Fight Against Adel in Rinoa (ch30)

Link to the Chapter: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/9446325/30/What-s-all-Gone-on-Before

Link to the livetumbl: http://magiksbrain.tumblr.com/tagged/ch30/chrono

So, this is the chapter where Leon finally decides that he's going to go after Rinoa.  Goodness, that took some persuading.  (Actually, it really didn't.  Edea basically just had to tell him what he needed to do.)  Anyway.

Literally, this is what I had written in my outline:
Leon, Zell, and Quistis were forced to go back to Balamb without Rinoa, but with Laguna.  Despite everything Laguna said, there was no retrieving Rinoa.  After agonizing about this for a while, Leon takes it upon himself to go rescue Rinoa.  He realizes that he cares about her a lot, maybe even to the point of love.  Edea coaches him a bit about Sorceress Knights and he goes off to rescue her.  On the way, he realizes that he loves her.  He brings Rinoa back to herself and she gets the two sets of Sorceress powers under control.

Yeah, so that happened.

by *Mar-ka on dA

Well, it kind of happened like that.  That particular portion of the outline hadn't been updated since I decided
that Adel's consciousness wasn't going to die yet.  Originally, Rinoa just lost control of the second set of powers, rather than Adel having anything to do with it.  But, aside from that modification.

What I do wish I had done, was maybe make the fight against Adel take a little longer.  Reading through it again, I feel like I shortened it by too much to keep it in a chapter length.  I don't know.  Anyone else have any thoughts on that?

Despite that, I'm glad I included the Adel conscious in favor of Rinoa just losing control.  It make Rinoa the only girl who gets possessed, sure, but that's one girl out of a load of boys who have trouble with "shadows" (e.g. Rar's Sora, Riku and Cloud (and kind of Zack).)  *not spoilers because of AtP and BB*

Though, it does make this sequence a little bit darker than originally planned.  Whoopsies.

Then, to piggy-back off of what the livetumbl has going on... I *love* the sarcasm that Leon's got going on.  "I'm going to go visit it as a tourist attraction--no, I'm going to try and rescue her, you dumbwit!"  The second half of that post refers to Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog.  Because sarcasm, that's original.

Then, in those last moments, he's just so mushy.  And he's never been more grateful that Rinoa's always called him 'Squall' in his life.  I made sure that Adel always referred to him as 'boy', and it's not until Rinoa's truly herself again that she calls him 'Squall.'   Heheh.

So, yeah.  That's all I have to say.

Leon versus Things he Doesn't Want to Do (ch15)

But he gets roped into anyway.

Link to the chapter: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/9446325/15/What-s-all-Gone-on-Before

Link to the livetumbl: http://magiksbrain.tumblr.com/tagged/ch15/chrono

by ~ancientzoidian on dA

Have some Zell! He needs some love:

Anyway, so this is that Leon chapter I'd mentioned in the last blog.  Or last chapter.  Or... something.  I remember saying it, but now I can't find record of it.  *headdesk* Of course.  Anyway! Leon chapter!

I continued off the epic entry introduced last chapter and then just continued it into 'Leon getting roped into things he doesn't want to do.'  Because, in all honesty, he really doesn't want to have to go somewhere else and deal with anyone else's problems, he's got enough of his own as far as he's concerned.  But then something twinges in his heart and he wonders that if he helps these people, maybe he'll feel better about letting Radiant Garden fall.  (He still feels mildly responsible for that, yep.)  And so off he goes, despite hardly knowing these people.  And we call Zack impulsive.

Though, I do find it amusing (but completely rational of him) that he tries to pawn Zack off on the newcomers, it goes back to him thinking that he's got enough on his plate and it's completely logical for Zack to go, because Zack was going to leave anyway.  Plus, Zack calls himself a hero! And that's what they're looking for.  Leon does not consider himself a hero, and probably won't for a while.

Anyway, you'll note that Yuffie still calls Leon 'Squall', mostly because she knows it bothers him.  Which is why she's super quick to tell everyone else what his true name is, much to his chagrin.  Yuffie just thinks this is all great fun.  Leon's going to hate her in a bit when Rinoa picks up on it and insists on calling him 'Squall.'  It's cool though, Yuffie's super annoyed that not only does she NOT get to go and help these people, Leon's going instead.  So, congratulations you two, you've annoyed each other.

To expand on the livetumbl...

I basically explained why Leon is the epitome of 'can't be bothered.'

The continuity errors have to do with what is being blamed for Radiant Garden's fall.  Because in my KH Canon (actually, it could be canon.... i'm not entirely sure...) Xehanort plunges Radiant Garden into darkness about the same time he splits his heart and becomes a Heartless and a Nobody.  To compound the problem, Maleficent added a crapton of Heartless and darkness into the area, which just didn't help matters.  So yes, Maleficent is somewhat responsible and it's completely legitimate to blame her for it.  But, ultimately, like everything else in KH, it's Xehanort's fault.

And yes, Aerith has a look that makes everyone get defensive.  She gives Leon that look when she thinks that Leon might have agreed to let Yuffie go along to help.  Aerith tries really hard to keep Yuffie out of the Worlds' problems and only partially succeeds.  It's cute.

And then Aerith went and gave me feels regarding the fact that she felt every death that was a result of Radiant Garden's dirge.  Yup.  Thanks Aerith, for that.  Really wanted it.

And then there was the Xehanort and Ultimecia post.  It came about because rar and I were discussing how Xehanort and Ultimecia both have a thing with possessing people and I casually mentioned that they should make a club.  Yep.

Review Responses:

SpiritDreamWarriors from Chapter 14: I might be able to add Vincent in there somewhere.  It won't be for a while, because I've got the next long bit pretty much ironed out for what's going to happen.  But I can guarantee you a cameo or three before the fic's end.

KKBeckett: Yeah, if you hadn't read the chapters before this one and only heard about a Sorceress causing darkness problems, you're definitely given the jump to assume it's Maleficent.  I kind of did that on purpose.  Mostly so LEON thinks it's Maleficent.  And then he finds out that it's not.  Heh.  I considered actually doing that, but that would be A) too convenient, and B) Leon couldn't actually KILL Maleficent (because that messes with KH canon--don't get me started on her coming back... she needs to not die...) and I needed to give Leon someone (or two, or three) to kill.  Yup.

Anywho, that's all I have for you right now.

I love this video.  All the fandoms.  Advent Children even appears in it somewhere.  :P

And So The Story Begins.... (Prequel Ch9)

Well, a new part of the story, anyway...  This chapter marks the end of one part and the beginning of another.  It also marks an extreme passage of time.

Link: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/9446325/9/What-s-all-Gone-on-Before

by ~YunaB-Rabbit on dA

So, Kairi's portion of the chapter happens directly after the previous chapter, the dirge of Radiant Garden.  The protection charm she had took her from that world and plopped her right into the seas of Destiny Islands.  From there, she was carried to the main island of Destiny Islands and was found by Sora and Riku, both of whom she instantly becomes friends with.  Though not mentioned in the chapter, nor will I do a chapter on this, Kairi is then adopted by the mayor and his wife and proceeds to begin a life as if she were their daughter.  She still retains memories of her old home, but five-year-old's only have so much memory recall, so things begin to blur and fade.

In between the last time we saw Quistis and now, she's been studying hard to become an instructor, and she finally makes it.  She's not even an instructor for an entire hour when she's called to do a mission to research the appearance of Heartless onto her world.  Proud and logical, Quistis takes up the job, knowing that since she has no classes or students at the moment, she won't have to put her life on hold to do it.  After this chapter, she will proceed to take Zell and maybe another Cadet or two and do as much research as she possibly can on the Heartless.  I will explore Heartless and that world later.

Tifa's in a conundrum.  She wants to take martial arts lessons, for many reasons, (protecting her town, trying to see if Cloud will take her on as an adventuring buddy, not wanting to be helpless) but she can't afford them and knows her dad won't pay for them.  I'm not sure when I decided that Tifa's dad would be such a pain, but it happened somewhere in this chapter.  So she tries to get a job as a tour guide for Mt. Nibel (a job that she has in Crisis Core) but unfortunately, she can't get the job at this point.  However, despite not having a job or the money to pay for the lessons, Zangan is willing to train Tifa anyway because he sees her potential.  I will explore this later as well.

Rinoa's magical powers finally dwindle and she decides that she must not be a Sorceress after all.  (Spoiler alert, she wasn't.)  She's initially upset, mostly because she's finally been able to master some good spells, but then she becomes relieved because she's not a pariah to society.  She starts thinking about other ways to fight and how she's going to help Timber without magic.  She reconsiders going back to SeeD and becoming a cadet, thinking about how she could help the Timber Owls that way, but the thought gets postponed because maybe, maybe she can handle things at the Timber Owls without magic and without being a SeeD.  Her plans to become SeeD will continue to get delayed partially because of things with the Timber Owls and partially because of the influx of Heartless.  (Trust me, this isn't spoilers.)

Things that did NOT appear in this chapter, but I can guarantee you are happening: the Organization takes form with the first six members, and Ansem, Seeker of Darkness, starts to bring darkness to more worlds.  Yup, yup!

So, there was no liveblogging for this chapter... however, I did go back and add the liveblogging link for chapter 8 below.

And this is super awesome....