Land of Dreams and Winter: mCooperative's Idea Thread

[mCooperative]

A young man stands in his bedroom. It just so happens that today, the 26th of May, 2018, is quite a special day. He stands on the threshold of a new day, a new chapter, a new story. He has received a great deal of advice over the last few days, the last few years. He has had many adventures, learned many lessons, read the wise words of many, many people.

Though it was twenty-three years ago he was given life, it is today (or perhaps tomorrow) that he will take the first steps of the rest of it.

He doesn't know what that tomorrow will bring. Nor the day after, nor the day after that.

He knows only what he will bring to tomorrow.

Stories. Always stories.

And one sentence to sum up all the advice he's been given to this day.

Be excellent; be kind.


What might the name of this young man be?

--> Enter name.

===

Welcome, howdy all. I'm mCooperative. Seeing as I've seen a few folks make these sorta threads, and I have loads and loads of ideas I want to throw out into the world, this seemed like the thing to do. This first post will keep a list of running ideas, and I also plan to post snippets of some of them here. Feel free to engage, build on ideas, critique, and whatnot.

Eheh, and please excuse the intro to this post. Comes from listening to three or so graduation speeches in the span of two days. And being Homestuck trash. Probably mostly that last one.

===

Ideas/Index:

"Fate/Madoka" or possibly "48th": A Fate/PMMM fusion universe. Wherein Homura discovers the Fifth Magic, Madoka is Fate Grand Order's protagonist, and somehow, in the end, everybody lives. Probably. (A self-indulgent fix-it fic, with four plot arcs, the first three of which are essentially extremely long prologues.)

"Magical Girl Voldemort", "Megucamort", or possibly "Magical Girl Voldemort and the Power Of Friendship": A HP/PMMM crossover, where I take the premise of 'Magical Girl Voldemort pursues the route of Love And Justice' and attempt to treat it semi-seriously. Wherein a surprising amount of logic is found, HP canon veers gently off the rails, and we declare that we're interpreting Voldemort as at least moderately competent and self-aware.
Checking the PMMM idea thread for interest in the overarching summary.

"Unforseen": A HP/PMMM crossover/fusion. Wherein Madokami is surprised by the world that comes after her wish, and Homura doesn't even know where to begin with this one. "This is not a tale of magical girls, nor is it a tale of wizards, neither yet a tale of demons and goddesses. This is a tale of people learning to live again."

"I am the dream": A freeform Quest built out of the bones of and spite that sprung forth out of Game Design, Spring 2018. Where in you play as a magical girl, and get to live a life, and explore nearly a decade's worth of original universe. Options also include crossover elements! (Probably at least PMMM, if my diagram of the universes lets me conclude it would work.)

Children of Camelot: Wherein I take every available source about King Arthur, from the classical mythology, to Fate/Stay Night, to BBC's Merlin, and then throw them into a melting pot to become the Camelot of my original setting. Featuring: Ghost Mordred, Arthur Quest 2015, forgiveness, and a rather lot of reincarnation.
"This Is Not A Longer Story" - The long and the short of things.
"For Arthur" - Possibly the first thing I ever wrote for this setting, for class, a long time ago.
"The Names We Carry With Us- snippets" - My organization of this as a series is a mess. Here are some Arthur snippets, though.

"The Lamp Whisperer": I did not intend for this to be the first Quest I actually tried out the writing for, but then, it's a bit of a silly idea, that doesn't require nearly as much planning as "I am the dream" does. Wherein you are Jack Williams, The Lamp Whisperer, the most renowned detective in London, and you've just discovered some cases that might merit your personal attention.
1 - First post, also and originally on the Quest Ideas thread, seeing if anyone is maybe interested. Now in an actual thread.

"The Long Work": My oldest setting.
"On the Evening I Was Leaving" - A children's story for a children's story, really. Meant for a friend. Also, context for the Winter Kingdom, the Summer Country, and a war long back in their history. Also, the fae. Some things that were canon when I wrote this aren't quite anymore, but a surprising number remain.
"This Dawn Which I Have Shed" - The first King Regent of the Winter Kingdom, the first and only King's Regent of the Winter Kingdom. Everyone leaves something behind, when they come to that land at last. This is what Ina left.

"Changeling": A Princess Principal crossover with my oldest setting. Has a thread. Also on AO3. The reason I suddenly posted "On the Evening I Was Leaving" and "This Dawn Which I Have Shed". You don't actually need to know anything about my setting for this, though. I just wanted to leave stuff out there if people were interested.

"There is a boy": A contribution to the Elsewhere University setting. Also on AO3. Also a massive stealth multi-crossover, but if anyone can tell what with, I'll be incredibly impressed.

===

Adaptations/Omakes: Sometimes, I feel like writing sonnets. Sometimes, I feel like reciting my favorite sonnets. And sometimes, I feel like bastardizing Shakespeare. I feel like Shakespeare would have approved. Disclaimer: May include non-Shakespeare memes, poetry, copypasta, and general shitposting. Also omakes, since those end up being mostly couplets for some reason, until or unless I make enough of them that they need their own section.

"Sonnet 64: When I have seen by Best Girl's* hand defac'd" - also on AO3. Somewhat major DDLC spoilers.
"Cuil Theory: PMMM Edition" - Sorry not sorry. Rebellion spoilers.
"Even wonders and clocks." - A PMAS omake attempting to sum up who we are as Sabrina Vee.
"Resolution" - A PMAS omake otherwise known as me being inspired to couplets again.
"Ashtaroth, Witch of Void (?)" - An omake for Subsumption, wherein I do a Homestuck Classpect Analysis of the main character.
"Sabrina Vee, the Witch Mage of Hope (?)" - A PMAS omake, wherein I do a Homestuck Classpect Analysis of the main character.
"PMAS: Rebellion" - A PMAS omake wherein I get very creative with a transcript of Doctor Who: "Asylum of the Daleks", and discover I actually have to change very, very little. Lots of color coding. Needs more Mami and Nagisa, though.

===

Other snippets: Things short enough that a summary wouldn't be productive. Or things that I don't really have too many ideas for continuing, and so remain oneshots for the moment.

"Springs, Leylines, and Orreries": A short work in an original universe. Inspired by those "Humanity Fuck Yeah" posts floating around the internet. Wherein, during Earth's prehistory, Earth was strip-mined of the esoteric elements necessary for technomagic, faster-than-light-travel, and advanced technology in general. What remained would never be enough to travel the depths of space, not with pure magic, nor with the steel-and-circuit building blocks left behind. (Both Earth and humanity reject this reality, and substitute their own.)
"First Contact": A prequel to "Springs, Leylines, and Orreries", written by @GordoffTheSnord. I declare it canon, for posterity, and suchforth.
"A Book Dragon": A prompt I belatedly took inspiration from on Tumblr.
"Prologue": An Akuma no Riddle/Fate Grand Order crossover idea wherein Ichinose Haru is actually kid!Gudako and so post-AnR goes on to run facefirst into the FGO plot.
"even wonders and clocks: reprise": Magia Record NA is ending 09/29/2020 and I have feelings about it, so more impromptu poetry is in store. Also this links to my AO3, because I've been way more active there these past few months.

===

Setting notes and resources: Not quite story ideas or anything, rather, scattered puzzle pieces that form the foundation for the various things I'm writing, or background knowledge that doesn't fit under a specific idea above.

"My clever ruse!" - 20180607 1100 - PMMM - Details of the storyguca powerset that is being used as a cover story by a Homura-like timecycler OC to avoid the implications that there's any timetravel happening. The PMMM AU that this occurs in, "Someone's Princess", is probably never seeing the light of day, but enough elements of it are both detailed and moderately legit, that they may be included in other stories.

The Great Library of the Winter Kingdom - 20180817 1545 - Original Setting - Wherein I describe an architecture; the library-mountain that's in the keeping of a rather large dragon.

===

Sigged quotes: Because I find many things excellent, and desire to keep them for posterity. I'll probably end up cycling things in and out of my signature as appropriate, and this is as good a place as any to keep track of them.

Spoiler: Sigged things

Wherein Kaizuki outlines a metaphysical philosophy regarding the time loops in PMMM (and by extension, PMAS). Let it be on the record that I do emotionally believe the above philosophy to be true, or as true as any interpretation can be.
(Sigged: 20180415-20180607)

"THIS IS NOT A DEMOCRACY!" I have a gun, so I'm in charge! Many governments around the world function around this principle! And some of them last for months!" - Homura Akemi In the middle of a bad Loop (Spiders may or may not be involved) ( - Dragontrapper, PMAS)
(Sigged: 20180407-20180607)

"Ours is a friendship that cost us an arm and a leg. Respectively." - The Phoenixian, PMAS
(Sigged: 20180315-20180607)

 

[mCooperative]

Hell with it, was trying to make this a bit more presentable before posting it, but if I keep delaying it'll never go up. @GordoffTheSnord thank you for providing the idea for this bit, when you sent me all those Humans Fuck Yeah links and followed up with

it would also be cool, though, harder, to go the opposite way. strip all the Element-N or whatever out of a planet to deny the developing race advanced tech, and then watch them be the best mages ever seen

Click to shrink...

I swear these conversations are where half my ideas come from these days...

Anyway. First thing proper in this thread I guess. An unedited first draft, really. A bit late for Mother's Day, too, but...

===
Springs, Leylines, and Orreries
===​

"You left us a fuckton of ley lines, guys, and have you never actually woken up a planet's spirit by pissing it off? Because Earth-mom wasn't happy when she woke up from her creation-dreaming, let me tell you, she told us that in our Sun's parent-nebula's life as a Star it'd seen a bunch of little lifeforms develop all the technology, and it told stories to our Sun when it was forming, and our Sun told Earth-mom when she was born, and she wanted to have a bunch of little technomancers running around and having adventures. She had all these plans for energy expenditure graphs and the matter formation she'd need to do for us and she'd grabbed all the best elemental-nth during early-stage accretion, and had a bunch of plans for subtly nudging us toward SCIENCE!, and then you come by and swipe everything!"

"And Earth-mom always tells us, she could have started over again and downsized her plans and done the matter generation for more modest tech, but seriously, she was not happy with you lot. So she spent a few thousand years re-optimizing her ley-line layout so that we could use it directly instead of with technomagic."

"And by that time we humans had finally finished properly developing the capacity for cognition. Steeped in magic, from that time forward, every human has been a mage. And the first human mages asked Earth-mom what she wanted from us, because we could see a world saturated in magic, woven finely like spun light, and rushing like great rivers, and we thought there must be some great purpose in this. And Earth-mom told us recently, when we made First Contact with you all and learned what you'd done and asked her to tell us what she remembered, that all those millennia ago she looked at our first mages, and honestly, she was ready to tell us to go to war on the universe, ready to teach us the magic of stars and planets and the void of space, ready to teach us early how to search the universe for those who'd maimed her and robbed her of her gifts to us, and, well, set them on fire."

"But, she tells us, when our first mages came to her and asked her, 'Mother-Earth, what grand plans do you have for us?', she remembered those dreams you stole from her. She looked out at us, her humans, her children, who viewed with such wonder her salvaged gift, who sought with such curiosity to explore and to learn- and she sighed. The most ancient human records talk about that sigh, the moment that every leyline, great and small, rippled for a brief moment, carrying in it a tide of feeling- a tide of a planet's feelings, at once so foreign and yet so familiar to every human who then lived."

"And Earth-mom told us what she tells every child of Earth, even now, when we first can think enough to greet her. She told us: 'Aspire. Explore. Discover. Create what you are inspired to create; be it the art of magic or the art of the iron beyond magic. Destroy what you want to destroy, be it myself or eachother or the universe beyond me; but leave more creation than destruction in your wake. And above all, be excellent. Fear not. I am here. In time, I will teach you all I know.'"

"So we didn't go to war with you lot in our species' infancy. We lived and loved and laughed and learned and died and lived again instead; step by step we grew nations and cultures and dreams and the stories of them; and Earth-mom poured magic into our veins and DNA, those human leylines, and taught us how she looks at the universe and the magic sometimes so sparse in it, and how to take magic and breath more magic into the universe than we started with, because fuck conservation of energy and entropy; and now every child of Earth, human or not, has within them the soul of a planet, and we are each both people and the worlds within people; we are magic and planets given flesh."

"(So, you know, if that's what you were trying to do when you stole Earth-mom's resources to keep us planet-bound, you definitely succeeded there, good job.)"

"And Earth-mom could not teach us how to be not-planets, which we are as much as we are worlds in and of ourselves, and though she wanted technology for us, she knew only what a planet should give its children that they could learn it; without that gift, she knew not how to help us. But though she had not told us so, we knew well enough to know, that this was our Earth-mom's dream. So that, we taught ourselves. To learn what science you'd left to us, as well as we could without what had been stolen from us. And Earth-mom told us the stories our now-sleeping Sun had told her its parent-nebula remembered from the technology of its people, so very long ago; she taught us what little she knew and had pieced together during her creation-dream."

"Also, she taught us the magic of the stars and the planets and the void of space. But she didn't teach us that magic to revenge ourselves on you, don't look so worried. No, she taught us that power when the day came that we looked up at the stars and said to her, 'We know we don't have the resources for the technology. But still we dream, we wonder. We want to go out there, and see what there is, and have ourselves an adventure'. And we didn't know who we'd meet, didn't yet know of your galactic society with all its rules, who'd taken from us what we'd have been heir to, in another life. We just knew that there was so much out that that we'd never seen with our own eyes before. Things to do, places to explore, maybe even people to find."

"And that's all Earth-mom ever really wanted for us."

"And so here we are. That is how we made your so-called theoretically-impossible pure-magic FTL drives."

"And also why we've been demanding all our planet's elemental-nth back, with interest, immediately, even as we've been developing theoretical technomagic faster than we have the physical resources to manufacture. Fuck your laws of thermodynamics, we figure at the present rate we'll top your present mastery of technomagic within the next 7 months or so."

"We figure, that'll make a good Mother's Day surprise, eh?"

 

[mCooperative]

As a short introduction to my particular rendition of Camelot... There are a few details that I'm waffling over changing, but, this is the long and short of it.

===
This Is Not A Longer Story
===​

The boy swung his legs back and forth idly. He sat cradled in the arms of a tall oak tree, watching the light clouds chase each other across the morning sky. Dew glittered on the fields of grass that spread out below him, millions of gleaming silver pieces swaying in the breeze.

"When I grow up," the boy told the tree, "I'll be big and tall and have strong arms like you. And I'll have a horse, and a sword, and I'll go adventuring, and meet my father, and he'll be so proud of me he'll come home to live with me and mother, and I'll have lots of brothers and sisters, and we'll all live happily ever after." The boy nodded to himself.

"And we'll have the whole world to play in, when I'm big." He spread his arms wide, as though reaching to hug the sky.

...​

Covered by a blanket and curled up in his mother's chair by the kitchen fire, the boy dozed. Cocooned in warmth, he caught snatches of murmured conversation around him.

"… with the children from town…" That was his mother's voice, musical and fond, accompanied by the soft clink of bottles and the rattle of pans and alchemical equipment.

"…such a polite boy… do anything for his friends…" His uncle, voice quiet, paged absently through a book. The pages crinkled and ruffled the air as they turned, matching the quiet crackle of the fire. "… just like Art was, isn't he." The pages kept turning, a slow and steady rustle. The clicking of glass stopped.

After a long moment, the boy heard his mother sigh, a deep, heaving breath. She answered, "… of course he is."

"… who's Art?" the boy murmured quietly, yawning, curling further into his blanket-nest, turning his face toward the fire. The turning pages stopped.

...​

The young man, clad in plate armor, mounted on his horse and draped in the colors of his country, smiled reassuringly at his mother. Her hair was barely greying, and just the other day he had seen her laughing like a woman half her age, but today she looked tired. Worried.

"It will be alright, mother. I've trained side-by-side with the King himself. A patrol of the countryside will do me no harm, and I mustn't shirk my duty as a knight." The young man spoke with a bright confidence. His mother brought herself to smile weakly at him, and his own expression softened. "I'll be fine, mother. I shall be back before you know it."

As he departed, he glanced briefly at the old oak tree that stood by the road. He turned his face up toward the cloudless blue, and felt the warming sun.

"Are you proud of me yet, father?" he asked the sky.

No answer came; the young man shook his head, and rode away.

...​

"You're lying." The knight shook his head at his mother. She opened her mouth to reply, but he interrupted her. "No. You have to be lying because you would have told me, you had to-" His voiced broke. He looked at the mirror in his hand, and threw it to the floor by his mother's feet. The glass cracked.

"This isn't even my real face?" he asked quietly.

"… no," the tired sorceress admitted. "Not quite." She was silent for a long moment. "To those who know the truth, you're the spitting image of your father. Now you know, so that's what you'll see in your reflection."

Against his will, he glanced at the broken mirror. The shards reflected unfamiliar green eyes and hair as fair as the morning light. Even the shape of his features had changed; no longer could he see his mother in the turn of his nose or the line of his jaw.

"… does he know who I am?" the knight asked his mother. She hesitated for a moment, then shook her head.

"He asked not to be told."

The front door slammed behind him as he walked away.

...​

The wind was chill and the sky was clear; the birds sang and the field was filled with the sounds of two armies, ready for war.

Ready, but reluctant. He drew in a breath, and motioned for his men to stay where they were. Then he walked, across that sweet grass, toward the hill where his father stood.

He had to try.

"Father?"

...​

They faced each other, an army behind them both. Each held a holy sword, sheathed in hand. Bright green eyes searched each other- for rage or regret or love or loyalty.

"I made a mistake."

He reached out a hand. Somebody called a warning. An arrow flew, and suddenly the battle began.

...​

On the fields of Camlann, Mordred slew King Arthur, and was slain in return.

...​

"I'm sorry."

 

[mCooperative]

"Sonnet 64: When I have seen by Best Girl's* hand defac'd"

Spoiler: DDLC Spoilers

"Sonnet 64: When I have seen by Best Girl's* hand defac'd"
by: Shakespeare, probably.

===

When I have seen by Best Girl's hand defac'd
The rich text code upon the open page;
When Sayori's lofty corpse I see up-ras'd
And Protag slave to script for age on age;
When I have seen the thirsty Yuri shed
Her blood by blade upon the classroom floor,
And Natsuki try to help, which doomed instead
Herself, deleted, her file from in its store;
When I have seen such meddling with fate,
The game itself corrupted and decayed;
The Fourth Wall's taught me thus to ruminate,
That Best Girl wants my love, for me to stay.
Her thoughts are as a death, which cannot choose
But seek to have that which they fear to lose.

=====

*title of "Best Girl" has historically been fraught with controversy. Here, we think that Shakespeare is referring to Monika, but other sources have submitted that he is referencing J͡͠ư̡͏st̷͠ ͢M̸͜on͠i̵k͘͡a̵͞͞, but this remains unconfirmed.

 

[mCooperative]

So, does everyone know Cuil Theory?

Spoiler: Original text of Cuil Theory, Cuils 1-6

Unedited Cuil Theory, Cuils 1-6
What Is Cuil Theory? - Cuil Theory
Credit to the OP
…

Can we make that a unit of measurement?

One Cuil = One level of abstraction away from the reality of a situation.

Example: You ask me for a Hamburger.

1 Cuil: if you asked me for a hamburger, and I gave you a raccoon.

2 Cuils: If you asked me for a hamburger, but it turns out I don't really exist. Where I was originally standing, a picture of a hamburger rests on the ground.

3 Cuils: You awake as a hamburger. You start screaming only to have special sauce fly from your lips. The world is in sepia.

4 Cuils: Why are we speaking German? A mime cries softly as he cradles a young cow. Your grandfather stares at you as the cow falls apart into patties. You look down only to see me with pickles for eyes, I am singing the song that gives birth to the universe.

5 Cuils: You ask for a hamburger, I give you a hamburger. You raise it to your lips and take a bite. Your eye twitches involuntarily. Across the street a father of three falls down the stairs. You swallow and look down at the hamburger in your hands. I give you a hamburger. You swallow and look down at the hamburger in your hands. You cannot swallow. There are children at the top of the stairs. A pickle shifts uneasily under the bun. I give you a hamburger. You look at my face, and I am pleading with you. The children are crying now. You raise the hamburger to your lips, tears stream down your face as you take a bite. I give you a hamburger. You are on your knees. You plead with me to go across the street. I hear only children's laughter. I give you a hamburger. You are screaming as you fall down the stairs. I am your child. You cannot see anything. You take a bite of the hamburger. The concrete rushes up to meet you. You awake with a start in your own bed. Your eye twitches involuntarily. I give you a hamburger. As you kill me, I do not make a sound. I give you a hamburger.

6 Cuils: You ask me for a hamburger. My attempt to reciprocate is cut brutally short as my body experiences a sudden lack of electrons. Across a variety of hidden dimensions you are dismayed. John Lennon hands me an apple, but it slips through my fingers. I am reborn as an ocelot. You disapprove. A crack echoes through the universe in defiance of conventional physics as cosmological background noise shifts from randomness to a perfect A Flat. Children everywhere stop what they are doing and hum along in perfect pitch with the background radiation. Birds fall from the sky as the sun engulfs the earth. You hesitate momentarily before allowing yourself to assume the locus of all knowledge. Entropy crumbles as you peruse the information contained within the universe. A small library in Phoenix ceases to exist. You stumble under the weight of everythingness, Your mouth opens up to cry out, and collapses around your body before blinking you out of the spatial plane. You exist only within the fourth dimension. The fountainhead of all knowledge rolls along the ground and collides with a small dog. My head tastes sideways as spacetime is reestablished, you blink back into the corporeal world disoriented, only for me to hand you a hamburger as my body collapses under the strain of reconstitution. The universe has reasserted itself. A particular small dog is fed steak for the rest of its natural life. You die in a freak accident moments later, and you soul works at the returns desk for the Phoenix library. You disapprove. Your disapproval sends ripples through the inter-dimensional void between life and death. A small child begins to cry as he walks toward the stairway where his father stands.

Good.

This is what happens when I get a good idea.

(And perturb several people by chanting the original Cuil Theory in unison with a friend in an eerie voice!)

Sorrynotsorry.

(Rebellion spoilers.)

===
Cuil Theory: PMMM Edition
===​

...

Let's make the cuil a unit of measurement.

One Cuil would be one level of abstraction away from the reality of a situation.

For example, you ask me not to become a magical girl.

At 1 cuil, if you asked me not to become a magical girl, and I make a contract with Kyubey.

At 2 cuils, if you asked me not to become a magical girl, but it turns out I don't really exist. Where I was originally standing, a picture of a magical girl is drawn upon the ground.

At 3 cuils, you awake as a magical girl. You start screaming only to have time freeze around you. The world is in sepia.

At 4 cuils… Why are we speaking German? A girl cries softly as she cradles her best friend. The alien stares at you as her friend's soul falls into pieces. You look down only to see me with bright golden eyes. I am singing the song that gives birth to the universe.

At 5 cuils, you ask me me not to become a magical girl, I make a contract. You raise a hand to your shield and reset time. Your eye twitches involuntarily. Across the city, a girl wanders into a labyrinth. You swallow and look down at the soul gem in your hand. I make a contract. You swallow and look down at the soul gem in your hand. You cannot swallow. There are familiars teeming in the labyrinth. Greif swirls uneasily in your gem. I make a contract. You look at my face, and I am pleading with you. The familiars are laughing now. You raise your hand to your shield, tears stream down your face as you reset time. I make a contract. You are on your knees. You plead with me not to make a contract. I hear only witches' laughter. I make a contract. You are screaming as you fall through the air. I am a witch. You cannot see anything. You reset time. The universe rushes backward to meet you. You awake with a start in your own bed. Your eye twitches involuntarily. I make a contract. As you kill me, I do not make a sound. I make a contract.

At 6 cuils, you ask me not to become a magical girl. My attempt to reassure you is cut suddenly short as my body experiences a sudden lack of existence. Across a variety of hidden dimensions you are dismayed. Kyouko hands me an apple, but it slips through my fingers. I am reborn as a concept. You disapprove. A crack echoes through the universe in defiance of conventional physics as intertemporal background interactions shift from randomness to perfect harmony. Magical girls everywhere stop when they are dying and their souls are saved from the miasma of their grief. Arrows fall from the sky as hope engulfs the Earth. I hesitate momentarily before allowing myself to assume the locus of all knowledge. Entropy crumbles as I peruse the information contained within the universe. The girl who is now the Law of Cycles ceases to exist. I stumble under the weight of everythingness. Your mouth opens up to cry out, and collapses around your soul before blinking you out of the spatial plane. We exist only within the fourth dimension. The fountainhead of all knowledge rolls along the ground and collides with a small cat. My head tastes sideways as spacetime is reestablished, you blink back into the corporeal world disoriented, only for me to hand you my ribbons as memories of me collapse under the strain of temporal paradox. The universe has reasserted itself. A particular black cat is fed fish for the rest of its natural life. You die fighting wraiths some time later, and your soul is stolen to become bait for the Law of Cycles. You disapprove. Your disapproval sends ripples through the inter-dimensional void between life and death. A demon begins to smile as she walks toward the classroom where a sleeping goddess stands.

 

[TheBiggerFish]

...were you going to do 7 Cuils?

 

[mCooperative]

...were you going to do 7 Cuils?

Click to shrink...

The whole thing was mostly inspired by listening to the attached video far too often; we sort of had the intonation down right as we were memorizing it, and then the PMMM associations sort of fell into place. At the time I was also working on a DDLC Edition, because a lot of that works rather well, but there were too many directions for me to have taken it in to finish, really, so that's also sitting around a quarter done. I didn't actually know about the 7th Cuil until I looked up the text of the thing, and without the alarming chanting powering the whole idea, it's a little harder to pull together. I think there's definitely something that could be done with it, but I don't really think I'm planning on it.

**long rambling answer, as is characteristic, whoops**

 

[mCooperative]

Not the first Quest I had planned to actually write up a post for, but hey, totally a good plan. This is also posted on the Quest Ideas thread, I'm mostly just checking for interest at the moment. It's not necessarily a long story idea, although knowing me, it could always expand beyond my control, I guess. There is very little actual planning for this one, mostly just an idea that sprung fully-formed into my mind. Hope it turns out reasonably enough.

Now in an actual thread. I have no idea what I'm doing save me.

===
The Lamp Whisperer
===​

The flickering glow of the streetlamps illuminates many secrets.

A man hurries through the streets, hat pulled low over his face. He is the local butcher; he has passed this way twice a week for the last two years. He goes to meet the fruit seller's wife. His pace quickens as he feels a sprinkle of rain.

A young journeyman strides confidently back to his master's workshop; if asked, he will say that he was asked to fetch something. He practices the lines under his breath. He plans to steal his master's tools, flee the area, and start his own workshop on the other side of the city. The fog grows thicker, and as the rain begins to fall, he knows in his bones that there will be nobody to witness his theft tonight.

A girl ducks into an alley. Seven streets behind her, a house begins to burn. Six streets to go, and she will slip back into her parents' house through the back door with the shoddy latch. Tomorrow she wake in time to help them with the bread. For now, she breathes a sigh of relief that the man with the frightening eyes will not be able to trouble her or her parents ever again. She hurries on as the rain beats down ever heavier.

A shadow approaches the Thames. A splash. A bag weighted down with stones and a small corpse sinks to the river floor. A tall figure straightens, and steps away from the riverbank, back toward the street. In the pouring rain, the tattered hood and cloak cling to a man's silhouette. He trudges away from the evidence of his crimes, beginning his long, roundabout walk home.

The flickering glow of the streetlamps reveals to you many hidden stories.

You look out the bedroom window of your home, watching the them through the fog and the rain.

You sigh. You have learned many things tonight, these only the most interesting among them. The scratching of your pen quiets as you finish noting down your discoveries. The more mundane thefts and murders you will sort through in the morning to add to your daily anonymous tip letter to the police.

The more interesting cases, you may just investigate on your own. You've been bored lately; your informants (your friends) have noticed you getting antsy and have expressed their concerns.

Your oldest friend has suggested taking up murder; the gleam against his glass suggests he was joking, but no matter how full you keep his kerosene, he won't confirm it for you.

Well he'll have to settle for accompanying you on investigations for now. It would be counterproductive to bring a lamp with you to a murder; proper illumination would just get you caught. You should know- that's how you get most of your information, after all.

You are the most renowned detective in London.

You are the Lamp Whisperer.

===

You don't actually call yourself that when you talk to the police. That would be ridiculous. You do sign your anonymous tip letters that way, though; a little joke between you and your friends. You're fairly sure the police know it's you, but they've never said anything.

No, when you bring your serious investigations to the police, you merely go by your name, Jack Williams.

It's taken some work, but they trust that name now, trust that your information is good. You wonder if you'll have anything interesting to bring to their attention personally in the near future.

Will you investigate tonight's disturbances?
[] Yes (pick one)
-[] The meeting
-[] The theft
-[] The fire
-[] The death
[] No

 

[GordoffTheSnord]

My attempt to expand the Springs, Leylines, and Orreries universe around the speech that @mCooperative wrote above. I guess this would be considered a prequel to that speech.

===​

Leylines and Orreries -- First Contact
===​

Aboard the parliament-ship Celestial Serenity, the Council was in session. This was a rare occurrence – usually the councilmembers were spread out among the various Federated worlds, performing their standard feats of political magic to keep the whole edifice from collapsing. But for occasions such as this, the induction of a new species into the Galactic Federation, they had gathered themselves in the fleet that comprised the wandering capital of the Federation and boarded the Celestial Serenity. Per standard protocol, the rest of the fleet had then moved off to maintain station tens of milli-lights away. The great parliament-ship orbited alone over the Ixnari homeworld.

As alone as it ever was, anyway. Around it fighters patrolled in protective formations, mage-craft wove glittering defensive shields and anti-surveillance wards, drones hunted for incoming stealth ships, interdiction buoys generated the negative-energy fields that stopped enemies from simply worm-jumping past the other lines of defense. This force was nothing unusual, of course. This was simply standard procedure for protecting the seat of Federation government, and would be maintained for as long as the Council remained in session.

So far this session had lasted for three months with no sign of slowing down. Captain Cltrik, the head of security, honestly had no idea what undoubtedly critical negotiations were still occurring at this point. The Ixnari had been eager to join the Federation and their induction was unopposed except by the usual grumblers, so in theory this should have been a quick session. But her job was to handle security, not speculate on how to better wrangle politicians. Her forces were skilled professionals; they could maintain the cordon indefinitely. But after three months with no action except for drills she herself had sprung on them, things were starting to get dull. So it came almost as a relief when the Tracking officer sounded the alert.

"Radar has an unscheduled contact! Range four milli-light, it's just outside the outer perimeter and drifting closer! Bearing fifty-two one-oh-four."

Captain Cltrik started snapping orders. "Scramble the alert fighters!" A particular fighter patrol changed course, heading to intercept. "Reinforce the wards between it and us!" Enormous glyphs began to glow, hovering just off the skin of the parliament-ship. "Hail the intruder, order it to change course or be fired upon." Several communications officers started muttering into their microphones. "Tracking, what do we know about this ship?"

The furry Grathian touched a few keys and turned away from his screen, scowling. "No identification transponder signal. No energy signature at all, in fact. Doesn't show up in the scrying pool and we won't have visual until the fighters get close enough." On the screen behind him, diagnostics started scrolling. "Besides the radar, the only proof we have that this thing really exists at all is the divination section reporting they just sensed an enormous presence arrive in the area. Their words, not mine. And the radar diagnostics are coming up green. Otherwise I'd be sure this was all just a glitch."

The captain shook her head. "Assume it's real. Otherwise we're likely to be unpleasantly surprised. Comms! Any reply to our hails?"

"Yes ma'am! Took us a while to find it, but it's there. Bare telepathy only, no subspace or radio modulation and none of the usual encryption, but we're getting through. We've warned them to change course, but…well, ma'am, I think things are getting political. This seems to be a First Contact scenario." Cltrik sighed. "Well, best get this over with. Keep the fighters on course to intercept, but order them not to fire unless fired upon. And put our new friends on the main speakers. I guess I need to explain to them where they've wandered into with their first worm-jump."

"NO NEED." The voice boomed from the room's speakers. The translation program from telepathy to audio was designed to preserve the essence of the speaker's mental voice; the intruder ship sounded like it was crewed by planets. "WE HAVE BEEN SEARCHING FOR YOUR COUNCIL FOR FIFTY MILLION YEARS. WE WILL NOW GO TO MEET THEM. WE WILL NOT BE PREVENTED." The speakers hissed, then went silent again.

Cltrik stared at the comm officer in disbelief. "You had them able to hear us the whole time?" He pressed a few buttons then shrugged helplessly. "I didn't hook it to the microphones or speakers, no. That was all them. They just…bypassed part of our system somehow."

The Grathian at tracking suddenly shouted. "Energy signature! The intruder ship just exploded! Wait, no, belay that. Chemical explosive, but it's propulsive. They're using chemical engines! Ha! They've vectoring toward the Serenity, but our fighters will run rings around them. How backwards are they?"

"Advanced enough to hack our comms," Cltrik muttered sourly. Even for a First Contact with a new civilization, this was going exceptionally strangely. She might actually have to order the newcomers shot down. And what did they mean, they'd been searching for the Council for fifty million years? The Federation was only ten million years old… Well, the scientists and linguists could figure that all out later. Right now, her job was to stop the intruder's sudden move toward her ship. The alert fighters were closing in to visual range…

"Onscreen!" The scrying mirror at the front of the command center flickered, then started relaying images from the lead fighter. And the picture it showed was completely unbelievable.

In the mirror was a wooden sailing ship, complete with masts and sails. The sails were covered with glowing sigils somehow woven into the cloth, and there was a bubble of silvery air covering the exposed upper deck. And on that deck stood the crew, small two-armed bipedals that would barely come to Cltrikt's shoulders running around adjusting ropes and tending the sails. A gout of flame issued from the tail of the frigate where a rudder would be, driving the whole ridiculous contraption surprisingly quickly toward the Celestial Serenity. One of the aliens on the deck pointed an appendage at the incoming fighters and made hurried motions, and the entire ship began to weave in the slowest evasive maneuver imaginable while maintaining its collision course.

Cltrik grimaced. She had hoped it wouldn't come to violence, a volatile political situation like this, but "fire a warning shot," and beams of blue-green energy shot across the bow of that ridiculous sailing ship. Which stopped its pathetic attempts at evasion as it realized it had no hope of outmaneuvering fighters equipped with inertial drives, and resumed its desperate dash toward the parliament-ship. Well, nothing for it now. Her job was to protect the politicians, not make them happy. "They had their chance. Cut the ship to pieces."

The energy beams lanced out, directly toward the frigate this time… and bent around it, and continued on the far side. "What?!" Several of the aliens in long robes stood at the bow of the frigate, appendages raised, and seemed to be shooing the deadly bursts of energy away from their vessel as the fighters continued the barrage. "They have mages! Archmages even, and somehow they have five of them at the same time? Shields to maximum! Fighters, switch to firing hexes!"

And then she watched in disbelief as the aliens continued to shield their frigate from magical attacks designed to be so complex that no living mage could counter them. And then redirected a wave of missiles by hijacking their guidance spells despite the tamper-proof spirit-locks. All the while the frigate accelerated closer, then flipped around and began decelerating as though it was going to dock with the Celestial Serenity.

A coil-gun round finally punched through the alien mages' defenses and took out the main engine, but the vessel held together and remained on a collision course with the parliament-ship's main force-shield. And just as it reached it, the mages did something and the shield shimmered and the ship passed through without more than a ripple. A moment later the Celestial Serenity shuddered as a heavy mass slammed into it.

"Security detail to the breach! Prepare to repel boarders!" Damage Control was still trying to assess, but Captain Cltrik was already running. She knew her ship and that impact felt like it had penetrated. Tracking reported the alien ship was also shattered, but Cltrik suspected that any race able to survive the gauntlet of fire she had run them through would also be able to make it from their ship to the gaping hole they had made in her hull.

And rounding a hatchway she saw them, regrouping in a lounge area whose left side was now exposed to space and sealed only by the air-wards. Wards which the aliens were apparently able to slip through without breaking, somehow. But they weren't doing anything aggressive, merely assembling into some official-looking formation oriented toward the far doorway. In it stood the First Speaker of the Council, surrounded by his private bodyguards.

One of the aliens, one of the ones in the fancy black robes woven with glowing sigils and runes and wearing a tall pointed blue hat, stepped forward. It extended one of its appendages graspers-upwards and cast a spell that Cltrikt recognized as an audio-telepathy translation orb. Then, holding the orb, it spoke.

"WE REPRESENT THE HUMAN RACE. AND WE ARE HERE TO SPEAK WITH YOUR COUNCIL REGARDING PAST GRIEVANCES."

Cltrik sank back beyond the hatchway. This was beyond her pay grade now. This was political.

 

[mCooperative]

The above is declared officially canonical, for posterity, and such.

 

[TheBiggerFish]

I just like that humans, once they had incredible mystical power, decided to make their spaceships boats.
With rocket engines.

I'm vaguely annoyed at their engineers for letting them do it, though.

 

[mCooperative]

I just like that humans, once they had incredible mystical power, decided to make their spaceships boats.
With rocket engines.

I'm vaguely annoyed at their engineers for letting them do it, though.

Click to shrink...

Would you be appalled to know that it was something of a tie between the first ship out to make first contact being this lot, and the first ship out to make first contact being a load of angry hobby-archmages from the internet in an incredibly passive-aggressive fuck-you boat made of a sheet of plywood as a floor, cereal boxes stapled together as a waist-high hull (with the merchandising side facing outward for maximum visual absurdity), and a load of mismatched incredibly fancy chairs bolted to the plywood as seating? With the word "Spac3ship" crudely painted on the side and then a translation spell scrawled on top of it?

Because if they haven't shown up already in some other part of the galactic empire, they'll be the lot that arrives next.

 

[kittygirl]

"I am the dream": A freeform Quest built out of the bones of and spite that sprung forth out of Game Design, Spring 2018. Where in you play as a magical girl, and get to live a life, and explore nearly a decade's worth of original universe. Options also include crossover elements! (Probably at least PMMM, if my diagram of the universes lets me conclude it would work.)

Click to shrink...

This one sounds very good. I'd love to be a magical girl in a free form quest. Crossovers are a plus. What kind of magic was this magical girl gonna have? And I hope I'm not responding to something too late I didn't check what time it was posted. What kind of original universe is it? Like Earth?

 

[TheBiggerFish]

Would you be appalled to know that it was something of a tie between the first ship out to make first contact being this lot, and the first ship out to make first contact being a load of angry hobby-archmages from the internet in an incredibly passive-aggressive fuck-you boat made of a sheet of plywood as a floor, cereal boxes stapled together as a waist-high hull (with the merchandising side facing outward for maximum visual absurdity), and a load of mismatched incredibly fancy chairs bolted to the plywood as seating? With the word "Spac3ship" crudely painted on the side and then a translation spell scrawled on top of it?

Because if they haven't shown up already in some other part of the galactic empire, they'll be the lot that arrives next.

Click to shrink...

AAAAHAHAHA THAT JUST MAKES IT BETTER!

 

[mCooperative]

AAAAHAHAHA THAT JUST MAKES IT BETTER!

Click to shrink...

Exactly. }=o)

This one sounds very good. I'd love to be a magical girl in a free form quest. Crossovers are a plus. What kind of magic was this magical girl gonna have? And I hope I'm not responding to something too late I didn't check what time it was posted. What kind of original universe is it? Like Earth?

Click to shrink...

Feel free to respond to whatever I post, whenever; it's always good to see any thoughts on it.

Yeah this is a Quest I definitely plan to start at some point, although at the moment I've got The Lamp Whisperer that I need to keep up with, and I still need to iron out some universe consistency issues that come of continuously building a setting for a decade. Magic is going to be very much up to the players when the time comes, starting with basics like "do you manifest a magic melee weapon, or are you primarily energy blasts, or do you do something more unconventional" and building up from there. Crossover options being what they are, depending on what people vote it would be possible to go full-on Madoka Magica with things, and if I've gotten around to diving into other Magical Girl anime that would work with what I've got laid out, then those would probably be possible too, but by no means are the options limited to a pre-existing model of that kind.

The original setting has rather a lot going on, and some places are more like our own Earth than others. That said, the world things are set on really would seem to be very much like our own, albeit of course with the magical elements underlying things. It would even be called Earth! You'd be given options to start in one of several towns as the magical girl (or boy, that will be a player option) overseeing the area, and also would be given then choice to start in 2008, 2011, or 2015, each with different implications about what sort of people or events you'd be dealing with.

There will be plenty of chances to stick your nose into all sorts of other people's business- but there would also be the opportunity to just sort of live a normal life, go to school by day, and fight nightmare abominations by night. Delve into what exactly a normal life and routine looks like for a magical warrior of Great Justice (or whatever players choose to fight for). Part of this is the remnant of my original mobile game idea spawned by Game Design class, really; a lot of progression will be choosing whether to put extra focus into the magical side of things, or to put more into the mundane side of things, and then what you learn as a result. Work-life balance, heh.

And whoops that was rather a long answer. I just have a lot of plans for this Quest, though it'll take some time before they're ready to be put to writing properly.

 

[kittygirl]

"Magical Girl Voldemort", "Megucamort", or possibly "Magical Girl Voldemort and the Power Of Friendship": A HP/PMMM crossover, where I take the premise of 'Magical Girl Voldemort pursues the route of Love And Justice' and attempt to treat it semi-seriously. Wherein a surprising amount of logic is found, HP canon veers gently off the rails, and we declare that we're interpreting Voldemort as at least moderately competent and self-aware.
Checking the PMMM idea thread for interest in the overarching summary.

Click to shrink...

As a HP fan I love this idea. But wait: Is Voldy gonna be a girl? A gender swapped Voldemort is sooo amusing. Would Voldy use magic powers too from the series or original spells? Would it be like HP and Methods of Rationality where everyone is super smart for some reason?

 

[mCooperative]

As a HP fan I love this idea. But wait: Is Voldy gonna be a girl? A gender swapped Voldemort is sooo amusing. Would Voldy use magic powers too from the series or original spells? Would it be like HP and Methods of Rationality where everyone is super smart for some reason?

Click to shrink...

Voldemort is not going to be a girl, although certain circumstances make him realize he was very lucky to avoid such a dire fate for himself. He'd have both wizarding and magical girl powers that hopefully balance out- and while I don't think people are going to be Methods levels of smart, I am going to be working on the assumption that Voldemort isn't stupid and thus makes decisions that somewhat befit a relatively capable Dark Lord of Conquering Other People's Shit. Which isn't to say they'll always be excellent decisions, but, **shrug**.

 

[kittygirl]

"Unforseen": A HP/PMMM crossover/fusion. Wherein Madokami is surprised by the world that comes after her wish, and Homura doesn't even know where to begin with this one. "This is not a tale of magical girls, nor is it a tale of wizards, neither yet a tale of demons and goddesses. This is a tale of people learning to live again."

Click to shrink...

I don't even know this series and I'm interested. A wish changing the world? Unforeseen consequences? Yes and more yes. And that it's not another tale about some fantasy tropes makes it extra yummy of an idea. Good job @mCooperative. ^_^

 

[mCooperative]

I don't even know this series and I'm interested. A wish changing the world? Unforeseen consequences? Yes and more yes. And that it's not another tale about some fantasy tropes makes it extra yummy of an idea. Good job @mCooperative. ^_^

Click to shrink...

Heh, thanks. There will be magic and magical girls and wizards, but like, that's really more the backdrop. Big important things will be going on, shaping the world, etc, etc, etc, and Homura and Madoka might even be in the middle of some of them, but this isn't their adventure story.

To paraphrase myself from another conversation, since this really isn't spoilers so much as it is an expansion of my posted summary:

This whole AU premise is not about setting up the Battle Against The Villain Voldemort. Like, he's there, in the background, being a pending situation, and sometimes that's a pending situation that Homura and Madoka end up involved in dealing with.

But the main point of this AU is basically the story of how Homura (and Madoka) and the rest of the PMMM setting minus Witches now has the HP setting fitted into the spaces that Witches left behind. And it's a story that's essentially an epilogue, really, for PMMM canon- dealing with the aftermath of a story that's already done, and moving on with a life afterwards. All the HP canon stuff- that's all happening in the background, more softly in most cases, more on fire in others, and a lot of it is getting dragged along for the process of finally healing after their own war 11 years ago.

So yeah.

Actually, a question that I'd be interested to hear thoughts on- a reasonable amount of interesting content for "Unforseen" could be found in the way Homura seems from the outside, to people from the HP setting, even as a large amount of content comes from how Homura is learning about the new world and what the heck is going on. Several events, such as the first meeting with Hagrid, and the first meeting with Dumbledore, could be just as entertaining written from both Homura's perspective, and Hagrid's or Dumbledore's. While I think I'll want to try and keep the information available to the audience limited to what Homura discovers, once events progress such that it doesn't reveal anything early, would you be interested in me trying to write out some events a second time from an outside perspective?

When I actually get around to putting this down in story form anyway...

 

[kittygirl]

Yes, I would definitely love to see you write down some events from a second perspective. When you get around to it ah ha.

 

[mCooperative]

Yes, I would definitely love to see you write down some events from a second perspective. When you get around to it ah ha.

Click to shrink...

Heh, then that's on the list.

 

[mCooperative]

I wrote this for class a long time ago. Might have been the first proper entry to the events of my rendition of Camelot.

...
For Arthur
...
​

Let me tell you what you have missed
My king.
Let me give you my tears and laughter.
Fifteen hundred years have passed
An age
Since Camelot, destroyed.
Or, that is what I remember most.
A city on fire, stones crushed
Castle dead
And then disappeared from time.
I was there
To see the empty world,
To walk between crumbling pillars,
Onto fields of wildflowers
In spring, blossoming amidst the wreckage.
Time passed, and I walked
To Avalon
Where you were sleeping, my king.
But even before Camlann- that
Dread bloodied field-
The Isle was old.
Shining were the waters, aye
But the boat in its mooring-
Naught but an ancient shipwreck.
I could not wake you, father.
For years, I wandered.
I stopped, once, in the world awhile.
A ghost, mist colored only by traffic lights.
Intangible.
In an abandoned playground
I imagined you.

 

[mCooperative]

More Camelot. So, this is Arthur. Also, why I now spell "Artoria" when talking about Fate, so that I can differentiate...

===
The Names We Carry With Us - snippets
===​

He does not remember her name.

Once upon a time, a bouncing baby girl-child was born to a King and Queen of the land of Camelot. They gave her a name- the Queen, gave her a name, full of love.

Some years later, to that same King and Queen, a boy-child was to be born. The King would have named him Arthur.

That bouncing baby boy falls still beside his mother's yet-warm body; he is only minutes old.

The King will have no more children; his wife's blood will run through the child that one day takes his throne.

They have an heir remaining. The King takes aside his only daughter, and tells her: She is dead. She died with her mother, that day. He tells her: Forget your name. Forget the life you have lived. You were born today.

The King calls him Arthur.

Arthur does not remember the name of the girl who died the day he was born.

***

By the time he is grown enough to seek the name of the girl he might have been, he is High King of Britannia, and all those who knew that name are dead.

He finds it scribed in the geneology records, far in the back of the royal library. The name that must have been his, once, a long time ago. He does not recognize it. It does not belong to him, anymore.

"Died of grief," it says, "alongside her mother. The royal physician declares that her heart simply stopped, that day, as she followed the Queen into the arms of God."

***

He has been 'Arthur' for most of his life. As much as it might have been in another world, his brother's name was never Arthur. He never had a chance to use it, not even in death. And yet, it is the only name that he will ever have.

He would give back his brother's name, if he could. But he cannot lay claim to the name given by his mother; that name belongs to a girl as long dead as the boy she replaced.

Sometimes, in the deepest, most silent night, the King calls herself Arturia.

(Three others will ever know that name, in this lifetime. Merlin and Morgaine will see her only once; as she mourns her father, and tells them all about the name of her brother, the name her mother gave her, and the name she knows she will never be able to use. Guinevere will see her every night as she lays sleeping in their bed.)

 

[mCooperative]

I wrote this years ago, for a friend, way back in November-December 2012. I've tidied it up a bit, because while it's a part of my Long Work's canon, some things have changed since then, some of this was contextually very personal, and also I'd like to think my writing quality has improved enough to be able to make this slightly more readable while maintaining the content. Also, I have renamed every location in this setting except the Winter Kingdom at least once, and I still have far too many things called 'Avalon', so that needs some fixing. It's... It was a children's story for a children's story, by a young adult desperate to try and provide reassurance to a friend. It still reads like it, I think; I've left a lot of that stumbling, because, well, this was what it was, you know?

Somehow, it formed the basis for a great deal of the Long Work that was written afterwards.

And so, as I began to write something based in that world of mine, I realized that you kind of need this context, for that. Here we are, then.

And if the person I wrote the original for, six years ago, is reading this now... Hey. Hi. It's been awhile. Remember this?

===
On the Evening I Was Leaving
===​

It's an old story. All the children of our Winter Kingdom learn it. It's a story that dates back, back, thousands of thousands of years, back to the Hundred Years War. And I'll tell it now to you.

The War, for those who don't already know, was a conflict long ago between the Winter Kingdom and the Summer Country. Nobody in this day and age, except maybe the High King, knows how the war really started (or anyone who does certainly isn't saying anything). Even now, both the Winter Kingdom and the Summer Country blame each other, and the truth has been lost to time. But it got vicious on both sides quite quickly. Cities burned, and soldiers died, and children were stolen, and the War lasted for a full one hundred years and a day.

(Time runs quite strangely, in these Otherlands. Nowaday, it's 12 years in the Winter Kingdom is a single year on Earth, and 12 years on Earth to a single year in the Summer Country. Oh, I think the edges of the world were stretched a bit less, back then, but even so. It was something like 10,000 years of war in Winter, a war that would never end. It was 100 years in Summer, 100 years filled with 10,000 years of fighting. Is it any wonder that we still remember?)

In the end there was peace, of course. Even today, there is peace, or something like it. There have been skirmishes, and angry words, and trade embargoes, and a hundred other things, but there has not been a war between the Winter Kingdom and the Summer Country for thousands of thousands of years.

In part, this was thanks to the efforts of the first Queen of Summer after the War ended. One of the Fair Folk, just as her Winter Kingdom counterpart was, she ruled her country for a two thousand years before making way for the more famous Oberon and Titania. She was a tireless advocate of peace, the moment she took the throne after her parents abdicated. She was compassionate, and she listened, and she compromised. And whenever any of her court insulted the Winter Kingdom within her earshot, she calmly, politely, impeccably, insulted the speaker right back, as though it had been a remark upon her very own name.

And this is the story of why.

...

It was the early days of the War, before the children had learned to hate, and before the weight of the deaths had risen so high. But already the nights were long and cold and there was fear of the dark and the monsters and food was short and swords were many and all the magic of the Summer fae was turned toward growing strong for fighting.

The King and Queen spread words throughout the land, calling the Winter Kingdom evil and depraved and the aggressors in the War, the cause of all the conflict and the death and even the burning of their own cities, sometimes. The King and the Queen said it so often, so vehemently, and the citizens were so angry or afraid or broken that many believed without question. But some did not.

They were children, mostly. Fae, Fair Folk, under a bare 100 years, who had not yet learned to latch on to the fear of people different.

The Princess was one such child. She was 6 decades only, when the War began, and she still remembered the days before, the balls and the gatherings between the countries, where the other people were kind, and their own parents friendly, and the skies bright and clear of the fear which clouded them now.

And the Princess's Friend hated the War, too, with an anger that she never quite explained. The Princess never thought to ask, and the Friend never volunteered to explain, and so in the dark days at the beginning of the War, the two friends stood alone in the Princess's tower against the oncoming tide of blame and hurt.

One day, though, fifty years in to the war, a the Winter Kingdom stuck a great blow to the heart of the Summer Country.

The phoenix hatchlings had been taken.

You know, I expect, about the Phoenix Messengers? They were the ones, kidnapped only days out of the shell, from the very capitol of the Summer lands, and brought to the Winter Kingdom capitol, the Citadel of Midnight. They were raised there for the final fifty years of the War, never sent out to the fighting (and indeed later the Winter Kingdom would say that they only stole the hatchlings to keep them out of the War), and in the end they became go-betweens for the two countries when they were finally at peace, so as to keep contact with both the families who had raised them, and the families from whom they'd been taken.

In the Summer Country, immediately after this great injury, the sentiment against the Winter Kingdom was heavy with insults and anger and blame and the urge to shout and rage and destroy.

It was in the midst of this chaos that the Princess's Friend told the Princess that she had a secret that must be told.

The two walked up to the very top of the highest tower in the capitol of the land of Summer.

They stood there in silence for a moment. They stared out over the capitol they both loved so. In the eventide light, the marble buildings gleamed, and their tarnished gold sparkled. The wind carried the sounds of the quieting riots and the echo of the mourning phoenix-parents through the city and up to the tower and then past, past, far into the distance. The sight of the shimmering wingbeats of the fairies mixed with the sound of the heavy clip-clopping of the minotaurs and the heavy footsteps of the fae as they shuffled back to their homes to wait for another night. The sky smelled like summer rain, like petrichor, stone-blood, and yet it was nearly clear of clouds. The two friends took in their city, drinking in the taste of it, and they wondered at how different it was from fifty years before. A certain anxious hope-despair had crowded its way into the once happy place, and now it was forever somehow more and less than it once was.

Finally, after long minutes had past, the Princess's Friend spoke up. Quietly, carefully, never meeting her friend's eyes, she told the Princess that she was leaving the day after, and that she hadn't planned to say anything, just leave a note, only... And she shrugged, and almost before she had finished speaking, the Princess, wide eyed, asked sharply, plaintively, why? Why, why, why would she leave, there was a war out there, and the Princess didn't want her Friend to leave, and, and, she'd stop her, she would-

And her Friend explained. She came from the Winter Kingdom, originally, she said. She didn't remember exactly what had happened, although she supposed it must have been her jealous older brother's fault, except that when she was only five and a half decades old she'd found herself in Summer's capitol somehow, and, after finding herself counted among the Princess's friends, had never found reason to leave.
And earlier during the War she'd been hoping it would end soon, because it felt like she was holding a great weight in her, the secret of her first life (as she counted it), and she wanted to go back to the time when both parts of her life were neatly reconciled and simple, because now every word against the Winter Kingdom struck like an unintentional brand against her own soul. And when the Princess defended the Winter Kingdom, for awhile it was enough of an unconscious reassurance.

But now, now that the War had lasted so long and this latest action meant that it would likely rage another time again as long as it already had, and the Princess's Friend couldn't keep the secret anymore. Not from the Princess.

And so she said that she'd decided to go away, far from either the Summer Country or the Winter Kingdom, and leave a note explaining her deception. But she couldn't go. Not without a proper explanation, a proper good-bye.

So the Princess's Friend apologized, and she said that it was okay if the Princess called the guards and got her locked up or thrown out of the country or at least the capitol (because even in the heat of the War, children were never killed on either side unless they at that very moment bore arms), and that the Friend knew that the Princess thought that insulting the whole of the Winter Kingdom was just outside of too much but of course she might believe at least some of the things They had been saying and the Friend wished that she didn't, of course, but if she did, she would leave without protest, and say only that she would not have traded their friendship for the world-

The Princess interrupted her Friend, who was startled enough to quiet in an instant. The little Princess's next words became immortal in their conviction- they survived through the War and up through this very day, exactly as they'd been said so long ago (much to the consternation of every human historian who'd ever studied quite how that vernacular had come into being thousands of thousands of years past)...

"Screw Them," she said, "and screw what They think. I don't believe any of that propaganda crap my parents are feeding everyone. I'm not getting you kicked out, and I'm not abandoning you." The words were confident, and completely sincere. Both knew it.

"Why?" The question was quiet and small and ever so slightly confused. It meant, not just why the disbelief in the lies, but why the complete faith that they were untrue, why the risk (even for the Princess, being found helping someone from the Winter Kingdom courted great danger), and why the complete disregard for even the lies that her parents told her.

The Princess answered just as simply, and with just as much meaning. "Because you are my friend."

...

The story continues, of course, through the rest of the War and up until the Princess's own becoming Queen. There are a million different versions- some travelers and some Winter Kingdom first generation immigrants say that there are similar stories, though perhaps not as true, in many other lands. One thing throughout, though, remains the same.

The Princess does not abandon her Friend, and her Friend does stay.

And whenever somebody insults the Winter Kingdom and its progeny again, loudly, and the Princess's Friend flinches from the unintentional accusation, the Princess takes the time to say, later, almost apropos of nothing, "Because you are my friend."

It is a phrase that has grown to mean a reassurance of faith and friendship, and a vow of the same, throughout nearly all of the Summer Country and the Winter Kingdom alike.

 

[mCooperative]

Wrote this for a writing club publication, a little over a year ago. More context for my Long Work. Also, a short story that I've half started. Also, I now have more knowledge than I will ever need again about approximately-ancient-Mesopotamia, and giving characters multi-layered names-that-are-references-and-also-puns. Ask me how.

===
This Dawn Which I Have Shed
===​

Her first memories are happy.

The sun beats harshly down and sand whispers on the wind, but her father's voice is kind, and her mother's arms are warm, and she remembers raising a tiny, trembling arm into the air, wondering at the blue of the sky against the brown of her skin. She giggles, a burbling child's glee.

(The nights are cool, and for her whole life, she will remember her parents' quiet breath and songs, comforting in the moonlight.)

When she begins to crawl, she gnaws on blanket-edges, and is determined to draw her memories in the dirt. Wild grasses prickle her soft hands, and before her father whisks her back up into the safety of his arms, she's scrawled down the memory of summer breezes, and met the eyes of a venerable old shelled creature that blinks slowly at her before it turns away. She remembers believing for a long time that she had met a wise old god carrying the history of the world on its back; she is still not entirely convinced she was wrong.

She grows.

She grows taller than her sister and taller than two of her brothers and she grows strong, too- her arms are strong, so she carries her youngest brother; her legs are strong, so she runs messages for her father to his brother's shop up in the city; and her will is strong, so she spends hours each day helping her mother and father with the sheep, and hours more spying on her cousins as they work to memorize the thousands of symbols that make up their written language.

She practices writing in the dirt as she tends the sheep, quietly mouthing the meaning of each glyph. She's taught herself nearly to the level of her youngest cousin by the time anybody notices- her uncle sees her practiced scrawls one day when he comes to visit her father, and in short order he brings her to study alongside his own daughters with their tutor.

(She is her parents' pride and joy, destined to marry a well-off merchant or trader or craftsman, and help bring the family into the same prosperity that her father's oldest brother enjoys.)

(She is thankful her younger siblings are old enough now to help their parents during the days she spends at study.)

The seasons pass, all the same. She arrives home each night in time to pen up the sheep, and wakes early enough to help her mother with the day's bread, and she never forgets to look into the bright blue sky and feel the wind through her hair and appreciate the life she loves. In the summer, the sun beats down on the plains and the sands, and the moonlight touches the wild grasses where she sometimes swears she can spot an old shelled god, making its way through the years.

In the winter, there is rain. She walks just the same to her uncle's home in the city each day, and watches as the dust and sand are washed from the air and the land and everything in it. The rain leaves behind fecundity and hushed fields and plants that gleam verdant in the returning sunlight.

(One winter, years before she learns to read, she spots an old pale crocodile in the reeds by the riverside. It watches with wary eyes as people pass it by, unknowing, and she quietly decides that it is the wise god's son, come home from war to learn the ways of its father.)

(She will leave it exactly one offering, the day she leaves her home for the last time.)

Winter and spring have both gone when she begins to dream of the cold.

It is not the cold of the rain, or even the cold of the darkest nights out on the plains. It is a white cold, the color of that pale crocodile, of the lightest clouds, and the brightest smiling teeth. A cold the color of bleached bone under the bright blue eyes of the statues of the gods.

When she wakes to the golden dawn of the summer morning, she watches the light play over her hands. Well-worn, she knows each scuff, each small scarred sheep-bite, each callous from her writing lessons- and in that golden dawn she watches the light on her hands as though she has never seen them before. Her arms and legs feel short and stunted as she rises to her feet, and the weight of her hair feels impossibly heavy.

Her head clears as she walks toward the city, and her body is familiar again, but that day she leaves a small offering at the temple of her namesake anyway.

(At dinnertime, her mouth feels full of crocodile teeth.)

She continues to dream of the cold.

She dreams, too, of faceless figures that creep tall around her. They coo, and reach for her with too-long fingers made of grey bone and grey blood and eggshell-white skin stretched thin and translucent. She wakes with a gasp to the quiet sounds of her family's breathing, and she spends too many long minutes watching the moonlight paint silver on the umber of her skin.

She begins to wonder if this is madness; she begins to wonder if she must approach the temples and seek godly cleansing; but she does not begin to wonder if her family would cast her aside for this, because she knows that they love her, and that she is their pride and joy.

She learns her reading, and tends the sheep, and raises her head defiantly in the rain towards the clouds as she walks to the city. When they clear, she memorizes the blue of the sky and the caress of the wind. Returning home in the darkening light, she admires the stars and the rising moon. And when she helps her father return the sheep to their pens, she asks him if there have been any offers for her marriage hand.

(He replies, yes, there have been, and jokes that she must be eager to take her leave of her old parents; she jokes that if she grows too much older, her worth would be sworn of the service of the gods. They both hear the hint of truth behind the jest; her father begins considering the proposals seriously, and she does not ask after them again.)

She was born near the end of summer, and the summer favors her. The wild grasses prickle her ankles, a familiar punctuation as she minds the sheep. Her youngest brother has begun his walk home, her arrival heralding the end of his duties for the day. Even as the sun falls toward the horizon, the wind is warm and the world is bright. The clouds are bare wisps, and she can already see the stars taking their place in the sky.

She remembers looking forward to teaching her future children the shapes of those stars, one day.

The sky pours down, when winter comes.

(It floods, and she sees the old pale crocodile swimming quietly through the fields.)

She wakes up in a night dimly lit by moon, and does not recognize her hands.

She remembers: grey bones and grey blood and cold fingers reaching white in the dark-

And these are her hands, now.

For a moment, she thinks it must be the moonlight, but no; even then, her fingers are too long, and her skin thin stretched, pale over her bones.

Nothing like the deep copper that should be visible, even in the night.

She can see her heartbeat in her veins.

***

Some day very soon, she will remake her name.

Her family had given her a name that was half homage to Inanna, the goddess of love and wisdom and war. This homage, she will keep, for she will need her patron's strengths.

The rest of her name, though, she will change- because she has only ever been part of the person who was meant to bear it.

She remembers, now, her infancy- screaming as the skin of the child whose face she would steal was sewn into her flesh by grey-bone hands.

She will call herself Inanna-nasir, and she will leave behind her old name for the child whose place she had taken.

(Her human parents lost their daughter long ago, and never had a chance to mourn her.)

(She will not be the demon-child who brings her family shame; she will be the sacrifice that lets them grieve.)

***

She creeps quietly from her family home, that winter night she wakes with bone-hands and crocodile-teeth and hair that falls light and dry like the wild grasses of the plains.

The plains are still flooded, though, and the dark makes them eerie and still.

She takes her clothes and wets them with the blood of a recently slaughtered sheep, and then goes looking for the shelled god's son.

(Her own blood seeps too grey beneath her skin to be mistaken for hers, anymore.)

The old pale crocodile rests beneath an acacia tree. Its scales are the color of her new hands, and it is awake, staring at her with wary dark eyes as she approaches. She wonders, for a moment, if her eyes are still her eyes, or if they belong to the faceless figures from her memories, now.

She expects it to attack her, as crocodiles do; even a god should be no different. But it waits, instead.

(It is cautious of this strange creature that approaches it; it remembers this same scent, faintly, from many years ago.)

She sets her clothes between them, and kneels.

"I offer to you, oh shelled god's son, this blood and my blood. To you and your father I offer you my bones. Please, strike from my family the shame of my deception, and let them weep only for the daughter that I have never been."

She bows her head, and closes her eyes.

(The pale crocodile sees a strange meal set out before it, and it smells of sheep-blood and sorrow, and no threat. It opens its wide mouth-)

- and before Ina can feel the immense jaws bite into her flesh, she is gone.

(The ground beneath her now is soft like sand, and far colder than the pouring rain.)

"Our- our dearest daughter- welcome home."

She opens her eyes, as two grey-bone creatures tower above her and weep tears of joy.

(In the morning, her human parents will rise to find her missing. They will search the fields and plains, and find her clothing stained red beside signs of a great old crocodile's attack.)

(The crocodile is long gone.)

(An ancient tortoise rests in the wild grasses on a nearby hill, watching the rise of the sun.)