VGhost

[ QUOTE ]
Heh... VGhost, this particular story is done.

[/ QUOTE ]
Bah! Go write another story than! Hurry, before I get bored waiting have to get my lazy self in gear and write one of my own. Now go!

Odd, because I don't have any trouble reading the purple-on-blue on my monitors at work or home. Perhaps you need to adjust your monitor settings? I hope that helps.

I personally enjoy the the font colors he uses for certain characters. Kinda reminds me of Death in the Discworld novels. You always know when he's talking and some characters just need distinguishing font. Especially if they have a distinctive voice.

Woot! More story! Good stuff so far, now go write more.

Very well written. I personally didn't mind the mention of the ATs as I always kinda imagine them as in character designations. People love to classify things and if Paragon City can have five government branches for each origin then I'm sure they subdivide thier heroes into the ATs we're familiar with. And if the heroes do it I don't see why the evil geniuses of the Rogue Isles wouldn't come up with their own designations for what a villain is capable of. That's just my take.

Also the ending where the boy relates what happened to Stahlkreiger's mother didn't bother me so much. I acutally was kinda releived you killed her off and let her find a sort of peace. As a new parent I particularly empathized with her when you abducted her kids on the day of her greatest triumph for them. In fact it's all I've been thinking about this afternoon. Very well done. A tremendous amount of emotional impact without melodrama, and that's hard to do - especially in a short story. Of course you could just say being a dad has made me soft, but I can live with that.

Overall very good. You got me involved enough with the characters I was supposed to care about so I cheered when when they triumphed and felt for them when they fell. And there was enough emotional detachment from the extras that were killed off that I felt bad, but wasn't detracted from the overall mood of the scene.

If I had to make a nitpick it would be the fact that Brian became a villain. Somehow I expected it would take more than a hero passing him by and being shot at by Longbow to push an upstanding young man who had avoided gangs all his life into a life of crime. Of course that could just be explained by that fact that he's a soul in an android body and that morality doesn't have quite the same impact that it once did - which I think is what you were going for. Anyway, I think that could have been expanded on some more but who cares? It was still a great read and you are truly talented.

((In a word - masterful. I stumbled across this today as I don't drift by the roleplaying section much and this happened to be on the first page. I was hooked from page one. Thank goodness it was finished when I found it, cause I don't think I could have taken the suspense!

I can see what DeviousMe was saying about the detachment from the story, but for me that gave it a truly epic quality. Of course everything was going to work out okay, so why not make it big? There was enough detachment that sacrificing one of the main characters for the climax wouldn't have detracted from the story. But there wasn't so much detachment that the loss wouldn't have been felt. This wasn't a story about character development (though it could certainly lead into one - ala Picard and the Borg) it was about a monumental clash and a very clever plot (IMHO). In fact, now that I bring it up, I realize I got the same feeling reading this as I did watching that "Best of Both Worlds" episode for the first time. Epic, grand, and suspenseful with dozens of wonderful little hooks to dangle new plots off of.

Finally, kudos to you for drawing all the different factions and storylines together so seamlessly. If you hadn't said so I never would have guessed you'd made this up as you went.))

Name: Laine Jordan
Apt. #: 418 (coincidentally her birthday )
Age: 20
Current location: Settling in.
Archtype/Powerset: MA/Regen mutation scrapper
Description: 3'10"; very slender; red, windblown hair falling past her shoulders; innocent face with pouty lips; wears long-sleeved shirt with jeans and fingerless gloves.
Disposition: Stand-offish. Was hurt deeply by her friends' rejection of her when her powers manifested, and so lives in a sort of self-imposed exile from others. She does deeply wish for close friendships again but seems to work against herself in that respect.
Hunting tactics: Walking down dark alleys alone (the goons fall for it every time. ).

Name: Laine Jordon

Theme songs: Hadn't given it a lot of thought, but....

"Do You Hear the People Sing?" from 'Les Miserables' - Laine sees herself as the embodiment of people's desire to stand up for themselves.

"No Rain" by Blind Melon - Sort of embodies her disconnection from others.

Origin/Backstory: Laine grew up in a good sized (small by costal standards) midwest town. She is a mutant and her powers didn't truly manifest until college when she was attacked by some unruly frat boys on her way through the university parking lot. The two weeks of Tae-kwan-do she took in middle school coming back with exceeding clarity. She found that after practicing something once or twice the action became reflex to her. Her diminutive height (3'10") is due to the fact that her cells, instead of turning outward and causing her to grow normally, turned inward and became more resiliant and able to recover from trauma faster. She also posesses the ability to, with a little concentration, absorb nutrients from organic matter by touch. Her body requires more nutrients than what her size would suggest, but this is offset by her incredibly efficient digestion. She can also hover which helps greatly in day-to-day activities - imagine being shoulder height to the stove, unable to use the freezer without a stepstool, or having to 'hop' to sit on the toilet. She hates being reminded of her height and is quite sensitive about it. However, subconciously her size makes her feel powerful, in the sense that others very often underestimate her.

Broken or Broken-ness: A term I first heard playing Magic:The Gathering, and that probably originated there. Refers to an ability, power, card, etc. that some creative gamer found a way to use to unbalance or 'break' the game that the devs didn't intend. This usually leads to a nerf or restriction on that ability by said devs. This can be used in a positive way ("Instant Healing pre-I5 was pure broken-ness!") or a negative way ("Did you see what he did to me in PvP? I'm telling you that power is totally broken").

e.g. and i.e.: My pet peaves. e.g. is Latin for 'exempli gratia' meaning 'for example'. i.e is Latin for 'id est' meaning 'that is to say' or 'in other words'.

WIWAW: "Wish I was a wookie." Ok, I made that up - I think I did anyway. Cyberspace is awfully big. Heh, think I'll start using it to see if it catches on.