[Meme] first lines of imaginary sequels

[edenfalling]

Found via askerian:

Pick one of my stories and I will tell you the first line (ETA: okay, the first few paragraphs, on the theory that context is more interesting than concision) of its sequel. Even if I was never actually planning to write a sequel. Even if it already has a sequel -- I'll give you the first line of another version of its sequel!

Do not ask me about "Strange Likenesses," because I don't yet know how that will end (basically, there is the wildly unlikely happy ending, several variants of the rather likely inconclusive ending, and the semi-likely 'rocks fall, everyone dies' ending). Everything else is fair game.

-----

Sequel snippets written so far:

for The Way of the Apartment Manager (So how did Naruto wind up friends with Sakura by the start of "Guardian"? I will probably continue this at some point.)

for Lemonade (Thus proving that I do so know where the story's going.)

for Endurance (This one turned into an actual fic, 900 words long. *headdesk* I am not sure how 'canon' this sequel is, though, as I'd left "Endurance" inconclusive for a reason.)

for New Horizons (ie, the story in which Ginny, Harry, and Draco have a post-DH-epilogue threesome in Greece. Naturally there are repercussions. *grin*)

for The Two Secretive Princesses (925 words on Toph and Mai during Ozai's invasion of Toure-on-Marsh. Rather dark.)
---[[or the more canonical version, which includes fewer deaths and more mentions of Aunt Ermintrude]]

Comments

[uminohikari.livejournal.com]

Endurance?

[Fic] "Remembrance," part 1 -- Chronicles of Narnia

[edenfalling]

"Endurance"? Oh, lord, that's tricky -- I left it inconclusive for a reason. But okay. *ponders* Hmm. I think, maybe...

-----

She will not be canonized; the Church of England does not claim that power. But the Archbishop of Canterbury announced yesterday morning that Dr. Susan Pevensie will be remembered in the calendar of Common Worship as a beloved example of what one person can do to advance God's work on earth. Dr. Pevensie's charitable children's medical organization, Lucy's Cordial, operates in partnership with Médecins sans Frontières and won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1972 for its work to mitigate the suffering of children in Vietnam and the surrounding regions. Her advocacy for women's rights won her international acclaim in the 1980s and 1990s. Queen Elizabeth II admitted her to the Order of the British Empire as a Dame Commander in 1987, though Dr. Pevensie preferred not to use the title.

Dr. Pevensie always seemed puzzled by the adulation she received. "I don't deserve praise," she said, in a 1999 interview. "I've done nothing that other people haven't also done, and I've done none of that alone. Don't think that I'm any better than you. Open your heart and God will lend you strength to do the right thing, just as he has helped me."

Dr. Pevensie's faith and calling, the common story goes, came from her grief after the loss of her parents, siblings, and cousin in a terrible railway accident in 1949. This idea persisted even after the posthumous publication of her private journals, which speak of a shared vision she and her siblings experienced during her childhood evacuation from London, and of her struggle to reconcile that vision -- that personal experience of God -- with her desire for an ordinary life. The later tragedy was simply a reminder.

"I identified the bodies in the morgue this afternoon," Susan Pevensie wrote the day after her bereavement. "I have been fighting for so long, without admitting to myself what I was doing. I told Edmund I could not fight the world. He was too kind to tell me that by surrendering that battle, I was fighting myself, fighting my family, and fighting Him. I left myself utterly alone, for the world did not care to see me, only my flag of surrender, and false friends are no exchange for love. But if I fight the world, I open myself again to Him; then I am never alone."

Here there is an inkblot in the original manuscript.

"They are all in His country now, beyond the ends of the world," the writing continues, "and I am glad for them, but if only I had trusted Him to lend me strength, instead of measuring my own heart and finding it wanting, and forgetting that my own heart is never all that I have to lean on-- if I had listened to Edmund, and Lucy, and Peter--"

Another inkblot.

"But if one of us had to remain, best for it to be me. I am the one who waits at home while other go forth to battle. This will be a longer wait, but I am sure I will find tasks to occupy the years, and at least now I have no need to fear anyone's fate but my own."

[[continued in next comment]]

Re: [Fic] "Remembrance," part 2 -- Chronicles of Narnia

[edenfalling]

Two months later, when her parents' wills had been mostly executed, Susan Pevensie quit her job as a shopgirl and began training as a doctor. Six years later, she founded Lucy's Cordial, endowing it with her entire inheritance. By 1960, Lucy's Cordial had expanded to every Commonwealth nation, as well as most of Western Europe. In 1976, Dr. Pevensie allied Lucy's Cordial with Médecins sans Frontières. At the time of her death, Lucy's Cordial operated permanent missions in 157 countries, and had a well-trained and funded crisis response system.

"Medicine was never truly my calling," Dr. Pevensie wrote in 2005, one month before her death in a suicide bomb attack in Fallujah, where she was overseeing the expansion of a Lucy's Cordial mission hospital. "Lucy was the healer among us; my interest lay more in beauty and gentle persuasion. But this world is so desperately in need of healing, and I wished to honour Lucy's memory, so I pretended to be her rather than myself. Of course, one cannot live another's story, so perhaps it is not surprising that I have gradually drifted away from the practicalities of the organization and become something of a one-woman protest movement in service of human rights. I am only thankful that I had the good sense not to attempt living Peter's and Edmund's lives as well -- I make a passable doctor with some effort, but as a general, a minister, an MP, a barrister, or a judge, I would be a laughingstock."

Here there is a faint line, as if Dr. Pevensie rested her pen on the page for a moment, followed by, "Well, perhaps I might have made a passable MP. But there is no point wondering what might have happened. This is the life I made with the world I was given, and it is more than enough."

Whatever might have happened to Dr. Pevensie had she followed another path, it is certain that without her faith, her love, and her tireless work for justice and fair treatment for all people in all nations, our world would be a poorer place. On March 4th, the Church of England will attest to that truth.

-----

So yeah, that was kind of random. *blinks*

Also, I chose 1972 as the year for Susan's Nobel Prize because in our world, no prize was awarded that year. :-) I make no guarantees for the accuracy of any other stuff, though I did poke around Wikipedia a bit for some general background information.

Re: [Fic] "Remembrance," part 2 -- Chronicles of Narnia

[hamletti.livejournal.com]

This is fun to read. I had never really thought about Susan post Chronicles. Interesting to imagine that she would take the death of her family as a catalyst back to her faith.

Anyway, the reason I commented was that a friend of mine celebrates March 4th. It's the only day of the year that tells you to do something. I found it funny that you chose that as the day they honored Susan. She certainly did "March forth!"

Re: [Fic] "Remembrance," part 2 -- Chronicles of Narnia

[edenfalling]

"March forth!" I like that; I will have to tell my sister. (I picked the date because March 4 is my sister's birthday. Do not examine me for deep symbolic reasons, for I am really rather shallow. *grin*) But yes, Susan did rather march forth in this fic.

Re: [Fic] "Remembrance," part 2 -- Chronicles of Narnia

[aishuu.livejournal.com]

Lovely work, as usual. Nice to see the problem of Susan solved in a positive way - the comparison to her waiting during the wars really rings true.

warning: long and slightly ranty comment ahead

[edenfalling]

Confession: I have never actually understood a lot of the vehemence with which people accuse Lewis of mistreating Susan. Yes, she does a silly, thoughtless, hurtful thing -- pretending that Narnia isn't real and turning away from her family -- but she's young. She has her entire life to return to Narnia, if she wants to.

And the reason she doesn't go to Aslan's country is very simple: she's not dead. Which to me says that she's the only one who has a chance to do anything meaningful with her life. I feel horrible for what Susan must suffer as the only survivor of a cruel, senseless tragedy, but in a way I feel more sorry for the others -- they die, they watch Narnia die right in front of them, and they have no chance to make a difference in the world anymore. All Lewis's descriptions of "real" Narnian scenery and joyful reunion scenes cannot make up for the characters' basic helplessness and irrelevance at the series' end. Susan, in contrast, still has a future.

Anyway, I always figured that Susan was going to live the rest of her life on her terms, whatever they ended up being. What she does in "Remembrance" is one way of taking the lessons about responsibility and love she learned in Narnia and putting them into action in our world, which Aslan himself implies is half the point of their adventures. (Also, I wanted to write a "Susan regains her faith" story that did not involve Susan getting married, if only for variety's sake. *grin*)

Re: warning: long and slightly ranty comment ahead

[aishuu.livejournal.com]

Good point. I don't have strong feelings for Susan - she's the Pevensie who never really "clicked" with me, compared to Peter especially. I think the people who do have the issue are the ones who look at Narnia as a religious allusion... and it troubles them that she only got one shot.

Re: warning: long and slightly ranty comment ahead

[edenfalling]

Funny -- Peter is the Pevensie who is most opaque to me. I find it much easier to get at the other three. (I do have a very strong idea of what is IC for Peter and what is not. I just find it hard to get inside his head.)

I think the people who do have the issue are the ones who look at Narnia as a religious allusion... and it troubles them that she only got one shot.

And this is where they lose me, because how does anyone get only one shot? So far as I can tell, Lewis's position is that as long as you're alive, you have the option to, I dunno, convert or repent or whatever. Infinite shots! Susan just missed one highly specific chance; she'll have lots more.

Re: warning: long and slightly ranty comment ahead

[aishuu.livejournal.com]

I see Peter more as an archetype than anything else - the golden boy. It's why I had issues with the PC movie. But I love playing with archetypes, so that's why I like writing him. honest to god, I'm one scene away from completing my "Peter fic."

As for Susan, I totally agree with you. But people want the happily ever after spoonfed to them.

Re: warning: long and slightly ranty comment ahead

[edenfalling]

Peter's mischaracterization was the worst part of that movie, hands down. (Well. Mischaracterization if we're relying on the books. It made sense in terms of Disney's own version of LWW, but since I think that was mischaracterization too... *sigh*)

I like happily-ever-after as much as the next person, but bittersweet and complicated is so much more interesting. :-)

Re: warning: long and slightly ranty comment ahead

[aishuu.livejournal.com]

*nods* I didn't like him as the standard "angry teen." Totally destroys what he represents (EDMUND is the angry one, thanks).

Life is bittersweet, after all.

Re: warning: long and slightly ranty comment ahead

[firedawn.livejournal.com]

Jumping in this discusion once again months after the fact, but I just wanted to say that book!Peter is much too responsible and mature to be up to all that he's up to in the film. I am so bitter about what they did with his character, but glad they didn't screw up Edmund's redemption for me.

Re: warning: long and slightly ranty comment ahead

[edenfalling]

I suppose they did better with Edmund because the books already give him flaws (and therefore a ready-made emotional growth arc), whereas Peter comes off more static, and they therefore felt a need to dirty him up a bit. It is perfectly possible to write an already good and noble person having an emotional growth arc -- one doesn't have to express self-doubt or a sense of loss by being an immature jerk -- but apparently that is beyond Hollywood in most cases. *sigh*

Re: [Fic] "Remembrance," part 2 -- Chronicles of Narnia

[uminohikari.livejournal.com]

♥!! I really liked it :D I liked how narnia is described as a shared vision

Re: [Fic] "Remembrance," part 2 -- Chronicles of Narnia

[edenfalling]

Thanks! I had a lot of trouble working out how Susan might have described Narnia in a way that wouldn't make her sound crazy, and visions ended up being the least awkward solution. (Well, fantasy stories might have been easier, but I am pretending Susan first wrote about Narnia shortly after LWW, when she hadn't yet started denying its reality, so she needed a different way to hide the magic in plain sight. *grin*)

Re: [Fic] "Remembrance," part 2 -- Chronicles of Narnia

[firedawn.livejournal.com]

Lovely! And I think a persuasive, very probable solution/ending to the problem of Susan.

Re: [Fic] "Remembrance," part 2 -- Chronicles of Narnia

[edenfalling]

Thanks!