Ah, an El Hazard fic. Well then, I suppose I must, musn't I?
Let it not be said that I do not do C&C....
Hmmm, I think I even make a comment on grammar in here (will wonders
never cease?)
	Well, on with the shew.	

At 05:56 PM 1/8/97 -0800, Tim Williams wrote:

Okay, this has taken quite a while to get done (well, what I have done,
anyway) but that's because I want it to be good.  Read it, and PLEASE
mail me with a comment.  Two sentences are infinitely better than
nothing at all :)  Anyway, any C&C welcome.  Oh, its/it's seems to be
the big weenie in this one.  I'm not sure how many of them I missed when
I was checking it, but I'll make sure that the next draft has them fixed
(I hope).  

This prologue is the best way I've found to get to the end of the 1000th
night (yes, Makoto spends 1001 in El-Hazard, read the fic)  Written
journal style and all.                          

1001 days in El Hazard seems to be popular for some reason, I wonder why....
^_^

Chapter 1 should be included with this when I mail it, but you can
e-mail me for coppies or I might eventually get them put up on my web
page (soon as I remember my address again)

Um, I've err... 'borrowed' these characters and some of the background
and concepts from people with a legal budget greater than my yearly
income, the only thing that I lay claim to is the writing itself.

Oh, and a BIG thankyou to my proofreaders, specificly to Keith Wood and
Larry Fontenot, this would be a lot worse without their help.


			A Thousand Nights of Dreams
	                         Prologue


Night 138
	She waited for me for ten thousand years.  Alone.  Lost in space and
time.  Free for the first time, but bound to oblivion until I would free
her for the second time, for the first time.  More than that, she went
willingly into that oblivion so that I could meet her.  For a woman like
that, how long could I wait?  I'd like to think that I would wait for
her forever, but sometimes I doubt myself.

Seems a bit too melodramatic for Makoto to me, but that's my opinion on 
his character. You may want to change the way you phrased this (it's not
the what, it's the how).

	Even now, as I work to find the key to the Eye of God, I know that I
might never learn it's secrets.  I might never rescue her from her
solitude on Earth.  Even if I did free her from her servitude and give
her soul to her, I built a new cell for her.  A prison made of  a
strange,  alien world and people. She was so close to death the first
time I saw her, I can't help picturing her dying on Earth, a stranger in
a strange land.  There is nothing more frightening than being alone in a
world with five billion other people.  People who don't know her name or
her past.

In a way, Ifurita would be used to being alone; she only recently met Makoto,
the only one who has shown her a gram (ounce, for those who don't use metric)
of compassion. Ifurita was universally feared and despised in El Hazard. On 
Earth, she at least has the chance to meet people who won't a) run away
screaming
or b) try to kill her.

	Of course, I'm not so sure that no one knowing her identity would be
such a bad thing after all that she has done to deserve scorned and
hatred.  I love her with all my heart, but I know that doing so pains

Okay, so Makoto realises my previous comment too. I wonder at the necessity
of this passage, since the conclusion is rather obvious. Perhaps another
angle would help. 
	Makoto seems to be taking too much responsibility for Ifurita's plight
on Earth, as if he did it to her on purpose. He instead might talk about
what he could have done, and what he didn't do-- "the four cruelest words in
the English language are 'it might have been.'" (I know I screwed this quote
up real bad, but still....)This might be a better way of inducing sympathy
and/or pity for Makoto.

those around me.  Even Shayla and Nanami don't chase after me so much
anymore.  We're still friends, I think, but I know that it hurts them
that I care more for HER than I do for them.  They still see her as a
soulless destroyer and I fear that they will grow to hate me for
choosing her over them.  They can't even hope to compete with her. 
She's gone!  She's perfect in my mind, and they can't fight that.

I would change "a soulless destroyer" to "the soulless destroyer," which
makes Ifurita seem even worse. In the former, Ifurita is one face, possibly
among many, and not necessarily the worst. In the latter, Ifurita becomes
a scourge of greater proportions, "soulless destroyer" becomes almost titular.
Or maybe I'm just niggling-- it is after all a very minor thing.
	You also might want to elaborate a bit more on Shayla's and Nanami's 
plight here: "She's perfect in my mind, and they can't fight that" implies
that Makoto knows that the image he has of Ifurita in his mind is not the
real one, and is not something that the others have a chance against, but
it could also imply that Ifurita is the embodiment of perfection to
Makoto, and everyone else (Shayla and Nanami for instance) are a distant
second. If the former, you might have Makoto ponder upon how fair it is
to Shayla and Nanami.

	I grow weary of this loneliness.  I only hope that I'll see SOME
progress with this research soon.  

Methinks he is getting a touch desparate now, is he?
  

Night 294
	It didn't take Mr. Fujisawa and Miz long to begin a family, it seems. 
Today little Fuij Junior was born.  He's quite healthy and happy and
even the subject of a full day of feasting and merrymaking.
	Unfortunately, it didn't last.  Jinnai lead another raid on the palace
in the middle of the afternoon.  He might have gotten me, too, if
Fujisawa hadn't been so upset by the interruption of the celebration of
his son's birth that he bodily ejected the entire force singlehandedly.
	After a beating of that magnitude, it's going to take him a while
before he's able to muster the forces to lead another raid like that. 

	You might want to stress the size of the force Jinnai led if it will
take him a while to ready more forces like that. Also, Makoto's brushing
off of the attempt on his life seems a little quick to me; Makoto was never
one to not care about danger like that. A little elaboration on how close
Jinnai actually got to Makoto before Fujisawa came to the rescue might be a
good idea.

At least, I hope it will.  This is the third time he's stormed into the
palace, and I'm not sure how many more I can survive.

	You might want to talk about the first two attempts too (a brief
description, pointing out the differences between this attempt and the
other two would be sufficient).

Night 659
	Shayla left.  I don't blame her, either.  How could she still bear to
be near me?  I, the one that chose the monster over her.  That's what
they call her, the monster.  I might have been happier if I'd just
forgotten about Ifurita and chosen one of the girls who adored me so,
but it's far too late for that now.

	Regrets? I've had a few, but I did it MY wa-a-a-a-ay.
(apologies to Mr. Sinatra)
	I like this bit, for the might-have-been approach.

	I couldn't do it.  Instead, I buried myself in tomes and ruins, seeking
my answers.  If I had just let Ifurita go, I might have found something
with Nanami.  I might have been happy with any of the girls, for that
matter.  Even Rune Venus has hinted at least once that I would make a
suitable husband for a princess.  Though, I'm still not sure whether she
wants me for herself, or she wants me to marry her sister.

The last sentence doesn't seem quite right to me. It's the "Though," don't
start off with "though," which should be used to splice together sentences,
and not start them (though it doesn't always have to be used to splice two
sentences together, it is just that in this case it should).

	Like anyone in his right mind would marry Fatora. Hah!  
	No, I don't really mean it like that.  She is nice enough, though still
controlling and self-centered.  Much of her initial anger was due to her
ordeal.  Someone so used total control over her life doesn't react well
to being powerless.  She has matured quite a bit in this last year.  A
few months ago, she actually began to search for a husband.  I'm not
sure that she really has to do it, but her sister thinks it better that
there be more than just two princesses in case the Eye is needed again.

Fatora swings both ways does she? Well, actually I don't recall seeing
anything to the contrary. It is possible after all, so why not?
Of course, it could all be a ploy to get Rune Venus off her back about
getting a husband....

It was far too easy for the Phantom Tribe to cripple the kingdom in this
last war.
	Well, Shayla is still missing.  No one is quite certain where she went,
but I think that she might be searching for someone to love.  At least,
I hope that's what has happened. I really hate for her to be miserable
because of me, but I can't love her.  Wherever she went, I hope she
finds happiness. 
	The other girls?  Well, I haven't seen Afura for several months now. 
The last that I heard, she was still in search of a new priestess to
replace Miz now that she's happily married.  Of course, Miz won't be in
any state to do much for a couple months.  She's well on her way to a
big family, it seems.  Little Fuji Junior is already growing to be a
strong lad and I hope his new brother or sister is like him.  Mr.
Fujisawa himself?  Well, it's strange to see him doting on his wife like
he does.  He even came back from the newest Bugrom front to see her
through this pregnancy.
	Of course, leaving the front of the Bugrom "army" isn't that great a
sacrifice.  It's nothing like it once was and they mostly confine
themselves to raids on small border towns.  Sometimes I wonder what
Jinnai is up to, he hasn't tried to kill me in almost half a year now.
	Almost everyone around here is so happy it almost hurts not to be able
to join in with them, but I have a duty to my true love.
	Oh, god, it's almost dawn.  If Fujisawa sees that I didn't sleep again
tonight, I'll have to listen to another of his lectures on how I'm
working too hard.  Personally, I think that I'm not working hard
enough.  I know that I'm just missing one vital piece of the puzzle, and
once I have that, I can be with my Ifurita again.


Night 762
	Little Hito was born today.  I've never seen Mr. Fujisawa so nervous,
either.  You'd have thought that the second child wouldn't be such a
shock, but I guess he's still nervous about that last attempt on my
life.  Jinnai is starting to really bug me, but I can't leave my
research for the length of time it would take to capture him, so I just
have to be careful, I guess. 

One would think that Makoto would be guarded rather well by now, considering
the four (that we know of) attempts on his life. That he is only starting to
get annoyed by now seems a little on the incredulous. Some elaboration, a
quick
sketch, of the last attempt, and a explanation as to how Jinnai was able to
get through this time would be nice too.
 

	Someone, bless his soul, managed to find a reasonable facsimile of
tobacco so we that we could have cigars.   Everyone showed up for it,
too and the feast will probably last all week.  Shayla even turned up. 
She was searching for relics in the eastern kingdoms.  It seems that she
has decided that if she can't have me, she wants to make sure that I
actually get my girl.  I don't deserve friends like these, but I'm not
going to argue since these relics look so promising.
	The Eye has been repaired of what little damage it sustained from it's
last prolonged usage, and I believe the Stairway to the Sky to be free

>from the Phantom Tribe's sabotage once again.  However, the Eye itself

has yielded few clues as to the source of it's power.

	
Night 874
	The secrets of the Eye of God are lost to me, it seems!  I've searched
so long, and found nothing.  I received news not long ago that a
research facility of the ancients had been uncovered, along with some of
the original plans of the Eye.  However, before I could get a hold of
the items, they were stolen by raiders.  I suspect Jinnai, but it could
have been anyone.
	It appears that my answers do not lie directly with the technology of
the Eye.  Tomorrow, I leave for the forbidden island.  I have a hunch
that if I can understand the workings of Ifurita's powers, I may be able
to duplicate the process by which she gained the power that let her send
us to El-Hazard.


Night 922
	Eureka! I have found it!  The ruins under the eastern edge of the
Desert of Bleached White Bones have yielded much knowledge about how the
demon gods were created.  The technology doesn't exist to create
another, but the Power Key Staff seems to be the key to capturing the
technology I need from the Eye.


Night 1000
	It is done.  I've discovered that the Staff has a backup computer
system built into it by the ancients for maintenance purposes.  It even
has the circuits needed to record and repeat attacks directed toward
it.  It seems that this is they best hope that I'm going to find, so I'm
going for it.  The priestesses have agreed that they will unshield the
Eye again for this so that I may make my attempt.  

	There is a kind of sense that the Staff would also have the circuits.
After all, Ifurita needs to be "wound-up" with it to regain energy, at which
it seems like she collects ambient energy from around her, especially through
the Staff. Add in that Ifurita generally focuses her attacks through the
Staff,
which she has even said is an extension of herself, and we get the ability to
duplicate attacks-- when wielded by someone who can interface with the Staff,
such as Makoto is able to via his psychometry.

	The princesses will open a passage for me in the desert, to prevent
anyone else from being accidentally sucked into the void with me.  I
don't blame them, personally.  No one in his right mind would want to
enter that vortex.
	Perhaps I'm not quite in my right mind anymore?  Now I risk all for
her.  If, no, WHEN this works, I'm heading straight for earth.  Please,
god, don't let me fail her.

Overall: I liked it. Further proof that El Hazard writers are superior to
the common lot (everyone! Write El Hazard fics if You! Too! want to be
acknowledged as superior to the common lot. Offer ends in 90 days. 
Satisfaction guaranteed or your money back [yes, I am strange. You should
have seen me a couple of years ago. I never frothed at the mouth, but that's
about all I can say....]).
	Cut down on the melodrama early on (it tapers down to what is to me
"acceptable levels" as it progresses), and pump up the elaboration on some
points. Even though it is written "journal style" and a certain glossing
over may be forgiven, some points seem to large for Makoto to just pass
over without doing much more than mentioning that they exist.

Chapter one? I'll comment on it later tonight, or possibly tomorrow.
I read it, found it intriguing, but my C&C muscles are out of shape, and need
a bit of time to recuperate (does the Atlas bodybuilding kit work them too?
I could become a mega-C&Cer in a mere 90 days...).



Matthew "Shortfics are a way of life" Lewis
	maybeso@ican.net
___________________________________________________
The Second Question:
 What happens when you win?
   When your enemies are at your mercy: how will 
you act then? Compromise is the temptation of the
weak; this is the test for the strong.
What are you going to do?
	-Salman Rushdie, The Satanic Verses
___________________________________________________