#cue identity reveal down the line and Billy goes up like

[im-not-buying-it-ether]

Bruce, 6’2”, lifted up 2 ft off the floor:

Captain Marvel, who noticed his coworker getting neck aches looking up at him: (talking)

Diana and Clark: (Rolling on the floor laughing)

Cap hikes him up higher so he’s holding him up to be a little taller than him and Bruce just accepts his new brooding perch and keeps talking about the mission that was brought up.

Shorter members of the League get the scruffed treatment and carried around on Caps hips like a single dad, the piggy back rides are top tier. Cap bangs his head onto every door frame in the Watchtower and they all have to be raised cause he keeps putting dents in the metal.

Batman was caught being carried by Marvel once, a photo was taken, and now all his kids have seen their dad being carried around like a toddler despite the only 2 ft height difference.

Do you think that after being shocked by lightning more times than humanely possible, Billys heartbeat has changed to such an irregular pattern? Imagine with me:

Clark and Billy are under the same roof, think something of a journalism convention. Billy was invited due to his outstanding work at WHIZ Radio, and now gets to meet so many people that are both within his circle of work and outside of it.

Clark, while Billy is busy trying to get Jack Ryder to talk to literally Anyone Else, can't help but notice that. The kids heart is fucked. Like, just beyond belief.

It makes Clark's hair stand on end. He doesn't know if the kid knows that he has an arrhythmia. Clark can't tell him that he does either, because thats a giveaway to his identity. He cant just hint for the kid to get an ECG also, because who fucking says that upon first meeting. 'Greetings, nice to meet you! Not to worry you or anything, like, this geniunely comes from nowhere, but when was the last time you got a health checkup? Yeah, haha! Take care!'

Clark has to sit there, being chatted to by reporters, journalists, and others alike, trying not to rip his hair out. He's watching Billy listen attentively as others give him tips and tricks. Clark can't stop listening to the odd thumps of the boys heart.

[morwenna-crows]

Notes from Dun Laoghaire August 2014 - The Dying of the Light Event

This was the talk in Dublin on the 31st of August 2014, just after The Dying of the Light was released. Because the series was ending, Derek expanded on loads of things I`ve never seen mentioned here, and also read out four chapters from the Original Draft of the first book.

Some people I spoke to in Easons bookshop afterward had recorded bits and pieces on their phones, so if anyone else was there too, and wants to corroborate, correct, or elaborate on anything I jotted down at the time, please feel free!

We were asked beforehand not to spoil the last book (which had only been out a day) for those who hadn`t yet read it - hence, the things discussed were mostly what-might-have-been scenarios, pre-Canon stuff, and apparent confirmation that a written chapter depicting a certain previously unseen character does exist. I`ve put the boring bits first, the best bits last, under the cut, for length:

At the signing after the Q&A, in Easons, everyone was chatting with Derek and asking face-to-face questions. I asked him why they couldn`t just have used the Scepter to destroy the Accelerator, the way they did with the Book of Names. He said that whilst the Book was tangentially linked to the Source of Magic, the Accelerator was direct-lined. You could destroy extensions, but not something actively channeling the Source itself. It was a bit of a wishy-washy answer, to be honest. I should have asked something better.

From the talk itself:

Scapegrace was originally supposed to be Serpine`s inept, adoring lackey, named Scaramouche (that name was later used for another character.) He was supposed to be a zombie right from the start - Serpine`s failed attempt at necromancy, before the White Cleaver. Essentially, Scapegrace was to Serpine what Thrasher became to Scapegrace.

Billy-Ray Sanguine was originally named Cadaverous Drake, and he was more mercenary than Hitman Deluxe. This name was later used for Cadaverous Gant.

This is the infamous signing where Derek revealed that his self-insert character was Saracen Rue, and not, as some had assumed, Gordon. He also (apparently) confirmed, speaking to older fans later, that Dexter and Saracen had gotten it on at least once. I`m not sure if these two points are related.

We learned that, near the end of the War, Erskine secretly poisoned Saracen, hoping to get rid of him before Saracen could use his power to discover Erskine`s plots. When Saracen revealed his Discipline, and Ravel realized it wasn`t a threat, he relented and slipped him an antidote. This… does raise questions about what happened to Hopeless, given the level of prescience he showed in Across a Dark Plain.

The first book was originally twice it`s final length, and featured Serpine, Vengeous, and Vile.

Extract One:

The first short, deleted scene which Derek read out is included at the back of The End of the World. I`ve actually posted it in full on my blog before - it`s the original final chapter, where Eachan Meritorious abandons the Sanctuary and goes into hiding, letting Morwenna Crow die at the (literal!) hands of Serpine, but surviving himself. He then must hold together a magical community which sees him as a coward who left his fellow Elder to her fate. Val and Skulduggery discuss this, and then Val returns home to Haggard.

Extract Two:

The second deleted scene has Valkyrie seriously poisoned by the magic monsters underneath Gordon`s house, a lá Tanith`s later poisoning by the Grotesquery - on the brink of death. Skulduggery - accompanied by China, who shows up to rescue them in her car - cares for Val and brings her to Kenspeckle. Skulduggery stays by her side the whole time she`s recuperating, as she fades in and out of consciousness. She remains critically ill for quite a while; when she wakes up and calls her parents, they`re frantic and haven`t seen her in days. They have the police out looking for her - her mother, in particular, is furious.

Extract Three:

A War-era, flashback scene. Lord Vile and Serpine are in a dungeon, torturing prisoners. This time, their victim is a man named Arnel (Armnal?) St. John, the High Commander of the Cleavers. They want information on the Elders from him, in particular the location of the hidden Sanctuary, but they also seem certain that the Elders won`t risk the lives of others to rescue this man. Serpine argues that he`s no good as bait, and that they should just murder him. Vile agrees.

The most interesting thing about this is that Lord Vile appears to be having moments of recognition; he somehow knows a whole lot about Arnel (his full name, his job, facets of his personality, his sense of ethics) implying that this man (whom Serpine ultimately kills) could be Skulduggery`s unnamed older brother - hi-ho, reason for abandoning that family crest! Also, Vile can speak, haltingly - he just doesn`t bother most of the time.

Extract Four:

The last thing that Derek read out was an extension of the deleted scenes from The End of the World, where Valkyrie struggles to maintain her secret identity, clashes with her mother, and is suspended from school.

In this extract, the Reflection goes haywire way earlier; it ambushes Valkyrie at home, they scuffle, and the Reflection hurls Val into the liquid mirror, trapping her in the strange world behind the glass.

The Reflection, calling itself Stephanie, then takes Val`s place in Haggard. Beryl, Carol, and Crystal call over to the house whilst the fight is taking place, hoping to nose around and find some dirt on Valkyrie to get her into trouble. The Reflection goes to meet them with a knife behind her back, and some creepy dialogue ensues: Stephanie threatening her aunt less and less subtly, and Beryl becoming increasingly frightened of her niece. Eventually, Stephanie attacks them.

Meanwhile, a terrified 12-year-old Val is trapped in Mirror, which is Not A Very Nice Place At All. It`s a bleak world of perpetual darkness, blanketed by thick, billowing black smoke (from a pile of bodies being cremated?) Similar in tone to the Other Dimension in Kingdom of the Wicked, only much, much worse. All around her, she can hear sobbing, punctuated by  someone pleading for their life. Through the fog, she sees a gallows, and realizes she`s about to witness a mass execution.

This is where Derek stopped reading. Possibly because it was coming across as sheer horror and getting very grim for some of the younger listeners, but more likely because the next thing he told us might have contradicted canon, somewhere.

All he would say was that the subsequent chapter involved, in no particular order, “decapitation,” “screaming,” and “poor, poor Larrikin. Yeah… he died. But you don`t want to hear about him.” Cue shrieking from basically the entire audience, who most certainly did want to hear about him.

That was it.