"To Catch Up With The Sun" Chapter One notes

I'm finding that many of my stories stem from things I don't like in canon/fanon, as well as a desire to see the kinds of storytelling elements I prefer. There aren't many good stories around in the EoA fandom which actually focus on Esteban (I've seen a scant few I like or which seem promising, but that number is more then likely less then ten in total), and often he gets shipped with a canon character I don't like in a bunch of them. 

I remember initially playing around with the idea of doing a story that stuck closer to canon. But after realizing that EoA's writing was just going to continue to disappoint (aside from a handful of decent episodes sprinkled here and there), I decided the AU route would ultimately work better for me. I think taking the characters in a more adult direction makes them more fascinating to follow. Looking through my blog, I see that I've had this idea since December 2018 (a three chapter story I only finished this year... =D). It originally stemmed from a few people at the show's Reddit community saying that it would be interesting to see what it was like for the Castillo-Flores to deal with everything that happened after being reunited. 

Uh, a lot has changed since then. Still liked the idea enough to develop it however, in part because I realized I needed a way to show how my universe was different from the show's and set things up. With TCUWTS done, I can now move onto other stories set within this AU (which I still need to name. I've been jokingly calling it Esteban Of Avalor).

My take on the EoA world is intended to have more historical elements and less... goofy stuff, but still maintain that Disney flair. It's sort of a kinder, gentler version of our world (for example, there was no slave trade carried on by any of the major world powers, probably not a Crusade as we would know it, etc), but only up to an extent. Like, it's still not a place where you can really run around openly as a gay person (well, unless you're rich like Esteban, and even then most people don't actually know about his sexual orientation XD). It's also not set in any specific time period that we'd recognize from our own world history. 

I saw people at the subreddit saying EoA is set in the 1800s (I think), but I don't believe that anymore. For one, there are still knights in plate armor running around in Enchancia. Knights had gone the way of plague doctors well before the 1700s. Much of the fashion in both series also looks newer then the Middle Ages, but too old for the 1800s. Of course, it could also be that they took a lot of stylistic liberties with clothing too. At this point I feel pretty comfortable in saying Disney just pulls whatever from the past and throws it into Sofia The First and EoA. That's not me hating on them for that; I mean, that's one way not to tether your fantasy series to a certain time period. It's it's own thing.

Also, let me say here and now that just because I criticize the show/or most of its characters does not mean I personally hate if you if you do happen to like them. I fully support your right to enjoy them. I only take issue with fans if they feel the need to belittle me/other people for not agreeing with them, or are otherwise behaving inappropriately.

- The story title is taken from the lyrics of the Pink Floyd song (which is one of my favorite of theirs) "Time". Originally I had been calling my fic When We Dead Awaken. One day I happened to be listening to "Time" though and thought some of the lyrics could apply to Esteban's situation. Like TCUWTS, the song also deals with the theme of the passage of time. Here's a character who's fixated on his lost youth and fears old age. In the story proper a few times I allude to the idea that at one time Esteban was this kid who thought he has all the time in the world... but before he knows it, that's not the case anymore. He's nearly sixty. 

Each chapter title are lyrics taken from "Time". Here's the part that inspired both the title and the first chapter:

So you run and you run to catch up with the sun but it's sinking
Racing around to come up behind you again
The sun is the same in a relative way but you're older
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death

And here's the song itself if anyone's interested: 

 

- You know that river that runs by the palace and which Shuriki ended up falling into? I have no clue if it's ever been given a name in the show or not. I didn't see anything about it, so I just went and named it myself. Mitotiqui is a Nahuatl word meaning "dancer".

- I have no clue where Castillo-Flores as a surname for Elena and her family originated from. I just saw it someplace and was happy I didn't have to come up with my own surname for them. It mean "castle flower", which is cool.

- "Don" is Spanish for Lord. Ergo, when people are calling Esteban "Don Esteban", they are calling him "Lord Esteban", which is appropriate for a man of his station. Also, in the show he's simply just the Chancellor, but I refer to him as "Lord Chancellor" here for extra fanciness, lol. It's something I borrowed from the Brits.

- Another thing I really wanted to do was add more palace staff and people who the Castillo-Flores knew/or know as a way to flesh out the world. Unless it was some kind of special occasion, I remember the palace almost always looking huge and empty. A real palace would have servants, courtiers, guards, etc all over the place. Same for the city itself (this kinda seems to be a reoccurring issue with modern cartoons, I've noticed). I'll make a character list so readers can keep up with who's who.

- For the life of me I couldn't justify any reason as to why Esteban would have Higgins/or Armando working for him in my setting. Like, my Esteban's intelligence is supposed to be pretty consistent (unlike the series) and he's a pretty pragmatic dude, so he'd want to have a competent manservant, y'know? If you haven't seen the show, then Higgins and Armando both are just your standard goofy bumbling sidekicks, nothing more. Not only that, but I don't even know what Armando was doing in canon at this point, since he has like a hundred jobs there. Like, he's a personal servant, a puppeteer, and a cook who gets on some kind of committee in the second season?... And to top it all off, he's not that strong a character to carry whole episodes by himself, so I don't care about him and only became more and more actively annoyed that canon kept shoving this boring unfunny doofus into my face and telling me to care. Time wasted on Armando-centric episodes could've been spent on more worthwhile characters, or moving the plot forward.

I'd ask whatever happened to Higgins, but that'd actually require me to care about him. He was the same character as Armando, but white I guess. Thankfully, the freedom of fanfic allows me to replace them both with someone else entirely (Sancho). I will enjoy making Armando a very minor bit player on the periphery of things.

- That bit with Esteban thinking about executioners not being successful in decapitating prisoners the first time around? That is actually something real that I've heard before... probably in something discussing Henry VII and his wives, if I recall correctly.

 Also, high treason refers to acts of treason committed against a sovereign.

- From what I understand, rice pudding (arroz con leche) is a popular comfort food in Mexican culture. Have a recipe.

- Poor jaquins. They were not used well. I remembered in one episode (it might've been the special where Elena goes to Vallestra) it was stated that they were the guardians of Avalor -- okay, so why did all we see them do was pester Shuriki in "Elena/Sofia And The Secret Of Avalor" then? If you knew Esteban was the last member of the royal family around, then why not just grab him, fly him somewhere safe, then go back and attack Shuriki? I'm sure Esteban would've been more then happy to provide info to them in order to aid in a successful revolt. But no. They were just cute animal sidekicks who were cheerleaders and transportation for Elena. There's writing a show for little kids, and there's making characters stupid because you can't write. If they'd tried putting up a fight against Shuriki then that would've been something at least. They never really did anything to make me believe they were these stalwart guardians, much less be taken seriously as such. And I was actually intrigued by Cruz and his sister, but they were wasted too (you wasted A.C. Slater, writers!)! 

Uh, I have different plans for the jaquins here. Also, because I'm not limited by a Y-7 rating, expect to see them, as the kids say, "tear shit up."

- I wanted to add more depth to the feud between Victor and the Castillo-Flores clan. I do not see the guy as having any interest in religion, and that would not make him kindly disposed to a bunch of staunch Catholics (Francisco the traditionalist, anybody?). Does anyone remember it being stated that Victor's father was the royal treasurer? Was that ever brought up again?

- I don't think a person confronting a sorceress by themselves without some kind of backup or protection is smart, no (IMHO, Esteban would think the same). Yes, I still feel that way even if the other protagonists keep on telling us how awesome and brave said person is for doing so. I'm guessing Elena just charged in like she was just gonna straight-up body Shuriki with no strategy or plan because that's precisely what she did when Shuriki returned. She's a really frustrating protagonist to watch. :-/

- So initially my fics were going to be neutral towards the issue of the characters' religion. If EoA's Reddit community is anything to go by, I feel like several of the fans would react negatively to the religious elements. But a person I knew made the argument that Christian analogues do crop up in fantasy settings, such as Lord Of The Rings, The Chronicles Of Narnia, and Dawnflight. And EoA itself did seem to be implying that the characters are Roman Catholic, considering the fact that they observe Carnival ("King Of The Carnival"). And they are Latinos, so... more then likely, Catholics. Come on, if Hanukkah is a thing in EoA, then why not Catholicism?

I hope people are not going to take any of this and accuse me of being okay with the bad things the Church has done, even though there is absolutely nothing in TCUWTS to even suggest that. Nor do I think that an EoA fic is really the right kind of vehicle to criticize the Church with. One could probably better do that if you were say, writing for the series Evil (a more grounded series that does deal with real world social commentary). But it is the Internet, so I've resigned myself to someone saying something eventually.

I thought it'd be a nice change of pace from what we tend to see in fiction (the Church practically declaring war on anyone who uses magic/magical creatures) to have the Church here view good magic as a gift from God instead. It's just something you don't see too often. The more I thought about it, the more I think introducing religion wouldn't just add more depth to the cast, but give insight into how they engage with the world around them, other people, and even see themselves. I'm not Catholic, but I do find the architecture of their churches beautiful and the services have a certain... gravitas to them. And there's another reason why I wanted to touch on this matter...

- The chapel scene in my fic was inspired by this: link It's a really memorable moment in the movie, and you have no idea how much I just love the twisted juxtaposition of a character pretending to be pious and sitting in church while dark things are going on outside (though in Esteban's case, I make it clear that unlike Michael, he didn't know that anyone was going to get axed. He is a lot of things. Psychotic isn't one of them. Even EoA for all its flaws usually makes that clear). No one gets baptized in my scene, so I devised the idea of Esteban and Victor going to Mass early as a cover story instead. I was told about the Confiteor, a prayer in which evil is rejected and which occurs early on as a ritual cleansing before the Sacrament, and wanted to specifically feature it in place of Godfather's baptismal prayer. I don't know how canon played it or if they even did, but I knew I did not want to have a scene with Esteban and Victor sitting around sneering and cackling evilly because OMG SO EVUL. That's very cartoony and lame.

I'm actually not sure if Victor knew Shuriki was going to kill the king and queen or not.

- I figured Esteban would have pet names for his grandparents, so I did some Googling and landed on Lita and Papito respectively for them. He also calls Francisco "old man" (in his head), something which started out as an insult but morphed into a term of affection with time.