How about a power struggle? One of Jason's elite is trying to overthrow him or something? A rebellion...
Led by someone whose power may rival J&A's. Who would that be?
Jude! (how does he come back to life?)
The other Rising Sun candidate
A Satanist...??
Agnes
A New Character, much as I am loathe to do it. I just hate new characters. I already introduced Kieran, who is important, and I really don't want another new character. But I do kill people off with a vengeance, so...
This actually could end up sort of cool, because it could be this person that forces Jason and Azazel to work together in the third book and they could fight with this person and then eventually be convinced to go into exile.
So there are, then, two dual plots:
A: Azazel tries to save Jason from the plot to overthrow him and ends up becoming his queen in the process and helping him wreak evil on the countryside.
B: Kieran searches for Azazel while having the responsibility of Azazel's powers, working with the OF, and trying to raise little Chance.
Think that's pretty meaty. We'll say 40 scenes per each arc. Maybe plan for 45 since I always write thin.
Question: Are the OF and the rebellion connected somehow? Yes, they are. Whatever that one chick's name is... Lily, I think?? Yeah, she's going to be the center. She's got the power to create a space where J&A's power doesn't work, but not enough. She wants Kieran to let her take and harness A's power to do this, but there's no way to take the power without the memories, and Kieran can't let that happen. He's keeping her memories and power safe for her, so that he can give them back.
I really want either Jude or Lilith to come back. Both were killed from gunshots to the head...
Jude was killed by the Sons. Could they have somehow captured his essence?
Okay, this is dumb.
Questions for Kieran
Here are some questions I asked myself about Kieran as I formulated the book.
What does Kieran do to try to find Azazel?
Well, he could try to follow a trail. He could take a picture with him and ask people about her. There can be makeshift hotel type things that have cropped back up. People can be super freaked and superstitious, trying anything they can think of to protect themselves from Az's power. (They think Jason is aces.) Kieran can try to compell people to tell him where she is. He can reach out and try to find her and compell her back to him. But her essence isn't her essence anymore, so it doesn't necessarily work.
What does Kieran find to help him in his search?
A person who's seen Azazel, who turns out to be...a Satanist? Do the Satanists have power again? If the Satanists have power, how come the Sons don't? Because the Sons are all dead. Even Edgar Weem? Probably.
What kind of prophetic dreams does Kieran have?
Lots of slaughtered people, covered in flies.
Dead Azazel, Jason standing over her body weeping.
Memories of Azazel's past, which really disturb him.
What issues does Kieran have with little Chance?
Food, diapers, screaming baby, meets a girl who helps him with baby?? Girl is Lilith.
Lilith is dead. Her face was blown off.
That Last Onset Extras
Original Sparse Outline
Sexy in Love Gods??
Original Spiritus Mundi Outline
Final Spiritus Mundi Outline
Original Sparse Outline
This is how I originally envisioned the story would go, before I made up the idea of the Spiritus Mundi.
-tracks Az down. She's sarcastic, been fighting for the resistance. Chance is nowhere in sight.
-Finds out where Chance is, but doesn't go to see him
-fights with resistance on some big thing they're doing, can't pull the trigger
-he and Azazel argue. Az is having some fuck buddy relationship with someone from before...don't know who yet
-scene with Marlena. She asks him and Az to fight for their powers back. Jason resists. He leaves.
-Goes to see Chance with Mina. Sees that the government is encroaching on them as well. Knows he has to save Chance.
-Az has followed him. They make love.
-Go to find Lily, which is tough, because she works for the government. They capture her, feed her leaves, make her talk. She says the grimoire was destroyed, but there might have been more of them. She says they originated in Tuscany.
-They have to travel, which will include like disguises and crap
-They find Agnes, who they have to feed leaves to as well. She's like, um, no we don't have a grimoire, but I know of someone who might be able to help you in the deserts of the Maya civilization or something... (Greece? India?)
-So they go there (bunches of obstacles along the way) and then that person tells them that they have the power within, the power comes from humanity, etc, and that they must summon the power by gathering important items from their past to put together and communing with the dead.
-So, they do that,
-Then they confront Kieran and Eve and there's a big showdown, but they get the powers back.
-And then they're awful, and possibly people are considering killing them and stuff.
-And then they go on some kind of spitural journey to fight the darkness within or something.
-And then they win.
-The end.
Sexy in Love Gods??
This is me having the Spiritus Mundi epiphany, which at the time, I thought was freaking brilliant, as you can see.
Possibly they don't have to work so hard to get their powers back, and instead, the bulk of the book is a trippy, spiritual journey that they are on.
-So how would they get them back?
They'd go into the Spiritus Mundi and travel through their pasts, the collective beliefs about them, meet dead people, etc.
During this, they'd find out the significance of Kieran and Eve...whatever that might be ????
They'd emerge, but with powers equal to K&E's, not the same powers. What I mean is, they'd have powers which wouldn't have taken away K&E's powers.
NO: The final chapter is to confront K&E and convince them to give back their powers to the people and to demand that they're never woken up, because they're too powerful and they'll suck away humans' ability to rule themselves.
So...they confront their darkness, they realize it will always win, and they decide to live in the spirit realm forever, as disembodied forces, keeping other disembodied forces in line.
Oh, this is great, because it ties up the weird Agnes storyline. How she wanted them dead and together at the same time. Of course, she is consumed by the darkness now, which is not good.
So, you're saying they become Gods.
Yup. Sexy in love Gods.
This is great. I KNOW!!!
People create the power, because they're all sheep and they relinquish their individual power because they're lazy and afraid of being their own sovereigns. They seek out strength and surrender all their power to it.
The Order of the Fly knew that power would grow if the world were more primitive. And they knew Jason had the power to do it...so they purposefully broke up J&A so that he'd sort of explode.
-There are two forces at work
One wants J&A to die
The other wants them to live and take their powers and kill everyone.
Light vs. Dark
Agnes works for the darkness, which is why her last message to Azazel, while she was alive told her to kill herself and kill Jason. That side of things, that agenda, determined they were too dangerous to live.
The darkness has always wanted the powers together, because it feels it can corrupt the "good" side, and it has.
These dark energies came from people. They have been worshipped, etc. for a long time. The two ideas that Jason and Azazel represent are:
Azazel: Chaos, destruction, anger, hatred, strife
Jason: Lost of indi
viduality, mob rule, surrendering one's power for "good," corruption from power, misguided use of goodness.
People tried to give up their darkness and it grew stronger and stronger.
People tried to give up their goodness and it became corrupted from the power
Jason and Azazel must penetrate the inner part of the Spiritus Mundi and destroy it—give back the power to the people.
Original Spiritus Mundi Outline
Me trying to work out the Spiritus Mundi idea...
The Spiritus Mundi
Phase One:
-Jason in the throes of evil under the Sons.
-It takes Azazel to rescue him.
Phase Two:
-High school in Bramford. They're apart. Toby's back, etc. Lilith-Jason issues...
-JUDE??
-To get together, they have to kill.
Lilith and Jude, both people killed by J&A, want to change things, to keep A&J from getting together.
-So, instead, at the dance, they kidnap the two of them and leave Bramford
-Followed by holing up in some cabin that Toby's friend's parents own or something, where mismatched couples ensue, but both J&A resist.
-Conversation together about how this just doesn't feel right, and then a kiss
-Showdown: You just won't let things go, will you? You have to be together. But we're not dying this time. So they all try to kill J&A, who have to kill them.
Jude saves Az and then...
Phase Three:
-Michaela Weem, Grandma, Edgar Weem, Agnes, Nancy
-Bombarded with prophecies, etc.
-They have to destroy each and every one of them and when they do...
Phase Four:
-The big guns. Azazel, the demon. The Spirit of the Rising Sun. Their powers in various incarnations over thousands of years.
-All the terrible things these powers are responsible for, including the OF's creating the solar flare. How the OF has pushed them to become more and more powerful.
-Question: Do you want this? Answer: Yes
Phase Five:
-a series of tests, involving people they know and love. They fail over and over, until finally, Jason gets it.
-He kills Chance. (Lost moment)
The power is back.
Phase Six: Giddy conversations watching people in the world about what things they could do...
-Answer is to believe some of what you are told, but to work with it. To make your own way.
But then they watch Hallam and Marlena talking about their baby and they change their minds.
Phase Seven: Spiritual showdown with Kieran and Eve. Redistribution of power.
Holding hands, they disappear into the ether.
Final Spiritus Mundi Outline
Phase 1
Assume the darkness—get your powers back
Power comes from people
All their darkness has been given up b/c of Kieran and Eve, who aren't using nearly enough of it
So take us and breathe us and become us.
1. Agnes appears, explains who she is and what happened to her—or they see it? She says they're not out of the woods yet and they still have to work to get their powers back. They are born of darkness (doesn't bug them) and they must embrace the darkness. She gestures to the woods. A test.
2. Jason home with Michaela and Jude, weird gothic-y family scene. Jason must go through the woods to his father. Taking meat. There are flies everywhere.
3. Once in the woods, J is met by Az, his girlfriend who he's sneaking out with. They have sex in the woods and drink wine, complaining about their families.
4. Az hatches a plan that they should kill them all. Cut out.
5. Slaughter Jason's mother and brother. Steal her car.
6. Kill Az's family
7. Find Edgar Weem and Arabella Hoyt together inflagrante. Taunt them. Kill them. Dress up in their clothes and eat dinner.
8. Find themselves in a hospital, being watched over by Marlena, Hallam, Mina, and Chance. Everything's really great. They take them back home to the Hoyt house.
9. Jason awakes to the buzzing of flies. He goes to the kitchen and gets a butcher knife. He goes upstairs and kills Mina and Chance while they sleep.
10. Meets Azazel in the hallway, covered in blood. She is giggling. Jason: Not going to be a problem anymore. They step through a doorway and back to an applauding Agnes. It has all been part of the test. Their powers are now secure. They now must escape from the Spiritus Mundi and get back to the real world to kill Kieran and Eve, (the prospect of which seriously excites them both.)
Phase 2
Get out of the Spiritus Mundi and back into the real world
Obstacles
1. Agnes takes them as far as she can, to a strange maze, where they must battle the forces of light which want them dead and gone. They step into the first room and turn into crazy pyscho killers ala Tarantino.
2. The law on their tail, there's a car chase and shoot out. The cops look like Polly and Graham, but they just laugh and waste them anyway. They then arrive in the next room.
3. Next scenario: Their wedding. Random members of the Sons, the OF, Kieran's men are all trying to stop Jason from getting there, but he kills them all and the wedding sequence is chillingly romantic.
4. Next scenario: They have babies, which grow up to chase them and try to kill them. They're forced to kill their own children, an act that leaves Azazel in tears and reminds Jason that uncomfortably, he killed Chance—not the real Chance, of course—and he didn't even feel bad about it.
5. Agnes' tarot card reading. She tells them that they Agnes they see isn't her, and that she's always begged them to stop this madness. When she begins to try to hurt them, they have to kill her too.
6. They clutch each other through a snowstorm, the surety of the darkness's test wearing away. They question how evil they will really be if they go back. But when they get to the gatekeeper, he tells them if they want to be good, they must turn back. They fight him and go through.
7. Jason walks in on Azazel having sex with Kieran. He rushes at Kieran and beats him up, but Azazel thrusts herself between the two of them and he finally has to chose to kill her as well.
8. When he does, crying and destroyed, he stumbles through to the other side to find Azazel standing over the dead bodies of his concubines. Lori is still alive. She begs him for help. He yells at Azazel over what she's done.
9. They are stuck in this room, still angry at each other. They search for a door or a passageway, but can't find one. They attempt to use their powers, but can't. Eventually, they rely on each other and the door opens.
10. They are on the other side of the maze, and they can see their bodies now. They debate, because of the fakeout earlier, if it's really them. Just as they're about to break in to figure it out...
Phase 3
The truth about the world
1. Graham appears. He tells them not to go out there until they know what's going on. They argue but decide to listen to what he's got to say. He says they're in the middle of a war of the world's spirit
2. Tells them about the beginning. See a primitive world. Giving up evil. Good being overtaken by evil.
3. The history of Azazel and the Rising Sun and where they came from. The growth of power over the history of the world.
4. The birth of the Sons
5. Arabella Hoyt and Michaela Weem--the necklace???
6. The Order of the Fly and the solar flare
7. J&A thus far and K&E
8. Discussion: how to give the power back to the people. Graham: There could be a way, but you'd have to work very hard. Killing Kieran and Eve would probably be easier
9. Watch Marlena and Hallam talking about their baby. Think about what unleashing their powers on the earth would do. Decide to try it.
Phase 4
Destroying the Spiritus Mundi, wherein they discover at the last minute that if they are successful, they'll have to stay there, using t
heir power to keep everything fragmented
One-Dismantle K&E's power
1. Attempt to put K&E to sleep, disrupted by forces of light who protect K&E. J&A must uncover darkness to repel them, but this releases their dark powers again, which means...
2. Dream world containing K&E is a gothic mental facility, where the wardens are the powers of light. Jason, separated from Azazel, must trick a guard into letting him out of his cell to get to her.
3. Sadistic guards grab them on their way to K&E and try to make them undergo shock therapy. J&A turn the tables and shock them. Discussion about going too far and their own balance.
Jason and Azazel Extras Page 7