ozymandias

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THE VIRIDIAN FOREST

It is said that once every ten years, a child is born possessing the mysterious powers of the forest. 

In the climax of the Lance and Yellow show down on Cerise Island it’s revealed that not only is Lance also a Viridian Trainer with special abilities, he makes the bold statement that only another trainer from the Viridian Forest is capable of defeating him due to his powers. Giovanni shows up at this moment and when Yellow warns him to leave, essentially parroting Lance’s claims, Giovanni also reveals that he too is a Viridian Trainer, hence his affinity with Beedrill, a Pokémon he captured from the Forest, despite him being a ground-type specialist. 

The implication here is that Giovanni was supposed to be one of those chosen by the forest when he was born, but this is never again touched on and we never see Giovanni display any of the same preternatural abilities that Yellow and Lance have beyond a few super-human moments that could be explained away as more anime cliche than anything. There is one instance in which Giovanni was able to sense that he was being watched from a distance and managed to freeze his spy into near total paralysis with only a stare. Could this be an ability born from being a Viridian Trainer or simply an anime cliche? Again, never answered.

But as Kusaka refuses to touch on this again, then guess what I’ll do his job for him.   

With Giovanni, Lance and Yellow, we have three generations that actually line up almost perfectly with the ten year gap with only a missing fourth person that should probably fit between Giovanni and Lance. If one were to believe this ten year gap is more of a guideline and less of a strict repetition, give or take a few years then generations do fit perfectly this way.   

Giovanni was actually meant to be a chosen guardian of the forest much like Lance and Yellow, but channelling the forest’s gifts requires a certain spirituality and ability to commune with it. Yellow, having spent most of her life within those woods is possibly the strongest Viridian Trainer as a result. The reason why Giovanni lacks these gifts is that he purposely chose a more material and personal path rather than follow his calling. Thus shunning his duties and diminishing his connection with the Forest as a result.   

We also find out that Giovanni had Team Rocket exploiting the Forest’s natural resources, causing it harm in the process, something I’m quite certain that angered it enough to completely rescind whatever gifts Giovanni might have possessed.   

That said, his connection with the Forest isn’t wholly severed. No matter how Giovanni might scoff at the idea of being beholden to some ancient tree deity, there is still a primal part of his soul that feels the calling of the Forest. It’s no real secret to those around him that he often considers the Viridian Forest as a sanctuary, his real home that he often has to revisit time and time again through the years, treating these sojourns more as a pilgrimage as sorts rather than a week long hike. He often leaves the Forest feeling recharged and energized, his soul more at peace.   

Surprising no one, this is the very reason why Giovanni had his home built right next to the Viridian Forest so that his very backyard stretches into the expanse of ancient trees. After his battle with Lance and Yellow and his near death experience along with being saved by another forest guardian in the form of Celebi, Giovanni these days tends to be more devoted in the duties he’s shirked ages ago though still not quite able to wholly commit. After all, why should he when Yellow is more than capable of shouldering that responsibility?

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STRANGER‌:

Starter for @rocketbcss

Outside the hotel Jack raised her cold fingers to clasp over her mouth. Brisk wind caught in her hair and snow filtered down from the towering skyscrapers above. The street was dim from the grey cast cloud cover. It was winter at home too. Even across realities Jack couldn’t escape the cold. The hotel glowed warm and inviting. People shuffled past the door hop and into the luxurious lobby. 

There were any number of ways she could get through the door.  Last night she taught herself a new spell and she was eager to try it out. Under the layers of coat her heartstone rested against her sternum, a furnace of heat. She pulled on its magic and breathed in the sharp cold. Condensation gathered on her fingers and she bended the light around her. She waved her hand in front of a nearby passerby to check that the spell worked. 

Jack crossed the street, slipped past the bellhop and into the lobby of the building. She followed the glimmer of aura she’d been chasing. It was a man who sat at the hotel’s bar, alone. He had a different air than the people around him, all power, ambition, and hard edges. Jack dissipated her spell as she slid onto the stool next to him. She adjusted her glasses and said:

“You’re Giovanni, right?”

There should be a surge of panic through his body, some bone chilling spike of fear born from adrenaline with the knowledge that despite every precaution, someone, somehow, had managed to find him. Statistically, he's known that this was inevitable. There are so many men and women working tirelessly right now trying to hunt him down like hounds rooting through a field trying to find that ever elusive fox. And yet for so long he'd remained out of their reach, always so many steps ahead since his freedom depended on that distance. 

He's wary of course. This girl's not interpol, he still has enough eyes and ears within the system that he's knows of every individual working his case. More importantly, she simply doesn't strike him as someone who seems to follow the stringent rules set by being an officer of the law. There's too much of a free spirit to her to be interested in being tied down to a one place for very long. 

That narrows the list considerably. If she were a potential enemy then he's certain she would have made that obvious and enemies certainly don't go into the habit of small talk. Meaning, she's a girl who's looking for something -- something that Giovanni is supposed to provide. And now he’s intrigued since there’s certainly not a lot that he can offer these days save for money and information. Giovanni smiles into his glass, taking a slow pull of his scotch. 

"That depends on who's asking."

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CHILD‌:

There weren’t many things she recalled from her days in Organization thirteen. It was all a haze but the mandate: ‘do not interfere with other worlds.’ Still rang clear. It must’ve been said and emphasized often. What was she supposed to do if they already knew? This was another strange place, All the animals were unique and colorful; She thinks they called them ‘pokemon.’ They were also really cute and she wasted almost an entire day trying to hug them all. It was focus time. 

“O-oh, so you know,” Xion murmured. “You’ve seen them. I suppose then, that they’re not here?“

Xion’s hands played into the edges of her black hair. An ink like strand slipped off and around her finger. She saw black hair and pale skin but she wondered what this man saw. This man who dressed in fancy suits and kept his broad shoulders thrown back, proud, strong. He might’ve seen a boy or a different child altogether; Or her jacket hood still thrown over her head.

She paused, wait, she was being rude. “Oh, and my name’s Xion! It’s nice to meet you!”

"You would have to be living under a rock not know of the Heartless." It hadn't been so long ago when they'd come to this world like a flood of shadows, crashing into the lives of hapless men and women who knew little of what to do with such creatures that seemed to refuse to die. Shadows shouldn't be so persistent and yet it'd taken force and power to drive them away and only then this peace they enjoyed would be temporary. For such mindless creatures they knew enough to retreat to gather their numbers and to return again to overwhelm them all. 

Ask anyone and they would assume that these creatures were new, springing forth with little to no warning. Giovanni knew better. He'd known for years. He'd stood at the scattered remnants of his son's room, shards of glass crunching underfoot as he'd tried to chase after the demons that'd taken Silver away. 

It's taken years, but he has the means now. He'll chase them to the very ends of the earth, to the stars themselves if necessary, if only to have his son back. He's ready and this girl may have just given him the lead he needs. 

"Xion, an usual and pretty name." He smiles and almost thinks he sees a flash of red within those dark locks of hers. "Were you looking for the Heartless or were you up to some other mischief?"

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GIRL‌:

Starter for @rocketbcss

Leaf’s first week as Champion closed on a quiet Friday in mid-Fall. She sat on a park bench outside the offices and smoked a cigarette as crisp wind played with her jacket. Her only hope was that it’d be the worst week of her career. She lost her first fight as Champion, failed to earn the respect of her Elite Four and Gym Leaders, screwed-up a TV interview so bad that a board member yelled at her for an hour, and then earlier this afternoon made an idiot of herself in a crucial meeting. Leaf could figure out the battles, elbow her way into authority with the trainers, and heel her temper in the interviews. None of that accounted for her biggest problem, the one that stuck to the inside of her skull like glue: Giovanni. 

She still rode waves of panicked emotion from that meeting. It sunk like a torpedoed battleship in an old war documentary. She ended it early so she could lick her wounds and tend her bruised pride. Afterwards Leaf broke-down in the bathroom. All Giovanni had to do was pin her with a smug grin and her inexperience did the rest. She stuttered through her proposals and undermined her own decisions with second-thoughts.  

In theory Leaf chose her Elite Four but in practice that was not true. Leaf had the Elite Four she was given and the Elite Four gave her Giovanni. He was the darling: respected, honored, and a generous annual donor. He ran the Viridian Gym longer than she’d been alive. Meanwhile good money said she’d be gone by the end of the month. 

The crunch of fallen leaves under heel pulled her attention from her miseries. A quick glance down the path and Leaf scowled around her cigarette. 

“So, Giovanni,” Leaf grunted, “Did you win any bets?”

With how long he’s been a gym leader, a summons from the Indigo League is common enough that he’d hardly blinked when his secretary had passed him a familiar looking envelope. It happens at least once a year, twice when there’s a gifted trainer that sweeps through their ranks with all the chaotic force of a hurricane. A new champion is herald for change. It’s new blood that trickles from the very top, dripping on the lower echelons from elite four to gym leader and even further down. Truthfully, he’d been expecting such an invitation after that fateful encounter with the girl.

The change comes with no real surprise. Isolated and distanced as he is from league business and his supposed peers, he still manages to hear of the rumours whispered within the halls of every gym and every pokémon centre. It’s the worst kept secret that Agatha had long been planning on retiring and that Lorelei would be stepping down to focus on her academic career. Nor is he surprised when he’s asked once again, for the eighth year in a row, to assume one of the vacant positions.

Two decades ago, such an invitation might have come as an honour. What trainer hasn’t thought of becoming a member of the Elite Four at least once in their career. Giovanni would be lying if he said otherwise. Back when being a gym leader had been more than a front, a sleight of hand to fool a captive audience. Then he’d been pulled away by other pursuits, tugged and leashed to the ever expanding Team Rocket. What use did he have for the instability of such a position when he had his own kingdom to oversee?

It’s a safe assumption that Lance only asked as a formality, that much is obvious when the boy looks shocked when Giovanni accepts. It only snowballs from there, the great change, the great winds of that buffets all of the League. And there is the girl at the head of it, hardly the victorious champion he’d been expecting. From the first meeting and onward, all Giovanni had seen was a girl ready to tumble and fall at one more strong gust.

He waits for her, seated on a bench outside the Indigo Plateau, hardly interested in the view from so high above. Giovanni takes one look at the girl, sees the unmistakable red tinge to her eyes and his attention is back to the vast stretch of dark forest below.

“What sport would there be in betting on such sure odds?” He leans back on the bench, arms thrown over the back as though he were some simpleton caught up in the splendour of yet another mundane sunset. “I’d come all this way expecting to be challenged. At the very least to be entertained. Thus far, I’m only bored.”

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DAUGHTER‌:

This palace was once her home. Back when she was the welcomed princess found in the wilds, goddess of the moon and the soft night. Back when she was so vulnerable. How sweet and rounded she was when she played in these halls, and watched her father work with a curious eye. She curled in his arms and heard stories of glory and heroes. Then untamed nature wound like thorns around her wrists and pulled her home to the Earth she arose from. How she longed to find and break the nature limits of her father’s perfect order, just to see the universe’s true boundary. 

The small lone piece, a survivor out of hundreds and thousands. The little piece rested in the safe curve of Leaf’s fingers. She could be sweeter and kinder, fight harder for more but practicality curbed her passion. Leaf learned when to place her bets against her father and her little pawn was quite the dark horse. She placed it back on the board and allowed it to wander into the wilderness: The wounded soldier’s next testing grounds. 

“You didn’t have to do that,” Leaf murmured. “Doesn’t it get boring, playing this game all the time? Wouldn’t it be nice to step away for a day or two –maybe a few months– and just see what happens? You could take a vacation!”

“Or you could come down to Earth.” Her finger floated by the path of her new hero. “See what it’s really like.”

He leaves the table and all the violence and destruction that’d been wrought in a single moment. Where a mortal man's failure lies, soon to be swallowed by silence and dust. Bards and poets might lament on what had been lost, they might write of the fire and blood and the clattering of swords against shields. Or perhaps more likely, all this suffering and loss will be forgotten, becoming a faded memory in which only one young goddess might recall. She has a soft heart for these heroes, defiers of the gods and the laws placed upon them for the sake of order. She might recoil and chafe against his word, but in the end, she is very much her father's daughter. She might care, but these mortal men and women are still nothing but pieces spread across the great game they both play across time. 

"I know very well what the mortal world is like, Little Bird." He steps beyond the white curtains fluttering against a gentle breeze and onto a marble balcony. The first stars of the night already glitter against a darkening sky, but there remains enough light that he can still discern the world stretching far below. He thinks he can almost see smoke billowing in the distance and the orange bright glow of fire against the horizon. 

"I spent my time on Earth, marveled at it's many wonders. I walked beyond the very reaches of the oceans, from North to South and East to West. Turned over all the rocks and peered into all the nooks and crannies of the world. There wasn't much I didn't poke at when I was young." It'd been ages and ages ago, when the world had still been young and new and the first of humanity were still cave dwellers learning to harness fire. "Time passes, but very little has changed."

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MISS CALEDONIA‌:

@rocketbcss ( x )

                 The scorching sun was already doing its job above this already beaten man. It’d be a pity to just finish him like that without having some fun first;  the whole gang had already their eyes on him, and on anyone who’d pass through their route. This was their territory;  more over: HER territory.  Whoever already lived near this deserted road already knew this truth, and on under whose rules they had to live for.  But he? He wasn’t from here. He came from so far and exhausted himself to dust just to be able to reach them.

                Ashe knew very well the type: untouchable riches who’d have the world under their feet;  they didn’t need to do anything by themselves but command;  they wouldn’t dirt themselves for nothing.  It must worth it.  They grew up made to be leaders.  They grew up to be cold, to work themselves to make their empire grow bigger and bigger, when nothing else really mattered. Just themselves.  Was really this man like that?  It disgusted her to just think of it, honestly – and the guns pointed directly to his head ready to shoot him dead were the very proof of it.  The moment he said one word wrongly, he was dead.  He wasn’t anything at that point for her.

                                ‘ Should I feel honored or what? ‘   there was no way she couldn’t hide a side-mouth smile now.  So, the Deadlock Gang fame grew this big, huh?  He gained a few minutes more from her attention: props to him.    ‘ I’m assumin’ ya already have my name.  Shouldn’t I know yours before ‘nything? ‘ 

          The first prickles of chilling fear crawl along his spine and with it comes an old and familiar surge of excitement. To feel even an inkling of cold in this heat, beaten and worn down as he has being by the blistering heat of the sun, it’s enough for that wry amusement to spark a more genuine grin this time. Smiling while he’s staring down the barrel of a gun. He’s as certain as he is of his own name that even as this distance that this woman will hit her mark.

          “I suppose introductions are in order though I highly doubt you’d know who I am: Giovanni Sakaki.” He’s kept his identity far too secret for crooks slithering about in the dust out here to know who he is, but he supposes this is part of that southern charm. It’s all a polished veneer of smiles and grace while trying to hide the rusted frame beneath. It’s not unlike his own people, who are rather famed for being exceedingly polite. How amusing that he can find a connection when his people back home would scoff and sneer at the woman and her ilk. Dust covered, dirty and rough, more carrion creature than true predator, no matter the red bloodlust he spies in her burning eyes now.

          “Now that you have my name and I have yours, perhaps we can discuss business?” His life is hers now, as he’s planned since he’d set out on this journey. Let her call the shots as she wills, but he’s more than happy to plant a few suggestions. “In a more intimate and less public place, if you would prefer. As I’m aware such talks around here should be done over a bottle of Jack or something as equally potent.”

[groovybisexual]

[mirayama]

[anomalously-written]

Despite the bloody and violent history of the Mafia, their strong structure or organization can be used for a model for many other types of groups, clubs, packs, etc. 

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Boss [also known as capofamiglia, capo crimini, representante, Don or godfather], The undisputed leader of the crime family. He makes all the important decisions, much like a CEO of a company would. They are greatly respected and widely feared by their subordinates. All of the men in his outfit pay him a tribute, so he is also usually an extremely wealthy man. 

Underboss or capo bastone, is second-in-command in the hierarchy of the Mafia crime family. His level of authority varies from family to family, but he is ready to stand in for the boss at any given moment. Could be a family member, such as a son being groomed to one day take over the business.

Consigliere known as an advisor or “right-hand man,” a consigliere is a counselor to the boss of a crime family. The boss, underboss, and consigliere constitute the “Administration.” The consigliere is meant to offer unbiased information based on what he sees as best for the family. He’s not supposed to factor emotional concerns, such as retaliation and blood feuds, into his decisions. Unlike the underboss (see below), the consigliere is not required to be a direct relative of the boss.

Capo was originally known as a “capodecina” (captain of ten) because he oversaw only 10 soldiers. In more recent times, the caporegime may oversee as many soldiers as he can efficiently control. A caporegime is appointed by the family boss to run his own borgata (regime, or crew) of soldato (soldiers). Each caporegime reports directly to the underboss, who gives him the permission to perform criminal activities. If the family needs to murder someone, the underboss normally asks a caporegime to carry out the order.

Soldier Also known as a sgarrista, soldier, “button man,” “made man”, “wiseguy” or “goodfella”. This is the lowest level of mobster or gangster. A “soldier” must have taken the omertà (oath of silence), and in some organizations must have killed a person in order to be considered “made.” A picciotto is a low-level soldier, usually someone who does the day-to-day work of threatening, beating, and intimidating others.  

Associates not actual members of the Mafia but rather anyone who teams up with them on a criminal enterprise of some kind. They could be someone who does business with the mob, including money-laundering bankers, crooked cops, lawyers, politicians, drug dealers, etc. 

[x] [x] [x]

—

Rules & Customs

In order to be invited into the American Mafia and become a member one must perform a series of tasks, such as committing murder for the family and not for one’s own personal benefit. When the boss decides to let a member into the family one will be part of a ceremony, involving the drawing of blood, swearing an oath over a gun or holy picture, and obeying the rules of the organization. In New York City, the Mafia created customs and traditions which the members have to follow. If one breaks any of the rules they can be killed by another member of the family and usually the murder is committed by the people closest to that person.

“Omertà” – is the oath or “code of silence”, never talk to the authorities.

“Ethnicity” – only men of Italian descent are allowed to become full members (made men). Associates, partners, allies etc. have no ethnic limits.

“Family secrets” – members are not allowed to talk about family business to non-members.

“Blood for blood” – if a family member is killed (by another member) no one can commit murder (in revenge) until the boss gives permission.

“No fighting among members” – from fist fights to knife fights.

“Tribute” – every month; members must pay the boss; also giving the boss a cut on any side deals.

“Adultery” – members are not allowed to commit adultery with another family member’s wife.

“No facial hair” – members were not allowed to grow mustaches; part of the Mustache Pete way.

—

Xx

[friendshauna]

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[thoughtkick]

“People will show you who they are, but we ignore it because we want them to be who we want them to be.”

— Don Draper

[cosmosfated]

“Lord help anyone who stands in my way; for I am not merciful, and I am not kind, and I am not afraid to make you wish that I was.”

— say your prayers now | m.a.w (via dvoyd)

[fourthchairman-archive]

In Japanese traditional tattoo art, dragons are generous, benevolent forces that use their strength to do good for mankind.

[wehadfacesthen]

A foggy night in San Francisco, 1953, photo by Fred Lyon

[moku265]

[y0champinmaking]

始まりの時間 | すずめ [pixiv]

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