The Queen's Champion Arrives At Sloan-Kettering

[dr_pretentious]

On the third day, Sir Percival finally took off his armor. None of the families in the ICU waiting room seemed to mind the way it bent the coatrack. Their minds were all on weightier matters even than good steel plate.

It wasn't so much the weight of the armor--he'd been wearing it for centuries--but rather the problem of rust. All day, he poured and poured the Grail out over the Fisher King. "To clean things away that need cleaning away," he explained to the nurses. "I may not know much, but I know about purity. And it'll help keep the fever in check."

A familiar voice said, "Oh, you know about purity, all right. How's my second favorite prig doing?"

Percival didn't even need to look up. "Hello, Lancelot."

"Could you use a hand there?"

"A worthy knight is a humble knight," Percival said, and saying it took the sting out. "Yes, I could use a hand. But you realize, you're trying to force the patient to be the Fisher King and Sir Urry at the same time. It's hard enough, just crossing redactions. I've changed the spelling of my name so many times in the past three days, I think I'm getting a touch of dyslexia, and I know I'm developing a serious case of postmodernity. Some moments, I can't even tell if I'm thinking in French or German or what. Are you sure you can handle this? Are we sure he can handle this?"

Lancelot examined Sir Urry, whom 110 other knights had proved unable to heal. "Everyone in the Grail Castle says he's a fighter. They talk so much about his beating the odds, you'd think they'd been wagering on him at tournaments. So, if he'll never be healed until the best knight in the world searches his wounds, we'd better get his dressings off."

Percival swallowed his pride. He'd been second-best after Galahad, and now he would bear being second-best after Lancelot. The story had to be bigger than he was.

The two knights gently peeled the dressing off the wound, and Lancelot whistled low in amazement.

"There's something wrong with his blood, too," Percival said. "They've been searching his wound for a while."

"Better not delay, then," said Lancelot. "Just think what a report this will make when we go home for Pentecost. If it were any knight less pure than you telling the tale, they'd never believe it."

So the knight of worldliness and the knight of purity tended the wound in the world. The wound in the world happened to be in the mortal frame of Everyman, any man, the Maimed Knight, the virtuous king, a person who knew how to think in myth, a person who was still hanging on in that terribly literal body.

Comments

[hypanebliss.livejournal.com]

"Just keep swimming swimming swimming just keep swimming"

[onyxtwilight.livejournal.com]

Good, now we have a soundtrack. I find it always helps to have a soundtrack. :-)

[leapfaith.livejournal.com]

I'm enjoying your posts far too much, but to be slightly fair, I should direct you toward this equally tongue-in-cheek gem:

http://eye-of-a-cat.livejournal.com/176383.html

Hope you are doing well, and no longer stressing way too much about word count.

[dr-pretentious.livejournal.com]

That's BRILLIANT. Whoever she is, she perfectly captured eight years of my life in a single Infocom parody. I'm so glad you pointed me to it.

Word count is no longer troubling me--ah, the relief of December. Right now, my friend's cancer is taking up most of my mental processing power. I thought I'd be doing very different things with my time this week.

[vgnwtch.livejournal.com]

I think that, when the story is done, in whatever way it ends, it should be published with a dedication to Geo. I think that would be a marvellous spell in itself.

[dr-pretentious.livejournal.com]

I had put aside the idea of publication, but your suggestion raises a possibility I hadn't considered.

citabria said there was talk around FSA of naming the scholarship after him. I could see printing them through, say, Lulu.com, and making a fundraiser of them within the community. In my own mind, I'd be giving this story away, while doing so in a form that honors him by giving practical help to someone else and making our community a more educated one. I could be very happy with that.

What I really don't want to do is revise them for publication with questions in mind like, "How can I make this more marketable to [name of magazine here]?" As wacky old Ezra Pound puts it, the temple is the temple because it is not for sale. Most of the stuff I write, while important to me, is not the temple. This? This is definitely the temple.

[dr-pretentious.livejournal.com]

Oh, and to be able to hold that thought in my head alongside the hope (Remember hope? It's the thing the doctors keep telling us it's not time to give up on yet.) that he'll pull through, I have tim imagine that we'd print it as a fundraiser if he recovers, just the same as we would if he didn't.

I talked to J a while last night after she got a look at him. She said she agrees that it's too soon to give up. So I don't.

After all, I had doctors telling me unequivocally that I wouldn't live to be 20, and here I am, getting the occasional gray hair and living happily ever after. You really never know.

[dr-pretentious.livejournal.com]

That should be "have to imagine". My typing's been terribly inaccurate all week. What a surprise.

[jr0124.livejournal.com]

Have you considered pagan magazines? Especially if you submit with a "preface" that's a word about the story's origins and the power of myth as magic? Heck, maybe even the B3...

I don't think anyone completely understands the in-jokes and symbolism in a lot of the stories we read. I'm sure there's a ton of Shakespeare that no one will ever truly understand until they talk to the Bard in the great beyond.

[oakleaves.livejournal.com]

These are brilliant, and thank you so much for sharing them...

[dr-pretentious.livejournal.com]

I didn't know there would be more than just the one episode. I knew it comforted me to write it, but I didn't realize how much the story would comfort other people who are waiting in the same suspense. I'm very glad it's doing that.

It seems to be doing all right as a spell, too.

[happy-dr-friend.livejournal.com]

Some moments, I can't even tell if I'm thinking in French or German or what.

Yeah, that would be english all right.

The story is wonderful.

[dr-pretentious.livejournal.com]

I didn't know if it would speak to people who don't know G. I'm glad it seems to be working as a story. It's doing me a world of good to write it, and many of the people who care about G have told me it gives them some comfort to go with the suspense. And as long as C tells me she needs to laugh while she keeps vigil, the comic element is staying.

The weird thing is, his doctors keep saying it's not time to give up. The time to give up might come any minute, but we mustn't give up yet. I'm trying to write us into the world where it won't be time to give up for a few more decades. We'll see how it goes.

[kistha.livejournal.com]

It seems to be working very well as a spell.

You have all my thoughts and good wishes!