Tuesday, September 21, 2010

The Sons of a Battlecry

After been gone for what, 3 months maybe (!) I'm back. Uh-huh. Before anything though, to all Muslim all over the world (I know I'm late, but hey, when have I not? Duh.) Happy Eid Fitri or formally in Malay, Selamat Hari Raya Aidilfitri Maaf Zahir Batin. There, I said/type it. LOL. Formality aside, this post is going to be long (I hope not but knowing myself there's a lot to rant about lately *gets bricked*), so yeah~ You have been warned.

Let's start with the title post, which is a one-shot written last month and only posted now, really. There's a reason to that of course, apart from my lack of time and the suck which is the internet, but before we get to that here's the link, so that I don't forgot it. Apparently Livejournal said that the post is too long (duh!) so I had to cut it to two post instead, thus the double part. Tsk.


The Sons of a Battlecry -Part 2-

So, the idea on writing this story came one fine day when I was browsing aimlessly on the internet -more specifically on Livejournal- and found out that a community is organizing a writing contest with the theme 'New Beginnings'.

While I'm not one on writing with deadline -tried before for Chapter 2 and failed brilliantly-, and the last day for submitting the entry is only about 1 freaking week from the time I got to know about it, to my horror, somehow, I WANT to participate, despite the strong protest from my consciousness at the time. I mean, that was a busy period; what with assignments and what-not, heck even mid-term was not far away! But my muse was hanging at the back of my head, and keeps saying 'Why not? Just do it!' and as reckless as I am with my poor time management skill, I opened the dreadful MS Word, ready to write.

But of course, enthusiasm does not mean I have any idea what to write at the first place. *gasp* Not to mention I'm bad at theme-related works, being random and all. So, one whole day is dedicated on finding idea -not the plot, that can be damned later- and I settled on AU (why, of course), a Samurai AU. Didn't saw that coming huh? :P

The thing is I just finished the anime 'Samurai Champloo' (damn awesome anime, might blog about it later, but damn there are TOO MANY anime to blog about~! Tsk.) before that and I'm really really liking one of the main character that I modeled him in my story! It's quite obvious if you look at it actually, so yeah~ there comes my samurai one-shot.

I admit I do know much on samurai, I've read quite a number a samurai-themed manga and watched the anime for all that matter, but there is a theme, and I'm lacking a plot, which always is the death of me in writing. So I looked for prompt, which comes in the form of the 100 fic challenge I sadistically participated in, and settled on no. 64, Balance, basically because it's character-centric duh. But wait.

Samurai, New Beginning, Balance. What kind of plot can I conjure from this?! Worse, when I realize it I have about 4 days left. And I don't even start anything, yet. And it's not like I don't have anything else to do to begin with. I'm on the verge of giving up when I decided to call my 'editor', which is actually of course, my imouto, Ainin. And this conversation comes up (I always insert our conversation for some unknown reason, lol).

Me: So there's a contest in Livejournal and I think of taking part but...
Ainin: I know! Saw it too~ wait you're taking part? Great!
Me: Wait, so you know? When?
Ainin: When they first opened it of course, I'm quite a lurker in LJ recently.
Me: And you don't even TELL ME?!
Ainin: You don't ask.

Trust her to make me go headdesk all over.

Me: Next time, just tell me dammit!
Ainin: Ok. That aside, what are you writing on? Tell me the spoiler yes!!
Me: Uh...that's the problem.
Ainin: What?
Me: I don't have a plot.
Ainin:................
Me: Hello? You there?
Ainin: The deadline's here, you know.
Me: Why do you think I'm calling you for?
Ainin: *sigh*
Me: My idea consist of the theme new beginning, of course, samurai AU, and prompt balance.
Ainin:.....WHAT.

Not a good sign. Definitely not.

Ainin: How are you going to combine all that?!
Me: Any idea?
Ainin: And how do you expect me to help you at the first place?
Me: Yah! You're my editor, think of something!
Ainin: Since when am I one?!

So we had a fight, that's normal.

Ainin: Take your time, it'll not be that hard~ Good luck!

Somehow it dawn on me that I don't have my song muse with me, which can explain my off feeling this whole time. Indeed, I just look around my playlist for more muse and voila! I found a plot. And it combines them perfectly in my head. Of course, I called my 'I'm-not-your-editor' Imouto.

Me: Found the plot.
Ainin: YES!! TELL ME ABOUT IT!

And I did.

Ainin: Go for it, unnie!!

Just so you know, unnie is Korean for older sister and imouto is Japanese for younger sister. She likes Korean more than Japanese language actually, something she shares with the rest of my sisters, thanks to all the drama on tv and K-Pop; while I'm more heavily influenced by anime, though I do have my fair share of K-Pop. So yeah, we quite a multi-language speaker to each other. LOL.

Now that I have the confidence to write all the bloody thing down -I guess Ainin will continue being my editor whether she like it or not, she had a knack for good stories IMO- I started writing and damn I was halfway through when I found myself thinking 'Ah, it shouldn't be like this, maybe this way is better...'

I had only 2 days left to go. And although the dateline is something based on London time and I actually have a day extra then the stated date due to GMT and all, I don't think I can afford the risk, the internet here is unpredictable after all. Still, I scrap the whole freaking thing and start it, all over again.

I had morning class the next day -8AM Statistics lecture for 2 hours + 1 hour tutorial = death of my brain- and my self-conscious constantly reminds me that, but my fingers cannot stop typing, my muse is running 200km/h and my whole body is shaking so much I feel like my head is spinning round and round.

By the end of it all, I end up typing for 11 pages of MS Word, far exceeding the usual 7 pages for one-shot habit and send it almost instantly. The wash of relief flood me instantly and I collapse on my bed, the clock on the sidebar shows 5AM. Heck I'd been typing the whole night away!

As much as I'll be glad to do so, I didn't skip the lecture that morning, which is quite a feat in itself. I have to admit though, that I'm practically dead by afternoon onwards, heh.

And so my imouto read the contest entry, and the result is positive from her, to my relief. After that was the mid-term, submit the assignments, and there's the 2-week mid-sem break along with Raya holiday, which totally drain me away, thus the lack of writing on my part.

I didn't won anything from the contest, but I'm happy I participated in it -it's my first time entering such a contest after all- and it's surely a great experience! It helps that this is my first time exploring this style of writing and I'm glad I'm able to pull it off! If there's other contest next time I'll make it a point to enter~! If there's opportunity, time, and idea/plot that is. =_=;

I'm actually thinking of ranting on anime too as there's lots of things going on as far as the fandom goes but this is getting too long and I better stop for now. Heh.

Anyway do read the story and tell me what do you think about it! ^^

~The-Finally-Done-With-The-Post-Heiji.

Music of the Day: Radwimps - Order Made

P/S: The song that influence the plot of The Sons of a Battlecry. Try search for the lyric, this is awesome!

OT: Is currently rediscovered the love that is Natsume Yuujinchou. Midorikawa Yuki-sensei is awesome!! ^^

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