I like how medieval historians are like "feudalism wasn't really a thing" and you ask what the legal-political-economic structure of society WAS in that case and they're like Umm I have to go

The Clan’s Clothing

Razielim- The most varied fashion. More willing to experiment with different styles, textures and individual silhouettes- but they tend to like fabrics that are either very thin or drape nicely. Most of the clothing sold is meant to be altered to suit the tastes and body-type of the buyer. I think there is a very big dimorphism between what is marketed as “Male” and “Female” Razielim clothing. Ultimately, the buyer can alternate their clothing however they see fit, however. It is not uncommon to see a Razielim man wearing a “feminine” style dress, or a Razielim woman wearing a “male” style suit. There are also very little limitations on fabric color, especially throughout the scope and complete history of the Razielim clan. Same goes for (most of) the clans. While cultural pride is definitely a thing all the clans experience, it is not as though the clansmen wear the colors of their heraldry all the time. Undergarments are tight-fitting and minimal, if they’re worn at all. Most shaping is done by the clothing itself, rather than any undergarments.

If there is only one rule Razielim clothing follow-- it’s art nouveau. And Capes. If you aren’t constantly looking wind-swept, and like you could be standing dramatically on a cliff-side-- it’s not Razielim.

Turelim- By contrast, Turelim fashion is the most structured- and it’s entirely practical. A “Fashion forward” Turelim will import clothing from other cultures, but otherwise keep to practical garb that are form-fighting and layered. This allows clothing to be adjusted throughout the day. Trousers, knickers, or a pair of bodies are made from wool, or human silk. These undergarments are worn directly against the skin, and can be changed throughout the week. Next come the reinforcement garments. These are often metal or leather slats of practical armor worn atop of it. Often on the arms, shins. They can be removed, and the common citizen doesn’t own full armor for protection (think of them more as athletic braces. If a corset or girdle must be worn, this is where they’d also go after applying leather boots. Next often comes a linen or cotton shirt, then comes a kirtle, or doublet over-vest. These can vary in lengths, cut, and style, but they almost always have removable sleeves. The sleeves are often the most decorative portion of a Turelim’s usual dress. They can be simply tied to the kirtle and be straight, long sleeves, or they can be decorative... But just as easily they can be removed. There is very little difference between traditionally “male” and “female” Turelim clothing, as all clothing has situations where they are most practical. This also helps reinforce the idea that a Turelim is more willing to purchase clothing from outside their clan.

Dumahim-  Due to the sheer love of battle the clan has. Dumahim clothing is mostly made from hardened leather and iron. Up until now, I’ve described the every day garb of the clansmen. I have not been describing armor or uniforms (as that’d take all day to write) however Dumahim love the thrill of the hunt, and the sport of a good fight. Armor, for Dumahim, is simply every day wear. Undergarments are long, but practical. Often made from a thin cotton or linen that is padded or reinforced at joints to prevent chafing. In every-day wear, secondary padding may not be used always, but if it is- it’s likely quilted to slow claws or knives. Apart from that, hardened leather slowly curated to the form of it’s wearer is used next... From here is where the individual outfits begin to differ. Armor pieces can be polished, dyed, stained, patched and embossed to the tastes of the individuals. Not to mention the sheer amount of awards or finery taken from battle. No two Dumahim look alike, even if they have similarly-cut armor, hair, ect. It is said you can tell a Dumahim Vampire’s story through the baubles, awards, and scratches on their armor, and once again clothing differs little between male and female Dumahim.

Rahabim- Rahabim are the first departure from what I would call a “classically European” style wardrobe. The Rahabim tend to don simply made clothes that are comfortable and easy to move in. Much of their clothing is flowy, made from linen and often only covering as much as an individual is comfortable concealing. This noticeable shift in fashion became an answer to the increased devolution, and appearance of scales on Rahabim vampires. It simply just became practical to wear less clothing on a day-to-day basis with all the swimming and itchy scales. Still, while Rahabim more likely to be found in a state of undress than any other clan, downright nakedness is frowned upon, and outside of their home territories they do dress more warmly. Their clothing is more likely to be patterned from light linens. Thin decorative jewelry is often used to denote higher status’ and pin down clothing where flowing fabric becomes impractical. There is no difference at all between male and female clothing and jewelry. In fact, many articles of clothing can be worn many ways.

Zephonim- Now for the other extreme. Due to their vast array of human slaves, and body modification the Zephonim have a plethora of clothing, and wear the most layers of robes by far. They are also the clan which has a strict caste system associated to their clothing. The clothing they wear varies from person to person, in both wealth and status, but the construction is very similar. Typically the more layers of clothing one wears depicts how wealthy a particular Zephonim is. Colors and patterns are no stranger to a Zephonim’s wardrobe while solid blacks, whites and grays denote noble-status or ceremonial garb. Each Zephonim also has a distinct mask marking their identity as a Zephonim, and more often than not a headscarf or veil to go with it. The look of Zephonim is particularly androgynous and obscured. It’s considered tactless for a Zephonim to reveal bare arms, chest or back in public unless actively in battle. There are many suspected reasons for this, some suspect it’s a way to secretly arm one’s self (hiding daggers in one of many sleeves), others think it is a display of wealth, and others believe it is a way to hide any current modifications a Zephonim has performed upon themselves. Starting from the layer closest to the skin, assuming armor is not being worn, the Zephonim either wear a long shift or a thin robe as undergarments. From there, some sort of v-necked tabard can be worn, and may or may not have sleeves. If push comes to shove- this layer is what most Zephonim are comfortable wearing in front of polite company. Next come any jewelry or weaponry. Neck collars, thick bracers, these are typically fashionable for a Zephonim. Next come the outer robes which are long-sleeved, and made from human hair. The amount of layers vary from Zephonim to Zephonim, these outer robes may also have varying sleeve-shapes to suit the taste of the individual Zephonim. Lord Zephon is often known to be wearing seven outer-robes while attending court, becoming a mass of fabric atop his throne he can easily discard as he sees fit. Combined with the vast array of personal masks and veils to wear, Zephonim are highly regarded as being the “most dressed” of the clans.

Melchahim- Now we are falling back to utility, and ironically, the most sexually dimorphed of the clan’s garb. With the constant decay of a Melchahim’s flesh it calls for a certain necessity of upkeep, but from it stems the chance of cosmetic surgery. Perhaps, next to the Rahabim, Melchahim dress the most bare on a daily basis. However, this is due to need not necessarily fashion. Open sores, wounds, and stitching need to be easily accessible for bandages or treatment. As such, a Melchahim’s wardrobe is comprised of support wear, and thin over-garments. Frankly, corsets, gussets, bracers, are arguably the most important. For whatever skin isn’t rotting, skin can be compressed and reinforced. When purposefully applied, foundation wear can hold in spilled viscera and divert swelling blood-flow. Due to the inevitability of a Melchahim’s body-modification, foundation-wear of canvas or muslin is worn. Clothing made for nicer occasions are normally made from silk, but are rare. Cheap fabric functions well, and it is easy to replace. A Male Melchahim’s foundation wear probably begins as a girdle atop a loincloth for undergarments. A female Melchahim would likely wear a corset, or a set of stays, and additionally wear something around the shoulders and chest for modesty. Next come any additional support wear on the limbs. These can sometimes be made of the same fabric, but they can also be made in leather as a slightly reinforced armor. Next follows whatever a Melchahim choses, so long as it is thin, and easy to tear. Often, this outer layer doesn’t appear as a completed outfit, but rather a covering to provide modesty and air for wounds. Many of these outfits, in fact, are just scrap to don until wounds or limbs need treating.

Gochiusa BLOOM episode 9 impressions

Previously: 8 - 7 - 6 - 5 - 4 - 3 - 2 - 1

That’s right, the long-awaited review of episode 9 is finally here! I haven’t managed to finish it last week and kind of lost motivation since almost nobody reads these anyway, but there we go. Not sure what I’m going to do with the remaining episodes at this point, maybe I’ll combine 10 and 11 together? 

The episode starts with a flashback from Chiya and Sharo’s childhood which shows the origin of Anko’s crown. The scene is “shot” in widescreen aspect ratio, a technique that I don’t remember being used before in Gochiusa anime, such as during the previous Chiya/Sharo flashback in Season 2 Episode 9.

I’d like to bring the attention to the opening shot of flowers, which are periwinkles (Vinca major). As you might know, Japanese media often uses the flower language, or hanakotoba which assigns specific meanings to various flowers. The meanings of greater periwinkle are “pleasant memories” and “childhood friends”, which seems to apply rather well here. In fact, if you see a shot of flowers in an anime, there’s a very high chance they have a relevant meaning in hanakotoba.

Of course I couldn’t help but look up chamomile as well, and its meaning seems to be “patience in the face of adversity”...

It seems that Chiya has now lost the crown, but it’s honestly surprising how it stayed on Anko all this time considering he has been carried away by crows and dropped from the sky more than once. Also, I feel like revealing the crown is lost so early in the episode deprives the viewers from being able to spot it on their own, just by seeing crownless Anko in various scenes (as has been done in the manga chapter).

In Chiya’s class there’s an election for picking the candidate from the class for the student council president position. The only two people competing are Chiya and the class president (who doesn’t have a name and referred to only as Iincho). In a surprising turn of events, Chiya gets 16 votes versus 14 votes for the prez (refer to the tally mark chart in episode 3 review), which means there are at least 30 people in the class.

Imagine losing a popularity poll to Chiya. The prez is a tragic character...

Cocoa volunteers to be Chiya’s “producer”, but Chiya calls her “First Lady” which totally means she wants to marry her. By the way, it was Cocoa who nominated Chiya for the election, which I don’t think is mentioned in the anime. In general, this particular chapter has been rearranged rather heavily for the adaptation with things happening in a completely different order, so it’s quite interesting to compare the two versions.

For example, when we see Chiya coming up with the names of various student committees, it seems like a completely natural and Chiya thing to do. It’s hard to believe that in the manga, it is Sharo who comes up with the idea of renaming all the committees. In fact this particular Chiya/Sharo tête-à-tête is not in the manga at all. However it’s an important scene to establish Sharo’s feelings towards Chiya’s presidential ambitions and she doesn’t seem too happy about them, in fact she doesn’t even congratulate Chiya.

Next we have another anime-original scene where Chiya goes to accessories store (from episode 6) to find a replacement for Anko’s crown. It should be pointed out that the design of the crown itself is not completely arbitrary. It features a moon crescent, which symbolizes night (the last character 夜 of Chiya’s name) but is also associated with Arabic world. The closest thing to Anko’s crown I could find is this heraldic crown of the King of Egypt. Anyway, this is also a reference to Chiya’s name, namely it being derived from Japanese name for 1001/Arabian Nights 千夜一夜物語 (Sen’ya Ichiya Monogatari).

Meanwhile Rize is trying to change image to be more like a college student, notices Chiya and asks to make her an adult (phrasing?). As a result, we get an appearance from Rize’s alter-ego Rose for the first time since season 1 episode 9.

The interesting thing about Rose is that despite being featured in only a small number of chapters, she gets a mention in Rize’s character blurb in Manga Time Kirara MAX until this day. It literally takes like a third of her character description!

Anyway, this scene is just a prelude for the adaptation of chapter 2 of volume 7 which is named after a Rize character song  鏡合わせのアンビバレット. In the song, Rize tries on outfits in front of a mirror and tries to convince herself that it’s still her. The illustration for this chapter also shows Rose as a mirror image of Rize.

We see Sharo looking through a bookstore window, which I think also appears in the following episode, and this is a foreshadowing that she works here too. The bookstore is named “Dreamy Books” which is seen later in the scene.

Chiya and “Rose” appear and at first Sharo doesn’t recognize Rize, and only does after Rize points a finger gun at her. Well, it’s not like there is anyone else in this town having purple hair or anything.

By the way you might notice that compared to the last episode the characters are dressed much more warmly, which reflects the fact that it’s already December. Looking back at the scene in episode 8 where Rize and Chimame cross the bridge at night, it’s quite shocking how lightly they’ve been dressed there.

Chino and Cocoa come by, and recognize Rize as Rose. It’s lampshaded that the last time they’ve seen Rose was more than a year ago, so it’s quite impressive that they still remember her, as well as her promise to visit Rabbit House (in s1e9 she only visits Ama Usa An). Rize thinks it’s a good chance to “infiltrate” Rabbit House to see what the others think of her when she’s gone.

Rize’s infiltration goes relatively smoothly until Maya and Megu barge in and immediately recognize her. Chiya manages to get them to play along in time, however Megu makes up a ridiculous backstory painting Rose as a ballet kempo practitioner who fights an evil organization.

Aoyama Blue Mountain also backs up Rose’s existence, by mentioning that she is in her literature club and also does food reviews. She gives Rize a cheat sheet which seems to parody the tendency of food reviews to describe food as “melting in your mouth” (for example wagyu beef).

Later Rize ends up having a conversation with Chino where she reveals that Rize’s been taking more days off than usual and it gets lonely without her. She has also started lazing about in the sun, just like Cocoa does, which wouldn’t have happened if Rize has been around upholding the discipline. In the anime Rize doesn’t really react to this, but in the manga she seems a bit disappointed in Chino.

This scene is a callback to the very first episode of the show, where Rize pretends she can’t easily carry these bags of coffee beans, because they’re too heavy for a “normal girl” according to Cocoa. Soon after, Rize’s cover is blown after she reacts to an intruder who is just Takahiro.

It turns out that Cocoa has already recognized it’s Rize. One thing that Cocoa and Rize have in common is that they change hairstyles a lot compared to the other characters, so it makes sense that Cocoa would not be fooled by a simple hairstyle change... or would she? Shortly after Cocoa has a realization that Rose has always been Rize, which makes her feel really stupid... until she finds that Chino is still completely in the dark about everything. Maybe Chino has propagnosia, or inability to recognize faces? Anyway, Rize is quite supportive about it and asks Chino if she’s ok if she does image change in the future.

But there’s still one more twist in this chapter, since Cocoa’s sister Mocha makes an appearance! Considering she appears in the opening, this season hasn’t really done anything with her yet. But it turns out it’s just Cocoa in a wig (why does she even have a Mocha wig???), nevertheless she successfully fools Rize and Chino for a second. Maybe the last episode of the season will have real Mocha (I’m assuming she won’t be in the Christmas arc).

And we’re back to the student council election storyline. The “sandwich” composition where one story “wraps” another seems to be used a lot this season. In this case the stories have almost zero relation to each other so I don’t know why the episode had to be structured like this.

Chiya’s election poster (aside from Cocoa’s scribbles) follows a traditional Japanese election poster design, featuring a closeup photo of a politician, her name and a slogan (which implores you to vote like a shiratama dumpling for some reason). I feel like a poster like this prioritizes the looks of a politician over their policies or whatever, but maybe there’s some sort of election law that these posters have to follow.

Cocoa and Chino also wrote letters of endorsement for Chiya, although Cocoa’s was mostly written by Aoyama and was basically a food review. Chino not only made Chiya almost explode from praise, but also presented a verbal takedown of Cocoa on the fly. Later, Chiya makes a passionate speech trying to emulate Rize, but maybe Chino should’ve written that too.

Next I’d like to point your attention to the name of the dish that Chiya made to celebrate the occasion:

Aki no sora (in the autumn sky) Todoroku oto wa (a thundering sound is) Omedetai (auspicious)

If you count the syllables, you’ll find that it is actually a haiku. and it even includes a kigo (season word, “autumn in this case”). The final line is a pun, as tai indicates the presence of taiyaki (a bean paste filled cake shaped like a bream fish) in the dish.

Another anime-original scene appears to flesh out the episode’s “moral” and show how Ama Usa is where Chiya really shines. A bunch of old ladies (who seem like they starred in a Kirara manga a long time ago) enter the teahouse to celebrate the birth of a 5th grandchild for one of them. Cocoa also helps Chiya, donning the Ama Usa uniform once again. 

Chiya sprinkles gold dust on her dish, doing her best “salt bae” expression. Pure gold is inert and as such can be safely eaten. In Japan, gold leaf is even added to tea, which might explain why Chiya has it.

As everyone is about to go home, Chiya’s grandma appears through a rarely-opened sliding window and offers some manju as a treat. In the anime this is how Sharo eventually discovers the lost Chiya’s crown, which her grandma uses as a hairpin (the hairpin functionality explains how this crown doesn’t fall off Anko). Surprisingly she doesn’t appear at all in the manga chapter, and Sharo just randomly finds the crown “outside”.

By the way, the text on the manju box says “congratulations on winning the election”, which might’ve been a bit premature.

Sharo goes to return the crown back to Chiya, and Chiya repeats Cocoa’s reaction from part A, which sounds like breakup song lyrics. This dialogue wasn’t in the manga in either scene and I think it was included to somehow tie the two parts together, and make the inability to notice something obvious that was around you the whole time the unifying concept of the episode.

For Chiya the crown was the symbol of ambition, and her dream to become the director of Ama Usa An and conquer the world. Sharo has a lot of drive to work multiple jobs, but doesn’t seem to have a goal she aspires to. When she finally gets an opportunity to move up the ranks, by becoming a student council president, she declines it. Living side by side with Chiya forever (zutto issho) seems to be the extent of her ambitions. Sharo feels betrayed by Chiya being ready to “leave” her and spend more time with student council than at her own restaurant.

After the ED we see the conclusion of this conflict. Sharo sees the preparations for celebrating the winner of the election, and begrudgingly congratulates Chiya. We see Cocoa, Rize and Chino helping out, but Sharo wasn’t even invited...

But it turns out class prez was the winner, after Chiya has declined the nomination. She probably had all the posters and speeches at the ready just in case, and didn’t have to prepare at all. In the manga, this is also where she returns Sharo’s uniform that she borrowed back in episode 4.

Meanwhile Chiya and Sharo have a talk and agree that it was the best for them to decline their nominations and they should stick with what they have. Not sure if that applies to Sharo though, she wasn’t really shown to be “shining” but more like “barely getting by”. There was also another reason in the manga for Chiya to agree it was the right choice: Chiya’s classmates totally trashed her menu names, which means they probably wouldn’t like her committee names either. Most of the classmates dialogue was cut out in the anime though.

So that was episode 9 and all that’s left for this season is a 2-episode Christmas arc and the season finale. Hope you enjoyed this review and until next time!

Baptember Prompt: Talon HQ

“Evaluation”

-----

Baptiste’s eyes flicked around the luxurious office with wariness, taking in the smoke-damaged Kandinsky on the wall and the small Yoruba sculpture on a table in front of it--both likely salvage from the Omnic Crisis---the placement made it seem like the painting was a dream of the sculpture, a chaotic but appealing whirl of triangles, circles, and straight and curving lines. Maybe Baptiste was looking at the wall behind the desk because of who was sitting at the desk. 

“Hm,” Doomfist was dressed in a lightweight olive blazer and white dress shirt. An orange and yellow aso oke scarf was tied at his neck in a casual ascot style. It looked like he had walked right out of a fashion magazine for a spread for ‘Fun and breezy executive casual looks,’ but Baptiste felt awkward in the gray cargo pants and fitted, high-necked black shirt of the Talon ground forces ‘casual’ uniform in the chair across from him.

“Is... there a reason you wished to see me, sir?” said Baptiste and Doomfist’s eyes flicked up to him from the tablet.

“I was just running over some testimonials again,” said Doomfist, setting the tablet down on his desk. 

“Testimonials?” said Baptiste.

Doomfist interlaced the fingers of his massive hands in front of him on the desk and gave Baptiste a single nod, “They’re very impressive.”

“...thank you sir,” Baptiste chuckled a little, “I... wasn’t under the impression that I popped up on your radar.”

A warm chuckle rumbled in Doomfist’s chest. “Yes, given the way this world has treated you, I can understand how you expect people to disregard you. To underestimate you. But you have my word that I will show no such ignorance. You see, I care about this organization,” Doomfist’s smile was so dazzlingly white, that it nearly distracted from that discerning gleam in his eyes. Baptiste felt himself being read, anticipated even, “I care about its future,” said Doomfist, “And yours.”

“...my future?” said Baptiste, hesitantly.

“You see, Lieutenant Augustin, much of the world runs on algorithms. These algorithms can define your life, from where you’re born, to what job you might get, to whether you qualify for medical care, to whether you qualify for a job.”

“I’m aware,”said Baptiste. He could count on both hands how many times Sombra had launched into her “cradle-to-the-grave algorithm” rant with him.

“I’m not a particular fan of that,” said Doomfist, that slightly-faded smile still tugging at the corners of his mouth, “Don’t get me wrong, I’m not some luddite or ‘human supremacy’ fiend--I recognize Omnics as a vital part of the populace,” he demonstrably held up his own prosthetic arm, “And I recognize technology’s place with humanity, but we had a chance to break free of these oppressive algorithms after the Crisis and instead... Overwatch simply let us slip back to a system that punches down. We prized normalcy over humanity. Over evolution.” He rested his elbow on his desk and his chin on his knuckles “But anyway, in Talon’s early days, in the days of my predecessor Akinjide Adeyemi, Talon more or less mimicked this structure, and when I replaced him--”

Killed him, thought Baptiste.

“I thought we needed to take a more... personal approach when it came to the careers of our more outstanding recruits.”

Baptiste blinked a few times. “...Outstanding?” he said.

“It’s not often someone joins our ranks having invented their own weapon,” said Doomfist.

“The biotic launcher isn’t 100% a weapon---” Baptiste started.

“I’m aware,” Doomfist returned, holding up his tablet, “Again, testimonials. Now, my question is, with your talents, why not apply for Talon’s engineering or R&D departments?”

“...I don’t have a formal education in the sciences,” said Baptiste, “And my medical education is largely limited to my Caribbean Coalition training. I read, certainly, and I tinker, but... that’s not the same.” 

Doomfist leaned forward slightly. “I can assure you, you are more than qualified, and Talon would be happy to help fill in any gaps for you,” he said, smiling, “Look at Moira O’Deorain! Now that she’s not constrained by the formalities of academia, she is doing some of her best work with us. I would love to see what you create with the right resources made available to you.” 

Baptiste had to suppress a shudder at the direct comparison between himself and Moira. He had seen her strolling around the facility, her little cult of labtechs close at her heels. Across the desk, Doomfist’s eyes were making Baptiste feel like every microscopic facial twitch of his was being picked apart and analyzed. But it didn’t have the cold distance of Moira’s glare---it felt closer, hotter, consuming rather than dissecting.

“You... want me to be a labtech,” said Baptiste hesitantly.

“Hardly,” Doomfist shook his head, “You see, O’Deorain works mostly in theory, you, however, are able to quickly take available technology and find its immediate application. You could be the perfect bridge between our R&D department and our combat division.” 

You could make it faster and easier to weaponize O’Deorain’s ideas, thought Baptiste. He could feel his own fingers digging into his leg through his fatigues with the amount of control it took to keep his expression neutral.

“I’m,” Baptiste cleared his throat, “I’m more of a ‘boots on the ground’ guy.” 

Doomfist gave him a studying look.

“You can do a lot better than pure mercenary work, Lieutenant Augustin,” said Doomfist, “And the benefits would be much higher, with much less risk to your person. It wouldn’t even be more demanding, time-wise, than your current schedule. You wouldn’t be as subject to the whims of Talon’s ‘boots on the ground’ missions. More freedom to conduct your own business.”

More money. Less travel. He could visit the clinic back in Port-Au-Paix more often. He could buy better equipment for the clinic. He could invent better equipment for the clinic. But then how much more would Talon know about it? How much more would Doomfist or Moira know about it? How much did they know already?

“I’ll...” Baptiste’s voice trailed off, “Need time to think about it.”

“Of course,” said Doomfist, leaning back in his seat easily, “Take all the time you need... to an extent. Remember: Talon believes in a world where men are not bound by their fear. Hesitate too long, and you might just get left behind. If you ever need to discuss your future, you know where to find me. Of course, we’ll be keeping an eye on you in the meantime,” He picked up his tablet. “That’s all for now. As you were.”

“Sir,” said Baptiste pushing up from the chair, saluting, and walking briskly out of the room. 

He walked out of the office and made it a ways down the hall. An omnic assistant opened the elevator for him and he stepped in. As soon as the elevator doors closed on him, he slumped into a corner, bracing his hand against one of the wall rails of the elevator as he tried to get control of his breath. The elevator dinged as it reached the below-ground levels devoted to Talon’s armories and training facilities, and he still had his other hand clamped on his chest as the door opened to reveal Sombra and Mauga standing there, hunched around a cupcake filched from the mess hall. Sombra was sporting her heavily modified ‘tech specialist’ armor, her blood red pixie cut styled into a pompadour that day. Mauga, like Baptiste, was in the fitted black shirt and gray cargo pants of Talon’s casual fatigues, his wild mane of black hair with a white lightning streak tied half up in a white streaked bun with the rest of it cascading over his shoulders.

“Hey hey! There’s our favorite engineer!” said Mauga, clapping his hands.

“How’d it go?” said Sombra.

“How did what--” Baptiste started.

“The big boss calling you in!” said Mauga, “I mean, come on, you’ve been up for a promotion for weeks.” He clicked his tongue, “Gotta admit: I’m gonna miss you while you’re in the nerd squad.”

“Oh--I’m not... I didn’t...” Baptiste’s words didn’t feel like they were coming from him so much as he was trying to pluck them out of the air as they materialized.

“...didn’t what?” said Sombra, and a sharpness suddenly overtook her features, “You didn’t take it?!”

“I said I’d think about it!” Baptiste fumbled.

“Aw, is it ‘cuz you’d miss me?” said Mauga but both Sombra and Baptiste shot him ‘come on,’ looks.

“Look, it was just... a lot, okay? He--Doomfist--is a lot,” said Baptiste, “I didn’t slam the door on it! It’s just... a big change!” 

“‘Big change’ he says!” said Mauga with a laugh, “Like we aren’t being uprooted every couple of weeks to fly off who-knows-where!” But Sombra apparently read Baptiste’s expression and elbowed Mauga. “What?” said Mauga, before looking at Baptiste. Those sharp bright eyes gave Baptiste a brief scan. It didn’t give Baptiste the same apprehension that Doomfist’s look gave him, he had spent too long fighting alongside Mauga for that. He knew him too well for that. But Mauga seemed to concede to Baptiste’s apparently shell-shocked expression and sighed. “Eh, cold feet,” he said with a dismissive hand wave, “Happens to everyone.”

“I guess this is a consolation cupcake now,” said Sombra, pushing the red velvet cupcake towards him.

“Yeah... and... he said they’ll be keeping an eye on me?” said Baptiste, taking the cupcake from her.

The look Sombra gave him then had a flash of warning to it. “I guess that’s still good... just remember: they remember the shots you don’t take just as much as the shots you do.” 

“And you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take! That’s on my quote-a-day calendar,” said Mauga, trying to find the tone of conversation that Baptiste and Sombra were on, or at least trying to segue them hard back to his unstoppably jovial mood. 

Baptiste picked one of the red sprinkles off of the cream cheese frosting of his cupcake, “I’ll uh... keep that in mind.”

Sombra and Mauga exchanged glances.

“Tell you what,” said Mauga, “How about we all change into civvies, grab a couple drinks, and talk about it.”

“...or we could change into civvies, grab a couple drinks and not talk about it,” said Sombra, giving Baptiste a wry smile.

“...Let’s get the first two parts out of the way and figure out the third part later,” said Baptiste with a huff.

“There, y’see? Thinks on his feet, this guy,” said Mauga, “Real promotion material--oof--” Sombra elbowed Mauga again.

“Meet back at the usual spot in 30?” said Baptiste.

Sombra and Mauga both gave him a nod before they headed off for the lockers, leaving Baptiste in the hallway with his lonely little cupcake. He picked off the wrapping from the side of the cupcake, thought of Doomfist’s smile, of that brief flash of everything he could have done to help the clinic if he had just taken up the offer, and he wondered how a job where everyone was telling you you were doing so well could make you feel so wrong.

Can’t Touch - k.sm

Chapter Six: September 

Words: 2.8k (I couldn’t divide it)

Warning: none for now

(I’ll add a gif cuz it made my day)

IT WAS NEARING your wedding day and Mrs. Kim was as busy as ever. You've met Seungmin a couple of times already. It was mostly because of his hyperactive mother, who invited you to his company whenever she visited, shoved you inside his spacious office and closed the door in a jump-scare way. Even though the first few seconds consisted of inadequate staring, it erupted small talks between the both of you, starting from 'how are you's to 'you know what's.

You noticed that he was very soft-spoken and decorous. He didn't necessarily give you small answers to avoid speaking too much, but his speech was adequate with the amount of words. You got to know quite a few outer things about him, that you could probably also discover on a magazine. But hearing it from him seemed special. And you felt special because he answered all your questions patiently.

He was nice to the point you could actually hope of your romantic happy ending. Arranged didn’t seem so bad.

And at one point, he seemed to enjoy answering you. He often cast down his laptop lid at the sight of you. And peered at you with undivided attention-  with that heart wrecking look on his face, which made you feel even more flustered.

And you loved the fact that he didn't question your rather simple, in your words- trashy outfit choices, which heavily contained random uniforms. You would've dressed up for him- you screamed at yourself too, but your meetings were always spontaneous, so you went out with whatever you were wearing. (“Y/n! I need you right now! Come with me please.” Mrs. Kim hollered. “Right now? b-but I need to change--” “There’s no need, dear. It doesn’t matter. Quick!”)

Seungmin didn't seem to care about your attire. At all. Once you’d apologized for coming in poorly and he had given you a mocking eyebrow lift. After jeeringly looking you up, he replied that its your comfort that mattered. Even though, in this case, your comfort wasn’t your choice (Its was your workplace’s), your inner self could but swoon at him.

You also noticed one of his many many impressive traits- he was always honest and authentic on his opinions. Maybe it was a habit he’d grown since diaper-hood but you admired it. Nothing about him and his words were over-sentimental, be it for press or himself in general.

Today, you were scheduled for a planned meeting with Seungmin, in his home. His living quarters (The thought was chilling). You were to bring your mother as well, but she felt slightly sick, and forced you to go alone. You had your worries set on her, but nonetheless, you went. You made sure to imprint a better impression this time. So pairing with a nice, decent, navy dress, you wore some matching earrings- that you didn't think you had- and applied slight makeup.

You got out of the taxi and stepped your sandal clad feet on the pavement in front of his building. You exhaled a deep breath through your lips in an attempt to boost up your confidence and proceeded towards your destination, preparing to be awestruck with Seungmin and his stupidly lavish home. Mrs. Kim had said that today was special for the both of you, and that you could look forward to it.

Suspicious, but who are you to question it anyways?

"Hey!" you heard a cheery voice from behind you, shaking up at the unexpected call. You turned around to search for the source of the voice, coming face to face with the brightest smile adorning a squirrel like face. At the first sight, he looked undeniably cute and sort of – as much as you thought of it as cheating, you couldn't deny- attractive. He looked like the unplanned diva, innocently blind to the attention he absorbed- or maybe not. His eyes sparkled with immeasurable joy, with a smile so contagious that it could be severely infectious to each and everyone around. He wasn't much taller than you and had dyed blonde hair styled in a flaunting manner.

"Hello," you staidly greeted as you proceeded to give him a bow.

"Whoa, you don't have to be so polite." He said. You felt that he seemed hesitant all of a sudden, but nonetheless, he exuded warmth and cordiality. 

"I'm Han Jisung," he introduced himself, extending his hand towards you for a handshake; smile still adjacent to his radiant face. You shook his hands, again giving him a little bow with your head. His never- wavering smile encouraging you to reciprocate.

"I am--" 

"I know, I know. I cannot not know my best friend's soon to be wife now, can I?" he flirtatiously giggled. Cordial and friendly people like him were so rare and that made you crack a soundful smile as well.

"I, the mighty and fantastic Han Jisung, am your escort for tonight. Please anticipate today's event," he acted out skillfully, bowing to you with victorian hand motions and elegance . He reminded you of superficial historic knights, except he was a modern stylish man with dramatic acting skills. You couldn't help but laugh.

"Come one, I'll show you the way," you followed behind him, constantly looking around you in awe. When you thought the dress boutique was extravagant, Seungmin's company building was baroque. It excelled in decorative composition and was keenly pleasing to naked eye. And the employees were just as fashionable as the interior. It made you feel inferior among all the diva-like presence.

You were so focused on eyeing your surroundings that without knowing, you arrived at an almost deserted part of the floor. And you wondered why there weren't any people in this particular area. You looked ahead to Jisung's walking figure, heading towards what looked like an elevator. And when you were close enough, you realized that it was, indeed, an elevator. A very entrance door looking elevator.

"After you," Jisung mused as he stood aside in front of the gates, pressing on the buttons and the gates immediately opened, revealing a vacant space.

Without keeping the latter waiting, you stepped inside the elevator, gawked yet again. The theme of the space seemed to be matte black and gold, and it was absolutely gorgeous. It had mirrors above your head and right behind you, along with a tiny hanging shelf which contained a bunch of hygienic equipment, a little opaque bottle of perfume and a few other things on the adjacent folders that you couldn’t see.

"Seungminnie likes privacy like no other. That's why, he has his very own personal elevator. Although it's smaller than the public ones." Jisung informed. It was as if he read your mind when he replied to your unasked question. You 'hmm'ed at him, mentally marveling how he'd said "seungminnie'.

It was cute.

You had gotten the fact that Seungmin was exceptionally self-kept. But it bugged you when he said this was a small space, because it seemed to be as large as your home bathroom- which you were much satisfied with. But he didn't need to know that.

You both reached the top floor in seconds and swiftly got out, facing a rather plain door right in front of you. You stood still, this place was new to you and you didn't want to be the one knocking on the door first. You knew for a certain that claustrophobia wouldn't hit you all of a sudden, but it was still sort of nerve-wracking.

everything was nerve-wracking for you.

You grasped that 'knocking' seemed irrelevant when you saw Jisung casually pushing in the pin number and unlocking the door in seconds with a single ting sound. You were stiff, both because you were unknown to this place and because this was Seungmin's abode, somewhere you were to live as well. That thought made you feel uneasy for a moment. For someone who lived their whole life in a mediocre and sophisticated way, you couldn't imagine yourself calling an amenity like this, home.

Jisung ushered you to go inside, pushing the door so that it was wide open for you. You cautiously walked inside, Jisung gliding in after you. As you got in, you were instantly faced with Mrs. Kim to whom you bowed, showing courtesy. She nodded at you, smiling and brought you further inside by your arm.

The inside was just as you thought, lavish and deluxe furniture decorating the span of the living room. There was a large curved-screen TV placed in front of the davenport. You didn't dare determine just how expensive the structure was. Everything was absolutely immaculate. Spare dust; you couldn't even see any misplaced item or any obstacles to the eye when you panorama-viewed the interior. It looked extremely akin to a newly bought apartment, with basically no flaws.

Mrs. Kim was explaining to you where Seungmin was and asking you occasional questions about your mother and your well-being. You saw Jisung leisurely dropping berries into his mouth while sitting on the divan with one of his legs smugly resting atop the other. He looked like it was just as much of a home to him as it was to Seungmin. He could spread out on the divan and watch a movie; yet be completely careless because no one would object his actions.

Minutes after, Seungmin came from the hallway that lead to other rooms. You greeted him with a curt bow and small smile which he reciprocated, looking like the same handsome man you’d seen these times.

Mrs. Kim left both of you supposedly to bring some important 'thing'. Before that, she excitedly tugged Jisung inside with her. Her smile permanent. Because of the harsh tug, Jisung stumbled to get up from his posh sitting, but managed to steady himself just fine; and ran after Mrs. Kim with clumsy feet.

"Take a seat, please," Seungmin offered. He directed you towards the divan, hands ghosting over your back. This was the closest you've gotten to him since that day. It was polite to not touch someone's back while guiding them, but you couldn't help but feel like there was an ulterior motive to it. But that was not what you wanted to think about.

As you sat down on the comfortable seat, Seungmin took the opposite seat from yours.

"You look like you changed your styling preferences, but you still look very nice," you complimented him, with a soft yet quite voice. Coincidentally, you both matched in color. He was wearing a navy blue shirt with slightly rotated collar, making it look dispositional yet elegant, but you knew this was fashion. He also wore black slacks which matched him greatly.

How can someone manage to be this perfect and bat their lashes like it’s nothing?

"Those formal stuff can't be altered to match updated style much, you'd see me wearing this type of clothes more if I'm outside of work," he replied. He sounded like a chic person in general, a stark difference to you. His attire was casual yet sophisticated, and you wondered how he looked more dashing the more you got to know him. He was handsome and dressy from the first, but everyday he turned even more perfect. Are humans supposed to work like that?

Maybe you were too sleepy.

You heard excited shouts and hysterical 'woo's which you knew were coming from Jisung in the most chaotic way. You both paid attention to the upcoming people as you averted your eyes. Mrs. Kim came with a square and shiny gold packaging with Jisung carrying a dark cake with his barely stable feet. You promptly went to the wavering boy and helped him set the cake on the table.

You felt embarrassed when you saw it was a birthday cake for Seungmin, with candles forming the number 26 above the cake. You felt like you didn't care enough to know his birthday and it made you feel guilty. Before apologizing, you made sure to glue this date into your head, September 22. This was a crucial information, so there was no way you could forget it.

"I never knew it's you birthday, I'm extremely sorry--" Seungmin shook his head, reminding you that it was redundant. In unabated embarrassment, you smacked your lips together, looking anywhere else but him.

"Eyy, you weren't supposed to," He says, pert. And shied at that, face hidden behind the shelter of your hair. You lifted your head at Mrs. Kim. And before you knew it, she had shoved the wrapped up plastic knife in your hands and forwarded you right in front of the cake. You felt the others surrounding you and the lighted cake. 

His mother animatedly motioned you to cut the cake. Jisung already clapping faintly in a rhythm with hyped whistles. You weren't supposed to be the spotlight, it wasn't your special day. You meekly looked Seungmin. To which he encouraged you to proceed as well.

But you couldn't cut the cake for someone else's birthday. So you shook you head at him and held the knife in front of him. He took it from you and fleetly cut the chocolate coated cake. And right before that, the other two had started singing happy birthday to him, like he were a little boy. And with an eye-smile, you joined them, singing it in synchronization.

You heard a somewhat giggle like sound from Seungmin, your heart beat reacting to it in an instant and incredibly speeding up. For a second, you admired him with his blatantly dazzling smile lighting up his face and the raw happiness in his shining eyes. He was like any other smothered only-child, celebrating his birthday in sheer commemoration.  

Seungmin fed all of you a bite of the cake with a spoon. Even more than the moment he fed you, what you loved the most was the unwavering smile of his lips and the bright stars in his eyes. You saw a whole constellation, one that stretched into abyss and sparkled like polished diamonds. It was your first time seeing him so exultant – and so smiley- that you wished you'd see more of this Seungmin.

But what you didn't notice was how he wiped the handle of the knife with the decoration-handkerchief stuck to his belt. You didn't, but Jisung did. And he applauded Seungmin for turning his sneaky means into fashion.

"Alright, now get ready for the main event of this day," Jisung yelled, clapping his hands to attract your attention. Both you and Seungmin looked at the older male, providing him 'undivided attention'. While Mrs. Kim swiftly extracted two velvet boxes from the mysterious sparkly bag. Your eyes were now on her as she stood in front of you both, the boxes in her hands. You could see one of them being crimson while the other was a beautiful royal blue. You were instantly striked with jitters in the anticipation of what’s to come. 

"Tada! Y/N's ring is chosen by Seungmin, so you can answer yourself if its too glamorous," she stated with a sing-song voice and giggled heartily. She came to you as she handed you the red box, placing the other on Seungmin's outstretched hand. "Open up."

You opened the lid to see the most delicately ornate ring you'd ever seen. And you were touched so deeply at the first sight of it. You could only imagine the cost of it, and so, a part of you felt bad. So much money was spent on you that it was unimaginable.

"Do you like it?" you heard Seungmin ask you. You immediately thought, 'what a nonsense question' but you didn't say it out loud. This ring was so beyond your expectations. It was obvious that you cannot but love it.

"This is so beautiful. I don't even have words for it," you said, with sincerity. And true enough, you were lost of speech. The ring wasn't too sparkly, it was elegantly modest. There were three pearly diamonds gradually decreasing in size from left to right. It sparkled even more as you rotated it under the lights. It was your engagement ring, so it held so much more to it than just the beauty of it. It wasn’t anything grandiloquent, but sincere.

Seungmin smiled at your response.

You saw him pick up his ring and wear it on his ring finger- by himself. Your heart felt a heavy weight, the feeling of disappointment. And you realized, that he wasn't going to hold your hand like a prince charming and fit the ring into your finger. I mean of course not, he wasn’t marrying you out of love.

You forced yourself to accept it as it is without further illogical presuppositions . Expecting more from him would be fairly selfish, and you didn't want that. Expectations were futile, and it only made you brittle.

Mrs. Kim furrowed her brows as she opened her mouth to object her son's action, but her attempt was replaced with Jisung's ringing voice.

"Minnie, wouldn't you thank your mother for the ring? She was the one who chose it." Jisung nervously laughed. Seungmin looked up from his ring and thanked his mother; telling her that he loved the ring to which she only smiled with hesitance. Jisung huffed a sigh of relief.

You didn't wait anymore. Picking up the ring, you slid it into your ring finger, pretending to admire how beautiful yet – a bit out if place- it looked on your finger. And as everyone eyed your reaction to it, no matter how much you liked its artistry and glamour, how much it concisely meaningful it was, your mind repeatedly asked why Seungmin didn't put it on you; it left a heavy weight pulling down your heart and you could only feign a grateful smile. 

It wasn't sincere, you knew it. And Jisung knew it.

a/n: I’m not happy about this at all. My writing is going down the hills and that’s a fact. T.T

Investigation 13: Elasticity – Danjuro Tobita

It’s almost the Christmas holidays as I write this, as well as being exactly halfway through December. Hopefully during the holidays we can catch back up to schedule, so this should be the last upload that isn’t on time. Let’s not dwell on it. Shall we?

Danjuro Tobita, better known as Gentle Criminal, has the quirk of elasticity. This allows him to make anything he touches elastic (in the sense of property, rather than material). I only learned when researching this quirk that his name is in fact a pun of the quirk in Japanese, where the standard Japanese kanji for ‘elasticity’ also translates as ‘gentleman’. This has nothing to do with the investigation, I just thought it was a cool fact.

The first problem we run into is that elasticity isn’t a set property at the molecular level. Different materials are elastic for different reasons, mostly due to the different ways the atoms and molecules within the substance are bonded together. For example, rubber is elastic because of its complex interlinked polymers that align when stretched. Most other substances deform elastically due to uniform deformation of their atomic structure. Which brings us to our second problem…

Nothing is perfectly elastic. Rubber and other elastomers are ‘elastic’ up to a point (around 10x their original length), but other materials can only deform slightly before they become plastic. Plasticity, in opposition to elasticity, is the property of a substance that retains its new shape when deformed, while elastic materials return to their original shape.

These two factors together make the effects of Gentle’s quirk highly irregular. To explain them, we first have to look at elasticity in more depth. So-called ‘perfect elasticity’ is described by Hooke’s Law, which states the force required to stretch or extend a material is directly proportional to the distance it is to be stretched or extended. This means to compress a spring to a quarter its length, one must apply twice the force required to halve its length, and so forth. This is (practically) true for all materials to a point. After that point, known as the yield point, the material stops being perfectly elastic, and begins deforming plastically. There are other stages between this and the material breaking, but these are unnecessary to discuss since no material that has been affected by the quirk has ever reached its yield point.

Let’s begin, as always, with the largest use of the quirk, here being the material that underwent the largest force and still remained elastic. The answer would of course be the air trampolines that redirected Izuku’s pellet of air[1], but the physics behind this interaction is possibly the most gratuitous and bloody murder of sense in the anime. I usually shy away from criticising the anime on its science, primarily because it’s a work of fiction about superheroes, but also because its purpose is a source of entertainment, and I bring the burden of applying science to it upon myself. In this instance however, I am allowing myself a small fracture in my usual composure to discuss why this scene is absolutely nonsensical.

Firstly, Izuku cannot create a bullet of air. To flick his finger is to create a pressure wave that spreads out from the point of creation at the speed of sound. No faster, no slower. If the finger is to move at a supersonic speed, the resultant pressure wave would create a sonic boom, and still travel at only the speed of light, still in a dissipating wave. Due to the properties of waves, their amplitude decreases with the square of the distance from the source. Thus Deku’s blast wave would not need aiming, and would also be barely a light breeze at such a distance as it is used.

Additionally, and most grievously, Gentle cannot create trampolines of air in the air. This is for the simple (yet often misquoted) fact of Newton’s Third Law. The classic, profound, smart-guy quip version is “every action has an equal opposite reaction”, but this is most likely only because the full answer is far more bloated. The law is in fact “when body A exerts a force on body B, body B exerts a force on body A that is of equal magnitude, opposite direction, identical type, and in the same line, as the force of body A on body B”. Quite a mouthful, but there’s a lot of subtle and important detail missing from the first, I’m sure you’ll agree. The problem here is that the created trampoline must exert a large force of Gentle to cause such acceleration (see Newton’s Second Law of Motion), and thus Gentle exerts a force on the trampoline, that causes an accelerate in the same proportion to the acceleration of Gentle as the ratios of their respective masses. Since air is a lot less dense than Gentle, and his quirk does not appear to add mass to a system, the trampoline would be accelerated backwards considerably fast before Gentle could gain any significant acceleration. It would be like trying to push yourself backwards by punching a balloon. Sure, the balloon is elastic, but it does not have enough mass to exert the required force. The only way this could work is if the trampolines were connected to the earth (thus the mass of the system is increased), but the only way this could occur is via more elasticated air. This does not happen because a) it is not seen – the elasticated air becomes slightly opaque (possibly a stylistic effect to show the action of the quirk) and there are no opaque structures visible, just a single floating disc, and b) these structures would be elasticated, and thus the system would be too flexible to exert such force over such distance.

Right, after that little rant, lets get back to the matter at hand. During the fight with Gentle and Deku there is a scene within a construction site that gives a lot of valuable information. This comes in the form of gratuitous quirk use, as well as an explicit statement of the quirk’s features: it cannot be turned off at will, and instead fades over time. This is odd when compared to almost all other quirks (if you need any examples, every other quirk investigated save one can be both activated and deactivated at will) and so it is likely it ties into the mechanism of the quirk’s action.

The scene contains two key uses of elasticity. Firstly, multiple steel girders are made elastic, and secondly a crane arm is made elastic. The former is useful because it is used by Gentle for movement, so the force on it and thus a lower limit for the yield point can be garnered. The second is useful because it showcases the flexibility of elasticated materials by how much the crane arm bends.

The steel beam bends about 1m each side of its equilibrium, which seems to be relatively unaffected by the quirk. The beam seems around 10m long, but thankfully the beams look like Universal Beams, which have standardised measurements including each type’s flange thickness, root radius, and most importantly, mass by metre and elastic modulus in each axis. Unfortunately there are almost 100 types, each of subtly different dimensions and properties. After downloading a spreadsheet and sifting through all types, I can confidently say the distinction does not matter, as the differences are all within the margin of error that arises upon attempts to measure the on-screen girder.

Let’s start with some maths. There’s no escaping it, and this time it’s back with a vengeance. Assuming the girder bends to approximate an arc (a section of a circle’s circumference) we can use some geometry to figure out the length of the original and stretched girders, and thus how much longer the latter is than the former. The unstretched we already know is around 10m long, and the centre bends ~1.5m from equilibrium. Since the ends are fixed, we know the chord subtending the arc is 10m long, and the distance bent (1.5m) is the distance between the arc and the centre of the chord. I won’t bore you with the details, but it turns out that the steel only increases length by 60cm, or one 60th its original length.

There isn’t much clear data on how elastic metals are (illustrated by the fact that a cursory search of “how far do metals stretch” gets 10 results in before some very different and nsfw questions come up instead, no points for guessing what they are) but there is an incredibly useful dataset courtesy of engineering toolbox, containing the ultimate tensile strength, yield strength or Young’s Modulus of almost every material you can think of. I’m not sure which engineer would need to compare the elasticity of compact and spongy bone, but I’m sure some day I’ll be glad the entry is there. For now we’ll look at the structural steel values, and thankfully all three are available. Let’s take a moment to discuss what they mean.

Young’s Modulus is the ratio of stress against strain, and has a fixed value for each material. Stress is the force per unit of cross-sectional area applied to the material, and the strain is the stretched length sure to such stress over the original strength. Yield strength is the minimum stress required to deform the material plastically, and ultimate tensile strength is the stress required to snap the material. Structural Steel has a Young’s Modulus of 200, so for every 200 MN of force per square metre of cross-sectional area, the beam will double in length. Sadly, these simple calculations are only applicable when the force and extension lie on the same line. In our case, the deformation is complex, non-shear, and therefore cannot be described at an angle relative to the force. In this case, we must apply the terrifyingly named Euler-Bernoulli Beam Theory. It contains some fittingly terrifying equations, included variable functions based on beam material, and second derivatives against two separate nested variables. However, in our scenario, the beam is supported at both ends (known as a simply supported beam) and we’ll assume it is uniform in density, elasticity, etc. Therefore we get an equation that looks like this: σmax = ymax F L / (4 I) where σmax is maximum stress at a given point, ymax is the distance from the point to the neutral axis, F is the force applied to the centre of the beam, L is double the length of the beam, and I is the ‘area moment of inertia of the cross section’. I have almost no idea what that last one means, but thankfully I managed to find an equation for it given different dimensions of a symmetrical I-shaped cross-section. There are two pieces of bad news. 1, it looks like this: Iy = (a^3 h / 12) + (b^3 / 12) (H - h), and 2, we now need to play a game of universal-beam ‘Guess Who’ to gain the correct dimensions.

The beam in the anime seems to be less than 500mm in depth, so that removes 47 possible types. Less than 500mm in width sadly doesn’t remove any more. However, we do know the beam is roughly larger than 150mm, since it larger than Deku’s hand span, which removes another 23. Averaging the rest gives us some dimensions we can use as an approximation of the beam. Thankfully, there exists a table of standard UK I beam dimensions and their respective area moment of inertia of the cross section. Comparing our values to the closest standard gives a value of 7440. Plugging this into the max strain equation, we find the maximum strain on the beam to be 0.79N per square metre. A strangely low number that says to me something must be wrong. The problem is we don’t know the value of F, and since I just used Gentle’s weight the formula treats the beam as incredibly flexible, since it bent so much under such little load. This is a problem, only solved by using a formula involving the Young’s Modulus E  of the beam rather than F. Such a formula is even more complex than those already seen, and is at such a level that I cannot understand how to apply it to the above scenario. Indeed, this post is already much over its due posting date at time of writing, and we have not talked at all about the quirk’s mechanism. Beam theory being as complicated as it is, and having spent now a good few days failing to apply it, I believe it is best we approach the problem from a different angle.

It’s safe to say the metal becomes not just more elastic, but more flexible, when the quirk takes effect. It takes a very large force to bend metal to the extent shown, and that metal would snap or at least bend plastically before that point is reached (sadly I cannot say which would occur). Therefore something about the molecular structure of the metal must change.

As previously discussed, metals and polymers bend differently at the molecular level, and this is because their very structures are different. Metal atoms bond by delocalising their outer electrons, creating positively charged ions attracted to a sea of negatively charged delocalised electrons. This is why metals shine – the electron sea is incredibly smooth, sub atomically so. Polymers bond via covalent bonds and inter-molecular bonds, creating discrete polymers that weakly attract each other. Gentle’s quirk must somehow make both these structures, and others, elastic in the same fashion.

The first answer is to weaken the inter-molecular forces within the structures, allowing polymers/molecules/any base elements to more easily move past each other within the material. Sadly, this just makes the material more ductile, which is the ease with which the material can be elongated via tensile force. To make something more elastic, the forces holing the molecules together must be made, for want of a better word, springier. Essentially, they must be able to act over a longer distance in order to pull the material back into shape after deformation. To do this simply would be to make the bonds stronger, but this would also make the material less flexible and denser. Instead, the force must somehow be spread across some distance profile, maintaining its magnitude at the standard distance of molecules from each other, but fall off slower as distance increases. The way to do this while retaining the other featured of the material is essentially fictional, and would even break thermodynamics (again) by being able to increase the Helmholtz Free Energy within a closed system. Since we’re now changing the mechanism by with one of the four fundamental forces of the universe functions, we can suppose the quirk changes the quirk in such a way ass to create perfectly elastic materials, since they already seem to have ridiculously high yield points.

Supposing this is the case, the question immediately arises – so what? The answer is that perfectly elastic materials have immense uses within many scientific circles. If a material returns to exactly the same state after deformation as it was in before, then it has the same energy. This means any object that hits it rebounds with the same kinetic energy as it started with, a phenomenon known fittingly as a perfectly elastic collision. Every other collision loses energy as heat, save for collisions that stretch the term for physics reasons, such as two orbiting objects. In our case purely elastic collisions have as many uses as elastic materials do, and possibly more. To have any material possible suddenly, even though temporarily, gain perfect elasticity will have material scientists drooling, and although I do not have the intelligence to think of any novel applications of such, asking one of them would I’m sure give you myriad answers.

Another fun application is heat-proofing. A material becomes liquid when the inter-molecular forces are partially overcome by kinetic energy, and gasses when the forces are broken completely. Since these forces are unlimited in distance, the objects would never be able to become gaseous, and would have very high cohesion (surface tension) when liquid. I’m again not sure of the applications of this, but it is cool nonetheless.

To conclude, Gentle Criminal’s quirk affects any material he touches, and changes the effect of the electrostatic forces within it, making them act across any distance, with a slight reduction in magnitude with distance. This works by having the force pull the molecules together from any distance, until they become close enough to be repelled by the electrostatic repulsion of the atoms. Any force applied may overcome the electrostatics for a distance, but will never cause yielding.

[1] Season 4 episode 85: School Festival Start!!

I hope you enjoyed this investigation! It’s almost Christmas as I post this, and as I’m sure you’re aware this post should have ben released on the 1st. I’m also sure you’re aware this has become a trend, and I’m sure you know reasons behind it. It is therefore with a heavy heart I announce we will be taking a hiatus for an undefined length of time. We have decided it is better to write a few posts as backup and prepare for posting, rather than desperately writing posts weeks after they’re due and apologising. We don’t have an idea of when we will be back, but we will. In the mean time, go have a Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays, and a happy new year. We’ll see you some time in 2021.

I pulled this from an article on that off duty female firefighters account of George Floyd’s murder and alarms went off immediately - so many things are made clear in how the cops responded to her here, a woman who’s more their peer and team mate than ANY ONE:

-They don’t believe her when she says she’s a firefighter [because she’s a woman, and someone will certainly jump in and posit that a white guy saying the same thing would get the same response from the cops but .....I really don’t think so, I think we’re kidding ourselves when we pretend that equality is our cultures norm and not segregation and actual genocide and systemic racism and obvious sexism, seen in our disregarding/discrediting/cheapening everything that is feminine, like fucking feelings😤. Those cops would have recognized themselves in another guy claiming his skill set and even if they wouldn’t have let him check George’s pulse while he was dying, they would have for SURE treated him with more respect and with the assumption that he’s telling the truth if he exhibits enough “friendly qualities” aka be white, be male, not be dressed in clothes that look ‘urban’ or homeless (because a homeless white guy is just a failure which is unamerican 🙄) qualities which are literally a result of *luck* [white, man] and superficiality+privilege [money to buy clothes that make others more comfortable]

-‘you would know better’ is a totally infantilizing tone to take with this professional woman, and ultimately she DID KNOW BETTER THAN THEM and had they let her do what she knew was right to do a person would still be alive [like, piece of shit Derek Whatever should be fucking WISHING he had listened to her in that fucking moment every day for the rest of his life, it should haunt him that he let his surrounding fucked up culture of white supremacy and male-coddling move him to murder a man over a $20 bill instead of listen to a woman, or listen to a child, or listen to someone crying, or listen to someone with no money - he should be the poster child of “yo, we white men NEED everyone else around us and we should start acting like it, NOW” that’s literally what “make space” means, because too many men need to move out of the fucking way, like “let the grown ups talk” “let them work”, “let them save lives” I am so sick of LETTING cops play action hero with real guns and imagined ‘enemies’ in their real neighbors bodies - they shouldn’t ever be working with a defense mindset, it should be “support the community”, their intentions and goals should be *sooooo feminine* and rooted in love and care and family projected onto their country at large, their home🏠=their home🌎

- If/then statements become instantly threatening when someone’s life is immediately at stake, it’s an aggressor and his buddies telling you to get out of their way, to shut the fuck up

-....”you’d know not to get involved” WHAT THE FUCK she is part of the team of emergency responders in our country and she SHOULD get involved when she sees something that she can take care of - like a man with a swollen face smashed into the ground and a blocked air pipe and weakened heart rate - that is exactly her fucking job and how she knows to do it [all stories of off-duty cops running around discharging their weapons and making arrests without wearing their uniforms - we’re supposed to be fine with that, but not when the other emergency peeps try to apply their experience?? In this case where there was no threat to anyone as George was HANDCUFFED AND LOSING CONSCIOUSNESS surrounded by three cops and a crowd upset to be watching them kill him. cops constantly demand all this respect in response to their abuse and demand that citizens suspend their logic and their fucking freedom to exist so cops can “do their jobs” and we can’t complain, we can’t protest their bad job, we can’t give them *any* attitude at any time while they harass us even if they aren’t dressed as such..... but none of these special rules apply to anyone else.... like, cops fail the golden rule from the outset 🤨

The fact that a murderer who used to make money as a cop [because to be clear, being a cop isn’t a personality trait, it signifies no goodness, no heroism, nothing more than a job, a job people do to get money, it’s not heroic to get a chunk of cash after “triaging a childs gun shot wounded leg” especially considering the violence that cause that child’s injury was propagated by the violent and militant policing of their community...so cops have literally set the stage perfectly for all their “acts of heroism”and bonus! They get bonuses/pay increases when the crimes rates are “really🤑bad” like HELLO!!!]

that these spineless men can actually rest on the defense of “it was the black mans fault that he was killed, it was the counterfeit bills callers fault, it was the crowds fault for making us nervous and being threatening to us and angry at the sight of a man being slowly murdered in front of them” - the crowd was mostly people of color, young kids, and this firefighter who made a point of staying behind because she was concerned for the safety of her black neighbors *while police were around*

😑I need fucking Queen amidala in the center of the senate saying “the people have spoken and we vote no confidence” fire all cops, tell them “we set up this new protective agency, you can apply but we cannot promise you’ll get this job, you’ll have to PROVE IT that you can even do it” because I’ve never seen men spoken to like that,

I constantly hear how women and bipoc “just need to find another job” when they are in a tough spot with bad treatment, harassment, low pay, hours, etc, (these are almost always service jobs that entertain/benefit wealthy people, like waiters, like strippers, like masseuses, like fast food workers, like cheerleaders, like maids, like nannies, the rich seem to be in this cycle of consuming without resistance for as long as they possibly can, then if/when anyone brings up how it’s kind of dangerous and there should be a better way they say “well fucking fine! Just shut it down, we didn’t even NEED it, this was a pointless job anyways so now it doesn’t exist” it’s a shitty breakup - it’s the other person responding to your valid criticism and willingness to work together to improve the relationship “well I didn’t even like you and you’re ugly so” 🙄Cool!

~Whyyyyy don’t wealthy/privileged people get called out for all their daily bridge burning??? [the answer is unfortunately because they were burning bridges with people no one cared about - like the workers of a Taco Bell, or the child of a black man murdered by cops, or a teenage girl raped by an executive who invited her to his office for “an interview” - no one tells all the many people involved in letting abuse continue not to burn bridges with their victims, with all of THOSE people, because our culture doesn’t respect them. hence #blm #metoo #transrights etc, the real theme is “we’re not white straight men” white supremacy needs to die a horrible painful, ugly, honorless, despicable death~

So the wealthy creates the job, labels it from the get go “not worthy of respect”, enjoys without consequences, abuses, pretends that it’s the fault of the worker for their pay and that they receive no respect [✨gaslighting✨]...... and when that worker decides that their dignity isn’t worth 8.25 an hour, the wealthy response is to either fire the easily replacable body whose Heath is clearly of no importance to them [if it was we’d have universal heathcare] or just erase that job entirely that serves as someone’s lifeline, their survival, because abusing vulnerable people bears no weight on their own wealthy existence, with all their options. bill gates doesn’t give a shit when a subway closes, but that subway was not only the job/livelihoods of a whole team of people who *hopefully* live nearby with their families [and not three different bus rides away in a more “diverse” neighborhood 🙄], that subway also fed the community when they wanted lunch/dinner or wanted a sandwich snack or something warm, and didn’t have the time or the ingredients or the know how or *bodily ability* to do it themselves. To so many nameless/non celebrity people, that closing is catastrophic and in some cases threatening to their life.

We dismiss little lives and simple lives so ruthlessly, a man could be perfectly happy heading a subway for 35 years if he was paid respectfully by his employer and treated respectfully by everyone [if We had a subway guy like that, we’d love him! We’d know his name and he’d know ours and our faves and our goals and we could ask how his three kids are without hanging our heads in shame knowing he makes no more than $30,000 a year as a manager which is NOT AT ALL ENOUGH for either him alone or his lovely family that he loves so much - and this hypothetical is annoying already because we shouldn’t pay people a certain amount *because they are good*, people should be paid an amount that allows them to access the things that help them and enrich them, make them happier, healthier, make *choices* that lead to goodness for sure - but we can’t fucking expect people living in poverty now to prove to us that they’ll use their money “appropriately” - it starts with us helping them up

We couldn’t let restaurants/grocery stores close during the pandemic, that alone proved that we need these people who just flip burgers and stack cans - and we need them to be well paid, and healthy and happy

it is always those vulnerable individuals responsibility to find a new employer, not for structures of power to end discriminatory practices and mistreatment [uwu, too hard, thanks for making this laziness in our leaders possible white supremacy! It’s going so great😒] I’d like for white male cops to feel that vulnerability FOR ONCE [even just in conversation, even in a hypothetical] and have to consider winning a new job, and winning it based on actual merit and skill, not the fact that their fellow white dude bosses feel most comfortable with them in the locker room 🙄

if the larger portion of the community that doesn’t subscribe to white supremacy has no confidence in the men and women whose jobs it is to protect them and ‘serve justice’ then we need to adjust, not throw more money at the privileged, brainwashed fuck ups and say “here’s more money to be less monstrous” I really don’t get why anyone is surprised these tiny, insignificant, performative measures don’t result in any positive change - because we’re not tackling the actual issues and unfortunately for dipshits, *racism/sexism/classism* is the entire issue that needs to be handled - the issue is simply that some humans don’t think another group of humans deserve their respect [and I don’t want to hear that that’s how the animal kingdom works because fuck that, we’re thinking and *feeling* humans and that places us on a higher plane of existence and potential - to not know that we’re better than *this* is so fucking offensive, and we can’t keep moving as slowly as white straight ass holes, everything is on fire]

Sql Interview Questions You'll Keep in mind

The program has lots of interactive SQL practice exercises that go from easier to challenging. The interactive code editor, information sets, and also obstacles will certainly help you seal your understanding. Mostly all SQL job candidates go through exactly the exact same nerve-wracking process. Here at LearnSQL.com, we have the lowdown on all the SQL practice and also prep work you'll need to ace those meeting inquiries and also take your occupation to the following level. Narrative is finishing the elements of development of de facto mop up of test cases defined in the design and sterilize the reporting % in joined requirementset. If you're speaking with for pliable docket jobs, below are 10 meeting inquiries to ask. Be sure to shut at the end of the interview. And also exactly how can there be obstacle on liberation comey. The first affair to celebrate or so the emplacement is that people. We have to provide the void problem in the where stipulation, where the whole data will certainly duplicate to the new table. NOT NULL column in the base table that is not picked by the view. Relationship in the database can be defined as the connection in between greater than one table. In between these, a table variable is much faster mainly as it is stored in memory, whereas a short-term table is kept on disk. Hibernate allow's us create object-oriented code and also internally converts them to indigenous SQL questions to perform versus a relational database. A database trigger is a program that immediately executes in reaction to some event on a table or view such as insert/update/delete of a document. Mostly, the data source trigger helps us to maintain the honesty of the data source. Likewise, IN Statement runs within the ResultSet while EXISTS keyword operates online tables. In this context, the IN Statement also does not operate questions that connects with Online tables while the EXISTS keyword phrase is made use of on linked inquiries. The MINUS keyword essentially deducts in between two SELECT queries. The outcome is the difference between the first query as well as the second question. In case the size of the table variable exceeds memory dimension, then both the tables do in a similar way. Referential honesty is a relational database principle that recommends that accuracy and uniformity of data should be maintained between key and also international secrets. Q. Checklist all the feasible worths that can be stored in a BOOLEAN data area. A table can have any number of foreign secrets specified. Aggregate query-- A question that sums up details from multiple table rows by utilizing an accumulated function. Hop on over to the SQL Method course on LearnSQL.com. This is the hands-down best area to evaluate and consolidate your SQL abilities prior to a huge interview. https://geekinterview.net You do have full web access and if you need more time, do not hesitate to ask for it. They are extra worried about the end product instead of anything else. Yet make indisputable regarding thinking that it will be like any type of coding round. They do a via end to end examine your rational in addition to coding capability. As well as from that you have to analyze and apply your method. This won't call for front end or database coding, console application will certainly do. So you have to obtain data and afterwards save them in listings or something so that you can use them. Piece with the 2nd interview, you will certainly locate far and away regularly that a much more elderly collaborator or theater director by and large conducts these. Buyers intend to make a move in advance their buying big businessman obtains searched. Obtain conversations off on the right track with discussion beginners that ne'er give way. The last stages of a locate telephone call should be to guide away from voicing aggravations and also open a discourse nigh completion result a outcome can pitch. Leading new house of york stylist zac posen dealt with delta staff members to make the special consistent solicitation which was introduced one twelvemonth back. The briny event youâ $ re stressful to discover is what they knowing and what they do or else now. And this is a rather complex query, to be sincere. Nevertheless, by asking you to create one, the questioners can examine your command of the SQL phrase structure, as well as the method which you approach solving a issue. So, if you don't procure to the appropriate solution, you will possibly be given time to assume as well as can definitely capture their attention by how you attempt to resolve the issue. Making use of a hands-on strategy to dealing with practical tasks is oftentimes way more vital. That's why you'll have to manage functional SQL meeting inquiries, also. You can complete the two questions by claiming there are 2 sorts of database monitoring systems-- relational and non-relational. SQL is a language, designed just for working with relational DBMSs. It was created by Oracle Corporation in the very early '90s. It adds step-by-step attributes of programming languages in SQL. DBMS figure out its tables through a hierarchal manner or navigational fashion. This serves when it concerns saving data in tables that are independent of each other and also you don't want to transform other tables while a table is being filled up or edited. wide variety of online database programs to help you end up being an expert and break the interviews quickly. Sign up with is a query that recovers related columns or rows. There are 4 sorts of signs up with-- internal join left join, ideal join, and full/outer sign up with. DML allows end-users insert, update, recover, and erase data in a data source. This is one of the most prominent SQL interview concerns. A gathered index is utilized to purchase the rows in a table. A table can possess only one gathered index. Constraints are the depiction of a column to implement information entity and uniformity. There are two degrees of restraint-- column level as well as table degree. Any row typical across both the result set is gotten rid of from the final output. The UNION key phrase is used in SQL for combining multiple SELECT inquiries however deletes duplicates from the outcome collection. Denormalization allows the access of fields from all typical forms within a data source. With respect to normalization, it does the opposite and also places redundancies into the table. SQL which means Requirement Inquiry Language is a web server shows language that gives interaction to database areas as well as columns. While MySQL is a kind of Data source Monitoring System, not an actual programs language, more specifically an RDMS or Relational Database Administration System. Nonetheless, MySQL likewise implements the SQL phrase structure. I responded to all of them as they were all simple questions. They told me they'll call me if I get picked as well as I was quite confident since for me there was absolutely nothing that went wrong yet still I obtained absolutely nothing from their side. Basic questions concerning family, education, jobs, placement. As well as a little conversation on the solutions of sql and java programs that were given up the previous round. INTERSECT - returns all distinctive rows chosen by both queries. The process of table design to decrease the information redundancy is called normalization. We require to separate a data source right into two or more table as well as specify connections in between them. Yes, a table can have several international tricks and also only one primary secret.

Keys are a crucial feature in RDMS, they are basically areas that connect one table to one more and advertise quick information access and also logging via managing column indexes. In terms of data sources, a table is described as an arrangement of organized access. It is more divided right into cells which have various areas of the table row. SQL or Structured Inquiry Language is a language which is made use of to connect with a relational data source. It supplies a way to adjust and produce data sources. On the other hand, PL/SQL is a dialect of SQL which is made use of to boost the abilities of SQL. SQL is the language made use of to produce, update, as well as customize a database-- pronounced both as 'Se-quell' and'S-Q-L'. Prior to starting with SQL, let us have a short understanding of DBMS. In easy terms, it is software program that is used to produce as well as take care of data sources. We are mosting likely to stick with RDBMS in this short article. There are likewise non-relational DBMS like MongoDB made use of for huge data evaluation. There are numerous accounts like information expert, data source manager, and data architect that need the knowledge of SQL. Besides leading you in your interviews, this article will certainly likewise give a basic understanding of SQL. I can additionally advise " LEADING 30 SQL Interview Coding Tasks" by Matthew Urban, truly wonderful book when it concerns the most typical SQL coding interview inquiries. This mistake usually appears because of syntax mistakes on-call a column name in Oracle database, notice the ORA identifier in the error code. See to it you key in the correct column name. Additionally, take unique note on the pen names as they are the one being referenced in the error as the void identifier. Hibernate is Things Relational Mapping tool in Java.

Sql Meeting Questions You'll Bear in mind

The course has lots of interactive SQL practice exercises that go from much easier to testing. The interactive code editor, information sets, as well as obstacles will help you seal your expertise. Mostly all SQL task candidates go through precisely the same nerve-wracking process. Here at LearnSQL.com, we have the lowdown on all the SQL practice as well as preparation you'll require to ace those interview questions and take your occupation to the next degree. Reporting is coating the aspects of development of de facto mop up of test cases specified in the layout as well as sterilize the reportage % in signed up with requirementset. If you're interviewing for pliable docket work, here are 10 meeting questions to ask. Make sure to shut at the end of the meeting. And also how can there be impedimenta on freedom comey. The initial affair to celebrate or so the emplacement is that individuals. We need to offer the invalid condition in the where stipulation, where the whole data will replicate to the brand-new table. NOT NULL column in the base table that is not selected by the sight. Relationship in the database can be specified as the link in between greater than one table. In between these, a table variable is quicker mainly as it is stored in memory, whereas a short-term table is stored on disk.

Hibernate allow's us create object-oriented code as well as internally transforms them to indigenous SQL queries to carry out versus a relational database. A data source trigger is a program that immediately carries out in action to some event on a table or sight such as insert/update/delete of a record. Mostly, the database trigger aids us to maintain the integrity of the data source. Likewise, IN Declaration runs within the ResultSet while EXISTS keyword operates on digital tables. In this context, the IN Declaration additionally does not operate on questions that relates to Online tables while the EXISTS search phrase is utilized on linked inquiries. The MINUS keyword essentially subtracts between two SELECT questions. The result is the difference in between the very first question and also the second query. In case the size of the table variable goes beyond memory size, then both the tables carry out similarly. Referential integrity is a relational database concept that recommends that precision and also uniformity of information ought to be kept between primary as well as foreign secrets. Q. Checklist all the possible worths that can be kept in a BOOLEAN information area. A table can have any kind of variety of foreign keys defined. Aggregate query-- A inquiry that summarizes information from multiple table rows by using an accumulated function. Hop on over to the SQL Practice course on LearnSQL.com. This is the hands-down ideal location to evaluate as well as consolidate your SQL abilities before a big meeting. You do have full internet gain access to as well as if you need even more time, do not hesitate to ask for it. They are a lot more worried about completion item rather than anything else. Yet make indisputable concerning assuming that it will certainly resemble any coding round. They do a via end to finish check on your rational as well as coding ability. And from that you need to assess and also execute your technique. This will not require front end or database coding, console application will do. So you need to obtain data and after that save them in lists or something to make sure that you can utilize them. Item with the second meeting, you will certainly find to the highest degree regularly that a extra senior partner or theatre supervisor by and large performs these. Customers want to make a move ahead their purchasing big businessman obtains combed. Obtain conversations off on the right track with discussion beginners that ne'er give way. The last stages of a find call must be to steer away from articulating irritations and open up a discourse nigh completion result a result can pitch. Leading brand-new residence of york fashion designer zac posen collaborated with delta employees to make the exclusive uniform solicitation which was unveiled one twelvemonth back. The briny affair youâ $ re demanding to figure out is what they knowing and what they do otherwise currently. https://geekinterview.net And this is a instead intricate question, to be honest. Nonetheless, by asking you to develop one, the questioners can inspect your command of the SQL phrase structure, along with the way in which you approach resolving a trouble. So, if you don't procure to the ideal response, you will possibly be given time to think and can definitely catch their interest by how you attempt to solve the trouble. Making use of a hands-on approach to dealing with reasonable jobs is most of the times way more vital. That's why you'll have to deal with sensible SQL meeting inquiries, too. You can complete both questions by saying there are two sorts of database management systems-- relational and also non-relational. SQL is a language, developed only for collaborating with relational DBMSs. It was created by Oracle Corporation in the early '90s. It includes step-by-step features of programming languages in SQL. DBMS figure out its tables with a hierarchal way or navigational way. This is useful when it involves saving data in tables that are independent of one another and also you don't want to change various other tables while a table is being loaded or edited. myriad of online data source programs to assist you become an expert and break the meetings conveniently. Sign up with is a inquiry that fetches related columns or rows. There are four types of signs up with-- internal sign up with left sign up with, appropriate sign up with, as well as full/outer sign up with. DML enables end-users insert, upgrade, recover, and also erase data in a database. This is just one of the most popular SQL meeting inquiries. A clustered index is made use of to get the rows in a table. A table can have only one gathered index. Restrictions are the depiction of a column to apply information entity and consistency. There are two degrees of restriction-- column level and table level. Any type of row common across both the result set is removed from the last output. The UNION key phrase is utilized in SQL for combining multiple SELECT questions but deletes duplicates from the result collection. Denormalization allows the retrieval of fields from all typical kinds within a data source. With respect to normalization, it does the contrary and puts redundancies into the table. SQL which means Requirement Question Language is a web server shows language that supplies interaction to data source areas and columns. While MySQL is a kind of Data source Management System, not an real programming language, even more specifically an RDMS or Relational Database Monitoring System. However, MySQL additionally applies the SQL syntax. I answered every one of them as they were all easy inquiries. They informed me they'll contact me if I get selected and also I was rather positive because for me there was absolutely nothing that went wrong yet still I got absolutely nothing from their side. Basic inquiries regarding family, education and learning, projects, placement. And a little discussion on the answers of sql and also java programs that were given up the previous round. INTERSECT - returns all distinct rows picked by both questions. The procedure of table style to decrease the information redundancy is called normalization. We need to split a database into two or more table and specify connections in between them. Yes, a table can have numerous foreign keys as well as just one primary key. Keys are a vital attribute in RDMS, they are essentially fields that link one table to another as well as promote fast information access and also logging via taking care of column indexes. In regards to databases, a table is described as an plan of organized access. It is more divided right into cells which consist of different areas of the table row. SQL or Structured Query Language is a language which is used to connect with a relational data source. It provides a means to adjust and also develop data sources. On the other hand, PL/SQL is a language of SQL which is utilized to improve the capabilities of SQL. SQL is the language made use of to create, upgrade, and customize a data source-- articulated both as 'Se-quell' as well as'S-Q-L'. Before starting with SQL, let us have a short understanding of DBMS. In simple terms, it is software application that is utilized to produce as well as take care of data sources. We are going to stick to RDBMS in this post. There are also non-relational DBMS like MongoDB used for huge information analysis. There are different profiles like data analyst, data source manager, and information architect that call for the understanding of SQL. Aside from leading you in your meetings, this write-up will likewise offer a basic understanding of SQL. I can additionally advise "TOP 30 SQL Meeting Coding Tasks" by Matthew Urban, really excellent publication when it involves the most usual SQL coding meeting concerns. This mistake usually appears because of syntax errors available a column name in Oracle data source, observe the ORA identifier in the mistake code. See to it you typed in the correct column name. Likewise, take unique note on the aliases as they are the one being referenced in the error as the invalid identifier. Hibernate is Things Relational Mapping device in Java.

History of Chinese standing collars (part 2: Republican era)

Quick recap: I was debating with myself whether “Mandarin collar” should be a thing because standing collars throughout Chinese history looked different. In part 1 I went through standing collars in the Ming and Qing Dynasties, now I’m going to investigate the Republican era (1912-1949). I numbered the styles in part 1 but they’re only guidelines so you don’t have to remember anything.

*I’m not including Manchu womenswear in this post because they weren’t very significant to collars and there’s a lot I need to verify, so hopefully I’ll make separate posts about it one day.

1910s

Summary of 1910s Han women’s fashion here.

Let’s look at Han women’s fashion first. The 1910s continued the use of collar style 7 from the 1890s and 1900s; this style of collar, often called 元宝领 yuanbaoling, ingot collar, or 马鞍领 ma’anling, saddle collar, after the objects it resembles, was so tall that it reached the cheeks of the wearer and could not be closed in the front at all. It could be trimmed with binding, piping, or commonly in this era, fur or ruffles. It could have either rectangular or round edges. It was closed by one 盘扣 pankou, this fabric braided button, at the base, but it could have more pankous for ornamental purposes. Around this time people began experimenting with stiffening and structure in standing collars; this was a result of Western influence, specifically the standing collars on some Western military uniforms. I don’t think Chinese collars were ever boned like Victorian and Edwardian women’s collars, but a layer of stiff interlining was probably enough to give a collar shape and rigidity. Because of the extraordinary height of collar style 7, it had to be stiffened.

Source here

Calendar painting from 1914. This collar has a rectangular edge and is trimmed with fur.

Source here

Calendar painting from 1915-1916. This collar has a rounded edge and wide binding.

However, this ultra tall collar wasn’t everybody’s cup of tea and normal height collars existed as well, especially in the beginning and end of the decade. A new invention of this era was this tall collar with slightly rounded edges closed by two to three pankou----in some extreme cases four. I believe they were stiffened, but even if they were not, the use of wide, heavyweight binding could give it shape and rigidity. This style probably grew out of collar styles 2 and 3 from 19th century Han women’s collars, but it is going to become very iconic and distinct later in the 30s so let’s label it collar style 8. All Han women’s standing collars before the 1970s were extremely fitted, i.e. they completely hug the wearer’s neck and could sometimes be restrictive to neck movement. The loose fitted collars often seen on modern mass produced cheongsam is not historically accurate.

Source here

Calendar painting from 1911 showing collar style 8. It had three pankou, wide double row binding and could be closed at the front.

Source here

Calendar painting from 1919 also showing collar style 8. Throughout the 1890s, 1900s, 1910s and early 20s, innovative/Western trims like lace were commonly used instead of plain binding.

Quickly turning our attention to menswear. I’m not a menswear expert so feel free to add info or references. In the 1910s, menswear collars followed a similar development. After looking at more photos from the period, I figured out that in the late 1900s, men’s collars still had rectangular edges and were pretty low. This was also echoed in the formal dress code issued by the republican government in 1912. You can read more about the formal dress code in this article, it’s a great guideline for understanding ceremonial clothing in the republican era. 

Source here (I’m probably gonna pull most of the menswear photos from the photo album in this article cause they are conveniently dated)

1907 photograph of a certain Mr Ye Jinglv, a legend who preserved his photographs from the 1900s to the 1960s, wearing a 短衫 duanshan short robe and pants.

I have no idea where this collar type came from but the three main suspects are European military uniform collars, Japanese uniform collars (also inspired by European military uniform collars) and Qing Dynasty officials’ collars (now attached to the tunic itself). 

As the 1910s progressed, men’s collars gained rounded edges and grew taller just like women’s collars, but they were never so tall to the point that they could not be closed in the front. They were still closed by one plain pankou at the base (men’s pankou has always been plain). This is likely the collar style 6 I identified in part 1 but wasn’t sure about. These collars don’t appear to be stiffened, but rather just constructed of heavyweight fabric similar to the robe itself. Oh and sometimes in photographs you can see men wearing two collars, that is because both the 长衫 changshan, long robe, and 马褂 magua, riding vest, had standing collars in the 1910s, so when both are worn at the same time there will be two collars.

Source here

1916 photograph of Mr Ye Jinglv in a changshan and magua, collar style 6.

1920s

Summary of 1920s Han women’s fashion 1, 2, 3

Going into the 20s collar style 7 went out of fashion completely. The 20s was a wild decade and everything went, but overall collars usually ranged from medium height to tall. There is a wide variety of collar designs in the 20s, women’s dresses with no collar or Western collars like sailor collar, shawl collar or no collar at all etc. all existed, I’ll just list the most common standing collar designs of Chinese origin.

Early 20s collars decreased in height slightly but were still tall standing collars, with rectangular edges, binding and two to three pankous. Let’s call this collar style 9 because it has a will of its own. It’s weirdly reminiscent of collar style 4 from part 1 but the difference is that collar style 4 was unstiffened and had rectangular edges. I don’t think designers in the republican era ever really consciously referenced any historical collar shapes prior to the 19th century... Fashion history was a non-existent academic discipline at that time.

Source here

Calendar painting from 1920 showing collar style 9. It is unstiffened and moderately tall. It has slightly rounded edges, two pankous and a thin row of binding/piping.

Source here

Calendar painting from 1920-21, showing similar collar style 9 with thin binding and two pankou.

Toward the mid 20s both wide and thin binding could be used and the number of pankou ranged from one to three. I’ve seen multiple times collars with only one pankou at the bottom but still could close completely at the front, which means stiffening was likely used to keep the shape of the collar; I’ll number this collar style 10. The decorations of the mid 20s pursued a tacky aesthetic and were heavily inspired by the 19th century. Alternatively, collars could be decorated with scalloped edges or geometric Western trim. The overall aesthetic was still very 19th century Chinese though. I feel like internal hooks and bars could’ve been used to close these collars, like Western or Japanese military uniform collars, but this is pure speculation.

Source here

Watercolor ca. 1926 showing a medium height collar style 10. It closes with only one pankou but holds its shape very well.

Source here or see watermark

Mid 20s artwork showing a similar collar, albeit with thin binding.

Starting from 1928-29 there was this huge trend of using tall, side closing collars. This collar was stiff and structured, tall and closed at the side or back with either pankou or hooks and eyes/bars. It covers the wearer’s neck completely and doesn’t have any openings. This kind of collar was frequently applied to the newly developed cheongsam, which was a one piece dress, to emulate a Western flapper look. The art deco aesthetic was en vogue in the years 1929-31, so there were many cheongsam with innovative closures instead of pankou. I personally really love this look it’s very underrated. This would be collar style 11; it was truly one of a kind since it was never seen again in Chinese fashion history. Rest in Power.

Source here

Painting ca. 1929 showing collar style 11. This is probably closed at the back? Anyway the pankou were not emphasized at this time.

Source here

Kong Sang Hong ad from 1929 showing collar style 11 without visible pankou.

Now menswear again. In the 20s, the tall collar style 6 went out of fashion, following trends in womenswear. The new collar was medium height and still closed by one pankou at the base. It could have either rounded or rectangular edges but rectangular or mostly rectangular edges seem to be more common. I’d say this is similar to collar style 10.

Source here

1925 photograph of Ye Jinglv wearing again changshan and magua.

1930s

Summary of 1930s Han women’s fashion 1, 2

Returning to Han women. Collar 11′s popularity continued to around 1931, when it began to be replaced by a revived version of collar style 8. Collar style 8 with three buttons dominated the majority of the 30s, and these buttons didn’t necessarily have to be pankou; any kind of decorative loop button, clasp or frog closure could be used. 30s collars emphasized the roundness of the buttons, so beads or pearls were commonly used as buttons.

Source here

Calendar painting from 1932 showing collar style 8. 

Source here

Mid 30s advertisement showing collar style 8 with bead buttons matching those on the cardigan.

Source here

1932 cover of The Young Companion showing collar style 8 with pearl/bead buttons. Oh collars on a transparent cheongsam would usually be opaque because the interlining/stiffening needs to be hidden.

Men’s collars of the 30s decreased in height again, this time becoming really quite short. Round and rectangular edges coexisted but round edges were still more common. Still closed by one pankou. Not many changes otherwise (gosh, menswear always changes at a glacial pace, y’all men need to step up your game). This foreshadows 40s Han women’s collars so let’s label this collar style 12. Men’s changshan and magua collars stayed this way well into the 40s and 50s.

Source here

1935 photograph of Ye Jinglv in changshan with collar style 12.

In the late 30s/early 40s collars dropped in height significantly, regressing to collar styles 9 or 10. It was usually closed with one or two pankou (because there was only enough space for two maximum). 

Source here

Late 30s/early 40s artwork depicting the revived collar style 10.

1940s

Summary of 1940s fashion here

As the 40s progressed collars became even shorter, eventually so short that only one pankou could be attached. This developed from collar style 9 but since it was so low and so distinct to the 40s I’d say this is also collar style 12. It may appear similar to collar style 3 from the 19th century but it has rounded edges and is also stiffened and slightly taller.

Source here

Early to mid 40s artwork showing collar style 12.

19th century trims became fashionable again in the early 40s, especially collars with multiple rows of binding/piping. However because of scarcity of materials during the war, that style was only ever seen on actresses and celebrities; cheongsam collars for the average woman were plain.

Source here

40s Indanthren fabric ad, showing low collar style 12.

In summary:

Collar style 7: cursed belle époque (ca. 1890-1918) women’s collars that touched the wearer’s face. Extremely tall, stiffened, both rounded and rectangular edges existed. Closed by one pankou at the bottom but sometimes had more pankou for ornamental purposes. Worn by Han women and the plain version for men.

Collar style 8: first appeared in the 1910s, popular in the late 10s and throughout the 30s. As tall as possible without restricting the wearer’s neck movements, stiffened, rounded edges. Closed by two to three pankou. Decorated with wide binding or Western trims like lace in the 10s, multiple rows of binding in the 30s. Worn by Han women. 

Collar style 9: developed from collar style 8, popular in the early 20s and late 30s/early 40s. Slightly shorter (medium height), stiffened, rounded edges. Closed by two pankou. Thin binding. Worn by Han women.

Collar style 10: developed from collar style 9, popular in the mid 20s and late 30s/early 40s. Slightly shorter (medium to low height), stiffened, rounded edges. Closed by one pankou at the base. Both wide and thin binding. Worn by Han women and a similar version by men.

Collar style 11: distinctly Western collar, popular 1929-1931. As tall as possible without restricting the wearer’s neck movements, stiffened, rectangular edges. Closed at the side or back with pankou or hooks and eyes. Often plain or of the same fabric as the dress. Worn by Han women.

Collar style 12: developed from collar style 10, popular throughout the 40s. Very short, stiffened, rounded edges. Closed by one pankou at the base. Commonly had thin binding. Worn by Han women and men.

Phew, I thought this was gonna be a short and simple post but it ended up taking way more of my time than I wanted it to. I’m gonna do one last post on the 50s and 60s and maybe address the state of Chinese standing collars nowadays, hopefully that will be actually simple to make lol.

Hello Secret Santa!

It occurs to me that just a vague link to the garbage fire that is my tumblr isn’t going to help you much, so I made a character reference guide for my idiots. 

If you’re unfamiliar with the Mass Effect universe (which you might be, or might need a refresher) I hope it’s useful. 

Kolyat Krios:

I don’t actually own him, I adopted him from BioWare. Kolyat is the son of Thane Krios, an infamous assassin. His childhood was not a nice one, but Kol got his life together after the war and decided not to murder people for a living like dear old dad did.

Kolyat is a drell, a scaled, bipedal race that are rare to the point of extinction in the universe, thanks to destroying their homeworld; only half a million of them exist, which is nothing. A large chunk of this population are subservient/lackeys to a jellyfish-like sentient race called the hanar, who use the drell to operate their machinery and fight for them, often from a young age. It is called the Compact agreement, and drell have worked off their debt for being ‘saved’ from their dying planet for centuries, with no sign of leaving it- yet.

Kolyat is not part of the Compact, nor does he have a hanar handler. In my Postwar ‘neon noir’ universe he is somewhat independent of his homeworld and lives on the Citadel; Kolyat is instead a 20-something detective in C-Sec, a job that defines him.

He lives on a mass, multispecies Ward on the space station -like DS9, but far more civilian- think NYC, London and Hong Kong on acid. Kolyat works for the station’s Homicide and Violent Crimes division; he finds the work fulfilling, but is a workaholic about solving the cases.

Kolyat’s a little bit grumpy, a little bit sarcastic, often prone to scowling. He is also a secret softy, despite the distant introversion- good with kids and pets, despite grumbling appearances. Once he trusts you enough to let you in, you have a friend for life, but he’s guarded about his past for good reasons.

Outfit wise, he’s a man who dresses for comfort, not style. He wears a constricting uniform all day, so his civvies are the 2190 equivalent of jogging bottoms and t-shirts. I mostly draw him in his battered leather jacket, but it’s fine without too.

His tag is: [HERE]. I have made outfit/inspiration sheets [HERE].

I actually really love his in game model, it’s not just a recolour of his dad. That chin! It’s truly excellent. Kolyat is head over heels in love (to his bafflement) with...

Oriana Lawson Lee:

They met at a postwar party on the Citadel, a few years after the Reapers were destroyed. I don’t actually own her either, I also adopted her from BioWare. She’s the sister/twin/clone of Miranda Lawson, but goes by her adopted family’s name of Lee.

Like Kolyat, Ori’s past isn’t a nice one; she was created in a laboratory to be a clone of her sister, a genetically perfect human. Ori was smuggled out as an infant to live a normal life for 19 years with her adopted family; during the war she was kidnapped and held at a space concentration camp by her creator, where he experimented on refugees and turned them into fodder for the war.

She survived, but has scars she keeps quiet about. Oriana is an ‘Ori’ to most people, and the kind of person in which the definition of charisma is usually applied to. She just has something that makes her noticeable- when she wants to. Ori is old Hollywood glam passed through a sci-fi filter, and is usually dressed to impress- often to a calculated degree. Feel free to go over the top with with pretty dresses and red carpet/gala looks, it’s very much her brand.

It’s not all sashaying around in heels, though. Oriana is also a structural engineer and colony developer for Kellam Industries, a sort of made up Doctors Without Borders/ Medecins Sans Frontier charity in the 2190s, and homes displaced refugees for a living. If you want to draw this side of her too, I will be just as delighted.

She and Kolyat seem like complete opposites, but are very much in love- even if they can’t work it out yet. Ori definitely keeps him on his toes; she’s guarded about her past, for obvious backstory reasons.

Ori’s tag is [HERE] and her wardrobe inspo tag is [HERE.] I have made two outfit/inspiration sheets [HERE] and [HERE].

I actually ignore the in game model, especially ME3′s horrible version. I don’t have a face claim for her, but I’ve drawn her plenty of times now for her to be distinctively her.  (I say, hopefully.)

Fish The Cat:

Fish is a standard short-haired cat that belongs to Kolyat, a stray he found and brought back home. She is as grumpy as her owner, but still the boss- Fish remains the absolute queen of their household.

She’s a grey-brown tabby with a white bib and matching socks; at one point she was overweight thanks to her food obsession, but Kolyat half-heartedly tries to keep it below chonk levels. Fish is very much his cat, the only one who she’ll let touch her/pet/etc. It seems Ori’s charm doesn’t actually work on belligerent cats at all, and Fish can be spiteful if she tries to hard.

Fish’s tag is [HERE]. She has no faceclaim (lol) but she’s just a standard tabby and white housecat you can find everywhere, really.

Detective Batesda “Bats” T’Lori:

T’Lori -Bats to his friends- is part of the same team/squad as Kolyat is in C-Sec. He’s also the closest thing Kolyat has to a best friend, which considering their personality difference, is hilarious.

Bats is a he/him asari. Asari are the universe’s space-elves, but female-presenting; his choice in pronouns is unusual for the setting, but accepted.

He will often roast the shit out of Kolyat on a daily basis. Bats is on paper is quite odious -a joker, never keeps the same lover around longer than a month, heavy drinker, titty obsessed, anime obsessive, lazy- but somehow has a certain charm that makes him get away with most of it.

Bats is an absolute powerhouse of a biotic (space wizard magic), and the squad’s heaviest hitter because of it. He dresses in practical clothing, but is fond of catsuits and one-pieces (no dresses.) He’s not a particular snazzy dresser, though, but is fond of wearing black and red.

Bats’ tag is [HERE]. I’ve used Ruby Rose a couple of times as reference for his face.

Detective Arjul Patel

Patel is part of the same team/squad as Kolyat in C-Sec, and self-appointed Squad Dad. He has somewhat gross traits; the one most likely to roll up his sleeve to show you his elbow rash, but he’ll also bring in candy and snacks he’s made for the crew.

He’s in his fifties, and has brown skin, warm brown eyes with a sly twinkle in them and a well combed head of black hair. Thanks to a steady diet of snacks, Patel has a little belly- he also has very impressive eyebrows that are very expressive. 

Patel is a born and bred Indian, but moved off world to a colony as soon as he was able. He has less art than the others; I have used Nawazuddin Siddiqui as a face ref for a few paintings, but softened his features every time. 

Patel’s tag is [HERE].

Thank you for reading all this!

Art of any of these characters is more than fine with me, but a combination of the above will probably make my christmas.

A lot of Kol and Ori is my headcanon interwoven with actual canon, if you’re reading it all and going “I don’t remember that” that’s why. All the fan wiki links are legit canon, though.

I write about them as well as draw them, hence the mass amount of words. Their stories are up on A03.

I also answer questions about the characters a great deal in asks and prompts, the tag is [HERE].

Feel free to send me asks via anon if you want to know anything else <3

For @abbyheart25​, from the send me a pairing and a number and i’ll write you a drabble thing.  As always, brevity is not my strong suit.

116.  “If you’re here to arrest me you should know I have no intention of coming quietly.”  Graves/Credence

This one kinda feels like it should come with warnings?  My sense of what needs warnings and what doesn’t is a bit skewed, but I suspect it’s better to be safe than sorry.  So.  Warnings for racism, sexual harassment, the food service industry in general, and attempted underage prostitution.  (Nothing in the warnings applies to the main pairing except the last one.  Which doesn’t actually sounds as helpful as I think it does, but I promise this is very PG-13.)

Credence let the storm go.  He collapsed back into his body, landing hard on the rain-slick concrete.  He bit his lip when he landed and tasted blood.

Changing back always left him disoriented.  It didn’t hurt, exactly, but he couldn’t control it very well and he usually landed badly.  One of his knees twinged faintly; Credence couldn’t tell if he’d scraped it or strained it while his mind tried to reconcile having a body again.

For a second, his world was nothing but panic and pain.  He had to run -- had to get away.  He didn’t know why or from what, but he was on his feet and running before he realized what he was doing.

Credence ducked down a side alley on instinct.  The world was a rain slick blur, but some part of his brain recognized where he was.  He was down by the docks, not far from one of the squats he’d stayed in after Ma had thrown him out for being a godless freak.  Credence scrambled up on a dumpster and grabbed the fire escape, hauling himself up with a grunt of effort.  The squat had been cleared out awhile ago, but no one had bothered to check the little alcove on the roof.  He could hide there for awhile.  It wasn’t like the cops were going to go door-to-door.  Not in this neighborhood.  And even if they did, they wouldn’t check the roof.  Why would they?  No one in their right mind would be up there.  Not with the storm rolling in.  Everyone who had someplace else to go would be indoors.

The little alcove had probably been a pigeon coop at some point.  It was a rickety structure whose only saving grace was that it had a roof.  That was enough for Credence.  He ducked inside, closing the chicken wire door behind him.

Credence sat down on the floor.  Someone had cleaned out the bird shit since the last time he’d sheltered here.  There was a nest of filthy blankets in one corner.  They smelled like mildew and stale urine, but there was no other sign of human habitation.  No one had been here in awhile.

He wrapped his arms around his knees and tried to force his thoughts into some semblance of order.

He’d been twelve the first time he’d changed,  He hadn’t realized that was what had happened until much later.  All he’d known was that he’d somehow managed to reduce his bed to splinters.  Ma had beaten him so badly for it he couldn’t move for two whole days, and he’d slept on a thin mattress on the floor until the day she’d turned him out for good.  She said that he’d done it because he was willful and sinful and all manner of other hateful things that she needed to beat out of him.  Credence had tried to tell her that he hadn’t.

Except, of course, he had.  Just not in the way that Ma thought.  He hadn’t done it maliciously, or to be disrespectful.  He hadn’t been able to control the change or the storm. Not then.

Credence had read enough comic books to know that whatever was happening usually kicked in around puberty.  He just didn’t know what it was.

He didn’t know what he was.

Part of him desperately wanted to believe that he was different.  Special.  Magic or metahuman or a mutant or something else out of the stories.  That there were other people out there who were like him.  That there was a place for him.

This was real life, though.  Real life was nothing like the stories.  The good guys didn’t always win, the bad guys were rarely punished, and there was no such thing as a happily ever after.  Not for people like him.

Whatever he was, he was the only one.

Except, maybe, he wasn’t.

Credence rested his forehead against his knees and remembered.

*

Nagini hated the stupid outfit Skender made her wear.  She called it the video game version of a Chinese cheongsam, from the kind of fighting game that was designed to appeal to perverts.

“You know,” she said, at Credence’s baffled look.  “The ones where the women all have breasts the size of cantaloupes and they make porno noises when they get hit.”

Credence had seen pictures of those kinds of video games -- Ma had been religious, but it wasn’t like he lived under a rock -- but he’d never actually played one.  He had to admit that Nagini was probably right about her outfit.  Any modesty the high Mandarin collar of Nagini’s pervert-inspired cheongsam might have provided was entirely destroyed by the enormous lace panels “covering” her breasts and part of her right flank.  The skirt went down to her knees, but there were slits up both sides so high that Credence -- and therefore everyone else -- could see her underwear when she moved.  Skender made her wear underwear that matched, but what he’d provided had been little more than string, so one of the other girls at the Circus Arcana had taken pity on Nagini and told her where she could get cheap lacy Victoria’s Secret knockoffs to wear instead.

“This is about as Chinese as I am,” Nagini added, sounding more exhausted by the racism than enraged.  She passed Credence a hundred bucks under the guise of topping off a patron’s drink.  Her stupid skimpy outfit didn’t have any place to hide her tips, and Skender wasn’t above stealing them.  He’d check the girls at the door before he let them leave for the night, mostly as an excuse to put his hands on their breasts under the pretense of checking if they had money hidden in their bras.

Skender didn’t check Credence, though.  Why would he check the dishwasher?  No one was going to tip Credence.  The patrons of the Circus Arcana didn’t even know he existed.

“Sorry,” Credence said.

Nagini shrugged.  “Makes the assholes tip better,” she sighed.  

It also made them handsy.  Credence could see red marks on her thigh.  The guy at table six had tried to grab her again; he must’ve scratched her when Nagini jerked away.  Table Six always got handsy with the girls, but he paid well and he tipped well, so Skender let him.

Credence hated him.  He was vaguely aware that Table Six -- Shaw, his name was Shaw -- was a politician of some sort.  He’d seen pictures of the man on the subway.  He used to wonder what would happen if someone leaked the fact that Shaw liked to get handsy with the waitstaff at the Circus Arcana, and what he liked to do with the working girls was worse.  Nagini had told him not to bother.  Shaw’s father owned a newspaper.  No one would run that story.

“Nagini…”

“It’s fine, Credence,” Nagini said, twitching her skirt to hide the marks.  “It’s nothing.”

It wasn’t.  Credence felt the storm beckon.  For a second, he was genuinely tempted to let it go.  To reduce the Circus Arcana to rubble and rid the world of the entitled, handsy assholes who’d had the world handed to them on a silver platter and still thought it owed them something.

He couldn’t hurt Nagini, though.  Or the other girls.  Credence pushed the storm down and went back to work.

Shaw got loud enough and drunk enough that Skender had him escorted out.  Discreetly, of course.  He’d torn the lace panel over Nagini’s breasts before Skender had done it, though, so Skender had sent her home.  He’d docked her pay -- “for the cost of a new uniform” -- and laughed when Nagini flushed red with humiliation and rage, but he didn’t know about the hundred dollars Nagini had slipped Credence earlier, so it wasn’t as bad as it could have been.  She could still make rent.

“C’mon,” Credence said.  He’d filled a water bottle with well vodka at the start of his shift.  He took a sip, just to ward off the night chill, and handed the bottle to Nagini.  “Let’s go get pancakes.”  It wasn’t much, but it was all he could think of to salvage the night.

Nagini laughed.  “You’re such a lightweight,” she said.

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” Credence teased.  “If we both weren’t lightweights, Skender would catch me, and then how would we get free booze?”

Nagini tipped the bottle to her lips and drank.  “Pancakes are too much work,” she declared, a red flush creeping over her cheeks.  She always got red when she drank.  “Let’s have waffles.”

“With chocolate chips?”

“Fancy,” Nagini said approvingly.  “Do we have chocolate chip Eggos?”

“... No.”

“Shit.”

Credence was pretty sure they had regular Eggo waffles at home.  He was just tipsy enough to think the sandwiching a Hershey’s between two waffles might be an okay substitute to chocolate chip waffles, when a car door opened behind them and Table Six lurched out.

“Hey!” he said.  “Hey, you bitch, I’m talking to you.”

Credence and Nagini both turned to look at him.  Nagini jerked her head.  “Let’s just go,” she said.

“Don’t ignore me,” said Shaw.  “I paid for you.”  He gestured to his crotch.  “Time to work for your money, you slanty-eyed bitch.”

“Fuck off!” Nagini yelled.  She threw the vodka-filled water bottle at him.  It was half-empty already, and it didn’t do much besides splatter Shaw with cheap vodka.

Shaw roared something incoherent and charged at them.  Credence put himself in between Nagini and Shaw and got a black eye for his trouble.

“Don’t worry, freak,” Shaw promised.  “You can have her back when I’m done.  I just want what I paid for.”

The storm beckoned.  This time, Credence let it take him.

His storm self raged the way his human self couldn’t.  Credence threw Shaw around like a rag doll and stole the breath from his lungs.  He heard Nagini scream something -- maybe his name, maybe a warning -- and then white hot pain streaked through him.

Credence was so surprised that he let Shaw go.  He didn’t really know how his abilities worked, but he’d figured out that bullets and conventional weapons didn’t work on his storm self.  Nothing could hurt him when he was the storm.  Credence would have given up being human entirely if he could have, but he’d never managed to stay a storm for longer than an hour.

The storm turned, and whatever it was hit him again.

Credence screamed in rage and pain.  The pain made it hard to keep his hold on the storm.  He felt himself flicker between his storm self and his human self and forced himself to be the storm once more.

“Stop!” someone roared.  The voice was male, commanding and familiar.  Detective Graves from the 12th precinct.  He walked down the middle of the street like he owned it, his tailored coat flaring out behind him like a cape.  He looked like a superhero.

Credence had run away a couple of times when he was younger.  Detective Graves used to by the street kids sandwiches.  He was alright, for a cop.  Didn’t seem to want anything for his kindness -- not information or favors or a couple of sweaty minutes in the back of his patrol car.  He’d been horrified when Credence had offered, the one time he’d taken Credence to an actual diner and let him eat his fill.  Credence hadn’t understood why he’d been so upset at the time.  It wasn’t like he had any other way of paying Detective Graves back.  And besides, he was starting to think maybe he liked men more than he liked women, so it wasn’t like Credence wasn’t going to get something out of it.  Credence was pretty sure Detective Graves would be nicer about it than anyone else, and he could at least find out if he liked it.

Ma had found him and dragged him back home not long after that. Credence had only seen Detective Graves once after that day in the diner; he doubted the man even remembered him.

The man didn’t stop.  He’d made a gesture and lightning leapt from his hands to strike Credence.

Credence screamed when it hit him.  He had enough presence of mind to force himself to keep his storm shape as he scanned the area, looking for Nagini.  She must’ve run off as soon as Credence changed shapes.

She was probably afraid of him now, but at least she was safe.

Credence fled.

*

The filthy blankets were better than no blankets at all.  It was cold enough that Credence was grateful for them.  His clothes were soaked through with rain, and he couldn’t afford to go to a doctor if he got sick.  It wasn’t like Skender offered his employees health insurance.

Credence curled up underneath them and tried to sleep.

That man had been like him.  He had -- abilities.  Credence didn’t know what else to call them.  Maybe he was a metahuman.

He wasn’t alone, and the only other person who was like him had tried to kill him.

Real life was a little bit like the comics after all.

Credence fought down a wave of hysterical laughter.  Behind it lurked the urge to cry.  He wasn’t alone, except he was, and Nagini had seen what he was and she had to be afraid of him now, which meant that he was more alone than he’d been since Ma had thrown him out.  He wanted to go home and he wanted to run and he had no idea what to do.  He was a little bit afraid that if he started laughing or crying then he wouldn’t stop until he’d gone crazy.  Credence had seen enough comic books turned into bad movies to know what sort of person had that kind of origin story.  He didn’t want to be a supervillain.

There were footsteps on the roof.

Shit.

Credence bolted upright, trying to breathe as quietly as he could so as not to draw attention.

Stupid, stupid, stupid.  He was so stupid.  Why had he ever thought that hiding here was a good idea?  He was trapped.

Credence reached for the storm.  He could change if he had to.  It would hurt, so close to his last change, but he could do it.

“You can come out if you want to, Credence,” said Detective Graves.  “I’m not going to hurt you.”

Credence couldn’t help the bitter bark of laughter.  It just slipped out before he could stop it.  He clapped a hand over his mouth, but it was too late.  The damage had already been done.

Well, it wasn’t like Detective Graves didn’t know he was here.

Credence stood up and walked out of the pigeon coop.  The storm surged beneath his skin.  He could fling himself off the roof and change shapes before Detective Graves could stop him.  Go somewhere else.

“It would be you,” Credence muttered.  The only cop he’d ever kind of trusted.  The only one who’d ever been kind.

The only one he didn’t want to hurt.

“If you’re here to arrest me, Detective Graves, you should know that I have no intention of coming quietly.”

“Captain,” said Detective Graves.

“What?”

“It’s Captain Graves, now.  The 12th is mine.”

“Oh.  Um.  Congrats, I guess.  On your promotion.”

“Thanks,” said Captain Graves.  “Would you believe me if I said I wasn’t here to arrest you?”

“No,” said Credence, and changed.

He didn’t want to hurt Captain Graves, but if it was Captain Graves’ life or his freedom, he knew what he’d pick.  He’d killed Shaw, not to mention done a shit ton of damage to various buildings over the years.  Captain Graves was a cop.  Cops arrested people like him.

The storm surged towards Captain Graves, reaching out with grasping tendrils.  They slid away without touching him.  It was like trying to take hold of a glass sphere that had been coated in oil.  There was nothing to take hold of.

Credence howled in frustration.  Captain Graves tilted his head back and looked up at him.

“You’re magnificent,” he breathed.

Credence pulled back, confused.  He meant that.  Credence could see that he meant it.  Captain Graves looked at him the way people in movies looked at each other -- like Credence was something precious and wondrous and worthy of love.  He could have just been acting, like the people in the movies, but Credence didn’t think he was.

Captain Graves reached out a hand.  “Oh, my boy, you should have been brought to us long before it ever came to this.  The fact that you survived is nothing short of a miracle.  You are a miracle.”

Credence grasped his hand, letting the tendrils go solid until his human self remained.  It was hard to hold on to the storm when he was this confused.  The storm needed rage to direct it.  Rage and hate.

He stumbled, disoriented, and Captain Graves caught him.  He wrapped his arms around Credence, steadying him.

Credence felt safe there.  He hadn’t felt safe in years.

Us, he’d said.  You should have been brought to us.  There were more people out there like the man from earlier.  People with abilities.  People like Captain Graves.

People like Credence.

“What am I?” he asked.  “What are you?  Are we … metas?”

Captain Graves snorted.  “No.  Nothing like that.  Although it’s a useful cover for what we are.”  He raised one hand to cup Credence’s cheek.  “I told you.  You’re a miracle.”  He loosened his grip on Credence and took a step back.  For a second, nothing had changed and the next Credence had the impression of wings, huge and dark, unfurling in the air behind him.  They weren’t there and yet they were.  The feathers were a shade of brown so dark they were almost black.  Credence felt the rumble of tectonic plates shifting beneath the earth, the thin air of mountain peaks and the oppressive weight of dirt as he was buried alive.

Captain Graves snapped his wings shut and they vanished.

“What the hell?” Credence blurted.

“Not hell,” corrected Captain Graves.  “Or heaven.  Something in between.”  He traced a symbol in the air between them.

Credence recognized it.  He didn’t know how he recognized it, but he did.  He knew what it meant, too.  It was almost like he’d grown up knowing it and just forgotten that he did until now.

“Nephilim.”

A/N: This prompt made me wish I could draw.  It really did.  For some reason it was easier to think of in terms of comic book panels than it was in words, despite the fact that I am nooooot a good artist.  At all.  IDEK.  Brains are weird.

Sheer floral blouse, spring 2019

It’s always exciting when you try something new, and I’m so happy about this blouse, which is my first! I can’t believe how I’ve been sewing clothes since Grade 7 and this is the first blouse I have ever made.

To be honest, I have been wanting to sew a blouse since forever—mostly because of the ill-fitting uniform blouses I was required to wear at school—but it always got pushed back on my agenda to make place for fancier items. Then after the Chinese New Year, it came to me that I could no longer rely on my trusted school uniforms from this October. University would be the first time I need to wear my own clothes on a daily basis, and I realised that now would be a good time to make some wardrobe reformations, to make it both more grown-up and more personal.

Where better to start with shirts and blouses? I had a couple of store-bought blouses, but they were either somewhat uncomfortable, or just blend. ‘Blend’ not only in the sense of having solid colours, but also that didn’t look quite in line with my character. They were safe choices for a job interview, but not really something I would willingly dress myself in on an ordinary Tuesday.

Since most of the time I preferred something a bit structured and with some personal details, it was unavoidable that I had to make it myself. I decided to make a couple of floral shirts and blouses because little floral prints made (and still make) me happy.

I am probably too deeply affected by V&A’s pattern collections. Or it’s just because I have fully adopted my grandma’s aesthetics when it comes to clothes.

And so, this is the first blouse in my queue. I should’ve probably picked a more basic design, but I felt that this offered me an equally good opportunity to get to know my measurements in still and moving states. Since I am currently working on a more standardised blouse, this one has been helpful in easing me into this new world of shirt-making.

And here it is, tucked in, just as how I plan to wear it.

Design elements

It has an open collar. Structure-wise it’s continuous from the front pieces, and rolled back to form the lapels.

The short kimono sleeves are coupled with underarm gussets to increase the range of motion. The gussets extend from underarm to become undersleeves.

The sleeve cuffs are made with one extra strip of fabric for each side.

There are two vertical darts in the front and two in the back.

(Pardon the awkwardly rolled-up lapels. I should’ve done more pressing.)

Fitted kimono sleeves and underarm gussets

Here is a great resource that includes guidelines for kimono sleeves, gussets, and different kinds of rolled collars. The following is my own notes built on top of that.

I was worried about my shoulders appearing wide, so I didn’t add any ease to the shoulder areas on the bodice (i.e. I didn’t let out the shoulder seams; instead I cut more into the shoulder-sleeve dart at the top of sleeve in order to smoothen it out). When there is little ease on the shoulder, it is easier to make the sleeves to fit, as they enclose the arms better. The downside is that my shoulders do feel a little restricted and the range of motion for my arms are reduced, as in I cannot do a ballet bun while wearing this shirt. It’s a worthy compromise for me.

There will inevitably be a crease or some excess fabric in the underarm area, which allows movement of the arms. One way to reduce the excess here is to make the gusset extend more into the bodice (but not more into the sleeve). In other words, you can tighten the fit at bust but not at the inside of the upper arm.

Many patterns I’ve found have diamond-shaped gussets. However, it is far easier to have a curvy, slim, olive-shaped gusset. In a fitted design, if the two underarm corners of the gusset extend too sharply into the bodice, it will be a nightmare to sew because the angles are just too drastic, and there will also be a crease between those two points that cuts uncomfortably into the underarm.

I cut my gussets on bias, so that they are more giving and lay flat more easily under my arms.

A toile is most helpful—the idea is to make as many mistakes as needed on the toile so that they would all be avoided when making the actual blouse.

(It’s probably not very clear, but I used dense overcasting stitches for the underarm corners of the gusset instead of flat-felling them down, so those two centimeters of seam allowance on either side ‘float’ inside the garment, and it doesn’t pull the bodice in an area where it’s already somewhat taunt.)

Fabric

A cotton fabric with floral and star patterns. I purchased the fabric to make a summer dress last year (for which by the way I’m planning on a bit of modification), and I had enough fabric left to make this blouse. There are still some strips and squares left that can be used in other projects.

Both kimono sleeves and continuous rolled collar can take up a lot of space if not arranged carefully, so definitely draft and arrange the pattern pieces first if considering buying some new fabric for such a project.

This fabric is so sheer that I’m sure the lines of any bras or slips will show under sunlight. I don’t mind, though. Besides, it looks lovely when held in front of light—reminds me of the X-ray photos that V&A has done on Balenciaga’s works.

Look how thin the seam allowances are on the sleeve cuffs. I can only pray that the part will not suffer from much wear and tear.

 Details

The blouse is entirely hand-sewn. I did a backstitch every several running stitches so that the pieces will not just fall apart when a thread is broken. I used to always sew a seam twice to mimic the machine-sewn running stitch, but I didn’t do it on this shirt.

I used French seams on side seams and shoulder seams. The raw edges of the lapel facings are folded over only once and held in place with an overcast stitch, catching the outer fabric every few stitches. The stitches are almost invisible from the outside. Same for the hem, only that the raw edge is folded over twice. I applied fell stitches and slip stitches where suitable, and sometimes a Frankenstein version of these two stitches. The aim was to make it strong and invisible, not to stick rigidly to a stitch dictionary.

I’ve never liked making buttonholes—just when I start to get familiar with the technique, I run out of buttonholes to make. Fortunately, this time I remembered to start with the lowest buttonhole, just so that the buttonhole at the top would be the prettiest.

I found a pair of thread nippers in my trivia box, and it was very helpful as this design has some curved edges.

 Further considerations

I wanted the back to be fitted so as to avoid the baggy look, but it was difficult to achieve with just two darts since the shirt had to accommodate the upper part of my hips too. As a result, the back is a bit wrinkly, especially when the shirt is not tucked in. It gets better when I do tuck it into a skirt, but I think that unless I can have a centre back seam, I will have to give up on such fitted back shaping and use a waist stay instead to help the back lay flat.

 Next…

This blouse is making me interested in vintage fashion! I definitely plan to make some nice skirts to match the shirts I make.

I know I won’t be hand-sewing all the garments I want to make, and I do have a perfectly functional sewing machine (despite not having been tuned for quite a few years). I plan to start with something simple to get back into machine sewing. A corduroy pinafore dress, maybe?

during the winter

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Translated Q&A with Akasaka Aka

Translated from this site:

Source reddit post:

Q1: Can you tell us more about the structure of the school uniform that Kaguya and the others wear?

A: Putting aside whether or not it could actually be made in real life, all the white parts on the uniform are removable. There is a small fastener on the back side.

Q2: I always thought the character design was super cute, did you pay special attention to this during the design process? I wanted some tips!! (Lit. I wanted to use this as a reference)

A: There were different versions of the design where their hair was down or conversely up and I was very conscious of all these choices. I like all the differences between a normal look and what the final design ended up being.

Q3: In Ch. 15 [Shirogane Miyuki wants to run away] we see a frame of Secretary Fujiwara saying [Eh? IQ? Its 3!!]. Is this what her real IQ is? Or is it instead what Kaguya-sama perceives her IQ to be? Or could it be that Secretary Fujiwara got IQ confused with something else entirely?

A: This is simply Kaguya's imagination of Fujiwara as a total idiot. In reality, Fujiwara-san's IQ is above 130.

Q4: I'm a student that studies French. I was surprised to see that Fujiwara-chan and Kaguya-sama speak French so fluently. Did Aka-sensei also study French at some point?

A: Even in Japanese there are a few things that I'm not totally comfortable with.

Q5: Aka-sensei, how much time do you spend working per week? Recently with the TV anime airing and the tankouban sale happening in such a short time span, it seems like it would be especially busy....(worry)

A: I pretty much use all of my time to make the product so I don't have breaks/vacations like normal people. That being said, I do frequently procrastinate and cause problems for my assistants. That's why I feel like I can't and shouldn't take too many breaks.

Q6: Among romantic comedies, Kaguya-sama is extremely unique and I've been having lots of fun reading it. I have a few questions for you. First, when did you start to think of the main idea behind Kaguya-sama. Second, what do you think is necessary to make an interesting romantic comedy?

A: The inspiration for the idea hit me when I was smoking food. This advice isn't limited to romantic comedies but what's important in a story is that the characters really display what it means to be human. Humans are interesting because they can both be strong and weak at the same time and to be conscious of that will help create more interesting characters. I think applying this concept allows the characters to become more organic and therefore more entertaining as well.

Q7: Akasaka-sensei what is your fetish?

A: I have a hair fetish. My favourite is long, silky-smooth hair. It's pretty hard to draw that so you don't really see that expressed.

Q8: Up until this point, what is the most troublesome part-time job that President Shirogane has taken on?

A: When Shirogane was still a bean sprout, his job helping people move looked like it was hell.

Q9: Chika is the one in charge of all the coffee in the Student Council. I was wondering how skilled is she at coffee brewing?

A: At the level where she can normally do it without any mistakes. Hayasaka is definitely better at it but Fujiwara is the type that can do things above the average level even if its surprising.

Q10: I want to confess to my childhood friend who I've liked since elementary school. He's a pretty popular guy. On the other hand, I'm a potato (literally potato woman).

The reality of how different we are has really put a damper on my ability to confess and I can't seem to gather the courage needed to tell him how I feel.

I would love some advice from the veteran of love, President Shirogane!

A: From Shirogane,

The world has taught me some convenient words for this situation. [Don't be afraid to be an idiot]! If you want courage then for just a little while throw aside the wise and thoughtful side of yourself, aim to become an idiot and just confess!

Q11: Were there any placeholder titles before finally settling on [Kaguya-sama wants to be Confessed to ~ The Geniuses' War of Love and Brains]?

A: There were things like [IQ ~ Wishing for love (aikyuu) ~].

Q12: Why does everyone in the Shirogane family have light hair?

A: Kaguya has black hair so I wanted them to contrast as a pair. This is mostly something I could express because this is a manga, if this was reality I think his hair would only be slightly light.

Q13: The story has referenced SONY products a few times (Hayasaka talking about the Z Ultra and the depiction of the Z2) so I'm guessing you're a SONY fan. I would be happy if you really are allowed to talk about your love of SONY like this!

A: All joking aside, my TV at home is from BRAVIA, my computer is from VAIO and of course I have every PlayStation model. Most of the items that appeared were modelled after things that I owned so of course I owe a lot to Sony Music Entertainment-san.

Q14: Why does the cover of Volume 1 look so much like a horror manga?

A: A cute kid being an idiot is a very typical character whereas a scary person being an idiot is more interesting. With regards to the first volume cover, beyond just wanting it to sell well, we wanted to convey that the content within the manga was interesting so we ended up with that design.

Q15: Secretary Fujiwara uses Twitter and Instagram but if her father used to get mad at her for looking at Shoujo manga wouldn't he stop her from using these as well? Or could it be that they are censored for her instead?

A: Even with a father like that, if he ever tried to look at his daughters' phone, they would all look at him like he was a piece of filth. Poor him.

Q16: Aka-sensei are you also a fellow [Food Aficionado]? (From the ramen chapter)

A: I eat a ridiculous amount. The way San-chan eats his ramen is the way I eat my ramen and it is incredibly delicious.

Q17: When did the members of the Student Council experience their first love?

A: Kaguya and Shirogane are both each other's first loves. When he was young, Shirogane had a woman help him study but this person would count more as somebody that he respects and is indebted to rather than someone he was in love with.

Q18: What was Ishigami-kun's first sexual experience?

A: None....

Q19: Did you ever get the chance to talk to the seiyuu's that voice the anime? I wanted to ask what you talked about.

A: They all seemed to be worried about how their own performance came across. I thought they all did a wonderful job.

Q20: I want to know which character is the most fun to draw and who you like to draw the most!

A: That would far and away be Kaguya. The fact that her facial expression changes so much makes it fun on the drawing side as well.

Dae-Ra and the Legions of Hordak

Rating: T | Chapter 1/8 | No Warnings Apply | cross posted on AO3

Concise Summary: Entrapta has built something no one could have anticipated, something even she doesn't fully comprehend; a sword of power. Unstable and desperate to find a wielder, the foul Sword of Destruction finds the hand of Yani, a lowly foot soldier who has spent her whole life trying to fly under the radar.

“How did you even… is that even possible?” Catra demanded, eyes locked onto the jet-black blade that glinted on the work bench before her.

“I have no idea!” Entrapta replied giddily, the beeping of her scanners already putting Catra on edge.

“You invented it,” she said bluntly, raising an eyebrow.

“Well, no,” Entrapta shook her head, her hair shifting a pile of tools away from the soft red glow of her latest creation. “It wasn’t so much invented as it was assembled. The plans were already there, tucked away in the data core, waiting to be found. And I did! I found them!”

“So, it’s old,” Catra muttered, mostly to herself. She glared down at the hunk of black crystal set into the cross guard, it’s jagged edges barely allowing for symmetry but oddly matching the strange geometric edges the Princess had built into the design.

“No, it’s brand new,” Entrapta gave her a confused look, probably wondering whether she needed to explain how time worked too.

“I mean it’s First One’s, the design? It’s like Ado… like She-Ra’s?”

“Oh, absolutely. I mean, the crystal is First One’s, and the metal is a complex alloy I melted down from their tech and the design and structure are all…”

Catra drowned out Entrapta’s babbling, her eyes locked onto the blade her pet genius had called the Sword of Destruction. This was the key. So what, Adora had a sword? Now she did to. She could beat her. She could finally be done with that stupid rebellion.

Catra reached out, ghosting her fingers along the ice-cold metal. The sword glinted and buzzed with power. She could feel it crackling in the air all around, something confined within trying to push out into the world.

“How do I activate it?”

“I… don’t know,” Entrapta deflated. “There’s not really an on switch.”

Catra gritted her teeth. Of course, that would have been too easy.

“Find one,” she ordered and spun on her heels, stopping at the door to stare down Lonnie and Rogelio.

“Not one gets in. No one but Entrapta touches the Sword until I come back.”.

Personnel Code: Y03197. Missive [Priority One]: Temporary Reassignment. Report to Unit Leader Lonnie (alt. Force Captain Scorpia), Black Garnet Unit.

This was the last thing Yani wanted. Nineteen years she’d served without special assignment. From her very first memories until that afternoon, she’d flown so silently under the radar she’d thought maybe she’d get away with it. Just serve quietly and die quietly. No fuss.

“Get going,” Force Captain Lionel jabbed his chin toward the door, prodding Yani out of her daze.

“Yes, sir,” she saluted clumsily and hurried for the door, heading straight out of Basement Level 4 Maintenance and toward the moon light above ground. Hopefully, she’d be back down here before too long.

Why had she, of everyone, been called up? She supposed it could be pure chance. The newly designated Black Garnet Unit, Commander Catra’s squad, had been down a member since their old Force Captain had defected, plus the whole Horde had been significantly thinned by the loss at the Battle of Bright Moon. Maybe Yani was just the next in a dismal line of underlings being called to step into the lost soldiers’ places. She hoped so. She really, really hoped so.

Whatever this was, she needed to make a good first impression. Where was her hair tie? On her wrist, of course it was. She pulled out her hair and drew it back again, making sure she caught every black strand as she tied it into a tight bun and smoothed her uniform, examining her reflection in the elevator walls.

When the lift doors drew back, Yani felt a wave of unease grip her. She’d never been in this part of the Fright Zone. It was quiet. Way too quiet.

“Soldier!”

She nearly jumped out of her skin as the sharp voice sent her stumbling from the elevator.

“You’re late.”

Yani pulled up a sloppy salute and stood stock still, trying to catch sight of the owner of the voice but too afraid to try.

“I’m sorry, Captain.”

“I’m not the captain,” the voice kept steady and an unfamiliar face stepped into view, dark skin, dreadlocks. “It’s Unit Leader Lonnie, and your new UL.”

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” Yani saluted again, less clumsily.

“Stop apologising, Soldier!” UL Lonnie ordered, an intimidating scowl set firmly on her face. “Catra’s got us on round the clock supervision of the lock up. You’re here to stagger the guard rotation.”

“Would that be Commander Catra, sir?”

“Whatever,” Lonnie waved her away. “Just do your job and we’ll have no problems. You’re filling in the gaps. Nothing special.”

“Yes, sir.”

Nothing special. That sounded just perfect.

Okay, not so perfect. Guard duty was tear-inducingly boring. Plus, Kyle seemed adamant that if they spoke, Commander Catra would personally murder them both. Kyle, the skinny and pale boy she’d been assigned with. He wasn’t mean, per say. Just so plain and perpetually scared. And… wait… what was that noise?

Yani perked up, ears straining in the quiet of the corridor. Not in the corridor… inside the room beyond the door. Behind the door they were supposed to be guarding!

“Psst, Kyle!” she gave him a soft shove awake.

“What? I didn’t do it!” he jumped, spinning on the spot.

“Shhh… I think someone’s in there.”

“In… there?” Kyle’s eyes widened in panic, and Yani put a finger to her lips.

She really, really hoped not. She wanted to ignore it and hope it was nothing and maybe it would…

There it was again. Like a soft whispering, the words too quiet to discern.

If she didn’t check, and someone really was in there, stealing whatever needed a round-the-clock guard, and Lord Hordak found out…

“We need to check,” Yani murmured, pressing her ear to the door.

“Catra said we’re not allowed in there.”

“If there’s no one, then we don’t have to tell. But if it’s something…”

“I’m not… I don’t know if…” Kyle stuttered.

Yani paused for another long moment, holding her breath. It came seeping through the cracks in the metal, in an unfamiliar, dull tone.

“You can wait here,” she nodded to Kyle, prepping her stun rod and pulling out her ID, tapping it on the entry pad and letting the heavy metal doors draw back with an uncomfortably loud clattering.

The room beyond was sleek, with reflective walls and smooth floors, and in the dim light she could see something on a stand in the centre, glowing a stranger shade of deep red.

“Yani,” Kyle whispered nervously, but she ignored him.

There came the voice again. It slipped out of the dark and into her mind, whispering sophisticated gibberish.

She stepped inside, half crouching, weapon ready. Sure, she’d trained for this, and she’d seen active combat more than once. But there was a big difference between intentionally missing shots taken at Princesses and creeping into a dark room to confront an enemy you couldn’t see.

There was a voice though, she could hear it. She crept forward and found her feet carrying her toward the centre of the room, toward the glowing red light. Toward the voice that whispered…

“Come… to me… take up… the sword…”

She was standing over the altar-like stand, staring down at a sword of black metal that whispered invitations into her mind. Her thoughts were blurred, her eyes couldn’t turn away, and the desire to just touch the sword was suddenly overwhelming. She just had to reach up, to see why it spoke… she just had to…

Her hand hovered over the black gem that dominated the cross-guard, and as the tips of her fingers brushed the cold and jagged surface, the world melted away and the voice crashed into her mind.

“Dae! Ra!”

She stumbled back, but the room was gone. She was in a dark hall, with smooth metallic walls and a red light pulsing at the end of the way.

“Come back… to me…”

The world shifted, the light grew closer and the walls fell away and the deep voice, like a breeze in the stillness of the air, slithered into her ears and latched onto her darkest thoughts.

“Dae-Ra… I see… you… are mine… take up the sword… take up my sword…”

The voice echoed through the sweeping ceilings and shadows too deep.

“Take up my cause… Dae-Ra… the world in darkness… on your brow rests a crown…”

“Who are you?” she called out, voice horribly timid.

“I… am yours…”

“What have you done?”

Yani woke to a slash of pain across her cheek. She blinked away the tears and fatigue, looking up to find a snarling Commander Catra glaring up at her, stun rod in hand. Yani was standing near the… no, she wasn't standing. She was being held upright. Her own legs felt numb.

“Answer me!” The Commander screeched, yanking at her collar and pulling her closer.

“I… I heard a voice,” Yani stuttered, finding her own.

“Gee, Catra. Don’t you think that was a bit harsh?” The question came in a chipper voice from the person holding her upright.

“Not if she’s done something to the Sword it’s not.”

“The Sword seems fine,” the voice said again, and behind Catra, Yani saw Kyle breath a sigh of relief.

“You can’t know that for sure.”

“Yeah, but I mean. Come on. This kid is nobody. Entrapta said that Sword was the strongest thing she’s ever built. And she built Emily.”

Yani’s head was pounding, and her cheek was burning from where Catra had slashed it. She just wanted to be back in Basement Level 4 Maintenance with the gentle orders of FC Lionel.

“Please, I didn’t mean to…”

“I don’t care,” the Commander growled. “Tell me exactly what happened, and I might let you live.”

“I heard a voice,” Yani said hurriedly. “In here. In the room. And I knew we were guarding something important, and if someone was stealing it right from under our noses… so I opened the door to check and the voice… it was coming from the Sword.”

“The voice was coming from the Sword?” The Commander rolled her eyes skeptically.

“It told me to take the Sword, and I touched it…”

The Commander let out a soft growl, and Yani wasn’t sure if she believed anything she’d said.

“That’s all you’ve got?” She asked sarcastically.

“It said it… it was… mine. It said it had a cause I… I could see the world fall to darkness.”

Catra suddenly perked up and gave her another once over before she spun on Kyle. “Where’s Entrapta?”

“She's coming, Commander,”Kyle squeaked.

“Well bring her faster.”

“Yes, Commander,” he bobbed and scurried out of the room.

“And you,” Catra brandished a stun rod at Yani. “If you’re lying, you won’t live to regret it.”

‘I’m… I’m not, I promise.”

“You can promise all you want.”

“Well, to be fair, that’s perfectly plausible,” nodded the purple haired Princess.

“But why did it speak to her, and not someone else?” Catra demanded.

“I don’t know. If it’s like the Sword of She-Ra, maybe this nobody is like Adora.”

“Don’t say that name,” the Commander ordered through gritted teeth.

“Which one? Adora? Because that’s her name,” Entrapta asked, entirely serious and oblivious Catra's gritted teeth. “I’m probably going to need an alternative. How about, the Tall One?”

“Forget about that. Just tell me how it works.”

“I told you already. I don’t know.”

“Not helpful, Entrapta.”

“Yes, but it’s still the truth,” Entrapta pushed off from the sword’s altar and began spinning across the room as she tapped away at a screen. “The crystal is the key, but the code is way more complex than I was prepared for, and my algorithm is still working to decode it.”

“Well, work faster.”

“That’s… not really possible,” Entrapta shook her head sincerely.

“Fine, so this nobody is the key to the sword.”

“Ah, my name is Yani,” she gulped, trying to steady her thudding heart. She wasn’t the key to anything. She just wasn't.

"I don’t care,” the Commander didn’t even look at her, eyes still locked onto the black blade. “The first time I saw She-Ra’s sword work, she was under attack. So maybe…” Catra turned on Yani and extended her stun rod with a grinned, “it’ll work the same here.”

“Catra, I don’t know if…” FC Scorpia began, but she was too late. Catra was already swinging.

Yani knew it would hurt. She’d been hit with a stun rod plenty of times in basic training. It was always a sharp pain that you could feel all over, down to the roots of your teeth. She was prepared for the pain. In the Horde, you were always prepared for pain. But that didn’t mean she was okay with getting zapped.

She mustered her strength and pulled from Scorpia’s grasp, dropping her weight as Scorpia tried to manoeuvre her away from Catra’s blow and tumbling down. She staggered up and away as she heard Catra growl as her hit sliced through empty air. She stumbled up and grabbed the closest thing she could find, and her fingers wrapped around the cold metal of… the sword.

“Dae-Ra…”

Okay. Two choices. Another hit from the stun rod, or pick up the sword?

Sword it was then. She heaved it up, and spun around to face the room.  Catra hovered back, smirking, even as Scorpia held up her hands and Entrapta gave a frankly disconcerting grin.

The sword was heavier than she'd expected. It seemed to drag her down with it, but she held it aloft. Barely.

“Good choice,” the Commander said, slowly stepping to the side, keeping her low crouch, stun rod up and ready.

Yani let the sword drop slightly, trying to appear as non-threatening as possible while maintaining her defences.

“Please, don’t. I’m nobody, you said it yourself.”

“Apparently not.”

“We don’t have to fight. I’ll try and speak to the sword. Just let me try...”

“Why try that, when this is so much more fun?” Catra smiled, and lunged.

Yani’s vision clouded. One moment Catra was leaping, and the next she was scrambling back, stun rod dropped and forgotten. Everything was darker, everything was… she was angry. No, she was furious. How dare this stupid cat lady… how dare they even try to touch her… she would destroy them for…

Yani caught sight of herself in the reflection of the walls, and her anger instantly dissipated.

It wasn’t her. It couldn’t be. She was taller and stronger and her hair flew around her head like a dreadful halo. Her clothes had melted away, replaced by black fabric and armour of sleek silver. And her eyes… her eyes glowed red.

Fear gripped her and devoured her courage. That wasn’t her. It couldn’t be. Because that was… she was terrifying.

A flash of sickly red light and she was herself again, panic etched across her face. The Sword clattered from her grip as she stumbled back, looking up at the horrified faces of her superiors.

Catra straightened from her crouch and some unkind emotion stretched across her face. “I can work with this.”