Subject: Don Juan and the Methods of Rationality?
Author:
Posted on: 2018-11-19 23:34:00 UTC
In the sense of "bizarrely vehement cult following" rather than, y'know... good...
Subject: Don Juan and the Methods of Rationality?
Author:
Posted on: 2018-11-19 23:34:00 UTC
In the sense of "bizarrely vehement cult following" rather than, y'know... good...
With yesterday being Remembrance Sunday, I found it fitting to base these prompts around Remembrance today.
Prompt 1: One of your characters honours a former friend/comrade
Prompt 2: One of your characters remembers and mourns.
Novastorme
"I remember you. Odd thing that I refer to you as such, but..."
Amber interrupted herself. It was a confusing train of thought and she was digressing anyways. She stood up from the tree stump she was sitting on.
The large patch of grass surrounded by a forest was not supposed to be there and would most likely dissapear when canon returned to normal. Amber considered it could perform one last service before that.
She started walking around in it.
"I remember you. I remember every Bubble you went to. I remember every Bubble your men went to. Every Bubble your race went to. You made it a point to remember them, and so I remember them."
Geographical distortions caused by Suefluences are a really interesting topic. The patch of grass was REALLY not supposed to be there, and it was of an unnaturally bright green color. The grass Amber stepped on immediately blackened and died.
"You also made it a point to remember your names, and a good thing you did, because they would have been lost. And you with them."
"I remember how you felt. Tension, knowing that each battle could be your last. Determination, knowing that whatever the result you'd see it through. Joy, knowing that Intervention wasn't necessary. A million times across a million Bubbles."
"And then the Mindwalker had the Reality Warper unmake you."
Amber stopped. She looked at the sky. The sun was setting down, casting long shadows from the trees. The forest dwellers would arrive soon, and they were not to be trifled with.
"They are now beyond reach. It's sad that you had to go, but it's worse knowing that you can't even be avenged."
She started pacing again.
"But you aren't really gone, are you? I remember you. 'Names are important. Never lose yours.' That was one of the creeds of your race. Even though you too may be beyond reach, your names are still there. Even if I am the only one that remembers them, it means that you are still there."
Amber stopped pacing again. She had drawn a full circle with the blackened grass.
"The Circle. It should be blue, but nobody ever really gets what they want. 'Earth exists whereever there is someone acting in its service. Where you go, Earth goes.' That's another creed of your race. The planet itself may be gone, but Earth is still here. It goes where I go"
"I remember you. And I will continue to do so, forever."
I can only assume this has to do with a canon I know nothing about. I have no clue what Amber is talking about at all. But I wish I did, because you sound like you know what you're talking about, and what you're talking about sounds like cool sci-fi. I've always considered a mark of good fanfiction to be that it makes me want to know more about the canon it's based on. {= )
~Neshomeh
WARNING: Major spoilers for the Dragonriders of Pern series. If you haven't read All the Weyrs of Pern or The Dolphins of Pern, you should probably click Back right now.
Still here?
Okay then.
There's something very moving about someone listening to (what to them is certainly) ancient music after a bereavement. You've captured the mood well, especially with the song choice. This may fade, it seems to say, but it will still be real, it will still have happened, and for all that it will pass the pain you are feeling is real and valid and okay. I think that's what I like about the use of telepathy in this; it allows you to explore an emotional connection without either party being able to hide it, and gives them both a chance to express private vulnerabilities, private griefs.
Really, really good stuff. Not that that's a surprise. =]
The song wasn't really a choice, though. It's the text of that Bible passage set to music. The way I see it, that's the much more fitting way to honor a harper, and Aivas has several versions of "Home on the Range," of all silly things, in its databanks, so I don't think an extremely well-known protest song with extremely well-known lyrics was too much of a stretch. In fact, I'd even go so far as to say that Derik's guitar gently wept, as such, before he was Derik. {= )
Tangentially related: I have a pet theory that the Phantom's Don Juan Triumphant was a rock opera way before its time. It burns, it's discordant noise, it gets in your head, it's full of dark passion... It's rock'n'roll, baby. |m|
~Neshomeh
It's clearly a concept album. =]
He did work on it off and on pretty much his entire adult life, and I can't imagine he'd have trusted anyone to give any kind of editorial feedback. "Hi, I'm a deranged lunatic living under an opera house, would you please give me constructive feedback on my magnum opus? I promise not to torture and kill you, so be honest! :D "
~Neshomeh
Strange, intensely lonely person quietly beavering away at something barely anyone will ever read and less will understand? Based on a pre-existing intellectual property?
It's badfic!
He IS a musical genius, among other things. I don't doubt that every note-choice is purposeful and has exactly the effect that he wants it to have.
OTOH, he's recasting a villain as a hero, and it's definitely self-indulgent wank, so if it's badfic, it's one of those really annoying ones that's excellently crafted, maybe even revolutionary, but still just awful for anyone else trying to read it. Or listen to it, in this case. Like Finnegan's Wake or something. But given time it would eventually gain a die-hard cult following who claim to understand it and will cut you if you dare to criticize it, and then it would become a classic. ^_^
~Neshomeh
In the sense of "bizarrely vehement cult following" rather than, y'know... good...
Harry Potter and, that is. Positive recommendations, or at least "see what you think" ones, from IRL people. It's weird. I might actually have to do it.
~Neshomeh
It's not... good. It can be entertaining, and it's not badly written, but it's not very good, to my mind. I also just had a hard time enjoying a lot of it, even as a kid. Too... mean, I guess? The tone's off.
There's also the fact that it is explicitly designed as indoctrination material for the Eliezer Yudkowsky's cult. That part just turned me off it. Yes, some of his ideas are right and he explains them well (usually his explanations of common fallacies), but the usual quote that shows up at this point is that the good parts aren't original and the original parts aren't good. Yudkowsky likes to act like he's an academic, but don't be fooled: he never finished highschool, he's almost never been published outside his own blogs and organizations, and he has a lot of wrong, unscientific ideas that he tends to mix with fact (see his ideas about quantum physics), ans is in fact derisive of actual scientists in many cases. His ideas about transhumanism and AI are... questionable (especially AI, seeing as he believes computers with consciousness are coming Real Soon Now™ despite a total lack of proof).
And normally I wouldn't bring the author into it: Orson Scott Card is an awful person in my opinion, but Ender's Game is still brilliant. However, HPMoR is expressly designed to spread the ideas I find suspect. And the protagonist is an insufferable Mary Sue, too, almost by definition.
So in short, you can read it, and might even find it enjoyable. Just be careful not to buy too deeply into what it's selling.
Okay, seriously this was well done, and I loved it and there is not much to say save that it made the scar of Robinton's death feel fresh again.
Jeez, that was almost chapter-10-or-summat-of-Dolphins-of-Pern gutwrenching. You know, the chapter that covers these events...
Chapter nine, actually. I know because I had to reread it (and the relevant bits of AtWoP) to figure out exactly when this happened. Pern's timeline is a bit rough and the wiki is little to no help. One of these days I'm gonna break down and start editing that sucker, cuz damn.
I really don't intend for so many prompt responses to be Derik backstory, but I do enjoy it, and this was right there, with feels prepackaged from my own memory, practically writing itself.
~Neshomeh
Anyways, that was the first time in a looong time that a book actually made me cry.
And yeah, backstory is often just an easy package for a lot of this stuff. :-P
It's kind of like referring to the Apollo Christmas broadcast when trying to show what the world looks like from the Moon, isn't it? /casually references another canon
If there'd been fewer religious folks in the past, we probably wouldn't be making these references now. =P As it is, they're just part of the language.
... That, and perhaps AIVAS developed a sense of irony/poetry?
In other news, this was very FEELS for me, and I enjoyed it. ;;
I don't mind the quotation for its own sake at all. It's very appropriate.
It's the part where Aivas says it's from "the greatest book ever written by Mankind" and ends its life with an "Amen" that knocks my head for a loop. I mean, does the AI consider itself Christian? WTF?
... But that's really beside the point.
Glad you enjoyed the story. ^_^
~Neshomeh
So... I may of got slightly carried away with one of my Halloween prompts (One of your characters meets a monster to be exact) and well... this happened.
There's a little disclaimer in the doc itself so all I'll say is it involves the characters of, and is based on a Skyrim fanfic I am thinking of writing at some point. Enjoy!
Novastorme
The clock told the time, again and again and again. Tick followed tock followed tick. Cass stood in front of it and stared.
"... I thought you'd like it."
Cass stood.
"It's just, your collection... gurl, you love it. Got more clocks on the walls than books, and that's saying a lot. Like, a lot a lot."
Cass stared.
"So when I saw-"
"You did."
Em looked at her partner, eyebrows rising up a little. "Uh, yeah, I said I-"
"You mistake my meaning." The words were flat and spat and dark. "You saw, and then you did. You didn't ask. You didn't check. You didn't discuss. You. Just. Did. Just like always."
Em stepped back, eyes wide, face slowly losing colour and leaving bone white. "Cass, I'm sorry, how, how do I make this-"
Cass turned to look at Em, and the girl took another step back. "You want to make it right? Here's what you do. You go shopping."
Em couldn't think of any words that made sense. Cass just continued, her voice short and sharp as thorns. "Oh, am
I not making myself clear? Let me spell it out for you, then. You go to New Caledonia and you go shopping. You take the money I make selling trinkets as fandom props on World One's Etsy, and you go shopping. You buy yourself some clothes or shoes or makeup. You buy an expensive coffee that's mostly whipped cream and sprinkles and pumpkin spice flavouring syrup. You buy whatever gimcracks and bits of tourist tat that catches your eye and satisfies your magpie instinct-"
Tears rolled down Em's face. "Cassie, please, you're shouting."
"-because that's what gets you through the day, isn't it, Emily Perilled? Having things. Preferably things that are sparkly and gaudy and ostentatiously expensive. You're a hoarder and you justify it with some vague garbage about retail therapy because you think that if you have no things then you're nothing. Well, guess what? You are nothing. And all the knock-off designer clothing in the world won't get rid of the emptiness in whatever shrivelled, battered little shred inside you's passing for a soul. So go. Enjoy yourself on someone else's dime, you leech. Have fun."
The clock ticked and tocked and landed on the floor when it slipped from Cass's flimsy grip. Em didn't see it thud into the thick blue Axminster carpet, kept safe from breakage by the Cushioning Charms where the driver's seat would once have been.
She was already gone.
---
The clock ticked on.
The RC door hissed open. Feet came through, wiped themselves off on the ugly tie-dyed blanket thing pressed into service as a doormat. They were loud, and only got louder.
Cass looked up into Em's frightened face.
"Cassie, have you moved?"
The witch said nothing.
"It, it's been two days. I'm worried about you."
In the smallest voice Em had ever heard, Cass said "Why?"
Em just wrapped Cass up in her arms and didn't let go.
The clock ticked on.
---
"It wasn't a clock, you know."
"Hm?"
The clock ticked on, as it had for some time. It was three in the morning and the both of them were tired. Their eyes were red and sore and their noses chapped from blowing. Crying's ugly when it means something.
"It wasn't a clock," Cass continued. "It was an old fob watch in a carriage clock mounting. The pattern was me, I did all the transfiguring myself. Took me ages to get the petals right. That's why there were all bits chipped off from the side. But the mechanism, the heart of it... the truth of the clock was a watch.
"You get one when you're seventeen. It's a wizard thing. The one in there was, well. See, that's the thing. I don't know whose it was. Found it in a junk shop in Muggle London and fell in love. It didn't work, never would again without a shedload of repairing charms, but that didn't matter. I didn't want it to work. It didn't feel right. It wasn't my watch, you see, I was just... I dunno, looking after it, I suppose. But I was going to be given one of my own, when I was seventeen, and I promised myself I'd fix it then.
"The guy in the shop told me it was old, and I could see it. There was an inscription I found in the case, and I couldn't make it out. It tore the name off, you see, but I could see a date. 1913. He wouldn't have been more than twenty-two when he died. Probably more like twenty. Off to war and home by Christmas and instead he died in a bombed-out ditch or hung up on barbed wire or stabbed in the gut. His watch stopped at eleven.
"And then came my war. My friends lying dead on the roads and stairs and grounds. People I'd grown up around killing and fighting. The, the death of it all. Lights in the sky and worlds on fire and then it all... stopped. Faded, like a bad dream. And I knew then, if I didn't get out, that I'd fade too. And it's the stupidest things you think of when you know you're going to die, because all I could think in my stupid fat head was 'Nobody's going to give me a watch'.
"So I tried to, to Apparate. Nobody taught me that either, I just knew you could do it if you tried. Everyone else was drifting away. I ran out of the grounds and into Hogsmeade as it turned greyer and greyer and I flung every bit of strength I had into this one spell to stay alive and... well, here I am. Left bits of myself behind on the trip too. Loads of hair and a couple of back teeth and my left kneecap and everyone I'd ever loved. But not this... this knackered old watch in a knackered old clock carriage covered in poppies.
"So I painted them, after I got out of the bacta tank. I painted them red at first, to honour the dead, but then I painted them white, to remember why they died. A callous and evil war prosecuted by a madman and his pet murderers. I kept the watch broken, too, even though it wouldn't even be hard to fix. It wasn't mine. It wasn't my right. I was just... looking after it, for now. You know, sometimes, when I looked at the watch face and those cheap, bent hands, I could hear the guns. They tear up the earth, you know. Pull down trees and hills and make a wasteland of everything around them. Wars, I mean. But the guns help with that."
Everything was quiet for a bit.
"They shall not grow old," Em said softly, "as we that are left grow old."
Cass looked up again. "What's that from?"
"It's from a poem. British, actually. I'm kinda surprised you don't know it."
"Hogwarts doesn't teach anything other than magic, and Muggle Studies is a bad joke anyway. Frankly, I'm amazed any of us learned how to bloody read."
"Huh."
The clock ticked on.
"They will not grow old, as we that are left grow old," Em said. "Age shall not wither them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning, we will remember them."
Cass said nothing for a while.
"Yes," she whispered, voice hoarse and crusted with salt. "We will."
The clock ticked on from its place face-up on the floor, hands turning little by little, moving forward.
First thing is that you did a good job using description and dialogue style to get the rather intense emotional states running around this whole story across.
That all being said, I'm not completely sure what it is set Em did to set all this off. My initial guess was buying Cass another clock for her collection. By the end of the story (and this was my second reading) I'd switched over to Em fixing the watch that wasn't supposed to be fixed being the underlying issue, but I'm not completely sure of that.
- Tomash
Yeah, it's the second one that's correct. Em fixing the stopped clock was something that caused Cass to snap in the kind of completely unjustified and nuclear way common to people with trauma.
I like Em and Cass, from the stories I've read with them before. It was hard to see Cass be that nasty to Em, and Em be hurt badly but not say anything about it.
I understand it. This thing with the watch touched a trauma, and trauma can manifest itself in unpredictable and nasty ways. I know Cass was sorry for it afterward. I assume that there was an apology given amidst the ugly crying, perhaps even some acknowledgement that Em meant well and Cass overreacted because of something that doesn't really have to do with an old, broken watch, but rather with a much deeper horror and (I think) shame. It's good that she was able to talk about it rationally afterward. I sure hope Em has some external support for herself, though.
~Neshomeh
In answer to your question: it's been briefly mentioned, but Em and Cass are both in the care of FicPsych more often than not. Em favours group therapy, while Cass prefers one-to-one sessions. It's been briefly touched upon a few times here and there in other Cass and Em stories, but they are not without their own independent support networks.
You're right that there was an apology in the ugly crying. I wanted to write it so that a lot of time was passing with both characters in something of a hole. As for acknowledging Em meant well, it almost certainly did happen, but Cass (as we've seen) has a self-flagellatory instinct and a very sharp tongue so it probably got twisted into something very nasty being said about herself. Why didn't I write any of that? Well, it's mostly because I felt like it would have really slowed the story down. It might also have become repetitive fast; there's only so many times you can apologise for something before it all starts to ring a little hollow.
You mention Em being hurt badly but not say anything about it. She's not the kind of person who says when she's hurting (this may have something to do with why she's in FicPsych); instead, she backs off or runs away or plasters on a fake smile to brush it aside. Despite being from a very action-heavy setting initially and being, y'know, a DMS assassin, Em really doesn't deal well with conflict. I've tried to show it in the other stories, but if it's not been clear then that's on me.
Poor Em. I feel I should write a story about her having a nice time with some friends, but it's me and I seem to have stolen inherited Ix's portable feels generator so maybe that's not such a brilliant idea. =]
I agree that, story-wise, including all of that stuff would be beside the point. If this were part of a longer arc about their relationship, then it would be relevant, but as a concise one-shot about remembering and mourning, not so much.
It's been a while since I checked in with the prompts, since I haven't written one (or much of anything else) in some time, so I've certainly missed things you've established in previous pieces. It's to your credit that I don't feel like I have. I can jump back in feeling invested, and everything required to interpret what happened between scenes is there. I was just worried and wanted to know everything would work out and be okay in the end. {= )
I love my angst, too, but I'm an optimist, dammit. The point of putting characters in a hole is to see them claw their way back out again, because they CAN. And so can we all... if we're determined and lucky and maybe someone throws a rope and we're not to damn stubborn to take it. {= )
~Neshomeh
"Tom," said Thoth. "Where are you going?"
The Astartes had just gotten back to the RC after a hard day of training. Thoth liked to say that he'd never been so inactive as he was at the PPC, but between keeping himself fit and psychically developed, keeping his psychic abilities developed, canon research, and Derik, he'd done a fine job keeping himself busy.
But while he'd seen a lot of strange things in his time at the PPC, and heard many an odd tale, he'd never seen his partner look so sad. Nor had he ever seen him wearing anything more formal than a clean T-shirt, much less something like a black button-up and a tie.
"I'm headed to the funeral, Thoth," Tom said solemnly. There was not an ounce of his usual humor in his voice. "A hero has died. No, a hero of heroes. And I am joining so many others in commemorating him."
Thoth was silent for a moment. If his partner was truly this serious... "I would be honored, then, if I could join you."
Tom looked up in shock. "Really?"
"Of course. It is important to remember the dead, Tom. Especially the heroes."
"...Thank you."
--
And so Tom and Thoth stood, Tom in his shirt and tie and Thoth in his robe, their heads bowed solemnly, only two points in a throng of agents, big and small, young and old, of every canon, continuum, age, race, and creed. Some stood bowed, some suppressed tears, some tried to stay strong. They were dressed in black, white, red, and orange. They wore robes, cloaks, jackets, suits, a thousand different ceremonial outfits, tuxedos, and cosplay outfits.
They stood united, hearing the words that echoed through the silent room.
"We are gathered here today in memory of Stan Lee..."
Writing-wise, I think the narration helped give a good sense of how heavily Tom was taking this.
Also, Thoth is busy with Derik? Omai.
One typo I noticed eventually: "psychically" -> "physically", probably.
- Tomash
The PPC honoring a creator as influential and generally awesome as Stan Lee? Yeah, this happened, and everyone was there. Thanks for this. {= )
Revealing my ignorance here, but what's the significance of the colors black, white, red, and orange?
~Neshomeh
That paragraph was really just dedicated to describing how radically different everyone in the audience was. This is the PPC after all, humans serve alongside Orks and hyper-intelligent shades of blue. Maybe the colors red or orange had some meaning to those agent's culture of origin.
Then again, it's perhaps equally likely that they just didn't have anything else remotely suitable in their wardrobes...
It seemed like a list of specific colors, not a range, and red IS the color of their logo. If you were to edit this, I'd suggest you either go more general ("every color in the visible spectrum") or ludicrously specific ("everything from black and white to red and orange to chartreuse-and-mauve paisley with electrum accents"), depending on how much humor you want out of it.
... I wouldn't recommend actually wearing that last one, but seeing as it's the PPC, no doubt someone thinks that's the height of beauty. And/or they had nothing else remotely suitable. {= )
~Neshomeh
Emiranlanoamar sat at the weapons bench, looking down at the staser carbine in front of him. Tools were neatly arranged by his left hand, a set of cleaning rags by his right, and various gardening supplies in front of him, behind his work mat.
“Let’s begin, shall we.”
The Time Lord began by checking the carbine’s magazine well, then the residual charge dampener. Wouldn’t be a good start if he were to blow a hole in the table with a chambered energy bolt. Satisfied that the weapon was safe to disassemble, he pushed out a few holding pins and pulled apart the carbine’s exterior casing.
“I’ve been waiting a long time to do this, Yannogarsil. It’s all your fault.” Emiran set aside the casing, turning his attention to the carbine’s internal dimensional compressors. “I’m sorry it took so long, old friend.” He took his laser screwdriver and unscrewed the barrel/condenser assembly, removed it from the carbine’s main body, then disabled the compressors. The assembly grew four times as large without the dimension-suppressing fields. The staser’s barrel was easily unscrewed from the condenser arrays; Emiran put it on a cleaning rag to keep it from rolling away. He opened the condenser box and found what he was looking for: the complex set of lenses used to generate, focus, and collimate the staser bolt.
“I remember. A long time ago, you asked me if weapons kept you safe. I said of course they didn’t: a weapon only brings death. A technically correct answer,” said Emiran, delicately withdrawing the lenses one at the time with a gloved hand. “My favourite kind of correct. But I digress. No, I said a weapon can only kill-- and I remember you disagreed. Hah, you even challenged me back then: after the whole War blows over, we find a way to use weapons to give life. Well...” He looked at the disassembled carbine. “I admit I cheated. I’m using its spare parts. But then again, isn’t that the whole point?” The lenses all removed, he set them aside and grabbed a plasma cutter. “We are at peace now, and we have rebuilt. From death, life. And so there is no need for weapons any more.”
He cut away large, circular cylinders from the carbine’s barrel with the cutter. Emiran then closed one end of the cylinders by bending the metal with a welda-clamp and added steel wires all around the pot slowly taking shape. Over the course of several hours he fashioned loops at the end of the wires and added the carbine’s focusing lenses in them, occasionally using a matter pen to add or remove layers of the lenses. He sighted down the new lens assembly, then used his laser screwdriver to shine light through the lenses. The focused beam was now a diffuse, gentle spot on the bottom of the pot. From the remainders of the carbine, he pulled the power transformer and mounted it on a pole made from the remains of the weapon’s barrel.
“You studied botany, as I remember,” continued Emiran. “Your entire graduation thesis was on the life cycles of plants only found megaflora worlds near high-radiation stars. That was a good talk, by the way. Brilliant thesis defence-- learned a lot. Enough to know that there exist rare flowers that grow on the forest floor who live off the patches of intense light that filter down from the tree crowns.” Emiran lined up the power source down his new series of focusing lenses. “Or should I say, light shooting down from above...?”
Emiran sighed and leaned back in his chair, looking up at the clock mounted over his bench. That late already? He glanced back at his project. “Sorry, Yan. Gonna have to leave you for tonight. Sleep, then work calls. But that’s how it goes.” He yawned and stood up, stretching as he did so. “It takes time to rebuild, you know. But it’s all worth it in the end. Life prevails.” As an afterthought, he reached towards the gardening supplies and tipped a bit of soil into the pot. He delicately smoothed out the surface with a finger, then placed a single bean-sized seed on the soil.
The Time Lord smiled to himself as he slowly walked out of the room, casting one last glance back at his plant incubator before making his way towards the RC's kitchenette for a midnight snack.
I like how the rather detailed descriptions of what the Guardsman was doing combined with the dialogue gave an overall sense of solemnity.
I like the way you sort of show us everything at the beginning, but we still have to read to the end for all the pieces to fall into the right places. All the little details about the tools he's using and the bits of tech he's using them on are great. I don't know for sure what they all are, but they're applied with such precision that I can guess, and that I have no doubt you know exactly what you're talking about. I can even visualize the project fairly well, or at least I think I could if I gave it a bit more time to gel. (I have a bad habit of skimming description to get to the dialogue/action, so that's definitely my failing, not yours.) Swords to ploughshares is a theme I can absolutely get behind, too. Or stasers to megaflora incubators. {= )
I now want to know all about megaflora on high radiation worlds. ^_^
Always good to see you posting!
~Neshomeh
((Though, really, what did you expect, posting something like this when I'm around?))
"Hey, guys."
The Aviator sat on the ground in front of her crew's gravestones. The courtyard was full of red and gold leaves, and the wind was beginning to get a bit nippy. She pulled her dog tags over her head, running her thumb over each of the names in turn.
"I'm doing a lot better now than last time," she continued. "Finally got help for my drinking problem. Been going to therapy." The tags clinked between her fingers as she turned them over. "Elanor's going to be two in
just eleven days," she added. "She's growing up into such an awesome kid. You guys would love her. Gavin... you'd have been proud of her. Dee's proud of her, too. Even if he doesn't really say it."
The Aviator swallowed away the lump in her throat and smiled. "I think it's safe to say I'm... happy again. Or getting there. I did promise I wouldn't wallow anymore, didn't I?" She put the chain over her head, tucking the tags back down her shirt. "How long has it been since I came to visit, anyway? Three months? Let me think... Oh! Elanor's got almost all her teeth now. I'm starting to teach her addition and subtraction—I know, I really should have started nearly a month ago. Zeb's been excited to help out, he makes up little counting songs for her...."
That is to say, I'm glad to see Ave getting better. Hopefully the "not wallowing" continues into the future.
These prompts don't really fit Tiger's character and I couldn't think of a way to make either of them work with him. So you get something else!
Please don't ask me for context, because there isn't any.
Katie sat in the second row, hand in hand with Matthew, struggling not to cry.
They’d been a team, the five of them. Katie, Matthew, Lauren, Jimmy and Sarah, the best the Monster-Hunters had got.
Until one particularly nasty monster had killed Sarah.
It was Lauren who was reading the eulogy, voice trembling. Katie had been asked to do it, but refused. It was too painful.
“Sarah was one of the most talented members of the taskforce,” said Lauren, speaking quickly to avoid crying. “She was always analytical and thorough and knew exactly how to tackle each monster. One of my favourite memories of her was when we were training.”
Katie remembered that time too. It brought a lump to her throat just thinking about it.
Lauren, Katie and Jimmy had been trying to work through a complicated puzzle, but none of them could figure it out. Sarah had walked up and spent five minutes staring at the puzzle and working out what they were meant to do. Then she’d talked them all through the solution without making them seem like idiots.
“She brought a lot to the team, but she never asked for anything back. She always tried to help everyone else, however hard she was finding it herself. We all liked and respected her for it, and we were very close to her.”
Lauren hesitated. “She was killed by a Black Snake. It was attacking us, and we knew one of us had to stop it.”
Katie began to breathe shakily, hoping to keep the tears away. Lauren was struggling too.
“She got her knife and she just stepped in front of it and cut its tongue out. Without its tongue the monster couldn’t live, but in its dying throes it…” Lauren couldn’t hold back the tears any longer, and nor could Katie.
“It’s all right,” Matthew whispered.
“Thank you,” said Katie quickly, in a flat voice.
Lauren couldn’t keep going. She stumbled back to her seat, blinded by the tears streaming down her face.
Everyone applauded politely and Mr Crow, who was conducting the service, got to his feet.
“Thank you to Miss Watson for that moving eulogy. Next we have a song that was very special to the deceased…”
Sorry for not having any particularly detailed commentary