(no subject)
I devoured all of Tanya Huff's Quarter books when I was a teenager, but Fifth Quarter is the only one that really strongly lives in my memory . . . probably because it is the one that is most easily summed up as the BODYSWAPPING INCEST AND ZOMBIES book.
I . . . can't explain why I had a sudden powerful urge to reread it recently, but maybe the Utena rewatch had something to do with it? I DON'T KNOW. Sometimes the ways of my own taste are a mystery to me. ANYWAY, I am pleased to report that the overwhelming crack of the plot lived up to my memories AND MORE.
Let's start off with an introduction to our protagonists:
VREE: A hot and tragic assassin, raised by the Army, in a codependent and constantly-verging-on-sexual relationship with her younger brother who is ALSO a hot assassin raised by the Army. The only way this could be more Kaori Yuki is if they were twins.
BANNON: Vree's younger brother. Loves himself so much that he wants to have sex with himself.
GYHARD: Has been keeping himself from dying for the past hundred and fifty years by stealing unsuspecting people's bodies. (But it's okay because he has a TRAGIC BACKSTORY.)
PRINCE OTAVAS: A doe-eyed seventeen-year-old prince; Designated Damsel.
KARLENE: A lesbian bard, who is NOT INTERESTED (unless you are a hot and tragic lady assassin.)
KARS: A ZOMBIE MASTER.
In the first like ten pages, Vree and Bannon are sent to assassinate Gyhard, not knowing that he is in fact an EVIL BODYSWAPPER. Gyhard, of course, promptly kicks Bannon out of his hot young assassin body and shoves Bannon into his old, decrepit and assassinated one.
BANNON: Sister! Sister! Sharing is caring!
VREE: . . . you want to share my body?
BANNON: It's okay, you're almost as hot as me.
So Vree stuffs Bannon's soul inside her head and they go chasing off after Gyhard to turf him back out of Bannon's body. Except Gyhard is an EXPERT bodyswapper, so this is not so easy to do!
BANNON!GYHARD: I propose a deal. I don't really want to be a hot twentysomething assassin -
BANNON: WHAT. My body is the BEST body.
BANNON!GYHARD: I want to be a prince. So, you guys, being the hot and tragic assassins that you are, can help me kidnap pretty pretty Prince Otavas and take over his body, and then Bannon can have his body back, and Vree can stop slowly going crazy from sharing a body with the younger brother she's awkwardly in love with! Sound good?
VREE AND BANNON: . . . well, we'll probably figure out a way to kick you out before we actually come up against any moral dilemmas.
ELSEWHERE, THE CONVERGING B PLOT:
KARS THE ZOMBIE MASTER: Time for you to meet my lovable zombie family!
MAMA ZOMBIE: Isn't my fly-ridden dead baby cute?
COUSINS ZOMBIE ONE AND TWO: The "in conclusion, totally cousins" conversation is pretty much literal text. Leave no incestuous stone unturned!
DADDY ISSUES ZOMBIE: Zombie master dad loves me way more than my real dad.
KARS THE ZOMBIE MASTER: I do! And yet my family is still incomplete . . . you know what I need? A HOT ZOMBIE BOYFRIEND. Pretty pretty Prince Otavas will do nicely!
AND ALSO THE CONVERGING C PLOT:
PRINCE OTAVAS: Karlene Karlene I wrote you a love poem, do you love me now? :D :D :D
KARLENE: Oh, honey. First of all, I am more than ten years older than you. And second of all, and I don't know how many times I have to say this, I AM STILL A LESBIAN.
MEANWHILE:
GYHARD: This wacky road trip is going great!
BANNON: Okay, sister, I have a great plan for you to help me get my body back. We need to distract Gyhard so I can turf him out, right?
VREE: Right . . .
BANNON: So clearly the only choice is for you to seduce the guy wearing my body.
VREE: WHAT.
BANNON: Look, we all know I'm really hot! It'll be fun for everyone! Besides, I'm in your head, so it's not like I don't know the fact that he looks like me is a turn-on for you.
VREE: THERE ARE NO WORDS FOR HOW MESSED UP THIS IS.
MEANWHILE, GYHARD, IN THE NEXT ROOM: Should I be having a moral dilemma about the fact that my body's sister totally turns me on . . .? Nah, I mean, she's not my sister.
SO SOME SEDUCING HAPPENS. UNTIL:
VREE: BANNON. WHY ARE YOU NOT TAKING YOUR BODY BACK NOW.
BANNON: Oh baby, oh baby!
VREE: . . . did you engineer this whole plan just so you could have sex with yourself???
BANNON: . . . look, I'm really hot, okay!
(BECCA: No, seriously, this is all literal canon.)
GYHARD: Complication: after this whole seduction thing, I kind of think I'm in love with you. Uh, Vree, not Bannon.
VREE AND BANNON: SHUT UP, GYHARD.
GYHARD: Look, Vree, all I'm saying is, I think this experience has taught us that despite my moral ambiguity I am still a better person than your brother.
So, by the time Vree-and-Bannon and Gyhard reach the capital, everyone is in a welter of emotional confusion! UNTIL they realize that Prince Otavas has already been kidnapped.
KARLENE: Well, okay, hot assassins who have invaded my room to demand information - if you have to ask, I'm pretty sure the guy who took him was a zombie master!
GYHARD: KARS?!?!?!
KARLENE, VREE AND BANNON: . . . so how do you know this Kars guy?
GYHARD: He was . . . . my BOYFRIEND.
VREE: ARE YOU EVEN KIDDING ME.
KARLENE: Anyway I'm going to come along on your wacky road trip to find the prince, because I feel responsible for him being stolen, and also because I find the whole tragic lady assassin thing really hot. As a sidenote, Gyhard, how did you and your zombie master ex there break up?
GYHARD: Well, I realized we had incompatible visions of our future together when he tried to poison and zombify me so I would never leave him. But now I realize that was probably a sign of mental instability, so I feel kind of bad about abandoning him without trying to get him some kind of help, you know?
KARLENE: Have you forgotten you're an evil body-stealer?
GYHARD: But being in love with Vree has gotten me a redemption arc!
KARLENE: I disapprove of you on so many principles.
MEANWHILE, THE D PLOT
HOT FORTYSOMETHING ASSASSIN: Assassins are not allowed to leave the army! Now I must hunt Vree and Bannon down . . . AND KILL THEM.
OUR SORT-OF HEROES: Wait, there's a D PLOT?
KARLENE: Well, now that Kars the Zombie Master has kidnapped the Prince and I'm on a wacky road trip with you guys to hunt him down, enough plots have converged that this is probably only the B or C plot.
BANNON: Speaking of, this road trip is getting boring. How about a threesome-or-technically-foursome-if-you-count-me? :D
VREE: SHUT UP, BANNON.
BANNON: I can't believe you're a hot and tragic assassin at the focus of a love triangle and we still haven't actually slept with anyone.
HOT FORTYSOMETHING ASSASSIN: I don't actually care about your incestuous love drama! NOW YOU DIE.
KARLENE: Vree! Don't kill him! That assassin is YOUR FATHER!
VREE: WHAT. WHAT. NO ONE EVEN CARED ABOUT MY MISSING DAD BEFORE NOW.
BANNON: Too bad, taking over Vree's body and killing him anyway.
VREE: How is it that every time I think I have just had the worst day ever, it proceeds to get even worse?
PRINCE OTAVAS, IN THE ZOMBIE CART CHILLING WITH MAMA ZOMBIE AND DADDY ISSUES ZOMBIE: Actually I think my day is in fact the worst of all.
THE DENOUEMENT
PRINCE OTAVAS: Karlene, you came to rescue me! Does that mean you will date me now?
KARLENE: I am sorry for your trauma, honey, but I am still a lesbian.
GYHARD: Kars, I am sorry that I abandoned you in the mountains to your zombies. Next time I am in a complicated and destructive relationship I will try to be a better boyfriend. Vree are you listening?
BANNON: I am so so so sick of sharing a body with my prudish big sister, JUST TAKE OVER THE PRINCE'S BODY ALREADY.
VREE: NO! Bannon that is MORALLY WRONG.
GYHARD: My moral redemption arc means that I will give Bannon his body back and probably not take over the Prince's! Probably.
VREE: Oh my god, fine, come in here.
GYHARD: . . . what
KARLENE: . . . WHAT
BANNON: . . . WHAT
VREE: Yes, I have gone from sharing a body with my codependent brother to sharing a body with the murderous bodyswapping love interest who stole my brother's body to begin with. AND YES I FEEL THIS IS AN IMPROVEMENT. Anyway, I think sharing a body with my brother and finding out just how annoying he is has at least cured me of the incest cravings?
KARLENE: . . . . . . . . . . . . yay?
KARS: While you are distracted with your new girlfriend, I will take Daddy Issues Zombie and flee into the mountains for the sequel.
Which . . . I don't remember anything about, so . . . I may have to reread that too!
I . . . can't explain why I had a sudden powerful urge to reread it recently, but maybe the Utena rewatch had something to do with it? I DON'T KNOW. Sometimes the ways of my own taste are a mystery to me. ANYWAY, I am pleased to report that the overwhelming crack of the plot lived up to my memories AND MORE.
Let's start off with an introduction to our protagonists:
VREE: A hot and tragic assassin, raised by the Army, in a codependent and constantly-verging-on-sexual relationship with her younger brother who is ALSO a hot assassin raised by the Army. The only way this could be more Kaori Yuki is if they were twins.
BANNON: Vree's younger brother. Loves himself so much that he wants to have sex with himself.
GYHARD: Has been keeping himself from dying for the past hundred and fifty years by stealing unsuspecting people's bodies. (But it's okay because he has a TRAGIC BACKSTORY.)
PRINCE OTAVAS: A doe-eyed seventeen-year-old prince; Designated Damsel.
KARLENE: A lesbian bard, who is NOT INTERESTED (unless you are a hot and tragic lady assassin.)
KARS: A ZOMBIE MASTER.
In the first like ten pages, Vree and Bannon are sent to assassinate Gyhard, not knowing that he is in fact an EVIL BODYSWAPPER. Gyhard, of course, promptly kicks Bannon out of his hot young assassin body and shoves Bannon into his old, decrepit and assassinated one.
BANNON: Sister! Sister! Sharing is caring!
VREE: . . . you want to share my body?
BANNON: It's okay, you're almost as hot as me.
So Vree stuffs Bannon's soul inside her head and they go chasing off after Gyhard to turf him back out of Bannon's body. Except Gyhard is an EXPERT bodyswapper, so this is not so easy to do!
BANNON!GYHARD: I propose a deal. I don't really want to be a hot twentysomething assassin -
BANNON: WHAT. My body is the BEST body.
BANNON!GYHARD: I want to be a prince. So, you guys, being the hot and tragic assassins that you are, can help me kidnap pretty pretty Prince Otavas and take over his body, and then Bannon can have his body back, and Vree can stop slowly going crazy from sharing a body with the younger brother she's awkwardly in love with! Sound good?
VREE AND BANNON: . . . well, we'll probably figure out a way to kick you out before we actually come up against any moral dilemmas.
ELSEWHERE, THE CONVERGING B PLOT:
KARS THE ZOMBIE MASTER: Time for you to meet my lovable zombie family!
MAMA ZOMBIE: Isn't my fly-ridden dead baby cute?
COUSINS ZOMBIE ONE AND TWO: The "in conclusion, totally cousins" conversation is pretty much literal text. Leave no incestuous stone unturned!
DADDY ISSUES ZOMBIE: Zombie master dad loves me way more than my real dad.
KARS THE ZOMBIE MASTER: I do! And yet my family is still incomplete . . . you know what I need? A HOT ZOMBIE BOYFRIEND. Pretty pretty Prince Otavas will do nicely!
AND ALSO THE CONVERGING C PLOT:
PRINCE OTAVAS: Karlene Karlene I wrote you a love poem, do you love me now? :D :D :D
KARLENE: Oh, honey. First of all, I am more than ten years older than you. And second of all, and I don't know how many times I have to say this, I AM STILL A LESBIAN.
MEANWHILE:
GYHARD: This wacky road trip is going great!
BANNON: Okay, sister, I have a great plan for you to help me get my body back. We need to distract Gyhard so I can turf him out, right?
VREE: Right . . .
BANNON: So clearly the only choice is for you to seduce the guy wearing my body.
VREE: WHAT.
BANNON: Look, we all know I'm really hot! It'll be fun for everyone! Besides, I'm in your head, so it's not like I don't know the fact that he looks like me is a turn-on for you.
VREE: THERE ARE NO WORDS FOR HOW MESSED UP THIS IS.
MEANWHILE, GYHARD, IN THE NEXT ROOM: Should I be having a moral dilemma about the fact that my body's sister totally turns me on . . .? Nah, I mean, she's not my sister.
SO SOME SEDUCING HAPPENS. UNTIL:
VREE: BANNON. WHY ARE YOU NOT TAKING YOUR BODY BACK NOW.
BANNON: Oh baby, oh baby!
VREE: . . . did you engineer this whole plan just so you could have sex with yourself???
BANNON: . . . look, I'm really hot, okay!
(BECCA: No, seriously, this is all literal canon.)
GYHARD: Complication: after this whole seduction thing, I kind of think I'm in love with you. Uh, Vree, not Bannon.
VREE AND BANNON: SHUT UP, GYHARD.
GYHARD: Look, Vree, all I'm saying is, I think this experience has taught us that despite my moral ambiguity I am still a better person than your brother.
So, by the time Vree-and-Bannon and Gyhard reach the capital, everyone is in a welter of emotional confusion! UNTIL they realize that Prince Otavas has already been kidnapped.
KARLENE: Well, okay, hot assassins who have invaded my room to demand information - if you have to ask, I'm pretty sure the guy who took him was a zombie master!
GYHARD: KARS?!?!?!
KARLENE, VREE AND BANNON: . . . so how do you know this Kars guy?
GYHARD: He was . . . . my BOYFRIEND.
VREE: ARE YOU EVEN KIDDING ME.
KARLENE: Anyway I'm going to come along on your wacky road trip to find the prince, because I feel responsible for him being stolen, and also because I find the whole tragic lady assassin thing really hot. As a sidenote, Gyhard, how did you and your zombie master ex there break up?
GYHARD: Well, I realized we had incompatible visions of our future together when he tried to poison and zombify me so I would never leave him. But now I realize that was probably a sign of mental instability, so I feel kind of bad about abandoning him without trying to get him some kind of help, you know?
KARLENE: Have you forgotten you're an evil body-stealer?
GYHARD: But being in love with Vree has gotten me a redemption arc!
KARLENE: I disapprove of you on so many principles.
MEANWHILE, THE D PLOT
HOT FORTYSOMETHING ASSASSIN: Assassins are not allowed to leave the army! Now I must hunt Vree and Bannon down . . . AND KILL THEM.
OUR SORT-OF HEROES: Wait, there's a D PLOT?
KARLENE: Well, now that Kars the Zombie Master has kidnapped the Prince and I'm on a wacky road trip with you guys to hunt him down, enough plots have converged that this is probably only the B or C plot.
BANNON: Speaking of, this road trip is getting boring. How about a threesome-or-technically-foursome-if-you-count-me? :D
VREE: SHUT UP, BANNON.
BANNON: I can't believe you're a hot and tragic assassin at the focus of a love triangle and we still haven't actually slept with anyone.
HOT FORTYSOMETHING ASSASSIN: I don't actually care about your incestuous love drama! NOW YOU DIE.
KARLENE: Vree! Don't kill him! That assassin is YOUR FATHER!
VREE: WHAT. WHAT. NO ONE EVEN CARED ABOUT MY MISSING DAD BEFORE NOW.
BANNON: Too bad, taking over Vree's body and killing him anyway.
VREE: How is it that every time I think I have just had the worst day ever, it proceeds to get even worse?
PRINCE OTAVAS, IN THE ZOMBIE CART CHILLING WITH MAMA ZOMBIE AND DADDY ISSUES ZOMBIE: Actually I think my day is in fact the worst of all.
THE DENOUEMENT
PRINCE OTAVAS: Karlene, you came to rescue me! Does that mean you will date me now?
KARLENE: I am sorry for your trauma, honey, but I am still a lesbian.
GYHARD: Kars, I am sorry that I abandoned you in the mountains to your zombies. Next time I am in a complicated and destructive relationship I will try to be a better boyfriend. Vree are you listening?
BANNON: I am so so so sick of sharing a body with my prudish big sister, JUST TAKE OVER THE PRINCE'S BODY ALREADY.
VREE: NO! Bannon that is MORALLY WRONG.
GYHARD: My moral redemption arc means that I will give Bannon his body back and probably not take over the Prince's! Probably.
VREE: Oh my god, fine, come in here.
GYHARD: . . . what
KARLENE: . . . WHAT
BANNON: . . . WHAT
VREE: Yes, I have gone from sharing a body with my codependent brother to sharing a body with the murderous bodyswapping love interest who stole my brother's body to begin with. AND YES I FEEL THIS IS AN IMPROVEMENT. Anyway, I think sharing a body with my brother and finding out just how annoying he is has at least cured me of the incest cravings?
KARLENE: . . . . . . . . . . . . yay?
KARS: While you are distracted with your new girlfriend, I will take Daddy Issues Zombie and flee into the mountains for the sequel.
Which . . . I don't remember anything about, so . . . I may have to reread that too!