Metroid - the Bergman Affair feedback, comments, and workshopping

[HunterOpera]

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.  

[HunterOpera]

On 11/22/2018 at 9:21 PM, MorbidFantasy said:

I will say the thing I like the most about Pride and Politics thus far is the comparatively beefier salvation arc. Reins of the Tomb Raider was and is a good read, but Sam/Himiko’s literal Deus Ex Machina kinda dictated a truncated ending.

As always, the choice of the MC’s dressage is impeccable. Loved the pony-girl in Reins, and the bird getup here is a nice lore reference to Samus’s origins.

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.   

[HunterOpera]

13 hours ago, Valet said:

I love Westworld way too much. 

[Valet]

9 hours ago, HunterOpera said:

I love Westworld way too much. 

Realistic dolls, huh?  With whom you can do anything you want? It’s a great temptation, I agree, but some people would say that no programming can be compared with all variables of the real mind.

[HunterOpera]

On 11/26/2018 at 7:55 PM, Valet said:

Realistic dolls, huh?  With whom you can do anything you want? It’s a great temptation, I agree, but some people would say that no programming can be compared with all variables of the real mind.

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.

[HunterOpera]

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.  

[HunterOpera]

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. 

[TheDragon1989]

12 hours ago, HunterOpera said:

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. 

I guess for me, she just still shouldn’t be at a level where she betrays her allies, at least not in a long-term sense.  Certainly, she should be less able to trust others, and showing what would happen if Samus did betray her is very wise (and thus, I think it does make sense that Alista would let Samus get raped), but I’m not seeing why she would think this is a good idea.  Again, especially when she’s just seen how very, very badly it can go wrong.  Hoping to be proven wrong, and I’ve certainly enjoyed stories with worse character motivations.  

 

12 hours ago, HunterOpera said:

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?

Well, since you asked…

Starting at the end of Chapter 27, I would have had Samus basically start a one-woman guerilla war, taking down Olsar’s resources and maybe one or two more of his subordinates.  Pushed back into a corner, he would then either retreat into his homeworld stronghold or to where they’re keeping Samus’ weapons and ship.  She defeats him, either killing him outright or sentencing him and his cronies to ironic, even sadistic punishments (breaking Salis in a similar fashion to how she broke so many prisoners makes a certain sense).  

Yeah, obviously very vague, and probably not to playing to the strengths of this story.  Subtle trickery and manipulation is more your thing.  Besides, the difference in resources would probably have made Olsar unbeatable by conventional means, unless Samus were to get her equipment back.

As to where I think it’s going now: 

Well, I think it’s fair to say that Samus is going to get her power suit back.  That certainly seems to be Alista’s plan, and it makes sense in terms of taking down Olsar and company.  Obviously, she has some plan for how to take down Samus afterwards.  My guess is that it involves her collar in some way.  You keep coming back to that detail, and if it had, say, an electroshock function in there, then it could theoretically take down Samus even when she was fully suited up.  

As for how it all ends, I think there are three basic possibilities:

1.  Samus wins, either killing Alista outright or letting her go to settle the debt.  Samus leaves the empire to sort itself out.

2.  Alista wins, enslaving Samus and taking over the empire.  If I had to take a guess, I’d say she’d be a fairer owner than Olsar (if nothing else, you’ve specifically mentioned in the story that she wants Samus as a bodyguard, and that would require a certain presence of mind), but this would still be a downer ending of sorts.  

3. Samus wins, and takes control of the empire, enslaving Alista, Olsar and whoever else is left alive to her will.  I think this might actually be the most likely, simply because you’ve mentioned the ending would be a surprise.  I can just about imagine this working, given that Samus is clearly a fan of retribution, at least in this story (in canon, I imagine killing Ridley, at least the first time, would have been immensely satisfying to her as well).  

In any event, I’m fairly sure this doesn’t end well for Olsar and his cronies.  After all, if you were going to have them win, you could have just ended things at Chapter 21.  

Of course, you could just pull something completely out of left-field (oh hi, Ridley), but I doubt that will happen.  

[HunterOpera]

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.  

[HunterOpera]

On 11/30/2018 at 11:55 PM, TheDragon1989 said:

I guess for me, she just still shouldn’t be at a level where she betrays her allies, at least not in a long-term sense.  Certainly, she should be less able to trust others, and showing what would happen if Samus did betray her is very wise (and thus, I think it does make sense that Alista would let Samus get raped), but I’m not seeing why she would think this is a good idea.  Again, especially when she’s just seen how very, very badly it can go wrong.  Hoping to be proven wrong, and I’ve certainly enjoyed stories with worse character motivations.  

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. 

On 11/30/2018 at 11:55 PM, TheDragon1989 said:

Well, since you asked…

Starting at the end of Chapter 27, I would have had Samus basically start a one-woman guerilla war, taking down Olsar’s resources and maybe one or two more of his subordinates.  Pushed back into a corner, he would then either retreat into his homeworld stronghold or to where they’re keeping Samus’ weapons and ship.  She defeats him, either killing him outright or sentencing him and his cronies to ironic, even sadistic punishments (breaking Salis in a similar fashion to how she broke so many prisoners makes a certain sense).  

Yeah, obviously very vague, and probably not to playing to the strengths of this story.  Subtle trickery and manipulation is more your thing.  Besides, the difference in resources would probably have made Olsar unbeatable by conventional means, unless Samus were to get her equipment back.

As to where I think it’s going now: 

Well, I think it’s fair to say that Samus is going to get her power suit back.  That certainly seems to be Alista’s plan, and it makes sense in terms of taking down Olsar and company.  Obviously, she has some plan for how to take down Samus afterwards.  My guess is that it involves her collar in some way.  You keep coming back to that detail, and if it had, say, an electroshock function in there, then it could theoretically take down Samus even when she was fully suited up.  

As for how it all ends, I think there are three basic possibilities:

1.  Samus wins, either killing Alista outright or letting her go to settle the debt.  Samus leaves the empire to sort itself out.

2.  Alista wins, enslaving Samus and taking over the empire.  If I had to take a guess, I’d say she’d be a fairer owner than Olsar (if nothing else, you’ve specifically mentioned in the story that she wants Samus as a bodyguard, and that would require a certain presence of mind), but this would still be a downer ending of sorts.  

3. Samus wins, and takes control of the empire, enslaving Alista, Olsar and whoever else is left alive to her will.  I think this might actually be the most likely, simply because you’ve mentioned the ending would be a surprise.  I can just about imagine this working, given that Samus is clearly a fan of retribution, at least in this story (in canon, I imagine killing Ridley, at least the first time, would have been immensely satisfying to her as well).  

In any event, I’m fairly sure this doesn’t end well for Olsar and his cronies.  After all, if you were going to have them win, you could have just ended things at Chapter 21.  

Of course, you could just pull something completely out of left-field (oh hi, Ridley), but I doubt that will happen.

 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. 

[Anonnox]

Great update for the Samus story. Honestly there’s something about Alista that just makes you want to root against her. Best ending would be everyone, including Salis, gets enslaved

[HunterOpera]

On 12/5/2018 at 7:36 AM, Anonnox said:

Great update for the Samus story. Honestly there’s something about Alista that just makes you want to root against her. Best ending would be everyone, including Salis, gets enslaved

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.   

[HunterOpera]

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.   

 

[TheDragon1989]

Disclaimer: I have pretty much no familiarity with any Metroid expanded universe stuff.  I’ve played all of the main games (or, in the case of Metroid II, the remake), and the things that are in your stories that aren’t directly from the games are not out of place for a miscellaneous sci-fi universe.  I’m still surprised by Samus not knowing the gist of how the collar works.  I would think that, even outside of a slavery context, they would be useful things to put on legitimate prisoners, and thus would have become widespread throughout the Galactic Federation.  It’s probably best to put things down to overconfidence on her part and move on.  I dare say that, if and when she gets out of this, she won’t be making the mistakes she made at the start of the story again.

 

5 hours ago, HunterOpera said:

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.   

Normalising the concept of slavery certainly makes sense on Alista’s part, and that removes yet another reason not to enslave Samus.  I still think, like any act, that it needs a little active reason to do it.  Considering Olsar for a moment, he wanted Samus specifically because she had hurt him on a personal level.  Though then again, Samus could have gotten them both out of the situation back just before her capture, when she “rescued” Alista from those space pirates.  Depending on how much she remembers of that, you could work with that.

 

On ‎12‎/‎5‎/‎2018 at 2:17 AM, HunterOpera said:

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. 

This is probably where my lack of knowledge of Metroid EU comes back to bite me.  I’ve always imagined Samus as willing to help, but not above revenge.  There’s a reason she specifically goes after Space Pirates, after all.  And within this story, she clearly got some sort of slightly-sick-but-justified satisfaction out of not only killing her rapists during the hunt, but in brutal fashion as well.  And I think once you’re killing people in general, you are past a Batman-esque psychological state (again, not without justification).  

[Valet]

Hi Ben! Such a nice your new art on pixiv :thumbs up: But I want to ask you about your old (and unfinished, for pity) story "Masque'd Hawk". First question - will you continue it to the logical end? And the second - could you explain, what is the goal of Madame Masque’s doings to poor Kate? Look, we are all adults and adult is distinguished from child by an understanding of the consequences of his actions. OK, Masque caught her victim – and promiced to free her at the end, but first she’ll punish her, rape her, scared her… – why? For what? Just only to show Kate her worthlessness? But OK. Showed. Whom becomes Kate when she’ll be finally free? Some sort of psycho? Another villain? And who said that the villains don’t torture or kill each others? Sweet little girl who want to play in superhero to protect the innocent will show understanding, condescension and mercy to her enemies. Villain won’t. So, torturing the Kate, Madame Masque literally digging her own grave, isn't it? What do you think?

 

Best wishes, Joel

[Fabia]

I recently came across Pride and Politics and really enjoyed the effort that went into the process of breaking Samus down, crushing her pride and making her an obedient slave. Taming someone far stronger than you are must be quite the thrill, god knows I envy her owners. A plot point I particularly like is how Alista plans to make Samus her tool. I often come across fics where powerful women are reduced to sex slaves, but only rarely are their other qualities exploited as well. It's quite inefficient to have someone so strong at your beck and call and only use them for purposes of pleasure, in my opinion.

It's been a while since your last update, and I don't know if you'll be getting back to it, but even incomplete it was an entertaining read all the same. 

[HunterOpera]

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.     

 

[HunterOpera]

On 3/8/2020 at 6:10 AM, Fabia said:

I recently came across Pride and Politics and really enjoyed the effort that went into the process of breaking Samus down, crushing her pride and making her an obedient slave. Taming someone far stronger than you are must be quite the thrill, god knows I envy her owners. A plot point I particularly like is how Alista plans to make Samus her tool. I often come across fics where powerful women are reduced to sex slaves, but only rarely are their other qualities exploited as well. It's quite inefficient to have someone so strong at your beck and call and only use them for purposes of pleasure, in my opinion.

It's been a while since your last update, and I don't know if you'll be getting back to it, but even incomplete it was an entertaining read all the same. 

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. 

[HunterOpera]

On 9/23/2019 at 12:43 PM, Valet said:

Hi Ben! Such a nice your new art on pixiv :thumbs up: But I want to ask you about your old (and unfinished, for pity) story "Masque'd Hawk". First question - will you continue it to the logical end? And the second - could you explain, what is the goal of Madame Masque’s doings to poor Kate? Look, we are all adults and adult is distinguished from child by an understanding of the consequences of his actions. OK, Masque caught her victim – and promiced to free her at the end, but first she’ll punish her, rape her, scared her… – why? For what? Just only to show Kate her worthlessness? But OK. Showed. Whom becomes Kate when she’ll be finally free? Some sort of psycho? Another villain? And who said that the villains don’t torture or kill each others? Sweet little girl who want to play in superhero to protect the innocent will show understanding, condescension and mercy to her enemies. Villain won’t. So, torturing the Kate, Madame Masque literally digging her own grave, isn't it? What do you think?

 

Best wishes, Joel

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. 

[Valet]

Hello Ben, how are you? Have you fully recovered from that car accident? I was very glad to see your answer, especially so interesting and promising. My friend, we are looking forward to see your new stories (the continuation of the “Masked Hawk” would be super cool, but if you decide to finish your “Taming of the Screw” story first, it will also be OK).

With hope and determination, Joel  

[MorbidFantasy]

Well hello there, blast from the past!

How serendipitous that I decided to check my email after 2 years of neglect only to see some action happening in this thread. I recently started doing some reviewing and brainstorming for continuing FMC after having set it aside for a while due to irl stuff.

Any chance you’ll get around to continuing Pride and Politics?

[HunterOpera]

On 9/20/2021 at 7:24 PM, Valet said:

Hello Ben, how are you? Have you fully recovered from that car accident? I was very glad to see your answer, especially so interesting and promising. My friend, we are looking forward to see your new stories (the continuation of the “Masked Hawk” would be super cool, but if you decide to finish your “Taming of the Screw” story first, it will also be OK).

With hope and determination, Joel  

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? 

On 9/21/2021 at 3:20 PM, MorbidFantasy said:

Well hello there, blast from the past!

How serendipitous that I decided to check my email after 2 years of neglect only to see some action happening in this thread. I recently started doing some reviewing and brainstorming for continuing FMC after having set it aside for a while due to irl stuff.

Any chance you’ll get around to continuing Pride and Politics?

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.  

[Valet]

First of all, it’s good to know you're all right now. About the patreon... hmm, that’s a good question. We know that patreon is the site where two (mostly two) categories of creators are working – it’s artists and it’s game developers. Of course, there are exceptions – like Joe Forest, who make art and write stories at the same time. He also share them for free at your proposed model – with one month delay (but now his Patreon page is blocked for some reason). But I'm not sure that you could earn as much money as you want (if it is your main reason). Many authors and artists earn just something, I quote, “enough to buy a couple of cups of coffee”. But the decision of course is yours, my friend.

Best wishes, Joel

[Sazbi]

On 9/20/2021 at 10:28 AM, HunterOpera said:

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.     

 

Good to hear you’re doing well! So is there a possible sequel still on the way or is that project not being worked on? Because the description of being returned to Drasha and with her overseeing Lara she never escapes sounds great!

[MorbidFantasy]

On 9/30/2021 at 2:05 AM, HunterOpera said:

Is the brainstorming for FMC over in your thread or do you have a discord set up? I should catch up.  

Don’t have a Discord (at least not under the MF name)

Chapters 50 and 51 are up now, but AFF is on lockdown and not letting new stuff post.

I’ve updated the FMC thread with links.