

"Well... that is a long one. Centuries ago, while we were living on one of the moons of your sixth planet. The House of Devils managed to track us down. They held us hostage with their superior numbers and ships. We may have had more hardware, but not the crews to use it."

He lifted a computer tablet from the table beside him and slowly swiped through it. "They threatened to wipe us out if we did not act as cannon fodder for their assault on what you call the Last City. There was nothing we could do about it." He brought an image up on the tablet and showed it to her. Smoke billowing up with a Spiderwalker in the foreground. Eliksni were grouped up around its legs, standing in the snow. A small village beneath the rim of something in the sky.

Her Ghost appeared and looked at the image. "This is the Last City? Is this the battle of Six Fronts?"

The Archon nodded. "I do believe that this is what your people call it."

Nicole slapped the Ghost. "So you do know stuff!"

He twirled around with the slap and stopped to blink at her. "It's not really useful information."

"NoT uSeFul inForMaTiOn." Nicole repeated his words in a mocking tone "I don't have any memories of anything. All information is good information."

The Ghost's fins angled down, giving him a frown look. "Okay fine. Once the Archon has finished with this info dump, maybe I can give you another."

The Archon clapped all four of his hands together. "By the Great Machine, you two are adorable. Ghosts have a much better sense of humor than our Servitors."

"Adorable or not," Nicole sighed and leaned back into her chair. "Please continue your story."

"Right right," he paused. "The battle went on for an awfully long time, the Humans were defending the city well. Our Kell decided to take the chance and we retreated. We took all our people and ran. And when the Devils came for us, to make good on their threat; we sprung a trap."

Marakis sighed and looked down at the floor briefly. "The Kell and his Barons stayed behind and held off the Devils as if Mist in its entirety was fighting back. Meanwhile they had the rest of us climb aboard our ships hidden beneath the oceans of the moon... when the time was right, we escaped. The ships jumped to warp immediately upon leaving the methane seas. I do not know what happened once we left, but from what we were able to work out, the shockwave from all our ships disabled the Devil Ketches and prevented them from tracking us here. As far as I know, our Kell and his barons fell in combat, except for Baron Acskis who he sent here to lead our warriors. Acskis has been angry about that ever since."

"He feels guilty that he was the only Baron to survive and not to die with the others" Nicole gave a sidelong glance at her Ghost, remembering that initial shot blowing out her thigh after the first fight in the Pass. Acskis had a monologue about a battle against the Guardians that night before killing her.

"Indeed, many of the old guard perished in the fight with your Last City and the Devils." He shook his head. "The Kell wanted there to be an experienced military leader to advise his son, who took up the mantle of Kell."

"I take it you may have had a run in with Acskis' anger?" He asked, noticing the look on Nicole's face.

"Yes... he shot me many times before finishing me off one night. Threatened to kill Rykis if we told anyone what happened." Nicole felt like informing the Archon was probably safe, and the best solution to that issue. Acskis had to be dealt with.

The Archon signed and interlaced his fingers; his Ether mask bubbled as he took a breath in. "That is troubling... That region is frequented by Human caravans, causing problems with them can be a relations disaster. I will talk with the Kell... and as for you with your acceptance into the House, you can move wherever you want within our territory. I think you would find yourself safer here in... as you humans say... Seattle."

Nicole nodded slowly; she did not want to leave her tower on the edge of the lake. Plenty of future plans had been made for fixing that place up. "Yes... I think I'll have to talk to Rykis about that."

Marakis perked up at that. "You want to talk with the Vandal about moving somewhere else?" He shifted in his seat. "Consulting an Eliksni?"

"Well... yeah..." Nicole felt like she was on the spot. "Rykis and I have basically been living together for the last five months. I think he deserves to be considered... Speaking of... where is he?"

"I never considered the effects of placing an Eliksni with a newly risen Guardian full time..." the Archon ignored Nicole's question and spoke quietly to himself in his own language. Thankfully Rykis had been a good teacher. He seemed to be in thought for a long time. "Well... how close would you say you two are?"

Nicole glanced up at the Archon, a bit of a blush and unease across her face. "I... would say we're pretty close."

He chuckled. "I do not think that he was going to come, I can have one of my associates get him and bring him here."

She nodded. "Yes, that would be nice, thank you."

The Archon summoned a Vandal from somewhere nearby and assigned them to find Rykis. Hopefully, they will come back with the right one; Nicole was not sure if Eliksni had last names but at this point she was too afraid to ask.

"If they are able to track him down, they'll bring him here. There must be more questions you would like to ask?"

"What made you stay here, in the ruins specifically?" She asked, it was not her first question, but keeping in line with the story he told would make it easier to remember.

"Ah well that was simple. The Ketch carrying our main Ether producing Servitor was damaged while escaping the Arcology, the ship crashed into the bay just off this city, and the wreckage was too twisted to free it. At the time it was our only Servitor of considerable size, we could not abandon it."

The Archon waved around, "Now we have many servitors, and we've built a place for us and the Human survivors that wish to take a chance on us. Mist has spent the past centuries forging a place where we can atone for our failures with Humankind. We are not a large house, but we hope it is enough."

Nicole gave him a smile. "Well I do hope that I can help with that." She believed this Eliksni was telling the truth about their motives. Absolutely nothing she had seen so far told her anything different, but the view of life she got in the ruins across the lake was not exceptionally large. "What about the Humans? What can you tell me about them?" There had been a handful of Humans at the admittance ceremony, some wearing House Mist garb, and some not.

"Oh Humans, they're wonderful. There are maybe a few hundred living across Mist Territory, primarily in their own enclaves that are mostly self-sufficient. We trade regularly with a few scattered settlements out across the mountain passes as well, but those haven't been seen since the Devils took up residence there."

She frowned, from what she had heard from Rykis the settlements out there have been quiet for years. 'I see... with the pass cleared will we be making a trip out there to check on them?"

"Likely yes, we also need to restore contact with the Mist crew over at the hydroelectric dam. Flybys with the Jackwings during the battle last month showed that the humans and dam looked to be faring well. But we have not heard from them in a while. Plus, the locals have asked us to check up on some of their people that were out of the flightpath."

"When do you think we'll head out there and do that? Can I go with them?"

"I do think that you will definitely be on that team." He replied. "Make no mistake there. They will want you to meet the locals." The Archon stood and motioned for her to follow him outside. "I anticipate the Kell sending you and the team out in the next few months, they've been doing too many missions lately, we need time to rest and recuperate."

"Then I would like to visit the humans that live here, is that possible?" Nicole asked, passing through the doors behind the Archon.

"That is something we may do. I can have the Vandals bring Rykis to meet us there too." Marakis replied.

"Well, I'd rather speak with them on my own, if you don't mind." She wanted to speak with the other humans on her own terms, and not have the Archon intimidating them. Their opinions on the House of Mist would help her ultimately determine her own thoughts about the trustworthiness of Mist from the Human perspective. From the Eliksni perspective, they seemed alright so far.

He walked her out to an old reflecting pool area underneath the tall art installations she had seen from the air. Various sculptures were surrounded by plants spiraling out from the center. It was obviously well curated. "I think we can do that." The Archon nodded. "Come, to the Skiff"

Nicole followed along to the waiting ship; the rain finally having let up. The Archon must have some sort of non-verbal communication with those that work around him, the oversized Skiff was powered up and ready to go as soon as they boarded.

They did not travel far, and the Skiff stayed low over the rooftops. It headed northwest, over the trees and crumbling buildings. Crossing the old docks, to a large steep hill covered in old low-rise buildings. The structures here looked like they were somewhat newer than the buildings downtown; however, they were far more overgrown. Small trees and bushes sprouted from the tops of buildings, the long unkempt remnants of rooftop gardens and greenspace.

On the other side of the hill was a wide flat area, ringed in a much smaller version of the wall that surrounded the Seattle area. The buildings inside were not very overgrown, many looked like they were still maintained. The area butted right up against the steep hillside that dropped down to the beach, where the water still lapped against the sand. Once the Skiff had done a flyover, it lowered down to an open area outside the wall.

"What is this place?" Nicole asked, hopping out once the Archon disembarked.

"This is one of the local enclaves that the Humans have. This site is arguably older than our habitation of the ruins, but they did not seem to mind once trading started."

Now that they were on the ground, Nicole could see a gate built into the wall. Either side was flanked with House of Mist banners but other, much older, banners blew on a pole above the gate. She had seen one down at the old base... Steilacoom. It was all over that place; painted on rusting vehicles and in tatters on poles. She had to guess that it represented what this region was way back in the Golden Age. The other banner on the pole was not the same layout as the top flag. It had a black and white sea animal superimposed on a geometrical shape. She had seen that before. The faded words on the bottom were not needed for her to recognize the UMIC company logo, the same one from the ID she had found on her old body armor. Thinking on it, she actually did recall the top banner from the card too. It had just been too faded.

She walked forward, taking the lead ahead of Marakis. This was something she wanted to do, finally really meeting fellow Humans.

Her Ghost appeared over her shoulder and looked around the wall. "Seems a bit more hastily built than the other one," he commented. "Last minute construction during the collapse?"

"Maybe, you can ask when we get inside." Nicole replied.

The Archon remained by the Skiff, respecting her wish to meet alone. Nicole approached the door and it began to swing open.

On the other side was an older scruffy Human. He was dressed in a worn bright yellow poncho, reminding Nicole that it had been raining just minutes before. A rifle was slung over his shoulder. He gave her a once over, and stopped on her Ghost, who was giving the old electrical control panel a digital prod. His face lit up. "Guardian! Welcome to Fort Discovery!" He waved her inside excitedly. "Come in, come in."

Nicole smiled and hurried inside. "Please, call me Nicole." The doors behind her slid closed, leaving the Archon outside with the Skiff. "What do I call you?"

"I am Pedro Luzana, sort of the person in charge here." A woman, also wearing a poncho jogged up to them as he led her through their small village. "And this is Athena Miller, my second in charge."

Nicole nodded to them. "Well it is good to meet both of you. I think the two of you are the only humans I've yet to meet face first."

"Right" Athena drew out the word. "You're that new guardian that Mist found poking around the old tunnels, aren't you?"

"Well, I wasn't just down there on my own accord. That's where my Ghost rezzed me." Nicole followed the two as they walked further into the 'fort'.

From the air, this place had looked deserted, and while not as overgrown as the rest of the area, definitely not livable; however from the ground, she could see that most of the overgrowth was on top of awnings and that the ground level was decorated and clear of plants. Human children played in the covered porches of the houses while the adults busied themselves, but everyone waved at the Guardian when they passed.

"Schematics." Athena said.

Pedro chuckled and put his hand on Athena's shoulder. "I'll tell you, when we heard that a Guardian had shown up down in Seattle, we were worried that all this stuff here would come to an end. But then the word came that you wanted to join up, everyone was relieved."

Nicole cocked her head to the side. "As you probably heard I don't know much about other Guardians; them showing up would be bad?"

He shrugged. "Guardians have a habit of shooting at anything non-human and never asking questions. We've never seen one up this way, but stories get passed from the trading caravans. They also like to round up any 'refugees' as they call 'em and send them down to that 'Last City' of theirs." He put his hands up in defense. "Not to say that living in the wildlands isn't dangerous elsewhere, but we've been lucky to have the House of Mist as neighbors."

"Well that's honestly relieving to hear," Nicole said. "I wanted to talk to someone here one on one so that I could find out if this whole Mist situation was okay. All I really know was what Mist told me since I woke up here."

"Mhmm, what we carved out here is good... well, what our founders made has worked well. I'm a third generation Fort Discovery resident. My great grandmother made her way here from a settlement beyond the mountains that got raided by another Fallen House." Pedro had led them to a collection of tables outside of a mostly open building. She could smell food and heard sizzling from inside. "Please have a seat. We can keep talking here."

Nicole plopped down in a seat, she had to adjust her new cloak so that it did not bunch up behind her against the chair back. "So, you called the House of Mist your neighbors? Their Archon said that you were part of Mist."

He sat across from her, and Athena took the seat beside the both of them. "Well yes, we are technically part of the House, but they let us run ourselves. We trade with their markets, help them fish and farm, even assist in the repair of things. Some bits of our old tech still need the Human touch. Do you drink?"

Nicole hummed to herself as she thought about the relationship between Mist and the Humans here. Everything seemed to be working fine with them. "Drink?" she asked, a bit confused, of course she drank water.

"Alcohol or beer? You know that sort of thing." Pedro replied.

The look on Nicole's face was probably response enough, as Athena broke out in a laugh. "I don't think she knows what that stuff is, Pedro."

"No? Right you're newly risen." He looked back into the building over his shoulder and got the attention of another Human inside. "Peter, can you get a cider for our Guardian guest?" The man inside nodded and disappeared deeper in the building. Pedro turned back to the table. "We'll start you on something easy," he laughed.

Nicole gave him a quizzical look. She had been alive for five months now, only eating what the Eliksni were eating, and drinking water. The food was good, but the water was just water. The other human, Peter, brought out a couple mugs and set them on the table. The amber liquid inside fizzed a little. "What is cider?"

"Well, it's a drink made from apples, or other like fruit. We used to get a lot from across the mountains, but that hasn't happened since the Devils closed the pass. This cider here has a kick to it. I think you'll like it." Pedro took his mug and had a sip.

Taking the mug from the table, Nicole looked into it, and gave it a sniff. It smelled bitter, but with a hint of something her mind said was fruity. The deep, not forgotten part of her head said it was apple. Shrugging, she took a sip and let it wash over her tongue. Instant regret. While it started out alright, the after taste was just not good. "Well... it's not bad." She winced. "Never had anything like it before." She set the mug back down on the table. Intent on getting back to the conversation, she looked around and then back to Pedro. "Is there anything bad about Mist? Or the situation?"

Lowering his mug, he set the now empty glass back down. "Eh... not really. They seem really eager to let us be most of the time. I don't think I can think of any incidents in my lifetime that come from Mist. Occasionally a small group of Devils will make it past the perimeter and bother us at our wall, but that's extremely rare."

Nicole thought back to the first night she was rezzed, and the Devil ambush she and Rykis ran into on the other side of the lake. That had been within the supposed safe area. She had put a stop to a lot of those when she helped clear the pass. "So, you think I should trust them?"

Pedro and Athena both nodded at the same time. "Hell yes," he exclaimed, "Like I said, Mist has been good to us, and having a Guardian here might just boost the stability of the area to where we start attracting other people."

"Might attract things we don't want though," Athena pointed out from behind her own mug of cider.

"And that's what I'm for," Nicole nodded, understanding.

"Exactly." Pedro laughed. "Hey Nicole, if you ever have any other questions, feel free to stop by. We'll be happy to help out."

"I think I'll do that. I like talking with fellow Humans." She laughed too.

After a bit more talking, Athena looked up from the table and waved to someone approaching. "Hey, Rykis. What brings you around?"

Nicole looked up and over to see her Vandal walking down the road, waving back to Athena. "Neh-cole asked for me to meet here," he happily replied.

"Well come on and take a seat. Been slow at the market?" Athena asked.

He came over and took the last seat at the table, the chair barely able to fit his larger frame. "I have not been to market for a while. I live with Neh-cole to help her adjust."

"Oh really?" Athena gave Nicole and Rykis a look. "You were the one that got thrown to the Guardian?"

Rykis laughed. "Yes, I was. The only English speaker within the Captain's reach. I thought I was going to die. But Neh-cole was nice."

"I had no idea what was going on when I came out of that hole." Nicole added. "My Ghost had told me about Eliksni, but you all didn't react like he thought."

"In my defense, I got my knowledge from encounters with the House of Winter, and what I learned from the Last City." Her Ghost finally spoke up from her shoulder. He had been flying around looking at things across the fort, and finally returned with Rykis.

"Well glad everything worked out." Athena said.

Rykis looked over at Nicole's full mug of cider. "Are you going to drink that?" he asked.

She shook her head and pushed it over to him. "I think I'm going to have to work on that. It's not really my thing."

"It's an acquired taste." Pedro said. "Once trade resumes with the eastern settlements, we'll have more to try."

Rykis took the mug and unlatched his mask, then proceeded to down the entire glass in one go. "I missed this."

Others from the fort began to make their way up to the table, and Nicole spent the rest of the day talking with the others that lived there. Children liked to poke her Ghost who decided to project a bunch of colors and lights to keep them entertained. It was a good day.

[aion-rsa]

The Public Enemy Solidified Gang Rule Under James Cagney for 90 Years

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William Wellman’s The Public Enemy (1931) turns 90 this weekend. When the film first came out, a theater in Times Square showed it nonstop, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The movie marks the true beginning of gangster movies as a genre. Mervyn LeRoy’s Little Caesar may have hit theaters first, but The Public Enemy set the pattern, and James Cagney nailed the patter. Not just the street talk either; he also understood its machine gun delivery. His Tommy Powers is just a hoodlum, never a boss. He is a button man at best, even if he insisted his suits have six buttons.

The Public Enemy character wasn’t even as high up the ladder as Paul Sorvino’s caporegime Paul Cicero in Martin Scorsese’s Goodfellas. But Cagney secured the turf Edward G. Robinson’s Rico Bandello took a bullet to claim in Little Caesar, and for the rest of his career Cagney never let it go.

Some would argue genre films began in 1931. Besides mob movies, the year introduced the newspaper picture with Lewis Milestone’s The Front Page and John Cromwell’s Scandal Sheet; Universal Pictures began an unholy run of horror classics via Tod Browning’s Dracula and James Whale’s Frankenstein, with the two turning Bela Lugosi and Boris Karloff into household names; and Howard Hawks’ Scarface would land the knockout for the gangster genre, even if it didn’t get released until 1932.

Sadly, the classic “Gangster Film” run only lasted one production season, from 1930 to 1931, and less than 30 films were made during it. Archie Mayo’s The Doorway to Hell started the ball rolling in 1930, when it became a surprise box office hit. It stars Lew Ayres as the top mug, with Cagney as his sidekick. For fans of pre-Code Hollywood, it is highly recommended. It includes a kidnapping scene which results in the death of a kid on the street. Without a speck of blood or any onscreen evidence, it is cinematically shocking in its impact.

Both Little Caesar and The Public Enemy earned their street cred, defying the then-toothless 1930 Motion Picture Production Code, which preceded the Hays Code. After New York censors cut six scenes from The Public Enemy to clear it for release, the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America (MPPDA) set further guidelines for the proper cinematic depiction of crime.

Public Enemy director Wellman was an expert in multiple genres. He spit out biting satires like Nothing Sacred (1937) and Roxie Hart (1942), and captured gritty, dark realities in The Ox-Bow Incident (1943) and Story of G.I. Joe (1945). He won his only Oscar for A Star Is Born (1937). The Public Enemy is the first example of what would be his trademark: stylish cinematography and clever camera-work. The dark suspense he captures is completely different from the look of German expressionism. It captured the overcast shadows of urban reality and would influence the look of later noir films. His main character would inspire generations of actors.

“That’s just like you, Tom Powers. You’re the meanest boy in town.”

Orson Welles lauded James Cagney as “maybe the greatest actor who ever appeared in front of a camera.” Will Rogers said watching Cagney perform was “like a bunch of firecrackers going off all at once.” The New York City born performer explodes in this movie. Even in black and white, Cagney’s red hair flares through the air like sulfur on a match. It turns out to be a slow burn, which will reach its ultimate climax in 1949’s White Heat. The Public Enemy is loaded with top talent, but you can’t take your eyes off Cagney. Not even for a second. You might miss some tiny detail, like the flash of a grin, a wink, or a barely perceptible glare.

Cagney had a simple rule to acting: All you had to do was to look the other person straight in the eyes and say your lines. “But mean them.” In The Public Enemy, the characters communicate without lines. When Tom and Matt Doyle (Edward Woods) sneak a peek into Larry the Limp’s casket, we understand this is the first time the two young thugs lost someone their own age. The scene barely implies how fortunate they are not to be in that box, but their curiosity is as palpable as the loss of their last shred of innocence.

Cagney was originally cast as Matt, and scenes were shot with him in the role. The parts were switched mid-production, but they didn’t reshoot the flashback scenes, making it look like the pair swapped bodies between 1909 and 1915. It’s a shame because Frankie Darro, who plays the young Matt, made a career out of playing baby face Cagney, and later joined the East Side Kids franchise.

Former “Our Gang” actor Frank Coghlan Jr. took on the role of young Tom. He takes the lashes from his cop father’s belt, backtalking him the whole time. Tom Powers is reprehensible. He never says thank you and doesn’t shake hands. He delights in the violence and sadism. Powers doesn’t go into crime because of poverty; he just can’t be contained. Cagney’s mobster mangles, manhandles, maims and murders, and still needs more room in his inseam. 

Dames, Molls, and Grapefruits

Besides defying the ban on romanticizing criminals, both The Public Enemy and Little Caesar broke sexual codes. There are explicit signs that Rico Bandello represses his sexuality in Caesar. Scenes between him and his friend Joe, and his gunman Otera, thinly veil homoerotic overtones. Public Enemy’s Powers, by contrast, subtly encourages the gay tailor who is openly hitting on him.

There are strong indications Putty Nose (Murray Kinnell) is grooming Tommy and Matt for more than just fenced goods. Look at the way Putty sticks his ass in Powers’ face while he is shooting pool. Putty Nose’s execution at the piano is creepily informed by the unspoken sins between the men. Tommy relishes the kill.

However, Tommy doesn’t relish being manhandled when he’s too drunk to notice. While the gang goes to the mattresses in the movie’s gang war, Tommy is raped by Jane (Mia Marvin), his boss Paddy’s girl. Powers protests the best he can, but the camera angles leave no doubt. Tommy wakes up hungover, horrified, and feeling impotent. Matt, however, has no trouble getting “busy” with his girlfriend Mamie, played by Joan Blondell, in one of the scenes trimmed by the censors.  Blondell, Jean Harlow, and Mae Clarke, who plays Tommy’s girlfriend Kitty, represent a glitzy cross-section of white Roaring Twenties glamour. In the opening credits, when Harlow and Blondell smile at the camera, male audience members of the time blushed.

Harlow was Hollywood’s original “Blonde Bombshell,” starring in the movie that coined the term. Her earthy comic performances would make her a major star at MGM, but she was a dud to critics of The Public Enemy. Hers was the only part which was criticized, and the reviewers were brutal, declaring her voice untrained and her presence boring.

Harlow’s greatest asset had to be contained within the Pre-Code era. Straddled with a wordy part as a slumming society dame, she is directed to slow her lines to counter the quick patter of the rest of the cast. Yet Harlow uses that to her benefit in the film’s best moment of sexual innuendo. While telling Tommy about “the men I’ve known,” she pauses, and appears to be calculating them in her head before she says, “And I’ve known dozens of them.” When an evening alone with Tommy is cut short, Gwen’s exasperation over the coitus interruptus is palpable. Members of the Catholic Legion of Decency probably had to go to confession after viewing the film for slicing.

Most people know The Public Enemy for the famous grapefruit scene where Powers pushes a grapefruit into his girlfriend’s face. “I wish you was a wishing well,” he warns, “so that I could tie a bucket to you and sink ya.” Tommy treats women like property. They are status symbols, the same as clothes or cars. Kitty’s passive-aggressive hints at commitment get on Tom’s nerves. He can only express himself through violence. There are rumors Cagney, who would go on to rough up Virginia Mayo in White Heat and brutalize Doris Day in Love Me or Leave Me, didn’t warn Clarke he was going to use her face as a juicer. According to the autobiography Cagney by Cagney, Clarke’s ex-husband Lew Brice loved the scene so much he watched it a few times a day, timing his entrance into the theater to catch it and leave.

Both actors have said it was staged as a practical joke to see how the film crew would react. It wasn’t meant to make the final cut. Wellman told TCM he added it because he always wanted to do that to his wife. The writer reportedly wrote the scene as a kind of wish-fulfilling fantasy.

The screenplay was written by Harvey F. Thew. It was based on Beer and Blood by John Bright and Kubec Glasmon. The unpublished novel fleshed out press accounts of the bootlegging Northside gang leaders, Charles Dion “Deanie” O’Banion, Earl “Hymie” Weiss, and Louis “Two-Gun” Alterie. Cagney based his Tommy Powers character on O’Banion and Altiere. Edward Woods was doing his take on Weiss. The book reflected the headlines in the Chicago papers, which reported Weiss smashed an omelet into his girlfriend’s face.

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The Public Enemy borrowed from the day’s headlines in other ways too. Hymie Weiss was assassinated in October 1926. It was the first reported “machine-gun nest” murder. It is recreated in the killing of Matt Doyle. While shooting the sequence, Cagney ducked real machine gun fire to bring authenticity to the scene. Also taken from real life is the fact that after O’Banion was killed in ‘24, Alterie’s first reaction was to do public battle with the killers. This is similar to Tommy’s final shootout at Schemer Burns’ nightclub headquarters.

Leslie Fenton’s dashing mob captain Nails Nathan (“born Samuel”) flashes the greatest grin in mob movie history. He is based on Samuel “Nails” Morton, a member of O’Banion’s mob. Both “Nails” were driven to their coffins the way it is depicted in The Public Enemy. The real Morton died in a riding accident in 1923, and “Two-Gun” Alterie and some of the other gang members went back to the stables, rented the horse which kicked Nails in the head, and shot the animal. Mario Puzo may have been inspired by this scene when he wrote The Godfather. It is not only tie to the Francis Ford Coppola movie. Oranges have as much vitamin C as grapefruits. Another similarity between the two films is the threat of being kidnapped from the hospital by a rival gang.

The Powers brothers’ relationship vaguely echoes the one between war hero Michael and Sonny Corleone, who believes, as his father does, soldiers were “saps” to risk their lives for strangers. Donald Cook, who played Mike Powers, didn’t pull any punches on the set. In the scene where he knocks Tom into the table before going off to war, he really connects. Wellman told Cook to do it without warning so he could get that look of surprise. Cook broke one of Cagney’s teeth, but Cagney stayed in character and finished the scene.

“It is a wicked business.”

After the stock market crash, get-rich-quick schemes seemed the only way through the Great Depression. The gangster was an acceptable headline hero during Prohibition because the law was unpopular with the press. But after 1929, the gangster became the scapegoat villain. The Public Enemy was the ninth highest grossing film of 1931. But the genre lost its appeal after April of that year, as studios pumped out pale imitations and audiences got tired of the saturation, according to the book Violence and American Cinema, edited by J. David Slocum. Religious and civic groups accused Hollywood of romanticizing crime and glamorizing gangsters.

The Public Enemy opens with a dire warning: Don’t be a gangster. Hoodlums and terrorists of the underworld should not be glamorized. The only MPAA rule the film didn’t break was portraying an alliance between organized crime and politics. The studios passed the films off as cautionary tales which were meant to deflate the gangster’s appeal by ridiculing their false heroism.

Through this hand-wringing, however, Cagney turns false heroics on its head with the comic brilliance of a Mack Sennett short. Stuck without a gun, he robs a gun store armed with nothing but moxie. Powers never rises in the organization. He takes orders and whatever the boss says is a good cut, only asking for more money once from Putty Nose. Unlike Rico, who rose to be boss among bosses, Powers has no power to lose. This is just the first gig he landed since he was a regular “ding ding” driving a streetcar, and it connected with audiences like a sock on the button. They identified with the scrappy killer, and it surprised them.

Even Gwen notices Tommy is “very different, and it isn’t only a difference in manner and outward appearances. It’s a difference in basic character.” Strict Freudians might lay this on his mother (Beryl Mercer), the greatest enabler Cagney will see until White Heat. Ma Powers’ little boy is a budding psychopath knocking off half the North Side, but look at the head on his beer. For audiences at the time, Tom was the smiling, fresh-scrubbed face of evil. He is consistently unsympathetic but likable from the moment he hits the opening credits.

Like Malcom McDowell’s Alex in A Clockwork Orange, he is the fiend’s best friend. Even if it is Tommy’s fault his best pal Matt gets killed. While Cagney spent his career ducking his “you dirty, double-crossing, rat” line from Taxi, the actor wasn’t afraid to play one in Powers. He’s not a rat in the sense he’d snitch on anyone. He’s the last of the pack who sticks it out for his pals when his back is up against the wall.

A Hail of Bullets

Tommy Powers goes by this credo: live fast, die young, and leave a corpse so riddled with bullets, not even his mother can look at his body when he’s done. But then, no one can end a film like Cagney. He’s danced down the White House stairs in Yankee Doodle Dandy (1942), been rolled across the concrete steps of a city church in The Roaring Twenties (1939), and was blown to kingdom come in White Heat. He gets two death scenes in The Public Enemy, a rain-soaked climax, and a denouement as scary as The Mummy. Tommy only brings one gun to the gang fight, and by the time he hits the pavement, he’s got more holes in him than the city sewage system.

“I ain’t so tough,” Tommy says on his final roll into the gutter. Cagney’s first professional job was in a musical drag act on the Vaudeville circuit, and he called himself a “song and dance man” long after retirement. For The Public Enemy, conductor David Mendoza led the Vitaphone Orchestra through such period hits as “Toot Toot Tootsie (Goodbye),” “Smiles,” and “I Surrender Dear.” But the song “I’m Forever Blowing Bubbles” is the one which lingers in the memory. Martin Scorsese has cited it as a reason his films are so filled with recognizable music.

Street violence comes with a natural soundtrack. Transistor radios accompany takedowns. Boom boxes blast during shakedowns. Car stereos boost the bass during drive-by shootings. In The Gang That Couldn’t Shoot Straight, mobsters feed quarters into a jukebox to cover up sounds of a beating.

In The Godfather, Part II, a street band plays traditional Italian songs while Vito Corleone puts bullets in the neighborhood Black Hand, Don Fanucci. The last thing we hear in the abrupt close to the mob series The Sopranos is a Journey song. The first thing Tommy’s mother does when she hears her boy is coming home from the hospital is drop a needle on a record.

The ending leaves us with two questions: Who killed Tommy, and what’s his brother going to do about it? We figure whoever did the job on Powers was probably a low-level button man from Schemer’s rival outfit. Probably even lower down the ladder than Tommy, and on his way up, until another Tommy comes along. Crime only pays in the movies, Edward G. Robinson often joked.

Mike’s reaction to the bandaged corpse is ambiguous. He’s already shown outward signs of the trauma following the horrors of war. Is he clenching his fists in anguish or anger? Is he broken by the battlefield or marching off in vengeance, a soldier on one last duty? Cook’s exit can go either way.

After 90 years, The Public Enemy is still fresh. It’s aged better than Little Caesar or Scarface. Cagney wouldn’t play a gangster again until 1938, but the image is etched so deeply in the persona, audiences forget the vagaries of villainy Hollywood could spin, and the range of characters Cagney could play. He and the film continue to influence filmmakers, inform culture, and surprise audiences. Tommy Powers was just a mug, but those streets are still his.

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[inkedsoldier]

AMOR VINCIT OMNIA - Chapter Three

A/N: Chapter three of the Sam Drake x reader series is ready to be read. Enjoy and let me know what you think!

Y/N = Your name.

Y/F/N = Your first name.

Y/L/N = Your last name.

Characters: Sam Drake, Nathan Drake, Rafe Adler, Victor Sullivan, Y/N.

Warnings: angst.

Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author of this story. The author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any previously copyrighted material. No copyright infringement is intended.

Masterlist

Chapter Three

Lost

 Scotland, December 2000

Killing the person that came up with the term morning sickness was the next thing on your so-called bucket list. It was like having the most awful stomach flu of all time. Nausea appeared and disappeared again, and the urge to vomit came with just the slightest provocation. The things you normally loved to eat now made you uneasy in every possible way. Morning sickness lasted all damn day and it could go on for another five or six months. As well as the feeling you had to pee every fifteen minutes. 

You rubbed the remainders of sleep from your eyes and gazed out of the bedroom window. It was still dark outside and waking up was a harsh thing to do. Since you heard the news of your pregnancy you had talked a lot with Nate. He wasn’t planning on letting you do this alone and insisted on being the “cool uncle”. He was the only one you could talk to. You had spoken to Rafe about what was going on, but afterwards he showed no interest at all - so you decided to pull out of the Avery job. Your health was currently way more important than a ‘might not even exist pirate treasure’. You still supported Nate, whom kept working with Rafe, and you helped him when he needed your expertise. After the time you took to think, you decided to give this pregnancy your all - the baby was the last thing left of the love between you and Sam.

Flashback “Why don’t you just tell her, Sam? I see that look in your eyes. You’re in l-o-v-e.” Nate said with a smirk plastered on his face. “What? No. She is not one of those girls that fall in love with a guy like me, so why would I even try?” Sam replied. You never left his mind, you were always there; it was a strange feeling, almost overwhelming. There was something in the way you laugh that reminds him of a better self. You have a creative brain that brings magic and interest to life. From the moment Nate had introduced you to Sam, he admired you and tried to memorize every detail about you. Some call it bewitched; Nate called it love.

After finally leaving your warm bed, you grabbed one of Sam’s old oversized hoodies on your way to the living room. It still smelled like him; just like all the other clothes of him you had kept. The hoodie had a baggy fit on you, but that didn’t matter; you loved that anyway, especially now you started to show. Your stomach was growling, and you really needed some breakfast. When you opened the door, you spotted Nathan on the couch, fast asleep. He never made it to bed last night after your late-night talk, while watching some kind of Scottish talk show. Quietly you walked towards the kitchen, trying to avoid any abrupt noise that would wake up Nate, but you totally missed the box standing around the corner. Time seems to slow down when you are falling. In the seconds it took to reach the ground you knew this was going to hurt. Nate woke and jumped off the couch, taking in his surroundings as quick as possible. His heart is pounding, as if all the adrenaline in his body was released. After so many years of stealing and hunting every action is automatic. As soon as he sees you laying on the ground, he jumps over the couch and tries to help you get up. “You okay? Did you hurt yourself? What the hell happened? Shit.” Luckily, you managed to catch yourself with your hands before falling flat faced on the wooden floor. You were now as steady as a baby taking its first steps. “I’m okay, Nate. Everything is okay. I’m so sorry for waking you, I know how you need the sleep,” you spoke softly. “Don’t apologize, Y/N. There is no need to,” he told you as you carefully went on with your morning routine. You made some tea and toast for you and Nate, before lowering yourself on the couch next to him. He carefully wraps his arms around you to give you a sweet brotherly hug. He wanted to assure you that he was here for you if you needed him. It was certainly a weight lifted of your shoulders now you knew that you weren’t in this alone. Not that you were still not terrified, but it made it all a bit more bearable.

The next day Nathan was meeting with Sully in a small pub in the city. Victor Sullivan was like a father figure to Nathan. He could really use a moment to talk with him in private, maybe he would finally be able to talk about Sam’s death and the emotions he tries to hide away. You were just like Nate; hiding emotions was easier than talking about them. As he drove away in a cab, you made yourself comfortable on the couch, with a hot cup of tea on the side table and a documentary about the Titanic on the television. Your eyes started to feel heavier and heavier, sending you into a dreamless sleep.

Around two hours later you got woken up by a strong ache. With the most recent check-up the doctor told you cramps were normal during pregnancy, so it didn’t concern you at first, but after about ten minutes they became stronger by the minute. You tried to steady yourself to walk to the kitchen to grab a glass of water so you could calm you down a bit, but as soon as you reached for the cabinet it felt like you got stabbed in your abdomen. Your legs felt shaky and you couldn’t support your body no more. Trembling with fear you fell to the floor wrapping your arms around your stomach in shock. You never had experienced a pain like this in your entire life.

“I’m sure she would love to see you, Sully!” Nathan told him after stepping out of the cab bringing them to the flat he now called home. “The last couple of weeks have been tough on both of us, but she is stronger than anyone I know. To be honest, I don’t know if I would have been here if it was not for her. She is like a little sister to me and remembers me that I’m not alone,” Nathan tells him while putting the key into the lock to open the door to the apartment. “I’m not sure what to think about Rafe at the moment. He is obsessed with the treasure, and…,” he wasn’t able to finish his sentence as he heard your cries coming from the kitchen. The two men rush inside and notice you holding onto one of the lower cabinets with one hand and your other hand on your stomach. Nathan couldn’t believe his eyes; there was a blood stain in your shorts, and you were gasping for air. “Sully, call the emergency number!”

  Flashback The telephone’s ring pierced the silence, and your heart rose to your throat as you walked across the room and picked up the handheld. “Hello?” you said softly. “Hey kid, how are you holding up?” the familiar voice spoke. “Sully! Hey, how are you doing? I’m doing okay. Still a bit shaken, but so far so good. Nate told me he spoke to you about the whole baby thing,” you told him while walking towards the couch. “Yeah, he was worried, sweetheart. I hope you are not mad at him for telling me,” he asked you. “No, of course not. I’m actually glad he told you. I don’t think I had the strength to do it at that moment… I’m terrified, Sully” you spoke with tears filling your eyes. “Don’t be, sweetheart. Both me and Nate are here for you. I’ll come visit as soon as possible to drop some stuff at your place and talk to Nate and you, okay?” Knowing that Sully would soon come to visit made you happy, “I would love that. Thanks for calling, Sully! Bye.”

Early next morning You lay there, keeping your eyes closed, matching your breathing to the beeping of the machines that surrounded the bed. There was only one indication of existence, one heartbeat. Your legs were numb, and your eyes swollen. You slowly tried to open them as you meet the disappointing view of a cream coloured hospital room. As you slid your eyes sideways, you notice that Nathan and Sully had fallen asleep. There was a stagnant smell in the air with a hint of hospital food. While turning your eyes back to the ceiling a tear fell down your pale cheek. Your heart is hammering inside your chest, and breaths come in gasps as you feel the panic rise. The pain of loss hit again out of nowhere, racking your body with sobs. Why the hell was this shit happening to you? Haven’t you lost enough already? Today you lost the last thing that connected you with Sam; heaven just welcomed another angel.

Tag list: @kiara-arts​ @wintermuteway​

[chiseler]

“You Devilish Mummy!”: Mexican Horror in America, 1958-1963

Rosa Arenas

For some people, Cinqo de Mayo means a nacho party platter, a cooler full of Corona, plastic sombreros and a pinata filled with stale butterscotch discs. For a few of us, though, Cinqo de Mayo means one thing and one thing only: Aztec mummies. The sad part of it is that it might actually make much more sense than the nachos.

After Tod Browning and his crew left the set at the end of the shooting day while working on 1931’s Dracula, they were replaced by director George Melford and a Mexican cast and crew. Using the same sets, the same cameras, and a translated version of the script, they worked all night to shoot the Spanish-language version of the film. Those who have seen both tend to agree that the Spanish version is the superior of the two. The cinematography is more vibrant and less stage-bound than the Browning version, the atmosphere is richer (possibly because they were shooting at night), and most important of all, the Mexican Dracula (Carlos Villar) smolders with a sexual energy and menace Bela Lugosi, great as he is, lacks.

Prior to the mid-’50s, most American audiences would probably be surprised to learn that Mexico even had its own film industry. That’s when low-budget producers from Sam Arkoff on down recognized the economic advantages of snapping up the US distribution rights to existing foreign genre pictures. It made perfect sense. You didn’t need to hire any directors or cameramen or gaffers. There were no actor hissy fits to smooth over. All you needed to do was dub in some English dialogue that more or less made sense, fit the action on the screen, and approximately matched the actors’ lip movements. Or maybe not, whatever. Sometimes you might want to bring in an editor to try and rearrange a few scenes so the picture and dialogue’ll make more sense to the kids at the drive-in, but even that wasn’t always necessary. Come up with a snappy English title, Americanize some of the actors’ names, and you’re good to go. The important thing is these films could be picked up for a song, and minus a few minor expenses everything they brought in was gravy.

Suddenly US theaters were full of sci-fi, horror, and westerns from Italy, Japan, Spain, and yes indeed, Mexico. Low-budget distributor K. Gordon Murray quickly established himself as the king of marketing Mexican horror cheapies to American audiences, handling films like The Man and the Monster, The Brainiac, Curse of the Doll People, and a whole lotta movies with “Aztec Mummy” in the title.  It would be nice to say these films have complex and thought-provoking storylines, that the acting is strong and subtle, that the cinematography is dazzling and the special effects on a par with any major American studio at the time, but that would really be pushing it. A lot of the films were just slapdash, flat-footed remakes of popular American films but with cheaper sets. A few of them do stand out, though, in that even the dubbed and edited versions remain uniquely Mexican, even if they do seem to tell the same story over and over again. And some of them are just plain nuts.

Genre director Rafael Portillo and screenwriter Alfredo Salazar were best known for their Aztec Mummy and wrestling pictures, and in 1958 topped even Santo Meets Dracula with La momia azteca contra el robot humano, translated as The Aztec Mummy Against the Humanoid Robot or, more simply, The Robot Meets the Aztec Mummy.

As the opening narration assures us, the film is based on an “actual experiment” conducted by two scientists from “The Los Angeles University” and verified by witnesses who “signed sworn statements with a notary public” so “there is no question about this story’s authenticity.”

Please keep that in mind.

The film is told mostly in flashback and through voiceover, which is generally a sure sign you’re watching a heavy-handed bit of editorial butchery. The same sort of thing was done regularly to the US versions of Toho films, usually with a mind toward simplifying the story.

Okay, a psychiatrist (Ramón Gay) is mocked by his colleagues when he presents a paper about past life regression, so he storms home and hypnotizes his wife Flora (Rosa Arenas). We slip into a low budget flashback within a flashback as we learn Flora was once an Aztec maiden on schedule to be sacrificed when she runs off with a warrior. The village priests find them, bring them back, and bury the warrior alive after placing a curse on him. Then they fit the old Flora with a gold bracelet and breastplate inscribed with directions to the location of “the secret Aztec treasure.” Then they cut out her heart, which may say something about the effectiveness of that breastplate.

Returning to the first flashback, we learn the evil Dr. Krupp had spied on the experiment and now wants in on it. Nevertheless the good doctor decides for some reason that the best way to prove his theory is to find the bracelet and breastplate, so they all go looking. Lucky for them they find a secret passage under the pyramid that I guess is in their backyard. Moments later they find the ancient temple, the skeleton of the old Flora, and the breastplate which they take home with them. The fun doesn’t last long, though, as  the warrior’s mummy shows up at the house, grabs the breastplate, grabs Flora, returns to the temple, and prepares to cut out her heart again. At this point we’re about six minutes into the film.

Then it turns out, see, that Dr. Krupp is really a sinister underworld figure known as The Bat, and...oh screw it. Over the course of the rest of the film we get gangsters, a shootout, hypnotism, a mad scientist, a pit full of rattlesnakes, that mummy again, some Aztec rituals, a few vanishing bodies, a police investigation, a stolen corpse, a stolen brain, and a stolen “machine that uses radium,” together with lines of dialogue like, “oh, you devilish mummy!” and “continuing our search we hurried to the snake pit.” Eventually we even get a robot there near the end (though it’s more of a reanimated corpse wearing a metal suit festooned with some blinking lightbulbs),and it has a brief and slow wrestling match with the mummy.

And all of it, believe it or not, is crammed into a zippy 65 minutes. No, it’s not a particularly good film as the term is traditionally used, but it is a fascinating one. As crazy as it all gets, as big as some of the plot holes and lapses in logic may seem, the craziest thing of all is that you can’t really criticize it for any of that given that it’s, y’know, based on a true story.

Robot Meets the Aztec Mummy is a pretty extreme example of what was coming out of Mexico at the time. Other genre pictures were no less strange, maybe, but a little more sane.

Three years after Bert I. Gordon’s Attack of the Puppet People and 25 years after Tod Browning’s The Devil Doll, Benito Alazraki released his 1961 film Muñecos infernales, better known in the States  as Curse of the Doll People.

An archaeologist interested in ancient rights and such and her physician husband (Ramon Gay again) visit an art collector friend who regales them with the exciting tale of his recent trip to Haiti. While there, see, he and two friends witnessed a secret voodoo ritual that included human sacrifice. For all the crazy goings on though, the art collector couldn’t take his eyes off the idol the voodoo priests were worshipping. He thought it would make a fine addition to his collection, so the next day he went back and stole it.

(Given that the story is not told in flashback, just by some guy sitting in an easy chair, I’m tempted to think the whole Haiti angle was an invention of the screenwriter for the American version. Maybe the producer was a little tired of Aztecs by this point.)

It’s not hard to guess that stealing a revered idol from a voodoo temple is not without its repercussions, and sure enough before you know it the children of all the men on the Haiti trip start receiving new dolls in the mail. Real nice, realistic-looking ones too. None of the parents seem a bit concerned by the arrival of anonymous gifts for their children, merely handing the dolls to the tykes and sending them off to bed. After a few cuts to an oddly Mexican-looking Haitian voodoo priest, well you guessed it. the dolls start coming to life and knocking off the parents in ways that can’t easily be traced back as the work of an evil dolly.

The one surprise here is given the budget, the special effects (midgets in doll clothes on oversized sets) are really, really good. Better than Bert Gordon’s, even. It’s just too bad the story around them doesn’t have a bit more zing to it. It’s a little flabby and obvious. Still, you start to get the sense a pattern is developing.

El baron del terror (released in the States as The Brainiac in 1962), directed by Chano Urueta, marked a bit of a break from the simple revenge plot. Oh wait, no it didn’t. But it was still a break from the standard storyline.

As the film opens it’s 1661, a comet has appeared in the sky, and  an evil baron  (Abel Salazar) is being burned at the stake by Inquisitors for practicing black magic. As evil barons are so wont to do when finding themselves in circumstances like that, he places a curse on all those who condemned him, vowing he would return in 300 years when the comet reappears and kill off all their descendants. The Inquisitors, for some reason, don’t seem terribly concerned by all this and go ahead and burn him anyway.

Cut to three hundred years in the future and true to his word the comet has reappeared and so has the baron, who  starts snuffing people who didn’t even know they were related to Inquisitors. Yes, it’s a plot we’ve seen how many times already? But the Brainiac, as the title might hint, does offer a twist or two. First, before he kills his victims the Baron transforms into a kind of hideous horned demon monster (the doll special effects were better). Then during the murders he sucks out his victims’ brains, which he keeps in a big salad bowl in the kitchen. When he lures someone over to his apartment and confirms their identity, all he needs to do is excuse himself to the kitchen for a moment, have a spoonful of brains, and shazam. No more descendant and more brains for the baron.

A year later  Ueueta returned to more standard form with La cabeza viviente, aka The Living Head. Here again he opens with a long prologue in which he went to some pains to at least give the illusion of historical accuracy. When a great Aztec general dies, not only is he buried, but so are a few of his servants and a high priestess to help him on his way in the afterlife. That those others weren’t quite dead yet doesn’t seem to matter much. It’s all quite a big to-do.

Cut to 450 years in the future, as an incredibly bad archaeologist and two assistants stumble upon the tomb. First they completely destroy the mummy of the high priestess and shrug it off. Then when he finds the invaluable Ring of Death, the archaeologist immediately announces that he’s going to give it to his daughter, “who likes ugly things like that.” Then after reading aloud the very clear curse that will befall anyone who desecrates the tomb, the trio scurry’s off with the general’s mummified head and the mummy of his servant (the one still clutching the knife). Do they then deliver them to the museum where they can be properly cared for and kept in carefully climate-controlled environments? Well, almost: he brings them back to his apartment and keeps them in the living room.

Yeah, it’s not really hard to see where this is headed. The daughter starts wearing the Ring of Death and gets a little kooky in the head . Then the servant and head come to life and all three of them (the daughter carrying the head) go tracking down the desecrators in order to cut out their hearts.

“I know what you’re thinking,” a police inspector says after the first murder. “But I don’t believe in legends. Or in superstitions either. All I know is that this is a very difficult case.”

That’s the real killer in The Living Head. Even more so than most, the dubbing is miserable, with most of the lines either being non-sequiturs, or so plainly obvious and logical they come out sounding like non-sequiturs. I get the feeling sometimes that the voice actors they brought in were never given scripts, simply shown the film and told to make it up as they went along.

Ah, but this is merely a taste of what’s out there in terms of Mexican horror. We haven’t even considered the Santo pictures yet, and there are hundreds of those. I’m not sure if the likes of Robot Meets the Aztec Mummy would really enrich anyone’s  appreciation or understanding of Mexican independence, but there are doubtless lessons to be learned here. Namely, should you happen to find some neat stuff in a sacred temple next time you’re in Mexico, for godsakes just leave it there, no matter how cool it is. Those Aztecs mean business.

by Jim Knipfel

[murasaki-murasame]

Thoughts on Sarazanmai Episode 8: “I Want To Connect, But We’ll Never Meet Again”

Hey Ikuhara, do you take constructive criticism on your posts? :) I JUST WANT TO TALK :)))

I’d seen vague stuff on twitter recently about how devastating this episode was gonna be, and honestly I think that actually under-sold how messed up and tragic this episode was, on so many levels. I was actually worried that I’d end up being a little disappointed in it after how strongly people were talking about it, but hahaha nope. I am officially dead now :)

Thoughts under the cut.

OK first of all I may as well point out that I, and also lots of other people, totally saw that starting scene coming. It’s a lot more obvious if you’re familiar with Ikuhara’s writing style and the sorta tropes he likes to use, but it felt pretty inevitable that Toi and Kazuki would have had a prior connection we didn’t know about before now.

I was a bit confused about the timeline of it at first, but by the end of the episode it became pretty clear that it must have happened shortly after Toi shot that gangster dude. I guess it also must have happened shortly after the whole incident with Haruka, since Kazuki talked about ‘not being connected to anyone’, but I vaguely remember Kazuki looking older in the flashbacks to that whole sequence of events than he did in this episode’s flashback.

Even though this all makes sense and just ties everything together, I’m curious about why Enta has been saying that he was the one to give Kazuki the micanga. I mean, I think the initial story was that Enta gave it to him, but I can’t actually remember now. I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s still a little more for us to find out about how Enta and Kazuki first met and became friends.

Over the last few days I’d been preparing myself for the possibility of Chikai becoming a kappa zombie and getting erased from existence, and on the one hand I guess I’m happy that didn’t happen, but on the other hand I feel like what happened instead was even more tragic.

I’d been waiting for the inevitable part where the main trio would come into direct conflict with Reo and Mabu, and oh boy did that sure go in the worst possible way. Reo’s out there looking like a horror movie villain, and now Enta’s dead? Maybe? The fact that it looks like the severity of the gunshot wounds is censored so much actually makes it hard to get a feel for how fatal it’s meant to be. When they shot the first gangster dude earlier in the episode, it was so clean and bloodless that I honestly thought it was more like a magical tranquilizer dart so they could drag him to their police box to use the desire extraction machine on him, but I guess we’re meant to think that it was a straight up regular fatal gunshot.

To address the whole elephant in the room, I’d be very surprised if Enta’s actually permanently dead, when we have three whole episodes left. I know Ikuhara likes killing off his characters, but I feel like that tends to happen much closer to the end of the show. And since we already have a whole wish-granting system in place, anything’s possible. And going by what Mabu said at the end, and how one of the ep9 preview images seems to be of Kazuki in a hospital, I have a feeling that Enta might still be alive, but on the brink of death.

I’ve been on the Enta Defense Train [tm] from day one, and I hope that this episode helped people understand that he really is a good boy who doesn’t deserve the shit he’s gotten. The whole bit with him saying at the end that even after everything that happened, he couldn’t make himself say that he hated Kazuki was high-key heartbreaking.

And on top of all that, I honestly wasn’t expecting Toi to actually end up leaving with his brother. Well, mostly because I expected Chikai to die in this episode, but still. I imagine Kazuki will find a way to get back into contact with him soon enough, but the fact that Toi had also left them sure puts Kazuki in an even more tragic spot.

I hope I’m not the only one who’s getting the feeling that Kazuki’s quickly developing a crush on Toi, with how fast they’ve been bonding and how severely he’s reacting to Toi’s departure. It’d at least throw a whole new wrench in things if it’s true.

In spite of how Reo and Mabu’s actions in this episode are pretty straight-up indefensible, especially if we’re meant to think that Reo actually just outright shot both Enta and the gang member dude, I still can’t help but like them. Reo in particular is being driven out of loneliness and desperation, and also tbh it’s kinda hard to take his scary moments too seriously when they’re so over the top, and when we also know what he’s like in his day to day life, lol. At the very least I’d much rather people criticize them than Enta, considering that the worst thing Enta’s done so far is be a petty and jealous 14-year old with a crush, whereas Reo and Mabu are literally serial killers at this point.

And on the note of them, it sounds like the anime might never get around to adapting the short chapter from the first light novel volume that goes over how the two of them first met, which would be kinda sad since, now that I’ve read it, it’s really good and helps contextualize why Reo feels so strongly about Mabu and is doing so much for his sake. I’d say that the material from the manga and the twitter account is actually more ‘plot important’ and necessary to truly understanding them as characters, but still.

Vaguely related to them, we also got another scene with Sara and Keppi in this episode, which seems to spell out more explicitly that they’re both on the side of the kappas and are working against the otters, to the point of Sara whipping out some anti-otter technology. I still have no goddamn idea what to make of her as a character at this point, especially since this episode really makes it seem like she doesn’t remember Reo and Mabu, even though we’ve already been told that the ReoMabu manga is, one way or another, canon to the anime.

I initially wasn’t sure if Keppi getting frozen was meant to have consequences or just be a silly thing, but I saw someone point out that if he stays that way for a while, then Kazuki won’t be able to transform into a kappa, which could be a problem.

I think I said in the last episode post that it looks like things are heading straight into the climax, and that seems to be the case now. A lot is probably going to hinge on who gets to use the plates to make a wish, and what they use it for. I’m curious to see if Reo and Mabu only have the four plates that Enta had stolen, or if they also got the fifth one that the trio would have gotten after the ball zombie fight. It’d probably make more sense if Rreo and Mabu only have four of them, so they can’t immediately make a wish with it.

The more the show goes on, the more things pop up that seem like really good and necessary places to use the wish on, so it’s getting harder to tell how I think that’ll all end up. At this point the situations going on with Toi and Enta seem a lot more severe and in need of outside help than Reo and Mabu’s situation.

Even with just three episodes left, I’m not entirely sure what to expect. Mostly I just hope it manages to stick the landing. I’m kinda worried that, at the very least, Reo and Mabu’s characters might end up being too reliant on material from outside of the anime to really flesh them out, but at this point I think the main trio and their development will be handled in a satisfying way.

I said before that I thought we’d be in for another whole round of secret reveals, but with how this episode went, and the possibility of Kazuki not being able to even turn into a kappa in the short term with Keppi being out of commission, I think the pattern is completely broken at this point and we might not get any more secret leaking sequences. At least not via the whole sarazanmai transformation thing.

If there’s any one specific thing I really want them to address before the anime ends, it’s the whole connection between Reo, Mabu, and Sara, since that hasn’t come up at all yet in the anime, and it seems really important. But we’ll see.

One way or another I think we’re in for a lot more tragedy before this ends, lol.

[chongoblog]

Hey I know that you all see me as the Grand Authority on Movie Opinions in that I am correct and can never be wrong and also my opinion on things is NEVER unsolicited because I’m literally the most important person on the internet and you CRAVE my opinions.

So I saw Shazam last night and I’m gonna talk about it under this readmore because I dunno how long it’s gonna be and I respect y’all’s dashes like that (plus if y’all don’t care abt what I thought then you can keep scrolling). There will be spoilers but I will clearly mark them.

So I’ve been thinking to myself on whether or not Shazam was the best DCEU movie. All things considered, it didn’t have too high of a bar to leap over, seeing how Wonder Woman, which was originally my favorite, had a lot of incredible moments, but was bogged down by a few of the scenes around those moments and a frankly terrible final act. And if I were to put it into numbers, (which people seem to love) I’d put Wonder Woman at about 50% INCREDIBLE 20% ehhhh and 30% GOD WHY, plus add a few bonus points for being so inspiring within its social context as a female-led superhero movie that isn’t terrible, sexualized or both. Shazam, on the other hand, doesn’t get those bonus points of social context, but has about a 60% Pretty Good and 40% ehhhh with one small bonus point for having one scene that personally hit me pretty hard that I’ll talk about later. It doesn’t reach any of the LOWS that any other film in the DCEU had, but at the same time, it didn’t really hit any of the highs either.

Something that’s worth addressing is that as someone who likes to partake in any and all drama because I’m a gremlin who loves seeing complaining, I saw plenty of DC fans complain that this movie was falling into a sort of trap set up saying “ITS ONLY BEING LIGHTHEARTED BECAUSE IT THINKS THAT IT HAS TO BE MORE LIKE MARVEL AND THATS WHY MORE PEOPLE LIKE IT” and I do want to address that because it’s a stupid argument. While Shazam is a departure from the DCEU’s more serious tone thus far, it’s not a black and white deal. DC isn’t strictly defined by being “the more serious Marvel” or vice versa. Being lighthearted did help Shazam out, not BECAUSE it was more like a Marvel movie, but because unlike movies like Batman v Superman, it didn’t try (and fail) to tackle more complex themes and down to earth schemes that made it lose focus and become an enormous mess. That being said, Shazam’s schemes and themes were much simpler, and it made for a much SMALLER mess if/when it did lose focus.

Before I dive into the spoilers, I’ll give my two cents on the film as a whole. Like I mentioned, the light-hearted tone did help out the movie, and it took itself a little less seriously with things while still balancing out some emotion in the story, and the whole theme behind it, while not PERFECTLY drawn out, still had a coherent message behind it. Visually, the movie was definitely trying to break out of the Zack Snyder mold that had been set up back with Man Of Steel, and while it still chills out in Low Saturation City a lot of the time, it IS doing a better job. Zachary Levi definitely deserves a shoutout in this movie for probably being the second best actor in the DCEU closely behind Gal Gadot in terms of casting choices, perfectly encapsulating the idea of Shazam, and pulling off the role of a Big Billy Batson, however he seems to have taken away the acting talent from half of the rest of the cast, because some of the acting in this movie is.....not great. And that’s not counting the child actors who did alright considering they’re child actors (Freddy in particular was fantastic).

The dialogue in this is pretty solid and indicative of the situation, and they really tried to lean into the idea that it’s some middle school (or early high I cant really remember) kid who just got these powers, and they do a pretty good job of that in both the dialogue and in the first half of the movie. And like I mentioned, there is a bit of Emotion in this movie that they really tried to deliver and they did a pretty good job delivering it. That being said, it’s very clear that they’re going for a kinda cheesy sort of vibe. Which makes sense, since the concept is Kid Becomes Superhero, which is ripe for picking like some kind of Cheese Tree....orchard.....thing.....and it leads to just a fun experience. It’s something that knows it shouldn’t be taken too seriously, which is why I’m writing an incredibly long analytical review of it, because I’m a curmudgeon like that.

ALRIGHT SPOILER TIME SCROLL DOWN TO THE VERY BOTTOM IF YOU DONT WANNA GET SPOILED

Lol alright so this spoiler section is gonna have a lot of negative points, so let me start with some positives.

The overall theme of this movie is sort of an idea of Found Family (which I’m an absolute sucker for), and there’s a subplot that follows this idea where Billy is looking for his mom. The movie starts showing a flashback where Billy’s mom gives him a compass saying “it’ll always help you find your way home” and then very shortly afterward, Billy gets himself seperated from his mother and had to be put into foster care and is now searching for his mother by looking everywhere he can to the point it causes him to run away multiple times. It’s not too surprising how this ends, with him finding his mother, only to find out that she just didn’t pick him up because she was 17 at the time and felt she COULDN’T take care of him. And that’s the point when he realizes “maybe my REAL family were the kids in the foster home all along”. Billy Batson sees that his birth mother’s life is tumultuous, taking on new lovers, working part time jobs, and not having time to even consider caring for Billy, moreso just hoping he turned out alright. Billy, as a sort of symbolic gesture, hands his mother the compass saying “you’ll need this more than me”. And then she replies with two words that just killed me for some reason.

“What’s this?”

I don’t know. It was a line that hit me. Kinda reflecting that sort of disconnect. Alright enough being nice, let’s talk things that are Alright but could be better.

The villain was alright. His character was pretty fun at the beginning, but after he got revenge on his father for Toxic Masculinity™ he became pretty boring, acting more like a CGI Monster Vending Machine. Of course it kinda leads into the whole Cheesy vibe they were going for, but it’s hard to make your movie seem like it’s gonna be campy and cheesy when your villain doesn’t really fall into the role once he actually fights the hero (also with the color palette). Just wish they would’ve sorta gone full Sam Raimi and just leaned into the campiness, with this movie kinda afraid to jump into the pool past its bathing suit.

And then there was the climax of the movie in the carnival, where I felt like it went a little bit downhill, not really being the best that it could be, but still pretty serviceable. The director seemed to be REALLY into using slo-mo, using it a little more than necessary to the point of being distracting, and while the Shazam concept was used in a few fun creative ways, there were some moments where it could have had more utility, or one moment in particular when he absolutely needed to change back and probably had time to say “Shazam” like twenty times over, but he didn’t, which was a LITTLE frustrating, but that’s way more nitpicky. Speaking of nitpicks, there were a few shots that were.....questionable (most notably the Santa.....moment? It seemed to be a clear funny moment, but it didn’t really land and didn’t flow either)

And also the climax has a bit of a fun twist moment that helps round out the Found Family moment where all of Billy’s adopted family also become superheroes, which is pretty sweet, but there was one SMALL nitpick that doesn’t overwhelmingly detract from anything but I found strange. Every character had a power, with one person showing the super strength, another showing super speed, another with lightning, another with flying, which were Shazam’s powers. And then Mary was there....and we don’t really get to see her powers? I did research and apparently she’s a character in the comics with all the powers of Shazam, but Mary was one of the only other characters with an arc and we don’t get to see her with any powers, which is a bit weird (we also don’t get to see her arc formally conclude. We can draw conclusions but still). So in the end it looks like Mary essentially kinda got Kairi’d. Oof.

But that’s really it for spoilers, in terms of the “bad” it’s really just that it didn’t really give it enough of an impact and while it knew what it wanted to be and isn’t disingenuous about it, it also doesn’t really commit to BEING what it wants to be.

ALRIGHT SPOILERS ARE ALL DONE YOU CAN LOOK NOW HERES MY BOTTOM LINE

Bottom line is that this movie is definitely flawed, and after consideration I don’t think I’d put it at the top of the DCEU, if only because Wonder Woman reached higher points than this one did, but that shouldn’t be a slight against Shazam at all. Heck, I would consider putting it a little bit above Captain Marvel if we’re inevitably comparing rivals.

So all in all I give it a Shazam/10. A good fun time. Not the BEST movie you’ll see this year, but you’re there to have a good time and you’ll have it.

[whostheblondegirlwriting]

Hi! So I freaking love everything you write! Seriously you’re insanely good! I came here to ask you if you could further break down Bucky and Rumlow’s relationship and how it’s developed through his years as his handler? Please and thank you!!!! Keep up the amazing work!

Now for the ““Wow. This turned in to a way bigger answer than I expected and I don’t know if you wanted” answer to your ask. 

So, I’ve always used two moments from TWS when I considered my Brock Rumlow: 1) the “You totally saw them! You’re looking right at them, right now!” escalator scene 

and 2) this quote from the man himself, Frank Grillo.

Brock was 22 when he was recruited by HYDRA. He was immediately selected for a deep cover assignment inside SHIELD and placed in the STRIKE Division. He had the opportunity to train with the Asset in his position with STRIKE Team Delta, who covered the Soldier on ops as his support team.

In Echo and Jack Rollins, you do get some flashbacks to Rumlow’s interaction with Bucky that hint around at his sympathy for the Soldier. But it wasn’t always the case. Brock initially fulfilled his duties as Handler following the “order through pain” model of “asset handling”.

He knew who the Soldier was, but it wasn’t really that important. It would be years before anyone found Cap in the ice and gave Bucky a living connection to the world again. The Asset was a tool that needed supervision, or it could breakdown. That was all. On his introduction to the Asset as his new Handler, Rumlow was directed to leave an impression on the Asset about who was in charge. In his own words: “I let him know I was not the mother fucker to test. Beat him down so bad, I fractured his orbital socket. And that’s how he met me. He knew I was a brawler and, from then on out, I was in charge.”

That was the nature of their relationship, for the next couple of years. But there was a turning point for Brock. More than just a ghost in the machine, Brock realized there was still a soul there. After the river, Rumlow realized, somewhere along the line, the Asset had become a part of his team. Brock considered the man and not the Asset, wondering what it was like to be him; having his life and memories taken from him, over and over again, pressed in to service for the enemy. He saw firsthand that Bucky could remember who he was and what his life was like before HYDRA. And, frankly, it fucking unnerved him.

With the horrifying scenarios of being in the Soldier’s place in the back of his mind, his resolve softened. He began to delay reports or make omissions, when the programming would begin to fail on missions, leaving Bucky a few precious hours with his memories or away from the torturous machines the Program doctors used to “fix” the Asset, when he could. No prisoner deserved the hell Bucky was living, to be repeatedly stripped of his life and imprisoned in a cryochamber. No man did. And certainly not a national hero like Bucky Barnes. It was the least he could do.

When the program expanded and additional Soldiers began training with the Asset, Brock realized the danger Bucky faced against HYDRA’s new weapons. He fought and filed complaints against the Winter Soldier Program staff, reporting their mishandling and “damaging” of the Asset and their disregard for his safety, under the guise of keeping the Asset mission ready, but the reality was, it was all he could do help Bucky survive.

In 2010, Brock was removed as the Asset’s handler, after going too far to intervene on Bucky’s behalf. But the experience had already begun to change him. Resentful of how the situation had been handled and his dismissal from the Program, Brock formed a plan to put himself in a stronger position of power, determined to get back in to a place of influence. He took command of the Division, but he never regained direct access to the Program. He could only ever look in from the outside, but at least he knew Bucky was able to endure, after he was left on his own.

A year later, Capt. Rogers would be found in the Arctic ice. A year after that, Brock found the love of his life. With the influence of her good heart and his unanticipated friendship with Cap, Rumlow’s disillusionment with HYDRA continued to grow. Events aligned and as Brock learned the details of Project Insight, he had found his breaking point. Although the original plot to unmask HYDRA failed, Rogers and his friends’ dismantling of SHIELD did what Brock had tried to do. Had Brock’s plan not been discovered and had it succeeded, Bucky’s existence would have been revealed, he would have been rescued and reunited with Rogers, and, hopefully, Brock’s conscience been eased a little.

It was only after Allison resurfaced with Bucky that Brock began to feel any animosity toward him. When Bucky went to speak to Rumlow, Brock recognized instantly the attachment Bucky had to Allison. It wasn’t so much that Rumlow was jealous. Suspicious and worried, that maybe Allison had moved on in the year they were apart, yes. Angered that Bucky had put her in danger by taking her with him, while he took his revenge on HYDRA, you’re god damn right he was. Brock had done everything he could to keep her away from HYDRA and safe. He was incensed at the idea that he could have lost her, without ever having a chance to make things right with her. And, yeah, he was a little insulted to see Bucky didn’t recognize what he had done to help him those years ago. Regardless, Brock always figured, that if his memories kept coming back after all the wipes and years, that Bucky could still the good and honorable man he’d heard and read Bucky Barnes had been. And, at the very least, that was worth his respect.

Brock had seen Bucky protect Allison. He trusted him for it. To him, that said he’d been right about Bucky all along. Brock couldn’t blame him for any hostility or resentments he may have toward Brock from his time with the Program. It wasn’t as if Rumlow hadn’t imagined the rage and hatred he would feel in his position, to have so much taken from him and be helpless to fight it. He even hoped somewhere down the road, the two of them might reach an understanding about all that happened those years they were both part of the Program and put it behind them, for Allison’s sake.

But for Bucky’s part, he never understood why Rumlow changed. He didn’t understand why Brock had begun to treat him differently than he had been before the river, than any other handler he had known had. As the Asset, his short term memory was practically nonexistent. It was the long years of mistreatment, of beatings and machines that always came back to him when he came out of cryo. Those painful and scaring experiences, somehow, always stayed with him. And that’s how each meeting or mission with Rumlow began, with the worst memories.

He never trusted Brock, or the others on STRIKE Team Delta, because of it, but somehow he became almost comfortable with them. Familiarity, he figured it had been, after DC, when his mind began to heal and he began to recover more and more of his memories. Delta’s camaraderie reminded him of the Howlies. Even the little bit of it they showed to him in the field, keeping an eye on him seemingly more for his safety, like their own, than for making sure he didn’t try to escape and taking an interest in his well-being, as they routinely checked in with each other. Deployments with Rumlow and his men were the closest thing to being treated like a human being, and not a science experiment, that he had known since the fall. When Delta was permanently replaced by the SpecOps team HYDRA kept in auxiliary for when the STRIKE Team was unavailable, he lost that sense of belonging and safety, and he inwardly mourned it.

Rumlow had been an enigma. Bucky knew two versions of one man, while Brock had been with the Program, and he couldn’t understand how he could be both. Bucky was always suspicious of Brock’s motives for not reporting some of the minor breakdowns in the programming. He assumed it was because the incident didn’t cost them the mission’s success or any team casualties. At first he was fearful of the intentional oversights, thinking Brock was piling up ammunition to use against him; that it was part of some large punishment to come all at once, instead of the immediate and brutal “corrections” in the field he used to receive from Rumlow and always got from the handlers before and after him.

As time went by, and Brock “permitted” the breakdowns and never used them against him, Bucky privately reveled in those fleeting hours he had to remember himself and his life before the fall, afraid to acknowledge the small gift Brock seemed to be giving him. He began to consider maybe they were a reward for a job well done, despite the lingering fear in the back of his mind that at any moment Brock would take them away and go back to the old ways.

He saw Brock questioned and criticized by Program staff, for his “oversights” and carelessness when their programming would begin to wear off or fail. He saw him argue with and challenge the doctors and techs, on his behalf, present to watch procedures and tests no other handler had ever come or stayed to see. One time, he saw Brock Rumlow turn a gun on his own people to protect him when a “training exercise” had once again gone wrong and Bucky was too injured to defend himself anymore. It was the last time he saw Rumlow, before that night in the woods in Pennsylvania.

That night in Pennsylvania, Rumlow’s face was one of only a few he knew. He was giving the orders again and he said the words to put Bucky back under his control, and HYDRA’s. Brock was the face of HYDRA and the Program again. Since DC, every moment had been about finding him and completing his revenge on everyone who’s had tortured him for decades.

He could never have considered helping him, if Rumlow hadn’t been the only way to save Allison. For all she had done and been willing to sacrifice for Bucky, he would have done anything for her. It sickened him, every time he heard Rumlow’s voice. He was wary, to be following Rumlow’s plan to rescue Allison. The earth disappeared from beneath him, when he realized who Brock was to her and the half-truths and omissions that she had made.

But he couldn’t argue the facts, when he saw and heard for himself what Brock had done to subvert the will of the Program and do what little he could to help him. He could sympathize with the lengths people would go to for the ones they loved, remembering what Allison had done to help him was more than she ever meant to do to hurt him. Eventually, Bucky began to realize those small intuitions those years ago, that Brock wasn’t like the others, were right. They didn’t excuse anything, but he could finally start to understand. And he needed to understand, if he was going to be able to move on. He still had his life, in some ways, because of what Rumlow had done for him. He could let Brock have his. After all, and if for nothing else, to let Allison have him.

[shaymcsudonim]

Crack SVTFOE Theory

OK, so this has been rolling around in my head since the start of season 3. Most of it is conjecture, but I feel the need to type things out, just the same.

Time Travel Season 4 theory below the cut.

I’ve only seen the episodes, so any extra information/word of god was not taken into account.

All right, so SVTFOE has a history of giving us little-to-no backstory on its antagonists, and that could simply be part of its writing style, I get that. Not everything is spelled out in explicit detail. We have very little idea of how Star and Ludo first became archnemeses, for instance. It couldn’t have just been the wand, because she just got the wand, and I’m pretty sure she and Ludo knew each other before the first episode. 

Then there’s Toffee and his complete lack of anything resembling a concrete motivation.

And now Globgore and him being stuck in a crystal with a mysterious backstory. 

Heck, even Glossaryck (morally-neutral entity who came from who-knows-where) and the Magic High Commission have no real info given on how they came to take the roles they now have. Heckapoo seems like the magic DMV, and Omnitraxus seems like an auditor of spacetime, so they might be more lawful than good, but Rhombulus seems primarily concerned with protecting people, particularly from being eaten, even if he is somewhat overzealous about it. 

For the first two seasons, everything built up to Battle for Mewni, and gaps in the lore could be attributed to foreshadowing, that would be resolved in the third season.

Except... that didn’t happen. Battle for Mewni was great, and Puddle Defenders rivals Mathmagic and Collateral Damage as my favorite episode of the series, but it gave us very little actual information. Ludo’s character arc was great, don’t get me wrong, and the subtext on propaganda was top notch, but Toffee apparently went batshit insane when no one was watching. He stopped Ludo from killing Star, even though she was the one who ultimately defeated him. Heck, he spent probably a year hiding in the realm of magic, only to get his body back and promptly die. 

It didn’t make sense.

And even before that, the Moon flashbacks. Just in terms of writing logistics, ‘show don’t tell’ is a pretty major one, and we weren’t shown any shots of Moon’s mother, or of Toffee prior to his killing her. If things had gone down the way Moon thought they had, the writers should have shown us what happened, rather than merely telling us about the aftermath.

Then the story veered into Eclipsa being the main villain, then not, and just a whole lotta relationship drama.

It could just be writing apathy, knowing that the show was going into its last season, but I don’t think so. It feels like there’s a twist that has yet to be revealed, a hidden dimension to all of this.

Maybe there’s not and I’m reading too much into it, but hey, I was right about Pink Diamond, maybe I’m right about this too.

Anyway, my theory is ‘time travel.’

Ever since Father Time was introduced in Freeze Day, I’ve been itching for there to be a time travel plot, so this is most definitely wishful thinking on my part, but that doesn’t meant it’s not true, just that I want it to be true.

Toffee’s last words were something like, “You think you’ve won? Only I know how this all turns out!”

Which struck me as odd, because he didn’t gloat that much when he was in the magic dimension, and his prospects were much better. He almost seems more enthused and optimistic when he’s inches from death than when he was literally made of magic. Which, who knows, maybe he was just punch drunk, but the phrasing still seemed odd.

What if there’s was some Doctor Who/ Girl Genius ‘I saw the future so I know things will eventually be like X’ prophecy at work. 

I had mostly written it off as WMG, until the first episode of season 4.

And the Beach Day photograph happened. An exact example of the ‘snapshot of the future’ prophecy. 

Since it was mentioned in the first episode, it’ll probably be a major theme of season 4. They’ve referenced it once already, trying to recreate it (and I’m incredibly worried about Tom asking why he wasn’t there. That seems like foreshadowing. I really hope he doesn’t die). 

IDK how many of you guys read the Girl Genius webcomic, but early on, there’s a scene where a future version of the protagonist, Agatha, is seen through a rip in time by one of the (then) antagonists, Bangladesh. Bangladesh wouldn’t have been able to find Agatha without seeing her through the rip in time. We also knew that, at some point, Agatha would find some sort of time portal/time machine. That was a set in stone aspect of the narrative. The story couldn’t end until it had happened. Even in the midst of the Mechanicsburg arc, we knew, in the back of our minds, that the story couldn’t end without time travel. It wasn’t winding down, it was still winding up.

That’s what this SVTFOE season 4 feels like to me. It’s just a hunch, but assuming that somebody in the narrative did have knowledge of the future, and had been working to bring about some glimpse of the future that they saw at one point?

My money would be on Toffee. 

He just seems, incredibly apathetic and uninvested in what he’s doing, and I find it hillarious that he might be working off a checklist.

I mean, don’t get me wrong, the guy killed Lekhmet, he’s no misunderstood cinnamon roll, by any means. 

But I do think that Toffee gained knowledge of the future at some point in his past, possibly from Star and Marco going back to Eclipsa’s time to find out more about Globgore and what happened to Shastacan. 

Possibly Star and Marco will meddle in other affairs shaping Mewni’s history, or just making Star and Ludo meet in the past and become enemies.

I realize that all this is quite the reach, but until I get more data, it’s my working theory.

We’ll see what happens

[inappropriatefangirlneeds]

Gotham s5ep5 “ Pena Dura” Personal Review

“Your chance to be a part of this mission”    Warning spoilers below

HARVEY BULLOCK Wow they really put him in the spotlight. First JIM GORDON´s praise. “What you are is the best cop that I know.” If Nygma outsmarts them he wants him to take over. “I need your help, buddy.”. Then he actually listens to Bullock when he doesn´t want to be side lined. Although, I suspect that if it would have been physically possible for Jim Gordon to arrest Oswald Cobblepot he would have done it himself.  Then Harvey gets a moment with BRUCE WAYNE. Bruce is looking for Jim and Harvey is like “Sorry, kid, it's just me.” But in this episode Harvey matters and they have a moment before Bruce batdissapears on him before he can finish his sentence. “I see people losing their will to do good. People I love. What if we don't make it out of this?”  “Because the little things mater. Act by act, deed by deed, it means something. Even if no one notices or cares.” Harvey talks about paperwork (and wow did he basically address my question from last week, he indeed did, partly  .. ) but it´s paperwork that matters and keeps you sane. BRUCE WAYNE / JIM GORDON  & HOPE Haven just blew up but it seems Bruce is much more occupied with SELINA KYLE´s case. Granted there is more personal investment and that issue of him feeling guilty because Jeremiah targeted her about him but it´s an interesting notion to have Bruce to struggle with hope over a more personal matter. While Jim Gordon had his “hope struggle” moments last week over Haven and missing support from the Government. Seems that Eduardo Dorrance might bring a more personal twist to it.  ACCESSORY TO MURDER Selina Kyle & Bruce Wayne Bruce Wayne compares Selina killing Jeremiah to him killing Ra´s al Ghul but Alfred Pennyworth begs to differ: Selina and Bruce are not the same. On is murder and one is not: “Jeremiah made Selina a murderer. Just like Ra's made me a murderer.” “Ra's goaded you into stabbing him, Master Bruce. He used you as an instrument. You're no murderer.”  I´m not here to judge on that but I judge a tremendous neglect in the writing here: Does anyone remember REGINALD REGGIE PAYNE, the guy that arguably threatened Selina and Bruce, the guy where Bruce made a move to push him out of the window and Selina actually did it, claimed not to do regret it and that she would do it again. This would be such a great argument for Alfred´s point. Moreover Alfred has a personal reason to remember the death of someone he had a personal relationship with. One would think, he might bring that up. It´s not like he was ever holding back on things when it came down to discrediting Selina Kyle. Granted they had their nice moments but it seems his first unfavourable impression and judgement still holds.  Alfred Pennyworth is the first one that brings up the instrumentation of a person for murder. Which comes up with various terms again and again: Instrument/ murderous puppet/ being controlled remotely / tool / killing machine. With EDUARDO DORRANCE I think we lack a specific work but his just following orders credo makes him basically a tool for killing as well.  Edward Nygma  tries to figure out why he blew up Haven. He himself his first station then the electricity grants him a flashback that leads him to Oswald Cobblepot (“How could you? You have made me into some murderous puppet.” ) which gets him on his path to Hugo Strange.  Both SELINA KYLE & Edward Nygma have an element of control. Despite Bruce´s repeated claims that Ivy´s medicine changed Selina and she is not herself it´s unclear if or how much this is true. Also Bruce knows he didn´t want to kill Ra´s however with Selina we´ve not that much insight (with the possibility of the plant altering her) and only the modus operandi to judge.  EVERYONE KNOWS EACH OTHER SO WELL * Bruce Wayne & Selina Kyle. “You're no murderer.” “But Selina is.” “You're not the same. She did what she did with open eyes, and you got to learn to respect that, son.” “You're wrong about her, Alfred.”  It´s about the murder, but it is about so much more: “It wasn't your fault. You were just a scared kid.”  The savvy Gothamite knows: Ah Bruce is talking about himself, that´s what he feels guilty about. Selina Kyle promptly picks up the notion. “No. You were the scared kid. We are not the same, Bruce. I didn't do anything because I wasn't willing to risk my neck for someone else because I didn't care. That's who I was and that's who I am.” (Goes on to say she loves "Psycho" by Grim Streaker) I´d say still sounds like case of scared kid, and if it´s just on the basis that they were kids. * Someone do a good paralells meta for 4x12 when Bruce was the one drinking at the Sirens and Selina went in being like “That´s not you”.   * Oh there would just be a lot of quotes that deal with responsibilities and No1 but I´m lazy * Jim Gordon knows himself, that´s why he sent Harvey Bullock to go after Penguin.  * Then we have Jim Gordon acknowledging that Edward Nymga had him framed and more than on his toes. “We're going after Nygma. He's ten steps ahead. This thing goes sideways, you're gonna have to take over.” He should have known him better though or he would have noticed that suspicious arm reaching for the book.  * Edward Nygma  while struggling with what his body does still has a remarkably good grasp on who he is. For him it is clear:  “You're not a murderer, Ed. Except Kristen Kringle. And Officer Dougherty.” Well not that kind of murderer. Good except that issue where is list is like a couple names short. This is repeated when he appeals to  JIM GORDON  “You know me, Jim. The people that I have hurt, they hurt me first.” [I wonder if Ed appealing to the emotional side of things is meant to echo Jim´s “what happened to you” approach in 2x17 ] With BARBARA KEAN Edward´s focus is less on the motive and emotional part it´s about intellect and modus operandi: “Barbara! Am I dumb? In all the years of plotting and the betrayals between us, have you ever ever known me to do something as idiotically brutal as shoot a rocket into a building full of innocent people?”   All of them eventually have to believe that Edward was innocent because they know him.  * Jim Gordon & Eduardo Dorrance  So we finally get some more on Jim “a war hero” Gordon´s military background, which is great but idk I can´t quite make anything of what they gave us. “We hated each other in boot.” “Jim disapproved of my ops tempo.” “Yeah, 'cause you only had one speed: too fast.” “Took me a while to realize he wasn't afraid to get his hands dirty. Just being careful.” “Well, Jim's taught me a thing or two - about being careful.”  That HARVEY BULLOCK says that could provide some great meta if I wasn´t too lazy to properly look into the line of his old partner DIX in  DIX 1x06:   “He's a loose cannon. He thinks he's a white knight, jumping into the breach like some idiot in the movies” First it´s trust and old friendship with EDUDARDO and JIM: “I trust you know what you're doing.” “We do what we have to do, right?” But soon Jim and Eduardo are opposite forces: “After all this, you'd kill me for some bureaucrat?” “Mission comes first. You taught me that.”  This really makes me wonder what Jim did that Eduardo says this!!  Also SEASON 1 Backflash: “You know I hate this spook crap. I don't ask questions; I follow orders.” “Walker wants you to put a bullet in his brain.” “Call it proof of loyalty. It's what she needs from you before she can move forward with final relief plans.” “Jim, ours is not to reason why. And this is your chance to be a part of this mission. So please. You pull the trigger on him, or I pull the trigger on you.” * It mirrors the Jim and Harvey contrast with Harvey being the one talking about questions above his paycheck but after everything Harvey still follows Jim´s disruptive tendencies. It´s about personal responsibility, control, and in Jim and Eduardo´s case we could get some take on the "Nuremberg defense" issue.   * It mirrors the situation with Oswald Cobblepot. Once more an established order tells Jim Gordon to shoot a man, that´s not technically innocent but didn´t commit the crime in question. And once more Jim doesn´t kill but this time he doesn´t get to claim his loyalties lie with the established order.  [For a moment Jim contemplated just shooting Ed because look at what happened with Oswald, he just can´t have another relationship like that] * I wonder if we will get some flack for Jim´s decision to honour integrity over supplies? Just briefly, before it is revealed how it was actually and not only morally the right thing.  FRIENDSHIP Oswald  & Jim  Oswald Cobblepot still tries to count on Jim Gordon.  “Harvey, you're not thinking clearly. Maybe call your boss, see what he thinks.” But Jim isn´t there because he made a decision to not be there.  Oswald´s line of having had only two friends from which one he shot is sad. And I don´t know but after all the “friend” and “favour” stuff between them the “no friends” statement from Jim really hurt: “You know, they say you can judge a man by his friends.” “This from a man who has no friends.”  But at least their dynamic still works, once you get them together and disturbing forces out of the way they still run smooth for the sake of Gotham  “You're protecting a mass murderer. Don't look to me for sympathy.” “Fine. But not with that meathead around.”  Edward Nygma & Oswald Cobblpeot * “Ed, what have you done?” First of all the delivery of the line killed me! Which is not even an exaggeration. * “Of everything that you have put me through, this this is the most cruel.” This was almost as impressive and heart wrenching. * Also I´m just going to put the words down there. How, how did they sound so much like vows?! Oswald just touching his lips, putting his hands in front of them covering his mouth before he can muster so speak further. Oswald later walking right up to Edward pressing the gun into his heart. Could anyone deal with this?!  (Also what is so fundamentally wrong with me that this kind of totally is what I want, like that´s what I´d ask for in any friend or relationship, and on the one hand it´s like just a very basic just knowing and acknowledging each other but also this trust that should be as basic but just really isn´t and oh idk that was just a really special scene.) “What was I supposed to do? Let you die? After Butch, you were my only friend.”  “You shot Butch!” “Which is why I needed you! Edward Nygma, if I wanted you to suffer, I would never do it in some backhanded way.” “If you and I are ever at odds again, you will know, without a doubt, that I am your enemy. I promise you that as a friend.” And then Edward followed up with a “yes I do” and his own vows.  “I might have killed you, Oswald. And if that day comes I swear to you I will stare you in the eye as I stab you in the heart.” * Then a BETRAYAL? And then right away Oswald tells Edward to stay where he is because he´s going to be save while telling his men to get Nygma. Why did you have to break up that wonderful moment so quickly? Self preservation is a wonderful thing but not on the expense of those feelz. Quick, someone meta/fanfic this “betrayal” into something more palatable. Something like, Oswald only said that because he knew Edward would know to disappear at once, they just know each other ~that~ well, okay that´s better, a super thin argument but I´m fine.    * Oswald in this context saying “They want him, not me.” (*)  is so wrong because no honey, you are a double now a TWOFER, as Eduardo phrased it. With one raid they´d get Ed and Os. They are inseparable now.  * This is why they now both looked into the barrel of Jim´s gun while Jim gets told to kill them for loyalty reasons. * This is also why they both had the exact same approach to Jim Gordon this time. Jim Gordon is NOT GOOD CHANCES: Edward: “Once words gets out that you're responsible for Haven, you'll have a target on your back.” “I'll take my chances.” Oswald: “Even if I were to let you go, sooner or later, the Army's gonna come for you. Things are changing in Gotham.” “I'll take my chances.”  * “But first, did you name your dog after me?” How didn´t we get a reaction to EDWARD NYGMA´s question. I get it the whole mass murderer question but I´d like an answer to that one too, especially since they threw in that other JoJo dog business. Honestly I was not living that electrocution scene. (And it´s not only about the fact that Sofia and her dentist made him look much prettier.) but the  “You anthropomorphizing nincompoop. Dogs can't smile.”  sold me on it. It was worth it. Also Edward pretending he doesn´t want to be shocked again when this is going to be his escape and getting them to ignite the fuel was a good one “Please. Shoot me, stab me, anything but another jolt.” * Another marvellous line from Barbara Kean: “I am going to cut your face into a jigsaw puzzle and watch you try and put it back together again.”   * HUGO STRANGE is back and promptly sends a corpse sliding and then wipes hands. Icky. So those lined up hanging body bags had me distracted so I didn´t pay enough attention on the one that Edward Nygma would jump out of. However I think this made me suspicious enough to not trust the “I will write it down. That way, if I'm ever confronted, I can honestly say that I never told you.” Like usually I´d agree, that´s a good plan, makes sense but ha not this time. Love that they kind of paralleled this with Edward reaching for the book in front of Jim and Eduardo. Is that even a proper parallel?  * EDWARD NYGMA tries to control the script  “Let's skip the part where you deny making me into a killing machine.” He wants to get to the point. When Strange starts with a nebulous “I may have tinkered a little with your grey matter.” Edward is like: “Would you just …”  and Strange complies with an answer: “I put a chip in your brain.” “It allows you to be able to be controlled remotely.”  * I am wondering if Hugo Strange really didn´t know about the alter ego situation? It could be right? Either his situation was the reason why the chip worked (which negates my other question below) or maybe this will be the thing that makes Edward overcome his issue? Maybe the other side will surface again and they both got a common enemy: The chip and they unify over that task. THEORY?  * Also the fandom has been all about all the Eds and Nygmas and used various name variations and now the show comments on this and it´s not helpful at all? “You did something to access the Ed Nygma side of my personality.” “But you're Ed Nygma.” “I'm also the Riddler!” Is he thinking of himself as (an occasionally riddling) Edward right now?  * “I developed a tool.”  “A tool? How dare you?”   Haha, he sounded SO offended. * Quick question, why did remote controlled Edward go through the corpse tunnel, was his perception working while he was switched off and did he see Jim escape through it?  PLACES AND THINGS * Can we talk about how pretty the first place of that RPG selling guy ( Gerry Grekov) was. So pretty! Guy got peacock feathers in it.  * What was that movie he was watching? * The floor is Lava! The Edward Jim scene was gorgeous.  * As we established Jim knows Edward he just doesn´t know him well enough to pay attention to that arm that grew longer and longer to reach the right book. Like seriously Jim how could you miss this, even I was on my toes dying to know what he would do. And he boobytrapped the library. Marvellous! The chess riddle with the movements and the books. Marvellous! More please. The shots were really pretty too.  * Apart from Edward´s arm growing longer and longer we got his long legged self running over the cushions. Marvellous!

JEREMIAH VALESKA “Verisimilitude trumps precaution, you see.” “That bullet is making you sentimental.” * So the present is some resurrection. How did they reverse all the decay. Is it the same bodies. Magic, Science.  Also am I paranoid or might there be some connection to Hugo Strange´s “The last body you procured for me was gangrenous. Completely unsuitable.” line. Unsuitable doesn´t mean unusable. * Jeremiah knew Mr. Wayne, didn´t he. I´m too lazy to look things up but there was a connection. Is he also doing this for himself. Family reunion cause he never had a (good) one?  * Sorry but EDUARDO DORRANCE is boring, get on the program Gotham doesn´t do boring. Clearly Eduardo Flamingo was the superior Eduardo. * “I'm gonna wring this nerd's neck.” Careful Eduardo, this other nerd is just in the progress of saving your life.  * “You left the Army for this city?” You know, I keep saying that people would probably better be off just getting the hell out of there but the reaction to this line showed me I´m as stupid. I mean not that it´s something new all the bathtubs alone had sold me. And army, army instead of riddles like that and freedom to wear leather, pink hair, how´s that even considered competition. * THERESA WALKER why did she need Edward Nygma? If they had a public trial, execution then yes but Eduardo didn´t seem to be concerned about getting him alive, they could have just sent in some random guy? They got all those military people in now I´m sure they could have done less before and it´s probably less effort than commissioning a human drone? * “We need shock and awe.” “Shock and awe is my default.” I wonder if this was foreshadowing because after all the Haven thing could fall under that strategy. They only sent in military after this devastating and shocking destruction. OSWALD COBBLEPOT BEING HIMSELF AGAIN? “Edward, I believe the time has come for a change of scenery.” What is Oswald Cobblepot up to?! What did he store down there, what are his plans? He didn´t seem to be too worried about the military. He must have some kind of plan? Also the “Please. An invasion is tanks, infantry. These are scouts.” line gives me hope that he is prepared.  (*) On the other hand him thinking the military would not go after him too, only Edward, while he was “on top of” the list seems to point into a different direction.  Also someone any (head)canons on Oswald Cobblepot and knowledge about military, has he been ever connected to military terms? He´s been in Jim Gordon´s soldier vision/dream thingie, I don´t know why this line stuck so much with me, but the dismissive patronizing smug deliver was marvellous.

[the-everlasting-dream]

The Revelation AU - Drake x MC, Part 5

Summary: As Elizabeth’s life hangs in the balance, her friends are faced with the harshness of reality while they wake for her to wake up. 

A/N: Y’ALL ASKED FOR IT! Here is the beginning of the angstiest possible route to a happy ending (that will come eventually). This was the hardest one to write because of all the different perspectives but I hope I did them justice? After this cliff hanger you may experience extreme shock, disbelief and denial so please have mercy on this writer when you grab your pitchforks. 

Also special thanks to @chantelle-x0x for making the character aesthetics for this chapter! She is amazing at this as I have told her so many times before! 

Word count:  5400  This is the longest one in the series, I apologise but I couldn’t have split it any other way. 

Warnings: Brief mentions of blood, injury, death, grief.  

CATCH UP HERE

Two days after the accident...

HANA

BREAKING NEWS: CORDONIA’S NEWEST DUCHESS, ELIZABETH RICHMOND HAS HAD A TRAGIC ACCIDENT AT THE CORMERY ISLE. EYEWITNESS ACCOUNTS STATE THAT THE CAUSE WAS AN UNSTABLE BALCONY IN THE VANCOUER MANSION. 

In her assigned room in the Vanceour estate, Lady Hana Lee sat in darkness, listening to the Cordonian radio host break the news to the country. She felt a sudden chill at his words and pulled the wooden blanket draped over her shoulders tighter around her body. The events of the last twenty-four hours had been a blur to her in the moment and now a tear slipped down her face as the truth of what had taken place started to really hit home. 

Elizabeth had fallen off a balcony. Elizabeth.

The thought seemed so misplaced. This was the kind of thing that happenned in books or movies, not real life.. And definitely not to someone she knew, her friend.. 

Hana had arrived back from Cordonia’s general hospital barely an hour ago where the doctors worked around the clock to save Elizabeth’s life. Her friend had still been in surgery when Liam finally convinced the rest of them to get some sleep. 

Drake, however, would not be moved. 

 He had remained stubbornly glued to chair in the waiting room, seated closest to the door that the medical professionals came through to report on the outcomes to the various surgeries that were taking place. His messy brown hair was clutched tightly between his fingers, he had only moved to lift his head each time he heard the door open. Despite his heavy eyes and exhausted body, he'd roughly declined any offer for rest or sustenance, ignoring Hana's pleas and Maxwell’s cajoling until Liam had put his hands on their shoulders, shaking his head and their efforts ceased. 

 After hearing about the commotion at the end of the press conference, she along with Maxwell and Liam had all come running to the press room but upon hearing a rough scream, they diverted their path to the heritage room. There they were shocked to have found Drake lying on the edge of the dilapidated balcony screaming Elizabeth’s name until his voice raw. Liam’s shaking fingers had the emergency services in the scene in record time but the wreckage was so severe that they had to radio in for a helicopter to rescue Elizabeth. Hana remembered Drake’s eyes wild and desperate, ready to throw himself off the cliff’s edge when he’d heard this. 

 ‘Fuck them, I’ll climb down and get her myself!’ 

 He would have nearly succeeded if Liam and Bastien had not held him back. When they’d finally reached the hospital after following in a car, Elizabeth had immediately been taken to the emergency room and they’d had little more than a small glimpse of her bloodied figure before she was wheeled into the surgery. A clipboard had been thrust into Hana’s hands and she was instructed to fill out Elizabeth’s personal details. She paused, pen hovering over the space labelled ‘Patient Full Name.’ It was only then that the group realised how little they knew about their friend... 

 ‘I know that one,’ Maxwell chimed in unexpectedly. ‘Elizabeth Aishwarya Richmond.’ 

Three heads whipped around to stare at him. ‘How do you know that?’ Drake asked almost menacingly, eyes narrowed. 

 Maxwell visibly panicked at the question. ‘Uhm.. I just asked her one day?’ 

Hana watched as Drake hung his head. ‘She never mentioned that to me. And I-I never thought to ask,’ he remarked hollowly, shuffling his feet a little. ‘Some fiance I’d have been, I didn’t even know her full name…’ 

‘Don’t worry about it man,’ Liam replied, patting his arm gently. ‘It's not a big deal anyway. None of the rest of us knew...’ 

Drake nodded vaguely despite the tears shining in his eyes and between the four of them, they managed to complete the form.   

It was 2.30am now. 

Something inside Hana gave way and she fell to her knees, seeming to lose the ability to hold herself up as sobs wracked her body. The adrenaline of the last few days had finally worn off giving way to a profound sense of exhaustion in more than just the physical sense of the word. 

This was Elizabeth, her best friend, her first real friend. The first person to see past the facade she’d been trained all her life to put forward to the woman she was underneath. Where she had been scolded for voicing her opinion and punished for the slightest mistake, her friend had instead offered encouraged and advice and Hana had found herself growing bolder and bolder, taking control of her own life for the first time in her twenty-six years. 

Elizabeth had believed in her even before Hana did herself and if she was gone, who would believe in her now? 

 The weight of this hit Hana hard as infinite possibilities and scenarios swirled in her mind. If Elizabeth died what would happen to her? Where would she live? Who would she go to for advice? Her parents wouldn’t take her back now that she’d scorned them so where else could she go? 

Depressed at her meagre prospects, Hana sunk into the mattress before shooting back up and grabbing her phone, double checking that the ringer was on full volume. Liam had promised to let them know the moment that there was any word about Elizabeth and as her friend’s life hung in the balance, Hana would have never forgiven herself if she missed the chance to say goodbye.  

Nine days after the accident...

MAXWELL

DUCHESS ELIZABETH RICHMOND REMAINS IN HOSPITAL IN A COMA FROM HER INJURIES. THERE HAS BEEN NO MENTION OF WHEN THE DUCHESS WILL RETURN TO HER DUTIES AND EARLIER THIS WEEK KING LIAM OFFICIALLY CALLED OFF THE UNITY TOUR IN LIGHT OF THE CIRCUMSTANCES.   

Maxwell Beaumont almost dropped his phone on the brick path as something tugged abruptly on his arm, jerking his eyes away from the news article he was reading. He looked down at the corgi attached to the leash in his hand, its brown eyes and wagging tail made it hard not to smile. He crouched down to rub Cooper’s ears. The dog cocked its head slightly, letting out a small whine and Maxwell thought he saw a glint of sadness in its usually playful gaze. 

'I know boy,' he said wistfully, scratching the corgi's head. 'I miss her too.’ 

 Ever since he and Bertrand had returned home to Beaumont estate, taking Elizabeth’s corgi on walks had become a daily ritual for him, something to get his mind off everything that was happening. Most days it worked as it gave Maxwell something to do while the whole country stood at a standstill, hold their breath as they waited for news about the condition of their favourite duchess. That was easier said than done however and now he couldn’t help as his mind slipped back into the events of the past week. 

*Flashback*

The doctors and surgeons had worked around the clock, racing against time and after almost 40 hours in surgery, Elizabeth had eventually pulled through narrowly avoiding the worst. When they had finally been able to see her, Elizabeth had been wrapped in so many bandages and wound dressings that he had barely recognised the woman he had come to call his best friend. Deep purple circles splayed out under her eyes and her mocha skin looked pale under the harsh fluorescent lights. Her mouth and nose were covered by a large oxygen mask, in fact her face was hardly visible under the bandages around her head. A nurse was adjusting the various tubes connecting her to various machines, the ventilator, drip, heart rate monitor. More bandages covered her limbs and unmissable, the ones spanning dangerously across her stomach tinged slightly red. 

 Maxwell gulped at the sight.  ‘W-what happened to her?’ His voice came out in a hoarse croak, shattering the thick silence that had developed as they crowded together in the small room. 

‘She fell off the balcony Maxwell,’ Bertrand’s dry tone held irritation. 

 The younger Beaumont felt the unfamiliar rush of red hot anger course through him as he turned on his brother. ‘You know that's not what I meant. Tell me exactly what happened.’ 

‘Maxwell you wouldn’t-’ 

He didn’t let him finish. 'Wouldn’t what Bertrand? Wouldn’t be able to cope with the truth? Wouldn’t be able to understand all the technical terms? Because I’m too dumb? Or maybe you think I’ll make a joke about it? You think I can’t take this seriously?! She’s my best friend and I demand to know what’s wrong with her!!’ 

‘Maxwell stop!’ Hana’s panicked tone pierced through the fog of rage and emotion. 

Collecting himself, Maxwell realised that he had been gripping the lapels of Bertrand’s blazer so tightly they’d begun to tear. Releasing his brother, he dusted off his hands taking a moment to organise his thoughts before he regarded his friends expectantly. 

 ‘Well?' 

Liam answered this time, struggling to keep his voice steady. 'She’s sustained a serious head injury and a few broken ribs, fractured pelvis, broken shoulder as well as a collection of cuts and bruises from the debris of the balcony. There was a lot of internal bleeding thats why the surgery took so long. The doctors said it would have been worse. She was really lucky that she’d only fallen about 25 feet and not the entire length of the cliff. Her broken bones will heal but at this point its the head injury they’re more worried about.’ 

The gravity of his words plunged the room into silence, yet again save for the beeping of the various machines around Elizabeth’s bed. Maxwell inched forward reaching forward hesitantly to touch her hand. Just as his fingers made contact however, a frenzied beeping sounded out and Elizabeth’s body started to spasms and shudder violently. 

'What’s happening? Why is she doing that?’ Maxwell screeched, panic flowing through him. 'Nurse, nurse, someone help!' 

In the blink of an eye, three nurses entered the room, one turning to the group. ‘Your Majesty, Your Graces I have to ask you to leave the room please. We need to stabilise her now.’ 

Before he knew what was happening, Maxwell had been pulled into the hallway and the door was shut in his face. He whirled on Drake, shoving two hands against his friend’s chest roughly. 

'You were supposed to look after her man! You were supposed to protect her!' 

'You think I don’t know that? You think this is easy for me? To see her like that?’ Drake’s entire body was taut as he pulled himself to full height a few inches taller than Maxwell. ‘You were just her friend I was the one meant to be marrying her!’ 

Both of them were locked in a tense standoff, hands balled into fists, neither wanting to back down. Around them, other hospital patrons watched in surprise. 

‘Maybe its a good thing you didn’t then because look where she ended up!’ He spat in reply. 

‘Say that again I dare you.’ His friend's voice was dangerously low but Maxwell didn’t care. 

‘Come on Maxwell. You’re making a scene,’ Bertrand swooped in, gripping his arm as he yanked him away from the other man. 'We’re going home.’ 

*End of flashback* 

‘Maxwell!’ His brother’s voice cut through the memory as he approached. ‘Hurry up! We’re late to fetch Elizabeth’s parents from the airport!’ 

 Maxwell shot to his feet. ‘Chanaya and Danvir? I totally forgot they were arriving today.’ 

‘Thats Mr and Mrs Richmond to you,’ Bertrand reminded him. 'Yes well they have had quite a few complications with their travel arrangements but they will be arriving soon.’ 

 Maxwell had coaxed the corgi back to the house following his brother when something occurred to him.   

 ‘What about the Marquess and Neville?’ 

Bertrand’s face darkened frighteningly. ‘They’ll be paying for that if King Liam or I have anything to say about it,’ he replied in his signature Duke of Ramsford tone that Maxwell had heard many times but he noted that this time it was different. 

The threat held in the words was very real and the younger Beaumont almost shuddered, glad that he wasn’t on the receiving end this time.

Fifteen days after the accident...

KIARA

AND NOW FOR OUR DAILY CHECK-IN ON DUCHESS ELIZABETH: THERE HAS BEEN NO OFFICIAL ANNOUNCEMENT FROM THE ROYAL PRESS SECRETARY BUT AN INSIDE SOURCE HAS CONFIRMED THAT THE DUCHESS’ CONDITION HAS STABILISED HOWEVER THE FULL EXTENT OF HER INJURIES WILL ONLY BE KNOWN WHEN SHE COMES OUT OF A COMA.

‘Off to the hospital mon chere?’ Joelle asked her only daughter as she watched her head for the door. 

 ’Non Maman. King Liam has moved her to a secure ward not too far from the palace,’ Kiara answered, ducking into the lounge room of their manor where her mother sat watching the news. Her eyes flitted to the shot of the wreckage on screen and she instinctively clutched the bunch of flowers in her hands tighter. 

‘Bien sur. Please send her my best and to Drake too. Those poor things…’ Joelle sighed turning back to the screen. ’Such a terrible tragedy to happen to such a lovely pair. You’re sweet to go and visit her.’ 

The knot in her chest only tightened when Kiara heard her mother’s words. After the accident, she had feigned sickness and returned home where she had buried herself in her diplomatic duties instead, determined to shut everything out as the country was shocked by the news. Her parents were happy to have her home but they were too busy to notice the change in their daughter. Her brother Ezekiel had approached her attempting to extract the truth but she had pushed him away. 

All the guilt and regret she had been trying to shove down over the past two weeks now bubbled up dangerously. It had kept her up late, preventing her from sleep as she tossed and turned thinking of what she could have done. It had kept her from going to see Elizabeth even though she knew she should have and after two weeks of talking herself up to it, she had finally mustered up enough courage to go. Her mother’s tone was gentle and admiring but instead, Kiara eyes filled with tears and her lower lips began to wobble. She couldn’t keep what had happened to herself   

 ‘Maman..’ Her voice was small, squashed by the guilt again now as she toed her way around the couch. 

 ‘Oui?’ Joelle answered vaguely, her attention still on the TV. 

‘Maman,’ she began again unable to stop her voice from cracking. ‘It's all my fault.’ 

‘What do you mean cherie?’ Her mother turned to her confused. ‘Mon chere you can hardly blame yourself for what happened.' 

The dam of feelings that had built up over the past fortnight finally burst and Kiara sunk down beside her mother switching completely to French now. 

’No Mother, you don’t understand… This wouldn’t have happened if it wasn’t for me.’ 

-  

Two hours later, Kiara found herself outside the door to Elizabeth’s ward. She had confessed everything to her mother who had held her as she sobbed, gently stroking her hair listening while she admitted her part in the lead up to Elizabeth’s unfortunate accident. Though Joelle reassured her repeatedly that it hadn’t been her fault, Kiara just couldn’t bring herself to believe it. Mere words wouldn’t be enough to take away the guilt she felt. She’d almost abandoned the idea of visiting altogether but something tugged at her conscience telling her no, it was time to stop running. She needed to face this. Now mustering up her courage, she knocked once to announce herself before twisting the handle wincing as the door creaked loudly. Kiara’s eyes flew immediately to the figure on the bed. 

 Lying unmoving on her back, Elizabeth’s eyes were clamped shut while a collection of machines and devices surrounded the bed. The duchess' dark hair peaked out from under a thick wide bandage wrapped around her head. If it wasn’t for the gentle rise and fall of her chest, Kiara could have sworn she was looking at a statue and her breath caught in her throat as she stared at the numerous cuts and bruises that littered the other woman’s arms. 

Gulping deeply, she felt her confidence filtered away but before it could, she inched toward the side table to set her bouquet down with the others placed there. The crinkle of the wrapper making contact with the table was louder than she had meant for it to be and Kiara was barely able to keep her wits when dark head suddenly jerked up from the farther side of the bed. 

 Drake. 

 'I-I’m sorry,’ Kiara faltered, almost ashamed to be caught. 'I just came to drop these off. I didn’t mean to wake you.' 

 Seated in a chair beside the bed, he took a moment to adjust to wakefulness and in that time, it occurred to her that this was the first time they had been in the same room since the night at her estate. 

'No its fine really,’ he reassured her, exhaustion heavy in his voice. 'Just dozed off I guess.' 

Fighting waves of regret, she kept her eyes trained steadily on the girl on the bed, determined not to let her emotions get the better of her. 

'How is she?' 

Drake sighed wearily, running a hand over his haggard face. ‘She’s started breathing on her own yesterday which is a massive improvement. The doctors say its a miracle that she landed on her side rather than her back because her shoulder took most of the impact. They managed to stabilise her and stop the internal bleeding but on top of that she broke a few bones too so its gonna take some time before she’ll back to normal.' 

 Kiara nodded carefully, digesting this information. 'Did they say when she’ll wake up? 

He shook his head gravely. ‘Its all up to her I guess,’ he answered gesturing at Elizabeth. 'She’s recovering well from the massive head injury but they won’t know the full extent of the damage until then.’ 

 Kiara’s stomach dropped. She'd had minor differences with Elizabeth in the past, formed first throughout the social season and extending a hand of friendship was difficult due to the nature of competition. Contenders like Olivia and Madeline made it hard to believe that anyone would genuinely be interested in forming friendships without ulterior motives. Kiara was an ambitious woman and took pride in her abilities to get her what she wanted but it had always seemed too easy for Elizabeth. The American had been difficult to stomach at first, as she, despite having no courtly training or special skills, seemed to succeed almost blindly at winning the heart of the prince. To add to their bitterness, she’d indirectly humiliated all the suitors by turning him down. 

It had only grown deeper when Elizabeth started to pursue Drake Walker, another competition she had lost and the diplomat had been left with cold anger as she was rejected yet again. While Penelope had easily taken to the new duchess, Kiara found it harder to let go of the resentment. 

Despite all this, however, she realised that she’d never hated Elizabeth. The duchess didn’t deserve for something like this to happen to her. She had proved herself to be a kind and caring leader, something Kiara valued highly. If Kiara could take it all back, she would in a heart beat. 

 She swallowed hard before responding. ‘I’m sure she will be back to normal in no time.' 

‘Let’s hope,’ he nodded before addressing her again. 'I’m surprised you came to visit. Elizabeth would have liked that..’ 

Kiara paused. Would she? Would she have liked me if she knew all the bad things I had wished on her? 

‘She was my friend after all. I’d better go,’ she suggested, mumbling a weak excuse as she headed for the door. 

‘Kiara.’ At the sound of her name coming from his mouth, she froze, back still to him. 

 ‘Yes?’ 

 ‘Its not your fault you know?’ Drake told her. 'What happened to her...' 

Why was everyone telling her that? She knew he meant it from a place of thoughtfulness but it didn’t make her guilt any less. It wouldn’t take back what she had done or change what had happened. 

 All this and more swirling in her mind but she just nodded. 

-  

As she stepped over the threshold, Kiara was so immersed in thought, she almost bumped into someone coming in. 

 ‘Oh pardon!' 

‘Its alright dear,’ the woman reassured, her American accent complimented perfectly by her kind tone. Her dark skin and lively eyes struck a chord of familiarity and something occurred to the diplomat. 

 ‘You’re Elizabeth’s mother.' 

‘I am. And you must be Kiara?’ Mrs Richmond beamed, looking even more like her daughter. 'She often talked about you and Penelope among her other friends. Thank you for being such a good friend to our Aishwarya, dear.’ 

Kiara nodded again, this time unable to keep the tears from falling as she rushed away leaving her companion bewildered. 

Twenty-four days after the accident..

OLIVIA

BREAKING NEWS: THE GROUP BEHIND THE ASSASSINATION ATTEMPT ON THE ROYAL PALACE 3 MONTHS AGO HAS BEEN OFFICIALLY IDENTIFIED. AS WE SPEAK, MEMBERS OF THE TERRORIST GROUP ARE BEEN ARRESTED BY THE ROYAL GUARD.  

Olivia Nevrakis smiled as she scanned images of the resisting criminals splashed across the front page of the morning’s newspaper on the breakfast table before her. There was no better way to start your day than with an arrest of an entire terrorist group she mused, delicately sipping her tea. She went on to imagine all the ways they would be punished if only she was in charge of dealing them out, wondering if her methods would have differed greatly to that of her ancestors. Before she could dwell on it, her phone chimed reminding her she had to be at the palace in half an hour.   

When she arrived, Liam was already seated in one of the meeting rooms with Hana and Maxwell. The latter gave her tentative smiles while the king nodded in greeting. 

 ‘Thank you all for coming. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you the good news but we have other matters to discuss. Naturally, the court wants to have a ball in celebration and it would be a strong front to put forward if all of us attended.' 

‘Are parties all those  can think about at a time like this?’ Drake’s rough voice cut through the room as he stepped through the door. 

’So nice of you to join us Drake,’ Olivia scoffed as he took a seat next to Hana. ‘I’m was beginning to think you’d superglued yourself to Elizabeth's bedside.’ 

‘Ignore Olivia,’ Liam placated shooting her a cautionary look. ‘We’re glad to have you with us man. How is she?’ 

Drake sighed, seemed to age 10 years. ’She’s… stable. Not much has changed. Her parents are with her now.' 

 ‘Will Mr and Mrs Richmond be joining the festivities?’ Hana inquired trying to break the tension. 

Liam shook his head. ‘They will be departing back to the States later this week for their other daughter’s graduation. They wanted to stay on longer but there was no avoiding it. They actually wanted to take Elizabeth back with the-‘ 

‘Take her back?!’ Maxwell interrupted. ‘But- They can’t! She needs to stay here with us. She hasn’t even woken up yet!’ 

The king held up a hand for silence. ’The doctors have informed them of that it is very important that she be kept stable in this sensitive time. I have assured them that she would continue getting the best care Cordonia has to offer.' 

Maxwell nodded sombrely, plunging the room into a melancholy silence. 

 Like everyone else, Olivia’s mind shifted to Elizabeth. In her first few encounters with the American, she’d readily dismissed her as the clueless foreigner who was sure to crack after one week. To her initial surprise and chagrin however, Elizabeth had proved her otherwise, surpassing all the trials of the court with as much grace as a noble born lady. Back then, Olivia held no love for her but she could appreciate strength when she saw it and surprised herself by agreeing to work with the foreigner to restore her name. Elizabeth had been like the glue that held their little group together for without her their friendships would not have developed as well as they did. Although she had harboured feelings of resentment towards her for turning Liam down even those had been fading lately. 

If Elizabeth did die, she had no idea what the future would look like for them and there was little Olivia hated more than uncertainty. It made her impatient and more prone to outbursts and for a moment she bitterly resented the duchess for compromising it, when she was only just getting the hang of the whole friendship thing. 

‘She’d save us all some trouble if she hurried up and kicked the bucket already.'  

There was a sharp intake of breath from the room and the redhead's eyes widened she realised that she had voiced her comment out loud. 

 ‘Olivia!’ Hana chastised.   

Her eyes landed on Drake who was glaring at her, jaw clenched in anger as the veins in his neck throbbed dangerously.  

’Nevrakis I know being empathetic isn’t really in your capacity but just this once could you cut it out with the sarcasm?’ 

 Olivia’s usual flawless exterior faltered slightly as she realised her last comment may have gone a step too far. Her mouth dropped open to apologise but one glare from Drake silence all response she would have formulated. She remained quiet for the rest of the meeting as the rest of them discussed the plans for the ball. Even though the assassins had been apprehended they still needed to persuade the court that Liam was the best option for Cordonia. After almost two hours of tactics and strategy, Liam released them and she approached Drake carefully. 

‘Drake I-‘ He brushed her away with a dismissive wave. 

‘Forget it Olivia. I wouldn’t expect you of all people to understand.’ 

 Now that stung. 

 Olivia knew she put forward the emotionless, cold-hearted persona very well but now it was coming back to bite her. Underneath the facade, though she would never admit it out loud, these people has wormed their way into her heart and she really did care for them. She just wished she could find it in her to voice it out loud. 

The Duchess of Lythikos mentally shook herself at the thought. Her feelings would have to wait. There was work to be done now and if she was going to help Liam rally the support he needed, internal monologuing wouldn’t do anyone any good.

Thirty-one days after the accident... 

LIAM

AFTER THE ARREST OF ALL MEMBERS OF THE TERRORIST GROUP THAT THREATENED THE ROYAL FAMILY AND MANY OF THE NOBILITY, CORDONIA IS RECOVERING WELL AND IS ON ITS WAY TO PROSPERING. THE SHARES ON THE CORDONIAN RUBY ARE AT AN ALL TIME HIGH UNDER KING LIAM’S STRONG GOVERNANCE.

‘Gracias Your Majesty. I look forward to our next meeting where we can iron out those last few details.’ 

‘De nada, Signor Gutierrez. I believe this trade deal will greatly benefit both our countries. I look forward to a long and fruitful relationship between our countries.’ 

‘As do I King Liam. I must mention I have never seen a monarch who prioritises the safety of his people as well as you. Other countries could learn much from your method of governance.’ 

 Thanking him, Liam hung up the Skype call with the Spanish embassador, gently massaging his temples as he scanned the headlines on iPad in front of him. 

 The politician's words had come from a place of kindness but all they seemed to inspire was a sense of deep guilt within him. A quote from his childhood studies on Cicero returned to his mind. 

 The safety of the people shall be the highest law. 

 He’d watch Constantine rule with this principle and though his father had many faults, he always had his priorities right. As a monarch it was his cardinal duty to keep his people safe and after the assassination attempt the weight of the crown had pressed heavily on Liam's shoulders. It has eased slightly now the assassins had been captured and apprehended. The economy was finally stabilising and thanks to the ball a few days ago, he had secured more than a few important deals with the help of his friends. 

Cordonia was finally prospering, getting back to her feet so why did he feel so terrible? 

 The answer lay a few miles away in a hospital bed. 

 After the accident, as soon as Elizabeth was stable, he’d immediately placed her in a secure ward with state-of-the-art facilities and the best medical professionals. He’d given her the best possible care but still the guilt persisted. To say Elizabeth was a very special person to him would be a huge understatement. She had no idea but she represented the beginning of  a new life for him, one where he would take matters into his own hands to make his own decisions. If possibility had a colour, he was sure it would be the green of her dress from the night they’d met in New York city what seemed like a lifetime ago. He loved her and though she hadn’t reciprocated in the way he once wanted her to, Liam knew she would always hold a unique place in his heart. Any ill feeling of resentment when she chose Drake over him had faded away now and in its place a strong friendship was blossoming. When he promoted her to duchess, Liam had looked forward to seeking her counsel during his rule. Unlike him, Elizabeth hadn’t been born into nobility, she knew the struggles of the common man and was more in tune with their needs as he never would be. 

She would have been an amazing duchess. 

No, he corrected himself. She is going to be an amazing duchess. 

Now that her life hung in the balance, it was all too easy to succumb to the temptation of pessimism and he found himself constantly fighting against it now, knowing that his friend wouldn’t have approved of his despondency. He would do it. He would continue to fight the good fight, with or without her, Liam promised himself that. 

 A frantic buzzing of his phone broke him out of his thoughts. He’d been in that position for so long that his arms twinged slightly as he reached for the device beside him, glancing at the screen to reveal a text message from Drake.

Hospital. Now. 

Twenty minutes later, Liam strode purposefully down the ward hallway, staff parting in front of him like the Red Sea. Before he could reach the door to her room, a gasping Drake stumbled out, barely able to stand as heavy uneven breaths wracked his figure. Fear rose up in Liam as his mind automatically assumed the worst but before he could say a word, Drake’s body began to pitch forward and he caught him just before he could hit the floor. 

 ‘Drake what happened? Is she okay?' 

‘Liam… Liam she…She doesn’t..’ He choked out, clutching onto the sleeves of Liam’s blazer as the king helped him to stand. Drake gulped deeply, desperately fighting for air as he attempted to articulate his thoughts. 

 ‘She doesn’t what?! Is Elizabeth okay?' Liam could not help the notes of alarm and impatience that laced his tone as he questioned the other man. ‘Dammit Walker what happened?’ 

 He watched his best friend’s brown eyes well up with tears, his face contorting with anguish. ’S-She doesn’t remember Liam!’ 

 The king's face screwed up in confusion at the words. ‘You’re not making any sense. What do you mean she doesn’t remember? What doesn’t she remember Drake?’ 

Liam would never forget the look of complete and total despair in his friend’s eyes as he finally gasped out his response. 

‘She doesn’t remember falling in love with me.’

-

A/N: YOU ASKED FOR ANGST AND I OBEYED! Leave me some reaction gifs to giggle at. 

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The Incredible Hulk’s Diminished Legacy in the Marvel Cinematic Universe

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Love it or hate it, one of the things that makes the Marvel Cinematic Universe work is the long term synergy. With Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame, over a decade of movies came together to pull off one of the most entertaining spectacles of our time. It’s a universe that, for the most part, feels consistent and it builds on itself as each movie feels like an essential cog in a larger machine.

Some cogs are bigger than the others, though, and when it comes to “the others,” one can’t help but notice that 2008’s Incredible Hulk is something of a black sheep in the Marvel movie roster. These days, they’re just starting to dust it off as a property with the return of Tim Roth’s Abomination in She-Hulk and William Hurt’s General Ross’ gradually increasing role in the universe itself (he’ll appear in Black Widow and possibly other projects soon enough).

Now, there are plenty of reasons why Incredible Hulk is the green-skinned stepchild of the MCU. It made the least amount of money (about $42 million less than Captain America: The First Avenger, which was the second worst showing), the lead actor was recast afterwards, and its status as a Universal co-production meant that it would be the only movie in the first three Marvel phases that would not get its own sequel, no matter how popular Hulk was in the Avengers movies and Thor: Ragnarok.

It’s not like the MCU acted like Incredible Hulk never happened, but the creators definitely had a tendency to shove it into the corner and be somewhat vague about its existence. It became easier as the MCU became rich with more and more properties, but early on, it was very much the rage-filled elephant in the room.

The Hulk Design

There were a couple of ads for Avengers: Endgame that included shots from all the previous MCU movies in chronological order. For one, when it came to Incredible Hulk, all it had to show for it was Hulk’s fist bursting through the wall. In another, they just used shots from later movies and hoped nobody would notice. That’s because CGI or not, Ed Norton’s Hulk and Mark Ruffalo’s Hulk were two very different beasts. Not only did they roughly resemble their actors, but Norton’s Hulk was more of a giant, angry bodybuilder with green skin while Ruffalo’s came off as more Cro-Magnon, like a shaved gorilla.

It means that while they could talk about Hulk’s exploits, they could never really show any flashbacks, as it would just look awkward. Similarly, Incredible Hulk filmed a cut opening where Banner tried to shoot himself, but the Hulk wouldn’t allow it. While it was a bit too extreme to show, Banner at least got to talk about it happening in Avengers.

The Effect on the World of the MCU

When you look at the events of Incredible Hulk, it keeps things focused on the characters and not the world at large. Sure, it would have been bigger news if the Abomination defeated the Hulk and went on an even bigger rampage, but that problem was nipped in the bud. If you’re a citizen of Marvel Earth, all there is to know is that some soda has been recalled and there was a monster fight in Harlem.

In the movies themselves, the only time the Harlem fight is brought up is in the background of Iron Man 2, where Nick Fury’s map signals it as a place of interest.

With the exception of the Hulk straight-up existing, the most lip service his movie got early on was the scene in Captain America: The First Avenger where Steve gave blood for further study. They needed something to give Emil Blonsky down the line and turn him into an angry Ninja Turtle.

Speaking of…

Whatever Happened to the Abomination?

Of Marvel’s Phase 1 villains, one died, a couple vanished confusingly into space only to come back later, and three were taken into custody. Ending up in custody means you’ll be back soon enough because prisons usually can’t hold the type of enemies who can throw down with the Avengers. Usually.

In other words, it’s pretty damn impressive that the Abomination has been kept off the grid since the Hulk choked him out in Harlem. She-Hulk will be his first real appearance since then, but his name has been on the tongue of Phil Coulson on Agents of SHIELD a few times.

The scene of Tony Stark appearing at the end of Incredible Hulk to confront General Ross is something that came off as a big deal at the time, but afterwards didn’t make too much sense. Piggybacking off the Iron Man post-credits scene, Stark was seemingly trying to recruit the Hulk into the Avengers. That didn’t exactly jibe with what they were going for afterwards, so they released a short film to make sense out of everything.

The Consultant featured Agent Coulson and Agent Sitwell discussing the unfortunate decision by the World Security Council to demand the Abomination join the team. After all, Blonsky is a decorated veteran and the Harlem incident could easily be blamed on Banner. Fury wasn’t in a position to refuse the Council, so the only hope was that General Ross – the guy in charge of Blonsky’s captivity – turned them down. And so, they sent Tony Stark. That final scene in Incredible Hulk was reframed as Tony Stark obnoxiously asking for the keys to Abomination for the Avengers and Ross being so annoyed by his antics that he straight-up refused.

Afterwards, Abomination was namedropped a couple of times in Agents of SHIELD, which is par for the course considering early Agents of SHIELD was about reminding us about stuff that happened in the movies and saying, “We’re part of all that!” According to the show, Abomination was kept in a special prison in Alaska that only a select few know about. There was an episode where SHIELD’s main prison lost power and one of the writers realized that they probably needed to note that Abomination wasn’t going to be an issue in this situation.

But hey, at least he finished his story. The Leader on the other hand…

Samuel Sterns and the Fate of the Leader

At the time, it was the right play. Tim Blake Nelson played the kind of surprise villain you’d find in your average CGI animated Disney movie. As Mr. Blue, he existed as Bruce Banner’s potential salvation, only to be revealed to be kind of over-the-line and sinister in terms of his gamma experiments. After turning Blonsky into the Abomination, Sterns was knocked to the floor and a sample of Banner’s irradiated blood dripped into the open wound on his head. Sterns seemed especially jazzed with a crazed expression as his head started throbbing and increasing in size.

And then…nothing! Not even a mention in a different movie or Agents of SHIELD. That’s what happens when you set up a villain for a sequel and then have legal reasons keeping you from making that sequel. That said, there is a follow-up to what the hell happened with Sterns.

Back in 2012, a prequel comic was released to coincide with the first Avengers movie. The Avengers Prelude: Fury’s Big Week showed that the events of Iron Man 2, Thor, and Incredible Hulk all happened over the course of a few days. We got to see those storylines from the perspective of SHIELD, especially a very overwhelmed and fatigued Nick Fury. That makes sense for the stuff with Tony Stark in Iron Man 2 as well as Mjolnir and the Destroyer in Thor, but what of Incredible Hulk?

As shown in this story, Black Widow was in the background of its events, keeping an eye on everything and realizing that she was way in over her head. She played clean-up on the Sterns situation by coming across his giant, mutated head in the aftermath. Sterns was quick to figure out her homeland from traces of her accent and thought to bribe her in some way, but she stonewalled him with a couple of bullets to the legs.

A year later, Sterns was shown floating in a tank, unconscious, as various SHIELD scientists studied him.

Will we ever see the Leader pop up in the MCU? I can’t imagine Tim Blake Nelson is too busy to appear on She-Hulk at some point.

Betty Ross

Bruce Banner’s old flame is now nothing but a footnote. Considering Banner moved on to another relationship and then another planet, there was never a reason to reintroduce Betty. The only nods to her were Tony Stark naming his Hulkbuster armor “Veronica” (get it?) and the Russo Brothers saying in an interview that Betty was one of those turned to dust by Thanos.

Maybe one day we’ll see Red She-Hulk. Don’t hold your breath, though.

Thunderbolt Ross

General Thaddeus Ross does the heavy lifting for keeping Incredible Hulk relevant. The guy came back for Captain America: Civil War, a movie that didn’t even have the Hulk in it! But it did give him the Henry Gyrich role in a time when Gyrich was probably off-limits since he was considered part of the X-Men corner of Marvel (he already had a very minor role in the first X-Men movie). A familiar face, Ross got to be the government liaison type who spoke with logic, but came off as an antagonistic killjoy.

Right or wrong, Ross’ insistence that the Avengers sign with the Sokovia Accords ruined the team in the face of Thanos’ rampage against the cosmos. He still got to show his respects as Tony Stark’s funeral at the end of Endgame.

Yet, that’s not the last we’ll see of him. In Black Widow, Ross is shown in the trailers. We don’t know his role quite yet, but there’s a lot of fan speculation that Ross might tie into the next roster of the Avengers. Maybe a team that’s government sanctioned and controlled. Maybe a team that’s an awful lot like the Thunderbolts.

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It does seem that as the MCU reaches further and further outward, it looks back more and more on the events of Incredible Hulk. Then again, I doubt we’ll be seeing Ty Burrell’s Leonard Samson turn into a gamma-irradiated psychiatrist with long, luxurious hair any time soon.

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[tohavefaithistofindwings]

Time to be brutally honest and just throw feelings out to the internet. That’s the healthy way to cope right? Oh well. 

Here I am. Alive still. Two years after the car accident. I’m still angry. I’m still in pain. I’m still discovering new issues from that night. I’m still recovering. 

Along with all the other issues that were caused like broken bones, we discovered this past year that my spine took a lot of trauma. *shock* 

I have been in varying levels of extreme chronic pain for the past 11 months. And varying levels since the accident so about 2 years. The latter being expected to a certain extent. Being in extreme pain that limits my mobility while planning a wedding, while getting married, while going on my honeymoon, while working on shows non stop in between. Not great for morale as you can probably guess. 

Basically, I have in simple terms is early spinal degeneration. Because of the damage done, my lower back is kind of giving up. 3 out of 5 lumbar discs are herniated or torn or both. and several have started to develop bone spurs. It took almost 3 months after my pain got extremely bad for doctors to give me that diagnosis. But even then they sugar coated it. I’ve seen a surgeon and he wants to fuse my spine to prevent further damage to my nerves and back in general. I’m waiting on a second opinion before we pursue that option.

I’m scared to pursue the surgery. What would that mean for my future? I’m 25. I’m too young to be dealing with my body breaking down. No one can even promise that this will resolve my pain or make it better. They can just promise a reduction of pain after I heal. Plus they are operating on my spine. MY SPINE. They are directly working around the nerves that let me walk and move and go to the bathroom on my own. Yeah. That’s a symptom I have to be watching for. If I lose control of my bowels I have to go to the ER immediately. TMI? Maybe. Its not really something I want to be thinking about when I have to use the bathroom. 

Doing the surgery would mean I’d be out of normal life for 4 months. 4 months of not working, of not doing shows, of not pursuing things I want to be doing. And after that I don’t know what I’ll be able to do. I have a lot of things I cant do. Like go on roller coasters. Which is a silly one to be sad about but still its something. I feel like I am just starting to get my life back from the last time. I’m getting booked for shows. I’m somewhat satisfied in my day job. I’m scared what it means for my future if I’m gone for 4 months again. I don’t know how I’ll be after the surgery. The doctor says he’s had firemen go back to work afterwards but they don’t have the other damage I do. And there are so many risks. So many risks. 

My therapist asked me if I was ready for the surgery. And I said I dont know. She said that there is more than just my body to consider right now. She says I need to be emotionally/mentally ready for the surgery. I dont know if I can ever get to that point though? I’m so risk adverse I don’t know if I can do it if I play by those rules.  Mentally, I’m not even over the accident. I thought I was getting better. But I keep having flashbacks of  that night. They are so vivid and real. I’m living it over and over again. I can see the headlights coming at me. I can hear myself saying “no no no” and the TripleA agent asking what is wrong. I remember waking up sprawled into the passenger seat. Everything hurt. I had no idea where I was. I remember struggling to sit up in my seat. It was so hard, my body felt heavy. I remember feeling the rain and someone asking if I was ok and struggling to reply. I remember touching my face and it was wet. The dashboard of my car was splattered with blood. I was so alone. People were standing outside of the car in front of it. I could see them through my front windshield. I remember screaming blurred words to them. Help. Help me please. please. I felt so utterly alone. Somewhere in all of this, I grabbed my phone and the wallet I had open in the passenger seat from trying to call the tow truck. I closed my eyes and just waited. I couldnt move. I didnt know why. I remember the first responders cutting me out of the car and asking if I could walk. I said a garbled I dont know. They pulled me out and i took one step and almost fell. The pain was too much something was wrong. They carried me to the stretcher just a few steps away. They strapped me into it. The rain was falling harder. I was soaking wet by now. They hooked the stretcher into the ambulance and it hurt so much as they shoved me in and got it latched safely. They tried asking me questions. I tried talking but everything was so garbled, I guess they couldnt hear me. They assigned me a trauma name. Georgia. All I can think about is the pain in my leg. I was shouting. My leg. My leg. They helped lift it up under a pillow. Its only slightly better. I remember them cutting off my clothes. I had just gotten new black jeans and I was wearing a brand new flannel that I loved. I asked them to not cut my flannel and they tried as best they can to help me out of it. Little did I know it was already ruined from the blood and from the car. When they cut me out of the car, it had gotten in the way. It was silly that I cared so much about a flannel shirt, shock can do that to you. I remember very little from the ride. I was in and out of consciousness apparently. I remember at one point hearing the EMTs laughing and I couldnt say anything. I dont know what they were laughing about, but I just remember that sound. My brain makes me think they were laughing about me, but I so hope I am wrong. The pain was worse getting pulled from the ambulance into the ER. The jarring slams of the stretcher coming out then down out of the bus. I remember a doctor asking me questions. She had a kind face. They put me under so I remember very little in the ER. I remember waking up at one point getting put into a CT machine then I was out again. I remember hearing doctors talking in the room. And talking about my scans or X-Rays. Who knows? I woke up again to my mother and Annie talking in the room somewhere. When I tried to call out to them, they came over. Then asking how I was etc. I was covered in bruises. I literally had a list of things that were wrong. My mom took photos of my face and my body so I could see since I couldnt move. The doctor told me I would need surgery the next day. Then when I complained of more pain, they discovered another thing to add to the list and scheduled another surgery. 

That night and those days are seared into my brain. The photos of my car the next day. My brother telling me of the blood covering the inside of my car turned brown while drying. I found out later on that the TripleA agent that was on the phone with me called back, multiple times and left worried voicemails. I had at least 7 from them. From what I understand, they are the reason 911 got to me so quickly. 

I’m sorry if this is all too graphic or whatever. I just need to put it down in some form. I hope that writing it out it stops pushing to the front of my brain. The smallest things trigger me right now. Some have nothing to do with cars or the accident. 

Its been 2 years. I’m still recovering. I celebrated a small personal victory the other day. I was able to take the stairs two at a time without needing a handrail and minimal pain. I wasn’t running or anything. Just casually walking up. It was exicting but no one really understands why. Its just normal for them. Its something I’ve not been able to do for so long. This pending surgery makes me scared for what other things am I going to be losing, forever or even just for a very long time. Is it going to effect my progress in the other things? 

I just want to move on. I want to leave it in the past. The scars are there, can the trauma just stop now? I’m so tired. I’m so tired of being “strong”. I’m ready to be done. I’m so done with all of this.