#tsv 27

[tisanegarden]

Carpenter: I'm glad Paige is back with her people, I couldn't stand the thought of that shit, Hayward, having his claws in her

*cuts to Paige and Hayward hanging out*

Hayward: trust me I'm so good at skimming stones from my undercover days in illegal pond gangs check this out *hucks a massive rock in the river*

[tsvwords]

You’ll always be my people, Faulkner.

— Chapter 27: So I'll Bear It Trembling Onwards.

[archingcurrent]

Oh my gosh, seeing (hearing) the process of making a god (in terms of the silt verses as a podcast) is so neat!! Like, Paige & Hayward? (and Dennis I GUESS) hitting us with the

"I will die today. I will not die helpless. My death will not amount to nothing. My hand will draw the marks of my revolt. My flesh shall take the great shape of my revenge. I will steal myself away from their intent for me. My blood will not ripen their soil, nor shall my body blossom into their chosen colours. I will bring them fear instead. My death today shall be the quiver in the executioner’s hand tomorrow, the wavering doubt in the mind of the justice. I will be hallowed, but not for them. I will die. I will not die"

THEY WROTE 21 PAGES OF SCRIPTURE? And I'm sorry this god is so cool as a concept, martyrs and victims, people who NEED it? Also the names that have been come up with so far, bangers all of them. The Many Below, Tree of Spite, and The Fiend of Flowering Crocus? those are all SO cool, I am so ready for more about this god holy smokes

[theboombutton]

"Because we raised something we couldn't control"

I'm disappointed in Paige in The Silt Verses episode 27 (Season 2, Chapter 12).

Not in how she's written - it's very in-character. She's a liberal who's kickstarted a violent revolution. She's gonna have regrets.

I just. Look at what she said in episode 23 (Season 2 Chapter 8):

Transcript: "My point is, there's nothing we can make that can't be turned against us. So. If we're going to make a god that's genuinely new, something that actually helps ordinary people, and which can last in opposition to the contemporary pantheon, we need to make sure it's airtight. It can't be taken from us."

And Hayward's contribution to the same conversation:

Transcript: "The gods that always gave us the most trouble in law enforcement were the localised ones. God of a hill, god of a river. They're the hardest to control, they're the hardest to understand if you're on the outside of it. If you want something that can't be taken from you - that can't be repurposed or stolen - you want to be thinking local."

And now in episode 27 she's fretting about how "Nine people are dead. And it's because we raised something we couldn't control."

Like. Good?!

You were trying to make a god resistant to control. Something that couldn't be recouped and recuperated. And now you're wringing your hands that it's something you can't control? That its first saint is popular enough in the prison to get the captives chanting its name so loud the helicopter can almost hear?

Transcript: From below, we begin to hear muffled chanting. It's hard to hear, but the words might just be - 'Tree of Spite, Tree of Spite, Tree of Spite.' The sound cuts out quickly.

Fucking GOOD!

This is what you wanted! This is literally what you wanted.

Stop pussyfooting around, Paige.

Also, what the fuck did you think a Saint based on The Many Below, the god of spite towards the system that killed you, would be? In episode 26:

Transcript: "But we think... we think it's going to be something to help you spit in the face of the people who are doing this to you."

What did you think spitting in the face of Esther's executioners was going to look like, Paige?

Transcript: "I will bring them fear instead. My death today shall be the quiver in the executioner's hand tomorrow, the wavering doubt in the mind of the justicar." [The image says 'justice,' not 'justicar,' but this is in error: in the actual podcast, she says 'justicar.']

What did you think would bring a quiver to the executioner's hand, Paige? What did you think would bring doubt to the justicar?

And on top of that, one of your god's closest conceptual predecessors (episode 23) is a god of spite from the Immemorial War, with a significantly more evocative name than The Many Below:

Transcript: "'May Its Spear Impale Your Father Sufficiently To Fuck Your Mother' - whew. A god of spite, used in the Immemorial War by dying soldiers on both sides." (Reading aloud) "The prayer-marks of 'May Its Spear' were typically erratic and ideographic, designed to be used by shaking fingers dipped in their own blood."

What the fuck did you think was going to happen, Paige?

What kind of god did you think you'd called forth?

And what kind of god do you think would be better?

Because from where I'm standing (sitting) this looks like a really fucking good god, Paige. It's working. It's spreading devotion organically among the powerless ("Tree of Spite! Tree of Spite!"), it's spreading fear organically among the powerful.

---

Now, the major downside of The Many Below is something Paige hasn't touched on at all - only Hayward has paid attention to it. Namely: animals spontaneously turning to saints when killed by predators, despite obviously not being able to recite the prayers or make the prayer marks.

Best case scenario this is a sort of aura effect based on the farm now being a holy place to the god, or on Paige being a holy person. Because if this sort of thing starts happening everywhere The Many Below is worshipped, hooo buddy the ecological implications are Not Great.

Great reason to become a vegetarian though.

[tsvwords]

It’s a god of martyrs, Keith. My daughter, she…she came up with that. It was her idea. Isn’t my daughter clever? Isn’t my daughter something?

— Chapter 27: So I'll Bear It Trembling Onwards.

[tsvwords]

I did learn one good lesson, growing up, that wasn’t about skimming stones.

First time in any kind of fight with anyone, you’re going to trip. You’re going to swing and miss. And then they’re going to knock the shit out of you.

And the best thing you can do in the aftermath of your own failure, with all of Tommy Lawson’s boys circling around you - and some of them were in the year above, mind you - is get up, grin at them through bloodied teeth, clench your fists and scream in triumph like you’ve just knocked each one of them to their knees in turn.

That scares the shit out of them. Because then they think you’re crazy.

— Chapter 27: So I'll Bear It Trembling Onwards.

[tsvwords]

You ever feel like there’s someone at your shoulder, trying to keep you on the right path, and at a certain point you just stop listening to them? And then they’re banging on the windows, screaming at you, getting more and more furious and yet fainter and fainter, and you know you’re doing the wrong thing, so you start to get a kind of satisfaction from it, savouring every last curse and every last judgement upon you as you bare your back and you carry on doing the wrong damn thing all the same.

— Chapter 27: So I'll Bear It Trembling Onwards.

[tsvwords]

Well, who amongst us should be denied a second chance?

— Chapter 27: So I'll Bear It Trembling Onwards.