Helbereth wrote:
I think a lot of them may have forgotten that this version of Iwanako (not that there are a lot of them out there) spent all her time in the hospital watching movies and such, rather than reading. Four months is a long time to spend cooped up in a hospital room, and if we assume she spent as much time watching movies as Hisao spent reading (he went through the entire hospital library), she likely viewed a couple hundred films. Mathematically she could have watched 500+ 90-minute movies, even if we subtract time for sleep, check-ups, and time spent away from her bed.
Oh God, I used a serial comma! I'm going to be lynched!
Leaty wrote: Short Sharp Shock is about 760 words long, and the Emi portion of this chapter is only about 470,
Daaamn. That's some meticulous calculus for occult minutia right there. This is why I don't write fanfics. I've always been wary about fucking up someone else's stuff.
Mirage_GSM wrote:Very nice scene with Hanako. Usually I'd count being able to handle a situation like this without complications as a sign for "Mary Sue", but you managed to make it believable.
I was
very concerned about potential Mary Sue implications during that interaction, so I'm glad it worked out the way I wanted it to.
Honestly, "Mary Sue" has never entered my mind throughout this fic, it just felt completely natural that Hanako would take to Iwanako's advances, meek and refined as they were. Surprising? Yes, at first, but natural nonetheless. The act was a scalpel compared to Hisao's sledgehammer, to say the least.
Where I think the ending needs more work is that there's too quick a jump from denial to acceptance. It comes off as a little rushed, probably because I was running out of steam by that point. I think I'll toy with it a little bit more.
Iwanako was indeed mirroring Hisao in
The Deep End, but then again, Iwanako was fully awake and sober of her predicament, while Hisao had the final luxury of being utterly shitfaced just before his body splattered into corned beef.
The similarities to The Deep End were intentional, by the way, so I'm glad somebody caught them. Remember, what was the name of the fourth chapter of this story?
Yay.
The Shallow End, but no one died there. Well, besides possibly Iwanako's libido (and dignity).
Yeah, see, this is why I stressed so much about this chapter!
People take Hanako business mad serious; that's why
Sisterhood is almost always bumped to the front page despite having been finished for a long time now. Nobody is going to yell at me for my characterization of Aoi and Keiko, but if you're perceived to have screwed up Hanako... well, two cases in point:
Mendacium,
Misstep. I refuse to be sent to the stockades for Hanako abuse.
Aoi and Keiko
Who?
To my non-credit, I've yet to read
Sisterhood, but I am somewhat familiar with the call for torches and pitchforks elsewhere. As for abuse, I am personally not squeamish about throwing characters through the grinder (that's what authors
do) but at the same time I understand Katawa Shoujo is relatively lighthearted (I should probably stop using that word in KS discussions...) so I also understand the uneasiness towards more grimdark KS stories even if my personal threshold is beyond the ordinary. I'd be more concerned with plausibility and contrivances.
More to the point. I can't speak for the Hanabros, but the so-called "Diet Hanako" meeting Hanako has met and exceeded my expectations, so it's all good, at least as far as I'm concerned.
Hehe, excellent catch! You're actually on to something here, but Iwanako's "prescience" here is actually completely intentional. Remember, Iwanako is highly socially aware (one of the few traits she shares with her mother,) and she's also very logical, as we saw when she managed to get Momomi to spill the beans about the Student Council. Iwanako has never actually noticed Hanako leaving the classroom, only coming in. So why does she think Hanako is going to run away? Well, keep in mind that Iwanako said she had stage fright when she was walking up to Hanako, and even, for a moment, worried Hanako was going to hurt her. Now remember what Iwanako said the first time she ever noticed Hanako: "like looking into a very skittish mirror."
So, after seeing Hanako's scars, why does she think Hanako is going to run away? Well, it's because running away is what she herself would do, when she pictures herself being a bit more scared than she already is. She then projects that onto Hanako, and that course of action briefly seems so reasonable that it only exacerbates her anxiety.
So... it's like Inception right? Wowee, my head hurts now.
Ha, just kidding. As Iwanako's social finesse has been readily apparent for a while, I thought it was something to that effect, but I figured I should point it out. And I also certainly didn't expect such a fully thought-out answer. Phew!
I didn't want to introduce Emi any earlier than her appearance in canon. In fact, without this encounter occurring, Iwanako wouldn't have met Emi or Rin at all, since the Nurse never would have arranged for Iwanako to go running with Emi (he sets up that whole thing in response to Hisao not going to the track or pool, and Iwanako went to the pool yesterday. The lifeguard commented to him about it later, so he is aware of that.)
Well, there's not really any meaningful reason why anything in Emi's schedule would be different just because Iwanako's here and not Hisao. They haven't met yet and they're not even in the same class. There's no reason why Emi isn't still going to go running down that hallway on Wednesday. MTB isn't a "Stations of the Canon" fic like Sisterhood, but it is a Divergence fic and that means there's certain things I can't change.
Oh, oops, I didn't even think of that. My mistake.
In my mind, that justifies the Emisuffix being the same. It just makes for a good story too. How else would they meet, over lunch? Snore.
That being said, is Iwanako being in exactly Hisao's position at that exact moment a bit contrived? Probably, yes, but in a way, that's what makes it more of a surprise; I think I've done a pretty good job of keeping events in MTB from duplicating events in canon, so even though the reader knows they're coming right up on the moment that Emi Meets Cute, they think I'm going to find a way around it... And then it not only happens, it happens catastrophically. It was always going to happen this way, because this was one of the encounters that made me want to write this fic in the first place.
Yeah, Iwanako just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, just like Hisao. It seems
you the Fates are out for her blood, then.
As far as Threat Conditions are concerned, let's also not forget that the United States has more than a few military bases on Japan, and they all still use the THREATCON (now FPCON) system. That said, Iwanako probably learned the phrase from movies.
This topic is just a trap set up for one sole purpose, a trap eagerly awaiting with bait no one has been willing to take.
The answer is simple, really, but no one wants to say it.
I have waited patiently, but no one has made the obvious connection yet.
No one wants to open up this can of worms.
I guess it'll have to be me who breaks the ice.
Is it possible that Iwanako knows because she is a feminist spy?
Iwanako is dead. The rest of the fic is about Emi suffering from crippling amounts of guilt and seeking comfort in Lilly's arms.
Somebody out there's gonna take this and run with it...
