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cienie-isengardu · 4 years ago

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axelzp replied to “The Bad Batch”:

I think most people take issue with Omega and TBB due to concerns over whitewashing. Also, what do you have against the explanation of the biochips? Personally, I always thought it fit Palpatine's controlling nature better than the idea of clones just getting a command from some random guy in a hood, telling them to kill the Jedi.

First off, I apologize it took me so long to answer. I tried to explain my reasoning in a short and coherent way as possible, but apparently the years of frustration about this issue needed more space to be properly addressed. So, in advance, sorry for text length.

From all TCW changes done to star wars, the chip-in-brain is one of my top 3 reasons to dislike the whole TV show, despite many of its good moments. I understand why authors chose this sub-plot that allows them to separate the visibly individual "good" clones (thus making them more likeable for the audience / marketing) from the “bad” that kill the Jedi but frankly, I find it a cheap and kinda problematic excuse. Clones were victims regardless of which version people will accept but I really despite the idea that Jedi were their beloved generals and commanders - so beloved that clones actually had nightmares about killing them waaay before Palpatine ultimately won which undermines the whole point of Order 66.

Jedi could never expect clones to shoot them in the back because they were used to their unquestioned obedience from the start of war. It was common knowledge, repeatedly mentioned in sources like “Jedi Trial” that clones were “bred to war, bred to discipline, bred to obey without question the orders of the powers that paid for their services”. Clones were made that way by genetic manipulations and years of intensive training; an indoctrination that makes clone troopers believe they have obey, no matter what cost.

Some sources, like Clone Wars Adventures’ “Orders” outright show us the mindset of clones:

and We’ve got nothing but each other ad our orders.

Because of that worldbuilding, I prefer Legends take on clone obedience and the Jedi approach to the problem than what TCW created. I talked about it more here, but the general sense is that I feel cheated by the idea of chips that turn people into some “programmed” machines because in such way, TCW erased the Jedi & Republic part in abuse & enslavement of clone troopers, while at the same time giving an unrealistic idea that Jedi were so liked / respected when most of clones did not have any special bond with them. And this is less about if Jedi were good military leaders or not and more that as generals/commanders they didn’t interact that much with common troopers. Because the chain of command doesn’t work like that. I’m willing to buy the close(r) bond between Anakin & 501st because frankly Darth Vader himself from the start was built as someone with better relationships with common troopers / “normal” officers than with most of the high ranking officers presented on screen. I’m pretty sure some other Jedi were caring and liking clones (and vice versa) but it is impossible for generals to know and be so close to all of their troopers.

Above everything else, Legends created an interesting situation in which the Jedi Council / Order knew clones would follow orders no matter if those were right or not and were aware how dangerous it could be yet they still didn’t do anything about it, because the obedience of clones were beneficial for them. Jedi not only took for granted their obedience, they mistook it for respect.

Which really speaks a lot about Jedi's own moral failing and/or lack of understanding the difference between those two terms.

In the Legends sources, there was no need for chips, really, when from the start Kaminoans tinkered with clone genome, created the effective system of “proper” education to mold clones into obedient soldiers and Republic wasn’t really interested to undo the damage done by such indoctrination.

Before TCW brought the chips and “nightmares haunting clones” there were officially established Contingency Orders for the Grand Army of the Republic: Order Initiation, Orders 1 Through 150. A guideline for unexpected and/or critical situations, so the Great Army of Republic [GAR] would know how to proceed - especially when troopers were given contradictory orders. The orders (also known as Clone Protocols) weren’t secret and there is a big chance that Jedi knew it, if someone bothered to learn the manual. The whole formula of Order 66 was described as:

"In the event of Jedi officers acting against the interests of the Republic, and after receiving specific orders verified as coming directly from the Supreme Commander (Chancellor), GAR commanders will remove those officers by lethal force, and command of the GAR will revert to the Supreme Commander (Chancellor) until a new command structure is established."

And here how the scene played in the RotS novelisation:

That concealed compartment held a secure comlink, which was frequency-locked to a channel reserved for the commander in chief.

Kenobi nodded and spoke to his mount, and the great beast overleapt the clone commander on its way down into the battle.

Cody withdrew the comlink from his armor and triggered it.

A holoscan appeared on the palm of his gauntlet: a hooded man.

"It is time," the holoscan said. "Execute Order Sixty-Six."

Cody responded as he had been trained since before he'd even awakened in his creche-school. "It will be done, my lord."

The holoscan vanished. Cody stuck the comlink back into its concealed recess and frowned down toward where Kenobi rode his dragonmount into selflessly heroic battle.

Cody was a clone. He would execute the order faithfully, without hesitation or regret. But he was also human enough to mutter glumly, "Would it have been too much to ask for the order to have come through before I gave him back the bloody lightsaber. . . ?"

The order is given once. Its wave-front spreads to clone commanders on Kashyyyk and Felucia, Mygeeto and Tellanroaeg and every battlefront, every military installation, every hospital and rehab center and spaceport cantina in the galaxy.

So there is really no “random hooded guy” calling clones to kill Jedi but Chancellor himself using an appropriately secured military channel with confirmation of his identity to issue a legal order in a critical situation (an opportunity created by the Jedi Council themselves who went into the Senate building to kill Palpatine). So why the clones shouldn’t listen, when the order came directly from the Supreme Commander of the Great Army of the Republic?

Of course, the movie (and novel based on it) alone has this weird addition like “yes my Lord'', what I personally consider as the cinematic way to show the switch from Chancellor Palpatine to Emperor Darth Sidious. Still, I’m willing to give some benefit of doubt about the modification made by Kaminoans and if Order 66 could trigger anything hidden in clone subconscious. But even if there was something, it didn’t erase their personalities or changed the way clones behaved like it happened in The Clone Wars and The Bad Batch.

One way or another, the Order 66 worked out because clones “have no malice, no hatred, not the slightest ill intent that might give warning. They are only following orders”. Which I guess comes down to how clone troopers were presented - or maybe rather how they were seen by other characters in the Legends. As more detached, combat pragmatic, toned down, to some degree isolated from the outside world, less individual. Regardless of what Jedi or Republic citizens thought about clones, it did not make them any less human beings.

And here comes the paradox of The Clone Wars. The TV show made great effort to humanize clones by presenting them as very individual, outstanding people which in itself is a great thing. The names, the tattos, the different paintings of armours, visible variety of behaviour. All great to make the audience see clones as human beings, to get emotionally invested into them, because the more likeable clones were the better for marketing the story (and the cynical part of me thinks it really comes down to making money, isn’t it?)

But this effort became also the trap and the inhibitor chips is the excuse to make such loved, caring and brave characters into the detached clones gunning down the Jedi in Revenge of the Sith.

The things that irks me a lot about this situation is the feeling like fans started care for clones because they were made into different type of characters than what they were (similar like Anakin’s movie characterization was thrown out of the window, to make him more suitable for fans who wanted the badass typical male hero instead of introverted, conflicted and traumatized young man). The clones get the visible individuality to make them the heroes we should root for, but then there is the “magical” switch that will cut down their heroic deeds because now they are “bad” and stormtroopers can’t have any personality. Which is just… frustrating.

Don’t get me wrong, I adore how clone troopers get more visible individuality (even if sometimes if felt too exaggerated), but the “not standing out from the group” was something that kept clones alive on Kamino and I can see why it was used as coping mechanism (the safe option) during the war. I regret that The Clone Wars didn’t show the transition from AotC nameless troopers into such individuals and how much it happened thanks to Jedi, what may help to build the feeling of supposed strong bond between Jedi and troopers. Because frankly, when we met TCW!clones, they already have names, different colors and marks on armor plates and helmets and for all we know, they could create their own “culture” without Jedi influence.

The final part of why I hate the chip-in-brain sub-plot is how it changed clones. Because even if that was a means to force clones into killing Jedi & ensure that Order 66 will be carried on no matter what, it shouldn’t change them into bullies toward their own brothers. But now in The Bad Batch, the clones don’t speak between themselves, are aggressive toward others and generally act like assholes for no real reason. And yeah, I get this may be a cinematic metaphor for a change from “good” republic soldiers into “bad” imperial stormtroopers and most likely something along the way “Republic/Jedi gave you individuality, Empire takes that away” but frankly, Republic did not give anything to clones. It did not acknowledge their human right, didn’t have any plan for their future, didn’t pay for their service or more expensive medical treatment for that matter, did not teach them they could - should - make their own choices.

Now clones are cheering for the Empire because inhibitor chips! They are assholes, because inhibitor chips! They shoot their *beloved* Jedi generals because of the chips!

And in a way, I get this resolution, the chips make it clear clones were victims. But even without them, they were victims from the start. Except now clones are “programmed” while in Legends the senate (a power paying for their life) officially and legally renamed Republic into Empire and clones were glad for still having a purpose in life. The war ended (thus their usefulness), but they were still needed - still wanted - instead of being put down or closed at Kamino or whatever. I can see why the uncertainty of the future made clones cheering up for the Empire. And frankly, I personally prefer them not caring for the political change (because why should they? It never was their job to *judge* the rightness of their superiors) instead of being “programmed” like some droids and playing the role of fodder to kill for the “good guys”.

Dunno, if I explained properly my issue with inhibitor chips, it just feels to me as not really convincing and a too risky concept in the bigger picture of the things and the fact that Jedi just like that ignored this suspicion matter of Tup and Fives and biochips doesn’t help either. Like I said, I understand why the chips were introduced to the story, as the excuse in the change of clone troopers’ behaviour but at the end of day, Legends worldbuilding will always make more sense to me. I don’t need overly done differentiation of clones to care for them as an individual human beings (and it kinda seems to me like that, clones suddenly became fan favorite when every looks or act differently but not when the AotC literally presented them as an army created to blindly obey Jedi/Republic) and I don’t blame them for sticking with Empire because what better option they had, considering their upbringing and the pathological system in which they lived all their life?

Dunno, I’m biased and may just have allergy to TCW in general.

As for Omega, I’m not really surprised about this concern, especially after seeing TBB’s version of padawan Kanan (that if not for A) some basic knowledge about his backstory and B) Depa Billaba calling him by name, I would probably never have figured out who he was supposed to be). But for Omega alone, I don’t mind her look, because I’m used to Legends!Jango’s biological family in which his mother and sister were both blond haired women and frankly, some “defective” clones (including Rex?) apparently could be blond too, so it seems like Jango’s genome has a recessive gene somewhere for that color of hair. I try to hold my judgment about Omega and her appearance until the full backstory will be revealed because there is still a chance that Fett’s DNA was mixed with someone else's (still I hope Omega is not force sensitive…). I mean, Hunter has heightened senses while Wrecker has almost supernatural strength and both traits seem to be not really human, so who knows what Kaminoans really did with them.

I understand people’s emotional response to Disney’s approach to characters and their visual look, especially since it isn’t the first screw up in New Canon (the models for characters in general and New Mandalorians especially). I’m totally okay with people’s criticism of that matter and demanding from Disney more diversity and respecting the already established ethnicity of certain groups. I’m aware I may not be sensitive enough to that matter as some other people (even more with barely watching TV shows to have any current and up-to-date comparison to trends in cartoons) and I’m pretty sure more qualified / invested fans already wrote or will be writing soon great metas about that. But the thing that irks me is hearing people saying that Omega *can’t* be Jango’s clone - I don’t like this sort of exclusion based on someone’s look alone. She may not look like Fett or other (male) clones but it is not something Omega chose for herself and does not erase her connection to the rest of the Bad Batch. Being angry at Disney/creators for her look is a different matter I don’t have any problem with.

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chroniclesofamber · 5 years ago

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THE CHRONICLES OF AMBER & History Lessons

It should be obvious that writers, composers, painters and all artists respond to the time in which they live, and that this is reflected in their art. And it should also come as no surprise that some material is more strongly influenced by the historical moment than other art. All this is at least as true for Roger Zelazny and his idolized Chronicles of Amber — perhaps somewhat more so, given that these five books in no small way chart a complete decade.

NINE PRINCES IN AMBER (1970)

History: Pieces of the first book saw print as early as 1967. It appears Zelazny worked on the book here and there for three years or more until its publication in 1970. Still looming over the political landscape of the time was the assassination of John F. Kennedy years earlier, which had led to the Johnson “great society” era and from there to Nixon’s struggles with China, the Soviet Union and the Vietnam War. Just as influential was the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., as well as that of Robert Kennedy. The 1960s were dominated by these issues, the Cold War and threat of nuclear annihilation, the rise of the counter-culture and protest movements, the Beatles and Woodstock, and the first landing of men on the Moon.

As someone familiar with Jungian psychology and Frazer’s Golden Bough, Zelazny saw a way to harness the interregnum turmoil of the Sixties while incorporating the ritual of “the Killing of the King.” (Conspiriologists left and right — politically, and otherwise — have long adhered to the notion that it was not a coincidence that this particular killing of the king had been carried out in accordance with ancient ritual.) The King of Amber is missing or deceased. Factions have quickly aligned to jockey for the best position to take advantage of the power vacuum. That a conspiracy to remove both the king and Corwin is uncovered, a few books later, also mirrors the deaths of the Kennedys. Our hero, already in a state of confusion over his own identity and situation, is thrust into the midst of this power-struggle and — like Armstrong and Aldrin aboard the Eagle — soon finds himself visiting another world.

Lesson: Corwin charges in somewhat blindly, and is literally blinded (and imprisoned) as a result. When he miraculously regains both his sight and his freedom, he vows that patience and planning will guide him going forward and that, this time, he will prevail and take his rightful place in Amber. He also learns that what drives you, what you want, has a lot to say about who you are.

Journey: He starts out being held against his will in a hospital, recovering from broken legs and near-drowning from a car accident. By the end of the book, he is recuperating from years of blindness and imprisonment under much better circumstances in a remote lighthouse while cared for by an old friend. When he leaves the lighthouse, no one tries to thwart his departure (he is voluntarily assisted, in point of fact), he knows exactly who he is and what he wants, and has a clear idea of his objective and how to achieve it.

THE GUNS OF AVALON (1972)

History: Two years pass, eventful ones. No shortage of natural disasters — major cholera epidemics in Istanbul and Slovakia; avalanches in France and Peru; earthquakes in Tonghai, Gediz, Burdur, Bingöl, Peru and elsewhere destroy cities and kill thousands; Mount Etna erupts; Montreal is buried by the blizzard dubbed La Tempête du Siècle; the Odisha cyclone overtakes the Bay of Bengal and claims 10,000 lives; 50 tornadoes tear through Louisiana and Mississippi; floods put Bangladesh and eastern Bengal underwater; the Bhola cyclone wipes out half a million people. But the real disasters turn out to be man-made, so much so that this period could easily be described by the phrase “state of emergency.” The Apollo 13 mission fails, though the astronauts survive and the summer of 1971 sees a rover rolling across the surface of the Moon. Oil-price instability and Nixon taking the dollar off the gold standard together signal economic and energy crises yet-to-come, but the real instability is social, political and military. Coups and assassinations become commonplace as former colonial possessions are granted independence.

Keyword: Napalm. Bombs, terrorism, murder and violence, state-sanctioned and otherwise, plague the United Kingdom due to resistance to British rule in Northern Ireland. American incursions into Laos and Cambodia fuel growing anti-war sentiment. The publication of the Pentagon Papers and the COINTELPRO documents stolen from FBI offices in Pennsylvania, news images of the Kent State shootings, and revelations of the My Lai Massacre throw gasoline onto the fire: 150,000 protest the Vietnam War in San Francisco on the same day that half a million march on Washington, D.C. 60% of Americans oppose American troops in Southeast Asia. Meanwhile, the ashes of Hitler, Eva Braun, and the Goebbels family are scattered in East Germany’s Biederitz River. Echoing all this, Zelazny pulls from the Grail quest an idea which unites the chaos reflected in the natural and human worlds in a single image — the Wasteland — and gives it the form of the Black Road, which Corwin discovers runs all the way to the outskirts of his beloved Amber.

Lesson: Corwin struggles with his commitment to his system of values as demonic beings and foreign-imposed dictatorship threaten the shadow world Lorraine and Amber herself. With some reluctance, he risks his own neck for a place lost to him long ago, and abandons his scheme to turn his troops and guns against Amber when the kingdom seems on the brink of falling to an enemy coming in strength. He understands the necessity to adapt to changing conditions and to remain flexible while pursuing his goals.

Journey: Corwin intends to sail straight to Avalon but gets lost in his very own Wood of Error, so that a spontaneous choice leads him instead into the hell of Lorraine, its Goat, and the citadel at the heart of the Black Circle. Toward the end of the book he is again diverted from his course in that his original mission, to exact vengeance on his brother Eric and seize the throne, is set aside when he comes upon the creatures of the Black Road at Amber’s gates. Just as he set out seeking gunpowder in Avalon but found something else along the way — the knight errant he once was long ago — he marches to Amber to find that the regicide he believed he desired was not what he would ultimately want or choose to do.

Vietnam and the 1970s

The tide had definitely turned against U.S. participation in the Vietnam War by the first years of the decade. Nixon, having seen Johnson’s presidency founder and meet an early end due to the war, initiated a draw-down of forces. Australia and New Zealand pulled out of the war in 1971. By the end of that same year, American ground forces had been withdrawn from the war effort, though involvement would drag on a few more years.

Britain, though victorious after World War I, had been left depleted and weary of war — brutal trench warfare had cost the nation more than a million lives. The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution of 1964 more or less marked the beginning of the Vietnam War in the minds of Americans, when U.S. troop strength went from 23,000 to 184,000. It had therefore gone on longer than World War I and wound up costing approximately 60,000 American lives. In America a fatigue had taken hold which was not so different from what post-Great War Britain had known.

Zelazny may have been responding to the mood of the times when portraying the enormity and senselessness of the losses witnessed, and caused, by Corwin and other princes of Amber.

From the first book:

“…ten thousand men dead in a plains battle with centaurs, five thousand lost in an earthquake of frightening proportions, fifteen hundred dead of a whirlwind plague that swept the camps, nineteen thousand dead or missing in action as they passed through the jungles of a place I didn’t recognize, when the napalm fell upon them from the strange buzzing things that passed overhead, six thousand deserting in a place that looked like the heaven they had been promised, five hundred unaccounted for as they crossed a sand flat where a mushroom cloud burned and towered beside them, eighty-six hundred gone as they moved through a valley of suddenly militant machines that rolled forward on treads and fired fires, eight hundred sick and abandoned, two hundred dead from flash floods, fifty-four dying of duels among themselves, three hundred dead from eating poisonous native fruits, a thousand slain in a massive stampede of buffalo-like creatures, seventy-three gone when their tents caught fire, fifteen hundred carried away by the floods, two thousand slain by the winds that came down from the blue hills.”

What tends to jump out from that passage (especially to readers harkening back to the ’70s):

(1) napalm dropped from aircraft on troops moving through jungles below results in a number of casualties far higher than deaths from any other cause;

(2) immediately after thousands depart for paradise, their desertion is contrasted with the hell of the detonation of a nuclear weapon;

(3) aside from deaths due to centaurs, war machines, nuclear warfare and napalm, natural disasters are responsible for the mass losses of life, yet the total taken by disaster is still dwarfed by the number slain in combat.

There is not much other commentary on war in the series. The subject of warfare is largely confined to the first two books. But there is this from the end of the sixth chapter of Nine Princes in Amber:

“As I stood on a hilltop and the evening began around me, it seemed as if I looked out over every camp I had ever stood within, stretching on and on over the miles and the centuries without end. I suddenly felt tears come into my eyes, for the men who are not like the lords of Amber, living but a brief span and passing into dust, that so many of them must meet their ends upon the battlefields of the world.”

[…to be continued in a future post…]

#the chronicles of amber #roger zelazny #vietnam war #chronicles of amber #nine princes in amber

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vaulthunter426 · 6 years ago

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Tour of Sanctuary III | PT. 1

“We don’t speak about Sanctuary 2...” but we sure as hell speak about Sanctuary III! My lord it’s beautiful, and with so many familiar faces and new features that our previous hubs in the Borderlands franchise never had it is certainly one of the more prominent highlights from the day’s events for me.

Right as this section of video begins we are panning out from a decal of our dear friend Scooter to get a beautiful view of our Borderlands hub in space!

In image 3 above we see our Vault Hunter is Amara and we don’t even get out of the room before we catch the second piece of news that I’m most excited about:

“Claim Lost Loot”

Whether this particular “Vending Machine” has an official name is as of yet unknown, but I know this is something that the Borderlands community is going to be excited about.

We are all too familiar with farming a boss countless times to finally seeing that telltale orange glow explode out of them upon their death, and watching it sail over your head off the map or clipping through the environment, or landing in a location that is unreachable.

Nothing is more infuriating and devastating when it comes to our beloved looter-shooter, than not being able to claim the loot we were shooting for.

This machine will collect all the unclaimed loot from our enemies and store them here until we Press X to Claim Lost Loot. Our soon to be favorite machine will loot-vomit our gear all over the floor in front of us for us to sort through a second time.

Also notable from the streams is that Legendary Loot is much more noticeable with a larger and much brighter glow than the previous games, but it also appears on the mini map!

Customizable Living Quarters!

No other Borderlands game has come close to achieving this and I am so excited.

This particular room is dedicated to our Siren, Amara. Each room will be tailored to the Vault Hunter of our choice with “customization options” for each.

Above Amara’s bed we see a glowing purple “Zen” sign, fitting for any Siren. And hanging in the corner is a purple punching bag, fitting for this particular Siren.

Our room will feature wall mounts so that we can showcase our favorite gun, and below that a mount for our favorite relic, shield, and grenade mod.

And as you can see below, it is quite easy to equip that gear to take it Vault Hunting and fight off Cult Fanatics along the way.

#borderlands #borderlands 3 #amara #amara the siren #bl3 #sanctuary #sanctuary 3 #sanctuary III #tour of sanctuary #tour of sanctuary III #tour of sanctuary 3

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tiger-in-the-flightdeck · 6 years ago

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Originally posted on https://www.patreon.com/tigerdoeseverything

When Good Projects Go Bad

Not exactly a tutorial today, but it is related to them, and inspired by one I was planning on posting. One which failed rather spectacularly. Perhaps a little backstory?

My beloved sewing machine suddenly came to a grinding, crunching halt recently. No problem, I thought. Just take it apart and give it a nice oil rub! Easier said than done. First, I had to figure out how to actually take it apart. Then I had to physically pry the plastic shell open like some deranged sea otter trying to get into a jumbo clam. It involved two screwdrivers, a lot of swearing, and eventually pleading with it to work. Craaaaaaaaack! It finally separated to reveal the inner workings and globs of slimy engine grease. Disgusting, a little smelly, but nothing I couldn't handle, I was sure. Some cleaning with a toothbrush, a good dozen paper towels, and a lot of lint in my eyes later, and I was ready to lube up. But where was my darn mineral oil?? A trip to the dollar store later, and I was ready to lube up. I used a disposable pipette to get into all the moving parts, giving it generous squirts of oil. So confident was I that this would all go according to plan, that I recorded it for my channel, describing each step as I went along. When I was finished, I paused my recording and let the oil sit to do its work.

An hour later, still nothing. Two, three, Twelve hours later, the mechanics still won't turn. Gritting my teeth, I would push down on the foot pedal as if I'm trying to turn the engine on a '92 olive drab K car that's been sitting in a mall parking lot for just a little too long. The motor feebly groaned and whined in a deeper accompaniment to my own pathetic sounds of defeat. Nothing.

I turned off my camera. I swear it was mocking me. I dismantled my recording mounts, wiped up the excess oil (So much oil) and sat down to figure out what I was going to do now.

And the first thing I decided was that I was going to write this post. As much for myself as for you, dear followers. I needed a reminder, something I could go back to in future when my next project inevitably goes belly up. How to cope with Creator Failure.

Step One: Acknowledge that something is going to go wrong, no matter how well you plan. Needles will break, thread will snap, that piece of wood you ordered will have a giant knot just below the surface which will catch on the saw blade and shatter the entire board, sending splinters and shrapnel in every direction including at your face (Goggles are your friends, folks).

Step Two: Plan for those problems. Have extra supplies on hand. Buy just a bit more fabric than your pattern calls for. Keep a spare glue gun in a marked box for when your regular one goes missing because you accidentally set it down on something soft while it was still hot and that means it glued itself to the side of your mattress just out of sight (again).

Step Three: Schedule in time to rage. Rage is good. Rage is cathartic. Rage while you're using a rotary sander to try to get fine details into a carving.... Not so much. Give yourself time to step away from your project to cool down. Don't take it out on your work or yourself. That's what pillows are for- punching and yelling into. And occasionally weeping.

Step Four: Set realistic completion dates. We've all done it. You find out that you need an emergency gift and you need it NOW. For example, you find out the day before Christmas Eve that three extra people are going to be coming and you have no gifts for them, and certainly no money to buy for them. But what you do have is paper, pencils, wool, knitting needles, and a heck of a lot of yarn. Sure, you might be able to reach a trance like state where you manage to finish everything within ten seconds of the family arriving, but how many times is that likely to happen? On my count so far... Four. The rest of the time though, when you know something needs to be completed? Give yourself that extra day. Two, if it's a project you've never done before. Trust me, you need that time.

Which ties into

Step Five: Think you're done? Great! You're not. Sorry. When you've reached that final stage, whether it's the last row of a knitting pattern, or just before baking a clay sculpture, please take a break. Set the project aside, and go do something else. Watch a movie. Make dinner because you probably haven't eaten since you started. Do anything that involves not looking at your project for at least an hour. Then go back to it with a fresh eye and see all the little things you want to change but wouldn't be able to after the final step. Something I am very guilty of is reaching the point of almost completion, and starting to rush. I want to see that finished product. I want to hold it in my hand, or wear it, or give it to its new owner. Or I just want to be done with it. That's when the mistakes start getting made. I've needed that break to clear my head so I can focus on the details. And often, just to rest from it!

And finally:

Step Six: Laugh about the failures. Cry first if you need to, yell, swear and stomp your feet like someone just guessed your true name, let out the frustration. Then sit back, laugh, and write up a long post about it to share with your friends.

#tiger talks #long post #craft fail

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castellankurze · 6 years ago

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FSF: As per your request (and the fuuko no miko drawthread): a White Scar on a Jetski. Polearm optional, but welcome.

An ask inspired by White Scar on a jetski by @boltertokokoro

“He wrecked my bike.”

The words came out in a hoarse, stunned rasp as Suvd stared at the burning wreck that had moments ago been her precious attack bike. Space marines did not know fear, but they could know a kind of horror, they could know loss, and a hollow pit opened beneath the White Scar’s twin hearts as she gave voice to the sudden and tragic end to her beloved steed of steel and chrome.

A moment passed and that horror was replaced by a sudden and all-consuming rage. She kicked a foot and leapt to her feet, already sprinting as her soles hit the ground, heedless of the danger. Her pursuit of the ork dok had already brought her to the entrance of the harbor and it was not impossible that even on foot she might catch him before he made good his escape.

The orks had transformed the better part of the coastal city into a fortress for their kind, and the harbor was no exception, ramshackle contraptions tied up at one brutal iron pier after another with no seeming regard for order or purpose. Their sloppiness became her advantage, however, as Suvd cut across the harbor itself by leaping from the sidewall onto one of the empty boats, jumping from one to the next as she made her way towards the pier where the warbike had stopped.

Smoke was pouring from one of the boats, announcing its immediate departure, and Suvd could see a coterie of greenskins ringing the craft in small one-person (one-ork?) craft that likewise chugged and coughed and belched smoke. Some of the cyborks were so heavily augmented that it was hard to tell where the creature ended and the watercraft began.

Even as the dok’s boat pushed off and began to make for open water, Suvd angled in towards one of the more fleshy ones, leaping from one tied-up barge to close the gap. By the time they saw the White Scar coming and began shouting and pointing various bladed appendages it was too late. She jumped from the gunwale of the last ship between her and her prey and kicked out with both feet, slamming the ork bodily from his seat. The watercraft bobbed dangerously, but Suvd managed to grab the control bar and leaned hard against its angle to prevent its overturning.

The machine had controls not unlike the bikes used throughout the Imperium by Astartes and mortal humans alike, and within a moment Suvd found the throttle, and the patchwork thing’s engine roared like an enraged squiggoth and kickstarted beneath her, nearly slipping the White Scar’s grip. She shot forward as las- and gunfire filled the space where she had been, and flung out an arm to bounce a projectile off the nose of one of the other craft she passed. The ork howled and hurried to abandon his steed, but the grenade went off before he could jump, flipping ork and craft alike through the air.

Someone on the boat must have been watching because a whoosh of flame exploded from nozzles attacked to the thing’s hull, and the escape craft threw out a massive wake as it accelerated. Suvd gunned her engine, crouching over the handlebars as the watercraft picked up speed, bouncing over the waves like a frightened horse. In her own wake, the cybork bodyguards whirled their craft about as they recovered from the sudden ambush and jetted in pursuit of the lone Astartes.

Gunfire continued to stitch the waves around her, and though her bobbing craft made a difficult target she was not content to leave such things to luck, and snapped her bolt pistol from her belt, twisting to keep one hand on the controls as she fired at the ork closest to her. The first shot went high, but as she adjusted to the motion of the jetcraft as it tore across the water her second and third shots punched the ork from his saddle.

Another came in from the opposite side, gunning his throttle and the two vehicles bucked sharply as they collided, nearly throwing Suvd into the ocean. The cybork grabbed her wrist as she tried to bring her pistol to bear, and the two of them struggled for a moment before the White Scar reared and slammed her helmet into the greenskin’s face. Her left-side eyepiece cracked with the force of the blow, but the alien went slack as he reeled, stunned, and toppled from his watercraft.

The collision had cost her speed, and one of the orks had used the opportunity to circle around in front of her, and as a result she had a perfect view of his fate as the ocean exploded and a massive, thrashing beast, a full ten meters of scale and sinew overturned his craft, enormous jaws hyperextending to grab the hapless ork in mid-tumble. It vanished a moment later, leaving Suvd no time to contemplate its miraculous appearance, and so she opened up the throttle to full to resume her pursuit.

It was as the last of them was closing in that the sudden, gut-level warning to veer starboard hit her. Suvd had not lived to the age of seventy as an Astartes by ignoring such instinctual warnings, and hastened to alter course. A moment after she did the beast reappeared from the depths, rising from the waves to cross her wake, and a flash of white was visible from its back. The Stormseer Charakha rode the beast by gripping its dorsal fin with one hand, the other swinging his lance out to decapitate the shocked ork. With a swing of his head, the celebrated Charakha pulled the beast into a turn, driving it with his telepathic powers, and such was the beast’s speed that it actually brought him alongside Suv’s own roaring jetcraft.

“He’s mine!” Suvd snarled at him through the kick of ocean spray, and the Stormseer raised a warning finger from his lance, waggling it at her to warn against hunting another’s prey. Suvd slammed a hand against the control bar. “He wrecked my bike!” she protested. This brought the Stormseer short, and she saw his helm turn from her to look at the ork boat and back. Then, with a shrug, he threw his spear into the air and hauled back on the fin of his improvised steed, turning the create back towards the harbor to hunt the remainder of the ork waveriders.

Suvd caught the proffered weapon and swung it out to one side. Now there was nothing to get between her and her target, and she rapidly closed the distance between herself and the boat. At the last moment, she gave the watercraft a gentle pat of apology. It might have been a haphazard nightmare borne of alien minds, but it had served her well. With that she leapt, letting the jetcraft slam into the back end of the boat, while the White Scar herself landed on the rear deck and quickly made use of her lance to begin spearing the orks that manned the craft, the energy weapon cutting them down as if she were harpooning fish in a barrel.

The dok himself was waiting for her one the bridge, but rather than raise a weapon the greenskin raised a hand control, thumb poised over a bright red button painted with a skull and crossbones. “Fuggedit, ‘umie,” it cracked in a voice augmented by vox-feedback. “I press dis button, an’...”The dok trailed off, looking down at the decking where a severed hand lay alongside a spatter of black ork blood, then back up at the severed stump of his wrist where the lance had passed through it.

Said lance clanged to the deck as Suvd pulled off her damaged helmet to reveal her braided topknot and the ritual scars of her chapter. A moment later and she’d grabbed the ork’s head with both hands and, before he could do more than struggle, slammed his face into the boat’s instrument panel. “YOU!” she roared in tandem with the blow. “WRECKED! MY! BIKE!” Each word accompanied another blow of the dok’s face against the controls, until finally the last of them slammed his head into the circuitry all the way up to the shoulders, and the alien’s body jerked spasmodically with the sudden influx of electricity.

She was sitting on the boat’s aft deck, spear in hand, when Charakha and his maritime mount surfaced, the fearsome predator sidling up to the drifting ship as tame as any cart horse. “Is all avenged?” he asked as Suvd rose.

“All is,” she confirmed, tossing the borrowed lance back to him.

“Come,” he said, patting the beast’s dorsal scales. “Let us away from here, then.”

She eyed the proffered conveyance with a moment’s distaste. “Are you sure you couldn’t commandeer me another one of those watercraft?” she asked.

#40k #White Scars #kurze writes #fanservice friday #FUCK YEAH #this was fun to write #female space marines #ivorytowerblr

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houghtonfagan40-blog · 6 years ago

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This Is Just what Occurs When You Order Ridiculously Affordable Clothing Coming from Singapore.

The Huawei P8 possesses all the correct ingredients for a top smartphone, however something's not gone to prepare in the baking phase. Ever since December 15, 2016, our company Android users have actually been actually loathing on iphone players as they gleefully appreciated Super Mario Run, the very first original Mario game from Nintendo for smartphones and tablet computers. In a style saturated with romance and searching for 'beloved' at 17, Operate is actually a refreshingly realistic exploration from the absolute most vital connections in most real adolescents' lives: their loved ones as well as relationships. In addition to the size, among the functions you ought to look of a really good travel alert clock is actually mobility. Every month or so I gain sufficient to acquire some flicks, applications, and purchase content in Clash Royale. 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In fact, there was actually a lot regarding Huxley's planet that in fact seemed interesting me, and it was the absolute most scary truth of all. And yes tbh I neglected the sexism in this book (all the women characters are bimbos-not-bimbos-but-they-are-in-the-end #ohwell) since I read that as a microcosm in itself on/off over a duration from 8-months which simply really thrust swiftly to my focus in the past 3 weeks or so. Sometimes I assume individuals are receiving far also delicate (or even am I getting much too unresponsive). You may find where creator Wargaming is actually mosting likely to earn some money coming from Globe from Tanks lovers. In purchasing check this link right here now as a photocopy machine, you run the risk of obsolescence; there may be restricted re-sale value from your copier. Character Operate is actually rather an excellent unlimited jogger with popular graphics and excellent controls. 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At that point incorporate ~ 2 mL from starch sign and titrate until heaven colour vanishes.

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toradh · 7 years ago

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And for the top 5, I’m sending your ask right back at you! =D Top 5 (or 500) pieces of video game music!

HAHAHA EVERYTHING YOU DO IN LIFE COMES BACK TO YOUOK HERE YOU GO, IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER (except alphabetical per game lol)

I’m gonna… put this under a cut for length. Oh boy.

Chrono Cross (fun fact: I’ve never played the game but I own a copy of the soundtrack):-Scars of Time-Fields Of Time - Home World-On The Beach Of Dreams - Another World-Departed Souls-Dragon Knight-Prisoners Of Fate-Magical Dreamers - The Wind, Stars, And Waves ~-The Dream That Time Dreams-Dragon God-Life ~ A Distant Promise

Assassin’s Creed II:-Earth-Ezio’s Family-Venice Rooftops (my first contact ever with AC was the Soul Calibur version of Venice Rooftops and at that very moment I KNEW I had to play the game that it originally belonged to. No kidding!)-Master Assassin (it’s from Brotherhood but yada yada)

Assassin’s Creed III:-Main Theme-Ratohnhaké:tonThe Liberation soundtrack was also amazing, I could listen to the Main Theme for days.

Dissidia Final Fantasy:-the openings and ending medleys, and also that new version of The Man with the Machine Gun is killer

Final Fantasy IV:-the goddamn opening of the Nintendo DS remake

Final Fantasy VI:-Terra’s Theme

Final Fantasy VII:-the battle theme and boss battle theme, who doesn’t love it-the main theme once you had spent enough time in the menue to actually ever hear the end of it-Cosmo Canyon AKA Valley Where Stars Fall whatever and Become a Great Soldier-Words Extinguished by Fireworks-Listen to the Voice of the Stars-and of course Aerith’ theme-Towards the Mountain-The Day of Our Last Moments-Perfect Jenova-Carmina Burana reloaded uhm I mean One Winged Angel, too, of course-also the opening and ending credits from Crisis Core which is a mediocre game, but it let me hack n slay, had the infinitely more lovable protagonist, and it had some cool music remixes

Final Fantasy VIII (oh boy, the FFVIII OST is my fav right after IX, although the latter wins every other race in the franchise)-Liberi Fatali and also the Overture AKA the motherfucking opening credits when you insert Disc 1 for the first time-The Landing-Force Your Way (honestly this game has some of my favourite of favourite battle themes EVER; the feeling of beating up bosses after spending hours, HOURS in the menue to set up your team is incredible lol; like OH MY GOD MY PLAN ACTUALLY WORKED)-The Mission-The Stage Is Set-Fithos Lusec Wecos Vinosec-Premonition-Drifting-The Oath-Trust Me-Lunatic Pandora (gives you a headache if you listen to it for too long tho lol)-Compression of Time-The Castle-Legendary Beast-Maybe I’m A Lion-The Extreme-the Ending Theme (yep, including Eyes One Me! I mean it’s cheesy but it kinda grew on me…)(basically the entire end of the 4th disc is a blast, not gonna lie)

Final Fantasy IX (buckle your seatbelts!):-Place I Call Home/A Place to Call Home/whatever AKA the opening credits-Living by the Sword-Hunter’s Chance-Marsh of the Q Tribe-Sword of Confusion-Eternally Good Harvest-Roses of May-City Under Siege-Protecting my Devotion-Light of Destiny-Chamber of a Thousand Faces-Mount Gulug-Four Mirrors-Concurrent Battles-Terra-You Are Not Alone-Assault of the Silver Dragons-Organum (which is an obscure organ version of the opening credit theme which gets a billion variations throughout the game anyway; it’s on a bonus soundtrack CD that I bought at one point before I finally got my hands on a copy of the actual OST)-and of course the One True Melodies of Life

Actually 90% of the soundtrack

Final Fantasy X:-People of the North Pole-A Fleeting Dream-Suteki Da Ne, too

Final Fantasy XII-the boss battle theme-the Esper battle theme-also the Imperial March I mean Theme of the Empire

Final Fantasy XIII:-Blinded by Light (VIOLIN BATTLE THEME VIOLIN BATTLE THEME)-Saber’s Edge-Lightning’s Theme-Caius’ Theme from FFXIII-2 (which was a waste of time BUT it had Liam O’Brien. Can I just have a poster of Liam O’Brien’s voice pls)

Final Fantasy XV (I still haven’t played this thing lol):-Too Much Is Never Enough (I bought sheet music lol)-Somnus (both instrumental and /w lyrics)-Departure-Wanderlust-Ardyn and Ardyn II-Labyrinthine-The Hydraeans Wrath-Homecoming

(notice a pattern lol)BTW every single Distant World CD is a fucking gem and you should buy them

Kingdom Hearts whatever (I’m not gonna go through the individual titles):-Dearly Beloved in all versions ever released-Disappeared-Another Side-all of Vanitas’ battle themes-Ventus’ themeand of course Hikaru Utada’s songs I love that woman; and also the orchestral/instrumental arrangements that were used in the trailers.

Tales of Berseria:-BURN (why is it capslocked tho)

Tales of Destiny:-Yume De Aru Youni-Irony of Fate in that goddamn epic remix from that orchestra CD thingy

Tales of Symphonia:-Starry Heavens and the sweet instrumental version that plays when you thought you had lost all your teammates but they come back and help you while you rescue that one team mate whose affection for Lloyd was highest

Tales of Vesperia:-Ring a Bell

Tales of Xillia:-Progress

Tales of Zestiria:-White Light-Zaveid the Exile-Flaming Bonds are Being Tested-Melody of Water is the Guide in Spiritual Mist (can we set a petition for Mikleo to play his own trial theme on the piano, yes, sign here, thank you)-Competing with the Honor of the Land-Fight Between the Wind and the Blinking Sky-Rising Up

(why do these trials themes have so long names bleurgh. So yeah AKA ALL THE TRIAL THEMES)

(basically all the Tales openings lol)

The Legend of Zelda… oh god why are there so many games.So I’m only gonna go through my two favs:

Ocarina of Time:-Lost Woods-Windmill Hut (aka the Song of Storms)-Gerudo Valley

The Wind Waker:-Dragon Roost Island-Molgera’s boss fight theme

also the bonus orchestra CD from Skyword Sword was so good :O

Valkyrie Profile:-Take A Flight

Xenogears:-Stars of Tears-Grahf, Dark Conqueror (only a JRPG would name a villain Grahf tho lol)-Premonition-Awakening-The One Who Bares Fangs at God-Small Two of Pieces (PLEASE I NEED SHEET MUSIC FOR THIS WHERE CAN I FIND SOME; legally if possible lol)-the battle themes aren’s bad, either(fun fact: I’ve never played this game, either)

Xenosaga stuffz(never played that either lol. I didn’t listen to the complete soundtracks, either, only bits)-The Miracle-Kokoro (whoever came up with that song title has guts, but it’s seriously super beautiful, and Joanne Hogg makes a comeback on vocals!)

BTW I never played anything Wild Arms, either, but I really the openings for the first and third game in the series, respectively.Oh and that one boss battle theme from Shadow Hearts II! (I think it’s called Hardcore to the Brain?) I actually never played that thing, but I watched my sister (who’s super fond of the game!) for like 90% of the plot I think.

…Would you believe that this a selectionI… I’ll better not go into movie soundtracks*faints*

…Uhm, do anime songs count lol

#this is my tag meme tag now #I didn’t exactly plan on spending an entire evening on this ask meme (rather like a few minutes)#but it was worth it lol #anyway I keep saying that the 8bit version of When Time Stands Still On the Iron Hill sounds like a boss battle theme straight from a SNS RP #G

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ranger-of-estel · 7 years ago

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A Legend Returns: The Truth of Things

Leonard returns to the Waverider, and finally learns exactly who the men he'd worked alongside really are.

Also on AO3

After meeting Lily Stein, and spending a couple more hours being questioned by Team Flash Sara approaches Len where he’s taken residence leaning against an unoccupied wall. “I’m going to head back to the ship.”

One eyebrow rises, “Lisa and I were going to head to a bar later.”

Sara smiles, but it’s halfhearted. “I’d love too, but I have a few things to take care of before we leave.” She pats his crossed arms, “You two have fun.”

Before he can say more she’s moved away, sharing embraces and well wishes with the others in before disappearing out of the room. He and Lisa leave not long after, and he finds himself surrounded by the familiar sounds and smells of Saints & Sinners. Sitting in a booth with burgers and drinks.

“So,” Lisa pops another fry into her mouth. “You’re going back tonight?”

“Don’t know,” he leans back in the booth, watching her. “I could stay?”

“Stay?!” She looks at him in something between surprise and anger. “Absolutely not!”

He blinks in surprise, “No?”

“I mean,” She softens a little, “don’t get me wrong, I want you home….But-” she motions outside. “You belong with Mick, and Sara, so you have to go back to the ship.”

He nods, both knowing there is no real argument to be had. “I’ll try and stop in more, find a way to keep in touch.” He finishes his burger.

She smiles, “Sara has already promised that.”

“Has she now?” he smirks, “Plotting behind my back Sis?”

She scoffs, “Hardly, we weren’t just planning visits for you.” She teases, then quiets. After a moment her eyes meet his once more, “Sara cares for you Lenny.”

He sighs, “Sara cares for the team,”

Lisa rolls her eyes, “She hasn’t kissed the whole team.” He looks at her with some surprise, she just grins smugly. “She told me about it.” She changes to an almost scolding look, “And how she called your bluff with the gun.”

“I was more than a little on edge at the time…besides.” he frowns. “That’s been more than a year ago for her. A lot can change.”

“Only one way to find out,” she shrugs, but he can see a glint in her eye. She steals one of his fries, dipping it in the ketchup still on her plate. “Now come on, I want your help canvasing a job before you leave.”

He finishes his beer and they head out. It doesn’t take long for him to realize it’s little more than an excuse to be together, buying time before he returns to the ship. Her target is one he’s hit before; not only does she have his notes, she’s got part of his original team. But he mentions neither, finding himself equally reluctant to part with her.

They are just reaching their bikes when Leonard’s phone rings. “Mick.”

“Boss, we got trouble!” Len can hear battle in the background, “Bounty hunters.” And then the line goes dead.

“Lenny?” Lisa is looking at him with concern.

“The team’s in trouble,” he steps up to the bike. “I have to go.”

“I’m coming too.” She states, approaching her own.

“No!” he forces himself to calm down, releasing where he’s caught her elbow and evening his voice. “Not this time Sis.” He looks at her, pleading. “I need you safe.”

At first she glares, but after a moment she nods. The little girl back in her eyes once more. “Be careful Lenny.”

He gives her a small smile. “Always am.” Pressing a soft kiss to her crown before adding. “See you around, Sis.” He mounts the bike, knocking the kickstand back and roaring the machine to life as he pulls the helmet on. Then he’s peeling out of the ally, navigating to where he started the morning before.

He hardly takes the time to park before pulling the coldgun from the back of the motorcycle. Swinging his helmet to hit one of the bounty hunters from the back, saving Raymond a painful shot to the shoulder.

“Boss!” he ducks to the side, flames hitting something to his right as he slides into place with his back against his partner. They dispatch the remaining enemies with very little trouble.

“Everybody alright?” Sara asks as she approaches.

“Mostly superficial cuts,” Amaya replies, her gaze dropping to a bleeding gash on Mick’s arm. “Nothing Gideon can’t patch up.”

Sara nods, “Good,” She swivels slightly, “Ray! Call Barry, let him know we have some guests to pick up.” The man nods, reaching up to touch something on his helmet as she returns her attention to the rest of the team. “Now everyone on board, we need to get out before reinforcements arrive.”

They nod in agreement, everyone making their way back toward the ship. Leonard notes Sara’s walk is both slower and heavier than normal as she moves just in front of him. But she’s moving purposefully toward the bridge the moment they step on the ship.

“Jax, tell me she’s ready for takeoff?” she calls down one of the halls.

“I am perfectly capable of getting us into the timestream Captain.” The A.I. replies.

“Then let’s get out of here.” The moment they are strapped in she gets them out of Central City. Once they are safely in the timestream Nate makes his way toward medbay, Amaya dragging Mick close behind. Sara is talking to Jax, and Len gathers from the conversation that the men appear to have been sent by Maestro, and some minor damage was done to the ship as well. She approaches him next, “You alright?”

“Peachy,” he frowns, motioning to where one of her arms rest awkwardly around her abdomen. “You?”

“Bruised, maybe a fractured rib…” she drops the arm, frowning. “I’m sorry your night with Lisa got cut short.”

“I’m sorry I wasn’t here sooner,” he replies with a frown of his own.

“Don’t worry about it Len,” she pats his shoulder, “Get some rest Crook, things are about to get interesting.”

He can’t help but scoff as she makes her way down the hall, shaking his head. “That’s one word for it.” He returns to his room, cleaning his gun before putting it and the leather jacket away. It’s late, but he knows sleep isn’t going to be an option a while, so he makes his way to Mick’s room instead.

“Hey Boss,” The other man greets him with a half nod, not moving from where he’s feeding small pieces of cheese to Axel…Whom Leonard is yet to understand the man’s attachment too. “Need something?”

“Just checking to see if Gideon got you reassembled,” he drawls, looking to the fresh skin on his partner’s arm.

“Good as new.” Mick grunts, turning to give him a curious glance. “Surprised Lisa wasn’t with you.” He motions toward the main deck. “Always came to see Sara and me off.”

“She’s been on board?” Len’s head tilts slightly.

“Course,” he nods. “She and Science girl both. I keep telling Blondie they’re going to stowaway if she ain’t careful.” Mick’s eyes hold something close to amusement, “But none of that’s why you came in here.”

“Mm,” Leonard hums thoughtfully, leaning back against the wall as his arms cross. “I was wondering if that offer for old movies still stands?”

Mick smirks, “As long as you’re getting the beer.”

Len feels a smile tug at his mouth, “I think I can manage that.” He turns, making his way toward the galley. Part of the reason their partnership has always worked so well is that they’ve never needed to spend time together outside of ‘work’; and yet, he enjoys the other man’s company when they do.

“Snart, hey!” He’s drawn from his thoughts at the ever cheery voice. Necks of four beers in hand as he turns to face the younger man. “Thanks again for saving my skin back there.”

“Well,” he drawls, “I would have hated to see that little scientist of yours upset.” Ray flushes and Leonard smirks.

The other man recovers quickly, “Oh, speaking of the ladies.” He tilts his head curiously, “How is Sara doing?”

“Couple bruises –“

“No,” Ray cuts him off with a shake of his head. “I meant after her trip.” He frowns. “I know going back after letting Laurel’s killer go couldn’t have been easy.”

“She let him go?” The question is out before Len can’t think better of it.

Raymond just nods, “All I can guess is she found out killing Damien in the past would cause other aberrations in the timeline.”

“Of course,” He shakes his head, “She seemed herself when she joined us in Central.” He adds with a shrug.

“Good,” the other man nods to himself, picking up the mug of tea he’d been fixing and turning to leave the galley once more.

Beers still in hand Leonard makes his way to the library. “Gideon, pull records for Damien Darhk.” Hundreds of files flash across the screen as he sets the drinks on the desk. “Narrow to results concerning Star City.”

“Is there something specific you are looking for Mister Snart?” Gideon asks

“I’m not sure,” he lies, walking up to begin rearranging the icons on the screen. He notes several articles with pictures of Damien but captioned as Kenneth Vender. Something about H.I.V.E. and what looks like aftermath of an earthquake. But the article he finally settles on says, ‘Beloved DA killed in uprising – Mayoral candidate claims tragedy.’

“There you are!” Mick’s voice comes from the doorway, “Was beginning to think-“ he trails off, coming to stand at Leonard’s side with a sigh. “Was wondering when you’d get around to looking this up.”

Leonard turns to the other man, “What happened, really?”

Mick shrugs, “Sara didn’t tell us much, but.” He approaches the screen. “Darhk was apparently planning to destroy the earth,” he pulled up a couple of the pictures Len had assumed linked to a massive earthquake. “Captain’s sister was trying to prevent it, got stabbed by Damien...died in the hospital.” He shakes his head, “Arrow ended up killing the guy, not that the fact seemed to settle Captain much.”

“And she let him go?” Leonard wasn’t sure if it was surprise or anger that made him ask.

Mick nods, then crosses his arms. “Not without a fight though…she spent the first part of our fight with the Legion out to kill him.” He shrugs, “But then we found you,” Leonard feels his stomach knot; the idea he’d worked alongside the man who left that broken look in Sara’s eyes gnawing at him. After another minute or so Mick shakes his head, making his way toward the desk. “Blondie doesn’t blame you.” Len frowns, Mick grabbing the beers as he heads for the door. “When you get done thinking come find me.”

Once Mick is gone Leonard turns back to the screen, “Gideon.”

“Yes, Mister Snart?” she replies,

“Give me any files pertaining the Legion Members and Sara Lance up to the present date.” He approaches the screen once more. Gideon leaves them in three neat stacks, he quickly dismisses his own name before pulling up Damien’s. Most of the information pertains to various face offs between them, but there is some further information on Laurel’s death. He’s amazed at her restraint, he knows that if there places had been changed he’d have taken the man out the first chance he had. Sara’s grown in the year, this isn’t the woman he stopped in Russia, not the woman who had to kill to fill a void. He almost smiles.

It’s gone the moment he changes to Malcolm Merlyn’s stack. He’d heard the other man talk about being the head of the League. He’d absently wondered if Sara had crossed paths with him…But as he looks at Gideon’s notes he feels bile in his throat. He’d been working alongside the very man who had ordered Sara’s death. The man behind the three scars he’d glimpsed on her abdomen in med bay. The reason her family had brought her back with the bloodlust, the reason she believed herself a monster.

“Gideon,” His mouth feels dry, “Where is Sara?”

“She appears to be moving her things into the quarters previously used by Captain Hunter.” She replies easily.

He makes his way through the ship, mind still in turmoil. It’s not until he’s standing in the doorway, Sara’s blue eyes looking up at him curiously that he realizes he hasn’t the slightest idea what he is going to say to her. “Hey Len,” her voice is borderline concern, “everything alright?”

“Peachy,” he replies instinctively, settling against her doorframe as he tries to force his thoughts into something more coherent. “You and Amaya not working out?” he drawls, motioning to the single box of belongings on the desk.

She shrugs, “Figured if Rip wasn’t going to use it there was no reason to double bunk.” She steps closer, frown tugging at her lips. “You sure you’re alright? You look pale.”

“I’m fine Assassin,” he wants to apologize. For what’s happened to her, for working with the men who wronged her so brutally. But the words aren’t there, and the ones that do come are far too vulnerable for his lips. “Just wondered what the plan is from here?”

She sighs, returning to the box and pulling out a couple frames which she arranges on the desk. “Maestro has proven himself a threat, so our game of chase is over.” She checks her hip on the desk, arms rising to mimic his. “I figure we find somewhere for a proper face off, somewhere civilians won’t get caught in the crossfire.”

“And you think he’ll take the bait?” Leonard questions.

“I think he’s angry, and he’s desperate.” She frowns, “And desperate men will do anything to get what they want.”

The ship jerks violently, causing them to throw out their hands for support and balance. “What the Hell?” Leonard growls.

“It appears that they have located our ship in the timestream,” Gideon states, tone far too cheery for the red lights beginning to flash around them. “They are trying to knock us out.”

Sara rushes by, Leonard tight on her heels. “Gideon, get the others to the bridge or tell them to strap in.” She swings into the Captian’s chair as Leonard drops into one of the ones at her side. “This isn’t going to be a pretty landing.”

Chapter 5 (x) Chapter 7 (x)

#A Legend Returns #Captain Canary #Leonard Snart #Sara Lance #Mick Rory #The Truth of Things #Chapter 6

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ladystylestores · 5 years ago

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When the Mexican Air Force Went to War Alongside America

The latest article from “Beyond the World War II We Know,” a series from The Times that documents lesser-known stories from the war, remembers the Aztec Eagles, a Mexican fighter squadron that trained in the United States and fought the Japanese alongside Allied troops in the Pacific Theater.

In the waning days of May 1945, a squadron of P-47 Thunderbolt pilots roared down on a Japanese military convoy. Above them, American pilots harbored doubts about these greenhorns, new to the liberation of the Philippines and, to boot, Mexicans.

In his burly and fast P-47 Thunderbolt, Lt. Reynaldo Perez Gallardo swooped down on the convoy, pouring .50-caliber rounds into the Japanese trucks in a low-level strafing pass. Then, the vehicles bursting into flames, Gallardo pulled his fighter up into the Pacific sky, snapping into a victory roll, exposing himself to enemy fire. Over the radio an American voice crackled: “Look at that crazy Mexican!”

Crazy or not, this new bunch of fighter jocks — roughly 30 pilots of the 300-strong 201st Fighter Squadron of the Mexican Expeditionary Air Force, nicknamed the Aztec Eagles — was now in the fight to free the Filipino people.

The 201st didn’t have a major effect on the overall outcome of the giant Pacific war 75 years ago. But by the end of the conflict, these men were hailed as valiant and deadly in their machines, beloved for their ferocity by the Filipinos and Americans alike. And their participation alongside the Americans helped improve relations between Mexico and the United States after the war, Gustavo Vázquez-Lozano argues in his 2017 book, “201st Squadron: The History of the Mexican Pilots Who Fought in World War II.”

Other than Brazil, which sent troops to fight in Italy, Mexico was the only Latin American nation to actively fight the Axis, namely the Japanese Empire, a decision carefully made by President Manuel Ávila Camacho of Mexico, an old soldier himself.

Early on, there was a swirling sympathy for Nazi Germany among Mexican intellectuals. And Camacho was reluctant to side with the United States, his nation’s perpetual enemy, with its repeated invasions and incursions. After all, Gen. Douglas MacArthur himself participated in the brief U.S. seizure of the port of Veracruz in 1914.

But on May 14, 1942, a Mexican oil tanker off the coast of Florida was intercepted by a German submarine, which torpedoed the vessel, spilling 6,000 tons of oil and killing at least 13 of the 35 crew members. A week later, the Germans struck another tanker, killing at least seven Mexican sailors.

Enough was enough. On May 28, 1942, Mexicans listened to the radio as “the grave, emotionless voice of Camacho declared war on the Axis powers,” Vázquez-Lozano writes. “The conflagration was coming to them.”

Secretly, though, Mexico City was convinced that its deadliest enemy lay not in the heart of Europe but across the Pacific Ocean: Japan. The Mexican Army intercepted a Japanese plan to invade the United States via the Sea of Cortez on the Pacific Coast. Troops would land in the state of Sonora, in northwestern Mexico, and drive north into the vulnerable American Southwest.

The Mexican government forced much of the country’s large Japanese population to relocate to designated areas, and some were even detained in camps. Mexicans turned up at army bases across the country to volunteer, but Camacho was well ahead of them: He had already organized the 201st and sent it to the United States for training, even before he publicly announced the force.

The men, all volunteers, came from a cross section of Mexico. The commander, Col. Antonio Cárdenas Rodríguez, was a combat veteran who had flown with the U.S. Army Air Forces in North Africa; even so, some Americans did not feel that Rodriguez was pro-American enough, and they tried unsuccessfully to have him replaced. Gallardo, a lieutenant when he signed up, was the scion of a powerful Mexican family who had transferred from the cavalry.

On their way to war, the men of the 201st stopped first in San Antonio, where they were trained by the Women’s Airforce Service Pilots. They were then shipped to North Texas and then to Idaho to train on the plane that would take them to war: the Republic P-47 Thunderbolt. Designed as a fighter, the aircraft was also a flying tank, capable of close air support, dropping 500-pound bombs and unloading its .50-caliber guns with ferocious generosity. Reinforced armor underneath also made the plane able to take damage as much as it could dish it out.

Gallardo loved pushing his great big fighter plane. When the squadron went to Greenville in North Texas, he dropped out of formation in his Thunderbolt and buzzed the town — flying right down the main street. On landing, he got busted to a desk job. “I was very sad,” he said later in a University of Texas at Austin oral history. “But I knew that I would fly again one day, and I did.” He was shortly reinstated, in time to conclude his training in Texas and go on to advanced training with the rest of the unit.

Now far from home, the Mexicans experienced something they had never known at home: discrimination during training in a restaurant whose owner refused to serve them, despite their uniforms, because they were Mexicans. Many in the squadron suspected that the Americans doubted their abilities as fighting men.

The American counteroffensive, meanwhile, began to pay dividends, though at staggering human cost. The Battle of the Coral Sea hampered the Japanese navy; the Battle of Midway destroyed its prized aircraft carriers. U.S. Army and Marine amphibious invasions prevented an invasion of Australia and then slowly peeled back Japanese control of islands extending southeast from the Philippines even as thousands of lives were lost in grinding battles like Guadalcanal.

Finally, the prize was in sight: the Philippines and outlying islands like Guam and Tinian. From here, the Allies would once more be within range to bomb the Japanese main islands — and even invade. So MacArthur made his return, and the main American invasion force landed on the Philippine island Luzon on Jan. 9, 1945, engaging in pitched fighting with the Japanese.

Arriving in the Philippines aboard the U.S.S. Fairisle on April 30, 1945, the 201st was assigned to the U.S. Fifth Air Force. The 201st went into action on its own near Vigan, where the Japanese were dug in, and the only way to get them out was to fly close against the mountain range, executing dangerous dive-bombing runs. The Mexicans got the job done, to the amazement of the Americans, who nicknamed the Mexicans the “white noses” for the paint on their cowlings. The pilots had to fly so close to the Japanese that one of the first aircraft took “two blows to the wings,” according to Vázquez-Lozano.

On June 1, 1945, the 201st planned an attack on a Japanese ammunition depot. Because of three high cliffs and antiaircraft batteries, they would have to dive-bomb from high altitudes and then try to pull their heavy planes up and out. The Americans considered it suicide; the Mexicans had never dived-bombed in combat.

Four pilots took off. Carlos Garduño Nuñez explained later: “Fausto was coming up behind me, right on my tail. First I dropped my bombs and I got out straight away, grazing the sea.” Rising fast, he recalled, “my blackout happened, and when I got my vision back, my plane was ascending. I turned around to see if Fausto was behind me … but it was another plane.”

“They got Cachito!” the radio crackled. “Cachito” was the nickname of the squadron’s youngest pilot, Second Lt. Fausto Vega Santander of Veracruz, who was just 22. Various accounts described him having been hit by Japanese fire or losing control. His powerful P-47 lurched twice to the right and then spun into the Pacific at 350 miles per hour.

The 201st continued to attack Japanese positions day after day into June. As the soggy rainy season set in, the 201st flew into combat to hit remaining Japanese infantry and antiaircraft guns in Northern Luzon and the Marikina Valley, east of Manila. The losses of the squadron’s pilots mounted into July.

MacArthur ordered his air forces to turn their attention northward to the Japanese territory known as Formosa, now Taiwan. The battle for the Philippines was largely over at a cost of 13,000 Allied lives — and over 300,000 Japanese. Now the fight would be taken directly to the enemy.

The remaining Mexicans flew dangerous, six-hour wave-top missions over nothing but open ocean to hit the Japanese in Formosa with half-ton bombs. “We saw more frequent airplanes from Japan on that 650-mile trip than ever before,” Miguel Moreno Arreola said in a 2003 interview. “But they didn’t want to have combat with us, because they knew our P-47s were better than their Mitsubishis. We could fly higher and faster.” So grueling were these missions that when they returned, pilots had to be pried out of their cockpits and helped off the tarmac.

From nearby Guam, the big American bombers roared off to fire-bomb Japan. Despite losses, no replacements came, and with 14 aircraft wrecked, the 201st was becoming ineffective for combat. So many of its pilots were killed and aircraft destroyed that the 201st was left in the Philippines when the U.S. fighters relocated to Okinawa.

Then one night in August, the men gathered in a tent at Clark Field. They learned the United States had dropped atomic bombs on two Japanese cities, and the enemy was finally offering to surrender.

The war was over, and the men returned home to parades and flowers. “I can vividly remember our welcome home to Mexico,” Capt. Luis Pratt told a U.S. Air Force interviewer in 2003. “As we traveled through the towns toward Mexico City, we were greeted by cheering crowds and confetti and marching bands.”

Because of its contributions to the war effort, Mexico received one of the first rotating seats on the United Nations Security Council, alongside the permanent members, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, the Soviet Union and China.

Relations between the United States and Mexico thawed. The Mexican military received financial aid from the United States; the Central Intelligence Agency covertly established the largest office for U.S. intelligence in the Western Hemisphere in Mexico City during the Cold War. Ultimately, Mexico received military aid and training from the United States, which continues to this day. Mexican marines, for instance, train at Camp Pendleton, Calif. Free trade would not have been possible without a more relaxed atmosphere between the two North American neighbors, for better and for worse.

Gen. Henry Harley Arnold said in 1945 that the 201st squadron put 30,000 Japanese troops out of combat. Logging 2,000 hours of combat sorties, the unit dropped 1,457 bombs on the Japanese.

The unit was commemorated at a monument in Mexico City on Feb. 9, just as it is every year. “Sadly there are not that many people who remember,” said Martín del Campo Alfredo, a member of the association’s board, whose grandfather was a Mexican Air Force pioneer. The military and families still care, however, he said. “Even though there are fewer and fewer men, we will remain dedicated to their memory.” Just 10 Mexican veterans of the war remain alive, and one is a pilot: Carlos Garduño, who recently turned 100.

Richard Parker is a journalist who writes about the American Southwest, the U.S.-Mexico border and is the author of “Lone Star Nation: How Texas Will Transform America.”

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thesilverthreadsmith · 5 years ago

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Mako-Tinged Dreams, Ch. 1

Green...green as far as I can see...the eerie, radioactive shade of mako that we hated so damn much…

Cloud’s eyes opened...well, one eye opened. The other was still swollen shut, though a light touch proved that by the end of the day, it would most likely be open again. He sighed and dragged himself up off the ground and out of his sleeping bag, groaning at the pain and stiffness radiating through his back and hips from the last few days of fights...and smiled weakly as Tifa’s gloved hand appeared in his vision, palm open and ready to help him up.

“...I owe you one.” He sighed, taking it and standing up, shaking himself all over to loosen up, and she just rolled her eyes and shook her head. She looked pretty rough herself, her legs heavily bandaged under the rough shorts she’d made from the remains of her pants, and he wished she hadn’t taken the brunt of the fires; her legs would be weeks in healing. Cloud grabbed up his pack as he followed her out, rummaging a bit.

“No, you owe me a lot more than that. C’mon, Vincent and Yuffie just got back with supplies; we’ve got bacon, eggs, and fresh coffee.” He let out a moan of thanks, and followed her out of the shelter they’d made out of an old Shin-Ra building to a very welcome sight; a proper breakfast, and Cid’s Rocket Fuel Coffee. Vincent passed him an empty mug and the steaming pot from the fire while Yuffie fiddled with their communications equipment, and Cloud took both with a grin, tucking his pack between his legs, and settled by the fire.

Cid was working on their dual pair of jeeps as he poured a mug full and took a plate, wolfing things down one-handed, borrowed from the Turks (and Rufus), doing the filter and oil changes while Barret worked on the mounted machine guns on top. Nanaki and Cait were both patrolling the perimeter of their camp, and Tifa sat down on Vincent’s other side, reapplying fresh bandages to the burns on her legs. Cloud gave her a sympathetic wince, and having found it finally, offered his Cure materia; she took it with a tired smile.

“Thanks…”

“Like you said, I owe you. How’s everyone feeling?”

“Tired, but we’re managing. The Turks are on their way up to join us for the last push, after that, we’re declaring Midgar a disaster zone.” Vincent sounded more than tired; he was gray from all of his transformations, and his red cloak had been abandoned a few weeks back for some of the heavy duty SOLDIER gear they’d found in one of the old barracks. Everyone, in fact, was pretty much in the same boat; their normal gear just wasn’t strong enough to take the constant monster attacks…

Constant, and draining.

The WRO’s Special Reclamation Team was the combined forces of the Turks, and AVALANCHE, and they’d spent the last two months in the center of Midgar’s ruins, battling the nonstop hordes of genetic horrors that were Hojo’s twisted legacy. Jenova remnants, mutations, failed experiments that were the next thing to immortal...It was heartbreaking, some of the poor souls they’d had to free. And infuriating; all of this, all because of one man’s ego… Damn you, Hojo.

“About damn time; just Reno and Rude?”

“No, Tseng, Elena, Cissnei too, and a few of the Old Guard are coming to help. They’ll be airborne while we’re on the ground; we’ll have full air support the whole way in.” Cloud let out a sigh of relief at that. The final zone they’d left for clearing was the hole Omega had torn out of the center of Midgar three years prior, and Vincent had been the main scout...well, technically Chaos had been, and between the eldritch creature and the dour gunman, they had a rough idea of how bad it was.

Actually clearing it out was impossible; the concentration of spilled mako, genetic monstrosities, destruction...all of it was just too much to heal quickly. Or even, really, at all; Cloud was not confident in their ability to do much, if anything, to help the enormous wound in the earth. As it was, technically, only Vincent and Cloud could really go safely into the pit, and that was...not entirely proven yet. Today would be that day... He drained his coffee and ate a second helping, though, grateful for the rest and the food.

“Hey, Spiky, ya up fer helpin’ me out?” He glanced up at Cid, who was covered in grease, the cast on his arm included, and couldn’t help but smile a little bit sadly. Cid had a broken arm, nose, head, and probably hand too, yet he was in the thick of it just as much as everyone else, and Cloud couldn’t say no. He got himself up and hobbled over, the mako in his body healing him faster and faster, but not quite fast enough...he dug around his pack a bit more, and found another Cure materia, and with a quick murmur, cast the spell over the both of them.

“Sure, whatcha need?” Cid looked a little more relaxed as the spell washed over him, and he sighed wearily, rubbing the side of his nose where the bandages met skin.

“Jus’ some help keepin’ the jeep up fer me to get the pan out from underneath…Thank ya, by the way...I kinda needed that.”

“It’s no trouble, Cid...Why don’t you let me get it, and go sit down? You look just about as bushed as everyone else, and you’ve got the worst injuries.” To his honest surprise, Cid grimaced and nodded, if a bit reluctantly.

“Ya kinda gotta point...thanks.”

“It’s no problem, Cid...go lay down and get some sleep, okay? You were up all night.” The older man gave him a surprisingly gentle shoulder clap, limping away from the two vehicles, and Cloud was grateful to see Tifa and Vincent both helping him into the building. He hoped that all three of them would lay down to sleep; Tifa had taken the night shift too, and Vincent had done the night patrol before meeting Yuffie with the supplies, and he knew they had to be just as drained as Cid. He smiled as Tifa cuddled up between the two of them, Vincent’s arm draped over her shoulders. It was so sweet, and he was happy for them; they deserved happiness.

He shared a look with both Yuffie and Barret; they nodded, and Barret gave him a cheeky salute, after which Cloud flipped him off and finished up both jeeps. An hour later, he grabbed his gear and got ready to head out for scouting. Fenrir was, sadly, back in Costa, so he simply strapped on his swords and checked his pack and comm gear. A quick test with Yuffie and her grinning thumbs-up, and Cloud was set to go. He walked out of camp before leaping to the first craggy remnant of a plate, and followed the path Vincent had left a few days before.

It was...quiet, out here. The sound of the wind, a steady trickle of liquid that he hoped was water down through the shattered ruins...occasionally, a soft shh-shhing of new grasses growing in little cracks and crevices. He passed by the sagging, fallen church that had been Aerith’s beloved secret, and he touched the gray wood of the doorway in fond, sad memory. It was no longer safe to go inside; too much damage, and too many years. It was so badly broken, almost near collapsing, though he could see the glimmer of her pool inside, the softest white glow a familiar sight.

“Miss you, Aerith…”

Cloud... Her voice was a balm, a murmur from the shadows, and he gave the remnant of her spirit a soft smile. Here, perhaps better than any place on Gaia, was the closest path to the unsullied part of the Lifestream. The others…?

“They’re doing okay. We...probably won’t be able to come back. Things are...bad here, I’m sorry…”

Hush...better that way....stay safe.

“We will. I promise you, we will.” He smiled as the pool shifted, growing, and a silvery figure came towards him, pausing just before the half-light outside the doorway. She was as ghostly as the Lifestream itself now, but she was smiling, just like always. “Would you like me to tell the others, give them a chance to say their goodbyes?” She paused, thinking, and nodded, hands clasped before her, and Cloud smiled.

Thank you...there is...old danger...ahead...but also...a friend... He blinked, but didn’t ask her to elaborate; she was having a hard time holding herself as it was, and he knew he couldn’t ask much of her. He’d seen her a dozen or more times around Gaia, but they’d never felt her, or seen her, as strongly as here, in the heart of her power and her love. Elmyra had never forgiven him for taking her after Sephiroth...To this day, he still blamed himself, despite everything.

“Okay. I’ll keep my eyes open, and let the rest know.” He earned a winning smile at that, and she vanished into mist, leaving him all alone in the shadows under the plate. Vincent’s path followed the safest, darkest route, and for once, Cloud wasn’t interested in testing the limits. The fallen plates were in various states of decay, the mako in the air and water and earth degrading the metals a great deal faster than most people realized. The temperature too, would change from one moment to the next, between freezing and sweltering, much to the team’s annoyance. They could see it, so close and personal now, and while Cid and Reeve found it fascinating…

He found it horrific. Cloud eyed the spidery patterns of rust and decay across one of the panels that Galian Beast had propped up days earlier, and pulled up his facemask when a too-cold gust of wind blasted him with a face full of fine, powdery rust. That triggered a nasty coughing fit, and he did his best to muffle the sounds, drinking a little too liberally of the cinnamon whiskey Cid had left him, and when it passed, continued on to the point where Vincent had stopped, surveying the area beyond the plate.

Most of the last scouting mission that had ended in Cloud’s battered body and cracked leg, Cid’s broken bones, Tifa��s burns, and Vincent’s latest transformation had been a nasty skirmish, and they’d retreated to call for aid from the Turks. The decision to hide hadn’t really sat that well with all of them; they were all fighters, used to running to the front lines. But...a lot had happened in a short time, and none of them were fully healed, even now; retreat just made sense. He tugged out the radio, and Yuffie picked up right away when he called.

“Hey Cloud, what’s up?” He surveyed the already decomposing bodies of the remnants they’d fought days before, and once again, cursed Hojo to the deepest depths of hell, because this was atrocity piled upon atrocity.

“I’m at the stopping point from a few days ago; it’s not gonna be safe for us to explore much more, and no one who’s unenhanced should. It’s...pretty bad.”

“Damn. Alright, I’ll let the others know. Anything else?”

“I’m about to send some photos to Tseng, then I’ll probably be on radio only for a bit. Want me to send them to you, too?”

“Nah, just let Tseng know. I’m holding the fort here, Barret’s running out to meet with Reeve, and Vin, Cid, and Tifa are all three out cold. Nanaki’s napping too, so it’s just me and Cait. We’ve got this, so you focus on exploring carefully, alright?”

“I will. Thanks, Yuff; I’ll be back before dark, I do not want to be out here at night. It’s...pretty damned creepy.”

“Preachin’ to the choir, Cloud, I won’t go any farther than this, shit glows during the day. Be safe, take it slow. Radio if you need help, I’ve got a direct line to the Turks, so they can swoop in and get you out of there ASAP.”

“Thanks, Yuffie, I will.” Cloud tucked the radio into his belt, and sighed through his mask, getting his goggles and oxygen mask ready and then Cloud pulled out his phone to snap a quick few photos to send to Tseng; it wasn’t ideal, but it gave Reno a starting point for piloting the chopper into the area. The message back was short and simple, just “Be safe, will land at campsite first, then find you. Keep the beacon on.” Cloud checked his tracking beacon, and relaxed at the stable, solid green light on his belt. He texted his thanks back, then tucked his phone back into his pack and loosed his smaller sword, leaving about an inch of blade free so that he could draw it fast if needed...and into the Pit he went.

The Pit was the twisted, broken remains of the central tower, the gaping wound deep into the planet where Omega had fallen, revealing the remains of Deepground, the many, many failed experiments...The whole area was almost a wasteland, it was so huge; the remains of at least two or three mako reactors, falling in on themselves, three fallen plates and the remnants of another...And halfway in, the gaping hole that opened into Deepground, not unlike the gates of Hell. White-hot mako seethed underneath it all, and he winced at the metallic stench, then started marking the trail carefully as he made his way around the fourth mako reactor.

It was agonizingly slow; most of the walkways were completely destroyed, and the remaining ones were in terrible shape, the mako vapors eating away at them. More railings and steps than he liked completely disintegrated at a touch or a step, and finally, he found a safe way around, making his way carefully into the lower reaches. Here, he actually needed his oxygen mask; the gases were just too much, even for his enhanced constitution, and he pulled out his radio again to let Yuffie know, not trusting his phone’s ability to survive.

“Yuffie, it’s me again.”

“What’s up? ...Are you wearing your mask?”

“Yeah, it’s pretty rough down here. Tell Tseng to stay back; I won’t be in here long, but I need to get to the base of the Pit and give it a look around, then I’ll head back. I can feel the mako burning now, and if I can feel it, it’ll hurt Vincent even. Heading down now, give me one hour, alright?”

“You got it. But only one hour; I don’t hear from you after that, we’re sending in the Turks.”

“Deal. One hour, see you then.” He sealed the radio back into his pack, pulled on his goggles and made sure his mask was in place, and started to ease his way down the side of the reactor. Here, he could use his natural abilities, since no one other than Vincent would follow him, and climbed like a monkey down, jumping and catching himself easily. It was...scary, and thrilling, and Cloud felt his blood heat with anticipation...when he paused, eyes narrowing as he saw something...unusual. Something that hadn’t been in Vincent’s initial Deepground report right after he’d returned from Omega’s demise. An old friend...

Tucked underneath an enormous slab of Plate Three, Cloud could see part of the original Shin-Ra medical facility. Somehow, it had slid from the central tower to the Pit, and while it looked pretty roughed up, it was still standing, and the heavy concrete looked more stable than the metal around him. And Cloud felt drawn to it. Something was there...and he had to know what. He climbed up a little higher, heading back up the way he’d come, and with a quick calculation, jumped from the top of the piece to land harshly on the rocks just below the building.

“Son of a bitch, that hurts…” Super soldier he might be, but those landings still hurt like hell, and he stood back up with a grumble, limping down the gravel to the building itself. He had to tear the remains of the door off to get in, and felt a cold wave of air blast over him. Thank Gaia for the mask; he could feel his eyes watering a little from the stench, and he pushed his way in, setting aside barrels, boxes, and massive ropes of rotting wiring as he explored the inside.

It, like many of Shin-Ra’s buildings, was a great deal deeper than the outside let on, and it was a difficult task to clear a path, but something called to him, something...familiar. A good familiar too, and Cloud found himself wondering if it might be Zack’s remains. He had buried his friend out on that frontier, or so he’d thought; certainly, the sword had remained there for several years as a grave marker, but Cloud was hardly surprised when he’d discovered an empty hole five years ago. Annoyed and aggrieved, oh yes, but surprised? No.

He’d known someone would come looking for the remains of a SOLDIER, be they Turks, Rufus Shinra himself, or Hojo...and his money was bet on the last. But that would explain the connection; all the SOLDIER candidates and leaders had a sort of...well, almost a blood connection, Cloud supposed. It explained how Sephiroth had found him, and vice versa, and how Zack had found Angeal and Genesis years before. And if all he did was lay Zack’s body to rest in Gongaga for his parents, then that was enough for Cloud.

He pulled apart another door, flicking on his chest light to survey the room, and sighed when he noticed the still glowing mako tube in the corner. Bastards...of course Hojo would have tried to reanimate him. Too bad...Zack had so many bullets in him it was amazing he still survived long enough to say goodbye. And I know I saw him in the void with Aerith; he’s dead, dead and finally at peace with the world. Still...it was infuriating, and Cloud made another path as he moved closer, feeling his anger manifest in kicks to the barrels, a few punches too. That sociopathic monster had lived long enough; he was glad Vincent had killed him at long last.

Finally, he was in front of the tube, and he felt his stomach churn as he peered through the dull green glow. It was definitely Zack alright; unsurprisingly, the mako had healed his body, and judging by the breathing tubes, Hojo had succeeded in reanimating his body at least. But power had been gone from down in the labs for the better part of a year now, and there was no indication of life signs, so Cloud sighed, brushing his gloved fingers over the dusty glass.

“...For what it’s worth, I’m sorry, Zack. I’m so very sorry. But we’re gonna get you home, buddy. Where you belong.” He drew his heavy knife and popped the clasp on the tube, ignoring the hiss and sudden gush of sludgy mako that drenched his boots and pants, and caught the falling body carefully in his arms. It was...a bit more awkward than he liked to admit, and he winced as he smacked Zack’s poor head against the casing twice, but he managed to get the body out over his shoulder, and laid him over a few of the boxes to wrap him in a tarp. Not the most respectable way to be carried to his rest, but Cloud really didn’t have a lot of choices, and at least this way, it would be less shocking…

He started at Zack’s feet, wrapping and binding him carefully in the tarp as he went, all the way up to his head, and Cloud paused to stroke back his long black hair, soft and soaked, those elegant features so still. Cloud turned to check the area again, checking the time on his radio...when he heard it. A rattling noise, followed by a soft wheeze, then slow, steady breathing...and Cloud whipped back around to Zack’s prone body, eyes huge and heart pounding as he studied the tarp, barely hoping...there. Zack was breathing... Zack was breathing! Not only that, Zack was sleeping ; Cloud knew that soft snore anywhere.

He didn’t know if it was a miracle, or if his best friend would wake up a monster, but he didn’t care; he had to get Zack back safely. He carefully checked the tarp, tying it enough that he could carry Zack back with ease, and pulled his spare mask out of the pack, pulling it on and putting the nicer one on Zack. The downside was that he only had thirty minutes to make it back to the safe zone; the spare tank was a small one, and this mask wasn’t as strong as the other, but Cloud didn’t really care; he could take it.

He levered Zack into his arms, and back over his shoulder; still not the best way, but he needed a hand free to climb, and he could move faster like this. Cloud headed back out at a lope, glancing around for an easier slope to climb...and that’s when he noticed the remnants. Genetic mutations spun out of control by the unleashed mako, the remnants were the bane of Midgar and Edge, and the one reason that reclaiming the ruins had been such a nightmare...and now, he felt his heart sink as he realized just how many remained.

Most were the hooded, ragged failures of Sephiroth; sickly silver hair and blind green eyes, their faces a hideous caricature of his unearthly beauty, clawed hands reaching out. He knew from experience now that scent and sound were their strongest senses, and while they were weaker than the three his team had fought before, and infinitely weaker than Sephiroth himself...they were more than strong enough in sheer numbers to take down even someone as strong as himself. That’s why Vincent was still so tired; he’d had to summon Chaos, the eldritch demon being the only thing that could fight them easily.

He swallowed, shifting Zack a little higher, and felt his heart rate ratchet up even more when he noticed them following the sound of the tarp, and carefully, slowly, he loosed his shortsword, taking a careful breath. Twenty minutes. Time’s wasting, Spiky. Oh, this is gonna suck so much... He crouched, just a little, and jolted forward at a dead run, cutting down the four in his path as he leapt up for the last walkway, and he had to stab one of the panels as his feet slid when he landed, panting behind his mask as he climbed for dear life now.

He freed his other hand after clipping Zack onto his armor, and just hauled ass up to the walkway, heart pounding as the monstrous nightmares howled and screamed at his heels, surging up, climbing one another in blind, rage-filled hunger...and Gaia, it was terrifying . He made it to the walkway finally, panting hard, his mask and goggles fogging with his exertion, and he took off at a sprint down to the safe zone, so sure that he could make it. I can make it...I can make it...c’mon, Cloud, just a little more…

“STRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIFE~!” The hoarse scream came out of nowhere beside him, and a dozen of the bastards flew out from under one of the plate pieces, slamming into him and Zack, and Cloud choked as he brought his sword up to guard, back almost bend double over the walkway’s railing. It groaned in protest, but Cloud was too busy trying to fend them off, protecting Zack while trying to draw his other sword. The remnants just hounded him, too far gone to be frightened by the slashes and his muffled yells, and they got in a dozen or more slashes with those poisonous claws…

And then the railing cracked. Cloud felt his heart freeze, and the biggest of the remnants snarled and launched at him...and then all of them were falling. The whole walkway shuddered and collapsed under the weight of all the remnants. Cloud couldn’t help the fear now, couldn’t fight the terror, and as the remnant tore off his mask, his cry for help was to someone long dead, someone who’d held the world safe…

And Aerith answered .

The whole of the Pit lit up, so bright it blinded him, and all around him, the Lifestream surged up and surrounded them. He jerked as the light caught them, and it was almost a blow in its own right, leaving him dazed, and Cloud blacked out, throat burning, Zack still in his arms...but Aerith’s gentle hand on his brow.

Rest, Cloud. He’ll need you. He’ll need you…

“...--ENO!! Get them out of here!”

“Tryin’, Boss, but the chopper’s struggling, and Rude can’t land her!” Cloud came to with a sob of pain, every nerve feeling like it was on fire...and he realized with a panicked start that he couldn’t see anything but white light. He tried to flail, shuddering as the pain rippled over him, gunshots sounding over his head, and Reno dropped to a knee next to him, and with a sharp word, cast Curaga over him, voice muffled in the mask he wore. “Stay with me, Spiky, it ain’t time for you to bite the bullet yet. Fair’s alright, he’s still breathing, how , I don’t fuckin’ know, but he is, and after the blow up in the Pit, we’re just amazed you two didn’t get fried.”

“Ah...Aerith…Aerith saved us...” Reno paused, and Cloud found his vision clearing, the panic fading as he tried to focus in on the Turk.

“...Well, that explains how most of those ugly fuckers died so quick. Tseng and Cissnei are holding back the horde, Elena’s making a bomb, and we need to get you two on the chopper so we can all get the fuck out of here.” Cloud nodded, swallowing the blood and bile back down, carefully sitting upright, and Reno helped him up, casting the healing spell again.

“Wait...don’ waste it…”

“Relax, my bat’s got four slots and only one’s Fire. C’mon, up you get, I’ll get Fair taken care of...oh thank fuck, Rude’s a fuckin’ gem. RUDE! COME HELP ME GET THE SPIKY IDIOTS.” Cloud had to laugh a little, blood trickling from his lips, and let Reno drag him to the chopper, Rude following close behind with Zack in his arms. Cloud glanced back, trying to focus in on the slowly retreating Turks...and that’s when the Lifestream flared again out of the Pit, Tseng and Cissnei yelling a retreat...but a figure stood there.

She still looked so goddamn strong, pink dress and that long brown braid fluttering in the hellish hot winds that whipped through the spires towards the chopper, her back to them and facing the monsters boiling up out of the Pit once again, her staff in hand as she brought it up...and that’s when he heard her voice, her real voice, for the first time since that fateful night.

“GREAT GOSPEL!” The heavens opened up above them, pouring down healing rain...and Reno shoved him into the chopper, the rest of the Turks piling in as the redhead wiggled to the front for the controls. They took off with a scream of the helicopter blades, and Cloud tried to reach out for her because she was real and she was whole...she was alive. But Tseng and Rude held him back, despite his pleas, and they fled Midgar as the whole of the place was consumed in a massive, ancient storm.

It seemed insane as they popped out of the clouds, into brilliant, blinding sunshine, and Cloud knew his face was soaked with more than just the rain...but as they headed towards Edge, the two jeeps speeding along below them through the remains of the city, he knew…he knew. Aerith had to have been planning this, to ensure that Zack escaped, that she could finish what she’d started with Holy. And he knew too that she wouldn’t let anyone into the storm until the Pit was healed...and that would take years.

“...Cloud…” Tseng’s voice was oddly gentle, something he’d never seen from the elegant, professional Turk, and Cloud took a little comfort that this had affected them too. He wasn’t surprised by it, actually; Tseng and the Turks had never agreed with the President on allowing Hojo so much leeway. Nor had they agreed to Gast’s and Ifalna’s murders, Aerith’s kidnappings...and given the way they’d thrown themselves into the WRO, even Reno, he was grateful for the change of heart. He took a deep breath, letting it out, then another; he had to do what he could to help Aerith, and right now, Aerith needed him to take care of Zack.

He turned now to the Turks, to Zack, and carefully undid the tarp around the SOLDIER’s head, Zack’s tanned skin pale now from years in mako and death, but his chest rising and falling, still snoring, still living. It was...well, he knew what it could be. He knew that there was a chance that when...if...Zack opened his eyes, they might be green and cat-slit, rather than blue...but he had to take that chance. For Zack, for Aerith...and for himself. He had his memories now, fragmented as they were, and all the guilt…

“...Cloud...he might not be Zack anymore.” Cissnei sounded so sad, and he nodded, swallowing the lump in his throat.

“I know. I know. But...I think Aerith led me down there. I know she knew about him, she just...didn’t have anyone to get him free. And if Aerith trusts that he’s alive, that he’s okay...then we might just see the one miracle Hojo’s bullshit ever created.”

“Even so...let’s get grounded before we wake him up. I won’t risk it in the air.” Tseng had a very good point, and Cloud sat back, watching Zack as they made their way to the main encampment out on the southern plain, Reno landing so gently it was barely a bump. He motioned for the Turks to go out first and eased himself out, still hurting, still a little blind, then scooped up Zack in his arms. They all moved to protest, and he shook his head gently; he had strength enough for this. “Where to, Cloud?”

“...Over there.” Cloud motioned with his chin, pointing to the small bluff to the north...the bluff where Zack had died. The first time. Reno and Rude went pale, and Tseng gave him a look he couldn’t quite parse.

“...If you’re sure. We’ll follow, you lead.” He nodded, and they walked into camp, Yuffie wandering up...then gasping, in horror.

“Cloud…Cloud, that’s…”

“Yeah, it is, Yuff. You don’t have to come with us, but...well, we might just have another member to the team.” She glanced up, dark eyes huge, and he gave her a soft smile. “Yeah. Aerith...well, Aerith saved our skins twice today. She’s cast Great Gospel on the whole of Midgar now, and she led me to him. We’re going up to the bluff to revive him...and if he’s himself...well, we’ll explain things. If not…” She grimaced and looked away...He felt a bit heartbroken himself, but waited her out, no matter how much he ached; Yuffie was the one other than Aerith who’d known Zack the best. Finally, she looked back up, tears glimmering in her eyes.

“...Okay. Let me get my shuriken.” She was but a moment, ducking into the tents, and Vincent came out, looking exhausted but armed, but calmed as she spoke to him; Cloud couldn’t hear the words, and he was too blind to lip read, but he knew what she was saying anyway. Vin glanced at them, red eyes taking everything in...then nodded, returning to presumably pass back out around Tifa. Yuffie came back up to him, her blade on her back, and nodded, taking a deep breath. “Sorry, Vincent was a bit annoyed…”

“It’s okay, thank you for doing that. C’mon. Won’t be long…” The walk was quiet, and Cloud let his feet lead him up the familiar, gentle slope of the bluff, once barren and nothingness, now a vast field of grasslands and wildflowers, a seeding project Reeve had started last year that had borne incredible yields. The first Buster sword, Angeal’s blade, stood despite the rust, the weather...and carefully, Cloud propped Zack up against it, taking the mask off and remaining crouched in front of him as the Turks ringed the area, Yuffie nervously almost hiding behind Elena, who in turn was protective of her equally tiny girlfriend.

Cloud carefully tilted Zack’s head up, swallowing, and took a phoenix down out of his pouch, the tiny red feather twirling in his palm as he licked his lips.

“Raise…” The feather became a glowing golden light that settled over his heart, and Zack’s eyes fluttered, his breathing labored...and he came to with a broken scream, blue eyes wide as his whole body spasmed. His eyes darted about as he fought to break free of the tarp, everything flooding his system in berserk mode, and that’s when Cloud cast Esunaga, the shadowy soft light soothing away every bit of panic and fear and fight. Zack settled back against the sword with an audible thump, panting...but those sapphire eyes, still glowing with mako at their depths, were lucid now as he took in everyone around him...then zeroed in on Cloud.

“...hey there, Chocobo-head.”

#threadsmithwrites #fanfiction #Final Fantasy VII #FFVII #the after years as I saw it happening #as canon compliant as possible #zackxcloud #vincentxtifa #cidxairships #yuffiexelena #rufusxreeve #more pairings to come

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newstfionline · 7 years ago

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How an aging Billy Graham approached his own death

By Grant Wacker, Washington Post, February 21, 2018

Evangelist Billy Graham tackled the topic of death often and with surprising frankness for a man who made his living telling people the Good News of salvation in Christ. Graham died Wednesday at the age of 99 in his home in Montreat, N.C.

When Graham preached, he said that death was, of course, inevitable. As no one knew when Christ would return, he said, everyone should think instead about the sure thing they did know: the certainty of their own death. While some fundamentalists predicted that some believers would escape death in the Rapture, the evangelist repeatedly insisted that death fell on everyone.

In his remarks at former president Richard Nixon’s funeral, Graham reminded the family and audience that someday every one of them would die: “John Donne said that there’s a democracy about death. ‘It comes equally to us all and makes us all equal when it comes.’”

Graham noted elsewhere that many people tried to avoid this inescapable reality by playing word games, by changing the title of a cemetery to a memorial park, for example. But he left them no loopholes. First, he said, “accept the fact that you will die.” Second, “make arrangements.” Third, “make provision for those you are leaving behind.” And finally, “make an appointment with God.”

Though believers would not escape death, they would face it with greater clarity. During his Las Vegas evangelistic crusade in 1980, the MGM Grand Hotel burned. “Someday, for all of you, if you don’t know God, the music will stop. It will all be over,” he said.

Death was one thing; the passing of time in the midst of life, another. Once, when he was in his mid-60s, a teenager asked him what surprised him most in his “old age.” He answered without hesitation: “the brevity of life.”

The relentless march of events taught important lessons, too. “I urge each of you to invest your lives, not just spend them,” he told another group of young people. “Each of us is given the exact same amount of seconds, minutes and hours per day as anyone else. The difference is how we redeem [them]. … You cannot count your days, but you can make your days count.” A good life and a good time were not the same.

Of course it was natural to fear death. Everyone did. But facing it squarely put life in a longer perspective. “The future is as bright as the promises of God,” he assured the faithful at the opening ceremony of his North Carolina retreat center, the Cove, in 1993.

What about thoughts on his own death? Until the later decades of his ministry, Graham seemed not to dwell very much on the subject. For one thing, he proved consistently outwardly focused. That outward orientation fostered a perennially sunny disposition, especially in public. “I don’t have many sad days,” he told Larry King.

Beyond that, Graham aged well. Into his 70s and beyond, he still cut a dashing profile. He fit the American media ideal of the seasoned man: tall, lean, blue-eyed, and blessed with a great mane of silver--later snow white--hair right up to the very end.

Many compared Graham with Clark Gable and Gregory Peck. Though prone to sniffles and accidents--a bit of a hypochondriac, his friends affectionately allowed--his work and travel schedule showed his amazing stamina, year after year.

But with time, Graham did slow down. Aging quieted his trademark machine-gun sermons into talks that seemed more like fireside chats. He readily admitted that he “yelled” less, and that he had come to favor less demanding indoor auditoriums over the outdoor stadiums that had propelled him to international fame.

The mature Graham mastered the art of poking fun at himself, even when it came to mounting infirmities. Grumping about his advancing age, he urged one late-life visitor, “Don’t get old, if you can avoid it.”

Yet serious illness took its inevitable toll. He collapsed while speaking in Toronto but climbed out of a hospital bed several days later to preach to a Sky Dome record crowd of 73,500 on the final night of an evangelistic crusade.

More significant was the Parkinson’s disease (later diagnosed as hydrocephalus). “You know what happens when you get Parkinson’s? Your handwriting gets illegible and your sermons longer,” he quipped. But his wife, Ruth Bell Graham, saw things more soberly. “This Parkinson’s is no laughing matter,” she judged. “Overnight he has become an old man.”

Graham told a friend that he was prepared for death but not for growing old.

Still, Graham soldiered on, year after year, until he preached his final evangelistic crusade in Flushing Meadows, N.Y., in the summer of 2005. Though others had to help him to the pulpit, the image of an old warrior of the cross, pressing far past the normal retirement age, help normalize the aging process for many and provided inspiration for millions.

As for his future, Graham made clear that he anticipated his demise as a door to a new life in heaven. “I’m looking forward to it--I really am,” he said in 1995, in his late 70s. “I’ll be happy the day the Lord says, ‘Come on. I’ve got something better planned.’”

To be sure, Graham admitted that he did not look forward to the dying process itself. He said he had seen “some of the terrible things that happen to people that are dying. I don’t want that.”

But beyond the event itself stood heaven as a place of glorious fellowship with the Lord, saints, loved ones and invigorating work to do. “Think of a place where there will be no sorrow and no parting, no pain, no sickness, no death, no quarrels, no misunderstandings, no sin and no cares.” The preacher even speculated about golf courses and beloved pets--whatever it took to make folks happy.

The journalist David Frost asked the mature Graham what he would want the first line of his obituary to say. “That he was faithful and that he had integrity,” he replied. “And that I was faithful to my calling, and that I loved God with all mind, heart and soul.” Frost wondered if Graham had questions he hoped to ask God in heaven. “Yes, thousands. Many things in Bible mysteries.” He then added, “Some things in my life I would be embarrassed if anyone else saw. I would like God to edit the film.”

If God needed to edit the film of Billy Graham’s life, some readers undoubtedly thought, the rest of us were in big trouble.

#Billy Graham

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maybetheres-hope · 7 years ago

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stormx49 · 7 years ago

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New Threat

Sot System, Planet Dessara: 0700 Hours. Sleep eluded me like a thief in the night, I didn't want to be ambushed by the Blue Gears in case they were patrolling the area. The loss of my village still lingered in the morning, but I had to leave the village behind for now before Liandri came and made me part of their televised tournaments. I only got 3 hours of rest, far below my normal time. It'll have to do for now; for my current prerogative is to get back home to Earth, my mission is done. I know what became of Dessara and the Azures Village, they became victims of modernization, greed, and lust, it's disgusting. Now I needed to find a form of transportation to get to Earth, be it a spaceship or some teleportation device. I don't remember much of Dessara besides the Azures and Ciudad de Polvo... or Cráter de neón as it's called now. I rode my hoverbike across the sandy seas, kicking up dust behind me. The rain storm finally stopped and the sun began to rise on a new day, the calming orange-pink rays washed across the skies, with not a cloud in the sky, birds flying above me, singing their songs to one another. If there was one thing I missed during my times stationed on this forsaken rock, it was the beautiful sunrise and sunsets. A breeze blow over my gray, white and onyx spotted fur, my blackened hair blew in the wind behind me as I looked ahead through biker goggles and blue irises. It was a bit nippy around the chest and rib areas, for my combat armor took some hits, exposing some of my upper torso, plus the left cup of my green bra with black frills. But all that riding had taken its toll on the gas tank, and soon my hoverbike began to slow down, making sputtering noises. "SPRA-SPU-SPU-SPUUU...." Just my luck, gonna be stranded in the middle of the desert. Thankfully, luck was on my side, only a little bit though. As my bike was crawling to a dead stop, there was an oasis ahead, I had hoped it wasn't a mirage. Once the hoverbike ceased to move, I hopped off the bike, letting the paws on my feet touch the sand which left imprints. I took off my goggles and put them in the pocket of my dark blue jeans, my snow leopard tail wagged at the sight of the crystal clear water. Humidity and thirst crept up on me, so I need to quench them. I walked up to the water and knelt down, cupping my hands and lifting the liquid up to my face; sipping the sea down. It tasted good and dehydration was defeated, for now anyways. Looking down at the rippling water, I stared unto my own reflection, and it stared right back at me... then... it began to speak towards me. "Elder Thom is dead because you weren't there to save them!" She screamed at me, causing me to jump back in fright where I felt my heart skip a beat. My breathing increased, my hands were shaking like leaves in the wind. I knew she wasn't real, just my mind playing tricks on me; whether it was from the arid heat from Dessara, or survivor's guilt creeping up behind my shoulder, whatever the case, I tried to shut out the auditory hallucination. She wouldn't stop berating me though... "Instead of feeling sorry for yourself like a sad sack all those years, you could've got off your furry but and go see the village earlier and maybe, JUST MAYBE ELDER THOM WOULDN'T BE 6! FEET! UNDER!" "Enough!" I cried back at her, standing to my feet. "You don't know that, no one knows that! So stop blaming me!" It's foolish... yelling at nothing there, just whatever's going on in my skull. I swear it felt so real... but I know it's nothing. But it was beginning to spiral out of control, for my auditory hallucination suddenly became a physical manifestation, made of the clear waters in the oasis. "You want to yell at me!? I'll reunite you with your beloved elder!" There was no time to react, the water being instantly warped in front of me, grabbing me by the hair and threw me into the water with great force. "KA-SPLOOOOOSH!" Descending only a few feet, bubbles temporarily clouded up my vision with my hearing muted by the submerged environment, I didn't get a good breath of air before being dunked into the oasis. Once my sight returned to normal, albeit a bit blurry, I tried to get up to the surface, however that didn't happen. Before I got upright, the hallucination came roaring down towards me and pinned me down by my shoulders. My lungs felt like they were set alight, I needed air, badly. I struggled, trying to plant my feet on the sandbed. "GLMMFHH!" I moaned behind held breath, but I wasn't going anywhere fast. "THIS PLACE WILL BE YOUR GRAVE! RETURN TO THE HEAVENS ABOVE!" She screamed at the top of her lungs, while my pair were running on empty. Air bubbles surged from my nose and lips, my vision was growing dimmer by the second. "Lbbt mbble gbblboblp!" I cried out in a gurgly fashion "No, rest in peace, let the water seep into your lungs!" Time isn't on my side, I'm nearing the blackout point at a rapid pace, so it's either fight back or die, and I'm no longer going to sit back to hide like a coward. I fumbled towards my dark green kilt with my left hand, trying to grab something underneath it; and the item I needed was my Cicitar Sub-Machine Gun. One of Storm's latest firearms, it was a modernized version of the Uzi SMG. With a forward ejecting mechanism and only 18 rounds left in the magazine, it had to be done, to ensure my survival. Gripping tight to the grip, I rammed the barrel into the water being's torso and pinned the trigger. Normally the bullets wouldn't go very far while submerged in any form of liquid, but at this very close proximity, the 9mm bullets had no issue perforating the hallucination's gut. Emptying the mag, I felt the gun rock back and forth in my hand, unleashing 650RPM of full auto action. Though my vision was blackening up, I noticed that the water began to run red with blood. I pushed whatever was in front of me and ascended, bubbles exploded out from my nose before I broke the breach. "NYAAAAA!" I gasped, taking in a huge breath of fresh air. My fur was soaked with strands of clear water pouring back down into the oasis, my hair was drenched and undone, making it long and straight. I didn't care about my look at the moment as I shuffled towards the sands, where I stumbled and collapsed onto my knees; coughing up a storm. I'm getting sloppy, shouldn't have let my head get the better of me. I need sleep, food, a new gun, and a change of clothes. It'll get better once I get back home to Earth... for now I gotta push onwards. Once I stopped coughing and caught my breath, I sat up, turning towards the blood soaked sea; turns out that while I was in my stupor, a Blue Gear scout spotted me and tried to drown me; what I thought was a watery ghost was an actual threat. I really am losing my edge, aren't I? Her corpse was floating face down, with holes in her abdomen and upper chest, one of those bullets must've broken her heart, quite literally. I saw she left her hoverbike here, her version looked a lot sleeker than mine. So I'll be using that to head towards the nearest town or city. I wasn't done with her yet.Ge Getting up to my feet was easy once I was back to normal, I headed back into the water to go grab the Blue Gear Cadaver, needed to scavenge for some supplies; it's part of my Nakotan tradition. I reached the corpse and grabbed her by the backside of her armor, getting a good grip, I waded back towards my own bike. Back on the land, I stopped dragging the dead Gear and let her go to check her for any supplies, be it guns, money or MRE's. First thing I grabbed was an MSMC PDW with a mounted EOTech Holographic sight on top, plus 2 spare magazines filled with 5.56x30mm MINSAS rounds, it'll be a suitable replacement for the Cicitar SMG, perfect to keep me alive on Dessara, should any more Blue Gears decided to tango with me. The second thing I swiped from the corpse was her wallet, I checked inside and saw about 400 dollars, which was an added bonus because I was getting a bit low on cash; about 90 some dollars left. Alas, that's all I could, there wasn't any form of food on her. Oh well, I'll have to find some when I get to a town or city. Can't go back to Cráter de neón, pretty sure I'm a wanted criminal, least in the eyes of the Blue Gears anyways. I got up to my feet and looked back to the oasis, with droplets of water dripping from my fur, my muscles trembled slightly. I don't want to suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder again... never again... need to get a grip. I went towards the Gear's bike, looking at that sleek dark-blue hoverbike with their logo on it, a Gear with a spear in the middle. Real original logo. Still, it's my new mode of transportation, and the cadaver even left the key in for me. How thoughtful of her. I grabbed the goggles out of my pocket and put them over my eyes, then I hopped onto the bike, turned the key to rev up the bike. "VRRRRRRRR..." Works like a charm, I felt the bike slowly lift up off the ground, the fuel gauge read that it was full and ready to ride. Time to go, so I twisted the right handle to engage the motor. I felt there were two pads where my feet were, and if car logic served right; left is to brake, right is to accelerate. Easy enough for me, I pressed down on the right pad and the bike revved forward with a warbling noise, I left a trail of dust behind me that erased the footprints behind me; both mine and the bootprints of the Gears Scout. Not gonna look back, just focusing on where the winds take me. Didn't have any set destination in mind, however. And so I drove onwards; gliding across the sands with speed and grace, letting the winds dry off my body. I drove westwards for hours and hours, going in a direction without any signs of civilization in sight, just endless amounts of coarse, gritty Earth. "GRRRMGMGRRR..." That was my stomach, making demands to be fed, but I wasn't going to feed it dirt; no I was going to give it some actual food. Now if only I could find a place to stop. I spent at least about... I wanna say 3 hours, but it felt so much longer that. But I was riding for a long time without food and water, I wanted to go look for another oasis to quench the thirst. Soon I could see some form of a city ahead, sitting in the middle of a giant gorge; there were waterfalls descending into the abyss below, and they came from within the city, with a dome right in the exact center. Unlike the other places I've seen that got the futuristic overhaul, this city looked like the old days; made of sandstone and rock; it felt far warmer and more inviting than the cold, lifeless so called "improved cities." This is where I needed to go, to fuel up and get something in my belly. So I floored it, increasing the speed to 75MPH. Once I got to one of the stone arches suspended above the crater below, I slowed down so I wasn't going over the speed limit; there I saw two men dressed in traditional Arabic affair... with body armor over it. One of them gave me the halt sign, and when he's armed with an MK48 Machinegun, you bet your tushie I'm gonna stop. Putting pressure on the brake pad, I let the bike stop. The other guard walked towards me, armed with an AH208 "Hawk" Pistol; unlike Storm's however, this one was blinged out with gold and engraved. Seems stereotypical I know, but it's what I saw with my own two eyes. "Need some ID, madam." He said to me in a thick Arabic accent. Though when he got a second look at me, his expression changed in a heartbeat. "Dear lord.... are you a ghost; Erika Kinderington?" He asked out my name with fright. "I seem to get that a lot." I replied. "But no, I'm flesh and blood, just like you, sir." "Graal has heard of your exploits across Dessara, a true heroine has blessed our city by ridding of those Blue Gear scoundrels." "Graal?" "Yes, Graal; formerly known as the Den." My memory lit up, I remembered the Den or "The Widow's Nest" as we called it. It used to be a hive of some of the scummiest men and women around, stealing from nearby towns, kidnapping women to have their way with... disgusting. I personally never entered the Den before, I only heard of horror tales from some of the villagers at Azures. Seems like time can change everything... as I've learned recently. "So I see..." I replied. "Can I come in, please? I need something to eat." Both guards nodded with vigor. "Yes, yes, come in! No charge, no charge!" The man with the machine gun said enthusiastically "That's kind of you, thank you very much, sirs." I rode into the Den or Graal as it's named now, I parked my hoverbike and hopped off, taking off my goggles along the way. Walking down the dirt road, I went from the parking lot and into the city where I took in the sights; the first thing I saw were the sandstone buildings with vines growing out the sides, growing blue and white flowers. Looks very peaceful and bliss, though when I got further into the city, it became more dense with civilians and while the Egyptian styled buildings were still standing tall, signs of futuristic tech were bleeding in slowly in the form of supply pods; where weapons and armor can be purchased. Might have to stop by one of those later, right now I need food. I looked around, trying to find a place to stop and rest. There was a hard-light bridge right over one of the currents, flowing towards the edge and descending. At least it's not all sci-fi, high tech decorations. So I walked over the bridge, heading right into a long path with food and clothing stores on each side of the street. It was packed with people, some chattering, some gossiping, some yelling at one another about their cruddy services. Thankfully they didn't point out that I was walking among them. Soon I can smell some traditional Indian cuisine, personally, I don't eat much of it but I couldn't be picky, not when my stomach was demanding food of any sort. I walked over and saw it's one of those old street side restaurants, with stools, a counter and some tandooris in the back. Thankfully there was a stool for me to sit on, so I sat down, moving my tail to the side. One of the owners walked up to me, dressed up in his black chef coat that was stained with spices, he spoke to me in his native tongue. Which I didn't understand, I don't speak Pashto very well, or at all. Upon looking at my confused expression, he cleared his throat and spoke in English, not good English. "Welcome, what eat, yeah?" He said with a very thick accent, his words were broken, but I knew what he meant. "Tandoori Chicken and plain Naan please." I ordered. "Choice good, 15 dollar." I pulled out 25 dollars from my pocket and forked it over to the owner. "Keep the change." With a smile on my face, I felt generous and kind. "Bless kind heart." He replied with a smile right back, he turned around and talked to his chefs in his normal language while I watched them at work. Their passion was very noticeable, their work ethic and drive were very graceful, very swift yet diligent. These are people who loved to make food and serve it to the customer, and unlike the other restaurant owners nearby, they didn't shout and scream like raving banshees. Within 15 minutes, my food arrived on a plate, tandoori grilled chicken with 3 pieces of naan bread. It looked very yummy and the scent was making my mouth water; I don't care if it's so spicy that my brains might implode; I was hungry and I needed to eat it NOW. "Thank you, sirs!" I exclaimed before eating it. Oh believe me that first bite of the chicken was divine, the spices of coriander, cardamom, and turmeric bombarded my taste buds, my tongue exploded with zestiness and heat, but oh was it so delicious. The grilled poultry was juicy and cooked to perfection. And don't get me started on the naan, it may not have any flavoring and it might be flat, but it was still nice and fluffy when I took a bite to absorb the spices resting in my mouth. I forgot to grab a drink, but I can get something later. Alas, peace and quiet can only last so long before reality came rushing back. "Please, please! This city is not for the tournaments, but for people who wish to live here!" I heard someone cry out to somebody. I munched on some more of the delectable chicken wrapped in some naan when I turned around to see the commotion. Standing before one of the highly dressed officials was two of Liandri's combat droids, with their sleek orange chassis, exposed servos, glow red visors and armed with some tri-barrelled rocket launchers, I had a sneaking suspicion they were here to do the same thing they did to the Azures Village. Eradicate the people, making it open grounds for Liandri to turn this place into one of their combat arenas. With the streets cleared, people watched on from the sidelines as this poor old man stood up to two advanced robots. "Stand down and comply." One of the robots ordered with his deadpan expression, but credit to the elderly gentleman; he stood his ground. "No, take your infidel kind and be gone from this land!" He shouted back to the soulless beings, and that made them react by aiming their rocket launchers at him. I swallowed my food and was about to pull out my MSMC to let them taste justice. That's when I heard someone call out to the robots. "Stand aside!" She commanded with a blunt, curt cry. The robots complied and moved towards the side. I thought it was another one of Liandri's robots, just higher up on the food chain. It was far from the truth. I saw a young female anthro, she looked like me but instead of having snow leopard fur, she had normal leopard fur that was yellow/orange with black spotted fur. Her blond hair was done up like a secretary, looking all fancy in her gray dress with body armor covering her upper torso. She looked very young... like she was 17 years old. Wielding the mighty FSSG-50 Marksman Rifle in her hand, it looked like she didn't struggle with it at all, she hefted it with ease. Her dressy boots left imprints on the dirt road as she walked up to the government official. "My sincerest apologies sir, but Graal City falls under within legal jurisdiction of our heritage program, we are within our rights to take over this beautiful city as an Onslaught arena for the Liandri Tournaments that will begin in the next 6 months." She said with a calm, collected tone. "Then why haven't we gotten the message!?" He cried back, emotions riding high, but she kept her composure. "I understand your pain, I lost my village to Liandri as well, but I promise you that we're doing this for the benefit of all. I'll only extend this offer once to you sir: either take you and your mecca to a new place or perish. No blood has to be spilled today, and you can even make some nice money in the process." Her furry hand extended forward to the man, she put on a fake smile for the man. It's appalling to me... And the man thought so too, as he spat in her face, causing her to recoil back, wiping the saliva from her orange eyes. Once she came to, she gave him the mother of all death glares. "Guards... hold this man down." "Understood." They both chimed in at once and within seconds, they turned around and grabbed the man, forcing him to his knees, extending his arms out as he futilely struggled to free himself. She shouldered her rifle and turned it off safe, aiming it through the iron sights and pointing the barrel at the man's chest. She squeezed the trigger and popped off a .50BMG round right through his chest. Oh dear... things are gonna go down. The government man was dead with a huge hole in his chest, blood spurted from the hole and leaked from his lips. Then the robots lifted him up to his limp legs to tear him in half, making an example of him and the townsfolk. The sounds of screaming rapidly reached crisis point, and soon they scattered, trying to save their own lives. "Should've taken the deal, sir!" She exclaimed. "Boys! Eradicate the people, we're turning this place into an arena!" "Yes, ma'am." Rockets began to fly through the air, hitting some of the people and they turned into clouds of red mist. Hell had broken loose and things weren't looking good. My stomach had enough food now. I could've turned tail and ran, let the people to their fate; but that wasn't the way of the warrior and it certainly defied the code of the hero, so I pulled out my MSMC, took the weapon off safe and cocked it. "SHHHK-CLICK!" My turn to go on the offensive, I aimed the Holo Sight at one of the robots firing their rocket launchers and I wrapped my finger around the trigger to unleash some bullets. Firing at full auto, the 5.56mm lead flew towards its metallic target, ripping through some of their servos and one went right through the cranial dome, causing him to collapse with black oil leaking from his new vent holes. Although the sound of the gunfire had given my location away to the other robot. Acting on his orders, he fired a single rocket which was coming towards me fast and with barely enough reaction time, I dove towards the right to miss being turned into snow leopard pate; the explosion took out the tandoori grill instead. I slid across the muddy ground about a few inches while aiming my PDW at the other robot and opened fire; some of the bullets deflected off the torso, others pierced his visor to render him blind. Unfortunately, upon losing his sight, he called out to his buddies. "Unit is blind, requesting backup." To the right there were more Liandri robots coming, armed with Flak Cannons and looking a lot heavier, I needed to make sure that my aim was as true as Storm's so that I can take out their exposed servos. I got to my feet, my right side covered in caked mud and began to take aim. Before I could... how do the kids say it? "Pop a cap in their asses?" They aimed their Flak Cannons high into the air and shot fragmentation shells, they were heading right towards some children, little girls dressed in burkas. I didn't hesitate, children come first n my eyes. Looking at the descended shells, I pointed the barrel just below the shell and fired, letting the bullets fly towards them to intercept with the shells, causing them to explode in midair. Forgot about the shrapnel though, while most of them were harmlessly impaled into the walls and buildings, one of them did fly by my right cheek, cutting it pretty good with blood leaking out. I felt the sharp, burning pain. Left me temporarily exposed, it was a bit foolish on my end... "BAANG!" A loud gunshot rang out behind me, and I felt the bullet impact my armor, not only did my armor fragment into pieces, but the high velocity knocked me down onto my knees. My back was sore, but at least my armor served its purpose for the last time, now all of my upper torsi was exposed, minus my green bra. Right behind me was that anthro representative from Liandri, FSSG-50 in her left hand, the smoking barrel of an AM67 pistol in her right hand, man those .50 Snubs hurt... my muscles were stiff, I was in pain and tried to get to my feet. It was too late, I felt the barrel get pressed up against the back of my head. "So ghosts DO bleed..." She said to me, pressing the barre even further and looking at me with a smirk. "Captain Kinderington... welcome home." Wait... she knew me? I didn't remember her... though that would soon change. All I knew is when she referred me to my title; I knew she was a member of the Azures Tribe, now she's an agent of Liandri. "My home was destroyed by Liandri... the company you work for now, have you no pride for Azures?" I asked, panting. "It was an unfortunate situation, yes. We tried Captain, we tried to save our home from Liandri but it was a futile effort. I managed to kill a few, but I was spared, given a new lease on life like you did in the past. Now I serve them to honor our people." "You honor the Azures by killing innocent people in cold blood!? You should be ashamed!" I roared before getting stepped on my back and kicked in the ribs. Exhaling sharply, I rolled on to my back and looked up at the Liandri Representative, aiming her hand-cannon at my head. "It was more than what you did, you left us, 10 years we waited to see you return, to reunite with your people but no! You had to stay back on Earth to rejoin with your son!" "Sorry I didn't return earlier, but you said it yourself... I was given a new lease on life, and I overcame my demons." "Enough of your prattle Captain. I looked up to you after you took me in... Now it's time to surpass the master." Aiming at my head, she slowly wrapped her finger around the trigger and was about to blow my brains out, however, I'm not planning to die here and now, not again. I pushed through the pain and performed a sweep kick, knocking her down and allowing me to get back up. While she was down, I grabbed her FSSG-50 and aimed at the robots. I quickly pulled the trigger and fired a .50BMG round at the mechanized troops, even without aiming with precision, I managed to take down one by removing his head from his shoulders. He collapsed in a heap, black oil spurting everywhere. Didn't have time to take out the second one, cause I got a pistol whip to the back of the head, immediately I felt a throbbing pain going through my skull as I staggered forward. That leopard anthro got back up to her feet with AM67 in hand, she aimed at me and fired. Barely had enough time to dodge, and my left rib was grazed. Enough was enough, I grabbed the pistol from her hand and pointed it at her, however, I wasn't planning to shoot her point blank, rather I used the flash module on the gun to temporarily blind her. So while she was seeing white, I kicked her back down. When her sight came back to, the tables were turned as I was pointing the pistol at her, but she wasn't afraid to die, rather she smiled at me. "Even after death, you're still in your prime, Captain." She complimented me, sounded genuine, but I had enough senior moments for one day, I was on my guard. "Thanks, but I'm not here to play around." I said coldly and curtly. "Get you and your troops out of Graal and don't come back here." "An empty threat from a has-been... you won't come back to Dessara once you leave. I'm doing these people a service so that Dessara will be remembered." "Be remembered for needless bloodshed and insatiable greed." "In your opinion Captain... but as for your demands..." She lunged to her feet and tackled me onto my back, causing me to release the gun and it slid away. "Motion to leave: Denied." She gave her one liner before punching me a few times in the face, causing my vision to blur up a bit, my headache growing stronger. I winced in pain, it was overwhelming. I managed to see an opening, when she brought her right arm down, I grabbed it and rolled her onto her back; unleashing some palm strikes to her face. They were pretty good strikes as well, cause her nose and mouth began to bleed red, not black, not blue, real blood. About 6 strikes later and she pushed me off, getting onto her feet while panting. I too got on my feet and assumed my Aikijiujitsu stance, I pointed at her and curled my fingers, beckoning her to come here and get it on. No not like that. She responded by assuming her Wing Chun stance and came running at me. Chopping and swinging at me, she was relentless in her offense, but she hasn't met a formidable defense. I managed to dodge and weave to avoid her strikes, and as part of my Aikijiujitsu stance, I grabbed her right arm and redirected her energy upwards, causing her shoulder to pop out of its socket. Then I kicked her away with ease, causing her to stagger back, holding her disjointed shoulder. She looked at her robotic soldier behind me, who was sitting still, causing her to hiss at him. "Don't just stand there you idiot! Help your boss!" She shouted at him. "Affirmative." Now the fight was 2 against one, while I can fight an organic being hand to hand, a robotic one wasn't possible. That armor's so heavy that it'll break my hands and ankles if I tried to combat it, and he even has a Flak Cannon, so he can rip me to shreds with just one shot. So I need to be careful. Especially when I got Ms. Leopard butt behind me. Looking in front of me, and behind me, I was stuck between a rock and a hard place; I searched for a firearm on the ground, be it my MSMC, the AM67 Combat Pistol or that FSSG-50 Marksman Rifle; heck, even a Rocket Launcher will do and I'm terrible with those! Once more I was in a do or die situation, I had to get out of it fast. I remembered one thing about my Nakotan tradition, if you have to fight someone and your weapon isn't in your hand, you must resort to underhanded techniques... much to my chagrin. I crouched low and scooped up some mud from the ground, then I quickly chucked it at the anthro. My B-sized cleavage jigged behind my bra and of course, the leopard had to dodge it, but she left herself briefly open. So I ran towards her, tackled her to the ground then I rolled behind her, grabbing my MSMC. Don't know how many bullets are left in the magazine, just hope it's enough to take down the droid. Gathering my focus was easy and soon, I aimed my PDW and fired at the exposed servos on his arms. Some of the 5.56x30mm bullets missed, others managed to rip the servos apart, rendering his arms useless; causing him to drop his Flak Cannon and look at his arms. "Unit incapacitated." He said in his usual cold, lifeless expression. When the female anthro got up, I chucked my MSMC at her, knocking her back down and that's when I walked up to her, grabbed her by the back of her neck and began to slam her face into the mud multiple times. Adrenaline was flowing through my veins, I lost my sense of control... I just wanted this to stop. And soon, I got my wish. "STOP!" She cried out, panting. "Stop! Stop Erika!" Slamming her one more time, I let her go and backed up as she sat up, dazed and beaten with teeth missing from her mouth, blood, sweat, and dirt covering her face, her dress was stained, she was done for now. "Fine... you win Captain. I'll leave Grall... but rest assured, we will meet again, and next time... things will be different." "Just go..." I replied, panting myself. Spitting out some blood, the anthro tapped her ear twice, activating her communicator. "2 to warp back to Liandri HQ, Codename Kat, and Unit LRK-5504M. Mission aborted, ran into unexpected resistance." Her atoms scattered into red balls of light as well as the robot who had his arms disabled, the fight was over... but when I heard her name, it all came back rushing me, I sank to my knees with a shocked expression on my face. Heart beating through my chest, it was a lot to take in all at once. I didn't care about the people running up to me, heralding me as a heroine, their voices were drowned out, all I could focus on was the past once more; I failed her like I failed the Azures. "Eliza..." TO BE CONTINUED

#action story #UT2004 Related #New OC #my newest story #have to post it here cause Deviantart's stupid right now

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