Betrayed: Chapter 29

Sep 17, 2011 11:44

ZeldaQueen: Well folks, we're on the home stretch. Just a few chapters left until the end, and nary a sign of resolution in sight. Why am I getting deja vu?

Also, a happy birthday to lollapalooza108

Projection Room Voices: Starting Media in 3...2...1...
Chapter 29

ZeldaQueen: So, let's see. When we last left off, Zoey is stuck in a tunnel with a very weak Heath and just her...um, perfect control of all five elements to save herself from a bunch of red-eyed ghosts. She has summoned fire into her hands, and can surely use wind and water and whatnot to help out as well. I think this is supposed to be tense, but I'm not getting that. Anyway, Stevie Rae shows up, OH THE DRAMA!!!

I would like to remind you that this is the second time that Zoey has actually seen Stevie Rae as an undead vampire-thing. This is the third time she's been confronted with the fact that Stevie Rae is Not Herself Anymore. Aphrodite had already reminded her specifically that Stevie Rae is different and can't be trusted as the same girl she used to be.

So, with all that in mind, what does Zoey do?

She stands there, jaw hanging open, staring at Stevie Rae and letting the flames in her hands flicker and die out. All while reminding us yet again that Stevie Rae is ugly and horrible and smells bad and has a nasty expression on her face. Oh, and her voice is no longer friendly but still has that infuriating accent, so now she sounds like "mean trailer trash".

Right. Zoey? *shakes her* YOU IDIOT! DO YOU HAVE SHORT-TERM MEMORY LOSS?

I mean, my God! She's acting like it's some huge revelation that Stevie Rae is like this! I could understand being upset or uneasy when confronted with one's undead friend. I could understand her trying to talk Stevie Rae down or bring her back to her old self. But this is just her completely dropping her guard and being an idiot. All while Heath is behind her, weak from blood loss and in danger of death by nommage, I might add.

Right. *rubs head* Zoey starts trying to determine if Stevie Rae is alive or a ghost or whatever, all while Stevie Rae does even more villain cliches than Dark Link as written in My Inner Life. If she had a mustache, I'm sure she'd be twirling it. As it is, we must be satisfied with the mysterious description of "Her laugh was a sneer". I'm...really not sure how that works or how the Cast ladies thought that was heart-wrenching (at least in the way they intended, as it makes the English Major in me weep), so let's move on.

Stevie Rae continues to sneer and and be cliched and spout the usual nonsense about how she's not the same and it's complex and sweet Jesus, something happen! Meanwhile, Zoey sees the fact that Stevie Rae isn't hissing at her "like that Elliott thing had". Okay, seriously Cast ladies who exactly is Elliott based off of? I refuse to believe that there isn't some personal animosity going on at this point.

Anyway, Zoey throws herself at Stevie Rae and gives her a big hug, while trying to ignore the natural feelings of disgust and revile that are being invoked by her undead-ness. Unfortunately, what could be a touching scene is rather marred by the fact that Zoey continues to harp on about how smelly Stevie Rae is, which makes it just come across as Zoey being icked out over something trivial.

Stevie Rae just sort of stands there all stoney-like while Zoey clings to her, and when Zoey finally lets go, Stevie Rae says to never touch her again. By this point, I'm suspecting that the character is becoming aware of how annoying Zoey is. Shame it isn't going to last. And I do so love how these extremely uncivilized and feral monsters are all just staring there, acting like a put-out Looney Tunes character.

I'd like to bring up another point, while we're at at. Zoey is throwing so much effort into reconnecting to Stevie Rae. She's so happy she's back. She's so certain that her friend is alive and not an undead monster. So, question here - what about the other red-eyed ghosts? They're all obviously dead House of Night students. Zoey went through Stevie Rae's death, so she should know that those kids have friends and family members who are grieving and missing them. And yet, she makes no mention of them at all. They're just sort of standing there, un-persons. She makes no effort to remind them of people that love and miss them. Yes, Our Heroine.

Right. My anger kind of fizzled and died at this point, because Zoey's idiocy just made me laugh. After seeing all of this, after all of the things she discovered, she just casually asks if there's a good time and place for her to meet Stevie Rae again after she rescues Heath. Elsewise, would it be possible for Stevie Rae to come back to the House of Night with her, because they really need to have a talk.

Excuse me for a minute



ZeldaQueen: "Hey, undead friend of mine, who has been sneering and laughing and threatening me, is there a good time for us to meet up after I rescue my boyfriend (who I'm sure you'll just let me leave with)? I don't really know what your schedule is like, what with randomly kidnapping and murdering people and all. If it's better for you, maybe you could just come back to the House of Night with me, where you'll certainly be noticed and be willingly exposing your evil mistress's plan".

Christ, only Zoey.

And no, near as I could tell, that wasn't meant to be some plan to get witnesses for the red-eyed ghosts and expose Neferet. That would require brains, which Zoey has nary a one of.

Stevie Rae doesn't laugh her ass off at that, but she does give Zoey the equivalent of a "Dude, you're so retarded" look. Zoey keeps blathering on about how she and Stevie Rae are just the bestest of friends and nothing will change that, not even the minor detail of death. Elliot pipes up at this point and says that they should just kill Zoey already. Well said, my good man. Stevie Rae and Zoey both tell him to shut up, and it's implied that for that one moment, they're both united in dumping on Elliot. Elliot's really the bottom of the heap, isn't he? Even the leader of the undead monsters hates him. Poor guy.

Anyway, at this point, an undead chick comes out and she basically is the Bride of Dracula of the bunch - eerily alluring, but still scary as fuck. She says that if no one else will stop farting around and eat those two, she will. I'm already starting to like her. She also makes it clear that she's perfectly fine with slurping Heath's blood down, whether or not he's been Imprinted on.

I'd like to pause for a moment and note that this will be a bit of possibly unintentional foreshadowing for this character, who as you might have guessed is Aphrodite's roomate, Venus. From what I understand, Venus and Aphrodite are very similar, but the fandom hates Venus something horrible. Apparently the reason for this is that Venus later is involved with one of the many guys that Zoey has a thing for, even though the guy isn't dating Zoey (and no, it's not Heath). So here we have Venus saying that she wants to do the vampiric equivalent of having sex with Heath, saying that she knows and doesn't care that he's basically attached to Zoey. Right.

That aside, Zoey just right now remembers that oh hey, didn't Aphrodite have a roommate named Venus? HOW ABOUT THAT? Sure enough, Zoey calls out Venus's full name, and Venus is all suspicious and wants to know how Zoey knows her name. Now if the Cast ladies were good, they'd have Zoey remind Venus about Aphrodite. She could tell her that Aphrodite remembers and misses her, and how she was drugged by Neferet and nearly forgot her, but managed through sheer willpower to remember her roommate. It would make Zoey look a little more empathetic for trying to bond with more ghosts than Stevie Rae, be a way for her to increase the odds of winning them over, and perhaps sow the seeds of discord amongst them, by telling them what their beloved leader has been doing to their friends.

Of course, the Cast ladies don't do that. Instead, Heath decides to remind us that he exists and blurts out how Zoey knows a lot of stuff, so of course she knows Venus's name that way. Although he almost makes up for it with the line "And I'm about sick of all of you fucked-up creatures". And I bet he's tired of those mother-fucking ghosts in this mother-fucking tunnel.

Zoey agrees with him on that and knows that she has to rescue him and get Stevie Rae back to normal. Yet again, the Cast ladies take what could be a decent scene and make it shallow and stupid via Zoey's inane dialogue. She actually rolls her eyes, which pretty much ruins any tension or sorrow they were going for.

And speaking of ruining tension, guess what happens next. Go on. You've had your guess? Alright.

Zoey and Heath start to argue about whether or not they're dating.

They are trapped in a tunnel with a group of murderous undead fledglings and they're bickering about whether or not a relationship will work out for them.

Excuse me for a minute, ladies and gentlemen.

*beats head against wall several times*

That's better. The red-eyed ghosts are just as baffled as I am. Elliot (who still is given the modifier of "creature", even though NO OTHER RED-EYED GHOST IS) asks what they're doing. That is a very good question. Zoey turns to Stevie Rae and, in a scene that does actually work well, tells her to explain to the ghosts what's going on. Stevie Rae is disgusted, but tells the others that Zoey and Heath are showing off their humanity. Huh. And here I thought they were being dumbasses. *muses*

The red-eyed ghosts get all freaked out at this, and Zoey compares their reaction to having holy water thrown on them (and she also pauses to go on about how holy water totally doesn't affect vampires and is a malicious lie, which begs the question of why she made the comparision in the first place then). Venus and Elliot go on about how humanity is stupid and pointless and a weakness, and Zoey says bullshit to that. I have to ask, how is humanity being defined here? Because I've read the Fledgling Handbook 101, and there's nothing but references to how humans are always being so narrow-minded and bigoted. Zoey talks about how narrow-minded and bigoted humans are. In this very chapter, she says she isn't human anymore! The series in general treats vampires and humans as different species. So it really loses its impact for Zoey to declare how great humanity is, when she and the rest of the vampires do nothing but bash humans.

Stevie Rae agrees with the others that they have no humanity left, and Zoey outright says that it's entirely possible that the other red-eyed ghosts are soulless monsters, but Stevie Rae certainly isn't. That's so nice of her, just dismissing the rest of them like that and only thinking her friend is worthy of redemption.

We get more stupid banter between Heath and Zoey and JESUS CHRIST, DO SOMETHING!!! Fucking a - this is the climax of the novel!!! We've spent this entire fucking chapter DOING NOTHING BUT STANDING AROUND AND LISTENING TO INANE DIALOGUE OH MY GOD SOMEONE SHOOT ME IN THE HEAD

*SMACKS SELF IN FACE WITH 2X4*

*mops up bloody nose* Okay, I'm good now. Sorry about that.

So finally, Stevie Rae tells them that Zoey and Heath have seen to much and to kill them (which, I might add, Elliott had been saying for this entire chapter). She leaves and the other red-eyed ghosts close in. Heath is still willing to take them in a fight, but Zoey just summons fire on command again and says that anyone who stops her from rescuing Heath is getting their asses fried. To prove her point, she blasts one of the ghosts that tries to leap at Heath. We find out that it's Elizabeth, the girl who showed up a grand total of three times in the last book and wasn't mentioned since. Zoey uses water to douse the body and does mention that she feels sick, but she gets over killing someone she used to know awfully fast. Meanwhile, ten bucks says that Elizabeth is completely forgotten and her parents aren't told about this.

Zoey grabs Heath and...just leaves. That's it. They start walking out of the tunnels and the red-eyed ghosts follow them, but don't actually attack or call for Neferet or anything. So, this is what we get as the climax of our story. NOTHING AT ALL! WHERE IS THE CONFLICT?

Oh, wait. Apparently the conflict is supposed to be the angst about Stevie Rae. Because as they're walking out of the tunnels, Zoey tells Heath to wait a minute while she sumons the element of Earth. They are underground, surrounded by a bunch of kids who would love to kill them, with only Zoey's powers keeping them safe and alive, and Zoey decides to just stop and summon an element to get to Stevie Rae.

I'm not even going to bother. I just want this chapter over and done with already.

Zoey gets a vision of Stevie Rae crying...for some reason. No, it's not explained. She decides that it's a start and...figures she ought to collapse the tunnel. Again, I don't get the reasoning for that. We were just told that the red-eyed ghosts didn't dare attack them, and I would imagine that any high school student would know that collapsing a part of a tunnel, unless she really knew what she was doing, would be a Very Bad Idea.

But no, this is all done as casually as you please and the tunnels don't all cave in and kill everyone. We also get no mention of the red-eyed ghosts panicking at the collapsing tunnel, or trying to make a break and get to Zoey and Heath. They might as well not be there. Anyway, the way is blocked but Zoey knows that there are other tunnels and they need to leave before the red-eyed ghosts use them to catch up again. She's conveniently all weak from what she just did, even though summoning fire didn't cause any fatigue and she didn't really seem to be exerting herself there. Of course, we all know that it's an excuse for her to take comfort in Heath's manly arms (I'm sure Kristen loved this all immensely), all while being distracted by the nummy blood oozing from Heath's cuts, which have conveniently re-opened in the very banal escape.

Heath draws her in and says he knows what she wants and, oh baby, take him right there. Actually, he tells her to drink his blood to recover her strength. Basically the same thing, though. All I can say is time and place, you lunatic! That right there is proof that the boy ain't right in the head! There's no reason they can't get outside and then let Zoey snack on him! What is up with these people? This is the stupidest rescue mission ever!!!

Gah!

So yes, Zoey does start munching on Heath and rubbing her hips against his and goes into how good it tastes, and dude, you are basically having sex in old tunnels full of monsters. What is WRONG WITH YOU???

And then Stevie Rae shouts for them to kill her, and I would like to second that motion. And there, we end our chapter.

This is supposed to be the climax, ladies and gentlemen.

*weeps*
Onward to: Chapter 30

Back to: Chapter 28

Back to: Table of Contents

book 2, suethor: kristin cast, fic: betrayed, chapter 29, series: house of night, suethor: pc cast

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