guy who definitely wants to do the right thing:

There’s a fic on fanfiction(.)net that I’ve kept tabs on for years to see if it’s been updated or not. While I’m no longer even in the fandom it’s written for, it just has one of the greatest storylines I’ve ever read. Last time it was updated was 2011.

The other day, I decided to reread the entire thing and leave a very in-depth review of what I thought of each chapter. I also mentioned how I started reading it when I was 13 and am now 21, but always came back to see if it was ever finished because I loved it so dearly.

Today, said author sent me a private message saying that her analytics showed that the story was still getting views even after all these years, but no one ever bothered to leave reviews other than “update soon!!!”, so she never felt motivated enough to finish it. She said that me reviewing every single chapter with lengthy paragraphs made her cry and meant the world to her. She also mentioned that she felt encouraged to write the two remaining chapters needed to complete the story and that she would send me a message the night before she updates the fic.

I’m literally sobbing. I’m so excited :’)

Please always remember to leave a review when reading fanfiction!!! It means a lot to a writer.

This is an intriguing question. Right now, signs point to necromancers not being the beauty standard - at least not as they really are.

Gideon's magazines depict them with "necromantically uncharacteristic cleavage" rather than as they really are, in order to make them more attractive.

Necromancers who skew more robust than average - Judith, who can run a ten minute mile, and Abigail, who only has a hint of a necromancer's build, tend to get more favorably described.

Ianthe and Coronabeth look alike except for Ianthe's necromantic thinness and pallor. Coronabeth is widely considered exceptionally beautiful, while Ianthe is not.

Ianthe herself confirms this isn't just the Gideon filter. When Augustine compliments her, she says "You should see my sister." When Mercymorn says she isn't as goodlooking as Cyrus, she says "It's like being home with Mummy." Ianthe regularly talks about what a beautiful bimbo Corona is and how she looks great doing things, while Corona only ever compliments Ianthe on her mind. They agree Ianthe will look even peakier in white than Babs's corpse. Even Palamedes confirms - he tells Nona the things she likes about Crown (pretty hair, big breasts) are things most redblooded people like.

i’m very curious about beauty standards and potential fatphobia in the nine houses in relation to necromancers vs cavaliers. I would imagine that since necromancers are the more powerful members of society, they would become the standard for what’s considered most attractive, but we also see them being described as not only thin and petite but often almost sickly (depending on who’s describing). are there fat or large necromancers experiencing crazy levels of dysphoria because they’re surrounded by waifs? and for house citizens that are neither necromancers or cavaliers, are there social pressures to be thin in order to align more with necromancy ie appearing in god’s image? or perhaps cavaliers with their physical prowess are considered to be the ultimate beauty standard? i want to do a deep dive in the books specifically for beauty/appearance related language. especially because if it seems that there is social pressure to appear more like a necromancer, it’s yet another example of john accidentally recreating pre-resurrection prejudices and attitudes even as the framework for those attitudes is completely destroyed. (shoutout to john gaius for ruining literally everything almost 100% of the time)

I don't think so. Aiglamene is mentioned in Harrow Nova - she praises Harrow for standing "like a monument" while criticizing Ortus. Harrow's father sounds like the worst bully - Gideon has to intervene to stop him whipping her.

Think about Harrow's AU Bubbles

Thinking about Harrow's AU bubbles, not as fanfic references, but as expressions of her subconscious fears and desires, is so fascinating.

The Harrow Nova one is pretty obvious. Harrow's parents were obsessed with her being a necromancer, were willing to kill for it. It's only natural she'd wonder, "What if I hadn't been?"

And the answer Harrow gives herself is: Your parents and everyone would reject you (except, wildly, for Crux). Also they'd be alive cuz you'd never opened the tomb, and you'd be an unpopular orphan they'd abuse (Just Like Gideon). And you'd still be just as devoted to serving the Ninth with a blade. There's a lot there. But the other really telling bit is her relationship with Gideon. Harrow Nova professes to hate the reverend daughter even as she seeks to (re) create the necro-cav bond with her. But that hatred doesn't seem to be mutual. And the bit about the daughter intervening when Harrow was whipped…

That's Harrow's subconscious saying if their roles had been reversed, "Gideon would have treated me better than I treated her. Gideon would have protected me."

The Ball AU also seems like a reasonable extension of Gideon's childhood query: "What if my other parent is the most important guy in the universe?" Answer: Emperor Dad would throw a big party.

But also… it's a bride-finding ball! That's so very telling. It could have been anything, but Harrow invents another scenario where she's fighting, competing to get to Gideon, to be awarded the role of her sworn partner (first cav, now bride), while outwardly claiming not to want it.

Now The BARI Star AU often gets described as a "coffee shop" one, but it's actually set in a cohort cafeteria. And normally I wouldn't split hairs over that, but I think the cohort setting is actually really significant. The Cohort was Gideon's dream, and also Harrow's rival for Gideon's attention. It's what she kept trying to leave Harrow for.

So now Harrow dreams that she's left Drearburh to join the cohort and will meet Gideon there. Not fight or compete for a role where they're bound to each other, but just meet her there. That feels like yielding. Like compromise. It makes me think Harrow's subconscious has matured past trying to keep Gideon with her always and is instead looking for ways that SHE can be with Gideon. Meet Gideon where she is.

(Also this may be a stretch, but I always find it low-key funny that Harrow imagines Gideon in the cafeteria… I like to think her brain is skimming lists of hypothetical military jobs like... what sees the least action... ah, coffee-adept, she'll be perfectly safe there...)

This is so wonderful! I love Harrow's face so much!

(͜ !͜ ) o{}×××[]::::::::::::::::::::::::>

BIG ASS + SWORD

<Reblog to get a sword.> o()xxx[{::::::::::::::::::::::::::::>

The princess told me that she had felt for a long time that the Cohort movements didn't make sense to her. She said what would be most economically productive was intermingling with these people, allowing immigration and absorption into the Nine Houses; that shepherd planets got more costly the further the Houses extended themselves, and that instead of creating long-lasting industry we were doing little more than slash-and-burn trading. Scattershot, she said. Notwithstanding the moral issue. She said she and her sister had always been interested in the way the Houses were being run, and that lanthe had encouraged her interest. She had always thought we were being wasteful... Afterward she said it was much more than theory. She said she had groomed herself for something and all it had done was make her unfit for the purpose. What purpose? ... I told her she wouldn't understand. When she asked me why not, I said I was just an administrator; she was a princess. A king. ... The princess turned to me then and took my hands. I kept my balance. She said, Jody, if I offered you that sword, wouldn't you take it? I know how to use it. I know what it would mean. Lieutenant Dyas is dead. My own necromancer wouldn't have me. Won't you let me be your cavalier? Here, now, at the end of the world? Save me, Jody. Bind me to you, or who knows where I will go? What throne will I mount, if you don’t bind me down?

- As Yet Unsent

“But we’re closer to the goal than ever before.” “Of course we are, you perfect genius,” said Crown, lovingly, and she took the dead gloved fingers, and she kissed them. Every single dead soldier’s fingers twitched. Prince Ianthe Naberius raised hers, an involuntary movement almost, and that waxen, handsome face was an expressionless mask, with only the cool grey eyeballs moving in their sockets. Then Crown said quietly, “We can do good work, Ianthe. I know people who need us.”

-Nona the Ninth

- The Unwanted Guest

Corona recoiled from Gideon and looked up at her, her golden hair smeared to her forehead with sweat and tears. “She took Babs,” she said, which seemed fair enough. But then Corona started crying again, big tears leaking out of her eyes, her voice thick with misery and self-pity. “And who even cares about Babs? Babs! She could have taken me.”

-Gideon the Ninth

Emphasis mine, excuse my dreadful formatting I'm just excited because every time we learn more about the Tridentarii's schemes I remember again how Coronabeth (Crown) wants to be eaten and knighted and bound, but also possibly be god-king of the universe, allegedly on the grounds that Jod's forever war is morally bankrupt and economically likely to lead to bankruptcies.

it’s in the small gestures (keeping her things like a lover)

WHAT HOUSE ARE YOU: UPBRINGING EDITION

if you were a military brat you are SECOND

if you or your parents live in outfit world you are THIRD

if you were in the foster care system you are FOURTH

if you attended a lot of dinner parties as a child and/or grew up rich but your parents are not academics, lawyers, or doctors, you are FIFTH

if your parents are academics, lawyers, or doctors, you are SIXTH

if you have a hereditary disease, you are SEVENTH

if your parents were uber-religious, you are EIGHTH

if you grew up in a cult or otherwise had an especially grim childhood, you are NINTH

if none of the above apply then THE EMPIRE IS OCCUPYING YOUR PLANET

More Jod Bullshit

Oh hey, anybody notice how when Harrow confesses to Jod that she broke into the tomb that “somebody else helped me build it” is the absolute worst possible argument for “I know for a fact there’s only one way to get in there”.

And it’s Anastasia! He killed her cavalier right in front of her. She’s literally the worst possible person for him to pick as a partner for such a personally sensitive construction project. There’s just no way John “there’s no such thing as forgiveness” Gaius could ever trust her with something so crucially important to him after that.

So why does he say that?

He’s doing the same thing he did when Harrow confronted him about *cough* Ortus the First *cough* and his constant murder attempts where he neglects to mention that the person who ‘convinced’ Ortus that Harrow was a threat to his life is, in fact, himself and that he absolutely could call him off at any time.

He’s saying something that is true - because he has to be a good person, and good people tell the truth. If Harrow doesn’t understanding what he means, then that must be her fault, it couldn’t possibly be his.

When he says “I built that tomb with Anastasia” he wants Harrow to hear “the quasi-mythical founder of your cult helped me build the tomb” so that her fanaticism will lead her to ‘realize’ it’s impossible to break into it. But that’s not what he means.

He doesn’t mean with as in together, he means with as in out of.

Anastasia couldn’t bypass the blood ward, she’s not his daughter and she didn’t have his blood. At least I don’t think there’s any indication anywhere in the text of either possibility being true.

So how are her bones inside of the tomb at the end of Nona the Ninth?

Because Jod put her there. She’s the lock on the door, ready to roll the rock back should anybody ever manage to do the impossible and make it inside.

What he’s actually saying is “I knew I couldn’t trust her anymore, so I made her into bricks and mortar before she could betray me and sneak in a back door while I wasn’t looking.”

Do you ever think about Pyrrha’s loneliness, when she would wake up surrounded by the empty bodies of her living friends being autopiloted by her dead friends’ souls? And she had to pretend to be dead too. Just standing there idly, reacting to danger only? Waiting for Gideon’s soul to return and to take the control back, not knowing what would happen if she was discovered? Oof

OH WOW this is horrifying (positive)

Running into Mercymorn with her old eyes and she looks like Mercymorn, but actually it's just the empty shell piloted by whatever is left of Cristabel. Playing living statue. Waiting to disappear again.

I think about this especially in the early days, like, before Pyrrha realised what was going on and was able to be more "present" even when G1deon piloted. I think it took her centuries, if not more, to reappear to the surface. What if early on she WAS just a defensive shield who gained awareness bit by bit, and every time she got shut off it was like dying again?

Think about Harrow's AU Bubbles

Thinking about Harrow's AU bubbles, not as fanfic references, but as expressions of her subconscious fears and desires, is so fascinating.

The Harrow Nova one is pretty obvious. Harrow's parents were obsessed with her being a necromancer, were willing to kill for it. It's only natural she'd wonder, "What if I hadn't been?"

And the answer Harrow gives herself is: Your parents and everyone would reject you (except, wildly, for Crux). Also they'd be alive cuz you'd never opened the tomb, and you'd be an unpopular orphan they'd abuse (Just Like Gideon). And you'd still be just as devoted to serving the Ninth with a blade. There's a lot there. But the other really telling bit is her relationship with Gideon. Harrow Nova professes to hate the reverend daughter even as she seeks to (re) create the necro-cav bond with her. But that hatred doesn't seem to be mutual. And the bit about the daughter intervening when Harrow was whipped…

That's Harrow's subconscious saying if their roles had been reversed, "Gideon would have treated me better than I treated her. Gideon would have protected me."

The Ball AU also seems like a reasonable extension of Gideon's childhood query: "What if my other parent is the most important guy in the universe?" Answer: Emperor Dad would throw a big party.

But also… it's a bride-finding ball! That's so very telling. It could have been anything, but Harrow invents another scenario where she's fighting, competing to get to Gideon, to be awarded the role of her sworn partner (first cav, now bride), while outwardly claiming not to want it.

Now The BARI Star AU often gets described as a "coffee shop" one, but it's actually set in a cohort cafeteria. And normally I wouldn't split hairs over that, but I think the cohort setting is actually really significant. The Cohort was Gideon's dream, and also Harrow's rival for Gideon's attention. It's what she kept trying to leave Harrow for.

So now Harrow dreams that she's left Drearburh to join the cohort and will meet Gideon there. Not fight or compete for a role where they're bound to each other, but just meet her there. That feels like yielding. Like compromise. It makes me think Harrow's subconscious has matured past trying to keep Gideon with her always and is instead looking for ways that SHE can be with Gideon. Meet Gideon where she is.

(Also this may be a stretch, but I always find it low-key funny that Harrow imagines Gideon in the cafeteria… I like to think her brain is skimming lists of hypothetical military jobs like... what sees the least action... ah, coffee-adept, she'll be perfectly safe there...)

?) Harrow read enough of Gideon's magazines to pronounce some "very nasty" so saying she picked up basic tropes/ premises from there definitely tracks

??) Maybe some fics are considered classic literature & included in a standard house curriculum. And yes, Ortus draws inspiration from these.

???) Harrow's dreams reflect her authentic thoughts & fears and it's just a coincidence they resemble what we think of as fanfic tropes.

So I like kind of mentioned this in a previous post but like. It’s weird?? Right?? That when Harrow re-constructs the bubble over and over again at the start of HtN Act V she does 1) role-reversal AU 2) Arranged marriage AU 3) Coffee shop AU. Because those are FANFIC TROPES. (The arranged marriage AU being especially unhinged to me because she doesn’t even know John is Gideon’s dad at that point!! Her brain had to come up with “what if Gideon were royalty omg??” ON ITS OWN.) And like the fanfic-ness always was insane bc of course yeah that makes sense from a Doylist perspective, ie, Taz Muir’s an author notable for her inclusion of internet humor and culture, and she has personal experience with fanfic. But it didn’t make sense on a Watsonian level because sure, Harrow’s clearly a Romantic, but this isn’t a genre language that I think Harrow naturally speaks. Harrow doesn’t read smutty romance novels!!! She’s a repressed little nunlet obsessed with bones, her only options of sexual interest in her adolescence being 1) GIDEON 2) a corpse she views as holy and sacred— no really safe options for exploratory crushes or sexual experimentation here. So how is she thinking in fic/romance tropes? Either A) Harrow is significantly less repressed than everything I’ve ever read about her would lead me to understand, B) fic tropes are so transcendental that the agonized, wounded, thrice-haunted mind of Harrowhark Nonagesimus could, in its death throes, find itself in this specific genre of text she has no personal reference for, or C) according to the Sex Pal Theory of Permeability, Harrow has gained an understanding of romance tropes via soul osmosis, from Gideon/Alecto/Wake/Palamedes during the bubble visit???, and that explains why she dreams in fanfiction. I’m going with option C. Thank you Unwanted Guest for solving this little mystery for me 🙏🙏🙏

Ok minor detail but ...

So I noticed in A:TLA, and it’s carried over in LoK, that Airbenders always seem to have an advantage in a fight. And at first, it felt like plot armour, particularly in A:TLA.

But when Aang fought Bumi, he lost most of that advantage. And I realised that this wasn’t just plot armour. Someone had sat and worked it out: nobody has had to fight Airbenders for generations. 

None of the other nations have had to train to face them, or practised sparring with them, or anything. Apart from Bumi, no bender in the show has ever even met an airbender before Aang comes along. And in LoK, for the most part people still haven’t. We never see fights between those who have (for e.g. we never see Tenzin and Lin fight); when Korra and Tenzin use airbending, its a unique fighting style that people aren’t trained to manage.

It’s a really small detail, and it fundamentally works to give the heroes an advantage (and make up for Aang’s young age and lack of combat experience), but I love how it’s an advantage in combat for completely logical reasons.

The detail in these shows is amazing. 

Honestly pokemon is the ideal universe not just because there’s cute animals that are your life companions, but because they have walkable cities and adequate biking infrastructure

I want to continue pushing my 'Magnus Quinn wasn't actually a terrible swordfighter' agenda.

Obviously, he wasn't on the same level as professional duelists Babs or Pro, or soldiers Marta or Jean. He was a guy who did some kind of fencing in high school and then picked it up again in his 30s, presumably with some degree of seriousness.

When Gideon joins the other cavaliers in the training room, Magnus and Jean are sparring. He jokes about how badly Jean is beating him, but he must have some degree of competence for aspiring soldier Jean to find him worth training with. Babs then mocks him for getting beaten by a teenager and Magnus jokes, describes himself as "absolutely no good", and praises Jean's abilities...before giving Babs such a death glare he gets obviously embarrassed.

It's worth bearing in mind that there's some degree of tension between the Third and the Fifth. Babs will have know Magnus since he was small and has almost certainly seen him fight before. But the Fifth, their relationship, and the relative freedom that Magnus has to not be a perfect fighter (because his necromancer values him as a human being) is clearly something that rankles the Third. In TUG, when Ianthe talks about Babs, she explicitly references Abigail and Magnus. And what's interesting is that she makes a comparison not just between Abigail's husband-with-a-sword and her perfect tool to be moulded and used, but also to Corona's aspirations to swordcraft:

IANTHE (Playing a card) She’s not here, so let me be fully honest, Sextus: my sister is not a swordswoman. She loves to wear big boots and wave a sword around, and she looks wonderful doing it, but her actual competence … well, put it this way: she’d lose to Magnus Quinn.

PALAMEDES Magnus Quinn was a cavalier primary.

IANTHE No, I mean Magnus Quinn now.

There's...a lot...to unpack here: the comparison of Corona to the husband-cavalier is intriguing in and of itself on a psychosexual level, as is the contradiction between Ianthe and Corona's own versions of Corona's competence. But Palamedes' response is also interesting, suggesting that Magnus was up to an acceptable standard for a cavalier, which Ianthe's joking response seems to back up.

So Babs' rudeness towards Magnus and Jean may have a lot to do with the internal dynamics of his own necromancer-cavalier relationship and not necessarily be an accurate reflection of Magnus' abilities.

Likewise, Judith's comment in the Cohort Intelligence Files that the Fifth is 'undoubtedly chagrined" to have "schoolboy fighter" Magnus representing them had to be read against the fact that we know from the Sermon on Necromancers and Cavaliers by Second House stooge M. Bias that the Cohort has a very low opinion of unranked "social cavaliers". And Judith Deuteros may have her own reasons for being disdainful of a cavalier who is so...cavalier...about his intimate relationship with his adept.

Magnus' own self-deprecating comment on his ability is:

"I didn’t get to be cavalier primary due to being the best with a rapier. I’m cavalier primary only because my adept is also my wife. I suppose you could say that I—ha, ha—cavalier primarried!”

But again, there's a difference between becoming cavalier primary because you're the best sword fighter and getting up to a vaguely competent level once you've become cavalier primary (guys in their 30s with high powered jobs tend to be scarily into their hobbies...) He is definitely the worst cavalier there (or would be, if Pro were actually alive), but on a general standard he probably isn't as terrible as people like to joke.

Another important bit of context here is that all of his comments about his own ability occur in the context of Corona trying to get him to fight Gideon. The shy, silent 18 year old from the cult planet whose practice of cavaliership is generally acknowledged to mostly consist of carrying buckets of bones.

She gets paired with Magnus because they assume she's not going to be much of a fighter and Magnus - neither a professional duelist nor a soldier - would therefore be the fairest opponent. Magnus is clearly uncomfortable. And Gideon is certainly Intimidating. But when you consider that most of his previous interactions with her have been trying to coax her out of her shell and clearly feeling rather sorry for her, his comments take on a bit of a different tone.

Does Magnus worry Corona has dragged along this poor kid out of interest or curiosity, and that she's going to be humiliated and never want to interact with them again? As Corona says “Come—Gideon the Ninth, right?—why don’t you try Sir Magnus instead? Don’t believe him when he says he’s rubbish. The Fifth House is meant to turn out very fine cavaliers," Magnus is politely dissembling, telling exactly the sort of jokes that would appeal to a teenager.

As everyone else mocks or is intrigued by Gideon's knuckle-knives, Magnus is trying to look her in the eye through her sunglasses, bewildered that she doesn't know to take off her robes or glasses to fight and then...suddenly realising that she is dead serious and perhaps he has dramatically underestimated her.

After his defeat, we hear him saying to Jean "I'm not quite that out of form, am I?". Gideon's abilities were totally unexpected: she severely tests a top duelist like Babs, and Magnus is surprised to be beaten in three moves. That suggests he's been holding his own rather more comprehensively in previous sparring.

And while he certainly wasn't up to Gideon's standard, he may have managed to draw his sword before Cytherea took him out...