#what with Jon reading a book while at uni and the 'story' of him meeting Craw

[wolvenjay]

Scarecrow Week 2024 - Day Two University Stories

[be-not-afeared]

Jaime Lannister and John Silver: of arcs and endings

Or, herein follows a possibly niche comparison between the character arcs of Jaime Lannister (Game of Thrones, HBO, 2011-2019) and John Silver (Black Sails, Starz, 2014-2017), in which I will argue that Jaime’s character arc fails not because of Jaime’s actions, but because of the way his story is framed to the viewer throughout the series, using Silver as a springboard to explore the requisites for a tragic yet satisfying ending.

(Yes, this is 5K words long. No, I am not sorry. Spoilers for Jaime’s and Silver’s storylines in their respective shows, and while I’ve tried to stay vague about the Bigger Picture, read at your own risk.)

Okay, so. I was, and still am, to an extent, a huge Game of Thrones fan. I’ve pored over the books, been to conventions, and spent a good couple of years while I was at uni discussing fan theories on message boards into the early hours of the morning. Jaime Lannister has been one of my favourite fictional characters for over a decade. Yet I certainly wasn’t alone in watching in horror as years of hopeful build up was thrown away in the span of one and a half episodes during the final season of the show. There are *many* things that hurt about season 8 of Game of Thrones. But the swift 180 we see in Jaime, from aiding the Starks in the Battle of Winterfell and finally choosing Brienne, to abandoning her to return to Cersei 20 minutes later, was, for me, one of the deepest cuts.

When I started watching Black Sails this August, I was immediately compelled by Silver – unsurprisingly, as someone who has exactly one favourite character type: Traumatised and Morally Grey Anti-Villain. Watching Silver’s character develop over the four seasons of Black Sails was an absolute joy, and his ending in the finale, though *incredibly difficult*, was nuanced and in character and satisfying. (Am going to try and keep as vague as possible on details here, because Black Sails is an incredible show that more people should watch and I don’t want to completely spoil the ending).  Silver and Jaime are two characters with a lot of similarities and their characters arcs appear to run in direct parallel with each other: both selfish and arrogant men who become more empathetic and invested in others as the series progresses, in large part prompted by the loss of a limb. However, the gulf in reception of their overall arcs can be pinpointed to one huge disparity between the way both storylines were framed to the audience, and that is difference between redemption and tragedy.

“I was that hand”

But first! Let’s start with the more obvious stuff.

When we meet Jaime Lannister and John Silver in the pilots of their respective shows, they are both introduced as arrogant and self-serving – yet charming – men, who place the needs of themselves (and Cersei, in Jaime’s case) above all else. Silver kills and impersonates the cook on the merchant ship Flint’s crew captures, and has no qualms about lying his way onto the crew whilst simultaneously planning to sell the Urca schedule to the highest bidder. For Silver, his own survival comes before any sense of moral code. We are told stories about Jaime before we properly meet him  – that he killed the previous king, Aerys Targaryen, that he has no honour – but nothing that we see first-hand contradicts this; at the end of the pilot he attempts to kill a child to cover up his and Cersei’s incestuous relationship. Silver is certainly supposed to be more likeable than Jaime, but both men, despite their lack of morals, are presented as charming, clever, and good with a one-liner. As we move through the early seasons of both shows, they are consistent in these traits, although Jaime is presented as an outright antagonist whereas Silver from the outset is a morally grey unknown entity, keeping viewers on our toes wondering if he’ll turn against Flint, against Billy, against Eleanor. Things change, for both men, however, with the direct lead up and fallout of the loss of a limb: Jaime’s hand and Silver’s leg.

The introduction of Brienne of Tarth as Jaime’s foil kickstarts his path towards becoming the honourable man he once dreamed of being. During their roadtrip across Westeros, she challenges him and is able to get under his skin in a way we haven’t yet seen before. This comes to a head when the duo are captured, and Jaime intervenes during her attempted rape, lying about her ransom worth and saving her from an awful fate. The result? The immediate amputation of Jaime’s sword hand, representative of Jaime’s identity (“I was that hand”). Jaime is punished for the first selfless act we see him commit on the show with the loss of the source of his power and self-worth.

Silver, in a similar fashion, finds himself in a position to save the crew he has spent two seasons disparaging. When he is offered the opportunity to betray his crew for an escape route, he refuses (the reasons for this refusal never outright stated, although I imagine Flint’s “where else will you wake up in the morning and matter” and Billy’s “that’s our brother you’ve got there” both factor heavily). Again, the result of this refusal is the brutal torture and eventual amputation of Silver’s leg – a man who in his own words is “not a joiner”, prone to taking what he needs and leaving, to reinventing himself, to always having an escape route. As actor Luke Arnold says: “He's a guy who's always had one leg out the door, and then they cut it off.”

What is interesting here is not only that we have two characters who are *punished* for moving beyond their selfishness, but that that punishment is specifically catered towards their defining characteristics. Jaime is left unable to fight, unable to defend himself, unable to uphold his reputation. Silver is left unable to run, unable to leave his past behind him, unable to remain without attachments. Both are left vulnerable.  The loss of Jaime’s hand forces him to reinvent himself in a world ruled by swords; as Lord Commander of the Kingsguard, father to Tommen, and an honourable man working to uphold his oath, through Brienne, to Catelyn Stark. The loss of Silver’s leg, however, leaves him *unable* to reinvent himself; forcing him to rely on his crew and paving the way for the growth of his relationship with Flint and Madi. In losing their limbs both Jaime and Silver are set on paths towards gaining empathy, and are able to become invested in those around them.

 “Defined by their histories, distorted to fit their narratives”

Game of Thrones and Black Sails both engage heavily with ideas of myth-making and storytelling. Stories are woven into the mythology of Westeros; a world with thousands of years of history revealed to us slowly over the seasons to suit the narrative and the teller. We are told the story of Rhaegar Targaryen’s kidnap and rape of Lyanna Stark in the pilot, and at first this serves to provide a tragic landscape for Robert’s unhealthy relationship with his wife and his crown. It is only as the show develops and we hear more about Rhaegar and Lyanna that we realise there is more to this story; in season 5 Littlefinger recounts the events of the Tourney of Harrenhal to foreshadow the reveal of Jon’s parentage later that season, that Rhaegar and Lyanna had a happy and consensual relationship and that it is Robert who could be viewed as the villain of this sequence. We are taught through watching the show to never assume that any given story is true. Black Sails similarly plays with the idea of the power of the storyteller, combining historical pirates with fictional pirates and an origin story for Treasure Island, and going to great lengths to show that history is in the hands of the victor. Most of the primary sources of pirate history are from the perspective of civilised England, and in the process of watching the show we come to realise the bias inherent in these histories; much like in Game of Thrones, they are stories, and should not be assumed to be either true or accurate. As Jack says in the finale: “a story is true, a story is untrue […] The stories we want to believe, those are the ones that survive”.

Jaime Lannister and John Silver are both characters defined by stories that are forced upon them without choice: the Kingslayer and Long John Silver. We meet Jaime as the Kingslayer; our opinion of him is immediately formed by the story of him stabbing in the back the King he had sworn to protect, and cemented by the fact that our protagonist, Ned Stark, a man we like and trust, is the one telling this story. The Kingslayer’s presence is so strong in the first two seasons of the show that Jaime becomes nameless, reduced to this one defining act. It is only after the loss of his hand, and through his developing bond with Brienne, that he is finally able to tell his own story and we realise our entire perception of Jaime’s character has been based on an incorrect interpretation of events: that in killing Aerys Targaryen Jaime was saving the population of Kings Landing from destruction via wildfire. It is only after the truth of this story has been revealed to us that Jaime is able to begin moving past the Kingslayer and forging a new identity.

We see this in reverse in Black Sails, for the story of Long John Silver is not introduced until the season 3 finale, but like Jaime, this story is not told by Silver. Billy creates the myth of Long John, commits the acts attributed to him, and uses him as a figurehead for the pirate rebellion all without Silver’s knowledge or consent. Season 4 sees Silver wrestle with this identity of King of the Pirates, surrounded by people who want to use ‘Long John Silver’ for their own benefit: Billy, Israel Hands, even Flint. As the power and influence of Long John Silver the story grows, John Silver the man is disregarded, and his value reduced to how he can further everyone else’s individual causes. Though he does embrace this title (for a time, at least) to further “Flint and Madi’s war”, a cause he doesn’t truly believe in beyond his investment in Flint and Madi as people, we come to realise that the ‘character’ of Long John Silver that we know from Treasure Island is only that: a character, a story, a collective created for a larger cause that Silver himself eventually betrays.

I have seen some criticism of this scene, but for me one of the few redeeming moments of the Game of Thrones finale was Brienne writing Jaime’s story in the Book of White. Despite Jaime’s less than satisfactory conclusion, with this act he is finally able to move past the Kingslayer; Brienne has rewritten his narrative, and he will be remembered as a Knight who “died protecting his Queen”. Silver is offered no such release. By contrast, the story of Long John Silver is all that will be remembered; the worst fear for a man who cannot bear for his own story to be known. Indeed, we learn that “those who stood to benefit most from [Long John Silver] were the most eager to leave it all behind”. While Jaime is able to escape the story of the Kingslayer, the story of Long John Silver is what will endure, “all that is left of [him] is the monster in the story they tell their children”. Hello Treasure Island.

 “Reviled by so many for my finest act"

We can see here that Jaime and Silver’s narratives deal with similar themes, but often in contrasting ways. Just as with storytelling, Jaime and Silver’s backstories are key parts of their storylines in their respective shows, but operate with very different functions. (It is only as I am writing this that I’m realising how similar the themes of Game of Thrones and Black Sails actually are? If only Game of Thrones had the follow through of Black Sails... We were all rooting for you, etc etc).

Jaime’s backstory, and the truth of the act that earned him the title ‘Kingslayer’, is revealed to us mid-way through season 3. This comes at a very key moment for his character: Jaime has just lost his hand and is at his most vulnerable, and Brienne’s stubborn and persistent honour is clearly starting to affect him. “I trust you,” he says to her in the bathroom scene in 3x05, and we can assume that this is the first time he has said this to someone who isn’t a Lannister in quite some time, possibly ever. Essentially, the reveal of Jaime’s backstory comes at a moment where we are already beginning to soften towards him and are therefore open to hearing an alternative interpretation of events. While Jaime needs to be able to tell his story to begin to move past the identity of the Kingslayer, if this reveal had come too soon it wouldn’t have had the same dramatic effect, as viewers wouldn’t have been open to seeing him in a different light. All we saw of Jaime in the first two seasons was the “man without honour” that everyone believes him to be; by mid-season three we are already beginning to realise that there is perhaps more to him that meets the eye, so the reveal of his backstory has the most impact.

(This is exactly what Black Sails does with Flint’s backstory, and I firmly believe that if we had been told his story in season one as was originally the plan it wouldn’t have been anywhere near as effective. We needed to know more about Flint, and to see his uneasy partnership with Silver begin to develop as we delved into the backstory piece by piece, so that by 2x05 our hearts were ready to be broken. Buuut that’s a different essay.)

Black Sails loves a backstory. As we move through the show we slowly learn why and how our favourite characters came to be in Nassau , and universally these reveals add to our understanding of that character and their motivations: for Flint, for Billy, for Max, for Jack. We enter season four with Silver as the only character we don’t know anything about prior to the pilot. Surely then, we were about to get a ‘Jaime Lannister bathroom scene’ equivalent, a moment that will add depth and understanding to Silver’s character? Were any of the stories he has told about his past true? Who is Solomon Little? … Instead, what we get is one of my favourite sequences of the entire show, in which, after Flint realises that he knows nothing of Silver’s past, Silver reveals that Flint, and by proxy the viewer, knows “of [him] all [he] can bear to be known”. Silver is the ultimate storyteller, master of manipulating and deceiving others through the power of a narrative, yet he cannot bear to be the story himself. We never learn Silver’s backstory, and all he reveals of his past is that it speaks to “events of the kind no one can divine any meaning from, other than the world is a place of unending horrors”; he has chosen to repress his past, has rendered it unspeakable, and both Flint and the viewer are only left to wonder at what these “horrors” could be.

Although this lack of backstory adds nothing to our view of who Silver *was*, it is key to understanding who Silver *is*, and *why* Silver makes some of his more controversial choices further down the line. Silver’s need to repress his past is as key to his character as Flint’s need to define himself by his own backstory. We understand from this that Silver has experienced a level of trauma which is unspeakable, quite a feat for a show with plenty of other horrific backstories and especially pertinent given that Silver is one of our most gifted orators. Silver’s inability to process his past explains a lot of his actions in the early seasons; his coping mechanism has been to move through life without forming attachments, convincing himself that he doesn’t need (and shouldn’t need) other people. It is safe to assume that Madi and Flint are the first people he has let himself be truly vulnerable with, which paints his actions throughout season four in a different light; loving people is new for Silver, and he doesn’t know how to do it in a healthy or selfless way. The placement of this scene is as important to Black Sails as Jamie’s bathroom scene is to Game of Thrones; we needed to have already seen Long John Silver’s significance to the war spiral beyond Silver’s control, to have seen him become compromised by his love for Madi and the beginnings of the collapse of his partnership with Flint, for this scene to pack the punch that it aims for and to beautifully set up the culmination of his arc in the finale. How devastating, for a man who cannot bear for himself to be known, to be the one figure whose story will outlive them all.

Both of these scenes have stayed with me long past my first watch, and feel vital to understanding Jaime and Silver as characters. For Jaime, his backstory informs all his actions moving forward, his desire to transcend the Kingslayer, to become an “Oathkeeper”, or even “Golden-hand the Just”. For Silver, his lack of backstory informs all his actions up to this point in the narrative and prepares us for the choices to come. Just as Jaime is defined by his past, Silver is defined by his *lack* of past.

 “This is not what I wanted”

So, we’ve tracked Jaime and Silver’s characters throughout the show, but how do they both end? The answer, of course, is… tragically. Jaime is offered a glimpse at what could be a peaceful life, in Winterfell with Brienne, before turning it down to return to Cersei’s side only to meet his end while the duo try to escape the collapsing walls of Kings Landing. Silver betrays Flint and Madi in a horrific fashion, ensuring that they both survive though knowing that in doing so he was destroying his relationship with Flint and that there was a chance Madi would never forgive him his actions. (Or, this is my chosen interpretation of the ending, in any case, although the point still works if you prefer one of the other readings). Just thinking about Silver’s ending in Black Sails makes me want to cry. Thinking about Jaime’s ending in Game of Thrones makes to want to cry too, although for a very different reason. Neither are the ending we would hope for these characters in an optimistic and ideal world. But Silver’s decision to betray Flint and Madi feels narratively satisfying in a way that Jaime’s decision to betray Brienne and return to Cersei never could. Why is that?

Jaime Lannister’s character progression from season 3 onwards was set up as a redemption arc. We thought we were watching a jaded and selfish man become an honourable man. The show, admittedly, takes its sweet time with this journey in comparison to the book equivalent, and inserts some *interesting* deviations which I won’t dwell on here (looking at you 4x03 and the entirety of season 5). But, ultimately, the journey that Jaime finds himself on from the moment he loses his hand seems to be heading for a triumphant ending. Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t expecting him to survive the series. But I was expecting him to go out in a blaze of glory – fighting side by side with Brienne, perhaps, or protecting Bran, or one of the other characters he had wronged in the past. There was also always the chance that he would end up fulfilling the much subscribed to book theory of the valonqar, although this admittedly looked less likely as that particular line of the prophecy was cut from the show. When Jaime finally leaves Cersei at the end of season 7 it is such a triumphant moment – after years of struggling with these warring parts of himself, his toxic love for Cersei and his growing moral conscience, a decision had been made and a tie cut. We enter season 8 assuming that there is no going back. We don’t get a hint of any conflicting feelings from Jaime about this decision in the first half of season 8; we are focused on preparation for the Battle of Winterfell, and revelling in the joy of having Jaime and Brienne in the same place for longer than a single episode for the first time since season 4. We get the knighting scene (which, let’s be honest, is where the season peaks). We get the battle. We get the sex scene between Jaime and Brienne (which I… don’t love, for many reasons up to and including the weird virgin shaming jokes from Tyrion in the previous scene and their level of intoxication, but still gives no hint that Jaime is battling an inner war). And then later in that same episode, despite Brienne pleading with him to stay, we get Jaime’s snap decision to return to Kings Landing to attempt to save Cersei: “You think I’m a good man? […] She’s hateful, and so am I”.

The issue here isn’t the decision itself, or Jaime’s choice of words. We know that Jaime isn’t a good man. We know that he’s done awful things for Cersei’s love. And, if we think about it, it makes sense that he wouldn’t be able to leave behind a lifelong co-dependent and unhealthy relationship without looking back, and that he would be driven to return to Cersei’s side when the reality of her impending death hit. The issue is that none of this decision making is presented in the show itself; there was no build up, no foreshadowing. Instead of showing us why this decision was made, the show presents this scene as a shock twist, leaving the viewer with whiplash wondering how Jaime’s story could have taken such an unexpected turn so quickly. The redemption arc that we all thought we were watching was not a redemption arc at all, and don’t think I was alone in finding this revelation deeply unsatisfying.

Let’s leave Jaime for a moment and turn to John Silver. Even for viewers who entered Black Sails without knowing they were watching a prequel to Treasure Island (such as myself!), we can assume that most people have heard of the fictional pirate Long John Silver: the ‘villain’ of Robert Louis Stevenson’s adventure who embodies what it means to be a “gentleman of fortune”.  When we meet clean-shaved, smarmy, two-legged Silver in the pilot most viewers will at least have an idea of the trajectory his arc will take – and that it won’t end with him and Flint skipping off into the sunset hand in hand. We know, because of history, that the pirate rebellion is doomed to fail, that slavery does not end in the West Indies, that Nassau does indeed fall back under English rule, and that piracy is eventually stamped out of New Providence. And we know, because of Treasure Island, that John Silver will end up hunting for Captain Flint’s treasure, while Billy Bones dies from a stroke at the very idea of a visit from Long John and Flint drinks himself to death in Savannah. In essence, we know that we are watching a tragedy.

The genre of tragedy dates back to Ancient Greece, and describes a narrative that presents an examination of human suffering while evoking a sense of catharsis. Aristotle defines tragedy as “an imitation of an action that is serious, complete, and of a certain magnitude … through pity and fear effecting the proper purgation [release] of these emotions.” In other words, in order for a tragedy to achieve this state of emotional release, we as the viewer need to both anticipate (or, fear) the resolution and feel sympathy (or, pity) towards the tragic hero. Black Sails does this masterfully. The pathway towards the destruction of Silver and Flint’s partnership has its grounds as early as season 2, before it has even really started to develop, where Silver talks of his fears of being “used and discarded” by Flint. In the finale of season 3 it is made explicit during their conversation before the battle, with Silver interrogating what he sees as the pattern of Flint’s loved ones dying “not just during [their] relationship, but because of it”. Silver finds himself “unnerved by the thought that when this pattern applies itself to [Flint] and [Silver], that [he] will be the end of [Flint]”. As they lock eyes across the water later on in this episode, the setup of their opposition, complicated by the genuine care between them, is complete, and we enter season 4 dreading the crumbling of their relationship. Season 4 dangles this dramatic irony over us; every time Flint mentions the indestructible force of their partnership, the things they can achieve when there is “no daylight” between them; every time Silver mentions that Flint has his “genuine trust and friendship”; every time they both speak of their partnership in the same terms as the love that Silver holds for Madi, “I’m committed to Flint, I’m committed to Madi” / “he is my friend, too”, we dread the moment where this will all change. We may not know how it will play out, but we know it is coming. The “fear” is very much present. As, indeed, is the “pity”. We understand why Silver makes the decision he does, even if we don’t agree with it. The show has taken lengths to track the development of Silver’s ability to care and make himself vulnerable to others; we believe in his love for Madi, and understand why he believes that he is doing the right thing. Silver’s tragic flaw is that in gaining empathy his selfishness moves to encompass those he cares about; he will do dark things to protect them without consideration of their own choices or agency.  The finale of Black Sails is difficult, beautiful, and yes, tragic, but we end Silver’s story understanding and perhaps even empathising with the decisions he made, believing him when he says that “this is not what [he] wanted”.

 Tragedy vs redemption

John Silver’s story is a tragedy. And I believe that Jaime Lannister’s story is also a tragedy; a deeply flawed man who tries to escape the inevitability of an abusive and unhealthy relationship, only to eventually fall back into this cycle and become consumed by it. The problem is that this wasn’t the story we thought we were watching. The ending of Jamie’s character arc has none of the fear, none of the pity, none of the catharsis of Silver’s, because there was no signposting towards this end. If Jaime’s arc had been treated as a tragedy from the outset then perhaps it would have felt emotionally satisfying rather than rushed and unexpected.

Admittedly, as Jaime is not as central to Game of Thrones as Silver is to Black Sails, the show could not spend as much time detailing his inner world as Black Sails does to the latter. However, if the show had framed Jaime’s story with a sense of tragedy rather than triumph, then his decision to return to Cersei in season 8 would have had the same inevitability as Silver’s betrayal. In season 1 of Game of Thrones, as in the first instalment of A Song of Ice and Fire, Cersei tells Ned Stark that she and Jaime “are more than brother and sister. We shared a womb, came into this world together. We belong together”. However, the show doesn’t include Jaime and Cersei’s later, darker ruminations, that “we will die together as we were born together” (Jaime, ASOS), and “we will leave this world together, as we once came into it” (Cersei, AFFC). Jaime and Cersei’s doomed fate in the books is entangled in a way it never is in the show, and doubly so when you factor in the possibility of Jaime actively causing Cersei’s end due to the valonqar prophecy. In addition to this, if we had seen Jaime leave Cersei earlier in the narrative and then grapple with this decision, showing him struggling to be the man Brienne believes him to be and overcome his past actions, then his failure wouldn’t have seemed so out of the blue. With very little effort or changes on the part of the show, Jaime’s *entire* arc could have been framed in a way that would have made his death a tragically fitting end to his and Cersei’s story.

Jaime and Silver both end their respective narratives in very similar places to when they were introduced, or at least they do on the surface: Jaime unable to leave Cersei even in death, Silver alone and eventually chasing treasure (yes, Madi is still in the picture, but I don’t think we are meant to infer that their future relationship will be a trusting one). However, for Silver, this similarity is only surface deep, for we followed his growth and development and understand the tragedy of his choices. Although Jaime goes through a very similar pattern of growth, the framing of his arc as redemptive means that the unexpected nosedive into tragedy in season 8 doesn’t have the weight or impact that it intends, and we are left without understanding *why* he makes his choices. Jaime’s arc is a failed tragedy that doesn’t fulfil the cathartic requirements of the genre, but with a bit of reframing it could have been as emotionally resonant as Silver’s.

Long story short: watch Black Sails.

[lostinmirkwood]

Gendrya Kinktober Day 14- Strength/Muscle Kink

Call this a maple tree cause it’s full of sap. Find it on AO3 here.

The first time it happened Arya was 15 and Jon had dragged his roommate, Gendry, home for their first uni Spring Break. She’s sitting on the back porch reading Fahrenheit 451 for her honors Lit class soaking up the sun on the unusually nice spring day while Sansa sits in an adjacent lounge chair while working on a paper for her Civics class. The boys are in the yard playing footie when Jon calls for her to bring them some water. 

She stands and stretches her arms over her head before stepping into the kitchen to grab an armful of water bottles, dropping two for herself and Sansa before stepping down onto the grass. Robb, Theon, and Jon stumbled over to her, shoving each other as they approach. She hands bottles to Robb and Jon and lobs Theon’s at his head as he makes a crack about her being their team mom. Gendry is much more hesitant. He’d been quiet most of the week, likely overwhelmed by the sheer number of Starks and assorted friends constantly traipsing through the house. She hands him the final bottle with a shy smile, his eyes crinkling at the corners as he takes it from her. She watches as he cracks it open and downs it, his throat bobbing as he drinks the entire bottle in one go. Then, he lifts the hem of his shirt to wipe the sweat from his face, revealing his toned stomach and a smattering of dark hair across his broad chest. To her dismay, Arya’s face goes red before she quickly turns on her heel and bounding up the stairs and back to her chair to bury her face in her book to try and hide her blush. Sansa glances over with a single raised eyebrow but blessedly doesn’t say anything.

Arya doesn’t see him for a few years, long enough to have mostly forgotten about what she’d mentally dubbed “The Water Bottle Incident”. She’d decided to follow Jon to the University of Storm’s End and at the end of her first year was moving into an apartment off campus instead of returning north. Jon showed up at her dorm with a tall, dark haired guy to help her move, saying, “Arya, you remember Gendry? He has a truck so he’s helping,” before grabbing a box of books with the smaller box of desk supplies stacked on top of it and heading back out the door. Arya gaped at her brother before turning back to meet those blue eyes she remembered well. He had his massive hands shoved into the front pockets of his jeans and just sort of shrugged at her before he too stepped around her and hefted her minifridge into his arms as he too walked out the still open door. Arya had to shake herself out of her stupor, grabbing her duffel bag and last box to follow the boys out. That fridge had taken both her and her roommate to bring up to the room and she’d taped it shut because she hadn’t felt like removing the drinks and snacks still stashed inside it and he'd lifted it like it weighed little more than a bag of groceries. The mental image of his biceps flexing stayed with her for the rest of the summer.

When they moved in together she remembered the way his arms bulged as him and Hot Pie moved her furniture, how biteable his arse looked as he squatted to lift her heavy bookshelf. Years of watching him play footie with his mates without his shirt still thrilled her. Him carrying her home in his arms after a few too many drinks at the pub and the number of times he’d held her up against a door, a wall, or with her arms around his neck would still make her blush. He’d step up behind her and wrap his arms around her, reminding her of how small she was compared to this massive man she’d fallen in love with. One memorable weekend when they visited Davos and Marya and he’d lifted a dresser so Marya could retrieve an earring that had fallen behind it like it was nothing, all the while his back flexing and Arya hoping she wasn’t drooling. The way his shirts would stretch across his chest and shoulders and those jeans of his that would strain across his thighs made her hands itch to caress him. She loved to watch her gentle giant play with their nieces and nephews, to watch him pick the little ones up and throw them over his shoulder with no trouble, having several of them hanging off him at once while they played in the yard.

It wasn’t just his physical strength that attracted her either. It was also the way he’d dropped everything and raced to the Vale when Maya’s mom had passed, how he’d held his half-sister’s hand all through the funeral as she wept. How Bella would turn to him for advice and support and Barra would climb into his lap for him to tell her a story. That his friends would turn to him for a listening ear and a steady hand. It was the time he cried in her arms on the anniversary of his mother’s death when he realized he’d been without her longer than he’d had her. The way his rough exterior hid a gentle heart and a fire in his soul. Arya knew she could rely on him for anything, could tell him anything, share the darkest, ugliest parts of herself and know that he wouldn’t look at her with anything less than love in his eyes. He knew every inch of her, inside and out. Knew when she needed his physical strength and when she needed his gentleness. Knew when to fight for her, but more importantly, when to step back and let her fight for herself.

One day his physical strength would undoubtedly wane, time and age moving inexorably on. But that inner strength was his foundation and he would stand strong in there forever.

[notquiteaghost]

there isn't enough nonbinary jon sims content, here is... well i started writing this as headcanons but this is really a not!fic about nonbinary jon sims. it’s 3′300 words

it contains: nonbinary trans masc autistic jon, jongeorgie, lesbian georgie, trans guy martin & tim, trans woman sasha, team archives trans solidarity, and not-insignificant amount of internalised transphobia and references to misgendering & general cis people bullshit

(also ftr i am heavily basing jon's experiences here as a nonbinary autistic person on my own experiences as a nonbinary autistic person) (this is like 80% projection) (what else is fandom for!)

also on AO3 if you prefer your 3k of bullet points to have better spacing

tiny baby [jon] who knows she isn't very good at being a girl but doesn't have the words to articulate why

her grandmother thinks kids clothes should be durable and practical so even tho jon is not a kid who climbs trees or plays football, her wardrobe is exclusively straight jeans & 'boys' t-shirts & large jumpers

she keeps her hair roughly shoulder length because that's the length it's always been but strangers still 'mistake' her for a boy a lot. this makes her feel a way she again hasn't got the words for

when she starts secondary school she continues to dress 'masc', never starts wearing makeup, never gets any interest in dating, generally fills out the checklist for everyone else assuming she's a lesbian

she knows she's definitely not a straight girl, so she shrugs and decides sure, she's a lesbian. it's a moot point, mostly, seeing as even if she did have any interest in dating she's the only gay person her age she knows

but she does get involved in some community support stuff – she spends a lot of time in the library as a teenager, and one of the librarians is a lesbian who takes jon under her wing a bit

coffee mornings and book clubs and things like that. sixteen year old jon and a dozen queer women all in their late twenties at the youngest. they joke a lot how often they forget jon isn't also a thirty-something

(this is that autism feel of having no interest in your peers but getting on great with adults)

and then she goes to uni, and then she meets georgie

georgie is a Very Out lesbian. she goes to clubs, she's heavily involved in the lgbt society, she has a rainbow flag hanging in her bedroom window. yknow.

jon likes her a lot, and still isn't really sure if it's romantic or not, but assumes that's more due to being gay than anything else

(no one has told jon about asexuality yet)

so when, one night when they're meant to be studying in georgie's room but instead are mostly drinking shit cheap wine and complaining about their professors, georgie looks at jon with this soft look on her face and asks to kiss her, jon says yes

and then they date

they're both living in one of those massive student houses with a thousand bedrooms crammed everywhere and only a kitchen for a communal space. georgie has lived there since coming back to finish first year, and jon moved in halfway through second year after a somewhat disastrous flatmate situation

so after they graduate, moving in together seems like the natural progression of things even tho they’ve only been dating for two months

jon is still, when asked, identifying as a lesbian and using she/her, but is also still dressing what other people now call butch. she always feels kind of weird about that term, but again, just chalks it up to the mess of complicated feelings being a gnc lesbian does genuinely involve

and then, finally, jon meets some actual trans people

jon has, circumstantially, known trans people. thanks to georgie, jon goes to a lot of lgbt soc things, and is passingly familiar with most of the lgbt people on their campus

but there’s a big difference between nodding at someone when you see them in the library and having an actual, proper conversation about gender

so, jon goes to a lot of social events because georgie does. without georgie, jon would probably not leave the house except to go to work and to the library (jon is not doing postgrad. jon’s library habits do not particularly reflect this)

mostly at these events, jon sits in the corner and reads, and only talks to other quiet antisocial people, while georgie circles back periodically to report on her social butterfly escapades

and at one, one of the other quiet antisocial people is a trans guy

he’s called harry, and he asks about the book jon is reading, and after they’ve been talking a while he says, “sorry, you probably get this a lot, but what pronouns do you use?”

jon just blinks at him and says “what”

“well, i’m trans, so i’m always really cautious about assuming,” harry says, easily, and this does not answer the question jon was asking

jon.exe has crashed

she(?) eventually says, “uh. she? i’ve never– she”

and harry, who has spent the last forty minutes discussing dante with jon and is already sure they’re going to be friends, says “want the trans 101? you’re making a face like you need it”

three hours later georgie finally reappears with the intent to actually interrupt (she’s drifted past periodically, but jon was always deep in conversation with harry, so she left them alone) and get going, and jon gets harry’s email address and is then very quiet as they walk arm-in-arm back to their house

just as they turn onto their street, jon says, “i, ah. i think i might be trans?”

georgie, who has for the past couple months been having something of a crisis after realising she definitely loves jon but she isn’t in love and she can’t figure out why, says “oh thank god”

jon, very bemused, “that wasn’t the reaction i was expecting”

“i think we should break up,” georgie replies, and jon stops walking. they’re four feet from their front door, but it’s late, no one’s about, so georgie decides sure, they can have this conversation in the street

“you– because i’m trans?”

“i love you, i really do,” georgie steps closer, takes jon’s hands in hers, “but i’m not in love with you. and it was driving me crazy trying to figure out why, but if you’re not a girl–”

“i can’t tell if i should be offended by this or not,” jon says, somewhat dazed, “i’ve been trans for an hour, georgie, i don’t know if this is transphobic yet”

georgie laughs, and presses a kiss to jon’s cheek, and says “it’s nearly midnight, we both have work tomorrow, let’s table this for later. we can look up names and what word i should use when i complain to other people how you always leave your shoes in the middle of the floor when we aren’t both on the verge of passing out”

and that sounds reasonable, so jon nods, and kisses georgie on the mouth, and then they go inside

the next day jon stops by the library on the way home from work and checks out almost every baby names book they have. georgie comes home and he’s sat at the kitchen table making a spreadsheet

“you don’t have to make it this complicated, you know,” she says, hooking her chin over his shoulder to read what he’s already got. the spreadsheet has a lot of columns.

“it’s my name,” he retorts, and she hums agreeably, then points to ‘jonathan’, which has relatively few ticks in any pro columns (god, this nerd), and says, “isn’t that your grandfather’s name?”

it is. he doesn’t talk about his grandfather a lot – doesn’t talk about his family a lot full stop, but she knows, even though he died when jon was still a toddler, the stories his grandmother told had a significant impact

“my parents didn’t name me after anyone,” jon says, quietly

georgie nods. she doesn’t say they’re not here now to offer an opinion, because that’s far harsher than jon deserves to hear, and it’s not like she ever needs to remind him of it either. he’s definitely already beating himself up for taking so long to come to this realisation there’s no one left around to tell him how they’d have reacted

“i think it suits you,” she says instead, and jon nods, and then she moves away to make a pot of tea and some pasta (it’s technically jon’s night to cook, but she was anticipating coming home to find him already hyperfocused beyond the point of no return)

a week later, jon looks up from the spreadsheet to where georgie is curled up on the sofa reading and says “ugh, fine, you win, you were right”

(georgie hadn’t pressed her point any further, jon is just like that)

“jon?” she asks, and he makes an exasperated noise and nods, then closes his laptop dramatically and stands. most of his spine pops when he stretches

“this calls for celebration” georgie says, also standing, “franco’s or monsoon?”

“franco’s. i’m going to eat a pizza the size of a car”

so then jon is actually going by jon, and using he/him, and isn’t dating georgie anymore but is still living with her and spending most of his time with her and factoring her into all his major decisions

he talks to harry, and other (binary) trans people, and reads a lot of blogs, and after a few months gets a referral to charing cross gic

by the time he starts at the magnus institute, he’s had top surgery and has been on T for years, and passes as cis completely, and he doesn’t know how to articulate it but this is. bothering him.

he’s not exactly… he likes being stealth, he doesn’t need to flaunt his personal life. he can understand the impulse, but he doesn’t share it. his feelings about gender and romance are no one’s business but his own

but. everyone assuming he was a girl itched – being miss simms, georgie’s girlfriend, she, it felt like wearing a coarse knitted jumper. it was exhausting

and, for a while, everyone assuming he was a man was a relief. it didn’t make his skin crawl, it didn’t make him want to scream, it was nice. it felt good.

it didn’t feel right. but it didn’t feel bad, either, and jon has never been gendered in a way that felt right. he thought that was just part of being trans

except. he moves to london, and he starts at the magnus institute, and he wears shirts and slacks, and the long skirts and patterned dresses some of his colleagues wear keep catching his eye the way men in three-piece suits used to, and that terrifies him

he was lucky, in a way, having no family left to care when he transitioned – if anyone reacted negatively, he could just cut them out of his life, and his social circle was already queer enough that was hardly necessary

but that doesn’t mean he escaped internalising a whole swathe of shit about what being trans should mean and how he should act and what he should want and if he wants to wear skirts then is he even a man? was he making it up all along after all?

naturally, he deals with this by ignoring it. he’s a man, men don’t wear skirts, he doesn’t wear skirts, that’s that.

he manages to keep that up until he’s made head archivist, and he’s given three assistants who are all also trans

(he doesn’t know if elias did it on purpose. elias knows he’s trans, of course, because he’s never bothered to get the name on his diploma changed, but the way elias reacted lead jon to assume elias may also be trans. and if that’s true, then selecting only trans people for the archives staff feels like a kindness more than anything)

and, the thing about them all being trans, is even if jon and martin are both rather fond of being stealth, and sasha and tim aren’t used to being out at work, and none of them are exactly friends, they’re the only people who ever come in the archives, so the archives very quickly becomes the Safe Trans Zone

they all vent a lot about cis people. sasha will walk in and the first words out her mouth will be “the next person to ask me if i’d had the surgery is getting their own surgery when i cut their tongues out”, and tim will make a commiserating noise and offer her the pack of donuts martin brought in

so when, on one of the rare afternoons when jon leaves his office to lean against tim’s desk and brainstorm organisational system ideas, martin walks back from the break room upstairs with a scowl and says, bitterly, as he sits back down, “oh so when cis guys wear nail polish it’s inspiring and breaking down gender roles but when i wear nail polish, jenny from HR gets to side eye me and ask if that means i changed my mind, because surely i’m the one who’ll do that and not all the men who didn’t have to do hours of therapy to establish they are definitely, one hundred percent for sure a guy!”

tim and sasha both make the standard commiseration noises, and sasha says something about the supervisor at her last job trying to say it wasn’t appropriate for her to wear trousers, and jon stops listening and runs away moves back to his office

he hadn’t noticed martin is wearing nail polish, is the thing. or, he had noticed it, but he hadn’t thought about it, and now he’s thinking about it. he’s thinking about it a lot

martin had– martin is a guy. martin is definitely a guy, if something of a feminine-leaning gay guy, the kind of feminine-leaning no one ever questions in cis guys, and it hadn’t occurred to jon to question martin, either, even though he’s trans, and. and.

he’s still circling round a revelation he can’t quite make himself have an hour or so later, when martin sticks his head round the door

“you, uh. you alright?” martin asks, incredibly tentatively. it says a lot, jon thinks, about how nice martin is, that he’s asking even though there’s a 90% chance jon will tell him to fuck off “you kind of disappeared abruptly, earlier. i didn’t upset you, did i?”

jon stares at him for a long moment, then says, “can i see your nail polish?”

“oh!” martin’s cheeks flush, just slightly, as he steps inside the office and lets the door shut behind him “uh, yeah, of course. it’s a little chipped, now, but, yeah”

martin’s nail polish is a light, pastel blue. it’s neat, and even, though his nails aren’t that long, and jon thinks he remembers martin saying something about mostly painting his nails to try and get himself to stop biting them. jon’s never really gone for nail polish, but it’s. nice.

“it’s, uh. it’s a good colour, on you,” he says awkwardly. martin flushes even more

“oh, um, thanks? did– are you alright?”

if jon was a different kind of person, this is where he’d open up to martin, and this would be the beginning of them becoming actual friends

jon is jon, though, so he just shoves all his emotions back in the box they escaped from, nods, and says “i didn’t sleep that well, is all. not really up to socialising”

(an aside about s1 jonmartin dynamic: jon is very good at shittalking martin when martin isn’t around, but in the face of martin’s genuine care and concern, he defaults back to a far more friendlier tone than he’s aiming for. he knows, on a level, that he and martin could be good friends if he ever got his shit together, but that is something else he’s currently repressing. he doesn’t need friends! he isn’t desperate for social contact at all! what’s loneliness!)

martin says “ah, okay, i’ll just– i’ll leave you alone, then”, and then jon makes himself focus on work, and then when he gets home he opens the group chat he’s still, thankfully, in with the trans people who got him through his first gender crisis and sends ‘help i don’t know if i’m a guy after all’

three people immediately send back a link to nonbinary.org

and that’s the rest of jon’s evening

he reads through every article. he reads several articles multiple times. he opens several new tabs, and gets a notepad to make a list of books, and eventually remembers to reply in the group chat

a week later, he bites the bullet and writes an email to georgie

nothing long, just, they still tell each other about big life events

and then, another couple weeks after that, when martin brings him tea, he says, “ah, martin, could i– do you have a moment?”

“of course,” martin says, and lets the door swing closed again, “what do you need?”

“i, ah. this isn’t very professional, so, you don’t– you are perfectly welcome to say no, of course, but i. um. would you– come clothes shopping with me?”

(ideally, jon would have asked georgie, but as much as he loves her (still), they haven’t talked properly in years, and she is cis. the best cis person he knows, but still a cis person. and he’d just, rather have a trans person, for emotional support, and no one in the group chat lives particularly nearby anymore) (or, well, some of them are, but when he asked they all told him to get over himself and ask one of his ‘lovely’ coworkers)

(why does he ask martin and not sasha?) (well, dear reader, he is nursing the beginnings of a crush) (not that he knows it. but that’s absolutely what’s happening here. martin is sweet and lovely and jon definitely finds him annoying and overbearing. yes. nothing else. no other emotions.) (his chest feels all weird when martin smiles because he doesn’t like him. that always happens around people he dislikes.)

“oh!” martin says, surprised. “uh, yes, of course, is– is there an event or something…?”

jon takes a moment to stare at the wall above martin’s head before he makes himself say, “i. am non-binary, and i need– different clothes.”

“oh, god, have we been–”

“no, no, this is a, a very recent development. he is still fine,” jon says, quickly, then pauses, then adds, more haltingly, “i think. i might, if – they, as well, maybe? just, to see”

“of course. d’you want me to tell tim and sasha?”

martin, jon thinks, is maybe not all that bad “yes, please”

“cool,” martin smiles, “i’m free this weekend? for shopping?”

“this saturday would be good, yes”

and then jon and martin go shopping! it’s probably not that successful of a shopping trip, because it takes jon like four shops before they admit what exactly it is they’re looking for, but they go to several charity shops and have fun trying to one-up each other with the most ridiculous/inexplicable item of clothing, and at the end of the day jon has three skirts (a knee-length black a-line skirt, a full-length black skirt, and a full-length black skirt patterned with red flowers), two necklaces, and a skater dress they probably can’t get away with wearing to work, but they really liked the way the skirt moved when they spun

other things that happen include lunch at a cafe where the staff definitely think they’re on a date and only martin notices and also martin is dying, both of them only managing to walk past a secondhand bookshop twice before they cave and go inside, and then emerge half an hour later both holding three books (two poetry anthologies and a sci fi novel; a psychology book and two history books), and martin somehow talking jon into trying on skinny jeans and then, again, leaving this mortal coil

jon doesn’t buy the skinny jeans, which is for the best really

the first time jon wears one of the skirts to work, sasha does a victory lap around the archives because “hell yes skirts are so much more comfortable, and now you swish! tim you should get a skirt. skirts for archives uniform”

and jon is still a prickly antisocial bastard but now he’s an outly nonbinary prickly antisocial bastard, and sometimes they walk into the archives at 2PM smelling of tobacco and holding a bottle of vodka, and then the archives staff all do shots and dramatic readings of the most ridiculous fake statements, because sometimes that’s how you cope with cis people, and that’s! valid!

[coppicefics]

Masked Omens: Week Eight, Part One

[Image Description: Image 1 - A simple rendition of the Masked Singer UK logo, a golden mask with colourful fragments flying off of it. The mask has a golden halo and a golden devil tail protruding from either side. Below, gold text reads ‘Masked Omens’.

Image 2 - A page from the Celebrity section of the Capital Herald, dated 13th February 2021. Full image description and transcript below the cut. End ID.]

Read the fic here!

The Capital Herald - Saturday, 13th February 2021 Celebrity section, page 18

Top: “Informants come to me”: Carmine Zugiber on front-line successes Tips, troubles and truths about writing headlines abroad - and now making headlines at home When working in a war zone, most people wear camouflage and try to keep their heads down – but not Carmine Zugiber. The successful war correspondent is one of the most recognisable journalists in the world, and that's even more true after her recent unmasking on The Masked Singer UK. I sat down with her to discuss her work, her brand partnerships, her passions and her fears – if, indeed, she knows the meaning of the word 'fear'. “I don't, really,” she laughs, “people have said that about me ever since I was a little girl. My mother absolutely despaired – she always wanted me to be safe at home playing with my dollies, and there I was climbing trees and falling out of them. I was always in the middle of fights, even then. So I suppose it was only natural that I'd drift towards war reporting.” But not everybody encouraged Zugiber to follow her dreams. “When I told my tutor at uni that I wanted to work on that side of things, he tried pretty hard to steer me back towards something a little safer. The politics beat, or entertainment, or fashion. I've actually been covering politics for the last month or so, as a colleague is on leave, and I have to say, that can feel pretty cut-throat! But I knew I wanted to see the world and get right to the heart of the action, and I'd like to think I've achieved that.” Zugiber has certainly made her mark on the headlines, covering conflicts in countries including Eden and, more recently, Celestan. “I just think it's important to take as unbiased an approach as possible and really tell the stories that are coming out of – well, especially a situation like Celestan. It's a complicated sort of conflict, and you never know how things are going to pan out. And sometimes being a journalist can feel like having a target painted on your back.” And Zugiber's signature red hair must stand out somewhat – does that make her more of a target? “I make it work for me, honestly. Informants come to me of their own accord, which is handy when everybody else is frantically chasing leads! Having done my share of broadcast journalism, people all over the place recognise me and there's a sort of built-in trust. It's flattering, really, and it's just a matter of making sure that trust is justified.” Zugiber has long been an ambassador for the Vibrant brand of hair dye – leading some to question her objectivity as a reporter. “Yes, I've heard that, but unless Vibrant starts a war, I don't think it's an issue. Clearly my editors and the press watchdog agree, because I've had no complaints from on high. And it's a product I genuinely believe in and use all the time, so why not?” Zugiber's most recent departure from the newsroom was even less likely to conflict with her usual work. What drew her to The Masked Singer UK? “I was asked if I wanted to take part in the show at about the same time that a colleague announced that she'd be taking some leave around now, and my editor suggested that I might like to take over her post for a while to get a broader range of experience. It seemed like perfect serendipity. I didn't want to be bored, hanging around in London for months – I'm used to travelling a lot – and the show sounded like a lot of fun. I jumped at the chance to make people smile for a change. Unfortunately, as a war correspondent, that's not something I often get to do.” Zugiber admits that she had mixed feelings as she got on the plane back to the UK. “Oh, yeah, definitely, it was a hard decision. With the situation unfolding in Celestan, which is becoming more complex by the minute, a big part of me felt like I should stay and keep working on the story there. But funnily enough, that story has followed me right into the Politics section, and it's looking increasingly likely that some sort of diplomatic solution might be reached. And the break has been really good for me – I needed to remember how to lighten up and be silly, and The Masked Singer is definitely silly! So ultimately it was the right decision for me.” And now, with The Masked Singer UK behind her, what's next for Carmine Zugiber? “The Masked Singer was a lot of fun, I really enjoyed it. And the response from the audience has been overwhelmingly positive. I loved the secrecy, but it's a relief that the truth is out now! I'll be staying in the UK, covering for Uriel [Scrolle, News World Weekly's Political Correspondent], for a little bit longer, and then in a couple of months I should be back out on assignment. No rest for the wicked!” BOGDAN PIGTON [Image Description: A picture of Carmine Zugiber’s face, in her motorbike helmet, with part of the village of Tadfield visible in the background. End ID.] [Caption] ROCK AND ROLL: Carmine Zugiber, pictured here outside a Labour party campaign meeting in Lower Tadfield, Oxfordshire, often uses her motorbike to keep up with subjects on the move. Her iconic scarlet look has led to her gathering something of a cult appeal among her viewers and readers. Photo: QuiteUnlikely.net

Centre left: ConStellation boots web star Wytchfynder host removed from astrology event Popular YouTuber Sergeant Shadwell was thrown out of the Greater Dyvyn Conference Centre last Sunday after trying to attend ConStellation. ConStellation has been the UK's largest convention for astrologers ever since its foundation in 1994. In 1999, the convention expanded to include practitioners of other divination techniques such as cartomancy (tarot card reading) and tasseomancy (tea leaf reading). The convention has been dogged by controversy throughout its history, with critics claiming that the 'con' of the name stands for more than 'convention'. Sergeant Shadwell, through his Wytchfynder channel, has long been committed to investigating the claims of fortune-tellers and paranormal practitioners such as those who attend ConStellation each year, and in several cases he has denounced claims of psychic ability as completely and demonstrably fraudulent. It is, then, perhaps not surprising that he is completely banned from ConStellation, which according to its website is 'intended as a safe and welcoming place for practitioners and interested parties to share their appreciation for, and knowledge of, the unknowable'. Sergeant Shadwell himself, however, does not seem to have been aware of the blanket ban. Witnesses to the scene on Sunday reported that the YouTuber could be heard arguing with security all the way to the doors of the building. When reached for comment, the organisers of ConStellation issued the following statement: 'A man was removed from the ConStellation event on Sunday morning after attendees expressed concern that he might be attempting to create an 'exposé’ on their work by manipulating footage of the convention. The man in question is known to the convention organisers, and a decision was made to ask him to leave. Calls for the man to be searched for recording devices were not enforced, and the man eventually departed with minimal fuss. The convention otherwise proceeded without incident.' Sergeant Shadwell was not available for comment, but a video on the Wytchfynder channel on Tuesday mentioned the incident in passing. 'All right, I just want to say thanks for all your comments, you don't need to be worrying about me. I did go to a convention this weekend, but not for anything to do with the channel, I was just planning to meet up with a friend. Well. We've been exchanging texts, I thought it might be nice to meet in person. And we did, after the convention, so. Not a total waste. Anyway, about this haunted castle-' Speculation is rife about the identity of Sergeant Shadwell's alleged friend, with some The Masked Singer UK fans pointing out that fellow The Masked Singer contestant Marjorie Potts - better known as TV's Madame Tracy - was one of the key speakers at Sunday's event. Shadwell is far from the first person to be escorted out of the Greater Dyvyn Conference Centre by security; earlier this year, three women were removed from a panel at DivaCon after starting a food fight. Several other attendees had their weekend passes revoked and were allowed to leave under their own power. But whether Sergeant Shadwell was there this weekend to meet a friend or conduct an investigation, it's probably best that he choose another venue; he's unlikely to be welcome at ConStellation any time soon. SCUZZ FISHER

Centre- and lower- right, advertisement: [Image description: A microphone on a stand, against an orange background. A pair of Union Jack printed Converse hi-top shoes cover the lower half of the image. The microphone/background image is credited to Jon Tyson on Unsplash, while the shoe image is credited to Nick Fewings on Unsplash. End ID.] The British Inquisition Book now www.brianthames.co.uk/british-inquisition Brian Thames “Nobody expected this!” [4 stars] The Capital Herald.

Bottom left: Masked Cat out of the bag? Did a Pam & Sam guest let the big secret slip? Did Rose Montgomery really just admit to being the contestant known as Black Cat in the current series of The Masked Singer UK? It seems almost impossible; surely a contestant would be more careful when taking part in a show like Pam & Sam AM. But people do make mistakes, and Pam & Sam does air live. Let's look at the evidence. Appearing on the show to advertise her upcoming show, Notes and Measures – which promises to be part cooking show, part mixology class, and part vineyard tour - the celebrity chef was asked if the rumours surrounding her participation in the competition had any truth to them. “Well, naturally, I can't tell you that,” Montgomery told her hosts with a knowing smile, “there are all sorts of NDAs involved.” I don't want to jump to conclusions, but several of the previous weeks' clues seem to have hinted at Montgomery's involvement. For example, in week five of the competition, Black Cat's clue package included “if they take note of my performance, they'll finally get the true measure of me” (emphasis mine) – while Montgomery's show Notes and Measures was still just a distant speck on the TV scheduling horizon. And in week six, Black Cat was shown on CCTV with a daisy – and Daisy, like Rose, is a popular flower name. Is Rose Montgomery Black Cat? We'll find out tonight. GRESHAM PENDER

[End of transcript]