7.5 KiB
Heroes Save the World, ch. 22: Dasha Popov
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Author: u/callmebrotherg now posting as /u/callmesalticidae*
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URL: https://heroessavetheworld.wordpress.com/2016/11/22/not-too-small-ch-9-dasha-popov/
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Score: 9
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Created: 2016-11-22T06:05:47
Post:
Comments:
u/semiurge [+5] (8 hours later)
Theory 1: It's a social experiment, bro! The ultimate source of the powers will be irrelevant to the story. This will serve to further distinguish HStW from Worm, another "rational" superhero web serial. What will be important is how powers are distributed, such as based on population, land area, etc.
Theory 2: There is a significant level of correlation between a person's mental traits and the power they get. Most confidently, I believe that there is a link between a kid's altruism, or desire to change the world, and the strength of their power.
More tentatively, there are other traits which play a significant role. Ananya and Michael both have powers that control "elements" (plasma & electricity) on contact, which could suggest that they have other features in common. All three of the world-saving characters thus far (Simon, Noam, and Bodhisattva-kid) have powers that directly avert the loss of life.
Theory 3: Noam can control the mental states of his "passengers". This is about the only way I could find an elderly Orthodox Jewish man waking up in the backseat of his grandson's mind not believing it was an abomination in the eyes of God to be plausible.
Theory 4: Ananya is going to be the cause of the foreseen nuclear war. She's in India, affiliated with the military, and actively trying to make better weapons for her power. Pakistan is gonna get antsy.
Theory 5: The alphabet soup is going to tear itself apart. If history has taught us anything, it's that the CIA is an incompetent mess of competing agendas and personal aggrandizement. Once internal information hygiene fails on the super-kids, it's gonna be organizational anarchy.
Further speculation along the same lines: the main thematic conflict of the story will be the conservative old against the radical youth.
Theory 6: Bodhisattva-kid is responsible for the flesh trees, and Simon's gonna help him do it. Based on his power, the former is the most likely instigator of the phenomenon. Based on his actions to this point, it's probable that if he is responsible the flesh trees aren't as evil as we might think.
As for Simon, he's just wishy-washy enough to fall to the "dark side" if he thought it'd "save the world".
Also, are you posting this story to Space Battles or some other fiction sites, or waiting for the story to be more finished before you do?
u/callmebrotherg [+2] now posting as /u/callmesalticidae (3 days later)
Apologies for the delay in replying to this. Have not one, but nine experimental cookies.
I can't comment too much, but with regard to Theory 3
Noam can control the mental states of his "passengers". This is about the only way I could find an elderly Orthodox Jewish man waking up in the backseat of his grandson's mind not believing it was an abomination in the eyes of God to be plausible.
the reason that I can't comment is different from the others: One of my beta readers wrote that part of the scene! (She's Jewish, so presumably it made sense to her, but I didn't ask for an explanation at the time).
I should also be safe in a quick reply to this:
This will serve to further distinguish HStW from Worm, another "rational" superhero web serial.
I have actually spent a lot of time worrying about distinguishing it from Worm, not least because I've been working with this idea (off and on) for six years now, give or take, long before I was really aware of Worm. I'm confident that it's going to stand on its own, but even so, I have changed character abilities and other elements in order to distance the story that much more. As an example, when I first came up with Yuka's chapter, years before I had come across Worm, her best and only friend would refuse to acknowledge their relationship when they were in public because Yuka had become the school pariah. Obviously, this was way too close to Taylor and Emma (and, now that I think of it, Yuka shares Khepri's power, so the similarities would have been that much stronger...) and I had to get rid of it.
(Amusingly, though: Most of the character names are created a more or less randomly, the only constraint being that the list I was "rolling" from was made of the most common names from that country, adjusted for region or ethnicity where necessary. One of the names to come out of that process? "Sophia Taylor." Everything can be in flux until it appears on screen, especially character names (hell, I changed some names after they appeared, because it turned out they didn't work!), but I'm strongly tempted to keep this one.)
Also, are you posting this story to Space Battles or some other fiction sites, or waiting for the story to be more finished before you do?
I was posting on both SB and Sufficient Velocity, and then I stopped on account of low activity. I'm waiting to get more of a backlog, and then I'm going to be updating on a daily basis for a few weeks to see if that changes anything. If you'd prefer to read this on one of those sites, though, then I'll start the daily updates now (until such a time that they go back to twice-weekly, because they've caught up with the main site).
u/callmebrotherg [+3] now posting as /u/callmesalticidae (9 minutes later)
The stuff about licenses for "faith healing" and "magic" is not made up. I never found a source that mentioned both, though, just one or the other, so I might be incorrect in portraying them as two different licenses rather than the same one, translated and described in two different ways. I also found nothing concrete about the requirements (or the hiring practices of psychic centers, for that matter), so a fourteen-year-old probably wouldn't qualify, but then again I don't know that he wouldn't, and if anyone could skirt the rules in either instance it would be someone with a superpower.
Nevertheless, I am probably about to learn that fully half of you are Russians whose suspension of disbelief has been irrevocably shattered... >:P
If you have any theories about what's going on, I'd be very interested in hearing them--and it'd be helpful, too, because while I'm pretty sure that the characters aren't stupid, I'm a little worried that some of them might be too smart and connecting the dots too quickly.
There are some things that I think should be clear to them at this point, and some theories that are laughably improbable to them and not to be considered, but I'd like to guard against the possibility that I'm not doing a good enough job of separating my knowledge from theirs.
This'll be relevant to the next couple of chapters.
u/DraggonZ [+2] (a day later)
I'm not sure... Have you intentionally used a female name (Dasha) for one man and a female surname (Vinogradova) for another?
u/callmebrotherg [+2] now posting as /u/callmesalticidae (a day later)
/headdesk and seppuku
I don't know how that happened (Not once, but twice! And it's obvious once I really look at the names). I'll change "Vinogradova" when I'm back at my laptop.
I'll probably fix "Dasha" too.