devilofajob | Secret Santa 2009

Could I ask about favorite characters (or just not-favorites who you wouldn't really want to hear about) for the stuff on your list of fandoms? ♥

...I thought I had anonymous commenting enabled. *facepalms and goes to fix this*

Any fandoms in particular or should I list them all?

It took me an embarrassingly long amount of time to remember that the camp anon account existed when I noticed you didn't have it turned on! And by "embarrassingly long" I mean "I went D: WHAT DO I DO at someone in PM and they told me to use it."

Just fire them all off, please!

Sorry about that - shows how much I check my lj settings.

I think the only Devil Summoner character I'm not interested in seeing is Kaya. Nothing against her, but she wound up being more of a plot device than a character, which is a shame. Otherwise... Raidou is good (obviously); Narumi, Dahn, Tae, Gouto, Raido, Raidou XL... hm. Since Raidou crosses over into SMT: Nocturne, it would also be interesting to see him interacting with the Demi-fiend.

I'm not as interested in the Persona characters, although I like the Persona 1 characters (I still need to play the Persona 2 games).

For Fire Emblem: Serra, Erk, Lucius, Canas, Vaida, and Wallace. To a lesser extent Lyn and Florina.

Claymore: No real favorites, aside from maybe Clare. I haven't been reading the scanslations, so I don't know where the story's headed, but I'm getting a bit fond of Cynthia and Uma.

I cannot for the life of me remember what else I listed. I know there was something... Oh, wait - Shadow Hearts! I know the basic plot of the second game, and some of the more serious spoilers for it, but it's stuck in the backlog, although I did finish the first game. For the most part, I like all the main characters, although I'm less enamored of Keith and Halley. I really like Alice, Yuri, and Zhuzhen. Kawashima was interesting. I was kind of "meh" about Margarete, though.

Does any of this help at all?

Edited 2009-12-03 01:50 (UTC)

This helps a lot, thank you!

\o/

(And again, sorry about having anonymous commenting disabled.)

I HAVE NOT FORGOTTEN YOU. ♥ I'm almost finished but it's looking like I may have it up in the very early hours of the 24th.

I'm so sorry for the wait, I just seem to be...doing everything in slow motion this week :X

IT'S OKAY. I know the slow motion feeling very well. =|

♥

I really wish I had a proper working knowledge of your canon, because I would've loved to do something with the menagerie.

...though even in sticking with the canon I know, I still end up using the characters I've never written before. I hope it turned out okay!

ALSO: I finally have time to think about doing this, but now my means of access to the post office is temporarily gone, so I can't do this without hilarious delays, but! If you are okay with it not actually happening until...mid-January (sob), I WOULD LIKE TO BAKE FOR YOU. ♥ (Or instead of January, the other way we could do it is that you could just save it up for sometime when you're having a crummy week and need cookies and I could do it then?)

But anyway. ♥

-------

Winter tended to come late in Araphen, but when it did, it came with a vengeance, all snow and howling wind and branches rattling the windowpanes. After five years, Lucius still wasn't sure if he'd ever really get used to it, but even if the cold was no less biting from one winter to the next, experience was a good teacher, and he was becoming something of an old hand at the yearly preparations -- at least, he liked to think so.

The first couple of years had been the hardest; although Araphen had seemed welcoming enough of his intentions to give the territory a proper orphanage, material support had been less than forthcoming and the closest church of Saint Elimine had been facing dire financial straits of its own, and balancing the costs and making the decisions of whether to spend that last bit of gold on another blanket or a bit more firewood had left him nearly frantic. A polite, but very long, letter to the marquess had gotten him a bit more help at the last minute, but the experience had been altogether frustrating. He vowed to start making allowances for the season earlier in forthcoming years, seeking more donations in the summer, when the populace had more to give, and though things were always a bit tight, for the past three years he'd managed to successfully keep the orphanage in the black, and avoid most of the close calls that had plagued that first, dreadful winter.

But as he sat down with his records one late night in the sixth year, it occurred to him that perhaps that streak was an end.

It was nobody's fault, really. Certainly not the people of Araphen, for whom the year's harvests had been less than impressive, and yet they'd still managed to help him meet the goals he'd outlined for the year. Certainly not the marquess, either, who'd matched the contributions he'd made in the previous few years, which was all Lucius had ever requested of him. Nor could the fault be laid with the church, who had also been no less helpful than in years past --

-- and not, Lucius had decided, after some very careful consideration, himself. He was no seer or fortuneteller, and though the year's harvest had been nothing to brag about, there had been no clear signs that this year's winter would be any worse than the usual. He'd allocated things no less carefully than before. Tempting as it might be to take the blame on himself, there was nothing he feasibly could have done.

But to think that this was simply divine will was perhaps the worst alternative. What comfort was there to find in that? An earthly scapegoat was infinitely more appealing.

He sighed, pushing the carefully written lists and records to the side, and rubbed his hands together. Cutting back on firewood had been his first attempt to conserve. It wasn't as though he needed much heat to sit alone and brood for a bit. But he couldn't cut back too much on the room where the children slept, so there was only so much to be saved in firewood. And there was only so much to be saved in food costs; he couldn't expect such young children to understand the concept of rationing.

Is it warmer where you are, I wonder, Lord Raymond?

He sighed again. Dwelling on Lord Raymond's whereabouts would do little to help with his current predicament.

Still, it was troubling. He'd done so well after that first awful year, come so far, and now to have it all threatened by a whim of nature -- I wanted to do some good, for all of them. I wanted to be useful to someone until Lord Raymond returns. I wanted to --

He was torn from his thoughts by a loud thumping sound from the window.

Branches didn't thump in the wind, did they?

After a moment's pause, he was almost ready to write it off as a figment of his imagination, but -- no, there it was again, and so he moved towards the window, drawing his cloak a bit tighter around him. He hated to let more cold air in, especially given his own tendency to fall sick more easily in the winter, but --

There was a flash of bright pink as he opened the window, and a high-pitched "it's about time!"

Serra.

Serra?

"You should answer your door, Lucius, it's simply dreadful out here! Don't you know better than to keep a lady waiting out in the cold? And on a night like this --"

"I'm terribly sorry, I'll be around to open the door in just a moment." He had to wonder what Serra was doing all the way out here -- and at this hour of the night! -- but that, he suspected, would come soon enough, and so he made his way around to the front door, where the sounds of an argument were already audible even before he lifted the latch.

"-- should've really been the one to knock on the window, not me, Matthew!"

"I told you I could just let the both of us in without bothering. Don't blame me because you wanted to make life more difficult."

"It's terribly rude to do that, you know, and we're here as official representatives of Ostia! Whatever do you think Lord Hector would say if I told him about all of this?"

"He'll be amazed I made it this far without cutting off my own ears, I'm sure," Matthew snorted.

"Oh, Matthew, don't be silly, how would you know what I'm telling you to do without your ears? And besides, I nearly fell into a snowdrift, that's no place for a lady! You have absolutely no sense of chivalry whatsoever and I ought to --"

"I'm...terribly sorry to interrupt," Lucius said mildly. "But you'd prefer to finish this inside, wouldn't you?"

Serra's eyes lit up as she turned to face him. "Oh, Lucius, I knew I could count on you to understand!" She bounded across the threshold, Matthew following and muttering something inaudible (but almost certainly sarcastic, Lucius assumed).

"What -- ah, no, we should take this somewhere more comfortable, I'm sorry. Please, this way." It was only a few minutes to show them to the chairs in the next room, a moment more to put another log on the fire (for all that he was trying to conserve, they certainly both looked like they could use it), and finally Lucius folded his hands in his lap and started again. "What brings you two here?"

"Ostensibly, we've been sent by the Marquess of Ostia." Matthew leaned back in his chair. "Though really, it was something a bit closer to Serra not shutting up until he agreed to send her."

"Who else could come but me? Of course it had to be somebody Lord Hector trusted, somebody who will get the job done, and of course, preferably a lady whose beauty might fool the average bystander into thinking that Araphen's orphanage was receiving the blessings of a --"

"You see what I have to put up with?"

"And how tragic, that with such a lovely, radiant, and ever-dutiful cleric on the job, that Lord Hector could only spare a flippant bum of a bodyguard to --"

Lucius coughed. "I'm sorry, Serra, but that...still doesn't tell me why you've come..."

"I was just getting to that!" Serra clapped her hands. "This winter's been rough all over, and I remembered from the last time we'd spoken that you'd had some trouble with everything before. So, with all my charm, I convinced Lord Hector that we should see if you could use any aid from Ostia this year! Aren't I thoughtful?"

Lucius blinked in surprise. "Aid? For us?" He'd entertained just a bit of hope, perhaps, when they arrived. And yet he hadn't wanted to count on anything, and certainly Ostia had to look to its own people first...

Not to mention that Serra had a way of exaggerating things sometimes. He glanced at Matthew, as though for confirmation; he'd never spoken to the thief much, but their time fighting together under Lord Eliwood had at least been enough to prove that Matthew's word was enough.

"Everything she said," he nodded. "Well, maybe not so much about the charm, even if all this was her idea, but --"

"Matthew!" Serra gave a huff of annoyance. "Stop changing the subject." She turned her attention back to Lucius, beaming. "But, yes! We were trying to get here sooner, and not at such a ridiculous hour, but the snow slowed us down a bit and Matthew picked the worst trail into Araphen --"

"-- that was you!"

"-- and we haven't got much with us now, I'm afraid, because we weren't sure what you're running short on. But Lord Hector did send a bit of gold ahead, so you could take care of anything that can't wait until we can bring him back an estimate of what kind of aid you need, and get it all properly brought out from Ostia! Matthew has that, though, Lord Hector was saying something about being unsure whether to leave either of us alone with it. He's so silly sometimes! You should give that to Lucius now, Matthew!"

Matthew took a pouch out from his cloak and tossed it to Lucius, who fumbled and dropped it on the floor. "Oops! Sorry about that."

"No, it's fine, my reflexes have never been --" Lucius scooped it up from the floor, looking at it for a moment as though unsure whether it was really his. "I...I don't think I can express enough thanks to Ostia, and to both of you."

"It was the least we could do, really! Lord Hector thought it fitting after everything you did to help him and Lord Eliwood years ago." Serra's voice dropped a bit, to something a littler softer and gentler than her usual shrill, bossy tone. "Besides. It really did need to be done."

He remembered the conversation he'd had with her during their battles with Nergal, all those years ago. Like you, I grew up...in a strange, sad place...

It wasn't so surprising that he could rely on Serra to support his efforts. She understood...

...and the cheerful lilt was back in her voice as she added, "But you know, it was awfully good of me, so I'm sure I can think of something you could do to --"

Matthew gave a long-suffering sigh, but Lucius could only smile.

♥♥♥ I love this - Serra is just the right mixture of obnoxious facade and genuine caring, and Lucius' quiet determination comes right through. And poor, poor long-suffering Matthew.

Thank you so much!

Oh, right - I forgot to answer your question. I would absolutely not mind baked goods at some point! (And I am fine with waiting!) The only thing is that I'm deathly allergic to tree nuts.

Secret Santa 2009

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part the first!

part the second!

part the final, damn this tiny commentlimit!

Re: part the final, damn this tiny commentlimit!

Re: part the final, damn this tiny commentlimit!