Saga - Legends Between the Porch and the Altar (OC Challenge; tie-in to The Book of Gand)

Author: Findswoman
Title: Between the Porch and the Altar
Era: Saga (Legends), early Imperial Era. Ties in to The Book of Gand.
Characters: OCs; some oblique mentions of others
Genre: Short story; drama, introspection
Rating: PG-13 for depictions of the aftereffects of violence; [hl=black]blood; mutilation; suicide (but not of the main character)[/hl]
Summary: A Gand Findswoman struggles to carry on during the Imperial invasion of her homeworld.
Notes: For the Spring 2016 OC Revolution challenge, initiated by leiamoody:

Many thanks, as usual, to Kahara for her perceptive and supportive beta-reading.
This story has been translated into French by @yahiko and may be read in French here.

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Between the Porch and the Altar

Let the priests, the ministers of the Lord, weep between the porch and the altar, and let them say: “Spare thy people, O Lord, and give not thy heritage to reproach . . .”
—Joel 2:17 (JPS 1917)

In the Great Temple of Gand, which floated serenely on its own pocket colony above the north pole of that eternally mysterious gas giant, all was desolate, mournful, uncertain. The halls that once echoed with the footfalls of Findsmen’s boots and rang with the sound of Findsmen’s chanting now merely rustled weakly with weeping and prayer—or had fallen silent altogether.

For the invaders had come: the mammalian, Human invaders in the gigantic wedge-shaped ships, who had driven the Sacred Visionary Mists from the skies and then boasted to the monarch, the magnates, and the merchants that their gray metal boxes could track missing beings and objects better than the mystical talent of the Findsmen.

In one of those silent hallways, bounded by a statue of Trynfor the Holy Madman at one end and by one of Isthien the Sacred Healer at the other, a wall-lamp cast its flickering blue-gray light upon a bundle of robes huddled against the cold stone wall: the hunched form of a young Findswoman.

Long ago the Mists had shown her everything that would come to her homeworld: the spindly hovering probe droids, the immense, bladelike wedges piercing and dispersing the Mists of Gand, the plasteel soldiers marching rank on rank through the Sacred Capital. They had warned her of the grief and distress that would come over her and her fellow Findsmen.

And now They were scattered, and would show her no more.

She could do nothing now but sit there, with her head bowed, her shoulders hunched, and the golden light of her compound eyes buried in her arms and knees, and think of those past visions. She did not know how long she had been sitting. Perhaps it had been days. Or perhaps weeks; it no longer mattered. Had the invaders’ hideous atmosphere-modification devices had sapped away time itself along with the Mists? Perhaps so; without Them, there was no longer any difference between hours, seasons, revolutions, eons.

Again and again she strained to catch some wisp of intuition from the Sacred Visionary Mists of her world. Again and again her mystical senses poured themselves out to Them like a lost gree-graak chick crying for its mother. “How long?” she asked Them, again and again—how long till she would know what would become of herself, her fellow Findsmen, her homeworld, the Galaxy? It was a physical as well as a mental effort that sapped the energy from her slight frame.

But it was all to no avail, for the Mists were too weakened to show her anything. All her meditative powers were useless now. All the hours she had spent drilling them, under the supervision of her Findsmasters, had gone for naught.

(She thought of those Findsmasters: the kind, stooped elder with the friendly eyes, the stately Findslady revered by all, even the oversized old oaf who never stopped complaining about his students. She had seen them, too, crouched in the temple’s labyrinthine halls; she had knelt beside each of them, offering words and gestures of comfort, offering prayers and healing chants. Only one of them had replied to her. But there was a fourth, too, who was at once Findsmaster, zaviir, tarnuur, promised one . . . and where now was the flash of his proud silver eyes, the grip of his claws? Oh, for the simplest Mist Query, the simplest Ritual of Wayseeking to hunt him down!)

At least there was still Stillness of the Fog, the Findsman’s calming discipline. Even if the Mists of Gand had been weakened, perhaps she could at least commune with her own Inner Mists this way—as well as rest from the exertion of her futile meditations.

There were six levels of Stillness of the Fog, ranging from simple relaxation at the first level to the temporary shutdown of vital functions at the sixth—the feigned-death state known also as Mortal Stillness. One by one, as the hours passed, she engaged each of them. Like rippling pond waters or churning fogs calming to stillness, her Inner Mists first settled themselves into the simple relaxation, then into the slightly deeper relaxation. Next came the transition to the sleeplike trance, then the coma-like trance. For those hours the only motion in that hallway had been that of the flickering lamp.

At last she concentrated her Inner Mists into the core of her lungs, building toward the final, vital mystical effort that would propel her into the death-like trance of Mortal Stillness. She drew a deep breath in, filling her lungs as she recited the mystical formulas in her mind. Then she exhaled sharply, crumpling to the ground in an amorphous heap of robes.

But was not blue-gray haze before her the light of the hall lamp? Was that not the statue of Trynfor looming upside down in one facet of her compound eyes, the statue of Isthien in another? Was not her heart still beating? Were even her Inner Mists too weak to cross over into the realm of Mortal Stillness?

And was not a voice speaking to her?

“Findslady Telfien!”

Her name, her long-silent name! At its sound she pulled herself up and blinked her nictitating membranes. Crouched before her was a female Temple servant in the customary slate-blue uniform—one she recognized, who had shown her kindness in the past—with her hands spread in a pleading gesture.

“Please come! There is one who is calling for you!”

“Telfien shall come.” And she rose and walked with the servant down the hallway, in the direction of the statue of Trynfor.

* * *​

Telfien walked with the servant through the halls of the Great Temple. All was as the Mists had first shown her. Proud Findsmen, erudite Findsmasters, eminent Elders, and fledgling apprentices sat crouched in degenerate grief in the temple hallways, just as she herself had done: bent over, trembling, weeping, praying, striking their breasts, clawing their clothing. And just as she herself had, they had stopped in their places out of sheer hopelessness and fatigue. Without the Mists, there was no longer any use in making it all the way to their wonted teaching rooms, meditation chambers, chapels, or garden haunts.

She went over to offer them help and comfort, but the servant pulled her gently away.

Further on, her antennae twitched at a toxic chemical scent wafting from a group of apprentices who sat particularly still, leaning against each other and against a support column. The chitin plates of their hands, feet, and faces were warped, peeling, and corroded; Telfien recognized the effects of poison distilled from the bruugaan tree. Just beyond that, an elder Findsman in ceremonial garb was slumped against the archway leading to the Temple’s main sanctum. His head hung limply, in sleeplike calm, above a gaping, blackened hole in his thorax. Telfien noticed the half-molten barrel of an energy weapon peeking from the hole and realized what had happened: he had set his blaster to overload quietly within the inner pocket of his robes.

But again the servant hurried her on with impatient claw-taps on her shoulder.

At last they came to the gateway that led out to the Temple gardens. The servant led Telfien outside onto a broad, arched portico, into a night that was an unnaturally solid, mistless black.

“Here.”

A figure in Findsman’s robes sat against one of the columns, writhing and groaning in violent pain as brown blood oozed copiously from a wound in his shoulder. Telfien could not see much of his face, for his head was thrown back and to the side at a peculiar and uncomfortable-looking angle. Another healing servant, this one male, sat beside him and was applying bacta pads to the wound, but it seemed to be doing little good. A large shockstaff lay on the ground a little ways off, its once-sharp tip bent and blunted. Farther away two of the white plasteel invaders lay piled on top of each other, motionless.

“A squadron of the . . . invaders managed to get into the garden,” the servant accompanying Telfien explained. “He went against them . . . he eliminated two of them, as you see, but one of the others—”

She stopped suddenly. The wounded Findsman was now sitting upright, looking directly at Telfien through glassy, delirious silver eyes. The Findswoman started at the sight of those eyes, for there was something familiar about them—but they shone from a face whose plates were so scraped, gashed, and dislodged as to be unrecognizable.

“Telf—” he began. The name was instantly swallowed up in another paroxysm of groans, prompting the healing servant to redouble his efforts with the bacta. “Sacred scion . . . you are here . . .”

“Y-yes, yes, she is . . .” Those eyes, that face . . . could it be . . . but it couldn’t be . . . or could it?

“By the ancient power that dwells within you . . . h-help this Gand!”

Telfien looked down at her hands. She knew what he wanted her to do; she had known since she had first seen him. Would it even be possible with the Mists in such a weakened state, with herself in such a weakened state? But she had to try. A Gand life depended on it.

“Telfien shall do her best.”

The healing servant with the bacta made room for her as she knelt beside the Findsman, placed her hands gently over his wound, and channeled all that remained of her intuitive energy toward it. Minutes passed. He continued to twitch and writhe—was it working?—and was he really—? But it was no use wondering that now. All she could do was ensure her hold on him would not slip, despite her own flagging energy.

More minutes passed. Perhaps, against all odds, it was finally having some effect: he was calmer now, the blood flow was slowing, new tissue was beginning to regenerate. She would give it a little longer, till it was almost healed, and then—

Without moving her hands from their place over his wound, she leaned in close to his face and whispered a single, questioning name.

He twitched and ground his outer mandibles. “Yes?” he growled. “What do you want to know about that befoggèd traitorous upstart?”

Telfien started at these words but remained as calm as she could. “Apologies—Telfien merely wondered—”

“You mistook this Gand”—he reared up and tapped his chest with his claws—“for him, didn’t you?”

“Apologies again—now if Telfien may ask you kindly to remain still—”

“It would certainly not be the first time someone has had that misconception,” the Findsman grumbled as he relaxed again onto the flagstones of the porch. Telfien resumed her pressure on his wound. “But he, he shall suffer, that Uncanny One . . . because of his treachery Gand has no more Guardian to protect her secrets from the invader . . . his power joined with yours”—he thrust a claw at Telfien—“would have saved his people and his Mists . . . oh, but those who reject their homeworld will be rejected by their homeworld—you shall see! YOU—SHALL—SEE!”

With these last words he sprang up with surprising energy and vehemence, causing Telfien to tumble to the ground. Then he stormed off into the temple. The two healing servants hurried after him; the gate shut with a crash.

Only Telfien remained behind on the stony ground, immobile from the pure shock of what she had heard. The dire words of the wounded Findsman (whose wound was not yet fully healed!) still reverberated through her whole being: her mind and soul, but also her lungs, her heart, her deepest core.

Traitorous—upstart—suffer—treachery—reject—rejected—YOU SHALL SEE!

Their relentless ring seemed to freeze her blood in its very path and to strangle her internal organs, constricting the motion of her blood and breath till they stopped altogether. The nictitating membranes of her eyes flickered and closed; her limbs and head flopped limply to the side.

And Telfien recognized the feeling and abandoned herself to it: Mortal Stillness had come at last.

* * *

Some time later, two Imperial stormtroopers happened upon what looked like a body lying on the Temple portico.

“Hey, this isn’t the same one!” expostulated the first, prodding the immobile, robed form with a plasteel boot.

“You’re right, it’s not.” His comrade seemed equally bewildered.

“Where’d the other one go?”

“No idea. But who cares? Look at that.” He prodded with his boot at the green brocaded sash that encircled the presumed corpse’s waist. “Wouldn’t that make a nice gift for Moff Waddsley?”

“Oh yeah! She can wear it with her green Deyor gown!” He dropped to his knees and began clumsily to unwrap the sash, which he then stuffed into one of his supply pouches.

“Just make sure you give it to a laundry droid when we get back shipboard. Get the ammonia smell out, y’know.”

“Yeah, sure.”

Giving the body one last kick, they walked off. ¶

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Spoiler: Notes

I’ve had the verse from Joel in mind as a potential fic prompt for a while now, and leiamoody ’s challenge was the perfect opportunity to use it. Those priests weeping between the porch and the altar are themselves undergoing a period of forced inactivity, after all.

The Gand ability to shut down all bodily functions and feign death has been established in canon; Zuckuss does so in Slave Ship (I think it is) in order to fool Bossk. In my fanon, this is a Findsman ability and specifically an extreme extension of the calming discipline of Stillness of the Fog. It will go in my fanon post eventually, I promise.

All the characters in this story are also in The Book of Gand. Trynfor and Isthien are two renowned Finsdmen of ancient times who are mentioned there as well.

My fanon posts on Gand terms and techniques and on Gand flora and fauna should explain many of the names and terms encountered in this story. In fact, those posts will need to be updated with new material that I’ve introduced here! You are, of course, welcome to ask me any questions you may have about anything you see here.

The image of the Findsmen in the Temple hallways who committed suicide in protest against the Empire was inspired by a similar scene in TrakNar ’s 2012 vignette “The Changing of the Gand.” Indeed, the whole notion of writing about the Imperial occupation of Gand is at least partially indebted to her story too.

The comparison of Telfien’s plea to the Mists to the cry of the gree-graak chick for its mother was inspired by this anonymous medieval Judeo-Spanish poem:

In the Hebrew version of the poem, the dove cries out “Avi!” (my father).

Yes, bruugaan is named (rather unoriginally) after brugmansia, and I imagine it being similar in its appearance and its effects.

Deyor (a play on Dior) is borrowed from Chyntuck ’s mahvelous fanon post on GFFA fashion houses, luxury products, and cosmetics.

What exactly is it that Telfien is doing to the wounded Findsman? If you’ve been following The Book of Gand, you may have a guess . . .

Wookieepedia links:
Gand: http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Gand/Legends
Findsman: http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Findsman/Legends
laundry droid: http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Laundry_droid
tarnuur: http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Tarnuur
zaviir: http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Zaviir

 

Thank you so much, and thanks for stopping by to read!

Thank you, and I'm so glad you have been enjoying reading about Telfien. She's been with me for years now, and I'm very partial to her, so it always makes me glad when others like her too.

Thank you so much for that compliment. It's true; just because she's there and just because they can because she's lying there in a death-like state. And the added irony here is that these are the people who subscribe to the notion of Humans as superior to all other species—but they're not setting such a good example, are they?

Thanks. As mentioned in the notes above, that verse has been floating around in my head as a potential fic prompt for a while now, specifically as a prompt for a story about Empire-occupied Gand, since their plight always seemed so similar to those of those displaced priests at the beginning of that exilic period. And thanks to leiamoody 's excellent challenge prompt, I finally got the chance to do so!

Yep, it's definitely never a good sign when the Empire appears on the scene. I am glad you like that passage—one thing I'm hinting at here is that the Empire believes not only in the superiority of Humans but also in that of technology. In other words, in desentientizing (that's a GFFA version of "dehumanizing" ) everything as much as they can, which is as hurtful to a place like Gand as the Human supremacy is. (Now yes, it is established that Findsmen have no problem using technology to assist them—energy weapons and the like are AOK. But certainly they draw the line at using for the actual process of finding of things and beings, since they have their "weirdly effective" mystical techniques for that.)

Thanks! Well, she at least manages to mostly heal him; he jumps up in anger and storms off before she can finish, but apparently he's at least now OK enough to do that. Her ability to heal him fully was never in question—it would have happened had he not jumped up and run off. What was uncertain here was her ability to achieve the feigned-death state of Mortal Stillness given that she no longer has her homeworld's Mists assisting her. The shock of the wounded Findsman's harsh words is what finally pushes her into that state (which is albeit a state she was trying to reach anyway).

Thank you so much—those are incredible compliments and it's an honor to receive them from you. I like your interpretation and I don't think you're maligning anyone; it's one I hadn't thought of myself, but it definitely fits. As established in her backstory in The Book of Gand, Telfien has a very prodigious Mist talent that starts out very chaotic and uncontrolled, in ways that can be as hard on her as on those around her. By the time of this story she's a full-fledged Findswoman and in full control of her powers, but she's still experiencing how prodigious power can sometimes be a burden and a curse as well as a blessing. And that certainly can be a Cassandra-like feeling: she is forced to see the horrible things that will happen in the future but can't do anything (or can do very little) to stop them.

And most importantly, leiamoody, thank you for coming up with this fantastic challenge! I have you to thank for the fact that these little years-old disconnected ideas of mine have finally come together in story form.

 

Thank you so much for reading and commenting, gaarastar58! I'm glad you enjoyed this; it's a story of a sort that I've been wanting to write for almost as long as I've been developing my fanon on the Gand. Without the Mists all the Gand (mostly the Findsmen, but really everyone) are pretty much lost; what the Empire sees as a visibility-ruining annoyance is as essential to their life, physical and spiritual, as the sun is to ours. But it's just like the Empire to totally disregard that, alas! You definitely don't need to know all the events of The Book of Gand to get what's happening in this story, though some of the characters, both mentioned and otherwise, will certainly look familiar to those who have. (Granted, though, it was a bit challenging for me to try to write this in a spoiler-free manner, since it technically is intended to take place either after or close to the end of The Book of Gand.)

Thanks again—wonderful to see you here!

 

I'm long overdue in responding to this wonderful comment, and I apologize:

That is quite a compliment coming from someone whose stories are among the most beautifully written and emotionally moving things I've read here. Thank you so much, and thank you also for the role you played in this story's genesis.

Thanks, and yes, it does, and that's the part of the quote that in a way most specifically connects to the challenge theme: those priests are sitting around doing nothing but weeping instead of doing their priestly duties. They're in a similar position to Telfien, really.

That is indeed what I was going for: this kind of devastation steals language, steals thought. The stealing of the Mists (see below) is kind of emblematic of that, in a way—well, they're emblematic of each other, really.

That totally is something they could do—if they can destroy a whole planet with a superlaser, certainly taking out something like the atmospheric clouds or mists would be child's play. There would almost certainly be untellable damage to the ecosystem and to the plant and animal life (including to the Gand themselves, most likely) that would compound the psychological devastation something really dreadful. The Mists are their physical and spiritual lifeblood—I've always felt like Gand spirituality is in some ways intimately connected with Gand physicality, though it's not always easy to articulate what I mean—and those befoggèd invading mammalian oxy-breathers went and swatted them away just because they made it hard for them to see.

That is indeed probably one of the occupational hazards of the sacred seer business. leiamoody 's comparison to Cassandra was apt: Cassandra foretold a disastrous situation but the disbelief of those around her made it impossible to do anything about; Telfien has also foretold disaster but this time is hampered first and foremost by her own inability to do anything to avert it.

It does, and I have no doubt that you know exactly who all those hinted-at-but-unnamed characters are.

I hadn't really thought about whether the elder or younger Findsmen's deaths happened first, but it is indeed horrific and devastating either way, and it's an example of the way a disaster like this can level things out so much (in every sense of the world) that time itself becomes irrelevant. And it goes on from there, because now the care and guidance of those elder Findsmen toward their students has become irrelevant too, as have (at least partly) their names, as you go on to observe.

Yep—it's a combination of that with the whole quality of leveling mentioned above, and in this context it may even be regarded as a drastic, universalized form of the "name reduction" that's an established Gand concept. I confess too that another part of it was just me trying to minimize any possible spoilers for BOG.

I always have admired people in RL who have not let their rougher experiences take away their kindness and good-heartedness, and that's what I tried to express with Telfien here. By this point she's endured a lot both good and bad, but none of it has turned her jaded or hardboiled or misanthropic. Her meek, gentle heart is still there under it all, and it spurs her to do what she can to help.

He's the opposite of the type I just described in the paragraph above: he has let bad experience turn him jaded, but one can tell that he was sort of like that from the start anyway. But indeed, how can one not feel bad for him? None of this was his fault. Telfien knows that, even though what he says shocks her so much.

By the way, this side character's identity is meant to be a bit ambiguous. If you know BOG, there are a couple of possibilities for him (though there is one who might be called the prime candidate). If you don't, it's no big deal, because he also can be regarded as just one of the various unnamed characters in the halls of the temple.

That it is, and indeed she would, perhaps better than anyone; she knows him very well, as is suggested by her thoughts about him earlier on. And perhaps, paradoxically, that's precisely why it comes as such a shock to her. (Yes, I am beating about the bush here, mainly because [hl=black]I haven't yet fully worked out all the backstory behind this and am just trying to keep things as open as I can for now[/hl]. )

In that scene one gets to see just what kind of people it was who whisked the Mists away and thrust their "metal boxes" in the face of an entire planet—totally shallow, with an inflated sense of their own superiority and no regard for the sentience or beauty of those whose homeworld they have invaded. To them, the comatose form lying before them is not even a being—it's something for them to ravage and plunder. Note too that they're doing what they're doing to gain a pretty accessory for their moff—they're acting out of a perverted and warped sense of beauty that's diametrically opposed to the true beauty of the being they're plundering and the surrounding beauty of Gand.

And that is a beautiful film—thanks so much for reminding me of it. Many of the same issues at work here indeed.

Thank you very kindly for that; I'm immensely flattered to hear that from one of those whose story judgment I trust the most. And thank you, indeed, for everything.

 

Thanks for that fantastic review, Ewok Poet, and thanks for persevering through all those technical setbacks, F5s, etc.—for my own part, I have to say it was more than worth the wait. Now I too have to apologize for taking such an excessively long time to reply; it's largely because you came up with so many different and very thought-provoking angles on the story that I hadn't even thought of (which, as I've said often before, I love it when readers do), and I wanted to make sure I had the time to digest and understand everything properly so I could write a response that wouldn't sound too half-baked. So, now, here goes:

Wow, thanks, that's quite a compliment! I have to say, if I may, that I'm pretty proud of it myself. Again, I'm really sorry you had to go through all that trouble and all those technical difficulties.

Yes, similar-but-not-quite to those two worlds is not a bad way of describing it—and I actually will probably have to emend the "gas giant" part of this story, because that's not totally 100% it either, at least in my fanon (and because the geology doesn't quite mesh with something I'm about to do in BOG). I would indeed be glad to do a fanon post on this topic when my thoughts thereon are a little more well formed, but for now I guess I'd say that I envision Gand as kind of a cross between a regular rock-based planet and a gas giant—some of the colonies are very high buttes or tepui, some of them are captured asteroid type bodies in geosynchronous orbit, and there are a few orbital space stations (which, according to official lore, is where they prefer most outworld visitors to stay). Hope that helps for now!

Ah, that's what those Humans think they have done, and that's what they think! I most certainly don't think they've done it, though, not really, nor do I think they really got rid of the real Mists. And indeed you get to that point further down.

Now I like that interpretation of the statues of Isthien and Trynfor, because in certain ways the dichotomy and counterpartship (to coin a word) between those two characters (and character types) is a central theme in BOG—one can see it (or, at least, I'm hoping one can see it) at work in the two main characters of BOG. So naturally it would continue to echo into this story as well, and in such a way that it colors the whole world around our heroine. And in what you say about the wall, you're getting at an interesting possible difference between this story and BOG as concerns the nature of the middle ground or meeting point between those two characters/types. In BOG that meeting point is mystical, luminous, awesome, otherworldly; in this story, it is bleak and blank, as befits the hopeless situation in which Telfien and her people now find themselves.

These Human invaders are such boorish oafs that they may not even have seen it in such subtle terms—but that internal destabilization of course is always going to be an outcome of such a horrendous and all-encompassing disaster, and Telfien and her fellow Findsmen and Findswomen (well, those who have not sccumbed utterly to despair) certainly are capable of seeing it.

I'm going to have to take your word for it on this one. But yes, the fear is at this point sapping her physically as well as emotionally, mentally, etc.

I figured you might! Those are of course there as bit of an Easter egg for those who have read BOG. But not only that: you may by now have noticed that [hl=black]one of them, perhaps the most important one, appears namelessly in two other shorter Gand stories of mine in addition to this one.[/hl]

Yes, you're right on about this! The Mists are not unreal, and they have not been banished for good—they are part of each and every Gand, just the way the atmospheric mists were part of what made the planet Gand such a unique place. This same idea comes up in the riddle scene of BOG chapter 7—but you are absolutely correct to observe that it is something that became rather heavily buried under the pervasive ethic of self-deprecation and in her people's very idiosyncratic understanding of the Force. And now, in the face of grave disaster, is perhaps its chance to shine forth. Strange how that works sometimes!

Yep, she's definitely walking toward the madness there, and the choice of the statue was conscious (though you articulated it here a lot more clearly than my brain did when it was blatting this all down). That kind of suicidal hopelessness makes sense as a very unfortunate but very natural corollary to the whole ethic of self-deprecation; to fight back would be a way of asserting one's individuality in a most unbecoming way, so the only legitimate way to protest is to take oneself out of the picture altogether. (The same theme is central to the story by Trak linked to above.)

And yes, the bruugaan is basically causing their chitin to disintegrate; that too was inspired bartly by the description of the two self-immolated Findsmen in Trak's tale.

Your guesses about the wounded Findsman are almost certainly correct. As to what he says to Telfien, this too is an area where [hl=black]I kept things somewhat nebulous (!) so that I don't lock myself into one story direction too early, given that I have yet to work this all out in ful[/hl]—but yes, you're not wrong to detect that hint of blame.

Ah, now that is an interesting interpretation indeed. Once chapter 18 (i.e., the very next chapter) of BOG is up, what she's doing might become somewhat clearer.

Answering that question, as best I can:

Spoiler

Findsman's Mark is a standard enough Findsman technique that is learned by most advanced apprentices. The reason the occurrence of it in that particular chapter is so strange is simply that it was being performed by someone without formal training in the ways of the Findsman.

Now, there's no reason that Telfien wouldn't be perhaps also trying to place a Mark on this wounded Gand (in addition to whatever else she's doing), particularly if she thinks he might be Zuckuss—another thing I didn't think of at first, but that would certainly work! In any case, she's certainly powerful enough that any mystical technique performed by her would have powerful effects on others with sensitivity to the Mists.

Because she never reached the point of fully denying the good that was in her. She knew at least that goodness remained, even if her powers might not, and she knows that she is bound by that goodness to help save this life in any way she can. The madman and the healer combine in her harmoniously.

Another interpretation that I had not thought of in quite those terms, but it does work and it does fit with the title quite nicely! The fact that the official lore is that some Gands (notably Zuckuss, among others) did take their talents into the wider Galaxy already implies that there had to be some way of transforming those powers into a form that could be carried far away from the physical mists of Gand. And I guess this story ended up exploring that, in its way.

Oh, ask and thou shalt receive, though be prepared to be patient, because that may be many chapters from now. As outlined in the notes at the end of the story, Mortal Stillness is a riff on the official lore about the Gand ability to temporarily shut down the body and play dead, though it turned out to make a good counterpart to the motif of multiple deaths and rebirths that is such a central theme in your stories, so I guess I'm pretty proud of myself for managing to get it in there—you are welcome regard it as an homage if you like. On the subject of rebirth: although I haven't yet worked out any details about it at all, I promise I will find some way of having that rebirth happen, both on Telfien's personal level and [hl=black]on the level of her homeworld[/hl]. Because I'm a sap that way.

That scene is of course intended to be a complete, absolute foil to everything before: these oafish yahoos are the people who overran this world of mystery, beauty, and depth! But I hope it has also shown that such types can't ultimately win, in a way, even if it's just the readers' hearts that are being won over.

Well, thank you. As for the dual interpretations, I suppose some of that goes back to the motif of counterpartship/dichotomy/etc. alluded to above: the madman and the healer are interpretable as different aspects of each other, and they can unite within the same being. And as for the symbolic death rather than an actual one: well, that could be related to the notion that the connection between being and belief hasn't really been severed and can't really be—it's just undergoing some change, is all. That's a hopeful thought indeed, and you know it wouldn't be a Finds story if it wasn't totally without hope at the end—because, as mentioned before, I'm a sap!

Well, thank you! In true Gand fashion, I shall take a bow with hands cupped over my heart. And thank you, ma'am, for your amazing review, in-depth analysis, thought-provoking interpretations, etc., which are themselves a huge enrichment to this story.

 

Oh, Kurisan, thank you so much for taking the time to read this, and for this absolutely fantastic comment. It made pretty much my week!

Don't feel bad, I know it's awfully long—I have trouble catching up with multipage stories on the forums, too. But if it helps at all, an ebook is in preparation thanks to the peachy keen technical and graphical skills of Ewok Poet, and if you like I can give you a heads-up when that is available.

Thanks, and I so agree with what you say about writing aliens—they really do have to be actually alien (otherwise why write them). I believe, in an odd way, that if they're written well that way that will ultimately lead to their being more believable—a bit of a paradox, I know, but you probably get what I mean. One reason I have always felt drawn to the Gand is because they really seem like some of the most alien races the GFFA has to offer, both culturally, with the complex rules around naming and self-reference, and physically, with the insectoid physiology and the ammoniac atmosphere.

As it turns out, Telfien's name does have some Tolkienic inspiration, even if the resemblance to the actual name of the author was mostly coincidence. The inspiration for the -ien ending (which, as you'll see in BOG, I've made a common one for Gand female names) came from Lúthien (and some of the place names, like Lórien and Ithilien). At that point I mainly just came up with the name because it sounded pretty, but later on I learned that [hl=black]telfien is some kind of inflected form of the word that means "loss" in Maltese[/hl]. And that, of course, seemed very fitting in its way too.

The EU lore on the Gand was my starting point for the way I portray them in BOG and related works (like this one), though I have expanded on it a good bit as well (and for some details on that, have a look at my Fanon Thread posts). The Book of Gand has its origins in things I wrote almost 15 years ago, so much of my lore on the Gand has been percolating in my head for about that long. I have always tried to do my worldbuilding in a way that harmonized with the lore that was already there. (And feel free to look up any of it in Wookieepedia—I won't be offended, indeed, I'll be flattered! If it's not there, it'll be in the abovementioned fanon post. )

Wow, that's quite a compliment! I guess I kind of did approach this story in terms of capturing a particular moment and a particular feeling and reveling in their tragic beauty. And I kind of was approaching parts of it as though they were poetry of sorts, particularly that opening paragraph you mention and some of the descriptions of Telfien's grief, etc. So I'm glad to hear you found that effective—thanks! And ditto the descriptions; sometimes I feel like I get bogged down in them, so I'm glad you felt those worked well too.

And of course even though I sometimes find it hard to resist writing "smelling the flowers"-type prose, I am known to quite enjoy a good fast-moving story from time to time, too—and you do have quite a talent in that direction!

That is a very good point, and I hadn't thought about it quite those terms before—yes, the ability to intuit "possible futures" would most certainly have implications for how one perceives time. Future and past and present all kind of come together in sort of kairos fashion, which of course hearkens back to the whole notion of capturing one specific moment. And perhaps in a way this also relates back to the way the Gand are portrayed in official GFFA lore: they have always been kind of off by themselves in their own far corner of the Galaxy doing their own thing, they've been pretty much outside all the major Galactic conflicts, and the Yuuzhan Vong (for example) don't seem to have to touched them at all. So in a way they do exist in eternal floating stillness—and that's one of the things that just makes them so cool!

Ever since I first read about the Gand and their spirituality, I got the impression that that spirituality was, in some way, organic to the species—as in, it's very closely linked to the very fact of being Gand. (I borrowed that turn of phrase from something Kahara once said to me, and I still haven't found a better way of putting it. ) And yes, as a result of that, their spiritual/intuitive and empirical/technological existences are constantly spilling and flowing into each other—just the same way as past, present, and future all flow into each other, as alluded to above. It all fits!

Findshusband says I should say, "I can charge you if you like." Just teasing, Kuri. Thank you so much for that wonderful compliment, which is very much appreciated. And I am rather proud of this story, if I do say so myself. Thank you for taking a chance on it.

 

Thank you so much for reading and reviewing—it's great, as usual, to have you here. I totally hadn't thought about it before, but you're right, what Telfien is doing here is basically just like what she's doing back in chapter 13, when she's [hl=black]crouching in the greenhouse after escaping from the goons who killed her parents[/hl]. And indeed here too she finds herself a similar position of hopelessness and powerlessness. The difference, of course, is that in this case [hl=black]help and comfort aren't going to come so quickly[/hl].

I definitely did mean for this story to flesh out the events recalled in "Box of Visions," and for the events recounted here to be among those Telfien is recalling in that story. Indeed, Glockel's experience in that story means she has already unwittingly seen some flashes from those events, and being inquisitive sort that she is, she will no doubt be asking Telfien about what she saw. And Telfien will probably tell her about it (though she might leave out a thing or two)—but only because Glockel asked. This is by no means the sort of thing Telfien would want to tell most people about on her own initiative.

Thanks once again for the kind words—I'm glad you enjoyed this.

 

Just stopping in to express my sincere gratitude to everyone who nominated “Between the Porch and The Altar” in not just one but two categories in the 2017 Fanfic Awards—Best One-Shot and Best Drama. What a wonderful surprise that was—thank you all for being such a wonderfully supportive and perceptive bunch of readers!