#hazel young

“You are a better mother than yours ever was,” Praem sang behind me.

I glanced back in surprise to see her staring right into Evelyn’s eyes, gently holding her mistress by the forearms.

Wildbow starts more from the Mundane and gradually cranks up the Tentacle Knob as chapters settle and the plot thickens.

Hungry has the Tentacle Knob turned up pretty darn high right off the bat but dials it back through the characters' development.

Wildbow deals very heavily in how ostensibly ordinary and even tedious personalities and circumstances have a deeply eldritch undercurrent when penetrated as threats.

Hungry deals very heavily in how ostensibly bizarre and even grotesque specific personalities and circumstances have a deeply sincere undercurrent when received as people.

Pact starts with a young man enduring the perpetual drama of his family, the constant acrimony that he wants to get away from at any cost. Katalepsis starts with a young woman who sees monsters every waking moment and a god for the lion's share of non-waking moments. Blake's situation isn't universal but pretty common in dramatic fiction. Heather's situation is more commonly framed from a purely antagonistic or even facetious narrative-point.

I'm speaking broadly, of course. Both are fantastic angles in their own right and all-around are why I love reading Weird literature.

How should the two approaches be reconciled?

I tried to post this on the website, but it didn't like it for some reason.

“Oxford New” implies that something happened to Oxford Old. The fact the “New” is suffixed is probably meaningful. somehow. 

The fact that Octavia knows the binomial name for the polyps is definitely interesting, but I'm not sure what it means yet. I also just learned the word “scrud”

The fact that “the King’s English” has “King” as a proper noun implies they might not have a real name or at least not one the public is aware of. Until otherwise stated, I am forced to assume they’re referring to the character from The Owl House.

Nightmares are some kind of big boss-monster-thing™ Probably like the Witch’s from Madoka Magica, or the Endbringers from Worm. They seem to have some sort of insanity AOE and even an early warning system in the form of bad vibes. Apparently “One cannot fight Nightmares with bullets and missiles.” I think they just need to try harder tbh, to quote the GOC “Despite what [they] may claim, the vast majority of supernatural beings are susceptible to gunfire.” Can’t wait to inevitably meet one.

We’ve got a “Dream Control” and an “I&O ward”. Apparently strange dreams are a big issue, although it doesn’t seem like Octavia thinks so. Other orgs include: “Section Special” whose job apparently overlaps with whatever Dream Control does, black bag people who touch other’s hair I guess.

We’ve also got references to a “Waking world” and a “Dreamlands”. The latter of which appears to be a Lovecraft reference. The Dreamlands are probably home to the “Dreamers”, a group of beings to which our terrorist (Whom I shall be calling Smiles) appears to be a member. Smiles is apparently a Dreamer, whatever that means. She(?)’s got super strength and broken shaders. Currently I’d describe her vibe as “Eviler Lozzie”.

Apparently gods exist. And we’ve got a nod towards everybody's favorite sentient black hole: Azathoth! A guy who just cannot catch a break when it comes to nicknames.

RAF Brize Norton is a real place, located about 120km outside of London. but Tiger attack craft are a class of boats, not planes as is heavily implied. Harriers are also real, and only really became a thing due to the Korean War, but that might not have been the cause here. On the topic of the military: the mention of “two dozen foreign intelligence agencies” means that countries other than the UK still exist, and quite a few of them too.

Magdalen College is also a real place, located in Oxford and founded in 1458. Again there’s no telling how much of that is still true in Eviler UK™.

The BBC exists, so Octavia might be able to watch Doctor Who. I wonder who the Doctor is? Or, maybe Sci-Fi has been outlawed. If so, that’s definitely a good reason to do a terrorism.

For the Magical Girls, we’ve got “The Trio of Albion” with

Dawn: Gun. probably yellow, title unknown, Gun.

Azure: Blue, title unknown, runs around with a big ass hammer, the nice one.

Scarlet Edge: Presumably red, wields a fire sword with a built in flashbang.

They’re also apparently government officials, or at the very least take orders and receive tech from the government.

In other news, we’ve got the appearance of my favorite trope: beating supernatural entities with entirely mundane methods.