#....apparently i have a lot of beatrice headcanons.

[no-where-new-hero]

Chapter 26: On the Bay Shore

I was dreading this day of the book club.

I do think this chapter succeeds extraordinarily well in setting up everything that Dean will be for the rest of the series. LMM's overall tone really changes with regard to Dean from book to book, but the tension of the dynamic is here from the outset. It spells romance, but with a shadow over it. Dean saves Emily's life, coded as romantic and chivalrous. Dean saves Emily's life and also immediately tries to have a claim on it that she resents. The push-pull of the scene is bewildering, and I feel as though Maud herself is finding herself almost distracted by her problematic new character.

We also cannot quite ignore the loving detail Maud gives us about his appearance: "beautiful" voice, "dreamy and attractive" eyes. "Dreamy" is only ever used as an adjective for Douglas, apart for Emily herself. Emily likes his mouth (show me a reaction to a mouth that doesn't immediately connote sensuality). She does not think him handsome like the Jane Eyre analogue that she is, but these reactions to his looks are more how she responds to Perry or Teddy than, say, to Father Cassidy the Brown Nut. Twice in one paragraph, Maud tells us Emily's likes "a flavor" about him and "that lean clever face of his." He has a connection to her beloved father and gives her the impression that she has known him for a long while, an apparently kindred spirit that will wait for her--romantic in notion, cringy to our modern ears, but also more universally symbolically troubling the more and more you realize that Emily's journey has to be, almost by definition, a solitary one.

I think part of why Maud seems to be trying to get us on Dean's side is the way that he's a character whose thoughts and reactions we're privy to (Aunt Elizabeth is the only other one): we know he "never forgot" how Emily smiled at him here (oho, the foreshadowing, Maud!). We know he knows she wants to recite her whole poem to him. He becomes, for the span of this chapter, a strangely immediate secondary main character. In other LMM novels, this kind of primacy is afforded to such important people as Gilbert Blythe. In addition, of course, is the fluency of his conversation. Maud's gift for dialogue shines through Dean, and despite the imbalance we can perceive between the lines, the relationship that evolves between Emily and Dean has a tangible realism not felt elsewhere in the novel (Alice Munro, in her afterward to the book in one of the Canadian editions, points this out). I think this is due, in some measure, to the tension between said and unsaid, between two natures that are similar but desiring two different things.

Dean is very interested in symbols and metaphors; he thinks of Emily as a fairy, a star: it's dehumanizing but, right on the heels of Aunt Nancy's vivid portrait of adult womanhood in Beatrice, such a romanticized and abstracted attitude feels safer, childlike in its fancy. It is so very nearly like the return of a Douglas analogue--except for the fact that Emily is no longer a child. The preceding few chapters have assured this for us. And Emily's own obsession with the transgressions of Beatrice start echoing onto her own desire to reach out for the aster. She, like Beatrice, overstepped. She, like Beatrice (according to Dean--though he was only joking, says Maud!), cannot get off scot-free. Again, the tension between two opposing appearances confuse our takeaway.

I will always stand behind my own hypothesis that Maud just really enjoyed writing Dean. Right before she began drafting Emily of New Moon, she wrote in her journals about wanting to write a "novel for grown up people ...a psychological portrait of one person's life" that she titled Priest Pond, and my favorite LMM headcanon is that Dean would have been the main character of this novel. He has similarities to other prominent male figures in her canon (Walter Blythe and Barney Snaith), and he's also so fully rendered in a way a lot of her supporting male characters are not, which makes me suspect she had done a bit of planning for him beforehand. I think she absolutely set him up in this conflicted way because of Emily's necessary arc, but I also think that she was interested in him on his own behalf. And I'm rather sad she never wrote that other novel, going by the complexity and layers at play in this chapter.

[violivs]

NMTDaily: A Wild Hero Appears

- It makes me a little sad that Bea tweets out this video with “meet the prettier version of me”. You’re beautiful in your own right, Beatrice, and I don’t think Hero would want you to compliment her by putting yourself down. This moment starts to show Beatrice’s insecurities, in a very teenage-girl way. It feels very accurate to that time of life for sure.

- What’s interesting, though, is that this tweet, where Bea thinks of herself as less pretty than Hero, is a direct parallel to and reversal of the moment in a future episode when Claudio tells Ben who he likes (Hero), and asks what Ben thinks of her, and Ben says he prefers her cousin, naming no names. These lines are adapted from the play. Now, I’m not going to say it’s good or ok for the guys to be comparing the girls to each other, even unintentionally, and of course Beatrice has to develop her own self-confidence outside of what anyone else thinks of her. But it is very sweet that at the time she makes that self-deprecating tweet, Beatrice already, unknown to her, has someone who looks at her before anyone else, who always thinks she’s the prettiest girl in the room. It’s just that even he doesn’t know it yet! Ben has thought Beatrice was gorgeous since long before he could admit it to himself, and that just makes me happy.

- I bet Hero’s “you’re not so bad looking yourself, Bea” is her answer to the tweet. She’s too sweet even to directly address it.

- Hero reading TFIOS is so incredibly 2014. (I can also tell she’s an actress and isn’t actually reading it right now because she’s that far into the book and she isn’t SOBBING. I’ll never forget how hard I cried and I’m not afraid to admit it.)

- “Hero it’s Darcy on a horse” being the thing to get her attention is hilarious and adorable and how many Jane Austen Movie Nights do we think she and Bea have had? Definitely some!

- Hero is adorable and we love her enthusiasm and many many video ideas 😆

- there are so many amazing quotes in this episode. “room tour. room tour. ROOM TOUR”; “I am very proud of the witty capabilities of 3-in-the-morning me” amazing.

- Bea is starting what’s essentially senior year in April at a new school. That has to be stressful. Good that she seems cheery about it. I’m sure she’s not at all worried about who else is in her classes…

- Now I want lemonade! Lol. But US lemonade for me. Research is telling me that NZ/Aotearoa lemonade is just basically lemon soda, like it is in the UK, as opposed to the US lemon juice + water + sugar situation. I hope Bea gets to try US lemonade on her travel year. It’s so good when it’s good.

- the Hersula origins! “She’s so lovely I catch myself wanting her to insult me” 💕

- Shoutout to the NMTD Fandom Revival Discord for catching the fact that Bea’s line “what is this cake even for” is a reference to the TARDIS cake Ursula shared on her tumblr, showing that Ursula and Hero surprised Bea with the cake for no reason at all, they’re just that sweet and lovely!

- A brief aside: Ursula’s tumblr has been lovely. She’s posted lots of desserts including one that she said is her dad’s specialty, so now I headcanon that she likes to bake because it’s something she and her dad do together. Ursula lore!

- Poor Meg. It’s tough to be an early bloomer, and you can tell the girls know they shouldn’t be making fun of her for it. I’m glad Hero told Bea to stop, but she was still going along with it and was the one who said the “Queen of Scream” line. We know they’ll learn, though.

- I also notice the link to Ursula’s first video in the description of this episode is now broken and goes to a page that says the video doesn’t exist. Fortunately VOX POPS is alive, well, and next in the playlist. Interesting how links break over time.

- This episode is apparently from before the characters start answering YouTube comments, I checked the comment section. That’s something I’m interested to see whether the NMTDaily emails will highlight, because I remember the characters’ comments being very fun to read! Good for immersion too!

- I’m embarrassed to even admit this, and I blame growing up without cable tv or video games, but I’m just now realizing this title is a Pokémon reference. This show was always even nerdier and more full of pop culture references than I realized! Excited to see if I find anything else I didn’t get before!

💖🥭🦩

[msmoon-and-the-cyberdemon]

I keep finding myself going through the TF2 OC tag so I’m gonna infodump on Jack Lore (Even if I’ve probably said it in previous posts) (Also comes with sketchbook drawings that don’t make sense!)

The man that operated on Jack and turned him into a vampire was actually Medic’s grandfather. I headcanon his grandpa was also interested in animals, and finding ways to mix their genes with humans.

Jack kills him- (specifically, eats him but I’ll explain later) immediately after the operation. Later on, Jack admits this to Medic, thinking Medic was gonna be mad at him. But apparently, due to his grandfather’s mysterious disappearance, his whole family had made a bet of how he died. A cousin jokingly said that he was eaten by a cannibalistic patient. Now Medic’s mad that he’s gonna win the bet, out of the whole family.

(Also, Medic’s okay with the whole Jack killing him. It’s not like he got to know him anyway.)

Now the thing about the “eating him”. Jack is seen with a pair of fangs, but the thing is he filed those fangs himself. The operation only gave him the bloodlust and extended lifespan, but no fangs. And with said bloodlust hitting him like a semi truck and nothing else to control him, Jack straight up devoured the doctor, to the point where the police who came to check couldn’t even identify the body. They thought it was just spilled organs from other animals.

Also- he’s afraid of surgeries and doctors, but overcomes it after meeting Medic.

Jack is half-English & half-Chinese! English on his father’s side and Chinese from his mother’s.

After his whole first arc, he reunites with his mother and spends the rest of her life with her, learning Mandarin from her, ‘dealing’ with robbers that try to harm them and helping out in her little grocery shop.

His mother dies later on. The only thing he remembers about it was finding her sitting near the window. It was a full moon.

From there, he continues travelling. A lot of stuff happens between that and him getting to the TFC, but it’s not really important.

It does influence how he got to be a V.I.P. in the Escort game mode in Team Fortress Classic.

He was a frequent one, and often got to see first hand what goes on, and it was exciting.

So, during one match, he actually swipes a gun from one of the teammates and “helps” them.

By the end of the match, Classic!Heavy (or Cain, my hced name for him) was pretty pissed at Jack, but everyone else was impressed enough to recruit him in.

Usual shenanigans happens.

Everyone learns about his case and are cool with it.

Him and Cain have a bit of a… fling during his time there. Which makes things awkward during the comic’s events

Jack was also close to Beatrice. They like messing with each other and even casually flirt, but in the end, they’re good friends.

After a few years in the team, Jack just- leaves out of the blue. Completely. He was let go to take care of some personal stuff, but as a result, history of him and his class was archived. Maybe to make sure nobody learns that there’s a way out of this job?

(I’ll end it here for now, but I’ll make a part 2!)

[butchhamlet]

Ok I also asked Ophelia but I also want Beatrice

BEATRICE TIMEEEEEEEEEEE HELL YEAHHHH

Sexuality Headcanon: okay i have a lot of thoughts about lesbian much ado and how that would change the gender dynamics of the play and i could in fact give a ted talk on this but in a hypothetical f/f version i think mean dyke beatrice who is so so sick of getting told about the men she should date is so legendary. god tier. alternatively i think she’s a very tired bisexual

Gender Headcanon: woman! any flavor of woman. though i will say that trans woman beatrice hits specifically different

A ship I have with said character: ...........i think benedick and beatrice can have little a rights. as a treat. (it’s the mutual respect and the fact that they both show love via banter and the enemies-to-lovers-but-they-were-never-that-seriously-enemies.)

A BROTP I have with said character: MORE CONTENT ABT BEATRICE AND HERO BEING CLOSE AND HAVING EACH OTHER’S BACKS ALL THE TIME PLEASE

A NOTP I have with said character: ...who else do ppl ship beatrice with? i mean. i guess i’ve seen people ship her with hero in which case i respect the attempt at f/f but guys they are cousins please. they are cousins i am begging. also beatrice/don pedro is bad because don pedro is a slimeball [kicking dirt at him]

A random headcanon:

modern beatrice dresses like an art hoe. overalls. denim on denim.

wears suits to formal events because “fuck gender roles” and also she looks hot in them and is aware of it

she also has a garden and she ONLY takes selfies with her plants. fuck an “angle” fuck a “filter” her qualifications for a selfie are 1. plant

whether modern or canon-era, she had a teenage phase where she was just... so argumentative... all the time... but like in a social-justice way. like she used to fight people re: women’s rights (and rightfully so). but by the time the play starts she’s just. so tired. you know the one production where she is simply such tired disaster energy. yeah

postcanon i don’t think she ever fully forgives claudio. like, even if hero does, and even if they make up, and even if they’re happy now, i think she’s always going to be a little wary of him

you know that post that’s like “in the wokest way possible beatrice is criminally and sacredly thick”

General Opinion over said character: beatrice please marry me

[kkglinka]

Gonna join in with an, apparently minority headcanon. I think fandom is literally reversing the respective character's needs when it comes to the infamous praise kink.

Any perfectionists can tell you the same thing: when you internalize that excellence is expected, being praised by authority figures becomes meaningless. We hear it as, "you have done adequately and met the minimum standards." Over time, any praise of skill becomes meaningless. This makes true, sincere, personal praise — not of skills or accomplishments, not of acquired social value — becomes dangerously impactful despite being desperately, secretly wanted.

Ava was told for twelve years that she was a useless burden, and therefore had no valuable skills or social value, but overcame what appeared to have been severe depression, rebelled against her abusive treatment, and became secure in her own worth. This is not a kind choice given to anyone with a severely limiting disability, but the alternative is, well... *points at severe depression and its common outcome*. We see this driving need to be useful borne out in how aggressively Ava acquires and implements new skills, along with all those she gained through audio-visual learning when more fully disabled. Because she still is — the halo effectively has a spoon limit.

Now, I get it! Ava visibly enjoys being praised for those accomplishments. She wriggles and bounces around like a puppy. But she's also smug, cocky, blatantly fishes for more of it and is otherwise very open about enjoying that praise. That's someone who has the balls to express open happiness and pleasure when their skill or contribution is recognized. She's equally open with her displeasure when a skill isn't recognized. It's something we're not accustomed to seeing in adults, especially adult women. So we notice it, but as many times as we see that open delight, we were not shown a sexual component. Whether mental or physical, that reaction is what makes a kink a kink. Praise Ava during an intimate moment and she'll just be insufferably smug about it. Hell, given how condescending Sister Francis was, the phrase "good girl" might kill the moment entirely.

Beatrice, on the other hand, internalized that she was unwanted, undesirable, and fundamentally unacceptable now matter how useful. She has subsumed that need for personal validation into service (because acts of service are her love language) long before the audience is introduced to her. That is someone dying to be told that she is good, and worthy, and wanted. (A praise kink does not require a d/s element, which I think a lot of fans are assuming). Praise her during a vulnerable intimate moment and you'll take her out at the knees.

[confusedspaceotter]

Daily avatrice analysis (day 5)

day1 day2 day3 day4 day5 day6 day7 day8 day9

Oh analyzing ep 8 is going to get personal because of the coming out scene 

I’ve already decided to split Ep 8 into 2 parts because there is just too much to cover 

today i’ll mainly focus on the first half of ep 8

and I’ll talk about the rest tmr

So

Ep 8

we start with the beginning of the episode where the gang is reading the warrior nun journal 

got nothing deep about the scene but I do believe part of ava is this vine:

At least I am(the way kty say Et defunctis requiem IM WEAK)

anyway moving on 

I think there are a few reasons why Ava seems so eager to proof herself here

One

As someone who was quadriplegic, she knows what it’s like to be powerless and weak, since she spent most of her life receiving help from others

Makes perfect sense she’s she will jump into action the moment she got a chance to proof to herself that she is useful 

Two

She wanted to fulfill her job/destiny as the halo bearer 

Leaning from the journal, she realized how serious this is and she is the only one that can stop it

(You know things are serious when Mary said oh shit

Third

She wanted to protect her new found family(mainly Beatrice 

“If we get rid of Duretti, we can get the OCS back together.”

Will Ep 1-5 Ava cared about the OCS?

Probably not 

This is why ep 6 is so important to Ava’s character 

She needed to see the good that OCS is doing 

And not just some high trained nuns who’s after the thing on her back

That’s why she came back to the Cat’s Cradle

To help innocent people by accepting that she IS the warrior nun now

And it’s what happening here as well

Before we get into the training scene 

Two thing i wanna point out 

One

Absolutely love the way this guard go "oh shit she’s here again she better not break my table this time"

Two

Who the fuck give permission to Ava/Alba to look this good in that leather jacket????

Since the jacket is a tad bit oversize I’m guessing that’s Mary’s?

I would like to headcanon this happened:

Ava: *visible shivers from the cold*

Mary: *yeets the jacket to ava* 

Or it could go like this as well:

Ava:*visible shivers from the cold*

Beatrice: *notices Ava shivering* Mary? Do you have a spare jacket?

(either way i love this jacket i want it)

Now moving on to the actual training scene

say it with me ava silva is not only a genius but also a comedic genius 

(we love traumatized character who use humor as a coping mechanism) 

look at how precious Ava is 

her little whoo baby girl is so proud of herself

and so is Bea apparently 

love this genre of Avatrice where Bea smiling because of Ava’s smile ughhhh

Moving on to the next training scene

we can see supportive gf Beatrice

even when Ava is panicking all she did was to remain her composure and give her clear directions on how to get out 

even though she is probably worried sick on the inside as well

If avatrice have a timeline 

here is where Bea knows she definitely cares about Ava a tad bit much 

but she still trying to convince herself is platonic and she is just doing her job by taking care of Ava

I mean do friends cup each other's faces as gently as Bea did here???

Also the way Ava eyes lingers on Bea is something so personal to me

after she rushed towards Ava the first things she does is to touch her face

physical touch is definitely an Avatrice thing

and is such a vital part of their relationship because is how they communicate with each other

is them subtly asking: "hey you good?" and answering "yeah im good"

which we will see a lot more in season 2

Here we can see bea hesitates to help Ava up/touch her

feels like Bea was so worried about Ava after she cupped her face she panicked a little 

I think she is like “oh wait that's a little fruity in it”

and that's why she retracted her hand here

imo once you repressed you emotions it doesn't just go away in an instance 

it takes time to open yourself up again

which i think she did in season 2

but for now, Bea probably still views her feelings towards Ava as something she shouldn't have

Still doesn’t stop her from calming Ava down though putting her hand on her back tho

what can I say Avatrice is endgame from the beginning 

After Jillian said that she had been able to amp up the halo’s output 

notice how Bea was gonna say something?

she look almost hopeful for a second 

like she is glad they had found a solution to their problem 

truly live up to the name “the strategist of the group”(which i just decided to call her that)

btw side note

I love how Bea talks slower compared to other characters

because she really did think it though about what she is going to say

and we can see that in scenes where the gang is grouped up together to discuss something

you can tell she is always trying to find the best solution and consider all the possible angles

compared to Ava "punch first ask questions later" Silva

Avatrice is such endgame material because they fit so well

today feels like me fangirling over avatrice then an analysis but oh well

tmr we are going to get emotional and talk about possibly my favorite coming out scene in media 

stay tuned :)

day6

[snicketstrange]

Rereading The Chapter 14 (The End)

I believed that in ASOUE's universe, chapter 14 was apparently written some time after the rest of the book. But I abandoned that idea. Lemony wrote to the editor that chapter 14 could be found at the end of the same manuscript.

We then have the epigraph of Le Voyage. It's an excerpt that portrays the moment of death, and perhaps the acceptance of death. But I don't think this means that Lemony is completely certain of the Baudelaires' death. I think it means he's pretty sure he won't write about the Baudelaires anymore. I think the right question is "why did Lemony decide to stop writing at this point in the story?" "Why did he plan to write more and then stop writing?" I think Lemony didn't promise to write the entire story of the Baudelaires. He promised to write the story of the conflict between the Baudelaires and Olaf. So when he was sure of Olaf's death, and that was only with the additional information he had probably had access to through Beatrice Jr, Lemony realized that the research might be over. The certainty of Olaf's death was the event he determined when the narrative came to an end. So, it makes us wonder what kind of promise Lemony made. Apparently he promised that he would clarify the facts surrounding the charges the Baudelaires went through, as well as the contexts in which these events took place. That's why it was so important to get this information out to the general public. Because it involved the honor of the Baudelaire family. Furthermore, this explains why he could not rely solely on the account given by the Baudelaires themselves: after all, they were being accused of being lying criminals. Lemony needed to clear their name, proving, so to speak, that the facts reported by the Baudelaires were real, and it was not enough just to record what he read in the island book.

I think this is the most sensible explanation, and as a theorist I will defend it. But as a fan willing to come up with slightly bizarre ideas, I feel like imagining Lemony realizing that his own death was close to happening. It would be interesting to imagine that Lemony's research took so long that he was an elderly man when he was publishing The End. And the reason Lemony finished his work at this point would be his physical limitations. That would explain shocking secret #13: "he's finished." And more than that: it would even explain the title of the book: "The End of Lemony Snicket". And furthermore, this would explain Lemony's dedication to Beatrice in chapter 14. After quoting the words of Charles B., in which the poet compares the hour of death with the setting off of a ship, Lemony claims that both he and Beatrice are like boats sailing at night, but especially her. Both were on a dark and lonely journey, but she was already dead. "

Beatrice's last words recorded in the book were really emotional to me when I first read them, and they still are today. Especially after I watched the Netflix series, it's now possible to imagine a very specific face when I picture Beatrice. And it's possible to think of a specific soundtrack when I read this.

About the baby's name, on my Headcanon Violet is the name of Mrs. W, who was presumed dead around the same time as Lemony. And in my Headcanon, just as Lemony didn't really die, she didn't either. I still like to think that she was the mystery woman on TGG, and that's the real reason Quigley used the name Violet in the message he sent to submarine Q.

I think this is the first time I stop to think that the Baudelaires ate crab. This is unclean food for those who practice Judaism as a religion, isn't it? I even thought the roast lamb was a reference to the Passover celebration, but they wouldn't do that by eating crab. Or is it that in a book in which Daniel Handler implicitly criticizes religion, he did so on purpose? I think it's unlikely, but still possible. But, albeit unintentionally, the Baudelaires rejected the religious customs of their ancestors in a book in which religious customs are questioned and this is significant.

"The baby had heard about danger, too, mostly from the register of crimes, follies, and misfortunes of mankind from which the Baudelaires read out loud each evening, although they had not told the infant the whole story. She did not know all of the Baudelaires' secrets, and indeed there were some she would never know."

The above excerpt is important as it reveals that Lemony has information about Beatrice Jr's future as he was writing this chapter. This explains how Lemony knows what happened in this chapter: Beatrice Jr told him. Lemony did meet her, and he realized that the Baudelaires hadn't told her the whole story.

A detail that has always pleased me in this book is to notice that after 1 year, Sunny stopped babbling words and has a more conventional and extensive vocabulary. I find this compatible with the fact that 1 year has passed and it's also compatible with her character development arc. One of asoue's themes is "how some children are forced to mature too quickly because of tragedy". Sunny, for example, needed to learn how to cook and convince herself that she loved doing it and that she was good at it in a few days. And all this before she learned to speak English properly. She needed to help with a birth long before she fully understood issues related to human procreation. But in chapter 14, she finally had the opportunity to develop without tragedies forcing her to skip important steps in life.

"Do we take this?" Violet asked, holding up the book from which she had read out loud.

"I don't think so," Klaus said. "Perhaps another castaway will arrive, and continue the history."

"In any case," Sunny said, "they'll have something to read."

Please realize how important this dialogue is. Daniel Handler placed this dialogue here to make sure the reader understood the source of information Lemony had access to: the island book. The children wrote about their own story in that book, including their thoughts, feelings, and private conversations. The children shared some details about ancient events, about when Sunny wasn't even born. In the book, Lemony found details about some events that took place on the island before the arrival of the three Baudelaires.

"I want to make sure these life jackets I've designed will fit properly."

Well... It's good to know that, even though the boat sank, the Baudelaires had lifeboats. Their chances of survival really increased a lot. And knowing that Beatrice Jr managed to survive a shipwreck, it's quite possible that they did too.

The Baudelaires watched her approach, wondering what the next chapter in this infant's life would be, and indeed that is difficult to say. There are some who say that the Baudelaires rejoined V.F.D. and are engaged in brave errands to this day, perhaps under different names to avoid being captured. There are others who say that they perished at sea, although rumors of one's death crop up are often revealed to be untrue. But in any case, as my investigation is over, we have indeed reached the last chapter of the Baudelaires' story, even if the Baudelaires had not.

Lemony just reports here what he heard. Although Daniel Handler intentionally wishes the ending to be left open, and I will respect his decision, I will speak my opinion. They didn't die at sea, though. Note that Lemony directly relates the baby's future to the future of the three Baudelaires. The way Lemony wrote here suggests that the baby's future is as uncertain as the future of her adoptive parents. But we TBL readers know the truth about Beatrice Jr.'s future. Beatrice is alive! So the most likely situation is that her parents are also alive. ( And who knows other characters that we thought had died there on TBB... could it be that at least one of them could also have survived?)

But the question is: if Lemony knows the baby survived, why did he hide this information from the reader? Certainly to protect his niece. Lemony didn't lie, just omitted some details.

The baby paused, and looked at the back of the boat, where the nameplate had been affixed. She had no way of knowing this, of course, but the nameplate had been nailed to the back of the boat by a person standing on the very spot she was standing—at least as far as my research has shown.

Lemony once again dismantled specific knowledge through research, which could only have been done through information provided by others. Beatrice Jr needed to tell Lemony exactly where she was at that moment and Lemony needed to compare that with the information Beatrice Sr and Bertrand wrote in the island book. And then, on visiting the site, Lemony was able to ascertain the most likely position for those descriptions. While Lemony is a bit mistaken, the research process must have been like that.

Finally, she uttered a word. The Baudelaire orphans gasped when they heard it, but they could not say for sure whether she was reading the word out loud or merely stating her own name, and indeed they never learned this. Perhaps this last word was the baby's first secret, joining the secrets the Baudelaires were keeping from the baby, and all the other secrets immersed in the world. Perhaps it is better not to know what was meant by this word, as some things are better left in the great unknown. There are some words, of course, that are better left unsaid—but not, I believe, the word uttered by my niece, a word which here means that the story is over. Beatrice.

Oh... How I love this ending. That's when I felt my head explode for the first time in my life, and I'm still picking up the pieces.

[ramblings-of-a-mad-cat]

HPHM Amortentia Scent Headcanons

Or as I like to put it, “Scentcanons!” ...I’ll show myself out. 

No but for real, I had an anon asking about this, so let’s dive in!

The question here is what would each character smell in Amortentia vs what another person would smell if they fancied said character. There are also certain characters who we have confirmed from canon. Finally, I’d like to clarify that I don’t think of Amortentia scents being exclusive to who one is attracted to romantically, just that it can go that way. I don’t want to get too deep into shipping, so any loved ones that turn up as scents probably aren’t going to be romantic interests. 

Rowan - We know they smell of parchment, ink, and lumber. As for what they would smell, I think we can safely assume they’d smell old books, tree sap, and probably Fuzzclaw? Speaking as someone who’s grown up with cats, they do have a unique and not unpleasant smell to them. Everything that reminds Rowan of home, and of what they love.

Ben - Someone who had feelings for Ben would probably smell the scent of dust, or if we want to be more poetic, petrichor. Yeah, I like that. It makes sense given how much he hides and sneaks around. As for Ben himself, I feel like he would be drawn to the scent of safer things. At least Pre-Portrait Vault. I’ve seen clean sheets, mint leaves/mint soap, and hot chocolate used as examples before, and all of them agree with me. 

Penny - I can imagine someone would smell whatever her perfume/conditioner is. Let’s go with honeydew, that kinda suits her.  Head-canons for what Penny herself would smell are the metallic scent of a Cauldron, the wildflowers from Kew Gardens (where she’s said her family visits) and also Beatrice’s hair. Come on, Bea is the person she loves the most, easily. 

Merula - Another canon confirmation, Merula smells of nail polish, cloves, and something “elusive.” (The MC/Merula hints continue, I swear to god.) As for what Merula herself would pick up on, I feel like it would be scents that are attractive, but also painful, if that makes sense? To suit her prickly nature. Stuff like smoke and soot, as well as poison ivy. On top of that, maybe something softer to counter-balance it, like pumpkin pie? 

Bill - I feel like Bill would smell of leather. Let me explain. While he’s usually depicted in a variation on his school uniform, we know from Harry’s description that he was “cool.” In HPHM, he doesn’t have the earring yet, but he does have the long hair. I feel like he’d smell of leather. As for Bill himself, gonna go with scents that remind him of home. Stuff like Molly’s cooking, his father’s jumper, even the gnomes out back. 

Andre - He totally wears perfume, he is the type. There are just certain characters (Penny is another) where you just know that’s a thing they do. So whatever type he wears, that’s what the Andre fans pick up on. For Andre himself? I’m gonna go with the scent of a sewing machine, as well as a broom shed, and maybe something that reminds him of his family, since he seems to be close with them. 

Tulip - As for Tulip’s scent, this is going to go full on fanon, and I’m going to say she smells like cherries. Because apparently when the writers were designing her wand, it was going to be made of cherry wood and be a family heirloom. I still think Sycamore suits her better, but I love that idea. As for the scents Tulip would find attractive, I’m going to go with ones that carry a hint of danger. Candle wax, for example, is always close to a fire. The scent of dungbombs feels like a given. If anyone likes it, Tulip would. Finally, I’m gonna go with pond water, because of Dennis.

Tonks - Anyone who fancies Tonks is probably going to pick up on the scent of Zonko’s. That is where she spends most of her time and does all her shopping, after all. As for what she would smell? I’m gonna say maybe a Wizarding candy, like Fizzing Whizbees. The packaging on something like a Fanged Frisbee. And even Filch’s office, because she has cherished memories of practicing mischief there.

Barnaby - Canon time, we know Barnaby smells like sandalwood and fresh laundry, which is just adorable. But I feel as though Barnaby would be drawn to the scent of the flowers and trees from the Reserve, as well as the old, dusty and musty smell of the Dueling Club. For a third scent I think I’ll go with the smell of Hagrid’s Hut. This is totally a head-canon, but I think they become very close friends. 

Ismelda - Well, this one is awkward. The game loves to make jokes about how she smells bad, but maybe to someone who’s in love with her, the scent would be nice? As odd as that sounds. Otherwise, who knows. She had to have cleaned up pretty nice for the Celestial Ball, right? As for Ismelda herself, this one is tricky. But like Merula, I think she’d be drawn to scents that have more of an edge. Fresh ink comes to mind, and perhaps burnt toast. Other than that? I’m not sure.

Charlie - This one also has canon to back it up, Charlie smells like honeysuckle and grass. As for what he would smell in Amortentia...okay, let's get the obvious out of the way right now. Whatever dragons smell like, that’s going to be one of his scents. Because I don’t care what canon says, he works with dragons in the Reserve. He just does. Other than that, I feel like maybe the metallic scent of a Snitch, because we know he��s a Seeker, and maybe the thistles of trees in the Forbidden Forest? He’s said to hang out there.

Liz - I’m pretty sure she’s supposed to smell like lake-water and hay? I cannot find the screenshots, but her scent was also confirmed by Care of Magical Creatures. In any case, Liz is a fairly straight-forward character to get a handle on. Her smells from Amortentia are mulch, (don’t judge her) as well as a Porlock’s fur, and the scent of vegetables. She’s an outdoorsy sort of girl and similar to Newt Scamander, seems to get along better with other creatures than humans.

Chiara - In terms of what someone would smell, I’d have to go with moonflowers. I know it’s the obvious choice, but how can I resist? As for Chiara herself, I’m going to go with fresh soil, hospital sheets, and dog fur. Reflecting her interests in Herbology and Healing, and also representing the sweetest baby to ever exist, Borf. I’ve seen head-canons that she would smell Wolfsbane potion, but it’s supposed to taste disgusting, so I doubt it.

Talbott - Likewise, I think it’s pretty clear that someone would smell the scent of bird feathers if they fancied Talbott. If that’s too cliche, go with whatever product he puts in his hair, since it’s always slicked back. As for what Talbott smells, I’d go with the scent of hay from the Owlery, maybe the quills that he writes his notes with, and finally the scent of his mother, or her necklace. Could be the same, at least as far as he remembers.

Jae - Anyone who fancies Jae is going to pick up his scent, so probably the scent of the Hogwarts Kitchens, since that’s where he spends most of his time. For Jae, okay...money has a unique scent. It just does. And he deals with it a lot, doing what he loves. So I’m gonna say the scent of galleons, turkey sandwiches, and maybe something with more of an edge, like Firewhiskey. Come on, we all know he’s tried it before.

Badeea - She’s a character I don’t know nearly as well, though I’d like to rectify that. I’m torn between saying that the scent of paint would be what someone else smells if they fancy her, or if it would be something that she herself smells because she loves painting. No reason it couldn’t be both. Other than that, she gives me the feeling that she’s someone who would be really into incense and various spices, like maybe sage. So it’s all chemicals with Badeea...make of that what you will.

Diego - I also don’t know him well enough to judge, but I am certain that he’s the type to wear cologne, so whatever it is that he’s wearing is what the Diego fans would pick up on. As for Diego himself, I’m gonna say the resin of a dance floor, the scent of denim (he wears a lot of it) and probably the smell of flowers? He does make a few casanova style lines about enjoying them. And not just the hellebore. 

Skye - No clue what Skye’s scent would be. Probably something strong Citrus. As for what she picks up on, gonna go with the scent of quaffles, ground coffee, and maybe the streets of Wigtown. I just feel like she doesn’t have much of a life outside of Quidditch and her legacy and has kind of turned herself into a machine to fulfil that life goal, without focusing on anything else. 

Murphy - Murphy smells like linen. Don’t ask me why, I just know that this is true. I can just feel it. It suits him. As to what Murphy himself picks up on, among other things he smells Kneazle fur, the wood of a chessboard, and the scent of chalk. I mean come on, this one one of the easier characters to figure out, give me a hard one. 

Orion - Someone who fancied Orion would seriously pick up on the scent of his hair, because that is some glorious hair. Orion himself would probably smell Jasmine Tea, Quidditch Grass, and the scent of sea salt. I’m not sure why exactly, but he’s a character who I’ve actually thought about this for before, and I think these scents are mystical enough but also give the suggestion of an overall healthy balance.

Rath - This is a case like Ismelda, where I don’t think anyone ever gets close enough to smell her, but more out of fear than the idea that she might smell unpleasant. But I feel like she smells like ginger. As for what she would pick up from Amortentia, the metallic scent of a bludger, as well as perhaps the scent of new robes, and maybe broomstick polish? Similar to Skye, I’m not sure. Not because she has no life outside of Quidditch, but we have no idea what it entails if she does.

Beatrice - I feel like anyone who fancied Beatrice (We are not getting into the debate of who that might be) would probably pick up the smell of her makeup? Because she wears a lot of it now, seemingly every day. As for what she would pick up on herself? I’m gonna say the scent of puffskeins, since she seems to be a fan of them and have one of her own. As well as the scent of the library, but specifically the Restricted Section, because I feel like she regularly breaks in. Finally, hmm...maybe something to do with home? Perhaps a fresh baked pie that her parents made? Just throwing out ideas. 

Covered as many characters as I could think of, and there were only so many scents that occurred to me, aha. I hope this helps though, anon!

[paladinwife]

ya didnt have to call me out like that man- GSHSGSJKJGJ but uh all 50 for goober :> (beatrice-santello)

@beatrice-santello​ @of-saints-and-demons​ oh god here comes Goober

1. Does your F/O have a birthmark? (or any type of freckles or beauty marks?)

None that are visible! She might have some on her body under the clothes, but none that we know about in canon. I headcanon that she has a couple of moles on her torso.

2. Is your F/O the type to volunteer to their community? 

Judging by her past, which she spent fighting to protect her community, she does in her own way. She’d probably keep doing it as well, were she not trapped as an AI in the Corporation.

3. Does your F/O the type to be giving or to take?

Ignoring what I thought this question meant as first she’s more selfless than you’d think. There’s a reason she’s kind of a hero figure in the Back Streets. Even now, her anger is over the dangerousness of the anomalies and her inability to protect people. I’d say she’s more of a giving person.

4. Does your F/O have any battle scars?

There’s a couple very visible on her face. Most likely there’s some on her body as well that you just can’t see because of the bodysuit.

5. Does your F/O wear make up? (Do you think they would be open to wearing makeup if they don’t wear it daily?) 

I don’t think she does, mostly because she sees it as a waste of time. The fact that she’d look great is beside the point.

6. Has your F/O ever dye their hair or worn a wig?

She hasn’t. She probably sees that as a waste of time too, but her natural hair is gorgeous either way.

7. What is your F/O fashion taste?

Sleek and maybe a bit edgy, with lots of black and red. Especially considering her signature longcoat.

8. How tall is your F/O?

Taaaall. She’s taller than every other sephirah in the game. If she’s not six feet tall, she’s pretty close.

9. What is your F/O’s blood type?

In her present form, she doesn’t have blood. Which is a really ominous statement out of context. Even when she did, I have no idea what her blood type would be.

10. When is your F/O birthday?

She doesn’t have a canon birthday, but I think sometime in late October to early November. She’s probably a Scorpio.

11. Does your F/O know how to cook? If so are they good at it?

She’s an okay cook, I think. She’s not amazing at it, but she can get by.

12. What is your F/O favorite flavor?  (sweet, sour, bitter, salty and umami (savory))

It isn’t listed here, but she probably prefers spicy food over anything else, and I mean very spicy. If she’s not in actual pain, it’s not enough.

13. If your F/O could be a fan of any video game what do you think it would be?

For some reason I like the idea of her just being unfairly good at Smash. She can and will crush you. Her main is probably Ganon or something similar, heavy on offense.

14. What type of aesthetic does you F/O have?

Reeeeed. She has a clear theming color, and I feel like her aesthetic involves it a lot. Red and slightly edgy.

15. What color is your F/O eyes?

They’re a golden color. Sometimes in fanart she’s portrayed as heterochromatic because of her damaged eye.

16. Does your F/O have any tattoos? If not do they like or hate the concept of tattoos? 

She doesn’t have any in canon, but I feel like she could get behind the idea. She’d probably get something in memory of her fallen comrades, as a reminder of what she’s here for and what’s at stake.

17. If you could matching tattoos what would it be?

Hmm, some kind of matching symbol to remind of us everything we’ve been through. Potentially one another’s weapons?

18. Does your F/O have any piercings?

I don’t think she does. She doesn’t hate the aesthetic, but depending on where they are they might be risky in battle, so she might not get any.

19. Is your F/O a cake or pie person?

Oooh, hard. I don’t think she’s crazy about sweets, but she’d prefer pie.

20. Is your F/O a morning or night person?

More of a night owl, I’d say. She’s just used to getting most of her work done at night, and it’s a hard habit to break.

21. Is your F/O a coffee or tea person?

Definitely a coffee person. It’s more readily available at the Corporation, and she prefers the taste. She takes hers black.

22. Is your F/O half empty or half full type of person?

She’s more of a pessimist and can maybe be a bit bitter at times. Hard to blame her, considering everything she’s gone through.

23. Does your F/O have a pet? If not in canon what do you think they would have if given the chance? 

I don’t think she has one in canon, due to the peculiarities of working for the Corporation. In a AU I could see her going for a big dog, or maybe a cat.

24. Is your F/O the type to want to live in the city or live out in the country? 

She’s lived in the city all her life and is used to it, but I don’t think she’d mind the space when it comes to living in the country.

25. Does your F/O like to swim?

I’m not sure she ever has, but (assuming she’s not in robot form) I could see her enjoying it. Helps keep her strong and all.

26. What harry potter house would your F/O be in? (Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin)

She’s a pretty clear shoe in for Gryffindor, especially considering her past.

27. If your F/O was in “avatar: the last air bender” what type of bender would they be? (air, water, earth, and fire) 

Honestly if her design didn’t already scream firebender, the fiery personality sure does.

28. Is your F/O LGBT+? 

It seems to be a pretty popular idea in the fandom that she’s some kind of wlw. I personally like to see her as bi like me.

29. Does your F/O have any artistic hobbies? (Knitting, drawing, painting, etc)

I don’t think she’s ever tried any, and she’d probably say something about just not being meant for that. Still, I wonder if she’d enjoy it if she ever did get the chance to try. Maybe just as stress relief.

30. What’s a piece of clothing your F/O is never seen without? (glasses, a necklace, hat, etc)

Her design changed as a sephirah, but that long coat she wore before was so iconic. When it comes to accessories though, she tends to keep things light.

31. What type of scent does your F/O remind you of?

Maybe some kind of warm, smokey scent. I mean I know she’s portrayed smoking a lot but maybe some kind of nice bonfire smell?

32. What’s something you see often that has little to no relation to your F/O but always reminds you of them?

She’s never used one in canon, but I could see her appreciating a good knife. Just like swords, which I absolutely do associate with her.

33. Do you have any silly nicknames or pet names for your F/O?

Goober. She probably hates that one. I’m also pretty generous with pet names, which embarrass her if they’re done in front of others, but she kinda likes them when it’s just us.

34. What does your F/O house/apartment look like? (or what do you think it looks like)

I think she’s just fine with a smaller space, just a small apartment is fine. She keeps it pretty organized, not minimalist by any means but she keeps it nice and clean.

35. What season reminds you of your F/O? (winter, spring, summer, fall)

Honestly, fall. Not just because of the colors, but I could see her liking it best.

36. Have you ever had a dream with your F/O in it?

Recently she has started appearing in my dreams. Confusingly Binah (who I’m not considering at all) was also there?

37. Does your F/O play any musical instruments?

I honestly doubt she’s ever had the chance to try, so she has no idea how. Her learning to play a saxophone though, hmm...

38. What’s a song that reminds you of your F/O when you hear?

For her as a character and not in a romantic way, Firestarter by the Prodigy. It definitely has the right heavy feel, and the fire imagery is always good for her.

Also, low key, Together Again by Janet Jackson came on earlier today, and it had me thinking about my ship with her.

39. What is your relationship like with your F/O?

Actually, really close. I’m one of the few people she feels like she can trust, and really she needs me around. I’m the only one she can lean on, and while she knows sometimes she doesn’t know how to handle emotional things, she’ll repay the debt by doing everything she can to protect me.

40. How long have you been with your F/O? (or at least been interested in them?)

I only just added her to the list in the past few days, but I’ve been thinking about her for slightly longer. Still, it hasn’t been very long.

41. Where is your F/O from? (as in born)

She’s from the Back Streets, which is a slum kind of area which is apparently pretty dangerous to live in. I’m also not sure what the city from Lobotomy Corporation is called, but it’s some kind of metropolitan area. 

42. Is your F/O the type to read reviews, or just go with their gut

She definitely goes with her gut, just as a general rule. After all, her gut is all she has.

43. What does your F/O’s Saturdays usually look like?

God, a much needed break. Get some coffee, maybe get a workout in, not have to deal with the bullshit from the Corporation. Maybe have some time with me. (This is, of course, unless she just has to work on Saturdays anyway, but god I want her to have a break.)

44. What is your F/O’s most valuable possession?

It’s probably a memento from her time in the Back Streets. Something small, but she’s still pretty fiercely protective of it. In some ways, it’s a reminder of what she’s lost.

45. What’s a fad you can see your F/O taking part of?

Honestly the thought of her taking part in any fad is really funny. The closest thing I can think of is her trying crossfit or something along those lines (and even then, something tells me she wouldn’t be impressed).

46. does your F/O prefer to work alone or with a team?

You know, I feel like it’s really easy to assume she prefers to work alone, especially with how she acts in game, but I think she misses having a team of people she could really trust. I feel like she likes to work with a team, but it has to be the right team.

47. How well does your F/O know tech? (such as computers, smart phones)

She has some exposure to tech, but mostly in a Corporation setting. So some things she’s pretty used to handling, but others she has no idea what to do with.

48. What’s some advice your F/O would tell you?

My first thought was she would tell me to hold on to what I believe in. I think in many ways she’s ashamed of not being able to protect others and the situation she’s currently in, so that’s what she wants to say the most.

49. What animal reminds you of your F/O?

I know she’s been compared to various kinds of big cats before, but maybe a bear? Like for both the vicious reputation and the protectiveness.

50. What color reminds you of your F/O?

Well, considering how strong the color theming is, it feels wrong to say anything but red.

51. What’s the most interesting fact you know about your F/O?

So we’re limited in how much we know about her in canon, so my fact might be kind of lame. But while she’s usually depicted wielding Mimicry (Nothing There’s weapon), she uses many more than that in her Sephirah Meltdown. They include, from what I remember, weapons from Spider Bud, Burrowing Heaven, Silent Orchestra, Apocalypse Bird, One Sin and Hundreds of Good Deeds, Mountain of Smiling Bodies, King of Greed, and Judgment Bird. In fact, I’m pretty sure she touches on most of the aleph-class weapons. Of those, my favorite one that she wields is Twilight (from Apocalypse Bird).

[mementomcriis]

´   ･   .   ✶   ⧼   maya   hawke,   demiwoman,   she   &   her   &   they   &   them   /   girl   with   one   eye   by   florence   and   the   machine   +   the   soft,   white   noise   crackle   of   an   ancient   vhs   tape,   aging   newspaper   clippings   and   yellowed   family   photographs   pinned   to   a   corkboard   and   connected   with   a   distinct   red   string,   and   the   cloying,   all   consuming   smell   of   lavender   and   sage   ⧽   ━━   don’t   look   now,   but   that’s   SIDNEY   AMELIA   KNOX-KHAN.   the   twenty   two   year   old   HUMAN   has   been   here   in   seattle   for   their   whole   life,   and   is   a   FILM   STUDENT   &   VIDEO   STORE   CLERK.   they’ve   always   been   IRREPRESIBLE   &   IRON   WILLED,   but   i   guess   this   town   just   brings   out   the   worst   in   people   ;   apparently,   they’ve   been   way   more   CONTRARIAN   &   VOCIFEROUS   than   usual.   it   wouldn’t   surprise   me   if   they   knew   what   was   going   on.   you   can   check   out   their   stat   page   HERE.

       i   wish   that   i   could   say   that   i   am   a   LIGHT   that   never   goes   out   /                           BUT   I   FLICKER   FROM   time   TO   time.

section one of three : bullet point history trigger warnings for talk of murder

sidney was born here in seattle, washington. her mother was BEATRICE KHAN, a fairly well known name in the publishing world ( though she never released any of her own countless numbers of novels ), absolutely unrelenting when it came to cutting her clients a good deal. her father was julian knox, a one time american football player who PEAKED in college and turned to writing romance novels after a career ending injury forced him to confront that he wasn’t much qualified for anything else. the family unit that they created was full of love and ever nurturing - perfect, from the inside to the out.

they were the quintessential all american family, where it COUNTED. parents that were sickeningly in love. two kids, with the perfect age difference between them. they lived in a house in the suburbs with a picket fence ( that was actually stained brown, not white ) and a perfect lawn, where the cat they had in place of a dog due to julian’s allergies would lounge, day after day. even the neighbours figured they were perfect ; the kind of thing with with all smiles, to their faces, and muttered darkly in the privacy of their own suburban homes. beatrice would go to work from eight to five, every day. julian would stay home. he got the kids their breakfast, he got them on a bus. he would go inside and write and break up the day with gardening or do it yourself projects, attending community meetings, fulfilling his pta role - and then his kids would come home, and dinner would be on the table in time for his wife’s return. perfect. clockwork. 

sidney loved it, personally. she had no desire to act out. no need to break the mold, so to speak. she never felt as if she were stifled, or that her parents were pushing their own ambitions onto her. if anything, the thing that was most shocking about her early life was that she actually ENJOYED it. school could be challenging, in it’s own way - she was diagnosed with dyslexia young, but it took a few more years for them to pinpoint her adhd - but she got all the help that she could have dreamt of needing. she was allowed, if not encouraged, to try every whim that came to mind. they were, after all, within a privileged position enough to ALLOW it. piano lessons for two years, the violin for five. she attempted gymnastics and managed to break her wrist just two lessons in - never bothered to try another more physical activity, after that, but she had a healthy appreciation for watching sports, just like dad. her home life was excellent. her school life was just fine. she was a BRIGHT and curious soul, and she had aspirations for the kind of college that should she have attended, her mother could have lived VICARIOUSLY through her. she was extremely lucky to like her parents, and to appreciate the life that they had given her for all that it was.

she shouldn’t have to look back on these earlier years with sadness, and yet, life simply doesn’t work the way that it SHOULD. the week before the murders, she never could have presumed what was going to happen, though she was plagued by nightmares - something that she attributed to the horror movie marathon she had just completed or the milk drank before bed, and not to anything legitimate. she dreamt of hooded figures and serrated knives and a screaming that never stopped ringing in her ears, even after she awoke in a cold sweat and struggled to fall back asleep. she would struggle from the tangle of bedsheets with the urge to wash her hands, compulsively ; as if she were trying to get non-existent blood out from beneath her fingernails. she was fifteen years old, and she googled things like ‘can my period give me nightmares?’ and ‘is the milk before bed thing legit’, but she had NO REASON to fear the images that slipped away, as night turned into day. 

it seems cruel, in it’s own way, that the night which changed the course of sidney’s life for good is one she spent completely unaware. she was staying at her girlfriends house - a sleepover planned for almost a MONTH - and the next morning, when the police came to pick her up, she had been in the midst of eating breakfast with the affectionately named ‘in laws’ and trying to swallow back a persistent feeling of unease. she was lucky that she was waiting for a lift back to her house - she was luckier, still, that a nosy neighbour had noticed her mother’s car hadn’t left for work, yet, and popped around to check in on them. if they hadn’t, and if she had gotten the early morning bus as planned, then sidney would have had to live with image of her bloodied parents until the day she DIED, too.

her mom and dad were gone. this was the gut punch, number one. number two was that her sibling - her should have been legal guardian - was under arrest. the MURDER weapon ( a phrase she had only ever heard on tv, and could never have guessed would be said in regards to her life ) had been found wrapped in one of their jackets and thrown in a dumpster outside. they had been picked up a block away, and in interrogation, their alibi didn’t stand up. it was a rather cut & dry case, and suddenly, everyone in the neighbourhood - what felt like the whole world, back then - was doing their level best to pick sidney’s picture perfect life apart. people who had once only ever had good things to say now talked about late night arguments between mom and dad. said that they had never trusted the look of her sibling, not even when they were a kid. said there was something not right about them - and that they couldn’t be sure sidney wasn’t the same. the circumstantial evidence piled against the only member of family that sid had left, and there was nothing that could be done. she was put into the system a mere week after the murders, and everything moved quickly on. she talked to a handful of reporters, but for the most part, people out in the world didn’t care for the story. it wasn’t anything too SPECIAL, she supposed. 

too many stories talk of foster care becoming a sort of hell for the children stuck in it. for sidney, however, her foster home was her only salvation from the world outside her door. the one thing that she could rely on, even as she went through the most momentous changes. her first week back at school, the staring was almost painful. the whispers were worse. sidney requested she be moved, and in the process, she allowed herself be cut off from her old life - the friends she had, the partner she had loved. she started somewhere new, and she was... different, now. stranger. sidney’s way of dealing with all that had happened was to cling to things that had once only been a special interest - UNSOLVED crimes, sensationalist stories, horror movies and the supernatural. she spent a lot of time in her room, and she spent even more indulging in these new interests. the people at her new school figured that she was weird, and that assumption only got worse when they discovered what had happened to her parents. whispers of her being like her MURDEROUS sibling were somehow worse than anything else that had ever been said, but she took it, for the most part, on the chin. she couldn’t explain her sudden draw to the macabre, even less than she could explain why everything in her life had fallen apart. frankly.... it didn’t matter. she simply was.

sidney’s foster family supported her, right up until she turned eighteen, and even after. she sacrificed the dream of an ivy league school for something more achievable, beginning to attend a seattle local college after graduation and majoring in film, finding among those students - OLDER and more mature, of course, than high school kids - something she had started to forget was possible. her job as a film store clerk didn’t exactly help her rake in the cash, but once she started selling movie reviews to online publications, sidney was able to save up some money and buy professional equipment - beginning her podcast in late 2018. she doesn’t tend to talk about what happened. she doesn’t tend to think about her SIBLING. she’s got a life, now, and it’s not exactly the one she ever expected to be living - but it is her own, and that’s really all that she can hope for. 

section two of three : headcanons

sidney dealt with her grief by… hyper fixating on a special interest she had always sort of had, and becoming quite the little movie buff. horror movies, more than anything, but people didn’t react very well when she went off on a tangent over wes craven’s talent, so she broadened her horizons a little. she enjoys film, maybe moreso than she should. all that led her to other special interests, and now she’s dabbled in just about everything that a woman can. 

her podcast deals, of course, with unsolved mysteries. this usually takes the form of unsolved CRIMES, but... she believes in ghosts and aliens, and she throws an episode in every now and then that deals with them. she’s very open about this side gig, solely because she hopes that someday, it’ll be what she does for a living - and because there’s no point in attempting to hide something that’s such a huge part of her life, even if people do tend to... not enjoy her being so into these things, as the daughter of two murder victims.

her older sibling was acquitted of the crime - eventually. sidney still doesn’t enjoy thinking about them or it, per say, but when the news reached her, she did begin to... hyper fixate, once again, and begin to obsess over what the TRUTH was. she has cork theory board dedicated solely to her parents - and more recently has added another one, dedicated to what’s happening in seattle. she’s not gifted, or in the know, but she’s certainly not an idiot.

has a pet rat named church ( which is a fairly ironic reference to the cat in pet sematary ), and he’s NOT her first. she’s owned several since she was put into care, and they’ve always been something of an emotional support for her. 

while i align sidney more with ‘conspiracy theories’ and ‘true crime’ than i do ghosts and ghouls, i will admit that i tend to push a lot of spooky cliche’s onto her, because i like having a character who’s very IN TOUCH and into that season, in particular. promise i’m trying to control the impulses.

always has on at least five necklaces and eight rings, and never has any less than ten bracelets. her style would be hard to define, but the amount of cheap jewelry is FAIRLY indicative. 

section three of three : wanted connections

sidney knox-khan, our maya hawke is looking for their older sibling who resembles finn cole, tiera skovbye, dacre montgomery / up to player and should be 23+. applicants do not have to contact rachel to talk over details before applying.   (   pls allow me preface with the fact that i wld be happy for her sibling to be half / adopted / fostered either, and they don’t necessarily have to be named after a horror character like sid was - though the latter is a fun lil thing abt the family, so i would love if u went that route too ! sid and her sib have had. a rough life. and by that i mean, they had an entirely perfect life up until the sib was aged 18 - when they were arrested for the murder of their well to do parents. it’s all explained more clearly within sid’s intro, and basically… the evidence was circumstantial and flimsy. it probably would have made sense they spend SOME time behind bars, but it’s also possible they didn’t -  though sid was put into care for the remainder of her teens, so may not know they were ever released ! the two very distinct routes this could go in are …. sid being suspicious of them and feeling as if they must of done it, because who else could have, or alternatively - sid being open to the idea of them not, because nothing about the case ever sat right w her. we could talk more abt it, but i feel like it’s one of those connects i just. wld love to have !  )

sidney knox-khan, our maya hawke is looking for their foster family ( parents, siblings, etc ) who resemble ariela barer, iman meskini, madchen amick, santiago segura, herman tommeraas, bradley cooper / up to player and should be any age. applicants do not have to contact rachel to talk over details before applying.   (   sid never took their name, so first up - that’s a detail open to applicants ! basically. there’s a mother, a father, and their merry band of foster kids - probably… four… five? a nice amount. none of them have to be like one another. none of them have to fit a specific role. this is the family that took sidney in after her parents were murdered, and the fact of the matter is - there are a LOT of stories in which foster care became a hell for the protagonist, but that’s not sid’s story. she was ostracized in school. she had lost her only blood relations. her foster home became a safe haven, and the people within it became as close as could be to her. we stan one supportive household who still hold her whole heart, to this day.   )

sidney knox-khan, our maya hawke is looking for their close friends ( max. four ) who resemble virginia gardner, justice smith, sydney park / up to player and should be 21+. applicants do not have to contact rachel to talk over details before applying.   (   sid didn’t have ANY friends until she got to college, due completely to how #weird people began to find her. she eventually found her squad, but they’re basically. like every good horror movie group. her equivalent would be rany meeks from scream 1996, or noah foster from scream tv. she fits their archetype, but i wouldn’t say that the group MUST comprise of likeminded people. in fact, it’s more fun if they don’t. they’re not a group of jocks or cheerleaders or popular kids, but they are a sort of breakfast club. a merry band of b-listers who grouped together and have remained together for a real long time.   )

sidney knox-khan, our maya hawke is looking for their ex poly ship who resemble up to player and should be 21+. applicants do not have to contact rachel to talk over details before applying.   (   sidney made a bunch of… not entirely excellent choices, in the yrs following her parents deaths. that isn’t to say she acted out, or that she did anything that was too out of character for her. she really didn’t - but she did become a much more WEIRD version of who she had always been, and people pushed her away because of it. when others came along that seemed to be able tolerate who she had become, she clung to them - to almost extreme degrees. the relationship was a whirlwind if ever there was one, and perhaps wasn’t ‘true love’. maybe not even close. but they did seem to work right up until when they didn’t - and the end was quite messy, by all standards. sid did a good job of ending relationships on friendly terms, but this didn’t - all details aside from these are open for discussion !   )

[ghostofbambifanfiction]

For the ask game--002 for Lily Evans?

How I feel about this character: Like she’s occupied a piece of my soul for half my life and if that piece was suddenly carved out, I’d feel a little empty in a way that I couldn’t realistically compare to any other loss I’ve sustained.

All the people I ship romantically with this character: James Potter

My non-romantic OTP for this character: Lily/Beatrice

My unpopular opinion about this character: Apparently it’s an unpopular opinion to believe that she respected James as intelligent, capable equal rather than belittling him like a baby all the time

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon: It would have been nice if she’d lived.

my OTP: Jily, of course!

my cross over ship: Don’t have one!

a headcanon fact: I mention in a lot of my fics that yellow roses are her favourite flowers. They make her feel cheerful.

[infcrtunii]

Hello, ladies and gentlemen, I’m here to provide you with a quick overview of my raccoon, Masked Deuce. 

has the color palette of a forest [ at least i think so? ]

called a fashion disaster by several and apparently enjoys being half naked

what the hell did he eat when he was younger he’s tall as hell

loyal. like a dog. but he bites

hahah romance? he’s got a dead girlfriend called Beatrice except that, it’s a lie. he just doesn't want romance

or so he says

writes. and writes. and writes. 

very fancy handwriting by the way

the black sheep despite his colorful appearance

embodiment of misfortune

all animals hate him -some hiss, others leave, a few threaten him -except like three

a jerk simply because it’s fun

but got a really nice, considerate heart

dramatic, extra and edgy

drinks his RESPECT WOMEN JUICE everyday

if he likes you, you’re allowed to run your fingers through his messy mane

he’s got the energy of a child and only needs 30 minutes of naps to recover

doesn’t sleep much, speaking of which. wakes up at the slightest of noises

superstitious as fuck

loves knives and constantly carries around 13 of them

doctor, strategist, crafter, writer, what else do you want in a man? he’s perfect

but got the personality of trash

ugly scars on face -that’s why he wears a mask. his big bro did those

pastel hair color it’s bc of an illness passed on by mom. the rest [ his dad, mom, and big brother ] have darker blue hair. but don't tell him that

hates white but dresses in white since it’s the medical outfit. in my headcanons he comes from a white city [ literally ]. havE I MENTIONED THE CREW HE BELONGS TO IS CALLED WHITEBEARD PIRATES!?!? also his favorite jelly [ aka @jcllyfisn​ <3 ] has a dog called Stephan. and he’S WHITE TOO najsbajfsd

smirks a lot ;)

constantly angry too

roses are aesthetic as fuck

if you save his life he’s gonna be your loyal dog. will die for you

real name is unknown. will rather die than tell you

his dad and older brother are ‘prodigies’. deuce hates them

big appetite

can’t die because the plot says so

that’s it, folks. thank you for coming to my ted talk

[hananabee]

2) I'd be a nonclique, but occasionally hang with the Greasers and Nerds. Mostly I keep to myself and stay in my room all day playing video games or watching tv. I also like to people watch, and casually observe everyone doing their thing (Russell's headbutting a locker, Gary's scheming and dragging Pete along, Beatrice is sighing dreamily at Jimmy). I'd also tutor ppl who need it, and bc I'm apparently a great listener everyone, even ppl I don't know comes to me when they have problems to vent

Okay so this was a long one and I’m an idiot and left my laptop at work.. I think??? So I have to use my phone so bare with me. I’m sure there’s a better way to have done this.. anywho! Here was the full description!

If youre still doing Bully matchups, can I get one? I’m a bi INTP Scorpio Ravenclaw and have a huge but sweet service dog. I’m curvy, v pale, and wear glasses. I love learning about everything from amusement park history to criminology! Im very chill and am a bit distant to strangers but once I know you I open up. My mom’s a former teacher/librarian and I like Ms. Phillips & Galloway. I also like Gary despite my better judgment and LOVE Russell to pieces. I love Fallout and Law & Order too! I’d be a nonclique, but occasionally hang with the Greasers and Nerds. Mostly I keep to myself and stay in my room all day playing video games or watching tv. I also like to people watch, and casually observe everyone doing their thing (Russell’s headbutting a locker, Gary’s scheming and dragging Pete along, Beatrice is sighing dreamily at Jimmy). I’d also tutor ppl who need it, and bc I’m apparently a great listener everyone, even ppl I don’t know comes to me when they have problems to vent I honestly don’t know what relationship would be good for me. I’ve only ever been in 3 my whole life and they were all short. I wouldn’t want anyone clingy, tho. I usually don’t like PDA (I flinch when MY MOM hugs me sometimes, its not a trust thing; I’m just rarely in the mood for affection. If Gary ever asked me out I’d be skeptical that it was genuine but I’d go along just to see what he was up to. I have anxiety, and I usually assume a guy/girl asking me out is pranking me or smth

This may be an off the wall here, but I could totally see you and Edgar being one of the most adorable things ever. If you’ve read my Edgar headcanons then you already know his love for dogs and I totally think that he’d be that boyfriend who politely (or rudely bc why the fuck not) tell people your service baby is working and should be left alone. He’d love your thirst for knowledge too, like, yes tell him more about Coney Island pls. Oh, you’re reading about Charles Manson?? Spooky, tell me more. Being with you makes him feel less stupid, even though he isn’t stupid but I mean. I definitely see the two of you fighting over who gets to play the game as well. Edgar was talk you into making a joint character on New Vegas and would distract you so you would die just so he could play. He’s a sneaky lil snake let me tell you. He really loves how you’ll go from not saying anything and watching tv to dropping everything to let Clint cry on your shoulder sometimes. He’s the momabear of the townies and having an extra set of ears takes a lot off of his shoulders. He just genuinely loves you and loves being around you. It’s the most functional disfunctional relationship in Bulworth and it’s perfect. 💚

[darkmasterofcupcakes]

I posted 2,772 times in 2021

860 posts created (31%)

1912 posts reblogged (69%)

For every post I created, I reblogged 2.2 posts.

I added 3,140 tags in 2021

#she ra - 480 posts

#ducktales 1987 - 418 posts

#dt87 liveblog - 413 posts

#ducktales 2017 - 337 posts

#glimmer - 315 posts

#glimbow - 285 posts

#glow - 282 posts

#bow - 269 posts

#otp: i always trust you - 217 posts

#funny - 124 posts

Longest Tag: 86 characters

#either out of ignorance or kinda just being sort of awful at that point in their lives

My Top Posts in 2021

#5

Just imagining Drake seeing Gandra kissing Fenton when he’s in the Gizmoduck armor...and then him later going to Fenton and telling him that he thinks Gandra’s cheating on him.... with Launchpad. Gandra is told about this later, and doesn’t even try to correct Drake, because she’s too busy laughing. 

75 notes • Posted 2021-04-01 14:16:35 GMT

#4

I don’t know what’s more entertaining: Beatrice and Greg just casually discussing leaving Wirt, Greg seeming to seriously consider it, or Wirt apparently just completely ignoring the conversation happening less than two feet away from him.

Also, I noticed that the Frog (Wirt Jr. for now) is glaring at Beatrice here. Apparently he doesn’t trust her any more than the person he’s named after does. 

75 notes • Posted 2021-11-20 04:57:10 GMT

#3

Yet more of Greg’s adorable innocent little kid logic. He grabs his huge ax and instead of actually trying to hit the giant monster with the blade....he just keeps “spanking” it with the wooden handle, despite that basically doing nothing but mildly annoying it. 

80 notes • Posted 2021-11-16 19:28:57 GMT

#2

Gotta love Greg’s innocence. This guy is talking to them in a sinister voice about something that he only calls “The Beast”, and when he hears that The Beast would be looking for people like him and his brother....he immediately assumes that The Beast would be trying to help them. 

80 notes • Posted 2021-11-14 18:51:10 GMT

#1

Headcanon/Theory: Bentina Beakley DID have a daughter and a son-in-law who died, possibly right around the time she found Webby and took her in. They may have even been planning to have children before they died, and one of the names they mentioned liking for a girl was Webbigail. So Beakley gave the baby she rescued the name that her daughter and son-in-law wanted to give their own child - because in a lot of ways, Beakley thought of the baby as the child they never got to have.

103 notes • Posted 2021-03-19 16:26:56 GMT

Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →

[beatrice-lestrange]

You saw NATASHA LIU BORDIZZO in London recently? It was actually BEATRICE LESTRANGE née MACMILLAN, the two share a resemblance. Apparently SHE is FOCUSED and LOYAL but can also be MISGUIDED and SELF-SERVING. They are TWENTY-FOUR and attended DURMSTRANG. The PUREBLOOD works as a JUNIOR UNSPEAKABLE for the DEPARTMENT OF MYSTERIES, lives in LONDON and is affiliated with NEITHER SIDE. (pat, 21+, pst, she/her).

the dark side of the moon, the indentation left by a wedding ring, vials of silver memories, scent of cologne, a mourning veil

[ content warning: blood, death, murder ]

Full Name: Beatrice An Lestrange née Macmillan - Beatrice was eager to take the name Lestrange, upon leaving school and officially marrying Marius. The match had been planned for a decade and a half to Marius Lestrange, from the French line of the family and distant cousin to the more infamous Rodolphus and Rabastan. While the name Beatrice might be a mouthful, only Marius was allowed to give her nicknames.

FC: Natasha Liu Bordizzo

Age: 24

School: Durmstrang Institute

House: I’m basing Durmstrang houses from on this headcanon! Beatrice eventually chose to study under the College of Theory. While her prospects didn’t require her to actively work, that didn’t mean she could go through this life uneducated. Had she been asked while she was in school, she would have answered that she intended to be an arithmancer, despite her father’s hope she would become a potioneer.

Country of Origin: Sweden. She’s fluent in Swedish, French, and English, and knows a little of German and Russian as required for her coursework (though this has been forgotten once she had left school). Her mother is fluent in Mandarin, but she didn’t pick it up. 

Current Place of Residence: Diagon Alley. She’s stuck at the Leaky Cauldron for now, trying to make arrangements for herself (though mostly trying to see if the long dead and imprisoned part of Marius’s family had better accommodations). Little does she know that the name Lestrange has some baggage with people around these parts, especially with a very unfortunate similarity of her name to a particularly loyal Death Eater. To her dismay, she may fare better with muggleborns--those who weren’t around with stories of those distant cousins. 

Please list any canon relatives:

Father: Ernie Macmillan

Mother: Chang An, cousin of Cho Chang, whose family resides in Sweden

Career: Right now, Beatrice has a job with the Department of Mysteries. However, she’s never been one you could call career-minded, so it may be more apt to talk about her abilities as opposed to her plans: 

Remote viewing - the practice of seeking impressions about a distant or unseen target. Beatrice had never cared much for using divination to see in the future--how could she, when there was no future without Marius? She has to prepare to do any sort of clairvoyant work and there's a fairly significant degree of ritual required. Beatrice needs to form a connection with an object, not in the soul/Horcrux sense, but definitely similar as far as the magical energies imbibed in that object. If she places that specific object in a location, then she can access "connection" so long as that object isn't destroyed. (For example, if she does her ritual with a picture frame, and she gives that picture frame to a friend, she can "access" that connection.) Beatrice isn’t able to "multitask", she can't hold conversation and "access" a connection at the same time; she's got to stay perfectly still and focused, in a meditative state.

Astral projection (or astral travel) is a term used in esotericism to describe an intentional out-of-body experience that assumes the existence of a soul or consciousness called an "astral body" that is separate from the physical body and capable of travelling outside it throughout the universe. A part of her interest in astral projection is a result of some of the sleep paralysis she suffers from after Marius died. Her body appears dead when she does astral projection; she's cold, there's no heartbeat, etc. and her body can't be moved otherwise she can't go back. Beatrice is definitely limited in how long she can astral project for, but this gets longer with practice (but up to an hour) and also depends on the environment too! The "colder" her environment is, the longer her physical body can stay that way; if done during a new moon or eclipse, she can go for longer (given than she’s done her rituals when the moon was full). 

Legilimency and Occlumency. Aside from having a telepathic connection to Marius, her sister-in-law had a certain penchant for memory charms, which led her to study this form of magic. Since her priorities have changed, Beatrice is a bit out of practice. This doesn’t mean she has forgotten how, but she’s selective about when she has to make the effort. 

Affiliation: Neutral, but she can go either way. I think that the factor that will push her one way or another is the information each group can offer as far as expanding her magical abilities. Her choice will be less about morals and more about resourcefulness. And regardless of which group she joins, she certainly has a lot to share, or perhaps even utilize as a possible spy, so there’s definitely value in having her around… for the right price. 

Significant Other: None. Her husband, Marius Lestrange, was murdered about a year ago, on their fifth anniversary. It would definitely take a special sort of person to convince her to move on, and she’s not particularly keen on the idea. 

Sexuality: Beatrice would identify as bisexual, though she doesn’t think it’s very important, not when she had been betrothed for so long, and especially not when she planned to live her life as a dutiful wife.

Any HC’s: See Labyrinthos for moon phase meanings.

Last Quarter - to cleanse and forgive. Ernie Macmillan’s life postwar involved a lot of travelling--especially in want of new knowledge of potioneering--was his means of recovering after the Second Wizarding War. As one of the Sacred Twenty-Eight, his family was well-acquainted with friends across the continent to help Ernie with his travels, finally meeting a branch of the Changs in Sweden. It was then that the scars of the Second War had truly begun to fade. Their connections and high ranking among wizarding societies had allowed them to travel frequently after they had married, though Beatrice had been born in Sweden. 

Solar Eclipse - a rebirth, a release from past cycles. Beatrice was raised differently than either of her parents had been, mainly in the travel between the family homes between both countries. Perhaps that was why she never really noticed how the Second Wizarding War affected her family; she had never stayed in Britain enough to notice what it was like to rebuild. She had been taught to behave, treating everyone with kindness and respect regardless of blood purity--but only in theory and less in practice. It was rarely that she had gone anywhere without some sort of chaperone to lead her to the proper places for someone like her to be. 

New Moon - to plan ahead. Both of her parents relied on the support systems of old family friends, which they had many across the globe by the virtue of old money and name recognition. And despite the Lestrange family’s infamy in the UK, their distant cousins in France still held a fair amount of wealth and respect from their allomancy business. As soon as the Lestrange family had offered to them an eligible bachelor, Beatrice had been promised. Not because it would contribute to her safety, but because the match had a significant effect on her present and future happiness. 

First Quarter - to take the first step. She and Marius were close friends from when they met, already entertaining the idea of marriage and playing at domesticity before their families had arranged the match. Beatrice often stayed with the Lestranges and learned how to be a proper lady with her soon-to-be sister-in-law, Vivienne. 

Waxing Crescent - to plant seeds. As much as she wanted to attend Beauxbatons with her future in-laws, her mother insisted that she would receive a much greater depth of education at Durmstrang. But for as progressive as the magical world had become in the last three decades, Durmstrang hadn’t changed much. While the school had begun to accept muggleborns, her course of study was limited because she was female. But that didn’t make learning the theory of spellcasting and forbidden magicks any less interesting--and she certainly gained a foundation in the Dark Arts. 

Waxing Gibbous - to make improvements and finalize a plan. Marius was a few years older than she was, though most of his time after he finished school involved visiting the Nordic regions often to see his future bride--and making wedding arrangements with her while she was still in school. Their wedding took place a week after she had finished her studies at Durmstrang, though she had been eager to have the ceremony as soon as she had come of age a year prior. Beatrice lived in a smaller house in France, not far from the original manor where she spent her time. Marius was only the second son of the Lestranges, so his share of fortune had been carefully parcelled out when he had been an infant--and Beatrice didn’t care much (considering she had some fortune of her own to inherit), so long as she had Marius. 

Full Moon - to celebrate achievement. Their life together was idyllic; they both focused further on their courses of study. Marius saw Beatrice as more than just a housewife; she was his equal. The two of them were trained Legilimens and Occlumens, often reading each other’s minds for practice. They tread into the realm of the Dark Arts more out of fascination for the possibilities it held. Marius worked with fiendfyre and Beatrice delved into clairvoyance and divination--particularly the kind that required a sacrifice. For how secretive they had been, perhaps someone had much more sinister intentions for the pair because of their work. 

Lunar Eclipse - a sudden change, a deep transformation. [content warning: blood, death, murder] During a celebration for their fifth anniversary, Beatrice woke to find herself covered in Marius’s blood and his body cold beside hers. The Lestrange family was helpful; Beatrice was family, they had known her for years, and the Macmillans and Changs were nothing less than respectable; there was no possibility she would have murdered Marius. The investigation is still open and Beatrice was still a suspect, but the family’s protection couldn’t extend outside of the house where the news spread fast and her reputation burned like the fiendfyre Marius tried to control. 

Waning Crescent - to rest and recuperate. She took what she had left from Marius and went to the United Kingdom where her father’s family lived. While she does feel more of an affinity for Sweden, having spent her formative years in the Scandanavian region while attending Durmstrang, it seemed a better idea to become reacquainted with family and to establish roots in a place that held very little memory to her. She didn’t want to go to a home that no longer felt like home, though little was she aware of the legacy her husband’s family had left behind.

Waning Gibbous - to look inwards. Beatrice found a position where her theoretical knowledge could turn into practical results: the Department of Mysteries. It was there she had found the resources to properly focus her magic. While she was busy actually working now, that didn’t mean she didn’t have her projects at home. She delved further into the Dark Arts for her own edification, but she longed to see Marius again, whether in flesh or in spirit. The memories in her pensieve were no longer enough. She was determined to do whatever it takes.

[snicketstrange]

Rereading The End Chapter 13

Chapter 13: From the moment the Baudelaire teeth bit down on the apple—first Violet's, and then Klaus's, and then Sunny's—the stalks and caps of the Medusoid Mycelium began to shrink, and within moments all traces of the dreaded mushroom had withered away, and the children could breathe clearly and easily. The hybrid apple almost instantly cures the disease caused by the deadly fungus MM. This leads me to the conclusion that Kit's death was unnecessary. Kit could have been saved if the moment Beatrice Jr had her umbilical cord cut, she ate an apple. I don't know why Violet didn't even think about it, even if it didn't work out, I think it would be good for someone to have mentioned the possibility of saving Kit. "Stockpot," Sunny said, and walked to the rack of pots on the ceiling, where the snake helped her take down an enormous metal pot that could hold a great number of apples and in fact had been used to make an enormous vat of applesauce a number of years previously." This passage makes me even more certain that Lemony had read the island book, for how else would he know that precisely that cauldron was the same one that had been used to make a particular dessert years before? Certainly he read the island book and was able to compare information previously written in the book with the new information written by the Baudelaires. "Who was playing the violin in the candlelit restaurant when the Baudelaire parents first laid eyes on one another..." This description bothers me a lot. This seems to indicate that Bertrand and Beatrice met for the first time in a restaurant, however, I believed that one of the people cited by Lemony as B in the VFD school on TBL in Lemony's childhood was Bertrand. But to think that Bertrand Baudelaire first met Beatrice a few years after she met Lemony makes more sense given that Lemony apparently didn't trust Bertrand very much. In ATWQ, the way S. talks to Lemony about Bertrand seems to indicate that Lemony didn't know Bertrand personally or at least wasn't intimate with him. Ish suggests that all islanders leave the island after being poisoned. I always imagined that Ish actually believed he could save everyone by getting to the factory that produced the poison's thinner. But rereading the chapter today, I realized that his plan was to let everyone die. Those people had failed to produce a peaceful community, and he himself had failed as a facilitator. As I said, Olaf had triumphed. Ish apparently acknowledged his defeat. But for some reason, this motivated him to let everyone die except himself. And just as some cult leaders led all the faithful to commit collective suicide by making them believe that this was the way to achieve salvation, Ish also made his faithful commit collective suicide. The deadly MM fungus wouldn't spread across the world, and Ish knew it. He would make sure everyone was dead before they reached shore.  I'm sorry for Friday... Ish has become a child killer. Friday chose to die rather than withdraw from her family's religious sect even though she was smart enough to realize that her decision would result in her own death. Daniel Handler makes the dangerous message in Ish's words very clear: "Your mother is right, Friday," Ishmael said firmly. "You should respect your parent's wishes."  This time it wasn't a suggestion: it was something Ish said Friday should do. Ish didn't want to lose any of his faithful. Ish knew that apples could heal the island people, because he had read about it in the island book. He ate the apple himself to save himself. He really decided to kill the entire colony. And everyone followed him blindly to death. But did they survive through the apple that Ink brought to them? I truly believe Daniel Handler inserted that hope here just to lessen how dark the story was. He left that question unanswered. Lemony Snicket doesn't know if they died or not. But I'm pretty sure Daniel Handler knows they're dead. People refused to eat the apple, even when they were poisoned, even with the arguments of the Baudelaires. Why would they change their minds when a serpent that doesn't speak came to the vessel? Ish didn't want people to eat the apple, he wanted them to die. Do you really think Ish would let one of the islanders eat the apple when the snake arrived? Also, how much time did the islanders have before they passed out from lack of air? The Baudelaires were infected at the same time and had almost no strength... So, in a few minutes the chance of saving the islanders through a single apple brought by a mute animal would become close to zero, considering that the only person who would still be awake and with strength would be Ish himself, who evidently didn't want anyone to eat the apple. Now let's talk about Kit again. "How reliable is Snicket a narrator?" I think this question is asked many times and there are still people who will defend one side or the other of the issue. However now I realized that maybe we were asking the right question about the wrong Snicket. Kit Snicket needs to be re-evaluated with regard to her narration being trustworthy or not. It is true that the certainty of death often makes a person very trustworthy. But there's an important detail about this: Kit wasn't sure she was going to die. Kit believed that survival was possible, precisely because the cure was so close to her. "I hope I'm half as good a mother as yours was, Violet," she said. "You will be," Klaus said. "I don't know," (Kit said)  I believe Kit's plan was to have the baby and then be a good mother to her. Despite that, she also knew she could die. Therefore, as death was not an absolute certainty, total honesty was perhaps not the only option. Now let's get back to what we actually know: 1 - Kit claimed that the Queequeg was attacked. 2 - Fernald went to Hector's mobile home with the object of attacking it and according to Lemony Snicket that's what he did. (See TPP chapter 8)- 3 - According to Olaf, the Carmelite Submarine was stolen by Fernald and Fiona. (See TPP chapter 9 In other words, while Fernald was fighting the Quagmires he had already betrayed Olaf and he had already stolen Olaf's submarine along with Fiona. Come to think of it, realize how unlikely it is that what Kit said was true. She said: "I failed you," Kit Said Sadly, and Coughed. "Quigley Managed to Reach the Self-Sustaining Hot Air Mobile Home, Just as I Hoped He Would, and Helping His Siblings and Hector Catch the Treacherous Eagles in an Enormous Net, while I met Captain Widdershins and his stepchildren." Then there's Quigley's difficult move to self-sustaining hot air mobile home. How did he do it? We don't know... But in the world of asoue amazing things are possible. But after that Kit claims that Captain W was already with his stepchildren. This contradicts Lemony's claim that Fernald was the enemy who had led the eagles to the self-sustaining hot air mobile home. So if Lemony isn't lying, (and I don't see any reason for Lemony to lie about these details when he could have just omitted it) Kit is lying. Fernald wouldn't have stolen the Carmelita along with Fiona, then gone to the self -sustaining hot air mobile home, used the eagles to attack them, then left the eagles there, returned to the submarine, met Captain W, regretted it, found Kit and then abandoned the Carmelita and then went along with Kit to help to the Quagmires. I mean... Is this possible? Yes. But this is very unlikely. Especially since Kit claimed to have been attacked. Did Kit Snicket have reason to lie? I believe so. The reason is that her hypocrisy had been exposed. When she spoke out against the mutiny, two islanders had shown the Baudelaires that she herself was also a violent woman. Now she needed to invent a story to preserve her image. In fact, even if she died there that day, she certainly wanted the Baudelaires to tell her daughter good stories about Kit Snicket. In other words, Kit wanted the Baudelaires to portray her from the best angle. So Kit Snicket lied. She denied having been attacked and taken part in a match against Fernald. If there's any truth to Kit's story, I think it's more likely that Submarine Q detected Submarine C via sonar. (After all, we saw in TGG that this is quite possible). Submarine C attacked Submarine Q. (Submarine C has tentacles that can be used as weapons at short ranges, as we saw in TGG). Kit hurt her feet in this attack, as she claimed to have happened. Fernald was on Submarine C along with Fiona. And the eagles were nearby causing problems for the self-sustaining hot air mobile home, which was right above. Then yes, the house fell on them. Then things can make sense. Both submarine C and submarine Q were hit. And then Fernald and Fiona were seen by Kit for the first time, in the water. I hope several kids also got off the C-sub in time, and Kit didn't mention them to avoid needing to give details about the fight she had with C-sub. "From the depths of the sea a mysterious figure approaching—almost like a question mark, rising out of the water." As we saw in TGG, this question-mark entity had been behind Submarine C for a long time. It was submarine C that attracted her.  An important note: I am not saying that this was Daniel Handler's intention. He probably just got confused by generating these contradictions. I am saying that, given what is written, I think this is the best explanation. "All I heard," she said, "was one of the Quagmires calling Violet's name." That phrase always made me dream. Now I understand that DH's goal was probably to somehow strengthen the love triangle between Ducan, Violet and Quigley. But he did it at such an awkward moment that it made me imagine other, more interesting things. And do you know? I still have a right to imagine. In my headcanon, one of the Quagmires saw a woman inside looking like Violet. And he got confused, thinking she was the girl. And so he asks out loud, "Violet?" to which Kit interpreted that he was screaming for Violet. And that's my big plot Twist from asoue. Beatrice was alive all along, and not even Lemony Snicket knows it. That might not be true, but for me it's the perfect ending. Chapter 13, on the other hand, goes against my selfish desires. It's a chapter devoted to accepting death, and my headcanon is the exact opposite of that. The Baudelaires and Kit mourn the death of the people they loved. And they cry a lot more than all the previous descriptions. I think Daniel Handler abandoned all ideas about the possibility that one of the Baudelaire parents could have survived, although he honestly thought about it at some point. But as I've already explained, Headcanon are valid when the author decides to let the story have a life of its own. But I have to recognize that the story is better if you just accept how the story looks. Death is surprisingly simple. So I don't think the great unknown represents death. I think the great unknown represents the open ending of asoue and uncertainty about the fate of some characters. In the end, it doesn't matter whether the Baudelaires' parents survived or not. The fact is, they never met again in recorded history. Just like they've never met the Quagmires again. All these characters are in the great unknown. And like the publication of the end, the Baudelaires themselves are symbolically in the great unknown, as it doesn't matter whether or not they survived their departure from the island: in the end we won't have access to new official adventures about them. But the beauty of the unknown is that it stimulates the imagination. And it's interesting that in my imagination, Beatrice was already inside the great unknown when one of the Quagmires saw her. So, in my own Headcanon, Beatrice's fate is uncertain. As much as I want to escape from allegories to interpret asoue, the allegory is present even though the entity in the form of a question mark is a physical entity: the name given to the entity and its shape make it a walking allegory, just like the ants are a walking allegory for organization and work. We keep thinking: if it was God who created animals like these, would he want to teach us a lesson? And if Daniel Handler is the god of asoue, did he want to teach a lesson with the question-mark entity? I think the answer is yes in both cases. So, in a universe created by someone's creativity, entities can be both physical entities and allegories at the same time. So, I think that's what TGU is. And I don't see any more problems with that. It is an interesting fact to note that Kit believed her both brothers were dead. In LSTUA we notice that Kit was trying to exonerate Lemony of the Baudelaire arson charge, even though she knew he might already be dead, which may indicate that she believed Lemony could have died in the fire itself. Kit claims that the Baudelaire family and the Snicket family needed to stay away from each other, not just Lemony and Beatrice needed to stay away from each other. These mysterious motives must surely have been detailed in the letter Beatrice wrote to Lemony.  So I don't think the wedding was canceled because Beatrice fell in love with someone else.  I don't think the wedding was definitely canceled because they were life-threatening.  I think there are organizational reasons for the Snickets and the Baudelaires to keep away from each other. Now the scene of Olaf's death. I have to say: what an epic scene! Whether it was Olaf who killed Beatrice and Bertrand we will never know for sure, but he never admitted it even when he believed he would die. He didn't seem to be willing to hide facts at the time. He seemed to me to list the things he managed to do. And Olaf always liked to brag about his murders. So for me the fire was accidental. Oalf bit the apple in order to recover from the MM fungus. He, like Kit and Ish, apparently knew that apples cure the disease caused by the fungus. He at first refused. Had he accepted death? I think so. Now: What was the relationship between Kit and Olaf? Everything indicates that it had been an old relationship. Something like a first love. Olaf did not apologize. He didn't think he was wrong. He wasn't sorry for his villainy. Kit survived for more than an hour, I am sure of it, before Beatrice could be born. A mother's willpower is really impressive. This excerpt below is for me one of the most important: "The Baudelaires would sit together in the two large reading chairs and take turns reading out loud from the book their parents had left behind, and sometimes they would flip to the back of the book, and add a few lines to the history themselves. reading and writing, the siblings found many answers for which they had been looking, although each answer, of course, only brought forth another mystery, as there were many details of the Baudelaires' lives that seemed like a strange, unreadable shape of some great unknown." This is clear proof that the Baudelaires left their own history on the island. Not only did Klaus write about it, but all three Baudelaires did, including Sunny who must have had enough time to learn to write. And Lemony knows they wrote it. I can only conclude that Lemony knows what they wrote, and it is on this basis that Lemony makes a narrative from the Baudelaires' point of view, even including an exact record of what they thought and talked privately. Another evidence that Lemony read this book is seen in the following excerpt: "As the night grew later the ould drop off to sleep, just as their parents did, in the chairs in the secret space beneath the roots of the bitter apple tree." Lemony knew details of what had happened to the Baudelaires' parents, which evidently happened when they were on the island. They themselves had written these events in the same book. Now, regarding the final section of the chapter: "In many ways, the lives of the Baudelaire orphans that year is not unlike my own, now that I have concluded my investigation. Like Violet, like Klaus, and like Sunny, I visit certain grave, and often spend my mornings standing on a brae, staring out at the same sea. It is not the whole story, of course, but it is enough. Under the circumstances, it is the best for which you can hope." I think it's pretty clear that Lemony wrote this passage while he was on the island. Lemony was visiting the same graves as he waited for an opportunity to leave the island. I will still read TBL again. So I know that Lemony wrote the letter to the editor of TBL after he learned of Beatrice Jr.'s existence. After he learned of her existence, Lemony searched for the items cited in TBL. So after that he went to the island and finished writing TE on the island. As I said, it is very likely that at this time the island was already inhabited by very nice people who did not allow apples to be removed from the island.