Betrayed: Chapter 17
Jun. 5th, 2011 11:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
zelda_queenZeldaQueen: In which nothing happens!
Projection Room Voices: Starting Media in 3...2...1..
Chapter 17
ZeldaQueen: Right. So when we last left off, Zoey had just seen a dead student who was clearly crazed and animal-like drinking blood from and basically groveling to Neferet.
Now, one would imagine that there is no way at all that the Cast ladies can have that be ignored. That it was such a huge scene, which so clearly and obviously showed us that Something Is Not Right that Zoey has to sit down and admit that there's something going on and figure out how to deal with it. Yeah.
That doesn't happen.
I'm dead serious. Zoey goes staggering into the dorm, where her friends are gathered around, watching TV. They apparently don't notice that she's all freaked out and instead keep talking to her about the snowball fight they had while she was away. They also take a lot of time to hammer in that Damien and Jack are practically married by this point. After less than one day. Really.
Zoey finally gets herself together long enough to ask if fledglings have ever come back from the dead. For some reason, everyone's mouths hang open, like Zoey just asked if there was the serious possibility that the Earth's core was actually a giant jawbreaker. You'd think they'd chalk it up to her just being curious or whatever. Anyway, Damien says no, when a fledgling dies, that's it for them. Stevie Rae freaks out because she thinks that Zoey's getting sick and rejecting the change, and Zoey says she's fine. She then proceeds to spill the beans thusly -
Zoey: Hey guys, this might sound a tad odd, but I think I saw the ghost of that Elliot kid, over by the wall
Everyone else: Huh, how about that?
I'm serious. I mean, they do say things like "I'd be scared if it were me", but it's all done so blandly that it sounds like Zoey nearly ran over a deer and not, I don't know, THAT SHE SAW THE GHOST OF A DEAD STUDENT!!! And no, don't tell me that it's because they're vampires and thus are used to weird stuff, because they acted like it was out-of-this-world for Zoey to even consider fledglings coming back once they died. Damien actually suggests that Zoey has the affinity to see dead people, and I'm so glad it's not the case, because the last thing Zoey-Sue needs is another power. Anyway, Stevie Rae spills the beans about Zoey also seeing Elizabeth's ghost. Zoey is just about tell everyone about Neferet hanging around with Elliot, but decides not to. Why?
"I should have realized before I'd said one word to any of them that I absolutely could not tell them about Neferet. Vampyres were all intuitive to some degree. High Priestess Neferet was amazingly intuitive. So much so that she often seemed to be able to read actual thoughts. No way could my four friends walk around school knowing that I'd seen her letting some kind of disgusting undead Elliott creature suck her blood without Neferet knowing everything in their freaked-out minds"
ZeldaQueen: Okay, let's play that game. So Zoey's reasoning for hiding everything is that Neferet will instantly cotton on that they know about it. Alrighty then. How many important things has Zoey let them in on, which clearly have something to do with this?
She told Stevie Rae (who just told everyone else) about the existence of the red-eyed ghosts at all. Clearly Neferet is trying to hide Elliot, so them knowing about the ghosts period ought to raise warning bells for her.
She told them about Aphrodite's vision and how Aphrodite doesn't want Neferet to know it.
They all know for certain that Aphrodite's visions are still true and that Neferet won't believe it.
Apparently Zoey is just fine with them knowing those things. But this tidbit, which might actually advance the plot? Oh no, too dangerous! Seriously, it just comes across like when Holly Potter and her friends gave half-assed reasons to keep from doing something, just because her Suethor didn't want to write anything new. Oh, and the fact that Zoey isn't concerned about Neferet figuring out that they have the above information kind of implies that she still doesn't see how it's all connected. IDIOT!
*sigh* So her friends treat her discovery of the red-eyed ghosts like a mildly frightening novelty and then Nala proves to be more intelligent than her owner and brings back the plot by jumping on the remote control and changing the TV station to Fox News. As luck would have it, they're in the middle of reporting how the latest kidapped student has been found in a stream by the local museum, having also been killed from blood loss via multiple lacerations. Zoey's friends comment on how that stream is right on the way the Dark Daughters used to go for that stupid Samhain ritual, and then Damien announces that "Someone is trying to make it look like vampyres are killing human kids".
*pauses and steeples fingers* Okay, that really pissed me off. And I know that a lot of people would say that I'm overreacting, but let me tell you all that this is the first of many times in this chapter alone that we're constantly told how humans are evil bigots who just pick on the poor, harmless vampires. There is no reason for Damien to immediately jump to the conclusion that a human is making it look like it was a vampire any more than he could immediately jump to the conclusion that there's a vampire who really is murdering people. After all, the vampires in this world are regular people with various powers, right? Zoey keeps bitching because humans just don't understaaaaand how they're not dead things or whatnot, right? So that means that there is just as likely a chance that a vampire could be an insane killer as a human.
Oh yeah, and Zoey does bring up the idea that it's possible that a vampire really is doing the killing. Everyone stares at her like she grew a third head and she says to the readers that she has no idea why that thought entered her head. MAYBE BECAUSE IT'S A LEGITIMATE POINT, YOU IDIOT! No, everyone just chalks it up to Zoey being stressed and overly involved in this thing. Blah.
Damien next asks about Zoey having her Deus Ex Machina feelings about all of this. She goes in a flap because OH NOES, SHE CANNOT TELL HIM ABOUT THIS and in the back of her mind gets the vaguest of feelings that Neferet's Cryptic Conversation with Elliot might actually be important. Of course, she promptly forgets about it. *head desk*
Zoey fakes being tired to go up to bed. Stevie Rae follows, complaining about a cold she appears to have picked up. Ruh oh! Of course, Zoey handwaves it by insisting that it's just because Stevie Rae is a frail little sensitive kid. Normally I'd be less annoyed because most people don't see someone getting a cold and think "Oh noes, potential bloody death!" but the whole point in this series was that the kids were always on pins and needles about dropping dead at any second. Anyway, Stevie Rae drops off to sleep pretty quickly. Zoey's pleased about this, because apparently there's something Very Important she wants to look up in private. And on that note, we end this chapter
Onward to: Chapter 18
Back to: Chapter 16
Back to: Table of Contents
Projection Room Voices: Starting Media in 3...2...1..
Chapter 17
ZeldaQueen: Right. So when we last left off, Zoey had just seen a dead student who was clearly crazed and animal-like drinking blood from and basically groveling to Neferet.
Now, one would imagine that there is no way at all that the Cast ladies can have that be ignored. That it was such a huge scene, which so clearly and obviously showed us that Something Is Not Right that Zoey has to sit down and admit that there's something going on and figure out how to deal with it. Yeah.
That doesn't happen.
I'm dead serious. Zoey goes staggering into the dorm, where her friends are gathered around, watching TV. They apparently don't notice that she's all freaked out and instead keep talking to her about the snowball fight they had while she was away. They also take a lot of time to hammer in that Damien and Jack are practically married by this point. After less than one day. Really.
Zoey finally gets herself together long enough to ask if fledglings have ever come back from the dead. For some reason, everyone's mouths hang open, like Zoey just asked if there was the serious possibility that the Earth's core was actually a giant jawbreaker. You'd think they'd chalk it up to her just being curious or whatever. Anyway, Damien says no, when a fledgling dies, that's it for them. Stevie Rae freaks out because she thinks that Zoey's getting sick and rejecting the change, and Zoey says she's fine. She then proceeds to spill the beans thusly -
Zoey: Hey guys, this might sound a tad odd, but I think I saw the ghost of that Elliot kid, over by the wall
Everyone else: Huh, how about that?
I'm serious. I mean, they do say things like "I'd be scared if it were me", but it's all done so blandly that it sounds like Zoey nearly ran over a deer and not, I don't know, THAT SHE SAW THE GHOST OF A DEAD STUDENT!!! And no, don't tell me that it's because they're vampires and thus are used to weird stuff, because they acted like it was out-of-this-world for Zoey to even consider fledglings coming back once they died. Damien actually suggests that Zoey has the affinity to see dead people, and I'm so glad it's not the case, because the last thing Zoey-Sue needs is another power. Anyway, Stevie Rae spills the beans about Zoey also seeing Elizabeth's ghost. Zoey is just about tell everyone about Neferet hanging around with Elliot, but decides not to. Why?
"I should have realized before I'd said one word to any of them that I absolutely could not tell them about Neferet. Vampyres were all intuitive to some degree. High Priestess Neferet was amazingly intuitive. So much so that she often seemed to be able to read actual thoughts. No way could my four friends walk around school knowing that I'd seen her letting some kind of disgusting undead Elliott creature suck her blood without Neferet knowing everything in their freaked-out minds"
ZeldaQueen: Okay, let's play that game. So Zoey's reasoning for hiding everything is that Neferet will instantly cotton on that they know about it. Alrighty then. How many important things has Zoey let them in on, which clearly have something to do with this?
She told Stevie Rae (who just told everyone else) about the existence of the red-eyed ghosts at all. Clearly Neferet is trying to hide Elliot, so them knowing about the ghosts period ought to raise warning bells for her.
She told them about Aphrodite's vision and how Aphrodite doesn't want Neferet to know it.
They all know for certain that Aphrodite's visions are still true and that Neferet won't believe it.
Apparently Zoey is just fine with them knowing those things. But this tidbit, which might actually advance the plot? Oh no, too dangerous! Seriously, it just comes across like when Holly Potter and her friends gave half-assed reasons to keep from doing something, just because her Suethor didn't want to write anything new. Oh, and the fact that Zoey isn't concerned about Neferet figuring out that they have the above information kind of implies that she still doesn't see how it's all connected. IDIOT!
*sigh* So her friends treat her discovery of the red-eyed ghosts like a mildly frightening novelty and then Nala proves to be more intelligent than her owner and brings back the plot by jumping on the remote control and changing the TV station to Fox News. As luck would have it, they're in the middle of reporting how the latest kidapped student has been found in a stream by the local museum, having also been killed from blood loss via multiple lacerations. Zoey's friends comment on how that stream is right on the way the Dark Daughters used to go for that stupid Samhain ritual, and then Damien announces that "Someone is trying to make it look like vampyres are killing human kids".
*pauses and steeples fingers* Okay, that really pissed me off. And I know that a lot of people would say that I'm overreacting, but let me tell you all that this is the first of many times in this chapter alone that we're constantly told how humans are evil bigots who just pick on the poor, harmless vampires. There is no reason for Damien to immediately jump to the conclusion that a human is making it look like it was a vampire any more than he could immediately jump to the conclusion that there's a vampire who really is murdering people. After all, the vampires in this world are regular people with various powers, right? Zoey keeps bitching because humans just don't understaaaaand how they're not dead things or whatnot, right? So that means that there is just as likely a chance that a vampire could be an insane killer as a human.
Oh yeah, and Zoey does bring up the idea that it's possible that a vampire really is doing the killing. Everyone stares at her like she grew a third head and she says to the readers that she has no idea why that thought entered her head. MAYBE BECAUSE IT'S A LEGITIMATE POINT, YOU IDIOT! No, everyone just chalks it up to Zoey being stressed and overly involved in this thing. Blah.
Damien next asks about Zoey having her Deus Ex Machina feelings about all of this. She goes in a flap because OH NOES, SHE CANNOT TELL HIM ABOUT THIS and in the back of her mind gets the vaguest of feelings that Neferet's Cryptic Conversation with Elliot might actually be important. Of course, she promptly forgets about it. *head desk*
Zoey fakes being tired to go up to bed. Stevie Rae follows, complaining about a cold she appears to have picked up. Ruh oh! Of course, Zoey handwaves it by insisting that it's just because Stevie Rae is a frail little sensitive kid. Normally I'd be less annoyed because most people don't see someone getting a cold and think "Oh noes, potential bloody death!" but the whole point in this series was that the kids were always on pins and needles about dropping dead at any second. Anyway, Stevie Rae drops off to sleep pretty quickly. Zoey's pleased about this, because apparently there's something Very Important she wants to look up in private. And on that note, we end this chapter
Onward to: Chapter 18
Back to: Chapter 16
Back to: Table of Contents
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-06 04:25 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-06 12:55 pm (UTC)Oh, there will be plenty of ranting! ^_^
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-06 04:48 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-06 12:56 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-06 09:30 am (UTC)YOUR VAMPIRES ARE DANGEROUS! HELL; VAMPIRES SHOULD BE DANGEROUS.
YOU ALSO FAIL AT BASIC STORY TELLING WITH YOUR SHITTY IDIOT PLOT!!!
Do you think they heard me?
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-06 01:00 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-06 01:59 pm (UTC)Do you notice the way it offensively sends the message that bigots are in fact correct that those they hate are dangerous monsters or uniquely privileged; and thus deserve to be hated.
Think about it!
Vampire has unique power, are incredibly dangerous, are incredibly attractive , and have unquestioned power in society, and act like stuck up assholes who horde themselves from the world well they look down on others...
The Cast ladies' allegory towards racism and/or religious persecution falls apart when the supposed victims are everything one needs to hate somebody with the added bonus of super powers!
How the hell do they not notice what the hell they've written!?
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-06 02:36 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-06 05:46 pm (UTC)THEN MOST OF THESE VAMPIRES' FAN BASES ARE HUMANS, YOU DOLTS.
How can you play the "BAWWWWW! We're oppressed and ignored!" card when humans not only pay for these vampires' very nice living expenses, but also accept them as talented and important people? Humans have posters, movies, clothes, and other memorabilia of these vampires lining their rooms! They flock to whatever movie, concert, show, etc they're in! These vampires are anything BUT belittled and ignored! This is the worst allegory for racism of all time!
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-06 07:22 pm (UTC)This, incidentally, will make up the bulk of my ranting for the next chapter.
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-06 04:22 pm (UTC)I think this was in... Germany, in the 1930s.
The Casts have their human villains espousing rhetoric similiar to the Nazi Party towards the Jews... except that the humans in these books are largely RIGHT.
tl;dr: The same as everyone else pointed out, but with added fail.
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-06 07:14 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-07 05:24 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-09 02:53 am (UTC)Some is trying???? God, you'd have to have the IQ of a hamster to miss that! >.< Humans have all the right to be suspicious of vampires, especially when the vampires instantly get their backs up whenever something suspicious happens.
Damn, was this chapter pointless! Even Aphrodite seems to have more happening to her in this story and putting more effort into whatever thin plot there is than Zoey and the others combined! This is pretty bad, I mean isn't this book about to end and only now we're seeing things that should have happened earlier in the 'plot'?
And what about this Dark Daughters crap? Zoey has been going on and on about having to do all this important crap for it and having all this responsiblity, electing new members, collect ingredients, blah blah blah, yet she's hardly spent any time doing anything for something that's supposedly so significant to the 'plot.' I mean, even Aphrodite performed some rituals in the last book! She only seems to think about the Dark Daughters when it's convenient.
You know what one of the major problems of these books are? The Casts have tried to cram way too much into them, way too many over-arching subplots and pointless details (I know, there is no actual plot in these books, but bear with me here). Think about it: they're cramming all these things in so they can make the Sue look all the more Sueish: forbidden romance, romance with the popular boy prefect of the school, drama with the ex, being the all-'powerful' leader of the DD's, murder, Sue-per powers, having a gang of sycophants to handle, her 'evil' parents, human 'bigotry,' Damien's gayness, the ugly ghosts… Seriously, I can't even remember half these plots happening! It's been ages since we saw the cops arrive at the school or heard from creepy Blake! The Casts are trying way too hard with way too much. See, you really can't have your cake and eat it too, no matter how Sue-ful you truly are :P
(no subject)
Date: 2011-06-09 04:08 am (UTC)I hate these filler chapters. If the Cast ladies had any sense of how to properly spread out the story, maybe it would work better. As it is, it's just one big, jumbled mess!
(no subject)
Date: 2011-08-03 08:23 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-08-04 12:39 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2011-09-22 11:57 am (UTC)Nala reminds me a bit of Fang from Chick Tracts. The animal that is in a lot of the scenes and nicer than the protagonists.
(no subject)
Date: 2011-09-23 03:44 am (UTC)Heh, I never thought of that. XD
(no subject)
Date: 2013-09-05 01:54 am (UTC)But this? This is the WORST spot to first propose this. This is the cover-story Neferet should have used when the police officers were over (calmly, coolly and completely-seeming-to-be-rational), explaining that vampires normally can't drink someone dry, and even if they did, they'd do it from one neat hole and that almost certainly this is some of the WBC-ish Faith dudes trying to rile up the public. This is something that should be investigated and speculated upon by the protagonists and looked-into by the police and having examples cited as historical.
To bring up the Harry Potter comparison others have made, it's like the red herring that the bigots in Slytherin were releasing the Basilisk. It's reasonable for the situation (as the characters know it), but it needs to be initially proposed and discussed!
Fuck these stupid, unimaginitive assholes. D:
(no subject)
Date: 2013-10-14 01:01 am (UTC)So yeah, if the some actual reasons were put to it, I'd buy "It's a frame-up!" As it is though, it just comes across as stupid.
(no subject)
Date: 2015-03-20 11:07 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2015-03-28 11:12 pm (UTC)