Marked: Chapter Six
ZeldaQueen: Alrighty, time we got to the infamous House of Night. Also, someone with sense created an It Just Bugs Me page for Hogwarts Exposed, so all tropers, feel free to contribute!
Projection Room Voices: Starting Media in 3...2...1...
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Chapter Six
ZeldaQueen: Zoey is in the middle of having a nice dream about her grandmother, when she remembers the whole turning into a vampire thing, freaks out, and wakes up. Grandma Redbird is there, and to give credit, it is nice to finally have a guardian who actually seems to care about their kid, or grandkid in this case. Anyway, she tells Zoey that she found her bloody and unconscious and freaked out, before bringing her to the House of Night. So we finally are there, thank the dear and ever-loving God. Grandma Redbird adds that she called Zoey's mother and "I had to pretend that my cell phone cut out so I could hang up on her. I'm afraid she's not happy with either of us". Zoey has a giggle over how funny it is that her mother is upset with the two of them, and I have to wonder why her mom hasn't called the frigging police. I mean Zoey's mother gets a call which apparently went something like "Oh hey, your daughter randomly showed up at my place and I found on the cliffs, passed out and with her head cracked open like a coconut. She also appears to have been Marked as a vampire and I'm just going to drive her away to this weird place where we don't know if she can ever come back again. What's that? You had no idea she was leaving? You thought she was still in her room? You don't want me to take her there? Uh oh, my cell phone's cutting out, talktoyoulaterbye!" Isn't that grounds for kidnapping? And no, just because it's between family members doesn't mean it can't be kidnapping. Plenty of kidnappings happen within families.
Zoey claims that her parents locked her in her room - um, no they didn't, you went there yourself - and that she crawled out the window to escape. Grandma Redbird grimaces and then admits that she's surprised that this happened. No, she's not surprised that her granddaughter was Marked, because "The Redbird blood has always held strong magic; it was only a matter of time before one of us was Chosen". So apparently it's family tradition to be initiated into a vampire school? I don't know! But no, what's so shocking is that Zoey's Mark is completely colored in, instead of just being an outline. Zoey is also shocked by this, and I'm sure that if we were given any sort of backstory to this world and what something like this would imply, we would be just as shocked as well.
A previously-unmentioned third person speaks up at this point, disappointed that Zoey couldn't explain why her Mark was filled in. Zoey turns and we get the description of our first actual vampire
"Her voice was amazing. Even before I looked up from my reflection I knew she would be unique and incredible. I was right. She was movie-star beautiful, Barbie beautiful. I'd never seen anyone up close who was so perfect. She had huge, almond-shaped eyes that were a deep, mossy green. Her face was an almost perfect heart and her skin was that kind of flawless creaminess that you see on TV. Her hair was deep red-not that horrid carrottop orange-red or the washed-out blond-red, but a dark, glossy auburn that fell in heavy waves well past her shoulders. Her body was, well, perfect. She wasn't thin like the freak girls who puked and starved themselves into what they thought was Paris Hilton chic. ("That's Hott." Yeah, okay, whatever, Paris.) This woman's body was perfect because she was strong, but curvy. And she had great boobs. (I wish I had great boobs.)"
ZeldaQueen: Fuck, not this crap again! Just for once, can't we get vampires that aren't always hot? I mean, I know the idea is that it's easier to get prey and all, but this just gets ridiculous!
Not to mention it makes Zoey comes across as airheaded and shallow. Carrot orange-red and blond-red are both undesirable colors? Oh, really? And what were those asides about Paris Hilton and the boobs supposed to show? They were completely unrelated to what was going on! Jesus Christ!
I'm sorry. I have a rather low tolerance for airheaded teen talk like that.
The woman smiles and Zoey pointedly mentions that she has no fangs, and for some reason sees this as reason to bring up that the lady also has a Mark and is thus a vampire. Uh, given that she was incredibly hot and at a vampire school, that reveal wasn't as shocking as I'd imagine the Suethors were going for.
So yeah, the lady is Neferet, High Priestess of the House of Night. She explains that a filled-in Mark means that a vampire is fully mature however Zoey is still a fledgling, hence why it's so odd. Neferet then tells Zoey that because being a vampire is soooo speshul, she gets to pick the new name that she gets for the rest of her life. Zoey sticks with "Zoey Redbird", and in a better work of literature, I would imagine that this would be used to show how she is true to herself or wanting to keep something of her human life. Given how this is being written, I'm kind of doubting that.
Neferet grabs Zoey's arm as...some vampiric handshake I guess, and we get this
"Her touch was warm and firm. Her smile blazed with welcome. She was amazing and awe-inspiring. Actually, she was what all vampyres are, more than human -stronger, smarter, more talented. She looked like someone had turned on a blazing inner light within her, which I realize is definitely an ironic description considering the vampyre stereotypes (some of which I already knew were totally true): They avoid sunlight, they're most powerful at night, they need to drink blood to survive (eesh!), and they worship a goddess who is known as Night personified"
ZeldaQueen: Oh yeah, "more talented" my ass. Looks like we're getting another case of "vampires are better than humans, nyah!" And that switch to the info dump about vampire stereotypes? That was just clumsy and badly done, period.
So back to Zoey and how speshul she is. Bet you all missed that. Neferet asks if anything odd happened to Zoey and Zoey lies and just says she passed out and can't remember anything. So yeah, time for Zoey to meet her roommate! Hooray, I guess! Grandma Redbird is still worried about her granddaughter's health, so Neferet makes a Solemn Oath (book's capitalizations, not mine) and this puts her at ease. I, only the other hand, feel the urge to scream, mostly because it reminds me of far too many Harry Potter fanfictions.
Grandma Redbird leaves, and Zoey starts to think of how cool it would be to be a High Priestess, for no reason that I can see. She also thinks that there's just no way in hell she'll be one, so best to just forget about it. Yeah, I think most of us know where this will be going
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Onward to: Chapter 7
Back to: Chapter 5
Back to: Table of Contents
Projection Room Voices: Starting Media in 3...2...1...
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Chapter Six
ZeldaQueen: Zoey is in the middle of having a nice dream about her grandmother, when she remembers the whole turning into a vampire thing, freaks out, and wakes up. Grandma Redbird is there, and to give credit, it is nice to finally have a guardian who actually seems to care about their kid, or grandkid in this case. Anyway, she tells Zoey that she found her bloody and unconscious and freaked out, before bringing her to the House of Night. So we finally are there, thank the dear and ever-loving God. Grandma Redbird adds that she called Zoey's mother and "I had to pretend that my cell phone cut out so I could hang up on her. I'm afraid she's not happy with either of us". Zoey has a giggle over how funny it is that her mother is upset with the two of them, and I have to wonder why her mom hasn't called the frigging police. I mean Zoey's mother gets a call which apparently went something like "Oh hey, your daughter randomly showed up at my place and I found on the cliffs, passed out and with her head cracked open like a coconut. She also appears to have been Marked as a vampire and I'm just going to drive her away to this weird place where we don't know if she can ever come back again. What's that? You had no idea she was leaving? You thought she was still in her room? You don't want me to take her there? Uh oh, my cell phone's cutting out, talktoyoulaterbye!" Isn't that grounds for kidnapping? And no, just because it's between family members doesn't mean it can't be kidnapping. Plenty of kidnappings happen within families.
Zoey claims that her parents locked her in her room - um, no they didn't, you went there yourself - and that she crawled out the window to escape. Grandma Redbird grimaces and then admits that she's surprised that this happened. No, she's not surprised that her granddaughter was Marked, because "The Redbird blood has always held strong magic; it was only a matter of time before one of us was Chosen". So apparently it's family tradition to be initiated into a vampire school? I don't know! But no, what's so shocking is that Zoey's Mark is completely colored in, instead of just being an outline. Zoey is also shocked by this, and I'm sure that if we were given any sort of backstory to this world and what something like this would imply, we would be just as shocked as well.
A previously-unmentioned third person speaks up at this point, disappointed that Zoey couldn't explain why her Mark was filled in. Zoey turns and we get the description of our first actual vampire
"Her voice was amazing. Even before I looked up from my reflection I knew she would be unique and incredible. I was right. She was movie-star beautiful, Barbie beautiful. I'd never seen anyone up close who was so perfect. She had huge, almond-shaped eyes that were a deep, mossy green. Her face was an almost perfect heart and her skin was that kind of flawless creaminess that you see on TV. Her hair was deep red-not that horrid carrottop orange-red or the washed-out blond-red, but a dark, glossy auburn that fell in heavy waves well past her shoulders. Her body was, well, perfect. She wasn't thin like the freak girls who puked and starved themselves into what they thought was Paris Hilton chic. ("That's Hott." Yeah, okay, whatever, Paris.) This woman's body was perfect because she was strong, but curvy. And she had great boobs. (I wish I had great boobs.)"
ZeldaQueen: Fuck, not this crap again! Just for once, can't we get vampires that aren't always hot? I mean, I know the idea is that it's easier to get prey and all, but this just gets ridiculous!
Not to mention it makes Zoey comes across as airheaded and shallow. Carrot orange-red and blond-red are both undesirable colors? Oh, really? And what were those asides about Paris Hilton and the boobs supposed to show? They were completely unrelated to what was going on! Jesus Christ!
I'm sorry. I have a rather low tolerance for airheaded teen talk like that.
The woman smiles and Zoey pointedly mentions that she has no fangs, and for some reason sees this as reason to bring up that the lady also has a Mark and is thus a vampire. Uh, given that she was incredibly hot and at a vampire school, that reveal wasn't as shocking as I'd imagine the Suethors were going for.
So yeah, the lady is Neferet, High Priestess of the House of Night. She explains that a filled-in Mark means that a vampire is fully mature however Zoey is still a fledgling, hence why it's so odd. Neferet then tells Zoey that because being a vampire is soooo speshul, she gets to pick the new name that she gets for the rest of her life. Zoey sticks with "Zoey Redbird", and in a better work of literature, I would imagine that this would be used to show how she is true to herself or wanting to keep something of her human life. Given how this is being written, I'm kind of doubting that.
Neferet grabs Zoey's arm as...some vampiric handshake I guess, and we get this
"Her touch was warm and firm. Her smile blazed with welcome. She was amazing and awe-inspiring. Actually, she was what all vampyres are, more than human -stronger, smarter, more talented. She looked like someone had turned on a blazing inner light within her, which I realize is definitely an ironic description considering the vampyre stereotypes (some of which I already knew were totally true): They avoid sunlight, they're most powerful at night, they need to drink blood to survive (eesh!), and they worship a goddess who is known as Night personified"
ZeldaQueen: Oh yeah, "more talented" my ass. Looks like we're getting another case of "vampires are better than humans, nyah!" And that switch to the info dump about vampire stereotypes? That was just clumsy and badly done, period.
So back to Zoey and how speshul she is. Bet you all missed that. Neferet asks if anything odd happened to Zoey and Zoey lies and just says she passed out and can't remember anything. So yeah, time for Zoey to meet her roommate! Hooray, I guess! Grandma Redbird is still worried about her granddaughter's health, so Neferet makes a Solemn Oath (book's capitalizations, not mine) and this puts her at ease. I, only the other hand, feel the urge to scream, mostly because it reminds me of far too many Harry Potter fanfictions.
Grandma Redbird leaves, and Zoey starts to think of how cool it would be to be a High Priestess, for no reason that I can see. She also thinks that there's just no way in hell she'll be one, so best to just forget about it. Yeah, I think most of us know where this will be going
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Onward to: Chapter 7
Back to: Chapter 5
Back to: Table of Contents