I don't have anything to show yet, but I've begun work on a Xenogears fanfic revolving around Ramsus. Calling it Asymptote, after the mathematical curve that approaches 0 but never quite gets there, because I like making myself sad.
It's gonna end up with some Dominia/Ramsus romance, maybe some Sigurd/Ramsus romance if I can get past the yelling, and a lot of probably really depressing introspection and negativity directed at Krelian and Miang.
I've gotten about 5 pages into it so far over the past week, but it's been really difficult for me to focus. I really wish I was 17 again and had the time to burn.
I do have other Xeno fanfics, but they're old and I'm not keen on showing them off at the moment. ^^
This your story, of course, but I'd recommend to make the basic framework work without any romance at all first, then add some later if you absolutely feel you must have some. Or maybe it's just me being weird because I don't like romance-centric stories much. XP
Ehheh, I guess it's another instance of me being vapid, but most of the time, I rush into these things wanting to write for the pairings I'm a huge fan of. I tend to generally section off the more steamy bits, but I can tell already that this isn't going to just be about people kissing. Ramsus has a lot of thinking and making up for things to do, and I wanted to logic my way through it because I think it might help me improve my own outlook. I've just wanted to do something other than fanart for my ships for once. Ramsus is really hard to write for romantically to begin with, because he was at odds with the main group for so long and caused so much havok, so I don't see anything really lasting.
I'M SUPER EXCITED FOR YOUR FANFIC, KAT. And I haven't even Xenogears (yet). ^^; I loved the part you sent me that you had written so far, and I didn't think the romance was out of place. I actually have the same problem in a lot of my writing--I grew up being told that romance in stories was a frivolous kind of silly girly thing (*cough* internalized misogyny much there, Artsy Intellectual Grandmother who was otherwise pretty cool?) and not ~real literature~ (my ex-stepmom can shove her literary snobbery directly where the sun don't shine, thanks), and that I could do better, and so on. :P But y'know what, romance and relationships are a part of life too. A really important part, I think. And if they're important to your story, why the heck not?
The way I like to look at it is, OK, I like to read and write about how people connect and relate to each other. Platonically, romantically, as family, or whatever. Ships (in the fandom sense) can be a lot of things, and if your story is character-driven, then they're definitely going to have some relevance to the plot. So maybe you decide to focus more on the relationship itself, or maybe you focus on the outside events that influence or hinder them as a bigger part of the plot. It really depends on the scope of the story and what you want to achieve with it. (To be fair, one of the first long Xeno fanfics I wrote--the Missing Year one--was basically just an elaborate justification to squish my OTP together, so I half-baked an entire plot to give them teh dramas. But that doesn't have to be a bad thing! Shipping is fun!!)
Uh, tl;dr, because I apparently can write an awful lot of redundant nonsense when I'm trying to avoid actually working on the thing I'm writing (I'm also kind of struggling with how far to go with the romance in that, coincidentally, so I feel this). But it sounds like you've got a good idea of what you want to work through in this fic, and how you wanna do it, and yeah! Lemme know if you'd like me to take a look at it again when it's further along. Good luck! <333
I'm the odd fish out then (and probably a prude too) . Still, I'd very much like to have a look-see at what you come up with and, hopefully, help out where I can.
My sister is not an incondsiderable yaoi fan and has already... prepared me for some concepts I wasn't ready for before I set out in the wide internet seas on my own. I may not ship the previous Elements with each other, but you won't irreversibly harm my fragile psyche if you show me something that does.
I like to think of myself as someone who doesn't run around shoving yaoi down everyone's face, but I certainly don't mandate that all my friends read what I write. ^^; It's turning out to have a decent amount of aromantic padding around it, and I will be marking any steamier bits pretty clearly. I need to find a proper place to upload what I have so far.
Okay! So, I have a little bit to show, but it's going really slow because I'm trying to do research on just how much damage Ramsus caused before he winked out of existence in the game.
Here's the link to the first chapter. It's really short because I cordoned off the sexy bits into chapter 2. Chapter 2 is hella not safe for work, so you can skip it if you like. It's with Dominia.
Poor Ramsus, you're giving me feels. lol Being someone who has seen a lot of awkward fanfiction, (not to imply this is one,) I think this is pretty good thus far. It's finely written and you handle Ramsus as a character pretty well. Unlike a lot of fan fiction writers I think you can pull off shipping without becoming so incredibly non canonical as to be ridiculous. And this is coming from a dude who was commissioned to write several out there Kingdom Hearts yaoi ships. >___> (Of course, it was made easier by how inherently homoerotic KH can be at times...characters like Axel take friendship to the next level sometimes, lol) If you're looking for any input, I'd say keep putting the character first as you have. You set a logical chain of events that didn't play out without the character's input, which is how it should be.
Thanks for the compliments, Kire! ^^; I haven't written fanfic in about a year or so, so I'm glad you feel it's coming out strong! Writing for villains is always a complex ordeal, and for someone as bent out of shape as Ramsus, I gotta approach it carefully. A lot of people write fics for their OTPs all sparkly and rainbows and they're married forever, and as much as I want to write a quick happy ending for Kahr, like the Matrix, it'd be too good to be true and even I wouldn't believe it.
A lot of yaoi in general seems a little pastede on, and although I'll see a pairing and totally like it visually, if I try to think about it too hard, it just falls apart under heavy scrutiny. As much as I like Ramsus and Sigurd visually, with Solaris' backing of Shakhan in the Aveh-Kislev war, there's a lot to get in the way.
Exactly what I mean. I can't get into the stuff unless it's well explained. Though with a lengthy enough story, Ramsus x Sigurd could work. It would be a huge project, though. It would essentially involve the building of an entire unexplored relationship. Which would be a massive pain in the ass, lol.
Wow, I re-read the first bit and I realized just how romantically oriented the whole thing is. >_>; I'm going to work on getting 1-3 out soon. I just need to go through it a few more times.
Eh, while I was thinking on what to say, that one problematic sentence got fixed and now I have nothing to complain about! XP
The narrative certainly evokes lotsa various (often contradictory) feels in me so far, so I am inclined to say that your effort was a success.
(Even though one of those feels is 'you are way too prideful in this one, Ramsus, so you'll get no sympathy from me!')
Other characters' retreat in the face of his... unresponsive state may seem callous, but them having no idea what to do (and maybe even feeling unsettled) in this case is very, very understandable. The way the one who choses to stay anyway loses hope of getting through to him and starts just venting her own feelings out in the air included.
'I'm in love with you, by the way' comes up a bit abrupt, though. In fact, everything seems to go a bit too fast, in my opinion. My suggestion would be to pad it out a bit. Make the transitions more gradual. Obviously, I'm not the author here, but I'd like to share what I feel is lacking in this soup, in my opinion.
XXX
I understand that, as a hot-blooded martial artist mech pilot character, Ramsus is not subject to the same limitations as we simple mortals are and would not have trouble with snapping out of his near catatonic state to jump off an upper bunk of a cramped submarine cabin all graceful-like and proceed to thoroughly ravish his adoring ex-subordinate like a boss. Instead of, you know, wheezing out and slurring his words, and struggling to tear his exhausted, unresponsive carcass off the cot, and kind of crawling down to the floor in the time it would take Dominia to hop from the door to him and back on one hand. Thirty times.
But it may be beneficial to make him do that all the same.
Ramsus here is supposed to be (warning: personal interpretations incoming!) this physically powerful, extremely well-trained warrior that climbed through the ranks on his own merit and experience and has learned to keep his impulsive nature in check (in matters that don't concern Fei, at least). Someone Dominia, on top of whatever feelings of unrequited love (and/or lust) she developed, has come to admire and strive to be more like for some years now, right?
So, with that in mind, would seeing him in such a state make her feel, think or do something she wouldn't have otherwise?
It was easy to assume Ramsus was unconscious when he just lied there, mute, unmoving, seemingly deaf and blind to the world around him. But now... He neither succumbed to his wounds and died in his sleep, nor bounced back to his old self. Now he is just kind of slouching there, body swaying, limbs awkward, unsure of his posture, almost half-curled up on himself. Gone is the confident, stern and calculating stare every soldier on both sides of a fight trembled under; now his gaze is dark and murky, uncertain, haunted by horrors only he can see.
What would Dominia do when faced with such a visage, alone, with no one else to witness her reaction? Somehow I don't have trouble imagining her either just standing, frozen on the spot, too stunned to do or say anything or even plain running out of the room right then and there, to be honest.
She'd probably return soon enough, but what would Ramsus do in the meantime? Will he retreat back into his dreary thoughts? Will he engage in (relatively) mild self-mutilation like pulling his hair or hitting his head on something? Humiliation was mentioned to be on his mind in there somewhere, yes? I think that if Ramsus is to get poked out of this disconnected state of too much and too little thought he begins the chapter in, him bitterly crying out of sheer shame and self-loathing may fit the bill.
Hmm... what else?
Could it be that, being in this foul mood, Ramsus would take exception to someone claiming to 'know how complicated this is' and 'understand' what he feels towards Fei? I know I would.
I'm not sure if (both in canon and for the purposes of this story) Dominia had a first row seat for what happened when Ramsus had first run into Id, but, seeing as how she is neither dead nor suffering from some form of PTSD, I assume that she didn't. (For all that Id is, essentially a child on a non-stop temper tantrum, I think he'd be absolutely terrifying for most people that aren't Grahf.)
So, the words 'you can't understand!' are probably gonna be yelled in there somewhere. There is a number of ways she could respond to that, but my favourite option would go something like 'Of course I don't! You never tell anyone!!!'.
And, yes, I think there is gotta be some yelling between these two in a scene like this. All that frustration and anger and confusion have to go somewhere.
(And then she would probably try to help him in some way and he would probably cry tears of shame even harder. But that'd be for the better - for all that this process is ugly, messy and awful and painful, it is also incredibly cathartic and allows the person to start recovering.)
Dominia comes across to me here as a person who, when faced with things that push her outside her comfort zone, tries to revert to her usual modus operandi of being extremely, almost confrontationally, blunt. So, while Ramsus is unblinkingly staring off into the distance, taking his sweet time to form curt responses to some questions, while completely ignoring others and failing to respond to physical contact and such, she would need something else to show off that she too is, in fact, stressed out in this chapter.
Nervous ticks and gestures? Being unable to remain still for any period of time? Constantly wandering gaze? Really not being able to decide where to place her hands? I dunno.
Is Ramsus a Thing living in the body of a boy that should've died in that trash collector on that day in this story?
Is he aware of it? Does it affect him some way beyond being able to recall the talk between Krelian and Miang and his subsequent disposal? Could it be that this depressive state of feeling oddly disconnected from your own body is even worse for him on that account? Does the fact that among all the mutants and super-powered people running around his own predicament takes the cake bother him on some level?
(And now I imagine the 'Thing' and the 'boy' parts being distinct beings and co-existing in one body kind of like that belly-guy from Total Recall for some reason.)
XXX
re: smexy
Spoiler:
He took a step forward and she shied away. She could never keep eye contact when he spoke directly to her. It was too intense.
*Ramsus suddenly straightens up, all signs of fatigue and depression gone. His shirt is now rather conspicuously three sizes too small for him. Both layout and lighting of the room are changed as well. Dominia, to her surprise, finds herself sporting stiletto heels.*
*Music starts playing.*
I'm sorry.
Joking aside, I was too amused by the setup to get into it for some reason, so my feedback is probably of questionable value.
(Also, holy shit, is the dude messed up in the head. That's kind of the point and his most recent partner apparently used sex as yet another angle in psychological subjugation, but, damn. Chilling.)
My suggestion would be to have them not do the nasty at this point because it won't be good while one party is depressed and the other is irritated not speak anything legible. Like, at all. If they both just happen to get consumed by passion to overcome a). previous emotional baggage, b). the scene they've just went through and c). them not being intimate before this, then it must be some hella strong passion there. I'd argue that both of them should be just a pile of limbs rolling on the floor near the spot the ignition happened, frantically trying to suck the air out of each other's lungs.
After that I'd either have them take a break, seriously out of breath like they've just *insert some kind of physical exercise martial artists mecha pilots go through to get their GAR levels high enough* for several hours, their brains only just catching up to what they were doing, get all flustered and embarrassed and stop; some story would happen some then; after some time passed they'd resume their attempts at getting horizontal in a more organized and deliberate fashion.
Or, if there are no breaks on the smexy train and all conviniently walking in people / ship getting exploded / whatever fail to produce the expected result, have them grind it out or something. Like the 'in too much of a hurry to bother undressing' approach, but even more extreme. Failing that 'mutual mastrubation' is everybody's friend too.
IMHO, at least. Probably won't work for the angle you seem to be going for here, though.
XXX
Alternative audios I've considered for the *music* part:
Doop! Hey Yikari, just wanted you to know that I read this and I'm falling over from exhaustion to respond at length, buuuut I really like the idea of pacing 1-1 better! Thank you for your input! Parts of it were really amusing and the other parts were enlightening! I'm coming up on an explanation of what happened to Kahran Bekka soon, but it doesn't align with what you've got there. When I first started writing this, there was about 16 years of pent up "DO HER!!!" frustration on my part seeing things from Dominia's end, so it escalated too quickly from Ramsus: Sad. Dominia: DO ME Ramsus: Okay. ;(
I think I wanted to get a little bit of my 50 Shades of Grey protest piece out of the way first. I wish I had the spoons to speak at length better, but I'm burned out from working overtime tonight.
No problem! It took me some days to think of what I wanted to say and several hours after I've started typing to get this done (with lots of mistakes included, tautology and all). So take your time and let's talk about Ramsus some more!
Which, incidentally, is what I think Ramsus should do himself sometime. Trying to find words to explain something to another person can sometimes really help to get your own thoughts in order.
(If you want to be a really evil author here, have Emeralda come up to him and ask why did he feel the need to try to kill her dad several times and would he please stop doing that before she'd have to infiltrate his body and self-destruct it from within, thank you very much.)
Hehe, okay, so! Once I get a spare thought to myself, I'm going to go through the beginning again and even out the presentation of how he got to where he started in that fic there, and how long the girls had been waiting, and flesh out just how pent up Dominia was, and how the first chance of being alone with him in a non-professional setting escalated things up really quickly.
I like what you had to say about what kind of physical condition he was in. He was banged up from his last fight with Fei before
Spoiler:
killing Miang and attempting to kill Krelian
but mostly he was just being a jerk and focusing internally before coming back up to the surface. I'll shine that up a little better. As I said before, I wanted to get to the action first, eheh. ^^;
After weeks of research interrupted by some OT, here is 1-3! http://archiveofourown.org/works/3478520/chapters/7872137 (I also went back and ironed out 1-1 a little for practicalities and cut some dialogue from 1-2, too.) It's a little shorter than I wanted it to be, but since this was my last night of freedom until June, I wanted to get it out while my brain was functioning at full capacity.
Ooh, it's coming along great!! <3 And I'm so interested in the backstory that this might actually be the thing that gets me to play and/or watch an LP of Xenogears. ouo
stitchedmoon wrote:Ooh, it's coming along great!! <3 And I'm so interested in the backstory that this might actually be the thing that gets me to play and/or watch an LP of Xenogears. ouo
I took some time to write little backstories to get the ages for The Elements appropriate. Since I couldn’t find any canon info on Seraphita and Tolone, fuck the Gazel, I’m making it up.
Spoiler:
Dominia: 20 (14 at Elru) - Saved from Elru by Ramsus in 9993. Ramsus convinced Krelian to enroll Dominia at Jugend because she possessed the power to survive the uncontrollable power Id used to destroy her homeland.
Kelvena: 18 (roomed with Elly at Jugend, so naturally the same age) - Placed into Elements Class in 9998 via pure talent.
Tolone: 17 (Billy’s age because I feel like it) - In 9995, an assistant of Krelian’s that went off the rails experimented on his recently deceased daughter to revive her after an accident (caused by Krelian). Blaming Krelian, Tolone’s father built her back up to fight. It worked, but when her father was discovered in 9996, Krelian had him killed outright. Ramsus was on the enforcer squad on the mission, but wasn’t the one who pulled the trigger on her father. When Tolone flew into a rage at the troops who killed her father, she displayed incredible ether talent. Tolone was marked for death by Soylent, but Ramsus convinced Krelian not to kill her - an easy task since Krelian was keen on studying her. Because she would have been a liability otherwise, Krelian wiped her memory and did his best to infer that he was the one who had created her. Since her positronic brain gave her an edge in her studies, she was entered into Jugend at 14, three years after Dominia.
Seraphita: 21 - Jesiah Black was given command of Gebler in 9990, and Ramsus and Miang served for a brief period under him. Jesse landed his ship on an excursion to the surface in an area populated by Demi-Humans. Seraphita stowed aboard the ship and escaped into Etrenank, but was discovered rather quickly because she was a bunny girl with bright pink hair and a tail and Solarians are racist as fuck. Partially responsible for letting her into Solaris, Jesse ordered Ramsus and Miang + some goons to go after her. While resisting arrest, Seraphita displayed a ridiculously high amount of ether power, and it took both Ramsus and Miang to subdue her. She was immediately marked for disposal, but Ramsus found that she was extremely loyal to anyone who fed her. Seeing this, Miang convinced Ramsus that her power was extremely useful and she could easily be controlled, and he took it to Jesse, who took it to Krelian. Twelve years old at the time, Seraphita was much too young to be enrolled at Jugend, but Ramsus found a suitable sitter for her until she was old enough, and made sure she was properly treated, especially after assuming command of Gebler after Jesse’s desertion. When she graduated Jugend, she became the first of the Neo Elements in 9995.
Also, Kire, sorry for missing your comment re:Sigurd earlier! Sigurd is my third-favorite character in Gears, but to set anything up properly with him and Ramsus that isn't a flashback, both of them have to work through Solaris' backing of Shakhan, Bart and Margie's enmity for Ramsus as a result of that (SIG YOU DID WHAT?!!), and the awkward romantic situation with Dominia/The Elements on the other end (COMMANDER I THOUGHT U LOVED ME) which could really derail what I want to do at the moment. If I figure something else out that circumvents all that (besides a flashback), I can definitely do this, but I think I'm just going to rely on flashbacks for a bit.
Judging by this Xenogears Timeline page - http://chaos2.org/ff/xeno/pw-chartime.shtml - it looks like Sigurd was only with the original Elements for a year. Enough time for things to get very emotional, to be sure, but by the time Id starts busting things up, Sig had been gone for six years, and by the beginning of the game, it will have been twelve years since Sigurd and Kahr had been on good terms.
I've scraped 1-4 together, finally! This chapter is from Dominia's perspective. (I've been thinking about doing perspective chapters from a lot of different characters, actually.) http://archiveofourown.org/works/3478520/chapters/7999536
I got 1-5 done quicker than I thought, but I'm trying to keep chapters pretty short, like, less than 5 pages long in 10pt Verdana in OpenOffice.
This is another from Dominia's perspective, joining back up with the other Elements girls. I think I'm writing this fic because I'm a little bit more interested in her than Ramsus sometimes. (She's kinda the first female character I'd call myself bi for.) http://archiveofourown.org/works/3478520/chapters/8047944
I also did some binary pen doodles this weekend: http://katimus.tumblr.com/post/114819019636 (Sigurd) http://katimus.tumblr.com/post/114812993306 (Dominia)
I've finished up to chapter 1-9! And I started in on 2-1, and finally solidified my interpretation of the Wave Existence. Writing for Krelian, Elly and Miang was not something I was expecting to spend so much time on.
. Still, I'd very much like to have a look-see at what you come up with and, hopefully, help out where I can.
Writing for villains is always a complex ordeal, and for someone as bent out of shape as Ramsus, I gotta approach it carefully. A lot of people write fics for their OTPs all sparkly and rainbows and they're married forever, and as much as I want to write a quick happy ending for Kahr, like the Matrix, it'd be too good to be true and even I wouldn't believe it.