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badhabitscollection · 1 year

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So Much (For) Blitz —An exclusive reveal of the star of Fall Out Boy’s latest album cover

Fall Out Boy’s latest effort So Much (For) Stardust) has been critically acclaimed and lauded by fans as some of their best work to date. The album artwork, prominently featuring a doberman, has left some puzzled and looking for additional context as to the dog’s identity and how the artwork came to be. The Bad Habits Collection is proud to bring you the exclusive reveal of the dog featured on the cover of their eighth studio album alongside the full story of how they were discovered.

—

When Fall Out Boy officially announced their eighth studio album on January 18th, 2023 and unveiled the album artwork for So Much (For) Stardust, there were a lot of opinions to be had. Some of the fans immediately felt connected and claimed it as their own, some compared it to Fiona Apple’s 2020 release Fetch the Bolt Cutters, and some downright found it revolting. Overall, most agreed that it was polarizing to say the least. Donned in an all black background, the front cover features both the name of the band and the album itself in the work of Omar Mroz (hereinafter referred to by his online moniker Mr.Oz). The text is covered in glitter and written out in the same style featured earlier in the rollout of FOB8’s album cycle with A Claymation Fall Out Boy Celebration, dropped as a surprise present from the band on Christmas one month earlier. The headlining attraction of this sideshow was in fact just a simple square box, containing a swirling artistic depiction of a doberman barking in the presence of a froth of bubbles.

From the moment I first laid eyes on the iconography of Fall Out Boy’s new era, I had just two questions in mind: Who is the dog? & Why choose the dog? A few obvious possibilities were immediately ruled out. Solely based on what’s been posted to social media, this dog did not belong to Pete, Joe, or Andy. Patrick has remained dormant online for years at this point, but still the odds felt slim. I did my best to brush it off, but ultimately I kept coming back to the thought of WHY? If you’re familiar with my previous work on the history of Take This To Your Grave’s album cover, you already know this type of sentiment means a lot to me. After a while of waiting for the band to bring up the topic in an interview or statement, I had essentially given up hope on any type of official explanation. It was at this moment, just 3 days before the release of the record, that I accepted the reality of the situation. This wasn’t a hot topic within the fandom. And no one was going to provide me with the answers I was looking for. If I wanted to know more, it was solely up to me. So… I got to work. —

To take a step back, the artwork for So Much (For) Stardust first hit the internet on January 11th, seven days before the official reveal. Posted alongside the name of the first single Love From The Other Side, our barking pup friend was featured on the home feed of FILTER | NEWs on VK, a Russian social media site that I’ve been told is comparable to Facebook. The artwork was watermarked with a subtle, transparent white logo for FILTER in the background. Despite this post being up for five days (a millennia on the worldwide web), it wasn’t until the 16th that the fandom at large made this discovery, with many claiming it was an outright fake.

However, the *stars* started to align proving this leak to have a dose or two of authenticity. Mr.Oz’s claymation video from earlier in the rollout followed the story of a similar looking doberman, who just so happened to pose in the final frame in a style strongly resembling the leaked cover.

Beyond that, a post from lyricist and bassist Pete Wentz’s Instagram dating back just two days earlier was quickly dug up. On the 4th slide of the carousel, there it was: a selfie of Pete with a Santa hat on and propped up on the shelf behind him... the physical painting of the doberman seen on the leaked cover.

All but confirmed at this point, one last clue presented itself online. The freshly created Twitter account “@muchstardust” popped up out of nowhere, making itself known by following myself and a few other notable hardcore fans in this space. @muchstardust made just one single tweet before being suspended (for reasons unknown).

The post featured three images, the watermarked cover, Pete’s selfie, and notably, a compressed form of the actual photo taken of man’s best friend —the same one the leaked cover features an oil painting rendition of.

— As we all know now, this leak was indeed real and confirmed as the album artwork just a few days later by Fall Out Boy themselves. But that’s when the trail went cold. Later promotional photos featuring the band and taken by their long time collaborator Pamela Littky included another doberman, but clearly not the same one once examined a bit closer. On March 21st, the Chicago rock group posted “What do you think the dog’s name is? 🫧”, but never followed up with the answer. It’s as if they were taunting me specifically with how vocal I had been about wanting to solve this mystery. Just before the album’s official release, I was tipped off by someone with an early copy of the CD that the liner notes of So Much (For) Stardust credit Safia Latif for the cover painting and Jen Patterson for the photograph the cover painting was based on. With new pieces of the puzzle in play, my search for the dog in question was reignited. However, my leads proved of little to no help. I could not get in touch with Safia and could not properly identify Jen Patterson online for the life of me. Taking the hunt back to the drawing board, I reverse image searched the photo @muchstardust had originally provided, which even at this point, months later, was our only source of the actual photograph. Littered with results of the album artwork naturally, I did come across one potential connection. Once again, I found myself on the public timeline of someone’s VK.com profile. “dextromethorpan 3” had included the same photograph in a gallery of different doberman puppies posted on December 21st, 2020. This was…something. Sure, this photo likely did not originate from the VK profile I had unearthed, but at least now I knew it had been around the web for a few years. Scratching my head, I wondered how Fall Out Boy had originally come across this image. Was it something that came up on one of their feeds? Or perhaps just a keyword search? Taking it to different forms of social media, I found a potential match on the /r/doberman subreddit posted 10 months ago. Titled “Cool pic of us playing with bubbles”, the dobie in question featured strikingly similar features and color patterns, and was of course, playing with bubbles.

So I did what any other sane fan would do… and sent a private message to the Redditor the night before the album dropped with Jen’s photograph. “/u/drc55555” responded Saturday morning agreeing that the dog did look a lot like their own, but that they didn’t recognize the photograph. I woke up in a cold sweat seeing the glimpse of the Reddit notification on my iPhone and replied informing them of the cover of Fall Out Boy’s brand new release and asking if the user was the Jen Patterson credited in the album’s booklet. A day later, they replied once again noting that they weren’t Jen, but that this has sparked a memory of another DM they had received in the fall of last year from an Elektra Records personnel, Fueled By Ramen’s distributor who Fall Out Boy had publicly rejoined the roster of just this January. Indeed, 200 days ago from this very conversation, a marketing representative from the label had reached out to the Redditor through the same platform letting them know that an artist they work with had come across the very same photo I myself found and that the artist had fallen in love with it, hoping to use it as part of the artwork for an upcoming project. /u/drc55555 had conceded that they regretted not responding at the thought of how their dog could have become famous. This is when I knew, I was HOT on the trail. Either a member of FOB discovered this photo of their dog while scrolling Reddit or had specifically sought out the same search terms as me, which meant the actual photograph used on the cover could have potentially been found through the very same method. My search accelerated and within a few hours I had run a variety of similar terms by Twitter, TikTok, Facebook, really any social media site I could get my hands on. Nothing had come up, but I hadn’t called it a day quite yet as one of the more obvious sites remained: Instagram. Heading to the explore page I have barely used in my own time on the platform, I typed in the same keywords that brought me to the pup’s uncanny match on Reddit: “doberman bubbles”. And there it was, exactly 60 rows down, right in the center, the original image of the dog I had been looking for all along along with an alternate photo of the same dog in the next slide in the same setting captioned “BUBBLES!!!!!”, posted —you guessed it, in 2020.

— With this case officially closed, I’m beyond stoked to introduce Blitz the Doberman to other fans of Fall Out Boy. At the time of publication, Blitz has 12.8k followers on his public Instagram account, which lead me to question how this match hadn’t already been made. Blitz’s bio reveals he was born on February 27th, 2019 and lives in Las Vegas with his human, one Jen Patterson.

In a beautiful twist of fate, within the hour of finishing the final draft of this piece, Blitz’s humans responded to my inquiry from earlier in the week. I spoke with Jen at length who was happy to share her story exclusively with The Bad Habits Collection. Similarly to the Redditor from earlier, a marketing rep from Elektra Records had reached out to her through Instagram on September 20th, 2022 inquiring about using a picture of her pup for one of their artists’ work, a message she initially regarded as spam. Eventually, she came to an agreement with Elektra, however, this story ended there for her. Up until Jen read the direct message I sent to Blitz’s account, she had not the slightest idea that he was featured on the cover of the new album of one of the biggest modern rock bands left in the world. I was shocked to hear this, but Jen on the other hand was incredibly excited to learn of the breaking news. I shared a photo with her of her name printed in the liner notes of So Much (For) Stardust, a cool moment for us both. Jen told me “I never considered myself a photographer, but that’s amazing!” When I asked about how Blitz already had such a huge following on Instagram, she told me all about how she’s networked with others in a doberman group and has kept a steady stream of posts coming on the daily. In discussion of what she’d like for others to take away from this article, Jen simply hoped others would get to know Blitz’s name —my entire goal of this investigation all along. Half-joking, she expressed that she’d also love to have gotten her hands on some merchandise with his face on it. Infinitely grateful for her responding to my DM and taking the time to talk with me, I’ve personally sent Jen physical copies of So Much (For) Stardust in both vinyl and CD format. I’ll be sure to update this write-up with a photo of FOB’s newest mascot posing with his album cover when they arrive! Closing out our conversation, Jen let me know that she “felt like if you hadn’t reached out, we would not have known.” To be honest, there were times in this journey that I thought it might be for the best if I gave up the search for this pup as to not invade anyone’s privacy. I figured if Blitz hadn’t already made himself known publicly, maybe there was a specific reason behind not doing so. I would have never guessed that reason was because his family were simply unaware of his new-found fame. I feel honored to have been the one to share this discovery with Blitz’s owners and again want to thank them for their contributions to this piece. Jen has also graciously shared the original photograph of Blitz the cover was based on in its full resolution, uncropped:

—

After scouring the internet to to uncover this story, it all leads me to just one final question: Why Blitz? What’s the connection? Moreover, what’s the intended meaning here? Jen let me know that she herself was unaware of how and why the photograph was found and selected, but we can naturally draw our own conclusions. Discussing this topic with other longtime fans of the band, all have come to the same conclusion that Fall Out Boy’s latest effort features some of Pete’s bleakest lyrics in a long time paired somehow ever so perfectly with some of Patrick’s most uplifting and dance-worthy melodies to date. As my partner pointed out, the album artwork depicts a breed known for their usage as guard dogs with a tough exterior, but shown playing lightheartedly with what’s usually associated as a child’s toy. In the words of fellow Fall Out Boy historian and Bad Habits Collection collaborator Tommy McPhail, the cover displays “the epitome of boundless joy and simplified bliss amongst chaos”, a phrase that perfectly sums up the entire feeling artistically and masterfully expressed in So Much (For) Stardust in my own eyes. Fall Out Boy’s newest full-length studio record So Much (For) Stardust, produced by the legendary Neal Avron, is one of their strongest statement pieces in years and is now available everywhere music is streamed or sold. You can follow Blitz’s adventures on Instagram: @blitzdoberman — “The kind of pain you feel to get good in the end. Inscribed like stone and faded by the rain: ‘Give up what you love before it does you in.’” Written by Alex Toor for The Bad Habits Collection

#Fall Out Boy #FOB #FOB8 #So Much (For) Stardust #So Much For Stardust #SMFS #2023 #Pete Wentz #Patrick Stump #Joe Trohman #Andy Hurley #Blitz #Blitz Doberman #Blitz The Doberman #Doberman #Fueled By Ramen #Alex Toor #Live On Toor #LiveOnToor

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jinxxsims · 2 years

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*Deep Breath*

Okay, so I started work on this download back when it was 100, but life got busy and when I was able to resume working on it, there were 150. Life got busy again before I was finished, and now there are 250 of you amazing people... but I’m actually getting this thing out there, so yay for that.

There are 61 meshes in this download, and hundreds of recolors. A quick rundown of what’s included:

Some of @aroundthesims 4t2 tattoo parlor set. The chair is cloned from pikkon’s tattoo chair, so it’s a double for the makeover chair. The single rolling drawer is an end table that is slaved to the double sideboard, so you need the double for the single to show up.

High School Years’ Starry Eyed prom/dance set, which contains the balloon arch (sculpture), backdrop (sculpture), dining table, dining chair, and banquet table, cloned from a very similar table by @veranka-downloads

And finally, I converted at least one thing from every expansion pack and game pack from Sims 4 currently released that hadn’t been converted before, plus a few deco things from Sandy @ ATS that I really wanted in my game.

From top left to bottom right...

Girl Scout cookies (ATS, sculpture) • Pepperidge Farm cookies (ATS, sculpture) • Royal Dansk cookie tin (ATS, sculpture) • Teddy Grams (ATS, sculpture) • Arrrmed Dining Chair (Base Game) • Captain Rodrigo Dining Chair (Base Game) • Salyut Aeronaut Chair (Base Game) • Booping Shnoops (Cats & Dogs, sculpture) • Crate End Table (Cats & Dogs) • Town Statue 4 (Cats & Dogs Debug) • Town Statue 5 (Cats & Dogs Debug) • Fuzzread Article (City Living) • M.A.P. Most Amazing Player (City Living) • Chicken Competition Prize Ribbon (Cottage Living Debug, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and participation ribbon recolors included) • Food Platter (Dine Out Debug) • Party’s Over Chair (Discover University) • Polymer Chameleon Barstool (Discover University) • Very Impressive Lawyery Desk Chair (Discovery University) • Very Impressive Lawyery Desk (Discover University) • Fabric Sampe Book (Dream Home Decorator Debug) • Bougie Burlap Sofa (Eco Lifestyle) • Biochemical Medical (sculpture, Get Famous) • The Queen’s Gossip Chair (Get Famous) • Seat of the House barstool (Get Together) • Doctor of Medicine Diploma & My First Simolean (Get to Work) • Ever-So-Versatile Chillbox End Table (Get to Work) • Modern Metallic Illuminated Display Case (not illuminated, but functional table, Get to Work) • Stainless Steel Fab Slab (Get to Work) • Bubbly Barstool (High School Years) • Cheer Megaphone (sculpture, High School Years) • Clear as Crystal Coffee Table (High School Years) • High School Event Banner (High School Years) • Modest Marcel Dining Chair (High School Years) • Call Me Ottoman (functional living chair, Island Living) • Bug Bite Cure (Journey to Batuu) • Supply Crate (functional end table, Journey to Batuu) • Stool de Selvadorada (Jungle Adventures) • Fenwick the V Banquet Table (3-tiled table, My Wedding Stories) • Not Your Average Firewood Loveseat (Outdoor Retreat) • Timber Log Chair (Outdoor Retreat) • Brohill Barstool (Parenthood) • Magical Crystal Cluster 2, 3, and 4 (Realm of Magic Debug) • Violets are Blue Flower Arranging Station (functional table, Seasons) • Spirit Doll (Snowy Escape) • Pillow for Deep Thoughts (was a throw pillow, but I turned it into a functional bean bag chair, Spa Day) • The Sign Saw You (Strangerville Debug) • You Saw the Sign (Strangerville Debug) • Dead Hawthorn Tree (sculpture, Vampires) • Fenry Chompsalot Jr. (sculpture, Werewolves)

When it comes to the downloads, there are two options for you to choose from. One offers each of the meshes in a separate folder with its recolors and the textures for each so you can pick and choose what you want to keep. The second zip is all the recolors merged with their respective meshes, so there are 61 total files. You only need to download one.

I hope everyone finds at least a few things they can use. Enjoy! And thank you for following!

Download Individual Files

Download Merged Files

#sims 2 download #download #s2cc #4t2cc #4t2 conversion #AroundTheSims

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hyperfixatedimagines · 2 years

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The Queen & her Lady- Chapter 1

Summary: The third, unruly, unmarried, unbowed daughter of Prince Qoren Martell of Dorne is sent to King's Landing to be a lady in waiting. Initially unwilling, Princess (Y/N) soon falls for a certain Queen in green.

A/N: This starts out a few months before episode 8. It will be show divergent in that Aemond is aged up to about 17. It will be book canon divergent in regards to House Martell's support during the War for the Stepstones. This is Alicent x f!reader but there is a bit of Aemond x f!reader (mainly platonic), but heads up if you aren't down for that. I always welcome feedback and take requests so if you have any, shoot me a line.

(Y/N) had spent many a night in the great library of Sunspear. To her family it seemed as though she lived there. Her eldest sister swore (Y/N) had read every book in the Sunspear library at least twice.

She was a voracious reader but mainly she dreamed of seeing the many wonders of the world as described in the books she read. (Y/N) dreamed of adventure and discovery.

But she had been confined all her life to Sunspear. (Y/N) had been born with a delicate constitution. She had contracted a deadly fever as a young child and almost died. After many a worrisome night (Y/N)'s fever broke and she recovered. Because of this scare her father kept her much closer in fear that (Y/N) would become ill once again and he would lose his youngest daughter.

(Y/N) was not the heir, she was not even the spare as that honor belonged to her elder sister Coryanne. No, (Y/N) was the third daughter, the third in line. The best she could hope for was a good marriage to one of the lords of Dorne.

Much to her father's dismay, (Y/N) had proclaimed from a young age that she would never marry. A husband would not allow her to travel to the far corners of the world and learn from all the grandest centers of knowledge. She would be forced to have children...to stay in whatever castle her husband was lord of and confine her mind to whatever his library contained.

Qoren paid it no mind for many years...until it seemed as though (Y/N)'s oath was something she intended to keep. Many a suitor was brought in from all the great houses in Dorne. All of them brought books, some rare and some (Y/N) had never heard of, but (Y/N) would always keep the books and send the boy away.

At seventeen (Y/N) had fallen ill once again. Once again her father worried over the fate of his daughter's life. And once again (Y/N) beat the sickness and recovered faster than the maesters predicted she would.

So Qoren continued to indulge his daughter's spinsterhood. He made sure to have new books brought in from the ports every couple months for (Y/N).

(Y/N) wasn't happy in Sunspear, but it had been all she knew, it was her home. She longed for adventure, to see the world, but the day her father announced that she was to leave for King's Landing and be a lady in waiting to Queen Alicent Hightower (Y/N) felt a dread creep over her.

Why her? Why now?

Unfortunately the princess wouldn't know the true nature of the agreement, at least not until it was too late.

King Viserys longed to unite the seven kingdoms as all his predecessors had. But Dorne was a land that managed to slip through the Targaryen's fingers time and time again. So he'd try a different route, one not new to them, but one his family had not employed in some time.

He wrote to Prince Qoren. Viserys wrote of his desire to continue the peaceful relationship between them. The king offered to marry his son Aemond to one of his daughters. Qoren wrote back, sharing similar sentiments, as the Targaryens power had only grown in the last couple of years and he did not wish to plunge Dorne into another war. So Qoren accepted the marriage proposal, and told the king he'd wed his youngest daughter to Aemond. Princess (y/n) was two years Aemond's senior while Coryanne was much older. Prince Qoren also asked the King to keep the marriage between trusted individuals as he would break the news to (y/n) when the time was right. (y/n) was free spirited and did not take to the idea of marriage as easily as other girls. King Viserys understood, as his own daughter was much the same. So they agreed that to the world (y/n) would be coming to King's Landing as a lady in waiting for the Queen. She would meet Aemond, and get to know him before her father would tell her the true reason of her travels.

King Viserys informed only his wife, Queen Alicent, and his hand, Otto Hightower of the truth.

Alicent hoped the girl would take to Aemond, and that Aemond would take to her. Aemond was not as loud and brash as his brother Aegon. Aemond preferred to spend his time training with Ser Criston or reading in the keep's library. She hoped the girl would bring a smile to her son's face. Alicent longed for her children to find some form of happiness, even though she never could.

(Y/N) realized what trouble she was in when she could not fit more than six books in her final trunk. Her eldest sister had helped her pack, and of course Aliandra made sure to pack all of the dresses and finery (Y/N) didn't care for. Which left little room for her books.

She stared at the many volumes of histories and philosophy she had laid across her bed. How could she choose between them? She loved them all.

"They have books in King's Landing you know," came her father's voice from behind.

(Y/N) whirled on her feet and faced her father, who stood at the entrance of her chambers.

"What if I'm not allowed in their library," (Y/N) countered.

Her father laughed. "You're not a prisoner. You'll be one of the queen's ladies in waiting."

"There's little difference in times of strife."

At this, her father's smile faded. He sat down on the bed and patted the space next to him for (Y/N) to sit. Qoren explained that he would never send her to King's Landing to be prisoner for the dragon king. Prince Qoren added that he was only helping (Y/N) on her mission to see the world. What better place to start than King's Landing?

(Y/N) could think of a million places that would be a better start. The princess felt there was something her father was not telling her. But she didn't press. She knew a decision like this was not made lightly, and that she would have to perform her duties as a princess of Dorne. Her father had indulged her for many years, and being a lady in waiting would be better than marrying a lord and having his children.

The journey to King's Landing was tiring, and it was too long for (Y/N)'s liking. She had never been in a carriage that long. The second they stepped foot in King's Landing (Y/N) wished for nothing more than food and rest.

The Red Keep was grand but it was a bit disappointing compared to what (Y/N) had imagined. The Queen, and her children, stood outside to greet the Princess.

(Y/N) fell into the mask of propriety she had forged throughout the years. She knew the people outside of Dorne were much more conservative in their actions and words than she had grown up with. So she would play by their rules while she was there.

What (Y/N) had not counted on was the ethereal beauty of Queen Alicent Hightower. The brown- almost auburn- hair that was braided to perfection about her head left (Y/N) with a clear view of the Queen's face. And oh- what a face indeed. The Queen's eyes were large and doe-like. They were tired, an a certain sadness lingered in them but they were nonetheless beautiful. Then came the queen's full lips that looked so soft and inviting. (Y/N) realized she would have to work hard to keep her mask of propriety on tight.

(Y/N), and her family for that matter, had always known the truth of herself. (Y/N) did not care for men, that most people knew, but what they didn't know was that she deeply, deeply, cared for women. If (Y/N) was ever to know true love it would be with another woman, that (Y/N) was certain of.

And she felt it right then, standing in front of Queen Alicent. Her palms began to sweat, and she felt her throat go dry. She could not take her eyes off the Queen.

So distracted by the Queen's beauty, and by her own thoughts, (Y/N) quickly realized she had not heard all of what the Queen had said.

"...and this is Prince Aemond," the Queen finished.

(Y/N) finally tore herself free from staring at the queen and looked to who she had mentioned.

The man, though surely he was but a boy just yesterday, bent his head graciously. "Princess (Y/N), I do hope your journey was not unpleasant."

(Y/N) greeted Aemond. "Thank you Prince Aemond. My journey was a tad tiring but this warm welcome has lifted my spirits."

The Queen gave a smile as she looked between the Princess and her son. "Wonderful. Princess Heleana will show you to your quarters."

The girl, who seemed about (Y/N)'s age if not only a year younger, lead (Y/N) to her quarters as the Queen had said but not without mumbling rhymes and riddles all the way there. (Y/N) wanted to ask, wanted to know what Heleana was talking about but the way the girl seemed to be in a world of her own made (Y/N) refrain from such questions.

After Heleana had left (Y/N) in her chambers (Y/N) crashed on top of the plush bed and closed her eyes for a few brief minutes.

She awoke to a knock on her door.

"Come in," she spoke.

A moment later the Queen walked in.

"I hope you are settling in and are comfortable with the provided chambers," she said as she stood in front of (Y/N). From where the Queen stood she had to look down to see (Y/N).

(Y/N)'s hands started to sweat again. For a brief moment she let herself imagine the Queen hovering over her, looking down on her with those beautiful but sad eyes, and those soft and inviting lips. She slowly rubbed her hands along the blankets on the bed as she stood to get as much sweat off her palms as she could. (Y/N) smiled up at the Queen.

"I am indeed your grace, thank you."

The Queen gave a quick nod. "Good." Then the Queen stood there in silence for a moment, unsure how to proceed.

(Y/N) watched her. "Your grace," she began, hoping her voice would not betray her.

The Queen stepped closer. "Yes?"

"I've never...I've never had ladies in waiting," (Y/N) said. (Y/N)'s eyes had wandered from the Queen's face. "I never cared to have that many girls following me around all day. That was always something more suited to my sister Aliandra," (Y/N) continued.

Her eyes wandered down the Queen's neck, to the Queen's collarbone, then even lower to the small window of cleavage the Queen's dress allowed.

"I'm not sure I'll be any good to you, your grace," (Y/N) finished. She looked away quickly, knowing her gaze should not linger there. Not here, not in King's Landing.

This was not her home. She could not live and do as she pleased the way she had always done in Sunspear. Here she had to be alert, cautious, and above all she could not linger on the beautiful chests of gorgeous women. Especially when it is the Queen's.

The Queen smiled, though it did not reach her eyes. "Your honesty is...a welcome surprise. But please do not fret over that. The other girls will help you, and the servants do most of the work anyways."

(Y/N) lifted her gaze to meet the Queen's. "You're too kind your grace."

The Queen smiled again, and again it did not reach her eyes. "We're having a dinner to welcome you princess. Please join us in twenty minutes time."

"Of course your grace," (Y/N) replied.

Then the Queen made her exit.

Once alone again, (Y/N) fell back onto the bed and covered her face in one of the pillows.

She would have to put those thoughts of the Queen aside if she was to be here long, and if she was to wait on the Queen.

Dinner was uncomfortable to say the least. It was just the Queen, Aemond, Heleana, and (Y/N).

It was not at all like the dinners she was used to having, with her whole family. She was used to loud dinners with music and laughs.

Her first dinner in King's Landing was quiet, save for the pleasantries she exchanged with Aemond and the Queen. The lack of sound made the minutes feel like hours.

Aemond would not meet her gaze, Heleana mumbled more riddles to herself, and the Queen made polite conversation. (Y/N) did her best to navigate the uncomfortable silences.

"So," the Queen began, "your father mentioned in his letter that you liked to read."

(Y/N) nodded. "Indeed your grace. My days at Sunspear were mostly spent in my father's library."

The Queen turned to Aemond. "Perhaps you could show Princess (Y/N) the library here in the Keep."

Aemond looked at his mother. "If you wish it so mother."

The Queen frowned then took a drink of wine.

"Is it vast," (Y/N) asked Aemond. Not that the prince would meet her gaze.

Aemond looked down at his food. "It is."

(Y/N) pressed on. "Then I should like to see it. I brought a few books from home but I've read them more times than I could count." Then she looked to the Queen. "If it is not an imposition, your grace."

"None at all," the Queen replied. She smiled at (Y/N), clearly appreciative of the princess' efforts with her son.

The Queen declared that Aemond show (Y/N) the Keep's library after dinner. Aemond grumbled but did not protest.

Aemond kept his word and led (Y/N) to the castle library after dinner. He lit the candles in the library while (Y/N) explored the room.

The shelves were tall and filled to the brim with books. She looked around the room. This library was bigger than the one at Sunspear, but not by much.

"How is it arranged," (Y/N) asked Aemond.

"Arranged?," Aemond asked.

(Y/N) turned to Aemond, who was staring at her puzzled.

"Yes, are the histories grouped together on a particular shelf? The philosophies?... The tales of princes rescuing fair maidens?" (Y/N) joked.

Aemond did not laugh, but (Y/N) managed to pull a small smile from the grumpy prince's lips.

"I'm afraid I'm not so knowledgeable about the books on princes rescuing fair maidens, but the histories and philosophies are on that end," he said and pointed to the shelves at the far end of the room. "The religious texts, books on languages, and books about the many cities in Essos are on this side," Aemond continued and gestured towards the shelves closest to them.

(Y/n) nodded and stepped closer to the prince. "And where are the books that are discouraged and forbidden to read?" She asked with a mischievous smile on her face.

Aemond stared at the Princess for a minute, his face inscrutable. "Why do you ask?"

"Those are always the most interesting, are they not?"

The Prince returned (y/n)'s devious smile. He stepped closer to the princess. "My favorite section, the dragon texts," he said getting closer. "..are there," he finished and pointed to the shelves just above (Y/N)'s head. "Though they aren't quite suitable for a princess to read."

(Y/N) locked eyes with Aemond. "And why is that?"

"The histories of the dragons and how my ancestors tamed them aren't quite appropriate for proper ladies. They go into great detail about the dancing, singing, fighting," Aemond rattled on getting closer and closer to (Y/N)'s face. "The fucking," he finished with his face inappropriately close to hers.

(Y/N) laughed. Was he trying to intimidate her or was this his clumsy attempt at wooing her? (Y/N) stepped away from Aemond.

"Inappropriate for a lady of these lands sure, but for a princess of Dorne..." (Y/N) whirled around to face Aemond. "A light read before bed."

At this, Aemond let out a laugh. "Right, you Dornish are not so encumbered by Andal customs."

"Last I knew neither were the blood of old Valyria," (Y/N) quipped.

Aemond looked into the Princess' eyes and felt something in him stir. Then he looked away and cleared his throat. "It's getting quite late. I should escort you back to your chambers."

"Of course. Thank you for showing me the library," (Y/N) replied. She was sad she had to leave before really exploring but now that she knew where it was she would have to find a moment to sneak away and return.

So Aemond walked the Dornish princess back to her chambers. The walk was quiet but not in an uncomfortable sense. (Y/N) was pleased to find out that the prince was not so dour and boring as she had feared upon first meeting. And Aemond was intrigued by the princess' playful nature.

Once the two stood outside the princess' chambers, Aemond bid the princess goodnight.

"Good night, zaldrīzes dārilaros (dragon prince)," (Y/N) replied before quickly slipping behind her chamber door.

Aemond stood outside the large brown door with yet another smile on his face. The princess piqued more and more of his curiosity.

The following day the princess awoke to a serving girl informing her the Queen requested her presence in her chambers.

The serving girl quickly helped the princess into her own dress, and the princess hastily combed her messy mane until it was presentable.

Then she was led to the Queen's apartments.

"Good morning your grace," (Y/N) greeted as soon as she was let inside.

The Queen sat at her vanity, her hair loose about her shoulders. She smiled at the Princess, and this time (Y/N) could not detect any sadness in her eyes. "Good morning princess. Did you sleep well?"

"Yes your grace, it was as comfortable as my bed in Sunspear."

"Good, I'm glad to hear so," the Queen responded. Then she motioned for (Y/N) to approach her.

(Y/N) did so but stopped at a respectable distance.

"Do you know how to braid," the Queen asked her.

(Y/N) stomach dropped. Growing up she often dodged her sessions with the septas, and as such she was never very good at what proper young ladies and Princesses should be experts at.

"I do know how your grace, but it is skill in such endeavors that eludes me. My sisters' hands were much more adept," (Y/N) confessed.

The Queen stood up and grabbed (Y/N)'s hands. "Then we will have to practice until you are better than your sisters."

(Y/N) smiled. "I fear we will toil in vain, your grace."

"Nonsense. You're a smart girl are you not," the Queen replied.

(Y/N) nodded. The Queen sat (y/n) down on the bench of the vanity and got to work demonstrating different braiding styles.

(Y/N) did try to listen and follow along with the Queen but all she could think about was the Queen's fingers in her hair, gently braiding it. The feeling of the Queen's fingers raking through her hair flooded her mind with images she knew better than to linger on. This was not Sunspear. She could not think such thoughts.

Then when it was her time to braid the Queen's hair all she could think about was how soft the Queen's hair was. (Y/N) was careful when parting the Queen's hair and even more delicate when braiding it. She handled the Queen's hair as she would an ancient and rare tome.

The Queen was patient with (y/n)'s awkward and unskilled braiding. When needed she kindly corrected (Y/N), and then would demonstrate the correct way of doing it. (Y/N) tried hard to please the Queen and when she finally earned a praise out of the Queen's mouth (Y/N)'s whole body felt weightless.

(Y/N) loved hearing the Queen praise her so she made sure to make less mistakes with the next braiding technique the Queen showed her.

"That's it princess, just like that," the Queen encouraged.

Heat radiated all over her body when she heard the Queen's praise. She could feel her face getting redder. (Y/N) prayed the Queen wouldn't notice, and if she did notice, (Y/N) prayed the Queen was kind enough not to mention it.

Minutes that felt like hours later, the Queen informed (Y/N) that she had improved considerably in their time together. The Queen was sure the princess would be a braiding expert by the week's end.

"You honor me your grace," (Y/N) replied, her cheeks rosy and warm.

The Queen did not comment on it but she did notice the way the princess would turn red when the Queen complemented her. She did not think much of it. She figured the princess had not anticipated the Queen being capable of kindness. The Queen was no stranger to the horrible rumors that had spread of her, especially after the dagger incident on Driftmark all those years ago. She reached out for the princess' hands.

"You honor your house, princess," the Queen said and gave (Y/N)'s hands a light squeeze.

The Queen found it easy to be kind to (Y/N), easier than being kind had been for her in the last ten years. She would keep (Y/N) close, the Queen thought to herself. She would keep (Y/N) close and be kind to her. She liked the feeling that bloomed in her chest when the princess smiled at her. It almost felt familiar.

Hours later Talya walked into the Queen's apartments. "I was unable to find Princess (Y/N) your grace," Talya said with her head bowed.

The Queen set her goblet down on the table in front of her. "Did you check the library?"

Talya nodded. "Yes your grace. She was not there and not in her chambers."

"Please keep searching, and alert me when you find her," the Queen proclaimed.

Talya nodded then bowed and exited the room.

Now alone, the Queen surveyed all the food that she had requested be made for her to dine with (Y/N). All of it would now go to waste as the princess had made herself difficult to find.

Where could (Y/N) have gone to?

So the Queen stood and left her apartments to search for the princess. She let out a deep sigh. This was most impolite of the princess.

"Are you alright your grace," came a deep voice behind her.

Alicent turned. It was Ser Criston. She relaxed. "Yes, well I will be alright when we find princess (y/n)."

"Has she fled the keep?"

She stopped walking and thought about it for a second. The princess would not do something so rash, would she? She had seemed happy the last time Alicent saw her, just hours ago when she taught the princess how to braid.

"No...I don't believe so. If she's anything like princes and princesses of the Red Keep she is probably hiding away somewhere reading something she probably should not be," Alicent replied with a soft smile pulling at the corner of her mouth.

Ser Criston nodded. "Then let us find her at once."

Alicent agreed and off they went in search of the princess. Thankfully for them the very first place Alicent thought to look is where the princess was.

Her stomach knotted when she saw (y/n) underneath the keep's weirwood tree. (Y/N) sitting there, reading a book, with her hair falling all over the pages of the book that sat on her lap, forced Alicent to remember the many days she and Rhaenyra spent giggling and dreaming of things that could never be under that very tree.

"Leave me Ser Criston," Alicent commanded.

Criston did as his Queen asked and bid her goodbye.

Alicent slowly walked closer to (y/n), not wanting to startle her.

"That book must be awfully interesting if you left the Queen of the seven kingdoms alone to eat her meal to come out here and read it," she teased.

(y/n)'s gaze shot up to where Alicent stood. (y/n) stood up so quick the large book fell to the wayside and let out a loud thump when it landed on the ground.

"Your grace I- I was not..I mean I-," (y/n) stuttered, her face going pink.

Alicent crossed the distance between them and picked up the book. She looked down at it. It was a history of the warrior queen, Nymeria of Ny Sar. Alicent's smile dropped. She gripped the book tightly. Alicent was instantly transported back to that day in the godswood with Rhaenyra. Alicent opened the book and thumbed through the pages until she found it, the leftover edges of the page that Rhaenyra had torn out and given to Alicent. She swallowed hard.

(Y/N) watched as the Queen searched the pages of the book until she came across a part of the book where a page had clearly been torn out. The Queen carefully ran her finger over what little remained of the page.

"I'm sorry I missed dining with you, your grace. I was unaware of how much time I had spent here," (y/n) explained.

This seemed to pull the Queen out of her reverie. She closed the book and looked up at (y/n). "You must have read a hundred books about princess Nymeria. So why did this one captivate you so much you forgot your manners?"

The Queen's harsh tone caught (y/n) off guard.

"I...You are correct your grace. I have read many a history about my ancestor." (y/n) reached out for the book. "I was intrigued by this maester's account as it differs from the many I have read in Sunspear..."

The Queen quickly handed the book back to (y/n) , as if it burned her to hold it. (Y/n) opened it to the section with the page torn out.

"But I was captivated by this missing page." (y/n) ran her hand down the book. "I know what page should be here. I know how the story goes by heart."

(Y/N) looked back up to find the Queen staring intently at her.

"So I asked myself why someone tore out this page? Why this page specifically? Did it have some meaning to the person who ripped it out? Did they loathe my ancestor so much that they tore it out in rage?"

The Queen's eyes started to water. So she turned away from the princess and dabbed at her eyes with the sleeve of her dress.

Princess (y/n) looked back down at the book and smoothed out the surrounding pages. "Or did they love her so much they wished to keep the page of her victory close to them forever?" (y/n) finished.

At this the Queen turned back to face (y/n). (y/n) slowly looked back up at the Queen.

"I am truly sorry I have insulted you your grace. It was not my intention to miss dining with you...I was looking forward to it actually." (y/n) felt her face heat up as the final words came out of her mouth.

The Queen softened. "It's quite alright princess. You are still adjusting to life here." She offered the princess a small smile.

This seemed to calm the princess as (y/n) let out a breath and returned the Queen's smile.

The Queen walked to the weirwood tree then sat down underneath it's leaves. She motioned for the princess to sit next to her. The princess did so.

"I know the answer to your question," the Queen said.

"You do," (y/n) replied.

The Queen nodded. "It was torn out by a spoiled, tempestuous..," the Queen began, the venom in her voice slowly fading as she stared up at the moon with a faraway look in her eyes. "...a free spirited and idealistic girl," she finished, her voice but a whisper.

Then the Queen closed her eyes and shook her head. When she opened them again she looked over at (y/n). (y/n) stared at the Queen with a small smile on her face.

There it was again. Something blooming in her chest.

"So it was torn out in love?" (y/n) asked.

The Queen let out a small laugh. "No, not love...something more naive."

"Hope?," (y/n) replied.

The Queen nodded. "Something like that."

"Your grace, I hope that my transgression today has not tainted any future invitation to dine with you."

(y/n) had looked forward to eating a meal with the Queen. She liked being around the Queen. In truth, she liked the feeling that radiated through her body when she earned a smile from the Queen.

"Were you anyone else, I would have said the offense was too great to forgive," the Queen said as she set the large book aside. The Queen turned to (y/n) and beamed at her. "But, seeing as how you were indisposed with such a captivating mystery I shall excuse the lapse in manners."

Without thinking (y/n) reached out for the Queen's hands. "Thank you your grace. I swear it will not happen again."

The Queen froze.

Princess (y/n) realized the impropriety of her action and quickly pulled her hands away. "Forgive me your grace I forgot myself," she pleaded and looked down at the ground, tears forming at the corners of her eyes. She had just earned the Queen's forgiveness for her lack of good breeding only to commit an impulsive foolish action. Surely the Queen would not forgive her a second time.

It was improper. It was thoughtless. It was all too quickly taken back.

Alicent felt the ghost of the princess' hands on her own.

Maybe it was because they were sitting underneath the weirwood tree. Maybe it was the memories of a happier time flooding her mind. Or maybe it was the ease with which (y/n) had reached out to touch her.

But Alicent found herself wanting to hold the princess' hands.

She watched as tears fell from the princess' face. This brought Alicent back to herself.

Alicent reached out and touched the princess' shoulder.

"It's alright princess," she said.

The princess looked back up at Alicent. "That was inappropriate of me your grace."

Alicent smiled. "You are young. You were led by the boldness of youth."

She noticed the princess' shoulders relax.

"You are too kind to me your grace," (y/n) confessed.

"I am kind with too few these days," Alicent replied, a bit embarrassed at how true it was.

The princess smiled. "Then I am even more fortunate that you have blessed me with so much of it."

This time when something bloomed in Alicent's chest she realized what it was. It was something she had not felt in decades. It was something that made a chill run down her spine.

More importantly, it was something she would do anything to keep feeling.

#alicent hightower x reader #alicent higtower imagine #alicent hightower #team green #rhaenicent

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coolbeans32 · 5 months

Text

Echoes of Destiny: The Serpent and the Phoenix

PAIRING: Tom Riddle x F!Reader(OC)

SYNOPSIS: Harry, Hermione, and Ron delve into Dumbledore's puzzle, examining the scrapbook and magical texts to locate Genevieve Ariana Dumbledore Grindelwald. Three days pass as they decipher Dumbledore's cryptic messages, tension mounting with each failed attempt. Hermione's discovery of a hidden message sparks hope, leading them to Grindelwald Manor. Despite Ron's skepticism and Hermione's sass, Harry urges focus, emphasizing Genevieve's importance. With renewed determination, they plan to depart for the manor, vowing to protect Genevieve from Voldemort's grasp. As they bid goodnight, Ron reassures Harry, pledging unity against Voldemort. Their minds already brimming with strategies, the trio prepares to confront the challenges ahead in their quest to uncover Dumbledore's secrets and thwart Voldemort's darkness.

WARNINGS: This passage doesn't contain any form of triggers/warnings aside from tension between characters and small bickering arguments.

WORD COUNT: 672 (shorter chapter)

Previous Part| Next Part

Chapter Two

The Name

Harry, Hermione, and Ron sat around a large oak table cluttered with an array of magical texts, worn-out parchment, and the scrapbook itself. It has been three days since they’ve received their respective items, and were trying to figure out Dumbledore’s puzzle, in hopes to find Genevieve. The soft glow of the candlelight illuminates their determined faces as they diligently scour the pages, their fingers tracing over faded photographs and handwritten notes.

Hermione was tracing her finger along the edges of a faded photograph of Albus, Gellert, and Genevieve; her eyebrow furrowed in concentration as she observed the image. “I still can't believe it. Dumbledore had a daughter, and we never knew.”

Ron nodded solemnly, his expression reflecting the gravity of the situation. “Yeah, it's a lot to take in. But at least now we have a name. Genevieve Ariana Dumbledore Grindelwald, doesn't know how that is much help. Honestly, why couldn't Dumbledore give us her location instead of all this,” he remarks as he gestures to piles of books layed out in front of them. “Honestly, it feels like we’re studying for bloody OWLs all over again.”

Hermione replied irritated, “As if you have done any studying in the first place. You haven’t even passed the first page, and we’re not even studying for anything Ronald.”

Ron replied, “But it’s just so much reading ‘Mione! We don’t even know if this will even help us even figure out the first clue.”

"Honestly, Ron, if reading past one page were an Olympic sport, you'd be a gold medalist in giving up," Hermione sassily clapped back.

Harry ran a hand through his unruly hair, his green eyes reflecting a mixture of annoyance and cheekiness . “Guys, this isn’t the time to act like a married couple, we need to find her. She could be our best chance at understanding Dumbledore's past and what he was trying to tell us to do.” Both Hermione and Ron blushed and glanced away from each other.

Hermione agreed and said, “You’re right, but we have to be careful. We can’t let you-know-who find out about her. Especially with their history.”

Ron finished her sentence, his voice tinged with apprehension, “He'll stop at nothing to use her against us…especially if he can get her on his side, they were together before, I wouldn’t put it past him.”

Harry met their gazes with a steely determination, “We won't let that happen. We'll find Genevieve, and we'll protect her, no matter what.” The trio shares a silent moment of solidarity, their resolve strengthened by their shared mission. Suddenly, Hermione's voice breaks the silence, drawing their attention back to the task at hand.

Hermione, her eyes lighting up with excitement as she points to a corner of the page, “Look! I think I found something.” She gestures towards the corner of the page where the edges of a piece of parchment peek out from beneath a photograph. Ron's eyes widen with anticipation as he eagerly reaches over and carefully lifts the corner, revealing the handwritten words "Grindelwald Manor" scrawled in elegant script, underneath the photograph.

“Grindelwald Manor. That's got to be our next destination then,” Ron exclaims.

Harry nodded in agreement, a determined glint in his eyes, “Then let's get ready and pack. We should leave first thing tomorrow morning. The sooner, the better.”

The trio move to gather their belongings and prepare for the journey ahead, the weight of their mission hangs heavy in the air. But amidst the uncertainty and danger, there is also a glimmer of hope—the hope of finding Genevieve and uncovering the truth about Dumbledore's past.

Ron placed a reassuring hand on Harry's shoulder, “We'll find her, mate. I promise.”

Harry returned the gesture with a small, grateful smile, “Thanks, Ron. And we'll defeat Voldemort too. Together.” With renewed determination and a shared sense of purpose, Harry, Hermione, and Ron bid each other goodnight, their minds already racing with plans and strategies for the challenges that lie ahead in their quest to find Genevieve Ariana Dumbledore Grindelwald.

Tom Riddle Masterlist

#harry potter #harry potter fanfiction #harry potter fandom #tom marvolo riddle #tom riddle #tom riddle fanfiction #tom riddle x reader #tom riddle x oc #slytherin

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heraldeez · 3 months

Note

i saw your requests were open temporarily, may i request a first kiss with jayce ? i think it'd be cute. i hope youve been well !

I have been well, thanks for asking! Life's crazy because I'm getting ready to move.

DEFINITELY CUTE. I want to smooch him. I wasn't sure if you meant his first kiss, the reader's first kiss, or their first kiss together, so I just knocked down two targets and hoped for the best 🙈. Hope you enjoy!

Jayce x Reader | 962 | SFW

Contains: bad group projects, falling asleep on someone, and some sweet sweet smoochin.

Jayce stiffens as your jaw comes to rest against his shoulder, hands freezing their progress. Chancing a glance down, he confirms that yeah, you’re out cold.

It's another late night at the Academy, spent doing curriculum work instead of work that could change the world someday. Jayce was fighting with a tricky relay of copper fittings. You'd finished your share of the project twenty minutes ago, both the clean copy of delicately illustrated schematics and all the vocal presentation bits that Jayce dreaded.

Nobody likes group projects. Jayce knows he isn't out of the ordinary there. He just can't help but feel that it grates on him more than the average student, faced with the fact that most of his peers didn't actually care about discovery. They just cared about making themselves look good.

Not you, though. He'd only shared classes with you this semester, but you were always fair in your division of the work.

And you were one of the only people who seemed to be able to stand his… candidness, always laughing it off when he’d get frustrated with the pace, being slowed down by others.

‘It’ll get done either way, slow or not.’ You'd been smiling at him so sweetly when you'd said that, despite the fact that he knew he had been nothing but irritated and fussy. Your patience had left him stricken with… something.

Jayce decides to leave you be, asleep on his shoulder. This project wouldn't have been a problem if the rest of your group members had anything to offer except slapdash efforts and excuses, leaving the two of you with the brunt of the work.

Tonight, Jayce is the one slowing you down, grumbling his way through fixing the shoddy work your other partners had put forward and finishing the things they had neglected to do entirely. To get this project up to his usual standards…

It’s eating up far too much time. The least he can do is let you rest a bit.

---

Your pillow is talking.

“Finally. Alright, I’ve got it dialed in so the fluid can actually cycle through all of the cooling chambers even as a prototype – the professor should be impressed. This is almost professional quality, so our marks should be flawless.”

Your pillow also smells incredibly good, nice and warm, so you elect to ignore it and nuzzle deeper.

“Are you listening?” – it sounds incredibly put out – “Hey. Wake up, we can go home now.”

Blearily, you blink your eyes open and find yourself caught up in Jayce’s gaze, the low lamplight reflecting off the gold of his eyes and revealing him peering down at you, close and tired and – dare you say – almost fond looking.

This close you can see every last eyelash, and how his stubble is starting to come in from the late hour on the alluring curve of his jaw. Despite the bags under his eyes, they’re bright and satisfied, his face almost glowing, the way it always does when he’s worked hard and made something perfect.

In fact, you can almost feel that glow on your skin. When did he get so warm? His ears are starting to get red.

That little detail reminds you just how close your faces have become, but a sleepy contentedness has drizzled its way into your joints, and you can’t bring yourself to pull away.

He’s just so –

“You’re really lovely when you’re making progress, you know that? It opens you up,” you sigh, still half dreaming, watching the flush spill across his face.

Jayce is too busy looking at your mouth to respond, his own ever so slightly parted.

Were you not half asleep, you probably never would have chanced it. But the way he was looking at you almost lost, how close he was –

It felt natural, to wriggle in closer, tilt up your jaw invitingly.

You catch the way his brows shoot up just as your eyes slip shut, and your mouth slots perfectly against his, slow and –

And unmoving. A little shocked stiff. Jayce makes a funny little noise in the back of his throat, something aching and perhaps a touch confused.

You jolt back, suddenly a whole lot more awake. “Sorry. Wow, sorry, I should have asked first –”

“It’s fine,” Jayce cuts in, a little strangled, busying himself with wrapping the prototype in oilcloth and setting it inside its small crate as an excuse not to meet your eyes. “You were – It was nice, just – I’ve never done that before.”

The end of his sentence leaves him in a rush. If it’s possible, his ears seem even redder now.

“Never?” you echo, a bit disbelieving in the wake of how plush and soft his lips had been against yours.

His shoulders hunch up defensively, looking awfully small for such a large man. “I’m kind of a busy guy, alright?”

Jayce’s fingers snap the clasps shut on the lid of the box, but your brain wrapped itself around the way he’d said your kiss was ‘nice’, and you’re itching to try again, to give him something even nicer to latch on to.

“Too busy to give it another go?”

Jayce’s wide eyes cut over to yours finally, from where he’s tucking the prototype into his satchel.

His fingers loosen on the strap of his bag. “Well. Maybe not,” Jayce mumbles, leaning in close enough for you to close the gap again.

The shuddering exhale Jayce gives you when you bring your lips together this time is everything, your hand coming up to cup his jaw and guide him into the most comfortable angle. His movements are still a bit stilted compared to yours, but he’s mimicking your motions in an incredibly earnest fashion.

You have no doubt he’ll be a quick study.

#jayce talis #jayce x reader #reader insert #he ended up with a bit of that Giopara poor socialization in him #he's just so crunchy i find myself gravitating back to that

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cleolinda · 1 year

Text

Varney the Vampire: Chapter 12

Chapter 11: Oh boy, Gothic ableism feat. implied racism; Charles Holland has Plans

Chapter XII.

CHARLES HOLLAND'S SAD FEELINGS. -- THE PORTRAIT. -- THE OCCURRENCE OF THE NIGHT AT THE HALL.

This chapter is fully twice as long as the previous one, so you can imagine how I felt when I got a couple thousand words in and it just! kept! going! It's 4900+ words, y'all. Colin Robinson feasts tonight. As such, it's helpful to me to break it up into sections—like movements in a symphony, really, except that all four movements are inhumanly long renditions of "Free Bird."

I. PREVIOUSLY ON: Charles Holland still feels a way about it (530+ words)

As noted in the previous chapter, it would have been one thing if Flora had been a strumpet, or if Charles Holland (who I literally cannot just call "Charles," that's just how it is) had fallen out of love with her, but Flora transparently trying to break up with him For His Own Good gives him a sad. The reason she wants to break up is also pretty alarming:

Fortune he had enough for both; death had not even threatened to rob him of the prize of such a noble and faithful heart which he had won. But a horrible superstition had arisen, which seemed to place at once an impassable abyss between them, and to say to him, in a voice of thundering denunciation, -- "Charles Holland, will you have a vampyre for your bride?" The thought was terrific.

Oh, the thought is fantastic. "Will you have a vampyre for your bride" is PEAK goth; in my opinion it's 100% relationship g—oh. You mean it's terror-ific. I mean... if you have no sense of adventure, I guess.

II. Charles Holland looks at a painting (670+ words)

Charles Holland is settling down in Flora's room to wait for a motherfucker to try it. We're looking at the painting of Sir Ancestor von Spookyportrait, who is wearing a 1700s coat that matches the handful of cloth pulled off Varney. You see where we're going with this.

The picture, as a picture, was well done, whether it was a correct likeness or not of the party whom it represented. It was one of those kind of portraits that seem so lifelike, that, as you look at them, they seem to return your gaze fully, and even to follow you with their eyes from place to place.

Spooky trompe l'oeil (OR IS IT?). Impeccable vibes.

For a considerable number of words, Charles Holland remains staring at this painting:

"I shall now," he said, "know that face again, let me see it where I may, or under what circumstances I may. Each feature is now indelibly fixed upon my memory -- I can never mistake it."

This will obviously become a plot point.

III. Charles Holland tries to move a painting (840+ words)

After the panel containing the picture had been placed where it was, it appeared that pieces of moulding had been inserted all around, which had had the effect of keeping it in its place, and it was a fracture of one of these pieces which had first called Charles Holland's attention to the probability of the picture having been removed. That he should have to get two, at least, of the pieces of moulding away, before he could hope to remove the picture, was to him quite apparent, and he was considering how he should accomplish such a result, when he was suddenly startled by a knock at his chamber door.

POINTS:

holy shit the probability of the molding I don't give a fuck

Suddenly there came a tapping, as of someone gently rapping, at Charles Holland's chamber door: Poe's "The Raven" was published in the U.S. the same year, 1845, that Varney the Vampire began serialization. I'm not saying there's a connection, I just think that's fun.

Random knockings in dark halls also made me think of my favorite TV genre: paranormal investigation.

Now, while I'm primarily a Ghost Files/Buzzfeed Unsolved fan because having an actual skeptic completely changes the usual Ghost Show vibe, I also enjoy a ton of shows on Discovery Plus that involve investigators getting spooked and flipping the fuck out. (Honestly, the real appeal of any of these shows is the personalities involved; it's not like I actually need to see eight different takes on Waverly Hills Sanatorium.) One of my favorites is the recently-canceled, soon-to-be-revived Destination Fear, where a group of friends ride around in an RV and torment each other in dark abandoned buildings that may or may not be riddled with squatters. Sometimes there is a stray cat. I suspect a lot of it was faked, and I honestly don't even care. They are constantly hearing random slams and knocks and voices, maybe, and shrieking in panic when a camera falls over, and I love it. What I'm telling you is, I am basically imagining Charles Holland as one of the Destination Fear kids in their solo sleeping arrangements, trying to decide if he wants to go barreling after this ghost or not. This is an experiment in fear and he can't call Dakota on the walkie and say he wants to peace out because he can't let this location get the best of him!!:

"I will remain the occupant of this room come what may, happen what may. No terrors, real or unsubstantial, shall drive me from it: I will brave them all, and remain here to brave them."

The thing is, it's "an odd sort of tap -- a single tap, as if some one demanded admittance, and wished to awaken his attention with the least possible chance of disturbing any one else." This happens, like, four times, and Charles Holland keeps flinging the door open and no one is there. I have no idea who this is supposed to be—it can't be Varney, because he has enough corporeal substance to be unable to haul himself over a garden wall, and therefore he can't vanish instantly. If it's a ghost who can vanish, we've never heard of them, and I don't recall that we do later. I am forced to conclude that it is one of James Malcolm Rymer's creditors asking if he's gotten his pay by the line yet.

IV. Charles Holland and Henry look at a painting (1020+ words)

At last, Henry emerges from his own bedroom at the sound of Charles Holland repeatedly demanding who the fuck happens to be tapping, rapping at his chamber door, and now Charles Holland is vexed that he looks like a coward who couldn't handle it. In contrast, the Destination Fear kids are always walkie-ing each other to GET OVER HERE RIGHT NOW, A FALLING BRICK DID ME A SCARE!!! and then pelting through the ruins of some heinous crumbling hospital past a Tall Dark Mass named Red (it's always named Red) and maybe a couple of crawlers (there's always a crawler) to save each other from nothing in particular. I've watched the entire series like five times. I would pay good money for an adaptation of Varney where Charles Holland and the Bannerworth brothers are panicking at each other from the various mansion bedrooms over, like, tin cans tied together with string.

Anyway, Henry and Charles Holland look at the painting of Ancestor von Spookyportrait and try to pry it off the wall. It's painted on a panel rather than a hanging canvas. Someone has recently pried it off and put it back! It's eminently priable! They cannot do it, for they do not have any tools to do so, except then they have a knife out of nowhere that they can use, because you keep knives in bedrooms the way you do crowbars and swords, and they finally get the portrait off the wall.

There is nothing behind the portrait.

"There is no mystery here," said Henry. "None whatever," said Charles, as he tapped the wall with his knuckles, and found all hard and sound. "We are foiled." "We are indeed."

V. Someone shoots a vampyre, again, maybe (790 words)

Even as he spoke they were both startled by a strange clattering noise at the window, which was accompanied by a shrill, odd kind of shriek, which sounded fearful and preternatural on the night air. "What is that?" said Charles. "God only knows," said Henry.

I didn't have a whole lot of sympathy for Henry back when he was moping around the family crypt, but I'm starting to get on board now. What WAS that? God only knows for 800 words of it, Henry. God only knows.

The two young men naturally turned their earnest gaze in the direction of the window, which we have before remarked was one unprovided with shutters, and there, to their intense surprise, they saw, slowly rising up from the lower part of it, what appeared to be a human form. Henry would have dashed forward, but Charles restrained him, and drawing quickly from its case a large holster pistol

What? Do we also keep pistols in bedrooms? Flora's bedroom? Did Charles Holland just know to bring his trusty Large Holster Pistol with him from Somewhere in Europe? Do we keep them in cases or holsters? What?

He pulled the trigger -- a loud report followed -- the room was filled with smoke, and then all was still.

Like, this is great. Cinematic before there was cinema. And then Rymer has to dither around with hundreds of words about how the smoke blew out the only candle they had (I hope to fuck y'all have matches), and the window latch is too fancy for Charles Holland to fathom and he needs Henry to unfasten the fastening because the fancy fastening is known only to Henry, and then Rymer goes into the perfect bullet hole in the glass that did not cause any cracking or "starring," and I had to go take two Advil and lie down. Like. I can't. I cannot when Rymer does this. I mean, I comprehend perfectly what's happening. I just. I Just. So what are we, 3000 words into this chapter about staring at paintings? SUDDENLY AN ACTION SCENE BREAKS OUT. Henry's brother George and their mother's—somebody—Mr. Marchdale rush in! Henry flings the fascinating fastened window open! Henry and Charles Holland and Marchdale (eventually) leap down to the garden in "a wonderfully short space of time"! Indubitably, here is the terrestrial location where the vampyre must have gotten his sad ass shot, again—

But nothing is there. No blood. No vampyre. No "revivified corpse" that Charles Holland was so sure they'd be able to net, and that was the foundation of his optimism. Woe:

"Human means against such an appearance as we saw to-night," said Charles, "are evidently useless."

VI. You must leave Spookyportrait Manor (200+ words)

A brief movement in the symphony, but an important aspect:

"My dear young friend," said Marchdale, with much emotion, as he grasped Henry Bannerworth's hand, and the tears stood in his eyes as he did so, -- "my dear young friend, these constant alarms will kill you. They will drive you, and all whose happiness you hold dear, distracted. You must control these dreadful feelings, and there is but one chance that I can see of getting the better of these." "What is that?" "By leaving this place for ever."

We've seen in previous chapters how Henry just cannot cope with any vampire-themed revelations, and maybe I'm too hard on him for that—mostly it's because I always see him in contrast to Flora, the actual victimized person, who has wailed a good bit less about it. But I've always liked that literary Victorian masculinity seems to leave more room for tears and expressing distress (many of you are familiar with this from Dracula, I'm sure, and that's one of my favorite things about it), so maybe I should take that into consideration. However you see it, the serial has definitely established that Henry is very emotional about the Whole Vampyre Thing. But why Marchdale breaks in now, while Henry is merely "silent" and "lost in wonder" with Charles Holland, I don't know. Should we consider this sus? Unsure.

What's important about this to me, however, is that Henry does bring up that he doesn't want to be Driven from the Home of His Ancestors—but also, that they can't afford to flee the mansion and, by necessity, sell off the property cheap to pay their creditors and have anything to live on somewhere else. How many times have you yelled at someone in a horror movie to just LEAVE! WHY DON'T YOU LEAVE THE HOUSE?!? Well: money.

VII. As regards Flora (870+ words)

"As regards poor dear Flora," said Mr. Marchdale, "I know not what to say, or what to think; she has been attacked by a vampyre, and after this mortal life shall have ended, it is dreadful to think there may be a possibility that she, with all her beauty, all her excellence and purity of mind, and all those virtues and qualities which should make her the beloved of all, and which do, indeed, attach all hearts towards her, should become one of that dreadful tribe of beings who cling to existence by feeding, in the most dreadful manner, upon the life blood of others -- oh, it is dreadful to contemplate! Too horrible -- too horrible!"

Quick recap: in the previous chapter, we discussed 1) the weirdness of this serial conflating a contagion with a "race" or "tribe" of beings; 2) the way Victorians often associated mental illness with both violence and [racist bullshit here], and 3) the way that they also cast all of these things as a "family stain" that must not be passed to your children, and yet, 4) Flora is also visually coded as being white, fair, "pure," and immune to any stain. Marchdale's blathering touches on the contagion idea without confusing it with heredity, at least. But Victorian ideals of beauty were tied up in whiteness (source: there are so many), so that historical subtext is present. Also, the word tribe: not a great usage right here!

That said, I also have a long-suppressed rant about the way people don't get that Lucy Westenra needs to be played as sweet and pure and lovingly innocent (I think wanting three husbands is very sweet! Desire isn’t impure! Wait why are Victorians throwing me in an asylum), in order to underline the real horror of the woman we knew, corrupted into an unrecognizable predator. And that's the excellence and virtue and purity of mind that make Flora the beloved of all—which sounds very Lucy to me—that Marchdale is talking about. Ultimately, if you put that paragraph under the microscope, you can isolate what you need to discard and what you could keep, and the sweetness of character is something that works.

Meanwhile, I have the temerity to claim that James Malcolm Rymer is long-winded. Go off, Charles Holland:

"Then wherefore speak of it?" said Charles, with some asperity

We're back to the thing Rymer mentioned umpteen thousand words ago: how Marchdale and Charles Holland hated each other on sight, for (allegedly) no reason. Charles Holland does not appreciate your bullshit, Marchdale, and he "will not give into such a horrible doctrine!" Marchdale tries to backpedal with a reply I had to read five times to parse, but I think he is saying that if anything could make this whole Vampyred Flora situation worse, it's that Charles Holland is such a stand-up dude and it's a shame the young couple can never marry now. BET? says Charles Holland. "May Heaven forbid it!" ripostes Marchdale, who just. cannot. quit:

"Oh, fancy, then, for a moment, the mother of your babes coming at the still hour of midnight to drain from their veins the very life blood she gave to them. To drive you and them mad with the expected horror of such visitations -- to make your nights hideous -- your days but so many hours of melancholy retrospection. Oh, you know not the world of terror, on the awful brink of which you stand, when you talk of making Flora Bannerworth a wife."

Aaaaand here we are back at the Do Not Propagate the Family Stain discourse. I told you.

That said! It is a Vampire Literature Trope that the vampire preys on the people who were closest to them in life, particularly a betrothed, from Lenore and The Bride of Corinth forwards. As noted on that very handy Wikipedia page, Byron's The Giaour (1813) specifically says that first, the vampire will first "ghostly haunt [its] native place, / And suck the blood of all [its] race"—daughter, sister, and wife included. I can't say what Rymer did or didn't read, but if he had Byron in mind, the idea is twisted so that the wife/mother, the Victorian "angel of the home," is the predator: extra unnatural.

Meanwhile, Henry is trying to get Marchdale to stop, but Marchdale just! will! not! Charles Holland will hear no more of this!! "Fine, I'm done," says Marchdale. "YOU COULD HAVE JUST NOT," says Charles Holland. "It was my SOLEMN DUTY," bloviates Marchdale. Charles Holland uses sarcasm!! It's so wordy effective that Marchdale abruptly threatens to flounce:

"To-morrow, I leave this house," said Marchdale. "Leave us?" exclaimed Henry. "Ay, for ever."

So now Henry has to coddle this asshole's disingenuously hurt feelings—I really wanted to like Marchdale, but come on, y'all, this guy is every mother-in-law on AITA. "I was just trying to help, I guess you hate me!!" Have you seen the Reddit essay about "boat-rockers" and their enablers? Basically, Henry has to get Charles Holland to steady the boat with him, even though the latter just got here and has no desire to cater to whichever random, non-Flora family member. Charles Holland does manage to say that if saying he's sorry Marchdale got his feelings hurt is an apology, then he'll say that he's sorry Marchdale got his feelings hurt (it's not). BUT KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT FROM NOW ON, YOU DON'T EVEN GO HERE:

"I will not allow this monstrous superstition to tread me down, like the tread of a giant on a broken reed. I will contend against it while I have life to do so." [...] "Come weal or woe -- come what may, I am the affianced husband of [Henry's] sister, and she, and she only, can break asunder the tie that binds me to her."

Which Flora already did two chapters ago, like, five times, but in a very "I clearly don't want to say this but we can't just talk to each other like normal people or there wouldn't be a plot" way, so I'll allow it. *gavel*

Varney the Vampire masterpost

#varney the vampire #vampires #long post #victorian bullshit #wtf this is so long I apologize #this is truly the short version #vampire studies

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kittycheshired · 2 years

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New Rules!

For the Ever After High Gift Exchange, Thank you @eah-exchange for hosting it!

This fic is for @feline17ff !

Summary:

After the events of Way to Wonderland, Chase is still stuck about what he is, or what he should do. Luckily his friends have a solution!

Chase Redford goes to Ever After High.

Rating: All. General

Characters: Chase Redford, Darling Charming, Alistair Wonderland, Red Queen, Kitty Cheshire, Madeline Hatter, Blondie Lockes

A message from me : this was super challenging omg, bc especially i havent written in a while, and chase has absolutely no content?? i tried to make him like socially awkward and not understand social cues. i hope you enjoy it, and merry christmas! i hope i did ur fav character justice! (i also had no idea who to make him dorm with, so i made up a random character)

“You should transfer to Ever After High.” Alistair suggested before smoothly popping a small chocolate in his mouth, seemingly to always carry them around in the pockets of his coat. The two teenagers were standing at one of the various tables with food. The Red Knight no longer adorned his helmet which made his body look proportionally wrong in comparison with his head, and the armor was also quite heavy. Chase raised an eyebrow at Alistair’s comment, grimacing a bit before his eyes grazed across the throne room and bustle of the party, before replying.

“Why?” Chase cleared his throat, his cheeks slightly flushing pink, as he was usually used to hiding behind his helmet. “I mean – it’s not like, I’m nervous, it’s just– that.. Will going to Ever After really benefit me? Has it benefited you? Bunny?”

Alistair seemingly paused a bit, as if weighing his options. Sure, he and Bunny basically had no choice but to attend Ever After High due to Kitty’s mom’s desire to see the world fall into ruin for a joke, but the change was actually a good thing! Of course his boundless curiosity had always led him to some sticky situations in Wonderland, but Ever After was nothing like Wonderland! It was bland, boring and normal, which was relieving in a way. You didn’t have to worry about hearing the horror stories of a Jabberwock and how it destroyed everything it touched. You wouldn’t have to worry about all of your nightmares coming true, when a deranged Evil Queen came to your home and attempted to make it into some sick, twisted version of her own fairytale… despite all that, Wonderland was still like his home, and he wouldn’t trade that for the world.

Alistair smiled lightly, placing a hand on Chase’s shoulder. “Look, all I’m saying is you should… think about it. I know we aren’t– particularly close, but maybe having a sense of normalcy will be good for you.”

Chase blinked, everything in Wonderland was already normal, there was no need to go to Ever After for a new sense of normalcy. The normalcy at Ever After High was different from Wonderland, so it wouldn’t be normal at all, it’d be totally different, and he’d be surrounded by other people, who he knew nothing about.

“But… this is normal, for me, at least. You weren’t born here– so it’s different for you.” Chase replied, looking at Alistair very seriously, as the other boy retracted his hand from Chase’s shoulder, wearing a hurt expression.

“Alistair! Mother wants to talk to you about your discoveries of that riddle book!” The snappy voice of Lizzie Hearts sounded from across the room, grabbing their attention, as the teenager had started to sound more and more like the future Queen she was going to become. Indeed, the Queen of Hearts was standing by her daughter, waving at the two boys. Alistair waved back, Chase didn’t, seeing as he nearly almost killed her daughter (He had a sinking feeling that if he made contact with the agitated Queen, it wouldn’t turn out very well).

“Alright, Lizzie!” Alistair walked off to the mother-daughter duo, not before sparing Chase a second glance. Chase signed in resignation, leaning against the snack table that contained a variety of food, but he ended up grabbing a cucumber sandwich, chewing it roughly.

Somehow Chase had gotten the impression that he had said something wrong to Alistair, which was ridiculous because he was being honest. His mother, the Red Queen, had always said honesty was a good thing, even if it hurt sometimes.

That explained a lot, actually. Chase was mostly used to following the Redford rules, (There was actually a handbook for it, and it was required for a family member to memorize all 127 pages of it. Or atleast get down to the basics.) They were all he had known his whole life, and he wasn’t about to let the chance of the Redford family taking him in, even if it was rather reluctantly, go to waste. So, he trained all his life to be the best Red Knight that he could be, since there was only one singular story running through Wonderland, everyone had to play their part to make sure the story was played out correctly.

Being adopted into the Redford family was.. Endearing, to say the least. ‘Redford’ was as much of a namesake as it was a surname, everyone either had frequent streaks of red, or their hair as a whole was a flamboyant red. Since Chase wasn’t blood-related to the family at all, he had taken to choppily dying parts of his naturally black hair, red. A large majority of the family liked Chase, but sometimes, whenever he arrived at family gatherings, small whispers and gossip often followed.

“He isn’t even a real Redford, why is he here?”

“I heard that his hair isn’t even partially red.”

“I heard that he was abandoned and his parents didn’t even want him!”

“I’d be ashamed if I was the Red Queen.”

Chase didn’t let the gossip bother him, he held his chin up high, but mostly kept to himself or ended up sneaking out of the family gatherings to go sit by rivers, listening to the way the waters rippled, the way the fish swam up the waterfalls, he liked the feeling of just being there in the moment.

“Chase. Redford.” Two voices mixed together, Chase, who was lost in his thoughts, nearly choked on his cucumber sandwich as he looked up to see Darling Charming and his mother, who was sporting her classic ruffled gown. Eyes watering, he regained his composure before he spoke.

“White Knight.” He bowed, a small smile formed on the girl’s lips, he turned to the Red Queen, “Mother. I’m surprised to see you here.”

A scoff escaped the Red Queen, as she set a peculiar gaze on her son. “Oh please, even though I may not be on the best of terms with our revered Queen, I was still worthy enough to be invited to her birthday party.” She held up the invitation, a certain sparkle in her dark grey eyes. “Pardon me, but you–” She turned to Darling, who, on reflex, straightened up and relaxed her face to look more demure. “Are you the White Knight? Who single handedly defeated my son in combat?”

Chase had fought back the urge to let out a groan. His mother was going to interrogate Darling, and then he would be scolded for not doing well enough.

“Yes, your majesty.” Darling smiled tightly, glancing at Chase. “Although, it was not easy. Your son is a formidable opponent.” She paused. “Not so formidable in the art of dancing, though.” The girl added on mischievously.

Chase’s face flushed as red as his namesake, as The Red Queen let out a chorus of laughter, tears threatening to spill. “Oh, you – are a card! What did you say your name was again?” The Red Queen questioned, interest written all over her pale face.

“Darling, Darling Charming. “Charming? I was aware that Charming families only taught the females to act maidenly. Who taught you how to handle a sword?”

“Well – myself. I sneaked around a lot, and I had lots of more opportunities when I was sent to Ever After.”

“Well! Aren’t you a crafty one?”

“Thank you, ma’am. Actually –” She turned away from the Red Queen to Chase, who just now noticed that Darling had a small rectangular box in her hand. “The reason I came over here with your mother was because I wanted to give you this, as a gift. You can open it later.”

“Oh, thank you, Darling.” Chase replied, taking the box and gazing at it curiously. “You’re welcome, now if you’ll excuse me, my brothers have been worried sick about me.. And royally angry at me, for not telling them I was the White Knight.” The Red Queen and Chase watched as Darling made her way back to her brothers. The blonde one practically enveloped her in a hug, while the other brother started chatting animatedly to her.

“Such a sweet girl, now, back to you, Chase.” Chase immediately straightened, waiting for the reprimanding to begin. Would he be sentenced to another round of vigorous training? Would he be forced to recatalog the whole Redford library again? Would he have to clean the pawn’s armor?

“I want you to go to Ever After High.”

“What?”

“I realized after your defeat.. In the chess match. I’ve always pushed you to where you think you weren’t doing enough, but that’s not true.” She reached up to cup his cheek, smiling softly at her son. “You are exceptional, and you always have been. Since you were.. adopted, I’ve always wanted you to be better, despite your unfair circumstances at not fitting in. Now, I realize that was my fatal error as a Queen, and as a mother. No matter what anyone says it does not matter if you are related to me through blood, or if you're adopted. You, Chase Redford, always are, and will be my wonderful son.”

Chase swallowed roughly, tears softly streaming down his face as he pulled in his mother for a tight hug. “You haven’t had any chance to be a teenager. So going to Ever After with help. No restraint, no rules– at least not ones you’re used to.” “Mother.” Chase’s voice sounded hoarse. “I’m scared.” The Red Queen pulled back from the hug, gently kissing Chase’s forehead. “Don’t be, dear. It’s just a new stage in your life.. Now, I’ll be back, I’ll go get both of us some refreshments!”

As the Red Queen left, Chase proceeded to open the small box Darling had given him, inside he found the note.

The note read…

Dear Red Knight, Enclosed in this box is an item you may not be familiar with. It is called a MirrorPhone and is used to communicate with friends and family over the MirrorNet. I understand that using this device may cause confusion, so I put (hopefully) simple instructions along with the MirrorPhone to assist you. ☺ Enclosed in this note are also the following’s phone numbers; Alistair Wonderland, Bunny Blanc, Kitty Cheshire, Lizzie Hearts, Maddie Hatter, and mine. I hope that having your fellow Wonderlandians’ assistance at a moment’s notice will help you feel more at ease! This MirrorPhone was originally intended to be gifted for the Queen of Hearts, but then Lizzie informed me that she had thousands, and I didn’t know anyone else without a MirrorPhone, except you, that is. I hope that you can use this for communication while in Wonderland. I hope that interdimensional internet is a thing, and since Raven broke the Wonderland curse, it will be easier to maintain contact.

-Darling Charming

Chase moved aside the note to find a dark red MirrorPhone, and smiled.

One thing that was in the Redford handbook was to always have spare armor. You never knew when it would come in handy. This added to the fact that Chase barely had any clothes, just armor. He would probably get weird looks wearing his Red Knight armor, so he eventually just settled for wearing a white long sleeved blouse, accompanied with black leather pants and black boots.

A week later, his first impression of Ever After High was that it was abnormally bright. The abundance of dark colors and white made his brain contain numerous amounts of static, and not in a good way. As Chase made his way to his dorm room and down the hallway, he noticed that he got a lot of attention. As always, there were more stares.. and whispers.

“Isn't that the new boy from Wonderland? He looks so charming.”

“Right, he’s off-the-page! Maybe he could even rival Daring!”

“What?! No waaay.”

“Way.”

A red flush crawled up Chase’s neck as he hurried to get to his dorm, wishing to avoid contact with anyone. Unfortunately, that sentiment wasn’t shared because as soon as he took one step, a rectangular digital device was shoved in his face.. It looked like a MirrorPhone but bigger? Darling had hexted him and it was called… a MirrorPad! Behind the helm was a blonde curly haired girl, with big bright blue eyes, she was sporting a grin that was practically bigger then the Cheshire Cat’s, the small blinking red light of the MirrorPad made her look terrifying then any opponent Chase had ever faced.

“Welcome back to Just Right, my fairytale listeners! Blondie Lockes here, with another dose of news! Our classmates have just returned from Wonderland, which Raven Queen has lifted the curse from! Isn’t that amazing? Now, it appears that a new student has arrived at Ever After High!” Blondie shoved a microphone near Chase’s mouth, her body practically buzzing with eagerness. “Chase Redford, the former Red Knight who was defeated by Darling Charming in combat, has seemingly caught the attention of the female population of Ever After!” She giggled, the MirrorPad now being passed to one of Darling’s brothers.

“So, Chase, how do you feel about that? Has anyone caught your eye? Looking for a spot in the romance hexpartment?” She smiled at him brightly.

“Uhh– Well, I uh–” “Uh’s assorted with catnip!” A voice yelled out, the next thing he knew, his vision was obscured by lavender hair, and the smell of lilacs was ingrained in his senses. There was a mixture of voices, including an “Oh!, “Whoopsies!” and a faded “How rude!” before everything turned grayish and dull, then snapped back to color, even though all he could see was lavender hair, and he heard the suitcase fall on the ground with a loud thump.

“Kitty, can you get off my head?” Chase snapped, light headed and disoriented from disappearing from one place to another. “Of course, my shining Knight in red armor.” Kitty drawled, gently hopping off his head, and strolling over to where Madeline Hatter was giggling madly, whilst Chase glanced around to see that Kitty had promptly transported them by Chase’s designated dorm.

“That was tea-rrific!” Madeline Hatter said as she pulled a cup of tea out of her hat, “Blondie was so caught off guard! It’s hilarious how Kitty and I were conveniently there at the same time you were feeling uncomfortable, Chase! Spelltacular thinking, Narrator!”

Chase blinked, not knowing what the mad girl was talking about. “How did you know I was feeling uncomfortable?”

“It was written all over your face!” Maddie was now pouring tea a cup, Kitty was now drinking a cup of tea that she poured as well. “Plus, the narrator told us how you were feeling, although they’re not Brooke. All I could hear was, ‘Chase’, ‘Chase that’ ‘Chase–” She was interrupted by the ringing of a clock from her hat. “Teatime for two! Sorry, Chase, Kitty and I are going out. I hope you have fun figuring out what to do.”

Madeline and Kitty waved, Kitty kissing Maddie's cheek, before they both disappeared in a gleam of purple sparkles. Chase sighed, he didn’t even have time to thank them for helping him escape Blondie. That girl seriously needed to understand the definition of ‘privacy’. Heaving the suitcase up, he read the nameplate on the door of the room. ‘Glenn North and Chase Redford” and pushed the door open.

One side of the room was completely bare, and the other side was decked out in an assortment of whites and greys, with hints of green. There was a boy with long platinum blonde hair, brown eyes, who was perched on his bed, reading a book labeled Dorothy’s Shoes: The Oz Debate. At Chase’s entrance, the boy looked up, setting his book down and marking it with a bookmark before closing it.

“You must be my new roommate, Chase Redford. The side of the room that’s a blank slate is yours. I’m Glenn North, son of the Good Witch of the North. I hope we can become friends in the future.” Glenn said in the most monotone voice, then went back to reading his book.

“You too.” Chase muttered back, setting his bag down on his bed, then finding an envelope addressed to him.

CHASE REDFORD - CLASS SCHEDULE

RIDDLING

TRACK AND SHIELD

GENERAL VILLANY

GRIMMNASTICS

MYTHOLOGY

CHEMYTHSTRY

As Chase gazed at the schedule, it didn’t seem to invoke any particular feeling at all. He felt like this was alright, and it would certainly be better then Wonderland High, given he never got to learn anything at all. As long as he had his Wonderlandian friends, it would be okay.

Hopefully.

#ever after high #eah exchange #eah #eah fanfic #chase redford #madeline hatter #alistair wonderland #kitty cheshire #red queen #blondie lockes

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choukoara · 1 year

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Clashing and Crashing

Silence. Only the shallow breathing and aimless footsteps of one. No one, yet everyone existed in this senseless void. A colorless, endless void. With one inhabitant, a lone wanderer with no memory of who they are, or how they got in this. So they just wandered in this empty silence. Until, a soft noise uttered a word. Or at least a sound. Startled, the Wanderer tensed up and snapped their head over their shoulder. They were met with confusion when they were greeted with a disappointing discovery of nothing, only the underwhelming void. Just as they began to relax, a coherent word was whispered. "Mist." 'Mist?' They gazed over their shoulder once again, full of false hope that they'd see a glimpse of this speaker. But, only nothingness was in their sights, a lingering disappointment washed over them. The long gaps between whispers closed as the Wanderer's frustration grew. "What is mist," the Wanderer asked in a snippy tone, "what does that mean?" "You." "Me?" The wanderer, who was presumably named 'Mist' blinked. 'This is a start,' Mist thought to themself. "Psst, Traveler.." Mist turned around once again, there was a new voice that spoke. "Silly Mist." "Silly, silly Mist..," the two voices chanted, "you cannot see us." "No you can't." Mist stared blankly in the direction that the voices were talking. They then sat down and held their head between their knees. This was an attempt to calm their racing mind, just to clear the waves of stress and lingering confusion. Their lost identity, the voices, everything was strange and unusual; like a newborn familiarizing themselves with the world. The voices spoke again, clashing with each other. "Mist, listen to me, dear," one calmly reasoned, counteracting their more brash neighbor. "Don't listen to this dimwit," the brash voice chided, "I can lead you." "No I must." "Shut your trap." "No need to speak in foul terms." "Stop fancy talkin' me." Back and forth, back and forth. The unnerving bickering went on like a swinging pendulum.

Just listening to this mindless bickering, mentally exhausted Mist.

"Quit your two's blabbering," Mist chimed in, "and get to the damn point." Silence washed over the trio, each waiting for the other to say something; anything.

Mist finally broke the ice.

"Well?" They impatiently tapped their foot on the ground, waiting for a response.

"Mist, dear," the formal voice spoke, "you do want to leave, do you not?" Mist crossed their arms, intrigued.

"Go on." "Well-" the voice was rudely interrupted by the second one.

"Well is a deep subject," the second voice joked.

"Anyways," the fancy voice continued, "this does not exist." "Huh?" "This place, me you, we simply do not exist." "I-I what- who- how" Mist stammered over their words, "what do you mean?" A memory flashed on the wall, almost as a projection. It contained a human girl, who was crossing the street, and a car, driving at high speeds. The memory showed the car getting very close to the girl, and everything went black.

Mist started hearing more muffled voices as they began to piece things together. But, they still did not understand everything.

"What does this mean," they asked, still missing a few pieces, "who was that girl?" "That girl is you, Mist." "What?" "This place is where you are. You cannot stay here forever." Mist stared at their hand, and suddenly, they began seeing a beige wall in front of them. They began slowly opening their eyes, blurred figures surrounded her as she slipped out of the dimension.

"Luna, you're awake!"

#short story #weirdcore #Void #coma #car crash #Aimless wandering #Mist #Voices

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rjalker · 2 years

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What would you do, if, like Quest, you were tricked, and your very Mind and Will stolen from your body?

The Stolen Mind, By M. L. Staley

From Astounding Stories of Super Science, January 1930

Almost 10,000 words long.

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"What caused you to answer our advertisement?" Owen Quest felt the steel of the quick gray eyes that jabbed like gimlets across the office table.

"Why does any man apply for a job?" he bristled.

Keane Clason gave an impatient smile.

"Come!" he said. "I'm not trying to snare you. But there were unusual features to my ad, and they were put there to attract an unusual type of man. To judge your qualifications, I must know just why this proposition appeals to you."

"I can tell you that," nodded Quest, "but there's nothing unusual about it. In the first place, I knew that the Clason Research Corporation is the leading concern of its kind in the country. In the second place, this seemed to offer a way to obtain a substantial sum of money quickly."

"Good," said Clason. "And you feel that you have all the necessary qualifications?"

"Decidedly. I am 24 years old, athletic, and of an earnest and determined nature. Moreover, I have no family ties, and I'm willing to run any reasonable risk in order to improve the condition of my fellow men."

Clason smiled his approval.

"You say you need money. How much immediately?"

Quest was unprepared for the question.

"A thousand dollars," he ventured.

Without hesitation Clason counted out ten one-hundred-dollar notes from his wallet and laid them on the table.

"There's your advance fee. You're ready to go to work immediately, I hope?"

"Certainly," stammered Quest.

Stunned by the swiftness of the transaction, he sat staring at the money that lay untouched before him.

To accept it would be like signing an unread contract. But he had asked for it; to refuse it was impossible. Even to delay about picking it up might arouse Clason's suspicion. Already the latter had turned away and was opening the door of a steel cabinet. Quest had one second in which to reach a decision.... He crammed the currency into his pocket.

With delicate care Clason set two objects on the table. One looked to Quest like a miniature broadcasting tower or a mooring mast for lighter than air craft. The other was a circular vat of some black material, probably carbon. Within it a series of concentric tissues were suspended from metal rings, and in a trough outside ranged four stoppered flasks containing liquids of as many different colors.

"Look at these models carefully," said Clason. "They represent two of the most remarkable discoveries of all time. The one on your left is the most destructive weapon known to man. The other I consider the most constructive discovery in the history of science. It may even lead to an understanding of the nature of life, and of the future of the spirit after death.

"Both of these were developed by my brother Philip and me together—but we have disagreed about the use to which they shall be put.

"Philip"—the inventor dropped his voice to a whisper—"wants to sell the secret of the Death Projector—the tower, there—as an instrument of war. If I should permit him to do that, it might lead to the destruction of whole nations!"

"How?" demanded Quest "I've heard of a device called the Death Ray. Is this it?"

"No, no," said Clason contemptuously. "Even in a perfected state the Ray would be a child's toy compared to the Projector. This is based on our discovery that invisible light rays of a certain wave-length, if highly concentrated, destroy life—and our additional discovery that if these are synchronized with short radio waves the effect is absolutely devastating.

"We obtain the desired concentration of invisible light by using a tellurium current-filter under the influence of alternate flashes of red and blue light. The projector can literally blanket vast areas with death, up to a top range of at least five hundred miles.

"Just picture to yourself what this means! In a space of ten minutes two men can lay down a circle of destruction a thousand miles in diameter; or they can cut a swath five hundred miles long in any desired direction."

"Have you ever proved it?" demanded Quest skeptically.

"Yes, young man, we have," snapped Clason. "Right here in the laboratory—but on a minute scale, of course. However, there's no time to demonstrate now. The point is that my brother is determined to sell if he can obtain his price for the invention. He argues that instead of bringing disaster upon the world, this machine will forever discourage war by making it too terrible for any civilized nation to consider. In spite of my opposition he has opened negotiations with an ambitious Balkan power. He may actually close the sale at any moment!

"However," Clason drew a deep breath "you see this other device? Simple as it appears, it is the key to the whole situation. We can use it—you and I—to overcome Philip's will and prevent this unthinkable transaction. The two of us can do it. Alone I would be virtually helpless."

"Why not have the Projector confiscated or destroyed by our own Government?" suggested Quest. "That seems to me the only safe and sure way out of the difficulty."

"You simply do not understand," frowned Clason impatiently. "Philip is selling the plans and descriptions of the machine, not the machine itself. Even if this model and the larger test machine that we have built were destroyed—even if I were willing to have Philip sent to Leavenworth for life—he could still sell the Projector.

"But this other invention, our Osmotic Liberator, makes it possible for me to gain control of Philip and actually change his mind, through the medium of an agent. I have hired you to act as my Agent, Quest, because I can see that you are a young man of unusual character and vitality. And by way of reward I can promise you both money and a brilliant future."

The inventor poised in a tense attitude on the edge of his chair as though his body were charged with electricity. His eyes seemed to dart out emanations that set Quest's blood to tingling. Then for a moment the latter lost consciousness of his physical self. It was as though he had opened a door and found himself suddenly on the brink of a new and totally strange world. He dispelled this fancy by a quick effort of the will, for he knew that he had a delicate problem on his hands and that it must be solved within a very few minutes. However he proceeded, he must act without disloyalty to his Government, and at the same time without injustice to Keane Clason.

"Tell me," he said in a husky voice, "how do you intend to use me? I do not believe in Spiritualism. I would be a poor medium."

Clason gave a short laugh.

"You are not to be a medium in that sense at all. Spiritualism as practiced is just a blind sort of groping and hoping. Osmotic Liberation, on the other hand, is an exact and opposite physico-chemical science. Here—I will show you."

Into the outer cell of the Liberator he emptied the purple vial, and so on to the innermost, which he filled with a golden-green liquid like old Chartreuse.

"The separating membranes, you understand, are permeable by these complicated solutions. Each liquid has a different osmotic pressure and therefore should, under normal conditions, interchange with the others through the membranes until all pressures are equalized. I prevent such interchange, however, by maintaining an anti-electrolysis which retards ionization and thus builds up what might be called osmotic potential.

"Now if an Agent—yourself for instance—submerges himself in the central cell, at the same time maintaining a physical contact with his Control at the surface of the liquid, and if then the osmotic potential is suddenly released by throwing the electrolytic switch, the host of ions thus turned loose in the outer compartments make one grand rush for the center solution, which contains the cathode.

"Under these conditions your body becomes a sort of sixth cell, and your skin another membrane in the series. Properly speaking, however, you are not a part of the electrolytic circuit but are merely present in the action. Your body acts as a catalyser, hastening the chemical action without itself being affected in any way. Physically you undergo no change whatever; but in some strange way which is, like life, beyond analysis, your mind flows out into the solution, while your unaltered body remains at the bottom of the tank in a state of suspended animation.

"If no Control is present, all that is needed to return your mind into your body is a throw of the electrolytic switch back to negative, whereupon you emerge from the tank exactly as you entered it. But with your Control present and in contact with your submerged body, your mind, instead of remaining suspended in the solution, flows instantly into his body and resides there subject to his will.

"This can not be done, however, unless the wills of Control and Agent have first been brought into accord. To accomplish that, we clasp hands"—Quest grasped Clason's extended hand—"and look steadily into each other's eyes.

"Now, it is well known that the vibrations of an individual's will are as distinctive as the sworls of his finger-prints. What is not so well known is that the frequency of vibration in one person can be brought into accord with that in another.

"You consciously retract your will by concentrating your mind upon the thing which you know I wish to accomplish. Gradually while we continue in this position your vibrations speed up or slow down until they acquire exactly the same frequency as my own. We are then in accord, and when your mind is liberated in the tank it is in a state which admits absorption into my body. And it is subject to my will because you have purposely attuned it to my peculiar frequency. Immediately after the transfer there will be a brief conflict, due to the instinctive desire of your will to obtain the ascendancy. But of course mine will gain the upper hand at once, since both wills will be in my frequency."

Quest felt, rather than saw, a wall of alarm closing in on him. He tried to avert his eyes, to withdraw his hand from Clason's grasp. With a nostalgic pang in the pit of his stomach he suddenly realized that he could not do so. He had gone too far—farther than any man in his position had a right to go. Having deliberately weakened his will, it seemed now to have deserted him entirely. A prickling sensation coursed up his spine, his extended arm went numb, his hand trembled violently.

"Splendid!" said Clason, suddenly releasing both eye and hand. "Just as I foresaw, you will be able to attune yourself to my vibration-frequency with hardly an effort. Now please remain seated; I'll be back in a moment."

For a second after the door closed, Quest remained slumped in his chair. Then he was on his feet, shaking himself like a wet dog to free himself from the spell under which he had fallen. Something about Clason attracted and at the same time repelled him, fraying his nerves like an irritant drug and confusing his mind at the moment when he needed the full alertness of every faculty.

Invisible light—disembodied minds—will vibrations! Nothing there to get hold of. Were these things real or imaginary? Was Keane Clason a great inventor, or a madman? Would Philip prove to be a real or an imaginary scoundrel? Should he summon help, or go on alone?

Professional pride said: wait, don't be an alarmist! With his knuckles Quest tapped the table, half expecting it to melt under his fingers. The feeling and sound of the contact gave him a peculiar start. On the farther end of the table stood a letter-box—an invitation. From his pocket Quest snatched a slip of paper, and wrote:

6 stroke 4—9:45A—Hired. If no report in 48 hours, clamp down hard.

To address a stamped envelope and slip it in with the outgoing mail was the work of seconds. But he was none too quick. He had just dropped back into a lounging attitude when the door burst open and Clason flew into the room?

"We must act instantly," hissed the inventor. "Philip plans to close the transaction within a day."

In spite of himself, Quest jumped upright in his chair. Clason tapped him on the shoulder reassuringly.

"It's all right," he smiled, "I'm ready for him. We'll make our move this afternoon and beat him by eighteen hours.

"Let's see." He paused. "Oh! yes. I was about to explain to you that as soon as the will of the Agent enters the body of his Control, the latter can again transfer it into the body of still another person.

"Now you understand why I advertised for a man of exceptional character? As my Agent, I want you to enter the body of Philip, and your will must be strong enough to conquer his in the battle for mastery which will begin the instant you intrude into his body. You will still be under my control, but your will must be strong enough on its own merits to overcome his. I can direct you, but your strength must be your own. That's clear, isn't it?"

"I think so," said Quest slowly. "But what becomes of me after you have frustrated Philip's plot?"

"That's the easy part of the process," smiled Clason; "but naturally you feel some anxiety about it. I simply withdraw your will from Philip, return it to your own body, and pay you a reward of ten thousand dollars."

"You're sure you can?"

"Perfectly. I have merely to touch Philip's hand to recapture your will. Then I immerse myself in the tank with the switch at plus. The osmotic action will extract both wills momentarily from my body. But the presence of two bodies and two wills in the solution together forces a balance, and each will seeks out and enters its own body. Then you and I climb out of the tank exactly as we are this minute."

"If it weren't for my belief that anything is possible," Quest shook his head, "I'd say that your claims for this invention were ridiculous."

"And you couldn't be blamed," admitted Clason readily. "This toy of a model is hardly convincing. But come along with me and I'll show you how the Liberator looks in actual operation."

The office rug concealed a trap door which gave upon a spiral stair. Below, Clason unlocked another door and led the way through a narrow and tremendously long passage lighted at intervals by small electric bulbs. Presently another door yielded to the inventor's deft touch and closed behind them with a portentous chug. Here the darkness was so utter and intense that Quest imagined he could feel the weight of it on his shoulders. From the slope of the passageway and the muffled beat of machinery that had come to his ears on the way along, he guessed that he was below ground in some chamber at the rear of the factory.

He gave a low exclamation as Clason switched on the toplight. No wonder the darkness had seemed of almost supernatural quality! Even the hard white glare of the daylight arc was grisly. Its rays rebounded from the liquids of the great circular tank in a blinding dazzle of color, while the dull black walls and ceiling were so perfectly absorptive that beyond arm's length they became to all effects invisible. Even the ledge on which he stood—the shoulder of the vat—gave Quest the feeling that to move would be to step off into a bottomless pit.

But Clason took his attention at once, pointing here and there in his quick, nervous way to indicate how faithfully the Liberator had been reproduced from the model. In all respects the arrangements were the same, with the addition that here a long plank like a spring-board extended out from a wall-mount as far as the central compartment of the tank, and that from its end a narrow ladder hung down to the surface of the Chartreuse liquid. A double-throw switch fixed to the wall above the base of the plank was evidently the source of electrolytic control.

"When you throw the switch to plus," said Clason, pointing to the chalk-marked sign above, "you produce the violent electrolytic action needed to bring about a liberation. All the rest of the time it should be closed at minus, in order to maintain the anti-action which I explained to you.

"Now let's rehearse, so that when the time for the real performance arrives we can be sure of running it off without a hitch."

"All right, sir," nodded Quest, so dazed by the glittering light that he was hardly conscious of what he said.

"First," said Clason, running lightly up the steps to the plank, "you walk out to the end, like this, and start down the ladder. Then you lower yourself into the tank. The liquid is at body temperature; it's neither strongly acid nor caustic; it will cause you no injury or discomfort whatever.

"Meanwhile I keep in contact with your hand until the instant that you become submerged. Now your mind is in me, see?—ready for transfer into Philip, where it will act as my Agent. That's how simple it is! Come on up and we'll go through the motions."

Quest experienced a shiver as he mounted the bridge. Annoyed with himself, he shrugged the feeling off. There was no risk here. Moreover, it was a part of his daily work to take chances; he had done so a hundred times without hesitation. Now he moved all the more quickly, as if to belie the squeamishness that possessed him in spite of himself.

Swinging past Clason on the plank, he lowered himself without a pause to the bottom rung of the ladder, while the inventor, hanging head down, maintained contact with him.

"No need to stay here," he said in sudden irritation. "I understand perfectly what I am to do."

"I'm testing my own acrobatic ability," grunted Clason amiably. "Just a minute now."

He wriggled as if trying to adjust himself to a better balance, but in reality to mask the motion of his free hand with which he reached up and pressed a button in the side of the plank. Instantly the structure, pivoting downward on its wall-socket, plunged Quest to his waist in the osmotic solution.

"For God's sake get out of the way!" he shouted, trying to wrench his hand out of Clason's sinewy grip. "Let go, I tell you!"

But Clason clung like a leech, his teeth gritted under the strain. Again the plank lurched downward, and with a violent splash Quest vanished below the surface.

Quick as a cat, Clason scrambled up the ladder and back to the base of the plank, where he erased and interchanged the chalk-marked signs with which he had misled Quest. Then with a sinister twist of a smile he threw the switch to minus, and turned to watch as the plank slowly righted itself and the vacant ladder came clear of the liquid.

For some time he stood staring at the gleaming colored rings of his dissociation-vat like some witch over her cauldron, his lips working, his hands clasping and unclasping like the tentacles of some sub-sea monster. Then, as if the spell had suddenly broken, he turned on his heel and switched off the light. As he hastened down the passageway toward his office, the airlock sucked the door against its jamb with an ominous whistle.

In a twinkling, as Quest's shackled spirit writhed in its new housing, he knew that he was in bondage to a scoundrel. Formless and voiceless, he still fought madly for the freedom which the instinct of ten thousand generations made necessary to him.

At the same time he was furious at himself for having been tricked like an innocent schoolboy. The plank socket, the button which had tripped the supporting spring, the fake rehearsal, the tuning of his will to that of Clason—step by step the whole cunning scheme unfolded itself to him now.

But what could be the purpose behind this villainy? Only one answer seemed possible. Keane must be the one bent on selling the Death Projector, Philip the one who wished to frustrate the fiendish transaction! And Quest of the Secret Service—he was to be the tool to force the sale.

With the soundless scream of rage Quest's will hurled itself against Keane's. The two met like infuriated bulls, and for an instant too brief to be pictured as a lapse of time they poised immovable. But two wills can not exist on equal terms in a single body, and in this case the vibration of both was that of Clason. Quest had challenged the Master Will. He could do no more. It hurled him back, crushed him like foam, compressed him to the proportions of an atom in the background of his consciousness. So brief and unequal was the conflict that in the next breath Clason had all but forgotten the presence of the stolen will within him. When he was ready to use his Agent, that would be time enough to summon him!

Despite this suppression, Quest began to see dimly through strange eyes, and to hear vaguely with ears that were not his own. Feelers, tentacles, some intangible kind of conduits carried thought impulses to him from the Master Will. He received these impressions vividly, but those which he gave off in return were so weak, due to the subjection of his will, that Clason was entirely unconscious of any response. Quest was not enough of a scientist to be astonished at the ability of a disembodied mind to experience sense impressions in the body of another. He was only glad that the darkness and silence were growing less. Very, very slowly he was awakening to a new kind of consciousness—the consciousness of another person's Self. He hated and loathed that Self, yet it was better than the awful blankness that had gone before.

Suddenly, as light grew brighter and sound more clear and definite, a new element entered—the element of hope. At first it was feeble: its only suggestion was that sometime, somehow, he might escape this prison. But it was like water to a parched plant. It caused his will to expand, to extend its feelers, to press up a little more bravely against the crushing pile of the Master Will.

Now another surprise sprang upon him. He was moving! That is, Clason's body was moving in some kind of a conveyance, which was threading its way through crowded streets. Stores, buildings, buses, people—Quest remembered them all distantly as things he had known thousands of years ago. The driver turned his head, and his profile seemed vaguely familiar.

Now a rush of foreign thoughts drowned out his own. They were a sort of overflow from the mind of Clason. They thronged along the conduits that bound the two wills together, but only Quest was conscious of the movement.

Keane's mind was on his brother Philip: that much was particularly clear. And there was something about a telephone call. Yes, Keane had telephoned to the police, disguising his voice, refusing to divulge his name. He had said that a man by the name of Philip Clason was in trouble and had told them where to find him. Then the police had telephoned the factory, and Keane had pretended astonishment and alarm at the news. That's why he was here now—he was on the way to confer with the police. And he was chuckling—chuckling because he had fooled Quest and the police, and because now the hundred million dollars was almost in his grasp.

Cutting in close, the car turned a corner and drew up before one of a row of loft buildings in a section of the city which Quest failed to recognize. As Clason stepped to the sidewalk, Quest was more painfully aware than ever of his powerlessness to influence by so much as the twitch of a muscle the behavior of this hostile body in which he had permitted himself to be trapped. In his weakness he felt himself shrinking, contracting almost to nothingness under the careless pressure of the Master Will.

Clason glanced casually at his watch, and three men converged toward him from as many directions. There was nothing to distinguish them from anyone else in the street, but along the conduits it came to Quest that they were detectives and that they were there by appointment with Keane Clason.

"What floor?" asked the latter, with an excitement which Quest felt instantly was pure pretense. "Are you sure they haven't spirited him away?"

"Don't worry," replied the leader of the detectives. "The alley and roof are covered. We'll take care of the rest ourselves."

On tiptoe they climbed three long flights of stairs in the half-light. Clason held back as if in fear. He was a good actor, and Quest felt the shrinking and hesitation of his body as he crouched and slunk along in the wake of the detectives, pretending terror at what was about to happen, though he knew—and Quest knew he knew—that there would be no resistance up there—that Philip would be found alone exactly as he had been left by Keane's hired thugs.

On the top landing Burke, the leader, paused to count the doors from front to rear.

"This is it," he whispered to the bull-necked fellow just behind him.

The other nodded, and crouched back against the opposite wall while his companions placed themselves in position to cross-fire into the room the moment the door gave way.

Quest longed for the power to kick his hypocrite of a master as he still held back, cowering on the stairs, playing his fake to the limit. Then the door flew in with a splintering shriek under the charge of the human battering ram, and across it hurtled the other two detectives in a cloud of ancient dust.

"Here he is!" someone shouted.

"Phil! Phil!" Keane Clason's voice fairly quavered with sham emotion as he ran into the room and threw himself at a man tightly bound to an upholstered chair, which in turn was wedged in among other articles of stored furniture.

But Philip was too securely gagged to reply, and as Burke slashed the ropes from across his chest he dropped forward in a state of collapse. Stretched on a couch, he soon gave signs of response as a brisk massage began to restore the circulation to his cramped limbs. Suddenly he sat up and thrust his rescuers aside.

"What time is it?" he demanded with an air of alarm.

"One o'clock," replied Keane before anyone else could answer, patting his brother affectionately on the shoulder while within him Quest writhed with indignation. "By Jove! Phil, it's wonderful that we got to you in time. Really, how—you're not injured?"

"No," grunted Philip, "just lamed up. I'll be as fit as ever by to-morrow."

"If you feel equal to it," suggested Burke, "I wish you'd tell me briefly how you arrived here. Do you know the motive behind this affair? Did you recognize any of the body-snatchers?"

Philip frowned and shook his head.

"Yesterday noon," he said slowly, "I took the eight-passenger Airline Express to Cleveland on business. There were three other passengers in the cabin—two men and a woman. Right away I got out a correspondence file and was running over some letters. The next thing I knew I was approaching the ground in the strangest state of mind I ever experienced. My head was splitting, and everything looked unreal to me. Seemed as if I was coming down on some new planet."

"You mean the ship was gliding down to land?"

"No, no. I was dangling from a parachute.... By the way, where am I now?"

"In a Munson Avenue loft."

"In Chicago?"

Burke nodded.

"I guessed as much," frowned Philip. "You see, I came down in a field, and then before I could free myself from my trappings I was pounced on—trussed up and blindfolded—by a gang of men. I knew they had taken me a long distance by automobile, but I saw nothing more until they tore the blindfold from my eyes when they left me here."

"And they were all strangers to you?"

"Yes—those that I saw."

"Isn't this enough for just now, Burke?" interrupted Keane, and Quest received an impression of uneasiness that was not apparent in the inventor's tone. "After a good rest he's sure to recall things that escape him now."

"Just one minute," nodded the detective, turning back to Philip. "Can you think of no plausible reason for this attack? Is there no one who might possibly benefit by putting you temporarily out of the way?"

Philip gave a frightened start. Then he was on his feet, clutching at his brother's arm.

"Keane!" he pleaded, "Keane! What's happened? I know, I know! It's the Projector."

"Water!" roared Keane, and Quest felt the panic that coursed through him as he tried to drown out his brother. "Somebody bring water! He needs it!"

At the same time he snatched up Philip's hand in a grip of steel. Instantly the latter's wild eyes became calm, the flush passed from his relaxing face, and he slumped down weakly on the couch.

In that fleeting moment Quest surged into the body of Philip and confronted his will with a fierce and triumphant ardor. For now his will would have command of a body with which to fight his fiend of a Control.

With a sensation of contempt he met Philip's resistance and buffeted him ruthlessly backward, crushed down and compressed his feebly struggling will. And as Philip yielded, Quest felt his own will expanding to normal, taking possession of the borrowed body with hungry greed, and flashing from its faded eyes the spark of youth.

Burke stared in amazement at the kaleidoscopic rapidity of the changes in the rescued man's expression. Strange lights and shadows continued to flit across Philip's face as Quest's invasion of him proceeded, but with a diminishing frequency which soon assured Keane that his Agent was tightening his command.

The younger of Burke's aides stood fascinated, his mouth agape. The other spoke guardedly to his superior:

"Dope, eh!"

"Nah!" replied Burke, shrugging himself out of his trance. "Shock."

The actual duration of the conflict in Philip was something less than three seconds. It would have been more brief if Quest had exerted himself to the utmost. But his sensations as he first surged into this new habitat under Keane's propulsion were so weird and unearthly that for the moment he was lost in the wonder of the experience. For that short time, therefore, Philip was able to fight back against the onrush of the invading will.

In the next second Quest became conscious of the resistance. Urged on by his Control, he must push Philip back and quell him; but his sympathy for his opponent and his hatred of Keane roused him to sudden revolt. He wanted to disobey the Master Will, retreat, leave Philip in command of himself. But he could only go on, unwillingly thrusting back Philip's will despite the indescribable torment and confusion in his own. Then, with the feeling that he was ten times worse than the most inhuman ghoul, he took full possession of his borrowed body.

"I'll take him home now," said Keane composedly to Burke. "As you see, he needs a little extra sleep. Meanwhile, if you have any occasion to call me, I will be at the factory."

To the youthful mind of the Agent, used to the lightness of an athletic physique, the body in which it moved down the stairs to the limousine seemed strangely heavy and awkward.

"I'm badly done up, Keane," he said with Philip's lips as the car got under way.

"Bah!" snorted Keane, "you've had a scare, that's all. Go to bed when you get home and sleep till nine this evening. At ten a man named Dr. Nukharin will call for you. He will drive you to a garage, leave the car, and transfer to another one a few blocks away.

"Out near Marbleton you will find an airplane staked in an open field. Nukharin is a capable pilot. He will fly back southeast along the lakeshore to the meeting place. You should arrive about twelve-thirty. The test is set for one o'clock."

Quest listened in a state of abject rage. Lacking the power to resist his Control, he could only boil away in Philip's body like a wild creature hemmed in by bars of steel.

"Bring with you," continued Keane venomously, "the set of papers that you took from the safe in my office. Hold the other set in readiness to deliver to Nukharin to-morrow, after he has studied the results of the test and has notified Paris to release a hundred million dollars in cash for delivery at your Loop office at 3 p. m."

The murderous greed of the man maddened Quest. He tried to revolt, his will squirming like a physical thing, threshing the ether like a wounded shark in the sea. For a moment he felt that he was about to burst the bonds that his demon of a Control had woven around him. So violently did he resist that the immured and sporelike will of Philip forged up fitfully out of the blackness and joined his in the hopeless struggle. But along the attenuated conduits that still chained Quest to the Master Will Keane caught the impulse of the mutiny, and his eyes darted flame as he countered with a will-shock that paralyzed his unruly Agent.

"Listen! you whimpering dog," he snarled. "Think as I tell you—and nothing more! You are going to apologize to Dr. Nukharin for your previous unwillingness to sell the Projector. You are going to tell him that I am at fault—that I held out—but that you found a way to force my compliance. You understand?"

Quest could find no words. With Philip's head he nodded meekly. Just then the car stopped and the chauffeur threw open the door.

Dr. Nukharin flew high despite the masses of cumulus cloud which frequently reduced visibility to zero. He had merely to follow the rim of the lake to his destination, and an occasional glimpse of the water was sufficient to hold him on his course.

In the back seat hunched Philip, his body crumbling under the weight of Quest's despair. For hours the latter had gone on vaguely, hoping somehow to thwart this horrible transaction that was rushing the world to its doom, thinking he might grow strong enough to wrench himself free and so liberate Philip from the dominance of his conscienceless brother. Even though such a move should leave his own will forever separate from his body, he was ready and anxious to make the sacrifice.

Suddenly the crash of the motor ceased and Nukharin banked the ship up in a spiral glide. Quest had never been in the air before, and the long whirl down into the darkness on this devil's errand was to him as eery as a ride to perdition in a white-hot projectile.

His mind seemed to trail out in a great nebular helix behind the descending ship. He felt that he had suddenly crossed some cosmic meridian into a new plane of existence, where he was changed to a gas, yet continued capable of thought. But even here his obsession remained the same. Keane Clason—trickster, traitor, arch-criminal—must be destroyed!

"I'll get him!" vowed Quest in words that were no less real for being soundless. "I'll trail him to the end of space and bring him to account!"

Then wheels touched earth and the cold, bare facts of his destiny rushed in on him with redoubled force. He felt the nearness of his Control seconds before he perceived him through the eyes of Philip. With a sensation like a stab he realized that now he must speak, play his part, be any bloodless hypocrite that Keane Clason chose to make him. The silent order surged down the conduits promptly enough; he responded as an automaton obeys the pressure of a button.

"Well, Doctor," chuckled Philip with a cunning leer, "here's the magic tower, just as I promised you. We'll run it up in a jiffy. This test is going to be so vivid and conclusive that not even a hard-headed skeptic like you can raise a question."

"You misunderstand me," returned Nukharin in an injured tone. "So far as I am concerned this procedure is only a formality, but it is none the less necessary. Suppose that I should spend a hundred million of my government's money and the purchase prove worthless? You may guess that my folly would cost me dear."

Keane Clason was waiting on the platform of a giant truck, the motor of which was idling. All the apparatus was in readiness except that the three demountable sections of the tower had yet to be run up into position.

"One of the beauties of the D. P.," said Philip gleefully to the Doctor, while Keane smiled slyly to himself, "is that this pint-size dynamo provides all the current needed for the test. We pick the power for our radio right out of the air by means of a wave trap and mensurator invented by this bright little brother of mine," and he clapped Keane patronizingly on the back.

"Yes, ah—Dr. Nukharin," ventured Keane timidly, and at that moment Quest experienced the raging red hatred that causes men to murder. "Philip has promised me that you will employ this device only as a threat to hold the ambitions of the larger powers in check."

"Of course, of course!" replied the Doctor heartily. "But now let's have the test. Even at night I'm not too fond of these open-air performances."

The height of the tower as they ran the upper sections into place was forty feet. When all connections had been inspected, first by Keane, then by Philip, the former led Nukharin aloft.

As the climax of his plot approached, Keane's excitement bordered on a cataleptic state, hints of which came confusedly through the conduits to Quest. With a peculiar satisfaction he felt that Keane was suffering. The inventor's jaws became rigid, as though his blood had changed to liquid air and frozen him, and he had difficulty in controlling the movements of his arms.

Now he was afraid! Genuinely afraid, this time. Quest caught the impulse too clearly to doubt its meaning. This was no sham! Keane was doubting his own machine, fearing that in the crisis some element in the finely calculated mechanism might fail to operate, thus cheating him of the blood-money on which his heart was set. Then he was speaking, and even Nukharin noticed the tremor in his voice:

"These nine tubes, which look like a row of gun barrels, are molded from silicon paste. Each shoots a beam of invisible light and a radio dart of precisely the same wave length. The destructive effect depends chiefly upon this exactness of synchronization."

"A question occurs to me," said the Doctor: "will others be able to manipulate the machine as successfully as you can?"

"It's fool-proof," chattered Keane, almost losing control of his voice, "absolutely fool-proof. Surely you have scientists in your country who can follow written directions! Nothing more is necessary."

"Very well," shrugged Nukharin. "I only want to be sure that no unforeseen difficulties may arise in an emergency."

"See this range-setter?" continued Keane. "The thread on the vertical shaft enables us not only to limit the range by angling the beams into the ground, but it can also be disengaged and the Projector revolved in a flat circle for maximum ranges."

"And is there no danger of the machine going wrong—of destroying itself and us?" suggested Nukharin.

"None whatever, Doctor. There is no explosive force and no great electrical voltage involved. As long as we stand back of the muzzles we have nothing to fear.

"Now look. I have set the micrometer at three hundred yards, which will just about cover the stretch between ourselves and the lake. I will cut a swath for you—and every bush, every blade of grass, every insect in this swath will be withered to ash in the twinkling of an eye. The destruction will be absolute."

"Please proceed," said Nukharin grimly.

Keane pulled a lever in its slot, then pressed it down into its lock as his projection battery swung lakeward at the desired angle. Then with one hand poised on another lever, he pressed an electric button.

At the controls below, a bulb flashed on and off. The signal was superfluous, for already Quest had received his silent command from the Master Will. An icy dread fastened on him. He must obey the unspoken command; he had no will of his own with which to resist. The test would be a success; the Projector would be sold; the world would be turned into a shambles. And he, Owen Quest, would be the destroyer, the murderer, the weak fool who made this horror possible.

All this flashed through the Agent's mind in the fraction of a second that it took him to extend Philip's hand, close the switch of the dynamo, and snap on the alternating lights in the housing over the tellurium filter.

For an interminable five seconds he waited, in a ferment of revolt which the paralysis of his will made it impossible to put into action. Then again the command pulsed within him, the signal bulb flashed, and he reversed his motions of the moment before.

Cold sweat cascaded down Philip's face as Quest felt the ladder vibrating under descending feet. He longed for the power to hurl Keane Clason to the ground and turn the Projector upon him. But with an awful irony the Master Will forced him to his feet, and to speak in a tone that withered the manhood within him.

"Come," said Philip in a triumphant tone to Nukharin, "and I will show you that Clason inventions perform as well as they sound."

Flashlight in hand, he started toward the lake with Nukharin and his brother close behind him. Twenty paces, and the long meadow grass suddenly vanished from beneath their feet.

"See that!" whispered Philip excitedly, waving the light from side to side to show the forty-foot swath that stretched away before them. "Not a trace of life left, not a blade of grass—nothing but dust!"

The only response was a gurgling sound that issued from Nukharin's throat.

"Look!" Quest formed the word with Philip's lips under the urge of the Master Will. "Here was a tall bush. What do you see now? Just a teaspoonful of ash. When you examine the remains by daylight, you will find that even the root has disintegrated to a depth of two feet."

"Enough of this," croaked Nukharin in horror. "The deal is closed."

His face was convulsed with fear. Without another word he whirled about and fled toward his airplane. Philip gave a start as if to follow.

"Halt! you slob," growled Keane, whose composure had returned with the successful outcome of the test. "I have use for your company, even though you are as great a coward as our Slavic friend."

Coward! The epithet stung Quest like a flaming goad. One of the fine, intangible lines that bound him under the will of Keane Clason severed, and his own will exploded into action like a thunderbolt. With startling agility he whirled Philip about, the flashlight clubbed in his hand. But Keane was quicker still. A clip on the wrist sent the weapon flying. Then Philip reeled backward from a kick in the stomach, and his clutching hands beat the air as he sank unconscious in the dust.

With a violent tug, Quest lifted Philip's body to a sitting posture. The phone was ringing, and by the pull on the will-fibers he knew that Keane was at the other end of the wire. Philip's body was failing under the strain of the part it was forced to play, and the blow of the night before had further weakened it. Now he sat rocking his head painfully between his hands. But Quest lifted him to his feet by sheer will, and he staggered across the room.

"Hello!", he said in a hoarse voice.

"Get the hell out here to the factory!" rasped Keane, and the crash of the receiver emphasized the command.

It was one o'clock as Philip whirled his sedan into Olmstead Avenue. At three, reflected Quest as the car scorched over the pavements, he must be at the downtown office to deliver the papers and receive the money.

Then he was face to face with Keane, reeling dizzily at the hatred that blazed from the latter's accusing eyes.

"Double-crossed me, eh!" The voice was a low snarl, and as he spoke Keane thumped the extra outspread on his desk. "But you're not going to get away with it—neither of you!"

Dismay, hope, dread, wonder robbed Quest of the power to speak. But he whirled around behind the desk with such unexpected violence that Keane staggered back in alarm. Then he was devouring the screaming headlines of the newspaper. Three seconds, like a slow exposure, and every word of the Record's great scoop was etched upon his mind as if with caustic:

DOOM LAUNCH ADRIFT ON LAKE

Physician Baffled by Condition of Five Bodies Found in Craft

Blighted Area on Shore Said to Have Bearing on Tragedy

THAW HARBOR, IND., June 6.—Five Chicago sportsmen, most of them prominent in business and society, perished in the early hours this morning while returning in the launch of A. Gaston Andrews from a weekend camping party near Hook Spit on the Michigan shore.

The boat was towed into this port at daybreak by the Interlake Tug Mordecai after being found adrift less than a mile off shore. According to Captain Goff of the Mordecai the death craft carried no lights and he barely avoided running her down. The weather along the Indiana shore was perfect throughout the night and there is nothing to indicate that the launch was in trouble at any time. The bodies are unmarked, and this little community is agog with rumors ranging all the way from murder and suicide to the supernatural.

Dr. J. M. Addis of Thaw Harbor, the first physician to examine the bodies, says that they appear to have suffered some violent electro-chemical action the nature of which cannot be determined at the moment. This statement is considered significant in view of the reported discovery ashore of a large blighted area almost directly opposite the point where the launch was found. Joseph Sleichert, a farmer who lives in that vicinity, reports that this patch of ground extending back from the lakeshore was completely stripped of vegetation overnight. He ascribes the damage to some unknown insect pest. Others say that the condition of the ground indicates that it has been burned at incinerator temperatures. Nothing is left of the soil but a blue powder.

Philip faced his brother with eyes that were dull with agony.

"You have made me a murderer!" Quest forced out the words in painful gasps.

But Keane snapped back at him like a rabid dog.

"You did it—you did it yourself! You tampered with the Projector. You tried to spoil the test. You changed the range. You tried to kill me, and instead you killed these others. And you're going to pay—both of you. You hear me?—you're going to pay!"

His voice mounted the scale to a scream. It was a wail of unreasoning terror, of the dread of exposure, of the fear that he would fail to collect the fortune now so nearly in his grasp. The accident that had jarred his well-laid plans had unnerved him.

Frantically Quest strove to answer him, to explain his utter subjection, as Agent, to say that if he had possessed the will to oppose or trick him he would have turned him over to the police, or might even have killed him, at the very outset. But in his frenzy, Keane had so tightened his control that Quest was speechless. Now he tried to substitute gesture for words, but Philip was rooted to the spot like a statue; even his hands were immovable.

He might have remained in this state indefinitely had not Keane's fears withdrawn his mind from his immediate surroundings. Momentarily he forgot Quest, Philip—everything but himself and his predicament. And in the instant that his vigilance relaxed, Quest's enslaved will experienced a sudden lease of strength and hope. Independently of his Control, he found that he could move Philip's hand, could take a faltering step.

But now, what to do? How might he fan this feeble spark of volition to sufficient strength for decisive resistance? The idea came to him: if only he could place distance between himself and Keane, perhaps with one titanic effort he might launch himself against the Master Will, take him by surprise, crush him down, and reverse him to the status of Agent instead of Control.

With infinite effort Quest forced Philip's body step by step across the room. He must reach that window, get a signal of distress to someone in the street.

But Keane began to sense a mutiny. He followed. He crossed the floor with slinking, tigerish steps and snaking body. His wet lips writhed back over his teeth, and his contorted features wove the leer of the abyss. Now as his Control drew physically near, Quest felt his mite of strength ebbing fast. Slowly Keane reached up with his clawed fingers and grasped his Agent by the arm.

"Remember!" he hissed, "if these deaths are traced to us, you break down—you confess—you take the blame—you paint me lily white—you describe the cowardly means by which you moulded me to your will—you plead only for a quick trial and the full penalty of the law. You understand?"

Quest made no reply, but he understood all too well the hideous intention of his betrayer. What a fool he had been to imagine that Keane Clason would ever restore him to his body! Philip to the chair, Quest a homeless spirit wandering in space, and for the body at the bottom of the tank, the brief regrets of the Department!

A sudden rushing sound filled the air with a sense of action and alarm.

Two—three—four speeding automobiles swung in recklessly to the curb and shrieked to a standstill under smoking brakes. Men leaped out and deployed on the run to surround the factory. Keane darted to the door and twisted the key.

"Come on!" he spat at Philip as he snatched back the rug and threw open the trap door.

The command galvanized Quest to action. In two bounds he had Philip on the stairs. A heavy impact rattled the office door just as he dropped the trap into place over his head. Then, infected with Keane's panic, he was running down the passageway like mad.

Inside the tank chamber the brilliantly colored rings of liquid flashed back the rays of the arclight. Half crazed with anxiety, Keane danced on the black ledge like a monkey on a griddle. His face was ashen, drool ran from his twisted mouth, his eyes were two black pools of terror.

Again Quest experienced the peculiar sensation which came with the slackening of control. New hope sprang up in his agonized being as heavy blows boomed against the air-locked door. Great waves of fear poured along the conduits, betraying to the Agent the state of mind of his Control. Now what would Keane do? What could he do? Why, of all places, had he fled down into this blind burrow?

Thud, thud! Then came a series of sharp reports. Outside, they were trying to shoot away the deep-sunk disk hinges.

Still the door stood fast, but the fury of the assault on it whipped the faltering Keane to action. In a bound he was on the platform. With a lightning hand he threw the switch to plus, starting electrolytic action in the tank. Then he pressed a button concealed under the edge of the switch-mount and a panel slid silently aside in the wall, revealing a narrow outlet.

To Quest everything went a flaming red. He might have known that this fox would have something in reserve—a way of escape when danger threatened!

But his Control gave him no time for independent thought. He forced Quest to turn Philip's eyes up to his own. Without disconnecting that grip of his glittering eyes, Keane leaped back to the ledge. Quest felt the silent order:

"Get up on that plank! Dive into the tank! Get back into your own body, let Philip have his! Then come up—the two of you—and face the music. For I'll be gone, and your story will sound like the ravings of a maniac."

Quest took an obedient step toward the platform. But at the same instant a tremendous crash shivered the door. It seemed to unnerve Keane Clason. With a gasp he sank down upon the steps, his body doubled in pain, his hand clutching at his heart. Another crash followed, and he shuddered and cried out.

Instantly Quest felt an expansion of the will. Keane's sudden physical weakness had loosened his control. Philip's lips worked painfully as Quest forced him to pause, to disobey the command of the Master Will. In a spasm of will he fought to wrench himself free from the countless clinging tentacles of his Control. In great surges, Quest's reviving volition pounded against the walls of his borrowed body. Now he sought to force this sluggish body back to the wall, so that he might release the airlock and spring the door. But Philip seemed to ossify, every cord and muscle of his body frozen to stone by the conflict that raged within him.

Braced against the wall, Keane was rising slowly to his feet. His seizure was easing, and so he was able to exert a better pressure upon his rebellious Agent.

"Come!" he gasped, realizing that he lacked the strength to escape alone and must therefore change his plan. "Lift me—quick! Carry me out! Slide the panel back into place. We will escape together!"

The spoken command turned the balance against Quest. His will yielded to the master. At the same instant Philip's body relaxed like an object relieved of a great excess of electrical potential. Suddenly strong and supple, he lifted the trembling Keane and tossed him across his shoulder.

For a moment there had been a lull in the assault on the door. Now the battering resumed with a fury that jarred the whole chamber and sent ripples dancing across the varicolored liquids in the osmotic tank.

"Quick!" gasped Keane. "Move! I say. Carry me out."

But he was in a fainting condition. Crash after crash rocked the chamber, and with every blow Quest's will felt a stimulation that enabled him to stand off the commands of his Control. Then a wave of nausea swept over him and left him reeling. It seemed that Philip's blood had turned to boiling oil. A dazzling mist swallowed him up, and with a weird sense of inflation he felt full strength returning to his will.

A booming blow that bulged the door inward acted upon him like a stage player's cue. He leaped to the platform. The gurgling sound of remonstrance rattled from Keane's throat. But Quest paid no heed. Philip was walking the plank—away from the open panel—out over the tank.

Rapidly he dropped down the ladder to the bottom rung, snatched Keane's wrist in a gorillalike grip, and hurled him down into the vat.

Then Philip was clinging desperately to the ladder, his strength gone, his body shivering as if with ague.

"Go on up!" came a strange, impatient voice from below him. "For heaven's sake let me out of here!"

A downward glance, and with a shout of alarm Philip was scrambling up the ladder, for there was a head down there, and a pair of naked shoulders, and the face of a man he had never seen before. Hand over hand Quest followed. Philip had collapsed and lay prone on the plank. Quest lifted him to his feet and shook him anxiously.

"Philip!" he urged. "Philip! Can you walk?"

The tattoo on the battered door helped to revive the older man.

"Quick!" whispered Quest, kneading Philip's arms. "There's barely an hour left. Get to your office. Burn the papers. Refuse the money. Do you hear me?"

Philip nodded dazedly.

"Hurry!" puffed Quest, thrusting him through the opening that Keane had reserved for his own escape, and sliding the panel back into place.

Quest was himself now—young, strong, free. Instantly he threw the electrolytic switch to minus. For Keane had failed to emerge from the tank, and since he was submerged alone, he could not escape until electrolysis was halted.

Just as Quest leaped from the platform to release the airlock, the door burst in and three men with drawn guns rushed into the chamber.

The leader stopped with a startled oath and stood blinking his unbelieving eyes. Quest was poised like a statue, his naked body gleaming an unearthly white against the lusterless black of the wall.

"Quest," came from the three in chorus. Then a rush of questions: "What's the matter? What's happened to you? Where are the Clasons?"

Quest turned toward the platform, expecting to see Keane.

"Something's wrong!" he shouted. "Quick! Somebody get Philip. He's gone to his Loop office. Keane Clason's at the bottom of this tank. I'm not sure how this thing works, but Philip can get him out! I'm sure of it!"

Despite the confident predictions of both Quest and Philip Clason, osmotic association failed to restore Keane to life, and at last the coroner ordered the removal of the body. The autopsy revealed heart disease as the cause of his death.

For reasons best understood at Washington, the cause of the five launch deaths was withheld from the public. Quest's punishment for his part in the crime consisted of a promotion and a warm personal letter from the President of the United States.

#The Stolen Mind #M. L. STALEY #Scifi #science fiction #short stories #mind snatchers #Owen Quest #Keane Clason #Phillip Clason #public domain characters #public domain stories #public domain

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