My memory's a bit rusty, but I believe the Corpsetaker nabbed her purely because she was in a position to cozy up to that professor at the museum.

Though the body-switch did leave her mental defences shot, making her vulnerable to Peabody's control, so that's an argument against it, I suppose. So depends on the writer to interpret canon.

Though the Dresden Files RPG might have some more solid answers on the nature of magic, and it's solid canon considering that Jim was heavily involved in the writing of it.

 

Small plot idea I came up with while reading through the JB forums.

What if Lash had survived through White Night and reformed herself enough to use soulfire? If there is any surer sign of an evil entity doing a heel face turn, it would be a Fallen (or a shadow of one) forsaking the use of hellfire for the angelic equivalent.

Possible consequences of this could be Lash's prevention of Mab rooting around in Harry's brain (though I'm not sure that would work since she technically isn't an independent entity). Information regarding the Denarians, which would be a big help during Small Favor. The obligatory hint of sex, since she is the Temptress, no matter her allegiance. Tutoring on the finer points of soulfire control, rather than just Big Hand of Doom or Fire Whips of Awesome. Eidetic memory is always useful. Always.

But yeah, I've got no plot to go with it other than a canon rewrite (and we all know how those turn out), so I just thought I'd throw the idea out there.

 

It all depends of what you think of the Dresden-verses God. If he's a forgiving tyrant willing to welcome back anyone with open arms then maybe Lash will get her wings back, if not... well, being bad aint't so bad.

But baddies in Dresden usually don't change their spots because either they're pretty much that way, it's bound into their very fiber (Mab, other Fae,) or they've lived so long with evil that they wouldn't know where to start (in fact that statement makes it seem like they want to change, not the case) -which is why Lash's heel turn was always so unbelievable to me.

It could allow you to better explore the Hell side of the Dresdenverse though. And the heavenly side too, I don't think Uriel and his ilk would be pleased with Harry's passenger.

 

If you think that Lasciel has been evil for a long time, imagine the eternity she was good for, in heaven before Earth was formed.

If it follows traditional mytholgy, that is.

If she can change her ways once, she can change them twice. Especially as Lash isn't even really Lasciel, but rather an imprint in Harry's mind (and therefore affected, somewhat, by his mind).

 

There is no reason to assume that the Fallen cannot use Soulfire as they still retain their soul. If the Fallen didn't somehow acquire another power source, Hellfire and Soulfire have to be just different ways of utilising one's soul.

EDIT:

And Dresden never makes mistakes... Anyway, the fact that they Fell once proves their ability to change. Unless, of course, you are arguing that God created them evil.

 

There have been arguments either way. The bible claims he was a murderer from the beginning and is the father of lies, but God looked upon his creation and said it was good implying that Lucifer hadn't fallen yet. However, Lucifer had fallen by the time Adam and Eve were in the garden as he was there to tempt them. Even if you don't believe Lucifer=Satan, Satan had fallen from grace with Lucifer meaning the fall had happened regardless of whether or not it was Lucifer himself in the garden.

You could say that because God is all-knowing, that when he created Lucifer he knew of Lucifer's inevitable fall beforehand, bringing to question why he created an imperfect being capable of sin when he specifically mentions that Lucifer was perfect at the time of his creation. God=originator of Sin.

There is also the Islamic interpretation claiming that Angels are perfect and unable to change, while Lucifer was a Djinni. I don't know enough about Islam to say much either way on that though.

 

So quite awhile ago I was thinking Joe's of Harry and Harry story, and was thinking about how the White Council are assholes and really hypocritical for going around and blaming WW2 on the Wizarding World/Grindelwald and then again with Undead Horcruxy Voldemort and holding them all accountable.

What makes the WC hypocritical is that in Dresden canon it is explicitly said that Kemmler deliberately engineered WW1 so he could get strong with death energy or some shit, and that Kemmler had been killed repeatedly but always came back up until when the Warden group that included Justin killed him, supposedly for good.

Potential plot holes in Joe's story aside, I got thinking about how else the WC are bastards. And a really obvious one the most hypocritical of them all, good old Black Staff Eb. Who lays claim to doing such events as Mother fucking Krakatoa which, for those too lazy to click the link:

and the Holy shit Tunguska event, again for those lazy:

These are quite literally world shaking events, in a world where there is an entire civilization of other wizards, surely they would sort of go 'wtf' and have at least go and have a look. Now, I prefer my Dumbledore to be ~150 years old around GoF as opposed to the more lame ~116 he was later revised to as his final age, so lets go with Dumbledore being born sometime in the 1840's. Who better to send to check out these world altering events then super prodigy and renowned wizard Albus Dumbledore.

Wand in hand, Dumbledore is ready. He casts the bubblehead charm on himself as he prepares to apparate to Krakatoa. Feeling the unpleasant feeling of apparation squeeze the air from his lungs, he lands. However, the second he does, unbearable pain strikes him. Tasting blood he whirls around looking for a threat, but only feels more pain. The almost microscopic slivers of volcanic ash and glass have broken his bubblehead charm and have begun to tear his respiratory system to shreds. Jabbing his wand at his own throat, he transfigures the ash and glass into water, and then in another instant into air. Another twist of his wand and he's the creator of a brand new, more resistant variation of the bubblehead charm.

He's survived the first 20 seconds of his investigation, but will he survive the rest?

Basically, he'll find magical traces and the like, and maybe even encounter Eb, who feeling pretty shitty about what he's just done will flee rather than stomp some wizard after a some exchanged words.

Enter Tunguska. Albus Dumbledore has never forgotten the man he met on Krakatoa, and has reached another level magically since then. What will he do when they meet again at the scene of an untold destruction?

A series of stories about an epic Dumbledore that makes Shezza's look like a bitch and his encounters with the Black Staff. (no homo)

 

Er, Joe!Canon doesn't necessarily have to fit perfectly with HP canon, Kemmler doesn't need to be a Drizard (I'm fucking tired of making distinctions between the two).

And you seem ready for some WC bashing; slow down, your idea could be good, but it's all in the execution really. So if you go around bashing WC as I expect a fic from Dumbledore's POV would do, at least let us hear from the opposite end of the spectrum, as Butcher did.

I would love to see a Dumbledore walking through the wake of the Blackstaff, whether it be Ebenzar or otherwise -he might have been too young. I would also love to see Dumbledore and Ebenezar in the future after their travels, kinda like Kincaid and Eb, just to see how they interact.

 

Post Changes Idea.
================

The light at the end of the tunnel is bright. Too bright. When people talk about near death experiences, you don't hear them bitch and moan about retina scorching pain, just their elation of having made the discovery of the after life. They are not me. I'm Harry Dresden, professional wizard, and just when I finally was about to run all the bases with my good (and hot) friend Karrin Murphy, some asshole had the balls to shoot me. Make that 'Dead Professional Wizard'. The light seemingly got brighter as I got closer, and I had to lift my hand to shield my eyes. The Big Man, Uriel, St. Peter, Lucifer, or whoever the hell I saw on the other side of it was going to get chewed out for this

Then the light engulfed me and suddenly there was blackness. A more muted flash of blueish light lit up the darkness and a tall, blond woman stepped out. She was attractive, not Ms. America, but attractive nonetheless. I had once described her as amazonian. Now I knew better. Nordic Angel of Death fit better, these days.

"Gard. That light was fucking bright. Tell the All Father to cut back on the blinding fluorescents."

Gard, or Sigrun if you prefer, was a true life Valkyrie, employee of Donnar Vadderung. Translation: She's a minor Norse god, hand maiden to the big chief himself, Odin. She gave me a flat stare, before rolling her eyes.

"Even in death, Dresden, you cannot keep your remarks to yourself."

Convicted smart ass, that's me.

It was only then I took a look around the inky blackness. The light emitting from Gard had provided some visibility and I realized I was in Graceland Cemetery. I did a quick 180 and gulped as I read the tombstone before me.

'HERE LIES HARRY DRESDEN - HE DIED DOING THE RIGHT THING.'

The grave had been filled and covered...

My mouth opened, then shut again. I had died after slitting the throat of the mother of my child. I had died after committing genocide against an entire race of vampires. I had died after saving my daughter...

The tombstone was right. I had died doing the right thing. It brought me no comfort. My humor sufficiently snuffed out, I turned back to Gard and spoke quietly,

"So what is this?"

"Monoc Securities has taken an interest in you Dresden."

"I figured as much, what with your boss riding in on a bolt of lightning to kick vampire ass with me."

She nodded. "And now, you've perished."

My eyebrow quirked up. "I can't help but feel we're inching closer to a point. We've established my lack of life enough."

From no where apparent, she handed me a piece of paper.

'MONOC SECURITIES TERMS OF EMPLOYMENT: EINHERJAR'

My mouth opened slightly before I lifted my eyes back to the tall woman.

"I thought I was under contract with Mab."

She shook her head. "The mantle of winter passed back to the Queen of Air and Darkness upon your death, Dresden. Your 'contract' so to speak, is up for grabs and there are very few who may offer you a position at this point."

I could only think of two others at this point. "What, Uriel didn't want to pursue our work relationship? I must've been a crappy intern."

A grin tugged at Gard's lips. "I'm faster than the Angel."

Ah. So maybe He did have more plans for me, the All Father just reached me first.

My eyes went back to the so-called contract, scanning through it. Some sections caught my eyes.

'Benefits include:Return to Midgard, increase in physical and magical traits, flexible hours, paid housing, and lightning fast transportation' The last bit was likely literal. I had seen Vadderung come and go from Chichen Inez back to Monoc in a single flash of lightening. I continued my scan.

'Duties: Assist Valkyries[Brynhildr,Sigrun,Hildr] in matters of supernatural security. Defend against Vanir threats. Return 'sleeping' Aesir to active duty. Protect the All Father, Odin at all costs. IN THE EVENT OF RAGNAROK: Defend Valhalla and the High Gods.'

Gard's blue eyes were looking at me expectingly. I had no clue where to start, so I picked a topic at random.

"So...Ragnarok, huh? Still hasn't happened? Fenrir and the old man haven't thrown down yet?"

Gard's eyes flashed with hate. "The vile beast yet sleeps. Jormungandr still grasps his own tail, and Loki has yet to show his cowardly face."

"The recruiting of the other Aesir?" I asked.

"The times are quiet, many of my brothers and sisters forget themselves. Still, we must seek them out and remind them. We must prepare for the end."

"Look. This all sounds cool, being an Einherhar and all, but I remember who you're under contract with right now. I refuse to work for Marcone, so I'm afraid you're going to have to take your job offer somewhere else."

"You needn't worry about that."

"But the contract states that I have to assist the Valk-"

"I'm aware of the contract. I wrote it. If you would let me finish, I was saying that the contract states that you must assist the Valkyries in certain matters of supernatural security. John Marcone's case is a personal contract, and while he does benefit from our help now and then, he primarily serves as one of our ears to the mortal and supernatural communities."

Monoc backing Marcone's entry into the Accords suddenly made a little more sense.

"How much time am I looking at here? It says flexible hours." Yep. That's me, arguing for free time, even in death.

"Normally, your assignments would be very specific and time consuming, but Mr. Vadderung has taken special interest in you, Dresden. Given the locale of Chicago and the events surrounding it lately, your duties as Einherjar would not often take you away for long."

"What if I decide to wait around for Uriel and the Big Guy?" I like to explore my options.

"You, work for Uriel? Somehow I don't see that going over well Dresden. After all, one of his resume highlights is 'Slaughtering First Born Egyptian Children in the name of the Almighty'. Somehow I don't see your personalities meshing."

The lady had a point. I sighed and ran a hand through my hair. Didn't seem like I had much of a choice.

"Where do I sign?"

 

Hmm....I have some questions about Dresden Files related to plot, and instead of starting a new thread (though a Random Dresden Files question thread might not be a bad idea), I thought I would ask here.

I hope this is okay.

Anyway, I wish to know the following things:

- In one of the Side stories, Maeve sends one of her servants to ruin Bill the werewolf's wedding. I think her name was something Greentooth or Greentheeth, or whatever. Anyway, did she get killed in that side story, or is she still alive as of Proven Guilty?

- Does Dresden have an answering machine? I can't remember if it ever mentioned in the book if he did or not. If he didn't, one of those old answering machines that has double sided cassette tapes would probably work for him, right? Being as the newer ones would probably start swearing at him if he came to close...

There was one other question I had, but I can't remember what it was at the moment. Anyway, if anyone knows the answers to these questions, I would greatly appreciate an answer.

Thanks!

 

Mauled completely by Billy and Georgia in their werewolf form.

According to Dead Beat, he has an answering service, not a machine - he calls up a number and gets the messages left by Murphy and his mechanic:

 

Greenteeth. Actual folklore figure. "Don't play near the river alone or you'll fall in and drown Jenny Greenteeth will eat you!"

 

Fuck me - I just thought the Dresden character was made up out of whole cloth. I should've known better; Butcher makes fairytale references any time he can, so I should have picked up on that and looked into it before now. Thanks for the link.

/learning for the day already.

 

Idea that's been rattling around in my head.

Margaret II is grown up, and an FBI agent in a world where the masquerade has finally collapsed. The White Council has collapsed, and the Grey Council regulates the supernatural world's interactions with mortals (or tries to). Maggie is assigned as the liaison between the FBI and the Council, working with Lenore Raith (Lara's niece). As she solves cases, she searches for the identity of her father and tries to find out how her mother died.

Light on specific plot, but I think the setting is interesting.

 

Whoa, I'm actually somewhat depressed because I know this when never be written.

/sad

 

I like this idea. Nothing more to say than that.

 

Came up with a Dresden/Firefly crossover during work while thinking back on Browncoat; Green Eyes, so don't be surprised if there are a few superficial similarities. Set post-Changes and post-Serenity, so spoilers for both.

Premise: Harry Dresden has been dead a lot longer than in canon, and the world has changed significantly. For one, the Apocalypse happened and it wasn't the side of freedom and justice that won the day. Earth is a literal hellhole where the barrier between the Nevernever and the mortal realm is practically non-existent.

Humans were hunted for sport, nukes were launched and lost, anarchy reigned with the loosed Fallen above all. Even the Faerie Queens were unable to halt the armies of Hell, and now they live as servants to those that now rule.

A small group of humans, however, got an idea into their heads. If life on Earth is nothing but suffering, why not move? So they did, and they took a vanguard of multinationals to pave the way to the stars. Apparently even Angels cannot abide the black.

So it is to a time when mankind has settled beyond its homeworld that one Harry Dresden awakens, and he's confused as hell.

Next comes the technical details, which are in spoilers. Read if you want.

Spoiler

Okay, the premise has been laid down, but there's so much more going on behind the scenes than that.

When humanity left for the stars it wasn't at the call of some good-natured scientist, it was by the will of Gentleman Johnny Marcone, who has taken up the Coin for Thorned Namshiel and forged his own path through the darkness.

However, he wasn't the only member of the Blackened Order to leave Earth for fresher pastures. Nicodemus Archelone soon discovered after the Apocalypse that immortality isn't much fun when all you've got to do is torture people. His sense of fulfilment comes from plots within plots and planning the downfall of his enemies, which can't really do when all of them are dead. So he tags along on one of Earth's colony ships and gets himself involved in the politics of this new government, eventually becoming the shadow behind the throne of what is now the Union of Allied Planets.

Marcone, on the other hand, doesn't like this at all. He'd set this up so that he could rule peacefully. Make it nice and happy and peaceful for children everywhere, while making a nice profit on the side. So he starts up an opposition. An Independent government. They later become known as the Browncoats.

Now we have the history laid out, time for the plot.

Harry Dresden wakes up in a place very unfamiliar to him. Technology had never been his strong point, but he'd been pretty sure spaceships weren't all that common back when he was alive. So he tries to work out how he's alive again, and where the hell he is. Later this evolves to 'what the hell happened to my planet?' and 'how do I take down Nicodemus?'.

Eventually, as this is a crossover, he finds his way aboard Serenity, which immediately starts fucking up even more than it had been, but them's the breaks when you have a wizard on board.

There he finds a young, traumatised, slightly insane young girl that has had the Sight permanently locked on. Naturally she freaks the fuck out when she first spots Harry, and once he realises that she's doing continuous neuromancy of all things, well, shit hits the fan. I think it does well in explaining why River cannot forget anything, and why she sees things so strangely; she's not looking at things with her regular eyes and it's driven her pretty damn insane because of it.

Naturally Harry takes this cause on as his own, what with his anti-authoritarian streak that fits in mighty fine with our Big Damn Heroes, and especially because River reminds him oh so heavily of another young girl with a talent for neuromancy.

Aside from this I've only got a few plots points that I thought fit the bill, and they're not as fleshed out as the rest is.

1) The Nevernever exists on the new planets, but they're all isolated from one another, and very chaotic besides. Up until one/two hundred years ago they had been basically uninhabited (the Core planets that is, the Border planets much less than that), and the spirit realm surrounding them was pretty damn sparse as well. Once humanity arrived, however, the Nevernever was filled with the dreams of mortals and has been in a state of turmoil ever since, with only shadows of the Earthly Nevernever being seen. Naturally I'd planned to connect all the Nevernevers at one point, which makes travelling easier, but also opens these new planets up to the beings humanity had ran away from.

2) Mab breaks free of her enforced servitude after this fact. She has her Knight now and she's going to make use of him, so help him.

2a) I can't decide what to do with the Faerie Mothers. Word of Jim is that they're a league above Mab and Titania in terms of power, so I can't really see a way for them to live through the Apocalypse without being so thoroughly broken that they're all but useless to the plot. I'm thinking kill them off; died in battle against Lucifer himself.

3) Thomas, Lara and a couple of others from the White Court are alive and kicking on one of the Core planets. Maybe they set up the Companions' Guild and are just hiding in the shadows so that Nicodemus doesn't find out about them. Justine naturally died a long time ago.

Okay, that's done. Any suggestions/criticism for the idea? Too close to nonjon's fic or a good enough distance away?

 

While this won't be nearly as fleshed out as Aekiel's idea, I'd had an idea which also centered on Marcone and Thorned Namshiel's coin, though not in the same manner.

Way back when, in Fool Moon (iirc), John Marcone offered Dresden a job. Dresden, whose principles were of the black and white variety at the time, refused.

Flash forward several years to the end of Small Favor; Dresden has just confronted Marcone over the theft of the coin. For reasons he keeps to himself, Marcone soon gets back in touch with Dresden with an idea to find out if one of his people is responsible for the coin's disappearance, and all Dresden has to do is accept the job he was offered years back.

In order to convince all of Marcone's underlings that this deal is genuine (and avoid scaring away the culprit), Dresden must be seen in Marcone's employ, and enjoying the same benefits you would expect from one of Marcone's enforcers. Pros include extra cash, contacts with people in positions to know things, and access to information or materials Dresden couldn't get himself. Cons include trouble with Murphy and the police and possibly federal agencies, somewhat shaken faith from certain of Dresden's friends and allies, and pressure from the church to find the coin.

Throw in the necessary bad guys, conspiracies, and Dresden's abundant wit, and we might just get a good story dealing with two things many Dresden fans would like to see - a fleshing out of the What If scenario involving Marcone's job offer, and a plausible story behind the disappearance of Thorned Namshiel's coin.




All that typed out, I feel the need to mention that I'm running on pure delirium and caffiene induced jitters, so I apologize if it isn't 100% coherent.

 

I have a couple of ideas spinning in my head right now, mostly inspired by the March contest (which I won't make, obviously). But I have a question first.

Seeing as this fic will most likely be a crossover in which Dresden is pretty much the main character, would it too terribly fucked up to write from Dresden's POV (1st person) sometimes and other chapters from other characters', most likely in 3rd person?

I dunno. Seems like a crime to write fanfiction based on Dresden Files without using the 1st person, so it's either that (see above) or drastically butchering the plot (pun intended).

Thoughts?