UFO Fanfiction Discussion

[The Veteran]

Erm... Basically? No... I mean that he's going to presume you'll be a terrible soldier and are mopre likely to kill one of our guyst han one of theirs. Usually he wouldn't be overly bothered but as you are a medic I'm sure he'd rather you were alive than dead! If it was someone like poison he's more likely to shoot her himself...

[The Veteran]

JellyFishGreen! You have to start reading the fic more thoroughly before you post! I'm only half way through reading your last installment and I've found several errors already...

 

At the end of today, they'll recommend to me their choices for squad leader. Those temporary bars will be issued for team training tomorrow. Final squads will be assigned day after tomorrow." -

The day after tomorrow will be January 2nd. We need the final squad assignments now! By tomorrow morning everyone has to know exactly where they are and we need the tanks to be finished as well...

---This one is edited---

 

after some warmup exercise and breakfast -

Read my post a few days ago. The reason Knight woke the base early was so anyone wanting breakfast could have it before training started at six.

---This one is edited---

 

He looked at Gia, who was resting her leg cast and crutch on a second chair. She grinned sheepishly from underneath curls held flat by a head bandage. -

Writing about Gia I specifically pointed out that she was back on her feet almost straight away. She was walking around the med-lab before she'd even finished her physio! She is supposed to be a VERY tough pilot and the amount of damage your post gives her is way too extreme! She should be flying in hours not weeks.

---This one is edited---

 

"That reminds me, we need to order you a new one of those, yours was wrecked. But I wanted to get your view on the actual events leading up to and cause of the crash." -

As we speak Doc is already on his way to pick up another Hurricane for the base. The whole point of crashing the Lightning was to allow Gia to get a nice new real interceptor craft...

---This one is edited---

 

"Hurricane production schedule was moved up to compensate. They'll have it ready in about ten or twelve hours. We're going to send Mr. France to pick it up with Mr. Davies as relief pilot. Doc, you're allowed to look in the back this time." Doc grunted to indicate slight amusement. "General Genega has already mentioned this to you, yes?" "Yeah, it's old news. Half an hour ago." -

I'll say again, Doc is already underway making almost this whole section unnecessary.

---My post is edited to compensate---

 

"Unfortunately we've only allocated three hours for your familiarization and training flight. Three and a half if you skip breakfast." -

No time for familiarization. The two pilots will rely on the onboard computer for any assistance they require.

---This one is edited---

 

SIX errors... All now edited but still there shouldn't be the need for it. Sorry that this whol thing is so heavy handed but it has to read properly or it won't be a good fic. Nice following of the storylines though...

 

Right well I edited them before I actually posted this so they're all done now. I just ask that when you next post, read the rest of the fic first!!!

[Tammy]

Nice post, JFG! Putting the squad assignments in memo form was a good idea. I like the crack about Poison having seen salutes only in the movies, too.

 

Oh, and Doc, you must find time to write soon. Are you a skyranger pilot? I seem to remember you are. Can I sit up front with you sometimes? Oh, and I have a question. Is there any reason for a skyranger pilot to sit in the skyranger the whole time? That's not the way it's done in the game. In the game if your whole squad gets killed, you lose the skyranger. I think they should get out there and shoot some aliens, though maybe they should stay close in case we need to get out of there in a hurry.

[Crazy Photon]

Hey TJ, give him a little break, it's his birthday after all!

 

BTW, I've been busy today, so I'll post the briefing tomorrow or on wednesday (worst case).

[Snikers]

Arrrrrrrr now I'm all confused! Is Rick our sexist or not? Is it Rick "Ping" or Rick Carr? Is he calmly sexist out of

what he sees as logic or is he going to be abusive towards the female soldiers? For the love of God it's cruel to

torture lower creatures such as myself (huddles mumbling in a corner) !!

[The Veteran]

Well sorry it sounded a bit harsh but I had to edit that post... I like the story but there were just the small things in it that threw it off...

 

Now listen carefully Snikers... Rick O Chez is Ping. Rick Carr does not exist. That's simply what he was going to be called... He is an extreme biggot dissaproving of any foreign countries in the way of policies, governments, armies and populations but he can get on well with foreigners who he knows if they seem decent folk. He is BRITISH and damn proud of it, think National Front those of you who know what it is!

His attitude towards women is normal except with respect to everything except cooking and cleaning. He does not think women are good enough to do many of the things society allows them to and very strongly disapproves of women fighting. As I pointed out the one person in base this will not apply to is Tammy as she is a medic. Being the kind of soldier he is, Ping will no doubt need Tammy a lot! He still disapproves of her fighting though and if Tammy is forced to produce a weapon, Ping will do all he can to prevent it from being fired. Simply because he thinks she will be equally likely to hit him as hit the alien in front of her.

One thing I strongly forbid is any kind of racial discrimination on his part. Nationality and sexist discrimination is all in good humour pretty much the world over but I don't want anything to do with bringing any form of racism into the fic...

[JellyfishGreen]

Ahe-hem. The defence, despite having consumed a few beverages on their birthday, would like to present their case.

 

1. My timeline presented earlier said the briefing speech was...

late Tuesday evening, December 29, 1998. First day of training is Wednesday Dec. 30. Thursday is second day of training & New Year's Eve, Friday is 1 Jan 1999 and potentially first mission.

This matches the calendar, BTW.

So 'day after tomorrow', from Dec 30, is 1st Jan.

I also put the 'final squads' bit in in case there were complaints about these assignments, or assignments that didn't make sense to other people, that we could change without overly editing the fic.

- but yeah, the edit reads OK, I'm happy to let it stand.

 

2. Breakfast. It's the most important meal of the day! Fifteen minutes is enough to shower, but not enough to get enough food in you for a full morning of training - so I let them go back for breakfast after the speech.

 

3. Walking could be hobbling, talking with a concussion, kept in medlab overnight. To me this is too little damage for riding an aircraft into the ground, but I felt this description showed the crash was severe but wouldn't leave her with permanent injuries. You should be able to fly a jet fighter without the use of your foot, right?

 

4. "Ordering a new one" The lieutenant is referring to her fitted flight pressure suit/crash cocoon.

 

5. The previous post had Doc heading to meet an officer in Hangar One - this is the officer, I figured I could sneak it in.

 

6. I had pictured Doc picking up the new Hurricane at Groom Lake (America) by loading it into the belly of a Galaxy - so did DocFrance - so it's unrealistic to me to have him sling it underneath a much smaller troop transport and bring it from Europe (Europe?!). But I let it stand.

 

Having him fly his first supersonic aircraft around the world without so much as a takeoff-and-landing practice stretches credibility a bit too far.

 

No time my arse. If we get the Hurricane back next week rather than next day, it's credible, and I don't see any problems leaving Gia to recuperate and Trigger to fly the sole Hurricane to shoot down UFO's in our first week of operation.

 

Davies went with Doc because Trigger's probably too attached to his plane to let someone else fly it - like Davies was.

---

So how does that sound? Convincing enough to undo a few edits?

 

PS. Edited the Green/Ping post, it's now Green/Wexford, so those mischevious gremlins that made me think there were two Ricks should be exorcised.

 

Well, I'm off to Bonny Scotland for a few days, but hopefully everything will still make sense when I get back

[The Veteran]

Ah of course! Ther is an extra day in there isn't there! I apologise but I think I had that confused from day one so if I'm right then January the first IS tomorrow even though technically it shouldn't be... Sorry!

 

2. Breakfast may be an important meal but this isn't summercamp JFish! These soldiers are hardline military creme de la creme! They'll be expected to go without a lot more than breakfast in the future!

 

3. Firstly you can't fly a jet fighter without a foot as it would leave you without Yaw. Secondly the whole point of Gia's crash is to show just how tough she is. Therefore she has virtually no damage from the impact and will be flying very soon.

 

4. "Ordering a new one" The lieutenant is referring to her fitted flight pressure suit/crash cocoon. Ok I see where you're coming from, by all means edit it back in. It didn't read clearly at all though so if you put it back just be sure it reads well first please!

 

5. The previous post had Doc heading to meet an officer in Hangar One - this is the officer, I figured I could sneak it in. Fair dos but that needed to be pointed out somewhere as the meeting for the pilots was in the ready room and Doc was in the Hangar. Agan as long as you mention how he got there that's fine to be left in.

 

6. Seeing as XCom is a UN venture I figured the craft they used would be similar to the Eurofighter in terms of construction. That's why they're in Europe. Plus the fact that Cheese has already taken the galaxy back to where it came from so France had to take the skyranger to collect it. Besides how do you think they bring the small UFOs back to base? They just sling them under the skyranger... So they do with the Hurricane as well although as Davies is going along he may be able to fly it back.

 

Doc and Davies will almost definitely have taken off with the assistance of the autopilot. Once it's in the air the only difference is speed and as Davies is an interceptor pilot and France is a godlike cargo runner they'll have no problem the rest of the way. It's also VTOL so stopping and starting in Europe won't be a problem.

 

We MUST have two interceptors and a skyranger at base by tomorrow. When you start the game that's what you have so that's what we'll have. Gia is ok to rest for a few days because Davies is at base but we MUST have both craft...

 

Davies went with Doc because Trigger's probably too attached to his plane to let someone else fly it - like Davies was. Yeah, I'd probably say that's accurate. I refuse to let anyone else in my plane! Although the new plane isn't just Davies, it's Gia's as well. (More Davies though because Gia is new, that's just what she'll be flying)

[tftd fan]

TFTD: Hi! Write a character into the Character forum and we'll write him/her in! How long do you want to be alive for?

Hi there guys,

 

Do we now have a limited life time at the fic?!?!?

What's the rules to get killed and keeped writing at the fic ?

 

Anyway, my charcter profile is up. Of course if TJ don't mind refreshing his har disk searching to re-loading my info from the last fic... hehe!

[Zager]

Hello there, I'm interested in joing this fanfiction. I'm a big fan of X-COM, having played all the games except interceptor.

[The Veteran]

Hey ther Zager. We're happy to have you in the fic. Just go to the character profiles section and add your character to the roster! Start writing as soon as you want but be sure to read the whole fic first and be sure you know who everyone is.

And terror? I'm not quite sure what you mean but I'm sure the answer is a positive one!

[tftd fan]

Okay, okay TJ, the text was edited. Hope still positive!

 

Are you guys already set up in swuad teams or what?

[Tammy]

They're laid out in one of JFG's fanfic posts.

[The Veteran]

Ah right I get you terror. Well I don't have the profiles on disk I'm afraid. I just have the apoc fic and this is the UFO one. Sorry! And no we don't have a limited lifetime, I guess JFish just want's to know if you're staying long! So are we writing for you then or are you writing for yourself?

 

And Zager? I read your profile, it sounds good. The only thing to watch will be the laser research and the intelligence level. Crazy Photon IS the best of the best in the science world simply because he was in the fic before you wrote your character. That means you can be almost equal to him but not quite. Also he was recruited for work on the laser as well so the two of you will be the leading researchers on the weapon so learn to work together! It may give your character an interesting storyline...

[Zager]

Okay, I got that, no problem. I was planning to specialize in psionic research later on, once we interrogate a psionic alien.

[The Veteran]

Cool. In that case when we start on the psi amps mind probes and mc labs and stuff you'll be pretty much in charge... Although unless Crazy Photon has other ideas then he'll still be actually in charge...

[Doug]

Hi

 

I had Chris Black lined up to do some PSI development too ?

 

 

At least the part where you take a Sectoid to pieces, realise which bit is an internal PSI amp, and build a human bio-interface.

 

[Zager]

Well, I was thinking of having my guy work more along the lines of developing the physical technology required, and working along the theory behind it.

 

Me, I always thought that aliens were capable of psionics without a psi-amp because they were genetically capable of it, not because one was internally implanted.

[Doug]

I have a theory, that the sectoids have the PSI implanted in them. This could be like a "brain tumour" that is stuck in the sectoid's head by the Ethereals. But then again - I am only borrowing that idea form Babylon 5. The Shadows and the Vorlons did that kind of thing to humans.

 

[The Veteran]

Well hey maybe the psionic capabilities of the aliens is actually a kind of cancer after all. Imagine that a new virus is discovered in the human brain sometime in our future evolutionay path... It could be deadly to humans but could provide them with a sort of second sight or telapathic ability...

Maybe this is what happened to the ethereals, explaining why they're so physically weak (think Darth Vader without his gear!) The Ethereal race then decided that the soldiers they fought with may also be able to benefit from this ability and finding that sectoids were almost perfectly suited to it they introduced the virus into their cloning vats.

Remember how in apocalypse the mind shield was supposed to cripple people who used it for too long? I don't know whether it does or not but it was meant to...

[Zager]

Perhaps, but only sectoid leaders and commanders have psionics. My guess as to why the etherals were physically weak was because they did everything through psionics, rather than physically, causing their muscles to atrophy.

[Crazy Photon]

BTW, I've been busy today, so I'll post the briefing tomorrow or on wednesday (worst case).

 

Damn... my week turned into a nightmare, starting from tuesday... I had so much work that I had to stop visiting the site... I apologize for that and start working on the fic as soon as I can... still, when I post the briefing I shall not continue in the fic as the end of the semester approaches at uni and I've several tests and courseworks to finish, not to mention that I'm about to release a new system at work that's going to be used by all the country

 

Crazy Photon IS the best of the best in the science world simply because he was in the fic before you wrote your character. That means you can be almost equal to him but not quite. Also he was recruited for work on the laser as well so the two of you will be the leading researchers on the weapon so learn to work together!

 

Better be colleagues than enemies *stretches hand*

 

When we start on the psi amps mind probes and mc labs and stuff you'll be pretty much in charge... Although unless Crazy Photon has other ideas then he'll still be actually in charge...

 

Had not thought about it... sure, you may be in charge, or share it with Doug's character..... just remember that if someone has already chosen a research priority (to say it that way) doesn't mean that he/she has to be the only one

[The Veteran]

Perhaps, but only sectoid leaders and commanders have psionics. My guess as to why the etherals were physically weak was because they did everything through psionics, rather than physically, causing their muscles to atrophy.

I see the validity of this but thinking about it in a little more depth than I originally did I realise something. If the Ethereals were weak because they relied heavily on psionics then it'd have taken decades maybe even longer for their bodies to deteriorate to such an extent. Therefore sectoids would probably also be similarly affected. Unless of course the sectoid was a very recent creation which as we know from TFTD is not true...

I like the tumor, cancer idea though...

[Zager]

But we also have to look at the differences of the two races. Only a few Sectoids use psionics, presumably because they have superior minds to the other Sectoids, while all the Etherals use psionics, and use it much more than the Sectoids (telekinesis to move and fly, for example).

[Snikers]

You know, this is a bit of a stretch, but I'd sort of though that, given their similar skills

and not totally different appearance under the cloaks, the Ethereals may be a sort of "higher

race" of the Sectoids...but this is rather out on a limb...