Oops. I Dropped Off Of The Face Of The Earth Again.

Oops. I dropped off of the face of the earth again.

Whatever. Lady Sneasler but she has spaceship rights.

(This is from my Astral Shards AU! You can read the pitch for it here.)

Happy pride month. Have a crack ship.

Mirror Image, chapter ten: INTERMISSION

Summary: Meanwhile…

Pokémon battles with friends is fun

(Original making out meme by kupahdraws on Twitter)

Everyone goes feral in Hisui 25: Anticipation and Steel

Summary: The rift goes quiet. Melli meets a train

Tags from @reblog-subway-station:

#do they [the sentinels] mess with Ingo's plans? #i imagine they do because. he probably isn't a big fan of the Atlas either

The Sentinels (Ingo)

“Warning. Sentinel detected.”

Ingo flinched at the sudden voice of his exosuit, his hands threatening to drop his multitool in surprise. That wasn’t a message he hadn’t ever gotten before, although the alien dread and irritation suggested that before his memory loss he had. Getting a better grip on his multitool, Ingo turned to where his visor was directing him, coming face to face with-

A little red drone.

He tensed for one anxious wordless moment… before the drone tuned away with a wirr, floating a ways away to scan a nearby tree. That was…. anticlimactic. For all the hubbub involved, Ingo assumed that they would attack him or something. The warning was still ever present on the bottom of his visor screen and it didn’t look like it was going away anytime soon. But why? The drone wasn’t doing anything- just scanning random rocks and trees as it buzzed around.

….well whatever. Ingo shook his head and went back to mining. He had a brother waiting for him, and his ship was almost finished. Just a couple more materials and he-

A metallic shriek was the only warning Ingo got before a sleeve of bullets got fired into his back. He whirled around as his visor lit up with red, his suit’s shields wailing about the damage they had taken. The sentinel- because it had been the sentinel who attacked him- began charging up another volley. “Hey!” Ingo shouted in alarm as his shield took another round of bullets. “Violence is highly unnecessary! Words would suffice!”

Unfortunately, the sentinel didn’t seem interested in (or capable of) starting a conversation, and Ingo had to dodge another round of ammunition. Irritated (and a bit scared for his life) he turned his mining laser on the aggressive little droid- which did little more the singe it. Still, Ingo didn’t have much other options, so he kept at it, slowly racking up damage while doing his best to avoid as much fire as possible.

By the time he finally managed to take the thing down, his shield was critically damaged and flashing at him aggressively. “Serves you right.” He spat at the exploded shrapnel on the floor, its internal parts fractured and and broken, strewn wildly in all directions. The parts were strange though, hardly resembling the internal circuits of his own ship and looking more like jagged purple shards. ….shards that eerily resembled the message from his brother.

“Warning. Sentinel reinforcements approaching” Oh heck no. Investigation abandoned, Ingo hightailed it out of there, running up the nearby hill and praying he could get far enough away in time. In less than thirty seconds the area he had previously been in was swarming with little red drones, the little buggers having blinked into existence between one moment and the next. Ingo had no idea where they could have come from- but he wasn’t sticking around to find out.

When you got time, do you have any tips on writing Ingo and Emmets dialogue? I really like how you write them but I can't seem to get their speech down. It's mainly Ingos which is annoying since he canonical has more dialogue than Emmet.

Oh thank you!! I’m glad you enjoy- writing these boys dialogue is one of my favorite parts of writing and has made me seriously consider how I write speech for every character I do. It’s been great practice!

Okay, actual advice time lol.

HOW TO WRITE INGO AND EMMET

(According to me, Blue)

(Now, keep in mind that there isn’t one true way to write the boys, and this is just how I personally write them. Take this with a grain of salt)

When you’re first starting out writing the boys I recommend writing dialogue in your own voice and then submasifying it.

For example, let’s take this dialogue and transform it:

“Sorry I’m late for work! My dog chewed through my nice pants so I had to find some new ones! It’s been a bit of a rough day today, not gonna lie.”

So starting with Ingo-

Ingo talks extremely formally and is super long winded. When writing dialogue for him, try to imagine a fancy British butler who uses long words and long sentences. Replace normal words with more “fancy” ones and use more words then you really need to. (A thesaurus can be extremely useful for this)

“My sincerest apologies for my tardy arrival!”

Then, pepper in train terms as much as possible. If he goes three sentences without saying something train related, find a way to stick one in. If you’re stuck, look up a list of train words and take inspiration (I’ll include a list of train expressions I commonly pull from at the bottom of the post) (Make sure to use “Bravo!” and “All aboard!” whenever applicable as well)

“I awoke to the unpleasant surprise of joltik holes in my trousers this morning- which delayed my cab significantly as I was forced to find an undamaged pair!”

I personally strive to use consonants (stuff like I’d, we’ll, don’t) as little as possible with the boys. For Emmet it’s to add to the choppiness of his dialogue and for Ingo it’s because that man would rather use fifty words when one will do. (It also makes them sound more professional!)

“Honestly, after a morning like this one, I pray that the remainder of today’s tracks prove to be much smoother.”

Another thing to keep in mind is that Ingo is extremely polite while Emmet is a bit more blunt. Try to use titles like “sir” and “miss” when writing Ingo- and then just don’t bother with Emmet.

Next up is Emmet, who I personally find much harder then Ingo! Unlike Ingo who’s dialogue you need to add words to, Emmet you need to subtract and simplify! This is the post I originally read to kinda get the jive of things, but here’s my pointers!

First off, figure out what concepts the are being expressed in your sentence, and split those apart.

“Sorry I’m late for work!” has two parts- an apology and an acknowledgment that the person is late. For Emmet we would want to split this single sentence into two.

“I am Emmet! I am late! Sorry!”

Next is vocal ticks! Emmet has several, and they should ideally be sprinkled in sparingly through his dialogue. (You can see that I used ‘I am Emmet’ in the previous section)

‘I am Emmet’ should be used when he is joining a conversation or when he’s about to say something about himself. It CAN be used more then once in a single conversation- but try not to overdo it.

‘Verrrrrrrry’ is another one! Other submas authors have him roll the r on other words as well, but I stick with verrrrrry. This one is easy to use- just extend the word very with extra Rs and use very whenever naturally applicable.

‘Yup’ is one as well- and one I admittedly don’t use often. It rarely jives with the way I write Emmet so I usually don’t bother- but you should definitely keep it in mind!

And of course, train terms! Less often then Ingo of course (since he says less words in general) but if you can find a way to fit it in, go for it.

“The joltiks chewed holes in my pants! Verrrrry naughty. Had to find new pants. Holey pants do not pass safety checks! Yup!”

Finally, the man likes his patterns! When writing Emmet it’s a good idea to have his Blubapedia page open nearby so you can just steal chunks of his script from that. (You can, and should do this for Ingo too!)

“Bad morning. Oh well. Follow the schedule! Everybody smile! All aboard!”

Of course, the man is perfectly capable of speaking longer sentences- but when and where he does so is up to the author.

All that being said, it’s important to remember that you’ll likely have to attempt their dialogue a few times before getting a sentence to flow right. Even for these examples I had to do a couple takes until I found one that really worked!

Here’s a couple of other notes for writing Pokémon characters in general:

Watch out for expressions and words that use animals. (like beeline or ‘in the dog house’) Try to replace those words with their Pokémon counterparts- (such as combeeline [which I’ve typed so many times I’ve started using internally in my day to day life]) or something that sounds close enough (like if your censoring f***, ducklett doesn’t work nearly as good as duck. So try muk instead!)

Do your best to replace religious swears with Pokémon religion! Instead of heavens, or the big G word, use words like, ‘Dragons!’ Or ‘Sweet Swords of Justice!’ (Of course, these are Unovan swears. For Hisui you should be using things like ‘Sinnoh’ and ‘great Time!’. Other regions have their own legendaries as well)

And finally, my list of train terms I pull from regularly!

Cab (or car): To refer to one’s body

“I am afraid my cab is in need of repairs.”

Tracks: A plan or intended route

“Very well! I will follow the tracks you have set!”

Destination: The goal or like, the actual destination

“Bravo! Your talent has brought you to the destination called victory!”

Station (or terminal): A location

“Very well! Let us set our tracks to the Pearl Clan’s station!”

Two Car Train (or three or four or whatever number you need): Friends or a team

“Emmet and I are a two car train!”

Couple (opposite being uncoupled): To join together

“I must ask that you couple your car to mine as we make our way through here. It can get quite dangerous!”

Engine: Another term for your body, but more specifically in regards to energy or drive

“I’m afraid I must rest my engine.”

Refuel: Eat.

“It is getting quite late- let us take a break to refuel.”

Conducting: Guiding

“I look forward to conducting you on this endeavor!”

Derailment (or collision, wreck, trainwreck): Something that has gone wrong.

“Apologies. It appears I have been derailed.”

Unscheduled (opposite being scheduled): Something unexpected

“Ah! A cave in! It appears we must make an unscheduled stop.”

Passenger: Person (or Pokémon)

“It appears we have picked up some unexpected passengers!”

Conductor: Ingo sometimes uses this to refer to himself (works especially well in Hisui)

“Passenger, please refrain from stabbing the conductor”

Delay: Something happening later then scheduled

“Apologies for the delay! Let us begin!”

Sidetracked: put off course

“Ah, but now I have sidetracked us with this talk.”

All aboard!: Good conversation ender 💙

“ALL ABOARD!!!”