one of the most horrifyingly existential things about kingdom hearts to me is the fact that nobody leaves anything behind when they die

I hope you don't mind this ask, but... Any theories / speculations about the most recent story update for KHUX?

Oh, I don’t mind at all! I’m glad you asked, actually, because I’ve had some thoughts, though not many new theories of my own, unfortunately. That being said, I can definitely go over how some of my old theories and some of the fandom’s hold up and my thoughts on a few of the new theories I’ve seen floating around

One thing that I’m consistently proud of is how my old guesses about Darkness’s true nature just keep ending up almost right barring some slight details. I made the claim back when Re:Mind first came out that Darkness could be a hive mind of entities that plant bits of themselves in others, and then refined that back in July of 2020 by likening it to a parasite that worms its way into people’s hearts and incorporates itself into them to control them. This past update confirmed that the Darkness we’re fighting is one part of the hive mind that wormed its way into Ven to force him to act out, and that by doing so it detached itself from that hive mind and became incorporated into Ven’s being (which Ven can then shape). So I gotta say I’m pretty pleased about that part

All that’s left to be seen from the July post is if Darkness has a connection to Verum Rex/Quadratum, but I doubt that that will be touched on by the KHUx finale. Though I will say that it’s pretty interesting that the Master of Masters tells Darkness about “a world [he] can’t even conceive,” which seems like it could easily be referring to Quadratum, which also means that Darkness knows about it

That’s pretty much all I have to say on the Ventus/Darkness/Vanitas connection, but there’s still more to cover in this update

One thing that I’ve been trying to figure out is who the cloaked figure right at the start of the update is, Luxu or the MoM. Measuring the sizes and my old guess based on the KH3 Secret Reports both say Luxu, but this brings into question “when,” exactly, the True Dandelion scene takes place as it doesn’t have the dark haze around the edges that they give flashbacks, but is clearly the real-world set of pods as they’re not destroyed AND it’s missing the pod that Maleficent already used. The True Dandelion scene has a lot to unpack, but this scene at the start does make me wonder if Luxu and/or the Master have a way in and out of the datascape that doesn’t involve the pods, otherwise the numbers don’t add up

Also related to the post of mine I just linked is the idea that the Black Box is the datascape. I believe that this might still hold true. It’s interesting to note that they show the scene from Back Cover where Luxu is given the box in the first place just prior to the reveal that using the lifeboats to escape starts the process to seal it off and have the real Daybreak Town fall to darkness, and the Master’s “hint” to Luxu involves this very process. Why would Luxu be forbidden to open the box? Quite possibly because it contains the infected datascape meant to seal off the vast majority of the Darkness hive mind. And several Dandelions. It is both the “hope” mentioned in KH3 through those Dandelions, as well as a trap to keep Darkness out of being able to interfere for quite a long time

Now, the questions that I’m sure are on everyone’s minds are “who is the True Dandelion,” and “who are the ones who use the lifeboats?” Let’s start with the True Dandelion, as there’s far less moving pieces involved in that one

I won’t take credit for coming up with any of these options, I’m just going to discuss the logistics of them. So the candidates for the True Dandelion in, what is in my opinion, the least likely option to the most likely option, are:

Kairi: I’ve seen this one floating around and... honestly don’t believe it at all due to the sheer amount of logical contortions that you have to do to make it work. To wit:

Where the hell would she even come from if it was Kairi? As can be clearly seen with Ven, is stated to be true with Subject X, and is implied to be true of Lauriam/Elrena, those who travel to the future using the pods will regenerate their bodies at the age they were when they used the pods. Which would make Kairi at the oldest a four-year-old. Four years prior to KHUx was when Brain was told that he was a Union Leader. So she either would have been just born immediately prior to the war and was just... stolen or something? And we never saw? Or just after the war, where she would probably have to be the child of a Dandelion that got teen pregnant because they’re supposed to be both kids and the only survivors? Or Luxu and Ava’s kid somehow? Like, what? The timeline is just insane with that

If she was born before the war... you would assume that the True Dandelion would be, you know, a Dandelion. Which would mean that Ava handed a Keyblade to and recruited a literal toddler. This would also retcon Aqua being the one to accidentally pass the ability to wield a Keyblade down to Kairi and I refuse to make theories predicated on “the author will retcon this.” You just open up a huge can of worms doing that

The body wrapped in white looked a hell of a lot bigger than a four-year-old to me

I am sick to death of “this character was secretly from the Age of Fairytales~” being employed by the narrative. It’s happened at least three times already (four if you count Luxu). Enough already

Ventus: Ven has some hints, though some notable contradictions to it being him

On the one had, the sheet that the True Dandelion is wrapped in is extremely similar to the one that Xehanort wrapped him in when planning to leave him on Destiny Islands in BBS and there’s a possibility that Xehanort may have found him in that very sheet if he regenerated wearing it

On the other hand: Ventus might not have even been a Dandelion in the first place (he definitely wasn’t a Union Leader, but I don’t know if it was ever said whether he was selected as a regular Dandelion or not), and there’s the timing of the scene that I mentioned above. It’s definitely after Maleficent used her lifeboat but before anyone else used theirs (when you would expect Ven to remain with his friends) and, since the scene doesn’t have the flashback effect, it’s implied to be happening concurrently with everything else, so Ven should still be fighting Darkness in the datascape while it’s happening and eliminating him from being this particular person

Strelitzia: Oh, boy, have we got some nice old hints to Strelitzia, but still a few logical contortions, just like Ven

The white sheet is coming back up again. Namely, the fact that we still have an unexplained scene where Strelitzia appears to Lauriam in a dream wrapped in a white cloak, though it’s of a different style than the one that the True Dandelion is in. That scene also featured flower petals being blown into the wind, much like a dandelion seed (though, notably, the petals that are blown aren’t Dandelion seeds)

The question is, yet again, one of timing. How would Luxu get her body? While she was only introduced in KHUx, her scenes are all flashbacks to before the war, so we know that she was struck down in the real world, not the datascape. We see her body dissolve into light and her heart be released. Now, technically you only need a heart to time travel (actually, a heart is the only thing that can time travel), but Luxu is clearly seen putting a body into the machine. A machine that only allows for time travel because it destroys the body. If he had her heart, he wouldn’t need to use the lifeboat because she’s already in a state to time-travel on her own and this eliminates the possibility of him putting her Nobody into the machine, because without a heart it would just evaporate her body leaving... absolutely no heart to go to the future with

Now, Luxu theoretically could have grabbed her heart. We know that he was hanging around Daybreak Town at the time while observing thanks to his fight with Ava, but Strelitzia is struck down just after the fight with Ava starts so it’s very likely that Luxu was too preoccupied to retrieve her heart before it was gone. Speaking of Luxu’s fight with Ava...

Ava is my current top pick for the True Dandelion candidate due to the sheer number of questions it answers and how few it raises

Ever since KH3 came out, the question of “where the heck is Ava?” has been buzzing around as a major mystery. Her last chronological point of appearance is the same as the other Foretellers: the Keyblade War itself, where she’s shown leading her Union to battle. Notably, she seems resigned to her part in this, and this is the first and only time we see her after her battle with Luxu where he reveals to her the Master’s true plans. Melody of Memory seems to imply that the other Foretellers managed to skip to the future by going to another world, Quadratum (or at least this is the most likely explanation as there’s not enough pods to send all four of the other Foretellers AND the characters that we know end up in the future to their destination). However, Ava isn’t with them and Luxu knows what happened to her

It would be easy to write this off as them trying to drop Ava from the narrative or her not being important, but her chess piece is included in the “Eraqus and Xehanort foreshadow the next saga” chess game on the far right of the board and Nomura confirms that they represent the Master’s six apprentices, i.e. the five Foretellers + Luxu. So, Ava is necessary in the upcoming saga and yet, she didn’t get to the future the same way as any of the Master’s other apprentices leaving her open to get there via a lifeboat

Ava is the very founder of the Dandelions, who all of the others look up to and defer to and was spoken of heavily in the scene just prior to the True Dandelion reveal. That’s grounds for being called the True Dandelion if I’ve ever seen one

Luxu would very easily be able to ensure that Ava would be able to make it to the future. Just like with the Master of Masters, he already has the memories necessary for her to use to regenerate a body, and either her Keyblade or her mask would make for effective mediums that wouldn’t be too difficult for Luxu to take. If he put her in the white cloth, he probably took her mask off already

Ava hasn’t been around for the events of KHUx, so there’s no timeline discrepancies if it’s her

So, now that we have an idea of who the True Dandelion could be, let’s talk about the rest of the lifeboats and how they might fit together. For the purposes of this discussion, let’s assume that the True Dandelion can’t be one of the Union Leaders and that their battle with Darkness is taking place at the same time as Luxu is sending off the True Dandelion. I’ll be referencing an old theory of mine, while making additions now that it’s clear that there’s two sets of lifeboats: the Data Set and the Real Set

Right now, there’s an equal number of Real Pods and Data Pods: 5 each. For the Data Pods, of the seven that we started with, one was used by Maleficent and one was damaged in the battle between Maleficent and Lauriam. As for the Real Pods, one has been used by Maleficent, and one has been used by the True Dandelion. This leaves us with five each.

We can narrow this down further by eliminating people that we know end up in the future. These are:

Ventus

Subject X, who is most likely Skuld based on her description

Lauriam

Elrena* (of note with Elrena is that we actually have no idea where the hell she is at the moment or how she’s going to get into the pods. Furthermore, while every other lifeboat user sans Maleficent has been shown to have amnesia upon waking and Lauriam/Marluxia directly indicates as such applies to him, too, in KH3, Elrena/Larxene’s KH3 scene and character file short story both indicate that she recalls Lauriam and possibly Strelitzia, though she also seems surprised at the idea that she’s part of an ancient Keyblade legacy. I won’t deny that there’s a possibility that she doesn’t use a lifeboat and ends up in the future by other means based on the discrepancies)

So with three confirmed cases, we’re left with one ambiguous case in Elrena and three more possible candidates: Ephemer, Brain, and Player. Four people, and two pods

I want to make it clear that despite what I brought up against Elrena, I do think that she’ll be using one of the lifeboats if only so that KHUx has narrative consistency. They introduced Elrena, they made her part of the investigation on Strelitzia’s whereabouts, so it only makes sense that they need to show us where she ended up for a satisfying conclusion. So let’s slot Elrena in for one of the lifeboats. That leaves one between Player, Ephemer, and Brain

My best guess is that Player won’t be using a lifeboat at all. Not only are they a create-a-character that would be a HUGE pain to try and incorporate into future entries in the series without making a “canon” version and thus ruining their appeal as an avatar, but we haven’t seen or heard mention of them at all in the games set in the present-day. There’s zero indication that they made it, which makes them the most easily eliminated as a lifeboat user

That leaves Ephemer and Brain, and I still believe that Ephemer will be the final lifeboat user, and for the same reasons as stated in the theory I linked at the start of this section. Not only does Brain have the same facial sprite as Eraqus, but he wields the Master’s Defender which will be later passed down to Eraqus and I believe that this eliminates him as a time traveler, despite the fandom’s popular opinion that it confirms it

Because I don’t believe that Brain is Eraqus’s grandfather, but rather his distant ancestor who inherited the No Name and passed down both Keyblades through the ages

So let’s resolve some plot threads taking everything I’ve stated and linked to above into account

My Big Guess for the KHUx Finale

Ventus will use the fact that Darkness is tied to his heart now to give it a physical, but still mostly amorphous form that he, the Union Leaders, and Player can finally take down. Darkness will be sealed inside Ven’s heart, where it will lie dormant until he reaches the future. Eventually, Xehanort will extract it in the form of Vanitas and it will follow Vanitas’s life cycle, ending in him being reabsorbed into Ven at the end of BBS. Darkness, now back in Ven’s heart, will make brief contact with Sora during the events of Re:Mind

Lauriam, upon learning that the world will be sealed with the use of the lifeboats, will attempt to rescue his partner, Elrena. Both will take lifeboats out of the datascape and into the future, whereupon they will be recruited into Organization XIII by Luxu’s current incarnation, Xigbar, likely to keep an eye on them. I believe there might be a squabble among Ephemer, Skuld, Brain, and Player among who will use the final lifeboats (each person nominating others besides themselves), but ultimately they will settle on Ephemer and Skuld

Skuld will wind up amnesiac in the future Radiant Garden and is discovered by Ansem the Wise and his apprentices and dubbed Subject X. She becomes Xehanort’s favorite test subject due to the similarities in their amnesia and possibly some lingering memories that he has that don’t quite belong to him (KHDR Xehanort certainly seems to want to meet his “old friends” very badly)

Ephemer’s heart will wind up in the Keyblade Graveyard as I mentioned in an old theory, unable to manifest a body due to the lack of a medium present. Through this state of being just a heart (and possibly related to those old talks about him being “unchained”), he will be able to enact the Light of the Past moment from KH3, and may very well be revived for future events in the series

This leaves Brain and Player behind in the datascape. However, you may remember one detail that I brought up, but neglected to fully expand on until now. There is a difference between the Data Pods and the Real Pods. While all of the Real Pods have been used up at the time of my proposed sequence of events, the Data Pods have not been. One was never used, only damaged. This leaves open the possibility that it can also be repaired (Also, I’m just gonna say it. Player’s met someone recently who has a magic hammer that can repair anything... might not come back but also totally could). Brain and Player could then repair the final pod and, in a callback to when Player was sent to Game Central Station, have them both agree once again that Player is the more expendable person in the scenario. Brain will take the repaired pod, leaving no way out of the datascape for anyone else, while Player stays behind to be sealed away for the time being (this could also be a callback to the original KHx, where Player also stayed behind to take part in the war instead of fleeing with the Dandelions, as they refused to leave their party behind)

When Brain escapes, however, he will be met with a Daybreak Town with no Real Pods left, as Luxu used one on the True Dandelion. Now that the seven pods have all been used up and the real Daybreak Town is falling to darkness, Luxu will take a corridor out as the Master instructed, but bring the newly appeared Brain along with him (either that or Brain emerges after Daybreak Town falls, either is possible) and bequeaths the No Name onto him. Brain, stranded in the past while all of his friends have been sent to the future, will be Luxu’s new apprentice and rebuild the fallen Daybreak Town as Scala ad Caelum, then pass down both of his Keyblades: Master’s Defender to his biological descendants, and No Name to his apprentices

As for the Master of Masters? I think he’s already taken an eighth lifeboat (you’ll note that there’s space right in the center of the cluster where one more could theoretically fit) and had done so before the start of the original KHx. He’ll be revived at some point in Xehanort’s young adult life to goad him into his insane plans as seen in Re:Mind, then duck into Quadratum to hang out until the next arc in the franchise, as hinted at with his appearance in the KH3 Secret Movie

(He is most definitely not Sora. He’s clearly bound to the same rules of time travel as everyone else which means that Sora couldn’t go back in time to become him as that would be long before the point in time where Sora was born and that breaks KH time travel rules. Not to mention that the Master talks about Quadratum in this update like he’s never seen it before until it came up in the No Name’s range of vision. Sora is literally in Quadratum right now, he’d definitely know what it was already if he was the Master)

And I do believe that should cover everyone’s whereabouts by the end of the game and into the next arc of Kingdom Hearts with minimal plot holes

This is just my best guess, putting together details that I’ve been accumulating for the past year and a half or so into what sounds like a coherent sequence of events that bridge the gap between KHUx and KH3 and beyond. There may be some details I get wrong, obviously. Nomura has been known to be... unpredictable. But I think, based on the evidence we have at hand, that this is the most logical series of events to end the game on and I’m really interested to see how close this gets to the actual finale we see

SURVEY_PROGRAM

It’s been a long time, but here’s my updated thoughts on Deltarune.

Evidence for DELTARUNE being a SIMULATION created by W.D. Gaster:

Gaster's tweets. Toby tweeting as Gaster when Deltarune Chapter 1 originally came out seems to imply he’s the one in charge of Deltarune.

Deltarune was originally called SURVEY_PROGRAM. What is being surveyed, why and by who?

Entry number 17 plays from your cellphone in the Dark World.

Gaster seems to talk to you during the character creation.

Sans, his house and Grillby's seem the same as in Undertale, though without the decorations.

”Delta” can be a reference to ”Delta Testing”: The first Chapter is isolated for testing under Gaster's surveillance.

Questions this raises (and my assumptions):

What does Gaster know about the Red Soul/The Player?

The Red Soul could be an artificial SOUL created by Gaster. (Contradiction: Alphys states in her log entry that the power of the SOUL can't be artificially constructed, and she opts to use Monster Souls as test subjects.) The Red Soul is Chara's original SOUL after they've died with Asriel. (Contradiction: There is no mention of what happened to Chara's SOUL after the fused Asriel and Chara returned to the Underground, but the six other SOULs have been told to vanish every time after Flowey/Asriel absorbs them. Also, it is uncertain whether Chara can be thought of as a character the player could control, as we only ever control Frisk, and then Kris in Deltarune.) The Red Soul is simply our SOUL. (Contradiction: That would imply the player is a literal part of the game/Undertale universe, but would explain none of our origin within it. Human SOULs (most likely as no other indication has been given) spawn with human bodies, and Chara says both the SOUL and human body were “not theirs, but yours.” With Frisk being an actual character outside our control, it's debatable whether Chara is referring to them or the player, or perhaps both.)

The fact that we use the player name we've chosen within the mechanics seems to imply Chara is still very much with us, and that the Red Soul is the same as in Undertale. Especially because we recognize Sans both in and out of game. Even if our previous association with him is not the same as in Undertale, the Red Soul and Sans are somehow involved. The character creation resembling the form of Frisk, even if older, seems to indicate the same thing. And because we are given a teenage body instead of a child's one, it could imply the Red Soul has matured from when we were controlling Frisk. It enters a very messy area of speculation however, especially considering the likely timeline(s) of the two games.

What is Gaster testing?

If Deltarune is a simulation created by the W.D. Gaster who was once the Royal Scientist in the Undertale universe, we can assume it had to do with freeing monsterkind. Alphys' experiments focused on recreating or ”unleashing” the power of the SOUL in order to break the barrier. She discovered a component in the SOULs makeup she called Determination. She also discovered that it is the fundamental aspect that allows human SOULs to persist after they die. Determination can only be hosted by beings with enough ”physical matter”, or the subject will melt and fuse with another of its kind if possible. Beings without SOULs will gain the will to live if injected with Determination – or at the very least this becomes the case when monster dust seems to be involved (memory data, DNA). Without a SOULs other properties, this kind of being lacks the capacity to love, but hosts a multitude of powers Determination apparently grants Human Souls.

Gaster could be testing the Red Soul. He is said by the Gaster Followers to have been brilliant, and because nobody remembers him, it could be that he was further along in this kind of study than Alphys. When Chara wields Determination among a set of other kinds of strenght provided by the No Mercy (Genocide) run, they have the power to Erase the world of Undertale. They also encourage you to ”move onto the next (world)”, and later refer to us recreating Undertale if we complete No Mercy twice. This implies that either the human SOUL or Determination alone gives us the power to not only manipulate reality, but to destroy and rebuild it. DETERMINE, TERMINATE and DE-TERMINATE. Because Gaster specifically gives us the option to create and erase files in Deltarune, this could be something he's testing. What are the limits of the Red Soul, how much can you do with it... What choises will it make in a controlled environment?

You have to take into account that Chara interferes with Character Creation and discards the vessel Gaster has encouraged you to construct. Chara places the Red Soul in Kris' body and tells the player that ”they can not choose who they are in this world.” That means that the experiment is not going exactly according to plan. (Sans could be there as damage control, but it is hard to know what part he actually plays.) This is also proven when, at the end of Chapter 1, Kris rejects the Red Soul. In the Dark World, Kris' flavor text says ”Body contains a human SOUL,” which seems to imply the Red Soul is not Kris' original one. This could imply that the SOUL needs to match its body for the body to act in complete obedience, a bit like how Ghosts become corporeal by finding an appropriate form through a strong emotional reaction. This would also explain why Gaster wants us to make our own vessel specifically. He could have meant for us to be in control within the experiment, but Chara interfered. For whatever reason, the experiment was not interrupted. We are given the power to stop or resume, which seems to indicate the biggest thing Gaster wanted of the Red Soul was its cooperation. This could imply simply trying to understand the Red Soul.

How was Deltarune created?

I believe the world of Deltarune is constructed similar to how one would create a video game. First, you need an engine: It is shown SOULs can be used as sources of energy through how they supercharge whoever they're fused with. A human SOUL or the CORE could very well work as an engine. Then you need to program it, where I assume Gaster would come in: He provides a platform upon which you can create. The Red Soul could/would be in charge of creation as much as Gaster would be: Their memories, experiences, hopes and dreams could be functioning as the pillars for the simulated world. They'd simply manifest within the constraints Gaster had placed (which could also explain the way we experience Undertale/Deltarune. It is simply the extent to which we're able because of our own power. Some Undertale characters seem to be aware of it: especially Sans. Which would confirm the theory of him being involved with Gaster and the creation of Deltarune, the experience given to the Red Soul and the lense the Red Soul can view the world through).

Chara's interference could’ve caused the world to form the way it did. This would imply the people present in the overworld are the people Chara knew and how they witnessed them/or maybe they did not know them very well and made up their own environment from these people. Sans may or may not be an intruder in that and is having an effect on the world to mess with Chara. The world is likely not an ideal world of Chara's, but rather their hopes and dreams mixing partly with reality. The Dark World could be a world created within that world with more effects from either Gaster or Chara's/Frisk's/Kris' imagination, or perhaps a subconcious world. Their own power could be catching them off guard.

Where in the Undertale timeline does this simulation happen?

The lack of Gryftmas lights (as well as the lack of snow on the roof) on Sans' house would imply before he lived in Snowdin, or at least before Gryftmas was made a tradition. The use of Red Soul could imply 'after' Undertale, but it is specifically referred to as ”not a sequel,” so I don't think it would happen afterwards in the timeline. So the experiment could reasonably take place before they have seven human SOULs; It would have to take place either before or after Chara's death, but at the very least before all the other humans fell in. Gaster's presence could also imply that it was before he was scattered across time and space, especially because Entry Number 17 plays on the phone (he could be making it during Chapter 1). However, the fact that he says he has been ”searching for us” (either referring to the player or the Red Soul), could mean that he is in fact scattered. Or at the very least, the SOUL is lost. (Which, when I think about it, could imply Chara has died at this point and he is fishing for the Red Soul from the Void after it has likely vanished. This could clash with other portions of my theory, but I'm simply looking at whatever facts we have.)

Who is Kris?

Kris is the vessel chosen to host the Red Soul by Chara. This, combined with the behaviours the people in the Deltarune overworld say they've witnessed of Kris, seems to suggest Kris is a version of Chara. A vessel they want the Red Soul to work through, and it is notable that they travel with the Red Soul when their name (whatever your player name ends up being) is called. Kris does not match the Red Soul as perfectly as it does Chara, the original fallen child. That could be why they created or chose this vessel and why they're able to fight the power of the Red Soul by extracting it from Kris.

If experiments are done while Chara is still alive, Chara would still most likely be a child considering the timeline. However, if experiments are being done to strenghten their SOUL, the SOUL could be more mature than Chara themselves is. Thus an older vessel matches the Red Soul or alternatively, Chara's SOUL, better.

What is Chara?

If nothing has changed from Undertale, the Chara the Red Soul knows is the memory of the first human who fell into the underground. We give them a name and they realize a purpose from themselves when the Red Soul distances from the vessel known as ”Frisk.” This purpose is power. With the lack of a SOUL of their own, Chara lacks the ability to love. It seems they operate almost purely on a manner of logic, like a program. Within Deltarune though, Chara seems to act differently. They take initiative and actively seek to take control, which on paper is not too different; However, Chara is no longer a result of our actions, implying they have their own free will from the start. Chara acts very much like a virus within the context of Deltarune if you consider it a program. They interfere and take over. If the world is a projection made by Chara, it also implies an emotional presence and could suggest Chara still has a SOUL and is an active character/player within the universe.

These are my current thoughts. Up to changing. Left out a ton of speculation.

Monthly Reads | July 2020

Happy 28th! As always, my undying love goes out to all the amazing authors this fandom still has. You are all incredible! Thank you for sharing your work with us ♥ Here are all the 21 fics I read and enjoyed this month:

⋙ The Murmur of Yearning | MediaWhore | historical - no smut - arranged marriage past rape/non-con - implied/referenced dubious consent - minor character death - slow burn - 93k Four years ago, Harry Styles was forced into a marriage of convenience to enrich and ally both his and his promised's families. The sudden, and slightly suspicious, death of the Marquess of Haxshire, however, brings great disturbance to Crescentfield Hall and, as his late's husband's closest male relative, Harry unexpectedly finds himself the head of a family he never felt he belonged to. Between a meddling distant cousin hellbent on inserting himself in Harry’s life, his wicked and mistrustful mother-in-law and his late husband’s advisors refusing to help or take him seriously, Harry struggles in the fight to keep what he’s earned and make the Estate finally feel like home. Luckily he doesn’t stand completely alone and finds himself an unlikely ally in Mr Tomlinson, the elusive Land Stewart who has been taking care of the property in the shadows for years. Louis Tomlinson is caring, patient, and unlike everyone else, he doesn’t seem to think Harry committed a murder.

⋙ Donor-Conceived | jaerie | a/b/o - omega/omega - friends to lovers - intersex omegas - pregnancy kink - unplanned pregnancy - fertility issues - miscarriage mentioned - male lactation - lactation kink - 31k When Harry receives the worst news of his life, it's now or never if he wants to carry a child of his own. Without an alpha, it's a daunting idea. But after it's a go, he finds another omega having a child from the same donor and become fast friends. It is only logical that they raise the boys as half brothers, making sure their sons keep up the relationship with the only connection to their anonymous father. It seems like the perfect plan but life doesn't always work out that way.

⋙ Just a touch of your love | anonymous | a/b/o - touch-starved - past abuse - past rape/non-con - miscommunication - anxiety attacks - 12k “What if something happened to you? What would I say to Niall?” “Nothing, he would have to wait to see my corpse on the news like everyone else.” Deadpanned Harry. Louis’ gasp was all the answer he got. Ok, so that might have been a bit too much. With a calmer voice, he said, “It’s really fine. I’ve walked to the tube countless times, I can handle myself. Just go home and tell Niall to stop mothering me.” Louis was finally walking by his side and gave him a sideways glance before talking. “He doesn’t know, does he? Of your, uh, condition.” Harry tensed and his breath became erratic, but he didn’t say a word. Louis continued. “His nose probably hasn’t picked it up, and you’re lucky Liam’s also a beta, but it took me a minute to confirm it. Your scent is gettin’ so…” He seemed to struggle to find a word. He didn’t finish the sentence, but the emotion in his voice made Harry’s tummy churn. -- Or, Harry is a touch starved omega trying to get through it on his own. Louis happens to be the only alpha around to realize it and offers to help.

⋙ We're Not Who We Used To Be | jaerie | trans female character - trans Harry - childhood friends - friends with benefits - transitioning - gender dysphoria - body disphoria gender identity - first time - self-medicating - reference to depression - 7k Louis comes back to his childhood home and sees an old friend who has changed quite a lot since the last time they saw each other.

⋙ Sincerely, Yours | anon | strangers to lovers - military - 25k Prompt:Historical AU where Louis is a soldier on his way to first deployment and Harry is working at a diner. They meet there when Louis is waiting for the bus, Harry tries to cheer Louis up and agrees to write to him while he's deployed because Louis doesn't have anyone else to write to. People kinda make fun of Harry for writing to (and falling for) a virtual stranger but otherwise everything is great until Louis stops writing. AKA travelin' soldier by the Dixie Chicks but gay and with a happy ending.

⋙ Ever Since I Tried Your Way | anon | historical - 1940s - 1950s - farm/ranch - internalized homophobia - hurt/comfort - emotional hurt/comfort - fluff - smut - gender exploration - body worship - 26k Harry had been kissed before, but never like this. He’d shared sweet, curious kisses behind bleachers and in soda shop booths, one or two more daring ones in cars parked on dark suburban streets, but the girls he’d kissed had never filled him with the desperation that erupted from Louis’ touch. He parted his lips and pulled him closer, as though he could breathe Louis straight into his lungs, as if he could swallow him. He wanted to consume Louis the way he consumed the body and blood of Christ. He wanted to place Louis on his tongue and feel him dissolve into a frothy mess of starch and saliva. He wanted to gulp him down until his teeth were stained purple and he was drunk on him. He wanted him in some violent holy way that made his hands shake where they were twisted in Louis’ shirt. In 1949 Harry left his bride at the altar, running away from the only life he'd known. When a kindhearted farmer offers him a ride in his truck and a place to sleep the two find themselves inexplicably drawn together. Isolated on Louis' farm with nobody but a field of dairy cows to intrude, the men are finally able to explore the parts of themselves they've spent their lives hiding away.

⋙ sleeping on our problems | falsegoodnight | a/b/o - college/university - mpreg - friends with benefits - angst - slow burn - hurt/comfort - 67k I’m in love with you, Louis thinks. He feels empty, weighed down by his sadness and the loss of Harry inside him just moments ago before his knot finally went down. There’s moments where he’s sure Harry feels the same. Like now, when he’s gazing down at Louis with so much adoration and tenderness. It’s like they’re both on the cusp of something more, but neither of them ever say a word. His confession is on the tip of his tongue ready to slide out like honey, and yet he remains silent. They both do, looking at each other and recognizing the reluctance mirrored in each other’s eyes. It’s then that Louis realizes they’re both scared. - Or Louis sleeps with Harry and they have more than just catching feelings to worry about.

⋙ in a world alone | falsegoodnight | a/b/o - Swan Lake AU - historical - royalty - magic - curses - friends to lovers - slow burn - mpreg - 51k Harry’s breath catches as the glow grows bigger and bigger until he’s squinting his eyes and blinking at the sudden intense brightness. He closes his eyes, rubbing at them helplessly. When his eyes open again- he gasps, grip loosening on his bow as he gawks at the sight before him. Because the swan is gone. And in its place is the prettiest omega Harry has ever seen. - A Swan Lake AU

⋙ The Baby Whisperer | jacaranda_bloom | strangers to lovers - prior mpreg - neighbours - fluff - smut - kid fic - 19k Harry’s newborn baby is having trouble sleeping and nothing he does seems to work. Tired and alone and at his wits end, Harry is at a loss until a new neighbour arrives to turn his world upside down. OR the one where being neighbourly takes on a whole new meaning.

⋙ was in no hurry, had no worries | defencelouis | strangers to lovers - car accidents - smut - daddy kink - 21k The year is 1999 and Harry can’t stop dedicating songs to Louis on the radio. Or the one where Harry hits Louis with his car.

⋙ Strong Enough | jacaranda_bloom | enemies to lovers - exes to lovers - angst - smut - divorce - 21k “So…” Liam starts, and Louis instantly knows where this is going. He’s actually glad it’s Liam that's dragging the subject out from the shadows and into the light. Louis turns to face him, mirroring his position on the couch and nods, ready for him to continue. Liam takes a deep breath. “Have you spoken to Harry recently?” Five years after Vertigo goes on hiatus, the band comes back together for a benefit concert. Can Louis and Harry work through their complicated past, or are some wounds too deep to be healed?

⋙ What's It Gonna Be? | zeldasayre | high school - 37k Louis looked thoughtful for a moment. “When are you meeting with Clare again?” “Thursday,” Bebe said, looking over at him, the ice clinking in her glass as she stirred it with a long spoon. “Why?” He grinned, narrowing his eyes. He took a long, dramatic pause, sipping his lemonade, and then said, “Scheming.” aka I've watched Shura's "What's It Gonna Be?" music video one too many times. ((Or, Louis and Bebe, best friends since childhood, have crushes on two of the most popular kids in school, and in an attempt to increase their respective chances, Louis befriends Harry Styles, quarterback of the football team, while Bebe befriends Clare Uchima, head cheerleader. Only... the plan... doesn't go exactly as planned.))

⋙ There Goes My Life | anonymous | older larry - colleagues with benefits - mpreg - unplanned pregnancy - smut - lactation kink - 8k Metallic taste in the mouth, check. Aversions to favourite foods, check. Nausea without throwing up, check. A heightened sense of smell, check. Sore and sensitive nipples, check. It had felt as though Harry had been ticking off boxes from his own mental checklist and every new addition brought him closer to an existential crisis. Pregnant. Everything over the last few weeks began to make sense; thoughts he pushed from his mind because he was too busy, and to be honest too scared, to think about. Getting knocked up from a few-night’s-stand was something that happened to teenagers and/or uni students, but certainly not to a forty-year-old Member of Parliament such as himself. *** Or, the one where Harry is single, a Member of Parliament, gets knocked up and has to deal with navigating motherhood in his forties. And Louis? Well, his life is about to change forever as well. This is a tale about colleagues with benefits and the consequences that can come with that.

⋙ Mother I'd Like to * | anonymous | implied mpreg - MILF Harry - 4k “What’s up, dad?” Oliver asks Louis, standing in front of Harry in a way that hides his friends from the view. “Is there something wrong with your mom? Your friends are staring a lot.” Oliver goes beet red at that. He groans and hides his face on his hands. “Oh my god. Oh my god.” --------------------- Written for the prompt: Harry’s and Louis’ son is like 16, so he is hanging out with his friends and his friends are teasing him about how hot his mother (aka harry) is, just like the 1D boys always did with Harry about Anne. The son feels super uncomfortable and Louis is super confused why these little teenagers boys always stare at Harry’s body when he is cooking for them whenever they visit until he finds out they think of Harry as the hottest milf in town (more humor than actual sexual references pls, this is supposed to be more funny than awkwardly sexual :D)

⋙ An Invincible Summer | Brooklyn_Babylon | farm/ranch - historical - 1940s - period-typical homophobia - adoption - minor character death - epilepsy - homophobic language - smut - 44k Never content to stay in one place for long, a few months down south researching for his novel seemed like an idyllic, slow-paced summer to Louis. He wasn't ready for the blistering heat, the backbreaking work of watermelon picking, or how stifling the attitudes in rural Georgia would feel. And he definitely hadn’t anticipated falling in love with the farmer’s son. The summer of 1946 would turn out to be everything worth writing about.

⋙ a trail of honey through it all | faeriestyles | strangers to friends to lovers - mild violence - D/s undertones - 27k The boy in front of him, well really, the man in front of him, was like something out of a confusing wet dream. Built, tall, tan and muscular, his skin glistened with sweat after a long day of working outdoors with his hands. He was wearing a cut up old American football shirt, the bottom hem was torn and the sleeves were cut off to the point where the t-shirt was really just a loose tank top. The shorts he had on had clearly been full length jeans at one point, and were now just crudely cut off above the knee. His white socks were pulled up too high on his calves, and the brown work boots he had on were old as fuck, the leather peeling along the edges of the soles. Curly brown hair stuck out from the edges of his backwards snapback, and there was a smudge of grease wiped along his brow bone. The smattering of hair along his jaw proved that he hadn’t shaved in a week or two, the hair growing in thicker across his upper lip and around his chin. His sinfully bowed mouth was pink and plump, and Louis was suddenly hyper-focused on the way that he chewed at the toothpick stuck between his lips. He looked like he needed a shower. Louis wanted to lick him. Or, the TPH fic we’ve all been waiting for.

⋙ The Recklessness in Water | LarryOn | light angst - smut - 50k Louis Tomlinson is miserable. He's stuck on a family vacation at a lake cabin in New Hampshire when all he wants to do is bemoan his sorry existence and wallow in his sweatpants. As if the humidity and mosquitos weren't bad enough, he becomes the singular target of an obnoxious lifeguard named Harry.

⋙ baby blue | soldouthaz | cowboy AU - famous/not famous - angst - hate to love - enemies to lovers - smut - hurt/comfort - minor violence - 39k Harry Styles takes his time coming out to greet them. Louis only knows what he’s seen on file and what he’s heard them talking about, but he fully lives up to the image he had inside of his head. He saunters down the front steps of the farmhouse in his Levi’s, brown snakeskin boots curving out from underneath the denim Louis’ sure he had specially made. He’s got on a plaid button-down tucked into the jeans because of course he does, curls spilling out from either side of his cowboy hat around his sunglasses and country-tan skin. “Harry Styles,” he drawls, extending a hand to Louis’ manager, “Pleased to meet ya’ll.”

⋙ with no way out and a long way down | we_are_the_same | royalty - soulmates - strangers to lovers - fluff - angst - no smut - emotional hurt/comfort arranged marriage - 31k Prince Harry is ten when he receives his soulmark.

⋙ adjudication | bottomlinsons | royalty - historical - enemies to friends to lovers - enemies to friends - love letters - betrayal - slow burn - light angst - arranged marriage - 75k Harry's been engaged to Princess Charlotte of Ryde for as long as he can remember. He's come to know her, to love her, through the letters she's sent him over the past three years. But when the wedding finally arrives, Harry quickly learns that nothing is as it seems. With his crown and country at stake, Harry must decide who to trust in this strange new land. And the sly Crown Prince of Ryde doesn't seem inclined to make things easy.

⋙ Something to Prove | trysomecats | a/b/o - enemies to lovers - mpreg - smut - 9k Louis is the first and only omega to work at Red Valley Medical Center. Despite being more than qualified, he still faces prejudice for his career choice everyday. From patients refusing his treatment to condescending alpha doctors intervening with his work, practicing medicine in Boston is more challenging than Louis had ever thought it would be.

Terrible, Beautiful, Maddening (a Hegeleth fic) 5/?

Read on AO3

She wakes up in a hospital bed three days after the fight in the throne room. Judging by the biting light streaming in the windows, it’s mid-afternoon. At first, she thinks she’s alone in the room, but a small snore alerts her to Flayn’s presence, blending in perfectly with the overflowing table of flowers and gifts at the side of her bed. In her lap, precarious and on the edge of falling, is a set of knitting needles and a half finished object that could possibly be a hat, she isn’t quite sure.

Her head aches, and it takes her a minute or two to remember what exactly happened to her to land her in an infirmary yet again. Ah yes. Edelgard. If she closed her eyes again she could almost see those haunting red eyes again, desperate for something, but what she could not tell.

Her throat is dry; she shifts on the bed to see if there is water anywhere, and Flayn wakes with an “Oh!” Knitting needles clang to the floor, forgotten, as the girl leaps to her feet.

“Professor, you are awake! We have all been so worried! You sit tight, l’ll go find Mercedes and the other healers.” Before a word can be said, Flayn scurries out the infirmary door. Minutes later, a wave of healers, well-wishers, and Seteth bustle into the room. They busy themselves asking questions about how she feels, if there’s any pain, how many fingers are they holding up. Her headache is whisked away by a cool hand aglow in white healing light but the endless questioning threatens to bring it back with a vengeance.

She tries to say she’s fine, really, but either nobody hears her or believes her or both, until a stern voice from the back of the crowd halts the poking and prodding. Seteth- bless him, orders everyone who isn’t himself or Mercedes out of the room. They slowly file out, mumbling congratulations and words of encouragement. Mercedes quietly confirms that she seems to be in good health, only requiring another day of bed rest to make sure there are no lingering side effects of having a Ragnarok spell nearly dropped on one’s head, and leaves. Her throat is still parched.

Seteth assures her that Dimitri is fine (internally she is rather surprised at herself that her first thought upon waking was Edelgard rather than the young prince, and makes a mental note to unpack that at a later time) and has been up and about since yesterday. She can expect a visit from him when he returns from his inspection of the captured imperial troops. He updates her on the status of the Archbishop, who is recovering in another room after suffering severe malnourishment in the palace dungeon. She nods along as he lays out details of efforts immediately underway to placate the restless population of Enbarr; distributing supplies and offering medical aid seem to be winning people over more and more each day.

Several minutes into Seteth’s report, she yawns. He stops mid-sentence with an amused smile. “Ah of course, you must still be exhausted from recovery, Professor. Please excuse my thoughtlessness. The rest can wait until tomorrow.”

He turns to leave, but as he crosses the foot of her bed, he hesitates and stands before the open window, clasping his hands behind his back. His shadow falls across the thin blanket at her feet. “There’s one more thing I would like to mention. Dimitri fell unconscious upon hitting the floor, which leaves you as the sole witness to the ultimate fate of Emperor Edelgard. While there is no question that the final spell you cast was devastating enough to destroy half the platform you stood on, curiously no remains of her body were found. Therefore one must come to the conclusion that the blast was concentrated enough to destroy the entire body after it reverted to human form, much like the students we saw that were transformed by the crest stones. Additionally, the shockwave from the blast must have been the cause of the shattered window above the throne. Does this theory parallel the actual events as you experienced them, Byleth?”

She swallowed thickly. Why was there no water here still? “Yes, that’s… That’s how I remember it,” she said with what she hoped was some measure of confidence.

He turned his head and regarded her with one eye. “That is reassuring to hear, my friend. A creature like that let free to roam across Fodlan would certainly cause a good deal of trouble and unnecessary death, don’t you agree?” His words were deliberate and pointed.

“Of course, Seteth.” She should have known Seteth, ever the perceptive one, would have noticed something was awry. She is thankful he is not the type to act rashly, Dimitri would not be so receptive to such knowledge. She can only hope that he trusts her enough to let things be.

“Very well then,” he says, mouth a set line. “I’ll leave you to your rest, professor. Lots of people are looking forward to seeing you up and about.”

He leaves the room, and she slumps back down onto the pillows, letting sleep take her again.

--

She returned to Garreg Mach monastery late the next day. As she had predicted, Seteth, Flayn, and a good portion of the Knights of Seiros had already arrived several weeks earlier. Almost immediately she is whisked away by Flayn to the second floor of the church, updating her on what she had missed while she was away, as well as the several varieties of fish she had tasted while on the road from Enbarr.

They reached the second floor strategy room, which served as a makeshift classroom for the last few months of the war. Inside, Dimitri, Seteth, and Gilbert were set around the large table in the middle of the room, voices hushed and faces somber.

“Brother! Look who the cat has dragged in!” Flayn said, beaming.

Dimitri stood and met them in the middle of the room, embracing her in a tight hug. “It is good to see your face, Professor! I was beginning to believe you would not return before I left for Fhirdiad.” He released her and stepped back, grinning. “I was a bit surprised to hear from Seteth that you would be taking some time to yourself, but I suppose I am not one to judge a person on how they process such violent experiences.”

Seteth stepped out from behind Dimitri’s fur-covered shoulder. “Yes, professor, it is most fortuitous that you arrived when you did. We were just beginning to consider sending out search parties, in fact.”

She nodded. “Yes, my time spent away was most… refreshing. I apologize for not returning sooner than I did.”

Dimitri laid a hand on her shoulder. “Nonsense, professor. Now, let’s update you on the reunification efforts so far…”

--

That night, and days after, were filled with endless meetings with lords about reparations and distribution of relief aid, and when it wasn’t that it was slowly getting lessons from Seteth about the duties of the position of Archbishop. The only constant thing she could rely on were dreams every night bookended with two glowing red eyes staring at her from the darkness.

It was almost three weeks before Byleth was able to divest herself enough from her ever-growing pile of duties to be able to leave the monastery again. Reassuring Seteth that she would only be gone for a couple days, she set off at the first light of dawn. Her breath puffed in the air in front of her as she made her way through the winding mountains. Being familiarized with the path she had to take this time, she was able to shorten her journey by several hours and made it back to Edelgard’s valley by late afternoon. At the mouth of the valley, she stopped for a moment to admire the view. If she hastened, she could make it back to her campsite before sundown. She adjusted the pack she carried on her back, it was bulky and quite heavy, but she hoped that at least some of it would be unnecessary to carry back on the return trip. She pulled her hands together to  breathe some warmth into them, and continued down into the valley.

The bright leaves of autumn had all but fallen to the forest floor by this time of year, and the bare trees above her arched like the vaulted ceilings in the monastery’s chapel, casting long shadows in the evening light as she walked. As she got closer to the opposite end of the valley, she noticed more and more snapped trees and fallen limbs that had been broken off and tossed aside, creating traversable spaces through the dense forest.

Reaching her campsite, she noticed the carefully-built circle of stones she had placed for her fire had been knocked aside and scattered across the campsite. She sighed, dropped her pack at the edge of the clearing, and began the task of picking up each stone and placing it back where it belonged in the circle. Once that was finished, she took out a small hatchet from her pack and began gathering branches and kindling for the fire.

As she circled the outskirts of the clearing, she noticed several familiar footprints. Some were old and covered in leaves, others were more recent, left in softer soil, and a few, she was glad to see, looked to have been made within only a few days. Most of these tracks carefully skirted the perimeter of the clearing, save for one set, which seemed to be left from when the stones had been knocked aside.

Finally gathering enough firewood to last the night, Byleth dragged over a dead and dried log she had found near the river to sit on, pulled some dried meat and cheese out of her pack, and sat down to wait as the sun fell below the mountain peaks. She waited as the sky grew dark and the waxing moon showed its face through the bare skeletons of the trees above. The fire cracked and popped, providing just enough warmth to keep away the early winter chill. Somewhere far away a wolf howled, and was soon joined by another on the opposite side of the valley.

She waited until she heard what she was listening for. Her back against the boulder making up one wall of the campsite, she heard a snapping of branches to her left, just beyond the reach of the fire’s flickering light.

“You’re back.” Her voice was just above a whisper.

“You knew I would be,” Byleth said. She started to turn, to meet the red eyes she saw so often in her dreams now, but at the motion there was a hurried shuffle of dried leaves as she moved backwards.

“No, don’t… Don’t turn around. Don’t look at me.” Her voice was pleading, wavering, and Byleth felt a tug of something deep in her chest to hear it.

Byleth slowly moved her eyes back to the fire. “Okay, Edelgard. I won’t.” After a moment, she heard Edelgard take a few steps closer again. “Can we talk?”

She hears a tired sigh from behind her. “Very well. Although I am afraid I have become a poor conversation partner as of late.”

“That makes two of us,” Byleth said, poking the fire with a stick, considering her next words. “How have you been?” She immediately realized she was off to a poor start as a harsh bark of laughter echoed through the trees.

Edelgard’s voice changed to a bitter tone, far from the one who pleaded for Byleth not to turn around but moments before. “Please, professor. You are smarter than that. How have I been ? Half the time now I’m not sure I even am . Am I destined to become a living revenant, a forgotten echo of the person I once was? Do not mock me with such drivel.”

Byleth continued poking at the embers of the fire. “Of course not, Edelgard.” She grew silent a moment, then, “I have to know though, is there no way you know of to reverse this process? Surely you must have had some idea when you- when you became-”

“No,” she interrupted curtly. “This was a last ditch effort of a foolish and desperate girl, who was abandoned as yet another failed experiment as soon as she proved to be worthless to those who performed the procedure.”

Byleth stayed quiet, gradually processing the information. Minutes passed, yet the figure in the shadows did not move away. Quietly, “Do you want me to try and help you, Edelgard?”

She hears an intake of breath, and then slowly, ever so slowly, she heard the soft steps of feet on dried leaves pad closer. From behind, Edelgard whispered softly, “Can you?”

Gently placing the stick in her hand back down on the ground, Byleth took a breath. “May I turn around, Edelgard?” When no response came, she leaned forward and slowly stood up. She moved deliberately, making no quick or hurried movements, and turned to the towering figure now standing just within the warm light cast from the fire. Her eyes moved up, up, until they met Edelgard’s, who shrank back slightly, her arms raised to her chest.

“It’s okay, Edelgard. I’m not going to hurt you.” Byleth moved her arms away from her body to indicate that she, in fact, had no weapons on her. Edelgard didn’t respond, but she lowered her clasped hands slightly, though Byleth could see them trembling almost imperceptibly. Edelgard’s face was shrouded in deep shadows, but Byleth could see strands of her pale white hair framing her face. The golden crown, once intricately and delicately woven into her hair, had become loose and askew, one horned side dangling and in danger of nearly falling off.

“Edelgard… Will you kneel down?”

Edelgard blinked. Then, haltingly, she brought her body to a kneeling position. Byleth tried not to think about the fact that they were in much the same arrangement many moons ago in the throne room. Byleth reached up towards Edelgard’s face slowly, but even that simple movement caused her to twitch and close her eyes.

“It’s all right, Edelgard,” Byleth murmured. Gently, she brought both hands up and worked at untangling her long white hair from the elaborate headpiece, first the one already nearly falling off, then the other. Edelgard trembled slightly at her first touch, but as Byleth continued her ministrations, she could feel Edelgard faintly leaning into her hands.

Once both horns had been tossed to the ground, Byleth loosely combed her fingers through the long white hair, dislodging several twigs and leaves that had found their way into it. Edelgard had opened her eyes at this point and silently watched Byleth work. Her breath had evened out, but Byleth could still sense a great tension held in her tall form.

She was just about to consider her work finished and started to pull away when her hand caught on a hidden knot of hair at the base of Edelgard’s scalp. The sudden jolt of pain released a sharp snarl from the back of Edelgard’s throat, and Byleth quickly pulled back, her hand instinctively flying to her waist where a sword would normally hang.

Edelgard’s eyes darted to where Byleth’s hands lay, and then down to the glistening golden crown at her feet. Rage dashed across her face and in a swift motion she stood to her full height.

“Now you can see all that stands before you is nothing more than a monster. I will not tell you again. Don’t come back.” With that, she turned and disappeared back into the forest.

The Stone Knight

Part 1/? - Two Statues Part 2/? - A Curious Interview Part 3/? - John Doe Part 4/? - Escape Attempt Part 5/? - Making the News Part 6/? - Fallout

Attempts to figure out what the fuck is going on continue to fail.

Sir Stephen's words hung significantly in the air for a few moments, then DI Carter turned to him with a frown on her face.  “Sorcery?  That was an act of terrorism, that's what it was!”

“I have seen such things before,” Sir Stephen insisted.  “It's a very dangerous form of magic, because you must persuade the devil to perform a task before you give it a reward.”

“Oh, shut up,” Carter told him.

Sir Stephen was apparently undeterred.  “Normally a demon performs no service until blood has been spilled for it,” he explained.  “To bring down a building and kill all those inside requires it to take on faith that there will be people inside, and the blood will be enough to pay for the deed. And if the devil is disappointed in the result...”

“Shut up!” Carter repeated.  “Are you listening to yourself?  Do you have any idea how many people just died?  There must have been a hundred or more, who came there to be cured, and now they're dying in the rubble and you're blaming magic?”

“The most terrible of all magics,” Sir Stephen said gravely.  “I know there are dead, and I know I was meant to be one of them.”  He looked up at Dr. Wilson in the pilot's seat.  “I did not yet come to that part of the tale, but when we tried to return to the priory, we found it had collapsed just the same way, with the blood of the sisters staining the snow.”

“You guys.”  Dr. Wilson turned in his seat.  “More important question: it looks like they didn't refuel the chopper after their last trip. We've got about twenty minutes in the air – where do we want to go?”

He'd turned to the southwest, following the line of the Great Glen as they left the hospital area.  The cloud of dust from the collapsed hospital was lit brightly behind them by the setting sun.

“Away from here,” said Natasha.  That was all that mattered.  If somebody were trying to kill one of them – or all of them – they had to go somewhere that person didn't know they were.

“Burnett Road,” said Carter.  “I need to talk to my colleagues and figure out if the bombing were connected to the disappearance of Mr. Pierce.”

“Invermoriston,” said Sir Stephen, “and I shall prove to you that it was.”

“There's nothing in Invermoriston but an Irish nutter with a deformed seal!” DI Carter protested.

“The woman who spoke to Wilson on his 'mobile' was there to tell of the beast, was she not?” Sir Stephen asked.  “If we can find her, I think she will tell you she did no such thing.  A kobold is a shapeshift.  I think you will learn it was Zola you spoke to, and the Red Death whose sorcery brought the building down once they were sure I was within it.”

Nat thought about that.  “All right,” she said.  “Invermoriston.”

“You must be joking,” Carter protested.

Nat tried to explain her reasoning.  “You're assuming he's making all this up, but what if he's not?  What if it's a twisted version of things that really happened?”  Maybe this was the spy thinking again, but Natasha didn't want to leave the possibility un-investigated.  “Maybe the reporter confirmed that Sir Stephen was in the hospital not because she wants to interview him, but because somebody paid her to – and then once they knew he was there, they bombed the place?”  That almost made sense, except that what had happened at the hospital hadn't felt like a bomb, any more than it had felt like an earthquake.

“I think you're reaching,” said Carter.

“Actually, it's not a bad idea,” Dr. Wilson said.  “They'll have a spot for us to land.  We'll be in somebody's way if we land in the city, because they'll be disatching police and rescue from everywhere they can, but that little square we saw on the news has space to put a helicopter.  It'll be easy to find, too – it's three quarters of the way down the Loch, where the River Moriston gets wider.  I'm out of practice navigating by night, but I can find that.”

Carter sighed.  “Okay, Invermoriston.  I'll have to call my colleagues when we arrive.”

“As long as it's unanimous,” Dr. Wilson said, and grabbed the radio. “Um, hello?  INV air traffic control?  My name is Dr. Sam Wilson. I just escaped the Raigmore Hospital collapse in the air ambulance, with a patient, a cop, and a guest on board.  We want to fly up the Loch to Invermoriston... and it's been about six years since I last flew a helicopter.”

Somebody at the airport gave Wilson some guidelines for the flight, and they continued to work their way down the Great Glen.  Days were long in the Highlands in August, but it was still twilight and rapidly getting darker.  Lights were coming on in the towns and tourist hotels on either side of the long, narrow Loch, and cars could be seen on the roads coming and going.  The waters of the lake themselves were very dark, reflecting the last light of the sunset and a bright half moon.

“Did you ever hear about a monster here back in the day?” Nat asked Sir Stephen, out of idle curiosity.  She was pretty sure she'd read somewhere that there were medieval legends to that effect, but had no idea if they went back as far as 1066.

“The first time I ventured this far north was in pursuit of the Red Death,” said Sir Stephen.  “Nobody warned me of such.”

“The BBC went through the whole Loch in 2003 with sonar, and they didn't find a thing,” said Carter.  “You'd think that would have been the end of it.  My guess is the guy caught that seal somewhere else and moved it to the lake himself so he could 'discover' it.”

“Are you so skeptical about everything you encounter?” asked Sir Stephen.

“Like I told Dr. Rushman, I don't beleive in things, I follow leads,” Carter insisted.  “When I see where they take me, that's reality  It's not about belief.”

“Truth is truth, whether you believe in it or not,” said Sir Stephen.

He'd thought he was arguing with her, but Carter treated it as an agreement.  “Exactly,” she said.  “If I start off believing things, I'll be looking for eviddence that confirms my belief, rather than for the truth!  Finding the truth is my job.”

“Mine, too,” Natasha said thoughtfully.  Archaeology and detective work were actually very similar.  Both involved looking for evidence of past events and trying to reconstruct what had actually happened. The only difference was the time elapsed – Nat's cases were very much colder than Carter's.  It was a curious thing to realize after she'd been doing this as a cover for several years now, especially when she contrasted it with her previous line of work, which had often been about obscuring or even destroying the truth and the traces it left.

She wondered what a psychologist would think of that.  Was Natasha somehow trying to redeem the years she'd spent hiding the truth by helping to reveal it instead?  Or was she still just a child who wanted to be Indiana Jones?

“I can see the mouth of the Moriston,” said Dr. Wilson.  “Air Traffic called them to tell them we were coming, and it looks like they've lit up the car park for us.  Hopefully somebody moved the Loch Ness Monster.”

He turned on the helicopter's landing lights, and managed to make a nice soft landing in the car park next to the Glenmoriston Millennium Hall.  Dozens of people were there waiting for them, including a news van and an ambulance, but all Dr. Wilson did was turn off the engines and slump agains the pilot's seat with a massive sigh of relief. “Never thought I'd have to do that again,” he said.  “Maybe I should take some lessons, get my license back.  Can't hurt.”

Natasha opened the door, and the first person she saw was the woman from the ten o'clock news, the one who'd reported on the monster capture.  She was taller than Nat but shorter than DI Carter, with bottle-blonde hair in a pixie cut and multiple earrings.  The helicopter landing had apparently caught her in her off time, since she was now wearing a sweater and jeans instead of a tidy pants suit, but her cameraman was right behind her.

“Good evening,” she said, coming up to meet Nat.  “I'm Yvonne Kirkland from Channel Four Scotland.  May I have a word about the events at Raigmore?  I understand you were a witness.”

“I'd rather not, thanks,” said Natasha, trying to be polite.

DI Carter climbed down next, and the two of them reached to help Sir Stephen – but he gently refused, preferring to demonstrate that he was able to stand and walk on his own.  “I am quite healed,” he assured them.  “Or nearly so.”  In the glaring lights set up in the car park nothing looked natural, but the wound on his face did look like it was knitting quickly.  Nat wondered if there would be a scar, or if it would entirely disappear.

“Would either of you mind telling our viewers what you saw when the hospital collapsed?” the reporter asked them.

“Yes, we would mind,” said DI Carter.  “We mind very much.”

“I...” Sir Stephen began.

“He would definitely mind,” Carter added, putting a hand in the middle of Sir Stephen's chest to keep him from approaching the other woman.  Nat could almost see what Carter was thinking – she must be imagining Sir Stephen telling the entire country that A Wizard Did It, and almost dying of embarrassment from the thought alone.

Dr. Wilson was now climbing out, and Kirkland decided to give it one more try.  “Excuse me, Sir,” she said.  “I'm Yvonne Kirland from...”

“I know who you are,” snarled Dr. Wilson.  “We spoke on the phone.” He took Sir Stephen's arm and guided him over to the waiting ambulance.  “Come on, Sir Steve, let's get you looked at.”

“Maybe get him something to wear,” Natasha agreed.  Sir Stephen was still dressed only in a paper hospital gown, and it was sagging open at the rear.  He had a very nice backside, but that didn't mean the whole world needed to see it.

“Wait,” said Sir Stephen.  He reached for DI Carter.  “I told you to ask the lady from the ten o'clock news whether she poke to Dr. Wilson.”

DI Carter hesitated, then turned to face the reporter.  “Inverness Police Department,” she said, showing her badge.  “Did you ring Dr. Wilson's mobile about an hour ago?”

“No,” said Kirkland, visibly puzzled by the question and still a little startled by Wilson's rude dismissal of her.

“You didn't ask for an interview with the man from the river?” DI Carter insisted.

“The riv... oh, from the Pierce disappearance?” asked Kirkland.  “No, I'm not even on that story.”

“Would you swear to it in court?” Carter wanted to know.

“Absolutely,” Kirkland said.  “On a stack of Bibles.”

“As I told you, Carter,” Sir Stephen said with a satisfied nod.  “It was sorcery.”

“Sorcery?” asked Kirkland.  “What do you...”

“He has a head injury,” Carter cut her off.  “We're taking him to the ambulance now.”  She grabbed the arm Dr. Wilson wasn't already holding, and the two of them dragged Sir Stephen over towards the waiting ambulance.

“It's been a long day,” Nat told the reporter, and followed them.

Nobody told the waiting paramedics about Sir Stephen's bullet and axe wounds, or the fact that he'd nearly drowned not twenty-four hours ago.  There was no spoken agreement not to, but Nat, Dr. Wilson, and DI Carter all seemed to be waiting to see if they'd be able to find them for themselves.  They didn't, or at least if they did, they didn't appear to think they were serious.  Instead, they behaved as if they thought Sit Stephen had been almost ready for discharge at the time of the disaster, and accordingly pronounced him ready to go.

“You're as healthy as a horse,” one of them said, clapping Sir Stephen on the shoulder.

“Thoroughbred,” murmured one of his female co-workers with a snicker.

The manager of the Glenmoriston Arms Hotel, just up the hill, had heard about the disaster at Raigmore and offered them rooms free of charge. None of them were planning to spend the night, but they accepted anyway for the simple reason that none of them had a car anymore. Nat, Carter, and Wilson had all been parked at the hospital, and their vehicles were now presumably buried in the rubble.  The hotel would provide them a place to wait for somebody to pick them up.

From a seat in the little hotel's comfortable common room, Dr. Wilson called his mother to assure her he was all right, then a number of other people for the same reason.  DI Carter called her family and then texted her colleagues to find out what they'd learned while she was busy fleeing for her life.  Natasha called Sue at Dundee and told her she might need a couple more days off.

Sir Stephen was dressed now, in clothes that had apparently once belonged to the manager's son – jeans and an annoyingly appropriate Superman t-shirt.  He had asked for a meal, and was now making his way through a plate of shepherd's pie with peas.

“I swear that guy's had about six dinners today and he's still hungry,” DI Carter observed, setting her phone aside to sip her tea.

“Well, the rate he heals suggests he has a hell of a metabolism,” said Dr. Wilson.  “He did warn us he eats a lot.”

“What do you think this all means?” Natasha asked the others.  “We've heard what he thinks is happening, so could it have been Zola who called, or somebody who works for him?  I mean, somebody's obviously trying to kill this guy, and Zola already expressed interest...”

“No,” DI Carter interrupted, “somebody's trying to kill people. I'm not gonna start believing in magic just because of that, any more than I'm gonna start believing in the Loch Ness Monster because somebody has a seal in the back of his lorry.”  Her phone beeped and she looked at the screen, then her face lit up.  “Oh, good!”

“What is it?” asked Dr. Wilson, leaning to see.

“Somebody's found the guy who made the statues,” said Carter.

I love the new King’s Quest game with all my heart, and I’m so thrilled it has become the vehicle leading my son to love this series as much as I do, but I am troubled by the absence of certain characters in it. Logically, I’m sure it’s because of things like budget and time constraints, but in terms of the internal canon... (Spoilers ahead)

I understand the lack of Connor, because the story is pretty hyperfocused on the Cracker family, and, let’s be real, Connor barely knows them and is, for the most part, an Average Daventry Citizen.  I’d have loved to have seen him make a cameo around town (I like to think he and Amaya would have gotten along), but I can understand him not being included.

Cassima’s absence is much more puzzling, especially since her daughter is so central to the story.  She gets mentioned a couple of times, but it’s odd that she never shows up.  I mean, Gart tells Gwendolyn that he’s glad she and her family have made it to Daventry, and, uh, last I knew, that should have included Cassima.  And there’s no obvious reason why she’s missing.  To be honest, if I were Cassima, I’d be more than a little concerned about certain decisions being made for my daughter without me being able to be there and weigh in on them.  My personal theory is that Cassima stayed behind in the Green Isles because she doesn’t trust leaving the kingdom on advisor-autopilot, considering what happened last time both the king and queen (i.e., her parents) weren’t around to keep things under control.  Hopefully things have become considerably more politically stable in the 30-ish years since KQ6, but I wouldn’t blame her for being paranoid enough to insist on sticking around.  Also, maybe she’s aware that Graham has come to the end of his life, and, considering what happened to her parents, she doesn’t feel like she can handle witnessing another parental-figure death.  It’s definitely odd to me, but maybe she’s got a good reason for not being there.  

And then there’s Edgar.  What happened to Edgar?  I am actually very concerned by Edgar’s absence.  Seriously, where is he, and why is he not around?  He gets mentioned exactly once, when Gwendolyn asks in Chapter 4 why Graham didn’t just make Rosella his heir (sexist addendums not withstanding), and he answers, “She was always off on her own adventures with Edgar.  Then she had Gart, and she was much more interested in training him to be King.”

SAY WHAT NOW?  WHAT.  HAPPENED??  No, for real, I NEED TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENED HERE.  BECAUSE I AM VERY MUCH BOTHERED BY THE IMPLICATIONS OF THAT STATEMENT.

For one thing, Gwendolyn does not follow that statement with “Edgar who?” which tells me that she must at the very least know about him, even if she may or may not know him personally.  Edgar is also the most likely candidate to be Gart’s father (the KQ wiki even lists him as such), though it seems odd that this is never actually confirmed within the game.  But the way Graham talks about Edgar there...  It kinda sounds like he implied that at some point during all that adventuring (which was probably the courtship Edgar asked for at the end of KQ7), Edgar sired Gart on Rosella and for whatever reason was not around to help raise him. Which... does not sound like something the Edgar I have come to know and love would do, at least willingly or purposefully, or without a very good reason.  And I also find it strange that during the dinner scene in Chapter 4, not only is there no chair for Edgar at the table (nor one for Cassima), but there is ZERO mention of him in all that succession talk, and, theoretically, he should have been in the running somewhere??  At least, more likely so than Kyle, as Alexander suggests.  So, again, I ask:  what the heck happened?  I have a few possible theories.

Possible theory #1:  Edgar’s already dead.  There are three possibilities regarding Edgar’s life expectancy:  1) As an Etherian prince, Edgar is effectively immortal unless somebody kills him again (and, who knows, maybe someone did); 2) when Genesta transformed him into a more-or-less human form, she also ended up making him mortal and giving him a human lifespan; 3) since Rosella used the black cat’s extra life to restore Edgar, he has the life expectancy of your average cat, which, for most cats, is somewhere between 12 and 20 years, give or take.  And since it’s probably been 25-30 years since then, it’s possible his cat life has run out, and also possible it may have run out while Gart was still very young.  Morbid, sure, but a tidy explanation.

Possible theory #2:  Fairy shenanigans.  This feels to me like the most likely scenario, because, let’s face it, fairies are jerks.  Even if they aren’t out-and-out evil, like Lolotte and Malicia, they operate on a whole different value system than humans.  And one thing that they value very highly is children.  Consider how Oberon and Titania left Etheria pretty much unattended for YEARS while they tried to track down Edgar, running off on every tiny rumor they thought might be a lead.  Not to mention that both Lolotte and Malicia struck their blows at Oberon and Titania, and Etheria itself, through kidnapping and manipulating poor Edgar.  It would be pretty naive to believe that Lolotte and Malicia are the only bad apples to have ever come out of Etherian society, so who knows what other threats may have emerged since the events of KQ7.  Maybe Edgar got kidnapped again and is being held prisoner or brainwashed somewhere.  Maybe Oberon and Titania THEMSELVES are more or less keeping their son under house arrest for fear of losing him again.  Or maybe, just maybe, this is how “overprotective parenting” has manifested in Edgar.  Because, now that Edgar’s all grown up, he’s probably not as interesting a target for the unsavory residents/exiles of Etherian society, but you know who would be?  His son.  His precious, beautiful, half-human, only son, poised to inherit another kingdom.  That’s like dark fairy catnip right there.  And the best way to protect Gart from them is if they do not know that he exists, forcing Edgar to do the hardest thing in his life: keeping his distance from his family and pretending he no longer loves Rosella, or has a child with her, in order to keep them both safe.  Or, if they have learned about Gart’s birth, that Edgar is on the front lines in Etheria doing all he can to keep them from getting anywhere near his baby boy, because by the time dark fairies start invading Daventry to get to the young prince, it’s too late to do much about them.  Not to mention the fact that if they succeeded, there would probably be war between the two realms, and nobody wants that (or maybe there’s someone who does and Edgar is trying to prevent it).  Or maybe, in a likely parallel to Cassima, Edgar has to stay in Eldritch to help keep its various factions from causing the realm to go hell in a handbasket, which, let’s be real, would be something a disgruntled Etherian would start.  Again.  Thanks, Malicia.

Possible theory #3: Edgar and Rosella’s relationship just didn’t end up working out.  I’m sure they tried really hard, but maybe they realized they were better off as friends.  Maybe it fell apart because it’s unlikely that Edgar has any idea how healthy relationships actually work, and the dynamic they fell into just couldn’t be sustained.  Maybe it’s one of those “faerie bride” (or, in this case, fairy groom) scenarios, that are passionate and romantic, but ultimately short-lived because humans and fairies just aren’t long-term compatible and their relationships are doomed from the start.  And so, with a heavy heart, Edgar just bowed out or maybe he straight-up ghosted, I don’t know.  It’s a sad possibility, but sometimes relationships, even those resulting in children, just don’t make it to happily ever after.

Possible theory #4:  Edgar normally would be there, but is out adventuring *right now* in an effort to find a way to help Graham.  Oh, man, this one is just heartbreaking, but I could see Edgar volunteering to go out and search the ends of the multiverse for a cure, trying to cut deals with the Fates, whatever he has to do, all the while telling Rosella and Gart to stay in Daventry so they can be there for Graham and Valanice.  And just imagine how sad he would be to find out that, despite it all, it’s too late, even if he does make it back to Daventry with something helpful, blaming himself because he just wasn’t quick enough.

Possible theory #5:  Edgar *is* around, we just don’t see him because he’s being shy/socially-avoidant.  Shyness is one of Edgar’s defining traits in KQ4, and, all things considered, he probably never entirely grew out of it.  He didn’t have the opportunity to learn how to socialize normally until adulthood, because Lolotte and Malicia kept him so isolated.  And, bear in mind, during that time, he was never socialized to be around other males (unless you count the goons, who don’t really talk much and may or may not actually be masculine)--it was always women who primarily interacted with him.  The first time we actually see him interact with another guy, he gets into an immediate brawl with him.  Though he does later hug his dad, so that’s good.  But still, I could totally understand Edgar having trouble with social interactions, be it from just a lack of skills, or even up to having severe social anxiety.  Maybe, for some reason, Edgar just doesn’t get along very well with Graham and/or Alexander, and so is avoiding them.  Maybe he gets along with them fine, but only if it’s one-on-one contact, and he just doesn’t handle group interactions well.  This could be why he left his own party prior to the events of KQ7, and maybe why he’s not on the succession list, if he feels too overwhelmed by the prospect of having to do royal functions like meeting with advisors or the public, and so maybe deliberately asked to not be Graham’s heir.  Or, maybe he can handle groups in small doses, but the added stress of Graham’s imminent death is just using up all of his spoons, and having already been through the traumas of both losing a parental figure and dying himself (and being brought back), he simply cannot cope with it AND be there for the rest of the family.  Therefore, he’s spending this time in his own safe space by himself, trying desperately to hold it together.

So, yeah.  I don’t know what happened to Edgar, or why he, Cassima and Connor aren’t part of this story, but I miss them and I’m sad they didn’t make it into the game.

The Dedication, Part 2: Bao He

Part  2 // 5

Premise: In the year 2000, a woman named Yue Ruan wrote her book “Memoirs of a Dragon”. In this novel, she speaks about her youth at the Xiaolin Temple, her relationship with an individual she only ever refers to as The Monster, and about experiencing some of the most important moments in history. Most take this as a work of fiction, but to those this book is dedicated to they know it’s more real than themselves. The following is a series of those individuals reading her novel.

To my daughter, Bao He whom I miss greatly. Perhaps if I had been around you would still be with us.

It had become a habit as of lately while on her way to the studio to stop by the Bouquinistes along the Seine. She rarely bought anything, but it was interesting what she found when she did. While she wouldn't admit it to her Fiancée, it provided comfort seeing artifacts which like her had survived for so long. One day she would tell Marissa all her stories. It was unhealthy in the relationship that she did, but how does one go about saying to their lover they've been alive to witness the death of Marie Antoinette and France both be seized by and liberated from the Nazis yet still be alive. Better yet, how was she supposed to explain to said fiancée she could control fire, and that the last time she was engaged she killed them by accident. It needed to be soon no doubt, but she needed so many answers first. Grabbing for a random book, the gothic designer scanned it's cover carefully. It seemed to be not as old as others at the Bouquinistes, but it spoke strongly to her. Opening it up to the first page she scanned it's information. Her eyes widening as she flipped the page only to find who it was dedicated to. "To my daughter, Bao He whom I miss greatly. Perhaps if I had been around you would still be with us," she spoke out loud. How long had it been since she had heard that name? Perhaps her engagement party to Arnolphe? Sounded about right since shortly after she had chosen to go by the name Manon. Then again, who knew exactly how many Bao He's existed in the world. Looking around she signaled for a book seller. "Monsieur! Combien le prix," producing her wallet the man held out 5 fingers. Handing him a 5 Euro note, the wallet was back in her purse and she began walking, book in hand. "Avez un bonne weekend," She shouted. Perhaps this could open up some type of conversation with Marisa. She walked along the Seine, nose in a book. When living as long as she did, she knew exactly where to make turns, and without a doubt where her office was. Making said turn into the studio, Manon closed the door behind her. "Ma Cher! Are you upstairs," Manon shouted, already headed up. No? Perhaps she had something to do. Going over to the other woman's desk she checked her schedule. Yup. Meeting with the owners of a small clothing store chain. Looks like she'd have the office to herself then. Walking back over to her desk, the green haired woman put her stuff down. In front of her were notes about her next collection, Yǒnghéng. She was a woman known for her clothes to have themes of ephemerality, and this collection which was inspired both by the traditional dress of China and the Victorian Era would be no different. Slumping back into the office chair Manon reached for the book. Searching and scanning the chapter index, for titles of interest. Of course, there was one. Chapter 13, Provence 1783. Not only the year, but the place where she was born. Flipping to the indicated page she threw her combat boots up onto a cleaner part of the desk. Lighting a cigarette with her finger tip the designer popped it in her mouth. "My second chance at escaping, but this time one with much more reason. I had become impregnated with the Monster's child. This was not the first time he had done so, it was rare with how careful we were. However, unlike the others something spoke strongly in me to let this one live. I knew the Xiaolin temple would not accept me, nor did I think to stay in China. No matter where I'd run He'd find me, but perhaps I could throw him off for a while longer. I convinced him with proper evidence that there were dragons in Europe, and if he were to allow me to travel there for a year he would not require any more hunts for a while. The less this child knows, the less likely he will find her." From just that paragraph Manon could not believe what she was reading. Was this really her birth mother's writing? A part of her seemed disgusted, the other strongly intrigued. Running her hand through the shaved part of her head she knew she had work to do, but before her was the answer to so many more questions that nobody could provide her. What was this about dragons, why was her father a monster? She'd have to go back and read from the beginning later, but for now she felt there was a reason to be self absorbed. Opening up her laptop she began her research. First searching for the name Yue Ruan. Nothing had pulled up, then she realized something. Sitting on Marissa's desk was a photo of the blonde with her siblings. The girl in the middle was squished between her older brother and sister, and was not amused at all about it. A light went off in her head and quickly Manon began to dig out her phone. Jackie had to know about these sort of things, didn't she? Selecting the contact a ringing tone was shortly heard. Nothing though. Must be asleep. "Hey Jackie. This is Manon. I have some questions about that Xiaolin stuff you talk about all the time. Call me back when you can," hanging up and putting the phone down Manon tapped her black stiletto nails on the desk. Thoughts began to plague her mind. She had so much work to do but also felt this impulsive need to keep reading Therefor she decided to do what she knew she had control of, her job. Looking over her work notes she began to design a dress. Enamored in the details, she didn't hear the door to the office door open. "Babe," Marissa walked over after tossing her coat onto the rack and her purse onto the desk. Manon looked up for a moment and waved at the other. "Babe, what's wrong? Did something happen?" "It's nothing," Manon put out the cigarette, her deep brown eyes scanning her lover's green. "It's just been a morning. How was your meeting with Fragonard?" "Decent. I'm pretty sure I landed the line, but that's for time to tell," Marissa shrugged, sitting on the corner of Manon's desk. "Sweetie. I know when something's wrong, is it this new line?" "No no. Not that at all it's just," Manon sighed. "I told you before I was adopted and how I had an interest in figuring out about my birth family?" Marissa nodded. "Well there's a lot more to it." Now was the time to have that conversation. Getting up, Manon grabbed Marissa's desk chair and rolled it over to the other's desk. Indicating for Marissa to sit, the blonde did. Taking a deep breath, Manon held out her hand. Procuring a small flame she waited for the other to run. She didn't. Jump of course, but not towards the door. "Manon, How are you doing that? Have you always been able to do that?" Manon nodded to the other. "Also, I was born with the name Bao He, in Provence. I changed my name to Manon when I moved to Paris. My birth mother gave me to the Fitzroy family who wanted a child but struggled for years," Manon spoke shakily, terrified to give the details. Closing her hand into a fist the flame disappeared. "My adopted parents never understood it either. Apparently they kept in contact with my biological mother. She spoke about Chinese magic, and in time when it would be safe, she'd return for me. That was years ago when I was 7. I suppose though it never was safe." Biting her lip she contemplated saying the next bit. "Because that was 227 years ago." Marissa flew out of her chair at that. Expected. "Wait, so you're a vampire," Manon chuckled at that assumption. "That or what drugs are we on. Because you do NOT look like the oldest woman in the universe." "No drugs. And as far as I know I'm not. I don't know what I am but... I found this book. It mentions me, and talks in detail about that group of warriors your sister gets involved with. I'm waiting to hear back from Jackie to see what she can tell me.... I understand if this is a lot to handle." Marissa stayed silent. How was one supposed to react to such a bombshell? Taking the hand which produced the flames Marissa just nodded, kissing the knuckles. "Manon... it's a bit more than a lot but," she looked her fiancée in the eye. "I love you, I've always loved you. I'm sad you've held this back from me but I'd love to spend every moment of my mortal life with you," her lips met Manon's the two savoring the feel of each other's kiss. "So when do we leave for China?" "The moment I hear back from Jackie about this, who even knows where that temple is." Marissa nodded. "Thank you so much ma Cher. I love you." "I love you too," giving Manon another kiss Marissa stood up and pushed her chair back to her desk. Pausing for a moment, she turned back around. "So we can neither confirm nor deny you're a vampire?" Manon laughed and shook her head, the two getting back to their respective work. It felt better having that massive weight off her chest. A few hours later, the phone rang. Caller ID said it was Jackie. Picking it up, Manon put the phone on speaker. "Manon. Sorry I missed your call. I actually was dealing with those people you were calling about. How can I help?" "It's fine. I just wanted to know where the temple was. I'm planning a new line and thought I'd visit for inspiration," relaxing back into her seat again Manon played with one of her pens. "Oh that's easy. I'll email you the directions. Anything else you need," Manon shook her head as if Jackie could see her. "Just email me everything you can about it," nibbling on the end of a pen now. "Who they are, the stuff about the magic items, any history you know." "Expect it in the next few hours. Au Revoir." Jackie hung up, Manon looking to Marissa. "Time to plan a little trip."

The Death Of The Floor Trader

This post The Death Of The Floor Trader appeared first on Daily Reckoning.

The near deafening thud of the hundreds of time stamp machines rolling over in unison every minute…

The high pitch ring of order phone’s buzzing incessantly like locusts…

Colored-jacketed clerks and brokers jostled and jeered in very limited physical space…

That was just a smidge of the sensory overload on the trading floor in Chicago decades ago.

Today I want to give you an inside look into the lucrative world of the floor trader.

And, as you may have guessed, the days of the floor trader are coming to an abrupt end. Truly, we’re witnessing the death of the floor trader.

However, this isn’t the death of the millions of dollars that can be gained and lost on a daily, weekly and monthly basis. Instead, the ever-changing market is bringing a new opportunity directly to your doorstep…

The Millionaire Epicenter Evolving

In the mid-90’s, the Chicago Board of Trade had more millionaires (when a million was a lot of money) per square foot than any place on earth.

But they weren’t just giving away cash in the pits, of course.

Nine out of ten locals who traded money for themselves blew up as the ultimate test of capitalism. Demand was high for big-dollar memberships for the right to fight, elbow to elbow, with the best traders in the world.

I was there with them. Personally elbowing for space in the Treasury Bond pits. That was back in the heyday of the pits, when bonds actually paid substantial interest.

Where I stood was hard fought territory. And for most traders it determined success or failure. Floor real estate was always…location, location, location.

But here’s something that most folks overlook when they think about the big markets and the floor traders in Chicago and New York…

You see, the guys on the floor were not good traders, per se.

Nerves of steel and amazing skills to sense price direction through the sounds and sights of the order flow, separated a few of the greats that could be called true traders.  The rest had success because of floor dynamics.

But when you look under the hood, most floor traders made money the same way…

They profited from being able to buy at the “bid price” and sell at the “ask price.”  Floor trading for locals back then was all about making money on the “tick.” In other words, traders could earn the spread between the bid and the ask, calculated in ticks.

Elbow to elbow in the pit, if you could buy low and sell high, you’d personally collect the difference. And, in the sea of colored jackets, proximity to an order filler from a big bank or brokerage house meant sizable paychecks.

Making that “tick” hundreds and hundreds of times each day, could really add up, too.

For example the minimum movement in my high-flying Treasury Bonds futures was $31.25. The math on a 100 lot is $3125.  A 1,000 contracts? Well, that’s $31,250 to be earned, just for standing in the right spot.

The pits of Chicago we’re filled with money.

But Times, They Are A’ Changin…

For hundreds of years the order route was the same…

You called your broker with a buy or sell, the broker called a desk on the floor, a phone clerk wrote the request on a ticket, a runner “ran” the trade to the trading pit where a broker would execute the trade, an endorsed filled order card was grabbed by another runner and brought back to the desk, a phone call was made to your broker and they in turn called you with your confirmation.

This was a very labor intensive – but extremely efficient — execution method for trillions of dollars in transactions.

But, today, technology has changed everything.

The trading floor of lore, and the “floor trader” is dead.

Travel agents, bank tellers, most brick-and-mortar stores, etc., have ALL been displaced by computers. And the same goes for the trading floor.

The floor guys had a skill that is not transferable to the “click click” world of online trading. Tens of thousands of sweaty, belligerent, almost all alpha males battled daily in a zero sum game… winners or losers…

Going…Going…Almost Gone…

Electronic markets have done away with the order filler and the corresponding locals in the pit to make things work. A man doesn’t stand on that step in the pit to trade anymore. Instead he presses buttons on a laptop — electrons fly and buy.

But here’s the GREAT part of this disruptive technology for everyday investors…

The disappearance of the floor means nobody has an advantage anymore.

Big traders and small, short and tall all have equal access to opportunity. (I was disparagingly told I was hired because of my 6 foot 3 height to be seen on the floor, not my intelligence – but I beg to differ.)

And in today’s digital marketplace, that means one thing — the potential to profit has never been greater… This is hands-down the best time in the history of markets for the “little guy.”

You simply need TWO things…

First, you need to know what to trade (your favorite big ideas)…

A floor trader was limited to one market. The boys club had hard rules.  A corn guy could only take advantage of whatever opportunities or not that they had in that particular pit. Gold was its own game and so on…

Now? Anybody and everybody can trade in any market anywhere anytime. Money never sleeps… It moves around the globe at lightning fast speed to meet the need of greed.

Second, besides knowing what to trade, more importantly you need to know what vehicle to trade it with…

With today’s digital world and near-endless trading strategies, the importance of picking the right type of trade – stocks, bonds, options, currencies, and more – can make a HUGE difference in profit. Do you want to make $31.25 or $31,250? Do you want to call an Uber on your way home or chauffer your Tesla?

Trading 2.0

24-hour markets with buyers and sellers looking to enter and exit as prices move up and down means a risk control plan can be executed efficiently. This is a trader’s paradise.

And, because of the abundance of market participants, spreads between where you can buy and sell have been reduced to pennies. The edge cost is near zero and commission costs are minimal at a great discount to what used to be $100 per trade.

“Plan your trade and trade your plan” is the simple mantra that can lead to big paydays. And now, everyone has the chance to join the elite money club of past floor traders and big money market players…

Tens of thousands of jobs are gone…but millions of investors have the technology and tools to profit like never before.

The death of the floor trader means new life for the little guys…

Sincerely,

Alan Knuckman Editor, Weekly Wealth Alert [email protected]

Facebook: @TheDailyEdgeUSA

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