#The Fate of Ten

[ll-but-its-random]

Five when Nine literally drove a sign post through his chest:

[tbhcatsaresocute]

rereading united as one and i just forgot how much of an insane mental load was on ella. she died, came back to life, was one with a existential being for a period of time, still has some of that entity within her, can and has seen MULTIPLE futures, im just like wow

[scorbleeo]

Book Review: The Fate of Ten

Lorien Legacies (Book 6) by Pittacus Lore

Source: Amazon

For years the Garde have fought the Mogadorians in secret, but now the invasion has begun. If the Garde can't find a way to stop the Mogs, humanity will suffer the same fate as the Lorien: annihilation.

When the Elders sent the Garde to Earth, they had a plan-one which the Garde are finally starting to understand. A group of the Garde travelled to an ancient pyramid in Mexico where they awoke a power that had been hidden for generations. Now this power can save the world or destroy it. It will all depend on who wields it.

ISBN: 9780718178383 (2015) | Source: Goodreads

Neither Good Nor Bad But At Least It Was Not Boring

I honestly was a little flabbergasted when, upon finishing The Fate of Ten, I realised this book literally penned down the happenings of two days. The good thing was, there was a lot of action, so much so that I really did not have room to complain it was boring because at least there was action to read. However, there really wasn't much going on in the book. You would think that considering we're already on the sixth book, we would have learnt everything we needed about all-things-Lorien but this book came and suddenly it was an information dump.

The biggest issue I have with this series is the amount of stories you have to get through before reaching the last book, I'm including the novellas and short stories. Of course, hand in hand with that issue is the planning and dividing of the books. With what I've read, this could easily have been a lesser books, lesser novellas series. Unfortunately, because there are so many instalments, sometimes it feels like a waste of time.

Didn't help that every time I got to read (who is my favourite Garde) Six's POV in The Fate of Ten, Marina was there too. Her identity or moral crisis was so annoying and very unneeded. Which brings me back to, waste of time.

Truth to be told, the only reason I am still going through this entire series is because of characters that are rarely highlighted in the books or are simply, side characters. First being Adam, I loved him since his first appearance but he's always the "side character" when the Garde is involved. I truly miss his novellas. Next, Mark James, his character development helped me decide to not give up on this series after that whole Five fiasco. And though this character does not appear in this book, I have to, I just have to bring more spotlight on Rex. Going through the Lorien Legacies series, I have come to a realisation I love the villains-turned-allies characters. Except Five, though I liked him a lot more than Marina in The Fate of Ten.

Oh well, I cannot believe I rambled so much. Regardless, I am absolutely delighted that the next book is the last book in this series.

Rating: ★★★☆☆ (3.5/5)

More on the Lorien Legacies series: I Am Number Four (#1) | The Power of Six (#2)

[qualityrain]

why are they batshit insane

[kori-senpai]

New Leokumi content in the lords year of 2024?? It's more likely than you think! (x)

[backjustforberena]

FARAH DOWLING + speaking of Rosalind.

[nodosauriday]

Not always a fan of inserting angst into every event in canon but one thing I do think about basically all the time is the six months ryuunoske spent in London while susato was gone.

Like fresh of the backs of kokoro squared (in the narrative not the timeline) where the main emotional crux is about the loneliness and alienation felt by a foreigner in London, and the bond formed between soseki, susato, and ryuunoske because of that shared experience, the game shows us Ryuunoske in baker street who obviously has the support and companionship of iris and sholmes and is objectively less alone— yet he’s lost everyone he originally set out for London with.

I think ryuu’s pretty good at taking things in stride but I also don’t blame him if he went a little insane during that period. In fact Iris does comment about how down he seems at the beginning of 2-3 (although its sort of skipped over because sholmes is also feeling down) and every line of dialogue when you poke around his office just gives the impression that he's had a bit too much time to himself. He’s talking to the prawns and covering photos of susato someone come get him

[ffcrazy15]

Observation: actual traditional stoicism is a lot more similar to Zen Buddhism than whatever the hell these modern "stoic" bros are doing.

[c10v3r]

i love you algebraliens.... nothing cluld ever make me hate you algebraliens.......

[pia55tri]

it's been ten years since the 2015 aus gp, where oscar was a grid kid and where carlos had his debut f1 race and got his first career points, aka since oscar and carlos first crossed paths 🥰

[ll-but-its-random]

Guess you know wat else I like now

[aq2003]

really love how throughout a lot of smith and jones martha is really skeptical and apprehensive towards ten (+ one of my favorite exchanges between them - "what, people call you 'the doctor'?" "yeah?" "well, i'm not. far as i'm concerned, you've got to earn that title."), not taking everything he says at face value, even doubting the fact he's an alien until over halfway through the episode.. And like. i really truly think the thing that wins her over isn't him kissing her or any of the other insane mixed messages he manages to send, it's this scene here, where he /earns that title/ in her eyes:

(+ david's bit in the commentary, where he says: "[the doctor] has actually sacrificed himself, and - i would say, that that final act of selflessness is what finally, eventually, welds martha to him. [...] and she now returns it. she returns that act of selflessness.")

this is what their relationship is built on. it isn't about martha being the second-best replacement to rose or a rebound or whatever. bc it isn't really about rose. it's about doctor-in-training martha meeting someone (quite literally, "the doctor") whose ideals she aspires to, and doing her best to be the same person to him as he is to everyone else. it's about ten in return admiring her intelligence and inquisitiveness and how she cares for human life, recovering his compassion, letting himself lean on her for support - and then remembering at the most inopportune moments that he's supposed to not need anyone and be on his own forever. And around in their little nightmare loop they go where they save each other over and over until one of them breaks

i've seen ppl look at martha and go "why she does she admire/why is she so in love with ten if he acts like that to her?" or something along those lines and like. it's not just the fact she's in love with him (in fact i'd argue she actively tries to push it aside post-gridlock). it's the fact that she knows he's the kind of person to put everyone else's lives/well-being over his own. she trusts him to save her when she's in trouble even though it's been like two days at most that they've known one another bc she recognizes that same "deep all-encompassing drive to help others" in him. and she also recognizes, much much earlier than him, that he needs someone to save him, especially when he's unwilling to save himself. and yeah for a bit she thinks he returns her feelings and is just playing hard-to-get, but she realizes pretty early on that this probably isn't the case, and i think that realization fully solidifies here:

(this is when she's listening to ten talk abt gallifrey). And idk it might just be me but i think this expression isn't just her empathizing with his loss. it's also guilt, for wanting something from him that he's clearly unable to give when he's wracked with so much grief. (and you see it in the next episode, where tallulah asks if they're together and martha says for certain that they're not, and that he doesn't know about her feelings for him. she keeps everything to herself bc she now knows that when he shut her flirting down at the end of 3x01 it was the genuine reaction of someone who a) isn't interested and b) is scared of getting close with someone else again)

freema described their dynamic as "she's keener than him" and i think about this all the time. martha doesn't really take what ten throws at her. what she does instead is constantly poke holes in his already-failing front of "i will show someone the wonders of the universe so i can ignore what is wrong with me". what she does is stand up and fight him when he tries to go off on his own. what she does is put aside her well-being in favor of helping someone - just like what she saw him do for the people in the hospital when they first met. tldr, that's the doctor and his doctor and rip martha you would've loved who's gonna save u now by rina sawayama

[fairweathermyth]

ROBIN HOBB’S REALM OF THE ELDERLINGS >> The Tawny Man Trilogy Excerpts from Book One: Fool's Errand [Golden Fool + Fool's Fate Sets - to be updated once I post them <3]

[variousqueerthings]

the appeal for nine and rose for me, is that nine gets to reconnect with the wonders of the universe by seeing it through this young woman's eyes and rose gets to have a fantasy of being taken out of everyday life and see the wonders of the universe, as a simple fairytale/(re)introduction to the world for the audience

the appeal for ten and rose for me, is that they double-down on this premise because it's inevitably going to end and is constantly ticking down to that end throughout this story, and the only way for them to move through life now is to pretend that nothing ever ends which makes them increasingly detached from reality, and is in and of itself a tragedy

the appeal for ten and martha for me, is that ten is spiralling and martha is a doctor to her core, and both of them want to fix everything for everyone else except themselves and so they're mirrors of a similar self-destructive sacrificial drive that makes them orient around each other in an unhealthy coping-mechanism kind of way that martha eventually has to detach herself from, even though there were the wonders...

the appeal for ten and donna for me, is that donna is actually very level-headed, and in many ways very capable, even though she doesn't believe in herself she can make decisions that are healthier than either rose or martha could, and the doctor initially through wanting her to believe in herself forces themself outside of their bubble of despair, which somewhat breaks the cycle of the previous companions (although, not properly until a very long time later)

[sieglinde-freud]

why are they out-Prince Charming eachother… why have i never rolled an s supported couple on these interactions before… my god you guys. happy pride. what the hell

[tophat-69]

OHHH my god ty SO much for updating, I've only just gotten around to TSF (I've been Saving it because it looked so good) and OUGHH chapter 5 JUST when I started it??? I feel so TREATED

You've taken "the children yearn for the mines" to a whole new height ;-;

I’m so glad you started TSF, and I’m so happy that you liked it!

Chapter 5 got long, mostly because Vander and Silco almost demand to be domestic coparenting teen dads before they’re even actually dating. I couldn’t shake the image of nineteen year old Silco immediately going “I have only had Felicia for a day and a half, but if anything ever happened to her I would kill everyone in this room and then myself.”

(This poor man. He has no idea that he was destined to be both a girl dad and an absolute pushover for a daughter. Felicia is training him well for Jinx’s future benefit.)

And I KNOW that the children yearning for the mines is a meme but now I get to be a nerd in replies so BEFORE I do that thank you so so much for reading and for letting me know you enjoyed!

…

…because now I am going to jump into child labor laws in the 1830s.

Why? Because I am a nerd and a simple meme joke gave me an opening and that’s all I need to infodump! This is the magic of ✨neurodivergence✨ because any random combination of words threatens to send my brain careening in a different direction.

I’m going to preface this by saying that for this story I’ve been doing entirely too much research on early 1800s coal mining (ex: my use of Geordie Lamps because a canary wouldn’t survive Zaun’s polluted air, let alone the air their mines). But I’ve also been brushing up relevant factors in the Industrial Revolution and to an extent the Victorian era… because Zaun is heavily influenced by the Steam Punk genre which is heavily influenced by those historical timeframes. Zaun is written to show the seedy underbelly of that genre, the parts of it that a more romanticized view like Piltover glosses over.

So this gilded fantastical realm is inspired by an era where 50% of the workforce was made up of children. Children with parents started work between the ages of 9 and 14. Orphans were put to work as young as 4. They were considered cheaper, easier to manage, and families had been putting kids to works on their farms and domestic workshops and homes already so the justification was right there for them. Families in poverty often have their kids enter the workplace as soon as they’re legally able, because that’s often the only way they can support themselves. And the Sumps prior to the Lanes were the literal depths of poverty, and even after they still aren’t exactly rolling in wealth.

Silco started as a trapper in the mines at 10 and that’s a pretty common role to shove kids into, and a would be a not-uncommon starting age. Basically he’d be crammed in the dark for 12 hours at a time opening and closing a trap door for coal tubs and fresh air. Even during his time at the mines, though, Zaun was undergoing the technological advancements that both Zaun and Piltover are famous for, and he’s a smart kid and basically became the one learning each new advancement they brought in at every chance so he could make himself indispensable. Which is how he ended up a blaster so young.

He doesn’t have an inherently negative view of child labor. He was a kid, he did a job, he got paid, he got out of the orphanage, and it wasn’t uncommon or unusual. Before Vander and Silco’s work for the Lanes, it’s pretty clear from Silco’s later rants in-show that there weren’t exactly unions around pushing for improved conditions, either.

The change from “child labor for all!” to strict child labor laws took a century. Arguably longer. They slowly went “eh, maybe not four year olds. Let’s start at nine” and then the Factory Act of 1833 said “okay but let’s be reasonable 9-12 year olds can ONLY work 8 hours a day, and 13-17 year olds can ONLY work 12 hours a day.” And on and on from there, these incremental little steps, often pushed by labor unions.

So, in the actual realm of Arcane we see all these children working in the factories and it’s horrific—because it is and was and will always be—but it’s also commentary on the sort of thing a rosy look at history glosses right over when it comes to people who lived in poverty, instead of the fantasy “topside.”

Silco’s like “yeah, started at the mines at 10, been here ever since” and it just is what it is. Commonplace. Vander’s family had a business so he’s worked just as long but was better protected, and he didn’t start in the real workforce outside of the Drop until years later, because the bar couldn’t support itself.

So Silco and Vander have subtle but significant difference of viewpoints. And Piltover never had to confront that reality at all, until Jayce is in the factory.

…Anyway, side rant done! I have a ton of research and parallels and symbolism and just layers of useless nonsense I’ve written into this story and around this story, and it’s generally going to waste in my head so it jumped right out.

I hope that didn’t scare you off, and that you continue to stick around and enjoy the story!