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gorgonarcher · 5 months ago

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13th Game - City of Mist

All right, time to get to the third of my four favorite games. (The last is Monster of the Week and will likely do that one late this year or early next year because there's a thing I'm waiting for).

(and just so it is the picture in the thumbnail, here's a City of Heroes made picture for this character)

So, City of Mist is a game of noir superheroes takes place in a city where people are empowered by connections to a story. This story can be any sort of thing ranging ancient myths to comic books to overall concepts. As some examples, here are some other characters I've made or seen in games:

Arachnae

Arthur Dent

The concept of names

Count of Monte Cristo

Dracula

D&D Cleric

D&D Wizard

East India Trading Company

Echidna

Euryale

Evangeline A.K. McDowell

Evil Queen

Frankenstein

Gamemaster

Lamastu

Lilith

Mathematics

Medusa

Movie Monsters

Orpheus

Perseus

Peter Pan

Pompei (the volcano)

Puppet Master

Stheno

Tengu Swordmaster

In any case, the characters will have a combination of a Mythos, the supernatural aspect that gives them power, and a Logos, their day to day normal life. Though "normal" here is relative because you could be a "vigilante" or "lab test subject" as easily as "housewife" or "fire fighter". The only thing is that it is something that we could reasonably see being a situation that someone would be in, in the real world.

From there, you choose four themebooks. There are Logos and Mythos themebooks and you need at least one of each. So you would have one of these combinations:

Touched: 3 Logos, 1 Mythos

Borderliner: 2 Logos, 2 Mythos

Legendary: 1 Logos, 3 Mythos

Within the narrative, a Legendary character is substantially more powerful than a Borderliner or Touched character, but gameplay wise all three are balanced in the amount of bonuses they can get to rolls. As explained here:

Each of the four themebooks represent major character themes. Perhaps you have a signature piece of gear, that would be Possessions themebook for mundane gear like a sports car or a Relic for a magic weapon. You might have a formative event from your past. That's a Defining Event. If you have powers to alter the world around you, that's Expression. So on and so forth.

Step One: Concept

So, to start with, I've done a build of this before, and that was Yuri Ayler, a competitive archer whose sister had died recently. I don't want to re-use that because it will prevent me from actually thinking through the idea. So I'm going to make a new character and I'm going to name her Steffani Noel. She goes by Stef.

Now, for her mythos, the obvious choice would be Stheno, given the name. But we're not required to do that. We could have Stef's mythos be Stheno specifically, Gorgons in a more general sense, or even the specific gorgon of a different story like Clash of the Titans.

In this case, I think I am going to say her Mythos is the idea of Gorgons in general rather than any specific one.

So now, let's consider the Logos. Let's think of some real world roles or occupations that could work with the idea of an archer. Yuri Ayler was a competitive sport archer, which is an option, of course, but I want to do something a bit different. City of Mist also mostly takes place within an urban environment, but there's accounting for having nearby semi-rural areas. So park ranger isn't completely out of bounds, but feels a bit meh. What I think I'm going to do is have her as a sporting goods store owner.

So that presents the following:

Name: Steffani "Stef" Noel

Mythos: Gorgon

Logos: Store Owner

Step Two: Themebooks

Now, we have to choose four themebooks. The options are as follows (themebooks from the Shadows and Showdowns supplement are marked as such):

Mythos

Bastion - Defensive powers

Divination - Sensory powers

Expression - Alter the world

Mobility - Movement powers

Subversion - Stealth powers

Adaptation - versatile powers

Relic - magical artifact

Conjuration (S&S) - summon creatures

Destiny (S&S) - Luck, fate, curses, prophecies, etc

Enclave (S&S) - Magical location

Familiar (S&S) - Magical companion

Logos

Defining Event - Formative event or experience

Defining Relationship - Mundane relationship

Mission - A chosen duty and drive

Personality - Manner of behavior

Possessions - Signature items

Routine - A set sequence you engage in regularly

Training - Skills you have acquired

Struggle (S&S) - Personal adversity

Turf (S&S) - mundane domain or reputation

I think Stef is going to be a borderliner. So, two of each. I'm actually going to make her a very locational based hero and give her both Turf and Enclave. Yuri didn't have the gaze, but in this case I think I will go for that and give Stef an Expression. For the fourth themebook, I'm going to go with Defining Event.

So now, we complete each of the Themebooks answering certain questions associated with each book. So, for each Themebook we're going to have the following:

One title for the theme.

One Concept which doesn't have much mechanics but forms a guideline for what makes sense for you to be able to do with that theme.

One Identity/Mystery, a statement of self that anchors you to your life or a question that drives you. Mythos themes get Mysteries, Logos themes get Identities.

Three Power Tag questions

One Weakness Question

A relationship with one of the other crew members.

In addition, we will choose one Theme to get an extra Power Tag and extra Weakness.

For the purposes of showing the History, we're going to give her four Crew members, one for each theme. This is a fairly large group to play this game with those. Anyway, that Crew will be:

Maxine Itami - Rift of the First Person Shooter and Online Gamer

Kylie Swift - Rift of the Banshee and Street Musician

Ada Sainz - Rift of the Hell Hound and Veterinarian

Mika Lala - Rift of Blahaj and Therapist

I'll explain the mechanics of Tags and Weaknesses after character creation.

Step Three - Use the Themebooks to choose theme components

So, we're going to start with the Logos themes.

Logos Theme - Turf

So, the themebook gives some basic questions to help inspire you about your concept for a themebook. I'm not sure I really need them and they don't particularly have mechanics attached, but I'll look through them anyway to see if it gives some ideas. Rather, there's a single question and three example answers.

The question is "What is your Domain?" and the answer is going to be a variation of "I am the head honcho at _________". And we're going to use the name of the shop as the title of the Turf.

Let's see, the mythical Python was a great serpent associated with oracles and a child of Gaea. They laired at Delphi and were slain by Apollo who set up his own oracle at Delphi.

So, we're going to go with "Gaea's Girl - Sporting Supplies". With a concept of "independently owned sporting good shop."

For the Identity, we can't just say what the Turf is, we have to make a statement about our relationship to it. Ambitions for its future, strong emotions attached to it, or other sorts of statements that can be threatened in game play. I'm going to say "This was Mother's gift to me and I'll make her proud." So, I'm going to say that her mother funded her to buy the land and building for her shop.

So, now we get to Power Tag and Weakness questions. Each Theme has ten possible Power Tag questions and four Weakness questions. Of these, we will answer the question marked with the letter A and choose two other questions and then we will choose one of the four weakness questions.

So for Power Tags, I'm choosing the following questions. (Again, question A is mandatory.

A: What area or domain do you control?

D: Who in your turf follows your orders?

I: What advantage do you have over your competition in your Turf

And for the Weakness, I'm going with:

B: What negative behavior or quality did you develop in your role as leader?

So, the answers should short statements, things that can be easily quoted as a catch phrase, or easily worked into a narrative description. And I'm going with the following.

Power Tags:

A: shop full of sporting gear

D: enthusiastic and well-paid team

I: loyal customer base

So, if she has a need for rope, tents, pitons, ammunition, or anything in that vein. She can get it easy enough from her own shop. Her employees are friendly and well-paid, so they are eager to be there. Finally, she has a lot of repeat customers and they lead on to other customers via word of mouth.

Weakness:

B: "No time to relax."

I envision that Stef puts everything she has into her business. She's probably the sort of owner that will cut her own pay rather than that of her employees and she probably doesn't delegate nearly as much work as she should.

Now Crew Relationships will provide either a Hurt or a Help related to the named Crew member. A Hurt is used to give a crew member a -1 to a roll while a Help is used to give them a +1. As a note, there are times when you can use a Hurt to prevent a crew member from doing something that you think will be bad from them in the long run. And you can use Help to push enable them along a self-destructive path. But these do generally represent lingering emotions between the two of you.

For this case I'm going with

"You once caught one of them operating in your turf. Tell them what you said. If they complied, take a Help point on them. If they ignored you, take a Hurt point on them."

What I think happened is she caught Kylie Swift busking outside her store and asked her to not do it so close to the entrances. However, Kylie refused to do it. Stef didn't want to resort to trespassing her team mate, and people have started to chuckle at or ignore the repeated low-stake arguments between the two. So Kylie continues to busk there and the result is a Hurt on Kylie.

Now we do the same for the other three themes.

Logos Theme - Defining Event

The inspiration question here is "What happened to you that changed your life forever?" So, what I'm going to say here is that her shop was robbed by a man with a couple of thugs with a gun and a Molotov cocktail. When the cocktail was thrown at one of her employees she moved to shove them out of the way and was badly burned as a result.

Title: Robbery and Arson

Concept: I was burned in an attempted robbery.

Identity: I'd do anything to protect my people.

Now for the Power Tag questions I want to answer:

A: What kind of strong emotion did your defining event leave you with?

F: What skill or mundane ability did you pick up during or due to your defining event?

H: What approach to life did you adopt following your defining event?

Next, the Weakness question:

D: What is now broken within you, physically or mentally, due to your defining event?

And the answers to the Power tags will be:

A: fierce rage and protectiveness

F: mastered the bow

H: "I can't let them down."

The whole event set a cold, snake-like fury into her veins. She will protect her people and her territory as much as she can. To do this, she picked up the bow, figuring it was a quiet weapon that was less regulated than guns. Finally, she has burdened herself with the need to make sure she lives up to the expectations of her family, employees, and customers... even if some of those expectations are ones she decided they should have of her.

Finally, the Weakness answer:

D: severe burn scars

Stef's face and body was severely burned, which comes with occasional spikes of pain and a decidedly shocking appearance that new people aren't used to.

For Stef's crew relationship here, I'm going to go with the following question:

"One of them is trying to help you (or make you) get over your defining event and move on. If you appreciate it, take a Help point on them. If you resent it, take a Hurt point on them."

I'm going to say that Mika has been trying to be there for Stef and be someone to listen to. She provides counter points to some of Stef's most self-destructive arguments and thoughts on the matter and is basically trying to slowly chip away at the damage. Stef appreciates this and thus she takes Help on Mika.

Mythos Theme - Expression

So, where as Logos themes get an Identity that anchors things to the character's non-supernatural life, the Mythos has a Mystery which is a question that drives them forward into adventure. The Expression theme is all about how the character's supernatural power influences the world around them. This can include things like mind control, weather control, super strength, fire powers, or anything of the like.

The inspiration question is "What change does your Mythos wish to effect in the world?"

The phrasing of that is important. It is unclear what exactly the Mythos is. Possibilities include:

The truth of a supernatural being that has forgotten who they are.

The influence of an entity reliving itself through a human.

A metaphysical modeling of powers via a familiar tale.

The game calls the heroes "Rifts" but notes that the term is mostly for game-mechanic purposes, to have something in text to refer to, and that in-universe there's no common term that all the Rifts go by. Some Rifts have never even heard of the story they gain power from, while for others it is a well known story they have long thought about.

What is consistent is that the Mythos is more about repeating its story than about seeking the goals of the beings in that story. As such letting the Mythos rampant and override the Logos, called becoming an Avatar, is never something you want to last very wrong. An Avatar has lost connection to humanity and it will do everything to recreate its story on an epic scale. A Rift of a legendarily kind entity still becomes a monstrous danger because the Mythos doesn't have the entity's morals... it just wants to repeat the rehash the story.

So, how does the Gorgon wish to change the world? Let's say the Gorgon wants to punish everyone for her suffering.

That said, let's look at this:

Title: Gorgon's Gaze

Concept: The gorgon seeks to punish the world for her suffering.

Mystery: Why did this happen to me?

For the Power Tag Questions:

A: What is the most common way you use your Mythos to affect the world?

G: What additional expression, not necessarily related to the main one, does your mythos have?

J: How can you use your power to shield yourself, especially from similar effects?

And the Weakness:

A: What situations or conditions weaken or suppress your Mythos' Expressions

The Power Tag answers will be:

A: petrifying gaze

G: vipers for hair

J: bulwark of rage

So, of course, the primary expression is her ability to turn people to stone with a look, but she also has vipers for hair which she could attack with or use to spot trouble coming. Most people wouldn't notice the snakes because the Mist hides the supernatural aspects of the world from most people. Finally, she is protected by the vast amount of rage she now harbors in her heart. This makes it especially difficult to affect her with emotional attacks or to stop her through mere pain.

With the Weakness answer being:

A: They have to see me.

Unfortunately, if someone can't see her, they're not going to be affected by her gaze. They can still be bitten by the snakes, but a significant portion of her power has been avoided by people that can't see her.

Crew Relationships for Mythos themes talk about how the two crew members have interacted with or relate to each other's powers and Mythoi. Perhaps one Mythoi feels a kinship or suspicion with another. Perhaps one Rift has helped you protect or deal with your supernatural abilities. For this I'm going with the following question:

"To your Mythos, one of them seems like the modern-day version of a character in its legend. If they were your foe in the legend, take a Hurt point on them. If they were your ally or loved one, or if you were their rescuer, take a Help point on them."

I'm going to say that they have mixed feelings about Maxine Itami, they recognize Maxine's past and near death experience is similar to their own situation with the robbery. However, the Gorgon part of her (assuming it is part of her and not an eldritch other) looks at Maxine and is reminded of the various adventurers that come to their lair to slay the monster. So, she takes a Hurt on Maxine.

Mythos Theme - Enclave

The inspiring question for this is going to be "What location serves an important role in your mythos?" In this case I'm going to say it's a Statuary Garden full of the trophies of past victories and places to hide and ambush foes. As we want Stef to be a hero, I'm ambivalent on having the garden fell of actual petrified enemies. It could be that a representative trophy is made when a victory occurs. On the other hand, this game tends to be on the gritty side, so she might very well store the statues of people she found too dangerous to let live.

It's important to remember that every hero in City of Mist has the seeds to become a villain.

So, for the concept section:

Title: Statuary Garden

Concept: A place that carries reminders of pain and conflict.

Mystery: "How can I bring life to this ruin?"

So now we go to the Power Tag questions:

A: What or where is your Enclave?

C: How can you access your Enclave quickly, discreetly, etc?

J: What item, skill, or quality do you keep when you leave the Enclave?

With the Weakness question of:

B: What happens when you've spent too long in your Enclave?

The answers for the power tags are as follows:

A: ruin of dark shadows and terror

C: walk through lonely places

J: instinct for stalking

The statuary garden is a lonely place that appears to have been abandoned for centuries and allowed to become overgrown and falling apart. There are statues of people and animals in poses of terror all over the place. Stef can access the garden, or lead people to it, by walking through lonely areas, like an abandoned building, or an unknown alleyway. She probably has a basement storage mostly forgotten about in her shop that she can use to reach it as well. This means that if she plans her route, then she can lead enemies into the garden for a battle. Finally, she has learned how to stalk enemies through her time in the garden.

Finally the Weakness answer comes as follows:

B: depression and self-loathing

The garden as it currently exists is a place of death and destruction and does nothing to remind Stef of anything good about her life. Staying too long in the garden will deepen the negative ways she views herself. Especially as her Mystery drives her to find out how she can bring life to the place again and make it something different.

For the crew relationship question I'm choosing to answer

"When your Enclave was in danger of being discovered or damaged, one of them stepped up to cover for your or had your back. Take a Help point on them."

I'm going to say it was Ada Sainz and say that in an early case when some thugs managed to get into the Garden somehow while Stef was busy, Ada followed and took care of them.

Extra Tags

Now we come to one Theme that will get an extra Power Tag and an Extra Weakness tag. And I feel like I've got most of the Themes where I want them for the start of this character, but I feel like the Statuary Garden could use more filling out.

So, we're going to get a fourth Power Tag and second Weakness for Enclave. These are going to be:

Power Tag D: What protects your Enclave?

Weakness Tag D: What could hinder you from accessing or using your Enclave?

And these will be the Answers:

Power D: serpents and shadows

Weakness D: too many bystanders

So, now we can further see that the garden is full of shadowy places to hide in and many serpents which will help her defend the place by attacking intruders. Unfortunately, if there are too many people around, she won't be able to reach it. So if she leads enemies through what she expects to be an empty warehouse and instead finds a rave, she'll be stuck in the mundane world.

Crew Theme

A Crew theme is like any other themebook with some differences. Every character in the Crew has access to it and its Tags will "burn" when they are used. What this means is that whenever the team uses a Crew power tag to add a bonus to a roll or introduce something to the story then that tag cannot be re-used until something is done to refresh it. A character's tags can also burn, but usually that's as a result of making a desperate gamble or as a consequence of bad luck.

There's also only one set of Crew theme questions, though there are a lot of example ways to create them.

As with the other themebooks there are some inspiring questions before we get to Power Tags and Weaknesses.

What is our shared goal?

Who or what brought us together?

Why do we work together? What does each member contribute to the cause?

Where do we meet? Where do we collect our evidence or prepare for action?

What sort of resources do we have at our disposal?

Three of the stories I chose are related to violence or death, and are similar in many ways to each other. The fourth member I deliberately made an outlier to anchor them and made it a story about the kindness of a shark bringing food to an old man. I'm thinking the group is trying to resist the gentrification of their neighborhood and have found that there are supernatural forces at play in the situation.

Also, note, that for a Crew theme, you can give it either an Identity or a Mystery. We're going for an Identity in this case.

Title: Peach Circle Protectors

Identity: This is our home and nobody's going to take it.

Concept: A crew of superheroes resisting gentrification and other threats.

For the Power Tag questions, we can choose any three questions and are not required to answer the A question... but I'm going to anyway. I'm choosing:

A: How do you help, assist, or support one another?

C: Who is guiding, backing, or assisting your operation?

H: What sort of reputation or name have you made for yourselves?

The Weakness tag I am going for will be the following:

D: What places or situations do you find tough to handle?

So the answers to the Power tags will be as follows:

A: understanding and honesty

C: Countess and Princess

H: reliable and down to Earth

So, despite everything, the four have all experienced tragedy and initially came together through a support group before learning that the four of them all had some supernatural things as well as the public trauma. As such, they have gained a habit of trying to be honest and supportive of each other. It's not a 100% successful thing. Things are still hidden and feelings are still hurt, but they have a better connection than most.

The Countess and Princess are a reference to one of my past played characters (Patricia Althius, Rift of the Count of Monte Cristo and Lamashtu) and her girlfriend (Hayley Hayami, Rift of Medusa) who later in the campaign would have come back as mysterious rich people to start to carry out their revenges on various evil-doers. I felt these two in late game would make a good support for this vengeance-focused team.

Finally, the local neighborhood may not know everything the team has done for them, heck they might not even know who the team is if secret identities are going on, but there's an ongoing reputation that the local heroes have a good head on their shoulders.

And next is the Weakness:

D: "There's never enough money."

Even with patrons like The Countess and The Princess, there's only so much money the team has available. And most of their backer's resources are mythical and supernatural anyway, that's hard to convert into a bank account.

Tags and Weaknesses

So, what do tags do? Whenever you apply a tag to a roll you gain a +1 bonus to that roll. When weaknesses are applied then you instead apply a -1 to the roll but you also grant that Theme one Attention and after three Attention you can give the Themebook an Improvement.

Tags also apply narrative justification for certain things. For example, Stef is going to have snakes for hair, and that will justify her attacking someone and giving them a venom related status as a result. Other characters would have to explain where the poison came from first.

Now, what's stopping you from using all tags on every roll? First of all, the tag has to apply, "petrifying gaze" isn't going to do anything to help breaking down a stone door, for example. Second is that you can't apply the same tag twice to the same situation. For example, say you had the tag "Bomb Disposal Expert" and added that to a roll for disarming a bomb but the roll doesn't completely end the danger. Well, you won't be able to use that tag on the next roll, because you've already applied those skills to this problem.

For Stef, she could apply the "petrifying gaze" to attempt to turn a hitman to stone, but perhaps she doesn't quite finish him off. On a future attack she would still be applying the petrifying gaze narratively, but she couldn't use the tag for a bonus to the roll because she's already thrown that in there. The stoning is still happening, yes, but the roll needs support elsewhere.

In combat, we tended to work this out by saying repeatedly attacking with no variation was just doing the same action over and over again and thus you would have a slowly dwindling supply of tags to use in the fight. Every so often, we'd then try to change up the strategy and create a new situation to justify refreshing all those tags.

As another note, it is possible to use a Weakness for a +1 (doing so would not grant Attention) or a Power tag for a -1 (doing so would grant Attention) if it makes sense. For example, Stef could use her "severe burn scars" to help her out intimidating someone or maybe even empowering her "petrifying gaze". Or the GM might poke her tag about "I can't let them down" as a -1 due to her being worried about someone getting hurt because she failed.

As a note, the same Tag can't be used for both a +1 and a -1 on the same roll. Similar to the "Bomb Disposal Expert" example above on using the same tag twice, that fact is already influencing matters.

Breaking Themes

It is also important to note that themebooks can go away and change. Mythos themes can Fade as that part of your legend is forgotten and Logos themes can Crack as that facet of your life is shattered or left behind. This is not a bad thing and exists for the most part at the control of the character.

When a theme cracks, the character will receive some "Build-Up" which allows for taking a global improvement called a "Moment of Evolution". Unlike with Attention to improve a themebook, global improvements require five Build Up and the only way to gain Build Up is to lose a theme.

Once a theme is lost, it will be replaced with a theme of the opposite type. A Mythos theme will be replaced by a Logos theme and vice versa. If the last theme of a type is lost then it will not be replaced and the character will instead have three Logos (becoming a Sleeper) or three Mythos (becoming an Avatar). These are both meant to be temporary states of being and once the character comes out of them, they will vanish for a while before returning as a basically an entirely fresh character, rebuilding themselves from scratch. A character who went Avatar will come back as a Touched and a character who went Sleeper will come back as a Legendary.

This mechanic allows for some of the deepest mechanical support of character development I've ever seen in any RPG. Look above at the two pictures of Patricia and Hayley to see the gulf in how they begin the game and how they end it. And the best part is that these changes are very very rarely dictated by the dice. They almost always come as a result of informed player choice. And even when dice cause it, the player is informed of the possibility of the risk before they roll.

All that said, here's the collection of themebook cards for Stef Noel. I used the character sheet template on Roll20 for this graphic. Also note that I write down the letter of the questioned that is answered for each tag so that if there's question of what context the tag exists in we can look it up.

#ttrpg #gorgon archer #tabletop rpg #archer #gorgon #tabletop rpgs #gorgons #tabletop roleplaying game #character creation #roleplaying games #City of Mist #Son of Oak Games #urban fantasy #superheroes

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leam1983 · 2 years ago

Text

I occasionally get a bit of an interesting "third angle" view of things when I think about smash hits like the Potterverse and their successes and variable downfalls. It's fairly simple, really:

Consider how many books were printed when the publishing model became accessible to the masses. In Honoré de Balzac's "Lost Illusions", we get a glimpse at a Parisian publishing scene that was as rabid, back in its day, as the crypto market was a few months back. You had a shitty idea? You got published.

You get a book deal, you get a book deal, EVERYONE GETS A BOOK DEAL!

Cool, right? The one problem is that the books that made it through History and over to us were selected and recognized for their quality. For every Robinson Crusoe, there's dozens of authors who either were never meaningfully recorded by history - or worse, who were massive hits in their day but who are now forgotten.

Visit a book fair and look for collected Adventure serials; you'll find hundreds of Alexandre Dumas copycats trying to gin up the popularity of the then-serial Count of Monte Cristo with narratives of their own. Narratives that fail at capturing the imagination in quite the same way as Dumas' work.

Look at the modern publishing sphere and it's obvious that Rowling is in something of a similar position. Right now, whether you agree with her or not, she's a hot commodity. Right now, HBO is rushing to adapt her juvenilia into a ten-season behemoth out of the misplaced assurance that it'll be as gangbusters as Game of Thrones was for its first few seasons.

Even if it is, even if my grandkids grow up sorted by their Hogwarts Houses because the fucking Stupid Magic Series can't leave the zeitgeist, know that it eventually will.

Eventually, the only ones left to dwell on Harry Potter and its derivative works will be media scholars specializing in the dissection of Pop Culture materials, the sorts who buy books at dusty book fairs and who pirate material relentlessly because they work for a department that has a shoestring budget. Nothing lasts forever, and there's a day in the far-flung future that'll see someone sell the entire series for a couple bucks. They'll never have read it and never will have cared, because something else will have taken Harry Potter's place.

So, to the detractors - rest assured, this series isn't Classic Lit material. It'll sink into the sidelines of specialized Undergraduate programs or in the wheelhouses of Sociology teachers tracking how Pop Culture repurposes folk magic.

To the fans - just remember that your own grandkids won't connect with the Potterverse. They likely won't connect with the MCU or the DCEU, either - much less Star Wars. Very few are the media properties who become more than basic household names, phenomenons like Dracula killing it in book fairs and surviving off of the popularity of vampires for a hundred and twenty-six straight years are almost unheard of.

After all, the second-best fate a book can hope for is to be regurgitated by a myriad of other authors. Not everyone reads the Epic of Gilgamesh but we've all read something that lifts from the Epic.

What this means is that you liking this over another franchise is, in the grand scheme of things, generally harmless. Reading a book never killed anyone, and we'll eventually reach a point where there won't be a Rowling estate left, no active transphobic organisms to promote by purchasing these books and derivative products - especially not if book fairs and flea markets are considered. The bigots are going to find themselves another sacrificial lamb, and we'll reach a point where despite all the ink that's flowed on Rowling's transphobia, the average curious bookworm's going to be left thinking "There's transphobic stuff in this old-ass book series? Really?!"

Most of everything ever written ends up forgotten. Even now, movies and video games are falling victim to legal abandonment. Life goes on, studies are funded and, I'm certain of it - the greater LGBTQA cause will keep advancing. Rowling's transphobia feels like a tsunami that could wash away years of popular support in some areas, but it's likely more of a tiny stream in an otherwise-dry valley.

Rest easy - nobody's going to give a shit about which Hogwarts House you've been sorted in; and it'll happen fairly soon on the scope of all of Literature's recorded works.

It's just in human nature to want to focus on the Next Shiny Thing.

i agree it's tactically sound to reframe harry potter as a Loser Brand for Losers, since all the transphobia clearly isn't slowing its fanbase down. they don't feel guilt, the consumerism patches over it, so instead... make the consumption painful, shameful. treat it like Ghostbusters: a franchise doddering into the senior home, while its fans slobber for a new movie to turn them young again

like relentlessly. always talk about HP in the context of manchildren refusing to let go of their fifth grade level reading. talk about it like it's got the literary complexity of a crossword puzzle. treat them like they're eating kid cuisine every meal of the day. baby like their baby book? gonna watch the spooky wizard show? that's nice sweetie, but the bills and the kids and the rest of the world are waiting for you, whenever you feel like changing out of your pajamas

#on the potterverse #transphobia #jk rowling

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jmoriarty-221b · 4 years ago

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Ok so this idea was inspired by AUs where Tim Drake is a member of the Addams family and thus this cute idea was born

Ok so, Tim’s parents still travel a lot but instead of leaving him alone in a big empty manor they leave him with his aunt and uncle Morticia and Gomez Addams

And Tim is a weird little kid who grows up without fear of the dark figures at night because the boogeyman is actually a pretty nice fellow who was very touched when Tiny Tim gave them a drawing of themselves, the monster in the closet actually gives great fashion advice as well as providing the perfect clothes for playing dress up, and the monsters under his bed are great storytellers and the shadow man gives Tim great advice on how to hide and use shadows to his advantage, etc.

The point is that Timmy grows up under the care of the Addams when his parents have to leave on long business trips or excavation sites and as such, is exposed to Gomez’s great appreciation of swordsmanship and fencing, and the haunted suits of armors are always great at comparing which kind of swords are the best in which kind of combat as well as the the importance of craftsmanship when in relation to having a reliable sword

And then one day Timmy watches the movie ‘The Legend of Zorro’ and becomes absolutely obsessed with learning how to use a sword and fight with it in the way only little kids can become obsessed with something they find completely cool, and Gomez is so excited to be teaching Tim everything he knows and they work together to craft Timmy his very own mini rapier for learning how to fence (swords are heavier so Tim learns those from Gomez when he’s older and can parry more weight)

And Tim becomes very Focused and Serious on learning how to fence and he’s very excited when he manages to finally best his uncle in a fencing duel (not as excited as Gomez tho, “MY CHILD SHALL BECOME THE BEST SWORDSMAN YET MY LOVE, DID YOU SEE HIS TECHNIQUE, HAD I BEEN SLOWER HE WOULD’VE RIPPED OPEN MY THROAT IN ONE SWIPE, I’M SO PROUD” “Our child dear”)

And then the movie ‘Count of Monte Cristo’ comes out and both Tim and Gomez are super fans (as a whole the family’s favorite movies are this one as well as the Legend of Zorro because 1. Revenge is achieved to the improvement of the main character’s well being and 2. The Aesthetic) and Tim just focuses on getting the hang of swords now with Gomez being more than happy to help his darling nephew

So years pass and Tim’s parents have finished one of their most taxing excavation digs so they return to Gotham and Tim has to return too (for the purposes of this AU Janet and Jack actually do give a fuck about their son so they would call him every other night when they’re away and if they can’t then at the very least they would call Tim once a week; they also call Morticia and Gomez at least once a week to check on how Tim is doing and they were also very happy to know that Tim has taken a liking to swords so they try to bring new types of weapons or literature related to weapons from the culture of their latest excavation so Tim can learn how different types of swords are wielded all around the world)

But anyway, Tim is going back to Gotham so he and Gomez work on creating a new sword for him with the family motto carved on the blade “Sic Gorgiamus Allos Subjectatos Nunc” which translates to “We Gladly Feast on Those Who Would Subdue Us” which is metal as fuck so yeah, and this sword is super durable and strong, inspired by a katana’s durability and a rapier’s gracefulness with a blade that is such a dark purple that it looks black like obsidian and the inscription of the family motto is carved in letters that are ruby red with a black hilt where an image of a drake is engraved in the same ruby red as the family motto (basically it is a Very Deadly Sword that is also Very Pretty with a dark aesthetic)

So Tim gets back to Gotham and one day he’s watching the news and sees The Batman saving the day and what not and sees Robin do a quadruple back flip and figures out their identities and decides that he wants to meet them at some point while on his nightly photography sessions of Gotham architecture; and if he manages to snap a couple of shots of Gotham’s heroes sometimes then that’s a bonus but Tim is mostly focused on capturing the essence of Gotham city (at this point in time when Tim moves back to Gotham he physically looks like 10-12 year old; he did meet Dick at the circus when he looked like he was 4 years old but for the purposes of the timeline Tim, as an Addams, can choose to remain at any age he desires for as long as he wants so while he did appear to be 4 years old at the circus, he had been alive for a couple of years more at this point, this also explains how he can master swords and fencing while physically looking like a 10 year old because he has been practicing for years as well as why he remembers Dick from that night at the circus)

So the timeline continues with Tim figuring out that the Bats are actually his neighbors but instead of staying away from the Waynes, he decides to go ask his parents if he can stay with the neighbors whenever they have to stay later than usual at the company or have to take a short business travel and they talk with Bruce about it and he agrees to take care of Tim, so now Tim has an in to befriend the Waynes and helps smooth out the edges of Dick and Bruce’s relationship so Bruce doesn’t fire Dick from Robin, but rather they talk about their feelings for once and Dick decides he wants to create his own superhero identity and Bruce supports his decision (Tim may or may not have had to talk about how his family happened to be very open about their feelings and worry for one another and how much closer they are due to talking to each other and resolving conflict; Alfred may or may not have been 100% behind Tim every time he made such a conversation) also, Tim is basically a trial run for Dick on becoming a big brother for when Jason arrives

One time Tim asks Dick if he knows how to fence which Dick can’t really answer because technically he knows how to fight with a sword but that’s for vigilante purposes which his civilian self isn’t supposed to know so Dick says that he doesn’t and asks Tim why he wanted to know, Tim proceeds to talk about how his favorite masked hero uses a sword to fight injustice and he has a black cape and a black horse and Bruce comes into the living room they’re in in the middle of Tim’s rambling about his favorite hero using a sword and is Concerned for a hot minute until Tim finishes the rant by saying “. . . and that’s why I like his movie so much, have you seen the Legend of Zorro?” (Cue relief for both Dick and Bruce because for all that they scrambled to put a name to the hero Tim was describing they couldn’t come up with one and were considering the possibility of a new player in the vigilante scene) so then Tim asks Mr. Bruce if he knows how to fence and Bruce says yes and asks if Tim would like to learn cue the “Oh, my uncle taught me how to fence a few years ago and when I lived with them we had a duel at least once a week, it was very fun so I was just wondering if you knew so we could practice if you want to Mr. Bruce”

Dick is 100% on board with this because the idea of Tiny Tim and 6’1” Bruce fencing is hilarious in his mind, Alfred is there to supervise and both Tim and Bruce are provided with the appropriate fencing equipment and protection; Bruce starts off slow and is surprised when Tim manages to beat him before starting to enjoy fencing with someone who can surprisingly keep up with him (Dick is taking pictures because the height difference is just too cute to be ignored and Tiny Tim is adorable in his own mini fencing equipment)

Whenever his parents do have to leave for extended periods of time (any company trip that takes more than 3-5 days qualifies as this) Tim stays with his aunt and uncle, thus starting a fun tradition of having spontaneous fencing duels with his uncle Gomez, basically if one of them is in the library then the other will shout ‘En-garde’ while throwing a sabre towards the other person and engaging in a quick duel; basically, if Tim is reading about the latest poisonous plants produced by Poison Ivy and annotating his research in order to get an idea of what would be a nice gift for his aunt Morticia and Gomez walks into the library then Gomez will grab two of the sabres they have on the wall for this exact purpose while shouting ‘en-garde’ before throwing a sabre at Tim and engaging in a duel, same goes for Tim, it’s almost instinct to the point that Tim has to hold himself back from doing exactly this whenever he sees Bruce in the library of Wayne Manor

Later on, when Jason is already adopted into the Wayne family, Tim still comes over and makes it his sacred mission to teach Jason the art of swords so he has another fencing buddy because “Mr. Bruce isn’t always here and I have decided that we will be friends and you’re pretty cool but knowing how to fight with a sword just ups your coolness level ya know?” So now Jason has smol Tim teaching him how to fence and it’s pretty fun to be able to do a taxing physical activity outside of being Robin with a friend, when Jason gets the hang of fencing Tim decides that he must now advance to the next level: sword fighting (Alfred is always there to supervise and give tips and pointers because he also knows how to fence but chooses to stay in the sidelines and let the young masters have their fun)

The problem with this is that, while the Waynes do have sabres for fencing, they don’t have swords, at least not in their civilian selves, so Tim decides to bring his own swords to teach Jason how to sword fight, Alfred is the first to see Tim’s very own special sword and is both impressed at the craftsmanship and concerned as to why a child has a sword, Jason thinks Tim’s sword is the coolest he has ever seen and Tim is happy to talk about how he made it himself with his uncle’s help when he finally learned all about sword fighting and promises Jason that they can make him his own cool sword when he learns how to sword fight too, Dick also thinks that the sword is a little concerning for a kid to have but he also wants his own cool sword and so now he insists Bruce has to teach him how to sword fight because Tim said he’s not allowed to have his own sword until he learns how to sword fight, Bruce is baffled as to why Tim has a sword, impressed at Tim’s skills in craftsmanship, and a little Concerned as to why Tim’s sword has that Latin inscription on the blade (no Tim, knowing that “we feast in those who would subdue us” is your family motto doesn’t calm me down yet it explains a lot about your mother)

By the time Damian comes along to the family he is very interested in where Jason and Dick got their Very Cool swords from, his father also has one and he wants to have his own Very Cool Sword too, thank you very much, and Tim visits them when Damian is still settling in and asks his customary question of if he knows how to use fence and gets an affirmative answer he asks Bruce if it would be ok for him and Damian to have a fencing duel, Bruce explains the rules to Damian and makes sure that Alfred, Dick, Jason and him are present in order to keep Damian from maiming/killing Tim

The duel does get a little out of hand as Damian gauges that Tim is more skilled than he previously thought so he stops holding back, Tim is positively grinning at this since he always has to hold back with the Waynes in a way that he doesn’t with Uncle Gomez because while an Addams won’t die from a stab to the heart, the same can’t be said for anyone else; the duel ends with Tim winning because he has more experience than Damian but he is positive beaming at how awesome Damian was and how these duels could become a weekly thing before they transition to swords and once Dames graduates from swords he can design his very own sword with Tim’s help as a sort of graduation present for learning how to sword fight and he’s sure that it won’t take too long for Damian to master swordsmanship because he’s basically a natural already and very skilled and this duel was so much fun Damian we have to do this again sometime oh my gosh I want to teach you everything I know it’s gonna be so much fun

And Damian, a poor baby, was mad at having lost to Tim but then Tim hits him with all this excitement and smiles and it’s the promise of getting his own Very Cool Sword is what gets him to agree to learn from Tim, it’s not that he feels warm at getting compliments from someone who also likes swords and knows what he’s doing in a fight, he definitely doesn’t find Tim cool at all, he’s just making use of a resource and he will learn everything Tim has to offer and become better than both Grayson and Todd, that’s all (that’s not all because it turns out that Damian is the younger brother Tim never had and he takes Dami under his wing and helps him adjust to a life outside the League of Assassins and how to find hobbies to enjoy; Damian won’t admit it but he is also Very Attached in to Timothy and feels like he won’t be judged for his past with him and he is also a fellow sword enthusiast so yeah)

Tim decides to do the same thing to Damian and initiating a quick fencing duel whenever he sees that Damian is in the gardens (no fencing inside the Manor on pain of Alfred’s eyebrow of disappointment); this helps Damian with the transition of learning to have fun and also learn to realize that not everybody is an enemy, it also helps keep up his training and burn some energy whenever he gets restless and helps him bond with Tim more

The idea was that Tim and Uncle Gomez would surprise each other with spontaneous fencing duels by shouting ‘en-garde’ at the other person whenever they find one another in the library, and now it turned into a fluff AU where Tim isn’t Robin but he’s still a family friend to the Waynes and an Addams and helps bring the family closer through his love of swords because yes

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theoriginalcarnivorousmuffin · 4 years ago

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I read your headcanons about James Potter and I’m really interested to hear your thoughts Sirius and regulus Black pls pls pls

Oh no.

Alright, strap in people, because I’m about to say some things that nobody will like.

Let’s start in alphabetical order with Regulus.

Fandom often sees Regulus as a reformed Death Eater, the redeemed villain, or else a cooler suaver version of Sirius steeped in pure blood culture, making him more palatable than many pureblood characters as a love interest. There’s a lot of fics of him having almost defeated Voldemort, coming back from the dead and actually defeating Voldemort, reconnecting with Sirius, showing Harry the cool pureblood ways without being racist, etc.

Well, I don’t really buy into any of that.

I think, even with his defection, Regulus was likely still a very racist character and never really disavowed the cause. True, he was young when he was sucked in, he had his whole family meltdown when Sirius was disowned and suddenly he was heir, but I do think he really did believe in blood purism and nothing from the books suggests that he died not believing in it. He just stopped believing in Voldemort.

Instead, I believe he discovered that Voldemort a) did not mean anything good for his culture and b) Voldemort was a fraud.

What do I mean by that?

Well, in the first case, I’ve always viewed Tom Riddle in that period in time as a hate filled nihilist who doesn’t really believe in what he preaches. It’s just convenient to him as the purebloods are the ones with the money and the power. There’s no point in him appealing to Dumbledore’s ilk as they’re far less likely to be able to make him king (also it would mean putting up with Dumbledore and his stupid speeches about love and friendship). Most of Voldemort’s actions throughout the books don’t make the muggle borns’ lives miserable (at least not until he gets into power) but makes hell of the purebloods’ lives and absolutely ruins them.

The Black family, in particular, he essentially wipes off the face of the Earth.

With that in mind, I imagine a young Regulus eventually came to realize that Voldemort was systematically destroying the great families from the inside to put himself in power. It was never about the muggleborns or the country, it was only ever about power.

Then we get to the other bit, Voldemort being a fraud. Unlike many, I believe the Death Eaters had no idea who Voldemort was. It’s too unbelievable to me that some guy named Tom Riddle, who their fathers all went to school with, who everyone knew as a muggle born impoverished orphan, could convince them all that he was the next Merlin who they should devote their lives (and their money) to. Tom’s charismatic, but he’s not that charismatic. Better for Tom Riddle to just disappear entirely and show up as the Count of Monte Cristo, descendent of Salazar Slytherin himself, impressing all the young heirs while their young, angry, and stupid.

With Regulus finding out that his great leader is actually just the halfblood son of a squib, the whole movement falls apart. Regulus is a pawn, fighting for nothing he believes in. Now, that said, I don’t think Regulus ever figured out who exactly, Tom was. He clearly knew the name, as we see from the locket, but just knowing that Riddle is a muggle last name would be enough to know that Voldemort was nothing he presented as.

Basically, Regulus becomes extremely disillusioned with the Death Eaters and Voldemort in a few short years. The change he wanted to see sweeping the country doesn’t happen. Instead the violence, which he was initially very excited for (guys, Regulus did join a domestic terrorist organization and I will not cut him slack for that, he was excited to blow up some muggle borns) is pointless and hurting their own people as opposed to the muggle borns.

During all of this we have Kreacher borrowed by Voldemort for the creepy horcrux placement. This certainly makes Regulus go “hm” and he’s clever enough to put together on his own that the locket must be a horcrux.

That said, I do not believe he knew enough about Tom Riddle to have been able to hunt down the rest or even know where or what they would be. Dumbledore had been paranoidly collecting memories of Tom Riddle’s entire goddamn life and relying on the plot convenient aspect that Tom was apparently so much of a romantic he never left his horcruxes anywhere but Britain and always left them in very noticeable sentimental objects. Regulus knew about the locket because of Kreacher, had he lived, he’d have no idea where the hell else to start.

So that’s Regulus for you, a fairly intelligent, yet youthfully stupid, extremist whose dream did not live up to the reality and probably still would have spat in Hermione’s face had the gang resurrected him from being a lake zombie.

As for Sirius, well, he’s James the asshole times a thousand to the point where he makes some “ha ha, very funny, but actually really this is horrifying” decisions.

I guess we’ll start back when he’s young.

We don’t see much of the young Sirius, and granted, what we do directly is given to us by a very bitter, resentful, and biased Severus Snape but his actions still read a lot like pretty much any Stephen King bully villain. The scene where they’re tormenting Snape (and Snape drops the slur, Lily abandoning him) is horrifying to read. And it’s clearly one of many moments over many years of this group of boys sexually harassing him (and yes, that was sexual harassment guys, let’s not pull out stops here).

Then we get to the joke with Lupin that... really wasn’t a joke.

The flimsy excuse we’re given in canon is that a) it was all in good fun b) Snape was so much of a coward he’d never actually go to the Shrieking Shack because he’s a big chicken. Bawk bawk bawk, Snivellus the chicken. But, well, these excuses are flimsy.

When you get down to the bare bones of it what Sirius did there was attempted murder via his chronically ill best friend. It’s one of those actions that I simply cannot justify, even had Sirius not thought it all the way through, as boys will be boys. What was the good outcome there? Snape sees Lupin and shrieks in terror? (Only to probably run to some authority and try to get the uncontrolled werewolf the fuck off of campus, nice going Sirius) Snape gets infected with lycanthropy? Snape dies, Lupin wakes up covered in blood with the horror of knowing he ate a classmate?

Later, we do get Sirius sort of apologizing for his behavior. But it’s at best a ‘sort of’ apology. He never admits the full horror of what he did, just how relentlessly brutal he was to Snape, or what the werewolf thing really would have ended in. Instead he goes, “yeah, James and I were kind of assholes. He grew up though, Lily married him so he couldn’t be an ass anymore! And it was Snape, Come on, Harry, it was Snape.” And Harry, messed up asshole that he himself is goes, “Yeah, it was Snape! Stupid Snape!”

I also never got the feeling he ever fully apologized to Remus. Sirius used Remus in the worst of ways, made it clear he had no respect for Remus and no compassion for his condition, and continues to treat him as a sort of secondary friend to James. I think it says a lot that Remus was able and willing to believe Sirius was guilty of murdering James and Lily in cold blood.

Which probably gives you a hint that I think Remus/Sirius would never happen except in the most toxic of ways possible.

Basically, in a fair world, Sirius should have been expelled if not tried for the werewolf incident. However, Dumbledore plays favorites and chose the sons of two lords as opposed to the poor half blood (which I imagine cemented Snape’s path to becoming a Death Eater). And so there is some cruel irony in that Sirius was eventually jailed for something, even though it was something he didn’t do.

Now, after Azkaban, Sirius seems to have mellowed out a lot. While he’s a bit unhinged and thoughtless (his rescue attempt of Harry’s rescue attempt at the end of Order of the Phoenix) a lot of this can be seen as after effects of his stay in literally hell on Earth for over ten years.

That said, a lot of people see him as the cool uncle character who, if Harry had been able to live with him, all would have been well. I firmly disagree. Young Sirius was, well, god knows how warped Harry would have been growing up with a young and reckless Sirius Black. After prison he’s in no condition to take care of Harry, and even says as much multiple times. Sirius is cool to hang around at a distance, but up close and personal he’d be very messed up and not at all ready to be a father to a teenage boy.

Otherwise, Sirius was very very very gay for James Potter. Unfortunately for him, James Potter was straight and into Lily Evans. I’m sure it was a very sad day for Sirius when Lily actually said yes to James. Except not really, because James always strikes me as a “bros before hos” kind of dude. Not that I’m sure if Sirius ever admitted he was gay and in love with James, I’ve always been of the belief that pureblood culture is extremely homophobic and it just... wouldn’t come up.

So there it is, now excuse me while I go hide behind this barrier before I get eaten alive.

#harry potter #head canons #regulus black #sirius black #remus lupin #severus snape #ask #anon

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usergreenpixel · 3 years ago

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MALMAISON MEDIA SALON SOIRÉE 2: THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO (1844)

1. The Introduction

Greetings, dear Neighbors. Welcome to the second soirée at the Malmaison Media Salon, hosted by your friendly neighbor from the French Revolution community.

As promised, this time we’re discussing “The Count of Monte Cristo”, a classic written by Alexandre Dumas-père (ghostwritten and co-written by Auguste Maquet) and first published in 18 parts in 1844.

Unsurprisingly, this novel has been adapted multiple times (there’s even an anime with a sci-fi spin on it!) and there’s a high chance that at least some, if not most of you, had read it. However, while digging up obscure media is fun, I believe that reviewing the classics doesn’t hurt either.

After all, this is also a piece of Napoleonic media so it fits the criteria for being a subject of one of our soirées.

Now, the novel (albeit in an abridged version and in Russian) first caught my attention when I was in primary school. At the time I loved reading adventure stories (and still do!) so I was hooked immediately.

An adventure novel involving an unjust imprisonment, cunning plans, daring rescues and revenge? You bet I was hooked! And Dumas is one of my favorite authors to this day, so this was pretty much an additional reason for me to be hooked.

However, it wasn’t until recently that I actually got my hands on the full version and was able to compare it with the abridged book that I still have to this day.

The full version of the novel can be downloaded for free via Project Gutenberg, which I use frequently for obtaining books for my reviews of the French Revolution media.

So, without further ado, let’s take a closer look at this beloved classic tale of revenge and find out just how well it holds up today and how exactly it is connected to the Napoleonic era.

2. The Summary

“The Count of Monte Cristo” is a story about Edmond Dantés - a man unjustly accused of being a bonapartist and imprisoned because of it.

His life is ruined and it seems like there’s no hope... That is until a chain of events gives him a chance to become free again, reestablish himself under a new identity and take revenge on those who took everything from him.

3. The Story

The story actually begins in 1815, when Dantés delivers a package to General Bertrand (apparently a real person, but I don’t know who he was) on Elba. He has no idea what’s in the package but it’s this event that dooms him.

This happens during Napoleon’s exile and therefore I actually like how it’s a historical situation that kickstarts the entire plot, as Dantés potentially aiding the exiled emperor really would be considered an act of treason in real life.

I honestly think that the plot only wins from the connections to history as this is a common way to ground a historical fiction novel in reality and showcase that the events described in the plot could have actually happened in real life. A classic yet effective tactic, if it’s done right. Fortunately, here it definitely is done right in my opinion.

Also, contrary to some other novels of the era, this story doesn’t take too long to get to the action but the readers aren’t thrown into it unprepared either. I think this particular book took just enough time to introduce us to the protagonist and give us the context before shit hits the fan. So at least we don’t have any major pacing issues.

Unfortunately, things can get pretty confusing later on. For example, I personally got confused in the family trees of the characters (especially when the Villefort family was shown). However, that’s not exactly a major complaint on my part.

For the most part I didn’t really have a hard time following the events of the novel and watching the titular Count’s schemes unfold until he goes too far is actually pretty enjoyable.

I also really like the fact that the narrative isn’t excusing the actions of the protagonist when he does go too far in his crusade.

(Spoilers ahead!)

In fact, this novel is a major part of the reason why I personally don’t condone revenge as it does a fantastic job of showing just how much collateral damage can result from revenge and how destructive it can be even for the avenger.

It takes the death of a child, Villefort’s young son, to make the Count realize that, in his quest for revenge and in his attempts to play God, he caused more damage than he did good. Really drives home the point, doesn’t it?

I would talk more about the story, but we’d be stuck here forever so let’s move on before I bore everyone to death with my rambling.

4. The Characters

I like Edmond Dantés as a character. He starts out as pretty much an average Joe and life is good for him, what with promotion on the way and being engaged to his beloved Catalan fiancée, Mercedes.

Unfortunately, all that flies out the window and this journey Edmond undergoes, from a happy average young man to a hopeless prisoner to the vengeful count came off as alarmingly realistic for me.

His character arc is understandable though. I personally see why he became this way and I can understand him as a character.

As for the villains... Boy does the narrative succeed in making them truly despicable and punchable. Putting aside the fact that they screwed over a person for selfish reasons despite knowing that said person is innocent, they each have have other qualities that make them truly disgusting people who are vile to a scarily realistic extent.

Danglars used to be Edmond’s shipmate who wanted him out of the way due to jealousy and masterminded the entire plot to ensure Dantés would be ruined, but he also embezzles a lot of money from HOSPITALS.

(Spoiler alert!)

He is also an ungrateful jerk who refuses to help Morrel, the person who helped Danglars himself get to where he is now.

Morrel was the boss of Dantés and Danglars and had no part in the plot but he is in debt and asks the now well off Danglars to vouch for him. Danglars refuses.

What an awesome guy... (sarcasm)

Curiously enough, he is also the last target for the Count’s revenge and the only person that the Count lets go, mostly because this is after the protagonist’s realization of what he had done.

Other villains, however, meet much grimmer fates.

Fernand Mondego, Mercedes’s cousin who gets Dantés out of the way to marry her (*vomits*), becomes addicted to backstabbing, so to speak. He too is pretty well off when the Count appears.

(Spoiler alert!)

He is married to Mercedes, has a son and somehow he acquired a vast fortune in Greece.

Let’s just say that it doesn’t last too long when he is exposed by the daughter of Ali Pasha (who was a real person), one of the people Fernand betrayed in the past. Couple that with Albert and Mercedes finding out all the unsavory details and leaving and...yeah, it’s not surprising the treacherous snake offs himself.

Then there’s Villefort. A prosecutor who KNOWINGLY sent the innocent Dantés to prison to further his career (doing the opposite could have ruined it), he is now a stern lawyer who is also a giant hypocrite. And he almost commits patricide. Nice.

(Spoiler alert!)

However, Villefort does go down like a sinking ship through the Count’s machinations and the consequences of his actions, which ultimately lead to him losing his second wife (don’t feel too bad, she’s a textbook evil stepmother and a serial killer) and his young son, he becomes insane.

Arguably even worse than Fernand’s bullet to the head if you ask me, but I can’t say that I feel particularly bad for him.

Fortunately, this novel doesn’t just contain jerks. Most of the people who end up becoming collateral damage, the children of the targets, are actually quite decent people and don’t deserve the Count’s wrath at all.

In fact, one of them (Eugenie Danglars) is all but stated to be a lesbian but, in a nice subversion of old tropes, she is not portrayed negatively because of it and doesn’t die. Instead, disguised as a man, she flees with her girlfriend just in time to avoid becoming collateral damage, so that’s good.

I didn’t like the fact that her portrayal leaned onto the “doesn’t like men” schtick and the “masculine lesbian” though, but oh well. Otherwise I would still call it a better case of representation. Better than “evil gays”, at least.

However, there’s one female character who truly shines in the story, and that’s Haydee. The daughter of Ali Pasha who was sold into slavery by Fernand (who betrayed said Pasha), she was bought as a child by the Count and now poses as his concubine. (Yuck!)

Now, technically she is an enslaved concubine in name only. In reality she is actually free to leave whenever she pleases but she is so devoted and loyal to the Count and loves him so much that she refuses to leave his side even when he offers her to do so multiple times.

While the fact that she was bought as a child and loves a man old enough to be her father is definitely icky by modern standards, I still like her as a character and I was rooting for her when she helped bring Fernand to justice.

Honestly, most of the characters are written quite well, even though some could’ve been more complex.

Okay, moving on before I go on for eternity.

5. The Setting

I love the descriptions. They’re definitely wordy and lengthy so it might be an issue for some people, but I didn’t personally find them irritating.

Besides, they really set the tone quite well, so I can’t complain much.

I just wish the writing didn’t ramble so much about Haydee’s dresses. 😂

6. The Writing

Unfortunately, I read the novel in English so I can’t judge the original style but, while the novel is definitely wordy, it’s not incomprehensible at all and I liked the writing style a lot.

It is a bit old-fashioned, naturally, but not too much.

7. The Conclusion

All in all, I think this story is truly deserving of its title as a classic.

Sure, it is wordy and long but it’s also a truly exciting revenge tale with (mostly) realistic characters a neat connection with actual history, daring schemes and so much more. Sure, parts of it hadn’t aged well at all, but I think it’s still a pretty interesting story and the pros outweigh the cons here.

If you haven’t read the book, I definitely recommend it.

Unfortunately, now we have to finish the second soirée at our salon. I hope you liked the review.

I will post updates on future reviews as soon as possible, so stay tuned, my dear Neighbors.

Love,

- Citizen Green Pixel

#history #napoleonic media #napoleonic art #alexandre dumas #malmaison media salon #the count of monte cristo #napoleon bonaparte #napoleonic era #french history #historical fiction #classic literature #french literature #literature review #napoleonic literature #book review #review

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snowdice · 4 years ago

Text

Finding the Time to Study Fic 2 [Day 32]

Here is my starting post for today’s study break stories session. See this post for more details and feel free to send me asks to keep me going! It’s been a lot of fun so far! I will reblog this post with the story as I write them today. I’ll be constantly looking for ideas of times and places for Janus to have missions, so feel free to send in any you can think of at any point!

If you are a new follower or just don’t want all of these posts clogging your dash, please feel free to block the tag “study break stories” as all posts and voting about it will go there. You can still see the finished product of the story even if you are blocking that tag as I will not tag the edited chapters with “study break stories” but with the tag “folds in paper.” See edited chapters below. None edited chapters are under the cut.

My Masterpost Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11

I also have a playlist on youtube (because Spotify didn’t have one of the songs I wanted). It’s short, and not really for serious listening, but I had fun with it.

This was on hiatus for a while because I needed to focus a lot harder on my exam than usual studying and then it was break after that, but I have to get some stuff read for next week, so I’m going to be doing this for a bit today! Last time we just entered a church... with Remus. Let’s see how this goes...

Chapter 12

There was something off about his readings. Clearly the time distortion was starting to pull at this place with the way the weather was flickering between storming and sunny, but he still couldn’t quite pinpoint the exact location of the source of it. He could, however, get that it must be somewhere on this side of the river more into the downtown area, so that’s the way he was walking, Pat close on his heels.

“What’s your name, by the way?” he asked.

Janus shot him a glare. “Elvis Presley,” he said.

Pat frowned, clearly knowing who that was. “There’s no reason to be mean.”

“You did it to me first.”

“…Introduced myself as a famous musician?” he asked. Janus didn’t respond, and after a moment, Pat laughed lightly. “You really don’t understand time travel, do you?”

“Oh, yeah,” Janus said. “Name the three types of time distortions.”

“Just because I don’t know the names of things doesn’t mean I don’t understand them.” He stuck out his tongue. Janus was dealing with an actual toddler. “Unlike you who has a bunch of fancy words, but just caused a time loop.”

Janus scoffed. “I did not just cause a time loop.”

“Maybe not a big one,” Pat agreed, “but you did.”

Janus raised an eyebrow. “I’ve never introduced myself to you with a musician’s name, but now you’ve told me that I will. So, at some point in the future I will have to, thereby making you think to say that now. Time loop.”

“That’s not… that doesn’t count.”

“Does too,” Pat claimed. “Like I have said once before and you may or may not have heard me say before, anything you do to me to get back at me for something I haven’t done yet, just causes whatever that is to happen in the first place.”

“But you’re still going to do it.”

“Then take it up with future me. I haven’t done anything to you.” Then he paused and sighed. “…Which I guess means you’ve done nothing to me.” He seemed to mull this concept over for a long moment. “Well you were a bit crabby about me not knowing what a time distortion was, but I can forgive you for that.”

“And I’m supposed to forgive you?”

“Like I said,” Pat said. “I haven’t done anything yet.”

“You also haven’t done anything to endear yourself to me either,” Janus grumbled.

“Hmm,” Pat said. “Fine.” He pulled something out of his pocket. “You’re obviously not having much luck finding whatever you’re looking for. Tell me what it is and I’ll help.”

Janus squinted at what was in his hand. “Is that… an iPhone 5?”

“No!” he said. “It’s super-secret time travel tech disguised as an iPhone 5!”

“We’re in 2027,” Janus said. “Not a great disguise. Those things have been obsolete for a decade.”

“Well I’ll keep in mind to have my tech disguised as phones from the right year next time,” Pat said, sticking out his tongue. “Now what are we looking for?”

“If my timepiece can’t find it, I’m certain yours can’t.”

Pat rolled his eyes and tapped on the device’s screen a couple of times. “I’m going to guess it’s that,” he said proudly.

Janus leaned over to look at the screen. “Are you using google maps?” he sputtered.

“It integrates time relevant data like traffic conditions and local weather warnings with time travel technology,” Pat explained. “Something seems to be going on in a museum a couple of blocks that way.”

“I…” Janus said. That was actually a really good idea, usually unnecessary with scouts observing that data beforehand, and Janus wasn’t sure how good the accuracy would be considering whatever was taking it into account was automated, but still a good idea. “Well, I guess since we have no other leads, we can check it out.”

Pat looked far too proud for having only used a piece of tech that hadn’t even been confirmed as accurate. “Then, let’s go,” he said right as a chilly wind started to pick up and a couple of snowflakes began to fall around them. “Before that gets worse…”

Janus let Pat lead with his iPhone. Janus’s timepiece still wasn’t picking up a clear signal for some reason, but it seemed to point in the same general direction as Pat’s. Strangely though, as they got closer to their destination, the signal started to get fuzzier. Pat’s tech seemed unaffected leading them closer to the museum.

When they got to the Musée Fabre museum, Janus stopped. “What?” Pat asked. He was shivering slightly in the cold and holding his arms around himself.

“My timepiece stopped working completely,” he said.

“I’m assuming that’s weird?” Pat said.

“It is,” Janus confirmed, turning to squint at him suspiciously. “How do I know you’re not the one doing it?”

“If I was doing it, wouldn’t I have just knocked it out from the get go?” Pat questioned.

Janus pursed his lips. “I don’t know,” he said. “Would you have? Maybe it’s a trick.”

Pat’s eyes narrowed a bit on him. “Think what you want, but I’m freezing. Come in with me if you want.”

He dithered from a few moments before following Pat inside. Pat had already struck up a conversation with the woman charging admission into art museum. She was looking at him, her brow knit as he spoke. Janus nudged him away from her getting a confused glance from him in return. He shot a smile at the woman.

“Two adult passes for the museum and the Hotel Sabatier d’Espevran, please,” he said, placing down 14 euro.

“Ah,” she said, still looking at Pat oddly. “Yes sir.” She gave them the passes and Janus quickly shuffled Pat away.

“What is wrong with your French?” he hissed once they were out of earshot.

“What?” he asked, bewildered.

“You sound like you’re reading Le Comte de Monte-Cristo. No one talks like that anymore.”

“I’m a little rusty,” Pat defended himself.

“Two centuries?” Janus asked. Pat stuck his tongue out like a child once again. “Is that your only way to respond to legitimate criticism?”

“What does it even matter anyway? No one ever expects time travel, at least not for something so silly.”

“It’s not silly,” Janus said. “It’s a legitimate issue. The wrong person who’s watched too much science fiction notices and you’re putting the timeline at risk. Not to mention if there are other time travelers around that aren’t as nice as me.”

“Are there a lot of time travelers around?” Pat asked, sounding intrigued.

“There are plenty, both legal and not.”

“Huh,” he said, “but what are the chances we’ll run into another one?”

“Considering the time distortion? There could be many. Opportunists wanting to capitalize off the chaos, people trying to stop it, like me, and not to mention the person who caused it.”

“Wait, someone made it happen?” Pat asked.

“These things don’t just happen naturally.”

“Huh. So, something like this has to be caused by a person?”

“Yes,” Janus said. “…Why?”

Pat smiled. “No reason. I think we should head upstairs. Whatever I’m picking up says it’s around here, but I don’t see anything. Maybe it’s a floor or two above us.”

“Which is why it’s ridiculous to use Google Maps.”

“Would you rather use yours?” he asked sweetly.

“I’m still not convinced it’s not your doing,” Janus growled. “Why does your tech still work when mine doesn’t?”

“Probably the same reason the ring did,” he muttered.

“What?”

“You may be the most aggravating being in the universe.”

Pat glanced at him with a bit of a smirk. “I can’t tell you,” he said. “It would be a much bigger risk to the timeline than me speaking in French from the 1830s. But, I’m pretty sure the reason mine still works is just a software difference.”

“What the hell do you mean a software difference?”

Pat opened his mouth, doubtlessly to supply him with yet another frustratingly cheeky and unhelpful answer. Yet, Pat did not have a chance to do so as, just as Janus stepped onto the second floor of the museum, the ground started to violently shake. Janus tried to turn to catch Pat as the other man’s foot slipped on the last step, but he couldn’t do so in time. Pat fell onto his hands and knees, sliding back a few steps and smacking his face into the stairs hard once and then a couple of times more after that as he slid.

Chapter 13

The room stopped shaking after a moment. “Ow,” Pat said. He seemed a bit stunned but was still moving at least. He carefully maneuvered himself into a seating position. “Ouch. Owie.” He reached up to poke his own nose. “Ow!” Janus slapped his hand away when he got there. A bit of blood was already trickling from his nose and there was a small cut over his eye, but it wasn’t bleeding too much.

Janus pushed him so he was leaning slightly forward and produced a pack of time appropriate tissues from his pocket. He pulled one out of the package and offered it to him.

He took it and pressed it up against his nose to try to stop the bleeding. He seemed mostly alright though Janus imagined he’d have plenty of bruises down the line. The power in the museum flickered and Janus looked up. Now that he was listening, he could hear people panicking in and out of the museum.

“We should probably get off of the stairs,” he suggested.

“Yeah,” Pat agreed. Janus helped him to his feet, and they climbed back up the steps. Janus looked around and found an employees only sign a few feet away. Usually he’d not risk that as it could get him into trouble he didn’t want to be in, but considering the earthquake that had just happened, he could probably play it off as panic.

He ushered Pat into a small room and found a chair and table. He had Pat sit in the chair and pulled out another one of the tissues to dab at the blood coming from the cut over his eyes. “Here,” he said. “Hold that there. I’m going to go see if there are any bandages about.”

Pat took the tissue with the hand not already holding one to his nose. “Thanks,” he said.

Janus nodded and got to his feet. The lights flickered once again but didn’t stay off for now. He didn’t know how long that would last.

He couldn’t see anything that might hold bandages in this room, but there was a second door. “I’ll be right back,” he told Pat, exiting through it.

The lights flickered once more as the door closed behind him and he cursed. When they came back up Janus’s eyes immediately fell on a man. They both froze.

“Remus!” Janus hissed the second their eyes met. “What are you doing here?”

Remus blinked at him for a moment. “Hi. Janus,” he said. “I… come to France for… tea sometimes?”

“There isn’t any tea back here.”

“So, there isn’t…” he said. There was a moment of silence. “Uh, so I actually cannot talk to you right now.”

“What do you mean?” Janus asked. Remus grimaced in a way Janus had never seen from him before. It immediately set off alarm bells in Janus’s head. “Oh my god,” Janus said. “Oh my god. You’re not from the same time as me.”

“Oh, you have no idea,” Remus mumbled.

“Holy shit, you’re looping?!”

“It’s… not looping if I wasn’t here the first time.”

“Remus, we spend more than 12 hours a day together most of the time. The only thing worse than this is if I looped back to this time myself.”

“…Yeah. Anyway, I need to leave now.”

“Please do.”

He turned to go, but then stopped. “Oh, and,” he reached into his pocket and tossed something at Janus. Janus caught it.

It was Band-Aids.

“Oh, shit,” Janus spat at the clear use of foreknowledge. “I hate this. I hate you. I’m going to kill you the next time you see me.”

“Sure, Jan.”

“Go.”

He did, slipping into the next room while Janus took a deep breath and then turned back to the door behind him. He schooled his face before Pat looked up. “I found some Band-Aids.”

Pat nodded and Janus came over to squat next to him.

Janus opened the box and Pat looked down. His eyes lit up with sudden joy so intense that Janus felt like he’d just gotten a punch to the gut. “Kitty Band-Aids!” he exclaimed. Janus bothered to actually look at the design on the container, only to note the cartoon cats on the front. Pat was almost vibrating off his seat. “Look they’re all so cute!” He grabbed the container from him to inspect the different designs printed on the back with glee even as a bit of blood was still trickling from his nose.

Janus took the box back gently and guided the wad of bloody Kleenexes back to his nose.

“Which would you like?” Janus asked.

“Oh, they are all so cute,” Pat cooed. “Um, how about that one!” he pointed. “Or that one! Or that one!”

“Pat you only have one cut.”

“But they’re all so cute!” Pat said, tongue tucking into his cheek. He contemplated the box again. “Let’s do the black one,” he finally settled on.

Janus selected one of the Band-Aids with a black cat wrapped around a pink ball of yarn and staring back at them with wide green eyes. The think looked like it had partaken in one two many doses of catnip, but Janus didn’t mention that.

Instead, he just carefully unstuck the backing from the Band-Aid and motioned for Pat to remove the tissue from his forehead. He smiled at Janus as he drew back.

Janus cleared his throat. “How’s the nose.”

“It’s slowing down,” Pat replied. “Thanks.”

“No problem,” Janus replied. They met eyes for a second before Pat looked away back at the box of Band-Aids.

“Oh,” Pat said. “There’s a grey one. I didn’t notice.” He pointed to it. “I should have used that one.”

“Do you like grey cats?” Janus asked.

“I like all kitties,” he said, “but one of my roommates loves grey cats. He had one when he was a kid and thinks of them as good omens. Seeing one always brightens up his day.”

“A friend of mine has a grey cat,” Janus said. “She’s much more tolerable than him.”

Pat laughed a bit. “Don’t be mean,” he said.

“Oh, he deserves it, don’t worry.” Janus considered him for a moment. “Here,” he said, pulling out one of the Band-Aids with the grey cat on it. It did, actually, look a lot like Diesel Fuel.

“But I don’t…”

Janus just shrugged and stuck it on his cheek where there was no wound. Pat giggled and touched it with a finger. Janus stood back up.

“Can I have another tissue?” Pat asked.

“Sure.” Janus handed a tissue over to him and he crumpled up the bloody ones in his hand.

“I think I’m good to keep going,” Pat said, putting the new tissue under his nose. “The nose will stop soon.”

Pat got out his iPhone and directed him back out of the room. They checked the second floor and didn’t find anything and so went to the third floor. The second they arrived in the room that Pat’s phone was directing them too, Janus knew that it must be right. There was a strange, distorted whirling sound and the entire room was shaking slightly like they were standing next to a railroad track.

“I’m guessing this is it,” Pat said.

Janus nodded and looked over his shoulder at the screen. They both cautiously walked towards where the little dot was on the phone.

“Is that it?” Pat asked, pointing at a small device on the center column in the room. Janus reached forward to flip the switch on it. The whirling stopped and the room settled. Janus’s time piece vibrated as it came back online. They waited for a few moments. “I assumed… time distortions would be more…”

“They are,” Janus said. “This one is artificial.”

“What does that mean?”

“It’s a simulation,” Janus said. “It causes similar symptoms to a time distortion, but it’s not actually fracturing time at all.”

“That’s good, isn’t it?” Pat asked.

“I don’t know,” Janus said. He took the piece of tech of the wall and carefully stored it in his pocket, “but someone’s trying to get our attention.”

Chapter 14

Janus didn’t feel comfortable leaving France 2027 just yet, still weirded out by the strange turn of events. So, he and Pat ended up sticking around for a couple of hours. They looked through the art museum for a bit, but Janus was having trouble focusing on the pieces, and Pat eventually suggested they get some air. Janus agreed considering the museum would close for the night soon anyway.

They wandered around the downtown for a bit. The people seemed to jump back from the strange weather and earthquake that afternoon rather quickly, and there were plenty still about to blend into.

Pat was snapping photos every so often like a tourist which Janus shook his head at but allowed because even with the outdated phone it almost made them blend in even more. It also might stop any questions about Pat’s weird way of speaking French. They could just say he was an overeager tourist who watched too many old movies.

“Ooo!” Pat said. “We should get crepes.”

“Why?”

“You can’t go to France and not eat crepes.”

“I assure you, you can,” Janus said dryly.

Pat shot a pout at him and the next thing he knew he was in a small crepe shop.

For Janus, choosing something was easy. He just ordered the first thing he found on the menu which seemed to be a standard one with ham and eggs. Pat on the other hand seemed to be struggling greatly, and Janus had to gently push him to the side to let some other customers order first.

“What should I get!?” Pat asked. “They all look so good! I could do strawberry preserves or maple syrup or just sugar!”

“Or you could get one that is actually food,” Janus suggested mildly. “I don’t think you need any more sugar judging by how you are acting.”

Pat rolled his eyes. “You sound like Lo.”

Janus made a note of the name ‘Lo’ even though it surely was a nickname.

“But, since you’re insisting, I’ll get something healthy. I’ll have the strawberry one. That’s a fruit!”

“It comes with a cream cheese filling,” Janus pointed out.

“And it’s fruit!”

Janus shook his head and stepped up to the counter. “One ham and cheese and one strawberry preserve, please,” he said to the cashier as he was not allowing Pat to order in French and accidently say something stupid. He forked over some euros.

“You don’t have to pay for me,” Pat protested when he saw that.

Janus glanced back at him. “I was afraid you’d try to pay in francs,” he said dryly.

It looked like Pat was about to stick his tongue out at him, remembered that Janus had criticized him for that earlier, and then just scrunched up his face in displeasure as though that was any less childish.

They waited for their crepes to be finished and then went to eat them outside near a water fountain.

“I can pay you back for the crepe,” Pat said after they sat down. “I do actually have euros.”

Janus waved him off. “It wasn’t that expensive.”

Pat hummed. “Well, in that case. I insist on paying for a wish for you.” Janus raised an eyebrow. “In the fountain!” Pat clarified.

Pat set aside his crepe to dig in his pocket for a couple of coins. “Here!” he said handing one over.

Janus glanced over at the fountain. “No.”

“Oh, come on,” Pat beseeched. “You have to want something. I’ll even throw it in for you, but you have to make a wish first!”

“No.”

“Please!”

Janus sighed. “Fine.” He popped the rest of his crepe in his mouth. “I wish for a crepe,” he said after swallowing.

“You just had a crepe, silly.”

“But I liked it, so I want another one.”

“We can go back and get you another crepe.”

“Ah, but I’m not hungry anymore.”

Pat crossed his arms. “You’re just being difficult on purpose.”

“Not me,” Janus said putting hand over his heart. “I would never do something like that.”

Pat glared at him, but then snatched the coin out of his hand. “Fine!” he said. “One crepe wish coming right up.” He hopped up with the two coins and darted over to the water fountain. Janus turned to watch him go but then happened to catch sight of something out of the corner of his eyes.

Pat’s phone.

He didn’t pause in his movement, completing the turn, but as he watched Pat close his eyes, presumably to focus on his own wish, Janus snuck a hand out and grabbed the phone without looking. He slipped it into his own pocket.

Pat came back over after throwing both coins in the fountain and didn’t even seem to notice that his phone was missing, picking up his crepe to take another bite. Just to make sure, though Janus decided to distract him. “What do you think of your crepe?” Janus asked.

“I like it! It’s sweet, but not too sweet. There was a crepe place across the street from my apartment in college, but they always put a bit too much sugar in the dough, I think. I’d still eat them, but these are much better.”

Janus nodded and kept up the light conversation until Pat was finished.

21088

“Well,” he said then, getting to his feet. “It seems that nothing else is going to happen regarding the time distortion. I should be getting back.”

Pat hummed. “I should too. It’s movie night!”

“I probably should arrest you,” Janus noted.

“In the middle of all of these people?” Pat asked mildly.

“Touché,” Janus said.

Pat gasped and pointed at him. “Pun!” he said. Janus blinked at him. “Because we’re in France! That’s French!”

“…Goodbye Pat,” Janus said, turning to walk away from him.

“Goodbye… wait I still don’t know your name!”

Janus stopped to look back at him for a moment. “Like I said,” he replied. “Elvis.”

“Fine,” Pat said. “Au revoir, mon chéri.”

“You never stop, do you?” Janus asked.

Pat giggled. “Considering I don’t know what you mean, I imagine I’m just getting started.”

Janus actually left then, walking off towards the alley he’d first arrived in. In some ways, the mission had been a bust, but in others it had gone very well.

He felt for the weight of the phone in his pocket before pulling up the display screen on his timepiece to go back to the TPI.

It had gone very well indeed.

Chapter 15

The first thing Janus had done when he’d returned to the TPI was hand over the timebomb to Khalid who sent it to forensics. Within the hour, forensics got back to them that it was the same timebomb as 2999 and that it had never exploded, but simply been diffused. Which meant, blessings on blessings, everyone got to go home that night.

Not that Janus went home, no, he ended up falling asleep on his desk somewhere between 3 and 4am, but at least he wasn’t sharing his space with anyone. He’d been trying to hack the cell phone all night to see if it had anything he could use, but he honestly had no idea what he was doing. All it seemed he could do was play some annoying song over and over again about never giving someone up. At around 2am, he’d finally broken and sent off an email, though, he’d continued to try to mess with it after that.

He got woken up by Lena coming into the office at 7am, and noticed he already had an email response asking when Janus wanted to come in.

“Now?” he sent back.

“…Do you sleep?” was the immediate response. “And yes.”

His wrist buzzed as an appointment in 5 seconds downloaded to his timepiece. He selected the coordinates and landed at Cultural Outreach. The receptionist blinked up at him and then back down at the screen on his desk. “Oh!” he said. “I didn’t see this appointment. I think Professor Eran is in his office.”

He didn’t stand to escort Janus this time, so Janus went ahead and went down the hall to Virgil’s office himself.

He knocked on the door and while he was waiting for Virgil to open it, the infernal contraption once again started to play the same stupid song.

“I didn’t even touch you!” he spat, getting it out and tapping on the screen.

“Jonas Brothers dude again?” Virgil asked causally upon opening the door.

Janus shoved it at him. “Make it stop.”

Virgil took it and fiddled with it for a few moments before it stopped with the song. “Oh my gosh,” he said scrolling through something on the screen.

“What.”

“What maniac sets a custom alarm for every 30-60 minutes for a week that just plays ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’? Oh, and one ‘It’s Not Unusual’ on Saturday. He’s mixing memes at an alarming rate.”

“Can you. Just. Make it not happen. Anymore?”

Virgil smirked at him. “Maybe.” He turned around to go back into his office.

“Virgil,” Janus growled following him in.

Virgil just laughed. “What do you want to know about it?” he asked. “Just a fair warning… the song means he… likely was aware someone would steal it.”

“Of course, he was,” Janus groaned.

“But I’m sure we can still get something out of it.” Virgil started tapping at the screen again. “Okay, let’s see. It’s an iPhone 5, and someone jailbroke it.”

“What does that mean?”

“Tampered with it so they could install non-company approved software,” Virgil explained.

“Well I figured that since he was using Google Maps to track time distortions,” Janus grumbled.

“I think I have something,” Virgil said to himself while digging through his desk. “Ah ha!” He held up some sort of cord. “This will let me hook it up to my integrator.” He slotted the cord into the bottom of the iPhone and then crawled under his desk to fiddle around with some other things. “There we go,” Virgil said popping back up. “It might take a few minutes. Running the program any faster might overheat the phone.”

Janus nodded and sat back to wait. Virgil grabbed the phone and started to play around with it a bit even as it uploaded all of its information to his computer.

“Weird,” Virgil said after a moment.

“What?” Janus asked, sitting up straighter.

“There are exactly two contacts. Fewer than I’d anticipate for a regular phone from the 2010s. More than I would expect from one clearly not being used as a phone.

Virgil glanced to the side, and it must have finished the download because he unhooked it from the computer. “I have a 21st century phone network adapter,” Virgil said. “It transfers call back to whatever date the phone says. Do you want to try calling one?”

“It’s worth a shot,” Janus replied.

Virgil dug back into his desk for a small device that he plugged into the same port he’d plugged the earlier cord. “Okay, which contact do you want to try first?” he asked. “One has ‘Ro’ with a crown, red heart, and a gold star emoji. The other has “Lo” with a book, blue heart, and Milky Way emoji.”

“He mentioned a Lo,” Janus said. “So, try him first.”

Virgil nodded. “I’ll put it on speaker.” He pressed some buttons before setting the phone on the desk between them.

The phone rang three times before with a bit of a crackle, it was answered. “Salutations,” a voice said, voice sounding a bit scratchy as though he had only just gotten up.

Virgil motioned with his head for Janus to speak. “Are you ‘Lo’?” he asked.

The man hummed. “To some people.”

Janus… didn’t quite know what to say to that, or even what questions he should ask.

“I’m assuming you’re the man that stole my associate’s phone.”

“Your associate?” Janus fished.

The man made an amused hum. “I believe you were calling him ‘Pat’ on your last adventure.” Janus could hear something being placed down on the other end of the phone. Before Janus could respond, he heard what sounded like an old keyboard being typed on. “Now,” Lo said. “I have to admit, I am surprised you were willing to oblige me so thoroughly by plugging the phone into your system. Let’s see…”

The screen on Virgil’s lit up bright blue all of a sudden. “…shit,” said Virgil.

“Well,” Lo said, “it seems you were clever enough not to plug it into the TPI system, which is disappointing, but…”

There was more clicking on the other end. “Hmm, interesting music tastes for the 4000s,” he said.

“I’m an anthropologist,” Virgil spoke up.

“Ah, yes, I can see that,” Lo replied. “Virgil Eran, senior professor at Silver Mountain University, a vetted member of the Cultural Outreach program, and searched the phrase ‘How to eat sushi without making a cultural blunder and making everyone hate you and losing your job because what kind of shit anthropologist doesn’t know how to eat raw fish right’ which you then shortened to ‘How to eat sushi’ and proceeded to search 52 times in the last 48 hours.”

Virgil went a bit scarlet around the ears. “Dude, did you really have to out me like that?” he hissed at the phone.

“My apologies,” Lo responded. “From my personal experience, don’t dip the rice parts in soy sauce, and don’t add too much wasabi. Overall, most people will be understanding of mistakes, and you will certainly not be fired or ostracized for handling food incorrectly. As long as you are not acting intentionally disrespectful, and I image you will not be considering your clear anxiety over whatever outing you are planning to attend, you will be fine.”

“Okay,” Virgil said. “Good point, but counterpoint, what if you’re wrong and everyone hates me forever?”

“Is it the lunch meeting today at 11:30am?” Lo asked, “because I can see that a Professor Boris Laden has attended the event multiple years in a row. Considering he is a philosophy instructor, has no Japanese heritage that I can see, and I have found a photo of last year’s event wherein he has placed his chopsticks vertically in his rice, and he has yet to be fired or ostracized, I would postulate that your fears are unfounded.”

“Yeah but… okay, I really don’t have an argument for that one, except maybe I’m a piece of shit and everyone is looking for a reason to hate me.”

“Considering your many impressive accolades in your field, I would argue that ‘a piece of shit’ is not a good descriptor of you. Not to mention the fact that you are often a highly requested member for different committees in your department and outside of it.”

“Oh, but is that because people like me or because I’m an anxious mess and make sure events go off without a hitch?”

“From experience, disorder with people you enjoy the company of is far more tolerable than order with people you do not. Which explains my current living situation and the lack of finished dishes in my sink. Therefore, I would assume the former.”

22735

“A lot of assumptions,” Virgil commented, but he was smiling slightly.

“Assumptions based on data,” Lo argued back lightly.

“You really came in here, hacked into my computer and smacked my anxiety in the face, huh?”

“Glad to have helped.”

“Y-”

“Are the two of you finished?” Janus interrupted, finally getting sick of the two of them.

“Not nearly,” Lo said. “I have gained access to an entire network of a very large university and will be sorting through the data for a long time.”

“Ugh, right,” Virgil groaned, “and you got access through my integrator.”

“I doubt they’ll be able to trace it back to you if you don’t tell them.”

“Nice try,” Virgil said dryly, “but not likely. I’m telling them about you immediately so they can work to kick you out.”

Lo laughed. “Fair enough, but I’ve already gotten plenty of information at this point. Including the fact that you work with the TPI and scheduled an appointment with an Agent Janus Picani this morning set to start a few minutes before this phone call. So, hello Janus.”

“Bastard,” Janus shot back.

“And goodbye Professor Eran. It was a pleasure.” He hung up.

Virgil sighed and ran his hand through his hair. “This is going to be fun to explain to both of our bosses.”

Arc II What We Do to Each Other

Chapter 16:

As it would turn out, Janus and Virgil did not get in trouble for hooking up the old phone to Virgil’s integrator, mostly because it wasn’t really a mistake on their part. The phone cleared all virus checks that the tech people both from the university and the TPI ran on it. The phone should have been clean and should not have caused an issue.

In fact, they were still trying to pin down the code on the general university server. They could tell that something was mucking about on the system but what or how was a mystery. This also meant that there was no telling what information had been compromised and considering how many things Silver Mountain had its hands in, that was… a bit worrying.

Another worrying thing was there was suddenly more activity of late at the TPI. There were more time distortions popping up every day. Usually they would be few and far in between. There had been 3 total recorded the year before, but over 12 in the last week. Some of them were fake like the one Janus had investigated, but some of them were real. It painted a distressing picture and also was a drain on their resources. Khalid was actually looking to advertise positions to hire new recruits which was something she rarely did as she liked to keep appointments to the TPI in house.

They’d even loosed the number of field agents needed for each mission and Janus and Remus had been splitting up just to get everything done. Today, he and Remus had thankfully only two missions scheduled for the day.

“Are we going together or separate today?” Janus asked Remus.

“Think they’ll burn me at the stake for being a witch if I go alone to either of them?” Remus asked.

“I don’t know. Probably. I think we’re getting a bit late into the 1700s for that in Cuba, but I have no idea about Mesopotamia.”

“Let’s just go together. I did not like almost drowning yesterday because I was the only stranger in town when the weather was going wonky.”

“Surely it isn’t because you opened your mouth. Ever.” Janus said dryly.

“How was I supposed to know he was the local clergyman’s son?”

Janus rolled his eyes. “On second thought,” he said, pushing a button on his desk to choose Cuba as he next mission, and standing up. “I don’t want you coming with me.” Yet, he did not protest when Remus also signed up for the Cuba mission and he waited for him by the office door before going to talk to Rhi.

Rhi was a bit frazzled when which meant quite a bit as she was usually incredibly put together. Remus didn’t even seem inclined to tease her today.

“Okay,” she said once they’d closed the door behind them. She flipped through some documents on her desk. “Picani and Clockson. Camaguey Cuba 1755. Do you know Cuba?”

“Uh,” Janus said. “Yeah?”

“Like you’re reading the things, right? I don’t have to babysit you, right? You got it? The Seven Year War was happening, but it won’t affect you much as it hasn’t really hit Cuba. It’s the middle of the Camaguey Carnival. Everyone will be everywhere and there will be chaos so as long as you don’t really fuck up you should be fine. Um…apparent races.” She looked up at them and studied them each for a moment as thought looking at them for the first time despite having known them for years. “It’ll work. Go to costuming.”

“Shouldn’t we…” Janus said, “sign things?”

“…Yep,” she said, fiddling with her desktop and then sending documents over to their side to sign.

Janus and Remus both did before sending them back.

“Great. Good.” She stood and grabbed some things from behind her. “You can go.” She sat back down as they took their things and Janus noticed a message pop up on her desk. She looked up at Remus looking exhausted. “What?” she asked.

“Just open it,” Remus said.

Rhi tapped it and a photo opened.

“I got her a new mouse toy!” Remus said happily as Rhi looked at the picture of Diesel Fuel attacking a cloth mouse.

“That is… appreciated Agent Clockson,” Rhi said. “Now get out.”

They did, leaving to get their costumes on and checked. Costuming was just as busy and frazzled as Rhi had been and they actually had to wait for decon because there’d been a mix up with the agents leaving before them. They landed in Cuba without issue. Janus could already hear the festival in full swing outside the small building they’d were in. Remy was standing there with a very not time appropriate mug of coffee.

“Sue me,” Remy said when Janus raised an eyebrow at it. “Please just… get in and out without causing trouble. Seriously. I don’t want to have to deal with that on top of everything else.”

“We’ll do our best,” Janus assured.

Remy pulled his sunglasses down to look at him. He looked exhausted. “God please do more than your best.”

Janus nodded tightly. “We’ll be in and out,” he said, already glancing at his timepiece. It had been disguised as a golden bracelet which made it a bit harder to actually use, but wrist watches wouldn’t be invented for more than a century, so they’d have to make do. “The time distortion, if that’s what it is, should be in the middle of town. Let’s go.”

He and Remus exited the building onto the packed city street.

Janus was immediately bombarded with all types of sights, sounds, and smells. There were many colorful articles of clothing and costumes as people went every which way along the street talking to other members of their community, playing instruments, and dancing. There was the sound of people speaking Spanish, still mostly almost pure Castilian Spanish with perhaps a bit of influence from Taino as the Haitian revolution had yet to push the Creole language over to Cuba. People must have been hard at work cooking different dishes for the carnival as many different spices wafted through the air. It was sticky hot considering it was the middle of June in the tropics and Janus was immediately sweating despite the temperature appropriate clothing he’d been outfitted with.

He glanced around their immediate area, just scoping out the crowds. His eyes were immediately drawn to one person near them.

“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me,” he said out loud when he saw Pat. Remus looked in the direction Janus was.

Even if Janus didn’t recognize him the moment he laid eyes on him, he probably still would have ended up staring as he was the only person in the area who clearly did not know how to do the dance he was attempting.

Remus snorted and Janus shook his head in secondhand embarrassment. “Well, would you look whose boyfriend’s here,” he said to Janus. Make that firsthand embarrassment. “Has anyone told him the Mambo wasn’t invented until the 1900s and also that’s not how you do it?”

Chapter 17

Pat stopped dancing the moment he saw Janus approaching him, but he still bobbed cheerfully ( and unrhythmically) to the music. “Hi Janus,” he said pleasantly.

“You just have to rub it in, huh?”

There was a flash of confusion across his face, but then he smiled. “Well, I know where in our relationship you are. How was France?”

“You’re a bastard.”

“You stole the phone,” he laughed.

“You stole the bomb,” Janus countered, “and you wanted me to steal the phone. You booby trapped it.”

“No,” Pat correct, putting a finger up. “We have security on my phone because in high school I once forgot it in the school locker room and long story short, the three of us ended up in a lake. So, then Lo made sure I always had some sort of tracker on it. When I started time traveling, he updated it and when I met you we updated it again in case there was ever an opportunity like that. Lo calls it using our weaknesses to our advantage.”

“He’s a bastard too,” Janus growled.

Pat just laughed.

“Is someone talking about me?” Remus asked, stepping over to them. Janus rolled his eyes.

“Oh,” Pat said, blinking at Janus’s partner for a moment. “Remus.” He hesitated slightly. “How are you doing?”

“Me?” Remus asked. “Uh, I’m doing good. A little stressed out with work, but fine.”

“Good,” Pat said with just a little too much heartfulness to it.

“What?” Janus asked, eyes narrowed at Pat. “What is that?”

“What is what?” Pat asked. He met Janus’s eyes briefly and it made panic surge up Janus’s spine because the look Pat was sending him wasn’t one that said he was playing dumb. It was a warning.

Oh, Janus did not like this. That look told Janus Pat had some foreknowledge that he absolutely could not tell Janus about without messing up the timeline spectacularly. This was why this mess the two of them were mixed up in was so bad, but it seemed Janus did not have much of a choice when it came to Pat.

Despite how bad of an idea he knew it was, he still wanted to push, because whatever Pat was hiding could be very, very bad and it had to do with Remus. There were so many reasons Pat could be acting like that around Remus, but the worst ones were definitely the ones on his mind. Death, injury, illness. They were all possible especially in their line of work and especially with how time was being screwed with right now. And Pat knew. He knew exactly what the answer was, and oh did Janus want to push.

Experience knowing what worse things could come out of having foreknowledge made Janus bite his tongue.

“So, what are you two doing here,” Pat asked, and Janus unhappily let him change the subject.

“Oh, like you don’t know,” Janus replied.

“I don’t know,” Pat said innocently.

“There’s another time distortion,” Janus said, “and while you didn’t know what it was the last time I saw you, I’m pretty sure you do now.”

“Oh, I didn’t know there was a time distortion here. I can help you if you like,” he offered sweetly.

“Oh, yeah, sure. Then why are you here?”

“I wanted to see if I could find the Flying Dutchman,” Pat told him.

“And so you went to Camaguey?”

“Uh huh.”

“One of the farthest places from the ocean in Cuba?”

“Is it?”

“I don’t trust you.”

Pat just shrugged. “Well, if you don’t want my help finding the time distortion, I’ll just be on my way then.”

“Wait,” he said when Pat went to turn away. Pat paused. Janus turned to Remus. “Remus, do you think he’s bullshitting me so I let him wander off and do whatever the hell he’s doing, or do you think he’s bullshitting me into letting him come with us.”

“Hmm,” Remus said, looking Pat up and down. Janus could immediately tell he wasn’t going to get any helpful answer. “Well, if we’re going with the how much do I get to see his, admittedly very sexy, ass criteria.” Janus pinched the bridge of his nose. “Letting him leave now means instant gratification and a nice full image when he turns away. However, letting him go with us means many more opportunities to get a glimpse, but they’d probably just be glimpses. So, yeah that’s a tough call.”

“You didn’t even bother to give me an actual hidden suggestion with that bullshit,” Janus groaned. He glanced at Pat only to see him hiding his very red face in his hands. Janus blinked. “Oh,” he said. “You got him, Remus.” Janus was surprised. He’d expected a bit more tenacity for someone with Pat’s personality. Of course, Janus was used to Remus, so that perhaps had some effect. Pat made a muffled distressed sound behind his hands and Janus raised an eyebrow. “You really got him.”

Pat flapped one hand around while still using the other to completely hide his face. “It’s just. His face. Saying that. Is weird.”

Janus could not say that he didn’t feel a slight spark of joy at seeing Pat flustered. After all, Pat’s weapon of choice had often been flirting with Janus in the past. However, he still smacked Remus on the shoulder when it looked like he was about to continue with something likely far more inappropriate. “We are here for a reason,” he reminded. He turned to consider Pat and squinted at him. “You’re coming with us, I’ve decided. I don’t want to let you out of my sights. Don’t,” he said empathically turning to Remus as the man opened his mouth once more.

Pat had mostly recovered, though his cheeks were just a bit pink still. “Yeah,” he said. “I’ll go with you. Where do we start?”

Janus glanced at his timepiece. “It’s not showing up on our trackers yet.”

“It messed with your tracker last time,” Pat pointed out.

“I know,” Janus said. “Which means it could be another fake one or whatever is causing it hasn’t started yet. If things start going wrong, but it still doesn’t show on our radar, it’s almost certainly a fake one, but some of the fake ones haven’t blocked our technology.”

“Here, I can check,” Pat said.

“Please don’t pull out an iPhone,” Janus begged.

Pat stuck out his tongue at him, and then smiled. He reached for the bracelet on his wrist and twisted it back and forth a few times before pressing his palms together. He glanced around them quickly to make sure no one around them was watching and then peeled apart his palms like he was miming reading a book.

“What the fuck is that, and how do I get one?” Remus asked immediately. It was innocuous, whatever it was. If someone from this time caught a glimpse of the display, they’d likely assume it was a trick of the light, but staring right at it, Janus could tell it was a map of the surrounding areas with a softly glowing blue light marking their current location. Janus could see no screen or origin of a hologram. It looked like the image was drawn onto the man’s palms, but as he watched, the image shifted to zoom out.

“There doesn’t seem to be anything major yet,” Pat said wiggling his fingers a bit. The display changed slightly to some sort of colorful overlay Janus did not understand. Pat hummed. “Did you two come from that building recently?” he asked nodding at it.

“Yes,” Janus replied. “How do you know?”

“There’s sometimes a slight temperature change when people time travel,” Pat explained. “I can read it on here.” He tilted his head. “There also seems to be a big enough temperature change in a church a few blocks away that could indicate time travel. Want to check it out?”

“We might as well,” Janus agreed.

“And if it’s nothing, we can get drunk on the communion wine!”

“He’s going to get immediately struck by lightning,” Janus said.

Chapter 18

“If we see anyone,” Janus said as they entered the church. “You keep your mouth shut. Do you understand me? Remus, do you understand me?”

Remus immediately turned to Pat. “You know, I didn’t grow up Catholic,” he said to Pat who looked at him in confusion. “So the first time I ever entered a Catholic church, you can’t blame me for being a little confused about the whole cabinet thing with a wall between them. After all, everyone was singing about glory to god and what not. So I…”

Janus slapped him. “This is why you were almost burned at the stake yesterday.”

#study break stories #not writing

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kwat01 · 4 years ago

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Tis I! Your lovely secret pantom again🎅🌹 Oooo, those are the best kinds of fairy tales~ I love learning about the older tales, they are so much fun to read! Is there a particular tale that holds your heart, one you could read over and over again? Awe, sounds like she has fun though! She'll grow to love them when she gets bigger, eheh! The OG book is one of my favorites too! Is there any particular gothic literature you like to read besides POTO? I saw you like science fiction!

You know I don’t think I really have a favourite tale, but I remember when my love for them began. A girl in my 8th grade art class brought a HUGE book in with her one day that was an illustrated encyclopaedia of Celtic monsters and folktales. This thing was about 2 inches thick and as big as an old atlas book. The kind of book you would work a book collection around because it’s so awesome. I remember her saying it was her mother’s and that she would KILL her if she knew she’d brought it to school but that she wanted to create an art piece with the book as inspiration. I’ve never been able to find a copy since despite bookstore, library and, later when the internet became the norm, google searches over the last 20 years. Here is a webpage that is quite similar to the book, minus the tales to go with the descriptions and only a fraction of the monsters on offer. Gives pretty good idea of what I’m talking about though.

The other earliest memory I have is of an original telling of The Little Mermaid picture book I had as a kid and loved. The sea witch seriously scared me, but I loved the mermaids. I didn’t understand her obsession with the prince 😂 “Why didn’t she kill him?” I’d ask my mother, who replied “Because she loved him.” My brain screaming but he didn’t love her??!! And now she’s sea foam!! Uuurgh!

I've read at random real endings for some well known fairytales, like where the three bears eat goldilocks, there are multiple gorey versions of Little Red Riding Hood, I'm obsessed with the big bad wolf 🖤 The evil step sister that kept slicing off pieces of foot to fit into the glass slipper etc.

Gothic novels, hmm, I loved Frankenstein, Jane Eyre, the Hunchback of Notre Dame, Wuthering Heights I can’t actually remember Dracula very well, it’s been too long. I read a lot of H.P Lovecraft and dabbled in Edgar Allen Poe, Anne Rice had a fair run. Then I’d dedicate an entire year to giant classics like the Count of Monte Cristo and become obsessed with revenge 😂 or War and Peace, my best friend said I drove her crazy when I was reading that one because I’d go off on tangents about Russian history or spout off Freemason facts, didn’t help at the time she was reading the biography of Che Guevara and was in a completely different mind space. I’ve been attempting to read Les Miserables over the last year and have been failing miserably. I couldn’t focus when I was pregnant and now I have no time 😤

Science fiction has definitely taken a backburner to fantasy and gothic novels, I love love love Terry Pratchett's Discworld and always will, I’ve read a few Dune novels and a few H.G Wells. The Hitch-hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is amazing, 1984 was terrifying, Slaughterhouse 5 was just mind blowing! I read a lot of science fiction in my young teens mostly and couldn’t even give you titles now! Then there was obvious fantasy novels like the Hobbit & Lord of the Rings, but lots of strange ones I’d just randomly pick from the bookstore or steal from a friends collection. A few years ago I bought the first 6 books of the Wheel of Time series on a friend’s recommendation. I made it through the first two and realised I really wasn’t having a good time, the characters just weren’t holding my interest enough. I do think about the plot now and again though and so I will have to come back to them eventually and find out where it goes. I did really enjoyed the settings in the book, very creative, I need to give it another chance i think, probably takes off in book 3 lol.

I make it a habit to never continuously read the same author because I don’t want to grow tired of their writing style. And i tend to never read a book more than once! I try to tuck it away in my mind and will reflect on them now and again, passages or chapters that will stay with you, but you can’t get the same shock, or surprise that you had in your first read, it just won’t be the same the next time around.

This was fun going down memory lane, now I’m thinking of other books I’ve forgotten about that I’ve read and loved, a good workout for a brain that’s been fixated too long.

On a side note, my girl laughed for the first time today! She’s been trying to for weeks, her attempts hilarious in their own right, but today was her first actual chuckle. It was one of the most magical things I’ve ever heard 💕😊 today has been a good day.

Thank you again for the asks Santa, so much fun! Sorry I waffled on a bit 😁

#poto secret santa

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nouncore · 4 years ago

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10 Books I Want to Read in 2021

Yes, we're more than two weeks into 2021. But what an insane two weeks that has been? Hope that justifies this list being obscenely late. My reading of 2020 was rather erratic and I hope this year I can be a bit more purposeful in what I'm reading.

She’s Too Pretty to Burn by Wendy Heard

Sapphics AND The Picture of Dorian Gray? It's like the universe heard my innermost desires I didn't even know were there. A YA, love triangle, thriller based on The Picture of Dorian Gray. I'll be counting down the days until March 30th.

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas

I tried (and failed) to read this book in 2020 but I do truly want to read this book. The roughly 200 pages I read were wholly exciting, engaging, and thrilling. A young man imprisoned for a crime he didn't commit, treasure, sword fights, oh my! Plus this book is one of my mom's favorites so I want to read it for her.

The Chosen and the Beautiful by Nghi Vo

Gatsby but make it gay? Sign me up! This new take on Jordan Baker as a queer, Asian, girl is genuinely all I need in life. Although The Great Gatsby is not my favorite book, I'm so excited to see what this book will entail.

Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M. Danforth

Horror meets dark academia meets sapphics. Deaths at a New England boarding school. A movie? When it comes to horror, I try not to read the synopsis, but whatever the details are, this sounds fantastic.

Dune by Frank Herbert

A personal goal of mine is to read more science fiction this year, and what better place to start then the cornerstone of science fiction? I honestly don't know much about this book but I'm going to read it!

The Testaments by Margaret Atwood

Anything written by Margaret Atwood immediately goes to my tbr list, especially the sequel to The Handmaid's Tale. Gilead, over fifteen years after the events of the first book. This book has been sitting on my shelf for at least six months and I honestly don't know why I've waited this long to read it.

The Devil and the Dark Water by Stuart Turton

The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle was a true masterpiece, and I could hardly wait to get my hands on more of Stuart Turton's work. Going into The 7 1/2 Death's, I hadn't read a word of the synopsis or had any preconceived notions of the book, and that was truly for the best, so I have no idea what this book is about!

The Memory Police by Yōko Ogawa

Yes, I have a bit of a thing for dystopian novels. Maybe it's to distract myself from the actual dystopian novel we're all living through. Well anyways, this book! Things begin to go missing and no one notices it. Well, almost no one. A terrifying examination at state surveillance. Can't wait!

The Waste Lands (The Dark Tower #3) by Stephen King

The first two books of The Dark Tower series were so remarkably different, yet always had that signature Stephen King feeling. Every King book I've read thus far has been a hit, but I know his writing can be a bit of a hit-or-miss for others, so we'll see about this one!

Emma by Jane Austen

Taking another shot at Jane Austen with this one! I've previously only read Pride and Prejudice and...didn't like it. But to be fair, I was reading it for school and that can suck the joy out of anything. It seems that I'm the only girl in my family who doesn't adore Jane Austen, so we'll see if this will change my opinion of her work!

#books #bookblr #tbr #idk what im doing

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terramythos · 4 years ago

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TerraMythos' 2020 Reading Challenge - Book 14 of 26

Title: The Count of Monte Cristo (1840s)

Author: Alexandre Dumas (English translation by Robin Buss)

Genre/Tags: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Revenge, Adventure, Classic, Re-Read, Slow Burn, Third-Person.

Rating: 10/10

Date Began: 5/07/2020

Date Finished: 6/13/2020

Young Edmond Dantès is about to get everything he’s ever wanted-- he’s set to marry the woman of his dreams and become captain of a distinguished trade ship. However, everything goes wrong when several jealous rivals frame him for a crime he did not commit, landing him in a horrific prison with no hope of trial or escape. After years of solitary confinement and despair, Dantès by chance meets a wise old abbé imprisoned in the neighboring cell. The two become close friends, and the abbé teaches Dantès everything he knows. On his deathbed, Dantès’ mentor reveals the location of a fabulous treasure hidden on the abandoned island of Monte Cristo.

Dantès escapes prison after fourteen harrowing years and discovers that the treasure is real. Not only that, the men who ruined his life have obtained wealth and success. He reinvents himself as The Count of Monte Cristo, a mysterious and fabulously wealthy aristocrat. Utilizing this and a multitude of other personas, Dantès enacts a manipulative and intricate revenge on the men who wronged him long ago.

Click the readmore for the full review!

“Dantès cannot stay in prison for ever; one day, he will come out, and on that day, woe betide the one who put him there!”

The Count of Monte Cristo is, obviously, a famous classic. It’s also one of two books I had to read for a class in high school that I actually liked. Considering 15-year-old me was a “gifted” burnout who had stopped reading for pleasure at that point, it says something that an assigned 1200-something page classic novel not only captured my interest, but kept it to the bitter end. Reading this was genuinely one of the few good things that came out of my high school experience. While I didn’t understand everything about it (least of all French pronunciation when I tried to read it out loud-- good God), the adventure, political intrigue, and revenge were all very exciting. It was shocking to actually read a book for school that was so entertaining.

But it’s been about a decade since I’ve read The Count of Monte Cristo. A lot has changed about me as a person since then-- I’m older, maybe a little wiser, and an entirely different gender than I thought I was. So, is it the same novel to me now as it was back then? Yes and no.

On a reread, I found I understood the novel more than I did as a teenager; I was able to follow the multitude of characters, subplots, and events much better. While many people discuss and praise the revenge plot, myself included, Monte Cristo doesn’t fully embrace that narrative until the last quarter or so. Most of the book instead establishes characters, relationships, and events that pay off big time when the Count finally pulls off his various schemes. It’s satisfying to see how everything comes together, especially in the last leg of the story. Each time Dantès reveals his identity is a treat, and it’s always fresh, with different philosophical implications. It’s impressive how Dumas ties so many threads into a coherent and entertaining whole.

Revenge itself is very psychological in this book. The Count’s revenge plots are premeditated and usually immaculate in execution. He doesn’t just get revenge on the men who wronged him -- he actively fucks with, manipulates, and ruins them in the eyes of society. Even when the unexpected happens, he’s usually quick-witted enough to figure things out and still accomplish his goals. Dantès sees himself as an agent of God, reasoning that it’s the only explanation for how he went from the utter despair of eternal imprisonment to wealthy and powerful. He believes his revenge is ordained by heaven to punish the wicked-- and he likewise shows paternal compassion and care towards those he deems to be worthy. It’s only when innocents begin to suffer for his actions that Dantès questions his pursuit of revenge, and whether his utter devotion to it was divine at all or even the right thing to do. Does a life dedicated to revenge truly make one happy? Does revenge actually improve the world? These are almost universal ideas in modern revenge stories, but there’s no doubt that The Count of Monte Cristo popularized them.

The Count of Monte Cristo is also surprisingly modern for a story written in the 1840s. Many elements would be considered unusual for the time. There’s honest-to-God, non-fetishized lesbians in the story, which was something I definitely didn’t catch on my first read (you can even interpret one of them as a trans dude, which is bonkers). One of my favorite characters is Noirtier, a disabled old man whose entire body is paralyzed except for his eyes. Despite this, he communicates via different blinking patterns to enact multiple complex schemes to protect his granddaughter. He’s a total badass, and the only character that gives the Count a run for his money re: ulterior motives. There’s also some pretty risqué elements-- Dumas really liked hashish, which features quite a bit in the story. Add in the graphic violence and an actual plot-critical serial killer, and you’ve got an adventure thriller that often feels like it was written for modern audiences.

Do I recommend reading Monte Cristo? Yes, absolutely-- but there are definitely some caveats. The length is an obvious consideration. If you want to read this, be prepared for a commitment-- I read pretty fast, and it still took me over a month to get through it. While it’s long, it is entertaining (and often humorous) throughout, even to a modern reader. You also want to avoid the multitude of abridged versions, as they tend to cut out most of the interesting subtleties of the story and focus on the action sequences. The translation I read clocks in at a cozy 1276 pages, and they definitely aren’t short. While I haven’t read other translations, this one (the Penguin Classics translation by Robin Buss) seems to be considered the best English version.

While I mentioned the modern aspects of the story, and Dumas was considered liberal, The Count of Monte Cristo is still a product of its time. Dumas has some very interesting female characters, for example, but their roles are generally still true to the sociopolitical climate of the 1840s. Slavery is just a thing in the story, and while there’s some nuance there considering Dumas’ own heritage, it’s worth mentioning. The Count’s relationship with Haydée is pretty yikes, even though I like her as a character and her role in one of the revenge schemes. Generally speaking, this book also has more pop culture references than a Shrek film, and while the footnotes help, there’s still a lot that isn’t annotated and totally went over my head.

In my opinion, though, The Count of Monte Cristo is definitely one of the most captivating classic novels out there. It’s had an immense impact on modern storytelling, and I can’t understate how genuinely fun it is to read. Definitely give it a try if you’re in the market for a classic and the sheer length doesn’t scare you away.

#taylor reads #10/10 #sorry for the shit picture -- i literally couldn't find one for this edition without horrible jpeg artifacts lmao #2020 reading challenge

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alienspawnwrites · 4 years ago

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Laying Hands: Chapter 8

Read on AO3

A Complete Party

Before long, the two of them had returned to their separate reading. Althea marveled at the speed with which Loki was devouring the tome in his hands, emphasized by the crisp sound of the ancient pages turning every few seconds.

Stealing a move from his playbook, she addressed him without looking up from her text. “Either you’re reading a picture book or you’re the fastest reader I’ve ever seen,” she said light-heartedly.

“The latter,” he replied simply. “Though I admit I’m rather familiar with this volume. I’ve read it many times.”

“What’s it about?” Althea set her copy of The Count of Monte Cristo aside, enticed by the opportunity to learn more about the enigmatic god.

“Candlemaking.”

Althea looked at him blankly, taken by surprise. “…really? And that’s… that’s something you’re into, then?”

Loki lowered the book, his expression a mixture of exasperation and amusement.

“Do I look like someone who makes candles in their spare time?”

Althea answered with an exaggerated shrug of her shoulders. “How would I know? Why would you keep rereading a book about making candles if you’re not interested?”

Loki tensed, the amusement falling from his face. “I… wasn’t able to bring many Asgardian texts with me. My selection is a little limited as a result.”

Althea peered past Loki to the wall of stuffed bookshelves behind him. “There are plenty of books here. I’m sure you could find something a little more entertaining than a book about wax.”

“Midgardian books,” he scoffed. “I’m not interested in what passes for literature on this backward planet.” He had, in actuality, dipped into Stark’s impressive library many times, even finding a few pieces that he quite enjoyed, but he refused to admit that to her. Better to keep her, like everyone else, at arm's length, he reasoned. And since she neither feared nor hated him like the rest of her race, he would just have to rely on his signature air of superiority.

“You are so…. pompous,” she said, shaking her head.

Loki expected her expression to match her harsh words but found she was smiling, shaking her head.

“Here.” She stuck her copy of The Count of Monte Cristo out for him. She still had a few chapters left in the novel, but she figured she’d get it back soon enough - it wouldn’t take Loki long to get through the French work. “You’ll like this,” she insisted, extending it out a little further.

Loki hesitantly reached out to take the book from her hand. He held it gingerly, sneering as though it were made from refuse. “And what is this about?”

“Oh the usual,” she feigned, “adventure, love…”

Loki rolled his eyes dramatically.

“…betrayal, prison breaks, deceit, vengeance, some murder,” she continued, awaiting his reaction.

Loki’s eyebrows raised. Althea figured the darker themes would appeal to him.

Loki studied the cover with an appraising look. “I suppose I could give it a try.” He sounded reluctant, but quickly cracked the cover and began reading.

Her reading material now firmly occupying Loki’s attention, Althea decided to fix herself a snack. The perpetually stocked fridge made the task equal parts easy and challenging and she found herself trying to choose amongst the ample selection for a few minutes. When she finally emerged, the ingredients for a simple salad in hand, she caught Loki making his exit.

“Still wordlessly fleeing rooms, then?”, Althea called out after him.

“It’s about to become a little crowded for my taste,” he replied, neither turning around nor pausing his stride.

Althea watched him go, realizing that the two of them had, essentially, just spent the day together. She’d even go so far as to call it a nice day together. Sure, Loki had been snarky and more than a little haughty, but she was proud of her ability to keep up with him. She’d even caught him off-guard a few times, though he’d be loath to admit it. As she assembled her salad she pondered what book she would recommend to the other-worldly prince next.

From a young age, her parents had encouraged her penchant for reading, often pushing her towards more and more difficult works. She had been steadily making her way through ‘the classics’ with their guidance. “You have to start with the classics,” her mother had told her. “You can learn just about anything about the world through them.”

“Plus, you’ll have a leg up in school. Easier to write a book report on something you’ve already read,” her father had added, always the more practical of the two.

It was one of the few concrete memories she had left of her parents. Althea tried to push the nostalgic recollection aside. If she didn’t think about them, then she didn’t have to think about their demise. She focused instead on adding just the right number of croutons to the bed of greens in front of her.

She’d only taken a few bites when she heard the Quinjet landing behind her, signaling the return of Steve Rogers and the rest. She turned to greet them as they made their way back inside.

“You do realize there are other rooms in this place,” quipped Tony immediately heading to the bar to fix himself a drink. “This building’s got 93 floors and you’ve got clearance for oh, 20 of them? You don’t have to spend all your time here, you know.”

“I like the view,” she mumbled through a mouthful of spinach, shrugging. She swallowed before continuing. I like reading in the window seats. Not much else for me to do.”

“Yeah, well, we’ll have to do something about that,” Tony said, throwing a meaningful look towards Steve and Natasha in turn.

“You and my brother have that in common,” Thor said, smiling. Althea wondered if he was referring to reading by the window or having nothing else to do.

“I know,” she told him, stabbing another forkful of greens and chasing a rather evasive crouton around the bowl. “I actually got him to read a book from Earth: The Count of Monte Cristo,” she boasted.

“Huh. Good choice. That’ll appeal to the whole ‘victim complex’ deal he’s got going on,” Tony commended.

“Stark…” Thor warned. It was endearing, the way he stood up for his brother, even against Stark’s throwaway jokes.

“Actually, I’m surprised he hasn’t gotten to that one yet,” Tony continued, unperturbed.

“…what?” Althea looked at him, her eyebrows knitted in confusion.

“That guy’s a voracious reader. Goes through about three books a day sometimes,” Nat chimed in as she passed Althea to grab a bottle of water from the refrigerator.

“Loki said he only read books from Asgard,” Althea persisted. “He said our literature was below him.”

“That arrogant little shit,” Tony cursed, rolling his eyes. “He’s read just about every book in the place.”

“One time I watched him read all of Lord of the Rings in one sitting. He even read The Silmarillion,” Bruce interjected, his expression one of exaggerated disbelief. “Who does that?”

“That arrogant little shit,” Althea echoed. Still, she smiled to herself. Loki could pretend he held nothing but disdain for humans, but now she knew better. She looked forward to calling him out on his lie.

“We’ve got more important things to discuss than Loki’s reading habits,” Steve reminded them dutifully.

“Right, yeah.” Tony looked at Althea, his playful demeanor gone. “So kid, you’ve been staying with us for a while now. We finally know why Hydra was interested in you and you’re not a secret from SHIELD anymore. Really, there’s no longer a reason for us to keep you here.”

Althea felt the blood drain from her face. Before accidentally healing Loki and revealing her ability to the rest of the Avengers, she had been afraid they would continue Hydra’s experimentations. When the team had left this morning, she’d been worried that they’d hand her over to yet another shadowy organization. She’d never considered that they’d simply turn her out, leave her to her own devices in the world, abandon her. It was suddenly harder to breathe. She didn’t know anyone outside this tower. She was otherwise entirely alone. How would she get by? What would she do?

“Jesus, Tony, you couldn’t think of a better way to phrase that?”, scolded Natasha.

“What Tony means to say,” Steve shot the billionaire an exasperated look, “is that you don’t have to stay here if you don’t want to. No one’s kicking you out, but you’re free to go if you want.”

“I don’t have anywhere to go,” Althea said defeatedly. “I wouldn’t even know where to start.”

“I could, of course, help you out there,” Tony told her flippantly. “Set you up with a place, some scratch, even a job. You could live the rest of your life in comfortable obscurity, free from the troubles of the world.” He paused then, letting the idea sink in. “Or, and here’s an interesting idea, you could join us. This party could use a cleric.”

“A what?” Thor and Steve posed the question in unison. Off to the side, Bruce snorted. Natasha rolled her eyes.

“A cleric… you know, a healer? We’ve got just about every other class spoken for. Cap’s our fighter. Nat’s a monk and Clint’s a ranger. Banner is clearly the barbarian, that one’s so obvious it’s not even funny. We even have a paladin with Thor bringing his god power into the mix, and I’m clearly a rogue. A cleric would really round out the gang.”“Eh, you’re more of an artificer, Tony,” Bruce cut in, now openly chuckling.

“Fair enough. I’m an artificer with roguish good looks.”

“Will someone tell me what in the world he’s going on about?”, Steve asked, exhausted by the conversation’s left turn.

“Dungeons and Dragons, old-timer,” a nonplussed Tony answered.

“I have fought many dragons and even I am confused,” said Thor.

“It’s a kind of roleplaying game. Every player has a different class and skills to… wait, you’ve fought dragons? Like, actual, fire-breathing dragons?” Bruce stared at Thor in amazement.

Before Thor could launch into another boastful tale, Tony cut him off. “My point is, we could use someone like you on the team, Thea. So what do you say? Want to be an Avenger?”

All eyes turned to Althea. She stood frozen on the spot, eyes wide and jaw slack. For a moment it looked like she wouldn’t respond. Finally, she spoke. “You want me to join you? To… to fight crime and save the world and stuff?” Her voice was breathy in her disbelief.

“Only if you want to,” assured Steve, stepping forward. “It’s entirely up to you. I won't lie to you, it's a dangerous job. No one would blame you for saying no, but we think you’d be a good addition to the team.”

Althea focused on him, finding his warmth and confidence comforting. “I don’t know the first thing about fighting.”

“You don’t have to do any fighting,” Steve answered, “but it sure would be nice to have someone like you around in case someone gets hurt.”

“You’re like the Swiss Army medic, kid,” Tony added.

Natasha moved to stand beside Steve. Her expression was softer than any Althea had ever seen her wear. “I know healing others causes you pain, and I know you’ve had enough pain for a lifetime. But I also know you want to help people. This could be your opportunity; your chance to use that power for good.” The two women looked at each other, a silent understanding passing between them. Althea knew very little about Natasha or her past, but she was starting to realize the two might have more in common than she’d guessed.

“You don’t have to decide now,” Steve began. “You can-“

“I’ll do it,” Althea cut him off. “I want to help, anyway I can.”

#loki #loki fanfic #loki fic #loki (marvel)#loki x oc #loki x ofc #loki x original female character #slow burn #slow build #avengers #fanfiction #fan fiction #fanfic #romance #marvel #MCU fic #mcu #angst

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brightbeautifulthings · 5 years ago

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The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas (trans. Robin Buss)

"'I have heard it said that the dead have never done, in six thousand years, as much evil as the living do in a single day.'"

Year Read: 2019

Rating: 3/5

Context: Last year’s year-long Les Mis read went so well, I decided to choose another intimidating classic to tackle in the same fashion this year. I know myself, and if I don't deliberately pace out a book like this, I'll try to read a thousand pages in a week, and it will just be a miserable experience. (That's not to say some classics aren't miserable experiences regardless of how you read them, but that's another issue entirely.) The Count of Monte Cristo was calling to me from the shelf, and by pure luck, I already owned the edition I wanted to read (plus a B&N abridged version that promptly went into the donation box). Reviews overwhelmingly praise Robin Buss’s translation for ease/modernity, and the Penguin Classics haven’t let me down yet.

For my less coherent updates in real-time: I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, IX. My review is spoiler-free, but my updates are not, so read with caution if you’re not familiar. Trigger warnings: In a book with a thousand pages? Everything, probably, but for sure death, parent/child death, suicide/suicidal thoughts, severe illness, guns, abduction, poisoning, slavery, mental illness, sexism, ableism, grief, depression.

About: When forces conspire to have sailor Edmond Dantès arrested for a crime he didn't commit, he spends years in a hellish prison, fighting to stay sane. Through bravery and good fortune, he manages to escape, and he assumes a new identity for himself: The Count of Monte Cristo. Under this guise, he inserts himself into the lives of the French nobility, vowing revenge on those who wronged him.

Thoughts: Like most thousand page novels, there's no reason this novel needs to be a thousand pages, but the one thing I can say about them, collectively, is that I come away feeling like I have a relationship with them that I usually don't get from a shorter book unless I've read it multiple times. And it makes sense: I've been reading this book for a year. I've had relationships with actual humans that were much shorter than that. Dumas's prose (helped along by Buss's translation) is accessible and not overly dry, if not quite as humorous as Victor Hugo’s. Thanks to both of them, I now have a rudimentary understanding of the French Revolution and the difference between a Royalist and Bonapartist (because truly the only way to make me read about history is to put it in a novel).

Dumas proves himself more capable of staying on topic though, with one or two exceptions. The only margin note I cared to write was, apparently, "Horrible digression", and I stand by that. As soon as the novel leaves Dantès’s perspective, it gets less interesting, beginning with Franz encountering Sinbad the Sailor on Monte Cristo and continuing with the Very Weird and Terrible Side Anecdotes about bandits in Rome. Otherwise, much of the storyline is more or less linear, without the intricacies of Waterloo or the Paris sewer system. It grows more chaotic as the book goes on though, with frequent digressions into every character's backstory.

The plot takes such a drastic turn that it's almost like reading two different novels with two different main characters. At the beginning, it’s most like an adventure story. There are sailors, prison breaks, and buried treasure. Yet, for all those things, it’s surprisingly un-suspenseful. Dumas has a very stolid way of story-telling. The pace is almost supernaturally consistent, so that even things that probably should have tension in them are presented as a matter of course. (Or maybe I’m just hugely desensitized by media.) I wasn’t as excited as I thought I should be during some of the more compelling parts, but there’s something reassuring about Dumas’s relentlessly straightforward story-telling.

The middle takes a major dip in interest. Cue a lot of long and tedious backstories, plus Monte Cristo's elaborate set-ups to take down his enemies. It basically devolves into a soap opera of the various dramas of Paris’s rich and powerful families. Monte Cristo barely needs to lift a finger to destroy these people, since with a few mostly harmless suggestions, it looks like they're all going to self-destruct at any moment without outside help. The ending never really recovers from the action of the beginning, thanks in large part to the characters. There are more than it's worth keeping track of, including a lot of side characters, family members, and name changes. A detailed, spoiler-free flow chart of how everyone is connected to everyone else would have been helpful. (But be careful about Googling those because spoilers.)

Edmond Dantès is an easy hero to pull for, since he’s honest, good, and capable, and he has a kind of earnest faith that things will work out that’s endearing. He goes through a fair amount of character development in prison, and his father/son relationship with Faria is especially moving. On the other hand, it's difficult to like his alternate persona, The Count of Monte Cristo. Dumas goes a bit overboard in making him filthy rich and knowledgeable about literally every subject, and no matter how generous he is to his slaves, they're still slaves. Whether he’s playing the part of a pompous ass or is actually a pompous ass is sort of irrelevant by the end. There are a couple of flailing attempts at character development in the last sections where he wonders whether he had the right to do everything he did, but it's too little/too late to make much of an impact.

The story wouldn't work without some Shakespeare-level villains. Danglars is Iago whispering in Othello’s ear, and Villefort is even more insidious because his upstanding citizen act is so convincing. Caderousse is just a coward, and it’s interesting to see how jealousy, ambition, and fear all play an integral part in condemning an innocent man. Mercédès is a bland love interest; Valentine and Morrel are basically the Cosette and Marius of the novel, but at least there are some decent people on the page to pull for. Much as I dislike all the descriptors of Eugenie as “masculine” (because she must be less of a woman if she has a mind of her own), she's a powerhouse, and I was living for her lesbian relationship with her piano instructor.

It's clear Dumas has no idea when to end a story, since every time I thought we'd wrapped up a plot with a certain character, they'd resurface a few chapters later to spin it out a little further. Though everything (and I do mean everything) moves much more slowly than necessary, I was satisfied with the way it all played out. It's hard to come back from a main character I can barely stand though, and I happen to not like novels where nearly every character is terrible. While I found Les Mis surprisingly relevant on its social commentary, I’m struggling to see why Monte Cristo has stuck around. Only the first parts could reliably be called an "adventure novel," and the rest is purely middle of the road.

#book review #the count of monte cristo #alexandre dumas #monte cristo readalong #classics #3/5 #rating: 3/5

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chimerri · 6 years ago

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In your Monte Cristo AU: I wonder what kind of rumors/gossip LBH comes back to. Like does the public think SQQ is out to romance NYY even though he's not? Did people notice SQQ worrying about/for LBH while he was imprisoned and have their own ideas why? What does the rest of the conspiracy think of SQQ and their interpretations for his behavior?

Ooh good questions. LBH had people on the inside (cough, Shang Qinghua) do some snooping a year or two before he made his superfluous appearance as the count. The news that goes back to him from Shang Qinghua -> MoBei Jun are that:

1. The Huan Hua manor and Wens have greatly profited from using LBH as a scapegoat.2. SQQ, with his acquisition of the merchant ship, has successfully expanded his business and may be collaborating with the huan hua manor in business affairs.3. NYY is now possibly SQQ’s fiance

The thing is, only point 1 (and a bit of point 2) is correct. Shang Qinghua, being the author of the original Proud Immortal Demon Way Monte Cristo AU, assumes that after seeing SQQ and NYY close to one another that they’ve gotten to the courting stage.

SQQ and NYY are close. But for SQQ’s part, it’s mainly to keep other potential suitors away from LBH’s wrath, and also because he’s grown fond of NYY and wants to help her some gain some autonomy! (After all, she is a woman in this 19th century world and SQQ is a millennial!! Womens rights!!!) So the public definitely things that SQQ might have eyes for her, but for SQQ’s part, he just thinks he’s doing the BingYing ship a favor.

As for the business, SQQ has definitely made good investments what was meant to be LBH’s ship. Enough so that he’s started investing in more ships. SQQ’s business dealings are bound to cross paths with huan hua, so he sees those as meant to be throwaway cannon fodder for LBH’s schemes. He definitely keeps himself at a distance from them. Again, faulty assumptions from airplane bro.

SQQ definitely sulked a lot after LBH was falsely imprisoned. NYY and MF did their best to cheer him up, and even YQY and LQG from neighboring manors were worried. SQQ seems especially off when he received news about LBH’s “death” (Which SQQ knows will be the day LBH escapes and starts planning his revenge).

For the most part, everyone knew that SQQ and LBH were close. And LBH’s death must have been devastating to SQQ! He seems super antsy!! But they don’t think too much about aside from a man mourning the loss of a friend. Unlike the original SQQ who conspired with Huan Hua and the Wens to frame LBH, SQQ’s relationship with them is pretty neutral/business oriented?

(I’m vaguely thinking SQQ was meant to send a letter from Wen Ning to WWX, but decided not to. LBH, being the big loyal sap he is did it for, SQQ and returned with a letter from WWX… but that letter was intercepted and caused LBH to be blamed for conspiring with WWX. So now I guess the Wens just kinda assume SQQ is on their side/neutral bc he let LBH get arrested???)

When LBH returns, under the guise of a Count, that’s when people start dropping assumptions about his relationship with SQQ. NYY definitely thinks there’s something going on between them when SQQ speaks nothing but praise about the Count (Because he’s trying to get the s.s.bingying sailing!!!)

#sv monte cristo au #oh gosh this response was a lot longer than i anticipated

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xanthicantag · 5 years ago

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alright bro im gonna do all the ask so. U Know You're Doin Em Too

Hot read more since there’s so maaaaaany

1. if you were to have Hanahaki disease, what flowers would you cough up?

I feel like this is entirely based on who i’m feeling the one sided love for? (I googled Hanahaki disease and i’m all about that shit no doubt there) But like, maybe daffodils?

2. if someone were to catch Hanahaki disease for you, what flowers would they cough up?

Uh Roses motherfucker, you’re welcome

3. if you were any historic trope, what would you be? (i.e., the knight, the town baker, the witch of the forest, etd.)

Ok so like on the one hand I love lances, so fucking much, so I’m like big into Knights for that and like protecting people (and/or a beautiful prince cause like, you know), but I also really love the idea of just being like, a traveling fighter of some kind, leading a troupe of loveable idiots or being in a troupe as a loveable idiot. I want to be Iron Bull is what I’m trying to say I guess????? or like, Krem? who knows

4. tell us about your ideal battle outfit.

Ok so I’m torn again. Cause protection and ease of movement are super important, so like a breastplate and some kind of back protection, maybe a shield? or maybe a sick gauntlet arm like Ike from Fire Emblem cause he knows what’s up, and then some minor leg armor to keep the front of my thighs and calves safe and like a shield since those fuck am I right?? On the other hand: If you look like a Thot, the enemy is distracted and an easy target. I’m talking chainmail crop top, plate armor booty shorts, stupid looking heel shoes(?) for maximum thot energy, and of course a whip, either that i use or just have for the thot energy.

5. what would you be a god/goddess of and what would people sacrifice to you?

I think like, a minor deity that helps people make small to mediumish choices (i.e. talk the left or right path, call or don’t call this person), and then like, a cute little charm that people just kinda crush or burn before asking about the choice feels good, feels organic.

6. name five iconic quotes that make you feel things.

Now, I don’t know a lot of quote to be honest, but here’s some paraphrased stuff:

“Now that larping exists dnd is like, not the least cool thing to do”- Travis McElroy

“Yeah I have a pickle allergy, what about it *Pickle eating sounds*” -Me, often

“I fucked your dad” -Me during a quiplash game? And often yeah I’ll admit this

I don’t remember what’s said, but the scene in the Count of Monte Cristo where he just shows off all his sick skills to be like “Yeah I’ll murder the fuck out of your homeboy if he tries to step up to me”.

“All Magicians are inherently inclined to kill” -That unraveled about Megaman robots who get sentience

7. scythe, battle axe, broad sword, spear or trident?

Ok so like, Scythe for formal occasions/when I want to just look good cause I think their a sexy as hell weapon, at me if you want to be I know I’m right. Battle Axes are cool and like, really useful during a siege since you can easily bust stuff down with it and it lets you cut spears in half so you look dope as hell, like, Hector of Ostia if you’re out there, yes you’re correct. Broad Swords are like, just in general really good, you can use it in a duel, a battle, a coronation, magic rituals if you’re really feeling fancy, the list is just endless, a real classic all purpose weapon. Spears are for fucking losers, fuck you if you use a spear sword fight me like a fucking real fighter or get out of here none of this reach bullshit. Tridents are like spears but just, inherently sexier? You know? Like 1 point is stupid and boring, but 3? that’s some good shit. But really fuck all these weapons whips are lances are where it’s at yes feel free to at me again.

8. what combination of natural scents would you use as perfume?

Now this i have like, actually no idea for, but like, just tons of flowers. I just take like a fistful of flowers and rub them on my face.

9. ancient scrolls or leather-bound books?

Oh you know I’m about that leather-bound book life! Fuck A scroll, that is just a piece of paper that is going to tear and be illegible in like 5 years. A nice bound book though? *Chefs kiss*

10. describe yourself as if you were a storm.

A summer rain. It comes in quickly and is gone by the turn of the hour. A brief respite during the dry season, and gone before it can become a disaster.

11. what type of flower (other than a rose) would you offer someone you were trying to court?

First of all op, get the fuck off my back Roses or nothing. Secondly a big sunflower.

12. honey in milk or cinnamon in tea?

Um, neither??????????????????

13. cabin in the woods, apartment in the city or mansion in the suburbs?

Honestly an apartment in the city would be nice but like, living in the woods is the prime chance to be a local mystery.

14. curtains of beads or lace?

Probably lace? Do beads block light?

15. vocal or instrumental music?

I am a big fan of instrumental

16. describe your ideal fantasy outfit

Step one, big cape, it doesn’t touch the ground while on my shoulders but goes about mid calf. Step two, leather armor, it’s light and easy to move in, and provides good protection. Step three, Mask, nothing like flashy, just a plain black mask, preferably a full mask if i’ve got some magic to see with not my eyes, other wise like a typical masquerade mask

17. of all the fantasy races to ever exist, which one would you be?

Fuck. This is so hard. I want to be, so many. No you know what, fuck it. I wanna be a Dragonborn Tiefling hybrid, I’m talking cool horns, I’m talking sweet tail, you already know I can spit literal fire out of my face. Fucking try and get at me I dare you.

18. hard candy, fruit preserves or spice cake?

I love hard candy to just suck on, but my teeth do not.

19. show us an a picture of your ideal crown.

if you don’t think this crown fucks, get out of my face

20. tying your hair up using ribbon, yay or nay?

I’ve had my hair long enough for that like once, and I don’t really like tying my hair up tbh

21. an evening in the forest with elves, a night in the caves with vampires or a morning in the garden with fae?

Um. Bold of you to say I’m not hitting up all these parties??? Like def vampires first since the elven party is advertised to go for like 5 hours, but we all know it goes on for like 4 months and I can’t party that long as a mortal you know. And like you hit the fae up last since you literally are gonna be stuck there the rest of your life after one (1) round of truth or dare

22. tell us, in detail, about a curse a witch would put on you.

Like, in all honesty the biggest thing a witch could do to me via curse would just be to make my right arm like full unusable. Not gone or broken. Just like, it’s slow, I can’t always get it to fully hold onto something so it drops everything, there’s always a small feeling of discomfort, not pain just a minor annoyance, in the knuckles of the hand.

23. talking with sylphs or singing with nymphs?

I get kicked out of the nymph singing area after four seconds of

24. mint, rosemary, basil or sage?

I fucking go wild for the smell of basil don’t even try me

25. favorite childhood story? (doesn’t have to be a fairy tale)

I remembered Inkheart recently and like, I honestly really liked that book

26. tell us about an experience you’ve had that seemed unreal or supernatural. (doesn’t have to be scary)

Sophomore year of college, I realized that all the people around me were people I actually enjoyed spending time with, and it just felt so weird to be there after all the just nonsense that had happened up till then

27. would you rather have poison or healing ointment in your traveling pack?

healing duh? You think I’d ever remember i have the poison one? nope not me!

28. tell us three sayings that you live by.

Try and be a little nicer, unless they really don’t deserve it. Walk away sometimes. Eat food and don’t think about it.

29. vials or mason jars?

Oh get me those vials baby!

30. describe your ideal masquerade ball outfit (mask included).

OH HELL YES. Get me that suit, it’s a sweet dark red with rose colored vest underneath, the jacket and pants have flower vines on them that 100% connect to a big ass rose on the back of the jacket. The mask is more or less this guy:

31. splashing around in a river with mermaids or flying through the sky with harpies?

I can literally swim any day so let’s fly

32. what would you end up in the dungeon for?

Ok i didn’t understand this one at first so I’m keeping my initial reply below and the real one is: You know I beat some like high ranking knight or minor noble in a duel to humiliate them and no i didn’t think it through so here i am lol.

3 things: A talking magic weapon (Probably a sword but i’m down for other options). A certain someone is going in and I’m not letting him go in without someone to keep him safe. There’s dragon eggs that work like the Eragon dragon eggs and I am already waist deep in dead enemies getting one of those babies.

33. if you were a fairy, what color would your wings be?

Take a wild fucking guess

34. if you could have any magical item, what would it be?

God this is so hard, but I think a magic flower that when you pluck one if its petals you can undo a recent event, up to like ten minutes or so.

35. what song would the bards sing about you when you passed by?

I’ll say the Death of Me by Meg Myers

36. would you rather be a pirate or a king/queen?

God that’s hard, Like yeah pirates are cool but i’d love to be royalty and just get to do good shit for the people and also not have scurvy.

37. would you spend more time in the field of flowers, the tavern, the docks or the marketplace?

Hmmm, I think the Tavern as like the number 1, and then a tie for docks and field, and the marketplace in last since i hate crowded areas i need to buy things in

38. would you have a painting of yourself?

Only if I ever ride a dragon and then have a painting to immortalize the moment, and only if the dragon helps me paint it

39. what skill are you famous for?

I mean, people know I sword fight, fight fight, and program, so like, those? and I guess my sick dnd skills

40. if you could live any fairy tale, which one would you?

Fuck if I can think of one!

41. stained glass windows or fairy lights?

Ok Stained glass windows literally slap so like, you already know

#romanarcadia

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