Star-Crossed - Commentary - Ch. 3-4 (Patreon)

Greetings, earthling!  Welcome back to another commentary, and another opportunity to prove my writing prowess by rambling about a couple more chapters.  (Considering I routinely refer to the current story as Space Bees, I think I’ve already more than proven my writing genius…)

This commentary will likely be fairly quick, as Chapter 3-4 were also pretty quick.  These two chapters were originally going to be just one chapter, actually, but I ended up splitting it in two because Blake goes to sleep in the middle.  I haven’t yet figured out a great way to handle time skips mid-chapter, so I try to avoid doing that as much as possible.  I prefer the events to flow smoothly from beginning to end with the time skip between chapters.

In this case, it also felt way more natural to end the chapter with Blake falling asleep and begin the next chapter with her jolting awake.  Can you imagine that sequence of events happening within two paragraphs instead of between two chapters?  I can’t, obviously, which is why I didn’t write it that way!

Maybe I need to find a way to handle time skips better...definitely something I should work on.  Another skill to add to my arsenal, so to speak.  Or repertoire.  Repertoire is a much nicer word to use there (although I’m sure you sometimes feel like I wield these stories against you).

Chapters 3 and 4 offer a few more glimpses into the world Blake’s joining as well as into what type of role Yang plays in this universe.  Personally, I loved these introductory chapters because Yang’s demeanor is so different from how I’ve ever written her in the past, and I hope it makes people even more curious about her backstory.  

Don’t worry!  We’ll obviously be learning much more about Yang later on, otherwise I would be referring to this story as Space Blake instead of Space Bees.

Space Blake, on the other hand, finds some success in Chapter 3.  Actually, I guess you could call it a lot of success since she makes it into the Blackguards.  Considering that’s her only job at the moment...good job!  Mission success.  Or at least, mission not failed.

One of the recurring themes that will keep popping up is how Blake feels towards the Blackguards, - Yang, Adam, and Cinder in particular - versus how she views herself.  Only a few chapters in, and I think (I hope) it’s pretty obvious that Blake thinks of herself as much, much better than them.  

As she should, really, considering she swore to protect the universe and Yang told her to shoot Cinder in order to join their club.  One of those groups is much better than the other.

Yang didn’t help Blake win any favors with Cinder by pulling that stunt.  But Cinder doesn’t strike me as the type to like anyway, no matter how much they sucked up to her or ‘shot’ her with a fake phaser.  Hopefully Yang knew that?  Or, at this point in the story, she probably doesn’t care.  

But they had to make Blake pass some type of test in order to join, right?  Otherwise, they’d have cops left-and-right just walking on board their ship.

Originally, this ‘cop test’ was going to be a fight - like what we see in Chapter 4.  Essentially, Adam has two potential new joiners, and he would pit them against each other to see who got to be a full member and who became a scrub.  My intention was that Blake would win that fight (obviously, she needs to be more than a scrub!) and that was how she joined the Blackguards.

Eh...a fight is great and all, but I found it lacking a bit of oomph.  Especially for proving willingness to obey orders and do generally bad things. 

I ended up repurposing the ‘fight’ idea in Chapter 4, but as initiation/hazing instead.  That feels a little more appropriate, right?  And I realized, again, that Blake is super, super green outside of ISA.  I couldn’t make her some all-star fighter right off the bat.  She’s inexperienced, somewhat overconfident, and destined to take a few lumps before she figures this out.  This is why she went from potentially winning a fight to make her way into the Blackguards to getting her butt kicked during initiation.

I thought it was important to point out Blake’s compassion towards the young man she had to fight.  At least, in the beginning, she’s compassionate.  He’s ‘just a kid,’ and she doesn’t want to hurt him.  Her mission, however, dictates her participation.  Pretty quickly though, the need for survival kicks in.

You probably noticed the progression of her strategies.  First, “Maybe if I refuse to engage, the Blackguards will get bored and give up.”  Then, “Maybe I can knock him out.”  Finally, “Nope, none of this is working and now he has a weapon - I have to hurt him.”

Unfortunately, her resistance to fight nearly gets her in a world of hurt.  Possibly killed, even, though I haven’t thought that far.  Would Cinder have stopped the fight before Blake gets mortally wounded?  What do you think?  I’m thinking...most likely not.  Cinder would stop after it’s already too late, then raise her hands and say “Oh well, maybe she should’ve been a better fighter.”

Fortunately, Blake’s knight with a shining arm shows up once again.

While writing this story, I discovered that I really like stern, commanding Yang.  I’ll always think of her mostly as a soft, sweet marshmallow, but she can be intimidating when she wants to be!  And I love how she storms into the chapter and demands everyone’s attention through her presence alone.  We know by now that she ranks higher in the Blackguards than Cinder, and she definitely knows how to use that authority.

This story allowed me to explore the idea of Yang as a leader, which I don’t think I’ve really done before.  Ironically, I typically view her as the most natural leader of the four main characters, due mostly to her being older than Ruby and always caring for others (yet the first to run into a fight).  

I also see Ruby as a leader, of course, but Yang being her older sister might always make it a little...weird?  While growing up, it was probably more common for Ruby to defer to Yang rather than the other way around, so it might take some time for those roles to reverse.  Anyway, Yang gets to be the leader here, and I enjoyed watching her in that role.

Returning to Blake though, who we know far more about at this time.  Something else I’d like to point out about her amateur status is that she’s not great at staying in character.  She just doesn’t have a firm grasp of what role she’s supposed to play with the Blackguards.  She’s supposedly a skilled mercenary/gun smuggler, yet she’s constantly getting her butt kicked and thanking Yang for saving her.

I guess she can’t really help getting her butt kicked, but she could be better at not being thankful!  Except...I thought it was important for her to break her role early and often.  With this being a Bumbleby story, I didn’t want her to be so firmly set in this alternate persona that we (most importantly, Yang) never see who she really is.  If she’s always talking and acting like the perfect gun-smuggling mercenary, then...when do we get to see the real her?

This will obviously become more important as she and Yang get to know each other better.  The story would get...quite messy...if Yang falls for mercenary Blake, wouldn’t it?

Blake gets her act together for a brief moment at the end of Chapter 4, when she twists the arm of the sleazy guy walking her back to her room.  I like to think that’s more frustration slipping out on her part, as she feels like she failed her first impressions in the Blackguards and has to do something to get her rep back in order.  Plus, she definitely doesn’t want a sleazy dude suggesting anything...sleazy (I think he deserved it, basically).

That flash of character is who Blake is supposed to be playing throughout the story.  That’s the role ISA created for her, and a role that would fit in better with the Blackguards, but...she’s going to do this her own way.  Of course she is!  Would we expect anything different from her?

Alright, this was brief!  But that’s kind of all I have to say about this chapter without spoiling anything.  I am really excited for the story to get on the road though, and especially for everyone to see more interactions between Yang and Blake.  Their interactions are my favorite parts of the story (obviously), and I hope you enjoy them as well.

I have a quick writing update as well!  I know I usually put these at the beginnings of commentaries, but the intro was so smooth this time that I didn’t want to interrupt.  So...at the end it is!

As you’ve probably noticed, we have a little White Rose story going on Wednesdays now.  Papercuts is the one I mentioned a long time ago about Weiss miserably failing to flirt, which was a tremendous joy to write.  I swear, at some moments I was literally cringing while putting her through some of that.  It’s a quick four chapters, which we’ll breeze through in no time.

In other news, just today I wrapped up a ‘oneshot’ that turned into an eight chapter, 40k word...story, I guess.  I don’t know what happened, but apparently one chapter wasn’t good enough.  This story is the White Rose one (I think I’ve mentioned before) where, essentially, Weiss returns to Vale after a long time away and discovers that Ruby, her childhood friend, has grown up and become very, very attractive.  Cue gay Weiss, and hot Ruby.  

It’s pretty self-indulgent, but I think it’s fair for me to write self-indulgent stories sometimes!  I’m also planning on posting it on Wednesdays, and possibly very soon.  From the length and amount of time I put into it, I’m tempted to add it to the list of Saturday stories, but I can’t imagine writing commentaries for it.

“And in these chapters, uh...yeah, Weiss continues to be gay, and Ruby continues to be hot.”

Besides, that Saturday list is getting a little long, so I need to clear some stories out sometime.  I probably won’t post two chapters while RWBY is in season, FYI, but while we’re still on hiatus...why not?  Then the season can be a break for me.

Anyway, that’s what I’ve got going on right now!  Thank you again for all of the incredible support!  I’m honestly still so surprised and grateful by this whole experience, and I hope to keep providing some enjoyable stories for everyone to read.

Until next time, 

Miko