English is weird because it has morphed so much from its original pronunciation (heck, from its original vocabulary even). Not only that, it is a language that alters rapidly, not just over millennia. People using vocab of this generation are missing or usage-changed entire words of just a generation ago, much less a bunch of completely different words and usage a couple centuries ago, to say nothing of the various letters added and lost over time. Makes it hard to even read older historical documents, much less say them.
If you think Early Modern English (1400-1600, like Shakespeare) is hard, try Middle English (1100-1500); it doesnât even seem like the same language. And Old English (5th-11th century) is incomprehensible to modern or even pre-modern English speakers. (The dates are wibbly-wobbly, because language changes donât happen overnight or on a clear schedule.)
This pronunciation poem is a lot of fun, but itâs not so much the pronunciation (because that varies by what era youâre speaking in) as it is the wonky inconsistent English spelling.
You gotta pause to remember that the point in history at which English spelling for various words was âstandardizedâ was not the point at which the words were pronounced the same way most people still spelled them (and missing letters!). âNewerâ words were standardized at different times than âolderâ words, by different, then-current rules, and sometimes based on a rough spelling of whatever language it came from if it had a similar alphabet (Greek, Latin, French, etc, at the same time the addition of more languages caused vocab and pronunciation to drift even further).
And then people started writing permanent manuscripts and printing books, making the âstandardâ spellings stick (frozen in time) while the pronunciation and usage of the language continued to shift and adapt as it always does, increasing the disconnect. Take a look at oddball words like âknifeâ with all the silent consonants and vowels, and remember that at one point, the letters werenât silent and were actually spoken! (âKâneefehâ instead of ânaif.â And thatâs just one example.)
Spoken English morphs like a happy shapeshifter on crack enjoying a block party with all the neighbors; written English is spelled the way it is just because thatâs the way itâs âalways been doneâ (but not really).
Iâm still mad about this because it happens frequently. Students at all levels of education need library and research instructionâthey should get it before graduating high school, they should be getting it in several different classes in college, and there should be something in grad schoolâseriously, there are people in my masterâs program who donât know anything besides Google.
And donât say âthey should have learned in [previous level of university education].â Do you think every person continues education within a few years of their first degree? THEY DONâT. Even if they did get a then-good introduction to research, you think nothing changed between 2008 and 2018? How about the doctoral student I met today whose last degreeâand last experience with academic librariesâwas in 1996? How about the guy in my masterâs cohort who got his bachelorâs degree in 1987?
Because look. See that very specific topic the student wanted? There may or may not be actual scholarly articles about it. But here are a few things you can do:
First, zoom out. Start broad. Pick a few phrases or keywords, like âtech companiesâ and âculture.â See what comes up.
Actually, back up. First, does your libraryâs website search include articles, or do you have to go into a database? My libraryâs website searches some of our 200+ databases, but not all. And youâll need to find (in advance search or adjustable limiters that pop up after your initial search) how to limit your search to scholarly and/or peer-reviewed articles.
What other keywords are related or relevant? For the search above, you could use a combination of âsilicon valley,â âcompany/iesâ or âorganization/s,â âsharing,â âcollaborative,â âworkplace culture,â âsocial culture,â âorganizational culture,â and those are just the ones I can come up with off the top of my head.
Did you find something that looks promising? Great! What kind of subjects/keywords are attached (usually to the abstract, sometimes in the description section of the online listing)? Those can give you more ideas of what to search. Does it cite any articles? Look at those! Some databases (ilu ProQuest) will also show you a selection of related/similar articles.
If youâre researching a very specific topic, you may not find any/many articles specifically about your subject. You may, for example, have to make do with some articles about west-coast tech companiesâ work cultures, and different articles about creating sharing/collaborative environments.
That said, this student did the right thing: they tried what they knew to do, and then reached out for help.
Also: Everyone has forgotten how to browse the stacks. As in, find a book thatâs relevant, go to the stacks, then look at whatâs near it on the shelf. You will find stuff that way that would never turn up on a search. It really works and can be a useful supplement to electronic research even though it involves your corporeal form and books made out of paper.Â
my law school requires a legal research class. you take it as a 1L, and itâs mandatory. you are signed up for it automatically along with all your other 1L courses. itâs a wise thing to do, because youâre fucked as a lawyer if you donât know to find, you know, the law.
I have a library and information science degree, which I often refer to as a degree in google, and Iâm only being a little facetious with that. I often impress people with my ability to find things online, but itâs only because Iâve taken so many classes in research methods that I know how to phrase a search well. Itâs so important, not just in school!Â
Goddammit there is so much information and so many way to access it that it burns my biscuits when we donât give students the tools they need to succeed at this. Hell yeah all yâall above!
And hereâs what Iâve got to add:Â Â
Ask a Librarian
Seriously guys librarians are here to help. We would love to help you find the right resource for your particular informational need and weâve been trained to do so as efficiently and effectively as possible. Nowadays you donât even have to go to the library in person as many libraries offer online chat services as well as the option to contact via email. Further, and I think very importantly we are dedicated to our patrons rights to privacy. To quote the American Library Association the ârights of privacy are necessary for intellectual freedom and are fundamental to the ethics and practice of librarianship.â Â
Search the Stacks
This is one of my favorite ways  to immerse myself in an area of study. While a good subject or keyword search will lead you to some good results sometimes is just as fruitful to go the library and plunk yourself down in section and browse all the books in a topic area. Libraries will label the (book)stacks based on whichever classification system they use and you can use the links below to figure out which area of the stacks youâll want to look through.
Dewey: used in public libraries
LOC /Library of Congress: classification system used in university libraries
Some websites like gutenberg project are dedicated to making public domain books accessible to the public. Using the search term public domain books is a good way to go about looking for more sources of them. Open sourced is another good term to use when trying to find freely accessible books online and thatâs not just limited to fiction books but textbooks are also offered by various sites.
Project Gutenberg is an online archive of tens of thousands of  books that have enter the public domain that can be freely accessed.
Openstax is one website that provides access to Higher Ed and AP open sourced textbooks.
Libguides and Pathfinders
As stated above librarians are in the business of connecting people to resources. If we canât do so in person then we also do so by creating guides that can be found and used when we arenât around. These guides are filled with search terms, books, articles, reviews, lists, links, and anything else we think would be helpful for patrons trying to explore a particular topic area.Â
Pathfinder is a particular term used for these guides. Libguides is a particular platform which to host these guides. Using either word at the end of your search terms online will bring up guides that have been created in that particular subject area. Or you can explore libguides directly with your search terms to find what guides librarians across the country have created.
Note: Using pathfinder in your search terms may pull up resources about Paizo Publishingâs same titled tabletop RPG series and while dragons are cool you can modify your search to library pathfinder to exclude these resources.
Other than using a search engine or libguides directly I find a great many pathfinders on university library sites. Usually what I do is find a universityâs library webpage, find their pathfinder/research guides/guides section, and then browse through their lists of guides. These are generally organized by field of study so just pick the one you are interested in and look through the resources they have listed.
Some of the resources will be accessible for anyone while some might be locked for students of the particular university. Â If the article, book, or resource is locked by a school portal you can either search for it online outside of the university portal or you can go to your own university/public library to see if they have access to the resource there. Even if they donât have it currently in their collection libraries are often connected with other branches and may be able to request an interlibrary loan of what you need.
Online Reference Resources
Sometimes the problem isnât finding information but finding good information. Below are two sites that I use regularly to help me with this issue when searching online for resources.
The Reference and User Services Association of the American Library Association gives a list of the best free reference sites on the internet
The Ipl2 is a good authoritative source to find general information on a variety of topics. Even though the website is no longer updating there are still a plethora of subject guides that can be explored.
Open Sourced Journals and Articles
Just as there are open sourced books and textbooks so too are there open sourced journals and articles available. Again  you can add the term open sourced when searching for these resources.
DOAJ is the Directory of Open Access Journals and you can search through here to find both articles and journals freely available to access.
Journal Article Tips
Finally whenever Iâm searching through journal articles there are a few things I always like to keep in mind.
Build context. Once you find an article that is relevant to your search you can do this by exploring the citations. Both those that the article you are using references in its bibliography and those that reference the article itself.Â
Every database is going to do this differently but generally with a few clicks you can find out who has cited an article that you have read. If nothing else try popping the title of your article into google scholar and youâll see a blue âCited byâ below the description. Also in some cases you can click on the author directly in a database to see what else they have written in the subject. Totally ask your librarian for help navigating the particular database you are using again they will be stoked to do so.Â
Building this context of literature by finding and reading these extra articles is important to building a critical understanding of your topic and will allow you to build the best possible defense of your arguments. This will also allow you to see if the article youâve initially selected is in itself a viable position or if it is an outlier of its field.
If you can try and find reviews of literature articles and special issue/special topic editions of journals. These are your best friends in the resource world as these types of articles and journals compile a great deal of information on particular topic in a tiny space. They are immensely helpful in building context in an area of thought and useful to finding out what to read further to be informed in an area of study. Add those words to your search terms to see if you can get some useful resources.
DidâŠdid they take this out of school? When I was in middle school we were taken By Class to the school library and the librarian gave a lecture on how to us the library and itâs resources. Of course, at the time all they had was the card catalogue, but we were taught how to read the cards. We were taught the dewey decimal system and how to search the stacks. Then the teacher gave us an assignment that made us go to the public library and use the knowledge we were given. I donât remember if I was taught to look through journals then or if that came later, but I eventually learned it. Either way, I was taught that way back in the 80sâŠ
WHEN THE EVER LIVING FUCK DID THEY STOP TEACHING THAT IN SCHOOLS? ITâS A GODSDAMN NECESSITY IN THIS AGE OF INFORMATION. INFORMATION IS FUCKING USELESS IF YOU DONâT KNOW HOW TO FIND IT!
GodsâŠwe are failing kids so fucking hard in this fucking countryâŠ
Prolly stopped teaching this around the time Google became a major thing, come to think of it; who needs a library when you can get Google or Alexa or whatever to tell you anything? Same people who ask why in the world would kids need to learn to read cursive, or how to spell or do math without digital assistance. We donât need to know that, someone else will know it for you (and in many cases, decide if you get to know it at all).
Pretentious personal story:
I was in a university library one time when the library server went down and the whole place went insane. The printer service was offline. No one knew how to check out books using the catalogue numbers and the actual check out cards that were still in the back of most of the books. No one knew how to look up anything in the actual physical card catalogue or where to find anything via Dewey decimal. There was great wailing and gnashing of teeth as patrons piled up at the front desks and the computer terminals clamoring that theyâd never get their last minute papers done, and the staff milled like frightened lambs, calling IT support and wringing their hands.
So thereâs my introvert minding-my-own-business INTJ self casually going on with life using the card catalogue and I notice this strife...and somehow, while just being there as a student researching my own stuff, I end up rallying the library staff (mostly young student workers) and spend about 15 minutes honest-to-frog showing them how to use the check out cards in the books to manually check out books and keep a record of who took what until someone can enter the information when the system is back up. Itâs slower but it works.
And then I waded into the teeming mass of confused patrons and started bringing groups of them back to the card catalogue room (closet where they hid the things, really) just off the main entrance hall and showing them how to look things up the old-fashioned way, and telling everyone to spread the word. Granted, the card catalogue wasnât up to date since the digital servers were brought online years before that, but it would at least put them on the right floor/shelf where they needed to find their books and others like them. When things were sufficiently flowing, I disappeared from the library like a mysterious rider into the sunset; no one knew my name.
I spent more than an hour with that âcrisis,â exhausted all of my dealing-with-humans energy, and almost missed my next class, but omg that needed to be done before the library went up in flames.
it just occurred to me that darth vader, master engineer, probably looked at the death star plans at some point and noticed the flaw, but didnât bother to tell anyone about it because he despised everyone who was involved in the project
#krennic and tarkin: [die as a (indirect and direct, respectively) result of the death starâs flaw]Â #vader, who knew about that flaw and did nothing: unfortunate
Meanwhile Vader, expert ace pilot, acts well below rank to supposedly fight off the attackers. Attackers who, as far as anyone else knows, canât hope to do shit to the Death Star.
He just despised the Death Star cuz everyone was all ânyeh heh this thing can do ur job for u u LOSERâ and he actively loathed every single person who was on board it. Of course he was petty enough to ignore its self-destruct button. Heâs just that bitch.
this seems entirely reasonable
sidebar: apparently thrawn treason is, like, mostly Krennic and Tarkin hating each other and i have never read a thrawn book but i might just read that one
Vader is high-key insulted by the existence of the Death Star, the effort and expense thrown into making it, and the way everybodyâs praising it as the new ultimate power in the universe, and probably the worst part of the whole affair?
 He has no one to bitch to about it.Â
Even the Emperorâs jumped on the superweapon hype train. Even the tolerably-competent officers like Tarkin are all #TeamDeathStar, and then thereâs smug assholes like Admiral Motti who just wonât shut up about it, and honestly?
Vaderâs probably been on the email CC list for the design since the project started. Years of enduring shitty design and interdepartmental bickering and watching some smarmy asshole in an inferior cloak prance about bloviating about his special superweapon like somebody who has an anime body pillow of the superlaser housing.
And then thereâs this one scientist who keeps going on and on about this thermal exhaust problem.
Just. Huge amounts of emails on the subject, going on and on and on about it.
Vader is totally the only person who actually reads these after the first, like, five of them. Everybody else just skims through them with a side of âSeriously, Galen? Another one? Force-dammit, Krennic, couldnât you have left him on that mudball with his family?â But Vader is bored out of his skull with 90% of his job anyway, and itâs not like he has anything better to do. Besides, viciously judging other peopleâs design abilities is the closest thing to pass for fun when there arenât any Rebels to slaughter or armies to curbstomp, and thereâs plenty of shit design for the judging.
He spots the flaw in the reactor the first time it appears in the plans.
Heâd have shit himself if it wasnât for the suit.
He promptly makes a bet with himself on whether anybody is going to spot it.
Nobody does.
Theyâre a pack of idiots. Every last one of them.
Maybe he contemplates telling them for like two-thirds of a second. It would be fun to lord his actual mechanical expertise over that little shit, Krennic.
But then he considers that he can only tell them once, and what if it were after the thing blew itself right the fuck up, what if that? He can still point out the flaw, and he can throw everyoneâs stupidity right in their stupid faces, but also thereâll be no more Death Star.
So when Galen Erso sends out Thermal Exhaust Problem Analysis Report #6,109 and buried in paragraph 37 is a suggestion of an extra exhaust port, and Krennic responds with âSHUT THE FUCK UP ABOUT YOUR GODDAMN THERMAL EXHAUST PORT, GALEN, I DONâT GIVE A SHIT!â and Erso goes, âSo you approve the solution?â and Krennic goes âS***** F*** LKJDGJFKL!!!!LJF$%#$DJF! YES!â Vader saves the email exchange for posterity and is downright cheerful the rest of the week.
True, he acts in its defense, chasing down Rebels when the plans are stolen. Of course he does. Theyâre Rebels, and hunting them down is his job and one of the very few pleasures of his existence. But itâs not for the Death Star. In fact, if one of them were to escape with its plans, and hide them successfully, and keep their location secret through torture and worse, and if another of them were to fly a starfighter well enough to keep from being destroyed long enough to drop a torpedo through that vulnerable exhaust port and touch off that reactor instability and turn the whole massive, ridiculous, wasteful, absurd, and vaguely insulting contraption into so much spacedust âŠ
⊠well âŠ
⊠oops.
Vaderâs only regret about the whole affair is that Krennic predeceased it and is therefore unavailable for gloating to.
It doesnât stop him from snagging a copy of the Rebelsâ footage of the Death Star blowing up and posting it anonymously to the holonet with the added caption âPlay stupid games, win stupid prizes.â
Going out to chase down âoverestimatedâ rebel fighters in the trench was also the perfect excuse to be in the right place to casually drop a torpedo in the exhaust port.
Some punk with a Force signature just happened to get there first.
Side observation:
Just wonderinâ.
Who was Galen Erso expecting to see the flaw and make the shot?
Nobody âordinaryâ could have done it. Itâs a good bet your average targeting computer was going to miss a lot as well.
As far as anyone knew up to that point, the Rebels donât have Jedi any more. (And Vader just offed Kenobi.)
Did Galen Erso design his flaw knowing that Darth Vader was among the people knowledgeable enough to make note of it and its likely results?
Did Galen Erso design his flaw knowing that Darth Vader was among the vanishingly few people who could stroll up and hit that target off the cuff with appropriate ordnance?
Sure, the Rebels might be able to pull it off, if they know about it, if they have the logistics arranged for such a battle, if they have pilots who can aim like that.
Everybody whoâs anybody has probably heard that Lord Vader is not fond of the Emperorâs favorite new toy, because when Lord Vader is unhappy, everyone knows it.
Galen Erso designed a flaw in the Death Star that was likely to be spotted by master engineer Darth Vader and also likely to be best utilized by the same.
If youâre a clever, talented, vengeful man playing the long con, it probably doesnât hurt to have a couple layers of backup plans.
Maybe, maybe not.
Just wonderinâ.
(*Anakin and Galen posthumous high-fiving each other*)
Hereâs a dragon!Zuko tiny bit of thing to read for flips and giggles while Iâm working on Wild Fire.
dragon!Zuko ficbit: The Whistling Dragon
One day, while picking fish bones out of his teeth, Zuko accidentally discovered he could whistle by curling his upper lip and pressing his tongue along the back of his sharp front incisors. Â Whatever he was doing in there somehow formed a channel through which came a whistle like a rough, low flute.
It was finally, finally something that didnât sound like a dragon at all, and as stupid as it was he relished it. Â He spent the rest of the day curled up on the bow of the cruiser whistling through his fangs, testing what he could do to change the pitch.
The crew seemed nonplussed by the whole thing at first. Â But the look on Uncleâs face was worth it when Zuko clumsily whistled the old manâs favorite song, âLeaves From the Vine.â
Zuko hadnât felt so okay in weeks.
(It was an awkward, wet-sounding, breathy whistle and not the most sweet tone in the world, but later that week Zuko actually participated in music night just to show off what he could do, and to Iroh that made it one of the most beautiful things heâd ever heard.)
What do you think about Combustion man/sparky sparky boom man? Was he actually relevant or necessary for the book 3 plot? Was it even in character for Zuko to hire an assassin to go after avatar & co?
How much time you got? In short, I HATE with a fiery, burning passion everything about him.
Oh, did you ask why? Iâm gonna tell you anywaysâŠ
Me, rubbing my hands before Book 3: Iâm really looking forward to Book: Fire. I canât wait to see something about the government and the politics of the Fire Nation, like we did with the others. And the fire siblings. Their relationship is so fascinating and full of contradictions, I love it. And the dangerous ladies. Can we get into that particular hot-mess? This should be good.Â
Bryke: Thatâs boring. You know what would be cool? A guy that can make explosions with his forehead. I even have just the character-design.
I always thought to myself that doing wack stuff like hiring an assassin was just one more way that Zuko was losing himself to keep his place in the Palace. To stay there, he had to become like one of them; the lies, secrets, backstabbing, maneuvering, the scrabble for position that he was trying to learn. He came home from Ba Sing Se regretful but determined to be what Ozai wanted; he already knew the price for deviating.
In those early S3 eps I was watching him slip away from himself, even as he tore himself apart weighing the costs of his decisions. I sat there in dismay; where was my hot-tempered, opinionated, bull-headed idiot of a short-sighted warrior-prince? Who was this quiet, decorous, submissive little dressed-up doll kneeling properly and sitting quietly looking worried and fearful all the time? The only times he seemed real was when he was away from the Palace (Irohâs prison, Maiâs house, Ember Island).
So yeah, to stay the good little Fire Prince of the Fire Nation Palace, Zuko has to do and keep doing some very un-Zuko things, and heâs afraid to not do themâŠuntil it costs too much of his soul, and itâs too wrong, all of it, to continue.
Writers just chose a ham-handed representation of an assassin to show it; the assassin couldâve taken any form, imho.
Donât get me wrong, I got what they were trying to do, and how the point was to show Zuko becoming like Ozai. But, in my view they didnât pull it off believably.
1. During Book 1-2, we watched as Zuko went from apparent one-dimensional villain to a complex character whose very basic conflict was that he values life more than his family and was told he was somehow wrong.
Now Iâm not saying that Zuko couldnât be pushed to kill under any circumstance - I think he could be. But it would have to be something important to push him over the edge.
But what did we see? He comes back home, already full of internal conflict about his choice. The home he was dreaming about doesnât exist, his hero-welcome is based on a lie, he doesnât fit in the palace - he resents his loss of freedom, the pomp seems completely meaningless to him - and his father is nothing more than a stranger on a flaming throne. He seems disillusioned before he even steps off the boat, he has nobody to talk to, and he admits to Iroh how nothing is like he wanted.Â
And then somehow we are supposed to believe that in order to keep this something heâs not at all happy about, he just crosses the line he never crossed before no matter how hard things were and goes, yeah, I know, Iâll fix this with premeditated murder?
I think you lose too much of his character. Because that was the thing that set him apart in the first place - he wasnât ruthless enough to fit into the family. And Iâd even understand if he flirts with the idea of killing Aang to spare himself the embarrassment, but backs down in the end. But once he hires the assassin, itâs not up to Zuko anymore. Itâs only by luck that he doesnât become a killer.
2. It also doesnât make sense for the redemption arc from the Gaangâs perspective. Itâs very hard to suspend belief that after learning Zuko sent the assassin after them they would just suddenly let him join just because he once heroically swings in on a vine (and doesnât even manage to stop the guy). And letting Aang to go alone on a field trip with him like two days later? Come onâŠ
I have a huge problem with how the story plays this off for laughs as well (even years later in LoK?) Like itâs something we were never supposed to take seriously. (At the same time taking Aangâs dilemma very seriously) Taking away something thatâs essential to a character, tearing him down just for the sake of a couple of visual jokes? I HATE that kind of writing.
I agree that the whole thing wasnât handled well at all. It felt very clumsy, and like we only got half of the story most of the time. (I never watched much of LOK, so I canât really comment on that.) Thereâs a lot to like or dislike, a lot to unpack, and the vagaries I think are what makes it possible for so many people to see it all so differently, often with equal validity.
Zuko isnât ruthless enough for his family, and he knows it. Itâs been like his secret shame since day 1, likely a huge reason for all the yelling and snarling and âLook at me Iâm a terrifying Fire Nation Prince nobody better cross meâ he does in S1 even to his own men. Apart from his entire turmoil and disillusionment with coming home not being the event he expected, heâs still trying like hell to fit in to Ozaiâs standards. Heâs conflicted about his choices in S2, heâs conflicted about his conflict, heâs conflicted about being conflicted about being conflicted... Like he realizes in The Beach, he doesnât even know if heâs got ârightâ and âwrongâ correct any more, from a lifetime of rigid indoctrination in Fire Nation superiority vs everything heâs learned from Iroh and seen and experienced in the last three years. I feel like there was a lot of emotional gaslighting going on. The Fire Lord is always right, but then thereâs everything that Zuko saw in S2 (and even S1, when the FN embodied in Ozaiâs man Zhao was already turning on him) to show the human qualities of the EK people and the wrongs being done by the FN.
Youâre right about Zuko having no one to talk to, and this is I think why his thought process seems so opaque for the first half of S3. We get to watch him sulking around looking angry and conflicted, but since he has literally no one to confide in for the entire time, the audience doesnât actually get to hear what heâs thinking. He tries to engage with Iroh, needing someone to help him work out his thoughts, but we know how well that went. He for sure canât talk to his family, he doesnât risk opening up to Mai (I think he leans on her as a source of ânormalcyâ from the old days and emotional comfort he canât get anywhere else), and we only get a glimpse of his internal process during the campfire talk on The Beach (and even that had to be heavily edited since he was in the presence of Azula and her two allies). He does have a strong moral compass, but it keeps pointing him down the straight and narrow rocky thorny path and not in the direction he thinks heâs supposed to go. Heâs not happy to be at home, but he thinks heâs supposed to be, and of late Zukoâs been very dedicated to adhering to things that other people have forced on him.
I think our difference stems from the fact that I could see Zuko doing the things he did with the pressures he was under and elements of his previously established character, but the writers did a very poor job of showing their work in the actual execution. It had to be more than just embarrassment that drove Zuko to seek out a hired gun. I totally agree thatâs not him under normal circumstances. Heâs always been one to handle his own problems (Blue Spirit), and if he hadnât been trapped in his situation (all of his actions and movements under scrutiny for the slightest hint of rebellion) he mightâve taken off to deal with the Avatar question on his own. Or maybe he couldnât; maybe facing Aang himself would be too much of a tipping point for him and he knew that too. All of that conflict whether he shouldâve helped the Avatar before or not, he is afraid to risk facing up to that and turning his life upside down again. He doesnât even know himself any more.
More than embarrassment, Azula put all the credit/blame for the Avatarâs status on him and I think that scared the piss out of Zuko. If the Avatar is dead, hooray (guilt, regret, confusion). If the Avatar is alive, heâs screwed, his entire âtriumphantâ return hinged on this âheroic deedâ and Azulaâs treacherous regard, and if this turns out to be a lie itâs worse than failure would have been in the first place. Zuko has already been the recipient of Ozaiâs anger and itâs not something that heâd just get over (itâs permanent lesson, every time he looks in a mirror), especially trapped in the middle of the Palace with no Uncle at his back. Thereâs very likely dread that the punishment this time would be worse (and what is âworseâ going to be? Locked up in the dungeon? Losing the rest of his face? Burned alive?). So, in his scrabbling for a solution, Zuko has two shoulder dragons: Iroh and Azula, and Iroh is the one in prison. Ozai likes Azula and wouldnât punish her (in Zukoâs mind), so what would Azula do if she couldnât deal with a pesky foe herself? Possibly send Mai and Ty Lee after them, but Zuko doesnât have a power team so...next best thing, hire an assassin who wonât tell Dad how bad he messed up! ( /facepalm) Itâs totally something he could see Azula doing, which is why he laments he didnât use that excuse to the Gaang.
Zuko is impulsive, doesnât think things through, and doesnât plan well. He canât even not blow up at Iroh when heâs trying to ask for help. Heâs sixteen and afraid and not thinking about killing a child, which in all his own personal confusion is going to occur offscreen to him anyway. (Same as Aang and Katara causing deaths in battle and not even pausing, âIf I donât see it then it isnât real,â which is the same thing that let Zuko go on as long as he did in arrogant ignorance and loyalty to his father in S1 and previous.) I think hiring an assassin was an impulse buy out of fear. Iâm not going to accuse the boy of deep forethought or maturity, nor am I going to accuse the writers of doing a good job of showing their work. This is just my interpretation of his un-Zuko actions here. Heâs bad at being good, but heâs just as bad at being bad.
I absolutely do think that Zuko is afraid of Ozai. Thereâs anger and resentment and even love but itâs all bound up in fear. As clear and well-deserved as his Calling The Old Man Out speech was, he still waited for the Eclipse to do it. For a time when he knew for certain there wouldnât be another fistful of fire coming at his face for speaking out of turn.
Maybe once the consequences of his decision fall in on him (all of his decisions) itâs just adding more momentum to his decision to join the Avatar. Maybe the assassinâs just all part of his realization of how far heâs fallen into all this stuff he knows is wrong and heâs been desperately and deliberately working his hardest to look the other way so he could stay at Home. (But itâs not home, not any more, not the old home with Mom and Uncle and a happy family, itâs not like completing his mission and returning was breaking some kind of curse and heâd have his face back and everything would be like it used to.) Heâs losing too much of his character and that realization is a pretty good spark for his final decision. We all know that Zuko is stubborn to the point of idiocy when heâs got his heart set on something, and thatâs half of whatâs got him all twisted up here is knowing his heart is set on something wrong, or that never existed in the first place, and heâs sacrificing/has sacrificed everything for a lie.
And by the time heâs making the decision to go join the Avatar, I think heâd mostly forgotten about the assassin thing, being wrapped up in his choice and his escape and Irohâs message. Part and parcel of Zuko not thinking ahead, or his habit of tunnel-vision. He doesnât think about the impact that may have on his decision now, so much that heâs not thinking about it when he blunders it up in conversation. Heâs bad at being good, because heâs good at doing a lot of ill-advised, short-sighted things for their immediate effect without regard for their consequences. I just think a lot of the ooc things he did were based on a whole lot of fear and wishful thinking.
As said, I agree that the show was ham-handed with the whole thing. We didnât get to see much of Zukoâs internal workings for his decision-making, without anyone to bounce off of. In S1 and S2 we at least had Iroh present as a confidant or sounding board for most of Zukoâs life choices. I think that S3 ended up being too short (I know there are financial and network constraints), or they tried to cram too much into the space of a few remaining episodes. This made a lot of things in the latter half seem rushed or poorly contrived (padded with cheap humor), like Zukoâs easy acceptance and brushing off the consequences of his previous actions in favor of advancing the narrative to the end. Kataraâs the only one grudging for plot/drama reasons, and everyone else is pretty accepting. A lot of that reconciliation would have had to take place off screen, which deprives the audience of understanding (unless you read the side comics? I havenât, so I donât know if I should consider them reliable sources). Imho, they couldâve devoted an entire season just to Zuko working it out with the Gaang, and that wouldâve been barely enough to cover the enormity of that history and that personal change. But friendship is magic I guess? Iâm not sure how much of it was just everyone wanting Zuko to skip straight to long-awaited buddy status.
I hope Iâm not offending with my discourse. I enjoy the in-depth analysis youâve made and appreciate the chance to engage with it. Iâm glad that, by and large, I agree with you! Even if we may diverge on the finer points. But thatâs what makes the fandom fun to explore. :) Cheers!
What do you think about Combustion man/sparky sparky boom man? Was he actually relevant or necessary for the book 3 plot? Was it even in character for Zuko to hire an assassin to go after avatar & co?
How much time you got? In short, I HATE with a fiery, burning passion everything about him.
Oh, did you ask why? Iâm gonna tell you anywaysâŠ
Me, rubbing my hands before Book 3: Iâm really looking forward to Book: Fire. I canât wait to see something about the government and the politics of the Fire Nation, like we did with the others. And the fire siblings. Their relationship is so fascinating and full of contradictions, I love it. And the dangerous ladies. Can we get into that particular hot-mess? This should be good.Â
Bryke: Thatâs boring. You know what would be cool? A guy that can make explosions with his forehead. I even have just the character-design.
I always thought to myself that doing wack stuff like hiring an assassin was just one more way that Zuko was losing himself to keep his place in the Palace. To stay there, he had to become like one of them; the lies, secrets, backstabbing, maneuvering, the scrabble for position that he was trying to learn. He came home from Ba Sing Se regretful but determined to be what Ozai wanted; he already knew the price for deviating.
In those early S3 eps I was watching him slip away from himself, even as he tore himself apart weighing the costs of his decisions. I sat there in dismay; where was my hot-tempered, opinionated, bull-headed idiot of a short-sighted warrior-prince? Who was this quiet, decorous, submissive little dressed-up doll kneeling properly and sitting quietly looking worried and fearful all the time? The only times he seemed real was when he was away from the Palace (Irohâs prison, Maiâs house, Ember Island).
So yeah, to stay the good little Fire Prince of the Fire Nation Palace, Zuko has to do and keep doing some very un-Zuko things, and heâs afraid to not do them...until it costs too much of his soul, and itâs too wrong, all of it, to continue.
Writers just chose a ham-handed representation of an assassin to show it; the assassin couldâve taken any form, imho.
Apparently in the 20s and 30s, armadillos werenât very commonly known, so moviemakers would use them wherever they needed some creepy, âdemonicâ animal running around. So there were a lot of armadillos in early filmmaking, and it was often peopleâs only source of reference for armadillos.
Fast forward twenty years to when the father of the biology professor who told me this is driving out from the east coast to see his son in California. Crossing the southwest at night.
An armadillo runs across the road.Â
He comes to a screeching halt and the Thing Of Evil, which he never knew was actually a real animal, trots the rest of the way across the road and vanishes into the desert.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
For reference/example, this is the only Avatar TLA fic I have officially posted. Originally in 2017 on FF.net, but written some time before that.
The various Avatar comics have their cuteness, but I think they missed a lot of the point. The ones I have seen never really got the feel of the original series down pat, and since it seems like they missed a lot of characterization much of their angst seems contrived, like a teen TV show. I guess this short fic was my attempt to throw some sense into the mess.
PS: Link to other Avatar fic possibilities, responses welcome as I figure out what to actually work on:Â https://beckytailweaver.tumblr.com/post/187832851914/avatar-the-last-airbender-fic-stuff
Since Iâm trying to work on something (ANYTHING!) and I seem to be in an Avatar mood of late, Iâll throw this up here.
These are fics, potential fics, and mostly-concrete ideas that have existed in the back of my closet for a very long time, since the good old days of watching ATLA when it was shiny and new and cool. Most of them are also so old that LOK didnât exist yet or was in its infancy.
Note: These are mostly gen fic. If pairings come up they are not the central goal of the piece; they will be mainly canon as it existed at the time the fic was outlined. Treat them like the scenery (no ship war drama allowed in my workroom, thatâs what stopped me participating in the fandom years ago).
Iâd kinda like to put some feelers out and see what folks think would be most interesting to work on.
Read on:
The End of the Circle
Post-canon continuation, my oldest ATLA fic, conceived and outlined before comics or LOK existed. Does some headcanon worldbuilding based on what was available at the time of the original series. Dragons and spirits and legends coming to life, oh my!
Status: outlined, some scenes written, firm endpoint, world built.
Summary: Roku warned Aang that he could not die in the Avatar State, or the cycle would end. Azulaâs lightning killed Aang in the Avatar State. To their good fortune, Kataraâs spirit water was able to bring Aang back to life, but there are Consequencesâfor the Avatar and for the world.
Wild Fire
Canon AU/semi-rewrite. Also born before LOK was a thing so Druk doesnât exist. It borrows some concepts from the idea of Toph and her badgermole family. It breaks some TLA canon around the edges but itâs all in good fun.
Status: outlined, many scenes, ending fully plotted.
Summary: The young Fire Prince was burned and disowned by the Fire Lord, cast away and abandoned on the hostile shores of the Earth Kingdom before his kindly uncle could aid him. Disfigured, angry, and lost, young Zuko finds solace in the wilderness when he is taken in by a most unusual protector: A dragon.
Phoenix Legacy
Not-a-time-travel âtime travelâ fic. It was born after seeing Season 1 of Avatar LOK and...kinda liking it but not? (I mostly lost interest in LOK after S1.) And wanting to add some more classic feel to the season. No information from subsequent seasons was used to outline it (thus there is no Druk) but recently I have gone back and âfixedâ Zukoâs daughter (giving her the correct name and appearance), and added her nameless daughter (Iroh IIâs sister) for lulz. Basically a rewrite of LOK Season 1 with a TLA character along for the ride to shake everything up, because at the time I was disappointed that there was only Katara and no other Gaang members out there kicking the new Avatar into shape.
Status: outlined, a few scenes written, ending plotted; not to be a rehash.
Summary: A phoenix cannot die by fireâit can only be reborn. When Ozai claimed the title of Phoenix King, he had no idea what sort of spirit he might be invoking. When he lost his ancestorâs war and his crown, the spiritâs blessings were unknowingly conferred upon his heir: The hapless Fire Lord Zuko, determined to bring his nation to peace. Seventy years later, thereâs a tragic explosion in a tea shop in Republic City, and exiled traitor Fire Prince Zuko wakes up to an unfamiliar world full of unfamiliar faces. The last thing he remembers is an Agni Kai under a Comet, catching lightning to protect a friend.
The Princeâs Prisoner
Another ficling born before the comics or LOK were really a big deal and/or I didnât know about them. Basically during TLA S1, rather than fleeing Prince Zukoâs clutches, Aang decides to remain his prisoner. The original reasoning for this was a kind of modified Peggy Sue: Aang effed up his final battle with Ozai for reasons, his soul is sorta sent back in time to do-over from his iceberg wakeup. The problem is that this is not a perfect process and he doesnât actually remember everything, only some very important faces, feelings, and concepts. The idea of Zuko as a dear friend/teacher/trusted person is one of these things. Thus, in defiance of all visible logic, Aang trusts S1!Zuko with his life and keeps his promise to go with him. In spite of his Water Tribe friends continuously trying to rescue him, Zhao continuously trying to capture him, and Zuko himself continuously trying to avoid being befriended by his ticket home. (âIâm your prisoner, not anyone elseâs.â)Â Intended to be a funny and heartwarming friendship/journey story taking a different angle at the series.
Status: tentatively outlined with very few scenes skeletonâd out, season 1 definite, endpoint undecided but can continue throughout the series. The premise mechanic is a bit flimsy; itâs less concrete since itâs supposed to be fluff, angst, and friendship.
dragon!Zuko AU fic
Everybody has to write one of these, itâs like a law. Hereâs mine: Ozaiâs cruelty during the Agni Kai with his young son invoked the wrath of Agni, bringing down a magic from a time before memory and no one knows if itâs a blessing or a curse. When Zukoâs face burned, the fire didnât stop there, and when the flames went out a young dragon was left on the floor of the arena. Uncle Iroh came to his rescue before the rest of Court could gather their wits, and then had to get him on a boat and out of the Fire Nation before Ozai could decide whether to make him into a pet or a trophy. Part 1: Rather than going on a mission to hunt the Avatar, Zuko and Iroh are on a road trip to keep Zuko alive and secret from the world (Ozai wants to usurp his brotherâs title of Dragon). Iroh and his crew end up raising this stubborn angsty dragon prince; since he canât turn back into a human he has to come to terms with being a dragon most of the time (which canât talk), and he can often be Very Dramatic about it. Part 2: Years later, thereâs rumors of the Avatarâs return and Zuko (who has sort of learned to take a human shape again) sees an opportunity to spare his own life and go home by offering his father a bigger prize than a dragonâs head...
Status: very general outline, some scenes conceived and a general plot/endpoint. Part 1 is in the 3 years pre-canon, Part 2 is during canon, including the grumpy dragon hiding out in Ba Sing Se.
Years Gone/Avatar kids AU
S1/pre-canon rewrite. Some whim of fate cracks open Aangâs iceberg three years early (a storm, a passing boat, pure chance?) and he tumbles out into the world in the same year that Prince Zuko was banished. Despite befriending some Water Tribe children who would love to go adventuring with him, heâs got to get home to the Southern Air Temple and thatâs where he runs into young, angry, raw-wounded Prince Zuko on his first visit. The tiny chase ensues up and down the entire temple. Aang will of course be friendly but escape. And this begins a probably-ill-advised adventure with a lot of kids who are entirely too young to be camping across the world on a bison (but itâs exciting!), chased by another kid entirely too young to be leading a manhunt. The Comet is three years away so thereâs plenty of time for adults to tear their hair out over this. Zuko is a tiny ball of determination, rage, and tears. Aang feels bad for him and tries to make with the befriending even as heâs dodging the fire tantrums. Occasionally during adventures Zuko just gets scooped along for the ride in Appaâs saddle, no oneâs sure how these weird truces get called, but Iroh sips tea and directs the crew on a new heading and theyâll pick up their prince at the bisonâs next stopover most likely after the kid pendulums back the other way and remembers heâs trying to nab the Avatar again. So Zuko spends 50% of the time yelling and chasing the Avatar and 50% of the time sitting in Appaâs saddle learning tentative smiles and being offered berries and seal jerky, all the way from the South Pole to the North. (Itâs slightly terrifying to realize that Aang and Zuko are currently the oldest kids in the party and are actually in charge of this terribly irresponsible expedition.)
Status: general outline, a couple of scenes written, particular S1 plot points, no endpoint yet. Possible bonus content: Toph and/or Suki come along for the ride because why not.
The Blacksmith of Ba Sing Se
This is a very old Lu Ten Lives! story. Lu Ten always knew Uncle Ozai envied him, but secure in his position he didnât really care about it until he took an arrow in the back during the final battle of the Siege of Ba Sing Se. With unknown assassins among his own ranks and no safe place to retreat in the melee, the wounded prince decides to fake his own death by hiding in the rubble, and then swapping clothes with a slain Earth Kingdom soldier half crushed in the ruin. At first, itâs only to get to safety until he can get to the bottom of this. But Lu Ten is picked up by the EK medic teams after the surprising withdrawal of the Fire Nation troops, and ends up spirited away into the heart of Ba Sing Seâwhere he discovers that itâs hard to escape. He also discovers a whole new world, and a whole new perspective, and, keeping out of the authoritiesâ notice, eventually manages to make a life for himself as Chang the Blacksmith, a humble craftsman with a wife and kids. This...is much nicer than war, death, and Court politics. Years later: refugee Zuko walking home from his job at Pao Family Tea Shop runs across a little boy crying over his broken toy in the dusty street...
Status: nebulous outline with a few particular sketched scenes. Takes place mostly in Ba Sing Se, outcome indeterminate. It could be mixed with the Lineages concept from below.
Lineages / not Ozaiâs kid AU
Not really a concrete plot so much as a campy idea from long before the Avatar comics blundered through Ursaâs backstory. There was a phase in the fandom (I think the Search comics drew off of that) where it was popular to imagine almost anyone else than Ozai as Zukoâs Secret Real Dad (the boy deserves a better father) and Iroh was often selected as primary candidate. (I know, Iroh is already the real dad and stepped into Ozaiâs cold empty shoes like a pro.) Me, deciding that I had to be different, decided to offer up Lu Ten on that altar. Justifications: Iroh and Ozai looked to have a pretty extreme age difference and there was no solid age for Lu Ten at the time of his death, but his picture looks mature enough. Deals with family secrets and the political issues of muddying the lines of inheritance in the middle of a war. Also takes a crack at Ursa having a clever hand with Azulonâs last will and testament on Ozaiâs behalf, with provisos.
Status: nothing really more than a vague concept without enough plot to stand on its own. Without a viable framework, it could work better/well folded into The Blacksmith story, above.
Iâm open to opinions and/or asks about these. Trying to get a spark going! (I need to be working in a fandom, ANY fandom at this point! ^_^;; )
But, you know, the magical treasure chests are awfully good sports about it and open for him anyway. I think they feel sorry for this poor idiot destiny child.
Ok but Zuko using the knowledge he acquired during his banishment to help him as the Fire Lord. Like making small talk with Earth Kingdom dignitaries about their local foods that he enjoyed and even misses. Like having in-depth conversations with his captains about sea currents and navigation. Like, in the middle of a meeting with several high-ranking naval officials, pointing out flails in security, like how a person can cling to a Fire Nation ship for hours at a time, or climb aboard using hatches on the upper decks, or disguise themselves as a lower ranking guard with easily accessible spare armourâŠ.
Though none of his experiences can prepare Zuko for the long, awkward silence that comes after he admits to doing or at least knowing something illegal and/or completely buck wild
Because Iâm not actually dead (if I was, I might be better at this land of the dead stuff), just distracted and RL is always this huge thing. (Trying to start a business, remodeling the house, building an outdoor arena, etc etc etc. x_x ) So hereâs a little bit of âWhat the Xolo Dragged Inâ because it actually is being worked on at a pace approaching the heat-death of the universe.
Among all the other story-type things Iâm trying to work on. Fandoms are moody beasts, so youâll see them come and go in my tags if I get the gumption to work on them. Discipline? Whatâs that? said the squirrel as it spotted a new shiny thing.
The following is an excerpt from a future chapter of Xolo Dragged in and contains various spoilers.
It certainly gave him an interesting profile under the blanket. Â His laugh was little more than one brief, lazy huff of breath, one hand finding its way to Miguel's soft hair. Â Too sleepy to bestir himself anyway, he let the blanket fall along with his eyelids and slipped easily back into dozing.
He woke again to the sharp rap of Imelda's rapid footsteps in the hall, and was blinking just in time for her to fling the guest room door open.
She rolled her eyes at him, but it was with a snort he knew was laughter and that tiny victory made his ethereal heart dance in his ribcage. Â She came over and lifted one corner of the blanket, and the way her face softened when she saw the sleeping child made that same heart thrill with affection.
She was harder and sharper but underneath she was still his Imelda, fierce and loving.
"Don't you two lay about all morning," she told him quietly when she let the blanket fall. Â "We'll have breakfast for him in half an hour."
"Yes ma'am," he replied.
*****
This scene is cute, but donât think everything is happy hearts and rainbows in the Rivera household just yet! It took a long time to get there, and will take a long time to reach the end still. (omg it will, wish me luck)
My brain: Giant industrial plot bunny kitchen attached to a massive college dormitory/apartment complex inhabited by multiple canon and AU versions of every character, original and otherwise, of every movie, cartoon, TV series, video game, anime, etc etc I have ever been even vaguely interested in.
Itâs slightly chaotic but cooking up a lot of plots for basically anything is completely possible when I put all these people to work!
Finding the time to actually do something about the plots is an entirely different matter, Iâm afraid...
Fun fact: technically, because of its inability to roar and its ability to purr, the cheetah is not a âbig catâ (or Great Cat) - they are still classified as Lesser Cats.
Also you havenât heard anything until you hear them cheep.
Man, itâs a good thing Iâll probably never find myself in the situation shown in the first video because the temptation to stick my hand through the bars and try to pet them would be just AWFUL. XDÂ
Beware of extra long exposition chapter where a lot of nothing happens. There are no hugs. This is a travesty.
Seriously. Boring stuff.
(Warning: Mentions of porta-potties. If youâve ever had the traumatic experience of needing to use one of these stinky, humid little boxes in a hot, dusty parking lot outside of a cheap event populated by careless drunk people. -_- )
Part 8 - (Interlude) Lost Boy
Imelda was exhausted.
Technically, it shouldnât be possible for a Well-Remembered skeleton in the Land of the Dead to be tired. She had her entire living family proudly Remembering her all year long, she had no need for food or sleep or even air, she had no real joints to ache or muscles to strain; indeed, under most circumstances she could power on for days at a time, keeping watch over her family as she always had.
Sheâd started the week thinking that everything was going to be ordinary, as it had been for decades. And then that pendejo mĂșsico who had been her husband showed up out of the blue (sheâd been enjoying years of peace in his absence, without him constantly popping in to pester her with his simpering and whining and caterwauling) and dropped an absolute perfect storm of a nightmare in her lap.
She wasnât really angry with her little Miguelito. If anything, the child was the most innocent person involved in this entire debacle, despite their difficulties. She wasnât entirely sure who or what was to blame for this, other than the dubious ghost that may have been in the Santa Cecilia river, but she suspected that part of it was because of that ridiculous, obnoxious alebrije which refused to be parted from her great-great-grandson (though she knew better than to try to separate them; Pepita would tear down walls if she thought her chosen soul was being taken from her, and Imelda didnât want to find out what mess a stupid dog might make of her house by attempting to climb in the windows or dig under the door).
It had been simple enough to take in her grandson and get him some food; they still had a few things left over from last yearâs DĂa de Muertos, since everyone tried to make it last until the next, and her brothers always kept a stash of cookies in reserve. And of course, everyone was delighted to have Miguel in their home, to be able to talk to him and embrace him after years of merely watching him grow through annual visits. Rosita was practically beside herself to have a child in the house to dote on again.
The Department had no record of his entry into the Land of the Dead, therefore it was certain that Miguelito was not in any way deceased (gracias a Dios). They also had no idea how a living person could have arrived in the Land of the Dead without dying, or without crossing over the Marigold Bridges during DĂa de Muertos due to some supernatural influence (something which hadnât happened in a couple of centuries, by the Departmentâs best reckoning). The awe-inspiring cempasĂșchil spans used to pass into the living world on the Day of the Dead did not even exist outside of that hallowed eve, rising mysteriously from the fog and wind near the Veil at sunset and vanishing into golden dust on the breeze the moment the sun rose the following morning, closing the gates between realms for another year.
The only creatures capable of passing through the Veil year-round were alebrijes, and they could take nothing with them from either world when passing from spirit to mortal form and back again. The clerks and researchers in the Department were doing a great deal of head-scratching about how Miguel had ended up on this side at all, much less how to send him back. Living souls fell naturally into the afterlife when their bodies stopped functioning; leaving it took a great deal of magic.
Theyâd spent the remainder of the day at the Santa Cecilia Department office, with personnel running to and fro carrying books, folders, and clipboards, searching through archives and looking for records of any Remembered soul old enough to recall the ancient days when the worlds of the living and the dead brushed shoulders more often. Theyâd had both Imelda and Julio attempt various curse-breaking rituals for hours, from the modern to the arcane, including everything from precious family objects to dried and fresh marigold petals, just to see if there was any way to send their grandson home, but in the end they had to admit defeat; Miguel was not cursed and there was no spell to break.
All the while, that stupid alebrije-puppy sat at Miguelâs side, panting and grinning a doggy grin as if nothing was wrong at all.
When it grew terribly late Imelda called a halt to the frantic testing (Miguel was already sullen and upset and wanted to go home to his parents, and with the constant poking and long hours of waiting he was rapidly moving toward cranky) and took her grandson home to rest. The child was tired and hungry and Imelda was done with ineffective bureaucracy fluttering around like pigeons.
Then, when they fed Miguel dinner, Imelda had a terrible realization: Their boy would need to eat a sufficient amount of food two or three times a day for as long as it took to find him a way home, and two meager (and rather unhealthy) meals of cookies and sweetbread had already half decimated the Riverasâ modest stores of snacks.
She wasnât going to have enough food for her grandson to last a few days, much less a week.
It was a chilling, hollow awareness that brought to mind the time before sheâd started making shoes, when she wasnât sure sheâd be able to put food on the table for Coco from one day to the next, waiting for another envelope containing meager pesos to arrive. Only this time it wasnât a matter of money, it was a matter of wondering if sufficient food even existed in the Land of the Dead.
Imelda asked her granddaughter, who knew what seemed like almost everything, how much time they might have, and Victoria gave her the Survival Rule of Threes: Miguelito might live three minutes without air, three days without water, and three weeks without food.
And three weeks was the outermost limit before he went into a coma and died; infirmity and severe illness would set in long before that.
By the next day, the twins and Rosita were canvassing their neighbors for donations of food and supplies for their lostling living child. Imelda and Julio took Miguel back to the Department office to harry them for answers again, or at least some solutions to their problems. And suddenly there were a lot of problems.
Theyâd all long forgotten how much work it was to stay alive and healthy, when in the Land of the Dead they needed so little. Miguel had to eat sufficient food and use the bathroom regularly (one of the archivists had found an old chamber pot in the basement like Imelda hadnât seen used since her girlhood, and placed it in an empty office) and would need to bathe and brush his teeth. Obviously skeletons didnât need to eat, and especially didnât need to eliminate after they did; bathing was something done rather rarely and only when there was need (there was no skin to sweat with, no oils or odors to worry about).
Imelda had been horrified to learn that the water piped into their houses for washing wasnât clean (why would the dead need it to be more than barely filtered?) and this was what she had been giving her grandson to drink. The Department heads immediately began to fall over themselves to work out water sanitation (they had the tools and materials but no one had ever bothered). There probably werenât any bacteria in the Land of the Dead, as there was no way in and nothing really for them to live on, but Miguel was a source of them himself and if he was weakened by dirty water or rancid food he might still take ill.
They would need changes of clothes and bedding for him, and ways to wash those things. He would need combs, toothbrushes, toilet paper and towels. He would need a near constant supply of clean water, sufficient calories and nutrients each day, a place to eliminate waste and keep it sanitary, at least eight hours of sleep per night, and ways to keep his mind busy. The frantic air in the Department of Family Reunions gradually shifted from âHow can we send the child home?â to âHow do we keep the child alive and healthy until we can figure it out?â
Some members of the Department, faced with seemingly insurmountable troubles for just one kid, wanted to give up; by their logic, it wasnât the end of the world if one child among millions died and heâd be much easier to care for then. Imelda wouldnât hear of it (chasing one vocal individual out of the room with her boot), and took her sniffling grandson home again, leaving the clerks and workers with a stern admonition to keep trying.
At least her fierce defense of the boyâs right to continue living seemed to make him glower at her a little less.
By the day after that, the entire neighborhood around the Rivera home was in a quiet uproar, having heard the news of the living boy and responded with disbelief, amazement, and concern. People were dropping in at all hours of the day to bring food, spare clothes, extra toiletries, anything they had. They gave freely, asking after Miguel and expressing their hopes for his safe, swift return home. Imelda had never felt prouder of her community, nor more grateful for the good friends her family had made in the years here.
The Department pulled itself together as well, not entirely due to Imeldaâs shoe threats; there were decent folk there as well. Technicians arrived to set up a filtration system under the Rivera house so that Miguel would have assuredly clean water to drink and bathe in. There were a great many things that skeletons didnât use which were thrown into piles at the bottom of the towers of the Land of the Dead, and some enterprising interns had found and cleaned up an abandoned set of those portable plastic outhouses (suddenly these were much less silly and disgusting things when they were so desperately needed). One was placed in a corner of the Rivera courtyard near the gate (Rosita immediately set about putting up colorful curtains and screens to make that corner more pleasant and private for their boy), and the Department promised trucks would come by regularly to switch it out for a fresh one.
They had water aplenty, and sundry supplies in forgotten dumps, warehouses, and basements from decades of not being needed by the dead, but they were desperately short on foodâthe rarest, most vanishing resource. And Miguel could not live on conchas and chocolate alone.
To Imeldaâs surprise, however, more than just her family, friends, and neighbors wanted to share what they had with the mysterious living child. As the rumors spread day by day, more and more skeletons showed up on the Riverasâ doorstep with bags, boxes, baskets, and armloads of everything they had left over from the last DĂa de Muertos. Some had to see Miguel for themselves before they were entirely willing to part with their gifts, but all of them brought something edible. Most of it was baked goods and sweets that could keep long-term (Imelda and Victoria despaired of turning the poor boy diabetic before they managed to get him home), but sometimes there was hard cheese or jerkyâprecious protein.
Seeing how willing even perfect strangers were, the Department clerks finally got the idea through their collective idiocy to put out an official announcement about the living boy in their midst and his desperate need for nourishment until he could be returned to his home. In the time that followed this broadcast through television, radio, and newspapers (complete with a picture of Miguel looking suitably sad and frightened), the entire Land of the Dead pulled together in a stunning display of both shock and care. There were millions dwelling in the afterlife and most of them had access to one ofrenda or more; everyone was dropping extra food off at Department offices, community centers and churches. Celebrities made great shows of bringing large loads of gifts. Even deceased youngsters started taking up food drives in their neighborhoods with little wagons and baskets.
In a matter of days Miguel Rivera was the talk of the afterlife, like a news story about a baby in a well or whales trapped in the Arctic. Everyone had heard about him and wanted to help.
Enough food arrived that Imelda felt somewhat better about Miguelâs chances, even if it opened up an entirely new can of logistical difficulties. It was impossible for food to actually mold in the Land of the Dead (mold spores, it seemed, didnât grow there any more than anything else did), but it could very well go stale or rancid if left out too long. The Department helped her family set up as many refrigerators and freezers as could fit in the pantry, to hold as much of the offerings as they could for Miguelâs daily use; the rest was kept in the care of the Santa Cecilia Department office. The familyâs kitchen was also provided with a larger stove, a toaster oven, and even one of those noisy, new-fangled microwave things (and a stern warning never to put anything metal inside it).
Oscar and Felipe were already tinkering with things to help with food storage and making toys for Miguel. Rosita was thrilled with cooking for real on a regular basis, even as limited as their menu was, and took up overseeing baths and bedtimes since Miguel didnât trust Imelda. Julio worked twice as hard, keeping his duties in the shoe shop and looking after setting up Miguelâs living quarters and sorting out his clothing. Victoria read up on child care, nutrition, and first aid, eager to help in her own quiet way. Imelda shook her fist and her shoe at the Department of Family Reunions and demanded day after day that they find a way to send her grandson home.
After long, tiring days of trying and trying every little thing that anyone could find or even think up, from ancient dances to a memorably chilly boat ride, one by one the heads of the Department began to give up. There was no spell or curse or astral projection; Miguel was physically present in the Land of the Dead and they could find no way to send him back. In the end, they were sure of only one path back to Santa Cecilia: DĂa de Muertos. When the Bridges returned and the gates to the Land of the Dead opened, they would have at least one sure way to take Miguel back to the living world.
The problem was that the Day of the Dead was over two months away.
Imelda wasnât happy with how long that would take. Her grandson would have to survive with their makeshift preparations and inadequate food supply for better than nine weeks, and on the other side his living family had to be worried positively sick for him. She knew how distraught her daughter would be with their precious littlest grandson missing, and in such tragic circumstances; it knotted her nonexistent stomach to picture Coco weeping for the lost child, thinking him dead in the river.
But Imelda would get Miguelito home to Coco, she swore it on her familyâs love and honor. All they needed was to hold on until DĂa de Muertos. Just that long, and then they could walk Miguel across the Bridge to Santa Cecilia and take him home. Oh, what a joy and relief that would be at last!
Imelda had to admit that she didnât know her great-great-grandson as well as she thought she did. She remembered a sweet but bored child during the quiet DĂa de Muertos feasts at the living Rivera home, Elena feeding him and shushing him, and his young mother keeping him in arms to prevent him running about the cemetery during candlelight visits. Nothing in those encounters had done anything to prepare Imelda for the energetic, messy, loud little boy who could go from sunny grins to surly scowls in a heartbeat and tended to leave a trail of dust, clutter, and sheer noise wherever he went.
If there was a mess, the boy was sure to be right in the middle of it. If there was something that could be knocked over, Miguel would discover a way to bump it. If there was any object that could make sound, the child would rap, puff, strum, or tap almost without thinking. With his silly alebrije at his heels, he could do all of this nonstop, from the moment he woke until the moment he collapsed into bed. Poor Julio couldnât keep up with him in the least, and they could hardly go an hour without Rositaâs high pitched shrieks and squawks as yet another thing went awry or another mess was found. Imeldaâs brothers were entirely too distractable to be good babysitters, but they were the only ones who could match Miguelâs pace when Imelda was busy.
And Miguel could be as moody and stubborn as he was kind and shyly cheerful. He tended to be quiet around Imelda herself, frowning and only grudgingly responding to her, but he was obedient, even agreeable to the others. He knew the routine of a shoe shop, and he tried to do what his PapĂĄ Julio asked him to when he helped, even if the results were clumsy. He even tentatively tried to assist Rosita in the kitchen, though that often just made the messes worse. He missed his living family terribly, and he wouldnât accept Imeldaâs comfort; she would often find him later, curled up next to wherever Victoria was reading a book, sniffling quietly while his great-aunt absently petted his hair.
Coco had been a stubborn girl in her own quiet, sweet way, but she had been far more cooperative and respectful than Miguel. Imeldaâs granddaughters had also been much more agreeable children; Victoria had plenty of her own ideas, but she was obedient and thoughtful. Elena had of course been quite loud and willful, but in the end she seldom actually disagreed with her family and always did as her mother and grandmother bid her. Even Elenaâs oldest boy, Berto, had been a cranky but compliant baby when Imelda had known him briefly in life.
Miguel was in a class by himself, and half the time Imelda was at her witsâ end. Equal parts precious and infuriating, the little boy had her by turns melting and tearing her hair out multiple times a day, and the shoe shop soldiered on under Julio while she ran after the child. Miguel did not seem to like his great-great-grandmother at all, which didnât help matters when she had to scold him for one thing or another (depressingly frequent). Sheâd never had to bark âNo music!â to anyone in the family so often as this child, but on the other hand sheâd quickly learned that when he got quiet there was usually a disaster waiting to happen. He knew how to use puppy-dog eyes to great advantage (Rosita had no resistance whatsoever) and would often go right ahead doing something he was told not to do as long as he thought no one was looking; âNoâ didnât mean âNoâ to him; it meant âGo around.â He was kind-hearted and well-meaning but obstinate and artful and terribly clever for his age.
She was not prepared to contemplate the rare courage heâd shown, standing firm in the face of an alebrije heâd always seemed terrified of, or the way heâd pushed back for the first time when she swung her boot at him. She could count on one hand the number of times heâd ever raised his voice to her, and the memory of the bite in his tone that day still gave her an uncomfortable pinch in her chest.
She was not prepared to think about the way heâd turned his back on her, the wooden expression on his face, the way heâd spoken as if they were strangers. She should have been happy it seemed like heâd at last given up. She wasnât prepared to think about it, but no matter how she tried she could not forget the shattered look in his eyes.
Even walking away from her and Coco had not left him looking that broken. She couldnât understand it. At this point, she hadnât the energy to try to understand it.
No one had ever called her mean. Not her family. Not to her face.
Miguel had fled from her and was hiding in his room with that damnable poncho again, possibly under the bed this time. Imelda was sitting in the sala with a cool damp cloth on her forehead, ignoring the passing of time, wondering where all her child-rearing skills had gone and how she was going to survive eight more weeks of this stubborn, surly, uncooperative little boy she loved so muchâ
âOye! Imelda!â
That was Oscar or Felipe. It didnât matter which had yelled; where one went, the other was right behind him. Imelda plucked the cloth from her head and sat up to glare at her brothers as they tumbled into the room.
Felipe waved his arms frantically. âMiguelâs gone!â
âWhat?â she snapped.
âRosita went in to check on him after a whileââ
Oscar took up the explanation. ââbecause a treat can sweeten him up a littleââ
ââyou know like she always does? Andââ
ââthe bedâs empty, that raggedy security blanket is goneââ
ââand the crazy dog is gone too, and Danteââ
âânever goes anywhere without Miguel...!â
Instead of leaping into action, Imelda paused a moment to lean back, drop the damp cloth over her face, and resist the urge to let out a string of dire, blue-air curses that would have shocked even her brothers who knew her younger days well.
âAve MarĂa PurĂsima...does it never end?â she muttered instead.
Then she stood up, faced her brothers, and took charge once again. âClose the shop. Gather everyone and get ready to search. Send Julio to the Department office to notify the authorities of a missing child. I will get Pepita. VĂĄmonos!â
(tbc)
I still really donât like this whole part, but at this point I have to throw up my hands and post it or it just wonât happen. Canât seem to tweak it any better.
I had to cram a lot of information (10 daysâ worth) into it that would have been much too dry for non-interlude chapters and wrong from any other POV than Imeldaâs. Sheâs in charge of the family after all, and sheâs appointed herself head of the shoe business, as well as head of Getting Miguel Home Safely and head of Looking After The Living Child Day To Day.
Think sheâs bitten off more than she can chew this time?
I do think she tries to do too much, and doesnât stop to think about the consequences other than the practical, determined to protect her family for their own good. (Imperfect narrator.)
Miguelâs bad first impression of her is not making anything easy. He misses his parents a lot and heâs an angry, scared little boy who has a very hard time trusting his primary caregiver who in his mind is hostile to music and hates/drove off the best friend heâs made here.
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