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ratrinisa · 1 year ago

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ANALYSIS OF THE MAN HE KILLED BY THOMAS HARDY

by Annisa Nur Ratri Oktavianti

A. Synopsis and Interpretation

Thomas Hardy wrote the poem "The Man He Killed" in 1902. The events of the Boer War in South Africa are notably regarded to have served as inspiration for the poem, which emphasizes the senselessness and wasted tragedy of human conflict. The poem educates the readers on death, battle, and warfare. Thomas Hardy especially depicted a conflict between two combatant men in his writing. In a dramatic monologue, the speaker of the poem describes having to kill a soldier with whom he had come face to face during combat.

The narrator pondered in the first stanza how they may have become friends if they were not on the battlefield. They stood on the same ground yet they had to fight for each other’s country. Line 3 – 4 implied the meaning that the narrator intended to share his hospitality to the man.

The second stanza sets up a contrast with the first. He had expressed a desire to be close to the man in the previous stanza, but instead, as they were both staring at each other, the narrator shot and killed the man. “Ranged as infantry” means that the narrator and the man were forced to be “ranged” or “distant” because of the war.

Although it was clear that the narrator did not want to confess it, he attempted to persuade himself in this stanza of reasons why he should kill the man. The word “because” that repeated two times implied the meaning that the narrator was hesitating and doubting his decision. The phrases "Of course" and "That's clear enough" are obviously ironic because the hostility is not something that happens by default, the narrator did not find the claim to be "clear," and the narrator's pretense of assurance is dispelled by his admission that begins with "although..."

The fourth stanza implied a meaning of regret. This can be seen on the many use of stop sign “—”.The soldier's decision to enlist was somewhat impulsive ("Off-hand like") and partially motivated by a need for money because he was out of a job and had already liquidated his things. No other cause existed for him to enlist. The last stanza concludes the poem about the cruelty and stupidity of a war. The narrator finally realized there are no good reason for a war.

B. British Society

Celtic Society

A class of nobles at the top of Celtic society was ruled by a monarch or chieftain. The artisans, of which metalworkers were the most significant, were situated beneath them. Then the farmers arrived, who helped with food production and supported the chief in battle. Tribes were formed from the Celts. They were divided politically and engaged in a lot of fighting.

Roman British Society

Upper-class Celts assimilated the Roman way of life following the Roman Conquest. They constructed villas that were based after Roman structures and benefited from amenities like mosaics and even a system of central heating known as a hypocaust. Rich Romans also adorned their homes with murals, which are paintings on the wall. They had glass panels for windows.

Roman rule, however, probably didn't make much of a difference to the majority of the poor Celts, particularly in northern and southwestern England. For them, life continued largely the same as before. Their residences remained basic huts.

English Society in the Middle Ages

Society in the Middle Ages was structured like a pyramid. The king was located at the summit of the pyramid. The barons, or tenants-in-chief, stood beneath him. They were given land by the monarch in exchange for providing a certain number of warriors to battle on a certain number of days each year. A loyalty oath to the monarch was also required of them, and they were made his vassals as a result. Knights received land from the barons. They were required to battle for a certain number of days each year in exchange.

The king exercised divine right to reign during the Middle Ages. In other words, many thought that defying him was wrong because God had appointed him to be king. That, however, did not put an end to uprisings.

English Society in the 16th Century

Tudor society was split into four main categories. The nobility at the top owned enormous amounts of land. The gentry and wealthy merchants were below them. Yeomen and tradesmen were classed below the gentry. Tenant farmers who rented their property from the wealthy were below the yeomen. Paying workers were also present.

English Society in the 17th Century

During the 17th century, merchants' standing rose. Merchants gained greater respect as a result of the public's realization that trade was a vital component of the nation's riches. Rich landowners, however, maintained positions of influence and authority in politics.

English Society in the 18th Century

There were around 6 1/2 million people living in Britain at the beginning of the 18th century. By the end of the 18th century, it had expanded quickly, reaching nearly 9 million people.

English Society in the 19th Century

Britain was an oligarchy at the beginning of the 19th century. In national elections, only a tiny minority of men (and no women) were permitted to cast ballots. When more men were granted the right to vote in 1832, the situation started to alter. Additionally, districts were redrew, and some industrial towns were given their first-ever representation. In 1867 and 1884, the franchise was once more expanded. The secret ballot was first used in 1872.

However, at least 80% of people in the 19th century belonged to the working class. You needed to employ at least one servant in order to be categorized as middle class. Most domestic helpers were women. Because men received larger compensation, male servants were more expensive. Throughout the century, women were primarily employed in "service."

Poverty in the 19th Century

More than 25% of people were living at or below the subsistence level at the end of the 19th century. According to surveys, 10% of people were extremely destitute and unable to pay for even the most basic essentials, such adequate nutritional food. 15% to 20% of people only had enough money to get by (assuming they didn't lose their jobs or have to take time off work due to illness). You had to check into the workhouse if you had no income at all

C. Analysis

Thomas Hardy wrote the poem “The Man He Killed to express his disapproval about the Boer War. As a liberal, Hardy and his wife, Emma, did not agree with the Boer War. The War made Hardy hesitated to trust British Empire and he wanted to know what made them agreed to decided to start a war. Hardy could not understand why English wanted to take over the gold and diamond mines in South Africa.

He rode a bicycle miles and miles over to Southampthon to take a look at departing ships of English troops in 1899 when the war started. English had it worse in the early phase of the war. Thus, he wrote many poems to express his condolence for that situation.

The Boer war started in October 1899. It was a war between British Army and Boers in South Africa. The war's objective was to unite the Boer republics of the Orange Free State and the South African Republic (commonly known as the Transvaal) with the British South African provinces of Cape Colony and Natal. It was the Britain’s desire and the Boers, Farmers who speak Afrikaans, did not approve it. The Boers’s desire was to keep and protect their land. Fortunately in 1880-1881 the Transvaal Boers won the war against the British.

In 1886, the Uitlanders (Outlanders), an enormous number of English-speakers by the Afrikaners were interested by gold discovery in the South African Republic (SAR). The boers saw them as danger and a threat. As an uprising attempt, the Uitlanders attemped The James Raid in 1896. The James Raid was led by Dr. Leander Starr Jameson with his British South Africa Company troops. The Boer and British administrations' ties continued to deteriorat as the result of the uprising. Paul Kruger won the presidental election in 1898 due to the Boer’s dislikes about The Jameson Raid. President Kruger was even less willing to give the Uitlanders political sway. The Britain did not attempt to reach a peaceful resolution hence, in 9 October, the SAR launched an ultimatum to demand withdrawal of all of British troops around their country. It was an obvious reason that the British disapprove the ultimatum. In 12 October, the troops attacked Cape Colony and Natal. The war eventually reached its end on 1902. The Boers agreed to accept British sovereignty in exchange for some degree of self-government under the terms of the Treaty of Vereeniging on 31 May, 1902. In 1910, the Union of South Africa completed its integration of the Boer republics.

The Boer war was the first modern war to ever exist yet it was also traditional. Many variations of technologies were involved in the war such as air balloons, trains, engines, and horses. Aside from modern technologies and innovations, the role of cavalry was necessary in the Britain troops. The British troops did not allow mercy as they subdue the Boers by using British troops’ railway. Animals like horse had critical conditions due to lack of food and health.

The war impacted heavily on both side of troops. Many people died and lose their house, even had financial loss. Variations of issue emerged because of this war.

Social Issue

The Boer War caused both sides to lose many lives and death rate raised increasingly. 75.000 troops of British Army were sent to war at first for Natal invasion. The British was unfortunate enough to lose 22.000 men of their troops from the war. Not only death because of the war, 13.000 people lost their lives due to disease. The same fate occured to the Boers. 27.000 lives were lost and even worse, the victims were dominatetd by young children. Another 20.000 black and ‘colored’ Africans died in concentration camps.

Boer women and children, and other black families were interned as a result of British military sweeps to clean the veld, which sparked debate from the beginning at the concentration camps of Boer War. The deaseas, measles, increased high mortality. This resulted in a lot of resentment, but the history of the camps has never been thoroughly examined.

Political Issue

The war led the disconteted South Africa race groups from 1910 since the war ended. The Afrikanerdom was divided – the bitterreinders vs the hands-uppers, and the joiners specifically. The bitterreinders were were humiliated and resentful.

The black people were not in the same thoughts with the British authorities which gave the image of political equality and rights of social to the black people. This resulted in the forming of policital organisation for example, South African Native National Congress (SAANNC) on 8 January, 1912. SAANC was formed due to black people suspiciousness of white people. The black people often dragged into conflict with the white people later on.

South Africa’s connection with other countries was also impacted which led to sports banning, pressure of economics, and the imposition of a mandatory United Nations arms embargo in November 1997.

British Army lost 450.000 contingents from Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and India.

Psychological Issue

Lot of people dealt with their post-war trauma. Some Afrikaners kept their hatered, bitterness, frustration, and fear for many years. Years passed by, but the trauma still went on in some cases. A great fear of foreigneers (non-Afrikaneres) still dominanted them eventhough many years passed by. This trauma occured for at least 59 years since the end of Boer War. At the same time, people among races began to differentiate and formed an alienation towards them.

Economical Issue

The amount of money spent in this war has a very large amount that was around £210 million (over £25 billion today). This large amount of money was the cost of having many many troops, and the mobilized resources. The result of sickness and insufficient medical care accounted for two thirds of the deaths. British Empire and British goverment were supplying that many cost for British Army and yet, they lost.

In addition to the large amount of money, buildings, public facilities, and animals were heavily impacted by The Boer War. British troops were unable to subsist off the soil like their adversaries caused lots of damage such as burning farms, railway sabotage, and devastation in the countryside. In other hand, the Boers also blown up a railway bridge at Kroonstadt in 1901.

D. Conclusion

This poem entitled “The Man He Killed” is about a man hesitation and guilty from killing the other man. This poem described about the uselessness and foolishness of a war. Furthermore, it is also about how war brings out the worst in people and what teribble things it can lead and cause.Thomas Hardy wanted to draw attentions to the plight of the poor men who were forced into this war. He wanted to help give a voice to those who were suffering and got injusticed. The Boer War influenced in the making of the poem. It was a political conflict about land, ownership, and resources. The Boer War heavily impacted both side of troops, the British and the Boers (Afrikans). Many issues were found after analysing this war. Death became major social issue in this war due to getting killed in a war or caught in a desease. Political issue emerged from the lack of trust from black people with white people. South Africa were banned in almost every aspect by the other country. The Britain lost many contigents due to the war. In addition, many people were affected physically and mentally. Many Afrikans felt hateful towards the Britain and some cases revealed that Afrikans also got post-war trauma. Over £25 billion of money were sacrificied as an important source of foods, aids, animals, camps, and technologies. Public infrastructures were affected from the Boer War such as burning farms, railway sabotage, and devastation in the countryside.

References :

https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1478-0542.2008.00562.x

Author's Note :

Here goes the last post of my college assignments. Well that was quick lmaoo.

I hope I can graduate soon and get out of my thesis :"(

Until we meet again. Goodbye

#college assignment #essay writing #thomas hardy #poem analysis #boer war

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stuffedeggplants · 4 years ago

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A Benefit of the Empire Getting Rid of Clones

The Empire switching over from clones to a recruited force is about more than cost, clone longevity, and concerns about the inhibitor chips.

It’s also about diversity and shaping culture.

With any group you bring into the military, you immediately create a division between clones and non-clones. The clones have a very strong intergroup dynamic and were all raised together from birth specifically to serve a system which no longer exists. While they’ve cooperated and worked with non-clone Republic-aligned groups plenty of times during the war, they have little to no experience (that we are shown in new canon) working with non-clones within the same institutional structure they’ve spent their entire lives in. The clones went through the exact same training courses and then grew up in the same culture on Kamino and then their own specific unit cultures once they left. While they’re all individuals with their own personalities, they do all share that very particular background/experience, and that only strengthens their ability to strongly empathize with each other over the war’s tragedies and how they were not just shaped by the war, but made for it. Non-clones do not have that, and could potentially have to ‘work’ very hard to be accepted and integrated at the same level as the clones are with each other. So by bringing in non-clone recruits, you’re potentially setting up internal divisions within the new Imperial military right from the get-go and destabilizing a very solid base whose members have trained their entirely lives to work seamlessly together.

So what can the Empire do? Cycle out the clones and replace them with two kinds of people: people like Tarkin and Coruscanti elite, and recruits who share very little in common with each other.

You can retain some clones as instructors/trainers to ensure that you don’t completely lose all the lessons and experience you learned during the Clone Wars, but you want to start promoting/selecting/bringing in people similar to Tarkin to fill out the upper levels Imperial officer corps to immediately set the tone for the kind of climate, culture, and direction you want in this new system, for what sort of behavior and values you want to see rewarded. Tarkin is essentially the model for this, but people like Yularen are important too, people who are both competent and completely willing to simply do their jobs and go along with the new direction of your government. Palpatine also wants to fuzz (or even erase) the lines between the political influence/power in the civilian world and power in the military one, but he can’t effectively do that if he relies too much on a clone force as they have zero presence or experience in the civilian world; it’s just not conducive to massively centralizing his new government if he can’t actually rope scores of local leaders into a military structure that’s going to police/hold it all together.

The second group of people you replace the clones with are a diverse group of humans. These people have little in common, but they’re all Imperial recruits who will glom on to the same basic Imperial military culture that you’ve created and set for them because they have no choice. That will be their commonality, and they’ll accept that tailored culture in order to work and cooperate effectively together. All these new people will be similar in that they have very diverse backgrounds, but also in that they’ll all go through the same training together, take the same oaths, will work together and learn to speak the same language (I’m not talking about Basic), and will only ever have known serving the Empire (which is crucial.) So you take diversity and run it through a homogenizer, then put everyone in uniforms with zero options for personalization or customization— no custom unit patches, no nice expensive boots you bought yourself as long as they meet gear requirements, no writing funny shit on the side of your TIE, nothing. Oh, and your name may very well now be a number, depending on who you are. This isn’t a commentary on uniformity and standardization within militaries; the point is that Palpatine gets to determine everything about the direction of that standardization because he gets to foster Imperial culture from scratch as long as he gets rid of the pre-existing base of clone culture.

#The Empire can still use clones but the should be relegated to small and high specialized units #where you need insane levels of competency and coordination and skill that you get from cloned super soldiers #grand army of the republic #GAR #clone wars #clone wars meta #star wars meta #imperial military #galactic empire #empire meta #galactic empire meta #star wars #tarkin #palpatine #darth sidious #clone troopers #imperial era #clones #meta

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k7l4d4 · 3 years ago

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Midnight Striga: Fairy Tail/Owl House Cross Fic Episode 5 Part 10

Hello, and once again, I welcome you to Midnight Striga. Please, enjoy.

Perry Porter strode into the Covention Center, eyes easily panning across and compartmentalizing the tragic sights around him, a skill he picked up by virtue of sheer experience. Clinically, he noted the amount of bodies present, living and dead, as well as the brow-raising sight of what could only be human corpses, if the ears were any indicator. He felt a sinking sensation within his stomach; whatever had occurred today would rock the Isles to its core, of that he had no doubt.

Shaking his head, Perry scanned the crowd again, eyes widening at the sight of a hand waving him over. Rushing over, he slid to a stop in front of his son, Augustus; his silly, energetic, passionate, brilliant son, Augustus, alive and well. “This is Perry Porter, on the scene saying,” He started, before pulling Gus into a hug. “I am so happy you’re alright.” He sighed, relieved, feeling Gus relax into his grip.

“I-I am really glad you got here so quickly dad.” Gus choked out, a light sprinkling of tears in his eyes. “A lot’s happened, and I really, really want to talk with you about it, but something more important came up, and I think you can help out, you know?” He put on his bravest smile, trying to hold in the scream that was building ever since he had managed to process that yes, everything that had happened to today was all but over.

“I really think it would be best that I try and talk with you about what happened here,” Perry began, before noticing the stubborn expression on his son’s face, “But I can see that you won’t budge on this. So, shall we?” He calmly asked, gesturing for his son to lead the way, which he did with a beaming smile.

As they walked through the clinic, Perry idly noted the general behaviors of the people around him; there was his son’s friend, Willow Park, tearfully talking with her parents, a relieved smile on her face. There were the Blight Children, the two eldest tightly squeezing themselves around their younger sister, a baffled look on her face. He saw the crowds of crying, pleading, nervous faces all around. As his son led him into a backroom of the small clinic that had been established, Perry came face to face with three figures; the Emperor’s Coven Head Lilith Clawthorne, Eda the Owl Lady, and a human girl, all seated around a central table, gesturing for him to sit. As his son quickly saw himself out of the room, Perry had the sinking suspicion he was in a bit over his head.

After they explained the situation, as much as they could at least, Perry took a deep breath, holding in a sigh. They wanted his help to spread this information, which he could see the basis behind it- a group that invested this much effort into an attack wasn’t going to just stop and people needed to know about them- but the sheer depth of this reveal would completely change the social landscape of Bonesburough. “Very well, I agree to help with this. Do you have a plan for how we go about this?” He asked Lilith, who seemed to be trying a bit too hard to hold authority over this meeting, despite the lack of resistance from the other two.

Lilith nodded. “We have two real options at this point.” She said, holding up two fingers for emphasis. “We can either do multiple takes and present them later, or we can have this meeting broadcast live as breaking news.” She ticked off the options on her fingers, a grave look of contemplation upon her face. Lilith pursed her lips. “Personally, I favor the second option.”

That caught the group by surprise. “Huh, I honestly thought you’d prefer to get this all perfect and have it presented later.” Eda commented, arching a brow.

Lilith snorted. “Please, sister, give me some credit. The longer we go without addressing this, the more severe public unrest and hysteria will become. While the release of this information will certainly have its own consequences, those are still preferable to the people being left in the dark, and drawing more unsavory conclusions.” Lilith calmly stated, gaining impressed looks from the others.

Perry calmly assembled the equipment he would need, adding in his own take on the situation. “While an official report would normally be prepared by the Emperor’s Coven,” He carefully ignored Eda’s derisive snort, “that would be contingent on them possessing factual information to present. Without it, anything they provided would be woefully inadequate for informing the people. While a Live Report of this interview will most certainly cause a stir, it will ultimately be a mere fraction of what would result if the Emperor’s Coven issued a report that ultimately proved to be false in some capacity.” The group blinked, but, after mulling it over, agreed with what he said; it made sense, if people placed trust in an organization and it failed them, whether as a result of malice or otherwise, there would be backlash.

Perry clapped his hands. “So! Let’s begin, shall we?” They all shared a look, and nodded.

As they gathered around the table, Lilith leaned forward. “Now then, human, it’s time for you to answer my questions. The People of the Isles are dying to hear what you have to say.”

Luz gave a challenging grin. “Ask away. I’m all ears.”

Taking that as his cue, Perry started up the broadcast. Turning the camera to himself, he began, voice grave. “To all the citizens of the Boiling Isles, this is Breaking News, Live from the Covention. I am Perry Porter, reporting on behalf of Emperor’s Coven Head Lilith Clawthorne.” He paused, allowing the prepared footage to play across the crystal balls of all watching; the broken walls and shattered stands, the caged prisoners held under guard, and the bodies of all those who’d died, some gathered together for examination, others… not so much. He continued. “Today, tragedy has struck. For the first time since Emperor Belos’ ascendancy, an organized attack on our people has been committed. Of the over 2000 attendees, approximately half have been slain, and a third of the remainder have sustained moderate to severe injuries. Many of them were children. Of the 300 Coven Guards assigned to the Covention, over half of them have died, with all but a quarter sporting severe injuries.”

“What is most shocking, however, is that those claiming responsibility, a group known as the Black Dog Squadron, working on behalf of a group or individual known as Oroboros, are humans. That’s right, humans!!” Perry exclaimed, milking the drama a bit more than he liked, but needing to keep the audience invested; tragedy could only captivate for so long. “During the attack, all displayed some form of magic, but none, bar a handful who commanded Plant Magic, utilized any of the Nine Magics. How is this possible? Why did this happen? What will we, as a society, do next? To help answer these questions, Lilith Clawthorne has initiated an interview with a human who fought on behalf of our people, one Luz Noceda.” He knew that the girl’s image was now emblazoned across every crystal ball on the Isles at this very moment, leading further weight to his broadcast, in theory at least. “I am here with Coven Head Lilith herself,” He indicated the prominent Witch, who raised her hand to the audience. “To broadcast the interview to you all. Please be advised, some of what may be discussed may be shocking to some viewers.” With his part finished for the moment, Perry fell silent, allowing the broadcast to focus on the interview, more of an interrogation really, going on in the room.

“To ensure that what you say is true,” Lilith began, cutting right to the chase. “I must insist that you swear an Unbreakable Vow to that effect. This way, none can claim you are attempting to deceive us. Is that acceptable?” She asked, holding her hand out to begin forming the spell.

Luz raised an eyebrow, but saw no problem with the spell. She shrugged. “Sounds fine to me.” She said bluntly, prompting a nod from Lilith as she formed the spell. When the circle was completed, the two shook hands through it, sealing the oath. Luz was blissfully unaware of the shock rippling through the Isles, as now none would be able to refute or deny her words without looking insane or foolish. She had effectively solidified her legitimacy irrefutably in a single instant.

“Excellent.” Lilith replied, a grim smile playing across her face. She began. “First of all, I must ask, for how long have humans been capable of magic?”

Luz gave a shrug. “I can’t give you an exact figure, but at least 700 years, most likely more.” She said, unaware and uncaring of the shock that erupted at her statement. Even Lilith wasn’t totally immune, managing to school her features, expertly concealing the bewildered shock at the girl’s reply.

Lilith cleared her throat, forcing her instinctive urge to dive into the historical implications of that statement. As calmly as she could, she continued. “I see. How is magic utilized in Human Society?”

Luz tilted her head a bit. “You’re gonna have to be a bit more specific than that. There are a lot of Human Societies, all of whom have magic capable individuals, and all have their own ways of doing things. A benefit of being the dominant species in our world, is that we can afford to divide ourselves into a LOT of individual cultures and communities.”

Lilith paled at that, unable to stop the question that bubbled up in response. “Just… how many humans are in existence, exactly?”

Luz pondered that for a moment before replying. “I can’t give you an exact number, but I’d say there’s about several hundred million of us. Our world is big, and there are very few places we can’t survive on it.”

Internally shaking her head, and forcing herself not to focus on all the implications that came to mind, Lilith continued with her questions. “What is this Oroboros that the attackers claimed to be working for?”

Luz’s eyes sharpened, a burning hate filling her eyes, enough that even those watching at home suddenly felt very unsafe at the moment. “Oroboros is a criminal organization; specifically, they are the single largest Dark Guild active in the world right now. Oroboros prides itself on its ability to seize control and orchestrate things to its own benefit, without any regard for the harm and chaos that erupts in their wake. Cruelty and brutality are prized and cultivated among their members, almost as much as magical power is. No crime is too heinous, no line too sacred for them to cross.” She hissed out, the pure malicious hate coloring her tone forcing Lilith to gulp in nervousness.

“I see.” And Lilith did see. She had personally borne witness to the aftermath of that cruelty and indifference; however, Luz’s response brought another question to mind, one she felt she needed an answer to. She narrowed her eyes. “Edalyn told me you would be an excellent source of information for this. So far, you have proven to be so, even if my questions have not been exacting enough to gain satisfactory answers as of yet. But that response of yours has me thinking. How do you know about Oroboros, Miss Noceda?” Lilith inquired, eyes focused.

Luz raised an eyebrow, stood up, and turned around. After ensuring her back was presented to the broadcast, she reached back, and pulled down at the back of her outfit. Seared into her flesh lay a symbol, a serpent arranged into a Sideways eight, biting its own tail. “I used to be a member.” Luz said, voice dead and hollow. She turned a heartbreakingly sad smile towards Lilith. “Specifically, I was a member under protest.”

“Elaborate.” Lilith ordered, voice hard and unrelenting. She could feel the urge to bring out her staff and blast this child into oblivion, but tamped it down. She didn’t have all the information yet.

Luz gave a chuckle, bitter and full of the kind of spite that made people glad for what they had. “Oroboros has no limits to what they are willing to do, and that extends to what lengths they are willing to go to for recruits. Whenever someone with a useful skill or magic appears in their information network, they send out recruiters. For those with a few too many morals, such as myself, they like to employ a more… decisive argument.” She turned an empty smile upwards, oblivious to the daggers Lilith was glaring her way. “Oroboros kidnapped my sister, and used her as a hostage to keep me in line.” Lilith froze, unblinking.

Luz continued, oblivious. “Whenever I talked back, Vee was beaten. Whenever I failed an assignment, she had a bone broken. Whenever I completed a job, she got a good meal, after having been starved and deprived of water to just short of death that is.” She smirked, an angry, tired thing. “I hated myself. I wanted to die. I only kept living for her. And then she died; one of her guards decided they wanted to have a little fun with her, and the next anyone knew, the guard was dead, and my sister had a knife in her liver. I was free in the worst way possible.”

Stunned silence rang throughout the Isles, such that even Lilith herself was rendered speechless. Forcing herself to speak, Lilith asked the next question on her mind, one she felt the Isles would wish to know. “Should we consider this an act of War from the Human Realm?”

Luz blinked. Then, she laughed; a deep, cackling laugh filled with so much loathing and misery it was genuinely astonishing a living being could make such a sound. “No. Or at least, not the way you’re thinking. Oroboros is in no way affiliated with any form of Government or Ruling power. It’s a criminal organization that supports itself alone.” She gave a poisonous smile. “While I have no way of knowing if any Human Governments know about the Isles, I can assure you that none of them were involved in this.”

“Well, that’s something good at least.” Lilith said dryly. “What can you tell us about Oroboros in regards to how it is structured?”

Luz leaned back, gathering her memories on the subject. “Oroboros originally began as a Dark Guild that took jobs that other Dark Guilds shied away from, stuff that was extremely messed up and depraved in what was involved to go about them. When the big three Dark Guilds were dismantled, Oroboros clawed its way to the top of the heap after all the infighting died down. After that, they started breaking down and assimilating other Dark Guilds that they thought might be useful. You actually met one of them out there.” Luz offhandedly mentioned.

“Truly?” Lilith broached.

“Yup.” Luz nodded. “Before they became the Black Dog Squadron, the Squad was originally a guild in its own right, Barghast. Barghast was a mercenary guild at first, selling the services of its members as soldiers and fighters to the highest bidder, with an emphasis on fighting in wars. But when the local groups started fighting less, Barghast decided it would be better to start the wars they fought, and sell their services to both sides to keep the conflict going longer.” Luz smiled at that. It was not a nice smile. “When their little scheme came to light, they were branded a Dark Guild and went on the run, before being absorbed into Oroboros.”

Luz leaned forward. “Oroboros likes to present itself as one big unit, and while it can act like one in the field, Oroboros is full of splintered factions and units. The Black Dog Squadron is one of the neutral factions, actually; they don’t care which faction is using them, just as long as they can cause as much suffering and bloodshed as possible. I was an unaligned member, mostly because none of the Squadrons trusted a conscript like me not to stab them in the back, so I didn’t really work with any of the Factions or Squads outside of being paired with them for missions. My jobs were assassinations, thefts, and… less savory things.” Luz admitted, eyes downcast. Tears pooled in her eyes, dripping onto the table.

Lilith pursed her lips, feeling unwilling to judge the girl for compromising herself in the name of her loved ones; if anything, she was impressed the girl had the sense of self not to justify the atrocities she had done as anything other than what they were, a means of sparing the life of her loved one at the expense of others, and felt remorse over having done so. Still, she had two pressing questions to ask. “I must ask, you keep referencing Oroboros as a Dark Guild. Just what is a Guild?”

Luz slumped, feeling spent from the roller-coaster of loathing that always came when she thought about… all she had done. “Guilds are the Human Version of your Coven System, if far less restrictive. I won’t go too far into it, that would take way too much time, but Dark Guilds are essentially guilds that flout the laws that govern what Guilds can and cannot do, and actively have their members engage in crimes. If I had to give a close equivalent, Dark Guilds are basically for us what an Assassin Coven or Thief Coven would be for you. An organized effort to commit crime with little to no regard for who would be hurt as a result.”

Lilith felt a chill run up her spine at the thought. The idea of the Coven System being twisted like that, perverted into a warped, criminal mirror of itself, made her shudder; the implications of what such a thing could do, producing criminals whose magic was specialized to enabling criminal acts… it was a horrifying thought. Lilith swallowed, before jumping into her last question. “I thank you for agreeing to this; some of what you’ve revealed could not have been easy for you. But… I must ask you this; can we count on you to aid us against Oroboros?” She peered forth, unknowingly mimicking the apprehension of many of the citizens watching.

Luz gave her a smoldering glare. “You don’t have anything to worry about. I’ve already seen enough misery because of Oroboros. I won’t let them do as they please anymore, not while I can do something about it.” Luz paused, a thought coming to mind. “Huh, this reminds me of something my teacher said while I was training.”

Lilith raised any eyebrow. “Oh?”

Luz gave Lilith a soft, tired smile. “Yeah.” She reached up, rolling back her sleeve; Lilith recoiled at the sight. From her elbow to her shoulder, Luz’s arm was a maze of scar tissue, deep gouges and rents woven through the veil of poorly healed flesh; the fact she could use her arm without issue was awe-inspiring, when one considered the pain she must feel every day from such an injury. “I got this when I first tried using my Magic in a combat situation. I was fighting a monster that was bothering some of the fields near the village I was staying at during my training. I had barely been training for a week, having only just barely made a proper spell for the first time less than a day ago. The monster dashed me against a cliff, driving my arm so deep against the stone that it started scraping bone. If my teacher hadn’t intervened, it would’ve eaten me.” She turned to Lilith, sober eyes burning with shame. “I was an idiot. My teacher made sure I remembered that. What they said to me that day, I’ll never forget.” Luz leaned back, before reciting something with the air of quotation. “‘Magic is an unreasonable force. It is wondrous and horrific. It cares nothing for good or evil, or the intentions of those who use it. If you wish to put your skills to such a task as fighting for truth and justice, grow strong. Otherwise, you’ll never be anything more than prey for those with less moral compunctions than you.’” Luz gazed fondly at the ceiling, tears pooling at the memory. “Ever since that day, I swore I would never let myself be too weak to stand up for myself, or what I believe in. I would be strong enough that I could protect others, but also to protect myself.” She gave a chuckle. “Things didn’t work out too well for that promise.”

Lilith just looked on with pity, before turning to Perry. “I think that would be a good point to end the interview. At least for today.”

“Indeed.” Perry nodded. “Well then, you heard it here first, Citizens.-”

“What are you doing?” Lilith queried.

Perry blinked. “I’m… ending the broadcast.”

Lilith shook her head. “Not yet. I still have one thing left to do.” She beckoned her sister forth, who had been silently looking on as the interview went on. Eda’s mind was brimming with questions for Luz, but she was willing to put it aside for when they got back home. For now, she had her sister to deal with. Lilith gazed upon her sister, an unreadable look in her eye. “Earlier, when you defeated me in a Witch’s Duel, your request for your win was that I would tell the truth about your curse to the public, dispelling the official story. We even swore an unbreakable vow over it.” She held up her arm for emphasis, her arm flashing with a white ring. An ominous smile graced her features. “Well, I do believe a live broadcast all across the Isles is certainly public, wouldn’t you agree?”

“Yeah, it is. And I’m glad you’re not putting it off, I am! But… are you feeling okay sis? You seem a little out of it.” Eda asked, genuine concern coloring her voice. The hysterical laugh Lilith gave just added to that concern.

“Oh Edalyn, if you only knew.” She said, wiping away a tear from her outburst, before sobering. “But then, I suppose you will in a moment.” Turning to the broadcast, Lilith braced herself, fully willing to bear the backlash her actions would cause against herself and the Coven from this. “Citizens of the Isles, I, Coven Head Lilith Clawthorne, stand before you to reveal a bitter truth. For years, the story of the Owl Lady has been told, how her defiance and dismissal of the Coven System was punished by the Titan. That story… it is a lie.” She bluntly stated, almost feeling the gasps rippling through the Isles. “The Emperor’s Coven itself has no knowledge of how Edalyn was cursed, but it was most certainly no work of the Titan, or its will.” A mysterious smile, almost beatific were it not so filled with pain, crossed her features. “The one responsible for Eda Clawthorne’s curse was a witch. Specifically… the one responsible was myself.” Lilith felt more than saw Eda freeze up beside her. She could see it now on Perry’s own face, the look of horror, accusation, dumbfounded shock.

Lilith turned to Eda, feeling an almost spiteful glee at the look of horror, denial, and hurt that crossed her features. “Y-your lying, Lily. You-” Eda stuttered (Edalyn stuttered!), denial and shock filling her voice. Lilith slowly stroked Eda’s cheek, an almost tender gesture.

“Edalyn, we both know that, for all your hatred of the rules and authority, you are far smarter than this. You know I can’t be lying.” Lilith said, just barely loud enough for the broadcast to pick up. “Think about it, you’ve surely pieced it together after all this time. Who else could’ve gotten into your room to curse you? Who else would’ve had reason to curse you?” Eda shook her head, denial still burned across her features, backing away from Lilith.

“Why?” Eda hissed out, forcing it through the denial. “Why would you do this!? To me!? TO YOUR FAMILY!?!?” She screamed, hurt and rage finally making themselves known in full.

Lilith chuckled, the same bitter, empty laugh Luz herself had used previously when discussing her failings. “Because you were going to win, dear sister!” Lilith cried, almost relishing the horror on Eda’s face, were it not for how sick she felt at it all. “We were set to fight for a place in the Emperor’s Coven, and you would win!! I knew you would!! You were the prodigy, the gifted genius that everything came so easily to when you bothered to try, the powerhouse who could already level buildings at the age of TWELVE!!!” Lilith felt the tears coming, the bitter, hot tears of her own weakness surging forth. “I was the one who wanted to serve the Isles, I was the one who wanted to help people!!!! You only cared about joining the Coven so you wouldn’t have to give up any magic! So why should I have given up my dream, my future, for you!?”

“I ONLY WANTED TO BE PART OF THE COVEN TO SUPPORT YOU!!!” Eda cried, her own angry, hurt-filled tears flowing. “All I wanted was to support you, to give you the future you deserved!!” She shook her head, anger and shame filling her heart.

“I KNOW!!” Lilith shrieked. “I Knew it then, and I know it now!!” The tears were like waterfalls now, bitter pain coating her every word. “But I couldn’t accept it, the idea that you, someone who so effortlessly and deliberately flouted the rules, would have what I wanted, what I dreamed of! How could I have known that you would forfeit, how could anyone!? A position in the most prestigious and influential of covens, and you throwing it away for me!?” She shook her head. “No. I didn’t believe you could be that selfless.”

Eda gave a bitter snort. “And I didn’t believe you could be that selfish. I guess we were both surprised.” Not staying to hear another word, Eda grabbed Luz, who wordlessly followed her, and stormed off. Luz shot Lilith a look of empty disappointment. It was exactly what Lilith deserved.

Lilith turned to the still running broadcast, a blank smile on her face. “And you’ve heard it here first, folks.” Lilith mockingly imitated the standard reporter line. “The Enforcer of the Emperor’s Will is a cheat, scum who would betray her own family, and a fraud. What a shocking revelation, is it not?” She wandered off, tears still streaming. Perry wordlessly cut the broadcast. He suddenly felt the need to give his son the biggest hug of all time.

All across the Isles, people were reacting to the horrifying news. Some focusing on some parts over others, of course, but none could deny that the Special Report was on everyone’s minds.

“This is unacceptable!!” Kikimora cried, frantically pacing in front of the Emperor’s Throne, heedless of her standard deference. “How could Coven Head Clawthorne reveal such sensitive information through a broadcast of all things!? Your Highness, this mutiny cannot stand!!” Normally, Kikimora would never be so blatant and emotional in front of her lord, but she felt now, of all times, was the best moment to voice her worries.

“Hmm… it seems I must adjust some of my plans.” Belos murmured. While Lilith publicly revealing the secret she so fervently guarded was certainly a surprise, if anything the revelation of her obsession should make her even more fervent in her future attempts to apprehend her sister. The revelations of Human Realm Magic now infesting his realm… oh he would definitely need to broach this carefully, but his ultimate goal remained unchanged. Wild Magic would be PURGED from the Titan, that was non-negotiable. But the revelation of Human Magic would certainly prove a useful tool for later…

“My lord!?” Kikimora frantically pleaded.

Hunter contemplated the revelations he had just witnessed. Humans were capable of magic, something deemed impossible. If it was possible for them… could it prove possible for himself? Something to think about for later. Right now, he had to attend to his Emperor. He owed the man everything, and this did not change that fact. He would probably have to keep a closer eye on Lilith though,

Alador calmly adjusted the latest adaptation to the Abomiton project, carefully tuning out his wife’s frantic screams and rage. She would burn herself down, if not out, in a little while, and then he would intercede. For the moment, he needed to properly calibrate the Coiled Composition System, truly a marvel really; if it worked properly, even the lowest quality of Abomitons would be a force to be reckoned with.

Odalia slammed herself down across from Alador with a huff, blistering rage burning in her eyes. “Well, at least now we know who our mysterious clients are.” She bit out, forcing herself to calm down with a cup of tea. Alador merely raised an eyebrow. He would see what she said in full, before replying. Odalia chuckled, a nasty, angry sounding thing. “It truly makes sense, you know. Such mysterious customers, wanting such a variety of goods and supplies! And they turned out to be murderous criminals. Fitting.”

“Will we stop supplying them, then?” Alador faux-absentmindedly asked. He had a feeling as to what she would say, but it was still imperative he hear it in truth first.

Odalia snorted. “No. We’ll keep selling to them. We’ll just covertly sabotage the goods we grant them, and use our dealings to pump them for information. Once we’ve gained everything we can, we use the resources we’ve acquired in our dealings to crush them.” Her eyes sharpened. “They endangered our children. Our FAMILY. They will not be allowed to survive for this offense.” Alador gravely nodded. Oroboros had made a crucial mistake already. They’d tried to challenge the Blight family, and harm their children. There would be a reckoning for this sin, of that neither Blight had any doubts.

Raine Whispers was conflicted. On the one hand, they now knew who had cursed Eda, and their heart went out to their old flame about what she must be going through. On the other, more clinically minded hand, the revelation that Humans could wield magic was in itself a massive blow to Belos’ authority, particularly in regards to his edicts on magic and the Titan. It was certainly something to explore for the future. For the moment, they had to get to their meeting. If all went well, they would finally, finally have prospective members willing to step out of the shadows with them. To be honest, that Katya girl had seemed almost too eager to join up, but they would at least give her a chance to step back and explain before making… hasty judgments.

Eda slammed the bottle of Appleblood back, her tears pouring down as fast as the heavy beverage went down her throat. It still hurt. Luz cuddled up to her, lending a comforting presence, King sitting on her lap. Words could wait. The three of them had enough pain to work through. Eda allowed a small smile to cross her features. At least they had each other to share the burden.

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azems-familiar · 3 years ago

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I posted 7,638 times in 2021

311 posts created (4%)

7327 posts reblogged (96%)

For every post I created, I reblogged 23.6 posts.

I added 1,344 tags in 2021

#kotor - 320 posts

#swtor - 273 posts

#darth revan - 236 posts

#asked and answered - 105 posts

#ramblings - 76 posts

#revalek - 73 posts

#discord shenanigans - 72 posts

#kotor 2 - 66 posts

#ask me thiiings - 65 posts

#lotr - 58 posts

Longest Tag: 138 characters

#jedi are allowed to love! they're even i would say allowed relationships! but their first and most central commitment must be to the order

My Top Posts in 2021

semi-coherent ramble on the tragedy of the mandalorian wars

okay but actually the Mandalorian Wars are a tragedy massively in part because there are no right answers! like, the Council was afraid to go to war because they sensed an outside influence and were afraid going to war would just make things worse. and they were right! and Revan was so determined to go to war because people were dying and the Republic was in danger and what are Jedi if not selfless and compassionate and determined to protect the innocent and save lives? and what are Jedi if they turn their back on the oaths they swear when they’re knighted?

and she was right too! because without her the Republic would’ve fallen and the Mandalorians aren’t an expansionist empire, they weren’t looking to conquer so they could rule, they wanted to conquer for the sake of conquering, they would’ve burned the galaxy to ash just to prove that they could, and then the reconstituted Sith Empire would’ve swept in and taken everything and the Jedi would’ve died and the Republic would’ve died - because the Jedi High Council was right. Vitiate was out there orchestrating the war for his own gains and there wasn’t a single right answer.

in going to war Revan saved the Republic but she also brought about the downfall of herself and so many other Jedi and she nearly destroyed the Republic she gave up so much to save, and there is never any other way it could go.

because Revan goes to war because of her strengths - her compassion and her sense of justice and her determination and her righteousness and her selflessness, because there is selflessness there, there is, compassion is inherently selfless even if it’s hard to recognize. she goes to war and she takes the weight of the galaxy onto her shoulders because there is no one else who can do it and it’s her strengths that led her there but it’s her flaws that make it so she can’t let go. her savior complex, her pride, her arrogance - there is no one else who can do it and so she makes herself into what the galaxy needs (a savior, a mask, a legend, a hero) and that pride, that savior complex, it won’t let her admit that she’s struggling and that she’s losing herself in it all.

(and so she becomes both more and less than a person, and people are not meant to be concepts, be abstracts, but by all the gods in the galaxy Revan will make herself one if it kills her (and it will, it will) because that’s what the Republic needs, and she clings to Alek because he’s the one thing, the one person, that keeps her steady and grounded. until he’s not enough anymore, because she turns herself into the mask and the legend so successfully she doesn’t know who to be without it and this is always what the Jedi Council has been afraid of, the Jedi who was the best of them all turning into a warrior and not knowing how to be without a war to fight)

the war is always, always going to end at Malachor V, because the Exile is loyal unto death (loyal until the order that tears her apart because she hasn’t made herself into something so much more and less like Revan has and how can (only) a person survive the horror that is Malachor?), and Revan will always ask, because sacrifices are necessary in war and it’s for the greater good and it will save the Republic and Revan doesn’t know, anymore, how to let anyone else be the savior. so the war ends but it doesn’t really, nothing ends, nothing’s over, because there will always be those echoes and no one knows how to escape them.

and Revan and Alek and the Exile, they were the best of the Order, they were bright and strong and good, and the war swallowed them whole and shattered them into pieces and crushed them under the weight of so many expectations and desperate souls and in the end they cannot say no because it’s a rigged game.

they were always meant to fall.

the Republic won, but it lost, too.

and no matter what choice the Jedi Council made, it was wrong.

132 notes • Posted 2021-04-14 06:48:42 GMT

crossing fingers for non-gender locked Bastila and Carth romances, a character creator, dare i hope for a Canderous romance, expansion on Juhani's romance.......

140 notes • Posted 2021-09-09 23:42:47 GMT

@mossycorvidae made this at my request after a conversation on the hell discord server.

dilf marr propaganda? dilf marr propaganda

162 notes • Posted 2021-10-15 23:01:20 GMT

so i commissioned the absolutely incredible @stellorc to draw my Revan during her Sith years for me and i am losing my mind at the result! she looks so amazing, the lighting and textures are gorgeous, her hair and the scar and her armor....... i am very aaaaa over this!!!

394 notes • Posted 2021-09-24 01:35:55 GMT

960 notes • Posted 2021-03-04 23:37:15 GMT

Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →

#my 2021 tumblr year in review #your 2021 tumblr year in review #absolutely howling at the cognitive dissonance between these posts #long post

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not-from-the-absence-of-violence · 4 years ago

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A whisper weighed upon the tattered down where you and I were lying

You see, I take the parts that I remember and stitch them back together to make a creature that will do what I say or love me back. ~Richard Siken

Sometimes Travis dreams and sometimes the happy ones hurt more than any nightmare could.

“Should we buy honey, William?” Margaret says, holding up a pot up to him questiongly.

He blinks, taking in his surroundings. He’s at some sort of market in the central square of a village. His village. The sun is shining high in the sky.

“Sorry?” he says to his wife.

She rolls her eyes, placing the jar in her bag and handing the merchant some money. She smiles though, and still they walk with their arms intertwined.

“You are distracted today,” she says, lightheartedly.

He holds her hand tighter, but smiles. “It’s nothing,” he says, “I’m just thinking.”

She snorts. “Thinking? About what, dear?” she says teasingly.

He sighs overdramatically. “You always make fun of me, Margaret,” he says, voice full of put upon dramatics, “And here I thought you were supposed to love me unconditionally, or whatever.”

They both burst out laughing, and he feels the background worry and knowledge fade away. They buy the rest of their things and start heading home by the time the darkness starts creeping over the horizon.

As they approach their home, everything is so idyllic it feels wrong. It’s a small house at the edge of a town, surrounded by lush forests, painted some artful colour. There are plants growing gracefully down one side of it.

Travis’ resolve to maintain his faith that this is real wavers as he sees their ridiculous home. It breaks even more as he finds himself opening the door and there’s a kid standing in the hallway. She isn’t a spitting image of her mother, but she has her curly brown hair, neatly put into two puffy ponytails.

She unmistakably has his eyes.

She smiles and runs towards him, throwing herself into his arms. "Dad!" she says. She can’t be older than five. "You’re home!"

Her weight is so real in his arms, for a moment Travis lets himself believe and hugs her back. She makes a little noise of delight. Margaret is smiling in the doorway, she stands to kiss her daughter’s head before making her way towards the kitchen.

He wants so very badly to believe this is real. That’s the problem with lucid dreaming, you are always so painfully aware of the unreality around you. But Travis Matagot has spent decades mastering pretending and repressing, and so he smiles and carries his daughter into the kitchen.

"So what are we eating tonight?" he asks.

It doesn’t actually matter what they are eating, it’s something warm and nice and completely devoid of meaning anyway. He hears the meaningless chatter around the table, and he probably joins in. He’s happy to just let this wash over him. He doesn’t eat, but at the end of the meal he finds his plate empty and his belly full anyway.

It's fully dark now, and he knows it’s time to tuck Hope into bed. She wants to be read to and Travis obliges, almost on autopilot. The story is some garbled nonsense and she falls asleep in no time.

Once she’s asleep, he stands there and looks at her, so small, so fragile, so utterly dependent on him. She has that sort of childish devotion too, she loves him, trusts him with everything. It’s terrifying, more than any horrible nightmare he could have. It's almost ironic really, that one of his biggest fears is his own child sleeping safely under his watchful eye.

Margaret leads him out of the room, with some mumbling about sleep. Suddenly Travis feels tired and yawns without meaning to. They get undressed and she climbs into bed in silence. He stares at her for a while, in bed with her hair let down and an expression of satisfied peace on her face. It aches.

He stares for long until she pats the bed next to her. He slips into the covers and her warmth feels so real. How come he can remember her smell so well? Something like a river bank and spring flowers.

Travis lays his head just under her neck, she plays with his hair and he tries to just not think so much. She's humming a song she wouldn't know because it was composed about thirty years after her death. He hasn't changed, of course. Maybe the Queen doesn't even exist in this corner of his mind.

"You will have to leave," Margaret says abruptly, although not unkindly.

Travis groans. "Maybe I don't," he says and firmly closes his eyes, trying not to see her face.

She lifts his chin up to meet her gaze anyway, and it hurts, fuck, it hurts to see her look at him like this.

"Travis," she says, he flinches, she never would have called him that. "We both know you always wake up eventually."

"We usually don't have a kid." His voice cracks on the end of the sentence.

"It's because you’ve been thinking about it, probably."

He knows this isn't Margaret. She is a thing stitched of memories, of things he saw in her, of the Margaret he has now.

Partially she's just him, bouncing him thoughts he would like to not examine when he is awake. Today’s Margaret's treatment had helped, of course, but it had opened doors with things behind them Travis had almost managed to forget about.

"Why don't I at least believe it's true," he laments, "Why don't I get to live my perfect world or whatever, at least for like a night?"

"I don’t think that’s what this is," she tells him.

He knows that, but he asks anyway. "What do you think it is, then?"

"You don't actually want to know."

He lays his head back on her chest, listening to the phantom beating of her heart. "I know you’ll tell me anyway."

She hums. Her hands are back in his hair. "I think," she starts, "Partially this is a place you believe you could have ended up, if your mother hadn't died, if your father had been kinder, if the world hadn't ended, if you hadn't walked into that wretched forest."

He vaguely hums in acknowledgement, and for once he doesn't interrupt.

"Maybe then, you would have settled down in a small town, with your wife. You would have wanted and would've gotten a kid. Been a great father."

She trails off, he doesn't look at her.

"I guess," he says. "You said partially?"

"This is what you wish you wanted, too."

He tenses up. "I do want this."

She shakes her head, and even without looking at her he can picture her face clearly, the exasperated fondness mixed with that horrid melancholy.

"We both know that's not true," she says.

There’s a pause. Travis doesn’t know if he's angry or guilty or relieved.

"Come on, Travis," she says, being so very kind, so patient.

They hadn’t been like this, him and Margaret. They’d been so young, in the grand scheme of things. They’d liked going to bars and beating everybody at Illimat and running small schemes and violating curfew and running from law enforcers. Margaret had been kind to him, but she could bite back just as viciously as he could. It had worked so well. At the time they were both just mildly dysfunctional people, and they’d truly brought out the best in each other. They were reckless and they had gotten married with blood oaths, which people had advised against. They’d been told such things just invite tragedy.

And they had both been so very afraid when Margaret had noticed she was pregnant.

"I remember," Travis said, he could hear the waver in his voice "That you said we should find a Black Lily, or a doctor, or maybe we…" he trailed off, not wanting the tears to spill from his eyes.

"We never got to weigh our options,” Margaret says.

William hadn't wanted children. He was afraid of what he knew you could do to a child, he was afraid of outliving his own kid, he didn't want to give his long dead father the satisfaction. And every single bit of relief he had ever felt about it not being a problem anymore had been met with guilt in a tenfold.

"We didn't want this," she said, "I didn't want this." Margaret would not have settled for a weirdly perfect life passively weaving and cooking dinners. William would not have coped well either. The two of them had been master con artists and reckless young lovers.

"I wouldn't have left you," he says.

She kisses his hair and murmurs "I know, my love, I know."

Travis Matagot would have left, of course, right at dawn, unable to face any of this. But he knows that William would have tried. William would have stayed and he would have been broken and afraid but he would have stayed and he would have faced it all.

If it had come to that, then he knows they would have been unfit, stumbling parents. It would have been messy and just a bit broken, and they would have found a way, because together they usually had. It wouldn't end in a perfect village with normal jobs and no heartbreak, not even back then.

And then William had died alongside her in the depths of the river.

She smiles like she knows what he's thinking, which she probably does, as she’s nothing more than a shade of his own subconscious.

"We would have made the best of it," she says, "But none of that would have led us here because then you wouldn't be you, and I loved you. Even the parts you believe unlovable, even the ones that led you to be the broken man you are now, and especially the ones that made you yearn for more than this."

They sit in the silence of that, but Travis still doesn't wake up. "There’s more to this, isn't there," he says, sighing. There’s always more to it.

"You don't actually want to go back anymore, and that scares you."

He flinches and sits up angrily. “I don’t know what you mean.”

When she speaks, there’s a bit of the real bite she would have had in her voice. “Yes, you do.”

"I didn't want you to die!" he says. His hands are shaking in his lap. He's crying, trying to focus on a point on the wall, trying to wake up.

"Gable isn't here," she says, "And neither is Jonnit, and you wish you wanted this back, but you have the two of them now."

"I would trade it all to have you back," he says, and his voice comes out so small.

"Oh, Travis," she says, gently placing her hand on his back, "It's alright, you know-"

"Shut up!" he says. He looks at her, her endless patience, the mangled ghost of his wife that isn’t really like her at all.

She slumps against him, hugging him from behind. He turns around and kisses her softly, and he remembers kissing her so vividly this feels almost real.

He wakes up in the middle of the night and he knows he's very obviously been crying. He climbs out of what he generously calls his bunk. He needs to get some fresh air, or something.

As he’s walking up to the deck, he bumps into Gable, because of course he does.

"Have you been smoking rope?" they ask, peering at him.

Travis could not be in a worse mood to deal with this. "Yes!" he spits out angrily, the lie coming easily.

"I just asked a question! What did I do this time?" Gable says, exasperated.

"Nothing," he says and then, "Everything, I don’t fucking know, Gable! Just leave it."

He sees them flinch and he sees the hurt look on their face, and he almost convinces himself he doesn't care.

"What has gotten- Travis? Travis, where are you going?"

He begins stomping off to find a closet where he can curl into a ball in peace. "I said leave it!" he shouts over his shoulder.

They stomp off in the other direction.

He does find a corner eventually, and he just sits there. He can't actually bring himself to cry, or even to think. He's stuck on old worn memories and the intense mix of helplessness and guilt. He hates himself and everything for it.

It’s Margaret who finds him.

"Leave," he says, not turning to face her.

"Travis," she says, ignoring him. "We are still tethered together, remember, and you woke me up rather abruptly."

"Well I am so sorry," he says, voice dripping with sarcasm. "Happy now?"

She sighs. "Bad dream?"

"Well, you know," he says, too tired and strung out to stop himself, "About her. And our kid. And you, I guess. A perfect day. Bad dream.”

That makes her pause. "I understand why that would make my presence upsetting, and if you truly want me to leave I will," she says. "But I don't want to leave you here alone, and you won't talk about this to Gable, and you shouldn't dump these sort of things on Jonnit."

She's right. She usually is. He sighs and sits up a little straighter.

"You don't need to look at me, if that helps."

That does make it easier, and he hates that she knows it. "Alright," he says.

"So this dream about something you lost is what upset you?"

"I feel like I just had this conversation, you know."

"You talked to her?" She sounds a little surprised.

He considers the question. “It wasn't like with Dref, she was just like… a memory."

Margaret nods. "I can feel you don't want to take me through the whole dream,” she says, sounding both gentle and firm, “But can you maybe tell me what you think is most upsetting to you right now."

"She said some things that I didn’t want to think about."

"Very vague, dear, but it's a start," she says.

So Travis starts explaining. It's halting and abstract and broken up by bitten back sobs but he tries. Tries to explain Margaret, and the life he never got to lead, and the one he never even wanted. About a kid he never had that he still feels guilty towards. About the mangled stitched together thing his dream Margaret was, and how that is all that’s left of her now.

Margaret weaves a spell between them quietly. The moment their connection strengthens, tears begin to fill her eyes, almost involuntarily.

He turns to look at her. Seeing her face is hard and comforting all at once, because nothing in his life is ever allowed to be simple.

“You’re holding onto so much, Travis,” she says, her voice somehow still steady, despite her tears.

Travis can feel she's shouldering his burden of grief and guilt with him. It's nice somehow, to know that she truly understands. In a sick, twisted way, it's nice to know she's struggling under it too.

"I just don't want to lose her,” he whispers.

She pauses to think, and then very carefully says "You’re holding onto all this grief and guilt because you believe it keeps her close, but Travis dear, it only makes it harder for you to think about her, talk about her.”

She moves forward to hold his hands and his gaze. “You want to be guilty because that makes the pain fair. You want to be in pain because her loss deserves to be felt. You are afraid of being content without it; now and in the future. Which is not letting you be happy with the people you have now, and not letting you think about what you could have."

They’re looking at each other now, and her hands move up to cradle his face ever so sweetly. Travis has nothing to say. He just nods vaguely and feels her tears on her hands.

"I wish I could get rid of it all for you, but it will take work, and you have been bottling it up for so long.” She slowly pulls him closer to her and kisses the top of his forehead. She murmurs, like a small prayer onto his skin, like it's holy, “You need to understand it's okay to let go of her Travis. You love her, so deeply and fully, I can feel that. That will keep her close, that is worth remembering."

He's crying now, and he leans into her and falls into her embrace so easily as the tears finally flow, as he lets himself feel the grief finally, letting it all out. Letting it go. She holds him, sharing the mourning with him. She rubs his back tenderly as he sobs into her chest. She’s got him this time.

A few nights later, he dreams of a river and he's holding Margaret’s hand. He's been through this a million times: sometimes he hopes he will be able to pull them both out, sometimes he hopes to die with her. Neither ever works out, of course.

This time he stops struggling, and looks at her face. Looks at the millions of hands pulling her down, and the current threatening to tear him apart.

It burns in his chest, but he takes a deep breath.

“Goodbye,” he says.

And he lets go of her hand.

#skyjacks #campaign podcast #campaign skyjacks #travis matagot #margaret skyjacks #my writing #fic

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sometimesrosy · 4 years ago

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Bellamy and clarke separated but finding some hapiness and peace, after they confess their feelings for each other. Would it be a bittersweat ending? They know they love each other, but they can't stay together. Would it feet the narrative being told? Like a season 4 ending, but they confess their feelings and can comunicate via radio

It might tell the narrative, but I believe it would be a tragic ending, no sweet, just bitter.

To have that epic, soulmate love, but to be separated from it forever?

Yes, it would be epic. Yes, it would fit some of the symbolism and metaphors (like sun and moon, never to meet,) but I don’t think it follows the characters to their personal character journeys.

It would be an ending that reinforced the need to sacrifice the self for the greater good. And it SEEMS like the story, since s5 at least, has been telling us that it’s not just about surviving, not just about saving people, not just about doing it for your people, but ALSO about believing you deserve happiness, you deserve a chance to live, everyone deserves to try for that good life, even when they are bearing the burden of taking care of their people. Actually, that’s been a theme, often unaddressed, since season 1. They were UNABLE to do that in their traumatized lives. So as we’ve seen them heal, we’ve seen them start to take steps towards living the life that is right for them... like Monty and Harper.

From the beginning, “Together” has been really important for not only Bellarke, but also the entire show. But SPECIFICALLY for Bellarke, or reuniting them wouldn’t have been the central plot line in season 5.

IF Bellarke gets to be together before the finale, but doesn’t either live “happily” ever after or DIE together, but rather is separated forever... I think that would be backtracking on the personal development of the characters and the concept that you can’t live your lives for other people. It would be reinforcing the toxic and incorrect concept that they “bear it so their people don’t have to.”

Now both Clarke AND Bellamy tend to be self sacrificial and willing to die to save their people, and that’s part of what makes them heroes, but this has turned out to be TERRIBLE for them. And separating would be them sacrificing THEIR happiness for their people.

Happy for their people, tragedy for them. I suppose that could be the bittersweet. Like Pirates of the Caribbean where Elizabeth and Will are separated and can only meet once a day every year or some such. Or even Titanic, where Jack sacrifices himself so she can survive on that door, and she lives and he dies and they are reunited in death decades later. It’s a trope. It happens.

Could it happen? Yes. Will it happen? I don’t think so.

Ok. Thinking back to past story.

Deleted script when Bellamy asked Clarke to run away with him from s1/day trip

Closing the drop ship door on B and F, then B telling her it was the right thing to do at the campfire.

We’re all safe here in MW. “not all of us.” no B or F

“I can’t lose you too/It’s worth the risk” when B went into the mountain and I maintain is where their relationship broke. As B thought C didn’t care and C became desperate to save him.

“Together” pulling the lever at MW

B’s desperation to save Clarke in wanheda (can’t lose her!)

“Together” again when they drank floukru’s poison. Live or die together. Almost an oath.

Start with Bellamy Blake

“If I’m on that list, you’re on that list.”

Jaha questioning B about who else he needs to save in order to feel worthy, and the way he looked at Clarke.

C giving up half of Arkadia’s spots to save B.

C not being able to sacrifice B for the sake of humanity.

B being traumatized by leaving C to die in praimfaya (trauma which lasts 6 years. Reinforced in s 5 and 6 with how he CAN’T do that again. Can’t leave Raven behind, can’t sacrifice E for O, can’t let O kill C, can’t leave Murphy, Emori and Monty to die, WON’T let Clarke die in Sanctum.)

NOW, Clarke has been willing to let go of her claim on Bellamy because she believes he loves E, and also she would never go against his will and his choices for his life. Bellamy wouldn’t let Clarke sacrifice herself although he did in perverse instantiation, he was “still with her” by fighting to keep her safe (maybe that was the hand hold metaphor there. they were in it together.) They’re BOTH willing to sacrifice themselves for the safety of their people but they are NOT willing to sacrifice the other. They have in the past, (MW and Praimfaya) and it was not worth it.

I think it might seem like one of them will sacrifice themselves to save everyone... and I’m betting Bellamy, who will probably be “the key”... but I think that at the last moment, Clarke will NOT let him go alone, even though they only need one person. If you’re on that list, I’m on that list.

What if that scene at the tree in Day Trip was meant to be distant foreshadowing for them “running away together” at the end of the story, but it turned out to be too romantic for that early in the narrative so they deleted it? Hmm.

Anyway. That’s my ending for Bellarke. They die together, because one won’t let the other sacrifice themselves without them. (and then I think they get a happy ending isolated and separated from their friends, a soft epilogue outside of the story, like Marper.)

But could they become romantic and then get separated? Yes. It fits the larger narrative. And I think it will seem like that’s going to happen before we get an “I jump you jump” moment (another titanic reference. the tropes fit.) Because letting one sacrifice themselves no longer fits the Bellarke narrative. They’ve gotten to the point where they can’t do that anymore. BTDT, and not again.

#the 100 #bellarke #bellarke endgame #together #the list scene #i can't lose you #marperly ever after

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atlanticcanada · 4 years ago

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N.S. mass shooting probe will include look at RCMP actions, gender-based violence

The joint public inquiry in response to the April mass shooting in Nova Scotia has announced a mandate that includes a probe of the RCMP response as well as the role of gender-based violence in the tragedy.

The federal and Nova Scotia governments announced in July their intent to establish the inquiry to determine what happened and make recommendations to help prevent similar events in the future.

A lone gunman killed 22 people on April 18-19 during a 13-hour rampage that spanned several communities in northern and central Nova Scotia.

The killer was shot dead by RCMP officers at a gas station in Enfield, N.S.

Thursday's announcement says the terms of reference are complete, a third commissioner has been chosen and the commission is set to begin its work.

A release says Kim Stanton will join chief commissioner Michael MacDonald, a retired chief justice of the Nova Scotia Supreme Court, and Leanne Fitch, a former chief of police in Fredericton.

Stanton is a lawyer and the former legal director of the Women's Legal Education and Action Fund.

They are to submit two reports on their findings, lessons learned and recommendations, with an interim report by May 1, 2022 and a final report by Nov. 1, 2022.

Under the federal Inquiries Act and the Nova Scotia Public Inquiries Act, the commissioners have the power to call witnesses under oath and require them to provide documents or other items that the commissioners consider necessary to carry out a full investigation.

Two orders-in-council were released outlining the commissioners' terms of reference.

They direct the commissioners to inquire and make findings into the causes, context and circumstances giving rise to the tragedy, the responses of police, and the steps taken to inform, support and engage victims, families and affected citizens.

The commissioners are tasked with looking at the "role of gender-based and intimate partner violence" and "access to firearms."

In addition, the mandate calls for examination of the gunman's "interactions with police, including any specific relationship between the perpetrator and the RCMP and between the perpetrator and social services, including mental health services," prior to the event.

The commissioners are to look at police actions, including operational tactics, response, decision-making and supervision, along with communications with the public during and after the event.

They're also to consider communications between and within the RCMP, Canada Border Services Agency, Criminal Intelligence Service Nova Scotia, the Canadian Firearms Program and the Alert Ready Program.

The terms of reference call for an examination of police policies in terms of gender-based and intimate partner violence and police training in active shooter incidents.

The shooter used a replica police vehicle during his rampage and wore an RCMP uniform, and the commission is being called to look into policies on the disposal of police vehicles and any associated equipment, kit and clothing.

The commission is to be "guided by restorative principles in order to do no further harm," and a provision also notes it is to grant to the victims and families of the victims an opportunity for appropriate participation in the inquiry.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 22, 2020.

from CTV News - Atlantic https://ift.tt/3mgtat4

#new brunswick #prince edward island #nova scotia #news #politics #canada #CTVAtlantic

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kendrixtermina · 5 years ago

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On the Three Lords’ Leadership Styles

I seem to have made another rambly meta post

One underappreciated but very consistent Detail throughout all routes is that Edelgard’s followers are invariably shown to be very dedicated, it’s kinda one of the main hints that she’s not actually evil even on the AM and SS routes where you don’t explicitly find out about that.

This is mostly shown through engage and death quotes instead of outright cutscenes (though you get Seteth observing how the imperial troops fought to the last and clearly weren’t forced to be there, since you napped most of her would-be underlings thanks to Byleth’s own considerable heroic charisma)

One memorable moment is the Arianrhod Paralogue in AM where Manuela and Hanneman show up as empire-aligned enemies if you didn’t recruit them. Hanneman even goes down saying that he doesn’t mind dying for this new, reformed empire (and given his backstory it makes all the sense)

Then there’s her random generals Randolph and Ladislava - in the empire route you find out that they were some of her first meritocratic appointments and super popular with both the armed forces and the general populace. I don’t think it’s ever outright stated that Ladislava’s a commoner but she sure doesn’t mention any title. And of course Edelgard gives this speech to her classmates about how they can totally leave if they want and how ppl like them are the true face of the empire not the corrupt elite from the last generation that they’re about to sweep aside.

It’s not for nothing that she’s got the highest charm stat and growth in the cast, we’re supposed to understand that she’s one heck of a compelling leader.

Of course this isn’t blanket likeability... she’s authoritative, inspirational even, in a lot of her supports she doles out pep talks or accommodates ppl’s quirks so that they can excell on their own terms, but she markedly comes off as the taskmaster/ with a student-council-president sorta vibe in most of them whereas we see plenty of Claude and Dimitri just goofin’ around with their buds. She’s kinda resigned herself to being unable to rely on anyone and never being understood - Even people who know her enough to have some in-depht understanding of her (such as Hubert or Ladislava) speak of her with a sort of awe

This is markedly not something she wants or likes, she makes a point of speaking about teamwork and togetherness and doing chores just like everyone else, but due to a mix of her natural personality, her position as the soon to be most powerful person on the continent and her backstory she just genuinely finds it hard to step out of Business Mode. (that’s a big part of why she latches onto Byleth the way she does. They’re pretty unphased and flippant, they were raised away from politics and got their own fearsome reputation/ crazy power, so they approach her on a more even basis like its no big deal.)

It’s the tragedy and contradiction of someone who has sworn themselves to creating a world where she could never have existed. She’s playing by the unfair rules of a rigged game so that she may un-rig it if she wins.

Actually all three just want the others to treat em like a normal person because they’re ultimately all good humble people but Claude, being the one with the most social skills, is the only one who actually gets the others to do it.... though one also has to consider that the Alliance is less centralized/ more participatory to begin with, he has only somewhat more power than, say, Lorenz or Hilda. Though it’d say that Dimitri’s the one who comes the closest to being just one of the group, for all that his friends won’t drop the honorifics, they are emphatically his friends. Though it must be noted that only Bernadetta and Hubert give Edelgard the ‘lady’ treatment and the whole bunch feels pretty comfortable complaining at her (and she generally takes the criticism to heart), though to be fair the Black Eagles all just kinda have sorta quirky and/or irreverent personalities (and that is a huge part of why I love them so)

Due to her exceeding pragmatism she’s not completely above cloak-and dagger tactics or deception (see when she pins the nuke on the church and much pertaining to the faustian bargain) but by and large her underlings know what they’re fighting for and why, and she prefers to fight enemies head on and give them a fair chance to surrender as long as she can do so without jeopardizing the end result. (Evidenced by many dialogue options, cutscenes and even some of her lecture questions)

It’s also a marked contrast to Claude who also has lofty idealistic goals, but doesn’t tell a soul until he’s already winning and knows ppl will likely follow him no matter what. This also ties into his arc of becoming more open and less jaded under Byleth’s influence, but it’s also a genuine difference in their leadership styles. If you show your hand and show what you stand for, people will also know what you stand against and you’ll have enemies. That’s part of why he didn’t join with her right away though he agrees with her goals, he says she’s antagonizing everyone and that that will be “hard for the people to get behind”.

Meanwhile Claude remains elusive so he can promise everyone whatever they want (on full display with the Knights of Seiros but also with the random Alliance merchants), though this also makes ppl distrust him just due to his secretiveness alone. As Hilda points out he’s not just waaay less untrustworthy than he seems, but actually pretty reliable. His big secret ambition is as benign as world peace and his big secret as simple as that he grew up in another country... not sinister at all.

As a leader he appeals to ppl’s self interest, trying to figure out their deal and give them what they want, and explicitly tells them all to run if things get tough. He’s surprised when people don’t (see the sad sad scene that happens if Hilda dies) and has a lot more reluctance with asking ppl to put themselves in danger than the other two, perhaps because he’s less invested himself; Leading the Alliance is his side gig, a means to an end, not the end all be all cause of his life, he’d escape if given the chance so why shouldn’t his allies? Edelgard is likewise consistent - her allies gave it their all so how could she surrender and escape?

In Dimitri’s case, people follow him largely out of personal loyalty, both because Faerghus culture is just big on honor and fealty, because they’re close friends of himself and his father, and also because they like him for his own virtues.

The most extreme case would be Dedue who for the most understandable of reasons doesn’t care about Faerghus at all, his loyalty is to Dimitri and Dimitri alone.

In AM their faith eventually pays off, otherwise they kinda follow him to their deaths because he stubbornly continues without thinking of negotiation surrender or even damage control. To be fair to him tho, he never actually asks anyone to follow him on his kamikaze mission nor does he hide his intentions, but the others kind of build their hopes on him anyways.

But we can’t really judge him solely by his worst moments; In general he’s a honorable guy with more empathy than is good for him and he really makes a point of making other people’s suffering his business, most apparent with how he’s promised to improve the standing of Dedue’s people (after his return in part 2, Dedue explicitly says that the empathy is why he follows him and that as he ses it even Dimitri’s vindictiveness comes from a place of empathy for the victims of evil) or how he’s ready to swear a blood oath when Byleth’s father gets killed and just gets very emotional on their behalf - it’s easy to see how that would attract people. For better or for worse he’s more a heroic figure than a politician per se.

He feels alot on behalf of other people and he’s got a real service mentality. If he weren’t the prince he’d probably go into public service anyways, or charity maybe, he’s constantly doing stuff like rescuing passers-by and taking in random orphans. He’s also markedly the one of the three who always stays the ruler until his death. Part of it is from his sense of duty and later on, wanting to atone for his past sins, but he’s a genuine chronic do-gooder, and he strives to resolve conflict while making all sides happy even if it means taking a risk to builde a bridge (quite notable when he helps out Claude after their last encounter was anything but friendly)

He clearly and transparently cares a lot so ppl believe things will be better if they get him on the throne (and as per his ending narration he does a lot to help the poor and downtrodden is he does get it)

So really all three have a lot of appeal to potential followers in different ways, depending on what those followers would value in a leader.

#three houses #fe3h #fire emblem three houses #fire emblem: three houses #edelgard von hresvelg #dimitri alexandre blaiddyd #claude von riegan

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thefeastandthefast · 6 years ago

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Connections that took me too long to make...

In Chinese mythology, 奈何桥 (The Bridge of Helplessness) is where one drinks the soup of forgetfulness to forget one’s previous life to prepare for reincarnation, the liminal space where transformations occur.

In The Rise of Phoenixes, 奈何 (Helplessness or To No Avail) is the title of one of the OST songs that plays every time some horribly tragic thing happens to ruin my day, where the third line is 看飞桥开隔 (roughly translates to “watching how the bridge divides”). This is Ning Yi’s song- he knew from almost the beginning what was in store for their relationship, but was able to only watch with perfect clarity the heartbreak that time and change would bring. This is his particular tragedy.

Ni Ni sings the female version of the song, which is titled 何奈何 (Such Helplessness or Why To No Avail). Her third line in this song is 隐隐飞桥隔 (”the bridge is hidden”). Zhiwei’s identity and purpose for much of the show was shrouded in mist. And even after she understood her past, the best path forward was unclear and her decisions could only be based on the limited information she had. Her transformations into Wei Zhi, the Queen of Jinshi, the Princess of Dacheng, were thrust upon her. For someone whose desire for self-determination is so paramount, this is her particular tragedy.

And that bridge- it’s where Zhiwei and Ning Yi grapple with the knottiest and most painful and pivotal changes in their relationship. It’s where they try to decide whether their love for each other can withstand the differences in their worldviews and circumstances. Whether they should choose to transform together and look forward or choose the transformations that will take them away from each other. That bridge is where they confront each other’s stands on matters of justice (after Ning Yi killed his brother the Crown Prince and shot Zhiwei in the leg). They were able to cross that threshold together and become closer, but the two later bridge meetings took them further away from each other. Their goodbye after Zhiwei’s renewal of her oath and her decision to go ahead with marrying Helian Zheng. It’s a scene that’s really about Zhiwei’s decision to prioritize her self and her newly discovered identity over her love for Ning Yi. And that last tragic meeting where Zhiwei told Ning Yi he never knew what she wanted- that was about self-determination and freedom. Ning Yi’s transformation into the emperor required him to sacrifice his freedom to fulfill the wishes of a father who never cared what he wanted. He didn’t want to sacrifice that freedom, but he ultimately bowed to it. On the bridge, he underestimated the absolute centrality of Zhiwei’s need for the freedom to make her own way and her absolute sense of responsibility to preserve the freedom of those Dacheng subjects under her protection. He thought that because freedom was something he was able to sacrifice in order to keep moving forward, she would be able to do so as well, to keep him company. But one of their first important conversations had her telling him that she could never be anyone’s servant, to be beholden to someone, even as a way to regain her freedom later. And that fundamental misunderstanding changed their relationship irrevocably, into something that could no longer be sustained in that particular lifetime.

#the rise of phoenixes #天盛长歌 #cdrama #stuff that keeps me awake at night #my commentary

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kusunogatari · 5 years ago

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[ ObiRyū October | Day Thirty-One: Medieval AU ] [ @abyssaldespair ] [ Uchiha Obito, Suigin Ryū, Jiraiya ] [ Verse: Drake by Day ] [ Previous || Next ]

Making his way through the gates of the capital city, Obito peers out from under the hem of his hood to the castle at the peak of the hill. It’s taken him two weeks to reach it from where he first heard word of the quest. All he can hope now is that no one else has succeeded...and that the reward is as grand as the bulletin made it appear.

With a gentle nudge of his heels, he urges his mount onward through the main thoroughfare. He’s never been this far north, and all the tales he’s heard of the city are more than true, given what he sees. Never has he witnessed buildings so tall, streets so wide and cobbled. And like a proverbial crown, the castle sits above it all, gleaming in the sunlight.

It’s there he’s headed to take on the challenge offered by the king.

Already he can tell that there’s a lingering tension in the air. The townsfolk look nervous, faces drawn in the wake of the bad news. Obito doesn’t yet know how long this tragedy has weighed on them, but it must be quite some time…

Putting that thought aside, he continues upward until reaching the castle gate. Dismounting and taking his horse’s reins, he approaches a guard. “I’m here about the contract offered by the king.”

The knight, dressed in gleaming armor, seems to look him over skeptically for a long moment. Obito’s own garb is more akin to a rogue than someone like him, weighed down by strong but bulky plates. “...go ahead, then. You can leave your mount at the stables until you’ve finished your business.”

Nodding, Obito does as he’s told before taking the steps up to the main doors. Beyond them stretches a grand hall that draws his gaze to the vaulted ceilings. And at the far end, upon a lonely throne, sits the king.

Obito’s hardly the only person milling about. Staff, knights, members of court...all bustle around and look high-strung. Seems the anxiety is only heightened here...and for good reason.

When he approaches, the monarch is talking lowly to a courier, who disengages with a bow before letting his ruler eye his new guest.

“...and who might you be?”

Reaching into his hip satchel, Obito draws and unravels the parchment that had hung in the tavern he frequents. “I’ve come to offer my aid.”

Immediately, the man’s face falls as he sees the portrait upon the paper. Gently accepting it, he looks over the visage of his daughter. “...I see. Forgive me, but…” A hand spares to gesture to him. “You hardly look the part of a knight.”

“Because I’m not one.”

“...and yet you would attempt to bring her back?”

“If I may, your majesty...how many knights have you sent on this voyage?”

The man’s face darkens. “...too many.”

“And how many have succeeded?”

There’s a gusty sigh, considering the traveler. “...I see your point. But you did read the missive, did you not? The princess is not simply missing - she’s being guarded by a beast of legend. Have you any experience in fighting such a monster?”

“It doesn’t always come down to a fight. I’ll try my luck, if I may, your majesty.”

“...very well. And may I assume it is the monetary reward that tempts you?”

“...I’ll not deny it.”

“There’s no shame in seeking your fortune through honest work,” the king replies. “And it is more than worth seeing my daughter - my sole heir - returned whence she belongs. Very well...should you succeed, the money is yours. Bring her here...and you will have your reward. My steward will show you the map where she has been taken. There is no date by which you must return, but the sooner, quite obviously the better. My people fear having their future queen missing so long, for I am growing old…”

“I’ll bring her back. You have my word.”

“Either that, or you’ll perish trying,” the king replies dryly. “...go, then. And good fortune to you, for my daughter’s sake.”

With that encouraging send off, Obito is pulled aside and shown a map of the nearby lands.

“She is currently being held here, in these ruins of an old fort...it should take you three or four days to reach it. Are you…?” The man gives Obito a glance. “...sure you have what you need?”

“That and more,” Obito assures him, straightening from the table.

“As you wish, sir. Good luck.”

Route planned and permission given, Obito fetches his horse and leaves the capital city behind, taking an eastern road. He has a few days to finalize his preparations, and he’ll have more to scout and plan his methods. If all goes well...his stealth-based movements will get him in and out with the damsel before the beast even knows he’s there. So long as she doesn’t present any problems…

The trip is mostly silent, camping off the road come each nightfall and imagining ways to spend a mountain of gold. The rest of the proposed reward doesn’t interest him much: he doesn’t have any use for it. He’ll stick to his money, thank you very much.

On the fourth day, he finds the ruins near noon, picketing his horse a ways back as not to give him away. Peering out from the trees nearby, he neither sees nor hears the beast supposedly guarding his target. Perhaps it’s away feasting on another poor soul trying to find this damsel. Ever so quietly, he works his way around, eyeing the remains of the fortress carefully. It seems easy enough to scale - he’s climbed and traversed worse. But where is she being kept within is the question...and will she make getting back out any more difficult?

Only time will tell.

By the time he’s finished his scouting, it’s late afternoon, evening creeping up the horizon. And still no sign of the beast. Drawing his hood and pulling the fabric of his mask up to his nose, he begins sprinting from cover to cover. Reaching the outer wall, he digs the claws of his boots’ toes into the gaps of the stone, quickly ascending and kneeling atop it. Crouched and moving fast, he makes it to a crumbling section and descends into the yard of the fort.

...still nothing.

Huh...maybe someone has beaten him here. But he still needs to check the interior. The largest central tower - a great hole blown out from the top - is likely his best bet. But he nevertheless checks the rest of the fort first. Half an hour of searching shows him nothing, so he retreats and makes to start scaling the tower.

...but that’s when he hears it.

Ducking behind a section of collapsed wall, he watches as a winged beast soars over the fort, bellowing in warning before coming to perch atop the fore of the wall. White and silver scales shine in the setting sun, moonstone horns and spikes glittering.

...dragon.

Well...drat. Nibbling the scar on his lip, Obito looks up. Can he make it to the top before it notices him? And if he does...how to descend without being spotted, let alone once he’s got a princess to account for…?

Well...sitting around won’t get it done.

Creeping around his cover, he starts ascending, one eye on the dragon. Its back sits to him, seemingly watching the sunset. The climb goes well...until Obito’s split focus lets him grip a loose stone by mistake. Dislodged, it leaves him swinging for a moment, tumbling down with a loud clatter.

Ears flicking back, the beast turns a serpentine neck, eyes locking and pupils widening. Giving a roar, it pivots on its perch, wings flaring as Obito makes to finish his climb.

Shit, shit, SHIT…!

Reaching the lip of the shattered wall, he leaps up and tumbles behind a broken desk to hide. The room - a good twenty paces in each direction - is covered in a nest of blankets, pillows, curtains, and even tree branches. Eyes flickering over the space, Obito stills.

...there’s no one here.

Oaths threaten to spill from his tongue. Was he lied to?! Did someone beat him to his goal? Where’s the princess, she has to be -!

The tower gives a great shudder as the beast collides, half-landing within the open room. Talons screech and scrape against the floor as it hauls itself in with another ear-splitting bellow.

This isn’t good.

Still ducked behind his cover, Obito listens with a pounding heart as the dragon growls, nostrils flaring with breath as it tries to sniff him out. At one point, a hot breath flares over him, and it takes all his courage not to bolt. Looking around desperately, he spies a window across the room. If he can just make it there, and start descending the rear side…

But the sun is nearly setting, the light dying and bathing the tower in twilight. The beast’s paws start digging at the interior, sending all manner of debris clattering down several stories to the courtyard below. Each swipe of its limb cuts between him and his goal - he just has to -!

...wait…

Having pulled itself fully into the room, the dragon suddenly stills, head turning to look out to the night sky. A waxing moon throws the nightscape into sharp relief, and the beast gives a long, low...almost mournful cry.

...and then it starts to glow.

Daring to peek over his hiding place, Obito’s eyes widen as the dragon takes staggering steps forward, form beginning to blur...and then shrink. And then, with one last flare of light...it fades to show a woman just as she collapses atop the remaining blankets.

...wait…

Letting a long moment pass to ensure it’s not a trick, Obito stealthily makes his way out. Clearly unconscious, the woman is slack (and bare) within the tangle of fabric. And yet, there’s no mistaking it...she looks just as she did in the portrait.

...this is the princess…!

A bit boggled, Obito drops to a crouch, cupping his chin with a hand. So...she wasn’t being guarded by a beast...she is the beast! It must be some kind of curse, if he has to guess. A monster by day, human by night...and yet…

...he has to wonder how much of this the king knows. After all, orders have been given to slay the dragon if possible, in order to save the throne’s heir. But she has been that dragon all along! If someone had actually succeeded...they’d not have saved her, but killed her.

...whoever cursed her must have surely thought it through. They didn’t want her out of the way...they wanted her dead…! And by a knight of the realm’s own hand!

...and what is he to do with her, now? If she changes every time the sun rises, they’ll never make it back to the castle before she’s a beast once more! And he can’t know if she realizes it: if she’s a beast in both body and mind during the day. Was she actually trying to kill him out of bestial instinct? Or was she merely protecting herself, assuming he - like the knights - was bent on killing her?

Well...only one way to find out.

A bit awkward at her nudity, he first tugs aside a spare blanket to cover her before shaking a shoulder. “...oi...wake up…!”

There’s a soft groan, white lashes fluttering as she opens bleary greys. “...what…?”

“You’re the crown princess, aren’t you? Ryū?”

Clearly still addled, she clutches her cover and sits up, a hand at her eyes. “...yes, I...I am. Who are you…?”

“I’m one of many sent to rescue you, but...seems you don’t really need rescuing, now do you?”

Once her expression clears of sleep, her eyes widen with a gasp. “...you…! You saw…?”

“A bit hard not to. You were about to finish me off before the sun set. Is that how all of this works…?”

Looking to him in near horror, Ryū then softens, glancing aside in what looks like shame. “...in truth, I...I know very little. I was taken from home some months ago, and brought here...cursed...and left alone.”

“Do you know who did this?”

She gives a somber shake of her head. “My eyes were kept bound...and I only heard them speak the incantation in the old tongue. Beyond that...I-I’m just as blind as you. But yes...with the dawn I become a monster...and at night, under the moon, I’m human again. But with one exception: nights of the new moon, I remain a beast throughout. It seems tied to the lunar cycle.”

“Do you keep your mind during the day?”

“Aye. But I cannot speak...I’ve tried to evade those who come for me, but they...they…!” Tears brim along her eyes. “...I never meant to hurt them...but they had every intent to kill me! None ever last to the night, to see the truth...not until you. I didn’t mean…”

“Well...you had to protect yourself,” Obito mutters. “No shame in that.”

“But those men, they’re...they’re dead because of me…!”

“And would you rather be? Your father and your kingdom are stricken without you. This may sound harsh, but there are many knights...and only one princess. Besides, many meet their ends in other ways. If not to you...then some other quest. Try not to worry. Right now...our biggest obstacle is getting you home in one piece to tell the truth...and then finding a way to get you relieved of this curse.��

“I...I can hide during the day. There’s a route that follows the forest. It will take a few more days, but it should be enough to keep me hidden. If...if that is agreeable to you, sir.”

Obito waves away the title. “Whatever gets you back in one piece.” He won’t get his reward until then, after all - a few more days’ wait isn’t about to kill him. “And, er...I suppose we need to find you something to...wear.”

At that, her cheeks flush pink. “Ah...yes. I don’t think there are any garments here, but...I can improvise. And...thank you for preserving my modesty. Clothes can’t really survive such a change of shape…”

He manages an awkward chuckle. “...right. Well...let’s get you dressed, and down to the ground...then we can start our way back.”

She manages to craft a makeshift dress from a blanket and curtain cords. Hardly a gown of nobility, but...better than nothing. The stairs within the tower are half destroyed, Obito helping her climb down until they reach the ground.

“...it’s been so long since I’ve seen a friendly face,” she admits softly as they leave the ruins behind. “I was beginning to lose hope I’d ever been found. Though...you are not a knight, are you?”

“No...but I think that’s what made the difference.”

“...perhaps you are right.”

They find Obito’s horse where he left them, the princess pulled up behind the saddle as he starts directing them into the trees. “You must miss home.”

“Terribly...was my father well?”

“Beyond being worried, he seemed stout enough. But he’ll be even better once we get you home.”

She mulls that over in silence. “...and how do you plan to spend your gold?”

“...er…”

The princess gives a soft smile. “I feel that I owe you more than just money. You’ve quite possibly saved my life...and my kingdom. Is that really all you want?”

“I’ll be content with it. Besides, we’d best not hold our breath. We’ve several days between now and reaching the capital. Something may yet go wrong.”

“Oh, don’t say that…” Her steadying grip on his waist tightens, and he feels her bow her brow to his back. “...I can’t bear it…”

“...well, we’ll do what we can. We have a goal, we have a route...all we can do is stick to it. By week’s end, we’ll have you back where you belong.”

“My curse still remains.”

“...true. I’ve no skill in them, but surely your father employs a court wizard?”

...silence rings for a time. “...I yet wonder if it was he who did this…”

“What?”

“Many may refuse to see it, but I know he yearns for my father’s crown. There was a time he attempted to earn my hand...but when I refused…” Ryū sighs softly. “...what if this was his plan to take it by force?”

“...well, we can’t do anything about it now. I can always stash you and speak to your father privately. But that may mean finding another spellcaster. And curses are tricky, from what little I know.”

He feels her wilt behind him. “...my people will never acquiesce to a monster as their queen...if I cannot be cured…”

“Don’t dwell on it now. We’ll find a way.” Obito isn’t sure the king will agree to pay him if his daughter isn’t whole...this might take longer than he thought. But he’ll be damned if he came all this way to go unpaid. “For now...one step at a time. We’ve got a road to travel, first.”

“...you’re right. We’re already farther than I’ve ever gotten. I just...need to stay calm.” A long pause falls between them. “...thank you, by the way...for all you’ve done. I know it’s for your coin, but...you’ve saved my life.”

“...don’t thank me yet,” Obito murmurs, ignoring the slight guilt he feels at the mention of the money. “Thank me once it’s all said and done.”

“I can still thank you for what you’ve done thus far...I…” She hesitates. “I don’t yet know your name, sir.”

“Obito. Far better than sir...I’m not one someone would call sir.”

“...Obito...neither a knight, nor sir. And the only one able to rescue a princess in so many months of trying. How...intriguing.”

“...that’s one way to put it.”

From there, they sink into a companionable silence. They’ve a long journey ahead of them, but...at least this is a start.

;~; It's the last daaay, aww...I mean, I DO have MANY more stories to work on with these two, but...still. I'm sad. It's been a blast (and more than a little exhausting atop everything else) to do this ship month. But I don't plan on stopping writing them any time soon! ANYWAY! This is a plot I've partially written before in RP with another partner who's currently inactive, and...I've reallllly wanted to reuse it. No idea if I'll make a full story of it, but I love the concept: based rather heavily on The Swan Princess...I loved that movie as a kid, still do xD Only this is a little more...serious than that. Dragons and swans are a stone's throw apart, lmao! Who knows, maybe I'll write more...orrr maybe we'll RP it. We'll see! Buuut on that note...I guess that's it for this one. Thanks to everyone who stopped by to read beyond Meg, lol - wasn't really expecting that! But I do hope you enjoyed, and thanks for reading! I'll be working on other series soon :D

#obiryū october #abyssaldespair #uchiha obito #suigin ryū #jiraiya #drake by day [ au ]

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foxofthedesert · 6 years ago

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2040 | An Arrow / DinahSiren Fic

Long before we found out that Mia is Olicity’s kid, I developed my own take on her identity. I may revisit this universe in the future. Hah! In the future...

If you prefer reading on AO3, click here.

Swirling in a lazy circle, Mia surveys her surroundings with a critical eye. The remains of what used to be the center of operations for Star City’s famous team of superheroes is little more than a ruined relic of a bygone era. An era in which masked vigilantes prowled the streets, striking fear into the hearts of criminals of all stripes. An era of idyllic bravery and unheralded service. An era of death and despair.

With a derisive sneer, she glares out at the decrepit complex from it’s circular central platform. Connor, her friend and companion, is nearby milling around the overturned weapons racks. The glee of nostalgia paints his features with a handsome, ambient smile. Mia does not share his enthusiasm for their current location. It was from here that Star City’s famed band of masked heroes labored to rescue the city they loved from the blight of an unchecked corruption that infested it from the slums of the Glades all the way up to the vaunted halls of influence both private and public. All for naught. Sacrifice after sacrifice was made to achieve only temporary victories.

Would they have tried so hard if they knew how pointless it was? Mia thinks, lightly brushing her fingers over a dusty keyboard in all likelihood last touched by Felicity Smoak. Would they have given up so much if they were told how it would all end? That their friends and loved ones would die and their children be orphaned because of the man they chose to follow?

Oliver Queen. Mia shudders at the thought of that name. Her hatred of the man has yet to abate since her intensive investigation into the circumstances that preceded her being condemned to an abysmal childhood.

Living on a time ship prior to returning home came with certain advantages, as did having the Captain of said ship as an aunt, among them access to comprehensive histories of multiple universes. Thanks to a series of ingenious upgrades to Gideon installed by none other than Cisco Ramon shortly before her birth, she was able to efficiently sift through the massive stores of data and make sense of the interwoven events that resulted in her abandonment. By the time she was done the causal point all other incidents in the web traced back to was, in her opinion, conclusive. Were it not for Oliver Queen surviving the sabotaging of the Queen’s Gambit and being unfairly guilted into righting his father’s innumerable wrongs, everything would be different.

It was that seminal event that set off a chain reaction of unavoidable tragedies. Less than two decades later, the city of her birth was ultimately reduced to an ashen wasteland and her homeworld was occupied by unimaginably evil forces bent on its destruction. As if that were not reason enough for her grudge, due to Oliver’s actions her family was made to suffer through one hell after another beginning with her grandparents’ divorce, to her grandfather’s alcoholism, to her aunt being murdered in cold blood, and finally to her mother’s totally preventable death. One man’s deluded crusade was responsible for all of that, including her own personal traumas, as well as for the millions of innocents who have been slaughtered and those left behind to mourn them due to the endless series of wars and coups and crime waves that were ushered in by the rise of popular vigilantism.

No one knew it then, but the Hood’s arrival in Starling City was the beginning of the end for Earth-1.

Unbidden, a growl of unfettered animosity rumbles through Mia’s chest. If only she could get her hands on Oliver Queen to unleash years worth of enmity upon the primary catalyst of her city’s downfall. If only she could expel every last ounce of her pent up anguish upon the unwitting author of her family’s destruction. If only justice had not been slain by the gleaming verdant tip of an arrow, she might have her day of reckoning upon the one she has judged guilty for her family’s misery and for the cruel subjugation of an entire world. If only...

Sadly one cannot exact vengeance upon the dead, she thinks, not for the first time wishing for someone, anyone, to prove that principle incorrect.

Her hands clench into tight balls as she leaps down the platform stairs then stalks purposefully in the direction of the table that once served as the de facto round table of Team Arrow. She circles around the table several times, studying the warped metal supports and broken glass so symbolic of those who once commiserated here, before coming to a stop behind a plush albeit otherwise ordinary office chair. This particular one was the throne of the Green Arrow from whence he unwittingly presided over the ruination of all he claimed to love.

“You have failed this city.” Such an ironic catch-phrase from a man who epitomized the charge he so smugly flung at his countless victims. Truth be told, Star City was better off in the hands of the criminal element that ruled unopposed prior to Oliver initiating his ill-fated crusade. Anything would be better than the constant human suffering to which Mia is exposed around every street corner in a city that once was vibrant with false hope.

When she was still in diapers, or so she has been told, people started to believe worst days were over and that the seemingly endless supply of mustache-twirling villains was finally set to be exhaust thanks to the tireless efforts of the SCPD working alongside the Green Arrow and his team. The problems in the Glades, so long unaddressed, were being taken seriously by the government while most other districts flourished in the midst of what historians would dub the Pacem Per Sagitta. Crime and homelessness plummeted as unemployment rates bottomed out. Tax revenues soared. City services expanded dramatically. By every conceivable metric, the city’s happiness index was at peak levels. People dared to hope that a fledgling future which seemed oh-so-bright might survive into adulthood for their children. Sadly that fleeting period of relative peace ended the day City Hall was introduced to an alien material that makes azidoazide azide seem tame in comparison while Lex Corp tower was simultaneously transformed into a misshapen pancake of concrete and steel.

Now the city is but a ghostly shell of its former glory, a metropolitan corpse inhabited by a host of miscreants, degenerates, fools and lost souls. No one possessing a shred of common sense or with available means to escape stuck around to watch as the last desperate line of defense fell before a rabid onslaught. Long before the final assault was launched three days before Christmas, the vast majority of businesses closed while prominent and wealthy citizens hastily vacated the districts for surrounding cities and states. Some thirteen months after the Green Arrow alongside his superhuman colleague the Flash inexplicably vanished without a trace, the city perimeter was at last catastrophically breached. Enemy forces poured in, easily overwhelming ill-equipped reserve units comprised mainly of volunteers and conscripts. Less than two days later, the city government surrendered. In short order, law and order collapsed, and with it municipal services, as the mercenary armies of a group calling themselves The Seventh Circle took control. Their ascension signified the initiation of a new age of terror that would outstrip all that came before.

Every district of Star City fell to the invaders save the Glades, which was miraculously spared the indiscriminate razing. Those that refused to submit to their ghastly new overlords were summarily executed, with the most prominent citizens treated to a macabre public spectacle belonging more to the Dark Ages than the Twenty-first Century. The mayor, half of the city council, and a good portion of the top SCPD brass were immediately disposed of alongside key members of the resistance movement that were captured in the fighting around City Hall. Lyla Michaels and John Diggle were the last notable leaders to fall prey to the Seventh Circle’s inhuman butchers some three years later. Felicity Smoak was spared solely for her usefulness to the Seventh Circle, though she never explained to Mia precisely why she capitulated when her friends paid the ultimate price for refusing to do the same. All she would do is shake her head, mutter under her breath about needing to stay alive to find ‘the key’ and then promptly move on to another unrelated subject.

That Mia would not even exist if events played out differently does not really matter when her life barely passes for anything worth inhabiting nine days out of ten. She is virtually alone in the world since Felicity’s death, her subsistence of late is a far cry from the spartan rations doled out aboard The Waverider, and what little she has scrounged up for herself has been mainly purchased by virtue of her fists. Her diet typically consists of dried fruits and vegetables with a few cubes of salted meat and stale bread, all washed down with tepid water, while her apartment is little more than a dingy hole in the wall just big enough to pass as an inhabitable domicile. And she is doing relatively well for herself compared to most. Her only real friend stays by her side solely out of obligation to an oath he swore to a digital recording left to him by his dead father, which he was to watch upon his eighteenth birthday. That was four months ago now. And while Connor is a good person, perhaps the reason his shadowing of her is such an abrasive irritant to Mia is that she is anything but. She is, or so Felicity glumly insists, her mother’s daughter.

Thoughts of the woman whose body nourished her for nine long months quickly turn Mia’s gut sour. Acid scours her stomach lining as the burning acrimony in her heart toward one Oliver Queen inflames all over again.

Mia was not even a year old when her mother died saving the Green Arrow from a collapsing building the fateful day The Seventh Circle announced their presence to the city they would soon enough conquer. The great hero of Star City was in such a rush to escape a grisly demise that he broke a cardinal rule when he left one of his own behind. After her mother freed him from the wreckage of an interior office using her meta powers, he had wrongly assumed she was on his heels as they fled from a rapidly encroaching doom. Only when he emerged into the warm summer night did he realize he had exited alone. By then it was too late for him to make amends for his fatal mistake and repay the selfless act that spared his life. The building came down seconds later, pulverizing all remaining within beneath fifty thousand tons of rubble. There was nothing left of her mother to bury.

“Good riddance to a selfish bastard who did nothing but sow death and destruction wherever he went,” Mia spits, hateful glee underscoring her words. Her animosity for the man is only rivaled by that for the still-living Black Canary – whom she blames in equal measure for her mother’s death.

A disturbing mental image pops into her head just then of what it must have been like for her mother to sacrifice her life for a man who did not deserve her loyalty or devotion. Reportedly, Oliver had been an asshole for much of her mother’s first few years on Earth-1, and even once she proved herself as a valuable asset and steadfast ally he refused to let her forget the many sins she had committed while in service to a revolving door of evil men who had offered her something she could not refuse: a convenient outlet for her pain. Hunter Zolomon. Adrian Chase. Ricardo Diaz. These infamous names were callously flung in her mother’s face every time she made the tiniest mistake. No member of Team Arrow was treated more unfairly or subjected to such harsh criticism by Oliver as Mia’s mother was. Had it not been for the surprising friendship offered by Felicity and the unexpected love of Mia’s other genetic contributor, her mother might have fallen short in in turning her life around to honor a father who believed in his wayward daughter when no one else would.

And yet in all this her mother never stopped loving the bastard who wore a face and bore a name she could never turn her back upon.

“I’ve never lied to you about your mother, Mia. She had a lot of faults. Really, really bad ones,” Felicity told Mia one night when they were working late. Somehow the conversation devolved from engineering schematics of an old chemical plant to the complicated relationship between her missing husband and a dear friend for whom the tech magnate never stopped grieving. “One of the worst was her ability to endure abuse from people she cared for. And Oliver...was a hard man who was molded by a past so dark that your Mom was maybe the only person who truly understood the pain he constantly lived with. They brought out the best in each other – and also the worst. So yes, Oliver was very hard on your Mom. But only because he cared.”

“Is that supposed to buy him some credit in my eyes or something? Maybe change my opinion about him by drawing parallels between him and my Mom?” Mia had grumbled obstinately, not liking the target of her rage being humanized.

“No. I know better than to expect you to stop hating him,” Felicity had softly replied, eyes shimmering with unshed tears. “God knows you have a right to your feelings. But I have a right to mine, too, Mia. He was my husband and I still love him. So where he is concerned, we’re just gonna have to agree to disagree if we’re gonna keep working together. Deal?”

Felicity then extended her hand, all of that softness gone, and it was then Mia finally, irrevocably divorced her admiration Felicity Smoak from her loathing of Oliver Queen. The point that was trying to be made, however, fell short of making any lasting impact. For her mother to have fought so hard to overcome a shitty life, to have worked so hard for redemption, and to have finally achieved a measure of genuine happiness in this world only to have it crushed under the colossal weight of Lex Corps’ Star City offices was the ultimate ‘fuck you’ from the universe. That Oliver Queen could have prevented that tragedy by displaying a smidgen of the situational awareness he was so famous for made him the guilty party in an injustice that is a fiery hot coal burning incessantly inside Mia’s chest. For Felicity’s sake, she spoke of Oliver almost dispassionately, but the rage never departed from her heart. Nor will it when her mother is dead and can never be avenged. Oliver’s shocking disappearance less than a year later forever eliminated that possibility.

Brooding upon her mother’s final excruciating moments as that building came down around her, Mia feels the circuit of her self-control short out. In a pique of arcing fury, she vocalizes her fury as she viciously kicks the offensive chair whose occupant symbolizes everything she hates, sending it tumbling across the room toward the central platform. She pointedly ignores Connor’s brow furrowing with disapproval over the disrespectful outburst. Team Arrow are still his idols, having lost none of their shine as she has slowly spoon-fed him the unfiltered truth behind their demise.

The idealistic fool will never believe they were anything but picture perfect superheroes like he reads about in his stupid comics.

Fetching the flask out of her back pocket, anger spent for now, Mia brandishes it in the direction of the Green Arrow’s seat, now turned on its side several feet away. “May Oliver Queen burn in hell for the rest of eternity. Amen.” To punctuate her bitter comment, she unscrews the top then takes a hearty swig.

“Didn’t anybody teach you respect for the dead, little girl?”

Mia swirls in place toward the direction the voice emanated from. A voice she needs no visual confirmation to identify. It’s one she would recognize anywhere seeing as she’s heard it a million times on the documentary she painstakingly dug up from the old Star City Library’s archives. The voice of a woman she hates – and in a sense even more than Oliver Queen. For whereas Oliver was ultimately responsible for so much general death and pain and grief, this woman is her own personal villain.

Dinah Drake.

The name alone reignites Mia’s unruly temper. Fists tightening until her knuckles pop, she searches the perimeter of the ruins until her keen eyes spot something moving within the shadows next to one of Felicity Smoak’s custom built server arrays. A moment later a familiar form emerges from the inky darkness. On instinct, her knees unlock and her legs spread into a proper fighting platform.

“I have plenty of respect for the ones that deserve it,” she finally replies, caustic bitterness seeping into her tone as it always does around the Black Canary. “And I’m far from a little girl. Ask the two hundred thirty pound meathead I knocked out cold a couple hours ago. If he can even answer through a broken jaw, that is.”

Dinah chuckles tauntingly as she departs the comfortable seclusion of the shadows. Draped in leather, she cuts a striking figure, still in peak fighting shape and hauntingly beautiful even in her early fifties. The stark red line scored across her throat is a reminder to Mia of the harrowing events, described in excruciating detail by an incredibly drunken Felicity, that precipitated her parents falling in love. A gift from the Star City Slayer that robbed the Canary of her supernatural song.

Pity for Dinah wells up from somewhere deep inside, and Mia rushes to strangle it with a ruthlessness that has served her so well in the fighting cages. Losing her powers must have been devastating to Dinah, and yet it was no less than she deserved if only for the unforgivable betrayals she committed against her own flesh and blood several years later.

“I would, but I have a feeling they’d tell me what I already know,” says Dinah, slowly sauntering toward the two youths trespassing on what is to her hallowed ground, a lair where some of her best memories were made.

This is the place where she learned how to be more than a public servant, more than a citizen, more than a soldier, more than an irrationally angry woman hellbent on revenge. It was here she learned how to be a hero. Had she never met Oliver, never become the Black Canary, her life would be so much more meaningless. The path she was heading down would have ultimately led either to one of three infamous dungeons constructed solely to imprison metas or to a premature, and very likely horrific, death.

It was Oliver who pulled her out of the pit of rage and self-loathing she crawled into after Vinny’s death by reminding her what honor means, and just in time too as she had very nearly lost all concept of it in pursuit of vengeance. He then trained her, taught her to fight against foes of a skill tier she could not have dreamed of facing as a lowly vice detective, gave her a purpose greater than herself, made her believe in herself again, and in doing so not only save her life but her immortal spirit. Without him, she would be nothing, would be a nameless number in a dark hole or a pile of rotting bones six feet beneath the earth.

And yet here she is, still struggling to preserve the soul of the city Oliver so loved and dedicated himself to. For what purpose? So many have asked her that question. The answer is that she owes him that and so much more, because not only did he save her, but he also introduced her to her chosen family for whom she would gladly lay down her life and indirectly brought the love of her life into her orbit. On days when it is nearly impossible to even crawl out of bed for the despair that hangs over her like an oppressive pall, she can draw upon the best memories of the happiest days of her life with her friends and her spouse, which never would have happened had Oliver not taken such an enormous risk on her. That is why no one speaks ill of him without provoking her wrath. Especially not an acerbic, broody, sarcastic street urchin like this.

As always around the girl whose name she was told is Maya, her attention never strays far as she moves in closer. Offended as she is by the intrusion upon this sacred space and as upset as she is about the girl’s heartless disparagement toward a man she still admires above all others, there is something about her that intrigues Dinah. And frightens her. There is a violence in those brilliant green eyes that reminds Dinah of someone else, of another blonde who loved to argue and throw punches nearly as much as she loved to breathe.

Having observed the girl in the illegal fighting pits, Dinah stops a stone’s throw away, eyeing her potential opponent critically. Not many since Oliver disappeared have earned her respect for their wild tenacity and breathtaking skill in combat, but this girl is one of them. The efficient brutality she witnessed in the cages was beyond impressive, especially for someone so young.

“You’re a great fighter in the ring,” she then finishes her point, “but a moody, irritating brat on the outside.”

“The vaunted Black Canary,” Mia replies, lids narrowing as her blood begins to boil. “So quick to judge those you don’t know. If I were you I’d be more careful. Somebody might get wise and finally call you out on your hypocrisy.”

Dinah rolls her eyes and scoffs, suddenly glad that William and Zoe are elsewhere so they are not exposed to this...unfounded vitriol. “Oh, that’s rich. How, pray tell, am I the hypocrite when you are doing precisely what you just now condemned me for?” When no response is given, Dinah barks out a derisive laugh. “What’s the matter, little girl. Cat got your tongue? Or are you all bark and no bite when faced with a harsh truth from one of your betters.”

Considering what this woman has done, that statement is an absurd joke so far as Mia is concerned. “Ha! I know two-bit sleaze bags who are better and more honorable than you.”

Something pricks at the back of Dinah’s mind, the same place that tickles when she was closing in on cracking a case that had driven her crazy for weeks or longer. A mystery is unraveling right before her eyes, puzzle pieces are being hectically slotted together by her deduction-oriented gray matter, but as of yet she cannot make sense of what revelation her subconscious is trying to convey.

Dinah crosses her arms over her chest, feeling unsettled and defensive all of the sudden. “Now that’s a claim I’m going to have to insist you back up. Which sleazebags in particular are you referring to? I’ve encountered my fair share.”

“Nobody you’d know...” Mia trails off, not having expected to be called out and not liking having the tables turned on her by someone with whom she has an intensely personal beef.

“Really? Sounds to me like you’re talking out of your ass, little girl,” Dinah growls, clearly on the edge of losing her patience.

“I told you to stop calling me that!”

“I will when you stop acting like one. Or you stop me. Either way is fine with me, Little Girl.”

Incensed by the bald provocation, Mia surges toward Dinah, intent on unloading a decade’s worth of anguish and blame. Fortunately for the Black Canary, Connor intercepts Mia before she can reach her target and holds her back as she angrily resists despite knowing her efforts to be futile. Connor is freakishly strong and knows all of her moves. There will be no getting out of his iron grip. Eventually she tires of trying to break free and reels away, steaming.

Muscles tense on the edge of snapping, panting for breath, eyes wild, she paces for a moment like a caged, starving tiger who is being taunted by a juicy slab of meat. That burning sensation in the back of her throat that has been present since she can remember whenever she is agitated flares up with a vengeance. The pressure building up inside her chest and throat is so terrific it takes every ounce of her willpower not to scream to the top of her lungs in a desperate bid for relief.

Instead of giving in to that impulse, she funnels her agitation into her go-to coping mechanism when violence is not appropriate. Whirling back around, she points at Dinah, unbridled rancor fueling her movements as much as her words.

“You know what? Fuck you. Just...fuck you! You’re nothing but a spineless coward. A failure. A traitor to your own kin! A worthless piece of shit only fit to be scraped off the soles of my boots. A heartless bitch who pretends to be so righteous and perfect and selfless when you are anything but. You’re a fraud, and a liar, and I hate you more than you’ll ever know!”

Brows arched as high as they will go, Dinah endures the tirade with barely concealed irritation. “All of these baseless accusations and not a single shred of proof as to their veracity. Sling pejoratives at me all you want, but all I’m hearing right now is the insufferable whining of a kid who thinks she knows how the world works but hasn’t a clue.”

“Oh, I know plenty,” Mia bites back, her control slipping again, and with it her will to withhold knowledge that will hurt Dinah more keenly than the sting of any weapon. “I know that I spent almost half of my life being abused and the other half chasing down ghosts all because of you. I know that I’m not the only one who wouldn’t piss on you if you were on fire because it is your fault that everything I have loved has been taken away from me, beginning with my birth mother. If only Aunt Sara were here, she’d...”

“Mia...” The tall, hulking boy who looks vaguely familiar shoots a pleading glances for his tiny companion to power down the vitriol. Sadly, as Dinah figured it would, his plea goes unheeded.

Too far gone to heed his warning, Mia barrels along under a full head of steam. “No, Connor! This self-righteous bitch needs to know that she isn’t the paragon of virtue she believes she is. How could anyone delude themselves like she has and call themselves a hero? A real hero would love and take care of her only child instead of tossing her away like a piece of fucking garbage!” Accusing green eyes pin a reeling Dinah down. “I mean, isn’t that exactly what you did?” When Dinah reels back, blanching, eyes blown comically wide, Mia shoots her a vicious, victorious sneer. “C’mon now. No need to deny it. We both know what you did to your daughter.”

Shocked to the depths of her soul, Dinah grapples to understand what the hell is going on. “What? How do you…? Who told you that?”

The spluttering response is indicative of her bone-deep confusion. There are very few people living who are aware she had a child, none of whom – or so she thought – were privy to the fact her baby did not die, but was in fact taken away from her and then put up for adoption because she was guilty as charged: a failure of a mother.

When her fiancee died, Dinah essentially much lost her mind. In a repeat of the aftermath of Vince’s death – only exponentially worse – she alternated immersing herself head first into whatever cheap form of liquor she could get her hands on until she passed out with needlessly picking fights. Most of those physical altercations were with bad guys twice her size that she took on without backup, and that many of them wound up hospitalized after she was done with them was of no concern to her. All she cared about was numbing the pain however and whenever she could.

Such reckless, disturbing behavior was not conducive to caring for an eleven month old baby girl. Which is why Dinah didn’t put up a fight when Rene took her daughter away from her in the middle of one of her vilest binges. Nor did she rail at Felicity for helping Rene find her baby new parents they both insisted were more than capable of providing the stable, loving home she could not. Instead of sobering up like she should have to fight for her daughter, she just sat at home, more miserable than ever, and drowned herself in Jack Daniels and tears. At the time, she was too far gone to do much else.

It took five long years for Dinah to crawl out of the lonely, filthy hole of withering depression and borderline madness she dug for herself. Even though she felt unworthy to reclaim a spot in her daughter’s life, she tried to track her down only to find all traces of the couple who adopted her were erased from the system. Not even Felicity with the full might of her gigantic server farm at Smoak Tech could track down her baby girl. Heartbroken all over again and so ashamed she could hardly stand to look at herself in a mirror, Dinah focused all of her energies on carrying on Oliver’s mission to save Star City, hoping in time the fickle whims of fortune might swing in her direction one last time. Only it never has.

Though Dinah has spent more time and money than is reasonable in the pursuit, she never located her daughter. And the shame of what she did to lose the sole surviving fruit of a love she thought could not possibly exist is still as fresh as the day she woke up in rehab. Sober for the first time in half a decade, she finally realize the depth to which she had descended to have so criminally neglected the last piece of her lost love that her friends felt it necessary to intervene lest a truly appalling tragedy occur.

Alone, and destitute, she had to rebuild her life from the ground up. So that’s what she did. It was only much later that she reconnected with a grown up Zoe, who she took under her wing and trained as her replacement. In a lot of ways, Zoe was a balm upon the wound that was her missing daughter. Were it not for Zoe’s faith and trust and affection, Dinah isn’t sure where she would be right now. All of her friends cut her off as she neared the terminal point of her self-destructive spiral. Sometimes it feels like Zoe is the only person in the world who still gives a damn about her. Not that she deserves even that much considering what she did to her own flesh and blood.

Regardless of how Felicity and Rene’s opinions of her, she had believed her secret was safe with them. Hate her as they may, they both loved her baby girl, and neither of them have ever hinted at indulging temptation to expose her most damning trespass. But apparently she was wrong.

“Who told me that?” Mia asks, tone taunting. “The question you should be asking is about my birth name. Maya Blackstar, I am not. Now that you’ve heard my real first name now thanks to Connor here, what comes after Mia? Care to wager a guess?” Silence is her only answer. “Oh, c’mon. How can you not know who I am? Felicity recognized me within ten seconds of meeting me outside Smoak Tech.”

Dinah’s heart stutters then constricts until pain lances through her chest. A piercing chill races up the length of her body as she connects the dots laid out plainly before her. The age is all wrong. But everything else is screaming out an identity that should be by any natural explanation impossible. The hair color. The eye color. The cut of Mia’s jawline and nose and brow. The shape of her lips and eyes. The way she moves when she fights in the cages. Her elegant savagery. Her insatiable rage. All that is missing is the sonic scream that could never have manifested thanks to Cisco and Felicity’s meta suppression implant.

Suddenly all Dinah can see is an image she has, for the sake of her mental health, unsuccessfully attempted to forget. A tall, svelte woman arrayed in a sleek black leather uniform, curve-hugging top with dual knee-length coattails attached to the hemline over top tight booty shorts, suggestive fishnets, and fancy knee-high heeled boots. A black choker wrapped around an elegant throat. Side-swept blonde hair tumbling down over shapely shoulders. Black painted lips curled up into an insufferably smug smirk, golden septum ring glinting in the moonlight. Not for the first time even today, Laurel Lance stands straight and proud in her mind’s eye. Vibrant and alive. Menacing and so terribly beautiful that Dinah would cry if she were safe within the secluded confines of her apartment.

Juxtaposed with the youth before her, it’s so easy to see the resemblance now. All she has to do is mentally place Mia in Laurel’s wardrobe, arrange them shoulder-to-shoulder beside herself in front of a mirror, and the awful truth dawns like a solemn bell sounding an alarm over a town previously ignorant to the impending catastrophe lurking on the fringes.

It can’t be. Can it? There’s just no way it’s her. I mean, it’s impossible because she is way too old. My Mia would only be eleven right now – err, wait. Didn’t she say something about The Waverider and her Aunt Sara. Oh, fuck! But surely Sara would have told me if Mia was with her. And if not her, than Felicity surely would have when they met. Wouldn't they?

The answer to that last question is self-evident. Sara would not have contacted Dinah because she never forgave her for Laurel’s death – and rightly so when Dinah never forgave herself. It was supposed to be her backing Oliver up that night, not Laurel. But she’d been too tired having stayed up half the night with a feverish, grumpy baby and Laurel had so sweetly volunteered to cover with Team Arrow that she simply couldn’t say no. So she fell asleep on the couch with Mia laid across her chest while her wife of four years was being eradicated from existence by Lex Luthor, the great betrayer of the human race.

At the funeral, Sara would not meet Dinah’s eyes except to convey a seething condemnation that was as present in her gaze as it was in the clenching of her jaw and the balling of her fists. And when Sara learned about Rene and Felicity taking Mia away? Well, to say that confrontation got ugly would be like saying a monsoon brought a little rain. The only reason Sara didn’t kill Dinah that night was Ava discovering her long time partner’s deadly intentions and arriving in the nick of time to stop the carnage. When Sara was finally dragged off, Dinah was a writhing mess of blood and pain who could only listen, and sob miserably, as her sister-in-law passed sentence upon her like she was a target of the League.

“You’re lucky Ava knows me so well and that I love her too much to do something she would hate me for,” Sara had said, fists raw and bloodied, all coiled up venom and hatred. “But if I ever see your face again, even she won’t be able to stop me from finishing the job.”

For obvious reasons, they haven’t spoken since.

As for Felicity...Dinah was not the only one to lose a spouse during the horrific year retroactively dubbed as The Long Twilight. Oliver’s disappearance, and presumed death, followed by a stress-induced miscarriage forever quenched Felicity’s light. The bright, overly excitable, adorably nerdy chatterbox she was proud to call her friend quickly devolved into an intensely pessimistic, highly unstable genius who used her amazing brain to do awful things. Whereas Dinah coped through measured violence and the bottle, Felicity submersed herself into building an empire and using the immense resources she accrued to punish the world around her for the pain she could not escape. It was inevitable that their divergent paths meant they drifted apart and that their friendship, like nearly every one of Dinah’s relationships since The Long Twilight, withered on the poisoned vine and died.

The last she heard from Felicity was a bewildering message which cryptically stated: “Don’t believe the narrative that’s being fed to us. Some things are not what they seem. Up can be down and lost can be found. Just have to find the key.” Two days later the news rolled in that Felicity Smoak was found murdered in her office at Smoak Tech.

So yes, it is entirely possible that Felicity, perhaps even in cahoots with Sara, kept this colossal secret. And why shouldn’t she? It wasn’t like Dinah ever attempted to reach out and span the yawning chasm of distrust between them. She’d been too proud as of yet to grovel and equally reluctant to find out how the new, frightfully hostile Felicity might react to any peaceful overtures.

As reality sinks in as to what that cowardice might have cost her, she also begins to accept what she’s being told, and the shock she had felt moments before rapidly becomes an unbearable mix of emotions. Eyes stinging with salty tears, the name she heard less than a minute ago escapes her lips with little more than a shaky breath.

“Mia…?”

An almost euphoric grin spreads across Mia’s lips as she watches the Black Canary, that paragon of strength and nobility, unravel into a weak, vulnerable, uncertain woman whose entire world has just been upended. She hadn’t planned on spilling the beans so soon, having preferred to stretch out the torment over weeks or months; but now that the truth has come out she can’t deny how sweet it is to observe the horror and shame playing across her mother’s face. Her other mother, that is.

When Mia turned thirteen, her Aunt Sara sat her down to explain her unusual parentage. As the details were laid out, she at first wondered if a mistake was made. How could two women be her biological parents? Perhaps, she thought, she had been the result of artificial reproductive techniques like In Vitro or sperm donation. Come to find out there is technology belonging to an alien – one whom all of Team Arrow, including her parents, had befriended – from another Earth capable of enabling same sex couples to biologically reproduce. Her aunt called it a Genesis Chamber. Said that her parents were honored to be one of a few select human couples permitted to utilize the facility. Something called a Kelex reportedly determined their potential offspring to be highly beneficial to human evolution due to their unique meta DNA. That, and their saving the life of a very important woman named Alex Danvers indebted the vessel’s rightful owners to them.

Whatever the case behind her conception, Mia was just happy to know that there was a time she was actually wanted by her birth parents. Loved even if Felicity was any reliable narrator of the past. But then she found out about Laurel, her birth mother, dying to save Oliver’s life, and how her other mother Dinah essentially checked out on their helpless baby due to grief. She was also informed that a man named Rene took her away from Dinah one rainy night in September when he checked in on his friend only to find her in an alcohol induced coma while Mia was screaming her head off in her playpen having been neglected for who knows how many hours. Five years later Dinah got sober, but by then Mia was already absent from Earth-1, having been rescued from an abusive home by her beloved Aunt Sara.

Needless to say pretty much the only thing she feels for Dinah is disgust.

“That’s it,” Mia says, relishing Dinah’s pain, needing to witness more to assuage the years of hurt and anger that have accumulated toward her only living immediate blood relative. “Say it. Say my name. That useless old book was right about one thing: the truth will set you free.”

Dinah is so shell-shocked, so devastated, so dangerously hopeful that her entire body trembles. This is the moment she’s been waiting for. And dreading. After being separated from her baby girl for so long, to have her right here within arm’s reach is a dream come true. At the same time it is a nightmare from which she doesn’t think she’ll ever awaken. Because the young lady before her is so deeply resentful, having been traumatized and abused by her adoptive family and then raised on a time ship with a bunch of morally gray misfits instead of the warmth of loving home with her parents, all the while believing she was unwanted by her own mother.

This girl – this haunted, hateful, beautiful girl – is her daughter, the only tangible proof remaining that Laurel was real and their love was extraordinarily special. And she hates Dinah. It’s enough to rend in twain what remains of Dinah’s shredded heart.

“Oh, God.” Dinah chokes down a sob, eyes now watering past the ability of her lids and lashes to contain the tears of joy and grief. “Mia. Is it really you? Is it...”

“I said, say my name!”

Mia’s explosive demand startles Dinah to such a degree she physically flinches. “Your name…” she trails off, draws in a shaky breath before recovering a modicum of composure. Time to stop feeling sorry for yourself. Buck up. Put on a strong front. Be the mother you should have been all those years ago. Shoulders straightening, she bravely and resolutely meets Mia’s eyes. “Your name is Mia Deardon Lance.”

So named Mia for Dinah’s beloved Nana and Deardon because Laurel had made an oath to her Oliver their firstborn daughter would somehow honor the distinguished but fiercely loving woman who was much Laurel’s mother as his. There hadn’t been a single argument about their respective choices, a rarity in their...occasionally contentious relationship. Dinah has never felt and never saw Laurel more proud than when she announced their newborn daughter’s name to their loved ones who had just spent eleven hours in a waiting room and yet were so effusively happy that they could scarcely contain themselves. Mia is their greatest accomplishment, and however much Dinah failed her that remains an indisputable fact.

“And there we have it. The awful, terrible truth. Isn’t it just wonderful?” Mia says, feeling the weight of a lifetime belonging to no one rescind from her shoulders. She has a mother now. If only that mother was Laurel instead. Stepping forward into Dinah’s personal space, she smirks as she goes in for the kill. “Hi, Mom. I’d say it’s nice to meet you, but that would be a lie.”

#arrow fanfic #dinahsiren #dinah drake #laurel lance #black siren #black canary #dinah x laurel

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