I’m anticipating that Albia is not going to be understanding of the OT3′s mind-control issues.
Like- Lucrezia was super stoked to go see her.
and Lucrezia said she was gonna try and be good.
and Lucrezia was attempting to control Europa, which is creepy, but technically a valid way to make them stop fighting.
and treason against Albia is ‘literally unthinkable.’
makes me nervous.
Oh….. oh dear……..
I think the best we can hope for is that she’ll be neutral. On the plus side, she doesn’t like the Other. On the minus…Gil way back when had to make a VERY firm threat against Agatha being “enslaved for the good of the Empire”, and now he…is not in a position to back that up. In fact, he’s being brought to England bound and unconscious. Agatha and Tarvek are a little better off, but neither has much back-up. This could go Badly.
…Well now I kind of want to see the three of them (or… possibly Agatha, Tarvek and Klaus, if that hasn’t been taken care of yet) having to team up to escape Albia, because can you imagine.
Albia is probably going to be an issue in similar ways that Voltaire was an issue or the library guys are an issue. She has her own interests, and whether that happens to meet with the OT3′s interests is, well, up for debate. She might also be misinformed about Agatha’s, Gil’s, or even Tarvek’s allegiances (if the library thought Gil was wasped, other people might have this opinion). But the Other is their common enemy, at the moment there are no reasons to doubt that.
For what it’s worth, Wooster thought Albia probably would have less issues with Gil as head of the Empire than she had with Klaus (specifically because Gil’s ego isn’t quite as huge as Klaus’ ^^).
Gil was worried about Agatha being controlled and used by Albia in the same ways he was worried about her being controlled and used by any other strong political player who happened to get their hands on her. At the time, Agatha was a strong chess piece on the board and Albia was a player. That’s why Gil initially wanted to marry Agatha, to stake a claim before anybody else could (and also to annoy his father, but that’s beside the point ^^).
I don’t think that means that Albia is using mind control, more that she’s an authoritarian ruler with a strong ego.
I think that the “Albia uses mind control” thing doesn’t come from her (theorized) interactions with Agatha so much as from a comment that disobeying her or acting against her empire is “literally unthinkable.” I can’t remember where exactly that quote comes from (comic/novels/an interview? Does anyone have it?) but that’s the basis for the mind control thing, more than Gil’s belief that she’d want to control Agatha.
Of course, “literally unthinkable” could refer just to really effective propaganda or some other not-technically-mind-control system, but that seems… inefficient if you’re not concerned about the ethical implications of mind control, and sparks are not famous for their moral restraint. (Unless you count the Heterodyne Boys, but honestly that just proves my point.)
Of course we also don’t know if Albia is a spark, or even a human; maybe she’s some sort of hivemind of past rulers, or a lost muse, or something like Castle Heterodyne, or who knows what. So it’s also possible that “literally unthinkable” could mean “sure you can technically think it, but she’ll know instantly and the police will be at your door arresting you in 1.4 minutes.” Or maybe Albia is actually a geisterdame and Lucrezia was eager to get there because the whole country’s wasped and we’ll finally figure out if Agatha can control people with her voice while the locket’s on or not.
Anyway, back to Agatha and Albia, I don’t think there’s a specific guess that Albia will want to (or would have wanted to) mind control Agatha in particular so much as that she would, as you said, want to control Agatha (and Gil, and to a lesser extent Tarvek… and still reasonably should, for that matter) and we suspect that mind control is one of her ways of controlling people in general.
Personally I have no idea what’s going on with Albia; I notice Wooster didn’t seem to have any mind-control-hinting issues with his response to Gil’s “go save Agatha OR ELSE” threat. But maybe he’s a spy and therefore exempt from mind control; if all of England’s spies could never do anything that would go against England even slightly, that’d be a little bit obvious. Or maybe he’s not exempt, because Gil did very specifically use a threat that made it better for England in the long run if Agatha is free than if she’s working for the good of England. I have no idea; it would be frustrating but this is Girl Genius so I’m so used to it I’m not bothered anymore.
The only thing I can add to this is in a footnote in one of the novels it was mentioned that Albia helped Klaus against the Other and the Revenents when he first got started and things only got colder as Klaus’ Empire got bigger and more powerful (and more conquereie) so she’s probably not with the Other, but who knows.
Ooh right! I think I’ve heard that before but I completely forgot. So Albia probably isn’t Lucrezia or a geisterdame (unless one of the rebel ones…) but other than that, still just a big mess of possibilities.
Tag: girl genius
For consideration for the DC AU (which I also don’t follow much): Tarvek as Red Hood.
Someone else will have to consider this, because I don’t actually know who Red Hood is ^^;;
It’s definitely interesting? (Red Hood is the name Jason Todd, the second Robin after Dick Grayson, started using after he was murdered by the Joker, revived by a villain through a method known to cause people to come back different degrees of insane, and then decided that Batman’s no kill policy wasn’t workable.)
Tarvek, Klaus’ second sidekick, hates and admires his predecessor, Gil. Tarvek has his own skills, plenty of them thank you very much, but he can’t shake the feeling that Klaus is looking at him and searching for something else. A cocky grin, an easy way with people, and a goodness strong enough to balance his mentor. Tarvek knows he doesn’t have that, alright? Tarvek knows.
He isn’t acrobatic, like Gil, can’t laugh off gravity like it’s nothing, doesn’t have that easy understanding of his own body. And Gil? Gil resents him, and it took Tarvek time to properly understand why.
He does, now, but that hasn’t made it hurt less. It stings, being resented by someone you
loveadmire so much.Tarvek masters it. His goal isn’t and never has been to be exactly like Gilgamesh Hollzfäller.
He’s not quite a hero, but he’s going to try his best to be something, anyway.
–Gil easily danced his way out of a dozen altercations such as the one that kills Tarvek with flips and laughs.
Maybe he really was missing something vital, is one of the last things he thinks as he waits for a rescue to come that…doesn’t.
–Tarvek wakes up after dying.
Tarvek wakes up screaming and wild from one of Lucrezia Mongfish’s mad and distressingly functional experiments in eternal life.
Heroes get brought back so often it’s hardly surprising anymore. But not. Not like this.
Lucrezia is the same as always, and Tarvek plays along, at first, but then there’s a girl.
At first Tarvek thinks she’s a trick. Because she’s obviously one of Lucrezia’s spare bodies, with her distinctive gold hair, vivid even in the sickly light of the Pit, and the voice Tarvek has heard croon to his mentor—his old mentor—in a hundred different tones.
But she’s not, the girl insists. She’s her daughter, and she thinks that she should know, thanks, but if he’s going to be cheeky maybe she won’t help him away from Lucrezia and her plans to use him as a tool after all.
“You look like you’ve been playing along with her,” she says, “but I need help out of here, too, so we need to make this work.”
The girl, whose name is Agatha (and that’s odd, in a family of Lucrezias and Serpentinas and Demonicas) is brilliant, and Tarvek falls a little bit in love.
(Again.)
–Tarvek goes back to Klaus’ city. It’s not smart, but the whole world has always been there, for Tarvek, and other places just don’t compare. And there’s still so much to be done, so much more than Klaus will ever do.
Klaus has taken a new apprentice, and Tarvek understands, viscerally, why Gil was such an utter boor sometimes.
Tarvek goes back, but not backwards. He’s done pretending to be something he’s not. He’s not a hero, so he doesn’t belong with them, shouldn’t wear their trappings.
He’s better at other things. He learned things from Lucrezia, and he’s going to put them to good use.
–Gil’s scorn hurts, again, but differently now. This is personal, and real. This has nothing to do with Gil’s confused relationship with his father. (His father, of all the things to come out while you’re dead—) The scowls on Gil’s face say I don’t understand how you can be like this.
But Gil and Klaus were never entirely approving of him, so it doesn’t mean much.
–What does matter is—
Tarvek doesn’t realize he’s become someone he doesn’t like until he meets Agatha again.
Agatha has come into her own, out of the darkness of Lucrezia’s main lair. He’s heard a few rumors about how it’s like a kicked hornet’s nest wherever she goes, accompanied by an increasingly colorful cast of metas and just generally odd people. (Okay, he obsessively seeks out and collects newspaper articles.) But in person she’s…something. The last clinging, sucking weight of her past has left her, and Tarvek feels envy at that, briefly and violently.
She’s a sight, and it’s the look on her face when she sees what he’s doing that makes him realize he’s become something horrible. His feelings when it’s time to share his plans with her, the panicky guilt of a child who has done something they know is wrong, that confirms he’s gone too far.
–“I can become a better person if it’s for you,” he insists.
“That’s not how being a good person works,” she says, sounding fed up with him.
–When he sees Gil again after that Gil of course doesn’t trust him, and he doesn’t like how Agatha trusts him. Apparently, they know each other. And Tarvek is so used to being resentful of Gil that he doesn’t see see it for what it is how Gil is a thousand times more tolerant of Tarvek than Klaus, who Gil looks up to more than anyone else in the world, is.
Gil says “You shouldn’t be here,” and Tarvek hears, “I don’t want you here” where he means “It’s not safe; you’re making things harder for yourself.” And Gil, who was mentored by the king of poor communication, never voices “I’m so glad you’re back.”
10 things I hate about you au where Agatha and/or Gil want to date Tarvek, who isn’t allowed to date until Anevka does, & they’re despairing because Anevka is “an unholy shark/preying mantis crossbreed that would probably eat anyone whose hands got too close to her mouth” and KB volunteers to ask her out without any prompting whatsoever and proceeds to shock and disturb them all by not only not dying but also ending up in a healthy and committed relationship, against all possible odds
This sounds entertaining, but considering personalities, can I suggest that Tarvek is the one to arrange for someone to ask Anevka out (with far greater ease than he expected)? I can only imagine Gil and Agatha responding to “Tarvek isn’t allowed to date” with some form of “try and stop me.”
it’s very unlikely that more is ever going to come of this au, if only because Barry would probably do very different things if Klaus wasn’t conquering Europa, so here, have the chat:
tanoraqui
i’m still a little mentally stuck on thistanoraqui
what if…idk, i guess if Klaus got killed? close enough into Europa that he was nearly there, but before he got home? and Gil just ends up adopted into the Knights of Jove somehow?do the Smoke Knights take in random orphans
answer yes, because I just Decidedconstancecomment
they almost certainly do
I’m LOLing over Doting Grandfather Saturnus Heterodyne kidnaping Gil to be Agatha’ boyfriend 😂. Please tell me more about this AU? What happened to the Boys?
idek maybe they’re still going around Doing Good with Klaus but when the lu wanna replace her daughter thing came out saturnus was like NOT MY GRANDKID YOU BITCH and yoinked the kids back to mechanicsburg. and bill was like… you know what… fair enough, they’re at least safe there (KLAUS BARRY LIVES) and i won’t break in to steal them back if we can hammer out visitation rights >_> they write each other a lot in between the last bill/lucreia explosion/makeouts and all the generalized Other thwarting.
(lu also writes them (come ON don’t you guys agree i totally deserve to rule the world and agatha darling you’re so stingy you’ve got this great body thanks to mommy in the first place UGH) but agatha burns them unless she wants a good eyeroll.)
agatha is mostly over the whole “dad and grandpa try to talk me into siding with them on Ethics and Being a Warring Butthead” thing. she’ll do her thing and whatever. KB keeps wringing his hands about it because he’s emotional and just wants his family to be proud of him. 😦
Doting Grandfather Saturnus Heterodyne AU where he decides that the only guy with the pedigree to even approach his darling granddaughter is this Gil Teufel he’s been hearing about and kidnaps him from Paris so Agatha can get a better look and stop ogling those gross snooty princes.
Agatha is not pleased because she can shop for boyfriends herself UGH GRANDPA.
Gil doesn’t know if or when he should even mention that Teufel isn’t actually his… *castle flexes its traps* never mind. Mad. Bad. Dangerous. He can do that. Yep.
The thing that gets me about this hypothetical scenario is that if we’ve been mostly sticking with canon, Saturnus would probably be fine with Gilgamesh Wulfenbach – assuming that Klaus and Saturnus have not talked with each other in the past several years. Sure, the boy’s father went though that hero phase with his troublesome sons. But then Klaus had his heart broken and came back a changed man! It’s good to see that someone in this generation has the good sense to conquer Europa and grind it under his despotic heel!
I just want to see Saturnus Hetrodyne telling Klaus Wulfenbach that he misjudged him, and that he is happy to see that Klaus has found his place in the world (above Europa in a floating fortress) with utter, utter sincerity. Can you just imagine Klaus’ reaction?
In (almost?) no version of this has Gil not talked to Klaus before that meeting. In every other version, Klaus has the awareness not to show his reaction on his face (for too long). The comedy payoff will be in the 3 frames of Saturnus saying that, Klaus reacting and then fighting valiantly to have a straight face again before Saturnus turns back to face Klaus.
The Woods Are Deep, My Dear – Chapter 1 – Azzandra – Girl Genius (Webcomic) [Archive of Our Own]
Chapters: 1/?
Fandom: Girl Genius (Webcomic)
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Teodora Vodenicharova, Agatha Heterodyne, Barry Heterodyne, Original Characters
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe, Teodora Lives AU, as a witchy old woman in the woods
Summary:One day, Barry shows up on Teodora’s doorstep with a small child. And a child can do worse than being raised by her grandmother, who people may or may not assume is some kind of witch.
The Woods Are Deep, My Dear – Chapter 1 – Azzandra – Girl Genius (Webcomic) [Archive of Our Own]
Girl Genius – Role Swap???
This idea occurred to me last night, and I’m still trying to work out how all the pieces would fit together, but I’m really enjoying what I’ve got so far.
At first I just thought ‘what if one of the boys was the Heterodyne heir instead, and Agatha was either the Storm Queen or the Princess of Skifander?’ but then I thought ‘no, what if Agatha was still the Heterodyne, but either the daughter of an ‘illegitimate’ emperor or the daughter of a well-established noble family?’
What if Barry, on getting back from killing Lucrezia, took one look at the mess Europa was in and lost his temper in the most epically Sparky way: ‘I spent my entire life cleaning up your damned messes, and this is what you do when we disappear for a few years?! No. If you can’t be trusted to keep Europa clean yourselves, I will make you, and you will like it! No more nice Heterodyne!’ so he goes back to Mechanicsburg with bb!Agatha, and he’s travelworn and weary and grieving and has a massive case of PTSD (…if it can really be Post Traumatic Stress Disorder when the stress hasn’t stopped yet), this little blonde toddler in breakthrough on his hip, and he goes straight to the Jagerhall, and they’re all stunned, and so relieved to see one of their boys home safe after so long, and to see him in their hall, when Bill and Barry always used to avoid the Jagers as much as they could…
And Barry just ‘Get everyone ready to march; we’re conquering Europa.’
Cheloneuniverse 