(no subject)
*clears throat and speaks in gritty movie announcer voice*
In a world where everyone is visualy impared, there is only one person who has the skills, the intelligence, the cuteness to infiltrate the Alliance. Ti'ran! With her unique Blood elf/ troll heritage, she's got what it takes to disguise herself as a night elf. Tusks, ten toes and fingers, ears, and accent, and eyebrows. Now she's bringing all five feet of her into the heart of the alliance to spy.
http://www.fanfiction.net/s/7063402/1/Blessings_In_Disguise
(Had to nuke my computer and word hasn't been reinstalled yet, so there are probably alot of errors...bear with me.)
Our trelf is woken up by her bff/bf/... I don't even know. We're never given a description. I can only tell It's a male because "he" is used...once. Anyway, Ti'ran looks at her reflection in a bowl of water and screams because she's a hideous troll/belf hybrid. Just kidding! She looks like a hideous troll/ nightelf hybrid. Wait, what?
"Don't know how I've made it so far. I may have ten fingahs and ten toes, meh brows stick out like antennae and meh eyes sure glow but if deez night elves be as smart as dey are made out tah be, ya tink dey woulda figured it out already. How dey haven't spotted meh accent or pointed out meh tusks or meh height is beyond meh!"
Everyone on Azeroth is incredibly stupid, thinks with their hoo-has, and is nearly blind. Just like the author of this fic. HOOOO! But seriously, get ready for levels of stupidity and glossing over of this magnitude. There's -lots- of it to come.
Or story progresses- oh wait, no. Time for clumsy exposition. Since our trelf looks so much like a night elf from bizzaro Azeroth, she was mercilessly teased. When she was old enough to fight she went to Azshara, wheres he was ordered to begin training to infiltrate the night elves. Instead of learning arts of subtly, she decided being a druid was better, because Alliance can spot those garrishly vibrant troll tiger forms with their horrible eye sight.
"She had succeeded in deceiving so many night elves in the past few weeks during her missions, that she couldn't help but feel a bit complacent. She approached two young Sentinels with a smile and said "hello" in polished Darnassian tongue. The Sentinels smiled and nodded in return. Ti'Ran strolled through the Alliance base without the twitch of a skeptical eye."
Where's that accent you were bitching about?
The belf troll quickly approached a human food vendor and pointed out a small selection of fruits she wished to buy. As the vendor collected Ti'Ran's selection, he couldn't keep his eyes off of the smiling imposed night elf. He handed over the goods and chimed, "I must say, what a pretty little night elf you are! I bet you'd stir up quite some mischief if you were in Stormwind."
One might say... too little.
Ti'Ran let out a soft chuckle, characteristic of many female night elves, as she shook her head. "Oh but I prefer to cause that mischief here." She jested in a dainty Common tongue as she paid for the bundle and carried on her way. The blood elf troll was as sharp and witty as she was cunning; traits she knew her parents had passed onto her. She smirked at the thought as she headed for the Northwatch Tower.
So... much rage... ggrrrg. 1. Nigh elves are not known for giggling. They are known for being warriors, being the opposite of dainty, and for the night elf bounce. 2. flirting at the visualy impared shop keep is not sharp, cunning or witty.
Moving on.. The Trelf approches two guards at a tower and says she's there to deliver some food.
"We were never given notice of such transactions today."
The imposed night elf gave a slight pout as she began digging into one of her packs. "Really? That's odd. I have his request right here…"
"Oh, come off it Edgar. Don't give the little lady such a hard time. You know how the Captian likes to snack these days due to all his stress. Let her do her job." One of the other guards said as he winked at her and let her pass by. Ti'Ran smiled and nodded at the man.
(Humans sure do gotta soft spot fo' night elf girls.) She smirked at the thought as she climbed the spiral ramp to the top of the tower.
"She's hot. My penis says to let her though without checking the package or anything, and since I'm a man I obviously can't think with anything else. Huh, awfuly short of a nightelf."
The Trelf enters the tower and sets the fruit basket on a table. A female night elf is in the room with the captain, telling him about spies.
"Gentlemen, we have a spy on our hands." Mariel stated darkly."
Protect the briefcase!
"Amberwind Lorekeeper and her mission crew suffered a massive blow last week when a spy came onto base. Apparently, our furbolg allies were conned into turning against us as well. One of the survivors believes it was a night elf member of our own, but we have reason to believe a Horde member in disguise was responsible for the massacre." The night explained to her party as Ti'Ran continued on her way to the small corner table."
"Yea, she was about five and a half feet tall, had tusks, strange accent... Must have been a night elf!"
"Well, it couldn't be a disguise! What race of the Horde could appear so convincing to the night elves that they would confuse the spy as one of their own?" one of the officials replied.
"Hey bob, what's that word to describe the use of makeup and stuff to dress up like another person in order to deceive a group of people into believe you are one of them? Oh right, a DISGUISE."
"Well, I can assure you of one thing my lady and gentlemen," Captain Grunwald said as he sliced off a piece of apple with a knife and popped it into his mouth, "No spy is going to make a fool of me." The Captain immediately chucked the knife just past Ti'Ran's nose. The Northwatch officials immediately grabbed a hold of Ti'Ran as she tried to head down the ramp. Captain Grunwald and Mariel presented themselves before the night elf imposter.
Look! Some one with a brain! Finally!
" The Captain drew his face close to the imposter's to further examine her. "Such an elaborate disguise… "
Hair and skin dye is not all that elaborate. they didnt even hide her tusks and HGHJHKJBKJFSKLSD FIVE FEET FIVE INCHESGGRRG.
A rogue who was with her intervenes. They kill all the guards, the captain, the night elf, and Ti'ran. Wait, that last one was wishful thinking. Ti'ran and the rogue climb to the top of the tower and are going to leap off, becaue the rogue set explosives.
"Got it!" Ti'Ran exclaimed as she pulled out a bag and pushed the head inside. She wrapped the bag's cord around her arm and climbed the banister ledge beside Slinky. "I didn't get ah parachute! What deh hell am I supposed tah do!"
"Ya hold onto me!"
"ARE YA NUTS! YA LIKE, TWO FEET TALL!"
An appropreate reaction, as a parachuse designed for some one two feet tall and probably half the weight of Ti'ran isnt doing to support Ti'ran alone, let alone both of them. BUT THIS IS A FANFIC, SO OF COURSE IT TURNS OUT ALRIGHT. The parachuse holds and Ti'ran only falls off then she's hit by a chunk of bebris. Ti'ran falls into the southfury river and the rogue lands near talrendis point. The rogue decides against retriving ti'ran because she's spoted by a bunch of night elves and they're running towards her. The rogue hoofs it back to Valormok, leaving Ti'ran to tragicly drown and be devoured by crocolisks. Wishful thinking again! The story cuts rather jarringly to valormok where everyone is prematurely celebrating the fall of talrendis point. Because exploding one tower will cripple everyone and completely destroy all resistance from the area. The rogue barges in and informs them that the night elves are on the way, and they prepare for battle.
AT this point I was almost beinging to think this story was becoming slightly tolerable and was shaping up to be decent. There hadn't been some horribly stupid incident for some time. Then I reached chapter two and all hopes were dashed.
Ti'ran washes up on the ashenvale bank, completely unscathed after falling "Fifteen stories" into a raging river. The blast from the tower knocked down that nice solid little stone bridge that connects azashara to ashenvale. She sees the battle for warsong raging and leaps in, only be mistaken for a night elf and attacked by an orc.
"DIE, NIGHT ELF SCUM!"
"No…" Ti'Ran barely uttered. Three arrows suddenly shot into the orc's chest and he fell back as a night elf pushed his bow behind him and whipped out a knife. He quickly slit the orc's thraoat and turned to Ti'Ran to give her a hand.
"Help us, little sister!" he called out in Darnassian. Ti'Ran backed away until she was up on her feet again. She turned and ran down into the valley at the center of the crossfire. Pain seared into her arm as she looked down to find an arrow planted there and yet she continued to run. Another orc came at her with their axe and she ducked at their attack.
"STOP THIS!" she shrieked in Orcish. "I…I am Horde!"
(Am I forgetting the Orchish language?) She thought suddenly as the orc swung again. Apparently, he was not listening either way.
"I'll crush you, night elf!" he shouted.
"I not…"
The orc was suddenly attacked from behind by two more night elves. As they took the orc down, another tugged at Ti'Ran's robes.
"Help me! Please young Druid, heal me!" the severely wounded night elf begged as she lie on the ground, covered in blood. Ti'Ran managed to get out of the female's grip and ran as fast as she could out of the Warsong battlefield.
A night elf thinks you're a freakishly dispraportionate child and a blood lusted orc isnt listening to you so you assume you're forgetting how to speak orcish... dear god, don't let this actualy be happening. let the trelf just be incredibly stupid.
Chapter two consists entirely of her going up to horde camps and then going away because she's afraid she'll get mistaken for a night elf in the fighting. Even when she comes across two patroling orcs out away from combat she hides. I think I'm going to start skipping around, because there's three more chapters of this drivel.
Chapter three is all about ti'ran and a night elf druid that healed her leg while she slept. They have he-laarious hijinks and sexual tension as he meets her and tries to check on the healing. He gives her a ride in his cat form. The only face deskingly stupid moment is this.
Suddenly, Ti'Ran felt Denar'eth's body shift as he dropped down on all fours and transformed into a bear.
(Oh… I forgot Druids can do dat!)
YOU ARE A DRUID TOO, HOW DO YOU FORGET THIS?
In chapter four Ti'ran's ride is interupted as the NE druid sees Raynewood retreat is under attack. he actauly drags up her there by the arm and signs the both of them up without even asking her. They go out ro collect dryad corpses and Ti'ran ends up killing an orc. The night elf is incredibly cheerful about this. This was almost a *gasp* good moment in the chapter, as it was a chancefor chracter development and to see how ti'ran dealt with the reality of what she'd just done. NOPE. She just sounds shocked and then she's completely over it in the next scentence. Ti'ran and the NE druid have another sexualy tense/romantic moment as he teaches her more about being a druid. Her remarkably fast recovery over killing an orc is expained now. Even though she's been portrayed as fericly proud of the horde, despite their rejection ofher due to her heritage, and the shame and anger she felt when she had to get the tatoo removed in order to become a spy, she's now really angry that they visualy impared orces tried to kill what they thought was a a night elf with dwarfism. they "betrayed" her. They're interupted as a seintinal reports that rogues are nearby, and she asks them to deal with them. Ti'ran runs into a troll she knew from sen'jin speaks wtih her as they battle.
Ti'Ran felt her stomach drop as the guilt returned. The troll bashed into the blood elf troll, slamming her into the wall, his knife just missing her already wounded shoulder. "Beh pretty pathetic dat ya took all dem childhood teasin's tah heart like dat. Dat elf blood in ya made ya weak. Let's face it… ya nevah were cut out tah be ah troll."
Honestly, the story is getting better. The writing style isn't getting any better, but the author is really starting to give the protagonist chararacter. The other characters are pretty flat and really just serve as plot devises, but she author is begining to deal with issues and give Ti'ran depth. The author is dealing with Ti'ran's Blood elf mix and the racism and shunning from the rest of the horde. However, the issue is still a little flat and black and white since the Night elves aren't displaying any of the same racism (which the night elves would -definatly- be all over). Course, they still all think she's a night elf that lost her shins in battle.
What's really made this ten times better is that she's mostly dropped the mind numbingly stupid glossing over of Ti'ran's appearance and other people's blind acceptance of her "disguise".
Chapter five is really slow. I really started skipping and skimming. The trelf and the night elf make it to Astrannar, put out fires, then have booze. The NE druid explains why he is more open to the horde and less alliance loyal. He tells the story of the fox and the hound his first trip to moonglade.
'A smile suddenly crept onto the night elf's face.
"I challenge you two to fight each other… to the death.""
excuse me, wtf is an alliance patrole doing in moonglade? wtf are they doing giving orders to cenarian cricle druids? and how the hell do you "challenge" two people to fight eachother? Unless she means it like a dare, then they can only order two people to fight, as a challenge can be accapted or denied. Nit picking to the extreme.
The trelf gets drunk, falls sleep, and wakes up tied with ropes and sitting in a catapult. What happens in Astrannar, stays in Astrannar. A night elf Commander, one who was at the tower that was blown up, catapults her into the lake and orders her archers to fire when the body surfaces. Instead of just slitting her throat. And in true over-the-top-bond-death-trap- fashion, she gets away. The night elf druid teleports them to moonglade and he gets a boob flash as Ti'ran pulls an arrow out of him. not even kidding.
So what do I think of this?
The author is improving as a writer as this series goes on. She's actualy confronting issues and attempting to deal with them realisticly. Instead of using Ti'ran's mix race to make her super special or a pity case as most sues would, the author actualy created a confliced and interesting character. In the later chapters there is the begining of alot of interesting characterizing. I would love to see the author explore this more and really bring these emotional scenes. That being said, there's a -lot- that needs improvement. Those emotional scenes I mentioned? They are right on the edge of being good, but not quite there yet. They give hints of what they -could- be, and it makes me want to see more from the author, but they're really being held back by the lack of description. Tell us what the character is feeling. Is her heart racing? Is she hesitent about killing that scout? or was it just reflexive survival? De-scrip-tion. Almost everything is one line, most of the text is dialog, we're told next to nothing about what these characters look like and all of Ti'ran's internal turmoil is blantantly stated as thoughts. Describe her feelings, don't outright say them. The blind acceptance of Ti'ran as a night elf is god awful aswell. This can be fixed by alot of tweaking in the first chapter however. Make her taller and either have her tuskless or have her tusks cut and filed to look like a normal tooth. Have her study nightelves for -years- to learn their culture, dialects, history, basic social and command structure, the way they walk, run,and fight. EVERYTHING . For gods sake she didnt even know what the cenarian circle is. That is a HUGE part of Night elf society.The romance with the night elf is clumsy and cliche. What happened to her troll friend? We suddenly stopped hearing about him. That brings me to another point. PUT SPACES OR LINES OR SOMETHING TO INDICATE A CUT. I'm reading about ti'ran, and then the next line is about what's his face the troll. No transition, no indication that there is a break in the story.
All in all, I think the author should keep writing. She's obviously improving from chapter to chapter, and she'll only get better with more practice.