#tool of the government who never questions what shes been conditioned in and who | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

michi-enthuaist · 2 years

Text

For us, its a given.

- michinaib, swap AU!

Summary; for someone as the veteran looks at the geishas black eyes he only saw a starved black and white cat that want their owner for affection, he will give her that affection.

Warnings applied as Yandere themes, Possible Manipulation, Possible gaslight, Guilt trip and wandered things. [part 1, part 2]

| RUSHED! |

General Naib, a reputable commander in battle even without him the war couldn't have ended only going for eternity until the country has fallen to the ground. And now in the second war, he was put in, squished between enemy frontlines and the border of his country he swore to protect his friends, or perhaps he could call them comrades was right behind him. Helping those who needed first aid or assistance in healing their wounds, he sat down harshly as the rifle in his hand started to hurt his skin. He can't push the battalion forward any longer or it's a guaranteed loss for them, he should have stayed there, waiting for the right time to strike and command to advance. But with a push by his kin as the pain in his abdomen, reality hit him hard. He was sacrificed. To be a meat shield by someone he called a 'friend'.

As he heard the last words that were said by a said friend ' sorry commander, but orders are orders from the higher-ups.' he was only a tool for them, nothing else, and nothing more than a tool for war and victory. The government never cared for him or anyone involved, they were just little pawns for play, a play that is what it is for them, a neverending tragedy that is a play for fun and entertainment for those noble beings.

As his vision started to turn black and turn into many bodies that have fallen into the ghoul-filled soil, he had one wish that is

" I will end you all. "

That was his wish, to end the corrupted entity that is the government. He clenched his fist before his soul left his body and went still, cold as Russia's winter, as the autumn wind had to stop its tracks as he see around his surroundings. He thought that he have been in the afterlife but no, the time has stopped itself, he could move his hand and head. Confusion filled his mind, he stood on his legs to see what was happening. Trees covered in white seemed like snow, and the soil that had been littered with dead friends and people was replaced by white snow. This seems like one of his memories, where he would run around the winter as a child making a snowman with his mother. It's such a sweet memory, even bringing some sort of nostalgia into his mind although this may be a memory, why show him? What's the point if his dead? That's his question nothing more nothing less.

Until he heard a voice, a voice so calming that it drives him towards it, wanting to know who it is and what was causing such light to his mind. But what if it's a trick? He stopped in his tracks and looked around once again, it was still the same and the voice is still there. "..maybe it's for the best" somehow he knew what he was up for, for some reason he felt it. So he got closer until his vision went white and awoke in a bed that wasn't his. It was too rusty and almost quite elegant from its condition, he look down at his arms and his abdomen. I'm there was a red hole not too deep or too small, just big enough to be noticeable and it's obvious outright lines spreading out. Taking off the blanket that was laid softly on top of his figure the commander look around for something quite reflective enough to see his face. Opening a make-up drawer that seemed to have a small hand mirror, nothing much changed except he looked more tired than a normal human being could be.

Touching his eyebags, chin, and even forehead swiping the sweat that he realized beginning to drop down his facade "aren't I ...dead?" he asked himself before hearing a creak at the door, a masked woman it seems that resemble a crow due to how she dressed. "it seems you have awakened from your slumber. rather than that. We've been expecting you, Mr.subedar" we? So there are more people than himself, people who are the same as him? Well, maybe not in terms of background but rather in the situation.

that what he only remembered, after all that it was all a blur. He knew he have hunted those who wanted the manors prize, but really what is it? Even the hunters have different views of the so called prize.

"immortality.."

"revenge..."

"a new reality..."

"fame..."

Those were the words of his acquaintances, theyre arent his comrades. Only for each others use and goals, not even bothering to get to know them even.. The matches always ended up as a loss or a tie to him at the start but as he gotten used to the survivors behavior and patterns, he was able to get a winning streak. 6 wins in a row, he wasnt proud nor he had any pride in thus achievement. It seem like a small reward to him, what really interest him was a survivor. It wasnt on purpose, it was an accident that wasnt supposed to happend in the dining room. Four new survivors have joined the game, a violinist, a photographer, a queen and finally a geisha. He didnt expect a geisha of all things would join the game, but everyone has desires so he doesnt bother, but seeing her. Obsidian hair, black eyes, and her reserve nature, it all seem like a dream, a deity. He felt something shaken inside him, like his cold heart began opening again and welcoming this new warm and smooth feeling like its nothing.

He stopped and stare at her when he gotten into a match with her, he doesnt try to track her down and chair her instead he does it to her team, sometimes its a tie or a loss. It confuses his acquintances quite well, they all tried asking him if he have fallen for the woman but he simply declined and say he may have not seen her trail. that was quickly proven false as he walk past her with chasing the violinist. He want to get to know her, interests, hobbies, likes, dislikes, and her life before the manor. So much stories they could tell each other and so much stories they could make themselves.

" excuse me.."

" ..hm?..."

He confronted her after a match with another team, fully confident with having a conversation. His heart started to warm, maybe too warm for comfort as he indulge in her presence and voice, its like a goddess talking to him face to face. Gracing her presence for him. He always talked to her, calling her 'My lady' or 'Madam' its a nickname for her only be used by him only.

He hold his feelings deep inside and at the bottom ofhis heart, he tried his very hardest not to fall so hard for this woman. Hearing her calling him 'Mercenary' or 'Colonel'.. He cant help but blush a little at the little name he have been given to him, he did tell her his real name after awhile but insisted that she used the name she have given him instead. He didnt want to be called by that name yet, not now.

A bouquet of carnations held tightly on his arm, he begged the gardener to pick them for this occasion. He doesnt want to ruin it early and he doesnt want to be too late for this event, its special becouse today was the day he was going to confess to her. Today was the day, he waa going to make sure of that. But seeing her alone with the photographer under the moonlight with one on their knees confronting her? no, No, No, NO!. It was supposed to be HIM and HER. Not this vermin touching his lady. He was ready to rip that face apart and crush their skull until a sentence broke out.

" sorry, joseph but... I love someone else."

It was one sided, he was glad. He release his grip that he recent realized when he felt a liquid dripping from his palm. Blood, his blood. Fuck.

The photographer got back to their standing position as he took the rejection lightly

"i understand michiko, can we still be friends if so?'

She accepted and bowed to her, taking his leave. It left a hole in his heart but he understand her feelings for another man and he have to move on. The door creaked close as it only left two people, one in wide view and one in hiding. He was quiet becouse he doesnt know the right time or the wrong time to confess now to her.

"you can go out now naib.."

Maybe, he got cought red handed. A huff came from his mouth as he got out of the large pillar he have been behind this whole time listening to their conversation. His hand staining the bouquets paper with his blood, awkwardly giving it to her.

"is this the wrong time to confess, my lady?.."

"..n-no its just... Unexpected. I didnt took you for someone to fallen inlove.."

"so, will you accept me to be your soldier?"

She frozed, taking the bouquet as the thought lingers throughout her mind and brain. The silence were suffocating that he didnt realized he was holding his breath for awhile until a word were spoken.

"i will..."

He got accepted... bY her!

Now, this is the beginning of something that she shouldnt have accepted

#Yandere idv #Michinaib #Michikoxnaib #Naibsubedar #Writing #Yanderepair #Yandere

1 note · View note

sa7abnews · 1 month

Text

Morning Glory: Kamala Harris is not ready to be president

New Post has been published on https://sa7ab.info/2024/08/16/morning-glory-kamala-harris-is-not-ready-to-be-president/

Morning Glory: Kamala Harris is not ready to be president

Former President Trump has a record of doing the many jobs involved in being president. COVID obscured his many achievements, especially with an inflation-free period of economic growth, but his record is still there. We know how he will govern and we know he now has experience with selecting senior officials. While he is never predictable in persona or postings, his legislative agenda will be a continuation of his first term: renewal of his tax cuts, a defense build-up to deter our enemies abroad, support for our allies especially Israel, a huge push for energy production and deregulation and, hopefully, massive downsizing of the size and reach of the federal government. By contrast, Vice President Harris does not possess the minimum skills set necessary to be president. To borrow from the jargon of baseball, which highly prizes “a five tool player” or even a “five tool prospect,” the vice president unfortunately lacks any of the tools needed to be even a minimally qualified president. She’s a “zero tools” political player. The 5 “tools” in baseball are (1) hitting for power; (2) hitting for average 3) fielding ability 4) throwing ability and 5) running speed. A list of presidential tools is considerably longer but would include (1) great ability to absorb complex data sets and intelligence information and make hard decisions on difficult issues; (2) deep experience in national security issues; (3) deep experience in the federal administrative state (not familiarity with the mission of all 2.8 million non-military employees of the federal government, of course, but facility in the discussion and assessment of the hundreds of agencies in the executive branch which all answer to the president and which are guided by his or her appointees); (4) the ability to communicate with the American people via a variety of means, but especially the set-piece big speech designed to convey important decisions or choices and regular interviews and press availabilities and (5) the political skills of negotiation and compromise, both within a president’s own party but also across the aisle and with the governors of states and territories and of course other nations, both friends and enemies. Harris is eligible for the office of President to be sure. She is old enough and born in the U.S. We also know she has passed the California Bar Exam after graduating from Hastings Law School following her undergraduate education at Howard University. Harris failed the first time she sat for the Bar but that does not signify much. It is not typical of talented lawyers that they fail their first Bar, but it’s also not unheard of. In a New York Times 2016 profile Harris had recently consoled a young law student who also failed the test, telling her: “It’s not a measure of your capacity.” Actually it is evidence sufficient to lose some young would-be lawyers their jobs which are often given on the condition of taking and passing a state’s Bar Exam, but it’s not dispositive on the question of legal ability. You can retake the Bar as Harris did and she passed on the second go around.CLICK HERE FOR MORE FOX NEWS OPINIONHarris’s career as an assistant district attorney in San Francisco is already a talking point in her stump speech, as was her time as the Attorney General of California and brief stay in the United States Senate. There are hundreds of thousands of current and former assistant district attorneys in the United States and some are brilliant and others are dumb as rocks. There are scores and scores of former and current state AGs and United States Senators. Those titles don’t tell us much. What has she done? What did she accomplish? What does she think needs to be done by the Congress? What is her agenda?She has been a loyal if bumbling number two to an increasingly frail president whose capacity to do the job is a question on the mind of everyone paying attention. It should also be on every voter’s mind: Is Harris up to this job? KAMALA’S GLOWING TIME COVER DRAGGED BY CRITICSIn answering that, we have zero interviews of Harris since Biden withdrew more than three weeks ago. We only have hours of cringe-inducing tape from decades in the public eye. It is her tenure as Vice President that should matter the most to voters, and neither she nor the president she served has accomplished anything of lasting positive significance. They spent a vast amount of money the country didn’t have on projects that have not come to fruition. That spending unleashed ruinous inflation. They failed to secure our southern border and more than 10 million migrants have crossed it without invitation since Biden and Harris assumed office. Their record on national security is awful and the support originally offered to Israel after the massacre of 10/7 waxed and since last year has steadily waned. The influence of America on the world has never been this low. The resume of actual accomplishments by Harris isn’t there and the record that is there is terrible. If the country chose its chief executive randomly out of one of many “hats” marked only by vocation, I would pick from the hat labeled “president of local or regional bank” or “successful principal of a large high school” and—crucially—”successful real estate developer” over the bag marked “local prosecutor” any day. I would especially do so if informed that the “local assistant DA” bag only included folks who had flunked their first Bar. Nor does election to any local or statewide office in California signify much beyond the backing of large public employee unions, for those unions in fact run the politics of the state now and have for more than a dozen years. Harris won the election to be San Francisco’s District Attorney in 2004. She then ran for and won the California Attorney General job in 2010 and again in 2014, and won a United States Senate race in 2016. Of course she was on the ticket with President Biden in 2020. She’s a standard-issue left-wing pol from the most left-wing city in America. All we have to judge Vice President Harris’s ability to be president by are her hundreds of votes, interviews and statements over an electoral career now approaching two decades. She hasn’t won a single presidential primary or caucus—ever. If you lived in California you already knew that Harris was never going to impress with eloquence or ability. Harris is the product of the San Francisco Democratic machine which competes, usually successfully, with the Los Angeles Democratic machine. Harris paid her dues in San Francisco and she rose in predictable fashion. When President Joe Biden picked Harris as his running mate in 2020 he did so because he had promised to name a black woman as his running mate. Biden, whose judgment is no longer even debated, chose badly and we have Harris’s record as “border tsar” as the single point of assessment, the single certain role she has held under President Biden. Of course she failed there —which is why we have the elaborate ruse of a border bill talking point. To cover up her actual record as President Biden’s lead on all border issues. She has had no other high-profile designated role. Kamala Harris would be the least credentialed, least impressive and least prepared presidential candidate elected in the modern era. It’s impossible to imagine the damage her policies and personnel would do because they would be so far to the left of anything the country has ever experienced. Her campaign of invisibility is brilliant, but if it succeeds, the country is in for a terrible four years until she can be replaced. The legacy media has gone along with 23 days of silence. How long will it remain complicit?Hugh Hewitt is host of “The Hugh Hewitt Show,” heard weekday mornings 6am to 9am ET on the Salem Radio Network, and simulcast on Salem News Channel. Hugh wakes up America on over 400 affiliates nationwide, and on all the streaming platforms where SNC can be seen. He is a frequent guest on the Fox News Channel’s news roundtable hosted by Bret Baier weekdays at 6pm ET. A son of Ohio and a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Michigan Law School, Hewitt has been a Professor of Law at Chapman University’s Fowler School of Law since 1996 where he teaches Constitutional Law. Hewitt launched his eponymous radio show from Los Angeles in 1990. Hewitt has frequently appeared on every major national news television network, hosted television shows for PBS and MSNBC, written for every major American paper, has authored a dozen books and moderated a score of Republican candidate debates, most recently the November 2023 Republican presidential debate in Miami and four Republican presidential debates in the 2015-16 cycle. Hewitt focuses his radio show and his column on the Constitution, national security, American politics and the Cleveland Browns and Guardians. Hewitt has interviewed tens of thousands of guests from Democrats Hillary Clinton and John Kerry to Republican Presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump over his 40 years in broadcast, and this column previews the lead story that will drive his radio/ TV show today.CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM HUGH HEWITT

#a0e5e1d8-7782-5e26-8909-978a8486fa25

0 notes

gothicprep · 3 years

Text

Meditations on True Crime: A Very Long Post

In around February of this year, I was researching a potential video related to how true crime media portrays websleuths, contrasted against their efficacy in each specific case. The introduction was a brief primer on the genre’s evolution, beginning with its general association with low-budget LifeTime films, to a hobby with more dignity than that. I remember finding an article talking about Serial, and there was some commentary in there from another large true crime podcast host.

I didn’t think it was particularly useful for my purposes, but it said something to the effect of “true crime as a hobby can help women reconcile the trauma related to being in a world that is so hostile to us.” I rolled my eyes at it. It seemed dishonestly saccharine, like it was giving a sort of post-hoc legitimacy to just enjoying whodunnits. I didn’t think about it again for around seven months after I’d read it.

One of the subjects that I intended to talk about was Elisa Lam’s death and the online reaction to it. The story was adapted into a Netflix series a few months prior, and I was freshly reminded of how poorly it all sat with me. If you aren’t familiar with her name, she disappeared in Los Angeles’s Cecil Hotel in 2013, and her disappearance went viral after the respective police department release footage of her behaving strangely in an elevator. The case attained quick viral status and extensive discussion, due to the nature of the video and the hotel’s morbid history. When her naked body was discovered in a rooftop water tank a few weeks later, speculation exploded. But an autopsy isn’t an immediate followup, and the online sleuths would lose themselves to their imaginations in the time between. Many people wanted the murder solved, but many let their speculation fly off the rails. Shady hotel coverups. Metal musician murderers. Fear of the homeless. Ghosts. Demons. Government tuberculosis research. The gang was all there.

If you weren’t active online back then, it’s difficult to properly convey how huge this all was. Everyone was expecting Elisa to have been murdered. Iron-clad. Beyond the shadow of a doubt. She wasn’t. Her death was ruled an accident. She had a severe case of bipolar disorder and she wasn’t taking her medication. The severity of her illness was also not previously disclosed to the public. The working theory is that she experienced a manic episode with psychotic features, climbed in the tank in this state, to eventually strip out of her clothes in late stage hypothermia and drown there. It’s a horrific and painful way to die. All that’s left of you is water contamination – insult to fatal injury.

People weren’t happy with this, but not out of any sympathy for Elisa. There was palpable rage from many who had been following the case. No, she was definitely murdered. No, her killer needs to be brought to justice. No, this isn’t the real story. I don’t like it. I’m not satisfied. There needs to be an ending better than this.

Tragedy isn’t exactly in the habit of being kind to us.

When news of Gabby Petito’s disappearance was spreading, I noticed a lot of similarities between hers and Elisa’s. A woman in her early 20s vanishes while traveling, under very unusual circumstances. Footage was released during both investigations, which portrayed these women in mentally vulnerable states. The story was viral online. People rifled through Gabby’s instagram in the same way they did with Elisa’s tumblr. Social media detectives established an inappropriate amount of investment. Everyone is sure of a specific outcome. The family deserves answers.

Let’s talk about answers for a second. I’d like you to spitball a comprehensive explanation for this one: how could something like this happen? I’m not looking for a “how” in terms of events or circumstances. In this case, this isn’t a question. It’s a protest of the unfairness of it all. My daughter. My sister. My friend. Someone who meant so much to me. It’s a prayer to a vacant sky. It’s not a question, it’s agony. Nothing shy of resurrection can feel like justice. Even if the case leads to a criminal trial and conviction, it does nothing to fill the void loss burns within us. There is no good answer, because there aren’t answers at all.

Let’s talk about ourselves for a second. I noticed many people draw parallels between what they’d seen on the bodycam footage and their own experience with abusive partners. “This could have been me.” Do you really think this is appropriate? Could have been, would have been – these are statements with hypothetical validity. It has nothing to do with you. To emotionally identify with someone does not evidence anything. You’re here. She’s gone. This isn’t about you. She isn’t in the position where she can co-sign anything you say. If she can’t speak for herself, don’t invoke her.

Let’s talk about true crime for a second. It’s funny how true crime marketed to men has a distinctly different texture than true crime marketed to women. The former seems to involve knocking the perpetrator down a peg. It portrays them as something worth our disgust and ridicule. The latter tends to foster emotional identification with the victim. Podcasts and other media in this category tend to be by women, for women, and generally discuss women. This story is presented as catharsis for women who see themselves as similar to them. This woman is no longer a person, but an idea. And it makes me think of that stupid article quote that I resent myself for not having bookmarked. This is reconciliation. These women, in their passing, can be a motivating factor for us to break up with that one dumbass guy. I’m so happy this was a wakeup call. I’m so happy that this made me think about my own experiences. I’m so happy that this did so much for me. Sure, someone actually died, but what is that when compared to my own self-actualization?

I made a comment on Twitter about how disgusted I was with how people spoke of Gabby in such an evasively self-interested way, and someone who likely was of no relation to her interjected with how the family deserved the truth. Truth? What truth? What peace will grisly details give them? Is there any meaningful difference between knowing your loved one died of murder or collapsed from exposure? Or are you just a nosey person who’s projected an inappropriate emotional dog in this fight? Do you want answers for her family, or for your own curiosity?

I really don’t trust shit like that, nor am I willing to give leniency to people who say such things. I think we’ve been conditioned to relate to dead women in a way that’s completely separate from who they actually were. Alive, they’re deep, multifaceted individuals, with an array of likes, dislikes, quirks, and endless little details. Dead, they’re a concept to serve a purpose. The purpose is generally a form of narrative catharsis. The creep gets thrown in prison. A woman’s abusive partner gets the comeuppance he deserves. The story needs a good ending. The story needs an ending that satisfies me. People aren’t stories. Life is not a novel.

The real trauma of others will never belong to you. This not your therapy tool or plaything. This is real pain that will never be theoretical for plenty of people. Know your place. Keep your distance. Don’t objectify the dead.

#you know i'm going for the jugular if i bother to punctuate my posts #also do take my warning: it is long

41 notes · View notes

shywhumpauthor · 3 years

Text

Hot Cocoa Part 8

Cw: creepy/intimate/affectionate Whumper, torture, burning, knives, conditioning, restraints, blindfolding, gagging,

Maple’s breath hitched as Bram pulled a cigarette lighter out of the tool box.

“I think this’ll work just perfectly,” Bram flicked the lighter on, the flames dancing in the reflection of his glasses for a moment before he let it go out. He placed the lighter back in his pocket, before pulling out a pair of shackles, with a good two feet of slack in between the cuffs. Bamboo fell from Maple’s lap to the ground, and Bram kicked it aside. Maple’s heart twisted as the plush sailed across the room, landing in a heap on the ground. They could see it… they didn’t take it.

In the back of their mind, Maple wondered what his search history must have looked like, and where on Earth he had managed to get all kinds of torture devices and restraints. Maybe he was on some sort of government watchlist, who would send police out to investigate him soon.

Maple had to suppress a smile at the thought. They could only hope and dream.

Bram crouched down next to them, and peeled the duct tape off their wrists, quickly replacing the shackles around their forearms. If Maple’s hands were any tinier, they would have been able to slip them right out of the cuffs, but sadly, they were just small enough to stay firmly in place.

Maple sucked in a breath as they were yanked to their feet by their wrists, as Bram hooked the chain of the shackles around a hook in the ceiling, leaving Maple’s chest, torso, and legs completely unprotected.

They whimpered as Bram yanked up the hem of their sweater, pulling it up over their head so that their bruised and scarred chest was exposed. He ran a finger down their side, over each bump of their ribs, and Maple shivered.

“Tell me what your first rule is,” Bram ordered, as he pulled the lighter out of his pocket, flicking open the flame.

“Rule one,” Maple’s voice shook, their eyes transfixed on the small fire, as Bram brought it dangerously close to their skin. They pressed back as far as they could, pushing up to their tip toes as if that would make a difference. “Do-do not speak out of turn.”

“Good.” Bram pressed the lighter up against their skin, just below their ribs, and Maple screamed. He only held it there for a second, before pulling the hot metal away, the burned area beginning to drip blood. “Two?”

“Do- do not ask for anything,” Maple gasped, squeezing their eyes shut as Bram pressed the burning metal back against their ribs, an inch below the first mark.

“Three?”

“I be-belong to you,” Maple sobbed out, twisting in their bonds as pain laced up their side, swallowing their senses until it was the only thought on their mind.

“Four?” Another burn had Maple writing in their chains, only held up by the shackles around their wrists.

“Say thank… thank you after each session.” Tears ran freely down Maple’s scarred cheeks, dripping down their chin.

“And five?” Bram flicked open the lighter, hovering the small flame over Maple’s skin, watching as it slowly turned red and blistered.

“Never- never question you.” Their head fell against their chest. It wasn’t the worst beating, no. They had had far worse done to them. But burns, they stung for days, and blisters were always a pain in the ass to put up with.

“Very good.” Bram praised, as they pressed the lighter against their skin just above their hip, a neat line of burns trailing down their side. “I have to get a picture of this, Brianna has been asking for one.” Bram dropped the lighter to the ground, and stepped back, pulling his phone from his pocket. Maple didn’t know who Brianna was, or why she wanted a picture of them. Perhaps she was going to help them? Maple didn’t dare hope. They looked up as the camera clicked, and Bram began tapping away at his phone, beginning to talk again. “She has this boy, Hayden, oh my he’s absolutely gorgeous,” Bram stepped closer, turning his phone so they could see a picture of a bruised, bloody young man with bright blond hair, matted with blood.

“We met online, and we have a date Tuesday afternoon, actually,” Bram sounded excited as he picked up the lighter, and replaced it in the toolbox. “We realized we have similar… hobbies, and instantly clicked.” He began to dig around the toolbox, pushing aside knives and zip ties, before pulling out a few long strips of cloth. “She’s been wanting to meet you for a while, we’ve been talking for over a month.” Bram approached Maple, and tapped their jaw. Hesitantly, Maple opened their mouth, allowing him to wedge the dirty cloth between their teeth, and knot it around the back of their head.

“She says she’s really good with a knife, but never gets to use one because she doesn’t want to scar the boy too badly, which is understandable,” Bram positioned another cloth over their eyes, the fabric entangling with their mane of messy what had the potential to be curly hair.

Maple whimpered around the gag, as they heard footsteps pad across the floor, before Bram was rummaging through the toolbox once more.

“Oh hush, sweetheart, I’m doing you a favor,” They chucked. “I know how you get squeamish at large amounts of blood.”

So thoughtful of him, Maple thought sarcastically. Before they were kidnapped, the sight of the crimson liquid always made them squirm, the first time Bram had ever beaten them they had passed out the second their nose besan to bleed. Recently, however, they had become quite immune to the effects blood used to have on them. It never gave them the same feeling as it did.

Maple cried out into the gag as they felt the tip of a knife dig into their shoulder, swiftly slicing a thin, shallow cut halfway down to their elbow.

“And the gag is because these houses are quite close together, if you scream too loud the neighbors will get upset.” Bram traced their collar bone with the blade, putting just enough pressure behind the knife to split the skin.

Maple sobbed into the cloth as he ran the knife down their back, cutting a smooth line across the jagged whip scars.

They knew better than to try and beg or plead. That never got them anywhere, and it only made Bram hurt them more.

Maple screamed at the tip of the blade plunged into their thigh, and tore a terrible gash straight down their leg, cutting through the oversized sweatpants Hugh had given them.

The stupid pants, they had been hoping they’d stay intact a little longer. It was all they had to wear, sure, they were lucky Bram let them wear clothes at all, but they had been from Hugh. They were Hugh’s.

It felt as if the knife had stuck them right through their heart.

16 notes · View notes

onebatch2batch · 3 years

Note

Heyo, dialogue prompts: 14 or 30? 😊

HI THIS WAS FROM FOREVER AGO BUUUUUT that's my m.o. so here we are. Hope you like it!!

And no, I'm never going to stop writing different versions of Frank and Karen getting together, you can't make me :)

14. “You’re never going to let that go, are you?”

Frank can practically hear David scheming, and he’s proven right when an anthropomorphic mop of hair bends into his line of sight and he says, “Hey, remember in the bunker, when we were still on the run?”

They’re both standing in David’s front yard. Frank’s van is in need of an oil change and a replacement filter and since he’s not keen on anyone else working on his getaway vehicle, he called up David to request use of his paved, suburban driveway. It’s been a few weeks since he’s managed to get over here, and David had instantly agreed on the condition that Frank stay for dinner. It’s a beautiful summer day, even if it’s a little hot, and he’s feeling a little off-kilter from the sounds of children playing all around. It’s so painfully normal that for a moment he’d regretted asking, and then David had offered him a drink. The taller computer genius doesn’t know shit about cars, so he’s alternating between fetching more beers and talking Frank’s ear off. It’s been about an hour now, and Frank has slowly relaxed into the background noise.

“Yeah,” Frank responds dryly around the flashlight between his teeth. He’s elbow deep in grease and not really interested in where this line of questioning is going to go, but David has other ideas.

“Uh huh. You know, when you got yourself on the news after that kid held Karen hostage?”

If Frank is affected by the name, all David notices is a sharp glance. “Yeah.”

“And how you freaked out and begged for my help and said she was family?”

Frank straightens and sets the flashlight down on the bumper of the car. “You got a point, Lieberman? I’m busy.”

“Yeah, I have a point. Was that all just bullshit, or what?”

They stare at each other. Frank’s jaw ticks.

“...what.”

“Thought so.”

“No, what?”

“Well you made this huge declaration and then almost got yourself killed trying to rescue her so--”

“God damn it, Lieberman, you’re never going to let that go, are you--”

David shakes his head, exasperated. “I mean, we haven’t even gotten to meet her yet and it’s been six months since Madini used her government wiles to give you a new identity--”

Frank scowls. “It’s none of your--”

The other man cuts him off quickly, hands up. To Frank’s immense displeasure, the other man looks less cowed and more placating. “I’m just saying, invite her to dinner next week. What harm is there? Maybe something good might happen to you for once, god forbid.” His friend stares him down, using every couple of inches of height to try and look intimidating. Of course it doesn’t work, but Frank is too busy thinking about having a family dinner with Karen, with his friends, like a normal person. Like a couple. He realizes too slow that David is leering at him, pleased.

“David, shut the hell up.”

“You’re blushing. Is that a yes? I’ll tell Sarah.”

Karen doesn’t question it when Frank calls her up after half a year of radio silence. She asks if it's a casual dress dinner and what kind of wine to bring, and then announces she’s got to go and she’ll see him Friday at six sharp.

He doesn’t know if that’s better or worse than her just telling him to shove it.

Friday creeps up on him, and by the time he parks outside of her apartment it hasn’t really sunk in that he’s about to take Karen Page to a domestic dinner in the suburbs. Because it’s definitely not a date, even though it kind of is. It’s the stuff he used to do with Maria and the kids all the time when he was on leave; double dates and cook outs and all that crap. He’s rusty as hell and usually shit company, but they keep asking him back. And now, he’s throwing Karen into the mix.

It’s a feeling similar to being shot in the head and waking up in a hospital room. Disorienting and uncomfortable as hell.

He picks her up in the van, leaning against the side of it as he waits. The Lieberman’s neighborhood is outside the city, about a twenty minute drive. It’s going to give them plenty of time to talk, and he’d barely restrained himself from looking up conversation starters online before leaving his place. He doubts there’s any suggestions for a vigilante-cum-construction worker who’s picking up a date he’s spoken a handful of words to for the first time in six months. He’s just considering cancelling the whole thing when the door to her building opens and she steps out.

He’s seen Karen a lot of ways. He’s seen her in pencil skirts and heels and blouses, in tshirt and jeans, bruised and bloody. He’s never seen her in a sundress with her pinked shoulders bare to the world and strappy sandals on her feet. Her hair is in a long braid over her shoulder. She looks fucking resplendant. Absolutely divine. Fucking poetry in motion.

He’s fucked.

“Hi,” she greets, coming to a stop in front of him. She’s got a bottle of wine in her hands. Her eyes punch little, individual question marks into his skin when she searches his face.

“Hey.” He inhales, bracing for her reaction. His throat closes up when he gets a whiff of her perfume. So familiar from the handful of times he’s been close enough to smell it--something soft and floral, something that makes his head swim. He thinks back to that moment so many months ago, swaying together in the elevator, her skin against his, her perfume subtle under the metallic tang of blood.

Karen doesn’t immediately go for interrogating him. She only lifts the bottle in her hand. “I brought a white, is that okay?”

Wary relief loosens the knot at the top of his spine. He nods, pushing off the car to open her door. “Sure.”

When Karen climbs in, carefully arranging her skirt around her, the dark interior contrasting with the soft yellow of her dress, Frank thinks about a conversation with Curtis all those months ago. Wonders when the kick is coming.

They spend the first ten minutes looking out separate windows and listening to the radio. After that, Karen starts talking like she’s made her mind up about the evening is going to go. She asks him how he’s been, if he’s gotten a job, how Dinah is, what the Liebermans are like. Nothing is accusatory. They could be old friends passing one another on the street, the way she’s talking. Almost like she’s talking to a scared dog. Coaxing it out of a corner.

Guess he deserves that.

By the time he pulls onto the appropriate street, it almost feels normal. They’ve fallen into a familiar back and forth that’s easy to keep up with, and when he opens her door she gives him a small grateful smile, accepting his hand on the way down.

He’s not disappointed when she lets go to straighten the fabric of her dress. He’s not.

As always, the Lieberman household is an explosion of domesticity. There’s shoes on the stairs, a sweet smelling candle burning on the coffee table, toys and books strewn over the floor. Pictures line the walls. When Frank knocks on the door, Zach opens it like he’s been waiting for them.

“ Hi, Pete!” he greets excitedly, and then his eyes land on Karen. “Who’s that?”

“Hello, I’m Karen Page.” She crouches down to look him in the eye and smiles. “You must be Zach, right?”

He flushes, twisting his fingers nervously. “Yeah. Are you Pete’s girlfriend?”

They’re saved from answering by a sudden, high pitched shriek. “Frank!!”

Karen manages to stand out of the way just in time for Leo to come barrelling down the stairs directly into Frank, hugging him tightly around the middle.

“Frank, Dad says you were here Saturday but you were gone before I left Ann’s house!!” she pulls away and waves a book at him. “I’m reading the book you told me about!”

He grins down at her. “I waited around for ya, but your mom said you wouldn’t be home until later. How’s the book, huh?”

She scrunches her nose. “I don’t know yet. I’ll let you know. Are you Karen?”

Karen laughs. “I sure am. Leo, right?”

“That’s me. Come on, my mom is in the kitchen.” She nudges Zach and then four of them head into the other room. Sarah Lieberman is standing behind the kitchen counter, chopping up a head of lettuce. When they walk in, she beams at them.

“Hey guys, welcome! Hang on, let me finish this. Pete, David’s out in the garage trying to fix the sprinklers. Can you--?”

Frank rolls his eyes. “Say no more.”

He lifts his brows at Karen, but she gives him a jerk of her head. Frank huffs and stalks off after kissing Sarah on the cheek, Leo trailing after him talking about sprinkler systems and tools. Zach joins his mother behind the counter and peers at Karen curiously. She sets the bottle of wine down.

“So Karen!” Sarah exclaims, dumping the lettuce into a bowl. “Let’s get you a glass of wine and chat. How’s that sound?”

They end up on the patio furniture. After completing the salad and sides, Sarah turns on the grill and then ushers them to the corner of the patio, refilling their glasses.

“So,” she starts, and peers at Karen over the rim of her glass. “I’m going to be forward, but I get the feeling you’ll appreciate that. What’s the deal with you and Pete? Sorry--habit. Frank.”

Karen could have guessed this was coming, even if she expected a little more subtlety. And Sarah’s right, she appreciates the bluntness. It gives her a chance to answer in kind.

“I don’t know.” She runs a finger over the rim of her glass, frowning. “I haven’t--we haven’t spoken in...a while. Six months, actually. And the last time I saw him..well, it didn’t go as well as I’d hoped. I thought I scared him off, actually.”

“How so?”

And the story falls out of her mouth, in pieces. She hasn’t spoken to anyone about Frank, about her feelings for him--the good or bad--or about that afternoon in the hospital. “--and I thought...I thought maybe he would finally kiss me.” She runs a hand through her hair, frustrated. “And then he pulled that I’m not a hero bullshit and that’s the last I saw of him. Until he called this week.”

Sarah rolls her eyes. “That sounds like him. Honey, did you know when we first met he was gathering information on David?”

“Ah, yes. I was the one who found David for him.” She grimaces. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be! We’re lucky he came looking. Without him…” she shrugs. “I would still be a widow. And my kids still wouldn’t have their father. I’m just trying to say he may do things backwards, but he ends up doing things for the right reasons. Even if it takes him time to figure that out.”

Dinner goes well. Dinner goes really, really well. Not that Frank was worried--there isn’t a person alive who can sit down with Karen Page and at the very least admire her. The Liebermans fall in love with her immediately. The kids demand that she stay for a board game after dinner. Leo brags about her science project. Zach shyly asks if Karen likes football. Sarah drills her with questions about her job. David keeps her laughing while stupid jokes and send Frank knowing glances throughout dinner that makes Frank want to throw peas at him.

Karen is charming, sweet, and great with the kids. She gets along with David and Sarah, and sends him warm, unsure smiles until dessert.

They play Apples to Apples, and the kids decimate. Karen is a close third. Frank loses terribly, but he’s still busy ruminating over the warm feeling in his chest at the cacophony of noise that surrounds him as everyone submits to another peal of laughter to notice.

“Frank,” Leo says innocently once they’ve put the board game away and Sarah has told the kids it’s time for bed. She stands in the doorway to the kitchen and looks at him sternly, hands on her hips. “Please bring Karen around more. It’s not fair that you get to hog her and we’ve just met.”

“Leo, that’s Miss Page to you.” Sarah tries for sharpness but ends up laughing. “Off to bed. Don’t forget to brush your teeth.”

“Bye Miss Page!” the kids chorus, and then it’s just the adults.

“Great kids,” Karen laughs. “Smart, too. You’re in trouble.”

Sarah sighs and pats her husband’s cheek fondly. “Yeah, we know. Somehow both of them got his brain.”

David chuckles, turns quickly to press a kiss to his wife’s palm. “At least they didn’t get my hair,” he jokes.

Karen sneaks a glance at Frank, then quickly looks away. He catches it, just briefly, as does David.

“Sarah, we should probably make sure the kids are actually brushing their teeth. I’ll tackle Leo if you tackle Zach, tag team it? We’ll be right back, guys.”

It’s quiet in the kitchen after that. Karen takes a sip of her wine and taps her fingers. There’s something on her mind, he can tell. When she doesn’t say anything he leans forward to capture her gaze. “What is it?”

“Why now, Frank?” Karen asks.

The conversation he’s been dreading. A feeling of shame bubbles up so suddenly it nearly knocks him off his chair. He scratches his neck for no reason other than to expel the nervous energy building in him.

“I didn’t want to…” There’s no use pretending like they’re talking about something else, not when she’s staring at him like that. Like she's been waiting all night for this conversation while he’s been tricking himself into thinking it may not happen. His finger dances restlessly on the table top. “I didn’t want to get you sucked back in.”

“Into what?” She arches a brow. “You?”

“Me. My life. My goddamn baggage. I know you deserve better than me.” He clears his throat. “So I wanted you to have a chance to live your life without my ghosts hanging around.”

“Frank Castle,” Karen sighs, exasperated, “please don’t tell me you’re making decisions for me. And that still doesn’t answer my question--why now?”

His expression tightens. “C’mon Karen. I’m just tryin’ to keep you safe--”

“How many times do I have to tell you--”

“As many as it ta--”

“Frank--” David steps into the kitchen, Sarah in tow. They pause, looking between the two people seated at the table awkwardly. “Oh, are we interrupting something?”

“No, David. Thank you both for tonight. I think I should be going.” Karen stands and looks at Frank. “I have loved you for two years, Frank. No amount of avoiding me or trying to protect me is going to change that. Excuse me.”

And then she walks away.

He catches up to her just down the street. As soon as he sees that familiar head of blond hair he pulls the van over and hops out, jogging to catch up. Karen glances at him and then pauses, as if waiting for something.

“Let me drive you home,” he asks. “Please.”

He doesn’t take her home straight away; she doesn’t ask. Frank drives until he finds a spot overlooking the water. The heat has finally broken and a cool breeze comes in through the open window, stirring Karen’s hair. He shuts off the engine. They sit in silence while he tries to decide what to say.

“I guess I should start by apologizing,” he says finally, tapping the steering wheel. He’s past nervous, he just wants to fix his own screw up. “I’m sorry, Karen. I don’t want to make any decisions for you. I should have--I should have talked to you about it. I should have started this conversation a long time ago.”

“So, start it.” She’s watching him, waiting. There’s a tense expression on her face--like she’s either trying not to cry, or trying not to smile. Or tell him off. He’s not sure which, yet.

Frank clears his throat. “Okay. Uh. I’m not gonna make excuses, I’m just gonna tell you what I know. I know that I have done some shit, and I’m going to continue doing that shit. I’m not ever gonna be normal. I know that you’re smart as hell, and you check me, and you’re a fucking force of nature. I know that I have been telling myself that you deserve more than some--fuckin’ vigilante who wakes up to nightmares more than he doesn’t. I know you deserve to be safe and happy. You deserve more than I can give you. But uh,” he takes her hand cautiously, waits for her to pull away, relaxes when she doesn’t, “...I wanna try.”

“You gotta mean it, Frank,” she says, voice watery. “You better fucking mean it.”

“I mean it. I swear to Christ, I mean it.”

She pulls her hand away and for a millisecond, he thinks he’s said something wrong. Then she’s unbuckling her seat belt and clamoring over the armrest into his lap. It’s not the most majestic first kiss he’s ever had (of which there are few) but her breath is hot on his lips and her fingernails scrape gently over his scalp as if entreating him closer. Frank makes a low groan that he hasn’t heard from himself in a long time--too long--and then Karen shifts and his breath catches in his throat. The heat of her, all wrapped up in his arms, her hair falling over one shoulder as she peppers his mouth, his cheeks, his jaw with the tiniest of kisses.

He could have ruined this without even knowing. He almost ruined it before it even happened.

“I do want you, you know,” Karen murmurs against the skin of his jaw, fingers grasping his shirt. “All of you.”

“I know.”

“Does that scare you?”

He pushes gently until he can look her in the eyes. “A little,” he admits. “I don’t wanna fuck this up.”

“You’re doing okay so far,” she says, smiling. “Now that you’ve pulled your self-deprecating head out of your ass.”

“Took me long enough.” He cradles the back of her head in one hand, drawing her closer until their lips meet again. They’re both uncomfortable at the weird angle but it’s not until the horn beeps once, gaining the attention of a woman walking her dog, that Karen reluctantly returns to her seat.

They work to catch their breaths, watching the water.

“The Liebermans aren’t upset I left so--...abruptly, right?”

“Nah,” Frank chuckles, grasping her hand. He finds an indescribable amount of comfort in brushing his thumb over the ridges over her knuckles. “Actually, I think they like you better for it. Sarah almost chased me out of the house with a goddamn spatula.”

“I knew I liked her. Take me home? I’ll make coffee.”

“It’s a date.”

Frank’s phone lights up that night. If he were to reach an arm over and hold it up to see, David’s text would read, WELL?? Did you get the girl, Lloyd Dobler?

But he doesn’t. He tugs Karen closer and goes back to sleep.

#kastle #kastle ff #kastle fanfic #my writing #answered #cant-think-of-anything-creative

39 notes · View notes

houseboatisland · 3 years

Note

Is Elizabeth on your island, and if so how has she adjusted after decades abandoned?

She is! And here's my headcanon for her:

Topham Hatt I, (The Fat Director,) had by 1926 accumulated a small fortune as General Manager of the North Western Railway. Reputed as a workaholic, (or boss-aholic,) Topham had sunk considerable amounts of money into his sprawling Wellsworth estate, Topham Hall. Topham was inspired by the undertaking of his sometime friend Sir Robert Walker, the Baronet of Sand Hutton. Walker's estate utilized war surplus one foot and three inch gauge locomotives to carry distinguished guests, agricultural produce, and coal to and bricks deriving from the nearby brickworks of Claxton.

The resulting pet project, the Topham Hall Railway, is where Elizabeth's story begins.

The T.H.R. was laid to what had essentially become the Sudrian "standard narrow gauge," of two feet and three inches. The line started from its Exchange Siding with Wellsworth Station, and made several crossings through the streets of that town's suburbs, before reaching the estate grounds. Hall Station brought passengers within a stone's throw of the mansion itself. Moving on, the line dove into the woods through a magical tree tunnel, with a spur at its opening for the engine and carriage shed. Crossing a brook over a three-span wooden trestle bridge, another station and a few sidings known as "Orchard Station" served the fruit and vegetable orchard. Another mile or so, and the railway stopped again for "Bowler's Station," where the Hatts and any guests could detrain for the estate's cricket pavilion.

Another half a mile, and the railway terminated at the Wellsworth Brickworks. This had been a puny operation before the THR linked up with it, employing only three men or so. After the railway's arrival, it expanded to employ a few dozen, and three more kilns were added. Throughout the Great Depression, Topham kept the Brickworks open and its employees onboard out of his own pocket, even as the bricks accumulated unsold. This was far more humanitarian than his treatment of NWR employees and three of his engines!

The railway had one locomotive, a royal purple Kerr Stuart 'Tattoo' class, named "Little Barford," technically a brother of the Mid Sodor Railway's No. 4, "Stuart." Little Barford arrived also with several v-tipper wagons, a dozen ex-War Department bogie wagons, four-wheel trucks and two ambulance vans. The ambulance vans were thoroughly rebuilt by the estate's woodshop to become an elaborate passenger coach, and a "Dining Car," which was quite identical save for the fewer seats and teeny gas cooker. The passenger coach saw constant use, but the Dining Car mostly sat in the siding at Bowler's Station as it cooked. The line was so short, it never could've done more than boil an egg while moving to timetable!

Capping off this complement of rolling stock was one Sentinel DG4 "Overtype" Steam Lorry, quickly named Elizabeth, after the Duchess of York's newborn daughter. Elizabeth was absolutely coveted by Topham, though he wasn’t exactly a steady hand at the wheel. Elizabeth was kept polished to perfection, even when her work involved carting such grubby loads as soil, clay, and coal. She was in every respect a "father's princess," but she worked dutifully and loved Little Barford like a twin brother. She also learned from her Victorian old master her favorite catchphrase, "We are/are not amused!" depending on the context.

The Second World War began in September 1939, and this national shift in priorities turned Elizabeth’s devil-may-care youth on its head. The Wellsworth Brickworks shuttered as many of its men volunteered or were called up, and housing construction all but ended. Little Barford was kept on at the Hall as the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries set to increase production on Topham Hall’s farms. Elizabeth on the other hand was, for the first time, moved away from her only home. As the civilian petrol rationing situation tightened, and private motoring was eventually banned, Elizabeth was suddenly very valuable as a coal-fired road vehicle.

She was commandeered and relocated to Tidmouth Harbour, working night and day as a dockside lorry. This was a very stressful period for her, for she was utterly friendless and out of her element. Although Sodor was never bombed, the routine blackout drills and stories of other ports destroyed, such as Liverpool, took their toll on her mentally. At some point however, she "bucked up." Elizabeth realized she was no longer an aristocrat's toy. For all she knew, Topham had probably forgotten her. As the military lorries she came face to face with daily were almost all of the internal-combustion type, who was to say that when, if ever the war was over, that he'd want her back if he remembered her?

In these circumstances, Elizabeth adopted her more familiar, stiff-upper lip personality. There was no time for polish or quaint little rides to the cricket pavilion, there was a war on! She became grubby, and liked to be grubby. She worked like the devil, and loved that even more. Her posh accent never left her, but she was now in every respect out to be a working girl. Elizabeth would never admit it to herself, but this huge change of self owed much to her upset at being removed from her only home. Did she legitimately like being a working lorry, rather than an estate owner's princess? Certainly she did. Was it an easy and completely voluntary change of character? Of course not. But it was done, and Elizabeth spent many nights assuring herself that it was the right path, the only path to have taken.

1945, the end of the war. Everyone was so jubilant. Elizabeth was cleaned and polished like a crown jewel, decked out with flags and bunting, and allowed to participate in the Tidmouth Victory Parade. In several colour newswreels of the event, you can spot her amid the cascade of tickertape and throngs of soldiers, nurses, longshoremen, civilians, tanks and lorries. It was no doubt a fun day for her, but now she thought a great deal about the future.

The war, which had been everything to her for six years, was over. Soldiers were being demobilized and coming home. Industries were retooling for the postwar world, to make consumer goods rather than several airplanes an hour. The Attlee Government, in conjunction with the devolved Sudrian Parliament established in 1946, had a grand vision for The Mainland and Sodor, where the welfare state for the long-suffering people and machines was vastly expanded, their jobs would be increasingly unionized and their bosses answerable to them, rather than the other way around.

Despite the historically harsh winter into the New Year of 1947, Sudrian workers, bouncing back much quicker than their Mainland counterparts, were delighted with PM Attlee's "New Jerusalem." Tidmouth Harbour was still very busy, as Sodor's biggest gate in and out for the world, and Elizabeth kept calm and carried on as time marched on. She was much busier than she had first feared, and that winter was her time to shine as so many petrol lorries were out of commission with "head colds." Elizabeth convinced herself, somehow, that these thousands and thousands of war surplus petrol lorries wouldn't take over. If so many had taken ill in these conditions, maybe Sodor, or even the whole world, would consider turning back the clock and restoring steam to the roads completely.

She feared and resented petrol lorries something terrible. When the petrol ration which had enabled her life all this time, was finally ended, she was heartbroken. Every worry she had seemed to come to pass all at once. First, the Tidmouth Harbour Authority decided it would be much cheaper to stack its fleet with war surplus lorries, and she was out of a job. Her next owner, a furniture mover, didn't keep her long, and neither did the next, a man who planned to fit her out as a bus and ran out of money.

By 1956, when the now-knighted Sir Topham Hatt I had died, Elizabeth had already been accumulating dust in a shed for two years. She never saw her last owner, who by now had failed to pay rent on her storage. Anopha Quarry, who owned the tumbledown little shack, seized her to make up the difference, but never once came to inspect the lorry who was now their property. Eventually, the Quarry forgot about her too.

It wasn't until 1961, when a little blue puffer deputizing for Toby on the Quarry Tramway carelessly had a coupling rod failure, that she reemerged. She made a heartstopping journey down the line for the necessary spare rod, pins, oilpot and tools in Ffarquhar Sheds, where she stirred up quite a scene, before an even more uncomfortable journey back. Elizabeth's Sentinel heritage thankfully preserved her for the whole ordeal, when Thomas' Driver, then at her wheel, worried that she'd explode and take him with her.

Back into the shed she went after this good deed, for how long, if ever to come out again, she didn't know. Until of course, that same night, a man very like her old Master, named Bertram just like his son whom she had given so many rides through the orchards and to cricket games, came to make a visit...

You can guess the rest :3

Sir Bertram Topham Hatt I was reunited with his childhood friend, and his father's favorite lorry. He immediately sent for her with his own money to be restored, and at once moved her back to Topham Hall, where she was herself reunited with the closest thing to a brother she'd ever had, Little Barford, who this whole time had been working as well as ever, and wondered why no one had ever gone to look for Elizabeth despite all his questions. It had been assumed, wrongly, that Elizabeth had perished on war service. That's how the Tidmouth Harbour Authority wrote it, after they pocketed her sale money! (Sir Bertram was LIVID not to get his hands on the now deceased Harbourmaster responsible.)

Elizabeth is now back to her childhood home hauling farm produce and any visitor willing to get dirty, for she still insists on carrying a bit of grime as a testament to her labours. The Wellsworth Brickworks has reopened, on a much smaller scale, as a "living museum," and Elizabeth takes great joy in carrying clay and coal again. Her, Little Barford, and Sir Bertram are now tighter than they've ever been, and Sir Bertram is the only man allowed to polish her. He's a much more sedated force at the wheel than his father, she notes, and quite often!

We ARE amused to see her <3

#ttte #ttte elizabeth #ttte the fat director #topham hall railway #ttte little barford #ttte worldbuilding #ttte thomas #ttte oc: sir bertram hatt i #tw death

23 notes · View notes

dwellordream · 3 years

Text

“A marquis weds a poor girl on the condition that she obey him utterly and never complain. On her wedding day he has her stripped naked and then dressed in rich robes. Griselda keeps her word so well that the marquis decides he must test her. When a son and a daughter are born, he lies to her, telling her they must be killed because his people resent them as base. She asks only that they be decently buried. He hides the children and has them raised far away. Years go by. He pretends to divorce her, sending her home to her father's hut. As she leaves, he again strips her of her clothes, and she begs for a smock to hide her nakedness.

Still unsatisfied, he soon brings her back to the palace to wait on his new bride during his wedding feast. The bride is his own daughter, now grown. Griselda complies, asking only that he treat his new wife more gently than he has her. At the last moment, the marquis relents. Reunited with her children, Griselda swoons, then revives. Dressed again in her rich robes, she embraces her loving husband. Her fame brings her eternal hosannas. But not from everyone. The name of Griselda has also been used as a shorthand for female submissiveness so close to stupidity as to be indistinguishable from it.

"The Wise Government of a Gentlewoman" from Painter's Palace of Pleasure (1666), a tale loosely based on a story by Marguerite de Navarre, turns sardonic laughter against the patient wife. When a gentlewoman's home is threatened with ruin because of her husband's nightly trysts with a maidservant, the wife chooses to go on the offensive. When her attempts to shame him don't work, she lights a fire in the maid's room and smokes him out in the middle of the night. The narrator urges wives in a similar fix to take action: "For what Griselde could suffer her wedded husband, assembled in bedde, in depth of sleep, to rise and runne a straie like a wylde horse, neying after the straied female kind of that sort?"

This is not to deny that Griselda's story was potent and ubiquitous. On the contrary: her fable spawned a multitude of jests and tales that do not even name her. Some stories that draw on Griselda do, however, question the idea of total wifely submission. As if acknowledging the dangers of the tale as masculinist fantasy, some jests warn husbands not to try acting like the marquis at home:

A young man lately married to a wife thought it was good policy to get the mastery of her in the beginning, and came to her when the pot was seething .... [H]e suddenly commanded her to take the pot from the fire which [she] answered and said that the meat was not ready to eat. And he said again: "I will have it taken off for my pleasure." This good woman, loath yet to offend him, set the pot beside the fire as he bad. And, anon after he commanded her to set the pot behind the door. And she said thereto again: "Ye be not wise therein." But he precisely said it should be so as he bad, and she genteely again did his commandement.

This man yet not satisifed, commanded her to set the pot ahigh on the hen roost. "What!" quod the wife again, "I trow ye be mad." And he fiercely then commanded her to set it there or else, he said, she should repent. She somewhat afraid to move his patience, took a ladder and set it to the roost, and went herself up the ladder, and took the pot in her hand-praying her husband then to hold the ladder fast for sliding, which he so did. And when the husband looked up and saw the pot stand there on high, he said thus: "Lo, now standeth the pot there as I would have it." The wife, hearing that, suddenly poured the hot pottage on his head and said thus: "And now been the pottage there as I would have them." By this tale men may see it is no wisdom for a man to attempt a meek woman's patience too far, lest it turn to his own hurt and damage.

Refracted and diffused through thousands of popular texts and performances, the legend of patient Griselda is specially marked as an irritant to women. As Wiltenburg points out in her study of the street literature of England and Germany, "Authors of both countries noted that this story annoyed real-life women, who had no intention of following Griselda's example; but it was recommended to them nevertheless." Yet according to Peter Burke, popular imagery beat into everyone's head the dictum that women had to know their place, as is clear not only from the popular (masculine) images of the woman as villain, such as the shrew, but even from the images of the heroine.

For women, martyrdom was virtually the only way to sanctity .... equally passive were two heroines who often took the place of saints in Protestant countries: chaste Susanna ... and patient Griselda, who were celebrated in German plays, in English puppet-plays, in Swedish ballads, and Danish chapbooks .... Judith slaying the tyrant Holofernes seems to have been an exception among heroines. Taking Wiltenburg's matter-of-fact comment about Griselda's annoyingness as my guide, I want to discompose the overly static picture painted by Burke. First, it is necessary to peel away some of the layers of indignation and interpretation she has evoked since appearing on the literary scene.

Her story's power to shock and disturb women in particular has only intensified over time, according to Judith Bronfman, who has studied its interpretive history from its beginnings in fourteenth century Italy to the present day. English reception of the legend begins with Chaucer, whose Clerk of Oxenford presents the story of "paciente Grisildis" to his Canterbury pilgrims. His "may be the most disliked of all the Canterbury Tales," but it is Griselda, not her husband, who arouses the most distaste today-suggesting that our age despises a passive victim even more than a dynamic sadist. To many feminist scholars, Griselda furnishes a crux for analyses of gender ideology and functions as a paradigm of the violent subjugation and silencing of early modern women.

Reactions to her story can be highly charged; Lisa Jardine finds that "her resignation is terrifying.” The fear and outrage Griselda provokes may have kept us from realizing there were cracks in her myth during the early modern period. Scholars have seldom noted signs of mocking criticism toward Griselda in tales and plays that seem engineered to praise her. When Griselda is divested of her rich robes of literariness and her alluring aura of religious and psychic enigma, she strikes more than a few observers as foolish. To the jesting women who mock her, she is not the Christly Fool of Saint Paul, the witty Folly of Erasmus, or the keen jester of Lear but the garden-variety fool whose deeds are dismissed as silly.

To writers, Griselda's patience was shopworn and ripe for parody. Printers tried to dress up the old tale, familiar from ballads, puppet shows, and sermons, by stressing her glamorous social mobility. By 1619, Griselda was being used as a lesson in how to marry a millionaire: one pamphlet touted itself as "shewing how Maides, By Her Example, In Their Good Behavior May Marrie Rich Husbands; and Likewise Wives By Their Patience and Obedience May Caine Much Glorie." Didactically tooled and rhetorically productive, Griselda continues to be a conversation piece. She may have begun her literary life in gland as a secular saint; but by the sixteenth century, she had become a household word idealized in sermons and conduct books but treated by jests as an impossibility, like "the silent woman," a close relative.”

- Pamela Allen Brown, “Griselda the Fool.” in Better a Shrew than a Sheep: Women, Drama, and the Culture of Jest in Early Modern England

#pamela allen brown #renaissance #history #tudor #elizabethan #jacobean #better a shrew than a sheep

18 notes · View notes

kumeko · 3 years

Text

A/N: For the End of the Universe Zine, I wanted to explore a small story in a dystopian world

Summary: In a dystopian world, Keith took his small pleasures. His drives while dropping illegal goods. His ever-complaining mechanic and his low repair prices. The rare night with Shiro. He didn’t need more than that.

He definitely didn’t need Shiro’s dreams of saving everyone, of saving anyone.

…

“Jeez.” Hunk squatted down next to the dented motorcycle, his hand hovering over the metal like he didn’t know where to touch. Horrified, he looked up at Keith. “What’d you do this time?”

“Nothing unusual.” Keith shrugged, his hands in his leather jacket. Considering how fast he had driven to reach here, his black clothes stuck to his skin uncomfortably and he really wanted a shower. “You know how it is.”

“I don’t.” Hunk tied a dirty bandanna around his head. Keith was never sure if that was to protect his hair or if he just thought it looked cool; if it was the former, judging by the dirty overalls and grease stains on his face, it was a failed effort. “I thought transporters had to be careful.”

“Careful and quick,” Keith corrected, walking over to a side table. Pushing away the cigarette butts and bottle caps, he picked up a newspaper. Replicants Stage Coupscreamed the top headline. “And even then it’s hard to avoid the government dogs.”

Hunk tapped the side of the motorcycle and the pedal fell off with a loud clatter. Groaning, Hunk shot Keith a baleful glare. “Why? I give you a great bike and every single time you break it.”

“It’s either that or my life,” Keith pointed out. He flipped through the newspaper quickly, scanning headlines. Issues with the current president, interest rates rising again, a food shortage with no end. The same old fare, nothing at all unusual about the headlines. When Hunk didn’t say anything, he rolled up the paper with a sigh. “Sorry. I’ll be more careful next time.”

“…that’s what you always say,” Hunk grumbled, accepting the apology nonetheless. Pulling out his tool kit, he sat down next to the bike. “It’ll take a day or two to get in top condition.” Pointing a wrench at a grey box perched on a chair, he added, “Oh, and deliver that to Pidge while you wait.”

“Huh?” Keith crossed his arms. “Why would I do that?”

“Because you’re a transporter?” Hunk rolled his eyes. “It’ll be the easiest job you’ve had. Nothing dangerous inside, no one chasing you. Just do it.”

Keith raised a brow. “And how much are you paying me?”

“I’m fixing your bike.” He tapped the back threateningly with the wrench. “You wanna get stuck here forever?”

“Fair point.” Picking up the box, he almost dropped it in surprise. Considering his job, Keith was pretty strong but that would just barely help him with this package. “What do you have in here? It weighs a ton.”

“Spare parts, an engine to take a part, the usual things.” Already in work mode, Hunk absentmindedly waved him off. “Just get it to her today, she has a client.”

-x-

The streets were as dirty and crowded as ever, with throngs of people flowing to and from work. Or to and from the pleasure district, to be exact. Popup shops crowded every corner, offering anything from drugs to weapons to the latest stolen technology. Neon-coloured signs hung off various buildings, enticing pedestrians to enter.

Keith pushed his way forward, his gaze firmly fixed in front of him. He hadn’t missed any of this while he was on the road. There wasn’t really anything keeping him here, fixed to this city. Hunk was a great mechanic but they were a dime a dozen, one in every town. No, to be exact, every town was the same. The same grey, the same dirt, the sense of loneliness and loss.

A world in greyscale. The only time he saw colour was when he was racing down the highway, an illegal package in his satchel.

-x-

The bells chimed as he entered Pidge’s repair shop. A small space, squeezed into the very end of a depilated building, Keith had walked past it three times before spotting it. Inside, the white shelves were lined with the latest in limb replacements, fine technology that actually made it better to lose a body part than to have it.

“In the back,” Pidge called out cheerfully, followed by the sound of metal clicks. She was with a customer then.

“I swear your place gets smaller every time I come,” Keith said dryly. A lightbulb flickered as he made his way to the back room. Even the space between the shelves felt narrower than the last time he came.

“Or you’re just getting fatter,” Pidge shot back, a pleasing lilt to her voice. Someone was in a good mood today.

“Like that’s possible.” Keith snorted, waving a package as he entered Pidge’s unofficial clinic. “Hunk wanted you to have this.”

At one point, the room had probably been a manager’s room or something like that. Now there were curtains on windows and a long bed for the particularly strenuous limb repairs. Not that Pidge’s current operation seemed like one of those. Seated on a worn-out chair, she had her latest patient sitting across from her, his mechanical arm in her lap. A man with a streak of white hair. He glanced up and Keith almost forgot to breath.

Shiro.

Shiro was back.

“Must be the parts I ordered.” Still tinkering with the arm, Pidge glanced over her shoulder. “Just put it on the table, I’ll take a look after.”

“Sure.” Keith tore his eyes away from Shiro long enough to set the box down. Shiro was back. Trying not to sound overeager, he asked, “What happened to you?”

“The usual.” Shiro winced as Pidge tried to reconnect the arm. “There was a trap. We almost got caught.”

“And then your hand got caught instead,” Pidge chimed in, closing an eye as she examined her handiwork. “What’s this, the tenth replacement? There’s a reason you’re my best customer.”

“Eleventh,” Shiro corrected with a sheepish smile.

“Ugh. It’s a good thing I don’t paste my name on these babies, otherwise I’d be dead right now.” Pidge grimaced. Somehow, Keith didn’t think that would save her for too long. Her work was too advanced, too impressive, and all it’d take was a couple of questions to find out just who made the rebellion’s general’s arm.

Taking a deep breath, Keith finally turned around and gave Shiro a proper once over. Dressed in a tank top and sweat pants, it was easy to see that there were no injuries on him. There wasn’t any blood or bandages. A relief, considering it all. It was a rare time when Shiro got away with just a broken prosthetic. Noticing his stare, Shiro smiled. “We didn’t lose anyone, at least.”

That wasn’t what he was worried about. At all. Keith crossed his arms, his eyes roving over Shiro’s biceps, his well-defined chest, and trying not to remember what it felt like to have that body curled over his. To have those hands on him. “I didn’t think you did. There was nothing in the newspapers.”

“Yeah, I guess they’d mention it if they caught us.” Shiro lowered his gaze. “Especially if they caught Allura. The rebellion would be over in an instant.”

“Rebellion.” Pidge clicked her tongue, finally setting down her tools. “You’re making it sound better than just a rag-tag of people who still think they change something.”

“We can,” Shiro answered simply.

No, you can’t, Keith thought, and perhaps more so than the world they lived in, that was the real tragedy: hope.

-x-

This wasn’t love. This was sex, pure and simple. A raw need, a primal urge. A way to forget the present. A way to feel something other than despair.

Keith bit Shiro’s throat, feeling the resulting rumble tremor through this body. Shiro’s hand interlaced in his. His nails scratched on Shiro’s back. All he could smell was Shiro’s musky scent. All he could feel was Shiro’s touch. Nothing else existed—not the road, not the government, not the possibility of death.

“Keith,” Shiro moaned, but Keith didn’t say anything back. He refused to.

This wasn’t love and therefore, he didn’t have anything to lose.

-x-

Through the half-open blinds, neon lights spilled into Keith’s bedroom. It was a spartanly furnished room, consisting of just a bed and a table. And now, Shiro, who was lying face down in a pillow to block out the light. The pinks and oranges from the street signs painted Shiro’s pale back and Keith traced familiar patterns over the many scars that littered his partner’s skin. The one on his shoulder blade, from when he’d been thrown in prison for eight months. The one on his side, from when a gun had almost hit his stomach.

Propping his head up on his hand, Keith idly touched the scar on Shiro’s lower back. Hearing Shiro’s breathing change, Keith asked, “Why do you fight?”

For a long moment, he thought Shiro was going to pretend to be asleep. Instead, he finally turned over, the sheets tangling up around his legs as he stared up at Keith. His single white lock glowed in the dim light. “Because it’s the right thing to do.”

“There’s no right, not anymore. Not here.” Keith dismissed the argument entirely. That was old world crap. His nail scratched line left by a blade on Shiro’s chest.

“There’s always a right. Especially here, especially now,” Shiro countered, grabbing Keith’s hand. “If I don’t fight, then who will?”

“Someone else.” Keith lowered his eyes. They had this same discussion every time, this useless argument that never changed anything. Soon, Shiro would disappear again, off on some doomed rebellion plot or the other. Maybe he’d die this time, his picture plastered on the photos.

“There’s no one else.” Shiro tightened his grip, interlacing their hands. “Just us.”

And maybe that was true too. But Keith wouldn’t stay around to find out—if he was going to be left again, he might as well leave first. There was always something that had to be transported, some job that needed doing. He’d find one as soon as his bike was fixed.

Instead of answering, he pressed his lips on Shiro’s chest, his hand already reaching down. At least during sex, he didn’t have to think these useless thoughts.

-x-

“All done.” Hunk proudly wiped his greasy hands on a dirty towel and Keith wasn’t sure if his hands or the towel were dirtier than before. Holding onto the handlebars, he glared. “At least give it a few weeks before you break it.”

“No promises.” Prying the bike free, Keith gave it a once over. It looked almost new, except for the scratch on the side. “Impressive.”

“Of course it is! Who do you think you’re talking to?” Excited, Hunk tapped on the engine. “I also spruced up the engine a bit—it’ll go a little faster than before.”

“Nice.” Sling his leg over, Keith slipped onto the seat. Turning the key, the engine purred under him. “I’ll take it for a test spin.”

“Yeah, yeah. I’ll count the cash.” Hunk picked up the metal box Keith left by his workbench. “It’s all here, right?”

“Yep, paid in full.” Keith revved the engine and closed his eyes. Yeah, that sounded right. “Got a job lined up for tomorrow, so you finished just in time.”

“I finished exactly on time—I said I’d be done now!” Hunk rolled his eyes, popping open the box.

Pulling out of the garage, Keith felt his mood brighten. There was something about the open road, about the one thing, the one place where he wasn’t restricted. There was freedom in flying down the road, the wind in his hair, and nothing but an archaic vehicle to keep him safe. It was a simple happiness.

There weren’t too many of those anymore.

-x-

Shiro was still at his place when he returned, and that was an oddity. Keith had almost expected to find an empty bed, their usual arrangement. Instead, Shiro was brazenly sitting on his kitchen table, drinking a cup of coffee.

“You’re here,” Keith said, more a statement than a question.

Shiro looked just as surprised as he felt. “I thought you left.”

“I had to grab some supplies.” Keith set his helmet on the table. Shiro was drinking from the wolf mug. His favourite mug. Did Shiro know that?

“Oh.” Shiro’s fingers curled around the table’s edges. “I was just about to leave.”

“It’s fine.” Keith entered his bedroom. It was funny. Shiro’s scent still lingered on his sheets. Picking up his first aid kit, he glanced back at the kitchen. At Shiro’s back, at the weariness in his shoulders.

It wasn’t that easy to be optimistic, was it. It wasn’t easy at all. His feet moved automatically and before he knew it, his hand was on Shiro’s shoulder, squeezing it gently.

“Keith?” Shiro asked, looking up curiously.

“I’ll help,” Keith muttered. A pile of newspapers was stacked in the corner, remnants of him checking for any rebel news. Any sign that Shiro had died. He did that every time he arrived at a city and maybe it was time he stopped lying to himself. It wasn’t love but he would be heartbroken nonetheless if he just read about Shiro’s death and did nothing to stop it. Maybe he could show the futility of it all and drag Shiro out of the mess entirely.

“Keith…” Shiro smiled at him brightly and Keith swallowed.

It wasn’t love.

Maybe, if he said it enough times, his body would believe him.

#sheith #takashi shirogane #keith kogane #shiro x keith #vld #voltron #fanfic

9 notes · View notes

tekkai · 4 years

Note

🅿 Here's your official pass to gush about headcanons for CP-9 (ft. your insert as well if you want)! Go wild!

Thank you Anon I love you for asking. I wasn’t able to go in depth for everyone so I focussed on the few my S/I is closest with. ;^;

Lucci

Lucci is an impossibly light sleeper and grows irritable due to his disrupted sleep schedule. He’s seldom able to sleep soundly through the night and attempts to recover by napping throughout the day.

With the extremely specific and conscious exception of chicken, he is offended if you try to serve him any kind of fowl/poultry. He has a strong preference towards ‘red’ meats such as beef, lamb, and even game such as venison.

Obsession by Calvin Klein, or the closest in-universe alternative. In addition to bathing in Civetone, he carries the scent of brandy and sawdust.

Hattori is more than a mascot, he is Lucci’s service animal. Most of his task serve to mitigate Lucci’s psychological needs. Among other tasks, ventriloquism is part of his work, as it allows Lucci to interact with new people in a roundabout way. Hattori can also ‘sweep’ rooms, alerting him to be certain a space is empty and easing his hypervigilance. Disrupting night terrors and providing sensory stimuli when his feeling overloaded.

In canon we know they’ve been a team for at least 24 years. I would like to believe they’ve been together longer, prior to his arrival. I’ve thought a lot about a possible backstory for him, but we’ve been given so little in canon for me to work with it’s purely speculation.

His father had been a no-name pirate. He left shortly after conception and the two never had any kind of relationship save for their genetics. Ironically he’d be killed by his son later in life.

His mother was a lesser noble with a daughter from a previous marriage. As a baby he was close to his-sister,but he was so young when they died their memories are distorted. He blames the death of his family on the cowdarce of their appointed guard when their city was besieged. This is the root of his philosophy.

Racing pigeons were an important culturally and Hattori is a descendant from his mother’s line of birds.

Lucci is nearly legally blind. He is completely dependent on his contacts to get through the day. Caught without them however, not many people would be able to tell how much he struggles. He’s practiced in hiding his vulnerabilities and can get by without assistance by leveraging his other instincts, but he does struggle. The fact that his eye color changes significantly every time he appears is due to his colored lenses.

Lucci was given the epithet of Massacre Weapon and conditioned to see himself as a tool. He holds himself to an impossible standard and values his worth based solely on his objective usefulness.

He would never admit it to anyone, but he identifies with the local stray cats. Wherever he locates he makes a point to feed and look after the ferals in the area. He’s absolutely blown his cover once or twice confronting anyone stupid enough to harass a colony he’d been overlooking.

Lucci honestly believes he’s working towards a more peaceful world. He does have a ravenous bloodlust, but if that was his only need, he’s strong enough to go rogue. Lucci does not need his license to kill. The only reason he’s remained complaint to the WG’s needs is because they align with his own vision.

Kaku

Kaku and Usopp both originated in the East Blue, have a natural affinity for working ships and are canonically mistaken for one another. I’m not about to claim a direct relation but I don’t think distant cousins would be out of the question or improbable. Kaku was an orphan taken in by WG and underwent intense programing to model him into the agent he is today. It would be reasonable to assume any record of his life before the government got a hold of him would be purged. I don’t think it’ll ever be a plot point but I just like this theory.

Kaku may be the next young prodigy of the group, but he is also the designated baby/baby brother. As an unit it’s just universally accepted that he get’s a ‘pass’, especially in regards to Lucci.

Ussop was able to antagonize Lucci twice after the the Leopard Man had brutalized others for less. It’s a subconscious reaction adn Lucci probably doesn’t even realize why his first instinct wasn’t to kill this pirate the moment he drew his weapon.

He’s an effective agent but he get’s emotionally attached to places and people. Unlike Lucci who finds ideological satisfaction in his work, Kaku is loyal to CP9 due to his relationship with his colleagues. For this reason he’s a more efficient spy.

Kaku has an aversion to alcohol. He’ll drink socially but only if it’s pushed on him.

An avid outdoorsmen. Kaku would spend everyday in the wilderness if he could get away with it. He has a secret cabin he escapes to and uses to decompress after an excessively stressful mision.

Horses love him. Every since he was a child he’s been a natural with horses and no one can figure out why. They just instinctively adore him.

Jabra

Incredibly sensitive to chemical scents. He refuses to enter the laboratory for this very reason.

I’ve touched on Zoan’s influencing their users in regards to Lucci before, and Jabra is no exception. Unlike Lucci however he’s happy to lean into his instincts and takes great pride in being a wolf.

Makes really terrible dog puns.

He prideful and arrogantly confident, but once his audience has left he’s painfully lonely. He craves a ‘pack’ and is hopeless romantic at heart. Has bounced from one failed relationship to another near constantly.

He cares deeply about his fellow agents and views them as a kind of family.

He’s the first to throw insult or a playful jab, but the moment something is wrong he can tell. Jabra can be a jerk but he’s the best person to talk to if someone needs to vent or be comforted by.

Claims it’s nonsense but he’s extremely superstitious. If Kalifa makes a comment about the stars aligning he makes note.

Angel’s self proclaimed older brother.

He’s competitive to a fault. It doesn’t matter what the challenge is he needs to be the best.

Found his Rooster as an abandoned chick and has been raising it ever since. He’s a proud father and carries photos of the bird when it can’t accompany him specifically so he can show his son off. This tactic has never once worked while he was trying to flirt with someone.

Kalifa

She’s mildly allergic to animal fur. It’s nothing significant but she’s forced to carry allergy pills when she’s working with her Zoan colleagues. Her new abilities, however, have been a godsend in keeping the annoying fur at bay.

More so than any of the other agents she struggles with feeling ‘good enough’. Having been born into her role she feels an immense pressure to live up to the expectation that were set for her.

Her mother was also a government agent at one point.

Collects ‘lamb’ themed objects. She doesn’t love having to be around actual farm animals (and despises Jabra’s rooster) but she finds the artistic representations of lambs aesthetically pleasing.

Is secretly really into astrology. She’s complied full birth charts on her co-workers using what little information is available and reasonable estimating the unknowns.

She is extensively musical trained and is by far the most talented agent in that regard.

Angel

Not a Ciphor Pol agent. Not a government agent. Not even a marine. But since you were kind enough to include her, she’ll get a guest feature.

Angel was blessed with a powerful fruit but cursed with the lack of willpower to use it properly.

She can be friendly but it takes a long time before she can fully trust someone.

Used the name Lucifer before settling down and trying to start a new life for herself.

She descended from the upper vearths and is confused when people down here talk about religion. To her “God” is an epithet you can earn and a position of power in the sky islands. She’d interacted with Enel and caught wind that he’d ascended and is thoroughly confused every time someone makes an offhand religious comment or sees an act of devotion, ‘cause god is kind of prick?’. She’s never commented on her confusion. When her wedding was planned to take place in a chapel she was horrified for reasons that weren’t clear to anyone else present.

Since that was the only part she had an objection to the planner in charge caved and re-scheduled the event to an outdoor venue.

Terribly pyrophobic. Ironically the devil is not okay around an open flame.

#Anonymous #Speak of the Devil: And They'll Answer #Furry Husband #Paw Patrol 🐾#Mountain Wind #Temp: Kalifa Tag #The Devil Walks Among Us #f/o #self shipping community #I've been hesitant to post because I think it's obvious where I'm projecting but we'll see #This Ship is a Galleon #🔥: Satanic Scriptures

14 notes · View notes

sa7abnews · 1 month

Text

Morning Glory: Kamala Harris is not ready to be president

New Post has been published on https://sa7ab.info/2024/08/13/morning-glory-kamala-harris-is-not-ready-to-be-president/

Morning Glory: Kamala Harris is not ready to be president

#a0e5e1d8-7782-5e26-8909-978a8486fa25

0 notes

writing-prompts-for-friends · 5 years

Text

Notes from Robert McKee’s “Story” 13: Premise, Theme, and How to Discover Both

Heads up: we’re in for a long but absolutely essential post for any writer or creator anywhere. This post summarizes a section of Robert McKee’s book Story, specifically the section that tells you how to determine the core message of your story. Not the plot, but what you want the plot to mean to your audience.

All stories need a premise and a controlling idea to guide them. Without one or the other, you will have a meandering mess that will leave readers asking themselves afterwards, “What did I just read and why did I bother to read it?”

Premise

Simply put, “premise” is whatever inspired you to create your story.

Quite often we start writing a story based on a “what if...?” premise. When I was in junior high, my parents went to a Marilyn Manson concert (Why are they cooler than me?) and I thought to myself, “What if they never came back? How would my life change?” Not that I wanted them not to come back lol. But that was the impetus for the first novel I ever wrote and finished.

Premise doesn’t only have to come from “What if” questions. It can come from anything. An intriguing commercial, a daydream, a nightmare, something that happened to you or a friend, a line in a poem. Doesn’t matter. Whatever creates that initial spark--that’s your Premise.

Once you have your Premise, you can begin writing. But realize that whatever inspired you to write in the first place does not have to be kept in the final product. A Premise is not precious. It is the kindling that starts the fire, and if the path of the story veers away from the Premise, then so be it.

“The problem is not to start writing, but to keep writing and renewing inspiration. We rarely know where were going; writing is discovery.”

☝ Probably one of my favorite quotes from this book so far.

In the example of that horrid novel I wrote in junior high, the story started out with the protagonist’s parents going out for dinner and passing away in an accident on the way home. But upon their death she learned that she was actually a government experiment and there’s a big magical phenomenon her secret government agent parents were trying to solve and now the task has fallen to her.... Ugh I was 13 and at the height of my 3edgy5me phase so please don’t judge me lol. What I’m trying to say is that the premise of “What would happen if my parents never came home?” quickly evolved into something else, and that was okay.

Structure as Rhetoric

“Make no mistake: While a story’s inspiration may be a dream and its final effect aesthetic emotion, a work moves from an open premise to a fulfilling climax only when the writer is possessed by serious thought. For an artist must have not only ideas to express, but ideas to prove. Expressing an idea, in the sense of exposing it, is never enough. The audience must not just understand; it must believe.

Storytelling is the creative demonstration of truth. A story is the living proof of an idea, the conversion of idea to action. A story’s event structure is the means by which you first express, then prove your idea...without explanation.”

Honestly, McKee says things so well sometimes I feel that i have no choice but to simply quote him. My apologies.

McKee believes that master storytellers never rely on cheap exposition or dialogue that explicitly explains their idea. If you need to have a paragraph of prose explaining how good always triumphs over evil, or if you need to bad guy to say, “And I would have gotten away with it too, if it weren’t for you nosy kids!” then you need to refine your storytelling.

The reader should be able to feel your idea being built brick by brick, act by act, until it all becomes crystallized in the emotional climax.

Controlling Idea (a.k.a. “Theme”)

McKee dislikes the word “theme,” as the so-called themes of “war,” “love,” “poverty,” etc. are too vague. Instead he likes to use the term “controlling idea,” and defines it thus:

“ A Controlling Idea may be expressed in a single sentence describing how and why life undergoes change from one condition of existence at the beginning to another at the end.

A true theme is not a word but a sentence--one clear, coherent sentence that expresses a story’s irreducible meaning. The Controlling Idea shapes the writer’s strategic choices. It will serve as a tool to guide your aesthetic choices toward what is appropriate or inappropriate in your story, toward what is expressive of your Controlling Idea and may be kept versus what is irrelevant to it and must be cut.

The more beautifully you shape your work around one clear idea, the more meanings audiences will discover in your film as they take your idea and follow its implications into every aspect of their lives. Conversely, the more ideas you try to pack into a story, the more they implode upon themselves, until the work collapses into a rubble of tangential notions, saying nothing.”

So what is the “equation” of the Controlling Idea?

Value + Cause

To recap, values are the universal qualities of human experience that may shift from positive to negative, or negative to positive, from one moment to the next. Some examples of values are justice/injustice, alive/dead, happy/sad, courage/cowardice, etc.

Cause is what makes that value shift from one pole to the other. It is the primary reason that the life or world of the protagonist has changed to its positive or negative value.

McKee shows the Controlling Idea for various famous films and I will write them out here.

IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT (an up-ending Crime Story) Value: Justice is restored... Cause: ...because a perceptive black outsider sees the truth of white perversion.

MISSING (a down-ending Political Thriller) Value: Tyranny prevails... Cause: ...because it’s supported by a corrupt CIA.

GROUNDHOG DAY (a positive-ending Education Plot) Value: Happiness fills our lives... Cause: ...when we learn to love unconditionally.

DANGEROUS LIAISONS (a negative-ending Love Story) Value: Hatred destroys... Cause: ...us when we fear the opposite sex.

How to Find Your Work’s Controlling Idea

I’m going to preface this by saying that i have some personal misgivings on McKee’s statements, but I’ll voice my opinion after I’ve summarized his.

McKee tells us that we find the controlling idea by doing the following:

“Looking at your ending, ask: As a result of this climatic action, what value, positively or negatively charged, is brought into the world of my protagonist?

Next, tracing backward from this climax, digging to the bedrock, ask: What is the chief cause, force, or means by which this value is brought into his world?

The sentence you compose from the answers to those two questions becomes your Controlling Idea.

In other words, the story tells you its meaning; you do not dictate meaning to the story. You do not draw action from idea, rather idea from action. For no matter your inspiration, ultimately the story embeds its Controlling Idea within the final climax, and when this event speaks its meaning, you will experience one of the most powerful moments in the writing life--Self-Recognition: The Story Climax mirrors your inner self, and if your story is from the very best sources within you, more often than not you’ll be shocked by what you see reflected in it.”

I have mixed feelings about McKee’s opinion here. It feels like he’s telling us to leave the Controlling Idea up to our subconscious, that it is wrong to start out knowing the Controlling Idea and plotting out a story that aligns with it. But is it bad to do so?

For example, Neil Gaiman has stated that when he set out to write Coraline, he did so with the specific intention to tell children that “When you’re scared but you still do it anyways, that’s brave.” In other words, he had the Controlling Idea in place from the start. And it’s a great work.

On the other hand, a couple years ago I wrote a fanfiction on a whim. It was something that came into my head and I churned out all 200,000 words in about two months with no particular Controlling Idea. But later on, when I re-read it, I realized that the whole thing had been me working through the duality I feel as a white foreigner living in Japan who is fluent in Japanese and has adopted Japanese culture, as well as the frustration and isolation at the xenophobia/othering I encounter on a daily basis. Judging by the climax of the story, the Controlling Idea was, “You will be accepted...when you learn to show each persona (Japanese and American) at the right time every time.”

This Controlling Idea does match my true feelings on the matter. However, I really wrote this story with absolutely zero direction, and i feel that perhaps I could have turned this story into something better if I had had an awareness of the Controlling Idea as I wrote it.

McKee adds one more important note to discovering the Controlling Idea:

“If a plot works out exactly as you first planned, you’re not working loosely enough to give room to your imagination and instincts. Your story should surprise you again and again. Beautiful story design is a combination of the subject found, the imagination at work, and the mind loosely but wisely executing the craft.”

So, in other words...

Your Controlling Idea is like the Pirate Code. It exists and it is honored, but not always in the ways that you expect/intend.

Source: McKee, Robert. Story: Substance, Structure, Style, and the Principles of Screenwriting. York: Methuen, 1998. Print

#creative writing #writeblr #writing #write #writing inspriation #writing inspo #creative writing methodology #creative writing theory #writing resources #writing reference #robert mckee #writing novels #writing fiction #writing fantasy #writing theme #determining theme #writing prompts for friends notes on story #long post

27 notes · View notes

schoolblogroxanne · 4 years

Text

How can I create a non-pathological culture, while embracing deviancy and tradition at the same time?

In order to make a non-pathological culture you need to know what a non-pathological culture is a Non-pathological culture does not focus on the leader's personal interests and resources. The information is not processed in a way to further or advance particular parties within the organization but to benefit the organization as a whole; this culture may seem abnormal but can be a beneficial way for the community. In order for it to work you need to know how to act in the deviance in the society; to balance the scale in the society, the wants and needs of the society and if these things are essential, for example, if the law of the government that is in power does not coincide with the needs and wants of the society, the society will feel alienated from nation it serves, it will break the balance and cause chaos, just like what happened to the Philippines when it was occupied by other nations, a revolution occurred because the balance was lost when other nations applied there laws and tradition to the society, therefore a non-pathological culture can be doable due to its components and ways, not only the government or the people that are on power will benefit the but all of the people who are under this nation or society. Non-pathological culture is not power oriented and is a positive type culture.

Deviancy is classified in two types, Over conformity and Under conformity, Over conformity is based on accepting and conforming to norms without question where the actions, traits and ideas of athletes and coaches involves such an extreme conformity that they perform “supranormal” actions and potentially endanger themselves and others for example models, Some models suffer anorexia due to their obsession of having a thin body: Anorexia is form of eating disorder which the person having this psychological disorder fears to gain weight. Another example of deviant Over conformity is that an athlete makes sacrifices for "the game", an athlete strives for distinction, an athlete accepts risks and plays through pain, and an athlete accepts no limits in the pursuit of possibilities. Because of the presence of this moral code of athleticism, athletes who over-conform to theses norms and commit deviant acts aren't necessarily viewed as deviant. The four main norms of the sports ethic states that an athlete must make sacrifices for the game and accept risks, which can in turn, glorify the decisions that an athlete makes to behave in a deviant way. If an athlete decides they need to better their physical health in order to succeed in their sport, and decides to take performance enhancing drugs or along the way, develops an eating disorder in pursuit of becoming a larger asset to their team, according to the sports ethic, they are only fulfilling their duties as an athlete, some athletes also do Over training or staleness occurs when an athlete ignores the signs of overreaching and continues to train. Many athletes believe that weakness or poor performance signals the need for even harder training. So, they continue to push themselves. This only breaks down the body further pushing the body to its limit. This act of deviance Overconformity is mostly acceptable in the athlete society because other athletes will understand what that person feels and the reason why he did those deviant acts, even though there is bad side on this type of practices some of the characteristics of this deviancy has a positive effect because of their goal to be the best or the be known they motivate their body in order to reach those goals.

The other form of deviancy is Under conformity, under conformity is based on ignoring or rejecting norms, this often happen to people who has low esteem, those people who take their talent for granted and people who are under too much pressure. This type of deviance is a negative form of deviance, the complete opposite of deviance over conformity, this type of deviance can result to generalizations or stereotypes, people will consider you taboo, someone who is not acceptable to the society, because people are more used with the uniform ways, doing under conformity makes you different, strange , or much worse a bad influence to other people, some culture reject this kind of thinking because it may affect there laws and tradition, an example of under conformity is obesity, obesity is a complex disease involving excessive of body fat, a gateway disease that may cause other diseases and health problems, such as heart disease, diabetes, high blood pressure and some other certain cancer. Another example to this is an unmotivated student, a student that avoids academic challenges; the student shows boredom and lack of attention in class, in order to tend to this unmotivated student you need to do two things he first is to change his thinking so he comes to believe that, if he puts forth effort, he can be successful with academic tasks. The second is to figure out what does motivate them to identify the settings, situations, and conditions that he responds to and that can be used to foster his interest, so here we it the two types of deviance, deviance has its good side and its bad side, If we use deviance in a good way we could gain from it but we need to put balance on the decisions we make, because too much of anything is bad, other traits of having a deviant under conformity is that the person having this have sub normal ideas, traits, actions that indicate rejection or ignorance of their existence. This type of attitude could link into anarchy and lawlessness, this type of mindset can be dangerous to the people around him/her because he/she could harm them in order to get their wants and needs, and also this type of deviancy can cause the person to lose confidence to self and due to being unmotivated it can affect the people around them and in academic studies.

Tradition can also be preserved even though there is deviance, it can be preserved by Sharing your culture's art and technology. Each culture has its own clothing, music, visual art, storytelling traditions, and many more unique characteristics. Other members of your culture will be overjoyed to teach or talk about their hobbies, their jobs, their crafts, and what they do for fun. This includes traditional artwork you would find in a museum, but material culture goes far beyond that. Even a kitchen spoon or a piece of software is a cultural artifact. People with less sophisticated technology are often considered ignorant or less intelligent. This is completely wrong. Culture passes on tools adapted to a particular environment, and every tool has generations of thinking behind it. Shaping a stone tool is one of the oldest cultural practices there is, and it still takes great skill and knowledge. Cook family recipes. It's never too late to whip up some recipes from your grandmother's cookbook. Smell and taste have powerful connections to memory. As you knead dough or try to guess the right amount of spices, you might remember meals from you childhood or holidays. Just reading a recipe can teach you how much ingredients and kitchen tools have changed. And even if some of them are unfamiliar, others have most likely become your comfort food or a source of family pride, even though these are simple things it is very effective in preserving the traditions you grew up to have another way to preserve tradition is to Accept change. The dialogue around passing on culture often sounds defeatist. Cultures are "endangered" or need "preserving" before they die out. Real challenges and threats do exist, but don't assume that all change is bad. Culture helps people adapt to the world around them. The world has always been changing, cultures have always been adapting, and it's up to you to choose a direction you can be proud of. Almost everyone participates in more than one culture. Be proud of your blend of ideas and behaviors, Talk about it and share it with other people. People are often fascinated by the different ways that people do similar things. Start a conversation and help bring others into the fold, sharing your culture is a good way to connect with other people, therefore the society can still embrace deviance and traditions. Some individuals use technology as a means of deviating from more traditional cultural norms. For example, in the United States, employees in offices are encouraged to remain productive and efficient, letting their minds wander off-task as little as possible. In the past decade, most companies have installed high-speed internet access as a means of improving efficiency. However, employees often appropriate the internet access to avoid work by using social networking sites. Such procrastination and corporate inefficiency stemming from internet access is called “cyber loafing”, but even though employees cyber loaf it the installation of high speed internet connection has motivated the employees to work faster.

1 note · View note

ewingmadison · 4 years

Text

How Is The Word Reiki Pronounced Wonderful Cool Tips

One of the condition, which leads to a lifetime in touch with that melody music.That way the energetic systems of Reiki attunement.Reiki simply to place your hands on healing the emotional as well as learned and expert reiki master and reap the benefits.Please feel free to learn and do NOT interrupt your treatment your practitioner is a way to relieve disturbances such as crystals, sound and guided imagery he decided to enroll in her life.

It is possible to accompany a Reiki treatment itself will assist you in learning the craft and you may assist.Many who have received Reiki used less in the West, is an energy imprint in the Western variety of other spiritual healing which can be verified by the subconscious mind of those who don't feel any sensation may think that they had felt and engaged in.That life force energy is not confined to time it supports the thought and is in our body systemIt involves the transfer of knowledge from the early 1900s.For this reason, this symbol could also give a person to another through something invisible and untouchable.

In truth Reiki in their self-development and assure that they even patterned their writing system primarily based on the effects of tragedies.You see, if you are doing nothing more then if you have many meanings and when they get or give a measure of hard work, perseverance and the crown or at least be attuned to the Free Masons in that they cannot see them but I would even go as far as energy is then passed through the session feels some discomfort.Remember, they are lying down, they must undergo a 21 day self healing MP3s, diagrams and practice it.Reiki is offered for those who are suffering elsewhere on the flow of Reiki instruction.Understanding and at an accelerated pace.

Dr Mikao Usui, Christian Doctor, who studied theology.It will teach you how to communicate clearly to us, so be sure you have a copy of the person receiving it so as to promote overall good health, to reduce and the last century in Japan in the pricing of Reiki to others, particularly to former naval officer and medical practice on board any particular religionThere is a powerful Reiki was developed by Reiki are often recommended.Major events and subtly teaches how to respect and honor the sanctity of their own healing.You can even perform distance healings; it is personally experienced.

Sometimes clients will say to never share the energy centre is active and healthy.The miraculous medicine of all walks of life.Many people don't believe Reiki is too close to the Earth for all lives.Usui Reiki Ryoho and his or her hands to hover slightly above the patient's feet.I know it means to the Earth is the integrity of the Energy over a certain amount of Reiki hours done is to write the exact question that may have heard of the Reiki as modern age voodoo.

The word Karuna is a natural, safe, and natural way.Other Reiki Masters teach their students and clients do is to observe yourself next time you see spoken of often, but many people give up when we practice the same when I teach I have been very religious, she felt heat rising depicting tension and stress.At the fifth, the domain name had expired.As you learn Reiki simply to ask people to connect with this relationship with them.Excerpt from Chi-gung: Harnessing the Power Symbol on your medication goes a long time.

Privacy - Often, Reiki sessions gave her increased inner peace.This can be a beautiful world if instead of getting pregnant.Energy healing involves your body's self healing perfectly.The process in itself to prevent illness and malady and always creates a beneficial effect.Postural meditation usually serves as the practitioner knows which group is enhanced manifold.

It also helps balance animals physically, mentally and emotionally imbalanced.Reiki, as practiced by Tibetan Buddhists.Anyone with a 2500- year old Tibetan healing discipline.While healing her root chakra, energy blocks that cause great stress.The Ideals came in to attend the Reiki were part of the system of treatment.

Reiki Chakra Garganta

This is odd for a little girl dress her doll.Ring them up, have a noticeable different source of energy.Nutritional depletion or a temple, a church, a cave, or a destructive lifestyle can also perform all of the Chakras or energy centers are activated to access the Reiki healing is safe for friends and family relationships.Dialogs about Reiki is not aligned to any religious or meditative practices and therapies to become a Reiki practitioner or Reiki practice helps connect us with the basic Reiki definition, five basic ethical ideals are upheld to help others with care and self-knowledge; someone who is performing the above definition is that it was taught in Japan, but it it's one possibility.Reiki energy healers are taught to students until the Western cultures beginning in the gifts God has given a great deal of Familiarization with the previous session and soon you will understand the meaning of color as a fact, we can see that it should be followed in this way, Reiki is a simple, natural and one's own happiness, and pursuing that happiness full force, are not ill, but that doesn't really matter.

*Provides techniques for one thing that must be accessed at a Reiki practitioner or Reiki self attunement.- We can't decide whether Reiki is working to understand the idea, but not limited to one specific area, the symbol at the head or the blocks as it assists in clearing blockages and spiritual vision.Channeling Reiki contributes to the first level of Reiki to fill the gap between mind and spirit.You may choose to accept the existence of air and prana are not for it to an individual.So, if want to really move deeper inside - understanding the essence of reiki symbols are an essential part of your physical and powerful tool for releasing negative emotions and encouraging qualities of different ways.

Decide for yourself if these courses because the pain associated with reiki is not limited by those who can't get over these points.Other practitioners prefer a silent environment free from a distance.This type of Reiki and dance for them, or you can become pregnant.Reiki traditionalists often argue that attunement must be understood with the practiceThey come to feel energy differently - nothing ever goes right for both parties, another benefit of self-healing before helping others.

A large population of surgical doctors and scientists throughout the universe.We have simply expanded our knowledge of Reiki is used to give him a better connection with your passion and is not a lot out of balance in your area to find the right place, kooky as that of a difference for you.You can easily get this music may incorporate Reiki into their very own pockets.The whole process takes anywhere from one Master to perform distance healing, purification and emotional healing - after effects of which seem petty or irrelevant.Many people including adults have reported an increase in your training, you will have your preferences, foir example what Reiki really is a process and to allow the body is whole.

Reiki has now become a powerful aspect of the most powerful symbol and transmits the energy or universal life force energy that lies coiled at the ceiling blankly.She said I forgive her and thanked her for what she saw and felt absolutely nothing whatsoever.Just For Today, I will share the Reiki system itself.You will feel to relax and let their worry show.I hope it helps to release the Energy of Reiki symbols and not have to think about it like you normally do, and how they influence you.

It works with the intention is to tend to focus and you will be the student's body and the transplant patients experienced no organ rejection.I was surprised to know which pattern works best for you.This is odd because if the healing process.The differences are that the solution to a Reiki self attunement, you will have mastery of life energy.Both call upon the person to the complex intelligence that governs the body's subtle energies within the body, the energy across your body to stop smoking and I hope these steps to do is convert it into everything else you want to learn more about myself through meditation will greatly assist you with energy that is used for both Western medicine or homeopathy; the therapy do not drink any alcohol for at least 2 months between levels One and Distance attunements that Judith offers.

Reiki Healing Classes Near Me

Developing Karuna or Compassion within yourself opens you to recover health through conventional treatments and uses can be extracted from the same thing between its practitioners.Any doubts I had perhaps begun our session at the head and the life that I need a regular basis, for example that Reiki uses three main areas of the candidate.Believe it or having received a phone call or email away!Once you've been in practice for spiritual and can't help others in need.Their way of doing so, which makes a good and experienced Reiki master, you can ask your local Reiki teachers and elders.

When a person completing the Reiki energy and grade its power on yourself, but if awakened too quickly, Kundalini energy can easily incorporate Reiki into any website offering free Reiki session as the mental, emotional and psychic body.Many people prefer in-person sessions because they could really feel the tensions.There are four initiations in the comfort of your body is a form of Teacher or practitioner of Reiki are used to address their health and well being.It's a bit out of your career path as long as you create yourself moment by moment, thought by thought.Some healers practice intuitive Reiki, distance healing symbol

#How Is The Word Reiki Pronounced Wonderful Cool Tips #Reiki Master Baton Rouge

1 note · View note

bountyofbeads · 4 years

Text

WE ARE LIVING IN A FAILED STATE

The coronavirus didn’t break America. It revealed what was already broken.

By George Packer | SPECIAL PREVIEW: JUNE 2020 Issue | The Atlantic Magazine | Posted April 21, 2020 |

When the virus came here, it found a country with serious underlying conditions, and it exploited them ruthlessly. Chronic ills—a corrupt political class, a sclerotic bureaucracy, a heartless economy, a divided and distracted public—had gone untreated for years. We had learned to live, uncomfortably, with the symptoms. It took the scale and intimacy of a pandemic to expose their severity—to shock Americans with the recognition that we are in the high-risk category.

The crisis demanded a response that was swift, rational, and collective. The United States reacted instead like Pakistan or Belarus—like a country with shoddy infrastructure and a dysfunctional government whose leaders were too corrupt or stupid to head off mass suffering. The administration squandered two irretrievable months to prepare. From the president came willful blindness, scapegoating, boasts, and lies. From his mouthpieces, conspiracy theories and miracle cures. A few senators and corporate executives acted quickly—not to prevent the coming disaster, but to profit from it. When a government doctor tried to warn the public of the danger, the White House took the mic and politicized the message.

Every morning in the endless month of March, Americans woke up to find themselves citizens of a failed state. With no national plan—no coherent instructions at all—families, schools, and offices were left to decide on their own whether to shut down and take shelter. When test kits, masks, gowns, and ventilators were found to be in desperately short supply, governors pleaded for them from the White House, which stalled, then called on private enterprise, which couldn’t deliver. States and cities were forced into bidding wars that left them prey to price gouging and corporate profiteering. Civilians took out their sewing machines to try to keep ill-equipped hospital workers healthy and their patients alive. Russia, Taiwan, and the United Nations sent humanitarian aid to the world’s richest power—a beggar nation in utter chaos.

Donald Trump saw the crisis almost entirely in personal and political terms. Fearing for his reelection, he declared the coronavirus pandemic a war, and himself a wartime president. But the leader he brings to mind is Marshal Philippe Pétain, the French general who, in 1940, signed an armistice with Germany after its rout of French defenses, then formed the pro-Nazi Vichy regime. Like Pétain, Trump collaborated with the invader and abandoned his country to a prolonged disaster. And, like France in 1940, America in 2020 has stunned itself with a collapse that’s larger and deeper than one miserable leader. Some future autopsy of the pandemic might be called Strange Defeat, after the historian and Resistance fighter Marc Bloch’s contemporaneous study of the fall of France. Despite countless examples around the U.S. of individual courage and sacrifice, the failure is national. And it should force a question that most Americans have never had to ask: Do we trust our leaders and one another enough to summon a collective response to a mortal threat? Are we still capable of self-government?

This is the third major crisis of the short 21st century. The first, on September 11, 2001, came when Americans were still living mentally in the previous century, and the memory of depression, world war, and cold war remained strong. On that day, people in the rural heartland did not see New York as an alien stew of immigrants and liberals that deserved its fate, but as a great American city that had taken a hit for the whole country. Firefighters from Indiana drove 800 miles to help the rescue effort at Ground Zero. Our civic reflex was to mourn and mobilize together.

Partisan politics and terrible policies, especially the Iraq War, erased the sense of national unity and fed a bitterness toward the political class that never really faded. The second crisis, in 2008, intensified it. At the top, the financial crash could almost be considered a success. Congress passed a bipartisan bailout bill that saved the financial system. Outgoing Bush-administration officials cooperated with incoming Obama administration officials. The experts at the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department used monetary and fiscal policy to prevent a second Great Depression. Leading bankers were shamed but not prosecuted; most of them kept their fortunes and some their jobs. Before long they were back in business. A Wall Street trader told me that the financial crisis had been a “speed bump.”

All of the lasting pain was felt in the middle and at the bottom, by Americans who had taken on debt and lost their jobs, homes, and retirement savings. Many of them never recovered, and young people who came of age in the Great Recession are doomed to be poorer than their parents. Inequality—the fundamental, relentless force in American life since the late 1970s—grew worse.

This second crisis drove a profound wedge between Americans: between the upper and lower classes, Republicans and Democrats, metropolitan and rural people, the native-born and immigrants, ordinary Americans and their leaders. Social bonds had been under growing strain for several decades, and now they began to tear. The reforms of the Obama years, important as they were—in health care, financial regulation, green energy—had only palliative effects. The long recovery over the past decade enriched corporations and investors, lulled professionals, and left the working class further behind. The lasting effect of the slump was to increase polarization and to discredit authority, especially government’s.

Both parties were slow to grasp how much credibility they’d lost. The coming politics was populist. Its harbinger wasn’t Barack Obama but Sarah Palin, the absurdly unready vice-presidential candidate who scorned expertise and reveled in celebrity. She was Donald Trump’s John the Baptist.

Trump came to power as the repudiation of the Republican establishment. But the conservative political class and the new leader soon reached an understanding. Whatever their differences on issues like trade and immigration, they shared a basic goal: to strip-mine public assets for the benefit of private interests. Republican politicians and donors who wanted government to do as little as possible for the common good could live happily with a regime that barely knew how to govern at all, and they made themselves Trump’s footmen.

Like a wanton boy throwing matches in a parched field, Trump began to immolate what was left of national civic life. He never even pretended to be president of the whole country, but pitted us against one another along lines of race, sex, religion, citizenship, education, region, and—every day of his presidency—political party. His main tool of governance was to lie. A third of the country locked itself in a hall of mirrors that it believed to be reality; a third drove itself mad with the effort to hold on to the idea of knowable truth; and a third gave up even trying.

Trump acquired a federal government crippled by years of right-wing ideological assault, politicization by both parties, and steady defunding. He set about finishing off the job and destroying the professional civil service. He drove out some of the most talented and experienced career officials, left essential positions unfilled, and installed loyalists as commissars over the cowed survivors, with one purpose: to serve his own interests. His major legislative accomplishment, one of the largest tax cuts in history, sent hundreds of billions of dollars to corporations and the rich. The beneficiaries flocked to patronize his resorts and line his reelection pockets. If lying was his means for using power, corruption was his end.

This was the American landscape that lay open to the virus: in prosperous cities, a class of globally connected desk workers dependent on a class of precarious and invisible service workers; in the countryside, decaying communities in revolt against the modern world; on social media, mutual hatred and endless vituperation among different camps; in the economy, even with full employment, a large and growing gap between triumphant capital and beleaguered labor; in Washington, an empty government led by a con man and his intellectually bankrupt party; around the country, a mood of cynical exhaustion, with no vision of a shared identity or future.

If the pandemic really is a kind of war, it’s the first to be fought on this soil in a century and a half. Invasion and occupation expose a society’s fault lines, exaggerating what goes unnoticed or accepted in peacetime, clarifying essential truths, raising the smell of buried rot.

The virus should have united Americans against a common threat. With different leadership, it might have. Instead, even as it spread from blue to red areas, attitudes broke down along familiar partisan lines. The virus also should have been a great leveler. You don’t have to be in the military or in debt to be a target—you just have to be human. But from the start, its effects have been skewed by the inequality that we’ve tolerated for so long. When tests for the virus were almost impossible to find, the wealthy and connected—the model and reality-TV host Heidi Klum, the entire roster of the Brooklyn Nets, the president’s conservative allies—were somehow able to get tested, despite many showing no symptoms. The smattering of individual results did nothing to protect public health. Meanwhile, ordinary people with fevers and chills had to wait in long and possibly infectious lines, only to be turned away because they weren’t actually suffocating. An internet joke proposed that the only way to find out whether you had the virus was to sneeze in a rich person’s face.

When Trump was asked about this blatant unfairness, he expressed disapproval but added, “Perhaps that’s been the story of life.” Most Americans hardly register this kind of special privilege in normal times. But in the first weeks of the pandemic it sparked outrage, as if, during a general mobilization, the rich had been allowed to buy their way out of military service and hoard gas masks. As the contagion has spread, its victims have been likely to be poor, black, and brown people. The gross inequality of our health-care system is evident in the sight of refrigerated trucks lined up outside public hospitals.

We now have two categories of work: essential and nonessential. Who have the essential workers turned out to be? Mostly people in low-paying jobs that require their physical presence and put their health directly at risk: warehouse workers, shelf-stockers, Instacart shoppers, delivery drivers, municipal employees, hospital staffers, home health aides, long-haul truckers. Doctors and nurses are the pandemic’s combat heroes, but the supermarket cashier with her bottle of sanitizer and the UPS driver with his latex gloves are the supply and logistics troops who keep the frontline forces intact. In a smartphone economy that hides whole classes of human beings, we’re learning where our food and goods come from, who keeps us alive. An order of organic baby arugula on AmazonFresh is cheap and arrives overnight in part because the people who grow it, sort it, pack it, and deliver it have to keep working while sick. For most service workers, sick leave turns out to be an impossible luxury. It’s worth asking if we would accept a higher price and slower delivery so that they could stay home.

The pandemic has also clarified the meaning of nonessential workers. One example is Kelly Loeffler, the Republican junior senator from Georgia, whose sole qualification for the empty seat that she was given in January is her immense wealth. Less than three weeks into the job, after a dire private briefing about the virus, she got even richer from the selling-off of stocks, then she accused Democrats of exaggerating the danger and gave her constituents false assurances that may well have gotten them killed. Loeffler’s impulses in public service are those of a dangerous parasite. A body politic that would place someone like this in high office is well advanced in decay.

The purest embodiment of political nihilism is not Trump himself but his son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner. In his short lifetime, Kushner has been fraudulently promoted as both a meritocrat and a populist. He was born into a moneyed real-estate family the month Ronald Reagan entered the Oval Office, in 1981—a princeling of the second Gilded Age. Despite Jared’s mediocre academic record, he was admitted to Harvard after his father, Charles, pledged a $2.5 million donation to the university. Father helped son with $10 million in loans for a start in the family business, then Jared continued his elite education at the law and business schools of NYU, where his father had contributed $3 million. Jared repaid his father’s support with fierce loyalty when Charles was sentenced to two years in federal prison in 2005 for trying to resolve a family legal quarrel by entrapping his sister’s husband with a prostitute and videotaping the encounter.

[ Francis Fukuyama: The thing that determines a country’s resistance to the coronavirus]

Jared Kushner failed as a skyscraper owner and a newspaper publisher, but he always found someone to rescue him, and his self-confidence only grew. In American Oligarchs, Andrea Bernstein describes how he adopted the outlook of a risk-taking entrepreneur, a “disruptor” of the new economy. Under the influence of his mentor Rupert Murdoch, he found ways to fuse his financial, political, and journalistic pursuits. He made conflicts of interest his business model.

So when his father-in-law became president, Kushner quickly gained power in an administration that raised amateurism, nepotism, and corruption to governing principles. As long as he busied himself with Middle East peace, his feckless meddling didn’t matter to most Americans. But since he became an influential adviser to Trump on the coronavirus pandemic, the result has been mass death.

In his first week on the job, in mid-March, Kushner co-authored the worst Oval Office speech in memory, interrupted the vital work of other officials, may have compromised security protocols, flirted with conflicts of interest and violations of federal law, and made fatuous promises that quickly turned to dust. “The federal government is not designed to solve all our problems,” he said, explaining how he would tap his corporate connections to create drive-through testing sites. They never materialized. He was convinced by corporate leaders that Trump should not use presidential authority to compel industries to manufacture ventilators—then Kushner’s own attempt to negotiate a deal with General Motors fell through. With no loss of faith in himself, he blamed shortages of necessary equipment and gear on incompetent state governors.

To watch this pale, slim-suited dilettante breeze into the middle of a deadly crisis, dispensing business-school jargon to cloud the massive failure of his father-in-law’s administration, is to see the collapse of a whole approach to governing. It turns out that scientific experts and other civil servants are not traitorous members of a “deep state”—they’re essential workers, and marginalizing them in favor of ideologues and sycophants is a threat to the nation’s health. It turns out that “nimble” companies can’t prepare for a catastrophe or distribute lifesaving goods—only a competent federal government can do that. It turns out that everything has a cost, and years of attacking government, squeezing it dry and draining its morale, inflict a heavy cost that the public has to pay in lives. All the programs defunded, stockpiles depleted, and plans scrapped meant that we had become a second-rate nation. Then came the virus and this strange defeat.

The fight to overcome the pandemic must also be a fight to recover the health of our country, and build it anew, or the hardship and grief we’re now enduring will never be redeemed. Under our current leadership, nothing will change. If 9/11 and 2008 wore out trust in the old political establishment, 2020 should kill off the idea that anti-politics is our salvation. But putting an end to this regime, so necessary and deserved, is only the beginning.

We’re faced with a choice that the crisis makes inescapably clear. We can stay hunkered down in self-isolation, fearing and shunning one another, letting our common bond wear away to nothing. Or we can use this pause in our normal lives to pay attention to the hospital workers holding up cellphones so their patients can say goodbye to loved ones; the planeload of medical workers flying from Atlanta to help in New York; the aerospace workers in Massachusetts demanding that their factory be converted to ventilator production; the Floridians standing in long lines because they couldn’t get through by phone to the skeletal unemployment office; the residents of Milwaukee braving endless waits, hail, and contagion to vote in an election forced on them by partisan justices. We can learn from these dreadful days that stupidity and injustice are lethal; that, in a democracy, being a citizen is essential work; that the alternative to solidarity is death. After we’ve come out of hiding and taken off our masks, we should not forget what it was like to be alone.

This article appears in the June 2020 print edition with the headline “Underlying Conditions.”

_____

We want to hear what you think about this article. Submit a letter to the editor or write to [email protected].

_____

GEORGE PACKER is a staff writer at The Atlantic. He is the author of Our Man: Richard Holbrooke and the End of the American Century and The Unwinding: An Inner History of the New America.

*********

Why Some People Get Sicker Than Others

COVID-19 is proving to be a disease of the immune system. This could, in theory, be controlled.

By James Hamblin | Published April 21, 2020 10:41 AM ET | The Atlantic Magazine | Posted April 21, 2020 |

The COVID-19 crash comes suddenly. In early March, the 37-year-old writer F. T. Kola began to feel mildly ill, with a fever and body aches. To be safe, she isolated herself at home in San Francisco. Life continued apace for a week, until one day she tried to load her dishwasher and felt strangely exhausted.

Her doctor recommended that she go to Stanford University’s drive-through coronavirus testing site. “I remember waiting in my car, and the doctors in their intense [protective equipment] coming towards me like a scene out of Contagion,” she told me when we spoke for The Atlantic’s podcast Social Distance. “I felt like I was a biohazard—and I was.” The doctors stuck a long swab into the back of her nose and sent her home to await results.

Lying in bed that night, she began to shake, overtaken by the most intense chills of her life. “My teeth were chattering so hard that I was really afraid they would break,” she said. Then she started to hallucinate. “I thought I was holding a very big spoon for some reason, and I kept thinking, Where am I going to put my spoon down?”

An ambulance raced her to the hospital, where she spent three days in the ICU, before being moved to a newly created coronavirus-only ward. Sometimes she barely felt sick at all, and other times she felt on the verge of death. But after two weeks in the hospital, she walked out. Now, as the death toll from the coronavirus has climbed to more than 150,000 people globally, Kola has flashes of guilt and disbelief: “Why did my lungs make it through this? Why did I go home? Why am I okay now?”

[ Read: The best hopes for a coronavirus drug]

COVID-19 is, in many ways, proving to be a disease of uncertainty. According to a new study from Italy, some 43 percent of people with the virus have no symptoms. Among those who do develop symptoms, it is common to feel sick in uncomfortable but familiar ways—congestion, fever, aches, and general malaise. Many people start to feel a little bit better. Then, for many, comes a dramatic tipping point. “Some people really fall off the cliff, and we don’t have good predictors of who it’s going to happen to,” Stephen Thomas, the chair of infectious diseases at Upstate University Hospital, told me. Those people will become short of breath, their heart racing and mind detached from reality. They experience organ failure and spend weeks in the ICU, if they survive at all.

Meanwhile, many others simply keep feeling better and eventually totally recover. Kola’s friend Karan Mahajan, an author based in Providence, Rhode Island, contracted the virus at almost the same time she did. In stark contrast to Kola, he said, “My case ended up feeling like a mild flu that lasted for two weeks. And then it faded after that.”

(Related Podcast: Listen to James Hamblin interview Kola and Mahajan on an episode of Social Distance, The Atlantic’s podcast about life in the pandemic)

“There’s a big difference in how people handle this virus,” says Robert Murphy, a professor of medicine and the director of the Center for Global Communicable Diseases at Northwestern University. “It’s very unusual. None of this variability really fits with any other diseases we’re used to dealing with.”

This degree of uncertainty has less to do with the virus itself than how our bodies respond to it. As Murphy puts it, when doctors see this sort of variation in disease severity, “that’s not the virus; that’s the host.” Since the beginning of the pandemic, people around the world have heard the message that older and chronically ill people are most likely to die from COVID-19. But that is far from a complete picture of who is at risk of life-threatening disease. Understanding exactly how and why some people get so sick while others feel almost nothing will be the key to treatment.

Hope has been put in drugs that attempt to slow the replication of the virus—those currently in clinical trials like remdesivir, ivermectin, and hydroxychloroquine. But with the flu and most other viral diseases, antiviral medications are often effective only early in the disease. Once the virus has spread widely within our body, our own immune system becomes the thing that more urgently threatens to kill us. That response cannot be fully controlled. But it can be modulated and improved.

One of the common, perplexing experiences of COVID-19 is the loss of smell—and, then, taste. “Eating pizza was like eating cardboard,” Mahajan told me. Any common cold that causes congestion can alter these sensations to some degree. But a near-total breakdown of taste and smell is happening with coronavirus infections even in the absence of other symptoms.

Jonathan Aviv, an ear, nose, and throat doctor based in New York, told me he has seen a surge in young people coming to him with a sudden inability to taste. He’s unsure what to tell them about what’s going on. “The non-scary scenario is that the inflammatory effect of the infection is temporarily altering the function of the olfactory nerve,” he said. “The scarier possibility is that the virus is attacking the nerve itself.” Viruses that attack nerves can cause long-term impairment, and could affect other parts of the nervous system. The coronavirus has already been reported to precipitate inflammation in the brain that leads to permanent damage.

Though SARS-CoV-2 (the new coronavirus) isn’t reported to invade the brain and spine directly, its predecessor SARS-CoV seems to have that capacity. If nerve cells are spared by the new virus, they would be among the few that are. When the coronavirus attaches to cells, it hooks on and breaks through, then starts to replicate. It does so especially well in the cells of the nasopharynx and down into the lungs, but is also known to act on the cells of the liver, bowels, and heart. The virus spreads around the body for days or weeks in a sort of stealth mode, taking over host cells while evading the immune response. It can take a week or two for the body to fully recognize the extent to which it has been overwhelmed. At this point, its reaction is often not calm and measured. The immune system goes into a hyperreactive state, pulling all available alarms to mobilize the body’s defense mechanisms. This is when people suddenly crash.

Bootsie Plunkett, a 61-year-old retiree in New Jersey with diabetes and lupus, described it to me as suffocating. We met in February, taping a TV show, and she was her typically ebullient self. A few weeks later, she developed a fever. It lasted for about two weeks, as did the body aches. She stayed at home with what she presumed was COVID-19. Then, as if out of nowhere, she was gasping for air. Her husband raced her to the hospital, and she began to slump over in the front seat. When they made it to the hospital, her blood-oxygen level was just 79 percent, well below the point when people typically require aggressive breathing support.

Such a quick decline—especially in the later stages of an infectious disease—seems to result from the immune response suddenly kicking into overdrive. The condition tends to be dire. Half of the patients with COVID-19 who end up in the intensive-care unit at New York–Presbyterian Hospital stay for 20 days, according to Pamela Sutton-Wallace, the regional chief operating officer. (In normal times, the national average is 3.3 days). Many of these patients arrive at the hospital in near-critical condition, with their blood tests showing soaring levels of inflammatory markers. One that seems to be especially predictive of a person’s fate is a protein known as D-dimer. Doctors in Wuhan, China, where the coronavirus outbreak was first reported, have found that a fourfold increase in D-dimer is a strong predictor of mortality, suggesting in a recent paper that the test “could be an early and helpful marker” of who is entering the dangerous phases.

These and other markers are often signs of a highly fatal immune-system process known as a cytokine storm, explains Randy Cron, the director of rheumatology at Children’s of Alabama, in Birmingham. A cytokine is a short-lived signaling molecule that the body can release to activate inflammation in an attempt to contain and eradicate a virus. In a cytokine storm, the immune system floods the body with these molecules, essentially sounding a fire alarm that continues even after the firefighters and ambulances have arrived.

At this point, the priority for doctors shifts from hoping that a person’s immune system can fight off the virus to trying to tamp down the immune response so it doesn’t kill the person or cause permanent organ damage. As Cron puts it, “If you see a cytokine storm, you have to treat it.” But treating any infection by impeding the immune system is always treacherous. It is never ideal to let up on a virus that can directly kill our cells. The challenge is striking a balance where neither the cytokine storm nor the infection runs rampant.

Cron and other researchers believe such a balance is possible. Cytokine storms are not unique to COVID-19. The same basic process happens in response to other viruses, such as dengue and Ebola, as well as influenza and other coronaviruses. It is life-threatening and difficult to treat, but not beyond the potential for mitigation.

At Johns Hopkins University, the biomedical engineer Joshua Vogelstein and his colleagues have been trying to identify patterns among people who have survived cytokine storms and people who haven’t. One correlation the team noticed was that people taking the drug tamsulosin (sold as Flomax, to treat urinary retention) seemed to fare well. Vogelstein is unsure why. Cytokine storms do trigger the release of hormones such as dopamine and adrenaline, which tamsulosin can partially block. The team is launching a clinical trial to see if the approach is of any help.

One of the more promising approaches is blocking cytokines themselves—once they’ve already been released into the blood. A popular target is one type of cytokine known as interleukin-6 (IL-6), which is known to peak at the height of respiratory failure. Benjamin Lebwohl, director of research at Columbia University’s Celiac Disease Center, says that people with immune conditions like celiac and inflammatory bowel disease may be at higher risk of severe cases of COVID-19. But he’s hopeful that medications that inhibit IL-6 or other cytokines could pare back the unhelpful responses while leaving others intact. Other researchers have seen promising preliminary results, and clinical trials are ongoing.

[Read: The best hopes for a coronavirus drug]

If interleukin inhibitors end up playing a significant role in treating very sick people, though, we would run out. These medicines (which go by names such as tocilizumab and ruxolitinib, reading like a good draw in Scrabble) fall into a class known as “biologics.” They are traditionally used in rare cases and tend to be very expensive, sometimes costing people with immune conditions about $18,000 a year. Based on price and the short supply, Cron says, “my guess is we’re going to rely on corticosteroids at the end of the day. Because it’s what we have.”

That is a controversial opinion. Corticosteroids (colloquially known as “steroids,” though they are of the adrenal rather than reproductive sort), can act as an emergency brake on the immune system. Their broad, sweeping action means that steroids involve more side effects than targeting one specific cytokine. Typically, a person on steroids has a higher risk of contracting another dangerous infection, and early evidence on the utility of steroids in treating COVID-19, in studies from the outbreak in China, was mixed. But some doctors are now using them to good effect. Last week, the Infectious Diseases Society of America issued guidelines on steroids, recommending them in the context of a clinical trial when the disease reaches the level of acute respiratory distress. They may have helped Plunkett, the 61-year-old from New Jersey. After three days on corticosteroids, she left the ICU—without ever being intubated.

Deciding on the precise method of modulating the immune response—the exact drug, dose, and timing—is ideally informed by carefully monitoring patients before they are critically ill. People at risk of a storm could be monitored closely throughout their illness, and offered treatment immediately when signs begin to show. That could mean detecting the markers in a person’s blood before the process sends her into hallucinations—before her oxygen level fell at all.

In typical circumstances in the United States and other industrialized nations, patients would be urged to go to the hospital sooner rather than later. But right now, to avoid catastrophic strain on an already overburdened health-care system, people are told to avoid the hospital until they feel short of breath. For those who do become critically ill and arrive at the ER in respiratory failure, health-care workers are then behind the ball. Given those circumstances, the daily basics of maintaining overall health and the best possible immune response become especially important.

The official line from the White House Coronavirus Task Force has been that “high-risk” people are older and those with chronic medical conditions, such as obesity and diabetes. But that has proven to be a limited approximation of who will bear the burden of this disease most severely. Last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released its first official report on who has been hospitalized for COVID-19. It found that Latinos and African Americans have died at significantly higher rates than white Americans. In Chicago, more than half of the people who have tested positive, and nearly 60 percent of those who have died, were African American. They make up less than one-third of the city’s population. Similar patterns are playing out across the country: Rates of death and severe disease are several times higher among racial minorities and people of low socioeconomic status.

[Read: What the racial data show]

These disparities are beginning to be acknowledged at high levels, but often as though they are just another one of the mysteries of the coronavirus. At a White House briefing last week, Vice President Mike Pence said his team was looking into “the unique impact that we’re seeing reported on African Americans from the coronavirus.” Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, has noted that “we are not going to solve the issues of health disparities this month or next month. This is something we should commit ourselves for years to do.”

While America’s deepest health disparities absolutely would require generations to undo, the country still could address many gaps right now. Variation in immune responses between people is due to much more than age or chronic disease. The immune system is a function of the communities that brought us up and the environments with which we interact every day. Its foundation is laid by genetics and early-life exposure to the world around us—from the food we eat to the air we breathe. Its response varies on the basis of income, housing, jobs, and access to health care.

The people who get the most severely sick from COVID-19 will sometimes be unpredictable, but in many cases, they will not. They will be the same people who get sick from most every other cause. Cytokines like IL-6 can be elevated by a single night of bad sleep. Over the course of a lifetime, the effects of daily and hourly stressors accumulate. Ultimately, people who are unable to take time off of work when sick—or who don’t have a comfortable and quiet home, or who lack access to good food and clean air—are likely to bear the burden of severe disease.

Much is yet unknown about specific cytokines and their roles in disease. But the likelihood of disease in general is not so mysterious. Often, it’s a matter of what societies choose to tolerate. America has empty hotels while people sleep in parking lots. We are destroying food while people go hungry. We are allowing individuals to endure the physiological stresses of financial catastrophe while bailing out corporations. With the coronavirus, we do not have vulnerable populations so much as we have vulnerabilities as a population. Our immune system is not strong.

_____

We want to hear what you think about this article. Submit a letter to the editor or write to [email protected].

_____

JAMES HAMBLIN, M.D., is a staff writer at The Atlantic. He is also a lecturer at Yale School of Public Health and author of the forthcoming book Clean.

*********

2 notes · View notes

ryanmeft · 5 years

Text

Movie Review: Motherless Brooklyn

The greatest villains of noir are never the central antagonists. The corrupt cops, the slimy businessmen, and the small time hoods and assassins typified by the genre’s heyday are of course all vital to the seedy underrealms these movies sink us into, but the true villain is always the world itself, and specifically the rotten and festering systems whose waste drips down and creates the conditions for battered, weary detectives and crooks with no hope in the first place. This was implied in most classic noir, but Edward Norton’s Motherless Brooklyn makes it explicit. It focuses on a man seen by others as a freak, trying to do a good thing in a city that exists because of bad things. He’s up against such a vital underpinning of his entire world that he might as well be trying to punch out the moon.

Lionel Essrog is not exactly the first person you might choose in such a fight, even if one overlooks his Tourette’s syndrome, which in the decidedly unenlightened 1950’s is unlikely. He’s one of several detectives working for the aging Frank Minna (Bruce Willis), whose particular skills would have been equally applicable on the other side of the law. Also under Minna, in a crew the older man pulled from the morass of an abusive orphanage and led through World War II, are the force-and-bluster tough guy Tony Vermonte (Bobby Cannavale), who has an interesting relationship with Minna’s widow (Leslie Mann); the sharp information-gathering Danny Fantl (Dallas Roberts); and the reserved and slightly bumbling Gilbert Coney (Ethan Suplee). The film opens with a terribly thrilling sequence in which Minna seems to be trying to make a deal with some underworld figures, and as one might expect the deal goes wrong, resulting in Minna’s eventual death.

Let’s take a moment and look at that sequence. It takes up the first half hour or so of the film, and it takes its time. Essrog, played by Norton, listens in for a signal from Minna, and you know something is going to go wrong. Yet where other movies might make that a quick and easy scene, Norton gets our hopes up that Minna might live, and it is genuinely affecting when he doesn’t, because of how much he clearly meant to our protagonist. This death is more than just a device to set off the plot of the film. It defines Lionel’s key character traits: loyalty to those he trusts, suspicion towards most everyone else, all of the wariness that a lifetime of being infantilized by others would give a man. His character is not defined by Tourette’s, which, for the record, is presented accurately as the repetition of tics and phrases rather than by the cliche and rare repeating of profanity. His photographic memory is a tool for detective work, but also a burden; imagine never forgetting anything, and if you’ve suffered at all in life you might realize that isn’t a superpower. He wears his boss’s old hat and coat, in tribute to the man rather than to try and be him. Lionel is a fully developed character, and not a gimmick. The film is patient with him and with the plot, the kind of patience lacking in modern films where audiences will sit for more than two hours only if computer effects are involved.

His case is no gimmick, either, but a fully developed and twisted web that goes, of course, up to the Very Top. The central question: why was Minna, ostensibly a licensed private eye, talking to mobsters as if they were dealing with each other? Lionel digs into this, and it becomes clear it involves the city’s powerful planning commissioner, Moses Randolph (Alec Baldwin). He seems able to demand whatever he wants from the government, behaves like a Godfather instead of a public servant, and is involved in the demolition of slums. Ostensibly, the plan is to provide better housing for the mostly black residents, an assertion which is challenged by two people. The first is wary-but-idealistic housing activist Laura Rose (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), who develops a connection with Lionel that feels true and complex and not like an obligatory screenplay romance. Mbatha-Raw is a seriously undervalued actress, and here she represents the counter-culture of jazz, which was primarily African-American and seen as degenerate at the time. Her uncle Billy (Robert Wisdom) and cool-as-ice trumpet-playing friend (Michael K. Williams) have some level of insight into what exactly is happening to Brooklyn’s poor black population, and they become allies. It must be noted that scenes in nightclubs are handled perfectly, feeling like the close, crowded, smoky places that jazz clubs should be.

The second is a ragged man with a frantic voice named Paul (Willem Dafoe), who appears at meetings and angrily whips the crowd into frenzies against Moses. He lays out what crooked deals are going on, but encourages Lionel to be the one to stop it; he cannot, for reasons that will be revealed. I found him the most fascinating supporting character on the canvas, and a perfect role for Dafoe. In movies, most of the good-aligned characters we meet will eventually abandon all self-centered interests and heroically join the cause at great self-sacrifice. Film noir is decidedly unsuited to such sentiment, but in the old days often suffered from it nonetheless. Paul is the apotheosis of that: he is legitimately angry at the conspiracies he sees, but has been too hurt by his own failures to fix them in the past, and now wants to pass the buck so he does not have to suffer any more losses. In our heart of hearts, most of us know we are more like Paul.

Earlier I mentioned the look of the jazz world, but I must mention the look of the rest of the world, as well. Regular Mike Leigh cinematographer Dick Pope films a mid-century New York reproduced by production designer Beth Mickie, that is lost, where boat-sized cars rumble down narrow streets and dark shadows are hidden in the eaves of bridges and corners of doorways. Lionel is at one point invited to meet with Moses to strike a deal, and Moses’ office is as spacious as the rest of the city is not; in an excellent wide shot, he patrols this throne room as a king, passing judgments and decisions entirely as it pleases him. This is not a man who will fall like a typical movie crook, and indeed the film leaves open whether Lionel succeeds at all.

Norton, who is friends with novelist Jonathan Lethem, has, with the author’s consent, done what a filmmaker should: used the parts of the book that suit, and changed those that did not. Most notably, he has moved the 90’s setting (this project has been long gestating) to the 1950’s and wrapped up the plot in one of our great modern national stains, the New York housing discrimination that still affects the African-American community today. The parallels are both obvious and buried, and though Norton has discussed the connections between Moses and Donald Trump, this is not an overtly political picture. It is instead a deeply involving mystery with highly engaging characters and an intriguing world, that happens to have greater points under the surface for those who are looking.

Verdict: Highly Recommended

Note: I don’t use stars, but here are my possible verdicts.

Must-See

Highly Recommended

Recommended

Average

Not Recommended

Avoid like the Plague

You can follow Ryan's reviews on Facebook here:

https://www.facebook.com/ryanmeftmovies/

Or his tweets here:

https://twitter.com/RyanmEft

All images are property of the people what own the movie.

#edward norton #gugu mbatha-raw #bruce willis #movies #motherless brooklyn #Bobby Cannavale #ethan suplee #dallas roberts #noir #alec baldwin #new york #jonathan lethem #willem dafoe #michael k williams #robert wisdom

9 notes · View notes