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larrythefloridaman · 3 years ago

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Y'all like your deities with or without the shell?

Under the readmore is aaaaaaaaall color god observations and musings based on them, because I am studying to become the world's Premiere Chromatheologian and RGB Understander so under the cut is pretty much Oops! All Spoilers! up to the most recent episode of season 3.

Apparently Universal Color God Attributes:

Damage to their domain hurts them, but fixing the issue, or lashing out by using their powers destructively, can help them to repair the damage.

If they sustain enough damage, it can temporarily paralyze them and send them into a strengthened but 'exposed' state (chartreuse's spirit activation in the last fight of 19) and further damage after that will activate a failsafe, which is unique by domain but seemingly designed to give them the chance to balance things, but can get… very out of hand or backfire depending on circumstances. (see: cobalt’s failsafe sending mark's universe into a never-ending apocalyptic war because word of the cure for death became too widespread for the killing urge failsafe to affectively balance anything because every side could simply revive their fallen.)

Chartreuse's failsafe is something of a stopped time bubble quarantine where processes that require the passing of time cannot complete, allowing her the time to wear down the offending party to beat them to death or plan around finishing them.

Cobalt's is inciting war, the casualties serving to balance the scale. I'm not sure we know Crimson's yet- he's never taken enough direct damage without doing damage to compensate in order to trigger it, although i dont remember season one well enough to recall if any of the universe stuff in it tracks with the pattern bc season one is a bit fucky

Connected in a fashion that allows them to simply Sense the overall status of the others to some extent, although they don't know Why theyre in the state theyre in without asking (chartreuse [and by extension, folk, presumably on her information] confronting crimson via crimsonaut for pretending to be dead, Cobalt confronting both his siblings about how they are handling their duties improperly but not knowing about Folk. He knew about the constants deaths because hes a death god, duh, but he didnt use their names like crimson did, possibly implying they're erased upon death so thoroughly that only crimson and the constants can really recall a shattered constants' existence, not even the other guardians.)

Abilities of the guardians can be replicated by mortals through three apparent methods- through machines (dimensional bus, the time machine, presumably J0hn's part in Sephiroth's resurrection,) simply through advanced enough individual skill (Home MD curing death, potentially Dantoinette's universe portal travel, maybe Genwun's sped up time bubble that evolved them into Genfour? although that could very well have just been an illusion and theyre just like, a fuckin theater kid that was doing pretend character development for the Bit or something given GenFive turned out to be a zoroark) or through stealing some of the power of the relevant god (Dr. Order stealing Chartreuse's power, Dani maybe having stolen some of Crimson's when she beat his ass. Dani's one woman universal travel is like, wicked ambiguous)

Cobalt:

Can seemingly perceive or act through any living material. (The Tree. Cobalt instructed Larry to slap his hand on that tree, that shit glowed and he had a new deal tattoo without Cobalt ever having been physically present)

Can influence the resurrected by giving them a killing urge. Represented by an aberrant brainwave and a ringing in the undead's heads. This doesnt appear to be direct control- as the Grunk could clearly restrain himself from killing people that genuinely didn't deserve it (like nightly and cha cha, who WERE grunk event targets but not fatally so. Nagito was a crimson thing so it really doesn't count here. God poor grunk his life really is just a constant plaything in the hands of the gods huh) and Sephiroth very much had personal motivation to want to kill Folk. failsafe activates this ability on the scale of war.

Deals. The extent of what Cobalt can do with these is unclear but Iggy's god powers were taken from him as his part in the deal so what he can take isn't limited to physical things or things obviously related to his domain.

Weaknesses:

Deals. While this ability is impressive his preference for making deals for those that offend against his domain is potentially very exploitable- Larry's knowledge of the cure for death is, if word of it were to ever get out beyond Larry, wildly dangerous for this dimension, so technically the safest thing for the iron-fisted cobalt to do would be to nip the problem in the bud and get rid of him. But, fascinatingly, that wasn't even put on the table, the first thing Cobalt does is threaten J0hn, prompting Larry to make a deal. While Cobalt enforces death, he also doesn't like unnecessary death, and Larry demonstrably knows how to keep a secret for the good of the world even at great cost to himself and Cobalt is aware of this- easily clarifying to Larry the aberrant thing endangering the universe wasn't his timeloop business. So while he's clearly not letting his resurrection fuckery go unpunished, he's being pretty merciful when he doesn't have to be and from a strictly, brutally pragmatic perspective probably shouldn't be.

His control over the undead manifests as a ringing and an aberrant brainwave trackable by J0hn's equipment, and could probably therefore be accounted for and circumvented? J0hn has, wisely, largely sworn off fucking with people's brains after the sephiroth fiasco went So Wrong, So Very Wrong, Oh God Oh Fuck Someone Cool Almost Died, but if he hadn't, and if J0hn let his dislike for authority and keeping Larry safe outweigh reason like he let safety, spite and comedic value outweigh good ethical sense when reprogramming sephiroth, in theory Mr. 'hacked a time machine for breakfast?' could. y'know. probably do it. what is a god's authority to an anarchist, what better to challenge life and death than the cold and eternal machine, you get the point its a fun scenario

Olive Garden Breadsticks and Small Cute Dogs, apparently

Chartreuse's:

Time Clones: taps into parallel timelines to retrieve alternate versions of herself to utilize.

Time Travel: what it says on the tin. Travel to the past creates painful splits in the prime timeline, but through careful action and traveling back into the past, these can be weaved into a time loop. A split from the timeline is a wound, and a successful timeloop is the surgical scar it can become with attentive care, to use a medical metaphor. Carefully closed and healing. Keeping Folk here is essentially akin to chartreuse pulling out her stitches on the initial incision.

Time Stopping: creates a space wherein things that take time to complete cannot complete, where things can move, but everything within is in a perfect unchanging stasis until the bubble drops. This is the form her failsafe takes.

Timeline Creation: can create timelines from scratch.

Can fuse alternate timeline versions of the same individual to allow them to coexist. (Ryan's confirmed in the discord that Dantoinette experienced both failures in 20, because Chartreuse fused the two instances of her to save the post-raid instance from fading. Could... theoretically do this to Folk and save herself the pain, but while Folk and Therapuppy are the same person, there's seven years and untold amounts of difference deriving from the time and circumstance between them and the inherent cognitive dissonances that would result from attempting that would be wicked fucked up to inflict, and that's assuming there isn't some reason that it wouldn't be possible anyway. while the two Danis had like. A day or so's difference between them, so she could be safely fused with the only dissonant thing being that she remembers both being too slow to prevent order's time escape and beginning to dissipate post-raid, AND losing that fight to her pre-raid. RIP Dani, that perfectionism must be kicking her ass)

Weaknesses:

Unwilling to use her powers destructively in her pursuit of domain repair and thereby much easier to damage to the point of paralyzing her, making her particularly vulnerable to Power Theft

Morally Optimistic. At one point in 19, she briefly justifies Crimson's shitty evil actions to herself after experiencing for herself how Wack the kerfuffleverse is firsthand, ("and all he did was kill a couple people!" Chartreuse. Honey.) and when she fights Crimsonaut she seems to actually believe for a second that he's actually worried about her when Crimson asks if she's okay after he beats her. Additionally, as D+, she concerns herself with trying to understand doctor order's motive, and after Larry defeats Order, he makes a point of confirming she feels no remorse before making his request for what Chartreuse does with her, and appeals to the idea of letting Order fulfill her desire to be a god in a way which isn't a problem for anyone and Chartreuse is more than happy to oblige under these conditions after what Larry's done for everybody. Then immediately threatens to evaporate him for playfully teasing her about having a crush on folk. Fucked up a little bit

Crimson's:

Universe Shifting: Travel between universes.

Universe Correction: appears to replace an aberrant individual with the 'correct' version of themselves for that universe, presumably sending them back to their own. (Mario from super mario was universe corrected, but still seemingly exists in wario form as evidenced by smashup kerfuffle, and was simply temporarily replaced with his corrected universe counterpart. But like. The dimensional bus system is still active crimbo doing the Put That Thing Back Where It Came From Or So Help Me routine aint gonna work if they can come back with a shrug and bus fare. you're fighting the symptoms without treating the problem)

Universal Constants:

Three individuals per universe that serve as the pillars which stabilize said universe, created by absorbing red orbs Crimson creates. Becoming a constant grants power, but also makes the constant fragile, and death wipes them from the face of the multiverse, only crimson, those he's possessed and the other constants seemingly able to recall they ever existed, although some physical evidence is still left behind (Larry's record of Nagito's death, which is just as redacted as everything else relating to him but still is very much something Larry has. Kind of a Voidfish adventurezone type beat ironically enough? Taako really has seen all this shit before no wonder he peaced tf out)

To counterbalance the weaknesses the constants have, they have a sort of spidey-sense to alert them to danger, and an intrinsic bonded connection to their fellow constants, and additionally, Crimson apparently doesn't suffer any pain from the death of constants or the structural instability of a universe.

Possession: what it says on the tin! Seemingly can only be done with permission to living things- none of crimson's direct hosts seem to have entered that agreement unwillingly, Valentine lost a bet, Hamburger and Crimsonaut have been by all evidence intentional allies to Crimson- but electronics are fair game, as seen with The Guy's suit. Kinda curious how that rule applies to bitches that are half and half, like J0hn or the clonebot gang, as its unclear whether The Guy's suit was yoinkable without permission because it was mechanical or because its not sentient. could go either way but if it's the former that's potentially very frightening

Fusion: Two individuals from alternate universes can be fused into one shared body which can take on aspects of either depending on which is currently in control. (possibly allows someone who traveled into a given universe to become a fixed resident there without it being an issue for Crimson, whose job is to prevent interdimensional travel?) Monday Mark and possibly T.O.M. are our main examples.

Corruption:

Unpleasant As Hell and can even kill you instead of changing you if you cant handle it.

turns the corrupted individual into a twisted exaggeration of themself, allows them supernatural control over their shape, and makes them very difficult- if not impossible by traditional means- to kill, based on Garfield.

Subjects them to control by Crimson, but can be exorcised of this influence just like crimson's direct hosts can, although the supernatural changes to their physiology are seemingly permanent, judging from Shantae.

Notable Weaknesses:

Exorcism can be performed to free a possessed or corrupted individual of Crimson's influence. Its unclear how exorcism works/is learned in CPUK, but confirmed exorcists: dantoinette and yung papaya's snake dad, confirmed non-exorcists: folk

The universal constant orbs are physical objects so they are Very Stealable and they grant a power boost so theres literally an Incentive to beat his ass for anybody who wants to be strong and either doesnt know or doesn't care about the whole 'getting erased when you die' part

Crimson has lots of tools to create pawns, but all of them have drawbacks. Corruption could kill a potential pawn, possession generally seems to require permission, and he has no control over the constants' choices and actions

Manipulative bitch's highest stat is charisma and it shows. This motherfucker is selling snake oil. If he was mortal rather than a Whole Entire God he'd make an excellent ineffectual saturday morning cartoon supervillain and i think everyone, including him, would be happier for it, ngl

Something interesting ive realized that likely wasnt fully intentional, is that a lot of Dr. Order's creations, considering her motive, can kind of be sorted by a color god it appears to be a crude attempt at mimicking the abilities of. My Grunk is a poorly executed resurrection, the clonebot gang vs chartreuse's timeclones (this one deserves special mention because Chartreuse used this shitty attempted mimicry to her advantage with D+, very smart and ironic play, excellent job Treusy,) spirits are somewhat similar to universal constant orbs (orbs which can be absorbed to grant power, but which have physical repercussions- key differences being that spirits require activation and grow stronger while attuning to a user without being used, and having far less severe drawbacks, taking a heavy toll on the body, but only once they've worn off and without the risk of wiping yourself from the face of existence,) and she also augmented Perfect Spriteman and Larry, which kind of track as crude imitations of Crimson's corruption!

Garfield was an acerbic cat who loved food and hated mondays, now its an actively malicious ever-hungry amorphous entity whose only weakness is monday and whose only consistency in form is 'cat-like.'

Shantae was (to my extremely limited understanding of shantae,) a friendly heroic type who had to introduce herself often, and she became something akin to a biblically accurate angel that can *only* introduce herself.

The Grunks a tough but sweet and supportive single dad with stage presence and a tendency to fly off the handle when he or his family are slighted, and now he gets so hype in the audience when his son does well that he bursts into flames and ascends and we get random grunk events along with the associated murder charges when he gets mad and the target sucks enough that he doesn't hold himself back from killing them.

Perfect Spriteman and Larry fit the trend of exaggeration of already present traits- Spriteman fucking loves sprite and became something that only thinks about sprite, and Larry the Florida Man, characterized from minute one by unpredictability and who spent his first matches in the series pre-shapeshifter transformation staying alive keeping stocks for Shockingly Long even despite getting seventh, became literally physically random as well as developing the ability to regenerate, albeit with the ability to feel pain normally very much intact, unlike Garfield just... Soaking up damage like its nothing in his pursuit of Jon. The fact that Arbuckle legit defeated Garfield, even temporarily, is terrifyingly impressive honestly that dude is fucking built different for being so chronically bland

i dont think they're actually corrupted in any meaningful way we have to worry about, to be fully clear, Spriteman was cured with fucking antacids, i simply think they could be a fucked up attempt at making something that kind of seems like it from a functional standpoint, from the wannabe god doctor that brought us green clones whose only fundamental association with time was accelerated aging and who thought an actively rotting corpse thats just reanimated enough that it can throw hands was as good as curing death

#cpu kerfuffle #cpuk cobalt #cpuk chartreuse #cpuk crimson #im like. 80% all this info is correct but im not feeling up to rewatching matches to doublecheck rn ngl asdsfgfghgfhfgsdf #will probably edit with fixes if im misremembering smthn later

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starr-fall-knight-rise · 5 years ago

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Humans are Space Orcs, “Stalemate.”

An update on the Burg war :) Hope you like.

“Commander be advised, more Burg ships have appeared from warp.”

“Shit, how many.”

“I uh….they don’t know sir, but they say it has to be an entire fleet.”

“Damn it.” The darkfire banked a hard right and began angling upwards. McCaster did his best to get information on the battle proceeding above their heads, though most of the information was garbled and confused.

The dogfight above the Gromm city hadn’t lasted more than a few minutes, and while there were still burg drones about, the commander clearly trusted the other pilots to take care of this mess.

They had lost three jets over the course of the battle, which was a surprisingly expensive ad large percentage of their flight budget in the UNSC, of course he ws sure the commander was less worried about the monetary cost as much as he was worried about the cost of lives.

Six pilots dead, and more sure to follow.

McCaster’s stomach dropped back against his spin as the commander cut the jet engines and switched to fusion. The switch was so quick that he only had a momentary feeling of free fall before they were rocketed back skyward cutting through the atmosphere and breaking into the dark reaches of space, the eggshell blue of the sky fading about them until darkness and the vast universe beyond unfolded before them.

A universe that was now besieged by silent explosions and eruptions of short lived fire immediately snuffed by the vacuum of space. Debris flew in all directions, and even the commander was having a hell of a time keeping from exploding cutting this way and that, pulling maneuvers that shouldn’t have been possible slicing between two parallel pieces of floating metal so close that McCaster could see the individual rivets running down its silver length.

Cutting past that, the commander pulled down bringing them in a stomach churning dive before moving back upwards, pressing them back into their seats.

Ahead of them chaos was unloading, the GA on one side and the burg on the other. Ordinance flew back and forth, and, as they watched, stuck and unable to do anything to help, one of the burg ships cut around from the side and tagged one of the UNSC vessels, with a round straight to the port side.

There was a silent explosion, fire ripped through the inside of the hull as oxygen was quickly consumed. The ship listed heavily to one side.

“Fuck! Who was that! Get me a casualty report NOW!” The commander ordered.

McCaster rushed to do as told, but was having trouble with all the comms interference. As they watched, little pods began breaking away from the ailing ship, most of them coming from the breached decks as panicked crew-members fled to the escape pods.

One escape pod was completely annihilated by a passing piece of debris, popping like a popcorn kernel does in a microwave, ripping open and sending bodies flipping like rag-dolls out into the vastness.

McCaster grew sick just thinking about what dying like that would have felt like. Freezing to death as all the glasses slowly boiled from your blood. He hoped that they were all to dead to think about what had happened to them.

“That was the UNSC Esperanca, commander. Captain Silva is not responding, and all coms to the bridge crew have been cut. GA rescue teams are being dispatched casualties are estimated in the hundreds.”

“Shit, shit, shit.” The man continued to cure wildly, “Radio in to the harbinger.”

“Yes sir.”

He connected the coms link so the commander could speak freely, though he was rather concerned about the man’s ability to fly and talk at the same time.

They rotated to the side, executing a tight barrel roll and dive taking them out of the line of a fast moving group of space debris which threatened to pop their ship like a can opener and expose the two of them like a couple of sardines.

“Commander.”

“Tell me what’s happening.”

“The burg brought in a second surprise fleet to back up their first. The Burg command ship has landed planetside just outside the central city, and ground troops are making a march for the capital city. Captain Silva is in contact, and unharmed, but the ship is heavily damaged. Casualty report is up to 220 from all ships 150 of those being from Silva’s crew, and the death toll is rising as we speak. Sunny has dispatched marine drop troops to deal with the burg invasion of the capital city.”

The commander had to stop talking for a moment, as a burg vessel dropped in behind them. The commander cursed again rather violently before bringing them straight towards the debris field. McCaster hopped on the under-wing guns shooting away any piece of debris that he could manage flying as fast as they were.

Again, the commander proved his metal, cutting through the field with only inches to spare leaving the burg drone in pieces behind them.

A couple more GA ships popped into view.

“Get silva to fall back, have some of the GA vessels form a protective perimeter around their ship, I don’t want anyone else getting killed, have them fall back and wait for assistance. Do we know of any GA ship that is capable of multiple microwarps without overheating?’”

There was a long pause.

“Sunny says that the Rundi ships should be able to do at least ten before it becomes dangerous.”

“Alright, new plan, have the rundi ships alternate micro warp behind the enemy fleet, have them take a shot and then warp out, then have the next ship do the same but in a different location. Aim for one ship at a time if you can, or be random if it looks like they are catching on. Pair each of our fleet with one of the Rundi vessels and have them communicate with each other about the micro warps. Let's see if we can’t flank them. Try to hit them at the same time then use the rundi shields to block our unshielded vessels between bouts.”

“Yes sir.”

“And lieutenant?”

“Yes sir?”

“Can you hold the ship or do you need me to return.”

“I have it commander, you do what you need to do.”

“I have a better eye from up here.”

“Good, sir.”

The commander kept the line open listening to the general chatter of the battle. While they watched, the Rundi ships fell back into formation with the four remaining human vessels, while the tesraki ships pulled back to protect the limping remains of the Esperanca.

A body rolled past their window, face pale and cold in death.

The commander kept his cool though.

The burg Ships were still firing, but now the Rundi ships were taking the brunt of the attacks, their superior shields lighting up in shades of blue.

One of the ships vanished leaving it’s human counterpart open to fire, however as the Burg were gearing up to take a shot, the rundi ship appeared behind them. There was a pause as the ships seemed to be deciding what to do, during which time both the human and the rundi ships took that moment to take their shots.

It was a dangerous maneuver, for if either one of them missed the could potentially send their ordinance into friendly territory, but it worked for the time being, and an explosion rocked the leftmost side of the burg hull ripping three decks open to bare space.

Bodies were sucked out into the void and tossed like ragdolls into floating objects.

The rundi ship vanished and appeared back before the human ship just as the burg began to fire.

The rundi shields were not looking great, but another pairing was ready to dot the same taking the focus off the first ship for the time being.

“Commander, Commander.” The garbled voice rushed over the radio marred by the sound of explosions in the background, and shouting.

“Go.” The man ordered taking the ship into a steep incline locking onto one of the burg drones and erupting it into a ball of flame.

“Sir, This is Ramirez with the ground forces. The burg have deployed ground transport and artillery units and are advancing towards the city. We have made a protective perimeter, but our weapons arent going to do shit against those ground units.”

“Sending in air support. Hold tight Ramirez.”

He turned back to the coms and requested bombers to be deployed to the surface.

“What do they want with the capital city?”

McCaster wasn’t exactly aware of alien politics and so couldn't help but asking.

“The Gromm homeworld is the center hub for trade in the galaxy. Each of the home worlds has a warp disruptor that doesn't allow direct warp into a solar system unless authorized. The Gromm capital city holds the coding software that allows this to work, considering it needs access to almost all planets in Andromeda and, by extension, earth as well. We cannot let them get access to that information or else they can easily move in for an attack on any one of us. The rundi homeworld, the Tesraki, humans.”

They cut around the side of the burg ship.

And the commander kept an eye out in the field for something he knew he wasn’t likely to spot.

“Conn, Conn, are you there, can you hear me.”

There was silence, and for a moment the commander thought the worst.

“Right here captain, though I would appreciate if you told everyone to stop blowing each other up for a few minutes. That would make my life much easier.”

He ignored the snark for the moment, “Have you managed to get close enough to hear them?”

“Mmm only close enough to get general impression. If I get any closer, I run the risk of getting exploded, and right now I am already at risk of being chopped in half, which I am not highly appreciative of.”

“What if we came, picked you up, and flew you past. Could you do it then?”

“I could probably manage that. Sending you my location now.”

McCaster hadn’t heard the conversation for obvious reasons, and so was confused as the commander pealed away from formation and started heading straight towards the burg fleet line.

Luckily the larger ships didn’t consider one lone jet enough of a worry to actually fire at them, though the burg drones were eager for blood. The commander pulled some risky maneuvers, cutting through fields of metal, and maneuvering two drones to crash into each other.

He ordered McCaster to follow a beacon into the debris field, and with his help they were able to maneuver further in, slowing greatly and hiding their signature as they turned off the engine and coasted for a bit. They were going very slowly now, cutting through an eerie junkyard of mingled bodies and the skeletal remains of ships. A rundi corpse gently bounced off their right wind and went tumbling away into nothing.

McCaster was looking around for the beacon assuming they were after a ship of some sort, when there was a clatter atop the canopy. Of course there was no sound from outside, but the reverberations through the air on the inside of the canopy made him look up.

And immediately almost peed himself.

The black eyed- leering face seemed quite amused with his near panic attack, white ribbons billowing out from behind it, as it settled itself into place at the back of the canopy.

“Sorry McCaster, forgot to mention we were coming to pick up a friend.”

“Friend my ass.” he muttered under his breath, looking back at the still leering face.

They began a slow creep towards the burg ship, keeping low and below their enemy.

It was a strange angle , hard to remember that in space there was movement in almost any direction. Generally speaking all of the burg and GA ships were on the same grid level, so their approaching presence was hardly noticed. Burg drones hung about the outside of the enemy ship so this was about as close as they planned on getting.

“How about here, this is about as close as I can get you.”

“Mmmm, it may take a few minutes, there is only so much I can do between bouts of screaming.

Their faces were lit a moment later by the fiery glow of another explosion, silent and dead in the vacuum of space.

Everything around them was eerily quiet.

“Well, shit.”

“Don’t give me that conn, tell me what’s going on now!”

“Might want to hurry up commander. This little space battle is simply a diversion for the real plan happening on the surface. Those artillery guns aren't just artillery. Some of the rounds have data nets on them, and may be able to hijack the pertinent information without them even getting into the city, if they land one close enough. I would wager to say you have ten minutes.”

“Shit!”

What followed was sincerely the most insane and terrifying thing that McCaster had ever experienced. The commander flew like a madman, cutting duck rolling and spinning through the debris field with drones hot on their heels all while on the radio yelling for all air units to target their fire on the burg artillery. He probably would have ordered all the ships to break off and use orbital targeting as well, but they were too close to the burg city for that, and too close to the marines who were valiantly impending the burg efforts.

Luckily for them a single one of those data rounds would have to hit an exact target in order to work, but the closer they got the more likely it would become.

Jets whizzed around the city shooting ordinance from the sky when they could.

The data rounds had to be slow in order to remain in tact for the flight down, so that was one advantage they had.

All remaining bombers and jets were ordered down to earth, with the burg drones peeling off behind them.

The freaky alien, Conn let them go just as they were about to fall into orbit ribbons billowing out about him as they vanished into the distance rocketing towards earth at fenominal speeds. The fire licked up at their wings again, but this time McCaster knew what to expect.

He moved himself to the under-wing guns determined to help in any way he could.

They were approaching the ground fast, and an entire formation of aircraft rolled in one mass dogfight over the scene below as burg drones fought aggressively to protect their precious artillery units. The Burg command ship lobbed Anti-Air missiles into the sky causing one darkfire to erupt into a ball of flame.

McCaster though they were going to join another formation of jets heading towards the artillery units, but was surprised when the Commander continued their dive the ground approaching at a stunning speed.

This time he held himself conscious as the commander pulled out of the dive, at the last possible moment. They were going so low, that the power of their engines kicked up a trail of dust behind them knocking burg soldiers to the ground as they marched.

AA guns were useless against them as they careened towards the artillery line.

The wing guns fired repeatedly tearing up the ground, and sending burg bodies erupting in all directions.

The commander narrowed his sights, locking on, and then fired, before peeling off and pulling up. The right wing of their jet was so close to the ground, it clipped the top of a tall shrub sending plant bits in all directions, though it made no difference as the shrub erupted into momentary flames as the explosion reached it.

McCaster tried not to think about how close they had come to dying, and was reminded seconds later when a burg drone, which had been following them from their dive, rammed into the ground exploding just as violently and taking out a second piece of friendly artillery.

Burg bodies were thrown to the ground in the ensuing explosion, remaining cold and still.

One of their bombers was clipped hard in the wing, and went down with an explosion.

A white parachute opened after a moment only to be torn up by an incoming burg drone, with no qualms about shooting a man while he was defenseless.

The commander made sure it was the last move that drone ever took.

Back towards the city more troop transports were dropping soldiers onto the front line. Marines, rundi and Tesraki soldiers were spilling from open pods setting up a defense line around the city. The Gromm were doing what they could to assist though their military technology was rudimentary at best.

“They almost have the nexus back online!”

As it turned out the Burg were well aware of this fact, at at least twenty incoming burg ships cut into atmosphere and were forced to descend to land, creating a defensible position around the burg command ship just as as the nexus went back up

A large, translucent amber dome erupted about the ground where the burg ships were stationed locking them into place with their own shields.

The drones fell back to defend the position, leaving the exhausted pilots to circle around the perimeter unable to get close to the well defended position.

On rundi pilot made the mistake and was immediately shot from the sky.

Overhead, friendly forces had made a defensive perimeter of the Nexus and the remaining burg ships had fallen back leading everything to a standstill. They could do nothing about the burg ships already on the planet for fear of hurting the civilian population.

As for now, the battle had come to its conclusion as a draw, though the war was far form over.

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tony-starkrogers · 6 years ago

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The Massive SteveTony Rec List

Welcome to my Fairly Comprehensive, Ridiculously Long SteveTony Fic Recs, aka my collection of pretty much nearly everything I’ve read and loved so far over the years. This fandom is lucky enough to have some truly brilliant and dedicated authors, and I’m always discovering new fics to love, so I thought I’d share some of them with you! Fics will be sorted alphabetically tbh just because I suck at sorting stuff? Some of my personal forever-faves will be marked with ♡. This is by no means all of the fics this fandom has to offer, but if you’re new to the fandom, this should give you a good place to start, and if you’ve been a SteveTony shipper for a while, hopefully you’ll find something new! And if you do have a favorite fic that’s not on the list, please add it to the comments or rec it to me (because who doesn’t need more fics)!

Here’s just a few GREAT resources to check out if you’re looking for Even More fic recs:

@sabrecmcstonyficrecs - I mean, sabre is basically THE fandom resource? Any and all fic you’re looking for you’ll likely find here. ||| @findingstony - if you’re looking for a particular fic and don’t remember where you found it, look here first! ||| @cap-ironman - the place to go, especially for brand new fics! the fandom lives here ||| @nasaficsrecs - many good fic recs ||| @ishipallthings many wonderful rec lists ||| @sineala - the place to go if you are at all interested in 616 SteveTony or really anything in the 616 comics universe

I have lots of fics bookmarked on ao3: my bookmarks! You can also check out my other fic rec lists, and my general fic rec tag. Also while you’re at it maybe check out some of my fics?

And here are the recs! (under the cut.) Have fun reading and be sure to show your authors some love with kudos and comments!!!

♡ 1796 Broadway by rainproof, teaberryblue - M | 460,220 words

Captain America respectfully requests that all complaints be addressed to him in writing. On paper, the nice old-fashioned way, because the computer screen hurts his eyes.

Put your phone down, Tony.

absence makes the heart by fantalaimon - G | 4,835 words

“One night,” Tony says, and just flies himself bodily into one of the canary yellow beekeepers like a red and gold battering ram. “I ask for one measly night. One single goddamn night with my boyfriend—”

“Oh, is the boyfriend label on now?” Clint asks over the comms.

A Higher Form of War by sabrecmc - M | 292,114 words

Tony is a King with a surprising number of people out to kill him. Steve and the rest of the Avengers are fighting for Pierce's rebellion and end up with Tony as their prisoner. Oops.

A New Way For Us by ann2who - M | 24,435 words

They fight Thanos—and they’re losing. And before Tony knows what’s happening, he’s standing with Doctor Strange in front of the Eye of Agamotto and gets send back in time. Can he find a way to fix things this time around, or are they doomed to fall apart all over again?

♡ A Partial Dictionary Of The 21st Century By Captain Steve Rogers, US Army by copperbadge - E | 13,888 words

Steve is adapting well to the new millennium, and he has the dictionary to prove it.

age is an irrational number by valtyr - E | 8,749 words

Steve and Tony grow old together.

♡ All Roads Lead To by theappleppielifestyle - G | 13,155 words

After Obadiah's betrayal, Tony hides in the depths of the Midwest to become a mechanic.

The Avengers come into his life anyway.

All These Things I've Said by Amuly - M | 5,840 words

When Tony starts talking in a language Steve can't understand--the language of science--Steve figures he'll retaliate with a little foreign language knowledge of his own. Only once he starts speaking French around Tony, Steve finds that sometimes it's easier to say what he really wants to say to Tony in a language he can't understand.

Good thing Tony doesn't know French.

And The Void Would Be Calling. by jadedoll - E | 17,721 words

Tony could be suffering from amnesia, a hitch-hiker from a parallel dimension, a ghost or maybe a time-traveller. He's sure he could work out the answer if Steve would just stop pretending he was Tony's boyfriend.

♡ As Sharp As Any Thorn by RurouniHime - E | 47,027 words

It’s four days to Christmas, there’s a city in shambles, and the nation is in mourning because of the actions of a single man.

♡ Be No Stranger (All Your Saints and Soldiers Remix) by jibrailis - T | 5,973 words

That's the twenty-first century love song, baby. Glitz and glamour and every one of us is a liar.

Bizarre Love Triangle by panickyintheuk - T | 1,929 words

Once the idea was in his head, he’d started picking up on all kinds of things, like the way Stark talked about Iron Man with such affection, and seemed to share so many of his mannerisms, and was constantly working on ways of improving the suit. It was obvious.

Blank Slate - A Tony Stark Mystery by navaan - T | 25,381 words

He doesn’t remember who he is or who his friends are, but he knows he’s in a Nazi prison and needs to get away. He doesn’t remember anything about Captain America either, but the man seems to be the kind of guy you trust.And apparently they share more history than meets the eye at first glance.

♡ But Loving Him Is Red by theappleppielifestyle - Not Rated | 25,524 words

"It is- it is not just destined, Steve Rogers. It will reach through the decades, through entire universes if it has to. It will scour the galaxies without rest until the two of you are standing next to each other. Migardians- Migardians call them soulmates, I believe."

♡ Captain America, Undone by laireshi - M | 2,818 words

Steve thinks he can seduce Tony before Tony seduces him. He's very, very wrong.

♡ Captain !@#$*%& America by Wordsplat - T | 8,093 words

The first time Tony hears Steve swear, he's pretty sure it's a dream. The second time is a lot harder to dismiss, considering it's the middle of the afternoon and they're both clearly awake. After that, what else can Tony do but use science to get to the bottom of it?

Catching Lightning in a Bottle by sabrecmc - M | 120,650 words

College student Tony meets janitor Steve at MIT and they fall blissfully in love, until Howard happens and things fall apart. One divorce paperwork snafu courtesy of the ever-helpful Jarvis, and ten years later, Tony has to get re-divorced from Steve.

This does not go as he imagines.

♡ Cherry Ride by copperbadge - E | 12,318 words

A SHIELD agent named Roger Stevens told Tony that his nickname was "Cap". Tony didn't connect the dots until it was much, much too late.

♡ Counterpart by sara_holmes - M | 217,400 words

coun•ter•part [koun-ter-pahrt] [noun] 1. a person or thing closely resembling another, especially in function. 2. a copy; duplicate. 3. one of two parts that fit, complete, or complement one another.

Just because Hydra used the DNA of a Captain America from another dimension to create a lab-grown, six-year-old super-soldier, it doesn't mean that said six-year old super-soldier is biologically Steve's, right?

(Where Steve wants to ban Clint from bringing things home from alternative dimensions, until he doesn't.)

Dangerous Kitchen Tools by ladyshadowdrake - E | 18,330 words

Engineering prodigy, billionaire, and heir to the Stark Industries empire, Tony Stark turned the business world on its head by opening a restuarant and burying himself in the kitchen. Years later, he covers an informal evening cooking class for his friend and fellow molecular gastronomist, Bruce Banner, where he meets famously camera-shy comic artist Steve Rogers.

♡ Dazed and Confused by tsukinofaerii - M | 4,160 words

Captain America has a great many duties that need careful attention. He has to... uh... That thing where... Wow, Tony's pants are awfully tight, aren't they?

Dear Tony, by sirona - T | 5,925 words

Once the dust after what no one is referring to as "The Break-up" has settled, Steve starts writing and doesn't seem to know how to stop.

"death by coffee" and other search queries by goodmorningbeloved - T | 2,841 words

In which Steve's feelings are hopelessly obvious through his Google searches. JARVIS decides to step in.

Deep in the Heart of Me by Finely Honed (jaqen_hgar) - E | 255,926 words

There were days when the realization that he was someone’s father made Steve's head hurt, but mostly he was grateful that he could trust his instincts, because apparently Peter was what had been missing from his life. Yes, he still had lingering, unresolved issues from his time in the Army, and sure, he had what Bucky annoyingly referred to as a criminally untapped ass, and no life outside of work and Peter, but Steve was okay with how his life had turned out because of trusting his instincts.

Unfortunately, those same instincts had straight up betrayed him by going absolutely haywire upon being exposed to Tony Stark.

Do It Over by Sineala - T | 1,999 words

The last words your soulmate says to you are written on your skin, and you won't know who they are until they die. The thing is, Steve and Tony die a lot.

♡ don't know why it took me so long to see by goodmorningbeloved - M | 11,209 words

“Oh, watch this,” Natasha says, propping her chin against her knuckles and turning a sweet gaze on him. “Tony, what’s it like dating a superhero?”Tony bristles in irritation. “We’re not dating,” he snaps. “Captain America probably thinks he can get into anyone’s pants just ‘cause he’s got a mask, costume, and reputation, but not me, buddy. That shield? Gotta be overcompensating for something.” He adds, a bit petulantly, “Oh, and all that blue? Definitely more Steve’s color than his.”-

In which Tony is a genius in all matters except recognizing his boyfriend past a mask.

♡ Emanata (The Comics Will Break Your Heart Remix) by teaberryblue - T | 29,720 words

Steve Rogers has the opportunity to fulfill his childhood dreams of becoming a comic artist when eccentric billionaire, superhero patron, and obsessive comic enthusiast Tony Stark offers him a job drawing Iron Man.

But Tony Stark has no idea that Steve Rogers is really Captain America, the newest member of the Avengers.

And Iron Man has no idea that Captain America is really Steve Rogers, up-and-coming comic book artist.

And Steve doesn't know what to do about the fact that he's falling head over heels for them both.

♡ Engaging the Enemy by tsukinofaerii - T | 22,823 words

Iron Man is one of the more persistent villains that the Ultimates face, with a special fondness for one Captain America. As Steve starts to findout more and more about him, the lines between hero and villain begin to blur. Sometimes, you don't have to be on the right side of the law to be in the right.

even if the brain has forgotten, perhaps the teeth remember (or the fingers) by theappleppielifestyle - G | 8,906 words

Tony gets temporary amnesia.

Some things are clearer without his preconceptions dragging him down.

♡ Even My Phone Misses Your Call by rainbowninja167 - E | 10,869 words

Steve makes it all the way to Ohio before conceding that the post-Chitauri road trip might’ve been a mistake.

Or, ten times Steve has to call Tony to come pick him up.

Even Tony Can't Resist Puppy Love by Wordsplat - T | 7,766 words

In which there is a dinner bet, a com line confession, and, as usual, Loki's magical hijinks make Tony's life unnecessarily difficult.

Fairy Godmother by Amuly - T | 5,186 words

Auntie Peggy has been telling Tony stories about Captain America his whole life. Only problem is, the real thing just about measures up to the stories. Which means, of course, that Aunt Peg has to go to work, because an Aunt's work is never done.

Favorable Winds by RurouniHime - T | 2,056 words

Steve’s voice comes from behind, a sigh and a thump as his own pack hits the floor. “Sam. Meet Tony Stark.”

Follow in Your Footsteps by Sineala - T | 6,788 words

When Tony is twelve, his soulmate's name appears on his wrist. Unfortunately, it's hard to find out anything at all about Steve Rogers.

It turns out there's a reason for that.

Formerly by laireshi - T | 13,620 words

A week ago, he touched Steve at night. A week ago, he kissed him. A week ago, Steve kissed him back.

(A week ago Steve was dead, and Tony deleted his brain.)

The Foodieverse (series) by copperbadge, scifigrl47 - works G-T | 130,326 words in series

It's an AU where everyone works in the food industry. That makes total sense and is definitely not wildly irrational on any axis.

♡ Get Some Now by Sineala - T | 10,376 words

Avengers Mansion has a mysterious feline infestation. Meanwhile, Steve just can't figure out how to ask Tony out on a date. And the thirteen teleporting cats sure aren't helping matters any.

♡ Going on a Ride (series) by theappleppielifestyle - Not Rated | 14,306 words in series

"You want to take me for a ride on your motorcycle," Tony repeats, slow so he can process it as he’s saying it, "because you think my glasses are cute."

Hashtag Finally by Wordsplat - T | 15,208 words

Tony doesn't ever actually ask the Avengers to move into his house, steal his wifi, eat all his food, and become the best family he's ever known. They do it anyway.

How To Be a Truly Terrible Wingman by Wordsplat - M | 11,721 words

Prompt: "We were both playing wingman for our friends who have now decided to go home together, and after five minutes of conversation we fucking hate each other. Let’s bang it out."

♡ How To Excel At Supervillainy (and lose your heart to America) by Zekkass - E | 13,531 words

And that's how Tony's supervillainy hobby got way way way complicated.

♡ How to Lose a Super Soldier in One Easy Step by and_backagain, jibrailis - E | 18,248 words

Rogers jerks backwards, shock registering on his face, and Tony thinks, welcome back to the land of the living, Cap, looks like you're sticking around.

Or, a Pushing Daisies AU.

♡ I (created from fantasies) exist solely for you by Mizzy - T | 62,917 words

Six years ago, without the Avengers Initiative there to save the day, scientist Dr. Eric Selvig sacrificed himself to save the world, the almighty demi-god Thor was lost to a terrible storm, and vigilante Iron Man – spotted with a nuclear weapon trying to take advantage of the situation – was forever labelled an enemy of SHIELD.

This is a comic book office AU, where Steve is defrosted a year too late, Thor has forgotten who he is, and no one knows Tony is Iron Man. Also includes: office pranks, inappropriate post-it notes, and superheroes who like pina coladas and getting caught in the rain

Indecent Proposal by gyzym, Siria - T | 2,592 words

On the plus side, marriage is bound to be easier than proposing.

i stole the keys to this guy by kellifer_fic - M | 6,007 words

Where it was Nick Fury's idea, but he didn't mean it like that

♡ In Which Tony Stark Builds Himself Some Friends (But His Family Was Assigned by Nick Fury) (series) by scifigrl47 - works rated T-M | 343,010 words

Steve takes things like personal responsibility and respect seriously. Tony's got people he pays to take care of that kind of thing, and anyway, he's pretty sure that he's going to die of some exotic disease in his workshop, because Dummy's still a little spotty about what is 'clean' enough to put on an open wound. The rest of the Avengers are in this for personal gain, except for Clint, he just enjoys being a dick.

And some things shouldn't be a chore.

♡ i will never stop losing my breath (every time i see you looking back at me) by theappleppielifestyle - G | 3,222 words

In all fairness, Tony is on autopilot when this happens. He’s had a long, hard day, and it’s possible he hasn’t slept in several long, hard days. He’s already half-asleep on the couch and he’s relaxed and happy, which is a rarity on its’ own, and he’s comfortable enough to let his guard down and get his body to do all the work without switching his brain on.

That should’ve been enough of a warning sign, but apparently not: Tony stretches, says goodnight to his teammates and gets varied responses back, and then he kisses Steve.

He only realizes what he’s done after he’s started to lean back, opening his eyes to see Steve’s blown wide, staring at Tony with his lips gone slack and a tiny furrow between his eyebrows.

if they be worthy by theappleppielifestyle - Not Rated | 824 words

Everyone's staring, and Tony isn't awake enough to do anything but gape dumbly at the hammer in his hand."Huh," he says."Seconded," Steve says through his toast. "Tasha, go tell Coulson another one of us can pick it up."

♡ Last Train Home by erde - T | 10,983 words

Steve writes letters to Tony that he never sends. By the time he hands them to their rightful owner, Tony has had a brush with death, has retired as a superhero, and now has a small town workshop of his very own. But it's okay, Steve has gone into retirement too.

Like Gene Kelly in the Movies by lyra_wing - M | 11,449 words

Everything Tony Stark does is a dance. And it's super confusing for Steve.

Like Sunlight by sara_holmes - M | 8,309 words

Steve is used to the way it feels by now; a strange but gentle tugging connection under his sternum, warm tingles in his skin whenever they touch. That is, until Tony gets himself kidnapped. Then it kinda feels more like someone is trying to wrench his heart out through his ribcage.

Looking for Heaven by foxxcub - E | 31,950 words

When young Lord Anthony Stark learns Steven Rogers has enlisted in the army, he thinks he's seen the last of his tiny, headstrong, haughty stable boy. But four years later, Lord Stark gets an unexpected visit from Steve, whose mother has fallen gravely ill and into financial ruin. Even more unexpected, Steve agrees to a shocking proposal: they will marry, giving Steve the necessary funds to save his mother, and Tony the much-needed reprieve from harassing would-be suitors. It is a business arrangement, nothing more. But as time goes on and circumstances arise, Tony begins to learn that keeping his heart away from his husband is easier said than done.

♡ Love in a Time of Amnesia by Amuly - T | 6,241 words

Carol might have lost all her memories of her friends, but there's at least one thing she can know with absolute certainty: Steve and Tony are a couple. And if the rest of the Avengers insist on saying they're not, well: Carol will just have to put her amnesia to use, for the greater good.

♡ L☆VE by copperbadge - M | 3,773 words

Steve's favorite shirt is at the center of a debate about masculinity, sexuality, and whether or not he did in fact steal it like a thief in the night from Tony.

♡ Meet Your Heroes by Wordsplat - M | 4,130 words

Tony gets rescued by a highly concerned, very handsy Captain America. This is confusing for a number of reasons.

Momentary Paws (or, DO NOT WANT) by velithya - T | 16,834 words

WTF KITTEN

♡ Mr. July by jibrailis - E | 10,065 words

Tony is the only one who can defend Steve's virtue. Tony hates his life.

♡ Neanderthals In Tights (Also Known As a Football Game) by Wordsplat - T | 3,228 words

In which Tony supports Steve at his first big football game, with guest appearances by an exasperated Pepper and an embarrassed Bruce, because yeah, okay, maybe Tony's not really one hundred percent clear on the rules of this game. Why, exactly, are a bunch of neanderthals tackling his boyfriend again?

one hundred percent skill, fifty percent luck by kellifer_fic - T | 7,418 words

Where there is a poker game, a v-card and general misunderstandings

Orbiter Dictum by schmevil - T | 7,357 words

Steve is at the sink, washing the few dishes that pizza for two generates, when he realizes that Tony is in love with him.

Our Weight In Gold by ann2who - E | 33,607 words

It was every cliché he’d ever heard about. Every sappy thing they wrote down in the magazines, every single thing he had always hated about the myth. It was as though he had experienced life without sight, and was suddenly bombarded by a storm of color. It was all-consuming, and rushing through his veins like molten lava, like his whole existence was suddenly filled with sunlight. A door opened, and a myriad of emotions stormed through his body: confusion, disbelief, loneliness, and so much fierce determination that it almost knocked Tony off his feet. And he understood then, understood that these emotions weren’t his. They were Rogers’.

This is a story about fate, self-doubt, choice and eventually—love.

Over Sea, Under Stars by vorkosigan - T | 36,651 words

Tony gets the phone, but he never uses it and he never intends to. Or, he doesn’t until Steve starts texting him, asking strange questions about medication and mental health, which is when Tony gets worried.

♡ Phil Coulson's Case Files of the Toasterverse - works rated mostly G-T, | 287,890 words in series

Short stories from the Toasterverse

Place Your Bets by RurouniHime - M | 35,999 words

Steve Rogers may or may not have just picked up a prostitute. This may or may not be Tony Stark’s fault.

♡ Pulse, Beat, and Measure (series) by Sineala - E | 134,095 words in series

Two men. Two worlds. Life during wartime.

Ready, Fire, Aim (series) by gyzym - M | 63,019 words in series

There's no "I" in "Avenger."

♡ Relativistic Heat Conduction (series) by BlossomsintheMist - E | 70,484 words in series

Age of Ultron-based, but not entirely canon compliant. Written for the 2013 Cap-Iron Man Reverse Big Bang. Ultron has attacked, obliterating most of the world's superheroes and resistance in a matter of hours. The remaining heroes band together and share what strength they have to get through it, to survive, and defeat Ultron once and for all. Steve Rogers grieves in the wake of the disaster and the heroes' defeat, and no one knows if he will be able to provide the leadership they need--but Tony Stark isn't about to let him slip away that easily.

♡ Rom-Commed By Fate (Or JARVIS) by leashy_bebes - E | 14,387 words

The best thing about being an Artificial Intelligence is the ability to parse, filter and modify the things people say until you've got the cause to do exactly what you wanted in the first place. Or, in which JARVIS cock blocks Tony into having an actual relationship.

♡ Run Program: {x} by Amuly - M | 19,728 words

Taking care of Tony is a lot of work. Especially when you’ve only got one arm. And your code dates back to the 1980s.

♡ Secrets of a Successful Marriage by valtyr - E | 24,118 words

Tony Stark lives a double life; he's secretly the supervillain known as Iron Man. But his loving husband Steve has a few secrets of his own, as Tony is about to discover.

♡ SexyMechanic70 by Potrix - T | 2,449 words

“SexyMechanic70,” Natasha reads aloud, nodding approvingly.“Sounds promising,” Clint offers.“And look,” Bucky adds, “he didn’t even send a dick pic! And he praised your sketch which, by the way, is a totally lame icon choice.”Steve snatches his phone back, batting Bucky’s hands away when he struggles to reach for it again. “Cut it out,” he grouses. “Also, excuse me for not posting a picture of my abs.”“A true tragedy,” Sam sighs, earning himself an indignant squawk from Bucky and a betrayed look from Steve. “What? I’m just saying. They’re great abs.”“True,” Nat hums and bumps the fist Clint is holding out to her.

♡ Sixpence In His Shoe by scifigrl47 - M | 103,682 words

Steve and Tony should really read the fine print on what they're signing. Then again, some mistakes are not really mistakes.

♡ Soul Bomb by copperbadge - T | 1,944 words

Suddenly everyone in Manhattan has someone else's voice in their head. Tony got Steve's, for his sins.

♡ Stand Back, I'm Going To Try Science by Good_News_Everyone - T | 2,123 words

Soulmates are a rare and cherished thing, a simple touch of hands bringing love that lasts forever. By all the rules of romance, they're meant to wait for each other and to trust in the vagaries of fate to bring them together. Tony's never been good at waiting, and when he has science on his side, who needs fate?

♡ Start as You Mean to Go On by BlackEyedGirl - E | 2,612 words

Tony gets that the others think this is an ego thing - the way he can’t resist pushing Steve’s buttons. Honest-to-God, the guy just bugs him. Mostly because Steve is distractingly perfect, but a little bit because of the family history.

♡ Steve Rogers Is (Not) A Morning Person by theappleppielifestyle - Not Rated | 1,161 words

Dream, Steve decides. With that comforting knowledge, Steve takes Tony's face in his hands and kisses him.

(Spoilers: it isn't a dream.)

Steve Rogers Takes Offense and the World Gets Schooled by RurouniHime - T | 2,463 words

In which Steve has no idea how that got up on BuzzFeed (aka, because some people don't respond to anything but the direct approach.)

♡ Syzygy (a Kludged Together remix) by Mizzy - T | 20,198 words

When Tony Stark cut Steve Rogers' morning jog short to join him on a reconnaissance mission off the East Coast, Tony sure wasn’t expecting to end up stuck on a life raft in the middle of the ocean, Steve's hand knuckle-deep in his chest.

♡ Tales of the Bots by scifigrl47 (series) - most works rated M | 523,654 words

When Tony Stark was seventeen years old, he built his first AI. On that day, he ceased to be his father's creation, and became a creating force in his own right.

That one act likely saved his life, and not always in the most obvious ways.

The Best Policy by cylobaby27 - M | 22,724 words

Tony Stark breezes through life on bluster and bullshit. When he gets hit by a truth spell, he locks himself away in his workshop so he can find a way to reverse it without anyone finding out. So why can't he say no when Steve keeps asking to spend time with him?

♡ the family you choose by theappleppielifestyle - Not Rated | 7,385 words

“Just who exactly was my son making out with in a closet?”

“Tony Stark.”Huh.“You might know him,” Fury continues, and Sarah nods, furiously biting at her cheek so she doesn’t do something awful, like giggle.

♡ The Forever-Nighter by Wordsplat - T | 10,172 words

When Rhodey decides that Tony's been slacking lately and drags him along to the gym, Tony's fully prepared to duck right back out the door the first time Rhodey turns around. Then he sees Hot Blond Guy.

♡ The Last Love Song of Anthony E. Stark by jibrailis - M | 42,327 words

After contracting an Asgardian virus, Tony starts forgetting things. And people. And Steve.

♡ The Opposite of a Problem by Sineala - T | 2,490 words

"I promise to love, honor, and probably not obey you, and, uh, take you as my totally-unlawfully-wedded husband, in sickness and in health, forsaking all others, until death do us part, or for at least the next seventy-two hours."

(Or: Tony and Steve get fake-married for the sake of the mission.)

♡ The Tchotchke Cha Cha by Arukou - T | 7,269 words

What started off as one impulse buy souvenir snowballs into a constant flow of knickknacks from all over the world, and Steve is starting to wonder if it's more than just Tony being nice.

♡ The Twice-Told Tale by arysteia - E | 15,789 words

For someone he'd hero-worshipped for so long, Steve Rogers in the flesh is a pretty big disappointment. For one thing, he keeps looking at Tony as though he reminds him of someone else, and even if he never says anything, Tony's pretty sure it's his father. A lifetime of not measuring up to Howard's expectations is more than enough, thank you very much, and he's certainly not going to make an effort to live up to any of Steve's. Steve's pretty clearly failed to live up to his expectations, in any case, and that's not hypocritical at all.

Think of This as Solving Problems (That Should Never Have Occurred) by Sineala - T | 35,216 words

No one knows Tony is Iron Man. Then Tony gets amnesia, and literally no one knows Tony is Iron Man.

♡ Toasted Buns by copperbadge, scifigrl47 - E | 47,044 words

After seeing Tony naked and tanned -- all over -- in a decontamination shower, Steve realizes he may be in trouble. Tony, meanwhile, is definitely in trouble over those tabloid pictures of him sunbathing nude. The solution is clearly a tropical island getaway.

♡ Tony Stark Falls In Love With A Cat by shellhead - M | 6,887 words

When Steve goes missing, Tony ends up finding him at an animal shelter. Volunteering.

♡ Tony Stark and the Super Sleeper, or actually, Soldier by RurouniHime - T | 8,571 words

The one where Steve keeps falling asleep on Tony.

♡ Tony Stark Takes a Liberty and the Universe Thanks Him by RurouniHime - T | 1,512 words

In which people think they are entitled to Steve Roger's face (aka, because tomorrow is coming, and I hold out hope, Supreme Court.)

♡ Toy Soldiers by copperbadge - E | 44,241

When Steve Rogers, five foot four and a hundred and ten pounds, met Tony Stark in a bar, he didn't expect it to lead to a relationship. Or that Tony would find out he's not an art student during a SHIELD rescue mission in Afghanistan.

♡ Truth by valtyr - E | 2,677 words

Captain America takes truth serum. Tony is all over that.

♡ Two Out of Three (Ain't Bad) by plingo_kat - T | 9,449 words

It blindsides him one morning in the middle of his customary third cup of coffee; Steve walks through the door in loose cotton pants, shirt pulled up to wipe the sweat off his face from his usual morning workout, and Tony thinks: adorable.

♡ Unveil My Unsightly Heart by Mizzy - M | 43,019 words

Looking over an old prototype helicarrier for its future viability as a base for the Avengers should have just been a routine day full of bickering and non-adventure for Steve Rogers and Tony Stark.

But when they're catapulted into an alternate universe – where their alternate selves are married and battling with a mysterious threat – the two are forced to get over their differences in order to figure out what's going on, before it's too late.

Because there's more going on than meets the eye, and Steve and Tony falling in love might just be the most dangerous thing that can happen. Not just for one universe, but for all of them…

Wait & Sea by Lenalena - E | 53,244 words

In which Tony and Steve get sent on an undercover mission aboard a cruise ship to make contact with Hydra. In this AU the military has kept the discovery and defrosting of Captain America a secret, so Steve and Tony have never met before. Yet they are to pose as newlyweds....

Wash It All Away by ann2who - E | 8,634 words

Steve hummed, looking up at him. “All right. Strip.” Tony blinked at him. “Excuse me?” “Can’t very well wash your clothes while you wear ‘em,” he said and held out a hand expectantly.

What You Don't Know by Sineala - E | 9,808 words

In 1941, two strangers meet in a bar. And then Captain America meets Iron Man. And then Steve Rogers meets Tony Stark. They get it right. Eventually. And also they fall out of an airplane.

♡ when i run out of road, you bring me home by quidhitch - M | 18,466 words

“Oh, I won’t bother you.” The tone of Steve’s voice implies that he definitely will be bothering Tony, aggressively and frequently. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll keep to my farm, you keep to yours. Solitude together.”

Tony opens his mouth to argue that that’s not how this works, but he snaps it shut at the realization that Steven Grant Rogers is fucking with him. That twinkle in his eye has accelerated into a full-on glimmer, and the ends of his lips are twitching. Jesus, he hates this man. Or maybe he wishes he did. Tony can’t really tell the difference anymore.

♡ When I think about you by sirona - E | 11,955

Five times someone saw Steve sass the hell out of Tony and one time Tony finally bought a clue. Also known as the story of Captain Sasspants more than handling his own with Tony Stark at his most devious.

♡ When I Think (Oh, it Terrifies Me) by celli - E | 8,641 words

Look, some mornings you wake up and little green men are invading New York City; some mornings you wake up and you can hear Captain America's voice in your head. Tony has been an Avenger long enough that he saves his freakout for important things.

♡ will we ever say the words we're feeling by theappleppielifestyle - Not Rated | 1,673 words

He breaks off then, the realization of what he’s just revealed finally hitting him, and he stops, and Tony’s still staring.

(Or, Steve and Tony argue and Steve lets something slip.)

♡ With Words Other Than These by RurouniHime - E | 14,690 words

The way Steve’s beating that bag, though—Tony traces the cadence as well as the lines of Steve’s body, and wonders if he might not need to know about the mission after all. There’s a lot of tension knotted in Steve’s shoulders, a frenzy to each punch. The precision lacks. Maybe Steve’s just getting started, and if that’s the case, Tony could be here a long, long while.

with you by laireshi - M | 3,108 words

Sometimes Steve gets overwhelmed by how much he loves Tony.

Your Name on Every Wall by Sineala - T | 17,863 words

The Time Gem throws Steve into the past rather than the future, and in doing so, it gives him the opportunity to undo his past mistakes. But when it turns out that all of his mistakes involve Tony Stark, Steve begins to wonder if he's ever going to be able to mend things between them.

---

Hey, the list did have to end at some point! Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed these recs!

Tagging some people who might be interested:

@divine529, @sabrecmcstonyficrecs, @sineala, @ishipallthings, @itsallavengers, @nasafic, @estebanrxgers, @starksnstripes, @goodmorningbeloved, @goose-danvers

#stevetony #stony #stony fic rec #stevetony fic rec #stevetony rec list #stony rec list #superhusbands #my fic recs #fic rec

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lovehaswonangelnumbers · 5 years ago

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New Post has been published on https://lovehaswonangelnumbers.org/a-massive-explosion-detected-in-ophiuchus/

A Massive Explosion Detected in Ophiuchus

ByMahala’s Astrology

Ophiuchus has held a special fascination in the Heavens for many people as the thirteenth sign of the zodiac. Here we have an image of a healer with two serpents representing the male and female forces which are the mirror of the Creator’s divine blueprint of life.

In my own explorations of Ophiuchus, I have felt him as a holographic representation of Moses holding the serpents and witnessing the burning bush. You might recall from the bible that Moses had a stutter and had also killed a man – you might say an unlikely candidate to be a primary prophet of God. It is in this part of his journey that God shows him two miracles – his staff turning to serpents and also the burning bush which doesn’t burn, to convince Moses to follow His will. As a result of Moses trusting God he is eventually able to liberate the Hebrew people from Egypt. This story has many metaphoric resonances for our time and if you haven’t looked at it as an adult delve into its profound mysteries.

The Goddess Asteroid Hygeia in my journey also connects to Ophiuchus. Hygeia was the daughter of Asclepius and again the symbol of the two serpents is connected to both figures. Hygiea, as the feminine counterpart, represents ancient lineage of healing that connects to sleep, dreams and altered brain wave states such as sound healing.

The BBC released this story of the huge explosion on the 22nd February 2020 – I’m not sure of the exact date it was discovered but given the numerology this is certainly a key date in which its impact filtered into our Earthly consciousness. 22 is the number in the Gene Keys which relates to the Opening of the Seven Seals. It coincided with New Moon in Pisces conjunct Neptune in the days that followed.

Supernova’s have been known to release incredible new information to human beings. For example, Human Design is said to have come from the Supernova of 1987 – the year of Harmonic Convergence. Many wonderful political events followed such as the Berlin Wall coming down and the end of Apartheid. The system of the Gene Keys then emerged from Human Design and is a system I myself follow and am infinitely fascinated by as it is all about unlocking the potential for light within our DNA.

It is a struggle to find harmony at the moment but that is I feel the essence of the work. In the post-election depression in the UK many people on the more progressive end have completely withdrawn from the media and politics – perhaps not such a bad thing. It is a fight sometimes to reach for love for the ‘other’ voters and for authorities who seem hell bent on harming both vulnerable people and the environment. The new government has started their rule with deporting many people from the Caribbean who have lived here all their lives. There is a hostility towards other Europeans, for example one commentator said how we can all go back to enjoying shopping again once other European’s have left. That is certainly not how I feel, I celebrate living in a diverse humanity. Britain like America is a split society at this time and the parallels are striking,

The BBC and media are also under attack and much like Apartheid South Africa, there are moves to control exactly what the media can and cannot say. Despite this though, the Prophetic side of me hears God whispering hope, knows that Christ is right here – is us all – for those who have ears to hear.

I recently discovered a wonderful audio book of an interview with Brother Gregg who runs an awesome project called Home Boys in Los Angeles, and the Buddhist teacher Pema Chodrin, who I often feel saved my life in the years I was an adoptive mother. The audio book is called Creating a Culture of Tenderness and by the end of listening to it I was right in that place of harmony. The job is to stay there!

Back to the explosion in Ophiuchus that was so enormous at first astronomers dismissed that it could be an explosion at all. It is 5 times bigger than anything previously seen and is more akin to the Big Bang happening again. Using low frequency radio wave telescopes astronomers have figured it out.

What does this mean for humanity? God works in mysterious ways, but I feel sure that perhaps many of us are receiving this download right now. We can certainly tune into it and see what emerges from that ‘void’ space. What has been birthed?

Below is an excerpt from the jovianarchive.comwebsite

Ra Uru Hu was not your traditional mystic: “I was conditioned to believe that science fiction was a genre of literature, that mystical revelation was simply a more antiquated form of the same, and that God, if not dead, was most likely a concept. On the evening of January 3, 1987, all that changed.” Previously a sceptic who didn’t believe in the mystical or even follow astrology, living as a hermit on the island of Ibiza, Ra’s experience changed him dramatically. He spent the next 23 years becoming the world-renowned messenger of the penetratingly accurate, immensely detailed Human Design System, which describes the mechanics of our being.

According to the source of the Human Design System, “The Voice” originated from a supernova – the death of a star. Scientists named it 1987A. This supernova’s last breath bombarded our planet with subatomic particles that transmitted the entire system into Ra Uru Hu, and seeded all of us with its information. One of the first things it told Ra was that the big bang was our universes conception point, and it has yet to be born. (My words – could this be the birth?)

Here is a link to the original BBC report https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-51669384.

Here is a link to the Gene Keys web site https://genekeys.com.

By Alison Dhuanna

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omeletsforpepper · 6 years ago

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If They Liked This, They Might Also Like...

Over at @reactingtosomething we wanted to get into the holidays in a way that was more or less on brand. So in the spirit of a Netflix recommendation algorithm, here are some book suggestions for what to buy friends and family who may have liked some of the same movies I did in 2018.

If they liked Wildlife or Widows: The H-Spot: The Feminist Pursuit of Happiness

As I say in my Amazon review, this is the best applied ethics text I was never assigned. In fairness to my professors, attorney-turned-journalist Jill Filipovic hadn’t written it yet when I was a philosophy student. Filipovic is also not a philosopher. But she is a brilliant writer and a rigorous thinker, and The H-Spot is fundamentally and explicitly an Aristotelian ethical project. That is to say, it takes the starting position that political organization should be aimed at the goal of human flourishing (as opposed to, say, economic growth). From there Filipovic builds a case, or maybe it's better to say several cases, for specific ways in which American policy fails women and disproportionately women of color in this aim, and concrete ways in which it could address this failure. She does so largely through first-hand accounts of several women across America, in a wide range of socioeconomic circumstances. Although the institutions and less formal systems in play are complicated, the questions at the heart of all this are simple: What do women want? What do women need?

Filipovic asks these questions without pre-judgment, and without assuming that any answers are too unrealistic to consider. Not that anyone she talks to asks for anything "unrealistic." Partly this is because they often speak from too much experience for the unrealistic to occur to them as something they deserve to ask for, but also, the idea that woman-friendly policy is unrealistic is a Bad Take to begin with. Filipovic doesn't need to be pie-in-the-sky utopian to show how things could be much better for women (and by extension, it should but still doesn't go without saying, for everyone).

I left academic philosophy over five years ago, but I really think each chapter (built around topics like friendship, sex, parenting, and food) is brimming with potential paper topics for grad and undergrad students of ethics and/or political philosophy. Whether you’re philosophically inclined or not, if you think “women should be happy” and “the point of civilization is to make happiness easier for everyone” are uncontroversial claims, The H-Spot is the book for you -- and for your friends who loved the several underestimated women of Widows, or Carey Mulligan’s captivating portrayal in Wildlife of a woman doing the best she could within the restrictions of her era.

If they liked Black Panther: A Nation Under Our Feet

Though it helps to have some familiarity with the Avengers storylines that led up to Ta-Nehisi motherfucking Coates’s first year on the Black Panther comic -- as well as with the excellent opening arc of Matt Fraction’s Invincible Iron Man -- here’s all that even a new comics reader really needs to know before jumping into Nation: King T’Challa, the Black Panther, was recently unable to prevent several consecutive disasters in Wakanda. Both as a cause and as a result of these disasters, T’Challa worked with the so-called “Illuminati” (Tony Stark, Reed Richards, Stephen Strange, and other intellectual and strategic heavyweights) to prevent the end of the multiverse itself. That crisis averted, T’Challa has returned to Wakanda to resume his royal duties.

Coates takes as a starting premise that Wakanda, the most advanced nation on earth, would only still have a hereditary monarchy if the monarch was uniquely suited as a protector of the people. In the wake of the Panther’s failures in this regard, Nation opens with a rebellion against T’Challa’s rule on two fronts: domestic terrorists with an unknown agenda on one hand, and on the other, former officers of the Dora Milaje (the all-female royal bodyguard corps beloved by fans of the movie) rallying Wakandan women who have suffered great injustices unaddressed by the crown. The leaders of the latter, lovers Ayo and Aneka, are nominally antagonists to T’Challa, but to the reader they’re parallel protagonists. You root for both T’Challa and the Dora Milaje, even though their agendas are in tension, not unlike the way one might have rooted for both Tyrion Lannister and Robb Stark in early Game of Thrones. (Shuri’s around too, though she’s quite unlike her movie counterpart.)

When he’s not fighting or investigating, T’Challa does a lot of soul-searching and debating about his responsibilities as king, the ways it conflicts with his career as a globetrotting superhero, and whether and how the government of Wakanda must evolve. Though Wakanda is too small to be considered a superpower, the domestic terror angle, an interrogation of historical injustice, and the struggle between moral idealism and political reality make Wakanda a proxy in some important ways for modern America. (You may have noticed that Ryan Coogler did this too.) Coates’s meditation on leadership and political power made A Nation Under Our Feet not only a great superhero comic but -- this is not an exaggeration or a joke -- my favorite political writing of 2016.

Nation is illustrated mostly by Brian Stelfreeze and Chris Sprouse, with colors by Laura Martin; some of Stelfreeze’s designs clearly influenced the movie.

If they liked Thoroughbreds: Sweetpea

When a clever, mean-spirited would-be journalist with airhead friends learns that her boyfriend is cheating on her, old traumas bubble to the surface and she becomes a serial killer who targets sex offenders. Darkly, often cruelly hilarious, Sweetpea is what you’d get if American Psycho was set in southwestern England and for some reason starred Amy from Gone Girl. Protagonist Rhiannon is a self-described inhabitant of an Island of Unfinished Sentences, de facto Chief Listener of her “friend” circle, and a maker of lists. Lists of the things her friends talk about (babies, boyfriends, IKEA), signs she’d like to put up at work (please close doors quietly, please do not wear Crocs to work), and oh, the people she wants to kill. Like her boyfriend, at the moment. Or ISIS, when news coverage of a terror attack pre-empts her beloved MasterChef.

Author C.J. Skuse smartly chooses not to have Rhiannon wallow in her traumatic past as many superheroes do. We get glimpses for context, but Rhiannon is committed to moving forward, to escaping her demons rather than being defined by them. It matters that she wants to get better, even if she also hates that she’s bought into society’s definition of “better.” (#relatable)

It’s worth noting that Sweetpea leans seemingly uncritically into a lot of dated gender tropes, in Rhiannon’s assessments of the women around her. (Body positive she is not.) Then again, she’s an unreliable narrator -- one of the best demonstrations of this is a scene in which she’s convinced of her ability to fool the world into believing she’s normal, then overhears her dipshit co-workers talk about how unsettling she is -- so arguably we’re supposed to laugh at how terrible she is without necessarily agreeing with her. This is, I think, a perfectly legitimate approach to a protagonist, even if some find it unfashionable.

The book is not quite as thematically rich as it first appears, at least on the topic of sexual violence; it indulges a “stranger danger” picture of rape that doesn’t feel entirely contemporary. (For a more nuanced treatment of rape culture, see the sadly short-lived but wildly entertaining vigilante dramedy Sweet/Vicious.) But as a portrait of a vibrant, layered, genuinely Nasty-and-you-kinda-love-her-for-it woman -- given Oscar-caliber-portrayal-worthy life by Skuse’s wickedly sharp voice -- Sweetpea is too fun to pass up.

Upgrade or Infinity War: The Wild Storm

Castlevania showrunner Warren Ellis helped redefine superhero comics with 1999’s The Authority, which at DC’s request he's given a Gritty Reboot (along with the WildCATS, whom some of us remember from this extremely 90s cartoon) in The Wild Storm. Ellis has always been interested in The Future, both its potential wondrousness and its probable horror. Fans of Upgrade’s refreshingly unsanitized (and unsanitary) take on human enhancement through body modification will find much to like in Ellis’s spin on the trope of second-skin powered armor. (He semi-famously wrote Extremis, one of the comic arcs that inspired Iron Man 3.)

art by Jon Davis Hunt, from The Wild Storm #1

Angela Spica, a reimagining of Ellis’s old Authority character The Engineer, is a cybernetics expert who stumbles onto a sort of shadow government conspiracy related to her employer, and goes on the run with the armor she’s designed for them. (When not deployed, the armor is stored inside her body.) Angela is quickly targeted by multiple covert organizations, one of which rescues (?) her and brings her in on a secret history of technological arms races and contact with extraterrestrials. The Wild Storm is full of big action and bigger ideas, and for smart, generally curious superhero movie fans who find the decades-long continuities of the DC and Marvel universes intimidating, it’s a great entry -- with a blessedly planned ending -- into sci-fi-comics.

Happy holidays, and have fun shopping! Hop over to the full post for @supersnarker3000’s gift guide.

#holiday shopping #gift guide #recommended reading #Jill Filipovic #Ta-Nehisi Coates #CJ Skuse #Warren Ellis #The H Spot #Black Panther #Sweetpea #The Wild Storm

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ussarchangel · 7 years ago

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2257: A Multi-Verse Odyssey

Giftee: @geekcornucopia

Prompt: Prime Lorca makes his way back to the prime universe after visiting a few realities.

Genre: Bit of angst, bit of crack!Fic. If such a medley is ever possible.

Rated: T for some bad language

Notes: This is my first time taking part in a fic exchange. Thank you @geekcornucopia for the prompts, @ussarchangel for setting this up and @makimurakaori for giving it the once-over. Any remaining nonsense can be blamed on me.

“Commander Burnham? Is it true?”

Michael looked up from her plate, momentarily confused by hearing what had become an unfamiliar title but in a familiar voice. Tilly - Ensign Tilly, she corrected herself, since they both shared new ranks - was clutching her lunch tray close to her chest from underneath rather than the sides, something she only did when she was either nervous or excited or, as was often the case, both.

“What’s true?”

“About… him. That he’s going to be our new captain?” She frowned. “Although would he really be new? Our new old captain, maybe? I mean, he’s not the same man, right?”

Tilly had made a lot of progress in modulating the volume of her voice, but she still had some way to go, especially when she was… nervous or excited or both. Michael indicated that she should sit down next to her, aware that eyes were beginning to turn in their direction. Most people on Discovery had learned to tune her out, but they were on Earth Spacedock where their ship was undergoing maintenance; here they were surrounded by strangers who knew only of them following their victory over the Klingons and Michael found that she disliked fame nearly as much as infamy.

“Yes, it’s true,” she finally confirmed, as casually as she could. “Provided he is proven fit to serve and command. According to Sarek, that should not be a problem.”

Sarek had, apparently, spent a lot of time alongside a select few other people talking to Lorca and that was how Michael knew of what was to come. He had openly asked her, in that blunt yet perfectly polite Vulcan way, whether she thought it would prove difficult for her working with him, and she now suspected that he had requested his time with Lorca to vet the man himself. She and Sarek still had some way to go to repair their relationship but she knew now beyond a doubt that he cared deeply for her.

“That’s gonna be so weird.” Tilly wrinkled her nose. “We need a new word for weird, actually, because frankly after everything we’ve seen in the last few months, ‘weird’ doesn’t seem to cut it anymore, does it?”

“No,” Michael said with a half-smile. “It certainly doesn’t.”

Her friend didn’t know the half of it. Tilly had been very aware (and possible over-invested in) Michael’s relationship with Ash and it had been a blessing when that had turned into a special kind of disaster - the kind of disaster Michael was beginning to think was reserved only for her. She had been there to push Michael when she needed to be pushed, and accepting when she had needed that, and she credited Tilly for enabling her eventually to have the best parting from Ash that could be hoped for. She hadn’t needed to go to her and ‘talk’, Tilly already knew what she needed to know.

But Tilly didn’t know about Gabriel Lorca. She didn’t know that the man who had turned out to be from a mirror universe had been his Michael’s lover, that they had quite possibly plotted to take over the Quadrant together, that he had then more or less declared his love for her…

Saru knew. Knew that part, at least, what Michael had meant to that Gabriel Lorca, but had no idea what their captain had meant to Michael, and it was something far deeper than she felt capable to unearth. Maybe it was because she couldn’t talk about it that it hurt so much more than Ash. Maybe it was because she had let him fall, tired of getting hurt and wanting to do some hurting of her own. Except she couldn’t take it back. She’d seen him in her dreams for a while; once she had taken the hand he had extended to her. When she’d woken up, her heart thumping in her chest, it had taken a while for her to work out what was dream and what was real.

No, he wasn’t going to be the same person. People said that as though it was going to make it all easier, when in fact Michael wanted him to be the Lorca she knew. So she could say sorry. So they could start over.

“It’s macaroni and cheese.” Michael blinked, raised her eyes to look at Tilly. “You’ve been staring at your plate like you have no idea what’s there. It’s macaroni and cheese.”

She straightened and poked her fork at her food. “Trust me, that may be what it looks like but that’s not what it is. At least it’s nothing like the one Amanda used to make.”

“What’s Vulcan food like?”

Tilly could sometimes have an overbearing, distracting presence, and Michael loved her for it.

“They could move things with their minds?”

He sighed and rubbed his face with his hands. “Is this really necessary? I’ve already been through one debriefing and it was pretty thorough. No toilet breaks. Are we gonna have toilet breaks?”

“Do you require use of sanitary facilities, Captain Lorca?”

That was the Vulcan Sarek. He had known of many different Sareks in his travels and had even met some of them; after his encounter with the one in the universe where Vulcans had not embraced logic, he liked this present version a lot. Lorca’s fingers pulled slightly at his collar, remembering too vividly how that particular Sarek had tried to strangle him, looking to avenge his daughter’s honour: Lorca had apparently abandoned her after she’d become pregnant with “his” child. She’d saved his life, her arrival to plead with her father triggering the jump that had allowed him to escape.

“No, I don’t. But I might. Soon,” he replied, defiantly emptying the tall glass of water in front of him.

“I can assure you that you are free to make use of the facilities any time you wish, Captain -”

“So they could move things with their minds?”

Lorca turned to look at the Starfleet officer questioning him. Lieutenant Commander Stamets had not been at the previous debriefing but he had co-developed the Discovery’s spore drive and had navigated the ship and its crew back from one of the parallel universes they’d been dragged to by one of his counterparts. No one knew more about the Mycelial network than Stamets, Lorca had been told, and he could tell the man was pretty annoyed at the thought that it may no longer be the case.

“Yes. Or rather… their will. They didn’t share much with outsiders.”

“And by outsiders you mean people who were not… What did you call them?”

“I didn’t call them anything. They called themselves Jedis.”

“And they had…. Light weapons?”

“Lightsabers. Used it as you might a sword, except it was a beam of light. Saw one go through metal, repel laser shots -”

Stamets uttered a grunt of disbelief. “This is the stuff of fairy tales.”

“And before Zefram Cochrane fired the Phoenix into Warp, we thought telepathy and people with pointy ears were the stuff of fairy tales, too,” he replied, crossing his arms and jerking his chin towards Sarek.

The Vulcan raised an eyebrow. “Captain Lorca is correct, Lieutenant Commander Stamets,” he said. “Since it appears that the theory of an infinity of parallel universes may be true, anything - quite literally - may be possible.”

“Why would I make this up, Stamets? You think I don’t know how crazy this makes me sound? I was asked to share any information about my experiences that may help Starfleet - and you - find a way to tap into the Network safely for everyone involved. So that’s what I’m doing.”

Stamets stared at him for a moment, impatience and frustration written all over his face. There was something of a grudge in the way he looked at him that made Lorca assume Stamets had some unfinished business with the Mirror Universe Lorca he had served under for many months. “Ok. All right. And this is helping us how?”

“They talked about this thing called midi-chlorians. Knowing what I know now about the Network, it seems clear to me that these things enabled some people to tap into the Network somehow, like your spores do, or the Tardigrades. As for what you can do with that knowledge, I have no idea. You’re the scientist, not me.”

The debriefing went on for another hour or so, by which time Lorca really did need to make use of the facilities. Stamets’ manner had softened a little, although he wondered whether that would have lasted if he’d mentioned the universe with the Wizards and Muggles, but the Scientist had been taken with Lorca’s recollection of the encounter he’d had with someone who seemed to have their own version of a spore drive, although the Doctor, as he called himself, could only travel through space and time within his own universe.

Dismissed from the debriefing and having relieved himself, Lorca was looking forward to something to eat when he was caught by Sarek before he could make it to the turbolift.

“Captain Lorca, may I speak with you?”

Lorca groaned. “I think I’ve done enough talking today, thanks. I’ve told you all I could already. Twice.”

“I am aware of and thankful for your detailed testimony. However, this time it is I who has something to tell you.” A tingle of apprehension ran up his spine. “It is about Michael Burnham.”

Damn. Damn, damn, damn.

Lorca had hoped to avoid the subject for a little longer. Besides, he knew plenty about her from her files: parents killed by Klingons, adopted by Ambassador Sarek and his human wife Amanda, raised on Vulcan where she achieved the rare distinction of attending the Vulcan Science Academy, Starfleet’s first mutineer, warmonger… And now, of course, saviour of the Federation, it seemed. Like the numerous other Michaels he’d met, she clearly didn’t do things by halves, as well as also being raised by Sarek (though not all of them were). The only kind of information Sarek could possibly relay to him at this point had to be personal.

He could have requested another command, left well alone, but what good would it do? In the end, in all his travels, it had only ever come down to one thing: Michael Burnham. There was no point in fighting his fate.

Tilly was sharing stories of the most disappointing deserts she’d ever had when Michael’s communicator beeped, requesting her presence in Transporter Room 3B. There she found Sarek waiting for her.

“Are you returning to Earth, Father?”

“Only briefly, so your mother and I may travel home together. But I have not asked you here to say goodbye, not yet. Eight years ago, I brought you to Captain Georgiou. Now I wish, if you would let me, to bring you to your new Captain.”

Michael frowned. “I’m not sure I understand. Am I being transferred?”

“No. I am referring to Captain Gabriel Lorca.”

“So it has been confirmed?”

“It has.”

She already knew it was unlikely not to be. Logically, she should not have been surprised. Logically. “I still do not understand. We don’t need to use transporters to board the Discovery.”

“He is waiting to meet with you on the surface.”

“Why?”

“Why is he waiting to meet with you, or why is he waiting on the surface?”

“Both, actually.”

“I suggested an informal meeting to him. The specific location was his choice.”

“You suggested it to him? Why?”

Sarek glanced at the crewmember manning the operations panel. “Let us transport to Earth and I shall explain.”

She wanted to object, stand her ground, but it was pointless to. The meeting may have been Sarek’s idea but Lorca could make it an order. Refusing to go would only delay the inevitable and felt childish.

They rematerialised in a small park just outside Starfleet Academy. Michael blinked away the sudden brightness, then followed Sarek onto a tree-lined path.

“When I mind-melded with Lieutenant Saru upon your return to our universe, I saw many things that he had experienced, and was made aware of many things that he knew. Your relationship with the former Captain Lorca went deeper than those he had with other members of his crew.”

Be careful what you wish for, Michael. She had wished for someone else to know but now that they did, the pain and shame were made real. Some of it was habit, of course - the fear of disappointing Sarek by showing emotions, her own anger that she could not stop feeling because all she knew of feelings was sorrow and grief now.

“This previous Lorca gave you something that you had lost, something you would not let your family give you both before and after your sentencing,” Sarek continued. “The greater the gift, the more grievous the anguish when it is gone. It is to be expected that you should feel betrayed, Michael. And trust, while easily lost, is extremely hard to regain.”

“He is not that Lorca. He is as worthy of my trust as any other Starfleet Captain.”

Sarek halted. “That is indeed the logical position. Yet you know as well as I do that it is more complicated than logic would allow, or you would not have brought Emperor Georgiou back to our universe.” Michael looked away. “It is not a reproach, merely a statement of fact. It was a difficult task, reminding myself that she was not my dear friend. I know what she meant to you. I also know that you would never let someone die if you could prevent it.”

“You’re worried I will only see the other Lorca.”

“Are you not?” She had nothing to reply to that. “When I said I suggested this meeting, it was not entirely accurate. While I suggested the meeting to Captain Lorca, it was your mother who suggested the meeting to me.”

“Amanda? This is Amanda’s idea?”

“She felt that meeting with Captain Lorca in a context not over-burdened with duty or protocol would allow for a freer exchange of thoughts.”

Michael looked around, wondering whether she might be able to spot him. All she could see were people milling about, enjoying their lunch break in the sun; at the other end of the park she could hear the cries of children enjoying a playground. It was all very normal, and that felt… weirdest of all.

“I think she may be right.”

“She usually is. Captain Lorca said he was hungry. You may find him near a food stand.” Sarek raised his hand. “Dif-tor heh smusma.”

Michael raised hers. “Sochya eh dif.”

With a deep breath, she left her father and took another look at her surroundings. After a few moments she spotted a kiosk near a bandstand and headed that way. There she found him, much like the first time she had the other one, standing ramrod straight with his back to her - except this time he didn’t half-blend into the darkness. Instead, he stood out like a sore thumb in his Starfleet uniform, slightly rocking on his heels as he waited at the back of a queue of civilians. Silently Michael gave thanks to her adoptive mother, because just looking at the back of his head was enough to send her stomach roiling with apprehension and hope. Here in this park, surrounded by strangers who could not judge and an open sky that made her feel like there was somewhere she could escape to, she was able to steady herself. With another breath, she approached him, straightened and crossed her arms behind her back.

“Captain Lorca?”

“Yeah?” The first time she had met the other Lorca, he had been suave and open. This one was scowling and looked distracted, then wary as he recognised her. “Commander Burnham. Would you care for some chilli?”

“No, thank you, sir. I’ve already eaten.”

He looked back at the queue, then sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah, it figures. C’mon, let’s take a walk.”

As they walked past a pond, Lorca stopped and half-smiled. “They’ve taken down the fencing. That’d have been helpful 30 years ago.”

“Sir?”

“When I was 15, I went skinny-dipping in there. Made the mistake of taking my clothes off before climbing over the fence, and then the water was freezing, so climbing back over afterwards was pretty embarrassing. Worst thing is, I knew it was stupid as I was doing it.”

It took her a beat to understand what had happened. “So why did you do it?”

“Same reason boys and men ever do stupid things they know they shouldn’t: to impress a girl.” Michael’s steps faltered slightly, which he seemed to catch from the corner of his eye. She saw him clench his fists, his lip twitch, but he said nothing.

They walked on for a bit in silence, until he spoke again. “I don’t suppose Sarek told you how we were supposed to do this?”

“No. That’s not his way.”

“Why do Vulcans always do this? Make everything so hard?”

“They would say that for them, the easier way has led their people into much greater harm.”

“Fair enough.” He directed her towards a small grassy mound. “I read your and Lieutenant Saru’s reports on what happened in that other universe, about the other Gabriel Lorca, his deception. What happened with Ash Tyler. You’ve been through a hell of a lot. More than is fair. For that I am sorry.”

“It wasn’t your fault.”

“I didn’t say it was.” She looked up at him. The mirror Lorca had often shown her understanding, but the blue eyes she was looking into now were shining with warmth and kindness. “Will you sit with me?”

Michael looked around; there were no benches nearby, so he clearly meant sitting on the grass. She nodded and they sat on the ground, Lorca with his arms around his pulled-up knees, Michael with her legs crossed. She became aware that he looked awkward and seemed to be pondering something difficult, his lip twitching again.

“This is difficult for you, too, sir, isn’t it? Why?”

“Because I don’t even know how to begin to explain why it is difficult. This -” Lorca gestured at the sky then at her and back at himself. “- This kind of thing isn’t my forte at all. Not one for philosophy or poetry, never been. But after everything I have seen lately… There are things I wanna tell you but I don’t think you’re gonna like it. I know that because I don’t like it, either. Because while I know it to be true, I don’t understand why and that really pisses me off.” He looked at her. “Do you believe in destiny, Michael?”

He had been vetted, tested. There was no doubt this was the Gabriel Lorca that belonged in this universe. To all intents and purposes, he was a stranger to her. So what did it mean that he used the same words as his predecessor?

“I’m going to have to get used to that look. Right?” he interrupted her thoughts.

“What look?”

“The one you’ve got on your face right now, when I say or do something he did.”

“And how much do you know about that?”

“Sarek told me the other guy did a lot of good things for you, how much you trusted him. So I’d have understood if you’d punched me the first time you met me.”

Michael shook her head. “No. No, never. If anything… I just want to say sorry.”

“Sorry? You? What the hell could you have to say sorry for?”

“Because when Emperor Georgiou killed him, he reached for me. He was dying and he reached for me. And I stepped away from him. But I know now that all the things he did for me… they were real. He saved my life, in so many ways. I should have saved his. I tried - but not hard enough. And at the end, the one thing I could have done for him…. I didn’t.”

“Your other Captain… He was in love with you, wasn’t he?”

Anger welled inside her at the thought that Sarek would have shared something so private, yet again she reminded herself that is exactly what she needed. A few months ago she would have been able to ride this out, focus on the work, but she was exhausted and recognised that it would be better to let something out before the dam burst altogether.

“Sarek didn’t need to tell me that,” Lorca continued, as though he’d read her thoughts. “If there is one thing I have learned from all my travels, it’s that there is always a somewhere and somewhen with a Gabriel Lorca who loves a Michael Burnham.”

Nice job, Gabe. Really smoothly done.

Michael stared at him, looking appalled,then stood up. “I think this conversation is taking a very inappropriate turn, Captain.”

Lorca sighed, then stood as well. “You asked me why this was difficult for me, Commander. I think I’ve just told you.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I don’t believe in destiny, either. But you’re a scientist, right? If you carry out the same experiment, with the same elements, in the same conditions - what happens, over and over?”

She frowned. “The same results.”

“The same results. It’s not destiny - it’s probability, that’s all.”

“But the conditions are not the same. The mirror universe - we called it that because as far as we can tell it was the opposite of everything we know. So how could it have turned out the same for our counterparts?”

“Because the conditions were the same - for our counterparts. They lived in the same universe. They were changed in the same ways. But they remained aligned with each other.”

“So what are you saying? That people… that consciousness… moves on some kind of curve, or spectrum?”

“Honestly? It’s like I said, I don’t understand it myself. I can only tell you what I saw.”

Michael crossed her arms. “And what exactly did you see?”

“You returned from the mirror universe and ended the war with the Klingons about three months ago. I was found in this universe about two months ago. You probably know that I ended up travelling through multiple universes. What you may not know is that I was gone far longer than a few months. I was gone for about three years.”

“Three years? But how is that possible?”

“The network travels through time as well as space.”

“How did you travel through the Network?”

“I don’t know. At least not exactly. Which is why it took me so long to get back here. But now I’m going to tell you something I haven’t told anyone. The reason I was gone for so long is because that’s how long it took me to figure out why I kept travelling. And that reason… is you, Michael.”

Her eyes widened then turned darker, more guarded. It was an expression he was familiar with and the sensation was uncomfortable. Of course his counterpart would have felt something for this Michael. Lorca understood now what home meant. That’s how it must have felt to him, finding this Michael after his had died.

“There are different ways to travel between parallel universes. Mostly it has been accidental. When the Mirror Lorca travelled here, I didn’t end up in his universe. Somehow, I was dragged into the Mycelial Network. And when that happened, I think it knew I did not belong where I ended up, probably because my presence in the new universe - it was like a pothole in a road. Or a short-circuit. Wrong connections being made. Right piece, wrong jigaw.”

“If that’s the case, why did you not keep hopping continuously? From what I have heard, you stayed in some universes longer than others.”

“When you are doing a jigsaw, you only know two pieces don’t fit together when you try to put them together. So yeah, it took me a long time, until I realised that I only ever jumped from one universe into another when I met one of your counterparts. As soon as we… connected -” he made a fizzing sound, mimicked an explosion with fingers “- the Network knew it wasn’t right. It’s just that sometimes it took me a long time to find the other you.”

Michael was silent for a moment. “What do you mean, connected?” she asked.

“The connection you have with your father Sarek. Through his katra. I can only guess that maybe what the Vulcans can do on some level is tap into the Network and that is how they connect telepathically, do their mind-melding. Human beings can’t connect in the same physical, tangible way but I think on some levels we still do connect. So when I made an emotional connection to another Michael, the Network knew it wasn’t right, because it should have been.”

He could practically see her working her way through multiple thoughts at once. “If there’s an infinite number of universes, you could have been travelling forever.”

“If I hadn’t realised what I needed to do, what I could do, yeah.”

“And what was that?”

“I looked for you, Michael. When I was in the Network, I thought of home. I thought of you, what I knew about you. And I found you.” He smiled, ever so faintly. “You walked away from me a few times. But eventually you took my hand. You brought me home.”

“The dreams…” Tears sprung in her eyes, and he felt some in his, too. “I had this dream…” Lorca nodded. “And then 3 days later we heard you’d been found… How could I not see it -”

“Why would you, Michael? It doesn’t make any real sense even to me.”

“What does it mean? That we’re some kind of… The Vulcans would call it ‘bonded.’”

“I’ll try not to take the look of horror on your face personally,” Lorca said. “I told you earlier that I didn’t like it, either. There was someone, many years ago… Balayana. I loved her, I was going to marry her. But she died. I thought that was it for me. I’d met the love of my life and I’d lost her, because shit happens. To find that there is someone else…” He paused, still surprised it was so difficult for him to talk about.

“I’m sorry.” Her expression softened. When he sat back on the grass, she joined him, too. “This is all very… complicated.”

“Yeah.”

“Maybe…” She let out a long breath. “Maybe it would be best if I transferred to another ship.”

“Is that what you want?”

“It would be easier. Would it not?”

“Someone once told me that easier could lead you to greater harm.”

Michael raised an eyebrow at him. “I am not Vulcan.”

“Hard to tell right now with that face you’re pulling.”

She smiled and, he could tell, almost laughed. Yes, it was complicated. But if this had been the first time he’d met her, or even remained in this universe and been assigned to the Discovery, it would have appeared very simple to him. The pull he felt towards her was unmistakable.

“Where does that leave us?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know you. You don’t know me. Maybe we will only be friends. Maybe not. What I do know is that, at some level, the universe knows we belong together, in one way or another.” And you know that, too, he wanted to add. Because you felt something for the other Lorca. That connection. But there was no point pushing her. She’d already followed him a long way.

Instead Lorca reached for Michael’s hand, covering it with his own, gently closing his fingers around hers. After a beat, he felt her thumb gently stroking him.

And he knew he was home.

END.

#uss archangels #uss archangel fic exchange #Star Trek Disco #michael burnham x gabriel lorca #Lorcham #michael burnham #Captain Lorca #Captain Gabriel Lorca #Gabriel Lorca #excellent excellent fic #submission

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industrialrobots12 · 3 years ago

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Newbie's Information To Industrial Robots

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writesandramblings · 7 years ago

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The Captain’s Secret - p.86

“I’ll Dream a Nation of You”

A/N: We remain in episode 13, "What's Past Is Prologue."

Considering the circumstances of the Mirror Universe and all the available pieces, I think this plan is one actually worthy of Lorca. As a bonus it ties together some details in the show's rendition of events. The redacted Defiant files being on the Shenzhou (why are they on that ship and so heavily redacted to boot), the fact Burnham and Tyler aren't immediately murdered by Sarek and Voq's guards on Harlak... It also reconciles the interactions between Lorca and his interspecies crew (not to mention various actions he took throughout the series which he had no real cause to) with everything he suddenly starts spouting to his followers.

I'm also attempting to answer why Lorca suddenly went from zero to warp speed with what I feel is an entirely plausible explanation of his behavior that fits the facts established in the show. In a weird way, Lorca showed me the answer, because I lived the circumstance described myself while writing this story. It turns out, Lorca really does give everyone what they need. Even this humble writer.

Full Chapter List Part 1 - Objects in Motion << 85 - I Could Never Be Your Woman 87 - Captain Lorca >>

Luckily, there was a perfectly serviceable alternative to Petrellovitz already on Lorca's itinerary: this universe's Paul Stamets. Lorca wondered if that was part of the reason Petrellovitz had vanished. She and Stamets hated each other. Petrellovitz thought Stamets was a narrow-minded cretin and Stamets hated that she had stolen his life's work and co-opted it for her own endeavors. In this, they were entirely equal their Discovery counterparts. Mischkelovitz had attempted to steal Stamets' mushrooms there, too, after an entertaining little rant about the limits of his knowledge.

Lorca and Landry burst into Stamets' private laboratory aboard the Charon with rifles at the ready, as tactically in sync as they had always been, but found the place seemingly empty.

"Stamets is gone," concluded Landry. "Coward probably left at the first sign of trouble."

As Lorca scanned the room, he did not think that to be the case.

He had made one crucial misjudgment about Discovery's Paul Stamets. That Stamets had something he valued more than mushrooms: Hugh Culber. If not for that, Stamets might have been convinced to travel with Lorca to the ends of that universe, neurological changes and all. Instead he had issued Lorca an ultimatum, "only one more jump," and sealed all their fates.

In this universe, Culber and Stamets had never met. That meant Stamets was entirely the predictable quality Lorca had expected the other Stamets to be.

"All his research is still here," observed Lorca. "I've known more than one Stamets and they both have one thing in common: they love their work too much..."

Lorca's eyes scanned the room, certain something felt off, and then he spotted it. A holographic flicker.

"To leave any of it... Behind!"

He reached through the hologram and found Stamets' neck easily, pulling him out and shoving him up against the bulkhead. "Hello, Paul."

"Gabriel," whined Stamets, in that annoyingly high-pitched tone he had when nervous. "I really hoped you were dead."

"Well you can't always get what you want," said Lorca.

Landry sidled up beside Lorca. "Hi, doc," she said suggestively. She hated eggheads as much as her counterpart in the other universe.

With Landry covering Stamets, Lorca was free to stride across the room as he spoke. "Ironically, I have to thank you for helping me finish what I started. After you sold me out and ruined our coup attempt, I was down on Priors World recruiting allies when the emperor caught up with the Buran. As I beamed back to join the fight, her torpedoes hit. And luckily, so did an ion storm, which caused a transporter malfunction, and... know where I ended up?"

"Frankly, I'm still stuck on the 'not dead' part," said Stamets, shrugging almost comically.

"A parallel universe."

Stamets eyes flicked back and forth as he put it together. "The ion storm must have swapped your transporter signatures." (Stamets still could not see the full extent of what Petrellovitz had done. That was probably for the best.)

"To me, it was physics acting as the hand of destiny. My destiny." He arrived at a spot directly in front of Stamets once more. "The bioweapon you were developing for the emperor. Show it to me."

"Happily, sir," said Stamets.

Months ago, Burnham had stood in front of Lorca on Discovery and accused him of manufacturing biological weapons with the forest of Prototaxites stellaviatori in the cultivation bay. Lorca had never been interested in that line of research at all, but someone else had: Emperor Georgiou.

Georgiou loved biological weapons. The incompatible DNA that had rendered Kerrigan a balloon of gruesome ichor was but one of her many biological toys. The only thing she liked better than bioweapons were blades wielded in her own two hands. Her philosophy, so far as Lorca could tell, was that she liked things which were tactile. If the contact could not be made by a weapon she held, then it ought to be the result of a teeming horde of microscopic things crawling over someone's skin.

It seemed only fitting to wipe out Georgiou's forces with one of her own preferred weapons.

Stamets studied the Charon schematics. Petrellovitz's intervention had given him access to a good deal of the ship. "Looks like we can deploy here, here, and... here. Clear this whole area out." He waved his hands across a large swathe of the ship's midsection.

Lorca nodded. "Get to it."

Stamets was entirely gleeful at the opportunity to finally put his research to work. His spores, seemingly harmless, bypassed the environmental filters and within minutes, two whole battalions headed towards them were rendered a twitching mass of corpses on the ground as the spores ate away at them. Stamets giggled at the sight of it.

Lorca did not linger to watch the display. He had somewhere else he needed to be.

In the throne room, Emperor Georgiou stood on her dais with arms crossed. The loss of Captain Maddox and the recent deaths of her council left chief operational officer Commander Owosekun in charge of the Charon. (On Discovery, Owosekun was a lieutenant junior grade, several steps removed from command of the ship. Georgiou's habit of killing senior members of her staff tended to allow for rapid advancement. That it also provided Georgiou with the frequent companionship of young, ambitious women was probably no accident.)

Standing to the side, Burnham watched the deployment of the biological spore weapon and felt her every instinct about Lorca back on day one confirmed.

Owosekun deftly summarized unfolding events using what computer access she had. "Sensors have detected mass casualties on decks one through seventeen."

"He's come back from the grave to stage a revolution and that's the best he's got?" sneered Georgiou. "If he keeps doing that, he'll reveal his location. Then he's mine."

Burnham approached Georgiou. "Emperor, I've seen firsthand how he operates. He can get inside your head, manipulate you."

"You think I don't know that?" said Georgiou, insulted. This Michael Burnham seemed to have little to no understanding or respect for Georgiou's years of experience.

"He is baiting you, he wants you to come to him," explained Burnham. "Let me contact my ship again. They have no idea they're flying into a battle zone."

It was the third time she had requested this courtesy and Georgiou was entirely tired of it.

"Please, Philippa," begged Burnham.

Georgiou turned towards Burnham with a look of disgust. "I'm not Philippa to you. But you are right about one thing. He preyed on my sentiment, my weakness for your face. It will not happen again. Take her to the brig."

Imperial guards moved to either side of Burnham, grabbing her arms.

"Your choices have determined your fate," decreed Georgiou.

The guards walked Burnham towards the door. They did not make it far. Burnham kicked out the knees of one, sending him to the floor, and grabbed the rifle of the other, so when the guard fired, it hit another guard nearby. She wrenched the rifle away and slammed the butt of it into the guard's face. The guard on the floor rose and Burnham disabled him with the electrical rod in his own hand, then swung the rifle she was holding so it struck a third guard across the jaw and sent him careening away.

The guards across the room fired at her and Burnham fired back, red bolts of energy throwing sparks. Outnumbered, outgunned, her only chance was to escape somewhere they could not easily follow. Launching into a run, she vaporized a hole into a vent along the floor she had spotted earlier and slid across the polished surface of the Charon's decks into the hole, vanishing into its darkness.

"They'll find her, emperor," promised Owosekun.

Given the maze of access passageways that ran through the walls and floors of the Charon and the systems disabled by Petrellovitz, they did not.

Landry and her men remained behind with Stamets while Lorca ran his little errand. He found Larsson waiting alone. "Where is she," Lorca asked on approach.

Larsson pointed at a vent along the floor.

"Einar," came Lalana's voice from within as she pushed the vent panel outwards, "you were supposed to say I remained as instructed and did not leave with you." She was colored black like the shadows but rippled to a dusky gold to match the corridor as she emerged.

"And I said this is no time for jokes!" shouted Larsson, exasperated. "Now what the hell is going on, captain."

"The emperor has Burnham captive and we're assisting in the revival of a coup against the emperor to get her back," announced Lorca, having had more than sufficient time to cook up a story.

Larsson looked for a moment like a caveman getting his first glimpse of fire. "What?"

"I'm not repeating myself," said Lorca, leading them down the corridor towards their destination. Lalana loped alongside him.

Larsson shook his head but followed. "Only you would go to another universe and decide to upend a political system."

Lorca shrugged, waving his rifle irreverently. "It's a corrupt system!" he declared, as if that excused this massive, massive overstepping of the spirit of General Order 1, because surely whatever non-interference protocols were to be followed for pre-warp societies also applied to societies that existed outside the known universe and in whose natural development Starfleet ought not to meddle. (They were far, far beyond this, of course. They had been ever since the Defiant crossed over into this world. Its presence had altered history.)

"In the ten years I have known you, this is the most ridiculously convoluted plan you have ever had. Makes me think it might actually work."

Lorca smiled at that.

They arrived at a communication station. Lorca hit the door controls and fired upon the technician inside. She slumped over her console. "Guard the hall," he ordered Larsson.

"Aye, sir," grumbled Larsson, thoroughly annoyed to think he had left a perfectly good retirement of fishing to spend the past several months guarding doors, which was even worse than the brig and armory duties he had been assigned during his first tour of service.

Lorca kicked the technician's corpse out of her chair and began to key in commands. Lalana watched him disable several security protocols and key in a subspace band. "What precisely are we doing here?"

"It isn't enough to cut the head off the snake," said Lorca. "We have to flay her alive."

Now that he knew the full extent of the pieces on the gameboard, the time had come to gather them in one place.

More than that, as he revived this element of the plan they had built together, it felt like she was with him again.

They sat in the privacy of Michael's quarters with the lights comfortably dim around them. Lorca could scarcely believe his ears. Some part of him hoped he had misheard because if he had heard correctly, it was doom for them both. His voice was a gently lilting admonishment, but more amused than anything else. "Michael. That's treason."

"My loyalty," she said, her eyes fixed on his with a dark fire so bright it really was threatening to destroy them both, "is to the empire."

There was really something impossible about her, he decided, staring at her across the coffee table. "The emperor is the empire."

Her head tilted to the side, a smile on her lips. "The emperor is entirely too shortsighted."

Lorca closed his eyes a moment and shook his head. With anyone else, this action could have been a deadly folly, but Michael was the one person he could close his eyes on and not worry what he would find when he opened them because when he opened them, he saw the same ready smile, the same cocky confidence, and the same wildness he had always known—and not a trace of malice towards him in any of it. Well, maybe the slightest trace of malice, but only enough as to make things interesting between them where it counted.

He was only questioning her because he had to be sure. Not of her loyalty—he was sure of that—but of her thoughtfulness. This was not an endeavor to be undertaken lightly. He needed her to prove to him that she had considered it as thoroughly as he had. She had fifteen years of catchup to do in that regard.

"Here," said Michael, and tipped more scotch into his cup. She pushed it towards him across the surface of the table, clinking her own glass against his commandingly.

"There's no amount of alcohol's gonna make this sound a good idea," he warned her, but took the drink anyway.

"Be honest," she said. "I know you see it just like I do. The empire is stagnant. The emperor hasn't done anything important in half a decade. Twenty more years of this and the empire will be shot to shit."

Being almost twice as old as her, he had a much better concept of what twenty years meant, not to mention an idea of how short a time period five years was. Twenty was almost how old he had been when she was born. Twenty and five was a birthday she had enjoyed very recently. That she was unwilling to wait twenty years when he had spent nearly that many setting this all up was chock full of the abominable irony of her youth. Did she realize how ridiculous her time frames might sound from his perspective? Of course not, because when he was her age, twenty years had seemed like the number of years between then and the end of life as he knew it. Back then, he had known that people over forty were old as surely as he knew anything. Only having lived through those twenty years did he gain the perspective to know twenty was an entirely doable number for someone her age and probably an overestimate of the emperor's longevity on her part.

He also knew what she was talking about because he had played no small part in putting these very ideas in her head. He loved the way she phrased it. There was a lot of him in her sentiments, but the words were her own. He smiled despite the danger. "Let's say I agree with you—"

"Because you do."

He chuckled faintly. She was right, of course, there was no hiding it. "Then what would you have us do about it? And be realistic, I've taught you that much." Among many other things.

As she outlined her idea—based on a theory he was not sure he accepted—he had to admit it was at the very least ambitious. Startlingly so.

"They would never expect it," she grinned, "from the Butcher of the Binary Stars."

"The question is if you can sell them on this little theory of yours. Or sell them on anything. Let's not forget you are the Butcher of the Binary Stars." The title was so recently earned he could not imagine it would go down well at all with her intended allies of convenience.

Her eyes were like the depths of space, tiny reflections from the lights in the room twinkling as stars upon their glassy surface. "I don't have to sell them on anything. That's your job."

"Oh, I have a job in this little future of yours!" he went, a little too loudly because half that bottle of scotch was already in his bloodstream.

Michael came shooting across the table at him, her hands pressing down on his kneecaps as she leaned her face in so close to his he could smell the scotch on her breath. Every bit of this amazing him. To think this was the same child that had been hiding beneath the table at the banquet eighteen years ago. She never hid now. She was utterly brazen in everything she did. "The Graysons," she said.

That made perfect sense. The Graysons were wealthy and powerful and it was no secret the daughter of the family, Amanda, had certain proclivities where aliens were concerned. Her half-Vulcan son Spock was proof of that. That Spock still lived was a favor Lorca still held in his back pocket, ready for the right moment to cash it in.

But was this that moment? "What is your obsession with that half-breed," Lorca sneered, intending it in jest, but his face showed more jealousy than he wanted to admit. (Her obsession with Spock had begun as jealousy for his attention. Now he was the jealous one.)

"That half-breed," said Michael, sliding her hands up his thighs, "has more potential in his pointy ears than half the fleet combined. I will not have him take what is rightfully mine." Whatever barrier Spock's Vulcan blood offered could be offset by the wealth and power of his relations under the right circumstances. "All you have to do is bring my proposal to the Graysons and ensure that it reaches the right pointy ears."

That shifted Lorca into a smug smile. The Graysons were a perfect idea. His perfect idea. He had steered her towards it with such care she thought it her own. His existing relationship with the family gave him the clout to make introductions and sell this proposal both because of and despite Michael's own reputation.

He could also recognize a threat to himself when he heard one. "Phrased like that, makes me worry you might replace me with your pointy-eared rival when it turns out your little theory's no good."

"Oh, it's beyond good," she said. The Defiant was legendary in the empire. That ship, fallen through time from another universe, had given Hoshi Sato the power to conquer the empire a century ago. It would, under the right circumstances, give Lorca and Michael that power, too. "Just imagine it. A world bursting with potential." (The place her hand went with this particular word choice was entirely distracting.) "This is how we use it. And once we've separated the wheat from the chaff, this world will be ours for the taking."

He could hear some of his own words in that, and he had certainly planted the seeds of this whole undertaking, but he had to admit the particulars of Michael's approach were entirely novel and unexpected. She surprised him so often. Always somehow in a good way.

He was doomed, he decided, and glad for it. He traced a hand up the side of her body and down her arm to her wrist, fingers stroking gentle circles. She made the impossible seem possible. That was important because the task ahead of them was as impossible as they came.

"You could always just wait twenty years," he whispered to her. He said it not because he believed it but because he wanted to hear her say what followed.

"Why spend twenty years waiting when we can spend twenty ruling," she countered. That was the word he loved the most. We. She was the only person who ever said it and made him believe it. "And when you're short on time, the answer is to look for space."

She was, in a very real sense, trying to do just that. When you have no time, look to space, and when you have no space, look to time. It was an odd little conflation of some scientific explanation which Michael had taken as her personal mantra.

"It's gonna take a miracle," he said after a long, thoughtful, self-satisfied moment. It was as much an offer as a counterpoint. She accepted that offer and sealed it with her lips.

Luckily, miracles were his specialty. She was living proof of that. A child under a table turned into something worthy of her name, a name that mirrored his own. They were the pair of them archangels, though what they did next was anything but heavenly.

Lalana watched Lorca with patient curiosity. There was something written on his face right now, something bitter and regretful, but equally something that was hopeful and beautiful. A memory. She marveled at how such a simple palette could convey so many things at once and with such constant intensity that even she, a nonhuman, could see the colors. There was no one else who equaled him in this regard. Some humans expressed with the same intensity, some with the same breadth of range, but none of them, so far as she could tell, with both these things always, the way he did. He was the one human whose emotions were never a mystery to her.

The beep of a response took Lorca out of his momentary daze. "Finally," he hissed at the console, and accepted the transmission.

"Gabriel Lorca," said a calm, flat, almost toneless voice.

Lorca smiled in confident satisfaction. "Sarek."

That was the extent of the pleasantries between them.

"You are lucky this subspace band was still being monitored. It was slated for decommission." It was among the subspace bands the rebels had turned over to Burnham to supply the emperor as proof of her success. "It may not be safe."

"It doesn't have to be," said Lorca. "I'm sending you the coordinates of the Charon."

Sarek stared at Lorca. There was something frustrating about the stare of a fully cold-blooded Vulcan. Intensely dispassionate. "We are in no position to launch an assault. Our base on Harlak was recently destroyed, or did you not realize that when you sent us Michael Burnham?"

"I don't need you to attack the Charon," said Lorca, "because by the time you get here, the ship will be mine. I just need you to help me clean up the mess."

The same impassive stare. "You have been gone for too long, Gabriel. Many things have changed in your absence."

Lorca leaned forward on the console, fixing Sarek with a look of intensity that would have melted anyone else. He was simultaneously cold and furious as he said through gritted teeth, "Don't you dare. I didn't endure that goddamn mind rape for you to back out now that I've given you proof." His fingers gripped the console's edge so tightly his arms shook slightly.

"A bold plan," said Sarek, "if it is indeed true."

"Oh, it's true," assured Lorca. "You can take my word for it."

Lorca, Sarek, and Voq were standing in a single pressurized chamber aboard an abandoned asteroid mining facility. Of the two parties, Lorca was by far the more exposed. He was here without any backup, his ship out of transporter and weapons range, while their cruiser hovered above with the capacity to blow the meeting place to kingdom come and kidnap or send him with it. It was entirely intentional: Lorca potentially had the might of a whole empire behind him, so he was negotiating from a position of power, while Voq and Sarek represented a scattered mass of disenfranchised species. For Lorca to come alone and unarmed was merely balancing those factors out and proving the sincerity of his intent.

Voq sniffed disdainfully. "Take the word of a human?" he said. His voice had a honking quality to it.

"Or don't. You have the files Michael sent. That's proof enough."

"They were heavily redacted," said Sarek.

The files they referred to were the Defiant reports. Michael had secreted copies away aboard her ship, the Shenzhou, and transmitted them to the rebels alongside the promise of her plan. Minus any incriminating details, of course. Minus any useful details. The files were only intended to demonstrate the existence of Michael's conceit and get the rebels to the table.

"If we gave you everything, you wouldn't need us," countered Lorca easily.

Sarek was unmoved. "And yet, it remains possible that this is all a subterfuge on your part."

Lorca crossed his arms and glared at Sarek. "After everything I've done for your son?" There was a reason the half-breed progeny of Amanda Grayson and Sarek still drew breath and Lorca was part of it. As far as he was concerned, Sarek owed him a lot for that particular favor, even if it had been done more for the Graysons' sake than the Vulcan's.

To any of a dozen other races, such a personal gesture would have meant something, but Vulcans were not known for their sentimentality. "Be that as it may, we must confirm your intentions personally." Sarek raised his hands and stepped towards Lorca.

Lorca uncrossed his arms and stepped back, one hand going to where his phaser would have been. Of course, he had no phaser with him, and going for the knife in his boot was too obvious and would destroy the entire pretense of this meeting.

"If you consent willingly, this will be much easier," said Sarek. "But if you will not, there are ways around this."

Voq drew a Klingon blade from his hip, an ancient relic scavenged from the ruins of Qo'noS that still looked deathly sharp despite its dusty origins.

"Do not fight us, Gabriel," warned Sarek. "If you truly desire this union of our interests, then this is our price."

Lorca's back pressed against the wall of the chamber as Sarek's hands pressed against his head. His hands closed around Sarek's wrists because he could not totally escape the instinct to flee or to take hold of a weapon during a moment of perceived weakness and neither option was available, so all he could do was find something, anything to hold on to.

"My mind to your mind. My thoughts to your thoughts."

Sarek slipped into Lorca's mind. It felt like a million tiny little needles were pressing into his brain and splaying the memories out as a scientist spreads out a specimen for dissection. Lorca could feel himself being turned inside-out and was half-aware of a yell in his throat, but then all awareness was gone and he felt only Sarek everywhere—inside and outside, upon him and within him. He could not tell where he began and ended because there was no him, only Sarek. He was drowning in a Vulcan consciousness. He could see and feel his memories unspooling like ribbons in the darkness. He reached for them and they eluded him, slipped away into Sarek's waiting embrace.

Sarek released him and Lorca slid down along the wall, yell replaced by a wordless gasp. He knew instinctively that Sarek had seen it all: every truth, every lie, every secret, including the ones Lorca kept from himself. He felt stripped of everything. He was nothing in the aftermath of it.

"He is sincere," said Sarek, "and the Defiant is no lie, but he also does not believe the deal he has offered is possible."

"The usual human treachery," Voq concluded, looking angry enough to spit.

Sarek considered that. "Not quite. He does not believe it possible, but the one who sent the information, Michael Burnham, does believe it, and they have a scientist who is working on making it possible."

Lorca closed his eyes and took deep breaths to steady himself. He was better than this. He was stronger than it. He slowly rose to his feet, finding himself physically steady even if his mind remained unbalanced.

"What they believe is of no consequence," said Voq. "If they cannot provide what they offer, it is as good as a lie."

"I'll prove it," Lorca gasped at them. "If I can prove it, then we have a deal?"

"You will prove something which you believe to be impossible?" queried Sarek.

Lorca inhaled deeply and was entirely resolute as he said, "I've done more with less."

Sarek looked to Voq. "Then I believe this deal is in our best interests. If you prove the barrier between the worlds may be safely pierced and allow us this... 'world bursting with potential,' then we will help you supplant the emperor."

Voq extended his arm to Lorca. Lorca swallowed and clasped Voq's forearm. A warrior's pact. For better or worse, their destinies were now tied.

A world bursting with potential. The words had been Michael's, but they had come to Sarek through Lorca, stripped out of his consciousness by a mind meld so thorough it had, for a moment, made the two of them seem one. That Sarek still held those words was both damning and propitious.

Lorca hated that memory more than almost anything. What was supposed to be a mere confirmation of his and Michael's intentions had instead become a brutal exposure of everything he was. It was not acceptable to Lorca that this event should have been for nothing. Not now that he had given Sarek the very proof requested in the form of the other universe's Michael Burnham and in his own return here.

"I held up my end of the bargain," said Lorca through clenched teeth, "now you hold up yours."

"In your long absence, I find myself doubtful as to the enduring sincerity of your intentions. Now that you have this power, what is to stop you from claiming both universes for your own?"

Lorca was taken momentarily aback by the accusation. The thought had crossed his mind. At this point, a lot of thoughts had, many of them in conflict with one another, and his end game had changed a few times over the past year, but circumstances had forced him back on track and he was resolved to his original course of action. With a few adjustments. Even if he had ended up with a slightly different set of goals, the fact remained none of it conflicted with Michael’s offer to Sarek and the rebels.

"If you submit to another mind meld—"

"Absolutely not," said Lorca, hating Sarek for even suggesting it. "You've seen what I did over there, Sarek. I saved the other you. That has to count for something."

"I suspect because it felt like saving yourself."

Lorca's mouth twitched. This was true. Something the Vulcan had done during that mind meld made Lorca unable to stomach the idea of Sarek in distress because some part of him still felt like Sarek. The kinship was unwanted, but it was there. An intentionally implanted extra failsafe against the dissolution of their intended union. Some part of Lorca wondered if it was somehow part of Sarek's katra, but the larger part of him said no. Simple subliminal manipulation on Sarek's part. There might be some way to escape it, but seeking help would mean admitting the link's existence, and if word of it got out, Lorca would be finished on far too many fronts.

Besides, when he had learned Sarek raised Michael Burnham in the other universe, it had seemed like proof of something else. That Lorca and Sarek, the men who raised Michael Burnham, would be reflected across the two universes by such a bond suggested the two universes were united by a thread of shared destiny.

"Or maybe I'm just not the xenophobe you think," said Lorca, moving aside. "Lalana, get up here."

She hopped onto the seat into view of the transmission. Anyone else and the transmission would have been automatically framing her in the whole time, but since the computer did not register her as a life form, she had to rely on being in front of Lorca for Sarek to see her.

"What is that?" went Sarek, cold Vulcan façade letting slip some small bit of surprise mingled with the faintest affront or disgust at the two giant eyes.

"I am a lului. My name is Lalana."

Lorca looked entirely pleased with himself for putting this together. "She's my ally. That's proof I'm not lying. I have no problem working with aliens."

"You are from the other universe?" asked Sarek, because certainly he had never seen her like here.

"Yes, that is correct."

Sarek already knew from his mind meld with Burnham that the other universe had the potential to offer safe haven to anyone who wished it and had seen some glimmer of Lorca's involvement with Discovery's interspecies crew, but nowhere in Burnham's mind had he seen this creature. "What are you to Captain Lorca? In what way do you prove his intent?"

"I am his friend. As for his intent, what is it you wish of him?"

"He has promised to provide safe passage for non-humans to your universe."

Lalana tilted her head up at Lorca. "You said we were going to stop the war with the Klingons by bringing reinforcements from the Empire."

Sarek's glare looked entirely unamused. Lorca realized immediately where the problem lay. The first night here, when Lalana had approached him in his quarters, he had outlined a perfectly plausible plan involving killing Georgiou, taking over the Empire, and using Terran ships to fight the Klingons. While the Terran Empire and Starfleet were fundamentally incompatible, the prospect of a mutual alien enemy could have rallied the bloodthirsty Terrans to answer the call to war. They were as glory-hungry as the Klingons in Lalana's universe.

Nowhere in that plan had Lorca mentioned Sarek, Voq, and the rebels. To be honest, he was a little surprised they were still in play. He had expected to find them largely quashed by Georgiou at this point. That they endured was a testament to their value and made them worth adding back into his plan as participants rather than face them as a later adversary.

Lorca grimaced in disappointment at Lalana. Mentioning this in front of Sarek felt like a public betrayal. (In actuality, he was learning something the other Lorca had learned long ago: Lalana had no sense of propriety and did not distinguish between conversations in an official and informal context. She spoke whatever came into her mind.) "When we arrived here, I didn't know Sarek and Voq were still alive. Terrans or rebels, a gun is a gun."

Lalana's tail flicked. "Sometimes I think you are making this up as you go along."

That was entirely a betrayal. "Circumstance changed and I'm adjusting, restoring part of the original plan. That's not the same as making it up."

"It is almost. And what if the Klingons here wish to join the Klingons over there?"

Was she trying to screw this up for him? "Then we don't send the Klingons until after the war's won. If we have to send a few Terrans to clear a few battles, we do that. The important thing is we get Georgiou out of the way right now. Trust me, Sarek, I've thought of everything."

Lalana continued her dissension. "No one can think of everything, not even me, and I have trillions more brain cells than you do, Gabriel."

Lorca pressed his fingers to the bridge of his nose. She was talking about her undifferentiated tissues, which he knew from the lului medical report tended to be memory-focused, not cognitive. While the cells could provide cognitive function, they were sluggish compared to the specialized cortex cells that comprised the lului "brain" and infrequently used in such a capacity. He pulled his hand away and practically exploded at her. "This isn't the time for discussion! We have a chance right now to rid ourselves of Georgiou once and for all. The emperor's on her knees, and when she's gone, we all get what we want. But we need to do this now. Before someone else comes in to fill the power vacuum I'm about to create."

"Hm, that is a fair point," went Lalana, entirely unperturbed by Lorca's frustration. She turned back to the screen. "Sarek, will you please bring your ships to assist in this endeavor, for the benefit of your universe and mine?"

Sarek got the distinct impression there was something in this argument between Lorca and Lalana that was wholly domestic, which was more telling than anything Lorca could have actually said. He still needed more. In a measured tone, he said, "And who would you have replace the emperor? You?"

"I can't think of a better candidate," said Lorca as if he were congratulating Sarek for suggesting he take on this role rather than confirming an obvious bit of hubris.

"What of Michael Burnham?"

Lorca dismissed this suggestion outright. "It can't be Burnham. She doesn't know this universe. Her idealism will lead us nowhere. The minute they realize who and what she is, she's done for."

"And yet, it is in her idealism that I find hope for this plan, not yours."

Lorca glowered, thinking they were at an impasse.

Then Sarek said, "I was able to convince Voq of the sincerity of Burnham's intentions, even with the destruction of Harlak. I equally understand the validity of your concerns. I have seen into this Michael Burnham." That was a misleadingly innocuous description of a mind meld as far as Lorca was concerned. "She is not from this world and she cannot lead your people effectively. A new emperor is not worth the trouble if she is dead within a year. I suggest an alternative. I will back you, Voq will back you, if she stands by your side."

Lorca took a deep breath. That was, in fact, the best thing he could have hoped for. "Agreed." In a way, this Burnham was even better, because she would be sincere in a way his Michael could never have been. Lorca would have Sarek eating out of the palm of his hand.

"Then we will proceed to your coordinates."

Lorca leaned his hands against the back of the chair, feeling a great weight lift from his shoulders.

Lalana put her hands on the edge of the console and leaned forward. "Gabriel and I thank you, Sarek."

"I have only one question remaining. What of the Michael Burnham from our world?" asked Sarek.

A long pause. "Dead," said Lorca.

"Then you have my condolences," said Sarek, because he knew exactly how much Michael Burnham meant to Lorca. He knew it better than anyone.

The channel closed. Lorca exhaled, then erupted, "What the hell was that? You torpedoed me!"

"Vulcans are more easily convinced when they watch a successful defense of a position. I forced you to defend."

He blinked. That hardly seemed to excuse it. "Maybe next time a little warning?"

"You might have said we were contacting a Vulcan. As it was, you did not mention any part of this to me."

"I've been a little busy," he pointed out. He meant to tell her, but between Discovery and here, he had not had much chance to. Moving between the torture chamber and the aft hangar bay, they had been too busy ducking security, and in the brief minute before the transmission started, he had forgotten.

"It turned out well in the end," said Lalana. "Sarek is coming. I think he was reassured that you had me as an ally, and I think it is a very good plan." Now, not only was he uniting forces against a shared enemy, he was offering a chance for something better to the teeming masses of the oppressed.

That it would simultaneously remove what Terrans saw as an alien scourge on their claim of galactic supremacy was an additional windfall from Lorca's perspective. They would keep some quantity of aliens, because the Empire still had uses for many, but the rebels at least would be gone, and any species that fulfilled no Imperial purpose along with them. Best of all, they would go willingly.

"Thank you." Holding her up as a reassurance for Sarek was not the main reason he had summoned Lalana to the Charon, but it had been an entirely intentional move on his part and worked beautifully despite them both.

"Though, I should have cleaned your face before we contacted Sarek. You look quite a mess." There was still blood caked down the side of his cheek from the wounds he had given himself smashing his head against the wall of the ready room on Discovery. They had not healed much in the ensuing days of torture. Her tail drifted up towards him to clean them now.

Lorca grabbed her tail, stopping her. "Don't. People might notice."

Lalana's tail twisted slightly in his grasp. "What do you mean? They will notice there is less blood on your face?"

"Exactly, and if they figure out how..."

"They will think you cleaned your face."

"Yes, but how!" he exclaimed, voice rising. "I can't have them figuring out you're here. They'll shoot you. You understand?"

She did understand, but what she understood was not the point he thought he was trying to make. She would have blinked in confusion if only she could. Instead she stared at him and realized exactly how bad this situation was.

She had seen it, back in the torture chamber, with Maddox and Allan both. The same manic delight that had consumed him during null time, the sort of delight that overwhelmed people when they were forced to operate for far too long on far too little: a combination of sleep deprivation and adrenaline that induced a state of mind where suddenly everything in the universe seemed to make perfect sense. That point where you see all the patterns and feel you are suspended in something approaching total clarity.

A dangerous clarity, because often the patterns you saw in this state were not the sort of stable connections that made sense in the light of a more well-rested day.

She asked him the same question she had asked almost two hours ago.

"Gabriel, when was the last time you slept?"

They had been on the Charon for about half a day now, and before that, on the Shenzhou for over three. During that time, while Burnham had endured fitful but uninterrupted sleep in the relative comfort of the captain's quarters, Lorca had slept at most a handful of hours between being tortured in the agonizer booth. Four days on perhaps that many hours of sleep.

"I'm fine."

"I think you need to sleep."

Now she was being annoying. "Lalana, there's no time. We need to finish what we started. We're so close now."

"I also have a question about the conclusion of this."

There were a thousand other things he had to worry about right now, an entire coup he needed to attend to, but still he asked, "What?"

"Is it your intent that you remain here while nonhumans are sent to my universe?"

"That is the gist of it, yeah." He sounded enduringly proud about it.

"Including me?"

Lorca froze.

The main reason he had called Lalana to the Charon was that he knew he needed backup in order to reach Georgiou and kill her. Lalana's unique properties meant she could infiltrate any corner of the vessel and help him at a moment's notice. She had done exactly that.

Problem was, when he called her with those two little words, "lab rats," he had not known there existed an entire hangar of people loyal to him in need of rescue. He knew some of his people were aboard—Petrellovitz, for example, had been listed as such in the recovered data core—but an entire hangar full of them? It was too good to be true.

Once he knew they were on the Charon, freeing them became his top priority.

There was a reason his people were loyal to him after two hundred days of torture, a reason they loved him and said he loved them in return.

He did.

Not in the way he loved Michael, there was no one he loved like Michael, but in a way that made them feel valued. While Georgiou constantly culled from the top, Lorca kept people around. (Even in the other universe. It was why he let Tyler remain on Discovery.) Maybe he was not always kind, maybe he could be a tyrant, but he was a tyrant who kept them safe. So long as they were loyal to him, he was loyal to them. His people did not fear him the way Georgiou's people feared her. In this universe, that was as close to love as most people ever got.

He knew firsthand what it was like to exist as part of Georgiou's high command, to never be certain from one day to the next whether this was the day you would die or not, sometimes for no crime beyond being in the wrong place at the wrong moment. For years he stood by her side and watched her pick people off one by one and in sudden clusters. The dance it took to avoid falling victim to Georgiou's wrath was exhausting. The longer he lasted, the more exhausting it became. That his number would eventually come up seemed inevitable. Each new death brought him one step closer to his own.

Once Michael entered the picture, there were two of them to worry about. He did not think Georgiou would ever hurt Michael given her feelings for Michael's mother, but so many people had made the mistake of thinking Georgiou would not hurt them and paid the ultimate price, Michael's mother among them. Lorca had even made that mistake once himself. His price had not been fatal, but it had given him a dark and festering wound for which Michael had proven to be the only salve. If not Michael herself, then the role she offered him, which had allowed him to lose himself and become someone else completely.

In the wake of Michael’s death, his only thought had been to destroy the woman who had driven them both down this awful path together. It remained a central aim, but little by little, other desires had found him again. The desire to travel the stars, the desire to win a war, the desire to be a captain, the desire to save his people. The desire to live on as a testament to his Michael Burnham.

His people needed him and he needed them.

His people would not understand Lalana. They were Terrans through and through. They hated nonhumans. Not only would they not understand Lalana, her very presence undermined his credibility with them.

It was bad enough he had been secretly enlisting the rebels against Georgiou. He could sell this fact to his followers in the context of his long-term goals so long as he always seemed to keep the rebels at a distance in an antiseptic alliance of convenience.

There was nothing antiseptic about Lalana.

"Yes," he said. "Especially you."

"That is not acceptable."

"Well I'm sorry you feel that way," he drawled at her, "but fact is, you've done what I needed you to, so take Larsson and head on back to Discovery."

"But we have not yet killed the emperor."

"Lalana. This is the end of the road for you and me. It's time to say goodbye."

Part 87

#Star Trek #Discovery #Mirror Gabriel Lorca #Mirror Lorca #Gabriel Lorca #Captain Gabriel Lorca #Mirror Sarek #Mirror Michael Burnham #Mirror Stamets #Mirror Ellen Landry #What's Past Is Prologue

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mrmichaelchadler · 6 years ago

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Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

“Mom, can we go see ‘Into the Spider-Verse,’ again?” my nine-year-old son asked me as I was tucking him in to bed the other night. And I was happy to hear his request. I’d been thinking about how much I wanted to revisit the film for days after the screening we’d attended, myself—not only because it’s such a pure blast of creative joy, but also because there’s so much going on that a viewer couldn’t possibly catch it all the first time around.

It’s only fitting that my kid would be thinking about “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse” as he was drifting off to sleep. As rooted in a vividly specific, recognizable New York as it is, and as closely as it hews to comic-book imagery and structure within its animated format as it does, “Spider-Verse” has a wonderfully trippy, dreamlike quality about it. And that’s not just because it features a wisecracking pig in a Spider-Man get-up named Peter Porker, the kind of character you might conjure in your subconscious after eating too much barbecue and taking a shot of Nyquil before bed.

It would seem like an impossible feat, but somehow, directors Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey, and Rodney Rothman have breathed thrilling new life into the comic book movie. The way they play with tone, form and texture is constantly inventive and giddily alive. Given that we get a handful of Marvel films every year—and we’ve certainly had no shortage of movies featuring Spider-Man among them, either as a main character or as part of an assembled ensemble—the idea of yet another might sound like overkill or worse: a shameless cash grab.

But “Into the Spider-Verse” is after something different, both in its storytelling and in its stakes. And it knows that you know all the various incarnations of this character, and might even be tired of them yourself. The screenplay comes from Rothman and Phil Lord—one half of the brilliant team behind “The LEGO Movie” (alongside Christopher Miller), which also played in myriad meta ways with the audience’s knowledge about and expectations of ubiquitous pop-culture characters. It features plenty of fourth-wall breaking and self-aware narration, both of which might seem like trite crutches in less clever hands. These are comic-book characters that know they’re comic-book characters, which in no way diminishes the excitement of their adventures. On the contrary, this device welcomes us even more powerfully into their world.

It helps hugely that “Into the Spider-Verse” features a tremendous cast of voice actors to bring these characters to life. They hit the humorous beats with superb timing and élan, but they also find the humanity and pathos within their adventures to give the story dramatic heft. Familiarity with this parallel universe of Spider-Man characters isn’t necessarily a must. I didn’t really know any of them going into it, and I had a blast, but my son had seen them in various TV shows he’s watched and video games he’s played, which added a level of excitement with the introduction of each one.

At their center is Miles Morales (voiced with heart and smarts by “Dope” star Shameik Moore), an ordinary Brooklyn teenager who undergoes an extraordinary transformation when he gets bitten by a radioactive spider. The streets and brownstones, cabs and subways of his daily life have a detailed, tactile realism about them, but also the heightened aesthetic of a comic book come to life, complete with panels and dialogue bubbles. It’s simply gorgeous.

As was the case with his Queens counterpart, Peter B. Parker (Jake Johnson), the newfound powers Miles discovers are simultaneously terrifying and exhilarating. These characters, and the various others we meet in the Spider-Verse, introduce themselves in cheeky fashion, going through the familiar steps of their own respective spider bites in playful, knowing ways. The high-energy repetition of this well-worn origin story, in all its wild permutations, is a consistent source of laughs.

Whereas Miles is young, eager and full of promise, the version of Peter Parker he eventually encounters is middle-aged, jaded and paunchy. It’s an inspired new angle into this iconic superhero, and Johnson finds just the right combination of sarcasm and sadness in his reluctant mentor figure.

But wait, there’s more—so much more. Because Miles and Peter aren’t the only Spider-men out there. When megalomaniacal crime lord Wilson Fisk (Liev Schreiber) builds a super collider that tears a hole in the time-space continuum—or something—various Spider-beings from other dimensions come tumbling out. They include the elegant and acrobatic Gwen Stacy/Spider-Woman (Hailee Steinfeld), who poses as a student at Miles’ school; Nicolas Cage’s Spider-Noir, a black-and-white, hard-boiled detective; the anime-inspired Penni Parker (Kimiko Glenn), who fights crime with the help of her friendly robot; and the aforementioned Peter Porker, a.k.a. Spider-Ham (a perfectly cast John Mulaney), who steals his every scene.

Previously, we’d already met another more traditional Spider-Man within Miles’ timeline, voiced by Chris Pine. And among the other characters we’re familiar with, we see Peter’s longtime love, Mary Jane (Zoe Kravitz); his reliable Aunt May (Lily Tomlin); and legendary nemeses including Doc Ock (Kathryn Hahn, in a great bit of gender-bending casting). The always-excellent Brian Tyree Henry and Mahershala Ali respectively portray Miles’ father and uncle: two very different figures who have had an enormous influence on the intelligent, resourceful young man Miles has become. Luna Lauren Velez voices his warmly supportive mom, Rio.

Yes, it’s dizzying, and that’s part of the fun. But the characters are drawn so distinctly that they’re always compelling. And we come to care about them because they’re not cogs in a massive machinery where the fate of the entire universe hangs in the balance, as is so often the case in behemoth comic-book blockbusters. More intimately, their individual worlds are at stake, and the possibility that these characters will never be able to go back to the dimensions they call home. They fear being stuck in the purgatory of a madman’s making, an understandable cause for existential dread.

They all bounce beautifully off each other as they banter, draw from their strengths and learn to work together. It’s pretty linear from a narrative perspective, for a while. But then the climax unfolds, in which they fight for survival and a return to their own realms, rendered as a psychedelic explosion of color and style. What’s amazing is that this lengthy sequence is never hard to follow. We’re with it every breathless step of the way, which can’t always be said for live-action, CGI extravaganzas of this ilk.

So yes, we can see it again. And we will. And we’ll stay all the way through the credits again—and you should, too.

from All Content https://ift.tt/2G8QRDH

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irishcoffeeslushie · 8 years ago

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Nobuta wo Produce review (excerpts) - I

Disclaimer: I didn’t write this, although I wish I had. Source.

High school.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness; it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity; it was the season of teenage angst, it was the season of puppy love; it was the spring of maturity, it was the winter of childhood; we had everything before us, we had nothing before us…

God bless his soul, but Mr. Dickens must be turning in his grave this very minute knowing that his iconic opener from “A Tale of Two Cities” was hijacked by some slush-brained Jdorama fangirl, and then bastardized into a paean to the Universal High School Experience. Even worse, imagine his horror to find this piece to be just a pretext for a long and gushy tribute to a rather unsightly pair of Japanese teen idols — one scrawny and effeminate, the other looking perpetually lobotomized — who, by their performances in the drama that’s about to be dissected, have effectively clinched said fangirl’s undying affections (pure and, uh, otherwise). If our esteemed Victorian novelist only knew that his classic lines would later be co-opted into a rhapsody about a couple of Johnnies fer gawdssakes, he wouldn’t just be turning in his grave by now, but doing freakin’ somersaults while chewing on his elbows or something — or worse, gyrating furiously to the “Seishun Amigo” chorus. (Sacrilege!!! Is nothing sacred now? Not even Dickens???)

I know it may sound funny (and even counterintuitive), but “sacred” is exactly what I hold this drama to be. Admittedly, Nobuta wo Produce hardly looks impressive on the surface, and can be dismissed by the casual observer as just another idoru vehicle set against the disposable backdrop of high school — with the fluff, the stereotypes, the puerile laughs — only to be swallowed in a sea of other mass-produced Jdramas of the same teen-wanking formula… But no. This one is different. Because once in a while we drama fans are gifted with a viewing experience so transcendent in both style and substance, a triumphant synergy of directorial creativity, of writing deep and resonant, and of characters so heartbreakingly authentic.

Nobuta wo Produce is the Jdrama that is closest to my heart, the one that means the most to me out of all that I’ve watched (and re-watched). (And you thought it was something Kimura had starred in? Close, but no ciggy.) Although I cannot speak for all fans of this drama, I know that many, like myself, have come to love its three protagonists — Shuji, Akira, Nobuta — with a fierce allegiance, and can identify with their own feelings of disquiet and trepidation as they stand, inevitably, on the brink of adulthood. This is a deeply personal drama to watch — and that, for me, is what makes it sacred in no small way. Just as we all — whoever and wherever we are — inwardly uphold as sacrosanct the universal themes that this drama explores to rich, rewarding ends: the painful reality of growing up, the strange duality of alienation and friendship, and the “self-revelatory odyssey” of finding yourself as you make your way through life.

Robert Lloyd of the Los Angeles Times had this to say about another seminal teen drama from the other side of the world that remains, in my opinion, the best of its kind to ever be spawned by Hollywood — and also, regrettably, one of the most underrated and short-lived. The title? My So-Called Life (ABC, 1994).

“Every so often in the collaborative art called television a little miracle happens. There is a meeting of minds, a confluence of vision, a gathering of particular talents. The planets align, the cards fall into place, and something is born whose worth is instantly apparent to all involved, not as a generator of revenue — at which it might fail completely — but as an ennobling refraction of some little bit of the Truth, of what it means, or could mean, to be alive. Each department pushes the others a little bit harder; excellence from one corner prompts ambition in another. What might have begun as just the next greenlighted project or available job becomes a sort of holy mission, even if none of the participants would ever dare call it that — this being, after all, only television.”

These words also captured all that I felt about Nobuta wo Produce and had hoped to articulate in my own inadequate way. And the stars did seem to align for myself and this drama: a few minutes into the first episode I knew that something extraordinary was unfolding on my TV screen. There was no way this would turn out to be just another teen drama. Nor did it feel like an “idol drama” in spite of its cast; I saw no idols playacting for the paycheck, but three regular high school kids in a coming-of-age story that was all at once funny, heartfelt and bittersweet. NwP isn’t an outstanding high school drama, but an outstanding drama, period.

Based on the novel by Shiraiwa Gen, the screenplay by Kizara Izumi serves as the backbone of the whole drama… and oh my goodness, how can I NOT gush about THE WRITING — it both warms and pierces the heart. And it’s so… HIGH SCHOOL, y’know? It gets it, as in it really gets what high school is all about, that different planet we’ve ALL been to, where the drama and the heightened emotions and the clique wars and the desire for validation and the puppy love and the tortured ruminations matter more than they ever will by the time we’re these Big Old Boring Grownups. Nobuta wo Produce is about Becoming and Belonging, and about finding fast and true friends who will help you along the way.

Everyone loves Shuji – from his teachers right down to his peers, from his coterie of “bye-byecycle” homeboys to their simpering, magazine-flipping counterparts, from the resident toughies to the nerds and outcasts. And he lives for their acceptance, he craves their admiration, he likes to be liked by everyone… Well, maybe not everyone, because if there is one person he simply cannot stand, the bane of his high school existence, it’s this boy, the Weirdest Human Being Shuji has ever met. There simply is nobody else on earth quite like… Kusano Akira (Yamashita Tomohisa).

If Pinocchio were a special child and had magic mushrooms for breakfast every bleeping day of his life… then add a few more embellishments like the bleached hair and rolled-up shirtsleeves, the baggy pants and wallet chain, the spacey giggling and face-pulling, the repertoire of funny voices and horribly infectious expressions — bakayaro! kon-kon! Shu-uuuji-kun! sukebe! – and a partiality to quoting Nietzsche while incongruously flailing his arms like a gooney bird… voila! Kusano Akira, Resident Freak of 2-B. And the worst thing about this little creep? Is that he seems to harbor an unhealthy liking for… Shuji. (Oh NOES!!!) (Ohhhh YESSS!!!! Hehehe)

So what on earth makes this unlikely twosome team up for a common cause? Shortly after the new girl’s arrival, Shuji and Akira chance upon a particularly nasty case of girl-on-girl bullying coming from inside the ladies’ room. The victim turns out to be that odd little transferee Kotani Nobuko (Horikita Maki). Reluctant to get involved, Shuji stays outside the washroom while Akira goes inside to try and reason with the bullies. With no image to protect, Akira has nothing to lose by sticking up for someone like Nobuta — even if it means getting hosed down himself. For all his flakiness and irrational fears, Akira is no coward.

I like how the writing gives the viewer a comprehensive crash course in product development, brand marketing and image management. I have no background in this field, but still found this stuff incredibly fascinating. And there’s a certain *wink, wink, nudge, nudge* aspect to this drama, given that Shuji and Akira’s marketing strategy parallels how the entertainment industry manufactures, packages and sells celebrities, be they TV/film stars or recording artists or — yes, teen idols. (I really do wonder if Messrs. Kamenashi and Yamashita ever realized how meta the whole “Producing Nobuta” story line was. Did they ever look up from the script during one of the read-throughs and go, “Huh? But this is US!” Heh heh.)

A crucial point for Shuji comes in the Valentine’s Day episode, where he must choose between showering Nobuta with flower petals, or dousing her with cold water. The first option will spell kryptonite for his Cool Guy status, while the second will undoubtedly break Nobuta’s heart. What to do, what to do? As much as I wanted to wring Shuji’s neck for vacillating through most of the episode, you understand how much it means to him to put his popularity on the line.

This episode builds with delicious suspense — will he, or won’t he? — and concludes with a most unexpected twist. Damn, but when Bando (as a last-minute substitution, as per Nobuta’s request) pulls the cord and those petals come raining down on Nobuta, I frickin’ cried my eyes out. What’s more touching is when Nobuta realizes that Shuji, after an agonizing night of soul-searching, had in fact played, and played, and played a random eeny-meeny-miney-mo game until he finally arrived at “flower” instead of “water.” (Awwww, Shu-uuuji-kun!)

97% of the drama’s humor emanates from this singular bundle of goofy laughs. And Akira’s screwiness is surpassed only by how bloody endearing he is. You come to not only tolerate his foibles, but embrace them — because as a viewer you can look past appearances to see his good, stout and true heart. He may be off the wall (actually WAAAY off the wall, lol), but Akira is the Real Deal. He is also the perfect voice for an entire generation of aimless, unmotivated youngsters trying to make sense of, well, everything. “I dunno what youth is all about,” he bleats to Shuji on the rooftop in Episode 1. “I don’t have anything I want to do, and I don’t want to do anything.” (To which Shuji replies: “Isn’t everyone like that?” Hmm, good point, Shuji.)

If Shuji and Nobuta’s personal bugbears are dishonesty and low self-esteem, respectively, for Akira it is growing up. In Episode 6 he promptly leaves home to escape his dad’s mounting insistence that he take over the family-run company someday; and for the boy this is a most horrifying prospect, a life that will not only saddle him with a staggering load of adult responsibilities, but also take him far, far away from what he most holds dear. He tells Shuji before drifting off to sleep (having crashed the Kiritani home after a violent disagreement with his dad) “I don’t wanna go back home. I like that tofu guy and I can drink ‘mame chichi’ and be with Shuji and Nobuta everyday…” (Oh, Akira.)

Akira has the best lines when he’s at his tortured, lovesick worst. When Shuji the Cynic asks him what his immediate plans are — “What are you going to do? Confess to her, and then go to the zoo on a date, or something?” — Akira mulls it over a second, then answers: “What I want to do the most is… MARRY HER!!!….. How embarrassing!” (Then Shuji dryly comments via voice-over, “His reality goes way beyond my imagination.” LMAO!!!! Man I love those boys. *tear*) So, you don’t wish to deny him his petty fits of jealousy, like attempting to throw away Shuji’s short film – with insanely funny repercussions: “Akira DOWN!!!” (Lol!!!) Then, “My heart hurts…” (Awwww…) But he can’t keep his wrongdoing a secret from Shu-uuji-kun, so he confesses right there on the video room floor: “I’m the worst guy. The WORST.” To which Shuji quietly replies, “I’m the worst, too.” (Man I really, really love those boys. *tear*)

Salinger’s angstily f*cked-up hero Holden Caulfield fears becoming one of those adult “phonies” whom he detests so much, and instead envisions himself a catcher standing on the edge of a cliff, intercepting little kids as they come through a field of rye. In Nobuta wo Produce, Shuji, Nobuta and (most of all) Akira grapple with similar feelings as they face the terrifying inevitability of growing up. In this sense, both “Catcher” and NwP run counter to conventional Bildungsroman lines because the characters try to resist this process of maturity. It is only later that they learn to accept, and embrace it as part of life.

NwP is chock-full of these soul-stirring vignettes, and I’d like to include a few here. One unforgettable moment is a shot of Shuji and Akira on their bikes, pausing in the middle of a tree-lined road and turning to watch the adult pedestrians, these working stiffs in suits, hurry past in the other direction. Shuji: “I thought about how we’re gonna become like those boring-looking people someday.”

And this obviously pushes That Button inside Akira, sending him into Spaz Mode: “I don’t wanna be like that! Don’t wanna, don’t wanna, don’t wanna be like that!” (LOL oh Akiraaa)

#nobuta wo produce

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