#These last two chapters may be wildly different in style compared to the previous and the next BUT

[belethlegwen]

The Faerie Spell - Chp 9

Chapter One: Click Here Previous Chapter: Click Here Story Directory: Click Here Words: 9317 Summary: Daphne continues to navigate her situation at Nakahara's Cellar where she's been trying to recover in the hour or so since she's been rescued. Trying to avoid entering multiple panic spirals, she has to consider how she'll get home and what's going to be awaiting her when she gets there.

[Major appreciations again to @adjacentperception for the wonderful opportunity to RP with their characters and play in their setting with this story. I love The Cellar and all of the beautiful folks that hang out there <3]

How can you feel like you’re boiling hot and chilled to the bone at the same time? Apparently, one way is to just be incredibly stupid and have to face up to a billion consequences you maybe should’ve thought of before taking a step out the door.

I was mad. I was mad at myself, I was mad at that stupid Faerie, I was mad at how my friends were almost definitely going to react when they finally found out what happened; But I was also terrified of all of those things as well. What if it had happened while I was driving? My dumb ass would be baked in a hot car like a purse-dog that someone forgot about, abandoned and locked-in on the side of the road. What if it had happened where I wasn’t able to pull over? Just… suddenly raptured out of the driver’s seat?

All of the things The Gang were about to yell at me for… yeah. Yeah they’d have a fucking point. Could’ve died in a billion different ways, and all because my dumb ass wanted to go for a walk without Gem. It felt like there was ice creeping up the back of my neck as everything started to really pile in, and—

"Hey,” Zora’s voice pulled me back to a reality that should’ve still been terrible, but was so much… nicer, than where ever my head was about to flush itself to. “You're not a criminal for wanting to have a haircut."

I turned away from the phone to look up at her, my chest too tight initially to respond. She seemed to lower herself just a little more to get closer to my level, and that was just… so appreciated, right now, compared to how I usually felt about that.

"You're allowed to have your freedom, and it sounds like you at least made the effort to be careful about it like… they can't exactly be mad at you for this."

I laughed bitterly at Zora's comment. I didn't mean to-- she was being so nice and I'm sure if I had made the same laugh at my regular size, somebody would've hit me in the mouth. I didn't want to argue with her, but I mean… my stupid ass got me into this mess and my friends had probably been panicking for at least an hour by this point, looking for me. They could exactly be mad at me for this.

God, mad would be the nice option out of what they could be at me, right now.

My mouth was opening to reply-- to argue, honestly-- practically involuntarily, everything just wanting to rush out of my body and ramble again like it had been, when Arthur's voice made me turn so fast I think I pulled something that was already sore.

"Your friends sound like shit."

I wasn’t really in the headspace, in that moment, to think of how funny that blunt, flat-toned line probably was.

"Arthur."

Zora didn’t seem amused either.

"If they've made her feel like being cursed is her fault and a giant inconvenience for themselves, then they’re shit friends. Get better ones whose texts wont make you breathe like that."

It rumbled around my head a few times. No-- no. They're not. They care about me and they want me to be safe, and then I go and pull stupid shit like this. My arms squeezed tightly around myself after I finished rubbing at my magically-cooled neck, too lost in the rollercoaster of thoughts to really appreciate magic goo all over my body doing it's thing. Was he right? Like… did I feel like they blamed me for my curse and stuff?

Stupid question. Yeah, they did.

"It's not intentional," I had blurted out defensively before really taking the 2 seconds it would've needed to realize that that still sounded uh… bad. I was also caught up on how bad my breathing was that Arthur could hear it. Blind-people powers, something something, he could probably hear it better than most people, but I really hadn't noticed how whack my cardio was being until he mentioned it. "They just want to keep me safe…"

I don't know if I believed it. They wanted me safe, mostly because it kept me out of trouble. They wanted me home so if this happened, it only bothered one of them, maybe two.

I felt like I wanted to sink straight through the bar into the ground. Then, Zora’s voice was back.

"How long do these spells of yours typically last?" She was really good at this, despite her insistence she didn’t know what she was doing. Girl was able to pull me back from a spiral like I was her yo-yo.

"Days," I said, turning to look up at Zora again. "It's… more complicated than that. They started short, and I had a couple of short ones in the middle… one of the last ones was really short? Two of them, maybe?" My headache was coming back full force as I tried to make sure the phone was as completely out of my view as something bigger than me could ever really be. "The latest one that ended this morning was almost two full days. The record for it is a little over four, I think? And I mean… I never-- it's never happened this fast after a zonk, shift, whatever, before. I don't-- this is new."

"Could we help you lay low here and make sure your friends don't get the password until the whole thing has blown over? I'm sure we could offer you a decent alibi if you give us a few minutes to think of one."

Her question made my eyes drop back down to the sweater I was on, and the bar top, glad that Zora's arms were still resting on it. It made me feel less exposed, less… vulnerable, I guess, though that seemed stupid to say. I was obviously vulnerable. I flinched as I tried to hug myself tighter and just pinched one of my bruised ribs. My mind was racing, trying to consider the options and the offer. "I… I don't want to keep you out for maybe days of this bullshit until the fucker gets his shit together and puts me back to normal, but like… yeah, I don't really… I don't wanna see them… just yet."

My eyes gazed down at my hands and arms, my coat still somewhere beside me. I was battered to shit, even if I could lie low and this was short, it's not like my took-on-Mike-Tyson-ass was going to look or feel any better in IMAX compared to the mobile version of me.

"…I think I just need a bit of time to think about it, if you'll let me stay at least that long. Sorry for making it such a problem."

Listen. I’m no stranger to looks of concern or worry or pity or… we won’t talk about some of the others right now, everything else is still too much. Especially since this all went down, I’m used to getting looks. The looks I’ve gotten and still get from my friends when this happens, the looks I’ve gotten when I had to mention that I was cursed. They’ve run the gamut. But the look of genuine, just… human concern that Zora gave me was something I had seen so rarely that it shocked me when I looked back up to listen to her.

“Please don't,” her voice was so, so quiet. God, I don’t get this, ever, when I’m down here. Even at the start, nobody cared to just be soft. “You wouldn't be putting me out. I'm happy to be of help as long as you need me to be. Few hours, few days, whatever. If you need somewhere to be I can help.”

My rat-brain was churning out vague attempts to try and convince me that that was how I get murdered or something, but it was impossible to believe that even for a second when even in this situation, I just felt… so much more at ease with that idea. Like, how did that feel so much better than Gem’s place? Or even my own? I obviously had been staring too long without a response, because she cut back in pretty fast.

“I understand that we barely know each other, so maybe that doesn't sound as welcoming or earnest as I would like, but the offer still stands,” she offered quickly, Arthur moving up alongside her and resting himself on his elbows on the bartop. I assumed, honestly, that he was going to ‘subtly’ stop her. It’d be weird to have a complete stranger— even a tiny one— just… around like that. Wouldn’t it?

“We could set you up with some space in the back if you really needed to hide out.” Kinda glad he’s blind, I’m sure the stupid face I made would’ve made him laugh otherwise. Me and Zora both kinda looked at him, though she was much less surprised than I was about his interjection, as he spoke more. “Public space might feel safer, but you'd have to be chill with like… muffled bar sounds.”

While I tried to think of a way to respond, Zora perked up enough to ask what time the bar opened tonight, an anxiety I hadn’t even worried about until she mentioned it. “We open whenever we feel like opening. It'll be a minute before anyone comes knocking,” Arthur’s flat voice retorted at her as I finally got my tongue in working order again. Not that it would matter, much. Arthur spoke again.

“You're not a problem. Don't think having a curse makes you a problem.”

It was like he could read my thoughts. Arthur had turned his head vaguely in my direction as he said it like he knew I was about to… I guess not necessarily argue, but close enough.

“Zora has a curse, a chunk of our patrons are cursed; Lots of people have curses,” the giant man continued as I just stood there, blinking, Zora casually glancing between the two of us. “The guy we're getting medicine from has like… seven or something ridiculous.”

“Not a bad guy, but…” Zora drawled. “He deserves his.”

Arthur cut back, a very faint hint of defensiveness though I’ll admit that the guy was nearly impossible to get any kind of read on most of the time. “Most of his. I'll argue a few in his favor. He's got garbage luck.”

Zora was just as quick. “That might be one of them.”

“Shit,” I uttered, getting both of their attentions off their banter for a moment. “I really didn’t know curses just… got around like that.” They were speaking so casually about it. Zora didn’t even look cursed, but Arthur knew and they were open enough about it to just tell a stranger? Well— ok, fair enough to point out that I was obviously cursed so like, yeah, probably a safe bet I’d be less likely to judge. The guy with a fucking collection of them sounded a bit much, but I guess if it’s helpful in giving him experience for the medicine stuff, maybe it’s a good thing?

I was about to rush headlong into a pile of questions that were probably… way too personal, when Arthur pulled me back with that deep, flat tone again. “Anyways, the point stands: No one should be making you feel like shit for that.”

This man had a frown that— I’m sure that even if I was at regular size— looked like it could turn someone to stone. It wasn’t directed at me, but god… he meant it.

He meant it, and that felt… that felt too good really to put into any words. At least at the time.

I had wanted to ask almost immediately what Zora’s curse was, but it just felt too personal. She was lucky; hers wasn’t as obvious as a doll-sized person crying on a bar-top in the middle of the day. I felt bad about making her open up about something she was easily able to hide like that. I focused instead on asking about curses in general, musing about how it seemed too taboo to talk about and that’s probably why I was so ignorant about how common it was. “Probably didn’t help that I was basically thrown out of a place for mine, so like—“

Arthur’s face scrunched up so fast and so dramatically I practically felt it. “Who kicked you out for being small?” He blurted, his sunglasses coming so close to looking directly at me that for a moment I was sure he could actually see. “That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard.”

“Give us a name and we'd be happy to spread the word around our people,” Zora added firmly, nodding at me as her hands and arms moved in closer. I don’t know if she meant to, but it made me feel good instead of like I was about to get trapped or something. “We’ll make sure they don't get any business out of us.”

They were so fucking protective. Of me. Already.

I’d be lying if I said that didn’t make me feel guilty.

“I… uh… I don’t remember her name,” I lied, scratching at the back of my neck. I didn’t want to start a fight; if curses were that easy to get, I’m sure the witch would easily saddle me a few more if she found out I was smack-talking her business. She’d probably assume Cal’s eggs were thrown by me, too. Definitely not what I needed right now. “I wasn’t small when I saw her. She just wasn’t able to help with my curse. Was pretty nasty about it, but— it’s like— mine is probably different and that might’ve just been like… maybe she didn’t like…”

The last thing I wanted to do was make these people suddenly regret scraping me off of the concrete by telling them about my Faerie Bullshit(tm). But… I don’t know. Maybe they were cool about it? Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to prod a little?

“Is it… are there like, bad ways to get a curse?” I asked, immediately throwing my hands up in front of me defensively. “I only ask because that seemed to be, uh… her issue.”

The two giant people in front of me got to stewing over my question in a way that made me want to just go hide in the walls or something instead, in case they pieced together what had happened to me. What was actively still happening to me. “I mean… maybe? Probably… humans find a way to hate anything but… hm…” Zora mumbled.

“I guess if they thought you might bring more bad juju with you or something but… that's still pretty stupid…” Arthur droned. “Like… as long as you didn't get it for being a prick about something I don't know what the problem could be…”

Zora tilted her head at me and those giant eyes glanced me over. “I feel like people are more judgey about particular curses than like… origins.”

Arthur’s shrug and a gruff huffing noise didn’t even make me turn my head away from Zora as she watched me. “The vampires who took it willingly and trot around like they're hot shit are pretty fucking annoying but… I don't feel like that's an answer,” he said.

I was feeling more and more awkward as the conversation continued, and my body was really starting to ache as I just stood there. I kind of wanted to sit down again, but putting myself back on the sweater under my feet seemed pretty daunting given how messed up I was.

“None of it is any more taboo than you make it out to be. For some people it depends on the curse or the circumstance.” I really wanted to tell her again that she was good at this. She was making me feel better, no matter how my face probably looked at the time. “Werewolves still get a lot of undue shit in some places, but y'know, people are hard to convince when they’re scared. A lot of it is dying out as we modernize.”

I had never heard Vampires and Werewolves talked about like they were people. I didn’t want to say anything; again— came from a shit community with shit people around me who thought drug addicts deserved to suffer because they had sinned and shit and left it at that. If you were good and just and made the Right Decisions, nothing bad would ever happen to you.

“Basically,” Arthur cut in as his arms slid out on the bar, very careful to not come near to where I was, “it's no more taboo than talking about any sort of disability, and that has variances. To combat this, we don't let assholes in. That works pretty well.”

“I appreciate you not letting assholes in.” It was all I could really think to say; if I had woken up to being poked at by a bar full of people who were going to be judgey at me for what happened— I mean, it was bad enough trying to find the courage to talk to these people who had already been so incredibly nice about it. Zora’s arms seemed to shift just a little closer around me as she leaned down more to my level, her voice getting softer.

“You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to. Like, I get that you might want information but.. you don't have to give out what you don't want to.”

It took me a second for the words to really hit, but when they did I think I may have actually deflated. “Thanks…” I managed, taking a deep breath and smiling up at her. “Honestly. That… that means a lot, to hear. I definitely want to get answers, but… now’s probably not the best time.”

Pretty sure there was someone at that exact moment wondering where that stain on their shoe came from so… yeah. Probably an indicator that I could wait on any intense information digging. Speaking of digging, though…

“Would…” I started quietly, after turning to stare at the phone again, the icons having shifted place as most messages had rolled in in the peace of silent-mode. “Would it be ok to add you as friends or anything?” God, I sounded like I was 14 again. “It’s cool if not. I just… if I can talk to you guys and stuff, I’d love to come back here when things aren’t as… zonked, I guess. For me, I mean.”

I hadn’t even finished asking when Zora swung a massive arm up the bar to get a napkin and slide it down, Arthur groping around under the bar to get a pen. Before long, I was punching in their info to my account on her giant phone to add them both. It gave me a reason to get off of my inbox for a bit, at the very least, and that did wonders for how I was feeling. Well, that, and Zora offering again that I could lay low here or with her, and that the offer was always open.

I straight-up told her that that would be nice, even if just to get me out of the house sometime with someone who knows, who isn’t as likely to like… explode about it. Fuck, who knows how long it would be before I’d be allowed out again though. I was part way through suggesting that if she liked coffee I had very recently discovered a nice spot we could try, when Madge burst back in in a flurry and nearly scared the daylights out of me.

“Good god, Jasper is a chattering fool,” she was grumbling as she swept back toward the rest of us with vials in her hand.

“See, it’s not all my fault,” Arthur’s flat voice had managed to become comforting to me that quickly.

“You do not help,” Madge shot at him as she plopped a vial with a thick, pale-yellow goo in it on the bartop near us. “This is the one we were missing,” she said, her voice less loud now that she was close to me. It was appreciated. She seemed like the kind of woman who could knock a wall down with a few words if she really needed to. “Jasper recommends getting a bit on the end of a toothpick and stirring it into something for this sort of scene.”

“What does this one do?” Zora raced me to the question.

“Mends light fractures faster,” Madge said, sending my eyebrows straight up. “He’s not a miracle worker, but it’s a godsend if you can get it in ya early.” She turned to me, that quick flick of her eyes scanning me up and down though it was less aggressive-staring like I was kind of used to and more of that same concern that Zora was giving me. “Is the cold stuff helping at all?”

I stammered like an idiot. “Oh—uh— yes. Yeah, like… loads. My body doesn’t feel like it’d rather jettison my limbs than move them, which is nice.” To be fair to myself, I was way more focused on the magic potion vial. “Damn,” I breathed, staring at it. “I should’ve been checking out magic shops way before this.”

Madge was happy to hear the blue-goo was working, and she quickly set out another vial with a clearer liquid that was kind of… maroon? Just a pain-killer type of deal, apparently, which I was pretty excited for until…

“The nature of these,” she explained as she picked up my tiny cup from nearby, “is that they’re gonna taste real funky, just less-so when you mix them up.”

Arthur shrugged as he stopped leaning on the bartop. “I always feel like rum covers it best, but we’ve got other options.”

“I mean, carbonation does a decent job also,” Zora said with her own shrug.

“Either way, what drink would you like to taste like a foot so we can do this?” Madge asked so swiftly and so bluntly I blurted into a laugh instantly. That seemed to brighten the mood a little.

“I mean… a little bit of rum and coke won’t make this any worse, I think,” I said, still chuckling with a shrug. Arthur was already on the move to the back wall to start running his hands across the bottles before I even mentioned what I was looking for. It wasn’t like I was going to be driving BillTron home tonight; I’d need Cal to come with me or get one of the others to take my keys once they were back to a usable size again, and—

Cal.

“Um, Madge?” I asked, turning back to Zora’s phone and flicking it back to the inbox and the message previews again. “Did you… see anybody outside? Maybe acting weird? Dirty blonde hair, usually wears a beanie. They might’ve biked…”

Madge cut me off before I could spiral into worry about Cal. “The one walking in circles and not watching where he’s going? We may have met. Friend of yours?”

Why did that make my blood go cold? I nodded, and jumped a little as one of Zora’s hands slid closer to me again. She was looking at me with a worried stare. “Do you need more time?” She asked. “Do you need us to cover for you?”

I’m sure I made some kind of concerning noise as my brain ground to a halt, my heart going through the worst kind of cardio exercises yet again. “Uh… yes. Wait— no. Cal is… Cal is good.” Zora bit her lip at me as she listened, and her expression kind of said it all; I was as confident as a cat on a sinking boat and it was obvious. “They’ll be… fine! They definitely need to know where I am at some point, just…”

Now I absolutely knew I was making a noise as some kind of pathetic whining escaped me. Zora’s hand crept a little closer and I reached out to touch it if only for something to help ground myself. She rubbed her thumb against my back, and it was actually… reassuring, like someone patting my back. I didn’t know if she meant to do it intentionally, but I appreciated it all the same. I looked up at her again. “Just… follow my lead if I feel like I need to invent some kind of relation to keep them chill? I’m sorry— I promise they’re the better one out of everyone but just… I’m so sorry.”

“Please don’t apologize,” Zora replied as Madge looked on with noted confusion. I had forgotten she wasn’t here for the other two telling me they thought my friends were trash. “It’s going to be fine. We’ll help however we can.”

“So… should I go get him?” Madge asked.

Zora nodded with me. “Her friends should probably know she’s not dead.”

“Don’t tell him the password,” Arthur said over his shoulder. I was on the verge of asking if they actually had a password when Madge snorted out a laugh and headed towards the exit.

“Fine, I’ll leave it open,” she said, Arthur nodding vaguely in response as Madge disappeared out the door and back up the stairs. He placed a tumbler I could’ve soaked myself in near me and Zora with a container of toothpicks.

“Can you finish this?” He asked Zora, who had already picked up my tiny glass and a straw and was filling it for me. She seemed like she had done this dozens of times before as she used the toothpicks to swirl the medicine carefully into the glass and handed it back to me.

She had warned me not to think too much about the taste, and I had said I’d manage to get it down with way more confidence than was accurate. On the first big gulp I took the smell and awful… pre-after-taste? Hit me like an overflowing garbage truck. Zora pressed against me as I leaned back into her hand and plugged my nose to get through the rest of it. The painkiller part kicked in practically instantly, I just wished it did it’s thing on tastebuds too. Something something, beggars and choosers, something. I handed back the glass as me and Zora chuckled at how awful the stuff was, Arthur putting everything back in it’s place on the back wall when Madge re-entered with Cal.

“This one belong to you?” She asked from across the room, looking at me. Cal’s eyes were dodging to every dark corner of the bar, hunched and tense. I’d seen the look before; they absolutely thought they were being led into a murder basement.

It took me a second of staring to clock the weird feeling of massive relief at seeing one of my best friends and the chilling feeling of knowing how they were probably about to react to seeing me. When their eyes finally landed on me I kind of snapped back out of it and reached into my pocket for the amplifying stone and activated it, waving at them awkwardly from the bartop. “Hey, Cal…”

Zora jumped slightly, which caused me to jump only because I had still been leaning on her hand when it happened. She recovered pretty fast from the volume change though, moving her hand away as Cal immediately turned into the limp-spaghetti person I’ve always known. “Oh thank fucking God,” they blurted. “You’re actually here.”

They squared back up almost instantly, the relief short-lived as Cal glanced between Zora and Arthur with a concerned stare. I couldn’t blame them, Arthur had spun around on hearing Madge enter again and was leaning against the back bar with his arms folded, head toward the doorway. “…You good, or—“ Cal started to ask.

“I’m good, I’m good!” I called in a vague panic as Madge left Cal by the door and headed to stand next to Arthur. “They’re fine, it’s good!”

They didn’t relax much, but they felt at least ok enough to start approaching the bar.

“Hey there,” Zora said in a friendly greeting that was notably on the tense side, at least compared to how she had been before Cal walked in. “Nice to meet you, I’m Zora.”

“Hey, I’m Cal.”

I looked up at Zora to try and soothe her a little. “Me and Cal have been close friends for a long while. We come from the same neck of the woods.”

Cal’s awkward reply uh… undid any of the progress I had made in that regard as they said: “She uhhh… wasn’t always like this, heh.”

So if there’s one thing I always kind of hated with being small, it was being the topic of conversation for two people who were literally towering over you, who were talking like you weren’t even there. Like they had forgotten about you. The way Zora’s eyes kind of narrowed at Cal, I felt like I was maybe about to experience that again.

“Yeah,” Zora drawled awkwardly before brightening back up almost suspiciously fast. “she’s told us herself. But it’s not as if that would’ve prevented you from being friends, yeah?”

“I mean,” Cal replied with their crooked grin, “it’d have been hard to see her, mostly.”

I let out a reactive, polite laugh as Cal laughed at their own joke at a volume that I hadn’t had to worry much about for the last… well, however long I had been on a bar. The joke… didn’t go over well with everyone else. Zora’s face barely twitched, but Arthur was in the back trying to put both corners of his mouth through the floorboards, Madge also making an uncomfortable and displeased face as she put herself a bit more in front of Arthur. Like… it was awkward. I get it. This was just Cal though, it was fine.

…Wasn’t it?

“This is Arthur and Madge,” Zora said with a quick motion toward them, as if trying to get Cal to look at the two in case they might clue in. “They own the place, I just work here sometimes.” The three gave awkward waves, Cal as oblivious as ever still. My stomach was fixing to jump right out onto the sweater I was still standing on if this continued to get any more tense. Being an unseen spec on the bar top wasn’t helping my mood either. That was, until Zora spoke again, nodding down at me. “We met Daphne outside and offered some assistance.”

Zora’s description of what went down relaxed me so much, I found myself letting out a breath I had no idea I was holding. “Yeah, Zora’s been an incredible help, she got me inside after the zonk,” I said, turning to try and get Cal’s attention again. “Thanks for coming, my phone died and—“

“Wait,” Cal blurted, loudly, turning and blinking at me as if they suddenly remembered that I was here; that I was the reason they even came here. “How did you zonk?” I don’t even know if I had time to stammer something out before they talked over me again. “I thought you said it ended this morning?”

“No—no! It did end!” I said, trying to explain. “It happened again while I was out!”

Cal gestured in confusion toward me, their arms entering my airspace in big sweeps. “Why did you leave? Without telling anyone?”

Panic. It was mild, but it was just the start. I knew this was going to happen, I knew this was going to go to shit. God. What made me feel worse about it was knowing that this was how Zora was going to have to learn that I’m an idiot; by watching me get chewed out for every stupid decision I made. “I thought I had a few days, I usually have a few days… I just wanted to go get a haircut and a coffee an—“

Cal leaned down so fast to look at me I almost jumped backwards, worried I was going to choke on my own words. “Holy shit,” they muttered, their brow furrowed and looking extremely concerned as their massive eyeballs bounced up and down to look at me. “What happened to you?”

Their fingers and thumb gripped me as their hand swept across the bar, and the panic set in completely. “Cal—“ I grunted out through some kind of barrage of pained noises, but it didn’t matter.

“Relax,” they said, moving to lift me while I flailed, “I just need to look—“

I must’ve blinked, because suddenly Zora’s arm was across almost the entirety of my view and Cal’s hand was springing open to drop me back onto the sweater. I staggered back as a massive wave of noise crashed over me from all sides, my chest heaving and sore as the painkiller potion tried to kick back in.

“Bro you’re hurting her,” Zora snapped like thunder overhead, leaning across as she held Cal’s arm with one hand, the other one sliding up behind me as I staggered straight back into it.

“Shit—“ Cal hissed in surprise.

“Whoa whoa whoa,” Madge was calling from the back of the bar where she was holding Arthur back with a fully extended arm against him.

“You can’t just grab someone who’s hurt like that!” Zora continued sharply. Her eyes were like they were on fire as she leaned even more over the bar to get right in Cal’s face. “Do you not hear her?”

“You shouldn’t just grab anyone, period,” Arthur was muttering from the back of the bar as Zora finally let go of Cal’s wrist and just barely backed off from them.

Cal was stammering, pale as a ghost and holding their arm in front of them like Zora had burned it. “Shit, shit— I didn’t know it was that bad— shit.”

My hands were cradling my sides where I had been pinched, rubbing them to help the numbing feeling of the potions come back faster as Zora looked down at me.

“You good?”

I nodded up at Zora, coughing faintly as I tried to speak again. “It’s ok,” I said, just repeating to try and stop whatever had just happened from happening again. “It’s ok, it’s ok—“

“Shit, I am so sorry, fuck— I—“ Cal was still panicking, looking between me and Zora with a massive face of regret and concern.

“I’m good, it just— it wasn’t bad bad it just… everything’s hurt already so—“ I said, glancing between all four of the gargantuan people in the bar.

“Are you sure?” Zora asked, her hand pressing against me a little as she looked me over again. “Do you need more water? Did we just negate the painkiller?”

I shook my head. “No, no, painkiller is still working. Water maybe would be good but it’s ok, it can wait a second.” I said, as Zora’s concerned face continued to check on me. “Cal didn’t know, it’s ok, they do that all the time,” I tried to explain.

They nodded rapidly in agreement with me, hopefully cluing in that I was trying to save their ass. “Yeah,” they said, quickly. “That’s normal, I just didn’t know she was hurt— shit, what happened though?”

“You are aware,” Arthur’s blunt voice from the back got mine and Cal’s attentions quickly, “that saying this is normal makes it so much worse, right?”

“It shouldn’t matter that she’s hurt,” Zora added. “You don’t just do that to someone.”

My mouth opened to try and defend Cal. That was the original intent, I know it was. Cal’s my friend, I don’t know the rest of these people from a hole in the ground. But as my mouth opened while I was still staring at the intense frown on Arthur’s face, my brain just said one thing: Arthur was right. They were all right. I had hated getting picked up without being asked, I had hated getting grabbed. I had hated being pulled and carried around without anyone listening if I did bother to say anything, and literally no one had ever seemed to… care how I felt about it.

As I watched Cal jerk back a little with every single thing Zora said to them, my instinct was to try and defend them. But as Zora’s hand curled around me a little more, and gave me a safe place to just… breathe, that instinct went away.

“How on earth would you like that?” Zora snapped again, her voice sharp but still so much quieter than Cal’s had been. “Someone just squeezing your whole body with no thoughts at all?”

“I— it—“ Cal stammered, flinching as the barrage kept coming. “I didn’t think—“

“If she’s your friend you should at least treat her like a human fucking being.”

“It’s just what I’ve always done so I—?” Cal stuttered out.

“Saying that isn’t the cover you think it is,” Arthur said flatly, but I could see the veins on the side of the man’s head twitching as he leaned out over Madge’s arm. “You are admitting to garbage behavior, and I need you to understand how fucked up that is.”

Zora looked about ready to jump the bar after Cal as well.

“Zora, darling,” Madge’s voice came calmly from the back bar and cut them off as I moved a hand back behind me to rest on Zora’s palm, just to try and steady myself a little more. “He’s clearly an idiot, don’t get too angry. It’s to be expected.”

Cal shrank back at the comment, and then further as Zora muttered to Madge: “Well for fuck’s sake, it doesn’t take half a braincell to be decent.”

“You’ll have to forgive us,” Madge said sweetly, addressing Cal with a smile that looked from where I was standing like it could be hiding a series of knives behind it. “We have a deep respect for autonomy down here.”

I locked eyes with Madge briefly, mouthing a silent ‘thank you’ to her as Cal was finally calming down, now practically half way back to the exit after all of the shots they had just taken. “I uh… I get it, I think, I just—“ they started before turning to look at them all. “Fuck, I’m uh… I’m really sorry?”

“Well done on figuring it out at the dumbest possible time,” Madge said with that calm, sweet smile again. “It shouldn’t have taken this, but we’re glad you got there.”

Zora’s hand cupped around me a little more. I don’t know if during any of my bullshit episodes like this if I had ever been just… ‘held’ doesn’t even seem like the right word. Protected? This was new. It was new and it was nice and I liked it, especially right now as Zora’s voice sounded almost like a growl while she spoke to Cal again.

“Do not apologize to any of us. Don’t apologize because you feel like you’re in trouble. Apologize to her,” she nodded down at me and I pressed my hand further into her palm, “for not taking her humanity into consideration for two fucking seconds. You should feel terrible about that.”

Cal had practically withered away, and was somehow still managing to wither more. “I… fuck…” Their swearing was actually kind of soothing to me, only in that I only ever heard it happen like this before they had a pretty big attitude shift. For once, it seemed like that attitude shift would benefit me. “Garbage seems like a bit much but—“

I think they finally noticed Madge literally holding Arthur back and decided to abruptly shut up and change topic. They looked down at me finally. “Fuck, Daph… I didn’t realize. I’m sorry.” I smiled, feeling so much better about all of this with just those words. Then Cal kept talking. “You should’ve said something.”

I wondered, for a brief moment, if Cal would actually get murdered in front of me if I mentioned that I have absolutely said something, and been saying somethings this whole time. I leaned more into Zora’s hand only to keep it off of Cal’s throat. “Hey… it’s… this has been weird, and like—“ Y’know what? I’d like at least some praise for the fact that I could’ve been way more awkward about all of this and we only had to deal with this amount of awkward from me. “We’ll work on it,” I offered them. “I mean, you were getting better.”

“Oh,” Cal’s eyes glazed over and they muttered dumbly to themself. “That’s why you kept mentioning the whole-hand thing…”

I was desperate to change the topic before they got iced in front of me. “I got zonked in the middle of the sidewalk. That’s what happened to me, kinda.” That got their attention back pretty quickly. “I uh… wound up in the stairwell. Fell. It was rough but Zora got me inside. They’ve been treating me with some potions and things and I’ll be ok, I’m just… real rough right now.”

Cal’s brow furrowed and for a second I thought they’d been able to tell I wasn’t being totally honest. “Potions?” They asked bluntly, shaking their head before I could really take any relief from that change of topic. “Doesn’t matter. How long ago did this all happen?”

“Uhhhm…” I had no idea what time it still was. “Sometime before noon?”

“Where’s your car?”

“In the work garage…”

Cal let out an explosive breath that startled the shit out of me before I realized they were relieved. “Oh thank god, I don’t gotta feed a meter.” They whipped out their phone and started to type rapidly, my arm reaching out quickly like I was somehow gonna be able to do something— anything— to stop it. “We gotta get you home, the gang’s been losin’ it.”

“Don’t—!” Cal’s thumbs came to a halt so fast I thought I heard the sounds of tires screeching as they blinked at me. “Don’t tell them where I am, or anything. Just tell them you found me with friends.”

It was the best I could think of to try and stave off a massive party of screaming people storming into this bar and causing even more issue with these folks who had been kind enough to peel my corpse off the ground and bring me back to life. People who could actually help me and not just say they would. Cal stared at me and took a slow look around between everyone awkwardly. “Yeah, I mean… yeah, ok.”

Their eyes dropped back down to me, but moved to give Zora’s hand a long look before they went back to typing. I could tell Zora was still upset, her fingers were pretty tense and her breathing was like listening to an animal from here. “Offer’s still on the table,” she said to me, her voice a lot quieter. I appreciated that, even though I still wasn’t sure if I could take her up on it.

She still didn’t relax when suddenly Madge was approaching us with another glass of water for me in her fingers, still the calmest one here but the one I had a feeling I should be the most worried about.

“Would you like any of that medicine to take along with you? Just in case,” she asked as I took the water from her and started to guzzle it down. “You shouldn’t need more of the yellow stuff, but if you want a bit of the others for the pain, I can hook you up.”

“The blue stuff,” I managed, coming up for air and ignoring the concerned stares of Cal over their typing. “That’s wonderful, I’d love more of that if that would be ok. Especially because I don’t have to taste it.”

Madge smirked with a nod as she turned to get me the vial and another, smaller container to try and pour it into for me. “The red stuff… honestly I’ll take Tylenol or something when I’m home. It’s not the same but… it’s what we’ve got.”

“Crew’s, uh—“ Cal’s voice came quietly and I turned to see them glancing up at everyone in the room before they flashed me an uncomfortable grimace. “…glad you’re alive.”

I made the same face back. “Great,” I said as convincingly as I could manage, which I’ll admit wasn’t spectacular. Cal was trying to dodge getting more yelled-at by not telling me they were pissed, is my guess. “What uh… what did you tell them?”

“You’re with some friends. That you’re hurt.”

I stared and waited for more, which Cal seemed unwilling to give me until I gestured vaguely at the entirety of me. I needed to know if they had told the gang I was zonked or not. Cal groaned uncomfortably.

“Gem asked but I haven’t responded.”

I squirmed at the idea that I might leave here and wind up in a hand so much unlike Zora’s. I honestly tried not to think about it— how this hand could be just as bad as Gem’s with so little effort— and my stomach was starting to churn again. “Yeah, please just… hold off on that… at least for now.”

“She’s worried…” Cal drawled, whining.

“Please.” I said it more firmly this time, staring at them. “Don’t.”

With Gem fresh on my mind, I latched onto the only thing I could think of that might save me if I really started to panic. My head tipped back and bumped into Zora’s hand, getting her attention on me. “I uh…” I started awkwardly, really hoping she was going to follow along. “I know we had plans for today but uh… give me a minute to make sure I’m still good for them?”

It was instant. This girl was on the ball, and I couldn’t be more appreciative for it. “There’s no pressure in the slightest,” she said gently, “but know you have somewhere.” She smiled at me and I honestly believed for a second that this cool woman actually had plans with me. That she had actually wanted to make plans with me. I put my hand on the tip of one of her fingers, it just felt like the right thing to do.

“Thanks. I mean…” I figured I’d try to set up as much as I possibly could before leaving here, so I could at least look forward to getting more information that I needed. “We can always raincheck it. Loads of time to uh— go for coffee and food and stuff some other day.”

“Anytime, really,” she said back, her hand relaxing a little more around me. “I make my own schedule, so just shoot me a text and we’ll make it happen.”

When I looked back at Cal I saw them glancing between me and Zora with a weird face, but if there was anything worth talking about they seemed willing to wait. “Is it uh…” they drawled, looking around the room. “Is it cool if I pull up a stool, or something?”

Madge turned to look Cal over up and down a few times with a hard stare, pausing in her search for something to put blue goo in for me.

“We’re not open,” she said simply.

Cal jammed their hands in their pockets, something they always did to try and make them look less nervous, but they always just wound up looking more awkward. I felt a little bad for them. They went back to looking at their phone as I found new appreciation for how warm Zora’s hand was.

“Gem’s uh…” they started awkwardly after a second. “She’s pretty insistent that I answer her…”

“She can wait,” Arthur’s voice cut bluntly from the back.

I shivered a little as I shook my head. “Keep her on read for a—“

Wait. I knew that shiver.

“Oh, shit— sorry, sorry—“ I stammered out as I pushed out of Zora’s hand stiffly, swooping down with some pained grunts while grabbing my coat and putting the empty water glass down on the sweater. “I’m gonna bamf, hang on—“ I tried to explain as the air started to fill with concerned noises and Zora’s hand seemed to freeze in mid-air in concern.

I basically had to fall into a sitting position, and it was just barely on time as my legs suddenly shout out straight over the edge of the bar and I had the momentary dizziness I always do. My eyes closed tight while I waited for the ringing to leave my ears, reaching in to deactivate the amplifying spell before muttering probably a thousand quick sorries and sliding off the bar.

I would’ve probably expected and not felt so bad about Madge and Zora staring at me and assuming it was just because they hadn’t seen Full-Sized Me before, if it weren’t for Cal also staring at me, all three of them with wildly different expressions. My eyes dropped to my shoes as I hugged my jacket to me. Pretty sure I looked like I lost a cage-match against Ronda Rousey.

“…….Oh.” Zora’s voice came eventually and I looked back up at her awkwardly. Her eyes were wide. The first thing that struck me was just how god damn cool and pretty she was at normal size. It had been obvious from zonk-land, but it’s just… different when you’re all the same size again. We stared at each other a second before she spoke again. “…Hello.”

I shifted my weight awkwardly on my legs. I was about to say hello back when her hands landed on me, having jumped up from her stool. “Oh, geez,” she muttered, suddenly focused on me and trying to help me stand properly. “Are you alright? You got this?”

“I’m good, yeah… just… y’know,” I muttered with a chuckle as I let her help me for a second, even if it was kind of embarrassing, “a little bit damaged.”

Zora seemed to find it awkward and embarrassing too, taking her hands away as soon as I was on my feet kind of properly again and looking away quickly. She smiled, though, and that made me feel less bad. “Heh… just a little bit damaged. It looked dramatic already but… woof.” She winced as she looked me over again. “You’ll feel better after a bath, I’ll bet.”

I muttered awkwardly, leaning a bit closer to her to make sure she could hear. “Uhhh… baths are dangerous, for me. More dangerous than I thought, apparently. At least before today.” She flinched a little and gave me a small nod and smile of understanding.

Cal was next to us suddenly, rushing over after they had stopped staring. “Jesus Daph,” they breathed. “Are you sure you don’t need to go to the hospital?”

My heart entered my throat so fast I couldn’t get out any words about how terrifying I found the idea that I might go to a hospital and then suddenly zonk. “No, no—“ I stammered, shaking my head. “It’s just bruising and stuff. If it’s bad or anything tomorrow, or I notice anything worse… I’ll call my doctor or something.”

Cal stared at me, their mouth opening to argue.

“I promise, Cal,” I said, staring right back at them. “I will.”

They backed down a bit. “Alright, but…” their eyes swept with a whole head movement this time as they looked me over again. “Shit. Looks like you got shook up for a round of yahtzee.”

My stomach flipped at the size-joke, even though Cal obviously hadn’t meant it for a laugh. Honestly, that just made me a bit more uncomfortable— they just thought of that size as normal enough to talk about like that. Ugh. I looked myself over again, wondering if anything would’ve changed between being small and being tall. “It… it really does seem like it’s just bruising but…”

My eyes moved back to Zora with a sad smile. “I… I should probably head home to rest. I’ll, uh… I’ll hit you up as soon as I’m on my computer again and we can rebook? For coffee and lunch or something?”

She flashed a sad smile back at me, her eyes shining. God, she was gorgeous. I can’t believe I bothered her so much today with my dumb mistakes. “Please do,” she said. “No rush, no pressure, but I’ll definitely keep an eye out for it.” I grinned, she was really, really good at this. “I’d… I would definitely love to chat more.” She honestly made me believe it. This woman really wanted to help me out, for real. This was enough to make my heart pound against my chest— finally, answers.

Before I could launch into solidifying plans here and now for a coffee date, just to make sure this opportunity at curse-breaking didn’t slip through my fingers, Madge was next to me carefully putting the whole blue-goo vial in my hand. It had a beautiful, chilly feeling to it. “Take the whole thing,” she said warmly. I really liked Madge. “It’s just a hop and a skip for us to get more.”

“Thanks so much, Madge,” I said, literally feeling like things might be about to get better— really get better— in my life. “I’ll pay it off with a drink tab and some point, I hope.”

Madge took my hand in hers and patted it gently, like my Great Aunt used to. “You are absolutely invited to do just that. Pleasure to meet you today, even under rough circumstances.”

The idea of being able to come to a place outside of my house… outside Gem’s house… where I could be normal, even just a little bit, and even if I was zonked was… god I don’t know if they made words strong enough for it. Liberating seemed too shallow.

Then, slowly, Cal’s arm slid around my shoulder. Very slowly, and carefully. I don’t know if that was because I was hurt, or because they didn’t want to get torn apart by Zora and Arthur and probably Madge. “C’mon,” they said quickly. “Think you’re good to drive or should I get Mak to pick us up?”

My heart sank immediately. I didn’t want to see any of them. God, it was going to be an actual disaster. But I also, honestly, couldn’t trust myself to drive. “Uhhh… yeah. Pick-up is the smart idea.” I turned to Cal with the sharpest look I could manage. “Tell Gem I’m regular sized, by the way. Just… just that.”

Cal gave me a hesitant nod. “Ok. I will. If you’re sure.”

“Very sure.”

Cal started to lead me out of the bar, and I smiled and waved as cheerfully as I could manage to fake it to the three of them as we headed for the exit. My eyes landed on Arthur and I almost jerked to a halt to talk to him. “Arthur!”

He perked up and turned in our direction. I didn’t quite know how to read him, still, even at regular-size. I didn’t know the best way to say thanks.

“…Keep set 3 clean for me.” Seemed good enough. “You make good potion-cover.”

A tiny smile crossed his features with a quick nod. “Of course. Zora will give you the password.”

“I will,” Zora added with enthusiastic nodding. “Don’t worry.” She gave me a little wave goodbye. “Let me know you’re alright. Talk to you soon.”

I felt myself blush a little. I get to learn a secret password to a magic bar, and Zora actually wanted to talk to me more. “Talk to you soon,” I said back, waving as Cal helped me through the door and toward the stairs.

Now it was just a matter of getting home.

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[hypeathon]

RWBY - Volume 6, Chapter 7 Production Analysis

Vol 6, Ch 1 Production Analysis

Vol 6, Ch 2 Production Analysis

Vol 6, Ch 3 Production Analysis

Vol 6, Ch 4 Production Analysis

Vol 6, Ch 5 Production Analysis

Vol 6, Ch 6 Production Analysis

With Brunswick farms behind us, it’s time to move on to a series of different settings and a few surprises in this chapter that mark the halfway point for volume 6. With interesting story beats this episode, there are as always equally interesting aspects of the production to add to the discussion.

Before actually getting into the production analysis itself, I wanted to take a moment to briefly highlight on Gen:Lock. I’m unsure if or when I want to get around to throwing my two cents on the upcoming mecha show, but with this preview and the last one prefacing the latest episodes of RWBY, it’s intriguing seeing how this show has been building up attention between interviews and announcements about it’s cast and production. It’s also a bit concerning the kind of feedback from viewers and what they’ve been approving of and expressed being bothered with. Again, whether or not I’ll touch on its production is up in the air right now, but I wanted to put forth my quick thoughts on the matter.

With that out of the way, let’s start the analysis proper by touching briefly on the Haven Academy vault scene. Not a whole lot to say other than the character acting, which I suspect may be Hannah Novotny. The way mouths are seen as either puckered or with teeth shown clenching are the supposedly calling cards, though beyond that, I’m not really sure whether it’s Hannah or it’s someone else. Regardless helps sell the kind of interpretive facial expressions for a character like Neo and the little gestures of Cinder casually forging different knives add to her overall character in a manner similar to what Kim Newman and Millivette Gonzalez did with Pyrrha in the skit they animated during episode 8 of RWBY Chibi season 1.

Speaking of RWBY Chibi, now would be a good time to move on to the next scene highlighting Maria Calavera’s younger self and the behind-the-scenes story behind her being called “the Grimm Reaper”. Tom Alvarado, a writer brought for RWBY Chibi since season 2 who had a small prior experience in the American animation industry writing the “Metalhead” episode of the 2012 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series was inspired by Miles Luna’s thread of tweets about the Apathy Grimm to share his own anecdote. Although presented in a more comical tone, the fascinating piece of information to take away was that he thought of calling Jaune’s superhero alter ego, “The Grimm Reaper” before it changed to “The Hunts-Man.” Although Miles and Kerry Shawcross didn’t specify why at the time, they apparently already had the former title planned for something else. What’s also worth noting is how back during the CRWBY Reddit “Ask Me Anything” event back in February of 2018, Kerry answered a question mentioning that during the writing process, a certain character and sub-plot had to be cut out of volume 5′s script and pushed for a later, yet to be tangible point in the story. Between that and Tom’s tweets, it’s very likely that Maria was suppose to be that character.

Just a theory worth sharing based on scattered pieces of information about the behind-the-scenes of the story’s creative process. Moving on to analyzing Maria’s scene itself which the first minute of it was uploaded via Rooster Teeth on Youtube prior to the episode proper, the choice of camera shots and overall setting display an array of callbacks from certain scenes in past installments of the show. The way we see Maria walk across the bridge and responds to the incoming Nevermore Grimm is definitely reminiscent of both the Red trailer and the volume 4 character short and the overall setting and the is akin to that of of the setting against the Nevermore Team RWBY fought in chapter 8 of volume 1. What makes this work so well is how instinctively recognizable the callbacks themselves feel. This is also not the first instance of callbacks being made instinctive through the cinematography. As stated in the production analysis for chapter 2, the reveal of Salem in her past is very similar to that of Salem’s first proper reveal in the end of chapter 12. Another example was when Weiss got stabbed by Cinder’s spear at the end of chapter 11, where storyboard/camera layout artists, Rachel Doda and former lead producer, Koen Wooten, both stated in episode 11 of RWBY Rewind that Kerry was very deliberate about having that shot be a callback to both Amber and Pyrrha being shot at by Cinder. These are just things worth keeping in mind when watching the show going forward.

At the risk of being a broken record, choreography has its place in a fight scene, but so does staging for both the physical aspect and the story being told. In this case, the choice of camera shots help sell what kind of character Maria was as The Grimm Reaper and what her reputation meant for characters like Qrow and Ruby and how they made their weapons and have fought. With all that being said, the similarities between Maria’s scene and the other scenes with Ruby mentioned end there as the rest of the visual direction from here on gives Maria her own identity. Speaking of which, from the start of her bout with the Nevermore onward, most of the scenes were animated by Megan Pellino, Joe Vick, John Yang and Matt Drury with assistant lead animator, Melanie Stern providing the Maria vs Tock segment in particular. If these names sound familiar, that’s because with the exception of John Yang, this is the same set of people involved with the Cinder vs Neo fight. Since volume 3, the process animating fight scenes changed from Monty Oum and Shane Newville doing individual fights by themselves to having fights be done in groups of 2-4, if not more. The names of people involved with fights may have varied from volume-to-volume, but the approach has remained the same.

  Unfortunately, despite being familiar with these names, it’s still difficult to entirely tell the difference between all the animators and how they go about fight sequences, particularly Megan Pellino and Joe Vick. However, as an educated guess, it’s likely that they animated the beginning segment with Maria and the Nevermore while the latter sequence between Maria and Tock’s group were done by John Yang, Matt Drury and Melanie Stern. There are confirmations of previous sequences done by John and Matt, making it easier to tell their styles apart. In the past, John did a bit of the Blake vs Ilia fight (likely right before Kim Newman’s sequence), Oscar vs Lionheart, and part of Ozpin vs Hazel. In Matt’s case, he animated Ghira vs the Albain twins in chapter 9 of volume 5 (might’ve been his first action sequence) and much of Adam’s fight segments in his character short. Based on these confirmations and comparing those scenes to Maria vs Tock and the bandits, John may have animated the segment from the start of the fight up until Maria’s aura broke while Matt animated the next sequence after. John seems to have this way of how before or after certain swings, strikes and other attacks, a character will maintain a pose for a split-second before striking again, kind of similar to how the animation director of volume 6, Joel Mann has animated scenes. His sequence also tends to have the camera move a bit wildly but still steadily-enough follow each character’s actions, though how much of that is due to John or whoever provided the final camera layout is unclear. Matt on the other hand does not seem to emphasize as much on the poses leaving a dynamic impression and has the animations feel a bit more continuous. Also unlike John, he’s more conservative with the camera shots being more steady, to the point where it feels like watching a side-scrolling fighting game like Tekken or Street Fighter. Again though, how much of that aspect is the animator as oppose to who does final camera layout is uncertain.

At the end of the day, this is all guesswork so it’s totally possible that I may have mixed-up who did which segments. But it’s still fun to estimate none-the-less. At the very least, it’s definitely confirmed that Melanie Stern animated Maria’s eyes being slashed and quite possibly Tock getting the upper hand on her right before and the rest of the scene right after. What’s more interesting is that since her position as assistant lead animator, this is the first episode where she helped lead a fight in a manner similar to how Kim Newman led the newer animators when she was assistant lead back in chapter 10 of volume 5. Hopefully, this serves as another reminder of how it’s important to pay mind to newer talents working on the show, as I’ve stated in previous posts, even when comparing to some anime productions. Before moving on to the next scene, the choice of having the ticking clock sound incorporated into the action sequence also deserves a mention. It’s amazing how intentionally well-timed it came off right down to the timing being precisely 60-seconds, which I imagine was no easy feat to pull off with director, Kerry Shawcross and co-director/lead editor, Connor Pickens having to coordinate between the storyboard, editing, animation and audio departments. 

With that out of the way, let’s shift focus from Maria’s flashback to the next scene in the present. There’s honestly not a whole lot to say about the scene between elder Maria and the others other than that there were some great facial expressions between Qrow and certain other characters to expressed how flabbergasted they were about the former Grimm Reaper’s reputation. There was also a bit of neat choice of angling the camera to highlight both Maria’s praise to team RWBY while having Yang’s self-doubting reaction be made clear. Where the visual direction really picks up though is once Ruby answers Jaune’s call and she holds her scroll towards the path towards Argus. Given the earnestly melancholic discussion about whether to follow the foot steps of one who deemed herself poorly and whether one of the older generation could still contribute something to the newer one, seeing an old throwback to character nicknames via Ruby’s caller id for Jaune provided quite an appropriate change of tone for the scene. From here on, things get uplifting, through the piano instrumentation of this volume’s opening theme, the shift of lighting to create warmer color schemes as a result of likely the art and lighting departments and having the camera get closer towards with each invisible wipe transition of the trees as they travel uphill until the payoff of the city in their site is shown.

Next is the reunion scene between the two teams and while there’s again, not a whole lot to add, there are a couple of interesting notes. First, when Nora is first seen, there’s a moment where the camera suddenly zooms towards Nora. This is to serve as another reminder that choice of camera direction between different characters is indeed a thing as mentioned previous posts and in Nora’s case, shots can sometimes have zippy panning or zooms to compliment her very enthusiastic nature. The second thing is a little mention from Asha Bishi about how another animator did the moment where Jaune and Ruby hugged. She didn’t say who it was exactly, but it’s just something I wanted to acknowledge.

Then there’s the scene establishing Argus which has definitely been a highlight for fans. In volume 5, a lot of fans were especially critical due to how what little of Mistral was shown at the time was partially via the composited still art of residents in one of the market. The backlash, though not immediate, was very understandable and it does seem like a bit of a waste to not have enough on-screen interactions between the main cast and whatever new settings they set foot on given Monty Oum’s intention from the beginning. However, if I were to speculate as to why Argus was provided more premium treatment in its production instead, it may be because the main cast are expected to interact and traverse more within the setting. Knowing this, Kerry Shawcross and Miles Luna wanted to make sure more time was allotted specifically for however many episodes would take place. Combine that with a shift in software to model and animate crowds from Autodesk Maya’s Golemn Crowd plugin to Side FX’s Houdini and the creative process behind the color aesthetic and architecture from the art department and here is the end result. As breathtaking as the setting is, it shouldn’t be dismissed how time-consuming it must have been making this setting as fleshed out as it is.

Moving on, we get the first introduction of a character teased for the longest time since chapter 7 of volume 2, one of Jaune’s seven sisters, Saphron Cotta-Arc, fully voiced, modeled, animated and everything! There’s a lot to cover about the Cotta-Arc family scene in general, first and foremost being Saphron’s voice actress, Lindsay Sheppard, who has previously done some voice acting work, most notably Aria from the Pokemon XY anime. Second thing to mention is that seeing team RWBY meet Saphron was actually animated by Nyle Pierson, who you may remember for first contributing to volume 6 through his animation of Yang and Blake walking through the blizzard in chapter 5. Seeing someone new to the show’s production do facial expressions and the right combination of surprise and eagerness from Ruby is delivered very effectively, all while making sure to show the other characters in the background express finding the behavior awkward in response. It’s unclear if the next set of animated cuts are also from Nyle or not due to the similarly exaggerated nature of the expressions and body language of the characters, but kudos to him either way. This is also a good opportunity to talk about the storyboards for the Cotta-Arc living room scene which were done by Cassidy Stone. This is the same storyboard artist that provided the scene of the main cast eating the ramen hot pot in chapter 7 of volume 5 and it was actually Cassidy’s first work on the show. Between that, the scene of Ruby and Weiss in the storage room and now this, it’s clear that her forte is providing lively banter between characters in a way that rekindled some of the aspect more prominent in RWBY’s earlier volumes. The camera layout also deserves some credit, namely for that bit where Jaune firmly points at Adrian and the camera is timed to shake at that moment to sell his annoyance. One more thing to note was Jaune and Saphron’s family photo which may have been drawn by art director, Patrick Rodriguez.

Next is the introduction of Terra Cotta-Arc, Saphron’s wife which has undoubtedly invoked the fan base into a fervor of positivity over a visible representation of a married lesbian couple. As significant as these characters are for adding another log to the fire of making a minority feel more inclusive through fictional media, what especially works here is that in the short screen time, we get an inkling of what kind of relationship they have. Between the expressions, gestures, choice of dialogue and types of voices from Lindsay Sheppard as Saphron and Rooster Teeth layout coordinator and associate producer, Jamie Smith as Terra, we can tell that one is slightly more free-spirited and easy-going while the other is a bit more grounded, stressed and concerned with ethics (i.e: whether students helping professional huntsmen is “legal” or not). Both clearly have a strong rapport at the end of the day, but it’s the small bits of information in-between that gives that insight. Straight or gay, romantic or otherwise, that’s important to depict in any relationship between characters.

That small tangent aside, one more thing to add about the scene was the cast eating sandwiches. This moment was at least partially animated by Collin McAtee who funnily enough, did the scene while eating a Jimmy John’s club lulu sandwich. The animation was nicely done, especially with Ruby’s eagerness to chow down as well as Blake’s subtle reaction through her cat ears. Though what I wanted to note in particular are the modeled sandwiches. Since it was confirmed that the modeling team handled the ramen food in chapter 7 of volume 5, I assume that they also handled the models for the sandwiches by providing different ones for certain characters depending on how much was bitten off. There’s nothing inherently wrong with that, though I felt with Ruby eating her sandwiches in particular, there could’ve been different models of the sandwiches not being bitten off as much to make the animation of her eating them feel more seamless. But it’s all really minor.

There’s one more shot at the end of the episode of the gang at the Atlessian base, though given the preview for next week’s chapter on RWBY Rewind, it’s best to put a pin on that until the next production analysis. Speaking of which, that marks in end of this episode’s analysis. Definitely a variety of scenes that all provided different purposes and different tones, all done very effectively. To go from Cinder and Neo to Maria’s backstory to the present to reuniting with team Jaune, Ren & Nora to meeting Saphron and her family, all in roughly 15-16 minutes, was done very effectively and never felt jarring. We’re now officially at the halfway point with what seems to be an overall more well-received volume thus far and it’s pretty exciting to see what else will be in store from here on.

[squid-that-reads-a-lot-blog]

Oathbringer Review

A while back, I finished the most recent entry into the Stormlight Archive series by Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.  Haven’t gotten around to writing a review yet.  Starting off, I have to say that I have similar thoughts to my opinions of the previous two books.  Sanderson is rarely incompetent and he does many things very well.  Like the previous two entries, there are several small arcs throughout the story that make the 1300 page count a little more digestible.  There is also no shortage of action and each major character has their own story arc.

Overall, this is my favorite in the series by a long shot.  The first two aren’t bad, the style just is not my cup of tea.  However, this book did a lot of things that I liked.  The part that I liked the most is the fact that the book focused a lot on Dalinar.  Dalinar is my favorite character in the series and the fact that he is so much older than the other two previous leads made his story arc so much more enjoyable.  Sanderson puts his characters through a lot of shit but it felt more natural in this book.  I feel like the backstories aren’t as important as who the character is, and when the characters are as young as Kaladin or Shallan, their inner monologues about their pasts can’t help but feel... whiny…

It could just be me, and they aren’t terrible characters, but I think this story arc is far better than the others.  It’s full of some fantastic emotional moments that crank it up to eleven.  My personal favorites have to be the flashback of the attempted assassination and the burning of the rift.  The first one made me laugh because it’s so insanely badass and over-the-top.  It’s like a scene straight out of a crazy 90’s action movie.  The burning of the rift is a whole chapter that I found grimly entertaining.  I was reminded of stories of those ancient Roman emperors who would drag their enemies behind their chariots after they surrendered.  Everything about it is so brutal and shocking that you feel a whole mix of emotions while reading.  Honestly this is where Sanderson is at his best.  It’s when really insane shit is happening that his talent truly shines.  

A few smaller things that I liked included some of the other characters.  While I felt like it was too late to make him really heroic, Ellokar felt a little less useless in this book.  He had some nice moments in the spotlight throughout the book.  Shallan also had a few good moments but I honestly think that Sanderson is not good at writing very feminine characters.  Every time he has a female character with a tough, masculine edge he does great but if they like pretty dresses instead of punching people he tends to falter.  While some of the choices that he makes in this book could be explained with the trauma that Shallan herself has experienced, it feels a little out of touch to me.  He often misses the mark a little bit when it comes to writing women like this and it is very noticeable in this book.  

As for a few other characters, I have some mixed feelings.  Adolin is obviously being solidified as this awesome, likable guy that does badass things with a sword but something feels a little off.  There are a few times where I feel like the book is going out of its way to say how likable he is and it makes me feel like he is going to die.  It’s sticks out to me because nothing has really come out of it and he is so wildly different from the other members of the main cast.  This seems like an odd choice to me but there’s nothing we can do about it for the next four years.  Other than that, I love the fact that he is a total diva.  It’s rare that I get a Legally Blonde vibe from a male character.  

A character that got kind of shafted in my opinion, is Jasnah.  I guess that she’s supposed to be this sort of mysterious character because she’s so smart but I have a hard time getting that.  It feels like she does very little and there are few times when her intellect is really shown.  We’re just told that she’s one of the smartest women in the world while she is busy doing… stuff…  I’ve been waiting for her to be cool and I guess I’ll have to wait a little longer.  She could be a really awesome character but I just haven’t seen that yet.  

Now let’s get to the problems I have with this book.  A lot of these boil down to my personal preference so some people might not be bothered by these as much as I was.  

One small but glaring problem I saw in the last book had to do with Lift and it shows up again in this book when Lift returns as well as the introduction of Szeth’s overpowered sword.  The way that they are written really rubs me the wrong way.  The vast majority of the books are written in this old style that you see a lot with epic fantasy.  You are stepping back in time in this alternate universe.  People don’t use all the colloquialisms that we do in everyday life.  Against this backdrop, modern words and phrases are rather jarring.  Sanderson sometimes does this in this series.  Usually it’s not bad enough to take me out of the story but with Lift and the super sword it is pretty egregious.  The sword is not all that bad save for a few moments but the constant use of the word ‘awesomeness’ with Lift gets on my nerves.  It is so out of place and jarring.  It reminds me of L.E. Modesett Jr. where they would use modern curse words and it was really out of place.  I wish he wouldn’t use words like that but ultimately it is a small part of the story.  

A big grievance that I have with this book that may not seem all that bad to others is the whole murder plot.  I read that scene in the last book where Sadeas is murdered and I was really waiting to see what would happen.  Ialai is set up as this incredibly dangerous woman earlier in the series.  The last time she saw her husband alive was when he walked off with a guy that hated his guts.  There’s no way she doesn’t know exactly who did this.  It might have been my expectations being too high, but I felt like this was such a lame story arc in the end.  This was one that could have had some real consequences for our characters.  Imagine how much trouble Adolin would have been in with this woman for an enemy.  Not only that, but his rash decision would have some serious consequences on Dalinar’s budding political career.  Does he punish his son for his crime or does he risk looking weak in front of his political opponents?  It would add some legitimately serious consequences to Adolin’s story arc and this sort of thing sounds like it would be right up Sanderson’s alley storytelling-wise.  But things didn’t go this way.  Ialai doesn’t do anything in this book.  There were so many chapters that talked about her extensive spy network and how dangerous it is to get on her bad side but it all seemed like it was for nothing.  In fact, the whole treatment of the Sadeas characters has been disappointing to me.  Toral’s betrayal in the first book didn’t really make any sense to me.  I felt like he really was warming up to a friendship with Dalinar again.  Politics had driven them apart but I believed that he could come over to the good side.  I think he could have made a great anti-hero with his crooked approach to the things that the team good-guy is trying to accomplish.  Appearance-wise, I also think that they are very well designed.  I always like it when an author gives the faces of their characters some character itself.  I have a clear image in my head of what these people look like.  The fact that they’re both really ugly but really happy together is kind of unique as well.  Team good-guy wouldn’t just be comprised of a bunch of pretty people if these two had the potential for some redemption arcs.  The fact that he just died and his wife is just sitting like a bump on a log just feels like a waste of two potentially great characters.  Sanderson could have something planned for Ialai, but I felt like this was a huge waste of potential and her potential time in the spotlight has passed.

The other big problem is just an extension of a complaint that I have with the other two books.  Sanderson doesn’t seem to have the knack for making characters seem quite as alive as other authors.  The coldness in his writing is one of the few things keeping him from being one of my favorite authors honestly.  He’s introduced this vast and expansive world but it feels strangely small.  I think a big contributor to this is that the plots rarely take the characters outside of one area.  It’s a problem that’s seen in the original Star Wars trilogy.  Action packed plots and fun characters in this massive universe but it feels so small because we just see this handful of people.  The whole Kolinar arc made the world seem a little bigger but that went away as soon as the characters left.  It’s strange because we get so many POV chapters from characters all over the map but they feel incredibly disconnected.  It’s a strange problem to have, especially when this series is compared so closely with the Wheel of Time series, where this was one of its strongest parts.  

One more small gripe I have has to do with the pictures.  All of them are great but I wish there was just one landscape in there.  The world is so alien to what we’re used to seeing that it would be cool to really see it through the character’s eyes.  I hope he gets one of these in a future addition to the series.  

I haven’t mentioned a lot of things about the book either because I’m not sure what to think about it, there’s not enough information, or the fact that it’s just good.  The good far outweighs the bad in this book and I could not put this one down (not easy when I got the huge hardcover copy).  Even with all my complaints, this is still a fantastic book that I would highly recommend. Full of action and badassery at every turn, this is something that I see people enjoying for a long time.

[oumakokichi]

Is it just me, or does Ouma not call Gonta by any sort of honorific? I know most of the cast uses first-name basis with Gonta, but they'll still call him "Gonta-kun," unless we have characters like Hoshi or Harukawa who don't affix them to others in the first place. However, Ouma usually uses the affectionate (?) suffix "-chan," to others and with characters he's mean to he'll give them a nickname (ex. Kiibo) so what do you think this means? Is it possible Ouma disliked Gonta from the start?

It’s not just you! He definitely doesn’t use any sort ofhonorific with Gonta. Gonta and Kiibo are the only two exceptions to Ouma’susual “-chan” suffix—but I don’t think it’s specifically to be mean, exactly.

In Kiibo’s case, referring to him as “キー坊,” or“Kiiboy,” stems a lot more from the urge to tease, exactly. It’s partly a jabat Kiibo’s robot status (i.e. very tongue-in-cheek “you’ll be a real boysomeday”), but it’s also because Kiibo is so incredibly easy to tease about it.A lot of Ouma’s prankster side tends to show through whenever he finds an “easytarget,” and Kiibo is so incredibly easy to rile up about the whole robot thingthat I think he can’t quite resist teasing about it whenever possible. Even asearly as Chapter 2, the two of them have a pretty back-and-forth banterestablished; given Ouma’s love of comedy, I wouldn’t be surprised if he wastrying to borrow from manzai a little bit.

With Gonta, however, I think it’s actually the opposite ofteasing. Certainly, he does tease Gonta with his pranks and lies, especiallyprior to Chapter 4 when everything gets so horribly messy. And Gonta goes alongwith it for the most part and occasionally even finds out that Ouma was messingwith him and gets payback for it (make no mistake, Ouma having to touch bugsfor hours on end in Chapter 2 was probablynot part of his original plan. Gonta won that fight). But Gonta is such asincere, genuine, honest person, with no ill intentions towards anyone, andwhile Ouma knew that those were risky qualities in a killing game, I think partof him also couldn’t help but respect that.

Calling “Gonta” simply by his first name with no nicknamesor honorifics or anything else suggests, to me at least, that Gonta was just…Gonta. The fact that most of the group called Gonta by his first name suggests,to me at least, that it was nearly impossible for any of them to dislike him. He may not have been particularly closewith anyone in the group per se, but he was still so obviously well-intentionedand sweet that it was probably hard for any of the characters to feel as thoughthey had to be formal with him, per se (unless they were generally formal witheveryone, like Kirumi).

I do think some of the group’s first-name-basis with Gontadoes, however, stem from no one taking him seriously. Many of the othercharacters perceive Gonta a lot like… well, a lot like NISA is going to localizehim. They assume that because of the way he grew up and because of his lack ofexposure to certain information, he’s just plain stupid, and this is clearlynot the case. Gonta isn’t the brightest, of course, but he’s perfectly smartwhen it comes to his area of expertise, and he has general, practical knowledgeabout the way the world works.

His eye for detail is impressive (he noticed the “bug” inChapter 2 and had the foresight to tell the group about it), he realized thestars around Saishuu Academy were different from any of the constellations hewas familiar with, and he even figured out how Kirumi’s ropeway was crafted inthe Chapter 2 trial. Gonta is easily confused by things he’s not familiar withand led astray because he’s naïve, but that doesn’t mean he’s an idiot by anymeans. But because he perceives himself as an idiot, often calling himselfstupid and apologizing for it, the other characters subconsciously latch ontothis, and by the time Chapter 4 rolls around, none of them think he was verysmart, at all.

Interestingly enough, however, most of Ouma’s commentstowards Gonta calling him an idiot are reserved only for Chapter 4. Much of his outburst during the trial,including seemingly getting very angry, calling Gonta stupid, and telling himto confess to his sins, seems to have been a calculated act in order to promptSaihara to step up and explain the full details of the case to Gonta in hisplace. By bringing to light the fact that Gonta kept saying “I don’t know, Idon’t understand, what’s going on” in Chapter 4 again and again, Saiharafinally caught onto the fact that the headset cables being switched around hadcaused Gonta to lose his memories of what happened in the VR world.

Ouma’s angry outburst is, in fact, so wildly out ofcharacter compared to his previous behavior that I can’t help but feel it hasto have been an act; getting upset enough to yell at people isn’t his style atall, and we know he can keep his composure relatively well even after being choked,strangled, poisoned, etc. Getting so obviously, blatantly upset and angry atsomeone as obviously confused and bewildered as Gonta helped to cement hisvillain role too, turning the group against him even before he “revealed” thathe was just “pretending to care” at the end of Chapter 4.

Prior to Chapter 4, however, while Ouma does tease Gonta, heoften points out that his gullibility and naïveté will only get him killed inthe end. He calls Gonta “a simple person,” in Chapter 2, but not “stupid,” or “anidiot.” All in all, his pranks and teasing with Gonta prior to everythinghitting the fan in Chapter 4 were relatively harmless—he knew Gonta would bequick to believe him or anyone else about anything, and he kept that in mind.

So his referring to Gonta by his first name, withouthonorifics, seems like a reflection of Gonta’s “simple” personality. Oumahimself couldn’t afford to be trusting or honest or open when he was so deeplyparanoid by nature, especially not while the killing game itself was stillongoing. But I think he respected that Gonta was one of the few genuinely open,honest people in the game who wasn’t keeping huge secrets himself. Unlike Kaedeand Momota, both of whom spoke loudly about cooperation and honesty but hidthings from the rest of the group, Gonta was relatively straightforward.Whenever he found anything, or whenever he wanted to try a plan of his own(like fighting the Exisals) he came and talked to the rest of the groupimmediately.

If Ouma had ever actually disliked Gonta, I think it would’veshown quite clearly. He dislikes Maki pretty openly, after all, and it shows.He still refers to her by her last name and “-chan” for most of the game, andoccasionally even uses “Harumaki-chan” for her when he particularly wants to piss her off. Generally, he becomes even moresarcastic and confrontational than usual when he’s talking to someone heclearly dislikes, rather than cold or formal.

Ouma’s behavior towards Gonta just before his execution inthe Chapter 4 trial shows that he knew good and well that what he was doingsomething inexcusable to him, even if it was for the sake of stopping thekilling game. Midway through one of his speeches, his façade even slips, and hestops and speaks much more quietly, as though to himself, saying “That’s right…I do owe Gonta an apology… I really am doing something horrible…” before seguingback to his usual act.

He also, as we know, keeps finding it harder and harder tocarry on that act in the moments before Gonta’s death. Minutes prior to Gonta’sexecution, he actually begs to be executed with him, saying that he actuallycan’t stand it and that if they’re both responsible then they should both bekilled. The only reason he doesn’t actually do so in the end is because Gontaasks him not to, saying that he should stay alive and “become friends witheveryone,” to which Ouma reluctantly agrees.

Given everything we know about Ouma’s very genuine hatredfor killing, death, and suffering, his breakdown just prior to Gonta’s deathcomes under a very different light than his post-trial villain routine wouldsuggest. He had absolutely nothing to gain by asking to be executed, or askingthe rest of the group very specifically not to blame Gonta or hate him for hiscrime. Had he actually hated Gonta or looked down on him, he would’ve rubbedsalt in the wound, exposing his “betrayal” while he was still alive. There wasliterally nothing in it for him to risk his own death—unless he really did feelawful about the horrible, inexcusable thing that he was doing and was waveringat the last minute.

What Ouma does to Gonta is inexcusable and awful, but hedoesn’t do it out of hatred. I wouldn’t say that Ouma ever hated or disliked Gonta,not in Chapter 4, and certainly not at any point before that. If anything, thefact that Gonta was one of the few characters to trust him implicitly and whowas always nice to him, as well as the fact that he wasn’t someone who wouldusually kill anyone under normal circumstances, probably meant Ouma couldn’thelp but like him. But because of the killing game, and because of the horribleboiling point things came down to in Chapter 4, he had to make cold, hard,awful decisions, and he knew that making friends and getting genuinely close topeople wasn’t something he could afford.

He manipulates Gonta in Chapter 4 and sends him to hisdeath, but he certainly never wanted him dead—part of the reason he used Gontafor his plans was in fact because Gonta actually volunteered to come with himto search for the “motive” that Monokuma hid, saying that he would protect him.That was the point at which Ouma seemed to realize he could use Gonta for hisplans, but it doesn’t seem as though he was thinking of using Gontaspecifically prior to that.

In any case, I believe the way he refers to Gonta is a veryrare show of sincerity, rather than cheekiness, sarcasm, or dislike. Underother circumstances, I think he would’ve quite liked to have been Gonta’sfriend—although needless to say, he would’ve still pulled pranks on himrelentlessly and been a huge brat all around.

I hope I explained myself well. Thank you for asking, anon!