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The answer came without preface, and suddenly I felt the weight of the past fifteen minutes landing on me.
I feel bad for the protagonist here. We all have the potential to become something awful and inhumane, and naturally, seeing the truth of that in herself is terrifying.
But I was also smart, smarter than her, smarter than blind rage and the primordial desire to keep living. And most of all, I understood how my allies worked.
I mean, I wouldn't say that the protagonist's the smartest character in all this after some of the decisions she's made thus far in the fic, but... the confidence is something she very much needs in a situation like this. XD I think I'd also disagree about the allies bit. Sure, she knows them more than the enemy, but she doesn't have that much experience under her belt at this point.
{And, honestly, I don’t think you can explain.}
I'd be surprised if any human could. I don't blame the protagonist for her confusion one bit in all this.
Which ideally, would never happen. “I need screens on Iris, the kind you keep using to block his wind blades—”
{Air Slash,} the abra said in a level voice. {And Light Screen.}
They're wasting a ton of time strategizing, not because of the strategizing itself, but because of the random corrective remarks made by Dante and some of the more wittier comments like the one Silver makes. They all could've been killed just in the short time Dante mentions the two attacks above, really.
The gym leader stumbled in response while the ghost within shrieked wildly, but another cannon-like blast of wind sent Icarus spiraling to the ground. “Reeling shadowsss of indignant birdsss.”
I'm enjoying Falkner's random creepy ass dialogue, however. He's totally in a position to spend time saying things like this. XD
“I ssssshould give you the badge for thissss,” the gym leader said quietly, and, true to form, the corpse of Falkner lurched forward and patted his pocket before throwing a tiny lump of metal in my direction. The winged badge skidded to a halt near my feet. “You’ve done sssso well.”
Well, this was a messed up gym battle. Poor Gaia. But the emotions and dialogue were well written here, in my opinion. While the action's been the focal point this chapter, I think the emotions shine through more.
I opened my mouth to answer, prepared to be furious at the bastard that had nearly killed Gaia, prideful over the monster I’d never expected to vanquish, uncaring in the face of what as nothing more than a shell, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it. “I'm sorry,” I whispered instead. “I don't know.”
See, there's still some good in you, nameless protagonist! This part was well written, too, and again, I feel sorry for her.
“The darkness drops, but now I know,” Silver said from behind my shoulder.
Silver was surprisingly not present much in this chapter... It was kind of awkward when he did talk, because I forgot he was even there anymore. I think more dialogue from him would've slowed things down more, but still. He might've taken a more active role in commanding Dante, thus creating more obstacles in this fight because, I'm sure, the two would've ended up arguing. If anything, I'd consider replacing some of the dialogue with this particular obstacle if your goal was to not make the chapter 100% action-heavy.