... In hindsight, posting side-by-side with Avalanche
maybe wasn't the greatest idea of the generation.
That said:
*reads the update of 28k words*
Ooh... Okay, that wasn't that bad.
*Sees the following omake post*
...
I'm going to bed.
Whew.
And that's only half of it.
And then Tayta with the Omake of Doom.
Food ready. Music Ready. Let's get this on!
New record perhaps? I forgot how long your updates before
... wait is this half of an update?
Andd yeahhh, I thought you have learned your lesson back then when you give the questers options what to do what for the whole day instead of splitting in two updates.
I have forgotten this
Man, It has been an hour already and still long way ahead (admitedly I distracted too often).
More than two hours reading (and commenting, and googling on whims) so far. The cake ... well, it hasn't run out yet, but only because its a rather big slice and I eat slowly.
Back to story
Phew. Almost three hours. Good read, good job Avalanche. Also, you are crazy. 28k words and still only half of an update. Crazy awesome, but still.
What the hell, There's a doorstopper omake just right after!
Those were some great fights, but now I've finally finished the chap-
*sees the "bigger than the actual chapter"-omake*
...MOTHERFU-
Anna: "No swearing."
Ahem, sorry. *Deep inhale* MOTHERFUDGE!!!
I shamelessly admit that this was the reason I did it at all.
Sorry if I made you guys miss sleep or late for work or anything. Wasn't my intention.
Huh. Would you believe, I was pretty certain this was dead.
Anyways. Lot to process this update, the two that stand out to me particularly being that the mental issues Anna has do actually have a proper diagnosis - though hers is probably much more advanced than most, Koujiro can't use the word "shit" - and holy crap, Antagonists have internal politics and conflicts? We need that on a map!
Oh, and an omake that simultaneously juggles being very dark and quite lighthearted in a way I've not seen in a while. That too.
I'll take that as meaning you liked it.
Dr. Strangelove was all about that black comedy, so... I guess I managed to bring that over okay?
And
@Tayta Malikai's omake....what?
What indeed.
Anything I can do to help?
The update was great, i like it.
The omake, less so. If only because i simply didn't like the story.
Fair enough. It's not really a very uplifting tale, is it.
I almost vomited on several occasions. The feeling evoked were akin to combination of reading detailed description of Alien impregnating and festering inside your loved one and your mother turning out to be proud Jews-burning Nazi.
It is a rare work of fiction that engages me so. Great job.
Well, uh... that was an image to wake up to this morning.
Thanks for the feedback.
This did not go the way I was expecting at all. Setting aside Sandra's shift into maximum insanity at the end I kinda agree with her. The Antagonists have waged a war of genocide against humanity for 15 years and the moment humanity's victory looks likely the Antagonists suddenly start communicating and sue for peace.
The Antagonists can produce a Type Zeros per year for every Major Breach they have while the 300 are called the 300 for a reason. Given enough time they'll have too many Type Zeros for the 300 to fight and then defeat will be inevitable. So stalling is very much in their favor.
Honestly I thought this whole thing was a set up by the Antagonists. With Armstrong Base vs. G-Com the UN has it's best Valkyries killing each other and destroying the defenses protecting G-Com. Then "Caitlin" lies, because the Antgaonist's Static Wave counter felt like an obvious Diabolus ex Machina, about the Earth being destroyed if G-Com fires. This causes the UN to give permission for Abraxas to get close to G-Com; at which point he destroys the defenses, kills all the G-Com Valkyries, lets the remaining Armstrong Base Valkyries enter G-Com, and then destroys G-Com and kills all the survivors.
Now the UN has no super weapon, is down basically it's entire core of elite pilots, and odds are a good chunk of the 300 cores are either lost forever or destroyed. That leaves the Antagonists free to steamroll the rest of humanity.
Instead the Antagonists seem to seriously want peace, or rather they want Coke-Zero, and their Diabolus ex Machina is real so Anna ends up wiping out humanity.
Well, uh... I'm glad I managed to surprise you?
Part of the
Strangelove parallels was giving people at least somewhat reasonable arguments and good intentions for what they were doing, so if Nega-Sandra was convincing in that regard, I must've done okay (though I'm willing to admit that I may have been
slightly biased in her favour xD ). The fact that she just so happened to be
wrong in this case, I feel, shouldn't detract from her having a point.
Plus, if it
had turned out to all be a ploy by the AGs, I think that would've been even
more depressing, but not in a good way. As it is, the AGs being actually genuine in wanting peace just makes it all the more tragic.
And to be honest, I found the idea of the AGs suing for peace because Caitlin
really wanted to bang Koujirou far too hilarious to pass up.
The update was pretty good, though I prefer Anna as the viewpoint character. The omake was technically solid, but too depressing for me to like.
Thanks for writing!
You're welcome! Thanks for commenting.
I fucking hated the ending of the Omake.
Sandra destroyed humanity and got victory bullshit on the top of it? What nonsense with the Higgs Particles Wall.
What's worse she used poor Anna as a sacrificial bomb-terrorist. Who "won" against Antagonists. By blowing up everything.
I think that Plot Armour of Sandra was too thick. Setsu and Koiji should have serious shot at killing her, when they were in Frames, and she was not in Frame. Primary because while Sandra is good, she is not Anna. Also Shuri being useless doormat? I mean, what?!
I expected Shuri to not be shocked silly, but simply put Particle Cannon the biggest traitor of humanity ever.
Unlike kids, and unlike Sandra, she is a veteran like Anna ... if much less traumatized.
It's a fair cop.
I'll freely admit that the characterization in the story is the result of some rather significant interpretation on my part. When it came to figuring out how this hypothetical world would be, I drew heavily from these posts in particular:
Um, if you swapped and the setting tone remains at - 1? Well The Ace doesn't change all that much, there's really only one true real difference between the Golden Ace and the Broken Ace, one single character defining moment that sets her path in stone where before she could go either way.
The Broken Ace has never been shot down by Antagonists. The Golden Ace has never been shot down.
Sandra... wouldn't exist. The Design Child is a left over, or rather, scion from a den of mad science, where ethics are banned, where only results matter. The ends justify all means. The products of the lab would be fed back into the production cycle, put to work to iterate and improve their successors. The design child displayed results in the most spectacular manner possible by bringing the whole venture down and destroying the ones who set it up and all involved to the 3rd degree. The entire UN was staggered, this would have been as significant as the annexation of Pakistan in Shuri's backstory, possibly even more momentous.
In this case the Ace and the Ojou would still know each other, because the Ace helped the Design child break down the facility, but their current relationships would be hollow and parasitic. The Design Child cares for the now only in the relationships of what can be achieved in the future.
I'd honestly be rather afraid for Anna in such a setting. Someone so powerful yet...
So uh yeah. Things.
I think I've talked about this before, but you'd be absolutely miserable in a +3. Not because worse things happen to you in +3, but because less bad things happened so you're more human. The townspeople also wouldn't have turned on each other, they would have died when the fire nat Sekhmet attacked the town and erased it whilst you were at Saskatoon. Sekhmet would then show up as a recurring villain for you specifically. Most strikingly, the mantra would be actually one you use in positive settings rather than one used by the Agitators in negative settings. This also leads to shifts in character quirks such as you not being on hair trigger against human violence etc. Basically, people bully Anna, probably unintentionally, the show.
NegaSandra would love it. All these naive, optimistic, and powerful Valkyrie to take advantage of in her quest to have her revenge and rule the world, (for the best interest of the world of course, this is a positive tone setting after all). Then every time she tries something about taking over the world she gets interrupted by the Golden Ace who sits her down and gives her a half hour lecture on the inalienable rights of freedom, democracy and liberty etc. Of course, there's the whole 'god's mill grinds slow but sure' vs 'only blood will pay for this' views towards revenge between her and the Golden Ace.
Broken Ace in a +3 world would silently hate everything whilst maintaining the PR exterior. She'd also come in later in the series in +3 and probably be a study in contrast against Shy Girl Warrior. This is all due to various spoilers.
Yukari in a +3 world would be a mess really. She'd hover around the Flight more than she is now worrying about everything due to various spoilers.
VeterenKoujirou in +3? Snark machine. We are talking about Guile and Dark as Silver in one room levels of snark. What is this eroge game setting and why am I here? Unfortunately I don't have a real talent for snark so I'm glad I don't have to write him.
XxXxXxXxXx
Re; Flight merger. Yeah that something I wasn't and still am somewhat frustrated about. I thought about halting the update with Koujirou messaging you with a y/n and a vote, but I was rather sure it would end on a positive vote, resulting in a wasted vote, and it would also result in the shortest ever update (from lunch to just before afternoon class) so I decided to skip it. I then wrote a scene from Koujirou's PoV about the merger but threw it away. The resulting scene reads helter and skelter and rushed because it was. I really wanted to get past the scene to move on with the rest of the update. Were I to rewrite that sequence of events, it would be different.
My interpretation of this was that Shuri, while still not living the happiest life in this -1 world, would still have a fundamentally different character due to the difference in her backstory. Yes, she still watched as her country was destroyed in all but name; but destroyed by AGs, not by
Muv Luv-level human pettiness and politics. As such, she still retains that core of idealism that, in a +3 world, would have been used to scold Nega-Sandra for trying to take over the world.
The fact that she didn't particle beam Sandra as soon as she confronted her is due to two things. She still believes firmly in the rule of law, and shooting people without due process goes against that. And Sandra, despite all the weirdness between them, is still supposed to be her friend.
When it comes to the plot armour, maybe. But I believe Avalanche has said previously that Higgs is basically synonymous with handwave in this setting, so as far as I'm concerned, that makes it fair game.
That and... suppose they do kill her then and there. What changes? Earth is still gone, Abraxas is still going to die, most of the remaining Valkyries and UN Armed Forces have been killed... the only difference is that the UN is in charge of the wreckage. Which, I'll grant, is still probably the preferable option.
As for Anna "winning" by blowing up all the Antagonists forever... considering some of the discussion that's happened in this thread, I don't feel that's too off the charts.
Ugh, the omake right after mindfucked me. I was running late this morning before work so I only took a quick skim and missed the post change. I thought that Sandra had revealed herself as a hidden baddie and Anna suddenly got deployed to Europe...
Sorry about that?
It's a parody of Dr. Strange Love.
And what that parody lacked was 2nd flight doing a
survival kit content check.
What, you mean Second Flights breakfast didn't count?
Oh, you.
I wanted to, but I couldn't figure out a decent way to get it in there without causing things to bloat too much (and given how much the word count exploded...). I had a pretty tight plan when it came to each scene. Didn't manage to fit in a joke about an
ark ship gap, either.
Also, if I wrote that, I'd totally get banned for sure!
Anyway, I already gave most of my reactions when I was beta-reading it, but that was a goddamn outstanding update, Avalanche. Great descriptions, great characterization, great combat, great detail.
