#loadbearing silver. in these trying times

[moe-broey]

Does anybody wanna see my fucked up Silver the Hedgehog plushie I made in 6th grade who's dying badly?

Of course you do.

Lulu for scale. I really went all in on this guy LMFAOOO

Loadbearing Silver.

Loadbearing Silver.

[tatiana-starwalker]

A Doll’s Favourite Spell

Word Count : 1591

Summary : Baby’s first Immolate spell! Just the Krokhotep fight, featuring smacktalking the boss, trying a new spell out, class memories that aren’t all that fond, and comedic removal of limbs. Kind of the vibes from my first run through, so it’s going to be a bit deranged. Well, more than usual.

More to help get the fool’s vibes down than anything loadbearing. :)

Nothing really sat on them right, despite the fact that you could make a very compelling argument for them being just a sentient clothesrack, but at the same time: These were not human clothes. The propotions were all kinds of wonk, but at the very least it was warm enough to keep the creeping and biting ice out of their hinges.

Warnings : 

References to mutilation, self-inflicted and otherwise, mostly for the sake of comedy (e.g. Enjoying the Immolate spell too much, yoinking out a mannequin arm because it’s funny and doesn’t hurt that much)

References to / nongraphic depictions of body horror for the sake of comedy (e.g. Mentioning coming into class with half of your face missing)

Uncanny focus character. They are in fact a wooden construct.

Discussions of entropy as psychological warfare

General taunting mid-fight

Tatiana held onto their staff, looking at the cards in their surprisingly shaky hands. Normally, normally, temperature was water off a duck's back. But it was cold. So cold. And really hard to navigate, too. Good thing the dazed manders roaming the halls didn't notice the string that they'd purloined from... let's just say somewhere. There wasn't any misting breath on the air, a telltale sign that nothing here was well and truly alive, lacking that pulsing blood and high heat associated with simply being. Something that was impossible to replicate without magic, but that didn't mean that they didn't at least try. You know, for practice! Apparently it was "weird and offputting" to not do so, or come into class with half your face burned off. It's not like it's disrupting anyone's studies, or whatever. People are just rude sometimes. Sometimes you are just too tired to put it back on.

With a non-laugh at the vaguely fond memory, Tatiana looked at the book on the lectern, not putting up their whole comedic bit about not being able to think anything through. It was just a chain of events, really. Not much else to it. There was a gentle chime that came from everywhere including down, and the door swung open. There were a few whispers, though the grinding stone made both figures inside the hall face the wizard, who was clutching to a staff from around here that was not theirs by right. They still walked in, all false smiles and false demeanours and false anticipation, though the biting cold was starting to get to them, or more specifically just their joints.

Just like every other square inch of this temple, the uneven flooring was more than just a safety hazard, but there were about to be a lot more so... who really minded? It's not like they were setting one of the digsite workers on fire. There was a haughty laugh that caught their attention, and a well-robed Krok pointing a blue-gemmed staff at them from across the hall, and walking forwards with intent that Starwalker matched and responded to with their own confident strides, holding their staff with only one hand, just to match the feel of the room. Well, assumedly. They were never good at the whole getting emotions thing, and they just kind of assumed that Krokhotep wanted to commit a great act of violence too.

"Don't provoke me, Wizard." He spat, with a slight tilt of the head and as much of a smile as they could see in the torches' nonlight. "I was just thinking about letting you live. In my service, of course..."

He was clearly involved with ice magic, being bedazzled in blues and silvers with multiple snowflake accessories. Starwalker was equally obvious, despite the fact that they were wearing whatever they'd been picking up to avoid the biting cold. They weren't expecting it, in their defense, given that this was a desert and that preventional tools were too heavy to lug around. Nothing really sat on them right, despite the fact that you could make a very compelling argument for them being just a sentient clothesrack, but at the same time: These were not human clothes. The propotions were all kinds of wonk, but at the very least it was warm enough to keep the creeping and biting ice out of their hinges.

Speaking of biting, they were in a particularly bitter mood, themselves.

"Mhm mhm keep it coming." They said, taking a stance on one of the many circles on the floor. Perfect battlegrounds, just like everywhere else in this place, as they started pulling from their spelldeck. You could see their slumped shoulders and feel an anger welling and spilling out even as they yanked cards out of the box covered in cracking and peeling wraps. "How do you do it? Be so underwhelmingly... You! Everyone's like 'oh no Krokhotep this, Krokhotep that', you're just some guy with bad stage presence and worse fashion."

There was a somehow haughtier laugh from the Krok, but what incentive was that other than to continue? Emotional warfare was just as valid, even if it didn't show on the scoreboard. Besides, if he knew that they'd just pulled a frankly awful hand to start, they were done for. Three copies of a spell they hadn't messed around with, and a few blockers. No damage for a while. But hey, fun talks about the concept of Entropy was something to start with. Duskhaven tended to talk about it a lot, so it was the first thing that came to mind. Other than the fact that they missed them, but pining for your Beloved in front of some living fossil wasn't really going to accomplish much, even Starwalker knew that.

"You know no one's going to remember you, right? That when the Spiral spins itself out of control and cracks at the seams, you're just as forgotten as anyone else. I'd even go so far as to say that your chambermaids have more significance than you to the wider universe, because at least they're back as stardust, you know?" There was a look of rage in the Krok's eye. Good. He seemed like he was about to snap, and they hadn't even started properly yet. Also they had first turn, which was very nice, even if it was just a basic "okay let's set up for something to come up hopefully" move. Lovely little fireblade, though the new spell overwhelming their hand... Hm. What better time to test it? When everything rode on the decision-making and everything had consequences in the next five minutes?

"Well, I at least know that I'll be seeing tomorrow in one piece." Ohoho. Okay that's an opportunity to be funny. "And what are you going to be, little witch? Some poor soul to add to the collection? I think that's much too high a standing." He cast a similar defensive spell, but for storm, by the purple shimmers. Cool. Fine. No one needs to know that Tatiana's deck was all fire magic. No one. But what Krokhotep needed to know immediately was that they could pull out their arm. At the five minutes ago, actually, so they simply cast a second preparation spell, a trap. Not much use without damage, but that's fine. Retalliation came with another awful laugh that echoed through the halls, as if the man had already won. What they needed to pull was not another defense spell, but how can your deck be filled entirely with those? That's not a good look. Also not a good look, being bundled over by a grim looking snowman while trying to screw your arm back on. But that's just typical behaviour. "I'm not even sure what you're trying to accomplish, but it is rather strange. It's almost like you're borrowing things you shouldn't, little witch."

"And it's almost like you're being an impetuous old fossil, but you don't see me complaining. Are you scared, Teppy? Scared of being forgotten? Scared of calling me a wizard, too?"

There was a wide grin to accompany the taunt, the jeer, as Tatiana had a bad idea after rereading the spellcard again, and had to jolt themselves out of being entranced by the illustration. A hand reaching out of the flames. Not in fear, but in command, grasping the wisping embers like reins of a horse.

Immolate: Burn Yourself to burn That Which You Hate Threefold.

Well, they did hate Krokhotep as a concept. And it was tempting, and pretty, and entirely ill-advised. That's it. They were convinced. They even had a surplus of energy.

"I'm not afraid of you in any capacity. If you were more powerful," a snort, as Krokhotep slammed the base of his staff to the ground, Tatiana raising their wand and resting it against their temple, bracing for impact while seeing as aloof as ever. Because they had to. "Then maybe I'll give you your elevations. Do you know the dimensions of your spare parts, little puppet? I've wanted a new statue for my hall since my reawakening, and there's a spare alcove you'll fit right into."

"I was going to ask you the same, I'm sure you'll fit right into the Royal Museum's new Krokotopia exhibit. You are, after all, going to be history very soon!" There was a laugh - a cackle, more accurately - as Tatiana read the words off the card, and closed their eyes.

It didn't hurt. Not really. The consuming flames seemed closer to a chariot as implied in the illustration, and it gave them a warm feeling, of something pulsing that was so alien but felt so, so nice. They felt actually alive, as if this were an experience they were actually able to have rather than it being a direct cause and effect of the flames. It felt like a comforting embrace, it felt like this was going to work. Though, to be entirely honest, they did not feel burned. They felt loved. Absolutely glowing, though more in the literal sense, now, as they became aware of the fact that the wood was starting to split on their arms, and the room smelled of burning paint and wood and paper and dust. Or was that just them?

So much for handing in the body to the Marlybonians, though. A shame, they did seem to be interested in old fossils too out of their depth.

[vaguely-concerned]

empire of ivory here we go!

previous temeraire let’s read here

- um excuuuuse me I have waited two books for us to come back home to britain to see everyone again and now everything is awful and shitty and scary and my fave is leaving and nothing’s how it should be??? no??? this is unfair??????

- tharkay NO please don’t go everything provably goes to hell whenever you leave D:D:D:

(to be fair to him I guess it’s understandable to want some time alone to process the absolute outrageous bullshit he just pulled for a guy he’s known for like four months)

he used his page time well tho; instantly convincing roland of his worth and making her laugh... giving laurence his cup of tea b/c he looked like he needed it more... telling laurence that he’s leaving because he promised to do that much at least... truly the best boy, off to fetch more dragons apparently because it wasn’t quite crazy enough the first time

- god I love jane roland, I’m so glad my two faves got along instantly, between them they could... maybe protect laurence from himself? at least a little??? I can but dream

- I think this is the most emotionally invested I’ve been in a piece of media since that time I spent a few months completely incoherent over uncharted, and naughty dog very kindly held my heart in their hands and chose to be gentle with it in the end but I am not so sure that is how it’s going to be for this series and I am Not Prepared for the suffering

- I love whenever laurence thinks uncomfortably about one of the various and sundry atrocities committed by the government he’s still pledged all his loyalty to. yes william maybe the british empire... is in fact not good and has enough blood on their hands to dye the ocean red. I can’t wait until he connects the dots here (and presumably has a pretty intense crisis if faith about it because it seems like one of the loadbearing structures of his character... actually no wait I’m not ready to see this D:D:D:)

- the little details like the fact that he just calls bb!roland ‘emily’ and harcourt becomes ‘catherine’ so easily in his narration now are so so sweet  

- lord allendale is one of those dudes who have good politics but is a shitheel to his family and I want to smack him

laurence being the mortified poster boy of this party, though? priceless, imagine coming up with a protagonist this effortlessly involuntarily hilarious, it’s the mark of true genius

- I don’t usually quibble over things like this, but I think the edit for this fourth book specifically is a bit lacking? I’ve come across a lot of mistakes even my dumb ass can pick up on already, and I’m only a hundred pages or so in

- caught between crying and cackling at this part b/c like laurence I’m  d e v a s t a t e d  at the thought of temeraire getting sick but also temeraire is just like cheerfully getting laid the whole time

also how did none of the aviators think to give laurence The Talk about giving his dragon The Talk, you all know what he’s like

- oh thank god

- I have spent half of today crying about dragons coughing, how are you this fine evening good reader

- btw this series fills a hole in my soul left by jkr giving me all those tantalizing hints of different types of dragons in ‘fantastic beasts’ and never following up on it

- tharkay may not be here but laurence just mentioned him like once in his narration so let’s take the excuse to reminisce about the good old days (when tharkay was here)... remember that time when the one of his own jokes he laughed openly at was about lawyers and laurence frankly should have responded better b/c it was kind of funny and sadly temeraire doesn’t have the worldly experience to know it yet.... aaah precious, he truly is a sardonic blessing to my heart and deserves the world

okay back to our regularly scheduled content   

- riley why u gotta b such a bitch about this

(I love how laurence is constantly doubting himself over this tho, as if he’s done something wrong in this situation... like honey baby if there’s one thing worth breaking a friendship over it’s probably them being cool with slavery lol. it shows how much laurence has grown, considering that this disagreement has always existed between them but he used to be willing to just overlook it... I’m so proud of you laurence)

also lol @ berkely coming in to tell them everyone can hear them, I have a desperately soft spot for him and maximus. just the image of both of them turning to him ‘united in appalled indignation’ like ‘excuse you???’ and him giving exactly zero fucks... *chef kiss emoji*

- most important information revealed in this book: a) dragons are not widely considered to have committed original sin, thank you reverend erasmus and b) laurence has taken time out of his day at some point to worry about it b/c he’s a dork

(this is the sort of world building I am hopelessly weak to lol)

- gong su tricking temeraire into eating in the most melodramatic way possible... god bless you chef

- fkjhsadkjfhsdkjalhfaskjldhf laurence judging chenery for what he’s wearing while going out into the jungle in full uniform hat included himself... I caaaaan’t

- demane has only appeared on three pages so far but if anything happens to him I’ll kill everyone in this book and then myself

- ‘average dragon speaks one million languages’ factoid actualy statistical error. Temeraire Linguist Georg, who wants a pavilion thank you very much & learns over 10,000 languages each day, is an outlier adn should not have been counted <3<3<3

(I love that temeraire is like... a nerd dragon with a hopelessly jock captain)

- laurence effortlessly rating the relative hotness of the other male aviators to try to suss out who harcourt has slept with fjsaldfhsdkljafh do you ever hear yourself think william

like this is the thing about him it’s so easy to headcanon him as bi b/c he can be so mindbogglingly oblivious it’s entirely possible he literally wouldn’t even have noticed until someone smacked him over the head with it

- see I’m very happy they found the cure but I don’t fucking trust it b/c the pattern of these books tends to be to give you one moment of ‘oh phew everything is going to be okay’ about 2/3 into the story and THEN everything goes to hell and fifty pages later laurence is dissociating and napoleon has conquered prussia 

- THERE WE GO RIGHT ON SCHEDULE

temeraire is never going to let laurence go anywhere without him again and rightly so

- hasn’t mrs erasmus been through enough. can’t she just be allowed to chill 

- this is really cool world building but I’m too stressed out to appreciate it

really enjoy the description of architecture tho this sounds so awesome

- sfahdfklsahdfksjda laurence making sure his clothes are as washed and presentable as possible... I can’t with you you beautiful idiot

- TEMERAIRE OH MY GOD IS HE HERE IS LAURENCE HALLUCINATING PLS SAY HE’S ACTUALLY HERE

- ...well I mean if anyone has a freudian excuse for being kind of dickish I guess it would be these guys? it’s actually pretty chill of them to only flog one of them (laurence, because he just can’t play it any way but stupid lawful good at every turn) and not just killing them all I guess, they kept them fed and stuff

- oh thank god

- temeraire you are the most darling dragon boy and I love you

I was really really worried for a moment there that the reference to the Colosseum was a not-so-subtle hint they would have to gladiator fight to the death but thankfully they were basically just calling in a parliament

- DID THIS MOTHERFUCKER JUST STAB A CHILD IN THE STOMACH?? I HOPE HE ACCIDENTALLY SHOOTS HIMSELF IN THE DICK AND DIES pls say demane is going to be okay

- aw okay finally something good for mrs erasmus I will take it

- laurence you useless fool of a narrator is demane okay?? 

- god roland is just so cool naomi novik really gave us a jovial butch silver fox aviator lady huh... she did that for us and I for one am full of gratitude

- oh thank GOD (hm I sense a running theme here lol) the kid is going to be okay I can breathe again

- iskierka the pirate captain + temeraire’s reaction... perfect

- ;____________; I would lay down my life for temeraire and also that’s a gutpunch of a moodswing... the perfect hilarity of ‘that is an ugly hill’ immediately followed by That... jesus

- awww every time volly shows up again is a joy (temrer!!!)

- laurence... laurence you need to stop asking people to marry you because you never actually really fucking mean it!!!!! have you learned nothing about yourself since book 1, trust your goddamn instincts for once in your life you and roland have been doing perfectly okay thus far as like... affectionate fuckbuddies right? 

(her reaction was priceless tho god bless)

- aaaah there we go the british government is looking more like itself... welcome to the world of realpolitik laurence I’m really sorry :(

- “It is only dragons, you know” JANE ROLAND WTF DID YOU JUST SAY

- “This government is not of my party; my king is ill and mad; but still I am his subject. You have sworn no oath, but I have.” He paused. “I have given my word.”

:) this is... fine

(like. I know this is necessary character growth and he’s basically been a waste of a good man in service to a government like this the whole time and the writing’s been on the wall since book 1 but I don’t want this to be happening to hiiiiim)

- tfw... ur dragon boi is so good... that being anything less than good for him in turn is unthinkable...................... b o i

- ...jane doesn’t really know him very well if she didn’t see this coming from a mile off tho does she

I mean I guess she has other stuff to think about but this shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone

- remember when he thought the entire corps was weird and now he’s finally at home there... and has to leave it behind :):):) super extra fine is what this is

- yeah okay laurence definitely has a crush on ol’ bonaparte noting that down lol he’s all but blushing after that kiss on the cheek 

also... if you just overlook the dictator thing for a moment is napoleon wrong about what he’s saying tho. (no and not even laurence is prepared to say so he’s just going to go back there and get murdered anyway b/c idk lawful good is dumb as fuck sometimes I guess)

It’s really cool how the author shows that napoleon has a better handle on laurence’s psychology after barely meeting him than a lot of people he’s known for years now, though, really adds to his menace and appeal as a character

- wow uh that’s one way to end a book... it’s actually tipped over from tragedy into a strange sort of hilarity for me now: he literally got sued out of his life’s earnings for being a decent human being, committed treason for the same reason and is about to be hanged for thinking genocide might have been a step too far -- in the span of thirty pages. I believe ‘that escalated quickly’ is not too much of an exaggeration here

- SIPHO IS GONNA WRITE BOOKS ONE DAY YOU GUYS!!!! I PROUDLY WELCOME OUR SECOND NERD TO THE CREW

 - I think this one might be my least favorite so far? not that I disliked it, it’s just the one that’s hit the worst by the fact that there’s not always that much time spent with the cultures central to the book; tswana seems really interesting but because of the way the plot played out and our limited perspective though laurence it just didn’t work for me? the cool shit comes in sipho’s book at the end, like how thoroughly they kicked the europeans out of the coast of africa, which is very cathartic (I will say that most of the second book being set on the ship and then only a sliver of it is actually in china annoyed me too haha) 

I have the distinct feeling this book is setting up for some Misery and breaking of the pattern a bit in the next one though, which will be interesting! ONWARDS TO MORE PAIN AND LAURENCE IS ALREADY PASSIVELY SUICIDAL FROM THE OUTSET SO LIKE... I’M SURE THIS WILL BE REAL FUN :)

maybe my boy will be back tho? silver linings silver linings clinging to some silver linings