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rileyslibrary · 1 year ago

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Chest candy for Ghost and the 141! After many successful missions (and being the baddest bitches in general) the team is going to receive some medals. Ghost tries everything in his power to not have to attend the ceremony. Having to wear that stupid ceremonial uniform, all the attention and the fuzz around them - that sounds like hell to him. He's just doing his goddamn job after all.

A/N: I was very disappointed when I learned what a chest candy is, ngl. A literal version (like a crate filled with gummies and stuff) would be so much better. Anyway, on with the story.

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“You walk like you’re chafed down there, mate.”

Ghost stops and shoots a threatening look at Soap. And reasonably so—your poor lieutenant was trying his best. Price negotiated with him, and they reached an agreement for today’s dress code—he would put on the fancy uniform but keep the balaclava on.

The captain decided this was a fair exchange—persuading Ghost to wear anything other than camo deserved a chest candy of its own. Not only that, but many people will attend today’s ceremony; even worse, the press will also be there. There was no way he would get rid of his “comfort blanket.”

But, even a day without his camo, standing in front of strangers and being photographed, is a century for the lieutenant.

You, Soap and Ghost are preparing for the event in the town hall’s bathroom. Ghost struggles to walk in his new shoes, so you figured some practice might help. You made him walk across the bathroom stalls, which was an unfortunate location since Soap was already in one of the toilets and popped out, offering a “helping” hand.

But it’s not just the shoes that hinder his ability to act normal. He seems to struggle with something deeper within himself. He constantly fidgets, readjusts his blazer, pulls at his collar, and avoids direct eye contact. His gaze constantly darts between you, the sink, the floor, and back to you again.

Except for now.

He’s staring at Soap like a feral animal, ready to leap on its prey. And you get it. You do. Given what he’s used to, this situation should be tough and quite uncomfortable.

He slowly shifts away from Soap and towards you.

“What do you think?” he asks.

“Tell him,” Soap taunts you with his arms crossed, “tell him how he looks.”

“Why are you still in here?” You snap at him.

“I’m sorry!” Soap shouts and throws his hand up, “Have you guys booked the toilets for a private viewing?”

You close your eyes and rub your forehead. This better not escalate.

“Can you please leave us alone for a mom—”

“How about forever?” Ghost snaps.

“Fine”, Soap says and heads for the exit. “Just don’t let him pull another runaway bride on us again, okay?”

You wave for him to exit the bathroom. Soap does as he’s told, and you lean against one of the stalls. You examine the lieutenant from head to toe, but he’s too busy patting and pulling at the blazer to notice you. He grabs his tie and tugs at it.

“Don’t loosen the tie.” You command, “It’s supposed to be snug.”

“Who the fuck decided that wearing a noose around your neck is a good idea?” He says and starts tugging at his collar.

“And stop doing that to your collar—you’ll rip a button off.”

“It’s too tight.”

You approach him, place your index finger inside his collar, and trace the circumference.

“Ghost, it’s not that tight.”

“It sure feels like it.” He replies.

You sigh and slap your arms against your thighs. How will you make him understand what he’s feeling right now? He has to turn his attention inwards and observe his body. Acknowledge it. That’s the only way he’d be able to befriend his current state.

“Is the collar and tie the issue here, or is it your throat?” You ask.

He clasps his neck and looks at you, puzzled. “I don’t understand,” he says.

“Your throat,” you explain, “does it feel tight? Is there a lump when you swallow?”

He throws his head back and closes his eyes. He’s trying to become acquainted with his senses. He takes a deep breath and swallows hard.

“Affirmative,” he states, “a lump is indeed present.”

“It sucks, doesn’t it?”

He opens his eyes wide and nods slowly. “Sure does,” he murmurs.

“It feels like when we’re at the beginning of a mission, right?”

“Just like it.” He nods, “especially when we’re unsure of what we might come across.”

“How about,” you say as you straighten his tie, “We approach this event in the exact same way?”

“How?”

“What are the objectives here?” You ask.

“Get that fucking chest candy, and get the fuck out of here.”

“And what should we do to accomplish that?”

“Get up on the stage, shake some dickhead’s hand, and walk away.” He replies.

“How long would you recon that’ll take?”

He tilts his head. “About three minutes max.”

“That’s not too bad!” You shout and pat his chest, “Plus, I doubt the people awarding us want to be here either.”

He huffs. “You think so?”

“Of course! It’s just as inconvenient for them as it is for us.”

“Then why are we all doing this?” he wonders and throws his hands up, “Why pretend?”

“Because,” you reply, “sometimes in life, you must pretend; pretend to be strong, courageous, pretend to know what you’re doing even though you have no clue….”

“Fake it till you make it?” He asks.

You smile. “Yeah, Lt., fake it till you make it.”

He shakes his hands and kicks his feet. He straightens his suit and posture, then looks at the bathroom window.

“This won’t fit me this time, so we might as well get done with it as soon as possible,” he says and turns to you, “on me, soldier.”

“Sir, yes, sir.” You salute him.

You walk towards the entrance where the ceremony is taking place. Many people are in the room, but you always stay within his proximity to make him feel safe. Sometimes you direct him on what to do—shake this person’s hand, relax the shoulders, pose, stand over here.

He leans towards you while waving at another soldier.

“Do I walk like I’m sore?” He murmurs.

You smile at a photographer and lean towards Ghost.

“No,” you whisper, “why?”

“Soap said so.”

Fucking Soap. He was right; these shoes make him walk like a duck, but you can’t admit it, especially now. He’ll flee.

“Yeah, well,” you reply, “Soap also walks around with a mohawk on his head.”

“Ridiculous,” he says and laughs, “and here I am, wearing a full suit, right?”

You raise your head and look at his black-painted eyes and skull balaclava. He can’t be that delusional regarding what’s ridiculous and what isn’t. But if it helps him right now, so be it.

“Damn right, Lt.,” you say as you nudge his side, “You’re doing amazing, sweetie.”

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xoxochb · 2 months ago

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⋆·˚ ༘ * love grows (where my rosemary goes)

warnings: implied nudity, sex jokes, most quotes are direct from the tower of nero so credits go to uncle rick!! pairing: apollo x goddess! daughter of aphrodite and ares

two weeks. if you counted the time he was gone it would have been more but he was alive then. now he lay silently… and you anxiously wait. artemis places her hand over your free one in comfort

“he will wake up soon”

it was utterly ridiculous. you were a goddess, an immortal goddess yet you still worried about the waking of your also immortal husband. regardless the tears brewing in your eyes, threatening to pool out

“why don’t you grab a snack? take your mind off things”

“no,” you shake your head “I need to stay here”

the hunter goddess sighs and stands, patting your shoulder. “well, I will get you something”

the silence returns to the room. you look around at your surroundings (that you had got quite comfortable with over the past two weeks), a white marble chamber, a columned terrace with a beautiful view of olympus and the intoxicating scent of jasmine and honeysuckle. it was something you grew to hate and yet love. you hated it here because all you could do was sit in sorrow and wait for your beloved to wake from his two week slumber. but you loved it. you spent every day, every night here and you despised it

you sigh and look up to the renaissance painting adorned ceiling. you nearly shed another tear but a squeeze to your right hand stops you. or it leads all the tears to pool out. that’s a story for another time. you snap your head back down to where your husband lays— you see him stirring and his eyes flutter open. you don’t know what to do first; to cry, to scream, to hit him, or hug him. apollo chooses the third option for you. then the both of you break into a sob, holding each other tightly like maybe if you let go one of you would disappear into thin air

“you are such an idiot” you breathe out and you hear the sun god laugh in response— it made you realize how dearly you had missed the melodic laugh of his. or how every room he would walk into would be taken over by melodies instantly, every sound now a beautiful composed tone to it. reluctantly you took a last whiff of his scent and pulled back, yet still unwilling to let your hands leave his.

“how long?”

“what do you mean?”

“how long was I out? what century is it?”

you processed this question. maybe because you wanted to laugh but that would’ve had to stay as something only you knew

“since you fought python, only two weeks have passed”

you expected many different reactions after this statement but the one that hadn’t dared cross your mind was the chosen surprise. apollo jumps up from the couch and throws the sheet to the side, standing fully nude before you. your cheeks redden and you studiously admire the ceiling once again

“what about my friends? they’ll think I’m dead!”

“your sister sent clear omens of your success. they know you’re back on olympus. now would you please put clothing on?”

you hear apollo’s euphonious laugh again. “nothing you haven’t seen before”

“apollo!” you warn. and just as you asked you can feel a breeze from his wishing clothes onto himself. you return your head back down before standing up with a wide smile “thank you”

apollo wraps one arm around your waist, the other hand going to brush your pink cheek before placing a kiss to it. “you’re happy”

“you’re awake”

he places a kiss to your lips now. slowly and un-rushed. but everything good comes to an end eventually

he doesn’t go far, lips still brushing against yours as he speaks, “am I need somewhere?”

“yes,” you frown “but do you think you could stay here a bit?”

“as long as you want”

#xoxochb #percy jackon and the olympians #pjo series #pjo fandom #percy jackson #pjo #percy series #pjo hoo toa #apollo #apollo x y/n #apollo pjo x reader #trials of apollo #apollo x you #apollo x reader #apollo pjo

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mostlysignssomeportents · 9 days ago

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Neal Stephenson’s “Polostan”

NEXT WEEKEND (Novem<p>placeholder </p>ber 8-10), I'll be in TUCSON, AZ: I'm the GUEST OF HONOR at the TUSCON SCIENCE FICTION CONVENTION.

Science fiction isn't collection of tropes, nor is it a literary style, nor is it a marketing category. It can encompass all of these, but what sf really is, is an outlook.

At the core of sf is an approach to technology (and, sometimes, science): sf treats technology as a kind of crux that the rest of the tale revolves around. The Bechdel test invites us to notice that in most fiction, stories revolve around men – that it's rare for two or more non-male characters to interact with one another, and if they do, that interaction is triggered by a man.

The sftnal version of this would go something like this: "a story gets increasingly stfnal to the extent that interactions among characters either directly relate to a technology, or are triggered by the consequences of such a relation, or fears, plans or aspirations for same."

(Note that this implies that science fiction is a spectrum: things can be more or less science fictional, and that gradient reflects the centrality of a technology to the narrative.)

No one's work demonstrates this better than Neal Stephenson. Stephenson's work covers a lot of settings and storytelling modes. His debut, The Big U, was a contemporary novel lampooning academic life. Then came Zodiac, another contemporary novel, but one where science – in this case, extremely toxic polychlorinated biphenyls – take center stage. Then came his cyberpunk classic, Snow Crash, which was unambiguously (and gloriously) science fiction.

A couple of books later, we got Cryptonomicon, a finance novel that treated money as a technology, and, notably, did so across both a near-future setting and the historic setting of WWII. In addition to being a cracking novel, Cryptonomicon is exciting in that it treats the technological endeavors of the past in exactly the same way as it does the imaginary technological endeavors of the future. Here's Stephenson fusing his contemporary sensibilities with his deep interests in history, and approaching historical fiction as an sf writer, doing the sftnal thing to gadgets and ideas that have been around for more than two generations.

Stephenson's next novel was Quicksilver, the first book of the massive "System of the World" trilogy, in which the extremely historical events of Newton and Leibniz's quest to discover "the calculus" are given a sweeping, world-spanning sftnal treatment. As "system of the world" suggests, Stephenson uses this sftnal trick to situate a scientific advancement in the context of a global, contingent, complex system that it both grows out of an defines. This is the pure water of science fiction, applied entirely to real seventeenth century events, and it's definitive proof that sf isn't a trope, a style or a category – but rather, it is a way of framing and understanding the world.

You can think of Stephenson's career up to this point as a series of experiments in applying the stfnal lens to events that are progressively less historical (and, with The Diamond Age, events that are atemporal inasmuch as the book is set in a futuristic revival of the Victorian Age). Experiments that range over contemporary settings, and then contemporary settings blended with historical settings, then a deep historical sf trilogy.

(It's rather exciting that these books came out right as William Gibson was entering his own "predicting the present" decade, where he exclusively published sf about the recent past, a prelude to a series of sf novels set in a future so far from our present that the characters literally have no record of which events led up to their own circumstances):

https://memex.craphound.com/2014/10/28/the-peripheral-william-gibson-vs-william-gibson/

Having proved how successful an historical sf novel could be, Stephenson then bopped around with a lot of stfnal historical ideas, from the "transmedia" 12th century setting of the Mongoliad to a madcap time-travel book (The Rise and Fall of DODO). Stephenson's work since then have been pretty straightforwardly sftnal, which means that he's a little overdue for a return to historical sf.

That's where Polostan comes in, the just-published inaugural volume of a new interwar series about the birth of atomic science:

https://www.harpercollins.com/products/polostan-neal-stephenson

Critics and even the publisher have called this a "spy novel" or a "historical novel" but it is neither of those. What Polostan is, is a science fiction novel, about spies in an historical setting. This isn't to say that Stephenson tramples on, or ignores spy tropes: this is absolutely a first-rate spy novel. Nor does Stephenson skimp on the lush, gorgeously realized and painstakingly researched detail you'd want from an historical novel (Stephenson has long enjoyed a fruitful collaboration with the brilliant researcher Lisa Gold, whom we can thank for much of the historical detail across his body of work).

But the overarching sensibility of this work is a world full of people who revolve around technology. You'd be hard-pressed to list more than a handful of actions taken by the characters that aren't driven by technology, and most of the dialog either concerns technology, or the actions that characters have taken in relation to technology. It's unmistakably and indelibly a science fiction novel.

It's great.

Polostan raises the curtain on the story of Dawn Rae Bjornberg, AKA Aurora Maximovna Artemyeva, whose upbringing is split between the American West in the early 20th century and the Leningrad of revolutionary Russia (her parents are an American anarchist and a Ukrainian Communist who meet when her father travels to America as a Communist agitator). Aurora's parents' marriage does not survive their sojourn to the USSR, and eventually Aurora and her father end up back in the States, after her father is tasked with radicalizing the veterans of the Bonus Army that occupied DC, demanding the military benefits they'd been promised:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonus_Army

After the efforts of Communist organizers in the Bonus Army were mercilessly crushed by George S Patton, Aurora ends up living in a Communist commune in Chicago, where she falls into a job selling comfortable shoes to the footsore women who visit the Century of Progress, as the 1933 World's Fair was known:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Century_of_Progress

At the Century of Progress, Aurora sits at the junction where many global currents are mixing: she is there when Mussolini's air armada lands on Lake Michigan to the cheers of thronged fascist sympathizers; and also when Neils Bohr lectures on the newly discovered – and still controversial – neutron. She is also exposed to her first boyfriend, a young physicist from New York, who greatly expands her interest in nuclear physics and also impregnates her.

This latter turn in her life sends Aurora back into the American west, where, after a complex series of misadventures and derring-do, she embarks on a career as a tommy gun-toting bank robber, part of an armed gang of her cowboy shirttail cousins.

All of this culminates in her return sojourn to the Soviet Union, where she first falls under suspicion of being an American spy, and then her recruitment as a Soviet spy.

Also: she plays a lot of polo. Like, on a horse.

This isn't just an unmistakably sftnal novel, it's also an unmistakably Stephensonian novel: embroidered, discursive, and brilliantly expositional:

https://maryrobinettekowal.com/journal/my-favorite-bit/my-favorite-bit-cory-doctorow-talks-about-the-bezzle/

It is funny, it is interesting, it is even daffy in places. It's sometimes absolutely horrifying. It skips around in time like a subatomic particle bouncing around in a theoretical physics model. It creates and resolves all manner of little subplots in most satisfying ways, but also ultimately exists just to tee up the main action, which will come in future volumes. It's a curtain raiser, and like any good opening number, it hooks you for what is to come.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/11/04/bomb-light/#nukular

#pluralistic #science fiction #post cyberpunk #historical fiction #cold war #nukes #neal stephenson #polostan #gift guide #reviews #books

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dykealloy · 11 months ago

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Trafalgar Law and Faith

Pre-emptive warning this is going to be another LONG metapost/analysis. There’s a lot I could talk about here but for the sake of structure I’m going to split this into three sections, i.e. the main ‘faith transitions’ that Law has gone through in the narrative thus far: 1. Flevance (catalyst for loss of religious faith), 2. Corasan (martyr that figuratively and literally saves law by giving him something to live for, introducing the will of D.), and 3. Luffy (cementing faith in this new belief system and regaining trust in the goodness of humanity through the living embodiment of everything Corasan believed in).

Before we get into all that though, let’s establish that Christianity is a thing in one piece. Speedrunning through some visual examples that come to mind; the Flevance church and nun (holding a celtic cross - censored in the anime version), a nun literally praying to God right before Marineford, Vinsmoke Sora’s grave marked with a cross (is op Christianity a northern thing?), Usopp and Chopper having crucifixes and holy water whenever ghostly stuff is brought up, Kuma and his trusty bible, the religious symbols on Kikoku’s hilt (could instead be more a reference to the Red Cross/symbol of humanitarian and medical aid as a doctor) and especially in whatever Mihawk’s got going on (though this could just be a Japanese cultural thing with Christianity being a minority religion or Oda just finding that some of the iconography, y’know. looks cool). There are also many other references to other religions e.g. hinduism, shintoism, buddhism, etc. Whether op forms of religion are the same as the real-world ones is debatable, and yes, Law being canonically raised as a devout catholic schoolboy with all the religious trauma associated with that is comical, but let’s take it all unironically for a hot minute. For fun.

1. Flevance

Law’s birthplace (Flevance) is described as being, at one point, “a very wealthy country with an unearthly beauty about it, with pure white soil and plants, like some kind of snow kingdom in a fairy tale.” The country’s wealth came from the very bedrock it sits on — white lead, which could be used to make various high quality products like tableware, cosmetics, weapons etc. When the wider world heard about this everyone wanted a piece of Flevance (the World Government also getting involved with distribution), and very quickly white lead became a “bottomless well of money”. So, hooray. Law gets to grow up in a rich city in a big house with educated doctor parents and probably gets to go to private school on weekdays and festivals with his family on weekends. One problem. In their greed, the Government and royalty have been knowingly hiding the truth about this supposed goldmine from the beginning. White lead is a toxic poison. Mining it from the ground over the last century and putting it in so many everyday products has resulted in it accumulating in the citizens’ bodies and leading to amber lead sickness, shortening their life-span with each successive generation – with the children of Law’s generation fated to die out before they reach adulthood.

In the bible (especially in the old testament), God often inflicted these insanely disastrous events upon humanity, usually as some kind of punishment for their wrongdoings or as a test of their faith. Some events of which include (but are not limited to): famine, outbreaks of disease and natural disasters (e.g. hail, wildfire, earthquakes, floods). Historically, these stories played a key role in how humanity interpreted meaning from horrible disasters (e.g. assuming bubonic plague was sent as a punishment by god). Fire imagery is very common among these disasters as a representation for hell, which is clearly reflected in the destruction of Flevance.

Sometimes these disasters had sole survivors act as messengers for God. With that context, let’s put ourselves back in the shoes of a ten-year old Law. Raised religious, freshly traumatised from losing his home, his devout family, all the comforts of his life, and having the outside world completely abandon him, this kind of event is likely going to be processed as some form of divine punishment. Law stumbles through hell, finds all his dead classmates, and the last words of sister nun echo through to him here. Merciful and salvation are huge catholic buzzwords – promises of holy compassion, deliverance and hope – and all of it fire and smoke and riddled with bullet holes before him. A genocide funded, perpetuated and covered up by the same body Law was promised was there to save them. And the only reason Law hadn’t died with them was because he wanted to stay with his little sister Lami, who was on her deathbed, and his parents, who were themselves trying to help the afflicted citizens, Law’s own father (before he was shot and killed alongside his mother) begging for more doctors, fresh blood, anything the world can offer, and asking “Why doesn’t the government announce to everyone that white lead is not infectious?”

Oftentimes (and in the case of Law), when there’s a promise of heavenly intervention or some miracle that doesn’t follow through, it results in an ultimate feeling of betrayal and anger. Unfortunately a lot of Catholic teachings also use a lot of guilt, essentially teaching people that the bad things that happen to you are your fault and there needs to be some sort of penance (queue Law’s survivor’s guilt that carries on down the road). But also, if this was supposed to be some divine punishment, for what exactly? For the town being blinded by the incredible wealth they were sitting on? Being lied to? Continuing to extract their livelihood, ignorant of its dangers? Punishment for who? His parents? His innocent little sister? For ten year-old Law? These people who believed in God, who were good people? That’s fucking stupid. None of these people suffered and died for any reason at all — certainly not for a sacred one. God hadn’t saved a single one of them. Law had to crawl out of hell himself by sneaking over the border under a mound of corpses.

Given everything that happened here, Law has every reason to fall into nihilism, and you can see how his upbringing would’ve bred a lot of the feelings of guilt, anger and resentment that you still see in Law (which would suggest that though this is where he likely cuts ties with the religious/Catholic component of his faith, growing up with these teachings in his formative years would definitely influence underlying beliefs about how the world works, and how Law behaves and subconsciously processes information), but at the same time, there’s usually some form of redemption and changes to how these patterns of behaviour can be approached later down the line.

2. Corasan

Fresh off witnessing his whole world burning down around him, Law meets Corazon at the very bottom of this pit of self-destructive rage and unprocessed grief. Rosinante himself mentions to Sengoku that the hatred in Law at this time reminded him of his brother, but beyond the anger, harsh pessimism, vengefulness, I think you have to reach to find similarities between them. You can see some fragments of Doffy in Law down the line at times, with Law seeming to enjoy violence (especially against the navy, but given what they did to Flevance, it’s some well-deserved retribution for Law imo), but I’m not so sure it’s the cruelty so much as it is the high he gets off his own flavour of justice. Doctor’s Hippocratic oath maybe, but never once does Law like seeing others die (even at this point, he’s in tears next to a dead body, even though he’s the one holding the knife), and later on in Wano he makes it explicitly clear to Zoro that he’d rather see the mission fail than have any of them end up dead.

Little Law wanted to destroy the world and everything in it, but thinking rationally, what other choice did this kid have? He had no remaining family, was doomed to die before he hit puberty due to a terminal illness, was perceived as an infectious subhuman that most doctors would’ve sooner tried to exterminate than help. To Law, the world had turned its back on him – considering him a monster for simply surviving. He has all this hatred and pain boiling away with him with no tangible target to direct it towards. And this is the first clear cut rejection of faith that we see in Law. Any concept of a merciful God had just died. What God would allow this? Why is Law alive (a question that he repeats to himself throughout his life), why are these scumbags alive, why is the world going on spinning as if nothing has happened when his whole world had gone up in flames, why does anyone at all get to be here when everything I loved is gone? And it’s far easier to fall into a despondent nihilistic stupor than it is to work through any of that, and what’s the point in trying to process and move on from it, when there’s no hope for a future for Law anyway? When the only thing waiting ahead is more pain? What was this, if not a punishment? He’s supposed to be some messenger for God? How about fuck God, or whatever entity that exists that made him suffer this. Law’s not going to be a messenger for shit, thanks, he’d rather be their monster, he’d rather watch the world burn.

Corazon survives Law’s stabbing and doesn’t rat the little shit out (to Law’s confusion). It’s business as usual for another two years, then, one day Rosinante overhears his true name - Trafalgar “D” Water Law, and everything changes. On the back of his own beliefs, Rosinante dedicates himself to making sure Law a) lives and b) doesn’t become his brother. Law’s relatively short six month stint with Corasan forms the basis of Law’s new creed going forward, and all it took was a bit of kindness, love and humanity when the rest of the world had abandoned him. In the end Rosinante doesn’t save Law for the will of D. and the storm he’s predicted to bring in the future (as Law suspects), but he certainly believes in it, and the strength of Corasan’s conviction transfers right over to Law when he forces the ope ope fruit down the kid’s throat to heal him, tells Law he loves him, then sacrifices himself to set Law free.

Law clings to that love he was given, he takes all these fundamental teachings and ways of thinking in regards to faith that were drilled into him during his youth, rejects the religion element and applies just about everything else to Corasan. He holds onto the last shreds of what Corasan leaves him with. Corasan becomes his “benefactor” (he gave my my heart), his saviour, his martyr.

And the crazy thing is, Rosinante was never really this saint Law makes him out to be. Law hated the clutz when they first met (mostly on account of Corazon throwing him through a glass window down at least two stories and into a pile of scrap). Corazon initially showed nothing but contempt for his presence (to ward him and the other children away from the Donquixote family, but these are still extreme measures). And it wasn’t until after learning Law’s name that Rosinante dragged him kicking, crying and screaming from hospital to burning hospital (not very saintlike in of itself), even after Law begged him to stop. Rosinante became Law’s saviour partly because of his belief in the will of D., and probably due to some guilt being a Donquixote, but mostly because he has always had a bleeding heart and he pitied (and had very quickly come to love) this angry, sick, deeply lost little kid. All this to say that Law’s faith in Corasan – this saintlike figure Law upholds him as in the future and the lengths he’s willing to go to avenge him/fulfil Rosinante’s purpose reflects the strength of the absolute beliefs Law would’ve been raised with in regards to God.

Whether it be out of survivor’s guilt (just one more body to heap on top of the Flevance pile), his love for Corasan, or for the sake of taking vengeance on the man that took away the one good thing he’d been able to regain in his miserable life, Law adopts Corasan’s will, the will of D. (which in of itself seems divine in nature), incorporates it into his new belief system, actively takes on the role of the divine punisher/justiciar and dedicates his life to bringing down Doflamingo.

3. Luffy

Catholicism dictates that the entirety of someone’s beliefs should be dedicated to one true cause (that cause being God) and expects people to ride on that, letting it carry them through life, give them hope, purpose, etc. But a lot of former Catholics choose instead to find that through something else. Corasan ignited the spark in Law’s faith around the will of D., but it’s not until he meets Luffy that this really becomes something that feels tangible and real for Law.

When Law saved Luffy in Marineford (putting the heart crew in danger for a stranger he met once), he said he did so “on a whim”, but that seems incredibly ooc for Law — this man that pretty much planned out how the rest of his life would go after the dust of Corasan’s death settled and he came to terms with the fact he wasn’t going to die at age thirteen like he’d originally thought. Circling back to the concept of Law being a sole survivor/messenger for God, it is interesting that Law is the one to seek out Luffy (given that Luffy is usually always the one either being abandoned by people or recruiting his crewmates), and Law is ultimately the catalyst for pulling him towards Dressrosa and Wano. There must be a REASON that led to Law deciding Luffy to be the most viable option out of the Worst Generation for an alliance (beyond blind trust in an unhinged captain that just so happens to also bear the initial D, and Luffy being one of the few captains crazy enough to go along with what Law was cooking up).

Law undoubtedly would’ve kept a peripheral eye on Luffy for some time before officially meeting him due to him being a rising competitor pirate and another “D” (I imagine the news of his utterly insane exploits would’ve made good reading material, too). The first time Law lays eyes on Luffy in Sabaody though, he still blows all expectations out of the water — crashing headfirst into the crowd of a slave auction and immediately committing a felony against a member of the most powerful upper one percent.

The world nobles are at an “untouchable God” tier in terms of class standing and believe it’s only natural for them to be entitled to whatever and whoever they want in this world that’s beneath them – the same kind of self-aggrandizing false divinity that Law has a a lot of repressed rage towards and that the will of D. is fated to oppose, so this, understandably, is a highly compelling first encounter, but it’s really only an initiating factor for what ultimately draws Law to Luffy. From their very first meeting (and probably before then, in the news stories and rumours Law likely picked up on), it’s made abundantly clear that Luffy does what he wants without a second’s hesitation, no matter the consequences, simply because he feels it is the right thing to do. Some call this an iron will, Law would be more inclined to call it willful stupidity and trouble, but time after time Luffy somehow manages to pull off what Law would best describe as “miracles”. And Law believes the straw hats just might be the ones to drum up another one for him.

Luffy’s also got a lot of passing resemblances to Corasan going for him, e.g. inherently kind, compassionate liberators with big dumb hearts and wide goofy smiles in spite of everything they’ve been through, treating Law as nakama and saving his life despite his protests etc. All of which I’m sure Law hasn’t been completely unaffected by despite the high walls he puts up. And the more Law learned about Luffy the more it probably became clear that he is the antithesis to Doflamingo, i.e. what makes Luffy so goddamn dangerous and terrifying beyond his physical power is his ability to make friends with a simple kind of unconditional love that gets reciprocated enough so that these friends are willing to die for him.

Luffy agrees to the alliance, they successfully blow up Caesar’s base, and head off to Dressrosa. Now’s the time I should bring up that it’s taught in Catholicism that self sacrifice is the ultimate heavenly deed, and here Law is undoubtedly prepared to be a martyr for his cause. Law sends away his crew to Zou before Punk Hazard with the expectations that he’d never see them. He cultivates a fierce emotional detachment against Luffy’s willingness to bring him into the fold of the straw hats, and is resolute in that when the time comes, he will handle this himself, he will carry out Corasan’s will, and if he has to die for it, he will die with Corazon’s name plastered on his back. (Note here that Christianity is contradictory in that Law being this ready to die here is a sin, because revenge and suicide are highly discouraged, so you could say that by avenging and dying for his saviour, Law would be committing both the ultimate sacrifice and the ultimate sin).

Things get very dicey for Law in Dressrosa, to put it lightly. Doflamingo reveals that he was a celestial dragon (linking back into the will of D. “enemy of the Gods” notion), puts Law on the backfoot and gives him a thorough beating before shooting Law with a couple dozen white lead bullets in front of Luffy (because even when he’s winning Doffy loves to be a cunt about it). By the time Doflamingo is cuffing Law to the heart seat, it’s all looking pretty grim, and it’s very apparent when Luffy shows up to save him, that he is ready to die.

Law here has given up. He spent years planning his revenge for Corasan, but he lost, and he has very little left in the tank (physically, emotionally, spiritually). But Luffy doesn’t listen. Luffy who doesn’t think, doesn’t care, who trampled all over Law’s carefully laid out plan from the get-go and who is willing to take on Doflamingo single handedly for the simple slight that he dared to harm Luffy’s friend Law. Law will never find peace in his own demise because Luffy doesn’t do peaceful. He does loud and unashamed and open with no rhyme or reason other than the excruciatingly simply fact that he loves people and he thinks the people he loves deserve to have good lives. Luffy chucks Law over his shoulder and drags an injured Law across the city despite his protests (sound familiar?) and in the process inspires the fighting spirit in Law again.

When Law confronts Doflamingo again with Luffy in tow, Law’s faith in Luffy confounds him. The last Doflamingo remembers of Law is this beautifully moldable dark pit of grief and rage who’d given up on believing, period – who wanted the world destroyed. Not so long ago, Law had been a candidate for Doflamingo’s next protégé. Now?

THIS is the action (grinning, staring down the barrel of a gun, flipping Doffy off as he tells him in not so many words that he may kill Law but he will never beat Luffy), Law’s unshakeable faith in the face of his own death is what has Doflamingo realising he will never regain control of Law again – is what incites Doflamingo to go from breaking Law down so he can build him back up again, to conceding defeat and outright killing him.

The trust that Luffy inspires in Law and the way he talks about Luffy (Luffy being this powerful, miracle-inducing liberator that Law can’t comprehend but follows anyway, Law laying down his hopes on him, weaponizing the will of D. to try and provoke fear from Doffy), is very reminiscent of the awe and faith talked about in scripture. Law discovers the feelings of comfort and hope that Catholicism was supposed to give him in Luffy, but Law’s belief in Luffy is a direct rejection of those teachings. Rejection by believing in a real life person as opposed to the divinity he was taught about. He’s also cementing his belief in the will of D., thus rejecting Doflamingo and all the people that embody the sort of “all powerful” divinity that he abhors (i.e. celestial dragons, Kaido, the Gorōsei/five elders) for the embodiment of hope and humanity.

When Law survives (again), he expresses he’d rather see Luffy beat Doflamingo with his own eyes or die with Luffy if he loses than leave. Then he watches, after all this talk of miracles, looking up in reverence as Luffy delivers, bright as the sun, haloed by the bars of a cage that’s haunted him for over a decade, Corasan’s words echoing at the back of his mind. God had never saved or freed Law, but Corasan was there for him, the heart crew was there, Luffy was there. And this is Law’s biggest, clearest rejection of religion – this newfound faith in humanity.

This faith in Luffy is put to the test again in Wano when Luffy is struck down by Kaido, but Law never truly stops believing that he’ll make a comeback. Even when the straw hats doubt whether he’s alive or not, something tells him Luffy’s not dead, and he holds onto that hope.

We also have the whole nika/joyboy backstory which really only reinforces all of this imagery/god-fearing looks of awe from Law and this idea of Luffy who is this perfect juxtaposition of empathetic and kind to incredibly fearsome fire and brimstone fighter. And regardless of whether you’re into the ship or not this is the impetus of Law’s relationship with Luffy for me, because here’s Luffy who has every right to have a chip on his shoulder and be downtrodden about all the injustices against him, here’s this little guy who against all odds, in the darkest of places, embodies light and hope and kindness and proves to Law that there will be hard times but there IS a happy ending at the end of the tunnel, despite it all. And everytime Luffy rises to the insurmountable challenge and wins, it just further cements that the will of D. is alive, that Corasan was right, that there's something redeemable in Law, a reason why he was worth saving, even if Law doesn’t understand it quite yet.

#merry christmas law religious trauma be upon ye #what’s an endearing idiot to a non-believer #long post #favourite character thesis statement. or something #ive been wanting to talk about this for a while but just been gathering my thoughts #will preface all this by saying I was not born or raised religious but the concept’s all very compelling from an outsider’s perspective #but I have had conversations about this to people like lesbianluffy who *were* raised catholic and relate to this experience #who I have to thank a lot for helping me wrap my head around this #this is a compilation of thoughts and conversations over the last two or so months #one piece #op #CJ's op watch-through #trafalgar law #monkey d. luffy #donquixote rosinante #donquixote corazon #monkey d luffy #lawlu #trafalgar d water law #gear 5 luffy #sun god nika #wano spoilers #lulaw #op meta #op analysis #one piece analysis

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vervainandspritz · 2 months ago

Text

Lost On You

Robert Fischer x Reader

PART 1

6.5k words

A/N: sorry it took so long but it's here, life's been busy! The story will be written in a little different style, as I got inspired by old English novels. The point of view will be switching frequently to give a bigger outlook. Let me know what you think!

Money. They say it's something acquired and that it doesn't bring happiness, but ninety eight percent of your living doesn't come from nowhere, right? We don't get to choose workplaces based on wellbeing or fun, at least not everyone has the privilege to do so. Money. Nothing else would keep me here for so long, Y/N thought.

She couldn't help but ponder on her choices, driving in an automatic state of mind, doing it out of habit and barely paying attention. It's a surprise that I never crashed, the woman thought to herself chuckling under her breath.

Glancing at the buildings and, still sitting behind the wheel of her car - a white, six-year-old Honda Civic, as she asks herself every morning: Why do I still work here? Why do I get out of bed every morning, ten minutes before my alarm, when I'm already losing to time every single day, stuck in traffic jams and still being late almost everyday? Why have I been doing this for three years instead of two.. at most?

For money and practice, that's obvious, her own, bitter at times mind replies with slight annoyance.

This is the third year of her toiling at Fischer Morrow and Y/N had no idea how time has flown by so quickly. At the age of twenty-three years old and since she started college, FM has been her first and last place of employment. She got a paid internship in October of her first year, which seemed too good to be true. Yet here she was. Honestly? It wasn't a feat or success at all, and Y/N only understood that with time. Her raging headache was slowly growing with each thought crossing her mind. It was.. a daily thing for her, her mind being on overdrive.

For centuries, there has been a belief at all types of universities that freshmen never get internships, however, this is just not true, not entirely because the truth lies somewhere else. They don't get internships because they DON'T WANT them. Yes, they don't. It's a pain in the ass. First, you have to prove yourself to get one, and then you have to immediately approach everything very seriously and for little to no money.

You have to be responsible: don't waste your weekends partying. Your mind needs to always be focused on studying and working. That's why it's better to start later. There's time for everything in life, and instead of partying, meeting people, and enjoying student life, I got busy working. I take it seriously. SERIOUSLY.

However, not everything is so bad. Over time, such actions bring tangible benefits. I have more experience than other students and I know that I will have no problems finding a job. But I also have a good salary: better than if I interned at any competitor company. FM pays me more than students are usually paid, and the salary increases with the duration of the internship, so after almost three years… I was fine. Just fine.

I'm renting an apartment of my own, I have my own “almost new” car, and well. I never need to borrow any money from anyone. It's a bad habit that I absolutely don't want to ever have.

So what keeps me going here is fucking money, Y/N eventually decides as she gets out of the car, shutting the door close and wrapping the coat around herself a little tighter, since the weather wasn't the dreamiest. It was autumn after all.

Walking through the company parking lot, she made her way towards the main entrance. Her clicking heels were the only sound around besides the raging wind. As she passed through the door, she saw a very familiar woman.

Vicky, was sitting by the receptionist desk writing something down until she heard the door swinging open.

Vicky looked up to see Y/N as she lightly smiled. Her makeup was a little too intense for the workplace, but it had become what she was known for. People liked to talk about Vicky in less flattering ways than necessary, which… maybe was another reason why Y/N grew to like her so much. Going with the flow tended to feel like an itch and, well, who liked that damn nagging sensation? Nobody. Clearly.

“Early as ever” The redhead said with a chuckle, her bold-red lips stretching into a smirk.

Y/N rolled her eyes with a sigh, raising an eyebrow.

“...and good morning to you too. I guess” She replied, smoothing out her hair, which of course didn't want to fully lay down, slightly waving at the ends. Y/N leaned slightly over the desk. “Is the witch here already?” she asked in a quiet tone, looking around to make sure nobody caught her words.

“Which one? There's plenty” Vicky whispered back with a chuckle, seeing the unimpressed look.

Unable to contain her laughter, Y/N covered her mouth to make the snort she let out as inaudible as possible.

“The Italian one” She replied.

The Fischer Morrow company is owned by Italian-American entrepreneur Maurice Fischer. In order to work there, you need to constantly improve your language skills. Knowledge of Italian was one of the criteria to receive the internship. Even though I'm only an intern and my Italian is at a high level, I also have to attend lessons once a week. They are paid for by Fischer himself. This is another bonus of interning or working for this company in my opinion.

Free Italian language lessons. If only the Italian teacher wasn’t so terrible.

“Girl, I'm a receptionist. How am I supposed to know?” Vicky says with a sigh, followed by a shrug. Obviously she was disappointed with how little people in the company communicated with her despite being the first point of contact for anyone who entered Fischer Morrow. She was a little nosey by nature.

Y/N sighed deeply before straightening her back, grabbing her purse, and heading to the elevator with a heart pounding in her chest. She loved the Italian language, but simply despised the current teacher.

She's demanding and bitter, plus treats me like a fucking ten year old. She tends to leave us homework, which I rarely get on time because of the amount of work I have. She's thrilled every single time, needless to say.

“Y/N!” Vicky yelled out, as she rushed towards the closing elevator doors, managing to stop them on time with her arm. “You-know-who is calling us to the conference room. Not only us but most departments.” She said, trying to catch her breath in the meantime.

“What for?” Y/N asked with surprise.

Mr. Fischer was not someone who'd usually make announcements. He was demanding and reasonably kind but his expectations towards his workers were always high. Whether anyone liked it or not, he'd make a drastic change and expect people to get used to it immediately.

“Who knows, but… I'm telling you in case.” She said, giving Y/N THE look.

She immediately understood, nodding gracefully and letting out a deep breath as the door closed.

Walking through the corridor, Y/N noticed several workers heading IMMEDIATELY to the conference room.

That's sooner than expected, she thought with a sarcastic chuckle.

Caroline, the head of advertising, walked like she owned the whole building in her obscenely high heels, barely keeping from breaking her ankles as her hips swayed beneath the tight skirt.

Oh my fucking god, please not her. Anyone but her.

“Hey, Y/N” She said in a fake sweet tone that made Y/N contain an eyeroll. “Did you hear that we all have a meeting? I wonder why. Maybe something happened? Maybe I will get a promotion?!” She started babbling without giving her colleague a chance to speak at all. It wasn't anything new about her, that's just the way Caroline was.

“What's that?” Y/N asked, pointing at the hard cover in Caroline's hand, trying to smoothly change the topic.

The taller woman glanced at her own grip, like she didn't know herself before smiling once again.

“Oh, it's a calendar. I thought that I should look, you know, busy and smart since Fischer will be there.” She explained with such pride, causing Y/N to internally cringe.

Oh god, I sighed inwardly. Not that I consider myself an expert on human behaviour, but this is probably way beneath my dignity, or I haven't soaked the corporate dress code in yet.

“He'll probably start whining again and ask obvious questions.” Y/N murmured under her breath, barely listening to Caroline and Marie, another department head, who suddenly appeared by her side.

With a fucking calendar tucked under her armpit.

They immediately started talking about Vicky from the reception, feeling the need to comment on everything about her, apparently.

The boss always asks strangely simple and at the same time uncomfortable questions. He is an old-school man and often does not understand what we do. You need to explain to him the mechanisms of how some of the departments function and, despite appearances, this can be difficult. Caroline can't recall the details in her head, and Marie, in turn, can't explain how it works. That's probably why they work together. They must complement each other. But this is not a reason to discredit the boss. He wouldn't be where he is today if he weren't smart in some way? Right? Or maybe it's just my naivete, because when I look at my colleagues who pretend to be professional, hold old calendars in their hands and call the reception girl a plastic doll while holding high positions, I start to doubt it. I have the impression that the higher the position in this company, the worse the intellect and intelligence.

“But you like her, right Y/N? Can't blame you though, coming in late so often and knowing the receptionist well enough to make sure she doesn't tell on you must come in handy.” Marie said in such a fake kind way that well that annoyed Y/N more than she'd like it to.

It was supposed to sting and it did, but Marie is not my boss and all she can do is talk. I have nothing against her, but her fanatical approach to work can be tiring. Marie doesn't understand that not everyone finds her job the love of his life. By the way, I wonder how her husband feels in this arrangement, knowing that she is cheating on him with her job

Even our boss, whom I hate as much as the Italian teacher, isn't that fanatical. Another witch. My nemesis.

Katherina

She is mean and annoying, but at the same time has a lot of knowledge and experience. Sometimes a nice word will slip from her lips but it barely comes out of her throat, accompanied by THAT grimace and her praise sounds artificial from ANY distance. She doesn't have a sense of humour and is a cunning bitch. Calculating like no other and often ruthless. She always gets what she wants, and is one of the people who have the ability to approach the CEO and talk about budget in such a way ensuring she will always get the largest of all departments. Katherina is a real business bitch.

“Let's just get going” Y/N said, ripping herself out of the thoughts, turning around and slowly walking into the conference room which was by now filled with people.

We took our places by the humongous table in the middle, impatiently waiting on what was to come.

Everyone wonders what this meeting is for and quiet whispers fill the room. However, when Mr. Fischer appears with a serious face, everyone falls silent. We know right away that what he wants to tell us will not be pleasant.

Our boss is an older and slightly mannered man, with a specific sense of humour. Always dressed in a suit and a white shirt, he creates an aura of inaccessibility around him and immediately, at first glance, commands respect.

I don't like talking to him in private, although he once mentioned that he likes me and even loves my work style. To this day, I don't know how he knows what I'm doing, but it’s not important. I guess he wanted to let me know that he still has his finger on the pulse of even the smallest details.

I must admit, it's very encouraging to hear such praise from the CEO himself, but I still don't like talking to him.

The older man sits down in his usual seat and opens his notes. He looks up at all of us and sighs.

“Ladies and gentlemen” He begins almost like he was starting a holy mass in a church, and as if by an innate reflex I want to fold my hands in a prayer, even though I am not a Christian by any means. “...because I wanted to inform you that I will soon be planning to retire…” he finishes the first sentence in a weak tone, and the whole room is filled with a murmur of quiet conversations and surprised voices.

“Yes, yes, I'm so old that it's time to get going..” he adds and laughs briefly, while no one else has the courage to do so. “...and you're probably wondering who will take over the position in our company after me, well... “ He makes an appropriate pause to build tension.

“My older son Robert is coming back to us.” he finishes, and the room begins to boil, but not from words, but from employees squirming in their chairs.

They all look at each other as one and hear single words of surprise. The faces of some of them are not very optimistic, not to mention disgusted, but the boss quickly silences the noise with a loud clearing of his throat.

“...and although I know the circumstances in which he disappeared from the company, the most important thing now is that he returns and will take my position, but only in a few months, when I will re-implement and improve his training" he adds, and my thoughts wander towards my first days at work.

Despite the lack of interest Y/N had in the topic of Mr. Fishers’ son, she got an earful of it on her way back to the office.

Quiet conversations filled the corridor as people whispered about Robert Fischer, who apparently got kicked out a little time before Y/N got the job, so they never met. Not that she regretted such a sequence of events, as he sounded like an immature person lacking professional approach in work, and having more interest in women. Not the best colleague to have around.

Not long after, Maurice Fischer sighed deeply, gesturing to us that we could leave, so without waiting, Y/N made her way out of the crowded room. Ignoring Caroline's voice calling her name, she made her way through the corridor and chose the stairs instead of the elevator this time. It was faster.

Closing the door behind her back, Y/N closed her eyes for a second with a sigh, feeling relieved. Finally peace.

Sitting in her chair, she fixed her hair with a swift movement, putting it in a neat ponytail as her phone rang.

Deep sigh pushed past her lips once again, as she saw Maurice Fischer's name on the screen.

“Yes, Sir?” She responded in a professional tone without missing a beat.

“Y/N can you swing by my office in twenty minutes? I'd like to discuss something.” His voice was tense, and it didn't sound very promising.

God, I hope I didn't fuck something up, she thought.

“Of course. I'll be there, Mr. Fischer.” Her eyes shifted around the desk as she nodded unknowingly, before putting the phone down with a click.

Now, she was stressed, but it didn't mean that she could get away with the work that was waiting.

Without wasting another minute, her fingers started pressing on the keyboard at a quick pace, filling up the documents from her files, making sure no mistakes were made.

Twenty minutes passed sooner than she'd wished for them to, and soon enough Y/N was quickly walking through the corridor, holding tightly onto the file and her phone, typing away email after email before a certain impact caused her to almost drop the phone on the ground.

With a gasp she looked up, seeing a… young man with brown, neat hair and piercing blue irises.

His eyes widened for some reason as he let out a gasp.

“Katherina?” He said in a low, raspy voice which was filled with… something that Y/N couldn't quite put her finger on.

Quickly fixing up her facial expression, she cleared her throat, slightly shaking her head.

“No, no… I'm Y/N. You must have taken me for someone else.” Her voice was confident, not showing the confusion in the tiniest bit. Chin raised proudly, as she didn't shy away from eye contact, bravely grazing into his eyes.

The man blinked a couple times, sizing her up before letting out a breath as he nodded, smoothing out his suit jacket.

“Forgive me, it's… my first day today. I must have been a little confused.” He said slowly, carefully choosing his words as he straightened his back. Buttoning his jacket up one button higher, he stretched out his hand towards Y/N.

“I'm Enzo” His voice was smooth like butter, which already caused Y/N to… dislike the man in front of her.

Nevertheless, it was only proper to shake his hand in such circumstances.

“Y/N” Her voice came off kind but distanced, showing off how disinterested she was in having any longer conversations. “Unfortunately I'm in a rush, so I must go. I hope the rest of your day will pass with… less confusion.”

After the words left her mouth, she passed by him like a wind, leaving behind a trail of perfumes in the air and smirk on his lips. She seemed… challenging.

***

When I reached my floor after meeting the boss and went into my office, the girls almost immediately showed up right after me.

“So what did he want? What did he want?” They asked one after another.

“Nothing, he asked about my Italian classes.” I shrugged and they looked at me like I'm an alien.

“About Italian?” Caroline asked, slightly… deflated and confused.

“No way,” Marie murmured with annoyance.

Of course they immediately sniff out gossip.

“Yep, he asked how my teacher is and that's it.” My voice slightly bored as I looked at them, silently wanting them both to leave.

They fell silent and glanced at me and then at each other.

“Weird” said Caroline, and began to think hard about something. Still in my office, if I may add.

“Weird,” Marie repeated after her.

“So, what do you think about this Robert guy coming back?” I'm asked, because Marie and Caroline have been working here longer and probably knew him.

“Oh come on, did you see how all the girls started drooling?” Caroline asked with a smirk followed by a chuckle.

“Well, I saw what a stir it caused.” replied, sorting out the paper sheets on my desk before looking up. “That's why I'm asking.”

“He’s a womaniser, a rake, and quite the seducer,” Marie said confidently.

“Not you saying that! I thought you two were friends!” Caroline imitated her and nudged Marie in the arm with a loud giggle, covering her mouth like a schoolgirl.

“Oh come on, we had lunch together in the community kitchen because he happened to come by, and now you're saying we were friends.” Marie said indignantly with her brows furrowed in annoyance.

“Admit it, he was hitting on you” Caroline laughed at her.

"You're stupid," Marie continued grumbling and stuck out her tongue, laughing teasingly, "Admit it, you were the one who had your eye on him."

“Stupid, I've already been with Tyler, come on, stop talking nonsense, I don't want such insinuations” Caroline said, becoming more serious as her eyes widened, shifting between me and Marie.

“Okay” I said to end the argument. “I still don't understand the Robert phenomenon, can you explain it to me?”

“The Robert Fischer phenomenon cannot be explained, you have to see it yourself” Caroline stated and waved her hand at me with a smirk. “It was enough for the boss to say his name and you saw what was happening in the room?” She pushed further, proving her point.

I just nodded my head in the affirmative and Marie quickly filled in the rest.

“All the girls get wet when they see him, at least the ones who remember him.” Marie said quieter, leaning towards me with her eyes widening.

“Well, he's that handsome? Charming?” I ask further, getting slightly frustrated with not understanding the big deal. There were plenty of handsome men working in Fischer Morrow.

They nodded affirmatively, shrugging lightly. “The CEO mentioned that he's his older son, which means he has a younger one too, right?” I asked.

“Oh, yes” Caroline sighed and waved her hand dismissively “Enzo is even more of a freeloader than Robert. He studied at the Academy of Fine Arts.” She responded, and… that was all I needed to know.

“Oh no” I dramatically stuck my hand out with a chuckle.

“I guess I don't have to tell you what kind of guy it is” Caroline winked before starting to laugh.

“No, no, thanks,” I shook my head disapprovingly.

My brother also studied at the Academy of Fine Arts and although I love him more than anything in my life, I know exactly what kind of person he is. He lives for alcohol, parties and has no principles. He gets up when he's had enough sleep, talks to people when he thinks he needs it and doesn't care who he sleeps with. Only art resides in his heart and next to it there is no room for any woman or man - if he were gay, which he isn't - but there is plenty of that room in his bed. Every night. For any pretty girl he sets his mind to. A typical visual person. He likes big tits, blonde hair and a bit of weirdness. The last girl he spent the night with in my apartment had half of her body tattooed. He is fascinated by tattoos.

In one word: Artist.

Caroline and Marie laughed loudly, leaving my office, and I sat down at my desk, the topic of Robert Fischer and his little brother no longer interested me.

I turned on my computer and started replying to a dozen or so emails and that's how I spent the rest of my shift.

***

Coming in another day wasn't easier at all, the weather getting WORSE, causing Y/N to give up on wearing heels that day, as she preferred to keep her legs intact rather than get hurt.

Walking into the building, like always, she looked around for Vicky who was sitting by the desk.

“Y/N!” She hissed suddenly.

"What?" I asked surprised, coming up closer to the desk as I set my purse down, looking for a hand balm.

“Witch” Vickie replied and grimaced as she did so, letting Y/N know that the teacher was already impatient and annoyed because of her being late and that Vicky had no idea what the other woman was doing here.

When sudden realisation hit, she barely restrained herself from hitting herself in the forehead.

“God! Wednesday!” A panicked whisper pushed past her lips. “I have Monday's Italian lesson due today. I completely forgot. Please, occupy her for a second.” She whispered pleadingly and still almost silently, knowing that the door to the room where the teacher was was open and that she could probably hear the conversation if she tried hard enough.

“Okay” after a minute of silence Vicky gave her a nod “...but hurry up. I don't want her to turn me into a frog.” She snorted a short laugh and covered her mouth with her hand.

“I'll just take my jacket off, and open my office. Then I'm ready.” Y/N replied again quietly and ran towards the right office wing.

She quickly stripped off her coat and grabbed the notebook and pen, hurrying back to the reception desk. Just before the door to the hall, she smoothed down her black dress, hair and entered quietly.

“Buongiorno” She greeted, but to her surprise, there was no one inside. Looking around and coming in deeper only did I notice them.

At a small conference table she was sitting accompanied by the guy I bumped into outside a few days ago. The handsome, very much my type, weird Enzo.

Taking advantage of the fact she was still not visible to them, Y/N smiled lightly to herself, a shiver running down her spine.

I wonder what he's doing here? She thought.

Both of them, busy talking, barely noticed Y/N’s entrance, especially… older teacher. If she could, she would melt under the pressure of his gaze, like ice cream in the sun.

It wasn't surprising seeing the effect he had on most women, but the situation was embarrassing to say the least, because she was about twenty years older than him.

They only stopped their oh-so-nice chat when Y/N cleared her throat and sat down at the table.

They both looked at her, the woman with distaste, and Fischer in a way that made Y/N feel like she was completely naked.

“God, Mother Nature or other creator of all existence, what a look!” She thought to herself before wondering more and more intensely what the boss’ younger son was doing here.

“Buongiorno,” the teacher greeted finally, while Enzo only started looking at the younger woman even more insistently. Sigh.

I glanced at him. He was dressed in a navy suit, white shirt, sitting squarely across from me, with his legs crossed, his ankle resting on his knee. He was looking straight at me the whole time. A shiver ran down my spine again and I couldn't stop or resist it in any way. His gaze so insistent, but also… intriguing. He was clearly the type who knows exactly how to look at a woman to intimidate her. My gaze shifted at my notes, as I started trying not to glance at him again.

I felt a little embarrassed and completely intimidated. I immediately remember the warmth of his hand and his smooth voice as I saw him the last time I saw him. It was a nice thought.

No matter how hard I tried, I could still feel his eyes on me. I knew he was staring at me, but I almost never let myself get provoked so I tried not to glance or show him that his gaze had any effect on me.

Turned out that the teacher noticed it as well and was.. probably jealous of his attention? This whole situation was so odd, that I had no idea what to do.

The older woman straightened her back, clearing her throat like I did a couple moments ago and ostentatiously shoved the attendance list under his nose so that he wouldn't stare at me anymore.

"Please sign," she said to him sweetly.

Interesting. Are they on first name terms? Yeah, right. Who wouldn't want to be on first name terms with a guy like that?

I glanced at him again, starting to secretly observe what he was doing, and without taking his eyes off me, he picked up a pen and casually signed the list, followed by pushing it away from him as if it were something unnecessary.

I looked away again, pretending to look for something in my notebook, and he rested his elbows on the conference table and leaned toward me.

“Buongiorno, Y/N. I didn't know I'd have the honor of taking classes with you.” He spoke in pure Italian with an accent that his teacher probably envied.

I stared at him in surprise for a moment.

But how? Is he going to attend classes with me? Will the CEO's younger son also work in the company? The CEO didn't mention anything!

“Oh, so you know each other?” The teacher asked pleasantly, but her artificiality gave her away quickly, trying to mask her displeasure at the fact that he knew me and on top of that, said it was an honor.

“Yes, we met a few days ago.” I answered her briefly, which was enough to cause the displeased grimace on her face, as she failed to cover it with a fake smile.

…Which made her look like a frog that got run over.

“Robert will be attending the classes with you, the CEO asked for it.” Mrs Conner explained, seeing the questioning look in my eyes.

In the meantime Robert pulled out the worksheets and started arranging them into two piles. One for me, one for him.

…and that's when I realised.

Wait, who? What Robert? My mind raced to the moment he walked in on me earlier, and I could swear that he introduced himself as Enzo, right?

I wondered, my eyes narrowed before I swiftly pulled the list of names closer to me a bit too quickly. He introduced himself as Enzo!

That's when I heard his soft snort and for some reason I just knew he was making fun of me.

Under the date of today's class I was listed and of course not any Enzo, but… Robert Fischer.

A womaniser, a pick-up artist, and... as it turns out, also a liar.

The Boss' elder son.

The man who was supposed to become my boss so very soon, already fucking up the first impression.

Why do I immediately judge him very badly and assume that he has a nasty character? Well, after what I heard from Caroline and Marie and after how he charmed me, pretending to be someone else.. I can't lie, it's a HORRIBLE first expression!

Even seeing him makes my assumptions clear, it was visible to the naked eye for what pleasures of life he was brought into this world. With such beauty and manner, you don't sit in an office, you lie in bed with women who push themselves there, one after another.

At that moment I immediately understood the ‘Robert Fischer phenomenon’ my colleagues told me about.

I sighed and signed the list without a word, because I didn't even know what to say to him. Thank you? Besides, I had zero intentions for pleasantries after he decided to lie to me after seeing me for the first time. That's what I hated the most, dishonest people.

It annoyed me that he is a man who is absolutely my type, in terms of looks, I couldn’t deny that, but in terms of character, well, he leaves A LOT to be desired, and that's probably why his behaviour intimidated me so much. I felt like an idiot.

“Have you been learning Italian for a long time?” he asked in Italian with a sly smile. Piercing blue eyes scanning my face, looking for… a reaction perhaps.

I glanced at him and he was still staring at me. He was doing it in a way that he knew was making me feel uncomfortable. He was being pushy and rude. A caveman-like show off in a rather unsophisticated way, that I've caught his eye and that he was interested in me for a reason. It was awful.

“It depends,” I answered, also in Italian, looking down at my notes.

“On what?” He pressed further, making me want to roll my eyes so hard they'd just roll out of my damn skull.

“How long is ‘long’ for you?” I answered the question with a question and glanced at the teacher.

Still arranging worksheets.

"How long have you been studying?" His voice became more.. annoyed which gave me some unknown satisfaction. Smiling sweetly, I looked into his eyes with my chin turned up.

“Ten years” I’ve said with honesty in my tone, remembering how, when I was a little girl, I forced my parents to teach me my first lesson.

Italian was not a popular language in the States.

“Ten years?” Robert repeats with a surprise.

I didn't answer, not understanding what was so strange about it, and I had zero will to dwell on why HE was surprised. “After so many years you should already speak with an accent and be above C1.” He added arrogantly, leaning back in his chair which made me scoff.

“And you? How much do you study?” I asked in response without soaring him a single glance.

“Me?” He asked, raising his eyebrows in surprise. Well, technically it was obvious for most of the people here, but why would I give him the satisfaction?

From birth, I assumed.

“So what? Only C1? After forty years?” I mocked with a snort, causing the teacher to open her wrinkly eyes slightly wider at the exchange, as I insinuated that he was not only stupid, but also a forty year old man.

Obviously, he wasn't that age and I was fully aware. If he was thirty, I'd be surprised. I also knew that there are C2 level lessons with a native speaker in the company, but it still made me scoff.

A couple seconds of silence got interrupted as he snorted derisively. I glanced at Robert, catching him staring at me with a stupid smile on his pink lips. He was clearly showing me that he, in fact, did enjoy the little stand off we just had. He was impressed.

God, what have I done?

I quickly became annoyed at myself for losing my cool so fast, and at him for even making me lose it at all. I should have bit my tongue earlier or told him off, but I didn't know how. What would I tell him? To stop staring at me, or to stop picking on me? He'd probably pretend I was imagining things. Because that's how it goes. He only asked about the lessons, but he kept staring at me, and I couldn’t make him understand not to. Besides, I quickly grew worried about what the teacher thought. The last thing I needed was for any gossip to spread around the company, and I knew that the teacher is close friends with the girls from the Accounting Department. She also has lessons with them and they're on first-name terms, because they're about the same age and apparently she studied Italian Philology with one of them. I already could hear them talking shit.

The rest of the lesson passed on me trying to JUST survive. I didn't enjoy it much, as they took their sweet time bragging about their posh lives and places they've been to. Of course in a fluent Italian. I wasn't sure whether he was trying to impress her or anything, but this behaviour made me cringe internally. I couldn't help but count down every minute until the very end.

When the clock finally hit ten, I got up and packed my stuff immediately, rushing to leave the classroom before my head would explode. Passing through the doorway I said goodbye to Robert and the Witch with a short "addio". Right outside the door I quickened my pace as I could hear Robert leaving right behind me. I sneaked away, quickly entering the girls' restroom.

I got to the sink and turned on the water to wash my hands, at the same moment as my eyes caught in a mirror image of Robert walking into the bathroom behind me.

For a second I froze, rooted to the spot. Has he gone mad?

I stared at him for a moment and wondered how I should address him. He was not much older than me. Maybe five years at most, but he was my soon-to-be-boss. He lied about his name and FOLLOWED ME INTO THE TOILET!

“Mr. Fischer, you should leave. It's inappropriate.” I addressed him formally, wanting to emphasise the distance between us.

Even though it was my right to demand it from him, I still felt nervous. Maybe scared even.

A guy followed me into the ladies' room and I know he didn't come here by accident. If he had, he would have come out, apologising, but he was still standing there and looking at me like I'm... In the wrong place.

No, more like prey.

“Why?” He asked stupidly, furrowing his eyebrows in a fake incomprehension as he smiled mockingly.

.. leaning on his shoulder against the wall with arms crossed on his torso.

“Because it's a women's restroom?” I replied in a sharp tone and a fair bit of sarcasm, mirroring his stupid expression.

"So what?" he asked arrogantly, shrugging.

His response took me aback and surprised by his directness. Other women said he was unpredictable, but this bordered on harassment, yet I pushed this thought away. He's just a womaniser and a flirt. I guess he stopped developing in high school.

Eyeing him for a second I straighten my back, keeping my composure.

“Actually, nothing, you can stay here, after all, even the women's toilet is yours in this company, I forgot, but I'm leaving.” I said in a professional tone and without even wiping my hands, headed towards the door as if I had been scalded.

Suddenly he stopped me by pressing his back against the door, cutting off my escape route. I'm trapped, my thoughts racing. I bet someone's going to try to get in here in a minute and find me in the WOMEN'S ROOM WITH THE CEO’S SON! The one whose reputation isn't exactly spotless.

As I look up, his eyes shift around my face and I can see something new in his expression. A glimpse of awkwardness or maybe even… shame?

“I didn't want you to take it that way.” Robert said quickly, raising his hands in surrender as he saw the fear in my eyes. “I wanted to apologise for lying about my name.” He said, as if with regret, and if we weren't in the ladies' room, I might have believed him.

“I’m not angry, but please let me out immediately!” I raised my voice at him, and he looked me in the eyes for a couple seconds, before moving to the side and moving away from the door. He left me enough space to pass through, which I did, as my shoulder brushed against his chest in the meantime.

“It was good to see you, Miss Y/L/N” he added as I passed by before the door shut, still very confident and smiling like the devil.

I left the bathroom as if I was being chased and almost ran to my office. Entering the room, I shut the door closed and let out a deep breath.

I was absolutely outraged and shocked!

What a jerk! How dare he!

Taglist:

@lau219 @4ria790 @sasha28x @xsweetcatastrophe @betty21rose @aashika1908

#cillian murphy #cillian murphy smut #cillian murphy x reader #raymond leon x reader #cillian x fem!reader #in time #jackson rippner #raymond leon #robert fischer x y/n #Robert Fischer #robert fischer smut #robert fischer x reader #robert fischer #inception #robert fischer x oc

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crystalis · 8 months ago

Text

twitter thread by Mouin Rabbani

March 14, 2024

Who was there first? The short answer is that the question is irrelevant. Claims of ancient title (“This land is ours because we were here several thousand years ago”) have no standing or validity under international law.

For good reason, because such claims also defy elementary common sense. Neither I nor anyone reading this post can convincingly substantiate the geographical location of their direct ancestors ten or five or even two thousand years ago.

If we could, the successful completion of the exercise would confer exactly zero property, territorial, or sovereign rights.

As a thought experiment, let’s go back only a few centuries rather than multiple millennia. Do South Africa’s Afrikaners have the right to claim The Netherlands as their homeland, or even qualify for Dutch citizenship, on the basis of their lineage?

Do the descendants of African-Americans who were forcibly removed from West Africa have the right to board a flight in Atlanta, Port-au-Prince, or São Paolo and reclaim their ancestral villages from the current inhabitants, who in all probability arrived only after – perhaps long after – the previous inhabitants were abducted and sold into slavery half a world away?

Do Australians who can trace their roots to convicts who were involuntarily transported Down Under by the British government have a right to return to Britain or Ireland and repossess homes from the present inhabitants even if, with the help of court records, they can identify the exact address inhabited by their forebears? Of course not.

In sharp contrast to, for example, Native Americans or the Maori of New Zealand, none of the above can demonstrate a living connection with the lands to which they would lay claim.

To put it crudely, neither nostalgic attachment nor ancestry, in and of themselves, confer rights of any sort, particularly where such rights have not been asserted over the course of hundreds or thousands of years.

If they did, American English would be the predominant language in large parts of Europe, and Spain would once again be speaking Arabic.

Nevertheless, the claim of ancient title has been and remains central to Zionist assertions of not only Jewish rights in Palestine, but of an exclusive Jewish right to Palestine.

For the sake of argument, let’s examine it. If we put aside religious mythology, the origin of the ancient Israelites is indeed local.

In ancient times it was not unusual for those in conflict with authority or marginalized by it to take to the more secure environment of surrounding hills or mountains, conquer existing settlements or establish new ones, and in the ultimate sign of independence adopt distinct religious practices and generate their own rulers. That the Israelites originated as indigenous Canaanite tribes rather than as fully-fledged monotheistic immigrants or conquerors is more or less the scholarly consensus, buttressed by archeological and other evidence. And buttressed by the absence of evidence for the origin stories more familiar to us.

It is also the scholarly consensus that the Israelites established two kingdoms, Judah and Israel, the former landlocked and covering Jerusalem and regions to the south, the latter (also known as the Northern Kingdom or Samaria) encompassing points north, the Galilee, and parts of contemporary Jordan. Whether these entities were preceded by a United Kingdom that subsequently fractured remains the subject of fierce debate.

What is certain is that the ancient Israelites were never a significant regional power, let alone the superpower of the modern imagination.

There is a reason the great empires of the Middle East emerged in Egypt, Mesopotamia, Persia, and Anatolia – or from outside the region altogether – but never in Palestine.

It simply lacked the population and resource base for power projection. Jerusalem may be the holiest of cities on earth, but for almost the entirety of its existence, including the period in question, it existed as a village, provincial town or small city rather than metropolis.

Judah and Israel, like the neighboring Canaanite and Philistine entities during this period, were for most of their existence vassal states, their fealty and tribute fought over by rival empires – Egyptians, Assyrians, Babylonians, etc. – rather than extracted from others.

Indeed, Israel was destroyed during the eighth century BCE by the Assyrians, who for good measured subordinated Judah to their authority, until it was in the sixth century BCE eliminated by the Babylonians, who had earlier overtaken the Assyrians in a regional power struggle.

The Babylonian Exile was not a wholesale deportation, but rather affected primarily Judah’s elites and their kin. Nor was there a collective return to the homeland when the opportunity arose several decades later after Cyrus the Great defeated Babylon and re-established a smaller Judah as a province of the Persian Achaemenid empire. Indeed, Mesopotamia would remain a key center of Jewish religion and culture for centuries afterwards.

Zionist claims of ancient title conveniently erase the reality that the ancient Israelites were hardly the only inhabitants of ancient Palestine, but rather shared it with Canaanites, Philistines, and others.

The second part of the claim, that the Jewish population was forcibly expelled by the Romans and has for 2,000 years been consumed with the desire to return, is equally problematic.

By the time the Romans conquered Jerusalem during the first century BCE, established Jewish communities were already to be found throughout the Mediterranean world and Middle East – to the extent that a number of scholars have concluded that a majority of Jews already lived in the diaspora by the time the first Roman soldier set foot in Jerusalem.

These communities held a deep attachment to Jerusalem, its Temple, and the lands recounted in the Bible. They identified as diasporic communities, and in many cases may additionally have been able to trace their origins to this or that town or village in the extinguished kingdoms of Israel and Judah. But there is no indication those born and bred in the diaspora across multiple generations considered themselves to be living in temporary exile or considered the territory of the former Israelite kingdoms rather than their lands of birth and residence their natural homeland, any more than Irish-Americans today feel they properly belong in Ireland rather than the United States.

Unlike those taken in captivity to Babylon centuries earlier, there was no impediment to their relocation to or from their ancestral lands, although economic factors appear to have played an important role in the growth of the diaspora.

By contrast, those traveling in the opposite direction appear to have done so, more often than not, for religious reasons, or to be buried in Jerusalem’s sacred soil.

Nations and nationalism did not exist 2,000 years ago.

Nor Zionist propagandists in New York, Paris, and London incessantly proclaiming that for two millennia Jews everywhere have wanted nothing more than to return their homeland, and invariably driving home rather than taking the next flight to Tel Aviv.

Nor insufferably loud Americans declaring, without a hint of irony or self-awareness, the right of the Jewish people to Palestine “because they were there first”.

Back to the Romans, about a century after their arrival a series of Jewish rebellions over the course of several decades, coupled with internecine warfare between various Jewish factions, produced devastating results.

A large proportion of the Jewish population was killed in battle, massacred, sold into slavery, or exiled. Many towns and villages were ransacked, the Temple in Jerusalem destroyed, and Jews barred from entering the city for all but one day a year.

Although a significant Jewish presence remained, primarily in the Galilee, the killings, associated deaths from disease and destitution, and expulsions during the Roman-Jewish wars exacted a calamitous toll.

With the destruction of the Temple Jerusalem became an increasingly spiritual rather than physical center of Jewish life. Jews neither formed a demographic majority in Palestine, nor were the majority of Jews to be found there.

Many of those who remained would in subsequent centuries convert to Christianity or Islam, succumb to massacres during the Crusades, or join the diaspora. On the eve of Zionist colonization locally-born Jews constituted less than five per cent of the total population.

As for the burning desire to return to Zion, there is precious little evidence to substantiate it. There is, for example, no evidence that upon their expulsion from Spain during the late fifteenth century, the Sephardic Jewish community, many of whom were given refuge by the Ottoman Empire that ruled Palestine, made concerted efforts to head for Jerusalem. Rather, most opted for Istanbul and Greece.

Similarly, during the massive migration of Jews fleeing persecution and poverty in Eastern Europe during the nineteenth century, the destinations of choice were the United States and United Kingdom.

Even after the Zionist movement began a concerted campaign to encourage Jewish emigration to Palestine, less than five per cent took up the offer. And while the British are to this day condemned for limiting Jewish immigration to Palestine during the late 1930s, the more pertinent reality is that the vast majority of those fleeing the Nazi menace once again preferred to relocate to the US and UK, but were deprived of these havens because Washington and London firmly slammed their doors shut.

Tellingly, the Jewish Agency for Israel in 2023 reported that of the world’s 15.7 million Jews, 7.2 million – less than half – reside in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories.

According to the Agency, “The Jewish population numbers refer to persons who define themselves as Jews by religion or otherwise and who do not practice another religion”.

It further notes that if instead of religion one were to apply Israel’s Law of Return, under which any individual with one or more Jewish grandparent is entitled to Israeli citizenship, only 7.2 of 25.5 million eligible individuals (28 per cent) have opted for Zion.

In other words, “Next Year in Jerusalem” was, and largely remains, an aspirational religious incantation rather than political program. For religious Jews, furthermore, it was to result from divine rather than human intervention.

For this reason, many equated Zionism with blasphemy, and until quite recently most Orthodox Jews were either non-Zionist or rejected the ideology altogether.

Returning to the irrelevant issue of ancestry, if there is one population group that can lay a viable claim of direct descent from the ancient Israelites it would be the Samaritans, who have inhabited the area around Mount Gerizim, near the West Bank city of Nablus, without interruption since ancient times.

Palestinian Jews would be next in line, although unlike the Samaritans they interacted more regularly with both other Jewish communities and their gentile neighbors.

Claims of Israelite descent made on behalf of Jewish diaspora communities are much more difficult to sustain. Conversions to and from Judaism, intermarriage with gentiles, absorption in multiple foreign societies, and related phenomena over the course of several thousand years make it a virtual certainty that the vast majority of Jews who arrived in Palestine during the late 19th and first half of the 20th century to reclaim their ancient homeland were in fact the first of their lineage to ever set foot in it.

By way of an admittedly imperfect analogy, most Levantines, Egyptians, Sudanese, and North Africans identify as Arabs, yet the percentage of those who can trace their roots to the tribes of the Arabian Peninsula that conquered their lands during the seventh and eighth centuries is at best rather small.

Ironically, a contemporary Palestinian, particularly in the West Bank and Galilee, is likely to have more Israelite ancestry than a contemporary diaspora Jew.

The Palestinians take their name from the Philistines, one of the so-called Sea Peoples who arrived on the southern coast of Canaan from the Aegean islands, probably Crete, during the late second millennium BCE.

They formed a number of city states, including Gaza, Ashdod, and Ashkelon. Like Judah and Israel they existed primarily as vassals of regional powers, and like them were eventually destroyed by more powerful states as well.

With no record of their extermination or expulsion, the Philistines are presumed to have been absorbed by the Canaanites and thereafter disappear from the historical record.

Sitting at the crossroads between Asia, Africa, and Europe, Palestine was over the centuries repeatedly conquered by empires near and far, absorbing a constant flow of human and cultural influences throughout.

Given its religious significance, pilgrims from around the globe also contributed to making the Palestinian people what they are today.

A common myth is that the Palestinian origin story dates from the Arab-Muslim conquests of the seventh century. In point of fact, the Arabs neither exterminated nor expelled the existing population, and the new rulers never formed a majority of the population.

Rather, and over the course of several centuries, the local population was gradually Arabized, and to a large extent Islamized as well.

So the question as to who was there first can be answered in several ways: “both” and “irrelevant” are equally correct.

Indisputably, the Zionist movement had no right to establish a sovereign state in Palestine on the basis of claims of ancient title, which was and remains its primary justification for doing so.

That it established an exclusivist state that not only rejected any rights for the existing Palestinian population but was from the very outset determined to displace and replace this population was and remains a historical travesty.

That it as a matter of legislation confers automatic citizenship on millions who have no existing connection with the land but denies it to those who were born there and expelled from it, solely on the basis of their identity, would appear to be the very definition of apartheid.

The above notwithstanding, and while the Zionist claim of exclusive Israeli sovereignty in Palestine remains illegitimate, there are today several million Israelis who cannot be simply wished away.

A path to co-existence will need to be found, even as the genocidal nature of the Israeli state, and increasingly of Israeli society as well, makes the endeavor increasingly complicated.

The question, thrown into sharp relief by Israel’s genocidal onslaught on the Palestinian population of the Gaza Strip, is whether co-existence with Israeli society can be achieved without first dismantling the Israeli state and its ruling institutions.

#free palestine

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claywriting · 9 months ago

Text

Always at the right time

in which for four times Y/n saves our boy Freddy, and the one time he saves her.

Reader is a ravenclaw, but it's really not important

but she is also a Seer, and that is important

no sensible temes threated

and there isn't really a progression of their relationships, only a few kisses in the end

4800 words

Fred, he had never understood how this was possible.

He had sifted through a thousand and one solutions in his head, but they all led to the one, simple explanation: she was a witch. Of course, not the most brilliant of his reasoning, after all, his entire family were wizards, he lived in the magical world and had attended a school of magic based on raising young wizards and witches.

That should not have been the only answer he had been able to find.

Yet after years he still could not fathom how it was possible that every time, he found himself in trouble here was Y/n L/n to appear to get him out of it, in a quiet, nonchalant way that he had never explained. Well...let's be honest, not really every time, or else the poor girl would have spent the rest of her life running after Fred Weasley to solve whatever thorny situation he had caused. Certainly, a fate not desirable to many.

Often was a more accurate description.

However, often enough for the boy to notice her presence and begin to get curious.

Of course, intriguing Fred Weasley was not difficult, a far more impressive accomplishment would have been to actually manage to keep him out of trouble; but even attracting his attention long enough to get his nose out of his pranks and the Quidditch manoeuvres he had to learn, that too was an accomplishment, perhaps not mind-blowing; but at least noteworthy.

And it seemed that Y/n had succeeded splendidly, on her own, without anyone's help. But more importantly, without the boy understanding how it was possible.

It had all started years earlier, two to be exact.

Although thinking about it, with all that had happened, it seemed a lifetime earlier. Centuries and centuries of water had passed under the bridge.

So here is the story of how four times Y/n saved Fred, and how, for a change, the once he saved her.

1. Hogwarts, February 1996

The Weasley twins were in the throes of another one of their exploits; at the height of dinner the corridors of the castle were always deserted. This was, surely, a great advantage for them; the perfect time to organize their pranks was definitely during mealtimes. When the professors, and the nosy students, would gather in the great hall, too busy looking after the food on their plates, to notice the absence of the two identical Weasley brothers.

This was something they had learned in their first year. And they had not forgotten it since.

The two of them had now developed the skill necessary to work in the most perfect silence, their shirt sleeves rolled up above the elbows so as not to soil them, their ties loosened to allow them to breathe with ease in the eagerness given by the adrenaline rush that the risk of being caught injected into their veins.

It had always been, besides the great satisfaction they felt at seeing a successful prank, one of their favourite moments this.

The one in which adrenaline releases discharges in the heart from the anxiety of being discovered, the blood pumps faster in the veins, the palms and forehead sweat slightly, and you feel alive as if riding a broomstick descending at full speed to the ground. A feeling of pure life.

Of course, the risk of getting caught was more concerning getting caught red-handed; they knew perfectly well that regardless, the blame would fall on their red heads, knowing that, in the school, no one was able to play left-handed shots equal to what their brilliant minds were capable of processing.

But, in any case, without evidence they were not going to face any consequences. Most of the time.

The silence of their hustling was interrupted by a voice humming in the hallway, quick footsteps approaching, clatter of heels against stone that would have made even a werewolf's hair stand on end.

"Shit." It was the first word that slipped out of George's lips, who in an instant was on his feet ready to make his escape. "Fred, it's Umbridge, we have to go."

"I've almost-" murmured the other, still on his knees, connecting god knows what to a small box placed against the woman's office door "done." He said exultantly, rising to his feet.

Time was short, they both knew, and the twins launched into a run, just far enough away from the office not to be caught right at the scene of the misdeed, but, possibly, close enough to hear the result of their prank.

They took refuge around a corner, one aisle over. Their robes under their arms and two identical smiles on their lips.

The explosion and the stinking cloud came like a melody to their ears.

The screams that followed it were the icing on the cake.

What made their laughter go sideways, however, were the voices that immediately began to squawk; the woman was not alone. And footsteps approached, swiftly.

A brief glance at the two was enough for them to turn around and start running at full speed as far away from there as possible, the Gryffindor common room an ideal place to hide after the stunt they had just pulled. That was the plan.

George, in the lead, was running at breakneck speed with his twin at his heels, his ears pounding from the blood pumping desperately from the adrenaline in his system, and from the possibility of actually getting caught this time.

It took him a few minutes to realize that his brother was no longer following him, when he almost reached the portrait that led to his common room, in truth.

Fred, who had fallen behind, had slipped taking a particularly bad turn, crashing to the ground and going crashing with a particularly loud thud against one of the wooden doors that littered the castle, one of the many unused storage rooms.

The boy had stood there, admittedly a few seconds too long, massaging his head, when the door had swung open and a hand grabbed him by the scruff of his neck, pulling him inside before said hand was pressed over his mouth.

From below Y/n, she looked at him for a few moments before smiling; a smile that in all honesty was rather shabby for being that of a young woman whom Fred had never seen behave in a way that was not adorably kind to everyone. Always with a ready answer in class and always with a kind smile for anyone, whether they deserved it or not.

In silence the young woman raised a finger bringing it to her lips and leaned it against herself before whispering.

"Be quiet Weasley, if we get caught we're both in trouble."

With a mixture of admiration and confusion he obeyed, pressing his back against the heavy wooden door, trying to escape the human heat the young Ravenclaw emanated, in the cramped space. He, who was already sweating with his heart pounding from the run, found himself blushing hard when she gently pushed him aside as far as she could before pressing his ear against the door to listen to the hallway, waiting until the way was sufficiently clear. They remained in that position, pressed against each other for an indefinite time, before she raised her kind eyes to his and with a smile announced that the way was clear. She even offered to accompany him to his common room, constituting a credible alibi for him.

2. Diagon Halley, Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes, September 1996

The store that day was almost deserted, the picture of tranquillity, with the students having left the week before for Hogwarts only a few mothers with their small children, still too young to follow their future classmates, entered the doors of the Weasley brothers' store. That, then, was a dull day.

George had disappeared almost an hour earlier to the workshop behind the store, leaving his twin alone to manage the area in front, which had soon translated into Fred, bored as few times in his life, almost lying on the bacon drumming his fingers on it as his gaze wandered lazily around the shelves of his empty business. He puffed for what seemed to him the thousandth time, searching, almost desperately for something to do. He already missed the throng of young students crowding inside those four walls ready to spend their money to buy a laugh, as the two notorious troublemakers liked to say.

Without those cheerful young heads, the world was too lazy.

He wondered again if they should not have opened in Hogsmeade, make a cheeky competition to Zonko.

He drummed on the wooden counter once more as, yet another sigh left his lips.

He had to find something to do, or he would go crazy with boredom.

The best idea that occurred to him was to rearrange the tall shelves that reached from the base of the store almost to the ceiling, covered with objects with the most disparate uses and uses.

Yes. That was a good idea.

So he did, in an instant the boy rolled up his sleeves and began climbing up a ladder as narrow as it was rickety. He thought he could replace it later.

Lo and behold, suddenly his good humour was back, sitting on his hands was not really his thing, setting up the store, talking to customers, inventing new tricks, even cleaning up on the floor. Everything was preferable to having to, simply, wait for something to happen. That, surely, was the worst feeling he could be forced to experience. Of that, he was sure.

After all, he had already grown accustomed to the throngs in his store, to the cheerful shouts of young wizards and witches realizing that they had a need for something that until a few hours before they did not even know existed, or that they could buy. He had already grown accustomed to the grateful smiles of people who bought something from him, whether it was a potion of some sort, an explosive prank, or some candy that Honeydukes supplied to the twins at a favourable price, having been offered by them as a reseller for the candy store in the capital.

Yes, after all, their work was proceeding well, but those days, during office hours when people were working and not really buying, left him in low spirits.

These thoughts crowded his head as he absentmindedly slid the cardboard packages off the shelf in the wall, stacking them with less care than he should have had, under one arm. His head had always wandered to the most disparate places while he did simple manual labor, allowing him not to get bored by staying focused on what he was thinking, rather than what he was doing. Of course, this was not limited to introspective thoughts about boredom, but much more often traveled with imagination. He wondered if he and his brother might one day expand their business. It would have been nice to open more branches, perhaps around the world. Already he could see himself, him, a billionaire.

He was reminded of a drawing he had once seen while strolling through Muggle London with friends, a duck in a hat taking a bath, in a tub full of gold coins.

Sooner or later, he would have to try it, too.

He smiled to himself, absentmindedly stacking yet another box under his arm. The bombs that were contained inside were not powerful enough to cause serious damage to people and objects if taken individually. Of course, the thought that having six of them in one package, with already four packages under his arm plus one in his hand as he worked absent-mindedly was not a safe situation had not even crossed Fred Weasley's mind; in all honesty, it was George who was the more safety-conscious twin of the two. The one who weekly prevented both of them from blowing up irretrievably at the very least, obviously could not always prevent every trouble, or explosion.

So, when the bell set above the door rang Fred had no half-hearted qualms about leaning out of his already rickety stepladder to see who had walked through the door of his store. A toothy grin at the thought that, at last, a customer would snatch him from the day's deadly boredom.

This was just yet another in his long list of mistakes that morning, which began with not immediately fixing the stepladder, followed by absent-mindedly working with explosive material in hand, and ended with jumping like a puppy at the arrival of a customer.

Needless to say, he slipped ruefully from that ladder.

The ground beneath him approached at staggering speed, the boxes still more or less clutched in his hand the boy closed his eyes, bracing himself for impact with the lacquered wooden floor they had paid so much for when they had built the store.

Whether he died or survived, George would have killed him for ruining it, he was certain.

Instead, what he had not expected happened, a waving of wands, a gentle voice releasing the right spell at the right time. A perfectly executed Arresto Momentum, and, in front of him, Y/n smiling, while he remained stuck in midair like a subspecies of idiot.

"You should be more careful, Fred Weasley," smiled the former Ravenclaw, sweetly, "remember, they teach you that in first year. Stairs, they like to change."

3. The Burrow, August 1997

The wedding was what one might have called a veritable daydream. Bill in his suit, with his new wife clutched at his side was the picture of utter and complete joy; Fleur shone as if emitting her own light. Fred, who, in his years, had seen even too many sappy, melancholy couplets for his liking, had had to admit to himself that the two of them, no matter how nauseous and/or diabetic they made him feel at intervals, were in perfect harmony together.

There was no denying it.

The air was imbued with joyous excitement, perhaps even a good dose of alcohol, as Fred thought advancing among the wedding guests. Sunlight filtered through the foliage of the trees, dancing on the elegant white curtains that adorned the garden of the Weasley mansion, the magical atmosphere was undeniable. For Fred's taste there were a few too many undeniable things that evening, he thought as the sun set over the horizon, one hand sunk into the pants pockets of the suit he had purchased for the occasion and a glass of wine in the other. And most of all, a huge sword of Damocles hanging right above his head, ready to fall on him should he attempt to pull one of his cheap shots on the day of his brother's wedding.

He was certain that his mother would kill him.

The laughter and cheerful voices of family and friends filled the air, mingling with the sweet sound of music coming from the band playing on the makeshift stage. Fred watched with a mixture of emotion and melancholy as his loved ones exchanged loving hugs and bright smiles.

The scene was alive with a multitude of colours, with the vibrant floral decorations adorning every corner of the garden. Garlands of fresh flowers wrapped the tree trunks, while scented candles that had lit the path to the altar were replaced by the tables that had welcomed guests for the banquet after the ceremony.

Despite the looming shadow of war, in that moment, Fred could not help but smile comforted by his family around him and the unassailable joy of such a festive day. Quietly he took a sip from his glass shifting his gaze to Ron dancing with Hermione, his brother’s-stricken look wringing an amused laugh from him, so busy was the little Weasley dancing carefully so as not to step on his friend's toes, that she surely would not forgive him the affront.

The guests' elegant dresses swayed lightly in the breeze, while the scent of the delicious banquets enticed those present to indulge in a feast for the senses. The plentiful and delicious food, served on tables adorned with white linen tablecloths, offered a wide selection of culinary delights that satisfied every taste and desire.

The happiness of that evening on interrupted not long after, when a patronus burst into the middle of the banquet, announcing the most terrible of news on such a cheerful day.

The minister of magic was dead, the ministry had fallen, and the Death Eaters were coming for them.

Immediately there was panic, people screaming, chairs toppling over. His family clutched at each other, but, while still remaining Gryffindors, each of them tried to do their best to help people escape, to protect as many guests as possible.

He saw with a distracted eye Ron pushing Hermione behind him, the wand clutched in his hand with such force that Fred for a moment feared he would break it. Bill, taking his bride and clutching her to his chest, his eyes promising fire and flame. His parents try to find each other, shaking hands, ready to give battle.

In the corner George and Ginny stood back-to-back, wands in hand and spells already flying, striking the firsts Death Eaters to arrive on the scene.

For an instant his head spun wildly, for an instant the ground missed under his feet.

But it was an instant too long because when he recovered, he found himself on the wrong side of a wand, pointing in his direction, and a spell being fired at him.

Nor did he know what to do, so he simply closed his eyes, trying to raise his arms to keep from getting hit, waiting for the pain that-which did not come.

A roar not far away brought him to his senses, moved by instinct he picked up his wand, opening his eyes again only to find the familiar figure of Y/n in front of him. The girl had her back to him, her wand raised; clearly the spell that would have otherwise affected him had been deflected by her, but... how?

He had only a few moments to look at her, briefly. Her hair was pulled back into a dishevelled tail still damp, she was wearing jeans and a T-shirt, and her feet were bare.

Fred did not understood.

He was sure she was not at the wedding... how had she apparate there just in time to deflect that spell? At the exact moment when it should have hit him, she had appeared out of nowhere and, once again, saved him.

The only question was, how?

He naturally had no time to ask, because as soon as he could compose himself just enough to close the mouth that had been left open from surprise, the young woman turned around, barely looking at him from over her shoulder. After making sure the boy was all right, she gave him a smile and a wink, promising that "They would have talked about it later." And, she added, to the surprise of Fred, who came out rather red in the face that "That outfit looked really good on him."

The boy found himself momentarily speechless, still in disbelief at what had happened. He watched Y/n as she walked away as light as a feather amid the chaos of battle, her figure disappearing into the fighting crowd. A thrill of gratitude ran through him as he realized how lucky he was.

Or perhaps there was something else behind it, something eluding him, just beyond his fingertips.

He had no way of finding out that night.

4. Hogwarts, May 1998

The battle had been raging for several hours now, in every corner it was possible to find Death Eaters clashing with members of the Order of the Phoenix, desperate students, Aurors, and Hogwarts allies who had been summoned from wherever they could be reached on short notice and in a great hurry. Fred, was following his brother through the chaos of battle. The roar of duels and the heat of explosions filled the air, mingling with the screams of rage and pain. He felt alive; charged with adrenaline, but at the same time worried for the safety of his friends and family.

The lifeless bodies lay scattered on the ground, and in each of them, for a moment the boy saw a friend, a family member, an acquaintance, someone he had loved. His wand moved with precision and determination as he cast spells against the approaching Death Eaters.

Every movement was quick and instinctive, but he knew he could never let his guard down, aware that a mistake could be fatal.

The smoke and dust obscured his vision, the heavy air scratched his throat forcing him to stop from time to time, and it was only when he rejoined with

Percy was beside him, fighting with the same ferocity and determination.

The two smiled as they saw Ron and Hermione arrive, while Percy, with an arrogance that was natural in him announced to the minister, that was being thrown against the wall, that he was resigning, while Fred laughed in amusement.

"Percy! You made a joke!" the boy burst out laughing, shifting his gaze to his brother "Did you really make a joke? The last one I heard you make was..."

But he could not finish the sentence, an explosion behind them carried away the rest of his amused comment.

Fred looked up, from the floor. His ears were ringing, perhaps an eardrum had ruptured. The dust from the wall that until a second before was behind him was still falling from the sky, and around him Harry, Ron, Hermione and Percy were also having trouble regaining control over their bodies, which had been thrown hard against the ground.

He grunted, sore, shifting his gaze to the wall, now reduced to rubble, and, to his enormous surprise, found a person standing just in front of him. Standing wide-legged, with her jeans broken in several places, covered with soot and dirt, her soft hair matted with blood, sweat and who knows what else. There, above him like a warrior angel, but pale as a corpse, was Y/n.

Once again, the girl had, seemingly, appeared out of nowhere, conjuring up a shield just in time to protect him and the rest of the group from the explosion that was sure to hit them.

The girl silhouetted before them with fierce determination in her eyes, her figure dirty and wounded but still standing and ready to fight, while he lying on the ground stared at her, incredulous, surprised by her timely presence and grateful at the same time. His heart was pounding in his chest as he tried to understand how it was possible that she was there, at that crucial moment, to protect them.

"Y/n..." whispered Fred, his voice cracked with emotion and astonishment. "Thank you."

Y/n looked at him with intense eyes, full of determination, before turning a tired yet satisfied smile on him, a reflection of the gratitude she felt for having arrived in time to protect the group.

"Save it. There is no time to stay here," she said with a firmness in her voice that did not belong to her, yet her voice like a fresh balm after the wounds of battle, "we must move."

With a nod, she indicated for them to follow her limping figure, she held out her hand to each of them, holding Fred's in hers, unable to let go as they moved through the rubble and chaos of battle.

Fred nodded, understanding the urgency of the situation. There was no time to linger in thanks or questions.

They needed to focus on survival, on winning the war that had been going on all night, but caught up in a rush the boy leaned down, taking her face in his hands and planting a kiss on her lips, quick, almost a blink.

"Later, you'll explain how you always come at the right time." He murmured, taking her hand back in his, bringing his attention back to the rest of the group who had shifted their gaze in embarrassment.

The girl for her part was reduced to a smouldering heap, red in the face and downcast-eyed. A stupid smile on her lips.

The moment of truth came a few hours later, at the end of the battle the two found themselves in the great hall. In the rush of the last fight they had separated, both of them remaining so distressed that if they had not found each other again as soon as possible one of them would have had a heart attack.

Thus, when the girl crossed the threshold of the great hall it was the red-haired figure that was the first one she caught sight of, and he threw himself at her at the speed of sound, catching her in his arms with an emphasis that lifted her off the ground, and holding her so tightly that her bones creaked under the pressure of the boy's embrace. They stood like this, in the doorway, for a few minutes before he led her to a somewhat secluded table, retrieving from somewhere a clean handkerchief and some water to cleanse the conspicuous wound that the young woman wore on her forehead like a badge of honour, while he smiled with a split lip and a black eye so obvious that it would have been visible even from the other side of the castle.

"I believe you owe me some explanation now." He commented softly, gaining her attention as she moved from the bodies delicately arranged in the room with care and attention.

The blush grew on her cheeks as she blushed.

"I-oh, for merlin's panties. I'm going to sound really, really scary. Keep in mind that this is not something I control, please."

He, let out a laugh.

"I'm sure I can handle it. Tell me, come on."

“I’m a seer.” She blurted out, “I can see the future, really well in some cases. Accidentally, those cases involved you… getting hurt. Like, really hurt.”

She started blushing, her eyes low on the floor.

“And… and I could not allow it you know? I… I do care for you, really. So I was… not so accidentally always there when I knew you would have ended up… bad?”

The boy sat still, for quite a while, before exploding in a laugh.

“So, I was almost right, you are a guardian angel!”

5. Hogwarts, september 1992

To say that she was insecure on that broom was, absolutely, an understatement. Although she was in her third year of school now, Y/n was still a mess when it came to matters pertaining to flying.

The thing, it troubled her.

So, she had gone to the quidditch pitch together with a few friends, hoping to get the hang of it, with all those flying brooms without, possibly, making a fool of herself in the eyes of her far more experienced classmates.

Needless to say, her plan had foundered within the first fifteen minutes.

In no time, she had gone from hardly being able to lift herself off the ground to darting through the sky holding onto her broom with the purest of terror in her eyes. Unable to control her vehicle, she had simply been stuck in the air with her eyes clenched shut and tears stinging. Certain that she would have died there.

So great was her terror that she had not even noticed a foreign body approaching her, two in fact. George and Fred Weasley could have many virtues, minding their own business was not one of them.

So when the sight of a trembling girl stuck in the air had struck their eyes neither of them had thought twice about approaching her, perhaps to tease her a little, perhaps to tell her to move out of the way because Gryffindor team practice was about to begin and she would be in danger of getting hurt.

The important thing is that, she, she expected anything but to hear someone's voice speaking into her ear a few dozen feet above the ground.

The terror was so great that she jerked, on her broom. Letting her go with a scream that would have made a banshee's blood run cold.

This, was her second mistake of the day.

Losing the, precarious, control of her broom, which was keeping her suspended in the air the girl simply plummeted.

The ground was approaching her at such a speed that the world around appeared only as a series of indistinct colors and flashes, so Y/n, simply closed her eyes, waiting for an impact that would break who knows how many bones.

But what she felt instead was two arms grabbing her so fiercely that they pushed all the air out of her lungs with an unladylike oof, and the smell of gunpowder and smoke from Fred, who had caught her on the fly and was now holding her pressed against his chest.

"You should be more careful," he said with a laugh, "Good thing I was here at the right time."

perhaps this one day will become a complete fic with chapters and really progression of the relationship

#fred weasley #fred weasley x fem!reader #fred weasley x reader #fred weasley x y/n #fred weasley x you #hp fandom #hp universe #fred weasley fic #fred weasley fanfiction #harry potter #fred weasley imagine #fw

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itzrafee · 11 months ago

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A thing on Uran and Helena in Pluto

Okay a short little thing on Pluto. Uran and Helena are my absolute favourite characters in Pluto. Urasawa has always had amazing side characters, from Mr. Rosso in Monster to Lee Harvey Oswald and Jackie in Billy Bat to God in 20th Century Boys, but very few have tied off the emotional ends of the story like Uran and Helena.

Maybe I'm projecting here but much like myself I feel like Urasawa is absolutely obsessed with Frankenstein. And he recognizes the influence Frankenstein has on Dr. Umataro Tenma. Or at the very least, the similarities between the two. And so when he made the protagonist of one of his most popular works Monster, Dr Kenzo Tenma, he solidified that connection. Kenzo Tenma calls back to Victor Frankenstein needing to end his creation while also calling back to Japan's other famous Tenma, thus making the connection explicit. Another throughline between the three of them is that all three are father figures to their creations and have obligations to their children, though all three have varying levels of success with them.

I've only read what I like to call Urasawa's "Core Four", conspiracy minded thrillers that are essentially road trips featuring usually two main protagonists that we see the world through, Monster, 20th Century Boys, Pluto and Billy Bat. Though I still haven't caught up to Asadora and that could still possibly fit this mold, Urasawa's Core Four share a lot of themes and ideas. One of the most important being the responsibility for one's creations, whether it was Kenji Endo and the Book of Prophecy or Kevin Yamagata and Billy Bat or Dr. Kenzo Tenma and Johan, all of his protagonists could arguably be seen as someone with the need to take up the responsibility of their creations. So where do the protagonists of Pluto fit in there? That's where Uran and Helena come in.

But first, we should take a look at Pluto's themes. While I could be wrong, at a cursory glance, I feel like the general consensus towards it's themes is that it's about hatred. I don't really think that's what it is as I feel like Urasawa is more trying to show us what it is to be human and what it is to be alive. And in that, he has a hidden protagonist in Pluto. Someone who's influence snakes through the plot and isn't seen much, but without who the story's themes would remain incomplete. Pluto tackles what it is to be alive through many things, such as memory, sadness, grief, hatred, love and parenthood. But none of that works without the realization by Tenma of his own mistakes. And Uran and Helena bookend these revelations and are absolutley key to understanding that.

In my favourite chapter of the series, Chapter 37, Uran goes from person to person as she finds a way to deal with her grief and eventually comes across Tobio's grave, Tenma having left recently. It's an absolutely beautiful chapter that shows Uran's humanity and Urasawa's love for sharing these kind and soft moments. But it also sheds a light on Tenma as Uran realizes someone who was grieving has just left. Without saying much at all we realize that Tenma has finally realized his mistakes. In the process of grieving one son, he lost the other. While remembering Tobio, he let Atom go. His grief towards Tobio is clear in the following chapter, Chapter 38. All of the things he wanted Atom to be; Tobio come back to life, Tobio's ghost punishing him, Atom rejected. And Tenma could only see that rejection, and not what he had, another son.

Uran shows us very clearly what Pluto, the story, is. It's a chapter in their lives. And we've come into a story nearing the end for Tenma. And it's through the humanity of two absolutely amazing characters in their own right, Uran and Helena, that we are able to so fully understand Tenma. Despite being robots, these two characters are the most alive of everyone. They love fully and freely and are catalysts of change. Uran's vibrant and full of life in a way that really sticks out. And Helena has such depth that it's evident in every scene she's in. She's not pointed out to be made by any famous scientist so all the life she has is her own. These two represent the life of robot's more than any other characters in the series.

So it's that much more poignant when Helena finally breaks down after putting on such a strong front of everybody. Grief intersects and she brings out Tenma's sadness as well. They've both been putting up such strong fronts that it's heartbreaking to see them collapse. It completes Tenma's growth and strikes a heartbreaking contrast between the two. Tenma became the way he is through the loss of his son whereas Helena doesn't even get to remember her own loss. It makes you wonder if the grief for her and Geischt's child compounds her sorrow too.

Without these two and their grief, a large part of Pluto becomes inaccessible. Pluto is largely about death so when two characters come in who've never had a hand in the grim work of taking life, you see the world through a lens that's absolutely crucial in order to fully connect with all of the character's and their situations. Death and Grief has scarred the characters in Pluto. Time and time again they've chosen the worst path. They've chosen revenge and hatred. But Uran and Helena are different. Without them, the story is incomplete. They provide an alternative. They provide the path towards healing.

im sorry for this one:

#naoki urasawa's pluto #helena #uran #pluto #pluto anime #umataro tenma #astro boy #this was supposed to be short #also its largely unreasearched #i would need to read the original atom and read all of urasawa's other works and read up on the gulf war before tackling a proper piece #random thoughts I didn't put in:#something i love about Pluto is how each robot is a reflection of their creators in some way or another with Uran being Ochanamizu's love #the combination of jackie and lee harvey oswald will probably throw off so many people who don't know(totally not why I did it)#also God #honestly though no side characters feel insignificant in Pluto #Some more shared ideas between the Core Four are the burdens we carry and share and the importance of stories in our lives

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blazehedgehog · 2 months ago

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After watching SAGE's 2024 trailer, you ever get the feeling that most people want to be making indie games instead of fan games nowadays,? Every year there's been less and less fan works there.

youtube

This is the first year I've really felt it in any meaningful way.

There have been attempts for more than a decade to rename SAGE to drop the "Sonic" part. I've always pushed back against that and at this point the branding is too strong to give up, I think. People know about and come to SAGE because the brand is strong. Renaming it would be a death sentence.

Taking off my business hat, it's a bummer to see fangames in the minority here. Everybody wants to hop on that indie game gravy train and chase the success of Pizza Tower (seriously, count how many Pizza Tower clones are in the trailer this year) or Freedom Planet or Spark the Electric Jester or whatever.

And it's easy to congratulate people for striking out on their own and making original games. I was one of the many voices urging Sabrina to divorce Freedom Planet from the Sonic franchise and make it into an original game she could sell. So she ran a crowdfunding campaign (multiple, actually), was successful, and now we have two Freedom Planet games. And that's great!

But... does that mean all fangames should go away forever?

The example I lean on the hardest is comic books.

A lot of the guys who created the biggest super heroes aren't around anymore. They gave up control long ago or are straight up dead now. These books are effectively officialized fanfiction now, as are the $300,000,000 movies based on them. An ever-increasing number of people writing, drawing and directing these characters today were not alive when they were originally created.

But people still keep writing Batman stories, officially or otherwise. Because there are some stories you can only tell with Batman. Now, you could break off and make your own character that's similar to Batman, build up this history for him, and then finally tell your original story with that character. And maybe that's satisfying, to have built something of your own like that.

But for one: that's a lot of work. Batman is interesting because he has decades (almost a century now) of history behind him to play off of and work with. There are people out there who will tell you to just start writing your dream story and forget about building up to it first, but that's more about motivation and confidence than the idea that stories don't need historical context.

And two: that's already been done.

There's a good chance you know who Rob Liefeld is from his, uh, "distinctive" art style. He also created Deadpool, a katana-wielding mercenary assassin that dresses in red and black, whose real name is Wade Wilson. But before Deadpool, he created Deathstroke, a katana-wielding mercenary assassin that dresses in orange and black, whose real name is Slade Wilson.

Here is a guy who has built a career on copying his own work (and the work of others) over and over and over again.

Did it make Rob Liefeld rich and famous? Technically yes, but he kind of got rich because other people made better work using his characters, and he's famous for being kind of a hack.

So which is better?

Creative output you can do right here, right now, today, but is considered "fanfiction" or "fanart" or a "fangame", which may or may not lead to you being the person handling the official thing at some point down the road...

Or spending years of your life toiling to bring an original concept to life, and even if you struggle through all of the boredom and hardship of getting your original product out the door, it gets lost in the noise of now-million other creators trying to do the exact same thing. And then, at the end of your launch, after 2, 3, even 5 years of working and working and working, you've only made enough money to cover rent on your apartment for a month and a half.

Or, to put it another way:

Are you ditching fangame development because you have a legitimately great story you want to tell, or are you just doing it because you can't make money on a fangame?

Are you just creating another Bloodstrike?

As someone who has struggled to justify putting lots of hard work into a fangame myself, and have both made very popular fangames and some not-so-great original games, I don't know if I have a definitive answer for you. But I do wish there were more fangames at the fangaming event, and I will say, as always, if I could get paid a livable wage for making fangames, I would drop everything and do it in a heartbeat.

#questions #anonymous #sonic the hedgehog #sega #sonic team #SAGE #sonic amateur games expo #fangame #indie game #gamedev

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jimblejamblewritings · 1 year ago

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the fake date plot | part 1.

Summary: Gryffindors, seventh years, classmates, unrequited love. Just a few things Y/N and James Potter had in common. When a brilliantly dumb plan is hatched the two end up getting something a little different than what they wanted.

Author's Note: Hello! Yes, I'm here with a wip before finishing my other stuff. The James girlies have led me down a rabbit hole and some of the cutest stories are in the James tag. So before you read this, please read: If I Kiss You, I'm Sorry by @astonishment which is what inspired this fic.

Warnings for the Series: literally none that I can think of this is supposed to be just good fluffy fun

Pairing: James Potter x reader

Word Count: 2.3k

A/N II: I literally use whatever gif comes up when I type in 'James Potter' but imagine your own fancasts and I might switch up every now and then

Series Masterlist

“Prongs, there’s some owl at the window,” Remus said as he exited the kitchen.

James lifted his head, trying not to disturb Peter who was using his chest as a headboard while he tried to solve the Rubik’s Cube Remus had bought him for his birthday. It was summer and naturally, as someone going into his last year of school when break ended, James threw a party at his house.

His parents were going to be on business trips most of the summer. The party was a major success. Only the marauders, Lily, Marlene, Dorcas, and Mary were still there. They had all planned on staying, already having their trunks there. School was in two days.

James hopped up from where he was on the floor, cleaning the smudge of his glasses. “Oh, that must be Elton.”

“Elton?” Peter asked.

“Y/N’s bird. She really likes Elton John’s music. He’s some muggle singer. Moony knows, the Crocodile Rock dude.”

James left the rest of his friends in the living room to ask how he even knew you while he got your letter. He dug around the fridge to give Elton two blackberries as a thank you. James opened your letter in the kitchen before going back to his friends, in case your letter had confidential information in it.

He hid the smirk on his face behind the letter when he saw his friends’ expressions. They totally bought it and they would buy it even more when he saw you on the Hogwarts Express in two days. You and James came up with the best fake date plot known to man last school year:

It was the Yule Ball. Hogwarts kept the name even though you didn’t have Triwizard Tournaments every year. The students like that. It was always fun to go to a ball. It was also nerve wracking. Everyone was trying to get a date or they’d risk being talked about for a century. James was failing at asking Lily out and you were failing at avoiding a few boys that wanted to ask you out. None of them were the guy you wanted to ask you out.

Even when you got to the ball, boys were still trying to ask you to dance. You grabbed a cup of punch and excused yourself. You walked further away from the Great Hall and to a small corridor. A dark figure made you stop for a moment before continuing on your path. A sniffle made you stop completely.

“Are you okay?”

James jumped. Wiping at his eyes, he looked over at you. James stuttered through lies before giving up and turning the other way to lean his back against the windowsill. He took a sip of the drink he had in his hand and looked over at you.

“She can't even spare a dance with me. I thought everything was going well this year.”

You gave a dry laugh. “I totally know the feeling.”

James raised an eyebrow. He patted the space next to him and went to join him at the windowsill. The two of you clinked glasses and downed the rest of your drinks. James disappeared the cups.

“So which bloke did you want to dance with?”

“Oh, I don’t really think that’s important.”

“Nope, Y/N. It is totally important. I’ve poured my heart out to you, it’s just not right to be the only one.”

“Fine. Xenophilius… Don’t laugh.”

“I’m not laughing. Him? Really?”

“I know he’s snogged a lot of people but h—”

“Love, he’s shagged nearly all of Ravenclaw. The only long term relationship he’s ever been in was Pandora.”

“But they lasted all of fifth year plus the Ministry added eighth year so there’s still time to see him a lot.”

“Ugh, don’t remind me about eighth year.”

The Ministry was very concerned with the amount of Hogwarts graduates getting married and having children right after leaving school. Especially when a good chunk of them died either fighting for Voldemort or against Voldemort. Adding an extra school year was a way to try and quell that phenomenon. As someone so close to graduating, you hated it at first. It became only a minor annoyance when you realized the Ministry probably wouldn’t be changing their minds until Voldemort was defeated.

James shrugged his shoulders. “So what’s your plan exactly? Pine after Xeno all of next year and then when eighth year comes around hope he stops hooking up in Gryffindor locker rooms long enough to realize you’re perfect for him?”

“He hooks up in Gryffindor locker rooms?” you asked with slightly widened eyes.

“Unfortunately. Our rooms are closest to the pitch, easier to sneak in and out during games.”

“Do you really think I’m perfect for him?”

“Y/N,” James said with a roll of his eyes. “I haven’t sat next to you in Potions every class since first year to not know that if Xeno took just a week off from trying to fuck everything with a pulse he’d know you are one of the nicest and cutest girls he’s ever going to get. You’re wicked smart too which is up his alley… I still don’t understand how he still gets the grades he does.”

“Thanks, James. For what it’s worth, I think Lily is missing out on a very observant and handsome and sweet guy even if your pranks go a little too far sometimes.”

“Well, we only save those for people that like to pick on those smaller than them.”

“I know.”

“Do you feel like going back to the ball? Because I don’t.”

“Not really.”

James held out his arm. “Shall we make our way to Gryffindor, my lady.”

“We shall, good sir.”

You and James skipped through the halls until you made it back to Gryffindor tower. You ended up following him up to his dorm which you had never seen before. Despite being assigned class partners since you two were eleven, you weren’t exactly friends with James Potter. Just acquaintances was what you were.

The marauders’ dorm was nice. The first thing you noticed was the fact that they reconfigured their beds. Almost every bed was laying horizontal and flush against the wall, like a bed turned couch. And the wardrobes were also flush against the wall either at the head or foot of the beds, whichever allowed all the beds to see each other. You’d have to proposition your roommates about doing that. It made the space so much wider and seemed to give everyone a personal area.

James led you to his bed area with a blue rug in front of it. You took off your shoes and set them neatly next to his, noting how he was very organized about his shoes being lined up underneath the bed. James moved to the wardrobe at the foot of his bed. His hand dug through the shelves for his pajamas.

“Do you want something to change into?”

You took some of his clothes with a thanks and went into the bathroom to wash and get changed. You and James were going to open the firewhiskey in Sirius’ trunk and vent to each other while getting progressively drunker. James started to make himself a little cot on the floor while you took a shower. Something told him that you two would probably stay up late and potentially fall asleep. He already decided that you were getting the bed.

You laid down on the bed and ate some fizzing whizbees while waiting for James to finish showering. You shot up when James practically broke his own door. His hair was still wet and his clothes looked very disheveled on him.

“I have a plan so dumb it might work on luck alone,” he said as he shook your shoulders.

“I’m listening.”

“Go out with me.”

You laughed. “James, are you already drunk?”

“Just a bit tipsy. But listen to me. You want Xenophilius, I want Lily but neither of them seem to really notice us. So let’s make them notice.”

“You want to make them jealous?”

“Well, I don’t know if they’ll be jealous but I want to make them feel something. Don’t you think they would at least be curious about why we suddenly stopped pinning over them? They’d at least talk to us more, I just know it.”

“Okay, one problem. You scream through the corridors about how much you love Lily. I think only my friends know that I like him and one of those friends is Lily.”

“You two are friends?”

“Well, we’re roommates, one of the few Gryffindor dorms with five girls. I’m really just friends with Dorcas and Alice when she’s not holed up in Hufflepuff.”

“I hate to break it to you, sweetheart, but you’re gonna have to do something embarrassing.”

And that was how you found yourself waiting outside Ravenclaw’s locker room before the big quidditch match on the last day of first semester. If anyone talks, it’s going to be quidditch players. They chuckled a bit while you waited for Xenophilius to come outside, some even going back in to tell him that you were there.

He finally left the dressing room after what seemed like forever and stood right in front of you. Reluctantly, you gave him a small gift and wished him luck before scurrying to find your roommates in the stands. You didn’t think it would take very long for the gossip to spread. What you didn’t expect was for you to get the label of a lovesick puppy. That was worse than what they called James. You told him such over winter break.

The two of you were at his house for the entirety of the break, teaching each other all about yourselves and finishing the plot. You two wouldn’t start fake-dating until the start of seventh year, on the Hogwarts Express to be exact… with James doing a big gesture that was entirely his idea. He was super invested in making it believable. If it wasn’t believable then there was no point.

James handed over your letter to Peter who was still next to him. “Y/N says hi and she’s sorry she couldn’t make it to the party.”

“Since when were you talking to our roommate?” Marlene asked.

“Since I’ve sat next to her everyday in Potions and Transfiguration since we were first years.”

“You’ve been assigned that long?”

“Yeah,” he said, running a hand through his hair. “Minnie and Slughorn never switched us. I should probably write something back to her.”

The only thing in James’ letter was that he thinks the plan might work. Everyone perked up at the notion of you two being secret friends so maybe fake-dating would work after all. You threw the letter into your trunk and headed to Platform 9 and ¾. You went to find Alice who would hopefully be alone or with her other Hufflepuff friends.

That was what James wanted anyway. He came in about halfway through the train ride when you were in the middle of talking with your friends. James sheepishly held up a sweater and tapped on the window. Alice nodded for him to come in. The girl was shocked when he immediately turned to you.

“Bug?”

“Yes, Prongs?”

“Do you remember last year when you said you sew? Do you think you can mend this?”

“It’s not even autumn yet. Why do you need the jumper now?”

“I just thought I’d forget unless I said it right at this moment.”

You rolled your eyes but looked for a sewing kit in your trunk. Setting it on the bench, you grabbed the sweater and gently pushed him out of the room.

“Why am I friends with you?”

“Because you love me.”

“Goodbye, James Potter.”

“Bye, Bug. Thank you.”

You sat back down and dug through your sewing kit before muttering that you didn’t have navy blue thread and would try to find some. You had already known that you didn’t have the correct color thread. But a certain Ravenclaw probably did. Your hand shook a bit as you closed the door to your compartment:

“What are Xeno’s hobbies?” James asked when you two took a break to hang out at the pool in his backyard when you arrived early in the summer.

“I don’t know.”

“That’s a load of bull. I know Lily’s favorite gemstone is carnelian because it matches her hair. So what’s one of the man's hobbies?”

“He likes to sew.”

“Oh this is brilliant.”

You knocked on the door of the train compartment that Xenophilius, his friends, and the new girl he was with for the start of school. He and his friends smiled at seeing you and let you in. You held up the sweater.

“Do any of you have navy blue thread? I’m trying to mend a jumper.”

Xeno summoned the spool of thread from out of his trunk. He held it up in his hand until you came in to receive it. His hold lingered on yours.

“You like to sew?”

You shrugged. “It’s more of a hobby. I’ve only ever done stuff for myself until now.”

“Is that for your mum? My first gift to someone else was for my parents.”

“No, James Potter. The idiot can’t mend a simple hole in a sweater. Thank you for the thread, I’ll return it before dinner.”

You smiled a little as you walked back to your compartment. Xenophilius’ smile had twitched a bit when you mentioned James’ name. Maybe his plan might work. Your friends had clearly been gossiping about you when you were gone. There was no doubt that the Ravenclaws were gossiping about you when you left. And because James insisted that you give him his sweater once everyone got into the Great Hall, you were sure other people were bound to gossip.

James ignored the other marauders when they got back to their dorms. He’d tell his friends the truth eventually but it was necessary they also believe the lie for at least a month or two. You and him were supposed to be close friends for the first month. If Lily or Xenophilius didn’t make a move from that alone then you would start fake-dating. It was a foolproof idea really.

(part 2)

PERMANENT TAGLIST:

@venomsvl @peaches-n-sunscreen @summerellaz @supernaturallover2002 @sambucky8 @9daykrisr @thebitchinleo @23victoria @scarlets-widow @pagetpagetpagetpaget @lovexnatasha @awesomebooklover17 @1234-angelika @imatrisk @blackreaderatrisk @princess-jules47 @alexloveskili @a-marie-a @siriuslysirius1107 @i-have-no-life-charlie

#james potter x reader #james potter x black!reader #hogwarts #james potter x reader fic #james potter x y/n #james potter x you #james potter fic #marauders imagines #marauders fic #marauders era #james potter fluff #marauders fluff

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mswyrr · 1 month ago

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"circle sewn with fate": more evidence that they are meant to be a "coven true"

-Agatha didn't think they'd be able to open the Road together because "only a true coven can open the door." And yet they did open the door together. They did something only a true coven can do.

-Agatha talks about the "Covenstead Rule" and it's kind of wild to me as a bit of symbolism. This whole time--all these long centuries--and wherever she is there have been people around her she could have connected with, made community with. It takes work and it's not easy, but it's there for her. As a metaphor about community it's pretty powerful? And, as Teen puts it, "beautiful."

Notable that she says it's "definitely not" beautiful in response. There's something here, about the spell/delusions she was trapped within and then her overall incapacity/unwillingness to see that's right in front of her face (adamant in 1x04 that the song says "coven TWO" when it's obviously "coven true"). You don't see it until you're ready to. There's people all around us at any given time we could connect with, but are we ready for that? Are they?

The next part is even more pointed, if we think of it as metaphorical about human relationships and community overall:

-And then the real kicker - Lilia's magical gift determined the group's members. And when she got the names she also got "Three of Pentacles," a really positive card that the show has released with a special design meant to represent the coven.

Here's the show merch Three of Pentacles design and the Smith-Waite classic design:

Its meaning is really positive for what this group can be to each other:

Apprenticeship, learning, studying, growing, hard work, commitment, building on success, collaboration, teamwork, determination, goals, dedication, quality, attention to detail, tradesperson, achievements, recognition, reward, hard work paying off, effort, motivation (source)

And the core takeaway in the card as something given by a reading (as Lilia says it to Agatha imo) is this:

"Each person has an important role to play, and when they come together as a team, they can create something much more significant than if they were to undertake the project on their own. So, when the Three of Pentacles turns up in a Tarot reading, take it as a sign to collaborate with others, creating synergies to achieve big results. The Three of Pentacles represents the value of different ideas and levels of experience in collaboration. The architects respect the specialised knowledge of the stonemason, and the stonemason appreciates the wisdom and experience of the architects. Even though their backgrounds, experience levels and expertise are very different, they can come together to share their insight in a way that creates synergy and improves the finished product. There is no ‘us and them’ or any sense of superiority. Instead, each person has something to offer and is willing to learn from the others involved in the project. Everyone is getting the job done collectively and contributes to the group through active listening and sharing. As you work on projects with others, acknowledge the value that each person brings to the table. You will also learn from each member of the team when you see his or her unique contribution." (source)

I truly think this season is the story of how Agatha gets a "coven true" again, even though it is the last thing she thinks she wants. There's so much symbolism and references to it! Even passing "joke" moments like the "Chief of police" starting to say "teamwork makes the dream work" and Agatha cutting in with "eat my ass." Of course, if she rejects what the magic (the Road's magic, Lilia's divination magic) is telling her, she could face the Three of Pentacles reversed:

Not learning from mistakes, unwillingness to learn, lack of growth, poor work ethic, lack of commitment, mistakes, lack of effort, lack of teamwork, apathy, no determination, no goals, no dedication, no motivation, poor quality work

It's her choice. And the choice of her coven too, if they want to walk the road (both literally the Witches' Road and metaphorically the road of life) with her despite what a huge pain in the ass she can be lol

#agatha harkness #agatha all along #agatha all along meta

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brian-in-finance · 2 months ago

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•••••

WHAT THE STARS ARE SAYING

Check out why so many famed actors use Backstage

Trusted since 1960

Founded in 1960, Backstage has a storied history of serving the entertainment industry. For over 60 years Backstage has served as a casting resource and news source for actors, performers, directors, producers, agents, and casting directors.

Over that time, Backstage Magazine has also appeared on numerous TV shows, such as “Mad Men,” “Entourage,” “Glee,” “Oprah,” NBC's “Today” show, Comedy Central's “@Midnight”, NY1's “On Stage,” and “Saturday Night Live,” as well as multiple mentions on shows like “Inside the Actor’s Studio,” “Girls,” and appearances in films such as “13 Going on 30,” the Farrelly brothers' “Stuck on You” and Spike Lee's “Girl 6,” and even a mention in Woody Allen's short-story collection “Mere Anarchy” and Augusten Burroughs' novel “Sellevision” – and Backstage has received accolades from multiple Academy Award-, Emmy-, and Tony-winning actors and directors. (Plus, the hit musical “The Last Five Years” even includes Backstage in its lyrics: “Here's a headshot guy and a new Backstage / Where you're right for something on every page.”)

CAITRÍONA BALFE

ACTRESS

"I still get Backstage emails 'cause I still subscribe to Backstage. [Backstage is) kind of the Bible in the beginning, which is amazing. Samuel French and Backstage go hand in hand, you know? You go there for your plays when you're in classes, and then you get your Backstage."

Backstage 1

•••••

Brian’s Note: The following story originally appeared in April 2015. Most recent update is December 2020.

The Gorgeous Determination of Caitríona Balfe

Caitríona Balfe is on the move. That's been true most of her adult life— especially the 10 years she was modeling for Victoria's Secret, Dolce & Gabbana, and others—but as she sits on the rooftop patio of a West Hollywood hotel in mid-March, she mentions that she's pulling up stakes from Los Angeles.

"It just feels silly to have an empty place for 10 months until I figure out what I'm doing with my life," the Irish-born actor says. "I've rented the same place for the last four years and now I have to give it up." Her apartment is being razed to put in condos, but her departure from L.A. is extra poignant considering this is the city where Balfe journeyed when she decided to put aside that successful modeling career and focus on the vocation she'd always wanted: acting.

Photo: Luc-Richard Elie

"I've moved so much since I was 18," she says. "I mean, l've lived so many places. New York, I lived in for almost eight years [while modeling], and that's been the longest of anywhere since I left Ireland. But L.A. is where I came and said, 'OK, this is what I wanna do with my life.' "

She refuses to think of her move as a permanent one, though. "I'll be back," she declares, "but it feels really sad. My little apartment, it's got so many memories."

Balfe's sadness is no doubt mitigated by the fact that part of her need to move is due to the precipitous rise in her fortunes. She'll soon be flying to Scotland to shoot the second season of "Outlander," which returns to Starz April 4 to conclude Season 1.

When last we saw Balfe's Claire, the resourceful British nurse who comes home after World War |I only to be inexplicably teleported into the 18th-century Highlands, she was half-naked with a knife to her breast. Don't worry: Claire will get out of that scrape, but more perils await-to say nothing of the emerging multi-era romantic triangle developing between her, the Scottish warrior Jamie Fraser (Sam Heughan), and her 20th-century husband, Frank Randall (Tobias Menzies), who wonders where she's gone.

Based on the much-beloved Diana Gabaldon novels and developed for television by "Battlestar Galactica" rebooter Ronald D. Moore, "Outlander" is an ostensibly lush period-piece-within-a-period-piece drama that's consistently richer and thornier than its romance-novel trappings suggest. And much of the credit goes to Balfe, who had managed small parts in films such as “Super 8” and “Now You See Me” before landing the central role in this adaptation.

In person, Balfe is far less imposing than the steely Claire, who has to weather the dangers of being a woman in sexist, violent Scotland in the 1740s. Cast late in the preproduction of “Outlander”—Moore has mentioned in interviews how hard it was to find the right Claire—she didn’t have time to consider what the role would do to her life. “I’m so bad on social media," she confesses on this warm afternoon, nestled underneath a cabana. "I had set up an account on Twitter maybe a year or so before I got this job and had, I thought, a lot of followers — 250 or something, and most of them are my friends. Within about a month or two, it was thousands of people — and my phone, I didn't know how to turn off the alerts, so it was just going all the time. That was the beginning of the awareness."

Growing up in the small Irish community of Monaghan, Balfe had considered acting from an early age. ("I was devastated that I wasn't a child actor," she says, smiling. But after traveling to Dublin to study theater, she changed course once she received an offer to model. It wasn't a secret passion of hers, but who turns down a trip to Paris? "My parents felt that I should finish college," Balfe recalls, "but l'm slightly headstrong, so l took their advice and I completely ignored it."

Over the next decade, she lived in France, Italy, Germany, and Japan, her modeling inexperience hardly a detriment. "You'd be amazed how little information or training goes into it," she says. "When I first arrived in Paris, I was told to take a bus to the office. I left my suitcase — I barely spoke any French — and someone took me across the street, helped me buy a Carte Orange. They printed out five addresses that I had to go to that day, and then they sent me off." She still remembers at 18 riding the subway alongside 16-year-old aspiring Russian models, who knew no French or English, homesick and sobbing their eyes out. "That was just the way it was," says Balfe. "You become pretty tough. When I went to Japan, it was similar: They would drive you to their castings, but the minute you got a job, it would be like, 'Here's an address, here's a map. Good luck.' They don't have signposts in English in Japan, so the map and the address are not always very helpful."

Hear Balfe recount her early misadventures in modeling and you can't help but think of Claire, who's equally thrown to the wolves once she arrives in the 18th century amid people wary of the English in general and assertive women in particular. "Honestly, l've been in so many situations in my life where you just are completely displaced," Balfe says. “You have to adapt very quickly and figure it out. I definitely think that informs Claire a lot. It helped me understand her."

Did moving to Paris at such a young age teach Balfe that she can cope in any circumstance? "I think I didn't really realize that until many years later," she replies. "I have a great knack of not thinking about things and just going for it. You learn the hard way sometimes that you're able to get through, but sometimes it's quite tough when you're in a situation where you don't know anyone and you're trying to find your way around cities. But if an opportunity presents itself and it seems like a good idea, l'm just like, 'OK, let's do it, then I'll figure it out.'”

The decision to reconnect with her acting ambitions was conducted just as boldly. Ready to quit modeling, she moved to Los Angeles because a writer she was dating lived there. He was the only person she knew, but she had read a Vanity Fair interview with Amy Adams in which she said she trained with Warner Loughlin. "I could walk to that place from my ex-boyfriend's house," she says, "so l was like, 'Well, I'm gonna go there because I can't really drive. I started from scratch. I didn't have any managers, I didn't know any agents, I hadn't acted in almost a decade." But she just kept taking classes, moving from Loughlin to the studios of Sanford Meisner and Judith Weston. "I think when I first got here, I had a nice little air of delusion: 'It's gonna work out,'" she says with a laugh. “You just don't know how."

And then came "Outlander." By email, Moore admits that he didn't know Balfe's work until her audition tape came unsolicited to his office from her agent. Once she was chosen for Claire, he made it clear how demanding the job would be. “I told her in our first meeting that this was going to be an even bigger responsibility and workload than the normal TV lead," he writes. "Because the story was being told from Claire's point of view, Cait was going to be in every scene, every day for months, which is an extraordinary amount of work, far beyond what most actors are ever asked to do."

Moore's warning didn't faze Balfe. Writes Moore, "After she met with the president of Starz... and it was clear that she was going to land the role, I walked her to the elevator and just before the doors closed on her, I said 'Your life is about to change forever,' and she gave me a grin that was both thrilled and slightly nervous. I never saw her hesitate after that."

She's never hesitated before. As Balfe prepares to say goodbye to L.A. (for now, she thinks back to her early days in the city, trying to convince casting directors that she was more than just a model. "I went on many, many, many, many auditions that were Hot Girl No. 2 — you wanna shoot yourself," she says, laughing. "But, you know, I'm very lucky that l was even getting those auditions in the beginning. And it toughens you up. At least for me, to have that fuel to prove people wrong—it definitely spurs me on and makes me wanna work harder." Then she smiles conspiratorially. "And shove it to them."

Backstage 2

Remember… I told her in our first meeting that this was going to be an even bigger responsibility and workload than the normal TV lead. — Ronald D Moore

#Tait rhymes with hat #Good times #National Actors Day #8 September 2024 #Backstage #April 2015 #Story last updated December 2020 #Instagram

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kurishiri · 26 days ago

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21 . . . alfons main story — blind love

꒰ ִ ֺ ⊹ @ notice ⊹ ֺ ִ ꒱ this translation may not be 100% accurate or contain creative liberties due to characterization or narrative flow purposes. if you enjoy, please consider reblogging, but don’t repost these or claim these as your own!

— cw: wound aggravation and general medical talk.

With the help of Roger and the others, who came running, Alfons was carried back to Crown castle——

And there, Roger started an emergency operation.

That night, which felt extremely long to the point one second felt more like one hour, finally started to melt into the dim morning...

And that was around the time footsteps coming up the staircase resounded to the tall ceiling.

Seeing Roger come out from the basement, I ran to him in haste.

Kate: ...How is Alfons?

Roger: I did what I could.

R: Fortunately, I managed to suture the most vital blood vessels where the bullet penetrated.

Liam: Wait, that’s possible?

Roger: Just as the skin and intestines can, the same goes for blood vessels.

R: ...That said, it’s thanks to the many years of research my father, who’s a town doctor, had put into this.

R: Afterward... I used Elbie’s blood for a blood transfusion, so all we can do now is pray that his blood is compatible.

Kate: Blood transfusion...?

It was the first I heard of many words Roger had used, so it was a bit difficult to understand.

Roger: It’s a method of receiving blood from others, to make up for what was lost.

R: But the rate of success in clinical trials is low, and it’s a risky method.

(It’s risky... then, when he said the only thing we could do is pray his blood is compatible...)

Kate: What would happen, then, if the blood isn’t compatible?

Roger: In the worst case... he dies.

Kate: ——!

Roger: ...But, if we didn’t do it, then Al would have definitely died during the night.

He said that when that much blood was lost, to an extent, surgery and blood transfusions were a gamble.

Roger: Whenever I had the chance, I would draw the blood of Cursed ones here and did some experiments,

R: and from what I observed till now, Elbie’s blood shared the most reactions with Al’s.

R: So that’s why, we bet on him being able to adapt. Sorry about that, Kate, for not explaining to you earlier.

Kate: ...No, it’s fine. I know you were doing what you could.

(Since Roger had been researching the Cursed ones’ abilities for a long time, he was able to dive right into the surgery.)

Kate: So thank you very much. ...I’ll also believe for the best and wait.

Roger: ...Sounds good.

R: If he keeps a pretty lady like you waiting and doesn’t wake up, that would make full-on make him the idiot of the century.

Ever since then, the flow of time seemed more vague.

I could hardly bear even a second away from Alfons’ side as he remained unconscious...

And the only times I left the basement were to eat and take a shower. Other than that, I would spend all my time by his side, where he slept on the bed,

as I was scared that, were I to take my eyes off him, he would suddenly disappear.

(...ngh... h-huh...? Oh no, I fell asleep—)

I was supposed to pass the time at his bedside once again today, praying for the best,

But it seemed that at some point, I fell asleep atop the sheets.

(How is Alfons...)

I propped my body up with a start to check on the sleeping face that had been like that every day for the past few days.

(——W-wait, huh...?)

Kate: ...No way...

For a moment, I couldn’t grasp reality, and my mind went blank.

Alfons’ complexion was far off from a normal sleeping person’s.

It was so pale, it looked as though no blood flowed through there at all.

His lips had also lost all their colors, and they were chapped.

Kate: A-Al... Alfons...?

In a panic, I leaned over him on the bed.

Albeit faint, the movement of his chest even after he had lost consciousness now did not move an inch.

Kate: No... I don’t want this... please, no...

The tears I had always dearly tried to hold back overflowed then, and on an instinct, I held tightly onto his chest.

I held onto a faint thread of hope as I tried to strain my ear for any signs, but I could not hear even a single sign of his heartbeat.

The sweet fragrance Alfons gave off softly wrapped itself around me.

(Not yet... please...)

(I don’t want to ever forget that this scent was your——)

Kate: ...?

When I thought this, the fool called I finally realized something was off.

(Hm...?)

—— Flashback ——

(“To die without leaving his mark on anyone’s memories”——such was Alfons’ tragic fate.)

(When Alfons dies... at that moment...)

(The members of Crown, the friends Alfons would play with, the people in the slums, me, anyone and everyone...)

(...will all end up forgetting about him.)

His name, what he looked like, the scent he gave off... and the fact he even existed in this world altogether.

—— End flashback ——

(Alfons... he looks deceased... but——)

Kate: I... I still——haven’t forgotten... about you...

The moment those words came out in a whisper——

???: ...Dear me, it would seem you’ve come to your senses more quickly than I anticipated.

???: Were it that I could witness more of your grieving and crying... truly, a shame.

Kate: ...——!!

At the voice I’ve grown more than familiar with, blood rushed through my entire body as I stood up with a start.

There, with a smile filled to the brim with genuine mirth was——

Alfons: Well, how was it? My acting as a dead person, that is.

[1] The worst! (+4 / +4)

[2] You’re so mean.

[3] You fiend!

Kate: The worst! The absolute, utter... worst... hic...

Alfons: Well, as I am sure you are more than well aware by now, I am indeed the worst.

A: But even so, you fell in love with me, even for that, did you not?

I wanted nothing more than to give him a slap, if not for the fact that even more tears spilled, so I couldn’t see what was in front of me.

Tears continued to spill one after the other, each teardrop staining Alfons’ shirt more.

Kate: The worst... of the worst... ๐·°(⋟﹏⋞)°·๐!

Alfons: Ouch——won’t you go a tad easier on me, the wounds are stitched there... ow, ow, ow...

I weakly hit his chest with my hand, and while laughing, he slowly sat up.

Kate: Just why... would you do such a thing...

Alfons: .........That is a very good question. Why did I indeed?

A: Say, have you ever thought that there is no bigger mystery to ourselves than our own heart?

Kate: Wh—stop dodging the question! Because I won’t forgive you until you give me an answer!

Alfons: Alright, alright, I understand. You can stop hitting my chest over and over now, yes? I can feel it even with the strength of a kitten.

When I did as he asked, he stroked his fingers gently through my hair, which hung from the nape of my neck, before he let it flow to my shoulders.

Alfons: ...When I awoke, I saw you, face down asleep on the bed,

A: and seeing the back of your neck out so defenseless like that... an impulse tickled me silly, you see.

Kate: Isn’t that a bit too mean for something that was supposed to ‘tickle you silly’ though...!

(Even if you thought about such a thing for a moment, you wouldn’t actually do it!)

(...Under normal circumstances, that is.)

Realizing that the words he said were far from the ones I’d normally hear, I glared at him through teary eyes.

Alfons: My, cut me some slack, why don’t you. Can’t you think of this as my revenge for having lost the bet and let it go?

A: You will become my plaything for life, won’t you?

(T-this man, I swear...)

He was frustrating, infuriating, and annoying to boot.

But——more than that, he filled my heart to the brim with happiness, and...

Kate: That goes without saying...!

I was a mess of tears as I hugged Alfons——

Alfons: ...Hehe, have you the heart to forgive me now then?

(His body, and his life... they are still here in my arms...)

(And the fact Alfons still has a place in my mind too——I’m so happy...)

Kate: ...If you promise me that you’ll take responsibility to the end,

K: and tear my life to bits and pieces, then I’ll forgive you...

Alfons: Ahha! What’s with that condition?

Kate: I don’t know either...

Up until now, the depths of my heart was in despair, but now I felt the happiest I’d been in my life, my heart a mess.

(But, despair, happiness, and everything else——)

(If these scars can be left on this body as memories of Alfons... I want to accept them all.)

(I want all of what’s inside me to be filled with the scars he leaves.)

From now on, and for as long as possible, forevermore.

Alfons: However foolish you may be, I am just as much so.

A: Well, if you say so, it cannot be helped.

A: I will make a mess out of your life, and fill your body with wounds so deep, they can never disappear again.

A: By all means, let me be the one to drive you to insanity… and make you regret it all.

Alfons murmurations sweetly melted.

Kate: Please do...

It was the worst confession of love——but that very one brought me to the peak of happiness.

While seeming fed up with my tears that kept falling, he wiped them with his bare fingers.

Alfons: ...Goodness, to think such awful words could render you a puddle of happy tears...

A: I am more than sure, even if I were to scour the entire world, you would be the only one.

To feel his warmth made me so happy, I rubbed my cheek on his palm.

(I want us to touch each other more... but.)

(First things first, I should have Roger check up on him.)

Kate: ...Wait here a moment, I’ll go get Roger!

Alfons: I would rather do quite literally anything else other than see that man’s face the moment I wake up, thank you very much.

Kate: And now’s not the time for that.

Alfons: Indeed, more than that, since we have decided on loving each other to the fullest now,

A: how about we do pleasurable things?

Kate: W-what in the world are you...!?

Those naughty hands slipped from my back to my waist——

And my body, long used to the pleasure, reacted on its own.

(Wait, I can’t get carried away...)

Kate: N-no, we can’t.

Alfons: But why? And here I thought you no longer needed anything else to blame.

Kate: It’s not that...

K: I-I also want to do it... feeling good with you, that is. ...But——

K: While I no longer need an excuse to do it... I do have a reason not to, so we can’t.

Alfons narrowed his eyes at that, seemingly interested.

Alfons: And what might that reason be, if I may ask?

Kate: Of course, what else could it be but because I hold you dear?

He widened his eyes in response, blinking two or three times.

Kate: You’ve lost a lot of blood, and you just had a big surgery done on you, and you were asleep for some days too.

K: So, until I know for sure that you are alright after being properly examined,

K: Those kinds of things are off limits, for both you... and me.

Alfons’ eyes widened as though he had just been told something ridiculous, before he started giggling.

Kate: W-what is it?

Alfons: Oh, sorry, it’s just... I was just wholeheartedly admiring you for how direct you show your love...

Kate: ...Are you sure you don’t mean ‘making fun’ of me?

Alfons: Aha, out of the box so soon?

As always, my feelings were being played by him like a toy.

(But even so, that’s alright... in the end, that’s what I always think.)

(And somehow... that makes me a bit frustrated...)

At least in a show of resistance, I turned my face away.

Alfons: ...Hehe, are you sulking, by any chance?

Kate: Hardly. Are you sure you’re not being too self-conscious?

Alfons: Goodness, to say such a thing to your lover, my heart might break.

Kate: !? What’s with that, suddenly calling me your lover and whatnot...

Alfons: Why, is this not what a relationship of loving each other to the fullest is called?

(Me, and Alfons...)

Just that one word made me feel as though all my frustrations would be pulled out of me, but I remained obstinate as I kept my head turned away.

Alfons: Are you not taken by it? Now that’s quite a sad thought.

Kate: No, it’s not that! It’s just, now’s not the time to be talking about this...

The body that had wrapped its arms around him was now in his, leaving me with no escape.

Kate: L-let go of me, or I won’t be able to get Roger...

Alfons: Absolutely not. ...Turn toward me, won’t you, Kate?

to be continued…

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