Abigail Barnette's Blog, page 69

#LegionXIII Rome watch-along S01E08, “Caesarion” or “Julius Caesar, you are NOT the father.

Quick rundown of the episode: Humiliated by his side’s loss to Caesar, Brutus returns to Rome, to a mother who seems equal parts relieved by his survival and embarrassed that her kid lost in the war against her ex-boyfriend. But it’s cool, because now that the and his traitor friends have returned to Rome, they can just keep on plotting. Brutus doesn’t want to get involved right now, but I think we all know that’s going to change. Antony overhears them plotting, and warns Cicero that if he acts up, he’ll nail his hands to the senate doors.

Caesar arrives in Egypt, where all the speaking Egyptians are as white as this year’s Oscar nominees, and Pharaoh Jeoffrey Ptolemy presents Caesar with Pompey’s head. Caesar isn’t very thankful for the gift, and decides to help Cleopatra overthrow her stupid, spoiled brother. He sends the thirteenth out to find her. She’s out in the desert smoking opium and waiting for her brother to get pissed off enough to kill her. Luckily, Titus Pullo shows up just in time to stop her from being assassinated. Cleopatras’ womb is “between the flood”, so she comes up with a plan to get inseminated any way she possibly can, so that when she inevitably seduces Caesar, she’s already got one in the chamber. Her slave brings her Lucius Vorenus, but he can’t do the job, so it’s down to Titus Pullo to have some tent-shaking, acrobatic sex with her. They smuggle Cleopatra into the palace in a sack, and Caesar wastes no time getting her into the other other, proverbial sack. At the end of the episode, he proudly present “his” baby to his cheering army, while that little shit brick Ptolemy floats face down in some sandy water.

My favorite part of the episode: When, in what can only be described as my perfect romantic evening, Titus Pullo and Cleopatra bounce off the walls of her pavilion like ping-pong balls to the sound of extremely enthusiastic ululation.

My least favorite part of the episode: Every single Egyptian with a speaking part is a white person. Ptolemy, Cleopatra, the guy who was Cassandra’s slave in the Doctor Who episode “A New Earth,” every single one of them is white. There are a lot of black Egyptians in this episode. They’ve all been cast as slaves who have no lines and who just stand behind the talking white people. What the fuck, HBO?

Favorite costume: When Cleopatra returns to the palace all decked out, and her slave’s makeup is AMAZING.

Team Atia or Team Servilia: Doesn’t really apply in this episode, as neither are featured. Servilia has a sex scene with Octavia that’s presented in contrast to Caesar’s scene with Cleopatra, but that’s about it.

Favorite watch-a-long tweet: When Jess was unimpressed with Caesar’s dramatic style of lovemaking.

Full of drama and all that. Gotta get old. Cleo’s like, get on with it so I can convince you the baby’s yours. #LegionXIII

— Jessica Jarman (@jessjarman) January 19, 2016

What hairdo or costume would Bronwyn steal? Bron is sucker for comfort, so I’m going to go with Cleopatra’s linen nightgown thing.

Guess Jess’s head canon. Pullo and Vorenus double up on Cleopatra, but end up being more interested in each other.

Now go check out Bronwyn’s and Jess’s posts (Jess’s might be a little late this week due to illness), and join us Monday at 9 PM EST for season one, episode nine, “Utica”. Tweet to #LegionXIII to join us!

 

Don’t Do This Ever: “Defending A Sex Offender” edition

CW: This installment of Don’t Do This Ever deals with child sexual abuse and victim blaming.

This week, popular romance author Karen Marie Moning announced on her Facebook page that fan favorite narrator Phil Gigante would return to record the audiobook for Feversong, an upcoming novel in her beloved Fever series. Certain issues prevented him from narrating the most recent book, Feverborn, disappointing fans. It’s a great thing he’s coming back and everyone is happy, right?

Except for the part where “Phil” is Phil Gigante, convicted sex offender and pedophile, and the “issues” that prevented him from narrating Feverborn were a prison sentence followed by house arrest.

Ceilidhann at Bibliodaze covered the full story in depth, so I suggest heading over there and getting “all the details,” to borrow a repugnant phrase from Moning herself, and view a screenshot example of the discourse that followed the announcement. Some readers were overjoyed at the promised return of their favorite narrators, but others raised concerns over Gigante’s continued involvement in the series.

Moning’s initial response, which you can see at Bibliodaze and Red Hot Reads, was to defend Gigante. She claimed to have insider knowledge proving his innocence, but has yet to come forth with it. Readers are meant to take her at her word, and ignore the fact that Gigante pled guilty to accosting a minor for immoral purposes, as well as possession of child sexually abusive material, just two of the four felonies he was charged with in the incident. In a plea bargain, Gigante was sentenced to only four months in jail and three months on a tether.

Despite Moning’s assurances of Gigante’s innocence, some readers didn’t back down, resulting in the current state of the post on Moning’s Facebook page:

screencap courtesy of Melanie Simmons

Moning claims to want to protect all the parties involved, but she never addressed the rampant speculation and victim blaming that took place on her post, right alongside her own defense of Gigante. Is the fourteen year old girl he sent nude photos to not an involved party? Are the readers who feel tricked or cheated for having purchased books narrated by Gigante not involved? What about fans who would prefer not to support an author who lies to her readers in order to defend a child molester? To the casual observer it seems the only people Moning is interested in protecting are herself, the fans who agree with her and will continue to hand over their money and praise, and Phil Gigante, sex offender.

Authors, if you find yourself in a similar position, you have three choices. You can fight to disassociate your work from the bad actions of the person involved, while sharing disappointment in that person with the fans who are also being let down. Alternately, you can remain neutral, stating that such decisions are out of your control; whether your readers believe this is true is out of your hands. Or, you can defend a man who sent nude photographs to a fourteen year old girl, claim you have some secret knowledge that would excuse what he did, and lie to your readers about the crimes he was charged with. I would hope it goes without saying that the third option is what you should not do, ever.

Jenny Reads 50 Shades of Midnight Sun: Grey, Saturday, May 21, 2011, or “THE BIGGEST CHAPTER EVER: PART FOUR”

Now, everybody who’s been around these parts knows that Christian Grey is a creepy rapist. That’s not in dispute. But I’m still going to give you guys the heads up here with a CW: Rape, not because this is a rape scene, but because so many things he says/thinks in this chapter sound exactly like something a rapist would say/think. So there’s your heads up.

EDIT: I just woke up and read this amazing post on Smart Bitches, Trashy Books. It is so super relevant to this recap, I had to edit to include it.

Yes, we’re still on the same, massive chapter. If you want to read this recap in tandem with the original recap, you’re going to want chapter eight.

This day in history: Anabella Steeleswan lost her virginity and turned into a pirate.

Chedward has just realized that the woman he’s mistaken for a potential fucktoy is actually a worthless virgin, and he’s super angry:

“Why the fuck didn’t you tell me?” I growl, and start pacing my study. What do I want with a virgin? She shrugs apologetically, at a loss for words.

“I don’t understand why you didn’t tell me.” The exasperation is clear in my voice.

Okay, so, a few things. One, underlines indicate italics. Two, exasperation is a pretty big back step from where we were just a paragraph above (in the last recap), where you “glare at her as fury surges through” your body. Now it’s exasperation, and there hasn’t even been a section break?

Ana points out that it’s not like he ever asked, and she doesn’t generally blurt out that she’s a virgin to people she just met. You know, unlike some people, who decide they can meet a person and then days later ask them to sign a sex contract and barf out all of the details of their sex lives whether another person wants to hear them or not.

Which, by the way, is what Chedward is so angry about: he showed her his sex room, talked about hard limits, and revealed all this stuff about himself, and she has the nerve to not be exactly what he expected. He responds with ludicrously dramatic dialogue:

“May God forgive me,” I mutter under my breath.

He’s worried that she’s never been kissed, either. She answers:

“Of course I have.” She looks offended. Yeah, she’s been kissed, but not often. And for some reason the thought is…pleasing.

Ana is doomed here. She can either be a chaste virgin whose chasteness and virginity disgust Chedward, or she can be sexually experienced and disappoint him. And this is going to be the theme of their entire relationship from here out.

Why hasn’t some guy taken her to bed?

Because some guys understand the word “no”? I mean, not many, but some.

Shit, maybe she’s religious.

Hypothesizes the guy who just begged God’s forgiveness for talking about sex to another adult.

She gazes down at her fingers, and I think she’s smiling. She thinks this is funny? I could kick myself. “And you’re seriously discussing what I want to do, when you have no experience.”

I’m loving this scene from his point of view, because it’s explicitly laying out the thing that makes me stop reading a romance the second it comes up, and it still comes up with disturbing frequency even now. Here we have a romance novel hero internally boggling at the idea that a heroine’s sexual agency needs to be unlocked by a man, like a video game achievement. It’s amazing to him that she’s making decisions about her own sexuality without having the prior permission that only sexual penetration can grant. From this perspective, Ana appears to be a far more empowered character than she came off in her own head.

“How have you avoided sex? Tell me, please.” Because I don’t get it. She’s in college–and from what I remember of college all the kids were fucking like rabbits.

All of them. Except Me.

Wait, hasn’t your mom’s best friend been boning you since you were fifteen? I suppose the distance between Boston and Seattle probably put a crimp in that.

How has she avoided sex. I love it. It’s an inevitability that she’s going to have sex with someone. As a beautiful young woman, she owes it to the world to have sex, to the point that she’s apparently dodging dick like a runner jumping hurdles.

Ana tells him that nobody has ever taken an interest in her.

No one has what? Seen how attractive you are? No one’s lived up to your expectations–and I do?

Me?

There seems to be a real push in the narrative for the reader to see Christian has having the same low self-esteem Ana has in her point of view. But it’s totally incongruous with any of the characterization that’s going on inside of Christian’s actual head. We see no evidence that he actually has this much self doubt in his actions, or even in most of his thoughts. It’s basically just, “Everybody wants to fuck me all the time, I’m the greatest” with a side of “wait, what? Why would ANYONE be interested in ME?” which completely contradict each other. And there’s no acknowledgement of how contradictory this is. He’s not going, “Wow, I’m so mercurial” (to borrow the word-of-the-day from the original series) or examining these reactions at all. We’re meant to take them as written and not question the sharp contrast.

Chedward wonders how she’s going to be a submissive if she’s never had sex before.

This is not going to fly…and all the groundwork I’ve done has been for nothing. I can’t close this deal.

In case you forgot that our romantic hero literally views women as property.

“Why are you so angry with me?” she whispers.

Of course she would think that. Make this right, Grey.

Yes. Of course she would think that. Because you’ve glared and yelled and acted demonstrably, you know, angry.

Why the hell would I be angry with you?

But…you just…you sounded like you kind of understood why she…. Never mind.

So, how does he figure he’s going to “make this right”? By giving her the gift of his wang, of course!

And I want to fuck her, and spank her, and watch her alabaster skin pink beneath my hands. That’s out of the question now–isn’t it? Perhaps not the fucking…perhaps I could. The thought is a revelation. I could take her to bed. Break her in.

Tear the mattress tag off her. Void her warranty. Charge through the tape at her finish line. Drive your car into a canyon and take her with you. Shatter her into a thousand theoretical shards. Take it to the limit, one more time.

Would she want to?

Does it matter?

You know who Christian Grey reminds me of?

 

Anyway, Ana bites her lip again, and she apologizes:

“Don’t apologize. It’s just that I want to bite it, too, hard.”

Her breath hitches.

Oh. Maybe she’s interested. Yes. Let’s do this. My decision is made.

“Come,” I offer, holding out my hand.

“What?”

“We’re going to rectify this situation right now.”

I love how this reads like he’s going to rectify the fact that he wants to bite her lip. It’s like he’s saying, “Come on, I’m going to go bite your lip.” Also, “‘Come,’ I offer”? He offers? When I tell my dog, “come!” I’m not offering that they come inside. I’m telling them to. If it’s an offer, there needs to be a question mark. But that’s just my opinion.

“What do you mean? What situation?”

“Your situation, Ana, I’m going to make love to you, now.”

Again, not really an offer. But it’s okay, because then he backs off a little:

“That’s if you want to. I mean, I don’t want to push my luck.”

Let’s talk about something infuriating to me, dear reader. After Ana reminds Christian that he doesn’t make love, he fucks hard, he says:

“I can make an exception, or maybe combine the two, we’ll see. I really want to make love to you. Please, come to bed with me. I want our arrangement to work, but you really need to have some idea what you’re getting yourself into. We can start your training tonight–with the basics. This doesn’t mean I’ve come over all hearts and flowers–it’s a means to an end, but one that I want, and hopefully you do, too.”

In my recap of Fifty Shades of Grey, I pointed out how offensive it was for Chedward to tell Ana that having sex with her is a “means to an end.” What he’s actually stating is that he’s only going to have sex with her in an effort to make her acceptable for his use. But since that first recap, and since a boom of BDSM Billionaire erotic romance spawned from this book (my series included), I’ve noticed something that really frustrates me. I have seen countless reviews from Fifty Shades of Grey fans on other books wherein the reader will state that they found the hero wasn’t as “alpha” as Christian Grey, and therefore not believable or sexy as a Dom. I’ve seen this on my own series, but I’ll be the first to admit that my hero is not an alpha hero and therefore deserves that criticism. But I’ve also seen it on other books, several in particular featuring heroes that turned me off because they were such giant assholes (or “alpholes” to borrow a popular romance reader phrase). “Not alpha enough” is a fair reader criticism; if someone is reading a book for an alpha male hero and they don’t think they’re getting it, that makes sense to include it in a review. But it’s the comparison to Christian Grey that I don’t understand.

Christian Grey doesn’t come across as particularly alpha. He tries, bless him. He tells Ana “come” (like a dog, and they’re doing a scene) and “I’m going to make love to you, now.” Which, to me, as a reader, are huge, boundary pushing turn-offs; like I said, I’m not a fan of those heroes. But some people are reading for that trope. So, here’s Christian, saying these things that could be interpreted as alpha, but it’s followed up with please, and only if you want to, and I hope you want to. This is not the behavior of a trope-true alpha, whose actions are sometimes borderline rape: “I’m going to to fuck you, now. And you’re going to like it.” While I maintain that Christian Grey is a rapist, he’s not an alpha hero, so I’m not sure what definition of “alpha hero” these readers are going by. It’s one thing to see books where a non-alpha hero is being fairly labeled “not alpha enough for me”, but it’s perplexing when books with actual alpha heroes are labeled as “not as as alpha as Christian Grey.”

Ana reminds Chedward that she hasn’t agreed to all of his rules, and he tells her that’s okay, he knows she wants this as much as he does. He’s amazed that she hasn’t run away from him, now that she knows his deepest, darkest secret. Which he’s still convinced is super dark and unusual, despite it being super common.

If you’ve made it through my other recaps, then brace yourself, dear reader, for a wave of nostalgia that’s about to crash over you like a glowing, brown, Lake Eerie tidal wave:

“You are one brave young woman,” I breathe. “I am in awe of you.”

This is not the first time the reader will be told directly that Ana is brave/awe-inspiring, in total contradiction to her actions or characterization.

Chedward wonders if he can actually have “vanilla” sex. Since I first read these books, I’ve come to the conclusion that I hate the term “vanilla” sex. I’ve decided to make a concerted effort to refer to it as “sex without kink.” I’m trying to train myself into differentiating with the terms sex with kink, sex without kink, and kink without sex (which is absolutely possible, and if you want to discuss it in the comments, let’s all do that). It just seems to me that “vanilla” is kind of a snarky term that suggests sex without paddles and nipple clamps is somehow lacking, and, by extension, people who don’t involve kinky elements in their sex lives are also somehow lacking. It’s pretty insulting.

They go to Chedward’s bedroom, where we cruise by some conveniently placed slut-shaming:

Shit. Contraception. I’m sure she’s not on the pill…Fortunately, I have condoms for backup. At least I don’t have to worry about every dick she’s slept with.

No, you’re right. There’s only one dick she’s going to sleep with. Unfortunately, she’s going to fall in love with him and marry him, too.

Christian thinks about how his first time was embarrassing, lending further credence to my “Elena Lincoln is a child molester” position. Then it’s time to describe Ana like she’s some kind of untamed woodland creature:

I stalk toward her like she’s my prey. Oh, baby, I want to bury myself in you. Her breathing is shallow and quick. Her cheeks are rosy…she’s wary, but excited.

It’s also time for him to sound like a serial killer:

She’s at my mercy, and knowing that makes me feel powerful. She has no idea what I’m going to do to her.

That’s nothing at all like something that could come directly out of a Thomas Harris book.

Then he says:

“Let’s get this jacket off, shall we?”

And I realize that at this point, she has seen his sex room, talked about what he wants to do to her sexually, is about to have sex with him, and she hasn’t even taken her coat off yet. If this is the pace we’re moving at, how the goddamn Christ is this chapter so assing long?

There’s kissing, and he takes her shirt off:

“Oh, Ana. You have the most beautiful skin, pale and flawless.

“A perfect addition to the suit of human skin I’m constructing in my basement workshop.”

I want to kiss every single inch of it.” There’s not a mark on her. The thought is unsettling. I want to see her marked…pink…with tiny, thin welts from a crop, maybe.

You know, the emphasis on the unblemished whiteness of her skin is a lot more aggressive in this book than in the last one.

If I do nothing else, I will teach her not to be shy of her body.

Okay, but you leave your shirt on when you’re banging, so…

Also, he teaches her to not be shy of her body, then he handcuffs her and leaves unwanted marks all over her body when she dares to sunbathe topless on a mediterranean beach on their honeymoon. But if I point out all the double standards he holds for Ana, we’ll never get off of this conference call.

She tastes luscious. Wine, grapes, and innocence–a potent, heady mix of flavors.

WTF does innocence taste like? And aren’t wine and grapes basically the same thing? I’m no sommelier, but I’m pretty sure they’re related. And don’t get me started on “luscious” because that word was already ridiculous and now I’m going to laugh whenever I see it in print. Actually, I’ll never get to reread the Harry Potter series again, because I’ll see Lucius Malfoy and all I’ll think about is how he must taste like wine, grapes, and innocence.

Also, 40 volume conditioner and the tears of many house elves.

There’s some more kissing and she touches him, but he likes it, and Edward–I’m sorry, Christian–thinks about how she smells like an orchard in springtime. Since Bella Swan smelled like lavender and freesia, E.L. James has created a safe distance. But we, the haters, remain constantly vigilant.

Christian asks Ana to show him how she “pleasures” herself, and of course, we already know that this is a thing Ana has never done. Because, like any good and virtuous heroine worthy of love, her body has never been awakened to arousal before the first touch of the hero’s hand. The idea that she’s never had an orgasm blows Chedward’s mind, and he thinks:

I’m going to make you come like a freight train, baby.

He tells her to keep still. You know. Like how freight trains are known for not moving. Not moving is their primary function. So Ana can’t move. Because trains.

How, exactly, does a train come?

I’m done thinking about this, and to be perfectly frank, I wish I never had. I’m not going to be able to come back from this a whole person.

Anyway, he li-li-li-licks her from her toes to her head, to paraphrase Ludacris, and marvels the whole time about the fact she actually wants to fuck him.

She doesn’t stop me…she trusts me. Can I extend her trust to letting me have complete dominion over her body…over her?

“She doesn’t mind me licking her and cupping her breasts, so she probably wants me to have complete control over everything she does in life.” Sounds legit.

Dipping my finger into her bra cup, I jerk it down, freeing her breast. The nipple is small, rose pink, and it’s already hard. I drag the cup down so that the fabric and underwire rest under her breast, forcing it upward. I repeat the process with the other cup and watch, fascinated, as her nipples grow under my steady gaze.

I…I don’t think nipples work like that.

But it’s still fun to imagine Ana’s nipples getting bigger and bigger, filling the room, destroying Seattle.

There’s more nipple play, while Chedward keeps thinking she should just hold still while she orgasms. I remember people making necrophilia jokes about this during the last recaps. I was like, “Yeah, ha ha,” but now I’m kind of like, “Damn. They were right.” I’m surprised he didn’t ask her lay in a bathtub full of ice first.

Next up, we learn why nobody should ever want to get finger blasted by Christian Grey:

I thrust my finger inside her, and she cries out. She’s hot and tight and wet, and I want her. I thrust into her again, taking her cries into my mouth. I press my palm to her clitoris…pushing down…pushing around. She cries out and writhes beneath me.

No shit! It’s because you’re grinding her clit into her pubic bone. Do you even know what you’re doing down there? I mean, at least you used the word “clitoris” and earlier, “vulva,” instead of just “down there,” but goddamn, Grey. You’re just jabbing and smashing around like you’re trying to reach something that slipped down the back of the sofa.

He takes his boxers off and thinks about how she’s probably never seen an erect penis before. Ana’s never masturbated or even thought about sex or anything sexual before, apparently, so it’s unlikely that she’s ever been curious enough to hop on the internet and look for one. But holy shit, isn’t that a bummer of a thought? That this heroine is actually appealing to readers because of her entire lack of sexuality or sexual desire prior to getting wet panties over Chedward Grullen?

Now it’s time for the penetration:

I position myself so I can take her at my whim. Her eyes are open wide, imploring me. She really wants this…as much as I do. Should I be gentle and prolong the agony, or do I go for it?

I’m not sure what he means by prolong the agony. The agony of anticipation, or the agony of her hymen breaking? Because why, if she’s one of the people who do experience pain the first time, would you want to prolong that?

I go for it. I need to possess her.

“I’m going to fuck you now, Miss Steele. Hard.”

One thrust and I’m inside her.

F.U.C.K.

What kind of fanfic bullshittery is this?! “F.U.C.K.”? This isn’t even a grammar issue. It just looks unpleasant and silly. Well, I mean, it is a grammar issue, and usually I don’t think bending the rules for stylistic reasons is really so bad, but this… this is an assault on my eyeballs and I would like to press charges in What Kind Of Drunken Editor Allowed This To Happen district court.

Note, though, that immediately after worrying he might hurt her (if that’s indeed what the ambiguous “prolong the agony” was about), he’s like, ah, never mind, it doesn’t matter, because this is about what I need.

She’s so fucking tight. She cries out.

No, no, no, no, no. No. She does not “cry out”. That is not what happens in this scene. We all know what actually happens. She says “Aargh!” like a fucking pirate. You can’t hide from us, E.L. We all read it with our own eyes in the first book.

Okay, so remember how fans of the series said that throughout the whole thing, Ana is really in control of Christian instead of the other way around? And literally nothing in the books ever proved that? Well, we have definitive proof now:

I want to smuch from her: her trust, her obedience, her submission. I want her to be mine, but right now…I’m hers.

Well, don’t I have egg on my face for not believing everyone when they said that. And this was such an efficient way to get that point across, too. Why does it need to be explicitly stated in the actual events of the story, when a main character can just think it and make it so? We have to see the brilliance in this theme, now.

I push into her again and claim her, knowing no one has before.

It’s really important to remember, guys: Ana is a good girl, and that makes her special. The rest of us are all useless sluts.

Her trust in me–it’s suddenly overwhelming, and I start to move, really move.

Look who knows how to use the copy/paste function in Microsoft Word. It’s almost like that description is word-for-word from Ana’s POV in every single sex scene in the entire series.

I want her to come. I will not stop until she comes. I want to own this woman, body and soul.

If a dude makes you come, he owns you. It’s in the Constitution, look it up.

“Come for me, Ana,” I demand, and she cries out as she’s consumed, tipping her head back, her mouth open, her eyes closed…and just the sight of her ecstasy is enough. I explode in her, losing all sense and reason, as I call out her name and come violently inside her.

This book is making me lose all sense and reason.

Fuck. I’m undone.

Why? Did she take a break from writing the Declaration of Independence to play the fiddle for you? Are your strings unstrung?

That’s for my musical theatre crowd.

But seriously, half the things Chedward thinks in his head sound like an 18th century aristocrat is saying them. “I’m undone” is some Sir Percy Blakeney dialogue.

“Did I hurt you?” I ask, and I tuck her hair behind her ear, because I don’t want to stop touching her.

Ana beams with incredulity. “you are asking me if you hurt me?”

Does not compute, apparently.

While I’m waiting for her reply I remove the condom. Lord, I hate these things. I discard it discreetly on the floor.

No, you throw your nasty used jizz bag on the floor like a pleb, is what you do.

Ana says she wants to have sex again.

My cock stirs with approval.

My cock dances the meringue with some salsa moves.

Chedward decides he’s going to fuck her from behind with literally no refractory period coming into play at all. Seriously it’s been seconds. Most guys would still be cringing up into a little ball and pleading, “Don’t touch it! Don’t touch it!”, but not our virile stud of young CEO.

Her breath catches and I hope it’s with anticipation. She stills beneath me.

He doesn’t check if it’s anticipation or if she’s just not into it, though. See, he’s already fucked her once, so she’s basically just an object now. She’s not a virgin anymore, so he can treat her like the rest of the women he’s slept with.

Her sweet fragrance lingers over the scent of our coupling.

So remember the other recaps, and how I made so much fun of “down there” and kept saying they should use real words? The word vagina is used  over and over. He strokes “the front wall of her vagina” and he withdraws his thumb “from her vagina” and at no other point in this entire sex scene does he refer to her genitals in anything other than clinical terms. Now, I don’t have a problem with clinical terms. I use them myself. But like, literally nothing but clinical terms? Come on, mix it up a little, otherwise this feels like health class.

He puts his thumb in Ana’s mouth and tells her to taste him, and she responds by biting him. He thinks about how he could punish her if she were his sub.

 My cock expands to bursting at the thought.

The only thing that makes any of this readable is that last line, and the image it conjures of Chedward’s penis blowing out at the tip like the end of an overcooked hot dog.

He starts fucking her again, and thinking about how she should stay still, and suddenly I realize exactly what’s going on here: E.L. James has confused submission with a coma. In nearly every scene of submission, Ana just lays there like a dead fish. And that might be part of the appeal to some people: a fantasy of near total non-participation, in which they just lay there while someone does stuff to them. I guess I personally don’t understand why that kind of submission would be fun.

“You feel so good,” I tell her, and repeat the move again, circling my hips as I go. Slowly. In. Out. In. Out.

Just in case you’re unfamiliar with the mechanics of thrusting in human coupling.

“I want you sore, baby,” I pull out and sink into her again. “Every time you move tomorrow, I want you to be reminded that I’ve been here. Only me. You are mine.”

Look, I don’t want a relationship, okay? This is totally casual. But I own you now, and don’t forget it.

Ah, young love.

So, Ana has another orgasm and falls alseep, and that’s where the chapter that would never end finally meets its merciful demise.

#LegionXIII Rome watch-along S01E07, “Pharsalus,” or “Somebody’s landed on the Isle of Lesbos, and it sure ain’t Pullo or Vorenus”

 

Quick rundown of the episode: Despite being the dick who doomed his own ship by pissing off Triton, God of the sea and father of the brattiest mermaid in history, Pullo survives. He and Vorenus end up marooned on a sandbar together, where they debate the merits of blood drinking and Pullo is just generally not worried about the fact that they’re dying of thirst. Vorenus, however, is a man of action, and he decides the only way to survive is to ride a raft made of corpses out of his personal hell. Which is being alone with Titus Pullo for any length of time.

Things in Caesar’s camp are not going great. People are eating rats. Meanwhile, Pompey and his band of traitor bastards are eating like kings. They’re pretty sure that rather than starve Caesar out, they can fight Caesar’s army in a great big battle and get the whole conquest of Rome over (spoiler alert: it’s the battle of Pharsalus and this is a bad idea).

Atia is pretty sure her uncle is going to lose, so she sends Octavia to see Servilia, to beg for protection. Octavia gets all prettied up to go see Servilia. Since Servilia is the only human being who is remotely nice to her, Octavia immediately crushes on her hard and spends some time strumming her downstairs lute after their meeting. Later, Servilia invites her over for some “weaving”, the Netflix and chill of ancient Rome, and we see some May/December lady lust.

After a blurry, anti-climactic, grainy slow-motion battle, Pompey is left humiliated and poor, with no where to run but Egypt. And who should he run into along the way? You guessed it! Forrest Pullo, who totally recognize him. They see how beaten down he is and they let him go, which pisses off Caesar. Cicero and Brutus are basically like, I’m tired, I’m going to go home, so they go and surrender to Caesar. All things considered, Pompey gets away pretty easily. He arrives in Egypt with his wife and children, who get to watch as a servant of the Pharaoh cuts Pompey’s head off before he can even get a foot on the shore.

My favorite part of the episode: “Doesn’t matter. Everything’ll be fine.” -Titus Pullo, the Chris Traeger of Ancient Rome.

My least favorite part of the episode: Lyde and Naiobe’s reconciliation. It’s not that big a deal to get disowned if you’re just going to get reowned in the next episode.

Favorite costume: Octavia’s purple dress and veil. I would wear the non-stop fuck out of that.

Team Atia or Team Servilia: Team Servilia, because Atia said Servilia looks like “an old trout”. WTF is wrong with being a trout, huh? That’s what I thought. So Servilia wins this round. Doesn’t feel good, does it Atia?

Favorite watch-a-long tweet:

The forum newsreader’s name is Quintus Expositus. #headcanon #LegionXIII

— Gabriel Fortin (@gfortin_05) January 12, 2016

What hairdo or costume would Bronwyn steal? I was going to be funny and pick the silver replacement nose guy, but I think we’re probably in agreement about the Octavia

Guess Jess’s head canon. They’re stranded on an island together. This one is a no-brainer.

Now go check out Bronwyn’s and Jess’s posts, and join us Monday at 9 PM EST for season one, episode eight, “Caesarion”. Tweet to #LegionXIII to join us!

 

State of the Trout: 2016 book release news and new Afflicted

In case you hadn’t already heard, 50 Shades of Grey is now an Oscar nominated film. The tragedies of 2016 just keep coming and coming.

But here’s the good news! I’ve got books planned for 2016!

Second Chance  Ian and Penny return in another set of dual novels in the spring, release date tba.
Emir will get his own novel in the fall No title yet, but expect a romance between El-Mudad and a hunky bodyguard, and a very hot scene with Neil and Sophie.

Other good news! A new chapter of my free online horror serial, The Afflicted is available now! If you haven’t read it, you can start from the beginning here.

Oh! And I forgot and am now editing this bit in: I started my 2016 reading challenge today (I had to finish up a book I started in 2015 first). For “A book with a blue cover” I’ve selected Truthwitch by Susan Dennard.

That’s all the news that’s fit to print for now!

Jealous Hater Book Club: Apolonia, chapter 17

So, we left off with everyone deciding that they need to get to a radio station that will, realistically, be of absolutely no use to them, for reasons more than explained by Trout Nation resident experts in the comments section last time. Thank you to everyone who took the time to teach us a lesson in radio communications, by the way, that was fantastic!

Anyway, now everyone is standing around Benji’s bright orange Mustang, which is too loud and conspicuous, and doesn’t have the room for six people. Benji suggests making two trips, because duh, two trips in a bright orange car that’s super loud is way practical, especially when you’re trying to beat the clock. Cy decides it will be easier to leave Benji behind, and Dr. Z steps in to create some weak dramatic tension:

Dr. Z sighed. “Whatever we do, we must do it now. I’m sure there will be more soldiers coming at any moment.”

Why is this weak? Because there should have been soldiers there already. Detective Rorschach or whoever he is got away; reinforcements should have already stormed the ship hours ago, while everyone was dicking around in the med center. The only reason they didn’t was because it would have been disastrous to the author’s plans.

Benji tells Cy there’s no way they’re going to take his car and abandon him in the woods, which might be macho caveman posturing over Rory, but it’s also pretty understandable. But then Dr. Z says he’ll just stay behind.

Okay, let’s talk about the stupid uselessness of Dr. Z, shall we? The only reason Dr. Z exists is to make the space rock plot. At this point he’s so bumbling and totally incompetent within the structure of the dilemma he created, he’s John Hammond surviving at the end of the movie version of Jurassic Park. Nobody needs him once the dinosaurs get loose, so why is he still there? He’s useless. That’s why Crichton killed Hammond off in the novel; once he created the park and people started dying, he was no longer needed. Dr. Z hasn’t made a single useful decision since he told Cy and Rory about the Majestic. And any suggestions Zoidberg has made could have easily been made by other characters. The moment the reader finds out that Cy knows far more than Dr. Z, Dr. Z has outlived his usefulness. They should have found Dr. Z dead at his house, leading to the confrontation with Ellie. With Dr. Z dead, it would have removed an ally and upped the stakes. We also wouldn’t be stuck with Dr. Z trailing along behind them, throwing out the occasional bit of dialogue to remind us that he still exists. Unless Dr. Z does something pretty spectacular that saves everyone and wraps up the plot, he should have been cut loose a long time ago.

We’ll see what happens.

For right now, though, tough girl Rory has the situation in hand:

“No one is staying behind. We can all fit,” I said. I took Benji’s keys from his hands and pushed a button on the keyless entry remote. The trunk popped open, and everyone stared at the empty space. I climbed in, lay on my side, bent my knees, and propped my head with my elbow.

“This is ridiculous,” Cy said.

Benji smiled at me. He broke something off his keychain and tossed his keys to Cy. “You wanted to drive, right?” He climbed in, too, and made a show of getting comfortable next to me.

I can’t remember if the specific year of the Mustang was mentioned, but the classic models did not have much trunk space. I looked it up. A 1970 Mustang convertible had like 8 cubic feet of trunk space. An average refrigerator has 18.  A brand new Mustang would have like 13. Good luck, guys.

“What are you doing?” Cy growled. His patience with Benji was waning.

Right, because he was so patient before.

“It’s cold, and there are two too many bodies versus seats in the Mustang. I’m volunteering to keep Rory warm.” With that, he reached up and pulled down the trunk lid.

So, once they’re sealed in, Rory hears Dr. Z giving directions to the radio station and Cy and Apolonia talking in their language (she notes that it “doesn’t sound like a pleasant conversation”). There has been no mention of Tsavi so far, so who the fuck knows where she is or if she’s even in the scene anymore.

I wasn’t sure where the radio station was, but I assumed Cy would have to take back roads to get there. I didn’t realize until the ride began to get really bumpy that Cy was have to stay off-road until we cleared the roadblocks.

“I hope your car isn’t too damaged after this.”

Uh, I hope you don’t end up leaving your drive shaft on the fucking forest floor while Cy tries to drive an American muscle car through a bunch of trees and stumps and bracken. This car shit is KILLING ME.

Benji says he hopes they don’t get stuck or Cy doesn’t drive them off a bridge. This is an outcome I haven’t considered before, and it’s what I’m really rooting for now.

“Is that–ow!” he yelled. Cy had taken a bump too fast, and Benji banged his head on the trunk lid. He rubbed his head and then pounded the side of his fist against the interior wall of the trunk. “Take it easy! He probably wants to make sure we’re too rattled to cuddle.”

Finally, some childish, repetitive love triangle drama to break up the monotony of the space rock and aliens plot.

I smiled. “He’s got his hands full with the warrior princess.”

“Oh. I wondered if they were…if so, he’s doing a poor job of hiding it.”

“Hiding what?”

“How he feels about you.”

Just in case you were wondering, gentle reader, Cy is definitely in love with Rory and not with horrible, awful Apolonia (for whom the book is inexplicably named) and everyone can see that, except Rory, so that definitely makes it so.

Benji tells Rory that he was worried she would leave on the ship with Cy and never come back, or the soldiers would shoot her or something, and that’s why he’s on her side.

“So, it wasn’t all an act then? You didn’t want the rock?”

Benji’s face compressed, and he leaned toward me. “I don’t care about the rock. You’re the only thing I’ve wanted since the day I met you.”

Okay, but why? Serious question: what about Rory at the beginning of the book would make anyone want to be around her? Especially when she continually tells people she doesn’t want to be around them?

Also, how can Rory see Benji’s expression if they’re in the trunk?

They try to kiss, but Cy hits a well-timed bump, and they arrive at their destination. I am continually perplexed at the distances in this book. If it was such a difficult trip in a conspicuous vehicle, but the drive only took long enough for Rory and Benji to have a brief conversation about her relationship with Cy, why didn’t they just walk? It couldn’t have been that far away.

Cy lets them out of the trunk:

“Are you okay?” he asked. “Sorry about the sharp turns. Helena is crawling with Humvees. We had several close calls. It’s not easy sneaking around in an orange sports car.”

1. No sharp turns were ever mentioned.

2. Why didn’t Rory and Benji hear anything about the close calls, when they could clearly hear the people in the interior of the car speaking only a page before?

3. I don’t remember if we ever figured out where they were before, but the town is called Helena? So they’re either in Montana or Alabama?

We followed Dr. Z to the front door of the radio station. None of us were surprised that it was locked, but Benji successfully picking the lock with some wire from his trunk surprised us all.

“What?” he said.

“Where did you learn to do that?” Cy asked. “That’s a fairly expert move for a conservative engineering student.”

Yeah, engineers are terrible with mechanical systems. Like these engineering students, who built a robot that can pick locks. Of course, an argument can be made that an engineer would probably build the robot to do the thing before even thinking about trying to do the thing themself.

Benji tells them that his father taught him lock picking and a bunch of survival skills.

“Do you always carry a lockpick in your trunk?” Cy asked.

“It’s two paperclips, one bent like so,” Benji said, holding out his hand. “They were in my backpack in the trunk.”

“Amazing coincidence, that’s all,” Cy seethed.

No, Scooby Doo‘s Velma always having a bobby pin in her hair, despite wearing a hairstyle that clearly didn’t require bobby pins in the first place, was an amazing coincidence. A student having paperclips in his backpack isn’t that big a stretch.

A raggedy, skinny gray cat meowed and rubbed itself against the wall of the station and then against Benji’s leg.

“Aw, poor guy,” Benji said. He tried to pet him, but the cat maneuvered out from under Benji’s hand and kept rubbing his side against Benji’s other leg.

“Looks like you found a friend,” I said.

“Animals and kids love me,” he said before smooching at the overgrown kitten.

What exactly is happening here? What does the kitten add to the story? Why is this happening?

THERE ARE ALIENS. AND THE GOVERNMENT IS AFTER YOU. AND THERE IS A DEFINITE CHANCE THE WORLD WILL EITHER BE DESTROYED BY A PARASITE OR DESTROYED BY SOMEONE PREVENTING THE PARASITE FROM SPREADING. WHY IS THERE A SCENE WITH A KITTEN?

Apolonia and Tsavi guard the door while Cy, Benji, Dr. Z, and Rory try to get the radio station up and running. Benji goes outside to look for an electrical box, giving Cy and Rory a moment alone for more romantic tension drama:

“Why are you so hell bent on hating him?” I asked.

“I’m just waiting for him to betray you.”

“You mean, us.”

“No, I mean, you. One can’t be betrayed by someone one doesn’t trust.” He sighed, frustrated. When he spoke again, his voice was calmer. “This is a bad idea, Rory. His father is Majestic. Benji has been raised with that allegiance, and you think one girl is going to make him switch loyalties?”

“Why didn’t you make him leave then?”

“Because you wanted him to stay.”

Okay, but…

You know what, fuck it. I’m done looking for sense and logic in this book. Underlines = italics, you know the drill.

Cy checked over his shoulder, and then his eyes met mine. “I do care for you. When Tsavi, Apolonia, and I leave this planet, I don’t want you to be alone. If Benji is what he says he is, then you’re going to need him even if it makes me physically ill to put any thought in that scenario.”

This is some pretty impressive mental gymnastics. I hope he’s stretched. I think I understand now what Cy is saying: He’s going to be leaving the planet, so he wants Rory to have Benji in her life on the off chance he’s not going to betray her, even though Cy is 100% certain that Benji will betray her. But it makes him physically ill to think about Benji not betraying her.

Look, just because I understand what he’s saying doesn’t mean it makes sense.

 “So, you’re allowing Benji to stick around because you want us to be friends just in case he’s not a lying Majestic minion?”

“Precisely, but not friends, an asset.”

“We’re already friends.”

“Yes, this concerns me.”

“Why?”

“I’ve already told you, Rory.”

“You care about me.”

You know what would make more sense in this conversation than Cyrus having this line of reasoning because he cares about Rory? If he would just come out and say that he wants Rory to have Benji in case anything goes wrong with Majestic once Cy and Apolonia leave. She could use Benji’s safety for leverage or something, since his dad is involved in Majestic. That would make far more sense than, “I want you to have this dude hanging around you, even though you might be evil, because god forbid you are left dude-less in this situation.”

And that’s the real problem with the love triangle in this book. All the characters are making bad choices because it’s unthinkable that Rory might end up without a boyfriend at the end.

“Let’s be honest. You don’t get to deny me Benji because you’re jealous. If you choose Apolonia, then you can’t claim me, too.”

He released my wrist, clearly disgusted. “You’re wrong. I wouldn’t do that to you or to her.”

“I guess one girl can make someone completely contradict everything he thought was right.”

“Now you’re comparing me to him?” Cy said, his face twisting to anger.

The beauty of this passage is that the reader isn’t supposed to realize that Rory is unintentionally comparing him to herself. See, Benji likes Rory. She’s the only girl he’s interested in. He’s not stringing anybody else along. But Rory is doing exactly what she’s accusing Cy of: keeping one on the back burner just in case the one she really wants doesn’t choose her. She goes on to accuse Cy of being jealous, and he has been jealous. But Rory can’t get too high and mighty about that, because she’s been seething ever since she found out about Apolonia’s existence.

And let’s remember that the only thing Cy has done to make Rory jealous is be engaged to someone else, long before he met Rory. It’s Rory who’s gone out and actually fucked somebody else.

Benji finds the electric box and the lights come back on. He comes back inside, cat in tow, interrupting the fight.

In that moment, I realize how close Cy and I were. He noticed it, too. In unison, we stepped back, putting distance between us, fidgeting and failing miserably at appearing casual.

Benji picked up on it, and his smile disappeared. “Everything okay in here?” The cat wriggled out of Benji’s grip and ran into the back of the building.

Why? Why is the cat still a thing?

Rory storms off into another part of the building, and Benji follows her, demanding to know what she and Cy were talking about. She warns Benji that if he humiliates her with betrayal, she’ll never forgive him. But it kind of seems like if Benji betrays her to the Majestic, she’s not going to be around long enough to be mad at him, anyway. He tells her that his father believes Apolonia et. al are only interested in the rock as a way to keep humans from protecting Earth from them, and Rory points out that Benji is pretty interested in this rock he claims to not give a shit about.

As they set up the radio station, this happens:

Every once in a while, Benji would take a break and try to coax the cat over to him. It looked as if it had already been electrocuted once, so I wasn’t surprised that it wanted nothing to do with Benji while he was wrapping the copper wire.

This cat better turn out to be an alien or a spy trained by the Majestic or something that would make it a necessary element to the story.

Benji clipped his wire. “There are several radio antennae on the north hills. This radio station must redirect to them. It’s possible we could divert the beam, redirect by linking the ground signal to the antennae. Hamech’s ship could intercept the signal. If we knew the ship’s trajectory, we could even point one of the dishes here in that direction and bypass the antennae all together.”

Radio people covered why this would be extremely unlikely  in the the comments on the last recap.

Dr. Z points out that the only way that would work is if Hamech’s ship is monitoring those specific antennae, and Benji asks Apolonia if that’s a possibility.

“It is possible,” Apolonia said, her voice monotone. She was emotional all right with the one emotion she had–anger.

Just incase we’ve all forgotten, Apolonia is horrible and doesn’t deserve Cy the way Rory does. I mean, all Apolonia has done since she got there is be super angry about everything. You’d almost think dozens of people she cared about had been killed only hours before or something.

Cy and Dr. Z tell Rory she needs to rest. This constant need for everyone to rest, right in the middle of what should be urgent action, slows this book down almost as much as the love triangle does. Benji gets his emergency blanket from the car, and they get ready to go to sleep.

I returned his smile and felt my stomach flutter when I realized he was shifting to lie down behind me. The radio station was fucking freezing, but that wasn’t the only reason I wanted him next to me. Benji had been pursuing me a long time. It wasn’t until Cy came into the picture that I was able to feel anything. Ironically enough, it was for Benji. Now that that door had been opened, I couldn’t seem to get enough of him.

Now it’s time for a long conversation about their relationship. Benji asks if Cy leaving means something for them, and Rory says no, it just means Cy is leaving. She also tells Benji that she doesn’t know if they’ll work out, but she feels like they’re right together, or something. Benji suggests he and Rory could leave and not put themselves in danger anymore. Which is stupid, because if they leave and Apolonia and Cy and Tsavi fail in their mission, the entire planet is going to be overrun by horrific parasites. If they leave, they’re in more danger than they are just running around with the aliens.

I looked over at Cy and Apolonia, smiling at each other and stealing small touches every once in a while.

Huh. For someone who doesn’t have any emotions besides anger, Apolonia seems pretty happy to be with Cy, huh?

Rory tells Benji that Cy is her friend and she loves him, but she’s unwilling to say that she loves him as just a friend.

I turned on my back, looking up at him. “It’s different with you.” He tried to soften the tension around his eyes, but it was still there. I touched his cheek. “In a few hours, I’m going to tell Cy good-bye. But if I had to do that with you, I couldn’t do it, Benji. I couldn’t survive if you left me.”

Benji leaned down, touching his lips to mine. It didn’t matter who else was in the room or what they thought. The right pair of arms was around me, and that was all that mattered.

I don’t know. I think probably the alien parasite potentially taking over Earth kind of matters, but it’s never really treated that way by the narrative.

Then there’s more shit with the cat. Literally paragraphs of the cat.

Benji wants to name the cat Snuggles.

I frowned. “That is the lamest name ever.”

and after the cat actually approaches them, Benji says:

“See? He doesn’t think it’s a lame name.”

I’m pointing these out because there’s another “lame” earlier in the chapter, and it’s ticking me off. Even though I’m physically disabled and mentally ill, I’m generally not too freaked out about ableist language like “crazy” or “idiot” or “the meteor strike crippled the space station”, but there are a few situations that do make me furious and “lame” used to mean “stupid” is one of those. Especially because it specifically means not being able to walk due to disabilities affecting the legs. Like, sorry people who can’t walk are stupid? I feel like “lame” is one of those words like the r-word or “that’s gay” in terms of everybody knowing they’re wrong.

Before long, my body melted against Benji’s and I felt myself drift off. But I didn’t dream. It was just a warm, sweet darkness, the kind I had sunk into when I died. All I wanted was to lie still, heavy and relaxed against Benji. In that moment, it felt okay to just slip away even if it was forever. Staying there was easy. It was the waking-up part that was hard. This time though it was even harder.

My body lurched, and voices around me grew louder.

“Jesus! She was convulsing!” Benji cried, his hands hovering over me. “What…what do I do?”

Cy says Rory needs water, and Benji volunteers to go to a nearby gas station for it.

Cy touched my arm. “It will be over soon.”

My body lurched again. For someone who was so dehydrated, I seemed to be vomiting buckets. My palms were flat on the concrete, covered in whatever my stomach was rejecting. Maybe my whole body was rejecting what Apolonia had done to me. Maybe she had done it on purpose. Maybe she had been trying to kill me.

Of course it was something Apolonia did. Every woman in this book has wanted to kill Rory. And okay, that’s probably a natural reaction that anybody would have once they’ve met Rory, but I’m so finished with her assumption that all women are out to get her.

“What did you…” I said, but I couldn’t finish.

Once Apolonia recognized what I was accusing her of, her face finally flashed an expression–anger.

Of course it’s anger. You’re accusing her of poisoning you or something.

“You think I did this to you?” She took a step, but Tsavi held her back.

Let her go, Tsavi. Just end this for all of us.

“I saved your life,” she spit out. She looked to Cy. “This is who you are so fond of? How could you care about someone so weak? Look at her! Sweat dripping from her like an epocshta.”

Tsavi pushed her back, out of sight. I could hear them arguing in their native language.

Cy put a gentle hand on my back. “She’s just upset. I told you she’s emotional.”

Yeah, people tend to get, like, irrationally angry about being accused of murder. Silly, emotional, Apolonia and her mindless savagery.

Rory asks Cy what language they speak, because that’s of the utmost concern when you’re seizing and puking, and he tells her it’s Anhktesh. She’s all, “It’s beautiful,” or whatever, then throws up again.

“She didn’t mean to,” Cy said, a begging tone in his voice. “None of us could know it would have this effect. Please be okay,” he said before kissing the crown of my head.

Oh. So it was Apolonia’s fault.

I’ve probably used that .gif in an Apolonia recap before, but it’s really needed almost every time.

If I felt better, I might have appreciated Cy caring for me, even in Apolonia’s presence. Being near death was probably the only time she would allow it.

This is how petty Rory is. She’s convulsing and puking, but still has time to remind us that Cy is caring for her, and she’s won some kind of victory over his bitch fiancé.

Benji comes back with water and gas station snacks and sweatshirts. Apolonia gets Rory cleaned up–that bitch, how dare she–and Dr. Z, Cy, and Tsavi test the power to see if it will work.

But we need to know what the cat is doing. The cat is important.

The cat ran away when Apolonia gave me an improvised shower, but it returned when it realized Benji had food. Apparently, cats like pork rinds and Slim Jims.

With a new tarp beneath us and four extra-large C-Mart sweatshirts that Benji had bought from the gas station to use as a blanket, Benji, Snuggles, and I were huddled together again.

I hope that fucking cat gets infected by the alien parasite and kills you all.

A spotlight shone through the front window, and everyone who was standing ducked down. Apolonia, crouched and silent, walked across the room to look out.

Her body relaxed. “They are gone, but they might be back. We should stay hidden.”

The best way to do that, Cy decides, is to, you guessed it, sleep.

“Maybe we should all get some rest and try again in a few hours.”

Apolonia took a step toward him. She’d taken down her hair, and the black waves cascaded down past her shoulders, settling at her elbows. “I am not sure we have a few hours. I have been out of contact with Hamech for most of the day. If he tracks the Nayara to her last communication and sees that she is down…if he does not find me in the ship…the bodies…”

Oh, Apolonia. Don’t you realize what book you’re in? The science fiction is secondary to the real plot, which is just about Rory being a man magnet.

Apolonia nodded, still unsure. She and Tsavi made a pallet on the other side of the room. Cy made his a few feet away from the DJ booth and Dr. Z.

So, Cy sleeps far away from his betrothed, close enough to talk to Rory while everyone else sleeps.

“I’m glad you’re feeling better. I can admit now that I was afraid,” Cy whispered.

“That I was going to die or that Apolonia had tried to kill me?” I whispered back.

“The former. She wouldn’t hurt you. I know she’s–”

“Cold? Unfriendly? Hostile?”

All qualities that apply to Rory through this entire book, but they’re totally unacceptable in a romantic rival, even if that romantic rival is currently in a tense situation and has sacrificed the lives of her crew just to save the planet Rory currently lives on. But whatever.

Cyrus explains that he can’t sleep beside Apolonia because of some custom with his people, and how he and Apolonia met. He expresses uncertainty at the prospect of her still marrying him after they return to their planet.

“Why wouldn’t she?”

“My friendship with you…unsettles her.”

“Should it?”

Cy looked down to the floor. “No.”

I smiled. It’s okay. I can see that you love her.”

“If I’ve…seemed confused about the nature of our friendship, please accept my apologies. Being here, so far from home, and spending so much time with you…you make it very easy to forget.”

There’s the validation Rory needs. Cy forgot about the woman he loved because of her.

“It’s so strange to feel so strongly about two women who are so different. Sometimes, I wish the situation were different. But it’s not, and it’s wrong of me to think that.”

“So, stop.”

“You don’t know how much I wish I could.”

Rory tells Cy that she loved her best friend as much as Cy loves her, and Cy says the way he feels about her is confusing.

“Love is the most overused word in the English language. It’s confusing to everyone. Some people live their whole lives and never get it right.”

“Thank you. I don’t think I would have truly understood if I hadn’t met you.”

“Well, how about that? I finally get to be the one to say, you’re welcome.”

And that’s it. That’s how the chapter ends. They find a cat, they don’t contact the ship, Rory pukes a lot, and there’s way too much talking about how who loves who. I look forward to the next chapter, when probably more stuff doesn’t happen, and maybe there will be a dog or a spunky orphan added to the mix.

This is my favorite David Bowie song.

There’s like, filth and suicide/torture imagery, but it was the 90′s.

There’s not a lot I can say. I’m a Bowie fan. His work touched me the way it touched millions. I don’t know anything about the guy, and I’m not going to be like, “He was such a good person,” because I have no clue. But I do know that his mystique and persona and art did a lot for a kid in Catholic high school who wasn’t quite sure what was wrong with her mental health or her confusing sexuality.

Legion XIII Rome Watch-Along S01E06: “Egeria” or “Get in, loser, we’re going to Greece.”

Quick rundown of the episode: Lucius Vorenus has had about enough of two of his houseguests: his sister-in-law who’s perpetually crying about her missing, probably dead, husband, and his BFF Titus Pullo, who keeps going around treating slaves like people. Meanwhile, Mark Antony is running Rome the way Trump is going to run the White House, with threats, intimidation, and hideous decorating sense. He’s making it clear to enemies and resisters to Caesar’s rule that he’ll weaponize the senate, have them murdered, and marry their wives.

Vorena the Elder still has her mother over a barrel with the whole “I know you fucked my uncle and this baby isn’t mine” thing, which is really contributing to the household tension that’s driving Vorenus to drink. Pullo dissuades Vorenus from beating Niobe, suggesting the pair divorce, instead. But Vorenus  isn’t down with that. So instead, Pullo tells Lyde that he’s asked around and it turns out that her husband is dead, but hey, it’s not so bad, you’ve still got people who love you. It’s very clear that what he’s saying to both Lyde and Niobe is that they need to be careful, and not let Evander’s death become the thing that unravels their whole secret. We get a little more insight to what happened between Evander and Niobe, and it’s starting to sound like Niobe slept with Evander for his money, and the fact that he wanted a child motivated him into doing it. I guess maybe their plan was to wean the baby and then Lyde and Evander would take it? I don’t know, they don’t cover that.

At Atia’s house, she’s thinking of sending Octavian away to fight in Greece. But the more pressing issue is he still hasn’t “penetrated” anyone. She tells Titus Pullo to take Octavian to a brothel, but a clean, classy place. Not the type he would go to.

Vorenus returns home to a different marriage. Niobe has made dinner and gotten prettied up to seduce her husband, probably because if Lyde spilled her guts about Evander and the baby now, it would help if Vorenus was besotted with her.

Caesar is getting into some deep shit in Greece, and he asks Mark Atony to bring the XIII to Greece to help him. But Antony says he needs to think about it. Pompey offers Mark Antony a deal. If he doesn’t send troops to Caesar, he’ll get a province and all sorts of stuff. He tells Pompey’s man that the answer is going to have to wait a day. So clearly, he’s considering the offer. Atia suggests that Mark Antony marry her and not go to Greece. He could take over Rome with her money and his name, and she would basically be the first lady of Rome. And it’s this that sends Antony over the edge. There is Dynasty-level face slapping, and they break up. Antony is super ashamed of himself for even considering betraying Caesar, and he calls the XIII. They’re going to Greece.

Atia has a slave with a very impressive asset, and she’s going to send him to Servilia as a gift. “A large penis is always welcome,” she reasons, and sending gifts will gain Servilia as an ally. Atia thinks Servilia, as honest and sweet as Atia believes she is, has no idea that Atia was behind the graffiti that caused Caesar to dump Servilia. But that is not the case, and Servilia makes it very clear to Octavia that revenge is coming for Atia, but that Servillia doesn’t blame Octavia for her mother’s actions, and there shouldn’t be any bad feelings between them.

Pullo bids farewell to Eirene, whom he’s clearly developing romantic feelings for, and Vorenus and Niobe share a sad goodbye, and everyone leaves for Greece. The ship Pullo and Vorenus sale on is not faring so well in the tossing seas, but Vorenus is pretty sure they’ll be okay; a good offering was made to Triton to protect them. Pullo says exactly what he thinks of Triton, and the ship capsizes.

My favorite part of the episode: When Titus Pullo’s blasphemy dooms an entire ship.

My least favorite part of the episode: So, you know how Octavian has to pick out someone to “penetrate”? Why did he pick a girl who looked almost exactly like his sister? YOU KNOW WHY HE DID.

Also, Mark Antony’s ridiculously loud breathing after he’s done fucking Atia. WHY DID IT HAVE TO BE SO LOUD?!

Favorite costume: Everyone, truly appreciated this lady’s purple theme going on. Purple ombre wig, even!

Team Atia or Team Servilia: Team Atia. Because she sends thoughtful presents.

Favorite watch-a-long tweet:

Seeing all that fruit made me miss #MerlinClub. #LegionXIII https://t.co/GVwkdOQLcJ

— Bronwyn Green (@Bronwyn_Green) January 5, 2016

What hairdo or costume would Bronwyn steal? 

Guess Jess’s head canon. The drunken hugging scene between Pullo and Vorenus is a hurt/comfort fic waiting to happen.

Now go check out Bronwyn’s and Jess’s posts, and join us Monday at 9 PM EST for season one, episode five, “Pharsalus”. Tweet to #LegionXIII to join us!

 

What I Learned From Pro-Gun Twitter

CW: gun violence, rape, pedophilia, Islamophobia, racism

Yesterday, I posted a single sentence to Twitter:

My child is more important than your gun.

I tweeted this to the tag #StopGunViolence.

Now, you’d assume that the above statement isn’t controversial, right? The life and rights of a human child should always be valued above the existence or ownership of an inanimate object. To suggest otherwise,–unless we’re speaking of extremely extenuating hypothetical circumstances–is monstrous.

The following are responses I received.

Any one of my firearms is infinitely more important than your fee-fees. #StopGunViolence https://t.co/YCFl1CMSvX

— Rev Prez (@revprez) January 5, 2016

@Jenny_Trout move to canada then hippy. Firearms are part of American life — Firewater Chief (@ChiefFireWater7) January 5, 2016

Your child is irrelevant to my gun. https://t.co/8d0BWeiMLW

— The Rev. S. Mauldin (@Reverend_Ducati) January 5, 2016

My safety is more important than your temper tantrum. #StopGunViolence https://t.co/Sm131LD4k5 — Rev Prez (@revprez) January 5, 2016

So when someone breaks into your house, you protect your child with?? A broom? Perhaps scissors? https://t.co/BTQsruEyMo

— jake kesler (@jakekesler) January 5, 2016

#stopgunviolence but NOT more important than American’s Civil RIGHTS, G-d given and unalienable. idjit. https://t.co/qGytuEAnGX — Chayal Boded (@IstUngeheuer) January 5, 2016

@Jenny_Trout Make sure your child stays in a gun free zone at all times. That way the criminals can’t get to them.

— Charlie (@marveldojo) January 5, 2016

Your child has nothing to do with my gun. https://t.co/EG9uoX2JFH — The Rev. S. Mauldin (@Reverend_Ducati) January 5, 2016

@Jenny_Trout My rights and family’s safety are more important than your dislike of my guns.

— LA (@dirtyoldhooker) January 5, 2016

You can choose to have your family be defenseless, I choose for mine not to be. #KeepYourLawsOffMyFamily https://t.co/mmh68cOCnW — Barry Gadbois (@BarryGadbois) January 5, 2016

My family is more important than your whining. #StopGunViolence https://t.co/lGCHo4h4M9

— Rev Prez (@revprez) January 5, 2016

And yet I still own more than a few. Suck it up, cupcake. https://t.co/KaKGxhY6je — The Rev. S. Mauldin (@Reverend_Ducati) January 5, 2016

My child is more important that your paranoid need to control others. https://t.co/LI3nR9f4LT

— Barry Gadbois (@BarryGadbois) January 5, 2016

You WISH that were true. https://t.co/UU1NdZ2vJm — Pontifex Ameno (@JetstreamR3V) January 5, 2016

Your feelings don’t override the rights of others. The only ones affected by Obama’s gun control are law abiding ppl https://t.co/uYJFxGdvA9

— Christopher (@FujiwaraArmbar) January 5, 2016

@Jenny_Trout The #Constitution does not guarantee children. — TheHandgunGuy (@TheHandgunGuy) January 5, 2016

Not to me #StopGunViolence https://t.co/6T8g80I4NX

— Nathan Hale (@NH92276) January 5, 2016

This user went on to assert:

@CKscullycat @Jenny_Trout I think they’re more important than thousands of childrens’ lives. Because they guarantee the freedom of millions — Nathan Hale (@NH92276) January 5, 2016

As this is still going on, almost twenty-four hours later, this is only a small sampling. In almost every case, I responded by repeating, “My child is more important than your gun,” and in many cases, the person arguing with me continued to argue, even though they received the same reply over and over. One user sent increasingly agitated messages, insisting they had saved many lives, insistent upon receiving acknowledgement from me, until they finally broke, sending multiple rapid-fire tweets of variations of the word “no” before blocking me, as though I had somehow harassed them.

One user classified my concern for my children as hateful and dishonest, as though not honoring their firearm over my own offspring was an oppressive act itself:

Myself, my children and my family are more important than your hate and lies. #IamtheNRA https://t.co/Kqh0d6qLWH

— Hashtag Diplomacy (@FreddysMercury) January 5, 2016

Some of them insisted that their gun ownership protected my children. Some insisted that they had already saved my life and the lives of my family without my knowledge. Some demanded I thank them. One of them asked if my children were good at performing oral sex. Several of them mocked my “feelz” or “fee fees”; apparently their feelz of paranoia and fear are not emotions, but my love for my children is irrational and dangerous.

Jenny…I have no “terror and fear.” I choose to arm myself to protect my family. I’m armed….nothing can scare me https://t.co/gKUDoa7vgR

— SD Wheeler (@SD_Wheeler) January 5, 2016

Others, when faced with my unbending investment in my children over their firearms, resorted to the tactics you would expect:  

Come and take it. Ive got plenty of ammo. #StopConstitutionalViolence #StopGunViolence https://t.co/pla7M1djfB

— EscapeVelocity (@EscapeVelo) January 5, 2016

And there we go! Ding ding ding, we got our open threat. https://t.co/yyzau0nfOb — Jenny Trout (@Jenny_Trout) January 5, 2016

It’s not a threat, it’s a promise. #StopConstiutionalViolence#StopGunViolencehttps://t.co/G0BiOcyBWt

— EscapeVelocity (@EscapeVelo) January 5, 2016

When I described these tweets as threats, I was quickly informed by other ammosexuals that it’s not a threat to say you’re going to shoot someone. It’s self-defense. The fact that I’d never implied I would take EscapeVelocity’s gun, nor explicitly suggested that anyone should take EscapeVelocity’s gun, had no bearing. Placing more importance on the lives of my own children then I do on EscapeVelocity’s gun was an act of aggression that EscapeVelocity and other gun owners needed to protect themselves from, with threats of violence. In other words: If you don’t value my gun more than you value your children, I get to shoot you because

As EscapeVelocity went on, their fantasies of situations in which they would be called upon to discharge a firearm at a human target escalated:

@Morcelle @Jenny_Trout Set foot on my property with the intent of confiscating my guns, and youll be dead. #StopGunViolence

— EscapeVelocity (@EscapeVelo) January 5, 2016

@Morcelle @Jenny_Trout There is nothing I would like more than for Leftwingers to restart the Civil War. Bring it. #StopGunViolence

— EscapeVelocity (@EscapeVelo) January 5, 2016

Before arriving at the inevitable conclusion:

@spiderstumbled @FluffehDarkness @Jenny_Trout The Civil War wasnt about slavery. It was about tyranny. Tyranny won. — EscapeVelocity (@EscapeVelo) January 6, 2016

Lest you overlook the racist connotations inherent in suggesting that the United States is a poorer place since Sherman burned Atlanta, here’s what another Twitter user contributed to the same conversation:

 @90dayWond3r@EscapeVelo@Jenny_Trout Until then, enjoy all the Muslim cock your own government is trying to shove in your mouth.

— Warlord Ralts (@Warlord_Ralts) January 5, 2016

Another Twitter user became involved in the conversation shortly after. I blocked them when they tagged me with a graphic political cartoon of a young blonde woman being gang raped by men of various races, religions, and ethnicities.

Remember the sentence that started this all?

My child is more important than your gun.

Yesterday, conservatives mocked President Obama for crying when speaking about the children gunned down at Sandy Hook elementary school. Fox News–a news source that people trust to give them factual information pertaining to serious events–suggested he may have used an onion or eyedrops to fake his tears. The notion that a human being might, after spending time with the families of the victims of the tragedy and listening to countless stories of lives impacted by gun violence, become emotional at the thought of children gunned down in their classrooms seems ludicrous to these conservative gun wavers. Such an emotion must be faked, for who could ever possibly feel it? Who could genuinely feel sadness over the death of a child?

These are the people in the United States who want unfettered access to whatever arsenal they can build. These are the people who would describe themselves as responsible gun owners. They insist they can be trusted to own firearms, while leaping to threats and intimidation the moment they become frustrated or irritated. All from one single statement:

My child is more important than your gun.

Before these interactions, I would have said that the vocal minority of aggressive gun owners were a fringe group. As I studied the responses I got, and the subsequent escalating behaviors of the people trying to force me to engage with them beyond my form response, I realized the truth. We have fostered a national cult of sociopathic anarchy. You live by the gun, or you die by the gun, and only on the terms of whichever Ted-Nugent-loving, Bible-thumping survivalist who happens to be trolling the anti-gun violence hashtags on social media that day. When a white kid with a bad haircut decides that he’s been rejected by too many female classmates, that’s the day you die. There is no longer any right to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” Unless you equate being allowed to open carry an assault rifle into Qdoba to “liberty” and the pursuit of guns as the only thing that will make you happy.

The pro-gun right is as much a terrorist organization as Al-Qaeda or Daesh. They hold us hostage by subtly endorsing the assassinations of elected leaders. They buy politicians outright. They claim that grieving parents of murdered children are paid actors, that all of the mass shootings perpetrated by white people with legally purchased guns are false flag operations meant to sway public opinion, and all of the gun violence perpetrated by people of color is a symptom only more guns can treat. The pro-gun right has one weapon, and that is fear. If they can’t make you fear “terrorists”, they’ll try to make you fear “thugs”. If they can’t make you fear “thugs”, they’ll jump to the hypothetical rape of your pretty white daughter. If they can’t make you afraid at all, they’ll become violently afraid of you. Then they’ll kill you, and say it was in self-defense because you tried to take their guns.  Self-defense, because their guns are their selves. That’s why they’re panicking; if the government legislates their guns away, they’re legislating these peoples’ identities away.

And if you take away the gun, all that’s left is a an angry coward who can’t even shoot a child to make himself feel better.

The Big Damn Buffy Rewatch S03E01: “Anne”

In every generation there is a chosen one. She alone just came back from vacation, so she’s a little rusty. She will also recap every episode of Buffy The Vampire Slayer with an eye to the following themes:

Sex is the real villain of the Buffy The Vampire Slayer universe.
Giles is totally in love with Buffy.
Joyce is a fucking terrible parent.
Willow’s magic is utterly useless (this one won’t be an issue until season 2, when she gets a chance to become a witch)
Xander is a textbook Nice Guy.
The show isn’t as feminist as people claim.
All the monsters look like wieners.
If ambivalence to possible danger were an Olympic sport, Team Sunnydale would take the gold.
Angel is a dick.
Harmony is the strongest female character on the show.
Team sports are portrayed in an extremely negative light.
Some of this shit is racist as fuck.
Science and technology are not to be trusted.
Mental illness is stigmatized.
Only Willow can use a computer.
Buffy’s strength is flexible at the plot’s convenience.
Cheap laughs and desperate grabs at plot plausibility are made through Xenophobia.
Oz is the Anti-Xander
Spike is capable of love despite his lack of soul
Don’t freaking tell me the vampires don’t need to breathe because they’re constantly out of frickin’ breath.
The foreshadowing on this show is freaking amazing.
Smoking is evil.
Despite praise for its positive portrayal of non-straight sexualities, some of this shit is homophobic as fuck.
How do these kids know all these outdated references, anyway?
Technology is used inconsistently as per its convenience in the script.
Sunnydale residents are no longer shocked by supernatural attacks.
Casual rape dismissal/victim blaming a-go-go
Snyder believes Buffy is a demon or other evil entity.
The Scoobies kind of help turn Jonathan into a bad guy.
This show caters to the straight female gaze like whoa.
Sunnydale General is the worst hospital in the world.

Have I missed any that were added in past recaps? Let me know in the comments.  Even though I might forget that you mentioned it.

WARNING: Some people have mentioned they’re watching along with me, and that’s awesome, but I’ve seen the entire series already and I’ll probably mention things that happen in later seasons. So… you know, take that under consideration, if you’re a person who can’t enjoy something if you know future details about it. 

When we last saw Buffy, she was on a bus, headed out of Sunnydale. Which is why, when a vampire rises from his grave, it’s not Buffy who’s waiting with a stake and a pithy comment:

Xander and Oz are there, and between the three of them… they aren’t able to subdue the vampire and he easily gets away.

Xander: “First of all, what was with the acrobatics? How did that happen?”

Oz: “Wasn’t Andy Hoelich, like, on the gymnastics team?”

Xander: “He was. Cheater!”

Xander also has an issue with Willow’s attempts at pithy comments, lamenting that they didn’t give Buffy enough credit for her puns. School starts the next day, and Willow is holding out hope that Buffy will somehow just show up–they don’t know what’s happened to her or if she’s even alive, as evidenced by Willow’s insistence that no one use the past tense when referring to her.

So, where’s Buffy?

She’s in a douche commercial.

Buffy stands on the shore, and, in a shot that weirdly lingers on her boobs, we see hands around her waist. It’s Angel. They embrace in the sunlight, which is our first clue that this is a dream. The second clue is when Buffy wakes up to the wailing of sirens. She’s definitely not in Sunnydale anymore.

Buffy, now Anne, works at a greasy spoon diner where guys hit on her and smack her ass. Two of her customers are a blonde girl and her boyfriend. They have matching tattoos with each others’ names. Buffy recognizes the girl, and I’m not sure if we’re supposed to recognize her as the girl from the episode where Buffy’s dying childhood friend wants to be turned into a vampire or if that’s a big reveal for later, but spoiler alert, that’s who it is. She thinks she recognizes Buffy and asks her where she’s from, but Buffy hightails it out of there super quick, telling a coworker that she doesn’t feel good and she’s taking off for the day. So, at the very least, Buffy recognizes her from that episode.

Back in Sunnydale, Giles and Willow are talking pretty loudly and openly about vampires in a school library full of students. Like, more students than we’ve ever seen in the school library. Tens of students! It’s almost as though the library is attached to the school. Anyway, they’re literally talking out loud, within earshot, about vampires, which basically everyone in town already knows about, but everyone carries on as if nothing is amiss. #8 is still in action, even at the start of a new school year.

Cordelia comes into the library and meets up with Willow. Apparently the resort at which Cordelia spent her summer wasn’t as super fun as she felt it should be. She’s looking for Xander, and she’s afraid he’s forgotten her or met someone else over the summer. Oz shows up, and Willow is delighted that he’s come to visit her. But he hasn’t come to visit her so much as he’s come to redo his senior year, because he didn’t actually graduate. PS. I really like that Oz has to redo his senior year. He’s consistently held up as being as smart as Willow, but where she excels at school, he doesn’t. I love that the show quietly acknowledges that even smart people can fail to thrive in an academic environment, and never makes fun of Oz or suggests he’s not intelligent because of that.

Willow and Oz run into Xander, who has the same first day nerves that Cordelia has. This episode is taking me back, because I went to high school during the nineties. I remember when you might not see your boyfriend or girlfriend over the summer very much. If your families went on vacation? Pff, forget it. You had to figure out that slender window of opportunity to get one or two phone calls in. Maybe a date, if you’re lucky. And if you’re unlucky, that date is to Batman & Robin. So I feel for Xander and Cordy here.

Their reunion, however, is super brief and stilted.

Cut from the school full of lively action to Buffy, in her palace of sadness, eating cold Spaghetti-O’s straight out of the can like I did on election night in 2004. She walks to work, past a preacher handing pamphlets out to the homeless, then past a person who is homeless and sitting in a doorway, muttering that she’s no one.

Giles is on the phone in his office, and he’s super excited. He announces to Willow and Xander that a friend of his saw a girl in Oakland fighting vampires. Giles is off to catch a flight, but Xander reminds him that this isn’t the first time they’ve thought they’ve found Buffy:

Xander: “Look, I don’t mean to poop the party here, it’s just…you get your hopes all up, and then it’s just a big fat raspberry and I feel bad.”

So, clearly Giles has been on a hope roller coaster for a long time, and he’s unwilling to exit the ride when it’s come to a full and complete stop. Willow tries to be encouraging, but it’s clear that she doesn’t have much faith in this Oakland lead, either. When Giles leaves, Willow asks Xander if he thinks Giles will find Buffy, and Xander answers that Giles will find Buffy when she wants to be found.

Speaking of not wanting to be found, Buffy is wandering down a street, not answering to the blonde girl’s repeated calls of “Anne.” When the girl finally calls out, “Buffy!” it gets her attention. Way to be incognito, Buffster. Finally they work out where they remember each other from, and the girl–now calling herself Lily–thanks Buffy for saving her life from that vampire worshiping cult. Lily is squatting in abandoned buildings, living that glamorous 1990′s street urchin life, constantly changing her name and falling into cults and stuff. Lily invites Buffy to a rave, if Buffy can front the cover, because Lily is broke. Buffy is about to give her the money when a man staggers between them and into the street. Buffy asks him if he’s okay, and he repeats what the homeless woman said before: “I’m no one.” Buffy pushes him out of the path of a car and is hit herself.

A crowd of concerned bystanders help Buffy up and start tossing around words like “hospital,” which equals “everybody is going to find out where you are when you can’t produce ‘Anne”s I.D.”. Buffy runs, turns a corner, and smacks into the guy we saw ministering to the homeless before. His pamphlets scatter everywhere and Buffy, being a nice person, stops to help him pick them up.

That’s how those religious types get you. With scattered pamphlets.

The street preacher is character actor Carlos Jacott, who has been seen in basically anything. Just throw a dart. I know him best from Big Love, where he played one of the neighbors that the youngest wife tried to befriend.

Anyway, he asks Buffy what she’s running from, and introduces himself as Ken. He gives her a flyer and tells her to stop by his shelter for food and spiritual guidance. He talks about kids getting old quickly, the life draining out them, despair, etc. which is immediately followed by images of teens living on the street. Bellylove’s “Back To Freedom” plays mournfully over this scene, then we cut to The Bronze. This band and song are so painfully 90′s that I can almost feel Hard Candy nail polish drying on my hands.

Willow and Xander are wallowing to the sad music, Xander worrying that Cordelia is out somewhere laughing at him and how over him she is, and Willow wondering if they could be doing a better job stopping vampires. Cordelia and her friends walk in, dressed like they’re headed to the homecoming dance, and Xander hits on a great idea: use bait.

Seriously, this is where Xander goes when he feels his romantic intentions have been thwarted. Use Cordelia as bait to catch vampires, which they have, as of yet, been wholly unsuccessful doing. Another season, another example of #5. Cordelia is a person while cooperating with him romantically, but she’s a nightcrawler ready for a hook when she isn’t.

At Casa de Summers, Joyce is working on something when there’s a knock at the door. It’s clear that she’s expecting Buffy, but it’s just Giles, come back to tell Joyce that he still hasn’t found Buffy or any vampires in Oakland. Just goths. He reassures Joyce that Buffy is smart enough that wherever she is, she’s not in danger. Joyce doesn’t want to leave the house, which is new for her, considering she was hardly ever home during season two. She’s afraid that Buffy will call and she won’t be there, and says she’s sorry that the last time she saw Buffy, they were fighting.

Giles: “Joyce, you mustn’t blame yourself for her leaving.”

Joyce: “I don’t. I blame you. You’ve been this huge influence on her, guiding her. You had this whole relationship with her behind my back. I feel like you’ve taken her away from me.”

Giles: “I didn’t make Buffy who she is.”

Joyce: “And who, exactly, is she?”

This is where I really, really begin to loathe Joyce. She blames Giles for Buffy leaving? Wasn’t it Joyce who told Buffy “don’t even think about coming back”? Wasn’t it Joyce who never once questioned why her daughter’s school librarian was taking such an interest in her? And what’s with the “relationship with her behind my back” remark? Joyce even mentions in “Killed By Death” that she appreciates Giles looking out for Buffy. So where’s the secret? Joyce is the person who pushed her daughter away. Joyce is the person who refused to listen when her daughter tried to tell her the truth. And this isn’t my wide-on for Giles influencing my opinion here; up until this season, Joyce’s constant neglect and criticism of Buffy is straight up canon. So, fuck off with your blame, Joyce. Be a grownup and accept the fact that you told your daughter she couldn’t come back home (#3).

Back at Buffy’s diner, Lily tells Buffy that Ricky is missing and she needs help. Buffy is not interested in getting involved in any of the “helping people” stuff. She’s out of the biz now, and tells Lily as much. But Buffy is Buffy. She’s not really going to turn her back on someone in danger.

Buffy goes with Lily to a place where she and Ricky occasionally sell their blood. While they’re waiting for a nurse to check if Ricky has been in lately (these are the pre-PHI days of HIPAA), Buffy tells Lily they should split up to look for him and meet back at her apartment later. The nurse returns and tells them that Ricky hasn’t been around, but if she sees him, she’ll tell him Lily is looking for him. Buffy and Lily leave, and the camera lingers on the nurse, who makes a shady face as dire music plays.

Buffy prowls the alleys of the city in search of Ricky. She finds a middle aged man lying dead next to an empty bottle of drain cleaner. He’s got the same tattoo as Ricky had.

Back at Buffy’s apartment, Buffy breaks the bad news to Lily: Ricky is dead. At least, the person who Buffy thinks could possibly be Ricky is dead. She tells Lily that the person she found was old, that he looked about eighty. Uh…

That guy is not eighty. That guy is sixty at most, maybe a rough fifty.

Lily asks if a vampire did it, but Buffy knows that vampires can’t prematurely age people. She thinks there could be something fishy with the blood place. Lily, on the other hand, thinks there’s something fishy with Buffy; after all, Buffy knows about monsters, and suddenly monsterish things are happening. Buffy points out that Lily is the one who came to her, and Lily storms out.

Honestly, Lily might be onto something. Buffy didn’t always live in Sunnydale, and there were vampires at Buffy’s old high school, too. I know this, I’ve seen the movie. Donald Sutherland was barely coherent in it. But the point is, Buffy does seem to have a habit of being where monsters are. It’s not that strange for Lily to make that connection.

Wait, where is Buffy now? I don’t remember anyone ever saying where she is, definitively. We know she’s not in Oakland. Is she supposed to be in L.A.? That doesn’t make sense, because she used to go to school there. She was popular and knew lots of people. Surely she could be crashing with someone. Or maybe avoiding the city entirely, because what if she randomly ran into someone? L.A. is a big place, but I once ran into someone I went to Elementary school with in a medieval monastery in France, so. Shit happens.

Anyway, Lily is crying and upset, and Preacher Ken approaches her. He tells her that hope is real, and can help her get through this tough time. When she mentions Ricky, the preacher dude knows her name. He tells her that Ricky is at his ministry, and she should come with him.

I’ll note here that though I keep referring to him as a preacher, he never specifically says anything about God. You still know, though, that though he’s saying stuff about hope filling a hole in you that he’s talking about Jesus, and the pamphlets and approaching homeless youth is so, so preachery. I think it’s pretty cool the way Joss Whedon got that into the story. He couldn’t offend his audience by being all, “See this, kids? This is why you never trust religious people,” when he was clearly writing this thinking, “See this, kids? This is why you never trust religious people.” This is actually the first time I’ve noticed that street preacher wasn’t actually preaching about anything specific.

At the clinic, Buffy, goes through Ricky’s medical records. It’s always really easy for the Scoobies to do this, and it’s never occurred to me before but…medical records are actually pretty tricky to navigate if you don’t know what you’re looking for. There’s a lot of codes and abbreviations involved.

Anyway, the nurse from before comes in (because she’s apparently there after hours, lurking in the dark) and they have one of my favorite Buffy exchanges:

Nurse: “What are you doing?”

Buffy: “Breaking into your office and going through your private files.”

The nurse says she’s calling the police, and Buffy just reaches up and nonchalantly rips the entire phone off the wall. When the nurse tells Buffy that she’s going to get into trouble, Buffy responds that she’s basically always in trouble, because trouble kind of follows her around. This is not not true, and in admitting this to herself, Buffy is realizing that even if she abandons Sunnydale and her life there, she’s always going to be the Slayer. She demands to know what’s going on with the kids that come to the clinic, and the nurse tells her that she gives the names of the healthiest kids to someone.

And that someone turns out to be Preacher Ken. He’s got Lily all dressed up in rustic robes for “the cleansing”. He promises she’ll see Ricky right after, and Lily, believing she’s going to get baptized or something, goes along with it.

In Sunnydale, the Scoobies are on a vampire hunting mission. Cordelia loudly protests her role as bait, and makes it clear to Xander that she’s not doing this for him, but for Buffy.

Cordelia: “What’s the plan?”

Xander: “The vampire attacks you”

Cordelia: “Then what?”

Xander: “The vampire kills you. We watch, we rejoice.”

On the other side of the hedge, Willow is having to listen to all of this crap.

I’m with you, Will. WTF is Xander’s problem? Cordelia is unable to communicate her feelings toward Xander, so she lashes out by warning him not to misconstrue her presence as her helping him when she’s really helping Buffy. Xander is unable to communicate his feelings toward Cordelia, so he lashes out by wishing she would die. Why does she want to date this guy?

Willow is so distracted by wanting to stake herself, she doesn’t see the vampire creeping up behind her.

At the ministry, Ken shows Lily to a blackened pool, and talks about how she needs to wash away her past and her sin and stuff (sin being the first time anything remotely religious has been mentioned in conjunction to this whole thing). Buffy is outside the ministry, trying to talk her way past some guys at the door.

Buffy: “You know, I just, I looked up and I looked in the mirror and I thought, ‘Hey, what’s with all the sin?’ I need to change. I’m dirty. I’m-I’m bad with the sex and the envy and that, that loud music us kids listen to nowadays… Oh, I just suck at undercover. Where’s Ken?”

Then she bashes their door in and storms the place.

So, wait a second. Ken? Wasn’t his name Ken on Big Love, too? But now that I think about it, he looks like he could be a Ken. Or a Dan. Or a Kevin. Really, any name would work on this guy. He has a very generic face.

Lily starts to put her hand in the oily pool, because even though she knows about monsters and shit, she doesn’t see the harm in getting into a weird inky pool in a creepy ministry backroom. Buffy kicks in the door and demands to know how Ken makes the kids so old. Just then, something grabs Lily’s hand and jerks her into the pool. Buffy and Ken tussle, and they both fall through the pool, landing on the hard cement floor of a warehouse. Ken starts shouting about his face, but he’s not injured. He’s just pissed he’ll have to glue it back on:

 

I got super excited at this point, because I was like, “Wait, is that the same kind of demon as Kathy the roommate from ‘Living conditions’?” But the only thing they really have in common is the face ripping off thing. They both have weird, raw-looking faces underneath, but Kathy’s looks like it’s a lot more sore. I should have known better than to think there was a connection; demon races rarely appear more than once on this show, unless the demon is a recurring character, like Anya or Clem.

Ken shouts for the guards to pursue Buffy and Lily, who stumble into what looks like the set of a late 80′s, early 90′s music video, because there are chains and foundries and sparks flying around and a lone spotlight scanning the scene. Ken warns Buffy and Lily that they’ll never leave. But that’s not strictly true, is it, Ken? Because we already saw that Ricky got out, albeit with a craving for drain cleaner.

Back in Sunnydale, Cordelia and Xander are still arguing over who doesn’t love who, when Willow is attacked by the vampire meant for Cordelia. Both Xander and Oz run in to help, but it’s Xander who’s ultimately grabbed by the vamp. Cordelia rushes to Xander’s defense, knocking over both him and the vampire and driving the vampire onto Xander’s stake. Cordelia and Xander start making out with the bits of dead vampire still between them.

Buffy wakes up in a cage, where Lily immediately launches into a speech about how she always knew she was going to end up in hell. Let a girl get some coffee first, Jesus, Lily. Ken appears and tells Lily that it took Ricky years to forget her. Basically, the realm they’re in isn’t synched up with normal time, and while a day might go by in the in the mortal world, it’s been a hundred years in demonland. Ken tells the girls that basically, nobody is even going to wonder where they are before they’ve already served their entire lives in demon prison.

Buffy and Lily are herded into a group of humans, and a demon guard tells them they’re no one. Then he asks one of them who they are, and when they respond with a name, he hits them. After that, everyone answers that they’re “no one.” So, that explains all the old people chanting that on the street before. The demon guard asks Buffy who she is, and she says:

Buffy: “I’m Buffy. The vampire slayer. And you are?”

Then an ass-kicking commences.

Buffy tells the group of humans to follow her, and instructs Lily to take the prisoners up to the portal as quick as she can. An alarm goes off, and Buffy leads guards on a chase through the foundry.

You know what I really wish we could have learned in this episode? What product, exactly, are the demons making? What if it’s something totally ubiquitous in demon world? Nothing important, nothing magical or rare, just something like iPods or DVD players or something, and cruelly enslaving human children is just an accepted part of the process of delivering these goods to consumers? Wouldn’t that be unthinkably horrible?

Oh, Wait. Shit.

As Buffy busts her way through guard after guard, a frustrated Ken laments that humans don’t fight back, and that’s why everything was going so well. I assume Ken is up for a big promotion or something, because he walks in with Lily. He has a knife to her throat, so Buffy obviously has to stop what she’s doing rather than risk human casualties. While Ken monologues about how if anyone of them fights back, they’ll all die, Lily decides she’s had e-fucking-nough and shoves Ken off the platform they’re standing on. Buffy and the others race to a portcullis type thing. Buffy struggles to hold it while the others run under, but before she can get through, cracked-headed Ken runs at her. He only succeeds in pushing her through the gate. He doesn’t quite make it through all the way himself:

 

That is probably the only thing that has ever actually made me recoil in horror in this show. Just the thought of it. It’s so gross. You know that went right through the bone.

Buffy makes a joke about Ghandi that isn’t her best and bashes Ken’s skull in with a club. Lily pulls Buffy out of the hole and wonders aloud what they should do about it, when it suddenly bricks over like a Tetris “game over” screen. So it’s a good thing everyone got out in time.

At Buffy’s apartment, Buffy tells Lily that the rent is paid for three weeks, and Buffy got Lily a job at the diner. Lily says she’s not great at taking care of herself, and asks Buffy if she can be Anne now. Sure. Why not. It’ll tide you over until you join your next cult, Lily.

At the Summers residence, Joyce is fixing the dishwasher when there’s a knock on the door. When she opens it, she finds Buffy standing there, and they hug wordlessly.

Someone on IMDB.com described this episode as being filmed “like a big-budget mini-movie”, and honestly, it is. The fight sequence in the foundry alone must have cost at least a quarter of the production budget for the season. It’s just fantastic. And while it’s not one of my favorites (I can’t stand for one of the core cast to be “away” for an episode in most television shows, but this one, especially. Don’t even approach me about season seven and Willow being in freaking England for two whole episodes), I can appreciate the way it’s structured.

All in all, this is a pretty solid episode, and reinforces for the returning viewer that Buffy isn’t the Slayer just because of a mystical calling, but because she’s genuinely driven to help people, no matter how much she wants to deny that.