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Hyphen (Pokemon Emerald)

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Tentative addition to the chapter. Lines already in the chapter are in red, and serve as the insertion point:


May's pout when the joke flew over Astra's head made the psychic giggle.

"Still," she said, grimacing, "could you maybe... change into a bathrobe or something instead?"

Astra blinked. "What? Why?"

"Wh-" May's face scrunched up again. "Seriosuly? That cloak has got to be caked in dirt by now, and you are not sleeping next to me like that."

Astra didn't really see any problem with it. It was just some sweat and dust, right? There wasn't even any mud or droppings. However, the look on May's face told her that arguing this would pobably be a lost cause. "Alright," Astra sighed. "I'll see what I can do."

It took almost every towel in the bathroom and some creative folding, but Astra found a way to effectively cover herself before she stepped back out.

May blinked as Astra came into view. "Huh. Didn't peg you for having long hair."

Astra, who had to pile about half a foot of towel on her head to hide her horn and no idea what May was talking about, just shrugged.

May nodded at the dirty robe Astra was carrying. "There's a clothes washing service for trainers in this hotel; I can throw your cloak in with my stuff, it should be done by morning."

Oh! That sounded nice. "Thank you!"

May frowned at the lump of cloth Astra handed over. Slowly, she grabbed one section of the fabric and let the rest go. The entire garment unfolded into it's original form: a single, rather long sheet of black cloth. She stared at Astra, silently demanding an explanation.

Uh. "It helps with the heat." she lied flagrantly. It was the best she could do; nobody knew how to alter cloth back home!

May's mouth opened, then closed. This repeated a several times, accompanied by several aborted guestures between her and the fabric. Finally her expression settled into sheer resigned exasperation and apathy as she yanked the door open.

"It is way too late for this shit."

Astra winced as the door slammed. She could have handled that better.

May came back a few minutes later, recomposed and empty handed. "Right, that's all set up. I'll be taking my turn in the bathroom now."

"I think there's still a towel left." Astra offered, to which May rolled her eyes.

"Anyway," May continued, walking past Astra, "you can take the right side of the bed. If you hog the covers I will toss you out of the bed, you hear me?"
 
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May has been coming off as pretty abrasive. I get that she's like half feral, but the balance between friendly and barely tolerating this weirdo she just met is a little too far skewed in one direction.

Dermonster said:
Astra had to admit, she had a point. It was a little nasty.
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Would Astra realize this? It seems like an aversion to dirt would be one of those weird human things, from her perspective. I mean, the world is made out of dirt.

I wouldn't necessarily change what she does about this, but maybe her internal monologue could reflect this.
 
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Pax_Empyrean said:
Would Astra realize this? It seems like an aversion to dirt would be one of those weird human things, from her perspective. I mean, the world is made out of dirt.

I wouldn't necessarily change what she does about this, but maybe her internal monologue could reflect this.
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I am simultaneously super excited to be recieving so many helpful comments and horrendously irritated I have to modify it four times across three different styles of editing.

*Slams face into keyboard.*


'Astra didn't really see any problem with it. It was just some sweat and dust, right? There wasn't even any mud or droppings. However, the look on May's face told her that arguing this would pobably be a lost cause.'
 
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Dermonster said:
I am simultaneously super excited to be recieving so many helpful comments and horrendously irritated I have to modify it four times across three different styles of editing.
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If it makes you feel any better, the end result is quite good and a worthy addition.
Pax_Empyrean said:
In my experience, the most feedback is generated by stories that have minor problems but are otherwise really engaging. It's not perfect, but your readers really care about it, so... good things!
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Definitely this. All stories have flaws, but people only bother to comment on them if the story is worth caring about.
 
Well, it seems like we're winding down. Anyone who wanted to comment probably has by now, and soon thread will likely go into dormancy for a month or more barring the ocassional like that shows up in my alerts. During this cold period, I shall open my google docs yet again and pen chapter 16, with an 'I havent even planned anything yet' prospective title of 'Outset'.

As a fun thing, I thought I'd share the fucking incredible mspaint sketch I showed Dex as reference for the Sushi art.




If you still have a comment yet unsaid, feel free to say it; but for now, I'd like to thank everyone again for enjoying my story.
 
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I would also like to note that Dexexe is a goddamn artistic madman who made that in about two hours from request to finish. What a guy.
 
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Pax_Empyrean said:
May has been coming off as pretty abrasive. I get that she's like half feral, but the balance between friendly and barely tolerating this weirdo she just met is a little too far skewed in one direction.
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I mean, on one hand May is coming across as a little abrasive, but on the other Astra has just done like a dozen highly suspicious things in the space of an afternoon. I'm not sure I'd have May's patience at this point, and I'm not an antisocial preteen.
 
I have recently found this story, and I'm enjoying it very much. And I'm eagerly awaiting the moment Astra is exposed to May.
 
TheEyes said:
I mean, on one hand May is coming across as a little abrasive, but on the other Astra has just done like a dozen highly suspicious things in the space of an afternoon. I'm not sure I'd have May's patience at this point, and I'm not an antisocial preteen.
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All of those weird things can be accounted for by the whole "I live in a cave" thing, though. Before that point, it's fine that she reacts with disbelief that Astra doesn't know what sushi is or whatever, but once that's on the table, it stops being reasonable to react with exasperation that Astra doesn't know what plumbing is or don't care as much about dirt on their clothes. Everything Astra has done has shown her to be completely new to civilization. She might as well be a tourist from the stone age.

May's attitude toward Astra not knowing basic stuff is the same as her attitude toward Wally for not knowing basic stuff. Would you say that May is friends with Wally? It's totally believable that there would be a person who reacts with exasperation and frustration at having to take care of a clueless person, but I wouldn't say that a person like that is a friend.

I'm just saying that at this point, May doesn't feel like a new friend. She feels like an annoyed babysitter. We just need a few more "friend" moments to balance out all the "I can't believe I have to deal with this shit" moments.
 
Pax_Empyrean said:
All of those weird things can be accounted for by the whole "I live in a cave" thing, though. Before that point, it's fine that she reacts with disbelief that Astra doesn't know what sushi is or whatever, but once that's on the table, it stops being reasonable to react with exasperation that Astra doesn't know what plumbing is or don't care as much about dirt on their clothes.
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Just because there's an explanation for something does not mean it's not exasperating. It's also worth noting that "from somewhere really rural" doesn't quite conjure the picture that Astra's behavior is painting. She's gone from Place with little to no light pollution and never seen a city (extremely reasonable) to no idea what a bike is (odd, but not that odd), to having no idea what running water or toilets are (the first one pushes well past the normal bounds of rural and the second one goes well beyond that), to not having a concept of a clean bed (a rural upbringing does not even begin to explain this), to being dressed in a single unmodified cloth with no undergarments (and there's no reasonable explanation for this one).

That May is still explaining things, despite her frustration, is a credit to her. That she hasn't pressed for a better explanation, if for no other reason than to make sure Astra wasn't being abused or part of some cult, and is sharing her room show a level of trust and friendship that I wouldn't expect from most people.
Pax_Empyrean said:
I'm just saying that at this point, May doesn't feel like a new friend. She feels like an annoyed babysitter.
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I mean, at this point, she basically is babysitting her. Even if they are friends, it's fallen to May to teach her about the human world and watch out for her.
 
Epsilon Rose said:
It's also worth noting that "from somewhere really rural" doesn't quite conjure the picture that Astra's behavior is painting. She's gone from Place with little to no light pollution and never seen a city (extremely reasonable) to no idea what a bike is (odd, but not that odd), to having no idea what running water or toilets are (the first one pushes well past the normal bounds of rural and the second one goes well beyond that), to not having a concept of a clean bed (a rural upbringing does not even begin to explain this), to being dressed in a single unmodified cloth with no undergarments (and there's no reasonable explanation for this one).
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She told them that she literally lived in a cave out in the woods, and this is exactly the picture that her behavior is painting.

We're going just a bit beyond "rural" there. If her explanation were "I'm from a small town" then yeah, none of that stuff would be adequately explained. But as it stands, her given backstory is just a step above "raised by wolves" and her behavior reflects this perfectly. The only thing that's weird here is that she wants to be a Pokemon trainer, but that probably gets a pass because the world is so obsessed with Pokemon that it might as well be an immutable law of physics that as soon as a kid turns ten they'll put on two pairs of pants and declare themselves a Pokemon trainer. These kids aren't going to second-guess that desire.

May doesn't need a better explanation. She's already got one. She's helping out, which is a credit to her, but her attitude is basically the same as it was when she was helping Wally. So, points for helping but no points for accepting the explanation because it really was adequate, and the way she's bitching about things the whole time doesn't say "friend" to me.
 
Pax_Empyrean said:
She told them that she literally lived in a cave out in the woods, and this is exactly the picture that her behavior is painting.

We're going just a bit beyond "rural" there. If her explanation were "I'm from a small town" then yeah, none of that stuff would be adequately explained. But as it stands, her given backstory is just a step above "raised by wolves" and her behavior reflects this perfectly. The only thing that's weird here is that she wants to be a Pokemon trainer, but that probably gets a pass because the world is so obsessed with Pokemon that it might as well be an immutable law of physics that as soon as a kid turns ten they'll put on two pairs of pants and declare themselves a Pokemon trainer. These kids aren't going to second-guess that desire.

May doesn't need a better explanation. She's already got one. She's helping out, which is a credit to her, but her attitude is basically the same as it was when she was helping Wally. So, points for helping but no points for accepting the explanation because it really was adequate, and the way she's bitching about things the whole time doesn't say "friend" to me.
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I'd say give it until they are in the woods and Astra gets to show off her knowledge.
 
I don't really see it myself, but then again, I fully expected to have made some sort of weird social errors long before this. Mistakes with May were almost guarenteed.

I. I don't really. Have a lot of experience to draw from. In that area.

...

I should also note that when May was helping Wally she was pretty nice. It was mostly offscreen and only briefly visible during chapter 1 (Mind: I wrote that several years before May was introduced and was for some reason being coy about who it was. I don't like looking at the first couple chapters), but it's there. And while May was mildly irritated with Wally's experience, she was more angry at her Dad than anything and it bled over when she talked about the training trip.

I suppose it is weird that that same niceness isn't more readily visible toward Astra and Brendan. What a pain...
 
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Epsilon Rose said:
to having no idea what running water or toilets are (the first one pushes well past the normal bounds of rural and the second one goes well beyond that)
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I know a few places like that.

Epsilon Rose said:
to not having a concept of a clean bed (a rural upbringing does not even begin to explain this)
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I know some people like that.

Epsilon Rose said:
to being dressed in a single unmodified cloth with no undergarments (and there's no reasonable explanation for this one).
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... I got nothing.

Pax_Empyrean said:
because the world is so obsessed with Pokemon that it might as well be an immutable law of physics that as soon as a kid turns ten they'll put on two pairs of pants and declare themselves a Pokemon trainer.
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This sentence is like a... Well, less like a gem, and more like a chocolate bit inside a cookie that I haven't expected to have chocolate bits.
 
Words have the power
To maim, to kill,
To bring a quick laughter,
And a bone-rending chill.

They can build up a man,
And ruin him, too...
I should probably take this
Off this thread, though.

So watch your words, they have power,
But do they even rhyme?
This second refrain's
Fourth and second lines?
 
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