HunterOpera

Mostly. Had a little bit of surgery and am recovering from the last of it, so that’s fun. I think Taming of the Screw and Unarmored Knights are next, but I’m thinking of setting up a Patreon for them (one of the reasons they weren’t posted here; I’m not sure of the rules when it comes to Patreon and I don’t want to step on any toes). I’d still be releasing everything, but maybe putting it on a delay – I need to be able to justify doing this in the face of everything else I’m doing. What do you think? I think so, yes. PnP kind of jumped the gun on me, but I still know where it ends and there’s a thing I want to do with it that ties into the aforementioned Irkalla project. Is the brainstorming for FMC over in your thread or do you have a discord set up? I should catch up.

Oh, Madame Masque is a lying liar who lies. She has no intention of letting Kate go – the entire point is to keep dangling hope in front of her, making her think that there’s a point where she’ll be let go if she’s just good enough, but Masque is never going to let her go and has a life model decoy set loose to take over Kate’s life. There’s no way out for Kate and no reclaiming her independence. I think I might have been a little too subtle about that.

Thank you. It’s currently on the back burner – I have an end game in mind for it, and I agree that capturing someone and letting their potential slide is mostly wasteful (read Lara Swift is Colonialized or Tomb Raider: Natla’s Revenge where breaking Lara and wasting her potential is part of the fun). I’ve got a couple of other projects going right now, so we’ll see what the future holds.

Regarding Reins of the Tomb Raider, SailorNemesis said:  Parts of this were sexy and had merit but the ending was just silly. You also promised at the start Lara would not `get out of this' and while she ended up in a sort of slavery it was pretty far from her pony days so that's a let-down. It seems to me the only purpose of bringing in Sam/Himiko was to rescue Lara and that really betrays the whole broken/owned concept. Lame ending Yeah, I agree. About the time of the race, I got it in my head to do something larger and make a more expansive story. It was supposed to connect to a couple other realities / stories and spawn an eventual endpoint, Shadow over the Tomb Raider, that ultimately would have seen Lara recaught and captured after being betrayed by Himiko / Sam. Before that, the original ending had Lara escaping in London but the psychological damage she’d suffered made her escape short-lived, and she was quickly found and handed back to Drasha, the rest of her life being spent in the care of James as his beast of burden and eventual house pet. James would have eventually married Himiko / Sam for political reasons, a thing that would have given Lara hope, then terror, and then, finally acceptance at the feet of a corrupt aristocrat and a pseudo-goddess. The story got away from me, then real-life got in the way of the projected sequel, then the project mutated, and now I’m working on something equally absurd. I ended up writing a few fics based on Revolutionary Girl Utena, Sinfest, another Metroid thing, a few chapters of an American McGee’s Alice story, an X-Men thing centered on Kate Pryde and the Vivendi that went kinda dark, a Ghost Spider fic that went Masque’d Hawk levels of dark, and a post-Hogwarts Hermione Granger story with a subtle bad end, but then that all got co-opted into a bizarre thing that I’m about two-thirds done (see cover below, artwork by meeps123 and used with permission). I’ve been using Hentai Foundry and DeviantArt as a point of contact because I don’t want to violate the ToS here, but I should have some things ready in time for Christmas (and, thankfully, I now have a couple editors making sure I don’t overshoot myself). Also, just because: huge fan of your work.

Regarding Pride and Politics, TheDragon1989 said:  Well, we've definitely got some more information on Alista's plans here, and it is a better plan than I thought. Subtle, and easy enough to back out of up to a point if it doesn't look like it's going to work (up to a point). For what it's worth, I can't really see it working on Samus, especially now that Alista's given her quite a bit of information on how the tools work. Of course, that could easily be intentional on your part, and I entirely believe that Alista believes her plan will work, which is probably more important. And perhaps that's enough to overcome my issues with her motivation. Certainly, the risk-reward ratio is looking considerably more favourable for her now. It's still not quite there for me, but I think that is more me than anything else. Random little thing: I'm a little confused as to why Samus would be so surprised by the use of slavery, or even much of the methods. I assume this would have to be largely public knowledge, simply by the scale of the operation. It's the sort of thing I would imagine that a competent bounty hunter would know, either through research or simply her ship's computer bringing up information when she entered the system. Minor thing, though. In short: well-delivered exposition that's interesting from a character and smutty perspective, while pushing the plot forward that little bit. I'm just a nitpicker. Nah, the thing about slavery is a good point and I should have made it clearer in the text. It’s one of the reasons I write this stuff is to see where the holes in my writing are. There’s a couple of Metroid comics out there – the Captain N ones which are silly but is where I took Brannigan and Dare from, the Origins comic that is her childhood and early days working with the Galactic Federation, and Samus and Joey, which is just kind of fun. All three of them have text that state that there are parts of the Galactic Federation that have slavery in them, but that it is frowned upon and generally looked upon as a bad thing in civilized society. Samus knows little about it because she doesn’t spend much time in pro-slavery systems (why would she? she’d find the practice horrible) and never thought it would apply to her (and we’ve seen how that’s worked out). She knows about the process only in the most general of terms; the specifics were never something she bothered to look into, the same way people don’t look into things they find disgusting or don’t think have any relevance to them. So, yeah, it’s not that Samus is surprised so much as she’s horrified, disturbed, and trying to convey that to Alista – that parts of her Empire, even before Olsar hijacked it – were very, very wrong. Alista is wrestling with the concept because people tend to normalize whatever circumstances they grow up in. I’m not sure how or if I should explore that going forward, except… wait, got it. Thank you. This is going to be fun to play with.

Thanks, man. My problem with enslaving everyone is that, even battered as she is, Samus wouldn’t want to enslave anyone – she’s a hero. Wholesale slaughter, sure, but slavery is not her thing. The ending I have in mind, though, leads to another story entirely – I’m working towards something here that might be cool and we’ll see if I can pull it off. This means much more slavery to come, and Alista, well, she’ll get hers.

I aim for character motivations that make sense, so we’ll be getting a little bit more into Alista and where she’s coming from as this arc goes on. She’s not thinking rationally – she’s being led by her trauma and justifying some pretty terrible things to herself and taking advantage of things that no one else realizes she knows or is capable of because Braca is an idiot. This should become much clearer as time goes on, so hopefully I can keep her voice strong and motivations clear in the text. Interesting – I would read that story, though I don’t think Samus would tolerate any kind of actual torture. Good people don’t, and Samus is a good person. And just by logistics it would be a hard battle that Samus would not have a good chance of winning. Even without the collar, Samus would have a hard time fighting off the Tavleks without any gear, and even if she stole some she’d still eventually be overpowered by circumstances. The entirety Kanvian resources would be turned on her and, without any idea of the scope of those resources and with none of her own she would eventually be taken down, Alista’s tampering would be discovered, and that would be the Bad End. As for the ending… it won’t be coming out of left field, but it is going to lead directly into a sequel story and the seeds for it were set early. I’m aiming for one of those things where people are surprised but it’s obvious in hindsight, and other than that I will say nothing except that I have a plan and everything to going according to it. Getting into the psychology of Samus herself, I think she’s a big believer in retribution; I see her motivations being similar to that of Batman in that the core of her is more protection than vengeance and making sure that no one else suffers what she did. I think she builds more than she tears down, but that she is very good at tearing things down and has no real scale for escalation. When she decides she’s going to war she follows the total war concept and burns down worlds, and it’s one of the things that makes her a terrifying adversary. Anyways, off to edit Utena and work on the third thing. Back soon.

Regarding For Love, Perhaps, SailorNemesis said: The sex was well written. I am a big Utena fan. Unlike Samus who I enjoy seeing broken I prefer Utena to triumph and I hope she is able to redeem Anthy. But I will enjoy the ride for now. Oh, hey, man, long time. How you doin’? I’m a huge Utena fan and have been for a while. This is a project I’ve wanted to hit for a long time and I’ve been working the angles and trying to figure out the best way to tell this story. Given how much I like working with continuity and lore, it’s a pretty safe bet that Utena is going to come out on top and Anthy will be redeemed, but we’ve got a ways to go before we get there because, well, me. That’s kind of my narrative. I’m a little irritated at myself because I neglected the shadow girls, but we’ll see about working them in maybe every other chapter. Anyways, yeah. Second chapter in that tale is done and undergoing editing right now, should be up tomorrow.

Regarding Pride and Politics, TheDragon1989 said:  Well, that certainly answers a few questions I had. Probably a more believable direction than I would have taken the story in, too. I still don't quite buy Alista's motivation, though. Not for getting revenge on her brother and his underlings - that makes perfect sense. Rather, for trying to take control of Samus. Especially for her, having just seen what Samus can do even unarmed and outnumbered. It just seems too risky in the context. The same, of course, could be said for Olsar capturing Samus in the first place, but he at least had personal motivation to justify the risk. Alista doesn't seem to have any personal issue with Samus, so it just seems a lot of risk for little reward. Perhaps the motivation will make more sense when Alista's plan comes into full effect. And I'm sure it will be entertaining, anyway. Regardless, this was still a good chapter that advances the plot nicely, while giving another example of Samus' treatment in captivity. It all paints a picture. Also, Braca's a complete idiot if he can't figure out roughly what's going on, though that's probably the idea. Either that, or he's feigning ignorance to save his own hide. Keep up the good work. I can't wait to see where this goes. We aim for realism in the totally made up fictitious worlds in which we write. I thought I was being flippant when I wrote that and then the coffee kicked in; I think one of the most important things any story can have is internal consistency. The world presented needs to be a closed system that makes sense in and of itself, I think, otherwise there’s nothing for the person taking in the story in grasp onto. There needs to be a sense of order and pattern that our minds recognize, and when something doesn’t fit within that framework there’s a visceral reaction of rejection (hence the fanbase revolting at Other M or the end of Mass Effect 3). So, yes. Thank you, coffee. We’ll be getting into the mire of Alista’s motivation in the arc to come – this next section of story definitely belongs to her. I think I mentioned here or elsewhere that we had the prologue, the breaking arc, the broken arc, and now the Alista arc. She’s got some serious damage based around what happened to her and her untreated trauma is going to run its course. She’s not Samus Aran or a hero, and even before what happened to her happened she was passively okay more than actively good. I’m kind of looking forward to delving into her psyche a bit, particularly as a compare and contrast with Samus, and I think I’ve got a good idea of where this is going and we’ll return to that on Monday. And, of course, we strive to be entertaining, so I’m glad you continue to dig this tale. Braca is… we’ll get to Braca. He’s a special little snowflake. I’m curious as to where you would have taken the story – where did you think it was going? Where do you think it’s going to go? And thank you for reading and responding.

Regarding Pride and Politics, TheDragon1989 said:  Another great chapter. Probably the best 'standard' smut in the story so far, with the right amount of detail to make it brisk but evocative. Of course, the aftermath was immensely satisfying as well. With that said, I hope we get more information on why the plan was timed in the way it was, because it seems to me that there would have been more straightforward ways from Alista's perspective. Minor issue, of course, and one that you may well explain in the next chapter anyway. Regardless, I imagine things aren't going to be entirely straightforward for Samus going forward. Thank you. I really wanted a sense of rage in that whole “say my name” thing, and I hope that turned out well. It’s a cathartic moment for Samus that I hope the reader shares, and its also a turning point in the story – looking back, I’d say there was a prologue, the breaking arc, the villain’s enjoyment arc, and now the Alista arc. The chapter that was just posted should give some insight into what Alista is thinking and the next one will go into more detail. Her plan and thoughts will unfold along with her arc – why give anything away if I don’t have to? – before bringing it back around to what I hope is a surprising conclusion. And you guessed right. This story isn’t done yet, though we are approaching the finale.

I think that’s kind of the point of Westworld – the quest for fidelity parallelling the growth of a new kind of intelligence. I cannot wait for season three.

I love Westworld way too much.

Thanks, man. I thought it would be cute to let Samus explore her avian side a little, but this is going in a much different place than Reins. Samus is a very different character and this is a very different story. I’ll be curious to see what you think as this moves forward.

Regarding Pride and Politics, TheDragon1989 said:  Aww, I was hoping Samus would last a little longer than that, but let's see where it goes. Long-time reader, first-time commenter here, just dropping a line to say that this is my favourite story on the site, and I'm so glad to see you continuing it. The scenarios in this story are imaginative and evocative, but you've also been able to make the characters interesting to read about. There's not much erotica where anyone would care about the plot, but this is one of those rare stories. What I particularly like about this story, however, is the pacing. Each chapter and situation proceeds logically into the next, and each scene seems to find a way to degrade Samus further (this is in contrast to The Bergman Affair, which did feel a little like setpieces connected by a plot, rather than part of a single story). You've also been careful not to repeat yourself. Many less restrained writers would likely have had a fair few gang-bangs by now, but that would make things less interesting. It even makes sense in this story for the villains to be getting a bit overconfident, because of how thorough the breaking process has been, and by an almost compulsive need to humiliate Samus further. In the interests of honesty, I would like to offer a few minor criticisms. First, I think Samus would be far more resistant to the physical torture that Sallis dishes out early on. If there's one Samus should be able to handle, it's pain. I think you could have justified Samus giving in to Sallis' demands as simply being rationalisation - it doesn't mean anything at the time, and it's only later, hearing her own voice, that it really begins to break her. Second, I think your descriptions have been a bit sparse in the newer chapters. I would love to have seen more details for the stables. Are they medieval in nature, or more futuristic/alien? Little things like that could have made the situation even more vivid. These are minor problems. I still love this story, and can't wait to see how it all plays out. Ah, Samus isn’t done quite yet. This week’s updates should drive that home nicely… I’m going through the edit of the new chapter now and should have it up in the next hour or so. I’m glad you're digging this story; there was a lot of time figuring out the characters and their world and how this would all play out before pen was put to paper, so it’s nice to have confirmation that this is working the way I wanted it to. There’s an entire design treatment and images that were collected and ordered, and some things have changed as the story has progressed (Alista has become much more interesting, for example, than how I originally imagined her). I’ve always been a believer in plot and character making what matters matter, and in this case it’s the smut – if I can make you care about who’s doing what, I think it leaves a larger impression for what’s happening from one scene to the next. Pride was always meant to be a tighter story than Bergman, which is kind of a sprawling mess of a thing. It was also my first attempt at writing smut in more than a decade and I hadn’t really considered how to keep it under control; it spread and went everywhere, as opposed to what I think is a much smaller and more intimate story. The villains here are right villains, too – Olsar and Salis and Bekhesh and Braca are all terrible people who have stumbled into one another and their individual strengths cover their individual weaknesses while feeding their worst excesses. They’re not interested in gang bangs, by and large, more than they are interested in ownership. They’re driven by greed more than anything else, and this leads them to degrading and demeaning the people under their power. I think that’s coming out in the writing, but we’ll see how the next few chapters go. I think you’re dead on when it comes to Samus and pain – I doubt there’s anything Salis could do that would really hurt her in ways she’s not already familiar with, but pleasure is just as effective a means of torture. Add drugs and subliminal programming into the mix and you end up with one thoroughly frazzled Hunter. I like the idea of an empty capitulation coming back to bite one in the ass, however, and Alista might end up inflicting something very close to that and it’s a concept I will be exploring in a future story. One of my bigger problems, I think, is finding a good balance for detail and brevity. I tend to err towards the latter when I’ve come back to a story after a hiatus and towards the former when I’ve been enmeshed in a single story too long. I think I’m back in a good place now, but let me know as the next few chapters are published. If I go back and do a Reins style re-write, I’ll definitely add more description to what came before. And thanks for the review: this is very much the sort of thing I write these stories for.

Regarding Pride and Politics, MF said:  Solid updates from my long amissed degenerate brethren. This is definitely motivating me to rouse myself from post thanksgiving food-coma and put in some work. Good to see you back Hunter. It’s good to be back… IRL kept me busy but I’ve got some time now. Let’s see how much of this I can get done, and maybe start another couple of projects. How you doin’?