[45 / 20 / 1]
Quoted By:
You are Charlotte Fawkins, Herald and heroine. With the power of your positive spirit, you have overcome deceit, defeat, and divine possession, and now you are going to save the world. First, though, you need to achieve your fullest potential.
Richard had a plan. You didn't like the plan. The plan involved spending a lot of time with him, drilling your current weak points, and it's not that you thought it was a bad plan. It was a reasonable plan, and he said it all reasonably, like he'd been doing— he'd been reasonable ever since you learned he killed your father.
You couldn't tolerate it. You'd been tolerating it, admirably well, you thought, since you'd kill him later. Your father would be avenged, later. But it had been weeks, later was nowhere in sight, and Henry had picked the scab off the wound. Now when you thought of your father, Henry's voice in your head went <span class="mu-i">He wanted more than anything to be good for your sake.</span> And when you looked at Richard's new and stupid and reasonable face, you thought: He's trying to be good for my sake. Or the world's sake. Or something.
And it was too little and far, far, far too late and you hated him more than anybody else in the world. You hated his plan, too, and told him where precisely he could put it, and how deep. You told him you'd be taking Annie (well, you couldn't just leave her) and finding Cult HQ and getting Henry to help you practice. Because he said he'd help, and he didn't kill your father.
Richard was only a voice: you couldn't see his face. The voice sounded a little annoyed, but it said, reasonably, that if you had to be petty, at least Henry was likely the best alternative. As long as you actually stayed on track, Charlotte.
You wanted more than anything for him to call you a stupid bitch and shock you or possess you or knock you out and make you wake up a week later with a snake neck or something. But he didn't do that, so you wrote Gil a note and left for the Fen.
Several days of continuous worm-revival efforts had honed your Earth Powers. You still couldn't make earthquakes or sinkholes or anything, to your disappointment, but now when you stuck yourself underground and really concentrated you could sense pretty far. And distinguish different sources of vibrations, too, even if you didn't exactly know how. Through your Heroic Intuition. Anyways, you didn't need much Heroic Intuition to sense Annie, who was waiting pretty much where you left her. You'd given her instructions, but you were still pleased they got followed.
It was trivial, while underground, to tap into Annie's vast dim mind, and to say Up, and to return to your body just as her jaws snapped through the surface. You pet her rubbery bulk and chewed the gross gulfweed— strangely difficult with your teeth shaped the way they are— until you drooled brown saliva and went cold. You thought through a haze of Henry, Henry, come on, Henry, until Henry appeared.
(1/a lot)
Richard had a plan. You didn't like the plan. The plan involved spending a lot of time with him, drilling your current weak points, and it's not that you thought it was a bad plan. It was a reasonable plan, and he said it all reasonably, like he'd been doing— he'd been reasonable ever since you learned he killed your father.
You couldn't tolerate it. You'd been tolerating it, admirably well, you thought, since you'd kill him later. Your father would be avenged, later. But it had been weeks, later was nowhere in sight, and Henry had picked the scab off the wound. Now when you thought of your father, Henry's voice in your head went <span class="mu-i">He wanted more than anything to be good for your sake.</span> And when you looked at Richard's new and stupid and reasonable face, you thought: He's trying to be good for my sake. Or the world's sake. Or something.
And it was too little and far, far, far too late and you hated him more than anybody else in the world. You hated his plan, too, and told him where precisely he could put it, and how deep. You told him you'd be taking Annie (well, you couldn't just leave her) and finding Cult HQ and getting Henry to help you practice. Because he said he'd help, and he didn't kill your father.
Richard was only a voice: you couldn't see his face. The voice sounded a little annoyed, but it said, reasonably, that if you had to be petty, at least Henry was likely the best alternative. As long as you actually stayed on track, Charlotte.
You wanted more than anything for him to call you a stupid bitch and shock you or possess you or knock you out and make you wake up a week later with a snake neck or something. But he didn't do that, so you wrote Gil a note and left for the Fen.
Several days of continuous worm-revival efforts had honed your Earth Powers. You still couldn't make earthquakes or sinkholes or anything, to your disappointment, but now when you stuck yourself underground and really concentrated you could sense pretty far. And distinguish different sources of vibrations, too, even if you didn't exactly know how. Through your Heroic Intuition. Anyways, you didn't need much Heroic Intuition to sense Annie, who was waiting pretty much where you left her. You'd given her instructions, but you were still pleased they got followed.
It was trivial, while underground, to tap into Annie's vast dim mind, and to say Up, and to return to your body just as her jaws snapped through the surface. You pet her rubbery bulk and chewed the gross gulfweed— strangely difficult with your teeth shaped the way they are— until you drooled brown saliva and went cold. You thought through a haze of Henry, Henry, come on, Henry, until Henry appeared.
(1/a lot)
