The Triverse is
Mid-Earth, an alternate 1970s London
Max-Earth, a vision of the 26th century
Palinor, where magic is real
Previously: Detective Lola Styles has stopped the transit of illegal migrants through the portal to London. She’s just found out that Princess Daryla, her partner, has been running the gang behind the trafficking. Which is awkward. There’s a lot of swearing in this one.
Bruglia.
3202. Leafless.
Hold it together, Lola.
It wasn’t uncommon, when she was a child, for adults around her to always be lamenting her childishness. Her father, wishing she’d be more sensible. Her mother, wishing she would daydream less. Even her little sister rolling her eyes at her for being an embarrassment. Teachers, telling her to focus on the present instead of a made-up future. All of those adults, hurrying her along, telling her to be more like them and to leave childish fantasies behind.
She refused, but time had other plans and she became an adult anyway. That was when she felt it: that nagging doubt, that she was too silly to be in the police. That it was a job for sensible, proper grown-ups. Even as she passed every exam and raced through cadet training, that hesitation never went away. It was a chorus made of all the voices that had doubted her through the years. She no longer lived at home and her school teachers were in the past, but their whispers continued. Chipping away at her foundations.
Someone that hadn’t been like that was Clarke. He’d not tried to change her into something else. In fact, she suspected that she’d had that effect on him, if anything, pulling him out of the mire. Their partnership hadn’t been an obvious one, but it had worked for both of them. He didn’t treat her like a child, nor expected her to be more of an adult. And in return she’d reminded him, perhaps, of what it was to feel alive.
Now, though, she had to be the grown-up in the room.
She ran a hand through her wet hair again, the looked down at Daryla. The princess, with all her power, sat on a chair in her apartment, awaiting sentence.
“You’ve completely compromised me,” Lola said.
“Lola, I—”
Lola held up a finger and her expression was clear enough to make Daryla fall silent. “You used information I told you in private - which I shouldn’t have told you - to take over a criminal gang.” She let out a quiet scream of anguish. “I can’t believe I’m even saying those words. A criminal gang. What the hell were you thinking?”
“I thought I could do some good—”
“No, shut the fuck up. Really, I mean it. If I ask you a question, assume it’s rhetorical and keep your mouth shut. Do you think you’re some kind of superhero? A character in a movie? Sneaking out at night, dressed like a fucking ninja, beating up the local heavies? And then trying to run the show? Oh my god.”
“Someone had to do it, and if it wasn’t me—”
“Yes, yes. Shut the fuck up. Please.” Lola scrunched her eyes shut and took a deep breath. “I’m sorry, I don’t normally swear this much. Those people are murderers and rapists and thieves. They peddle drugs on both sides of the portal. They sell people. They run child sex rings. And you thought you could do some fucking good?”
Daryla got to her feet and paced the room. “I’m not saying they’re good people! But I could use them. Point them in a different direction. It’s not about them, it’s about shutting down what they used to do and putting them to work on something better.”
“And how’s that working out for you?”
Spreading her arms wide, Daryla shrugged. “I don’t know, I think it was going quite well until you blew it up by seizing one of my containers!”
She was actually going to try to turn this around on Lola. “You’re actually going to try to turn this around on me? Really?” Lola laughed. “You sure you want to try that one?”
“OK, no, but it was working. We’d got people through the portal, safely. Safe passage. My contact, a koth, they escorted people all the way, made sure they got to their destinations in London, and safely into the city and beyond.”
“I’ve met them. At the prison. They seemed very loyal.”
“I’ve given them something new. A chance to be someone else.”
“A bad lot turned good? Is that it?”
“Not all of them, but some, yes!”
Lola shook her head and walked over to the window. She opened it and breathed in the cool evening air. The situation was a disaster and she had no idea what to do next. But she did know that Daryla was full of shit. On purpose or otherwise.
“Daryla, do you genuinely think they’ve mended their ways? Given up a life of crime to do good? Modern day Robin Hoods? Sorry, you probably don’t get that reference. These are bad people.”
“They’re people who have done bad things. That doesn’t stop them doing something else.”
She might as well tell her, then. “Yeah, sometimes it does. You really think they’ve stopped doing all those other things?”
“They do what I tell them to do.”
“I have files that say otherwise. Very large files. Down at the office. You should have had a read when you were rummaging about earlier.”
The pacing stopped. “What are you talking about?”
“They’re still at it! OK, maybe not the people trafficking through the portal. They just do your ‘nice’ version. But they’re still shipping drugs. They still run half the brothels in Bruglia. They still grab refugees out of the camps to work in those brothels. How do you think this underground railroad of yours really works? Bribes, violence, threats. Two weeks ago a 12-year old aen’fa boy had his head cut off and used as a football in front of his father’s shop. Two weeks ago. Why? Because he didn’t pay his protection money on time. Half of the cases I’ve got open can be traced back to the remnants of the Collins gang. And now it turns out your fingerprints are all over it.”
“That can’t be true.”
“Why the fuck not? It’s a criminal gang! What did you expect? You’re a princess living in a palace with a dad who works in a literal ivory tower. Did you really think you’d be able to keep control over the Bruglian mafia?”
The colour had drained from Daryla’s face. She was getting through, perhaps. “I didn’t just ask them nicely, though. I spoke their language. They knew I was a threat, that I could take down any of them.”
“That’s great, but it just means they did everything behind your back. They’ve been doing all of this for longer than you.” There was another possibility, of course. “That’s assuming that you didn’t know about all this. I don’t know what’s worse: being the most naive person in the triverse, or knowing all of this and letting it happen. Or even being a part of it.”
“Lola!” Daryla turned away. That seemed like a genuine reaction, at least.
Another thought hit Lola. “Your micrology. Your magic. How common is it? How many people can wield it like you do?”
“I met a visiting scholar once who was better than me. In Bruglia, I have no match.”
She was proud of it. The danger hadn’t even occurred to her. “And how many people know that Princess Daryla alone is capable of that kind of magic?”
At last, a slow realisation, spreading over Daryla’s face. Her hands, previously agitated, dropped to her sides. “Oh.”
Shit. This was worse than she’d even thought it was. “They might already know it’s you, then. They could take out a hit on you at any moment. Or blackmail you.”
Daryla took several steps towards Lola. “What do I do, Lola?”
For once, someone saw her as the adult in the room.
Taking a deep breath, Lola nodded. “Here’s what we’re going to do.”
Oh, Clarke. There’s so much to say, and so little I can say. You know when you wish you had a rewind button, and could do something over again? Sometimes you find yourself in a situation where there are no good options.
Starting to feel like I’m just spinning my wheels here. I’m closing cases, but I haven’t made any progress on the other thing. And the connections I’ve made are starting to feel like weaknesses rather than strengths. Like I’ve taken my eye off the ball, except the ball is a shark and now it’s coming back to bite me.
Have you ever had to choose between the job and a friend? Or between what you think is right, and what your heart tells you to do? Where it feels like you’re damned regardless.
On the plus side, I have some new intel which is going to help us crack down on local gang activity. They’ve kept operating even after we got Thomas and booted Collins out, and it’s been hard to track the leaders down. Bit of a breakthrough there. So that ties up some loose ends from the work you and Holland did earlier this year. Can’t put anything else down in writing.
I don’t know whether I’ll look to renew my post here after the first year is up. What do you think I should do? The magic’s gone, so to speak.
Say hi to the gang. See you all soon, probably.
Love,
Styles
Thank you for reading!
We’re looking at going to Portugal in the spring. Specifically to Lisbon and Porto, so if any of you have visited or live nearby and have tips for places to stay, eat and see, please do let me know.
Have I talked about
’s Spectators? it’s one of the most interesting examples of serial fiction I’ve encountered. Here’s the latest instalment:Specifically, I find it fascinating how piecemeal it is. BKV and Niko Henrichon put out a few panels each week, sometimes more. It’s not consistent. It’s exceedingly slow paced - a comic panel a) doesn’t take long to see and b) doesn’t tend to move the story on by much.
It’s very good, of course, because it’s BKV. And maybe he can get away with it because everyone knows who he is and knows that it’s worth being patient. And obviously Henrichon’s art isn’t something he just rattles off, so the timeline makes sense from a creation perspective. But there’s no way Spectators could be published like this anywhere else, really, outside of their newsletter. A serial with this inconsistency wouldn’t work on TV, or radio, or in print comics. I like that online serialisation has that kind of flex.
I play a lot of games, and generally lament that a) there are far too many these days and b) despite that, they’re also mostly very good. As such, this resonated:
I had an interesting mini-viral moment over on Notes this week. After posting Monday’s newsletter I shared this pondering:
Turns out I wasn’t alone in thinking this. Also, it’s fascinating how those like/reply/restack numbers would be considered tiny on traditional social media sites, but on Notes it generated properly engaging discussion and also led to an increase in subscribers.
The epic Babylon 5 rewatch continued this week. You can check it out here if you’re not up to speed:
Lastly, I found this rather hilarious and wish I could write like this:
As I was going to press (always wanted to write that), none other than
dropped his first newsletter into our inboxes. It’s very good, inevitably:Here’s this week’s chapter sketch of a troubled Lola:
Author notes
This week’s chapter is essentially a rebuttal to last week’s chapter.
After part 6 went out, a friend and reader sent me this:
And it’s a fair point. Daryla did go quite Batmanny last week. Although Batman usually tries to shut down the gangs rather than take them over (and always leaves a few behind so that he can go out and beat up some more people the next day), there’s definitely a lot of wish fulfilment going on.
Last week’s chapter was primarily from Daryla’s point of view. Triverse is told from a subjective third person perspective, which means you can’t always trust what you’re reading. Last week, we got the superhero version of what she’s been up to.
This week, it’s Lola pointing out all the flaws in her plan. The immense danger she’s put herself in, and how she’s professionally entirely compromised Lola. The inherent selfishness and naivete of what she’s attempted. And, of course, that Daryla’s not in as much control as she thought: that her grand plan isn’t as neat and tidy, because reality is never that neat and tidy.
There’s a meta level, I suppose. It’s me this week taking the version of me from last week and saying “hold on a minute. Are you sure this story fits into the Triverse vibe?” For anyone reading who thought last week’s chapter was a bit on the silly side, this is the response.
Of all the characters, Lola is the one who would most like to be a superhero. Or, more accurately, she’d like to be a magical wizard or princess. She wants to go on grand adventures - no, quests. But she’s also had to face up to the real world, and how it rarely goes that smoothly. Bad guys don’t always win, but neither do the good guys. Even on Palinor, where everything is heightened and inherently more heroic, it’s still far from simple.
Triverse is a weird thing. It’s inherently very daft; a big, indulgent mash-up of my favourite things. I couldn’t decide whether to write another fantasy book or do proper sci-fi. I also fancied having a go at crime fiction. So rather than make a decision, I did all three, at the same time. At time it’s a genre pastiche. Sometimes it’s grimly serious. It flits between tones and styles. That’s a big part of why I’m still excited to come back and write it every week.
This is a very dialogue-heavy chapter. The staging is quite minimal, so the focus is quite intensely on Daryla and Lola. I mentioned last week how the Daryla reveal was originally going to be a dialogue scene, before I switched it up to be a full-on flashback. I think that was a good move, as it left space for this chapter to be the talky one, without it being two talkies in a row.
Right, hope you enjoyed it. Thanks for reading, as ever. Still blows my mind that you all show up for these words. Thank you.
I need to go back and fill in comments on all the chapters I haven't done yet (which won't be tonight), but I will say two weeks ago I didn't expect last week to be Daryla going full-on Jason Todd (DC's comics second Robin who died in the 80's, was reborn in the 00's, who initially used his training to take over a criminal gang).
I DID expect this week to have Lola point out all the ways Daryla was being stupid.
Poor Lola. She's just been moving from "no good solution" to "no good solution" situations.
It's the nature of crime fiction, but, overall, you're putting your characters through the wringer much more in Triverse than your prior stories.
It will be interesting to see how Lola resolves this dilemma. I guess we'll have to wait until next Friday's post.