Subject: Bits of writing
Author:
Posted on: 2013-06-29 19:58:00 UTC
Two separate things, for two separate characters.
New Lodgings (Introduction of Valon Vance)
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1dAHItOdWvikOr1Jc9p-PZfAHTuEVJOWOHXSgfXJsMjc/pub
Interview with a Weed (Introduction of Jean Chandler)
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Org4E58duS68YFj0WcI0H1M5m_3EL73iyWy4W8niZW0/pub
How do these look?
The links aren't working for some reason. :/
Why would the Marquis de Sod assume that anyone from outside continua with magical creatures and super-technology is automatically from World One? What about CSI or thriller movies or other such continua that are variants on the World One model, but have characters and events that are unconnected with "real world" events outside of a few tangential links and allegories?
Why is the Marquis de Sod surprised at the idea of Jean having no Lust Objects? He's been Head of Personnel since the early 70s; he'll have seen every facet of the human psyche by this point, and would be aware by the modern day that some people are just asexual. If there's one being who's not going to think of your sexual orientation as more than just a check-box on a few pieces of paperwork, it's the one who reproduces by pollination.
How did Jean get to de Sod's office in the first place? She seems to scoff at the idea of a canon patrol, so she wasn't a fic recruit, she doesn't seem to believe in alternate worlds and dimensional travel at first, so she probably wasn't deposited by plothole, and she's evidently from a continuum without any sorts of means for magical or sufficiently advanced transit that can go haywire, so she wasn't catapulted into HQ's null space by a glitch or the like.
Yet, she knows that the people around her in the halls are called agents, and she knew where de Sod's office was, so she's evidently met someone and that someone has shown her how to navigate HQ. Not everything seems to be clear, is what I'm trying to say here.
Why does de Sod immediately assign her to the DMS? Normally, immediate assignment as an Assassin or even a Disentangler come from intimate knowledge of a canon, tendency for personal attachment to canons, or a proclivity toward violence. From her interview, it seems to me that de Sod would have assigned her to an internship or to training to allow her to get a feel for the organization before giving her a permanent post. The only factor that would speak in her favor as an Assassin would be her experience in multiple weapons. It just seems like a decision that de Sod wouldn't make normally.
Jean seems... unstable. She asks a question of her interviewer in a confrontational manner and then immediately says "NOW it's going to give me some answers!" before de Sod says anything, her first reaction to "I might be hallucinating" is stabbing herself with a pencil, and she shifts between emotions randomly, chiefly reactive shock and befuddled confusion, which do not typically switch back and forth more than once. This, again, raises the question of why de Sod assigned her to the DMS. Assassins snap with regularity in the PPC, and she probably shouldn't be put in a high-risk Department when she's showing unstable tendencies without at least a few analyses from the Psychs.
I deleted Interview with a Weed from my drive. Judging from what you said, this story is completely illogical, and Jean is completely unsuited for duty.
The concept is all right, and I don't have any problems with the way it's set up (recruit walks in, sees Flower, learns about PPC, doesn't believe at first, is assigned, begrudgingly accepts, leaves, here we go again), but it's just that they way it was written could use some changes, most of them centered around the questions I posed. It's more a "you could use a beta" issue than a "delete this now" issue.
Oh, and the story was not deleted from the site. I can still access it from the link you posted. Is there a "hide this story from outside access until I'm through with the next draft" option? Because that might be a better course of action than just deleting it.
I don't know much about her as a character. Yesterday, I did a short RP as another potential character: Yorick.
Remember the urple skeleton that's briefly mentioned in New Lodgings? Yeah, that's him. He was created by Valon filching a scroll of Create Undead from a Pathfinder continuum. As I figured out by roleplaying him for a bit, he's eager, green as grass, dresses like a Hawaiian tourist, and loves blowing things up.
I'm half-considering using him instead of Jean. I wouldn't know how to enter the mind of any female character, never mind an asexual one.
If you can't think of how to enter someone's mind, as you said, it'd be best to get more experience working with similar characters first rather than making someone who might not turn out realistically a main character. Perhaps do some research by reading some other stories that feature well-written female main characters, and then work with writing for them later.
I like Yorick's concept, by the way. Aside from Agent Jenka, I don't think the PPC has any undead, and species diversity is always good.
I'm not entirely sure what the Pathfinder rules for undead beings and creation of undead are, but if its version of the Skeleton is capable of casting cantrips, I'd recommend he find one to change his color when he goes out of the RC. Urple is uncomfortable to look at for a large portion of people, in case you didn't know, and while Valon might be able to deal with it, due to him being partially color-blind, and Yorick would be disguised while on missions, if he has to go down to pick up some papers, or decides to go to a social gathering, or perform some other such function, he'd need to be able to make himself regular magenta or regular fuchsia so that he doesn't cause trouble simply by walking by and, quite literally, being himself.
I didn't delete it outright, I simply moved it to the trash.
Also, the pencil stab... I thought it was obvious that she thought she was dreaming, and that was to wake herself up.
Yes, but the leap in thoughts between "this might be a dream" and "I think I should stab myself with a nearby sharp object" is not one people normally take. There's a reason people who think they could be dreaming pinch themselves, or slap themselves in the face, or stomp their feet hard on the ground. There's less of a chance of bleeding, and almost no chance of small chunks of wood and graphite getting stuck in one's arm.
I still say de Sod would order her to be looked over by the Psychs if she did that right in front of him, especially since, to him, the pencil-stabbing was a direct follow-up to him asking her a perfectly routine weapon-proficiency question. It looks as though she's even more unstable, as though she's either stabbed herself with a pencil out of nowhere, or is doing so in an attempt to escape being asked any more questions. You have to think of what an action looks like to multiple people in the room. The Marquis de Sod can use thought-speak, but he isn't a mind reader.
My descriptions of Flower mental powers have always included surface-thought reading, to help with their distinctly mediocre sight (patterns of light and dark, not really defined images) and hearing (vibration patterns on their petals, not all that well resolved). They can operate without it, but don't, as a rule.
Of course, that's just my view.
hS
I'd always seen the Flowers' telepathic abilities as more finding minds and seeing minds than reading minds. They'd be able to detect the presence of others, detect species, emotions, or individuals based on the "shape" of the mind, but not find specific thoughts or the causes of those thoughts unless those thoughts affected the detected being's mental state in a noticeable manner.
For an example, if I can phrase this understandably, sudden bursts of fear in a previous state of happiness would change the shape, but just getting more nervous or afraid when one was already nervous or afraid wouldn't be as easy to detect.
It's not really based on anything, but I think it makes sense. I'm pretty sure I created the bit about the mind shapes allowing the Flowers to recognize people in order to fill a story hole somewhere, but I can't remember where any more.
I'd already picked up on how they see and hear from reading your trilogy of histories, though. It's a good model. I have one question, though. If they see patterns of light and darkness rather than detailed images, can they determine individual colors, or just general red end of the spectrum-green-end of the spectrum-violet end of the spectrum interpretation? It's not very important, all told, but it's something I was wondering about.
Have you completely rewritten the story behind the link? Because there's clearly something there (ie, not deleted), but it doesn't appear to match what Outhra read.
hS
Jean doesn't work! Nothing makes sense! I'M IN DESPAIR! VALON GOING BACK TO HAVING NO PARTNER FOR A MISSION HAS LEFT ME IN DESPAAAAAIR