Meme time!

[rthstewart]

I am going to see Avengers again!  knitress and econopodder are Avengers virgins so I'm excited and we WILL stay to the Very Last Scene.  You know the one, which I've so wanted to write but I figure there's more Shwarma fic at this point than Steve/Tony first time fic.  Also I've been to Budapest!  

There's been some interesting meta going about readers, writers, reviewers, entitlement, and concrit in lady_songsmith 's journal on Fandom Economy.

Anyway, then edenfalling presented this meme so tag, you're it!


1. Pick a pairing or a character
2. Ask me my particular headcanon regarding something about them
3. Post to your journal to share your own headcanon!

(And if you want to include OCs from fic and such, bring it on!)

Comments

[ilysia-039.livejournal.com]

Just to say: AVENGERS. Ahhh, yissssss, so lovely. My thoughts on that movie are, eloquently: ALL THE FEELS.

Have fun!

[intrikate88.livejournal.com]

JEALOUS. I want to go see Avengers again. And damn I want some good Budapest fic because I miss Budapest, it's a wonderful city and no fic I've read yet seems to be written by anyone who has even seen it.

Meme! If you know any of her backstory, what is your headcanon on Natasha Romanov and her view of love, and if you don't, what's your headcanon on how Leia's ideas of Darth Vader evolved after she found out he was her father?

(I've just been feeling more and more cheated lately that Luke and Vader got some resolution in their relationship but Leia who had even MORE history there got absolutely nothing.)

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

The thing about Natasha is that she is Russian. So she knows all about the deep longing of the romantic Russian soul. She thinks it's utter crap. Yuri Zhivago was an idiot. There's nothing the least bit romantic about a dying swan and your lover throwing himself into a lake. Anna Arkadyevna throws herself in front of a train because Vronsky is sleeping around. The Wall coming down, perestroika, and glastnost were all very romantic too. What the romantic idealists didn't understand was that the cut off the head but the body remained and another head just grew in its place. All those romantic Russian souls end up dead and Natasha is a survivor.

As for Leia, she wracks her brain for months after Endor. She hopes that maybe when Vader interrogated and tortured her on the Death Star, when he stood and watched Tarkin give the order that destroyed Alderaan, that maybe, there was some hint of goodness, restraint or concern. There's nothing that can redeem him or his actions. Luke (says) he had those moments with the man their father was. Leia resents that, too. It's just one more way in which Luke was given what she was not -- training, a name, heritage. Yes, she had privilege and love, but in the end, Kenobi and that Jedi Master didn't train her. She didn't have a secret Jedi guard. Kenobi didn't give her their father's lightsaber.

Eventually Leia does her research. It is difficult because Palpatine destroyed so much. Anakin Skywalker was famous and people she knows now, people like Mon Mothma, knew of him then. Leia is not certain she likes the man she learns of. He sounds brilliant, impulsive and arrogant.

Han will tell her sometimes, when they are alone, when she is angry about the latest political stupidity or ignorant diplomat, that it's the Vader in her. That her husband can say this of the creature who tortured him speaks to Han's goodness. She might, with enough time, maybe acknowledge, as Luke does, that he died a redeemed man. The wrongs to herself she might forgive; but Leia can never forgive for what Vader did to Han or for standing by as Alderaan died.

[lady_songsmith]

Hmm, meme! Tell me about Mara Jade and Karrde -- just their business relationship/history, not ship.

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

I NEVER ship Jade and Karrde. I think Karrde maybe, might have had a little crush on her, but not much. There's real loyalty there. He's her mentor and sponsor and he trusts her completely, which is something new for Mara. She rewards him with her loyalty. Once he learns of her Jedi abilities, he will certainly exploit them -- that's Karrde. But Mara stays because she really values Karrde. He respects her and she knows that's a rare thing. Apart from her husband and son, Karrde is the most important -- positive-- relationship in her life.

[lotl101.livejournal.com]

I just saw it for the first time yesterday and I'm already trying to find people to watch it with again.

And for the meme, what does Steve think of Tony? Not as a hero or anything like that, but as the son of someone he worked with.

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

Someone eventually points out to Steve that one reason why Tony was such a jerk was because he grew up with his dad obsessed about Captain America. Tony, when he was a little boy, tried using living room pillows and blue-rimmed plates as shields so that maybe his dad would like it and love him more. His dad got mad when he dropped the plate.

That helps Steve understand. Steve also understands better why Tony is so affected when Phil dies. Tony wasn't a solider committed to their cause. He is now. Tony changed over a day. He was willing to sacrifice himself to save them all and Steve respects that. Tony also recognized him as the leader of the Avengers. Steve still isn't sure how that happened, but he's grateful for it. He just won't tell Tony in case it's an accident.

[snacky]

I'm interested in your headcanon for Peridan!

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

Well, there's probably real Peridan from the books and then there's the Peridan I invented on the fly for H&M. In H&M and so I guess head canon, Peridan is a very disreputable actor by training. He grew up in traveling shows, I think, knowing magic tricks and performing roles and sneaking around during scenes under benches to pick pockets. He has enormous social intelligence and he's a chameleon, he can blend into any environment, play a role, and knows a lot about the polite cultures of Archenland, Calormen and the islands of the Eastern Sea. He speaks 6 different languages. He's loyal to Narnia for the moment because it pays well and it's a good gig. He is an alcoholic and will always be a bit of a thief. You always count the silver after Peridan visits.

[harmony-lover.livejournal.com]

Avengers was amazing. I want to see it again so much! Fantastic. As for headcanon, talk to me about Rilian. I know almost nothing re: your headcanon for him.

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

Rilian is a poster child for the need for medication and therapy. He doesn't get it and Rilian has a miserable life. He marries for the sake of his kingdom and is virtually impotent in his marriage. He dies young, still feeling the effects of the Lady of the Green Kirtle.

[vialethe]

What's your headcanon on how Peter and Susan reacted to Edmund's birth? And do you think Edmund was a fussy, whiny child from the start, or did he only begin to become a little jerk once Lucy came along and took the baby status away from him?

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

Oh we've actually talked about this one before insofar as Edmund's relationship with his father is concerned -- in one of my stories, Edmund is off to America where John is and John has, to date, been an absolute ass in the story.

As for Peter and Susan, Edmund's arrival is a huge disappointment. The two of them were terrific babies -- they slept regularly, ate regularly, were beautiful, happy, shining babies and toddlers and met every milestone. Every night, they were presented to their father for a peaceful hour of play. Peter was the ELDEST BOY and Susan was THE BEAUTIFUL GIRL and it was all exactly as a father would wish it. Peter and Susan are SO EXCITED to have a baby to take care of. Susan would like a little sister so she can braid her hair and Peter really wants a brother so they can play with toy soldiers but Susan is still happy when Edmund is born. They are going to HELP Mum, they are going to take care of the baby and it's all going to be lovely.

Except Edmund is a fussy, difficult, colicky baby. He spits up a lot, he is a night owl, every piece of clothing itches and he just won't sleep unless Mum holds him. (Today we would say he has mild lactose intolerance and sensory intolerance). He won't let Peter hold him and or let Susan change his nappy. They are crushed. Father looses his wife and his ideal home is in chaos. Mum doesn't get more than 2 hours of sleep in a row for months.

And then Lucy comes along and she is sunny, happy, Peter and Susan get to be the big brother and sister they wanted to be while Mum still has to deal with the very slowly improving Edmund. This family dynamic will simmer for years, until Narnia.

[hungrytiger11.livejournal.com]

I would go for just about anything about any of your OCs...Mary and travel.

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

By the time she was 10, Mary had lived on three continents. Her mother died in J'burg (in childbirth), she had her appendix out in Hong Kong in a botched procedure that nearly killed her (she does not have a mole/wood knot on her back but does have a terrific abdominal scar), and Mary got in heaps of trouble at the natural history museum in Berlin -- they were constructing a brachiosaurus and she wanted to see the work in progress (and nearly brought down the humerus on top of her.) She knew that going into the Kem Kem basin alone to look for dinosaur bones was foolish so she did try to be sensible about it, but her Arabic was terrible. When the Arab man (she found out later he was from a tribe in Egypt) began discussing her plans, it was embarrassing. Mary had to concede that she really didn't know quite how far it was to the Kem Kem basin from Marrakech, that she didn't know know just how much water she would need for a day and she did not have a map. He never told her no, she couldn't do it, only that it would be foolish to do it like some silly English girl on a holiday romp. It took them two months of proper planning but then they did get to Kem Kem and she found some wonderful theropod teeth and claws. One day, Asim came back from a bazaar with some old Army packs. It took almost a year but they slowly acquired the materiel so that they were never without basic necessities should the opportunity for adventure suddenly present itself. Mary would never let an opportunity go by unseized.

[(Anonymous)]

'E'

The Pevensies first kisses, either in Narnia or England. Thanks!

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

Oh gosh... I'm going to have to think about that one. And you didn't specify human, or whether or not it was romantic/sexual. Can I just say, "Mum" and leave it at that?

Probably not.

And it's LOVELY to see you!

[adaese.livejournal.com]

Sallowpad the raven.

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

Ravens have been known to live in the Tower for as long as 40 years. Ergo, Sallowpad is a very long-lived Raven.

There's a colony of crows and ravens, away south, in Calormen, east of Ilkeen. One of the temples to Tash feeds the birds as part of a sacred duty. A colony of Crows and Ravens, refugees from Jadis' persecution, have settled there, sharing the food with non-speaking birds, listening for news at the ports, and biding their time.

The Crows and Ravens hide in plain sight. They never abandon Narnia. Two Ravens were at the first Council called the day Aslan sang Narnia into being. Another of their kind, the Jackdaw, told the first joke. The Black Birds remember that day, remember their duty to advise Narnia, remember that Jadis was there that very first day, remember the day she returned, and have vowed to one day see her gone.

So the Black Birds of the North wait and watch, Sallowpad with them.

By the time the Four arrive, Sallowpad has flown the width and breadth of the Known Lands. He has flown as far east as the Lone Islands and all the way north, to Ettinsmoor. He knows the Western Wilds and beyond. He knows ever tree and Tree of Narnia. When he hears the rumors that a Daughter of Eve arrived in Narnia and then a Son of Adam, he knows. He begins to whisper the words that stir every Narnian heart, "Aslan is on the move."

And when Aslan does arrive, Sallowpad has no compunction. He flies up to the Lion, bows low, and asks to take his place in the Lion's council.

[joyeuce01.livejournal.com]

Hello rthstewart

Can I ask about Meave Stanleh?


And Mr Pensieve?

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

Hello! Maeve is a secret romantic. Think of every obnoxious stereotype about the hard nosed career woman who always put job and work first, ahead of everything, and then turns to mush when a man falls for her. It's all true for Maeve. She reads the Calormene equivalent of romance novels and bodice rippers. Pierce tells her she's beautiful (more beautiful even than Dara Sterns on a ten point scale) and she melts into a puddle of goo. Where Pierce is concerned, all her brains go leaking right out of her head. She secretly writes bad poetry to Pierce and then tears it up and never gives it to him because her inner critic is so severe.

As for John Pevensie, before the war he was an editor for scientific, mathematical, and philosophical academic journals. He'll go back to that job after the war. "I have measured my life in coffee spoons." Eliot wrote that phrase with John Pevensie in mind. John critiques and edits the works of great thinkers. He fancies he has a great mind himself, brilliant, but he is not original. In these journals, he reads the great works of these famous men (and a few women) and he yearns for that, both for himself, and since he cannot, for Peter, his eldest, shining son. He sees Peter striding through this intellectual and academic milieu like a giant, and then proceeding on to an important, influential, fascinating job in the civil service or in some little, fancy room in Whitehall with a name plate on the door and lots of initials.

[min023.livejournal.com]

Interesting tidbits here. So, what about Harold and Alberta, especially as relates to the unDragoned Eustace and the Poles? Or still yet, their thoughts on Eustace the explorer and Mary in the Last Battle AU-verse?

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

Eustace always sends postcards or photographs. Alberta's favorite is the one where Eustace, ecstatic beyond belief, is standing at a dig site in New Mexico next to a carefully plotted out excavation of Coelophysis bauri and what her son writes is evidence in the stomach contents of a young C. bauri. C. bauri may be cannibal.

Sometimes there are pictures of the others who are with Eustace, Doctor Russell, always obscured by an enormous hat and sunglasses, and sometimes her nephew. Peter never seems to be doing anything, though even Alberta has to admit he looks as happy as Eustace and usually even more filthy. That other man, Mr. bin Kalil, is never in the pictures, so he must be the one who takes them.

Their parlour wall slowly fills with pictures of her son, in the deserts of the Americas, in Morocco in the Kem Kem basin, in Berlin staring at the foot of an enormous B. brancai. Harold puts a map up on the wall and carefully puts pins in every location where their son has gone. They frame his first published article and each one thereafter, and the collection, over the years, slowly expands from the parlour to every room of the house.

(I think I just made myself cry).

[andi-horton.livejournal.com]

This is possibly something that has an actual canon, but I don't know what it is so I'd be intrigued to hear yours if you have one.

Jacen and Jaina, their earliest impressions of formal education.

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

Jacen and Jaina's early education I do know something about as that was first dealt with in the abysmal Jedi Academy trilogy, back in the days when I read Star Wars EU. I think Jacen remembers a continuing frustration -- see, want, get, with what he wants always being out of reach. He is always trying to reach out with the Force to get what he wants, always testing the Force, always experimenting with what he can and cannot do and it drives everyone crazy. He also learns to read at a very, very early age. Jaina laughs at him because really if he wants to read the stories on Mommy's data reader when he should be napping, he should just walk over, pull a chair over to the shelf, climb it, and get the data reader rather than trying to bring it to him.

Jaina is her father's daughter. She likes blocks and building things and she's got all these fancy and expensive electronic toys, but Han recognizes something else and he gives her sets of stacking cups and a work bench with tools where she learns you can't put round things into square holes no matter how hard you pound unless the round thing is a lot smaller than the square hole. Chewie sees it too and comes back a week later with a brightly colored board with long (firmly affixed) strings that make patterns when they are put in the right holes. Leia worries, at first about choking hazards, but Han says he'll watch Jaina as she carefully puts the strings in the holes. The playboard looks an awful lot like a circuit panel on the Falcon.

[(Anonymous)]

How did Briony and Lambert meet? And the backstory on Mr. Noll?

doctor dolly

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

Welcome back from vacation?!!

Mr. Noll, well, that will have to wait. That may be told via flashback in AW. Briony and Lambert meet during the Great Bonding. Master Roblang played matchmaker on a blind date. Briony had been part of his Company since before Beruna -- she's from an old line of Narnia Wolves loyal to Aslan. They had infiltrated the Witch's secret police and several of her Pack were freed when Aslan breathed on the statues. Lambert's pack had been living at the northern border and the Owlwood, wedged between the Ettins and the Witch and it was a very hard life and more than a few of his kin ended up being eaten by Giants. When the weather breaks, they are, fortunately, on the south side of the River Shribble -- otherwise they would have been stranded in the North for weeks until the waters went down.

Rumors of the gathering of Aslan's army at Beruna reach them and Lambert's pack race down from the North and pick off members of the Witch's army as they try to flee after her death.

Lambert is serving in a different company of the army, continuing to patrol the northern borders that they know so well, while Briony is south, and Roblang, being both practical and a bit of a softie where Briony is concerned, calls them both back to assist in the Great Bonding. Lambert escorts the Queen Susan on the hunt, Briony is part of the pack that runs the deer down and makes the kill, and they both travel with the Queen to the riddling with the Salamander.

Roblang is disappointed only in that it took so long to get their pups into his army. Duties of the Guard meant that Briony and Lambert put off having pups season after season and in two of her heats, the mating didn't take. Their descendants serve Consort Aidan's Narnian line for generations.

[runesnspoons.livejournal.com]

A pick-Ruth's-brain free-for-all? I'm in :) The General. Or Sir Leszi.

(And I did get an LJ after your recommendation. Sorry that runesnspoons and greaves sound nothing alike.)

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

This does seem to have become a free for all and now at 51 comments, it's getting embarrassing. Really, it's scary how much of this I make up completely on the fly. Not a clue! But, as it happens, I do have some head canon about the General.

The General (who has no name and until her appearance in Chapter 3 of H&M had no species), was the third leg of the stool that held together the Narnian resistance for decades. The other two were Leszi, the obnoxious Satyr, and Master Roblang, the Red Dwarf. Together the three of them represented the Beasts and Beings of Narnia opposed to the Witch. Roblang handled personnel, assignments, rosters, rotations and the managing of prickly personalities. Leszi conducted the military training. The General oversaw overall strategy.

All nearly came to ruin two years before Aslan’s return when the General was ambushed, on the ground, in heavy tree cover, in an intelligence operation gone awry. Jadis turned the General to stone. Leszi and Roblang really were crippled without her and it was a very dark time for them.

At enormous risk, Leszi and Roblang were able to bring their friend through the snowy wood to a safe hiding place. They visit her over the months, telling her statue what is happening, how much they miss her advice, and how they are carrying on her work, however imperfectly. When Aslan returns, Leszi begins training the army in earnest, with Roblang handling the logistics and personnel of the Beruna camp. They plead with Aslan to restore their friend and he does.

The General’s distaste for intelligence work and her antipathy to Rats and Crows dates to her own ambush. She prefers the straight up fight and the view she gets from overhead. She doesn’t like what she can’t see from the great height.

As a sidenote, when I first started working on the General (I think she first is reference in TQSiT), I was very worried about treading on Elecktrum and her portrayal of Oreius, which is so very, very popular in the fandom. I even blogged about it over here -- I didn't want to use Orieus, I didn't even want a Centaur, so what then? I figured the fandom was big enough for another General but it felt like a big deal to strike out as I did.

Eustace and Jill

[(Anonymous)]

Eustace and Jill please, assuming the no Last Battle AU.

Thanks.

P.S. Hope the bee balm is now mildew free.

ClaireI

Re: Eustace and Jill

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

I'm going to post pictures of the blooming bee balm shortly! I'll respond to this prompt tomorrow. But in answer to your question about Jalur and Rishta from the last chapter of H&M, I wrote a comment fic for you! It's here, http://rthstewart.livejournal.com/74121.html?thread=1326217#t1326217

[(Anonymous)]

"OldFashionedGirl95"

Ooh! I'm with runesnspoons! Can I play?

Hmm, lessee . . .

On which side do you think the Pevensies and Eustace are related?

Or, do you have any thoughts on Swanwhite?

Or . . . goodness, I have too many questions. That's plenty.

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

Hello! And welcome! Way back in Part 1 of TSG, I did something screwy and had Mr. Pevensie related to Harold. oops. It has since been changed at least once and now, my head canon is that John Pevensie is brother to Alberta Scrubb. John has very much become a villain of the piece (though his improvement is coming, it's still a long way away). I do see both John and Alberta having a very rigid sort of temperament, though Alberta is more swayed by fads than John who is very hierarchical and traditional. Up above in comments I explained some head canon regarding how the birth of Edmund affected the family dynamic and it's a very unhappy time for John. The more I think on it, the more John and Alberta as siblings make sense. In TSG they are both neglectful parents and so, within the context of the story I'm writing for TSG the two of them are not unalike.

It is sad though because again in the comments above, in the TSG AU where everybody lives and nobody dies (and there's a ton of that around here by a bunch of people -- follow the tag), Eustace becomes a paleontologist under Mary's guidance and Harold and Alberta are SO proud of him. It made me cry to think of them carefully framing all his articles and putting up pictures of his digs and a map with push pins of all the places Eustace has gone.

As for Swanwhite, my head canon is very much that of Ilysia http://www.fanfiction.net/u/1584520/ilysia who has done some wonderful things with this powerful character. In her character study story, Singing Paeans to the Stars, Swanwhite appears several times and makes an amazing impression each time. Under Protection is another great one of hers. Snacky, on the other hand, envisions Swanwhite as an idiot who is narrowly saved from being sacrificed to a Calormene volcano. I like both very much.

[linneasr.livejournal.com]

Ummm, sorry to be late. Asim? Who is Asim, where does he come from?