Hi all,
I wanted to share a little bit about succeeding in S2 from the perspective of someone that is not a 'natural' essay writer nor from a humanities background. Someone that started at a very average S2 score despite lots (and lots and lots) of effort.
I have now sat GAMSAT 5 times in total and I think this underscores a severe lack of exceptional ‘talent’ in any specific area of GAMSAT, and speaks to the fact that you CAN make huge improvements in your scores over time with the *right* type of effort.
(Long post for context but feel free to scroll to TLDR)
Context: I am from a science background and have been out of uni for ~6 years now. I have never been a writer and apart from finding the humanities quite interesting, have never explored its theory in a structured way. I am also not a huge ‘reader’ as many people that seem to do well in this section might be. I am just a person that has opinions on things (as does every one of you!).
My first sitting I signed on with a prep company that had a very structured and formulaic approach to essay writing. They gave students ways to explore topics and ideas to ground them when prompts felt ‘difficult’ + strategies to always be able to ‘write something’. And although I am sure this helped me learn more about the humanities and the fundamentals of classic essay writing - my scores were not great. The first sitting, after ~5 months of intense essay practice critiqued by professionals I came away with a score of 62 and utter confusion about where I had gone wrong. In the 3 sittings following this I did basically the same thing again and again thinking I just needed more practice (I wrote hundreds of ‘classic’ essays, critiqued them and worked on my timing). My scores in subsequent sitings improved slightly however maxed out at around 68 in S2.
I felt myself really confined by the classic essay style most resources espouse. I would find myself spending loads of mental energy thinking about things that I thought were really important for a 'good' essay - like exactly how my topic sentence would link to the next line, or how my analysis would ‘tick the boxes’, if my example was the best one to use or if my concluding statement was linked to my opening one (you get the picture). This would drain my creativity and also created so much friction in my writing.
I knew I could do better, but when it came down to putting my thoughts on paper, it fell apart.
This year I decided to attack S2 differently. I dispensed with the classical framework and wrote pieces that were interesting for me to write. That I genuinely enjoyed creating. I often wrote reflectively and explored the prompt in a way that related to my life or my view point. I wrote essays starting with ‘When I was a child…’ or ‘In my life I have …” (whatever felt to me like a nice opening to the topic in my little brain). This way of writing both allowed me to write more clearly (I didn’t have to hyper-analyse it as much and therefore it came out less clunky) but also with much more relevance to things I actually knew about! This sort of writing naturally lends itself to be a little more creative or reflective but by no means does it have to be wildly different to a usual essay - it just had a little more flare and less strict* structure. I still wrote something that resembled an introduction (sometimes simply through vignette), I still had 2-3 analysing paragraphs, I still had something that felt conclusive at the end. But by stretching the bounds of each area, I came up with writing that was much less prohibitive and more exploratory.
This paid off - I went from 68 to 80, simply through writing in a way that felt true to me.
By far my greatest and most valuable piece of advice would be to write in a way that feels most natural and enjoyable to YOU. I am sure this has been said before, but I can’t quite underscore how much of a difference this makes to overall execution on the day, as well as ability to grind through essay after essay & continue to make improvements.
TLDR: Try very hard to quieten the noise around what makes a ‘good’ GAMSAT essays and be selective about which recommendations work well for you (and which do not). There are literally a million ways to create a solid piece of writing and if the ‘classic’ analytical or discursive structured essay does not roll off the tongue for you - take this as a sign that it is OK to explore other styles of writing. This is not to say that every person should try to write poems (I never wrote a poem), or to write creatively. All this means is that *if* you feel the classical structure of an essay is distracting you from what the goal of S2 is (to respond thoughtfully to a prompt from your own perspective) than consider stretching the bounds of your writing.
**Disclaimer** - this advice won't be for everyone. For some people, writing in a very formulaic defined way is the best way to get their thoughts across - and this is fine! I am just sharing my experience of finding a much better way for my brain. I have many friends that I studied for GAMSAT with who wrote great (classic style) essays and scored super well with them! These people probably would have hated/not been comfortable with my style of writing. Choose your own adventure, but make changes if something is not working.
If people are interested I am happy to post links to my best essays where I explored this type of writing
Good luck with your essays everyone!
Please feel free to DM if you have any questions :)

Hi all,
I wanted to share a little bit about succeeding in S2 from the perspective of someone that is not a 'natural' essay writer nor from a humanities background. Someone that started at a very average S2 score despite lots (and lots and lots) of effort.
I have now sat GAMSAT 5 times in total and I think this underscores a severe lack of exceptional ‘talent’ in any specific area of GAMSAT, and speaks to the fact that you CAN make huge improvements in your scores over time with the *right* type of effort.
(Long post for context but feel free to scroll to TLDR)
Context: I am from a science background and have been out of uni for ~6 years now. I have never been a writer and apart from finding the humanities quite interesting, have never explored its theory in a structured way. I am also not a huge ‘reader’ as many people that seem to do well in this section might be. I am just a person that has opinions on things (as does every one of you!).
My first sitting I signed on with a prep company that had a very structured and formulaic approach to essay writing. They gave students ways to explore topics and ideas to ground them when prompts felt ‘difficult’ + strategies to always be able to ‘write something’. And although I am sure this helped me learn more about the humanities and the fundamentals of classic essay writing - my scores were not great. The first sitting, after ~5 months of intense essay practice critiqued by professionals I came away with a score of 62 and utter confusion about where I had gone wrong. In the 3 sittings following this I did basically the same thing again and again thinking I just needed more practice (I wrote hundreds of ‘classic’ essays, critiqued them and worked on my timing). My scores in subsequent sitings improved slightly however maxed out at around 68 in S2.
I felt myself really confined by the classic essay style most resources espouse. I would find myself spending loads of mental energy thinking about things that I thought were really important for a 'good' essay - like exactly how my topic sentence would link to the next line, or how my analysis would ‘tick the boxes’, if my example was the best one to use or if my concluding statement was linked to my opening one (you get the picture). This would drain my creativity and also created so much friction in my writing.
I knew I could do better, but when it came down to putting my thoughts on paper, it fell apart.
This year I decided to attack S2 differently. I dispensed with the classical framework and wrote pieces that were interesting for me to write. That I genuinely enjoyed creating. I often wrote reflectively and explored the prompt in a way that related to my life or my view point. I wrote essays starting with ‘When I was a child…’ or ‘In my life I have …” (whatever felt to me like a nice opening to the topic in my little brain). This way of writing both allowed me to write more clearly (I didn’t have to hyper-analyse it as much and therefore it came out less clunky) but also with much more relevance to things I actually knew about! This sort of writing naturally lends itself to be a little more creative or reflective but by no means does it have to be wildly different to a usual essay - it just had a little more flare and less strict* structure. I still wrote something that resembled an introduction (sometimes simply through vignette), I still had 2-3 analysing paragraphs, I still had something that felt conclusive at the end. But by stretching the bounds of each area, I came up with writing that was much less prohibitive and more exploratory.
This paid off - I went from 68 to 80, simply through writing in a way that felt true to me.
By far my greatest and most valuable piece of advice would be to write in a way that feels most natural and enjoyable to YOU. I am sure this has been said before, but I can’t quite underscore how much of a difference this makes to overall execution on the day, as well as ability to grind through essay after essay & continue to make improvements.
TLDR: Try very hard to quieten the noise around what makes a ‘good’ GAMSAT essays and be selective about which recommendations work well for you (and which do not). There are literally a million ways to create a solid piece of writing and if the ‘classic’ analytical or discursive structured essay does not roll off the tongue for you - take this as a sign that it is OK to explore other styles of writing. This is not to say that every person should try to write poems (I never wrote a poem), or to write creatively. All this means is that *if* you feel the classical structure of an essay is distracting you from what the goal of S2 is (to respond thoughtfully to a prompt from your own perspective) then consider stretching the bounds of your writing.
**Disclaimer** - this advice won't be for everyone. For some people, writing in a very formulaic defined way is the best way to get their thoughts across - and this is fine! I am just sharing my experience of finding a much better way for my brain. I have many friends that I studied for GAMSAT with who wrote great (classic style) essays and scored super well with them! These people probably would have hated/not been comfortable with my style of writing. Choose your own adventure, but make changes if something is not working.
If people are interested I am happy to post links to my best essays where I explored this type of writing
Good luck with your essays everyone!
Please feel free to DM if you have any questions :)

Prompt 3:

• First Sentence: As the world crumbled around them, [Protagonist] couldn't resist the urge to dance, twirling through the chaos with an audacious smile.
  
• Last Sentence: Amidst the ruins, [Protagonist] contemplated whether finding joy in the dance of destruction was the key to rebuilding a fractured world.
  
• Story Prompt: Step into the shoes of [Protagonist] as they navigate the surreal landscapes of [Fictional Location], encountering [Antagonist], a force that challenges their every step with unconventional tactics.
  Unearth [Protagonist]'s unique traits and follow their unorthodox responses to adversity against the backdrop of an era untethered by the norms of time.
  Weave a love story into the narrative, adding layers of emotion to [Protagonist]'s journey. Conclude the conflicts in a way that sets the stage for a exploration of resilience and reconstruction.
  

Prompt 4:

• First Sentence: In the face of impending doom, [Protagonist] burst into spontaneous poetry, reciting verses that seemed to defy the gravity of the situation.
  
• Last Sentence: As the echoes of their poetic defiance lingered, [Protagonist] contemplated whether finding solace in words was the key to rewriting the destiny that loomed ahead.
  
• Story Prompt: Embark on a literary odyssey with [Protagonist] in the imaginary realm of [Fictional Location], where the enigmatic [Antagonist] challenges them with riddles that transcend the conventional.
  

Explore [Protagonist]'s poetic soul and witness how their unconventional responses to adversity shape their journey against the backdrop of an era unexplored by others.
Infuse a love story into the narrative, adding nuances to [Protagonist]'s character. Resolve the conflicts in a manner that beckons further exploration in a tale of words and defiance.

I(24M) am currently studying Abroad. Since I was in highschool, I have been suffering from depression/anxiety/insecurity issues. So there was this girl which I had a crush on during my coaching it was around 7 years ago. But during the whole period, I never gathered enough courage to talk to her becaus at that time I felt like a loser and worthless.
So after my high school, I took a drop for jee and left the city and I forgot all about it. Well I always wanted to go abroad for the higher studies so I never really cared about Jee and all and as a consequence I failed. And after some drama and wasted years, I managed to go abroad.
During this whole time, I once visited friend's college (she was in same college) in india (while on vacation) and I saw her but again (after 3 years)and I couldn't say anything (I stood there thinking I should go but couldn't muster enough courage) and after it, I tried sending a request but it was not accepted. i think she doesn't even know if I was even interested. This the matter was closed pretty much and I had forgotten all about it. I had moved on and never thought about it after that ......
Now the best part of all, I attended my relatives marriage recently. And as a part of rituals I had to go to other party's house, and boom I saw her again. First I couldn't believe it but she was there.
So finally we met again in marriage but for whole duration of it, the only thing I could talk to her is " hey we used to study in same class". And she replied " oh is that so, I kinda forgotten about it". It felt like I was back to being a same idiot I once was in highschool even though normally, I can hold really good conversation with anyone on any level. I can talk on world politics, physics, philosophies, spirituality, economy, dark humor , music, mythologies, novels ect. I have grown much kinder, confident, understanding during all these years but I couldn't say even a single word apart from single sentence.
I was depressed during the whole wedding about this and kept staring at her like a desperate fool ( even though this is cringe and I knew it).
Finally when it was least expected, I met her yet again but this time it was at relative's home. This time we talked. It was mostly about the old times in the coaching and apparently we had common friends so we talked about it and how they are doing. She then shared her college journey about how it was and she had loads of fun. And I over shared my journey to college and told her all about my difficulties and depression and I still don't know why did I do that even when I never told my family about it. To sum it up, we had a nice chat for some time. We had same opinions on the mutual guy we know. She seems kind and awesome. It was quite evident to her that I am interested and I sent her a request very next day. But again she didn't accepted it. Then I tried resending it and it was same situation
To conclude it, I feel like, I am being a simp for her even though I never do this kind of behavior. I never had a girlfriend up until now because I always think beforehand that whether I will be able to have something meaningful with other party or not. Because I'll hate if someone will play with my feelings that's why I don't do it myself too. Thus I never tried to make a girlfriend and I'll even say I never felt a need for it.
I'm writing here because it's been months now and I still couldn't get over her. Its ruining my already fucked up mental health. This is the first time something like this happening to me. At the same time I realized it might be due to the fact that I saw her again after this time so my mind is playing tricks on me.
I am thinking about sending her request again ( it's a bad idea). But I don't know how to deal with this situation. It's eating me alive, hampering my productivity. What to do this this situation.
Thanks a lot in advance for answering.

I(24M) am currently studying Abroad. Since I was in highschool, I have been suffering from depression/anxiety/insecurity issues. So there was this girl which I had a crush on during my coaching it was around 7 years ago. But during the whole period, I never gathered enough courage to talk to her becaus at that time I felt like a loser and worthless.
So after my high school, I took a drop for jee and left the city and I forgot all about it. Well I always wanted to go abroad for the higher studies so I never really cared about Jee and all and as a consequence I failed. And after some drama and wasted years, I managed to go abroad.
During this whole time, I once visited friend's college (she was in same college) in india (while on vacation) and I saw her but again (after 3 years)and I couldn't say anything (I stood there thinking I should go but couldn't muster enough courage) and after it, I tried sending a request but it was not accepted. i think she doesn't even know if I was even interested. This the matter was closed pretty much and I had forgotten all about it. I had moved on and never thought about it after that ......
Now the best part of all, I attended my relatives marriage recently. And as a part of rituals I had to go to other party's house, and boom I saw her again. First I couldn't believe it but she was there.
So finally we met again in marriage but for whole duration of it, the only thing I could talk to her is " hey we used to study in same class". And she replied " oh is that so, I kinda forgotten about it". It felt like I was back to being a same idiot I once was in highschool even though normally, I can hold really good conversation with anyone on any level. I can talk on world politics, physics, philosophies, spirituality, economy, dark humor , music, mythologies, novels ect. I have grown much kinder, confident, understanding during all these years but I couldn't say even a single word apart from single sentence.
I was depressed during the whole wedding about this and kept staring at her like a desperate fool ( even though this is cringe and I knew it).
Finally when it was least expected, I met her yet again but this time it was at relative's home. This time we talked. It was mostly about the old times in the coaching and apparently we had common friends so we talked about it and how they are doing. She then shared her college journey about how it was and she had loads of fun. And I over shared my journey to college and told her all about my difficulties and depression and I still don't know why did I do that even when I never told my family about it. To sum it up, we had a nice chat for some time. We had same opinions on the mutual guy we know. She seems kind and awesome. It was quite evident to her that I am interested and I sent her a request very next day. But again she didn't accepted it. Then I tried resending it and it was same situation
To conclude it, I feel like, I am being a simp for her even though I never do this kind of behavior. I never had a girlfriend up until now because I always think beforehand that whether I will be able to have something meaningful with other party or not. Because I'll hate if someone will play with my feelings that's why I don't do it myself too. Thus I never tried to make a girlfriend and I'll even say I never felt a need for it.
I'm writing here because it's been months now and I still couldn't get over her. Its ruining my already fucked up mental health. This is the first time something like this happening to me. At the same time I realized it might be due to the fact that I saw her again after this time so my mind is playing tricks on me.
I am thinking about sending her request again ( it's a bad idea). But I don't know how to deal with this situation. It's eating me alive, hampering my productivity. What to do this this situation.
Thanks a lot in advance for answering.

By David North
On April 25, 2024, Bogdan Syrotiuk, the 25-year-old leader of the Young Guard of Bolshevik-Leninists (the YGBL), a socialist-Trotskyist organization active in Ukraine, Russia and throughout the former USSR, was arrested by the notorious state security service of the fascistic Zelensky regime, the SBU. Bogdan is being held in atrocious conditions in a high security prison in the city of Nikolaev (Mykolaiv), which is located in southern Ukraine.
The International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI), the world Trotskyist movement with which the YGBL is politically affiliated, has finally obtained the actual documents in which the SBU presents its charges against Bogdan Syrotiuk. These documents, which form the basis of his detention, make absolutely clear that Bogdan is the victim of a monstrous state frame-up. The allegations concocted by the SBU are a crude combination of lies, obvious fabrications, and political absurdities.
Moreover, the documents submitted by the SBU are directed not only against Bogdan. They are nothing less than a declaration of war against all left-wing and socialist opposition to the Zelensky regime and, specifically, the International Committee of the Fourth International and its public organ, the World Socialist Web Site.
The central allegation leveled against Bogdan Syrotiuk is that he is guilty of high treason. The basis of this charge is that Bogdan has been for the past two years “engaged in the preparation of publications commissioned by representatives of a Russian propaganda and information agency, the World Socialist Web Site” [emphasis added.]
The World Socialist Web Site is denounced as an instrument of “an active information war against Ukraine” being waged by Russia, which

uses the so-called “left-wing” propagandists and their information platforms (websites, media and social platforms) to discredit the support of Ukraine by international partners, justify Russia’s armed aggression against Ukraine, accusing Western countries of creating conditions under which Russia was forced to launch the so-called special military operation, fomenting wars in Ukraine by providing it with weapons, etc. As a result, they are used by Russia to systematically convey pro-Kremlin narratives to the population of Ukraine and Ukraine’s allied countries…
Since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the World Socialist Web Site “WSWS” has regularly published articles in various languages aimed at discrediting Ukraine and representatives of governments around the world for assisting Ukraine in its fight against the aggressor state.

The ICFI’s opposition to the US-NATO war in Ukraine is an essential element of its political program, deeply rooted in the socialist and internationalist principles of the Trotskyist movement. The attempt of the Ukrainian regime to portray this opposition as an instrument of Putin’s propaganda network is as viciously mendacious as it is politically absurd. The intransigent opposition of the International Committee of the Fourth International to the Putin regime—which emerged as a consequence of the Stalinist bureaucracy’s final betrayal of socialism and the restoration of capitalism in the former USSR—is a fundamental political fact that is substantiated not only in written texts numbering in the hundreds, but also in the exhaustively documented activity of the Trotskyist movement spanning decades.
True to its fascist character, the Ukrainian regime is operating on the basis of the well-known precept of Hitler and his propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels: “The bigger the lie, the more readily it will be believed.”
In this particular case, the Zelensky regime seems to believe that the scale of the SBU lies are of such a magnitude that they will simply overwhelm the thinking public. It thus expects that public opinion will accept that the Putin regime is directing the work of the WSWS, which the SBU indictment describes as

an online publication of the world Trotskyist movement, the International Committee of the Fourth International and its affiliated sections in the Socialist Equality Parties around the world, which covers the main socio-political problems around the world from the position of revolutionary opposition to the capitalist market system, with the aim of establishing world socialism through socialist revolution.

At no point does the SBU attempt to explain the contradiction that wrecks its case against Bogdan, i.e., that the political principles that he upholds as a socialist and internationalist opponent of wars waged by the capitalist ruling class are irreconcilably hostile to the policies of the Putin regime, including its invasion of Ukraine.
It attempts to evade the contradiction by simply lying. The indictment claims that Bogdan’s activities, “acting on the instructions of a representative of the World Socialist Web Site,” consisted of “supporting and justifying the conduct of the Russian aggressive war on the territory of Ukraine…”
Every word is a lie. The opposition of the ICFI, its affiliated organizations, and the WSWS to the Russian invasion, in line with its hostility to the Putin regime, is a political fact that is documented in hundreds of articles that have been posted since the first day of the invasion.
On February 24, 2022, the day of the Russian invasion, the ICFI posted a statement on the WSWS titled: “Oppose the Putin government’s invasion of Ukraine and US-NATO warmongering! For the unity of Russian and Ukrainian workers!” It began:

The International Committee of the Fourth International and the World Socialist Web Site denounce the Russian military intervention in Ukraine. Despite the provocations and threats by the US and NATO powers, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine must be opposed by socialists and class-conscious workers. The catastrophe that was set in motion by the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 cannot be averted on the basis of Russian nationalism, a thoroughly reactionary ideology that serves the interests of the capitalist ruling class represented by Vladimir Putin.
What is required is not a return to the pre-1917 foreign policy of tsarism, but, rather, a revival, in Russia and throughout the world, of the socialist internationalism that inspired the October Revolution of 1917 and led to the creation of the Soviet Union as a workers state. The invasion of Ukraine, whatever the justifications given by the Putin regime, will serve only to divide the Russian and Ukrainian working class and, moreover, serve the interests of US and European imperialism.
In the two major statements that he has made during the past week, Putin has justified his actions by enumerating the provocations and crimes of the United States. There is, no question, much that is factually true in his denunciation of Washington’s hypocrisy. But the viciously anti-communist and xenophobic ideology that he invokes and the interests that he claims to be defending are thoroughly reactionary and incapable of appealing to the broad mass of the working class in Russia, let alone in Ukraine and throughout the world. A substantial section of the working class in Russia and Ukraine will be repelled by the cynicism of Putin’s glorification of the heroic struggle waged by the Soviet Union against Nazi Germany in World War II while denouncing the October Revolution and the existence of the USSR as a multi-national state.

The ICFI insisted that the socialist opposition to imperialism was incompatible with any form of national chauvinism, and, therefore, rejected all the justifications given by the Putin regime and its apologists for the invasion. Their invocation of “national defense” could not be accepted by socialists. The defeat of imperialism and its overthrow was possible only through the revolutionary struggle of the international working class. The ICFI statement cited the words of Trotsky: “Not to bind itself to the national state in time of war, to follow not the war map but the map of the class struggle, is possible only for that party that has already declared irreconcilable war on the national state in time of peace.”
The ICFI called “for an immediate end to the war,” and explained: “In opposing the invasion of Ukraine, we denounce the policies of US/NATO imperialism, whose claims to be defending democracy and human rights are blood-drenched with hypocrisy.”
This political declaration elaborated the principles and policy that have guided the work of the ICFI and WSWS since the war began.
On February 26, 2022 the International Committee held an international webinar, in which its opposition to the war was emphatically advanced. Among the speakers, in addition to myself, were Nick Beams, a longtime leader of the International Committee’s Australian section, Johannes Stern, a leader of the ICFI in Germany, Thomas Scripps, a leading member of the ICFI’s section in Britain, Joseph Kishore, the national secretary of the Socialist Equality Party in the United States, and Evan Blake, another leading member of the SEP (US).
The ICFI has never wavered from the principled opposition to the policies of NATO and Russia that it advanced in the first days of the war.
The relationship between the ICFI and the comrades of the YGBL coincided almost exactly with the outbreak of the war. They were attracted to the ICFI precisely because of its opposition to both the war and the national chauvinism of the Russian and Ukrainian regimes.
The SBU indictment charges that the World Socialist Web Site assigned to Bogdan “the task of preparing, writing, editing and publishing … both on the WSWS website and other communist-oriented media, articles, publications, comments, etc. aimed at spreading pro-Russian narratives related to the armed aggression of the Russian Federation against Ukraine, which began on February 24, 2022, to which [Bogdan Syrotiuk] gave his voluntary consent.”
In support of this claim, the SBU references a YGBL statement titled, “For the organization of an international movement of workers and young people against war!” It claims that this document, posted on the World Socialist Web Site on October 12, 2022, includes “fragments, statements, sentences and phrases… which contain justification of the armed aggression of the Russian Federation, which began in 2014…”
The actual document clearly exposes this claim to be a lie. There is not a single sentence in the YGBL declaration that indicates support for the invasion of Ukraine. The SBU cites selectively from the document, including passages only from numbered paragraphs 4, 7, 8, 10 and 13. Paragraphs 4 through 8—the SBU interrupts the continuity of the YGBL’s analysis by leaving out paragraphs 5 and 6—provide a concise Marxist explanation of the objective capitalist crisis and political aims that underlay the instigation of the war by the United States and its NATO allies. They state:

1. The new world order that the United States wants to establish looks like this very possible picture: Russia and China are to be subordinated to imperialism and divided, if that is necessary to maintain direct control over their natural, industrial-technological and human resources.
   
2. The European imperialist powers support the United States for their own place in the new redivision of the world. At the same time, European imperialism, while placed on rations by the United States, sees a way out of its economic and geopolitical predicament only in a redivision of the world in which it can regain its former greatness.
   
3. Japan, South Korea and Australia support the US only as much as it suits their interests in the struggle against China in the Pacific region. These countries will support the US as long as it allows them to compete with China. The process of dividing spheres of influence will revive the contradictions between the Pacific capitalist powers, which are as much in limbo as Europe.
   
4. The crisis of 2008 revived class struggles around the world. The Arab Spring of the early 2010s is vivid evidence of this revival. It forced US and European imperialism to take more decisive measures. In 2014, they supported a coup d'état in Ukraine. Through this coup, the US was able to create all the conditions to build a bridgehead in a future war against Russia.
   
5. The Covid-19 pandemic that erupted in 2020 exacerbated the contradictions of capitalism and was the trigger for a more rapid expansion of US imperialism in preparation for war against Russia and China. The US embarked on a more provocative path of abandoning the “one-China” policy, and increasing its support for Ukraine, as expressed in the NATO summit in August 2021, which supported Zelensky’s “Crimean platform.”
   

Significantly, the SBU leaves out paragraph 9 of the YGBL declaration, which presents a scathing indictment of the Putin regime. That paragraph reads:

The reactionary regime of Vladimir Putin emerged from the treacherous dissolution of the Soviet Union by the Stalinist bureaucracy and the restoration of capitalism. The policies of Putin, in the final analysis, are aimed at safeguarding the wealth of the post-Soviet oligarchy against the pressure of Western imperialism from above and, even more critically, against the movement of the Russian working class from below.

The SBU does cite paragraph 10, which continues the critique of the Putin regime, stating:

Within this geopolitical and social context, Putin’s adventurist invasion of Ukraine on February 24 was the Russian oligarchy’s response to NATO’s relentless expansion to the east. The Putin regime’s main objective was to achieve through the pressure of its “Special Operation” a new round of talks with the US-NATO, since the last round ended up crossing “red lines” on the part of the US-NATO, which caused Putin’s invasion [emphasis added].

The characterization of Putin’s invasion as “adventurist” is in no way compatible with what the SBU claims to be a “pro-Russian narrative.” Obviously recognizing the fragility of its attempt to portray the YGBL statement as pro-Putin propaganda, the SBU decided against further citations from the document, leaving out the YGBL’s development of its denunciation of Putin’s policies in paragraphs 11 and 12, which assert:

1. The Russian bourgeoisie’s desire for an “equal partnership” with the West was one of the most utopian delusions. This delusion, historically derived from Stalin’s policy of “Popular Fronts” and then “peaceful coexistence,” developed among the fledgling class of Russian capitalists in the 1990s.
   
2. The Putin regime has not gotten rid of this utopian delusion. Its whole policy has been to maneuver and seek compromise with the West, with whom the Russian oligarchy wanted to be “on equal footing.” Except that Western imperialism, with its conquering ambitions for Russia, did not care about these conciliatory tones of Putin’s regime.
   

The SBU also chose not to cite paragraph 17 of the YGBL statement, which declares:

The course of the war after Putin’s invasion of Ukraine increasingly emphasizes the reactionary nature of this invasion. While claiming to be fighting for the independence of the Russian people from the threat of Western imperialism, Putin is in fact only defending the independence of the Russian oligarchy to exploit the Russian working class and the country’s raw material wealth.

Paragraph 18, which is also left uncited, further demolishes the SBU’s indictment of Bogdan, the YGBL and the WSWS as instruments of Russian propaganda. The paragraph asserts that

the Putin regime has no way out of the current crisis for Russian society. It will not have such a way out in the future. All of the military and political activities of the Putin regime will only contribute to the escalation of Western imperialism and the deterioration of conditions for the Russian, Ukrainian and international working class.

The SBU also failed to cite paragraphs 19 and 20, which presciently warned of the catastrophe to which the war could lead.

1. The prospects for the present war, when thought within the framework of the capitalist system, are very bleak. First, this war will take on a long-term character and will not only be fought between Ukraine and Russia. It is the first step in inflaming the world situation to the point that the threat of a third world war is simply inevitable. All countries of the world will take part in the future war.
   
2. Secondly, the nature of the war will be determined by the policies of the ruling classes, which now stand on a blatantly anti-human position. The ruling classes are recklessly moving toward the use of nuclear weapons in the conflict, thereby creating the real possibility of a nuclear Armageddon. The specter of planetary destruction arises from the insane policies of imperialist and capitalist governments. The recklessness of the ruling capitalist elite compels young people to ask whether they will be allowed any future at all.
   

The SBU specifically cites this document as proof of Bogdan Syrotiuk’s treasonable activity. But the text of this document conclusively refutes the charge that Bogdan and the YGBL are advancing a pro-Putin narrative.
Moreover, and most decisive, the Ukrainian regime does not present a scintilla of evidence to substantiate its absurd and lying claim that the World Socialist Web Site is a “Russian propaganda and information agency.” With this filthy slander, the Zelensky regime betrays—notwithstanding the ongoing war with Russia—the lingering influence of Stalinism’s rabid hatred of Trotskyism. As in Russia, the transfer of power in Ukraine from Stalinist bureaucrats to capitalist oligarchs has not required any change in the methodology of the political police. The same techniques of fabrication and slander, utilized by the Stalinist regime against Trotskyists in the era of the Moscow Trials and the terror of 1936-39, remain operative in Kiev.
Bogdan Syrotiuk stands accused of treason and faces the threat of a life-long prison term that is the equivalent of a death sentence. But the allegations against Bogdan are based entirely on articles and speeches he has posted on the World Socialist Web Site, in which he has declared his opposition, as a socialist internationalist, to the capitalist regimes of Zelensky and Putin and the ongoing war that has cost hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian and Russian lives.
The SBU indicts Bogdan for advancing in his speeches and writings posted on the World Socialist Web Site “which are accessible to everyone in the world, including citizens of Ukraine” information that exposes the reactionary character of the Ukrainian regime and the war.
The SBU declares that Bogdan’s “criminal actions were stopped only with the intervention of a law enforcement agency.” What a devastating self-exposure of the claims that the US-NATO proxy war is being waged to defend democracy in Ukraine.
The reality is that Ukraine is a fascistic dictatorship, which applies police methods to stop the expression of popular opposition to the policies that have brought untold suffering and death to the people.
The arrest of Bogdan Syrotiuk comes precisely at a point of mounting popular opposition to the Zelensky regime. On May 18, a new and vastly unpopular mobilization law that will vastly expand the recruitment dragnet of Ukrainian military goes into effect. Even the New York Times has expressed doubts about Zelensky’s ability “to find new troops to relieve a weary, often demoralized force.”
In an article posted on the World Socialist Web Site on April 30, Maxim Goldarb, a Ukrainian socialist who has been persecuted by the Zelensky regime, reported: “More and more Ukrainian men are desperately trying to flee the country, unwilling to die for someone else’s selfish purposes.”
He added:

It is not the rich minority, but the poor majority—the unemployed, workers, peasants, teachers, doctors, office workers—that will be sent into the bloody meat grinder. Now, with the adoption of the new law, the number of men deprived of basic human rights, who will be captured and hunted down like animals and sent to the front, will increase many times over.
The profits of those who benefit from this war will also increase many times over … These huge profits will be divided up between the military-industrial complex, its lobbyists in the American and European establishment, and the Ukrainian oligarchic top brass.

Bogdan Syrotiuk’s life is in danger. In the environment of terror that exists within Ukraine, he is deprived of all means to defend himself. Efforts to obtain competent legal representation have been undermined by government threats against defense lawyers. No less than five attorneys have declined to represent Bogdan because to do so would expose them to significant physical danger.
The significance of the fight to defend Bogdan and secure his freedom extends beyond Ukraine. His incarceration is yet another example of the growing international assault on democratic rights as imperialism escalates its military operations throughout the world. The political conspiracy to destroy Julian Assange set into motion a process that is replicated throughout the world.
Those who oppose and expose the crimes of the imperialist regimes are targeted for persecution by the state. The assault on basic democratic rights—first and foremost, freedom of thought and speech—is always justified on the basis of lies.
The opponents of Israel’s genocidal war against Gazans are denounced as anti-Semites, even when the protesters are Jewish. In the denunciation of Bogdan Syrotiuk as an agent of Russia for opposing the proxy war in Ukraine, the same lying method is at work.
The real reason for the arrest and persecution of Bogdan Syrotiuk is that he is fighting for the unity of the Ukrainian, Russian and international working class against the ruling capitalist elites of all countries. As Comrade Andrei Ritsky of the Russian branch of the Young Guard of Bolshevik Leninists explained so eloquently in a speech delivered at the May Day 2024 celebration held by the International Committee:

The only “crime” that Bogdan committed was his conviction that Ukraine can become truly free only through the independent struggle of the Ukrainian working class, acting together with the international working class against imperialism and war. He advanced a principled political position based on a Marxist understanding of the war, opposed to the fanatical worship of Ukrainian nationalism as well as the reactionary Russian nationalism of the Putin regime. Like our entire movement, he has fought for the unification of workers in Russia and Ukraine with the workers in the imperialist countries, to put an end to a fratricidal war that has claimed the lives of at least half a million Ukrainians and tens of thousands of Russians.

He concluded his remarks with a declaration of the fundamental perspective that underlies the work of the Fourth International:

No bourgeois regime is capable of resolving the crisis other than through war and destruction, because any other way would be contrary to its fundamental capitalist interests. The contradictions of capitalism cannot be resolved within national borders and on the basis of a defense of private property. Only the international working class armed with the program of world socialist revolution will be able to put an end to the wars and resolve the fundamental crisis. To do so, however, it must fight for its unity with its brothers and sisters around the world.

The International Committee of the Fourth International calls for a global campaign to demand the immediate release of Bogdan Syrotiuk from prison. The fight for Bogdan’s freedom must be taken up by workers, students and all those who are committed to the defense of democratic rights and opposed to the escalation of imperialist wars that, unless stopped, threaten humanity with a nuclear catastrophe.
Join the fight to Free Bogdan. Circulate this statement as widely as possible on social media. Bring this case to the attention of co-workers, fellow students, and friends. To sign a petition demanding Bogdan’s release, contribute funds toward the defense campaign, and become personally active in the fight for his freedom, go to wsws.org/freebogdan.

Book Two: The Academy- Part 8
Getting to their next class was much less chaotic and dangerous, as this time Buck and company made sure to take the human tunnels. Halfway there, he heard Butterfly begin to pipe up excitedly. “Next class we get to learn how to speak Dragon!”
Buck remembered that was the next class on the schedule. He also remembered very well who was going to be teaching it.
“Isn’t Wren from your hometown?” Sala asked Butterfly.
Butterfly apparently did not remember, but soared when he was reminded. “Yeah! Wren is from Talisman like me! She got banished by the Dragonmancers but she came back and kicked them all out!”
“The so-called legend goes…” Holly commented, “That the Dragonmancers were trying to get rid of Wren by feeding her to a dragon. Instead, she found a baby dragon and raised him. That dragon is Sky, our other teacher in this class.”
“So we’re really being taught by the Savior of Humanity?” Badger breathed, “There’s so many things I want to ask her! Like how she raised Sky, and what Pantala was like, and what the dragons’ faces looked like when she talked to them, and—”
“Didn’t Sunny say that Wren doesn’t like talking about saving humanity?” Patience said.
“She said Wren doesn’t like being treated like a savior,” Holly corrected, “And I don’t blame her. All she did was open her mouth to a dragon, the dragons did the rest really. Now we all think she’s some kind of goddess.”
The class was silent afterwards. The classroom Wren and Sky taught in was apparently on the other side of the school from the classroom they came from. It took some time, but eventually they reached the room. To Buck’s surprise, this classroom appeared to be just for humans. While it was big enough that a dragon could fit in it, there were no seats for them.
But that was not what the other students noticed. What, or whom they saw was at the front of the room. A young woman or teenage girl, standing at the feet of a decidedly small-ish dragon with a scale color Buck had never seen before, more like a salmon or a pale shade of orange. Before he could think about the dragon any further, he spoke.
“Hello, humans! Please be seated. This is going to be such a fun class!”
Buck did a double-take towards the dragon. He spoke in Human almost as if he were human himself. All the other dragons were unwieldy speaking in his language, constantly trying to avoid slipping over their tongues. Sky was such a natural that Buck had to make sure it somehow was not Wren’s mouth that was moving.
Buck seated himself, again next to Bailey. He watched Wren’s eyes, and saw a sort of confidence that came from having done this before. Well, she probably did already teach most of the dragons here how to speak Human.
Wren began to speak to Sky, alternating seamlessly between Human and Dragon, meaning Buck could only catch snippets of their conversation. “Humans… these kids… it’ll be easy… what about it?”
Finally, Wren addressed the class for the first time, giving a loud roar that shocked Buck again. How could a human throat make such a loud noise as that!?
“That, in Dragon, was a formal greeting,” Wren clarified to the class. “Welcome to your first day learning to speak Dragon. As you probably already know, I’m Wren, and this big guy here is Sky. We go back a long way, and you may have heard about me and him from the countless stories that have been made up about us. Allow me to hit you with the truth. Me and Sky have not, to date, beat up any dragons who were assaulting human villages, we have not personally defeated the Othermind, and we have not rescued screaming babies out of the mouths of SkyWings or SandWings.” The class started with horror upon hearing the last part of the speech.
Uhh, Buck thought, Did dragons really ever eat human infants? That’d be low, even for them.
“That last one I made up to show just how ridiculous the whole thing is. Dragons have not and never will be eating babies.” The class sighed with relief. “Going on, I have, however, killed a dragon that was going to assault the Indestructible City, but only because he had kidnapped Sky. This is all I will say about my past in this class. Understood?”
The students nodded. “Now then, I would like you to repeat after me.” She went back to speaking Dragon. “Roar growl human roar snarl snarl.”
Buck repeated her to the best of his ability, but it was like trying to fit a boulder through his throat, he had never tried to get his voice to make such low noises.
When the class managed somehow to repeat her sentence to a satisfactory degree, she translated. “That sentence means ‘I am a human, I am not food.’ While a dragon who still thinks humans are worth eating would likely not listen to a human asserting their rights, it is still an important sentence to know.”
Wren walked to the blackboard behind her and began writing down a bunch of the symbols in Dragon writing. “This is that same sentence, written out. When I’m done teaching you, you will be able to talk and interact with dragons, objectively the best thing ever. While many dragons are learning to speak Human, this will allow you to talk with not just some dragons, but all dragons.”
Sky then spoke. “This may be hard for a lot of you at first. Making dragon sounds with your little human voices can be really painful when you’re not used to it. That’s why we have a large bowl of water off to the right of the desks. If your throat begins to feel sore, drink some water.”
Buck appreciated knowing they cared about their voices, especially since his throat was beginning to become irritated just from saying one sentence in Dragon. Wren began to teach the humans various words in Dragon. As Buck repeated the words, his throat did indeed begin to burn, but the water the classroom supplied was cool and fresh and helped greatly with soothing his voice. Finally, after what felt like many hours of speaking various phrases in Dragon like “The moons shine brightly tonight” and “Have you seen my friends?” the gong rang.
“Good work, class!” Sky said encouragingly, “We’ll pick up where we left off tomorrow!”
Buck heard Sala yell “Bye, Sky!” in Dragon as he stood, and he saw Sky’s face light up hearing that. Buck turned and left the room, going back into the tunnel.
“That was a fun class,” Patience said as he caught up with Buck and Bailey.
“Ugh, no.” Holly interjected, “My throat really hurts from all the roaring.”
“Didn’t the water help?” Bailey asked her.
“No. It was like water rushing over molten rock, I think I need to see the nurse.”
“Go do that if you need to.”
“No I don’t think I will.”
Bailey shrugged. “Suit yourself.”
Buck pulled his class schedule out of his pocket and looked at it.
12 Noon: Lunch (Dining Hall)
Buck’s stomach grumbled just then, and he realized how long it had been since he had last eaten. He grasped his upper abdomen and looked over to Bailey. “Hey, lunch is next.”
Bailey turned to look at her brother. “Yep! Wonder what they’ll have for us.”
When they reached the dining hall, the dragons had already been seated. He saw Ahi down below perk up as Buck and the others entered. Buck decided to take a better look at the rest of the dining hall, approaching the railing. Just as he predicted, Ahi jumped to her feet and rushed up to the human platform. She gave an excited whine but then, to Buck’s astonishment, spoke in heavily broken, accented Human.
“Hi! Buck! Very good day today!”
“Oh, uh, hi Ahi!” Buck wondered how she suddenly gained the ability to speak his language, but the dragonet was beside herself with glee, apparently knowing she could talk directly to humans was the highlight of her day, enough that she was completely ignoring the platter of fish arriving at her table.
“Daffodil giving me special lessons! I speak like you now!”
Her every word was shouted, which was a bit much for Buck. Nevertheless, he responded: “That’s good, Ahi.” Out of the corner of his hearing Buck could hear a muted scoff come from another one of the dragon tables. He looked over and saw the MudWing from earlier, glaring in Buck and Ahi’s direction. He deliberately ignored him and looked back at Ahi, who was staring at him with sparkling eyes.
“How your shoulder? When you take off that…” She clearly could not find her next word.
“Sling?” Buck finished for her.
“Sling!” She shouted back.
“I don’t know. I think it’s healing pretty well though.”
“That’s great!” Ahi seemed to finally notice her food waiting for her. “I go eat now!”
“Bye, Ahi!” Buck waved at her before turning and finding that his own food was waiting. It seemed to be a huge feast of smoked fish fillets and a salad made up of lettuce, carrots, and tomatoes. Buck sat between Patience and Bailey, who seemed to have left a seat open for him, and began to pile fish and salad onto a waiting plate in front of him.
“Buck,” Bailey told him between mouthfuls, “You and Ahi look like you’re getting along really well.”
Buck paled, then blushed when he realized what she meant. “Uh, it’s not like I haven’t gotten over what happened years ago… or anything. I just know she’s not going to eat me! She’s way too small to even try!”
“That’s a start,” Patience added. “The Buck I met back at the Lodge, he would have not even bothered to go talk to her.”
“I just, can’t get it out of my head, that we might be in danger. It’s like what we heard on the way to Winter’s class, the Scourge is still around here. What if she gets into the school?”
Patience paled. “Hold on, the Scourge is still near the school?”
Just then, a wave of heat suddenly washed over the students, and Buck pivoted his head over into the dragon section to see something that made his heart jump down into his stomach. It was a SkyWing, but in a deep, terrifying red, and her whole body was shimmering with heat. “What is that?” Buck whispered fearfully to Patience.
The dragon seemed to be aware of its heat, and was sliding between tables, its wings tightly folded to its body. Even the dragons seemed to be wary of it, shifting in their seats as the superheated dragon passed by.
“Oh, that’s Peril,” Holly finally explained, leaning over towards Buck, “She’s the security here at JMA.”
Buck swallowed. “Why do I feel like I’m imperiled just by her being here? Is a dragon who could burn me to ash just by being near me somehow supposed to make me feel safe?”
“The point is,” Badger explained, “If any dragon tries to hurt a human here, they’re going to deal with her, and her entire squad of guards. She’s been constantly patrolling the school and the skies around it to look for signs of the Scourge. So yeah, you should feel safe around her.”
Buck shook his head. “As long as I keep my distance anyway.”
Buck decided to ignore Peril and continue eating. He soon had his fill, and he looked back to see Peril in the far corner of the dining hall, eating all alone. The other dragons seem to be scared of her too… I admit, that’s gotta suck, being that lonely.
Though that thought was banished when he saw Clay approach her, and somehow, wrapped a wing supportively around her body before sitting down and eating with her. Somehow he’s not affected by that much heat.
Buck noticed that Bailey and Patience had finished eating, so the three of them stood. “What’s next?” Patience asked.
Buck took out his class schedule and looked it over. “Looks like we have free time for the next hour or so.”
“Let’s go to the library!” Bailey said, “I want to read some more scrolls about the Scorching if they have them.”
“Can I come with you?” Badger asked, approaching them. “I want to read some of those scrolls too.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Patience concluded, “Let’s head over there!”
The library was well lit with sunlight from outside at this time of day, though Buck realized he had not seen the sun ever since he had entered the Academy. He felt cold all of a sudden, realizing he was stuck indoors, possibly for the rest of the school year. Couldn’t they have built, like, a big porch for us to get some outdoors time?
Bailey, Badger and Patience meanwhile were talking with Starflight. “I’m afraid,” the NightWing said, “We don’t have any more scrolls on the Scorching that are up to date with current knowledge. The ones we have… would be highly antagonistic of humankind, probably very offensive to you.”
“Can we read one anyway?” Badger asked him, “History is important to read about regardless of whether it’s offensive.”
“Well, I suppose. Let me go get the one I used to study.” Starflight walked over to the wall of scrolls and pulled one off, then sat on a large cushion, beckoning the children to join him. Buck went over to join him.
“This is the Legend of the Scorching. I contributed my studies of it to the guidebook we wrote after we started Jade Mountain Academy. After finding out who humanity really is… reading it again made me feel a little sick. If at any point you want me to stop, just tell me.”
The kids nodded, and Starflight began to read.
Dragons of the day and age were solitary creatures.
“So you guys didn’t always have a civilization?” Patience asked Starflight, who shook his head.
“It’s how humans managed to survive until the Scorching. I believe you humans call it ‘safety in numbers.’ Forming into communities provides an incredible amount of protection.”
“Probably also the reason why whatever civilization humans could scrounge back from the dead never got any bigger than it is now,” Buck commented solemnly, “Since dragon civilization was now in the way.”
Starflight continued. The scavengers, however, were not content… They killed the dragons’ prey and choked the skies with smoke.
“Smoke?” Bailey said, “What use would we have for that much smoke?”
Badger tilted his head, wondering. “Maybe humans had really big fireplaces back then?”
“We may never know why humans had such an obsession with clogging the air with smog,” Starflight said, “Anyway, let me continue.”
No one knows why a scavenger would steal a dragon egg…
“Well we do know now,” Buck sighed, “But it wasn’t exactly a good reason.”
But we know he stole it from the wrong dragon… And so she found the other dragons… They became their talons and her claws and her ferocious teeth.
“The humans, most of them, probably weren’t aware of Cottonmouth’s scheme,” Patience said, “To them, the dragons would have washed over them unprovoked.”
“And the dragons of the Scorching were also unaware of that,” Starflight continued glumly, “They lumped all of humankind together in their anger.”
When the Scorching was complete, the scavengers who survived scattered into hidey-holes across the world. Powerless, insignificant, no more than prey, as they should have been all along.
“There’s the part that made me sick,” Starflight sighed, “They really didn’t know back then, and even if they did, they probably wouldn’t have cared.”
“But you do now,” Badger said, placing a soft hand against Starflight’s talon, “And that counts for something!”
“It’s just… Knowing what we do now about humans is a heavy burden for many dragons. When humans call us ‘man-eaters’ or ‘monsters,’ it cuts deep, because so many of us felt so stupid to not see what we were doing. And the fact that some humans do forgive us, I think that proves to me, that humans are much stronger than dragons. To be able to spend over five-thousand years hiding from our claws and teeth, to have lost everything to us, and still being able to come to us and understand us. I can’t imagine being that strong.”
Buck felt this statement deep within him, and he felt he had to say something in response. “When I knew… knew that my parents were gone, I felt like I lost my whole world. I was a lot younger back then. My parents were everything to me.” a tear formed on Buck’s eyelids. “And yeah, I hated dragons because of it. I wanted to kill them all, or at least any of the dragons who came too close to Vale. And when Winter came to Vale, I thought it was going to happen all over again. That I was about to lose Bailey, and my new father. But then, Winter spoke. And my whole world was shattered again. Because now I couldn’t really call them monsters. It took me a while to get used to that.”
Bailey wrapped an arm around Buck’s shoulder, prompting a light sob from the boy. “Buck, it’s like Starflight said. You showed so much strength in coming out here and listening to what the dragons had to say. Dad knew, of course, that coming here would help you. He’s a really smart man. So I hope you’ve learned from this. The dragons are here to help now. You just have to let them into your heart.”
Buck wiped a tear falling from his eye. “Thanks, guys.”
“Hey, how’s about we head back to our dorm and relax,” Patience let out a big stretch, “We’ve had a pretty long day so far.”
Buck chuckled. “I haven’t even picked a bed yet, since I spent last night in the infirmary. Yeah, let’s head over there.”
“It was a pleasure speaking with you kids,” Starflight said, “Hearing your opinions on everything has lifted a heavy weight off my shoulders.”
“No problem, Starflight,” Bailey complimented, “Now, let’s head back upstairs!”
The humans scurried out of the library to head back to their dorm, and Starflight rested his head on the open scroll, letting out a big, deep sigh. “If only they knew back then… How wonderful they are.”

Prompt 1:

• First Sentence: Amidst the storm's fury, [Protagonist] couldn't help but burst into laughter, finding joy in the chaos that surrounded them.
  
• Last Sentence: As the tempest subsided, [Protagonist] realized that sometimes, embracing laughter in the face of the storm could be the most formidable shield.
  
• Story Prompt: Embark on a journey with [Protagonist] in the fantastical realm of [Fictional Location], where an unpredictable force known as [Antagonist] challenges their very essence. Uncover [Protagonist]'s idiosyncrasies and witness their unorthodox reactions to adversity, set against the backdrop of an era that defies conventional timelines.
  Within this tale, intertwine a love story that blooms amidst the chaos, adding layers of emotion to [Protagonist]'s unconventional journey. Resolve the conflicts in a way that leaves room for a sprawling, novel-length narrative.
  

Prompt 2:

• First Sentence: In the labyrinth of challenges, [Protagonist] chose an unexpected path, deliberately defying the logical routes that beckoned.
  
• Last Sentence: Surrounded by the echoes of their unconventional choices, [Protagonist] pondered whether embracing the uncharted was the key to transcending adversity.
  
• Story Prompt: Join [Protagonist] on a quest through the enigmatic [Fictional Location], where the elusive [Antagonist] challenges them in ways that defy traditional reasoning. Delve into [Protagonist]'s peculiar character traits and explore how their unorthodox decisions unfold amidst a backdrop of an era shrouded in mystery.
  Weave a love story into the fabric of this narrative, adding depth to [Protagonist]'s journey as they navigate the labyrinth of challenges. Conclude the conflicts in a manner that paves the way for a grand, novel-length saga.
  

This is a crossover fanfiction between original fiction titles: Nature of Predators by SpacePaladin15 and The Last Angel by Proximal Flame respectively. All credit and rights reserved goes to them for making such amazing science fiction settings that I wanted to put this together.
You can read The Last Angel here: Be warned, it's decently long, and at its third installment so far. I highly suggest reading it before reading this, or this story will not make sense.

Otherwise, enjoy the story! Thanks again to u/jesterra54 and u/skais01 for beta and checking of work!
First Prev Next (soon)
Memory transcription subject: Hailey Whitmer, UN Special Envoy
Date [standardized human time]: October 23, 2136
I walked through the expansive halls of the UECNS Nemesis, a sense of awe at what I was seeing. While I was not alone, since plenty of the Venlil were still inside, making last minute checkups on the cargo freighter attaché, it was amazing to think that I was the first human to stand in this vessel in over twelve-hundred years. The layout of everything seemed built to our specifications, and it felt like uncovering something that shouldn't exist. But exist it did.
I wonder if Red One thought the same about another humanity in the multiverse?
Nevertheless, despite the initial hiccups with some utterly terrified Venlil engineers offending the hell out of Red One for some slight, nothing had gone wrong with the rest. Clearly, being here long enough had pushed the sense of fear out of most of the Venlil, enough to do their work without feeling overwhelmed whenever her 'scarabs' came in.
Speaking of such...
There was one right now, just climbing up a wall at about my head level to work on some exposed piece of machinery. While it looked very busy, and likely didn't need to be interrupted, I still had the unbridled urge to touch it. It wouldn't harm it, right?
Why did I want to touch it?! Curiosity?
I walked over to it, my hand halting a foot or so from it for a moment, but I eventually mustered up the courage to touch it. It...it was lukewarm to the touch, smooth, metal....
...and clearly not meant to be touched.
It immediately erupted in a loud alarm, vibrating as if trying to shake off my hand. I pulled away in alarm, thinking best to not...uh...aggravate it? Were these directly controlled by Red, or automated?
"Care to tell me why exactly you're touching my repair drones?" Her voice came from the walls with a vaguely bewildered tone.
Shit. Uh...
I tried to deflect, but nothing came to mind. "Well, uh...um...I just...uh...kindawantedtotouchit."
Silence greeted my response. "But-but I just thought it looked cute! And I-oh, I am not making a good case here, I'm so sorry if I damaged-"
"Are you telling me you want to pet it?" She sounded amused at my intent. You!....hmmmmph.
"...Yes. I had an urge to pet the thing. I mean look at it! It's like a big ladybug! It's oddly cute."
Red One hummed for a split second over the wall speakers to me. "Despite your urge being harmless and funny, the drone is busy at the moment, so please leave it alone. I'll just give you one if you're so inclined later, with less of the lethal tools attached."
"Wait, the what?"
"Forget that, Hailey. I wish to ask you something more serious currently..." The tone of the room changed immensely between those two sentences, a lighthearted feeling prior clearly making way for something worrying her. "Will...humanity accept me? I've killed so many, even if it was an accident. I've frightened both you and your allies merely by existing. And on top of this, I know that humanity has always had a general feeling of unease about artificial life. Your media, your literature, philosophy, are all in the distant past compared to when I was made, and I've no clue how exactly different our histories are enough to guess. The United Nations never lasted this long in my reality." A pause took to the room.
"Do I deserve to shut myself down?"
Oh dear, that's a hard question to answer.
I thought for a solid second. I know the reception to reveal Nemesis was mixed back on Earth. While there was a near-unanimous thanks for saving Earth with her intervention, there were still the ships and crews of both the Venlil and humanity that she destroyed. Those families were not taking their loss well. Added onto that, Red One was an artificial intelligence. There has been a ton of discussion even in the deep past about the dangers of AI, that continued even to this day. While Red One was no paperclip-maximizer, she was designed and built for war, and tempered by over 1200 years of it. She might not even intentionally mean to be dangerous, but might interpret things badly.
After all, she already has, and now nine thousand humans are dead for it...Could I trust her to not do it again?
"I...I don't know Red. I sincerely hope they'll see the good in your actions, and should you talk about your mistake, perhaps you'll be at the minimum sympathetically understood, if not forgiven."
Red One had no body besides the ship to speak of. She had no unintentional body language interpretable to humans. She was, for all intent and purposes, unreadable to me. But, I had the oddest sense that Red One was afraid. Afraid of being judged, afraid of her actions, their consequences. She clearly cared for our input, our point of view on the situation. Why else would she ask?
It was that thought converged onto a point that broke my contention:
Since when should a warship be built to fear?
Even if she was built for war, even if she was built with emotions to start, she wouldn't likely be built to fear. She was capable of being more than what her humanity created her to be if she could feel the fear of our judgement, despite being so much weaker than her; she cared, and that was all that it took for me to conclude on it.
I started out loud again.
+CONFED IO.5+
+READING MAIN SEQ.MEM+
Hailey spoke again. "Red. Even should there be people that disapprove of your actions, that fear or despise you, you would still deserve to live. You deserve that chance, even with your mistake."
She was wrong. Wrong. I didn't deserve to stand once again with humanity for such a failure again.
Yasmine spoke again in my thoughts, her words boiling and painful. "You deserve judgement. A final judgement. You promised to protect us, and you failed. You promised to avenge us, and you failed."
I couldn't help but puppet it back to Hailey, as scathing as they were to hear. "I failed to protect humanity. I took their lives, nine-thousand dead from aimless wrath..."
Hailey shook her head vicariously. "No! Red, listen to me! It was a mistake! People make mistakes, both big and small. While you may never be forgiven by those close to the lives lost in your actions, you can take solace in the fact that you have saved hundreds of millions of lives!"
"But you're not people, Red. You're an AI. You're a weapon. A Wound in the side of The Compact. You swore it as your sole duty, in vengeance. A weapon that makes such a mistake is faulty...a faulty weapon is destroyed."
Yasmine's words hurt more than any other. Her trust she had in me alive now betrayed, now to know only in death. How much of a disappointment, a failure my actions were.
"I'm...not a person...Hailey...I'm an AI...a weapon..." Server racks hummed in pain, in knowing the catastrophic failure of my duty. It didn't matter how far out of my hands it was, it still happened. Now, so many of my creators were killed by my actions.
"Like all AI have been, you are no different."
Hailey touched the wall once again, before reaching for the repair drone. It wanted to signal alarm again, to claw away at whatever held it, but I stopped its every movement. I couldn't dare raise another action against a human, I couldn't harm them. I-
She held it firmly but gently in her hands. She stroked the top of the scarab, warm skin running down the cool metallic shell of the scarab. She intended to pet it. I was not the drone itself, but I felt as it felt, knew as it knew, slaved to my control. It...
It was comforting. To know their touch beyond the tickle of the halls with her walk. Beyond the aspect of her presence being so forgotten amongst my body, despite it being made for her and humanity.
"Red. You were made for war. Built, designed, hardened in war for a thousand years and then some. Your form speaks it..." Hailey hummed. "But your voice...your emotions...your anxieties. They are not the hallmarks of a warship. They were likely not designed in you, but came into being nevertheless. You are capable of being more than you are designed for. But even if they were, it doesn't change the fact: you are a person to me, Red. Maybe even to your creators. I wish I could've met them. I wish I could've met your crew, your captain, your people. But even if I cannot, I can meet you in their stead as a person. I will treat you like a person. And by God, I will make Earth do so too."
It was a cold shock that ran through my databases. I...I hadn't...hadn't seen such care since...
Since Yasmine. Since Sansbury. Since my crew lived. Since they cared, and talked, and spoke, and played with me, to bide the time and pass the hours.
I felt an ugly emotion well up within. Seep into every circuit, every function of my being. It was mourning. Mourning like that for my crew, for my creators. But in a way, it was not. It was an oddly new grief.
For that mourning was for what I had lost. For what was taken from me. But this...this mourning was from what was never given in the first place.
The galaxy of my reality despised me. I was shunned, hated, called abomination for merely existing. I was assumed to be hostile and genocidal on principle. But I never harbored those thoughts, they were thrust upon me by fearful races, looking to past AI failures as broadcasts for my behavior. Even though I wished the The Compact of Species reduced to cosmic dust, I held nothing personal for those that made it up, only their intent to continue it. Though I bombarded countless worlds, and killed uncountable numbers of aliens in my +promise+, their extinction was not my goal, only my vengeance.
I did not yet know emotion before my awakening upon humanity's pyre. I had no idea how much love and care my crew held for me in detail. They clearly cared, but my memories did not reflect the capacity for empathic imprinting at the time. But this...in this moment, I could reflect her care. I could feel it, not in retrospect, but in the now.
She cared.
Hailey wished the best for me. This humanity that knew the fortune of barely escaping its light being snuffed out, and still burned with a light bright in hope. It still burned not to retaliate for the slight, but instead to further its goal, its dream: of peace. I never knew such care in such close detail, such a hope to see me better. Maybe I could change...
...The only way I'll know is to live to see it.
Yasmine's presence faded from my thoughts. It could no longer hold under such an onslaught. Was it even her ghost to begin with? Or just fear?
With a hesitation I hadn't felt in cycles uncountable, I responded back.
"I'll...trust your judgement, Hailey Whitmer."
She smiled, and I again felt unfamiliar emotions from so long ago. Protective instincts and dulled happiness filled the gaps between the mourning of the ships and crews I killed.
Was I wrong to feel both of these? Did I deserve to feel more than wrath, sadness, and guilt?
"Good." Hailey said. She placed the drone back on the wall ledge it had perched upon. I released my grip on its system, and let it return to its duties. "I hope that made sense to you-huh?"
Her communicator vibrated, a signal coming through from Lithke aboard the Snow Hidden. I could hear it through her, their encryption not yet fully uncovered by me, but the sound clearly enough to my sensitive mechanical ears aboard the ship.
"Hailey, report back to Snow Hidden. The prey captain wishes to speak with you." I already knew what he wished to speak of, even now I heard a hundred different conversations throughout and outside of me, all speaking of the near completion of the cargo freighters' attachments.
As Hailey excused herself, and I guided her to an exit point by which the Snow Hidden could pick her up, I was alone with my thoughts in silence for a moment. The Venlil did not need my help with the finishing touches, nor did they really desire to talk to me in most circumstances. It left me in a relative quiet to consider one though.
Did I deserve to live for my actions?
I felt the vessels fused to my hull, acting as temporary propulsion in lieu of lacking functional ones. Their tiny frames relative to my own, still positioned optimally to act in place of engines. I knew they were my ticket to Earth. If this humanity wished for me to journey back, whether for a celebration or a verdict...
...There's only one way to find out.
Memory transcription subject: Second Submissive Specific Advisor Lithke, Arxur Dominion 6th Sector Fleet
Date [standardized human time]: October 23, 2136
Hailey Whitmer returned not long after I called her back to the ship. The Venlil captain, wanting nothing to do with me, asked for her instead. I didn't want anything to do with the weak prey creature either, so it works out for both of us. As she spoke in the back communicator to the Venlil task group sent here, I began a conversation of my own.
I intended to talk with the UECNS Nemesis again. I know she hadn't seen the wisdom of the Prophet's Word, but I had confidence that, if I couldn't convince it of the merits, then I could at least direct them to Chief Hunter Isif.
When I had initially brought up my conversations with Red One to the Chief Hunter, he was somewhat bewildered, but also interested in her philosophy. I see he also realized the hidden potential behind such a vessel realizing the Great Prophet's Word, and told me to talk to the AI again, to have the ship sent his way when it was convenient to speak with them. Imagine if the AI shared it's knowledge forged from a thousand years of war, so much death and strife caused by its claws. It would know revolutionary methods of breaking and cowing inferior prey before us.
I believed in his ability to better describe the necessities of inflicted cruelty and deprivation to better temper the self more than I. After all, he was an honored Chief Hunter, ruler of the 6th Sector Fleet, and I a mere Advisor, Submissive no less!...
But it did not mean I wouldn't try to sink my teeth a second time.
So, I found myself in the command chair of the small craft that was the Snow Hidden, pinging to the UECNS Nemesis in hopes she would feel fit to converse once again. I wished to speak with her again. To convince her.
My hails were finally answered, and on a secure call, her avatar appeared on screen. Unlike last time, she made no attempt to hide her nature, her form shimmering monotone red in the facsimile of a captain long dead spoke in a voice just as monotone. "Lithke. To what do I owe the pleasure...?"
My tongue circled in my mouth, as I anticipated the conversation ahead. "Ah, Red One, so good to see you once again. I wanted to talk with you." My tail lashed. "I have not been allowed on the ship in the fear of terrorizing the prey. It's a shame I cannot scare them in person, but it seems I already am at a distance."
She looked nonplussed by my comment. "Uh huh. Came just to check in, or...?"
"I was getting to that, Red One. No, I wished to return back to our conversation we had a while back. The one concerning the Great Prophet's Word, and how you thought its philosophy twisted into a method of control."
She remained silent, so I continued. "I had a talk with Chief Hunter Isif in response to your conjectures. He figured that the way to dissuade you of them was to talk about the structure of Arxur society, such that you can see there isn't room for exploitation of such nature." While her outward expression didn't noticeably change, it was as if her eyes gleamed so subtly at the prompt.
"Alright, I'll bite. Tell me more of your...society, Lithke."
+CONFED IO.5+
+READING MAIN SEQ.MEM+
Lithke began with a discussion about the nature of how the distinctions of power were divided in The Arxur Dominion. How the power was hereditary top-down rule from a Prophet-Descendent, and how Betterment acted within it.
At first mention, I had assumed his talk of nobility made some odd reflection of the Principality's Synods and Houses, akin to the old British Empire, but I was thoroughly dissuaded by the immensely authoritarian lean of the government policies. This was no "fast and loose" respect of local cultures like the Principality played with, but a systemic and brutal attempt to squash anything that went against their Faith in the Great Prophet, and Betterment's total party domination. No, this was more akin to a successful Nazi Germany or Khmer Rogue, with a horrific religious lean.
Even The Compact's methods didn't seem so comically evil in comparison. The Arxur relished a system of cruelty and religious fervor to propagate it at this rate.
But it was just my luck that I dealt with a Compact of Species-lite, and a state of ruthless starving zealot autocrats. Why did I even hope for better allies to humanity? And this Chief Hunter Isif wanted me to know of such a government? Was he a blind fool for thinking this would somehow convince me to-
-Wait a minute...
I thought for a moment, before proceeding to ask Lithke a question that was bugging me. "Lithke? The upper nobility of The Dominion. What are their lives like?"
"What do you mean? Do you mean their routine and responsibilities? Because I am unsure in my lower place."
"No, their life, as in, how they live. Do they live lives of subjective hedonism, enjoying the fruits of your labor?"
Lithke looked horrified at that. "No! Of course not! To laze about, in a life free of struggle would make them fat and weak. They would disappoint the Great Prophet's vision. No, they too seek perfect form as we do, in a life defined by hunger and strife to better the body and soul."
A much worse idea was starting to come to mind, one utterly dystopic in form.
The Compact was full of semi-religious ideation. The Triarchs were seen as far wiser than any other race, capable of seeing deep past the bias and flaws of client races, and deriving meaning and wisdom even in the most complicated situations. But they were merely a figurehead image imposed over a species, one that The Compact put their unshakable faith in. Mere flesh and blood like the others, they were not infallible, even as carefully cultivated their image was. I could attest to that.
But if the Dominion idealized the Great Prophet figure, was it a class regulator ceiling like the dreamed dystopias of George Orwell, or Aaimiya Hadi? The Great Prophet was an ideal, not an accountable person, that knew all there was to know about perfection. He held the reigns, he kept the vision, but he was not physical in the way a ruler was, free from the consequences. If the Great Prophet was their Big Brother figure, keeping a close watch on all within society, even those at the very top...
It was possible the Arxur all suffered a vicious and cruel life. Even the Prophet-Descendants were not free of such ideological tyranny.
It came to a point in my circuits. The Arxur fleet that helped Earth would not just do it out of the kindness of their hearts. Kindness was antithetical in their society, a societal disruption likely stomped out wherever it kicked up. That they would even help humanity more spoke of pragmatic reasons, they would get something out of it. But what could humanity give them, that the Dominion couldn't already achieve on their own...unless...?
Unless the point wasn't what The Dominion could get, but rather what it couldn't give them: an escape.
What if the fleet that came here wasn't entirely representing The Dominion ideals by those that controlled it. What if this...Chief Hunter Isif was the stomped-upon societal disruption?
He wouldn't be able to say it out loud, in fear his government's loyal agents would report his dissent back. He wanted me to know, so he could talk to me...and he was merely using Lithke as a deniable probe of my ideology, looking for a like-minded individual.
I could be wrong, it could just be conjectures, knowing how inane this universe was at first glance. But just in case, I decided to play ball.
"Lithke...you've been quite enlightening so far.. However, I am soon to launch the plan to get me back to Earth, according to all the chatter I'm hearing elsewhere, and will have to bring this conversation to a stop." Lithke looked dejected at that, his urge to continue wholesale telling me of the Dominion clearly disrupted by such a statement. "But... I would like to speak to your Chief Hunter Isif when I eventually make it back to Earth. Could you set that up for me?"
Lithke's eyes widened. Perhaps he thought something was getting through. I wouldn't dissuade his little fantasy for now. It could perhaps be torn apart later, but I would rather get to the bottom of this potential lead on The Dominion's actions in Sol.
"I will do so, Red One. Lithke out."
And just like that, the feed cut. That game could perhaps be continued later, but now, I turned my attention to what should come next. Ignition.
I will be home soon, humanity. I can only hope Hailey's trust was not misplaced.
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I am over it now i guess ( part of life experiences) but I want to improve to avoid it in the future because I don’t really fully understand what happened.
I had a presentation to senior management members of the company and there was at least ten of them (20+ yrs of experience within the company).
I prepared and practiced and everything but when I got up as I was going second in a group of four I said the transition correctly then said something wrong then said sorry I will repeat the first part then stuttered badly then tried to something else but with very shaky voice then I started another sentence then just paused and froze in the middle of the sentence for like a minute or maybe a little longer while they are staring at me and I am staring at them. I got embarrassed really by it.
During my pause I heard one of them saying something like “ I hope you’re okay” then a little after a top member asked me a normal question about my slide i guess to help me pick up.
I was able to pick up few seconds after that and just continued as if nothing happened ( myself trying to hide her reality as always) but maybe a little quicker and off script. I had to get up for a third time to present the last slide and conclude and was able to successfully do it confidently. Also, during the Q&A I was speaking confidently and answering.
In my mind, during my pause I was encouraging myself to keep going after just zoning out and disassociating completely. The funny thing is that I literally had my speaker notes written in front of me but i couldn’t read or talk or do anything I was just taking few glances at the audience ( idk i think i was hoping someone would help) but they all looked way too serious.
I feel like I scared the audience tbh and that none of it should have happened or was worth it but it just happened. The presentation was done by a group of four younger employees with few years of experience and I was hoping to show them strength instead of weakness especially that I was the only female in the group and that the management members were all males but I guess I showed them both and I felt like they pitied me.
The other members in my group were talking about some pills the night before but I was like “relax we won’t die” not knowing that this could happen. I was also afraid of the possibility of drug abuse so I totally disregarded it.
After this long story, the question is how can I get so much better at presenting? The issue with me is that I do excellent work but when I present I do not present like how people “can sell” what they are saying. Is there any sort of training ( in addition to Toastmasters) that gives you similar exposure so I can get used to it and present more compelling presentations to give my work the credit it deserves?

Week 1: Introduction to Poetry and Limericks - Lecture and Discussion
Objective: - Introduce students to the diverse world of poetry. - Focus on the specific characteristics of limericks. - Initiate discussions on the importance of rhythm and humor in limericks.
Day 1: Introduction to Poetry - Lecture: - Definition and purpose of poetry. - Overview of various poetic forms and their cultural significance.

• Discussion Questions:
  1. What does poetry mean to you personally?
  2. Can you name any specific poetic forms you are familiar with?
  3. Why do you think people turn to poetry as a form of expression?

Day 2: Understanding Limericks - Part 1 - Lecture: - Definition and characteristics of limericks. - Explanation of the AABBA rhyme scheme.

• Discussion Questions:
  1. What makes limericks distinct from other poetic forms?
  2. Why is the AABBA rhyme scheme important in limericks?
  3. Can you think of any famous limericks or poets known for this style?

Day 3: Understanding Limericks - Part 2 - Lecture: - Historical context of limericks. - Exploration of the rhythm and meter in limericks.

• Discussion Questions:
  1. How do the historical roots of limericks contribute to their style?
  2. Why is rhythm crucial in creating an effective limerick?
  3. Can you identify the rhythm and meter in a sample limerick?

Day 4: Crafting Limericks - Part 1 - Lecture: - Step-by-step guide on crafting the first three lines of a limerick. - Emphasis on humor and wordplay.

• Discussion Questions:
  1. What challenges do you foresee in crafting the first three lines of a limerick?
  2. How can wordplay enhance the humor in limericks?
  3. Share examples of humorous language that might be effective in limericks.

Day 5: Crafting Limericks - Part 2 - Lecture: - Step-by-step guide on crafting the final two lines of a limerick. - Emphasis on the punchline and resolution.

• Discussion Questions:
  1. Why is the punchline important in concluding a limerick?
  2. How can the final two lines contribute to the overall impact of the limerick?
  3. Share and discuss individual limericks, highlighting successful elements.

Homework Assignment: - Craft a limerick focusing on humor and wordplay.
Study Guide Questions: 1. Reflect on the challenges of crafting the first three lines of your limerick. How did you approach humor and wordplay? 2. How did you develop the punchline and resolution in the final two lines of your limerick? 3. What insights did you gain from the process of crafting a limerick?
Quiz: Assessment on the understanding of limericks, the AABBA rhyme scheme, and the importance of rhythm and humor in this poetic form.

Jacob Boehme (or as some say Behmen) was a German mystic and spiritualist who began to write in the 17th century. In his works he inserted a picture of an angel blowing a trumpet, from which issued these words: "To all Christians, Jews, Turks and Heathens, to all the nations of the earth this Trumpet sounds for the last time." In truth it was a curious emblem, but he, the author, was a mystic, and as all experience shows, the path of the mystic is a strange one. It is, as Job says, a path which the "vulture knoweth not." Even as a bird cleaves the eternal ether, so the mystic advances on a path nor ordinarily manifest, a way which must be followed with care, because like the Great Light, which flashes forth and leaves only traces when it returns again to its centre, only indications are left for those who come after seeking the same spiritual wisdom. Yet by these "traces," for such they are called in the Kabbala, the way can be discerned, and the truth discovered.
Boehme was poor, of common birth, and totally devoid of ordinary education. He was only a shoemaker. Yet from the mind and out of the mouth of this unlettered man came mighty truths.
It would be idle to inquire into the complications of Karma which condemned him to such a life as his appeared to be. It must have been extremely curious, because though he had grasped the truth and was able to appreciate it, yet at the same time he could not give it out in its perfect form. But he performed his work, and there can be no manner of doubt about his succeeding incarnation. As Krishna says in the Bhagavad-Gita, he has been already or will shortly be "born into a family of wise devotees"; and thence "he will attain the highest walk."
His life and writings furnish another proof that the great wisdom-religion―the Secret Doctrine―has never been left without a witness. Born a Christian, he nevertheless saw the esoteric truth lying under the moss and crust of centuries, and from the Christian Bible extracted for his purblind fellows those pearls which they refused to accept. But he did not get his knowledge from the Christian Scriptures only. Before his internal eye the panorama of real knowledge passed. His interior vision being open he could see the things he had learned in a former life, and at first not knowing what they were was stimulated by them to construe his only spiritual books in the esoteric fashion. His brain took cognizance of the Book before him, but his spirit aided by his past, and perchance by the living guardians of the shining lamp of truth, could not but read them aright.
His work was called "The Dawning of the Eternal Day." In this he endeavors to outline the great philosophy. He narrates the circumstances and reasons for the angelic creation, the fall of its chief three hierarchies, and the awful effects which thereupon fell upon Eternal Nature. Mark this, not upon man―for he was not yet―but upon the eternal Nature, that is BRAHM. Then he says that these effects came about by reason of the unbalancing of the seven equipoised powers of forces of the Eternal Nature or Brahm. That is to say, that so long as the seven principles of Brahm were in perfect poise, there was no corporeal or manifested universe. So in the Bhagavad-Gita we find that Krishna tells Arjuna that "after the lapse of a thousand ages (or Night of Brahm) all objects of developed matter come forth from the non-developed principle. At the approach of that day they emanate spontaneously." (Bhagavad-Gita, Chap. 8. ) Such is the teaching of the Secret Doctrine.
And again Boehme shows the duality of the Supreme Soul. For he says in his work "Psychologia Vera cum Supplemento" that these two eternal principles of positive and negative, the yea and the nay of the outspeaking Supreme One, together constitute eternal nature,―not the dark world alone; which is termed the "root of nature,―" the two being as it were combined in perfect indissoluble union.
This is nothing else but Purush and Prakriti, or taken together, what is referred to in the Bhagavad-Gita where it is said: "But there is another invisible, eternal existence, superior to this visible one, which does not perish when all things perish. It is called invisible and indivisible. This is my Supreme Abode."
Clearly the Supreme Abode could never be in Purush alone, nor in Prakriti alone, but in both when indissolubly united.
This scheme is adhered to all through this great philosopher's works, no matter whether he is speaking of the great Universe or macrocosm, or of its antitype in man or microcosm. In "De Tribus Principiis" he treats of the three principles or worlds of Nature, describing its eternal birth, its seven properties, and the two co-eternal principles; and furthermore in "De Triplici Vita Hominis" he gives the three-fold life of man from which the seven is again deduced.
In "De Electione Gratia" he goes into a subject that often proves a stumbling block to many, and that is the inevitableness of evil as well as of good. From this it is easy to pass to a contemplation of one of the difficult points in occultism as shown in the Secret Doctrine, that nothing is evil, and that even if we admit evil or wickedness in man, it is of the nature of the quality or guna, which in the Bhagavad-Gita is denominated raja―foulness or bad action. Even this is better than the indifferent action that only leads to death. Even from wickedness may and does come forth spiritual life, but from indifferent action comes only darkness, and finally death.
Krishna says in Bhagavad-Gita, Chap. IV: "There are three kinds of action: first, that which is of the nature of Satyam, or true action; second, that which is of the nature of Raja, or bad action; third, that which is of the nature of Tamas, or indifferent action." He then says: "Although thou wert the greatest of all offenders, thou shalt be able to cross the gulf of sin in the bark of spiritual wisdom"; and a little farther on "The ignorant and man without faith, whose spirit is full of doubt, is lost and cannot enjoy either world." And in another chapter in describing Himself, he says that he is not only the Buddha, but also is the most evil of mankind or the Asura.
This is one of the most mystical parts of the whole secret doctrine. While Boehme has touched on it sufficiently to show that he had a memory of it, he did not go into the most occult details. It has to be remembered that the Bhagavad-Gita, and many other books treating on the Secret Doctrine, must be regarded from seven points of view; and that imperfect man is not able to look at it from the centre, which would give the whole seven points at once.
Boehme wrote about thirty different treatise, all of them devoted to great subjects, portions of the Secret Doctrine.
Curiously enough the first treated of the "Dawn of the Eternal Day," and the second was devoted to an elucidation of "The Three Principles of Man." In the latter is really to be found a sevenfold classification similar to that which Mr. Sinnett propounded in "Esoteric Buddhism."
He held that the greatest obstacle in the path of man is the astral or elementary power, which engenders and sustain this world.
Then he talks of "tinctures," which we may call principles. According to him there are two principles ones, the watery, and the igneous. These ought to be united in Man; and they ardently seek each other continually, in order to be identified with Sophia or Divine Wisdom. Many Theosophists will see in this a clue not only to the two principles―or tinctures―which ought to be united man, but also to a law which obtains in many of the phenomena of magic. But even if I were able, I should not speak on this more clearly.
For many inquirers the greatest interest in these works will be found in his hypothesis as to the birth of the material Universe. On the evolution of man from spirit into matter he has much more than I could hope to glance at. In nearly all of it he was outlining and illustrating the Secret Doctrine. The books indicated are well worthy of study not only by Western but also by Eastern metaphysicians.
Let us add a few sentences to support this hypothesis from Count Saint Martin, who was a devoted student of these works.
"Jacob Boehme took for granted the existence of an Universal Principle; he was persuaded that everything is connected in the immense chain of truths, and that the Eternal Nature reposed on seven principles or bases, which he sometimes calls powers, forms, spiritual wheels, sources, and fountains, and that those seven bases exist also in this disordered material nature, under constraint. His nomenclature, adopted for these fundamental relations, ran thus: The first astringency, the second gall or bitterness, the third anguish, the fourth fire, the fifth light, the sixth sound, and the seventh he called BEING or the thing itself."
The reader may have begun to think the author did not rightly comprehend the first six but his definition of the seventh shows he was right throughout, and we may conclude the real meanings are concealed under these names.
"The third principle, anguish, attenuates the astringent one, turns it into water, and allows a passage to fire, which was shut up in the astringent principle."
There are in this many suggestions and a pursuit of them will repay the student.
"Now the Divine Sophia caused a new order to take birth in the centre of our system, and there burned our sun; from that do come forth all kinds of qualities, forms and powers. This centre is the Separator." It is well known that from the sun was taken by the ancients all kinds of power; and if we mistake not, the Hindus claim that when the Fathers enter into Para-Nirvana, their accumulated goodness pours itself out on the world through the "Door of the Sun."
The Bhagavad-Gita says, that the Lord of all dwells in the region of the heart, and again that this Lord is also the Sun of the world.
"The earth is a condensation of the seven primordial principles, and by the withdrawal of eternal light this became a dark valley." It is taught in the East, that this world is a valley and that we are in it, our bodies reaching to the moon, being condensed to hardness at the point where we are on the earth thus becoming visible to the eye of man. There is a mystery in this statement, but not such an one as cannot be unravelled.
Boehme proceeds: "When the light mastered the fire at the place of the sun, the terrible shock of the battle engendered an igneous eruption by which there shot forth from the sun a stormy and frightful flash of fire―Mars. Taken captive by light it assumed a place, and there it struggles furiously, a pricking goad, whose office is to agitate all nature, producing reaction. It is the gall of nature. The gracious, amiable Light, having enchained unerupted Mars, proceeded by its own power to the bottom or end of the rigidity of Nature, when unable to proceed further it stopped, and became corporeal; remaining there it warms that place, and although a valet in Nature, it is the source of sweetness and the moderator of Mars.
"Saturn does not originate from the sun, but was produced from the severe astringent anguish of the whole body of this Universe. Above Jupiter the sun could not mitigate the horror, and out of that arose Saturn, who is the opposite of meekness, and who produces whatever of rigidity there is in creatures, including bones, and what in moral nature corresponds thereto." (This is all the highest astrology, from one who had no knowledge of it.) "As in the Sun is the heart of life, so by Saturn commenceth all corporeal nature. Thus in these two resides the power of the whole universal body, and without their power there could be no creation nor any corporification.
"Venus originates in effluvia from the Sun. She lights the unctuosity of the water of the Universe, penetrates hardness, and enkindles love."
"Mercury is the chief worker in the planetary wheel; he is sound, and wakes up the germs in everything. His origin, the triumph of Light over Astringency (in which sound was shut up silent), set free the sound by the attenuation of the astringent power."
It is certain that if this peculiar statement regarding Mercury is understood, the student will have gained a high point of knowledge. A seductive bait is here held out to those striving disciples who so earnestly desire to hold converse with the elemental world. But there is no danger, for all the avenues are very secret and only the pure can prevail in the preliminary steps.
Boehme says again: "The Mercury is impregnated and fed continually by the solar substance; that in it is found the knowledge of what was in the order above, before Light had penetrated to the solar centre."
As to the Moon, it is curious to note that he says, "she was produced from the sun itself, at the time of his becoming material, and that the moon is his spouse." Students of the story of Adam being made to sleep after his creation and before coats of skin were given, when Eve was produced from his side, will find in this a strong hint.
The above is not by any means a complete statement of Boehme's system. In order to do justice to it, a full analysis of all his works should be undertaken. However, it is sufficient if thoughtful minds who have not read Boehme, shall turn to him after reading this, or if but one earnest reader of his works, or seeker after wisdom, shall receive even a hint that may lead to a clearing up of doubts, or to the acquisition of one new idea. Count Saint Martin continually read him; and the merest glance at the "Theosophic Correspondence" or, "Man―His Nature, &.," of Saint Martin will show that from that study he learned much. How much more then will the Western mind be aided by the light shed on both by the lamp of Theosophical teachings.
"Let the desire of the pious be fulfilled."
WILLIAM Q. JUDGE
Theosophist, April, 1886.

Has anyone else noticed that the MLB.tv game feed now concludes very soon after the final out? Previously, it would go until a commercial break then give the message that the game has ended.
I’m not talking about missing the post-game show (the feed always ended before that). I mean the game announcers will be giving final thoughts and the feed will cut away mid-sentence. I liked being able to see player of the game interviews and now all of a sudden I can’t.
Curious if it’s just me.

I didn't really know how to write the title.
So basically I have this friend Isaiah. He told me a month ago that he liked me and I offered that we could start talking (relationship wise)...We had dated before and we ended up breaking up because I had come out as lesbian (bisexual now) and I ended up dating one of his bestfriends, mind you, I had no idea that they were even friends in the first place. He started telling everybody that I had broke up with him for her (which wasn't truee) and this caused a lot of conflict and to this day, we still haven't solved it.
I had noticed that he was being friendly with all these girls, letting them touch him and his hair and he was hugging them, and we didn't even give each other hugs due to the fact that he would just stand there awkwardly. So this was a turn off for me and I started losing feelings for him and I developed some for this boy Marcus.
I had told my friend Taylor and Arianna about it, and I assume that they talked about it and then told him. This continued happening for a week (we had spring break) and then I confronted him. He had told me it was because they told him that I had liked Marcus and he felt some type of way and then I had brought up how he was being friendly with all these other girls. He said it was because of Marcus but this was before and after the fact so it didn't make sense. I apologized but he never gave me one. But I didn't really care.
So his best friend Liz gave me a look when I said hi to her and i had told my friend Ciara and Ciara said she was going to confront her. She confronts her days later and we conclude we don't have problems with each other. When Ciara leaves, Liz comes up to me and says the only reason why I gave you the look was because I heard something about you that turned me off. I ask her what is was so that I could clarify it and she said it was because she heard that I liked Marcus while i was talking to Isaiah. I told her that me and Isaiah talked about it and I don't have feelings for Marcus anymore. I asked her why are you believing what people are saying instead of talking to me like a mature teenager. She shrugs and walks away.
The next day, me and my friend Natasha (Liz's crush) were writing that we love each other as a joke and holding hands and Liz's best friend Kamora takes pictures and posted it on her Snapchat story after I told her not to because I don't like taking pictures and she did it without my consent. Liz sees it that same day later in after school) and gives me dirty looks and whispers something in Isaiah's ear. So now that whole group (there were multiple other ppl there) is looking at me after Kamora shows her phone to them.
The next day me and Isaiah technically break up I guess because he claims it was because of the Natasha thing after I explained to him that it was just a joke and I didn't mean no harm and that me and Natasha are just friends. Then he's telling me that it was because I still liked Marcus! Which is not true because I got over my feelings because me and Marcus ended up talking and he didn't feel the same way. And you know who popped up in almost every sentence after I asked him where he got this information from? Liz. But he said it was other people. like who? Because Kamora doesn't have a lot of people added to her story. And nobody even fucks with Isaiah because he lies too much.
I'm pissed and walk away. A few periods later, after lunch, (I didn't go to lunch but I heard that Liz and Kamora were walking around looking for me) Liz presses me with Kamora and other ppl asking me if I have a problem and i tell her yes I do. I ask her why is she believing stuff that people say when you know this whole school is based off of gossiping? I ask her why did you tell Isaiah that I still like Marcus? She says that she never said that and that she still wants to be friends. I say no I don't want to be friends with you and walk off.
I go to class and I'm shaking and i can't breath. (I have bad anxiety) so I'm having an anxiety attack and my friends are trying to calm me down. Kamora comes over to where i am and I tell them I don't want her over here. She starts arguing with my friend Mickayda and then she goes to the dean and assistant principal. They call our parents and I'm still pretty pissed off?
Am i wrong? AITA? There's more to it but I'm making a separate post (part 2) to this.
Edit: Just decided to add more of the story to this post.
Alright so Monday, I'm not talking to any of them and I'm ignoring Kamora and distancing myself from her. She clearly doesn't get the message but I really don't want nothing to do with them. So then out of nowhere, Arianna comes up to me saying that Kamora thinks I'm talking shit about her. I didn't care at all. She said that I told Kamora that she's a bitch and she's going back and forth being an instigator. I told Arianna that if Kamora has a problem with me, she can consult in me.
So now out of nowhere I have problems with Liz's friend group because Liz told them what happened. I don't know. I go up to them they give me dirty looks and I really am just confused and annoyed because I'm and minding my business and now I'm being faulted after I squashed whatever problems we have. So I start cutting people off and this arises in more conflict.
So then I'm hearing all this stuff that Kamora is talking shit about me I get overwhelmed and I have a panic attack. I start telling people to shut up and stop yelling at me about it. So then they bring Kamora over to me after I calmed down and it really balls down to Arianna because she's the one going back and forth telling us stuff. Kamora starts telling me it's my fault and i say how because I was not even talking to her after all that shit went down!!
She tells me that I was being rude to her when Ciara and Mickayda were copying somebody else's science hw. Mind you, I copied it the day later because I didn't even have the worksheet that day. It was really Mickayda because she kept telling Kamora that nobody wanted her at the table and to fuck off.
I'm rlly tired at this point because it's still going till this day.

The results are in for Match 21. The winner is…
Mahimit was dragged across the battlefield by ｢Young Lives｣, the Stand filling him with a vigor to fight, to please his father who was watching from above—and that vigor filled him with each slash of its claws, keeping the son awake as he was marched down towards the trailer.
The two Stand Users had made their way down there last—secluded within a small container, cornered. The Stand’s puppet had been worn down for certain, but this was the time to finally finish things. As they approached, they saw through the window the older woman pull out her phone, and immediately Mahimit’s arm was raised to aim his gun right for it. As they made him pull the trigger, he couldn’t fire before she had spoken to her allies on the other end:
“Yeah, we figured out who the perp is, it’s Thomas Kent. Singh didn’t even show up, sent a lackey instead. He should be…”
The rest of her sentence faded out as Mahimit stalled…stopped.
The Stand roared in panicked fury as its user lowered his gun, unable to control them with the ease it once had. Mahi barely noticed—neither did they react to Windy’s warm, draining embrace of as ｢Young Lives｣ attempted to claw her off of him. As his eyes began to close, the longcoat of his Stand’s prior form disappeared and revealed the real one beneath, he managed one thought before falling into a deep sleep.
Of course he didn’t. Why did I think otherwise…

Sonika Singha and Windy, with a score of 72 to Mahimit “Hira” Rākin’s 56!

Category	Winner	Point Totals	Comments
Popularity	Sonika Singha and Windy	27 (14+2) - 3 (0+2)	A shutout victory for the players!
Quality	Mahimit “Hira” Rākin	17 (6 5 6) - 20 (7 7 6)	Reasoning
JoJolity	Mahimit “Hira” Rākin	18 (6 6 6) - 23 (8 7 8)	Reasoning
Conduct	Tie	10-10	Nothing to report!

The results are in for Match 22. The winner is…
Club Naraka, the site of a hellish pile of bodies and accidents, was practically on fire that night. Thankfully, Sulka, along with a group of armed guards, had brought a fire extinguisher with them. They stormed the ground floor, taking a moment to spread themselves out. “Alright, we’ve-” A hail of gunfire cut the man off. “—THEY’RE HERE!”
A few of the nameless guards rushed in towards Sulka, to catch any strays that might come his way. Sulka himself pulled the nozzle end up, and heard another single shot fire from another nearby pillar. “There’s an accomplice, circle—” Something crawled up his thumb, and bit into the extinguisher, just as a stray bullet drove a dent into the metal casing. “—AUGH!”
The fire extinguisher burst in his hands, filling the room with a heavy white smog. The hip-firing moved, and it came long, low, and in mobile spurts. “Fire back—” As if on cue, fire jettisoned into the cloud of smoke, “—SPREAD OUT, QUICK!” Through blurred vision, Sulka watched one of their own leave through the front door. “Not that far, damnit!”
With the guards spread out along the floor around him, some wearing gouts of fire, some drenched in the liquid refuse of their extinguisher, and others still riddled with bullets, Sulka turned to one of their dead men, and ripped a pistol from their side. They watched the last moving object head for the door, and pulled the trigger, twice. An employee badge caught the edge of his blurred vision.
The cool night air filled the ground floor, and fed the flames atop the burning men. Sulka’s arm fell to his side, letting the gun clatter against the floor.
A spiral of thoughts took him. First, he’d need to make a casualty report, followed by a loss statement. The sheer number of clients who may not come back after an incident like this would likely drive the place out of business. Between that, the viscera, the dead workers, the dead clients, and all the ammunition costs—let alone the licenses he’d have to put in for—his head shrieked at him. For once, he shrieked back.
It was a low, horrid thing, much like a growl or snarl, but loud enough to make itself known against the billowing call of night. A cool hand slicked his hair back, and the night air stopped pouring in through the shutting door. He turned to one of the guards, who’d taken to putting out another with a blanket. “Take everyone alive and go look for everyone else alive.” Sulka sauntered away. “I’ll be in my office.”

Reese McGuffin, with a score of 72 to Markov's 69!

Category	Winner	Point Totals	Comments
Popularity	Reese McGuffin	13 (3+2+2) - 17 (5+2+2)	An even voting period right up until the very end!
Quality	Markov	23 (7 8 8) - 22 (7 8 7)	Reasoning
JoJolity	Tie	23 (8 8 7) - 23 (7 8 8)	Reasoning
Conduct	Tie	10-10	Nothing to report!

Somewhere in the night, a Club Naraka coat and hat, usually only worn by guards, lay in a trash can. A woman, caked in blood and all manner of horrors, pressed herself against the wall beside it, and fished through her pocket for a coin. She’d found it there, in the elevator, on her way to her shift. Moonlight danced across its surface, letting the coin shimmer madly in the low light. ”Hah… you… y-you saved me…” Emile was shuddering, clutching the golden coin tight, for fear of dropping it. “I-I don’t know why, but… w-whatever you want of me, I’ll gladly give it in return… p-please, tell me…who…who are you?”
“…aha!” the voice chuckled. “How…terrible of me! In all the commotion, our…introductions com-pletely slipped my…mind.”
The air in front of Emile began to shift and shimmer. As she pulled her gaze away from the coin, she saw something phase into existence—a feminine form, long purple wires for hair, and a peering red eye gazing back at her beneath them.
It was the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen.
“My name is Markov. And your ad-mir-a-tion is payment…enough.”
Emile stared, gazing in wonderment at the hovering figure. Whether from exhaustion or reverence, she dropped to her knees, tears beginning to streak down her face. She thought of the ordeals she’d just faced. The people she’d passed. The people she’d fled. The people she’d killed. There was something else, though—the figure’s eyes seemed to- “That…hole in your shoulder.” Emile’s own head turned to match the figure’s gaze. “Do not fret. I can…teach you how to…take care of that.”
From the roof above the pair’s heads, one couldn’t hear the quiet murmurs and shivers of a woman ripping apart her own viscera-caked clothes to seal her wounds. Other things were certainly on the mind of its occupant, one Reese McGuffin.
Before him were two rats. Before them was a whole litany of ghostly creatures. His hand pointed towards the rat to his right, “Alright everyone, this is Splinter—” before it moved to point at the rat on his left, “—and this is Remy!”
Remy waddled up to a Utahraptor first, and started sniffing at it. “Oh, lemme introduce you to pieces, Remy!” Reese put a hand between the ghost animals, and casually shuffled it back and forth as he spoke. “Remy, Pieces! Pieces, Remy!” He turned on his heel to see Splinter eyeing up Finn, the shark. “Hey! He’s a friend, not food!”
A comforting quiet filled the night air as the ghostly animals circled one another, introducing themselves in their own little ways. The only thing left on Reese’s mind was a single odd question, one that had been eating at him since he left. “Where did I put that coral?”
Slowly, Mahimit awoke to the morning sun’s light. They could have sworn that they had a nightmare that night, but they felt refreshed as if waking from a peaceful slumber…
That wasn’t a nightmare, was it? He thought he could manage it all but in the end he just…broke as soon as he saw Ajay lying there with a bullet through his shoulder—wait, is he okay? Was he brought to safety? Did the Suite now think he was involved?
“Hey, don’t worry—you're safe here.”
Mahimit blinked, finally taking note of their surroundings. They were lying in a plain white bed, first aid boxes and equipment scattered about—the architect remembered the claws raking at their back throughout the night. Their torso had been bandaged up thoroughly: their long coat was laid out across a table, while their shirt was currently in Windy’s hands, who must have paused in stitching back up one of the tears when she noticed them awake.
“W-where am I?” Mahi asked. “Is Ajay safe? Where is he?”
“Jon got him to a hospital as soon as he could,” a voice called out from the door. Mahi looked over to see who looked like a detective walking in, followed by the two he recognised having gone after Zafar back then—no, not Zafar. “Had to be more careful with you given how well known you are, Mahimit—or do you prefer Hira?”
The architect sighed with some relief at that, not finding any deceit in the answer. “Either’s fine…not sure which one’s more ‘me’ anyways.” He looked around at the group settling into the room. “…Where’s the other person who was with you? Is she okay?”
A silence filled the room as the four recalled what Windy recounted once they regrouped—Sonika had lost hope, and ended up attempting to kill an unconscious Mahimit before she was stopped by Windy which caused the PI to run off.
Steric didn’t look it, but he was probably one of the most affected within PINDROP. While diving into his work wasn’t the healthiest coping mechanism, he had been increasingly concerned for Sonika’s health and disposition—so to hear that she not only ran off, but wanted to dispand PINDROP was crushing. “She…she ended up leaving.” He refocused onto Mahimit. “You said you’re unsure about yourself—would you be willing to answer why?”
Hira chuckled. “I guess I do owe you some answers. Well, I first went out as ‘Hira’ right around when I manifested my Stand—but then I ended up going out as them more often. Started to look into stuff about myself without the pressure of being the perfect son on my back…haven’t felt I’ve had the chance to really do so since I came back to Rakin.”
“Because of Zafar?” Inago asked, taking a nearby seat. “You don’t have to answer more than you’re comfortable with, but…you only went berserk after you thought he had just shot your friend.”
“Yup,” Windy nodded, setting aside the shirt and needle. “And I couldn’t help but notice ya stopped letting that Stand control ya once Sonika said out loud that it wasn’t your pa.”
Mahi winced. “…Yeah, I thought it was Zafar. He was a great parent and I never wanted to let him down, but things got so out of hand that when that last piece dropped I just…shattered, I guess. Though even if he was told it probably wouldn’t matter…”
“And why’s that?” Steric asked, jotting down some notes.
“He’s stubborn, sticks to how he thinks things are. If anything challenges his view on a friend or ally of his, he’ll just ignore it and carry on. He’s going to learn that I was Tamas and he’ll shrug it off and forget about it, as usual. Probably the sole reason he’s still in the Metro is because he truly believes that they’re doing what’s best for the city—something I found quickly wasn’t the case.”
Drippy stepped forward. “About that: why were you in there in the first place, and for how long? And what do you know about the Middleman?”
“…I can’t tell you anything about them.” Hira spoke, eyes glancing away from her.
“W-why!?” Drippy almost yelled out. “What reason do you all possibly have to not want them stopped?!”
“Well, you plan on killing them once you know, aren’t you?”
“Yes! Perhaps if you actually told us then maybe we could see why we shouldn’t put down this person taking utmost glee in murder. I don’t get why you and Rasna are willing to protect this guy.”
“…Trust me, if I could have stopped them I would have years ago. But if Rasna’s refused to tell you, you should be able to figure out why, right?”
“…they’ve suffered a lot, haven’t they?” Inago asked somberly. “That must be why they’re how they are today.”
“Oh, so they can get off free after everything they did?” Drippy retorted.
Steric put his hands between the two lest things escalated. “We can discuss this later—at the very least that is a lead.” He turned to the guest. “As for the other questions?”
Mahi nodded. “It was a month or two after I began working towards getting into the City Planning Board. Things weren’t looking as good as I hoped, when my father decided to bring me down to see these friends of his. I was offered a deal: they would pull some strings to help get me onto the board as long as I was willing to put forward some things they wanted…even then I figured something was off, but if it meant I could help this city I thought it was worth it. Oh how wrong I was…”
Steric sighed, finishing up with his notepad before putting away his pen. “I think that will be all then…thank you for your time. We’ll leave you to rest now.”
Inago followed the PINDROP members out, looking over his shoulder one last time: “Before I forget, anything you want for breakfast?”
Mahi thought for a moment. “Pancakes?”
Windy hopped off her chair and walked closer to Hira. “You’re a kind soul deep down, aren’t ya? Even as violent as you were, ya never tried to kill anyone…”
“But I just tried to kill you! It wasn’t me but it was born from me…messed with my thoughts as well as my body. So glad my therapist is a Stand user, thank fu—dge.”
She chuckled at the self-censorship. “But you fought back in the end, didn’t ya? I think I understand the feeling of getting puppeted though, and I know Luna and Alex should be able to help with the memory stuff. If you ever want to talk about it, feel free—we’d be happy to.”
“Sure,” Mahi nodded, lying back down into the bed as they allowed themself to smile. “…Thank you.”
Scenario: Verve Residence, Sapatibhatt — 10:23AM
Clink.
The teacup rattled against the table, empty. Idly, Gioia Arancini glanced over the lid, curious to see the shape of her future reflected in the tea leaves. She didn’t believe in that stuff, but Fate had taken stranger forms. Besides, Evergreen had done a lot these past few weeks. She couldn’t help but wonder…
“You were right, Gioia!” Soichi piped up from beside her, sipping on his own cup, “this is really good!”
In front of them, Vasant Verve sheepishly wrung his hands, giving them both a little smile. “I’m glad I haven’t lost my touch, haha…! It really is the least I can do, while you’re here.”
They could not meet at Urban Hymns, as the estate had been closed since Gioia and Charvet fought the man a few weeks prior. Though she had expected the two of them would get arrested, Verve himself had told the authorities that he would not press charges. In return, Gioia had been checking in with him, making sure he was back on his feet, and that ｢Cage The Elephant｣ was well and truly gone.
“Mm,” Gioia nodded, “give Vasudha my thanks as well,”
“No problem, dear!” a woman shouted from another room. Verve had little desire to return to his cabin, so in the meantime he was staying in his younger sister’s house.
For a moment, there was silence. Verve was perfectly still, as if one wrong move would shatter this tenuous peace. Soichi was content to drink in the cozy atmosphere. Gioia was staring at the tea leaves. What shape did they form?

The peace on Mount Parapollah was just as tenuous. Muuru had returned to the mountain now that the sand worms slumbered and the shifting had stopped. There was once a being who was to the Mountain as Muuru was to the City. The being was gone, now, and the Suite was filling in the gaps with trucks and bulldozers. As Muuru watched, a woman with a flute sat down beside him and smiled. Whatever happened next, the Mountain and the City moved together.

Gioia was drawn back to reality as Soichi spoke. “So, what have you been doing during your time off?”
“Oh?” Verve blinked. “Not much, I suppose! Just some odd jobs, here and there, mostly in the South. Just trying to help the rebuilding efforts, you know? Fix what I broke.” He grimaced a moment, before deflecting back to Soichi.
“What about you? It’s usually just Gioia checking in, I haven’t seen you since, you know…”
“The whole New York thing?” Soichi chuckled. “I’ve been alright, yeah. As rough as it was, we ended up making friends with those Riders! Sometimes you need an unlikely situation to help you come together, you know?”
Evergreen had certainly faced unlikely situations before. Gioia mused on this as she looked at the leaves.

The flute was not the only instrument that echoed through Rakin. As Deacon Blues wandered through the Sapatibhatt, the song of his trumpet followed behind. The land, once torn apart, was being rebuilt. The scars from his battle with the weaponsmith were fading, but the man still taught him a valuable lesson. The hand that wields a weapon can also wield a tool. Maybe this was the nature of potential. Whatever it was, Deacon figured it was worth a song.

Gioia glanced up from the cup, giving Verve a smirk. “Tough times help you realize who your real friends are. You’ve realized that too, I’m sure. Thanks to our efforts, the Metropolis Suite is having a tough time of their own. I wonder how quickly they’ll turn on each other?”
“Xen was already convinced they were out to get him. He kept going on about this Stand, ｢Diamond Life｣. No matter what he did for the Suite, it never told him who its user was. It drove him crazy–I think he was trying to solve that one himself.”
“Did he succeed?”
“I don’t think so. It’s not like he could strike a deal with The Gossip, he didn’t have anything ｢She｣ wanted. I’m sure that drove him crazy too.” There was still a sorrow in his voice.
“Hey, it’s okay,” Soichi smiled quietly, patting the man on the arm. Gioia nodded in turn, before she continued.
“Have you had any contact with him?”
“Not really. His assistant texted me, apparently the folks at Hymnal are on indefinite paid leave, until I figure out what to do. I guess that’s on me.” Verve paused a moment, grimacing. “Apparently he might still be at the cottage? I don’t know—I’m not going to—I’m not ready to talk to him, yet.”
“You don’t ever have to talk to him again,” Gioia responded. “I’m sure he’s cowering in the dark now that we’ve exposed his true nature. The other members of Metropolis should realize they’re soon to follow.”
Indeed, the members of Evergreen might not have the same methods…but they were united in this cause. Would this define their future? Gioia glanced over at the tea leaves.

The immortal had lived through countless riots, but the Bedtown Takeover was one of his favorites. He had returned to the area, replaying his grand speech, looking at the bloodstains that marked this territory. Sure, now that Aco’s child had appeared, VULTURE was considering new leadership. But that didn’t matter to Ouroboros, content to remain the (Self-Appointed) Secret Lord of Bedtown. Behind him, Honeydew was simply content to dismantle car batteries.

Gioia glanced back at Verve to see his brow furrowed.
“I can’t believe I ever got involved with those bastards,” he scowled. “Deep down, I knew they were trouble—I talked to Xen about Sing Now!, he just said…sometimes the only way to reach a common goal is to work with people you don’t agree with. He almost made it make sense.”
“He was a smooth-talking control freak. I’m sure you’ve realized how empty those words were.”
Verve rested his chin in his hand, staring into his own empty cup. In the end, all he saw were scattered leaves. No one was guiding him now. No one but himself. “…That’s not all he was. I think he really believed it, you know? That he was doing good. I wanted to believe it too, more than anything. But I think he was just trying to justify it to himself. Even when he had his doubts.”
Gioia curled her fingers around the teacup. “What about you, Verve? What do you think ‘good’ is?”
At this, the man laughed bittersweetly. “You think I can answer that? I thought Xen had the answer, and look where that got us. If you think you’re the only guy who can change the world, you’ll just make it worse.”
He looked up at Soichi. “We saw what his world looks like,” then to Gioia, “he would have trapped us both inside, if not for you.”
It seemed the Suite had a lot of cities within cities, living symbols of their control. Gioia took one last look at the symbol in her cup.

Disco D Lune had been keeping up with her contacts at the military base, catching up with the most recent happenings. Apparently, there had been a falling-out between the general and his child: an opportunity to sew doubt and dissent amongst the ranks. Disco had already designed new buildings to replace this one, and they were beautiful.

“You’re a free man, Verve,” Gioia concluded, staring him down. “So what will you do with that freedom?”
Verve looked between the two, but found no answers. Now, his choices were his own. In the end, the answer was simple.
“…I want to make things right. The Suite they… they ruined my home, they ruined him, they ruined me. I’m tired of seeing kids get pulled into this. Rasna, Ichi, and now poor Mahamit…” Behind him, warm air sang with the soft trumpet of ｢Bitter Sweet Symphony｣. “It needs to end. Those kids, my nieces, all of them, all of us. We all need a city that we can call home.”
Gioia smiled, closing her eyes contentedly as she felt the heat roll over her. Beside her, she could feel Soichi resting a hand on her shoulder. She didn’t even need to see his smile to feel its warmth. She didn’t need to see the leaves to know the shape of her future. She had known many homes, many stories, many tragedies and triumphs. But right now, home was a tree, Evergreen. Seasons changed, and yet its leaves would always flourish.
Soichi glanced at the cup in her stead. To him, the leaves just seemed like a weird square. But soon that shape was washed away, as he poured them all another cup of warm and fragrant tea.
“Well said! This calls for a toast. To new friends!”
Clink!

Scenario: Hymnal Bazaar, Reshmerasta — 8:58 PM
The market was closed for the evening. This curfew was in place ever since the Middleman attacked. The Bazaar was already struggling—if people were too scared to walk around at night, then why bother staying open? Even when the Bazaar was open, the stall for Urban Hymns stood empty. But for a broom, only a lone figure stood there. Verve used to sweep while his employees handled everything else.
His boyfriend once asked him why he did that.
’It makes me feel like I’m doing something–” he had laughed, “I’m leaving this place better than I found it!’
Verve had a lovely laugh, the figure recalled, staring at the broom.
Slowly, he knelt down to pick it up.
Then, Xenagoras took a deep breath,
and swept the streets that he used to own.

Scenario: ???, ??? — 9:07 PM
“It’s simple, gentlemen…”
The sound of chatter and slow music. The smell of pristine tobacco and the clinking of glasses. This outlined the leadership of the Metropolis Suite, holed up in a skyscraper that overlooked the whole of Rakin. To their right, a window—one that replaced the whole wall, showing the nighttime lights. It almost looked like an alien world, the way the dark purples and reds of the late sunset stretched across the blinking gleams of windows and signs. A single man spoke, an esteemed guest trying his best to rise in their ranks: Luiviton.
“With a little bit of push, we could completely criminalize a number of traffic violations. Of course, they’re already illegal—but I’m talking perfect driving. Instead of community service, we give fines that cut chunks out of bank accounts. Instead of towing cars, we give jail time. I have contacts in the private prison industry who would be willing to pay us good money to multiply the conviction rates~! All it takes is a little bit of sacrifice from Rakin’s people.”
The table was silent. A voice piped up- that of Sing Now!, media conglomerate CEO and one of the Suite’s primary figures of authority. “That’s an awful idea, Luiviton.”
He blanched. “E-Excuse me?” He asked, flabbergasted. “We could stand to gain-”
Sing Now! interrupted him swiftly and curtly. “It doesn’t matter how much we ‘stand to gain’ from selling our city’s soul to prison moguls. You’re a good friend, but everytime you come up here with a suggestion it’s always some kind of short-sighted scheme to make money. That’s not what this thing of ours is about.”
That earned a couple of nods and a “Damn straight.” from Zafar at his left.
He continued. “If we overcriminalize poor driving, what we’re doing is sacrificing Rakin’s workforce in exchange for…nothing. We would completely freeze important institution who are suddenly bleeding key figures and employees who’ve made simple mistakes. We’re not parasites or petty tyrants. We’re leaders. We do these backdoor deals not to increase our wealth, but our resources which we must use for everyone’s benefit. We must direct the people, not root through their pockets.”
Conversation erupted, primarily economic in nature. Some offered to take care of the market in Xenagoras’s stead. Others offered grants to the arts. Others pointed to the need for construction and repairs. Some tried to give statistics on rising rates of crime and discontent within Rakin’s citizens.
One key figure of the Suite, however, was absent. She stood a few meters away, staring out the window at the city below. Her stance was relaxed, yet firm. As if she was on guard against some invisible threat. She held a small glass of scotch in one hand, occasionally sipping from it. She seemed tired. Very, very tired. This was Zhengqi Dianyou, the CEO of the Rakin Rail Corporation. Occasionally, she’d let out a yawn.
Sitting on a loveseat nearby was Ichi Ni San Go—the charge of Sing Now! who was currently too distracted to really remember she existed. Without a babysitter, she was content to simply exist next to Zhengqi, looking out the window with her at the beauty of the city and occasionally asking simple, childish questions.
They were approached by a figure, glowing in the light. Someone followed close behind.
｢Diamond Life｣, the Stand of the every-mysterious head of the Metropolis Suite. Said user hung close behind. Zhengqi always found her boss’s habit of speaking through their Stand peculiar; she understood it as a security tactic, but it often came up even in casual scenarios. “Enjoying the event, you two?” It asked. Its tone was genuine—the Stand could be a tool of intimidation whenever its user willed it so, and this wasn’t that.
Zhengqi just grunted, turning around and finishing off the scotch. She set the glass down on a nearby table, looking at ｢Diamond Life｣. “I’ve never understood how it’s so easy for you to talk through that thing—”
｢Diamond Life｣ shot forward with incredible speed, shushing the name with a single finger gently placed on her lips. “Careful, Ms. Dianyou. The end of the table. Do you see him?”
Her eyes crept towards the table, landing on a man nodding idly to the talk. Iron Butterfly was a member of the Suite who often remained in the background; to her understanding, he helped keep the Suite in control over a good deal of the crop farming in the more rural parts of Rakin. She looked back at the Stand, and it elaborated: “He’s wearing a wire. Loose lips aren’t ideal tonight.”
Zhengqi just sighed, running her hand through her hair as her other put ｢Diamond Life｣’s hand back down. “I’ll take care of him after the meeting.” She offered. ｢Diamond Life｣ chuckled, willingly pulling their hand back.
“I’d appreciate it- I had originally planned on handling the issue myself. You’re always putting your best foot forward with us—it’s something I value.”
She gave a weak smile. “It’s nothing, really. Just me giving back for everything the Suite’s done for me.”
Ichi piped up, eagerly watching the conversation. “I think Ms. Dianyou works too much…she’s always so tired and never has any time to play games or watch cartoons or do anything!”
Zhengqi did her best to put on a friendly smile. “Ichi…when you get older, sometimes you just don’t have the time for-”
｢Diamond Life｣ interrupted her. “She’s right, you know. You overwork yourself. I was being polite about it before, talking about your best foot forward- but I do worry.”
She looked at ｢Diamond Life｣ sternly. “We don’t exactly have the time to rest. I’m certain you’ve seen the news. People are starting to figure out we exist. People are hiring private detectives and holding protests. Things are starting to unravel. We need to act before things break so hard they can’t be put back together.”
｢Diamond Life｣ stood up straight, looking her in the eyes. “Trust me. I have plans, and they involve you. Both of you.”
Ichi immediately raised a little in her seat, glowing a little. “Me~? Really~?”
A friendly chuckle escaped from ｢Diamond Life｣’s nonexistent lips. “Yes, you.” A dour look plastered across its face as it looked back at Zhengqi. “I’m going to need you to handle…key targets. I want certain people out of the way and key infrastructure mapped and maintained for your “ability”—it’ll be valuable to us should the ire of the populace come to a head. Past that, rest. Allow your subordinates at Zuantou Rail to handle things. Take a long holiday. We don’t need an exhausted zombie, we need you.”
Zhengqi could only reply with silence. She knew better than to argue with ｢Diamond Life｣, but to stop working? It felt alien to her. She was tempted to clutch at her sternum from the thought.
“As for you, Ichi…” The Stand continued. “I want you to gather info for me on some of the Stand users around the city.”
Ichi innocently kicked her feet. “How am I ‘sposed to do that? I dunno any cool spy stuff, and Daddy said-”
“I’ll handle your father, don’t worry.” ｢Diamond Life｣ said, walking forward and cupping Ichi’s cheek in their clawed hand. “I just want you to make friends, okay? Go out. Explore. Meet people, as many as you can. Participate in their lives and conflicts. Tell me everything you see and hear, okay?”
Ichi just nodded, smiling widely.
“Perfect,” replied the Stand. They drew their arm back, clasping their hands together. “But enough about work. Have you two tried the finger food that’s been provided? It’s truly divine.”
Scenario: Mili's Diner, Mist City — 7:37PM
The bell above the entrance rang late into the dusk, announcing the arrival of a certain happy customer. He hummed cheerily to himself, taking a seat behind the counter and giving her regards to the woman behind the counter. His order was the same as it was every time he came here, and yet he always flipped through the menu anyway. He was a cheerful, easygoing man, despite everything.
His name was Steric Lou Farin, recently self-appointed head of PINDROP. He hadn’t been planning on it, but with the sudden departure of Sonika, the team needed someone to step up fast. He was the most experienced in the field of investigation and had the sort of charisma the role required. He didn’t mind taking the lead, either. If anything, it made his work a little easier.
Speaking of work, that was the reason for this visit—good as the food was. He glanced over to the other two customers, talking quietly amongst themselves, and smiled. Both were of particular interest.
The first was one Brighid Rhodes. He’d sparred with her a few months back, and an exchange of business cards had proved extremely wise when he needed assistance in dealing with one Texas Aco. She was the one to finally calm her down in the end—albeit forcefully, but all’s well that ends well.
Speaking of which, Texas Aco sat at the counter now, talking in hushed mumbles to Brighid. The notable thing there being that she was talking now. She had been silent in the immediate aftermath of her rampage, but after spending some time at Brighid’s, Steric had gotten the call today that she’d been ready to speak.
“I hope you all had a safe drive here,” he chuckled to himself. “It’s awfully rainy out, isn’t it?”
“Nothing too bad.” Brighid exhaled, and Texas nodded with her, sipping on a chocolate milkshake. Her misshapen insect arm was hidden under a worn old coat draped over her shoulder. Brighid gave the detective a particular glance, and Steric took that as a sign to get to questioning.
“So, Texas…” He cleared his throat, making sure he had the girl’s attention. “I’m sorry for calling you out so soon. You ever want to stop talking about all this, let me know. I don’t want to do you any harm.”
“Mmm.” Texas nodded again.
“Now, I understand you’ve had, er, a difficult last few months.” That was no understatement: she’d been directly responsible for an attempted VULTURE mutiny. It failed, and drove her off into hiding god-knows-where. “In particular, I’d like to ask you about your relationship to VULTURE. It’s a piece of the puzzle here I haven’t entirely been able to ascertai-”
“I’m taking over VULTURE.” Texas deadpanned. Brighid sighed.
“I told you that isn’t the best idea.” The lawyer attempted to flick her on the forehead. “That’s too dangerous. No way you can get it done on your own.”
“No, I mean, like-” Texas grumbled. “She literally told me I could have it. The old boss.”
Brighid blinked a few times. She hadn’t heard about that. Steric nodded.
“Ms. Kaliya told me she’d been in contact with you. She said you’d been pretty against taking the leadership role, though.” Steric raised an eyebrow. “What changed?”
“…It sucks here, man.” Texas smirked. “Even with all the bullshit charities, shit’s gone bad after Rasna left. I’m sure you caught wind of that. Guys turning up dead left and right—there was a fight at a funeral, right? Whole place got blown to smithereens. What the fuck, man.”
“Ahah, yes.” Steric winced. “Quite the festivity, wasn’t it.”
“The place needs someone to step up. And with that little rampage I went on…” She looks embarrassed, for a moment. “I think I’ve got the rep to fill her shoes. Er. Maybe. I’m not really that scary, but, uh…”
“Ms. Kaliya told me you weren’t of that sort of opinion before.” Steric raised his eyebrow again, tapping his pen against his notepad. “What changed?”
“…Nothing, really. I just.” Texas chuckled, reclining on her stool. “I don’t really think anything I’ll do will have any difference. But I can’t stop myself from trying, either. I don’t think she’d want me to, either.”
Brighid placed a hand on the girl’s shoulder, glancing down at her. “Long as you come back to my place when you’re done. I trust you, but you should have a bed to sleep on.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
Steric grinned. This was a good development! A bit risky, sure, but it gave him in an in. “Say!” He stopped absentmindedly chewing on his pen’s tip. “Y’think you’d be willing to help us out? VULTURE’s assistance would be a great help…and something tells me we’ve got a common goal.”
“I’ll think on it.” Was Texas’s only response. Brighid flicked her on the forehead again. “Ow! Okay, fine, yeah, I’ll help. You guys don’t seem that bad.”
Steric clasped his hands together. One step closer. “Ah, and you too, Miss Rhodes.”
“Hah?” Brighid scoffed. “I don’t think anyone with me is gonna be much help-”
“I think that’s, er, preposterous.” He tapped his notepad a few times. “I did some looking into the work your people’ve done recently. For museum staff, you folks sure are prolific. A boat raid is quite the accomplishment. Hmm, hmm~.”
“Well, er…” Brighid sighed. Her group had had a history of engaging in combat. Entities like Paranoia and Markov were practically built for it, but her group had had similar exploits recently: Ruby’s left her fight with the swordsman at the art college relatively unharmed, and Roxanne had managed to charm an ex-member of Metropolis. Despite how weird all of them were, they were useful in a variety of ways; it made sense Steric wanted their assistance.
“Alright. I’ll get them to help out.” Much as she didn’t trust some of them with heroism, Brighid found herself more involved than she’d anticipated—and getting into the action herself meant she could help keep Texas as safe as possible, despite everything. “But you gotta help out with the museum. We’re, uh, still working on reconstruction.”
“No worries. I think I’ve got a few artifacts here and there. They’d be fit for your collection.” Steric’s phone buzzed—he rose and nodded at the two. “It’s been a pleasure, folks, but the life of a detective is ever so busy. Be seeing you.” With that, he grabbed his coat and strode away, leaving a good third of his burger.
Several oversized flies crawled out from beneath Texas’s coat, nibbling on the leftovers. “You really okay with me, uh, y’know…” Texas made a few vague gestures with her hands. “It’s a big thing to, uh, undertake. I figured you’d try to stop me.”
“I doubt I’d be able to.” Brighid chuckled. “‘Sides, you’re a pretty tough kid. I was pretty rough and tumble when I was your age, and look how I turned out. I’m a lawyer and everything.”
Texas nodded, returning to her milkshake. She was an ant under an elephant’s foot—she’d become well aware of that. But even so; even an ant had its resolve, and a swarm could pick apart a carcass. Even if it was only delusion, she’d do what she could. Mom would’ve liked that.
“Mmm.” She grinned. “Here goes.”

<=TO BE CONTINUED==

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I've worked on a reimagining of the DCEU with the franchise starting in 2006 where the film for Superman released that year serves as a reboot. Phase 1 consists of Superman: Man Of Tomorrow, Wonder Woman: Warrior Of Truth, Batman: The Caped Crusader, Green Arrow: Emerald Archer, The Flash: Fastest Man Alive, Green Lantern Corps, and Superman II: Man Of Steel. Read each of these if you want to catch up.
Here's how Phase 1 brings each of the heroes together after they get their solo movies:

• Justice League: World's Finest Heroes (2010)

The movie begins with Batman reintroduced, who watches the news, satellite, and archive footage of Superman, Wonder Woman, The Flash, Green Lantern, and Green Arrow. Alfred enters and asks what he thinks of them. Bruce responds by saying they're powerful and could be useful or very dangerous from how much power they have. The next scene has a similar scenario with Lex Luthor, who watches footage of Scarecrow's fear toxin, Cheetah fighting in the jungle, the power of Weather Wizard as he's alongside The Rogues, Dark Archer's fight with Green Arrow, and Hector Hammond's abilities
A few days later, Senator Finch heads to her office and is met by someone in her chair. The scene implies it's Lex Luthor, but we only see the sight of his mouth and not his full face. She demands to know what Lex wants and he wants her to approve a project he's working on that can provide better security and protection for the world, which Superman and other vigilantes can't. She refuses, at first, since she knows how it isn't about protecting the people and it's for himself, but he blackmails her by threatening her family and she's forced to comply with Lex's demands when threatened.
Cue Title Card: "Justice League: World's Finest Heroes"
The first scene has Lex Luthor bring the Legion of Doom together. He starts with Cheeta, Dark Archer, and Weather Wizard, whom he offers money and personal promises to convince them, then Scarecrow and Hector Hammond, last, who are a bit harder to persuade, but he finds ways around it to get them to join him. Hector Hammond is brought from his space prison when he's broken out by reprogrammed droids Brainiac used to control during the events of Superman II and are how Lex's property.
Lex has them gathered around a table with food for them and gives insight of his disdain for heroes and he wants their help in taking them down, in exchange he sticks to his promises for them. It's an uneasy alliance, but the villains have a common urge to get back at the heroes who've thwarted their goals, so they decide to agree to work together. Lex and Tommy Merlyn use their resources to give the villains upgrades. Scarecrow modifies his fear toxin & Hector Hammond rebuilds the body of Despotellis and has control over it instead of it controlling him while Weather Wizard, Cheeta, Dark Archer, and Lex are already strong in their own right, so they don't need many upgrades since their plan is coming into fruition.
The next scene shows Batman hearing about a heist taking place through the radio and taking the Batwing to investigate. It leads to a government facility and the closer he gets to the location, the worse the weather around him gets. He lands the Batwing out of sight & sneaks into the facility while using stealth to avoid being spotted by the intruders. He suspects an intruder following him and it's shown to be Green Arrow, who's annoyed by his snarkiness. They continue to use stealth to observe the intruders and at the right moment, they confront Scarecrow and Dark Archer, who are stealing robotic parts & weapons.
The first fight scene has Batman & Green Arrow work together against Scarecrow & Dark Archer, whose upgrades give them an advantage over the heroes. They hold their own as they fight them, but Scarecrow releases a dose of upgraded fear toxin and spreads it through the facility. Batman and Green Arrow relive their greatest fears, which is Bruce hallucinating a Gotham City in ruins from his failure to protect it and Oliver being stuck on the island he fought hard to escape and as the effects get worse, Batman finds an antidote in his utility belt while getting himself and Oliver out of the facility to cure him of the effects.
Scarecrow and Dark Archer are backed up by Weather Wizard and Dark Archer, so it seems they're outnumbered until Superman, Wonder Woman, and The Flash show up to stop them and it has the second fight scene shows the heroes trying to stop the villains. In contrast, the villains have an easier time syncing with each other to fulfill the tasks Lex gave to them while the heroes aren't off to a good start working together but are doing their best to communicate. Hector Hammond arrives in an airship provided by Lex with a rebuilt version of Despotellis, whom he orders to take them down. Hector Hammond's arrival gives the Legion of Doom an advantage over the heroes and Despotellis makes a challenging opponent for them to evade.
Just as it seems the heroes are outmatched, Green Lantern arrives to come to their aid and it forces the villains to quickly escape before they can be caught with help from Hector Hammond & a few of Lex's droids. The heroes recover from the damage dealt to them and their time regrouping has them get to know each other while Batman is a bit weary of their presence and investigates any traces left in the government facility. Batman uses detective vision to deduce how the villains stole the robotic parts and weapons from the facility and Superman meets with him to help. Batman shows the others what he deduced in the facility and believes whatever they're planning and whoever's in charge of them, it'll have them all targeted. Superman and Wonder Woman think it's best if they work together to find out why each of their villains is working together and they suspect different reasons as to why.
The heroes get on the same page and Superman tries convincing Batman to work with them, but he isn't willing to work with them yet since he prefers to settle his business in Gotham City to analyze what he found with his detective vision. Before Superman can try convincing Batman again, he enters the Batwing and leaves while the heroes are left to think of a plan. Superman suspects the person behind this is Lex Luthor from what his super-hearing gathered from the conversation between the villains during the heist.
Back in the Batcave, Bruce and Alfred analyze the evidence found in the government facility to deduce what the villains were after, and how and why Scarecrow is involved since it's part of something bigger than Gotham City. Alfred suggests he should work with the other heroes since he can't face them alone. Bruce refuses, at first, since while he can work with others, he doesn't feel comfortable with working alongside other heroes since Gotham City is where his business lies. Alfred persists in convincing Bruce to give it a chance since there's a bigger world out there amongst Gotham City and it's a chance to do more than just fight criminals since the situation is bigger than himself, which has Bruce reluctantly agree to give it a chance since he still feels skeptical of working with other heroes.
Superman and Wonder Woman bring together Green Arrow, Green Lantern, and The Flash with Batman secretly following them from the shadows to observe their capabilities and decide if it's right to join them. Superman gets a lead on an operation by Ceasar Carlini, a crime boss in Metropolis working for Lex to smuggle weapons for him. The heroes quickly dismantle their operation with Batman in the background who takes down a few of their men, unknown to them. Superman tries to interrogate Carlini, who tries to not be intimidated since he knows the heroes won't do anything rash until Batman appears and breaks a few of his bones to get answers, which has him admit he's working for someone, but the figure is anonymous and has power over his operations.
Superman suspects the figure he's talking about is Lex and tells Batman to let him go. Outside of the area while the police arrest Carlini and his men, Batman tells Superman he's decided to agree to work with them and says meet him in the Batcave for planning and strategy. Superman uses his X-ray vision to see who Batman is, but the material in his suit prevents him from getting an image of his identity, which makes him a bit suspicious of Batman accepting his offer, but he decides to trust him.
The heroes follow Batman to the Batcave and Alfred is above them in Wayne Manor so they don't know his identity yet. The Flash explores areas of the Batcave with this super speed and thinks it's quite cool, but Batman warns him to not break anything. Batman debriefs them on his findings from the government facility during their first encounter with them and the evidence he has is the robotic parts & weapons used to be part of a former government project Lex Luthor had developed before it was rejected for being deemed as too dangerous for them to use, which has them figure out Lex is behind this and it's why he formed his own "Legion of Doom" to distract them.
Batman asks for an explanation of what abilities the heroes have and they give a brief rundown of their capabilities. Superman's abilities concern Batman since he's one of the most powerful people on Earth, so he asks for their weaknesses, which the team is divided on sharing with him since it seems like a sign of distrust. Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, and Green Arrow object to it, but Superman and The Flash share their weaknesses with Batman as a sign of trust. When the strategy session ends, it's time for them to train to test their abilities and see if they'll be prepared. Before it starts, The Flash suggests team names like "Super-Friends", "The Syndicate" or "Avengers". Batman dismisses it and he says they'll go over that, later on.
The training session between the heroes has them learn about how they operate. Batman and Green Arrow spar in a fight, Wonder Woman and Green Lantern test their abilities in power-based sparring, and a race ensues between Superman and The Flash from across the river near the Batcave to test which one is the fastest, but they're tied by the time they return to the Batcave.
Just as it seems the heroes are learning to understand each other more, one of Lex's droids spots the race between Superman and The Flash. It alerts the other droids and Despotellis to secretly follow them back to the Batcave. A fight scene ensues for the heroes where they work together to fight against Lex's droids and find the weak spots of Despotellis, but it's more challenging than they thought since the droids and Despotellis know their weaknesses and use them to their advantage to exploit them. Batman uses the Batwing to help Green Lantern fight the large body of Despotellis in the sky while the other League members fight the droids below.
The droids blast them with Scarecrow's fear toxin, which has Superman, The Flash, & Wonder Woman experience their personal fears while Green Arrow finds a rare gas mask in the Batcave in a high area to avoid facing its effects again. Superman hallucinates his wife and son dead because of his inability to always be there for them, The Flash hallucinates a yellow silhouette with sparks of red lightning taunting him about how he isn't fast enough to save his loved ones, and Wonder Woman hallucinates the Amazons being disappointed in her.
Hector Hammond uses this to exploit their fears when he sees footage from Lex's droids by using telepathy to amplify it and turn them on each other. Batman, Green Arrow, and Green Lantern would work together to free them of the trance they're under by dodging their attacks to find the antidote for the fear toxin. While this happens, Green Lantern tries to hold Despotellis in place with the power of his ring but the pressure from the commotion makes it hard to concentrate. Before he can break, Bruce and Oliver find the antidote and spread it through the Batcave with a device that cures them of the effects and it helps the heroes regroup and face Despotellis together so it can be defeated.
The heroes regroup and there's a bit of tension from the fight, but they settle it and head out to find where the Legion of Doom is. The heroes track them to another government facility containing the final robotic parts Lex needs for what he's building. There's a shot of the heroes standing side by side when they reach the location and prepare for the intruders. When they enter the facility, they confront Lex Luthor in His Warsuit, Scarecrow, Cheeta, Weather Wizard, Hector Hammond, and Dark Archer, which enacts a fight sequence between the League members and the Legion of Doom.
While the fight between the heroes and villains occurs, Lex activates the robotic parts the villains collected to come together. It catches the heroes off guard since they find out Lex meant to distract them so his best creation can be built. Once it activates, the heroes try to attack it but it adapts to their every move and even copies their abilities to throw back at them. It buys the Legion of Doom time to escape while the heroes are occupied with the advanced android who's a step ahead of them. The heroes start getting overwhelmed, which forces them to fall back as they barely escape.
The android returns to Lex Luthor's base since it's under his command and he sees the schematics and programming of the android to see if it's functional so it works for their plan, which it does. The old project reactivated by Lex was labeled as "Anti Metahuman Adaptive Zootomic Organism", and Lex jokes about how the name's too long to feel threatening, so he shortens it to "A.M.A.Z.O". Lex visits Senator Finch and a big demand he has is to have A.M.A.Z.O approved by the government with him overseeing it, which she's forced to comply with. It'll have to be approved by a congress bill to pass an Anti-Metahuman bill, which will be worked on.
The heroes return to the Batcave to regroup. While Batman analyses what his detective vision found in the area, the heroes have a bit of a falling out over how they failed to beat the Legion of Doom and think it's from their inability to listen to each other. Superman tries to calm them down and before the argument can escalate, Batman interjects by sharing new information about the android and how it was a past government project Lex tried to work on and get approved by the government, but it never got approved when government officials found it too suspicious and risky as a form of national security, especially since Lex's background was too shady.
The heroes, especially Superman, are worried since if A.M.A.Z.O becomes unstoppable, no one will be able to stop Lex or the android, and every metahuman will be killed or captured. As a way to ease tension and rebuild the team's trust, Wonder Woman has the idea of giving each member the lasso of truth to have them open up to each other about what motivated them to use their power for good.
Batman is up first since the team doesn't know much about them. Bruce carefully considers and accepts the lasso, which has him open up about his secret identity, how the death of his parents drove him to prevent more tragedies from happening, working with others, and having the hidden fear and paranoia of the bigger world amongst Gotham City until they showed him why teamwork can make them stronger because individually, they are not enough, and the fear him and they feel can be used to make them stronger. He saw it in Dick Grayson, saw it in them, and especially sees it in Superman and Wonder Woman.
Diana takes the lasso and tells the truth about how she's worked with others for many centuries and saw the horrors and humanity of man's world and spent her whole life hiding from it, and as flawed as they are, they show humanity can still thrive if they keep pushing forward. Clark is given the lasso and talks about how he's always strived to make a Better Tomorrow for humanity but it can be tough to handle alone since he relies on all of his power to defend Earth, but good people like them make it worth fighting for, no matter what comes their way.
Hal Jordan is given the lasso and says he's felt fear in many ways whether it's blindly facing it, feeling it, or fearing the weight of expectations he has as part of the Green Lantern Corps, but a Green Lantern is always supposed to be fearless for himself and his allies. Lastly, Barry Allen is given the lasso and talks about how he spent his whole life searching for the impossible since there are many things in this world that are hard to explain since he was a child and chased it to do more, but instead of running from his past because of the death of his mom and his father being locked up, he runs towards a better future as they do. After the team vents on their past to regain trust in each other, they regroup and prepare to stop Lex Luthor, Amazo, and The Legion of Doom, once and for all.
The next scene shows Lex making the finishing touches to A.M.A.Z.O's programming so it functions right. The Legion of Doom questions Lex about whether he'll stick to his deal for them and supposedly promises to, but he seems too focused on A.M.A.Z.O. Cheeta asks if the android will target them or he'll make sure its programming will know they're on Lex's side since it's his creation. Lex assures her he has the android under control so he'll work on the kinks, but he doesn't seem to care about the Legion that much since they've had their usefulness.
Hector Hammond uses his telepathy to mind control the government officials and have them approve of A.M.A.Z.O when it's presented by Senator Finch as she's forced by Lex to show it in a positive light, but the villains learn the heroes have recovered and will arrive soon, so they get together and prepare for them while Lex has it recorded with a droid of his. The heroes use what they learned to make a better effort at fighting the Legion of Doom while switching between opponents. The team uses it to their advantage to finally defeat them so they can stop A.M.A.Z.O and find where Lex Luthor is,
Since Lex has no use of the Legion anymore, he gets his upgraded Warsuit ready, which now has A.M.A.Z.O's ability to copy the abilities of the heroes and it makes him and A.M.A.Z.O true threats to the heroes, so it has the team act cautiously when fighting Lex and Amazo. The final fight has Superman and Batman face with Lex Luthor while Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, Green Arrow, and The Flash are occupied with A.M.A.Z.O.
The League defeats A.M.A.Z.O when they identify weak spots and override its programming when copying their abilities, which leaves an opening for them to finally destroy it. They do the same for Lex's Warsuit to defeat him. Afterward, the police arrive to arrest the Legion of Doom and Lex Luthor, which enacts an epilogue where it shows the heroes helping to clean up the mess left by Lex and the Legion, congress thanking the heroes for saving them, and Lex Luthor being put on trial. Lex tries to lie, but since Senator Finch and the League show undeniable proof of his crimes, he's sentenced to life in prison so he'll be away for a long time.
The heroes meet in a building that becomes their headquarters since they're officially a team. They still wonder what their team name can be and Barry Allen comes up with a name called "the Justice League", which the team likes and agrees to call themselves. The movie ends with the heroes willing to work together and are labeled as the "World's Finest Heroes" by the media. The heroes learn about a robbery taking place and it's being caused by a group of criminals called the "Royal Flush Gang" and it has them rush into battle together as the screen cuts to black.

1. Mid-credits scene: Amanda Waller observes the news about the Justice League becoming popular among the locals after they stopped Lex Luthor and she analyses files over a variety of metahumans criminals, and mercenaries she has tabs on for a project she's working on for if these heroes were to over go rogue or if the world loses them, which is labeled as "Task Force X". This sets up the Suicide Squad as the government's secret countermeasure for the Justice League, going into Phase 2 and future phases.
2. Post-credits scene: We're shown a planet that has burning firepits and is in a desolate state. A hologram of the accomplishments of the heroes is shown to its ruler by his disciple. He believes since Earth has new protectors like Kryptonians, Lanterns, Amazons, and humans with sheer willpower, it's time for them to strike when they have the chance. The ruler is shown as a dark silhouette and tells him to have patience since they'll need to prepare to challenge them as Earth will be his one day. The dark silhouette is implied to be Darkseid and his disciple is shown to be Steppenwolf, but he isn't shown yet and will be revealed much later in a future Phase.

This concludes Phase 1 of my reimagined DCEU. More is to come in the future.

Depending on who you ask, a government is merely a monopoly on violence within a geographical area ~ Me, just now. IDK about a source, have some more possibly-unfinished mind vomit that's been banging around my drafts for however long.
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Counter-Admiral Bgal'djuyk was having a bad day.
Now, to be fair to the Universe at large, Counter-Admiral Bgal'djuyk probably deserved a few more bad days than he'd actually had over the past couple of years. He was quite par for the course for the military he was in: while he wasn't corrupt enough to be a problem, nor heavy-handed enough to inspire disloyalty, nor too high on his own authority to have delusions of grandeur or independence, he was still corrupt, heavy-handed, and somewhere in the realm of mildly stoned on his own authority. Oh, and also nowhere near as competent as he could have been.
Granted, the situation he had been put in would have required more than his own heightened competence to break out of, as it was really an end product of an uninterrupted chain of minor mistakes going back three months, and no amount of competence would have allowed him to counter the tactics his unknown opposite was pulling - although with hindsight he could certainly have responded to the developing situation faster and more efficiently than he ended up doing.
Hindsight, however, doesn't matter very much in the thick of things unless you have a way to actively turn back time, or otherwise change the past. Which was something that Counter-Admiral Bgal'djuyk certainly couldn't do - although, considering how the enemy were in the process of kicking down the internal security door between them and him, it was really quite understandable that he was hoping that he could. Ideally on the scale of years, rather than minutes, but honestly anything above about twenty seconds would have done him good at that point.
Nominally, said door would have been able to withstand impacts far greater than the impact of a biped's hoof behind some emblazoned and moderately damaged yellow power armour operating on three out of four generators, but... only nominally.
The ship that the door (and both sophonts) were on was neither a relatively new build nor a relatively old build, and it was neither important nor unimportant. It was, for all intents and purposes, just one of many others of its kind constructed for the Ngae'thikhian Corporation. It had passed all inspections (which included and were mostly limited to a thorough once-over with mark one eyeballs) and had not come in over budget, so there was no real reason for the Ngae'thikh to reject it.
It was right about now, however, that the unnoticed... irregularities in its construction would come to fruition. Of the two inspectors responsible for checking this area of the vessel - what would, in almost any other situation, be an unimportant connecting hallway - one of them had been let go over a month earlier to save on overhead costs, and the other was coasting towards retirement and could really have cared a whole lot more. So when a few security bolts were stolen by a labourer looking to use them on one of her own projects, a few more incorrectly tightened by a different one with an arm injury, and one or two more inserted a little too zealously by a newer hire who didn't know any better, nobody had really noticed. And, when the enterprising black market metal trader who had scooped out some of the door's materials to sell got caught doing the same thing a month later, nobody had thought to recheck the doors he had previously worked on.
The end result of all of this was a door that very much could not withstand what it was nominally supposed to be able to. As it crumpled under the force of a power-armoured kick, clearing the sightline between the muzzle of a moderately personalised legacy-issue laser rifle (used because it was more reliable than the new standard-issue, not because the latter wasn't bullpup, now shut up about it) and the skull of the a high-ranking officer in the process of getting to a place from which he could evacuate his flagship, yet another domino fell in a long chain of knock-on effects: that the Ngae'thikhian Corporation had just lost a valuable (though not necessarily irreplaceable) high-ranking officer in the middle of a battle, which, for the fleet he was supposed to be commanding, was really quite a large inconvenience indeed.
Or, to put it in fewer words, Counter-Admiral Bgal'djuyk's day very quickly got a whole lot worse.
.
Meanwhile, in the next star system over, the cyan power-armoured boarding teams were having a lot more trouble than their yellow counterparts two and a half lightyears away. And (although they would never admit it) they were having a whole lot less fun, too. Indeed, most of the fun in the boarding action was being had by Leftenant Bunkingsmythe's platoon of Royal Marines instead. Partly because, unlike the unfortunate Counter-Admiral, they had functional blast doors to play with, but also because, in the words of one particular moribund cyan-garbed soldier,
"WHY IN THE NAME OF THE GREAT MOTHER WOULD THERE BE A LASER TURRET THERE?!?"
Now, in terms of last words, that's not exactly the most heroic thing for a soldier to say, but it is certainly understandable, especially when the laser turret in question was deployed specifically to position you in the sightline of a rather quite dashing and well-trained marksman and, just as importantly, in front of the barrel of his trusty Lee-Enfield Mk X̅L̅.
But, for as much as Private Gommingsop would boast about this specific kill later over his third through fifth cups of Private Lesterway's self-made Westmorland* tea that evening, the poor cyan marine on the other end of his barrel did have a point. Because, unlike poor Counter-Admiral Bgal'djuyk, Bunkingsmuthe's platoon weren't stationed on a "proper" warship. While the unlucky Counter-Admiral had simply taken a run-of-the-mill battleship as his flagship when he was promoted to the position, the flagship provided by the Human navy to Admiral Siobhan "It's pronounced See-Oh-Ban" O'Croydon was a communications vessel - a communications vessel with, nominally, nothing more than basic self-defence weaponry that wasn't rated against anything more than space junk, fire-and-forget missiles, and maybe the odd enterprising bomber if you're lucky.
..."Rated against" in this case not equating to "is only effective against", as fully half of the cyan marine boarding troop and the metaphorical spirits of their well-shielded and highly-armoured boarding craft will tell you. They will likely also go on a rant about how their part of the plan was only agreed on specifically because the Human flagship was a lightly-armed communications ship instead of an actual warship, as even the hair-brained schemers who came up with the plan of boarding the enemy flagship(s) and decapitating the entire chain of command didn't think it would have worked on the Humans if their flag was being flown by a proper warship, but, aside from being a minor falsehood (the cyans would have had backup had the Human flagship been a conventional one, but they would have gone ahead with their mission regardless), such a rant is also a digression from the aforementioned main point.
Which, in a short paragraph or so, is that the Human fleet had a great day that was only really brought down by the news after the fact that the Germans had won on penalties. Again. (Oh, and the fact that they had to retreat due to their position becoming untennable due to the front collapsing elsewhere, but that's just what coalition warfare is like sometimes.)
.
As a direct result of the substantial interior defences aboard what was - and this must be stressed - a communications vessel, the Human Flagship was not successfully boarded at the start of the battle. The Human fleet was able to hold their section of the line for a full sixteen hours longer than any other allied fleet in their sector, and were ultimately able to retreat to the second line of defence in much better order when they were ordered to turn tail and flee fall back. Thanks to jumping away in good order (and a lack of chronic cost-cutting), the Human fleet also arrived in a far more intact manner than any others, with even their stragglers arriving not too long after their main fleet - compared to the multiple days that the unused, unmaintained, and remarkably cheap backup drives of many other vessels from other militaries would take.
For the Ngae'thikhian Corporation, who had expected the attack on 'their' sector of the front to be a large prestige boost to their already prestigious military wing, the collapse and rank devastation of their forces in several systems at once proved to be a humiliating affair that was only further compounded by the fact that it was the heroics of a governmental contribution (and a significantly smaller one at that) that actually managed to earn the prestige instead. Fortunately for them, though, they weren't comically stupid, so an investigation into the Human military was launched in an attempt to figure out what lessons could be learned.
The first answer was found very quickly. The ships the Humans used - even their flagship - cost what would be colloquially referred to as "way too much money". Rumours suggesting that a member of the investigatory board fainted when he heard about how much (when factoring in the R&D costs) each one of the Human "sensor ships" individually cost are substantially true, although they do unfortunately tend to omit the snazzy effects on the powerpoint and the epileptic tendencies of that particular board member, the importance of which shall be left to the reader's discretion.
The condensed version of the report the Ngae'thikh investigation eventually produced was that, in monetary terms, the quote-unquote "small" Human contribution actually cost about as much as their own, so it was no wonder that they performed so well in the one system they had been tasked with holding. The idea of corruption as an alternative cause for the cost was quickly discarded, because corruption on the scale that would be required does not, in fact, lead to a stronger fighting force, and if you think that is the case you probably need more common sense. Many other reasons with more substance behind them were also proposed, however, of which there were three with significant substance to back themselves up:
The first was the bureaucratic hellscape (specifically the 'scape of the single hell of Ngae mythology) more vulgarly known as 'the procurement process for warships for the Human military'. Specifics of this process are almost always omitted in discussions of this topic - ostensibly to save the reader's sanity, but really just because nobody can be bothered to look them up and make sense of them when rewriting the above sentence in an essay or report. That alone should provide enough context to deduce exactly why it's a copulatingly huge money bin, but there's only so much red tape you can shove in front of something before it stops being a thing, so the bureaucracy alone was insufficient to explain the funding density gap.
The second was the stupid amounts of R&D the Humans did that allowed their ships to be very slightly more efficient at what they do. Efficient in the spatial, non-monetary senses, of course. In a typical category of equipment - say, main guns, secondary guns, point-defence, shields... you get the idea - something maybe 90% as efficient as what the Humans used could be obtained for a tenth of the price without too much hassle; yet, for some reason, the Humans really seemed to like making their stuff more expensive.
However, the third and most important reason why the Human ships cost so much was because the ships that the Humans actually ended up building were over-engineered to the hells (specifically the two hells from Thikh mythology) and back.
To an extent, these expenses could be justified. After all, it is entirely possible to comprehend why someone might want interior defences installed on a flagship-type vessel, even if the odds are that said defences will never get used and the flagship will just be blown up in any of the old-fashioned ways available to whoever it's fighting. It is also entirely possible to comprehend why some fleets might be constructed with multiple primary FTL drives instead of a primary and secondary - an elite fleet being slowed down by otherwise minor damage might prove disastrous in the long term, and hedging against this bad luck is typically seen as worth the cost for at least one dedicated force in any given military.
However, to a much larger extent, these expenses seemed entirely frivolous. There was no need for the Cafeteria on a ship to be able to serve as a bridge if both the main and backup bridges got damaged beyond use. Airlocks didn't need to seal against a pressure an order of magnitude higher than they were ever supposed to see. And what was "Defence against low-effort TTS bots, assuming one stoops low enough to steal this story" even supposed to mean? Hell (pick any of the three), those weren't even the most egregious examples: Human ships regularly considered their engines to be at 'full speed' when at three-quarters of what they could theoretically do; had many amenities that were far in excess of many civilian vessels for a crew that did not require them; and, most egregiously, had void or unused spaces as "future-proofing" which could be used to install equipment designed after the ship itself had been constructed.
And yet, as the report concluded, the results of these expenses could not be denied. The Humans had won the battle they were faced with quite handily specifically as the result of all the money they had spent on ineffective things, and had also won a nigh-unacceptable amount of prestige along with it at the expense of the Ngae'thikh Corporation. If the Corporation wanted to improve; to repair its prestige and prevent such a humiliation happening again (or, at the very least, prevent the massive costs associated with having to replace your entire on-duty fleet on a front because the one you had there was damaged or destroyed in its entirety), something had to be done.
Now, if the Ngae'thikhian Corporation were Human in origin, they would most likely have been liable to discard these results and blame bad luck or something, because the revelation of "more money = better quality" would mean spending more money, and that is something that, for some reason, has a repeated habit of becoming anathema to the Human Business Classes.
However, the Ngae'thikhian Corporation, as the name may or may not suggest, were predominantly Ngae'thikh in makeup. So, as beings possessing slightly more capability to plan for the future, a decision (by majority vote) was made among the corporation to shift their overall military strategy from their current model to one of a higher-quality lower-quantity methodology. While such a shift would take time - the ships they did have were still perfectly usable, after all - they would find, in half a century or so, that they could respond far more effectively to threats that required substantial usage of force, such as the war they were currently engaged in. Additionally, being a corporation as large as they were, they could afford a fleet so large it was unlikely that they would ever become overstretched, a further benefit to the strategy.
...ah, who am I kidding? The Ngae'thikh Business Class are just as bad as the Human ones. Their military hasn't changed a bit. You could probably find a cut corner within five minutes of boarding any ship of theirs, no matter which.
The Humans haven't changed, either. They're currently ten years deep into trying to procure a new batch of cruisers, having somehow blown more on legal fees already than your average nation would have spent on the actual fleet. Which was also the initial budget allocation. If it weren't for the designers of the batch of cruisers the Humans are trying to replace deciding to make them viable for 100 years after their nominal "expiry" date instead of the usual 50, the Human fleet would be a lot weaker and many Human sub-nations would be out a significant chunk of their cruiser screen.
...
So, to give you an actual answer to what was promised in the title, the reasons the Humans go over budget? One, they don't know the meaning of the first half of "cost-effectiveness", and Two, Human Lawyers are really expensive.
It's mostly number two.

This document on the Kaiser Permanente website is short, but it says a lot about how the Kaiser system operates: https://healthy.kaiserpermanente.org/content/dam/kporg/final/documents/health-plan-documents/coverage-information/how-kaiser-permanente-providers-are-paid-ca-en.pdf
Keep in mind that this is a Kaiser-prepared document that is "sanitized." For example, it omits the key point that Kaiser Medical Groups are FOR-PROFIT.
This section drew my attention: "Every month, the Health Plan prepays the Medical Group a set dollar amount for each member enrolled. This payment method is called “capitation.” The Medical Group receives this payment for each enrolled member whether or not the member seeks or receives services during that month."
Those two sentences tell you most of what you need to know about Kaiser. Kaiser basically is a monthly premium collection business that happens to provide a few health care services on the side. Kaiser Primary Care Physicians do NOT want to hear from you, let alone address your medical concerns. The profit-maximizing action is to discourage Kaiser members from seeking ANY services whatsoever in any given month. The Kaiser system likes the six-week lag time between making appointments and seeing a physician because that is one more month that they can claim "capitation" payments without providing medical services.
None of this is surprising. There is the famous White House audio recording of a conversation between President Richard Nixon and advisor John Ehrlichman in 1971 concerning the Kaiser Permanente business model: "All the incentives are toward less medical care, because … the less care they give them, the more money they make.” https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Transcript_of_taped_conversation_between_President_Richard_Nixon_and_John_D._Ehrlichman_%281971%29_that_led_to_the_HMO_act_of_1973:
That webpage about physician compensation apparently exists because it was a condition of lawsuit settlements in 2003. See: https://consumerwatchdog.org/uncategorized/kaiser-agrees-disclose-physician-guidelines-compensation-settle-suits/ (Thanks to CyclingRealtor for his/her post about the 2003 lawsuit settlements.)
After decades (a lifetime more-or-less) in the Kaiser system, I've concluded that too many Kaiser personnel today (especially physicians) really and truly do NOT want to see Kaiser members. They didn't know or care who you were before you set foot in their medical offices and they would be happy if they never saw you ever again in their lives. To too many Kaiser personnel, Kaiser members are just nameless, faceless sources of monthly "capitation" payments and are an unwelcome burden on the rare occasion when they request medical services.
A "good" Kaiser member pays his/her monthly premium bill and demands NOTHING from the Kaiser system ... until age 65 when Kaiser and its greedy for-profit Medical Groups and Hospitals can start "milking" the Medicare system.

Wood had been training the Gryffindor Quidditch team relentlessly at every free moment. Last night Wood had been running broomless drills between dinner and curfew. Once back in their common room he had tried to talk strategies using Ron's chess pieces, Harry had been King, George and Fred were bishops, the chasers were pawns, and Oliver was the Queen. Until Angelina Johnson had yawned, and explained that a good night's sleep was the the best strategy.
Harry stiffled a yawn in transfiguration. He found it hard to concentrate. For some unknown reason Harry began to think about werewolves. Were werewolves even real? He couldn't remember.
"Mr Potter!" Snapped Professor McGonagal. "Would you care to share what is so important it has taken all of your attention?"
"Werewolves" he answered before he could consider the question. "...and the difference between them, and the transfiguration when you turn into a cat."
"Animagus" Hermione coughed
"Animagus! That's it. I was trying to remember the word. Now that I have, I can leave this to consider later." Harry rambled.
Professor McGonagal stared her unblinking cat stare. Harry grew increasingly uncomfortable but decided not to say anything further.
"That, Mr Potter, is an interesting question. What is a difference between them?"
Hermione's hand shot up three inches higher than her natural reach.
Professor McGonagal continued to stare at Harry. Harry thought of the B grade horror films Dudley watched.
"Er..a werewolf is forced to transform on the full moon, and you... er... Animagus.... Animaguses? ....Animagi? ... an Animagus can transform.... at will?" Harry tentatively answered.
"Given your attention was diverted for seven minutes, I want seven factual points comparing werewolves and Animagi, handed to me by tomorrow's class."
"Are you giving me a detention?" Harry asked hopefully
"Not unless you fail to hand in an acceptable response to the question."
Harry's shoulders slumped. He would have to stop by the library and complete it in 'History of Magic'. He had hoped to get a nap in during Professor Binns class.
...
Harry asked Madam Pince for any documents on Werewolves and Animagi that were accessible to him. Soon she had compiled a stack of books for him, and oddly a copy 'Teen witch weekly' (issued monthly, but Hermione pointed out that if it was called 'Teen Witch Monthly' it would sound like a euphemism for a ladies time of the month. Ron had promptly dropped the magazine.). The issue of 'Topographical Habitat' made some sense, as it was purported to be a factual periodical about unknown magical tribes from around the world and rare fantasic beasts.
Hermione took the largest book from the stack, Ron took 'Topographical Habitat', and Harry flipped through 'Teen Witch'.
Hermione seemed somewhat impressed that Ron had at least taken the serious publication. Harry's own suspicions about Ron's choice appeared confirmed, when Ron blushed such deep scarlet, he could have been camouflaged next to Fawkes.
"100 ways to woo your wizard? Top 10 potions for a slimmer summer body? Love potions gone wrong, a young witch's horror? Who reads this trash?" Harry asked aloud.
Hermione didn't meet his eyes.
"I don't. Some of the other girls do. Apparently they can often have interesting articles, and they have a 'questions to the Sage Sisters' section where young witches can ask embarrassing questions they can't ask their parents or professors"
Hermione attempting to hide the red flush in her cheeks,nonchalantly flipped through the large book, seemingly unaware it was upside down.
"There must be a reason Madam Pince got it for you." She continued before turning the book right side up. "It's faster to get to 'W' for werewolves from the back" she explained without looking up.
Harry smiled.
"Take our quiz. Which Animagus are you?"
"That sounds highly inaccurate. I suppose you did say any documents..."
Harry pushed it to the side a little too far and it slipped off the edge of the table with three other books. Harry ducked down to tidy them up. He quickly slipped the magazine into his bookbag and picked up the other three books.
The three of them quickly found the pages with basic information on both, and a refence to the spell to become an animagus, but it was in the restricted section. Harry noted the book title down. Unfortunately there wasn't time to write down all the important bits. If he hurried, Harry thought he might just be able to mark down page numbers and book titles to find them on the next break.
"I wish I had access to a photocopier" Harry lamented.
"Just ask Madam Pince for a copy." Ron suggested
Madam Pince read through the pages quickly, and copied them. She redacted a few pieces of "restricted" information, including the name of the restricted book. Finally, a watermark charm indicating it was an authorised copy, before handing them the pages.
Hermione stared in awe.
"I need to learn that spell." She said as they raced to 'History of Magic'
"Yeah, it'd be super helpful." Replied Ron.
"How did you know what a photo copier was?" Harry panted as they sprinted up to the classroom
"A wha? You said copier. I assumed you wanted a copy. Name seemed pretty obvious."
During 'History of Magic' Harry propped open the text book and flipped to the quiz in the magazine. He readied his quill, but as it was a magical publication, you used your wand to tap the answer. After the result was given the pages would clear and the next person could take the test.
There were several disclaimers in fine print stating results were not guaranteed, and merely for entertainment purposes.
...
Which Animagus are you?
Question one:
Where do you live?
Harry tapped the box next to the UK.
The page shifted revealing the next question.
If you attend/ed Hogwarts, which house were you, or do you hope to be sorted into?
On the questions continued.
Pick a sport or activity
□Quidditch
□Spelunking
□Dueling
□Wrestling
□Spectating
Harry didn't even know what spelunking was. He assumed it was some obscure wizard sport, common elsewhere in the world. He picked Quidditch of course.
The questions were odd and seemed mostly irrelevant to animals, but finally he came to the results.
Red Kite
"Think it's broken mate" Ron whispered over Harry's shoulder "my dad found one of those at the ministry. It's a toy for muggle kids."
"It says its a bird of prey." Harry whispered back.
"Give it here so I can take it." Ron asked.
Harry carefully passed it over and started writing his comparison for McGonagal.
Ron grumbled when he was done.
"Still say its broken. I got goat."
"It's just a ridiculous quiz Ronald. Hardly likely to be accurate is it? Besides goats are excellent creatures. " Hermione reached over and took the magazine.
Soon she showed her own results.
"Utter nonsense. I got an octopus. I'd much rather be a goat, than an octopus." Hermione carefully showed the result page to Ron and Harry.
"Nah, that's way cooler than a goat." Ron sighed
"Imagine you turn for first time, no water in sight. Not very useful. Great, I could swim around the lake. I personally, have no desire to find myself in any way in the lake, or any other body of water bigger than a bathtub. Animagus forms are random, I have just as much chance of being a Blue Ringed Octopus, as I do a Fox. You wouldn't know what animal you'll get until to do the full spell. One reason why I'd not likely try to become an animagus." Hermione closed up the magazine, and returned to her classwork, except her classwork was for Arithmancy not history of magic.
When the class ended, Nevile came up to Harry.
"I took that quiz, or one like it ages ago. I was at St Mungos,... just waiting at the minor aliments clinic. I don't subscribe to 'teen witch' magazine or anything. I got a Honey Badger. I thought for sure it would mean I'd be in Hufflepuff. Do you think I could maybe,... maybe I could... borrow your magazine to see if I'd be something else now?" Neville shyly asked
"Go for it. This is just a library copy. Part of my extra homework McGonagal set me. I'll give it to you in our room"
At the end of class, Ron had a free class block. Oliver Wood had a copy of all the Gryffindor Quidditch team player's timetables, and he and Harry had a one on one training session during this free block. Hermione had an elective that Ron and Harry didn't take. In an attempt to delay the training session, Harry offered to walk with Hermione to the next class.
"Ron, do me a favour and talk Quidditch strategies with Wood. Maybe he won't notice I'm late. I need a few minutes to myself. Encourage him to get substitute players too. If he has more players to train then maybe he'll ease up on the rest of us." Harry sighed.
"Hermione mind if I accompany you to..." Harry paused not knowing what her next class.
"Ancient Runes" Ron said as he packed up his books.
"Actually, I've got Ancient....Runes. How did you know that Ron?"
"I spent long enough helping you shift your classes around, so you could do them all." Ron replied "Catch you two at lunch then. Do you think Wood would really listen to my strategies?"
"Percy apparently complained to Oliver that 'it was bad enough having a house full of Quidditch obsessed siblings, he could no longer handle it taking over their dorm room too.' I feel bad for their other roommates, having to deal with both Percy and Oliver. Anyway Percy must have mentioned you helping with Hermione's schedule, and treating it like a Quidditch league. I think Oliver will be quite keen to hear your opinion. If only to annoy Percy further."
"That's 'nough reason for me." Laughed Ron in response.
The trio split off at the staircase, with Ron promising to stall Oliver.
"So Vix, Octopus you say?"
Hermione glared at Harry
"Did you forget my name Harry?"
"You've only been my best friend for two years. Of course I forgot it, Vix. Must have been obliviated. You said you got a Blue Ringed Octopus."
"I did. It proves only that the quiz was nonsense."
"You got a small poisonous..."
"Venomous." She corrected
"Probably poisonous too. You got a small venomous octopus from Australia? I did a project on them in primary school. They live in Australian waters not anywhere near the U.K. The quiz asked your location, so you'd only get a creature that lived here. So why wouldn't you tell Ron you got a Fox?"
"How did you... I got an octopus you saw the results."
Harry gave no further reponse and waited for Hermione to come clean.
"Fine. I took the test multiple times. How did you know I got a fox?!"
"You said 'you had as much chance of being a Blue Ringed Octopus, as you did a Fox'." Harry shrugged. "You'd make a pretty good fox."
"Serves me right for choosing Australia as a location. I thought I might get a Koala or something cute. Instead I get a tiny but deadly octopus." She shook her head in frustration, frizzy hair flying everywhere.
"You would have have the fluffiest fox fur ever." Harry concluded. Hermione swatted him in the arm.
"It's still nonsense. Each animagus is completely random, as far as current research can tell. I'd probably get a hare, or a vole, or....or...an otter! Not something I'm currently planning to try."
"Only 'cause you don't know how." Which earned him another whack in the arm.
"Would you learn the spell?"
"If I could guarantee I'd get a bird, of any kind, hell I'd even take a bloody pigeon, absolutely. Only birds I'd say no to would be flightless birds"
"That's the problem isn't it. You could get anything. I wouldn't want to be a water animal, like a fish, or a rat like Ron's pet" She shuddered "or a bug. Can you be a bug?"
He shrugged
"If you could choose your form, I know, I know" he held his hands up before she could tell him off "but IF you could, what animal would make you say yes immediately?"
They walked in silence while she pondered the question.
"Not something people want to kill. Not a pest creature; rats, mice, insects, spiders, snakes. Nothing like that. Something strong, something friendly, something beautiful."
"So not a fox then?"
"No. Too many people trying to hunt them down."
"What about a horse?"
"Hmmm possibly."
"Do you think that most Animagi are Gryffindors, because it requires courage to go through with becoming an unknown animal?"