"Douglas MacDougall" <dougmacd@dougmacd.net> wrote:
(I'm no longer reading anything marked as a teaser, draft,
or incomplete, so this is my first time reading this part.)
So noted. Wording and grammar suggestions noted and (mostly) snipped.
[Disclaimer, URL to old parts *and* a summary snipped.
If only all multi-part stories had this...]
Don't expect the summary with every chapter... I put one with this one
because it had been a looooong time since the last complete one.
"Don't underestimate me, 'General.' I may be one mere human
being, but I'm an elder Amazon warrior. And unlike your major, I know my
opponents. He might fail, but I won't."
GENERAL: Wouldn't a Amazon warrior in her
prime be better than an elder warrior?
ZHEN BIAOZI: [whack!]
No, her reaction would be more like "Heh heh heh" and smiling to herself
at the secret that will be revealed in a later chapter. :)
suggest: I'm an Amazon warrior and elder
(Elder as a title connotes power, but you're using it as an adjective to
modify Amazon warrior. It sounds like she's calling herself decrepit.)
Okay, that'll work.
Lieutenant Batachikhan did as he was told. No doubt the Amazon
behind him -- Shan Pu was the name he'd heard for her -- would kill him
in an instant if he didn't follow instructions. He had no idea why they
hadn't done away with him already. They were all crazy, these 'Amazons,'
every last one of them. Nothing but cold-blooded killers.
SHAMPOO: Nonsense! Blood still is hot when we kill you! [bounce]
LIEUTENNANT: Er, actually, I was talking about *your* blood...
I *suppose* that's one way to indirectly show that Shampoo's been
running around, but like the guy said, a cat?!? And for all he knows
it's a tomcat... ^_^;;;
Maybe you should make this more obviously a joke. "Even *that* pussy's
starting to look good to me." Not that I would even condone the use of
a pun, of course...
Of course. :) Actually this whole character is an in-joke, one that
apparently only Alan got.
Genma nodded sagely at Ryoga. "Patience, boy. The acts of
sabotage we'll be carrying out will serve two purposes: First, to weaken
our opponents, but more importantly, to enrage them -- to the point that
when the time comes, they'll rush into a confrontation that we've set up
on our own terms."
GENMA: And finally, to steal the food.
RYOGA: To weaken them more?
GENMA: No, because I'm hungry. The Amazons make great buffets...
GENMA: *munch munch*
AKANE: I'm back! I put those chemicals in the food, just like you asked!
GENMA: *urp* Excuse me....
Shan Pu's face twisted angrily. The others rolled their eyes and
looked away.
Rolling their eyes implies to me that the others are thinking "Oh,
brother, not this again." Is that what you meant? I kinda thought
that this would make the others seriously uneasy, rather than
dismissive.
Good point. I'll change this.
On the other hand, as the old saying went, turnabout was fair
play. Sure, Kodachi could beat her in physical combat with one ribbon
tied behind her back. But when it came to verbal sparring, there were
some pretty obvious holes in her defenses.
Such as? :j The Kodachi from the manga didn't have any. (Or at
least, ones that she'd admit). I haven't seen any real differences
with this Kodachi.
Maybe not, but that doesn't mean Akane can't think she's found one.
"And I do mean *last,*" Akane continued. "I mean, you'd probably
have married the neighbors' dog sooner than her."
It always comes back to Ukyo with you, doesn't it? [sigh]
I meant Bess, of course. Ukyo's not... er, she's not a neighbor. :)
For a second, hate flashed in Kodachi's eyes, a fire so intense
that Akane and Shan Pu should've been instantly burnt to cinders. Then
her usual condescending smirk returned, as if none of this were
particularly important.
Hmm. Odd reaction.
Actually, since (a) they've run off (b) this is from Akane's point
of view, and (c) Akane is obviously looking at Shampoo, how do we
know what Kodachi's reaction is? Especially in her eyes?
They didn't run off that far, and Akane glanced back over at Kodachi.
Um... Why the heck would they park vehicles bumper to bumper?
Wouldn't that make it harder to mobilize them? I'll retract the
question if some military-type told you this is how it's done.
No, but I figured that Amazons wouldn't have much in the way of decent
parking space. But I'll retract this line if people really think it
doesn't work.
"He got... we chased him off." Yuan glanced past the rows of
wrecked radiators and punctured tires. "But at least we stopped him
before he could damage anything!"
Wouldn't that lie have worked much better without the massive
evidence to the contrary?
It's not a lie. Ranma himself didn't damage anything. :)
Yes, I'd say drugs falls neatly outside the acupuncture/acupressure/
moxibustion categories... As for Pink and Link, didn't they "subjugate"
Ranma and Shampoo with plants?
Aren't plants herbs? Am I missing some subtle distinction here?
Akane sprang into the air, and landed on the roof, causing the
whole hut to shake. It was empty. The attacker was already gone. How
could anyone have gotten away so fast?
Huh? What was empty? Grammatically it would have to be the hut
(how can a *roof* be empty?) but then how could she see inside?
The roof was empty in the sense of no one standing on it.
Akane leapt from the roof. She felt helpless, so very
vulnerable. If she hadn't moved at that instant, she'd have been turned
into... what? A mouse? An ant, to be squashed under her unknown
attacker's foot? Something even worse?
Golly, she's getting paranoid about the curses. I'm sure Amazon
just dropped their water and ran away, too embarrassed to admit
their clumsiness. ;)
AMAZON 1: Be careful! There might be someone down there.
AMAZON 2: Nah, it's just a non-cursed human being.
"Uh... don't mention it." He nodded feebly, for a moment
imagining a myriad of possibilities. Then he pushed off the rock, and
his feet landed on solid ground. Why would she ever be interested in
him? And even if she normally might be, this wasn't the time. He
couldn't ask her out on a date when they were about to fight a battle to
rescue her village. And after that, he'd be gone. No matter how he
looked at it, it seemed that Hikaru Gosunkugi was going to end up alone.
Hmm. This reads both as a little too angsty and a little too cheesy
for me. I have to say, if Gos ends up with Ti Pi, it'll feel way too
much like wish fulfillment to me. :p
See how you feel after it plays out. I'm intentionally making him
somewhat self-centered and whiny here in order to set up for some
character development to come.
Against one wall stood the ancient blue urn that
Great-grandmother had bought nearly a hundred years ago.
If Cologne was herself about a hundred years old,
does that mean she bought it was she was in infant?
Only in the sense that every flashback in Ranma 1/2 happened ten years
prior to the series. :)
The martial artists quickly charged out of the hole that Ryoga's
Breaking Point attack had made. The spiritual energy of the Amazons
coursed through them, energizing, supercharging like a rocket engine in
a compact car.
Um... Wouldn't that be a Bad Thing? ^_^
Depends. If the road were reasonably straight, and.... :)
Ranma and Akane leapt toward the squad on the left. Ranma
systematically took out opponents by strikes to nerve clusters. Akane
protected his back, knocking into the springs any of the soldiers who
managed to get a gun pointed in her husband's direction.
Hmm. I can see why you didn't bring it up earlier -- so as not to
spoil the surprise -- but I'd expect to see some reference to Ranma
worrying about Akane being near Jusenkyo, or Akane worrying about
Ranma being near the springs she thinks has an evil intelligence to,
or her own fears about being cursed.
I'll see what I can do in this regard.
A gunshot flashed. Tatewaki collapsed to the ground, clutching
at his chest. He staggered in shock, trying to stand as he watched his
blood trickle down into a puddle on the ground.
Would anything really form puddles in the rain? I'd think
it'd either get soaked into the soil or spill into a pool.
(Disturbing thought, that.)
So whatever falls in the pool next turns into the blood of Kuno? ^_^;;
"Oh." Tofu shook his head slightly. "I'm afraid Tatewaki is type
B. He'd need a donor of type B or O."
"Like I said, no problem." Ranma concentrated for a moment,
bringing his female body into being. "I'm type O."
Not ascribing to the "The Spring of Drowned Girl turns Ranma into
what he would have been if he'd been born female" theory, I see...
Nope. Actually, the blood type difference between Ranma's forms was
established back in prelude 10.
"Huh? How did *that* happen?" He'd slipped back into male form
without thinking about it, without even noticing it.
No doubt a sign of bad things to come. :)
Yup. :)
"The second question I can't answer," Lan said, smiling wryly.
"But as to the first... he's an old acquaintance of yours."
Herbie?
Maybe. :)
I think you might have shot yourself in the foot C&C-wise by
posting For A Dying Friend, first. It's a oneshot and shorter,
so it makes a much nicer C&C target.
You may be right. Didn't really have much choice, as I had to wait for
prereader responses on HaM. It's not easy to get people to read a series
as lengthy as this one, and I'd hoped that people who liked 4aDF and
hadn't read this series yet would give it a try. Oh well. Hopefully the
amount of response will be better for part 5, and I can start releasing
the hostages. :)
I'll be blunt. The premise doesn't really suit me at all. The Ranma
cast years later I can deal with -- I liked the preludes. But Ranma
goes to war against a conventional army? Doesn't work for me.
Fair enough. Though I hope you'll stick around long enough to see some
of the reasons behind it all. But if you don't, I certainly understand.
That having been said, I liked the dialogue, and the characterization
(with the exception of Kodachi). There were a couple examples of
inderect explanations that worked pretty well.
What was the problem with Kodachi? Could you explain?
Normally, the Ukyo/Mikado thing would interest me, but it feels
completely tacked on to this story. I hope this subplot wasn't
just added on to give Ukyo something to do.
Like much in this story, the point of this subplot will be clearer
later... I hope. :)
Well, that's about it. I guess you should mark this as an
"indifferent" response. ;)
That's cool. As always, I appreciate your taking the time to C&C this,
even though you were indifferent to it. :)
Gary Kleppe
http://www.execpc.com/~kleppe/comics.html