#save me helen richardson...please save me...

[thedispatch]

And if I were to tell you I'm down bad for the manifestation of insanity, the throat of delusion, what would you do then, huhhh??? Arrest me???

[ohthestoryteller]

my friend made a compilation of all the times helen came through the door except they added a slide whistle every single time and then they deleted the text that had it

[sunny-reacts-to-stuff]

tma 47 "the new door"

Use of 'It' as a Personal Pronoun, Gaslighting, Unreality, Abduction, Dissociation, Lost Time, Being Trapped, Starvation, Dehydration, Self-Harm, Physical Violence, Loud Shout at 15:00, High-Pitched Audio Interference

new speaker!!!

she seems stressed

miss richardson please

i have lost the counts of how many times i've said this but jon please never work retail

now WHY would you work for someone named wolverton. what if they have a ton of wolvers

fuck we have had the "i cant picture how they looked bc they looked too normal" shit so little ago and i dont remember where

i mean i am sure he wasnt two people

A TALL BLONDE MAN YOU SAY? DID HIS HANDS SEEM FREAKY?

hands so freaky they are closeted

helen no one is saying it was there

it was warm okay

and did the pattern look fractal-ish?

weird

aww helen :(

THE PHONE WAS THE CORRIDOR? that's good horror right there

do this people know you can place your hand on the wall

gay corridor

the corridor that makes you colorblind

jon, if you touch any tunnel again after this i will kick your balls

shifted? like the non!graham?

michael?

jon if you dont help this poor woman

HE HAS STARTED TO BELIEVE ^0^

he has started to believe :C

YOUR HONOR, HE IS LEADING THE SUBJECT

hey. so. how big is the fucking office for him to shout so much whenever someone comes in? is he like 20 meters away from the door?

"you've been less conscientious" at least he is not a replacement

wait what the fuck

"let ahahahha" michael, besides being a weird entity, your manners suck

"that is a real name" very well sweetie!! at least you picked a normal one and not idk john the 17th one of the podscast or fuckass wolverton

JON NO ONE IS GONNA KILL YOU I'LL PROTECT YOU !!!

michael can you stop being weird and fucked up, please and thank you?

"does your hand own your stomach" okay riddle me this mike. if i eat a piece of metal and i spit it out does it become mine? not necessarily. leave helen alone

jon. my doe my dear my darling. can you stop talking with this guy and phone someone.

JON HE'S GASLIGHTING YOU BE CAREFUL

"let her go" "no?" "fym no."

"who the hell are you?" he's the brat when he's bumping that!!!

no one cares about your identity

he is right there jon no name is a real name

is this michael's first time talking

HE STABBED YOU? AND YOU ARE STILL TALKING?

JON. JON YOU ARE BEING NICER TO THE CREATURE THAN YOU HAVE BEEN TO MARTIN AND NAOMI.

hey so showing sasha a dangerous corpse and putting her in danger doesnt count as intervening to save anyone!

also if the weird "leave" tunnel thing was from you i wouldnt take much credit for that. not like you cant i just dont like you

jon. you are being nicer to this guy than you have been to any of your coworkers.

so. that was crazy

[allavengedromance]

Visit Original Link

A compilation of interactions between Jon and Helen from beginning to end because they had the best dynamic

Transcript under the cut

[MAG 47]

[CLICK] [SOUND OF PEN SCRATCHING AGAINST PAPER IN SHARP, FRUSTRATED MOVEMENTS]

ARCHIVIST

Statement of Helen Richardson, regarding, uh… how would you describe it?

[PEN SCRATCHING CONTINUES]

ARCHIVIST

…Miss Richardson?

[PEN SCRATCHING CONTINUES]

HELEN

– uh, what?

[PEN SCRATCHING CONTINUES]

ARCHIVIST

Your experience, how would you summarize it?

[PEN SCRATCHING CONTINUES]

HELEN

Um, well, I’ve been, I’ve been trying to draw you a map, but, it doesn’t, it doesn’t work.

[PEN SCRATCHING CONTINUES; HELEN CAN NOW BE HEARD BREATHING HARD AS THE ARCHIVIST SPEAKS]

ARCHIVIST

– Right. Statement of Helen Richardson, regarding a new door in the house she was selling. Statement recorded direct from subject, 2nd October, 2016. Statement begins.

[MAG 101]

HELEN

Do you want to come in?

ARCHIVIST

Wh… Helen? H-Helen Richardson? But… But y– Michael…

HELEN

Michael isn’t me. Not now.

ARCHIVIST

What happened?

HELEN

He got… distracted. Let feelings that shouldn’t have been his overwhelm me.

Lost my way.

ARCHIVIST

And now? Y-__you’re__ Helen?

[MAG 115]

[KNOCK, KNOCK]

[Calls] Come i–

[KNOCK, KNOCK]

[More sombrely] Come in.

[A NEW DOOR CREAKS OPEN]

[Sharply] What do you want?

HELEN

Not sure. To talk.

ARCHIVIST

You’re keeping her face, then.

HELEN

I am Helen.

ARCHIVIST

Don’t pretend to be people I know. Knew.

HELEN

I’m not pretending.

ARCHIVIST

You’re not Helen Richardson.

[MAG 115]

HELEN

Before, talking to you made Helen feel better.

ARCHIVIST

You’re not that Helen!

HELEN

I just want… I just want to feel better.

ARCHIVIST

…

I don’t believe you.

HELEN

You don’t?

ARCHIVIST

Wh-what? Why should I believe… a-a-any of this? You’ve told me over and over that you’re… what was the phrase? The ‘throat of delusion’? All of this is –

HELEN

I have never told you a lie, Archivist. I wouldn’t dare. I, I just thought you might understand.

ARCHIVIST

Uh… How could I possibly…

HELEN

We’re both changing, Archivist. I had hoped, that together –

ARCHIVIST

[Furious] Get out.

[MAG 131]

[MELANIE SIGHS, KNOCKS ON THE DOOR] MELANIE

She’s been helping us.

ARCHIVIST

[Sharply] It has never helped anyone. Not without a cost.

[THE DOOR CREAKS OPEN] HELEN

If I am an “it”, Archivist, then what does that make you?

[THE DOOR CREAKS CLOSED] MELANIE

Hi, Helen.

ARCHIVIST

[Coldly] I have been told you can help.

HELEN

I have been trying to. But the last time you were very rude to me.

ARCHIVIST

You’re still wearing her face.

HELEN

Not this again. I’m not “wearing” anything, Archivist. I am at least as much ‘Helen Richardson’ as you are the ‘Jonathan Sims’ that first joined this Institute.

[MAG 143]

ARCHIVIST

Why are you here?

HELEN

I told you! I’ve decided to help. I thought you might like a way home?

ARCHIVIST

Another door?

HELEN

If you want it. (short pause) How was it?

ARCHIVIST

Hm?

HELEN

Looking upon the Dark.

ARCHIVIST

I thought I was going to die.

HELEN

You seem to think that a lot.

[MAG 152]

HELEN

(“delicately” hinting) Although – some of us are always lost, in a sense.

ARCHIVIST

Wait, are you saying you can navigate it?

HELEN

Not exactly, but my door has been part of these tunnels for some time now.

ARCHIVIST

Wh – (frustrated sputtering) – what’s it hiding, wh-what’s in the middle?

HELEN

(suppressed laughter) A delightful surprise…!

[HE SIGHS. SHE LAUGHS, OVERLAPPING HIM AND HERSELF, SEEMINGLY OUT OF SEVERAL THROATS AT ONCE, AND WITH A DRAINED, SLEEPY QUALITY TO IT WHEN SHE FINDS THAT SHE HAS LAUGHED TOO LONG, AND MUST STOP TO INHALE. HER LAUGHTER, IN SHORT, NOW SOUNDS EXACTLY LIKE MICHAEL’S. THE ARCHIVIST SIGHS AGAIN, RESIGNED TO HER.]

[MAG 152]

HELEN

Hungry, are we?

ARCHIVIST

(angrily) That’s not –

– I haven’t done anything –

HELEN

– yet.

ARCHIVIST

(roughly) I feel like if I don’t… I might die. Fade away into nothing.

HELEN

…

Do you… Know that?

ARCHIVIST

No. But I… (frustrated noise) I can’t die. They need me.

HELEN

Come on, John, no excuses.

[HE SIGHS AS SHE SPEAKS.]

They don’t need your protection.

[MAG 152]

HELEN

Helen was like you, at first.

[HE CAN BE HEARD INHALING UNHAPPILY IN THE BACKGROUND.]

She felt such guilt over taking people. Until one day she realized she wasn’t going to stop doing it. So she chose to stop feeling guilty.

ARCHIVIST

Fine. I get it.

[MAG 157]

[CLICK] [HEAVY KNOCKING ON A DOOR. IT SWINGS OPEN.] ARCHIVIST

Helen.

HELEN

Jonathan.

ARCHIVIST

I need – you said before you knew the tunnels, right? That you’d been a… part of them?

HELEN

Not my exact words, but close enough.

ARCHIVIST

I need to know what’s in there. What’s at the center? (urgently) I-it’s important, Martin – I need to know.

HELEN

(cheerfully) That’s a shame, because I’m afraid I’m not going to tell you!

ARCHIVIST

(aghast) What? Why not?

HELEN

Because I have a good enough sense of what’s going on to know that it will be much more fun without my involvement! (begins laughing)

ARCHIVIST

What? You – you said you were going to help!

HELEN

I am.

ARCHIVIST

I don’t have time for this.

[164]

HELEN

Remember? And please – my name is Helen.

ARCHIVIST

Like you said, I can know everything now, including how much of a lie that really is.

HELEN

Don’t mistake complication for falsehood, dear Archivist. And remember, that knowledge is not the same thing as understanding!

ARCHIVIST

What do you want.

HELEN

To say hello! And check up on the happy couple.

[She laughs again.]

[166]

ARCHIVIST

Hello, Helen.

HELEN

Oh, hello! In a better mood, are we?

(lower, teasing) Feeling more secure now you’ve learned how to kill?

[As she speaks, a shimmery, high-pitched sound starts to layer over the background.] ARCHIVIST

(inhale) Something like that.

MARTIN

Will you tell me how he did it?

ARCHIVIST

Martin…

MARTIN

He just keeps going all vague about it.

HELEN

Oh, goodness. You see what you’ve done to the poor boy, John? He’s coming to me for clear answers.

[She snorts, and it turns into her trademark laugh.]

ARCHIVIST

Shut up.

[177]

HELEN

Oh, John? Not to sound like a squeaky hinge, but do try to lighten up. Don’t get me wrong, the brooding thing’s a good look on you, but it is starting to get a bit tired. Especially now you’ve got someone else to do the intense, driven thing. I think you might need to get a new schtick.

ARCHIVIST

[Sarcastic] Thank you for the feedback. I’ll try to bear it in mind.

[183]

ARCHIVIST

What we want doesn’t matter much these days.

[HELEN MAKES A RASPBERRY NOISE]

HELEN

Oh nonsense. What we want is the only thing that matters these days. And Basira wanted to join Daisy.

ARCHIVIST

She made her choice.

HELEN

With your assistance.

ARCHIVIST

It was still her choice.

HELEN

[Sighing] What a waste.

ARCHIVIST

No.

It wasn’t.

[MAG 187]

HELEN

You really don’t like me, do you?

ARCHIVIST

No.

HELEN

And you never have.

ARCHIVIST

Not really.

HELEN

Even though I saved you from Michael.

ARCHIVIST

You were Michael.

HELEN

Argh. I’m The Distortion, as was Michael, but I am not him, and never have been. Surely you know all this by now, what with your shiny new eye powers?

ARCHIVIST

It’s not about what I know. It’s about what I feel.

HELEN

[Disparagingly] Oh, what do you feel?

ARCHIVIST

I liked Helen.

HELEN

I am Helen.

ARCHIVIST

The real one.

HELEN

…

Helen-Classic.

ARCHIVIST

Sure.

HELEN

But that doesn’t make any sense. You barely met her. You had half an hour together, and she spent most of that ranting about mazes! She was positively delirious with paranoia!

ARCHIVIST

True. But as you’ll recall, I was pretty paranoid myself at that point.

[MAG 187]

ARCHIVIST

I got you rattled.

HELEN

I’m not scared of you.

ARCHIVIST

Helen… Was that… a lie?

HELEN

[Too quickly] No!

ARCHIVIST

A lie. A genuine untruth. Like a little bit of loose thread, flitting in the breeze.

HELEN

Fine. You can go.

[SHIFTING, AND A NEW DOOR OPENS]

There’s the door. Just go!

ARCHIVIST

Ceaseless Watcher!

HELEN

No!

[THROUGH THE INCANTATION, THE HARSH BUZZ OF STATIC MINGLES WITH CREAKING WOODWORK AND CRUMBLING CRICK]

ARCHIVIST

See this lie, this golden strand of falsehood. Take it in your gaze and pull it, follow through its curves and twists and knots as it unravels all before you.

HELEN (BACKGROUND)

No. No! No! No, Archivist! Stop! John, it’s me, it’s Helen. It’s me. I’ve always been your friend. Don’t do this to me. I have always helped you. I have always helped you and lent you doors. Think of all that I have done for you. If you do this, everyone inside me is dead!

ARCHIVIST

Unweave it now, its fear and its falsehood, its hidden teeth and the ones it wears so proudly.

HELEN (BACKGROUND)

You’re no different – You are no different from me! You can’t save anyone!

ARCHIVIST

Take all that it is and all that it has. It is yours!

HELEN

No! NOOOOOO!

[HELEN’S VOICE IS STRETCHED AND VANISHED] [EXTENDED SOUNDS OF DISTORTED DEMOLITION]

[MAG 47]

HELEN

Finally, [suppressing tears] after the latest bout of nightmares, I decided to come to you and tell you my story. Maybe you can make some sense of this.

ARCHIVIST

…Perhaps. Leave it with us. We’ll… do some digging and see what we can find.

HELEN

[tearful] You believe me, then?

ARCHIVIST

I… yes. Yes, I think I do.

[aerialflight]

Fic Recs

I haven’t done this in a while, recommending fics. But there were some fics these past couple of months that put a smile on my face, so I want to spread that joy to others. Seriously, they’re so good and I want to shove all these recs at people and have them appreciate them as much as I do. Everyone stay safe and I hope these recs make staying home easier for everyone!

-

[Fullmetal Alchemist]

maestoso by novalotypo

Edward Elric is about eleven when he stands up, makes an extended effort to knock as many books off the old bastard’s shelves as he can, and says, “Fuck the military. Al, you interested in music at all?”

Everybody's got their own ideas of retirement.

The Elrics don't even do retirement, what with the world trying to blow itself up every other month, but this shit has got to take the fucking cake.

(You want a fic that’ll make you cry tears of uncontrollable laughter? I point you to this fic. The shenanigans, the fact this is a time travel fic, the fucking headaches the Elrics cause, the I-Have-No-Fucks-To-Give attitude. Legend.)

-

[The Magnus Archives]

we raise it up by savrenim

Jonathan Sims reads a book and saves the world; although maybe the real salvation is the friends he makes along the way.

OR: in which Jon is not the only Archival monster for very long, Sasha James is competent, Tim Stoker finds some catharsis, Helen Richardson is sexy, Melanie makes a very successful youtube channel revamp, and Martin Blackwood gets to brew a lot of new friends tea.

(This is literally the most creative, fucking inspired tma fic I’ve ever read. You literally will never be able to guess what happens next and it’s just so much fun.)(Kinda Time Travel, you’ll understand what I mean if you read it, it’s so well done and amazing.)(The characterization for Sasha makes me want to weep, I’ve never seen her characterized this way before and it makes SO MUCH SENSE.)(@savrenim you are a QUEEN and you inspire me to be a better writer.)

-

[Marvel]

Crash Landing by Nyxelestia

"You could've left me there," Adrian murmured, jerking his head back towards the burning beach in the distance. "For Stark and his DODC people to find me. Liz and Doris' lives would've actually fallen apart with my arrest, and all my work to take care of them would've gone to waste. You could've just left me there...but you didn't. So I'll make you another deal."

Peter clenched his hands, fists shaking hard. "I'm giving you a second chance - but if you go back to what you were doing...I can't make any promises."

"It would be stupid of me to expect you to, after all this," Adrian said. He looked at Peter, at the hints of bruises and all the blood. He had trouble reconciling this fragile-looking kid with the superhuman who's been destroying his business, his daughter's homecoming date with the boy he'd nearly killed. "That's not my deal. My deal is, we both walk away, and neither of us say a word about any of this to Liz. Anything else - we'll cross those bridges as we come to them."

Swallowing, the boy nodded.

Instead of gift-wrapping the Vulture for Happy to find, Peter lets Mr. Toomes go.

(Honestly, I’m disappointed in the fact there’s not many Vulture-centric fics out there. This was so great and Peter was wonderfully characterized here along with Ned.)(I have a deep craving now for more Adrian Toomes fics and I blame this fic for that. I don’t regret it one bit.)

-

[The Witcher]

all some children do is work by some_stars

It's two children, he realizes as they slowly sit up. They look about eight or nine, not that he's much judge of children's ages. One is a girl, dark-haired, in a shabby dress. The other is a boy. His clothes aren't much better, and his hair isn't much lighter than the girl's, but his eyes—

His eyes, Jaskier realizes with a distant sense of horror, are gold like a cat's. His mind makes one more valiant effort to keep from connecting the obvious dots and recognizing them, and then it finally does.

"How in the unholy fuck," Jaskier says to no one, "did this shit happen?"

(So sweet it’ll give you cavities. Break your own heart reading this, I dare you.)

of music and motion and love by WriteThroughTheNight

When Jaskier was four, he slipped his mother’s watch and went to the field to gather a bouquet of dandelions. He climbed back into the yard, as stealthy as a child really cared to be, and crept over to the barn. In the barn, lived a secret. (The man he thought his father said the secret was a monster, a plague. His mother said the secret was his sister.)

OR

Jaskier comes from a far humbler background, and would really like to know why Yennefer never came back for her youngest brother.

(YENNEFER AND JASKIER AS SIBLINGS ENOUGH SAID. FIENOWPAFE)

to render it transparent by theundiagnosable

Geralt wakes up warm, peaceful, and utterly content, which is how he knows that something is severely wrong.

(Where Geralt wakes up in the future and Jaskier and Geralt live at the Coast.)(They are Disasters. What else is new.)(Everything’s lovely and emotionally repressed.)

-

[Game of Thrones]

if I give you my heart, will you promise not to break it? by janie_tangerine

Ship: Brienne/Jaime

“It’s not broken,” she protests.

“Please,” Ronnet goes on, “it’s all red. Red hearts like that are broken and their owners are either useless or more effort than they’re worth. ‘Course you would get a broken one, who else would want you?”

“It’s not,” Brienne hisses, and at that he stops talking. She realizes her voice had turned cold. Very cold. A coldness that doesn’t belong to her, she’s never sounded like that, but it seems to come from the pulsing warmth in her hands, again - “and the day I find him you’ll see he’s not broken or damaged or unworthy. And I sure as the seven hells hope no one got saddled with yours.

in which soulmates find each other through one of them having the other's heart.

or, in which Brienne gets a mostly broken one the day Jaime Lannister kills Aerys Targaryen.

(So this is a series, just want to put that out there. And I read through all of them cause I just couldn’t do otherwise. Brienne is obviously the bravest, most noble, most amazing of course. And Jaime makes me want to punch a wall because feels.)(This soulmate idea is so creatively and well done, has become one of my favorite soulmate tropes.)(There are a lot of interesting pairings in this series and the way the author went about the relationships and this expanding world has me giving all the yeses.)(Please read!!!)

-

[Gilmore Girls]

Weather Me by missgoalie75

Ship: Paris Geller/Jess Mariano

A year in the life of Paris and Jess.

(PARIS GELLER AND JESS MARIANO AT THEIR VERY BEST HOLY SHIT!!! I can hear their voices in every line, every thought, every damn interaction and I am so in love it's ridiculous. Paris in particular won me over, I have become incredibly fond of her and it's honestly brilliant! And Jess has a beautiful mind and I love him, I do. God, do I.)(missgoalie75 did it again.)

Living With It by thesaltyavocado

Ship: Lindsay Lister/Jess Mariano

#Future Fic, #Post-Season/Series Finale, #So Your Ex is Now Your Step-Cousin, #And You're Dating Her Ex's Ex!, #A Step-by-Step Guide to Getting Over It

(There’s no summary, it’s a series, and I’m in LOVE. I am a sucker for really, really well done rare pairs, and this is the rarest of them all. Go for it. It’s beautiful.)(Also, the author is literally the BEST, the VERY BEST at making me want to ship people I never even thought of. They’re awesome.)(check out all their fics, I went on a spree and you should too.)

-

[The Hunger Games]

Speechless by thesaltyavocado

Ship: Haymitch Abernathy/Effie Trinket

Effie was kind, she was warm, she offered comfort to anyone who needed it, microphones be damned. She had a reputation for generosity amongst the Victors that Haymitch hadn't paid any attention to, because he was so paranoid about showing his hand that he barely even said her name around other people, barely even acknowledged her existence. Everyone thought he hated her, Beetee had explained. Everyone knew the stories about how he'd made her cry in the sponsor's lounge at the opening of the 61st Games, how he'd blown up at Cecelia that time when she'd asked him to pass a message onto Effie for her. Is that why none of you assholes ever liked me? Haymitch had asked. No, we didn't like you because you were a prick, Beetee told him, which was fair enough.

(The best, and I mean the best fic I’ve ever read regarding this pairing. Nothing is ever going to top this. Nothing.)(The WORLDBUILDING. FUCK.)(Literally everyone is perfectly characterized in new, heartbreaking ways and I just, fuck. Fuck.)(I don’t care if you’re not into the fandom, this will make you fall in love and see the characters with new eyes and it’s absolutely stellar.)(I want to cry.)(You don’t even have to be here for the ship, just be here for the writing, characterization, the WORLDBUILDING, fucking everything.)(Please.)(This fic NEEDS more love.)(I have fallen in love with Effie Trinket.)(This is my life now.)

-

[Harry Potter]

Walkabout by thesaltyavocado for teethandstars

Ship: Hermione Granger/Sirius Black

"You are always far too handsome for your own good," Hermione says, "in any timeline."

(The author strikes again when it comes to shipping people I don’t expect to love, yet here it is. Such an interesting fic where the time travel already happened and it’s the aftermath that the fic covers.)(Again, characterization off the fucking charts and I just want to wrap myself up in their words and live there.)(A story about broken people trying to find peace within themselves.)

-

[Stranger Things]

and you hunger for the time by missgoalie75

Ship: Steve Harrington/Kali Prasad

after the battle of starcourt, steve figured the rest of the summer would involve not working, waiting for his busted ribs and face to heal, hanging out with robin and the party, and trying to ignore the panic he feels whenever he thinks about his future. All that does happen, but other unexpected things happen too.

(Bet you didn’t see this ship coming, did you? Neither did I, yet here we are.)(missgoalie75 is the gift that keeps on giving.)(But in all seriousness this is my favorite characterization of Steve, hands down.)(This fic needs more kudos and comments and basically all the love it deserves.)(God tier characterization and relationship development.)

-

[Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas]

nfwmb by perennial

Ship: Eris/Proteus

The goddess of discord isn't careless enough to fall in love with a do-gooder mortal prince—unless, of course, she doesn't know it's happening.

(Okay, hear me out. I know it’s weird, I can feel the judgement coming from my screen. But I am weak in the face of rare pairings that actually work and the fact I fucking loved this movie ever since I was a kid, okay? So if anybody else loves this fandom as much as I do, stand up and take notice of this. I am here to tell you there are worthwhile fics to be read in this very, very small fandom.)

I'll keep turning down the hands that beckon me to come by deavors

Ship: Marina/Proteus/Sinbad

“Jealous?” Sinbad says, voice easily and casually mocking, but there’s something else under there, an undertone that speaks of so many things Marina isn’t even close to understanding.

“Extremely,” says Proteus, cracking a half-smile, but Marina feels like he’s not joking.

They stare at each other for a few moments. Marina’s gaze flickers between them. Sun and moon. She wishes—she doesn’t know what she wishes. Her heart is twisting again, but in a different way from before: as though it’s half-empty and longs to be full.

(You have no idea how in love I am with the idea of these three being in a poly relationship. No idea.)(I’ve been shipping all of them the moment I was introduced to the idea of polyamory relationships.)(This is THE poly ship for me.)(Nothing’s ever gonna come close. Nothing.)

-

[Crossovers]

Trust Me, I'm an Alchemist by metisket

Fandoms: Yuri!!! on Ice, Fullmetal Alchemist

In which Yuri Plisetsky began life with the name Edward Elric, and this has made the world of figure skating a significantly stranger and more alarming place.

“Are you saying you lived a life of crime before you began skating?” “I’m gonna have to check the statute of limitations on a couple things and get back to you on that.”

(Meme Alien Edward, Ninja Alphonse who’ll smile at you as you Perish, Disaster Gay Victor, Disaster Gay Maniac Yuuri.)(If this isn’t incentive enough, the Elrics traumatizing and delighting social media with their Life Stories and their Life of Crime.)(Feral Elrics being Feral Elrics.)(It’s the kind of fic that gets better with every chapter, cause the shenanigans just keep ESCALATING.)

[peachdoxie]

Okay! I’ve listened to eight more episodes of the Magnus Archives (99-106) and took notes on my phone in place of a liveblog, since my phone still can’t access tumblr. My laptop can, though, so I emailed the notes to myself. I figured I’d just post them all here for those of you following my liveblog, and also as a record for myself. It’s considerably more disjointed than when I usually post liveblog comments, but whatever. Anyway, below the cut are the notes. No spoilers, please.

Running list of the names that have showed up for sure

The Spiral

The Web

The Eye

The End

The Stranger

(Two others)

Possible names

The Buried? (Was this what Gertrude destroyed in the pit episode??)

The Hunt?

The Hive (is this the same as the Web)

The Filth?

The Meat (where does this fall??)

The Shrinking Walls (maybe the Buried?)

Episode 99:

Rip Jon worrying about his humanity and also the other people

Lol @jon worrying about the Admiral

WTF Gertrude's Michael is also the Michael???

How many Michaels are there???

Jon got kidnapped by the Russian/cockney guys

Episode 100:

Woman saw burning ghost of a woman in her flat. Jude?

Such an awkward episode lol

Peter Lucas person randomly shows up, static on tape, and says he has an appointment with Elias

"The only person you have to rely on is yourself" - but Jon is worried he's losing his sense of self, maybe?

Episode 101:

Michael doesn't want the Circus or the Archive to win

He wants to kill Jon for revenge

Did Gertrude sacrifice Michael for some reason? (Reminds me of the pit guy crying)

"To destroy our transcendence"

PETER LUCAS

Gertrude was good at "distorting the truth"

Michael (assistant) reminds me of Martin

Who the fuck was Gertrude???

"Of becoming. Of finally crossing the threshold into yourself."

Gertrude's map to Michael - who? how? why?

"And Michael became me."

What the actual fuck

"Reduced once again to feeding on the ??? and the confused"

Michael said Jon was a better Archivist than Gertrude—what???

The door is locked, but Michael says it's not (then he screams) WHAT THE FUCK

Helen Richardson....so Michael is now Helen, sort of. What's her game? She doesn't know yet. She is rescuing Jon though.

Episode 102:

The Dance, the Chorus

They need an important skin (hence the bear, but also maybe Jon's)

Jon having random knowing powers

I stg if Jon has to sacrifice Martin to save the world

Jon can read French

"stranger or filth"

There were several episodes with New Zealand

Get Jon some fucking therapy

Episode 103:

"Statement ends" *done sigh* (he does this like every episode lol)

So Jon used his abilities to get the traffic guy to get the paper

And now he's going behind Elias's back to meet with Daisy and get her to....?

Jon didn't realize he'd turned the recorder on. Huh. Was it him who did it? Was it a subconscious thing? Hmm.

WHY THE RECORDER

Episode 104:

Martin also zones out when reading statements

When did someone tell Martin about the Unknowing?

Tim has the circus book at the same time as all the stuff. Coincidence?

Why is Jon in China?

Also rip Tim. Why is his brother's disappearance relevant?

Ghost buildings. We've seen these before, like in the Pall Mall episode, and maybe the Archive as well.

I'm not surprised that Robert Smirck is involved

"The show must go on" what did he see???

Is this experience why Elias hired Tim? If so...why Martin?

How diegetic is the circus music? Didn't Jon say something about hearing music when talking about the circus earlier?

Huh. So Elias doesn't want Tim involved. Why?

Episode 105:

A sister organization. Hm.

Seeing the faces of those killed in the mirrors. And singing.

Was Gertrude searching for a new power? Why was she in China??

Oh, so Gertrude sent two files to somewhere in the US. Huh. Why?

Episode 106:

Didn't we already hear this guy speak already? I know the Daedalus came up before. I think.

"Existential vertigo"

This isn't the same one

OH this is isolation guy but from one of the other's perspective

Existential reasons - part of the psych profile?

Manuela and lasers

"The sense of a presence"

How does this connect to the isolation guy story?

Was this guy claimed as an avatar of this thing?

This is like the opposite of the shrinking walls. Are all the powers opposites?

Did Manuela also experience something?

Eldritch horror thing

This episode is quite unsettling

Where did that guy go? We’ve seen several “disappeared off the face of the earth” people

Also, when are they gonna connect the Daedalus statements together?

This episode passed the Bechdel test

Also, Melanie just....forgot? what she was reading

Also lol @them wondering if Jon and Martin are a thing

"I could have placed the ideas in your head" wtf who IS Elias?

FUCK. IVY MEADOWS. WHAT THE FUCK.

FUCK FUCK FUCK.

What is Elias doing to Melanie? What the fuck.

[queenofangrymoths]

Book Log of 2019

I kept a record of how many books I read in 2019. I liked most of them so I would recommend you give any of them or read.

So on with the list! If it has an X next to it then it means I didn’t finish reading it. 

#1: Warcross by Marie Lu.

#2: Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi.

#3: Kingdom of the Blazing Phoenix by Julie C. Dao.

#4: Bruja Born by Zoraida Córdova.

#5: A Thousand Beginnings and Endings by Roshani Chokshi, Alyssa Wong, Lori M. Lee, Sona Charaipotra, Aliette De Bodard, E. C. Myres, Aisha Saeed, Preeti Chhibber, Renée Ahdieh, Rahul Kanakia, Melissa De La Cruz, Elsie Chapman, Shveta Thakrar, Cindy Pon, and Julie Kagawa.

#6: The 57 Bus by Daska Slater

#7: The Dark Descent Of Elizabeth Frankenstein by Kristen White.

#8: Three Dark Crowns by Kendare Blake

9#: Broken Things by Lauren Oliver.

10# The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater

11# A Study In Charlotte by Arthur Doyle

12# Simon Vs The Homo sapiens agenda by Becky Albertalli

13# The Dream Thieves by Maggie Stiefvater

14# Blue Lily, Lily Blue by Maggie Stiefvater

15# The Raven King by Maggie Stiefvater

16# Carry On by Rainbow Rowel

17# Teen Trailblazers, 30 fearless girls who changed the world before they were 20 by Jennifer Calvert

18# Evermore by Sara Holland

19# The White Stag by Kara Barbieri

20# One Dark Throne by Kendra’s Blake

21# Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo

22# A Blade So Black by L.L. McKinney

23# King of Scars by Leigh Bardugo X

24# Truly Devious by Maureen Johnson

25# The Vanishing Stair by Maureen Johnson

26# Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie

27# Mythology by Edith Hamilton

28# Percy Jackson Greek Gods by Rick Riordan 

29# Two Can Keep A Secret by Karen M McManus

30# The Hazel Wood by Melissa Albert

31# Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie

32# Superman: Dawnbreaker by Matt De La Peña

33# The Phantom of The Opera by Gaston Leroux

34# Roseblood by A.G Howard X

35# Catwoman: Soulstealer by Sarah J Maas

36# Wonder Woman: Warbringer by Leigh Bardugo

37# Velvet Undercover by Teri Brown

38# Through The Woods by Emily Caroll

39# The Wicked Deep by Shes Ernshaw

40# Wicked Lovely by Melissa Marr

41# Girls of Paper and Fire by Natasha Ngan

42# Where She Fell by Kaitlin Ward

43# Modern Herstory: Stories Of Women and non binary people rewriting history by Blair Imani

44# White Rabbits by Caleb Roehrig

45# To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee Adapted by Fred Fordham

46# Wicked Saints by Emily A. Duncan

47# Ever The Hunted by Erin Summeril

48# Four Dead Queens by Astrid Scholte

49# Lost Souls, Be At Peace by Maggie Thrash

50# Honor Girl by Maggie Thrash

51# The Giver by Lois Lowry adapted by P.Craig Russell

52# My Plain Jane by Cynthia Hand. Brodi Ashton, and Jodi Meadows

53# What If It’s Us by Becky Albertalli and Adam Silvera X

54# An Assassin’s Guide to Love & Treason by Virginia Boecker

55# The Count Of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas adapted by Nokman Poon and Crystal S. Chan

56# The Fellowship Of The Ring by J.R.R Tolkien

57# What is someone I know is gay? By Eric Marcus X

58# Last Seen Leaving by Caleb Roehrig

59# The Two Towers by J.R.R Tolkien

60# The Hobbit by J.R.R Tolkien X

61# The Return of The King by J.R.R Tolkien

62# Lafayette by Nathan Hale

63# Aurora Rising by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff

64# We should all be feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

65# The Storm Crow by Kalyn Josephson

66# Frankenstein by Mary Shelly

67# Norton Volume Of English Literature

68# Beowulf by Unknown

69# The General Prologue by Chaucer

70# 20/20 by Linda Brewer

71# Always in Spanish by Agosim

72# The First Day by Edward P. Jones

73# Bullet in the Brain by Tobias Wolff

74# Writing Fiction by Burroway

75# Murderers by Leonard Michaels

76# Greatness Strikes Where It Pleases by Lars Gustaffson

77# Cathedral by Raymond Carver

78# A Conversation with My Father by Grace Paley

79# Gooseberries by Anton Chekhov

80# The Lives of the Dead by Tim O’Brien

81# Head, Heart by Lydia Davis

82# Richard Cody by Edwin Arlington Robinson

83# “Out- Out-“ by Robert Frost

84# The Ruined Maid by Thomas Hardy

85# I wandered lonely as a cloud by William Wordsworth

86# Poem by Frank O’Hara

87# On being brought from Africa to America by Phillis Wheatley

88# On her loving two equally by Aphra Behn

89# Because you asked about the line between Prose and Poetry by Howard Nemerov

90# Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish

91# Ars Poetica? By Czeslaw Milosz

92# Ars Poetica #100: I believe by Elizabeth Alexander

93# Poetry by Marianne Moode

94# “Poetry makes nothing happen”? By Julia Alvarez

95# Introduction to Poetry by Billy Collins

96# In Memory Of W.B. Yates by W. H. Auden

97# The kind of man I am at the DMV by Stacey Waite

98# The Changeling by Judith Oritez Carer

99# Going to war by Richard Lovelace

100# To the Ladies by Mary, Lady Chudleigh

101# Exchanging Hats by Elizabeth Bishop

102# History Of Ireland Volume 1 by Lecky X

103# A Modern History of Ireland by E. Norman X

104# The Tempest by William Shakespeare

105# Gender by Lisa Wade & Myra Marx Ferree

106# Trifles by Susan Glaspell

107# The Shroud by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm

108# King of the Bingo Game by Ralph Ellison

109# Sonny’s Blues by James Baldwin

110# Fences by August Wilson

111# Where are you going, where have you been? By Joyce Carol Oates

112# Daddy by Sylvia Plath

113# What is our life? By Walter Raleigh

114# May I compare thee to a midsummer day? By William Shakespeare

115# The love song of J. Alfred Prufruock by T. S. Eliot

116# À unr passante by Charles Baudelaire

117# In a station of the metro by Ezra Pound

118# The Fog by Carl Sandburg

119# The Yellow Fog by T.S. Eliot

120# On first looking into Chapman’s Homer by John Keats

121# the Road Not Taken by Robert Frisr

122# Paradise Lost  Book 1 & 10 by John Milton X

123# The Victory Lap by George Saunders

124# The Tempest by William Shakespeare

125# The Vanity Of Human Wishes by Samuel Johnson

126# Wayward Son by Rainbow Rowell

127# When to Her Lute Corinna Sings by Thomas Campion

128# Sir Patrick Spens by Anonymous

129# Ballad of Birmingham by Dudley Randall

130# A Prayer, Living and Dying by Augustus Montague Toplady

131# Homage to the Empress of the Blues by Robert Hayden

132# The Times They Are A-Changin’ *

133# Listening to Bob Dylan, 2005!by Linda Pastan

134# Hip Hop by Mos Deff

135# Elvis in the Inner City by Jose B. Gonzalez

136# Acquainted with the Night by Robert Frost*

137# Terza Roma by Richard Wilbur

138# Stanza from The Eve of St. Agnes by John Keats

139# Stanza from His Coy Mistress by Andrew Marvell

140# Stanza from Sound and Sense by Alexander’s Pope

141# Stanza from The Word Plum by Helen Chasin

142# Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night by Dylan Thomas

143# Myth by Natasha Trethewey

144# Sestina by Elizabeth Bishop

145# Sestina: Like by A.E. Stallings

146# l)a by E.E Cummings

147# Buffalo Bill by E.E Cummings

148# Easter Wings by George Herbert

149# Women by May Swenson

150# Upon the breeze she spread her golden hair by Franceso Petrarch

151# My lady’s presence makes the roses red by Henry Constance

152# My mistress’s eyes are nothing like the sun by William Shakespeare

153# Not marble, nor the gilded monuments by William Shakespeare

154# Let me no to the marriage of true minds by William Shakespeare

155# When I consider how my light is spent by John Milton

156# Nuns Fret Not by William Wordsworth

157# The world is too much with us by William Wordsworth

158# Do I love thee? By Elizabeth Barrett Browning

159# In an Artist’s Studio by Christina Rossetti

160# What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why by Edna St. Vincent Millay

161# Women have loved before as I love now by Edna St. Vincent Millay

162# I, being born a woman and distressed by Edna St. Vincent Millay

163# I will put Chaos in fourteen lines by Edna St. Vincent Millay

164# First Fight. Then Fiddle by Gwendolyn Brooks

165# In the Park by Gwen Harwood

166# Something Like a Sonnet for Phillis Miracle Wheatley by June Jordan

167# Sonnet by Billy Collins

168# Dim Lights by Harryette Mullen

169# Redefininy Realmess by Janet Mock

170# Lusus Naturae by Margaret Atwood

171# The House Of Asterion by Jorge Luis Borges

172# Death Fuge by Michael Hamburger

173# Clifford’s Place by Jamel Bickerly

174# We are seven by William Wordsworth

175# Lines written in early spring by William Wordsworth

176# Expostulation and Reply by William Wordsworth

177# The Tables Turned by William Wordsworth

178# Lines by William Wordsworth

179# Recitatif by Toni Morrison

180# Volar by Judith Ortiz Cofer

181# The Management Of Grief by Bharati Mukherjee

182# Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri

183# Jesus Saves by David Sedaris

184# Disabled by Wilfred Owen

185# My Father’s Garden by David Wagoner

186# Practicing by Marie Howe

187# O my pa-pa by Bob Hicok

189# Mr. T- by Terrance Hayes

190# Late Aubade by James Richardson

191# Carp Poem by Terrance Hayes

192# Pilgrimage by Natasha Trethewey

193# Tu Do Street by Yuaef Lomunyakaa

194# Diving into the Wreck by Adrienne Rich

195# Elena by Pat Mora

196# Gentle Communion by Pat Mora

197# Mothers & Daughters by Pat Mora

198# La Migra by Pat Mora

199# Ode to Adobe by Pat Mora

200# Barbie Doll by Marge Piercy

201# The Silken Tent by Robert Frost

202# Metaphors by Sylvia Plath

203# The Vine by James Thomsen

204# Questions by May Swenson

205# A Just Man by Attila József

206# the norton anthology of world literature

207# Pan’s Labyrinth by Gullernio de Toro and Cornelia Funke Xw

208# The prince and the dressmaker by Jen Wang

209# Rejected Princesses: Tales of History's Boldest Heroines, Hellions, and Heretics by Jason Porath

210# The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson

[centaurianthropology]

The Magnus Archives ‘Flesh’ (S04E11) Analysis

Well, this is a … meaty episode.  Come on in to hear what I have to say about ‘Flesh’.

Wow.  I wasn’t anticipating kicking things off with a proper heart-to-heart with Melanie, but I am seriously glad to get her perspective. There were a lot of things there that I had suspected—that a part of Melanie wanted the bullet; that the rage was hers, and the Slaughter just pointed it at things; that she feels the contradiction of knowing she’s been saved and knowing it was probably the right thing to do and also hating Jon and Basira for doing it.  There were also some things I hadn’t expected.  Melanie’s perspective on Basira is especially interesting, that she’s killed off her emotions and is running on intel and assets. She’s acting on strategy, and is probably the most put-together person in the Archives because of it, but it’s also locked her away from any real connection with Melanie.

I also found it interesting that Melanie isn’t even bothering to mention Martin.  He must have split off from them early in the six months, for her to completely disregard him in her calculations of being alone.  Basira is a factor, and Jon is a factor, and they’re both not great for her.  And not only because they did non-consensual surgery on her and took away the thing that directed her rage, even if it was killing her.  Basira refuses to see others as more than game pieces at this point (possibly more evidence that Elias is seeing her more and more as a successor for him), and Jon tries to connect in disastrous ways.  He really is trying to apologize, but he’s desperate for it partly because he needs someone to forgive and accept him.

And I get that.  Jon woke up and found that everyone remotely close to him is totally rejecting him.  Georgie walked away.  Martin is blocked from interacting with him.  Melanie sees him in her nightmares.  Basira sees him as another asset, and likely an unreliable one at that. He has absolutely no one, and for the first time in a very long time, I think that bothers him.

And it turns out that Melanie might have one other person to be close to, or at least as much a person as Jon is these days.  Helen Richardson has taken to putting a door in the tunnels, it sounds like, and has helped repel the attacks on the Archives on numerous occasions.  That makes the Lonely, the Web, the Slaughter, and the Spiral all defending the Beholding against other attacks including the Corruption, the Desolation, and the Flesh.  That’s a lot more alliances than I was expecting.  I have to wonder if there aren’t overriding alignments that are intangible, yet lead some powers to be naturally aligned in certain ways. Or if it’s more down to individual actors.  And I also don’t trust any of those alliances to be stable, or not fraught with betrayal. After all, Jared was asked to attack the Archives, specifically to kill the Archivist through anonymous letters. That sounds more like the work of the Web or the Lonely than any other power, and I really wouldn’t put it past them to play both ends toward the middle.  Helen’s motives are equally mysterious, and it seems that she acted because the Distortion rather likes the Archivist, despite the fact that she herself is angry with him.  

And Jon … Jon just can’t resist a statement, even if it means losing an extra rib to Jared (and really? Do you think he can’t do something with that rib, Jon?  Something that will come back and bite you in the end, possibly literally?).  I also find it interesting that Jon’s healing powers actively resisted him losing a body part.  Almost like they were trying to tell him that a physical anchor is a stupid idea or something.  And really, even though he has a lot of ribs, I hope from a medical perspective that Jared was considerate and removed his floating ribs, because otherwise that’s an invitation to a pneumothorax in the future.  I know he’s got magical healing powers, but seriously Jon, your ribs are there for a reason.

But he’s deeply addicted to the stories, to the point where he disregards his own safety time and time again, so he probably never even considered long-term necessity of specific bones.  If the other powers paid any attention, they would realize his greatest flaw is on ready display.

But instead they’ve been attacking.  And in Jared’s case, it was because for several years he’s been getting letters, typed in large font with simple instructions to target specific people, all of whom seemed either attracted to the Flesh or who would make good material for him.  I lean toward either the Web (obvious) or the Lonely sending him the letters, playing both ends toward the middle where the Beholding is concerned.  Because they may be allies, but I also really doubt any other power wants to see the Watcher’s Crown succeed.

No matter who sent them, he came to trust those letters, always one to follow his own interests rather than pursue some grand ambition.  I find it interesting that he was more than willing to follow that trail, when he flat-out refused to participate in the Feast, preferring the world as it was to any the Flesh might make of it.  Maybe it speaks to his simplicity.

Or maybe he’s the first avatar since Jon that we’ve met who deliberately does not want their ritual to succeed.  I’d love to figure out what it is about certain avatars that draws them to completing a ritual, and why others don’t seem terribly bothered by it.  Is it a lack of ambition, as Jared said, or is there something more fundamental about their personalities?  Both Jared and Jon are contrarian by nature, albeit in very different ways.  Is it possible those contrarian tendencies were enough to withstand the drive toward a ritual, despite being an avatar?  Helen pointed out that Jon is too frantic to label himself ‘not people’, when the distinctions are both far less clear and absolutely unimportant.  Jon cannot see that Helen is still Helen, despite what was done to her.  Although she was taken by the Distortion, the parts of her that were Helen survived, just as the eager-to-please parts of Michael Shelley survived before her.  The distinction between the monster and the person isn’t as clear-cut as Jon wants to believe.  So maybe it’s simply that certain avatars always had the personality to resist the rituals, and others always had the personality to embrace them.

Oh, and hey, we got some physical descriptors of the archival staff: Basira apparently still screams ‘cop’, and Melanie is ‘skinny’, and it’s possible Martin was the ‘wee’ one? It’s hard to say (and personally I cling to my absurdly tall Martin headcanon).  

So, now Jon has a rib and a really dumb plan (I appreciate that absolutely no one seemed to think ‘I will use a body part as an anchor’ is a good plan, though no one outright told him he’s an idiot).  Melanie has a possible-friend in Helen, and even seems to have started making her way past loathing Jon for what he did to her.  Basira is elsewhere, and her actions (particularly Melanie’s description of them) make me very worried about how much like Elias she’s becoming.  And Helen is … there.  Since she’s the Distortion, we really can’t trust her to be a reliable ally, but thus far the Distortion seems to be holding to some sort of alliance with Jon, for whatever reason.

And Jon has a coffin to dive into next week, possibly.  I can’t imagine that’s going to go well.

I’ll be interested to see if they try to actually narrate Jon’s journey through the coffin, or if we end up with more of an outside perspective.  I suppose we’ll find out next week.