The Last Fanfictioneers (ID2: The Lockdown)

[Nimras]

*shifty eyes*

*pokes Tydans*

Sorry. Couldn't resist.

[Dream]

I really need to STOP drawing pictures of Tabloid Kids (that I can't scan from here; if I do any really good ones I'll post them to the brother in the UK) and actually get to working on the next chapter (which is either going to be called "First Light" or "Dreamers' Hideaway"-- as of now I can't decide, and I thought I'd mention both now). It's the usual problem-- I know I need to work on both sides of the story, but only one side is flowing (on this occasion, the Lydie's Story side, since it follows on from In Darkness).

I won't be writing Ginger out, but she won't have anything major to do from here on in. It's important that she stays. She's down as Lydie's proxy guardian, after all.

Next time, I think, I'll write the entire story before posting it. I'm not professional enough right now, and the year's gap between starting this story and resurrecting it has been hard to deal with. One thing I really shouldn't be enjoying so much about working on this story is how much I'm having to handle the "stop blowing holes in my plot" effect. I put in something that I don't think should have unexpected ramifications, then suddenly realise it leaves a plot hole. Most people would edit it out, but I hate editing to cover the fact that I messed up, so instead I end up constructing an elaborate cat's cradle to force it to work.

I'll go into more details when the story's complete (way things are going: 2011-ish), but one good example is Marit, who was never meant to exist at all. Here's how it was.

SPOILER: Click to show

Vellan, whom we probably won't see in his adult form in this story, is Ishan's husband. He was initially created just to have a non-central TK to use for the earliest example of what was happening to the LF in Sunbeam's world. I considered having him get deleted by Sunbeam on the night of Lydie's wedding, but I liked Ishan too much to do that to her (and it's a good thing I didn't, the way things have worked out), so I decided he wouldn't be deleted, just out of the picture. Hang on, though; that presented a new problem. Why wouldn't Sunbeam have deleted a Tabloid Kid? Hmmm. No good answers, but I don't want rid of the impact of the idea. So, new plan: Vellan isn't a TK. He's a real person, must have been recruited before the NTWF got closed down. Sunbeam questioned him, got nothing, and took away his Crossing Permit. Sorted. Hang on, though. Shouldn't he be the same age as Ishan, roughly? I could get away with a few years older, but I don't want him to be significantly older than the TK he's married to... but that would make him about five years old when the NTWF fell. Even if they relaxed the age policy to allow for Tabloid Kids, how is a five-year-old going to get signed up? Wait, I've got it... give him a big brother. Thus, Marit, and the LF suddenly has one member of around thirty, but that is going to have to stick. I like Marit, actually. He makes a nice confused tag-along, and he's turned out to have much more of a sense of responsibility than I had expected. And I've decided that Marit is realworld-style married to someone he met in Neopia who doesn't know about the LF. I don't know how exactly it works (yet!), but I carelessly threw in a line from Ishan in the first chapter about Marit being married (IIRC, "Marit, I need those flowers, and I don't care if they're for your wife") before I figured out how old he was. I don't think it'd work with any of the TKs.

Phew.

So that's why I need to plan better, in a nutshell. Still, playing cat's cradle is fun.

[Nimras]

... Plot holes just add texture. *shifty eyes*