Reading panic attacks is always hard. I remember mine too well.
Also it sucks to just always have someone/thing hate you and never let you rest/forget it. Especially when you're too tired to even defend yourself emotionally from it.
Just sliding down and sitting there, staring blankly at the wall, munching on the bagels, offering one to the civie form of one of the magical girls from this morning as she stares blankly at us.
Considering her transformation trinket was still a ring, probably not. It would have been a broach or tiara since its Not!Twilight probably.
Also she was in civie wear- shirt, jeans, backpack, etc.
Also I agree in general with you. Just rolling over the kids and talking to them up and down about what is and isn't acceptable for a 9 to 12 year old is doing sounds hilarious. And chewing out the other thing that's giving them missions for the same.
Also I agree in general with you. Just rolling over the kids and talking to them up and down about what is and isn't acceptable for a 9 to 12 year old is doing sounds hilarious. And chewing out the other thing that's giving them missions for the same.
The thing is that we don't know how dangerous their 'work' actually is supposed to be. But-
They attacked an Excrusian. Can I just, for a second, relay my screaming heebies about that? This isn't like attacking the final boss while she's out getting groceries. It isn't like attacking the secret, hidden, optional boss. It's... it isn't like attacking the thing that gives the optional boss nightmares!
Excrusians, for anyone who hasn't caught on by now, are the biggest fish in an entire multiverse-sized pond. A multiverse they're working to destroy, for crimes against literally everything; a multiverse they would have already succeeded in destroying, if not for certain concept-hax that, quite honestly, probably just delays things. Because even an infinite pause to their ability to break the multiverse isn't going to hold them for all that long, given they can proceed to attack the pause.
You can't get there from here. We're the optional boss, of the optional boss, of the optional boss, of the optional boss -- possibly with a few more levels in-between. If we ever, ever encounter anything that counts as an actual threat, then chances are decent the planet's already gone. It might not be, because these conflicts tend to act on the conceptual level, so perhaps it's something like, say, 'kindness' which is already gone.
And this, by all accounts rather nice, twelve-year-old girl who has no idea what she is doing, and who doesn't realize the sheer abyssal depths of the pool she's swimming in-
Attacked one.
Tried to destroy our groceries.
Annoyed us, when a single flick of a fingernail could have reduced her to less than dust, to a nonexistence so complete that no-one would have ever known she'd existed. Could have rendered the entire concept of 'adorable children' into meaningless noise. Of course, we'd never do that. We've retired, the war is over--for us--we're trying to be nice... or at least non-world-destroy-y. But it could have happened.
I don't blame her. Obviously I don't blame her.
But I hope we get to have a serious talk with whoever put her up to this.
For this character's human counterpart, see My Little Pony Friendship is Magic Wiki:Workshop/List of unused characters#Sunset Shimmer. Sunset Shimmer is a female unicorn pony-turned-human and a main character in the Equestria Girls franchise, initially appearing as the main antagonist of My...
a homework assignment submitted on the 23rd day of september
Reccilda Isang Tanry Cooper
9/23/20XX
The Victory of the Ants
Once upon a time, there were three princesses and one prince who wanted to have a picnic.
But oh no!
There was an anthill in their garden!
So the three princesses and the one prince kicked over the anthill so they could spread out their blanket and their meal. But the ants came anyway! They got in the sandwiches and on the plate of cheese and crackers; and the three princesses and one prince decided that more drastic measures would be required to deal with the unanswered crime of the ants' existence.
The first princess led a revolution. With poisoned words and false promises, she rallied the worker ants against the ant-queen and bade them charge and seize the means of reproduction for themselves! But while her army bit and grappled with the queen's loyalist soldiers, four of the queen's daughters flew off to start their own anthills.
The second princess stomped and crushed and splashed poison and boiling water around! But she soon saw how the anthill was united in its resistance against her; how even the first princess' army abandoned their revolution to come to their home's defense; saw how it was the weakest ants that died and tunnels that crumbled to her assaults, letting the colony rebuild stronger and more princess-proof.
The one prince got distracted by watching the ants work. He knelt down to watch the workers carry a grain of sand here, one there; and got bitten all over 'cuz he was a dummy.
The third princess started faking the pheremone-signals that ants leave to direct other ants to go places and do things (it's really cool!) to make the ants destroy their own tunnels! But some ants were too clueless and lost to follow the orders they were supposed to, and so wandered over and bit the third princess instead.
And at the end of the day, there were five anthills in their garden, and their picnic was swarmed with ants, and the three princesses and one prince were bitten all over and had to beg the ants to leave some food for them.
The ants reign victorious over a yard that is not theirs, for despite their crimes they simply will not die.
Good work, ants!
commentary on the above by an esteemed educator
Great work Reccilda! Great use of vocabulary words! A+! Have a sticker!💯
I do actually have a recipe for this, and in the interests of not unduly influencing the vote, will publish Eily's recipe to the apocrypha regardless of what wins.
I do actually have a recipe for this, and in the interests of not unduly influencing the vote, will publish Eily's recipe to the apocrypha regardless of what wins.
Due to the Christmas Debacle, Eilind has a tremendous amount of experience with conventional, non-miraculous and minimally-magical baking.
She does not and cannot cook; nor does she know what basically any non-baking ingredient is; but yes, she does know how to bake with actual flour made from actual wheat and such.
I do actually have a recipe for this, and in the interests of not unduly influencing the vote, will publish Eily's recipe to the apocrypha regardless of what wins.
Due to the Christmas Debacle, Eilind has a tremendous amount of experience with conventional, non-miraculous and minimally-magical baking.
She does not and cannot cook; nor does she know what basically any non-baking ingredient is; but yes, she does know how to bake with actual flour made from actual wheat and such.
Thanks to the magic of AI, I believe I've produced a proper rendition of her cookery. These were all created through variations of "eldritch <insert baked goods here>".
I'm not sorry for this at all. Only saddened that 'eldritch' does not seem the correct term. It's lacking a certain whimsy... still, I bet something like that was brought along at one time or another.
Only the burn patterns are strange in this one. You could probably achieve this using blueberries.
The tea feels oddly civilised, but perhaps that isn't odd. It's tea.
The being collecting Eily's tea bag may have far too many tendrils, but it is still quintessentially British.
(Not dessert.)
Tentacles are a given, but the AI also seems to add insectile features sometimes.
I love this one. Can you see the face?
There's one more, but it got a bit too eldritch. By which I mean it has pincers.
It's even purple! Ish. Potentially it may be adorable. It's still eldritch, and I'm afraid she's certainly a meguca.
I'm not sorry for this at all. Only saddened that 'eldritch' does not seem the correct term. It's lacking a certain whimsy... still, I bet something like that was brought along at one time or another.
I expect that Sadawulf Iochibas's assignment, which described a political intrigue, embedded a delicious recipe for hors d'oeuvre — one which also served as a key plot point.
I expect that Sadawulf Iochibas's assignment, which described a political intrigue, embedded a delicious recipe for hors d'oeuvre — one which also served as a key plot point.
While I am equal parts alarmed and impressed at how you tracked down a name I made up as a throwaway line in a single post over two years ago and have never typed since; I must, sadly, inform you that Citizen Iochibas does not have homework on account of not being an elementary schooler.
While I am equal parts alarmed and impressed at how you tracked down a name I made up as a throwaway line in a single post over two years ago and have never typed since; I must, sadly, inform you that Citizen Iochibas does not have homework on account of not being an elementary schooler.
It co-occurs in a post where you use also used the name Reccilda, and, well, it's not just that Reccilda only appears on these forums in Thelxiope's posts about glitch quests; it's basically unique on the Internet level as well.
i thought it was some clever reference to something more-common that I didn't know about
I didn't even check the age of the post.
It co-occurs in a post where you use also used the name Reccilda, and, well, it's not just that Reccilda only appears on these forums in Thelxiope's posts about glitch quests; it's basically unique on the Internet level as well.
@tomoyo I fall into the rabbithole of ninuanni names easily enough on my own you don't need to kick me in Whatever I guess this is what I'm doing today. Ninuanni Names
So, astute readers may have noticed that the various beings from the Not in this quest all have unusual names that sound like they belong together, like they're from the same culture:
And even characters who have yet to show up but who I have already named, such as:
Sallarchos. Sagadé Gladiel. Lagavi.
These names are "in" Ninuanni, the language that is spoken by the Peoples of the Void. I use the scare quotes because Ninuanni, rather than being an actual con-lang that Dr. Jenna Moran spent umpteen years inventing from scratch, is instead, as a form of translation convention1, represented by Gothic; because, well:
Glitch: A Story of the Not pg. 379 said:
The Goths are, to the best of the author's ability to determine, extinct, and functionally immune to slander;
as the architects of the fall of Rome, their reputation in Western society is not the best; their names are close
enough to English names that the author can have some sense of them; and, finally, those names have in them an ominous, archaic feel that is fitting to the aesthetic of the game.
Excrucian names thus borrow heavily from the names of the Goths; from various attested or reconstructed Gothic roots; or from good old-fashioned making things up - because Jenna has a PhD in Computer Science and not in extinct Germanic languages; and was writing a tabletop game, not a thesis.
So, Excrucian names are dithematic - they're generally made from two roots, each of which (as words do) means something. This is really not that different from how most names work, apart from the near-universal two-element thing Ninuanni names have going on; and this means that you can look at a Ninuanni name -
There's a table of name-roots in one of Glitch's appendices and -
It produces fine names.
But, well -
... it's not quite ... extra ... enough. Not for the Riders. Not for the Great Host of the Excrucians, who seek to make an ending to the world, and who are the most melodramatic people imaginable.
So, each of these name-roots also has associated with it a scrap of poetry - a luthe - which, when combined with the other root in the name, make a cool little poem.
There are, thus, are three readings for a given Ninuanni name:
One is, just, the actual sounds. "Reccilda"
Two is the meaning. "Fantastic Game"
And third is the luthe, the name-poem.
And you recall, in that moment, as you see my face, that tales of me have long already flung themselves—on raven's wings!—into your beating heart:
a glittering and ever-shifting game.
This is extremely cool and was a ton of work on Jenna's part; and due to word count limitations it had to be cut from the final book, which is just a tragedy.
...thankfully, Jenna published all of that work as a 19-post series on her tumblr. This is the last entry in that series, which contains links to the previous entries because I'm not making twenty hyperlinks. It is a fascinating read, and I enthusiastically recommend it just for, like, the information on the process and background of even making the list of names in Glitch.
And it also has a couple hundred example luthes to play with.
But anyway, enough babbling about context. How about a practical example? So, when I invented Reccilda off the top of my head for a bit 2 years ago, I didn't know she was eventually going to show up in a quest I would be running. I didn't know much about her at all, actually.
I knew her name was Reccilda, because I liked the way those two name-roots meshed. It's a good sound and a neat luthe.
Excrucian surnames are usually locational2, but sometimes, particularly with praise-names or acclamational names, can be just ... another standard name. And I like Ninuanni names, so - again, two years ago, having no idea that Reccilda was going to go on to be anything more than an example - I gave her another Ninuanni name as a surname:
"Tanry," meaning "Promised Commander," and with the luthe:
I, the star of the promised day, have come:
I alone may rule.
And this was fine for an example; but in the intervening years, as Reccilda turned from a random one-off to a more fully-enfleshed character with a history and a personality and all, her name expanded.
(Eilind's name very much has not, for several reasons: she's less assimiliationist than Reccilda is; less tied into human society; and also, um, just a lot older and more mature; and stylistically, slightly less over-the-top. There may also be a cultural element to it - Reccilda is from southern Ninuan, while Eily is from the west; and there might be some differences in naming customs.)
"Isang" and "Cooper" are not Ninuanni names. They are Creational names, and Reccilda took them as a point, as a gesture: a way of signaling her withdrawal from the business of War and willingness to engage with Creation in ways other than violence.
Also she got adopted and it's really very useful on the paperwork to have her last name match her mom's.
Isang and Cooper do not have luthes, and the very idea of makingluthes for them is, at best, something that loyalist Excrucians are likely to roll their eyes at.
That said, I do think that Reccilda is still extra enough to want to have a luthe for her name in its entirety, just in case she really needs to get all offended-dignity and go "do you have any idea who I am" and list off her name and titles and accomplishments.
And this is a fun opportunity because it means we have to ask ourselves, and by 'we' I mean I:
What is the dramatic name poem for "someone who makes barrels"? We'll start with Reccilda's -
Well, it's not actually a 'middle' name if we want to be technical, it's a second first name; naming traditions are complicated -
We'll start with "Isang".
Isang, for those who have never heard it, is ... essentially the Cebuano or Tagalog form of "Izzy". It's "Isabel3 + ng," which is a diminutive suffix. It was originally a nickname, but - over time, as happens - just became a normal name.
Isabel is Spanish - the Spanish conquest of the Phillipines just obliterated the indigenous naming practices and even most of the names, it's awful - but anyway, it's the Spanish form of 'Elizabeth'.
Well, what does Elizabeth mean?
Elizabeth is a biblical name, ultimately from אלישבע - "My God Is An Oath"
This is good, in that that is a cool, evocative name.
This is problematic, in that if you talk about God to an Excrucian, they will likely immediately jump to thinking about Cneph Creator, who invented reality; and who the Excrucians despise and hate beyond all others.
What I'm saying is that Ninuanni does not have a lot of nice, usable name-roots relating to God.
Also, very strangely, there's not really a lot of oath stuff in the roots we have.
We could just invent a poem outright, but ... working within restrictions is fun.
So, we have to ask - what is meant by "my God is an oath"?
Forget the literal, we're not making that from the roots we have. What's the feeling?
To me, there are two elements to this name: the idea of a greater power outside the self, something high and holy and good; and the idea of an oath, a promise, something solid and binding and true.
...so for the first part, well, the closest thing we know the Excrucians have to religious devotion is going to come in their ideas of 'void' or 'formlessness' - both of which the Riders traditionally construe as positive things, as a limitless well of potentiality, as a fruitful, life and meaning-giving power.
We have a couple other options, like 'virtuous' or 'sacral,' but ... eh. Not great.
We'll probably go with 'formless' here; which leads to the second half -
There's not really a good root for 'oath' in the extant Ninuanni roots.
There's.... "Urged to", which is .... no. There's "Promised" which is also no, and is already in Reccilda's name. Nope.
There's "Law," which, ha ha, no. The Ninuanni conception of Law is as something evil, c.f. Creation and its Law-Beings.
So we need something like an oath, something with the same energy, same imagery, as an oath.
...I'm drawn to "Good"- "I am rock to faith; I am all truths' name" - as carrying the same idea as an oath: the idea of being trustworthy, and dependable, and solid.
So, my sort of back-translation of Isang into Ninuanni to create a luthe for it is probably going to be like:
"I am rock to faith; I am all truths' name:
I am the soundless, the formless; inexhaustible, inextinguishable; I am the sower and the raiser of all things"
Which is super self-aggrandizing but look humility is not one of Reccilda's virtues. Also, to some extent, there is an external identification happening here: she's sort of saying, "the silvered void works through me; I am a vessel for the primordial formlessness," which is at least a little better. Cooper.
Barrel-maker.
Hmm.
There are a surprising number of peaceful, everyday names in the Ninuanni roots we have - though the Strategists are creatures of war now, long ago most of them at least thought of themselves as gentle protectors; as people with slow, unpretentious, calm fates.
That said, we don't have "barrel-maker," or even "barrel."
I'm tempted to go for a Hobbit reference - something about lakes and rivers and such - but ...
hmmm nah.
Next tack. What is a barrel?
It's a - it's a thing that holds stuff.
Do we have a container word?
A check reveals the best we have is ... Chalice. Also grave, by way of a Ninuanni pun.
...
I can work with it.
What sort of chalice is a barrel, though?
Is it a generous chalice? Maybe, but the luthe for generous is weirdly grim - 'gold-filled graves' and such, generously offering death, it's a whole thing.
Is it ... homey? Home-made? Both are potentially true, but I don't necessarily like the luthes for either.
...
after some thought, I think I'm going to go with a barrel being a treasured chalice, because that gets at this idea of a barrel being tightly sealed and locked away in darkness. Is it amazing? No. But to be perfecly honest this has taken hours and I am tired.
Treasured Chalice will have to -
wait
A thought.
What are barrels for? For storing things. For storing drink and food, good things, against the cold; to stockpile them for when they're needed.
Be less literal. Not 'treasured chalice,' but rather, 'treasured merriment':
Most precious treasure of the realm; most tightly locked away:
a merry celebration! Hubbub, drink, and laughter last until the day's first light.
This means that Reccilda's full name, if recited at the height of her pompousness and desire to impress and awe, becomes something akin to:
fantastic game; my god is an oath (formless good); promised commander; barrel maker (treasured merriment)
And you recall, in that moment, as you see my face, that tales of me have long already flung themselves—on raven's wings!—into your beating heart:
visions of a glittering and ever-shifting game.
I am rock to faith; I am all truths' name:
I am the soundless, the formless; inexhaustible, inextinguishable; the sower and the raiser of all things.
I, the star of the promised day, have come:
and I alone may rule.
So let the most precious treasures of the realm; most tightly locked away, be opened at last!
Let there be a merry celebration! Hubbub, drink, and laughter shall last until the day's first light.
...
This is extra af; and realistically I have to imagine that it probably makes Reccilda sound very childish or extraordinarily smug to the Ninuanni ear; but I have to tell you, I am here for it.
Also Riders in general tend towards smugness, so, honestly she's probably not alone in going this over the top. 1 Akin to the way that Westron is just localized as English in The Lord of the Rings - hobbits were not 'actually' named things like Samwise or Meriadoc in the secondary world.
2 Eily, for instance, did some great and terrible thing in the vicinity of Salmydessus; and became known as "Eilind Who Did That Awful Thing Near Salmydessus," then as "Eilind the Salmydessan," then as "Eilind 'Eily' Salmydessa" over time.
3 Or possibly Luisa, which would trace back to ... Ludwig, actually - "Famous battle". And while that is trivial to render in Ninuanni, as 'Hludvig' - "Dream-Drenched Battlefield4" - I decided Reccilda already had enough martial stuff in her name, and wouldn't want a fight-y name as one of her Creational ones.
4 Drowned for an age past the shores of dream:
one lone figure, trudging forward, through metal, ringing, screams, and blood.
Now on Nix the people built a doméd city, and they lived in happiness and delight, and every year took joy in Christmas. And one year, in the December of that year, they brought life to their wooden soldiers, to their marionettes, to their wooden dolls. "Dance for us," they said. "Share in our Christmas joy. And, put on shows!"
These things the wooden folk did, and they did them gladly, and glad were all the folk of Nix, until a magistrix whispered in the wooden queen's ear the words that would poison her thereafter:
"And what will happen," the magistrix asked, "on December 26th?"
[X] Bake a cake. 🥄 You're very fond of baking, actually. It's a little like alchemy, except less exciting; which is arguably a good thing after the morning you've had.
And while you are not obligated to bring anything to the potluck at Eschaton House tonight, it would be nice to do so. Polite. Also it would be one area of your life where you can have your shit together today, and that's also valuable.
So while Kaisia splooshes into her basin in the living room to watch cooking competition shows - Claire got her hooked on them - you busy yourself gathering the assorted reagents you require to synthesize a cake.
Flour: easy! You just bought some - and it even managed to evade being scorched, nice. Cake flour would probably be better for this but eh, stocking multiple kinds of flours is a lot of work and pantry space. All purpose does the job fine and means you only need to remember to buy one kind of flour when you get low.
Baking powder and soda: these used to be one thing, back before the Noble Estate of Leavening Agents was shattered. Wasn't even the Riders' work - some inheritance dispute on Creation's end of things saw the Estate torn into pieces.
2009. Wild year for Noble infighting, it really was.
But anyway leavening, check.
Salt: now this is the fault of the Excrucians - Iolithae Septimian, to be specific.
You, like pretty much everyone who exists and a staggering proportion of those who don't, really, really hate Iolithae Septimian.
The whole 'lying the oceans into salt' thing doesn't bother you that much - that's (one of) Creation's problems with her, not her notional allies' - but seriously Iolithae Septimian is the worst. She's just the most obnoxious, annoying, self-righteous, condescending, thinks-she's-clever-but-actually-just-commuinicates-badly-and-acts-smug-when-she's-misunderstood, little -
You plop the saltcellar on the counter with more force than is probably strictly necessary. Salt, check.
Sugar, butter, eggs, yogurt, all in the fridge - the sugar probably shouldn't be there, and it is probably your fault that it was; but it's on the counter now and will hopefully go back in the pantry where it is supposed to once you're done, fingers crossed.
Sweetened condensed milk is … not in the pantry … oh, right. You dig the little tupperware container out from under the bag of frozen mixed vegetables. The cake only uses a half-can, and you never got the hang of un-spoiling things - you can, it's just - it's a lot of work, okay? You have to render everything down in alkahest, and distill off just the essential nature of decay; and then recondense all of the remaining goo back into the same thing it was to begin with which is - it's hard, and time consuming; and you own a freezer.
Powdered chai - you do not keep this in the apartment because you blend your own chai; because you are a semi-professional tea saleswoman and the thought of buying someone else's tea leaves is farcical. You grab your chai tin, and chivy Kaisia into grabbing your spice grinder from the cupboard above the stove - she can float, and you're not short, it's just that people these days are really tall. Also you don't know where the stepladder is.
Liquid chai mix - this you do buy commercially. It is essentially undrinkable - you mean that literally. You've checked. It contains, in fact, the alchemical and philosophical essence of undrinkable-ness within itself; which is presumably part of some bizarre Noble plot or political nonsense that you are no longer obligated to care about, since you're retired.
It is completely and totally undrinkable, but it does a remarkable job of carrying its flavors into other things; so it's really handy as, like, chai-flavoring, for, just as an example, baked goods.
Candied ginger … is also in the freezer, which … maybe it shouldn't be? You keep meaning to learn how to make this yourself, and keep forgetting. Surely it can't be that hard. But then, that's what you always tell yourself about cooking, and you can't do that either, so.
Which just leaves … spices. Ginger, nutmeg, clove, cassia, cardamom; spice grinder is already down, and a second's fishing around in the drawer gets the little rasp thingie for grating the nutmeg.
…and also reminds you that you need the pepper grinder.
… and also molasses because you forgot to buy brown sugar.
But that, finally, actually for real this time, is everything. You're pretty sure.
To work, to work. Cassia and cardamom; ginger and clove; a sprinkle of nutmeg; a pot on the stove -
It smells like the holidays.
It smells like Anti-Christmas.
People have the wrong ideas about Anti-Christmas.
They assume, naïvely, that it is "the opposite" of Christmas: taking presents instead of giving them, fire instead of snow, murdering a child instead of celebrating one's birth.
This is foolishness.
It's a lot like the idea of Not-things, of λ-things: the peoples of Creation, used to a continuum of Law, innately conceive of a Not-Apple as everything that an apple isn't.
But that's not what a λ-apple is. A Not-apple isn't "anything which is not an apple." It isn't "the set of things which do not belong to the Estate of Apples."
A λ-apple is an apple which does not exist - which has all the properties of an apple, which is recognizably an apple - save that it lacks the property of existing within the world of forms and Law.
And that is not a failure or a deficiency on its part. To be incarnate beyond the tangled web of Cneph's All, to be free from the net of Laws and Imperial Rule that cover the World Ash and all that stems from it is, objectively, a better state to occupy than being tangled up in Creation.
It is an apple - with crisp skin and sweet flesh and poisonous seeds and woody stem - and it is like the apples of the waking world, save that it is truer, and purer; that it knows itself, and its own appleness, intrinsically; and that it need not be shackled into that role by beasts of Law.
But anyway -
Just like they have the wrong ideas about Not-things, people have the wrong idea about Anti-Christmas.
It was never meant to be a negation of Christmas.
The photonegative of Christmas is still Christmas-y, by implication. 'A thing that is defined solely by opposition simply reinforces that which it opposes', as Sagadé is wont to say.
You built Anti-Christmas - planted it and nurtured it and tended to it for eleven centuries; spent lifetimes crafting and honing and preparing it for one fine morning, one moment of perfect glory which never came -
Anti-Christmas was, by necessity, extremely like Christmas. Still a time of peace, and togetherness, and goodwill. Still a time of banding together against the dark and the cold. And yeah, maybe the colors were green and black instead of green and red, but there were still bells and carols and cookies and pies; still community, still thankfulness for each other and hopes for a better year -
Just, with that one thing different, which was the overriding, desperate wish that Christmas not come.
But it was festive. It was joyful. It was an act of defiance against the night and the cold, just like Christmas. It was singing, and pageants, and gifts, and garlands; it was peace and goodwill; it was merriment and mirth; it was cookies and cakes and endless, endless baking (you had to learn, to fit in; the wooden people don't actually need to eat but they love to bake) it was life and love and fierce, fierce opposition to death and endings -
Just -
Just built on fear, because you made it that way. Spent centuries cultivating the exact circumstances that would see the wooden people die if Christmas ever came to Nix.
Spent centuries, diligently helping their watchful queen - helping her seal the humans of Nix out of time behind the Christmas Throne; helping her pen the anti-carols; helping her tame the hrímvargr; helping her develop new breeds of Anti-Christmas lights (they grow like grapes; and different varieties have different shades of green and black light; and help contribute to preventing Christmas from coming in slightly different ways. And of course, genetic diversity is important in agriculture)
And never once did you tell her that you had orchestrated her people's predicament. Not until that very last day, when all your plans came tumbling down at the hands of a group of plucky teenagers without even the decency to appreciate the cunning intricacies of your schemes.
You will pay for that eventually. It is the nature, not just of the world, but of the silvered void. It is far more true of the void than of the world, even. There will be a reckoning for what you have done. All debts come due, in time.
…
The kitchen smells of Anti-Christmas, and of Nix; of unanswered crimes and debts as-yet unpaid; and of eleven centuries of hard work that was ultimately fruitless but which -
You don't spend 1,100 years in a place without getting a bit attached.
The air is full of the smell of memories, and the carol comes unbidden to your lips. You tend to the glaze for the cake, and let it free.
"Let the bells not ring come morn;
Christmas from calendar shorn!
Peaceful nights and mercy's silence;
Christmas day held in abeyance!"
Humming comes from the living room - Kaisia will never admit to liking anything you like, but she has always been fond of music and song.
"Let our joyful songs resound!
May the church bells never sound!
Let the hrímvarg's howl declare:
Christmas pass by our Nix fair!"
There's the sound of keys working at the lock, and the squeal of hinges as someone else joins in to finish the verse:
"Let the bells not ring come morn;
Christmas from calendar shorn!"
There's a thumping of bags dropping, the clatter of keys in a dish, and the swish of a coat being removed as a herald of doom and darkness and the world's ending calls from the entry:
"So, if we're caroling, that means that there's baking going on, right? Is it cake‽ Kai, is she baking the tea cake‽"
Whatever Kaisia might be saying in response is drowned out by the thunder of rapid footsteps as a rushing blur gallops down the hall from the entryway to resolve into a young woman bedecked in a riot of colors leaning over the counter that divides the kitchenette from the living room.
More colors on her t-shirt than seem at all reasonable, especially when they're all so saturated; bright pink and electric blue streaks dyed through her pitch-dark braids; eyes that are, today, an intense, unnatural orange - you assumed, when you first met Claire, that her eyes changed color because she was either partially inhuman, or was using magic of some sort; but apparently humans just make artificial irises for cosmetic purposes these days?
A wild Claire has appeared!
You - you don't know what that means. It's just what Reccilda always says when she meets Claire, and both of them laugh so apparently it's funny?
And, well. It fits.
"Hi Ei!" Claire completely ignored your entire lecture on the nuances of Ninuanni diminutive suffixes the moment she realized she could say that. Also, eye puns. She is a monster. "Are you making the tea cake? Are you are youareyou‽"
You've lived with Claire for … coming up on two years now. You were A Guest at Eschaton House at the time; but living with Sallarchos and The Help was becoming, respectively, deeply annoying and deeply unsettling; and at one of the potlucks, Claire mentioned that she was looking for someone to split rent with, because she was graduating from college and needed an actual apartment; and, well, the remainder: of concern now only to historians.
The point is, you've been sharing a home with Claire for two years, and so know that there is no point in trying to get a word in edgewise to answer any of her questions, because -
"Did you go get the groceries you were supposed to? It was on the 🎵chore li~ist⭐ and everything! Are you wearing one of my shirts? Why is it burnt? Why did someone leave a first aid kit in front of our door? What happened to your hair? Are you stealing my clothes to burn them? Ohmigosh Ei that is not okay and - and - are you making the tea cake‽"
Claire is, ah, extremely excitable.
Ebullient, perhaps. Exuberant. Blithesome.
Look, she is a good child and you're sure that she is a valuable contributor to whatever it is she does as a day job that you have forgotten, but she reminds you of nothing so much as a puppy.
A very friendly and very, very foolish puppy; who for reasons you do not understand and have never felt the need to pry into, is dedicated to dark and terrible powers of unmaking and ill-omen.
You trace back through the avalanche of questions, marshaling responses as you go to deliver them all at once, in order - Claire, for some reason, thinks this is cool? - yes, you're making the tea cake; yes, stealing your roommate's clothes to burn them would probably not be okay; a magical girl attack happened to your hair; you have no idea why someone left a -
Wait.
Oh no.
She didn't.
Surely she wouldn't - surely no one is actually that responsible -
What sort of child even has a first aid kit?!
…
Maybe if you don't say anything Claire will forget about it and Kaisia won't bring this morning's humiliation up.
"Hello Claire," you say. "How was your da-"
"IS IT THE TEA CAKE‽‽‽"
You suppose you should be flattered that she likes it so much.
"In order," you snap, and Claire immediately freezes mid-bounce - you have no idea why she thinks this is so cool, but - "Some of them; yes it was; very observant; magical girl attack; the red shouty one lit my hair on fire; no I am not; yes, I agree that that would not be an acceptable thing to do; yes; and yes."
Claire nods along with each answer, which is probably not a good sign, because it means -
"And what about the first aid kit?"
Maybe you can lie? You used to be good at that, you really did.
You shrug. "I don't know. Maybe someone dropped it?"
Just the right combination of disinterest, confusion, and having something better to do - you make a show of fussing with the glaze on the stove.
You can feel Claire narrowing her eyes at you as she considers.
"Hmmmmmmmmmmm-"
This may go on for some time, so you go get the metal stabby thing which presumably has some other use for cooking, but which you use to check the doneness of baked goods, out of the drawer.
"-mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm-"
It is just about the time it should be done, but a quick stab directly into the cake's heart reveals there is yet some batter-blood left within. Another couple minutes.
"-mmmmmmmmmmmm I don't believe you."
Well, shit.
Claire turns to call into the living room. "Kai! Why's there a first aid kit by our door‽"
Over the sound of high-stakes culinary competition, Kaisia's reply comes back, "Some kid in the building was trying to be nice to her earlier when she came home all banged up, and Eily ran away rather than have a normal conversation!"
"So she left us a first aid kit‽"
"Apparently?"
Claire turns back around, and - oh no. Oh no. Her eyes are shimmering.
But she doesn't immediately start screeching about how you have to go track down Miss Purple Ferch Pity-Party Pen-Patronizer and thank her, like you were expecting. She doesn't throw herself over the counter to hug you, or keep mocking you, or - anything, really.
She just sort of stares at you, with that softness and that shimmer in her eyes, for a minute, maybe two, before she says -
"You should probably check on the cake again."
And then she turns, and heads back into the living room; and you're left uncertain whether to be outraged or comforted. Was that pity? You can't stand pity.
But maybe being understood and sympathized with isn't so bad.
Hopefully there's some kind of distinction. Eily and Claire have (jointly) a potluck and (separately) a support group/doom cult meetup, respectively; both tonight at Eschaton House. As it is both convenient, environmentally conscious, and handily resolves the issue of how Eily is to cross the city without a car or a working knowledge of the city's public transit options, they will be carpooling together.
What annoyance or complication awaits them when they arrive?
Apologies for the delay! This update was hit by several successive complications - the need to compose an Anti-Christmas carol; the pressing need to resolve a question Jenna never seems to have considered, namely "how do the wooden people celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ if they want to while having that be distinct from Christmas" (I posit that faithful wooden people have a small, private ceremony of thanks by themselves, with as few of the celebratory and communal touches of Christmas as possible) -
And also Claire, who, um, flat-out refused to be the person I had assumed she was for the past two years and informed me part way through the update that no, actually, she was this wholly different person instead.
I feel the update ends somewhat sloppily, but in my defense this was a rather extreme loop to be thrown for.
