Thoughtful Fangirling

Sheepfarmer's Daughter by Elizabeth Moon

Paksenarrion — Paks for short — is somebody special. She knows it, even if nobody else does yet. No way will she follow her father's orders to marry the pig farmer down the road. She's off to join the army, even if it means she can never see her family again. And so her adventure begins... the adventure that transforms her into a hero remembered in songs, chosen by the gods to restore a lost ruler to his throne. Here is her tale as she lived it. Paks is trained as a mercenary, blooded, and introduced to the life of a soldier . . . and to the followers of Gird, the soldier's god.

fantasy

Propaganda:

This book was published in 1988 so the protagonist never uses the word asexual or an equivalent, but she's clearly written as asexual and rejects a romantic advance from a close friend (which doesn't harm their platonic relationship.) The core of the book is military life and the bonds between comrades.

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum

Swept away from her home in Kansas by a tornado, Dorothy and her dog Toto find themselves stranded in the fantastical Land of Oz. As instructed by the Good Witch of the North and the Munchkins, Dorothy sets off on the yellow brick road to try and find her way to the Emerald City and the Wizard of Oz, who can help her get home. With her companions the Scarecrow, the Tin Woodman and the Cowardly Lion, Dorothy experiences an adventure full of friendship, magic and danger. A much-loved children's classic, The Wizard of Oz continues to delight readers young and old with its enchanting tale of witches, flying monkeys and silver shoes.

The Eridian visitors clearly do not know what to make of that. “We think we misunderstood Savior Grace’s word,” they say, apparently hoping this is a vocabulary mix-up. “Explain (question, polite)?”

“Didn’t misunderstand,” says Rocky, sounding very sheepish. “That is sacrifice wheel.”

“So. While we were on our way to Erid, we might have gotten… anxious about each other’s well-being,” Grace says, which everyone is already very aware is a wild understatement. “And, well, you heard what happened at Tau Ceti, and after. There were a lot of unexpected dangers for the whole trip that required a lot of, at least, attempted self-sacrifice to solve. We ended up almost dying for each other several times. And we had an argument about what we’d do if another crisis like that came up. And we couldn't agree.”

“Grace argued that Grace already was unlikely to survive long-term on Erid, so he should be the one to do any potential deadly but necessary maneuvers to make sure I was able to bring taumoeba back,” Rocky says.

“Which made sense.”

“Did not make sense! Grace already sacrificed so much for me and for Erid, wouldn’t be fair to make you do it again—“ Rocky cuts himself off with a huff. They have obviously had this conversation before. “So sacrifice wheel was compromise.”

“Yeah,” Grace says. He spins it to demonstrate; it whirls around in a blur and a rattle of the flap hitting the pegs, then eventually slows down, and stops—pointing at the segment depicting a very bad but very clear image of an Eridian. “Rocky made the wheel, I spin the wheel, and whoever it lands on, that’s who gets to sacrifice themself to save the other and the other person does not get to argue. This way, we wouldn’t waste time debating who does the self-sacrifice and who survives, it’s just a plain fifty-fifty chance. Or, eighteen-eighteen chance in base six. But the point is it could be either of us and we would have to accept the outcome.”

Rocky started fidgeting while Grace was explaining. When Grace finishes, proud of the equitable solution they came up with to allow them to die for each other fairly, Rocky says, “Now that we are back and we don’t need sacrifice wheel anymore… I have confession to make. About the wheel.”

“What about the wheel?”

Rocky doesn’t answer. Grace frowns, first confused, then suspicious, and spins the wheel again.

It lands on Rocky again.

He spins the wheel again, and again, and again, and it lands on Rocky every single time.

“Rocky!”

“I weighted the wheel,” Rocky admits.

“Rocky the whole point was that it was equal, that was why we even made it—“

“Never was necessary so doesn’t matter anymore!”

“But you WOULD have!”

“And you never noticed because you were hungry and cranky and distracted and so would have done bad job on heroic self-sacrifice anyway!”

“I would not! I would have done fine!”