this may start out with stardust, but of course it ends with narnia

[bedlamsbard]

I just watched Stardust, and aside from being highly amused, my main thoughts revolve around the following:

Ben Barnes is Dunstan Thorne, a.k.a. CASPIAN is Dunstan Thorne. (Although. He looks younger here than he does in PC. *flaps hands*)

Does this mean that Charlie Cox is Rilian? (I mean, really, he bears a strong resemblance to Ben Barnes in PC.)

...personally, I'm starting to think that Rilian may have taken after his mother. In other words, I think Rilian was white-blond and looked nothing like Caspian at all, and there was a lot of rumor about whether Queen Star's Daughter had been messing around behind the king's back. I don't think Rilian wasn't Caspian's son, I just have this theory that he didn't really look like Caspian at all. Not that this relates to Tirian being a redhead or anything, three hundred years down the line.

Thoughts?

The other Narnia-related thought I had was how fashion might have changed in three hundred years. *facepalm* Chances that contemporary pre-Calormene Narnian fashion might have resembled turn of the century Western? Because I'd be down with that. I mean, chances are it will never come up in Dust, but you never know.

I would say that I think about things other than Narnia, but it's really not true at this point. The only difference is which particular part of Narnian history I'm thinking about, or if it's one of the AUs.

Comments

[bedlamsbard.livejournal.com]

hmm, are we actually going to be writing this? should we take it to e-mail and word docs? (which is of course when it would get SCARY.)

not a traitor to narnia, but a traitor to the pact of the gods, maybe? because he's been stepping out of bounds, and lying, and all that, and his father the emperor-over-the-sea won't save him this time. so he mounts the steps of the broken stone table (or UNBROKEN. mended! mysteriously made whole again, with the crack still visible!) knowing his doom; lucy can read it in his eyes. is he "sacrificing" himself for someone else's betrayal, though? (peter's? lucy's?) or just straight-out paying for his own crimes?

mmm, yes. and i want peter wandering around stormhold with monette, gradually remembering the feel of a sword in his hand (but some things are never forgotten) and growing up and a little more distant from his siblings; it's like natare all over again, except in all the ways it's not.

and lucy. we will have to bring lucy in at some point. *sigh*

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

ooooh, not i, at least not at this moment. i haven't got the time. i'm quite happy to tool around in comments like this though, all carefree and easy and i can jump around to any point in the plot i want according to my heart's desire, heeeee. i'm enjoying this whole exercise, how we just kind of stumble through it haphazardly and puzzle it out as we go.

lucy! SHALL YOU OR SHALL I.

i dunno, 'cos peter is the high king and he has his duties and rights to narnia and aslan, but if it weren't for lucy the pevensies would never have fallen into narnia, and lucy has always been closest to aslan. in terms of whether peter or lucy sacrifice aslan (if we've not settled on jadis), peter would be freeing the land, but lucy would be freeing aslan. i'm kind of partial to lucy killing him.

OH MAN. WHAT IF. okay, so aslan dies for lucy's betrayal, because lucy is the only one who is truly able to betray him now, because she's still purely aslan's. because peter is the trickster's. AND ED AND SU ARE TOO. and that's why the trickster took ed and su in the first place. it's not about taking them. it's about not taking lucy, at least not until the crucial moment, when she is marked with the cup and she is life and revelry and death and mourning and life again, because this is how it has to be.
(...checking back to see what the symbols are for the other 3 again, i saw that this was pretty much starsimpulse was getting at. you may be a prescient one, you!)
but in the end overall scheme of things, it's less about lucy and more about the inexorable move of the ages. a closing of a chapter.

this still doesn't explain why edmund and su's memories needed to be taken. maybe more for the sidhe's sake rather than the trickster? maybe peter finds out why their memories were taken away and realizes that it's better that ed and su don't find out again ever. maybe the stars did it.

huh. we can use that device, you know, where maybe ed and su don't remember anything EXCEPT twists of flame and the eyes of a madman. and they dream about it in flashbacks. they tell their dreams to peter, who recognizes the signs.

("was it you, then, that made ed and i cross the wall? you enchanted us into crossing over!"
"that," said the trickster, "i had nothing to do with. as you said so yourself, little queen: your hearts were weary, and your home called out to you.")

[bedlamsbard.livejournal.com]

oooh, my bastard computer just shut down my IE and my comment. *beats things*

aslan dies for lucy's betrayal, because lucy is the only one who is truly able to betray him now, because she's still purely aslan's. because peter is the trickster's. AND ED AND SU ARE TOO. and that's why the trickster took ed and su in the first place. it's not about taking them. it's about not taking lucy

oooh, yes, exactly. and that's so the trickster, tricking lucy into betrayal. she'll never find out that it was him made her do it and not her own choices, will she? because he's called the trickster for a reason.

i had been quoting music here, but we shall set that aside for the moment. it's about putting the pevensies in the position where they walk away willingly, without regrets and without looking back. the meaning of life is do the next thing; all things must end, but there are no endings, just beginnings. their time is gone and done and over with; they cannot revisit it anymore and narnia can never be what she was. let her pass away until not even the echoes remain.

i am in favor of peter knowing either why their memories were taken or what those memories were, because if there's anyone who remembers what it's like to lose things whole and entire, it's peter. (and lucy and edmund know too, but that's different; they remember the impression of things, the feel of narnia, the taste of magic. this is nothing at all, just blackness, and peter knows that all too well.)


when you're ready for the truth, little queen, light this candle and think only of your siblings. she's not sure if she's ready for truth, but she's ready for answers, and too many sleepless nights have left her restless. she doesn't bother dressing for sleep, just sits down cross-legged on her bedroom floor, strikes a match, and fixes her siblings' faces in her mind before she lights the black candle.

it's magic, pure magic, and she feels her soul sing, recognizing it and reaching for it. she lands in a breathless stumble, careening headfirst into a tangle of blackberry bushes, the remnants of the candle clutched tight between her palms.

narnia she thinks for one fleeting moment, caught between glorious delight and terrifying fear, and then realizes that the air tastes different on her tongue. a magical land, but a different one.

she hears her brother's voice. "what was that? su, did you hear that? pete? where the hell did he go."

lucy struggles to extricate herself from the bush, splattering blackberry juice all over her skirt and sweater, and finds herself staring down the unfamiliar blade of peter's sword. he looks startled. also tanned, scarred, and more full of life than she's seen him (since narnia) in years.

"lu?" he asks as edmund and susan appear out of the trees behind him.

she holds out a hand and he pulls her upright, still blinking in astonishment. "did you miss me?"

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

it's about putting the pevensies in the position where they walk away willingly, without regrets and without looking back.
YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS


they each of them tell her about the trees, sailing on the skies, and fighting people for profit. the first two delight her, the last she sighs at in a half-affectionate way, the eyeroll and the oh peter implied but not spoken.

so, marx: forming the new society within the womb of the old.
it's not that we all carry within us the seeds of our own destruction. that is only one side of the coin. we carry within us rebirth, and continuity. the stars, all-watching and long-knowing, know this well.

"it's not aslan this time, i don't think," and lucy's like "pish posh" 'cos it's always aslan. whenever something like this happens it's always aslan. but it's like being at the gorge all over again (i saw him, he was standing right--), and everyone giving her these warm pitying looks. and it rankles. she thought they were past this. maybe not susan, but peter and edmund at least.

"there is other magic, you know," says edmund. "other gods. aslan is not the only one capable of doing things like this. it was the trickster that brought you here, after all."

and she doesn't know what to say to that, because it's frustratingly true, so instead she gives edmund the look she knows will twist him inside, because betraying lucy always takes him back to betraying her that first time in narnia, to memories of winter and the witch, of betraying all of them. it is a low move on her part, but it's just that -- although she is glad to be with her siblings, glad to feel the magic tingling in her bones -- she thought aslan would be here, assuring and reassuring her, calmly drawing the sharp clear line between good and evil, just he had before.

well, he's not.

"you'll see," she wants to say, but she doesn't. now is the time for reunion, not for divisions, and instead she says, "what've we got for food? i'm famished."


edmund says, "lucy."

there is no answer.

"lucy. i know you're awake."

and she is. she's tempted to shut him out, because she needs sleep after all, and because she doesn't want to forgive him for doubting her, but she carries years and other worlds in her, and she knows the wisdom of being open and willing.

she whispers, "what is it?" and patiently trudges through a whispered conversation about aslan and gods and faith and waiting. edmund is mostly unflappable, usually collected and level-headed, but occasionally when his past betrayals raise their heads, he becomes distracted and churlish, and none can evoke these betrayals so well as lucy. the only one smaller than him and the easiest, back then, to bully. so bully her he did, with frequency and relish, despite what his parents and peter and susan said. lucy has the honor of being the victim of edmund's first significant betrayal, and for these reasons, and reasons more unformed and intuitive, he seeks out her company when the past returns to him.

"you have to be content to wait," she says.

on the other side of the dying embers, susan snores softly, an arm around peter as he sleeps with his head on her stomach. above them all the stars are strange and brilliant, ever-watching, and the moon is full.

lucy holds out her hand and edmund takes it, their fingers curling together. edmund firms his grip, and maybe tugs at her hand or maybe he's just adjusting to a better position, but for whatever reason lucy moves closer to him, burrows into his embrace as he kisses her forehead.

"i did miss you," he confesses.

"i knew it," she says.

and they close their eyes, and sleep.

[bedlamsbard.livejournal.com]

it's not that we all carry within us the seeds of our own destruction. that is only one side of the coin. we carry within us rebirth, and continuity.

yeeeeeeessssss. like that. there is a quote, but i don't remember what it is. like burning ditches, burning fields, the ash that fertilizes. out of death comes life.

we are getting pretty deep here, aren't we? i think half my dust playlist fits this better than dust. i rather want a title. *muses*

aw, peter and susan cuddling together.


to gamenung, lucy says only, "it's just a sword, peter, it doesn't mean anything."

"what, like rhindon didn't mean anything?" edmund says, but peter is only silent, running his finger's over the golden wolf's head and the chip of sapphire, the chip of emerald.

they all three of them spread the trickster's pack of tarot cards for her, but lucy won't look at them. she sweeps them up with her hand and offers them back to peter, gingerly. "you know i don't believe in that sort of thing," she says. "and su, i thought you didn't either. it's just stuff and nonsense."

she wakes up in the early morning hours, the gray light of dawn just beginning to filter through the trees, to see peter stoking the fire. his face is shadowed as he pushes logs into position. he glances toward her as she sits up, but doesn't say anything, his attention seemingly fixed on the fire.

lucy gets up and goes over to him, and peter obligingly shoves the last log away and puts an arm around her shoulders. he's warm against her, steady and reassuring, familiar.

after a little while, when peter might have gone back to sleep -- his eyes are closed, but his breathing hasn't changed, hasn't shifted from waking to sleeping -- lucy says, "did you ask for it?"

his eyes snap open. "no," he says.

"then how could this happen?"

"it wouldn't have happened if i had," peter says. "the trickster has his own goals, you know, and we're just a vessel for him, a weapon, some way for him to get what he wants."

"no, we're not," lucy snaps. "we're us. we do get to make our own choices, you know."

she raises her head to see peter regarding her oddly. "don't you get it?" he says. "that's what we've always been. it's just someone else pulling the strings this time."

WOO peter/lucyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

fo' shiz. at the core of it it's a lot of "fuck you aslan, and you too, lewis. i judge your judgment!" though, then again, that could be said of most things we write. what's on your dust playlist? i'm piqued by the idea of a soundtrack for this thing, that would be fun. "the price that we pay" by hurricane #1 (second to last song on the page). piqued also by idea of a title! TELL ME MORE.

what would also be intersting is short perspectives from the trickster and aslan and narnia and narnians, here and there, feeling the end in their bones, a change in the winds.


lucy says, "freedom is more than just the ability to choose your own cage."

peter strokes her hair and looks into her eyes, and she forces herself not to look away, howsoever much she wants to. is he thinking about how young she is again? that she's but his youngest sister with a broken heart for her god? i used to ride into battle with you, she wants to say. i've seen you half-dead and i put you back together, and i've drunk the sweetest of wines and the foulest of moonshine with you. i hid beside you in the shadows waiting for the enemy, breathing low, footsteps light. you had your sword and i had my dagger and we were kings and queens.

"freedom," says peter, "is rarely what one thinks it is, and never what one thinks it should be."

"stop talking to me like i'm a child," she snaps. "if i'm a child, then so are you. we all are. ed, and su."

"i know you're not a child."

she bites down on her reply, and the ensuing silence between them flickers with what they choose to leave unspoken.

finally she says, "peter, you are my oldest brother and my high king, and i love you as a sister, queen, and subject. but, pete... you-- you can't ask me to betray aslan."

"oh lucy," peter says softly, "i wasn't asking you to."

Re: WOO peter/lucyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

[bedlamsbard.livejournal.com]

a lot of things are on my dust playlist that should either be on my after-dust playlist or a very different playlist! one of these days (http://www.cowboylyrics.com/lyrics/harris-emmylou/one-of-these-days-6313.html), emmylou harris, tie me at the crossroads (http://www.stlyrics.com/songs/b/brucecockburn10477/tiemeatthecrossroads338596.html), bruce cockburn (which is one of my edmund songs, but i feel it also works here), and if i should fall from grace with god (http://www.shanemacgowan.com/lyrics/gracegod.shtml), the pogues, i feel would work here as well as in dust.

but isn't this (http://www.absolutelyrics.com/lyrics/view/shawn_colvin/i'll_say_i'm_sorry_now/) such a pevensies/narnia song? (WHY YES IT IS MORE SHAWN COLVIN.)

i have no title. this is a subject that requires musing, and also the rereading of certain poetry. LIKE OUR BOY ELIOT.

oooh, yes, and then the people of stormhold, the people of the world, the ones that aren't narnia but can feel that something's happening. the countryfolk that see these four youths pass by on the road east, over the mountains, silent as ghosts.

OH LUCY. OH PETER.


lucy pulls away from him, gets up and stomps around. it's childish; she doesn't care. peter pulls his knees up to his chest and watches her, expression calm and contained, uncaring.

"what's happened to you, peter?" she demands as susan and edmund begin to stir, rubbing their eyes. they stay silent, watching the interplay. "you used to trust aslan. you all used to trust aslan!"

"and perhaps we were right to then," peter says, "but times have changed."

"no," lucy says, shaking her head. "oh, no, peter, you can't. things haven't changed that much. some things never change. look at the trickster's name!"

"what do we lose by just going to see?" susan says softly.

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

in which the center cannot hold.

but it's pevensies you know, they know how to weather their storms, and they walk now in the eye of it. the still point of the turning world as around them the earth shivers. they fall to joking and playing and teasing each other as they make their way east, for they are first and foremost each other's brothers and sisters, and this, at least, seems constant.


ehhhh, funny that lucy is kinda the odd one out instead of susan! i'm beginning to think that there are lucy people and there are susan people, and i think i know which we are, 'cos i was about to start the next paragraph like "lucy brings an unknown quantity..." but i'm not sure if that's what i want to express, quite. 'cos lucy completes the four, after all. more like
now that she's here, her very presence makes edmund think about aslan, again, because of how she always does. he's beginning to comprehend how they are chesspieces in a game of the gods, but lucy reminds him -- just by being there, by laughing and taking his hand -- of how he came to love the great lion in the first place. he remembers being a small boy, judged and guilty, standing on the hillside and aslan looking into his eyes, his soul. the feeling of being known so completely...

how often can you betray something before...?

he doesn't even know how to finish that question, and there is something in the air that tastes of final decisions.

"what's this?" lucy asks, tracing the dagger on his shoulder with her fingers, and edmund hesitates before telling her.

susan is less touched. she is not bound by forgiveness to either lucy or aslan. neither is peter. they have both received the benediction of aslan, but lucy is his favored daughter. they have never begrudged her this, and they won't now.

when edmund and lucy disappear further into the woods to hunt for game, peter and susan start the fire, and when it is steadily burning, susan tells peter more of the bits and pieces of her missing days that have begun to filter back to her, as they near endgame. the trickster comes not just in dreams, but in shadows, blind spots, and tricks of the light, optical illusion and camouflage. the same thing has been happening to edmund, and he and susan have come to find bits of themselves under bushes and in the play of sunlight through the trees. never enough to give them the whole picture or tell them the whole message, just enough to tell them that he is there, always, wild-eyed and free.

"you know him better than the rest of us, pete," says susan. "what's he playing at?"

her brother laughs. "i can't answer that question. i've never been able to and i never will. no one can. we just have to play the game."



i kind of can't believe i'm enjoying writing ed/lu. i have never been an ed/lu person before. I BLAME EVERYONE WHO WANTED LUCY BROUGHT IN <3
eventually babylon candle takes the kids to aslan? OR, babylon candle takes the kids to [fancier name for or some object of endgame], and they are surprised to find themselves standing before the lion himself.

how do they meet yvaine? and we need the susan/lucy side of the pevensquare!

[bedlamsbard.livejournal.com]

oooooh. and those who know magic fall silent as they go by, ceasing in their duties and holding still, because they can feel the gathering power of a coming storm. they are chldren yet, just youths, but the potential is building, building, building with every step eastward they take. no one can hold that kind of pressure for long; something, someone, has to break.

and then they pass away, and while the aftermath of their presence can still be felt, it is not so great as they themselves, and so the world carries on, holding its breath, waiting.

i think you are right! there are lucy people and susan people. hmm, i wonder who is which?


lucy tries, a little, to bully her sister, but her heart isn't in it and susan is susan again, strong and confident, not the girl she'd become in england, the one who laughed too rawly and jumped at shadows. alone of them all, she walks lightly now, like a weight's been lifted, and lucy grudges her this.

"doesn't it bother you at all?" she demands when it's just them, the boys having gone to the nearest town to barter for food. (rumors of their presence have spread; any travelers in groups of four, two boys and two girls, are being looked at askance.)

susan looks up from the small travel-kettle she's filling from the stream. "oh, lucy," she says. "of course it does. it bothers all of us. but there are some things that have to be done."

"that doesn't mean that this is one of them!" she's wrong, she knows, but she can still cling to the denial. she wants to say that she doesn't know, not the way the others do, but she is a child of magic, of fate, and she can feel both building in the air around them, so thick she can practically taste it. they are getting closer to narnia and she wants to drag her feet, but something is drawing her onward.

of the four of them, edmund bears the stain of the traitor, cleansed but not gone by aslan himself, and susan knows what it's like, though she's never been forgiven. aslan lost peter a long time ago; lucy wonders if either of them realize it.


i was thinking the babylon candle was going to be used to take them all back to england for the last time ever! and they just walked to narnia instead, because then they get the power of the laaaaannnnd.

*flaps hands* i got nothin' on yvaine. we need a catalyst for action!

written on my greek tyranny and democracy essay outline

[bedlamsbard.livejournal.com]

the closer they get to narnia, the more the earth sudders, shivers, shakes, animals fleeing before them, trees drawing away with their branches snapping in the sudden wind, women snatching up their chcildren and men barring the doors of their homes, protective charms hanging across the walls and windows.

be warned! the wind seems to cry. for your doom comes, and it cannot be swayed.

her siblings have eyes for nothing but narnia, their steps firm and unhurried, but lucy finds herself dragging her feet. much as she loves narnia, she has let it go a long time ago, and anything that brings her back cannot be good, or welcome, or healthy. she does not want to know what has summoned their presence, what is drawing them forward slowly and inexorably. but she cannot step aside, cannot look away, and she will not let her siblings face this alone, whatever this is.

so she goes onward, and if her steps are less firm than Edmund's, her gaze less steady than susan's, her path less straight than peter's, well, so be it. she goes onward.


in other words: destiny is a BITCH.

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

:-O have we turned lucy into lewis!susan?? man, my 'sing the sun' bones are creaky. hmm. i will recommence with SEXINGS.


"come on," giggles lucy, tugging his hand. it's always feeling like the ground is breathing its last to her these days, like the trees are more solemn than usual, reaching their branches for the cold stars, and it makes her chest feel tight and her hands clench. all she wants for now is to feel like maybe she's in her old narnia again, if just for a bit.

"we have to take these hares back to the others," says edmund.

"come on." and she tugs harder, and runs, refusing to let go, so edmund runs along with her, dead hares flapping awkwardly. at the lakeside she tugs at edmund's clothes, trying to pull them off, and when he says, "i can undress myself, you know," she just laughs and tells him what a big boy he is then, because that's not the point, and the only way edmund can fight back is to pull at her clothes too.

his shirt is pulled over head. her dress is pulled down over shoulders. it's like they're confusing one series of actions for another that -- when lucy throws her arms around him and they both lose their balance -- in the millisecond before they hit the water, lucy feels the brush of his lips on hers, a soft sigh.

a splash.

"all right," says edmund, when he finishes sputtering lakewater, "look, let me get these hares safe so animals won't get them, then--"

"oh edmund," says lucy, and dunks his head under the water.



...OKAY, PRE-SEXINGS.

[bedlamsbard.livejournal.com]

YAY SING THE SUN. i just wanted to throw that bit out there because i found myself writing it in class.


the mountains are steep and tall, and they grow out of breath as they go over the pass. here, close to narnia, things seem to be on the verge of tension. susan is irritable, edmund distracted, peter so determinedly focused that it's a wonder he's not sleepwalking.

it's only a space of time before something breaks, before something breaks. building, building -- the air feels the same way it does before a lightning storm. she just wants to know who the lightning's going to hit.

they are sitting down to dinner at the side of the road, edmund poking dubiously at their battered cookpot, when lucy looks up and sees the trickster sitting cross-legged between peter and susan.

"hello, loves," he drawls. "did you miss me?"

none of them have even had time to put hand to weapons.

"not particularly," peter says, easily and carefully, and susan scoots carefully away and closer to edmund, who has his dagger out now.

the trickster shakes his head. "is that any way to speak to the god who got you back to narnia?" he asks sadly.

"we're not in narnia," edmund says.

"not yet," the trickster agrees, "but this time tomorrow you'll be over the border."

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

"i don't like this trickster creature," one star says, making a face. "he is untrustworthy." he is a star of morning, and the glow around him is soft but beautiful, patient.

the star to whom she speaks is a star of the midnight sky, and she shines boldly, with cheer. a little recklessly, one might say. "ah, but the thing is," she says, "that you can always trust him to be untrustworthy."

"i don't like to play those games, you know that."

"we don't have to," shrugs the midnight star. "but they do, those poor things, those kings and queens."

"they barely look like kings and queens," he sighs. "look at the state of them. they look like little more than ruffians! vagabonds!"

"they will always be kings and queens. this is how aslan has made them. these are the rules he laid down for himself when he sung the land, and he is as bound to the rules as they are."

"he should have remembered that," muses the morning star, "before all this started."

"yes. he rather should have." she turns to her companion. "i say, what's the word from yvaine? she had better hurry if she wants to intercept them."

[bedlamsbard.livejournal.com]

the trickster is not the only one of the gods walking the land in flesh these days. in the south, the calormenes murmur of tash, sighted at the edges of the desert, and there is always rumor in narnia and archenland of aslan. in the western lands and on the eastern isles they speak of the seven once more, sighted alone or in ones or twos. in the high places of narnia the herdsman has been seen wandering among the flocks and fields; there are flickers of spirits in the woods and the waters, powers older than their young cousins the dryads and naiads. storm and thunder are the names on the lips of the sailors that come from the south, and coldfire seen winding its way up the masts and rigging of many a ship. god-touched.

there are strange things afoot in the world these days.

[tricksterquinn.livejournal.com]

...I am now picturing the Trickster as Jack Sparrow, you know.

Did you guys trail off from this? It's very interesting.

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

JACKSPARROW!TRICKSTER OMG
that is like candy for my brain

yeah our adding to this thread is at this point very sporadic and the story isn't always linear. bedlam has plans to turn all this into a coherent fic at some point, though who knows when 'at some point' will be (case in point: the peter/arthur).

[tricksterquinn.livejournal.com]

You can always trust an untrustworthy man to be untrustworthy!

Fair enough. It's all very... heavy. And awesome, too.

[lassiterfics.livejournal.com]

XD

'kay, sorry i keep skipping out on you, but it's just that i'm without my laptop until next week. i will IM you soooooooon.

[bedlamsbard.livejournal.com]

It is ridiculously heavy. And rich. Like dark chocolate.

As for plans to turn it into a coherent fic...I'm not sure I can actually handle two different LB revisionism fics at once (especially since Dust just past 70K and the war hasn't even started yet), so it may be a while.

[deepad]

Just popping in to say how utterly fabulous this is and how you are both such teases!

[tricksterquinn.livejournal.com]

*waves hands* In which avatars finally realize that's what they are! Poor dears.