Alpha Beta Soup (2/2)

[masu_trout]

Title: Alphabet Beta Soup
Characters/Pairings: Lyra/Silver
Rating: T for Teen
Warnings: None Applicable.
Summary: Silver might be a pain to deal with, but he’s Lyra’s pain and there’s no way she’s ever going to let some uppity psychic alphabet take him away from her

Comments

[solarpillar]

I was going to ask why did Lyra wait for days before trying to rescue Silver (if I was Lyra in a realistic settling I'd call Lance to see of anyone can help me trace his last call and tell me where he was or report the singing to various pokemon professors to see if any of them recognise it), then I realised that in an RPG I'd grind for a few days before going to the rescue. I'm pretty happy that you integrated various stimuli in this story, not just sight and hearing but also smell and touch, and details like mentioning the dust on pants add to the realism and immersion. Also, I envy your control of word count. You must be very experienced to limit the story in the word count you want and at the same time tell all you need to tell. I also enjoy how you made Tig and Lyra interact enough for a trainer and her walking pokemon and mention Tig's reactions when something happens. Many people (including myself, erheh) tend to forget to show the human-pokemon interaction when the pokemon is walking beside the human unless plot demands, but you show the intereaction less to advance the plot but more to add to the universe and the ambiance. And I love that.

Nitpicks from me would be Lyra thinking of Prof. Birch (part 1, after Silver's distress call). Her professor is Elm. That is all.

I'm neutral to the use of second person narrator because I don't care about that kind of things. I suppose some would find it distracting as this is not a role-play story and it does not seem to add extra immersion, instead risk reader-narration dissonance because the way the character acts could be against the thinking pattern of the reader. On the other hand, I find it consistent with the ambiance of the gameverse and adds extra... not believability, more like put the mind in the right mindset? Like a sign that says "The story you're going to read is from the gameverse of Pokemon, please suspend any disbelief you do not need to enjoy this story." The first sentence is "Silver is late." so the "You" immediately tells the reader to put his or herself into the mindset of Lyra. It's like magic.

Last of all I want to comment on the fact that many Lyra/Silver writers seem to make Lyra the manly knight on rapidash and Silver the princess who gets abused and needs saving. And somehow it feels right. It's like reading The Paper Bag Princess, but here the prince that needs saving actually loves the princess and just being a tsundere about it. I don't know if it's the feminism overtone of Crystal and HGSS (how the Rival and Gym Leaders act the same towards the player no matter the gender chosen) or that tsundere personality is somehow equal to feminine role in people's mind. Doesn't seem to matter, as I like male tsundere, if only because my male parrot is a tsundere.

As with many writers, I thank you for writing this.

[masu_trout]

Wow, thanks so much for this awesome concrit! I'm glad you like the detail, and thanks for pointing out I got the professor's name wrong! *///////* I'll have to go back and fix that, haha.

I think I'll probably also have to go and edit how time flows in this story too. The way I meant for it to be was that Lyra goes looking for Silver the morning after she gets the call, but looking back I don't think I portrayed that very well. So thanks for that too!

I'm glad you like my portrayal of Silver and Lyra's relationship! :)

[ainbthech]

Random data point: I got that it was the morning after, but it was still a little surprising that she would wait that long.