>Lurk drive failure!<
To any who know what it's like to spend forever between jobs spending all your time so focussed on the *next* job that it seems criminal to take any time away for other pursuits, you know pretty much what my life's been like lately. That said, I finally got a decent job offer... and I started writing again! Amazing how fast that turned around...
Anyway, if people are still interested, I was doing up a fanfiction of the DW2 fic, set about six months after Doug left, involving Vision, the Hou Bang, a new biotech firm based on Doug's leftover notes, a few new Sabers, and at least one or two appearances of Sailor Loon. I'm tapping happily away on the second chapter (which is now as big as the first chapter), and still trying to work out how to draw the second chapter to a close and point to the third. If people still wanna take a look, I've got it on my site. It's at www.cyberus.ca/~dragonflight/dead_bang/
Tell me what you think. I'm like every writer everywhere. I'll take criticism badly, but pretend I'm good with it.
---
Those who fear the darkness have never seen what the light can do.

Starting with the list that Bob posted on 24 March 2005, and adding in what we've seen in other stories (including a few fragments that Bob either wrote or hasn't objected to) and Bob's comments on songs from The Game Everyone Loves To Play, here's an updated (but unofficial and still incomplete) list of Doug's "Arsenal" that I put together as a reference for Blue Skies, Blue Water.
Since I did put this together as a writer's reference, copyright information is included if known.

Offensive:
99 Red Balloons (English re-write), Gabriela "Nena" Kerner, written by Kevin McAlea, copyright 1983. Creates 99 red balloons, which change into drone jet fighters and ICBMs mid-song and attack a target.
Another One Bites The Dust, Queen. Spectral (but damaging) machinegun bullets fire from his eyes.
Blinded By The Light, Bruce Springsteen. Flash/blinding attacks.
Dust in the Wind, Kansas, written by Steve Walsh and Kerry Livgren, copyright 1977 Don Kirshner Music, Inc. Disintegration.
Fire, Arthur Brown. Flame powers, including body of fire.
Fire and Ice, Pat Benatar. Flame powers along and from his right arm, ice powers from his left.
Here Comes The Sun, The Beatles. "Sunbolt" attack from his face. Good against vampires.
Lightning's Hand, Kansas. Lightning and electrical control.
Maxwell's Silver Hammer, The Beatles. Creates a "dancing" chrome hammer which he can direct from a distance.
Pinball Wizard, The Who, copyright 1969, 1993 Fabulous Music Ltd. A rather complicated set of combat-useful abilities, plus some pointless special effects, all linked together with a pinball theme.
Saturday Night's All Right (For Fighting), Elton John. Conjures knives made of solidified energy.
Stalin's Organs, GWAR. Conjures a solidified-energy Soviet BM-8 or BM-13 "Katyusha" rocket launcher.
Steam, Peter Gabriel. Superheated steam attack.
This Corrosion, Sisters of Mercy, written by Andrew Eldritch, copyright 1987 Blackwood Music, Inc.. Lets him accelerate the chemical breakdown or decay of objects in his range.
White Wedding, Billy Idol, written by Billy Idol, copyright 1982. Conjures a solidified-energy shotgun.

Defensive:
Black Hole Sun, Soundgarden, written by Chris Cornell, copyright 1994 You Make Me Sick I Make Music. Formation and control of quantum black holes as a shield against gravity attacks. Limited offensive use.
Freewill, Rush. Renders him immune to mind and emotion control attacks.
I Will Survive, Gloria Gaynor. V&V "Adaptation" power, with side effect of obnoxious self-sufficiency.
Tubthumping, Chumbawumba. Instantaneous regeneration and a "weeble" effect.

Mixed:
Another Brick in the Wall, Part 2, Pink Floyd, copyright 1979 Pink Floyd Music Publishers, Inc. Shapeable force fields with the appearance of white stone blocks.
Hazy Shade of Winter, The Bangles, written by Paul Simon, copyright 1966. Ice/cold control, including ice armor.

Transportation:
Don't Stop Me Now, Queen. Flight, with some switchable flame effects.
Fly Like An Eagle, Steve Miller Band. Transformation into giant eagle; flight in eagle form timeslips forward.
Help!, The Beatles. Teleports Warriors to him. (Planetary range, cannot cross dimensional barriers.)
Highway Star, Deep Purple. Gives Doug a rather obvious bonus when taking part in an auto race.
Homeward Bound, Simon and Garfunkel, written by Paul Simon, copyright 1966. Teleportation to his current home.
I'm A Pioneer (English re-write), Sharyn Scott, from "Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-oh-ki", written by Lorraine Feather, copyright AIC-Pioneer LDC Inc. Multimach/FTL flight with variable inertia, immunity to air friction, and vacuum support.
Little Old Lady from Pasedena. This one's a se-cr-et...
Magic Carpet Ride, Steppenwolf. Flight, by way of a solid energy "magic carpet".
Ray of Light, by Madonna, written by Madonna, William Orbit, Clive Muldoon, Dave Curtis and Christine Leach, copyright 1998 Warner Brothers Records. FTL flight via transformation into virtual tachyons.
Taxi, by Tom Chapin. Conjures a flying taxi (seats four, speed approx. 200 mph) permanently surrounded by a rain storm.
Thunder Road, Bruce Springsteen. Escape hatch.
Transport of Delight, Flanders & Swann. Summons a traditional, red, double-decker lorry. If none are in the area, it creates a simalcrum of one.

Gate:
Point of Know Return, Kansas. Opens gateway from Velgarth ("Heralds of Valdemar" fanfiction setting) to MegaTokyo ("Bubblegum Crisis" OAV alternate).
The Way, Fastball, words and music by Tony Scalzo, copyright 1998. Opens gateway from MegaTokyo ("Bubblegum Crisis" OAV alternate) to ??? (???).
Working My Way Back To You Babe, Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. Opens gateway from Lincoln Island ("Nadia" slightly-compressed alternate) to ??? (???).

Sensory/Communication:
Electric Eye, Judas Priest. Doug becomes invisible, and gains eyesight with an unlimited viewing range (i.e., as long as it's in his LOS, he can zoom up on it in microscopic detail) and supersentive directional hearing.
Eye in the Sky, Alan Parsons Project. Mass Telepathy.
I Can See For Miles, The Who. Telescopic and X-ray vision, and ability to detect lies.
Message In A Bottle, The Police. Global distress call.
Sweet Dreams, Eurythmics. Lets Doug intrude on and interact in anyone's dream for the duration of the song.
What's On Your Mind (Pure Energy), Information Society. Telepathy, by way of turning into an energy pattern that settles in the target's brain and accesses it at will.

Mind and Emotion Control:
Aquarius, the cast of the motion picture "Hair" (Milos Forman, dir., 1979), words and music by James Rado, Gerome Ragni and Galt MacDermott, copyright 1966 Rado, Ragni and MacDermott. Area effect non-violence.
Enter Sandman, Metallica. Area effect nightmares/terror.
Firing Line, Gossamer Axe, written by Gael Baudino, copyright 1990 Gael Baudino. Forces an enemy or enemies to focus their efforts on him alone.
Men in Black, Will Smith. Area effect (including Doug) "Forget".
Pressure, Billy Joel. Area effect increase of tension and anxiety (leading to tactical errors when used in combat).
Stickers on Fruit, Nancy White. Everyone in the area of effect is fanatical about nothing but stickers on fruit for the duration.
Take Me To The Pilot, Elton John. Sort of a mind-control song. Doug vanishes, and his consciousness ends up inside a single target, acting kind of like the superego.
Tainted Love, Soft Cell. Forces people to fall out of love for the duration; handy against emotion controllers of a particularly nasty (and perverted) sort.
Tom Sawyer, Rush, written by Geddy Lee, Alex Lifeson, Neil Peart, and Pye Dubois, copyright 1981 Core Music Publishing. A "don't do anything but look at me" compulsion.
Total Eclipse of the Heart, Bonnie Tyler. Area effect emotion control: despair and depression.
Under My Thumb, Rolling Stones, words and music by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, copyright 1966 Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. Mind control on a single female.

Healing and similar:
I'm Alive, Electric Light Orchestra, written by Jeff Lynne, copyright 1980 EMI-April Music, Inc. Healing.
It's All Coming Back To Me Now, Pandora's Box. Doug remembers everything he had forgotten. Then, those things he was supposed to forget would be labled as "Bad/Damaged" sectors in his mental "hard drive" and a mental SEP tagged to the whole thing so he doesn't spend time worrying about it being missing.
Twist of Fate, Olivia Newton-John, written by Stephen A. Kipner and Peter Beckett, copyright 1983 Stephen A. Kipner Music/April Music Inc./Big Stick Music Careers Music Inc. Allows Doug to contact a divine being and bargain for the resurrection of someone recently dead.

Simulacra:
AC/DC, from "Starlight Express". Summons simulacrum of Silverbolt.
On The Dark Side, John Cafferty and the Beaver Brown Band. Summons a simulacrum of Shadowwalker.
Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic, The Police. Summons a simulacrum of Ai Jiao Min.
I Live In A Split Level Head, Napoleon XIV. Summons a simulacrum of Skitz.
Magic Man, Heart. Summons simulacrum of Dwimanor.
Rhiannon, Fleetwood Mac. Summons simulacrum of Rhiannon.
Song of the Jellicles, from "Cats". Summons a simulacrum of Kat.
Witchy Woman, Eagles. Summons simulacrum of Hexe.
With A Little Help From My Friends, Joe Cocker, words and music by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, copyright 1967 Northern Songs. Summons simulacra of multiple Warriors, his choice.

Weather Control:
Konya wa Hurricane, sung by Kinuko Ohmori, words and music by Aran Tomoko, copyright 1987, 1998 Artmic, Inc. & Youmex, Inc. Creates a hurricane/tornado/twister/tropical depression, under Doug's full control, with Doug in the eye. Has side-effects in a sufficiently strong magical field...

Metasongs (Affect the operation of other songs):
I'll Play For You, Seals and Crofts. Focuses an area-effect song on a single target.
Play That Song Again, Joan Jett, Ricky Bird, & Frank Carillo. Makes Doug feel like an alienated, unloved twenty-something. If this song is played through completely, the next song (started within a half-minute) lasts twice as long in the daytime, or all night in the nighttime. The second song cannot be cancelled early.

Miscellaneous:
Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better, Ethel Merman, from "Annie Get Your Gun". Lets him return any attack which hits him with bonuses to hit and to damage.
Break On Through (To The Other Side), The Doors. Punches holes in walls. Big holes. Very forcefully.
Can't Take My Eyes Off Of You, Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. Doug keeps one person in his sight no matter what that person does, but Doug is also infatuated with that person.
Get Rich Quick, Richard ("Little Richard") Penniman. When played at a racetrack, the horse Doug bet on wins.
Good Morning, The Beatles. Gives immediate wake-up roll (plus one for each of his actions) to everyone in his area of effect.
I Can't Drive 55, Sammy Hagar. Boosts motorcycle speed above its normal maximums.
I'm So Hot For Her (And She's So Cold), Rolling Stones. Gives a woman of his choice ice powers while giving him fire powers.
In the Air Tonight, Phil Collins. If played at night, Doug recieves a premonition about a semi-random target's near-future actions. Target is someone Doug can recognize on sight, and either dislikes or outright despises.
Invisible Touch, Genesis, written by Tony Banks, Phil Collins and Mike Rutherford, copyright 1985. Lets him give a suite of telekinetic powers to a woman or girl.
Joyful, Joyful/Ode to Joy, from Beethoven's 9th Symphony. Soundtrack of "Sister Act II". Doesn't seem to do anything...
Over the Top, Miki Matsubara, from "Dirty Pair: Project E.D.E.N." Cancels out any feelings that Doug can't do something, whether natural or imposed by a mind-controller, and cranks Doug up to 11.
Spirits In the Material World, The Police, written by Sting, copyright 1981 EMI Music Publishing Ltd./Magnetic Music. Invisibility and non-corporeality.
These Dreams, Heart. Illusions.
Turn It On Again, Genesis. The closest TV set to Doug starts showing his memories of people he knows in any situation he remembers, with accompanying audio over the closest radio. The song works better when Doug's showing images of Maggie, if Maggie's not present.
We Didn't Start The Fire, Billy Joel, copyright 1989 Joel Songs. Full-immersion history lesson for the second half of Warriors' World's twentieth century.
Within You, Without You, The Beatles. V&V "Cosmic Awareness" power.

Transformations:
Eye of the Tiger, Survivor. Transformation into a Siberian tiger.
Rubber Band Man, The Spinners, written by Linda Creed/Thom Bell, copyright 1971. Gives Doug a hyper-flexible body, a la Plastic Man or Mister Fantastic.
Sledgehammer, Peter Gabriel. Full morph abilities.
Turn To Stone, ELO. Transforms him into an animated statue.

Just Plain Weird:
Bananaphone, Raffi. Conjures a cell phone in with the shape, coloration, and feel of a banana. The cell phone is edible.
Bulletproof, Blue Rodeo. Doug's power manifests in such a way that he's indistinguishable from a normal human for the duration of the song - no combat-hype, no improbability field, etc.
The Chain, by Fleetwood Mac, written by Lindsay Buckingham, Mick Fleetwood, Christine McVie, John McVie, and Stevie Nicks, copyright 1977 Gentoo Music, Inc., Now Sounds Music and Welsh Witch Music. Binding attack in the form of golden chains.
Freeze-Frame, J. Geils Band, composed by Seth Justman and Peter Wolf, copyright 1981 EMI/Capital. Limited timestop capability.
Hair, the cast of the motion picture "Hair" (Milos Forman, dir., 1979). Everyone in the area of effect grows a full head of hair, shoulder-length or longer, that obscures their eyes.
Hazy Shade of Winter, Simon and Garfunkel, written by Paul Simon, copyright 1966. Creates a patch of snow on the ground.
Hoplessly Human, Kansas. Used once to help cure Shadowwalker of her arrested vampirism.
I Am The Walrus, The Beatles. "Wand of Wonder" randomized effect.
I Will Follow Him, Chiffons (?). Unerring ability to track a male whom Doug personally likes.
Kodachrome, Paul Simon. Solidified energy 35 mm camera.
The Laughing Gnome, David Bowie. Summons/creates short gnomes that cooperate with Doug for the duration of the song.
Lucy In the Sky With Diamonds, the Beatles. Area effect drug trip.
Montage, from "Team America". Creates a time dilation effect for Doug and someone else as X weeks of training are crammed into 3 minutes. They come out of it starved and exhausted.
(Nothing But) Flowers, Talking Heads. Transforms *all* technologically-produced items in the area of effect into flowers.
Seventy-Six Trombones, from "The Music Man". Creates a full marching band that bulldozes through the area of effect.
Weird Science, Oingo Boingo. High-speed technomagic kitbashing; all the parts must be within the area of effect.

Off-Limits Songs - Do Not Use!
Everyone Has AIDS, from "Team America". Everyone in the area of effect contracts AIDS. (Off-limits for obvious reasons.)
Piece of Crap, Neil Young. Every piece of technology in the area of effect that could malfunction would have a chance of malfunctioning. (Off-limits because Doug doesn't use Neil Young's song.)

-Rob Kelk
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

(broken out of the M.Gai/FFX thread, as it ahd long devolved into video game discussion and probably lost anyone actually looking for fanfiction per the forum topic)
What if a young Harry Potter was the one to have the KH adventure, rather than Sora? I'm assuming that at the end of the game the worlds are restored the way some of the characters have said they would be, and would need to get and play KH2 before going on the superficial similarty of the bad guys standing around in black robes that have been part of the publicity pictures and the Death Eaters, but Voldilocks certainly qualifies as evil enoguh for a KH villian. But, forget this Mickey Mousing around - the King is, was and ALWAYS SHALL BE Elvis... which means the princess is Lisa marie.... which means that Donald's place is taken by MICHEAL JACKSON!? Kind of an old-school MJ from when he actually did a couple of songs I liked, mid-to-late 80sish, and because Presley-hime has him on a string young Harry is safe enoguh with him... but still. Hey, I said it was crack. Goofy could stay, though, or maybe Xander could get the shieldsman's role. The trouble of course is that a post-KH Harry would consider smacking down a hundred Dementors with the keyblade a nice warm-up and would have the standard FF-set of combat spells that are serious bad mojo by Potterverse standards, at least for good guys.

I'd kind of thgouht it would be ebst to jump into the Potterverse near the beginning, with the game as backstory that's explained where neccessary through flashbacks, Harry having been dropped on the Desiny Islands at eight or so and had a couple years to get in shape and become f4reinds with the plot-element cast, then spending a few months on the game adventure,before returning home to aworld that think's he'd never left, and not quite being sure it was real himself until Xander calls to see if their worlds really were the same, since harry had never heard of this magic stuff or demons or anything - fortunately, he managed to do it when Harry was the only one hoe, so he actually got the call, or perhaps Marge told Harry to answer the phone because she 'had her hands full' of a women's magazine.

Of course, part of the attraction of this idea is Bumblemore flipping out as Harry keeps vanishing from the castle (Lots of magical nexus points in there, where those who can see them can pull energy or in Harry's case beam up to the Gummi) and at some point bringing a huge stone temple (well not huge for a temple - maybe 120ft square at the base, assuming that the 'cockpit' piece is actually a control dome and a lower level for bunks, head, and galley - which admittedly is stretching it for a cartoon-style space ship, but meh) in for a landing instead of a Ford Anglia.

Whoa, sudden confirmation of the MJ-is-Donald thing - his music video for ... I think it was called "Stop Doggin' Me Around" has him flying in a Kingdom-model gummi as rendered in carnival ride style, at least if I rmemeber it at all accurately, and allowing for the lack of an underslung energy mount in the video.

- CDThat which does not kill us... has made its last mistake.
SERVO: Loook *deeeeply* into my eyes... Tell me, what do you see?
CROW: (hypnotized) A twisted man who wants to inflict his pain upon others.
" It's crazy to try to spell out all the mega-nooks and hyper-crannies of a Borg contrivance." - Doug Drexler
--
"Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles
woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows

I'm trying to identify one or two Harry Potter stories so that I can try to find them again. I say one or two because it MIGHT be from the same story; I'm not certain. The plot points that I remember seem to be fairly unique; at least, I only recall reading them in once.
1) Fairly powerful Harry, who's a Lord through several different lines. This gives him a number of votes that he can use to influence things. He only shows up wearing the rings for the Black and Potter lines, but has three other rings: Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin (I'm waiting for Hufflepuff to show up, really I am). He's set up a separate identity for the Ravenclaw lord, and he's also using 'elemental' bird summonings to carry messages back and forth to other lords - things like a fire owl, and an ice phoenix.
2) This MIGHT be the same story, but I can't connect the two in my head, so I'm not sure. Another powerful Harry story, where he actually exhibits traits of the Black bloodline. It has something to do with a ritual that Sirius took part in when he was named godfather, one used by wizards when they adopt children that causes them to take on characteristics of their adopted parents/bloodline. I believe the story mentioned that James Potter's hair was actually a dark brown, while Harry's is black like that of Sirius. The other characteristic of this story was a Black family ability called blackfire that they can summon. In one scene, Harry was knocked off of a broom, and actually summoned a column of the stuff to catch him/slow his fall - an amazing amount of it.
If anyone can tell me the titles of these stories, I would really appreciate it. I recall enjoying both of them, fairly recently, but can't recall the titles at all. Thanks.
Feinan

Sometime back, someone posted a description of a
character (original, I think) for a Naruto story. I know
next to nothing about Naruto, so I didn't retain any of
the setting specific information, but it went something
like this:
She's got so and so's [move], and thus and such [power]
and etc...
And to top it all off, she's stone. Bugfuck. Serial killer.
Crazy.
As I said, I know next to nothing about Naruto. Some
of my friends have started getting into it, and I'd like
to share this tidbit with them. Unfortunately, it has
either disappeared into the ether, or I'm looking in
-entirely- the wrong spots.
To make a long story short: Help?
-zerosum

When the Quicksand we call Fanfiction.net shifts thier
URL's for fanfics do they follow a pattern?
If they do and it's half way logical I'll write a program and convert the invalid links I've found to valid links.
I was about to add the 13th page of Links to my webpage when a older link caught my eye and I tried to go check on it.
The link didn't work and then I got a very familiar error for Fanfiction.net. I had a sinking feeling that was quickly confirmed by dozens of other links.
It looks like most of older Fanfiction.net links are no longer valid.
Unless someone knows of a pattern fanfiction.net follows when they change thier URL's I'm planning on deleting them from my webpage instead of trying to use the flaky search engines and the writers name to find Fanfiction.net's new URL address.
howard melton
God bless

Now, I haven't really played any of the Halo games, but I have read the Novelisations, 'The Fall of Reach' and 'First Strike' which takes place before the first game, and before the second game, respectively.
I can already tell you that this setup trips my sensitivity of nihilism.
So, I'm thinking about changing things up just a scoach. Reach is more than just a Big Ass Military Base, it's also the seat of all military research. Throw in a touch of Sliders for the science experiment that brings in our boy, only one of the lead scientists is a fellow named Dr. Emilio Lizardo.
Yeah, I know. I'm a sick puppy.
Before Emilio got what he got in the begining of Buckaroo Banzai he was a very decent fellow - had a wife and kid and all. Same applies here, only he doesn't get messed up. Ergo, he feels so terrible for the guy that he starts using his clearances to call in some help.
Of course, there were moral concerns...
"Emilio, this is a human being we're talking about here!"
"I know he is, but if we do not do this then all he will be is the largest living collection of scar tissue. Is that any sort of life for a human to live?"
"But how do you know this is the right thing to do?"
"You go in there and look in his eyes. That boy's lucky to still have at least that!"
With the interested assistance of Dr. Halsey and a few others (at this time I haven't figured out who yet) they save the poor sap by making him into the first ever full conversion cyborg.
Of course, thay had to get approval from the government, and of course, they want a return on their investment.
"Dr. Lizardo, you do realize that even with the help of the Spartans we will most likely not win this war?"
"The thought has crossed my mind."
"Then you'll understand why we are conscripting... Mr. Rhodes, was it? ...into the UNSC and assigning you and your team to a new project."
"But what about Rhodes? What do you intend to do with him?"
"Relax Dr. Lizardo. He will be your guinea pig for Project MANTICOR."
Dr. Halsey never really learns of this part... Until, that is, the Covenant arrive at Reach.
Project MANTICOR's prototype was ready for field testing (all lab tests had gone fairly well) and in a last ditch effort to keep that advanced cybertechnology out of Covenant hands, one last Pelican dropship, loaded with the Project MANTICOR prototype and key hardware rendevous with the Pillar of Autumn before her escape.
Thoughts anyone?-NeoRaven
"I became insane with long intervals of horrible sanity." -Edgar Allen Poe
Sponsored by Black Aeronaut Technologies -
Aerospace solutions for the discerning spacer.-NeoRaven

"I became insane with long intervals of horrible sanity." -Edgar Allen Poe

Sponsored by Black Aeronaut Technologies -

Aerospace solutions for the discerning spacer.

video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5206257500748953004&q=legend+of+zelda
An old Japanese commericial for The Legend of Zelda. So very very 80's.--
Oh, what has science wrought? I sought only to turn a man into a metal-encased juggernaught of destruction powered by the unknown properties of a mysterious living crystal. How could this have all gone wrong?
--
If you become a monster to put down a monster you've still got a monster running around at the end of the day and have as such not really solved the whole monster problem at all. 

Were the board's display fonts changed recently? I haven't changed anything on this end, but the text on the boards looks different. It's hard to describe, but they look kind of "light weight" to me in recent days.
Jeanne

I know we've all got at least one of these - an idea that hovers constantly at the edges of your mind, taunting you with this piece or that piece, but never stepping forward long enough or far enough to latch on to it and put it down on paper or electrons.
So, since I'm bored, I thought it might be interesting to talk to people about them.