Okay, I'm really going to push to get caught up on reviewing these today! . . . Although, it's already noon, and I need to get groceries, and I'd better take a nap before my work week starts tomorrow . . .
Boy oh boy, do I have things to say about this one. (I did not read any reactions to this chapter from before the time slide, so I may be making redundant observations here.) Let me first quote this line:
"'I hate amateurs! I REALLY hate incompetent morons. AND I HATE INCOMPETENT AMATEUR MORONS MOST OF ALL!!!!!'"
Alas, this mission is written both incompetently and amateurishly. Both of which are forgivable, especially considering the authors were probably teens at time of writing, but the hypocrisy is a lot grosser. This whole story is riddled with typos, many of which would make for rather amusing imagery in a badfic being missioned. (Especially annoying to me are "Mydraal," which would be a Wheel of Time mini of "Myrddraal;" and "tetrodoxin," which should be "tetrodotoxin." What is with these early PPC Boarders misrepresenting marine life!?!?) The agents have nearly indistinguishable personalities, and they're introduced with physical description dumps of the sort we often charge for. Despite doing missions in the Tolkien fandom, the authors/agents misidentify "Morwen" as being stolen from another canon's character, rather than recognizing it as Elvish for "dark maiden," which is clearly what the original author was going for. (I only know that thanks to the current most recent review on the mission; thanks, Narwen!) Between all of this and the overt aggression towards fanfic, there's no question that this story must look terrible to any non-PPCer reading it.
Okay, I do have some compliments to give. At least it has a bit of intertextuality, mentioning the report as having come from Architeuthis. I like the doorhanger mentioned at the end, and suspect such hangers are common throughout HQ. I also appreciate Gandalf calmly smoking his pipe while the assassination is about to go down, and that he and Gimli are largely unaffected. (Though even then, I don't see how Gimli can manage to trip multiple others of the Fellowship when he's among their slower members, and Gandalf's barrier spell feels a little Dungeons & Dragons to me.) Also, the following passage is legitimately excellent:
"She paused as she felt a familiar tingle going through her body. The land welcomed her, it knew she was there to help. Thus it hid her from its denizens and protected her as best as it could. It was humbling, to feel the gratitude of a land as ancient as this one."
Just beautiful; I love that. Also, I don't know if this was intentional or not, but I love the double meaning in the second clause here:
"The land could hide them from the natives, but the Mary Sues were another story."
Get it? Mary Sues are literally another story from their surroundings! On the other hand, we have this passage:
"The two assassins wandered around Rivendell, taking in the beauty of the Last Homely House. It was breathtaking, and Kage never grew tired of it."
What a weak, tell-don't-show imitation of Jay and Acacia's tendency to go sight-seeing on missions.
Ultimately, the badfic itself would have made for a much better mission in more competent mission-writers' hands. The Boarders missed an opportunity to riff on the fact that Melody, of merfolk descent, is almost definitely plagiarizing one of those "beloved" direct-to-DVD Disney sequels, Cinderella 4: Simba's Pride, I think? Which released two years before this mission was published, so the original fic probably published within that time. And hey, the fic's author gets kudos for getting a most excellent song stuck in my head today, even if their story predated it by roughly 15 years!
What's that? You're surprised I, the local zookeeper, didn't comment on literally killing a bird for its song, back where I was listing the mission's problems? That is because, I have done far more than comment . . .
Sakira stamped her feet on the way to the RC door, growling. She flung it open and demanded, "Who's there? I was watching anime!"
Outside stood a young, slightly tanned man in cargo shorts, holding a bird speckled with brown on one arm, while his other fiddled with his universal translator. He wore no PPC black; instead, his clothing was all khaki.
Oh, thought Sakira, when she saw his flashpatch. One of those DMFF agents. "What do you want? We aren't interesting in buying birds, or whatever other dirty animals you weirdos deal with."
"This is the RC of Sakira and Kage, right?" asked the man, with a slight professional lilt to his voice, as though he were talking down an angry customer. "Your RC didn't have a number printed on it, but the—"
"Yeah," interrupted Sakira. "Almost like we don't want unexpected visitors or something, especially not from other departments. You and your bird can take a hike, buddy," She started to close the door.
While she had been talking however, the DMFF agent had given the bird a questioning glance, and the bird had responded with a slight bow forwards. Now, the man stopped the door from closing by shoving his well-worn brown boot in the way. "Uh, sorry, but no." The customer service was gone from his voice. "I'm agent Therwin, of Misplaced Fauna. The Waterlily Commander sent me—"
"We don't answer to any Lily." This time, it was Kage who interrupted, stepping into view behind Sakira. "We're DMS, so if you're done interrupting our precious free time, we'd like to get back to—"
"Here's a fun trick," said Therwin, his voice and face suddenly hard. "Grab your universal translators, and set them to 'Throsel-tunge.' I'll just stand here and wait while you do so." He kept his foot in the doorway, and stared. The bird on his arm started calling out, "TWEETY TWEETY TWEET TWEET"
Sakira stared and him and glared, growling. The man just stared back. She huffed and started clicking around her UT, looking for the obscure language, and Kage followed suit. "Fine," Sakira grumbled, "but can you at least shut that bird up? It's so annoying, it sounds just like one I—Ooooh. Oooooh no."
As she arrived at the correct language, the bird's TWEETY TWEETs had abruptly started sounding like English words: ". . . didn't meant to disturb your slumber, but really, to simply fire an arrow without even asking me to stop first . . . I always thought better of the race of Men! Really!"
Therwin said something, which came out garbled to the assassins while their UTs were still set to Thrush. They clicked them back, and he started over again. "What do you know? A sapient animal in a fantasy series! Who would have thought?" He tilted his head, eyebrows raised high and mouth drawn down in a scowl. "I mean, I would have thought a pair of agents in the Tolkien Division would have thought of it before indiscriminately firing on wildlife, but apparently not. Did you even attempt to read the books?"
Kage sputtered, while Sakira sneered and said, "Uh, excuse me? Like, first of all, I had no way of knowing that bird was a magic talking bird, I was trying to sleep and it was being noisy! Second, you're telling me we can't hunt wildlife if we're stuck on a mission running out of food? There have to be hundreds of birds in Middle-earth, you're telling me killing one is some big deal? Bullcrap."
"Well, Sakira, believe me: I know bullcrap. Quite familiar with the smell, actually." Therwin gave a wide humorless grin. "But let's just consult the bullcrap detector, shall we?" He pulled a CAD from one of the big pockets on his shorts, aimed it at the thrush, and then offered it to Sakira to read.
Sakira crossed her arms and scowled. Kage's curiosity got the better of her, and she reached for it over Sakira's shoulder. She read aloud, "Ancient magical thrush. Tolkienverse canon species. 0% out of character. Critically . . ." Her eyes bugged out, and she raised her head to look from the thrush to Therwin and back. "Critically endangered?"
"They're critically endangered by the end of The Hobbit," Therwin said. "We don't even have numbers data during Fellowship."
Sakira snorted air out her nose. "Well. So?"
Therwin put a hand to his face and stroked his chin in mock dramatic fashion. "Well, so don't shoot things for no reason. Part of restoring canon means not removing things that belong!
Make sure to scan wildlife—and flora, for that matter—with your CAD, before messing with them. I know they don't have the same functions as the DMFF models, but it should still at least tell you when you're looking at something other than common wildlife."
"Fine, whatever. Are we done here?" Sakira made to close the door once again.
"Yeah, we're—wait." He put a hand to his ear, listening. Sakira held the door half-closed, practically vibrating with impatience. Therwin narrowed his eyes at the assassins. "Did you feed meat tainted with tetrodotoxin to multiple Velociraptor?"
"No, actually!" Kage said, looking confused. "We've only ever used tetrodoxin."
There was a beat.
"Kage, double-check the label on our tetrodoxin."
"On it." Kage disappeared behind the door. After a moment, she said, "Well, crap."
Therwin grimaced. "Ladies, boot up your console for a portal south of Rivendell. We have a thrush to neuralyze. After that, we're going to Jurassic Park so you can help me lug some dinosaurs to Medical."
I had to. I'm not sorry. Well, I'm sorry for making another defunct variety of CAD, but you have to admit, it makes sense the DMFF would need slightly different info from theirs. I know there isn't enough to go on in the bird scene in the mission to definitively say the bird was a thrush, but it isn't too unreasonable, and it made for a good narrative(?) The Veterinary Ward didn't exist yet in 2002, so hopefully something was figured out for those dinosaurs? Also, wow, Therwin. I need to come up with a better name than that . . .
—doctorlit no longer feels like he's going to make much progress today; it is nearly 2:00 as he finishes this