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| Writing Self-Insert Characters |
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Posted by: robkelk - 09-16-2025, 03:32 PM - Forum: Other People's Fanfiction
- Replies (12)
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(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)In 'Eyrie Thread 2: Overtech Boogie-Shoes', Bob Schroeck Wrote: Thirding the advice on being hard on your SI. Actually... I have a whole list of advice for Self-Insert characters in my fic writer's guide... let me go grab the relevant section to save you some time and effort. (Although, if you want to read the whole, incomplete thing, a not-quite-the-latest version can be found here.)
These lists look to me like the perfect starting point for a thread about writing self-insert characters. I'll make my comments inline; if anybody else wants to share their experience writing SIs or similar characters, feel free to add to the thread.
My first comment: Many of these rules also apply to many isekai characters who aren't self-insert characters. While they don't know everything that the writer knows, these isekai characters know more about the setting and characters than J. Random Native does, so many of the same writing issues apply.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: xx. Rules for Self-Inserts
- Your SI should be there to *supplement* the plot, not *supplant* it. Help the other characters achieve their goals, do not achieve those goals for or instead of them. Don't steal their awesome -- help them get *more* awesome.
Readers who look for stories set in their favourite works looked up your story to read about the characters and setting that they like. They aren't particularly interested in "The Amazing Adventures of Marty Stu and His Sidekicks from Some Story". Give the readers what they want and they'll stick around for the next chapter.
Yes, there are some Si characters and similar who have audiences of their own: Twister, Doug Sangnoir, Ed and Minerva, even (amazingly enough) Skysaber. But they started out as characters who were visiting other people's stories, and most of the characters that I listed did their best to fit in rather than to run roughshod over the existing plots.
As an example, Isekai by Moonlight's Robu-san rarely defeats the Monster of the Week and never defeats the season's Big Bad; his main story role is to ease the canon plotlines despite trying to change them, and to find boyfriends for the Senshi who don't have them. Not only does that leave something for the Sailor Senshi to do (unlike in so many episodes in canon), it's actually more fun to write than a steamroller-over-canon story would be.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: - No one likes a show-off. Even if you are far more competent or powerful than the other characters, do not run roughshod over them. Complement them. (*Not* "compliment".) If necessary, give yourself a valid and believable in-story reason why you can't just wave your hand and fix everything, even if that's actually in your power to do. This is not to say you can't give your SI the occasional set-piece that shows off how powerful or competent they are, but don't do it too often, and *never* at the expense of the setting's heroes.
Which ties into the "supplement, don't supplant" rule above. If the Si is a better fighter than Son Goku, why would the Dragon Ball fandom care about reading your story?
(And everybody likes getting a compliment, Bob! It's an ego boost. Do it too often and you get a reputation of being a flatterer, though.)
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: - At least some of the characters your SI meets and interacts with should *not* like your SI. And I don't mean the bad guys -- that's a given. Some of the *heroes* should find him suspicious, or too mysterious to be trustworthy, or just plain annoying (*especially* if he acts like a typical SI). Conflict drives a story, and conflict among the good guys makes it *interesting* -- what good is knowing the entire plot if no one wants to listen to you? And what I said about the bad guys a moment ago? What if some of the bad guys *like* your SI regardless of his opinions on the matter?
This is especially important in a deconstruction. Nobody has a 100% Adoration Rating; there will always be somebody who doesn't like your character, because not everyone has the same concerns and interests that your self-insert has.
I'll point at My Apartment Manager is not an Isekai Character for an example of the consequences of not following this rule: one writer actually dropped out of the project because one of the other writers introduced a character who had a good reason to not like the first writer's SI character. Both writers refused to budge on the conflicting principles.
A corollary: Nobody has a 0% Approval Rating, either. If almost everybody hates someone, iconoclasts and saints will at the least have pity for him.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: - Similarly, your SI shouldn't automatically like all the heroes and hate all the villains, even if he's coming in with full knowledge and awareness of what's going on. He may *want* to, but frankly, I can think of a dozen protagonists from as many genres whom I love to read about or watch but whom I would find incredibly irritating in person. (I'm looking at *you*, Ranma Saotome.) Let your SI dislike anyone who deserves it -- and when appropriate, *like* anyone who deserves it, as well -- regardless of their "side".
This is a simple case of truth in fiction. If there are people who you don't like, why wouldn't there be people who your SI doesn't like? The SI is based on you, after all.
In My Apartment Manager is not an Isekai Character, there's a scene in "Like Calls to Like" where my SI lists what he likes the most about each of his residents. Ami notices that he had to think about what he liked about Kuroko...
Going to Isekai by Moonlight for another example: Robu-san and Tuxedo Kamen don't like each other, but are willing to work together. The reason has only been hinted at in-universe, so I'll put it in spoiler markup here:
Because of a bad first impression and Mamoru's reaction to the warnings he received from the future, Robu-san thinks Mamoru isn't good enough to be Usagi's boyfriend. And Mamoru has picked up on that.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: - Even if your SI is deliberately there to get involved in the plot, don't drop him right in the middle of the action. A self-insert story will play better if your character arrives on the outskirts of what's going on, and has to find his way to the fun -- or accidentally stumbles over it. Your SI should also have interests and priorities that have nothing to do with the main plot -- like, for instance, *leaving* the story's world if he was sent there involuntarily. If the only thing he does while there is dog the main characters' steps, he's going to look like a creepy stalker to them -- and maybe even to your readers.
Mentioning My Apartment Manager is not an Isekai Character again: even after my SI gets powers and a geas to act in the face of injustice, he still leaves defending Love and Justice to Sailor Moon. He's a support character, not a front-line fighter, no matter how much he'd prefer otherwise.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: - If your SI is allegedly unaware of what he's getting into, don't write his reactions with *your* knowledge. The prime example of this is someone dropped into a whole new (and unfamiliar) world automatically sussing out who the good guys are and who the bad guys are without any thought or effort. Only in the most black-and-white worlds should this be believable. (For a great example of an SI ignorant of the world he's been dropped into feeling his way through it, check out the "Revolutionary Girl Utena" fic "Ma Vie et Roses" by Scott Johnson and Scott K. Jamison.)
For this one, I'll pull an example from Blade and Epsilon's epic Hybrid Theory. While both of the SIs have some idea about the plots of some of the stories in that mega crossover, neither SI knows everything that's going on, and as a result each of them make mistakes that make it more difficult (and thus more interesting) for them to succeed. If fact, Blade's SI is so far off-base with his knowledge that he effectively becomes the setting's Big Bad.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: - No matter how powerful or capable your SI is, *someone* will at least *try* to get the better of him -- and you know, they should succeed at least once. If you can't be beaten, you can't be truly challenged, and if you can't be challenged, you have no conflict to drive a story. And remember -- they don't have to challenge you where you excel. Just because you're invulnerable, can lift mountains, and can waltz invisibly into the bad guys' headquarters doesn't mean you can't be out-thought or out-planned.
As so many sports anime and manga show us, defeat is also a learning experience that opens up new storytelling opportunities.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: To re-emphasize the first point above, a quote from elsewhere in my guide:
The First Commandment of Interventions:
"Thou shalt not cockblock someone else's torrid affair with awesomeness." -- Alistair Young
Tying back to the "no 100% Adoration Rating" rule, cockblocking the characters who are native to the story is a good way to get them to dislike your SI.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: And after that, I had this pasted in as something to draw inspiration from. Several of its points already echo things I've said above, but there's other good advice here, too:
PsyckoSama's Rules for Self-Inserts
https://www.fanfiction.net/u/285562/PsyckoSama
The Ten Commandments of Writing an SI:
I: The SI is not you. It’s a character based on you. Remember this and maintain a degree of emotional detachment at all times. Treat your SI like you would any other character.
Even if your SI was a carbon copy of you when you dropped them into the story, they stop being you at that point because their life experiences are different from that point forward.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: II: Know your strengths and flaws. If you can’t think of any, invent a couple. It’s only based on you after all.
This can be a difficult one to write. If your SI is based closely on you, then admitting what the SI's flaws are to the readers is the same as admitting to strangers what your own flaws are... and that's something that takes a certain level of maturity (and fearlessness) to do.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: III: Have a couple prereaders with good bullshit detectors who are willing to smack you upside the head when you approach the Sue Zone. Even just having someone to bounce ideas off of can do a world of good and help kill some very bad ideas.
I am extremely lucky to have Labster as a prereader. He catches problems that I thought were strengths when I wrote them. (And I don't thank Brent enough for his work on my stories, so thank you again, Brent!)
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: IV: You are not an ironclad badass. In most of these series you’d be the extra who gets eaten by the aliens/demons/zombies and write accordingly. People are paranoid, panicky creatures and chances are you are no different. Remember this. Things can change with time but that’s what character development is for (See Rule VII).
You can play with this one if you drop your SI into a World of Badass, but even there, keep in mind the "supplement, don't supplant" rule.
And if the setting isn't a World of Badass, then some people – yes, the paranoid, panicky ones – will look at an ironclad badass and wonder whether they're a new villain.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: V: Life is a mixed bag. Shit happens and it happens to you, don’t be afraid to torture yourself a bit. That said, remember, the good comes with the bad.
I have an advantage here in that the writing style that I've developed over decades mixes drama and humour. If your writing style tends toward action, or drama, or comedy, or angst, you might have trouble mixing in the elements that you don't naturally emphasize.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: With that in mind remember the following two sub-rules.
Va: Avoid wish fulfillment. Good things can happen to you (see above) but your SI should never be an engine created specifically to allow you to be awesome, loved by everyone, and get all the chicks. If that’s what you really want, I’d suggest putting down the keyboard and reaching for a kleenex.
Wish-fulfillment can be done if you're willing to massively deconstruct it; see Ah! My Goddess for an example. But failing to take into account the downside of giving your SI what you think you really want leads to the stereotypical Mary Sue plot.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: Vb: Avoid wangst. While it's necessary for bad things to happen to create tension, drama, and to propel the plot forward, avoid throwing yourself a pity party. Someone who only has bad things happen to them is just as annoying as someone who only has good things happen. When you go too far it becomes obnoxious cartoonish.
Besides, listening to other people complain is boring. Do this in your story – SI or not – in anything other than very-small doses and you'll drive away readers.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: VI: Life goes on, with or without you. Do not make the universe wait on you, for life waits for no man. This is especially important in video game SIs. If you’re actually in the universe, treat it like a living breathing world. It’s not a magical playground that sits on its hands while you randomly run around and do awesome shit.
Pulling an example from My Apartment Manager is not an Isekai Character, the characters from Yumeiro Pâtissière set up shop and become successful before anyone who's supposed to help them acclimatize to the situation even know that they're in the setting.
And from Isekai by Moonlight: Robu-san accompanies Ami on her first two trips to Castle Mariner and helps her start repairs on her yacht from the Silver Millennium. Then he spends a lot of time with Makoto while Ami finishes the repair work without him... which surprises him when she actually launches the ship. (He even comments that she breaks a stupid genre convention in that he isn't involved in everything that his friends do.)
There are dozens, hundreds, or maybe billions of other people in your story. They don't all wait for the SI's cooperation to do things. In fact, some of them, for their own interests, will do things that act against what your SI wants to have happen. This is a source of subplots, not a problem.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: VII: Balance your flow of time. Don’t rush what you write. While you might want to skip to the good stuff, doing so can be jarring and make your character look like a Mary Sue. Show us your character is growing and making friends, don’t just tell us. On the same note, be careful not to get bogged down in the minutia. There is such a thing as too much detail. We don’t need to see everything. If you’re training, you can show a montage. If you’re looking at a long span of time where nothing out of a ordinary is going to happen, consider a time skip. Things are permitted to happen in the background.
Not skipping the "boring" stuff also leads to plot developments. Sometimes these developments are things that you as a writer didn't expect.
If I had rushed Isekai by Moonliht Chapter S and jumped straight from the first encounter between Kalonite and Rei to the raid on Mugen Academy, none of the characters would have developed and all of the Witches 5 would have ended up dead. Instead, some of the villains were actually rescued from being possessed, all of the Senshi ended up being willing to work together instead of at cross-purposes, and Hotaru didn't end up going through her canon fate.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: VIII: Throw curve balls at yourself. Even if you’re in a rather tight setting, your presence can create butterflies. In a loose one, you don’t know what’s around the bend. Good or bad, better or worse, do you find something or don’t you? I suggest the use of a randomizer. Flip a coin, roll some dice, pull pieces of paper out of a hat. Don’t let this do you thinking for you, but it can point you in directions you’d never have considered, and having a good chance to standing tall or fall flat on their face will do much to keep your character honest. But remember, you're not slave to the dice. Just let it point you in a direction, think about it, and see what comes out. You can sometimes come up with some amazing ideas that you never would have considered this way, even if it in no way resembles the original dice result.
A corollary: Sometimes, the random number gods tell you what you really wanted to write in the first place. You say "heads this happens, tails it doesn't" and you're disappointed with the result? Deep down, you wanted to write the other option... so write the one you didn't know that you wanted to write.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: IX: Be careful with the use of meta-knowledge. Meta-knowledge should stay that. Meta. Be careful who you tell, and only tell those you trust. If you make what you know common knowledge, you will attract all sorts, and mostly for ill. No one likes a know it all, especially evil wizards, secret societies, and evil military dictatorships bent on total domination.
A corollary: Sharing the meta knowledge can invalidate that knowledge. Especially if your foes find out about the meta knowledge and change things up in order to lull you into a false sense of complacency.
(09-15-2025, 12:44 PM)Bob Schroeck Wrote: X: This rule is related to rule IV and Vb in many ways, but deserves restating. In most cases you are not the main character of the universe. Events don’t revolve around you. There are others for that. You are a secondary character, if not background extra. To make yourself a main character, either hang with the mains, or do something, stand up and make the universe pay attention to you. But do remember, being a member of the central cast is a mixed bag. It often means you have the protection of plot, but on the same note, it means your life is always going to be interesting, and there is a very good reason that the ancient Chinese used it as a curse.
This isn't to say that you can't tell an interesting story about your character even when they aren't the lead. Consider that Touma Kamijo is the main character in A Certain Magical Index, but some of the most interesting stories in his world are about the girl who he doesn't realize is in love with him; those stories are told in A Certain Scientific Railgun.
You are the hero of your own story. You are not the hero of somebody else's story. Both stories are equally valid... but it's up to you as the writer to make the stories equally interesting.
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| 2016-09-25: Diary of a Montreal Shopping Trip |
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Posted by: robkelk - 09-16-2025, 07:02 AM - Forum: Stories
- Replies (1)
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Diary of a Montreal Shopping Trip
By Brent Laabs
Chapter 1: Ante Meridiem
Montréal, QC, Canada
Sunday, September 25, 2016
Artoria Pendragon, summoned to be Shirou Emiya's Saber, was up on the roof training for a war she dearly wished for, but was indefinitely delayed. A Grail War couldn't happen, not with the wyrd placed upon herself and the other servants, not here.
But now she was stuck here, with no battles to worry about, no goals to meet, no quests to seek and pursue. No peasants to assign to fields, no patricians to cozy up to, no armies to feed. No friends to talk to, but that wasn't a new state of affairs. Not since she lost those two. It wouldn't make sense to befriend those she might one day need to kill, if it ever started up again, and then find herself unable to do it.
So she found herself stuck in her own thoughts. To keep herself from going mad, raking herself across the coals of the past, or bracing against phantom winds of the future, she focused on being in the present, on establishing something that resembled her old routine.
So she stood atop the apartment's flat roof under the morning sunshine, and swung a found wooden broom handle through the cool breeze to quiet her mind. It wasn't working particularly well, though you couldn't tell that by looking at her. But with a real, living body rather than a magical construct, at least she was getting good exercise.
She didn't use her own sword, since she didn't want to reveal it — or anything about it, not even its weight – to the nearby prying eyes. Which she was sure there were. Indeed, Archer had spent the last couple of minutes watching her cut imaginary targets with a stick. She presumed he was investigating her, and pretended not to notice. But his reasons were much simpler than that, though Saber wouldn't have believed them: he looked at her out of admiration, along with good helping of the normal reasons for the male gaze.
After a few moments passed, he said, "Saber! The manager is looking for you."
"Oh?"
"She wants to take us shopping for new clothing today, remember? You're coming, right? Everyone else is." Archer asked.
She turned towards the tall, prematurely gray-haired man, thinking about her answer. Artoria was a veteran of the past Grail War, so it did make some sense to join, if only to to scope out her competition. Any clothes would do, but she could certainly do with more than those on her back. "Of course."
"Good. We're leaving in an hour. Just enough time for you to get ready," he said, right before he hopped back down into the apartment's courtyard.
How impertinent, she thought, a Servant is always ready! And then she took stock of herself, smelled under her own arm, and decided that she needed a shower. Servants with magical construct bodies might be ready at a moment's notice, but in this universe she had a real human body, and it came with its own positives and negatives.
A moment later, Saber followed with her own leap into the courtyard. Cassiopée Bright, the apartment manager, caught sight of her out of the corner of her eye, muttering, "Tabernac!" The shock wouldn't last, though. Over the next few weeks, she got accustomed to a certain resident leaping three stories like it was a totally normal thing to do, and would barely gave it a second thought.
At the appointed time, everyone assembled, and walked the half-kilometre or so down-slope to an entrance to Montreal's Underground City, a network of tunnels connecting buildings and shops. Collectively, they form one of the world's largest shopping malls, with an ever-changing design aesthetic depending on which building they were under.
The tunnels are a lifeline for the city in the cold winter months, but on a cool but pleasant morning like this one, no one really minded being outside. It was a good deal warmer than the winter in Japan the participants of the Grail War had just left behind — if slightly disconcerting to see the leaves of maple trees just starting to fall, for a second time in a row.
"RÉZO, the Red Mall," said Shirou, as he rode the escalator down.
"No," corrected Cassiopée, "RÉSO the underground mall. Though a lot of the shops are actually above ground. Anyway, I know a few boutiques where we can start out, but I want you all to be on the lookout for new clothing. Especially you, Archer, you look like a cosplayer in that coat."
"She's wearing a flashy red coat too," Archer muttered.
Rin countered, "But mine is fashionable."
"Just so. Though you won't need it inside."
Inside were a host of stores, selling clothing, linens, electronics, jewellery, beauty products, and food, on different levels, above and below ground. The corridors were wide and mostly straight, with the underground passageways intended to provide for foot traffic over a long distance, connected to multiple metro stations. Rin had visited the shops crowded beneath Shinjuku Station, but those were best described as "a twisty maze of little passages", not like these walkways.
The servants were the most impressed by the building, having never visited any indoor shopping malls before. Even the idea of pre-made clothing in particular sizes was novel, but it made the whole affair much more fun. Instead of relying on the skills of one's tailor, one could just try on the outfits to see how they looked. True to her word, Cassiopée led them to some of her favourite places.
The problem was that many of her favourite places were a bit too expensive for the group's budget, allotted by Funtom for Cassiopée to manage. That was no matter, as trying a garment out was free. Sakura, in particular, seemed to enjoy using Rider as a dress-up doll. The outfits Sakura chose for her were all over the map — formal gowns, riding leather, punk chic — the only common thread was that Rider had the figure to pull them off, where Sakura's short, flat frame meant that she had to stick to simpler, more covered up outfits. Which was fine for the upcoming winter.
Saber, fortunately, had Shirou Emiya as a master, and the men spent the lion's share of the morning in various menswear sections, and not dressing her up. Saber tried picking out her own wardrobe, but it didn't really bring her the joy it did the other girls, and she didn't really trust her own taste. Of course, Rin and Cassiopée picked up the slack, and dispatched Artoria to a changing room to try out various outfits for their approval.
After trying on a few dresses that didn't quite fit, Saber stepped out of the changing room, wearing a royal blue evening gown, high-cut and backless save for two straps, with a cutout below the breasts and plenty of space for necklaces above.
"Wow, you sure clean up nice!" Rin remarked.
"Whoa. I'm going to have to work a little to compete with that," Medea commented.
"Are you sure this is appropriate dress for me? Perhaps a simple tunic or two would suffice until we resume battle—"
"No good! Saber, you need to keep up with modern fashion or you'll let everyone else get ahead. Not that I'm helping you in the Grail War, understand? I just can't have you looking like a fashion victim."
Caster noted, "As Heraclitus said, 'Everything changes, nothing stands still'."
Artoria relented, "When in Rome, do as the Romans do."[1]
"Rome?" Medea asked, "Where's that? Good quote, though."[2]
Cassiopée split off from the men — who, unsurprisingly, needed the most help — to check on the women. "C'est magnifique, Sabre! I see I'm not truly needed over here. But alas, I think you should concentrate on everyday wear. And something a little warmer than that, with winter just around the corner."
"Hey! That looks too good on her to leave it on the rack." Rin protested.
Cassiopée tugged at Artoria's sleeve, and glanced at the tag. After a moment of thinking, she pronounced, "Of course, it would be a crime for her not to take it home. Carry on!"
Medea instantly picked up a dark violet velvet dress off a rack, and carried it into a dressing room in her attempt to outclass Saber. Something about that woman reminded her of Morgan — on second thought, most everything about that woman reminded her of Morgan.
Rider seemed relatively uninterested in going that route, instead asking, "What do people wear now when riding horses?"
Rin led her over to the jeans section, populated with long trousers made of a durable weave called denim predominantly in blue. After a bit of back and forth, Rin managed to convince Rider to purchase some form-fitting jeans with rips already included in between the seams and joints, ultimately with the words, "Just trust me!"
Saber selected some jeans that looked more practical and brand new, that had been richly and uniformly dyed with woad.[3] She knew that hardly anyone rode horses in this future era, but as a king she should have the option to be a cavalier, and that obviously meant not wearing garments that could belong to a pauper. Even if the ripped jeans were more expensive, and somehow more fashionable, Saber's dignity was worth more.
Sakura seemed to favour dignity as well, as all of the outfits she chose seemed quite conservative and feminine, or so Saber thought, based on her own observations from the previous Grail War, for what little they were worth. Of course, with winter coming, it made sense to cover up, but on the other hand, Sakura had no problem dressing up Rider in all sorts of showy costumes. Well, that was perhaps not so odd for a girl of her age. People never really change, even across the millennia.
Saber was quite right that Sakura had body issues, but as she learned later, quite wrong about the reason for them.
The party moved on to a different building, passing through the hallways below ground to reach a smaller boutique clothing store, on Cassiopée's recommendation.
Kuzuki-sensei trudged behind Caster, dutifully holding all of her purchases. Shirou saw this, so he offered Artoria, "Can I take your bags?"
"No, thank you. I can take your bags if you like," Saber offered in return.
"A girl shouldn't have to carry everything, Saber. I can carry them—"
"I am your servant, you should rely on me instead."
Another voice chimed in, "Here you go, I thought you were never going to ask," Rin said while jamming her purchases into Shirou's hands.
"Thanks, senpai!" Sakura smiled as she placed another set of plastic bags of clothing into his unsuspecting hands. "You're a gentleman."
He eventually shook off the dumbfounded look from his face, and returned her smile. "So it turned out this way, huh? No problem." At this, Archer just tsked at Shirou. "What?" he asked with a bit of irritation.
"Oh nothing. Perhaps you want to carry my clothes as well?" Archer suggested innocently.
"Oh come on, do it yourself!"
Once they found the store, Cassiopée realized that there was nothing in there for the men, and decided to lead them on a ways further to a bigger department store, leaving the women behind. They were too absorbed in the fashion to pay much notice to her absence.
"How about this coat, Saber? Doesn't it look très chic?" Rin held it up in front of her chest, so she could see it reflected in the store's full-length mirror: a white wool coat, piped with sea green trim and large, shiny gold buttons.
She thought about it, and supposed that it was flattering on her. More flattering than it would be on Rin herself, with her darker hair and complexion. And somehow less feminine than Rin's wardrobe. The whole morning was proof of Rin's fashion sense.
Artoria had no idea of the local fashion sense, but it didn't matter too much. She liked it. She stared at the mirror and, with the smallest of smiles, decided, "This will be acceptable."
"Oooh, high praise!" Rin teased. It was high praise from Saber, after all. "Let's find a few dresses to match."
Cassiopée, "And she'll need a winter coat; that one will only be warm enough for the autumn."
Certainly, if there were a Grail War of fashion, Rin and Cassiopée would be battling it out, and they'd all be left in the dust. Just like war, fashion is eternal, and some people are just better at it.
If Artoria had had some knowledge of local fashion provided by the Grail's magic that summoned her, it was lost to her now. All of that synthetic knowledge was lost. She could figure out some things from gift of language that had been bestowed upon her. She had seen Cassiopée pay for some items with a small card, which she somehow knew as called a credit card. And she knew that "credit" was a loan taken from a "bank", and banks were something of a treasury. She could learn just from following the threads of words in her head.
Fashion, however, was opaque to such methods. People looked somewhat different than what she remembered of Japan, but not so different as to feel like a different era. Honestly it was so weird that there was so little difference between dress on the other side of the world — men's styles in particular seemed remarkably uniform.
And yet, there were still ways for the men to fail. When they left to rejoin the men, they found they should perhaps not be left to their own devices. "Now we need to find Kuzuki-sen–" Rin paused, and raised her voice, "Hey Emiya, put that back. It's not going to work. No, not you Archer... actually yes, you too, both of you are hopeless."
On the bottom level of the Centre Eaton, the tunnel opened up into a food court. Now, this wasn't the type of court that Artoria was expecting, having no courtiers or lord. It resembled, more than anything, the chaotic scene surrounding the food wagons on market day, where commoners would gather to partake in a warm meal before returning to field or farm. But it did resemble a court in one important way: it was a place where people of many cultures would come and feast together.
From one of the side entrances, a young man with a high forehead and glasses called out, "Cassiopée!"
"Ah, Grahame! Glad you could make it!" They met and shared a quick peck on the lips. "You need to shave!"
"I only made it because your text woke me up. No, I'm fine, I just needed to catch up on sleep a bit." The past week had been spent in crunch — in fact, pretty much every week was 'crunch time' these days, as their game crawled its way through development hell.
"My love, they need to take better care of you."
"I can't argue with that. It looks like you're faring better than me at work."
Cassiopée related, "Oh, it has its challenges, but shopping has been rewarding so far." She reached into her bag, pulling up an article, "I found this lovely two-piece–"
"Save it, I'd much prefer to see you wearing it first."
She grinned, "All right!" then turned from her spouse to face everyone else. "Okay, there are a lot of choices here, so everyone can pick out something they like. Let's meet back up in a few minutes." She handed a few bills out to everyone, enough for them to pay for their own food, and went off with Grahame to pick up some pad Thai.
Saber was, at this point, more confused than she had been all day. The paper money was odd, sure, but money had been around in different forms since before civilization, and it was clearly marked in value.
No, it was all of these unknown options. The amount of choice here was bewildering. There was Italian food — they seemed to be as crazy about tomatoes now as they had been about garum back in the old days. The Greek restaurant had foods that Medea didn't appear to recognize, like gyros. And places that were even further out, like Thai, Korean, or Mexican, whoever those people were. Artoria knew that India and China existed, but had no idea what people actually ate there, aside from a few spices. The Chinese food seemed somewhat like the food she saw in Japan, based on the rice, at least.
And none of them claimed to be a British food place, which wasn't terribly surprising.
Variety like this, she had never been offered in any court before. "Does anything sound good to you, Saber?" Shirou asked. He seemed to realize that she was at a loss.
"Whatever you think is best. Perhaps... something simple."
"Simple, huh? I'll try my best."
"I will remain here, and secure us proper seating." She did just that, walking around the centre of the court until she found a large, circular table which could host the entire group. She sat down to claim it, and found herself in a metal chair which wobbled unevenly with her weight — un siège petit périlleux. She moved to another chair.
Cassiopée and Grahame soon joined her, with container of noodles that smelled spicy, though Saber thought she caught a hint of something that smelled a little like garum in there too. Caster, Rider and Soichirou tried the lamb gyros, which Caster quite enjoyed, but Rider felt lacked some authenticity as Greek food. Sakura had one of her cravings for raw meat, and picked up a mix of sushi and sashimi. Rin and Archer were feeling more adventurous, and tried out some tacos. Rin liked them well enough, but Archer made an offhand remark, "Well, I guess we can't expect too much, this far north."
With no meshiya offering simple Japanese food, Shirou decided to go with sandwich shop fare, picking up couple of sandwiches and bags of potato chips for each of them. "Which do you want, turkey or ham?"
"Hmm. Ham, please." She would only find out later that he had in fact managed to bring her modern-day British cuisine. She took a bite, and found the ham shared the bread with cheese, fresh vegetables, and a tangy mustard. Not bad. Many of the foods on their table today used bread to allow one to hold the food cleanly, which she thought was a pretty neat invention. She aped Shirou as he opened his small bag of crisps, and tried it. Ooh, salty, crunchy, starchy!
Then she noticed that Shirou's bag of chips bore the writing "sour cream and onion" Why those foods?
Shirou noticed her staring, so he explained, "I didn't know what flavour you wanted, so I just got plain ones for you."
"There are flavours?"
"Here, try one." She took the thin slice of potato from his hand, and placed it in her mouth. It was like the first one, but with a bit of milkiness, and a kick of onion. She liked onions. Very nice!
Sakura saw this, stared at his little bag of chips, and then gave Emiya the puppy dog eyes. "You too?" he said.
"Ahwwn," she intoned, her mouth open. He deposited a potato chip therein, much like a priest with a communion wafer.
Rin said, "So this is what you get up to without Sensei at your meals, Emiya-kun?"
"I mean..."
"Eh?"
Shirou offered, "You want one too?"'
"Flirt." She turned her face away, to the other end of the table. The view didn't get much better though.
Caster said, "Aren't you going to offer me a bite of yours, darling?"
"We both have the same thing," Souichirou replied, confused.
"So?" He didn't react, so Medea pressed on, pita in hand, "Here, I'll give you a bite of mine first, and we'll be even!"
Rin expected better of her high school teacher, so she called across the table, "Missus Manager, can you please do something about hormone central over here?"
Cassiopée replied simply, "Honestly, I doubt it."
- BL: This quote is attributed to St. Ambrose, which should make it old enough for Saber to have known. We're assuming that Artoria comes from sub-Roman Britain, c. 500, rather than the time of high chivalry c. 1100.
- BL: The Argonauts sailed before the Trojan war, a few centuries before "ab urbe condita" reckoning. Even if you accept the theory that Romulus was Aeneas's grandson, Rome would still be founded two or three generations after Medea's time, c. 1150 BC. That said, the archaeology indicates still earlier settlement, most continuously on the Capitoline Hill — but still only amounting to an unremarkable backwater set of hilltop villages outside of the Greek sphere.
- BL: Britons were once known to paint their skins with woad, mixed from a dye which makes the same pigment as indigo. Today, the same dye, produced synthetically, is mainly used to dye blue jeans.
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| Story Of A Fic That Never Happened... |
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Posted by: Bluemage - 09-11-2025, 11:18 PM - Forum: Other People's Fanfiction
- Replies (4)
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Hey. Been a while.
You ever listen to a song, only to have a scene burst, fully realized, into your head? I did, back in 2017. Problem was, the scene in question was part of a crossover fic that I wasn't writing. Not an early part, either, but very very late.
I tried on and off to write the story for years. I must've tried to write the first scene a dozen times, but it never worked out. It doesn't help that the primary setting isn't really my thing, and part of it is that I just didn't have the energy.
Couple of nights ago, I listened to the song again. The same scene hit again... but I was feeling inspired. It was like being a dorf in a strange mood. The words would not stop. Two hours later, I had the whole scene typed out. Figured I'd share.
This is the song. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3gjg3Ib-y54
*******************
The door to the Atlesian airship opened with a heavy thunk, Roman Torchwick sauntering out onto the deck as if he didn't have a care in the world. "Terribly sorry, kid, but you won't be winning the day this time, whoever you are.", he monologued, looking off at the battles raging through Vale. "There's far more going on", he continued, spinning on his heel as he waved a hand dramatically at the carnage, "-than any one Hunter can-"
Yep, he didn't even look at me. Oh, this is gonna feel GOOD.
Roman gaped, poleaxed for a moment, before regaining his composure. "Y-you sure you wanna do this, kid?", he snarked, lowering his cane to the ground. "From what I hear, you're not exactly top of the class over at Beacon. Tell you what- this ship's got a few Bullheads on it. If you wanna get on one, go back down there, and go be a hero with the rest of the class, go right ahead. I won't stop you. 'Case you hadn't noticed, we're in the middle of the biggest Grimm attack in history. Do you really need ME", he said, motioning with one hand to his still-impeccable white suit jacket, "to make it worse for you?"
I just grinned and planted my feet. One hand reached up, grabbing a handle on my vest.
Roman scowled. "Stupid monkey... I GAVE you a chance!" His cane lifted again- aiming at the ground in front of me- planning a warning shot?- as he settled into a stance. "What makes you think you can fight a master criminal like me?"
I pushed in on the handle, twisting it. With a short electronic chirp, the gravity engine deactivated. "You said it couldn't get any worse, right?", I growled out, a feral grin on my face. "Good." My hands came down, fists clenched in front of me.
Roman looked at my stance... then stood up and laughed. "Th- ha!- that trick? HA! You think that- hehheh- SCREAMING a bit will- heh- actually help you?" He snorted, brushing back his bangs with his free hand. "Stupid monkey... we know all about your Semblance. Doubling your power? Don't make me laugh! Twice nothing is still nothing!"
My grin just widened. "Let's test that, then."
Then I reached into my spirit, and began to yell. "Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa...."
The air on the deck- kept still by some Atlesian technomagic, no doubt- began to whip around us. My Aura- my ki- flared to life, going from intangible to a visible glow.
Roman blinked. "Huh. He's not stopping. I didn't know he could do that."
"HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA...."
The airship began to shudder under us, the deck quaking. Even over the rushing winds, we could hear the groans and screeches as the metal below us began to bend.
"HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!"
"Seriously, kid, this is getting rea-GAH!" Roman reached for his suit pocket, just before it exploded. The burnt remains of his scroll were picked up by the wind, never touching the ground. My own joined it- no big loss.
"HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!"
As my ki reached its peak, the overstressed deck of the airship began to rip itself apart. The sudden burst of power as I peaked finished the process, ripping panels clean off the ship.
Roman, stumbling on what was left of the deck, looked up, his eyes wide. "W- what the hell ARE YOU?", he demanded, voice shrill with panic.
I smirked. "What am I? A Saiyan warrior", I replied, removing my fist from his gut. "I'm going to go find a real fight now. Try not to piss out all your blood!" Then I crouched, and with a burst of ki- more than any three Huntsmen- launched myself into the sky.
*****
"WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"
Flight, I mused to myself as I burned through the sky, spinning idly around a skyscraper at the speed of thought, is the greatest thing ever. I looked down, idly letting off a volley of ki blasts at a pack of Beowolves. Seriously, my face is starting to hurt. Why didn't I do this sooner?
I stopped to think for a minute, swooping down and punching a Boarbatusk in half. Oh, right. Suppressing my ki so I didn't attract Grimm. That. I spun my way up and around another building, suddenly alighting on an antenna, before barfing a blast up a pack of Nevermore circling the building.
As it- and they- exploded, I took off again, laughing like the cares of the world had fallen off my shoulders. Cat's out of the bag now, Ozpin! I'm free! FREE! Nothing's gonna get me down now... and my ki is laced with joy right now, isn't it. I came to a halt in midair, one hand swinging out to grab another Nevermore by the neck and squeeze.
...Ozpin, you magnificent bastard! That was your plan ALL ALONG! I'm having so much fun, the Grimm aren't even FEELING everybody else! Chuckling to myself, I looked down at the street- ooh, fun!- and swooped down to land near team RWBY. Good to see them doing what they do best.
Weiss noticed me first, following through on a perfect lunge with Myrtenaster, only to rip her from the disintegrating corpse of a Beowolf, and stomp up to me. "Where have YOU been?", she demanded with a scowl, her eyes alight. "I tried to call you, but your Scroll-"
Love to see you like this, Weissy, but we don't have time now. "Scroll's gone", I replied through my happy grin, crossing my arms. My eyes lit up with ki, beams burning through the Grimm running up behind her.
"How'd you manage that? Drop it off an airship or something?" She jumped, landing on a Beowolf, the tip of Myrtenaster landing directly in the back of its head as she landed.
"Blew it the fuck up", I retorted, letting out a spinning kick.
"What, did it have an opinion?", she snarked back, firing ice at something behind me.
"That's your job", I replied, not missing a beat. Weiss turned away for a second, before lashing out into the sky with a burst of fire at- are they EVER going to run out of Nevermore?! "Did I miss anything important?", I asked, jumping up to grab a Deathstalker by the tail, pull it over my head, and- WHAM- slam it into another pack of Beowolves.
"Not much!", Yang chimed in, letting out a three-hit combo. "Just that big dragon... thing... flying through town... OH!- and an emergency call from Beacon!" She started firing at the ground in front of a charging Boarbatusk, forcing it to turn and slam into a nearby wall.
"What dragon", I asked, puzzled. "I didn't see any... oh." The sentence died on my lips as I looked up, beholding the largest Grimm I'd ever seen. "That thing is HUGE!"
"Yep!" said the breeze zipping past me, death floating by on the petals of a rose.
I'm not sure any Huntsman could kill something like that. It'd take enough firepower to destroy a city...
My smirk returned in full force.
Firepower I just might have.
"I've got a skill that can kill that dragon. Problem is, I have to stand still and charge it first."
Yang dropped out of the air next to me- "You need us to cover you, right? How long?" -before leaping forward into a punch.
I thought to myself, idly dodging a Grimm as it swiped where I was standing. "Gonna take a bit. Fifteen seconds? Twenty? Think you can do that?"
Ruby blurred out of the air in front of me, Crescent Rose embedding itself blade-first in the road. "Sure thing!", she chirped, letting out three shots at a distant Beringel. "Ready?"
I shuffled in place, lining myself up, and leaned forward. "There's gonna be a five-syllable verbal chant. I don't know how much backblast this one has, so when I hit four? Brace." I then leaned forward and to one side, cupped my hands together, and began to focus. "Ready."
Ki began to flow, curling into a ball, accompanied by a distinctive sound. "Kaaaaaa....." This is so cool!
A pack of Beowolves charged, only for fire and wrath to land in their path. With a twirl, Yang dropped a vicious axe kick on the alpha's head, burying it in the ground.
I stayed in place. "....meeeeeeeeeeee....." The swirling, warbling sound of the technique began to increase in pitch.
A Nevermore dove for me, talons outstretched, only to fall apart in a swirl of wind. The corpse didn't so much as touch my face.
I looked up at the dragon- more like a wyvern, I think?, and shuffled my feet slightly to one side, correcting my aim. "Haaaaaaaa......." The pitch of the technique increased even higher- it even SOUNDS ominous!
A Griffon jumped from a nearby building, clacking its beak- only to slam that beak straight into a glowing white circle. It recoiled, trying to take to the air, only for a pair of shadows to land on its back, tearing its wings from its body in identical strikes.
I focused deeply, compressing the ki in my hands to its utmost. "MEEEEEEEEEEEEE...." To my satisfaction, everyone- RWBY first, followed surprisingly by the Grimm- cleared the area. I even saw Ruby hit the deck, working her jaw and covering her ears.
The sound stopped. The world stopped.
I swung my hands forward. "HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!"
Ki burst forth like a raging river, a wave of glowing blue soaring into the sky. The pavement beneath me cracked, windows shattering in nearby buildings, but my eyes were locked on the tip of the wave-
-which struck true. The wyvern ROARED with earth-shaking force as my beam struck its shoulder, inky blackness bubbling and burning away under the irresistible light and heat of pure weaponized Life. It turned its head to face me, red eyes burning hatefully, and opened its jaw.
NOT QUITE RIGHT! Gotta correct! Should just need a little to the right... I twisted my hips slowly, walking the beam over to- THERE! -land directly in its mouth, then dug deep. "HAAAAAAAAAAAA!" The Kamehameha kicked again, almost doubling in size, as I poured even more energy into the wave. The wyvern, bubbling and dying under the initial beam, tried to force its jaw shut-
-only to instead swallow the added burst of power I threw at it. The thing swelled up, looking for all the world like an overfilled balloon, as its entire hide began to bubble, then froth, then-
BOOM
-explode.
I lowered my arms, panting. "Grimm... murdered." After a few seconds of catching my breath, something else popped into my head. "Wait, Yang... you said there was an emergency at Beacon? Is it still going?"
Not even bothering to reply, my ki burst forth, launching me into the air like a rocket. Gotta hurry... that's gotta be the mastermind... I put everything I could into it, burning through the sky like a comet- at that speed, it took mere seconds for Beacon to be in sight. Headmaster's in the tallest tower... I feel him and Pyrrha and- who is that? No time to check- I'm going in!
I aimed right at 12 o'clock on the clock face, bursting through the window in an explosion of glass- If I put myself in the middle, I should be able to- -kicking the Headmaster's desk aside, skidding down the middle of the office- and snatching a black, glass arrow out of the air before it could reach my classmate.
*Nailed it.*
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| The Imperial Presidency, Part 2 |
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Posted by: Bob Schroeck - 09-11-2025, 12:41 PM - Forum: Politics and Other Fun
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(09-11-2025, 11:54 AM)Jinx999 Wrote: He did say that Empathy is made up, woke and "dangerous"; so, in accordance with his beliefs, I have decided to not feel bad about his death.
Regarding that, I can't help but wonder how long it is until the Republicans start declaring that Christ's teachings are "woke" and dangerous, and any church that doesn't preach the Prosperity Gospel needs to be shut down.
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| 2016-09-13 ff. School Daze |
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Posted by: Bob Schroeck - 09-02-2025, 07:13 AM - Forum: Stories
- Replies (2)
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School Daze
By Robert M. Schroeck
Franklin High School
Franklin Township, New Jersey, USA
Tuesday, September 13, 2016
Clarisse Sherrel looked up from her desk at the sound of a knock to see Samuel Franks, one of her vice principals, standing at her open door with a handful of student file folders. "What's up, Sam?" she asked.
"Something a little odd I wanted to bring to your attention," he replied as he stepped into her office. As soon as he got close enough, he handed her the folders. "We've got five new transfers."
"So? The only thing odd about that is how close to the start of the school year it is," she replied. It hadn't even been a week yet since the first day of classes for 2016-2017.
Sam gave a sort of half-smile. "No, there's a bit more than that."
She just raised an eyebrow.
"Five girls," he went on. "All Japanese, as in fresh from Japan, not just ethnically, on student visas yet. Ui Hirasawa, Azusa Nakano, Nao Okuda, Sumire Saito, and Jun Suzuki. They all have perfect fluency in English and don't require EFL[1] classes." He laughed. "Saito's originally Australian. Has the accent and everything. The others sound like they grew up here in Jersey. Anyway, they're all transferring in from an all-girls school called Sakuragaoka."
Clarisse perked up at that. "Sakuragaoka High School? I recognize that name. The new music teacher, Sawako Yamanaka, used to teach there." Frowning, she began paging through the folders. "Quite a coincidence, that."
Sam nodded. "Yeah, well, maybe not. Yamanaka is the guardian of record for three of them." Clarisse's eyebrows shot up. "Nothing formal like a fosterage, just documented requests from their parents to watch over them while they're in the States. Knowing that, it's probably not a surprise that all five girls and Yamanaka live together for all practical purposes — in the Douglass Gardens Apartments complex on Hamilton Street. What's odd is that they're in almost sequential apartments, basically starting at apartment one."
She looked up. "Taken all together, that's kind of getting into Twilight Zone territory, isn't it? Let's keep an eye on the six of them for the next few weeks."
He nodded. "I'll spread the word."
Monday, September 19, 2016
Clarisse was hip-deep in the new and completely unexpected plan to expand the high school before the start of the 2017-2018 school year. Forget about where the money had come from — the multi-million-dollar grant from the state, specifically earmarked for educational facilities, seemed to have appeared completely out of nowhere. The question gnawing at her was why the state had decided that Franklin Township suddenly needed facilities for another two to three hundred middle and high school level students above and beyond anything they expected from census data and the existing enrollments. That and why they were so insistent it had to all be done by next September.
It was enough to give her a migraine.
A familiar rap on the metal frame of her office door had her look up to see Sam standing there with three student files in his hand. "Good morning, Sam. What's up?"
He held up the folders. "Our Twilight Zone girls just got some friends."
"What?" Clarisse immediately forgot about the paperwork in front of her.
Sam tossed the folders onto the pile of papers and she quickly scanned the names on them: Hikaru Shidou, Umi Ryuuzaki, and Fuu Hououji. "More Japanese transfer students?"
He nodded with a humorless smile playing on his lips. "Three freshmen, again with the perfect English."
Clarisse picked up Shidou's folder and opened it. "All from Sakuragaoka?"
"Nope, not this time," he said, shaking his his head. "Three other schools. But, and here's the thing, they're all living..."
"At Douglass Gardens Apartments," Clarisse finished for him. "Sequential apartments again?"
Sam chuckled. "They're all in the same apartment." She just stared at him, and he held up his hands. "I am totally serious."
"Who're their guardians?" she asked as she searched through the information.
"A couple named, um, Shrohk I think it is," he replied. "Turns out they're the managers of the apartment complex. Apparently all three girls' parents know them well enough to appoint them."
She shook her head. "There's something odd going on here."
"I thought so, too, so I made a few calls and had the Sakuragaoka girls' paperwork checked," he said. "Absolutely perfect and completely aboveboard, all the way up to the State Department and INS. I suspect our new students' will be exactly the same."
Clarisse sighed and closed the folder, before gathering all three up and handing them back to Sam. "Like before, keep an eye on them. If any of them step the least bit out of line, I want to know."
He nodded. "Will do."
Wednesday, September 21, 2016
Two mornings later, Sam didn't have the chance to knock before Clarisse said, "No, don't tell me. More Japanese girls."
He snorted. "Just one this time, but you're going to want to see this. Atsuko Natsume, transferring in from a Kyouyou High School. Pretty girl, very bubbly. Again, perfect English, although her transcript is a bit less impressive than most of our other recent transfers. Again, living in Douglass Gardens — this time with her entire family, no odd guardianship arrangements." He opened the folder and pulled out a thick sheaf of papers held together with a black binder clip and handed it to her. "But this is the really interesting part."
Clarisse began flipping through it. They were medical records and doctors' letters, mostly in Japanese but with translations attached. She hadn't gotten far in before her eye was caught by the words "quadruple amputee". She frowned and went back to the beginning. "What the hell...?" she muttered. She spied a photocopy of a TSA notification card, of the kind carried by persons with significant quantities of metal implanted in their bodies. Then she came upon a set of surgical reports. She'd averted her eyes from the graphic color photographs illustrating them, but not before one phrase leapt out at her: "extensive experimental prosthetic systems". She read on for several more pages before looking back up at Sam with an expression of shock on her face. "Seriously? She's basically The Bionic Woman? How is that even possible?"
Sam shrugged. "Your guess is as good as mine. But if that's for real, then why they even let her out of Japan is beyond me — if I've read that right, she's a treasure trove of medical technology beyond anything anyone in the States thinks is even plausible."
She threw the medical paperwork back into the folder and snapped it shut before shoving it back into Sam's hands. "Take her over to Security and have them test her with a metal detector. If these records are on the level, she couldn't give a stronger positive if she were wearing a suit of armor." She shook her head. "And if she does, well, we'll just have to hope she doesn't want to join any of the sports teams, because the poor girl is a walking performance enhancement."
Friday, September 30, 2016
"More?" Clarisse asked when she spied Sam with a handful of the now-dreaded student files.
He nodded. "Just like before. Native Japanese. Absolutely perfect English with Jersey accents. Living in Douglass Gardens, in near-sequential apartments. Four girls this time: Eimi Ohba, Chisa Tsukamoto, Asahi Sakurai, and Ikumi Tachikawa. All their paperwork in absolutely perfect order."
"Any more bionic women?" Ms. Natsume (whose entire body, head to toe, had registered very strongly indeed on the metal detector) had quickly fit in (and well) to the student body — her neighbors had helped her there — and to Clarisse's relief had shown no interest in any sports or teams. (The cheer squad, though, was very interested in her.) Somehow, though, her medical details had leaked almost immediately and she had picked up both a following and the nickname "the Six-Million Dollar Girl".
"Fortunately, no. Just a band of relatively ordinary girls."
Clarisse sighed. "I'll believe that when I see it."
Monday, October 17, 2016
"Not again," Clarisse groaned when Sam showed up at her door with yet another handful of files. "And it was such a good month, too."
"Hey, it's different this time!" he said with false cheerfulness.
"How?" she demanded.
"One of them is a boy!"
Friday, August 11, 2017
Clarisse leaned back in her chair and stretched. Her first year as principal of Franklin High School was just about over, and except for all the strangeness with the students from Douglass Gardens right at the start it had been a good year. She'd even been able to navigate the bizarre circumstances around the rush-job expansion of the high school mandated (and totally funded) by the state a year earlier. She still had no idea why anyone thought it had been needed — the school was going to look like a ghost town come the start of September.
Or so she thought until Sam staggered into her office with a stack of student files easily two feet tall clutched in his arms.
"Oh, fuck no!" she yelled. "What the hell is going on with Douglass Gardens?"
- RMS: English as a Foreign Language.
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| 2016-12-25: Melancholy Dreams and Dream-Coloured Sweets |
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Posted by: robkelk - 08-17-2025, 12:20 PM - Forum: Stories
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Melancholy Dreams and Dream-Coloured Sweets
By Rob Kelk
Chapter 1
Appartements Mont-Royal Sud, Montreal, QC, Canada
December 25, 2016
"Santa-san, I've been a good girl all year, and I'm an isekai character now. Could you give me some powers, please? The dress was nice, but I felt like a little girl playing dress-up when I wore it."
Konata Izumi sighed deeply. She'd been an isekai character for two whole days now, and she still didn't have any powers, or a boyfriend, or a quest to undertake. The lack of powers rankled her in particular; she'd seen Guru Clef at the Christmas party the previous night but she never got a chance to ask him to cast Bestow Magic on her. She'd also seen Belldandy, but Megami-sama was too busy to grant anybody a wish. Konata was certain that she'd earned one... hadn't she? She didn't consider, or even imagine, that anybody who's certain that she'd earned a divine wish probably hadn't.
And getting a boyfriend was just as fruitless as getting powers. Mind you, the only available guys in the apartment building were Shirou Emiya and Archer. Considering what it meant to be Shirou Emiya's girlfriend, she'd probably be better off chasing after Shirou Takamachi in Philadelphia instead. Even considering Shirou Takamachi was happily married and had children her age. Archer... had the same problems as Emiya.
"Who else might make a good boyfriend?" she said to herself in Japanese while standing on a footstool and looking through the kitchen cupboards in search of something to make for breakfast the next day. Grahame Bright was married to Cassiopée, her landlady, and Souichirou Kuzuki was both too old for her and engaged to Caster. Then she thought about the residence in Ottawa, a couple of hours away by train or a couple of steps away by portal. Accelerator was even more dangerous to date than Emiya was, Touma Kamijo was clueless, Rob Donaldson was way too old for her, Tuxedo Kamen was definitely spoken for no matter which version of Sailor Moon he was from, and Artemis was a talking cat. And while there were others like her in Canada, she had no desire to even speak with any of the Nerima Wrecking Crew, let alone date any of them... or to date Tenchi Masaki, either. She liked having unbroken bones. She sighed again. "There are way too many people from shonen stories in this world. Where are the people from all the shojo stories, with their crowds of hot available guys? It looks like I'll have to find a boyfriend somewhere else, maybe in the States... or somebody who isn't in on the whole 'displacee' thing." Switching to English because she thought it more appropriate for what she was about to say, she continued, "I wonder who might want a girlfriend in Canada?" She grinned at the reference, then she closed the cupboard doors. "And we don't have much to choose from for breakfast tomorrow."
That was her first quest in this new-to-her world: Discover what her apartment-mate, Miyuki Takara, wanted to eat.
Calling it a quest made her feel better about it.
Heading out to the living room, Konata said, "We don't have a lot in the kitchen, Miyuki-san. I'm making a shopping list; do you have a pref..." she trailed off when she realized her apartment-mate was crying. "Never mind food. What's wrong?"
Miyuki looked up, used a tissue to dry her eyes, and replied, "We're never going home, are we?"
"Oh, Miyuki-san, why do you think that?"
"So many of those people we met yesterday have been here for months. They haven't gone home."
Konata knew exactly what to say. As she sat down beside her roommate, she replied, "They haven't started their quests yet. All we need to do is find out what our quest is and complete it, and we'll be able to go home!"
"But those girls from Okanoue Girls' High School went on a quest to reach their home, and they're still in this world..." Miyuki forced herself to not cry again. "Also, if somebody like Guru Clef was able to give us quests, he would have been giving people their quests yesterday. I hope I'm wrong... but I think there aren't any quests for people like us. We're never going to see our families again, or Minami-san, either."
Konata realized that just because she thought she was starting the adventure of a lifetime didn't mean her friends thought that way. Miyuki was homesick. And Konata admitted to herself that her apartment-mate was right; she was beginning to miss her father and Yui-neesan and Yutaka... and her own friends. "Or Patty, or Tamura-san, or Kuroi-sensei." Konata sighed deeply as she sat down beside Miuyki on their sofa. "You might be right. But if we give up hope, we'll never know for sure. And that's why I know I have to find my quest in this world." She refused to give up hope.
"You're going to quest for a quest?" The recursive thought brought a smile to Miyuki's face.
Konata smiled just as widely; her apartment-mate wasn't crying any more. "That's the Miyuki-chan I'm used to seeing! Now I can ask: what do you want me to add to our grocery list?"
"Didn't Mme. Bright say that she was making a big meal for everyone? Maybe we should just have a light snack if we have anything at all."
"That wasn't what I meant, but you're right; Bright-san told us to bring an appetite."
"Ah." Miyuki thought for a moment, then added, "Even so, could we get something from Mlle. Tennouji's bakery and coffee shop?"
"You just want something sweet, don't you?" Konata said with a grin. "You'd better be careful that all the strawberries you eat don't go to your waist." Miyuki gasped and put her hands over her midriff to hide her figure. "Sure, we can go get some tarts or something from Tennouji-san if Patisserie Belge is..."
After a moment, Miyuki said, "I'm sure they'll be open."
Konata shook her head. "How could I have missed it? A blonde young woman named Tennouji-san working in a patisserie. Miyuki-chan, did you read Ribon while you were in junior-high?"
"I read a few issues... oh! Now I remember! What was the story called... Yumeiro Pâtissière?"
"Exactly. I'll bet you a strawberry tart that she's a displacee, just like us. Let us start our quest to find out more about our neighbours!"
"We're going next door to get a snack."
Kagami looked up from where she and Medea were setting tables for lunch. The tables had been pushed together to form a long communal-style arrangement that all fourteen of the building's residents could share. "I wouldn't if I were you. Tsukasa, Cassiopée-san, Grahame-san, and Shirou-san are all working in the kitchen, and they're all busy doing different things. I think we're going to have a lot of food in an hour or so."
"In that case," Konata replied, "we're going next door to say 'Merry Christmas' to our neighbours." Seeing Miyuki's disappointed reaction to her comment, she added, "Okay, fine, and we're getting a small snack."
"Don't say I didn't warn you."
"Oh, let them spoil their appetites," Medea said. "As Socrates said, each person is the final authority for himself. Or, in this case, herself. And the less they eat, the more there will be for the rest of us."
Konata turned to Miyuki and repeated, "A small snack." Since they immediately headed for the door, they both missed seeing Medea smile at that comment.
It took them less than a minute to reach the bakery. As they opened the shop's front door, the girl behind the counter — a brunette teen with her hair in twin buns — looked up from the cookbook she was reading and smiled. "Merry Christmas, and welcome to Patisserie Belge!"
Miyuki replied, "Merry Christmas! Two strawberry tarts and two bottles of sparkling water, please."
"I'll take two strawberry tarts, too," Konata added with a grin.
"I thought that you insisted that we get a small snack."
The girl behind the counter hid a giggle behind her hand, then said, "We only have two strawberry tarts left. We didn't make very many because we knew business would be slow today. One strawberry tart and a bottle of sparkling water each?"
"Yes, please," Miyuki replied.
Konata and Miyuki were seated at one of the patisserie's tables in less than a minute. "Thank you for the food," they said in unison, then took a bite from their tarts.
Neither of them said anything for a moment.
Miyuki was the first to speak. "Oh, my."
"Yeah," Konata added. "I didn't know that strawberries could taste like this." [1]
"Where have these been all my life?" Miyuki asked rhetorically.
Konata answered anyway. "In a different reality altogether, just like us." She turned to the girl behind the counter. "Isn't that right, Amano-san?"
And that surprised the pâtissier. "How did you know my name?"
"I read it in a manga. You are Amano Ichigo, aren't you?"
"Yes..." she said with some suspicion.
"And you found yourself here, not knowing where you were or what day it was?"
"Three and a half months ago, yes. How do you know that?"
Miyuki replied, "Because the same thing happened to us the day before yesterday. My name is Takara Miyuki, and my friend is named Izumi Konata."
"Izumi Konata... Wait here, please." And Ichigo headed into the patisserie's back room. Switching from French to Japanese, she said, "Mari-sempai! Makoto! Vanilla! Everybody! There are other people like us here!"
"We'd better finish our snack while she's back there," Konata said just before taking another bite of her tart.
"Yes, it would be a bad idea to tell them what we did say and then leave." Miyuki replied before enjoying her own tart.
Just after the women finished their sweets, the entire staff of Patisserie Belge — two young women and three young men, that Konata and Miyuki could see — made their way out of the back of the shop. The blonde woman said, "I'm Mari Tennouji, although Ichigo says you already knew who we are. I remember seeing you yesterday evening. What's all this about being from a different reality?"
"That does sound preposterous," the blond boy added. "Oh, and I'm Makoto Kashino."
"And I'm Konata Izumi. It may sound crazy, but how else would somebody who doesn't make desserts at all know about Sweet Spirits?"
That gave the staff pause. Finally, the boy with glasses said, "You could have heard about Sweets Spirits from somebody else." He emphasized the plural 'Sweets' slightly. "And I'm Sennosuke Andou."
"Well, yes," Konata said. "And that somebody else was Natsumi Matsumoto, the mangaka who wrote Yumeiro Pâtissière. That's the story that you're all in."
"I'm inclined to believe these young ladies," the other boy said. "They do look like the characters from the Lucky Star manga."
Miyuki turned to Konata. "I thought Kazari-san said we were from an anime."
"I wouldn't be surprised if both of our stories were turned into anime," Konata replied. She turned back to the others. "And I'm guessing you're Satsuki Hanabusa, right?"
"I am, yes."
"Are your Sweets Spirits here, too?"
"You can't see them?" Ichigo asked in reply while gesturing toward what Konata and Miyuki thought was empty air.
"No, I can't. Darn it."
Miyuki mentioned, "Neither of us are pastry chefs. Why should we be able to see them?"
Konata muttered, "Because I was hoping that might have been my power here. We're isekai characters now, we should have powers."
"We don't have powers," Mari pointed out.
Konata replied, "But you do have Sweets Spirit allies."
"Well," Ichigo said, "you have perfect fluency in French. The rest of us, even your friend Takara-san, have Japanese accents."
"You do, don't you? I wonder why that is. Maybe Cassiopée-san knows why. Oh! You have to meet Cassiopée-san! Come over for lunch!"
Before the others could reply, Miyuki said, "Are you sure you should be inviting them over? Mme. Bright was planning something special."
"You heard what Kagamin said. There's going to be plenty of food."
"Still, we should bring something to help out if we're dropping in unannounced," Mari insisted.
"That sounds like we're accepting their offer," Makoto commented.
"We are. They seem to know more about what happened to us than we do." Mari turned back to Konata and Miyuki. "How many people will there be at the dinner table?"
"There were fourteen of us before Konata invited you," Miyuki replied.
Mari looked at what was left in the display case, then turned to the other pâtissiers. "Ichigo, select gâteaux moka for two dozen people. Sennosuke, put the 'closed' sign in the window, draw the blinds, and lock the front door. Makoto, make sure the ovens are turned off and the windows are closed. Satsuki, you and I will put what's left of today's stock in the refrigerators. Let's not keep our new friends waiting!"
After locking the back door behind them, the group made its way to the back door of the apartment complex.
"Bright-san?" Konata asked as she opened the door. "Can we squeeze in five more displacees for dinner?" She walked into the dining room, letting Miuyki guide their visitors behind her.
Cassiopée replied to Konata without looking up from the bottles at the dining room's bar. "Displacees are always welcome. If it were any other day, we might have had a problem, but today we should have enough food to go around. We simply won't have as much food left over for tomorrow. Five more for dinner, and since I'm making the [url="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caribou_(drink)]cariboo[/url] right now, I'll mix an extra pitcher."
"Ten more," Medea said quietly while she and Kagami moved to add another table to the long row of tables, "and you five are the cutest eidolons I've ever seen."
"You can see us?" Honey asked in amazement.
"Of course I can," Medea replied matter-of-factly. "I am a master mage."
Cassiopée wondered why Medea appeared to be talking to empty air, but assumed there was a reason for it and didn't interfere. Instead, she turned to the displacees who she could see... and gasped in surprise. They weren't newcomers.
"Mlle. Tennouji, you're a displacee?"
"Is that what people like Mlle. Izumi and Mlle. Takara are called?"
"Maudit d'esti," Cassiopée muttered. Then she said in a more normal tone of voice, "Yes, anyone who has been displaced from their home worlds to this one is called a displacee."
Ichigo said, "We were wondering why we couldn't find any trace of St. Marie Academy. Is that because we're in another world?"
"Oh, yeah," Konata replied.
Marie said, "Then we're displacees, yes. Can you explain what that means, please?"
While she continued mixing the pitchers of drinks, Cassiopée gave Mari and the others the quick description: Something or multiple somethings had happened to put various realities at risk, some people were being displaced from their home worlds to the world that displacees had begun to call Refuge when talking amongst themselves, and various divine and infernal beings were working together to end the crisis and provide housing for the displacees while the crisis was ongoing.
At the end of it, Makoto said, "I'd think you're delusional, except that Mlle. Izumi and Mlle. Takara know who we are and we know who they are."
Konata grinned. "We can show you chapters of the manga you're in, if you want. As soon as I find copies."
Cassiopée smiled at Konata's eagerness to help out. "Or we can show you the anime that you're from, later. It's too close to the start of the Christmas feast to do that now. And before you ask the same question that Rin did, no, we won't be serving fried chicken. Where are you living? I know you've been in this world for at least a couple of weeks, and if you're close enough, we might be able to entertain you with a story from your own lives before you have to go home today."
"We've been so busy getting and keeping the shop going that we've been sleeping on bunk beds in the back room," Makoto replied. "And we've been here since... when was it, again?" He looked at what seemed to be empty air, then said, "Thank you, Chocolat. We've been here since September 10."
"Depuis le 10 septembre..." She poured herself a shot of rye whisky from the bottle that she was using to make the cariboo, drank the shot in one gulp, carefully put the empty glass onto the bar, then said, "Crisse de câlice d'esti de tabarnak de sacrament de trou viarge!"
Caramel covered her ears in dismayed shock, which showed on her face; she had always been the most innocent of the Sweets Spirits. Of course, only the other Sweets Spirits, the pâtissières, and Caster could see her. Saber, who was just walking into the room with Rin, scowled in deep displeasure at hearing her landlady taking the Sacraments in vain.
Graheme immediately came running out of the kitchen. "What's wrong?"
"Mlle. Tennouji and her friends are displacees, they've been living here since the day before we moved into the building, and nobody told me about them!"
He sighed in relief. Yes, this was a problem, but not one that rated such an extreme reaction. Quietly and calmly, he said, "Calm down, Cassie. We know now."
"Don't call me 'Cassie' in public."
"Ah, yes, sorry. Relax, dear; it's Christmas. This isn't a time to be upset."
She took a deep breath, let it out slowly, then said, "You're right." Still upset but not acting on the emotion, she turned to the pâtissières to see Sennosuke trying to comfort what she still thought was empty air. "I'm sorry that I never asked my employers about what I needed to know about all of you, I'm sorry if that caused you any inconvenience," then she addressed that spot in the air, "and I'm sorry if my language offended you."
"Oh, think nothing of it," Mari replied.
"And Caramel accepts your apology," Sennosuke added.
Mari continued, "And we hope that you don't mind that we've been sleeping in the back of the shop for the last three months."
"That's something that I can do something about," Cassiopée said, eager to make amends for something that was never under her control. "We have empty furnished apartments above your shop, complete with bedrooms enough for each of you and good-sized bath tubs in the bathrooms. And I'll let you have the first month for free as an apology for you not already living there, if you want to move in."
Ichigo smiled widely. "You have a bath tub?! I've had to make do with showers since we got here!" The brunette turned to her blonde companion. "Mari, they have a bath tub. And we can have bedrooms of our own instead of sharing a bunk bed. And..."
Mari held up one hand in a "stop" gesture. "Ichigo, she had me at 'bath tub'." She turned to Cassiopée as she lowered her hand. "Throw in a bottle of bubble bath and you have a deal."
"I think I can see my way to do that," Cassiopée said with a smile as she offered her hand to Mari. "It's a bit late, but welcome to Appartements Mont-Royal Sud."
"Please take care of us," Mari replied as she shook Cassiopée's hand.
"We're planning on buying basic wardrobes and household sundries for the ladies from Ryouou tomorrow," Cassiopée told her new residents. "You're welcome to join us, should there be anything you'd prefer we buy for you."
"Thank you for the offer, but we do have to work in the shop tomorrow," Makoto pointed out
Mari smiled. "It's Christmas break at McGill and the local offices. Business is slow right now and should remain slow until the new year, unless we get orders to be filled on New Year's Eve. We'll take turns taking time off to go shopping for clothes and household goods. Makoto, since you just volunteered, you, Satsuki, and Sennosuke can keep the shop running tomorrow while Ichigo and I join Mlle. Izumi and Mlle. Takara at the stores."
"My sister and I will be shopping with you, too. I'm Hiiragi Kagami; happy to meet you."
"Tennouji Mari. I'm pleased to meet you, Mlle. Hiiragi." Mari turned back to her co-workers. "And the Mlles. Hiiragi as well."
Grahame smiled and commented, "That's probably for the best. You ladies go have fun shopping tomorrow with my wife; I'll take the young men shopping on the 27th. Now, I do have to get back to the kitchen. Give us another half-hour or so before sitting down."
- RK: This is canon for Yumeiro Pâtissière, and it's also true in the real world. Wood strawberries are subtly different from other strawberries. Should you want to taste-test for yourself (and I recommend you do), the French company Bonne Maman makes both strawberry jam and wood strawberry jam. RMS: Count yourself lucky if you can find their wood strawberry jam. It doesn't seem to be available in my area. RK: Then I'd best provide links, at least to their Canadian website: Strawberry jam and Strawberry and Wood Strawberry Spread.
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| Dougness Squared: Stealth is Optional by Dominik Witka |
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Posted by: classicdrogn - 08-12-2025, 05:04 AM - Forum: The Game Everyone Loves To Play
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There's doing things the quiet way, then there's doing them the Doug way... and then, sometimes, you want to really draw attention and drive enemies into a frothing rage. This song works like a video game Enrage taunt, immediately drawing the attention of any hostile beings within LoS/hearing range and provoling them to attack him. It also super-charges his chaos field effect with a bias toward action-movie set effects like onjects that should be reasonably sturdy breaking or crumpling under impact like sugar-glass and cardboard, reduced damage from falls and collisions, or random patches of fire and explosions, which somehow utterly fail to burst eardrums, throw shrapnel around, raise the local temperature to unendurable levels, or spread out of control.
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![[+]](/images/collapse_collapsed.png "[+]")
Spoiler
