#link was just previously a very good soldier and even after he drew the master sword zelda showed only frustration with herself

[three-bunnies-in-a-trenchcoat]

Hate it when people say aoc when they mean pre-calamity. Like sir no they are the same yes but they are also very different! Even before Terrako's intervention things were different!

[cleverwordsandotherstuffilike]

Britain's child slaves: They started at 4am, lived off acorns and had nails put through their ears for shoddy work. Yet, says a new book, their misery helped forge Britain.

The tunnel was narrow, and a mere 16in high in places. The workers could barely kneel in it, let alone stand. Thick, choking coal dust filled their lungs as they crawled through the darkness, their knees scraping on the rough surface and their muscles contracting with pain. A single 'hurrier' pulled the heavy cart of coal, weighing as much as 500lb, attached by a chain to a belt worn around the waist, while one or more 'thrusters' pushed from behind. Acrid water dripped from the tunnel ceiling, soaking their ragged clothes. Many would die from lung cancer and other diseases before they reached 25. For, shockingly, these human beasts of burden were children, some only five years old. Robert North, who worked in a coal mine in Yorkshire, told an inspector: 'I went into the pit at seven years of age. When I drew by the girdle and chain, my skin was broken and the blood ran down … If we said anything, they would beat us.' Another young hurrier, Patience Kershaw, had a bald patch on her head from years of pushing carts - often with her scalp pressed against them - for 11 miles a day underground. 'Sometimes they [the miners] beat me if I am not quick enough,' she said. The inspector described her as a 'filthy, ragged, and deplorable-looking object'. Others, like Sarah Gooder, aged eight, were used as 'trappers'. Crouching in the darkness of the tunnel wall, they waited to open trap doors which allowed the carts to travel through. 'I have to trap without a light and I'm scared,' she told the inspector. 'I go at four and sometimes half-past three in the morning, and come out at five-and-half-past … Sometimes I sing when I've light, but not in the dark. I don't like being in the pit.' His master threatened to 'knock out his brains' if he did not get up to work, and pushed him to the ground, breaking his thigh. Eventually, bent double and crippled, he returned to the workhouse, no longer any use to the brute. Most were exhausted by their working hours - they were often woken at 4am and carried, half-asleep, to the pits by their parents. Many young trappers were killed when they dozed off and fell into the path of the carts. Ten-year-old Joseph Arkley forgot to shut a trap door, allowing poisonous gas to seep into the tunnel. He died along with ten others in the resulting explosion. But coal mining was just one industry in which children worked during the 18th and 19th centuries. The Industrial Revolution brought immense prosperity to the British Empire. Not only did Britannia rule the waves, she ruled the global marketplace, too, dominating trade in cotton, wool and other commodities, while her inventors devised ingenious machinery to push productivity ever higher. But, as a new book by Jane Humphries, a professor of economic history, shows, a terrible price was paid for this success by the labourers who serviced the machines, pushed the coal carts and turned the wheels that drove the Industrial Revolution. Many of these labourers were children. With the mechanisation of Britain, traditional cottage industries, which had employed many poor families, went out of business. Consequently, more and more poverty-stricken workers were driven into the major cities and factories. The competition for jobs meant that wages were low, and the only way a poor family could fend off starvation was for the children to work as well. These were the real David Copperfields and Oliver Twists. Beaten, exploited and abused, they never knew what it was to have a full belly or a good night's sleep. Their childhood was over before it had begun. Using the heartbreaking first-person testimony of these child labourers, Humphries demonstrates that the brutality and deprivation depicted by authors such as Charles Dickens and Thomas Hardy was commonplace during the Industrial Revolution, and not just fictional exaggeration. She also reveals that more children were working

than previously thought - and at younger ages. As British productivity soared, more machines and factories were built, and so more children were recruited to work in them. During the 1830s, the average age of a child labourer officially was ten, but in reality some were as young as four. Many child scavengers lost limbs or hands, crushed in the machinery; some were even decapitated. Those who were maimed lost their jobs. In one mill near Cork there were six deaths and 60 mutilations in four years. While the upper classes professed horror at the iniquities of the slave trade, British children were regularly shackled and starved in their own country. The silks and cottons the upper classes wore, the glass jugs and steel knives on their tables, the coal in their fireplaces, the food on their plates - almost all of it was produced by children working in pitiful conditions on their doorsteps. But to many of the monied classes, the poor were invisible: an inhuman sub-species who did not have the same feelings as their own and whose sufferings were unimportant. If they spared a thought for them at all, it was nothing more than a shudder of revulsion at the filth and disease they carried. Living conditions were appalling. Families occupied rat and sewage-filled cellars, with 30 people crammed into a single room. Most children were malnourished and susceptible to disease, and life expectancy in such places fell to just 29 years in the 1830s. In these wretched circumstances, an extra few pennies brought home by a child would pay for a small loaf of bread or fuel for the fire: the difference between life and death. A third of poor households were without a male breadwinner, either as a result of death or desertion. In the broken Britain of the 19th century, children paid the price. One young boy, Thomas Sanderson, went out to work when his family was reduced to eating acorns they had foraged after his soldier father had been demobilised without a pension. Children were the ideal labourers: they were cheap (paid just 10-20 per cent of a man's wage) and could fit into small spaces such as under machinery and through narrow tunnels. But while parents sent their children to work with heavy hearts, the workhouses - where orphaned and abandoned children were deposited - had no such scruples. A child sent out to work was one mouth fewer to feed, so they were regularly sold to masters as 'pauper apprentices'. In exchange for board and lodging, they would work without wages until adulthood. If they ran away, they would be caught, whipped and returned to their master. Some were shackled to prevent them escaping, with 'irons riveted on their ankles, and reaching by long links and rings up to the hips, and in these they were compelled to walk to and fro from the mill to work and to sleep'. Orphaned Jonathan Saville was sold as a pauper apprentice to a master in a textile industry. His master threatened to 'knock out his brains' if he did not get up to work, and pushed him to the ground, breaking his thigh. Eventually, bent double and crippled, he was returned to the workhouse, no longer any use to the brute. Robert Blincoe - on whom Dickens' Oliver Twist is thought to be based - was sold, aged six, as a 'climbing boy' to a chimney sweep in London. Forced to scale the narrow chimneys, only 18in wide, he would scrape his elbows and knees on the brickwork and choke on coal dust. It was common for the master sweep to light a fire under them to make them climb faster. Many climbing boys and girls fell to their deaths. After several months, Blincoe was returned to the workhouse. Then, aged just seven, he was sent along with 80 other children to a cotton mill near Nottingham to work as a 'scavenger' - crawling under the machines to pick up bits of cotton, 14 hours a day, six days a week. In return, he was given porridge slops and black bread. Weak with hunger, at night he crept out to steal food from the mill owner's pigs. Many child scavengers lost limbs or hands, crushed in the machinery; some were even decapitated. Those who

were maimed lost their jobs. In one mill near Cork there were six deaths and 60 mutilations in four years. Blincoe was lucky: he only lost half a finger. A German visitor to Manchester in 1842 remarked that there were so many limbless people it was like 'living in the midst of an army just returned from campaign'. A doctor who observed mill workers noted that '… their complexion is sallow and pallid, with a peculiar flatness of feature, caused by the want of a proper quantity of adipose substance [fatty tissue], their stature low, a very general bowing of the legs … nearly all have flat feet'. The average height of the population fell in the 1830s as an overworked generation reached adulthood with knock-knees, humpbacks from carrying heavy loads and damaged pelvises from standing 14 hours a day. Girls who worked in match factories suffered from a particularly horrible disease known as phossy jaw. Children in glassworks were regularly burned and blinded by the intense heat, while the poisonous clay dust in potteries caused them to vomit and faint. Supervisors used terror and punishment to drive the children to greater productivity. A boy in a nail-making factory was punished for producing inferior nails by having his head down on an iron counter while someone 'hammered a nail through his ear, and the boy has made good nails ever since'. But despite the growth of cities, agriculture remained the biggest employer of children during the Industrial Revolution. While they might have escaped the deadly fumes and machinery of the factories, the life of a child farm labourer was every bit as brutal. Children as young as five worked in gangs, digging turnips from frozen soil or spreading manure. Many were so hungry that they resorted to eating rats. Children in glassworks were regularly burned and blinded by the intense heat, while the poisonous clay dust in potteries caused them to vomit and faint. The gangmaster walked behind them with a double rope bound with wax, and 'woe betide any boy who made what was called a "straight back" - in other words, standing up straight - before he reached the end of the field. The rope would descend sharply upon him'. Another favourite gangmaster's punishment was gibbeting: lifting a child off the ground by his neck, until his face turned black. And yet, many of these children showed extraordinary resilience and lack of resentment. Children who worked six days a week spent the seventh at Sunday school, determined to better themselves. But whenever anyone sought to improve children's working conditions, they encountered fierce opposition from the proprietors whose profits depended on exploiting them. They argued that any interference in the marketplace could cost Britain her manufacturing supremacy. Even when regulations were eventually passed to improve working conditions, with only four inspectors to police the thousands of factories across the country they were seldom enforced. In 1840 Lord Ashley, later Lord Shaftesbury, set up the Children's Employment Commission, interviewing hundreds of children in coalmines, works and factories. Its findings, reported in 1842, were deeply shocking. Many people had no idea that coal was excavated by young children. But it was the immorality rather than the cruelty of the mines that shocked them most. An inspector described how, 'The chain [used to pull the carts] passing high up between the legs of two girls, had worn large holes in their trousers. Any sight more disgustingly indecent or revolting can scarcely be imagined … No brothel can beat it.' An Act was passed, prohibiting women and children under ten from working underground. Two years later, another Act was passed prohibiting the textile industry from employing children younger than nine. But it was not until the mid-19th century that children were limited to a 12-hour day. In 1880, the Compulsory Education Act helped reduced the numbers of child labourers, and subsequent laws raised their age and made working conditions safer. But it had come too late for the little white slaves

on whose blood, sweat and toil our great railways, bridges and buildings of the Industrial Revolution were built. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1312764/Britains-child-slaves-New-book-says-misery-helped-forge-Britain.html#ixzz2ZKkYXGMW

[newmoneytrash]

Death Stranding

I had to write about Death Stranding to get this not very good game out of my head and soul

(this has spoilers I guess but honestly who cares)

I was going to wait to play Death Stranding, if I ever even played it at all. I had barely seen any trailers outside of the first couple. I remember seeing them and thinking “this isn’t going to be the crazy, weird experience everyone thinks it’s going to be”. I didn’t think that I knew better than anyone else, or that the people who were excited were stupid to feel that way. I just felt like I could see what it was and knew that, having played the majority of Kojima’s work, that this probably wasn’t going to be the experience that people thought it was going to be.

And I was comfortable with my disinterest, content to know that this thing existed, that I was fine with it existing away from me. But then a week before release when the review embargo lifted and people started posting their impressions and experiences and reviews my interest was piqued in a way that no trailer or announcement had interested me before. It wasn’t the glowing and fawning reviews that drew me to the game, the people who played and loved the game. It was, weirdly, the negative ones that changed me from not having any interest in playing Death Stranding to going to the store on the Friday morning it was released and standing in the rain waiting too long for an Uber so I could get home as fast as possible to start playing.

The reason the negative reviews drew me to the game so much is not because they were negative, it’s not that I was taking some joy in getting to play something that I thought was going to be bad and now I had an opportunity to be vindicated by seeing for myself that it is bad. It was the things that they were negative about that sounded so interesting. The idea that a group of people would spend so much time and effort and money in creating a large premier video game experience where the main crux seemed to be tedium is an inherently fascinating concept.

The kind of elevator pitch descriptor that interested me the most (that was used by people both derisively and positively) was that it was a post-apocalyptic truck simulator. Travelling a dead or dying world as a UPS driver. Mad Max meets King of Queens (that’s a comparison that I made and I’m too proud of it not to use it). What if a development team who made one of the great action games on the last decade (Metal Gear Solid V might be a terribly lacking narrative experience with some frustrating mission design, but the core gameplay is extremely good) and funnelled all of that energy into something intentionally boring and monotonous?

Not only did that help reset my expectations of what this would be, it made me feel excitement for something that I had previously thought I wouldn’t be able to feel excitement or anticipation for.

I spent 40 hours with it over the course of a week. That might not sound like a lot of time in video game speak, but I don’t remember the last time I spent that much time with a game over such a short period of time. Over the first weekend I had it I played for just over 20 hours. Twenty hours. I don’t know if I’ve ever been that focused on a game in my life. But still when I reflect on my time with it, and especially when I try to recall those initial 20 hours which were far and away the most fun I had with the game, I feel nothing. It’s like static, like someone has gone back and just erased that time from my memory.

That’s maybe not entirely fair. I remember general things, just not specific gameplay moments.

I remember the gameplay loop. It’s less a truck simulator game and more of a hiking game, at least initially. And this was appealing to me. You’re slowly traversing across these barren, empty environments delivering packages to and from outposts and shelters. You’re packing a huge amount of garbage on your back and climbing up mountains and down cliffs and wading through rivers. You’re given ropes and ladders to try and ease your journey, and later you’re able to build greater structures like bridges and towers to help you more easily navigate the environment and scout your path ahead. Eventually you’re given access to motorbikes and trucks that can both help and hinder your deliveries, depending on the paths you take and forge. You even get a chance to help rebuild an actual honest to goodness highway, creating it piece by piece by providing an increasing amount of materials to each section. Maybe the greatest accomplishment I felt playing this game was spending a few hours creating large sections of the highway and then getting to just fly down it on a motorbike. It really did feel like I hate created something big, that I not only radically changed the world by creating this, but that I had bettered it.

And there’s there community aspect of the game. Having others donate materials to your structures as well as seeing structures others have built and abandoned vehicles and packages in your world is all really neat and interesting. Everything positive I have to say about this game is wrapped up in these systems, because there is a lot of the game that feels like you’re on a genuine journey. Taking a package over the peak of a snow capped mountain for the first time can feel like a legitimate achievement, it was rewarding just walking from one place to the next. Seeing a bridge helpfully placed in a frustrating location made me feel real gratitude toward that person, and receiving feedback that other people were using and liking things that I had built made me feel good, as if I was paying forward the help that I had received.

For a long time I didn’t even think there would be combat in the game but it gradually increases as you go along and, while it’s never good, it’s still serviceable and easy enough to never really get in the way. The shooting and melee combat feels off, and I might have had a better time if it wasn’t there at all, but a few boss encounters and combat vignettes were interesting and would occasionally help when the monotony of just delivering packages started to grow.

But after 20 hours of this nothing really stood out to me, there’s no one gameplay moment that will stay with me. I won’t reflect on this game and think “wow, remember that one journey I took by following the coastline?” It’s all just a long, sustained blur.

And it’s not that I don’t remember the story or the characters either. Those are all easy to recall. The story is especially easy to recall because, over 40 hours, it’s just basically telling you one thing over and over and over. It’s hard not to recall it, because there is only one thing to recall.

The thing that I was worried about before the game came out was that the story was just going to be a huge mess. Kojima’s games are always functionally good to great, that’s never really been an issue I’ve had with his work, it’s always been the stories he tries to tell and how he tries to tell them. From the first Metal Gear Solid through to The Phantom Pain there are always misgivings I’ve had with character representation, general themes, and just the delivery of that narrative. I know this isn’t a unique position to have regarding his work (sexism and his consistently awful portrayal of women is a pretty famous issue he has, even among his biggest fans), but beyond that I just never felt that anything he was doing was particularly special. They were different and almost always interesting, but a lot of people would like to tell you that Kojima was doing masterful video game storytelling that no one else was capable, that he was single-handedly raising the medium of video games to something as artistically valid and viable as cinema or art. But, to me, he was never doing that. He was making fun and compelling video games, but they were inconsistent and messy and overly verbose and self-righteous.

So my concern was that, now that he was the head of an independent studio that for all intents and purposes answered to no one, he would let that his storytelling get further away from him. In an attempt to prove his level of creativity, maybe to even prove his worth, he was going to put all of his ideas on the table and the result was going to be an indecipherable mess.  When they would release a trailer of a naked Norman Reedus on a beach holding a baby attached to him with an artificial umbilical cord, or Guillermo Del Toro standing in a sewer holding a baby in a jar while Mads Mikkelsen is covered in black tar leading a bunch of skeleton soldiers a lot of people responding with a variant of “wow Kojima is going to make something crazy, this is going to blow my mind”. But all I saw was a giant red flag.

So when I finally experienced the story of Death Stranding I was kind of taken aback. Not by how crazy or nonsensical it is, but by kind of how… boring and one note it is? There isn’t really any room for interpretation in this story. It’s all very, very literal. It tells you how and why things are happening, and if you missed the exposition the first time don’t worry! Here is another twenty minute info dump reiterating the same boring, one note narrative over and over.

The game just tricks you into thinking it’s being more creative than it is because it’s filled with endless jargon. There is timefall, void outs, BTs, BBs, Beaches, repatriates, chiral energy, and extinction entities. Ha and ka. But it’s all in service of creating a world and a narrative that ultimately says nothing, and spends dozens of hours painfully and slowly telling you nothing. It’s borderline torturous.

There is also some high school art level social commentary on social media. Likes are a huge commodity in this world, with people becoming addicted to the feeling you get when they receive one. And instead of having a smart phone or whatever you have Cuff Links, which is a literal pair of handcuffs that, when strapped to your wrist, functions as a way to communicate with people through the Codec or email. Because our phones are a prison, right guys? Pretty deep. In Kojima’s world we truly do live in a society.

But it’s not just the small stuff like that that’s so literal, every part of the game is literal. You’re Sam Porter Bridges, a porter who has a contract with the organisations Bridges, created by someone named Bridget, to create bridges with people across America (both figuratively and literally) to create a network across the continent that will bridge everyone together. Every metaphor and theme in the game is so painfully literal that the game never gives you the opportunity to interpret anything else. The only time there are moments in the game when you don’t know what is happening is when characters start talking about things that you could have no way of knowing about as if you did know about them, but even then these moments of mystery are immediately undone because they always immediately explain the thing that you missed. You will have a cryptic conversation with someone about something you have had no opportunity to deduce or discover on your own, but it never matters because it’s followed up a few minutes later with a flashback or exposition that lays everything out on the table.

Instead of Kojima creating something nonsensical and imaginative and impossible to follow, he managed to make the world’s most shallow metaphor about really nothing in particular. When he said that the game was inspired by Donald Trump and Brexit he meant that it was inspired by the division that these things caused between people and how we need to create Bridges to reconnect with people.

That’s it, that’s the game. That is its message. And it’s not interestingly presented, there’s nothing more to it than that.

One of the podcast conversations I listened to before released (that was largely critical of the game) that drew me toward playing it ended with one of the people saying “It is a game that I think everyone should experience, but not one that I could ever recommend” which is a perfect way of articulating how I feel. It’s a unique experience that does things that a game of its size has never really done before. I don’t think there’s merit in being different for differences’ sake, but this isn’t that. The gameplay is considered and deliberate and purposeful, but that doesn’t mean that it’s fun and it doesn’t negate the parts that are tedious and tiring. Just because you make something boring and annoying on purpose that doesn’t make it good.

If you had asked me six months ago if I think I would like Death Stranding I would have said no. I probably would have qualified it by saying I hope that I was wrong, that I would like it to be good, but that I was probably more likely to hate it.

I didn’t love it, and I don’t like it. I don’t even hate it, but in a weird way I wish that I could. Because then at least I would feel something toward it. Instead Death Stranding leaves me feeling something much, much worse.

It makes me feel nothing.

[worldofcelts]

Celtic Fantasy Books List #1: Popular

In this first list of Celtic fantasy books, we will see mostly popular books with Goodreads summary and links to each for further reading. Long post under the cut. Upcoming lists will be #2: Indie books, and #3: Classics, so stay tuned and enjoy!

Sevenwaters Trilogy (Juliet Marillier)

Lovely Sorcha is the seventh child and only daughter of Lord Colum of Sevenwaters. Bereft of a mother, she is comforted by her six brothers who love and protect her. Sorcha is the light in their lives, they are determined that she know only contentment. But Sorcha's joy is shattered when her father is bewitched by his new wife, an evil enchantress who binds her brothers with a terrible spell, a spell which only Sorcha can lift-by staying silent. If she speaks before she completes the quest set to her by the Fair Folk and their queen, the Lady of the Forest, she will lose her brothers forever.

When Sorcha is kidnapped by the enemies of Sevenwaters and taken to a foreign land, she is torn between the desire to save her beloved brothers, and a love that comes only once. Sorcha despairs at ever being able to complete her task, but the magic of the Fair Folk knows no boundaries, and love is the strongest magic of them all.

The Mists Of Avalon (Marion Zimmer Bradley)

Here is the magical legend of King Arthur, vividly retold through the eyes and lives of the women who wielded power from behind the throne. A spellbinding novel, an extraordinary literary achievement, THE MISTS OF AVALON will stay with you for a long time to come....

The Chronicles Of Prydain (Lloyd Alexander)

Taran wanted to be a hero, and looking after a pig wasn't exactly heroic, even though Hen Wen was an oracular pig. But the day that Hen Wen vanished, Taran was led into an enchanting and perilous world. With his band of followers, he confronted the Horned King and his terrible Cauldron-Born. These were the forces of evil, and only Hen Wen knew the secret of keeping the kingdom of Prydain safe from them. But who would find her first?

Deverry (Katharine Kerr)

Even as a young girl, Jill was a favorite of the magical, mysterious Wildfolk, who appeared to her from their invisible realm. Little did she know her extraordinary friends represented but a glimpse of a forgotten past and a fateful future. Four hundred years-and many lifetimes-ago, one selfish young lord caused the death of two innocent lovers.

Then and there he vowed never to rest until he'd righted that wrong-and laid the foundation for the lives of Jill and all those whom she would hold dear: her father, the mercenary soldier Cullyn; the exiled berserker Rhodry Maelwaedd; and the ancient and powerful herbman Nevyn, all bound in a struggle against darkness. . . and a quest to fulfill the destinies determined centuries ago.

The Dark Is Rising (Susan Cooper)

On holiday in Cornwall, the three Drew children discover an ancient map in the attic of the house that they are staying in. They know immediately that it is special. It is even more than that -- the key to finding a grail, a source of power to fight the forces of evil known as the Dark. And in searching for it themselves, the Drews put their very lives in peril. This is the first volume of Susan Cooper's brilliant and absorbing fantasy sequence known as The Dark Is Rising.

The Iron Druid Chronicles (Kevin Hearne)

Atticus O’Sullivan, last of the Druids, lives peacefully in Arizona, running an occult bookshop and shape-shifting in his spare time to hunt with his Irish wolfhound. His neighbors and customers think that this handsome, tattooed Irish dude is about twenty-one years old—when in actuality, he’s twenty-one centuries old. Not to mention: He draws his power from the earth, possesses a sharp wit, and wields an even sharper magical sword known as Fragarach, the Answerer. Unfortunately, a very angry Celtic god wants that sword, and he’s hounded Atticus for centuries. Now the determined deity has tracked him down, and Atticus will need all his power—plus the help of a seductive goddess of death, his vampire and werewolf team of attorneys, a bartender possessed by a Hindu witch, and some good old-fashioned luck of the Irish—to kick some Celtic arse and deliver himself from evil.

Ashling (Mary Mack)

A freak hang-gliding accident plunges Ashling through a rip in the fabric of Time and catapults her into Ireland’s past, where Fomorian Giants are battling Elves of the Tuatha Dé Danaan for lordship over the downtrodden, enslaved Humans. All Ashling wants is to go home, but the only way back is through the inter-dimensional travel hub on Mount Olympus, which is jealously guarded by Fallen Angels — the all-powerful and violent gods of mythology. In her seemingly impossible quest to outsmart these creatures, the transplanted university student gathers together a band of misfits, repels an invasion of Giants, rescues a besieged Elf princess, masters a ferocious dragon, and sparks a Human revolution. But her arrival has fulfilled an ancient prophecy and triggers events that will eventually culminate in the destruction of the gods’ sacred mountain — and Ashling must race against Time and Fate to reach the quantum portal before it closes forever.

Shadowfell (Juliet Marillier)

Sixteen-year-old Neryn is alone in the land of Alban, where the oppressive king has ordered anyone with magical strengths captured and brought before him. Eager to hide her own canny skill--a uniquely powerful ability to communicate with the fairy-like Good Folk--Neryn sets out for the legendary Shadowfell, a home and training ground for a secret rebel group determined to overthrow the evil King Keldec.

During her dangerous journey, she receives aid from the Good Folk, who tell her she must pass a series of tests in order to recognize her full potential. She also finds help from a handsome young man, Flint, who rescues her from certain death--but whose motives in doing so remain unclear. Neryn struggles to trust her only allies. They both hint that she alone may be the key to Alban's release from Keldec's rule. Homeless, unsure of who to trust, and trapped in an empire determined to crush her, Neryn must make it to Shadowfell not only to save herself, but to save Alban.

War For The Oaks (Emma Bull)

Eddi McCandry sings rock and roll. But she's breaking up with her boyfriend, her band just broke up, and life could hardly be worse. Then, walking home through downtown Minneapolis on a dark night, she finds herself drafted into an invisible war between the faerie folk. Now, more than her own survival is at risk—and her own preferences, musical and personal, are very much beside the point.

The Age Of Misrule (Mark Chadbourn)

When Jack Churchill and Ruth Gallagher encounter a terrifying, misshapen giant beneath a London bridge they are plunged into a mystery which portends the end of the world as we know it. All over the country, the ancient gods of Celtic myth are returning to the land from which they were banished millennia ago. Following in their footsteps are creatures of folklore: fabulous bests, wonders and dark terrors As technology starts to fail, Jack and Ruth are forced to embark on a desperate quest for four magical items - the last chance for humanity in the face of powers barely comprehended.

The Subtle Beauty (Ann Hunter)

A cursed prince. A vain beauty. Glory is the seventh daughter of Balthazar, High King of the Twelve Kingdoms. Glory hopes that - of all her sisters - she can escape the fate of a loveless marriage. But on the night she plans to elope with the royal falconer, her world comes crashing down: Her father announces Glory's betrothal to Eoghan of the Blood Realm - a prince no one has ever seen. The prince is said to be a recluse, cursed and deformed by the gods for the sins of his power-hungry father. Yet when Glory is trapped in Blackthorn Keep she discovers that not everything is what she expected. An insulting gryphon, a persistent ghost, and a secret plan to usurp the prince keep Glory reeling.

Song of Albion (Stephen R. Lawhead)

From the dreaming spires of Oxford, Lewis Gillies drives north to seek a mythical creature in a misty glen in Scotland. Expecting little more than a weekend diversion, Lewis finds himself in a mystical place where two worlds meet, in the time-between-times - and in the heart of a battle between good and evil. The ancient Celts admitted no separation between this world and the Otherworld: the two were delicately interwoven, each dependent on the other. The Paradise War crosses the thin places between this world and that, as Lewis Gillies comes face-to-face with an ancient mystery - and a cosmic catastrophe in the making.

The Forgotten Beasts Of Eld (Patricia A. McKillip)

Sixteen when a baby is brought to her to raise, Sybel has grown up on Eld Mountain. Her only playmates are the creatures of a fantastic menagerie called there by wizardry. Sybel has cared nothing for humans, until the baby awakens emotions previously unknown to her. And when Coren--the man who brought this child--returns, Sybel's world is again turned upside down.

Moonlight (Ann Hunter)

One vow. One curse. One thousand moons. While Princess Aowyn's six brothers are favored by their father, Aowyn is the jewel in her mother's crown. When the Queen dies, Aowyn takes a vow to protect her brothers and father from the hungry eyes of the queen's handmaiden, Ciatlllait - who is more than she seems.

In order to save her family, Aowyn risks a dangerous deal with the dark creature Sylas Mortas. But magic comes with a price: and Aowyn soon realizes the one she has paid is too steep. Only true love can reverse the spell...but it will take one thousand moons.

The Dreaming Tree (C. J. Cherryh)

It was that transitional time of the world, when man first brought the clang of iron and the reek of smoke to the lands which before had echoed only with fairy voices. In that dawn of man and death of magic there yet remained one last untouched place---the small forest of Ealdwood---which kept the magic intact, and protected the old ways. And there was one who dwelt there, Arafel the Sidhe, who had more pride and love of the world as it used to be than any of her kind.

But fear of the world of Faery ran deep in the hearts of men, and when Ciaran Cuilean, Lord of Caer Wiell, a man with Elvish blood in his veins, found himself the object of increasing distrust and suspicion from his men, his king, and even his own family, he knew he must once again put his humanity aside and return to Ealdwood. For shadows of a newly awakened evil swarmed across both lands, and unless Ciaran reclaimed his haunted weapons from the Tree of Swords and joined Arafel, he would see this evil overtake not only the warm hearthstones of the mortal keeps but the silvery heart of Ealdwood itself!

Faery In Shadow (C.J. Cherryh)

Avoiding other humans because of the curse placed on him, Caithe mac Sliabhan nevertheless aids a strange couple who claim to be husband and wife but look like twins to Caith and who are under the spell of a witch.

The Winter King (Bernard Cornwell)

Uther, the High King, has died, leaving the infant Mordred as his only heir. His uncle, the loyal and gifted warlord Arthur, now rules as caretaker for a country which has fallen into chaos - threats emerge from within the British kingdoms while vicious Saxon armies stand ready to invade. As he struggles to unite Britain and hold back the enemy at the gates, Arthur is embroiled in a doomed romance with beautiful Guinevere. Will the old-world magic of Merlin be enough to turn the tide of war in his favour?

The Perilous Gard (Elizabeth Marie Pope)

In 1558, while exiled by Queen Mary Tudor to a remote castle known as Perilous Gard, young Kate Sutton becomes involved in a series of mysterious events that lead her to an underground world peopled by Fairy Folk—whose customs are even older than the Druids’ and include human sacrifice.

The Mcgunnegal Chronicles (Ben Anderson)

The McGunnegals are all strange, and it has been that way for generations. They are too strong, or too fast, or too smart, and odd things happened when they are around. The neighbors say they are witches or devils, or have been snatched by changelings. Mothers hold their children close when they walk by, fearing they might catch the McGunnegal strangeness. But misfortune besets them when their mother, Ellie, disappears, followed by their crazy grandfather, but not before he reveals a family secret to Colleen and Frederick - a secret that reveals the source of their strangeness, and also threatens to cast the dark shadow of famine on Ireland.

He has opened a portal to the world of the Others, where their mother has gone, and a dark creature - a goblin - has come in her place and is spreading death and disease. They fall through this portal, and find this strange land filled with dark creatures that are crushing its people and now threaten to come through the portal and take up their abode in the world of Men, as they once did long ago. Yet in this dark world of oppression, this poor family discovers who they are, and also what it means to be truly human.

Caledon Of The Mists (Deborah Turner Harris)

After the death of her brother in a battle against a shape-shifting demon, Mhairi takes up the struggle to unite the Caledonians and must use all her Feyan powers to overcome a tyrant's dark magic and regain her rightful throne.

Legend Of The Fae (April Holthaus)

For centuries, stories of the Fae have been passed down from generation to generation throughout the Scottish Highlands. Over time, the truth of their existence was reduced to nothing more than childhood fairytales. Until now! To foresee the future, she had to forget her past. On the eve of war between Good and Evil, Ella of Andor, the Fae Princess of Darkness embarks on a journey that would ensure her kingdom’s victory as prophesied. But in a twist of fate, Ella is led to the mortal world where she soon discovers a mystery about her past that could destroy everything she has ever known. After returning home from battle, Laird Galen Graham stumbles upon an injured woman in desperate need of protection and care. Wanting to return her to her family becomes a difficult mission when he discovers the lass cannot speak. While trying to solve the mystery behind who she is, Galen finds himself falling in love with a lass he knows nothing about. Forced to return to the Fae world, can Ella stop the war threatening to destroy her kingdom, or will she give up her destiny to return to the man she loves in the mortal world? After discovering the truth about the mysterious lass, will Galen be able to let her go?

The Little Country (Charles de Lint)

When folk musician Janey Little finds a mysterious manuscript in an old trunk in her grandfather's cottage, she is swept into a dangerous realm both strange and familiar. But true magic lurks within the pages of The Little Country, drawing genuine danger from across the oceans into Janey's life, impelling her--armed only with her music--toward a terrifying confrontation.

The Forged Prince (Michael Laird)

The only future seen clearly is a single howling wilderness, in a land both barren and dead, an unmarked grave for the dreams of Man, with all the great castles fallen. Six hundred years past, High Queen Boudicca unified the three great peoples of the south and fought the Roman Empire to a standstill, forcing Nero's retreat from the land once called Brython by some and Prydein by many. Thus was the Kingdom of Tethera founded. The victors spoke only of the will of the gods and the great heroes that had made their victory a reality, yet rumors persisted of a triumph attained only at the expense of secret bargains with the ever duplicitous Fae, and of druids meddling with forbidden enchantments . Now the last high king is dust, his line long ended by treachery and murder, while the great kingdom itself lies in ruins a century old. Immutable prophecy dictates neither will come again: "Tethera cannot be restored until High King Pwyl's heir takes up his crown." To the people of the five kingdoms, "until Pwyl's heir takes up his crown" is just a an elaborate way of saying "never." The fragmented lesser kingdoms, all that remain of what once was, are failing, unable to prosper on their own. The wilderness grows, the barbarians press, the warlords feud, the Fae grows ever bolder, and even the very waves of the sea become hostile. In the end, none of that may matter for Annwyn, that otherworld also known as the Land of the Dead, creeps forth upon the world, growing larger with each passing year while its lord gathers his forces to crush all and end everything. Nevertheless, the Lord of Annwyn has a rival in the Queen of Deceit. She readies her own final stroke with the forging of a very special weapon. It is a weapon intended to sunder prophecy itself and one which even the Lord of Annwyn may find reason to fear. Yet even a weapon forged for evil can turn in its maker's grasp and strike in an unexpected direction—most especially a weapon with a mind of its own.

Gods Of The Nowhere (James Tipper)

The ancient Celts believed that the veil separating the worlds of the living and the dead was at its thinnest on Halloween; it was then that the dead could get through. But could it work the other way? Could we go to them? High school senior Sam McGrath is convinced it can be done. For as long as he can remember, The Nowhere has been beckoning him, reaching out with cold and ancient fingers. Crippled from a childhood injury, Sam has always been different, but he knows now that his differences go far beyond the physical. Only his best friend since childhood – a brash and beautiful Latina named Lucia – knows of his strange gifts, and she has vowed to help Sam. Together they intend to find the world where their nightmares are born.

Feel free to add additional titles below, or check out more lists on Celtic fantasy books here.

[emperor-uncarnate]

My Personal Take on a Sonic Movie

Somehow I knew I’d eventually end up doing something like this. With mixed feelings on the new trailer I had to ask myself what I would do if faced with the task of putting together a Sonic movie myself. Grab a chili dog because this might be a long read:

Before I get started, know that I’d make it fully animated. I am of the belief that some things just cannot translate to live action without losing too much of what makes them cool. Sonic with his weird little outfit, chunky cones of quills, and single giant eyeball can’t not be cartoonish. No two ways about it.

The film opens with some small animals hanging out in Green Hill Zone just doing what they do. Seems peaceful enough until a large Badnik swoops in and swallows up some of the unsuspecting critters. The menacing robot is about to haul its animal prisoners away when a blue blur rushes to their rescue. Sonic triumphantly chases the Badnik down, wrecks it, and frees the captured animals trapped inside. After showcasing what his great speed is capable of, the chase/fight scene leaves Sonic at a vantage point from which he can see where the animals were being taken: Robotropolis... aaand... title screen. 

Cut to a bustling urban area styled to look like 90′s San Francisco. People are out and about living their lives under a summer sun. No trace of animal life in sight besides pigeons and pets. This is where we’re introduced to our human lead who we’re going to call Chris (because I don’t care to put thought into it and he can be named after Sonic X’s Chris or Christian Whitehead) who is spending his morning getting ready for work. He can still be played by James Marsden, that’s fine. Anyway Chris meticulously puts himself together for the day in a suit and tie, indicating he’s a real clean-cut, straight-laced guy. The news on his television playing in the background is going on and on about one Doctor Ivo Robotnik and the rapid expanse of his empire. Robotnik is established by the broadcast as a genius inventor of artificial intelligence and advanced robotics who defected from the human civilization to begin his own fully-mechanical one.

Chris heads off to work where we learn he is an agent of the Guardian Unit of Nations (G.U.N.) and is being briefed for a mission with his covert team. With Robotnik’s growing forces posing a threat to the human population, G.U.N. intends to infiltrate one of Robotnik’s island settlements and figure out what he’s up to. Disguised as a team of nature photographers, Chris and his fellow agents travel to the series of islands Robotnik controls and begins their search for one of his secret laboratories. 

It isn’t long before Chris’ team is ambushed by a squad of Robotnik’s mechanical soldiers. The agents are easily subdued and captured by the more heavily-armed robots but Sonic arrives in time to save Chris. Though the rest of his team is captured, Chris is rescued and passes out from exhaustion or getting hit in the head or whatever.

He wakes up some time later to discover a small two-tailed fox watching over him. Initially startled to discover an anthropomorphic creature speaking English, Chris explains he did know about talking animals existing outside of the human civilization but he’d just never met one before. So yeah, this isn’t a story about Sonic traveling to the real human world or of a real human traveling to Sonic’s world; this is a place where animal people and people-people already exist together but almost never cross paths mostly due to geography. Humans have their cities while the hedgehogs and foxes and whatever else live in the wilderness or in small communities. 

Sonic the Hedgehog and Miles “Tails” Prower introduce themselves. Although Sonic was the one to actually rescue Chris it was Tails who got Sonic to stick around and wait to make sure Chris woke up alright. Sonic’s attitude comes across as impatient, not really caring much about Chris and instead desiring to speed off and continue his mission. Tails, however, is curious and compassionate to Chris who turns out to be banged up but well enough to walk. 

Chris is given the chance to introduce himself too but chooses not to reveal he’s actually a G.U.N. agent. He keeps up the charade that he’s just a simple photographer and it turns out to be a safe call: As it happens, Sonic and Tails are not crazy about G.U.N. and its methods. The two accuse G.U.N. of polluting the environment and stealing land from their animal friends. This gives us the sense that while G.U.N. isn’t villainous like Robotnik, it is in no way an ally of nature. Chris feels guilty as he’d never considered what the humans were doing that negatively affected the animal folk around the world. 

When Chris learns Sonic and Tails mean to go after Robotnik he offers to join them on their journey. Sonic resists, not wanting to be slowed down by a human, but Chris convinces them he needs to find out what Robotnik is up to so he can warn his fellow humans. Tails uses his little brother ability to guilt trip his honor-bound big brother Sonic into accepting Chris and the three set off together. Since Chris can’t move like a supersonic hedgehog or a flying fox they head towards Sonic and Tails’ home where another mode of transportation awaits them.

Meanwhile, Robotnik makes his grand entrance and introduces himself to the squad of undercover G.U.N. agents his foot soldiers captured earlier. The agents assure Robotnik holding them for ransom will be fruitless but the scheming villain states he has more significant plans for them. The scene ends with an attendant of the flamboyant doctor informing him “another one has been located.” You might be thinking that’s referring to a Chaos Emerald and to that I say ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Back to Sonic and company as they encounter some lesser Badniks... this is where your Crabmeats and your Buzz Bombers come in. Sonic and Tails bust them up (though Tails lags behind a little and is upset he needed Sonic to pick up the slack) and free the animals sealed within, getting Chris to ask why Robotnik would create such machines. The duo expresses that it is because Robotnik (who Sonic mockingly refers to as “Eggman”) must be looking for something and that sending Badniks out into the world is his way to find it. This is when we learn of Robotnik’s roboticization technology that changes animals into robot animals. This scene also serves to show a little more of how Sonic and Chris’ personalities clash; Sonic is carefree, hasty, and won’t hesitate to poke fun at Chris as he struggles to keep up. Sonic’s teasing Chris to speed up while Chris is advising Sonic to slow down now and again.

Eventually the trio makes it to the small hanger that houses the Tornado. They intend to use the rocket-boosted biplane to make way to Robotnik’s hidden lab (though Sonic reiterates he’d prefer running) but they are cut off by an obnoxious intruder. Knuckles the Echidna causes a ruckus outside that prompts a quick tussle with Sonic. The blue hedgehog’s speed clashes with the almost comically formidable strength of the red echidna while they argue. Apparently Sonic’s conflict with the Badnik at the very beginning of the movie drew Knuckles’ attention away from the Master Emerald, a hulking jewel of immeasurable importance he was supposed to be protecting, and it is stolen by an unknown thief as a result. Sonic insists it was Knuckles’ own fault for not keeping a closer eye on the Master Emerald but the thick-skulled echidna won’t listen. While they both believe Robotnik to be the culprit it doesn’t stop them from trading blows.

They slug it out until a new Badnik arrives and interrupts them with whirring chainsaws and blazing flamethrowers. This destructive robot clearly made for deforestation puts up a good fight but is ultimately taken down by Team Sonic thanks to Tails’ engineering prowess coming through in the clutch. Between that and getting a closer look at the Tornado, Chris is impressed that such a young fox could have such an impressive intellect. He notes that it is not common knowledge among humans that the animal folk could be so smart. Apparently the humans see the animal people as more animal than people, but this isn’t news to Team Sonic. It seems they’d always been disregarded by humankind or otherwise seen as uncivilized. What racists.

Sonic, Tails, Knuckles, and Chris talk things out and piece together some information to get an idea of what Robotnik’s after: the Chaos Emeralds. According to Knuckles there are six Chaos Emeralds that are linked to the Master Emerald and they contain mysterious powers even Knuckles himself isn’t aware of. Chris notes that Robotnik’s recent increase in military fortitude may be due to his possession of one or more of these Chaos Emeralds as power sources. 

When Knuckles says he might know the location of a Chaos Emerald, the gang decides to split up. The Tornado was conveniently damaged in the fight against the last Badnik so Tails and Chris stay behind to repair it. Sonic and Knuckles volunteer to head into the mountains with the hopes of recovering a Chaos Emerald from a temple there.  Elsewhere, Doctor Robotnik gazes down at the five Chaos Emeralds it turns out he’s already collected. He sends a group of Badniks to the mountains to recover the sixth Chaos Emerald he’s located (not knowing Sonic and Knuckles are already on their way there) while he gathers his G.U.N. prisoners for an experiment. Here he reveals his roboticization machine had previously only worked on animals but its latest iteration could also affect humans. Robotnik activates the machine and the G.U.N. agents are painfully converted into subservient robots one by one.

Tails and Chris have some downtime they spend venting. Tails is discouraged because he’s not as good a fighter and still needs Sonic to protect him. Chris reminds Tails that one, he’s still a child and will become stronger as he grows up more, and two, that his brains are a much more valuable asset anyway. Then Chris himself gripes about Sonic being right about him needing to loosen up, and Tails tells him it’s not so bad to wing it and take risks sometimes. It’d be cool if this was also where Tails got to telling Chris about how he first met Sonic. You know, for exposition. 

Cut to the mountains where we get an opportunity to see the fun ways Sonic and Knuckles travel up the steep cliffs using their powers. They’ll also have a chance to fight the big ass flying Badnik Robotnik sent before they do indeed find a Chaos Emerald, perhaps one that’s not green. I want Sonic to ask something like “if it’s an Emerald, why isn’t it green?” so Knuckles can say “not all sapphires are blue” or something to that effect. I imagine Knuckles to be a little dense but not unintelligent, if that makes any sense.

Sonic and Knuckles return to find Robotnik himself patiently waiting for them. Having already ensnared Tails and Chris, Robotnik offers their freedom in exchange for the last Chaos Emerald. Knuckles accuses Robotnik of stealing the Master Emerald, which he scoffs at and denies. Robotnik also announces that he knows Chris is really a G.U.N. agent, much to the surprise of Team Sonic. I think this scene should also briefly address Sonic and Robotnik’s dealings in the past: Sonic’s destroyed some of Robotnik’s machines before this moment but he’s never gotten the chance to battle Robotnik himself. As it stands, Sonic’s barely on the mad doctor’s radar and he’s presently seen only as a minimal threat.

After agreeing to the exchange and getting Tails and Chris back, Sonic makes a reckless move to go after the Chaos Emerald and runs straight into a trap. Robotnik captures Sonic and ferries him and the last Chaos Emerald back to Robotropolis while Tails and Knuckles are left with Chris. Tails feels hopeless without Sonic around and Knuckles won’t trust Chris since he was outed as a secret G.U.N. agent. All seems lost until Chris admits his guilt and apologizes in an emotional rant. He promises that if they can beat Robotnik he’ll do whatever it takes to get humankind to be more environmentally not shitty to the animal folk. The genuine nature of his speech sways both Tails and Knuckles who fire up the Tornado and get ready for action. The three of them are dead set on getting Sonic back and keeping Robotnik from using the Chaos Emeralds. The forests and jungles slowly turn to wastelands which in turn become rusted industrial parks as far as the eye can see. The Tornado zooms into the polluted skies of Robotnik’s manmade nation using some stealth modifications Chris was able to put in place. The spy tech begins to fail as they get close, however, and Robotnik scrambles a pack of fighters to shoot them down upon noticing them. Tails and Knuckles hold them off in some aerial combat while Chris crash lands the Tornado into the heart of Robotnik’s lair. 

Sonic is in locked in some kind of sciencey tube (which is busy scanning his DNA and designing Metal Sonic... but we’ll save that for the sequel) until he’s broken out and the four heroes are reunited. Robotnik defends the six Chaos Emeralds he’s collected and villain-monologues his plans to use them with his roboticization machine to turn everyone on the planet into robots. Perhaps Robotnik will rant a little about the shortcomings of organic existence and why he believes machines will be the superior form of life on the planet, yadda yadda.

Getting Sonic free is a small victory but now the quartet of protagonists is cornered by Robotnik and the roboticized G.U.N. agents. Chris reminds Sonic he can’t destroy the robot agents if there’s any chance they can be transformed back into flesh and blood, causing Sonic to have to learn his lesson and not rush without thinking into scrapping them. He takes some of Chris’ advice from earlier in the movie and coordinates rounding the agents up in a slower, safer fashion... somehow. Doesn’t matter, the point is that Sonic learns something over the course of the movie. Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles start fighting Robotnik as he pilots a giant mech suit resembling a modernized Death Egg Robot. Tails tinkers with something (insert ‘tiny character with giant guns gag’ here), Knuckles smashes shit, and Sonic literally runs circles around the thing but they can’t fend off such an imposing boss for long. This is where Chris takes Sonic’s advice and attempts to do something uncharacteristically heedless and batshit crazy to win. I’m thinking he gets hold of the contraption containing the Chaos Emeralds and flings it at the Death Egg Robot, causing them to become unstable and explode. The six Chaos Emeralds scatter to the winds in a big rainbow burst that starts causing the whole place to go down in flames. Actually, wait, make it so Knuckles catches one Chaos Emerald (for later).

The roboticized agents regain their free will with the core of Robotropolis failing and board a transport being hotwired by Tails. Chris falls down an opening in the floor into an abyss but Sonic swipes the Chaos Emerald from Knuckles and takes off at full speed to catch him. The Chaos Emerald glows and Sonic’s speed increases to the point where he looks like he’s boosting. He manages to be fast enough to reach Chris and save him from falling to his demise but they both wind up being trapped by the remainder of the building’s collapse. Sonic and Chris close their eyes as they’re about to be crushed but open them to find they’ve been magically transported to safety. They look down to see the Chaos Emerald’s glow fade and can only assume its power was what saved their lives. 

In the aftermath of the battle, Tails is using the Chaos Emerald in Team Sonic’s inventory to track the other ones. Sonic, Knuckles, and Chris are rebuilding the Tornado’s hangar. Sonic is glad to know the roboticized agents are underway to be returned to normal. Knuckles laments the Master Emerald was nowhere to be found in the ruins of Robotropolis. Chris is explaining what action he’ll take upon his return to G.U.N. headquarters that will improve relations between human and animal kind. Team Sonic is cool with that gesture and they thank Chris as their new (and respected) ally. 

Chili dogs is what’s for dinner and everything seems swell until Tails suddenly draws everyone’s attention to his tracking device. According to its data, there aren’t five Chaos Emeralds left to find but six. There were seven Chaos Emeralds total all along but neither Knuckles nor Robotnik knew that (this is our hint at Super Sonic’s appearance in the sequel and a reference to the fact that there were only six Chaos Emeralds in the first game).

Speaking of sequel, the last scene before the credits will be Doctor Robotnik miraculously aboard a space station hidden in shadow. The station is under construction and resembles a Death Egg in progress. Very Revenge of the Sith. His assistant will say something something and with a crazed look in his eye he’ll be like “No, from now on... call me Eggman” and embrace Sonic’s name for him. This will mark a shift in his motivation moving forward: the only thing he wants next to world domination itself is defeating that pesky blue hedgehog.

But yeah, there’s got to be an after credits scene, right? Cut to the Master Emerald being carted away by none other than Nack the Weasel (Fang the Sniper if you’re nasty). 

I imagine the sequel will have Team Sonic reuniting with Chris and a newly introduced Amy Rose (the classic design) to storm the Death Egg and take on Eggman once again. Sonic will have a high-speed duel with Metal Sonic while Tails and Knuckles square off against Nack, who has been hired by Eggman. Metal Sonic uses the Master Emerald to become a raging monster but Sonic uses the seven Chaos Emeralds to become Super Sonic and whoop Metal’s ass. I guess during all this Chris will tango with Eggman himself in some kind of human versus human fight (which somehow seems blasphemous in Sonic media). Amy’s there for comic relief. I’m gonna stop myself here before I do a whole ‘nother one of these hypothetical story posts. And then a third one following the events of Sonic Adventure. And a fourth one following Sonic Adventure 2. 

THE END

[spacegate]

TRUST CH 12

An Undertale Fanfiction

Chapters: 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9 / 10 / 11 / AO3 LINK / TV TROPES Characters: Sans, Grillby, Papyrus, Royal Doggies, Gaster, Asgore, OCs Setting: Baby Blaster AU Contains: SAD CHILDREN. Mentions of child abuse. SOME REALLY MESSED UP THINGS, BODY HORROR.  Synopsis: Gaster readies for his final experiment, while everyone else in the underground is out for his dust. We are close to the end!

Machinery hummed and the sound of metal hitting metal rang out through the CORE. A recent invention for the past few decades, the CORE is a monstrously huge machine located in Hotland. By drawing in the magically saturated lava below, it is able to convert the energy into power. Before, monster-kind had to huddle in the dark and cold, with only a few candles to guide them. But now. There was light.

And it was all thanks to the Royal Scientist.

The workers inside toiled about, checking gauges and lights as they kept the machinery running smoothly. Once in a while, an ice-block from Snowdin would fall into the lava below, hissing and causing the heat and humidity within to spike. The lava below the core glowed a fierce harsh light, casting dark shadows on the catwalks above. It was a little unnerving, but people got used to it quickly.

Somewhere, a bell rang, and the grateful workers laid down their tools and headed out of the doors. Time for lunch in air conditioned rooms! Soon, the CORE was barren, with only the computer systems left behind to monitor everything.

In the quiet, a sudden rip tore it's way open above one of the catwalks. The rift shifted and rippled, before tiny bone beast fell out roughly to the floor. SMACK! 1-S shivered and twitched as it struggled to get feeling back to its limbs. It gasped for air as a slender figure stepped out of the rip. The horrible noise of the void folded in itself over and over, before the rip vanished completely.

Gaster winced, his eye lights glowing as he used his coat like a makeshift sling for his broken hands and arms. Magic hand constructs flashed blue as they meandered on to the computer and began typing. It was his plans and calculations that built this place, one of his crowning achievements. He had build several backdoor codes into this place, so in the end, it would obey it's master. Always a multitasker, another hand streaked out to the first aide station. As he worked, the construct grabbed several vials of concentrated healing magic and bringing it back to himself.

One set of hands continued typing while others spawned around the vials. One plucked the sealed caps of the tops, one vial floated to his mouth while the others began pouring over his broken bones. He winced as the magic flowed down his throat and his broken bones began to pull back together. The pain faded, but the deep cracks in his face remained.

It would most likely take more magic than this to heal the terrible damage tho himself, but for now he was grateful that he felt stronger. More aware. The pain had faded to a manageable dull ache that he could easily ignore. When he attempted to flex his bone hands he found that they could barely move at all. The bartender's vow of him never being able to use his hands again seemed to have become truth.

No matter. He won't need his actual hands anymore, not when his constructs can perform a better job. He'll worry about his broken bones later. His priorities were in order. He wasn't a stupid person, he knew they would be looking for him soon. He just needed to finish one last thing....and then they can do whatever they wanted to him.

1-S shivered, but finally was becoming warmer, and tried to silently drag itself away. Pitiful. He brought down as a constructed hand pinned 1-S down firmly to the metal catwalk. The creature still struggled, clawing the metal and hissing.

{ “Stay” } Gaster didn't even look at his creation, his focus was on the main computer. 1-S snarled as it still insisted on struggling. Biting the constructs did nothing and it couldn't wiggle away from the iron clad grasp. One thing Gaster could say, is that 1-S is quite tenacious. It was coded into it, after all. It would need such tenacity to fight humanity.

Gaster typed one last string of code, and the doors leading to the core shut down with a sharp CLANG and bolted into place. A red light began to flash and emergency lights lit up along the catwalk.  A metallic artificial voice began to rattle off from the computer.

[ Emergency Containment Level 2 Procedure Initiated. Admin Level 1 Code Accepted. Lock-down Successful. ]

The lights above flickered before dimming.

[ Emergency Auxiliary Power Engaged. CORE output 25%. ]

Gaster hummed as he drew his constructs away from the terminal. There, now nobody will bother him. He'll have the time to set up his final experiment. For the good of all. Eventually, they may be able to break in past the blast doors, but by the time they did, he would be finished. Already he could hear muffled protests and banging on the other side of the blast doors. No doubt the workers were now aware that they were locked out of the CORE. He would need to work quickly and efficiently.

1-S continued to snarl and hiss. Gaster drew up the construct to eye level to face his creation. 1-S took a chance and began to build up a hum of energy in the back of  its throat. Perhaps 1-S forgot its place while away from his care? That would be quite easy to fix. Suddenly, Gaster slammed the tiny bone beast against on of the flat panels of the CORE, knocking both the breath and magic out of it. Stunned, the creature could only lie there and pant.

{ “All this time. All this sacrifice. All this death...” } Gaster once again brought up his bruised and shaking creation to eye level. { “An artificial construct blended by human and monster traits, and this is the result?” }

1-S gave him a defiant growl in return.

{ “For King and Monster Kind.” } Gaster hissed and squeezed 1-S a little too tightly. It was always amusing when using the trigger on his creation. How it struggled to remain in control, as that very control drained away.

1-S gave one quiet, strangled gasp...and then just hung limp in the blue hands, eye sockets completely black.

{ “You had better be worth it, 1-S.” } He carried the limp pup over to one side of the core, summoning new hands to pry off some paneling and exposing the wires and machinery is in. { “This is my last chance to free everyone.  They will see, that I was right!“ }

He set 1-S down next to the machinery, where it lay obediently. Good.  He glanced down at the area around the paneling..

There was a handheld power drill and a few needle nose pliers resting near the terminal. Good. This will make things much easier. He reached into his inventory to pull out a needle, and a few vials of red glowing liquid.

Much easier indeed.

With that, Gaster got to work.

Grillby is no stranger to loss.

As far back as he could remember, there was nothing BUT loss. Summoned during the war against the humans, he had no choice but to accept it. Friends would be alive one minute, but gone the next. He had seen whole platoons wiped out in a blink in an eye. He had seen fellow monsters beg for their mothers as they lay dusting on the battlefield. He had seen it, and he had accepted it.

But this?

This he couldn't accept. He couldn't.

His flames whirled blue and teal as he roared at the space where Gaster previously stood. He had taken his son! His child! It was one thing to lose fellow soldiers...but children! It was too much! Too horrible!

(“Grillby!”) “Grillby!” The Dogi wanted to do something, perhaps restrain him, but he burned so hot they couldn't get close. The entire Canine unit was witness to the bartender's pain.

Grillby would have torn the whole bar apart if it wasn't for a small cry.

“Papyrus!” The bartender's rage snuffed out like water on a campfire and he was immediately searching. “PAPYRUS!”

“Lesser! Get a healer! Greater! Help search!” Dogamy barked out orders as his wife called the Captain. All the dogs were injured to a degree, and there was only so much healing one could get from food alone. Not only were they injured, but now a child could be possibly hurt as well.  Lesser saluted and took off on all fours, heading towards Waterfall.

Greater barked and headed to the backroom. The couch where the children had often napped was trapped under thick wooden beams from the partially collapsed room.

The crying was coming from underneath the ruined couch, muffled under the layers of fabric and wood. Grillby and Greater went right to work, heaving the beams and debris away until there was only the couch. Greater simply lifted the couch straight up in the air as Grillby pushed away the last of the crumbled charred bits of wood..

Under the couch, wrapped up in blankets, was a tiny little skeleton. Papyrus. He looked up with his eye sockets full of tears and sniffled.

Grillby immediately reined in his flames back to their gentle, campfire-like features, and quickly picked up his little child. Papyrus bawled loudly and clutched the fabric of Grillby's shirt, refusing to let go. Grillby held him close and sank down to the floor to sit. He began to rock the little skeleton gently, sh-hing him in an attempt to comfort him.

“Shh shh...it's alright Papyrus...I'm here...I'm here...” Grillby was also crying, but could barely feel it next to Papyrus's powerful wails. They were both hurting in such terrible ways.

Dogaressa put a paw on Grillby's shoulder. ( “We'll find him. We'll get him back.”)

True, he trusted the guard to find his son again, but he was worried. What state would Sans be in when they recovered him? It took such a long time to work with Sans to get him in a somewhat comfortable state. It was all going to be undone, he was sure of it. Sans would needlessly suffer again when he was just becoming a child. Grillby seethed under his flames and clutched Papyrus tighter.  

(“The underground is small, turn over a few rocks and we'll find him. Then he will pay for his crimes.”) Her hackles raised and she pinned her ears back.

“I'm coming with you.” Grillby spoke softly over Papyrus's little cries.

(“You can't! What about Papyrus? Who is g-”)

She was interrupted by shouts of protest in the distance, growing closer. Both the Dogi and Grillby turned to gaze at the large hole in the side of the bar to see an approaching figure. As the figure drew closer, they could see it was Lesser Dog, carrying a surprised Frank bridal style. The salamander monster wiggled and struggled.

“Hey! I can walk!” The doctor protested, but Lesser is a Good Dog, and carried him right through the blown out hole in the side of the restaurant. Lesser borked and set the doctor down nicely once he was carried through.

Frank was rendered to speechlessness as he took in the ruined bar. All the dogs were covered in cuts and bruises, the worst being Doggo. There was a skeleton child wailing in distress. The bartender was tired and burning lower than what he should be. Everything was......ruined!

“...what happened here?” Frank gasped as he set his bag down.

(“Gaster happened”) Dogaressa growled. (“He attacked the bar and abducted one of the children.”)

Frank frowned and began looking after the dogs, hiding pills in pieces of cheese and giving it to them to eat. His claws glowed green as he began magically stitching them up. “Judging by the crying, I can assume he took Sans.”

The dogs sagged with relief as their wounds mended and their pain faded. Hiding the pills in cheese also lifted their spirits, as the magic within boosted their strength and health. Good dogs don't stay down for long.

“That is right.” Grillby just held Papyrus close and took him over to Frank. He had to raise his voice over the skeleton's wailing.

Frank took a look at Papyrus, weaving a diagnostic spell over the child. “He's unhurt physically, but mentally I can't be sure.”

“Gaster took his brother. Those two are never separated.” Grillby couldn't imagine what this would do to this little child. Sans and Papyrus were never more than a few feet away from each other at any given time. Being separated could be akin to torture to the youths, both Sans and Papyrus. Papyrus was more dependent on Sans, but both of them would be suffering.

“That's true.” Frank took to Grillby next, looking over him for injuries. Strangely enough, there was none. Grillby did his best to try and comfort Papyrus, but nothing seemed to soothe him. The dogs were however, feeling much better, and were beginning to check over their armor and weapons. They were more than eager for round two.

“...have faith, Grillby. Evil doesn't go unpunished for long.” The salamander packed up his supplies and looked one last time over the dogs.

Grillby said nothing but continued to rock the toddler in his arms, thinking. Gaster's labs have been routed already. The royal labs were still in lock-down. Gaster had nowhere to go, why would he even take Sans if he had no refuge left? Gaster was clearly insane, but even so...it made no sense!

As if to answer his question, the remaining lights in the bar flickered, and then dimmed down. Grillby found himself to be the only light source in the bar as the dogs looked about in confusion. Dogamy peeked his head out of hole in the wall.

“The whole street is dark!” He exclaimed. Already monsters were leaving their home to gaggle at the dimmed lights....before everything went dark with an electric ZAP. A strange buzzing noise crackled in the electrical sockets. Something was....wrong.

Dogaressa, who was still on the phone, listened closely to her captain. She suddenly widened her eyes and gasped.

(“....WHAT?”) She barked in surprise, drawing the attention to everyone in the bar.

“ Dogaressa, what is happening?” Grillby asked quietly, having now finally gotten Papyrus to calm down into soft burbles. Papyrus was still clearly not happy, but has tired himself out enough that he was  more interested in being rocked than screaming.

(“Captain Gnash said that the CORE workers have been locked out! Something strange is going on there!”)

“Angel above, what if it explodes! We have to evacuate Hotland immediately!” Dogamy was already thinking ahead, gripping his ax tightly.

(“Exactly, he wants us all there to help.”) She closed her phone with a click. (“Come on, we gotta hurry.”)

Suddenly, realization flashed across Grillby's mind.

“...he's there.”

“Who?” Frank tilted his head, unsure if he should leave or go.

“Gaster. He BUILT the CORE...remember? It was....a major celebration...some years ago...”

The dogs looked at each other, dawning realizations on their faces.

“Of course! But what is he doing! He could dust us all!” Dogamy was confused as well as pissed.

“I am not sure, but I am coming with all of you.” Grillby held onto Papyrus and went to step out of the hole in the bar...when a paw stopped him.

(“Grillby, you can't. Papyrus would be a target if you took him with us.”) Dogaressa was sympathetic, but firm. (“I know you can fight...but what will you do with him?”)

“I'll take him.” Frank stepped forward. “My home is home my husband, the Captain of the Guard. It's well warded and protected. Plus....Gaster would have no idea who I am.”

Grillby held unto Papyrus a little tighter. Both of them were right, he couldn't take a toddler into battle, and he trusted Frank with his life. But...he....didn't want to hand over his son. Not after what just happened. A real fear blossomed from within that if he handed Papyrus over...there's a chance he would never see his child again. He took a deep, rattling sigh...and then carefully handed over the skeleton after giving him one last kiss to the skull.

Frank took Papyrus in his arms and bounced him a little. The skeleton just blinked his little eye sockets and stared, confused about what is going on.

“...I will call you later...when this is over.”

“Of course. I'm sure Undyne would like to meet Papyrus. They'll have a good time, I promise.” The Salamander nodded and adjusted his grip on the skeleton. “...come back safe...alright?”

“I will. I have to. With Sans too” Grillby made it a statement. He WILL come back with his son. There was no alternative.  

“The fastest way to Hotland is via boat.” Dogamy pointed out. “We'll have to hurry!”  The other dogs gathered around, awaiting orders.

“Then by all means, let's not keep Gaster waiting.” Grillby narrowed his eyes.

Usually people learn their lesson after the first time, but Grillby is more than happy to teach it again to a certain scientist.

Some time later, Frank grumbled to himself as he carried his precious cargo back to his house. Being the husband of the Captain of the guard meant that his house is well protected. Gnash always valued preventative measures, so he had taken to hiding runic wards all around the property. If someone had ill intention for the people inside the house, they would essentially run into an invisible wall. Only someone powerful, like the King of Monsters, could hope to tear down the wards.

It was a safety measure that helped him sleep at night. With this whole Gaster situation, he found himself worrying more about his husband and child. He knew all to well, that sometimes trouble will follow you home.

Papyrus continued to sniffle, exhausted and weary from the terrifying events of the day. Physically, he was alright, but mentally is a different story. Frank used a clawed hand to shield the child from the constant water drips and cold of Waterfall. Even though he was bundled up in a blanket, Waterfall was still rather chilly.

“It'll be alright, your dad and brother will be back soon.” Frank ran a warm hand down the child's skull, knowing that he likes to be pet. Papyrus gurgled softly and closed his eyes, simply too young and tired to truly understand what was happening. All he knows is that he feels safe, and that is good enough for him.

Wanting to be extra careful, Frank retraced his steps and back tracked a few times, just to confuse anyone that may be following them. Satisfied nobody was going to ambush him in the dark, he made it to a nice corner in the cavern. There, next to some ponds and the river was his home. A simple house for sure, with a garden of herbs and fungi and toys in the front yard. At some point they were going to put up a swing but needed to find space for it. If only they could get a tree to grow in Waterfall...

Stepping past the mail box, he could feel the ambient magic race along both him and Papyrus. The wards checked the two over, and finding no issue, Frank was able to step within his property. He fumbled with his keys, but with practiced ease unlocked the front door while juggling a toddler.

“Pops!” A loud brash voice erupted from the stair way, and a ball of energy and fins came flying at the older monster!

“Undyne! Careful!” He braced himself as his daughter ran right into his belly. “Oof!” Thank goodness he has extra padding there!

His daughter resembled Gnash to a T, a humanoid fish monster with lots of teeth, she even had Gnash's yellow eyes! However, she inherited his colors, a soft blue gray with some red here and there. He thought she was a wonderful mix of the two. She is still fairly small, being eight years old, but he could see her towering over both her parents one day.

Papyrus wiggled at the sudden movement and made a soft warble, which attracted Undyne's attention.

“Whatcha got there Pops?” She wiggled her fins and reached up.

“Careful.” Frank knelt down so Undyne could see the little skeleton. “This is Papyrus, he's going to be staying here for a little bit. Say hello!”

Undyne stared at the toddler, and the toddler stared right back. She sniffed and crinkled her brow as she examined him. “Wow, he's really shrimpy, isn't he?”

“Undyne, that's not very nice.” Frank scolded quietly. “He's a baby, he's suppose to be little.”

“Nuh-uh, I was a baby and I wasn't THAT small.” She frowned and reached out to poke the skeleton on the head, much to poor Papyrus's confusion.

“Yes, you were very small when you were a baby.” He started to move Papyrus away to rescue him from the pokes, but Undyne is quite persistent.

“He looks weird! Where's his skin!?” She continues to poke.

Seemingly having enough of it, Papyrus growled and bit the next finger that got too close to his mouth. “Nyeh!”

Frank was very worried that his daughter had gotten hurt, but to his surprise, she started laughing!

“Ow! Heeheehee wow he's got guts for a weird no skin shrimpy baby!” She seems almost pleased about it, her bright yellow eyes sparkling.

“Undyne, please stop bothering him. He had a rough time.” Frank tried his best to calm his daughter down enough to stop harassing the poor baby.

“Okay.” She tried to withdraw her hand, but Papyrus was still holding on to the finger and growling. “....I LIKE him!”

Frank sighed and gently extracted his daughter's finger from Papyrus's tiny little jaws. “It's good that you like him, but please dear...be gentle. He isn't toy or a plaything, he's a little one who is still recovering from some...bad things.”

She blinked a few times. “Ohhhh....he's your patient?”

He nodded. “Yes, and he will be staying here for a little bit. Lets do our best to welcome him, eh?”

“Yeah! I'll go get my swords and action figures!” She raced back up the stairs, two steps at a time. Thankfully, the swords are made of soft foam. She wasn't quite ready for a wooden one yet, perhaps once she stops breaking lamps with the foam one.

He carried the bundle of skeleton to the kitchen, setting Papyrus in the crook of his arm as he started to mix up some milk along with his medicine.  He could hear his daughter in the floor above tossing toys and what may be boxes around, looking for the best thing to play with.

Well, it looks like they may have started a beautiful friendship! He'll see later if Papyrus would be willing to leave his blanket cocoon and play a little. After being sufficiently harassed by his daughter and the events of the day, he wouldn't be surprised if it took a little time.

He bottled up the milk and gave it to the hungry skeleton, anything to really distract him from what was really going on. Papyrus perked up, holding the bottle in his hands and he drank it down quickly. He seemed much 'brighter' and alert once he had something to eat.

“POPS! POPS! WHERE'S MY BATTLE ARMOR?!?” Undyne could be heard yelling from upstairs, along with a few crashes.

Frank sighed. At least, there were plenty of distractions.

All the way to Hotland, the dogs and Grillby were lost in thought. The boat would rock in the water as the River Person pushed it to speeds it usually doesn't go. River was a strange person before, but they could sense urgency. They only had one thing to say.

“Tra la la ! Beware the man who speaks in hands! Tra la la!”

After that, they were quiet. The last dog was barely on the boat before it began to move, skipping over the water. They sat quietly as Waterfall whizzed by, steadily getting brighter and hotter as they entered the red landscape of Hotland. Constantly lit by pools of lava, it gave an unsettling glow to those preferring cooler climate.

To their surprise, there was a group of residents waiting on the shore as they pulled up, all fire types. Obviously they would not survive the walk through Waterfall's rain unscathed.  Waiting among them was Captain Gnash.

“Bout time you all got here!” He helped the dogs climb out of the boat, which were being replaced with residents. “The evacuation has started. We need some men out sniffing out any stragglers. Can I count on you all to be Good Dogs!?”

The dog guard saluted and barked, beginning to fall into place. The Dogi remained in command, and began distributing orders. Grillby at once felt out of place. It has been years since he had followed or lead a command. He wasn't quite too sure where to go besides straight to the CORE.

He was startled when Gnash laid a hand on his shoulder. “Major General.” He said, giving the bartender a look. “Ya know, Gerson warned me you wouldn't be able to keep out of this for long.”

“I cannot. Gaster took my son.” Grillby narrowed his eyes. “I mean to get him back.” He knew that if Gnash told him to remain here, that he wouldn't. Nobody would be able to stop him.

“I'm not going to stop you.” Gnash put his fears at ease. “Hell, you're more experienced than all of us really. Gerson said you have a strong sense of justice so he said not to try and stop you. Instead, you'll be coming with us. The dogs and Gerson will handle the evac.”

“Who is 'we'?” The flame glanced around at the stream of people heading to the docks.

“It will be the three of us.” A deep voice answered to the left. Grillby turned, and was greeted by the sight of his sovereign ruler, King Asgore. Gone was his robes and his humorous t-shirts. Instead the king was dressed for battle. His dark armor looked as strong as it was during the war, and the trident of red magic was gripped in his paw. The king did not look pleased at all.

Instinctively, Grillby went to kneel, but was stopped by a soft paw on his shoulder. “There is no need, nor time for such things.” King Asgore looked Grillby in the eyes. “Today, we are equals looking to uphold justice.  After all...this could not have happened if it wasn't for me, I aim to fix that, with your help.”

There was rage behind those eyes. Ever since the King lost his two children, he has lived with a pain nobody else can really understand unless it happens to them. The King loved children. To see what Gaster has done has undermined everything the king has sought to build. Even with the law with the fallen humans, it still destroys the king, each and every time a soul is taken.

To be a king is a terrible burden, and Grillby had no envy for the position.

“My king, you are not to blame for what Gaster has done.”

“Oh, but it is. I gave him permission to build weapons, to aid in the upcoming war with humanity. He requested privacy, and time. Both what I have given him. I should have checked on him, demanded updates...demanded demonstrations. But I had trusted him since he built the CORE. I saw no reason to bother him before....and now my ignorance has resulted in the deaths of countless children.”

Gnash and Grillby had nothing to say to that.

“He will be brought to justice, and I will make sure nothing like this shall ever happen again.”

“Then lets not waste anymore time.” Gnash gripped his sword and then glanced to Grillby. “Do you have weapons? Armor? We might have time to stop by HQ to get some.”

“I need neither.” Grillby rolled up his sleeves. “Let's be off.”

The king and captain nodded their heads, and together they strode on past the fleeing population, towards the CORE.

By the time they reached the CORE, the area was deserted. No doubt, Gnash and Gerson have cleared out everyone. The only thing left was the unsettling emergency lights and the remnants left behind by the fleeing monsters. They could see lunches left forgotten on tables, hardhats , and work boxes left behind as if the owners suddenly vanished.  Lit up ahead, where the actual doors to the inner CORE. They were shut firmly and the key slot next to it lit up with warning signs.

Grillby was about to ask how they were going to get into the room, when the King's eyes began to glow. The doors began to shimmer with a chilly blue and creaked with some invisible strain. With a thrust of his trident, the doors folded up on each other like wet cardboard and were ripped from the hinges. The room suddenly became brighter from the ambient lava below, and the door sailed backwards to crash into the break room wall.

Gnash and Grillby could scarcely believe it. Of course, their king is strong...but THIS strong???

Asgore strode forward and then stopped, shocked. A sudden feeling of dread overcame Grillby as he peaked around the corner.

His flames dimmed in horror.

Far ahead in the main console, he could see Sans. His shirt and pants have been discarded, most likely to the lava below them. His right eye socket is full of various wires, going down deep enough to perhaps reach the brain case. He was bolted to the console with metal rings, which he would not be able to escape. The poor pup's head was popped up, jaws held open with metal as a tube was stuffed inside.

He hung still and lifeless, looking by all means ready to crumble to dust at any second. The most disturbing thing was how silent he is, simply staring out into the distance. If he could actually see or not was unknown to the flame.

“SANS!” Grillby roared and went to fly forward to rescue him, LOVE burning deep in his soul, when a sudden wall of blue bones slammed down to block his path.

{ “Idiots!” } Gaster hissed  and emerged from behind the console. Grillby was pleased to note that both of his arms were in slings. Seems like the beating from earlier had caused the scientist permanent damage. Excellent. Gaster now had to rely now on magic to pick up and manipulate objects. {“Do you know what you are trying to interrupt!?” }

“Gaster.” Asgore stepped in front of Grillby. “You have one last chance to stop this madness. Return the child to his father and surrender, or you will die where you stand.”

Gaster made a show of thinking about it, even manifesting a constructed hand to stroke his chin.

{ “I will not. I WILL break the barrier and save us all. It is my duty. It is my legacy. If you don't desire freedom.....then I suppose, you will have to take S-1 by force.” }

Asgore shook his head sadly.

“You were once my friend, but today...you have become a greater threat than the humans. A rot from within us that must be cut away.” Asgore readied his trident. Gnash drew his sword and Grillby ignited into angry, teal flames.

“I am truly sorry that it has come to this.”

Gaster sneered, clearly taking great offense to being considered WORSE than humans. { “I as well. If only you weren't so sentimental.” }

Bones suddenly appeared, angled down at the three. There were so many, the blocked some of the emergency lights from above. There was a great, terrible ripping noise, and two large childish beast heads flanked their creator. They swayed from side to side and stared out at the King and his companions with white circular eyes. They seemed to almost make giggling noises as they gnashed their teeth, staring straight ahead.

Then, the bones rained down.

[ FIGHT. ]

[cleverwordsandotherstuffilike]

Britain's child slaves: They started at 4am, lived off acorns and had nails put through their ears for shoddy work. Yet, says a new book, their misery helped forge Britain.

The tunnel was narrow, and a mere 16in high in places. The workers could barely kneel in it, let alone stand.

Thick, choking coal dust filled their lungs as they crawled through the darkness, their knees scraping on the rough surface and their muscles contracting with pain.

A single 'hurrier' pulled the heavy cart of coal, weighing as much as 500lb, attached by a chain to a belt worn around the waist, while one or more 'thrusters' pushed from behind. Acrid water dripped from the tunnel ceiling, soaking their ragged clothes.

Many would die from lung cancer and other diseases before they reached 25. For, shockingly, these human beasts of burden were children, some only five years old.

Robert North, who worked in a coal mine in Yorkshire, told an inspector: 'I went into the pit at seven years of age. When I drew by the girdle and chain, my skin was broken and the blood ran down … If we said anything, they would beat us.' 

Another young hurrier, Patience Kershaw, had a bald patch on her head from years of pushing carts - often with her scalp pressed against them - for 11 miles a day underground. 'Sometimes they [the miners] beat me if I am not quick enough,' she said.

The inspector described her as a 'filthy, ragged, and deplorable-looking object'.

Others, like Sarah Gooder, aged eight, were used as 'trappers'. Crouching in the darkness of the tunnel wall, they waited to open trap doors which allowed the carts to travel through.

'I have to trap without a light and I'm scared,' she told the inspector. 'I go at four and sometimes half-past three in the morning, and come out at five-and-half-past … Sometimes I sing when I've light, but not in the dark. I don't like being in the pit.'

His master threatened to 'knock out his brains' if he did not get up to work, and pushed him to the ground, breaking his thigh. Eventually, bent double and crippled, he returned to the workhouse, no longer any use to the brute.

Most were exhausted by their working hours - they were often woken at 4am and carried, half-asleep, to the pits by their parents.

Many young trappers were killed when they dozed off and fell into the path of the carts. Ten-year-old Joseph Arkley forgot to shut a trap door, allowing poisonous gas to seep into the tunnel. He died along with ten others in the resulting explosion.

But coal mining was just one industry in which children worked during the 18th and 19th centuries.

The Industrial Revolution brought immense prosperity to the British Empire. Not only did Britannia rule the waves, she ruled the global marketplace, too, dominating trade in cotton, wool and other commodities, while her inventors devised ingenious machinery to push productivity ever higher.

But, as a new book by Jane Humphries, a professor of economic history, shows, a terrible price was paid for this success by the labourers who serviced the machines, pushed the coal carts and turned the wheels that drove the Industrial Revolution. 

Many of these labourers were children. With the mechanisation of Britain, traditional cottage industries, which had employed many poor families, went out of business. Consequently, more and more poverty-stricken workers were driven into the major cities and factories.

The competition for jobs meant that wages were low, and the only way a poor family could fend off starvation was for the children to work as well.

These were the real David Copperfields and Oliver Twists. Beaten, exploited and abused, they never knew what it was to have a full belly or a good night's sleep. Their childhood was over before it had begun.

Using the heartbreaking first-person testimony of these child labourers, Humphries demonstrates that the brutality and deprivation depicted by authors such as Charles Dickens and Thomas Hardy was commonplace during the Industrial Revolution, and not just fictional exaggeration.

She also reveals that more children were working than previously thought - and at younger ages.

As British productivity soared, more machines and factories were built, and so more children were recruited to work in them. During the 1830s, the average age of a child labourer officially was ten, but in reality some were as young as four.

Many child scavengers lost limbs or hands, crushed in the machinery; some were even decapitated. Those who were maimed lost their jobs. In one mill near Cork there were six deaths and 60 mutilations in four years.

While the upper classes professed horror at the iniquities of the slave trade, British children were regularly shackled and starved in their own country. The silks and cottons the upper classes wore, the glass jugs and steel knives on their tables, the coal in their fireplaces, the food on their plates - almost all of it was produced by children working in pitiful conditions on their doorsteps.

But to many of the monied classes, the poor were invisible: an inhuman sub-species who did not have the same feelings as their own and whose sufferings were unimportant. If they spared a thought for them at all, it was nothing more than a shudder of revulsion at the filth and disease they carried.

Living conditions were appalling. Families occupied rat and sewage-filled cellars, with 30 people crammed into a single room. Most children were malnourished and susceptible to disease, and life expectancy in such places fell to just 29 years in the 1830s. In these wretched circumstances, an extra few pennies brought home by a child would pay for a small loaf of bread or fuel for the fire: the difference between life and death.

A third of poor households were without a male breadwinner, either as a result of death or desertion. In the broken Britain of the 19th century, children paid the price. 

One young boy, Thomas Sanderson, went out to work when his family was reduced to eating acorns they had foraged after his soldier father had been demobilised without a pension.

Children were the ideal labourers: they were cheap (paid just 10-20 per cent of a man's wage) and could fit into small spaces such as under machinery and through narrow tunnels.

But while parents sent their children to work with heavy hearts, the workhouses - where orphaned and abandoned children were deposited - had no such scruples. A child sent out to work was one mouth fewer to feed, so they were regularly sold to masters as 'pauper apprentices'.

In exchange for board and lodging, they would work without wages until adulthood. If they ran away, they would be caught, whipped and returned to their master.

Some were shackled to prevent them escaping, with 'irons riveted on their ankles, and reaching by long links and rings up to the hips, and in these they were compelled to walk to and fro from the mill to work and to sleep'.

Orphaned Jonathan Saville was sold as a pauper apprentice to a master in a textile industry. His master threatened to 'knock out his brains' if he did not get up to work, and pushed him to the ground, breaking his thigh. Eventually, bent double and crippled, he was returned to the workhouse, no longer any use to the brute.

Robert Blincoe - on whom Dickens' Oliver Twist is thought to be based - was sold, aged six, as a 'climbing boy' to a chimney sweep in London.

Forced to scale the narrow chimneys, only 18in wide, he would scrape his elbows and knees on the brickwork and choke on coal dust.

It was common for the master sweep to light a fire under them to make them climb faster. Many climbing boys and girls fell to their deaths. After several months, Blincoe was returned to the workhouse. Then, aged just seven, he was sent along with 80 other children to a cotton mill near Nottingham to work as a 'scavenger' - crawling under the machines to pick up bits of cotton, 14 hours a day, six days a week.

In return, he was given porridge slops and black bread. Weak with hunger, at night he crept out to steal food from the mill owner's pigs.

Many child scavengers lost limbs or hands, crushed in the machinery; some were even decapitated. Those who were maimed lost their jobs. In one mill near Cork there were six deaths and 60 mutilations in four years. Blincoe was lucky: he only lost half a finger.

A German visitor to Manchester in 1842 remarked that there were so many limbless people it was like 'living in the midst of an army just returned from campaign'. A doctor who observed mill workers noted that '… their complexion is sallow and pallid, with a peculiar flatness of feature, caused by the want of a proper quantity of adipose substance [fatty tissue], their stature low, a very general bowing of the legs … nearly all have flat feet'.

The average height of the population fell in the 1830s as an overworked generation reached adulthood with knock-knees, humpbacks from carrying heavy loads and damaged pelvises from standing 14 hours a day. Girls who worked in match factories suffered from a particularly horrible disease known as phossy jaw.

Children in glassworks were regularly burned and blinded by the intense heat, while the poisonous clay dust in potteries caused them to vomit and faint. 

Supervisors used terror and punishment to drive the children to greater productivity. A boy in a nail-making factory was punished for producing inferior nails by having his head down on an iron counter while someone 'hammered a nail through his ear, and the boy has made good nails ever since'.

But despite the growth of cities, agriculture remained the biggest employer of children during the Industrial Revolution. While they might have escaped the deadly fumes and machinery of the factories, the life of a child farm labourer was every bit as brutal.

Children as young as five worked in gangs, digging turnips from frozen soil or spreading manure. Many were so hungry that they resorted to eating rats.

Children in glassworks were regularly burned and blinded by the intense heat, while the poisonous clay dust in potteries caused them to vomit and faint.

The gangmaster walked behind them with a double rope bound with wax, and 'woe betide any boy who made what was called a "straight back" - in other words, standing up straight - before he reached the end of the field. The rope would descend sharply upon him'.

Another favourite gangmaster's punishment was gibbeting: lifting a child off the ground by his neck, until his face turned black. And yet, many of these children showed extraordinary resilience and lack of resentment. Children who worked six days a week spent the seventh at Sunday school, determined to better themselves.

But whenever anyone sought to improve children's working conditions, they encountered fierce opposition from the proprietors whose profits depended on exploiting them. They argued that any interference in the marketplace could cost Britain her manufacturing supremacy.

Even when regulations were eventually passed to improve working conditions, with only four inspectors to police the thousands of factories across the country they were seldom enforced. 

In 1840 Lord Ashley, later Lord Shaftesbury, set up the Children's Employment Commission, interviewing hundreds of children in coalmines, works and factories. Its findings, reported in 1842, were deeply shocking.

Many people had no idea that coal was excavated by young children. But it was the immorality rather than the cruelty of the mines that shocked them most.

An inspector described how, 'The chain [used to pull the carts] passing high up between the legs of two girls, had worn large holes in their trousers. Any sight more disgustingly indecent or revolting can scarcely be imagined … No brothel can beat it.'

An Act was passed, prohibiting women and children under ten from working underground. Two years later, another Act was passed prohibiting the textile industry from employing children younger than nine.

But it was not until the mid-19th century that children were limited to a 12-hour day.

In 1880, the Compulsory Education Act helped reduced the numbers of child labourers, and subsequent laws raised their age and made working conditions safer. But it had come too late for the little white slaves on whose blood, sweat and toil our great railways, bridges and buildings of the Industrial Revolution were built.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1312764/Britains-child-slaves-New-book-says-misery-helped-forge-Britain.html#ixzz2ZKkYXGMW