EEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!

[branchandroot]

Just caught up with Kuroshitsuji, and I have only this to say:

YES, YES, YES, GO, GO, OMG, YES!!!!!



GO ELIZABETH, YOU ROCK THE WORLD, OMG TOBOSO YOU ROCK SO HARD LET ME KISS YOUR FUCKING FEET, YES, YES, YES!!!

LIZZY WITH A SWORD! LIZZY KICKING ZOMBIE ASS! THE WORLD IS BEAUTIFUL, AND THERE NEEDS TO BE SEBASTIAN/LIZZY/CIEL FIC RIGHT THE FUCK NOW!



*pauses to catch her breath* The last issue made my fucking MONTH. *grinning all over her face*

Comments

[phoebe_zeitgeist]

And that was me, in case it wasn't all too obvious from style alone. Sorry. I thought I was logged in, but evidently not.

[branchandroot]

It's not that I'm /entirely/ surprised, I just hadn't hoped it would actually /happen/! I mean, how often have we seen strong willed women who show every sign that they should be able to kick ass and somehow... never do. Argh! But now! Now Lizzy is actually kicking ass, right there on the official page! *sparkles*

I think what I expect to be different now is that /Ciel/ knows Lizzy is strong. That has to change how he relates to her (if not how he reacts to her Cute Obsession as relates to his own clothing). He's always loved her, yes, but never /once/ even /considered/ letting her in on the business side of things. Now I think that has occurred to him wrapped around a big hammer. *pauses to sparkle some more* Now she's not just his ditzy little cousin who he protects, she has what it takes to be his /partner/ and he knows it.

*grins* I don't actually see the three of them all in bed together much myself, but I definitely think this opens up the potential for Sebastian and Lizzy to have a Deep Connection via protecting Ciel. I have this image in my head of her facing down some evildoer after Ciel and Sebastian appearing discreetly at her side with "Madam's sword." as if it were a bottle of wine at dinner. And her telling him to take care of Ciel and, of course, he wants to know what Phantomhive would come to if their butler couldn't-- and she cuts him off with a soft "Sebastian." And he /smirks/ and murmurs "Yes, my Lady." And off he goes with Ciel while she dices their pursuers. That's the kind of Sebastian/Lizzy/Ciel I'm seeing, and now I wouldn't have to write half a novel just to get them to where it's plausible. The mangaka has done it already! *sparkles some more* And, of course, the deeper that does, the more it becomes Very Fraught that Sebastian is going to consume Ciel's soul some day.

*just sparkles really a lot*

[phoebe_zeitgeist]

Ah! So, some of the difference in perception is nothing more than my being a latecomer to the series, so that it was a matter of mere weeks between my being introduced to the Marchioness and finding that she has seen that her daughter had the kind of education I would have expected her to insist on. I didn't have time to even think about the possibility that it would be otherwise, let alone spend years dreading it.

And the rest is all a matter of subtleties of interpretation. I can totally see Sebastian incorporating this knowledge into his strategic and tactical picture of whatever's happening around them at any given time -- indeed, I can't imagine that he wouldn't, or that he would not be in a position to see that she had the appropriate weapons whenever it looked as though they might become necessary.

I still have trouble seeing Ciel or Sebastian letting her in on the business side very far, though. To some extent, certainly: for one thing, I can't believe that Ciel doesn't have a little talk with her the very instant they're old enough for the tacit engagement to turn into something society expects them to act on. It seems to me that he has to tell her something about what happened during that time he vanished. Because really, he can't marry, or I can't see how he can. Not until every bit of that conspiracy that killed his parents and upended his life is found and extirpated. Until then his wife would be a target, as would, obviously, any children of the marriage. Maybe I'm wrong, but I can't see him being willing to risk that under any circumstances. So he's going to need to tell her something like, "There is no other woman I'd rather marry, and I'm not going to break this engagement; but it's going to be a long engagement, I don't know when I will be able to marry you, and I promise you now that I'll release you in a way that no dishonor attaches to you if you find someone else before that time comes. For your sake, I think you should look around. Oh, and here: have a fabulous emerald in a ring that won't be to your taste. Feel free to have it reset."

And she'll be upset, and bring all her force of character and intelligence into trying to be let in further, but I kind of don't think this is a point Ciel would be likely to give on. Especially since, depending on what version of the contract you go with, the truth of the matter may be that he can never marry at all; the instant he really has cleared the field of his enemies he'll be bound to fulfill a previous engagement.

-- As all that implies, my read has been that he already knows how strong she is. He's seen her forcefulness, her courage, and her emotional resilience, and we know he cares for her; I'm thinking that caring is likely to be based on more than shared blood and her interest in all things pink. Thus, my sense that his discovering she can use a sword with deadly effectiveness isn't so different from knowing her to be a strong swimmer: something impressive but not startling.

Or, maybe all this is an artifact of my imprinting on the first anime series before I read the manga? Either way, it's not as if I disagreed on the underlying point. Which remains, Swords, Elizabeth, OMG yes.

[branchandroot]

Ooo, yeah, having had over a year of Lizzy being relentlessly frilly definitely made me dread. So the rebound sparkles are /epic/.

I will be extremely interested to see how the mangaka chooses to play this out, now.