“Anyway, he shouldn’t be called Honesty at all, he tells huge lies and he’s trying to teach me too.”[1]
Honesty is one of the children that attends the New Rho refuge school, where he is the lieutenant of Hot Sauce’s gang, ranking higher than Beautiful Ruby, Nona, Born in the Morning, and Kevin.
Biography[]
Early Life[]
Little is known of Honesty’s early life, but it might be assumed that he was born on a planet under contract with the Cohort and was subsequently resettled onto New Rho. If he has any living family members, they don’t remember him very often. By the time he’s twelve, Honesty appears to be living alone in what he calls an “unlisted apartment”[2] in a decrepit apartment building, but is really an old utility closet which Honesty has decorated with his sleeping bag and large pieces of cardboard to serve as chairs. He supports himself through thievery, selling drugs, and the food and shelter at the refuge school.
Nona the Ninth[]
Before Day One[]
When Nona becomes the Teacher’s Aide and begins attending the refuge school, Honesty and the other children invite her into their gang. Honesty is initially interested in her alliance because she’s old enough to buy drugs and she lives in the Building, which is banned. He’s dismayed to learn that Nona doesn’t know anything about either. Furthermore, Honesty has to bribe Nona to not point out the lies he tells to the others.
The children spend most of their free time running around the bombed out city, and they develop a fascination with the Convoy: a large cavalcade of megatrucks that frequent the underground tunnels and shake the ground that they drive under.[1]
Soon after Nona joins the gang, Honesty and Hot Sauce get into an argument with some older kids and arrange to fight them after school. Honesty successfully threatens Nona not to tell their teacher Joli about the fight, but it ultimately doesn’t matter since the other kids never show up. Honesty assumes that Hot Sauce bribed someone, but she claims to have hit one of their opponents with a car before the fight ever began.[3]
Day One[]
At school, the main teacher, Joli, has the older kids focusing on maths, but Honesty follows Hot Sauce’s lead in greeting the Angel when she enters the classroom. Later, at break time, the gang huddles in the corner and speculates on the Angel’s disheveled look, with Honesty suggesting that she might be hungover. As the group divvies up their fruit, bickering over portions, Honesty announces that he has a job in the underground tunnels after lunch. When Hot Sauce declares the tunnels dangerous, Honesty assures the group that there won’t be any shooting, as the crew is just stripping stuff off pipes.
The job turns out to not be stripping the pipes, but stealing air-con units off the megatrucks that travel in the underground tunnels. Honesty’s job was to stay in one of the overheads and hold the net so the grapplers could get back up to safety. The first two attempts go cleanly, so the crew decides to try for the next truck that comes along. When the ground begins to rumble with oncoming trucks, Honesty is terrified to recognize the Convoy, but the grappler goes for it anyway.
When Honesty and the others haul him up, the guy’s empty-handed and terrified. After the crew rushes back to the car with their loot from the first two trucks, the guy explains that he had dropped into the truck and it was full of people with whited-out eyes. But despite their strange blind eyes, they all looked at the guy at the exact same time. Then the van behind him started shooting at him, so he got out of there.
The crew manages to calm the guy down after he tells his story, but the driver quickly realizes that their car is being followed. They pull over and get Honesty out of the car quickly. He takes off running then smashes his face into a streetlight. When he wakes up, some strangers have dragged him into their alley and are trying to make sure he’s okay, despite an insurmountable language barrier.
Day Two[]
The following morning, Joli fusses over Honesty’s newly-developed black eye, while Honesty loudly complains about the cold cloth draped over his injury. When she arrives, Nona takes over his care and shields him from the goggling younger students while the Angel looks him over and gets him an icepack.
At break, Nona sneaks Honesty some extra fruit and Hot Sauce demands to know who hurt Honesty. He tries to avoid telling her, but Hot Sauce insists. The kids all put their heads together and Honesty confesses the story to his engaged audience. Understanding the significance of trying to knock off the Convoy, the group sits in stunned silence until Born in the Morning breaks the tension by accusing Honesty of excessive swearing. Joli breaks up the group huddle by giving Honesty a shelter pamphlet, and Honesty is “so affrighted”[4] that he uncharacteristically accepts it.
Day Three[]
Honesty attends school as usual, though Nona is late. From his window seat, Honesty glimpses Crown dropping Nona off and is astounded by Crown’s beauty. He and Born in the Morning squabble over who gets to ask Nona about the gorgeous mysterious stranger, and their fight devolves into them promising their worldly belongings to anyone but each other out of spite. At lunch, Honesty takes his bagged lunch and leaves the school, purportedly to sell the painkillers Joli had given him for his healing black eye.
At the end of the lunch hour, Honesty comes crashing back into the classroom with the announcement that the zombies have returned and plan to screen a broadcast in the city square. Nona and the Angel lightly reprimand him for swearing, and Honesty retorts by claiming that it doesn’t matter since he’s quitting school to deal full-time during the war. When Born in the Morning and Beautiful Ruby burst into the classroom with the same news about the broadcast, the Angel orders the children to sit down on the mats. Very solemnly, she asks them to promise not to attend the broadcast. Honesty protests, claiming that he could make a lot of money in the crowd, but ultimately promises not to go and fights briefly with Born in the Morning to force him to promise as well.
Since most of the students hadn’t returned after lunch, and Joli had gone home, the Angel decides to cancel the lesson and have the children draw their favourite animals, though everyone elects to draw Noodle. Afterward, the Angel asks Nona and Hot Sauce to take Noodle out. Honesty volunteers to go with them, but Hot Sauce denies his request. Some time later, the girls send Noodle back upstairs with a note explaining that they had left to attend the broadcast. According to Beautiful Ruby, the Angel is “madder than hell”[5] when they receive the note, and Honesty is furious that Hot Sauce took Nona instead of him. The Angel immediately gathers the remaining children to prevent them from running off and personally drives them to their various homes, including Honesty, who lives in the midst of the chaos unfolding in the city center.
Day Four[]
Despite the influx of violence and subsequent increased militia presence in the streets as a result of the House broadcast and reactionary riots, Honesty returns to school. Accompanied by Beautiful Ruby and Kevin, he waits in the foyer for the others to arrive, and buzzes Nona and Camilla into the school building when they arrive. Nona is delighted to see them and rushes to hug Honesty, who embarrassedly pushes her away. Beautiful Ruby starts to ask Nona about the broadcast, but is abruptly silenced by Honesty and Nona before they reconvene in a huddle to discuss it without Camilla hearing.
Nona confesses that Pyrrha has gone missing, and Honesty suggests that she might’ve died in the riots. Nona, distressed by the idea, changes the topic and asks after Born in the Morning. Honesty tries to laugh it off, but they all know that Born’s dads probably joined Blood of Eden’s resistance force and he probably wouldn’t be attending school. The Angel arrives then, with Hot Sauce and Noodle in tow. She ushers everyone upstairs, including Camilla.
Once they’re all seated in the usual seats, the conversation immediately turns to the returning zombies, and the Angel advises them to avoid necromancers at all costs. She explains her negative experiences with the Nine Houses on her home planet which the children seem to understand the gravity of, though Honesty is surprised to learn that the Angel is an animal doctor and not a “real” doctor.
After explaining that school may not be able to continue while the people are rioting, the Angel offers one final lesson to the remaining children: how to stay out of trouble. They all huddle around a table as the Angel rolls out a map of the city and points out the school’s location and the civic center where the riots started. Following the Angel’s instructions, the children mark areas on the map to avoid and areas that are good to go to in an emergency. Hot Sauce points out the safehouse that she and the Angel had selected for the kids and explains that she keeps a stash of supplies there. Though she doesn’t explain exactly what her supplies are, Hot Sauce threatens Honesty not to sell any of them, which he somewhat reluctantly agrees to.
The power in the school shuts off—marking the end of school for the foreseeable future. Under the dim lights from the temporary generator, the Angel assigns the children tasks to help clean out the classroom on their way out of the building. Honesty and Beautiful Ruby complain that they don’t want school to end, but delight in being allowed to raid the fridge. The Angel takes care to specially shake each child’s hand in farewell, then the gang huddles into the cloakroom to say their personal goodbyes. Honesty gallantly offers to take Kevin home, then Hot Sauce reminds them to come to the safe house if they need to. They pile their hands together and pledge to look after one another, then trudge downstairs to leave the school. Surprisingly, Born in the Morning is waiting for them outside the school, and the gang has to make their oath all over again to include him. The reunion has them all in a happy mood, which is how they leave each other.
Day Five[]
Hot Sauce visits Honesty in his apartment, where she confides in him that Nona is a zombie and survived being shot in the head. The two are still together when Nona, now working with Blood of Eden, knocks on the door.
Honesty cracks open the door but refuses to let Nona in out of loyalty to Hot Sauce. Nona asks him to tell her where he had seen the Convoy earlier that week. Nona desperately claims the information is a “matter of life,”[2] and desperately offers Honesty her old cleaning rag with drops of turpentine, on the basis that he might be able to sell it to get someone high. Impressed by Nona’s consideration of his drug dealing business, Honesty closes the door to confer with Hot Sauce.
Hot Sauce warily lets Nona in, and Honesty points out the location of the Convoy on the Angel’s map that he’d stolen from the classroom. Hot Sauce tells him to write the location down, since it’s not actually for Nona. Honesty does so, giving the paper to Nona and advising her not to get involved with the Convoy. Hot Sauce gently directs Nona out of the apartment and awkwardly invites her back into the gang, even though she’s a zombie.
It is unknown whether Honesty is affected by the Herald attack on New Rho.
Appearance and Personality[]
Appearance[]
“Honesty was the only redhead that Nona knew, and Honesty had big pallid, blue eyes that he could make float in different directions, when one wasn’t smushed. He also had skin like a horrible ghost’s. You could see all the veins in his eyelids.”[6]
In addition to his ginger hair and pale eyes, Honesty also has “the widest mouth Nona had ever seen.”[7]
Personality[]
“I’ve got to swear, sir. You can’t let me not swear about this. It’ll give me inhibitions.”[6]
Honesty is crass and scrappy and relies on a lot of bravado. His tendency for lying and swearing make him something of an adversarial figure in the refuge school, and he takes on a bit of a class clown persona. His teasing is occasionally a bit mean-spirited—like telling the tinies that the generator is powered by kids burning alive inside of it—but he’s also very loyal and protective of his friends. He distrusts authority and often makes comments disparaging authority figures, but seems to respect his teachers and Hot Sauce well enough.
Abilities[]
- Deceit: Despite his name, Honesty has a reputation for lying, and he does so frequently. His friends are quick to point out his lies, but they seem to come naturally to him at this point.
- Drug Dealing: Though Honesty’s drug enterprise could hardly be labeled an empire, he seems to be consistently building toward market profitability. He ruthlessly pursues new opportunities, even going so far as to repurpose the painkillers Joli gives him for his injury and ask the Angel if she can help him get ahold of animal tranqs.
- Mime: Honesty’s level of skill in this area is unclear, but he’s talented enough to thoroughly impress Nona.
- Theft: Without any family to care for him, Honesty seems to rely largely on theft to support himself. This includes petty theft—like nicking odds and ends from the classroom—larceny, and the occasional odd job with professional crews to steal and repurpose expensive metals and machinery.
Posessions[]
- Paper Throwing Stars: Nona notes that Honesty and Kevin taught her how to fold paper into shapes,[8] and Honesty’s habit of doing so has yielded a number of paper throwing stars. Honesty promises that in the event of his death the collection will be ceded to Nona.[9]
Relationships[]
Hot Sauce[]
"I’m your boy, right, Hot Sauce? I’m your best boy?”
"'Yes,' said Hot Sauce gently, 'you’re my boy. I’ll take care of you.'”[10]
As Hot Sauce’s second in command, Honesty shares a close relationship with her, if not entirely equal. Hot Sauce tends to rule through fear, and Honesty is not immune to this. He strives for Hot Sauce’s approval, complies with her various requests and orders, and complains when Hot Sauce excludes him or rules against him. Hot Sauce has been known to bunk at Honesty’s place, which Honesty seems to be gracious about. The two kids particularly bond together in times of political tumult and rely on each other for safety and protection.
Nona[]
"It hadn’t even been that Beautiful Ruby had hurt her feelings; it was that the others had shushed him immediately and Honesty had said in a much louder voice than was necessary, 'Shut up, lad, Nona can do kiddie things if she wants to.'”[8]
Despite being several years Nona’s junior, Honesty tries to take care of her in his own awkward kind of way. Nona is accustomed to Honesty’s relentless ribbing and even revels in it, as it signals that she's part of the in-group. Because of this, Honesty’s frequent teasing remarks (e.g. Nona’s “dumb as a box of hair”[10]) hold little sting. This tendency to mask his affection with light-hearted aggression or indifference is also evident when Nona hugs Honesty enthusiastically and he pushes her away, saying “Get out of it, Nona, stop being in love with me.”[5] But when it really counts, Honesty is sincere, even advocating for Nona to rejoin the gang despite her status as a zombie.
References[]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Nona the Ninth Day 1, Ch. 3
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Nona the Ninth Day 5, Ch. 26
- ↑ Nona the Ninth Day 5, Ch. 23
- ↑ Nona the Ninth Day 2, Ch. 8
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Nona the Ninth Day 4, Ch. 17
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 Nona the Ninth Day 3, Ch. 11
- ↑ Nona the Ninth Day 1, Ch. 4
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 Nona the Ninth Day 1, Ch. 6
- ↑ Nona the Ninth Day 3, Ch. 15
- ↑ 10.0 10.1 Nona the Ninth Day 2, Ch. 7