FFXII Fic: Caliber of Consequences, Chapter 1: Penelo (Larsa/Penelo, Basch; Co-Author: Moontear)

[mariagoner]

I know I’ve been away for quite a spell, carousing and grousing about town with my special guest and neglecting my very gracious f-list… but I do hope you’ll all forgive me for that soon enough. I’ve spent much of my time either accompanying that special guest to tedious dinner parties or tearing my hair out while trying to do special projects. In

Comments

[intradependency]

Eh, it's the time of year. There's been a significant drop in fic numbers as well. Interesting how things ebb and flow online. And as long as you and moontear are having fun...?

a) I think, actually, yes. She's surprisingly different, amazingly different, maybe not so much from your other Penelos you've written, but very very different from the game. However, I was thinking about my comment earlier, how she appears significantly older than the 6-7 years post-XII, but then, it's almost like she's trying to prove how much older/mature/experienced/interesting she is from way back when, even in her own stream of consciousness. And especially with the sexual deviancy. So I'd say, yes; because she's trying to prove to herself how she cares less about others now in favour of herself and her own gratification. She's certainly not acting as conventionally moral as the Penelo we know, but if she's trying to prove to herself that she's a hard-ass pirate, yeah. It works. (Plus it's fun!)

b) In some ways this is harder. She's changed from how she interacts with Basch in your other fics, but in some ways this is oddly reminiscent of that one scene in Archades where Penelo gets a chance to dig at him. So it shows how she's changed, and also how she's not changed. Which might an interesting foil, a Basch and Penelo dynamic, where Penelo's trying to prove how much of a bad, bad pirate she is (the moogle six, the moogle six, Basch, come on, check out how totally bad-ass I am! - and he laughs like she's a little kid trying to impress her big brother/old mentor.) There's an interesting dynamic there; should be fun once Larsa comes into the mix with his preconceptions as well.

c) I will try, although this may be difficult, because Basch's default state should be as close to naked as possible at all times, and whoever made the decision to give him back his shirt in-game should be shot and crucified.

[intradependency]

Oh, yes, complete sense. :) I think there'll be so much fun with that basch-perception vs reality vs penelo-perception vs larsa-perception. Hmm. Layers and layers of pretending and performance!

[mariagoner]

Penelo's a born performer, Larsa was trained as one by his brother practically since he could toddle and Basch learned many things about masks from his brother and his dead lover.

This is going to be fun, yes.

[mariagoner]

Oddly, I rather feel as though (at least in the FFXII fandom), the number of fic being posted has held fairly stead. I'm not sure if this is because we're a small fandom and thus don't produce much fic anyway... but the same probably can't be said for other, larger fandoms.

And feedback! Yes! Thank you for giving this during such a number-crunch of a time period, dearest. And I need to sending you an email about our sekrit project. Oh god, it sucks we missed out on the April 4th deadline, however. But ah well... it'll be fun no matter what the date. ;)

a) Heh... it's true, this Penelo has far more of a rough edge than most of the others I tended to write. She's rather like every femme fatale that ever strolled across a noir screen... only with the ability to do her own dirty work. And I love love love what you have to say about Penelo going out of her way to establish herself as one tough cookie. I'd imagine (at least from Fran's demeanor) that the traditional work ethic of twice-as-hard-for-half-the-credit prevails as much among lady sky pirates as among (say) women executives in modern day America. She probably had to be far tougher than any of the men she runs around with to be taken seriously, no?

And if her way of being tougher is to also stretch sexual boundaries... well, that's sort of the traditional femme fatale in her coming out!

b) Hee! God, I love that scene between Basch and Penelo, if only for that rare glimpse of someone actually flustering Captain Basch fon Stoic. I rather think that time in Archades has also matured Basch in some ways-- or, possibly, jaded him even more than he already had been by a very hard-knock life. I'd actually love to play around with this dynamic some more... but you know me. I do love my L/P OTP the best. ;)

c) I absolutely cannot disagree with you there!

[vieralynn]

Sorry to thread hijack but I now feel compelled to *cough* innocently find ways for Basch to have his clothing stolen in most fic I write from now on. ;)

[intradependency]

...there's certain threads that just repeat with some characters.
- Vincent's gotta have his shirt ripped off in anything I write of him.
- Basch has to get wet and naked. Proudly or humiliatingly.
- Balthier has to fall off his chair. Or fall over.

We really do like humbling/humiliating our men, don't we? ;)

[vieralynn]

Hehehe.

I just like getting Basch wet and naked. I swear he asks for it. And if he asks for it, it isn't humbling or humiliating him, is it? Really? XD