#so I told him that + the fact that he's fighting literal factual information | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

itsclydebitches · 3 years ago

Text

Its Own Reward

Fandom: The Bad Batch

Words: 2,098

Summary: If, at times of unseemly emotional vulnerability, Tech found himself longing for the one thing The Bad Batch didn’t have... well, that was between him and his overactive mind, thank you very much.

Warnings: Mentions of blood/injury later on, but very minor

A clone's favorite game, in the whole wide galaxy, was Picture Your General.

Picture your general in the heat of battle, lightsaber flashing, tearing through Separatist forces with the intensity of a Kaminoan storm.

Picture you general in the aftermath, entering a meditative state, calming the battalion with their mind alone.

Picture your general giving an order and you, standing tall, accept it with pride. Picture yourself as their right-hand man. Their greatest asset. The tool that will win this war.

Of course, at this stage one brother or another would point out the flaws in the fantasy. "Only a few of us will ever speak to them," they'd say. "You're not making Captain. Commander? Dream on. And watch the arrogance, vod. We're important, sure, but we're disposable too. No one is going to mourn us when we fall, certainly not a Jedi."

From there they would either grow quiet in discomfort, or pummel the offender with whatever was in reach, depending on the makeup of the group. No matter the outcome though, the game would inevitably repeat just a few hours later, picked up by everyone from the youngest cadet, to soldiers a day from their first assignment. Every clone in existence wanted to picture their general; imagine up a person worthy of the Kaminoans' stories and, though shared with more reservations, imagine the place they'd find at their side.

Every clone, that is, but Tech.

Well, he supposed Hunter, Wrecker, and Crosshair might be the same, but that was a hypothesis he hadn't tested yet. Out of everything Tech still needed to learn, that was rather low on his priority list. Meanwhile, spending time on a useless game was downright foolish. Oh, he had nothing against games on their own — they fostered a number of desirable outcomes, including, but far from limited to, a social comradery that would serve them well in battle — but this game, Picture Your General, had nothing to offer him. For the simple reason that Tech would never have one.

It was a fact the Regs took great pleasure in pointing out. Frequently.

"Ignore them," Crosshair said, stealing an extra ration off Tech's tray. History implied that he wasn't actually that hungry, merely interested in teasing Wrecker with the extra food. He'd pretend to save it for most of the night until, inevitably, handing it off as a grudging, midnight snack. Crosshair played with the food, but Tech knew his attention was on the rowdy group to their left. "They're not worth it."

Given that it was just the two of them, Tech allowed himself a scowl, snatching the ration back. He had nothing against Wrecker receiving additional food, especially given his fast metabolism, but it was the principal of the thing. This was his. "Says the man who instigated four altercations this week."

"I like riling them up." The food moved back to Crosshair's side of the table. "You don't."

"You're mistaken. I take great pleasure in correcting our less cordial brothers. Though their initial claim is sound, the reasons for why we will not be assigned a Jedi are erroneous in the extreme."

"You mean that we're useless, unwanted defects who don't deserve to lick a Jedi's boots?"

"While I wouldn't have phrased it quite like that... yes. It's factually incorrect."

"Hmm. Your face doesn't say 'factually incorrect.'"

"That's because you're stealing my food!"

"You're mistaken," Crosshair mimicked, this time stuffing the ration deep into his pocket where Tech didn't have a hope of reclaiming it. "Ignore them."

Tech rarely denied himself the chance to speak at length on any topic he pleased, but this time he bit down on the retort that he literally could not. The Kaminoans had ensured that he picked up and payed attention to everything around him, even what he didn't want to hear.

Still, clones were nothing if not adaptable and very little in this galaxy was black and white. The very thing Tech craved was also evidence of his greatest joy: the rest of his squad. They weren't made for a Jedi, they were made for each other. The Regs might have seen that as another defect, but Tech understood the inevitability of balance. If he wanted something as remarkable as his team, he had to give up something else in turn.

Like the knowledge that someone else, anyone else, was fighting for them. To the Kaminoans they were property. Expensive and prized property, no doubt, but even the most beautiful tool would be discarded in time. To the other clones they were outsiders, a blight on everything else they took pride in. And to the Jedi they were... non-existent. Or near enough, Tech supposed. When called to assist a battalion they usually did so on the outskirts, getting into the enemy territory their brothers couldn't negotiate, leaving for the next suicide mission by the time they'd caught up. It resulted in a reputation that was, ironically, quite uniform, given their otherwise individualistic looks and personalities. The Bad Batch was a team of four who did what other clones couldn't. That's all the Jedi needed to know; presumably wanted to know. And Tech could hardly fault them for that when in the midst of a war. Like him, they had much more important matters to occupy their thoughts.

That naïve indifference — an inability to be seen — might have been bearable if Tech hadn't accumulated such a clear picture of them. Oh yes, much of it came down to his academic nature, scrolling through datapads in the dead of night, soaking up information about anything, but especially that which was so crucial to the war... but there were stories too. The GAR was full of them. Whereas cadets played Picture Your General, soldiers spoke of the real thing, at times even more fantastical than their imaginings. Whispers spread through the ranks of Master Obi-Wan's compassion, claims that he fought for clones on and off the battlefield, giving as much respect as he demanded in turn. His former Padawan was, they said, as much a vod as any of them, prone to establishing an equality based on practical jokes and near-death situations — the kind of insanity clones were genetically predisposed to enjoy. There was talk that Unduli welcomed every soldier into her ranks with a Mirialan ritual, that Windu was fighting for clone rights in the Senate, even jokes that Plo Kloon had millions of adoption papers ready and waiting for the war's end... utter nonsense that last bit, of course. Yet every time Tech scoffed at a Reg's unseemly devotion, an awful little voice in the back of his head pointed out that the jokes had to stem from something. One did not craft rumors about a Jedi's kindness unless they had done quite a bit to establish it in the first place.

Tech didn't need kindness, only assurances. Bonds with the Jedi provided his brothers with a connection outside of the Kaminoans. They were building a network, however small, for the day this war ended. The Jedi Council would fight for the clones, Tech was sure of that... but would they fight for a shadowy, defective squad they knew little about? Their place in this galaxy began with each other and ended with the occasional, dubious acquaintance of Hunter’s. That was not enough to survive on and Tech cared only about such practical matters.

At least, that’s what he told himself for a time, but it wasn’t in Tech’s nature to dismiss facts. Like how once Master Shaak Ti had laid a hand on his arm after training, bestowing a smile and words of praise that Tech later kicked himself for missing, too busy being disgustingly flummoxed by the attention. That warmth, gifted three different ways, stayed with him long after they'd left their simulations behind, and no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't rationalize it away as planning for the future.

Tech wanted a Jedi of his own. He simply... wanted.

In time those feelings didn't abate, but they were buried under an avalanche of new ones which, from a technical standpoint, he supposed amounted to much the same. After Kaller, Tech had lost his purpose in serving the Republic. Worse, he'd lost a member of his squad, even if he eventually got him back. Crosshair's presence now could no more lessen his past absence than food in one's hand could feed a starving man from yesterday. Tech's home was gone. The familiarity of his brothers' faces, even those twisted with cruelty, was something he craved. Everything from the rooms they'd once slept in to the smell of sterilized halls— all absent. So if Tech sometimes stared out at the stars and felt horrifyingly incomplete, who was he to say what that stemmed from? There were too many possibilities. The data was corrupted beyond repair and trying to divide what he'd lost from what the Kaminoans had denied him was an entirely useless endeavor. An experiment not worth his time.

Still, Tech was made of curiosity. His mind was always on the lookout for patterns and new information, whether he wanted it to be or not. In truth though, he figured that Omega's near death was an experience that would have stood out to anyone, genius not required.

Her screams were quite the conductor for one's focus.

"Shoot it! Shoot it!"

The order was for Crosshair, but Hunter couldn't see that he'd been knocked out by the krykna's last attack, one spindly leg the size of a cruiser slamming into his side. Hunter himself was trapped, hands scrambling to free his leg from the cave's crevice even as he yelled. Tech noted, in the dim way his mind noticed most things during a crisis, that he was now using his knife for leverage, cutting into his calf in the process, uncaring. Meanwhile, Wrecker was overwhelmed by the krykna's cluster, something about his size and boisterous nature attracting them like... well. Like kryknas to a clone. Echo was trying to help, but the planet's magnetic field had been messing with his prosthetics ever since they'd landed. Tech saw them both disappear under a small mountain of the creatures, yelling Omega's name all the while.

And Tech... he was running. Yes. He realized that now, legs pounding across the ground, heedless of the numerous arachnid bodies that crunched beneath his boots. He couldn't say that his attention was solely on Omega, her face now just inches from the krykna's pincers. It never was. Tech couldn't help but catalogue a hundred other observations as she neared death's door, most of them quite distressing. Like the difference in height between him and his brothers. Or his abysmal scores in sprinting back on Kamino. Omega was at least five meters away whereas the krykna, most assuredly, was not.

I'm going to lose another one, Tech thought as his next laborious pant turned into a sob. Probability proves it.

Thank the Maker his calculations were incomplete.

Later, the five of them would describe the sensation as akin to static electricity. Even Crosshair, unconscious, would say that he'd felt something passing along his skin, heedless of armor and all the more disconcerting for being... impossible. An impossible memory. Only Tech and Hunter saw it though, the moment when the krykna rose off the ground and flew, all five tons of it, slamming into the opposite wall where its skull caved in like an over-ripe fruit.

Omega sat with her little hand outstretched, looking just as dumbfounded as her brothers. When he finally reached her, Tech found evidence of the krykna's teeth on either side of her neck. They'd only just punctured the skin.

A moment of certain death, averted through instinct. Destiny? Perhaps some combination of the two.

"It's okay. You're okay. Omega, please breathe for me."

Tech was blessed — sometimes cursed — with an extraordinary memory, the ability to recall not just books' worth of information, but images in perfect clarity too. Superimposed over a sobbing Omega was a cadet from his youth. No one important. No one whose name Tech had bothered to learn, uninterested in remembering it against his will. But the boy's words had already been spoken.

"Kriff, maybe we're wrong, vod! Maybe the defect will get a Jedi. After all, don't they say the Force works in mysterious ways?"

An insult, a taunt, and now perhaps a speck of wisdom that Tech should have heeded. He pulled Omega into his arms, one gloved hand sinking into her curls, the other wrapping tight around her waist. He'd performed this gesture a hundred times before, but this time it felt like something slotted into place.

"There you are," Tech whispered and for now, he'd pretend that this was nothing more than a reassurance.

#TBB #The Bad Batch #TBB Fic #Tech #Omega #Crosshair #TBBfic #Star Trek #SW

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skvaderarts · 3 years ago

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Hiraeth Chapter 35: Disquisition

Masterlist can be found Here!

Chapter Thirty-Five: Disquisition

Note: This was such a fun chapter to write. It feels good to be back in the swing of things. Sorry for the extended hiatus. I had a lot going on with my emotions and my computer. Life is just… life, you know? Anyway, thank you so much for all of the support while I was gone! I was worried I wouldn’t have anyone to come back to if I took too much longer! But onto the new chapter! And sorry it was so late! I slept until 7:40pm somehow…

(-~-)

Most of the Ludwig manor was quiet, a serene landscape of lengthy halls, winding stairs, and large windows covered in thick curtains that blocked out most of the ambient light from outside. The only indication that there were people living here was the occasional passing by of a servant going about their daily tasks, and that was exceedingly infrequent by design. But even so, the library was a bastion of contemplation and peace, the only notable sounds being that of the turning of pages and the soft click of boots as the group navigated the vast array of books at their disposal. It was almost as if the room absorbed any and all outside noise to help facilitate a better reading environment. Truthfully, no one would be surprised if that was the case. There was a litany of supernatural energy in this house, more than any of them had an explanation for.

Dante sat at the other end of the long table that spanned the center of the room, flipping through some sort of book that had pictures in it. It seemed to be an encyclopedia of some sort that contained droves of information about demons and just about everything associated with them on a species level. Maybe it was more of a bestiary than anything else, but it was one of the few tomes that the youngest Son of Sparda had been able to locate that was actually in english. Okay, maybe not quite, but it was close.

“So what brought you here in the first place, Vergil? I feel like I'm missing a joke.” He said casually, flipping through the hand-illustrated novel to try and locate what he was looking for. In truth, he didn’t have anything in particular in mind, but he was still doing his best to try and help. Books like these were more Vergil’s jam than his, maybe even Nero’s to an extent. And V was a given. Dante was somewhat sure that his older nephew’s blood was actually ink at this point with how much he liked to read taken into account.

Vergil was flipping through an even larger less approachable book with such nonchalant ease that Dante was almost certain that his older twin was doing so just to make him feel more inferior than he already felt at the moment. When had Vergil learned to read this kind of stuff? Had he picked some of it up as a kid from all the time that he has spent with their father before his untimely disappearance? That seemed to be the most likely answer. Regardless, he was able to read it, and had been up until Dante had asked him that question, seemingly interrupting the flow of his train of thought. He clasped the book gently and laid it flat on the table, looking over out of the corner of his eye at his younger twin. It seemed that Dante was onto something.

Vergil casually gestured towards a bookcase on the other side of the room that was behind a locked metal door. None of them had even noticed the room until now, the other bookcases concealing it relatively well. Bars stretched from floor to ceiling, allowing the books to still be visible, but not accessible. The bookcase on the other side contained about a hundred thick books that seemed to be exceedingly old, and they were each locked inside of individualized cages with only their spines exposed. A chain attached to each book and the bookcase on the other end ensured that you wouldn’t be walking off with one.

“You are, Dante. I came here in search of a book in my youth. I… encountered more than I bargained for.” He said, seemingly almost embarrassed. He broke eye contact and returned to the book, not at all willing to elaborate.

Magnolia snickered slightly, taking a sip from the tray of tea that had been brought to them a short while ago. Normally people were not permitted to eat in the library, but they were all adults and could be trusted to not eat and then rub their hands all over everything without cleaning them off first. There was literally a washroom twenty feet from them, but the dining room was on the other side of the house and down a flight of stairs. No one felt like going that far just to drink a few sips of tea and enjoy a macaroon or an eclair.

“What your twin brother is trying to say is that he absolutely tried to lift a book from our private collection while we were asleep one night, and he was caught. We have his assurances that he would have returned it, but I do believe he was smart enough to realize that he might have been in over his head.” She giggled a bit harder then, covering her hand in a polite attempt to not die laughing at something that only she and Vergil truly understood, given the circumstances and the context. Plus, they were in a library, after all. Best to keep it down. “He got more than he bargained for, indeed.”

Nero was not intrigued by what was going on, peeping over at them from a bookcase a few feet away. He seemed to consider yelling his question over to them before it occurred to him that he was in a library. He flinched, knowing that idea wouldn’t go over well before walking over to them with the book he had been examining and leaning over the table. Something told him that this was a story that might actually keep his interest for a moment, at least better than the book that he was trying to read that he barely understood. He was going to have to ask for an assist on this one. Time to go get V and pick his brain. It wasn’t that he couldn’t read it so much as he didn't understand the knowledge that was being imparted upon him. “Okay, so now you’ve got my attention. What did you do to him, Magnolia? I know it has to be something you did. You're barely holding it together.”

At that, she gave up and actually laughed, holding her hands over her face in order to try and stifle her laughter. There was no holding it back, but she could at least try to block the sound a little. The eldest Son of Sparda shook his head, closing his eyes for a moment as Magnolia tried to collect herself. It seemed that they were at two different ends of the spectrum in regards to the context of this memory. Now Dante was intrigued as well, waiting to hear the answer elaborated on.

“See, what Vergil forgot to say was that I snuck up on him, caught him, and used a relocation spell to drop him head first from the ceiling! He had no time to even try to react. He just hit the floor like a brick.” She pointed to the ceiling and shook her head, clearing her throat as she attempted to put herself back together. Her hair had fallen into her face, and she battled it out of the way, unwilling to allow it to stay there. “It was easily the most uncoordinated thing I've ever seen him do, and just recalling the totally flabbergasted look on his face is enough to make me choke. He lost a fight to a little fourteen year old girl, and he’s the one who brought a sword.”

Everyone looked over at Vergil in various states of disbelief. Surely Magnolia has to be exaggerating just a little bit? The mental image of the Darkslayer plummeting head first from the easily forty foot ceiling was just too improbable to believe. And the idea that he had been snuck up on? Vergil practically had radar built into his brain, at least from what they could tell. But the look on his face was all that it took to come to the conclusion that she wasn’t telling a tall tale. This had actually happened.

“Pardon my interruption, but did you say the ceiling?” A familiar voice inquired from above them on the balcony. It was V. He and Lucia had approached the edge of the railing, holding books from different ends of the bookcase that they had both been examining. The young summoner seemed more than a little bit amused by this turn of events. How on earth had she managed to drop Vergil from that kind of high head first and not kill him? Were his father’s bones made of titanium?

“Unfortunately, she did. Every word of that exceedingly unpleasant tale is factual. My neck and head still hurt just recalling it.” Vergil said grumpily, attempting to conceal the fact there was actually a part of him that was impressed by her aptitude at such a young age. It was slightly astounding to him that she had even managed to sneak up on him, even if he had been in a dark, unfamiliar space and his sole focus had been on the task at hand. It was a learning experience, to be sure. Never again would he drop his guard like that.” I suppose I am lucky to be able to heal at the rate that I do, as I am certain that I cracked my skull and, at the bare minimum, dislocated a vertebrae in my neck. If I’m being honest, I probably broke it.”

“I was trying to use a compressing spell to hold him in place, but I panicked when I saw Yamato, and the first thing that came to mind was a relocation hex. I tried to eject him from the property, but unfortunately for him my powers were unable to draw from a location that I couldn’t currently see, and I didn’t know how to make him pass through a solid object yet, so he just fell three stories from the ceiling.” Magnolia laughed nervously, clearly horrified by the fact that she “My parents were impressed, nonetheless, and I was rewarded for my “quick thinking” even though I was sure I had just killed another child. Those were high times.” She allowed a wistful smile to spread across her face, the warmth from the distant memory spreading through every extremity she possessed. Yes, that had been a fun occasion.

Lucia chuckled lightly under her breath. The history of Dante’s family was fascinating, if not tumultuous and filled with problems. But it seemed that their frankly ridiculous durability made from some extremely interesting situations at times. She was just glad that they always seemed to recover and no permanent damage was done. She had come to like Vergil during their short time together, and to say she was fond of Dante would be a bit of an understatement. He had always been a wonderful friend to her, and she wanted nothing more than the best for him, perhaps even a bit more.

As if he had sensed her thoughts, V pulled himself away from the scene below for a moment to look over at her, hoping that he had yet to give away his intentions in regards to speaking with her. He just had to get the nerve up to explain what he couldn’t quite put into words, but he had noticed that of the two of them, he was not the only one who seemed to possess this issue. He saw the quiet little moments that she spent thinking, normally looking over at Dante. At times she became flustered around him for no apparent reason, much as he did around ehr. He couldn’t help but wonder if she too was longing for something or someone that she knew she couldn’t have.

He wished her luck in that regard, realizing that this was something that had probably been in the works long before he had come into the picture. Had Dante noticed the way that she looked at him? Had Lucia noticed the way that V looked at her? It was hard to say, and he knew that at some point he would have to simply ask her what it was that she was after. Whatever answer she gave him, he would fully respect and accept, even if it wasn’t the one that he was hoping for. That was what a responsible adult did. But leave it to him to suddenly realize that perhase the only person he had ever felt remotely attracted to was interested in another member of his family. There had to be a certain irony in that. He just hoped that if that was what she wanted, her affections would be returned.

Dante seemed to be the sort that was perpetually single by choice, never indulging in any of the impulses or desires that he might possess. Perhaps he felt that he was protecting those that he cared about by not becoming entangled with them? It was all that he could imagine. Dante was likeable enough and, at least to him, he seemed lonely. It wasn’t so much something that his uncle did as it was just a way that he was. He could see a little bit of himself in him at times in ways that he didn’t expect or wish, hoping to spare everyone that he knew and cared about the majority of the feelings that he kept bottled up and pushed back so deep within himself. But these were things that had been set in stone long before his arrival. He was simply witnessing the aftermath.

But maybe it didn’t have to be that way? After all, something was only set in stone when someone accepted that and didn’t choose to alter it. Even the hardest stone could be chiseled with the right tools. That was the nature of such things. Maybe there was something that he could do…

Griffon cackled slightly from behind him, manifesting and landing on the railing between him and Lucia. The wiley bird shook his head for a moment before looking over at V, then looking down at Vergil from above. “Ya know, I make alotta jokes about Dante having brain damage, but maybe he’s not the only one. Maybe it runs in the family. A fall from a room this high? Yea, that’s gonna bruise your brain a little.”

While the rest of the inhabitants of the lower level of the library giggled, Vergil shot the demonic bird a hard to read look. She seemed to be considering saying something, but decided against it. V could only wonder what his father thought of Griffon and Shadow, considering the history he had with them and the nature of their creation. There had to be some hard feelings on his end, even if there didn’t seem to be any from theirs. Dante had some prior with their previous iterations it seemed, too. But unlike Vergil, he didn’t seem to care much about that. One could only imagine that his experience with them had either been shorter or less tragic than his father’s, and considering how little he knew about that experience aside from what he’d gleaned from Griffon, he knew that he wasn’t in a position to say literally anything about such matters. But he did hope that one day he would be able to make some sort of peace between them.

Just as was about to turn and head back over towards the balcony with the book that he had been holding, he looked over and noticed that Lucia wasn’t where she had been a moment earlier. Intrigued, he walked down several rows until he located her. She was leafing through some sort of book, a curious look on her face. She seemed to be having some sort of eureka moment, and he had no intention of interrupting, but he had to know if he could be of assistance.

“You seem preoccupied. Is something the matter?” He asked quietly, wanting to make his presence known, but having no desire to destroy her train of thought. She looked up, seemingly slightly startled, but making no physical indication of this knowin. It seemed that she had simply been so deep in thought that she hadn’t been able to sense his presence when he had approached.

“... Have you… is there a card sorting section in this library?” She asked, glancing between him and the book in her hand. If he didn’t know better, he’d say she looked almost concerned, and that in of itself was somewhat startling to him. He stepped back and turned to face the railing with her close behind him before taking the opportunity to turn towards the desk near the entrance. V gestured towards it before watching as she nodded politely and headed down towards it. Wondering what was going on, he took a moment to gently place the book back where it belonged before heading down to meet her, noticing that she was flipping through the cards on the table.

By the time he reached her, it became apparent that she had not located what she had been looking for. Her somewhat hurried and slightly alarmed minor threw him off as he contemplated if he should ask. She clearly noticed this, shaking her head slowly. “I didn’t mean to upset you. Forgive me. I found something troubling in this book, and it makes reference to a certain section “X” in this library that contains a book with the requisite information in it. But I don’t know where that section is, and I don’t see it anywhere in this guide.”

“That’s because no one goes in there, darling. Those texts are dangerous.”

Everyone in the room turned around, clearly alarmed by the presence of another individual that they had not noticed. Standing before them was a tall woman in a trailing black and silver dress with a gray hooded shawl over her head. Her face was exposed a moment later when she lowered the hood, revealing her to look very much like Magnolia and Luta. She was soaking wet, and none of them could find any indication that she particularly cared. A certain darkness almost seemed to radiate from her, making them all uneasy in different ways, specially Magnolia and Vergil, the pair seemingly recognizing her but alarmed by the state that she was in. Was something wrong with her aside from what was obvious to them? Because that was the only thing they could place.

Looking over at the two of them, the woman nodded for a moment before turning towards the stairs. She didn’t have to say that she would return. They could just feel it. And before long she vanished up the stairs, more than likely to change into something less saturated. V and Lucia both looked over Magnolia, clearly desiring an explanation as to who this absurdly unnerving woman was. Nero seemed to concur, slowly making his way over to the table and sitting down. He suddenly didn’t want to read anymore.

So… Who the hell is that?” He asked, his voice little more than a faint whisper. He didn’t seem scared so much as he was concerned, wanting to know if they were in any sort of danger. He had no idea what anyone in the Ludwig family was capable of, or if they were all on the same side. There had to be at least one outlier, didn't there?

Vergil and Magnolia shared a glance between one another as she nodded in response to her longtime friend’s unspoken question. Vergil almost seemed to pale slightly before leaning quietly on his elbow, thinking. But before any of them could inquire as to what was going on, Magnolia spoke. His voice was slightly shaky as she spoke.

“Section X is forbidden. It contains dark texts that you dare not view without the requisite knowledge. But if you must view them, that might be facilitated. And luckily for you, the only person with a key to it has just returned. Though she has changed significantly since I saw her last… ”

Making himself known for the first time in the better part of an hour, Sirrus came from behind a nearby bookcase and walked over to them before speaking quietly. He looked as though he had just seen a ghost, his normally pale complexion drained of all evidence that it had once contained blood or melanin. Magnolia’s youngest sister. Aluta. My father’s ex wife.”

(-~-)

I literally stopped to order macarons when I wrote the part about them and the eclairs. Something about it just triggered my sugar tooth. I’ve literally never eaten a macaroon in my entire life. But they are just so pretty! So anyway…

I hope you all had a great week! See you all in the comments, and on Wednesday with a new chapter! Gosh, it feels so great to say that again! I’ve missed you all! Things are about to get very interesting, and I can’t wait for you to be able to read them. I haven’t been this excited about the start of an arc since the flashback sequence!

#Hiraeth #My Post Devil May Cry 5 AU #V #Vitale #Devil May Cry 5 #DMC5 #DMCV #DMC #Vergil #Dante #Nero #Lucia #Nico #Magnolia #My OC

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galleryfake · 4 years ago

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in depth headcanon prompts;

from this post !

are there any recent/daily thoughts they have about death or dying?

he does not think about it, nor does he worry about it — the only times it comes into his thought process is when his survival instincts kick in for whatever reason, and he needs to remind himself that he must suppress the urge for flight and focus on the fight, even if he perishes in the process. he goes into dangerous situation with the acceptance that he may not survive it, and is relatively at peace with that.

do they believe for every darkness there is a lightness? if not, why?

nope. the belief of “light” and “dark” isn’t factual enough for him and he doesn’t care for or understand such comparisons. all he knows is loyalty to his loved ones and complete apathy for everyone else. food for the spider’s web.

name one thing about the way their emotions work that they despise.

haha, oh yes — his emotions completely get away from him when his troupemates are in danger, and he’s more prone to acting irrationally than he ever is ; see the conflict over whether or not to let paku go alone to see kurapika. the fact that he’d gladly comply with a captor’s demands just to see paku and chrollo unharmed speaks VOLUMES.

would they ever wish upon a falling star? if so, what would they wish?

nah, he wouldn’t. he’s more likely to quietly be reminded of a fact about meteorites he read about in a book once, and relay it to whoever he’s with if they bring it up.

describe how they would spend a stormy, overcast/rainy day.

inside, watching out the window. he doesn’t have much of a problem regulating his body temperature ever since he started developing his transmutation skills and it ended up expressing as ice — in simpler words, he’s not bothered by the cold anymore. he likes to watch the weather as it fluctuates and ponder each raindrop as it falls, it’s pretty easy for him to get lost in thought about pretty much anything. troupe’s #1 space cadet, challenged in ranking only by shizuku.

storms or clear skies?

storms, for the reasons mentioned directly above.

what about nature do they find calming? what about nature do they find disagreeable?

he’s fairly neutral on pretty much everything relating to it, aside from sating his natural curiosity of the world around him by gathering information about it in his spare time ; he can certainly tell you a few things about a particular biome or species of animal if he’s happened to read up on it. the only thing he actual hates is strong windstorms — he clocks in at about sixty-five pounds and is susceptible to being yanked around by gusts of wind, plus it makes his hair an absolute NIGHTMARE to untangle later.

list three or more people they would call out for during an emergency.

he wouldn’t. he blames himself & his own lack of fortitude for any unfortunate situation he finds himself in and doesn’t expect anyone to help him. he is surprised and very grateful anytime someone helps him out of an emergency ; it’s one sure-fire way to get in his good favor.

what is their typical response to being given orders?

from chrollo? absolute compliance, no questions asked. from literally ANYONE else? he will argue with you if he deems the order invalid in any way, and whether or not he ends up following anyways depends completely on his own whims.

describe a thought or dream that would cause them to have a mental meltdown.

he’s never been the type to have very emotionally intense dreams, so when he does have them, they throw him completely off his game and he may act very unlike himself until he gets back into his groove. ( gestures to this thread for an example of that. )

are there any reasons why they would ever think of self-harm? if so, what are they?

( content warning for suicide and self-harm below. ) ah, yes. pre-troupe, when he was still under the care of medical caretakers with questionable credentials in meteor city, he would attempt to end his own life with any nearby tools to escape from the utter hopelessness of medical confinement with no end in sight. after he escaped and went to live on the outskirts on his own, he was in a lot of pain for several months due to his body re-adjusting to the harshness of his conditions and would paradoxically slash at his own arms and neck in an attempt to feel some sense of control over the pain by causing it himself. it is only by a SHEER series of miracles that he’s managed to survive this long — although, after having unlocked his full potential with nen, he is much more hardy nowadays.

describe a physical action that shows complete trust.

hand-holding. as a conjurer and a transmuter channeling an element of the weather, his hands are the sole conductors of his power. anyone outside the troupe who even tries to capture his hands will swiftly find themselves with a limb twisted off or some similar wound of instinctual self-defense.

describe a verbal way they would express complete trust.

haha, he speaks pretty bluntly, so i would imagine he’d just say “i trust you”. he doesn’t say anything he doesn’t mean, so having it spoken aloud would be proof enough to anyone that knows him that he means it.

explain how they portray feelings of hostility or dislike.

honestly, it’s pretty hard for him to feel such a thing, because he’s more prone to being curious why someone is Like That rather than disliking it right off the bat. in the case of him finally getting outright tired of someone’s shit, he just avoids them like the plague. when even kortopi gets up and leaves to avoid being in the same room with you, it’s probably time to think about your life and life choices. 😂

what is something that causes them to question themself?

paku’s death was a BIG one that caused him to silently marinate in doubt and self-hate for weeks afterwards. in general, being told that his stance on something is wrong, or even worse, being proven on this is something that disturbs him and will bother him for weeks, prompting him to scramble for the source of the inconsistency within himself so he can correct it. with things that have to do with emotions or his gut reactions, he has no idea how to deal with it and will likely become distant for a while, spacing out into thought on level that even surpasses shizuku.

on a sleepless night, what would they be found doing?

reading a physical book or something on his phone, or shalnark’s laptop, if he’s truly unable to sleep. if he’s just having trouble falling asleep, he’ll just space out in thought, following his train of thought wherever it happens to take him until unconsciousness finally overtakes him.

name at least two people who can trust them with their life.

tagging the boyfriend @painxpacker and the bff @kyousei . fei & shal are without a doubt his most important people on an emotional level, his loyalty to chrollo residing in a different part of his brain altogether. he would die for chrollo if ordered ; he would do anything for feitan and shalnark, for any reason.

describe a way that will earn affection (whether platonic or romantic) from them.

he very much enjoys being infodumped to, as it piques his natural curiosity about everything and deviates from the norm of him just being given the basics of an order to be carried out ; carry on a conversation with him about something you’re interested in and let him ask a bunch of questions about it, and you may find him hanging around you more often.

describe a way to make them uneasy or apprehensive.

he has trouble understanding some of the more emotionally-driven members such as nobunaga and phinks, and finds their manner of thinking to be more or less unpredictable. he doesn’t avoid them persay, but he is more aware when talking to them that they may suddenly blow up or act irrationally. this doesn’t change the way he speaks to them whatsoever, it just adds an extra element of caution to his demeanor.

are they prone to violent outbursts or thoughts?

to say that he would never have an outburst would be a lie, but, i mean. the chance of it happening is like.... 0.001%. he is so utterly desensitized to violence that he can hardly even recognize it as such when it happens anymore, especially if there’s only a single target being maimed and there’s no one around to scream about it the horror of it all.

what are their creative outlets?

his transmutation nen is the main source — while conjuration is rather straightforward, there is a lot of variation to be had in manifesting ice crystals or frigid winds with his nen, and he messes around with it whenever the thought occurs to him to try something out in a particular set of circumstances.

do they tend to rely on words or actions more?

words and actions are one in the same to him. if he speaks something, he wouldn’t hesitate to act on it as well. if he acts on something, he would have no trouble relaying it in words. there is nothing ambiguous about the way he goes about things and that is his greatest strength as a member of the troupe.

#cw: self harm #cw: suicide #✧ headcanons — illusionary spider #; jolt at it again with the headcanon posts clocking in at fic-length wordcounts

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ganymedesclock · 6 years ago

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So it’s been a while since I’ve really posted about some goshdang rocks on this blog but I have been staying posted with Steven Universe and it’s really starting to bother me how often I’ve seen people in the fandom insinuating Change Your Mind, or the show at large, is naively idealistic in the way that it handles talking to dangerous people.

Here’s the thing: I don’t think there’s anything naive or idealistic about SU as a show and how it depicts talking to people.

First and foremost, Steven does not ever successfully talk to people in a situation where he hasn’t protected himself. When he does, it’s a bad thing. Steven doesn’t get the upper hand on White because he makes bambi eyes at her and sniffles a little and goes “oh granny won’t you be nice to me” and she immediately falls over herself to go “oh my goodness you beautiful baby child how could I ever have thought to wrong you.”

White endangers Steven. And at that point, Steven makes considerable emphasis to protect himself and his friends. Neither half of split Steven waste much time looking at White or acknowledging her. Their focus is on each other. Steven takes care of himself first. He makes sure he’s safe and healthy.

Thing is? Pink split Steven makes it clear that White can’t hurt him. She literally tries. She gets steamrolled. She’s lying unconscious on the floor at the point that Steven’s halves reconcile.

Steven at no point neglects protecting himself to negotiate with people. Even as early as Monster Buddy half of his argument at protecting Nephrite is the awareness that she’s obviously not trying to hurt him and becomes dangerous when she’s triggered by the senior CGs’ overbearing interventions. Steven not attacking Nephrite is literally the sensible thing here and the Crystal Gems are wrong because they assume that being violent will fix everything in absence of factual evidence. Steven is in no danger. The reason things go to hell at the climax of Monster Buddy is because Garnet’s earlier violent behavior meant that the sight of her summoning her weapons was a trigger for Nephrite- and, even then, she still protects Steven, the person who was consistently nice to her.

This is not a whimsical fantasy scenario. If you use brute force to push people around, they will remember, and will either resent you or panic when it seems like you’re about to hurt them again. If you’re up against someone who is motivated primarily by fear, don’t scare them.

“Violence isn’t the solution here” in this case is not an arbitrary nicey-pants talking point where “oh but see if you just sing songs and hold people’s hands they will all universally like you!” it’s talking about the fact that you need to actually meaningfully develop your response to situations based on information. Nephrite is a traumatized soldier suffering from an affliction that makes her easily startled. When she’s able to maintain a clear head, Steven is readily able to observe that she is friendly and willing to work with him. Steven not being violent to Nephrite is based in the fact that she is not a threat, and the Gems are failing to reevaluate because they’re just assuming she’s a threat based on prior behavior (and likely some bias- both out of the assumption that corruption can’t be cured and out of knowing Nephrite is a Homeworld soldier) and they’ve stopped observing what she’s actually doing.

The show doesn’t even exaggerate how much or how well talking to people works. We see people rebuff Steven (e.g. Jasper in Earthlings). We see people indifferently stonewall his overtures of friendship (Peridot in Marble Madness). We see people who take fondly to him because he’s nice to them but frankly trust him as far as they could throw him and don’t feel that bad selling out his friends (Lapis in The Return).

We see people give him a blank look of “are you actually kidding me” when he tries to talk to them (Aquamarine in Stuck Together)

Heck- the entire thesis of Beach City Drift is that Stevonnie needs to reevaluate the way they’re responding to Kevin because he’s engaging with them in bad faith and using it as an opportunity to mess with them.

The idea that this is unrealistic because, we guess Stevonnie doesn’t decide that Kevin messing with them means they need to take him out back and extrajudicially execute him on the spot just tells us something: Our culture has been spoonfed the idea, over and over and over again and mostly through popular cartoons, that violence is the default solution for problems.

This is an idea that SU is deliberately deconstructing like in Monster Buddy. Because- why are Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl just assuming Nephrite can’t be trusted? In-universe, they have their reasons, but those reasons are also wrong.

However, we have to consider that Steven was clearly operating on the assumption all the monsters are bad even though he was able to observe that some of the monsters were only dangerous by accident (the worm from Bubble Buddies).

He assumed the monsters were dangerous even though time and time again, they largely only targeted the Crystal Gems, and most of them were in remote environments hiding, and only are drawn out of hiding because the Crystal Gems deliberately hunt them down.

And this is an assumption so pervasive that when given starkly contradictory evidence in Monster Buddies, his initial reflex is to defend this viewpoint- saying Nephrite “isn’t like the other monsters” and then trying to tell her “you’re not a monster any more!” when she never was in the first place. She only seemed “like a monster” because Steven was fed a specific narrative from people who were in some ways ignorant to the reality of Nephrite’s situation, and in others withholding information. And Steven is not a gullible, unobservant, or callous person.

Here’s the thing: before we as an audience are told anything about the Gem monsters, we accept that. We take it as a given the Red Eye is going to crash into Beach City just because it’s bad. We assume the “Centipeetles” are hostile even though Nephrite’s drones are frankly no more aggressive than you’d expect a stray cat loose in your house to be, and Pearl is the one calmly standing there snapping one’s neck.

Personally, I grew up with the high fantasy genre. Heavy door-stopper books with dragons on the cover, and games like Final Fantasy. This is a genre that most popular codifying installments of give you broad, sweeping pastoral environments chock full of monsters that live exclusively to fight and kill you, and you need to kill them first. Anything that you shouldn’t kill on sight is going to immediately broadly flag you down so that you know not to murder this one. And killing monsters is never wrong. The ones that you aren’t supposed to kill, the narrative will coddle you so that you could never even think they might be just like the intrusive offal.

Sometimes you’re explained these monsters, they’re especially bad, because they did this bad thing or caused that bad thing to happen. Often you don’t actually witness it. Sometimes there’s simply no explanation given at all, but they are called “goblins” and they look strange and pointy and dangerous compared to the pretty likable-looking Heroes, and that’s supposed to be all the evidence you need to never worry if your heroes run them through.

We don’t worry, even if these monsters are actually people. We don’t worry even if they will directly talk to you and make it clear they believe they’re doing the right thing. After all, they have an entry in the in-game bestiary, and if they were really good, the game wouldn’t have given us the option to kill them, right?

When I hear people talk about “villains” and which villains are entitled to “redemption arcs”, what I hear overwhelmingly is thinking that sprouted from that genre, those games and those books. I hear, basically, the indoctrination that we just accept that worlds just have a bunch of Evil Things and the way to solve Evil is to kill it, and that the world will gently guide our hand so if it’s not actually Evil, then it will throw up its hands and drop to the floor and the battle music will stop and all of our combat commands will lock up.

We accept that Nephrite is evil, going in. Even though, actually watching that first episode, she’s standing on the outside of the Gem Temple, and doesn’t attack until the Crystal Gems barge out to threaten her. Nephrite is written from the very beginning of the show as an expression of its thesis statement.

Nephrite does not fling herself to the ground and whimper for mercy and try to stagger back to her proper Gem form as soon as she’s encountered. Nephrite is written, deliberately, as a monster. We accept that she’s here to be a threat for Steven to beat to prove himself. We accept that her pain doesn’t matter because she’s a monster.

We accept, in effect, that she is not a character with a life or a story. We accept that she is merely an empty receptacle for Steven’s fighting capabilities and inventiveness.

That’s preposterous. That’s ridiculous. If you suggest someone disagreeing with you is actually just an empty caricature of a person here to galvanize your growth as a person, or just show off what you’ve learned or accomplished since your past, people would look at you like you’d grown another head and rightfully so. There’s nothing “realistic” about that.

But it’s pervasive. It’s everywhere. And when patterns are repeated endlessly and repeatedly and constantly we get used to them.

It’s why Steven Universe, why Undertale, why even Off are treated as subversive narratives, even though they’re actually more realistic.

“But Clockie,” you say, “the Diamonds were so willing to talk and listen to Steven! That’s preposterous!”

“They sure weren’t in The Trial, or most of Reunited,” I say. “In fact the only reason they’re shown to have changed their mind so quickly is because Steven had a direct personal connection to them, and is that really so unlikely- that these people who have been alive for thousands of years and live at the heart of a densely populated empire would actually have connections with other people, who would not all homogeneously believe the same thing? That they could meet and interact with others who might change their opinions even slightly?”

And even then both Blue and Yellow try to talk Steven out of actually trying to say anything to White. And Steven literally points out why he’s doing this: because they tried fighting White, they tried fleeing White, and none of that worked. It failed to meaningfully change anything. And forcing change through by murdering White and standing on her corpse would just repeat the doomed rebellion because the staged murder of Pink Diamond just entrenched more people against the Crystal Gems.

Steven literally criticizes the refusal to attempt any form of negotiation as impractical. Because it is. The only reason people genuinely think violence as a narrative cure-all works is because we are basically raised in narratives- even narratives that are otherwise optimistic, friendly, and colorful- where the only solution is murder.

#Steven Universe #writing ruminations #readmore

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morlock-holmes · 6 years ago

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This anonymous article from the Washingtonian, (Which is apparently... a magazine? Of some sort?) “What Happened After My 13-Year-Old Son Joined the Alt-Right “ was being reblogged on my dash a few times and looking at some of the notes a lot of people were calling it propaganda without saying which side they thought it was propaganda for.

I think a LOT of people were so swayed by the “One Concerned Mom Speaks Out!” tone of the thing that they kind of missed the actual narrative.

I mean... If anything it’s kind of propaganda in favor of the alt-right, isn’t it?

Here’s how the author of the piece sums up the inciting incident in the story:

One morning during first period, a male friend of Sam’s [The author’s son] mentioned a meme whose suggestive name was an inside joke between the two of them. Sam laughed. A girl at the table overheard their private conversation, misconstrued it as a sexual reference, and reported it as sexual harassment. Sam’s guidance counselor pulled him out of his next class and accused him of “breaking the law.” Before long, he was in the office of a male administrator who informed him that the exchange was “illegal,” hinted that the police were coming, and delivered him into the custody of the school’s resource officer. At the administrator’s instruction, that man ushered Sam into an empty room, handed him a blank sheet of paper, and instructed him to write a “statement of guilt.”

No one called me as this unfolded, even though Sam cried for about six hours straight as staff members parked him in vacant offices to keep him away from other students. When he stepped off the bus that afternoon and I asked why his eyes were so swollen, he informed me that he would probably be suspended, but possibly also expelled and arrested.

Later there’s more, but basically the school authorities double down, Sam’s parents decided that if the authorities were that cruel and insane Sam needed to be in another school, and so they transferred him. Sam then starts getting into 4chan and reddit alt-right communities, who explain that what happened to him happened because of feminism gone crazy.

So, as a slight aside I have always thought since I was in high school myself that this kind of zero-tolerance, authoritarian crap is particularly cruel to inflict on growing children. A boy Sam’s age is trying to differentiate himself, see himself as an individual, and the authorities come in and go, “It doesn’t matter what you think, it doesn’t matter why you did what you did, we will never care about that, we see you as a type and there is nothing you can do to convince us otherwise.”

This message would be incredibly dispiriting to anybody, but particularly to children.

Contrast, meanwhile, his experience on Reddit:

Soon Sam stopped trying to convince me to join his brave new world. He was so active on his favorite subreddit that the other group leaders, unaware that he was 13, appointed him a moderator. Among his new online besties, this was a huge honor and a boost to his cratered self-esteem. He loved Reddit and its unceasing conversations about the nuances of memes—he seemed in love with the whole enterprise, as if it were an adolescent crush.

...

Eventually, Sam had to give up moderating for the most practical of reasons: Eighth grade ended and he was packing for sleep-away camp. He would be offline for a month and would need other mods to cover for him. To ask for help, he had to out himself as a kid.

Sam and I both laughed about the absurdity of the situation, though he admitted he was nervous he’d be exiled from moderating. I asked him to read me the responses to his message. They were all of the “Dude, you’ve got to be kidding me” variety—one of their most sophisticated and reliable colleagues was a middle-schooler heading off to Jewish summer camp!

Later, it was my turn to be surprised: They all contributed to a going-away gift for Sam and mailed an emoji-themed fidget-spinner to his bunk address.

Faced with new information that Sam has broken the rules, his school imediately brands him a predator, threatens to arrest and expel him, and responds with undisguised hate.

Faced with new information about who Sam is, his alt-right buddies are shocked, but then reiterate that they still care about him and value the contributions he has made to their community, and get together to express that to Sam.

I’d like to make a little list of what Sam gets from the alt-right in the narrative:

A group of people who have shown that they will support and value him, even if they find out new things about him.

People who listen and care about what he has to say

An explanation of what, exactly, happened to him and why.

Ideas about how he can protect himself and others from having that happen again in the future.

Allies and support for enacting those ideas.

His parents, by his Mother’s own admission in the article, were only able to provide fumbling efforts to provide protection from that particular school’s administration. His parents and their politics were totally ready to say that taking all that stuff about cucks seriously was pretty weird and dumb, his mother is totally ready to counter any statistics his alt-right buddies might have, but is completely and utterly unequipped to provide any of the other stuff I listed up there. There’s a moment where Sam explains to her what he and his friends think happened:

Sam pledged fealty to the idea of men’s rights because, as he said, his former administrator had privileged girls’ words and experiences over boys’, and that’s how all of his troubles had started in the first place. I’d never in my life backed the “masculinist” cause or imagined that men needed protecting—yet I couldn’t help but agree with Sam’s analysis.

The mother’s politics didn’t actually equip her with an alternate explanation of what happened; rather, she has to concede that his explanation makes sense, and having conceded that has no idea what to do with herself.

In fact, as the article ends she is only vaguely starting to come to grips with the fact that Sam needed the kinds of support I listed above:

“All I wanted was for people to take me seriously,” [Sam] repeated matter-of-factly. “They treated me like a rational human being, and they never laughed at me. I saw the way you and Dad looked at each other and tried not to smile when I said something. I could hear you both in your room at night, laughing at me.”

I struggled for a moment because I wanted to tell him that wasn’t true. But I couldn’t deny his accusation. Behind closed doors, when my husband and I thought our children were asleep, we had often vented to each other about Sam’s off-the-wall proclamations and the bizarre situation we found ourselves in.

So I told Sam simply that I was sorry for making him feel bad.

I still think about his words a lot, especially when alt-right figures headline the news. But mostly, I wonder how I could have tried so hard to parent Sam through this crisis and yet tripped up on something as basic as not making my own kid feel small.

By the end of the article Sam is disenchanted with the Alt-right through, well, it’s not totally clear. The author of the article, by the end, seems to understand that Sam needed at least some of the things I outlined up there, but it’s not clear to me if she views the fact that her own politics were completely unable to provide them as an actual problem.

In fact, it’s not clear to me what she believes her politics are actually for. I know, I know, it’s not a philosophical article, but the question of “How much power do public school administrators have over their charges and what can parents do to counter them” is a nakedly, inarguably political question; after all, it’s about how a state-run institution should be run. And rather then turning to her own left-wing beliefs to contextualize and fight this decision, her solution is that her family has enough money to put Sam in another school.

Now, I’m not criticizing this decision, I think it was probably difficult, even brave. But it’s noticeable that her left-wing, non-culty politics don’t seem to have much to offer the next Sam, a Sam whose parents might not have private school tuition sitting around in their bank accounts.

In fact, she seems to regard the fact that Sam’s alt-right buddies were able to offer up compelling narratives and give him hope of implementing a solution and reasserting his self-worth as, well, cheating. Isn’t that cult-like behavior? Politics aren’t actually supposed to help the Sams of the world contextualize the things that happen in their lives, and when they do, it’s awfully sinister.

This seems to be part of something that has heavily infected the American left. It’s a kind of unspoken philosophy that says, “Politics is for solving major problems, the rest should be handled elsewhere.”

Even when a question overtly connected to Mom’s politics crops up in their life, her politics have literally nothing practical to offer any of them. Her left-wing politics are correct it doesn’t matter if they’re helpful.

This is what I keep trying to get at when I say people are missing the point with Jordan Peterson. Yeah, a lot of what he says sounds factually rickety to me as well, but, well, when I spend every day wondering why I can’t seem to get my life together, simultaneously dreading it AND feeling like there’s no point in trying to change, how does having a more correct view of lobster biology help me out with that?

I mean, I’m not saying it can’t, I’m saying people won’t even connect the two. Look at the reviews of 12 rules and people will usually grudgingly admit that his self-help advice might be useful, but really, it will tend to rile up exactly the wrong kind of person, and anyway, what does any of this have to do with politics?

This is what I keep trying to get at about effective altruism, as well. It’s not that it’s wrong, it’s that by its very nature it will never be about providing me, personally, with any help, because it’s focused on stopping rogue AIs and mailing out malaria nets, fine causes but notice that, while Rationalists see “How can I stop a super-intelligent AI from destroying us” as a solvable problem “How do I make the kind of friends who will spontaneously check on me if I sound like I’m sick?” is completely insolvable.

To the extent that my existing faculties haven’t already made it happen, unfortunately there are no clarifying frameworks or advice better than, “Well, it’s hard.”

Rationalists are better about this than generic leftists but I also feel like that’s a low bar. Answers to the question “What can I do to concretely improve my life, and, for that matter, why should I even bother, what’s the point?” are becoming ever more disconnected from left-wing thought, and most of the concrete attempts to answer these questions are coming from the right.

I actually don’t think this is good, incidentally.

#politics #rationalism

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voracious-pumpkira-starr · 5 years ago

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VORE COMMUNITY PSA

False information was spread about me with very little truth. While some is truth, others are either taken from untrustworthy sources or were said by people whom are enemies i made in the past to make me more hated. I dont know if all of you know the post im refering to, i wont link it here but it has been causing me a lot if stress

Now I’m not going to deny some parts of the post because they are factual. But other parts are false. I havent blackmailed people for roleplay, and I dont charge back payments. The charging back of commissioned artwork is only from the artists point of view. And even then its heavily exxagerated. What happened was I spent too much money on porn commissions using a family members credit card on my own paypal, i paid this family member to do this of course bit they didnt know what i was buying. After i spent over $1000 CAD they realized I was spending it on porn and called paypal to charge it back. Paypal charged it back. I tried and tried to get paypal to send the money back but they locked me out of the account and the family member refused to let me send the money to them. Since then I was only able to pay back one artist of many, its not just artists. Paypal took back all payments and I even lost some of my art programs such as Clip studio EX because of this. Ive also lost many mobile apps and more. This caused me a lot of stress and I wasn’t allowed to use a credit card for a long time. Now, You know who. A certain artist who made these claims. Yes I admit I tried to roleplay with them but I will be honest. This is a honest statement from my own mouth. There is many many people in the community who KNOW I’m sumlur and are of age who roleplay with me and I wont name them to keep them same from harassment. Im not innocent but neither are the people like YOU who spread this information. And I will send you this post privately. Yes it is not my place to be in the vore community but because I have it helped with my depression and I learned many things that made me better as a person. I know my mistakes and I understand even when 2021 comes I will be hated in the community or even not let back in at all. But all I’m going to say. Is that yes I was immature and regret a lot of my decisions. But i stopped ban evading and all that long ago. It is now 3 years since this ekas portal drama has started with me, I, because of outdated or false information spread by you and many others have been Doxxed and had my info leaked on 8chan by a user named cloud runner teeny on 12/24/2018. Its been over a year since i was doxxed and I have been struggiling with depression and at multiple times even was suicidal. I nearly killed myself on lean (purple drank). Im not asking for pity because we both know I did aome messed up shit but making a PSA about me and spreading things from your point of view is only half the story. Many people have harassed my social media because of this or even turned me into a laughing stock. So here, if it makes you happy Cham. I’ll make a statement right here right now publically for all to see. If i lose friends for this then whatever it is what it is. It took me a lot of guts and a long time to say this but the stress has gotten to much for me. for the sake of peace I’ll admit to everything Chammy was correct about me ane everything that was false along with some misconceptions about me: so firstly Chammy is right about my age. My birthday is 01/30/2003. I am nearly 17 years old. Chammy is also correct about me asking him for roleplay stuff. However many adults i know who know my age are fine roleplaying with me and I will make this very clear for all of tumblr and the world. Yes I know the underage law and why you think you would be at risk of becoming a sex offender. But hear me out, I’ve actually talked to online lawyers about this and there was never a statement in US Federal law about roleplaying with minors being wrong. The only thing that is bad is if your doing it with malicious intent or send real nudes. As for the age of consent, that is 16 and as far as I know you can legally have sex with anyone within 5 years apart from you as long as its not recorded at that age. So I would assume roleplay would be legal unless its recorded or screenshotted just the same. So yes although it might be risky there is almost a 100% gaurentee your not at risk unless you go bragging about it or the minors parents

Report you. And I don’t have parents, my birth parents abandoned me for a life of crime and my grandparents had custody over me since i was 2 years old. My grandparents know about my vore fetish and although they think its weird they are fine with it to some extent. I can assure you for a fact they won’t report you unless your asking me for literal nudes, which I’d never even give away. Secondly I wanted to bring up the fact I did NOT try to sneak into Cham’s server I was asking if somebody could vouch to let me in so at 18 my friend Andy (WHO KNOWS MY AGE) could vouch for me since he/you closed all invites because of people insulting male predators.

Nextly I want to say this, Chameleonette is not a bad person. They aren’t spreading lies about me on purpose they are only saying what they were told which was spread around by many people who hate me such as aljenserp, AlluringPredation, Reffles, Cloudrunnerteeny, and artists who think i charged back on purpose. Now I also want to bring up the accusations of blackmailing adults who roleplayed with me. This is false, the only adults i ever blackmailed where ones who knew my age and asked for nudes, or were ACTUAL MINORS pretending to be adults which i know for fact.

Now I will admit I exposed some of these friends as minors out of anger and lost friends for this. I regret this so i wont say which ones, But I blackmailed them about exposing their age for some fights in the past.

But I will also admit again I did some stupid shit in the past and I understand the hate I have but its been causing me lots of stress and Harassment on social media. Look cham, if you actually take the time to read this I’m sorry for everything ive done to you and the vore community but I want to say that the adults arent entirely innocent either. I caused these problems by lying about my age, joining ekas, ban evading, manipulating people, and buying art when I shouldnt have. All of it has come back to bite me in the ass. Combined with the stress from real life I couldn’t take things anymore and essentially ruined my life. As of now I dropped out of highschool because the stress was too much and couldn’t work anymore. Now I’m educationless and most likely won’t get a job. For those who are curious in one year and 29 days is when I will be 18. And if any of my friends whom dont know my age read this I want to say I’m sorry for lying. I strongly have issues and am really clingy to people I like so I end up lying to make friends. And i know many people are going to block me for this so in turn I will end up more stressed but its the most mature thing i could think to do. I would love it if nobody blocked me and we just talked like friends and save the vore stuff for when I’m 18, which I do with many of my friends already. As stated before the whole reason i joined ekas in the first place was to join a community i felt like i fit in with after getting depression from losing a friend i really cared about named anatoily

Many times in the past i used anatoily as an excuse for my actions but thats not what im doing. Anatoily if you see this i want to know im sorry for using your name as an excuse for my wrong actions. I originally joined Ekas for that purpose and used that as an excuse, on there i made many friends some of which i have even today. At one point i planned on leaving ekas but then I found somebody who reminded me of anatoily. I had an obsession with them and it led me to well ruin that friendship. Around this time i was exposed underage by Reffles on a minecraft server who had a incorectly dated birth date from a Enjin server about me claiming i was 14 when i was 15 which now i am 16 turning 17 and that link would display 15 turning 16. To explain this I want to say when I made this enjin account I mistyped the age and never bothered fixing it because I rarely used Enjin. I just used it to apply for minecraft admin positions.

I regret many of the things ive done and cant stress this enough that I’m sorry but in all honesty this is the true story of what happened with me and the vore community

In 2017 I joined ekas because my mind didn’t care about the consequences I was upset about anatoily, which isnt an excuse for my actions. I lied about my age and all was fine i was getting away with it. I met the person who reminded me of anatoily in February of 2018 whom helped me grow as an artist. I started working as a artist practicing for when I’m 18. When reffles found me out i was upset and was banned from ekas and the discord Work to Feed. I was upset for many reasons, one even being that i just got the first person ever to commission me and even today was never able to do the art or send it to them making me feel like a thief

So a lot of ban evading and ruined friendships later some problems happened with me and a friend named Aljenserp who like me was a minor. I was watching one of Silent_E’s streams and got banned because Tyrion13 recognized me. I betrayed Aljenserp like an asshole saying he was underage (i dont think he is underage anymore but he was at the time this happened) because he was a staff nobody believed me and i was banned from the stream and lost all trust aljenserp had in me. He became my enemy. Now after this a lot of people started hating me more and more, there was some drama on 8chan about me which i posted on being some idiot as i was younger and didnt know what i was doing.

This caused many people to not even feel any pity for me thinking i was stupid and deserved what i got. This was shortly before the problem happened with paypal. After that i was hated immensely more and many people startee saying some stupid rumors about me

One really dumb one was from the ekas user ExplosiveWaifu who has a Dragon OC named Lydia. Goes by DragonWaifu on discord. In one instance i was talking to Lydia about how one of my friends was a Maoist communist and his beliefs and how i support him because he is my friend. She believed because he had communist beliefs and i supported him that i was a terrorist and ceased all Communication with me for this. Another false rumor about me was spreaded by a friend of Explosivewaifu who i cant name as they are always changing their name. she is a trans woman, me and her used to talk a lot and whenever she got drunk she would well... be really irl lewd with me so i started calling her a pedophille (which is where the blackmail stuff ties in partially though i didnt blackmail her it was somebody else)

Many times this friend while sober would claim that i act to mature and that I couldnt be a minor, thus a rumor spread around that inwas a adult pretending to be a minor to get kicked out of the community for purposfully causing drama to make people think im a believable minor so i could easily prey on minors like a pedophille... honestly this is a really dumb rumor and dunno why it was believed by anybody at all

Next I want to talk about the ID theft accusations. Mettra Tonic gave me a health band from the hospital which in July of 2018 i tried to use as a ID to get me unbanned and it failed, this led to trust issues with Mettra who also spread false information about me which is mostly well known for the accusations of blackmail against her friends who were minors. There was another ID issue with a man named worthylightning and Kobayashi whom I tried to. Let them both help me get unbanned because friendship. It didnt work and i felt bad.

Lastly the only true case of ID theft is the one with reffles. Reffles gave somebody her ID who gave me the ID and I cropped out the age part of her ID and tried to use it. I since regret this action but i wouldnt concider the age part alone to be ID theft.

There was also accusations that I steal artwork which i dont own which is false. All artwork of Pumpkira is owned by me, either drawn by me, won in a raffle, requested, or given to me as a gift.

Moving on later in the year CloudRunnerTeeny doxxed me and made a group on discord called the Sumlur eradication squad where he blackmailed me and threatened to leak my info (which he did on christmas onto 8chan before it was taken down for breaking ToS) me and my friend tried to mislead him do he wouldnt Dox me and dox a fake person but this failed, made things worse infact. After that me and teeny came to a truce to leave eachother alone if i stay away from him and his friends. A promise I Semi-kept to today.

I already explained the whole issue with the art charged back, false rumors, and blackmail.

But I want to say this. Please stop sending information that is outdated or just speculation about me. Hear both sides of the story.

And yes when I turn 18 in 2021 I know I’ll still be hated and I have come to terms and accept that is my punishment for my mistakes. But please stop sending drama my way as I am very tempted to just delete all my social media at this point. Its gotten really stressful and I just cant...

Also Chammy again you aren’t a bad person i dont blame you for my hate as Its deserved. Although some of your claims were wrong or from your point of view, others were true and It is good you made a statement about me. But please tell people not to harass me and just block me. I’m going to make this post Private for a while before making it public. I want you to read this before it goes public on my Tumblr.

Lastly I heard you were feeling sick and hope you get better.

From artist to artist I have been improving my art and stories which like you one thing i hope for when im 18 is to be a successful artist or writer. Im already planning a large scale SFW webcomic as many people know. Though I feel like it is going to have a negative impact because Pumpkira is the protagonist and i gaurentee at least one person from the vore community would expost past me to everyone who reads future me’s work

Anyways thats all.

Update 2020: now 17

Update: 2021 now 18 as of January 30th 2021

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irondadgroupie · 6 years ago

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Bohemian Rhapsody: Chapter 5

We want to pretend like the week-long hiatus was planned @intoresus but honestly, we would be lying :D First was Easter and- you know what we are talking about.

When May Parker received the call, it had been a bad sign from the very beginning. There weren’t many people that would call her during work. The number wasn’t Peter’s, so it couldn’t be him telling her he was inviting Ned over - or staying for another night at the Stark Tower. It was a stranger talking on the other end of the line, calmly but urgently. He refused to tell what had happened, or why she was asked to come in the first place, just repeated he’d send a driver to pick her up and bring her to the compound.

There she was now, in the back of a small limousine - a little extravagant, as was everything coming from Tony Stark, but at least she was getting where she needed to be and had a little more time to try and reach Peter. A part of her knew he wouldn’t pick up, but the bigger, more optimistic part was always expecting to hear his voice at the other end of the line, or a new message, but nothing. The last one was from eleven this morning:

Dishes are washed. Mr Stark’s picking me up for lunch in a few. Be back tomorrow.

May didn’t exactly dislike Tony, but she wasn’t entirely warming up to him either. She knew he was trying to be supportive, and that Peter had lightened up since Stark had walked into his life. However, she questioned his behavior. What did Tony Stark want? It was a question that didn’t let her go. He appeared as if he really cared for her kid, but so had other people in Peter’s life - people who had ended up using him, in the truest sense of that word. May still felt sick thinking about it. Who was telling her that this was about Peter and not about Iron Man needing a side-kick superhero? Or about having the kid work on some ideas Tony could present as his own in the future?

As far as she’d heard – the man wasn’t exactly a hermit - it wouldn’t have been the first time. Back in 2002, there had been a heavy accusation of Stark stealing an idea for using concepts that were rumored not to be his. The case was dropped two years later due to the lack of evidence, but with the amount of Tony Stark’s wealth, he might’ve just bribed the entire court. Peter could spend a day talking non-stop about how the man had changed over the course of the past few years, but May couldn’t shake off her doubts. No one could make a 180 change after being an arrogant and eccentric millionaire for half of his life. Peter had a general tendency to trust people too quickly and too easily, believing in the good in everyone, no matter if they deserved it or not. The fact that he’d worshipped Tony Stark for most of his life didn’t help with that either. That’s what was getting her anxious about the two of them spending so much time together: If it were really about Stark’s intention to exploit her boy, it would be easy for him, and Peter probably wouldn’t even realize anything until it was already too late.

Twenty unlucky calls later they reached their destination, and May was guided inside the building.

“Mrs Parker?” She heard it before she saw it, her worst fears coming true. The woman in front of her her was wearing scrubs. She was a medic.

“Yes,” May answered tonelessly. “I’m here for my nephew, Peter.”

“Sure. Follow me, please.” The worst part about the entire situation was that May had been working in the medical field for long enough to recognize patterns. They guided her away from the main area, because the news wouldn’t be good. Because they wanted her to have a private room, a place to sit down before they’d fill her in. And that was exactly what was happening.

“I have to inform you that your nephew has been involved in an animal-vehicle crash earlier this afternoon.”

May heard the words, but their meaning didn’t put itself together. As if she was trapped in a nightmare. Getting the gist of a situation, nothing more. “He’s receiving the best medical care in this facility, I assure you.” Yet another typical sentence. Nothing with vital information.

May needed it. Needed some information, at least whether or not Peter was alright.

“How is he?”

The shuffle. A second offer for a glass of water. Again, May shook her head.

“He’s suffered something we call a hypothermia, which is factually a lowered body temperature, alongside a concussion and a splenic trauma. His vitals are stable at the moment. However, I am obligated to inform you that the severity of his injuries had caused a cardiac arrest. We managed to take control of it rather quickly, but Peter has unfortunately slipped into a coma.”

The universe around May Parker didn’t exist anymore. She��d heard all those words before. Screamed along hospital hallways, whispered between some doctors. All of them had a meaning that she was well aware of. The medic offered her sincerest apologies and suggested she’d bring her to Peter’s room whenever she felt ready but May ignored her. She wasn’t ready.

Barely a few years ago she had lost her husband.

And now they wanted to tell her that she almost lost her nephew by the skin of his teeth?

No. This had to be a nightmare, a very, very cruel nightmare.

Peter was at home, with Ned, building Lego sets.

In Stark’s lab, working on some secret inventions.

Maybe outside, as Spider-Man, saving ‘the little people’.

Safe.

Not in the ICU of a high-class medical facility.

She barely listened to the explanation of how it had come to the crash in the first place. The only informations she tried to keep in her mind was how the current prognosis and future treatment looked like. “Tests came back promising, and we assume that his healing factor will continue to have a positive effect. However, we can’t yet tell when he’s going to wake up.”

Her vision blurred by tears that refused to fall and the pain was so awful it literally made her feel hollow, as if she was helplessly sinking into quicksand.

Episodes of sadness had been a constant companion ever since Ben’s death, and usually Peter was helping her out. That’s what they always did: Cheering each other up - balancing each other out. But now? Now Peter couldn’t. Now it was on her alone.

They were about to explain her that he was currently still ventilated, due to his lungs needing to recover from the effects of drowning, when they entered the room.

Her first glance didn’t meet Peter - she doubted she would’ve recognized him under the thick blankets and with the countless wires covering him. But maybe it would’ve been good if that’s the first she saw. It would’ve anchored her.

Instead, the first thing she saw beyond the waterfall in her eyes was Tony Stark - One hand in her nephew’s hair, the other resting on his chest, mumbling something she didn’t comprehend. The first thing she saw was him.

The man who’d driven the car Peter got hurt in.

In that moment, he wasn’t Tony Stark anymore. Not Peter’s hero, not the man who’d rescued him after the crash.

He was the enemy.

“You-“ You did this. But the words didn’t leave her mouth, this cruelty was tying her tongue. She saw Tony looking up in what she believed to be shock and surprise.

“May- I'm sorry-“

“No. Don’t you dare attempt to apologize. This - you did this!”

“May,” Pepper stepped forward and tried to grasp the woman's arm in comfort. “We are all upset and shocked about this. How about you sit down, I'll get you tea-“

“No, no tea can solve this! You people caused this! It was your car he was in and you were driving,” She screamed at Tony. Tears spilled from her eyes and her face was read with rage. “You promised to take care of him and you broke it! Why? Because he had that good idea before you and you needed him out of the picture?”

“What?” Tony whispered and his shock and resentment flushed away to disbelief. “- I saved him! That doesn't make any sense!”

“What do I know about you rich people? Intern in coma sounds better than a dead one.”

Tony opened his mouth and closed it in the same instant, his chest suddenly feeling way too tight to speak, or even move. Somewhere outside of his mind, Pepper was asking him to calm down in a tone as worried as he’d never heard it before - which was huge, given the condition the woman had seen him in already, physically and mentally. But on the inside, there were only two things repeating themselves, one after another.

Peter could be dead.

You did this.

“May, you need to be careful. Tony is also healing. He can't take much emotional stress or his heart-“ Pepper told as she helped her husband to the bed. He wasn’t fighting her, and Pepper realized that she hated this more than him arguing with her. It meant that May’s words, spoken in terrible grief, had left an invisible, but no less painful scar in Tony’s heart.

“Yeah, that can be easily arranged,” May sniffed. “I want you out.”

“What?” Tony whispered, eyes wide.

“Both of you, out. I don't want you anywhere near Peter or me. Only family is allowed and you are certainly not family. Leave us alone or I swear to God I am taking this to the court.”

“A lawsuit? She can’t be serious about that. What’d be the charges? Saving her nephew from drowning? We’re in America, not China, or the middle-ages.”

Pepper kept her voice quiet only to avoid catching another deprecating glare from one of the night nurses. She and Rhodey stood outside Tony’s room in the long hallway. Although being on the possibly highest dose of non-anesthetic sedatives possible, Tony was in a light sleep, and Pepper did in no way intend to unnecessarily wake him. He needed rest, his heart and mind a break from conscious thinking. It had been hard enough to see how much the man had been suffering after May had insisted on him leaving. Doctors from both sides had tried to smooth down the conflict - arguing that it would be beneficial to both Tony and Peter’s conditions to not separate them, but May hadn’t listened. And with her being the boy’s legal guardian, there was nothing they could do about it.

Tony had been devastated, in a way that Pepper had never seen him. He’d been crying, unresisted, the entire way back, and even after they’d shot him the sedatives to lower the risk of a further arrhythmia, he’d still mumbled “I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry” until he finally fell asleep.

“She’s in shock.” Rhodey reasoned, and Pepper frowned at him in return.

“As is Tony. We all are. Hell, I certainly am.” Curses weren’t exactly in her typical daily word-repertoire, but this certainly wasn’t a typical day. “Gives her no reason to lash out at us that way. Her behavior could’ve caused Tony a heart attack and god knows I would’ve gone to court if that happened.”

“Pep.” Rhodey sighed. “She’s raised the boy.”

He almost made a step backwards at the ice in Pepper’s eyes when she looked at him. “I’m not saying I understand what she did, I’m just -“ He massaged his temple. The day had been nerve-wracking and horrible, and he was slowly feeling the pay-off. “Just imagine it’d be your kid in there. You, I, we all know Tony the way he is. We’ve seen him grow over the years, we have seen evidence enough that he isn’t the 00’s Tony Stark anymore. He proves that to us every minute of every day.

“For May... For May he’s the man that everyone’s talking about. America’s most criticized person. Everyone who owns a functional TV has heard of him, and the media doesn’t have a reputation of showing people at their best. For May, he’s the billionaire superhero that supports her son fighting crime at night. She has no idea who he really is or how much he really cares. He’s honestly just that guy in the driver’s seat for her, but it’s her son that’s caught the worst of this crash, and she needs someone to blame, because otherwise, all of that might be too cruel to handle.”

Pepper did not answer, but the words stuck with her. After all, Rhodey might be right. From the outside perspective, with just the media as a source of information, she probably wouldn’t trust Tony either, no matter how hard it was to imagine that. To imagine that no one saw her Tony as the gentle, loving human being that he was.

“You’re staying with Tony till morning? I’ll leave her for the night, and hope she’s a little more at ease tomorrow. We can help her through this.”

And Tony’s going to break if she refuses to let him see Peter for longer than a day.

Tony woke up in the middle of the night, feeling like someone had smashed a building right on top of him. He needed a while to recognize his surroundings, and to scan his memory for the reason for his pain. As soon as he did, he wished he hadn’t.

The worst seconds after trauma weren’t those when you’re confused about what’s been happening, but the flashes of minutes - hours even - burning themselves through your mind all at once.

His movie had an injured Peter as the main protagonist, and May’s angry voice as soundtrack. Her accusations stung. They stung, because after all, he’d thought that May would know him better than that.

The story she was referring to had happened years ago.

Some “upcoming star technician”, that had just started his small independent business, had denounced him because some of the blue-prints that Tony had used for filing a patent for his latest invention looked similar to his. It had become a top story; people believed it to be more realistic that a billionaire would steal ideas rather than a small company would use the indictment to sneak themselves some money and attention.

It wasn’t just that Tony’s ego was far too big to ever steal someone’s idea to enrich himself.

He could never do something like that to Peter.

The project the kid had been working on every time he’d been in the lab for the past couple of months had grown into something solid. There were still some edges on it that’d need fine tuning and Tony had gladly volunteered to help fix those, but this would always be Peter’s invention entirely, his baby and he would make sure that he’d get all the well- deserved credit for it.

He wouldn’t take that achievement away from the kid.

And he certainly wouldn’t cause a crash to... he couldn’t even finish the thought without feeling sick. His breathing would’ve quickened along with his heart-rate under normal circumstances, but with the amount of anti-arrhythmias rushing through his system, his body seemed to be stuck in its rhythm.

That didn’t make the idea any less hurtful. The image of how different the day could’ve ended for both of them. A world without Peter Parker would be a gruesome world, without light or colors or sounds, just a hollow emptiness. That’s what Tony had almost pictured hell like: A hollow place.

Sleeping had become impossible now. If he’d close his eyes, he would always see the picture of Peter’s lifeless, pale body in front of him. But staring in the darkness didn’t help the awful feeling either.

Rhodey was sitting in the armchair next to his bed, head hanging on his shoulder, snoring lightly.

For a moment, Tony considered waking him, aware that Rhodey would definitely be mad if he didn’t do it, but he had no intention to have the following conversation about how he felt, or that he should rest and not worry.

He turned his head to the other side, searching for the access button they’d given him that’d give him a light dose of painkillers if his pain became unbearable, but his eyes met something else: a metallic object glistening in the moonlight shining throught the window.

Oh please, let it be.

It was indeed his StarkPad, and Tony suddenly relaxed. This was better than painkillers. This would keep his mind busy enough for a while not to be sucked in the downward spiral of anxiety.

His arms moved sluggishly, and for a moment he feared he’d drop the Pad, but he managed to settle it quietly onto his lap.

A memo turned up.

You should really sleep, Tony.

But I love you, and I know you won’t, so take it easy right now.

Tony let out a breath and smiled weakly. Pepper had put up shortcuts to all his favorite music tracks and some brain-melting arcade games. However, Tony had other intentions. He couldn’t find it in himself to allow the distraction of playing simple mobile games - worse enough that Peter had infected him with that BlockMastery hype a few weeks ago - and music was the last thing he needed right now. He doubted he could ever listen to a rock song again. Not with one of them being so closely associated with this day.

No. He needed to do something else.

The ObserverSystem refused his command.

Access denied It reported, and Tony already frowned, checking the command protocols until he found the error: A foreign protocol called “Recover & Rest” that blocked all functions aside from games, music and video-platforms. Pepper knew him to well. But she should’ve known that this wasn’t keeping him from doing what he had to.

//Override. 496e76656e746f72 He typed, and the protocol was immediately turned off. The next burden didn’t come as a surprise, and the needed code was easier to type.

//Override. 50726f746563746f72

The system needed a few seconds before the medical database was fully loaded. After that, it was a matter of seconds to get the access to Peter’s data and connect himself to the kid’s vital monitors. Audio output was still turned off, and for almost a minute Tony just appreciated the wonderfully rhythmical spikes on screen and the ease that came with not having to wait for the sound underlying one of them.

He changed audio delivery to his headphones and the rhythmic beeps audible were more calming than even the best movie soundtrack could ever be, because each of them meant that Peter’s heart had made another beat, each of them meant that for now, his kid was alright.

It was the soundtrack that guided him to sleep.

#irondad #fanfic #bohemian rhapsody #whump #medical whump

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belphegor1982 · 5 years ago

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The FFnet (song) title for this chapter is “Going Mobile”, after a Who song. Because it’s high time we got this show on the road, isn’t it :3

FAIRY TALES AND HOKUM

Summary: 1937: Two years after the events of Ahm Shere, the O’Connells are “required” by the British Government to bring the Diamond taken there from Egypt to England. In Cairo, while Evelyn deals with the negotiations and Rick waits for doom to strike again, Jonathan bumps into an old friend of his from university, Tom Ferguson. Things start to go awry when the Diamond is stolen from the Museum and old loyalties are tested… (story on AO3; on FFnet)

(Chapters: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)

Chapter 11: The Misgivings of Izzy Buttons (on AO3 here)

Evelyn O’Connell was tired.

Not that this particular fact in itself was surprising: she was usually the first to admit that she was not much of a morning person. She could burn the midnight oil for what Rick qualified as an unreasonably long time, but when it came down to getting up in the morning… Well, sometimes it needed all of Rick’s persuasion to get her eyes to open.

Now, having slept less than ten hours after a sleepless night would make anyone tired. Not being a morning person had very little to do with that, especially since the old clock in the entrance corridor had just struck seven o’clock in the evening.

However, strain had never dampened Evy’s determination. And Sheikh al-Nazar didn’t seem to notice that she blinked a bit more than was polite as he recounted his interview with Tom Ferguson.

Evelyn couldn’t say she wasn’t a little bit disappointed at first. For one brief, shining moment, she had thought she would find Ferguson in Nazlet El Samman and drag him back to her house by the ear to make him spill the beans about where Rick and Jonathan had been taken. Then, as Rick would have said, they would have been onto something constructive.

But things were never that easy, she thought as she listened to the Sheikh’s tale.

She listened intently as he told her about the plans of that Hamilton fellow, and felt something twist her stomach at the correction al-Nazar brought about the Army of Anubis and what they would do if unleashed on the world. It was maybe a sign that she was getting used to apocalypses that Evelyn quickly got over her initial shock; but she all but gasped when the old man mentioned ever so casually that he had asked Anubis for information about his army. Of course, as a librarian, she had heard and read about High Priests calling upon gods in time of dire necessity, but the Bembridge scholars would dismiss such hearsay as fairy tales, not factual, verifiable reality. Then again, she thought, a small smile making its way on her lips, the Bembridge scholars were wrong about a lot of things.

“What did Anubis say?” she asked, the familiar feeling of mingled excitement and apprehension that appeared each time she was confronted with something unknown or unheard of awakening in her chest.

Al-Nazar marked a small pause, as though hesitating – as though he almost did not think she would take what he had said seriously.

“The great god Anubis told me that Ahm Shere would not see the next year. He is claiming her, and to him she must go.”

Evy’s mind began to race. She barely noticed Alex and Ardeth breaking off their conversation and looking at her.

“Dr Hakim said that the pyramid is probably still buried under the sand… That means it will be utterly destroyed before the next New Year’s Day, doesn’t it? Well, this means we’ve still –”

She felt her jaw unhinge in spite of herself as a certain thought popped into her mind.

The Egyptian calendar had nothing to do with the Gregorian calendar. And the next New Year was to begin on –

Evy felt colour drain from her cheeks.

“Oh my God… we’ve only got four days to stop them.”

“Three, Mum,” came her son’s voice, a little bit more high-pitched than usual. Alex looked suddenly paler under his blond fringe.

Sadek al-Nazar gave a slight bow, and Evy turned back to him.

“Now you know everything I know. I hope you all succeed in your endeavours, whatever those might be. Farewell.”

A second later he was gone. Alex’s none too steady voice broke the puzzled silence that had settled after the Sheikh’s parting words. “Whoa. What the hell did that mean?”

Evelyn rolled her eyes at her son’s language, but for once said nothing, because Ardeth stepped in. “That we’ve got little time,” he said quickly. “Evelyn, I’m going back to the Medjai. There is a lot to be done.”

“What are you going to do?” she asked, thinking hard and fast about what she could do.

“Call the tribes, dispatch spies, find out where they are and when they intend to go to Ahm Shere, if they are not already gone. We might have to attack them in the desert as a last resort. And if this doesn’t scare them into changing their mind…”

Evy had already seen the Medjai attack an archaeological party in order to protect Hamunaptra, the Lost City hiding both great treasure and great danger. She knew from experience just how scary it was, being on the wrong side of artfully and lethally wielded rifles and scimitars.

But another thing she knew by experience was that even the Medjai were not all-powerful, and that it only took one strong-minded person – all right, foolhardy and stubborn as a mule, too – to reduce three thousand years’ work to nothing. If she, at the time, had managed to wake up Imhotep after two strong-arm warnings from the strange desert men in black, what could possibly stop Ferguson’s boss from going to Ahm Shere and claiming Anubis’ Army for his own?

Beside death, that is.

She kept her thoughts to herself and gave a nod to Ardeth as he headed for the door.

“Hey, what about us?” exclaimed Alex, making her jump slightly. “What do we do now?”

Ardeth turned his head and looked at mother and son in turn. “The wisest thing would be for you to stay here. However, as I know this won’t be the case –” and there Evelyn could have sworn she saw a twinkle in his eye despite his stern face, “– I suggest you find a safe means of transportation. We may need to leave quickly. In this case I’ll meet you at the south door of Fort Brydon tomorrow morning at eight.”

This time, Evy felt a fully-fledged grin stretch her lips.

It just so happened that she knew exactly the man for the job.

.⅋.

Down in the cell that looked rather like a cellar, the heat had abated to a more reasonable temperature. It was almost cool in the room; one could guess that the night must have fallen not long ago. Soon, it would get colder, but nowhere close to the biting cold of the desert nights. In the middle of the Sahara, the night could chill anyone’s bones through more efficiently than a European winter’s breeze.

The small yellow bulb hanging from the ceiling was blinking unsteadily, and the bleak light it managed to cast in the room blinked in rhythm. Jonathan had been trying for quite a while to find a regular pattern to this rhythm, a sense of sorts, but he wasn’t getting any result. Not that he was really expecting any, for that matter.

Staring at this bulb was rather a more or less efficient way not to think about Tom and Hamilton and Anubis’ Army and the Scorpion King and lots of things. Staring at this bulb made him avoid thinking at all. Unfortunately, thoughts drifted in and out, and Jonathan did not see any way to truly evade them.

This Hamilton was mad.

No, scratch that.

This Hamilton was a bloody raving lunatic!

Granted, Jonathan had never seen the Warriors of Anubis in action… But he had had plenty of more or less wanted details from Ardeth, who always did seem to enjoy taking the mickey out of him a little too much for Jonathan’s liking. Before and after the big battle. If these kinds of stories had reached him when he was a small kid, there was no doubt that they would have often kept him awake all night.

However, Ardeth wasn’t the one who had truly made Jonathan’s skin crawl by his description of the jackal Warriors. The Englishman would always keep in mind the aftermath of the battle over Ahm Shere, after Izzy ‘dropped’ them for a while at the Medjai camp in order to at least say goodbye properly to Ardeth, make sure he was all right as well, that sort of thing.

The Medjai Commander wasn’t quite what one could call ‘all right’. Despite a few scratches he was physically intact, but he had lost more than a quarter of his men on the battlefield. His face was sombre as he described the fight in a few tense words. Evy’s eyes were sad, and both Rick and Alex were uncharacteristically quiet. For his part, Jonathan was too busy trying to swallow the lump in his throat to speak.

And then, as he lingered a few steps behind the small group, he heard something that quite literally made his hair stand on end. A scream. A scream so terrified, so terrifying in itself that his first impulse was to start running madly and not look back. He did not run, however, but spun on his heels to face the source of the scream.

Good Lord…

It was a kid. A boy of twenty, more likely nineteen, his tanned skin almost grey with terror and glistening with sweat, his dark eyes wild and bulging. Everything about him spoke of something so horrifying it was unspeakable; from his eyes, in particular, came such a terror that Jonathan’s stomach did a double somersault. He could not detach his stare from those eyes. He hadn’t seen the like since the end of the war, almost two decades ago, when he’d been roughly the kid’s age.

The boy had a large gash on his left side, and the men and women who tended to him came and went around him, blind and deaf to everything that went on outside of the tent. For a second, Jonathan was also blind and deaf to everything that wasn’t that kid’s eyes.

This was maybe why he jumped out of his skin when somebody touched his arm, as if sending a bolt of electricity through him. That somebody was Evy, and she was looking at him strangely; he pointed a somewhat shaky finger at the tent and the boy on the cot. She opened her mouth and her eyes widened.

“Holy shit. This kid looks like he saw the devil himself.” Rick’s low voice sounded none too steady either. He held Alex close to him, shielding the tent from view. Alex, usually so inquisitive, didn’t even try to peek and just clung to his father.

“He’s not the only one,” said Ardeth’s dark voice from behind them. “Older Medjai also seem to have this sort of terror in their eyes when the Warriors of Anubis come into their minds. Those Warriors are a wild, dark sort; they do not know the meaning of mercy, and they are ruthless and cruel to no end.”

And he had taken the four of them along elsewhere, shifting subjects rather abruptly, which wasn’t like him at all. But the expression in this anonymous boy’s eyes had long stuck in Jonathan’s mind, and from what he had understood afterwards, he wasn’t the only one.

The Warriors of Anubis were the sort to fill some of the bravest people he knew with unspeakable terror.

And those were the kind of monsters that Hamilton planned to send after thousands of people!

Bloody lunatic.

Jonathan shivered, feeling the cold of the night gradually creeping over him. Rick was already sleeping; it seemed that he had been for some time, if the moment he had put his head on the ground counted as falling asleep. The American, faithful to old habits, had managed to wrap himself in his brown jacket, and somehow he looked fairly comfortable this way. He even sounded comfortable, considering the quiet but deep and steady snoring that came from his corner of the room.

The bulb went out.

Without any warning, the world – or rather, the cell – went pitch black.

For a long moment, Jonathan kept his eyes wide open in the complete darkness, hoping the small light would come back, almost waiting for it. He had grown so used to this yellowish excuse for a light that its abrupt disappearance made it look like a bright, shining star in hindsight. But the room remained dark, and although Jonathan still stared around, he couldn’t even see the tip of his nose.

Only Rick’s snores remained as a signal to his position. As in, ‘Don’t you step this way, I’m sleeping here.’ After much deliberation with himself, Jonathan had to admit that it was sort of reassuring to know that he wasn’t the only living man in this room. And it was a hell of an acknowledgement, because in any other circumstances he would already have taken off a shoe and thrown it across the room.

All right, maybe only thought about doing so – Rick could be in a really rotten mood if somebody woke him up the wrong way. And he really did not want to be on the wrong side of an O’Connell glare, even in utter darkness.

Nonetheless, sleep continued to evade Jonathan, who was gradually feeling more and more cold and bored. The image of the kid scared to death still hung in front of his eyes whether he closed or opened them, which didn’t make any difference anyway.

He really could use a stiff drink right now.

There was something that was both scary and strange with staring at a world of black. Scary, because even for the most rational person on Earth, there still will be a little voice in the back of the mind whispering things like it’s going to remain this way for ever, or you won’t see ever again, even when light does come back. Strange, because the atmosphere changed radically. The movements somehow felt less real without the confirmation of sight. Even noises seemed to come muffled, the only actual sound being Rick’s steady snoring from the other side of the room, a few feet away.

Said snoring was actually growing less steady, as Jonathan noticed. As it sounded, Rick was grunting and shifting in his sleep, and the Englishman was almost tempted to shake him awake or something. But the last thing Jonathan wanted was to trip over something in the dark and wake him in a far more sudden way. The consequences could be disastrous, as he observed thanks to a particular event that happened a few years ago.

It had been only a cat, and Rick had been only half-asleep, but the animal had had the very bad idea of leaping lightly on him to sniff his face. The American had sent the cat flying across the room before even realising there had been no immediate danger. Jonathan still recalled Evy’s aghast expression, followed by an incredulous glare – oh yes, she was quite good at this one – that had forced his own laughter back down his throat.

Oh, of course. That change in Rick’s sleep must have something to do with Evy. Or Alex, for that matter. Rick had seemed to forget how to sleep soundly when the lad had been taken two years ago, and remember only after Alex was back. As for Evy… Well, after what happened at that place, suffice it to say that it had taken some time for the three other members of the family to be thoroughly convinced that she was very much alive, quite well, and not going anywhere. As far as Jonathan was concerned, it had been a bit difficult to get it into his head that nobody was going to take his baby sister away after all. At least in the first four or five months following Ahm Shere.

Rick muttered something in his sleep, and Jonathan turned his eyes in the general direction of the sound.

“Speak up, old boy – can’t quite hear you.”

Whether Rick had heard him or not, Jonathan had no idea, but something in the mumbling became clearer.

“Mmhm… vvv… vy… Evy…”

Right on target. Jonathan winced sympathetically and turned back to where he imagined the door would be. If you didn’t count the previous night, this marked the first time in years that the two lovebirds didn’t sleep at least under the same roof. And since eleven years made for enough time to grow used to one’s baby sister getting married and everything that went with it, Jonathan thought he could afford to feel sorry for his brother-in-law. At least be sympathetic.

Maybe it was because he was a little lost in his silent musings, or maybe he simply wasn’t paying attention, but he didn’t notice the sliver of light creeping from under the door right away. It was tiny, but growing slowly, meaning that somebody was walking down the flight of stairs holding a light. But even Jonathan couldn’t fail to notice the sound of footfalls coming closer and closer down the steps, then the corridor. He scrambled to his feet and tried to locate his sleeping brother-in-law in the darkness, which was easier said than done.

“Rick? Come on, old chap, wake up, we’ve got company… I think. Rick, where the hell – oof!”

Of course, he tripped over the sleeping American and fell heavily on what he thought was his stomach. The next second, a hand that felt as though it had been clad in iron grasped his throat, crushing his windpipe quite effectively.

“D–don’t be r–r–ridiculous, Rick, it’s me!” Jonathan managed to choke out. The hand released its grip immediately.

“Oh… sorry about that. Old reflexes, you know.”

Jonathan could almost hear him smirk in the dark room.

“Don’t mention it,” he muttered, rolling his eyes.

“You know,” he heard Rick say after a couple of seconds, “in this kind of situation, it’s better not to try to use long words. Short ones are easier to get out, see.”

This time, he was absolutely sure that Rick was grinning. Which was confirmed when the door opened, letting in somebody holding a paraffin lamp, although the sudden light seemed so intense that it was impossible to say how many they were behind it.

“Gentlemen,” came the unmistakable slimy voice, “please forgive us for disturbing your sleep, but it’s a long way to where we are going and we must leave now. If you would follow us.”

Now that his eyes slowly adjusted to the light, Jonathan could recognise the creepy-looking bloke who had led the taking in Cairo; Baine, Hamilton had said. And, considering the way Rick’s face clouded dangerously, he was not the only one.

Outside, only a very crescent moon hung in the sky, but they could see everything surrounding them as if it were daylight. The stark white walls of the little houses of Giza looked pale blue under the starlight, and the shadows were longer and deeper. It was a little bit eerie.

They were being led to the same truck that had brought them there, and Jonathan sighed wistfully, wishing he had got as much sleep as Rick had these past few hours. Whatever sleep he was going to get in there would hardly be restful.

To his surprise, there were two old mattresses secured to the floor of the truck. They were so old that springs were sticking out in places, and several buttons were missing.

“That’s for us?” Rick was eyeing the mattresses in a way that was both wary and sarcastic. “Neat, as my son would say. Is that the best you’ve got?”

“Certainly not, Mr O’Connell,” said Baine with a smirk. “But it’s the best you’ve got. We’re keeping the very best for our superior.”

“Lucky bastard.”

Fortunately, maybe, for Rick, only Jonathan heard that, and he agreed heartily. Silently, of course.

He searched for Tom among the different faces that all looked the same under this bluish light, but didn’t find him. This was rather disappointing. He had almost wished to see his former friend before going to Ahm Shere, to see whether he was in on Hamilton’s plan or not, what he thought about it all. But then, he reflected a little bitterly, if the man was capable of everything he had done so far without asking questions, only to follow orders mindlessly, then there was nothing left to say.

Of course, seeing him lose so much colour at Hamilton’s exposition had made Jonathan keep for a moment the feeble hope that he would do – or try to do – something to stop that. Tommy was always the one who would stick up for lost cases, try to right the wrongs, that sort of thing. He had sort of been Jonathan’s conscience for a while, and there had been many times when Jonathan had pulled him back in time to save him from doing something downright stupid. Obviously, Tommy often got furious on occasions like these, calling Jonathan a self-serving git, but if he was proved wrong he would reluctantly admit to it. And it worked both ways.

So it was a little bit odd to picture Tom Ferguson executing orders without thinking. But then, everyone and everything seemed to be constantly changing; why should Tom be an exception to the rule?

Jonathan hadn’t realised how exhausted he was until he put his head on the beaten-up mattress and fell abruptly asleep.

.⅋.

Evelyn was awake by the crack of dawn.

As light made its way inside the house, she packed a few clothes, food, and a number of Rick’s guns, certain as she was, despite her dislike for firearms, that they would come in handy at some point. She also took her own favourite weapon, a slender scimitar, light but strong, that Ardeth had given her for practice after seeing her fighting against Lock-Nah’s men.

When everything was ready, she went to Alex’s room to wake him. After a solid breakfast – all the more so considering it would probably be their last real breakfast for days – they set off in Jonathan’s car to what was gradually becoming the first real private airport of Cairo.

Evelyn couldn’t help a sigh of relief when she saw the ‘Magic Carpet Airways’ sign. It wasn’t hasty words painted on an old, dusty bit of wood this time, but shiny brass letters planted on a neat, dark bit of wood. Oddly enough, it was hanging on the same big wooden doors.

“Looks like he’s changed things around a bit, hasn’t he?” said Alex beside her with a whistle, looking at the great big doors.

“Let’s hope he’s still here,” Evy muttered, a bit worried.

As if on cue, one of the doors opened, and a gangling black man stumbled out, holding a few rolled-up maps and scratching the back of his head, making the flying hat he wore tip dangerously over his eyes.

Evelyn and her son exchanged glances.

“He’s still here.”

“Most definitely.”

She gave her sweetest smile and a small wave. “Why, hello, Mr. Buttons!”

Izzy’s reaction was immediate, to say the least. He froze on the spot, and stood there with his mouth hanging open, fish-like, staring at mother and son with owlishly wide eyes. Utter terror was in them.

“Oh, no… no… no, not you lot again!”

“Come now, Izzy, I haven’t said anything.”

He frowned.

“Please, ma’am, tell me this is just paying a friendly visit to a pal who’s saved your butts one time and nothing more.”

Evelyn gave the most reassuring smile she could. “Oh yes, I was passing by with my son and we decided to pay you a friendly visit.”

“Uh-huh,” said Izzy, one eyebrow deeply frowned and the other raised. “With all those bags?”

“Well, we also happen to be in need of a swift means of transportation.”

Izzy’s face lightened. The four silver teeth gleamed in his grin. “I can take you anywhere, even down south to Memphis or the Valley of the Kings – you study this stuff, right? Name the place and I’ll take you there. I got a new balloon, y’know,” he added, beaming with pride.

Evelyn gave a wry smile and shook her head. It worked. Izzy understood. His eyes widened again, his mouth opened, and he swiftly spun on his heels and ran back behind the door, locking it behind him.

Alex rolled his eyes and muttered something Evelyn didn’t quite catch.

“Exactly what did you say, Alex?”

“Nothing, Mum,” he replied quickly. Too quickly. Evy smiled.

“That’s what I thought.”

“What are we doing, then?” he asked, grasping the strap of his bag on his shoulder.

“I think he might be in need of a little persuasion.”

Grabbing the bags, she walked to the door, Alex behind her, and knocked firmly on the wood.

“Izzy, open this door!”

“Hell no,” came Izzy’s voice from some ways behind the door.

“This is ridiculous – nobody’s going to shoot you!”

“That’s what O’Connell said last time, but last time was worse than any time I got shot! What d’you want me for this time?”

“Something that does not include danger for you in any form – now open up!”

Evelyn was starting to get angry. She missed her husband, she missed her brother, and her patience was wearing thin.

That’s when she noticed Alex had put his bag on the ground and was searching his pockets.

“Alex, what are you doing?”

The boy didn’t answer. His face lit up as he fished a large paper clip from under his pocket handkerchief. “Got it.”

Evelyn stared as Alex pulled and twisted the paper clip into a certain shape. Then, as if this was the most natural thing in the world, he introduced it in the lock and began to turn it gingerly, his ear close to the door, listening raptly to catch any possible sound.

“Alexander John O’Connell! Why, I never –”

She was interrupted by the sound of a lock opening, and Alex grinned up at her.

“Aw, Mum, you know I hate it when you call me that.”

Evelyn remained speechless for a second as her son put his paper clip back into his pocket. While she was perfectly aware that Alex knew a good few tricks in the wide book of stealth and eavesdropping, it was the first time she saw him actually try something like this, not to mention make it work.

Alex was still grinning proudly, and she smiled in spite of herself. After all, these kinds of skills could come in handy. But still… It wasn’t proper to be proud about the prospect of a successful career in burglary. No matter what some people argued.

“Well… I think I’ll have a word with your uncle.”

“Don’t be mad at him, I asked him to show me this trick.”

“My point exactly.”

She put her hand on the doorknob…

The door had a bolt on the inside.

Alex’s face fell. Evelyn took pity of him and smiled reassuringly.

“Don’t worry, dear. I’ll just take a leaf out of your father’s book, now, shall I? It wouldn’t be the first time.”

She shook the door a little bit, to know exactly where the bolt was, and, as Alex’s eyes widened slightly, pulled out a short-muzzle shotgun from the bag she had put the lot of them into, and checked it was loaded.

“Izzy, wherever you are, I hope it’s not behind this door,” she said calmly before she pointed the gun at the door and pressed the trigger. There was a loud crack, the recoil almost made her arm shake – but when the small cloud of smoke dissipated, she could see the bolt on the ground, and, on the door, a hole where it had been blasted off. She reached, and, delicately, knocked on the maimed door.

A shaking black hand pulled it slowly open, and Izzy’s pleading face appeared.

“No, Mrs O’Connell, no… not that place again…” he moaned. “Please. That place is nothin’ but trouble. Just to get to it there was that wall of water, then we crashed, and then there was those weird noises…”

“Oh, that? That was nothing,” said Alex self-confidently. Izzy gave him an odd look.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, just a bunch of p—”

Evelyn just had the time to put a hand on her son’s mouth before he could say ‘pygmy mummies’. Then she gave the pilot her most motherly smile.

“Izzy, we just need you to take us there. There’s no one chasing us, nobody after us – nothing’s going to happen to you. Besides, we don’t have much time, we have an appointment at Fort Brydon at eight.”

“Mmhrph. What do you even need to go in that bloody desert for?” Izzy asked gruffly. “Last time, there was nothing left but sand – and blood, too, I bet.”

Evy decided to play the ‘serious’ card. She narrowed her eyes and set her mouth in a firm line.

“Well, my husband and my brother have been taken. I will get them back, and I’ll do whatever it takes.”

“Yeah, me too,” Alex chimed in at her elbow. Evelyn smiled inwardly at her son’s determination. He looked so sure of himself despite his small size that she felt her own spirits lift.

Izzy shifted uncomfortably. “So, you say O’Connell’s in trouble?”

“As I understand it, some thugs have kidnapped him and Jonathan for information about the pyramid of Ahm Shere and taken them there. Since the two of them think it no longer exists, I think we could say that they are indeed in trouble.”

Obviously, Izzy was seriously torn between rushing off to his new balloon and scramming out of here, and helping Rick for the sake of whatever history they shared. Let’s press this issue, then.

“Izzy, I’m aware I may not know a great deal about my husband’s past. You knew him before I did; I’m sure you’ll agree if I venture that he’s not the kind of man who lets his friends down. He never let you down, did he?”

In response to her kind tone, she got a mild glare and a sort of growl. “Oh yeah, he did, coupla times. Like that time with the belly-dancer g—but I’m not telling you about that.”

Too late. Alex’s eyes widened. “Belly-dancer girl? Dad?”

Izzy shot him a swift warning glance. “You’ll ask him when you get him back, kiddo.”

Alex made a face, frowning. “Not fair. Nobody tells me anything interesting.”

Evelyn turned back to the pilot, thinking there had been enough dilly-dallying.

“Izzy, please. Rick himself said you’d never let him down before.”

“Turned him down, Ma’am, not let him down. There’s a difference. Then again, there’s a first time for everything, I guess. I’m sorry, Mrs O’Connell, you’re very nice and all, and the sprog here is nice too, but the answer’s no.”

He gave her a sort of salute, putting two fingers to his flying hat, and turned away. This time, Evelyn had reached her limit. Ignoring her son’s amazed stare, she picked up again the gun that she had used to blast off the bolt with, and fired a warning shot that resounded all around the place and made the sand fly inches away from Izzy’s left foot. There was a strangled yelp, a herd of goats passing by a few metres away bleated in startled protest, and the pilot whirled round, looking panic-stricken.

“You – you – what the hell are you doin’ with that thing? You’re not gonna shoot me for real, are you?”

“I didn’t plan to,” Evy replied as coldly as she could. Good thing it appeared to be working. “But I’m going to if you don’t take us to Ahm Shere, or where Ahm Shere used to be.”

Izzy stared at her.

“You don’t know how to handle my dirigible,” he said quickly. “And if you shoot me, you’ll have nobody to guide you to –”

Evelyn cocked the gun, ignoring the fact that the butt seemed to burn her palms. “Izzy… You are not the only pilot in this part of Egypt. Or even in Cairo, for that matter. Just the one I trust the most to go after my husband.”

Alex looked at Izzy, then at his mother, beaming. “Whoa, Mum! Cool!”

Izzy rolled his eyes, and muttered under his breath something that sounded like, “Family of nutcases.”

Evelyn had to concede the point.

The next moment, he was helping Evelyn carrying the bags. She thanked him warmly, but he only gave a resigned sigh and shook his head.

When her hands were free, she unloaded the gun and put it back into her bag with a lot of relief. She really felt no fondness of any sort for weapons like these, but having a few of them into her bag could be useful if things turned dirty.

Alex and she followed Izzy down the path to the airport properly speaking, and both of them stopped for a second to look at Izzy’s ‘new dirigible’. Gone was the hand-made, patchwork balloon with a small fisherman’s boat for a bottom. What stood – or rather floated – in front of them was brand-new, light grey, slender, moulded like an arrow, and had actual cabins with a number of windows. The windows had patchwork curtains to them, the only remains of Izzy’s bizarre flying contraption, and Evelyn, strangely enough, found herself almost missing the old machine.

The proud owner made a great gesture towards the dirigible, his silver teeth gleaming in the morning sun. “Ain’t she beautiful?”

“Your favours seem short-lived, Izzy,” Evelyn said with a smile. “I remember you saying these same words about your old dirigible.”

“Yeah, but the old one was a slug compared to her. And Dee’s great for blending with the sky – grey, y’know. And she works on hot air. Cheaper, less dangerous. Can’t have customers blowing up, can I?”

Evelyn frowned. “Dee?”

Izzy cleared his throat. “Gave her a name. So’s not to get her mixed up with the old one. That’s Dee for ‘dirigible’.”

Alex gave a laugh. “Well, could’ve been worse.”

Izzy frowned down at him. “I figured you’d be a smart ass kid, kid.”

“Now, don’t go using this kind of language in front of my son,” said Evelyn, trying to sound serious. The state of things was bad enough already with Rick and Jonathan around.

“Right. Help me with that line over there.”

“This rope?”

“Yeah, that rope. Go aboard and catch it when I throw it.”

Alex was already on board, leaning against the rail. Evelyn complied, a bit puzzled. When she asked Izzy where the people who worked at the ‘Magic Carpet Airways’ were, he grumbled, “They’re gone, ain’t they? We’re supposed to be closed on Sundays and Mondays, and today’s a Monday. So you see, I’m really helpin’ you because it’s you – and ‘cause you’re paying well. So maybe O’Connell will do me a favour and not need help after that. ‘Specially from me.”

Evelyn gave him a genuine smile. “Thank you all the more for it, Mr Buttons.”

“Quit that ‘Mr Buttons’ business,” Izzy said gruffly, but smiling a bit all the same. “Sounds either too serious or just ridiculous.”

“All right, Izzy. Are we ready to go?”

“Yup. All aboard? Yes? Well, ready to go, then.”

Izzy hoped into the dirigible as the last cable was pulled in, and took his place at the helm. Alex ran to the bow to have a better look at the landscape, and Evelyn sat down on the sort of bench that ran the length of the hull under the rail.

Egypt in the morning was certainly one of the most beautiful places in the world. Far away down south, the dunes, not yet flattened by the implacable sun, stood proudly, casting shadows that were still long on the orange yellow sand. Evelyn watched the tall buildings of Cairo and the little white houses in the north getting smaller and smaller, and turned as the pyramids of Giza grew bigger. She could even start to see the Sphinx.

“We won’t overtake ‘em before nine, especially if you want to stop by the Fort,” said Izzy, whose eyes were also directed at the Pyramids. “Maybe we’ll be close when we stop for water, so you’ll have plenty of time to look at them.”

“Thank you,” Evelyn replied, still looking at the great shapes casting even greater shadows.

It was a quarter to eight when the walls of Fort Brydon came into view. At the foot of the wall stood a lone black-clad figure. Ardeth Bay wore his black, worn travel robes, and, it appeared, every weapon he owned.

“Him again?” Izzy cast a glance that was half glare, half pleading look at Evelyn. “So it’s gonna be just like last time, then. Gloom and doom and the world wiped out an’ all!”

“No,” Evy said firmly, “it isn’t. And be nice to Ardeth, he came here to help when he could have done otherwise.” At least he isn’t going to complain about the destination of the journey.

When the dirigible came down to the level of the Medjai Commander, he looked it over for a few seconds, then shook his head with a strange sort of grin. After he climbed onboard, he gave Evelyn a look and said calmly, “I am not going to comment on this. But… I suppose there wasn’t any other means of transportation, was there?”

“Hey, watch it,” snapped Izzy, his wariness forgotten, bristling at any perceived slight against his beloved Dee. “I’m not that happy to have you onboard either, so don’t you go sayin’ dirty things about my dirigible.”

Ardeth stared at the pilot for a while, during which Izzy seemed to pale a little; then a slight smile flickered over his face, and he said, “Apologies. Now quickly, if you please – there’s no time to lose.”

Evelyn shook her head to hide a grin; Alex didn’t bother, and his clear laugh rang in the morning air. Izzy humphed and went to take his place behind the helm. The dirigible rose through the air, and Fort Brydon seemed to float away.

A moment’s silence passed, only troubled by the flapping of the airs screws and the whooshing of the wind past the dirigible, then Izzy asked almost casually, “So… don’t mean to pry, but what’s the deal this time? Whatever O’Connell’s got himself into, it can’t be that bad… Can it?”

.⅋.

Is that famous last words or tempting fate? You decide…

#Fairy Tales and Hokum #fanfiction #my stuff #the mummy #the mummy films

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theartofmedia · 6 years ago

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Game Theory and the Art of Persuasion

Full disclosure from the start: I don’t like Game Theory. (I enjoy MatPat when he’s in other things (like the Random Encounters musicals, I think he’s wonderful there), but just not Game Theory.) I’ve heard a lot of other people not like Game Theory either, both personal friends and strangers on the internet, for a variety of different reasons--namely, inaccurate research, twisting of facts, and allegations of art-stealing (but we’re not going to talk about that last one for the sake of staying on topic).

Yet, it remains incredibly successful, and its fans are loyal. Many people believe the theories, or at least parts of them. Even when the top comments of the videos are critical (or even hateful) in nature, the videos still do well.

So, why?

Well, there’s no denying that a good portion of GT’s audience is young. I think we’ve all had that one creator or piece of media that we wanted to defend because we loved it, only to realize later that it wasn’t that good. (And many people still enjoy these things and recognize that they aren’t good.) Younger teens have a strong need to defend what’s important to them, regardless of however valid the criticism is--in fact, giving any negative criticism at all often just spurs them on further. Young teens just don’t have that reasoning ability (and let’s face it, we were all like this when we were that young, whether we like to admit it or not). GT is going to be successful as long as that loyal fanbase continues to thrive.

So why do people believe the theories?

I believe I have my own little “theory”--MatPat, to some, is very persuasive.

Not with well-structured arguments, but with his rhetoric. It’s in what language he uses, the visuals he puts up, his tone of voice, and how he subtly tweaks the facts in order to slant the information in favor of his argument.

(Note: I am aware that MatPat not only has editors but script-writers as well, but he has to approve all of it and read out the script. So while I’ll use GT and MatPat himself as sort of umbrella term, I do know that he is not responsible for everything.)

Let’s use the video “Game Theory: Kirby...Dream Land’s Biggest THREAT! pt.1″ and break down some of the major points. (I’ll be putting timestamps so you can check for yourself or follow along.)

Whether intentional or not, MatPat uses a lot of strong, slanted language in his arguments. At 2:14, he states “So what is Kirby? Is he hero of Popstar, or world-consuming villain? A pink puffball for good, or a fiery god of evil?” This sets up a dichotomy--good and evil, right and wrong. People are naturally drawn to definitive, clean choices. They’re easier to understand and easier to grasp. Setting up this dichotomy sets up two sides: Kirby is good, or Kirby is evil. No room for other nuances and small details that add depth, or room for any explanations of the circumstances that could lead Kirby to act the way he does.

2:22--”Surprisingly, Kirby lore does have an answer.”

2:25-2:29--”The Kirby games have slowly been revealing more and more of what the true nature of Kirby is.”

3:09--”... what the designers are intending to do with his character.”

These three statements encapsulate a common criticism of GT: MatPat exerts his theories as truth. “Have an answer,” “true nature,” and “intending to do” are all statements that present his argument as factual, as truth. He even pushes that onto the Kirby writers, saying that it’s what they were ‘intending to do’ with Kirby’s character. Now one could make the argument of him just making blanket statements and that these aren’t all calculated instances, and you’re probably right--however, regardless if intentional or not, it still plants a sort of subliminal idea in the viewer’s head that ‘what I’m going to tell you is accurate and true.’

(Also, at 3:09, he shows a visual of “kirby lore” books connected by a pentagram. Very subtle use of imagery to send a message, which once more ties back to the binary he set up earlier. It’s pretty clear what he wants you to believe.)

2:30--”And the answers they’re starting to give are shocking.”

3:16--”... after this two-part theory, I don’t think you’ll be able to look at Kirby the same way again.”

This, along with the Satanic visuals presented previously, are priming the viewer to think that Kirby is evil. It’s setting up for that assertion, easing the viewer into it so that it’s easier for them to think “oh yeah that makes sense.”

And that’s just at the beginning of the video!

Now probably the biggest criticism of GT is that he spins the facts and intentionally leaves out information, inadvertently giving inaccurate information in order to support his argument. Well--he’s basically flat-out admitted to doing so in his emails to potential script writers (as shown by this video from Inside A Mind (timestamped for convenience), where MatPat actually commented on it and talked about the incident that IAM was referring to and never outright stating that the contents of those guidelines for script writing were false.)

I feel like we don’t talk about this enough: the Game Theory script writers are actually told to omit information that contradicts the theory. Now this makes sense on the surface--omitting information that would weaken your argument--but thinking about it even a bit makes it confusing and even a bit shady. GT frames its theories as though they were scientific theories, and intentionally leaving out information that contradicts what you’re trying to say isn’t how you make a scientific theory, especially if it heavily disproves what you are trying to prove. You would acknowledge that there is contradictory information and either try to provide a counterargument, or just admit ‘yeah this exists and we don’t have an explanation for it.’ It’s okay to have holes in your argument, no argument is perfect! However, GT flat-out ignores this contradictory information, and in doing so, it actually twists the facts. (Honestly, in my opinion, him acknowledging the contradictory information would make his theories more credible.)

For example, in the Kirby video, he discusses Milky Way Wishes in Kirby Super Star/Super Star Ultra, and how the main objective is to stop the sun and moon from fighting by summoning Nova, who can grant wishes, with the help of a jester named Marx. Marx, however, betrays Kirby to get his own wish granted because he wants to take over Popstar. Kirby has to destroy Nova in order to save Popstar and possibly the rest of the universe.

Now the way MatPat explains it...

(starting at) 6:19--“When the sun and moon are fighting up in the sky, one civilian speaks up with a solution: Marx. His proposed answer to this literal star war is to summon Nova, a giant space watch that grants wishes. [something something dragonball joke] Kirby travels planet to planet to harness each one’s star power, making him quite literally an alien invading army to the locals of that area. After decimating seven planets’ worth of creatures [something something metroid joke], Kirby successfully summons Nova. But before he can make his wish and justify all the damage he just caused across the galaxy, he is betrayed by Marx, who wishes to take over Popstar. [...] Kirby goes on to defeat Marx, but also has to destroy Nova in the process, leaving the universe one step back from where this quest first started, and ultimately invalidating all the bloodshed from all the planets he just visited.”

... he frames it as though nothing was accomplished, planets were destroyed, and everything was ultimately for naught.

Conveniently leaving out that the sun and moon stopped fighting--you know, what caused all of this in the first place--in order to work together and help Kirby stop Nova. And again, his wording frames Kirby as this monster, while also conveniently forgetting about player choice. One can choose to not hurt the enemies--and the enemies are enemies for a reason, because they hurt Kirby.

So in the end, while Marx was stopped and Nova was unfortunately destroyed, the problem that Kirby set out to solve was, in fact, solved, and peace was restored. Putting back these facts completely changes the meaning of what MatPat is trying to say, and omitting them makes them inaccurate information. He does this frequently in order to support his arguments--and the very fact that he has to twist the narrative in order to make it fit how he wants to at all implies that said arguments don’t have much to stand on to begin with.

However, if you didn’t play the game or didn’t just do a quick google search like I did it sounds plausible, because there aren’t many missing pieces there (unless you think about ‘what happened to the sun and moon?’). It seems that GT is trying to reach the people who don’t know about these games, as they would be the ones who would most readily believe it. Kirby fans would be skeptical or outright against what the theory says, but if you didn’t know about what the games actually were, then it would make perfect sense.

(I’d also like to mention how he says that Kirby’s Avalanche isn’t canon and then uses it for a full minute to support his argument it’s not entirely relevant to this but it just Grinds My Gears)

15:51--”And again, if you think all of this is a stretch, and I’m reading too much into these details, I’m not.”

And at the very end, he once again asserts the idea that the information he just presented you with is true. It’s repetition; many times if you repeat something enough, people will start to believe it. It’s similar to repeating the thesis statement at the end of an essay so that it all ties together nicely.

To the average viewer, the Game Theory videos may sound very persuasive, especially with MatPat’s charismatic voice and assured tone, the editors very snappy and visually interesting editing, and the enticing words and phrases he uses in order to grab attention and prime the viewer for what he’s about to say. However, knowing even a little bit about the source material of what he’s talking about can make the theory videos fall apart, because in all honesty, the videos don’t have much actual substance. It’s like a house of cards; one light breeze and the whole thing topples.

Despite all of this, I still have hope that, someday, Game Theory’s content will improve, and these types of criticisms will be addressed. Until then, we can only wait.

#game theory #matpat #kirby

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lioncunt · 6 years ago

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Why do you think Klance will be canon? I read somewhere you though it was the most logical conclusion, could you outline your thoughts? Or if you already have, could you add a link to your post?

I have written about it before but I’ll put down my new thoughts to include season 6. I’ve never been certain of it, keep in mind, it just always has seemed like an inevitable thing based on every single thing we’ve been told about the show and characters, no matter what angle i’ve looked at it from.

So, here’s what we had been given on romance in the show:

-they were planning a slow burn with all romances

-endgame romances couldn’t really happen with all the space plot stuff going on

-lance’s love interest will be someone lance needs, rather than what he wants, and will get him to a place opposite of where he started. they will be self assured and confident, in order to help HIM be more confident and help him with his insecurity. jeremy shada said that lance would fall in love with someone a little bit and like having one person rather than just going all over the place, and he would mature in all ways.

-when asked in a post-season 2 interview about keith and allura’s development, steven yeun replied “I like playing this mystery of where the romance is. I don’t know where it is. It could be between anybody. That’s the natural evolution of this relationship. Even as a friendship, it has fits and turns and ups and downs. I think this is the beginning of a wonderful, wonderful storyline.”

What we get from this is that all the endgame romances will take massive amounts of time to develop properly, and since they are slowburn, it really can’t be with characters introduced far past the halfway point, cause that’s the opposite of slowburn. we also know that they couldn’t really explore ANY romance that wasn’t relevant to the galra plot. lotura is an exception, because it was literally the foundation of the plot in seasons 5 and 6, so they were able to fully go there. but other possible romances have been inching along at a snail’s pace.

Now, in season 6, allura and lance’s relationship has been getting a LOT of focus. i ship this heavily, but in this season I personally was put off by the way their scenes were written and how they reacted to one another. this isn’t evidence that it’s not going to happen, because these are all my subjective opinions and that’s NOT factual, but if you’re interested in why I feel this way, I’ve written about it a lot in the last few days, just do a search on my blog.

so, my opinions aside, there was a lot of focus on their relationship.

but we can look back and see all those keith/allura scenes in season 2, when everyone was certain THEY were going to end up together. in season 1, people were sure it was going to be allura/shiro, before allura was revealed to be in the teen paladins’ age group. it changes literally every season. this is the most it’s ever been, because lance canonically is in love with her, but it’s still just more of the same.

I’ve said it before, but any and all endgame romance in the show will be limited to keith, lance, and allura. pidge is too young for any of them and hasn’t had a single serious one-on-one interaction with any of them, shiro is too old and is seen as a mentor/brother figure, and hunk is linked to shay. any side character hasn’t had enough development, and it’s too late to properly develop a relationship with a brand new character. so, romances are only possible between those 3 – and we’ve already seen this come into play, what with the ship fodder for their various combinations in every single season. and steven yeun even said it himself - “it could be between anyone.”

now, before season 6, I would have said immediately that it would be keith/lance, because allura doesn’t fit the description of lance’s love interest (and he’s the only character confirmed to have one). he’s wanted her since episode 1, so how could she possibly be not what he wants, but what he needs? however, since season 6, you could also read it as that he’s wanted tons of girls, but he really needs just one. this is where one half of my brain is at right now.

the other half of my brain can’t stop thinking about the lgbt rep.

you can cry “queerbaiting!” all you want, but the fact of the matter is that they wouldn’t be so secretive about it if it weren’t happening and if it weren’t main characters. here’s literally everything that’s ever been said on the subject:

Pre season 1 Tim Hedrick (head writer) interview: http://www.denofgeek.com/us/tv/voltron/256121/creating-voltron-legendary-defender/page/0/1

So you worked on Legend of Korra and that show really broke ground with having Korra and Asami get together at the end of the series. Will we be seeing any LGBT content in Voltron?

“I think I’ll just let that play out as we go. No comment on that question.”

–

Fan interaction with Jeremy Shada right as season 3 came out: http://emerald-trash.tumblr.com/post/163610844403/so-today-i-got-to-meet-jeremy-shada-at-tbcc-i

So today I got to meet Jeremy Shada at TBCC. I made him a little doll of his character just like I did for Josh Keaton. I was so nervous but Jeremy was super nice and friendly! He loved the doll thankfully. I asked him about lgbt representation in voltron and his response was “I can’t say, but don’t worry. You’ll be happy.” Just the hope alone makes me happy lol

–

NYCC post season 3 panel question: https://vld-news.tumblr.com/post/166188210767/nycc-panel-quote

Fan Question: I know you can’t go into any specifics, or name any characters, but I was wondering if we will be seeing any LGBT representation in the Voltron universe before the show ends?

Joaquim: Lauren?

Kimberly: Ah, that’s a good question.

Joaquim: That’s a really good question.

Lauren: I think— You know, I think it’s something that is super important to us.

Joaquim: It’s very important to us. Um, you know, obviously I think what’s great about our community is that, you can pretty much tell whatever story you want to tell and put whatever you want to see into these characters. And just know that, from our perspective, we’re fighting to create as open and as broad a spectrum of characters as we can. So, um, yea. We—

Lauren: We can’t give you any definite answers, but we are super—

Joaquim: We are advocates, and we are fighting for as open and as broad a spectrum of characters as we can create.

–

Shada has also said some things on the subject that were illegally recorded and shouldn’t be repeated, but in short, there IS lgbt rep, it’s between two characters, and it’s apparently such a big deal that it would LITERALLY SPOIL PLOTLINES AND CAN’T BE TALKED ABOUT.

they’ve revealed info about the characters before. they said lance was cuban mere months after season 1 was released, even though that information wouldn’t come up in the show until years later. that could have been considered a spoiler. but no, it didn’t have to do with any actual plotline, so it was easily shared information to make people happy about good rep.

if the lgbt rep weren’t a big deal, they would tell us. they would at least say there’s definitely going to be some. i mean, people ask about it so fucking much, i’m sure they would say what it is if it would get fans to shut up.

and even before there was a fandom, tim hedrick said he would just let it play out as it goes, meaning it’s THERE and he wants people to watch the show and react to it naturally.

something else that i’ve said before – let’s go through the main characters one by one to determine who it could possibly be:

-pidge: has shown no interaction with any girl her age, and the creators have said that “if you want to see her as trans, you can” which is coding, NOT rep. plus, they did that in season 1, and they still won’t talk about the lgbt rep. she’s out.

-shiro: has shown no interaction with any guy his age. i originally thought it would be him and matt, but matt turned out to be younger than him and they haven’t interacted at all since matt came back. a husband back at home wouldn’t be a BIGGGGG SPOILER THAT THEY CAN’T CONFIRM OR DENY. he’s out.

-hunk: linked to shay. out.

-coran: has shown no interaction with any man his age currently. interacted in the past with alfor, but he’s dead, and the lgbt rep is a major plotline that can’t be spoiled. out.

-allura: has shown no interaction with any single girl her age. she interacted with shay, but shay is linked to hunk. unfortunately, i think romelle is too new a character for them to properly develop a relationship between them. out.

-lance: yall know.

-keith: yall know.

LITERALLY who could it possibly be besides keith and lance?? like i said, they wouldn’t be so hush-hush if it weren’t main characters and if it weren’t a huge plotline. i cannot think of a single other option. and anytime anyone’s tried to GIVE me another option, i just immediately disprove it. plus the fact that keith is super insanely self assured and confident now with his additional 2 years, his mom, and his brother safe and sound. he’s exactly what lance needs.

so that’s where the other half of my brain is.

I MEAN i really can’t be sure anymore. if you just go by romance alone it could totally be like allura/lance and keith/romelle or some other terrible het keith ship. or they could go back and rekindle keith/allura and do lance/romelle. but then when you factor in the elusive lgbt rep, there is no other fucking option than keith/lance.

and if one of yall dumbasses comes on this post crying “sh*ith!!” i’ll come to your house and piss on your lawn.

#ask #anonymous #klance #voltron #spoilers #voltron meta #mine

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karicharbonneau · 6 years ago

Photo

Personal Journal of Kari Charbonneau

Page 327

It’s been an interesting couple of days. I will try to recap the best I can. First came the meeting on Sunday night. What is there to say that I usually don’t say after those meetings. I typically leave full of anger. This meeting was no different.

I try to do good things, be polite and follow the rules. I even donated my land in Termina for an infirmary. Not so much as a nod of recognition. Every time there is a call, I come. I guess that isn’t enough. Then to top that off, the fact that we aren’t all equal and the rules only apply to some of us was rubbed in my face in front of everyone. I get physically threatened for shutting my comm off for thirty minutes when I was in Gilneas with Strather on a romantic holiday, yet Stas can tell another member to shut hers off in front of everyone, and it’s suddenly no big deal. Just another shining example of the bullshit I see all the time.

I was literally close to throwing chairs and causing a huge scene. Luckily, Strather’s voice rang in my ear. “Show them what you want them to see.” Clears as day. So I left, took a walk and got some whiskey. I don’t know why I feel surprised when stuff like this happens.

When I came back, I noticed that Elaine was giving me the stink eye for some reason. I wonder if Gideon told her I said something to him about her and Sal? Which would make sense I guess, but they are breaking the bond under their own free will, so why give me the stink eye for ratting on their affair?

After the meeting, I spent some time talking to Mac. I learned a lot about the woman, who she is under what she shows people. I like her, and not just because she gave me the greatest gift she could give a person, peace of mind. I don’t know much about the old ways, or her specific brand of magic. It doesn’t matter, if she is able to protect the one thing I hold so dearly, then I owe her more than I can possibly ever repay. I hope with time we can call each other friends. She gets away with saying shit that would get me flogged in the company we keep, but it’s nice to see someone with similar views be able to voice them.

Mac left shortly after Sal arrived and it gave us a chance to talk. I miss talking to him alone. He opens up, and I’m glad he still feels he can with me. He told me about breaking the bond, and I’m so happy he decided to do it. I know there will be a price for him to pay but no one deserves to be second best. I know that feeling all too well. Things might have been different for him and me, and I do think about the what ifs. If I hadn’t been second best. If he hadn’t pushed me away and right into Strather. I know he thinks about it too. There are times I see the regret in his eyes, but I try not to comment on it. I try to keep that distance. I’m reasonably sure he almost kissed me that night, and part of me wishes he had. That stupid, foolish part of me that luckily my brain tells me is a dumb idea. I refuse to string him along, I am not that person and I… I love Strather. Then my mind tells me that is a REALLY idiotic idea. I will blame it on absence makes the heart grow fonder. I can hear him in my head telling me I’m weak and feeling that intensely will get or both of us killed. I know this, of course, I do. It’s irrational, and I’ve been fighting writing those words down. Making them real but they are. Maybe it’s just an obsession, we both could agree on that.

Page 328

Anyway, enough of that dribble. I went shopping for furniture for my new place, and I realized, I have almost nothing, and it will not be a one-day thing. It’s going to take days and way more gold than I expected to get everything I need for the apartment, shop, and the lab. And way more time to get everything moved in and ready to go. It’s alright, with Strather away I can focus on work and try to clear my mind of him.

While I was out shopping, I grabbed a few gifts for people. When Sal and I were talking, he made me realize that while much of the Company I don’t trust, and a few I wouldn’t mind burning alive, there are some I feel I can rely on. Those who care if I live or die, who appreciate me and I appreciate them. He told me to forget those I can’t trust and focus on keeping those I do trust close. I’m a gift giver, so I picked up a few things.

I went out to see Mac at the Tavern in Termina. I had to tell her about Stas breaking into people’s homes and searching their places. Sun was there, and while I trust him, he is still management. I told Mac through a note, and she instantly signed to Sun about it. I didn’t tell him because I didn’t want it to be an issue. I just felt it right to warn people. I told Sal too. Of course, he left the room right away. I guess to check to see if Wolfram ordered it to be done or not. He sounded pissed off, which makes me think that they did order it. He wouldn’t say one way or another. He didn’t have to say it. He told me to keep it quiet. Why Wolfram would allow that junkie cunt to break into our homes is beyond me. I told Sun that I am now a business owner and will be rigging my place with traps that will kill. THEY might trust her, I don’t. Not that anyone knows where my new place is yet, which is a good thing. I got security people coming again and upgrading me beyond just my lock system.

Anyway, I spent some time after that talking to Gideon at the bar. I’m not sure what to think of him. He is a confusing person. I like him, but I don’t understand him. I guess that’s a common theme for me. I’m drawn to people I don’t really understand.

I also find it amusing that he tries to give me advice on how to do Alchemy. He wants me to go on jobs because I would be able to learn about herbs from different areas and gather things. I don’t think he realizes that I have formal training and years of it. My knowledge of my craft is paramount, and it still bothers me that people don’t trust that I know what I am doing. Sure, I’m not traveled, but Alchemy is not a new profession. It’s also like cooking, the recipes are the vital part, and there are thousands of books out there with the knowledge of ancient races and with vastly more experience than I have. Sure, I want a lab and to experiment, but if a person can create something new, no one has already come up with, it’s like the difference between a cook and a master chef. Maybe when I’m fifty, I will have the experience to be a master chef. For now, I follow the work laid out by those who came before me. Why try to fix what isn’t broken? Oh well, I guess it is my station in life to be underestimated.

((And always, as a private journal, the information is not open to the public ICly. So please do not use information as if it is common knowledge.The information in this journal is from Kari’s view point and not all accounts are factual or accurate. They are simply Kari’s personal thoughts.))

#journal #wow rp #moon guard #kari things #ic

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sntgoodposts · 4 years ago

Text

Boogie and Frank Hassle

Unlike other critics, Frank Hassle is notable for the impact he has had on Boogie’s life. As a member of the comedy troupe MDE, Frank has a caustic and somewhat negative reputation, though he has never physically hurt someone in his videos, or even touched someone. His MO is to say controversial things to people, and film their reactions. However, Boogie worked himself into hysterics over Frank Hassle, culminating in attempting to murder him.

Introduction: According to Frank, one of his fans told Boogie that Frank Hassle was "coming for you”. As a result, Boogie panicked and began to DM Frank begging to collab with him. However, Frank refused. This often involved Boogie accusing Frank of trying to kill Boogie, and Boogie begging Frank not to kill his dog.

The Initial Meeting: Frank and Boogie were appeared together on the Killstream podcast in mid 2020. Boogie initially DMed Frank on Twitter to try and beg for leniency, applying varying manipulative tactics. Initially, he leveraged his usual emotional blackmail to try and tell Frank he wasn’t worth it. He accused Frank of planning to hurt his dog and family, and said he would happily be given pink belly. When Frank mocked this tactic, Boogie said he would ‘play along’ with Frank to help his audience. Boogie now tried to befriend Frank in order to stop the criticism.

As the show date drew nearer, Boogie seemed to understand that he would probably get angry on the show, and assured Frank that the ‘meltdown’ would be fake. Before the show, he told Frank he ‘trusts’ him. He demonstrated that he would not take it personally, and told Frank to ‘go nuts’.

The Killstream: On the stream, Frank called Boogie out on his signalling of children, his abuse contradictions, his weight gain and his manipulation. Boogie tried his usual emotionally abusive tactics of trying to shut opposition up by recounting his sexual abuse, mentioning his inverted penis, and talking about his low testosterone. He also warned Frank not to hurt his dog or family (which Frank never mentioned), and said that if he came to Arkansas he would be shot by Boogie’s neighbors. Frank in return insulted Boogie and told him he would come to Arkansas to document and ‘hassle’ him, and cited the SamandTolki megathread.

Notably, in the stream Boogie repeated the idea that he was a pacifist, and had never fought back in any physical confrontation in his life after a middle school fight. Boogie claimed he had hurt a child so badly that he never wanted to fight again. This matches previous claims when Boogie has claimed to be a pacifist who would never fire a gun.

After the stream, despite insulting Frank constantly, Boogie tried to play friendly and thanked him, which Frank rebuffed.

The Next Day: The stream led to a large amount of ridicule for Boogie, further losing even more fans due to his inability to defend himself against accusations of child molestation and lies. Boogie began to claim that he had rhetorically beaten Frank. As his critics accused him of having another meltdown, Boogie and his fans engaged in mass reporting of Frank’s videos, simultaneously reporting the SamandTolki Subreddit to Reddit admins by claiming it now had an association with the banned MillionDollarExtreme subreddit.

This censorship was successful, and Frank was banned from YouTube alongside the SamandTolki subreddit. Frank tried to appeal his ban unsuccessfully, while Boogie celebrated it despite claiming to have had nothing to do with it. Frank was understandably mad at Boogie however, and promised that he would be held accountable. He made some joke Twitter posts to try and bother Boogie more. Boogie continued to worry that Frank would one day visit him.

Months later: After Frank mentioned he was in Arkansas to visit a friend, and decided to take a picture to tease Boogie. Boogie began to panic. He uploaded a video of someone casually ringing his doorbell and walking leisurely away. Critics suspect this of being either Boogie’s friend or a delivery person, but Boogie contested that it was Frank Hassle. After being criticized for the fact this person looked nothing like Frank, Boogie changed the story to suggest it may have been a friend, incorrectly claiming that he said that initially. Finally, Boogie acknowledged that it could have just been a fan or unconnected person, before backpedaling completely.

However, Boogie still felt determined to end his feelings of persecution. Initially confident, Boogie went on Keemstar’s podcast with Frank, culminating in him threatening to kill and take pleasure in the death of the bemused Frank. In the interview itself, Frank said he had a personal friend who had been victimized by Boogie’s lies. Further, he said Boogie engages in ‘almost pedophilic’ behavior, and said he had seen Boogie coming on to girls under 25. He said “He’s a 45 year old man hitting up teens and girls in their early 20s”. In response, Boogie claimed “I’ve literally never done that, that’s a lie, why are you lying?”. It should be noted that Lucy Foxx was 20 when she met Boogie, and claimed he had come on to girls younger than her. In the interview, he said “C’mon pussy! C’mon pussy! C’mon pussy pussy! (mocking voice) I’m in your town but I won’t drive the extra three miles, I won’t drive the extra three miles because I’m such a pussy. Show the fuck up, I will end you”.

Boogie would panic after this, accusing Frank of claiming to have evidence of Boogie’s pedophilia and abuse of women. Although he claimed this evidence had no merit, he continued to demand that Frank come to his house to debate him, while also threatening to kill him if he did show up. He accused Frank of being too scared to rise to this impossible challenge, displaying a perverse excitement.

The Fans’ view: Boogie’s fans and critics alike showed a concern and willingness to call the police, but Boogie said not to involve the police, and claimed to have contacted a police officer, who falsely informed him that Boogie’s death threats towards Frank were justified. Critics believed this was an attempt to avoid another welfare check, however as Boogie claimed to be sitting in the closet with an illegal firearm, it was certainly not out of the question.

Boogie ultimately claimed he was turning his back on the previously claimed pacifist stance, bizarrely justifying this by retroactively claiming that he had been harassed for his entire life. Some critics believed this was an attempt to try and monetize his criticism, something he has wanted to do before and wanted to do earlier that week. However, the general consensus was that this changed after being confronted with potential evidence of misdemeanors.

Rising to the Taunts: After being taunted repeatedly on Twitter, Frank understandably felt he had to confront Boogie directly. He showed up at Boogie’s house. Unarmed, and filming, he rung Boogie’s doorbell. Boogie opened the door, gun in hand, and immediately pointed it at Frank. A friend stood behind Boogie, holding Boogie’s dog as a shield. He fired a warning shot, and Frank left. The facts were clear, Boogie had broken Arkansas law by taunting Frank and firing a warning shot, and the police came to his house. As Frank walked away, Boogie would taunt him, calling him a ‘pussy’(3:15). Boogie had the choice to keep the door closed, and knew Frank was unarmed. He also demonstrated that he was mentally aware of his actions at the time.

After Frank left, Boogie returned to Twitter to justify why he had seemingly abandoned his pacifism, claiming that Frank and the SamandTolki thread had resulted in death threats, a claim with no evidence. Boogie asked his fans to send him memes about the event and bragged about almost killing his ‘stalker’ on Facebook. Finally, Boogie declared he was going to bring a defamation suit against Frank, however given that the claims Boogie disputes are factually documented on this very blog as well as elsewhere, it is unknown how well this will go for him. A police investigation is ongoing, with Boogie’s neighbors upset with his actions.

Later that day, Boogie went on Matt Jarbo’s podcast to justify his actions, explaining how it was politically motivated to get attention to his bullying. A partial transcript of ‘Boogie’s Speech’ can be found here.

Frank would later upload a heavily edited video.

A Summary:

Boogie, by his own admission, is mentally ill and medicated. That and having a medical marijuana card federally disqualify him from possessing a firearm. Furthermore, Arkansas is a duty to retreat state and the castle doctrine only comes into effect when someone has entered your residence and poses a violent threat. Frank was not in Boogie’s home as Arkansas law does not define the front lawn as part of the residence. Finally, Arkansas does not allow warning shots as in their own code it states "what goes up must come down". Frank might be on the hook for a misdemeanor but Boogie committed felonies and bragged about it.

Did Boogie Fear for His Life? Boogie’s legal defense is contingent on whether or not he feared for his life. As a result, he has reacted with intense anger, even gaslighting Matt Jarbo on his podcast when people suggest that it could be partially staged. Frank is well-known as a prankster who is known for not physically touching his victims. Therefore it is irrational to expect him to escalate this, especially on camera.

Chronologically, Boogie’s initial attitude towards Frank was offering to play along with his ‘meltdown’. Boogie didn’t talk too much about Frank after that, but after finding out he was in Arkansas, began to claim Frank had harassed him for months (there is no evidence that this occurred). He said he had tried to talk rationally with Frank, but that Frank wanted to harm his mental health. He claimed that Frank was here to ‘harass’ and ‘scare’, and was chosen by Frank to trigger his PTSD. On the other hand, Frank has always been clear in conversation with Boogie that his main issue is with his creepy behavior towards young women, and that Frank has a friend who has been emotionally abused by Boogie.

During the shooting, Boogie acted oddly. First, opening the door unnecessarily. Boogie could see that Frank was unarmed from his external camera, and could also communicate with him from inside. In addition, he immediately pointed the gun at him upon doing this. He also stepped out through the doorway, towards Frank to fire a warning shot. Boogie acted in a way that some critics have said seems rehearsed, though displayed odd familiarity with the gun that he legally could not own. In addition, the repeated taunts, including calling him a ‘pussy’ while he walks away, do not seem the actions of someone fearing for his life.

Initially, Boogie claimed these taunts and provocations were justified, however on Matt Jarbo’s podcast, state that the police later told him otherwise. After the shooting, Boogie changed to say that he was scared for his life or health, completely going against the previous narrative. Many have raised the question that the entire series of events is fake, and an attempt to promote storyfire on Boogie and Keemstar’s part.

Boogie should not be armed

In addition to not fearing for his life, the question is also raised if a man who has admitted to wanting to use guns to kill himself should be allowed access to a gun in the first place.

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