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dailyunsolvedmysteries · 1 year

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Yang Xinhai, The Most Prolific Known Chinese Serial Killer

He was nicknamed the Monster Killer by the media because of his heinousness. Yang was known by several names: Wang Ganggang, Yang Zhiya, and Yang Liu. He was the youngest of four siblings and his family was one of the poorest in the village. He has been described as a very intelligent, but introverted and sociopathic young man. In 1985, at the age of 17, he dropped out of school, refused to return home, and began his wanderings around China, working as a pieceworker. Three years later he had his first trouble with the law and was sent to a work camp for having committed a series of thefts in Xian, in Shaanxi, and Shijiazhuang, in Hebei. In 1996, he was arrested for attempted rape in Zhumadian, his home village. He served three years in prison. During this time something happens in Yang’s mind. Once free, he began an endless series of murders and rapes that will stain Chinese news for the next 4 years. The provinces of Anhui, Hebei, Henan, and Shandong were hit by a wave of crimes never seen before.

Yang slipped into victims’ homes at night, killing all occupants with improvised weapons (axes, hammers, and shovels). Sometimes he slaughtered entire families. Each time, after the murders, he showed up in new clothes, often wearing shoes that are too big. In October 2002, Yang killed a father and his six-year-old daughter with a shovel, then raped his pregnant wife who managed to survive the assault, sustaining numerous head injuries. On December 6 he massacred an entire family (grandmother, parents, and two children) in the village of Liuzhuang in Henan. The details were told by the grandfather, Liu Zhongyuan. In the words of the elderly man, three days later they were supposed to move to their new home. The grandfather discovered the crime when he entered the old house to visit his grandchildren and found his granddaughter lying on the floor with a hole in her head.

The room was completely bloody. Liu Zhongyuan’s wife was still alive, but she died ten days later from the injuries she received and was no longer able to speak. Yang Xinhai later confessed that in that case, he killed the family with a hammer, which he then buried in a grave that same night after throwing his clothes into a river. Then, he walked to the nearby town of Luohe, about two hours away. This was not the only time. On several occasions, Yang slaughtered entire households in similar ways: In Anhui, on October 1, 2000 (3 victims, 1 rape), on August 15, 2001, in Henan (3 victims, 1 rape), on January 6, 2002, in Henan (5 victims, 1 rape), on June 30, 2002, in Henan (4 victims, 1 rape), on July 28, 2002 (4 victims, 2 rapes), on November 8, 2002, in his home village (4 victims, 2 rapes, 1 injured), on December 15, 2002, in Anhui (3 victims, 1 injured), on February 5, 2003 (3 victims, 1 rape, 1 injured), on February 18, 2003 (4 victims, 2 rapes), on March 23 in Kaifeng, Henan (4 victims, 1 rape), on August 8, 2003, in Shijiazhuang (5 victims).

On November 3, 2003, Yang was arrested by a police patrol during a routine inspection of some entertainment centers in Cangzhou, Hebei. Once at the station, the officers discovered he was wanted for murder in four provinces. Yang confessed rather quickly. His short but intense criminal career left a long trail of blood in the provinces he visited: 49 murders and 17 rapes in Henan: eight murders and three rapes in Hebei: six murders and two rapes in Anhui: two murders and one rape in Shandong. He often travelled between cities by bicycle. His DNA matched that found at the crime scene. On February 1 of the following year, Yang, at age 38, after refusing to appeal, was found guilty and sentenced to the death penalty.

According to some reports Yang was driven to kill to take revenge against society, guilty of having negatively influenced his relationship with the girlfriend. Later, other newspapers declared that his actions were dictated by more macabre motives: Yang took a morbid pleasure in stealing, killing, and raping. Although Yang has never really expressed the motivations that drove him to kill, there is an emblematic statement of his that helps us to understand the reason for his extreme and heinous acts: “When I kill, I feel the desire to kill again. This drives me to kill. I don’t care if my victims deserved to die or not. I don’t give a damn … I have no desire to be part of society. Society is not my problem.”

#Yang Xinhai #murder #killers #true crime #crime

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dailyunsolvedmysteries-movedd · 8 months

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Yang Xinhai, The Most Prolific Known Chinese Serial Killer

#Yang Xinhai #murder #killers #true crime #crime

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beigehearts · 3 years

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Alright so this is some Yandere Hisoka, this is a college AU where he kills someone... let me know if you want me to write something like this for anyone else

CW: death, blood, non con, alcohol, murder

Hisoka

Quite honestly school has become more of a drag than anything. That’s why you’ve become unruly. The parties at school are infinite and every morning after is on a day that ends with ‘y’. While your classes aren’t going terribly, they’re also not great. But that’s the least of your worries as you assess your naked body in the mirror. What’s more important right now is figuring out which outfit will accentuate your form the best. So far it’s none of them, but that’s how it always feels when you’re getting ready to go some where. Eventually later in the night you’ll like your outfit.

The house is practically glowing, well it is. Different colored lights flash from each window and music blares from inside. Some people are loitering on the lawn, too drunk to care about the brisk weather.

You step up the creaky and abused front stairs, finding that the door is wide open. It is a party after all. There are some familiar faces and some unknown, students from other colleges are here as well. It doesn’t take long to find the sacred punch bowl. It’s a giant plastic box filled with candies, juices, and an assortment of flavored alcohols. You dip a red solo cup into the mermaid vomit and take a sip. Yup, tastes like young desperate, and horny college student’s hopes and dreams.

Don’t get it wrong, parties are loads of fun. But not when you’ve just broken up with your boyfriend after a rough relationship. Though, you really should take this chance to just enjoy yourself, let the alcohol take over. So that’s what you’ll do.

The night is nothing more than a blur of flashing lights and gross punch. Only one thing stands out.

You trip as you walk against the outer edges of the crowd. Fresh air, you need fresh air. Drunkenly, you trip off of the front porch, just barely stopping yourself from face planting in the dirt. It’s so loud, you have to get away. You finish the rest of the drink in your red solo cup, and throw it to the ground. It’s a miracle that you can walk in this state.

The cold air is so refreshing, and as the flashing lights and blaring music gets further and further away, you relax. Too soon.

A rough hand grips your wrist, yanking you backwards against a body. You pull away from the person and turn to face them. It’s your ex, your crazy fucking ex boyfriend.

“Oh god spare me.” You mutter at him.

He’s tottering in his place, with a dumb look on his face. He’s disheveled and possibly drunker than you. His eyes are half lidded but mask a darker intent. An ugly smile stretches itself on his face and he hisses out, “You always were a bitch. A hot bitch.”

His hands grab your waist, pulling you against him once again. His lips are on yours, aggressively demanding your attention. You pull your face away from him and push against his chest. His fingers dig into your sides and he smothers your neck with kisses.

“Stop it!” You screech at the top of your lungs and squeeze your eyes shut.

Did he listen? His hands drop from your sides, and you hear what sounds like a crack followed by a thud. You peek towards where he stood, finding another figure there. Your eyes shoot down to the ground, and he’s crumpled against the pavement. Your eyes find their way back up to the new person standing in front of you.

He’s so tall, and muscular, and bloody. He’s gripping an axe in one hand, and his other is resting on his waist.

He seems so confident, and so rightful in where he stands. He’s staring at you with his golden eyes and a frown pulling at his lips. A sigh escapes him and he tilts his head to look at the stars on this dreary night.

“You really make some bad decisions y/n.” He combs a hand through his red hair and drops the axe. It clatters against the ground, and it’s practically deafening. “Once again I must rescue you.”

Your mouth is dry and your throat suddenly feels like it’s being blocked. But you croak out, “Who-” You pause and take a step back “Who are you?”

Both of his hands drop to his sides, and he brings his gaze back down from the sky to meet yours. “Is that what you say to the man who just saved you?”

Right. Oh yeah. He saved you. You look down at the ground and examine the man on the pavement, he’s twitching but that’s just his body’s last fight. His head is split into two, and blood is pooling all around your feet, staining your shoes a dark red. His mouth is agape and his eyes are wide, and they’re staring right at you. His body begins to go limp and the last sound he makes on earth is nothing more than a gasp. Only now do you notice his hand gripping your ankle, and it falls to the cold ground.

You look back up at the man before you, suddenly feeling very empty.

“Don’t worry, he won’t bother you anymore my sweet pet.” Two strong arms wrap around your form, smushing your face against this man’s chest. Your savior? A murderer? The man who committed a crime right before your eyes?

His cold lips press against your forehead, leaving a smear of blood on your once pure skin. “It was going to happen anyway. Forget about him, he was trash and he needed to be thrown out.”

#hisoka #hisoka morrow #hisoka x reader #yandere hisoka #yandere hisoka x reader #hxh #hunter x hunter #phantom troupe #yandere

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urban-witch101 · 3 years

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(Byakuya Togami x Reader? That's how this idea started.) - Danganronpa 1 Ghost AU - "They Failed."

Oh it's as funky as it sounds. Just trust me on this one. Also, big fat Trigger Warning for assault, s3xual assault, murder, and angst.

Hope's Peak Academy is reportedly the most haunted high school in Japan. After the Most Tragic Incident the world had ever seen, the class of 78 was forced into a recorded killing game run by their fellow classmates Junko Enoshima and Mukuro Ikusaba and failed to survive. The Future Foundation, after eventually beating Despair and restoring peace to the world, established the high school as a National Monument to the pain and suffering of the students and turned it into a museum recording the history.

There are too many stories of the passed students to count, some from construction workers and some from ghost hunters. These are their sightings.

============================================

Yasuhiro Hagakure is reportedly the most active ghost, which makes sense as the Ultimate Clairvoyant.

He tends to greet visitors at the entrance.

If you drop your hat or gloves and don't notice, you'll find them by the coat rack later for you to find.

Children tend to see him the most, or they hear a whispered joke in their ear if they're particularly upset at any of the Despair history.

He doesn't tend to interact with adults a lot, but he's known to follow the descendants of all their relatives or friends to make sure they're okay.

10/10 ghost, very friendly and a chill dude. Makes sure kids are okay.

Toko Fukawa is rarely seen or heard, but if she's there you know.

She hangs out in the bathrooms with the most common sightings being in the mirrors.

She's often found playing with her braids or grimacing at guests if there are a lot of people.

The friendliest sighting was when a child got lost and found their way to the women's bathroom.

When the panicked mother finally found them, their child was calm and content while playing with a stuffed toy they know they didn't bring.

When the child was guided to leave, they turned and waved goodbye to the mirror.

8/10, antisocial but harmless.

Genocider Syo is extremely active.

She likes pulling pranks on tall, skinny men, like throwing their wallets across the room and pinching their elbows.

If said men are blonde with blue eyes, they will tend to feel watched whenever the enter the building and will continue to think so until they leave.

Children tend to be scared of her, but if she sees a scared child she'll tend to leave the room so they're more comfortable.

She likes knocking over stuff, books and coffee mugs in particular.

However, if the staff scold her she'll knock it off.

She never knocks over artifacts, but people have seen her scissors rattle in their case.

8/10, harmless prankster.

Leon Kuwata can be found in the First-Floor Dorms.

People report hearing guitar strings playing in the boys bathrooms.

If someone mentions baseball around his dorm, mirrors and glass will crack or straight up shatter.

Paranormal investigators once spent the night in his old room, but they "forgot" to take off their shoes and slept above the covers.

They woke up with a blanket that hadn't been in the room covering them and their shoes neatly placed by the side of the door.

That same investigator used a Spirit Box to try and talk to him about what happened in the school.

Of course their older generations saw what happened live, but they never spoke of it.

"Do you have anything you need to say?"

"I'm so sorry."

6/10, ow.

Hifumi Yamada can be found in the kiln room in the Art Studio.

People hear camera clicks, as if he's still taking pictures.

Pencils will roll when the floor is completely flat.

He likes messing with the kiln and knocking off the hammers.

He loves playing the flashlight game.

If anyone mentions Celestia Ludenburg, people swear the room falls into a heavy and tense silence.

When everyone leaves the kiln, they feel his conflicting pain.

Anger? Sadness? They don't know. He's still grieving.

6/10, more ow.

Kiyotaka Ishimaru is silent unless he needs to talk.

He only talks if you do something wrong.

He doesn't play any of the games.

If you run in the museum, people swear they hear a loud voice telling them to stop.

If the staff breaks the rules at all, they straight up get smacked in the shoulder.

Groups of friends, particularly men, feel very welcome in his dorm room.

They all leave after a friendly, invisible squeeze is given to them on the arm.

6/10, he'll never change.

Mondo Owada has one reported sighting.

When construction to restore the building was going on, there was an incident between a worker and a girl on the street one afternoon.

He took her behind the building and attempted to hurt her.

A man in a Crazy Diamond gang jacket, which it should be noted that it doesn't exist anyore, pulled him off and hit him with a pick axe.

After the assaulter was unconscious, her savior didn't say a word; he looked at the girl up and down, presumably checking her for injuries, and passed her a card with a phone number before nodding to her and walking off.

It was the local s3xual assault line, which had been established only two years prior.

After she called the number, she was never able to find the card again.

She didn't even put two and two together until she visited the finished museum and saw Mondo's picture.

No one has ever seen him since.

10/10, badass.

Sayaka Maizono is in one of the boy's bathrooms in the dorms.

Visitors report feeling unnerved or even scared when they enter the bathroom.

She will not interact with you.

She doesn't like playing any of the games. Do not turn on the spirit box in her bathroom, the shower glass will crack.

One investigator decided to spend the night in the bedroom and turned on the shower in the morning.

When they got out, there was a message written in the fog on the mirror.

"LEON."

1/10, no fucking thank you.

Aoi Asahina hangs around the pool room.

She's reportedly like Hiro.

She's been seen walking the halls everywhere.

Children love visiting the pool room. They tend to feel excited and safe.

At night you can hear the pool splashing when no one is inside.

She has one recorded incident.

A child brought a small bag of donut holes to snack on.

Said child began to complain that "the air" kept pulling the donut holes out of his hands.

So they ran an experiment.

They dropped one on purpose and watched it roll away towards the pool room. After that, they didn't feel anymore pulls.

Now it's a tradition to leave a donut for her on Obon by the pool room or her dorm room.

Staff report donuts pulling themselves apart to share. If staff take a half that is offered, the treats are always gone by the next morning.

9/10, a whole mood.

Chihiro Fujisaki is relatively quiet.

They can be found in the boy's locker rooms by the pool.

People will smell a slight perfume over the chlorine.

Muscular men in particular will feel an odd sense of guilt when entering.

There was a guest, who was a muscular man, who took out their phone to record the room and listened back to it to find bits and pieces of the audio were gone.

They took it to a friend who deciphered it into a message in Morse code.

"I forgive you."

9/10, holy ow.

Celestia Ludenburg is only active in the kitchen.

Investigators have put on a full pot of tea water with no heat on the stove.

If they leave and come back, they'll find the pot whistling with the heat still off. The water is always the perfect temperature.

She is never active at night.

She'll only use the spirit box on Obon, but you have to make her a cup of milk tea first.

She's very picky about it.

There was one who got it right on the first try.

"Well finally," the box picked up. "Have some."

She will share details only she would know.

"I don't want to be rude, but do you have any regrets?"

A moment of silence. The cup on the table left for her shakes for just a moment.

"I have too many."

6/10, talkative but be careful.

Kyoko Kirigiri has never talked, but you'll hear her.

Staff will hear her heels clicking in the halls at night.

She likes writing in people's notebooks.

Random strangers will enter with an empty pocketbook and leave with a full one.

She loves to write.

She tells her side of the story.

If the mirrors ever fog up, she's there scratching out letters and numbers.

She also turns on the coffee pot in the kitchen.

Intuitive teenagers tend to know when she's there because they feel safer in rooms that people normally aren't comfortable in.

She writes clues to all the murders that she was never able to solve.

She's not done yet. She's made it very clear that she is not at peace.

9/10, talkative and informative.

Sakura Ogami is said to be hanging around in the recreational room where she committed suicide.

Children feel safe in there, but they never play with the old equipment.

There is an unspoken rule among them that they all know and have never discussed as soon as they walk in.

Some thrill-seekers sit in her chair.

They report feeling their head throbbing and intense nausea, some even passing out from the pain.

They also report intense guilt.

One child sat in the seat without thinking about it and they reported being fine but feeling a little sad.

She plays the flashlight game with investigators, but only if they're nice.

One turned on a spirit box and gave her a cup of tea on Obon.

"Thank you."

8/10, don't sit in her fucking chair you dumbass.

Mukuro Ikusaba is heard rarely.

Like Mondo, she has one reported calling.

In the gym, late at night, you can hear a quiet sobbing.

Children will hear a crying girl in their head:

"I didn't want this."

3/10, how is this even more ow.

Junko Enoshima is heard in the execution room.

Staff used to think there were multiple ghosts in there, but it turns out it's just her.

She laughs, cries, and shrieks.

The story is that she killed herself with her own executions after succeeding in the killing game.

At night investigators play the flashlight game with her.

Every visitor is always unnerved by her.

There is an unspoken bitterness towards her.

She doesn't deserve her success.

0/10, scary bitch.

Makoto Naegi is seen everywhere.

The Ultimate Lucky Student loves telling his story.

He's seen in windows and mirrors with his hoodie and a warm smile.

He's always kind and welcoming.

People leave him popular snacks at his dorm room on Obon.

He never speaks, he just likes watching everyone learn about them.

If children ever get lost he leads them back to their parents.

They'll always tell their family about the "nice boy with brown hair" who takes their hand gently and leads them to safety.

He feels a duty to protect the staff. They never feel alone at night. He's always there to keep them safe.

The descendant of Komaru Naegi, who happened to be a paranormal investigator, once spent the night in his old dorm room.

She reported hearing quiet crying and sniffling that morning before she opened her eyes and was flooded with a sense of relief.

Oh thank god, she was okay.

10/10, heart of gold.

Byakuya Togami is seen in one room and one room only.

He is the only one that people regularly see in the flesh as a full figure.

He's sitting in the library, reading a murder mystery novel.

He has never acknowledged any of the guests, except for one.

A small child, a descendant of Togami's old butler, gently knocked on the table to get his attention and waved politely. They thought he was a staff member.

He looked up at them, gave a little wave back, and went back to his book.

When they turned away and looked back, he was gone.

Staff will see him walking back to his room when the museum is closing up.

He's snobby, sure, but he has his manners. He won't purposefully get in the way of the staff.

9/10, super chill.

???

There is an unknown ghost that has one known/recorded interaction.

One night a paranormal investigator spent the night exploring the building.

They walked in the library to see Togami with a book and a lamp on that was previously off.

They nodded at him politely and went to the bookshelves to "find a book". They turned on a spirit box and stayed quiet.

The library door opened and closed.

They hear a passing conversation.

"Hello love."

A kiss, presumably on the knuckles.

"How was today?"

"Tiring", says a voice. "Lot of cleaning. Did you get any visitors?"

A chuckle. "Too many. I think they can see me."

"Probably."

A pause.

"Togami?"

"Hm?"

"Do you think they'll ever figure out what really happened here?"

Hesitance. "For their sake, I hope not."

============================================

Feedback would be lovely. Thank you for your time!

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madlori · 3 years

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Coming soon: “Strike Anywhere”

Sooooo like a month ago I had a fun lil plot bunny and banged out a short Schitt’s Creek fic called “Burn Out the Night.” In it, Patrick is a firefighter and David is a city engineer and they do Not Get Along, in fact they are infamous for their fights at calls. Except this night, a warehouse fire goes badly, and in the course of the situation Patrick is injured, at which point it’s revealed that these two bitter enemies are in fact married. Everyone is SHOOK. SEEKRIT HUSBANDS. It’s also super fun to have both these guys really lean in to their latent troll tendencies.

People were into this concept, and I jibed so much with the premise that I launched into a prequel story about how these two met and came to be seekrit husbands. I expect to finish it in the next few days and start posting soon (one chapter per day). So I thought I’d post a lil trailer!

Title: Strike Anywhere Fandom: Schitt’s Creek Rating: E Length: 65K Tags: David Rose/Patrick Brewer, Firefighter AU, Enemies-to-Lovers, Secret Relationship, First Responders, Hurt/Comfort, Patrick Brewer/OMC, Patrick Brewer Is Gay (and has been out for awhile), these are just temporary tags the real ones will be on the actual story with content warnings (none of the Big Four)

------

Patrick Brewer would always remember the first words ever spoken to him by the man who he would eventually marry, because they were “What the fuck are you doing? Are you an idiot?”

He straightened up, blinking dust and grime out of his eyes, a futile attempt given that he was standing in the middle of a destroyed store with a car through the front of it, holding a pneumatic cutter. The man who’d just called him an idiot was lurking on the sidewalk, peering in through the jagged hole in the storefront, dressed in expensive-looking shoes and massive white-framed sunglasses, his impressive eyebrows halfway to his hairline. “I’m baking a cake,” Patrick said, dryly, and went back to what he was doing.

-----

Once the woman in the car had been extracted and whisked off to the hospital, Patrick left the scene to the police, the tow trucks and the insurance adjusters and toted his equipment back out to the fire truck parked outside. He stowed the pneumatic cutters, spotting David Rose standing with Ronnie by her truck. Pique rising in his chest, he stalked over to them. “Okay, somebody wanna explain to me who this guy is and why he gets to barge into my rescue?”

Rose turned to face him, tipping his sunglasses up on top of his head. “Who are you, sturdy wee man? An intern, or something? Does the fire service have interns?”

“I’m Captain Brewer of the 315,” Patrick said, flatly. “I’m in charge here.”

----

Patrick went back to his truck, tossing his helmet into the back with more force than was probably recommended by its manufacturer. Shit, he thought. This is going to suck, a lot. Having someone hovering over everything he did, second-guessing every decision he made, would be bad enough. But that wasn’t even the worst part.

The worst part was that he’d be suffering the unwanted interference of possibly the hottest guy he’d ever seen, and there wasn’t a damned thing he could do to make that not true.

----

“Ugh, I had the worst day. I spent three hours driving around with that snotty Captain from the 315.”

“You mean Brewer? The one you won’t shut up about?”

“Complaining about! Bitching about!”

“Sure.”

“He’s a self-righteous prick and I deserve some kind of peace prize for not flinging myself across the car and throttling him to death with my bare hands.”

“I’m sure that keeping yourself from, uh, flinging was a real struggle.” Stevie picked up David’s tablet and started Googling something. “You know when you told me about this horrible Captain Brewer, your arch-nemesis, I pictured some grizzled, crotchety old guy. You neglected to mention...this,” she said, brandishing the tablet with a flourish.

On the screen was an article from the paper with the headline “Toronto Fire Services Promotes Youngest Captain in its History,” above a very nice photo of Patrick in uniform, arms crossed, smiling and looking like a recruitment poster.

“What, exactly, did I neglect to mention? Young guys can be grizzled and crotchety.”

“You neglected to mention that Captain Brewer is a snack.”

“If he is, he’s one of those tasteless low-carb sugar-free snacks full of xylitol that’ll give you explosive diarrhea and make you wish you’d never been born.”

-----

“Why’d you do it, anyway?” David suddenly exclaimed, coming off the wall to stand right in Patrick’s face.

“Do what?”

“Save my life, you fuckhead!”

“That’s my job! What was I going to do, just stand there and let the truck fall on you?”

“Great! Except now I have to, like, be nice to you.”

“I am begging you not to be nice to me, I might drop dead of a heart attack from the shock!”

David’s lip curled in a sneer. “I don’t know what kind of carnage I committed in a past life to deserve this. Look at you with your fireman outfit and your respectably-gay undercut and you probably have a modest tattoo somewhere under there and I could axe-murder you, I really could, you just had to be the big damn hero, throwing me to the ground like some damsel in distress, and that isn’t even the worst part!”

“What’s the worst part?”

“That a guy I can’t stand saved my pointless life and it was so goddamn hot that I might have to jump off a cliff!”

------

...coming soon!

#schitt's creek #madlori's fic #strike anywhere

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moon-riverandme · 3 years

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And in the Beginning There was... Light, Film Rolls, and Controversy.

Watching old movies has always been one of my favorite pastimes. I love the cracks in the film, the oddly tinted placements of color, the quick, scattered movements of the actors, and the slice of an intertitle. It all just makes sense when I think of those first filmmakers who were trying to make sense of their new medium. In my journey through film, I will start at the beginning. Well, sort of the beginning. Our main topic of discussion takes place in 1903. So we’ve skipped over a few years… 15 to be exact. I’ll sum them up now because if I miss a beat I’ll ruin the scene.

Let's start in October of 1888 when Louis Le Prince has just recorded the very first film. It’s short yet scenic; his family gathers in a garden and for the first time ever - they move. A man walks across the screen, the rigid bustles and day dress of two women sway as they turn away from the camera - ergo we have a moving image years before Edison would invent the kinetoscope. Of course, most don’t know of Le Prince and in school I never heard his name mentioned. In fact, I only heard of him through a Buzzfeed Unsolved video. So what happened? Why did history remember the names Edison and Lumière but not Le Prince?

There were many entries in the race to create the first film. And of course, there are arguments as to what cinema is in comparison to a bunch of still photographs played one after another. Strange, I think is this argument. For film is a series of stills or frames played one right after the other. Nevertheless, in 1878, we have the famous images of a galloping horse caught by twelve cameras set up by Muybridge to capture motion and to study animal locomotion. Motion but not a movie. What we needed was a camera that had a single lens capable of capturing a point of view. That’s what Le Prince did. Unfortunately, as history would see it, he mysteriously disappeared on a train to Paris in September 1890 right before his first public screening in New York carrying luggage that contained all of his work. Neither Le Prince or the luggage has ever been found. Quite the coincidence.

There are a few theories: Le Prince committing suicide, Le Prince’s own brother killing him, Le Prince fleeing due to his sexuality being outed but none have stuck... except one. Le Prince’s widow, Lizzie, believed Edison, his biggest competitor in the race, had him assassinated. The evidence? The discovery of Edison’s journal containing the following entry, which has been proven authentic. It read:

“Eric called me today from Dijon. It has been done. Prince is no more. This is good news but I flinched when he told me. Murder is not my thing. I'm an inventor and my inventions for moving images can now move forward.”

Take of that what you will.

Today, we are taught that Edison’s kinetoscope launched the novel medium of moving pictures into our familiar. When it was invented in 1891 by Edison and Dickson, the kinetoscope was a peepshow-like device with a "sight opening" on top that one viewer at a time could look into and watch a moving picture. Think about it like looking into a microscope - very different from how we view films now both in method and price, it was 50 cents for access to all films at a given venue.

In 1897, an improvement on Edison's device arose. Invented by the Lumière brothers, the cinematograph contained both a camera, projector, and hand crank. Now, audiences could sit and screen films. I'll circle back to Edison as he connects to our 1903 topic. But first, let's take a stop with the Lumière brothers.

Auguste and Louis Lumière are credited as the first filmmakers. Their documentary-esque films Workers Leaving The Lumière Factory and Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat are milestones in cinema. Known as travelogues or actualités, they showed the casual and working life of people in the mid to late 1890's. These shorts were even screened to audiences who jumped out of their seats at a train onscreen because they thought it would actually hit them. The Lumière Brothers took their screening all over the world, from Paris, to India, and China.

Watching these films, it's hard not to put yourself in the shoes of a passerby, a random person whose name we don't know, who exists in a few frames before disappearing to time. Like a fossil, it's interesting to examine what life was like back then. I love seeing the clothing. Everyone is so formal, at least compared to the laid back air of today. Even so, in the 1890’s people were moving away from the Victorian Era and into the “New Woman” Era. High necklines and longer sleeves were replaced by the open neck and short sleeves as morning turned to dusk. High chiffons under feathered hats were popular as was the shirtwaist style for work. All of these visible in the Lumière films.

Where we jump from reportage to fiction is where we jump from Lumière to Porter. And back to Edison, who had Porter working for him. Projectionist and electrician turned director, Edwin S. Porter was the brains behind many of the mechanics and techniques that have become so highly engrained in the making of films that the idea of them being novel seems almost impossible. In 1899, Porter became head of moving picture production at the Edison Manufacturing Company and throughout his career, which spanned about 15 years, he made more than 70 short films. So lets look at a few of them in detail.

Jack and the Beanstalk (1902)

You'll see that a lot of the narrative ideas for these early films spun directly out of fairytales. For an audience, fairytales were a familiarity. Thus, they were able to stitch together what they already knew about the characters and stories and better understand these new moving pictures. And Porter knew this from his work as a projectionist. He knew what engaged the audience most. And that wasn't just story, it was technique. Porter's films were revolutionary for what would become known as editing, at that time just cutting film. Simplistic and impactful, he knew how to compact time and create magic. Objects and people appear and disappear in a single cut. The camera remains still, a wide shot, and on a tripod but what's in front of it changes slightly, making for magical realism. For example, once Jack makes it back down to earth after descending the beanstalk, he grabs an ax and starts chopping it down. He's got to do this or the giant chasing him will make it down too. So he swings the ax a few times with all his might. From a large beanstalk, ripe with leaves, reaching up to the sky, we immediately cut to a destroyed one. The fact that we end one cut with Jack in the same position as we start the next, keeps from disrupting the audience even though everything else onscreen has changed. We've condensed time, Jack has saved the day, and the Giant has fallen to his death. Porter would expand on this editing style, perfecting it, discovering cross-cutting.

Life of an American Fireman (1903)

Cross-cutting or parallel action is so integral to editing that it happens in just about every film. Simply, two separate events are occurring - say, a woman trying to escape a fire inside of her house and firefighters rushing in a horse carriage to save her. These two events, perceived to be happening at the same time, are stitched together through editing so that the audience experiences both. Cut to the woman in her house as the fire inches closer to her. Cut to the firefighters rushing up the stairs. Will they get there? Will they save her? Cross-cutting serves to create tension and set the rhythm of a scene. Eventually, the two spatial points of view merge and the conflict should be resolved. This originates in Porter's films and Life of An American Fireman is the first one that shows it off.

Let's cut back to the first shot of this film, it's a trick shot. A sleepy fireman dreams of a mother putting her daughter to bed. Abruptly, the fire alarm is set off and he wakes up. Instead of cutting from the fireman dozing off in his chair to a separate shot of the mother, which would create confusion on whether the fireman was dreaming, Porter uses double exposure to frame the dream above the fireman shoulder. Double exposure had been employed by photographers since the 1860's to produce dreamy situations in otherwise ordinary places but in film, it first appears in Georges Méliès Four Heads are Better Than One. When we see the house aflame for the first time in Life of an American Fireman, the same mother and daughter from the dream pair reappear. The fireman's premonition connects back to the main drama of the story.

The Great Train Robbery (1903)

In this film we take the leap from a theatrical approach to cinematography, where the camera simply watches the action at a long-shot or observing eye, to being involved in the action. One way that Porter does this is by integrating the pan.

Panning is a technique that moves a camera side to side in a fixed location. We haven't taken the camera off of a tripod or stepped forward in anyway, we are simply turning left or right on the horizontal axis. If we took a step forward and followed a character or action we'd have a tracking shot. But we aren't there yet so plant your feet in the ground for now. Porter uses pans to reveal. The first pan is executed about six minutes into the film. The robbers jump off the caboose with their stolen goods and make a run for it. But where are they going? Queue the pan and we find out it's down some steep hills and into a forest. The subsequent shot is them in the thicket of a forest. Running passed the camera until all but one have exited camera left. But how will they get out? Queue the second pan to reveal horses - their getaway plan. This pan is masterfully done. I love the way Porter keeps his camera static and just observes the tumbling, running robbers until only one is left onscreen. Then and only then does he pan left to reveal the horses. By leaving only one person onscreen, not only does the audience have less to track but so does the camera. Simplifying the frame down to only the necessities of the action, one robber running away in a forest, amplifies the pan and makes the reveal feel complete - we reunite with the group of robbers and horses.

Depending on which version of the film you watch, you might be surprised by waves of color among a sea of black and white. Tinting whole films blue, amber, or sepia has been around since the origins of moving pictures, but in The Great Train Robbery, Porter selects specific actions or objects to tint. This was all done by hand.

Color is one big manipulator. Think of light blue and you'll likely picture endless summer skies; an air of calm. How about Green? I picture the tangled tree webs of a jungle - adventure, growth, the smell of dew on fresh leaves, nature. Now red. Explosions, fire, burst of emotion. Yellow? A bright, morning sun, a blooming sunflower, happiness, positivity, a new start. Early filmmakers used color to bring attention to specific objects, people, and actions. They used it to draw out an emotion from the viewer. They used it to connect themes of violence, love, and happiness. And they used it to spice up their frame.

Porter hand paints the explosion of a train lockbox bright orange and a deep red. The smokey pops from gunshots are also a fiery red. The dress of a dancing woman is bright yellow. The coat of another girl is a rich purple. The addition of color cultivates realism but also gives the film a flair of the imaginary.

So, we have the creative process of tinting to enhance the visual characteristics of a story and we have panning to push forward the important aspects of a narrative. Let's add a few more ingredients to our recipe.

Because the story cuts back and forth between the robbers, the operator, and the posse of men who will eventually hunt down the robbers, it has parallel action. Three separate storylines, integrated through the edit, that coverage at the end. Now that we have the way in which the story is cut and delivered, how about some specific effects?

In shots where the action occurs inside the prop train, which is not moving but the audience is meant to believe it is, Porter uses double exposure to ground his location in reality. He filmed exterior, moving shots and layered them onto the static train shots. In the '30s this would become known as "rear projection".

Additionally, Porter creatively placed his camera in new ways to produce frames that diverged from the typical wide shot; bringing the viewer closer into the action. For example, at about 2 minutes and 50 seconds in, the camera is propped on top of the engine car roof while a sneaking robber crawls passed and kills a fireman.

At last we arrive at the final shot. Diverging from the narrative, Porter set this up to look like a wanted poster. It is filmed in a medium close-up, which serves to focus all attention on the subject by filming them waist-up, having them fill up most of the frame, and blocking out the surrounding environment. The robber points his revolver right at the camera and shoots six times. If you've ever seen Goodfellas, Martin Scorsese recreates this at the end with Joe Pesci. Seemingly, the purpose was to shoot the audience. To tell them even though all of these robbers were killed in the end, their spirit doesn't die. It says "I'm warning you- it's still dangerous out there." Funny enough, this wasn't even the original intention. The shot was promotional and where it ended up in the film was entirely up to the projectionist. It could've just as well been placed at the beginning if they wanted. Even so, the break in the fourth wall and punch of dramatics that ended the film still prevail through cinema history today. Completing the recipe for one the first Westerns, ripe with shootouts, chase sequences, bandits, and suspense.

The Kleptomaniac (1905)

When moving pictures are void of sound and spoken dialogue it's a bit difficult to understand what characters are doing onscreen. Heightened emotional and physicalized acting made up for this. Through facial expressions and over the top, exaggerated body movements, audiences could connect the dots to figure out what was going on in a scene. But in 1903, Porter directed Uncle Tom's Cabin and introduced intertitles, words that would appear printed onscreen. Early iterations of intertitles read like book chapters. They described the main action that was about to take place in the scene. In Uncle Tom's Cabin some examples include: "The Escape of Eliza", "Rescue of Eva", and "Tom and Eva in the Garden. In The Kleptomaniac, intertitles state location and give context to where we are, which is helpful because without them, I don't think I could follow what was going on - at all.

Location is such a main element in this film that intertitles are practically non negotiable. "Leaving Home", "Arriving at the Store", "Home of Thief", and "Court Room Scene", prepare us with the information that is necessary to fully understand the purpose of each scene. The department store shot isn't clear-cut. It could've been a mail room or an office. If we miss that it's a department store that our main character is visiting (and stealing from), we miss the connection to the thief stealing food later on in the film and thus miss the whole theme of class disparities. The intertitles supplement for lack of onscreen information and sound. They would be used regularly in the silent era, branching into dialogue intertitles and expositionary intertitles before dying out with the advent of sound.

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morbidology · 4 years

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What? You afraid of little different opinions from your own? The reason you didn’t answer back is because you have no argument carols wasn’t innocent he deserved to die. He had prior criminal records to rape so um you wept for a rapist.

First of all, I was asleep and this is a case I feel strongly about so wanted to give a proper reply. Secondly, he was charged with attempted rape when he cornered his friend’s mother and opened her shirt before running away. Not that that’s okay, I just thought I’d mention the exact charge.

Before we speak about Carlos Hernandez, I’d like to point that the crime scene was completely mishandled. It was a particularly bloody scene with blood throughout the store and out on the forecourt. Inside, Wanda’s flipflops which had come off during the struggle were found behind the counter and a folding knife with its blade exposed was abandoned on the floor nearby. They found shoe prints, a cigarette butt, chewing gum and clumps of hair but these were all overlooked Three fingerprints were found – two on the front door and another on the telephone. However, they were all such poor quality that they were allegedly unusable. There were no fingerprints on the knife. No samples of blood were taken or tested despite the fact that it was probably likely that the killer sustained an injury himself during the frenzied attack. It took less than an hour for the crime scene to be processed. The reason? They were so adamant they had already arrested the killer that they felt there was no need.

There is an abundance of evidence against Carlos Hernandez, who DeLuna named as the killer. He wasn’t identified until after DeLuna was executed but when he was, they decided to come forward and relay their own beliefs that their family member was the killer of Wanda. In fact, Hernandez was well known to police and prosecutors at the time of the trial and had a lengthy police record. He had a long history of violence which included stabbings committed with a knife that was very similar to the one found at the crime scene.

He was in and out trouble with the law throughout his life. In 1971, he was convicted of negligent homicide after he killed his sister’s fiancé while driving drunk. His sentence was suspended and he received no jail time. The following year, he received a 20 year sentence for holding up several gas stations. After just five short years, he was paroled. Then in 1979, Hernandez was arrested for the brutal murder of Dahlia Sauceda, who was found beten an strangled to death in her van. A crude X had also been carved into her body. Hernandez was tied to the crime when his fingerprints were discovered on a beer can inside the van alongside a pair of his boxers. While being held for this crime, Hernandez somehow managed to point the blame towards another man. Prosecutor Ken Botary – who would later be the co-prosecutor in the DeLuna trial – interviewed Hernandez. Furthermore, Hernandez was taken to the interview by Detective Olivia Escobedo, the lead investigator in Lopez’ murder who claimed Hernandez didn’t exist!

Astonishingly, Hernandez was once again released while the other man was acquitted. In 1986, he was re-arrested for the murder of Sauceda after new evidence surfaced. However, the evidence was somehow misplaced and the charges were dropped. Hernandez was once again a free man.

Two months after Lopez’ murder, Hernandez was arrested outside a convenience store with a knife and then several months later, he attacked his wife, Rosa, with an ax handle. During the attack, he smashed a window, shattering glass onto Rosa’s sleeping children. He threatened to kill her and the kids. He was sentenced to just 30 days in jail during which Rosa filed for divorce. In 1989, Hernandez attacked Dina Ybanez with a 7-inch lock-blade buck knife. While he received a ten year sentence, he was paroled after just a year and a half. Then in 1996, he attacked his neighbour with a 9-inch kitchen knife. Three years later, Hernandez died in prison.

The Chicago Tribune not only interviewed Hernandez’s friends and family, but also reviewed thousands of court records. Their findings indicated that the case was compromised by unreliable eyewitness identification, lazy police work and a complete failure to pursue Hernandez as a potential suspect. After all, the police and prosecutors flat out denied he even existed.

The investigation also uncovered that Hernandez had bragged to at least five people about the murder of Lopez as well as the murder of Fahlia Sauceda. Janie Adrian, a neighbour of Hernanfez, told The Chicago Tribune that she had overheard Hernandez talk about stabbing Lopez on at least three occasions.

Dina Ybanez also told the newspaper that Hernandez had confessed to killing Lopez to her and her husband. Both women said that they were too afraid to come forward earlier, particularly Dina, who had been stabbed by Hernandez in the past. She said that during that attack, he had threatened that “he was going to kill me like he did her.” Two other women – Beatrice Tapia and Pricilla Jaramillo – were just young girls when they heard Hernandez confess to the murder. Jaramillo was Hernandez’ cousin and she had been living at Hernandez’ mothers house.

One afternoon, she and Tapia overheard Hernandez speaking to his brother about the murder shortly after it happened. Jaramillo was too terrified to tell anybody about what she had heard because Hernandez had molested her in the past and she was scared of him. The Chicago Tribune also managed to track down Miguel Ortiz, an acquaintance of Hernandez. HE told the newspaper that Hernandez had openly confessed to the murder to him.

The Chicago Tribune even spoke with a former detective named Eddie Garza who said that before the trial, he received tips about Hernandez.

He said that he had heard from informants that Hernandez was openly bragging about the murder. As a detective, Garza knew both DeLuna and Hernandez and said that the crime seemed more like something Hernandez would do, not DeLuna. Garza said that he passed the information on to Olivia Escobedo, the detective leading the investigation. Escobedo, however, claimed she never received such tips. While Garza claims he knew about Hernandez, he still testified at DeLuna’s hearing and told the jury that DeLuna had a bad reputation.

In 2012, The Columbia Human Rights Law Review released a 400-page report which detailed the events of DeLuna’s trial and stated that he had been wrongfully convicted executed. Columbia Law School professor James Liebman and his students had conducted the study as a contribution towards a public debate on the death penalty. They specifically argued that it is an ineffective form of punishment. The group decided on covering the DeLuna case after Liebman did a study on courts across the United States and how they handled legal error.

They tracked down the witness that identified DeLuna while he was sat in the back seat of a dark police car later confessed he was less than 50% sure because “all Hispanics look the same.” He later said he only said DeLuna was the man because officers told them he was. His statement is recorded. There was no evidence against him found inside the store. It was a bloody crime scene yet there was no blood on him.

The Columbia study asserted that it was Hernandez who committed the murder, not DeLuna. “On evidence we pulled together on this case, there is no way a jury could have convicted De-Luna beyond a reasonable doubt, but they could’ve convicted Hernandez beyond a reasonable doubt,” Liebman said.

The Columbia study, which was called “Los Tocayos Carlos,” took five years of investigation to complete. Liebman said that his findings not only show that DeLuna was innocent but that Hernandez was a real person and was guilty of the murder DeLuna was executed for. He wrote that every single thing that could’ve went wrong in a case, did, and that the wrongful arrest of DeLuna was made specifically to avoid departmental embarrassment for the 911 operator not responding to Lopez’s first call for help. The Columbia Study went on to turn their findings into a book named “The Wrong Carlos: Anatomy of a Wrongful Conviction.”

You should read the book and read through all of the evidence that is readily available instead of basing your opinion on the fact that somebody had an attempted rape conviction. If that’s what you’re basing your opinion on then you should look at Hernandez’ history. It’s pretty widely accepted that Carlos DeLuna is innocent and his wrongful execution even led to laws being changed. I would also like to point of if even if DeLuna WAS guilty, I still wouldn’t agree with somebody with an intellectual disability, with the mindset of a child, executed never mind a botched execution.

This isn’t isolated case, either. Three decades have passed since DeLuna was executed but the flaws that condemned him still reverberate in the criminal justice system today - faulty eyewitness testimony, a quick to convict police force, lousy legal representation and withholding of evidence. American is the outlier among industrialized nations and it is the only country in the New World that continues to execute prisoners… Whether or not we agree with it, the death penalty is an extremely flawed system (and racist, biased, hypocritical and archaic) and one that I don’t support.

#carlos deluna #wrongful execution

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lunawho47 · 3 years

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Buzzfeed Unsolved: The Mysterious Doctor and the Omen of the Blue Box (Part 1)

Fandoms: Buzzfeed Unsolved and Doctor Who

Genre: Total Crackfic, Humor

Rating: 16+ (for language)

Summary: A script for Buzzfeed Unsolved, in which our two favorite jackasses, the Ghoul Boys, discuss the various internet theories surrounding the identity of various mysterious figures known only as “the Doctor” and the blue box that tends to appear around them. Well, Ryan wants to discuss the theories; Shane thinks it’s all urban legends and bullshit.

A/N: So, I’ve read a lot of these mock scripts going around for Unsolved discussing CW’s Supernatural as though it was real, and I thought they were hilarious. So, my brain started wondering what theories the reddit and conspiracy boards would think up about mentions of the Doctor, the Doctor’s companions, UNIT, and Torchwood. And to be honest, my brain came up with A LOT of theories that would make sense, and this format seemed a fun way to discuss all of them. It was originally going to be a one shot, but as I started writing, Shane kept interrupting in my head about how stupid all of it sounds, and that kept making the script longer and longer. So, it’s now going to be a few parts long cos the history of DW (even when seriously truncated) takes a long time to go through when you try to use the serials to make arguments about the Doctor’s potential identity(s).

So, here’s part 1. Please let me know if you like it and would like to see more. And if Shane and Ryan sound anything like themselves because if they don’t then the whole thing is nowhere near as funny as it should be.

Ryan: Today on Buzzfeed Unsolved we're looking into the puzzling mystery of an entity known only as "The Doctor" and the corresponding omen of a blue box. It's a mystery that, in its more comprehensive moments, is whimsically strange and, most of the time, is just plain batshit bizarre.

Shane: Okay, so I can hear the air quotes around the name, and you called it an entity. Are we talking like, cryptid creature that is based in reality or am I going to be sitting through theories about zombie plagues and Ant-man Ax murderers again? Just what am I in for here?

Ryan: No zombie plagues, and the Doctor has never murdered anyone with an ax. At least, not in any of the records available. It's just...well, it's hard to explain here, so let's just get right into it. Just bear in mind this is Gene Wilder Willy Wonka levels of weird when it's at its most sensical. And it's rare that this story makes any sense at all.

Shane: Alright, I'll confess I'm...intrigued. I'm ready to listen.

Ryan: Alright, here we go. *opens folder*

Ryan (in his Unsolved VO): The first documented evidence of a being calling itself "The Doctor" is in the files of now deceased British UNIT officer Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart.

Shane: Wait. UNIT? What's that? Sounds like something out of a video game.

Ryan: (wheeze) It does a bit, yeah. But there is paperwork evidence that verifies this group -- lame as the acronym is -- actually existed. They were set up in the mid-1960s by the United Nations to look into unexplained phenomena and for a long time they were a covert operation. The British Prime Minister knew they existed, and they answered to Geneva, but they weren't known to the wider public until after they shut down three years ago.

Shane: I'm sure that meeting went GREAT. 'Hey, everybody, thanks for coming down this Monday morning. Erm...thanks for protecting us from alien invasions for the last 50 years and for keeping such a great secret about it. Here's your reward: you're all fired, and we're going to tell the entire world what your names were and let you deal with the press about it for the rest of your life. Have a great rest of your Monday!' (Wheeze) What a bunch of shitty bosses.

Ryan: I mean, based on what little there is to read about how UNIT operated, the Brigadier we'll be talking about really had to go to bat for the organization in front of the Prime Minister a lot over the years in order to keep the operation going. After the Brigadier died, they were able to keep going for awhile, but as you'll see from some of these stories we'll be looking at today, the organization was considered obsolete long before it was disbanded.

Shane: Okay, so the Doctor first appears in conjunction with this UNIT?

Ryan: Right, so in the 1960s, there was some weird circumstance that led to the London Underground shutting down and the Brigadier, who was only a Colonel in the regular British army at the time, ran into what he described as a "(quote) man with a foppish haircut, ratty waistcoat, and tartan patterned clown pants; a young teenage girl; and a full Scotsman (end quote)."

Shane: So which is the Doctor?

Ryan: In this case, it's the first description. The man with the clown pants on. (wheeze)

Shane: (wheeze) Do you think he had clown shoes on, too?

Ryan: See, I know exactly what you're picturing right now. You're thinking of a guy with a depressing Beatles haircut and complete clown regalia, including the extra large shoes.

Shane: I am. 100% And you know, given some of the things we saw when traveling around London, including on (*with a terribly fake posh Oxbridge accent*) the Tube, a man dressed as a clown running around the platforms underground wouldn't even register as weird on a normal day.

Ryan: (Conceding) That is true. And on a normal day, I'd agree with you. But, bear in mind, this was the 1960s -- not the modern day -- and the Tube at the time was closed to the public because of this unknown threat the army was trying to deal with. And what's even more notable -- the reason why the future Brigadier apparently wrote about it in his official report to the Prime Minister -- is that the man who called himself the Doctor, together with the two other civilians, saved the day. The details are sparse, but the Brigadier makes it clear that the Doctor is the one who figured out what was really going on and managed to deal with whatever the situation was with minimal casualties.

And that's just the first time the Doctor and the future Brigadier crossed paths. There are later documents that report the Brigadier -- now promoted from Colonel and officially a Brigadier -- came across the same man and Scotsman, but a different young girl in London just weeks after the military organization known as UNIT was founded. And AGAIN, whatever the situation actually was, the Doctor and his friends were the ones that helped UNIT save the day.

Shane: Am I the only one who finds it suspicious that the details are always missing? Like, shady organization set up by the government to look into extraterrestrial happenings? Sure. (*puts hands in the air in surrender to argument*) I'll buy that. Governments do shady shit all the time. But, I mean, things like shutting down the London Underground and alien happenings in the city of London itself. People are going to notice, right? And how shitty are the Brigadier's write ups that no one remembers or knows any of the happenings in Britain's capital? "Dear Prime Minister, stuff happened. Doctor did some other stuff. Stuff stopped. The end. TTYL." Sounds like someone was crap at his job and when things just luckily worked out, everyone just swept it under the rug.

Ryan: You see, I would agree with you there. BUT...there are pictures. We can't show them to the audience because of copyright, but if you know where to look online, people love to discuss the Doctor and all the people who have gone missing while looking for the Doctor, so. Investigate at your own peril. But, Shane, here you go.

*the audience can't see the photos hidden by Ryan's open folder, but we see Shane's expression.*

Shane: (*laughs*) That Doctor looks like a moron. I mean, I still think the Brigadier must have been crap at his job, but he was bang on his descriptor of the Doctor looking like a clown. And I take it the guy in the kilt is the Scotsman?

Ryan: Yeah, I looked up what full Scotsman means when I read the description and apparently it means a guy who wears a kilt with no underwear on underneath it. Before that, I just assumed that it meant this other guy was wandering around the Underground, playing bagpipes and singing songs from Highlander or something.

Shane: You thought this guy was wandering around singing Who Wants to Live Forever over a decade before the film came out. (wheeze)

Ryan: Well, when we get into the theories that idea won't seem entirely out of place, I don't think.

Shane: Well, I'm going to go ahead and call a preemptive bullshit on that theory.

Ryan: Noted.

Ryan: (back in Theory VO) The next record of the Doctor's appearance comes about in the 1970s when a man is admitted to a local hospital after collapsing outside of a blue box in the woods.

Shane: There was a blue box in the woods? Like, human sized or was he scrunched up in it like Shroedinger's cat?

Ryan: We'll get back to the box in a minute, but it's larger than a human, yeah. In fact, it was something called a Police Public Call Box, which were common to see on city or town street corners in Britain in the 1950s and 1960s. The idea was that if police or citizens saw a crime being committed, they could either phone the police from the box or shove the criminal in the police box and go fetch a policeman. But what's weird about the box in this case is: 1) it's in the middle of the woods, and not even on like, a hiking path or anything. But, the legit WOODS. And 2) it's the 1970s and police call boxes are no longer really a thing at this point. But, once the man calling himself the Doctor gets to the hospital it gets even stranger.

Shane: I mean, everything about this story so far feels like the Brigadier spinning a yarn, but keep going.

Ryan: So, the Brigadier gets a phone call from the hospital that a man called the Doctor has been admitted to the hospital.

Shane: Wait, how did the hospital know to call the Brigadier about that? Was there a national bulletin? Is the Doctor a wanted man or something?

Ryan: I don't know, man. Maybe the police just call UNIT whenever something with the label "fucking weird" comes across their desk. I don't know. This is just what the report says.

Ryan: (theory voice) Due to a situation UNIT was overseeing in the area at the time, the Doctor's appearance was notably auspicious for the Brigadier, so the UNIT officer went to see if his friend could help with the investigation. However, when he got the hospital, he discovered that he the man calling himself 'The Doctor' was not anyone he recognized.

Shane: Wait...what?

Ryan: (laughing). I told you the situation at the hospital is weird. So, the Brigadier is told that this man who has helped him out before has been admitted to a hospital that is nearby a situation that UNIT is investigating -- a clear sign, in the Brigadier's mind, that this Doctor who is injured is the same one he's met twice before -- and then discovers that it's a completely different man.

Shane: Well, I mean...that's not *too* weird. I mean, the man is in a hospital, and you usually see doctors in a hospital. And I'm sure a lot of doctors are known more by their title than their surname. There are millions of doctors on the planet, so I don't know if two different people wanting to be called Doctor is all that unusual.

Ryan: (with a haughty smile) That makes perfect sense, but listen to this.

Ryan: (Theory voice) The Brigadier assumed at first that the patient calling himself the Doctor was a coincidence and started to leave the room. However, he found himself called back when he heard the unknown man call the Brigadier by name. The conversation made it clear that, not only did the patient know the Brigadier's full name, but also knew the circumstances under which the Doctor and the Brigadier had met both times before. Information which, at the time, was highly classified and known only to those in the Prime Minister's office and those who had been in the UNIT planning room at the time of the situational crises.

Shane: Okay, I'm going to call it. I'm going with spy. I think the Doctor is a code name and this guy inherited the call sign and the information from the Doctor's previous operations.

Ryan: So, you think this is like, a 007 scenario?

Shane: I mean, I'm sure you'll peddle some alien abduction theory or some other supernatural bullshit, but...yeah. I'm going spy call sign. Makes sense to me so far.

Ryan: Well, you might not be a *total* dipshit, but...we'll see. There's still quite a bit more to cover. This isn't even the tip of the weird iceberg.

Shane: (sarcastically) Oh joy...

#buzzfeed unsolved #bfu #doctor who #fanfiction #(or at least fanfic adjacent)#the mysterious doctor and the omen of the blue box

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twentiethcenturymoviesandtv · 4 years

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The Wizard of Oz: The Characters

Perhaps the most vital element of any story, whether television show, movie, or book, is its characters. You might have an interesting plot, but without compelling characters, it doesn’t stick, and The Wizard of Oz is no exception to that rule. In fact, The Wizard of Oz has probably given us some of the most iconic and compelling characters ever created. People don’t forget characters Dorothy Gale, or the Wicked Witch very easily. Today, we’re going to be taking a look at just what makes those characters so memorable, and so timeless. First up, let’s check out our heroine. (Spoilers below!)

Dorothy Gale is one of the most well-known and loved characters in all of pop culture history. Despite originating as a character from a children’s book, Judy Garland’s portrayal in 1939 has been firmly cemented as the essential Dorothy Gale, and with good reason.

Every protagonist should have a problem, preferably a problem pertaining to the plot (say that five times fast!) and Dorothy’s problem is, initially, Smalltown Boredom. She is surrounded by adults, authority figures who love her, but don’t understand her, and she’s the only one on her side willing to take action when her dog’s life is threatened. This reveals something important about Dorothy’s character that remains consistent throughout the entire narrative: Dorothy always tries to solve her problems, even if it isn’t always the best course of action, such as deciding to become the Runaway to save her dog’s life.

Despite her willingness to take action when necessary, she’s not a fantasy hero when it comes to the action itself. She never learns to use any weapons, or how to fight; her first instinct is to befriend, and she consistently shows politeness and kindness towards others. Her status as Accidental Hero Trapped in Another World never goes to her head, even after she frees two separate groups of people from underneath the rule of the Wicked Witches of the East and West. She helps the Scarecrow down from his pole, and oils the Tin Man’s joints, listens to their, and the Lion’s, problems, and then suggests that they join her so they can all get help together. For heaven’s sake, she even apologizes when she commits Accidental Murder!

While we’re on the subject, let’s discuss that Accidental Murder for a moment.

The witch’s death wasn’t a dragon-slaying moment, it’s a result of Dorothy’s attempt to save the Scarecrow. Dorothy is certainly not a She Who Fights Monsters character, in any sense of the term. She never craved adventure, she left the house to save Toto. She doesn’t try to attack what she thought was a vicious lion until he went after her dog. In fact, the only times she becomes angry in the film are when someone she cares about is threatened. She even forgives: she asks the Lion to join them after he attacks Toto, and she’s nice to the Wicked Witch’s guards. Dorothy is a character who always tries to do the right, and kind, thing, something that sets her apart from many fantasy heroes that have come before and after her.

Like I said in the last article, Dorothy Gale is an earnest dreamer, a scared, but brave little girl. She’s a nice person and a brave person, but more than that, she’s a good character.

Good characters change throughout the course of a story, and while at first it might not seem like Dorothy changes at all, a closer look reveals a different story.

As I’ve mentioned previously, Dorothy is one of the first and most famous examples of the Hero’s Journey on film, and a character can’t go through the Hero’s Journey without learning and growing. Much like her friends, searching for things they already had, (more on that shortly) Dorothy is searching for home, before finding out that she had the means to get there the whole time. Dorothy’s ‘journey’ in a character sense is discovering her own strength and agency, not allowing herself to helplessly watch others affect her life, while not losing what makes her a good and nice person. Not only is this a different moral than a lot of fantasy stories, where the hero does need to train to gain something before his narrative is finished, but Dorothy’s change also kicks in at a totally different time in the narrative.

The moment where Dorothy’s goal changes, the scene where she stops wanting to get away from Kansas and wants to get back to it, doesn’t happen at the end of the second act, it’s not a dramatic realization after the hero has gone through much of their journey; no, Dorothy’s priorities switch the exact moment she lands in Oz and is hailed for killing their witch. This doesn’t make her a bad character, or a bad example, because it makes a lot of sense for a young kid to immediately realize that they don’t belong in this fantasy world, and that they have family that’s probably concerned about them. Dorothy’s learning and growing is done on the journey to get back, struggling to return to the place she realizes that she belongs.

In summary? Dorothy’s a sweet kid, who doesn’t let adventure turn her into a harder person, just a kinder and stronger one.

But a hero is only as good as their villain, right?

The Wicked Witch of the West is rock solid one of the most memorable villains in film history. Everything from her laugh to her look is firmly cemented in the minds of moviegoers, even though she doesn’t really look like her book counterpart at all. She’s the quintessential witch: shooting fireballs, riding on brooms and cackling, but perhaps the most interesting part about her is the fact that she, like multiple other characters in this story, is not one person, but two.

Ms. Gulch is the original Big Bad of the film, an uptight woman who ‘owns half the county’. Fed up with Dorothy’s dog, Toto, she obtains the legal right to have him put down. We don’t see a lot of her, and there is even evidence to suggest that Toto did chase her cat and run through her lawn often as well as bite her, but there is also a lot of evidence to suggest that Ms. Gulch had it coming. Toto tends to be a good judge of character, and even Dorothy’s aunt and uncle, while legally powerless, don’t let her go without letting her know exactly what they think of her.

It makes sense that Dorothy’s frightened subconscious would exaggerate nasty Ms. Gulch into an evil, hammy, black-clad, laughing mad, Wicked Witch.

In the realm of Oz, that one key character trait of Ms. Gulch (besides overall nastiness) did carry over: power. In our world, she can order around the sheriff, in Oz, she has an army of flying monkeys and magic powers. And once again, just like in the real world, she uses an offense as an excuse to hunt Dorothy and Toto down, using the death of her sister as a way to get her hands on the magical shoes that she wore. Throughout the entire movie, she is never shown mourning the death of her sister, but she is very much focused on those shoes, and the fact that Dorothy is wearing them is enough to make the Witch vow vengeance. (‘I’ll get you, my pretty, and your little dog too!’)

In this, the Witch is an extraordinarily good villain. Just scary enough to frighten young watchers, and still mean enough to make older viewers wince with disgust, the Witch proves an excellent foil to Dorothy. She’s the ultimate oppression in a child’s life: an unjust adult with power.

(It’s important to note that Dorothy never ‘overthrows’ her as is often seen in these types of scenarios. Like I’ve stated above, the death of both witches is a total accident on her part, and Dorothy even shows remorse afterwards.)

The Witch maintains a steady threat throughout the film, arriving to throw fireballs, threaten, or just cackle when need be. She also follows through. Towards the end of the movie, she kidnaps Dorothy, which leads to the most important thing about being a villain: being beaten. The Witch goes out in one of the most memorable and iconic deaths in movie history, melted by her Weaksauce Weakness: a bucket of water.

In the end, as with Dorothy, we don’t know a lot about these characters, but in that, both hero and villain feel (fittingly) very much like characters from a fairytale: archetypes for young audiences to immediately grasp and understand. Sure, the Wicked Witch is no Darth Vader, but does that make her a less effective villain? I don’t think so. There’s a reason she’s a Breakout Villain and the second most famous character in the film.

Of course, there’s more to look at here than just the two main driving forces. No movie is complete without its supporting cast.

The first of the trio of supporting characters that Dorothy meets in Oz is the Scarecrow, a more exaggerated version of his own Kansas Kounterpart. The Scarecrow’s defining trait is his value of brains, intelligence, and sense.

The thing about the Scarecrow is that he always had brains, he was just under the impression that he didn’t. Every idea the gang gets is from him. He figures out how to get Dorothy apples, he comes up with the plan to get the trio into the castle, and he even uses the Tin-Man’s axe to bring the light fixture down on the Witch’s guards.

Once again, part of the brilliance of The Wizard of Oz is that both the Oz trio and Dorothy have the same problem: lack of confidence in their own abilities, constantly using what they think they don’t have to reach their goals. If it wasn’t for Dorothy’s realization that she needed home, or the Scarecrow’s idea that he needed brains, neither would have ended up on this adventure and neither would have grown as people the way that they do, or learned that they already had what they were looking for.

Same goes for the Tin Man, probably the most emotional character in all of cinema.

Like the Scarecrow, his Kansas Kounterpart also puts a lot of stock in having a specific trait, this time in having a heart. The Tin Man’s stock is in remaining emotionally open and caring, and also like the Scarecrow, the Tin Man spends most of the movie bemoaning the absence of something he clearly has: a heart.

Like I said before, it’s not an exaggeration to say that the Tin Man might be the most emotional character in the history of movies. He cries over everything. In another example of the truly interesting acting in this film, the performance that Jack Haley gives is dripping with empathy and kindness, directly tonally contradicting his claims of heartlessness. Ironically, the gentlest of the company is also the only one consistently armed, with an axe no less. Also like the Scarecrow, what he actually needs, and what he gets at the end of the story, is belief in the fact that he does have a heart, rather than the vital organ itself. He spends the entire story using and prominently displaying the trait he determinedly says he lacks, and it’s all the more rewarding when he finally believes he’s found what he’s been looking for.

Perhaps the most complicated and difficult of the three to look at would be the Cowardly Lion. Of the trio, he’s the one who does seem to lack the trait he claims to, routinely running away from danger and displaying extreme cowardice, to the point of being afraid of sheep he tries to count to go to sleep. He’s not exactly King of the Forest, Dorothy brings him to blubbering with one almighty smack.

While the Scarecrow and the Tin Man obviously display their own intelligence and emotion, the Lion never seems to portray any bravery of his own. He is drug, kicking and screaming, into danger at every turn, heading into the Witch’s castle, the Haunted Forest, and even the audience with the Wizard. Even during the rescue of Dorothy he begs his friends to talk him out of it.

The real question we must ask is: does this make him a coward?

The definition of courage is not, as the Lion seems to think, a lack of fear. In fact, the real definition of courage, especially from a storytelling standpoint, is being afraid, and doing what you have to do anyway. Many of our greatest heroes from fiction have been afraid during their greatest deeds, but did what they did because it had to be done. With this definition in mind, the Lion’s characterization makes a little more sense.

The Lion does pull through in every case, and yes, he does need some help from his friends to keep him going at times, but if doing everything alone and without fear constituted courage, very few of us would be considered truly brave. Once again, this brings out the emphasis that The Wizard of Oz puts on friendships, which is possibly another one of the reasons that this film holds up for all ages. We all know what it’s like to do things we don’t want to for a friend’s sake, even if it’s not exactly storming a castle.

Just like the Scarecrow and the Tin Man, the Lion never picks up on the fact that he too has what he’s been looking for this whole time, the real prize at the end being his own confidence in his ability. He also shares quite a few similarities to his Kansas Kounterpart, all bluster until Dorothy falls into the pigpen, and despite being afraid, he charges in after her. Like Dorothy and the others, he too ends the journey with what he’s been looking for.

But of course, there wouldn’t be a journey in the first place without our titular wizard, would there?

Of all of the characters in The Wizard of Oz, the Wizard himself is the most similar to his real world counterpart, Professor Marvel. He’s a con artist, a Stage Magician in both worlds, convincing Dorothy of his abilities with his ‘Crystal Ball’ in Kansas, and convincing everyone in Oz that he’s an all-powerful Wizard, with enough parlor tricks and bluster to be in charge without ever having to use any real magic.

Despite this penchant for dishonesty, both the Wizard and Professor Marvel display remarkable amounts of compassion. He’s a nice enough man when it comes down to it, using his ‘crystal ball’ to try to convince Dorothy to go back home to her family, and at the end, again trying to help her get home. He gives Dorothy’s friends symbols to represent their ‘missing’ traits, and even dropping a few words of wisdom on them.

(Yes, he did send a child on an assassination mission, but in his defense, he was probably trying to buy time to figure out what to do with their requests. Once again, all bluster, remember? And furthermore, this is all a dream of Dorothy’s. Cut her subconscious some slack.)

Another tidbit to look at: it’s interesting that his relationship with Dorothy is so very similar in both worlds: a con artist who tries to get her home. It’s also interesting to note that in Kansas, before her journey, she buys it, whereas in Oz, after her adventure, she unmasks him as the Man Behind the Curtain (granted, with a lot of help from Toto).

Despite the fact that in the end, it is Dorothy alone who can get her home, it’s not for lack of the Wizard’s trying.

There are only three remaining major characters in The Wizard of Oz who do not have counterparts in either universe: Auntie Em, Uncle Henry, and Glinda the Good Witch, and rather than sharing similarities with any other characters, this group actually seems to work as contrasts for each other.

Auntie Em and Uncle Henry are introduced as hardworking people, an older couple with a farm in the middle of the Great Depression, by no means an easy job. They are also raising Dorothy, which is another not easy job. As a result, Auntie Em especially comes across as a little stern and stressed, distant, and not really understanding of Dorothy’s young impulsive thoughts and dreams. In a way, they are part of the cause of Dorothy’s journey in the first place by not stopping Ms. Gulch from swooping off with Toto, coming across almost as a betrayal to not only Dorothy, but the audience. Dorothy and the audience both feel that the couple are unsympathetic to her, and don’t help her when she absolutely needs it, which works as a neat foreshadowing that Dorothy will, in fact, be learning to solve her own problems.

It is only later, when the tornado strikes, that you see the genuine concern and love that the pair have for their niece. When Dorothy wakes up, both aunt and uncle greet her with relieved affection. Despite the fact that it is Auntie Em and Uncle Henry’s inaction that drives her away, it is also them that she is so desperate to return to: caring family that she is sure is worried about her. (She’s right.) Dorothy’s self-sufficiency does not come at the cost of her family’s love and support, rather, the message seems to be that through relationships with others, you can learn to handle yourself.

By contrast, there’s Glinda the Good Witch, the first person Dorothy meets in Oz, a super-magical being with the power to scare off the Wicked Witch, and with the knowledge from the beginning that would have saved Dorothy a trip.

Glinda has a similar effect on Dorothy’s life as her aunt and uncle, but in a different way. It is Glinda’s inaction that is part of the reason for Dorothy’s quest. By not telling her about the power of the Ruby Slippers to take her home, she allows Dorothy to take that journey that Glinda knows she needs.

Glinda is the most otherworldly and magical thing about Oz. Everything about her is designed to be different to anyone else in Oz, from her mode of travel to her clothes to her way of speech. She’s immediately friendly and we instantly get the sense that she knows more than both Dorothy and the audience. Glinda is Dorothy’s guide, sending her off, rescuing her from the Wicked Witch’s poppies, and then at the end, when she tells Dorothy how she can get home to her mentors in the real world.

If you think that these characters seem a little simple, you’d be right. At the end of the day, The Wizard of Oz is not a story designed to have complex characters with deep motivations, it’s a fairytale intended to have uncomplicated characters that people immediately connect to and remember. And it works.

Every character in The Wizard of Oz is not only there for a reason, it’s for a good reason. It was a perfect cast that worked well onscreen, with enough relatability and charm that people of all ages come back to them again and again. They carry the story and make us care about it and them, and in the end, that is the mark of a good character.

Whether you like or hate them, a character is there to make you care, and in this case, this group does their job. They leave an impact, and a strong one at that. We remember these characters and their quirks long after the movie is over for a reason.

Join me next time where we’ll be looking at another interesting aspect of The Wizard of Oz: We’ve seen the impact it’s had on the culture, now it’s time to see the impact the culture had on it. Feel free to drop a suggestion or thought in the ask box, and thank you so much for reading!

#The Wizard of Oz #The Wizard of Oz 1939 #PG #1939 #30s #Film #Movies #Adventure #Fantasy #Judy Garland #Margaret Hamilton #Frank Morgan #Ray Bolger #Jack Haley #Bert Lahr #Billie Burke #Victor Fleming

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char-thenerd · 4 years

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Flight of the Mind

Part 25

Series Masterlist

A/N: HELLO IM BACK FROM THE DEAD!!! Thank you for your continued patience with me this last month but Its finished finally. Also I should say i didn’t really edit this so it might be terrible. however I love you all! Hope you have a wonderful afternoon!

Y/n and Seonghwa had assumed their small moment of passion together had gone unseen, but they didn’t realize that they had made a mistake until it was too late. When they returned to the castle they didn’t even have a moment to rest before they were called to the throne room, unaware of the fate that would shortly befall them.

Once they both stood in front of the throne Queen Hyuna snapped her fingers and guards quickly restrained them both, ridding Seonghwa of his weapons.

“I expected better of the two of you.” She said once the guards forced them to kneel “Lady Lisa has shown me that you two have broken your vows to be loyal to me and only me.”

“What do you mean?” Y/n asked panicking.

“Your dating ban, we have seen your relationship, sealed with a kiss.” Lady Lisa responded with a small smirk.

“She’s lying we would never-“ Seonghwa started to defend before being cut off by the queen slamming her hands down on the arms of her throne.

“DO NOT LIE TO ME!” She yelled eyes ablaze with fury. “The photo of your passion is enough proof that you two are obviously weak and I can not allow the weak to continue at my side. For this indiscretion, the two of you will be publicly executed to remind the people what I do to those who cross me and disobey my orders. It will occur tomorrow, for now take them to the dungeons.” She finished with a flourish of her hand, before the guards holding them pulled them to their feet and completed what Hyuna had ordered them to do, with both y/n and Seonghwa fighting and screaming every step of the way. Seonghwa nearly escaped when they reached the cell by kneeing one of the guards in the crotch but he was quickly subdued again by another guard standing by and forced back into the dark cell knocking y/n over in the process. After making sure y/n was alright and not hurt by the force he was thrown onto her, seonghwa attempted to find some way out of the cell angry with himself that they had been caught, while y/n just seemed resigned to the fact that she was to die, simply accepting their fate. After watching him struggle for nearly half an hour y/n spoke attempting to pull his attention away from the obviously impossible attempts he was making.

“Seonghwa, You of all people should know that there’s no way to get out of here.”

“There has to be a way,” he responded quietly before raising his voice to a yell in anger “I’m not going to let you die because of my mistake!”

“Seonghwa this is just as much my fault as it is yours, you can’t take all of the blame.” Y/n retorted attempting to keep her voice calm, despite the fear and anger she was feeling. After waiting a minute she approached him from behind and began rubbing his back, his wings fluttering slightly “We both need to accept the blame, but if we truly are to die, I would rather spend the time we have left together in peace, and not wasting our energy on something we both know is pointless and allowing anger to get the better of us.” At the end of her words, seonghwa simply broke down crying, his whole body shaking in an effort to keep the tears at bay. In an attempt to make themselves more comfortable, Y/n took his arm and led him to the wall at the back of the small cell and sat them both down on the cold dirt floor. Seonghwa continued crying into y/n’s shoulder, as she tried to comfort him, knowing that it wouldn’t matter. How could you truly comfort someone that knew they were going to die? With that realization, Y/n broke down too, understanding that this was truly going to be her fate. To die next to the man she loved.

“I was going to grow old with you.” Seonghwa admitted with a shaky voice and tear stained face.

“What do you mean?” Y/n asked wiping the stray tears from her face looking at him, trying to keep her composure enough to hear him out.

“When this was all over, I was going to take you away, maybe back to your village, maybe back to Elyxion, it doesn’t matter just away. I was going to bond with you, start a family with you, and continue to love you for the rest of our lives.” Y/n began thinking about the roads they could have taken together and broke down crying again, before Seonghwa asked “Would you have followed that path with me?” Y/n responded in a voice no louder than a whisper.

“I would follow any path, as long as you are at my side.”

“Even this path? Where we both meet our untimely ends.”

“Yes,” she said looking into his bloodshot eyes. “We knew that this was a risk when we started, if I didn’t think that it would have been worth it, I would have left our night in that hotel be a one time thing. Seonghwa this has been worth every moment we’ve spent together. Even though it has been short, we made it together.”

“How are you this calm? We’re going to die tomorrow?”

“I’m not sure, this just doesn’t feel like the end to me. I might be crazy but it feels like there’s something waiting for us on the other side.”

“If that’s what brings you comfort, it might not be a bad thing to believe in.” He responded finally calming down enough to stop crying.

“I hope you know that I am glad we’ve had this time together Seonghwa.” She said, putting her head on his shoulder.

“Me too.” He responded kissing the top of her head before placing his own head on top of hers, falling into a comfortable silence that eventually lulled them both to sleep.

Even though the scheduled execution had only been announced the day prior, thousands of subjects arrived to see if the announcement was true. Were the two most loyal people to the queen, one of whom had commited murder for her, truly going to be executed, simply for being in love? Most came to see, if she could kill those who were closest to her, why would she hesitate to kill people she had no connection to? The sun shone down on the gathering, causing the heat and tension to rise as they waited for the Queen to present herself before them along with the two 'accused’. Once she appeared, there was no cheering, no applause, simply silence tinted with fear. After a few moments she began to speak.

“Bring out the accused!” The disdain in her voice prominent. With the command a door leading from the dungeons opened revealing five guards holding a struggling Y/n and Seonghwa. “These two have defied my direct orders and are now being labeled as traitors and being executed for treason. To all who would think to defy me, those who would think of rebelling against me, let their heads be a signal and reminder as to what will happen if you defy me. Begin with the execution.” As soon as she finished speaking, the guards brought the two victims towards the blocks, walking them to their deaths, while they continued to struggle. Once they reached the blocks however, they were quickly subdued and tied down so they could no longer move. However, y/n continued to struggle, with the calm she had felt yesterday completely gone from her brain, pain and fear taking over her senses, making it difficult to breath. With their heads secured to the blocks, y/n and Seonghwa were able to look at each other. He saw her panic and attempted to calm her.

“Y/n, I love you, but we can't get out of this. It’s time to go home love.” He spoke to her while tears streamed down her face.

“I know,” She responded staring into his eyes “I’ll see you on the other side.” Once they had their moment, the two executioners took their places beside the two victims. Y/n knew that there was no going back now, but all she wanted was to continue looking at Seonghwa. Even as she saw the axe being raised above his head, knowing that the same thing was happening on her side, just out of her vision. She spoke one last time to him “I love you Seonghwa.” As soon as the words left her mouth, the axes descended on them both.

Y/n’s vision blackened for a second before her eyes shot open, loud beeping happening next to her, choking on something shoved down her throat, unable to breathe properly, she struggled to get oxygen back into her lungs as she heard people shouting in the hallway and the sound of shoes running. She quickly heard a familiar voice approaching her.

“Y/n, My name is Dr.Park, if you can hear me blink.” Seonghwa said, coming into her line of sight. She made a dramatic show of closing and opening her eyes, still attempting to process everything happening. “Lift your thumb for me sweetheart, lift your thumb.” She proceeded to do what he asked. “Ok perfect, we’re going to pull the breathing tube out. It might be a little uncomfortable.” Y/n blinked to show her understanding. “Nurse on three, one, two, three.” When the tube was pulled out, y/n began coughing uncontrollably. “It’s ok love, breathe.” Seonghwa quickly placed an oxygen mask around her nose and mouth. “Deep breaths, there we go.” Once her breathing and heart rate regulated, seonghwa secured the oxygen mask to her face. After a minute Y/n tried to ask what was happening but the only sound that came out was a small squawk. Seonghwa laughed a little at her attempt to speak. “It will be hard for you to speak after having the breathing tube pulled out but you should regain your voice soon. Do you know where you are Y/n?” After trying to speak again with the same results, she shook her head no. “You’re in the icu of Seoul General Hospital. Do you remember what happened?” She repeated the same movement showing obvious confusion in her eyes. “You had a bad accident cliff jumping with your friends. You hit your head and have been in a coma for three months. You're lucky to be alive y/n.” She looked away from Seonghwa to stare at the wall attempting to rack her mind around what was truth. Was this the afterlife? Was this reality? After a few minutes of silence seonghwa spoke again “I can see you trying to remember everything, but don’t worry. You may not be able to remember the actual accident but you should come back to normal after a day or two ok? Will you be ok if I leave to let your family and friends know that you’re awake? I’ll leave the nurse here to watch out for you.” Y/n looked back at him and nodded slightly, not really wanting him to go but knowing he couldn’t stay. Y/n still lying down continued to think about everything that was happening. Her death, her whole world, confusion still clouding both. “Y/n.” Seonghwa said bringing her attention back from her thoughts, causing her to look up “Your brother and friends should be here soon, but I got you something to help you communicate while you recover your voice.” After he entered farther into the room holding out a notepad and pen. “What’s going on in that head of yours?” She quickly grabbed the pad and wrote

(Is this the afterlife?)

“What makes you ask that?” He asked after reading her question.

(We were beheaded for betraying the queen. Why are we not dead?)

“Ah, that makes more sense.” He responded taking in her question. “Y/n you suffered a head injury when you jumped from a cliff, Your brain wanted to keep you alive so it created a world to keep itself active and functioning even if you weren’t conscious.” She looked at him even more confused. “I know that this seems like the afterlife since you died in your dream but I can assure you y/n this world is in fact real, and just as alive as you are. You’ll get used to it again.”

(But we died Seongwha, how can I prove that We’re not actually dead?)

“That unfortunately is something only you can figure out. As much as I can try to help you you’re going to have to be the one work that out in your brain.” When he finished his sentence there were loud voices coming from the hallway. Which caused seonghwa to leave his spot beside y/n to see what was happening.

“Sir, I’m afraid you can’t go in there.” A female voice said sternly.

“I don’t give a damn, I was told my sister was awake and I want to see her!” A familiar voice said.

“Sir if you can’t calm down I will have to call security.” She said matter of factly.

“That won’t be necessary Nurse Lisa, Baekhyun can come in.” Seonghwa said stepping into the hallway. “I do have to warn though, She was dreaming while she was in her coma so she’s having a hard time understanding that this is reality.”

“Is she not remembering who she is?” Baekhyun asked with a hint of underlying fear.

“She was in a dream world and in her mind that was real, so she’s under the impression that this is the afterlife. I have a feeling that she’ll be ok with a few reminders, which is why I’ve also called Mingi and Jongho.”

“Can I let Mingi and Jongho know what’s up before I go in? I don’t want them barrelling their way in here just to be blindsided.”

“Of course. Take your time.” Seonghwa walked back into the room while Baekhyun pulled out his phone and quickly dialed Mingi’s number, knowing Jongho would be the one driving to the hospital.

“Hey hyung, did you hear! You’re on speakerphone by the way!” Minigi yelled causing Baekhyun to flinch and pull the phone away from his ear for a second.

“Yeah Mingi I know, I’m at the hospital now.”

“What’s wrong Hyung?” Jongho asked, calmly.

“Just giving you guys a heads up, because of the injury, she might not remember you. Dr. Park gave me a warning before I went in. I just wanted to let you guys know so you don’t come rushing in with guns blazing.”

“Dr. Park warned us when we thought she was going to wake up those few weeks ago. But we’ll keep that in mind. Thanks hyung.”

“Yeah, It’ll be ok hyung. We’ve got pictures if she doesn’t remember us!”

“We’ll be there in 20.”

“K, See you guys soon.” He pulled his phone down to see a text from Chanyeol.

After he put his phone back in his pocket, Baekhyun approached the room and watched from the doorway as Dr. Park was gently talking to y/n. Even though he didn’t want to interrupt their conversation he knew he would have to face them eventually so he knocked softly simply to alert them that he was there. Both of them looked up towards the door.

“Come on in.” Seonghwa said to Baek, once he had sat down on the chair by her bed, Seonghwa asked y/n. “Y/n do you Know who this is?” She pulled off the top piece of paper and wrote

(He’s Baekhyun) showing them both. Giving Baek a flicker of hope

If she can remember my name, she can remember who I am. he thought to himself.

“Good, do you remember who he is to you?” She began writing underneath

(He’s the one who helped me with my light magic) his face fell after she wrote that, when she noticed she wrote again (I’m sorry if that’s not right) Baekhyun quickly corrected her.

“No, don’t apologize. That’s what you know, but I can say that we don’t have magic here and also,” he paused and looked at Seonghwa who gave him a small nod. “I’m your brother.” She looked confused at the revelation, quickly writing,

(like biologically?)

“Yes, here.” He answered, pulling his phone out of his pocket and opening his photos and began showing here photos from growing up together. From when their parents brought her home from the hospital, all the way to his wedding to Chanyeol. Explaining what had happened in every photo. She looked at each photo with an intense stare as if trying to force something to come back to her. She looked like she was about to write another question when there was another knock at the door, when they all had turned they saw Mingi and Jongho standing in the doorway.

“Hello boys, we were just trying to jog y/n’s memory here.” Seonghwa said, smiling at them as they both walked into the room and pulled chairs from the wall to sit at the foot of her bed.

“Do you remember who we are y/n?” Jongho asked softly. She nodded slightly and quickly wrote

(Mingi and Jongho, but I think that you’re different people than what my brain is telling me.)

“Maybe, we’ve been best friends since elementary school.” Mingi said pulling his phone out. “Do you want to look at some pictures?” She nodded yes to his question. Seonghwa stood up from his spot next to her and said

“I trust you all to keep a good eye on her, I have other patients to go check on but I will back ok?” He asked all of them nodded while Mingi took his spot next to y/n. By the time Seonghwa had reached the door, Mingi and Jongho had begun to repeat the same process as Baekhyun trying to get her to remember her past, Little did he know that by the time he would return two hours later to check on her that she would have regained full memory of her past life and had begun to make plans as to where the rest of her life would take her.

#Ateez #Ateez Au #Ateez Social Media au #Ateez Fairy au #Seonghwa #Hongjoong #Yunho #Yeosang #San #Mingi #Wooyoung #Jongho #Lee Know #Hyuna #Jennie #Flight of the Mind

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gyromitra-esculenta · 4 years

Text

So, generally, I couldn’t leave this stuff on ending 1. So, ‘Something Begins’, or so called Ending 2, part kind of 1. Mostly unedited, still ‘a bad Witcher AU’. So it would seem it gets to be made into a proper thing.

Warnings: none (unless you count general creepiness or mention of hunting/hunting practices or personal angst).

It takes him closer to two decades to return even if he swore he wouldn't come back. The horse plods slowly along the road, the dirt muffling the sound of its shoes. Only the jingling of the harness and gear rises above the song of the cicadas in the dead summer air. The trail takes him through the fields of wheat just about losing their grayish-green tint to dirty yellow of fresh straw. Clusters of red and blue in the grain provide welcome relief from the monotony, as do small birds on a hunt, flitting in and out of the wheat.

For the whole day Gabriel barely passes or sees anyone, people probably busy with the festivities preceding the hard work of the harvest, not that he is bothered by it. Far from it, he's rather comfortable with drawing no attention even if the region is favorable to his kin. The voice calling him comes from behind and Gabriel looks over his shoulder to a man awkwardly chasing him, a big pack on his back and a walking stick in hand. He turns the horse around, waiting for him to catch up.

"Master witcher," the man stops to regain his breath.

"A noonwraith?" The fact the general populace is less likely to call him a mutant or devilspawn doesn't mean anyone's going to stop him for a chat. The season's right for the wraiths, too.

"No, no, not a thing like that, doesn't keep around, master witcher." The man has a skin like leather weathered by sun, grey peeking from under his cap, wrinkles around his mouth and eyes. "Have you come for you pay, master witcher?"

Ah. He hadn't really intended to check back on that, mostly forgot about it. Gabriel shakes his head. Nothing about it stirs his interest.

"No. Keep it."

The man nods, as if thinking something over, humming to himself.

"Then come with me, master witcher, spend the night, and the feast. Tomorrow's my youngest hair-cutting, and Mikheil's farewells, the boy's leaving the homestead."

"Your oldest?" Gabriel asks on a whim.

"No, no, the third oldest, the boy got into his head he's better off finding his luck on the road. Well-spoken too, didn't get that from me and my girl," the man explains with enthusiasm. "Family's farm's not for him."

"That's how kids are. He will come around."

"No, no, master witcher, there's no talking him out of anything, always does what he wants. Me and Lila, we thought of giving him to the druids. Some choice words he had, and the druids, they just said no, but Mikheil's got talent."

The man - Wernund, as Gabriel’s memory suddenly reminds him after almost eighteen years, curious what little tidbits emerge when not expected - continues on about his family, and, whether wanting or not, he learns ins and outs of the familial life on the farm. Stranger still, Wernund keeps to the horse's side, and Gabriel feels no need to hurry the mount out of its complacent tempo.

"...I know the naming is mine but Lila chose the name for Nielub, it's a good name, strong name. Woj. That boy will fight a bear barehanded if allowed."

"And the woods, how are they?"

The treeline, closer and definite, sways on the afternoon wind, greener than Gabriel recalls it to have been when he paid it a visit with Jack.

"Never better. I don't know what you did in there, master witcher, but a month, and it was like before."

"Only returned what had been taken from it. Gabriel," he adds. "It's my given name."

With a glance, he observes the plethora of mixed emotions on Wernund's face, waits for the offer of the stay to be rescinded, but to his surprise the man again nods to himself.

"So it would be you, master witcher. Must've had your reasons."

"Gabriel."

"Would be improper, master witcher." Gabriel chuckles at his headstrong resolution and the refusal to feel fright at being in the presence of the one hailed the Reaper. "And there, there is my home."

Wernund points at the buildings at the edge of the forest, almost directly on the no-one's land between the trees looming over the road and the swaying wheat. The farmyard, as a whole, is too big and ample for him to travel on foot - a house, a shed, and a stable, all separate. With the diminishing distance the activity in front of the house becomes obvious: two women sitting on the wooden bench - both plucking chickens, some down floating freely - one man chopping the wood, and a boy running with a stick with several colorful ribbons tied to it.

As they get closer, one of the women notices them - quickly says something - the rest of the way they pass under the scrutiny, and the boy, must be Nielub, running towards his father, the ribbons fluttering behind him. The boy is blond, as is the man leaning now on the axe.

The women, on the other hand, both have rich brown hair, though the older one is visibly greying in front and on her temples - where her locks are woven around polished copper rings glinting in the sun.

Gabriel reins in the horse and dismounts while the boy asks after the gifts.

"Lila!" Wernund sends the boy back to play, placating him with a wooden sword from his backpack propped against the wall. "Lila, we have a guest."

"I noticed," she huffs, returning to her work after giving her husband a lingering look. "Mojmira. Bring the pitcher."

Being observed - regarded with suspicion - never something he grew accustomed to even if it'd always been present in the background of his life, but now back of Gabriel's neck prickles with the question unasked and the weight of her eyes on him.

"I have no intention of taking..."

"Not important," Lila cuts him off, fingers deftly tearing out the feathers, her head tilted to the side hawkishly. "You must be the witcher, the one who rescued idiot husband of mine, I've seen you in my ken." Ah, one of those. Gabriel nods, smiling with the corner of his lips. "You have my thanks, for everything. There's place for you, and the horse, in the stable, clean, and tomorrow, the feast. You'll be staying."

Mojmira comes back from the house with a clay jug held in one hand, and a wooden cup she hands him, dark eyes flicking to his face.

"I see," Gabriel chuckles, raising the cup to his lips - the smell and the taste slightly sour, water with vinegar. "A counteroffer."

"Maybe." Lila throws feathers to the ground. "Fate allows for bargains, but it won't be scorned, not even by the likes of you, witcher."

He glances to Wernund standing several feet away, talking with his oldest, Adan, as he came to know on the way.

"Is your daughter the same?"

Mojmira, sitting again by the side of her mother, and back at work, giggles.

"All women in my line have their gifts."

"And your husband said you're not well-spoken."

"My husband, as much as I love him, is many things, but he had not been born and raised here. He doesn't need to know."

"I see. I'll be going to the forest but I commit myself to be back for the night."

"Fine by me," Lila nods and Gabriel leaves the cup on the bench. "And if you find Mikheil hunting rabbits there, send him home."

"You let your son..."

"You should know, witcher, better than anyone, that if the forest wants to give, it does, and if it doesn't want to, it doesn't."

"It also has a way of punishing those that take what they shouldn't," his tone is sharper than he intends it to, and Gabriel sighs, closing his eyes for a moment.

"That is why we never take what is not offered. If the rabbit springs from under your feet, is it not a gift?"

Gabriel prefers not to answer her knowing smile, instead he turns and leaves the horse grazing in the yard. With a heavy heart, he crosses the road and walks into the forest's shade, feeling her gaze on his back.

The woods are nothing like he remembers them, lush and green now. Neither a desolate and twisted place overgrown with thorns and full of bones, nor a dark nightmare of a child full of monsters. There is life in the trees, birds and insects singing. He spots a fox deeper in - it idly considers him before turning and disappearing in the bushes. Gabriel lets himself wander, a ghost of a smile on his lips, and fingers brushing against the spot under which the flower rests.

Maybe he should have visited years earlier, but it had never felt like a thing to do, the current situation more of an accident than anything else.

It's the smell of fresh blood that pulls him out of his thoughts, and he approaches carefully the small clearing. Two rabbits being bled hang by their hind legs from a low branch, next to them several fish with twine threaded under their gills, a bow and a quiver on the ground. A young man, judging by the posture, sits on the grass with his back to him, occupied with something in his lap. Blond, like the other sons of Wernund.

"Mikheil?"

"You're the worst at collecting your pay, you know?" The boy, springing to his feet, chuckles, and turns. "I was about to go look for you myself."

Gabriel freezes, faced with the impossibility of the image before him, his eyes drifting to the weasel swinging freely from the hands holding it.

"You hate..."

"Oh, yeah, I still do, I guess," Jack mutters, "but this is Lord Murders-A-Lot."

Younger, with places still left to fill out, awkward posture - the legs and arms a bit too long and bony, bits of baby fat waiting to disappear, hair not short enough, dissonances like a vision superimposed on something real.

"...and he murders a lot," slips from Gabriel's lips.

"Mostly chicks. I'm trying to wane him off murder," Jack moves his hands - the weasel appears to be content with being swung around, "and teach him to go after the eggs, but it's not working out. At least, the eggs don't scream at him they're being murdered, like the chicks do."

Gabriel takes a tentative step forward as Jack continues to speak.

"Voles, too. I've even seen him take down a rabbit once, he's an exceptional murder ribbon."

"I miss you," words barely a whisper.

"Well, you certainly didn't hurry then," Jack scoffs, before his eyes widen a bit. He crosses the distance between them - Gabriel cannot shift his gaze away from the weasel for some reason - and stops in front of him. "You're still thinking I'm not here."

"No, you're here, just..." A memory, an apparition, a vision? Not real, not physical, because Jack is dead.

"I sure hope I'm not whatever it is you're imagining me to be, Rhenaweddin." Jack moves, quick, his lips warm and chapped at the edges, with an elusive taste of something sweet and green between them. Gabriel grabs onto his arms to keep him in place before he slips away, again. "I'm really counting on that last growth spurt. Standing on my toes to kiss you, cub, it's going to get old fast."

"That's," Gabriel laughs, almost silent, contained - maybe the emotion has a hysterical flavor to it, "that's what you're worried about?"

"Small things to worry about are good things. Now," Jack puts Lord Murders-A-Lot on his shoulder and the weasel with no delay flattens itself around his neck, "what has my mother managed to rope you into?"

"A bargain. I might have traded..."

"Then you weren't listening, cub."

"Told to send you home." The tightness in his throat is making it hard for him to speak.

"Sneaky woman," Jack clicks his tongue with appreciation, stretching his neck out for a quick peck. "Well, best not to keep her waiting too long, then, she can be really bitchy at times."

Gabriel watches him turn, gather the bow and the quiver, pick the rabbits and the fish from the branch, as if it's the most common - the most reasonable - thing to do. His medallion remains motionless, the thought of having missed its movement earlier in the day troubles him.

"Are you coming, little cub?" Jack laughs, passing him, the weasel still on its perch, its eyes closed and nose twitching. "It feels somewhat strange calling you that when I'm shorter than you."

At that age, yes, Jack hadn't been the tallest, rapidly gaining height only later.

They both did, but it took more time for Jack to grow into his body - his agility strangely mismatched with his disproportionate limbs and bony hips. All paired up with a little cheeky grin like the one he wears now when he looks over his shoulder at Gabriel.

"I'm coming."

Rabbits and fish. Out hunting when they should be training, returning to the keep with the spoils they had not roasted already over the fire hidden in the cove, stomachs full, ready for the reprimand coming from Reinhardt.

It's a memory playing out again in front of Gabriel.

He should, probably, thank the forest for that glimpse, or hate it, deeply, for forcing him to remember and dwell on happier times, uncomplicated, when the only worry had been doing something stupid - which they both were good at, exceptionally so - and suffering the consequences. Broken bones would mend, and scrapes and cuts, sometimes burns and bites, they would heal.

Jack, leading the way, moves with the same kind of disjointed grace he had observed so many times then. Maybe, it is a chance to say proper goodbyes, and to put the ghosts to rest.

"Wait," Gabriel calls after him as Jack is about to cross the invisible boundary of the forest and walk onto the road - the homestead and the fields visible in glimpses between the trees - and the moment has to end.

"You really won't like mother when she's angry."

And just like that, he steps outside the woods, leaving Gabriel with his hand outstretched behind.

He waits for Jack to vanish, for the illusion to fall away from the boy - yet nothing happens, it's still the same painfully familiar silhouette cut against the darkening sky.

The fact he doesn't remember there being any houses this close to the forest does not assuage his uneasiness. Respect it, trust it, revere it, but do not come too close if not needed. The medallion lies dormant. Gabriel draws in a deep breath and follows Jack - not Jack.

The table is set - bread, butter, and white cheese, a pitcher in the centre, probably more water - lit by two torches on poles sticking out of the ground. Lila combs her fingers through Jack's hair but her eyes are on Gabriel.

"Rabbits and fish, as promised."

"Go inside and welcome your father, he's back from the town."

"Yes, mother."

Jack leaves the catch hanging on the hook by the door and disappears inside the house. Lila waits before speaking again.

"Did you find what you were looking for, witcher?"

"No." Gabriel holds her gaze.

#sometimes I write #r76 #reaper76 #totallynotwitcher!AU #murder-deer

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danganronpa-21 · 4 years

Text

Commission Season - A Pre-Halloween Drabble

Maybe it was a first world problem. Many would consider it as such. But hey, everyone’s got them, and everyone hates them.

And Koichi would proudly admit that he thinks having to pee at three in the morning is the worst thing in the world.

Like seriously, who decided that this should be a function that the human body should even have at three in the morning? What, you need to void your bladder but you also need to sleep? Unheard of! Wake up in the midst of your slumber, puny human! Fight to bring yourself out of the warm, soft cocoon of your blankets to get rid of your problem! Don’t like it? Shouldn’t have had so much to drink while you were awake! Having to urinate at such an hour is a human problem, the beings of creation have no time for such nonsense!

It took a lot to convince him that he had to use the bathroom badly enough to get out of bed. Most of the time he’d just sleep it off if he could. Sometimes that meant he would wake up in the morning eager to use the restroom, but he figured it was a small price to pay. He would rather not leave his mound of fleecy blankets after a certain hour.

Sometimes, though, he would label leaving as a necessary evil. A warm, dry bed was infinitely better than a warm, wet one.

Pulling himself out of bed was hard. It was so comfortable, and he was so tired… but he knew it had to be done. With all of his strength and concentration, he pushed himself up out of bed to make a quick trip. If he moved quickly enough, he would reunite with his beloved bed once more. That was what he told himself, to make the trip easier.

He could comfort himself with the fact that it was a short walk down the hallway, too. Shorter than the one either of his sisters had to take, that’s for sure. He would almost say that he lucked out in that regard, if it weren’t for the fact that he had the smallest bedroom of the three siblings. Middle child problems, he supposed. Nevertheless, such problems had worked in his favour now. In the wee hours of the morning when one had to see a man about a horse, it was pretty convenient to be able to make it to the bathroom in a couple of steps. He barely even had to think about he what he was doing as he made his way down the hall. At least, that was what he thought, until he noticed light emanating from the edges of his older sister’s door.

The light stopped him dead in his tracks. Hope was never up this late. She had absolutely no reason to have her light on. Did something fall over in her bedroom, and she’d turned the light on to see what it was? No, he decided, he would have heard something fall if that had happened. The walls were too thin. Did she maybe go to the bathroom herself? It wasn’t that either, he concluded, for the toilet wasn’t making its usual hum after being flushed. Maybe she’d turned on the light to make sure a pile of clothes on her desk chair wasn’t some weird man? That last one was silly, he knew. Hope kept her room much cleaner than he did. She would never have clothes piled up on her desk chair. And she would never stay up so late into the night. She was too much of a goody-two shoes for that. If she really was staying up this late so far, she had managed to do so without their parents knowing — an amazing feat, considering that they had a detective for a mother.

Admittedly he was in awe, but even then, he couldn’t let that trump the fact that his perpetually obedient big sister was breaking curfew. She never did that, ever! If anything, she was usually the one to enforce curfew. The fact that her light was still on at that hour was unthinkable! For a split second he thought he might charge in there and demand to know what she was up to, but a pang of desperation through his lower abdomen reminded him of his original goal. He groaned quietly, wondering why his bladder was so desperate to forsake him.

“Pee first, scold Hope later…” He grunted to himself, continuing his slow and sloppy-footed trek to the bathroom. He took a couple more steps, assuring himself that he would visit his sister later. Right then, he had other business to attend to.

Business all handled, hands all washed, Koichi had been ready to crash back into his warm, cuddly bed. He hadn’t been gone for too long; it would still have retained its heat. He could curl back up and drift back off to sleep; he could dream of what his next day would bring…

Hope’s light was still on.

He couldn’t comfortably go back to sleep, knowing his big sister’s light was still on when it really shouldn’t have been. Forget his bed, he thought. Something was undoubtedly not right, and goddammit, he was going to figure out what it was. Taking long, careful strides towards her door, he readied himself to either scold or console her. His heart sunk when he realized that it would be the latter. Quiet, shaky sobs echoing through the room as she shuffled about… Totally unaware that she was about to be caught for a crime she wouldn’t usually commit. Koichi swore he felt his resolve weaken at the sound. She had never been a big crybaby — not like him. The sound of her weeping stung, a bit like he’d brutally been stabbed in the heart. He hated it when his sisters cried. It made him feel so powerless; it made it harder to wrap his hand around the door handle. Still, he knew he had to. With a careful push, he opened her bedroom door and bathed himself in the room’s light.

She gasped when the door swung open. In hindsight, he should have considered how frightening it would be for her. He could have been an axe-wielding murderer, for all she knew. After all, their parents were forever going on with their paranoid ramblings about how they should always be on alert. Sure, they knew it happened to be a product of their shared PTSD, but you couldn’t hear that regularly without getting at least a little concerned.

“K-Koichi!” She stomped her foot against the ground, “You scared me!”

He thought he should apologize. The words didn’t come out. Instead, they fell apart in his brain as he embraced the new information being thrown his way. His sister’s typically tidy bedroom had become a disaster zone. From corner to corner of each and every object hung threads and strings from every colour of the rainbow. More unintentionally, strings from glue also hung all over everything. Her bed, her desk, her mannequins, her bookshelf — everything had been tainted by stringy hot glue. He could even still see the sticky residue on her fingers as she tried to hide them. Did she think he didn’t know what she was doing? All over her floor were piles of fabrics made of her every material imaginable; he swore he could see the shine, the transparency, the fleece, the sparkle, the linen… everything. There wasn’t a piece of material on that floor that one couldn’t have used. He couldn’t even see her carpet anymore. Of course, textiles weren’t the only thing to be found. There were messes of props, too. Crumped flowers of made of tissue paper, painted pieces of clay sculpted to look like tropical fruits, lovely strings for beaded belts, braided threads, tangled fishnets… The only sense he could make out of any of this chaos was that she was making a costume.

Given her ultimate title, that would make sense. She’d had a passion for making costumes since she was young. Sometimes her workspace did look like the arts and crafts store had vomited all of its contents there. But her appearance, rather than the appearance of the room, was what keyed him in. Nothing about this could be normal or healthy.

It was her eyes killed him the most. They were glassy, producing tear after tear that dripped down her face, like she didn’t care that her brother could see her crying. At the beginning of the day he had seen her apply mascara, but by then she’d cried it all off. It smudged itself around her eyes and cheeks instead. Somehow, even past the black smudges of her mascara, he could still see the dark circles a lack of sleep brought. How many nights had she been staying up to work on costumes, he wondered? All that darkness couldn’t have possibly come from a single night of costume work. Had she been doing this for a few nights in row?

He chose not to find the answer. The other parts of her body told him what he needed to know. Her lip had quivered when she looked at him; he could see that she had bitten it raw. In one spot, it bled. He didn’t imagine she would have even thought about the fact that she could taste its copper when she licked her lips. She would be too focused on her project. Either that, or the fact that her hair was falling out of the bun she’d put it in. He knew that must have annoyed her while she worked, but some things she never brought herself to care about when she was in the zone. He knew that. She probably didn’t care that her apron was askew either, or that he could see the wrinkles in her clothes from all of the times that she had tugged at the material in frustration. All she cared about in that moment, it seemed, was knowing why he had interrupted her.

“Well?” She folded her arms. Her tone came out harsher than usual. Like she was angry. Her tears made it difficult for him to feel intimidated by this anger.

Koichi made his voice soft when he answered. “Hope… you’re crying.”

She paused for a minute, letting out a pathetic sniffle. She jerked her head away, refusing to meet him in the eye. She didn’t want him to see her like this. It was too shameful. “Yeah, so?”

He took a ginger step forward, and nearly fell over. He had almost been taken out by a rogue clay watermelon slice. “It’s three in the morning.”

“Believe me, I’m all too aware of what time it is.” She clenched her teeth. A rogue tear slipped out of her eye; however, she swiped it away in hopes that he might not see. She didn’t want her little brother to see her at a point of weakness. Her siblings were always supposed to look to her to be strong. She disliked exposing vulnerability to them. “I’m not moving fast enough.”

“Fast enough for… what, exactly?”

She sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose. The longer this conversation went on, the more time she would lose, but… Koichi wouldn’t leave without an answer. He was never the type. Stubborn like his mama, their father would joke. Notoriously inconvenient, she would say, despite also having inherited the trait herself.

“It’s commission season,” She sighed once again, brushing her bangs away from her eyes, “I’m busy as hell. I’ve been doing all sorts of crazy costume orders for weeks on end… This is the last one.”

The soft and debatable-as-far-as-curses-go curse word caught him by surprise. “That’s… good then, right?”

She shrugged. “I guess,” She began to pick at the layers of glue on her hand absentmindedly, “I’m just not moving fast enough. I need to have this costume ready before school tomorrow, but I’m nowhere near done. Hell, I only started it two hours ago.”

He turned his head to look at the mannequin, wondering how much of that she could have done in two hours. Already she had managed to sew together a layered skirt of various shining materials in greens and yellows and blues. There was a well-assembled bright yellow crop top dotted with seashells around the neckline. He could see the beginnings of what looked like a hat or crown, too. In all honesty she couldn’t tell what the costume was meant to be, but that was no measure of her skill. He knew all too well how many weird costume orders she got.

Still, having all that was impressive for two hours of work. It was already beginning to look like a costume, it was just lacking some accessorizing. Would it take her five hours to finish it for the morning? He couldn’t help but be curious about what the sketch looked like.

“What else do you have left to do?”

She sniffled again, refusing to look up from her hand. It seemed easier to pick the glue off of it than answer her brother. “A lot…”

It wasn’t a fair answer. Both of them knew it. It seemed like if she said it, she would be admitting to her failure. She had always been punctual with her work; she had always been dependable. That was why she was the best. Her clients, they all trusted her. She couldn’t help but fear that she might be letting one of them down. So, she couldn’t confess to being behind.

Koichi exhaled deeply. It killed him to see her in so much pain over something she was supposed to love. In a way, he could almost sympathize with what she was feeling. After his whole audition disaster, he’d struggled to feel as if anything he had accomplished was valid. Getting beat up humbled him just a little too much; he thought that he was a fraud. He didn’t feel like he deserved to have been considered for his title. Is that how she felt too, he wondered? Like she had duped everyone out? His hands curled into fists at the thought. No way in hell was he letting his big sister think of herself as anything less than amazing. He’d always admired her for the way she could pick herself up.

He took one long last stare at her before striding into the room. He shut the door tightly behind him, much to her confusion. She opened her mouth to speak, but he cut her off before she could properly form the words. “What do you need me to do?”

“Koichi, you don’t need to do anything,” She wiped at her eyes again, “It’s really late. We have school tomorrow. You need to get some sleep. I don’t want to bother you with my stress.”

He shook his head. He folded his arms across his chest, as if to convey that he had no intention of budging. “You should have thought of that before you made me get all worried about you,” He snickered softly, “C’mon. If you’re up this late without Mom and Dad knowing, I know you’re really worried about this. Two hands will be better than one.”

It became her turn to shake her head. “You need to sleep. What about class tomorrow?”

“I’ve got a couple of hours to run on. You don’t have any,” He smirked, “Trust me, you could use my help. So just tell me what you need to do, and I’ll do it. You can work on another half, and we can get it done in half the time.”

She sniffled, her mouth curving into a hesitant smile. “You’d really do that for me?”

He laughed and rolled his eyes. “Duh. You’re my sister. I want you to be happy.”

He had expected her to grab one of her pin cushions, stick him with a needle, and tell him to sew. He had expected her to hand him the burning hot glue gun and tell him to start gluing pieces of clay to the crown’s base. He had expected he would be untangling the fishnets, adding seashells to the neckline of the top, adding last minute details to the flip flops. What he hadn’t expected was for her to fling herself into his arms, forcing him to bury his face in her shoulder.

“Thank you,” She sobbed, “Really, Koichi, you have no idea how much you’re helping me.”

Koichi grinned at the feeling. Her grip on him was so tight that it trapped his breath inside him. Funnily enough, he didn’t care. Comforting his sister was more important.

Trust me, he thought to himself, I know.

#Danganronpa 21 #koichi naegi-kirigiri #hope naegi-kirigiri #naegiri fanchild

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bellatrixobsessed1 · 4 years

Text

A Flame For A Cabbage (Part 7)

“This is madness.”

“Go back to your own universe.” Azula frowns.

“You can’t just brainwash people into joining your side.” The woman insists.

“I can and I am.” Azula frowns. “And my boyfriend is helping me do it.”

“My fiance once helped me commit monstrous crimes against humanity, it doesn’t end well.” The woman argues, her fern green eyes burning into her.

“There is nothing monstrous about cabbages. If anything, I am helping them achieve healthier diets.” Azula folds her arms over her chest.

“You’re going about this the wrong way.” The woman says.

“Fuck you and your eyebrows!” Azula declares.

The woman narrows her eyes. “I’m trying to keep you from making a mistake. Brainwashing people is unethical.”

“Brainwashing people is unethical.” Jet mocks in the background.

“Don’t tell me what’s unethical!” Azula snaps. “You tried to murder your fiance with a spirit canon!” She does not know where from she has acquired this knowledge.

“I didn’t try to murder my fiance. He asked me for nudes, I misread the text and sent nukes.” She pauses. “Honestly, I think it was kinda hot.”

“Yeah, I suppose that is kind of sexy.” Azula agrees as Jet mutters something about how it is actually quite horrifying.

“Who are you?’ Azula asks.

“I’m you, but Earth Kingdom.” The woman declares.

“Fascinating.” Azula replies. It makes little sense being as this woman is older than she, but somehow, on an instinctual level that it is true. This woman...they are the same person. And if that is true, then she knows exactly how to get her to leave. “Your mother doesn’t love you.” A single tear slips down Azula’s cheek. But it is worth it, the woman shouts, “PROTEIN”, punches a hole through the wall with her foot, looks back, and gives Azula what has to be the most regal and well-mannered middle finger that she has ever seen.

Yes. They definitely are, somehow, the same person.

Except Azula is the better her. Clearly, better. If nothing else, she has much better eyebrows than her swol, Earth Kingdom counterpart.

With a final desperate look and another, “don’t do this, don’t make the same mistake I did…” the air around her closes in on her and sucks her back into whatever pocket in space that she had emerged from.

“Yeah, fuck you, you better run!” Jet declares.

“Jet, she got consumed by the universe.” Azula replies. “I got consumed by the universe.” She adds more softly. She turns back to her brainwashing equipment. If the man strapped to it wasn’t shitting bricks already, he certainly is now that he has witnessed that display. “Now. Where were we?”

.oOo.

“Ooooor I can make onion and cranberry juice.”

“Guru Pathik…” Aang grumbles.

“How abo-ooo-ot…” He makes spazzical jazzhands. “...Onion and sulfuric acid juice!”

.oOo.

“Thank goodness we're in time!” Sokka shouts.

“In time for what?” Kuei asks.

Basco glowers at Sokka from the corner. “Nevermind…” boy says.”

TyLee pushes the matter with a, “Yeah. What are you in time for,” she wriggles her eyebrows. “cutie?”

“Uh, I'm kinda doing activites with Suki.”

“Who?” TyLee asks.

“I don’t think that those guys are Kyoshi warriors.” Toph says.

“How do you know have you ever seen Kyoshi warriors.” Mai asks.

“No but I can smell the emo on you. I know what the clank of Hot Topic jewelry sounds like. Kyoshi warriors don’t recruit emos or anyone who uses axe bodyspray. Trust me, I know. I use axe bodyspray.”

Mai flinches, for she thought that she was the only one emo enough to access the secret interdimensional Hot Topic store. She must eliminate the competition at once. With a flick of her wrist she launches a daggers at the girl. One of them is shaped like a Keanu Reeves, she resents that Toph will not be able to fully appreciate its beauty.

TyLee decides that productivity is second priority and takes to dancing with Sokka she makes a few jabbing disco motions which Sokka imitates. “Oooh, it's like we're fighting each other!”

.oOo.

“Everyone, stop!” Jet calls. “Hammer time!”

“What’s hammer time?” Sokka asks asks.

“Quiet, or I’ll run the Earth King through.” Azula says.

Sie clears his throat, “mam, that’s a cabbage.”

“Yes.” Azula nods. She finds it most effective to hold enemies at cabbage point. “I assure you all that you don’t want to know what damage I can do with a single cabbage.”

“Okay, but I’m supposed to be the one holding the Earth King hostage.”

“You are holding the Earth King hostage.” Long Feng says.

“Then who is this?” Azula asks.

“Oh I’m just Quin Bohyuk Ching Shang the fourth. I am a hunter of anomalies.” He pauses. “I am here for…”

“I won’t let you hurt Basco!” Kuei declares from where Sie has him held at flame point.

“You have no choice.” Sie declares. “This fight is over.”

Toph and Sokka drop their weapons and TyLee, being ever so cautious, chi blocks them. Momo, tries to fly but the Dailluminati are well aware that the creature is surprisingly and unapologetically jacked. He is also not allowed to be a Kyoshi warrior, for he too wears axe bodyspray. Knowing such, they encase him in stone. But Momo is not afraid, Momo can flex his way out of this if he has the desire. He hasn’t the desire though, he just wants some lychee berries.

Having no more use for the Earth King, Sie shoves the king away. “Get them all out of my sight.”

“What. An. Asshole.” Azula mutters. “What kind of person does that?” She turns to Jet. “What kind of person holds an Earth King at flame point?” She asks as if she hadn’t fully intended on doing that herself. Jet does not point this out. Jet values his budding relationship with the socially inadequate cabbage merchant.

Long Feng strides arrogantly into the room with some more Dailluminati agents in tow. “Now comes the part where I double cross you. Dailluminati, arrest the Fire Nation princess!” One of them steps forward, but this is only because he has tripped over Mai’s Keanu Reeves knife. “I said arrest him! What is wrong with you?!”

“It's because they haven't made up their minds.” Sie says. “They're waiting to see how this is going to end.” He casts a squeamish look at the cabbage merchant. He can see the malice in her eyes. She is plotting something. She is always plotting something. But what?

“What are you talking about?” Long Feng asks.

But he isn’t quite sure. The cabbage merchant is though. He can see it in that smug expression. He opens his mouth to speak but the merchant talks first. “I can see your whole history in your eyes. You were born with everything, so you never had to struggle, and connive, and claw your way to power. But true power, the divine right to rule, is something you work for.” Yes, indeed the divine right to rule is bestowed upon those who have earned it. The fire princess hasn’t earned it, not like she has. And Long Feng...well he definitely had the strugglys too she can see his whole history in his eyes (she in fact sees everyone’s histories in their eyes, she had once wanted to become a history teacher but she sacrificed that dream for greener cabbages) but he has not had to work as hard as she. And therefore he should not be blessed with the divine right to rule. “The fact is, they don't know which one of us is going to be sitting on that throne, and which one is going to be bowing down.” She adds.

Sie’s look of concern grows. “But I know, and you know.” She sits down on the throne and crosses her legs. “You have no idea who much these shoes hurt my feet.”

Both Long Feng and Sie seem to deflate.

““Do I still get my ~*really cool~* prize?” Long Feng asks.

“I suppose.” Azula rolls her eyes. “I am, afterall, getting exactly what I want.”

Long Feng squeals in delight and holds his hand out.

“Jet.”

Jet steps forward. “Here you go.” He smiles.

Long Feng unfolds the slip of paper.

“Wh-what is this?” Long Feng asks.

“It is dickbutt.” Azula replies. “I drew it myself.”

Long Feng deflates once more. “You’ve beaten me at my own game.” he remarks as a single manly tear rolls down Sie’s cheek.

Azula smirks, “Don't flatter yourself! You were never even players.” Her smile fades, for neither was she.

Bosco grins in the corner.

Azula swallows.

They all swallow.

Basco cackles.

#Avatar #Azula #Cabbage Man #Mai #TyLee #Long Feng #Sokka #Toph #Fanfiction

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sulietsexual · 5 years

Note

TOP 5 villains in general?

Lilah Morgan (AtS), fierce, unapologetic bitch with hidden depths, has no qualms about her evil deeds and no illusions about who and what she is. She’s amazing.

Glorificus (BtVS), amazing, ax-crazy Hell God with a shoe fetish, she’s awesome and terrifying and powerful and Clare Kramer is amazing in the role. I just love Glory!

Katherine Piece (TVD), self-serving, fierce vampire, who will gladly throw anyone and everyone under the bus to save her own skin, does form genuine attachments but will always put her own survival above these relationships, so much fun, snarky, evil and amazing.

Amy Dunne (Gone Girl), such an amazing villain, smart, self-sufficient, self-serving, meticulous planner, no qualms about committing murder, knows exactly what she wants and how to get it, she’s an amazing villain.

Lex Luthor (Smallville), such a tragic villain, with a great arc showing us exactly what circumstances pushed him to make the choices he did, I love the exploration of his past and his issues, and how, by the time he becomes the villain we knew he always would be, we understand with perfect clarity why he’s become the monster we see.

#not surprisingly most of these are female #female villains are always so much more fun #Anonymous #answered

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yourneighbourpotato · 5 years

Text

TWDG S4 EP 4 HIGHLIGHTS AND THE GREATEST BAMBOOZLE OF ALL TIME.

I'm kind of late to the party cuz I couldn't play the episode till now and I basically used way less social media trying to avoid spoilers so thanks walking dead. So yeah. Its a long post and I want it here, so I can maybe read it years later and cry like a little bitch.

Violet: fuck, you...

me: indeed, fuck. me.

*James gets pissed off at Clem for making AJ kill Lilly*

me: I DID THIS FOR YOU.

*meets violet*

me: fuck yes boo, ur alive and u here for me.

*Clem has a wholesome chat with boo*

me: *feels Light and happy and knows for sure its not for long*

*Clem negatively answers a little angry at Violet suggesting Texas as the new name for boarding school*

me: pls don't tell me the real villain here is going to be Clem, because she will lose it or some shit.

*Clem smiles at Texas 2 suggestion*

*me happy knowing Clem is fine and is just a little tired*

*hears the night will be over soon being sung*

me: omg omg omg omg is Sophie actually alive? Omg maybe Minera never killed her and Minnie actually still had a heart OMG. (BOY WAS I WRONG)

Tenn: you're dying

Minnie: yes yes I am, I'm finally going someplace better and I want u with me

me:

*Minnie chops Clem with the axe she used to kill walkers*

me: JFJSKSOFNDOSO

*literally seconds later Violet dies because I didn't trust AJ making calls*

me: FISBJEOGJSOAPFJKSLSKF FUCK ME

*RESTARTS THE WHOLE EPISODE JUST TO SAVE MY BOO, while wondering whether this choice will make aj into a murderer or a psycho and ill have to change my choice just so I'm a good parent*

*gets to the same scene again everything is fine and then the little mountain climbing scene*

me: fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck, I swear to god if she gets bit ill fucking kill myself.

*seconds later Clem gets bit*

*me in denial*: haha her boots are as hard as steel, and the zombie bit the beginning of the shoe not the cutten place where the wound is at.

*Clem verifies she's been bit*

me: *starts crying for the majority of the remaining episode* (like I cried so fucking mucg and I felt sick, I had to take a break and I felt so dead inside during it)

When AJ and Clem got into the barn, I still had hopes that like we have time and shit, (I even ended up replaying the sequence just to change my choice from kill Clem and let her become a walker because I thought what if that way she gets a chance to live and I don't end up accidentaly killing her) but everytime I'd see Clems skin getting whiter and whiter and I'd end up crying more and more. It was fucking awful. And then the whole lessons thing. Fucking hell. And when they cut the part where AJ just swings his axe at Clem I was like: don't do this to me, fuck no. Fuck off everyone.

And then I cry because its the Ranch bit and I'm like I don't want to do this anymore and then I see AJ traumatised and crying and then I cry and I cry once again they have their bonding moment.

And then it just cuts to AJ fishing and I didn't manage to get even 1 fish, but then it hit me, Clementines hat is still missing and I cried once again upon seeing it ROWING MERRILY DOWN THE STREAM (IF U SEE A LITTLE MOUSE DON'T FORGET TO SQUEAK) yes I did sing the E3 trailer song a little and I cried even more because of it. And I thought for sure Clem was dead, but I still had so much dumb hope that, hey maybe she's alive, hahaha, but like big part of me thought that it was not true and it never will be. And then TAKE US BACK starts playing and I start to cry again and fuck me. For the whole song I crossed my fingers hoping it wouldn't end just like that and it didn't. AJ got back and then CLEMS VOICE SAYS GOOFBALL and I thought oh no, he's hallucinating isn't he? And THEN I FUCKING SEE HER WITH THE LEG CUT OFF AND I'M SO FUCKING HAPPY I START TO CRY AGAIN.

I cried.

I cried so fucking much after the whole bridge part like Holy shit. And then everything turned out to be okay. Clem was happy, I was happy and just before putting Clems hat on the table I thought : everything has a beginning and everything has an end, right? And I teared up a little, but honestly I liked the way her story ended. Even tho I went through a lot of pain (I'm sure all of us did) UHHHH. I was so angry at Minnie that I wanted her to commit reverse birth :( but it's not really her fault, so then I wanted Lilly to commit reverse birth, but then. Once again. I realised its not her fault either. It's the fucking zombies and the way world is. Would Lilly kidnap kids if no apocalypse? Probably not. Would have Violet had a healthy relationship with Minnie? Maybe. Would have Clementine lead a happy life? Maybe. Would have AJ even been born into this world? Who knows. Would have Lee just ended up being a criminal never meeting Clem and maybe changing for the worse? Well, maybe. WOULD HAVE CLEM EVEN GOT A CHANCE TO MEET EVERYONE AND GET JUST AS CLOSE WITH EVERYONE? I sure fucking hope so. Lmao. There's so fucking much, I would create wattpad just to write what I feel about TWDG right now, cuz I feel a fucking lot.

I ended up writing a whole paragraph up there and I messed up the "highlights" order so yeah.

Clementine: I'm glad I trusted you to make the right calls, otherwise I'd be dead.

*me while crying*: the 30minute replay of the beginning was worth it. (or was it, maybe Clementine would just say, gomen goofball for not trusting you, I'm glad u made the right call or smt)

*me going through what Clem taught me*

"if your grandma is dying, stop watching cartoons." I fuckin died

Also this was indeed a greatest and worst bamboozle I had to go through. But I'm not mad. I'm thankful that Clem didn't die, because I'm more than sure I would have been extra depressed for at least a week or month.

So, thank you Skybound, Telltale. I fucking love you guys. ❤️

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