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I sent you again the bets-status mission, added the "delivery" of the Sue bodies to Cocoa and Powder.

And the mini-Guardian, Chiauru, is yours.

The browser cache does seem most likely, now that you say it, especially since I see the blue before I log in. But right now I'm trying to keep track of what pages I've visited on a rather complex site, so I'm going to hold off with clearing the cache until I'm done over there. But afterwards I'll try it, and let you know.

Thanks :)

Heh. I had fun with the Grow your own garden gnome!!, since I figured that PPC agents probably tend to get some... interesting mail at times.

Ian's by far the more laid back and personable of the two, but Lee's got her moments. This mission marks the beginning of an arc I'm planning, and hopefully it'll help develop them as more concrete characters, Lee especially.

On that note, I was wondering if you wouldn't mind being my sole beta for this arc. I've got secret-ish plans for it, and it shouldn't last more than four, maybe five missions after this one. However, I don't want the overarching plot to be given away via me having multiple betas. If you don't want to, I'm perfectly fine with that.

Thanks!

~Pretzel~

I know I already said this on another thread, but I know it feels good to get replies on Mission posts, so I'm saying it here, too.

This is a funny mission, which is great considering how messed up the fic is. I think the line that sticks out the most is the one about the Grow your own garden gnome!! (with only two exclamation points).

Lee is growing on me, and I think Ian is really sweet and fun to read about (of course being described as resembling Ronon doesn't hurt him any either :p).

Faramir/Shagrat?
Anyone/Treebeard?

My advice would have been what Miah told you about setting your skin preferences--especially since I noticed that mind had switched to something else a few days ago, and I had to go and put it back to the custom settings. I'd hoped that might fix it for everybody, since that's something I can do as an admin.

However, if it's still not working, I suggest clearing your browser's cache. It may be mistakenly loading old information instead of picking up the current information (though I hasten to add the disclaimer that I'm not an expert on browsers and am pretty much making things up based on the tiny bit I do know).

If that doesn't work, I have no idea. o.o

~Neshomeh

1. That's what partners are for.
   
   4. Dunno. You should ask them. Cassie's e-mail is listed on her wiki user page (or you can page her on the Board), and I suspect Meir Brin can be reached via PM on her ff.net account.
   
   5. Not necessarily. The way I figure, it would be like Mike's situation when It had taken the form of a parrot: definitely an aspect of a Power, but limited to the capabilities of Its mortal form. I imagine a mini-LP to be like a shoulder devil. It can whisper things in your ear, and it might bite you or give you a nasty little kick on the shin, but not much actual power beyond the ability to hover over your shoulder. Maybe lightning (read: static shock). Among other things, seeing the LP stuck that way, many times over, would be hilarious.
   
   I can't claim this as my idea, though. Really it's all this fic's fault.
   
   Theoretically I guess they would look different to everyone, but since we never see the LP's human form looking other than how Nita sees It... I take that with a grain of salt. I mean, it wouldn't be that hard to throw in a line for Kit to describe what he sees, but unless my memory is failing me utterly and beyond recall, that's never happened.
   
   As for sentience, all minis can certainly understand human speech to some degree, and some (notably mini-Aragogs) can speak human language. In my opinion, they have a child-like intelligence: enough to understand and follow directions, but also enough to make up their own minds when it suits them. The exact level of intelligence varies from mini to mini, of course.
   
   ~Neshomeh

Agents:

Name: Summerblaze (Summer)
Species: Human
Home Continuum: Valdemar
Department: Department of Mary-Sues
Background: The offspring of a Sue and a Darkwind!Possession-Stu, Summer was created with virtually no personality, and pretty much ignored except for sicky-sweet bits of fluff. The PPC interrupted the fic when she was about five years old, but not having any charges on her except for parentage, they took her back to the PPC Nursery (after a jaunt through the science center, where they attempted therapy to remove as much Glitter as possible). She was "adopted" by another Tayledras agent, and essentially grew up in the PPC HQ. Due to her parentage, she has a mild case of MSS, but not quite as bad as a full-blown Rehabilitated!Sue.
Skills: Mind-to-mind communication with her bondbird, mental shielding, (momentary) physical shielding, small fireballs
Weapons: Tayledras climbing pick; longbow
Appearance: Her parents may have been Suvians, but the author at least paid attention to genetics. Her hair is black (at certain times of the month it becomes "glossy, raven locks" and/or "onyx tresses") and waist-length; on missions, she generally ties it into a pony-tail or braid. Her skin is golden-brown, the laws of Narrative Comedy having been lenient for once, as even in canon the Tayledras are simply described as "golden-skinned." She is fairly tall and athletic, although without Suvian influences her figure is about as average as it gets. She is perfectly fine with this, and wouldn't have it any other way.

Name: James Ochre Yellow (Jamie, Oke)
Species: Human (Ex-Piper's Child)
Home Continuum: Keys to the Kingdoms (The Lower House)
Department: DoM-S
Background: A Piper's Child of unknown ancestry, Jaime was running from an Overseer after stealing a pair of wings when he fell into HQ. No one's really sure how; it was put down to a plothole. An accident with a Mage!Sue caused the wings (he'd worked /hard/ to steal those. He wasn't just gonna leave 'em in a closet) to attach themselves permanently to his back, which, while occasionally convenient, can also be incredibly annoying, as they have a mind of their own and tend to snap out at inopportune times. (The process of turning a magical construct into a pair of flesh-and-blood appendages was also excruciatingly painful.)
Skills: Flight
Weapons: Whatever heavy object is nearest; decent hand at just about everything, but not particularly good at any one thing.
Appearance: James is quite clearly of mixed blood. His longish hair is sandy brown and usually messy; occasionally he ties it into a stubby ponytail when it starts to get in the way. His eyes are medium brown, and his skin is tan; in short, his coloring is what one might expect of a European, but his build is more like the stereotypical Asian, and his almond-shaped eyes and nonexistent epicanthic fold only emphasize the look. He is a rather mature-looking fifteen, easily mistaken for a college student.

Writing sample:
http://www.fanfiction.net/u/1648576/ My page in the Pit, although it's mostly serious stuff, and since I haven't posted there in ages my writing style's changed. I'm working on a sample with these two, but I figure as of now, might as well post what I've got, eh?

First badfic: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6094334/1/TheLifeofRosannaHathaway_Potter I don't normally read this fandom, but it's such a god-awful frightfest that I couldn't resist. Warning: The whole thing is written in bold/italic. THE. WHOLE. THING.

You know how, in some time-travel stories, someone will create a stable time loop in which Event One causes Event Two, which causes Event One? That's allowable, by the laws of physics (given that time travel can happen), despite the spooky way that information pops out of nowhere.

It'd be a lot like that.
1. Your agent returns from a mission.
2. He writes a mission report to turn in to the Flowers.
3. Because he's an Author, the mission report causes the mission to occur the way that it did.

Your agent would probably be quite unaware of the process. It could actually be what happens for many World One self-insert agents who write their own mission reports.

1. Minis on missions: Generally, no--because it puts agents in danger of owning a CAF, which is a Sue trait and thus not smart for agents to do. Some agents do bring ordinary pets on missions; and sometimes minis discovered on a mission go along for the ride.
   
   5. Young Wizards minis: Mini-BEMs would be cool, and has a better ring to it than Mini-Lone Powers. Mini-Eds (the shark from "Deep Wizardry") are another option. In general, powerful monsters from a continuum serve as Minis; but the main antagonist does not (which is why we have mini-Balrogs, not mini-Saurons; and mini-Aragogs, not mini-Voldemorts). But if you want it to be the Lone Power, then go for it. It's not like it's so far out of the norm.
   
   Minis generally have about the intelligence of a very smart dog or an average chimpanzee--animal intelligence, but smart animals. Some minis are sentient, but most aren't. Mini-Aragogs are notable for being able to talk (most minis can't.)
   
   Agents' lives:
   4. Time away from HQ: It's unstable. Sometimes, agents are away for months and return within a day; sometimes they're away for five days and return in five days. Sometimes no time has passed at all. In general, their time away is kept short on the HQ end of the portal. It's been mentioned that Agent Jay would have been dead of old age if she had spent as much time in World One as she did on missions; so it seems that agents tend to age at the rate that HQ time passes (or even World One time, which can be shorter), rather than at the rate they spend time in missions.

It's the first half of Ian and Lee's newest mission to kill a Twin!Sue infecting the Harry Potter continuum.

Enjoy.

1. For company and distraction. Though it would have to be small enough for the agent to carry it around so it wouldn't get lost or (shudder) mess up the mission or (extra-shudder) mess with canons.
   
   4. A better question: where do they keep their lists?
   5. I considered it. But they would be too scary. They'd have to have some power, being a mini Power, right? And that's not good. Also, would they look different for every person who sees them? And aren't minis not fully sentient?

Minis:

1. Nope. Sorry.

2. Probably just sit around and eat - or set fire to things, depending on their temperament.

3. There are a few options:
You can go to an Adoption Centre (that is, the webpage where whomever is keeping the relevant list has posted all known names), select a misspelling that appeals to you and send an email with your adoption request.
If there is no list being kept for that fandom (which is sadly frequent), you can adopt directly from a Board post in which someone lists all the new minis they've found.
If you find the misspelling in a fic you are PPCing, you can also adopt directly, though it's polite to make sure that no one else has already adopted that particular mini.

4. Honestly, I'm not sure. These things change, and if someone fades out, it's not always clear if they're still considered to be in charge or not. I think Cassie was involved at some point, but I can't recall.

5. According to the Minis page on the wiki, that hasn't been specified yet, so if you are the first person to write a mission in that continuum that stumbles across a mini, you can decide. If you're asking for an opinion, I'm afraid I don't know the fandom.


Agents:

1. What is this "vacation" you speak of?
Actually yes, it has happened - Jay and Acacia took a trip to OFUM, so strictly speaking I don't believe there's a reason they can't, just that it's very unlikely. There was a recent interlude where a very young agent went home to see her family, but how she escaped the constant BEEP!ing and the wrath of the Flowers, I don't know.

2. Assuming that they want to... it would probably be more like a holiday as extras, but recall what the Sunflower Offical said in the Original Series - there's a lot of paperwork involved, which would probably make it more trouble than it's worth, in the end. As for families, that depends on the details of the fic they came from, and if the agents who recruited them weren't forced to kill said family for Sueishness or other such crimes. If they were 'family' to a canon character, definitely not.

3. If they exist at all, probably not. Remember that the PPC doesn't exactly advertise itself everywhere it can.

4. Time is insane in HQ, and portals - which, as far as I understand temporal mechanics, act as time machines as much as moving-through-continua devices - can deposit you just about anywhere. The problem of too much or too little time passing in "the outside world" is unlikely to be a problem - at least, not in comparison to the actual fuss of paperwork required to leave HQ.

...that there are certain departments in the organization that would probably not take kindly to an agent messing with the organization by writing fiction about the organization.

They may or may not exist. They may or not have a Wiki page.

Oh...here it is: the DIO.

Minis:
1. Nope. Really. And... what good would an ordinary pet be on a mission?
2. Same thing your cat/dog/hamster does all day while you're at school/work, I imagine.
3. Preferably, yes. Also preferably, there's a list somewhere to tell you whether the one you want is taken already or not.
4. Yep: Meir Brin. And, Cassie is maintaining the mini-Balrog list.
5. Personally, I would think mini-Lone Powers. I realize the potential problems with this, but, well... yeah. Who can resist that? ^_^;

Agents:
1. Occasionally home visits are made. Cassie and Lycaenion recently posted an interlude involving such a one.

2. In the sense that they can visit their home continuum, yes, but in most cases there's really nothing left to go home to, since the remnants of the badfic that spawned them would vanish with the conclusion of the mission. If they have family, chances are they accompanied them to HQ (see Ithalond and his wife Mithiriel).

3. Depends, but usually no. Most people's parents wouldn't believe it, or if they did, they wouldn't condone it. Many people just tell their parents they're doing some kind of job abroad; others have used school as a cover; still others have said nothing at all and been presumed missing.

4. Again, depends--however, HQ doesn't work like Narnia. If you age in HQ, you've aged when you go back where you came from. ... I suppose you could use a disguise generator to hide the effects, but people are still likely to notice any changes in personality you've experienced.

~Neshomeh

We always try to answer questions, but no one can do so within two minutes of you posting the first time. ;)

And to be honest, I'm not sure. There are definitely agents who once wrote fanfic, and agents who are aware that they themselves are being written, but I don't think any agent would take the risk of messing with the already-fragile fabric of reality in HQ. Besides, if it worked, they would essentially have the power to write whatever they wanted to happen happening - that being anything from a payrise to tyrannical rule over the Flowers - and if not, they'd likely be caught by the fellow agents they're writing about and possibly end up in Medical as a result; so says the Laws of Irony and Rule of Funny. I can't see how the former would work out without toeing the line we've tried hard to draw about keeping agents from being to speshul. The latter, on the other hand, could be funny.

But as it seems you're talking about a character who once wrote PPC fics and then joins the PPC... Hmm, maybe. I'm sure some of the agents around this character would be wary, maybe even blame her (him?) for the daily suffering of their work, but it's still rather tricky.

Personally, I wouldn't do it, but I won't say outright that you can. What I will say is that - as you are, self-admittedly, a newbie - you should probably put this idea to the side for now and start by writing more normal agents. If you finish three or four missions like that and still feel it would be a good idea (and, of course, if the other PGs and oldbies on the board don't ask you not to), then you can consider writing in your new, former-PPC-fic-writer agent and see if it works. But please don't ask Permission with this character; it's too soon, and too tricky an issue.

Minis

1. Ordinary (and not so ordinary) pets can go on missions. I refer you to Absinthe from Trojie's missions.

2. Agents Miah and Cali's minis (and pet) spend most of their time finding new ways to disassemble PPC technology and tinker it into something else like a holodeck furniture generator thing. And also in making messes. I think it just varies writer to writer.

3. I think the mini has to be on an official list.

4. If those aren't defined yet, and you are the first one to write them, you get to pick.


Agents

1. Sometimes they do, there was an interlude released a few weeks ago, which dealt with an agent visiting home. I can't seem to find it listed on Current events right now or I'd link you to it.

2. I suppose it would depend on the particular agent, but I don't think so. Most of them recruited from fanfic were recruited from badfic that has been killed. Once it is killed it's not there to be gone back to, and most of them wouldn't want to try to visit a Sue infested place anyway. I know Agent Kelok sure wouldn't want to. Out of my agents, none are from World One, and half are confirmed to have no family.

3. I think a few do. According to the wiki, Foxglove not only maintains contact with her family, but also told them about the PPC, but I think this is probably very rare.

4. Again, possibly might depend on the particular agent. Time is not a normal thing in HQ. I'd say that time actually moves faster in World One than it does in HQ for a lot of agents. A lot of agents are still somewhere between 2006 and 2008 HQ time. When agents go on missions, even if months pass in the fic, they don't come back to starved minis and pets, which would say that they weren't actually gone all that long. It's one of those things kind of like getting from one place to another. It doesn't go in a straight line, and it isn't the same from day to day.

There must be something up with my browser.

It would take a while in either case, but the new entries don't need to go up on FfL while we're playing the game, I think - do they? We do all our playing here on the Board anyway, except for referring to last year's entries.

I'm no good with html of that complexity, though. The best I'd be able to do is collect every chapter and its reviews in Word documents and email them over.

And of course, if anyone wants to help, I'd appreciate it. If something comes up in my Real Life and I fall behind, it'd be most appreciated.

Concerning minis:
1. So we can't bring minis along on missions? Really? Not even for the continuum they came from? What about ordinary pets?
2. In that case, what do minis DO all day?
3. To get a mini, do I have to know where the name has been misspelled or just that someone, somewhere, sometime must have come up with this misspelling?
4. Is there someone in charge of HP minis, and who is in charge of LOTR minis now?
5. Any ideas what minis there would be for Young Wizards? I'd like to call them mini-helicopters, but I don't know of any real name for the helicopters that indicates that they're alive. My other idea is mini-BEMs (from High Wizardry), but nothing seems really good.

Concerning the lives of agents:
1. Do agents ever go home for vacation? Assuming the answer is yes...
2. Do agents recruited from fanfic ever get to go home, or do they have families at all?
3. Do the families of agents know what the agent is doing?
4. Do they even know that the agent is gone, or does time just stop for the outside world when someone goes to HQ?

Nobody has any other objections as far as I can tell. Does that mean that I have permission or that everyone's forgotten about me?

I'm not sure (and I have no authority on this matter) but the PPC guys can open portals to the Real World, and PPC writers exist in the real world, but that would create a new layer in the writer-to-story hierarchy...

I actually need an answer to this question, to see if a certain character of mine can write PPC fics and still join the PPC- crazy, I know, but still, I've had the idea for a while and don't want to let it go.