Appreciation post for the Hephaestus crew using the word 'boat' to refer to spaceships

Ep9 The Empty Man Cometh

EIFFEL: Unfortunately the good folks at Goddard Futuristics spared every expense when they put together this boat. [referring to the Hephaestus]

Ep23 No Pressure 

EIFFEL: The power and the support systems on this boat do kinda have a rocky relationship… [referring to Lovelace's shuttle]

Ep27 Knock, Knock

MINKOWSKI: I don't trust anyone on this boat right now. [referring to the Hephaestus]

Ep29 Pan-Pan

LOVELACE: Believe me, kids, right now I'm up for killing everything and everyone on this boat. But I promise the grid is down. [referring to the Hephaestus]

Ep30 Mayday

EIFFEL: Eiffel's Action Plan #1: turn this boat around, get back to the Hephaestus. [referring to Lovelace's shuttle]

Ep42 Time to Kill

EIFFEL: And we're sure our little lifeboat can survive the three hour tour? [referring to the experimental module]

Ep61 Brave New World

MINKOWSKI: Miss Young, you're going to go up to the bridge, you're going to get me flight capabilities, and then you and Kepler are going to get the hell off my boat. [referring to the Sol]

Since the exchange reveal was today, I can finally cross-post this here.

“A Working Relationship” Sci-Fi AU, Artificial Intelligence, Secret Histories, Intrigue, Finding Your Place (and getting a crush on your android boss)

__________

“I don’t care how smart he is, you’re not putting a Jin on this ship!”

His first reaction is a flush of anger. The second is a barely-smothered explosion of laughter.

In all the insults he’d borne over his parentage in his lifetime, this had to be the first time in… well… ever that it was his father’s side being disparaged.

But when he peeks around the corner and sees who’s arguing with the Admiral, he immediately understands why.

The speaker is a perso-core droid.

Meng Yao has no illusions about the treatment of the droids custom-ordered by the ports his father owns. He’s even met some of them, when they came to drop off another meagre payment to his mother. Delicate, beautiful dolls designed for little more than to be stared at… or played with.

Easily broken, and just as easily replaced.

His still healing ribs give a throb. He can relate to the feeling.

He can use it, too, he realizes, a plan coming together in the back of his mind as he watches the pair bicker.

“Excuse me.”

They both turn at the sound of his voice, and the droid’s eyes narrow, photoreceptors and the light patterns decorating his body briefly shading closer to red than their usual pale green. He’s reasonably sure that if that long dark hair and silver skin weren’t synthetic, he’d be bristling like an offended Firenian Raptor Cat.

It’s an uncomfortably attractive look.

He immediately squashes that thought, then bows, carefully emphasizing the stiff discomfort of the motion. “I apologize for causing any discord. It’s true that my father is Jin Guangshan, but I have no association with the company, nor the ports that it owns.”

“You approached him for work two stationary cycles ago,” the droid says, voice tinged with suspicion.

He had been made aware his background had been searched from the moment he’d been identified as a Jin, however, so he is ready for that. “My late mother desperately wished for me to join the family business. His, of course, not hers. But visiting him has proven to be a mistake. It’s clear now that my father has a very similar opinion of his illegitimate children as he does his droids.”

He opens one of the side panels of his flight suit to show off the bruises that still prominently mottle his skin despite two visits to a medical ward he could afford.

It’s the briefest flicker-flash, a barest twitch of synthetic musculature that most people wouldn’t notice on a human, much less a droid. But the reaction is there, and he can feel the emotional shift in the air as the droid and the Admiral look at each other, the argument between them now silent instead of snapped.

After a few moments that surely feel longer than they actually are, the droid makes a noise that would have been a huff from anyone with lungs and turns away. “One full planetary rotation,” he grumbles, then stalks away down the hall.

If the droid means the planet they’re currently in orbit over, that’s thirty days by the timers in the ports. “Is that to be my entire billet?” he asks cautiously, not wanting to let it sound like a complaint.

Admiral Nie shakes his head. “Probationary period. If Sang-er declares you a fit for Baxia’s crew by then, we’ll re-draw your contract for a more formal position.”

“You value his opinion very highly,” Meng Yao says, careful to keep his tone neutral, lest the Admiral think he’s probing.

Which he is, but-

“As well I should. He's been serving with our ships since before I was born, after all; he knows the fleets inside and out down to the last fastening and half-byte of data."

Something about the way the Admiral says that lingers in the back of his mind even as he’s herded down to the ship’s infirmary to have his ribs properly treated. It’s hardly uncommon for the owners of a particularly well-made droid to brag about them, but to his ear it sounds… odd.  

Less like an owner pleased with his possession and more like a younger brother proud of his elder.

He’s finished settling into his cabin, what few things he owns unpacked and stowed away, when something twigs in his brain.

Sang-er.

It couldn’t possibly be what he’s thinking… could it?

---

The first week of Meng Yao’s temporary new job starts with a surprise and ends with a realization.

Given his prior experiences with employers and Sang-er’s clear dislike of him, he braces himself for the bottom of the heap and jobs like cleaning over-boiled acid out of engine cells. Instead, Sang-er puts him through a mentally grueling -and yet actually somewhat satisfying- examination of his skills, then unceremoniously shoves him straight into financial work.

Tracking numbers and allocating data has always been something he could do in his sleep if he so wished; though he doesn’t exactly let his mind wander, the tasks are easy enough that they allow him space to observe.

He wasn’t wrong, he decides, in pegging the relationship between his human boss and his mechanical one as being something akin to siblings.

Which really only lends further credence to the theory his other observations are steadily building.

Observations like how Sang-er is simply too advanced for a perso-core droid. He sifts and sorts information, skimming star maps and calculating alterations via hard-light illusions generated from his own body, and does it all with a speed and ease that should have overtaxed him a hundred times over. Small-droid cores simply aren’t designed to hold or process that much information that fast.

But a ship’s core, on the other hand…

When he’d been small, a friend of his mother’s had dreamed of one day leaving and joining the Qinghe fleets, drawn by the near legendary status of Nie Zhuyun and her ship Huaisang. A captain so sharp and daring and a ship so clever and nimble that people claimed she had somehow bonded her mind to the core to make them a perfect symbiosis.

How many of the tales his mother’s friend told were true were arguable, but what had been true was that when the Wen Chancellor had finally succeeded in his near singleminded obsession to have the ship destroyed, its core had never been found in the wreckage.

Nie Mingjue had said that Sang-er had been serving the fleet since before his birth, but that didn’t mean it had always been in the same body.

And then there is the second most important observation: Sang-er never leaves Baxia.

He’d been unsure about that one at first. Even though they are docked, most of the crew remain onboard a good portion of the time. But after a few days of watching, it has become clear that while even the Admiral occasionally goes out into the port for one bit of business or another, Sang-er stays on board at all times, sometimes with some gentle but pointed reminding on the Admiral’s part.

As if the droid is being purposely kept hidden.

And he can guess from whom. His father has a very good business relationship with Wen Ruohan; even though the ship is docked in a port that isn’t directly owned by the Jin family, there’s a fairly large presence of both Jin and Wen contingents. If he’s right, and Sang-er really is a reconstruction of Huaisang’s core-

He stiffens, then reaches out to stop the flow of numbers he’d been monitoring.

When he had gone to that first medical ward… there had been…

He closes his eyes and sucks in a sharp breath, then lets it out slowly.

"There a problem?" a nearby officer asks.

"No, sir. Just needed a moment for the eyes," Meng Yao says, and then gets back to work.

---

His thoughts nag at him for the rest of the designated day hours and follow him into his bed that night. They’re still plucking at his nerves the next morning, annoying him enough that he barely touches the breakfast he would have gladly stolen -maybe even committed violence to get- from a rich man’s table not too long ago.

If he's right, then he has inadvertently picked up some information that would be extremely valuable to the Admiral and Sang-er.

But to use that information, he will have to do something he absolutely despises.

Tell everything.

There is no safety in full disclosure. Keeping things close to his chest had been the only way he’d survived the arduous journey between the port he’d grown up in and the central hub where his father resides.

But Sang-er has already proven very capable when it comes to checking up on those he does not trust. If he withholds anything that he overheard, and Sang-er finds out he’d done so, then being ousted from the ship is probably the best thing he could expect.

And… he... likes it here.

It’s hard to admit that, even just in his own mind. He’s only been employed on Baxia for a week.

And yet something in his heart just settles at the idea of staying here in a way he can’t remember feeling in years. The Admiral checks up on his wellbeing. His other crewmates treat him as his station befits. He’s comfortable in the jobs he’s been assigned. Even Sang-er -for all the droid’s aversion to him- judges his work fairly and takes his opinions into genuine consideration. Comparing the crew he’s found himself with to the tittering sycophants who’d taken such glee in watching his father reject him-

He bites his tongue to stop the flow of bitterness before it becomes overwhelming and clouds his thoughts.

The point is that, for the first time in a very long time, he has found himself a place he does not want to give up.

If that means having to lay all his cards on the table, then… then fine.

He reaches a point in his tasks that he can safely pause for lunch, but instead of going down to the dining hall, he goes looking for Sang-er.

---

After more than a little unsure wandering and some eventual directions from a couple of helpful crewmates, Meng Yao finds the droid in question in one of the small-ship hangars, surrounded by a star map and several of their scout pilots.

For a moment, his breath catches in his throat.

In the dim lighting of the hangar, Sang-er's eyes and the geometric designs decorating his form glow brighter, mingling with the reflective light of the illusory stars against silvery skin. With one fingertip, he draws flight paths and points of interest, directing models of their ships less like he is ordering soldiers and more as if he is conducting dancers.

It’s hard not to stare, and in that moment he understands better some of the particulars of the information he’s about to relay.

Drawing up his nerve, he straightens his back and approaches the knot of people just in time for the lights to come back up and the star map to vanish into the palm of Sang-er’s hand. A couple of the younger scouts wave to him, drawing the droid’s attention in his direction.

“Please excuse me if I’m interrupting anything, but may we speak in private?” he asks quickly, before any potential judgements can be made.

Sang-er regards him silently, expression completely neutral, then tilts his head in acquiescence. “You’ve all got your assignments,” he says to the scouts. “See you in fourteen days.”

“Yes, sir!”

“Follow me,” Sang-er says as he turns on his heel, and Meng Yao obeys.

Their destination turns out to be the hangar manager’s office, or what would have been the hangar manager’s office if they didn’t have Sang-er. The doors close behind them with a swish and click, but Meng Yao barely hears it over his own heartbeat.

He swallows hard as he watches the droid lean against the desk.

Okay.

All cards on the table.

"Wen Ruohan knows that you're Huaisang."

Sang-er doesn’t flinch or stiffen or show any other reaction that would give away a human but, like their first meeting, Meng Yao feels the subtle shift around them. "Interesting. And you've come to this conclusion because…?"

It’s not an outright denial. No automatic accusations of wild imaginations or delusions or… anything like that. Just a quiet demand to show his work, like the evaluations before. Meng Yao can’t help but find it oddly soothing for this to be treated as nothing more than a basic report despite the severity of what he’s revealing.

“There’s a specific medical ward in the district of Koi Port that most of the residents pretend doesn’t exist. At the time I was… dismissed, it was the only one I could afford to visit. One of the other patients there was complaining that a job for the Wens had been taken from him and handed over to shifters employed by the Jins.”

That gets a visible reaction as Sang-er’s hands clench on the edge of the desk he’s leaning on.

It’s an entirely understandable response. Shifters are the worst of the worst when it comes to orchestrating and carrying out the theft of high-end droids, and their services don’t come cheap at all. For someone like Wen Ruohan, who already has so much power of his own, to enlist them from another company…

Well, the implication is clear.

“Go on,” Sang-er says, and Meng Yao doesn’t fail to notice the tension that’s entered his voice.

“He didn’t specifically describe the target, but he did mention it was aboard the flagship of the Qinghe fleet, and that the backer had ordered it to be captured fully intact, or else. No offense to any of the other droids here, but there’s no one other than you who could possibly garner that kind of demand. And no other reason why Wen Ruohan would make it.”

“I see.” Sang-er’s expression still hasn’t changed, but the words are decidedly even more clipped. “And what price would a Jin expect for information like this?”

There’s the suspicion that he’s been waiting for.

All cards on the table, Meng Yao reminds himself for what may be the tenth time. Or the twentieth, he admittedly has lost track. If he doesn’t remain honest now, he stands to lose everything.

He allows himself one more nervous swallow before answering. “I don’t know… probably something obscene, honestly. I want to be extended to a full contract.”

“And?”

“That’s it.”

Sang-er blinks at him, unable to catch the surprise from flickering across his face quickly enough, though it’s quickly schooled away. “That’s it,” he repeats, arching one eyebrow disbelievingly.

“You’ve already given me nearly everything I was looking for when I originally went to meet my father. I want to keep that,” Meng Yao says. “The rest… I will come to terms with eventually.”

There’s no immediate response, and the silence stretches uncomfortably between them as Sang-er appraises his words and everything else. It’s hard not to squirm under the stare.

Then Sang-er’s expression visibly softens, and the sight nearly knocks the wind out of him, it catches him so off guard .

Oh, that’s just not fair.

He quickly recovers, standing straight as Sang-er pushes himself away from the desk and walks past him.

“Well, come on, then,” the droid says, and he absolutely does not shiver at the new warmth in his voice.

“Where are we going now?”

“To give my recommendation to Mingjue and have you moved to more permanent quarters. And then we will start planning to deal with this new development.”

We will start planning, he says.

Meng Yao finds he very much likes the sound of that.

https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13534569/1/Return-of-the-Survivors

Summary: Alternate Universe- What if Anakin's mother survived and Anakin never went dark side. Padme has the twins on Tatooine and survives. Anakin tries to help the surviving Jedi, while still keeping his family secret. Meanwhile Darth Sidious has been crowned emperor and is going after the remaining Jedi. Rumors have it he's looking for a new apprentice. Anakin gets to be a daddy.

I've added chapter 63 of Return of the Survivors. Below is a small selection. Please click the links to read more.

Chapter 63 - The Master, the Knight, and the Apprentice

“Alright Han, the ground crews are signaling us to land in the big hangar.” Chewbacca informed his co-pilot.

“Where?” Han asked.  “Never mind, I’ll just follow the kid.  He’s landing in the Royal Air Field.”

“Grr…It’s what I said.” Chewbacca growled under his breath.  It was a pain sometimes, having to talk to someone who Shyriiwook was a second language for.  Sometimes Chewbacca suspected Han had been taught it by the same street moles who’d taught him his manners.  He was limited to mostly the emotive howls of the main language.  None of the technical words of Thykarann made any sense to him.

“What’s wrong buddy?  Think of how happy Lukey will be.” Han said.

And Chewbacca couldn’t be mad at Han for long.  Not when he looked up to you with those big, pup-blue eyes.  Chewbacca playfully rubbed his head.  The boy made him proud today.

Earlier, when they’d both left Yavin IV, they had every intention to fly to Christophsis to deliver their cargo, but somehow the decision to do so still weighed heavily on Han’s shoulders.

“What’s wrong?  You know that boy’s a good pilot.  We taught him well,” Chewbacca tried.

“I know.  It’s just this Giant he’s up against.  The empire can’t be defeated by a little resistance party.  But I know Luke.  He won’t pull out of there until that station goes boom, or he gets shot down trying.  If that happens, I don’t know if I could live with myself.”  Han continued adjusting the ship’s coordinates.  “But you know what’s worse.  If they do shoot him down, not enough to kill him, but you know, just enough to take him out.  He’ll still have to watch that station destroy Alderaan.  You know, his Father and Sister will be on that planet, don’t you?  Lukey would never forgive himself.”

“Then forget about the cargo.  Let's go help our boy.” Chewbacca growled and started readjusting the coordinates.

“I’m on it!” Han said.  “Wait…”

“What’s wrong?” Chewbacca yowled.

“That deal I made, for the cargo back there.  I kinda had to sign a contract.”

Chewbacca threw his arm and yelled.  “A CONTRACT!  DO YOU LEARN NOTHING?”

Han put his hands out to pacify him.  “I know.  Contracts, bad,” he spat. “But it was the only way to get in on this deal.  It’s for a lot of credits, plus, if we make this delivery by the cargo’s sell by date, it’ll lead to more jobs.”

Chewbacca growled.  “How long do we have?”

“At this point, it’s either or.”  Han looked timidly at him.

“And what happens if we don’t deliver?” Chewbacca questioned.

“If we don’t deliver it, we’ll be seen as breaking contract and stealing their cargo.  We’d be lucky if they don’t issue a bounty on us.” Han winced.

“So, it’s Luke, or the contract.” Chewbacca stated.

“I know, I know.  If they issue the bounty on us, we’ll be back to smuggling.  No one decent will hire us.  I know you wanted to make the credits to free your people,” Han said.

“My people’s hearts are as strong as the Wroshyr Tree.  I will free them one day, but friendship is more valuable than any credits.  I’ll let you decide.”

Han hung his head.  In a few seconds he lifted it and started again at the coordinates.  “We’re going to Alderaan.”  Chewbacca smiled, knowing he’d finally taught the boy something.

When they landed on Alderaan, Chewbacca and Han ran off of the Falcon.  Luke was disembarking his ship as well.

A crowd had gathered.  They pointed up at Luke’s X-Wing and whispered to each other.  Looks of awe followed.

Luke climbed down and smiled big up at Han.  “You came back! I knew you’d come back! I just knew it.”

“Well, I wasn’t going to let you take all the credit, was I?” Han quickly disparaged.

“Luke, Luke!” Leia ran up and threw her arms around her brother.  Han looked away.

Anakin came running out a moment later, followed by Obi-Wan and Yoda.  They each took a turn hugging Luke.

“We owe you our thanks too,” Anakin turned to Han when his turn with Luke was over.

Han nodded and didn’t look up.  “I was just in the area, and decided to see how things were going.”

Chewy hit Han on the back and growled, “You’re our friends, and we don’t let friends fly alone.”

Han glared up at him.

Anakin laughed.  “Well, thanks.  You two are friends for life.”

“Oh no!” Luke’s shout pulled their attention back.  It seemed the ground crew was pulling the astromech droid from Luke’s ship.   R2-D2 was clearly damaged...

babyfaced

Summary: A bet gone awry forces Killian to get rid of his beard for a month. going beardless makes him look significantly younger; but the clock turns back on more than just his face. | rated T; 2.2k words

dedicated to @xpumpkindumplingx​ who told me to “do the thing” and @thesschesthair​ because this is either up her alley or the exact opposite of it.

A/N: just a bit of a crack fic inspired by this post (and the fact that Colin O’Donoghue is a freaking baby face when he shaves), but plus magic—because it’s Storybrooke and we can. header image taken by @lillpon.

Killian sighed heavily and stared at himself in the mirror, committing his face to memory. He ran a hand over his well-maintained scruff, relishing the feel of it against his palm for the last time for the foreseeable future.

“C’mon, Killian—it’s just a shave,” David shouted from outside the restroom at Granny’s.

It was a stupid bet, which of course Killian, in all his cocky arrogance, had taken Dave up on. And it was just his dumb luck that David would have the best darts game of his life and Killian his worst.

So now Killian had to shave off his beard and remain bare-faced for a month. (A month that was typically biting cold and he was always grateful for the bit of a barrier his beard provided.) He hadn’t gone without a beard since...well, not since he was capable of growing one. And there was a reason for that.

But he was nothing if not a man of his word, so with one last caress of his beloved stubble, he picked up the shaving implements he’d been provided with and set to work.

Although he had to send a disparaging glare at the can of shaving foam, labeled as Baby Face Shaving Cream. It was already mocking him. But at least Granny kept straight blades on hand, so he was able to complete the task at hand with some familiarity—even if it meant the result staring back at him was anything but.

Head hung down, he finally emerged from the lavatory to his waiting father-in-law. He could already hear David snickering.

“What, trying to hide? Come on—give me the full view.”

Killian gripped the can of shaving cream so hard he thought it might burst as he huffed and shifted his weight between his feet. “Must I?”

“Unless you plan on looking at the ground for the next month, then yeah.”

Best just get it over with. “Fine.” And he lifted his head to look David straight in the eyes.

It was simultaneously amusing and embarrassing the way Dave’s eyes grew wide at the sight. “Wow, you weren’t kidding—you really do look 10 years younger. Or a hundred and ten, or whatever.”

“No, I wasn’t. So please get all your infant jokes out now.”

David gave all he could in that department on the short walk back to the dining area, and had wrapped them up by the time Killian slumped into the booth next to Emma. He was back to trying to hide his chin and keenly felt the sensation of all eyes being on him, which just made him want to melt into the vinyl cushions even more.

As much as could be said for his leather jackets and kohl, that beard was part of the armor he used against the world, in addition to helping give him a commanding appearance. Without it, he felt much like a lost youth again, and oddly naked.

But then Emma’s hand was on his (very smooth) cheek, turning his face towards her. He heard her hitch her breath and that drew his attention, finally forcing him to look back up. She was studying him intently, and brushing the back of her fingers across his bare skin. Her brow was furrowed and to his surprise, he couldn’t tell why.

“Is it alright, love?” he asked quietly; if she hated it, then the deal with Dave was off.

But then a smirk took over her features. “It’s adorable,” she gushed, much to his consternation; he hung his head yet again. “No, Killian—come on,” she protested, and pulled his chin back up. “It’s different, but a good kind—it’s like seeing you in high school or something.”

“See? I look like a teenager. This is ridiculous.”

“I think you look very sweet, Killian,” Snow said from the other side of the booth, but that didn’t help much.

“Exactly,” Emma agreed. “You are a softie, Killian Jones, and for once, you look like it.”

He did have to admit: the way Emma couldn’t keep her hands off his face did have a perk, and she seemed to enjoy peppering his smooth cheeks with kisses (he also conceded that it felt nice to have her lips right against his skin). But the stares and smirks from everyone else meant it was going to be a long, long month.

------------------------

With the way his facial hair grew, he had to shave at least twice a week to maintain a satisfactory level of clean shaven-ness. Granny had let him keep the shaving cream they’d found at the bed & breakfast, even though she herself wasn’t sure how long it’d been there. At least it had a nice, clean scent, and seemed to take decent care of his skin, if the way Emma continued to caress his face each morning was anything to go by.

Although one day, a week or so later, she did narrow her gaze on him. “Have you been using my eye cream?” she asked.

“No; just the normal facial moisturizer,” he answered.

“Huh; must be something in that shaving cream, then, because your crows’ feet aren’t as deep.”

He shrugged; he knew there were plenty of ways of reducing the appearance of age in this realm with proper skin care, so it was to be assumed that once he started doing the same, it might have some affect. “I’m sure it’s only temporary, then, as you give me abundant reasons to smile every day.”

She just grinned and kissed him.

He did notice, though, that as time went on, his beard didn’t seem to fill in as much as it used to. It was mildly concerning, but he figured it just had to do with the fact that he was starting over from square one every time it began to regrow; once the month was up, it would return to its normal level of thickness.

A couple weeks in, he wondered if he might even be shaving too often, when red bumps began to appear on his chin; it reminded him of the zits he would get in his adolescence. God, he would probably blend in with the high schoolers, between the lack of beard and appearance of acne. At least he had his chest hair to rely on.

But—was it just him, or was that looking a little thin, too?

Perhaps he was just seeing things. Perhaps he was just tired, too—he found himself feeling rather...vigorous lately, which had led to some late nights with Emma. (Several.) Usually, she was the insatiable one, calling him “old man” and other teasing endearments, but for once, he had more stamina than her. 

“You’re not taking Viagra or anything, are you?” she asked, breathless, one night.

“Taking what?”

“Never mind.” (Even if she didn’t have another round in her, she still couldn’t keep her hands from his chin. Maybe this wasn’t so bad.)

With the extra energy in his system, he started to spend more time on his ship, and even took up running. It was giving him a leanness he hadn’t had since he was a lanky lad, and did lead to some oddly timed naps, but mostly just left him hungry.

“Are you sure everything’s okay?” Emma asked after he polished off far more of a pizza than he normally did.

“Aye, love—perfectly fine,” he assured her, though her worry was causing the same in him. “Why?”

“I don’t know; it’s like...with your face looking so much younger, all of you seems to be a little younger.”

His brow furrowed at that—but at the same time, he knew it was fairly impossible. 

Still, the idea lingered, as well as the sense that he’d somehow disappointed Emma. He found his mood changing on a dime during the last week of the terms of the bet, at times feeling depressed and lonely, and daring and joyous at others. It nearly gave him whiplash.

He sought once to calm his nerves in a glass of rum but, oddly, couldn’t stomach it like he used to.

It was while having a conversation with Emma and David at the station and his voice cracked that he finally realized something was amiss.

“God, you even sound like a pubescent teenager,” Dave teased, but Emma immediately became concerned.

“Okay, something weird is definitely going on,” she said, then came over to assess him. “Do you feel different anywhere? Did someone hit you with a spell or something?”

Suddenly feeling annoyed, he shrugged her off and stepped away. “Bloody hell, no! I don’t know what’s happening. I just know I’m emotional and have too much energy and it feels like everyone hates me and—”

He was cut off when Emma pulled him into a hug—quite possibly one of the best feeling hugs he’d ever had, and he immediately sank into it. “That better?”

“Aye,” he said into her shoulder.

“Sometimes, you just need a hug. It helps Henry.”

He rolled his eyes, but was glad she couldn’t see it. “Yeah, but you’re not my mum.”

“No; it still helps though.” She pulled away. “Can you stay here while I go check something? Make yourself a cocoa, okay?”

“Okay,” he muttered. She placed a peck on his cheek, gave her father an oddly angry look, then headed out.

“What was that about?” Dave wondered aloud.

Killian just shrugged. “I dunno. Want cocoa?”

“Sure.”

They shared a mug (Killian may have doubled up on cocoa packets in his) and were chilling on the couch when Emma returned, holding a vial. “What’s that?” he asked, standing, as she came in.

“Stand right there and don’t move,” she commanded. “Dad, come over by me.”

Both guys did as asked, and Emma popped the cork on the vial. Carefully, she put a tiny amount of the powder inside in her palm.

“Okay, brace yourself, Killian.”

“For what?” he complained, but it was too late: she’d blown the powder his way.

He winced when it hit him, then a tingling sensation took over his body, leaving him a bit sore—but somehow also feeling more normal than he had in weeks.

He blinked when the prickling feeling dissipated and looked back at his companions; Emma was smiling and David, for some reason, looked upset. 

“Hey, it hasn’t been a full month yet!” he protested. Killian reached up to brush his hand along his jaw; his beard was back.

“What did you do, love?” he had to ask; he thought she liked him cleanshaven?

“I was right; you were literally aging backwards,” she said. “That shaving cream? Turns out it had some magic in it that turned back the clock. If you’d used it any more, you probably would have started to get shorter.” 

“Bloody hell,” he cursed. “So I really was a teenager?”

“Yeah.”

“Damn.”

David was looking very sheepish off to the side, especially when Emma leveled her gaze at him. “So thanks for putting my husband in high school, Dad.”

“Sorry!” he said quickly. “I had no idea; I just wanted to see what he’d look like.”

“Well, maybe next time, don’t put such a ridiculous time limit on your bets, okay?”

“Yeah, yeah,” he agreed, though the way he was curling in on himself let them know he was genuinely sorry.

“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go have my way with the MAN I married—not the BOY,” she said pointedly, grabbing Killian’s hand and leading him from the station. They didn’t pause to see David’s reaction, but it was easy to imagine.

“I’d say that was fair punishment, Swan,” Killian quipped as Emma led them down the street toward their house. 

“Oh, definitely,” she giggled. “But I wasn’t kidding. I need to have you when we’re both on the same level.”

“I think I can handle that.”

(He couldn’t. Apparently, aging nearly 20 years in one day was draining.)

The next morning, he shuffled down to the kitchen to the smell of pancakes and bacon, and the sight of Emma cooking. He sidled up behind her, like he usually did, and buried his scruffy chin in the crook of her shoulder, tickling her and making her laugh.

“Still feeling okay?” she asked as she flipped the pancakes on the griddle.

“Aye; back to my old self. A fact that I don’t think I’ll ever take for granted.”

“Good.” She moved the pancakes off the pan and onto the plate, then turned off the stove. She turned in his embrace and quickly placed her hands on his cheeks, scratching through his scruff. “Mm, I missed that,” she hummed.

“Yeah? You seemed to have a thing for a clean face, too,” he replied.

She shrugged. “It had its novelty, definitely, and it was kind of nice to see what you looked like before life happened.” He swallowed; he hadn’t thought of that. He’d definitely seen pictures of Emma as a youth, but obviously, there weren’t any of him. “But now you look like the man I fell in love with again, so please don’t let any stupid bet or spell change that, okay?”

“I’ll do my best, love, as long as you do the same.”

“It’s a deal.”

“Actually, might I propose something else?” he added.

“What’s that?”

“I’d quite like to see what it’s like to grow old with you.”

Emma grinned, crinkling the skin by her eyes and around her mouth. “I would love that.” 

------------------------------------

thanks for reading! tagging some friends: @kat2609​ @optomisticgirl​ @shipsxahoy​ @amortentia-on-the-rocks​ @mryddinwilt​ @cocohook38​ @annytecture​ @wingedlioness​ @word-bug​ @distant-rose​ @wellhellotragic​ @welllpthisishappening​ @let-it-raines​ @pirateherokillian​ @its-imperator-furiosa​ @fergus80​ @killianmesmalls​ @sherlockianwhovian​ @effulgentcolors​ @laschatzi​ @ive-always-been-a-pirate​ @nfbagelperson​ @stubble-sandwich​​ @killian-whump​​ @lenfaz​ @phiralovesloki​ @athenascarlet​ @kmomof4​ @ilovemesomekillianjones​ @whimsicallyenchantedrose​ @snowbellewells​ @idristardis​ @scientificapricot​

                                      THE AUTUMN NARNIAN GIFT EXCHANGE.

                                   for @blueandnoah  by  @kadmeread .

THE PROFESSOR’S GRANDSON.

What has changed in England for Caspian:

Caspian and Edmund are friends at school, well maybe friends is a strong word for it, especially with how Edmund had been acting recently. He had been all sulky, and looking for a fight constantly. Caspian couldn’t stand it. It was a relief when Edmund went away with his family, sent away more like. But then he was stuck, in the Blitz, and soon it got too much and he too was sent away, his favourite aunt (not that that said much) turning away with barely a glance, as he headed out to his grandfather’s house.

His grandfather had long told him stories of a magical land called Narnia, and golden apples. He had loved them when he was younger, imagining flying on Fledge with his Aunt Polly (who he only knew from his grandfather’s stories she had died before he was born) and talking to the Talking Beasts. His real aunt had found him talking to the cat and told him not to listen to his grandfather’s stories. Animals couldn’t talk. And that was the end of the Narnia stories.

Arriving at his grandfather’s house led to a surprise, his grandfather had mentioned taking in some boarders during the Blitz, but he didn’t realise they were the Pevensies. They looked…different. As in they had a new shine to their faces. Edmund especially had changed, the sullen look on his face had gone, and he looked at others in the eyes now. The Pevensies were constantly whispering about something, stopping as soon as he came near.

One night he woke up, noticing the lack of one of the two boys he was sharing a room with. He went to investigate, watching as Edmund came out of a room. Looking visibly distraught. He stayed hidden and watched as Edmund went back to bed before going into the room Edmund had been in. There was only a wardrobe with fantastical designs on it. He looked closer, before jumping with a start as a hand landed on his shoulder, he looked up at his grandfather who was staring wistfully at the wardrobe.

“All in good time, my boy, you’ll find what you’re looking for in good time.”

But what happened here? He silently asked, What changed you all so much? What gave Peter that command, and Susan that tact? Why does Lucy have such a wide smile now? And why does Edmund know who he is, and what he wants now? What gives you this look of something long lost? What happened here?

Instead of asking any of these questions he silently nodded, and went back to bed. The mystery left unsolved.

Time goes on and he gradually get used to these new, mature Pevensies. He becomes closer to them but knows they are still keeping something from him. Soon it becomes time to go back to school for the Pevensies, he himself is going to follow along a little later, after spending some time with his grandfather. He watches them leave knowing that the change will be noticed, and not just by him.

He turns and opens the door, only to find himself in a completely different world.

Sometimes all it can take to do something new is to just open the door. He had been told that at some point, but he truly was finding it out then. He remembered the Pevensies and their whispers of “Narnia” that he had dismissed as fantasy and knew. He was in Narnia, the place his grandfather had watched be created, and the place that had changed the Pevensies so much.

And the Pevensies:

They still went to the Professor’s house and still failed to believe Lucy at first. They still went into the Wardrobe that fateful day and found themselves in Narnia. However when Edmund had still been close friends with Caspian he had once told him stories of Narnia. Edmund knew more than he let on. He knew about Aslan and the Witch, and still chose to go with her, This made his betrayal worse in a way. Yet he still returned, and used that knowledge for good, being the one who in the end destroyed the Witch’s wand.

Once returned they weren’t able to be as open about Narnia. Caspian was there, and he knew something had changed. They snuck out to look at the Wardrobe, and whispered conversations about their other life. Caspian suspected.

Then they were at the train station getting whirled away in a rush of magic, not knowing where it would take them except back, back, back.

And what has changed in Narnia (Caspian):

Caspian knew where he was instantly and he felt he was prepared. His grandfather’s stories had always stuck in his head. He just needed to look for the Talking Beasts. He couldn’t believe it, he was in Narnia! The Narnia of the stories he had grown up with. It was all a fairytale world to him.

He was disillusioned soon enough.

And the Pevensies:

They still found themselves in a destroyed Cair Paravel, and were still distraught over what had happened to their home. They still saved Trumpkin and showed off the skills they had learnt during their reign.   They still journeyed until Lucy saw Aslan, however things changed here. Edmund knew the stories still, and he also knew what had happened last time he ignored them. He knew of his greater betrayal and forgiveness, and he stood up for what was right. He stood by Lucy and then told her to lead them on. The others followed annoyed, until they had safely crossed the river. There they saw Aslan, and there he told them that they had “More friends than you think” In Narnia with them. They continued on to join the rebellion against Miraz, who although the rightful Telmarine King, did not treat the Narnians well. There they found whom Aslan had selected King, an old friend, who was indignant over the treatment of the Talking Beasts he had grown up hearing about their wisdom. His grandfather had known the first King and Queen of Narnia and was a Lord of Narnia,  he was descended from Narnian Nobility. He was the rightful King of Narnia as much as Peter or Edmund.

Many discussions took place that night about their stories. The changes that had happened. And they could see the changes in Caspian too. He was the Aslan ordained King here, not just Caspian form school, or the Professor’s grandson. His aunt wasn’t here to put him down, and the stories were all true. They fought and beat Miraz, the castle raid was avoided as an unwise decision by all involved. There were no personal reasons to do so after all.  

The duel still happened and it was still Peter who challenged Miraz, as Caspian was still considered a nobody by the Telmarine nobility and even they had heard of High King Peter the Magnificent. The battle still happened and in the end the Narnians won with the help of Aslan whom Caspian finally got to meet.

Caspian knew him not only from the stories but from the dreams he had dreamt of him since he first heard about him. He told Caspian that he had called him for a reason and that was not like the Pevensies to go back to their world after righting the wrongs in Narnia, but to rule.

The Pevensies left and Caspian was left behind. This time though he was busy, and although he knew he wouldn’t see Peter and Susan again in Narnia, he knew he would still see them again, and he hoped Edmund and Lucy would visit again in his lifetime.

The Pevensies landed on the station as the train came for them. They knew they would need to send a letter, or perhaps call the Professor to explain Caspian’s disappearance.

In England:

Edmund missed Caspian at school, especially now he had changed. He made new friends and explained away Caspian’s disappearance with a “He’s gone to live with his grandfather” but none of that stopped him from missing someone who understood.

As Susan drifted away from them he missed him all the more. He needed someone connected but not, and he couldn’t have someone. He tried with Susan, but when she went to America and talked of their silly games he knew they had lost her.

Then they were at their Aunt’s with their cousin and he was teasing them about Narnia and the painting was overflowing and there was a Narnian ship. Then there was Caspian diving from the ship to get them, and he had grown, but Edmund still recognised him, of course he still recognised him, he was his best friend.

Aboard the Dawn Treader:

Caspian felt it was odd seeing Edmund and Lucy barely changed when it had been 3 whole years. He was as old as Peter now. Yet there they were a year older and he knew there was a time difference, after all it had been hundreds of years when they came back the second time.

And then there was their cousin, he only had to hope that Narnia affected Eustace as much as it had Edmund. Eustace was a real piece of work, but he had learnt much from his years as King, and he knew what Eustace meant when he talked about the navy and steamships.

That didn’t mean he would put up with Eustace disparaging Narnia and it’s ways however. They might not be what he’s used to but that doesn’t mean they’re bad.

The voyage upon the Dawn Treader goes much the same. Caspian had heard of these Lords and that Miraz had sent them away for not supporting him. He had decided to get them back and go on a quest like the Pevensies had, and his grandfather had. This was his chance to make a mark, other than being the King who came from another world.

They travel and make mistakes, they still get captured by slavers, and Caspian talks them out. Eustace still gets turned into a dragon for his greed, and he still becomes a better person because of it. Not much changes with Caspian coming from another world, except, once they reach the end of the world.

Caspian wants to join them, to see his grandfather again, to see the world he came from again. Aslan still talks him out of it, and the Pevensies (+ Eustace) still leave without him, with the added knowledge that he wouldn’t get to see his best friend again.

And so they carry on with life, Edmund with the Friends of Narnia in England always aware of the one missing from their midst, and Caspian continuing to rule Narnia, when he dies he gets to scare of Eustace and Jill’s bullies yes, but he also gets to see his grandfather, and Edmund one more time before going to Aslan’s country, where he knows they will join him someday.

And when Jill is thrown into the stable and sees all the Kings and Queens and Lords and Ladies of Narnia before her, she sees King Caspian the Voyager, with his arm around King Edmund the Just and Lord Diggory’s hand on King Caspian’s shoulder. She had heard the stories, and she knows that they are all, finally home.

A.N: This was so much fun to write! It is not something I would ever have come up with on my own, but I had so many ideas, I just couldn’t fit them all in. I hope you enjoyed it @blueandnoah as much as I did writing it.

>ID: Set the barre.

@rebatrolls

-- iconicDisquiet [ID] is now trrolling unruffledVanquisher [UV]! --

ID: You simpering hypocrite. ￣へ￣ ID: You know, sometimes I think to myself: am I too harsh on Vadadear? Who is he, ultimately, but some kid of a seagoat, thrashing around in the shallows of life? Why, you might say to yourself, that's terrible, how could anything be so daft as to get stuck there? But ultimately, you can't exactly judge. All you can do is click your tongue and know that, eventually, it'll either asphyxiate, or figure it out. ID: But then you go and prove that, honestly, you absolutely warrant every cruel allegation towards your honesty, common decency, and common sense that I've ever given. ID: Out of all the doctors on the ship, you really go to Ullane. ID: The yellowblood. ID: Is your organisation so poor that they can't afford a higher mediculler, sweetheart? ID: Because frankly, I just don't buy it! UV: Careful. UV: You are sounding a bit casteist. ID: Well, heavens to betsy, we just can't be having that. It's not casteism, sweetheart, to say that the Empire might want someone a little higher to go looking at their little pet projects gear. ID: After all, they're the ones who say it's just not worth the time to go training lowbloods up for that sort of work~ UV: On top of just sounding like a pupa who had candy taken from them, spitting out accusations and hitting the ground. ID: You went and practically wept over me talking to your precious Nanako, and then you swing around and start hitting up my folks. ID: Why, were you just that keen for attention after a whole, long week? Couldn't abide not having my name in your inbox? ￣へ￣ ID: Congratulations, darling, you've got it. And all it took was making a fool of yourself, making a show of digging up the only mediculler on the station who just so happens to know me. UV: I was referred to Ullane. My apologies for not immediately realizing that it was, as you like to say, your Ullane and... Asking for another mediculler, I suppose. UV: To spare your delicate feelings. UV: Would you like to claim that I damaged myself on purpose to see her as well? UV: While you are busy hurling nonsense at me. ID: How in the world do you damage metal fronds in the first place? ID: Did you go and stick them in a blender? ヽ(｀⌒´)ノ UV: I do not think that is any of your concern. ID: I don't actually care, mind. But you're the one bringing up the injury. ヾ(¯^￣๑) And it is awfully hard to break metal. ID: But your incompetence isn't my business, it's true! UV: Honestly Iconic. Do you have nothing better to do with your nights than to stir yourself in to a froth over Ullane treating someone? ID: I just don't know. You certainly didn't have anything better to do than clutch your pearls over my daring to talk to your battery. ID: I'm just amazed, that's all! UV: We both know why I did not want you trying to use Nanako, you can drop the coy act any time now. ID: Would you believe that I just don't have the faintest idea? UV: Any time you say 'would you believe' I know it is a lie. UV: So no. UV: However, if you could perhaps take a moment to realize that the universe does not, in fact, revolve aorund you, you might take a moment to realize that Ullane is a skilled mediculler with plenty of knowledge about biowire. UV: So perhaps you should not disparage her for her caste or think that she does not deserve higher profile clients because of it. ID: ID: Since when is stating the obvious disparaging? UV: You are quite hopeless, do you know that? UV: I went to Ullane because she was highly recommended. My apologies that I did not chose to see someone higher but without the same amount of skill. ID: Well, it's positively lovely to know that you're one of the few finfaces looking for skill over hue. Forgive me if I just didn't innately realise. ヽ(｀⌒´)ノ ID: And I just don't think a basic general counts as high-profile, by the way. Don't get too up on yourself, now. ID: She's worked on far more prestigious folks. Or are you the one being disparaging, now? ╮(╯▽╰)╭ UV: 'It's not casteism, sweetheart, to say that the Empire might want someone a little higher to go looking at their little pet projects gear.' UV: You do a very poor job at backtracking. ID: It's not backtracking. I didn't realise you went out, looking for a mediculler yourself, that's all. ID: Aren't those sort of things usually assigned? ID: ID: You know what, never mind. ID: I don't actually care. ╮(╯▽╰)╭ UV: So you are admitting that you came in here assuming I had been assigned to Ullane. UV: But still decided to contact me, acting aghast, as if I had plotted it. ID: Oh, don't act as if you couldn't just request a new one. UV: Why would I have? Do you think I wished to spend all night turning my nose up at medicullers? ID: ID: Do you even read my text, or do you just look at all of the pink, let your eyes unfocus, and float around whatever thoughts you've got going in that empty pan of yours? ID: More ways to rail on my theatrics, maybe? ID: I'm not here to outline every step of your hypocriscy, Vadadear, even though I'm sure that'd just be a glorious use of your time. ID: More use than you usually get out of it, at least. UV: Honestly at this point, I was beginning to get used to not having to look at any of the pink. UV: And I am a bit occupied with much more important things than you having another fit. UV: Will you be going back to pretending I do not exist after this, then? ID: ID: Well, heavens, I just didn't know you were so keen on my attention that I can't go. What? A week or two without brightening your doorstep? ID: Maybe if you actually do something interesting, folks would pay more attention. ID: Just a tip~ ID: And what important things are you up to? ID: Smashing your fingers under ships again? ╮(╯▽╰)╭ UV: Darkening my doorstep. I was enjoying that you had sulked off to whatever sewer you usually crawl out of. UV: Perhaps you should return there. Since you are busy spewing garbage. UV: Confidential, Iconic. ID: Of course you were. That's why you went and answered the message, instead of your usual little exit strategy, isn't it? ฅ'ω'ฅ ID: And one night, you'll go ahead and learn a new word than just confidential. ID: But y'know what? ID: That's fine. I'm sure I don't even care to know~ And my point's been made, so I'll let you get back to - ID: - well, whatever it is you do, when you're not mangling your hands. UV: Mmm. UV: As long as you try to avoid getting shot at. UV: And your 'point' is as dull as your wit. As always.

-- unruffledVanquisher [UV] has stopped messaging iconicDisquiet [ID]!--

Well! That went better than you’d thought.

All things considered, even you know this is absurd. Stalking is not, despite all of Vadaya’s cruel jibes, actually a hobby of yours! Other people have never been interesting enough to warrant your attention, never mind enough to dedicate it to them. And you do know normal boundaries. In some circles, this sort of thing might be flattering. In most..

.. well. It’s essentially stalking.

You’ll just have to hope that Vadaya thinks of it as the former, that’s all, because you were halfway through this plan when the absurdity struck you, and it’s too late to back down now. Besides! He’d accused you of having no ambition, and having no motives. He’d said you were lazy, coasting on long-passed victories, and unable to emulate them before. He’d said a lot of things.. and everything you’ve pulled together tonight is a sign that he’s wrong, and you were right. He thought he knew you! He doesn’t know a single fucking thing about you, and you’ve got every plan to rub his nose in that fact. It’s not stalking. It’s showcasing your efforts, making him realise the sort of troll that he’s dealing with, even if you have to lead him to the water and drown him to make it set in.

It’s the sort of stunt that you might find endearing, if you were interested in someone pitch.

After you’d finished ripping them to pieces over it. But you’d like to see Vadaya try.

.. you’d really, really like to see him try.

The city of Civitrecce isn’t exactly your favorite place to be. It’s a huge, bustling metropolis filled to the brim with the sort of trolls that you’d like to sink your psi into: cullbait and mutants, highbloods with enough modifications that they could pass as either, hauling aliens behind them on chains and leashes. And the city itself isn’t much of a looker. Oh, there’s white sands as far as the eye can see off on the eastern edge, but that’s the problem with it. All of it’s got white somewhere, from the shining streets to the high-rises blocking out nearly every inch of the sky.

White, and red so bright that it makes you feel like you’re back in Temasek. But you’re not. More importantly, you’re not going to let yourself go and get spooked off of your mission over something as simple as architecture. It’d taken actual weeks of work to pull all of this together: first, in convincing Zhuang that the news of the Shepherd’s coolant implant had been stolen and was being sold was legitimate, and then in convincing him this was something that they could sell back to her, and then in pulling the information out of them after, in slow trickles as they’d sent off their messages, and waited for the responses.

The QPIN had always worked with the Imperial Education Program, long before you were hatched, and long before even the current Queenpin had emerged from the caverns. As one of the largest manufacturers of helming technology, and the largest producer of helms, they shared technology, employees, and most importantly, news. You’d heard the name enough when she and Raphae droned away in her office, more than any other business. You’d seen the name on enough technology, and on enough collars, scarred down to the bone with the name of what company’s ships the helming recruits would serve.

You’d known how Shepherd would take the news, as soon as she heard it. More importantly, you’d known what she’d ask! Your proctor had sat on the message for two, three nights before she’d thanked Zhuang for the notice, and then she’d asked them to take care of it. And why wouldn’t she? She didn’t know anything about this business, not really, but it wasn’t the sort of thing that she handled. She was a scientist and a businesswoman, not a keeper of soldiers.

And luckily, the QPIN turned out to have hooks in those as well.

You’ve never met a Scimitar prior to Vadaya and Rumisa. Oh, you’d read the pages and pages online on them, after you’d first met him, and then in the weeks after. Everything that can be accessed publicly! Everything that can be accessed privately, for those outside of the organisation, because even Raphae’s credentials won’t get you into another program’s personal servers. You’d called them glorified ruffianhilators, when you’d first met him, and really, you stand by that. There’s no point to them, and no reason for their sheer amount of pride; anything they do, then you’re certain you could manage it better.

Maybe not for some of the more headstrong ones, but.. well, you’re just not interested in using your psionics to their full potential. There’s nothing showy about the scale of work that your pan is geared towards. But that doesn’t mean you couldn’t, if you tried, and it doesn’t mean you don’t know what you’re capable of. You’d taken stress tests like the rest of your program, regularly enough to see how far you could be pushed. The body is full of small, vital parts, and places where the slightest tug of psi could set everything wrong.

So one of them can break walls with their scream. It’s not impressive.

And you refuse to be impressed by Zhuang’s pet Scimitar, no matter how much they prompt you. Tenienté Longhaul is a lieutenant general for the Imperial Psionic Corps, a tealblood with a combat history nearly as far as back as the first Ascension. He’s a speedster, a soldier, and a hundred different things that your contact had tried to press on you - but ultimately, the only thing that matters is he’s the one that assigns Vadaya’s missions.

Which is why you’re pacing along the brim of a roof, sipping on some pink and green powdered abomination of a drink as you watch the street. This is the most likely path for Vadaya to head to, you think. The laboratory is three streets over still, the sort of perfectly Modernist abomination that’s only unobstrusive in this hellhole of a city. It’s at the end of a dead end street, with the sea behind it and cliffs that crumble into a sheer drop, so you don’t expect he’ll go trying to climb it.

Especially not when you know the cliffs are wired with defenses for the institute honeycombed through them. He might still! If he does..

Vadaya’s interesting because he thinks he’s smarter than you: not just in books, but ways that actually count. He thinks he’s more competent, more agile, better in a thousand different ways. If he gets shot up trying to be clever, the only unfortunate part will be that you can’t watch it happen.

But it won’t happen. Already, you think you see a familiar set of horns cutting through the crowd, just as brisk as he’d been on Epiphany. And you could lunge down, introduce yourself properly, but.

.. you hate him. You hate this, because now that the moment’s come, your plan suddenly seems so much more ridiculous than it was in your head. What is this, one of Riccin’s musicals? You’ll show up at his mission, this time on purpose, and he’ll be infuriated, but impressed at your.. brass? Your confidence?

The fact that, for all of his showboating of the fact he’s an imperial soldier, that you can set yourself up as his equal just by pulling strings?

Of course he will. Vadaya’s yet to do anything that’ll surprise you, and you think - you hope - that you’re still on track. You’d be impressed! If he isn’t, then that isn’t your problem, is it? It’s his.

And in the meanwhile, you just need to remind yourself of what you tell your pupas: if you’re going to have cold feet, you might as well cut them off. So you drop off the roof as he passes under you, pose as neat as any lunge, and as you fall, you shoot off a message in your pan.

-- iconicDisquiet [ID] is now trolling unruffledVanquisher [UV]! -- 

ID: Hey there, stranger~

“Fancy seeing you here,” you call down, amused, and you don’t let your trepidation show. “Why, what a coincidence.”

-- iconicDisquiet [ID] has stopped messaging unruffledVanquisher [UV]!--

The Mortgaging of Sierra Online

The Sierra Online of the 1980s and very early 1990s excelled at customer relations perhaps more than anything else. Through the tours of their offices (which they offered to anyone who cared to make the trip to rural Oakhurst, California), the newsletter they published (which always opened with a folksy editorial from their founder and leader Ken Williams), and their habit of grouping their games into well-delineated series with predictable content, they fostered a sense of loyalty and even community which other game makers, not least their arch-rivals over at LucasArts, couldn’t touch — this even though the actual games of LucasArts tended to be much better in design terms. Here we see some of the entrants in a Leisure Suit Larry lookalike contest sponsored by Sierra. (Yes, two of the contestants do seem suspiciously young to have played a series officially targeted at those 18 and older.) Sadly, community-building exercise like these would become increasingly rare as the 1990s wore on and Sierra took on a different, more impersonal air. This article will chronicle the beginning of those changes.

“The computer-game industry has become the interactive-entertainment industry.”

— Ken Williams, 1992

Another even-numbered year, another King’s Quest game. Such had been the guiding rhythm of life at Sierra Online since 1986, and 1992 was to be no exception. Why should it be? Each of the last several King’s Quest installments had sold better than the one before, as the series had cultivated a reputation as the premier showcase of bleeding-edge computer entertainment. Once again, then, Sierra was prepared to pull out all the stops for King’s Quest VI, prepared to push its development budget to $1 million and beyond.

This time around, however, there were some new and worrisome tensions. Roberta Williams, Sierra’s star designer, whose name was inseparable from that of King’s Quest itself in the minds of the public, was getting a little tired of playing the Queen of Daventry for the nation’s schoolchildren. She had another, entirely different game she wanted to make, a sequel to her 1989 mystery starring the 1920s girl detective Laura Bow. So, a compromise was reached. Roberta would do Laura Bow in… The Dagger of Amon Ra and King’s Quest VI simultaneously by taking a sort of “executive designer” role on both projects, turning over the nitty-gritty details to assistant designers.

Thus for the all-important King’s Quest VI, Sierra brought over Jane Jenson, who was fresh off the task of co-designing the rather delightful educational adventure EcoQuest: The Search for Cetus with Gano Haine. Roberta Williams described her working relationship with her new partner in a contemporary interview, striking a tone that was perhaps a bit more condescending than it really needed to be in light of Jenson’s previous experience, and that was oddly disparaging toward Sierra’s other designers to boot:

I took on a co-designer for a couple of reasons: I wanted to train Jane because I didn’t want Sierra to be dependent on me. Someone else needs to know how to do a “proper” adventure game. We’re all doing a good job from a technology standpoint, but not on design. In my opinion, the best way to learn it properly is side by side. Overall, it was a positive experience, and it was very good for the series because Jane brought in some new ideas. She learned a lot, too, and can take what she’s learned to help create her new games.

There’s something of a consensus among fans today that the result of this collaboration is the best overall King’s Quest of them all. This strikes me as a fair judgment. While it’s not a great adventure game by any means, King’s Quest VI: Heir Today, Gone Tomorrow isn’t an outright poor one either in terms of writing or design, and this is sufficient for it to clear the low bar of the previous games in the series. The plot is still reliant on fairy-tale clichés: a princess imprisoned in a tower, a prince who sets out to rescue her, a kingdom in turmoil around them. Yet the writing itself is more textured and coherent this time around, the implementation is far more complete (most conceivable actions yield custom messages of some sort in response), the puzzles are generally more reasonable, and it’s considerably more difficult than it was in the earlier games to wander into a walking-dead situation without knowing it. Evincing a spirit of mercy toward its players of a sort that Sierra wasn’t usually known for, it even has a branching point where you can choose from an easier or a harder pathway to the end of the game. And when you do get to the final scene, there are over a dozen possible variants of the ending movie, depending on the choices you’ve made along the way. Again, this degree of design ambition — as opposed to audiovisual ambition — was new to the series at the time.

The fans often credit this relative improvement completely to Jenson’s involvement. And this judgment as well, unkind though it is toward Roberta Williams, is not entirely unfounded, even if it should be tempered by the awareness that Jenson’s own later games for Sierra would all have significant design issues of their own. Many of the flaws that so constantly dogged Roberta’s games in particular were down to her insistence on working at a remove from the rest of the people making them. Her habit was to type up a design document on her computer at home, then give it to the development team with instructions to “call if you have any questions.” For all practical purposes, she had thus been working as an “executive designer” long before she officially took on that role with King’s Quest VI. This method of working tended to result in confusion and ultimately in far too much improvisation on the part of her teams. Combined with Sierra’s overarching disinterest in seeking substantive feedback from players during the development process, it was disastrous more often than not to the finished product. But when the time came for King’s Quest VI, Jane Jenson was able to alleviate at least some of the problems simply by being in the same room with the rest of the team every day. It may seem unbelievable that this alone was sufficient to deliver a King’s Quest that was so markedly better than any of the others — but, again, it just wasn’t a very high bar to clear.

For all that it represented a welcome uptick in terms of design, Sierra’s real priority for King’s Quest VI was, as always for the series, to make it look and sound better than any game before. They were especially proud of the opening movie, which they outsourced to a real Hollywood animation studio to create on cutting-edge graphics workstations. When it was delivered to Sierra’s offices, the ten-minute sequence filled a well-nigh incomprehensible 1.2 GB on disk. It would have to be cut down to two minutes and 6 MB for the floppy-disk-based release of the game. (It would grow again to six minutes and 60 MB for the later CD-ROM release.) A real showstopper in its day, it serves today to illustrate how Sierra’s ambitions to be a major media player were outrunning their aesthetic competencies; even the two-minute version manages to come off as muddled and overlong, poorly framed and poorly written. In its its time, though, it doubtless served its purpose as a graphics-and-sound showcase, as did the game that followed it.

My favorite part of the much-vaunted King’s Quest VI introductory movie are the sailors that accompany Prince Alexander on his quest to rescue Princess Cassima. All sailors look like pirates, right?

A more amusing example of the company’s media naiveté is the saga of the King’s Quest VI theme song. Sierra head Ken Williams, who like many gaming executives of the period relished any and all linkages between games and movies, came up with the idea of including a pop song in the game that could become a hit on the radio, a “Glory of Love” or “I Will Always Love You” for his industry. Sierra’s in-house music man Mark Seibert duly delivered a hook-less dirge of a “love theme” with the distressingly literal title of “Girl in the Tower,” then hired an ersatz Michael Bolton and Celine Dion to over-emote it wildly. Then, Sierra proceeded to carpet-bomb the nation’s radio stations with CD singles of the song, whilst including an eight-page pamphlet in every copy of the game with the phone numbers for all of the major radio stations and a plea to call in and request it. Enough of Sierra’s loyal young fans did so that many a program director called Ken in turn to complain about his supremely artificial “grass-roots” marketing strategy. His song was terrible, they told him (correctly), and sometimes issued vague legal threats regarding obscure Federal Communications Commission laws he was supposedly violating. Finally, Ken agreed to pull the pamphlet from future King’s Quest VI boxes and accept that he wasn’t going to become a music as well as games impresario. Good Taste 1, Sierra 0. Rather hilariously, he was still grousing about the whole episode years later: “In my opinion, the radio stations were the criminals for ignoring their customers, something I believe no business should ever do. Oh, well… the song was great.”

The girl in the tower. Pray she doesn’t start singing…

While King’s Quest VI didn’t spawn a hit single, it did become a massive hit in its own right by the more modest sales standards of the computer-games industry. In fact, it became the first computer game in history to be certified gold by the Software Publishers Association — 100,000 copies sold — before it had even shipped, thanks to a huge number of pre-orders. Released in mid-October of 1992, it was by far the hottest game in the industry that Christmas, with Sierra struggling just to keep up with demand. Estimates of its total sales vary widely, but it seems likely that it sold 300,000 copies in all at a minimum, and quite possibly as many as 500,000 copies.

But for all its immediate success, King’s Quest VI was a mildly frustrating project for Sierra in at least one way. Everyone there agreed that this game, more so than any of the others they had made before, was crying out for CD-ROM, but too few consumers had CD-ROM drives in their computers in 1992 to make it worthwhile to ship the game first in that format. So, it initially shipped on nine floppy disks instead. Once decompressed onto a player’s hard drive, it filled over 17 MB — this at a time when 40 MB was still a fairly typical hard-disk size even on brand-new computers. Sierra recommended that players delete the 6 MB opening movie from their hard disks after watching it a few times just to free up some space. With stopgap solutions like this in play, there was a developing sense that something had to give, and soon. Peter Spears, author of an official guide to the entire King’s Quest series, summed up the situation thusly:

King’s Quest VI represents a fin de siecle, the end of an era. It is a game that should have been — needed to be — first published on CD-ROM. For all of its strengths and gloss, it is ill-served being played from a hard drive. If only because of its prominence in the world of computer entertainment, King’s Quest VI is proof that the era of CD playing is upon us.

Why? It is because imagination has no limits, and current hardware does. There are other games proving this point today, but King’s Quest has always been the benchmark. It is the end of one era, and when it is released on CD near the beginning of next year, it should be the beginning of another. Kill your hard drives!

Sierra had been evangelizing for CD-ROM for some time by this point, just as they earlier had for the graphics cards and sound cards that had transformed MS-DOS computers from dull things suitable only for running boring business applications into the only game-playing computers that really mattered in the United States. But, as with those earlier technologies, consumer uptake of CD-ROM had been slower than Sierra, chomping at the bit to use it, would have liked.

Thankfully, then, 1993 was the year when CD-ROM, a technology which had been around for almost a decade by that point, finally broke through; this was the year when the hardware became cheap enough and the selection of software compelling enough to power a new wave of multimedia excitement which swept across the world of computing. As with those graphics cards and sound cards earlier on, Sierra’s relentless prodding doubtless played a significant role in this newfound consumer acceptance of CD-ROM. And not least among the prods was the CD-ROM version of King’s Quest VI, which boasted lusher graphics in many places and voices replacing text absolutely everywhere. The voice acting marked a welcome improvement over the talkie version of King’s Quest V, the only previous game in the series to get a release on CD-ROM. The fifth game had apparently been voiced by whoever happened to be hanging around the office that day, with results that were almost unlistenably atrocious. King’s Quest VI, on the other hand, got a professional cast, headed by Robby Benson, who had just played the Beast in the hit Disney cartoon of Beauty and the Beast, in the role of Prince Alexander, the protagonist. Although Sierra could all too often still seem like babes in the woods when it came to media aesthetics, they were slowly learning on at least some fronts.

In the meantime, they could look to the bottom line of CD-ROM uptake with satisfaction. They shipped just 13 percent of their products on CD-ROM in 1992; in 1993, that number rose to 36 percent. Already by the end of that year, they had initiated their first projects that were earmarked only for CD-ROM. The dam had burst; the floppy disk was soon to be a thing of the past as a delivery medium for games.

This ought to have been a moment of unabashed triumph for Sierra in more ways than one. Back in the mid-1980s, when the company had come within a whisker of being pulled under by the Great Home Computer Crash, Ken Williams had decided, against the conventional wisdom of the time, that the long-term future of consumer computing lay with the operating systems of Microsoft and the open hardware architecture inadvertently spawned by the original IBM PC. He’d stuck to his guns ever since; while Sierra did release some of their games for other computer platforms, they were always afterthoughts, mere ways to earn a little extra money while waiting for the real future to arrive. And now that future had indeed arrived; Ken Williams had been proved right. The green-screened cargo vans of 1985 had improbably become the multimedia sports cars of 1993, all whilst sticking to the same basic software and hardware architecture.

And yet Ken was feeling more doubtful than triumphant. While he remainedr convinced that CDs were the future of game delivery, he was no longer so convinced that MS-DOS was the only platform that mattered. On the contrary, he was deeply concerned by the fact that, while MS-DOS-based computers had evolved enormously in terms of graphics and sound and sheer processing power, they remained as cryptically hard to use as ever. Just installing and configuring one of his company’s latest games required considerable technical skill. His ambition, as he told anyone who would listen, was to build Sierra into a major purveyor of mainstream entertainment. Could he really do that on MS-DOS? Yes, Microsoft Windows was out there as well — in fact, it was exploding in popularity, to the point that it was already becoming hard to find productivity software that wasn’t Windows-based. But Windows had its own fair share of quirks, and wasn’t really designed for running high-performance games under any circumstances.

Even as MS-DOS and Windows thus struggled with issues of affordability, approachability, and user-friendliness in the context of games, new CD-based alternatives to traditional computers were appearing almost by the month. NEC and Sega were selling CD drives as add-ons for their TurboGrafx-16 and Genesis game consoles; Philips had something called CD-i; Commodore had CDTV; Trip Hawkins, founder of Electronic Arts, had split away from his old company to found 3DO; even Tandy was pushing a free-standing CD-based platform called the VIS. All of these products were designed to be easy for ordinary consumers to operate in all the ways a personal computer wasn’t, and they were all designed to fit into the living room rather than the back office. In short, they looked and operated like mainstream consumer electronics, while personal computers most definitely still did not.

But even if one assumed that platforms like these were the future of consumer multimedia, as Ken Williams was sorely tempted to do, which one or two would win out to become the standard? The situations was oddly similar to that which had faced software makers like Sierra back in the early 1980s, when the personal-computer marketplace had been fragmented into more than a dozen incompatible platforms. Yet the comparison only went so far: development costs for the multimedia software of the early 1990s were vastly higher, and so the stakes were that much higher as well.

Nevertheless, Ken Williams decided that the only surefire survival strategy for Sierra was to become a presence on most if not all of the new platforms. Just as MS-DOS had finally, undeniably won the day in the field of personal computers, Sierra would ironically abandon their strict allegiance to computers in general. Instead, they would now pledge their fealty to CDs in the abstract. For Ken had grander ambitions than just being a major player on the biggest computing platform; he wanted to be a major player in entertainment, full stop. “Sierra is an entertainment company, not a software company,” he said over and over.

So, at no inconsiderable expense, Ken instituted projects to port the SCI engine that ran Sierra’s adventure games to most of the other extant platforms that used CDs as their delivery medium. In doing so, however, he once again ran into a problem that Sierra and other game developers of the early 1980s, struggling to port their wares to the many incompatible platforms of that period, had become all too familiar with: the fact that every platform had such different strengths and weaknesses in terms of interface, graphics, sound, memory, and processing potential. Just because a platform of the early 1990s could accept software distributed on CD didn’t mean it could satisfactorily run all of the same games as an up-to-date personal computer with a CD-ROM drive installed. Corey Cole, who along with his wife Lori Ann Cole made up Sierra’s most competent pair of game designers at the time, but who was nevertheless pulled away from his design role to program a port of the SCI engine to the Sega Genesis with CD drive:

The Genesis CD system was essentially identical to the Genesis except for the addition of the CD. It had inadequate memory for huge games such as the ones Sierra made, and it could only display 64 colors at a time from a 512 color palette. Sierra games at the time used 256 colors at a time from a 262,144 color palette. So the trick became how to make Sierra games look good in a much smaller color space.

Genesis CD did supply some tricks that could be used to fake an expanded color space, and I set out to use those. The problem was that the techniques I used required a lot of memory, and the memory space on the Genesis was much smaller than we expected on PCs at the time. One of the first things I did was to put a memory check in the main SCI processing loop that would warn me if we came close to running out of memory. I knew it would be close.

Sierra assigned a programmer from the Dynamix division to work with me. He had helped convert Willy Beamish to the Genesis CD, so he understood the system requirements well. However, he unintentionally sabotaged the project. In his early tests, my low-memory warning kicked in, so he disabled it. Six months later, struggling with all kinds of random problems (the hard-to-impossible kind to fix), I discovered that the memory check was disabled. When I turned it back on, I learned that the random bugs were all caused by insufficient memory. Basically, Sierra games were too big to fit on the Genesis CD, and there was very little we could do to shoehorn them in. With the project now behind schedule, and the only apparent solution being a complete rewrite of SCI to use a smaller memory footprint, Sierra management cancelled the project.

While Corey Cole spun his wheels in this fashion, Lori Ann Cole was forced to design most of Quest for Glory III alone, at significant cost to this latest iteration in what had been Sierra’s most creative and compelling adventure series up to that point.

The push to move their games to consoles also cost Sierra in the more literal sense of dollars and cents, and in the end they got absolutely no return for their investment. Some of the porting projects, like the one on which Corey worked, were abandoned when the target hardware proved itself not up to the task of running games designed for cutting-edge personal computers. Others were rendered moot when the entire would-be consumer-electronics category of multimedia set-top boxes for the living room — a category that included CD-i, CDTV, 3DO, and VIS — flopped one and all. (Radio Shack employees joked that the VIS acronym stood for “Virtually Impossible to Sell.”) In the end, King’s Quest VI never came out in any versions except those for personal computers. Ken Williams’s dream of conquering the living room, like that of conquering the radio waves, would never come to fruition.

The money Sierra wasted on the fruitless porting projects were far from the only financial challenge they faced at the dawn of the CD era in gaming. For all that everyone at the company had chaffed against the restrictions of floppy disks, those same restrictions had, by capping the amount of audiovisual assets one could practically include in a game, acted as a restraint on escalating development budgets. With CD-ROM, all bets were off in terms of how big a game could become. Sierra felt themselves to be in a zero-sum competition with the rest of their industry to deliver ever more impressive, ever more “cinematic” games that utilized the new storage medium to its full potential. The problem, of course, was that such games cost vastly more money to make.

It was a classic chicken-or-the-egg conundrum. Ken Williams was convinced that games had the potential to appeal to a broader demographic and thus sell in far greater numbers than ever before in this new age of CD-ROM. Yet to reach that market he first had to pay for the development of these stunning new games. Therein lay the rub. If this year’s games cost less to make but also come with a much lower sales cap than next year’s games, the old financial model — that of using the revenue generated by this year’s games to pay for next year’s — doesn’t work anymore. Yet to scale back one’s ambitions for next year’s games means to potentially miss out on the greatest gold rush in the history of computer gaming to date.

As if these pressures weren’t enough, Sierra was also facing the slow withering of what used to be another stable source of revenue: their back catalog. In 1991, titles released during earlier years accounted for fully 60 percent of their sales; in 1992, that number shrank to 48 percent, and would only keep falling from there. In this new multimedia age, driven by audiovisuals above all else, games that were more than a year or two old looked ancient. People weren’t buying them, and stores weren’t interested in stocking them. (Another chicken-or-the-egg situation…) This forced a strike-while-the-iron-is-hot mentality toward development, increasing that much more the perceived need to make every game look and sound spectacular, while also instilling a countervailing need to release it quickly, before it started to look outdated. Sierra had long been in the habit of amortizing their development costs for tax and other accounting purposes: i.e., mortgaging the cost of making each game against its future revenue. Now, as the size of these mortgages soared, this practice created still more pressure to release each game in the quarter to which the accountants had earmarked it. None of this was particularly conducive to the creation of good, satisfying games.

At first blush, one might be tempted to regard what came next as just more examples of the same types of problems that had always dogged Sierra’s output. Ken Williams had long failed to install the culture and processes that consistently lead to good design, which had left well-designed games as the exception rather than the rule even during the company’s earlier history. Now, though, things reached a new nadir, as Sierra began to ship games that were not just poorly designed but blatantly unfinished. Undoubtedly the most heartbreaking victim of these pressures was Quest for Glory IV, Corey and Lori Ann Cole’s would-be magnum opus, which shipped on December 31, 1993 — the last day of the fiscal quarter to which it had been earmarked — in a truly woeful condition, so broken it wasn’t even possible to complete it. Another sorry example was Outpost, a sort of SimCity in space that was rendered unplayable by bugs. And an even worse one was Alien Legacy, an ambitious attempt to combine strategy with adventure gaming in a manner reminiscent of Cryo Interactive’s surprisingly effective adaptation of Dune. We’ll never know how well Sierra’s take on the concept would have worked because, once again, it shipped unfinished and essentially unplayable.

Each of these games had had real potential if they had only been allowed to realize it. One certainly didn’t need to be an expert in marketing or anything else to see how profoundly unwise it was in the long run to release them in such a state. While each of them met an arbitrary accounting deadline, thus presumably preventing some red ink in one quarter, Sierra sacrificed long-term profits on the altar of this short-term expediency: word quickly got around among gamers that the products were broken, and even many of those who were unfortunate enough to buy them before they got the word wound up returning them. That Sierra ignored such obvious considerations and shoved the games out the door anyway speaks to the pressures that come to bear as soon as a company goes public, as Sierra had done in 1988. Additionally, and perhaps more ominously, it speaks to an increasing disconnect between management and the people making the actual products.

Through it all, Ken Williams, who seemed almost frantic not to miss out on what he regarded as the inflection point for consumer software, was looking to expand his empire, looking to make Sierra known for much more than adventure games. In fact, he had already begun that process in early 1990, when Sierra acquired Dynamix, a development house notable for their 3D-graphics technology, for $1 million in cash and some stock shenanigans. That gambit had paid off handsomely; Dynamix’s World War II flight simulator Aces of the Pacific became Sierra’s second biggest hit of 1992, trailing only the King’s Quest VI juggernaut whilst — and this was important to Ken — appealing to a whole different demographic from their adventure games. In addition to their flight simulators, Dynamix also spawned a range of other demographically diverse hits over this period, from The Incredible Machine to Front Page Sports: Football.

With a success story like that in his back pocket, it was time for Ken to go shopping again. In July of 1992, Sierra acquired Bright Star Technology, a Bellevue, Washington-based specialist in educational software, for $1 million. Ken was convinced that educational software, a market that had grown only in fits and starts during earlier years, would become massive during the multimedia age, and he was greatly enamored with Bright Star’s founder, a real bright spark himself named Elon Gasper. “He thinks, therefore he is paid,” was Ken’s description of Gasper’s new role inside the growing Sierra. Bright Star also came complete with some innovative technology they had developed for syncing recorded voices to the mouths of onscreen characters — perhaps not the first problem one thinks of when contemplating a CD-ROM-based talkie of an adventure game, but one which quickly presents itself when the actual work begins. King’s Quest VI became the first Sierra game to make use of it; it was followed by many others.

Meanwhile Bright Star themselves would deliver a steady stream of slick, educator-approved learning software over the years to come. Less fortunately, the acquisition did lead to the sad demise of Sierra’a in-house “Discovery Series” of educational products, which had actually yielded some of their best designed and most creative games of any stripe during the very early 1990s. Now, the new acquisition would take over responsibility for a “second, more refined generation of educational products,” as Sierra’s annual report put it. But in addition to being more refined — more rigorously compliant with established school curricula and the latest pedagogical theories — they would also be just a little bit boring in contrast to the likes of The Castle of Dr. Brain. Such is the price of progress.

Sierra’s third major acquisition of the 1990s was more complicated, more expensive, and more debatable than the first two had been. On October 29, 1993, they bought the French developer and publisher Coktel Vision for $4.6 million. Coktel had been around since 1985, unleashing upon European gamers such indelibly (stereotypically?) French creations as Emmanuelle: A Game of Eroticism, based on a popular series of erotic novels and films. But by the early 1990s, Coktel was doing the lion’s share of their business in educational software. In 1992, estimates were that 50 to 75 percent of the software found in French schools came from Coktel. The character known as Adi, the star of their educational line, is remembered to this day by a whole generation of French schoolchildren.

Sierra had cut a deal more than a year before the acquisition to begin distributing Coktel’s games in the United States, and had made a substantial Stateside success out of Gobliiins, a vaguely Lemmings-like puzzle game. That proof of concept, combined with Coktel’s educational line and distributional clout in Europe — Ken was eager to enter that sprawling market, where Sierra heretofore hadn’t had much of a footprint — convinced the founder to pull the trigger.

But this move would never quite pan out as he had hoped. Although the text and voices were duly translated, the cultural idiom of Adi just didn’t seem to make sense to American children. Meanwhile Coktel’s games, which mashed together disparate genres like adventure and simulation with the same eagerness with which they mashed together disparate presentation technologies like full-motion video and 3D graphics, encountered all the commercial challenges that French designs typically ran into in the United States. Certainly few Americans knew what to make of a game like Inca; it took place in the far future of an alternate history where the ancient Incan civilization had survived, conquered, and taken to the stars, where they continued to battle, Wing Commander-style, with interstellar Spanish galleons. (The phrase “what were they smoking?” unavoidably comes to mind…) Today, the games of Coktel are remembered by American players, if they’re remembered at all, mostly for the sheer bizarreness of premises like this one, married to puzzles that make the average King’s Quest game seem like a master class in good adventure design. Coktel’s European distribution network undoubtedly proved more useful to Sierra than the company’s actual games, but it’s doubtful whether even it was useful to the tune of $4.6 million.

Inca, one of the strangest games Sierra ever published — and not really in a good way.

Ken Williams was playing for keeps in a high-stakes game with all of these moves, as he continued to do as well with ImagiNation, a groundbreaking, genuinely visionary online service, oriented toward socializing and playing together, which stubbornly refused to turn a profit. All together, the latest moves constituted a major shift in strategy from the conservative, incrementalist approach that had marked his handling of Sierra since the company’s near-death experience of the mid-1980s. From 1987 — the year the recovering patient first managed to turn a profit again — through 1991, Sierra had sold more games and made more money each year. The first of those statements held true for 1992 as well, as sales increased from $43 million to within a whisker of $50 million. But profits fell off a cliff; Sierra lost almost $12.5 million that year alone. Sales increased impressively again in 1993, to $59.5 million. Yet, although the bottom line looked less ugly, it remained all too red thanks to all of the ongoing spending; the company lost another $4.5 million that year.

In short, Ken Williams was now mortgaging Sierra’s present against its future, in precisely the way he’d sworn he’d never do again during those dark days of 1984 and 1985. But he felt he had to make his play for the big time now or never; CD-ROM was a horse he just had to ride, hopefully all the way to the nerve center of Western pop culture. And so he did something else he’d sworn he would never do: he left Oakhurst, California. In September of 1993, Ken and Roberta and select members of Sierra’s management team moved to Bellevue, Washington, to set up a new “corporate headquarters” there; sales and marketing would gradually follow over the months to come. Ken had long been under pressure from his board to move to a major city, one where it would be easier to recruit a “first-rate management team” to lead Sierra into a bold new future. Bellevue, a suburb of Seattle that was also home to Microsoft, Nintendo, and of course Sierra’s own new subsidiary of Bright Star, seemed as good a choice as any. Ken promised Sierra’s creative staff as well as their fans that nothing would really change: most of the games would still be made in the cozy confines of Oakhurst. And he spoke the truth —  at least in literal terms, at least for the time being.

Nevertheless, something had changed. The old dream of starting a software company in the woods, the one which had brought a much younger, much shaggier Ken and Roberta to Oakhurst in 1980, had in some very palpable sense run its course. Sierra had well and truly gone corporate; Ken and Roberta were back in the world they had so consciously elected to escape thirteen years before. Oh, well… the arrows of both revenue and profitably at Sierra were pointing in the right direction. One more year, Ken believed, and they ought to be in the black again, and in a stronger position in the marketplace than ever at that. Chalk the rest of it up as yet one more price of progress.

(Sources: the book Influential Game Designers: Jane Jenson by Anastasia Salter; Sierra’s newsletter InterAction of Spring 1992, Fall 1992, Winter 1992, June 1993, Summer 1993, Holiday 1993, Spring 1994, and Fall 1994; The One of April 1989; ACE of May 1989; Game Players PC Entertainment of Holiday 1992; Compute! of May 1993; Computer Gaming World of January 1992; press releases, annual reports, and other internal and external documents from the Sierra archive at the Strong Museum of Play. An online source was the Games Nostalgia article on King’s Quest VI. And my thanks go to Corey Cole, who took the time to answer some questions about this period of Sierra’s history from his perspective as a developer there.)

source http://reposts.ciathyza.com/the-mortgaging-of-sierra-online/