#can you boil inside me can you radicalize me can you turn me to violence | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

Visit Blog

Explore Tumblr blogs with no restrictions, modern design and the best experience.

Fun Fact

Tumblr has 16.74 million mobile monthly users in the US.

#can you boil inside me can you radicalize me can you turn me to violence

vowled · 3 years

Text

Kill Your Darlings: An Analysis of its Twists and Themes

A few days ago, I watched Kill Your Darlings, and needless to say, I became completely mesmerized by it. Naturally credible characters with well-crafted backstories portraying a true story of Love, Obsession and Murder, it's everything a person could ask for in a movie. The colour palette of the movie radiates comfort and the sound track takes you back in time when these two bright young men were falling in love. Right from the start it was apparent that there were many themes in the undercurrent of the movie, and these were such that required some amount of thoughtful contemplation. And I was incredibly sorry to not find any post or review which critically discussed the themes of the movie and did it justice- so after doing some reading and digging up as much as I could, here I am making an attempt to analyze the twists and themes of the story.

The Crucial Plot-twist

The Night In Question- why the movie's recounting of the events is fictitious:

When faced with the prospect of writing the deposition for Lucian, Allen tried his best to gather information about the events that led to David's murder. However, it proved to be a difficult feat as Lucien himself would not speak much about it clearly. So he pieced together what he could from the bits of information he got. However, we see Lucian vehemently opposing the deposition written by Allen and claiming it to be false. After some thought, I find that I believe Lucian's claims. Most of the following arguments are rooted in the fact that Lucien's relationship with David was an abusive one, where David basically groomed Lucian and was a sexual predator. I suggest reading my post here to gain more insight about how the abuse affected him.

"You weren't there, you don't know what happened." These words right here- they're the words of a victim. Being subjected to a form of sexual abuse myself, I found these words hitting me like a brick ton. These are words coming from a pained soul that refuses to recount traumatic incidents. He's practically saying that the abuse was so bad he had to kill his abuser to be free from it.

Even after Allen saw first-hand what a total creep David could be, even after knowing the man had stalked Lucian across multiple cities, he had to ask Lucian why the latter killed David when he "could have run". This tells me he couldn't exactly relate to Lucian's situation and wasn't very keen on believing him. Although he displayed a moment of intimate affection, there's still a lingering feeling of yeah but he broke my heart inside him. After learning how Lucian drowned David, he even begins questioning if he should help him at all. At this point, Allen doesn't trust Lucian enough to actually care how accurate the story is. So he wrote what he could, what he felt right. But even he couldn't condemn his friend/first love to such a fate as prison, so eventually he submitted it as his final paper. In all honesty, I thought that turning it in was a brilliant move, and one which also further proved that the "once you loved him too" version was mostly fanciful fiction.

Throughout the movie, sequences have been played in reverse frames (and I found this so pleasing) and from the nitrogen-inhaling scene, we know that these sequences designated memories playing out in Allen's head or his subconscious creating dreamscapes. And here's the catch- the entire scene of Lucian taking a walk with David and eventually killing him began with frames played in reverse order. This gives the absolute proof that the movie's depiction of the events were fictitious.

Allen's P.O.V. of the events mainly relied on the argument that at some point, Lucian genuinely loved and needed David. This couldn't be further away from the truth. When you're 14 and and being groomed and coaxed by an older guy, a lot many things could feel like love because you haven't experienced them before; but in reality, it's never love, it just is another form of violence.

Themes running through the movie

"There can be no Creation before Imitation"

We see Professor Steves saying this at the beginning of the movie, hinting that it would be a theme in the story. This statement is reflected throughout Allen's progression and development as a poet:

In the beginning, we see him being hugely influenced by his father's works and possibly trying to imitate him through poetic devices such as consonance.

Next, we see him imitating Professor Stevens' style of writing in his poem "the rose that scents the evening air, grows from by beloved's hair" which Lucian outright criticizes.

It is only with the poem Allen recites to Lucian on the boat that he starts developing some sort of originality. That poem in particular is directly drawn from his personal experiences and delivers splendidly.

This development continues as he proceeds to write "The Night In Question" wherein he brilliantly describes his opinion of how things went down. It was this streak that would eventually propel him to write his most celebrated poem, "Howl".

The Circle of Life and How Allen Breaks it

We see Lucian telling Allen how "Life is only interesting if it is wide" and about Yeats' "Circle of Life". As displayed by the linked document, turns out the circle of life is quite complex a thing, and the movie displays a lay-man's version of it. As Lucian tells about it to Allen, unbeknownst to them both, Allen also enters the circle and changes the turn of events:

It is obvious that at the party at David's, Allen was a misfit. David even goes so far as to literally call him out and point how unremarkable he was, but says how given the correct circumstances, even Allen could change things. And what's extraordinary is exactly this happens next: the liquor runs out in David's party and Allen suggests they should change the venue of the party- hence hijacking David's party!

We see Allen's life widen as he becomes closer to Lucian and starts doing things he'd never done before. At the same time, he also plays an important role in changing Lucian's life as well. It's Allen who suggests at first that Lucian should break up with David and stop taking his help. Later in the movie, after learning about David's obsessive behaviour, it's again Allen that said "we should get rid of him". Again, here we see some foreshadowing. Allen could have worded it in any probable way, and yet he suggested getting rid of David which subtly implied killing him. I do believe that this happened to become a subliminal suggestion to Lucian and furthered his murderous intent.

Hence, although Lucian radically changes Allen's life, the latter does so too in unlikely and unexpected ways.

Sacrifices (and Rituals?)

Since the beginning of the movie, we know that the characters are all extraordinary men and that they are capable of something revolutionary. But it was apparent that all of them would need a catalyst to set things in motion- a sacrifice of some sort which would help them break their moulds and free their inner poet. Allen's love for Lucian and his wish to impress him did make him work toward become better at writing. It was the fear of completely losing Lucian to Jack that made Allen put all his effort into writing, and made him come up with his best work yet - here, the fear acted as the catalyst.

However, the most significant thing in connection to this happened in this scene where Lucian cuts both of their palms and holds them up together - this can be considered a Blood Ritual.

"A blood ritual is any ritual that involves the intentional release of blood. Blood rituals often involve a symbolic death and rebirth, as literal bodily birth involves bleeding. Basic to both animal and human sacrifice is the recognition of blood as the sacred life force in man and beast. The participants may regard the release of blood as producing energy useful as a sexual, healing, or mental stimulus. In other cases, blood is a primary component as the sacrifice, or material component for a spell."

The fact that this event took place inside Allen's head during a trippy session outlines how Allen had subconsciously taken a blood oath with Lucian to further The New Vision. This process of developing their revolutionary ideas would successfully progress for the rest of the movie; however, before its completion, the oath demanded a sacrifice- and the murder of David became this blood sacrifice.

"With Death comes Rebirth"

In the first half of the movie we see the initiation of this theme; after they've agreed upon to bring up something revolutionary, Allen talks about how rebirth comes only after death, and in their naivety, they play out a pseudo-suicide scene to imitate death. Little did they know greater sacrifices would have to be made. Eventually as events play out, we come to realise that it is David's death that became the cause and medium for their rebirth- both academic and intra-personal. Jack and Bill co-wrote the book "And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks" about the murder of David Kammerer, and eventually rose to fame, while Allen became popular with "Howl and Other Poems", none of which could have been initiated/inspired without David's death. As for their personal growth, none of them were the same as they were before the affair. I like to think all of them changed for the better. Lucian must have finally felt a sense of relief after getting rid of his abuser, while Allen finally took-off his rose-coloured glasses, saw Lucian under a more critical light, and developed a sense of self-esteem.

A Study in Violence (I was unsure whether to include this point in this analysis or not due to the violent nature of it. But I figure this analysis would remain incomplete should I leave it out. So here it goes..) The sequence from 1:10:00 to 1:12:00 was an in-depth survey of Violence and how it can occur in different forms. In particular, it focused on how any form of penetration is intimately violating.

We see a lonely Allen being so lost that he's about to have sex with a complete stranger. This itself is very unlike him, who in the beginning of the movie was shying away from Lucian kissing an unknown girl. A few sequences later we see how he wasn't very comfortable with this idea (he wanted to turn off the lights but the other guy turned them on) and yet he was made to shift into a position he did not prefer and hence was made to have rough sex.

We see Bill looking very solemn and injecting drugs into his hands.

We see the violent altercation between Lucian and David. We see David forcing himself on Lucian and eventually being stabbed by him.

We see Jack recieving the news of the death of his friend.

In this way, we see every member of the group being exposed to some form of violence, be it sex, drugs, physical altercations or death.

First Love and its aftermath First love is also an important theme of the movie as it shows how one's first love has the capacity to radically change a person from within:

Allen's first love changed him from the shy, people-pleasing always-upright persona to the bold, radical, critical and unafraid person he became at the end of the movie.

Allen's discovery of his own style of writing can also be majorly attributed to Lucian's criticism of his rhyme-schemes.

All in all, it was his love for Lucian that drove him to become a more out-going person and ignited the mischief in his spirit, while the heartbreak of realising Lucian didn't feel the same for him also lent him invaluable insight and allowed him to develop confidence and a sense of self-esteem, which would play a significant role in him eventually becoming his own person.

While Allen's first love furnished him with the overall better things in life, the same could not be said for Lucian, sadly. Lucian's first love reminded us how oppressive love can become if the other person isn't suited-well for us; it showed us how sometimes love and obsession are separated by a thin line, and how dangerous it becomes when the line is crossed.

Lucian's story also showed us how sometimes a relationship can be more abuse than love, and when that happened, how easy it became to confuse violence with love.

The most significant message that the theme of first-love portrays is that there will always be consequences.

With this, I bring my arguments and analyses to a close. I hope a future (or even past) lover of the movie happens to stumble upon this someday and learn something fascinating about the movie (or reignite their love for it). Thank you for reading this far!

[P.S. an uplifting fact: in real life, Lucian, Allen, Jack and Bill each got the type of life they wished for, and remained friends for the rest of their lives :) ]

#kill your darlings #dark academia movies #daniel radcliffe #dane dehaan #movie critique #film analysis #I hope I could word this comprehensibly

67 notes · View notes

acti-veg · 4 years

Note

I'm vegetarian with an interest in going vegan bc it "feels right" to minimize my violence footprint, but I'm curious to havw your insight on ethics based veganism and its extensions. For context, my fam is Jain so they don't eat onions, garlic, root vegetables, figs etc. The idea is that some vegetables are inethical to consume because there may be insects inside and others because if you eat the root, the plant will die (as opposed to fruit igs). But technically this logical can be extended(1)

forever right? During our holy festival, we boil all our water so we don't accidentally ingest microbes and we don't pour hot water down the drain similarly so microbes and small insects are not hurt. But, boiling water will still kill insects, we will still inhale microbes--its impossible to be completely nonviolent, so where do we draw the line? At what point to we begin living again conveniently rather than ethically? Does our contribution "matter" if our peers are largely unchanging (2)

Intention, action and impact as if it doesnt have plural and reverberating consequences (4). Anyway, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this avatar of existentialism

I just want to preface this by saying that I am really interested in Jainism and I respect it’s ideology in many ways, I understand that religious issues can be sensitive but I hope that none of this will offend you, and if it does I hope you’ll know that it isn’t my intention. I also didn’t get ask number 3, so I can only answer the sections I did receive.

Jainism is probably the religion which is most compatible with veganism, alongside some forms of modern paganism. That said, I do find some of the lines drawn by modern practitioners to be pretty arbitrary. Boiling water to avoid microbes, but not applying the principle of ahisma to animals who clearly are harmed and killed in order to accquire a product like milk or eggs, is more than a little bit contradictory.

Whenever I ask Jains about veganism, the responses I get were pretty disappointingly similar to the ones I get from every other non-vegan. ‘Treated well,’ ‘we heed x and y vitamins,’ ‘ethical sourcing’, ‘it is permitted by Jainism’ etc. Some talk about ahisma dairies, but only getting dairy from these places would mean a completely plant-based diet 99% of the time. Yet harm understood as not killing but still exploiting is limited in my view, and I’ve never really heard a solid justification for that.

The problem is that any ideology based around non-violence or harm reduction will always have to draw a line somewhere, and you can always argue that where this line precisely is drawn is based on arbitrary criteria, because it always will be in some respects. It ends up being about what I can practically do as opposed to what I should do according to my own principles. If I believe in environmentalism I can stop buying single-use plastics but I may still have to drive to work, for example. I can’t stop people littering but I can stop individual contributions to it. Similarly, as a Jain you can boil your water but can’t avoid killing microbes as you wash and just move around in the world. There will always be some ‘what about x, what about y’ involved, because it’s not practically possible to avoid all harm.

I think that the concept of intention is an important one, at the time I think a lot of the rules of Jainism were the best attempt to not harm that was available at the time it was developed, but practitioners have ended up sticking with those ancient principles and turned them into normative rules, rather than adapting them to the modern world. Nowadays, I think a lot of the acts involved in practicing Jainism have become largely symbolic. Some of these acts do practically avoid causing harm, but as you said, this could be extended far further than it is in mainstream Jainism. I think that practitioners demonstrate their commitment to ahisma with these acts, while recognising that of course, they can’t live entirely non-violent lives free of causing any harm. Again, intention becomes the important factor.

As for whether or not this makes a difference or has an impact, I think at a micro level it definitely does, which is sort of the point. Jains aren’t trying to make everyone Jains, so there is no evangelical movement per ce, no attempt at some macro global change, but as an individual agent acting on individual beings in the universe, my actions do matter within the scope of the beings they affect. If I don’t go fishing then I have not stopped others from doing so, but my actions do make a difference to that fish. If I don’t remove that carrot and don’t displace those microbes or insect, my actions make a difference to those individual beings, even if the person next to me won’t do the same.

From what I gather, most Jains feel like the act of living out non-violence has an impact on the self and on the individuals concerned, and I can get behind that as a concept. The principle of ahisma is really about radical non-violence, and I think in living that way and demonstrating it to others you do make a real difference, even if that impact isn’t always tangible. I think that trying to live in such a way as to cause the least harm possible is a beautiful thing, it’s the same thing that vegans are doing, we just have different interpretations of what that means and why we are motivated to do it.

#ask #vegan #religion #jainism

15 notes · View notes

richincolor · 4 years

Photo

Crystal’s 2019 Favorites

Truly this is the most difficult post of the year for me. There were so many excellent books published this year, but I finally narrowed it down to the following seven titles:

An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, adapted by Debbie Reese and Jean Mendoza Beacon Press || Crystal’s Review

Going beyond the story of America as a country “discovered” by a few brave men in the “New World,” Indigenous human rights advocate Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz reveals the roles that settler colonialism and policies of American Indian genocide played in forming our national identity.

The original academic text is fully adapted by renowned curriculum experts Debbie Reese and Jean Mendoza, for middle-grade and young adult readers to include discussion topics, archival images, original maps, recommendations for further reading, and other materials to encourage students, teachers, and general readers to think critically about their own place in history.

Like a Love Story by Abdi Nazemian Balzer + Bray || Crystal’s Review

It’s 1989 in New York City, and for three teens, the world is changing.

Reza is an Iranian boy who has just moved to the city with his mother to live with his stepfather and stepbrother. He’s terrified that someone will guess the truth he can barely acknowledge about himself. Reza knows he’s gay, but all he knows of gay life are the media’s images of men dying of AIDS.

Judy is an aspiring fashion designer who worships her uncle Stephen, a gay man with AIDS who devotes his time to activism as a member of ACT UP. Judy has never imagined finding romance…until she falls for Reza and they start dating.

Art is Judy’s best friend, their school’s only out and proud teen. He’ll never be who his conservative parents want him to be, so he rebels by documenting the AIDS crisis through his photographs.

As Reza and Art grow closer, Reza struggles to find a way out of his deception that won’t break Judy’s heart–and destroy the most meaningful friendship he’s ever known.

With the Fire on High by Elizabeth Acevedo HarperTeen || Group Discussion

With her daughter to care for and her abuela to help support, high school senior Emoni Santiago has to make the tough decisions, and do what must be done. The one place she can let her responsibilities go is in the kitchen, where she adds a little something magical to everything she cooks, turning her food into straight-up goodness. Still, she knows she doesn’t have enough time for her school’s new culinary arts class, doesn’t have the money for the class’s trip to Spain — and shouldn’t still be dreaming of someday working in a real kitchen. But even with all the rules she has for her life — and all the rules everyone expects her to play by — once Emoni starts cooking, her only real choice is to let her talent break free.

Love from A to Z by S.K. Ali Salaam Reads || Crystal’s Review

A marvel: something you find amazing. Even ordinary-amazing. Like potatoes—because they make French fries happen. Like the perfect fries Adam and his mom used to make together.

An oddity: whatever gives you pause. Like the fact that there are hateful people in the world. Like Zayneb’s teacher, who won’t stop reminding the class how “bad” Muslims are.

But Zayneb, the only Muslim in class, isn’t bad. She’s angry.

When she gets suspended for confronting her teacher, and he begins investigating her activist friends, Zayneb heads to her aunt’s house in Doha, Qatar, for an early start to spring break.

Fueled by the guilt of getting her friends in trouble, she resolves to try out a newer, “nicer” version of herself in a place where no one knows her.

Then her path crosses with Adam’s.

Since he got diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in November, Adam’s stopped going to classes, intent, instead, on perfecting the making of things. Intent on keeping the memory of his mom alive for his little sister.

Adam’s also intent on keeping his diagnosis a secret from his grieving father.

Alone, Adam and Zayneb are playing roles for others, keeping their real thoughts locked away in their journals.

Until a marvel and an oddity occurs…

Marvel: Adam and Zayneb meeting.

Oddity: Adam and Zayneb meeting.

The Downstairs Girl by Stacey Lee G.P. Putnam’s Sons || Crystal’s Review

Atlanta, 1890: By day, seventeen-year-old Jo Kuan works as a lady’s maid for the cruel daughter of one of the wealthiest men in Atlanta. But by night, Jo moonlights as the pseudonymous author of a newspaper advice column for the genteel Southern lady, “Dear Miss Sweetie.” When her column becomes wildly popular, she uses the power of the pen to address some of society’s ills, but she’s not prepared for the backlash that follows when her column challenges fixed ideas about race and gender.

While her opponents clamor to uncover the secret identity of Miss Sweetie, a mysterious letter sets Jo off on a search for her own past and the parents who abandoned her as a baby. But when her efforts put her in the crosshairs of Atlanta’s most notorious criminal, Jo must decide whether she, a girl used to living in the shadows, is ready to step into the light. With prose that is witty, insightful, and at times heartbreaking, Stacey Lee masterfully crafts an extraordinary social drama set in the New South.

The Weight of Our Sky by Hanna Alkaf Salaam Reads || Crystal’s Review

A music loving teen with OCD does everything she can to find her way back to her mother during the historic race riots in 1969 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, in this heart-pounding literary debut.

Melati Ahmad looks like your typical movie-going, Beatles-obsessed sixteen-year-old. Unlike most other sixteen-year-olds though, Mel also believes that she harbors a djinn inside her, one who threatens her with horrific images of her mother’s death unless she adheres to an elaborate ritual of counting and tapping to keep him satisfied.

But there are things that Melati can’t protect her mother from. On the evening of May 13th, 1969, racial tensions in her home city of Kuala Lumpur boil over. The Chinese and Malays are at war, and Mel and her mother become separated by a city in flames.

With a 24-hour curfew in place and all lines of communication down, it will take the help of a Chinese boy named Vincent and all of the courage and grit in Melati’s arsenal to overcome the violence on the streets, her own prejudices, and her djinn’s surging power to make it back to the one person she can’t risk losing.

*** CONTENT WARNINGS: Racism, on-page death, graphic violence, OCD and anxiety triggers. If you are affected by any of these things, please do consider setting the book aside until you feel more able to take them on. ***

Full Disclosure by Camryn Garrett Audrey’s Review

In a community that isn’t always understanding, an HIV-positive teen must navigate fear, disclosure, and radical self-acceptance when she falls in love—and lust—for the first time. Powerful and uplifting, Full Disclosure will speak to fans of Angie Thomas and Nicola Yoon.

Simone Garcia-Hampton is starting over at a new school, and this time things will be different. She’s making real friends, making a name for herself as student director of Rent, and making a play for Miles, the guy who makes her melt every time he walks into a room. The last thing she wants is for word to get out that she’s HIV-positive, because last time . . . well, last time things got ugly.

Keeping her viral load under control is easy, but keeping her diagnosis under wraps is not so simple. As Simone and Miles start going out for real—shy kisses escalating into much more—she feels an uneasiness that goes beyond butterflies. She knows she has to tell him that she’s positive, especially if sex is a possibility, but she’s terrified of how he’ll react! And then she finds an anonymous note in her locker: I know you have HIV. You have until Thanksgiving to stop hanging out with Miles. Or everyone else will know too.

Simone’s first instinct is to protect her secret at all costs, but as she gains a deeper understanding of the prejudice and fear in her community, she begins to wonder if the only way to rise above is to face the haters head-on…

#2019 Favorites #YALit

11 notes · View notes

thesaltmaknae · 5 years

Text

No Girls Allowed

Jimin x Reader

PART ONE

Genre: ‘50s!AU, Angst, Drama, Fluff,

Abstract: Park Jimin is a name known too well in your hometown. Infamous for his posse and multiple run-ins with the law. To others, he’s known for trouble, but to you, he’s everything you wish you could be. Can you prove to him that you deserve a place in the pack?

Rating: R (Language, Violence, Sexual Themes, Controversy)

Word Count: 1,313

01 02

The feeling was all too familiar, the iron taste too well-known.

You licked your lips with a smirk as fists continued to strike your sides, your face, any part that remained unprotected. The pain began to dull from when it first arrived as your body wearily became accustomed to the frequent beatings. You barely registered what your offenders were shouting, as you focused on the pool of blood forming at the side of your head.

Crimson red, a color so peculiar. So rich, yet cold. The color of blood, the color of a fiery love, the color of an elegant dress worn on a Friday night, the color of an exquisite, aged-wine. Crimson red brought you comfort, it reminded you of life. It reminded you that what was currently happening, was only a setback. That is, only if you got out alive.

“We specifically told you to stay away,” one of the offenders crouched down beside you, grabbing a fistful of your hair, “It was a simple request (Y/N), but you went ahead and disobeyed. What makes you think you can talk to whoever you want?”

It’s not like you could help what had happened. The offenders were four girls in your history class, one of them having their boyfriend in the same class as well. By the will of God, you just happened to have the worst luck. The teachers just loved to pair you up with him, and it clearly displeased his girlfriend. These ladies never liked you in the first place, not since you would surpass them in almost everything. Whether it was sports, academics, even beauty. You always had the upper hand, and this largely contributed to their pent up anger.

“Come on, Marina, maybe the universe is trying to tell you something. It’s just not meant to be,” you spat in her face, blood spraying against her flushed skin. Marina screamed in disgust, throwing your head back against the concrete.

Your vision suddenly blurred, and all you could see was the gray sky above, the clouds moving ever so slowly. You felt your temples pulsing before the world went black, and all you could hear were the girls gasping in panic as they were unsure of what to do.

...

You jolted awake as you felt your body shift around. You eyed the person below you, your head resting against his as he had you on his back. Though you couldn’t see his face, you knew right away who had found you.

“You were watching the whole time, weren’t you?” Your voice was barely above a whisper, your throat dry and aflame.

“You need to watch your mouth, I’m surprised you’re still alive with such an attitude.” That was the only response you got on your journey to wherever the hell this man was taking you. You scoffed at his remark,

“You’re one to talk.”

You continued to chatter about, making yourself comfortable against Park Jimin’s shoulders as he piggybacked you through the streets. You failed to notice the bystanders’ icy glares as they watched Jimin carry you home, nor did you care, it was something you both become accustomed to.

Jimin stared straight ahead and onlookers parted as he drew nearer. Like Moses, he single handedly created his own path, pushing through the Red Sea of gawkers. Each step he took silenced private conversations, the sound of his soles letting the world know that he was there.

You admired his confidence and unbothered persona. You admired Jimin because, unlike him, you cared about what everyone thought of you. You aimed to transcend above your peers.

What was the reason?

Society was brutal, it had consumed the mind of your closest friend, taking her life. You wanted to honor her life by living your best life, creating your best self, and being everything she wanted to be.

“(Y/N), are you asleep?”

Your train of thought had come to a stop as Jimin called out to you.

“I’m awake, or at least trying to stay that way,” you admitted.

“Your blood stained my shirt, I hope you’re a pro at stain removal. That shouldn’t be a problem considering you’re a pro at everything.” You lifted your head off of Jimin’s shoulder, staring at the blotch of rusty red sprawled across his white t-shirt.

“Oh geez, I’m sorry. But, you know... This wouldn’t happen if I had protection.” You smirked as you continued to rub your face against the stain, much to his displeasure.

“And what could you possibly mean by that?” You heard the annoyance in his raspy voice, knowing full well this would be the thousandth time you have asked,

“Let me join your poss- AAGH!” You landed flat on your butt at the foot of your door, feeling an intense wave of pain radiate from the tip of your tailbone to the rest of your upper body. “Fuck, Jimin! I get it, but seriously, why not?”

Jimin had formed a group of friends, six other boys to be exact. Each seemed to have a purpose, an asset that contributed to the team. You knew little about each of them, for you only personally knew Jimin. You had known him since your first year of high school, when he was a third year. He took you under his wing after noticing you had a hard time making friends, he was always protective and inclusive of you. You were grateful for his presence, especially since it was difficult for you to pursue people after the loss of your dear friend. After he graduated, he had changed. Rumor has it, he and his boys organized a rally, fighting against social injustice for minorities in the district. Their methods were quite, radical. This led to them getting arrested multiple times, luckily, no one has spent the night behind bars, yet. You were proud of his cause, and you wanted to join him. But, he never felt that it suited you.

“I’ve already told you this,” he growled, “There is no place for a girl like you to be hanging around with people like us.” He began making his way back, but not before you lunged at his side, grasping desperately at his hip.

“What does being a girl have to do with anything? Nobody has to know, I just-”

“Stop it. That’s enough.” Jimin kneeled beside you, cupping the side of your head. He briefly pulled his hand as he felt the wetness coming from your ear. “Shit, your ear is bleeding.”

“It’s fine, I probably just scraped it.”

“From the inside, (Y/N), you need a hospital, you could have a concussion. Are you feeling nauseous? Dizzy? Look me in the eyes,” Jimin frantically examined your condition, “See my finger, follow it?” He panned his finger from one side of your face to the other.

“Listen, I feel fine.” You gently grasped his finger, pushing it down to his lap. “Thank you for the concern, but it would have been more helpful if you’d have jumped in.”

“That’s why you can’t join.” Your eyes widened at his response, your blood beginning to boil.

“What do you mean by that?” Jimin stood up first, and offered you his hand. You declined, standing on your own, but suddenly feeling weightless you clumsily fell forward. Before you could hit the ground, Jimin had grabbed your shoulder to hold you against his side, supporting you.

“I mean that if you can’t fight the fire you started yourself, don’t start one.” You felt tears brimming your eyes as your friend scolded you, so you looked away.

“It’s not like I fucking asked for this. It’s not my fault so many people are so insecure and so mindless.”

“So, what does that make you? Perfect?” Jimin stretched out his neck, his head leaning against your shoulder as he peered over to see your frustrated face.

“No, not perfect. I’m far from it. But, at least I try to be a decent human being.” Your voice broke, and you choked out the rest of your reply before you allowed the tears the stream down your bloodied cheeks.

With a gentle sigh, Jimin turned you to face him, and he pulled you into his chest, his hand carefully cradling your head. You felt him peck the top of your head before he pulled away, ripping his blood-soaked shirt off of him in the meantime. Instinctively, you smacked your hands over your eyes to avoid staring at him, because in all honesty, it would be hard to look away. Jimin threw the shirt over your head, covering your eyes for you. His footsteps grew softer as he headed back in the direction her came.

“It better be white as snow by the time I pick it up tomorrow, get some rest.” He called out. When you removed the shirt, he had already made his way out of sight.

77 notes · View notes

scripttorture · 5 years

Note

I have a character who is keeping a "dangerous" prisoner. He is worried about the prisoner getting provoked and killing people (which was why he had them imprisoned in the first place) but so far the prisoner has been docile. The character tries to justify arresting them by provoking the prisoner into lashing out through a variety of verbal/physical abuses, but the prisoner never does. Is it believable for the character to decide that the prisoner must be harmless, & start treating them kindly?

Ithink that depends very much on the individuals involved. From whatyou've described I'm a little unclear on whether this is a torturescenario or an abuse scenario and I think the difference would effectthe outcomes here.

Forthe sake of this particular ask and keeping this in general terms: ifthe abusive character is part of a larger organisation and you'repicturing an established state-run prison then it’s legally definedtorture. If you’re picturing an individual keeping someoneimprisoned in their house, then it’s abuse.

Ithink the kind of progression you’re describing for this abuser isnot very likely in a ‘legally defined torture’ scenario. That’sbecause in those scenarios torturers aren’t alone. Even if there’sonly one person actively torturing (which usually isn’t the case)there are a lotof people actively or passively supporting their actions in theorganisation. There’s a distinct sub culture in these organisationssurrounding torture and torturers. It’s toxic and it’s highlycompetitive.

Thatsub culture and the social pressure these groups bring to bear on theindividuals inside them means that backing off and being ‘kind’is…...highly unlikely. A torturer who tried to do that would be, atbest, ridiculed by other torturers. It would be taken as a sign ofweakness by his peers and he’d be verbally abused and bullied untilhe started abusing the prisoner again. Or moved to another victim asa way to show off his capacity for violence and brutality.

Theworse way that could go is with other torturers taking it as a signthat this character is rejecting torture generally. Because thatmeans a rejection of the group and it means he’s a threat. That canlead to attacks, potentially lethal ones.

Everyonehas a choice about what they do and none of this excuses the facttorturers chooseto abuse others. It doesn’t even mean torturers ‘can’t’ stop.But stopping without dangerous repercussions tends to mean either theindividual is removed from the environment or the environment changesradically.

Nowa situation that’s legally abusewouldn’t have this sort of social pressure and potential source ofthreat. That means having the character change how he acts is- moreplausible, more possible. I’m still not sure it’s likelybut the character isn’t in a position where he’d be in danger ifhe changed how he treated the prisoner. That makes a big difference.

Itwould still be highly dependant on the character himself and well-the wider reasons he thinks violence is ‘ok’ in this situation.It’s really important to be aware that the reasons he statesas justifications may not be his actualjustifications and he may not be consciously aware of thediscrepancy.

Forinstance the character might state that murderer ‘deserve roughtreatment’ or something to that effect.

Ifhe actually believes that then- yes he might back down if he thoughtthe prisoner wasn’t actually capable of that sort of violence. Butto me statements like that usually don’t indicate a person’shonest beliefs. That strain of torture apologia usually boils down tosomething more like ‘thisgroup of people is beneath me and therefore I can punish them forcrossing social lines’.

Rejalicalls it the ‘Civic Discipline Model’. It’s a pretty commonway for people to excuse torture, especially of convicts or peopleaccused of a crime. It’s also often used against the homeless,immigrants, addicts, the mentally ill and any other groups with lesssocial capital. Anyone regarded as ‘lesser’ citizens.

Ifthat’s the kind of thinking behind the torturer’s actions thenthe prisoner’s innocence is….a trivial detail. It doesn’tactually have any impact on the torturer’s motivations becausenotions of justice or protecting the public aren’t actually cominginto this at all. Those concepts are being used as a smoke screen todisguise- well the torturer regarding the prisoner as sub-human, asundeserving of rights because of characteristics beyond the victim’scurrent control.

Doyou think the character actually needs further justification forarresting the victim? Is the fact he couldarrest the victim enough justification?

AndI’m a little concerned about the characterisation of the victimhere.

Becausetorture doesn’t make people docile. This kind of abuse- well theevidence we’ve got suggests to makes victims more likely to resist.It has a tendency to radicalise people and turn them heavily againstthe torturer and (sometimes) groups the torturer is seen asrepresenting as well.

Giventhe rest of the ask I suspectthat what you mean here is that the victim isn’t respondingviolently or aggressively. It’s important not to mistake that forlong term cooperation or agreement.

Inthis case I wonder if you’re planning to make this docile ‘act’part of the character’s resistance strategy. I think an idea likethat could work. It would be highly unusual but that in itself tellsthe readers something about the victim as a character, which I ratherlike.

Ifthat’s what you’re aiming for then keep in mind the differencebetween the act and- well how this might look or feel if a characterfeels genuinely forced to behave in this way. See if you can work insmall hints that it’s an act (or at least a choice). Things likethe character’s posture and expression could be useful there. Whenthe plot allows it I strongly suggest making that difference, andthat choice, clear.

Goingback to the torturer for a moment there’s a third option that’sjust occurred to me.

Ifthis is set in a state run institution then I don’t think atorturer would back off. But someone who hasn’tgone that far and is in an environment where torturer wouldn’tbe supported might well back down in the way you’ve outlined.

Inthat case I’d suggest sticking to verbal abuse. Have the charactervery strictly avoid physical abuse of any kind. You could perhapshave him consider it,things like applying handcuffs too tightly or turning off the heatingin a cell are easy for the abusive character to do and get away with.But write him refusing to give in to those instincts.

Thengo a bit further. Show that the environment he’s in reallyreinforces the idea that that kind of cruel, brutal behaviour isunacceptable. Show him getting in trouble for a few incidents ofverbal abuse. Have colleagues try to call him on it in differentways. Perhaps someone he’s close to could try the ‘gentler’approach of sitting him down and having a chat about it. Someone whodoesn’t like him as much might threaten to report him to a manager.

Allof these people could underline their statements with ‘the prisonerisn’t even doing anything’.

You’vestill got that element of the guard being abusive and trying toprovoke a response. It’s one that more people could reasonablyignore. And you have an environment that, rather than encouraging himto escalate abuse, is encouraging him to de-escalate.It also underlines the factthat police officers and prison guards are not supposed to behavethis way.

Verbalabuse is treated as a lesser offence in most legal systems (unlessyou want to be topical and talk about blasphemy laws). As a resultit’s more reasonable to have the character getting away with itwhile writing theinstitution itself as- perhaps not brilliant but not activelyharbouring torturers or the toxic sub culture that comes with them.

Socialencouragement to continue or change behaviour is incredibly powerful.Whatever the setting you’re imagining I think using it as a factorinfluencing the abusive character is a good idea.

Ihope this helps. :)

Disclaimer

#tw torture #police brutality #effects of torture #behaviour of torturers #writing torturers #legal definitions #social pressure #Anonymous

20 notes · View notes

orbemnews · 3 years

Link

Will the Next Space-Weather Season Be Stormy or Fair? The big news about the sun is that there is no big news. We are blessed, astronomers like to say, to be living next to a “boring star.” But the inhabitants (if there are any) of the planets orbiting the neighboring star Proxima Centauri, only 4.2 light-years away, are less fortunate. In April astronomers announced that a massive flare had erupted from its surface in 2019. For seven seconds, as a battery of telescopes on Earth and in space watched, the little star had increased its output of ultraviolet radiation 14,000-fold, in one of the most violent such flares ever seen in our galaxy. This was more than serious sunburn territory. “A human being on this planet would have a bad time,” said Meredith MacGregor, an astronomy professor at the University of Colorado who led the worldwide observing effort. Space weather on this scale could sterilize potentially habitable planets, and could augur bad news for the search for life beyond this solar system. Even mild space weather can be disruptive to creatures already evolved and settled; sunspots and solar storms, which wax and wane in an 11-year cycle, spray energy that can endanger spacecraft, astronauts and communication systems. A new cycle of storms will begin any day now, and astrophysicists are divided on how active or threatening it will be. The sun may be about to set records for sunspot numbers and violent storms, or it may be sliding into a decline like the Maunder Minimum, from 1645 to 1715, when hardly any sunspots appeared — a period that became known in Europe as the Little Ice Age. Cosmic mortgage payments “We live in the atmosphere of a star,” as Scott McIntosh, a solar physicist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., often says. “As a civilization we take our star for granted.” Here, 93 million miles from the nearest star — the one we call our sun — we exist and mostly thrive on the edge of almost incomprehensible violence and complexity. The sun is a medium-size star, a ball of blazing-hot ionized gas one million miles in diameter. Its large inside rotates faster than its outside, and the outer layers rotate faster at the equator than at the poles. The result is a snarled nest of magnetic fields, which manifest as sunspots and worse when they break the surface. Every second, thermonuclear reactions in the center of the sun burn 600 million tons of hydrogen into 596 million tons of helium. The missing four million tons, turned into pure energy, constitute the mortgage payment for all the life on Earth and perhaps elsewhere in the solar system. As the energy emerges from the sun, it rises through successively cooler and less dense layers of gas and finally, 100,000 years later, from the photosphere, or surface, where the temperature is a mere 5,700 degrees Fahrenheit. The sun is amazingly consistent in making these mortgage payments. A few years ago an experiment in Italy confirmed that our star does not seem to have changed its energy output in at least the last 100,000 years, the time it takes that energy to migrate from the sun’s core. The researchers were able to calculate how much energy the sun produces in real time, by measuring subatomic particles called neutrinos that are produced by nuclear reactions inside the sun, escape in seconds and reach Earth in just eight minutes. This energy, they found, matched the output that was generated 100,000 years ago and is only now detectable. The action doesn’t stop at the sun’s surface. That friendly yellow photosphere boils like oatmeal and is pocked with dark magnetic storms (the infamous sunspots) that crackle, whirl and lash space with showers of electrical particles and radiation. The corona, composed of thin, superhot streamers of electrified gas, and visible only during solar eclipses, extends millions of miles from the glowing surface. Things sometimes go wrong, although so far on a scale far below the outbursts seen on Proxima Centauri. As the magnetic fields generated by all that swirling, electrified gas emerge on the sun’s surface, they become twisted and tangled. Eventually they snap and reconnect in loops, releasing enormous amounts of radiation and charged particles — an explosive solar flare that can be more powerful than millions of hydrogen bombs. Sometimes these flares blow whole chunks of the sun’s outer layers into space, in events called coronal mass ejections. The mother of all known solar storms thus far occurred on Sept. 1, 1859, when a blob of sun slammed into Earth. Sparks flew from telegraph systems in Europe and North America, causing fires. The auroras that night stretched as far south as Hawaii and Cuba and were so bright that people could read their newspapers by their light. In 2012 another a coronal mass ejection barely missed Earth. An earlier study by the National Academy of Sciences concluded that a direct hit by such a storm could cause some $2 trillion in damage, shutting down the power grid and rendering satellites at least temporarily blind. Forget about trying to use the internet or your local A.T.M.; many people wouldn’t even be able to flush their toilets without the electricity to run water pumps, the report noted. “I think as a civilization we become screwed,” Dr. McIntosh said. Cloudy with a chance of sunspots Such storms are more likely to occur during the high points of the sun’s mysterious 11-year cycle of sunspot activity. Lately, the sunspot cycles have been getting weaker. During the last cycle, 101 spots were observed on the sun in 2014, the year of peak activity; that was well below the historical average of 160 to 240. Last year, a committee of scientists from NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration forecast that the coming cycle would be similarly anemic, with a peak in 2025 of about 115 sunspots. But Dr. McIntosh and his colleagues have produced a radically different forecast, of more than 200 sunspots at its peak. The 11-year sunspot cycle, they say, based on an analysis of 140 years of solar measurements, belies a more fundamental 22-year Hale cycle, named after its discoverer, George Ellery Hale. During that period the sun’s magnetic field reverses its polarity, then switches back. Each cycle ends or begins when two bands of magnetism, migrating from opposite, high latitudes of the sun, meet at the equator and annihilate each other. On average each phase of the cycle takes 11 years, but it can vary. Dr. McIntosh and his team found that the longer a cycle went on, the weaker the next cycle would be, and vice versa. The current cycle, the 24th since record-keeping started, shows every sign of ending after a little more than 10 years — shorter than average, which means the next cycle should be strong. “Sunspot Cycle 25 could have a magnitude that rivals the top few since records began,” Dr. McIntosh said in late April. On Thursday, he and his team were still waiting for “ignition” to begin. “It is very, very close,” he wrote in an email. “We are watching very closely.” The elephant and the stars At stake, besides the health of our planetary infrastructure, is the pride that astronomers take in feeling that they understand the complicated and violent processes going on behind the sun’s relatively calm face. “I think the problem with the sun is that we’re too close to it, and so there’s too much data about the sun,” Dr. McIntosh said. He called it a breaker of models: “Your models are going to fail eventually. It’s part of the reason why it’s so hard to forecast the weather, right? Because our observations are so detailed, but you know it’s hard to get it absolutely right.” Tony Phillips, an astronomer who runs the website Spaceweather.com, agreed in an email. “In my experience, when people really understand something, they can explain it simply,” he said. “It is striking to me that almost no one in the solar-cycle prediction business can explain their favorite dynamo model in a way that lay people can ‘get it.’” The situation reminded him of the proverbial blind men who try to produce a Theory of Elephants, with one of them focused solely on feeling the animal’s trunk. “Scott and Bob are standing off to the side shouting, ‘Hey, you guys are ignoring most of the elephant,’” he said. “In other words, there’s more to the solar cycle than is commonly assumed by conventional models. And so, according to Scott, they are doomed to get the big picture wrong.” Jay Pasachoff, an astronomer at Williams College who has spent his life observing the corona during solar eclipses, said he did not put much store in such forecasts. In an email, he recounted a meeting during the last cycle that had “an amusing set of talks.” The conversation, as he recalled it, went: “The next cycle will be stronger than average, the next cycle will be weaker than average, the next cycle will be either stronger than average or weaker than average, the next cycle will be neither stronger than average nor weaker than average.” He added, “So my plan is to wait and see.” Potential hazards aside, understanding how the sunspot cycle actually works is crucial “from a purely human standpoint, if you want to understand stars,” Dr. McIntosh said. “And if you think about it, Earth’s magnetic field is largely why we probably have life on Earth.” Mars, he pointed out, doesn’t have much of an atmosphere or a magnetic field. “If your planet doesn’t have a magnetic field, you can have all the atmosphere you want,” he said, “but your local friendly neighborhood star could whisk it away in a heartbeat.” Indeed, astrophysicists suspect that such a fate befell Mars, which was once warmer and wetter than it is now. Proxima Centauri, a small star known as an M dwarf, harbors at least two exoplanets, one of which is Earth-size and close enough to the star to be habitable if it weren’t bathed in radiation. Dr. MacGregor offered one glimmer of hope for life in such neighborhoods. “Recent work has shown that ultraviolet light might be very important for catalyzing life — turning complex molecules into amino acids and ultimately into single-celled organisms,” she said. “Since M dwarfs are so small and cold, they don’t actually produce that much UV radiation, except when they flare. Perhaps there is a sweet spot where a star flares enough to spark life but not so much that it immediately destroys it!” Source link Orbem News #fair #season #SpaceWeather #Stormy

0 notes

premakalidasi · 6 years

Text

thepurelands reblogged your post:Listen, I’m up to here with “spiritual” men and...

I love this SO much… All else to say, which is not in contradiction to your words but a qualifier, is that we as women...

#so much YES#sexuality

Well, I would be very careful with your terminology there (even though I believe your basic intent was benevolent, don’t worry). Saying women “aren’t victims of the patriarchy” edges far too close to basically telling women, bluntly in their faces, that they’re just imagining it all. Which is bollocks--and what I’ve been trying to get at in my post; that there are issues in the way of healing and liberation and becoming whole. It’s exactly because women are victimised as fuck and abused and beaten up all the time that it’s more difficult for them to even start handling sexuality.

Women are victimised and abused left, right and centre by a fucked-up, patriarchal system that values the male and “masculine” values over “feminine” ones, and that fucks men up as well as it goes. The whole system is based on violence and power-over and it’s 100% real. And we absolutely need to acknowledge that before we can move on. Not tell women, like far too many self-help guides (who’ve never had PTSD themselves) that hey, just think positive sparkly New Age thoughts and be ~open~ and ~forgiving~ (and forget about these silly BDSM things as therapy) and everything will be fine. Women are fucked over in this world 24/7, end of story.

But.

There’s a difference, a massive difference between being victimised, being on the receiving end of violence and abuse and adopting a victim identity. That’s the key; that’s what I hope you were after, too. I don’t believe in victim-blaming, but I do believe in shaking people out of the *internalised* victimisation part, the internalised self-hatred and passivity and weakness. I would never have said this pre-Tumblr, but I am honestly starting to wonder if women wouldn’t be so badly off right now if it weren’t for their own fetish for fucking themselves over.

My dear, dear sisters: whenever you feel hopeless and useless and act accordingly (or, rather, remain passive because you’ve accepted you’re shit), feel like you don’t have the right to do X (act that doesn’t harm anyone), don’t have the right to say Y (thing that doesn’t harm anyone), that this thing is rude and that thing is being a spoilsport, circle your sentences with “hehe” and don’t use full stops because that’s too stompy and yadda yadda, that’s a big-ass part of what keeps you down. You. You keep yourself down because once you’ve been put down by someone else, you copy them and start doing it to yourself, too.

Every time you call yourself a victim (instead of someone else victimising you that very moment), every time you think you’re weak, every time you’re being a nice girl and not making a fuss (when you absolutely should), every time you put yourself down and remain passive, someone benefits from that. Every time you fuck yourself over typing a Tumblr tag saying “but I feel like there’s nothing I can do” or “im shit lol”, someone’s going to benefit from that, usually the dudebros who are having fun somewhere else celebrating violence and other tough-guy crap (while trying to pretend they aren’t soft and squishy human beings underneath all that). Every time you define yourself through something you are Against, you let yourself be defined by the thing you think is your enemy; by focusing on resistance you’re forgetting about the part where you should be exploring and actively building alternative ways of handling things. You have a choice as to whether you’ll type that Tumblr tag or not, but you’ve forgotten you have it. You’re not being yourself--you’re being what The Man wants you to be. Miserable and malleable and useable because you don’t believe in yourself, believe you have any rights, any power, any divinity in yourself.

So I just want to clarify that. There’s a difference between being abused and *abusing yourself,* putting yourself down. There’s something you can’t help--if someone’s kicking you in the face with a combat boot, it’s pretty damn difficult to start manifesting your innate divinity. And I don’t want anyone to belittle that. It’s incredibly difficult to handle sex if the penalty for that is humiliation and physical violence. But those times you are on your own, self-governed (for example, on your own blog on the Internet, or in your own bed with a vibrator)--if you choose to put yourself down *there* as well, then, yes, that’s a problem. And that’s where you’ve got to start, because if you don’t believe that you have any value, you can be used over and over. That’s candy for abusers; that’s candy for narcissists--they see they can walk all over you.

These self-defeating structures have been programmed into us for millennia exactly to uphold the system as it is, so that we remain home as passive housekeepers and baby machines. It all goes back to that; every time you say “I should put my feelings and hurt aside and put others above myself at all times even if it literally kills me,” it goes back to being an efficient homemaker while the guys (in turn brainwashed into being good cannon fodder, efficient killing machines) go off to wage war. All gender bullshit boils down to that: either making someone into an efficient home/kid management system or a killing/moneymaking system, and all the divine potential inside of us, regardless of genitalia, gets destroyed and burned on the altar of that system. It’s madness.

But we’ve come so far from that. We’ve now got the technology and civilisation and brains to be far more than just homemakers or soldiers. We already know we can use these skills for building hospitals--transcending the homemaker and the warrior and channeling that into medical science and the engineering and power needed to build that hospital (and that these skills exist cross-sex, so gendering them is too limiting). We should be able to articulate our feelings and use them wisely by now, and to respect each other by now. But we have to respect ourselves first (and the same goes for guys respecting their “girly” parts). If you start saying “no, actually, this is how it works for me”--which is why I was explaining all those things about the female orgasm in my post, because nobody fucking talks about it on that level, especially in spiritual contexts--then we have a beginning. It’s a defiant act, a hella radical act and it’s exactly when we realise what such women are up against that we understand just how revolutionary it is.

Even now, I have to try and stop myself from saying “TL;DR” here because that’s one of those many forms of self-belittling, ways of saying “hehhehe, what I just said isn’t that important” because it bloody well is. I struggle with that shit, too. (I’m not even going to go into the list of the shit I’ve been through, even if this kind of Discourse often demands people show their hand--because I don’t believe in cred through victimhood. I almost started to list that shit, but stopped myself, because that’s what awareness is all about--not just vomiting out what you feel, but trying to at least have some consideration over what your output’s gonna be. And I don’t want anyone to feel they somehow have less cred than me because they haven’t been on the receiving end of X, because that’s inhuman and also insane). But all you folks need to know that I’ve been There, and over and over. And sick of it. And it’s exactly because people still self-perpetuate all this crap that I can’t keep quiet about it any more, having been through all this myself. Twenty years ago, I hoped things would be better in 2018, but they just seem to be getting worse, so we’ve got to talk about this stuff, start talking about it as much as people talked about this stuff in the 60s and 70s, and as critically as they did then (but that’s a whole different rant).

We’ve all got to start somewhere--but let’s just be careful about the terminology and not taunt people with broken legs into running when they’re still recuperating, or in any way imply they fell over themselves when someone else tripped them over.

There’s a difference between sabotage and self-sabotage. Being victimised=/=victim identity.

Now, can we talk about the glory of uterine orgasms?

#thepurelands #sermons #i suppose #i need to reiterate this isn't an attack but there's so much dodgy language around today #that we need to be careful and articulate exactly what we mean by what #in this case the difference between victimisation and victim identity and all that #that's all #peace

2 notes · View notes

asunafairywizardessheart · 7 years

Text

To Save Her (Rewritten)

Klaus/Asana

WARNING: VIOLENCE DEPICTED

Summary: Following off Klaus’ unhappy ending, he is distracted with thoughts of going to her home town and facing her but a dark wizard clan he is chasing takes Asana hostage.

This is a rewritten version of the old TO SAVE HER story I had previously posted.

I realised the problem with the old story likely occurred when I was having technical difficulties with Tumblr and my computer. To fix my computer I had to reset my computer to default settings which meant deleting everything off the drives, so I couldn’t go back to the original document I wrote.

So, I rewrote the story so it is different to the old story.

“They escaped again,” a young agent with short brown hair entered the vacant warehouse where the security guard had tipped to the Ministry of the gang they were chasing but had fled the scene before they arrived, “Look for clues, I will inform…Klaus,” he dreaded, something about the man had been off lately making him grumpier than usual to deal with.

Boarding his broom, the agent had not travelled far out of the city where cooped up inside his office, Klaus lacked the motivation to work but he had to complete his tasks or face a long lecture by his boss, who also happened to be his long-serving father or the second-in-command, who happened to be his carefree older brother.

Grumpily, Klaus analysed a map sprawled out across his desk with pins marking the places the dark wizards he was hunting had been too. As he did, the young agent who had the job of informing Klaus of their failure to capture the wizards, nervously knocked on his open door, “Sir?” his voice was soft, his composure stifling at Klaus’ tall and gallant figure.

“What?” in contrast, Klaus’ voice was sharp and his eyes refused to meet the young agent’s.

“Sir…the dark wizards evaded us again,” he answered, swallowing a lump of his nerves as Klaus pierced his famous violet glare at him.

“Then why are you standing here telling me this when you should be gathering evidence or talking to witnesses?” Klaus grumbled, “Any small clue you can find will help us catch these murderers.”

“Yes, right away, sir,” the young agent made a move to leave the office.

However, Klaus called him back, “Oh also,” he spoke loud enough for the man, and those working just outside Klaus’ office to hear him, “If you need to communicate with me, do not leave the crime scene to simply tell to my face the wizards escaped again,” he warned.

“Yes, sorry sir,” quickly, the young man fled to the safety of the elevator doors.

Walking across the room, Klaus closed his door and retreated to the tanned-coloured office chair made of cushioning leather. His porcelain tea cup filled with his favourite brew of black tea had gone cold as he spent time trying to think in the minds of those he’s chasing to counteract their steps, but they were smart not to leave a recognisable track.

Wiping any place clean of their magical residue, they couldn’t turn up any names of interests and careful not to show their faces, they stuck to the paddocks and fields or blended with the crowds of people in the city to remain hidden. During attacks, they wore masks and used magic to disguise their voices to shield their identity while carrying out their mission, taking valuables and money on the way. They called themselves the Soul Takers Clan, radicals who believe in pure magic and violently murder or kidnap non-magic users or half-blood wizards to preach the value of pure magic.

Rubbing his hands down his face and then cupping his head between his hands, he peered down at a small photo in a silver frame on his desk. He was standing next to the girl who got away, wearing his Prefect’s uniform and forcing a smile while her brunette hair flowed gracefully around her face and she wore the merriest pink smile as Amelia took a photo marking the day where she should have become an official student.

“Hm, time flies,” his eyes fixated on her beautiful round eyes and the smile he fell in love with, only his heart twitched in agony at the memory of her abandoning him as he waited for her to return to his office, three years had passed since that day, “Why didn’t you just come back to the office? We could have worked something out,” he whispered the same question he had been asking for the last three years as she ran away.

He wondered if she knew how much it had hurt him that she had run away like that or how every day he longed to see her again? Being a certified wizard and not wishing to find employment at the academy which now reminded him of his only love, he joined the Ministry, using his knowledge in dark magic to combat it under the authority of his father, though occasionally assisting wizard knights in combat training.

On the tenth floor of the extravagant building, he shared an office with his older brother but he was in a meeting long with his father and a few other members of the Ministry, unhappy these criminals have not yet been captured and his team had no suspects to question. It was like the Ministry to resolve these problematic issues quickly, especially when the media hounded around the investigation like dogs fighting over a juicy bone, wanting the same piece of meat as the others.

His mind shouldn’t be spacing out over a girl who had broken his heart three years ago, but her running away was the first time he had felt severe heart-break and it made him an even more difficult person, that infamous violet stare and brutal tongue plunging intimidation into the eyes of those who stood before him. Though, Klaus could never forget how she stood up to him, how she had broken through his walls and touched his heart, the flaming love he felt for her still burning as bright as it did in those thirteen days he knew her, like an eternal flame with no way to extinguish it, love was not emotion easily switched off.

Turning his gaze to the her the photo immortalising her young face, he wondered how much she must have changed and wondered if she had met someone new in the three years they had not seen each other. She’s an attractive girl who has likely matured into her beauty, and with the kindest and gentlest soul and infectious smile, any man would be a fool not to fall in love with her. Then, he glanced at the flip calendar beside the framed photo with the number ‘23’ circled with a red pen.

“I will see you soon, Bunnyhead,” he muttered in the silent room with no other sound but the noises of working employees muffled by the walls and door separating him from his colleagues and the ticking clock on the adjacent wall by his brother’s desk.

Turning his gaze to the calendar on his desk, he had a date marked in red pen. ‘23’ was circle but the date was three weeks away. It would mark the day he began his holidays and the day he would find the courage to travel to her mountainside home and fulfil his promise of chasing after her. “I will see you soon, Bunnyhead,” he whispered to the picture on his desk. The circled date marking the day he would use his holidays to finally get the answers to his one question, “Why didn’t you just come back to the office, we could have worked something out?” he sighed, reclining back in his chair as he refocused his brain on the case, he would be going nowhere until these criminals were caught.

Inhaling a deep breath, the smell of tea clouded the air around him, and his thoughts drifted back to the first cup of tea he shared with her, the fragrance of black tea transformed into the aromatic scent of Assam. They learnt more about each other in that office, these days occupied by his younger brother. Another twist of pain caused agony to his heart as these memories, as vivid like it happened only days ago, tormented him, but why did he have to think about it now when he should be concentrating on the case at hand.

“Concentrate Klaus,” he encouraged himself to think about the case, it needed to be his top priority, but it was hard to concentrate knowing in three weeks he would come face-to-face with the girl he loved, and perhaps his behaviour stemmed from some anxiety he refused to show. Again, he found himself thinking of all the possible scenarios that would play out when he shows up on her door step.

His lips tugged into a grin as he imagined the cute look on her face, not noticing his door flinging open and two men walked through his office. They were both tall, but one had golden locks and a youthful face and the other had blonde hair which had started to grey in his older years. The older gentleman had an authoritative stride and the other kept his posture straight and his steps were fast.

“How do they expect us to fight an enemy who keep themselves concealed?” the younger one had a slight temper as he crowed angrily and walked over to the kettle to boil water to brew a cup of coffee, his voice clear and smooth in his youth.

“I have been working on a magical tool to help us in this case,” the older man looked to Klaus, raising an eyebrow at the weird grin he was wearing, and back to the younger man boiling water in the kettle, his voice deeper and stern, “Is your brother broken?” he suddenly asked, waving his hand in front of Klaus to grab his attention.

Grabbing a ball of rubber bands tied together from his desk, the younger man threw it lightly at Klaus and it landed on the top of his head, “Ouch!” it snapped Klaus from his daze sharply and he growled at the younger man but older than him by a few years, “What are you a child, Julius?!”

“Listen when our father is speaking to you,” Julius refuted him.

“May I ask why you are grinning like a fool, son?” the older man in the room was Walter Goldstein, Klaus’ father, boss and a long-serving field wizard in the Ministry, where he held a chief position, though with two sons under his command he always remained their father first and their superior second.

Klaus stared up at him and answered, “…Just thinking…about someone,” he averted his gaze with a slight pink tinge in his cheeks, too embarrassed to admit he was daydreaming about a girl.

“You mean, that girl who stoned your heart?” Julius questioned, an amused smile curling across the man’s face, certainly more aloof in character than his two brothers.

It was a weird question to ask since Klaus had not once mentioned Asana to his eldest brothers or his parents, only Elias knew because he was there, and he made Elias swear not to mention anything to the rest of the family because he did not want to give them the ammunition to tease him, Julius, especially, would never let him live it down.

“I’m going to kill him,” Klaus muttered knowing Elias must have said something, not sure who he told first for it to have spread to everyone in his family.

Walter chuckled, “Now, do not resort to violence Klaus. Elias was only concerned for your emotional and mental health that he felt necessary for us to know why you have been a giant, grumpy pain in the rear more than usual,” his father told him the truth, “Why do you feel the need to keep these things from your mother and I?”

“I am a grown man, I don’t need my parents to hold my hand,” Klaus’ words were harsh in response, “Also, it’s my personal business,” his eyes twitched with agitation and his face went from a pink-tinge to a darker shade of red.

“She must be some kind of woman for you to be hung up on her for three years,” Julius commented, “Love’s a bitch, it hurts, but never thought you would fall this hard for anybody. Even after she abandoned you and broke your heart.”

“Language, Julius,” Walter said as his son brewed a cup of coffee.

Klaus shrugged, “I love her, and I always will.”

Walter’s life experience was far greater than his young sons’ and remembered his first heart break at the hands of an ex-girlfriend, a year before he met their mother, and was believer in true love, despite his stern and realist personality.

“To be young and in love,” he smirked and rambled, “A feeling felt in many ways and can happen at any moment, possibly when you least expect it. It can be a cruel torture and pure bliss, it can bring down the toughest men and women and it can also become your greatest strength in the face of adversaries. It can’t be persuaded not even by magic and, depending if it is true, when lost, can guide the way.”

Klaus and Julius traded a glance, their father saying something their mother would say, but they never knew he was quite the philosopher when it came to matters of the heart, “Since when do you believe in true love?” Klaus suddenly asked.

“Because, my true love has stayed by my side through sadness and happiness, blessed my life with three handsome and smart sons and is always waiting up for me to greet me when I return home from this depressing job,” he smiled down at his son, “Now, back to the case at hand,” his wrinkled hand disappeared into his pocket.

“That’s right, you said you made a magic tool to help us catch these criminals, right?” Julius remembered his father saying so before Klaus’ issues had them going off track, and carrying his cup of coffee, he leaned against his brother’s desk.

“Correct, I had Elias do some research for me,” Walter pulled out a crystal and placed it on the desk, “Simply, he researched the elements the tool we invented to collect magical residue in high volumes and research a way for that same tool to collect smaller amounts of magical residue.”

Klaus pinched his eyebrows together, “How is this going to help us? I mean, they wipe the scene clear of any residue.”

“Not true, magical residue will linger if you have used it until the air dissipates it,” Walter argued, and it was a textbook fact that a wizard’s energy lingered where they had last used it until it wears off naturally, “Knowing this rule, Elias used a stronger and larger crystal and fused it with the Tears of Undine and a person’s magical residue to create a persona mirror which could reveal where they are in the kingdom.”

Julius inspected the crystal his father had removed from his pocket, “Is this it?”

“No, Elias is bringing the finished product here in person.”

“So, how did he manage to make a tool to collect residue and to be able to find criminals far away?” Klaus was interested because this could be his little brother’s mark on the magical tool making world, a sense of proudness overwhelmed him.

“Relentless research is what I am hearing from Headmaster Randolph and a lot of trial and errors,” Walter explained, “He’s been working on this project for a while now and we might be the first people to use it.”

Julius smiled proudly, “He’s come a long way,” he commented and echoed Klaus’ thoughts, “If his invention is successful, this might be his first big magic tool he’s made.”

“I might have some competition after all,” no one was prouder than Walter, “Let’s hope his invention helps us.”

“For it to work, won’t you need to find some residue?” Klaus wondered.

“Already have a sample inside the crystal. I went to the most recent crime scene and collected what I could before it vanished.”

“What if this residue does not belong to any of the thieves we are looking for?” Julius asked.

“It might give us a witness at least, depending if they are on the Ministry’s list.”

“How long until Elias arrives here?”

“I believe he’s on the train here now.”

Looking at the map, they worked together to get inside the minds of the people they were chasing, not foreseeing how personal taking down these villainous radicals would become, especially to Klaus.

“You can’t go back to the warehouse,” a man with short brown hair met with the radicals on the outskirts of the city among the shrubbery, where their meeting wouldn’t be seen by several eyes, “I don’t know where you will go because you Klaus Goldstein on your trail, and he’s good at tracking.”

“Klaus Goldstein, huh?” the man he was speaking to wore a mask and his voice was changed using a potion to conceal his identity from the agent, “He’s becoming quite the problem. I suppose I should be thanking you for leading them astray with your false sightings but what is it you want from us? We murder people and you are helping us.”

Scratching the back of his head, where he had neatly shaved his brown hair from his neck, the same agent who had met with Klaus earlier had an agenda all his own, “Because…I need you to kill someone,” the agent replied and the masked man’s eyes widened.

“We have a political plan here, we aren’t assassins.”

As far as the agent was concerned the group of radicals owed him for risking his own flesh in helping them evade Klaus’ hands, “I could just tell Klaus where you are and he will deploy the knights and many other powerful wizards to stop you. If that’s not enough, I also know where your main hideout is, you should be careful where you speak about your business, in the woods anyone could hear you.”

“You have guts threatening me young man.”

The young man frowned and gave him a glare, “It’s not an empty threat either, besides, after all the innocent lives you have taken, why should this life be any different.”

“Can’t argue with that,” the leader of the radicals clicked his tongue, “Who is it you want to kill?”

Pulling out a photograph, there was a face of a young girl on the front, “Her,” she was stunningly gorgeous and the leader of the radicals raised his eyebrows.

“She’s a gorgeous thing, why would you want to waste such a beauty?”

“Because, Klaus Goldstein killed my brother and it’s time he lost someone important to him,” the young agent said, “Her name is Asana Way, she’s the only wizard in her village of Reitz. I want to make him fall to his knees and understand the pain of losing someone so important you can’t bring them back no matter how hard you wish.”

“This is perfect,” an idea sparked in his twisted mind and the agent paid him with a pocketful of golden coins, “Does it matter how we do it?”

“No, I don’t care so long as she dies and I can witness Klaus suffering everyday as I do for my brother. This is, call it a deposit, do the job right and I will pay you handsomely.”

That’s where they departed ways and the leader looked down at the picture in his hands. She was stunning and cheerful but with her ties to Klaus, a common enemy between himself and the young agent, she would be the perfect target to force Klaus into retreating. He wouldn’t kill her, not yet.

“Gents, pack your things,” he called out to his large gang, “We are going to the town of Reitz to pay a visit to Klaus Goldstein’s woman. When we get there, no harm is to come to this one, we will use her to control the Goldstein but the rest of her village and their magicless people can burn.”

Darkness fell across the kingdom as the clan moved from the outskirts of the city and ascended into the moonlit sky to advance onto the small village hidden in the valleys of the mountains in the deep countryside.

Small streams of hot air flowed off mashed potato and meatloaf on her plate. With small bites, she caught up on the day's news from the morning paper. It felt strange to be reading the morning paper at night, but she had a busy morning doing her rounds around the farms.

As it has been for a week, the front page covered the Soul Takers Clan and their latest attack on an innocent village. In Reitz, people were worried the murderous radicals would storm their tiny mountainside village, turning their lush green meadows red with their blood.

However, they expected Asana's presence would be enough to protect them from attack. ‘They're after non-wizards and half wizards’ they would whisper, but Asana was one person and unaware of their power. While she was no longer a clumsy wizard, she was not the most powerful either or knew how to fight that well, her speciality were taming animals and creatures and medicine.

As she read about the recent attack, her heart ached for those poor people who suffered, especially the children caught in the tragedy. “I hope the Ministry finds them soon,” she sighed.

Reading further down the article a recent picture of Klaus was published, he was the leading officer in pursuit of the Soul Takers Clan but the article about him was not positive. The reporter painted him in a negative light because the complexity of the case meant he had no suspects in custody or any leads to catch the criminals.

“Klaus Goldstein has studied dark magic, how do we know he's not aiding these radicals on their mission for a pure magic world?” the question at the end of the article made her angry, and she threw the paper to the floor.

“Rubbish!” she announced passionately to no one, “He would never align himself with dark wizards! They have no idea who he is!” suddenly, she lost her appetite at the thought of the one man she ever truly loved and those sharp pains in her heart brought tears to her eyes once again.

Like Klaus' heart, her heart ached with regret and loneliness as the accusations made against him caused her to relive those thirteen days she had fallen for him, and in the three years, without speaking to him, her unconditional love for him had not faded.

Back then, she was naive and had convinced herself she was not worthy to stand at his side. Her failure ignited a strong insecurity within her, and she ran away, afraid her failings as a wizardess would hinder his bright future. She left the academy, without a note or a personal goodbye, and returned to her cosy cottage where she continued to train hard to become a stronger wizardess, so one day she could face him as someone worthy of him.

She ordered every reputable text book on magic, even offensive magic, and practised day and night, sometimes without eating or sleeping, until she crammed the fundamentals of magic into her head. Every time she got a spell wrong, she could hear his beautiful voice scolding her, driving her motivation to become better.

Naturally, neighbours worried about her but they let her be but, in hindsight, those restless days was her working through her own heartbreak and the guilt she harboured knowing she had hurt him. Those restless days was her desperation to become a better wizardess for him, though after three years she'd understand if he never took her back and it was likely some other woman stood at his side.

She looked across at a jar of money on a dustless chestnut shelf nearby the kitchen. Her veterinary clinic was keeping her busy and bringing in a stable income that when she opened she had been saving to travel to the city to see him again. She had more than enough but she would have no idea what to say to him or even if he wanted to see her. Also, the thought of seeing another woman at his side made her heart ache.

“Stay safe Klaus,” she whispered into the air, knowing how stressed he must be and the danger he must be facing in pursuit of these radicals, “Maybe...I can come see you after the case is resolved,” she said out loud, like he would somehow hear her voice.

She sighed and her dinner had gone cold, not that she was hungry now. Washing her plate in the sink, her body began feeling tired from her busy day at the clinic though she had enough energy for a quick shower. As the water rained down on her body though, she felt heavier with tiredness and started to feel uneasy. She hadn’t realised it yet, but it was a sign she was going to be in for a sleepless night.

Wrapping a towel around her body, she dried herself off in her bedroom and changed into a satin nightdress with thin straps keeping the garment on her body. As she changed, her vision began to blur and her body felt like it was being pinned down by a weight she didn’t have the strength to move or speak, “What’s happening to me?” She asked and started to see Klaus’ face.

Collapsing onto the bed, she fell asleep and strong visions plagued her mind where her subconscious senses were consumed with the pain of being tortured and the smell of fire and blood in the distance fragranced the air: she could see masked men tormenting her and torturing her and could hear the cries of her village in the distance. She tossed and turned violently and her body became drenched with a sweat conjured by her nightmare. The only familiar face she saw, and the one she wanted to see the most in that moment, was Klaus’.

“Klaus!” bolting upright, she screamed his name into the silent and dark house, her breathing hard and shallow and her nightdress and sheets dampened by the layer of cold sweat covering her body. With no one to hear her, she held her blankets close and checked the time, it was one in the morning, but her scream had travelled further than she thought.

Miles away in the city, the Goldstein residence was shrouded in darkness as the family caught some solid hours of sleep. Klaus, Julius and Walter were exhausted after their eventful day chasing these dark wizards and fighting off the media, and Elias had returned home later than expected after the train ran late, but he would show them his magic tool invention in the morning.

As they slept, Klaus tossed and turned violently too, the silk sheets on his bed twisting with his movements and coming out from underneath the mattress where they sheet was tucked.

It was as though his mind had been connected to hers, but he couldn’t see any visions, he just heard screaming and he could smell fire and blood with a terrible and painful feeling in the pit of his stomach eating at him. Then, he heard it, “Klaus!” he shot upright with a cold sweat glistening across his brow in the moonlight which shined into his room, her voice rippling through his head.

“Asana!” he shouted her name as he sat up with an explosion of wind magic emitting from his body. He had unleashed an uncontrolled primitive wind spell just by calling her name, flipping the tables in his chambers over and any unweighted papers flying across the floor.

Next to his chambers, Julius and Elaine were abruptly awoken when they heard the loud crash of his furniture and Klaus panicked scream. Without thinking, Julius leapt from his bed with Elaine right behind him as they hurried to his chambers, “Klaus?”

Barging into his brother’s room, Julius turned on the lights and found his tables flipped onto their sides, papers strewn across the ground and Klaus staring into thin air with his violet eyes as wide as saucers. “Klaus?” Julius approached him.

“Is he okay?” Elaine kept her distance but her voice was gentle with worry for a man she accepted as a brother, though they were the same age.

Sweat stung his eyes as it dropped from his forehead and Julius noticed the wet patches of sweat in his white night-shirt. Klaus felt his heart racing as his breathing was rapid, but he couldn’t shake the terror he was feeling, after all he’d recognise her voice anywhere. He didn’t know why, but he could feel her fear and it was connected to the Soul Takers Clan.

Leaping out of bed, he raced to the library where they had been working on trying to calculate the Clan’s next target. “Klaus?” Julius raced after him, worried since his brother was clearly bothered by something, which was unlike him.

Turning on the lights to the library, the same map they had been working with at the Ministry was pinned to a chip-board wall. Every village and every town in the boundaries of the kingdom were named, with different coloured lines marking large rivers to slim creeks and streams, railroads and back roads to major highways.

Red pins marked the towns which had been attacked whereas the blue pins marked the places where the Ministry had received calls they had seen the criminals. Klaus knew their mission was to cleanse the world of non-magic people and half-wizards, pathing the way for a pure race of wizards.

Tracing his finger along the map in line with the red pins, he realised he had missed an obvious pattern, “How could I miss this?” he cursed at himself for not being able to focus his attention on the case, lately his mind had been thinking about the date he would come face-to-face with her again.

Jittering around the room, Klaus paced around with agitation in his steps, “Klaus?” Julius came to stand by his side and gripped his shoulders, “Hey, pull yourself together and tell me what happened?”

While Julius dealt with his brother, Elaine had intercepted Walter at Klaus’ chamber doors and pointed him to the library, along with Elias too. He didn’t know how to explain it but he heard her, “Let me go,” Klaus shrugged him away, “I’m not going to let anything happen to her.”

“Her?” Julius was confused and heard footsteps coming through the door, “What do you mean you won’t let anything happen to her? You are not making any sense.”

“Listen! They are following the Illgatto Mountains!” he pointed at the red pins and made his brother realise the pattern they had missed, “They are attacking towns and villages within and at the bases of the mountains because this is where they are more likely to encounter entire populations of non-magic users or half-wizards, a city is too complex.”

As he pointed it out, Julius and Walter realised the pattern as he explained it, “How could I be so stupid to miss something so obvious! Now, she’s in danger, I can feel it!”

“What are you talking about?” Julius didn’t know who he was talking about, “Calm down.”

“How can I?” his violet pupils were filled with pain, anger and sheer panic, “She screamed, I heard her and I can’t do anything to save her!”

“Who are you talking about?”

Elias answered Julius question, “There’s only one girl he would ever get this worked up about. But, how did you hear Asana from here when she lives in Reitz?”

“I don’t know,” Klaus snarled, “All I know is I was sleeping and all I could hear was screaming and the smell of fire and blood then Asana calling my name. That’s when I woke up with a terrible feeling and knew this clan was connected to her.”

Julius analysed the map and found where the blue pins conflicted with Klaus’ focus on the red pins, “Hey Dad, now that Klaus mentions it, the calculations don’t make sense. It took our agents six hours to be notified of the attack and arrive on the scene but then an half an hour later they were spotted six hundred and thirty-five miles from the scene.”

“That would be impossible by car and if they flew they would have expensed a lot of magical energy with little time to wipe the scene clean of their residue,” Elias agreed.

“Someone has deliberately thrown us off the trail,” Walter confirmed, “Can’t believe they blinded us like that!”

Tracing the base line of the mountains, the last city they had attacked was the major centre of Wile City, “The last city they attacked was Wile City, so if they are attacking villages and towns along the Illgatto Mountain Range then the next town in the firing line is…Reitz,” Julius remembered Elias had mentioned the village’s name.

“What if we are too late?” a shiver ran down Klaus’ spine, “Why else would I have heard her?”

“Don’t jump to conclusions, Klaus,” Walter put his hand on his son’s shoulder, “Does she by chance possess an ability to see into the future? Time magic, perchance?”

Even though Klaus had not seen her for years, he remembered every detail about the adventure they had gone through to stop Azusa from sacrificing her pure heart to the darkness and recalled her rare magical gifts.

“…She can use an ability called Foresight. Why does that matter?”

“Because, only a strong and powerful wizard with an ability to use to use high-level foresight and time magic can communicate with people far away through dreams. It takes a lot of concentration but if they focus on that person’s face, it’s possible, perhaps unaware, she communicated to you. Though, it takes amazing power to also share whatever she was seeing,” he explained, “Even if you didn’t see anything but she connected her mind and soul with yours, she must be exceptionally gifted.”

He hadn’t seen her for three years and couldn’t confidently say if she had become any more powerful since she left him. “…What are you saying?”

“She gave us time, but probably not a lot of it,” Walter said, “Deploy wizard knights to the town of Reitz immediately,” he ordered Julius to gather the knights, “Have them use the Transporter.”

“I want to go to!” Klaus demanded his brother not leave without him, “I need to save her!”

With the speed of a vanishing winged-rabbit, Julius and Klaus dressed quickly and left for the Ministry, Klaus using his communicator to call an urgent deployment meeting and to be at the Ministry building in twenty minutes sharp. Walter powerless to stop Klaus from leaving, “I could be wrong too…,” he sighed, he was only hypothesising with an eighty-five percent certainty they had time to counter the Clan.

“Dad, once it comes to Asana, nothing else matters,” Elias whispered, “Say, hold on to that crystal, we might need to use it before too long.”

“If we use it now we can tell how far way they are from attacking the town,” Walter argued.

“There must be another reason why he connected to Asana like that,” he felt something was strange, “Foresight often comes when whatever will happen directly involves the wizard. Sure, her town is one thing, but that’s not powerful enough to connect to Klaus, right?”

His question made Walter think and Elias had a good point, “Listen, while you are here, and I hate to ask this of you, but could you investigate whoever threw us off the trail?”

“Of course, but don’t use the crystal yet.”

“Elias, I don’t even know how to use it yet,” Walter had only heard the theory of his son’s invention but was yet to see a demonstration, “Go now, I will give you my key to the Ministry, and be careful.”

Since she couldn’t sleep, not without those nightmares consuming her mind, she tried to piece together what they could mean, unaware she had already called Klaus’ help. With no thoughts coming to her mind, she decided to bake some chocolate muffins in her kitchen to take her mind off her stress.

“What does all this mean?” she asked as she stirred the butter and sugar together, “Okay, next are the eggs and milk followed by the flour and cocoa,” she didn’t need a recipe since these were popular in the town and people ordered batches of her baked goods, though this batch would be for her.

As she stirred the ingredients together, the house completely silent with the town as her neighbours slept through these early hours of the morning, she didn’t count on an intruder opening her door without so much as a sound.

Though, she did see a shadowed figure move across her front window from where she stood in the kitchen of the open planned house. The knob on her front door rattled as whoever was on the other side checked to see if it was locked. Her heart jumped with fear and she dropped her mixing bowl to run to her bedroom to grab her wand but she was stopped by the intruder who had walked silently through her back door.

She was at the receiving end of a magic wand but she attempted to retreat backwards, hoping to escape the other way. However, a gloved hand quickly covered her mouth and the other man, holding the wand at her, bound her hands and feet together with an unbreakable chain bind. As they tightened, the sharp edges stabbed into her skin and she cried out with painful muffled screams.

“Don’t try to move too much or fight back,” the man grabbing her warned her, his voice had no emotion or feeling, but it was cold as his disgusting breath ghosted up her neck, “Those binds have sealed your magic and any resistance will only make the binds more painful.”

She could feel her own terrified breathing huffing through her nose onto the gloved hand covering her mouth because she had no idea what they were going to do to her or why. The metal spikes stabbing into her ankles and wrists forming tears in her eyes as the pain shot through her body. There was no point in screaming out to her neighbours because there was no way they could fight two dark wizards.

“Is this the one?” suddenly, she heard another man’s voice in the store room by the back door, followed by heavy boots padding along the tiles of her kitchen. He walked up to her and stroked her chin, neck and shoulders.

“It’s her boss,” the one who had bounded her hands and feet and kept his wand pointed at her produced a photo to the man who stood before her, uninvitingly stroking his gloved finger across her exposed flesh since she had not changed out of her nightdress.

Taking the photo, the man held it up against her, “This must be a younger photo of you, my you look more beautiful now then you do in this photo,” he chuckled, “Burn the village and kill anyone who is not a pure wizard. This one is coming with us.”

Hearing those orders, her eyes widened and she screamed, pointlessly, into the hand which kept her silent, and tried to kick and punch her way out of the binds concealing her magic. “I warned you,” the man holding her flicked his wand and the metal spikes slowly deepened, the unbearable pain made her scream loudly.

“Let’s go,” the man hoisted her up over her shoulder.

“Put me down!” she yelled as the man removed his hand from her mouth and as she heard screaming from her neighbours and smelt smoke, “No! Don’t do this!” she begged.

“But, I must,” the man the other two had called boss said, “You though, you are pure,” he said and yanked her from the man, “You help burn this village to the ground and then return to base.”

His grab was not gentle as he squeezed her tightly to prevent her escape as he mounted his broom. “Get any clever ideas and I will drop you,” he threatened and ascended to the skies, giving her a bird’s eye view of her village going up in smoke and some of her neighbours being killed.

“No!” she screamed and was powerless to stop them, tears fell from her eyes in a torrent, “You monster!” she punched the man in the back and he grabbed a fistful of her hair and held her.

“You don’t listen, do you,” he said, watching her legs kick as he dangled her in the air, “Now, I am supposed to kill you but I have other plans for you. Klaus Goldstein, he cares about you and he’s my enemy, which makes you the perfect tool to get to him.”

Her body trembled with fear but she didn’t want to hold onto this man, she hated him. “Klaus…will never chose me over everything else,” she declared and cried as her village burned in the distance, “You’re a monster, he will stop you.”

“Well then, shall we put him to the test?” he chuckled and flew faster through the air to reach their base. It didn’t take long for him to reach an abandoned barn and farmstead in the middle of a brown field of grass nor for his crew to join him.

Made of wood, the abandoned barn had several holes in its roof and the straw scattering the floor felt like a bunch of sharp sticks across a forest floor. Being bare footed and dressed in a thin nightdress, she felt cold and the ends of the straw stabbed at her feet, she could feel bruises forming.

The metal spikes stabbing through her wrists and ankles to conceal her powers throbbed painfully. She felt scared as the masked men of the infamous Clan surrounded her and laughed but she refused to meet their gaze. But, the boss of this clan clenched her chin between his fingers tightly, hurting her, “Ah!” she winched in pain.

“I suppose we should let Klaus know we have you,” he smiled and her gaze turned to a man holding a visual recording magic tool, “What to do though?” his smile was sadistic as was his threats.

Klaus and Julius gave instructions to the wizard knights and accompanied them to the village by using the Transporter, a magic tool which teleported people to far places without having to expense to much magical energy. Joining them was Walter.

“Elias will investigate whoever deliberately threw us off the trail,” he informed them as he arrived at the office.

“Alright, we need to prepare ourselves for a fight,” Klaus explained, “We believe they are attacking villages and towns within and at the base of the Illgatto Mountain Range.”

“Our priority is to protect the civilians and make sure they are not caught in the cross-fire,” Julius added, “You have permission to use whatever is necessary to stop these criminals. We will use the Transporter to get there faster.”

“Are there any questions before we discuss the strategy?” Klaus asked.

No one asked a question and Klaus proceeded to explain the plan of attack. Separating his agents and knights, Klaus’ strategy was an impromptu one and as he finished an owl flew through the office, dropping a package on the fire escape outside the window.

Walter collected it as Klaus finalised his strategy and Julius set the coordinates on the dial of the Transporter so they could, hopefully, intercept the Clan before they attacked, but Klaus felt uneasy that bad feeling still stirring in his stomach.

Collecting the package, Walter saw no address on it, only ‘KLAUS GOLDSTEIN’ written in a bright red substance. He took the package back to Klaus, worry settling in his heart as he handed the package to him, “Your name is written in blood,” he had been a wizard long enough to know what blood looked like, even on a sheet of paper.

“…Blood…,” he felt his heart sink and held his wand. Unsure of what to expect, he cast a spell over the package to analyse it. There was no threat to his own safety, but he was too afraid to open the package.

Julius turned to Vincent, “You lead your knights and the agents, report what you see. We will join you soon,” he gave his orders and Vincent nodded affirmatively and lead his knights and the agents through the portal.

“Do you think it’s from them?” Elias wondered.

“…I think so,” Julius answered him and waited patiently for Klaus to open the package.

“Dad, give me the crystal,” Elias held out his hand and Walter pulled the crystal from his pocket. He had brought the sealed wooden chest with him and prepared to use it to find the owner of the magic, hoping his father had collected the residue of the one of the criminals, if not, he could easily jump through the portal and collect another sample.

From the blood on the package, he could feel it belonged to her. With no more hesitation, he unsealed the back and reached into the pouch of the yellow only for his fingers to meet with a thick and warm wet substance. Bringing his fingers out of the pocket, he found the tips of his white flesh were covered in blood with strands of brown hair trapped within the sticky blood.

He felt like being sick and felt faint since he recognised her beautiful soft brown hair anywhere. With his hand holding the end of the envelope, he felt something hard inside the packaging but he was scared to know what could be waiting for him, anger burning in his heart.

At the bottom of the envelope was an amber disc from a magical recording device and a letter, the corners of the white paper also dyed in the stains of blood. “I don’t like where this is going,” Julius muttered.

“Are you sure you want to watch this?” Walter asked and looked behind him at Elias. His son concentrated his magical energy to transfer the residue between the mirror and a map he had created for his three-piece invention, and it was working.

Klaus had no clue what was waiting for him on the visual but he had to play it, he knew they had Asana and they had no idea what a huge mistake they had made. Enchanting the amber disc, it floated up in the air and a clear visual was produced.

“Klaus Goldstein!” a man’s voice was disguised with magic and his face was masked, “I think I have someone quite special to you,” the visual turned to Asana, she had blood running from her wrists and ankles where they were bound with metal chains, blood ran from her shoulders down her arms and there were bruises, gashes and lacerations across her face and abdomen. If Klaus was not angry before, he was now.

“Sorry, she’s not looking the best,” the man mocked him, “However, if you want to save her there is something you can do about it,” he moved to pick Asana up off her feet by grabbing her small neck with one hand and lifting her high enough that her feet were moved off the ground.

Holding her in a headlock, he dug his wand into her neck while tightening his grip around her neck, stealing her ability to breath. Sounds of her choking and gasping for air had Klaus’ blood boiling as he remembered the shape of the man’s darkened eyes in the face of the camera, “Stop investigating us or this pretty little thing will never take another breath.”

That’s where the communication ended and Klaus’ eyes had turned dark too. It was a look his brothers and father had never seen him wear. Elias had finished his spell and the map revealed the location of one of the men and saw he was in a barn watching the man trying to feed Asana with bread, but she refused, spitting in his face.

“Found them,” Elias smiled, “They are at an old barn and farmstead in the mountains. He’s watching that guy trying to feed her.”

In a low growl and gripping his wand, Klaus’ smirk was terrifying, “What are the coordinates?” his voice was dark and it made Elias flinch in fear.

“…F-Fifteen…miles west of Reitz,” he handed Julius the numbers to set the Transporter to take him straight to where Asana was being held against her will.

“We will come with you,” Walter said, referring to Julius and Elias, “There’s no way you can handle that many on your own.”

“Don’t underestimate me, Dad.”

With the Transporter set, Julius sent a message to Vincent to inform him where they were going and required assistance when they were free, sending him the coordinates in a magic note as they arrived at the old barn.

Klaus could hear her screaming and he was ready to storm the building to save her but his father brought him back down, “I know you want to save her, but you will be dead before you reach that door. Open your eyes and pay attention!” he slapped his son across the head.

She screamed again, only this time it was louder than before. Before his father and brothers could stop him, Klaus sprinted towards the warehouse. “Klaus!” Walter called him back but his son didn’t listen, firing magic towards those who attempted to intercept him, “Good grief!” Walter, Julius and Elias had no choice but to run after him, providing him cover.

“She must be something,” Julius commented.

Bursting through the warehouse doors, Klaus withdraw a magical staff full of wind magic and knocked several men opposing him on their backs. He was driven and when he reached the man piercing a hot wire into her open wounds, he quickly brought him to the ground, with his brothers and father surrounding the other men. Straddling over the man’s waist, Klaus didn’t hold back on making sure he knew how angry he was, magic flying from the wands of Walter, Julius and Elias, clearly stronger wizards then their enemies. Asana couldn’t believe he had come to his rescue, “Klaus…,” happiness overflowed from her heart.

“Asana!” rushing to her side was Elias, he unshackled the chains around her wrists and ankles, “Can you walk?”

She nodded and he helped her up but she fell right back down, “Ow!” she was in too much pain to stand and felt pathetic as usual. Suddenly, another group of wizards burst through the barn and they were dressed in white.

“Vincent, take them into custody,” Walter ordered.

The Clan did not try to fight and surrendered to the Ministry. Prying Klaus off the leader, Julius encouraged Klaus to go to Asana, where Elias was healing her wounds but she was in tears.

“Hey, you’re okay,” Elias tried to comfort her but her tears wouldn’t stop.

Suddenly, she felt her body leave the ground and into a familiar pair of arms. She had no reason to be afraid of these arms, especially after her ordeal, they cradled her gently and warmed her body. His scent of tea of books filled her nostrils as she buried her head into his chest, her tears not for her suffering but those in her village.

“…Please…tell me…,” she sniffed, “…some of them…are alive.”

“…I’m not sure,” Klaus replied as he carried her out of the old barn, “I am glad I came to rescue you. Seems like you have become stronger since the last time I saw you.”

She cried harder, “…I’m not strong…I couldn’t protect my village.”

“That’s not true,” Klaus sat down with her, “…I’m going to heal you now.”

Withdrawing his wand, he calmly chanted a wind healing spell to treat her wounds followed by a water healing spell. Unlike a moment ago, he was completely calm and relaxed knowing she was safely in his arms. “You led us to these criminals, you should be proud.”

Outside, the sun had started to rise over the mountains in the east and a light breeze had a chilly bite making her body shiver. “Oh, here,” Klaus took off his jacket and wrapped it around her shoulders, and things became awkward, “…This was not the way I wanted us to reunite.”

“…Neither did I,” still shaken, she didn’t understand how or why Klaus managed to find her, “…H-How…did I lead you here? I didn’t reach out to you?” she asked, wrapping his jacket around her shoulders tighter.

“…Do you remember having a foresight dream and you called out to me?”

She was stunned he knew that, “...I only had that dream a few hours ago. I could see fire and smell blood and these men attacking and torturing me, then all I saw was you. So, I shouted your name…and…,” she pieced together her dream, still in shock.

“Take it easy,” he hugged her as her body began to tremble, “Well, did you know those who possess a natural ability of foresight or time magic have the potential to communicate to another person through their dreams. I don’t think you meant it but you connected to me, I couldn’t see anything but I heard you and smelt fire and blood to, that’s how we managed to get here quickly.”

“…I…did that?”

“Your stronger than the last time I saw you,” he took in the details of her face up close. As a band of soft yellow sunlight rose higher into the sky, welcoming in the brand-new day, etching the light across her face, he found she was not the teenage girl he had met three years ago but a beautiful woman grown into her features and had become a stronger wizardess.

“…But…I saw them,” she began crying and remembering how useless she was in stopping those wizards destroying her childhood village and murdering the people who became her family, “I was powerless to stop them… I couldn’t protect them, even if I am stronger,” her voice strained as she cried.

Her body fell forward as she collapsed onto her knees but Klaus held her close and let her cry, her tears wetting the fabric of his shirt as the pain of losing those she cared about taking an enormous toll on her heart as nearby those dark wizards were being dragged out of the barn, one-by-one.

Handcuffed, Klaus gave them foul looks as Elias kicked the leader, roughly, “Hey you,” Elias grabbed his attention and pulled down his mask to reveal his identity.

Julius came to his brother’s side and recognised the man, “Figured you might have been behind this, Benedict. My, haven’t you come a long way since our school years.”

“You know him?” Elias questioned his brother.

“Benedict and I were rivals at school,” Julius explained, “We were never friends but during our final year, when I was offered a position at the Ministry over him, he accused the Ministry of being bias towards pure blood wizards over half-wizards.”

Benedict rolled his eyes, “Of course, no one could ever match up to the perfect first-born son of Walter Goldstein. Not only in your veins do you carry the blood of a Goldstein, but your mother’s family are a formidable wizardry family too. I see you met Daddy’s expectations.”

Julius shook his head, “No, I met my own expectations and didn’t let the darkness consume my soul out of pure pettiness over something as trivial as being a pure-blood or half-blood wizard. The Ministry offered you a position in the Knights but you refused.”

“A knight?” he laughed and spat at the unit, “The famous Wizard Knights are nothing more than puppets, deployed to the front lines to protect pure blood wizards like you. I simply did want the Ministry wants, a world full of pure-blood wizards.”

“If that’s the case, then why will you be facing the death penalty for dark crimes against the kingdom in the name of genocide?” Julius refuted, “Whereas I will return home to my wife, make love to her and take on another dark wizard tomorrow.”

Julius knew Elias had been interrogating this Benedict to retrieve information regarding the mole inside the Ministry, the one who had supplied misleading and false tip-offs in a deliberate attempt to obstruct justice. But, the dark wizard laughed.

“You are going down for countless first degree murders using dark magic,” Elias reasoned with him, “Why go down covering for another man’s mistakes when you don’t have to?”

“Maybe, I want to be nice,” Benedict replied and looked over Elias shoulder at the young agent with brown hair, he was shifting uncomfortably as Benedict was pounced on by two Goldstein brothers. Benedict chuckled as the young wizard who had paid him stretched his collar, feeling like he was choking with fear.

Julius followed his eyeline and found the brown-haired wizard turning bright red. Meeting his gaze, the young wizard took his chances and attempted to flee but other agents around him quickly arrested him, “Hurry up and get these criminals out of here,” Julius ordered and they began transporting the criminals back to the headquarters.

Walter kept his distance as he watched Klaus comforting the girl and Elias joined him, “Dad, about the magical tool I made. How do I go about submitting it to the Ministry?”

“Say, you are around the girl’s age and you seem to know her well,” his father was not interested in discussing his magic tool just yet, “I assume you met at the academy?”

“We were in the same class but she was failed to enrol in the academy,” Elias answered and heard Julius approaching to join them, “She was Klaus’ buddy.”

Walter had been speaking to Vincent, receiving a verbal report on the state of the village, “Vincent has told me half of the buildings in her village were burnt to the ground and ten people died. However, most of the villagers survived and she saved them through contacting Klaus in her dreams. She is quite…interesting.”

With thoughts running through his mind, Elias added some extra information, “This is the first time I have seen her since she was at the Academy, but I know she has her moments where she displays amazing powers in dire situations. She seems much stronger now than in those days.”

Crying herself to exhaustion, she passed out from sleep and had a request to ask Elias and carried her in his arms as he approached him, “I need you to do a favour for me?”

“Sure.”

“Go help her village get back on their feet,” unlike his cold-stone voice before, his tone was calm and his gaze soft as he peered down at her face, “Call for medical supplies to treat the wounded, whatever needs to happen to get them on their feet.”

Elias didn't seem any trouble with such a request, “I will gladly help but is she going to be okay?”

“She will be okay,” he smiled at her, “She may have grown up and became a stronger wizard but nothing's really changed. After what's happened here, she just needs to rest in hospital. She's in shock.”

Mounting his broom, Klaus cradled her gently in his arms and kept her warm, the same care as a mother cradling her infant. Brushing her fringe from her eyes, he was reminded of the day she fell asleep in his office and how adorably her cheeks puffed up when she slept.

It was like the three years they hadn't seen each other never occurred, and the love he felt for her overflowed from his heart. Though, once she rested he knew they would need to talk and he wanted those answers, but even if she decided not to pursue a relationship with him, Klaus knew he'd never love another person as he loves her. Thirteen days was all it had taken for her to steal his heart.

A nurse brought Klaus a newspaper as he requested, “Thank you,” Klaus appreciated the favour as he waited by her bed in a private room he had secured for her to rest and allow the magical medicine to completely heal her wounds.

Before he had even unfolded the newspaper, there was a gentle knock at the door. There in the doorway stood his father with a small smile stretching across his face, “She's asleep?”

“Yes, so I will ask you to be as quiet as possible so not to wake her,” Klaus grew defensive, seeing the teasing thoughts crossing his father's mind, “Why are you here?”

“Relax, I have no intentions of teasing you...yet,” his father promised, “Can't guarantee Julius will be as considerate but I was hoping she would be awake because I have news about her village.”

“Are they okay?”

Walter shook his head somewhere between a yes and a no, “...It could have been worse but she saved most of her village with her communication with you. However, where there is loss of life through murder, no one should say it could have been worse.”

Starting to wake up from her exhausted sleep, she turned her head and her limps moved under the blankets of the hospital bed. A wall of midday sunlight streamed through the large square windows, bathing her face as she stirred.

In Walter's hands, he carried a bag of clothes Elias had grabbed from her wardrobe as he checked her property. Thankfully, a protection barrier around the home prevented it being set on fire. Walking deeper into the room, he set the bag on a nearby table.

Her pink eyes fluttered open and she felt a warm hand covering hers, “K-Klaus...,” she recognised his warmth, even asleep, she could feel him next to her. As she stirred, Walter decided to leave the room and give the two a moment alone but he stayed hidden behind the wall so he could listen in.

“Dad, why are you eavesdropping?” Julius asked him.

They drove to the hospital together to speak with the victims of the attack on Reitz and where Elias had transported them to receive the best medical care as per Klaus’ orders. He knew his brother would not be happy if they received anything less than the best care.

“I am not eavesdropping,” Walter stood against the wall, “I am being considerate and giving them space,” of course, Julius saw straight through him.

“Honestly, you can be as nosy as Mother,” Julius chortled, “We have enough statements from the victims of the attack on Reitz, we just need hers to build a case. Though, heaven knows why we are giving them a fair trial when they are guilty.”

Glancing behind his shoulder into the private room, Klaus was patiently waiting for her to wake from her slumber and could reply to Julius implied comment they should be executed without hesitation, “Julius, we are not villainous murderers as they are and the trial serves as a platform to show potential dark wizards and remind the public that justice will be done, fairly and in the name of the law.”

“Yeah, I dare you to say that to Klaus after they nearly killed her.”

Julius glanced into the room and back at his father, watching Klaus bestow the back of her hand with a soft, gentlemanly kiss, “Are you honestly waiting to grab her statement or intent on eavesdropping on your son?”

“Can’t I do both?” he shrugged, “How often do I get to see your brother this besotted?”

Not paying his father and brother any mind, Klaus concentrated on her as she woke up and gently clasped her hand between his, “I’m here, Asana,” he whispered, kissing the back of her delicate and slender hands, “I’m glad you’re safe.”

His words brought a smile to her face as she peered at him through the slightest crack of her opened eyes, slowly widened and coming to her senses as the sleepiness wore off, “Klaus?”

“Shh, don’t strain yourself,” after seeing on the amber disc what she had been through, his voice and grasp of her hand remained as gentle and warm as possible and he didn’t want her to rush, “Take your time to gather your thoughts.”

The man she was seeing in front of her was someone she wanted for such a long time and the tears threatening to fall from her eyes were conjured from her guilt she harboured from hurting him and the love she desperately and unconditionally felt for him, “…I’ve wanted to see you for so long,” she whispered, a single tear drop falling from her left eye.

Klaus brought his thumb to her face and wiped away her tear, “Don’t cry…,” he gently kissed her eyelid, “You have cried too much already and I hate seeing you cry.”

His gentle kiss only produced more tears as she waited so long to feel the warmth from his lips again, “Klaus…,” she felt her heart pounding within her chest as she peered up into his violet eyes and her pulse raced as she felt his hand squeeze hers, “…I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” she desperately apologised, “I’m so, so sorry…I hurt you.”

Klaus supposed it was time to ask the question he had wanted to ask for the last three years and brought his fingers together to flick her on the forehead, “Considering I like the answer you will give me as to why you ran away, I might forgive you.”

She didn’t know how to tell him and, even with the love she had for him, she didn’t deserve his, and would rather he hate her, “…I don’t deserve your forgiveness, Klaus…I hurt you in the cruellest way all because I was a stupid idiot. I would rather you hate me and I suffer alone, knowing you will find another woman who would never hurt you.”

“Do you think an answer like that is going to be enough?” he didn’t accept her excuse, “Tell me the truth, now,” with one hand, he grasped her wrist gently, preventing her escape, and with the other he wiped away her tears with his familiar stare penetrating her teary pink eyes.

She couldn’t bring herself to explain as her eyes were taking in every detail of Klaus, inches separating them, “If you had just come back like I told you to, we could have sorted something out. You broke us apart for three years when we didn’t need to breakup,” his words were harsh but in their proximity, she sensed his pain, the pain she had caused him, more tears flowed from her eyes but Klaus wiped them away, “We could have stayed this close, if you only came back.”

It was hard to breathe with him so close to her and her heart was hurting as he growled his harsh but true words, “…Klaus…”

“I don’t want to hear you say anything but the truth,” positing his index finger under her jaw and his thumb on her chin, he raised her face so their gazes met, “Look me in the eye and tell me why? Why did you leave?”

His hold on her did not hurt but she saw tears in his eyes too and resolved herself to tell him the truth, “…I…,” she didn’t know how to put her feelings into words and felt her guilt and pain torment her heart, “…I wasn’t worthy…,” it was hard to speak as she cried.

She needed a moment to work through her pain to tell him, “…After everything you did for me…I failed you,” tears fell from her eyes as she looked him in the eyes and told him why she left, “…I wasn’t worthy to stand by your side…I wasn’t strong enough to stand with you…,” she tasted the saltiness of her own tears as a waterfall streamed down her face, “If you had to deal with me…teaching me magic…I would only h-hinder your future…so I left.”

“What stupid reason is that?!” he growled at her, “I don’t care about how good you are at magic, that doesn’t matter to me. I thought you understood that! I thought I made myself clear! You didn’t need to leave! You didn’t need to break us up if you just came back to the office!”

She remembered how she fell to the floor of her home as she arrived home from the academy and cried until she passed out there, “I know…I’m s-sorry…,” her words faded as her tears fell harder as his pain churned out some harsh and angry words at her but she endured it, she deserved it.

Klaus let her go and stepped away from her with the room falling silent, except for her sobbing. Instantly, he regretted yelling at her and could feel her tears crashing around him as he let his emotions out, especially after what she had been through with those dark wizards this was stress she didn’t need.

“I’m sorry…I’m so sorry, Klaus,” she pleaded through her hard crying, “I…I didn’t mean to hurt you…I didn’t mean…” her sentence was cut short through her tears.

He didn’t mean to make her cry and stepped closer to her again, “Hey,” his voice was gentle again as he pulled her close to him and circled his arms around her to stop her from crying, “Asana…,” he whispered her name and held her tightly, “Hey come on, I didn’t mean to make you cry this much.”

“I’m…I’m an idiot...,” she found her voice again, “…I deserve it…I’m always screwing up…I just…wanted to make you happy.”

“Well, I’m not…not without you,” he took her face in his hands to wipe the water stains off her cheeks, her cheeks as red as her swollen eyes, “Do you think I fall in love easily? I don’t know what you did to me in those thirteen days but there has not been a day that went by where I didn’t think about you or what you were doing. In hindsight, I should have come after you.”

Wrapping her hand around his, her tears settled down, “…I never stopped thinking about you either,” she had opened the clinic to produce a flow of income to be able to buy textbooks to study and eventually, to face Klaus again, “…I was saving to come see you in three weeks…I wanted to tell you the truth, no matter the cost.”

It was like their minds were linked, Klaus had circled the day he would come see her and the thought was amusing, “…What a coincidence, I banked up enough holidays and was coming to see you in three weeks too.”

His admission surprised her, “…R-Really…I thought you’d never wanted to see me again…I was even convinced you were probably married to another woman and forgot all about me.”

“…I thought you would have moved on from me too,” he confessed and sat next to her, “You are the sweetest and gentlest person I ever met, so I figured you would be snatched up pretty quickly. Any man would be a fool not to see what a beautiful, strong and kind woman you are.”

Asana shook her head, “…The only man I could ever love…is you,” she admitted her unconditional feelings for him, “When I arrived home, I probably spent a good month just eating ice-cream and chocolate, doing nothing but sleeping and moping around, before I started buying every textbook to become a better wizard. Each time I got a spell wrong, I heard your voice, scolding me.”

“Is that how you remember me, is it?” he chuckled.

“…My biggest regret for the last three years…was not going back to your office,” she averted her gaze, “The only person I still speak to is Amelia and she was the one who told me how depressed you were after I left. I heard you cooped yourself up in your office, you wouldn’t even allow Elias to enter.”

“Like I am going to let my little brother see me like that,” Klaus rolled his eyes and sighed, holding her hand, “However, it is true. I tried to fathom why you left and figured you were just embarrassed. After I told you I love you, you left and I never heard from you again, for three years, until last night when I heard you through my dreams. It hurt.”

Finally, she brought her face up to his, and rested her head on his shoulder, “I never wanted to hurt you, that was the last thing I wanted to do. I thought…I was doing the best thing for you by leaving, that way you could succeed without having me holding you back. I just…,” tears threatened to fall again.

“I know you would never intentionally hurt someone, Asana,” Klaus raised her face up to look at him, “…But…I’m not happy. Working at the Ministry is…depressing and I have nothing or no one to go home to. I honestly don’t know how Dad and Julius do it. They face dark wizards each day but are happy when they go home to their wives.”

“…I’m not happy either,” Asana hated cooking large meals for herself and having only animals and customers keep her company, with the occasional coffee date with a few of her friends in the village, but she was always somewhere in the village tending to animals as the only reputable veterinarian in her village, “I run my own vet clinic for creatures and animals, but I never have any time to meet with friends and nights is always cooking large meals for one person. Each night, looking at my shelf of savings trying to find the courage to board a train and come find you. I don’t really speak to anyone else from the academy but Amelia. I was sure everyone hated me for leaving you like that, so I have been living with this guilt for three years, unhappily.”

Wedging his fingers between hers, he squeezed her hand, “Our lives I think are missing the same thing.”

“What’s that?”

“I’m missing my buddy and you are missing yours,” he remembered how happy he was when they were together at the academy, and started laughing.

His laughter confused her, “What are you laughing at?”

“I’m pathetic,” he laughed, “I knew you for thirteen days but since I met you I haven’t been able to function properly. Just what is it you did to me for me to become so obsessed with you?”

As always, he made a valid point, because she had been acting the same way and laughed, “Well, I could ask you the same question,” violet eyes met her pink eyes, pulling their faces towards each other.

It was not the way they had planned to be reunited but when their lips finally touched, it soothed all the pain and loneliness which had been plaguing their hearts. It started out as a light kiss but it deepened and slowly became heated, “I love you Klaus,” she confessed in a gap before his lips crashed over the top of hers again.

“I love you too, Asana,” he accepted her once again and he always would because he loved her, unconditionally. As their lips parted away, Klaus rested his forehead against hers, “We’ll finish up all this dark wizard stuff, then me and you are going to be alone somewhere to talk.”

She nodded, still holding his hand and squeezing it, “…I want to earn your love again, Klaus and your trust and your forgiveness,” she admitted to him, “I will do whatever it takes to let you know how much I love you, and always have since the day I met you.”

“Good,” he smirked, “I wasn’t going to forgive you without punishing you first and I’m never letting you go again, not even if you beg me.”

“I don’t want to leave your side ever again,” she kissed him, “I will continue to grow as a wizard but I want to be by your side this time.”

“That’s what you should have done from the start,” he flicked her forehead again, “Bunnyhead.”

That familiar nickname, the name only Klaus could call her, set her heart on fire again and she jumped into his arms, “Oh, Klaus!” she threw her arms around him and pulled him closer to her, kissing his lips sending her sincerest feelings through a deep kiss.

Outside the room, Walter and Julius decided the best course of action was to leave and let the two rekindle their flames of love. Leaving the private room, Walter concealed all the windows in the room to give them privacy.

Several months after the attack on her village, the town had been rebuilt and she had explained what happened to her townspeople on the fateful night. She didn’t lie to them, saying there were too many for her to handle alone and they had captured her in the early hours of the morning when she hadn’t expected to be attacked at that moment. By her side, Klaus helped her explain how she used her foresight and time magic to communicate with him and lead him to the village to intercept the wizards.

They apologised for expecting too much of her trying the terrifying time and not understanding that even though she was magical, she was not invincible enough to take on a group of wizards by herself. A ceremony was held for the ten people who had been killed in the chaos with a statue unveiled to forever remember their names.

“So, Asana,” a girlfriend of hers from off one of the farms tugged at her dress sleeve, “Who is that?” she pointed to Klaus, he stood tall and gallantly as he spoke to some old men from her village, a smile crossing her face, “Why have you been hiding him from us?”

They had been working through their pain from the past three years slowly, making sure their second-chance was not rushed to the point it would crumble. However, the love they felt for each other was stronger than any magic in the existence, not even a group of dark wizards could break.

“Klaus, Klaus Goldstein,” she answered her friend and with the proudest smile, added, “My best friend, soul mate and the only man I will ever love.”

#klaus goldstein #elias goldstein #asanawayMC #wizardess heart #love #unhappyending #violence

43 notes · View notes

onemilliongoldstars · 7 years

Text

the future is female

anon: the marches this weekend have made me so emotional!! can you write a fic about lexa and clarke meeting at the women’s march ??

tw: language, misogyny, tiny bit of violence

ao3

---

“Jesus Griffin, watch your sign!”

“Sorry, god, don’t push me Reyes!”

“It’s not fault, Octavia stepped on my foot.”

“Hey!” Octavia whips around to glare at them, her sign swinging dangerously in her hands and several people let out a yelp, ducking out of the way. Octavia grimaces, holds a hand up in apology and falls back into step with the streaming crowds.

“Just be careful where you’re waving that thing O, you’ll take someone’s eye out and this is meant to be a peaceful protest. We don’t want anyone in the emergency room,” Raven nudges at her shoulder.

“Plus we didn’t fly all the way here from New York just so I could spend even more time in a hospital, this is supposed to be my day off.” Clarke pushes her hair over her shoulder, tugging at the tangles and pulls her hat more securely onto her head. In the distance they can hear music from somewhere over the sounds of women laughing and chanting and Clarke feels excitement spark inside her at the sound.

A mother goes past, carrying her tiny daughter on her shoulders in a shirt that reads the future is female in vibrant pink and Clarke returns her eager wave.

“Where are your friends again Raven?” She hauls her sign up a little further, “god, I’m glad I let you design this. Are you sure the lab won’t miss the carbon fibre poles?”

“This is more important than the lab,” Raven shrugs, staring down at her phone and Octavia pulls a face at them over her shoulder.

“Weren’t you building robots?”

“Listen, right now I’m more concerned with making sure there’s a future in which we can use the robots, okay?” Raven finally drags her eyes up, her jaw set grimly.

“Okay, okay.” Octavia laughs, “what does Anya say?”

Raven’s cheeks heat and she shoves her phone in her pocket, “She’s found Lincoln and Monty at the corner of 36th and Broad Street. It’s only a few minutes up there.”

They move with the crowd, easing their way through the streets until Octavia spots her boyfriend’s hulking figure looking vaguely ridiculous with a pointed pink hat on his head and pushes her way towards him until she can throw her arms around his neck and kiss him soundly. Clarke and Raven follow her, apologising in her wake, and Clarke finally spies Anya’s lanky figure lounging a little too casually against a lamp post. She’s wearing a shirt with my pussy is bigger than yours written on it, a bomber jacket thrown over it and her hat is crooked on her head. Monty is standing a few steps away from her, looking slightly out of place but smiling nervously, holding a sign that says THIS WOULD NEVER HAPPEN AT HOGWARTS and Clarke goes to give him a quick hug as Octavia untangles herself from Lincoln. Her boyfriend is wearing a shirt he clearly got from work, pink with white letters reading I support planned parenthood and Octavia’s lipstick has left an equally pink mark on his cheek.

Anya raises her chin in a short nod, “Nice of you guys to show.”

“Do you know how long it took to get from the airport?” Raven shoots back and Clark exchanges an exasperated look with Octavia when Anya’s lips quirk into a smirk.

“Did you guys see Melissa Benoist?” Monty asks, before the pair can fall into their usual flirty squabbling. “Apparently she’s around here somewhere?”

“Really?” Raven’s eyes widen, momentarily distracted from Anya.

“Anya wasn’t your friend supposed to be joining us?” Clarke peers around Monty and Raven to eye the girl curiously.

“She’s been held up at work, but she’ll meet us soon.” Anya shrugs, her eyes on Raven and Clarke rolls her eyes.

“Okay, if we’re waiting I’m going to grab some food before we start marching.” She hands off her sign to Octavia, who offers:

“I think there was a hotdog cart over there?”

“I’ll bring a few back.” Clark promises and turns, disappearing down a slightly quieter side street. The hotdog cart from earlier has disappeared, but she shrugs and keeps walking. The back streets are filled with normal civilians, although she sees a few women sporting the familiar pink and carrying signs as they search for sustenance. She receives a few nasty glances and meets them with a cutting stare. Her blood is boiling with righteous fury, whipped into a flurry, and she dares someone to approach her, eager for an argument.

Her phone buzzes in her pocket, a request from Raven for something vegetarian for Anya and she’s so distracted by it that Clarke walks straight into something soft and warm. Her phone goes spinning out of her hands and she is propelled backwards, barely keeping her footing. It takes her a moment to regain her bearings, finding her feet as the woman she barged into begins to apologise.

“Oh god, I’m so sorry, I wasn’t looking.”

Clarke finds her partner in crime bending to collect her phone from the floor and straightens her hat as the woman rises and she is met with piercing green eyes, dark hair falling from a once elegant updo to frame her face. She is caught for a moment, struck by how attractive the stranger is in her dark coat as a flash of familiarity shoots through her.

“Here,” The stranger blushes, tucking her hair behind her ear as she hands back the phone. “It’s okay I think, I’m sorry again.”

“No it’s… it’s okay,” Clarke is still staring at her, “Do I… know you?”

The woman hesitates, looking at her cautiously for a moment before asking carefully. “Do you watch a lot of news?”

“You’re Representative Lexa Woods!” Clarke almost slaps herself for not recognising the young politician earlier. “The youngest woman elected to the House!”

“Yes,” Lexa visibly straightens, though Clarke can tell that she is still flustered, her cheeks pink. “I’m not normally recognised in the street.”

“I was interested in your campaign,” Clarke explains vaguely, unwilling to admit that she and Raven had once agreed at the bottom of a bottle of vodka that Lexa would be on their celebratory free pass list. “Are you not at the march?”

“I’ve just left the office actually, I’m meeting a friend.”

Clarke’s brows tighten at the words and she feels her belly coil with annoyance, “So you’re not even going? That’s just typical!”

“What?” Lexa frowns, holding her hands out as if to ask for peace, “No I just have to-”

“You politicians are all the same,” Clarke riles, her fists clenching into balls in her pockets, “You’re just out to protect yourselves and your own image, you can’t seem too radical one way or another. I bet you were at the inauguration yesterday?”

“Well-” Lexa fumbles with her words, “Yes, I was but-”

“So you can make time for that but not for the march?” Clarke snaps, “Whole lot of good you are, you’re supposed to be a women’s candidate,” She shakes her head, glowering, “Well it’s okay, we can stick up for ourselves, we don’t need you.”

With that she marches around Lexa, not sparing her a cursory glance, and leaves the Representative spluttering in her dust.

---

Clarke is thoroughly lost. The crowd seems as if it’s grown since she went for hotdogs and her frantic texts to Raven are proving totally fruitless. Everywhere she turns are towering placards and pink hats and their corner has been abandoned, leaving her stranded and cursing when Octavia doesn’t pick up her phone. She’s about to try Lincoln, always the more reliable of the pair, when a commotion ahead of her catches her attention.

A few paces away two men are harassing a pair of protestors, yelling at them. One can’t be older than thirteen and his friend has her arm out, pushing him behind her as she yells back. The men are clearly drunk, swaying and their words slurred and one stumbles dangerously close to the girl, forcing her to stagger a few paces away. Clarke feels rage bubble in her stomach and takes a few steps closer.

“Hey!” The guys turn, distracted and confused by her and she steps between the protestors and the men, glowering furiously. “Leave them alone.”

“Fucking feminazi,” The first man rolls his eyes, sneering at her and the word feels like a physical blow to her skin, stinging.

“Don’t use that word asshole.”

“Get out of here if you’re not protesting!” The girl beside Clarke steps up until their shoulder to shoulder.

“Why are you fucking protesting?” The second man can barely stand upright and they’re beginning to attract the attention of other concerned protestors, glancing back at them anxiously. “President Trump won the vote, that’s democracy you stupid bitches.”

“Protesting is a fundamental right shit head, it’s in the fucking constitution,” Clarke spits, her hands balling at her sides.

“Yeah but it’s not going to change anything, this is going to be the best eight years for America.” The second guy smiles nastily and Clarke scoffs.

“Yeah, you’ll be lucky to have one year. Your precious POTUS isn’t cut out for the job idiots, he’ll quit or be impeached.”

“What do you know, cunt?” The first guy takes a menacing step forward and Clarke’s patience snaps.

“What did you just call me?” She’s readying to square up and punch the guy when a hand on her arm draws her back, tugging her away and she spins to see familiar green eyes and dark hair.

“Hey, hi, calm down here okay?” Lexa Woods is calm and collected, one hand on Clarke’s arm and one holding a tray with two take out coffee cups in it, and Clarke wants to rip herself out of her grasp.

“Let go of me so I can rip this guy a new one-”

“You should listen to your friend little girl,” The guy laughs, taunting them, “Get back to the kitchen where you both belong- when you’re not sucking my dick that is.”

Clarke feels Lexa go very stiff next to her, stilling and she is alarmed to see the stoic, terrifying fury painted into every line of Lexa’s face when she turns to look at her.

“Lex-”

Before she’s even able to say her name Lexa has stepped forward and swung her arm in a neat, smooth punch that collides harshly with the first guy’s jaw and sends him reeling. His friend’s eyes bulged at the sight and he staggered forward to push Lexa, catching her by the shoulder and jostling her a few paces back. The first guy curses loudly, spitting blood onto the sidewalk.

“Fuck! You bitch!” He staggers up and Lexa barely manages to dodge when he tries to grab her. His friend has more luck and his fist collides with her eye, sending her staggering. Clarke barely manages to catch her before she falls, her arms wrapping around her waist and she’s struggling to hold up a groaning Lexa when a familiar voice comes from behind her.

“Hey, what’s going on here?”

The guys hesitate at the sight of Lincoln’s hulking figure and Anya’s vicious snarl and Raven rushes to help Clarke keep Lexa upright, glaring at them.

“There are some cops right over there,” She’s barely finished speaking before the guys turn tail and scamper away.

Lexa finds her feet at last, staggering out of Clarke’s arms, one hand still pressed to her eye and Clarke is finally able to take in her appearance. Her coffee had spilled all over the front of her shirt in her tussle. The oversized shirt is worn over a soft grey hoodie, with the words if you’re not angry you’re not paying attention printed on it, and what Clarke had thought was a neat updo is actually a long braid down her back. She is still pressing her hand over one eye, but she struggles to stare out at Clarke anxiously.

“Are you okay? And you guys?” She turns to peer at the kids.

The girl nods, putting a hand on her friend’s shoulder, “Yeah, thank you so much. I think we should find my mom though.”

“You should,” Lexa’s words are a little muffled by her hand, but she is sincere despite it. “Stay safe!” She calls after them, “have a good march!”

Lexa’s eyes spin back to Clarke and the people now gathering around her and, to Clarke’s surprise, she breaks out into a smile. Anya’s arm is around her, surprisingly tender, and Lexa leans into Anya’s touch.

“Hey, you guys found me again.”

“Yeah, well you caused enough of a fuss,” Anya rolls her eyes, but draws Lexa’s hand away to look at her face carefully. “Shit, Lex you’re going to have a shiner.”

“Oh,” Lexa frowns, cringing at the pain the expression clearly causes her. “Damn, that is not going to go down well at work.”

“Screw work,” Anya fusses over her, unlike anything Clarke has seen her do before, but then draws back, frowning and punches at Lexa’s shoulder. “You idiot Lex.”

“Ow!” Lexa rubs at her arm. “What was that for?”

“I thought you were out of getting into fights by now,” Anya gripes and Clarke meets Lexa’s gaze with a slowly dawning realisation, her eyes widening and her cheeks darkening with shame and humiliation.

“You’re Anya’s friend, the one who was held up at work.” She says, uselessly.

“Yeah, Clarke this is Lexa.” Anya gestures between them.

Clarke opens her mouth to respond, but Lexa speaks abruptly over her.

“Hi Clarke, it’s nice to meet you,” She holds out a hand that Clarke stares at for a beat too long before taking it and shaking once, “Sorry I was late,” Lexa smiles sheepishly, “I was stuck in a meeting and then wanted to get everyone coffee to apologise.” Her eyes cut to the trampled coffee cups on the floor and her stained shirt, “That, uh, was supposed to be yours.”

“Thank you,” Clarke can feel her cheeks heating, “that’s so nice of you. And thanks for stepping in there.”

“I didn’t do much good really,” Lexa gives a soft, awkward laugh and rubs at the back of her neck. “But it’s not a problem.”

“Come on,” Anya presses a placard into Lexa’s hands, nudging her head, “Let’s march, I want to get to the White House and see if I can throw my sign over the fence.”

The pair fall awkwardly into step together, their silence unnoticed as the others stream around them, chattering excitedly. Clarke accepts her sign when Raven hands it back, eyes darting up to Lexa’s and she can’t help her smile when she reads to neatly printed words History Has It’s Eyes on You.

“Are you a Hamilton fan?” The words leave her mouth before she can stop them and she curses herself, wishing they were back to uncomfortable silence when Lexa flushes, glancing at her uncertainly.

“Yes,” Lexa admits quietly, “Yeah, I love it.”

“Me too,” Clarke keeps her eyes firmly fixed in front of her and she feels Lexa’s gaze run over her and then her sign- Carrie’s eyes staring out and a woman’s place is in the revolution below them. “I’m a Star Wars fan too,” She explains, before Lexa can ask.

“I love that,” Lexa answers, her eyes darting down from the placard as her cheeks heat even further. “I mean… the sign not… I love the sign.”

“Thank you,” The grin playing on her lips is hard to disguise and they walk for another few moments in silence before Clarke finally gathers the courage to continue, “I’m really sorry about earlier.”

“It’s okay,” Lexa is smiling softly, “You didn’t know.”

“I shouldn’t have assumed,” Clarke counters.

“It was a fair assumption,” Heaving her placard more comfortably into her arms, Lexa turns to look at her. “I’m glad that you called me out when you thought I wasn’t doing what I should. We’re going to need to start calling people out more often nowadays.”

“You’re… welcome?” Clarke offers at last, lamely and then continues in a desperate attempt to salvage the comment. “Again… thank you for coming to look after me as well, I mean I probably could have handled them… you’re kind of a beansprout, but even so.”

Lexa’s eyes widen at the word, blinking at her in surprise and Clarke is abruptly worried that she’ll be angry, but the girl bursts into laughter, shaking her head.

“A beansprout,” She echoes, “Oh my god, never tell Anya that, I won’t hear the end of it.”

Clarke grins, shaking her head, “I won’t, Scout’s honour.”

Lexa levels her with a sceptical expression. “Were you a Scout?”

“No,” Clarke admits, her grin growing, “But I respect their honour code. Anyway, thank you for helping me out back there even when I was rude to you.”

“It’s okay,” Lexa shakes her head, “But you have to tell me… how did you actually know who I was? No one follows local politics that closely.”

Clarke flushes, considering her options. She takes in the flush on Lexa’s cheek, the nervous way she keeps tucked her hair behind her ears and the sparkle in her eyes and finally says, before she can talk herself out of it. “I might have had a celebrity crush on you.”

Lexa lets out a snort of laughter so loud the woman next to her turns around in surprise, “A celebrity crush? You’re serious? Anya didn’t put you up to this?”

“Nope,” Clarke giggles, hitching her sign further into her arms as she feels a flurry of butterflies in her stomach. “I even put you on my free pass list, you should be honoured.”

“I am,” Lexa assures her, quickly and Clarke smiles at her for a second before she says, at last.

“I liked your policies too.”

“Really?” Lexa’s face brightens like a child on Christmas. “I’m so glad, they’re all so important to me. I just think you can’t ignore this sort of stuff you know? The second you turn away things start happening and it’s the responsibility of anyone who can to stand up for what they believe in because so many people can’t-” Lexa cuts herself off with a start, eyes wide as she flushed furiously. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to...”

“No,” Clarke is smiling so widely that her cheeks hurt, “no I like that you’re so passionate.”

“Thanks,” Lexa rubs at the back of her neck uncertainly, casting her a nervous glance from beneath her lashes. “I don’t want to come across as overbearing I just... I care very much about these things. Standing up for your rights and freedoms, it’s so important.”

“You can tell,” At Lexa’s quizzical glance, she explains, “You light up when you talk about them.”

“Oh,” Lexa flushes again, adorably bashful, “Well, we’re lucky to have people like you interested in politics Clarke. Protests are an important way to exercise your rights.”

“This is my first one,” She admits, “It’s amazing, I’d like to do it again.”

“I’m sure there will be plenty of opportunities in the next few years,” Lexa is momentarily sombre, but her expression breaks into nervous excitement when she looks back at Clarke. “But maybe when this one is done you’d like to get coffee? With me, on a like… date thing?” She stumbles through her words, flushing and Clarke almost takes pity on her.

“A date?” She clarifies when Lexa finally stops talking, “Like… romantically?”

“I hope so,” Lex gives an anxious laugh and then says, after a second of thought. “It’ll make Mike Pence really mad, if that changes your mind.”

Clarke’s laugh is loud and unladylike, more of a snort, but Lexa just smiles at her hopefully and she feels a curl of something between hope and excitement twine around her heart when she replies. “Yes, I’d really, really like that.” Her hand brushes against the back of Lexa’s as they walk and she can’t help but lace their little fingers briefly, unable to tear her eyes away from Lexa’s.

“Okay,” Lexa smiles softly and squeezes their pinkies gently, “so we’ll take down the patriarchy and then get coffee.”

“Sounds good.”

#tell me what you think in my ask box but this is just meant to be a fun lil thing cause the marches were amazing & i love women who care #clexa #clarke griffin #commander lexa #clexa fanfic

85 notes · View notes

literateape · 7 years

Text

Is It Art or Is It Competitive Therapy? The Paradox of the Slam

By Don Hall

I love poetry. My wife is a poet. I love listening to poets recite their poetry. I have amazing memories of Marc Smith thrilling me with his almost preacher-like facility with the spoken word.

I am frequently torn by the child he birthed: Slam Poetry.

A bit of history. Marc Kelly Smith decided back in 1984 to shift the tradition of the stale and uninspired poetry recital to a more exciting competitive event format known as Slam. What he saw was room after room of poets reading poetry to other poets and decided that poetry needed to be seen by the same people who went to sporting events and concerts, or become artistically irrelevant. The show was a huge success and moved to the legendary Green Mill Lounge and has grown from that to slams all over the world. George Dawes Green co-opted the format for The Moth, solidifying slam as the most popular way to present Live Lit of any kind.

I’ve performed DADA poetry at a few Smith events over the years and stories at a number of Uptown Poetry Slams at the Mill. Likewise, I’ve heard in the rumor mills surrounding that particular genre, tales of Marc’s reluctance to embrace the identity politics bred within the walls of the Young Chicago Authors space and his frustration with HBO’s Def Poetry Slam series. As is anyone who becomes a legend in his own time, that credit and notoriety comes at a cost. Blessing and a curse sort of thing.

Recently, I was asked to host two nights of College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational (CUPSI) at UIC. Six bouts of 16 poems each. Effectively, 10 hours of slam. I was happy to do so—many of the people involved in Slam Poetry are friends and many are artists I deeply admire. Sharing in their playground and service to young poets is as much honor as obligation. This stated while at the same time being conflicted by the format and the results of competitive art. As with hosting The Moth, I found when the competition becomes the point of the exercise, something integral and essential is lost in the art. Formulas for winning are created. Winning becomes the primary purpose. Those artists with points of view unlike the others lose the rounds and thus have less opportunity to perform. It begins a process of homogenization of the work and begins to place ideology above the craft, personal pain over artistic merit.

At CUPSI 2017, I encountered exactly what one would expect at a college tournament of any kind. Like any collegiate sport or group, there is the infectious joy of camaraderie, the sense of an enclosed and esoteric community, that sense of invincibility that is so wonderful about being young. Unlike a sporting event or cheerleading competition, these are the kids left behind by the standard college extracurricular tribes. These are kin to the Theatre Geeks, the Bandies, the Math Club Goers. And, again, unlike those other tribes, these are the Tribe of Identity.

Angry children screaming beautiful words at each other. No minds to change or dissenting ideas. The singers of the choir singing for one another. Chess players playing chess for an audience of other chess players. In a complete turnaround from Smith’s initial idea, the Slam has become room after room of poets reading poetry to other poets.

Cries for validation. Demands for power. Spitting ideas of the victimized. Of those society has denied agency. Using a microphone in a room the size of a living room and shouting in it to the point that the cursory AV equipment cuts out and in. None of the coaches bother to teach these students how to properly use a microphone especially when shrieking. But proper use of the microphone is almost beside the point as it is the outrage, the fierce, raw anger of these young poets that is most appreciated.

The passion is breathtaking. Beautiful. The amalgam of poems, however, becomes troubling. Rather than turning the poet's mirror outside to reflect oneself in a larger tapestry of the world, so many of the poems were turned narcissistically inward as if revealing only one's pain in the angriest manner was valid.

"Don't be nice, be necessary/nasty." — A frequent chant by poets to be supportive of performing poets.

There is a difference between being necessary and being nasty. Being necessary means not only being heard but being listened to as well. Being nasty is only about being heard. Being nasty while exposing personal things ordinarily saved for a therapist is only about being validated. It’s a one-way dialogue where anything less than complete acceptance of both premise and delivery is considered violence against the poet. Which is weird given that the format is constantly being judged and evaluated arbitrarily with points.

Finger snaps and positive murmurs at literally every utterance of either: Pro-women narrative Pro-black account Pro-LGBTQIA POV Pro-immigrant outlook

Anti-white rhetoric Anti-male perspective Anti-white feminism

Out of 102 poems I heard, 38 were about heartache, mental illness, abuse, sexual assault. The remaining 64 poems were any combination of the pro/anti list above, and even a few utilized all six themes. If those all-encompassing poems were read at an inside voice, they received decent scores but those that were screamed with a boiling rage that could only be sustained for three minutes received the highest scores of both nights. If the poet blew out the PA system at least a couple of times, the poet seemed to be rated higher.

The irony in this example—rage overtaking the narrative, rants being more important than the words—has been often exemplified by Marc Smith himself. In the many Slams I’ve seen, the sight of Smith kind of losing it onstage in a sizzling diatribe within the framework of poetry is commonplace. As if the whole format is spawned from the work of Sam Kinison. It works for Smith as, in those cases, he is the only poet who truly rants. In a compendium of poets, all going to that raging place, one after the other, it becomes a bludgeon.

It was no surprise, then, hearing that at the finals Smith came up as the featured poet, spit out some of his poetry and was effectively silenced by the crowd. Suddenly labeled both misogynist and racist, he was once again at the forefront of criticizing the status of poetry although now he is critical of the format he created.

Via social media, many of these young poets trumpeted the act of denying the man who created the very format that propelled them onto the stage and foregoing the points and judging for the night as "revolutionary." I can’t see it as any more revolutionary than a group of marching bands at a marching band competition deciding to publicly distance themselves from the white, cis-gendered John Philip Sousa or a group of two hundred flyers deciding to denounce airline travel due to the white, cis-gendered inventors of the airplane.

Revolutions are made of stiffer stuff and, quite often, involve violent resistance. This, at best, was a rebellious symbol.

While an interesting symbolic gesture, it is doubtful that these students will transform Slam Poetry, an industry in and of itself, in order to become simply poets who create poetry for the sake of it. Smith’s creation provides them the platform for exposure and validation, so calling out Smith may feel good but the only way these students get out of the competitive edge of points and judges is to stop competing altogether. And I doubt that will happen.

For the record, here are the poems Smith performed that were deemed misogynist, racist and xenophobic: http://www.marckellysmith.net/poems.html

You be the judge. I don’t see it as anything more than a critical eye toward those students who have taken the Slam and made it a forum for their therapy but I wasn’t there (and I'm white and cis-gendered) so it’s hard to be accurate. The fact is, Smith created the format for dissent himself. Slam is democratized art in many ways, encouraging the audience to openly heckle poems and poets they deem unworthy. If the audience he performed for found the pieces unworthy, it’s right there in the rules for them to hiss and stomp them their feet and silence the poet.

For myself, the best poems in Slam are rooted in anger but avoid the histrionic scream as a performance technique. The best poems are focused—the rage and pain funneled into the language of metaphor and unique looks at the world that force my perspective. I do not subscribe to the beliefs that only those with the experience of pain are allowed to create from it nor that offense equals harm. It is a set of positions that puts me at odds with the majority of these collegiate poet/warriors and most Slam poets and it seems unfortunate that a dialogue cannot be brokered anymore than a conversation about climate control can be had with a Tea Party Republican.

But this is poetry, right? This is art, yes? While I can disagree with the coaches and students that this therapy session dressed as artistic expression is the best approach, I can still be inspired by the raw passion they have for this thing they do. I can still marvel at the craft of a poem spit by a black woman about wanting to write poetry like a white person and be floored by the beauty, anger and genius behind it. I can still be moved by a poem recited by a young, white gay man about the needless machismo behind violence and aggression in society and be thinking about it days later. Even if, as a white cis-gendered male, I am the enemy.

The experience of momentarily immersing myself into ten hours of Slam Poetry caused me to reflect upon the stridency of the Radical Left and the whole Monster that has become identity Politics. I surmise that those doing most of the screaming are performing for the rest of us—to be seen, to be heard, to get the highest scores in a social structure where likes and follows are the emotional currency of the new popularity.

I’m not sold that this approach is productive in the long term but I can appreciate the passion behind it. Even if, as a white cis-gendered male, I am the enemy.

#CUPSI 2017 #Slam Poetry #Marc Smith #Green Mill #Identity Politics #Art vs Therapy #competitive art

0 notes

Last Seen Blogs

miso-sup

sleep--walk

sleepwalk

twistiraki

🎀Vil's Skincare routine🎀

blinkandrevile

intermission

blinkandrevile

intermission