[FFML] Re: [Sm/Ranma][X-over][Lime][2nd Draft] All My Outers: Prologue


Grammar suggestions scattered throughout.  Overall impressions at the end.

--- "Sam Vilsmeier" <syp104@email.psu.edu> wrote:


The characters in this story belong to their respective creators and rights
holders.
Ranma 1/2 is the creation of Rumiko Takahashi. Sailor Moon is the creation
of Naoko
Takeuchi. All original content is the creation of Samuel Phoenix.

All My Outers...
Prologue: Here Comes the Brides
PsyckoSama (syp104@psu.edu)

Ranma let out a low groan as he opened his eyes to the day. Bright. It
was just was too damn bright. The morning sunlight was like two hot


Damn is a verb.  It means to condemn.  To use it as an adjective, you need to take a participle, most probably the past participle in this case.  Thus, you want "too damned bright."

daggers of solar hellfire burning into his eyes sockets.


That should be "eyes' sockets" (the sockets that belong to eyes) or "eye sockets" (eye becomes an adjective modifying sockets).  The latter is the way the phrase is most often expressed.

He clamped his eyes shut, and let him mind wander. What the hell was


The comma in this line is superfluous.  "Let him mind wander" would not be a complete sentance on its own, so there should not be a comma before and.

Also, that should be "let his mind wander."  Him is the masculine object pronoun; his is the masculine possessive pronoun.

going on? Slowly, through a clouded mind, he considered his current
state. His eyes were supersensitive. It took everyone a moment to
adjust to the light level when they woke up in the morning, but this
was ridiculous.

He also had problems thinking. While most people would think that was
normal, it was not. While he would loath to admit it, the only thing


A verb is needed in the opening clause of this sentace.  Either "he would be loath" or "he was loath" depending on the exact meaning you want.

quicker than his mind, was his mouth. Right now that was not the case.


The comma in this line is superflous.  In fact, I believe it is probably incorrect to have a comma there--that comparison is a single clause.

He was light headed, and his mind was working more slowly.


You probably don't need the comma in the this sentance, but I do not believe there is anything wrong with having one there.  My preferance would be to remove it.

He had no idea where he was or what he was doing here, but he sure as
hell felt strange. Like some kind of mist had been lifted from his
eyes.


This paragraph ends with a fragment.  You can easily join it to the previous sentence by replacing the period with either a colon or a dash.  A dash would probably be better, as colons are not usually used in fiction.

What the hell was this pressure on his chest? He slowly shifted his
body, and felt some form of weak resistance when he moved his arms.
Suddenly, the pressure shifted. Ranma's mind went into immediately


You have a dangling modifier in this sentance.  From its positioning, 'immediately' should modify 'overdrive'.  However, this makes no sense, since immediately is an adverb and overdrive is a noun.  Assuming you want it to modify went, you need to either place before went or after overdrive, thus:

"immediately went into overdrive."

or

"went into overdrive immediately."

overdrive. It was then that he realized what was probably going on.

Slowly, he forced his eyes open, fighting the pain. He did not like
what he saw as his vision cleared.

He was in bed with four people. Four naked people. Four very *female*
naked people.


You have two fragments here, but it is probably okay to leave them.  The occaisional fragment as a deliberate stylistic choice is acceptable, especially in cases such as this where there is no easy way to combine them into (a) complete sentance(s) without rephrasing in such a way as to lose much of the impact.

The on his on his chest was a small, cute, black haired


"The one on his chest" perhaps?  Looks to be a typo.

girl in her mid teens, fourteen, fifteen at best. The girl on his left


You have a comma splice here.  I would suggest replacing the comma after teens with a dash.

was a beautiful and had aquamarine hair. On his right was a healthy


"was a beautiful . . ." what?  Articles--a, an, and the--are only used before nouns.  Either remove the article or add a noun after the adjective beautiful.  If you choice the latter, you will also need to rephrase the rest of the sentance, most probably:

"was a beautiful (noun) with aquamarine hair."

Some list members would question your use of hair colors, but I refuse to get into that argument.

but tomboy-ish blond, and there appeared to be a shock of dark green


You probably want blonde here.  Blond is the masculine form.

hair at the foot of the bed.

Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit! He was the filling of a girl sandwich. No
ifs, ands, or buts about it: Akane was going to *kill* him, slowly and


Normally, I would reccommend against using colons in fiction.  However, it seems to fit here.

painfully... and if she didn't, Shampoo and Ukyo would finish the job.


Technically, an ellipsis should have a space before and after each dot, thus:  painfully . . . and.  However, this can lead to unfortunate problems with wordwraps in electronic documents.

Also, it is normally best not to use ellipses in narrative.  However, since you appear to be directly relating Ranma's thoughts in this paragraph, it is acceptable here.

He had to get out of here! He had to run! He didn't know exactly how he
was going but he was. Saotome Ranma was not going to die because of


"How he was going"?  "How he was going to" perhaps?

this! An orgy wouldn't do *him* in.


The orgy itself?  Not unless it gives him a heart attack.  Now, what comes later, maybe.

He had to get out. He had to escape before it was too late, but how?
Maybe he could squirm out of their grip! Yeah, that might work, squirm


I would suggest replacing that exclamation point with a question mark.  It would seem to fit better.

out of their grip and run! If he did that, he might have a chance!

There was a loud yawn from the girl on his chest as she reentered the


I think re-entered probably needs to be hyphenated.  Not sure on that one, though.

land of the living. She groaned slightly as she opened her eyes. After
a moment she looked up, and straight into Ranma's eyes.


You need a comma after 'moment'.  You also either need to remove the one before 'and' or remove the word and.  I would reccommend the latter.

So much for his chance.

She smiled cutely, and blinked twice for good measure. "Er, hello."

"Ahh, Hi," replied Ranma.

The cute girl blushed and looked downwards, "Something poking me in the
hip..."


As this is dialogue, you can probably leave the sentance exactly as it is.  However, to be gramatically correct, it needs a verb:

"Something is poking . . ."

or maybe

"Something's poking me . . ."

The latter is more informal, and so might better fit what you want here.

Ranma gagged, so that's what that pleasant feeling was....

"You're a naughty boy, aren't you!" she giggled cutely.


Ranma:  So Akane repeatedly tells me.

No, seriously, that's an uncontrollable physiological reaction.  Do you think we males /want/ to be wondering around with uncomfortable protrusions down there?

Ranma's mind froze, and he slowly nodded affirming her accusation with


You need a comma after 'nodded'.

an "Ah huh".

Again, the girl giggled, "I feel lightheaded... I bet this is just a
strange dream. I'm going back to sleep now, okay?" To accentuate her
point, she yawned.

Ranma gulped. He wished this was just a dream. Maybe if she went to
sleep he could find a way out, if only he could get out from under this


This parses oddly, but I'm not sure how it can be made better.

cute girl. "Er... okay."

"Good night..." The girl smiled, and snuggled into Ranma's chest, much
to his growing discomfort. "Mmm, this is nice..."

Her movement must have awakened the woman at his feet, because there
was a groan at the foot of the bed, and then a loud thud as she rolled
off, followed a battery of what sounded like curses in some strange
foreign language.

Ranma chuckled morosely to himself as he one again took stock of the


"once again" perhaps?  Looks like a typo.

situation. He was in bed with four women. One of them was awake, and
cuddling his chest, another just fell off the bed and was obviously
pissed, and two more were still sleeping in his arms. Considering his
past luck with women he could only come to one realization.

"So this is it, I am going to die."

--------------

Setsuna cursed loudly as she hit the ground. Today her chosen language
was Old Norse, and the reason was its colorful collection of insults
and foul words. The Norse really knew how to express their opinion when
things were not going their way.

Once she was done venting her displeasure, she laid back onto the
floor. Squinting because of the light, she began to consider her
situation.

She was nude, she had just gotten laid, and she had no idea how she had
gotten into this situation. She tried to remember, but she was drawing
a blank. She shook her head in an attempt to clear the cobwebs, the


You have a comma splice here.  The simplest fix is to replace the comma after cobwebs with a semicolon.  Or, you could just split it into two sentances.

last time she had been this lightheaded was... was... 1960-something.

Setsuna squinted her eyes, and took a quick look at the interior.


I would suggest removing the comma after 'eyes'.

Haruka and Michiru's room. Could she have had a three-some with the two
lesbians?

Her hand quickly darted down to her nether regions. After a moment of
probing, she brought her hand up to her nose and took a sniff.

So much for that theory. There was definitely a man present. Girls just
don't smell like that.

Setsuna carefully stood up, but her movement was slowed by an aching
pain in her lower half. Whomever she had been with was very energetic.


I think you probably what 'whoever' here.  Whom is an object; who is a subject.  I'm not entirely sure which is correct here, but most people would probably use whoever.

To get her this sore he'd of had to screw her brains out. Too bad she


"He'd of had"?  Um . . . give me a moment to figure out what that should be.

Okay.  I think, without contractions, it should be "he would have had".

"Would have" can become "would've" but I do not believe any other contractions are possible there.  "He'd" is "he had" not "he would".

could remember any of it.


Um . . . I thought you said earlier she didn't remember?

She sat back down to orient herself. Man, what was that uncomfortable
feeling on her finger? She looked down at her hand, and was struck by a
wave of sobriety.

She was wearing a ring, a wedding ring. Now this was new. She could


This is a comma splice.  The comma needs to become either a colon or a dash.  I would recommend the latter.

honestly say that in all her thousands of years of life she had never
married.

Setsuna swore to herself, this time in Sanskrit. While she was not
particularly fond of the Sumerian culture, they always had the most


Since you're writing the entire story in past tense, "they always had" means that they still do at the time the story takes place.  I believe you want "they always had had" (which gets confusing) or "they had always had".

explicit curses. They made the Norse sound clean.


Again, "made" here means that they still do at the time the story takes place.  You probably want "had made".

When she was finished vocalizing her displeasure, she laid back and
thought to herself. What now? She would have to have it annulled, there
was no other option. She did not know the person, and she could not
afford a long-term relationship.


For Setsuna, no relationship is long term.

She had too many secrets, and could not allow herself to become
attached to a 'mortal'. She had already watched everything and everyone
she had ever known and loved be destroyed once, and she would be damned


"Already . . . once" is redundant.  Remove one or the other.

before she watched a husband slowly rot away from old age while she
stayed young. It was just not good for one's mental health.

Oh well, that could come later. Time to take a look at "husband number
one". Great, now she was sounding like those bitter old divorc�es that


Please do not use accented letters.  They are not part of the ASCII standard, and thus not guarantteed to show up correctly on all computer systems.

she knew during her time in America.


Again, "knew" means that she knows them now, during the story.  You need "had known".

She shook her head then slowly wobbled to her feet, and took a look on
the bed. What the hell? Michiru, Haruka, and Hotaru too?! She blinked
twice then exclaimed, "What the hell?!"

The repetition of "What the hell" is jarring. I would suggest removing the first instance.

Okay, now for overall impressions.

You have an interesting opening. I'm curious to see where you're going with it . . . but I always want to see more of Awkward Consequences. (Arrgh! I can not decide! I must have them both!)

And I like what you did with the two separate viewpoints.

I know I pointed out a lot of grammer mistakes, but they're really not that bad. I only saw two or three the first time I read it, and then found more only when deliberately looking. Most of what I pointed out would probably go unnoticed by the majority of your audiance. Still, for your own edification, you might want to look at them and make sure you understand why I flagged them.

But think about it this way: if I didn't like the story, I wouldn't be replying at all.

Defender of the Light
Elite Mage
junior member of the Inner Circle of the Mages Council

Contrary to popular opinion, magic and science do mix.

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