oskarshai
Message Runner
Justice for Mammoth
Posts: 47
Gender: Other
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Post by oskarshai on Jul 29, 2021 13:45:23 GMT 10
Title: Faithless Rating: PG Word count: 100 Summary: Alex in his extra hour of Ethics.
Alex toyed with the signet ring on his finger, the one object he'd taken from home that had no practical use. It was old, the gold now so worn down that the Tirragen crest was barely identifiable as a jasmine flower. For faithfulness, his mother had told him when he was small. Her face was faded in his memory now. "Alex," said Sir Myles, his normally animated voice sounding a little weary. "Have you been working at all?" Alex glanced up, then back down. "If you can't accept the answer I already gave, I'm afraid I don't see the point."
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Post by mistrali on Jul 29, 2021 13:57:40 GMT 10
Very nicely done - working the jasmine flower and Alex’s mother in with his worldview.
I like faithfulness as a family virtue for Alex, for a few reasons - both in view of his loyalty to the Tirragens’ apparent anti-Conte or anti-Crown sentiment, which nicely cements/foreshadows the rebellion in LR, and his (treacherous) attempt to kill Alanna during the skating incident. Makes you wonder even more about what happened to him between ATFA and LR. How much of a hand did Roger have in magically compelling him, like he did to Jon, vs playing on his upbringing or other emotions?
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purplepotatoblob
Message Runner
'From now on I'm Alan of Trebond, the younger twin. I'll be a knight.' - Alanna
Posts: 45
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Post by purplepotatoblob on Jul 29, 2021 14:10:50 GMT 10
This is beautiful… Alex fics always sad but amazing… good job on this one
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oskarshai
Message Runner
Justice for Mammoth
Posts: 47
Gender: Other
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Post by oskarshai on Jul 29, 2021 14:15:15 GMT 10
Very nicely done - working the jasmine flower and Alex’s mother in with his worldview. I like faithfulness as a family virtue for Alex, for a few reasons - both in view of his loyalty to the Tirragens’ apparent anti-Conte or anti-Crown sentiment, which nicely cements/foreshadows the rebellion in LR, and his (treacherous) attempt to kill Alanna during the skating incident. Makes you wonder even more about what happened to him between ATFA and LR. How much of a hand did Roger have in magically compelling him, like he did to Jon, vs playing on his upbringing or other emotions? Thank you! Yeah, it's really always more questions than answers with Alex. I tend to lean toward a headcanon of Roger having relied more on emotional manipulation than magical compulsion (mostly just because I find magical compulsion more boring as a story element), and Alex having been a darker character from the start than his friends really ever picked up on in their youth – kind of an Anakin-Skywalker-in-Attack-of-the-Clones situation where he was a basically nice guy, but with some very worrying political and philosophical leanings that sprang out of dark emotional roots and likely also some difficulty with empathy. "The type of guy who unironically tells you to read Ayn Rand" about sums him up in my brain, lol. I think he saw the murder attempts on Alanna as a twisted kind of game, rather than feeling any real animosity toward her; it's extra depressing when you consider just how young they all were at the time. This is beautiful… Alex fics always sad but amazing… good job on this one Thank you so much! <3
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Post by mistrali on Jul 29, 2021 22:11:42 GMT 10
Yup, that’s about how I read Roger’s manipulation of Alex, too, and for the same reason. Magical compulsion is a very cool power to have, story-wise, but I think it only really works for short-term situations (like Roger compelling Jon to go to the Black City), rather than alliances, where you need the person in their right mind over a long period of time. I also like to think (and it seems pretty heavily implied in canon) that familiarity and trust play a part in priming the person to let their guard down, since Roger himself is the focusing object.
I wonder if blood had anything to do with that compulsion, too - did Roger find it easier to beam his compulsion directly into Jon’s head because he knew him and was related to him?
Agreed, too, about Alex being darker from the start and Roger playing on those tendencies.
His attempts to kill Alanna are bizarre. I don’t get it. He treats Alanna like a target he has to eliminate, but... it comes so out of the blue, and he tries not to raise suspicion. My headcanon is that Roger gave him that assignment.
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Post by devilinthedetails on Jul 30, 2021 4:17:25 GMT 10
Oh, I always get happy whenever anyone writes Alex fic! Good job!
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oskarshai
Message Runner
Justice for Mammoth
Posts: 47
Gender: Other
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Post by oskarshai on Jul 30, 2021 5:00:57 GMT 10
His attempts to kill Alanna are bizarre. I don’t get it. He treats Alanna like a target he has to eliminate, but... it comes so out of the blue, and he tries not to raise suspicion. My headcanon is that Roger gave him that assignment. Oh yeah, it was definitely either suggested or ordered by Roger. But I don't know, Roger had probably already been encouraging Alex's worst impulses for a good while by that point, and Alex does kinda strike me as the type who could have hypothetically gone either way between "functional member of society" and "serial killer". I do wish we had a little more insight into where his head was at the time, but it doesn't seem any stranger to me than certain true crime stories I've heard that start with young people entertaining idle fantasies of harming their friends. And of course, Alex's intense competitiveness with Alanna could easily have been twisted into something that brought him to that point. Oh, I always get happy whenever anyone writes Alex fic! Good job! Thank you!
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Post by mistrali on Jul 30, 2021 12:30:01 GMT 10
His attempts to kill Alanna are bizarre. I don’t get it. He treats Alanna like a target he has to eliminate, but... it comes so out of the blue, and he tries not to raise suspicion. My headcanon is that Roger gave him that assignment. Oh yeah, it was definitely either suggested or ordered by Roger. But I don't know, Roger had probably already been encouraging Alex's worst impulses for a good while by that point, and Alex does kinda strike me as the type who could have hypothetically gone either way between "functional member of society" and "serial killer". I do wish we had a little more insight into where his head was at the time, but it doesn't seem any stranger to me than certain true crime stories I've heard that start with young people entertaining idle fantasies of harming their friends. And of course, Alex's intense competitiveness with Alanna could easily have been twisted into something that brought him to that point. Oh, I always get happy whenever anyone writes Alex fic! Good job! Thank you! No, you’re right, it just feels bizarre because we don’t see any change in behaviour - at least, not from Alanna’s POV. Mind you, Alex is obviously good at masking his true intentions, so he could well have been a touch that way inclined to start with, and Roger was the perfect tipping point. I have no doubt Roger built on Alex’s jealousy, but the way it’s written from Alanna’s perspective, it seems random. There was no build-up from his side, no change in behaviour. But then, in real life, no one ever has a flashing neon sign that says “I’m going to kill you!” If we’d had SOTL from Alex’s POV, things would’ve looked a lot different.
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