kiix

Thanks for your vote and your trek over to the forums guys and gals. I picked Sex. That sounds absolutely wicked. Yeah. Why? He is a strange little monkey. He wasn't a blip on my radar when I started writing Cake. There wasn't an Armor either. Then when he did arrive, he was such a slut and was so tragic..but then he kicked Armanita's ass. There was a lot negativity/resistance to my concept of Sex being First of the brothers. It just sort of flowed that way. Then it seemed logical. Why would he be stepping to to accept these horrid things in the place of Xavier? That is what older brothers do...or are supposed to. Sexy has changed and matured as well has turned deadly dangerous. The fact that he finds joy in the smallest thing after all that has been done to him is amazing. As it has been pointed out, Sex doesn't hide his emotions. If he hates you, you know it. Case in point - Hades. I don't think that Hades and Sex will ever be bosom buddies, but Sex is not longer actively stabbing/shooting Hades. I hope that changes that I made to Sex in CLOVE will be accepted and appreciated.

I love picking the brains of my LOYAL. BWAH HAHAHAHA Seriously, I love to write, but you guys come up with questions that would never have considered. They make me think and that in turn gets the motor going and I guess that what keeps you coming back for more...and more...and more. Ravenous little buggers. But I love ya. Your shield discussion has veered me off in another direction, which I think you will like. And, ya, I think Hades shield will be used as a drinking fountain....but by whom? Rubbing my little hands together. But, I got to get X to the top of the House first. A ways to go yet. Hellcat licks to one and all.

Thank you both!!! As you can tell, I'm not much of a forum user up to this date. Your assistance was greatly appreciated. Mauh! Kiix

Yes, I goofed I forgot to add Skell. I don't think you can change the poll. At least I didn't see anything immediately obvious. So if you like Skell had it to the post, I'll tally it up manually. Abacus is on stand-by. Kiix

Who is your favorite character in the Cake Universe? You can answer, I don't plan on killing them off. I have learned from the Claudius question.

This is probably going to sound bizarre but thinking about the stories I have posted on AFF, they are all started from dreams. It was as if my subconscious had been mulling stuff over and when it had figured out the beginning, I get a nice little techno-color movie in my head. Then I stumble over to the computer and try to write it down. I usually get the main characters names with the dream. For example: In CAKE the first person narrator is Sigmund Edward Xavier (SEX) -- there is no way in hell I would ever come up with name like that while awake. All my other characters come out of necessity as the story moves along. Once I get to that point of needed a new character, I pick their general usefulness -- good or bad, the best/worst thing they could do and....then I go searching baby names on the Internet. I search by sex, nationality, meaning and in some cases, by century. Kiix

As for the sunburn, it was a battle of the offices thing. Two pitch softball. I think I could smell bacon and then I realized that my 45 spf had given up the ghost. I thought we would come, play our guaranteed two games and then head back to work. No...we had to WIN the championship. So needless to say, this little piggy got fried...badly. But we got a trophy! Anyway back to the Shields. Did I tell ya, I love ya? No? But I do. (Enjoy this kissing up.) Ahem. I just keep telling myself that these questions make the story better. They do. They really do. And I'm not being sacrastic here. I haven't thought about them. And, I probably should have. You know that feeling you get when you know someone is standing behind you even though you didn't hear them come up. You don't have to turn around, you just know that they are there. This is the same as feeling of someone staring at your from across the crowded room. I think it's called the sixth sense (I know, I see dead people) but that is what I am referring to when Vampires encounter each other. You just know. Again, every Red Vampire would have this...the Blues would have it ramped higher. So it would be kind of like a regular person vs a spiritual medium. I don't know if I explained that well. You can always give me a shout back. Why do they need shields? Cause you have A-holes like Alarik out there. A shield is a defense mechanism for protection and stealth. If it is strong enough it can act like a Klingon cloaking device -- again this is based on color of flame, age and force of will. Everyone who does have one, is different. Even Lycan's can have a shield even though they can detect any presence of mind tampering almost before it begins. Liam told Hades how to protect himself, even from himself to his chagrin (I just love being able to use that word). A continuously flowing blood shield was effective enough to keep the progenitor from whisking his little Honeybee away to the beach. So to stay consistent with the Cake Universe, that will have to be the strongest shield -- especially is that is made with Blue Blood. Liam will have to have shown Claudius how to make this new shield. You can't have the new Lord Emperor wandering around defenseless. As for other shields...whatever the mind can believe it will achieve. X had a mirror disco ball for a shield because Claudius told him that Marcus hated mirrors and would go almost catonic when encountering them. So this was a rather strong -- stay the hell out warning sign. Claudius second shield was something he fashioned from himself -- blood and bone. Other Loyal and Ranked will have their own shields of their own making. Kiix slides down the evilness pew so Kiba can take a seat. I like it. Although when I first read it, I actually moved my hands off the keyboard, then I did a big shiver and eeeewwww. I want to use it on Hades. Bwah hahahaha. (Not up to that chappie yet though.) So here is my song and dance again. I'm off to bath in aloe vera. Later. Kiix

Can I say, holy crap!!! Okay, let me get my teacher's specs on. Ahem. Okay. Number one. Not all vampires have shields. They do not need them. A typical Red Vampire such as Frederick does not have a shield. His "world" does not require a shield. The Vampires who are mentally shielded belong to the House or the Council or who are doing illegal things to begin with. We forget this, because all four books are centered around the Elite of the Vampire world in Blood legacy (Blue & Red) as well as secrecy (House of Assassins) All vampires have the power of suggestion. The power of suggestion is to make your prey docile so you can take a nibble without it screaming and wriggling all over the place. Mindwalking is something more invasive and limited to X, Marcus and now Claudius, even though you really don't want him to have it. He's a royal blue...he has to have this special ability. Now, I didn't find the person who said it but I never thought of that. That explains it!! Because Marcus only has partial ability he has to send all this attention to the task to get it done. This leaves him vunerable. X doesn't have to work as hard. He is quicker but because he is unskilled he cannot travel as far as Marcus can when he is *hunting*.As for another attack like Sex did in desperation to Claudius. There is no other Vampire who can do it. Marcus does not have the power. You cannot call what Sex did skill it was just driven my emotion and force of will. He just hammered against a rock until it broke. Claudius has not worked on his new mental abilities because he has no need to (and this keeps Marcus in business) I hope this helps...or makes you think...or just makes you write. As always, I'll be looking forward to replies. It just makes me all warm...no wait, that's my sunburn. Big Sign....off to write another chapter. Kiix *ps. byw I liked that phrase Kiix universe. Ah...it's good to be queen.

Greetings Wow, reading everyone's method/process is amazing. It seems corny, but the saying "different stroke for different folks" is true. I started on AFF attempting to do a fanfiction of Ai No Kusabi. I've written original fiction before, usually with a pencil and a notebook, so this was my first attempt at computer composing. That is when I discovered I don't do good fanfiction. Mainly because the characters are not mine to toy with. So enough about that. I see my story in my head like a mini movie. I have the opening shot, the climatic scene and the ending. How I connect the dots is up to the characters of the story. I do not plot things out. I do not make character studies or profiles. Since I am comfortable writing first per narrative I treat the character as if I am meeting them for the first time. When you meet someone you don't know their entire history and the longer you interact with someone, the more you know -- or wish you didn't know. So, it is as much a mystery to myself as it is my readers what is going to happen next. Of course if you characters carry on for more than one book, and their history changes as you learn about them, this leads to major editing problems of the first book. But, it seems to work for me. Thanks for letting me share Kiix