Cristabel and the proverbial sandwich
(Spoilers for Harrow and Nona the Ninth)
I have not known inner peace since I saw someone say, "But come on, does anyone ACTUALLY buy John's story about how the nun died?"
Because honestly, I'd just kind of gone, "Super random, very weird interaction, boy there sure are cult mindworms at play here," and moved on to the next page.
But as soon as I saw that question asked, the amount I did not buy that story hit me like a load of bricks, to the point I'm kind of amazed that I ever did believe it.
Two people. A locked door. A nuclear standoff. A close-range head injury.
On one side, a full-fledged Catholic nun—well done, that’s the classic—who's best friends with a staunchly atheist world-class scientist and believes, if we're to believe John, that Jesus's problem is that he didn't stick to office hours.
On the other, a woman described as, "A total delight. Effervescent. Kind to animals and children. A master of the sword. Did not have the intellect you’d ordinarily find in a sandwich or an orange, and was a sickening twerp into the bargain."
Oh, and in the middle, there's also a necromancer who wants to bring back his friends... minus any little details about things he they might have done wrong. He "knows where memory lives in the brain", and they "won't have any of it." And "guys as careful as me don't make mistakes," but then again, all that means is that if he kills someone, he did it on purpose.
C— talks her way into a locked room with John, who's on the phone threatening some world leaders with a nuke, expresses care and concern for him, and then... decides he needs more data on the soul? And kills herself to provide that for him?
I'll be honest, I just don't believe that John was an ordinary guy, totally normal, could be any of us, and he just got put in a really stressful situation and made some bad choices but who HASN'T done things they aren't proud of??? I reject that point of view completely. Like, Elon Musk in any given interaction probably is really stressed out and unhappy and having trouble responding in a way that's at all well-considered or emotionally mature, but that doesn't mean that Musk isn't also, at baseline, a deeply stupid, petty, immature, grandiose, entitled, egocentric person. No matter what situation you put him in, he's going to keep on being those things.
I think that John's initial idea was to put the entire human population of Earth, minus some necessary staff, into some giant cryonic freezers, and give the Earth some amount of time to rest and recover from the effects of human-caused pollution. A plan about which I will confess some hesitation myself; being told "just lie down in this coffin, bro, you'll only be a little dead, I'll totally bring you back to life* in a couple centuries (*98% effective!) " does not fill me with an enthusiasm to hop on board.
And then his project got cut. And he decided, "Well, if they won't agree, I can just make them agree." After all, all that end game needs is 10 billion frozen corpses hanging out in those tin cans, and a small team of staff left to keep the place running. How it gets there is something he can afford to be flexible about. If people won't climb in on their own, he can put them there.
So when C— or the nun tell him to stop focusing on revenge, to bend all his energies to saving the world, I think he thinks: Well, I am. He's gonna wash the earth clean at the end of this! He just needs to be able to set the dominoes in motion. He just needs to engineer a situation that will justify taking his nuke out of the vault and making the pieces fall.
A situation that would be sabotaged, ruined, if anyone made a true deep sincere good-faith effort to talk him out of Plan Nuke and called the legitimacy of this crisis into any sort of question. He needs to prevent that from happening.
Actually. Also. He needs one more thing than that.
He needs an excuse to use the nuke, but also, he's finishing his homework at the very last minute. He still hasn't mastered the soul. He does need a few more test subjects.
Maybe he let her in and thought: Two birds with one stone, eh?
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I shouldn't be making another one of these because I didn't even give you enough time to catch up and I'm sure you're tired of me (I'm probably losing mutuals over the length of these) BUT I FINISHED ACT II and I think this is the right place for an update recap. I'm so sorry.
previously, in harrowlana the ninth (reference I might explain one day):
this happened
currently, chapters 20 - 22 (END OF ACT II!!!):
we start with a killer epitaph from harrow for her own grave that I absolutely 10000% need in a tshirt yesterday
"Here lies the world's most insufferable witch"
alleged gideon the first, here known as ortus the first (but I am so sure about this one) has tried to kill harrowbeanie 14 times
I honestly don't know how harrow is going through this without outright telling emperor johnny man to go and insert this entire planetary situation right in the center of his bolthole
we're over here working overtime for you and your sorry ass of a plan that is probably terrible for everyone who isn't you
and we have to put up with zombies (we'll get there), the terrible attitude of your remaining lyctors, very questionable food, very questionable decor, very questionable non goth fashions, and also a man who tries to kill harrow at every turn
this is the worst
at least in canaan house we had gideon's humor and camilla's perfection
ANYWAY
emperor john tells alleged gideon the first (if I'm wrong about this, these are going to be embarrassing looking back on) "she's your responsibility, not your punching bag" to which alleged gideon the first answers "I find the responsibility a hard one"
I'm not sure if this is alluding to baby lyctors in general or harrow in particular, or if anything related to the gideon-involvement narrative I'm imagining has anything to do with it
emperor johnny boy tells harrowbean that this guy's problem is that he made a pact with an "authority he has no power to gainsay" to protect emperor johnny john and that alleged gideon the first thinks harrow is a danger to the emperor
I SURE HOPE SO
I SURE HOPE HARROW KILLS THIS MAN
I HOPE ALLEGED GIDEON THE FIRST IS RIGHT
harrow then mentions how she's "lyctor lite" and emperor john of nottingham says he doesn't think harrow fucked up the lyctor thing
he says only one person fucked it up and it was nasty
it was the ninth lyctor, Anastasia (and a song someone sings, once upon a december)
the vacant room harrowbean has taken residence in was meant for her, but she never made it there
she asked emperor john the asshat to kill her and he said no because he's that kind of a person
"she had much more to give"
I hate this guy
he also says "I had a body and I needed a tomb"
harrow asks the question everyone is asking themselves
aside from where tf are gideon and camilla
"God, who did you bury?"
he gets all vague and cryptic so he can avoid taking about what the fuck he's doing
and he quotes Annabel Lee
edgar allan poe's Annabel Lee
this is a bit more in my wheelhouse than shakespeare
to which harrow notes "Who was A.L.?"
now, I have SEVERAL THINGS TO SAY
first, and most importantly, I HAVE BEEN SAYING THIS
THAT ICE CUBE BARBIE MIGHT BE A.L.
I HAVE BEEN SAYING THIS, FAM
here's more magic knight rayearth art of the vibes I get from them to celebrate
second of all, Annabel Lee
I do have Annabel Lee in one of my EAP books, but not the one with the pretty Lacombe illustrations
so here are some Ligeia illustrations from it that have the vibe we're going for, as a treat
now, not to be all ortus over here, but I'm gonna be reciting some poetry
For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride,
In her sepulchre there by the sea—
In her tomb by the sounding sea.
gonna put that in the 3d model
in the middle of it, like a centerpiece
let's bring back the barbie
this man is doing the whole wife/madwoman in the attic gothic trope but instead of an attic it's a tomb in pluto
another madwoman archetype to add to the list, we've got a whole collection
CHAPTER 21
we have summoned ortus by reciting poetry, because we're back in the gideon-less version of canaan house
so, the sixth is dead in this version
the sleeper or random rifle carrying person shot them in the face a bunch of times
what I wanted to do to not!dulcinea
harrow mentions not having seen camilla or palmolive much in this gideon-less version
devastating for her not to have met camilla
so then protozoa and dulcinea come in
notice I didn't say not!dulcinea
that's because this is the real deal dulcinea and the alive non zombified protozoa
we can know this by their descriptions (especially the hair), the fact that dulcinea knows who tf palmolive is, that she has a breathing tube that palmolive designed for her (this guy istg), that she can identify them and calls them "cam" and "pal"
I was so caught up on this book I forgot to read the short story that came before it btw
anyway, we also know this because protozoa speaks, but we'll get to that
before that, ortus calls the sleeper "the waker" and it's giving me the vibes of the citadel deck
wait, I'm gonna take a pic of some of the cards that give me the correct tlt vibes, so you know what the hecko I'm talking about
(I'm going on unplanned tangents but maybe someone appreciates them)
(we've moved from 3d models to me fetching books and decks from my shelves, what has palmolive done to me)
so, as previously established, protozoa speaks, which is how we know he might be the real one and not the zombie version
he then proceeds to recite poetry
ortus is feral about this
I thought initially that they were gonna have to make room for protozoa in the polycule ortus is in with the fifth, but he doesn't like protozoa coming for his gig
abby says "we're all in this together" which reminds me I did make a high school musical connection with magnus before, so it's funny that it turned out that way
abby asks real dulcinea, aka "dulcie" to her, to bring in mayonnaise uncle because he'll listen to her
why is everyone always into her in all the aus, idk
this one is less bad than not!dulcinea though, but the bar for that was on the subsoil
magnus (who is very much in love with his wife and he's pointing it out every chance he gets) is in charge of looking for martita
harrow is in charge of regina george twin (and yandere twin)
abby thinks regina george twin is the most relevant one
apparently also they're flooded with the rain
which was me last week, so I feel you fam
and we get our traidtional quote, this time by real dulcinea
"Is this really how it happens, Lady Pent?" "No. It's not" "Does it get—better than this? Do you know?"
real dulcinea is saying goodbye to palmolive and the love of my life, who I refuse to accept is in any way harmed in any timeline
and harrow "felt something in her core, though she did not know precisely what it was"
palmolive had a filmsy and we love flimsies because they have what I have started to call "harrow texts"
or "texts which can only be read by harrow"
OP is still ranting, a continuation of the egg rant
I'm gonna transcribe all of it and bold the new part, for my own access, even though everyone who has me in their dash will hate me and block me
The eggs you gave me all died and you lied to me so I did the implantation myself you self-serving zombie and you still sent him after me and I would have had him if I hadn't been compromised and he took pity on me! he took pity on me! he saw me and he took pity on me. And for that I'll make you both suffer until you no longer understand the meaning of that goddamned word. Him I'll kill quick because she asked me to and because that much he honestly deserves but you two mummified wizard shits I will burn and burn and burn burn until there is no trace of you left in the shadow of my long-lost natal sun
could the self-serving zombie be emperor john? could gideon the first be one of the people alluded to? has Annabel Lee anything to do with any of this? since OP mentions a long-lost natal sun? who's "she"? has gideon's mom anything to do with any of this? is this totally not related? is this the actual present? does 'mummified wizard shits' stand for lyctor? because I kinda live for that
ortus, on the other hand, sees an S
ortus in this timeline knows how his dad died, apparently
and we end this part with harrow and ortus finding rusted pipette needles
CHAPTER 22
harrow has killed 13 planets in this practice, which is insane and nobody's asking any questions about it
she was dreaming with ice cube barbie annabel lee and she told her to wake up
harrow mentions the sword sleeping next to her in a loverlike position and it reads like a gideon body pillow to me
remember when I said we should have flushed not!dulcinea into space?
GUESS WHO WAS RIGHT
nobody ever takes the not!dulcinea threat seriously but me
I have to do everything around here
she's a zombie now, which is protozoa's revenge from behind the veil
there's a moment in which she trips but still looks at harrow and it's very creepy and well narrated but I can't help but think of the dracula dead and loving it scene with hypnosis
"it was as though a magnet were stuck in the meat, a magnet that craved some polar force within you" wonder what THAT is about
much like the sleeper/waker, not!dulcinea can pass through wards apparently
harrow goes to wake up yandere twin and says "septimus is walking"
yandere twin doesn't understand at first "the name that had never been cytherea's" and later says "tell her I want my arm back"
which relates to the fact that I've been thinking
if real dulcinea is there in the gideon-less ver
how was not!dulcinea even involved?
because harrow seems to have memories of killing her, of fighting her, of her doing damage in some way, of her being a threat, of her doing it to lure emperor johnny boy to canaan house
so we have some big missing link between the gideon-less canaan version and the emperor's bolthole timeline
she can't be the sleeper/waker, because harrow wouldn't call her "septimus"
so harrow remembers not!dulcinea posing as real dulcinea, which does not happen in the gideon-less version, as far as we can tell atm
AGAIN, DON'T TELL ME ANYTHING, LET ME BE IN DISTRESS
last but not less important
remember not to hint me anything at all and thank you for being patient with me all this time ♥
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