*Please comment only on this and previous chapters to avoid spoiling.
Holy shet, this is talky. (T)he dialogue was giving me a lot of trouble. Eeeek. Remind me never to do such a talky chapter again. Edit: Thanks for the comments that it wasn’t as confusing as I thought it was (I think I just confused myself with my editing because I was losing everyone’s train of thought in the process). Heh.
Now, I have to admit up front that I wasn’t so interested in Mai while watching the series. It’s not that I disliked her at all; I was just less interested in her angsting over Yuuichi than other stuff (besides one of the best death scenes I’ve ever seen ^^;). Still, she’s a nice person–certainly someone who could be a decent friend in real life, I think, compared to many of the other characters, and I definitely see her as a positive social influence on Natsuki, so I think it’s not too far of a stretch to have her play the psychologist since she got the bigger role in the series. Ugh, but I’m no psychologist, either. :( I hope I didn’t screw up their psychology too badly.
Look up recipes for nikujaga; it really is a classic homestyle dish.
*P.S.: Yes, I ended up skipping a lot of theoretical dialogue. I just left it understood that Natsuki explained in greater detail what happened between her and Shizuru at the end of the HiME festival, minus that one part. I mean, the readers already know. Trying to write good dialogue takes too much work.
Special 1.1-1.3 timeline notes, or jump to the next chapter: 1.4
I love your chapter
I really like this chapter. I would say it’s my favorite so far (although Shizuru wasn’t in it)! I think the dialogue between Mai and Natsuki was very intense and revealing. I think having Mai playing the “psychologist†was a very efficient way to have Natsuki reveals her worries. & I think their interactions were very real. Your story is getting more and more interesting and I am anxious at reading your next chapter! Keep up the good work and your keyboard rolling!!!
I can’t wait to read ShizNat discussion… I have a feeling it’s going to be a quite painful one. I just love writers’ play with emotions…
Thanks for this great story!
Re: I love your chapter
Oh, good. I’m relieved at least one person wasn’t confused to hell by this. ;D (Frankly, I think my confusion and rewriting it two or three times was a lot more painful for me than either Natsuki or Mai. Ha!)
Thanks.
Re: I love your chapter
Really, you thought the dialogue could be confusing? Well certainly not for me… because you know… Natsuki is Natsuki after all, she says one and makes you guess ten hehehehehehehehehe… we all start to know her quite well now… not as much as Shizuru but almost :o)
Seriously, I though Mai’s comments were very mature and insightful. Natsuki is lucky to have her as her second friend :o)
Keep it up!
There is only ONE thing that is really irritating me throughout all of the chapters…this [click] thing. Hopefully, you’ll explain it soon or just leave it out altogether…it’s too distracting and though I love the chapters, the dialogue, pacing, etc, that thing is what’s keeping me from enjoying. My apologies for being too blunt but after three chapters, it’s driving me nuts.
Hnn interesting turn of events, Kuga is finally getting a nice kick to the head and I loved the dialogue you used to show that :D.
Heres a good luck to your next chapter, I’ll be keeping my tabs on this XD.
Thanks. Poor Kuga..
I’m sort of in love with this story so far and really interested in seeing where this is going. (And the [click]ing is certainly more intriguing to me than annoying.) Your Mai/Natsuki interaction was just fantastic. I’m working on a fic of my own and for some reason am finding Mai impossible to write, but you did a great job.
(Hope you don’t mind if I friend this journal, I just want to know when you update.)
Huh, forgot about that friending feature; maybe I’ll take advantage of it in the future… Hmmm. Omake chapters… ;)
holy hell. i really really like this chapter. all we need is more shizuru/natsuki/mai interaction and then we’ll have a 3-SoME. sorry, that’s a reference to another fic, but really, i love how mai is doing some teasing on natsuki. natsuki really makes it alllll so easy to do so.
O_O 3-huh…. No, I’m probably better off not knowing. :P
well…you probably are better off not knowing while you are writing a fic. i think it might…uh, distort your brain. it’s really a very hilarious fic in AU. And in there Mai is really OOC. though if you really ever get curious enough i’ll be more than willing to share that story.
This story is pure awesome. Honestly, I thought the dialogue was written very well. Natsuki’s lines were very Natsuki-like, and Mai’s were very Mai-like. No confusion whatsoever :D
Also, I think just because of the way you presented Mai made me like her a bit more than I used to. Haha, sometimes when I read really convincing/good fics I tend to get sucked away from reality somewhere in the midst of it all.
Keep up the good work!
Ha ha, poor Mai. :P But yeah, I’d like to think all the characters improved at the end of the series, so that’s what I tried to keep in mind for her.
Heya, I just got to read your story today, and really enjoyed it. ^_^
Hmm. The [click] thing got me thinking. >.< May I throw a wild guess or two? Loool. Ermmm... Is someone tapping them or taking photographs of them? I'm just being silly here. Please don't take my guesses too seriously. :)
The dialog in chapter 3 was not confusing. I found it nice, and you seemed to keep their trains of thoughts just fine. However, I felt that the dialog kinda went… Question. Answer. Question. Answer. Question. Answer. It’s a little too telling. Just a thought, yes.
All in all, this fic is good! Please update soon!
~Icemera
Re:Q&A ;)
True that, but this was really the only way I felt a natural dialogue could go between them on that subject because (a) Natsuki isn’t the type to volunteer opinion/self-reflection to begin with (explaining the general circumstances was fine because that’s factual), and (b) the fact that Natsuki was confused about the current situation meant Mai really had to be the interviewer to guide the entire conversation. Psychologically speaking, I felt this was the most natural way for it to go… without rambling way too much, that is. I’m sure Natsuki’s head can go in circles, but writing that would’ve killed my fingers. ^^
Heh. Heh. It’s all good, yow. Do as you please. ^^ Here I’ll wait for the next update!
Yep, I still love it. It wasn’t confusing, really. I went and read it twice, and had fun with it. Playing backround music while reading is interesting. I hope to get through the whole of what you’ve written so far by the end of today. Dinner? Bah. Who needs dinner?
~Naolin
Thanks. ^^
Oh, don’t make me the party responsible for making someone faint from hunger. That’s bad karma. :P
Yay, I’ve entered the realm of 1.3-dom now.
And first off, I think it’s good that you left the theoretical dialogue thing alone, since it would just be repetitive for most readers. The beauty of fanfiction is how you’re building upon it. After all, there really is no point in reinventing the wheel. =)
You would probably just lose my interest for a bit if you went and actually got Natsuki to explain this and that about the HiME thing. It’s better to have Natsuki sort of dance around the subject, and the not mentioning of the previous and theoretical dialogue is even better, since it sort of emphasises on the general taboo-ness of that topic as far as the HiMEs are concerned.
I mean, really.
Even though they had a fairy tale ending (this reminds me of the song sung by Alyssa), it simply cannot be fun talking about how they were killing each other’s Childs (Children? It sounds weird with “Children” though) and in essence, killing off the people they hold dearest to each other.
And in regards to a previous comment by someone else: I think the “Question. Answer. Question. Answer.” thing works best; it’s very Mai-like to do the guiding and prodding, and it’s also very Natsuki-like to be generally uncooperative and not volunteering information on her own.
If Natsuki started spilling her guts and wailing into Mai’s shoulder then… yeah, we’ve got a problem. ^^;
Eh, I think it’s better if you don’t have two “drops” so close to each other.
“… ran to put (down?) the sugar in the kitchen”?
Heh, the teasing at the beginning about the “date” (Natsuki: it’s NOT a date!!) and Natsuki’s cooking was rather cute and funny.
Mmm, a large part of it flows really well and I don’t have any suggestions, really, from the cooking lesson chunk.
However, I think it would be better here, if you cut out the first “even”, since it wouldn’t be an “even”, since Haruka and Yukino know, of course.
Ah, you make a good point there. Natsuki really isn’t that dense, but since she never had a friend, she wouldn’t know that what Shizuru’s doing is obviously because she like-likes her.
Oh, and I want to point out how I like the way you got Natsuki to think about the whole thing. I mean, we usually get Shizuru’s side, since it’s “easier” that way. Making Shizuru pine away is a lot easier than delving into Natsuki’s head since Shizuru’s feelings are rather apparent. I mean, of course they’re not going to talk about it just like that, and it’s kind of like the “toast and eggs” thing. It made perfect sense to you, but when I read it, it just wasn’t in that way and if I weren’t corresponding with you, I would’ve just left it at that, and… you know? It’s just that things left unsaid just sits there like that, and things grow from it.
But of course you know. =P Since you were the one who wrote it out like that.
Good job. This is a very good chapter– lots of insights into their frame of mind.
-I
You’re just blazin’ away, eh? ^_^
I was waffling over the QA thing, and then I had a “brilliant” idea to improve Mai’s end of the conversation with inner dialogue.
And then I recently realized that would be such a bad idea. I mean, the whole purpose of inner dialogue is to explore the person’s mindset about something in context, and the only thoughts that Mai would have in this context would be about Mikoto, Tate, or Takumi, I think (expression of love, etc.), which would mean more research/review and crep. I really want to avoid getting into Mai’s head too much that way–I mean, she’s not the main character here. ^_^; So I guess the original reasoning is best for me, still.
Oh, I’ll drop a “drop” and an “even.” That’s easy enough. Yummy redundancy.
> It made perfect sense to you, but when I read it, it just wasn’t in that way and if I weren’t corresponding with you, I would’ve just left it at that, and… you know? It’s just that things left unsaid just sits there like that, and things grow from it.
But of course you know. =P Since you were the one who wrote it out like that.
…You really lost me somewhere there. XD;;; This chapter was bad enough to write already, don’t play with my head in the comments!
Aha, I wouldn’t be interested in getting in Mai’s head at any rate. And it doesn’t really add to the story in that it doesn’t really help with the plot. Mind, I know this is character-driven, so my point about how it doesn’t help with the plot doesn’t really matter and is mostly irrelevant.
But what I care about most is the Shiznat component. =D
If you delve into Mai’s head, there’s no point to it unless you’re going to go through her life too and whatnot.
So, really, I don’t really give a darn as long as all the secondary characters act in character. Heh.
*waves a Fujino flag*
Yay for Fujino!
I read your post about having doctored pictures up for the new characters, and I felt like volunteering my artistic abilities for it, though that’s ludicrously out of character for me, so I guess this is mostly pointless, then. And I assure you, my drawing skills aren’t like… well, “crep”, as you might say.Eh, I’m going to take a break from reviewing. I don’t know if it’s because your writing improved as you progressed or if I’m just a lazy bum, but I see fewer mistakes and fewer problems.
-I
I’ll just post the descriptions first… I might be able to get a friend to doctor some pics for me, but we’ll see; I might even call for artistic volunteers later, and not necessarily just for the new character profiles. I’m not terribly worried either way. ^_~
(Oooh, I can do it, too! …Okay, I definitely won’t do it very often. In fact, let’s not encourage it too much. ^_^;;)
Thanks for your efforts.
Aw, darn, the mysteriousness of the scrolling text is no more. =(
LAZY BUM WINS