At 09:00 AM 29/10/97 -0500, Matthew Campbell wrote:

Mark Doherty wrote:

Help the Senshi
by Mark Doherty (mdoherty@mailbox.uq.edu.au)

expounded in I'm Here to Help, and it offers a different view on certain
things. This won't be the only one I do from another's view, probably.

Well here's the different view you've been promising.  I had been hoping 
for someone a bit more impartial, but maybe next time.

It's hard to get an impartial view, except for Pluto. And even she's bound
to be biased. However, one of the upcoming views will be from someone who
doesn't think much of either sides, they're the closest to impartial. I don't
really want to do an impartial view, I don't want people saying 'Ahhh... so
that's what REALLY happened.' I want them to wonder, to make up their minds
from the differing accounts, to get some disparate opinions.

The Great Ice was... horrible. It was like a slow-motion dream, thoughts
and feelings warped to a terrible slowness, as cold seeped, seemingly
permanently, into your limbs. When Serenity freed us from that, it was
something... a deed for which I can't even begin to describe how grateful
I was. She had a vision of a future, a better future, free from monsters such
as the ones that had brought about the Ice in the first place.

I notice she gives no credence to the youma-killer's theory that 
Serenity was in fact responsible for the Ice in the first place.  Also, 
it seems like Serenity has a specific plan here, not just a vague dream. 
I wonder if that plan included an absolute necessity for her to rule as 
queen.  Maybe something could have been worked out if the rebels had 
been willing to negotiate.

Negotiation, a question for later...

She was... she is incredible. So calm, so wise, with a quiet power that
speaks to us all. She was a creature of peace, of love, and she had a
bright hope for the future. All she needed to do was to drive out the last
of the darkness from our tainted Earth, so that we could all make peace in
a new, bright world.

I see she wears the same sort of blinders the youma-killer does.  Hers 
are just tinted towards a different shade.

Yes.

Apparently, Sailor Mercury had known one friend or another of mine from the
university I had been going to, and that was how they had found out about me.
They had talked to me, they said, because I'd had some experience with
psychology, having dabbled in it a bit while studying for my medical degree.

Just two more semesters and I would have got it, too.

This bit, more than anything else, makes me feel for the narrator of 
this story.  The fact that she knew Mercury through a friend of a 
friend, that she actually had a normal life and existence, that makes 
her more 'real'.  Good job.

Thanks.

So, I was asked to be there for the people, a soothing reminder of the
protecters of the city, giving whatever help for their minds that I could.
It was exhausting work, with periods of intense emotional pain, from seeing
so much suffering so close-up. But it was so fulfilling too, I was doing
something to help those in need.

Why is she working in Tokyo?  The entire world was under the ice, right? 
That means there should be millions of people all over the world in 
need of relief efforts.  Why does Tokyo get the special treatment?

Cough... er... chapter 4 of I'm Here to Help. Coming soon. ^_^

Just over a month after the ice had receeded, I was walking between the
encampment that housed the Senshi and a lot of other people, and the
broken buildings that contained a lot of the people who still refused to
leave their homes, the people who took comfort in the only thing left that
was familiar to them, the posessions in their ruined abodes.

No magical instant construction here, I see.

Construction of CT tends to be put as after the 'purification', which hasn't
happened yet(It was mentioned in ch2 of IHtH that the rebels attacked just as
the first exiles left. Serenity wouldn't start the process until the people
who didn't want any part of it were out of its effect.)

Out of the acrid smoke, like shadowed angels of death, they ran. Men, women,
beasts, united together like some sort of wolf-pack. All of the humans,
a truly motley bunch, wore the same insignia, a black, upside-down crescent
moon. Some had it painted or tatooed on their foreheads, others had it
sewed into their clothes, and some even wore it on battle flags attached to
their backs. The black moon sent a chill through my spine, such a symbol
could not possibly be meant as a good thing.

They aren't dressed in skirts or tuxedos, of course they're evil. :)

Hey, who said some of them weren't? ^_^

The Neo-Queen. The grim looks in some of their faces... they were going to

So she's already declared herself Neo-Queen.  My, that was fast.

Or been declared, most likely by the other Senshi. They know what must be
done, they've been to the future, they knew what she was going to become.
But I'm not saying who did it, either way. 

attack, going to try and kill the Neo-Queen! Damn them, why? She'd saved us
all, and now they repayed her like this? I'd heard the mutterings about some
people being discontent with the idea of a queen, but this was taking things
too far.

It's hard to judge how right she is here.  

That's the idea. It's hard to judge just how right any of the sides in this
are, because 'right' is so much a matter of the person's perspective.

We aren't privy to how much 
discussion, if any, took place between the senshi and the rebels.  Maybe 
they are attacking without warning, or maybe there have already been 
failed attempts at negotiation.  Personally, I think Serenity had plenty 
of warning.  After all, she had all her senshi grouped around her, 
rather than scattered across the planet helping people.

The views will build on each other, giving little glimpses on what happened
in the lead up to the rebels fighting the Senshi.

Hadn't he been pretty much a good guy up till now? 

You mean as in, wasn't he a good guy until he joined the rebellion? Basically,
although how much he changed from the final fights and the Ice haven't been
covered yet. They will be.

I don't know if he 
could take time in the middle of an attack to drain someone, I guess it 
depends on how long it takes.

Depends on how much energy they've got. In chapter 4 of IHtH, for example, he's
draining someone with a lot of energy, and has time to talk to them. 

I died. And my curse came true, as I hovered over him, my spirit attached to
his destiny.

This is where I lose a lot of sympathy.  What was done to her was 
horrible, no doubt about it.  However, holding onto hate and an oath of 
vengence for six hundred years isn't a good thing.  I can't be sure 
about Serenity, but I'm pretty sure Usagi would have forgiven him.  

But this isn't Usagi. ^_^

This 
girl isn't as noble as she like to believe herself to be.  You can't 
blame her for it, but I don't feel as sympathetic.

nasty monster, or even the Neo-Queen herself. How, HOW can he still be alive,
after the amount of times he should have died? How can he escape whenever the
odds turn against him? Why hasn't Serenity hunted him down?

Why is he still alive?

This is a good question.  Why hasn't Serenity hunted him down?  It 
deserves a good answer.

Heh... John might have had the right answer, in that she's already lived
through his attack in the past. Or it could be something else. Isn't time
travel a major headache?

Why can't my vow come true?

Why can't he just die...?

Why... why can't he just die?

The sad part is, it wouldn't really make her happy if he did.  He still 
feels himself to be perfectly justified.  her spirit might be able to 
beat up on his spirit, but that won't make him say he's sorry.

There he goes, writing down his thoughts again. Perhaps that's the worst

thing

about this miserable little vow of mine. With his poor memory, when he

finally

dies, will he even remember me?

Hmph, probably not. What's he writing this time? I don't see why he does it,
he almost never rereads what he writes anyway. If he did, he'd be a lot less
trouble for the Senshi. Let's see...

I don't understand this remark.  Why would he be a lot less trouble for 
the senshi?

Er... aheh. When I said this was written on the fly, I meant it. I wrote it
in the e-mail program, straight through, as I thought of it. I just simply
forgot to put another line in here, about how if he saw what picture his 
gathered writings painted of him, he'd be too horrified to be trouble. From
her view, of course.

Sweet lord... no. No, he couldn't...

He must be mad from desparation. Sailor Pluto would stop him for sure, time

desperation

Yes.

So is she then aware that Sailor Moon becomes Serenity?

Probably not. We'll never know...

If Pluto wasn't there, if he made it, he was going to kill Neo-Queen Serenity
before she was the Neo-Queen. That monster was going to kill her. Crystal
Tokyo would never be. He was going to destroy it, destroy a happy, peaceful
city.

But if you're still here, that means he didn't succeed.  There's no 
if-then in time travel.

That depends on if you allow for the single time-stream theory, or the 
infinite dimensions one. And if he did succeed, that timeline becomes an
anomoly, perhaps creating a loop in time, so that it continues to exist
in limbo even though its supporting history has been cut off.

He was going to destroy the greatest good on this planet, I could do nothing
about it, and I couldn't cry.

I couldn't even cry.

Hmmm.  Not quite as good as 'I'm Here to Help' but I still enjoyed it.  
Do you just have some sort of problem coming up with character names, or 
what?  

She doesn't need a name. If I wanted to name her, it would probably be
Sailor Procyon, or Sailor Altair. But she doesn't need a name, not in this.

Names are, in themselves, a surprising tool of characterisation. If I took
one character, and named him Fred Smith, would it have the same effect
as calling him Lord Raknard the Terrible Killer what Kills a Lot of People?
I wanted both the original character, the youma killer, and this Sailor girl
to go without names, so that their characterisation could be built on things
other than their name. The YK finally uses (one of) his name(s) in the next
chapter or two, and it's nothing special. It's just a name. He stops being
the nameless, the youma killer, the hater of Serenity, and he simply becomes
that name.

If you create many more of these nameless characters, it's going 
to get awfully complicated refering to them.
Next time I hope we can get a bit more of a detached observer, someone 
not so emotionally involved in the issues.  That's all the commentary 
for now.

Most of the viewers are attached in one way or another, except maybe for
one. It is sort of hard to justify an 'I don't care' attitude right after the
Ice, after all.

************  
Mark Doherty  -  mdoherty@mailbox.uq.edu.au
The Weekly FFML Synopses Lists are at:
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"Time grows short, but I remain tall."