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And SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS I DON'T EVEN KNOW IF THIS COUNTS BUT SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS ALSO TEENAGE YOU IS HILARIOUS DON'T SELL YOURSELF TOO SHORT SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS

You two have shared Ordeals, that's so sweet. :)

Tools are only as good as the hands who wield them?

Maybe in the hands of a more skilled player it would be a threat, but this is me we're talking about here. :P

The Ordeal is, in essence, the single task that the Powers feel you and only you are the best person for (or people, if you're a team). What it is springs out of your personality.

Siobhan is someone who reached for a history book to make herself feel better. It's pretty likely that her Ordeal will draw on that - possibly time-sliding her into the past (either 'accidentally' or because she inaugrated a time-slide deliberately, to visit history in person), or perhaps using knowledge/research skills that she has.

You've already Chekov'd dolphin wizards, and it seems like you're thinking along linguistic lines (with talking to the parakeets - you have those too?! They're all over the place up here!); history would be perfect for that. Young Wizards also plays a fair bit with parallel and pocket universes, and there's lots of possibilities there.

Or, it doesn't have to be that direct. Nita and Kit's Ordeal came about because they had a run-in with a messenger from across the universe, searching for something that was lost. There's nothing to say Siobhan's can't be sparked by the parakeets telling her about a dolphin looking for help just off-shore - and that would let you play with an on-Ordeal aquatic wizard, which sounds fun. ^_^

Ultimately, there are no limits. Wizardry can do almost anything, particularly in the hands of someone who doesn't know what it can't do. Find a problem that only Siobhan can solve, and mind the Lone Power doesn't lead her astray - it's a crafty one, that Power.

hS

Farilan sighed and went to pinch the bridge of her nose, only to remember she didn't have a nose, and instead rubbed her face. Stupid humans trying to get her to copy their habits. < Why did you set the CAD's thought-speech transmitter to public? You know agents have to keep things quiet on missions. > She shook her head and muttered, < This is why males shouldn't go into the sciences. >

I've not read... well, much of anything from the the Young Wizards series - I certainly don't own any of the books, though I dimly recall at least seeing them in my school library - so my canon knowledge is extremely limited. However, like all well-meaning but muddle-headed fanfic authors, I don't intend to let that stop me. =]

The reason I wrote Siobhan's manual the way I did - including why it's almost, but not quite a copy of an existing book - is thematic in origin. Siobhan, at least in my head, is someone who wants answers, who notices things and sees patterns. A book that's wrong like that is guaranteed to pique her interest and be noticed by her - which is, of course, what the Powers want. At least, that's what I've figured out from the wiki and the Young Wizards site. =]

I'll probably explore the "you are a warrior against entropy but you literally cannot win because people keep trying that and it doesn't work" angle in future chapters, when Siobhan has to figure out what the hell her Ordeal is. Hopefully it's not going to involve puns - she, as do I, lives quite near the town of Deal. I don't actually have any idea, aside from it'll probably involve aquatic life and Siobhan striking up conversations with the flocks of bright green parakeets that for some reason infest the skies of Thanet.

If you have any suggestions as to what an Ordeal for a teenage transgirl from the sticky-out bit of Kent should look like, I'm more than open to them. =]

The Chaos infestation has grown strong enough to affect not only the Hive citizens, but also loyal guardsmen and servants of the Emperor. I cannot allow anyone in the neighbourhood to survive and carry the vile taint elsewhere in the Hive.

Given that my resources are... limited, I look for another way to purge the area. Fire is always good - are there any stores of prometheum nearby?

hS

[Currently: stealing a Sith Lord's ship while he fights for his life.]

A glorious plan - literally! If you can pull it off, you will definitely achieve fame and glory.

...

How's it going down there?

-Help what is a keypad.
-Maul's guard droid has shot me and I am bleeding out.
-Maul came back and cut my head off.
-I got into the ship! How do I fly this thing?
-The victorious Jedi have thanked me for my efforts, but say they'll take things from here.

Currently: breathing.

Breathing is an essential skill, which you should most definitely keep up! Now, the next thing to do is figure out where you are, so...

Where are you?
-In a desert.
-In a forest.
-In a spaceship (ie, metal walls).
-In a building (ie, non-metal walls).

((Reminder that options not on the list are absolutely allowed. ~hS))

"What do you think he's doing?"

Jacob's father shielded his eyes, looking down at the boy on the beach. "It looks like he's drawing something," he said. "A game of some kind?"

The boy's mother sighed. "At least he's not just sitting up here with his book, at any rate."

"Mmm." Her husband squinted down at their son. "Maybe… but I think he's taken it with him."

~

Most young people, gaining access to wizardry for the first time, would probably try some big, impressive spell - a shield against harm, teleportation, a time-slide of their very own. They would work out the huge, complicated diagram, speak it to the universe, and be stunned when it actually took effect.

Jacob was not most young people.

The simplest spell he could find in the early parts of the Manual - before it got too densely-packed with the intricate spell-writing he now knew was called the Speech - was pretty much just an open-ended request to magic, or the universe, or the Powers to do something. "Do what thou wilt" was the best translation he could come up with, cross-referencing to the massive Speech index at the back of the book. It would serve extremely well as a first experiment with magic - it was simple enough that it would be hard for him to mess it up, which was a big bonus.

Of course, simple didn't mean the same thing as easy...

"Three paces," Jacob muttered, picking himself up and dusting himself off. "Not sure that's the most useful unit for measuring my height, but if you say so…" He leafed back to the index and found the correct symbol, used his stick to scratch it onto the damp sand. "Okay, what's next? Favourite colour? Black, obviously… oh, which black? Hmm…"

The spell was laid out on the beach as a large circle, its size necessitated by the coarseness of the medium. The main ring contained the spell itself, a single string of swirling Speech running around the outside. What Jacob was working on was the single inner circle, a lobe crisscrossed with complex strings of characters.

"Last book I read?" Jacob chuckled and shook his head. "Other than the Manual? Er… it was the new Pratchett, wasn't it?" Not that entering that detail was as simple as writing down a name - the chord that required the information was more about how he felt about the book, and the series as a whole. "Good grief, I can see why there's not more magic about."

The wizard's name (so the manual assured him) was the most important component of any spell: it had to be exactly right, or it ran the risk of changing the enacting wizard to match what they'd written. So Jacob painstakingly worked through every item in the example diagram, checked each one - then stepped back and checked the whole nexus again, just to be on the safe side.

The last symbol in the diagram was a twining, Celtic-looking pattern called the Wizard's Knot, to seal the spell together as a single whole. As he traced the tip of his stick through the final line, Jacob had a sense that the patterns he'd drawn were already shifting around him - or maybe they were staying still, and it was everything else that was moving.

"Don't get carried away," he muttered to himself, stepping over the tracery of lines to stand in the middle of his name-circle. "It's still probably not real…" He looked around at the woven pattern surrounding him in an unbroken chain of magic. "Now how do I read this?"

Just working out where to start involved five minutes of leafing through the Manual, comparing symbols and structures. The first few words were a struggle of teasing out the meaning from index and instinct.

After that it grew easier, the sound of the Speech seeming to rise naturally from the written form. The beach, the sea, the mountains towering behind seemed to lean in, listening to the growing spell. The words took over, until Jacob couldn't stop if he wanted to, but had to hurry to keep up with the wizardry that poured through him.

Abruptly, in a rush of absolute silence like the tolling of an octiron bell, it finished. Jacob stood, poised, as the world hung beneath him in utter stillness. He let out a breath, and was surprised not to see it floating away like mist.

"Well," he said, as the crash of the sea cut through the air, carrying the rest of the day with it, "that was-"

There was a bang, and a flurry of sand that whipped across Jacob's legs, obliterating any trace of the spell diagram. Jacob threw up an arm, covering his face - and when he lowered it, he stared blankly at the girl who had appeared in front of him.

She turned on one heel, beaming widely as she looked around her. "Wow!" she said, in a thick American accent. "It actually worked!"

---

Author's Miscellaneous Notes:
-Once again, names changed to protect the guilty.
-This was going to be a solo story, until I realised I needed a girl in it to make a joke work later. Luckily, I had a volunteer nearby...
-From my reading of High Wizardry, the more complex a spell you're working, the more you have to put into your name. That suggests that Jacob is actually over-doing it here, but... well, that's me all over. ^^
-The 'empty spell' here is my own invention. It seems like a moderately dangerous thing to do - a sort of inverted version of the Blank Cheque spells from SYWTBAW.
-I've actually sketched an impression of what this spell would look like!



With a sort of impressionistic version of the Speech... the inner circle is the name, with three chords (see <a href="http://www.youngwizards.com/ErrantryWikiOld/index.php/Spellcircle">the wiki) for past (left), present (base), and future (right). The past and present are filled in with personal data - the 'domed tree' in the Past is birth details, for instance, flanked by parents' names - while the future segment is empty, but lined by hopes and intentions.

On the outer circle, the left side is the preamble, explaining the type of spell and where it's being cast (the trio of large, spaced-out symbols in the middle together representing the history and geography of Wales). On the right we have the spell itself, rendered very simply: an open circle for 'fill me', and a simplified Wizard's Knot for 'Powers/universe/the One'.

Finally, above and below, we have my preferred version of the Knot itself. The wiki says that the Knot is a 2D projection of a topologically complex 3D shape, so I have no qualms about using a different version than Diane Duane's. ^_^

Sadly, I wasn't quite bored enough to come up with a concept lexicon for the Speech, so the text here is literally just squiggles. But it gives an impression of what I think this sort of thing would look like.

(The entire spell is also intended to be a single, unbroken line - the Knots provide crossing points between the various sections. Any breaks are an issue with the sketch.)

hS

I'm looking at that team and I'm seeing a legitimate threat to even my main ladder team. It's making me consider changing my team again just so you don't roll over everyone else in the tournament.

The last tiny screw slid home, and Ilraen stepped back from his work table with a sigh of satisfaction. He held up the Character Analysis Device he’d been working on for the better part of eight years. <There! I think it is finally finished.>

“Seriously?” Nume, who’d been reading on his high bunk, closed his book and shifted around to peer down over the foot rail. “I never thought I’d live to see the day. Mostly because I was sure you were going to blow up the RC.”

<In the beginning, perhaps that fear was justified, but I have learned a great deal since then,> Ilraen answered happily. <The schematics Farilan gave me have been instrumental in perfecting the L-dimensional circuitry, of course.>

“Sure.” Nume rolled his eyes. “So are you going to try it out, or what?”

<Would you like to be the first subject of character analysis?>

Nume hesitated. “You’re sure it won’t explode? Even if it thinks I’m massively out of character for some reason?”

Ilraen nodded. <With the more advanced heat sink in place, I am very confident it will not.>

After a moment, Nume said, “All right. Just a sec.” He swung his feet over the side of the bunk and dropped down the ladder to the floor. Now standing in his socks, he held his arms out to either side. “Go for it.”

Having turned to face him, Ilraen pointed the CAD and took a deep breath. <They say ‘here goes nothing’, but I hope it will not be nothing. So, here goes something.>

He pushed the activation button.

<BEEEEEEP!> went the CAD.

Both agents cringed and yelped. Ilraen’s ears flattened against his skull and Nume covered his with his hands, but it didn’t help either of them.

<SUPERNUMERARY, PPC AGENT, CANON,> went the CAD. <ALSO KNOWN AS—>

“Turn it off!” cried Nume.

Ilraen held the device at arm’s length in one hand and flailed at it with the other, frantically mashing the buttons until he toggled it off more or less by accident.

The pair heaved twin sighs of relief.

Nume glared at his partner.

Ilraen looked down and pawed sheepishly at the floor with one hoof. <Perhaps . . . perhaps installing a thought-speak transponder was not such a good idea after all.>

~~~~

I have no idea what L-dimensional circuitry is, but it probably has to do with Library Space? Beats me, I'm not an engineer. ^_^

~Neshomeh

I googled it. A miniseries that was aired in ABC.

I will be reading John Jake's North and South as well. Someday.

I was talking about Elizabeth Gaskell's North and South, though. Hehe!

I was talking about John Jakes's trilogy. Sorry if I was off-topic, Eleanor.

—doctorlit will fill the vacant ranks with a million freemen more, shouting the battle cry of freedom

Are we talking about the Elizabeth Gaskell novel or the John Jakes novels? I have read neither.

You are Sister Olivia, of the Order of the Argent Shroud, warrior of the Emperor and protector of the faithful. You are scouting a spire in Hive Kurtzwel, and you have just given the Emperor's mercy to a poor Guardsman corrupted by the Ruinous Powers. The tunnel whence you came leads to several shops, then branches out to the base of forward operations and the lower hive. Ahead of you lies a residential area, thought to contain a church of the cultists' blasphemous gods. You have:
A Godwyn-De'az pattern Boltgun
A suit of Adepta Sorortias power armor
Two Frag Grenades
Two thirty-round magazines of bolts, the one loaded into your boltgun having only fifteen rounds remaining
What do you do?

I feel like I learned way more about the U.S. Civil War era from them than I did from actual history classes.

A couple of characters are a little too intense in their characterization to be entirely believable, but overall, John Jakes did a very good job with them. I definitely recommend them. (Can't comment on how close the BBC adaptation is to the source material as I've never seen that.)

—doctorlit will rally round the flag, boys, rally once again, shouting the battle cry of freedom

I'd like to adopt the Mini-Aragogs Gileroy, Herminoe and Weazly.

This review probably isn't going to be very great, since I started this season over a year ago, before I was reviewing on the Board literally every piece of fiction I consumed. I therefore wasn't looking at it from a very thoughtful or critical standpoint until near the end of the season. And yes, it does take me over a year to finish a one-season television series sometimes. It's my least favorite medium, and I can only sit and watch on certain weekends when I don't have other plans.

Spoilers for the end of season one.

I think the bulk of this review is going to be, "Kilgrave is terrifying," so let's start with that. Kilgrave is terrifying. So many of the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies have such plain villains who are ultimately just direct physical threats, but Kilgrave is absolutely a league of his own, in terms of the sheer threat he can pose in basically any situation. He's not a fighter, yet he manages to be untouchable and endlessly dangerous in basically any situation where people are present. Over the course of the season, they really came up with an imaginative variety of ways for Kilgrave to use his powers over people, many of them just horrible. I'm often annoyed by the Marvel movies killing off their fun villains, because it means we don't get to see them anymore. But I wholeheartedly agree with killing off Kilgrave, because . . . well A) he's fun in a very different way than most villains, because the things he can do with his power are so unique and fascinating, but in a way that makes me feel more uncomfortable than fun. And B) the sheer damage he could do is almost unthinkable. We've seen what he can do when dominating someone like Jessica or Luke Cage; imagine what he could manage with Tony Stark or Scarlet Witch—or even worse, Thor or Vision, if his power works on non-humans. I know there typically hasn't been much actor overlap between the TV series and movies in the MCU, but there's no telling what the future might hold, so I'm glad to see Kilgrave gone.

Another big thing that stands out to me is the relationship between Jessica and her adoptive sister, Trish. Despite the huge difference between their personalities, the way they stick together and remain supportive of each other throughout the entire series was really cool, and really sweet. I especially like that this shows through Jessica that someone can be loving and caring without necessarily being a nice person, demeanor-wise. Both sets of actors, the adults and teenagers, did a great job of getting across the two characters' supportive natures, even when they aren't getting along in the traditional sense.

I was kind of weirded out by the whole plotline with Trish's boyfriend suddenly doping up on super-soldier pills. It felt out of nowhere, and really out-of-place with the themes of the rest of the season. The reveal in the last couple of episodes that the facility that made the pills was tied to Jessica (and, I'm assuming preemptively, to Luke) makes a bit more sense, now.

—doctorlit is now caught up through the season three midpoint of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.; Daredevil season two is next on his MCU docket.

"For each year that I was alone and frightened, spoil yourself in the heart." "For each year that I was alone and frightened, spoil yourself in the heart." "For each year that I was alone and frightened, spoil yourself in the heart."

The powers of Chaos take hold of you once more, and you start gibbering incoherently. Even a battle sister of the Order of the Argent Shroud, known for its mercy, will not hesitate to execute someone obviously possessed by Chaos. As much as it pains me to say this, she says a prayer for your soul, lifts her visor, kisses you gently on the forehead, and administers the Emperor's mercy with a single bolt to the chest. Such is the fate of a traitor. Que end credits music:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DQTCS6aWRSc

Siegfried Cortez was played by Huinesoron, Thoth, and Neshomeh
Everything else was done by 61516

Warhammer 40,000 quest will return after this commercial break:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wfdSx1YX_3w

I'm pretty sure Chaos doesn't let go just because you try to ignore it.

hS of the Unspeakable Name

I missed that. Durr. I don't know how to fix!