Subject: I feel like anime continua natives would be perfect candidates for these EFL classes.
Author:
Posted on: 2022-05-13 02:58:22 UTC
Not that Jiwon is from one! Generally speaking, though, imagine someone from an anime continuum (probably a recent one, since English was only made compulsory in Japan in 2011) walking into an EFL class in New Cal and having a bout of deja-vu.
This little thing is at its core a pretty standard "Suvian romances an elf" fic, nothing too unusual, nothing too outrageous except possibly bl12. The Suvian is an interesting one: despite being a native inhabitant of Middle-earth, she wears a kimono, has a Code Lyoko-style thrown fan as a weapon and talks about ki. She also has speshul powers, and – here's the catch – at one point has Legolas help her def bl8 in this spoiler tag; possible bl12 still applies. What a lovely woman. Also, her first name sounds like a Japanese surname.
Even If She's Different Summary: Officer Judy Hopps finds an injured girl human called Isabelle who is her age. Isabelle has bad memories in her past and three dangerous people in the present who are trying to take over Zootopia. Judy and Isabelle join forces to investigate the case and also their feelings for one another.....
So we've got a human named Isabelle randomly in Zootopia and Judy Hopps falling in love with her at first sight. The fic is 85% song lyrics, too. Also in subsequent instalments Nick Wilde is character assassinated. Very classic Sue story with the Zootopia setting meaning that your agents could finally live out their furry dreams (if they aren't, of course, already anthropomorphised animals) by taking this mission!
Haven't watched Zootopia, but I've seen some clips and stuff. Aren't all the animals more or less the same size they are in the real world? So a human would be ridiculously huge compared to a rabbit? {X D
I guess that's less scary if it's femmeslash, but still. Yikes.
... And glancing at the fic tells me this is completely ignored, since Isabelle fits easily into Judy's police cruiser. Right. Cool.
~Neshomeh
And yeah, all the animals in Zootopia are scaled to one another -- there's an entire mini-city called Little Rodentia filled with, you guessed it, rodents.
But I’m not claiming it myself. I don’t think I should.
Hope someone else can.
So, my siblings were watching a Croods spin-off show, and I thought "Hey, we haven't had a PPC mission to that contiuum!" So I looked on Fanfiction.net and found this. Basically: a pair of Sues ( who are sisters, one with color-changing hair) get transported into the first Croods movie, which they've seen, and is fictional...but somehow it's also time travel. Huh? Oh, and the "time travel" has not been explained, at least as far as I've read. One of the Sues is able to drive all the Croods very OOC, as they magically accept a random stranger--despite that totally contradicting one of the family's main character traits. Sigh. There's some minor SPaG errors, too. Not sure if anyone else is familiar with the continuum, though. Any takers?
Here it is. Basically: Harry’s stereotypical Southerner (who is a hateful Mary Sue) younger sister goes to Hogwarts. SPaG? Very, very bad. The version I could find is short, but it has its own TvTropes page. And here is an MST of the whole thing. The Sue hates "blaks, gaes, and Nurtherners". Sigh. I also found this “Sue profile”. By the troll author of “Da Ovy Coveered Wlls ov Hugwrts”, even.
Warning: this Sue is toxic. She seems to hate anyone who isn't like her. And she spawns an incredible amount of Mini-Sues and Mini-Aragogs. I really hope this is a trollfic and that this person isn't real.
Does anyone want this garbage?
Apparently Gollum shows up, but he’s a gremlin working at Gringotts.
I’m gonna take on this SPaG-less monstrosity.
Might take me a bit to put it on the Claimed page, though.
Seriously, this fanfic is REALLY BAD!
Freaking Hamlet!
Warning: terrorist group mention. And Bl 1 or 2.
No Spoilers, because I couldn’t get them to work. Sorry.
She MURDERS people for no reason and JOINS THE KKK!!!!!
Worst Sue ever.
Found an MST of the whole thing. Here.
Yay! Now I can kill the entire monstosity!
I just saw something that indicates that the author may be real. What is wrong with the world?
There's a story here. (No, not the badfic; how I found the badfic.) I was poking around the Wayback Machine capture of an old archive called Brain-Insane to see if I could find the actual publication date of "Subjugation," because it's older than I thought and it was hosted there. I didn't find the original date, but I've added the information I did get to the wiki.
Along the way, I noticed that the site had fic for lots of fandoms besides Harry Potter, and I couldn't resist taking a look. There was a section for Farscape! It's one of my top favorite fandoms, and it's relatively obscure. The fic tends to be mediocre to good thanks to a mature, intelligent fanbase, for which I am grateful.
But I can't say I don't want to write a mission for it.
Now, it's important to note that Brain-Insane was a dedicated Mpreg site, and Farscape is a continuum where it wouldn't be too hard to pull it off. I mean, there's an alien species whose females look like human males. Regrettably played for laughs and a bit of "no homo," but still. A male-bodied person getting pregnant wouldn't have been out of place on the show. (Maybe if they hadn't been unjustly cancelled, grumblemutter...) There was every chance I could have found goodfic.
There was only one fic. It is not good.
"Julon Crion" gets off to a failtastic start with the character assassination of Aeryn Sun. I confess I do not understand exactly what her deal is, because the plot is so disjointed, but I guess she decided to betray Moya's crew, be a Peacekeeper again, and also frell Scorpius under the crew's noses? IDEK. John, instead of doing the in-character thing and assume that Scorpius is behind it and come up with a terrible plan to get the Aeryn he knows back, decides that he's just going to give up on everything and jump ship at the next space port. This is supposed to be between him and Pilot, but Chiana overhears, so of course everyone finds out. (The author gets points for remembering that Pilot exists, but loses most of them for forgetting he's intelligent and sassy and very done with everyone's BS at this point in the show.)
There's a lot of confusing scenes where I'm not entirely sure why anyone is doing anything, but long story short, Chiana begs John not to leave, he says he needs time to think about it, and they leave him alone on this commerce planet for three days. Chiana, D'Argo, and Rygel eventually kick Aeryn and Scorpius off the ship, but not Sikozu, even though they can't seem to make up their minds about whether she's working for Scorpius and if they want to trust her or not. I really have no idea, it's that hard to follow.
Meanwhile, John goes to a bar and orders a particular drink, which Chiana had told him is a signal to any watching Nebari that you're interested in hooking up with a Nebari. He is surprised when a Nebari man starts hitting on him. Apparently badfic!John isn't as genre-savvy as canon!John. So, yeah, the completely predictable sex happens. The sex is poorly written; John's consent is dubious (his second drink is an aphrodisiac drug; he wanted a buzz) and both men are described as being in actual pain, yet the fic treats this as perfectly fine. They shag for three. whole. days. And then it gets weird.
It's not weird that John ends up pregnant; we knew Mpreg was coming. I even give the fic props for leaning into the horror aspect of a cis man's body suddenly behaving strangely and him being terrified.
What's weird is that John isn't suffering because he's pregnant; he's suffering because he's getting turned into a Nebari. I don't know why this happens. The crew take him to a doctor who specializes in xenobiology, and there's some technobabble about a virus inserting alien DNA into his normal DNA, and it's already done its work by they time they get there... But, the thing is, no one in the Uncharted Territories has ever seen a Human before. They recognize the Nebari DNA that got in there... somehow... but not the Human DNA. They assume the Nebari DNA is correct, and finish the job of making John look like a Nebari. This would almost be a good plot twist if anyone had stopped for one moment to acknowledge that this doctor had no way of knowing the strange Human DNA wasn't foreign, but they don't. Sigh.
The fact that John is pregnant is tacked on as an afterthought. The fact that the baby isn't genetically related to him at all, but somehow a fusion of the rando Nebari guy from the bar and BY THE WAY a different Nebari guy from an episode two seasons ago who apparently had his way with John between scenes, is treated as some sort of fantastic medical miracle. John is described as "genetic glue" (and then he has to explain what "glue" is because apparently that concept is too complicated for the translator microbes). Glue between two species. Even though the child is pure Nebari. Or is she part alien? I don't know! The fic says both things!
I just... I. What. How. WHAT??
Also, everyone insists that Chiana is its mother, even though she had nothing to do with it and is on record as not liking kids. ("Frelling narls," I believe is a quote.) I don't even.
Pretty much everyone is noticeably OOC at this point, with both John and Chiana being weepy and useless and everyone else being inconsistent at best, idiotic at worse. The final nail in the coffin for me? Braca isn't loyal to Scorpius. Scorpius has him killed. Now, I don't know exactly what Scorpy is up to in this fic, but there's one thing I DO know, and that is Miklo Braca is always on Scorpius' side, because Scorpius is always on Braca's side—which is to say the side of protecting and preserving the institution of the Peacekeepers and their ideals. It may seem silly for THIS to be the deal-breaker for me, but I'm telling you, it's like asking me to believe 2 + 2 = 5. It doesn't, and it never will, and it's wrong. Wrong, you hear me!
Gah.
I don't know if I'll actually mission this. It's not a "live" fic, and I'm not sure how I feel about sporking something from a dead archive. I mean, on the one hand, it's at least 18 years old; I'm not going to damage the feelings of a beginning author! On the other hand, I dunno, just feels kinda underhanded somehow?
Plus, I'd have to pull some shenanigans to get it in front of my agents who are competent in the fandom, and while I enjoy making Nume and Jenni work together, it's not something I want to have too much of. I could set it back in 2004-2005 when Nume was still partnered with Cameo in Floaters, but I quit writing Cameo because I don't like her and I don't wanna, so that's out. There's Agent Neshomeh c. 2004-2005, too, but she was in the DMS, and there's no Sue here.
I dunno, but I had to talk about it. Maybe that will be enough. {= )
~Neshomeh
I actually called it a couple nights ago in Discord, but I just read this:
This piqued Chiana's interest as she followed orders. "Hey Helie, what is this Divine One?"
Helie's laugh once again erupted. "Oh that, he is supposedly a bright being of light and energy that guides our destiny among the stars. Loves all, and watches over those who die. They believe that one day he will rise up among his people again after his flesh has burned away by the love our Goddess. This will make him immortal again, and restore the balance that was long ago upset."
Frell it to hezmana, I knew it. It's John. John is the Divine One.
Technically I don't know this yet, but look, John has supposedly died after being put through some sort of mystical trial where he had to listen to dead people from his past talk at him, and Jack (the Ancient) was involved, and so was the spirit of Zhaan (representing the Goddess no doubt), and this is 100% a thing that is happening.
I hate it. So much.
~Neshomeh
Your mention of these got me thinking about how nobody has ever played with the question of PPC translators. Jay and Acy mention that there are spells and Universal Translators, and it pretty much stops there. Everyone uses the UT.
But there are so many options - and so many ways for it to go wrong! Universal Translators which fail at Hogwarts. Spells which fail in non-magical canons. Microbes which get caught by Star Trek biofilters. Babelfish which get affected by the disguise generator. TARDIS translation which can't cope with specific languages. I'm sure there are many more.
Unfortunately, the best way to play with this would be to pick one and make it a running thing in a spinoff, rather than try to slam every option into one big story. One possible option would be an agent who refuses any translator - and thus can't understand half of HQ, and has to actually learn the canon Common Speech (unlike everyone else). That could be fun, not as a major thing but just their character bedrock.
hS
Apparently the French government runs an English-language teaching assistant job in New Caledonia. Based on the job description, it's literally the same as my current job in Japan. There's also some private schools in Noumea that teach English.
This leads me to the idea of some random World One recent graduate who wants to teach English as a foreign language in a different country signing on to teach English in New Caledonia and ending up, somehow, with a job at Digory Kirke or Paul Atreides teaching EFL to kids and agents from non-English-speaking continua. They probably don't have a UT fitted, so they'll be befuddled at their students understanding them perfectly but still responding in Sindarin or Klingon or Middle Chinese. The EFL course for agents would be aimed at helping them take down grammar-related charges, write cogent chargelists and mission reports, and read the Words (presuming, ofc, that the UT in use doesn't translate text, only speech). For kids, it would probably be closer to the standard EFL classroom experience with grammar points being hidden in games and conversation activities.
So yeah, if anyone's got agents who are not from an English-speaking continuum, this could be an interesting aspect of their backstory or just some ongoing character detail/gag. Imagine some, idk, Wookie agent pulling out their EFL homework in the middle of a mission or practicing reading the Words!
((Couldn't figure out the accent.))
Honestly, I feel like I learn something new about the actual New Caledonia each time it comes up. It's cool! Also, the EFL sounds like good fun - I might have to reference that somehow if my writing motivation comes back.
...
slides Jiwon back into the closet
Not that Jiwon is from one! Generally speaking, though, imagine someone from an anime continuum (probably a recent one, since English was only made compulsory in Japan in 2011) walking into an EFL class in New Cal and having a bout of deja-vu.
...I actually do have something similar planned! It just hasn't shown up yet. I've also played around a little bit with translator settings, having some languages translated but not others (for example: the Calaquendi agents have theirs set so they hear everything translated into Sindarin, but the only language that gets translated in return is also Sindarin, unless someone has Quenya translation turned on on their end; Dawn, upon rescuing the Elfling who becomes Lainduilien with Zeb, has to switch her translator output to include Sindarin so the child can understand her; things like that). I'm not sure how much of the Calaquendi version has shown up yet, since as far as I remember a lot of the writing for them hasn't been posted (yet), but Dawn's version has shown up, at least.
Overall, though, there's room for a lot of different takes. It's a fascinating concept, and with all the little differences between spin-offs and even just translation options, as you pointed out...there's a lot of space to play around in here.
~Z
I was planning to do a learning canon languages thing with my agent Rebecca Buch.
I finished reading chapter 2. I have now read something I truly believed no one would ever write, and I must share my pain. But be warned, this is NSFW and very NSFB. Do not unspoiler this if you're unprepared for cis male anatomy, strangely colored bodily fluids, traumatic alien childbirth, or a truly astonishing combination of the three.
I mean it, this is big anatomy fail and big squick.
No. I don't care if John isn't technically a human; even if he were a frelling hyena, this would not work! He was described as being big enough to waddle, dammit! (And don't even get me started on the gestation timeline.) NO! Bad! No biscuit!
And the grammar is atrocious. }= <
And also, I still have no idea why anything in this story is happening. I'll let you know if I find out! {= D
~Neshomeh
Unfortunately, I'm not in this fandom, so I will be of no use except possibly to swear at it in Shakespearean English.
I'm kinda dying to see Doktor Trollenfisch in action again…
I don't know when I might get around to it (many things on the backburner already), but I have a plan, which is to shamelessly snurch Agent Taboo of the MPreg Division and have her tap Agent Ilraen as a canon expert. Ilraen will have watched Farscape offscreen by now and he won't be so traumatized by the fic as to be totally useless, unlike certain Supernumeraries I could name. I think I can vibe with that pairing.
The fic is confusing enough that it could legitimately make a WhatThe mission, though, and Scapegrace is actually one of the few other Boarders I know of familiar with the canon, so I wouldn't rule that out if Scape were interested—but one of the things on my backburner is actually a stalled co-write with her, so, uh, yeah. ^_^; (To be clear, I'm not blaming her; we both have other stuff going on; it's okay; we'll get around to it when we get around to it.)
Either way, don't expect anything any time soon, but I do want to make this a thing. There's a character I want to recruit and a dumb Babylon 5 joke I want to make, and that's plenty of reason for me!
~Neshomeh
Given how much you've ranted about this, it was inevitable that you'd be the one to kill it. Which is something it needs.
Please kill it! Just make it go away...(whimpers)
(downs barrels of brain bleach)
...but that sounds terrible. Ugh.
He's weirdly accepting of this top-to-toe alien creature's strolling into his land, and is amused when one of his men is harmed and humiliated. Excellent characterization, there.
The Sue has: "A description so urple, you'll regret reading it."
Noticed that in the summary.