#c: horatio

[prydainroyals]

Officers. Best friends. Shit-stirrers. A Short King and a Prince.

[void-botanist]

Last Line Tag

I promised @vacantgodling some last lines and, well, I've been working on the scene where Sorian meets Horatio for the first time. With timeline adjustments, Horatio is 22 in this scene.

“What about your wife?” Sorian pressed his fingertips harder against his thigh. “Well, she found out about it recently. We’re separated at the moment.” “You didn’t tell her?” Horatio’s incredulity seemed so naïve, but maybe Sorian had been too when he made the decision not to tell her, at an age barely older than Horatio was now. “It would have made everyone’s life a living hell for the next nine months. And after that, well…I moved off planet too. I hoped that maybe I could keep that secret and not have to hurt her with it.” “And she went with you, off planet?” “Yeah, no, we were good until very recently, when she found out, and then she kicked me out. I know she was being sarcastic when she told me to go try and meet you—well, my son—but I thought I might as well, since I had the chance.” Horatio looked like he was having trouble swallowing all this. His hand silently slipped into Celia’s, and Sorian was viscerally reminded of himself and his sister. His sister who was going to have a hard time hearing all this too, when he mustered the guts to tell her. “Your wife,” Horatio said. “Is her name Avis?” The bottom dropped out of his stomach. “Yeah. Do you know her?” There was no way. “I know of her. Sid Reid is my best friend, and he’s been talking about her.” “Ah.” Horatio didn’t look at him for an endless moment. Then: “I think I would like the money for that paternity test.”

I'll tag @sam-glade, @sarahlizziewrites, and @akindofmagictoo, plus anyone else who wants to join in!

[eloquentsisyphianturmoil]

[dickensianenglishbulldog]

Hornblower: checks barometer

Hornblower: A rEaL cApTaIn WoUlD’nT hAvE hAd To Do ThAt- A REAL CAPTAIN WOULD HAVE USED HIS MAGIC CAPTAIN SENSE AND KNOWN!

*hides in quarters and sobs into maps*

[notachaconne]

I just remembered the existence of The Life and Times of Horatio Hornblower, a wonderful piece of fanfiction published in the 1970s by C. Northcote Parkinson (better known for Parkinson's Law). I read it many years ago, as it happened to be on the family bookshelf (certainly my Dad's), and I wondered if it was still in print.

It is still in print. At least two of the first page of reviewers on Goodreads are convinced by it that Hornblower was a real person. A few more don't appreciate the academic style.

I remember that I liked the take on the death of the paranoid captain. I also think it's a fascinating example of fanfiction that is not simply an adaptation to another form - and if Demonology is fanfiction, this is fanfiction - getting mainstream-published.

I wanted to say that the readers who didn't appreciate the academic style sort of understood what the joke was without getting it, but it's not really a joke. It's a completely serious, and magnificently executed, piece of fanfiction by a writer who was a deep expert on naval history.

[ganymedian]

Just some slightly unhinged Horatio screencap doodles

[domonicriley]

A question for Hornblower readers: should I start in chronological order with Mr Midshipman Hornblower or in published order with The Happy Return (Beat to Quarters)?

Never read them before but I've seen the television series.

[silverfoxstole]

Aww...

Found this the other day on Livejournal

[prydainroyals]

Arthur and Horatio are best friends and have been since their days as students in the Royal Naval Academy and University.

From the first day they met to their first assignments as young officers, they were absolute menaces--masters of malicious compliance and notorious for mutual prank wars that will live in legend amongst cadets for ages to come. Nonetheless, they were never prone to endangering their fellow sailors; rather, they seemed born to find every inefficiency in the system and poke and prod it with style and flair that their superiors found either brilliant or exhausting.

The Prince and the young Admiral are Navy lads through and through. The people under their watch are of the utmost importance to them, all else be damned.

Horatio's friendship with Arthur fundamentally changed the Prince's life and helped instill in him a strong sense of duty; Horatio's unbridled vanity inspired him to greater confidence; Horatio's loyalty and kindness gave Arthur more reasons to stand fast and forge on through years of grief and depression.

Arthur feels he is the best version of himself when he is with his twin sister, and Horatio. (Alice has accepted Horatio as a 'triplet' at this point.)

[void-botanist]

Spice tolerance tag game: AOM edition

Thank you for the tag (and the new game!), @ink-flavored!

Rules: rank your characters’ spice tolerance from 🌶 to 🌶🌶🌶🌶🌶 (or from 1 to 5, if you don’t want to use emojis). Feel free to add more detail, and then tag others to play next!

For some of the AOM cast:

Sid: 🌶🌶🌶 (3), but he often doesn't go that spicy, mostly because of cooking for his mom.

Emma: 🌶 (1). Does it really HAVE to be spicy...

Donovan: 🌶🌶🌶🌶 (4). He occasionally has Sid make him a spicier version of something, but he also has discovered the Ensaum version of Goron spice from Breath of the Wild and will just dump that on stuff if he feels like it.

Avis: 🌶🌶🌶🌶🌶 (5), at least. She loves spicy stuff, especially the spicy noodles at this one place on Eas. There's always a stockpile of hot sauces in her house/boat.

Sorian: 🌶🌶 (2). He's been tempted many a time by whatever Avis is eating, because it doesn't smell that spicy, and then regretted trying it as soon as it touched his tongue.

Horatio: 🌶🌶🌶 (3). He's expanding it because he thinks this is weak, but he's comparing himself to Celia.

Celia: 🌶🌶🌶🌶🌶 (5). She says it's a ferasca thing that she's always had a high spice tolerance. She's only a little bit right.

Colin: 🌶🌶🌶🌶 (4), just barely. He'll say he can withstand a 5, and he can, for a value of withstand that is "tears streaming down his face, full of remorse for his hubris".

Palmyra: 🌶🌶 (2). Honestly she doesn't really like spicy food.

I'll tag @kahvilahuhut, @kk7-rbs, and @sarahlizziewrites plus whoever else wants to join in!

[ashenwinds]

Your honor, I love my spicy skellie

. . . who is apparently missing a toe on their left foot??? Since when

[macaron-n-cheese]

Watching Hornblower again ☺️☺️☺️

WTF 1 horny guy got at least 20 people killed I WILL KILL SEX

(spoilers in tags)

[dickensianenglishbulldog]

Normal level of social embarrassment: Saying sorry when you bump into someone/they into you.

Average level of social embarrassment: Hiding from people you know in shops.

High levels of social embarrassment: Not being able to maintain conversations.

Hornblower levels of social embarrassment: Marry a woman who put you in an embarrassing situation and maintain a facade of marital ideality until she dies in childbirth.

[ratuszarsenal]

between the "he exaggerated disparingly to himself," and the "The four elements of Aristotle, Hornblower thought, insanely" and of course wishing he was dead for half the page count, midshipman hornblower is a flawless representation of what it's like to be 17

[ganymedian]

Horatio is always like

[isaacathom]

friends and i watched the first "episode" of the hornblower miniseries and my takeaway is that i need to pull a hornblower and start girlbossing.