(no subject)

*squints* Must...switch...brain...from Dust to Water, which is harder than one might think. It's not so much the Peter/Peta thing (although that doesn't help) as the fact that, although they may initially seem to be the same basic story (help, help! Narnia is overrun by invaders and must be saved! you have no idea how many times I've typed "Telmarines" instead of "Calormenes" in Dust and "Calormenes" instead of "Telmarines" in Water), they are in fact completely different in terms of tone, structure, and scale. Also, Dust is a much tighter story; I opened up Water yesterday to find myself right in the middle of one of the talkyface sections I've been ruthlessly cutting out of Dust. Also, Caspian? Not the most fascinating narrator in the world (well, coming off Susan), because the Pevensies don't trust him and therefore he's not doing anything fun and exciting.

Well, to be fair, there's not really anything fun and exciting going on anyway. There was supposed to be a three-month siege; I just managed to exposition-dump myself into realizing why that would be a very, very bad idea.

Perhaps a slightly shorter siege. I mean, I know vaguely what's going to happen: Miraz is going to march on the How, there's going to be a really spectacularly failed attempt at negotiation, Peta and Caspian are going to have sex, there's going to be skirmishing between the Narnians and the Telmarines, Peta, like Peter, is going to turn out to be down with her classical references and try and play out the Lysistrata with Prunaprisma (at this point I have to put something interesting in), more sex, more skirmmishing, Professor Cornelius is going to show up, the duel, the battle, and then some endgame stuff.

*pause* Wait, I thought I had less than that. OH WELL. Anyway, the main problem is that Dust is a much tighter story becuase I know what all the characters are doing and what the main emotional notes are; Water falters because I keep tripping up on what the rest of the Pevensies are doing and because there's a pretty strong focus on Peta/Caspian (which makes sense, given that it's a Caspian POV). I have the action plot, I just haven't figured out the emotional plot.

WAIT. Oh. That was my problem. Well, I'm glad I've figured that out, now I just have to figure out what the emotional/thematic plot is. With emphasis on this being a Caspian POV, but not really a Caspian story. (Although. It probably doesn't help that when I'm talking with my friends, I keep saying that my narrator and my MC are two different people. Caspian is my narrator and Peta's my MC. BUT IS THIS TRUE?)

...I have to go muse on this revelation now. Well, that and go to class. But mostly the musing.

can't friggin' *believe* i don't have an emotional plot, and Dust cut scenes

...I have been walking around in a daze all day because of my shocking revelation that Be Like Water doesn't have an emotional or thematic plot. Oh, it has two action plots (the main PC plot, slightly altered, and the Peta/Caspian plot), but it doesn't have an emotional or thematic plot.

This is not doing much for my wordcount, by the way. I'm at 36K! I only need another 14K before I can throw my hands up and have done with!

Let me make something clear: I do not have an emotional or thematic arc for the entire three-part story, not just the first PC!AU part. And I think I have a better chance of getting one once I put Peter and Co. in, but that's not until part two, and besides, this is supposed to be Peta's story, not Peter's. But -- I don't see where they're going. I don't see anywhere they can go. I need emotional conflict here, people! And there is none, especially not at this juncture. I mean, I don't think we even have the same problems we have in PC -- we've got overconfidence, but Peta's Pevensies go at it on a completely different level than Peter's Pevensies. And Water isn't a story about letting go and handing over the reigns, it's a story about --

Well, that's just the thing. It doesn't have an "about." It just has a "where." It's the story where Peter is a girl, it's not -- oh, let's use Dust as an example. Dust is the story where the Pevensies come back to Narnia after LB goes very, very wrong, where Narnia regains her independence. It's also the story about coming together as a family, about making your own destiny. Well, Water doesn't have an about.

This revelation could have sometime after I hit 50K, you know.

*grumbles* Man, I should have written "In This Hollow Valley." That has an action plot and an emotional plot. Water just doesn't have anywhere for the characters to go. Seriously now. I mean, of course, if I added in everything else I've written this month I'd be over 50K (not quite with the addition of Dust alone, even counting the original draft of Dust 5 -- which, trust me, was considerably more boring -- but with everything else, like the narniaexchange fic and various ficlet and commentfic type things), but where's the point in that?

At the very least I need an emotional arc for Caspian, since he's the POV character. It's just...*frowns* Maybe I should have started with the Peter POV in part two and skipped part one, let that be told in hints, not straight-out like this. Because Warsverse Pevensies I can handle, you know, and by that point Peta has somewhere to go. Right now she doesn't; right now she's back in High Queen mode and with her, with all the Pevensies, they're in stasis. Nothing's happening with them emotionally. (And if even one of you tells me that the romance is an emotional plot, I will cut you. Action plot. Not even much of an action plot.)

Now, if you just sat through all that, I feel the need to dump some of the cut scenes from Dust on y'all. Chances are bits of this will make it in later, since I want to keep most of it, but still.

( Dust deleted scenes )