IÂ’m so glad I asked.

Subject: IÂ’m so glad I asked.
Author: Hieronymus Graubart
Posted on: 2014-02-12 09:11:00 UTC

This had bothered me ever since the Evermind found out that most of the PPC’s income came from PPC Bioengineering Inc. and from FGenMS01: how could a Mary Sue factory make money?

So, all this money actually came from PPC Bioengineering Inc., because the factory sold or lent its products to PPC Bioengineering Inc., but the assassins mistook the procurement agents for ordinary Mary Sues, the Sue slaying increased and the Mysterious Somebody just let it continue to gain more power.

I like stories where not everything has been planned in advance and the outcome is not what the initiators had intended, although it benefits them for some time (until it backfires).

HG

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The second chapter of Blank Sprite is up! by Sergio Turbo on 2014-02-05 21:42:00 UTC Reply

http://rc1587.wordpress.com/2014/02/05/blank-sprite-mission-record-02/

Sergio and Nikki get involved in car chases and much more as they try to locate the missing canon characters. However, this is still only the beginning...

I got to read this at last, by Hieronymus Graubart on 2014-02-10 11:52:00 UTC Reply

and I didn’t take any notes. So, either I was too tired to spot any errors, or all the nitpicking is already done :-)

I liked Nicky’s reaction to being in a live action world. Not knowing her home continuum, I had never realized that she is a big-eyed anime character.

Apparently something more sinister than Mary Sues is at work here. Are “they” the maleficent force behind the Mary Sue factories, or did “they” just buy a special offer of Defectives to do the dirty work? Going off topic (or maybe not?) I never quite understood the economic reasoning for Mary Sue factories. Do they sell Mary Sues to writers who are too lazy to make up their own original character? Or do the factories create all these Mary Sues just for the fun of being evil?

I’m looking forward to the next chapter.

HG

The Mary Sue Factories tie into previous continuity. by Outhra on 2014-02-11 02:55:00 UTC Reply

It's been a while since I got to talk about continuity, so I'm happy I have finally been given another chance to. (rubs hands together gleefully)

The Mary Sue Factories were originally created by the Mysterious Somebody, formerly a Jedi Agent named Triad. Starting from his recruitment out of a badfic and assignment in the DAVD, he eventually took over Headquarters using Force-powered mind control on most of the Flowers in HQ, as well as any Agents who found out about his existence. He also installed the Bracket Fungus as the satellite Head of the Department of Internal Security, which covered all of the problems that today fall under the spectrum of the Security Departments, and after ordering the death of the Evermind, he installed the Bindweed as an additional satellite in the now-defunct Deputy for Infrastructure. To get more to the point before I summarize the entire Reorganization, the Mysterious Somebody created the Mary Sue factories as a way of consolidating his power further. Initially, he only made one, codenamed FGenMS01, in order to increase the PPC's workflow for the dual reasons of additional profit(where the profit would actually come from was never sufficiently addressed, though it was implied to be connected to the killing of Sues) and to keep the PPC's individual members active enough to allow him to remain hidden.

After the Reorganization, however, the Mysterious Somebody was exiled, along with all of HQ's Flowers that had supported him, and as a means of revenge, he set up a number of new Factories, planning to use the Mary Sues they created as an invasion force to retake Headquarters. The Mary Sue Factories had never been linked to the authors of badfics, but originally they had been released into the multiverse at random, acting as Mary Sues would if they had formed in the wild. From the Mysterious Somebody's exile onward, the Mary Sue Factories took on a role as a combination between the DMSEAR and a quasi-military force. Each Flower who was exiled with him was set up as the leader of a Mary Sue Factory, of which there were at least eleven, counting FGenMS01, which was the original, the largest, and headed by the Mysterious Somebody himself. The Factories created a massive number of Mary Sues, and an even larger number of Defectives, which were incomplete Sues that acted as staff members to keep the Factories running rather than as warriors or saboteurs. The actual invasion was preluded by several of the Factory's Sues being sent into Headquarters itself by a specialized Factory and masquerading as Agents or minor Flowers. These Sues, the aforementioned saboteurs, were usually detected and killed by the Department of Internal Operations, but since hunting and destroying what would have been seen by all around them as PPC employees would have been understandably controversial, the DIO kept its activities secret and only ever employed a handful of Agents at a time.

During the Crashing Down event, the J.R.R. Tolkien generator was stopped, leading to severely decreased shield power(it's a long story, involving why the DIS isn't around any more, and would require its own post), and the Mysterious Somebody took advantage of this to launch his assault, but was killed in the attack, along with his Flower lieutenants(save the Gladiolus, who defected from his defection and now serves as the Head of the DBS's Bad Het Division) and the Dassie Hyrax clones he had been using as a replacement for the Defectives(again, it's a long story, less long than the previous long story but unrelated to it), and the Mary Sue Factories were left leaderless and deprived of FGenMS01, which had been destroyed in the ensuing battle. The surviving Flowers, who had been Factory Administrators under the Mysterious Somebody but were without command after the destruction of the previous hierarchy, were reorganized into the League of Mary Sue Factories by the Yarrow, formerly the Factory Administrator of FGenMS08. The Yarrow's activities between Crashing Down and late 2008 are largely unknown, but at some point, one of the Factories snuck in a pair of macrovirus-infected Mary Sues, leading to an outbreak in HQ, in which the macroviruses smashed large amounts of PPC equipment, weakening the shields. The Yarrow, who had staged the epidemic, then sent in an army of Sues to wipe out the weakened PPC, planning to use Headquarters to spread the League's influence throughout the multiverse. Despite being aided by defectors from the DES, the Yarrow was killed when it decided to involve itself in the invasion directly, and once the Mary Sue invasion had ended, the entire League was thrown into disarray. The Yarrow was the last Flower among them who was any good as a leader, and the next candidates were its lieutenants, the weak-willed Forget-Me-Not and the vicious but shortsighted Venomous Tentacula. The Tentacula won the power struggle, killing the Forget-me-Not in the effort, but it was incapable of keeping the League together, and several Factories began acting outside of its rule.

The Yarrow had, during the reign of the Mysterious Somebody, been experimenting with certain components that allowed for more powerful and accurate Mary Sue duplicates to be produced from his factory, and tested out the new methods on a series of minor canon characters during his time as head of the LMSF, including Elethwen Eithriel, a Tolkien Elf who lived in Rivendell and had been one of the Elves attending the movieverse Council of Elrond. Elethwen Eithriel's duplicate, who was named Lilith Wyldenbrooke, had originally been intended to take her place in the Lord of the Rings continuum and serve as a sleeper agent for later affairs, but the Yarrow was killed before his plan could be carried out, and once the Tentacula took over the League and the Factory went separatist, Elethwen Eithriel escaped, took on the name Eledhwen Elerossiel to keep the LMSF from tracking her, and informed the PPC of said plan, leading to an attack on FGenMS08 that destroyed most of the duplicates. Lilith, however, survived the attack and took over FGenMS08, renaming it "Happily Ever After Ltd." She began to rally other Factories to her cause, forming an organized faction of separatists that opposed the Tentacula's rule. The pro-Lilith faction also developed whimsical names for their factories for unknown reasons, probably related to Lilith's Suvian sense of aesthetics.

Lilith's faction took an active role quickly, attacking OFUs and developing a Vambiolaria Bomb as part of a quest to develop military superiority over the pro-Tentacula faction(Vambiolaria is a disease created several years ago during the run of the Hogwarts Fanfiction Academy. Simply speaking, it coverts any dominant characters in its region of influence into Mary Sues, and its only known cure involves a very rare non-canon plant that grows on the grounds of HFA). Lilith was later killed during an attack on the International Academy of Hetalia Fanfiction, which may or may not have led to a refragmentation of her faction, and since then, the activities of the Mary Sue Factories have remained unknown. Presumably, the Tentacula remains in charge of at least its original post, FGenMS11, but Blank Sprite is the first time the League has been brought up in any capacity since 2011.

So, yeah, that's how all that happened. How the Mary Sue Factories started, what they do, and when they've done it. I probably got carried away and provided information beyond the boundaries of your question, but continuity is fun for me.

Actually... by Sergio Turbo on 2014-02-13 19:18:00 UTC Reply

... It's funny to think that...

[SPOILERS]

actual Mary Sue Factories aren't involved in Blank Sprite at all.

[END OF SPOILERS]

But I guess this big discussion brought out some interesting and necessary stuff, so it's still good.
Thank you for this comprehensive essay. by Hieronymus Graubart on 2014-02-12 09:09:00 UTC Reply

So, in a much shorter version, economics are not applicable to Mary Sue factories. The Yarrow and the Venomous Tentacula did and do it for Revenge on the PPC, not to get money. I’m not sure about Lilith’s motives – someday I will read IAHF, although Hetalia isn’t my fandom :-) – but she may not even need one, because Sues just do what Sues always do.

The Mysterious Somebody himself did it for power, because an increasing number of Sues meant an increasing number of agents who all obeyed his commands. How the original FGenMS01 contributed to keeping the agents not only busy, but also paid, would still be a mystery, if Huinesoron had not given us an answer at last.

HG

We don't actually know much about the Yarrow. by Outhra on 2014-02-12 15:59:00 UTC Reply

Which is a shame, because I've always found him kind of interesting. He managed not only to keep the Factories together after losses that would have destroyed any other faction in fiction, but managed to rebuild them and restructure their mission statement into a form that made the new League a long-standing, credible threat. He was a harsh and controlling leader, but he'd have to be to keep a staff that consists almost entirely of Mary Sues in check, since the Mary Sue in its natural state is a solitary and disorderly creature. Once the League shifted to new management after his death, problems started cropping up almost immediately. Plus, he had plenty of plans that we never got to see through, and they seemed from what I saw to be more complex than the standard. I know he had some sort of long-term agenda that was interrupted by his untimely death, more likely than not involving Lilith's stock of canon character duplicates. I'm interested in seeing how that would have turned out, but we were never given enough details to extrapolate before the Tentacula took over and botched the scheme.

In fact... by Ekyl on 2014-02-13 01:59:00 UTC Reply

...Was the Yarrow's ultimate fate ever actually written anywhere? It's all over the wiki that Harlan incinerated him then got killed by a Dandelion bodyguard, but that wasn't in any parts of the 2008 Invasion RP I remember reading, nor in followup writings.

Part of the Mary Sue Invasion RP is missing. by Outhra on 2014-02-13 03:57:00 UTC Reply

Two Google Docs, one denoting the very beginning and one denoting part of the conflict within HQ's halls, are inaccessible. Apparently, anyone reading needed permission from the docs' compiler to access them, and whoever that was left the PPC before making the compilations public. Those two also happen to be the only two accounts in which the Yarrow appears in a direct, active role, as well as the as-of-yet only appearance of the enigmatic Pipe-Weed Flower, so we cannot yet confirm or deny anything regarding events in that period. The conflict with the Davros Sue at The Tomb of the Unknown PPC Agent is still alive somewhere, since I distinctly remember reading that part, so it's not all gone, but at least some important scenes are lost.

I talked to Neshomeh about this a while ago when I'd been planning on using the Mary Sue Invasion for some more appearance links, and she said that she was working on the issue, and had been in contact with someone who had access to the restricted Google Docs, but I have no idea how that is going.

Believe me, if the original wording is ambiguous or contains the phrase "No one could possibly survive that." I would like little better than to reveal that the Yarrow had escaped the assault when it went pear-shaped and has been working on his master plan out somewhere in the multiverse, after spending a while post-Invasion inactive to deal with some temporary setbacks, but considering the speed that the League of Mary Sue Factories changed leaves after the Invasion and the wiki pages that you mentioned, he's probably unambiguously toast.

The problem is there's no evidence the scene happened atm. by Ekyl on 2014-02-13 04:00:00 UTC Reply

If you'll forgive the chatspeak due to lack of space. :P The Yarrow is definitely treated as dead and I wasn't saying it as a "hey, maybe he's alive" thing - I'd just really like to find some kind of actual source indicating that it actually happened as opposed to just getting tossed on the wiki.

(I'm also rather certain neither of those docs include the scene in question.)

Of course! The Yarrow was really killed by an ATM! by Outhra on 2014-02-13 04:35:00 UTC Reply

Maybe the ATM and the Sufficiently Advanced Vending Machine get together every once in a while and talk about their respective triumphs.
Ha ha, okay, sorry, I had to get that ridiculous mental image out before it caused any trouble.

What we really need is to get the entire Invasion all in one place so that we can sort it chronologically and for important events to make a better reference source. Right now on the wiki, there are seven Google Docs on its page, none in chronological order and all inaccessible(out of that list, I think the second is most likely to include the scene we're looking for, because most of the others deal with the paths of individual Agent teams, but I can't be sure), but I know that in at least one place there is some remaining, because I read about the Davros Sue off of it. I tried to find that spot again, but I couldn't. I don't even know where to look.

Do you know a good way to contact Neshomeh and ask how the project of retranscribing the Invasion is going? That would probably be the easiest solution here. I'd use the e-mail address she listed on the wiki, but I've tried to contact her with questions on it before and she's never responded. It might not be an operational e-mail address any more.

>:( by Ekyl on 2014-02-13 04:37:00 UTC Reply

Anyway, I think the GDocs are held by JulyFlame, who gave me access to the first one when I just sent a request, but yeah, next I hear from Neshomeh (since I've been talking to her anyway) I'll ask her.

Er... 'Triad'? by Huinesoron on 2014-02-11 09:15:00 UTC Reply

I'd be... interested to know where that came from, given that I thought I'd written him as an insane Dark Jedi clone of Joruus C'baoth who never told anyone in HQ any name whatsoever.

(The very short version: the MS created both the original Factory, and PPC Biotechnology/engineering Inc., to garner funds for the PPC. Since BioInc sells canon products to the multiverse, it is entirely possible the Factory Sues were designed as procurement agents. Since the best way to procure resources is to be ludicrously overpowered - like the Sues the PPC had previously encountered - he designed them to be Sues. The fact that this fed back into increased work for the PPC - and thus increased loyalty to the management - was something of a bonus.)

hS

IÂ’m so glad I asked. by Hieronymus Graubart on 2014-02-12 09:11:00 UTC Reply

This had bothered me ever since the Evermind found out that most of the PPC’s income came from PPC Bioengineering Inc. and from FGenMS01: how could a Mary Sue factory make money?

So, all this money actually came from PPC Bioengineering Inc., because the factory sold or lent its products to PPC Bioengineering Inc., but the assassins mistook the procurement agents for ordinary Mary Sues, the Sue slaying increased and the Mysterious Somebody just let it continue to gain more power.

I like stories where not everything has been planned in advance and the outcome is not what the initiators had intended, although it benefits them for some time (until it backfires).

HG

There's probably a bunch of profitable uses for Suvians. by Ekyl on 2014-02-12 09:32:00 UTC Reply

With the powers Suvians can call upon, you could loan them out as mercenaries, security, use them as procurement agents like hS said, assassins, muscle for protection rackets... there's tonnes of ways to make money when the whole multiverse is at your fingertips and you have legions of henchmen that are by their very nature absurdly overpowered.

Suddenly, two of my long-standing plotbunnies come together. by Outhra on 2014-02-12 13:41:00 UTC Reply

I hadn't thought of the Mary Sue Factories being used as mercenary security and defense forces before. And I know for a fact that a few of the Factories named in IAHF have never been seen anywhere else... Hmm... Yeeees. This fills a couple of holes that I've been wondering about for a long time.

Thank you, Ekyl. Now some of my sidestory-planned character actions will not be motivated by what is, to them, complete nonsense. I was getting worried about that.

I've considered writing a League thing on and off before. by Ekyl on 2014-02-12 15:35:00 UTC Reply

So thinking about this kinda thing already came naturally to me, plus just considering human nature. You've got a bunch of insanely powerful henchmen you can create in droves, lots of people would first think to toss those henchmen at whomever their enemies are/whomever is willing to pay to use those abilities in combat.

The SO says he went by Triad before taking over. by Ekyl on 2014-02-11 18:37:00 UTC Reply

I can take that out if it's no longer the case though.

(Since he was a Joruus C'baoth clone, was his "real" name technically Joruuus? :P)

Where? I have no idea what you're referencing. (nm) by Huinesoron on 2014-02-12 09:05:00 UTC Reply

Outhra linked it. Reorg, Chapter 10. by Ekyl on 2014-02-12 09:29:00 UTC Reply

In fact, allow me to quote Reorg directly here.

"But why him?" Nyx insisted. "Surely you did a background check or something – why did you put Joruus C'baoth in charge of the PPC?"

He never gave a name, the SO replied, sounding a little vague. Official records - well, they list him as Agent Triad, but I have a feeling that was more the Marquis' insistence that something get written down than an actual name he used. Since he took over, we've only ever referred to him as the Mysterious Somebody. He shrugged his leaves. It's not like we talk to him in person - that's what the Nightshade is for.

As for the "that" I offered to remove, that was the mention of the MS's "official" name being Triad on the wiki.

Even if he doesn't go by it now, by Outhra on 2014-02-11 22:29:00 UTC Reply

It's what he was called in the past, so it's still important personal information that the wiki page should cover.

You know, this is making me wonder what the Flowers under his command called him amongst themselves during the years that he was the leader of the PPC exiles running the Mary Sue Factories. Calling him "the Mysterious Somebody" when he isn't mysterious to them any more would have been odd, especially since "the Mysterious Somebody" is kind of a silly title. They might have called him "Triad", but knowing the Mysterious Somebody, he'd hit them with Force lightning if he caught them doing that, so it wouldn't be the best of habits to get into. He seemed to enjoy having people call him "our master" and related terms, so maybe he insisted that his fellow exiles refer to him as such. There might be a few Flowers who wouldn't like speaking so subserviently, but they could always have just appended sarcastic extensions when he wasn't around, like "our glorious ruler" or "our indomitable leader". Those italics would probably be reversed, since these are Flowers, but you get the point.

I think that's hS's call. by Ekyl on 2014-02-11 22:32:00 UTC Reply

People seemed to stop calling the MS the MS and start calling him C'baoth pretty quickly once he was revealed, but it seemed to me that in the years afterward it started being less a name and more a title the legend grew around.

The reason I said I could get rid of the Triad thing if hS wanted is, quite simply, when we saw Lofty Skies nowhere did that name ever come up, and hS just reacted as if that had never been his name at all. I think we should see what he says so the whole thing gets straightened out before going off into wild tangents and conjectures.

I was only wondering. by Outhra on 2014-02-11 22:54:00 UTC Reply

I wasn't trying to impose. Besides, he's dead now, so what the proto-League of Mary Sue Factories called him won't really matter any more, unless people start writing flashbacks to the Factories in the 2000-2006 period for whatever reason.

Well, the heads of the PPC would have had to call him something before he adopted the Mysterious Somebody title in the eighth chapter of Lofty Skies. If he never gave a name, there'd need to at least be a designation that they'd use when referring to him. He had a position in the DAVD's administration, so he wasn't exactly an anonymous figure that wouldn't require a name, since at least the Big Thorn would have needed to call him something, and they couldn't have just called him "that white-robed Jedi guy", because there would probably have been at least three of those.

Seemed more like none of them had any idea who he was. by Ekyl on 2014-02-11 22:56:00 UTC Reply

Now sure, it's possible (probable?) a lot of time skipping was going on in those chapters, but the vibe I got from how Flowers reacted to him and such was sort of a "who is this guy?" thing. Plus, you know, the whole "he was using the Force to mind control everybody" thing.

Double-er... by Outhra on 2014-02-11 16:00:00 UTC Reply

You called him Triad yourself, during Chapter 10 of the Reorganisation, and it says his name in big bold letters on his wiki page. Granted, the original chapter says that he was only referred to as Triad in official capacity, and that it was a name assigned to him rather than given, so that's why you might have been remembering that he never told anyone his name. It could have just been a codename that he adopted before he decided that he liked being called "the Mysterious Somebody" better, but either way, it was the closest thing to a pre-ascension name that I could find.

Okay, fair enough. by Huinesoron on 2014-02-12 09:13:00 UTC Reply

Takes some of the mystery out of him, but apparently I put it there. Given that the SO doesn't know his name in Lofty Skies, though, I'm going to guess that the 'official records' in question are buried pretty deep - and, possibly, post-date his assumption of power.

In fact, Chapter 10 probably needs reworking - it conflicts with Lofty Skies, and I prefer the latter version. Since people apparently noticed the name, though, I'll keep it in.

('Triad' is a private joke of his, of course: he's the third version of Jorus C'baoth, after the original and the clone)

hS, off to rewrite (and fix that blasted coding)

Is that the coding... by Outhra on 2014-02-12 13:45:00 UTC Reply

That underlines everything and/or turns it bright red when text is selected? If it isn't, do you know why the PPC Histories do that? It can sometimes get a little distracting.

That's the one. by Huinesoron on 2014-02-12 14:49:00 UTC Reply

It's because I have link-type HTML used to identify chapter heads, but never closed it (because for some reason I didn't think it needed it). I've now closed them all for Reorg, and will look into the others.

hS

While we're talking about things that the MS was in, by Outhra on 2014-02-14 01:24:00 UTC Reply

Is there or was there a plan for Shades of Black and Red, or the Arthurverse in general? It seemed like a potentially interesting AU, but nothing much really happened in it before the stories within it just stopped, and the wiki articles on everyone there are only a few sentences long each. I would have liked to see some more details on how that world is going to turn out.
Maybe it will show up at some point during that multiversal crossover event you occasionally bring up, or it will end up like the Sundering universe and become open for other people to continue. Most of the major players in the Arthurverse were solely your creations, though, so I'm not entirely sure how the latter would work, given PPC character-use protocol...

Also, on a tangentially related note, when I was looking through the Shades of Black and Red section again to get the URL for that link, sometimes the underlining code showed up when I lifted my mouse to another tab or scrolled down. You might not have closed all of the tags.

Mm, sort of. by Huinesoron on 2014-02-14 09:20:00 UTC Reply

There is a plot for SoBaR - or Reorg 2A, as it was known back when CD was simply 'Reorg 2' - but I don't know if I'll ever write it. The heart of it is Jay and Acy's plan to take out the MS by, well, blowing him up (there was a discussion a long time ago about whether generic surface is brittle under explosive conditions). Then there's... grief, it's been a long time... er, Dafydd and co trying to break Ontic out, Connie and Aella trying to bring down the Factory, Blue and company providing a view on what normal life is like during the event, and Lou and Morgan - meddling.

But there's no particular plan to continue it. I suspect the ultimate outcome would be a new Head of the PPC - probably the Sub Rosa, I'm a big fan - and likely a shift in organisational policy. I can see the SR deciding that all these troubles come from being too aggressive, and that from now on, PPC Agents will use stealth, not force, to take out badfics.

Of course, neither is there a plan not to continue it. I'll maybe get round to it? I honestly don't know.

hS

I suspect my quoting Reorg happened after this rewrite. by Ekyl on 2014-02-12 09:36:00 UTC Reply

If so, sorry, disregard me going in and fetching the quote upthread. :P That whole Triad thing always did bug me - think I asked you about it myself once. Glad it all fits in somehow.

(You know, I don't know how I only just got this, but was the MS himself the "secret project" of C'baoth's Anya and Josephine talk about forgetting to deal with/not catching in the beginning of Lofty Skies? Seems to've been the implication but I wondered if I was just looking too hard. Link here because I've somehow never figured out how to code links on this Board: http://ppchistory.webs.com/Skies1.htm)

Coding links. by Outhra on 2014-02-12 21:27:00 UTC Reply

It goes like this: "text that would show over the link", except with all of those quotation marks removed. I probably put in more quotation marks than I needed to there, but I didn't want to partially activate the HTML and turn some crucial section invisible.
Yes, he is. by Huinesoron on 2014-02-12 14:54:00 UTC Reply

The MS's origin is a secret project of (a badfic version of) Joruus C'baoth to clone himself. Nyx, as seen in Reorg, doesn't know this - in the scene under discussion, she thinks he is C'baoth, and is rather baffled to find out he looks nothing like him.

I forget whether she ever finds out; I think the narrative calls him by name in CD, but I may be wrong about that.

hS

...Can't believe I missed that opening by Ekyl on 2014-02-12 21:23:00 UTC Reply

That is, the chance to be all Obi-Wan and point out he was indeed C'baoth... from a certain point of view. :P

(out of idle curiosity, why C'baoth?)

Two reasons. by Huinesoron on 2014-02-13 12:22:00 UTC Reply

We (actually, probably I) needed a character who:

-Could control people's minds - and not just puppet them, but actually make them want to do what he said.

-Have that influence suddenly removed, and just as suddenly restored.

Oh, and:

-Existed prior to 1998.

The only thing that sprang to mind was the various scenes in the Thrawn Trilogy where C'baoth does exactly that (re: mind control). The existence of the ysalamiri made him perfect. Wait, did I use 'miris? I know he deliberately shut down to avoid being noticed by a Jedi canon...

hS

Ysalamiri got used in Reorg, yeah. by Ekyl on 2014-02-13 17:44:00 UTC Reply

Unless you were asking something else?

CD uses both names. by Ekyl on 2014-02-12 15:30:00 UTC Reply

The PPC just started calling him C'baoth after his reveal though, and I'm pretty sure "Triad" is never used by anybody at any point in the three stories. Nobody ever really bothered looking into his backstory though.

(Also, doesn't what he does to the Poppy go against what he says in CD about how he can't directly mind control Flowers?)

Re: I suspect my quoting Reorg happened after this rewrite. by Outhra on 2014-02-12 14:00:00 UTC Reply

I was wondering why your quote didn't match my memory of that scene. I hadn't recalled the Marquis being mentioned there at all.

Perhaps now that Huinesoron is rewriting the Reorganisation, he'll include that section on the Mary Sues initially being used as procurement agents somewhere in the revised version, answering the question of how the Factories bring the PPC money for future readers. Plus, it'll give me official basis to post that information on the wiki, solving the problem on two fronts.

I'll put it in. :P (nm) by Ekyl on 2014-02-12 15:29:00 UTC Reply
Maybe. by Huinesoron on 2014-02-12 14:58:00 UTC Reply

I'm not sure whether it'd fit in; the sections dealing with the Factory as a PPC installation are pretty brief. Although... hmm. I probably could expand on the summary the Evermind reads at the end of Chapter 1.

Actually, I'll probably rejig it along the way: as it stands, BioInc is listed as a separate income source to the Factory. Hmmmm...

hS

Works either way, but could do. by Ekyl on 2014-02-12 15:33:00 UTC Reply

At the least, yeah, it'd finally make sense to have a bit of info in the story as to how creating reality-warping abominations is making money for the PPC. :P

(Did the PPC really need it though? As you've said the organisation really has no overhead since they can just steal or fabricate everything, unless that was less of an option in the old days and so doing the work was more expensive.)

Ah, good, I was left plenty of nitpicks. by Outhra on 2014-02-06 05:23:00 UTC Reply

"None of the windows was facing towards the two Agents" That should be "were", not "was", since there had been multiple windows.

"[I can’t open the portal directly from the console, either,] Corolla added, [I’m afraid there’s a plothole near you.]" The comma after "added" should be a period.

"Ben, do you think we’re going to get back the car still in one piece?" The words "the" and "back" should be switched, and the word "still" may not be needed. It's not grammatically incorrect to include it, but it's a little awkward.

"it’s the tech that isn’t working. Also, calling a taxi would’ve took more time," Again, not strictly grammatically incorrect, but swapping "that" and "tech" would make the phrasing a little less awkward. What is grammatically incorrect is the use of "took" instead of "taken", though I'll admit the misuse of "took" does occasionally occur in spoken English. Sergio hasn't shown proclivity to use dialect, though, so I'm pretty sure it's just a grammar mixup.

"we’re on an highway," That should be "a highway".

"changed lane to let a Porsche go past, “see? He’s doing at least two hundred," There should be a period after "past", not a comma, and "see" should be capitalized.

"A different art style doesn’t change who you are, though," Sergio said, "or who I am, for that matters." The last word should be "matter", unless the meaning would be synonymous with "because that matters", which would be a bit strange in that sentence.

“I would’ve asked to the dock workers, but this place looks pretty empty,” That should either be "asked" or "talked to".

"Sergio explained, “besides, the container was to be loaded today," "Explained" should be followed by a period, and "besides" should be capitalized.

“I think I have an idea,” Nikki said, “the CAD should be able to find Madoka and Sakura". "Said" should be followed by a period, and "the" should be capitalized.

“I hope this isn’t going to become another six-”
[Bestest Shipping Co. container holding character Madoka Kaname. Uncanon. Suggested action: Open container and liberate the canon character.]
“Sometimes I have the weird feeling these things are mocking me,” Nikki deadpanned.
“Only sometimes?” Sergio asked while stopping the car next to a black container, “this one?” Other than the period-capitalization replacement again(for "container," and "this" this time), I think there might be a step missing here, unless Nikki's CAD states its readings out loud, and even then it's a bit of an issue. Nikki is about to say "six-hour search", sees the reading, stops after "six" because she sees the CAD readout, and then Sergio suddenly knows which crate has Madoka in it? If it was just a readout, she'd need to tell him and indicate which crate the CAD had been scanning when the readout came up, and if it was read out loud, which is atypical and a little impractical for CADs but within the realm of possibility, she'd at least need to nudge him and point or something. Sergio's shown no signs of being telepathic, and the readout didn't exactly say specifics to the level of "in the little brownish-gray one, second from the left of the north wall" that would have led him to just be able to pick it out.

"Yes. Let’s get her out, I don’t think it’s very comfortable in there." That should be two sentences, divided by what is currently a comma. If you would prefer it stay in one sentence, you can substitute with a semicolon. There's another comma splice at "We were lucky, ours is on the ground," which can be fixed by either making that into two short sentences or rewording the phrase as "We're lucky that ours is on the ground." Using a semicolon in that case would create a mid-sentence tense confusion.

"Sergio muttered as he inspected the padlock keeping the container locked." A little redundancy here. A suggested rephrase might be "Sergio muttered as he inspected the container's securely fastened padlock." I was going to say "sealed padlock" to spare a word and keep a little more ambiguity, but I'm not sure if closing a lock can be referred to as "sealing" it.

"[Hm, I wonder where Sakura is.]" This should be "[Hm. I wonder where Sakura is?]", since periods at the end of questions tend to usually evoke disinterest or at the least a flat tone of voice.

"I know who you are,” Madoka interrupted him, “you’re Sergio Turbo and Nikki Cherryflower from the PPC, right?" Capitalize "You're", and replace the comma after "him" with a period.

"Sergio continued, “until we catch the one who kidnapped you and Sakura" Capitalize "until", and replace the comma after "continued" with a period.

"Corolla confirmed, [I'm afraid" That comma should be replaced with a period.

Sergio said, "In the meanwhile" Comma-period switch again, and you should replace the word "meanwhile" with "meantime". Alternatively, you could delete "In the" and just leave the "Meanwhile", but that doesn't work quite as well in this context.

"Nikki agreed, “If they" Comma-period switch again

"Both of you,” Madoka said" Comma-period switch again.

"… We are being shipped by canons?" That first "a" shouldn't be italicized.

"but none of them was this suicidal" The "was" here should be "had been".

"habits, that would be the Goddess of Hope due to the fact that she was everywhere and everywhen. Well, she used to." The "that" should be an "it", there should be a comma after "Hope", and "used to" should be followed by "be". Also, though this might be personal preference, it might look better if "due to the fact" was replaced with "since". It's more concise.

"barely wide enough as the car" "Enough" should be followed by a comma.

"conceded, “but for" Follow "conceded" with a period, and capitalize "but".

“Those things are Porsche Cayenne Turbos, they’ve got sport suspensions and twice the horsepower we have!” Another comma splice here. Replace that comma with either a semicolon, a period, or most appropriately in this case, an exclamation mark.

"Nikki cast a worried glance behind." It looks as though there's a word missing here, probably either "her" or "them".

"I’m going to take care of them,” Nikki said while getting up from her seat," The second comma should definitely be replaced with a period, and since there are two separate thoughts being punctuated, the first comma could be replaced as well, but that one could be considered correct either way for different reasons. I'd prefer switching it out, though.

"At the joint between the two there were" Add a comma after "two".

"summoned four Barret Shoot projectiles" According to the Lyrical Nanoha wiki, the attack is called Shoot Barrett in English.

"went way off too due to Sergio" Add a comma after "too". Personally, I'd replace "too" with "as well", since "too" seems to me more of a conversational word than a descriptive or active word, but that's mostly just my stylistic choice.

"knocking it out of the chase too" My stylistic preferences from earlier would suggest that you delete the "too" here, making "chase" the last word in the sentence.

"mirror, “how did you do that?" Replace the comma after "mirror" with a period, and capitalize "how".

"over the guardrail as the car chase had a nasty effect on her stomach." To get the simple issue out of the way, there should be a comma after "guardrail". For the second, you might need to rephrase that second part. It's not bad, it's just that, due to an odd mix of definitions and helping verbs, using "had" there would make the grammatically correct phrase in that instance "car chase had had a nasty effect on her stomach", and putting two "had"s next to each other isn't very aesthetically pleasing, at least not to me.

"We’ll try,” Sergio said as he got up and walked towards Nikki and Madoka, “how do you feel?" There should be a period after "Madoka", the "how" should be capitalized, and "How do you feel?" should be followed with an indicator like "he asked the girls." so it's clear that he isn't still talking to Corolla.

Now that those are dealt with, I quite liked this. You don't need to know any of the continua involved to enjoy mysterious and seemingly impossible abductions, magical girls shooting energy blasts from the top of a moving vehicle, and the shipping preferences of omniscient deities. The car chase action scene could have stood to be more dynamic, since at times it didn't feel quite as exciting as a car chase by rights should, but I loved the way you established everything. Not only the setup for the story elements themselves, but how you gave just enough information to show what was going on and why without it seeming like exposition. The only time it seemed a little exposition-y was when Sergio and Nikki were talking about speed limits, but when I looked at that scene again after having read the rest of the chapter, I realized that it was a way of explaining the sort of conditions that would be necessary for a road to contain a high-speed chase, so that passes as well. That said, if this is going to involve enough Madoka Magica material to be considered a "crossover", I might need to get to watching more of the series. I'm going to need to find that Youtube channel that hosted the full season again.

I already got most of those nitpicks by son_of_heaven176 on 2014-02-06 06:12:00 UTC Reply

If you saw my post, you'd see that I gave a blanket mention to the period-comma substitutions. However, I won't begrudge you spelling out each of those instances.

I wanted to make sure that none were missed. (nm) by Outhra on 2014-02-06 07:03:00 UTC Reply

When's Chapter 3 coming out? by son_of_heaven176 on 2014-02-06 00:39:00 UTC Reply

You've done quite the job with Blank Sprite. Even having no knowledge of the Cobra 11 fandom, I did not get lost. Nice work.

A few nitpicks:

Excuse me, I have the last document you requested,” a voice behind them said.
Sergio turned around and recognized the woman as Suzanne König, the chief’s secretary. “The one with the list of their shipments? That was fast, thank you very much.”
Sergio took a quick glance at the document while the secretary walked away. “Well, isn’t that odd. There’s only one shipment on this list, and it’s still at Cologne’s docks. It’s going to be loaded on the ship today.”

In that passage, adding a paragraph break after "secretary" and deleting the break before "Sergio" might make it clearer that Agent Turbo said the "The one with the list" line:
Excuse me, I have the last document you requested,” a voice behind them said.
Sergio turned around and recognized the woman as Suzanne König, the chief’s secretary. [paragraph break]
“The one with the list of their shipments? That was fast, thank you very much.” Sergio took a quick glance at the document while the secretary walked away. “Well, isn’t that odd? There’s only one shipment on this list, and it’s still at Cologne’s docks. It’s going to be loaded on the ship today.”

Also, a few SPaG errors:
The specialized projectile made of wax and powdered iron, despide disintegrating on impact... That should be "despite."

[Then I’m surprised you aren’t going any faster,] Corolla said, [Isn’t that car a BMW?] Should be a period, not a comma, after "said."
This line has a similar problem: [Question: How do we find our container?] Corolla sent out from the RC, [Should we look for a pink and sparkly one?] That should be a period after "RC."

In fact, this type of period-comma substitution happens quite a lot in this story. Please allow me to explain the difference between those lines and this one, where the comma is merited: “A different art style doesn’t change who you are, though,” Sergio said, “or who I am, for that matters.”

In the first two lines, there are two separate sentences separated by the "[character] said" tag. In the third, it's still one continuous sentence; the tag simply went into a space in the sentence. (Without the tag, it would have read, "A different art style doesn't change who you are though, or who I am, for that matter.")

One more thing: you might want to consider hyphenating "less than eager" in the last sentence of the mission.

That said, however, good work overall. I'll be awaiting Chapter 3.