FLIRT, CHAPTER 8, PART 2
Feb. 12th, 2013 12:08 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
a_sporking_ratAt my request, this pretty awesome spork/chapter-by-chapter review blog is currently featuring the second Merry Gentry book
http://creativedoubledipper.blogspot.com/
Through this, I learned about Kitto. Kitto is one of Merry's men, a phrase which always makes me think of Robin Hood. Kitto is half sidhe, half snake goblin. Ok, so far so good.
Kitto is, like Nathaniel, described as very child-like...and he's also child-sized. Like about the size of a twelve year old. And she keeps him under her desk at work and pets him like a cat to calm herself. Uhhh.
And this excerpt...oh my god:
He clambered into my lap like a child, forcing my hands to encircle him to keep him from falling. My right hand slid over the slickness of the scales on his back; my left cupped the smooth, hairless curve of his thigh. The sidhe didn’t have much body hair, and snake goblins had none. The mixed heritage had left Kitto smooth and perfect like he’d been waxed from neck to toe. It added to the doll-like image and made him seem perpetually childlike.
I don't think I need to say anything at all. This points out all the creepy on its own.
FLIRT, CHAPTER 8, PART 2 in which Anita commits needless murder now that she's covered needless rape (and it's not just Silas!)
Jacob agrees to let Anita kill Silas. Ellen begs him not to, so he screams at her CAN YOU RAISE THE DEAD HUH CAN YOU THEN STFU because Ellen seems to exist basically so her powers can be called insufficient by everyone despite the fact she's done her job just fine. That's what she gets for having a vagina, I guess. And yes, I am 100% sure she has a vagina, because transgender people do not exist in the Anitaverse...and thank goodness for that because, given the way she portrayed an intersexual crossdresser, I really don't wanna know what LKH would do with a person who was trans.
Nicky asks Anita what he can do to help (to help KILL YOUR FELLOW PRIDE MEMBER?!) and Anita just tells him to stay close. Jacob tells Anita she needs to put up a circle of power, and Anita says that "Ellen's put up a circle so wide and deep that I can't feel anything from my vampire master or the men I'm tied to metaphysically. I think her circle will keep out any damn thing." Oh so NOW her circle gets credit as soon as having it up will keep Anita from having to do the work of putting her up her own! Jacob asks what she means by this, she says to give her a blade "so I can finish him." Fucking murderer. Also, instead of saying all that...she could have just said "Ellen's circle will work just fine and it's already up, so let's use that." We already KNEW it cuts you off from everybody. Also it makes me snicker that her logic is "oh well since it can cut ME off then I guess absolutely NOTHING else could possibly get through it, because what's stronger than ME?"
Jacob gives her a hunting knife, and of course it's only ALMOST as big as the one that she had strapped to her back. Anita asks the crying Ellen if she can hold the circle, Ellen glares and says she can and that Anita had better be as good as her reputation. Hey Ellen, maybe you should just collapse the circle right now. True, it'll bring Anita's men running when she contacts them, but I think if Jacob helps you and Silas could make a getaway before that happens. And if Jacob doesn't...well, I think Silas would rather go down like that then be used like a damn chicken in a sacrifice.
Anita bends Silas's neck back and Nicky makes a remark about how you only do that in the movies and how it makes more sense to do it this way instead (LKH really, really likes making remarks about how such and such is only this way in the movies YES I GET IT, YOU DO RESEARCH AND KNOW ALL THE THINGS). Anita cuts his throat and monologues about all the power you get from killing a human and how you get even more from "someone who wasn't a person, but something more than human." Uh, being a therian doesn't mean he's not a person. I think you should rethink that word choice, Anita.
Anita puts her bloody hands on the grave and calls for Ilsa Bennington and "I shoved the power into the grave, into the pieces of body, and there was so much power. I felt her re-form, felt pieces coming together that weren't in the grave. The power remade her into something perfect and whole, and that something grabbed my hands through the dirt, and I pulled it from the grave."
Ilsa does indeed come up as a whole human body, not even a scrape. Somehow she's even wearing perfect makeup. Okay, I get this is magic, but I don't think animation, or even necromancy, should be able to regrow a human body into a perfect state when it was just charred bits. Why? Because necromancy is by definition DEATH magic. It should have nothing to do with growth and rejuvenation and healing, even of the dead, at least in my opinion. And I don't see HOW the fuck she got MAKEUP on. I don't think it could possibly be funeral makeup, because I feel like it was made pretty clear there wasn't enough of her body left for that. Necromancy making messed-up remains into whole bodies again I may not be on board with (at least not in the way it's done here; if it made them into creepy ugly abominations, I'd be down with it) but I could be okay with it just as YMMV thing, but NECROMANCY MAKING PERFECT MAKEUP APPEAR? That's just...stupid doesn't even begin to cover it.
Ilsa's eyes are still empty though (as in expression, I mean, her eye sockets themselves aren't empty!), so Anita takes blood from Silas's neck and puts it to Ilsa's lips. She licks it and then "she was suddenly in there." Ilsa looks around and Tony comes to her and she asks him what's going on and is that a dead guy? Tony walks "his dead wife" away from the grave and Anita talks about how there is still SO MUCH POWER from Silas's death inside her and how "it pulsed through me, hammered along my bones" and that's actually pretty cool to me and then she falls on the grave writhing in pain from it and how it wants to be used. Okay, awesome. This is stuff I like. This is the necromancy I signed up for.
Nicky kneels by her and asks what's wrong, she says that was too much power for her to be raising just one zombie, and Nicky logically points out that they're in a cemetery so maybe she could raise some others?
...I feel like there are probably grave-tampering laws against that in the Anitaverse. Or at least there should be. It's kind of unpleasant to think that someone with the right magical abilities could just yank your loved one up out of the ground if they wanted to any time they felt like it, after all.
So Anita brings up every body in the cemetery, and they haven't been all prettied up like Ilsa. The power it takes to do this shatters Ellen's circle, and Anita feels that Jean-Claude is less than two hours away and that all her men are safe and some are on their way. She hears Jacob yell at Ellen because "You stupid bitch. You didn't just shield her from her people, you cut me off from ours. They were captured hours ago." Then he hits her so hard she falls down and stays there. Guess we couldn't have her getting uppity after Anita said her circle was passable. How did it take Jacob this long to NOTICE he was out of contact with the other lions, though? To the point he didn't realize it until the contact was resumed? That seems weird. Also, way to take the 'now what do we do about the snipers' problem out of it, LKH. That could have been pretty cool to have to deal with. Instead it just worked itself out on its own offscreen. Alas. And wait, since when are therian leaders in constant psychic contact with their people anyway? Is it just Jacob because he had Ellen there to link them all up, or is this another super-inconsistency?
While Ellen is getting beaten up by her Rex, Ilsa is "having hysterics" over how ugly the zombies are and has to be soothed by her husband. Jacob goes over to Tony and states the obvious, that he has what he wanted, and Tony agrees that "she's perfect" so Jacob asks him to transfer the rest of the funds and Tony says he will once "my wife" is safely home. Jacob says that three of his men are captured, one is killed, one is lost to me, and that he's just hit Ellen...because that last part is not his fault somehow I guess...and that Tony had better "make the damn call now." Tony does so and tells him it should be in his account now. Jacob checks his own phone, confirms it, and says he can take Ilsa home now.
Tony tells Ilsa not to be afraid, Anita tells Jacob the obvious (that he has his money) and then that Ilsa is going to rot, that "even with this much power, she won't hold together." Firstly, why should Jacob care about this? Second, why couldn't Anita send all that excess power from Silas into Ilsa instead of using it to raise all those other zombies, and that could make her last longer, if still not permanently? Anita asks Jacob "how do you think a man like Tony Bennington will take it when his flirty wife starts to forget she's alive and starts to rot?" I like that she has to point out Ilsa was flirty, lest we forget the very forced title of this book. And what kind of man is Tony? So far, he's shown to be a guy who operates out of grief and has no malice towards anyone. He even admitted he had second thoughts about this and was going to call it off, but then seeing Anita with her men reminded him of what he lost. He doesn't seem like a vindictive person (he doesn't even come off as particularly mad at Anita for originally refusing him, just desperate and jealous) or someone who would take it out on Jacob (which would make no sense and be very dangerous) when things went wrong.
Nicky says that "He'll go to the cops" (uhhhh, and that makes sense HOW, considering he'd basically be turning himself in too in that case?) and Anita says "or he'll hire someone else expensive to hunt you down, and he'll kill my flirty boys if he can't have his flirty girl."
JUST IN CASE YOU GUYS FORGOT, THIS NOVELLA IS CALLED FLIRT AND THIS IS WHY DID YOU GET THAT IT'S FLIRT BECAUSE FLIRTY PEOPLE FLIRTING WHO LIKE TO FLIRT
What Anita is saying makes no sense at all. If Tony was going to go after someone for Ilsa rotting, it would be Anita, not Jacob and his Pride. Anita is the one who raised her, so if he was going to blame someone when she rots, it would logically be Anita. Jacob and the others have nothing to do with bringing Ilsa back and keeping her whole. That was Anita's job and hers alone, impossible or not. So yeah, he might go and have someone kill Anita's men, and that might lead Anita to go to the police and get Jacob's Pride arrested along with Tony...except that killing Anita's precious "flirty boys" will most likely kill her as well. And even if it didn't, Tony could still rat her out for Silas's murder, which she could try to spin as self-defense ("I had to sacrifice someone or they'd kill me") but given the bias against animators in this universe, I doubt she'd get away scot-free. Actually, come to think of it, that means that killing Anita's guys anyway is probably the best way for Jacob to keep the whole thing shut up, not killing Tony. Which is what Anita is trying to justify doing here. No, seriously. Jacob asks her what she's asking him, and she says she's asking him not to interfere, he asks what she's going to do, and she says "Something symmetrical."
He understands what she means by this, and says he won't stop her. Anita tells Nicky and Jacob to stand by her because "zombies aren't particularly smart". And, uh, I guess Ellen, who is still presumably unconscious and helpless on the ground, is just gonna be left to chance? Oh, right, sorry, vagina, forgot. Luckily for her, Jacob thinks to grab her and make sure she isn't eaten or stepped on. I feel like Anita might be disappointed with that. Then Anita tells the zombies to "Kill him" while picturing Tony's face. They move forward and surround Tony, who asks "Mr. Leon" what is going on, and Jacob just says "It's symmetry, Tony."
It's really not. I don't think LKH knows what that word means. I think she might mean "cyclical" or something like that. Although I still don't think this situation counts as such, myself. Though that may be because I'm just so disgusted with Anita right now. She is not in danger. Her men are not in danger. And out of all the people in this graveyard, it's actually more likely that Jacob and his people will kill Anita and/or her harem than it is that Tony will harm her guys, for the reasons I just explained. She has no reason to be killing Tony right now aside from sheer spite and vengeance, and while that COULD be pulled off well by someone else, I'm sure, it's not here. It makes Anita look not only like a petty murderer, but also a stupid one, since, again, Jacob has a logical reason to want Anita dead RIGHT NOW, while Tony only MAY have that as an emotional reaction later.
But Tony is human, and he didn't have the hots for her like the lion guys did, and he had the audacity to love a BLONDE woman. So I guess he just has to die.
Which he does. The zombies, including Ilsa, eat him. According to Anita, "It was like every horror movie you can imagine, but worse." and stuff about how real bones are whiter and real blood is darker and yes I get it it is the grossest most edgy thing ever but god forbid you just actually describe it. No, she just tells us how bad it is while saying absolutely nothing about what it actually looks, sounds, and/or smells like. Man, you know what I love about Stephen King's horror? How he fucking lingers over every bit of pus and blood and entrails. He does not skimp on gore. He doesn't just TELL us it's bad. He SHOWS it. Big-time.
And then the zombies go eat Silas. I don't think LKH meant to, but Anita implies that Silas is still alive, even though he can't be since his death powered all this.
The zombies then look at Anita for what to do next and gives this paragraph-long monologue of trying-to-be-dark nothing about how "there are things that wait in the dark, that wait for a chance to find a body they can walk around in, things that were never human" and it would be really cool if zombie were possessed by these things but it's never expanded on in the series at all so clearly she's just saying this for the it-sounds-cool factor and then forgot it, and she looks at the zombies and says she realizes "I could keep the dead" and keep them animated as her own private army. Wow, that's the first interesting idea she's had in, like, forever. Jacob and Nicky get freaked because they can see "something in their eyes" and Anita says it's "shadows" and then she sends them back to their graves. Since Tony wouldn't let them bring salt, and so she uses "steel, and grave dirt, and power" to put them back and somehow manages to bring up the fact that she does judo. We also get a neat tidbit that "something about them eating human flesh without a circle of power" has caused the "shadows" in the zombies eyes and that "it kept things out" was one of the reasons for putting up circles. Ugggh, that is so cool, I WANT MORE POSSESSED ZOMBIES, WHY COULDN'T THE BOOK BE ABOUT THAT?
She then monologues her history of being an animator, the whole dead dog and dead professor gig, and a lot of purple prose about how she can call the dead...because we didn't know that. And in the process of sending them back, she shoves her power into them and "something shoved back" but instead of sticking around and BEING CREEPY AWESOME "the bodies were too much mine" and so they obey her. Poop. Ilsa is mentioned as still being a "lovely flirt." She's still a flirt as a ZOMBIE? What, was she making eyes at the other undead?
You remember how I said that this reminded me of the second book, with Harold Gaynor? Guy comes in, wants zombie raised, Anita won't do it even with a crazy amount of money offered, etc.? It ends like the second book too--there's a human sacrifice (but not of the intended victim) to raise not only the intended zombie but also the entire cemetery, that Anita then orders to kill the guy who wanted the zombie raised even though he is no immediate threat to her. That was what happened to Gaynor. He was a bad guy, but he was also unable to do anything to harm Anita or even to get away from the zombies, since he was in a wheelchair. She pretty much murdered a helpless man out of vengeance BOTH these times in the SAME way. I wonder if Miss Knows Everything About Serial Killers Anita Blake would class this as a pattern like she did beautiful vampire men who were burned by priests? *eyeroll*
Seriously, there's just nothing heroic about this. Not even in a dark antihero way. And unlike in a dark antihero type series, there's never any moral questions raised by either the narrative or by the protagonist. Seriously, she even acknowledges this: "I'd been arrogant, and I prayed for forgiveness for that particular sin. Killing Bennington didn't bother me."
...killing an unarmed man who was not attacking you and who was not guaranteed to harm you or your loved ones later? That doesn't bother you? And you don't think God has a problem with that either? I thought you were Christian? Like, it's been awhile since I stepped in a church or read any kind of religious material, but I am pretty sure the Christian God in EVERY denomination frowns on that kind of thing. I wish Ellen would wake up now and get her back for the "harm none" line by reminding her "Thou Shalt Not Kill".
Jacob tells Anita she almost got them eaten alive (and she would have if she had any brains--it wouldn't be moral at all either, but it would be smart as long as she's gonna go murdering people anyway) and Anita points out that he had her kidnapped and Jacob nods. He also says that Ellen will be alright and Anita snarks in her head "as if someone had asked the question." Yeah, Jacob, jeez, why the fuck would Anita care about a WOMAN, eeew, what do you think she is some lesbo?
Jacob looks at his gun and Anita can tell he is thinking about shooting her I guess because she tells him "Don't" and he says "Why not? You don't have any more zombies to eat me" and Nicky says "Don't" and Jacob is like "You'll kill for her, won't you?" and Nicky nods. Yeah, plug her now, Jacob. His being bonded to her means he'll die the second she does, and it would be a mercy at this point. Instead, Jacob just says he wishes he never took this job, and Anita says she does too. SO DO I, THEN THIS BOOK WOULD NEVER HAVE HAPPENED.
Jacob says that Anita's people tortured his lions to find out where she was, Nicky says their Pride would have done the same (so...Anita's people do the same as the bad guys? what makes them different then?) and Jacob says that Anita has destroyed his Pride and Anita says "You destroyed it when you put yourself on the wrong side of me and mine." OOOH, BADASS! You can still put a bullet in her head now for it, Jacob. But instead he says he's just going to try to get out of here before Anita's people get there and makes a joke about how Anita doesn't need rescuing BECAUSE SHE'S SO BADASS HURRDURR...yeah, against completely incompetent excuses for villains, sure. He also says that if her name ever comes up in a job again, he won't take it and "there isn't a price tag big enough to get me to come near you again." I agree, Jacob, I'd feel the same...for different reasons though, maybe.
Nicky hugs Anita and tells Jacob he isn't leaving, Jacob says he knows and that "I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to leave" and that "I'd put a sign above St. Louis for all the hired thugs, if I could."
...do hired thugs actually REFER to themselves as hired thugs?
Anita, who is clearly fishing for compliments in my opinion, asks what that sign would say, and the answer is "Here is a bigger motherfucker than you are."
SO THE CHAPTER ENDS WITH THE VILLAIN JUST KISSING HER ASS ABOUT HOW COOL AND TOUGH SHE IS. SERIOUSLY. WHAT THE FUCK.
He gives her weapons back to her, takes Ellen, and leaves. And she totally knows he'll never be back because her lioness says so. I am really too stunned by the badness of this chapter to snark anymore on it.
http://creativedoubledipper.blogspot.com/
Through this, I learned about Kitto. Kitto is one of Merry's men, a phrase which always makes me think of Robin Hood. Kitto is half sidhe, half snake goblin. Ok, so far so good.
Kitto is, like Nathaniel, described as very child-like...and he's also child-sized. Like about the size of a twelve year old. And she keeps him under her desk at work and pets him like a cat to calm herself. Uhhh.
And this excerpt...oh my god:
He clambered into my lap like a child, forcing my hands to encircle him to keep him from falling. My right hand slid over the slickness of the scales on his back; my left cupped the smooth, hairless curve of his thigh. The sidhe didn’t have much body hair, and snake goblins had none. The mixed heritage had left Kitto smooth and perfect like he’d been waxed from neck to toe. It added to the doll-like image and made him seem perpetually childlike.
I don't think I need to say anything at all. This points out all the creepy on its own.
FLIRT, CHAPTER 8, PART 2 in which Anita commits needless murder now that she's covered needless rape (and it's not just Silas!)
Jacob agrees to let Anita kill Silas. Ellen begs him not to, so he screams at her CAN YOU RAISE THE DEAD HUH CAN YOU THEN STFU because Ellen seems to exist basically so her powers can be called insufficient by everyone despite the fact she's done her job just fine. That's what she gets for having a vagina, I guess. And yes, I am 100% sure she has a vagina, because transgender people do not exist in the Anitaverse...and thank goodness for that because, given the way she portrayed an intersexual crossdresser, I really don't wanna know what LKH would do with a person who was trans.
Nicky asks Anita what he can do to help (to help KILL YOUR FELLOW PRIDE MEMBER?!) and Anita just tells him to stay close. Jacob tells Anita she needs to put up a circle of power, and Anita says that "Ellen's put up a circle so wide and deep that I can't feel anything from my vampire master or the men I'm tied to metaphysically. I think her circle will keep out any damn thing." Oh so NOW her circle gets credit as soon as having it up will keep Anita from having to do the work of putting her up her own! Jacob asks what she means by this, she says to give her a blade "so I can finish him." Fucking murderer. Also, instead of saying all that...she could have just said "Ellen's circle will work just fine and it's already up, so let's use that." We already KNEW it cuts you off from everybody. Also it makes me snicker that her logic is "oh well since it can cut ME off then I guess absolutely NOTHING else could possibly get through it, because what's stronger than ME?"
Jacob gives her a hunting knife, and of course it's only ALMOST as big as the one that she had strapped to her back. Anita asks the crying Ellen if she can hold the circle, Ellen glares and says she can and that Anita had better be as good as her reputation. Hey Ellen, maybe you should just collapse the circle right now. True, it'll bring Anita's men running when she contacts them, but I think if Jacob helps you and Silas could make a getaway before that happens. And if Jacob doesn't...well, I think Silas would rather go down like that then be used like a damn chicken in a sacrifice.
Anita bends Silas's neck back and Nicky makes a remark about how you only do that in the movies and how it makes more sense to do it this way instead (LKH really, really likes making remarks about how such and such is only this way in the movies YES I GET IT, YOU DO RESEARCH AND KNOW ALL THE THINGS). Anita cuts his throat and monologues about all the power you get from killing a human and how you get even more from "someone who wasn't a person, but something more than human." Uh, being a therian doesn't mean he's not a person. I think you should rethink that word choice, Anita.
Anita puts her bloody hands on the grave and calls for Ilsa Bennington and "I shoved the power into the grave, into the pieces of body, and there was so much power. I felt her re-form, felt pieces coming together that weren't in the grave. The power remade her into something perfect and whole, and that something grabbed my hands through the dirt, and I pulled it from the grave."
Ilsa does indeed come up as a whole human body, not even a scrape. Somehow she's even wearing perfect makeup. Okay, I get this is magic, but I don't think animation, or even necromancy, should be able to regrow a human body into a perfect state when it was just charred bits. Why? Because necromancy is by definition DEATH magic. It should have nothing to do with growth and rejuvenation and healing, even of the dead, at least in my opinion. And I don't see HOW the fuck she got MAKEUP on. I don't think it could possibly be funeral makeup, because I feel like it was made pretty clear there wasn't enough of her body left for that. Necromancy making messed-up remains into whole bodies again I may not be on board with (at least not in the way it's done here; if it made them into creepy ugly abominations, I'd be down with it) but I could be okay with it just as YMMV thing, but NECROMANCY MAKING PERFECT MAKEUP APPEAR? That's just...stupid doesn't even begin to cover it.
Ilsa's eyes are still empty though (as in expression, I mean, her eye sockets themselves aren't empty!), so Anita takes blood from Silas's neck and puts it to Ilsa's lips. She licks it and then "she was suddenly in there." Ilsa looks around and Tony comes to her and she asks him what's going on and is that a dead guy? Tony walks "his dead wife" away from the grave and Anita talks about how there is still SO MUCH POWER from Silas's death inside her and how "it pulsed through me, hammered along my bones" and that's actually pretty cool to me and then she falls on the grave writhing in pain from it and how it wants to be used. Okay, awesome. This is stuff I like. This is the necromancy I signed up for.
Nicky kneels by her and asks what's wrong, she says that was too much power for her to be raising just one zombie, and Nicky logically points out that they're in a cemetery so maybe she could raise some others?
...I feel like there are probably grave-tampering laws against that in the Anitaverse. Or at least there should be. It's kind of unpleasant to think that someone with the right magical abilities could just yank your loved one up out of the ground if they wanted to any time they felt like it, after all.
So Anita brings up every body in the cemetery, and they haven't been all prettied up like Ilsa. The power it takes to do this shatters Ellen's circle, and Anita feels that Jean-Claude is less than two hours away and that all her men are safe and some are on their way. She hears Jacob yell at Ellen because "You stupid bitch. You didn't just shield her from her people, you cut me off from ours. They were captured hours ago." Then he hits her so hard she falls down and stays there. Guess we couldn't have her getting uppity after Anita said her circle was passable. How did it take Jacob this long to NOTICE he was out of contact with the other lions, though? To the point he didn't realize it until the contact was resumed? That seems weird. Also, way to take the 'now what do we do about the snipers' problem out of it, LKH. That could have been pretty cool to have to deal with. Instead it just worked itself out on its own offscreen. Alas. And wait, since when are therian leaders in constant psychic contact with their people anyway? Is it just Jacob because he had Ellen there to link them all up, or is this another super-inconsistency?
While Ellen is getting beaten up by her Rex, Ilsa is "having hysterics" over how ugly the zombies are and has to be soothed by her husband. Jacob goes over to Tony and states the obvious, that he has what he wanted, and Tony agrees that "she's perfect" so Jacob asks him to transfer the rest of the funds and Tony says he will once "my wife" is safely home. Jacob says that three of his men are captured, one is killed, one is lost to me, and that he's just hit Ellen...because that last part is not his fault somehow I guess...and that Tony had better "make the damn call now." Tony does so and tells him it should be in his account now. Jacob checks his own phone, confirms it, and says he can take Ilsa home now.
Tony tells Ilsa not to be afraid, Anita tells Jacob the obvious (that he has his money) and then that Ilsa is going to rot, that "even with this much power, she won't hold together." Firstly, why should Jacob care about this? Second, why couldn't Anita send all that excess power from Silas into Ilsa instead of using it to raise all those other zombies, and that could make her last longer, if still not permanently? Anita asks Jacob "how do you think a man like Tony Bennington will take it when his flirty wife starts to forget she's alive and starts to rot?" I like that she has to point out Ilsa was flirty, lest we forget the very forced title of this book. And what kind of man is Tony? So far, he's shown to be a guy who operates out of grief and has no malice towards anyone. He even admitted he had second thoughts about this and was going to call it off, but then seeing Anita with her men reminded him of what he lost. He doesn't seem like a vindictive person (he doesn't even come off as particularly mad at Anita for originally refusing him, just desperate and jealous) or someone who would take it out on Jacob (which would make no sense and be very dangerous) when things went wrong.
Nicky says that "He'll go to the cops" (uhhhh, and that makes sense HOW, considering he'd basically be turning himself in too in that case?) and Anita says "or he'll hire someone else expensive to hunt you down, and he'll kill my flirty boys if he can't have his flirty girl."
JUST IN CASE YOU GUYS FORGOT, THIS NOVELLA IS CALLED FLIRT AND THIS IS WHY DID YOU GET THAT IT'S FLIRT BECAUSE FLIRTY PEOPLE FLIRTING WHO LIKE TO FLIRT
What Anita is saying makes no sense at all. If Tony was going to go after someone for Ilsa rotting, it would be Anita, not Jacob and his Pride. Anita is the one who raised her, so if he was going to blame someone when she rots, it would logically be Anita. Jacob and the others have nothing to do with bringing Ilsa back and keeping her whole. That was Anita's job and hers alone, impossible or not. So yeah, he might go and have someone kill Anita's men, and that might lead Anita to go to the police and get Jacob's Pride arrested along with Tony...except that killing Anita's precious "flirty boys" will most likely kill her as well. And even if it didn't, Tony could still rat her out for Silas's murder, which she could try to spin as self-defense ("I had to sacrifice someone or they'd kill me") but given the bias against animators in this universe, I doubt she'd get away scot-free. Actually, come to think of it, that means that killing Anita's guys anyway is probably the best way for Jacob to keep the whole thing shut up, not killing Tony. Which is what Anita is trying to justify doing here. No, seriously. Jacob asks her what she's asking him, and she says she's asking him not to interfere, he asks what she's going to do, and she says "Something symmetrical."
He understands what she means by this, and says he won't stop her. Anita tells Nicky and Jacob to stand by her because "zombies aren't particularly smart". And, uh, I guess Ellen, who is still presumably unconscious and helpless on the ground, is just gonna be left to chance? Oh, right, sorry, vagina, forgot. Luckily for her, Jacob thinks to grab her and make sure she isn't eaten or stepped on. I feel like Anita might be disappointed with that. Then Anita tells the zombies to "Kill him" while picturing Tony's face. They move forward and surround Tony, who asks "Mr. Leon" what is going on, and Jacob just says "It's symmetry, Tony."
It's really not. I don't think LKH knows what that word means. I think she might mean "cyclical" or something like that. Although I still don't think this situation counts as such, myself. Though that may be because I'm just so disgusted with Anita right now. She is not in danger. Her men are not in danger. And out of all the people in this graveyard, it's actually more likely that Jacob and his people will kill Anita and/or her harem than it is that Tony will harm her guys, for the reasons I just explained. She has no reason to be killing Tony right now aside from sheer spite and vengeance, and while that COULD be pulled off well by someone else, I'm sure, it's not here. It makes Anita look not only like a petty murderer, but also a stupid one, since, again, Jacob has a logical reason to want Anita dead RIGHT NOW, while Tony only MAY have that as an emotional reaction later.
But Tony is human, and he didn't have the hots for her like the lion guys did, and he had the audacity to love a BLONDE woman. So I guess he just has to die.
Which he does. The zombies, including Ilsa, eat him. According to Anita, "It was like every horror movie you can imagine, but worse." and stuff about how real bones are whiter and real blood is darker and yes I get it it is the grossest most edgy thing ever but god forbid you just actually describe it. No, she just tells us how bad it is while saying absolutely nothing about what it actually looks, sounds, and/or smells like. Man, you know what I love about Stephen King's horror? How he fucking lingers over every bit of pus and blood and entrails. He does not skimp on gore. He doesn't just TELL us it's bad. He SHOWS it. Big-time.
And then the zombies go eat Silas. I don't think LKH meant to, but Anita implies that Silas is still alive, even though he can't be since his death powered all this.
The zombies then look at Anita for what to do next and gives this paragraph-long monologue of trying-to-be-dark nothing about how "there are things that wait in the dark, that wait for a chance to find a body they can walk around in, things that were never human" and it would be really cool if zombie were possessed by these things but it's never expanded on in the series at all so clearly she's just saying this for the it-sounds-cool factor and then forgot it, and she looks at the zombies and says she realizes "I could keep the dead" and keep them animated as her own private army. Wow, that's the first interesting idea she's had in, like, forever. Jacob and Nicky get freaked because they can see "something in their eyes" and Anita says it's "shadows" and then she sends them back to their graves. Since Tony wouldn't let them bring salt, and so she uses "steel, and grave dirt, and power" to put them back and somehow manages to bring up the fact that she does judo. We also get a neat tidbit that "something about them eating human flesh without a circle of power" has caused the "shadows" in the zombies eyes and that "it kept things out" was one of the reasons for putting up circles. Ugggh, that is so cool, I WANT MORE POSSESSED ZOMBIES, WHY COULDN'T THE BOOK BE ABOUT THAT?
She then monologues her history of being an animator, the whole dead dog and dead professor gig, and a lot of purple prose about how she can call the dead...because we didn't know that. And in the process of sending them back, she shoves her power into them and "something shoved back" but instead of sticking around and BEING CREEPY AWESOME "the bodies were too much mine" and so they obey her. Poop. Ilsa is mentioned as still being a "lovely flirt." She's still a flirt as a ZOMBIE? What, was she making eyes at the other undead?
You remember how I said that this reminded me of the second book, with Harold Gaynor? Guy comes in, wants zombie raised, Anita won't do it even with a crazy amount of money offered, etc.? It ends like the second book too--there's a human sacrifice (but not of the intended victim) to raise not only the intended zombie but also the entire cemetery, that Anita then orders to kill the guy who wanted the zombie raised even though he is no immediate threat to her. That was what happened to Gaynor. He was a bad guy, but he was also unable to do anything to harm Anita or even to get away from the zombies, since he was in a wheelchair. She pretty much murdered a helpless man out of vengeance BOTH these times in the SAME way. I wonder if Miss Knows Everything About Serial Killers Anita Blake would class this as a pattern like she did beautiful vampire men who were burned by priests? *eyeroll*
Seriously, there's just nothing heroic about this. Not even in a dark antihero way. And unlike in a dark antihero type series, there's never any moral questions raised by either the narrative or by the protagonist. Seriously, she even acknowledges this: "I'd been arrogant, and I prayed for forgiveness for that particular sin. Killing Bennington didn't bother me."
...killing an unarmed man who was not attacking you and who was not guaranteed to harm you or your loved ones later? That doesn't bother you? And you don't think God has a problem with that either? I thought you were Christian? Like, it's been awhile since I stepped in a church or read any kind of religious material, but I am pretty sure the Christian God in EVERY denomination frowns on that kind of thing. I wish Ellen would wake up now and get her back for the "harm none" line by reminding her "Thou Shalt Not Kill".
Jacob tells Anita she almost got them eaten alive (and she would have if she had any brains--it wouldn't be moral at all either, but it would be smart as long as she's gonna go murdering people anyway) and Anita points out that he had her kidnapped and Jacob nods. He also says that Ellen will be alright and Anita snarks in her head "as if someone had asked the question." Yeah, Jacob, jeez, why the fuck would Anita care about a WOMAN, eeew, what do you think she is some lesbo?
Jacob looks at his gun and Anita can tell he is thinking about shooting her I guess because she tells him "Don't" and he says "Why not? You don't have any more zombies to eat me" and Nicky says "Don't" and Jacob is like "You'll kill for her, won't you?" and Nicky nods. Yeah, plug her now, Jacob. His being bonded to her means he'll die the second she does, and it would be a mercy at this point. Instead, Jacob just says he wishes he never took this job, and Anita says she does too. SO DO I, THEN THIS BOOK WOULD NEVER HAVE HAPPENED.
Jacob says that Anita's people tortured his lions to find out where she was, Nicky says their Pride would have done the same (so...Anita's people do the same as the bad guys? what makes them different then?) and Jacob says that Anita has destroyed his Pride and Anita says "You destroyed it when you put yourself on the wrong side of me and mine." OOOH, BADASS! You can still put a bullet in her head now for it, Jacob. But instead he says he's just going to try to get out of here before Anita's people get there and makes a joke about how Anita doesn't need rescuing BECAUSE SHE'S SO BADASS HURRDURR...yeah, against completely incompetent excuses for villains, sure. He also says that if her name ever comes up in a job again, he won't take it and "there isn't a price tag big enough to get me to come near you again." I agree, Jacob, I'd feel the same...for different reasons though, maybe.
Nicky hugs Anita and tells Jacob he isn't leaving, Jacob says he knows and that "I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to leave" and that "I'd put a sign above St. Louis for all the hired thugs, if I could."
...do hired thugs actually REFER to themselves as hired thugs?
Anita, who is clearly fishing for compliments in my opinion, asks what that sign would say, and the answer is "Here is a bigger motherfucker than you are."
SO THE CHAPTER ENDS WITH THE VILLAIN JUST KISSING HER ASS ABOUT HOW COOL AND TOUGH SHE IS. SERIOUSLY. WHAT THE FUCK.
He gives her weapons back to her, takes Ellen, and leaves. And she totally knows he'll never be back because her lioness says so. I am really too stunned by the badness of this chapter to snark anymore on it.
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Date: 2013-02-12 11:32 pm (UTC)I think she kills Bennington for making her do some damn work for a change.
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Date: 2013-02-13 06:24 pm (UTC)