#she would abuse her powers to call for some decorum every five seconds

[boygirlfag-sael]

@cctv-catgirl

i LOVE the word decorum . like please! have some decorum ✋

[statistical-improbabilities]

OCtober Day 2: Mercy

Thanks again to @oc-growth-and-development!

Ulla Teru is a siren with the power to conjure illusions to trick the five senses, but great power comes with a great price, and for Ulla this takes the form of headaches and hallucinations. She’s just recently taken over the siren kingdom and has made some interesting reforms as queen. She’s a charismatic leader, but a villain in the end, and well into an insanity arc that’s been pretty fun to write.

CW: emotional abuse, physical abuse (implied), hallucinations, fictional politics

Being a queen of a kingdom was a deceptively simple thing. It was being a queen of the people, Ulla had found, that was a challenge.

In an effort to convey her dedication to Kraseux to her citizens, one of her first measures enacted upon taking the throne was to hold open sessions for petitioners to come to the palace and air their grievances with the kingdom. The previous king had been absent frequently, and grossly out of touch with the people he dared call his, when in actuality, he had no clue what his subjects thought or demanded of him as a ruler.

Ulla would not rule like him. She would open her doors to her subjects, greet them from her throne with decorum and a charismatic smile as they knelt before her and poured out their hearts in hopes of some small mercy. And she would listen. She would promise nothing else, but she would listen, and often the illusion of a compassionate ear was enough, and they would go on their way feeling satisfied, approving of her methods and policy with unwavering loyalty. It was rather exhausting, but necessary.

The latest batch of petitioners were much like those from the day before, and every day before that: miserable, desperate, and forgettable. Each face blended into the next, an endless stream of flashing scales and tear-filled eyes as they begged for an extension on a loan payment, or an exemption from military service, or whatever else it was. Ulla listened attentively to each one, and had her attendants take note when it seemed appropriate. If she was feeling particularly generous, she might review the notes later that night before discarding them, but she wasn’t feeling generous often.

She called forward a Renegade who stood at the front of the line, noting the way he glanced back at the guards at the entrance to her throne room before kneeling. He looked as if he’d been turned shortly before becoming a grandfather, yet he wouldn’t meet her eyes. Ulla’s smile curled just a bit wider at that. She knew she looked young for a queen, even younger for a siren, but she commanded respect all the same. The illusion of maturity she wove over her true features only amplified it.

She let the silence hang in the air between them for a moment, then spoke in a soft tone, each word rippling with a smoothness like refined silk. “Rise, and state your business.”

The Renegade swallowed nervously, but drew himself up from his position. “Your Majesty, I’ve come to request compensation for an injury received while serving the kingdom. My superiors… they promised to file the request, but that was six months ago, and escalating the issue has done no good.”

Ulla raised a brow. “May I inquire as to the specifics of this… injury?” she questioned, leaning forward ever so slightly.

“The alignment in my tail is damaged,” he confessed, and indeed, Ulla could see where one fin lagged behind the other, even as he held himself in place. “I was hit by debris from the sinking of a human ship.”

A tense quiet persisted between them for a few moments, and Ulla tapped one finger against her chin in thought, flicking her own tail lazily. “Marianne,” she said, beckoning one of her attendants over, “please escort this gentleman to the proper offices in the military division to file his request and have it sent off.” The attendant hurried over and took the Renegade by the elbow, and Ulla’s demure smile briefly reappeared when he flinched. He was escorted away quickly, and she motioned for her scribe to record the details of their interaction before calling the next petitioner.

“Next.”

The black scales of a Deceptor came into view, and Ulla inclined her head ever so briefly as the woman knelt. She looked older than the Renegade before her, but no less respectful. The majority of Ulla’s own divining had been supportive of her reign since she was merely the Deceptor monarch, and they had reaped the rewards once she’d become queen. The days of Deceptors being reviled for their illusionary powers were soon coming to a close, and she was doing what she could to uplift their status as the superior divining of sirens. No longer would they be second-class citizens—not in Ulla’s Kraseux. “Rise,” she said.

“Your Majesty, I—I’ve noticed that more people in the capital are wearing Veritium jewelry,” the Deceptor woman began haltingly. Ulla sat up a little straighter, and conceded a small nod.

“Yes, I’ve noticed the same.” The cursed metal had fallen back into vogue when she’d assumed the role of queen, though Adonis had long since been a proponent of its illusion-breaking abilities. Not only did it stifle any Deceptor’s power who was too near to withstand it, it also bestowed adverse side effects that took any number of forms, depending on length and intensity of exposure. Ulla’s head began to ache just at the thought of it, even though her Deceptor guards strictly enforced her new policy forbidding the wearing of Veritium to these meetings.

The woman nodded vigorously. “I’ve heard tell that you plan on introducing legislation restricting the sale of Veritium in the capital. I came to request that you extend the boundary of that legislation to include the outskirts of the kingdom and the nearest colony as well. Some of my close friends find it hard to leave their homes without becoming ill. It’s harmful to our livelihoods. We can’t keep living like this, Your Majesty.”

“No,” Ulla mused, “you certainly can’t. Did you get that?” Her scribe paused to give her a short nod, then returned to writing frantically. Ulla smiled, watching the tension ease from the woman’s face as she received a tentative smile in return. “I’ll take that into consideration. You are dismissed.”

That woman’s obvious relief was quickly replaced as the next petitioner entered, an Auxilia man who appeared close to tears as he all but collapsed before her throne. Ulla’s smile vanished. “State your business.”

“Please, Your Majesty,” he begged, glancing fearfully at the guards, then back up to Ulla. He seemed quite intimidated. “The—the property taxes that you raised—I’ve been late on my rent for three months. If I can’t pay this time, I’ll get evicted—”

She held up one hand, and he fell silent. “Those taxes are necessary for repairing the infrastructure of our kingdom,” she said, exceedingly careful to keep her tone diplomatic and measured. “On the west end of the kingdom, correct? Your taxes have been raised to allow for maintenance of transportation currents in your area. Surely you knew this when you signed the contract for your lease?”

“I—I did, but… Your Majesty. It’s not just me. Other Auxilia in the area are struggling too, and—and Harmonia… we don’t need maintenance on transportation currents, we need to be able to live in our homes. I can’t make enough money to get by, there’s no jobs anywhere nearby because I don’t have the right qualifications. Please, Your Majesty—have mercy, or we’ll all be out on the streets, please have mercy…”

Ulla watched impassively as the Auxilia man worked in vain to conceal his desperation, his distress that was bringing him closer and closer to tears. Slowly, she lifted her gaze to meet the eyes of a guard, and inclined her head, motioning them over. To the man, she murmured, “Your concerns are not unwarranted, but rest assured, I and my fellow monarchs will find a solution for not just a few Auxilia, but the betterment of the entire kingdom. Now, if you would kindly compose yourself, I’ll have you escorted out.” She left no room for argument. It would do her public image no good for him to dissolve into a sobbing mess in her throne room.

Who was he to demand mercy from his queen?

~

She’d only heard a few more petitioners before closing requests for the afternoon, instructing her attendants to say that she had a great deal of work to attend to if anyone asked. They would assume that she’d taken many sirens’ requests to heart and was already beginning to process them, and she would allow them to think that for as long as they desired.

Ulla held no trust in her attendants. Only enough to know they would convey the message she told them to, nothing more, which was why she told no one the reason she’d retired to her rooms after the sessions was that a pounding headache was beginning to return. They were becoming easier to stave off now that Veritium was forbidden from most instances where it might come in close contact with her, but it was never completely avoidable. Adonis had always been paranoid, and some of the petitioners had worn scale implants that could not be removed for a short meeting. If her hallucinations were to arrive, Ulla wanted them to stay private.

The kingdom would never approve of a queen gone insane, no matter how much expertise she had taken in weaving her mask.

When Ulla reached her chambers, she locked the door behind her so no attendants could trail in her wake, then removed the crown that had sat upon her head and set it aside. There were no mirrors in her rooms, as there never had been. Her illusions could trick a mirror, but if the hallucinations so commanded it, the illusions could fall just as easily.

She drifted over to a window and clasped her hands behind her back. The Auxilia man was not yet out of sight, swimming far slower than the sirens around him due to his lack of a true tail. After a moment, she turned away from the window, but she could still hear his voice in the back of her mind, growing louder and more desperate until it filled the room.

“Please, have mercy… have mercy, or we’ll all be out on the streets… please have mercy…”

At some point, his voice had become her own. She wasn’t sure when.

Her father stood over her, the room distorted and rippling around them. Mercy, Ulla? he murmured, saccharine and dangerous, and she shrank away. Her tail was made of lead with the iridescent glint of Veritium, and it pulled her to the ground.

“No, please… I didn’t mean to, Father,” she whispered as her leaden tail gave way to leaden legs, short and spindly and unable to support the weight of her pleas. “I don’t—I don’t know what I did…”

Why, you’ve killed that man, the hallucination said with a wicked, sharp-toothed grin, and Ulla shook her head violently.

“I didn’t, it’s not my fault!”

Oh, but it is, her father said. You’ve killed that man as sure as you’ve killed your own mother. She’d be disgusted if she saw you like this—but she can’t, because she’s not alive to see it. The hallucination stepped closer, and Ulla shrank away again. It was no use crying for her mother—she never came when her father did. She’d died minutes after Ulla was born. Ulla’s mind could only conjure the dead she had known, because to be known was to never truly die.

Do you really wish to test me, Ulla? You look like your mother did at that age, you know. It would be a shame if you were to force me to change that.

“No, please,” she begged, loathing every word that fell from her tongue and yet being powerless to stop them. “Have mercy, please have mercy…”

The hallucination raised its ghostly hand, and the fingers elongated into jagged talons. Shadows around the edge of the room pressed in closer, piling heavy onto her chest and wrapping around her legs and arms and mouth. Her father brought his talons down. Ulla closed her eyes and screamed.

 ~

When Ulla opened her eyes, she was the only one in the room. The side of her face stung, but when she raised a shaking finger to probe for injury, nothing was there. A stream of bubbles rose up towards the ceiling, but no figures stood looming over her where she lay crumpled on her side on the floor.

Slowly, she sat up. The pain was an illusion, and it would go away when she regained control. She’d lost control for far too long that time. Her hallucinogenic episodes were lasting longer and becoming more frequent, but nobody had witnessed it. No one had been around when she’d lost control of her mind and her powers, and it would stay that way.

The streetlamps outside her window were beginning to glow, betraying the time that had passed. They’d be expecting her for a state dinner soon. Carefully, Ulla began to weave her illusions over her face once more, and only when the painstaking process was finished did she allow herself to breathe.

No one knew what happened when Ulla’s illusions fell.

A queen did not beg for mercy.

No one would ever know.

[jewrocker]

Republicans Cross the Rubicon Into Full Blown Treason Because There’s Nothing to Stop Them.

According to Wikipedia, the textbook definition of “Treason” is criminal disloyalty to the State.  Treason, by definition, does not need to be aiding a foreign power with information that would be detrimental to our national security - although there’s plenty of evidence of that, too.  There’s treason happening in front of our eyes and ears on a daily basis.  For years now.  

If you swear an oath to defend and protect the Constitution of the United States, and, with each subsequent breath, spend every waking moment either looking the other way while others seek to undermine every principle contained within that document, or worse, play an active role in obstructing those seeking to uphold those principles, is that not treason?  Is that not a blatant disregard of your sworn duties?  Shouldn’t the punishment for our highest elected officials who knowingly and willfully violate their oaths of office, to such an obscene extreme, be something other than free healthcare for life and a golden parachute?

Every Republican lawmaker currently in office who fits the above description needs to be held accountable for their betrayal of their oath to defend the Constitution. Otherwise, what’s the point of any of this?  And why isn’t there any remedy in our founding document calling for criminal penalties for those found guilty of violating their official duties?  There’s penalties in almost every other area of our society for betraying your official duty, i.e. if you’re a cop and you violate your oath to serve and protect, you’re terminated almost immediately - sometimes, even imprisoned.  Why shouldn’t our top lawmakers be held to the same, if not higher, standards? If you said, it’s because they write the laws that govern them, you’d be correct. 

The Constitution is not up for debate.  You’re not allowed to decide which side of it you come down on.  Any elected official, Republican or Democrat, who bases his/her willingness to uphold their oath to defend the Constitution on the shameless, self-serving position of whether or not he/she is up for re-election, should be stripped of their citizenship and shipped off to a Siberian prison, last week.  However, if that were the case, McConnell, Gaetz, McCarthy, Graham, Nunes, Meadows, Collins, Jordan, etc. would be on their fortieth case of hand warmers by now.  

Not for nothing, but the fact that, in close to two and a half centuries, Mitt Romney became the first Senator to vote to remove a president from his/her party in the history of our Democracy, says something about our judgement as a nation with regards to the leaders we elect to govern us.

Republicans swore an oath to defend and protect the principles contained in that document - be it convenient or inconvenient - and by pretending the facts are not real, or they’re all a smoke screen by the “Deep State Conspiracy,” you’re not only making yourselves out to be pathetic fools, you're betraying your country with every passing second.  And for what?  To defend the self-serving criminal acts of an ignorant, sociopathic, misogynistic, megalomaniacal reality TV has-been?  One who would happily throw you, your constituents, and the rest of us under the bus in the blink of an eye without a second thought if it meant saving himself?  

Is this the way Republicans want to be remembered by their grandkids?  A cult-like mob of spineless cowards, happily ready to abandon their oaths in blind servitude to a hapless Russian asset?  The GOP have made it clear, they are more interested in avoiding a “mean tweet” from the orange emperor, than upholding the Laws of the land they swore to defend.  

And what will happen to them for this utter betrayal?  After working tirelessly, day in, day out, to weaken the fabric of our Democracy, after choosing a “scorched earth” policy rather than let the Dems get the “upper hand,” will these deplorable traitors be held accountable?  Will they be put on trial, themselves?  Nope.  Nada.  There simply doesn’t seem to be any remedy in The Constitution for this kind of brazen betrayal on such a grand scale.  The House can’t even enforce a subpoena, as they know the president’s ‘human bidet”, bloated sycophant William Barr, would laugh in their faces.  

Ask the German People what happened when their Parliament caved to the whims of an unhinged lunatic.  If you think it can’t happen again, you must’ve missed the DOJ memo immediately following Trump’s acquittal addressed to every State AG, forbidding them to open ANY investigation into presidential candidates w/out his sole approval.  

After all this - after disgracing the memory of every soldier who fought to defend the principles held within the document these traitors chose to use as toilet paper, after ignoring the most crushing/damning evidence ever put forth against a president in history; after turning a political no-brainer into a three-ring circus, the epic cowards who make up the House and Senate will simply sail off into the sunset, unscathed, with the aforementioned golden parachute of free healthcare for life and full pensions all around - on us.  A nice reward for playing a starring role in the destruction of the institutions they’re entrusted with protecting.

FYI, those of us out there still relying on the theory of ‘voting them out,” it’s time to get with the program.  Even if we succeed in ousting some of these miscreants, we won’t accomplish anywhere near the amount needed to restore decorum/sanity to our State/Federal offices- nor is voting them out enough; considering the level and extent of such an egregious abandonment of duty.  Letting these cockroaches off the hook simply by voting them out is like asking the Manson family to move. 

Not to mention, after appointing an illegitimate, sex-assaulting SCOTUS judge, after blocking bills to protect us from election interference, and now the crowning of their idiot King, there’s no way in Hell we will see a fair and balanced election.  Anyone who thinks otherwise needs to have their heads examined. Get ready for election interference the likes of which we’ve never seen; i.e., rampant voter fraud, voter suppression, gerrymandering, ballot stuffing, ballot losing, ballot fixing, voting machine tampering, misinformation, disinformation, help from foreign governments, etc. etc. etc.

For a bunch of self-professed “truth seekers,” and “Defenders of the Realm” Republicans sure have hitched their wagon to the wrong horse.  Not only do they not see the storm brewing on the horizon, but if you’re going to hang your reputations, and what’s left of your honor, out to dry, as well as decimate your centuries-old party for generations to come, at least do it with a POTUS who has a modicum of class, dignity, and Statesmanship.  Not the Chernobyl of American Democracy. 

As crazy as it may be, as we speak, Republicans continue to try and get the American People to believe that every witness who’s testified to date is a liar, and the only one we can trust is a lying, thieving, charity-bilking, bank-swindling, tax-cheating, draft-dodging, environment-killing, Justice-obstructing, pornstar-bribing, student-defrauding, Russia-colluding, war-mongering, pussy-grabbing, megalomaniacal sociopath.   

Sad as it is to look back on this inexplicably insane shit show, was it that hard to predict a lifelong grifter who defrauded banks, partners, wives, mistresses, cities and students out of billions, who bribed porn stars then lied about it, who happily abandoned our sworn allies in the Middle East after just a five minute phone call; is it that hard to imagine this shameless putz would do the same to the nation he swore to protect and defend?  

If there’s one thing Republicans will never be accused of, it’s good judgement.  They’re so blind with hatred for the left, they’d rather see their kids grow up speaking Russian and their country torn apart than admit their boy is a colossal failure. That would require character.  Something only Mitt Romney appears to possess.

The president of the United States abused the power of his office and attempted to leverage a foreign government’s congressionally approved aid in exchange for dirt on his political rival.  Yet, in spite of the truckload of evidence, “Moscow” Mitch McConnell just etched in stone why he is the worst Senator in American history, by a landslide.  No doubt he’s earned a spot in Letterman's top ten of the Worst Americans of All-Time, as well.  Yet, ask yourself, with things being as they are, i.e., no legal consequences for their actions, why would any of these low-lifes feel the sudden urge to break precedent and, for once, uphold his/her vow?  After all, who’s afraid of a golden parachute?  

Raise your hand if you’ll vote for the first candidate who makes prosecuting these cockroaches their first official act of office.