Mythlands: THE HEIST

Character Profiles: The Heist Part One (26-30)

Harmonia - Harmonia is the Greek goddess of harmony and concord - a daughter of Zeus, she is the sister and opposite of Eris. A sweet natured and demurely lovely blonde, Harmonia is only briefly seen in the Heist but her deception by her older sister plays a big part in advancing the plot.

After Eris poisoned Harmonia's fluffy white dog by feeding it chocolate, she pretended it was a tragic accident and offered her the Nightingale as a gift. Allowed access to the royal court of Olympus, the Nightingale turned out to be a spy for Loki. 

The Nightingale - 'The Nightingale' or Nattengalen in the original Danish, was a literary fairy tale created by Hans Christian Andersen published in Andersen's 'New Fairy Tales' in 1843. Becoming a famous and well loved tale, it has since been adapted to opera, ballet, musical play, television drama and animated film.

Long ago in Imperial China, an Emperor heard that the Nightingale's song was one of the most beautiful things in his Empire, so he had the bird located and brought to him. The Nightingale enchants the Emperor and swiftly becomes his favourite, but years later he tires of her when he is given a beautiful bejeweled mechanical songbird. Saddened, the Nightingale returns to her forest - years pass and eventually the mechanical bird breaks down and more years pass until the Emperor lays dying. Hearing of this, the Nightingale returns to sing for him. Death is so moved by the beauty and love in the song, that he refuses to take the Emperor and so bird and monarch are happily reunited.

Loki relates this tale to Zeus and reveals that eventually the Nightingale went to live in Ta-Lo, the 36th Heaven with the gods of China. When Loki visited and paid his respects to the Jade Emperor, the two exchanged gifts, with Loki giving the Chinese gods an Asgardian peacock; in return he was given the Nightingale. Loki then gifts the songbird to Eris who offers it to her sister Harmonia as compensation for the 'accidental' poisoning of Harmonia's pet dog.

While the details that Loki provides are essentially true, the gifting of the Nightingale to Harmonia is all part of a ruse to allow the Nightingale unfettered access to the royal palace of Olympus. The songbird is in fact loyal to Loki and establishes a routine of getting out of her cage at night but always returning by morning after flying around the palace.

This routine is to make the palace guards and servants used to seeing the bird out and about - with everyone's guard lowered, the Nightingale then searches Zeus' chambers for information vital to Loki's plan, which directs his attention to The Tortoise and leads to the manipulation of The Hare.

It is not known if the Nightingale can speak or if Loki understands the language of the birds.

The Glass Cat - Bungle, the Glass Cat of Oz first appeared in the 7th Oz book written by L. Frank. Baum - The Patchwork Girl of Oz (1913). The original character was female and although the Mythlands version shares much of the same origins and characteristics, our Bungle is a male cat.

The Glass Cat from the Mythlands also differs somewhat from the original version in physical appearance. Bungle is made up of a blue crystalline substance that is incredibly hard. The original was quite transparent, whereas The Mythlands Bungle's glass frame is a deeply blurred opaque blue and none of his internal organs can be seen. Like the original, he has green emeralds for eyes.

Cool, reserved, aloof and sometimes disdainful, the stereotypical catlike qualities of the Glass Cat are tempered by his love of his fellow cats and fierce intelligence. The Glass Cat is a revolutionary and the leader of the Mythland-wide Cat Movement. Until recent times he has obscured his role and indeed the Brotherhood and Sisterhood of Cats - decades of patient and intricately detailed planning has been playing out, orchestrated by The Glass Cat.

He has a habit of talking in a singsong semi rhyming manner - example: When Mrs Tabby of the Valley of the Pussycats asks if she can answer a question posed at the Convention of Cats, Bungle smiles and replies...

'You may indeed and in fact, but answer factually my dear.'

As part of his plan, he has assumed a 'hanger's on' position in the Lucky Cactus Casino, Hotel and Resort Complex, where he is able to observe the comings and goings of most of the important personages of the Mythlands. Early in the Heist, Bungle convenes The Convention of Cats and it is demonstrated that the greater cat community follows him with dedicated loyalty - he is equally dedicated to serving the cat cause, but not above manipulating some of his fellow felines for his own ends.

The Glass Cat is an exile from Oz, having earned the enmity of it's Queen, Ozma, who has given standing orders he is to be shattered into a thousand pieces on sight, if seen in Oz territory. Bungle takes especial pleasure at the idea of angering Ozma and has an anarchistic streak which makes him a perfect agent of chaos.

However rather than follow others, Bungle sees himself as a leader and orchestrator - he is not above working with non cats and finds much common ground with allies like Professor Moriarty and Loki.

But at the end of the day, the Glass Cat and the Cat Movement's goals come first to the Glass Cat.

He is a major character in the Heist, with complex motivations and occasionally seemingly contradictory goals amd characteristics.

The Little Match Girl - A creation of Hans Christian Andersen, the tale of The Little Match Girl was published in his work 'Dansk Folkekalender' (December 1845) and since then the storiy's popularity has seen it reappear in multiple media including films, animations and television. Disney uses the character as part of it's stable as well.

Never given a name, the titular Little Match Girl tells the story of a poor child who lives with her abusive father - she is forced out into the snow on new years eve to sell matches to raise money for her father (perhaps to pay for his drinking) and is afraid to go home without money as he will beat her. Eventually forced to light the matches to keep herself warm, she has a series of visions including her dead grandmother, the only person to treat her with kindness. She sees a shooting star and imagines her grandmother coming for her - soon afterwards she freezes to death.

Like many other characters who died in their original stories, the Little Match Girl was reborn in the Mythlands but fears dying the same way again - a not uncommon fear as several characters she knew have had their fate repeated, including Cock Robin, who was murdered a second time.

Like a lot of characters with no real name and identity, the Little Match Girl has assumed another name, calling herself Miranda. She belongs to the class of child characters who were so well known as children that she has never aged to adulthood. Miranda believes that she is aging very slowly though as in over 70 years she has gone from physically being age 8 to age 12.

Eventually finding her way to Myth Vegas (partly because of an aversion to cold weather) Miranda found gainful employment on the concierge desk at the entrance to the massive Lucky Cactus complex - she is seen interacting with The Glass Cat, early on and although viewing him as an unofficial part of the staff, obeys him when he asks for messages and orders her to fix his mobile phone headset around his ears.

Although a relatively minor character in the Heist, Miranda stars in her own story 'I Saw a Shooting Star,' in the Mythical Origins collection, where it's revealed she takes trips north to Domain City every 1-2 weeks to attend self help meetings with other characters who question their existence before the Mythlands and other issues such as slow aging and past deaths.

Miranda is highly religious, sweet and helpful. She is good friends with Rose Red, the little seen sister of Snow White, who is employed as a stewardess on the MCI Corporate jet used by The Hare. Miranda hitches a lift to Domain City on the jet.

During the meeting in 'I Saw a Shooting Star,' Miranda befriends one of the teddy bears from the Teddy Bear's picnic and is later present at the same time as The Hare and Jessica in an important scene taking place at one of DC's popular bars, The Picnic Bar or Picnics, which is owned and run by several of the teddy bears.

The Blue Fairy - The Blue Fairy was one of the characters in Carlo Collodi's 1883 book 'The Adventures of Pinnochio.' where she acts as a conscience for the puppet boy and later protector.

It is presumed that the Blue Fairy may be a Fey of the same race as Ariel, but that hasn't been confirmed. All that is known of The Blue Fairy in the modern Mythlands is that she has become a popular singer and is heard on the 'pirate' radio station DJed by Mr Smee, covering Brittany Spears 'Oops I did it again.'