History Literature / AlouettesSong

* PrayerIsALastResort: In the wake of Richard's destruction of Nalboon's flagship that almost laid waste to Kondal, the emperor of Kondal orders a nuclear missile strike in revenge. Richard begs him not to but his pleas fall on deaf ears. Mardonale responds in kind. A potential extinction of all life upon their world through NuclearWinter seems inevitable. Richard realizes there is only one hope left: the Overlordship, which could give him the necessary authority over the emperors to restore peace. However, touching the symbols could kill him. Dorothy tries to dissuade him from trying to remove it from her grave, but then suggests they pray to God to stay the Lady Kondal's anger. Richard lives!

* PrayerIsALastResort: In the wake of Richard's destruction of Nalboon's flagship that almost laid waste to Kondal, the emperor of Kondal orders a nuclear missile strike in revenge. Richard begs him not to but his please fall on deaf ears. Mardonale responds in kind. A potential extinction of all life upon their world seeds inevitable. Richard realizes there is only one hope left: the Overlordship, which could give him the necessary authority over the emperors. However, touching the symbols could kill him. Dorothy tries to dissuade him from taking it, but afterwards suggests they pray to God to stay the Lady Kondal's anger. Richard lives.

* TheCallLeftAMessage: Lady Kondal's [[TimeAbyss abiding spirit]] guards the Overlordship of Mardonale, a necklace of seven symbols functionally equivalent to a crown. She is waiting for just the one person she judges worthy to take on the Overlordship for the good of all. She will instantly stop the heart of any other person. [[spoiler: Richard's mission to order the respective emperors of Kondal and Mardonale to destroy the nuclear missiles they fired at each other makes him worthy in her eyes.]]

* TheCallLeftAMessage: Lady Kondal's [[TimeAbyss abiding spirit]] guards the Overlordship of Mardonale, a necklace of seven symbols functionally equivalent to a crown. She is waiting for just the one person she judges worthy to take on the Overlordship for the good of all. She will instantly stop the heart of any other person.

** [[RolePlay/HolyRelic]] Her abiding spirit guards the Overlordship of Mardonale, a necklace of seven symbols functionally equivalent to a crown. She is waiting for just the one person she judges worthy to take on the Overlordship for the good of all. She will instantly stop the heart of any other person.

* GuardianEntity: The Lady Kondal, founder of [[TheKingdom Kondal]], by right of regency over her unborn child, the final scion of Mardonalian royalty to still exist.
** [[RolePlay/HolyRelic]] Her abiding spirit for more than six thousand years guards the Overlordship of Mardonale, a necklace of seven symbols functionally equivalent to a crown. She is waiting for just the one person she judges worthy to take on the Overlordship for the good of all. She will instantly stop the heart of any other person.

* GuardianEntity: The Lady Kondal, founder of [[TheKingdom Kondal]], by right of regency over her unborn child, the final scion of Mardonalian royalty to still exist. She also confiscated that land's crown, the symbol of Overlordship over Mardonale (and hence Kondal as they are a breakway nation) plunging it into civil war. At her gravesite her invisible spirit stands guard over the crown to prevent the wrong person from taking it up again and wresting power over all of Osnome. She's waiting for just the one person she judges worthy to wear it for the good of all. She will instantly stop the heart of any other person.

* ModernStasis: [[TheKingdom Kondal]] and [[TheEmpire Mardonale]] have been continuously at war for approximately ''six thousand years'' -- [[SciFiWritersHaveNoSenseOfScale about as long as Earth civilization has existed]] -- and there is no indication that their societies or cultures have changed at all during that time. The reason however, is now known.

Richard Seaton, an artist, is attempting to electroplate niobium through a rare-earths waste solution provided by his close friend, Martin Crane, an engineering student, living on the opposite side of the country. Martin had been childhood friends with Margaret Spencer, a child prodigy now a graduate student researching a total matter-energy conversion effect for her master's degree in math under her professor, Marc [=DuQuesne=]. When Seaton places his copper candlestick into orbit completely by accident, Margaret begins to see the possibilities. Martin and Margaret fall in love, build a ship, marry, and go out to Jupiter on a honeymoon; completely oblivious that Marc had Richard captive with a plan to highjack the ship on orders from Marc's other employer to suppress the technology. Richard had gained a girlfriend, Dorothy Vaneman, a musical superstar with talents in both voice and violin, in the meantime. Dorothy's the only one left on Earth who can rescue them. She has powerful friends who can help, but she's still terrified...

* GenreSavvy: After Richard takes power to stop the war on Osnome, he realizes the ruling power must be taken away from royalty and devolved to the common people. He provides [[Film/TheTenCommandments 'five decrees of decency']] for the people to obey forever and build their laws around, before he steps down. When Dorothy asks what he is about to do now that he has absolute power, he [[LampShade]]s his intentions by saying, [[ExtremelyLamePun "I'll give them each a tablet now and call on them in the morning."]] [[spoiler: this is all the more ironic given that he's Jewish ]]

* GenreSavvy: After Richard takes power to stop the war on Osnome, he realizes the ruling power must be taken away from royalty and devolved to the common people. He provides [[Film/TheTenCommandments 'five decrees of decency']] for the people to obey forever and build their laws around, before he steps down. When Dorothy asks what he is about to do now that he has absolute power, he lampshades his intended by saying, [[ ExtremelyLamePun "I'll give them each a tablet now and call on them in the morning." ]]

* GenreSavvy: After Richard takes power to stop the war on Osnome, he realizes the ruling power must be taken away from royalty and devolved to the common people. He provides [[Film/TheTenCommandments 'five decrees of decency']] for the people to obey forever and build their laws around, before he steps down.

** By the end of the novel, completely averted. [[spoiler: In the previous continuity Seaton is made Overlord by Kondal's emperor for saving his kingdom. In this continuity, Richard must BECOME Overlord to force Kondal and Mardonale from engaging in a NuclearWar. He then devolves the Overlordship to [[ HeartwarmingMomentOfCrowning all the people of Osnome, ]] [[ CrowningMomentOfHeartwarming abolishing all monarchies by side effect. ]] ]]

* AsYouKnow: The mean are the first the first to obtain an InfoDump about Dunark's planet about his nation, culture, and language. Seaton's the first of them, but stops the transfer when
[[spoiler: he's about to get a sex education lesson based on Dunark's first mating with Sitar, and he's trying to save himself for Dorothy. After Seaton explains this to Dunark, the women get their InfoDump from Sitar, and Dunark asks his wife to withhold similar knowledge from Dorothy ]]

** By the end of the novel, completely averted. [[spoiler: In the previous continuity Seaton is made Overlord by Kondal's emperor for saving his kingdom. In this continuity, Richard must BECOME Overlord to force Kondal and Mardonale from engaging in a NuclearWar. He then devolves the Overlordship to [[ HeartwarmingMomentOfCrowning all the people of Osnome, abolishing all monarchies by side effect. ]]

** By the end of the novel, completely averted. [[spoiler: In the previous continuity Seaton is made Overlord by Kondal's emperor for saving his kingdom. In this continuity, Richard must BECOME Overlord to force Kondal and Mardonale from engaging in a NuclearWar ]]

* GuiltFreeExterminationWar: Kondal and Mardonale are in the middle of one at the time of FirstContact, but compared to original continuity the real reason is now known [[spoiler: Lady Kondal, founder of Kondal, and the youngest son of the then dying emperor of Mardonale fell in love. The oldest son had killed all the others aside from the youngest. They killed each other in a duel. The lady confiscated the emperor's crown and sailed off with it, along with the final male heir she was carrying. This plunged Mardonale into civil war. They want the crown back.]]

* HaveAGayOldTime: Martin, but Margaret found a [[IncrediblyLamePun backdoor]] to him.

* StatuesqueStunner: Not so statuesque but still an absolute stunner. Dorothy at 5 foot 8 inches and having a perfect hard-body from being a kosher range-hand makes her according to Word of God easily one of the most beautiful Terrans of her generation. [[spoiler: as a probable tell-tale that Martin is potentially bisexual rather than purely homosexual, he remarks if Dotty were walking in the middle of downtown wearing only a bikini she could cause cars to plow into fire hydrants]]

* ZeeRust: Osnome's nuclear weapons technology on both sides is extremely crude, circa 1940's. Mardonale's prototype nuclear propelled flagship uses a design similar to ORION.

* StatuesqueStunner: Not so statuesque but still an absolute stunner. Dorothy at 5 foot 8 inches and having a perfect hard-body from being a kosher range-hand makes her according to Word of God easily one of the most beautiful Terrans of her generation.

* TechnoBabble: Lampshaded. Martin is the first to ask "what are the mechanics are this totally wield shit?"
* SpheroidDropship: And how. Even when the ship can't fly anymore the party can still escape in it [[spoiler: by droppin through several decks of arenak hull, shattering each deck with ultrasonics]]
* StatuesqueStunner: Not so statuesque but still an absolute stunner. Dorothy at 5 foot 8 inches and has a perfect hard-body from being a kosher range-hand that according to Word of God she is easily one of the most beautiful Terrans of her generation.

* BadAssBookworm: In this continuity, [=DuQuesne=] himself, followed just behind [[spoiler: by his research assistant Margaret]] The others aren't too bad either. See characters folder.

* EveryoneIsArmed: Kondalians - check. Mardonalians - check. But none of the humans are aside from Dorothy and [=DuQuesne=]. [[spoiler: Richard is in this continuity a near-total pacifist.]]

''The Skylark of Space'' was the first space opera series read in high school by Creator/Andrew Jonathan Fine while still attending high school during the 1970's. Fine had always been fascinated by the possibilities of how the story might have unfolded had it begun in the post-World-War-II era, with changes in the issues in culture and sensibilities that had taken place long since the Depression Era.

Because ''The Skylark of Space'', the first novel of E. E. Smith's Literature\SkylarkSeries had fallen into the public domain by the time Fine finally had a comprehensive vision for a reboot in 2013, this actually is a legally non-infringing piece of literature. Some names are the same, but the motivations for the characters are completely different. See character folder and tropes below.

* EveryoneIsArmed: Kondalians - check. Mardonalians - check. But none of the humans are aside from Dorothy.

* HumanAliens: The same as before [[spoiler: In fact, so much so that Richard is tempted to BoldlyCome with one but turns her down. He pawns the woman off to Margaret's professor, later. His fiancee' finds out later what he did and is extremely grateful he resisted. ]]

* NoBiochemicalBarriers: Osnome has fewer heavy metals than before, making it an almost parallel Earth, except that some plants concentrate the metals into their cell structure. [=DuQuesne=] is able to test for safety by taste [[spoiler: but advises against tasting the meat ]]

* ProudWarriorRace: The Osnomians [[spoiler: Dotty also. She's from Texas. Nuff said ]]

* StatuesqueStunner: Not so statuesque. Dorothy at 5 foot 8 inches and is a perfect hard-body from being a kosher range-hand that according to Word of God she easily one of the most beautiful Terrans of her generation.

* CallASmeerpARabbit: Sometimes the other way around. The term for horse manure sounds really different in Kondalian.

* EnemyMine: [=DuQuesne=] and Seaton are pretty snarky with each other but ready cooperate with [[spoiler: [[TheCaptain]] ]] Margaret bossing them both around!

* EvolutionaryLevels: The Kondalians of this continuity now ignorant of this and [=DuQuesne=] needs to explain to the ruler why [[RainMan Margaret]] was able to develop a stardrive.

* GrayEyes: Margaret is the one who has them in this continuity rather than Richard.

* GrayEyes: Margaret is the one who has them, now, rather than Richard. She needs the extreme intellectual power they represent to subdue [=DuQuesne=] after the crew takes him prisoner.
** [[spoiler: (she invokes the same power to change Martin from gay to bi) ]]

[[folder:Main Characters]]
[[WMG: Dorothy]]
Daughter of Rebecca Ostfeld who in turn is daughter of Rabbi Jacob Ostfeld. Father is James Vaneman.
Born in Amarillo, Texas. Round face, ash-blonde hair to buttocks, usually braided, amethyst eyes. 19 years old. Range-hand, butcher, violinist, singer, and concertmaster of an extremely small orchestra. Can read and write both Hebrew and English. 5 foot 8 inches height, weight approximately 130, shoe size 11. Cup size D. Privately tutored. Holds high school equivalency certificate. IQ in the mid-140's. Nicknamed "Dotty."

* {{Badass}}: At the start of the story, only against "varmints". But Daddy leaves her with a sawed off shotgun to defend the homestead with when he's away on business. Still, our of all four main characters she is the only one who ever learns to kill another person.
* TheBerserker: When fighting [=DuQuesne=] for control of the ship with nothing more than a knife.
* {{Determinator}}: After a little bit of help reigning in her despair and terror, she got herself put back together, got herself flown over to Jupiter, crept into the ship through the airlock, then with a little help from Richard whooped some ass as saved her friends.
* GreenEyedMonster: Inverted. For [[FryingPanOfDoom Richard's]] help in defeating [=DuQuesne=] she gives him a free pass to let Margaret deflower him, since she's staying a virgin until marriage, without consequences to their relationship. Richard turns Dorothy's offer down.
** Also played straight. Finds out Richard while bathing had turned down flat a seduction attempt by Osnomian lady-in-waiting as part of a test of character by Dunark. She is extremely glad Richard passed.
* TheSparkOfGenius: Fully activates when she first falls in love with Richard. Amplified when her grandfather passes down to her an heirloom Guarneri del Gesu' violin.
* IncrediblyLamePun: After noticing the vast leap in performance with her grandfather's counsel, he grandfather predicts she'll one day "perform violins on a grand scale". How right he was. Poor Dotty!
* TeenGenius: At ten borrowed a band violin and awkwardly copied the first few bars of a classical piece. Everyone noticed.
* HeroicBSOD: Only one Terran in the party is chosen by the others to take a detonator with him, escape Nalboon's ship heading toward Kondal to wipe out the place: Richard. Richard destroys the ship to save millions on the continent but as the thought he lost everyone he cared about on board (including Dorothy!), and goes catatonic. Dorothy is forced to [[IntimatePsychotherapy take]] [[TheGruntingOrgasm drastic]] [[TechnicalVirgin measures]] to reboot his mind.
* EverythingIsBiggerInTexas: "They can can this Jewess out of Texas, but they can't take this Texan of out this Jewess." Including her temper. Especially her temper. Everyone finds this out the hard way...
* ImprobableAimingSkills: A lifetime of killing rattlesnakes with a pistol at 30 yards gives her the ability to roll a perfect 300 game at a bowling alley. Played with in the story as a gag.
* GoodPeopleHaveGoodSex: When she finally does consummate her marriage (conceiving her baby at exactly the same time), the experience totally and completely rocks her world.

[[WMG: Richard]]
Son of Deborah and Jack Seaton. Born in Westmont, New Jersey. Brown hair, sky-blue eyes. Nearsighted, wears oversized aviator frames. 16 years old. Height about 5 foot eight inches, weights 180 pounds. Shoe size 13. Usually sedentary, rides bicycle for transportation. IQ in the 160's. Sophomore in college, double-majoring in fine arts and in history, boarding except for weekends. Nicknamed "Rick"
* {{Determinator}}: He's had a terrible childhood, both at the hands of bullies and by his own parents. He took the opportunity to skip to high school at 11, then created a three year option by cramming summers with electives plus remedial second year English.
* IncorruptablePurePureness: Because of the child abuse he experienced he swore he'd take his own life rather than grow up to become the kind of person who causes suffering. Essentially, he renounced humanity. This can be a very dangerous thing to do, not only for himself [[DrivenToSuicide]] but also for everyone else [[RealityWarper]].
* ThePowerOfLove: Margaret likens him to having "weapons-grade 'hesed' (compassion)". Richard doesn't NEED a weapon to get what he needs done. All he needs to do is be ready to sacrifice his own needs for the needs of others.
* TheSparkOfGenius: Took up sculpting from a young age. He showed such incredible potential in high school that the college he now attends offered him a full scholarship on a spot after viewing his portfolio on a campus visit.
* IncrediblyLamePun: Knocked [=DuQuesne=] out flat with a 9 inch cast-iron skillet while the professor was distracted by Dorothy's efforts to retake the ship. Declares one day his friend Martin's martial arts instructor should one day award him "a first dan in fryin' pan!".
* TeenGenius: His determination got him into college early more than his intellect ever did, but his intellect is hardly chopped liver, either.
* HeroicBSOD: Only one Terran in the party is chosen by the others to take a detonator with him, escape Nalboon's ship heading toward Kondal to wipe out the place: Richard. Richard destroys the ship to save millions on the continent but at the thought he losing EVERYONE he cared about on board (including Dorothy!), he goes catatonic. Dorothy is forced to [[IntimatePsychotherapy take]] [[TheGruntingOrgasm drastic]] [[TechnicalVirgin measures]] to reboot his mind. He interprets the entire experience in non-sexual terms, one of rebirth.
* GoodPeopleHaveGoodSex: When after he obtains written consent to marry he finally does consummate his marriage (conceiving his baby at exactly the same time), the experience totally and completely rocks his world. He also does some research at a public library to find something to [[TheImmodestOrgasm rock his wife's world too]].
* SpeedSex: Averted. Early in their discussions while courting, Richard confesses his great fear of Dorothy's physical beauty because he feels this would be the inevitable result of consummating the marriage in its due course. Dorothy later overhears to her horror psychological warfare waged by his mother against his father, accusing his father of always being "a one stroke wonder." She therefore determines to research a [[WomensMysteries "no-stroke" method]] for him to begin gaining confidence with her. It's one of the many things he loves her forever for.

[[WMG: Margaret]]
Nicknames "Peggy" (as child) "Marge" or "Margie" (older).

Surrendered to Washington State by parents for failing to talk by the age of 3. Working diagnoses of autism and aphasia given. Turned over to a children's charity care hospital in Spokane where she was found to have off-the-scale scores in non-verbal and visual reasoning. The staff used an experimental technique playing to her strengths help her learn how to talk, then she was bounced around the northern Idaho and eastern Washington foster care systems.

Discovered by [=DuQuesne=] at an elementary school reinventing high school math and becomes his foster daughter for a few years. [=DuQuesne=] has her educated by private tutors at roughly double the normal pace, supervising her mathematics instruction personally. He gets her into college at age 15, with himself as her academic advisor, with her major being mathematics. At age 16 she adopts then emancipates her, so she can care for herself on campus if something happens to him. That year, as a college sophomore, she discovers a flaw in his work. He rewards her with an instant promotion to the graduate department and gives her one of his pet projects purely as a master's thesis topic.

Margaret is 17 years old, 5 foot 10 inches, 120 pounds, rail thin, midnight black hair down to shoulders, grey eyes. Cup size A. Shoe size 8. Graduate student in mathematics and research assistant for [=DuQuesne=] in physics research postulated to create clean energy but which even [=DuQuesne=] because the key substance responsible he does not believe exists.

But it does... only because an innocent kid from New Jersey, an art major in college, had found a test reagent having dissolved minerals from an abandoned mine owned by her dearest friend, Martin's, father. [=DuQuesne=]'s reaction: [[OhCrap Oh... crap...]]

* NeurodiversityIsSupernatural: Averted. Margaret is simply a doubly special child. Her inner self has an IQ of approximately 240 or higher, because that's how high the test ceilings goes. What she made for herself, because of unavoidable trauma forced by her doctors in bombarding her with information to get her to talk, is an alternate personality which both communicates to the outside world and protects her [[Film/IronMan like metaphysical armor]].
** It's very pretty armor compared to, say, [[Film/TonyStark Tony Stark's]], and that's who everyone addresses as Margaret. The child Margaret draws pictures into the dominant personality's HeadsUpDisplay, which is especially useful in helping Margaret visual math. The child also communicates inexplicable or uncanny insights as intuitions which Margaret must entre into a holistic state (starting off into space) to capture. The combination functions as a [[RainMan give-or-take]] normal personality who once scored 160 on an adult IQ test. Only [=DuQuesne=] realizes the score is extremely deceptive about her real abilities.
** The armor reboots through post-hypnotic command designed by the therapists which MUST be encountered upon wakening. [[CrazyPrepared They gave her two cues, one verbal (doll), one visual (Margaret's own name) just in case. ]]
* HandicappedBadass: The real Margaret, inside the metaphysical armor she created for herself. When she drops it, she loses all ability to communicate either through speech or symbols, but now she gains her full intelligence and her complete physical coordination. If you threaten her friends, like Nalboon's son did Sitar on his father's ship, be prepared to be very dead, very fast.

* IncorruptablePurePureness: The sweet, innocent, and uninhibited non-verbal teen that she grew up into beneath the armor she designed for herself as a child. Her husband describes her after having discarded her armor while consummating their marriage, as being "an absolute joy in the sack."
** Also lampshaded by the "conversational mode" of Margaret regard her friend Richard's qualities. It's one of the reasons that had Dorothy never entered his life, she would have become a much closer friend.
* TheSparkOfGenius: Always there.
* TeenGenius: By definition. She could always "see" the math. [=DuQuesne=] took her in for this.
* IWantSong: All Margaret ever wanted since she started getting bounced around the foster system, was to belong somewhere to people who truly loved her exactly for who and what she was. At one foster placement, therefore, her favorite verse in a song [[CrowningMusicOfHeartWarming (Barking At the Moon)]] of a video she'd watch over and over verbalized Margaret's one true wish for her life to be happy.
** The potential for that fulfillment didn't begin until Margaret and Martin first became lovers, after which he swore to her she'd never be lonely again for as long as he'd life. Margaret's armor crashed briefly when this happened and child Margaret expressed a lifetime of built-up grief and loneliness upon him.
** Margaret decided on her wedding night that she and her husband should just rest and wait until the morning. That was because she wanted to show Martin how much she trusted him, by not bringing her doll with her. The results were very healing for pre-verbal Margaret [[spoiler: now dubbed Star Child by them both ]] They were unearthly for her husband. Afterward, as she fell asleep again, she hummed the song, because she was now finally happy.
** In the afternoon, by prior arrangement, Martin spoke Margaret's name as she woke again. As they discussed the experience, he hummed the song back at her. She recognized it immediately, and declared that in her husband she finally found her home. They celebrated.
** Pre-verbal Margaret ratified the above in a special conversation with Martin she enabled by finally regaining her verbal abilities very briefly, by borrowing them from Sitar during the knowledge transfers aboard Nalboon's ship. All of Margaret was now present, allowing each side of Margaret to realize what the other side had missed all this time. That began the process of Margaret's full reintegration.

[[/folder]]

Has a [[Characters\AlouettesSong CharacterSheet]]

Has a [[ Characters/AlouettesSong CharacterSheet ]]