Erin Ptah (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
ptahrrific) wrote2011-01-20 02:19 am
ptahrrific) wrote2011-01-20 02:19 am
Entry tags:
Fake News: Castle Walls, part 6
Title: Castle Walls (6/8)
Rating: R
Pairings/Characters: Jon/c!Stephen, Olivia/Kristen, Jason, OCs
Warnings: (skip) Sexual assault
Disclaimer: Two.
For the Report characters: They and their universe are property of Stephen Colbert, the other Report writers, and of course Viacom. Not mine. (Alas.)
And for the real people, the poem:
Please, make no mistake:
these people aren't fake,
but what's said here is no more than fiction.
It only was writ
because we like their wit
and wisecracks, and pull-squints, and diction.
We don't mean to quibble,
but this can't be libel;
it's never implied to be real.
No disrespect's meant;
if you disapprove, then,
the back button's right up there. Deal.
The villains' appearances and some of their lines are pulled from this incident (videos here; partial transcription here). Yes, it's another Thinking and Drinking with Lizz Winnstead; no, it did not go as well as Rachel Maddow's version.
Crois Dóiteáin is Gaelic, and means something like "cross of the blaze." Or, less poetically, "cross fire."
Decorative capitals are from Daily Drop Cap. For the rest of the story, see here.
♢ ♘ ♢ ☯ ♢ ♘ ♢
uick and quiet, borrowing the techniques used for stealth wilderness travel or a hastily planned ambush, Jon sped through the streets of the Castle, dodging crowds and cart-horses and apple-trucks easy as breathing.
Kristen, who had been on plenty of those wilderness campaigns with him, spotted him immediately.
"Jon! Over here, quick!" She waved him towards a cluster of trees that bifurcated the cobblestones, stopping him on the far side of a bench when the green-feathered parakeet in her hand began to cheep nervously. "No, better wait there, you'll scare her. Good news! We're on the right track. Alexis here says a man matching Stephen's description was on that very bench less than two hours ago."
"Alexis," repeated Jon, eyeing the bird with some disbelief.
"I can't pronounce her real name," said Kristen apologetically. "Now, we've been following Olivia's trail, which led here, so it looks like Stephen was keeping an eye on her."
"Oh, good! Uh, who's 'we'? You and the bird?"
"No, no, me and Jason." She nodded across the street at a small outdoor café, where the detective was failing remarkably to be inconspicuous in a billowing trenchcoat and matching fedora. "A rat thought she saw Olivia eating there, but she wasn't sure, so Jason's checking in with the staff, see if they know anything."
Jon decided not to get into a debate with Kristen over whether her squeakier friends had any business hanging around in restaurants. "Listen, we don't need to waste time here. Larry and John got me Stephen's location." He held up a square of parchment. "They can't find Olivia, she's probably under some kind of heavy-duty concealment spell, but whatever it is, it doesn't cover Stephen. And if they're together—"
Jason was tipping his hat to the waitress, slinking back between the wicker tables. He adjusted his mustache and nodded a greeting when he saw Jon, then pointed down the road. "The Princess, and a hot blonde, went thataway."
♢ ♘ ♢ ☯ ♢ ♘ ♢
tephen scrambled to his feet as the two women stepped out of the beam of the transportation spell. One was the tall honey-blonde who had drugged Olivia to begin with, her features sharpened by the pale light; the other had hair that looked as if it had been inked in place, and carried her broad frame with the kind of ease only brought by supreme self-confidence or professional dance training.
The latter might have been the one who had knocked Stephen out, though he couldn't be sure. He had stepped into the center of the massive stone flower where Olivia and the blonde had vanished and found himself transported hummingbird-swift into the stone cell, where his eyes hadn't been left much time to adjust before they were shut down by a blow to the temple.
"Both on their feet already?" said the raven-haired one, confusing Stephen all the more about where their captors were from. If she wasn't a native to the Castle, she sure spoke the language like one. "Guess we didn't hit them hard enough."
"What will you do with us?" demanded Stephen.
The woman waved a hand, not sparing him a glance. "With you? Nothing. This is about the Princess, not you."
"We'll have to do something with him eventually," countered her companion, also in Commedian. "Can't just let him rot down here. It'll make the place smell bad."
"Ooh. Good point. And after we went to all the trouble to pull together those spells, too."
"Enough!" interrupted Olivia. The heavy chain clanked as she stamped her foot. "We're in ur prison, wearin ur chainz. Why you do this?"
The blonde tsked at her. "You didn't think it was going to last forever, did you? Getting escorted around the city, trying on new clothes? This isn't Gi Foar, honey. You can't get make all your worries go away by putting your mouth on things anymore."
Olivia's reply was shaky but earnest. Both she and Stephen knew her moral high ground wasn't unimpeachable, but like him, she must have noticed that their captors weren't calling out her actual trickery. "I hasn't nommed anything for this. Your argument is invalid."
"And yet you were all too willing to 'nom' a drugged drink from a stranger. Just as my research suggested."
"Bet you don't do research," scoffed Stephen. "Bet you just read The Harlot and think it's a real paper."
Smiles like knives crossed both faces.
♢ ♘ ♢ ☯ ♢ ♘ ♢
own a well-kept but obscure back road, Kristen followed Jon and his compass-parchment, while Jason followed Kristen.
If someone had seduced Olivia into a trap using pretty blonde curls to distract her from the poison being slipped into her drink, Kristen was going to roast them alive. Slowly. On the other hand, if someone had seduced Olivia in a completely legitimate way and then given her satisfying consensual sex, Kristen might roast them a little anyway.
Especially if they got their sex tips from—
"He's around here," said Jon, breaking into her thoughts. "Within a hundred feet of us. He's got to be in one of these buildings."
"That's a lot of help," grumbled Kristen. The road was narrow, barely enough to admit the garbage cart that was doubtlessly its most frequent traffic, with the backs of buildings on all sides. In this district each one was three or four stories high, and Jon's map was two-dimensional, which meant it didn't count distances that were vertical.
"There's got to be a clue around here," said Jason. "Footprints in the dirt, a stray leaf from one of the trees they passed under, anything. And if not, then we start kicking in doors."
Kristen kind of wanted to skip straight to the door-kicking phase, but she reined herself in. It's worth it to search. Think like a bird. The kind of bird that pays attention to detail, anyway. Think magpie. Be the magpie....
"Shiny thing!"
Jason looked where she was pointing; Jon sprinted straight to the spot, where a glint of red lay half-buried in the dust.
"Jones," he said, clipped and businesslike, clutching the ruby bracelet in one gauntleted fist. "Get the cavalry. Schaal. You're with me."
"Uh, I hate to point this out," stammered the detective, "but the last time Stephen left that thing behind, it was after he beat you up and was on his way back to Vulpin."
"Things have changed," snapped Jon. "If this is here, then Stephen was trying to leave a trail. That, or he lost it in a fight—and if it's someone he can't beat, it's probably someone I can't beat, at least not alone. Now go!"
"So what's the plan?" asked Kristen, following Jon through an archway that cut under the offices to reach the main road. "Kick the doors in, or just burn them down?" She tried to sound neutral, but a hopeful flame twitched into being at her fingertips.
"Would that be a reasonable place to start?" countered the knight. "First we're going to see if they'll let us in the main door. If not, then we can—"
He choked on the next word, staring at the front of the building.
Kristen followed his gaze up the stairs flanked by stone pillars, to the engraved curls and ornate lettering that made up the crest of The Harlot.
♢ ♘ ♢ ☯ ♢ ♘ ♢
ouldn't scare you away," sighed the blonde editor, the one Olivia now recognized as the stranger who had joined her for lunch. "Couldn't shame you away—should've guessed that from the start. Probably could have shamed the Castle to rejecting you eventually, but why put in so much effort when it turns out we could have just seduced you away all along?"
"You betrayed me!" Olivia would have smacked the woman if she hadn't been just out of reach. "You were nice to me. You acted like you were interested in me as a person. I trusted you!"
"Well, that wasn't very smart of you, was it?" laughed the dark-haired editor, unperturbed. "See, there's a reason some of us have never been kidnapped. We're careful about who we hang out with."
"Like you wouldn't have tried something else if that hadn't worked! Why are you really doing this? Do you want me out of the Castle? Because you can have it. I'll go."
"No!" burst out Stephen. "Don't let them win!"
"I'm trying to help you, you idiot," snapped Olivia in Gi Foarese, before switching back to her best attempt at Commedien. "You have to let Stephen free. And promise to stop writing those articles when you don't know what you're talking about. And in return, we won't turn you in, and I...I'll go find somewhere else to live."
"Cute, isn't it?" said the blonde to her companion. "She still thinks she gets to bargain with us. As if she has any power here."
"Oh, frak you," hissed Olivia.
The fist hit her stomach before she could think to block.
Olivia spasmed, gulping for oxygen, her whole body wracked with the struggle for air. No strength was left to fight with, no coordination to resist as her captors wrestled her to the ground: pinning her face-down in the straw, the heavier one outright sitting on her legs. "I think Lisa here needs an object lesson in humility."
The other editor had twisted Olivia's arms, holding them behind her back; it was her knee that pressed down on the back of Olivia's head, shoving it against the floor. "Agreed."
♢ ♘ ♢ ☯ ♢ ♘ ♢
can't go in there."
"What are you talking about?" demanded Kristen, already halfway up the front steps. "You're a knight! Anyway, since when are you intimidated by the media?"
The noble Sir Stewart, veteran of a dozen campaigns, singlehanded slayer of the Wyrm of Crois Dóiteáin, shivered like a schoolboy getting chided by his teacher. "Have you seen what they've been writing about me? It's 'when did you stop beating your wife' spun out to the length of an article. There's no way to answer, all you can do is ignore it—which I have been!—but if I go charging in there all suited up—"
"—you'll find Stephen! Isn't that worth it?"
"What if I don't?" cried Jon. "What if he's locked up miles away, and someone planted a false trail with the bracelet and a confounding spell? If they wanted to lure me somewhere that would stir up trouble, you couldn't pick a better place than this!"
He had a point—which surprised Kristen, who had followed him into battle and still never seen him this distracted. Reluctantly, she extinguished the flame in her palm. "Right. I'll search the place, in a non-confrontational feminist way. But if I send up a flare, it means you need to shake off your hang-ups and come after me."
♢ ♘ ♢ ☯ ♢ ♘ ♢
et off her!" Stephen had dropped to hands and knees, the better to crawl closer, though Olivia and her tormentors were still painfully out of reach. "You are bad, bad people. Let her go!" He cast about for a missile, drew back, and slung it as hard as he could.
Without glasses, his eyes betrayed him: the ceramic jar struck a glancing blow off the dark-haired editor's shoulder. "Guess they don't make Vulpin men like they used to," she shrugged, unruffled. "At least he's assertive."
"Do not want," groaned Olivia, kicking feebly and trying to wrench her hands free, with no success. "Please...."
"Don't worry," said the blonde, as her companion's pale hand began to slide up under Olivia's skirt. "You'll live through it."
Stephen crumpled to the floor, quaking with fear and confusion. With Jon, it had seemed so clear. You were allowed to say no, and the other person had to stop, and it didn't even matter if they were a royal knight and you were still getting used to not being a pet. "Please stop," he keened, face buried in his hands. "It hurts, please, you have to stop!"
"Poor thing has to make it all about him," scoffed one of their captors. "See that? He can't even look at you."
When Olivia spoke, it was in her native tongue, pain-stricken but bell-clear. "I'm sorry," she choked. "Stephen, I am so sorry I got you into this."
"It's not your fault!" cried Stephen. Those were the words Jon whispered in his ear over and over when he woke up from the worst kind of nightmare, and Olivia didn't even get to wake up. "It's not your fault, it's not your fault...."
♢ ♘ ♢ ☯ ♢ ♘ ♢
acing in a tight circle in front of the building, Jon tried to ignore the increasingly curious looks from passersby. It was much harder than it should have been.
Jon had felt plenty of stress before, and if any situation called for worry, surely this one did. But this anguish, it didn't make sense, it was as if—
Stephen.
Of course. Stephen was nearby after all. Close enough for their link to kick in, for him to scream and Jon's throat to ache in sympathy.
It's okay, he thought, trying to sort his own emotions from Stephen's, to organize the jumble of feeling into recognizable communication. We're right here. We're coming to get you. You'll be out of there soon.
Panic. Bone-shaking, gut-clenching panic. Jon couldn't fix this; it was already too late; nothing would ever put it back together. A rift in the soul so wide it was filled with stars....
We pulled you back together then, countered Jon, ignoring the sense that he might as well be arguing with a tidal wave. We can do it again. But just like then, you've got to help me, okay? Think about where you are; tell me how to get to you. Come on, Stephen, trust me. Hear me!
♢ ♘ ♢ ☯ ♢ ♘ ♢
on...."
(In that instant Olivia envied Stephen more than anything, would have sufferered any number of tortures for a friend so dear that their name alone gave her strength.)
"Jon...it's the flower...."
♢ ♘ ♢ ☯ ♢ ♘ ♢
ou're free to search the cubicles too, of course," said the Editor-in-Chief primly, as Kristen scoured her office for false walls or secret panels. "But I can't imagine what—"
"Kristen!"
Kristen nearly shattered the glass panels in the door as she burst through. Jon stood in the front lobby, ignoring a security guard who was doubtless explaining that he would have to check his sword.
"The flower!" he exclaimed the instant he spotted her. "They're in a sealed cell. Our end of the transportation spell is located in the statue of the flower!"
♢ ♘ ♢ ☯ ♢ ♘ ♢
n the next moment, everything went red
and bright
and hot.
Rating: R
Pairings/Characters: Jon/c!Stephen, Olivia/Kristen, Jason, OCs
Warnings: (skip) Sexual assault
Disclaimer: Two.
For the Report characters: They and their universe are property of Stephen Colbert, the other Report writers, and of course Viacom. Not mine. (Alas.)
And for the real people, the poem:
Please, make no mistake:
these people aren't fake,
but what's said here is no more than fiction.
It only was writ
because we like their wit
and wisecracks, and pull-squints, and diction.
We don't mean to quibble,
but this can't be libel;
it's never implied to be real.
No disrespect's meant;
if you disapprove, then,
the back button's right up there. Deal.
The villains' appearances and some of their lines are pulled from this incident (videos here; partial transcription here). Yes, it's another Thinking and Drinking with Lizz Winnstead; no, it did not go as well as Rachel Maddow's version.
Crois Dóiteáin is Gaelic, and means something like "cross of the blaze." Or, less poetically, "cross fire."
Decorative capitals are from Daily Drop Cap. For the rest of the story, see here.
uick and quiet, borrowing the techniques used for stealth wilderness travel or a hastily planned ambush, Jon sped through the streets of the Castle, dodging crowds and cart-horses and apple-trucks easy as breathing.Kristen, who had been on plenty of those wilderness campaigns with him, spotted him immediately.
"Jon! Over here, quick!" She waved him towards a cluster of trees that bifurcated the cobblestones, stopping him on the far side of a bench when the green-feathered parakeet in her hand began to cheep nervously. "No, better wait there, you'll scare her. Good news! We're on the right track. Alexis here says a man matching Stephen's description was on that very bench less than two hours ago."
"Alexis," repeated Jon, eyeing the bird with some disbelief.
"I can't pronounce her real name," said Kristen apologetically. "Now, we've been following Olivia's trail, which led here, so it looks like Stephen was keeping an eye on her."
"Oh, good! Uh, who's 'we'? You and the bird?"
"No, no, me and Jason." She nodded across the street at a small outdoor café, where the detective was failing remarkably to be inconspicuous in a billowing trenchcoat and matching fedora. "A rat thought she saw Olivia eating there, but she wasn't sure, so Jason's checking in with the staff, see if they know anything."
Jon decided not to get into a debate with Kristen over whether her squeakier friends had any business hanging around in restaurants. "Listen, we don't need to waste time here. Larry and John got me Stephen's location." He held up a square of parchment. "They can't find Olivia, she's probably under some kind of heavy-duty concealment spell, but whatever it is, it doesn't cover Stephen. And if they're together—"
Jason was tipping his hat to the waitress, slinking back between the wicker tables. He adjusted his mustache and nodded a greeting when he saw Jon, then pointed down the road. "The Princess, and a hot blonde, went thataway."
tephen scrambled to his feet as the two women stepped out of the beam of the transportation spell. One was the tall honey-blonde who had drugged Olivia to begin with, her features sharpened by the pale light; the other had hair that looked as if it had been inked in place, and carried her broad frame with the kind of ease only brought by supreme self-confidence or professional dance training.The latter might have been the one who had knocked Stephen out, though he couldn't be sure. He had stepped into the center of the massive stone flower where Olivia and the blonde had vanished and found himself transported hummingbird-swift into the stone cell, where his eyes hadn't been left much time to adjust before they were shut down by a blow to the temple.
"Both on their feet already?" said the raven-haired one, confusing Stephen all the more about where their captors were from. If she wasn't a native to the Castle, she sure spoke the language like one. "Guess we didn't hit them hard enough."
"What will you do with us?" demanded Stephen.
The woman waved a hand, not sparing him a glance. "With you? Nothing. This is about the Princess, not you."
"We'll have to do something with him eventually," countered her companion, also in Commedian. "Can't just let him rot down here. It'll make the place smell bad."
"Ooh. Good point. And after we went to all the trouble to pull together those spells, too."
"Enough!" interrupted Olivia. The heavy chain clanked as she stamped her foot. "We're in ur prison, wearin ur chainz. Why you do this?"
The blonde tsked at her. "You didn't think it was going to last forever, did you? Getting escorted around the city, trying on new clothes? This isn't Gi Foar, honey. You can't get make all your worries go away by putting your mouth on things anymore."
Olivia's reply was shaky but earnest. Both she and Stephen knew her moral high ground wasn't unimpeachable, but like him, she must have noticed that their captors weren't calling out her actual trickery. "I hasn't nommed anything for this. Your argument is invalid."
"And yet you were all too willing to 'nom' a drugged drink from a stranger. Just as my research suggested."
"Bet you don't do research," scoffed Stephen. "Bet you just read The Harlot and think it's a real paper."
Smiles like knives crossed both faces.
own a well-kept but obscure back road, Kristen followed Jon and his compass-parchment, while Jason followed Kristen.If someone had seduced Olivia into a trap using pretty blonde curls to distract her from the poison being slipped into her drink, Kristen was going to roast them alive. Slowly. On the other hand, if someone had seduced Olivia in a completely legitimate way and then given her satisfying consensual sex, Kristen might roast them a little anyway.
Especially if they got their sex tips from—
"He's around here," said Jon, breaking into her thoughts. "Within a hundred feet of us. He's got to be in one of these buildings."
"That's a lot of help," grumbled Kristen. The road was narrow, barely enough to admit the garbage cart that was doubtlessly its most frequent traffic, with the backs of buildings on all sides. In this district each one was three or four stories high, and Jon's map was two-dimensional, which meant it didn't count distances that were vertical.
"There's got to be a clue around here," said Jason. "Footprints in the dirt, a stray leaf from one of the trees they passed under, anything. And if not, then we start kicking in doors."
Kristen kind of wanted to skip straight to the door-kicking phase, but she reined herself in. It's worth it to search. Think like a bird. The kind of bird that pays attention to detail, anyway. Think magpie. Be the magpie....
"Shiny thing!"
Jason looked where she was pointing; Jon sprinted straight to the spot, where a glint of red lay half-buried in the dust.
"Jones," he said, clipped and businesslike, clutching the ruby bracelet in one gauntleted fist. "Get the cavalry. Schaal. You're with me."
"Uh, I hate to point this out," stammered the detective, "but the last time Stephen left that thing behind, it was after he beat you up and was on his way back to Vulpin."
"Things have changed," snapped Jon. "If this is here, then Stephen was trying to leave a trail. That, or he lost it in a fight—and if it's someone he can't beat, it's probably someone I can't beat, at least not alone. Now go!"
"So what's the plan?" asked Kristen, following Jon through an archway that cut under the offices to reach the main road. "Kick the doors in, or just burn them down?" She tried to sound neutral, but a hopeful flame twitched into being at her fingertips.
"Would that be a reasonable place to start?" countered the knight. "First we're going to see if they'll let us in the main door. If not, then we can—"
He choked on the next word, staring at the front of the building.
Kristen followed his gaze up the stairs flanked by stone pillars, to the engraved curls and ornate lettering that made up the crest of The Harlot.
ouldn't scare you away," sighed the blonde editor, the one Olivia now recognized as the stranger who had joined her for lunch. "Couldn't shame you away—should've guessed that from the start. Probably could have shamed the Castle to rejecting you eventually, but why put in so much effort when it turns out we could have just seduced you away all along?""You betrayed me!" Olivia would have smacked the woman if she hadn't been just out of reach. "You were nice to me. You acted like you were interested in me as a person. I trusted you!"
"Well, that wasn't very smart of you, was it?" laughed the dark-haired editor, unperturbed. "See, there's a reason some of us have never been kidnapped. We're careful about who we hang out with."
"Like you wouldn't have tried something else if that hadn't worked! Why are you really doing this? Do you want me out of the Castle? Because you can have it. I'll go."
"No!" burst out Stephen. "Don't let them win!"
"I'm trying to help you, you idiot," snapped Olivia in Gi Foarese, before switching back to her best attempt at Commedien. "You have to let Stephen free. And promise to stop writing those articles when you don't know what you're talking about. And in return, we won't turn you in, and I...I'll go find somewhere else to live."
"Cute, isn't it?" said the blonde to her companion. "She still thinks she gets to bargain with us. As if she has any power here."
"Oh, frak you," hissed Olivia.
The fist hit her stomach before she could think to block.
Olivia spasmed, gulping for oxygen, her whole body wracked with the struggle for air. No strength was left to fight with, no coordination to resist as her captors wrestled her to the ground: pinning her face-down in the straw, the heavier one outright sitting on her legs. "I think Lisa here needs an object lesson in humility."
The other editor had twisted Olivia's arms, holding them behind her back; it was her knee that pressed down on the back of Olivia's head, shoving it against the floor. "Agreed."
can't go in there.""What are you talking about?" demanded Kristen, already halfway up the front steps. "You're a knight! Anyway, since when are you intimidated by the media?"
The noble Sir Stewart, veteran of a dozen campaigns, singlehanded slayer of the Wyrm of Crois Dóiteáin, shivered like a schoolboy getting chided by his teacher. "Have you seen what they've been writing about me? It's 'when did you stop beating your wife' spun out to the length of an article. There's no way to answer, all you can do is ignore it—which I have been!—but if I go charging in there all suited up—"
"—you'll find Stephen! Isn't that worth it?"
"What if I don't?" cried Jon. "What if he's locked up miles away, and someone planted a false trail with the bracelet and a confounding spell? If they wanted to lure me somewhere that would stir up trouble, you couldn't pick a better place than this!"
He had a point—which surprised Kristen, who had followed him into battle and still never seen him this distracted. Reluctantly, she extinguished the flame in her palm. "Right. I'll search the place, in a non-confrontational feminist way. But if I send up a flare, it means you need to shake off your hang-ups and come after me."
et off her!" Stephen had dropped to hands and knees, the better to crawl closer, though Olivia and her tormentors were still painfully out of reach. "You are bad, bad people. Let her go!" He cast about for a missile, drew back, and slung it as hard as he could.Without glasses, his eyes betrayed him: the ceramic jar struck a glancing blow off the dark-haired editor's shoulder. "Guess they don't make Vulpin men like they used to," she shrugged, unruffled. "At least he's assertive."
"Do not want," groaned Olivia, kicking feebly and trying to wrench her hands free, with no success. "Please...."
"Don't worry," said the blonde, as her companion's pale hand began to slide up under Olivia's skirt. "You'll live through it."
Stephen crumpled to the floor, quaking with fear and confusion. With Jon, it had seemed so clear. You were allowed to say no, and the other person had to stop, and it didn't even matter if they were a royal knight and you were still getting used to not being a pet. "Please stop," he keened, face buried in his hands. "It hurts, please, you have to stop!"
"Poor thing has to make it all about him," scoffed one of their captors. "See that? He can't even look at you."
When Olivia spoke, it was in her native tongue, pain-stricken but bell-clear. "I'm sorry," she choked. "Stephen, I am so sorry I got you into this."
"It's not your fault!" cried Stephen. Those were the words Jon whispered in his ear over and over when he woke up from the worst kind of nightmare, and Olivia didn't even get to wake up. "It's not your fault, it's not your fault...."
acing in a tight circle in front of the building, Jon tried to ignore the increasingly curious looks from passersby. It was much harder than it should have been.Jon had felt plenty of stress before, and if any situation called for worry, surely this one did. But this anguish, it didn't make sense, it was as if—
Stephen.
Of course. Stephen was nearby after all. Close enough for their link to kick in, for him to scream and Jon's throat to ache in sympathy.
It's okay, he thought, trying to sort his own emotions from Stephen's, to organize the jumble of feeling into recognizable communication. We're right here. We're coming to get you. You'll be out of there soon.
Panic. Bone-shaking, gut-clenching panic. Jon couldn't fix this; it was already too late; nothing would ever put it back together. A rift in the soul so wide it was filled with stars....
We pulled you back together then, countered Jon, ignoring the sense that he might as well be arguing with a tidal wave. We can do it again. But just like then, you've got to help me, okay? Think about where you are; tell me how to get to you. Come on, Stephen, trust me. Hear me!
on...."(In that instant Olivia envied Stephen more than anything, would have sufferered any number of tortures for a friend so dear that their name alone gave her strength.)
"Jon...it's the flower...."
ou're free to search the cubicles too, of course," said the Editor-in-Chief primly, as Kristen scoured her office for false walls or secret panels. "But I can't imagine what—""Kristen!"
Kristen nearly shattered the glass panels in the door as she burst through. Jon stood in the front lobby, ignoring a security guard who was doubtless explaining that he would have to check his sword.
"The flower!" he exclaimed the instant he spotted her. "They're in a sealed cell. Our end of the transportation spell is located in the statue of the flower!"
n the next moment, everything went redand bright
and hot.
no subject
Oh my goodness she's made of fire. I really hope that was on purpose.
Love the varying success at sneaking around.
(I found you through Doctor Who, so I have no idea who most of these people are, and I'm a little confused- is Olivia nomming things a reference to canon, or is it backstory we haven't gotten yet?)
no subject
(Back when Olivia was first brought on the Daily Show, there was some wank -- in the fandom sense, although probably some in the other sense too -- about how she wasn't good enough for it, in part because she once ate a hot dog in a sexy way. [Never mind that TDS' most enduringly popular clip involves Stephen eating a banana in a sexy way...] So her captors' sneering is a reference to that. Other icky things that got said about her IRL are alluded to in the Harlot articles.)
no subject
(Huh. That's... strange, but not surprising.)
no subject
Oh Jon. (By the way, I've always thought the best way to answer the question 'When did you stop beating your wife?' was to reply with '{insert age here} years ago.')
GO GET YOUR PRINCESS KRISTEN!
no subject
no subject
Next up: Kristen brings the pwn.
no subject
Oh, Stephen, you poor, poor thing...
no subject
The bad guys only really care about hurting Olivia (and they're succeeding); it hasn't even registered with them that they could be seriously triggering Stephen in the process. Although Olivia now knows enough about his history to figure it out -- so she feels guilty about that on top of everything else. (What they're doing is absolutely not her fault, but guilt does not yield to logic.)
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Lots and lots of love for this chapter. And Olivia's LOLcat Commedian, omg. At "Your argument is invalid" I think I died.
Also, protective!Jon, oh lovelovelove.
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Adorable Olivia is adorable. And you can never have too much protective!Jon.
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That, or he lost it in a fight—and if it's someone he can't beat, it's probably someone I can't beat, at least not alone. Now go!"
I like that Stephen is a skilled fighter and not just a woobie.
Okay I see that this is where this fic enters the realm of controversy. You're not exactly hiding your feelings on this one. And that's okay!
Why do they choose sexual assault as a method to hurt her?
Stephen's reaction is very interesting as well:
With Jon, it had seemed so clear. You were allowed to say no, and the other person had to stop, and it didn't even matter if they were a royal knight and you were still getting used to not being a pet. "Please stop," he keened, face buried in his hands. "It hurts, please, you have to stop!"
Has Stephen started to think of his previous sexual experiences as rape?
And is this something that he has figured out on his own?
In that instant Olivia envied Stephen more than anything, would have sufferered any number of tortures for a friend so dear that their name alone gave her strength.
;_;
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Heh, my favorite reveal in the first story is where Stephen breaks out the bodyguard training. Because he's been so docile up until then, and suddenly you find out that he absolutely does not have to be.
I struggled with this fic for a while, then finally decided to just disclaimer it and post it and cross my fingers. The reason the bad guys here are would-be rapists is the same as the reason Bill O'Reilly in this reality is a slave-owning soul-stealer: because at the end of the day it's OTT idfic. Obviously it's informed by my Feelings on the subject, but keeping it realistic or nuanced was not on the agenda.
...and if you get me started, I could carry on for paragraphs about how this AU would be a horrible platform for satirizing our world's social issues ^_^; For one thing, it has completely different structures of prejudice (homophobia doesn't seem to exist, sexism manifests differently, there's bias based on country of origin but it doesn't seem to be related to skin color, and then there's the slavery...), and for another, I haven't actually thought out how they came to be, much less bothered to ensure that they make sense.
Up until recently Stephen's whole life, not just the sexual parts, has been shaped by power and control and the notion that his body and will are not his own. It's hard for him to have perspective on this because it's so huge and all-consuming. The ability to see himself as an independent person was uploaded directly into his brain (Matrix-style!) by Jon while they were soulbonded, which had the advantage of being quick, but didn't give him any chance to process. But now Olivia's assault is happening in enough of a microcosm that he can see it for what it is. He doesn't necessarily have the vocabulary to explain it (and he's triggered enough that his thoughts are falling back on very simple terms anyway), but he definitely understands that there are parallels.
...and all this time Olivia gets her own personal trauma, which is much more straightforward: she's a stranger in a strange land without a soul in the world she can count on. Or so she thinks.
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He is kind of chubby and old, but strong and muscular... Mmmm...
. The ability to see himself as an independent person was uploaded directly into his brain (Matrix-style!) by Jon while they were soulbonded, which had the advantage of being quick, but didn't give him any chance to process.
I must say, I loved that scene where he saw himself the way Jon sees him.
I wonder if it's better for him to think of his past in a factual way. Sort of "it is what it is." If he really realizes how much he has been victimised, then won't that knowledge be too much to take in?
From what I remember in Castle Down, he does have some sexual agency of his own and did enjoy sex, even as a "pet". It will be interesting to see how he treats Olivia now that he sees her as having (almost) gone through what he now realizes he has gone through.
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Stephen can't avoid processing his feelings about his past forever -- note the mention that he has nightmares. But ideally he'll have opportunities to do it in a slower, more controlled way, rather than being hit over the head with it.
He managed to carve out what agency he could within the bounds he was given, which isn't the same thing. The magical mindlink with Jon is what's currently keeping their boundaries from getting muddled. That's another way in which Olivia's assault brings his feelings into sharp relief, because it isn't fraught (in Stephen's mind, at least -- her personal view has its own complications) with Stephen's confusion over "it's not like I hated all of it" or "sometimes I initiated it" or "I was born into this position; maybe it's just what I'm destined to be."
(IRL!O'Reilly has said some similar victim-blaming things about children in abusive situations. Turn that logic up to eleven, and you start to approach the rationale for Vulpis' slaveholding system.)