Okay, so that one word catches my attention because it's not saying
exactly what the one character in the scene, Velotus, is experiencing. Instead of saying whether or not he heard it, that passage suggests that there were multiple people that were there who collectively did/didn't experience the event. Now while this would be all well and good for a general description of a new location, this and the next paragraph blend Velotus' actions and the description of the location a bit awkwardly. Such as:
...
Who are we talking to at this point? Velotus clearly wants to be speaking, or at least have an action paragraph (you know, a quote by the character and a short description afterward), but the narration keeps going even though Velotus can do this by himself.
This goes on for a few more paragraphs and could all be remedied if Velotus simply had the narration reins from the get-go, so to speak.
Your point here about character narration versus general narration is actually a very perceptive one, I think. While, technically, everything is character narration, since I try to do third person limited, meaning it’s all what one character sees and experiences, you do bring up a good point about how some parts of the narration can be more charactery than others. The fact that switching back and forth between the very-charactery and the not-very-charactery narration can be awkward is probably quite true, but I’d never been aware of it before because I’d never really thought of things that way. So now that you’ve opened my eyes to this concept, I’ll be able to keep it in mind in the future and hopefully be able to do less of this. Thanks.
(Okay, yeah, so I’m not actually going to bother fixing the paragraphs in question in this chapter even though that’s not the only problem they had (see Dragonfree’s review) because I’m lazy and I don’t tend to like rewriting big chunks like this except for special cases *coughChapter26cough*. ^^; )
Huh. What I'm wondering at this point is why Velotus would have readied his Leaf Baldes if he knew he was stalking Sceptile in the first place? I mean, he would have been disgusted beforehand, which is partially the reason why he's doing it in the first place.
I don’t quite see what him being disgusted has to do with it. He readied his blades at this point because his mind was going “I’M AWESOME AND UNSTOPPABLE, RAWR”, so he saw fit to prepare his weapons; he didn’t really think any further than that. The reason they went out when he actually saw the Sceptile was because seeing it subconsciously frightened him, and it’s been a recurring point – albeit one that I doubt anyone has ever noticed – that Velotus’ blades fizzle out when that happens. He’s not really having much in the way of conscious, informed input about what he does with his blades here.
Oh
come on, you totally knew that Sceptile was scanning the treetops, Velotus. Its not like you didn't see coming. Grow a spine, why don't ya?
D: But Velotus was being all
stealthy and invisible in the treetops! It was totally unexpected that the Sceptile looked at him!
And I find this quite ironic since grassy knolls are usually places where assassins kill
from rather than kill
on. o_o
I like how you actually noticed the “grassy bump” part of that description there... but still missed what I put it there for. :>
You know, I would totally stoop two steps down the immaturity ladder and go for the "X and Y, sitting in a tree; K-I-S-S-I-N-G" shtick, but I stopped after I realized it would
make perfect sense.
And now I've become a shipper.
I’m... fairly sure that makes exactly
no sense except on very creepy levels, but you do seem to become aware of this during the next chapter, so I’ll let you off. D:
Even though I may not be a Velotus fanboy, the combined self-realization and inner softee contained in this paragraph makes me go "awwww" on the inside. (It would actually be more of a "kawwww", but you you know what I mean).
Really? I didn’t expect any of the Velotusy stuff in this chapter to be particularly aww-worthy. But still, I’m happy that I managed to soften your avian heart. :3
And this random amount of detail strikes me as odd. No idea why, though. ~_~
Bah, that random mutilated shrub is
totally important. It’s, uh... symbolic of Velotus’ inner struggles. Or something. Yes.
DAMMIT THEO! It was thisclose,
thisclose! >o<
And awkward wording to awkward entrance is awkwardly at the edn of the awkward sentence.
...
I'm just sorta lost now after that whole awkard bit. Did he just drop off the face of the earth or what? <_>
Yeah. I was sort of vaguely aware that Theo’s appearance and departure in this scene were kind of sudden and awkward, but after trying and failing to make it less so I sort of ended up leaving it like that because it probably
was awkward and sudden for Carrie, who was thinking very Velotus-centrically at that point. :/
YES! Finally! The minor characters get some screen time! \o/
...
But how come it feels so much like a hollow victory? ._.
Because the minor characters are
minor. It’s in the job title. Empathy and Crescent are simply unlikely to get that much focus, I’m afraid.
I’m sure magnetic fish have a lot to do with this. *nodnod*
I had no idea that Absol were dogs nor that it was a good idea to let them rub against your leg when approximately half of their heads are covered by nothing but
pure scythe. Or it could just be
Hoenn Endurance Crescent using his broad side for the rubbing. You never know.
I thought rubbing against legs was more of a cat thing? Well, either way, the point is that I wasn’t trying to portray Crescent as some kind of domesticated pet here; it just sort of
happened while I was writing this and seemed like what he’d do. So.
This is the third foul you've pulled off concerning moves, elyvorg. I do not approve unless it turns out to be Protect, which it's probably not. I don't care if Hidden Power works like this for a few seconds before the balls of energy are launched anyway, I'm still calling foul. >
Is a writer of Pokémon fanfiction not allowed to be creative with how Pokémon attacks work now? Am I not even allowed to do so when it’s the
Pokémon using the move that’s suddenly decided to get creative with it?
And yeah, Hidden Power
does look like that in the game animations before the attack is released, so shush, you.
Looks like it's time to light up the Christmas tree. >
This amused the hell out of me and struck me as the best possible phrase to use when attacking a Sceptile with a Fire attack. I then promptly felt bad for momentarily going back to my old, prejudiced, Sceptile-ridiculing mindset. Thanks for that. xP
Um. I think this is a little confusing, considering that it suggests that
Sceptile is the Bug type rather than its attack. Mind clarifying what's being described here? o_o
Had it been referring to a Bug Pokémon, it’d have been “Bug-type”, with the hyphen; “Bug type”, unhyphenated, simply means the type of Bug itself. Though admittedly this is unclear and I should probably find a better way to word it, but I did want to include the fact that the attack was Bug type in the narration somewhere so that the readers know it must have hurt like hell for Velotus (it was Fury Cutter, for the record).
I don't know, "the next thing that X knew" sounds a little too relaxed in this context. What about "in a blur" or "in one swift motion" or something similar?
Hmm. Good point. I may change that.
I'm just wondering how that tornado could still be sustained without Velotus' command. o.o
The fire is still going without his command because it has leaves to feed on now. And the leaves are still swirling because, uh... because Leaf Storm does that? D: Yeah, okay, possible fail here.
And by the way, this is where I get into a rage fit:
Dude.
You. Are. BURNING. On fire. The flesh on your skin (or lack thereof due to injury) is currently being exposed to temperatures that reach 100°C or higher. You know those organs and blood vessels you need to live? Yeah,
those are on fire. Hear that? It's your nervous system. Y'know what it keeps trying to tell you telling you? It's HOT. Why?
Because you are ON FIRE.
So
why are your thoughts so composed? The one and only thing that should be occurring to you is this: "Hey. You know what? I'm on FIRE. I should try to stop that!".
Thing is, Velotus is a Pokémon. Pokémon can clearly withstand a heck of a lot more than the ordinary animal body could. They’re capable of being engulfed by a huge great stream of flames and still getting up straight away once it’s over for a counterattack. They can be trapped in a spinning vortex of fire for two to five turns and yet clearly remain able to hear and carry out their trainer’s commands. Sure, it hurts, and sure, Velotus is a Grass-type so it hurts a
lot, but because he has the natural hardiness that every Pokémon has, he wouldn’t be quite so single-mindedly ARGH FIRE as you seem to think he should be.
Although you do have a point that his thoughts are probably too ordered and there probably should be at least
some more panic about fire there. But really, he’s a Pokémon who likes to battle a lot. Being surrounded by fire is practically just another day at the office for a battle-happy Pokémon.
And by the way, how could he struggling with Sceptile's weight if he's being
held up into the stream of fire?
That’s because he’s being held
down in it, not up, hence the weight being a big deal. I don’t remember ever giving the impression that the Sceptile was holding him up, did I? If I did, point it out to me, because I should probably reword.
"I'm going to let you die a slow, miserable death by your own flames. And do you know what I'll do then? I'll use your dead, smoldering corpse as a torch so I can go up to Archopy and do the same to
her. I'll watch. And after I've had my fun, I'm going to bring whatever's left of you to your miserable trainer so that
she can see you for the weak, miserable scum that you really are. And do you know what's the best part?
You can't stop me."
Which is what he
should TOTALLY have said, but unspecified energy balls are fun too. I guess. Maybe it's me being a bit too morbid again. ._.
Hm. I did try to make the Sceptile’s little speech as malicious as I could, but seeing that, maybe I could have had more fun with it than I did.
At this point I'm
sure that you're paying homage to the basement bomb brawl from Bug III, without a doubt. Being pinned down? Charging projectile attacks that originate from the mouth while doing so? Angry eyes of pure loathing? An assist shot out of nowhere
with a cry of anguish as the attacker is defeated? And
fire being everywhere? You'd have a hard time convincing me otherwise...
Because I'm absolutely flattered. :3
I’m sorry, but... that really was a complete coincidence. I only remember vaguely what that scene in Bug III was like, and I certainly don’t remember details such as being pinned down and charged attacks and assists coming out of nowhere. I wrote this scene this way simply because that’s the way it came out, I’m afraid. :/
The irony of
that statement is the fact that you consider the concept of killing something hilarious even though
the guy you just fought had the exact same viewpoint toward Archopy and you almost fought him to the death over to stop him.
Even considering how mad Velotus drove himself before this fight and how much this whole experience has rid him of significant amounts of emotional baggage, it's still rather disturbing to see how amusing Velotus find the concept of
killing hilarious. That and how his mind warped to completely forget the fact that the only reason he was able to win was because of the assist shot made by Archopy only less than a minute after he was a few seconds away from actually
dieing.
Velotus, how does your mind do the things they do? Maybe you should try laying off that Är Ou Gance cologne, the fumes are probably getting to you. :/
Hee. Velotus
really wasn’t thinking remotely coherently during that part. His mind basically went all MWEEHEEHEE I’VE FINALLY DONE WHAT I’VE BEEN TRYING TO DO MY WHOLE LIFE (see his backstory in Chapter 29) and duly found it utterly hilarious for some reason. I wasn’t even planning for him to laugh like that while I was writing the chapter; he just sort of
did. xP
Oh, and incidentally, he didn’t actually realise that Archopy had stepped in at all until much later. She fired the attack from behind him while he had his eyes closed – and then as soon as he’s won he’s too busy being ecstatic to wonder how it happened. He never actually thinks about it enough to figure it out until Chapter 29.
Although I do find it kind of jarring that we go from talking lizards, to what seems to be a domesticated dog and cat, back into more talking lizards before jumping straight back into even more, wait for it, talking lizards.
I’m not quite sure what you’re trying to say here. I mean, this fic is basically
about talking lizards, if you look at it like that. And the supposed divide between “talking lizards” and “domesticated dog and cat” is also pretty much just the way the fic is – since Carrie can understand her Grovyle, they’re used to talking to her if they want to share their thoughts on something, but because she
can’t understand Empathy and Crescent, those two are more used to keeping quiet and not bothering to try and communicate complex ideas to her because they know it’ll be pointless (the only exceptions being if it’s something important, in which case a Grovyle will translate, but there isn’t much point making one of them translate just for idle chatter).
I don't know if its just me, but the beginning of your battle scenes always leave me a bit confused, but then I manage to understand them later on somehow.
Do they? I’ve never been aware of my battle beginnings being confusing. If this ever happens again, do try and figure out how it’s confusing so that I can try and fix it in future, won’t you? D:
Spoiler:- Wait...why did the flaming tornado stop when Sceptile was hit?
Because a Solarbeam can totally disperse a whirlwind of flaming leaves. :x Yes.
You know, I always thought these psychic "nudges" would cause the recipient's brain to somehow reinterpret the foreign electrical signals as some sort of command, emotion, and a memory all at the same time, causing a seizure that could potentially cause permanent damage to the brain and the psyche
all because a cat was too lazy to freaking meow.
It’s less the cat being too lazy to meow and more the cat being smug enough to like flaunting the fact that he can pull off such a mental nudge with enough delicacy and precision to
not cause a seizure. =P
Cat is less than a third of a meter tall; lizard is about one meter tall (in this case, one meter
long). Whether or not Velotus is prone, being at least a few feet taller than a cat can allow you to easily see over it and see whatever's behind it if it's noticeably long enough. All that's needed to fix this is to combine her two sentences into the first quote and change the wording into something like this:
That is a very good point which I completely failed to notice and I will probably reword to something like that once I’ve finished posting this post.
This is the reaction he should have had when he was
ON FIRE released from the flames. It's a
traumatic experience. He should have least gave a meek "ouchies" for what it's worth.
Hmm. I suppose I could have worked in a brief moment of catching his breath and hurting before he went into RAWR MUST WIN mode.
Burns Do Not Work That way Count:
...and yet, the way burns work on Pokémon is that they lower said Pokemon’s attacking power and hurt it a little bit every now and then. So no, Pokémon burns
don’t work the same way as human ones.
Full Heal doesn't work that way! It's Full
Restore! How can you--
...
Oh, that
sorta makes sense now. Although I have to question why anybody would put
spent supplies among the perfectly good ones. Oh well.
...
Never really hurt to have some environmentalist messages mixed up into this fic. Go green; recycle!
Exactly. =P Or, at least, don’t drop litter when there aren’t any bins around.
And the facial expression range of a cat is...how varied?
About as varied as the facial expression range of a lizard in the same universe. Because these are
Pokémon. They’re going to be more expressive than their real-world animal counterparts.
Well, looks like
she's a bit mithed about getting demoted to an extra last chapter and simultaneously getting shafted for screentime. I guess she's not used to it. D:
I kept getting the impression that Carrie had somehow channelled those couple of readers who were getting bored of the Velotus focus while I was writing/proofreading those lines of hers. xP
So when did Pokes gain the ability to just get up and about by themselves after they've fainted? I mean, if they fainted, they'd be weak to do anything other than lie there. Even if Pokes miraculously
could do that all of the sudden, Sceptile can't take on a fully healthy Archopy unless he gets healed up. I don't really see Velotus' point.
First you want this fic’s Pokémon to be
more like real world creatures (such as when they’re ON FIRE), now you want them to be
less like real world creatures. There’s no pleasing you, is there? =P
But the point is that I figure it’s logical for a fainted Pokémon to slowly recover until it regains consciousness if it’s not in a Poké Ball (I mean, all those wild Pokémon you faint in the games can’t just stay there forever). Admittedly, the Sceptile probably would be too weak to do anything much for a while after waking up, but he could surely still try, and Velotus doesn’t want to take any chances. That and since when has Velotus been rational when it comes to that Sceptile and protecting Archopy’s life? xP
And through exhausting research that involved using several different social and emotional contexts that prompted the same inquiry as a starting point, I have discovered the true nature of this question. After running this question through a variety of tests, my suspicions have been confirmed: the question is actually challenging the receiving party's perception of dominance and psychological strength. One option will give him over to another,
more powerful, party; the safer, but less independent, option. The other will result in his emotional and social demotion in both his eyes his peers'; obviously the more dangerous, but more independent option. Only through consulting the most experienced and trustworthy translation teams the world has to offer have I retrieved the
true question from the depths of the psyche of THOUSANDS of humans, and that is...
Originally Posted by
Carrie
“You can either be a ***** or be my *****.” She raised an eyebrow. “Which is it going to be?”
Tough decision. What will his answer be?
I feel I should mention that this literally made me laugh out loud. Even if it was a reference to something (which I get the vague kind of impression that it might have been), I didn’t get the reference and it still amused me. So clearly your snarking powers of amusement haven’t completely faded! :O
I'm just half wondering if Carrie is implying that I think she's implying after considering the context of her
last question or if I'm really that "ssic" in the head. @_@
Yes, you really are that ssic. =P Did you honestly think Carrie thought he was going to do something along those lines?
Now with Carrie's previous lines to put this in a different context, I just can't help but picture this as a...err...you know...
that sort of scene. I'mma go take a cold shower now. >_>'
And now you’re just deliberately making yourself need the brain bleach. O.o
“
That’s what he
said,. . .”
Sorry, can't take that seriously AT ALL as an American. Just can't. XD
Well, I’m afraid that over here in Britland, I am aware of neither where that meme comes from, nor why on earth it’s funny, so the similarity didn’t even cross my mind when I wrote that line. If American pop culture is going to give you lot problems taking that line seriously, it’s not my problem. =P
No, what SHE saw was a
psychobath psycho
path who was laughing over a seemingly dead body. Not exactly the most heroic of stances that you could have chosen.
And that doesn't make you sound like a creepshow
at all, Velotus. Now try telling her how elegant her form is or how pretty her feathers look and how you want to stroke them, because, really now, if you have the right intentions who
cares if you sound like a stalker? e_e
Tee hee. It is amusing how utterly unaware of his perceived creepiness Velotus is. (also I totally never realised just how stalkerish that line of his sounded until now and xDDDD)
Ahahaha~
Butterfree'd. :P
Heh, indeed. Although the effects of being Butterfree’d first originated back in Chapter 22, and this is just the continuation of that.
Well, at least she thinks of you more as a stalker than an actual threat. Still doesn't change the fact that you
totally came off as a psyco/rapist/murderer, though.
Well, yeah, he did come across kind of like one, but Archopy can see in his eyes that he utterly idolises her and wouldn’t do anything to hurt her, so she knows he at least isn’t a threat to
her.
And do I sense that she's
hiding something that could possibly correlate Velotus to a past mate, or was that just me...? -_o
Huh? That must be just you. Archopy isn’t hiding anything in particular, and Velotus
certainly isn’t anything like her past self’s mate. Okay, so I didn’t even know said mate’s personality when I wrote this chapter because it just sort of grew into existence while I was writing Chapter 30 and you’ll get a brief idea of it there, but the point is that Velotus and past-Archopy’s mate are entirely different. The, uh, only similarity is that I happen to love them both to bits. :x
Sorry, I had to walk around the flashback that was in the middle of the road for some reason. :[
xD Yeah. There does seem to be an inordinate amount of them littering this chapter, doesn’t there, Carrie? D:
Carrie needs to stop thinking her lewd way of thinking or she'll go right ahead and pollute the minds of youths everywhere! Bring out the
brain bleach.
No,
you need to stop your lewd way of thinking. The only one introducing the need for brain bleach is you. =P
You know, I have a REALLY bad feeling that "that" pronoun will inevitably lead back to the color orange. Somehow. >_>
Eh. Not really. See, Andrew is one hell of a big deal to Velotus thanks to the syringe incident; he’s practically terrified of him. So if it
had been Andrew that he met, Velotus would probably have mentioned that fact and used it as an excuse to spout off about how despicable said orange human is and how much he hates him, because that's what Velotus is like.
Hi, I'm Theo and I like to stroke
rocks! I do it as a hobby! Don't stare at me when I start rubbing your expensive stone sculptures, I just rub them for the texture!
Still, I consider Theo stoking Omanyte's
shell a bit off since it's just some inanimate object that all Omanyte decided to reside in for some reason.
The shell
is part of Omanyte. She’s not a hermit crab. O.o She can probably feel her shell at least somewhat. And Theo doesn’t really have much choice if he wants to show affection to her; it’s either stroke the shell, or stroke the squirmy part which likes to hide inside said shell anyway.
Personally, the small, fragmented sentences sound to me like Velotus is trying to decide something very menial while he's actually looking straight at his moral event horizon. (If you don't quite understand by what I meant by that, read the last part a bit faster and a little less ominously).
Eh, I tried that, and I can’t see it that way. Maybe it’s just you?
Didn't we go into somewhat of a small-scale tussle over Leaf Blade's
glowiness? It's one thing to make it glow, but now you're negating that property (which was an important plot point) in favor of making it
shiny now? I cannot accept this outrage! :<
Uh. Things that glow can, uh, totally reflect light at the same time, yes! 8D; And I left it like that because I liked the unintentional symbolism of that line. Or something.
Of
course his injuries decide to act up now. I mean, why would have they acted up
last chapter? I mean, nothing else could have
possibly agitated his condition! e_e
*Smashes monitor*
Burns Do Not Work That way Count: 10
Yes, they act up now, because this is when his whee-I-just-saved-Archopy’s-life adrenaline rush which was blocking out the pain of his injuries for him finally wore off. :/
You're obviously very sleepy and delusional when you thought of this. And by that, I mean
you, elyvorg. ;p
Uh, what? I don’t see anything weird about that line.
So we finally
finally get to the home stretch without too many hitches (which I highly doubt is a status that will last very long).
Hee hee. :3
I don't know where I stand exactly on the ending scene, though; it sorta makes the whole ordeal that the whole team has been going through a bit more pointless, really, considering the whole problem that the story revolves around is only a problem because the protagonists acknowledge it as a problem and, as such, is not really so much of a problem.
But the entire fic has
always been about this problem which is only a problem because the protagonists see it as one. This is simply the first time that this fact has been blatantly pointed out and reflected on by one of the characters.
I hope it’s not too much of a problem for you, because, well, this is one of those times where it’s simply something integral to the point of the fic, and if you happen to not particularly like this kind of conflict, you shouldn’t really be reading this fic in the first place. :/
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