I create a world of finite somethings

I've had a few PMs and visitor messages ask me for advice on writing, so I thought I'd just put up some things that spring to mind every once in a while.

So, the thing I will say the most is that one of the reasons I identify with Shirou so easily is that I am a faker like he is. I steal. Shamelessly. They say that with fiction, "there are no new ideas," right? I agree. I think that instead what you have to do is pull everything and anything you feel works from any kind of source you can and use it. Figure out why it works, where it works, how it works, and use it.

Here's an example.

Originally Posted by Fate/Far Side: Origami Blades chapter 2

Thankfully, I think it was my own cooking that saved me. The heavy nature of the pork meant that I was operating on a full stomach when the alcohol started coming in. Within two hours, I still only felt marginally tipsy and had managed to mime drinking the last cup given to me since the others were too inebriated to notice.

Of course, my meal hadn’t really saved the others. Hisui was out, flat out, within twenty minutes, and Kohaku had taken to energetically stumbling around the room by the turn of the hour, asking philosophical questions like, “Is there such a thing as organic alcohol?” Tohno-san managed longer, sitting in not-quite-quiet dignity for that first hour, though by the second she was more like Fuji-nee after a long bout after hours with coworkers.

By which I mean, absolutely hilarious.

“—So then she’s caught ‘n the hallway with every’n staring out ‘t her in the first place!” Tohno-san had put her free hand up as if to give a parade wave, though her drunken mannerisms made it overly exaggerated. This classmate of hers apparently evoked the kind of ire from her that rich people did from Tohsaka.

“I see,” I had said, agreeing, still contemplating how to wrest the latest bottle Tohno-san had taken out of her other hand. The once I had tried earlier, it had been like it was affixed there with superglue.

So, by hour two she was pretty much a revolving door, rotating between fits of giggles and loud exclamations every minute. I managed to finally tear the drink in her hand away, though its contents were at that point two-thirds gone. Also, she certainly had quite the grip.

“Eheheheheh,” Kohaku half-snorted, half-giggled from behind me. “You wiiiiiin.”

I wasn’t really sure what she was talking about anymore.

It was still early, not even ten at night, though I couldn’t exactly see any of them recovering at this point. I tried figuring the logistics of picking Hisui up from her place on the couch, making it to her room, then getting back and retrieving Tohno-san next, but I was rather afraid another bottle would make it into her hands by that point. Too, I wasn’t sure where Hisui’s room was. “Kohaku…you wouldn’t be able to get your sister to bed, would you?”

“Totally not,” Kohaku said from her place on the floor. I’d just left her there from the last time she had stumbled. She claimed the coffee table had attacked her.

“Okay then,” I said, turning back to Tohno-san. The girl returned my look with a blushing face and a rather zoned expression. I resisted the urge to pinch her cheeks. “Tohno-san, I should take you to your room.”

She frowned. “I will not tolerate jokes about my phy-seek.”

What.

Kohaku giggled again from the floor.

“You, quiet,” I said. “You, up you go,” I turned back to Tohno-san and curled her arm around my shoulders at the same time as curling mine around her waist. “I promise not to make jokes about your body.”

“Promise?” she said, pouting.

Whoa. That sort of expression plus those words should be banned in seven prefectures. Actually, it reminded me a bit of Illya, which, huh, I get it. In hindsight, it becomes so apparent that she had weaponized such a thing to make me dance to her tune. “Promise.”

“Okay.”

She was not quite as resistant in walking then, and I glanced to Kohaku, who had somehow managed it back to her feet. “You, stay there with your hands and feet where I can see them.” I know that made no sense since I was going to be leaving sight of them, but the warning was still true.

“Roger!” Kohaku said, planting herself into a seat. “I’ll be right here, in this chair, and not move an inch!”

“Don’t forget to breathe,” I told her.

I half-pulled, half-guided Tohno-san back to her room, though the stairs took us a good ten minutes to traverse. Again, she revolved between giggling fits and making exclamations of how patronizing it was to be held this way.

“Want me to carry you like a newlywed bride instead?” I offered.

“Feh, you wish it could be so easy.”

I couldn’t help but grin at the rejoinder. Something about it reminded me of home, and I had to remind myself that I actually didn’t know these people all that well. They were just…

A little too much of a reminder, I guess.

“Don’t look like that, I was joking,” Tohno-san said. I glanced to her and she was frowning again. “I dun mean to hurt feelings or anything.”

“I know.” I grinned. “You must joke like that a lot, though.”

“Feh,” she again gave an unladylike snort. “Not. Like nii-san could be bothered with this.”

Well, I guess the hurt expression I had must have transferred into her voice. I gave her a little shake at that. “I’m sure he’s fine. He’ll probably have his fill of adventuring and then come back home and settle down.”

“Probably forget an omiage while he’s at it,” she muttered.

I managed to pry her door open and swing us both into her room. Tohno-san stumbled face-first into the bed, then refused to move from that position. “Er, I should go help Kohaku and Hisui too.”

She nodded in place, her voice muffled by the comforter. “Goh ahwed.”

I felt though, like I had somehow brought her thoughts to darker places, so I should somehow get her spirits back up. Or at least, redirect that energy. So I made it back to the door before saying, “And Tohno-san? I would never make fun of your physique. You are quite a beautiful woman, what with the long, smooth legs and the nice arch of your—”

Laughing, I ducked out of the room when a pillow went flying my way. Then tripped against the frame and crashed to the floor just outside.

Maybe I was a little more tispy than I gave myself credit for.

I made it back to the living room where we had been drinking and found Kohaku now sprawled out on the floor again, the chair she had been in tipped over directly behind her, indicating how she had ended up in such a position.

“I failed in my task, sir!” Kohaku said before giggling again.

Hisui gave a snort in her sleep, and I sighed.

Just like home.

Pretty much everything in this scene is cannibalized from other things. First,

and Kohaku had taken to energetically stumbling around the room by the turn of the hour, asking philosophical questions like, “Is there such a thing as organic alcohol?”

is something that a friend of mine in fact waxed poetical about when drunk.

“You, quiet,” I said. “You, up you go,” I turned back to Tohno-san and curled her arm around my shoulders at the same time as curling mine around her waist. “I promise not to make jokes about your body.”

“Promise?” she said, pouting.

Whoa. That sort of expression plus those words should be banned in seven prefectures.

K-On! episode 4. The look Mio gives the girls that makes them immediately call back to "Moe moe kyun~"

I half-pulled, half-guided Tohno-san back to her room, though the stairs took us a good ten minutes to traverse. Again, she revolved between giggling fits and making exclamations of how patronizing it was to be held this way.

There's a scene in the film Ten Things I Hate About You where Julia Stiles' character Kat, drunk off her ass, is being half-carried by Heath Ledger's Patrick and complaining about it being patronizing.

“Want me to carry you like a newlywed bride instead?” I offered.

Sano offers the same thing to Yumi.

I made it back to the living room where we had been drinking and found Kohaku now sprawled out on the floor again, the chair she had been in tipped over directly behind her, indicating how she had ended up in such a position.

Originally Posted by X-Wing: Starfighters of Adumar, page 142

Hobbie was sprawled on the main room floor, immediately behind him a tipped-over chair showing how he'd come to end up prone, and was carefully aiming a comlink at Tomer and thumbing its on-off switch as though firing a blaster at the diplomat; his expression was groggy enough to suggest that's exactly what he thought he was doing.

Suddenly, I'm not so witty, am I?

Anyway, as you can see, the real wit here is not in conjuring something up on my own. It's to find things I enjoy from sources that are kind of strange and unrelated, then use them where I see fit. One of the reasons I like anime is because of the vastly different genres you can have access to. If I only paid attention to the fantastical stuff, I might not have thought to equate Akiha moe = Mio moe. Or for Shirou's reaction to essentially be, "Moe moe kyun~"

Lesson of the, er, lesson: steal. Steal that shit like crazy. Steal it from any and all sources, ones obvious and not. Most importantly, steal it from things you like and enjoy, because there's probably a reason you like and enjoy them that probably works in general, and more importantly, probably works for the kind of thing that is going to come out of your mind.


More backup for Hearts of the Suffering.

One of the ways around OCs that I might end up trying

Hakuno is the name they give the Fate/Extra protag in supplement stuff.

“What is he like?” Saber had trouble finding the words. “As a leader, or ‘liberator’ as you say?”

Hakuno looked up and away, balancing the rifle barrel on her leg. She did not immediately respond, humming in thought. Julius was faster, his solemn voice one again carrying that hint of sadness. “It is as you say, he is not really our ‘leader.’ We follow him, but that does not mean he leads us. I think he would prefer it if we went on our way.”

Hakuno smiled. “Yeah, he doesn’t treat us like we’re nuisances, but he rarely gives us actual ‘orders.’”

“Rarely. What has he ordered you to do on the occasion it does happen?”

“It isn’t really something specific. Usually, we kind of come up with a general plan and synch up so well that there’s no orders involved.” Hakuno returned to wiping down the cylinder. “I think in that, we’re more like three individuals that just happen to complement each other.”




“He once said that in the event where something looked hopeless for him, we were to leave him be.” Julius scowled at the thought. “He was very specific. He said that in such an event, he would do everything he could to get us to safety. But that if it looked hopeless for him, we were to do nothing.”

Hakuno fitted the barrel back into the housing. “He told me why, once. That he didn’t want to place any kind of burden on us.” She smiled, but it was a sad expression, her eyebrows turning down even as her lips went up. “I don’t think he’s against mercy killings per se, but he wanted to be left alone in that kind of situation.”

Saber nodded, slowly. She thought she understood why. It once more confirmed to her that the boy she once knew and the man that was now fighting were still the same person, with the same damage to the soul. He wanted to shoulder what he could and stubbornly refused to let another take that from him, the paradoxically selfless action for a selfish reason. “You are correct to assume it is to save you from the pain of destroying one you love,” Saber said. “However, I would not concern myself with such a thing in your place.”

Hakuno tilted her head aside, confusion evident.

Saber gave her own little smile. “As you said, he is not your ‘leader.’ He has no right to demand that. That is the value only one who commands can claim. Besides,” she met Hakuno’s gaze, “I should think for all the trouble he has given others, you can cause trouble of your own. Make your own decisions, so long as they are what resound in your heart.”