Dec 28, 2019
Ten in firstlife, trying to decide between Myriad and Troika
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Ten in firstlife, trying to decide between Myriad and Troika
Firstlife chapter 25
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Chapter 25
“When did you sign with Myriad?” he demands.
“I didn’t. You—”
“You must have. You’re in the outermost part of the realm. The Kennel.”
“No. And stop interrupting me!” Desperation gives my tone a sharper edge. “I’m in the Realm of Many Ends, same as you, and I want to know how you got here.”
“This is Myriad, lass.” The two are connected through the lake?
Is the big secret that they’re all the same fucking realm or something? Or that the leaders knew exactly how to get into Many Ends… Or…
“The Generals now agree with Pearl. You’re better off dead than signed with Troika. But if you sign with Myriad, Ten, you’ll be one of us. You’ll be protected. And you and I...we can be together.”
I am, once again, screaming: WHY THE FUCK WOULD SHE SIGN WITH THE PEOPLE WHO ARE ACTIVELY TRYING TO MURDER HER?!
I stop and spin, facing the guards as they barrel toward me. I’ll fight to Second-death if necessary, but these men aren’t getting past me. A second later, the guards reach me and—
Chapter 25 summary: The song warns that there’ll be women in the lake, so Ten tries to warn them about this before they dive in. However, neither of them have any reaction towards Ten’s warning, which beyond coming from out of left field, it’s also random as fuck-all. In the water, they encounter sirens who clearly only want to drown and otherwise murder them.
But when they ignore them, they continue on to the bottom of the lake, where they come out into a room full of cages. There are prisoners being kept in each cage. The three of them climb up a little, as per the next line in the song. Three guards come out, slice out the tongue of one of the prisoners, and start hauling him away. Ten decides that she must fight to save this guy. But after the fighting is done and the guards are dead, so is the other guy.
The next verse is about a huge amount of numbers, and Ten decides that it means that they must climb up the racks of cages. 60 rows, to be exact. As you can imagine, this is exhausting work.
They’re almost there when Ten realises that Killian is in one of the cages. (Elena is also there, but I don’t care about her.) Killian is as surprised to see her as she is to see him. This is apparently the torture place belligerent Myridians go to be punished for their crimes. Ten tries to free him, but there’s no lock to pick. She tries to saw it open with her garroting wire, but it’s slow. He tells her to go, that he’ll get out after a bit.
So they keep going, and end up in a hall made from skeletal remains. She thinks some of them belong to Troikian members. They hear people approaching, and Ten tells Reed and Kayla to go, so they go.
Firstlife bonus chapter 4 & chapter 22
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Bonus chapter 4
Afterward, I’ll assign you to the Kennels for a decade—if I don’t kill you outright.
Bonus chapter 4 summary: Increasingly irate messages from whom I’m guessing is Madame Pearl. She’s upset that Killian took off with Ten. She said that she killed one of Troika’s other conduits, and is going to kill somebody else next. Although how the fuck is killing that random person somehow going to convince Killian to stop? I don’t understand her motives here.
Chapter 22
“Once I was thought to be Fused with a General, too. That’s why I was allowed to train with Archer. That’s why the King would visit with me.” Dread fills me, but I say, “What happened?” “I couldn’t complete the final stage of training.”
So what about Ten, then? They make her all of these promises, and then she fails? They determine that she’s not actually a general, or literally anybody remotely special? And then what? They chuck her to the wolves because THEY thought that she was more special than she actually was?
“Once I was thought to be Fused with a General, too. That’s why I was allowed to train with Archer. That’s why the King would visit with me.”
Dread fills me, but I say, “What happened?”
“I couldn’t complete the final stage of training. The King was disappointed, of course, and he gave me a task meant to redeem me. I was given the name of a human...someone I was supposed to kill.”
The dread becomes tinged with horror. “Murdering an innocent isn’t right, Killian. Your realm needs reform.”
“Then join us and reform us, Ten. That kind of change can be made only from within.”
Again, Killian’s plan of “help me reform this shitty, dystopian hell” only works if Ten actually is special. Remember, they thought Killian was special, too.
“They’ve lost a Conduit, the light in their realm dangerously dim. They are now doubly determined to save and recruit you.”
Again, how the fuck is that supposed to be Ten’s problem?
Any society that is that close to the brink of complete and utter destruction DESERVES to be destroyed.
But I’m beginning to suspect I finally know the right path for me.
Chapter 22 summary: Killian takes Ten out a secret entrance in her father’s closet, where one of his friends has a car waiting for them. He tells her that he’s taking her to her mentally ill auntie’s house, but they probably won’t stay there for long. He hints that Pearl put a tracker on her, but that’s the end of that conversation.
He goes on to say that they thought that he was special, too. That they thought that he was fused with another general. But they were wrong, and he was told that he had to go and kill a human as “punishment”, despite the fact that THEY thought that he was special! He had to kill Doir, but when he signed her instead, he was punished even further. Again, for THEIR mistake!
This moves Ten so much that she starts making out with him. Never mentioned is the car actually stopping at any point. I don’t know what’s happening. He stops her after about a page of this, and tells her that there’s no time. But Ten seems to think that she’s slowly starting to figure it out now.
Firstlife chapter 18
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Chapter 18
Archer is shouting so loudly, his voice is echoing from the trees. “Well, I adored you. I loved you. But you changed, and not for the better. You turned everything into a battle. And even back then, I understood.”
I ship Archer/Killian. It isn’t even about seducing women; it’s about getting back at their ex-boyfriend.
“If Killian fails to sign you, he could be decommissioned. You get that, don’t you?”
Again, how the fuck is that Ten’s problem?
“But, Ten...while you were at the asylum...when she left your father and remained in seclusion, even refusing to come see you...she had a baby.”
Did I call it or what?
Women are usually sterilized a year after giving birth to their first—and only—child. Time to ensure the baby survives infancy.
So if the child gets hit by a car or gets cancer? Then what? Do they reverse the procedure and allow her to have a second?
BTW, I love how they have all of this FUTURE TECHNOLOGY, but have yet to uncover the truth behind SIDS.
“What’s his name?” The words are whispered. I don’t want to wake him.
“Jeremy Eleven Lockwood.”
Ten’s parents are clearly not mentally well if they’ve named their kids Ten and Eleven.
“Ten!” My father’s voice echoes off the walls.
Chapter 18 summary: With the threats eliminated, Ten collapses, but Killian catches her. He and Archer start fighting over how Killian took out the last guy with a gun. Archer says that they could have questioned him, but that Killian is terrified for Ten to find out that Myriad sent them, because then she wouldn’t sign with the people who are TRYING TO MURDER HER.
Killian tells Ten that he’ll get her to see her mom before it’s too late. He then kisses her (against her will, I might add. Yay sexual assault!), but in doing so, pushes a sleeping pill into her mouth, which knocks her out.
When she wakes up, she’s in a tent with the Myriad agent Killian had previously shot. Elena tells Ten that Killian fought for more time to convince Ten to sign with Myriad, so if she fails to sign, Killian will be put through his second death. The only confusing part about this is why Ten gives a shit.
She stabs Elena in the “shell shut-off spot” behind the ear, and goes outside. She realises that Killian must have driven all night, because they’re outside her family home. Archer shows up and says that her mom had a baby in secret; not even her father knew about this. This comes as a surprise to literally everybody, since women are supposed to get their tubes tied a year after having their first child.
Inside, Ten finds a strange lady cradling the baby, while her mom rests in bed. The baby is introduced as Jeremy, and he looks like he’s on death’s door. The woman says that the mom didn’t know she’d been poisoned when she’d breastfed Jeremy, and now he’s dying, too. Archer promises Ten that when Jeremy dies, he’ll personally escort him to Troika so that he can grow up without interference. And then allow the child to decide which side he wants to be on.
From the bed, the mom begs Ten to help her brother, to let him choose his own fate. That the dad went and stuck his dick into the mistress because he wanted to avoid being punished due to a breach of contract (a failure to provide a child). But it’s only on death’s door does mom realise that she fucked up in her treatment of her first child. Not simply the torture (although that’s a huge part of it) but in simply expecting Ten to blindly go along with whatever she demanded of her. Ten begins to wonder if her dad is the one who ordered her killed, right as daddy dearest shows up.
Firstlife chapter 16
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Chapter 16
“She isn’t dead. I simply decommissioned the Shell, hit it in a spot that doesn’t damage the spirit inside. It’s a safety measure for the times a Laborer doesn’t have the strength to leave the Shell but must.” With barely a pause, he cups my cheeks and adds, “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine.” And I am. The cold-blooded murder of a Shell isn’t really a big deal in the scheme of things. “I guess she got what she deserved for eating my cake, huh?”
“The cake. That’s your main concern?”
He literally told her that the spirit was fine. Of course Ten doesn’t care about the woman who has now tried to kill her multiple times.
“Well, I gather it’s much, much harder to kill a spirit than a human.”
“Maybe I’ll be killed if I fail to sign you.”
Kind of sounds like a you problem, buddy.
So...no, I don’t believe in fate. No outside force is pulling my strings. I might have been born with a purpose, a divine destiny, but my decisions— even my indecisions—are mine. My actions—and lack of action—are mine. Because, at the end of the day, the consequences are mine alone to bear.
God: *invents free will*
Humans: *free willing it up*
God: :O
She changed her mind, because Myriad changed their stance. Truth evolves, they like to say.
[...]
Truth should remain the same, always and forever, a steady base at my feet; otherwise it was once a lie—once a lie, always a lie…
I feel like she’s kind of missing the point here.
The point isn’t so much that the truth itself shifted. The truth was always the same.
YOUR personal knowledge has grown. Evolved, as the Myriad said.
Newton discovered the concept of gravity in 1666. It’s not that gravity never existed before that; the human world simply learned something that was previously unknown. The truth EVOLVED in this instance, because now humanity had a better understanding of the world around them.
“There’s been a new development. Your mother... I’m sorry, love—”
“Love?” Killian demands.
“But she’s sick,” Archer finishes.
“Sick?” I press my hands against my stomach. “What’s wrong with her?”
A moment passes before he admits, “Baiser de la mort.”
No, no, no, no, no. “Someone poisoned her? Who? How?”
I’m sorry, but I don’t have an ounce of sympathy for a woman who sat by and watched her husband agree to let a stranger waterboard their only child.
I seriously hope that she suffers, and then she gets everything that’s coming to her. And then some.
“You’re going to see her?”
I nod.
She sighs. “This is where we part ways, then.”
I open my mouth to protest. No! We stay together. But resignation settles in and settles fast.
She was barely a character. And if you ask me, her presence has only dragged the IQ of this book down. I won’t be sorry to see her go.
“It’s safe to say you were the target of the plane crash. Someone wants you dead and plans to use your mom to draw you home.”
No fucking shit. It wouldn’t surprise me at all if the mom wasn’t even poisoned.
“You don’t know the future. I survived baiser de la mort. She can, too.”
“You survived a weakened version. She was given a full dose.”
My chin trembles, and I shake my head. “You don’t know that.”
Again, I doubt mommy dearest was even poisoned at all.
When we stop to charge the car’s battery—gas is no longer needed, thanks to the realms…
I’m going to assume that it takes way less than 2 hours to recharge the cars.
The fog vanishes in an instant. And so does the pain. Suddenly I’m weightless, and I’m falling...falling...thud.
Chapter 16 summary: Killian takes care of his two “co-workers” like it’s barely a problem; I don’t give a shit. For the next page, Killian pressures Ten to sign with Myriad. This is followed by a page of her wallowing in her indecisiveness. It’s starting to get seriously old.
Archer and Deacon show up then, and tell Ten that her mom was poisoned with the same supernatural poison that Dr. Vans had given her. She naturally wants to go to California to see her mom; the boys tell her that if neither of them sleep, they can be there in 3 days. They refuse to let her on a plane until the hit on her has been removed.
She goes back inside the cabin. Sloan tells her that she was going to wait until she turned 18 and couldn’t be controlled by her family anymore, but she’s done waiting. She’s going to go burn down her family estate now. Deacon is going with her, and she’s going to try and sleep with him now. *violently gags* So long and thanks for all the cringe. Ten gets packed up, and gets into an SUV Killian produced. Somehow.
They stop to recharge the car, and Ten and Archer go inside to both pay for the power, but also for Ten to get some snacks. Inside, Archer warns that multiple people in there are shells. At the counter, there are these electronic news scrolls. One of them is about Ten’s dad… And his apparently pregnant mistress. Ten is obviously a little upset about this, mainly because the “1 child” law only applies to women. The double standard is unreal. Archer buys the article, but says that the woman is only apparently 7 months pregnant.
As they’re leaving, a rando bumps into Ten from behind. But it’s not until they’re in the car and on the road again that she starts to feel like she’s dying… And then I think that she really does die.
Firstlife chapter 15
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Chapter 15
“Without us, you have nothing.” —Myriad
This line taken directly from the “abusive boyfriend” handbook.
“How can one girl be the tipping factor in the war? How can one girl decide the winner?”
A tense pause. “How about we pretend there’s only here and now?”
According to a lot of reviews on goodreads, not one single reason for the war is ever actually provided.
The fact that Killian can’t/won’t answer should have been a huge sign that something was wrong with the overall plot of this series.
At the sides of the table are nine kids; most look to be under sixteen. Two of the boys—twins—can’t be older than thirteen.
“Meet our Generals. They weren’t ready to ascend to their roles, but after their mentors were slaughtered, they had no choice.”
Nine kids...and I’m to be the tenth.
Again highlighting how fucked it is to have a military system set up like this.
Why are there no adults in charge? Why doesn’t the king step up and say “Hey Bob, you’ve been here for 150 years now. You’re now a general.” Not a literal child!
“Our King and Queen,” Killian says with unmistakable awe.
“The King...he kind of looks like...”
“Archer. Yes.” Bitterness has displaced his awe. “Archer is one of his many sons. One of his biggest disappointments.”
Wait. Stop. Go back. “Archer’s dad is the King of Myriad?”
[...]
What drove Archer to give up his parents and his realm?
I’m going to throw out into the void, if only because I’ve been down this road before, but I’m betting that Archer’s father was too busy running the war effort to give a shit about any of his children. And when he was paying attention, he was probably a verbally abusive shitfuck who constantly rubbed every tiny mistake into Archer’s face. Probably about 75/25 for physical abuse/not. Leaning more towards, if only because this book opened on waterboarding a teenage girl.
Then he goes quiet, and that’s even scarier. “I’m not. And now I’ll prove it.” He raises the gun and— Boom!
Chapter 15 summary: Ten is startled to see Killian and runs outside of the Troika safety bubble without thinking about it. By the time she gets out there, Killian isn’t there, but there are two other Myriad shells. Right as I’m starting to wonder if it wasn’t a trap, Killian actually does show up.
He takes her into a nearby tent, where he feeds her strawberries, and insists on showing her more of Myriad. She’s like “This isn’t propaganda if he actually has feelings for me!” Because somehow in her mind, those two things are randomly incompatible.
So he shows her a bunch of stuff, including where he lives. One of the shots is of the king and queen; as mentioned, the king is Archer’s father. (He doesn’t say that it’s Archer’s MOTHER, only that the king is his father.) That Archer grew up in Myriad, but then betrayed everybody and signed Troika when he came of age; it’s a huge embarrassment to the king.
He continues on and shows the 9 war generals, and Ten would be… well. Number ten. Much like me, Ten does not understand why literal children are in charge, or how one person could drastically tip the scales to win a war that’s been going on for millenia.
Ten then insists on seeing James, so Killian shows her. Except that what she sees is basically derogatory “boys being boys” talk between James and two other men. Ten is sickened, but mostly angry with herself that she fell for his ruse.
She mentions that Archer told her about Dior, and Killian tries to convince her to sign by saying that she can put in a loophole to save Dior. Ten is put off by that, and tries to turn his shell off randomly. He refuses to be shut down, and knocks her to the ground while mocking Archer’s fighting ability. One of the other Myriadians from the start of the chapter shows up with a gun, insistent that Ten was attacking Killian. He gets angry at this coworker of his, and shoots her.
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Chapter 9
As he speaks, he reaches over, slides the scalpel from my pocket and turns, flinging the metal across the cave.
I gasp with surprise and confusion. Then I see the scalpel embedded in the throat of an intruder.
[...]
Screw Killian’s order to stay here. Kids just like me are being hunted.
Killian himself took care of somebody who had come into the cave in search of escaped inmates. He must know that remaining in the cave is a stupid idea.
A guy I don’t recognize steps into the clearing, both of his hands lifted, palms out. A sign of surrender. His hair is the color of spun gold, and he’s impossibly handsome. He has the kind of face you’d see on a magazine. World’s Sexiest Male.
He is the saint to Killian’s sinner.
I don’t know why the book decided to meander through the entire “Archer is Bow” subplot. Especially if it was only going to end up like this, in the most boring, predictable way possible.
Can no one like me just because I’m me? Will I always be a commodity to win rather than a person to love?
Chapter 9 summary: Ten wants to leave the cave, but Killian drugs her and she falls as she’s trying to leave. She wakes up 6 hours later, and yes, she does feel better. But that’s no excuse to simply drug people like that, JFC. Killian tells her to stay in the cave, but not even two seconds later, he uses the scalpel to kill a guard who wandered into the cave.
After he leaves, Ten takes the dead guard’s winter gear. But what’s better is that there’s these cool vision goggles that tell her which way Killian went. She goes in the opposite direction. But then she’s set upon by invisible-to-her guardians who are like “You’re going to die if you keep going that way! Turn back!! TURN BACK!!!”
She ignores them, and they stop after a while. She counts random things to keep her mind occupied as she walks. (Counting is her obsession, if I haven’t mentioned it.) She then realises that the goggles have connected her to the other guards, who warn not to approach “the girl”. She thinks that it can’t possibly be her, but begins to have her doubts either way.
She comes across a dead inmate, who died from exposure. Then she runs into her old friend Clay, who had been an inmate, but escaped. He explains now about how he’d been caught, and then put into the training facility under the prison as punishment.
They come across Sloan, who is clinging to life. Ten asks Archer for help, in the hopes that he’d been hanging around like Killian had warned. He comes over, and now he’s super hot. He uses MAGI- I mean, TECHNOLOGY to make a room around them that’s super heated.
But then he starts to use the info he’d gained during his brief stint as Bow against Ten in order to convince her to join Troika. And Ten is pissed off about that.
Firstlife chapter 4
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Chapter 4
“No! Gross! I’ve never jonesed for his scones.” She shudders. “It’s just...he’ll sleep with you and leave you brokenhearted in the rubble that has become your life.” Bow, who is obviously biased, has probably seen a distorted version of the truth. She’s never seen into Killian’s heart.
Sweetie, you have literally known the guy for less than 24 hours. Don’t be so quick to dismiss Bow’s warning.
Yes, the reader knows that Bow and Killian are on opposite sides of this war. But Ten doesn’t know that.
I’d adored [Madame Pearl]. Once. She was the one who told my parents to send me to Prynne. I’d heard them talking. At first, my dad resisted the idea. When Madame promised him the experience would toughen me up, help me become the person I was meant to be, and snap me out of my pouty teenage refusal to sign with Myriad, he finally relented. Then he convinced my mother.
Fair warning, but I’m probably going to be working through a lot of anger about organised religions with this book.
But ah yes! You should 100% listen to a near stranger and send your child to jail so that she can be tortured… Simply because she refused to obey your brainwashing! THEY SOUND LIKE AMAZING PARENTS, I DON’T KNOW WHAT YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT!!
Despite that tangibility, we’re forbidden from touching the Shells for any reason. Without being told why!
Ah yes, the cornerstone of organised religion: don’t do something, and don’t ask why you can’t do it!
Nine months have passed since Dr. Vans shot him in the chest.
I don’t know why they bother to continue the war in the afterlife; they’re doing a great job at making every human life as fucking miserable as possible.
“I’m done with this subject.” I mean it this time.
“Of course you are.” With an unfeminine grunt, she falls onto her pillow. “You’re a runner.”
The girl has been abused beyond belief. By her parents, by society, by the so-called “doctor” meant to take care of her, by the guards in this prison, by the other inmates…
And Bow is somehow surprised that Ten wants nothing to do with her?
“How old are you?” I find myself asking.
“Nineteen.”
ASK HIM HOW LONG HE’S BEEN 19!!
He leads me down the hall, into the commons, just not the commons I’m used to seeing.
One corner of the room has been transformed. There’s a small candlelit table with two cushioned chairs placed side by side. Platters of food occupy every inch of the tabletop. There’s even a bottle of wine and a chocolate cake.
I really hope that I don’t have to explain to anybody why the director and guards of a asylum/juvenile detention facility working so hard to set a PATIENT/PRISONER up on this sham of a date is beyond creepy.
“I’m underage.” Eighteen, the legal age for everything nowadays, can’t get here fast enough. “If I drink any alcohol, I’ll be breaking the law.”
So they have laws about drinking alcohol under a certain age, but not about literally beating and raping CHILDREN?
Nice to know where their priorities stand.
“Oh, and let’s not forget the time I was waterboarded. So fun!”
Drinking alcohol is bad, but waterboarding a 17 year old because she disobeyed her parents is 100% legal. Good to know where they’re drawing the line.
“You have freedom. You have freedom right now. You had freedom yesterday, and the day before and the day before that. No matter where you are or what you’re doing, you have freedom of choice. You’re so afraid of making the wrong decision, you’re actually stagnant.”
They have the freedom to choose between A or B, or to be punished. So they literally don’t have freedom at all.
Real free will would have the option to choose nothing at all.
I flip him off via the camera, continuing down the hall, heading for my cell.
Chapter 4 summary: Dr. Vans is DEMANDING that Ten go on this “date” with Killian, because he’s desperate to see her signed to Myriad (aka what her parents have paid him to do.) A nurse even forces Ten to change into a dress, or go naked.
Before she goes, Bow starts talking about how terrible Killian is; that he’s a “love em & leave em” kind of guy. Despite Ten insisting that she’s not going to fuck him, Ten will not stop defending him. Bow then asks about Ten’s old boyfriend, who was a guard but he was killed by Dr. Vans 9 months ago. The conversation upsets Ten so much, and she kind of shuts down.
She goes to meet Killian, who shows her some VR stuff. The excitement of seeing a pretty beach is quickly shut down when she realises that this is yet another Myriad sales pitch. They sit down to eat the dinner, and Ten eats an entire cake by herself. The only thing that Killian brought to drink is wine, so Ten gets a little drunk.
Dr. Vans is watching them on the security cameras, and he insists that they keep talking about the realms, but when Ten refuses, he insists that they do “trust fall” exercises. Ten then says that since they have to talk about the realms, she’s going to ask him a lot of uncomfortable questions. The kind of questions that religions never want you to ask. This one is about “fusion”, which is basically reincarnation. Another one of those things that nobody can neither confirm nor deny. Since he refuses to talk in depth about that, she instead starts pressing him about his dead mother.
But then she’s super wasted, and she stops making any sense. So she finally decides to leave, despite Dr. Vans yelling at her over the intercom to not leave.