H. R. KINGSTON

Musings, reviews, and short fiction. Please enjoy your stay!

[hrkingston]

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[hrkingston]

Eleven Favorite Women in Video Games

Women in video games are as many and varied as the worlds they appear in. Here are eleven of my favorites from over the years, in no particular order!

Claire “Lightning” Farron (Final Fantasy XIII, XIII-2, and Lightning Returns) Lightning makes this list because not only is she a dynamic character, but she’s a badass. While having pink hair and being overwhelmingly attractive, Lightning is not a pushover of a character by any means. She’s a soldier first, then something of a goddess, and her progression only escalates from there in Lightning Returns. I love how she started as a practical character and stayed a practical character, even when weirder and weirder stuff is hurled her way. She knows how to think, she knows how to fight, and in XIII, she touts one of my favorite weapons in all of Final Fantasy: a gunblade that actually makes physical sense. Lara Croft (Tomb Raider)

I will admit, I got into the Tomb Raider franchise rather late and there are still a lot of games in the series that I have yet to play. However, in many people’s eyes, Lara was the “original” female protagonist in video games. She was smart, she was strong, she was daring, she could fight, and, as we all know, she’s not bad to look at.

I myself am partial to the rendition of Lara found in the 2013 reboot of Tomb Raider from Crystal Dynamics. It was the first time that I felt completely comfortable playing as Lara, because while she was beautiful, I didn’t feel like the male gaze was being directly pandered to. This was a Lara that I had an easier time relating to, and is what really drew me into the series. So yes, while I was very late to the Tomb Raider party, Lara has claimed a special place in my heart. Commander Shepard (Mass Effect) Few people have kicked as much intergalactic ass as Commander Shepard, and the fact that you can get it done as a woman makes it twice as satisfying. Some might view this as cheating, since Shepard, while she does have her own base personality, is very much informed by the decisions the player makes. But no matter how the player steers Shepard, she is never any less awesome, and the fact that you can personalize her adventure only makes her that much more likable and easy to relate to. Yuna (Final Fantasy X and X-2) While Yuna was only playable very briefly in X, I always felt that she was the true protagonist of the story. Anyone who knows me well knows that I complain about Final Fantasy X a fair amount, but despite any and all of that, it was my first Final Fantasy, and Yuna my first heroine. Despite some character flaws and inconsistencies that I still question to this day (Yuna is relatively smart but makes some unfathomable decisions, her fashion sense changes beyond all recognition between games, etc.) she is still a wonderful character with a lot of heart. While she can fight through the use of her aeons, her truest power is her strength of character and strength of heart. She is brave, selfless, loving, and fiercely protective. I admire her greatly years after picking up my PS2 copy of her game at a flea market. Okami Amaterasu (Okami) Okami will always and forever be one of my very favorite video games with its gorgeous cell-shading, unforgettable characters, and wonderful storytelling. One of the things that may be a little off-putting to certain people about Amaterasu is that she doesn’t speak a single line of dialogue. Amaterasu takes the form of a wolf in this game, and all of the dialogue that advances the plot from her perspective is done through Issun, he sidekick. However, Ammy is loveable and memorable in her own right by getting her thoughts and points across through primarily canine actions, such as growls, whines, barks, and iconic postures such as the confused head tilt, the coil before an attacking spring, and even biting or headbutting people. She’s a different kind of protagonist and a model example of non-verbal storytelling, and will always be one of my favorites. Miranda Lawson (Mass Effect 2 & 3) Miranda isn’t the protagonist of Mass Effect, obviously, but a party member. However, she still deserves to be on this list because she’s so dynamic. It took me some time to warm up to Miranda, but the more I got to know her in-game, the more of a shine I took to her. She is tough, she is vulnerable, she is smart, she is emotional, she’s a leader and a follower, a hard-ass and a friend, and it’s these oxymorons and more that showcase exactly what a multifaceted and real character Miranda is. She’s complex, and getting to know all of her different sides was an absolute pleasure.

(I also may or may not have a massive crush on her and be bummed that you can’t romance her as Femshep.)

Fran (Final Fantasy XII) Fran is an almost frosty, aloof character due to how old she is and will be. Fran is one of my favorites because, despite how collected she is, you really get to see into her layers when she interacts with her sisters, and when she interacts with Balthier the sky pirate. Fran’s relationship with Balthier is not only one of my favorite aspects of her character, but also one of my favorite aspects of the entire game itself. Unlike how things normally seem to go, Fran is not Balthier’s sidekick, or subservient to him in any way. Fran and Balthier are partners, and I really love the camaraderie that all but oozes from them. Also, Fran by default is an archer, and I have a weakness for a good ol’ bow and arrow. Aloy (Horizon Zero Dawn) What did I say about archery? Guerilla Games has essentially delivered us a neo-Mesozoic Merida simulator and I could not be more pleased. But despite the lush world and intuitive gameplay, one of my favorite aspects of the game is our star herself, Aloy. Aloy is a perfect example of the coming-of-age narrative, as she spends much of the game trying to discover her origin and save her world with the information. She’s fiercely motivated and incredibly capable, using a combination of strength, cunning, and finesse to take on everything the world throws at her from prejudiced humans to deadly bandits to giant killer machines. Oerba Dia Vanille (Final Fantasy XIII) When XIII first came out, I couldn’t stand Vanille. Her voice bothered me, her personality bothered me, her in-game animations bothered me, everything about her bothered me. But then one day (I kid you not) I woke up and thought “Why did I hate Vanille so much? I really like her! What was my deal?”

Vanille was one of those characters I had to warm up to first. I see a lot of myself in Vanille, which is perhaps why I was so harsh on her in the first place. We are our own biggest critics, and I believe that I had been unknowingly using Vanille like a mirror. The fact that she tries to be so hopeful in the face of adversity is a trait that we share, as well as trying to cheer others up and make them see the bright side. Vanille and I, we can be annoying in our tactics, but we both mean well in the end.

Vanille has a good heart and is a lovely person, and the fact that I relate so strongly to her has given her a permanent spot in my heart. Elizabeth Comstock (BioShock Infinite) Elizabeth Comstock is, in herself, a journey. The story of BioShock Infinite is largely focused on her, and she really does propel it forward. One of my favorite things about Elizabeth, besides the mystery and intrigue that surrounds her character, is how much she changes as a person over the course of the game. In the beginning, she reminded me very much of Belle or Rapunzel, but by the end of the game, without giving too much away, she seemed like she was about a thousand years old, too wizened and tortured for her years.

Elizabeth is a very real character, and in a game where you play a protagonist that you never really see, she does a wonderful job emoting and making you really feel both for her and for the world around her.

Elizabeth is a masterpiece inside a masterpiece; both she and her game have resonated very deeply with me. Kasumi Goto (Mass Effect 2 & 3) Kasumi is a downloadable character, and the fact that not everyone experienced Mass Effect 2 for the first time with her on the team makes me sad. We don’t get to see as much of Kasumi as we do other characters, but what we do get to see is very well done. Bioware had the task of making people care about this character in a relatively short amount of time, since she isn’t technically “in” the story, and so most of her character development occurs during her loyalty mission.

Kasumi is one of those characters that I wanted more of, and I found myself bringing her on many missions just to hear snatches of her dialogue if I took her certain places or did certain things. Even during the final climactic mission, I found myself snickering at her quips. She was an optional character that, for me, didn’t feel optional, and that’s when you know a character is very well done.

(I also remained disappointed that the bug in her mission in Mass Effect 3 was never fixed.)

[hrkingston]

The Modern Space Race Is a Waste of Money

Spending money on a modern-day space reason isn't the best idea. This argument has two major reasons, which are detailed below: Humanity's inability to adapt to life in space, and the worsening of the climate crisis here on Earth.

To begin, these two reasonings should look interconnected to you, because they are. For decades, one of the pushes behind a modern space race has been the idea of finding a new home for humanity. Just think about how many times you've heard someone talk about colonizing the moon or Mars. But this isn't really a good idea, because the human body is not suited to outer space. In an October 2023 article from the Scientific American, writer Sarah Scoles identifies multiple ways that outer space seems practically designed to kill humans and similar species. Some of the examples include cancer from cosmic rays (way worse than sunburn with no atmosphere in the way!), the problem of growing food or finding water without proper atmospheric conditions, and even the ways differing gravity can cause cells to age faster or joints and bones to stress improperly. Long story short, humans were not built to survive in space.

This seems like a bad situation, considering the second reason why modern space travel isn't worth the money: pollution. Publications such as The Guardian (2021), the BBC (2022), and Time Magazine (2023) have all put out articles outlining exactly how the extra pollution from the modern space race is effectively killing Earth, and therefore the only habitat on which humans are guaranteed to survive, faster. For example, emissions from rocket flights get trapped in the upper atmosphere, where it can take two or more years to disperse. This contributes to the warming of our planet, making our ongoing battle with climate change-induced natural disasters worse. Since these space flights, especially those by private entities such as SpaceX and Blue Origin, happen more often than once every two to three years, there's no time for those emissions to disperse before they're replaced. In short, the warming effect compounds every time we, publicly or privately, launch a rocket.

By making pollution worse on Earth, we're leaving ourselves fewer options for survival. Humans weren't built to survive in outer space, yet space flights continue to destroy our natural habitat. All the money that's pumped into the modern space race would be better spent on conservation efforts here on Earth, such as reducing emissions, fostering plant growth, and establishing green infrastructure. Our dollars should focus on saving the home we already have, rather than trying to reach one that wasn't meant for us.

Sources: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-well-never-live-in-space/#:~:text=The%20cancer%20risk%20from%20cosmic,spending%20big%20money%20on%20it https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/jul/19/billionaires-space-tourism-environment-emissions https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20220713-how-to-make-rocket-launches-less-polluting https://time.com/6273065/space-travel-climate-impact/

[hrkingston]

Arsenic and Adobo by Mia P. Manansala (Review)

I never fancied myself a small-town cozy mystery girlie. I used to think, "Those are the kinds of books my mom likes," and my mom and I don't often like the same things. However, after attending a writing workshop hosted by my local library system and the author, Mia P. Manansala, and loving her method and examples, I just had to give Tita Rosie's Kitchen Mysteries a try. And I'm so happy I did! This book gave me the same kind of vibes as the contemporary romances I've been enjoying recently by the likes of Alexandria Bellefleur and Ashley Herring Blake, where the characters and their relationships with one another hold a large focus of the story, which I love. Manansala's writing style is compulsively readable and hyper-engaging, and the audiobook narration matched her authorial voice very well. The cast is filled with likable, memorable characters, and none of them really felt like archetypes, not even the villain! The multiculturalism is also heartwarming, and I’ve used the adobo recipe in the back of the book more than once! Manansala has definitely earned herself a new fan, and I can't wait to dive into the rest of the series!

[hrkingston]

Representation

This piece was written by me and performed by my sibling (they/them). The broad assignment was “a short video regarding politics.” We decided to go with the topic of representation, and how the importance of it in our daily life reflects and influences the importance of it in our governance.

Original script transcription below:

There’s a founding principle to the USA I think we can all agree on, and it’s not freedom. It’s “no taxation without representation.” We had colonies before, but what spurred us to become a true nation was the desire not to have a crusty old guy who was far away from the problems that mattered to the people making unilateral decisions for them.

The makeup of our government doesn’t reflect our population. There are a lot of issues and barriers that make this so, but a big part of the problem is in the founding phrase itself: representation. Marginalized identities have a hard time gaining a foothold, be it in the arts, entertainment, the workplace, or governance. 

By normalizing multiple identities on an everyday level–particularly in media, which we all consume and have in common–public comfort with people of different races, genders, and sexual expressions opens up, which in turn makes it easier for a variety of people to enter politics. People fear what they don’t understand, and if they are never exposed to anything different, they will never learn any better, and therefore never vote any better. Every level of life has an influence on our government and the way our country is run. If we want fairer governance, it starts here on the ground. Every identity knows its own problems better than anyone else, and so we should all be allowed a seat at the table and the power to fix those problems.

[hrkingston]

She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan (Review)

I would like to open this review with a good, hearty holy shit. This is Shelley Parker-Chan's debut novel, to which I say: "That must be illegal in some way. How can anyone be this good at anything on the first try?" Is this book technically imperfect in that it breaks a few structural rules? Yes. Did I give a single rat's ass, or did it hinder my enjoyment of the book even slightly? No, and absolutely not. This book does so many things I like. A large-scale story that takes place over a decade or more in a character's life where we get to follow them from childhood all the way into adulthood? Check. Queer as hell? Check. Real legitimate stakes and the feeling that no one is ever truly safe? Check. At least one tragic romance? At least 1.5 checks depending on how you look at it. Most of all, though, this book had me questioning how high the stakes could possibly go right up to its very last pages. Usually (in western fantasy, at least), by the time you get to the last forty pages, the plot is wrapping up and settling into a nice neat denouement. Not so here. Up until perhaps the last three pages I was sitting there muttering, "Where the fuck are we going?" And then the last three pages happened, and once I was able to scrape my jaw off the floor I went, "Oh. That's where we were going." The second book cannot come fast enough, and until it does, I will be behaving in an absolutely feral fashion recommending She Who Became the Sun to anyone who will listen.

[hrkingston]

The Lost Apothecary by Sarah Penner (Review)

This book was so incredibly frustrating. So frustrating, in fact, that I hardly know where to begin. Let's see, what can I say without spoilers... There are three points of view in this book, two in the past timeline and one in the present-day timeline, and only one of these three characters didn't irritate me. Truthfully, I think I would have liked this book better without the present-day bits; if this had just been streamlined into a strict historical fiction, I think I would have enjoyed it more. All right, that's not entirely true. I could also have done without the multiple fertility/pregnancy subplots. This book is really weird about stereotypical gender norms, but more on that later. I think that's about all I can say without getting into spoilers both mild and gigantic. So let's take a trip to Spoiler Towne. Feel free to click away now if you intend to read this book and don’t want any spoilers; suffice it to say, I find this book entirely skippable. The premise of the book is as follows: Nella has an apothecary shop where she dispenses remedies to women (anything from soothing cramps and headaches to brews that aid in conception), and attached to her regular shop is her secret shop where she dispenses poisons to kill men that have wronged her female patrons. Everything from cheating to assault to poisoning and forcing them to miscarry can be solved with one of Nella's brews. Sounds really badass, right? I know I thought so. The book, though, doesn't seem to want you to think that, as it presents revenge as a terrible, awful thing that no respectable person should ever engage with regardless of how they were harmed or wronged, and in fact is an offense worthy of a slow death by rotting from the inside out. So, you know, turn the other cheek and let abusers get away with it. That's fine. Sure. Totally. Then we've got the future timeline, where our girl Caroline has been cheated on by her husband of ten years, and when she finds out, she runs away to London without him, where they were supposed to go for their anniversary. This absolute skidmark of a man follows her there and poisons himself with essential oils to try to gain sympathy from her. Not only does it not work 100%, but Caroline almost gets arrested for the crime of poisoning him, and she does say in her inner monologue at one point that she really shouldn't be so hateful of him, since everyone keeps secrets in their lives, including her. Uhm. I'm pretty sure keeping the Digimon Tamers fanfiction I wrote in high school a secret (not anymore, apparently) is different than keeping cheating on your significant other a secret. But whatever. What do I know? I'm just a 30-year-old woman who used to write Digimon Tamers fanfiction and has never cheated once. Also Caroline doesn't divorce him. She just files for separation with the implication that they can fix things after they've worked on themselves separately for a bit. Additionally, Eliza (a girl in the past timeline) grows up and marries the first boy she ever talked to (after being saved from drowning by a magic potion she brewed herself--the first magic potion she ever brewed after studying a spell book for half a day) when she was twelve years old. Also they were making goo-goo eyes at each other after literally half a conversation in a bookshop. How's that for some compulsory heteronormativity? Did I mention that after playing approximately the first 75% of the book completely straight, ghosts and magic just kind of... exist for some reason? (If you've read the book, I know what you're saying: "But Hannah, Eliza mentioned seeing ghosts and being haunted multiple times!" Yes, and every time she did, someone else in-universe told her that there's no such thing. And there's no foreshadowing for magic at all.) And now we get to the pregnancy/fertility stuff. Both timelines have subplots dealing with this. Multiples in the past timeline, in fact. In the present, Caroline spends about 85% of the book thinking she's pregnant with her louse of a husband's baby because her period is late. Does she take a pregnancy test at any point? Nope, it's just a cheap suspense tactic to up the stakes. In the past, we have Nella, who started brewing poisons after finding out that her past partner, Frederick, poisoned her and caused her to miscarry. Frederick, in turn, is the recipient of her first poison. I don't have a problem with this subplot; what happened to Nella is horrific and traumatizing, and I understand why this deep wound is imprinted upon her psyche and continues to torment and influence her. Next, we have the noblewoman (whose name I have already forgotten despite finishing this book a mere two hours ago), who comes to get a poison from Nella to use on her husband's mistress, because Mister Nobleman is pumping all his baby batter into the other woman and has none left for the missus. When Nella refuses, because it is her modus operandi to not hurt other women, Lady Noblewoman blackmails Nella to get it done. I get that it's a historical setting or whatever, but I'm so tired of watching the person that's cheated on go after the object of the cheating, rather than... the cheater. Woman-on-woman crime just doesn’t sit right with me. Then we've got Eliza, who gets her first period after administering a poison from Nella for her mistress to whom she is employed, and as such Eliza is convinced that her womb is haunted and a ghost is causing her bleeding. It takes two separate people on three separate occasions to convince her that this is not the case and that every uterus-haver gets their period. You thought today's sex-ed was bad? Check this action out. But then ghosts turn out to be real anyway so... Mixed messages here, book. Then finally, a bit of a nitpick, but Nella has been dubbed "the apothecary killer." Does that not sound like a serial murderer who kills only apothecaries? Would it not be more fitting to call her "the killer apothecary”?

In summary, just skip this book. Find another historical fiction, preferably one with fewer regressive themes.

[hrkingston]

Of course I would wind up becoming obsessed with a series that has a tiny/inactive fandom. I was so excited to finish Lightbringer and look at fanart of some of the hype moments, but there’s not really anything… I wish I was a better artist but I’m just not dedicated to it and I know that about myself. This series wasn’t perfect, but I had a great time with it. Kingsbane really sagged for me to the point where I had to switch to the audiobook, but Lightbringer, despite the impasse the characters were at for much of it, felt relentless in its pace. I blew through it, and (barring the epilogue) I was satisfied. I’m not sure I’ve felt hollow over character fates in quite this exact way since Mockingjay (if you know, you know). I’ll continue following the tags for this series, hoping some cool fanart will appear one day. Maybe I’ll even commission some! But in the meantime, I’ll be recommending this series to anyone who likes elemental magic and steampunk (especially Dishonored), and I’ll be holding these glorious, brutal queens in my heart and mind. I loved them; I hated them. I laughed with them; I cried with them. Eliana and Rielle will be with me forever.

[hrkingston]

Which three Pokémon games are currently your favorite? Why?

My current favorite has got to be Pokémon Go, which some people might not count, but for me, it's a great way to get some exercise while spending time in a fictional world that I love. Just yesterday my fiancé and I went out to tackle the Hoopa Unbound raids, and when we got to our local sports park, we found a group and made some new friends! 

 My number two is Pokémon Emerald, because this is where I started to take the series "seriously." I had had Blue Version and Crystal Version before this, but as a little kid, my only priority was catching as many cute creatures as possible. In Emerald, though, I went a lot harder with trying to build a cohesive team wth thorough type coverage. It was also in Gen 3 that my top 3 favorite Pokémon were introduced to the series: Aggron, Metagross, and Rayquaza. 

 Coming in third place is Pokémon X. As the first Pokémon game to appear on the 3DS, Pokémon X allowed us to see the world of Pokémon in a way we never really had before. I enjoyed the cutscenes, and the presence of Xerneas on screen carried in a way that few others have rivaled since Giratina's on-screen introduction in Gen 4. Pokémon X also introduced Mega Pokémon, which I adore, and are also one of my favorite mechanics in Pokémon Go. 

 This list is subject to change once Scarlet and Violet come out. ;)

[hrkingston]

Cantaloupe

Cantaloupes are wonderful motivators. This wasn’t something I knew until earlier this week, and it probably sounds a little far-fetched, but let me explain.

           I got up bright and early on Saturday morning to go grocery shopping. This was so that I could get all my errands out of the way before coming home and working, so that I would have the most uninterrupted working time possible. I had two food stores on my list to go to—the ordinary grocery store, and the Asian grocery store. I knew I was going to need to be frugal; I wouldn’t get paid again until October, and I likely wouldn’t be able to go grocery shopping again before that time. So I perused the aisles, picking up such things as Pop-Tarts for some extraordinarily unhealthy breakfast, dental floss to help alleviate said unhealthy breakfast, and honey for tea.

           I bypassed the ice cream (since I still had maybe half a carton left at home), and continued through the frozen aisles, looking longingly at the entrees. I was out for value, but as my work with the dance studio was about to resume for the school year, I was looking for health, too. So, to my great distress, I came across pizza rolls.

           Why is it that healthy food is so much more expensive than junk foods? I stared at the pizza rolls for a while, knowing that they would taste great, but in the long run would probably upset my stomach, since they possessed little to no nutritional value. (You, at least, could argue that the sugar in Pop-Tarts provides a good jumpstart in the morning. That’s what I argued, anyway.) So, with a heavy heart, I bypassed the pizza rolls and proceeded on to the produce section.

           Fresh produce is tricky, since you can only buy so much for one person without it going bad. In my quest for value, though, I picked up a bag of apples (to eat for breakfast with the Pop-Tarts, of course), and finally found myself face-to-face with the cantaloupes.

           I had never bought a cantaloupe before, but as far as fruits went, it’s priced pretty well, especially when you consider how expensive things like cherries and strawberries are per pound. Drawing on my little to no knowledge of cantaloupes, I chose one, and headed for the checkout line, feeling pleased with my decision to buy fruits instead of pizza rolls, and then proceeded to the next store to buy ten pounds of rice and twenty frozen baozi buns.

           My cantaloupe sat in the fridge for exactly one day before I decided to cut it open. I’d like to say that it was out of some kind of dramatic apprehension over the fact that I had never cut a cantaloupe before, but it was actually because, after I got my work done the previous day, I wasn’t feeling sharp enough to wield a knife. So the next morning (after eating my apple and forgoing the Pop-Tart), I took the biggest, sharpest knife and prepared to cut my cantaloupe, hoping that it would look fantastic on the inside and prove that I had some kind of superhuman cantaloupe senses.

           I cut it in half, scraped out the seeds, and got to work cutting the halves in half, and then the halved-halves into halves. I cut the skin off, cubed the thing as best a spherical melon can be cubed, and arranged my carefully constructed cube-ish melon pieces into a container to be eaten later.

           Now, here comes the motivation part. When you’re working on various things from school to occupation from the time you wake up at 8am to the time you got to bed at 12:30am, you need something to keep you going. While I had been cutting my cantaloupe, I had eaten a few pieces (quality assurance is very important), and discovered that my cantaloupe was quite tasty (you might say “beginner’s luck,” but I’m known for my ability to pick good bananas, so I choose to believe that this talent extends to melons). As a result, my Tupperware container full of orange melon now serves as the motivator waiting for me in the fridge when I take a break from work.

           Not only is it quite delicious and refreshing, but it also makes me feel both healthy and proud to know that my reward is not a pizza roll.

[hrkingston]

Vignette

Tier had never realized how ideal it was to have a dream, and how the dream itself was an idea that warped the reality around it.

           He had noticed, of course, that the very essence of a dream was idealism, but he had never noticed how photographic a dream could be in the brevity of its depth and scope. The dream itself was often a happy ending, a final result, a polished snapshot of where one wanted to go, not how they would get there.

           Tier’s dream was him and Rook on the other side of the world. Tier would learn to be a good envoy. Rook would learn that whatever had happened to him five years ago didn’t make him wrong. But most importantly, they would learn these lessons at each other’s sides.

           He understood now that there was quite a leap between dreams and reality.

           A dream in one’s head, like a perfect photograph, could be arranged any way one pleased. It was one brief, oftentimes staged, glimpse into a situation, the desirable way things were supposed to be seen and remembered. In such a photograph, the picture’s focus was the viewer’s focus, and there were no insights into what happened to the left or the right, above or below. There could be a different world behind the very photographer, for all anyone knew, or would ever know. A photograph might document something for all to see, but it was also proof of secrets tucked away and lost in negative space.

           So too were dreams, in the way that they showed one’s perfect destination, and not the path it took to get there. Sometimes, a dream could be so staged that it might never take place in reality. A dream was a picture of a goal, glowing and optimistic, and seldom showed those dangers to the left and the right, above and below, in front or behind.

           He hadn’t thought his dream had been so ideal that he wouldn’t see its completion.

           He hadn’t thought that, hidden behind that lens of his ideal future, was making it all the way to the other side of the world (his very first time on a zeppelin), only to be separated from Rook and kidnapped on a Revelian train, beaten and starved, sold and treated like an animal.

           All he’d wanted was to be with Rook, to have an adventure, and to make a difference.

           His dream had never once included being a victim of circumstance. His dream had not foreseen that his ride on the zeppelin—a joyous experience he had never had before—would be the last positive thing to happen in his life.

           Because he knew now that his life would end. Everything died eventually, but his dream had left that part out, too.

           He was lost and adrift on the other side of the world, with only pain and fear and confusion and loneliness to welcome him.

           He had dreamed of making the world a better place, but he hadn’t expected to die before he even had the chance to try.

           He hadn’t expected that he would need to be saved yet again before he would be allowed a chance at saving anyone else.

[hrkingston]

Relate

She had known him only three days. It was enough time for her to understand him, less than a lot but more than a little.

           When they'd met, she'd thought him anything but forthcoming. He'd fought her on the palace steps and lost, and for someone so strong, someone whose very blood sang with power, she thought for certain he would despise her for conquering him.

           But he hadn't. Almost as if he'd been waiting to lose. Almost as if he'd been waiting for someone to make it all stop.

           His vulnerability had given way to the impulsive thought to spirit him away, first from the palace and then from his world entirely. It was more than he would have asked for, more than she should have promised to give.

           And yet.

           It had all be easy with him. Perhaps it was because they were similar. Perhaps it was because he had suffered so clearly. But she could not leave him behind.

           Now he was asleep like a dead man. She had witnessed his unconsciousness before, three night's worth, and it had never been like this. Before, his sleep had been tense, shallow, prepared to be interrupted by deadly intent. How many nights of his life had gone by that way?

           The difference now was obvious, and she hoped he would feel rested when he awoke. Tomorrow morning would be the beginning of the rest of his life, and he deserved to face it with clear eyes.

           She tried to sleep, but she had always been easily disturbed, and having another person in the room was yet unfamiliar to her. It had only been three days, after all. Every time something shifted in him, be it breath or body, her awareness perked sleepy ears, waking her from her half-sleep. She found she didn't mind all that much.

           Maybe some part of what let him sleep this well was the knowledge that someone remained vigilant over him. It was a role she didn’t mind accepting.

           Instead, her senses extended to him, her eyes still closed, wondering if maybe something about him might lull her, too. His breaths were deep and even, and though he was feet away, she knew he was warm. It was part physical warmth, part the warmth of power, but all of it was unmistakably him.

           His scent, too, was twofold, one magical, one corporeal. When he’d first lashed out at her, his magic had smelled of cedar on fire, but now, perfectly at rest, the smoke was gone and he smelled only of wood.

           His physical scent was that of exertion and exhaustion. He had dethroned a king today and been too tired to bathe after it, so it made sense. But underneath even that was a softer scent, soap from the last time he'd bathed and something else she couldn't quite identify.

           The combination of scents, both heady and gentle, was just like him—passionate and shy, strong and gentle. Half of those things, though, he had been forced to bury. Half of his entire self. She had glimpsed that benevolent half, and prayed it would stay buried no longer.

           His body, too, for all the wear it showed, all the abuse it had endured, held that same sort of secret tenderness. She had never seen all of him, and doubted she ever would, but even while covered, the hard, lean muscle was obvious, and where his clothes had shifted during their fight, she had seen the crisscross of scars mapping him.

           But even for all that, the paradox continued. All those proofs of a warrior's body were set off by the innocence of his doe-eyes, by the way his posture ducked when at rest, as though he didn't know how to behave when he wasn't fighting or being told what to do. For all the harshly trained aspects of his body, there were still places—like the underside of his chin and the hollow of his throat and the back of his neck just below his hairline—that appeared baby soft. She couldn't know it for sure, because she would never touch him without asking, but they all looked like chinks in armor, spaces of humanity that his circumstances had been unable to blot out.

           “I promise,” she murmured in the dark, her eyes still closed. She didn't know what she was promising. Nothing, maybe. Everything, probably.

           Right now, it didn't matter, because he would not hear her until the sun rose on his new world.

[hrkingston]

untitled

It’s impossible to hate you

  I haven’t tried, but

I’m so accustomed

To hating your kind

 The people at the top

Who look down on the rest

As though we’re not the ones

Who carefully built their thrones

 I know you shouldn’t

Be exempt from my hatred

That maybe the scorn is in me

 Somewhere

 But even calling them

“Your kind” feels

Wrong

Inaccurate

Disrespectful

 You never meant

For any of this

To happen

  You were an accident

 All of it was

 I can’t say you deserve

What you’ve gotten

 But I can’t find the strength

To be contrarian, either

  That’s more than anyone else

Could weasel out of me

 May that innocence never leave you

That sense of awe and wonderment

The feeling that you know just how good

Life has been to you, chance or not

That not everybody has your

Luck

Skills

Timing

Privilege

  Don’t forget us

Don’t forget who built you up

Don’t drink the dark of “your kind”

And lose sight of everything you loved

Of everything that made you you and brought you here

  Keep looking at those little things

  The moon

The clouds

The flowers

  Keep bathing in that wide-eyed reverence

  The sky

The stars

The stillness

  You’ve departed already

And we can never follow where you’ve gone

  But at the very least

In your heart

In spirit

Please

  Don’t leave us

  Don’t forget

[hrkingston]

Absolve Me

There was a time when he might have described it as a coldness, or a numbness. Some kind of void where he knew something should exist, a hole that was meant to be filled. But now, when he went to that place, that dark corner of his soul, it was everything, and it was nothing. It was not an absence of something. It wasn’t a hole. It was just nothing. Nothing existed there, and nothing was meant to.

           And he let it consume him, wash over him, embolden him for everything he needed to do.

           He knew pain. He was pain. Everywhere he went, he brought it with him. There was nothing else to him, not in a frame like this, not in a world like this.

           But the pain was not his own. He knew what it was, but he did not feel it. Nor did he feel anything besides it.

           And then, through the emptiness, he smiled. Because he was either a shadow, or he was sunshine, and today the world dictated that he be sunshine.

           His target had no idea. He had talked with them before, earning their trust, siphoning their secrets. And now that the secrets had run dry, they would be no more. There was no more use for them.

           There was no more use for them, and he had a contract to complete.

           So he met with them, seeming just as kind and congenial as ever, nothing different in his demeanor even though today was to be the last day.

           He was nothing. Not guilt. Not disappointment. Not remorse. Not pity.

           He was nothing.

           The night drew to a close, and nothing seemed strange at all as he lured them into the dark, into his dark. He had been sunshine all day long, but now, it was time for him to return to shadow.

           There was nobody else at the pier besides them, not this late at night. They looked out over the railing, his mark commenting on the fanciful way the lights of the skyscrapers reflected off the water.

           They really didn’t deserve to die, he knew in some rational space in his mind, some logical place that the nothing did not obscure. But they knew just enough. Enough to put one gang in danger. Enough to empower another.

           Enough to be worth more dead than alive.

           One gloved hand met their chin, the other drawing a deep line into their throat. The red flowed immediately, and his gloved hands avoided all of it. He had done this enough times to know how to be clean. He felt the subtle tense of the body against his chest before it went slack.

           He retracted his hands and tipped the body over the railing into the water. A few droplets of blood had pattered onto the railing, and he wiped them away with one quick swipe of a pretreated towelette.

           And then he simply walked away, back into the shadow, further into the nothing. He slipped his gloves back into his pockets along with the lightly bloodied towel and took out his phone instead. His speed dial was programmed appropriately, and it took fewer than ten seconds for him to report his completed task.

           He checked his account and found that his contractor’s end of the deal had registered as outlined. Someone must have been observing him for his kill to be confirmed so quickly. That was nice, at least. It meant he could go straight home rather than having to stop for a shakedown.

           He so preferred to go home when he was stuck in the nothing. So preferred to just go to bed and wake up the next morning like nothing had happened.

           And it was always true. Because he was nothing, and he had happened, time and time again.

           And he would keep happening, until some other, bigger, more permanent nothing came and swallowed him up.

[hrkingston]

[hrkingston]

I am so tired of being too afraid to make a change or accomplish even one small thing that will make me feel better.

But even then there is too much fear to even know where to begin or whether I ever really could do it at all.

[hrkingston]

Nonstop

While it was true that Tier Ji had taken many lives at close-range (he preferred it, honestly), there were some jobs that needed to be completed at a distance. Luckily for him, today’s task would put him at about a mid-range—he wasn’t the best sniper in the world—but there was one other factor he would have to worry about, and that was the velocity of a moving car.

           Even at night, the neon signs that lit up the various districts of Tokyo left very few areas truly swathed in shadow. His dirty blond bangs hung in his eyes as he walked down the street as casually as could be, hands stuffed in his pockets. Nobody paid him any mind, because there was nothing suspicious about him, and even had there been, it likely would have gotten lost in a city of this many people. Nights in Ikebukuro were always busy, given how famous the district was for its nightlife.

           His current client had arranged his “nest” for the evening, a room in a love motel that had been reserved specifically for him. He might have looked odd entering alone, but anyone who bothered to see him likely thought he was just meeting up with one of the hotel’s many consort androids.

           His room was on the second floor, per his request, with a window that looked out onto the street. When he got inside he locked the door and left the lights off, the neon from outside the window all he needed to ready his high-caliber handgun, and tap the touchpad by the window to make the pane open two inches. He stuck in an earpiece, then retreated far enough back in the room to be made inconsequential by shadow, and waited.

           Years and years ago, a job like this might have been easiest to pull off by shooting a car’s gas tank, but such archaic forms of power hadn’t been commercially available in cars for a long time. Cars ran on energy rather than fuel now, making them quieter and more efficient.

           Though, even if he had existed in that time, Tier wouldn’t have wanted to carry out a job that way. It was too flashy for him, especially since only one person on this job really needed to die. A gas tank from the old days might have provided a bigger and surer target, but it was also far less subtle, and could harm passers-by.

           Tier would be shooting his target straight through the car.

           The informants connected to his earpiece gave him a steady stream of information regarding the location of the car. Finally, it turned down that last street, where Tier waited with trigger ready.

           The shot went off, and the suppressor on the firearm coupled with soundproof walls and the noise outside the window kept the shot from being noticed through the slightly open window.

           The bullet went through the ceiling at a downwards diagonal from upward left to downward right, piercing his target’s aorta. The target would be dead instantly, but cars these days were smart enough to drive themselves, and if the car hadn’t been doing so already, the vehicle’s collision detection would engage an autopilot protocol and park itself safely. Either way, the car went right on driving, and likely, no one would know a man was dead until he either did or did not arrive at his destination.

           Tier retrieved the one casing that had flown from the shot, and returned his gun to its concealed position. “It’s done,” he said into his earpiece. He waited around just long enough for the kill to be confirmed by his client’s informants, and then he was cleared to leave. This was done to ensure that his client had not paid for a botched job, which Tier could agree was fair.

           The screen of his phone illuminated the soft, almost babyish features of his face in the dark room. He always insisted on at least fifty-percent of his payment before the job, with the rest to follow after. The second deposit cleared in moments, and he left the motel. He wouldn’t have been above killing a few more people to get his money, but that didn’t have to happen today.