The Ones Who Aren't Chosen

Dawn's Lament. Once More, with Feeling. Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Does anybody even notice?

Does anybody even care?

BUFFY,

The Vampyre Slayer :

Hey. You okay?

DAWN SUMMERS,

The Princess :

Yeah.

I was thinking of hitting The Books, 

do some research on The First.

It's in retreat mode now, but you're still 

gonna need to know how to fight it.

BUFFY,

The Vampyre Slayer :

Great. 

Sounds Good.

Hey, you guys?

You want to head downstairs, 

get our newest arrival up to speed?

Come on.

DAWN SUMMERS,

The Princess :

What's up?

Xander :

I'm just thinking about the girls.

It's a harsh gig being a Potential.

Just being picked out of a crowd.

Danger, Destiny.

Plus, if you act now, Death.

DAWN SUMMERS,

The Princess :

They can handle it.

Xander :

Yeah.

They're Special, no doubt.

And the amazing thing is, 

not one of them will ever know.

Not even Buffy.

DAWN SUMMERS,

The Princess :

Know what?

Xander :

How much harder it is for The Rest of Us.

DAWN SUMMERS,

The Princess :

No way. They've got the...

Xander :

Seven years, Dawn.

Working with The Slayer, seeing My Friends get

more and more powerful.

A Witch, a Demon.

Hell, I could fit Oz in my shaving kit, but come a full moon, he had a wolfy mojo not to be messed with.

Powerful.

All of them.

And I'm The Guy Who 

Fixes The Windows.

DAWN SUMMERS,

The Princess :

Well, you had that sexy army training 

for a while, and... 

and The Windows really 

did need fixing.

Xander :

I saw What You Did Last Night.

DAWN SUMMERS,

The Princess :

Yeah. I...I guess I kind of lost my head when I thought I was The Slayer.

Xander :

You thought you were all Special.

Miss Sunnydale 2003.

And the minute you found out you weren't, you handed The Crown to Amanda 

without a moment's pause.

You gave her Your Power.

DAWN SUMMERS,

The Princess :

The Power wasn't mine.

Xander :

They'll never know how tough it is, 

Dawnie, to be

The One Who isn't Chosen,

to live so near to the spotlight 

and never step in it.

But I know.

I see more than anybody realises because 

nobody's watching me.

I saw you last night.

I see you working here today.

You're not Special.

You're extraordinary.

DAWN SUMMERS,

The Princess :

Maybe that's Your Power --

Xander :

What?

DAWN SUMMERS,

The Princess :

Seeing. Knowing.

Xander :

Maybe it is.

Maybe I should get a cape.

DAWN SUMMERS,

The Princess :

A cape is good.

Xander :

Yeah.

The 7-Year Journey : The Walking Dead as Epic Myth

Glenn, 

The Forerunner :

Whoa! Not Dead! 

Come on! Come on! 

Back here! Come on! Come on! 

Nice moves there, Clint Eastwood. 

You The New Sheriff 

come riding in to clean up The  Town? 

Sheriff Rick Grimes :

Not My Intention.

Glenn, The Forerunner :

Yeah, whatever. 

Yeehaw. 

You're still a dumbass.

Glenn. 

You're Welcome. 

Sheriff Rick Grimes :

Rick. 

Thanks.

Oh no. 

The bright side: 

It'll be The Fall that kills us. 

I'm a Glass-Half-Full kind of guy. 

Abraham, 

The Father of Nations :

You know what's gonna happen, 

how This is gonna end. 

We're gonna walk out that door together. 

We Kick Shit 

and 

Eat Snakes.

That's Us.

Sasha, 

Spirit of Vengeance :

We can sit this one out. 

They need us here, anyway. 

Rick said to get ready for a fight. 

Abraham, 

The Father of Nations :

How'd I die? 

[Sighs] 

Sasha, 

Spirit of Vengance :

We were at The Beach. 

It was Before. 

Mm. You got pulled under... 

and you didn't come back up. 

I was trying to find you, but you were gone. 

And then, 

I started to drown. 

Abraham, 

The Father of Nations :

I hate The Beach. 

[Sighs] 

End of The Day in a wet suit? 

It's like you're sandblasting your nutsack every single step you take back to the car. 

[Laughs] 

[Chuckles] 

Luckily, The Seaside ain't on the agenda today. 

Just security and some road to chew. 

All right? 

So, come on.

Let's Go Help Maggie. 

Sasha, 

Spirit of Vengance :

Abraham. 

Abraham, 

The Father of Nations :

What?

Sasha,

Spirit of Vengance :

They can use us here. 

[Sighs] 

Just once, we sit one out. 

Someone Else... 

Abraham, 

The Father of Nations :

It should be Us. 

Sasha, Spirit of Vengance :

Maggie's Gotta Take Care of Maggie.

It felt Real. 

It felt Real. 

Like we lost This.

[Sighs] 

And This just started.

[Sighs, sniffles] 

Abraham, 

The Father of Nations :

C'mon. 

Sasha, 

Spirit of Vengance :

Wait.

[Sighs] 

Abraham, 

The Father of Nations :

I like the way you call bullshit.

So let me return The Favour. 

The Next Thing you're gonna tell me is that you'll go and that I can stay. 

Because I know you didn't like hearing yourself just say that, 

"Maggie's Gotta Take Care of Maggie." 

I know those words are gonna choke in your ears a good, long while and you're gonna wanna make up for even thinking that. 

Am I right? 

Sasha, 

Spirit of Female Vengeance :

Yeah. 

Abraham, 

The Father of Nations :

We lay our Big Meaties across the chopping block ahead of 

Someone Else's. 

It's always for

Someone Else. 

Both of us know, if we're gonna kick, there sure as Hell better be a point to it. 

So maybe we feel there was a-a point to all of this. 

Alpha to Omega.

Whether it's on 

The Battlefield 

or 

The Beach 

or 

Somewhere Out There Today. 

Maggie -- 

She's carrying The Future. 

Sasha, Spirit of Vengance :

You're Right. 

[Sniffles] 

I knew how This was gonna end. 

Abraham, 

The Father of Nations :

C'mon. 

Layin' your ass on the line for Someone Else, 

tearin' it to shreds for 'em -- 

You said it before. 

Oh, my, That is Living. 

[Chuckles] 

Sasha, 

Spirit of Vengance :

You're an idiot. 

Abraham, 

The Father of Nations :

I never said otherwise.

Rick: 

Do you think Sasha did that herself? 

Maggie, 

Mother of The Widow's Son: 

I don't know how, 

but I know she did. 

She gave us a chance. 

Rick :

You did. 

You made The Right Decision to come. 

Maggie :

The Decision was made a long time ago, before any of us knew each other, when we were all strangers who would have just passed each other on the street before The World ended. 

And now we mean everything to each other. 

You were in Trouble. 

You were Trapped. 

Glenn didn't know you, but he helped you. 

He put himself in Danger for you.

And that started it all -- 

From Atlanta, 

to My Daddy's Farm, 

to The Prison, to Here... 

To This Moment Now... 

Not as strangers -- 

as Family... 

Because Glenn chose to be There for you 

That Day a Long Time Ago. 

That was The Decision that changed everything. 

It started with both of you, and it just grew... 

To all of Us... 

To Sacrifice for Each Other... 

To Suffer and Stand, 

To Grieve, to Give, 

to Love, to Live... 

To Fight for Each Other. 

Glenn made The Decision, Rick. 

I was just following his lead.

Rick: 

Back at the tank, why'd you stick your neck out for me? 

Glenn, 

The Forerunner : 

Call it foolish, naive hope that if I'm ever that far up Shit Creek, somebody might do the same for me. 

Guess I'm an even bigger dumbass than you.

Well - THAT Was Unlucky... : 14,000,405 to 1

Avengers : Infinity War 
is a Film about

DEPRESSION

In a Quantum Reality, the only Universal is 

CHOICE

We CHOOSE to Go to The Moon
(and to do The Other Things),
not because they are easy, but because they are HARD...

Mightier than The Sword

"There was no other way."

- Says the man who just looked ahead into 4,000,406 Quantum Reality Potential Futures

"Even Now, We are not yet beaten - this fate is not finally  yet sealed for all eternity. N

Writers have for years tried to make some sense of the Scarlet Witch’s powers (which seem to have to do with altering probablities, or altering reality or SOMEthing – it was all really vague when Stan Lee introduced her in the pages of the X-Men and even later on when he made her an Avenger). 

During Kurt Busiek’s run on the Avengers, he clarified her powers as being a result of 

Chaos Magick :

Well, during Avengers Disassembled, Brian Michael Bendis had Doctor Strange show up to say :

CHAOS MAGICK DOES NOT EXIST...!

PRINCIPIA CHAOTICA 

By Peter Carroll 

Chaos Magic for the Pandaemeon 

In Chaos Magick, beliefs are not seen as ends in themselves, but as tools for creating desired effects. 

To fully realize this is to face a terrible freedom in which 

Nothing is True 

and 

Everything is Permitted, 

which is to say that 

Everything is Possible, 

There are no Certainties, 

and 

The Consequences Can Be Ghastly. 

Laughter seems to be the only defence against the realisation that one does not even have a real self. 

The purpose of Chaos Rituals is to create beliefs by acting as though such beliefs were True. 

In Chaos Rituals you Fake it till you Make it, to obtain the power that a belief can provide. 

Afterwards, 

if you have any sense, 

you will laugh it off, 

and seek the requisite beliefs for whatever you want to do next, 

as Chaos moves you. 

Thus Chaoism proclaims 

The Death 

and 

Rebirth of The Gods. 

Our subconscious creativity and parapsychological powers are more than adequate to create or destroy any god or self or demon or other "spritual" entity that we may choose to invest or disinvest belief in, at least for ourselves and sometimes others as well. 

The frequently awesome results attaining by creating gods by act of ritually behaving as though they exist should not lead the Chaos Magician into the abyss of attributing ultimate reality to anything.

YOUR CHOICES ARE HALF CHANCE - 
SO ARE EVERYBODY ELSE'S

That is the transcendentalist mistake, which leads to the narrowing of 

The Spectrum of The Self. 

The real awesomeness lies in the range of things we can discover ourselves capable of, 

even if we may temporarily have to believe the effects are due to something else, in order to be able to create them. 

The Gods are Dead. 

Long Live The Gods. 

Magic appeals to those with a great deal of hubris and a fertile imagination coupled with a strong suspicion that both reality and human condition have a game like quality. 

The game is open ended, and plays itself for amusement. 

Players can make up their own rules to some extent, and cheat by using parapsychology if desired. 

A magician is one who has sold his soul for the chance of participating more fully in reality. 

ONLY WHEN YOU HAVE LOST EVERYTHING

ARE YOU FREE TO DO ANYTHING

Only when Nothing is True, and the idea of a True Self is abandoned, does everything become permitted. 

There is some accuracy in the Faust myth, but he failed to take it to its logical conclusion. It takes only the acceptance of a single belief to make someone a magician. It is the meta-belief that belief is a tool for achieving effects. 

This effect is often far easier to observe in others than in oneself. It is usually quite easy to see how other people, and indeed entire cultures, are both enabled and disabled by the beliefs they hold. 

Beliefs tend to lead to activities which tend to reconfirm belief in a circle they call virtuous rather than vicious, even if the results are not amusing. 

The first stage of seeing through the game can be a shocking enlightenment that leads either to a weary cynicism or Buddhism. 

The second stage of actually applying the insight to oneself can destroy the illusion of the soul and create a magician. The realisation that belief is a tool rather than an end in itself has immense consequences if fully accepted. Within the limits set by physical possibility, and these limits are wider and more malleable than most people believe, one can make real any beliefs one chooses, including contradictionary beliefs. 

The Magician is not striving for any particular limited identity goal, rather he wants the meta-identity of being able to be anything. 

So welcome to the Kali Yuga of the Pandaemonaeon wherein nothing is true and everything is permissable. For in these post-absolutist days it is better to build upon the shifting sands than the rock which will confound you on the day it shatters. 

Philosophers have become no more than the keepers of useful sarcasms, for the secret is out that there is no secret of the universe. 

All is Chaos and evolution is going nowhere in particular. It is pure chance which rules the universe and thus, and only thus, is life good. 

We are born accidentally into a random world where only seeming causes lead to apparent effects, and very little is predetermined, thank Chaos. 

As everything is arbitrary and accidental then perhaps these words are too small and pejorative, rather we should perhaps say that life, the universe and everything is spontaneously creative and magical. 

Relishing stochastic reality we can revel exclusively in magical definitions of existence. The roads of excess may yet lead to the place of wisdom, and many indeterminate things can happen on the way to thermodynamic equilibrium. 

It is vain to seek solid ground on which to stand. Solidity is an illusion, as is the foot which stands on it, and the self which thinks it owns either is the most transparent illusion of all. 

The heavy vessels of faith are holed and sinking along with all lifeboats and ingenious rafts. 

So will you shop at the supermarket of sensation and let your consumer preferences define your true self? 

Or will you in a bold and lighthearted fashion, thieve from both for the fun of it?

For belief is a tool for achieving whatever one chooses to consider important or pleasurable, and sensation has no other purpose than sensation. 

Thus help yourself to them without paying the price. 

Sacrifice Truth for Freedom at every opportunity. 

The greatest fun, freedom and achievement lies not being yourself. 

There is little merit in simply being whomsoever you were destined to be by accident of birth and circumstance. 

Hell is the condition of having no alternatives. 

Reject then the obscenities of contrived uniformity, order and purpose. 

Turn and face the tidal wave of Chaos from which philosophers have been fleeing in terror for millennia. 

Leap in and come out surfing its crest, sporting amidst the limitless weirdness and mystery in all things, for those who reject false certainties.

 Thank Chaos we shall never exhaust it. 

Create, destroy, enjoy, IO CHAOS! --- * 

Origin: ChaosBox: Nothing is true -> all is permitted... (2:243/2)

(ll. 404-452) Again, Phoebe came to the desired embrace of Coeus.

Then the goddess through the love of the god conceived and brought forth dark-gowned Leto, always mild, kind to men and to the deathless gods, mild from the beginning, gentlest in all Olympus. Also she bare Asteria of happy name, whom Perses once led to his great house to be called his dear wife. And she conceived and bare Hecate whom Zeus the son of Cronos honoured above all. 

He gave her splendid gifts, to have a share of the earth and the unfruitful sea. She received honour also in starry heaven, and is honoured exceedingly by the deathless gods. 

For to this day, whenever any one of men on earth offers rich sacrifices and prays for favour according to custom, he calls upon Hecate. 

Great honour comes full easily to him whose prayers the goddess receives favourably, and she bestows wealth upon him; for the power surely is with her. 

For as many as were born of Earth and Ocean amongst all these she has her due portion. The son of Cronos did her no wrong nor took anything away of all that was her portion among the former Titan gods: but she holds, as the division was at the first from the beginning, privilege both in earth, and in heaven, and in sea. Also, because she is an only child, the goddess receives not less honour, but much more still, for Zeus honours her. Whom she will she greatly aids and advances: she sits by worshipful kings in judgement, and in the assembly whom she will is distinguished among the people. And when men arm themselves for the battle that destroys men, then the goddess is at hand to give victory and grant glory readily to whom she will. Good is she also when men contend at the games, for there too the goddess is with them and profits them: and he who by might and strength gets the victory wins the rich prize easily with joy, and brings glory to his parents. And she is good to stand by horsemen, whom she will: and to those whose business is in the grey discomfortable sea, and who pray to Hecate and the loud-crashing Earth-Shaker, easily the glorious goddess gives great catch, and easily she takes it away as soon as seen, if so she will. She is good in the byre with Hermes to increase the stock. The droves of kine and wide herds of goats and flocks of fleecy sheep, if she will, she increases from a few, or makes many to be less.

So, then. albeit her mother's only child, she is honoured amongst all the deathless gods. And the son of Cronos made her a nurse of the young who after that day saw with their eyes the light of all-seeing Dawn. So from The Beginning she is a nurse of the young, and these are her honours.