Katzaniel

I'm not sure what to say, except that I need to tell you that I think you're overreacting. Temporary loss of creativity happens to all of us. Unfinished / abandoned stories are really more of the norm than any other type. Typos are minor, even if they do squeak past a spellchecker. And your writing does not suck. I know from talking to you earlier on MSN that you've convinced yourself you can't write for a while, but does that really warrant changing your title to "Loser" and skipping out on the coming Summer Festival? Stick around.

I'm only partway through the first chapter, but here are the typos I have found thus far: He being held -> He was being held seniority card He’d held -> seniority card. He'd held remind me of some one. -> remind me of someone. facing the speaker--- a white unicorn -> facing the speaker: a white unicorn (this is probably a matter of preference, I'm not sure... anyway, it struck me as wrong, though I can't say why.) Bursting into smile -> Bursting into a smile more than you, child -> more than you do, child the one I spoke of will be there -> the one of which I spoke will be there (These last two are fine as is because they come from speech, not narrative, and in order for speech to be natural, it can't be perfect. However, this comes from a unicorn, who I rather view as having achieved perfection. If that is the impression you wanted to leave for Trupulse, I recommend those changes.) Hope this helps! (PS, I am enjoying the story, and think it is well done, but won't post any sort of review on that until I've had time to read more.)

Oh no, Spiteful Loners have a majority of 3 to any 1 of another group!!! I'm sure there's some sort of irony in that. Although, I will add 1 to the Robots. Funny part about that is, almost everything they said, I thought of as a compliment. You know what would be cool, is a poll of Pennites to see what the average disposition of this crowd is.

*grins* Yeah, I imagined the Marshmallow Puff guy too, when I started trying to write about the image, but it's not quite it. And Quincunx, I'm picturing the bullets being absorbed by the warriors, but them falling back and crying out (soundlessly) as if in pain. I don't know if I can bear to remove that line, not without adding a better explanation in there. I'm certainly thinking about it. I dunno, maybe it's some allegory on wars that don't get media attention.... And who's General Winter? Thanks for all the comments! Their mouths, that shout with wordless cries. Their anger shows, but through their eyes. The white expanse is almost grand, their snowy forms fill up the land. Marshmallow men, in stance to fight. Bullets absorbed seem still to bite. With large pale gun each creature kills but silence reigns and white blood spills. No sounds pierce through the eggshell gore; no hue or cry in this odd war. PS. I don't think I can highlight in red inside code tages, so I'll just mention that I changed lines 3, 17, 18 and 19.

Maybe it's just me, but why do you need HTML to do that? Just do what I presume Yui did... link to the "entry" number since each question is in it's own post. You can find the entry # in a number of ways, discussed in ... erg, some thread that I simply cannot find to link to. As for a guild post... I will whether I or another guildleader can getcha something on that. I think there are already comments that come very close to what we want, I'll have to go looking, but later. Lastly, I think that calling the questions about the portal "Portal" might not be a good idea, because no one new would know what that meant until they had read it.

That was fun. I'd like to see another game done in first-person sometime, as long as we can assume the killer doesn't remember committing the act, because previous to this, I have always avoided actually going into my character's head, so that I don't have to either lie or give something away. I'm sad that it ended so soon, I was really looking forward to stretching those Seer muscles and trying out the pass-along PM system. Although, I have to admit I don't mind that I'm done with trying to empathize with Jason! Writing him was a grisly process, that's for sure. Also, we had a first this game! This was the first time, barring the time I intentionally provoked it to see if it could happen, that someone voted for me. Yay!

OOC: Vote for Thomas McKinston / Patrick Durham

Everyone is looking at Thomas strangely. He certainly has some odd motives, even for a murderer. A psychopath, obviously. Even more so than the other man, the one who seems to be pushing the buttons of the staff and the doctor, for what? To study them, I suppose. But this one, Thomas, he seems to be studying himself. I notice Duncan eyeing Thomas suspiciously. Yes, the murder. Someone here did it, I suppose. Well, I hope it wasn't Tabatha. She probably isn't pure; she's probably sick, like all the others were. But something in me hopes that she's here mistakenly. There has to be such a thing as a pure woman, somewhere. And the other women. I never did watch the news reports much, but I saw enough to know how Brenda, the Black Widow, killed her patients, even if I'd been in jail when it happened. She had to be innocent, of this murder at least. And Audrey? I missed her in the headlines, but I could tell she killed for the pleasure of it. No, whoever had murdered Jeremy had an agenda. Holly? No, she was another that I'd heard about, an exhibitionist. She always kills in public, or so I'd heard. But Duncan suspects Thomas. Or maybe he wants us to think he suspects him? Well, Thomas has me nervous, too. What kind of a person kills without knowing why? Maybe to learn why? I will definitely watch myself around him.

Sometimes there's just nothing to say that better describes one's feelings than "w00t"! Congratulations Ayshela, this is more than well-deserved, it's basically destiny.

Actually, I wonder if this wouldn't be better in the Scarlett Pen? Then none of us would have to hold back what these people are actually thinking. In fact, both of Celes' posts and certainly mine, I'm sure, belong in the Scarlett Pen... it's really hard to censure a psychopath... EDIT: Do we need an IC excuse for votes? And are we using actual werewolves then? Does that mean the WW would not necessarily recall the murder, and I can have my character think about the murder without giving away his guilt or innocence?

Regret? I would have to agree with the one they call Audrey on that one. I didn't get caught the same way - I would never have left bodies in my apartment for just anyone to find - but getting caught is my biggest regret. For now, I remain silent. I won't talk unless they make me. But I don't regret my wife leaving me, not any more. It was that that made me find Jennifer, and Lacey, and Susan... oh, I could list them all, but that's not really the point. Any young girl was better than my wife, despite their sick natures. Sure, there was a long period in there with very little sex, but once I got through that, once the girls started coming to me, it was all worth it. After I killed Jennifer (I couldn't have let her go back home, now could I? And she was a sick girl, very sick.) I felt a little guilty, but mostly I had wanted to run through the streets, proclaiming to all men that I had found the way to do it. Young girls, especially virgins, who would scream right when I wanted them to... there couldn't be anything better, could there? The doctors drone on about regret, and what do I regret? Not Jennifer. Certainly not Lacey, and not even Susan. What I regret is Tomoko. And not for killing her, nor for exploiting her inner sickness. I regret the complacency and the overwhelming desire that led me to pull the car over too soon, to fail to drag her far enough into the woods. I regret languishing in her screams, and not realizing that we were close to the highway, that someone else might hear them. "Mr. Ulmer." They want something out of me, do they? I'll give them a gem of wisdom that they'll appreciate, but never truly understand. "Regret is viler than the act which one regrets," I say. "Regret never gets you anywhere. Instead, learn from your mistake, and take advantage of your new situation." And while they muse over that one, croon over the deep meanings they think they see, I will take it to heart. This new facility offers me two really good opportunities: Tabatha, the young girl. She really seems my type. And Audrey, the one who keeps shouting arousing comments about kinds of sex I've never tried, and lesbianism. Mmmm, lesbians. I wonder what sorts of things she might be able to teach me, and whether I might be able to get her and Tabatha away from the guards at the same time?

OOC: This was going to be my second poem in the slam contest, if I made it. Probably better that I didn't, because I can think of no way to attribute this to Gabriel, and it's not alliterative or anything. Their mouths, that shout with wordless cries. Their anger showing, but through their eyes. The white expanse is almost grand, their snowy forms fill up the land. Marshmallow men, in stance to fight. Bullets absorbed seem still to bite. With large pale gun each creature kills but silence reigns and white blood spills. No sounds echo through eggshell gore; no sound or colour in this odd war. OOC: Now that you've finished reading, mind telling me what impression you got? It was a strange day-dream vision that flashed into my head one recent evening, and I have a feeling it could be interpreted some analogy or other (probably many) but I'm no good at those. And I want to know if I described it well enough for the image to come across at all.

Jason Ulmer, Caucasian Male, 48, divorced. Admitted March 2000. After a painful divorce from his wife of 21 years at the age of 43, Jason began frequenting internet matchmaking services and chatlines. After he had little success in achieving second dates, he began to get frustrated. Two years passed and he was soon lying about himself, becoming younger and more attractive every week. Soon he was going after young girls, finding them the most easily deceived. He spent most of his time (having a cushy, unionized desk job), keeping ten or twenty on the go at one time. When some of these were actually convinced to meet him in person, he raped and killed them, moving on to the next. Those that did not show any signs of wanting to be with him were soon dropped. He started pardoning himself by claiming in his own mind that each of them wanted to sleep with him, even after discovering how old he was, and that he was cleansing society of girls who would become indecent young women. Jason had murdered 23 girls, all below the age of 17, before being caught in 1999. Assessment of the state: -- To be editted in later. --

Hm... I could definitely be wrong about that part. Tell ya what, I get back home (and therefore to my textbook) in a few days. I'll see if I can't figure out what the problem is then.

Since YanYan hasn't answered, I'll post here what he told me, that he's considering leaving this incomplete and taking another go at his QQ later with some other idea. I think his reasoning was lack of inspiration or some such... if y'all wanna try to convince him to finish it off, go ahead, 'cause I'd certainly like to see it finished.

Ah yes, the speed of light question. I know just enough physics to feel comfortable bungling this. (Warning: The following explanation will not make much sense, however when my prof explained it, it was enough to convert me to a believer on this issue, which I never was before.) As an object approaches c, the speed of light, certain effects become more noticable. Time dilation, or distance contraction, for one. This is well-known and well-proven. A particle that has been accelerated to, oh say, 0.9c, will actually exist for more time to an unmoving observer than it would if it were moving non-relativistic speeds. The particle exists for the same amount of time as far as it is concerned, or anything in its frame-of-reference (ie, moving at the same speed in the same direction), but the observer seems to the particle to exist for longer, for exactly the same reason: both the particle and the observer are moving at 0.9c with respect to each other. Light is the only thing that can travel at the speed of light for a few reasons. (Or, probably one reason, but a few ways to say it.) One is that anything travelling at c will actually be at the point where all distances are 0 and all time is infinity. (I think. I may have this backward, or be slightly confused on this point.) A photon, or "particle of light" sees everything happening at the same time, and everything in the same place. (That part I do know). And anything that travels faster than c cannot get information back to anything that doesn't. Since information is light, or some such, you can't see anything moving that fast, it just as well doesn't exist to us. I'm kind of confused here, but again, it made sense when my prof explained it. And lastly, mass is relative as well. As velocity increases to relativistic speeds, mass increases, and nothing can get to the speed of light without reaching infinite mass, except for a photon, which has a mass of 0 to begin with. Photon are intriguing little things, and I don't scientists are quite sure yet whether they're matter or waves; actually I think the current theory is that they have properties of both. Light is unique, and it has very strange properties that allow it to travel at c. So, as far as I can tell, there might be things that travel faster than c, but they can't slow down to communicate with us in any way. Light, sound, et cetera all travel too slowly. This last bit is entirely my own conjecture, though... I don't know if any scientists even agree that it might be possible as far as that. PS: "If the universe is expanding, then there must be somewhere to expand into." I'm not sure if everyone would agree with that. Some might say it's not space, it's not somewhere until it's universe... or some such. But I don't feel comfortable delving into that.

It's rather amusing that despite all the talk of freedom, no rules, and inspiration governing, despite the mad attempt to escape the conformity of text, despite the unabashed freedom of constriction that the piece brings to mind... that despite all that, the anarchist has followed rhythmic and rhyming patterns of poetry. I liked it. I really did. It was difficult to read, and I can't help but wish for the sake of those not fluent in l33t and the like that there be some halfway-sane version, but I liked how the "text" format visually aided the concepts discussed. And, when it comes to the actual poem, sheared down to its words as they reach my brain one at a time and a line at a time, I once again find myself awed by your mastery of them, the seeming ability to pick words like books off a shelf and order them as you need to produce such an effect.

*grins* Ayshela, I think that most words you invent would not translate.

Horace returned to the stage when Gabriel was called up, this time remembering to jiggle the briefcase in signal. The kidnapped Archangel, uncharacteristically nervous, muttered, It's shorter than I'd hoped, but it's complete... Well, here goes, before launching into the actual poem. Once with whistling winds I wandered, now on sea of sand I stand. Whispered words should ne'er be squandered; laughing love brought life to land. Once I walked with gait unhindered - now I'll be on beach awhile. Better that her love should linger: I'd stay and still my heart would smile.

This is an English sentence. -> The English phrase of the program is one. What a wonderful little misapplication. -> That false narcotic of the small application. It's utterly amazing how this rarely fails to get it wrong. (It is completely narcotic, poichè that this one does not take with him the erroneamente very rare one.)

Okay, you're so good at writing knot-in-the-gut-scary that I'm not sure I'm ever going to click on this topic again. I did not enjoy reading that, but I'll fully admit that that's not because it wasn't good.

I think you definitely need to revisit this with rhythm in mind; it's very good, as is, except for that aspect. Hope the "therapy" worked for ya, and hope to see this reworked.

Not now. The thought interrupted Horace, who was on her way to ask Mynx about the strange pair of animals on her shoulders. It's Open Mike and I'd like to stretch these poetry muscles before competing. Sign up for me, would you? The demoness sighed and followed orders. Much as Gabriel was her captive, he was becoming a bit of a friend lately, and she had decided this would be his night. Gabriel was actually a little worried. Slam poetry was meant to be heard aloud. So what would it mean if it was instead inserted directly into the audience's thoughts, as his speech did when he was on Earth? At least his words would be easily recognizable from the listener's own thoughts, as they tended to resonate, and were always on the highest level of thought, one that most humans did not use. Well, nothing for it but to try. Horace wasn't very good at writing, but she noticed that another poet had already signed with an X, so that must be acceptable. Then she paused. That meant X was already used, didn't it? So she signed with a Y and made her way up to the stage. She stood for a long moment, wondering why Gabriel didn't begin, forgetting as usual that he could not see. The audience began to notice this strange, reddish tinted person, fidgetting on the stage. Finally she hefted her briefcase and whispered, unintentionally loud enough for everyone to hear, "Why aren't you saying anything?!" So Gabriel started. Oh moonlight, moonlit, moon of light, Lightly shining, shines so softly. Circle shining, light so mournful, Mournful light makes up the night. Oh sunrise, light rise, raise the sun, Rise to heavens, Heaven's sun. Circle, bright light, bright so rising, Rousing light makes up the morn. There was a distinct pause. Horace watched the effect on the audience, most of which was sitting up in their seats, not watching the stage at all, but some far-off point of their own brains, trying to figure out what was going on. Then Gabriel's whisper, still carrying across the room, Did it work? Did they all hear me? Horace nodded and ran off the stage before they looked at her again.

*blink* Yes, I meant Xaious. My excuse will be the funky way that the word "Vader" in his post could be read "Valdar" by someone in a dyslexic mood. Because I sure don't know what else that was!

Inbi watched in horror as the chaos unfolded. When Wyvern started acting strangely and screamed, she stepped forward hesitantly, but was beaten to the punch by Appy and Sweet, who for all she could tell must be sky-high on a sugar buzz. In this bunch, Patham seemed normal. More than normal: dull. But, Inbi was beginning to think that dull was good, very very good. When there finally five straight minutes where nothing insane happened, Inbi recovered her courage. Stepping up to the dance floor, she introduced herself to the shapechanger. "I'm Inbi Infusco. And you're Patham, right?" "Yes," he said, bowing his head slightly in mock-formal introduction. "Care for a dance?" queried Inbi, speaking to Sweetcherrie as well. So the three of them danced to the next song, and Inbi actually began to calm down, before the next thing happened...