#and I joined a farm party for the fight so I have more totems now

[impossible-rat-babies]

ough finally got my bluefeather book today !

[findingjoynweirdstuff]

Dream SMP Recap (April 27/2021) - Facing Fears

Ponk confronts Foolish at the Community House and plans to build a supreme fridge to make things up with him after the Banquet.

Tommy, preparing for the prison break, decides he needs to face his fears before he does so.

---

VOD LINKS:

Ponk

Foolish

Tommyinnit

Tubbo

Ranboo

Captain Puffy

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- Ponk starts off in the cobblestone pyramid base.

- Ponk looks at the photos on his walls and puts on his shoes.

“Chat...today, we make the supreme fridge. We lost a friend -- it should’ve been Eret, okay? In all honest, it should’ve been Eret...it’s sad. It’s all so sad to think a friend of mine -- another friend! -- betrayed me like this, you know?”

“I guess...Purpled won’t be needing our supplies anymore.”

- Chat thinks Ponk doing a deep voice sounds like Sam. 

- Ponk wants to make it up to Foolish, and what better to do than make him a supreme fridge? He still has the cake Foolish gave him at the Banquet. He had no idea. 

- He starts mining down the Netherite blocks. Purpled won’t be needing these anymore.

- Ponk then goes over to Niki’s city to retrieve supplies.

- Badboyhalo is like that one friend who’s way too into a pyramid scheme and tried to get everyone else involved.

- When a dono points out that Ponk still got involved in the scheme, Ponk replies: 

“I mean...look. The pyramid scheme gave me structure to my life, alright? What kind of structure did I have before then? Huh? Think about it. What was I doing? Who was I sharing my thoughts with, chat? Exactly. So anything with structure was probably better than that, you know?”

“‘I had Sam?’ I had Sam. Chat. What did Sam do to me?”

- Ponk makes it to the ocean monument farm.

- Sam joins the game.

Ponk: hello...

Sam: You’re cute :)

Sam: Later <3

- He leaves. Purpled joins the game.

Ponk: So

Ponk: LOOK WHO IS HERE

Purpled: hi ponk

Ponk: DONT HI PONK ME

Purpled: ok

Purpled: bye ponk

- Purpled leaves. Ponk realizes he missed out on his chance to play Bedwars with him.

- Ponk gets a message back and goes to play Bedwars.

- Foolish notices the renovations and new obsidian layer on L’Sandburg. It doesn’t actually look too bad, and he decides he might keep it.

- After Bedwars, Ponk returns to the cobblestone pyramid to get things. He takes a closer look at the photos again. Sam is crossed out with red in one.

- Ponk waits at the Community House for Foolish. He has a photo of him and Foolish and a cake.

- Foolish asks what happened at the Banquet. Ponk boats over to him, but Foolish notices his eyes are still red.

- Ponk tells him that he never knew Foolish was going to get hurt. He was just the coat man.

Ponk: “Look at me! Does this look like someone like the guest of honor? No, alright? To have to serve people that have betrayed me, Foolish! How do you think that hurt? And then to see you! Taken up there by my friends, alright! I don’t know.”

- He tells Foolish that they’ve had good times together, that he saved the cake Foolish gave him. He gives Foolish the cake. When Foolish worries it might be poisoned, he says they can eat it together.

- Bad said he’d found armor in a chest and gave it to Ponk. Ponk didn’t know he was going to need it.

- Foolish asks how he knows this isn’t some sort of trap. Ponk tells him that he wants to make it up to Foolish.

Ponk: “Obviously, you can’t trust me and I know that, right. But I wanna make it up to you. Okay? Trust is something I hold very dear to me, and for me to break it, alright...be it from a third party’s perspective, okay? I didn’t have much to do with this Banquet, Foolish, you have to understand me.”

Foolish: “You’re telling me the Egg isn’t in control of you right now, is what you’re saying?”

Ponk: “The Egg helps me, Foolish. It gives me structure, okay?”

Foolish: “Do you still believe the Egg is some kind of good thing? Do you believe it’s actually something you should have in your like?”

- Ponk tells him to walk with him. Foolish points out he led the attack on his temple, all for the Egg.

Foolish: “You did it for the Egg! Thinking you would like, impress it or something, like it would give you more! What’s the real problem, Ponk? You haven’t explained. What’s the real problem? Your hand, like what’s with your hand -- what’s with the Egg in the first place--”

- Ponk tells him they don’t talk about the hand. That’s something he has to deal with. But he’s truly sorry, and he’s going to build Foolish a supreme fridge.

- Foolish is still concerned about the eyes. Ponk says the eyes mean nothing. Foolish doesn’t know how much Ponk has lost, who he’s lost. 

- Foolish snaps, saying he died. Does Ponk know how scary a thing that is?  Ponk replies that he does know, but Foolish is taking it out of proportion.

Ponk: “A quick death, or a slow, painful one, Foolish? Come on, man.”

- Ponk will still lay the foundations for the fridge. Even if Foolish chases him off, he will come back, day after day, to build the fridge and prove that he’s a good person.

- The Egg provides free Starbucks, and that is worth it.

- Foolish says he can’t trust Ponk until the red eyes and everything in his system are gone. Ponk says it will all be explained in time.

- Foolish has had enough and leaves. He heads back to the summer home. Ponk got him thinking about death again. He makes it back to the green light to calm down.

- Foolish then goes to continue building, to finish the mansion.

- Tommy wasn’t there for the Banquet. The Blood Vines are gone from the path now, and he is not afraid of the Egg. He wonders where it went.

- He has something to do today. He heads over to Snowchester to meet with Tubbo. Tubbo and Ranboo come over to the mansion.

- Tommy pulls Tubbo aside to speak with him alone. He asks Tubbo about how, after the Disc War Finale, he gave Tubbo the Nightmare armor set. He wants it back.

- He asks for Tubbo’s help with some things, but doesn’t want Ranboo there.

- Tubbo takes Tommy into the Snowchester vault. Tommy says he’ll give the rest back, but he wants to keep the Totem of Undying. Tommy puts on Dream’s armor.

- Next, Tommy and Tubbo go over to Pogtopia to retrieve Tommy’s sword. They open Sam’s vault door and Tommy gathers his things.

- Tommy and Tubbo go mine some obsidian in Pogtopia. He needs obsidian and blackstone.

- He gets home and cleans up the blood on the Prime Path. Ranboo arrives and gives him more stacks of obsidian.

- He explains to Tubbo and Ranboo that in a few days’ time, things are going to change, and he’s not strong enough yet. He wants to face the things he’s scared of.

- Tommy mines below the watchtower. He wants to create two bunkers. One that replicates the Final Control Room, and one that replicates the prison.

- Tommy asks if either of them have been to the prison. Ranboo says no, Sam doesn’t let him in. Tubbo says Sam didn’t let him in either.

- He tells Ranboo and Tubbo that he’s afraid of taking damage.

- Tommy’s heard rumors about the Panic Room and asks Ranboo what it was. Ranboo says it was just a room he went to when he got stressed, kind of like what Tommy’s making but the opposite.

- After they finish the bunkers, Tommy leads them all to Logstedshire. Tommy walks around, looking at everything there and remembering what happened.

- Next, Tommy goes to visit the exact recreations of the rooms in the museum. He meets Eret on the Prime Path.

- He asks Ranboo and Tubbo to lock him in for a minute and walks into the Final Control Room, talking through his feelings, pressing the button like he did when it happened.

- Tommy starts looking through the chests and finds the book that Eret left for Wilbur named “I’m Sorry.”

Tommy: “It’s okay...it’s okay because times have changed, and so have people. Not all people...but most.”

- They leave the museum and Tommy asks Tubbo to stab him with a sword.

- Tommy then goes into the recreation they made of the prison cell. He starts panicking and asks to be let out. Tubbo and Ranboo let him out. He tells them that in the next few days, it’s all going to change. He’s going to try and do what he should’ve done a long time ago.

- Tommy gives Ranboo a hug and thanks him for helping. He asks Ranboo to leave, then tells Tubbo to come up the watchtower with him.

- There, he tells Tubbo about dying and coming back. He and Tubbo had the chance to kill Dream and they didn’t, but now, Tommy’s going to break into the prison and do it.

- He needs from Tubbo a couple of things, and Tubbo can’t tell anyone -- even Ranboo -- about this. He needs Tubbo’s help to get him several invisibility potions, defenses stronger than TNT: withers.

- People are going to be upset with him because getting rid of Dream will get rid of the revival book. Tommy says the revive book isn’t worth it to keep him alive. Being in between life and death was worse than just staying dead.

- Most of all, he needs Tubbo to trust him.

Tommy: “This isn’t the right thing to do, Tubbo. It’s the only thing to do.”

- He tells Tubbo he’ll see him soon and leaves.

- Tubbo and Ranboo go off to fight some wither skeletons for skulls.

- Later, Ranboo goes mining with Tubbo in VC.

---

Upcoming events remain the same.

[adifferenttime]

Honest Hearts: A Rough Rewrite

Hey! I’ve been working on an Honest Hearts rewrite-type-thing for a bit and figured I’d solicit feedback/assemble a post to store some of these ideas.

A detailed explanation of the premise is under the cut, but I’ve made this as a more interesting reintroduction to major locations, along with the characters who live there. I also have some lore consisting of letters, scripture, and holotapes that’s still in the early stages, along with a complete companion wheel for Salt-Upon-Wounds (he’ll follow you around for a little if you decide to help him out). Endings are now finished as well. I’m not planning on expanding this into a full mod, but I’m assembling everything in Twine so I can utilize branching dialogue and mimic skill checks.

I want to keep adding to and editing this because I’m having fun with it, so if you have any input, let me know!

Essentially, the story proceeds as written up until the point where Daniel sends you to either kill the White Legs or destroy their war totems. You quickly realize that their camp is deserted, at which point Salt-Upon-Wounds ambushes you, convo-locks you, and tells you that there’s an entirely different side to things here that you might not have considered.

Factions

The Mormons have established a theocracy in the Utah called Deseret, with New Jerusalem - what was once Salt Lake City - as its capital. Large numbers of them survived the initial apocalypse due to their pre-War focus on strong community ties and disaster prepping; over time, they have returned to the model of self-sufficient agrarianism that characterized the historical Mormon state of Deseret that existed in Utah in the 1800s. Their President, who wields supreme executive power, is also their Prophet. The Mormons believe he communes directly with God, but there’s some discontent in New Jerusalem over his hands-off approach to foreign policy and unwillingness to assemble a standing army. The Elders of the Priesthood are pushing him to allow for some kind of formal military to oppose what they see as revived versions of their ancestral enemies: America, Rome, and the “Lamanites” (this is what Mormons call Indigenous Americans; the “Lamanite” idea has historically been used as a justification for racism, and I’m reflecting that here because it’d be kind of heinous not to). In more than a few respects, Deseret serves as a mirror to the Legion and an exploration of the other side of the coin re: the tactics utilized by colonial empires to present themselves as legitimate while still claiming territory and steamrolling the opposition.

The White Legs are now more explicitly Shoshone, and I’m relying most heavily on the Timpanagos Band for names and historical inspiration (apparently the question of whether they’re Ute or Shoshone is pretty controversial, but I’m sticking with what the Timpanagos have said about it until someone corrects me). After migrating south in the wake of the Great War, the White Legs eventually settled in Ogden, about a day north of New Jerusalem. Initial interactions with the Mormons were friendly, but as New Jerusalem grew and its need for farmland and resources increased, tensions rose before culminating in open violence in around ‘76 or ‘77. Deseret’s party line is that the White Legs conducted a “raid” on one of their settlements and had to be driven away from Ogden; the White Legs claim the violence was not a raid, but a revenge killing after a Mormon killed a young man and was found not guilty by Mormon legal authorities (this is a theocracy, so “legal authorities” here can be understood as indistinct from “the church”). The Mormons established a new settlement on the ruins of Ogden, which they called New Canaan, and the White Legs fled to Salt Lake, where they have been dwindling in number ever since. Salt-Upon-Wounds’ plan to seek entry to the Legion is a last-ditch attempt to save his people from eradication when their neighbors and the land itself seems intent on killing them (not that that makes all the war crimes ok, which is a sentiment you’ll be able to express to his face if you engage him in conversation).

The Dead Horses are a pastoral society from out of Dead Horse Point, and are split almost down the middle along political lines. The more conservative, religious side opposes intervention in Zion. Graham desecrates the corpses of his enemies as an intimidation tactic, and because the Dead Horses’ religion is so eschatological and heavily focused on properly cleaning, preparing, and interring the dead, a big chunk of the religious leadership opposes him on that basis - they think his tactics are ungodly. They’re also worried that any Dead Horses who die in Zion and are interred there will be severed from their connection to Dead Horse Point and doomed to a separate, lonely afterlife. The younger, more progressive elements of the tribe are less traditionalist, sometimes less religious, and overall not as concerned about Graham’s treatment of the dead because of the potential benefit they might be able to derive from him. Follows-Chalk is their de facto leader, and while the Dead Horses don’t formally allocate political power, he’s among the most influential people in the informal tribal leadership. Most of the Dead Horses who’ve come to Zion have done so either because they support Follows-Chalk politically, or for practical reasons - namely, Graham’s access to a dizzying number of guns and his willingness to give them to anyone who’ll fight for him.

The Sorrows are now a terrace-farming agrarian society instead of hunter-gatherers (Zion has a lot of agricultural potential, and there’s already a few farming plots in the Sorrows camp you see in-game, so it’s not a huge departure from the canon). I’m keeping their Mexican heritage, but I’d like to give them some Ainu influences as well - partially for selfish reasons, but also because bears are extremely important to our culture and theology, which gels well with the elements of Sorrows culture and religion that appear in the canon. I’d like to keep the Survivalist because I like him, but I want to expand on their faith. One of the ways I’m doing that is by deciding they can still read English, even though they no longer speak it; it’s basically their equivalent of liturgical Latin. They’re also rigidly matriarchal and in contrast to the Dead Horses (who eschew formal political hierarchies) or the White Legs (who elect a chief who serves until he dies, is deposed, or voluntarily abdicates), leadership positions are allocated through matrilineal primogeniture; Waking Cloud inherited her position from her mother. Religious leadership, likewise, is only available to women. You’ll be able to talk to Waking Cloud about some of the ways this framework is incompatible with the Mormon perspective, and can appeal to her desire to retain power.

Characters

Canon Characters

Joshua Graham and Daniel are largely unaltered except through the addition of lore that gives insight into their cultures, motives, and pasts.

All three tribal leaders (Follows-Chalk, Waking Cloud, and Salt-Upon-Wounds) are either given new backstories, a different set of motives, or different approaches to one another/Graham and Daniel. They’re also explicitly leaders now - what power Graham and Daniel have, they derive from whichever tribal leader they’ve managed to attach themselves to. Of those three, I’m altering Waking Cloud the least and Salt-Upon-Wounds the most. Like I mentioned, I have a companion wheel for him so far and the bones of two other conversations - one, where you meet him for the first time, and the second, where you speak to him before the final battle. Will link as I finish them.

Original Characters

Each tribal leader now has a rival or right hand within their tribe so I can reflect the different ways the values of a specific community can express themselves.

Follows-Chalk’s primary rival among the Dead Horses is a man who refuses to tell you his name. That’s because using someone’s name in casual conversation is considered unspeakably rude, and the fact that Follows-Chalk is willing to share his own with you is, to Mysteriously Named Old Man Character, yet another sign of how disrespectful and laissez-faire Follows-Chalk is about their shared traditions. Old Man Character is suspicious of you initially, but if you speak to him more he starts to warm to you. The goal is to give you a sense that this he’s pretty xenophobic but for good reasons, and despite his political conflicts with Follows-Chalk, has a lot of love for him. He just wants what’s best for his family, and Follows-Chalk is part of that, even if Mysteriously Named Old Man Character thinks he’s making the wrong choices.

Kiiki is Salt-Upon-Wounds’ right-hand woman and intended as a contrast re: the approach to war and its costs. Salt-Upon-Wounds has done some horrible things and gets a fair bit of dialogue about that, but Kiiki is willing to go even further than he has with very little prompting. Her chief copes with what he’s done by trying to assure himself that the ends of war are worth the cost; Kiiki deals with it by trying to convince herself that the means weren't so bad, actually, and that anyone who isn’t nailing corpses to walls is being naive. All of that makes her sound pretty shitty, but she’s nowhere near as devoted to the idea of a Legion alliance as Salt-Upon-Wounds is. It only takes one very low Speech check to convince her that going Legion is a bad move, and one of the paths involves assassinating Salt-Upon-Wounds and installing her as the new leader as a way to stop the White Legs from joining Caesar. I haven’t added this path to the ending Twine because I’d like to finish Kiiki’s dialogues before I do that.

I’m replacing White Bird as the Sorrow’s spiritual leader with a woman named Imekanu. She’s incredibly old, savvy, and knowledgeable - she’s never been outside Zion, but has a store of books in English, Spanish, and Japanese that have allowed her some insight into what caused the war, if not the current state of the world. She’s also aware of the Survivalist’s origins - not because she’s entered any of his hideouts, but because she’s read over the scriptures and has correctly identified them as letters. Her perspective is that the Father in the Caves was a human being, but that doesn’t diminish his religious value. She sees him as analogous to the Buddha or a Catholic saint: human, sure, but still with access to some deeper truths about the purpose of man and the nature of human goodness. You’ll discover that this idea (that the Survivalist was a holy man rather than a literal god) is the most common perspective among the Sorrows, and you can talk to her about how this departs from Daniel’s perspective that the archetypal Father is divine, not human.

Quests

Each tribe has a specific quest that will either lower or bypass some of the penultimate checks that will determine your ending (people are more likely to believe what you’re telling them if you’ve already won their trust).

The Dead Horses: Joshua Graham has been putting the heads of the fallen up on pikes across Zion. The Dead Horses’ religion is deeply concerned with proper treatment of the deceased, and Graham’s decision to desecrate the corpses of his enemies goes against virtually everything they believe. The old man who won’t tell you his name asks you to take the heads off of the pikes and bury them deep in Zion, and to bring Follows-Chalk with you so you’ll have someone to tell you how to treat them properly. Over the course of the quest, Follows-Chalk will share some of his own beliefs about death, and you’ll have the opportunity to share your own. If you complete this quest without sabotaging it, Follows-Chalk will be willing to betray Graham to the White Legs before the final battle.

The Sorrows: This is basically just Ghost of She, but after defeating the Yao Guai you’ll discover a holotape revealing that the girl wasn’t killed by the bear, but by one of the murderers from Vault 22. Waking Cloud will speculate that maybe the Yao Guai wasn’t the ghost of the little girl at all but some other force that wanted to push you to discover the truth. If you wait until the end to tell Waking Cloud about the death of her husband, you’ll have to pass a Speech check of 75 to convince her you’re telling her the truth; completing this quest drops the check to 50.

The White Legs: Salt-Upon-Wounds will ask you to help him sabotage the Mormons’ preparations for the battle. If you help him with this, it’ll drop the Speech check for you to convince him to leave from 100 to 80. It’s not necessary at all to get the tribal confederacy ending, but a new note will appear in your inventory if you finish it and meet a couple other requirements (asking him certain questions, not attempting that one Speech check about religion, etc).

Endings

I’m trying to incorporate as much variety as possible, but there are three main ending paths: siding with the White Legs, siding with the other two tribes, and peace. The basic idea is that the outcome is predicated less on your direct intervention, and more on how other people act based on the facts they have available to them. Most of your influence is through your choices to hide or reveal key pieces of information, and the skill checks you need to access certain endings are less you convincing a character to do something and more convincing a character to believe you’re telling them the truth. There’s one major exception to this, it requires maxed Speech, and the ending it gives you is markedly bittersweet because you’re trying to get a guy to act against his own best interest. I’m writing all the endings up here, and will probably edit them as things change. The post where I explain them in more depth can be found here.

And that’s the story so far! Thank you for reading, and again: if there’s anything here you think is poorly-conceived, let me know. Thank you to @baelpenrose, who’s a grad student in the history of the American West, for helping me workshop a lot of this stuff. If you’ve got expert knowledge on any of the concepts I touch on or are personally a member of any of the groups I’m describing, please feel free to hmu: anon is on, and you’re always welcome to DM me. I’m just doing this for fun, but I still want it to be as not-shit as possible.

[thinkingagain]

“My aunt’s farm had some animals, some of whom lived a long time. The first real friend I remember was a cow.”

Sir Sleepy of the Bunny Nest (A Novel of the Revolution) Book Two: Empire Chapter 5

A few days after thwarting the wolf assault, Sir Sleepy of the Bunny Nest walked with the Madam outside the translucent Demesne walls. The morning was sunny and cool. They strolled through woods and fields, taking in the sights and sounds and smells of the hills.

To the Sir, the Madam exuded radiance. The air around her responded with a gauzy shimmer to the changing tones of her skin color which were the outwards signs of her magic and which she could control when needed. Today she had no such need.

The Sir always found her clothing well-suited for every occasion. This morning only emphasized his feeling: the shade of her blue dress created a thrillingly moody counterpoint to the fading leaves of late fall. “Ah, Madam,” the Sir used his most graceful tones, “it is a pleasure to have you join me, this fine day. I find your conversation ennobling and refined.”

“It’s nice to have some free time, isn’t it?” The Madam smiled. “The Demesne keeps us very busy.”

“It does,” the Sir agreed. “There is little time to rest when one has a crucial cause to work for. Yet at moments like this, I can imagine living differently. Perhaps one day, you and I shall take a trip and see many far-flung locales of this world—a world that is still beautiful, despite Beastly excess.” He looked up at her shyly, wrinkling his bunny nose.

“That would be wonderful, Sir.” The Madam’s eyes turned down. “But you would never be happy away too long from the business of the Demesne.”

Even on this casual stroll, the Sir’s sword was ready at his side. There was no great danger in the regular world immediately surrounding the Demesne. Yet life there, as anywhere, required a rabbit to remain on guard.

The Sir looked dapper among the tall grass on the edge of the trail, his gold suit with blue stars shiny in the morning light. Thomas, that silently attentive little grizzly, sat prominently in the folds of his shirt. “Perhaps with you by my side I would be happy far from here, even if only for a time,” the Sir said. “The idea seems dreamlike. You enjoyed your travels with Lucky, I know.

“Please don’t misunderstand. My life on the Demesne is one I asked for but did not know was possible. Now, I find it both more rewarding and challenging than I had imagined. But though I must continue fighting, there is much in me that longs for peace and beauty. I know I cannot have too much peace in a world which Beasts have corrupted. Perhaps it is too simple a longing to ever become real. That doesn’t mean it isn’t genuine.”

“I’m sure there’s a lot of good, Sir, in any dream you might be dreaming.” The Madam smiled at the Sir in a way that thrilled him in his spine. “I did enjoy my time traveling with Lucky. But Sir.” The Madam’s voice trailed away into the heavy stand of trees they were passing, and her mouth narrowed with pain. “I’m different now. I was still running then, still determined not to live in the way that I saw people around me living, not to believe the things they had accepted in order to have to live that way. In the years since, I’ve learned many things and made many mistakes.”

“I know only a few details of your story,” the Sir said, “from things you have mentioned and that Lucky has recounted—and of course from the obvious devotion that you and your totem animals have for each other. I would gladly hear more, if you would be kind enough to tell me.” They were passing a large low rock with a smooth top. “We could sit here, if you like.” He looked around and saw no immediate threat of Beasts, although forgotten scraps of Beast junk could be found all over the hills and fields. He hopped on the rock.

The Madam sat beside him. “It’s not a special story. Everybody struggles.”

“I do not believe,” the Sir bowed, “that any animal could have a more special story, although I find your modesty becoming.”

The Madam laughed and sat on the rock beside him. “You’re pulling out all the charm, I see. Okay, I’ll tell you.”

The Sir nodded a small pleased bunny nod.

“I was orphaned early,” she began.

The Sir startled. “Then you too do not remember your parents?”

The Madam startled too. “Oh, poor Sir. I didn’t know.” She scratched one of his ears, and he snuggled down more firmly on the rock. “No, I remember them, although not well, and I know the stories that others told about them. My father worked in the circus when he was younger, with animals. That’s part of where my love for animals must have come from, although I’m sure you know that life is often unhappy for animals in a circus.”

The Sir didn’t know of circuses. The Madam explained while he listened, not even interjecting with his opinions about Beasts.

“My father found it hard,” she continued. “He was concerned about animals, and he wasn’t happy with how the circus treated them. That maybe had something to do with his leaving the circus, although I’m not sure. By the time I was born, he was working the fair circuit. In the off season he did various odd jobs for people in the little town where he had been born, not too far from here really, maybe thirty miles north and another forty west. Sometimes my mother traveled with him.

“After I was born, they were apart more often. But she had gone with him for a trip, leaving me with my aunt, when they both died in a car crash. Car crashes around here are common, as you know, especially for those who live by traveling. Not that long ago, many roads were more dangerous than they are now. Narrow and poorly lit.”

“I do not approve of Beast roads,” the Sir waved a paw at the air angrily, “and am very sorry to learn what they did to you parents.”

“That’s kind of you.” The Madam smoothed a wrinkle in her dress and looked across the fields. “I lived for a few years with my aunt, my great aunt really. She wasn’t young, and though she was nice to me, in a tough-minded, hill country way, I spent a lot of time by myself. She owned a small farm. There were still people working it even when she was old, laborers who would be there awhile and move on when the seasons changed. I guess I’ve always been surrounded by wanderers.

“My aunt’s farm had some animals, some of whom lived a long time. The first real friend I had there was a cow. I used to take her for walks. She had a bell around her neck, with a deep sound that would clang as we walked. It wasn’t a time or place where people named their farm animals, so I gave her my own secret name: Joan, after Joan of Arc, who I had learned about in school. It was an important name for me, the name of someone who had fought and died for what she believed. I didn’t tell anyone I had named her. They would have laughed at me.

“I loved my aunt, I mean I was grateful enough, but growing up I never felt any huge affinity with people. They seemed oblivious and remote, and when not remote, hot and harsh and cruel. The other thing you have to understand is that I came from a mixed race background. Many people could see it.”

“Mixed race?” The Sir looked at her questioningly.

“My family background was made up of people with different skin colors. My father was dark-skinned, my mother not.”

“Ah.” The Sir nodded. “I am acquainted with this most ludicrous of Beastly ideas, that the skin color of a Beast is relevant to its character.”

“A lot of country people in this part of the world are mixed race,” the Madam said. “Their ancestors came from different parts of the British isles, or Germany or Africa, and in some cases from various Indian tribes like the Shawnee and the Cherokee. Many know little about what specific background they are. Often, people might not notice, or notice a little but not think anything of it. Nothing particularly bad ever happened to me. But now and then, people would say things, and I knew what was behind it.”

“Such Beastly behavior.” The Sir, agitated, shifted on the rock. “Those who do it should be chastised.”

The Madam patted him on a spot just above the nose, running her fingers up to his forehead and scratching him. “I dreamed often of going away, but I had no idea how. I was a hard worker in school, and I went to the library a lot and read. Many afternoons when I was walking with Joan, I brought a book along. There was a spot by a stream where I would sit. Sometimes I would read aloud to her. She seemed to like it.”

“Indeed,” the Sir said. “Why would she not?”

The Madam smiled, agreeing. “I worked hard and was smart, and I got enough tutoring and preparing for the normal world of people that eventually I was able to get a scholarship to Fallons.

“Most girls who went to Fallons were rich, but some were on scholarship like me. The scholarship girls weren’t accepted into the social world of the well-off girls, whose rounds of formal events and parties prepared them to be married to men of similar backgrounds. Still there were enough modern possibilities for girls that we could get preparation to enter the modern world of work.

“In my last two years at Fallons, I worked in offices on the campus to supplement my scholarship. I even stayed on in a full-time job for a year after I graduated and tried to figure out what to do. I didn’t like working in offices, but I wasn’t sure what else to try. Jobs that involved working with animals weren’t easy to come by, although I’d done volunteer work with animals here and there when I had time. So when I got a job with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and moved to Washington, I thought maybe I had found a solution.”

“What is the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service?” The Sir frowned. “It does not sound trustworthy.”

“It’s a government organization that tries to put effective controls on how people can and cannot treat animals.” The Sir scanned her face skeptically. “Yes,” she said. “You’re right. It was often hopeless.”

“I have seen no evidence,” the Sir said, “that Beasts can resist the worst excesses of other Beasts, even if a given Beast does not share that particular excess.” He shifted again on the rock, blushing at the implications of what he had said. “Of course, I understand that you yourself—and some others I suppose, although I have not met them—try hard to treat all animals properly.”

“We do. But sadly, Sir, I’m afraid your doubts are justified.”

“Which is why we animals must take up the cause ourselves, and have.” He looked at the Madam sadly. “Yet there is only so much one can do.” His mind drifted off, sensing a problem he couldn’t quite grasp. Then he came back to the present. “Please proceed with your story.”

 “The problems were those you’ve already mentioned,” the Madam said. “There were many good people in the organization, but just as many were there to further questionable personal desires. All of them were always up against much larger, more powerful groups who fought back against the organization’s goals.

“With a government organization, one of the problems is that whoever leads the government chooses who leads the organization. That means that sometimes, the head of a government organization that supposedly supports animals actually agrees with, and works for, people who don’t support animals. Some people do what they can and have good intentions. Others don’t.” Her face tightened, as if annoyed at the memory.

 “I can imagine how unpleasant that must have been.”

“It would have been enough of a problem,” the Madam shook her head, “even if it was the only problem I had. It was hard to live around so much grasping and scheming. I liked some people, but they weren’t enough to counterbalance the ones I didn’t like.

“I was young. It was hard to accept the existence of others who didn’t think like I did and who did terrible things. It was bad enough that people harmed animals without thinking, but that others harmed them even after thinking... well, I couldn’t stand it. I wanted out.

“I knew there were more radical organizations, ones in which people fought back against those who attacked animals, but those organizations also had problems: the people could be rigid, and the things they did, extreme or not, often didn’t have good outcomes. I didn’t know what to do. It was right around then, in my worst days of doubt, that for the first time I was introduced to the world of Animal Magic and shown that it was real.

“Did Mr. Puffy and The Magic Rabbit visit you too?” The Sir looked at her eagerly.

“Oh Sir,” the Madam cried out, pained, “No.”

The Sir, startled at her reaction, leaned towards her. “I hope I have not upset you?”

The Madam grew quieter again. “You have never upset me. It’s the rest of the world that does. I wish it had been Mr. Puffy. But it was a Beast who introduced me to the world of Animal Magic. And if anyone ever deserved the name of Beast—and believe me, many do—he does.”