unrepentantAuthor
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TEEN: Different Eyes
- Thread starter unrepentantAuthor
- Start date
kintsugi
the warmth of summer in the songs you write
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It’s still today somewhere, right??
apologies for any typos; running this gig off my phone. lmk if I spelled anything egregiously poorly
prelude
Laura could plausibly see and not be unnerved that Salem enjoys reading about anthropology and misses her when she’s gone and has a favorite food; these aren’t traits that we see as signs of sentience. But total communication/language? There’s literally no room to be uncomfortable; the pokemon can tell you exactly what they want, and I dunno if it would be “let me get beat up so you can get some metal trinkets from that guy.” Knowing you, there’s probably something deeper afoot. Looking forward to seeing it!
The rest of this prelude is wonderfully written. It’s informative without being too expository; it’s clinical in a way that makes me uncomfortable but also unsure if it’s trying to be sinister or not. There’s a lot of things answered here but you’ve left me asking a lotta questions, which I found delightful. For a short prelude, this does the job admirably!
chapter 1
And so we see our protagonist! I like Salem a lot. You do an awesome job of sketching out her goals/motivations; she’s a pokemon who wants to be human (which, from the premise, we know she’ll achieve), but she also wants to be cared for and loved (which is more up in the air). You do a great job of capturing her more catlike behaviors here (clinging to the taste of chicken in jelly, getting distracted by string, spitefully curling up under a bush and never dreaming of Laura. Oof.). There’s a lot going on with this little fsr here, but I like that you’re laying down who she was; that’s hella important.
The tone here is really sweet, too. You lay out Laura and Salem’s interactions really well, with just enough reminders for us to see that it ended in the only way it realistically could’ve. Sentience debates aside, I like the worldbuilding you introduce with pokesign; it’s a clever way at getting multi species communication in a manageable fashion. And pour one out for all the voltorb of the world. :’)
Lovely read so far. I was expecting grim sci-fi and instead got fluffy slice of life; I’m actually quite happy with this mixup. The little details are what sold me, I think. Awesome stuff!
I’ve read 2 and 3 but I’m half asleep so I’ll get to you on those tomorrow!
apologies for any typos; running this gig off my phone. lmk if I spelled anything egregiously poorly
prelude
Oh man. Starting off with some easy topics, right? I like this direction, though. Morphs are always a neat way to study humanity and what we ascribe as monstrous or human-like; tying in the debate of pokemon sentience seems like a logical (and yet usually ignored) leap. I’m not entirely sold on the handwave for “people feeling uncomfortable” if fully sentient pokemon are commonplace in the world, though? Does training still exist? How do we approach the concept of ownership in this world?
Laura could plausibly see and not be unnerved that Salem enjoys reading about anthropology and misses her when she’s gone and has a favorite food; these aren’t traits that we see as signs of sentience. But total communication/language? There’s literally no room to be uncomfortable; the pokemon can tell you exactly what they want, and I dunno if it would be “let me get beat up so you can get some metal trinkets from that guy.” Knowing you, there’s probably something deeper afoot. Looking forward to seeing it!
The rest of this prelude is wonderfully written. It’s informative without being too expository; it’s clinical in a way that makes me uncomfortable but also unsure if it’s trying to be sinister or not. There’s a lot of things answered here but you’ve left me asking a lotta questions, which I found delightful. For a short prelude, this does the job admirably!
chapter 1
Quick grammar thing, you actually want to use em dashes (—) instead of hyphens (-) here. Hyphens are used to join two words together, like lickety-split; em dashes are used to indicate breaks in sentences—and sometimes to join two ideas together. (Their middle sibling, the en dash, is used to indicate spans of time, such as 1992 – 1996).
And so we see our protagonist! I like Salem a lot. You do an awesome job of sketching out her goals/motivations; she’s a pokemon who wants to be human (which, from the premise, we know she’ll achieve), but she also wants to be cared for and loved (which is more up in the air). You do a great job of capturing her more catlike behaviors here (clinging to the taste of chicken in jelly, getting distracted by string, spitefully curling up under a bush and never dreaming of Laura. Oof.). There’s a lot going on with this little fsr here, but I like that you’re laying down who she was; that’s hella important.
The tone here is really sweet, too. You lay out Laura and Salem’s interactions really well, with just enough reminders for us to see that it ended in the only way it realistically could’ve. Sentience debates aside, I like the worldbuilding you introduce with pokesign; it’s a clever way at getting multi species communication in a manageable fashion. And pour one out for all the voltorb of the world. :’)
Lovely read so far. I was expecting grim sci-fi and instead got fluffy slice of life; I’m actually quite happy with this mixup. The little details are what sold me, I think. Awesome stuff!
I’ve read 2 and 3 but I’m half asleep so I’ll get to you on those tomorrow!
unrepentantAuthor
A cat who writes stories
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@kintsugi thanks for your review! Looking forward to the next one, aha. I'm always happy to hear that people are enjoying the story!
Thanks so much for your prelude praise! That's pretty much exactly the kind of reaction I was going for, so I'm chuffed now.
Thanks for the em dash catch — I didn't realise that hyphens weren't an acceptable substitute and was too lazy to copy in proper dashes every time. I'm now memorising the alt-0151 code for future use, and I'll fix this in the eventual revision of the early chapters.
I feel vindicated that you think Salem's characterisation is hella important. I wrestled with myself over the plan to write an extended build-up to the morphing rather than starting at the inciting incident proper. I love hearing about the little details that people enjoy, so thanks for that!
Hope to hear from you again soon!
Pokémon sapience is one of the most important themes for this story, that's not gonna be brushed over. I actually reckon it's more plausible than you might think that there would be widespread ignorance of pokémon sapience considering how skeptical people are in our world about animal sapience. Despite various animals from birds to cetaceans to land mammals of many kinds demonstrating problem solving ability, tool use, vocabulary recognition, self awareness and manipulation of others, and even existential speech in one case I've heard of, it's not even close to public consensus that any animals are remotely as conscious as humans are. Pokésign might be a powerful tool, but it is profoundly limited and only a small number of pokémon and humans are proficient in it. People also tend to ignore issues that don't seem pressing in favour of those that are, so if pokémon with sophisticated cognition are not widely abused and have no strong advocacy movements, then the public at large will not register the implications of such. I fully intend to explore this stuff in more detail as the story continues, don't you worry! That includes the ubiquity of pokémon battling, too.
Thanks so much for your prelude praise! That's pretty much exactly the kind of reaction I was going for, so I'm chuffed now.
Thanks for the em dash catch — I didn't realise that hyphens weren't an acceptable substitute and was too lazy to copy in proper dashes every time. I'm now memorising the alt-0151 code for future use, and I'll fix this in the eventual revision of the early chapters.
I feel vindicated that you think Salem's characterisation is hella important. I wrestled with myself over the plan to write an extended build-up to the morphing rather than starting at the inciting incident proper. I love hearing about the little details that people enjoy, so thanks for that!
Hope to hear from you again soon!
kintsugi
the warmth of summer in the songs you write
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[chunk on sapience]
Hurray! Sorry, I erred more on the side of caution here even though I know it's probably way too much speculation to engage in based on a single line of a prelude, and I'm glad that you've got this in mind! I can't imagine it's an easy topic to integrate, haha, but it looks like you've put a lot of thought into it. Looking forward to seeing where you take it.
chapter 2 specifics
^microcrit amirite
This chapter is equally sweet; you've got the character interactions and details down pat, so I'm not sure what exactly to comment on in that regard except that they were nice to read. I appreciate portrayal of a happy, wholesome shelter with actually friendly residents--it takes out the unneeded additional conflict about teh evil orphanage runners and lets you focus more on Salem's inner monologue.
chapter three specifics
Jamie! Jamie is so friendly. And wholesome. Yay. I forgot to mention this in chapter one, but I like that you've got different patterned pokemon here; it feels a lot more realistic, and honestly most people can't tell a leopard from an ocelot, so that girl mixing up glameow and purrloin makes perfect sense.
Me being a bad person aside, I like this note that you're introducing early: Salem wants to be a person. People are also not great. Laura abandoned Salem; these humans are not great to the conkeldurr. There's a nice complexity that you're starting to play with here that's really exciting!
more general thoughts?
My one qualm would be that things feel very much the same as the first chapter, even though emotionally the arcs should've progressed a lot further than that. I think this might be a result of your narrative choice to tell the story in jumps: conveying the passage of time is tricky. Where it fell a (just a tiny bit) short for me here was that Salem doesn't feel any different from whatever events have transpired between the first chapter and now.
Which may be your point! It's a little weird to try to sketch out an entire character arc in five thousand words as a prelude for what is presumably another character arc, but these chapters are tricky from a reading perspective because we're working toward a foregone conclusion until the actual morphing scene. Or I guess, in different words: we/you know that Salem is a cat who wants to be a human, and we/you know that these are events that will take her to this goal, so when she starts off pretty much already there, there's a lot less story left for you to tell. The emotional arc is already written, and the plot arc is set in stone slightly, so you lose the benefit of the story kind of unfolding/telling itself. It's kind of a story that's being told by the strength of its worldbuilding/narration alone at this point, which is far from outright bad, just a little strange.
...I hope this makes sense. This is vague thoughts I have on how foregone conclusions (and some prequels) are approached in media that I've never really had reason to write up formally before, but I think they're applicable here. Let me know if I need to elaborate/if anything here was toooooo abstract; I was trying not to drop a thesis on you while juggling actual information here.
Overall I'm digging the read so far; the complaints I have are pretty minor in the grand scheme of how well this is written. Especially the realism and lack of everyone being on fire and evil and shit. Thank you for writing and looking forward to seeing more!
Hurray! Sorry, I erred more on the side of caution here even though I know it's probably way too much speculation to engage in based on a single line of a prelude, and I'm glad that you've got this in mind! I can't imagine it's an easy topic to integrate, haha, but it looks like you've put a lot of thought into it. Looking forward to seeing where you take it.
Oh! If you write in MS word, it'll autocorrect for you! Just type this--and then this with no spaces between the words and the two hyphens, and it'll correct for you!
chapter 2 specifics
oh my god the subtle burns here. thank you.
dropped a double-spacing here
Normally (as a non-cat owner who mostly learns about cats from the internet), you've got me sold on this as realistic catlike behavior/establishing Salem as a clear non-human narrator, but I'm wondering why you had Salem scenting the mienshao's gender later but not here? Animals are actually pretty good at recognizing genders almost instantly from scent because it's so critical to a lot of their socializing/territorializing/mating/interacting, so idk if it's a matter of first impressions or an overreliance on visual descriptors when this would actually be a great opportunity to explore the non-human sensory things that Salem has here (and will later lose)? Unless this is actually deeper commentary on how pokemon are sapient and transcend genders and pronouns, and it's just humans who need to assign labels on them, in which case lmao I suck.
^microcrit amirite
This chapter is equally sweet; you've got the character interactions and details down pat, so I'm not sure what exactly to comment on in that regard except that they were nice to read. I appreciate portrayal of a happy, wholesome shelter with actually friendly residents--it takes out the unneeded additional conflict about teh evil orphanage runners and lets you focus more on Salem's inner monologue.
chapter three specifics
Jamie! Jamie is so friendly. And wholesome. Yay. I forgot to mention this in chapter one, but I like that you've got different patterned pokemon here; it feels a lot more realistic, and honestly most people can't tell a leopard from an ocelot, so that girl mixing up glameow and purrloin makes perfect sense.
oh man this is one of those things that I feel horrible for laughing at, isn't it please be nice now
Me being a bad person aside, I like this note that you're introducing early: Salem wants to be a person. People are also not great. Laura abandoned Salem; these humans are not great to the conkeldurr. There's a nice complexity that you're starting to play with here that's really exciting!
more general thoughts?
My one qualm would be that things feel very much the same as the first chapter, even though emotionally the arcs should've progressed a lot further than that. I think this might be a result of your narrative choice to tell the story in jumps: conveying the passage of time is tricky. Where it fell a (just a tiny bit) short for me here was that Salem doesn't feel any different from whatever events have transpired between the first chapter and now.
Which may be your point! It's a little weird to try to sketch out an entire character arc in five thousand words as a prelude for what is presumably another character arc, but these chapters are tricky from a reading perspective because we're working toward a foregone conclusion until the actual morphing scene. Or I guess, in different words: we/you know that Salem is a cat who wants to be a human, and we/you know that these are events that will take her to this goal, so when she starts off pretty much already there, there's a lot less story left for you to tell. The emotional arc is already written, and the plot arc is set in stone slightly, so you lose the benefit of the story kind of unfolding/telling itself. It's kind of a story that's being told by the strength of its worldbuilding/narration alone at this point, which is far from outright bad, just a little strange.
...I hope this makes sense. This is vague thoughts I have on how foregone conclusions (and some prequels) are approached in media that I've never really had reason to write up formally before, but I think they're applicable here. Let me know if I need to elaborate/if anything here was toooooo abstract; I was trying not to drop a thesis on you while juggling actual information here.
Overall I'm digging the read so far; the complaints I have are pretty minor in the grand scheme of how well this is written. Especially the realism and lack of everyone being on fire and evil and shit. Thank you for writing and looking forward to seeing more!
unrepentantAuthor
A cat who writes stories
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Thanks for another review, @kintsugi!
I'm hoping I won't let people down on the topic of pokémon sapience but I've spent so long thinking it through now that I think my best shot's a good one. I can only double down on it at this point!
I don't have MSWord, I use Scrivener to organise my work and sometimes I use Google Docs to do the writing proper. Neither has this function, unfortunately.
The note on rockruff's sex is a fair one, and I think I'll have Salem scent him as a male immediately on revision. I do intend to cover gender stuff later, just not in this instance!
Glad someone else appreciates wholesome pokémon shelter, I'm so sick of the abusive shelter trope. It's interesting to me that feedback on Jamie varies wildly depending on how much people value his promise to Salem not to contact Laura. The conkeldurr story is an apocryphal fairy tale but it does demonstrate the capacity of pokémon to have complex attitudes about humans. I don't have any interest at all in simple tropes about humans being evil, I'm much more concerned with exploring how humans are flawed. I'm glad that's exciting you!!
Your comments towards the end about the nature of these chapters as a kind of extended prologue are very interesting. I certainly see what you mean! It seems your main points are that Salem's not emotionally developed much over time, that the morphing plot is a foregone conclusion, and that the story is being told on the strength of the worldbuilding alone.
There's a couple things here that muddy this one. The first is that although her first-chapter reflection on her early years is a look into the past, the space of time between her huddling under the car at night in the opening scene and leaving with Alisha at the end of chapter three is only less than 24 hours. It goes [Salem under car] [daydream about Laura] [approach the shelter and stay the night] [interact with humans and pokémon] [leave with Alisha]. I worry that the clarity of this has been muddied somewhat!
The second thing is that as a small and somewhat anxious lost creature, she doesn't have an enormous amount of development room so far that I haven't already used. She's gone from comfortable pet, to distressed but proud stray, to desperate stray, to pessimistic shelter resident, to hopeful stowaway. Since I'm struggling to perceive how I might improve on that, I would really appreciate some suggestions!
The second thing is that as a small and somewhat anxious lost creature, she doesn't have an enormous amount of development room so far that I haven't already used. She's gone from comfortable pet, to distressed but proud stray, to desperate stray, to pessimistic shelter resident, to hopeful stowaway. Since I'm struggling to perceive how I might improve on that, I would really appreciate some suggestions!
I feel like this is an artifact of the kind of story I'm telling, honestly. I don't feel like I can write a proper morph fic without covering in detail the personal and circumstantial reasons why the central character would end up going in for morphing, and I don't feel like I can write the story at all without it being very clear from the beginning that it's going to be entirely about artificial furries after the first 15k words.
After all, this isn't a story about a purrloin seeking a way to become human, it's a story about how a purrloin finds a way to become part human, chooses to do so, and the consequences of that choice for her and for the other pokémon who do the same. I've been wondering about ways to make Salem's path to the morphing process feel more plot-based, in particular by extending the first chapter at the beginning to make it more clear that the narration is retrospective and in doing so foreshadow some of the post-morph plot a little better than the prelude does on its own. I welcome your thoughts on this!
After all, this isn't a story about a purrloin seeking a way to become human, it's a story about how a purrloin finds a way to become part human, chooses to do so, and the consequences of that choice for her and for the other pokémon who do the same. I've been wondering about ways to make Salem's path to the morphing process feel more plot-based, in particular by extending the first chapter at the beginning to make it more clear that the narration is retrospective and in doing so foreshadow some of the post-morph plot a little better than the prelude does on its own. I welcome your thoughts on this!
I'd be delighted to hear your prologue-related thoughts, of course!
Thanks again for your praise and critical commentary! I hope you continue to enjoy the story, so see you next chapter!
unrepentantAuthor
A cat who writes stories
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Thanks for your patience, everyone. The next update is already finished and will be up fairly soon, although it is only a short one. Chapter Five is well on its way. To those that don't know, there's now a worldbuilding thread for this story, the link for which is currently in my signature. Please do take a glance and ask some questions. And enjoy!
Four
The Culmination of a Cat
Oh! How Salem wanted to yowl out loud! Of course, even if she’d dared to cry out she couldn’t have managed to with her torso so tensed up. Instead she only gripped the fabric of the seat-well harder with every swerve and acceleration, her flank thumping against the car until she felt bruised. She began to wish that she would pass out, but she just kept clinging on. Nothing could be as painful as Alisha heading back to the shelter.
By the time Alisha stopped the car, Salem’s limbs ached, her whole body was exhausted, and her belly had churned itself into a nausea she feared would never subside. Still, the car had stopped, and that meant they had arrived! Alisha surely wouldn’t take her back to the shelter now. When Alisha got out, Salem jumped onto the back seat to peek out of the window after her, stomach still lurching. There were cars. A shop? Was Alisha getting food?
Maybe. Definitely, she could smell food. But now there was also an awful smell of petrol. The vile taste of fuel in the air pushed her over the edge.
Vomiting was never pleasant, but relief always followed. There was also the relief of having arrived at Alisha’s destination, Salem not realising what a gas station was or that humans might stop for petrol on long journeys. Unsurprisingly therefore, when Alisha came back from the gas station Salem was sitting on the driver’s seat, looking up at her expectantly. When she spotted the stowaway purrloin in her car, she reacted only with a raised eyebrow. Salem had expected a yelp of surprise, at least.
“So,” she said, grinning as she did. “I guess you wanted to come with me after all. Hey, I won’t tell Jamie you’re with me if you don’t.”
She winked at Salem, and Salem winked back, although since she couldn’t do the little cheek motion or tongue click she was really only blinking with one eye. It made Alisha smile, though, so it was good enough.
Alisha took a minute to clean up Salem’s mess with minimal grumbling, before taking the driver’s seat again. As Salem waited from her spot in the passenger seat, her previous concern with whether Alisha would take her back to Jamie was succeeded by a concern with whether she could go back to Jamie. She hadn’t wanted to. She still didn’t. But she still felt uneasy at the thought that she’d already travelled too far to go back.
The journey from that point on was gentler on Salem. Alisha drove more carefully knowing she had a pokémon riding shotgun, and the passenger seat let Salem watch the scenery go by. Salem spent a lot of time with her front paws up on the dashboard, wide-eyed at the speed of passing trees, signs, vehicles. From time to time she would spot a pokémon in a passing car looking at her and barking, or a wild one travelling on foot beside the road.
Alisha spoke up soon after Salem had her chance to rest.
“So, kitten. You must have really wanted to try something new, huh?”
Keeping her eyes on the road meant Alisha couldn’t look round at Salem to read her pokésign. Instead of signing, Salem miaowed, trying to communicate her desperation and hopes and fears all in one sound.
“That bad, huh?”
Oh! This human was smart. This was good!
“Well, you sure look banged up, I have to say. You must have been out on the street a while, I’m guessing. That’s a yes? Okay, well, you’re not hard to figure out, then. You didn’t get on so well with your human, you didn’t get on okay as a stray, and you didn’t feel happy at the shelter either. Here’s the thing. I’ve got another way for you. If you want it.”
Alisha told Salem about the future that she’d offered the other shelter pokémon, rephrasing things as she went if Salem had any trouble following the explanation. Salem listened attentively, mewing in acknowledgement with each promise. The deal was this: Salem was being offered a new home, along with other pokémon ill-suited to their previous lives. She would be asked to work hard in return, maybe fight battles if she could do that, and she couldn’t turn back once she’d made her choice. What’s more, there was another condition, one which Salem thought was a miracle, not a sacrifice, once she was sure she’d understood. Alisha explained it carefully, building up to the reveal like a hunter stalking quarry.
“I’m sure you want to evolve, one day, Salem.”
She gave an affirmative miaow.
“Maybe you’ve dreamed about it. Changing who you are so completely. Permanently. It must seem terribly exciting.”
It was exciting. Even scary. But it was something she had long aspired to, originally to be stronger on a journey with Laura, but lately just so she could be less vulnerable. To fight other pokémon for resources. Maybe even humans.
“Humans aren’t much like pokémon. Humans don’t have your strength, and humans don’t evolve. There’s no bright light when humans become adults. They change only with age, which is a slow and gradual process that nobody can avoid. You’ve spent your whole life expecting that bright light. Maybe longing for it. Perhaps you’ve longed to be human, too.”
Salem miaowed, quieter this time. That was truer than Alisha could know.
“It’s not impossible, you know.”
Alisha let the thought sink in for a few breaths. It was a strange thought. Perhaps Alisha was only being figurative. Humans did that all the time, Salem had learnt. They were on a long stretch of road now, with many other cars. Salem found herself trying to follow the green blur of roadside trees, which whipped past her field of vision faster than was comfortable for her neck to track. It occurred to her that she had finally left Laura’s city for the first time, and it hadn’t been together. How would the world be different now?
“I knew a zorua once,” Alisha continued at last. “A pokémon very much like you, Salem. She liked to talk, even though signing is difficult, and people don’t pay attention, and she knew she couldn’t ever think the way humans think. She just kept wishing she could. Sound familiar?”
It did. As familiar as hunger, as familiar as the moon.
“She had hope, though. She knew that when she evolved, she’d become a zoroark, and stand on two legs, the better to sign. Of course, even that wouldn’t be perfect. But she’d got this idea that if she wanted it badly enough, she could evolve into a human instead. If she just imagined it hard enough when the time came, she’d be engulfed in bright light, and in a flash have not only hands and fingers but a person’s voice, so she could talk to her human friends properly for the first time. She thought about it all the time. Have you ever had those kind of thoughts, Salem?”
A soft rumbling showed her admission.
“Well, that zorua got her wish, eventually. That’s what we’re doing for the pokémon who agree to our offer. We’re making them human.”
Silence. Then her heartbeat, the sounds of cars and wind and the engine noise all at once. She had to remember to breathe.
“Well, it’s a close enough thing, anyway. They’re hybrids, to tell the truth. Part human. Part pokémon. They may as well be human as far as I’m concerned. They keep all their abilities and much of their original appearance, but they have the shape of a human, and the mind and voice of one too. That makes them people the same as any human, in my opinion.”
Once again, Alisha allowed Salem to digest the idea. The thought fluttered in her stomach like nothing ever had.
“It’ll be tough if you agree to it. The actual change itself is pretty distressing to go through and there’s no way to turn back if you regret it, but it’s a chance to be different, to be better, to have an incredible life. I’d make that choice if I were a pokémon. Would you go for that, Salem?”
She miaowed earnestly, several times for emphasis. Alisha laughed gently, and said she wasn’t surprised. All Salem could think of was what Alisha had said — “the voice of a human.” She would have a proper voice. A human voice. Alisha didn’t say anything else, just turned the music up on the radio and left Salem to her thoughts. Many breaths later, when the sky was growing darker, and the car had travelled countless spans, Salem thought of the questions, “why would you do this for me?” and “are there many others who have done this?” and “how is this possible?” These were questions she didn’t know how to ask. Alisha answered one for her at least.
“It’s a lot like evolution, just slower. Someone found a way to trick a pokémon’s body so that instead of evolving normally, it becomes part-human. I don’t understand how it works any more than you do, but it works. It does take several exhausting days and growing to ten times your body weight is a huge strain, so we’ll just make sure you’re asleep for as much of it as possible and you’ll just wake up afterwards with a new body. You might not even remember any of it, if you’re lucky.”
Salem already felt lucky. Lucky enough to make up for all her months of pained survival, every scratch and bruise she’d sustained in fights over food and shelter, even the loss of Laura’s devotion. She would do anything, anything at all for this.
Alisha tried to talk a few times later in the trip, but Salem found her attention sliding off anything that Alisha said. It was too ordinary — the weather, what their destination was like, how tired she was — nothing about the shock that was her chance to become human. So instead of speaking to a silent Salem, Alisha sang along to the radio. Salem didn't recognise it, and music was mostly just an arrangement of sounds to her, but Alisha was singing with enthusiasm, and Salem enjoyed hearing that.
Later, she slept shallowly on the passenger seat as they sped along the motorway, comfortable in the evening darkness. The winter sun had died before they had even reached their destination.
Alisha woke Salem from dreamless sleep with a gentle nudge, so she stirred, got to her feet and put her paws up on the dashboard. The car pulled in through a security gate and into a large bare-earth car park, past which she saw a broad, squat building complex, surrounded by vehicles and ringed by a network of dirt roads. Further away, fences secured the area. She could have scaled them easily if not for the spooled barbs at their tops. Beyond the complex and to every side, deciduous trees sprawled across a craggy landscape for a great distance, such as Salem had only ever seen in her imagination or on Laura’s television programs. These forests felt both dreamlike and inviting to her.
Alisha got out, and retrieved her things from the back seat. Salem caught the unique scent of new pokéballs from her bags. Would pokéballs still work on her after she evolved into a human? Or a “hybrid.” That was the word Alisha had used. Salem didn’t know that word, but she could infer the meaning. She made an experimental series of swipes with her paw, trying to combine her signs for ‘pokémon’ and ‘human.’ Clawing motions for [POKÉMON.] Tapping her head for [PERSON.] One paw at her temple then slashing downward; [HUMAN-POKÉMON.] That would be her, soon. Her heart and lungs accelerated in anticipation.
“You coming, Salem?”
She chirruped her reply, and bounded up to Alisha, who led her inside one of the buildings. Part of her wanted to know what was in the other buildings and if she’d get a chance to explore them. And the forest, for that matter! Only part of her, though. Almost all of her was fixated on what was about to happen. That is, if she didn’t have to wait long. Would she have to?
They entered through double doors, and Salem scented tracked-in soil and mud, cleaning products, dozens of separate humans, and the tang of new pine furniture. Something else, too. That same peculiar smell she had detected from Alisha. She half-guessed, half-hoped that it was the smell of hybrids. Alisha waved to another human behind a desk, who waved back idly from behind a computer monitor.
As the two humans discussed things Salem didn’t know about in words she didn’t understand, she looked about the room, studying it. She wanted to at least explore if she had to wait to ‘evolve’. There wasn’t much to catch her eye, however, so she stared at the doors that led to the rest of the building, waiting for them to open. She’d been sat still practically the whole day and now her chest was thumping and her breathing was rapid; she would shoot off the first chance she got.
“...called Salem, she was at the shelter too…”
Just as Salem turned her attention back to the discussion, a door swung open for a human coming out, and Salem took the opportunity to rush past their feet and into the corridor beyond. She was grateful to see that several rooms along the length of it had windows for her to look into. She leapt up to each of them in turn, hoping to catch sight of a pokémon who’d become human or even the way in which they were transformed.
She had no luck with the two nearest rooms. The first was occupied by a dozen or so human staff, working at computers and therefore completely mysterious to Salem. The other was unlit and not in use, but she noted stacks and stacks of crates and boxes inside. When she scrambled to perch on the third window’s lip, however, she could see that leaning against the inside wall with their back to the window was a figure with a mane of sand and charcoal unlike any human hair, yet belonging to a fully clothed humanoid nonetheless. They must have heard her jumping up and scrabbling for purchase, because they turned around to look at her, and for scarcely a breath-span, Salem could see red eyes, a protruding charcoal horn, and sandy fur. Not skin. Fur. A hybrid-!
“Salem!”
She lost her grip on her perch and landed heavily on her paws. Alisha towered over her, hands on hips, but she was smiling, not frowning. Salem signed a small apology to Alisha and tried to get her excitement across with frantic mews and gestures.
“Hey, I’m excited too, but you can’t go charging round the place unsupervised, and it’s late already. We gotta get some rest. Don’t worry, I literally just put you down first on the waiting list, just because you were such a sweetheart today. You’ll get your chance tomorrow, okay?”
Tomorrow-! If only tomorrow could be now! But there was no hurrying the sun and moon. Salem would have to wait after all. Even the thought of a single night’s wait was painful!
She miaowed loudly, and signed [HUMAN-POKÉMON! FOUND!], but Alisha didn’t get the message, and lead her elsewhere in the facility. Alisha had a room of her own, and invited Salem to spend the night there. Naturally, she accepted — although, what else could she have done? It turned out Alisha didn’t have proper packaged food manufactured for pokémon consumption, but she did have the contents of half a tuna sandwich and some suitable treats. Good enough. Salem accepted, and although it took her some time to calm down, she eventually had the most restful sleep she’d managed in many moons, curled up on the corner of Alisha’s bed.
In her dreams, she was human. She stood on two legs and her paws were hands. She was walking in a forest that went on forever, when she saw her own face in a clear pool of water.
She looked something like her normal self, and something like Alisha, and something like the hybrid-person she’d spied before. She turned to look at Alisha, standing beside her, and Alisha’s face seemed to be a reflection of her own. She smiled, and felt what it was to smile. Alisha smiled back. She opened her mouth to speak-
-and Alisha was stumbling out of bed, seemingly unaware of Salem nearby.
Salem miaowed a gentle but resentful greeting. Then, when she remembered — today! It was today! This was the morning of the day she would become human! — she voiced a chirruping, lively token of her excitement.
“Good to see you, cheeky kitty,” mumbled Alisha.
Alisha calling her that wasn’t the same as Laura calling her that, but it was still faintly pleasant.
Every breath that Alisha took to wash and dress herself was a breath that Salem spent miaowing, pacing or otherwise fussing. Alisha poked gentle fun at her, called her a silly cat. This reminded her of Laura, and so she stopped agitating so much and tried as hard as she could to be patient. Her patience would be worthwhile. Alisha had a plastic-wrapped bar of something for her breakfast, and when Salem signed [FOOD] she wagged her finger, saying “sorry, kitty, but no solids before the morphing process. Strict rule.” So, no food for her, for now. This, too, would be worth it.
Everything would be worth it.
So, were they going to where she would be transformed, immediately? Not quite.
“We have to give you a little checkup first,” cautioned Alisha. “It won’t take ages, I promise.”
Alisha led Salem through the corridors of the facility, and past several human and pokémon staff, but she didn’t get another glimpse of any hybrids. Alisha spotted her looking around, guessed why, and asked if she’d like to meet one. Apparently it was normal to offer ‘candidate pokémon’ (that was her!) the chance to speak to a hybrid before going through the transformation themselves. Salem accepted with eagerness.
They carried on to the clinic for the ‘checkup’. Alisha passed Salem over to the staff and went to arrange the meeting she’d promised. True to Alisha’s word, the checkup didn’t take all day, but to Salem it may as well have lasted a moon. A veterinary nurse looked her over for injuries, illness and the like, and was kind enough to explain what she was doing as she did it, for Salem’s benefit.
Her temperature was taken, as was a blood sample (against her loud objections) and her microchip. She didn’t realise in that moment what the value of the lost microchip was, being more concerned with the indignity of having her blood taken. No cat would realise the implications of removing such a thing, and nobody would bother giving them an explanation.
Eventually, Salem was pronounced ‘in surprisingly healthy condition, considering’. She was given some tablets for nutrient deficiencies, which she swallowed only after an extended squabble, and allowed to continue on her way.
The small lounge where they were to meet a real, actual ‘pokémorph’ was a cosy place. It had a variety of different chairs, stools and sofas, apparently because comfortable seating standards were different between hybrids. There was a water cooler, a little tray of treats (which interested Salem somewhat) and a small squeeze-toy filled with catnip (which interested her enormously). This was surely all in the pursuit of her comfort! Salem went for the treats, only to be shooed away by Alisha. No solids!
While Salem played with the catnip toy, Alisha sprawled herself out on a sofa, lying on it sideways with one leg over the arm and the other hanging over the side. “I let the staff know I’d like to let you meet Church. He’s our resident ‘retired’ morph, we like him to say hello to new candidates and tell them about what they’re signing on for before they take the plunge.”
[WHAT?]
“Oh, uh, Church is a hybrid. A pokémon-made-human. His job is to meet pokémon like you, so you know what it’s like.”
[THANK-YOU.]
“No problem, kitten.”
They didn’t have to wait long for Church to knock on the door — Salem had yet to tear open the chew toy. The arrival of a [HUMAN-POKÉMON!] was far more important than catnip, however, so she sat straight up and batted the toy away, curling her tail around her paws neatly. Alisha jumped to her feet to get the door for the incoming guest, holding it open as he entered. He moved slowly, deliberately, as if each step was a choice carefully made. Alisha helped him into an armchair.
He struck an imposing figure, at first glance. He was tall, broad, and his head was crowned with enormous black horns, but as Salem watched his tree-trunk limbs move, she noticed a hesitance in his steps. Everything about Church was striking, but nothing so much as his being absolutely covered in fur. Salem had imagined hybrids to look like humans in thick coats, in her naivety, but his off-white and woolly fur thickly obscured all skin. It was especially startling to see fur where human skin would be most visible, around his neck and face. His facial fur was accented by dark markings around his eyes as if he were wearing eyeshadow or a bandit’s mask, Salem preferring to think of it as the latter.
“It’s okay, Salem,” Alisha was saying, wrongly assuming that Salem was alarmed rather than transfixed. “He’s a big teddy bear. You can come over, come say hi.”
She did, creeping up to him like she would an unfamiliar human. He leaned down, seeming like nothing so much as a tree bending in the wind as he did so, and reached out a hand for her to sniff. His hands were hands — human hands! They were furred hands, hands where the middle two fingers had the receded remnants of cloven hooves, but hands all the same. His scent was more like plants and earth than anything. Not as if he’d been rolling in a field, but as if he had been made from a grassy hill dug into the shape of a person and brought to life. He had a short mane of what Salem was sure was some kind of scrub grass, which smelled not entirely unlike a freshly mowed lawn.
As she continued to scent him, taking in the familiar and the strange all at once, he bent down to sniff her in return. With each intake and exhalation of air he made a kind of blowing, roaring snort, like any number of large mammals on the nature documentaries Laura used to watch. Salem at last detected a signature smell both like and unlike human scent and the scent of human things — the familiar smells of uncooked vegetables, and of cotton clothing.
At last, she looked up from his outstretched hand and examined Church’s appearance. He gazed back, as attentive to her as she was to him. His face had a sloping bridge higher than any human’s, and ended in the same sort of soft, leathery black nose as Salem’s. Above that high bridge were the roots of those grand, backward-curving horns that looked like nothing so much as a pair of bike handles. Church wore a pair of cargo shorts, which revealed his legs as still being hoofed and bent like a normal gogoat’s, changing only enough to support his humanoid frame and not to become perfectly human. An orange sleeveless jacket was open to bare his torso and grassy mane; it was bizarre to see something so human framing something so wild.
Seen as a whole, Salem could barely register Church as a real creature. He was like a forest beast out of a children’s book, or something from an urban myth, yet his clothes were the sort of thing Laura’s father would wear in the garden on a summer’s day. If she focused on the jacket, he felt human. If she focused on the horns, he became a pokémon. Hands; human. Hooves; pokémon. It was hard to reconcile the conflicting aspects of his appearance so that she could recognise him as somehow both, but neither. Only his scent seemed perfectly ‘both’, between human and pokémon. She signed her word for ‘hybrid’: [HUMAN-POKÉMON.]
To her surprise, he signed [human-pokémon] back to her, more fluidly than her of course but nevertheless using the same approximate gestures. He repeated the gesture experimentally, and again, until he had comfortably mastered it with a flair Salem could only dream of.
[I am a human-pokémon, yes. Hello, little one. I am-] he signed, and then he used one she didn’t recognise, placing his hands flat together as if in prayer. ‘Church’, she guessed. [It is my pleasure to meet you. I hope that you are well, and comfortable in this place.]
His pokésign was easily the best Salem had seen in her life. Not the throh from the day before, not Laura, nobody had the confident and perfect signing that this gogoat hybrid could manage. Salem missed a breath, stunned.
Alisha replied for her. “Church, this is Salem. She’s a purrloin who snuck into my car while I wasn’t looking, I guess because she was desperate to come with me rather than get adopted out. Could you tell her a little bit about what happened to you?”
“Yes,” said Church. His voice was deeper than any human’s and yet he sounded perfectly human to Salem. “I would be glad to, Alisha. Salem, is it? Welcome, Salem.”
Oh, how Salem wanted that voice for herself. Any voice at all, so long as she could speak her name.
Church told Salem who he was. He was once a riding mount for a human named Shannon Church and her companion for many years. He’d had another name back then. She had died as people often do, of an illness he had not understood, leaving him in the care of her relatives. Where Shannon had understood him perfectly, now he struggled to be heard. Nothing was the same. He had spent too long being that woman’s singular partner. Eventually Shannon’s brother let Church leave for a pokémon sanctuary. He did not belong there either, without purpose as he was. One day, a human very much like Alisha turned up. They made him an offer. He took it.
“It was hard, Salem. Understand this. I chose to become what I am because I could no longer be what I was. I took an entire moon to consider my choice, and it took longer for my body to change. It was gradual, and it was exhausting. Even painful. Do you understand this, little cat?”
[YES,] she replied at once.
Church stroked his chin with a massive hand. “Be careful, Salem. I believe you should take as much time as I did to be sure of what you want.”
Salem was already sure. And as best as she could, she said so.
[I’M HUMAN-POKÉMON. YES, SOON. I AM.]
The effort was tremendous, but Church seemed to comprehend perfectly.
“Alright, Salem. You seem very sure of yourself. I hope you will be as comfortable with your new body and mind as I have become with mine. It was nice to meet you. I trust that when we meet again you will tell me about yourself. Alisha- I am tired now. Please.”
Alisha thanked Church and helped him to his feet. Once she’d let him through the door, she gestured to Salem, who jumped down from her spot to follow her elsewhere.
“You ready now, kitten? All decided?”
[YES!]
She signed so forcefully that she almost tripped herself in doing so. Alisha laughed to herself, and lead the way.
Their destination was a white-tiled room with metal equipment and furnishings. Several beds, though not nearly as plush as the beds Salem was used to. A row of empty glass cylinders reaching from the floor to the ceiling. A small collection of humans and a short pink-and-cream pokémon following the instructions of another human, whom Alisha went to speak to. Salem did her best to listen attentively to the conversation — this was the conversation preceding the most exciting and singular event of her life! — but she only knew a tiny portion of the words being used. Still, she tried to memorise the sounds used, hoping to understand them later, as a hybrid.
There was some bickering between Alisha and the others, and Salem caught her own name. There was gesturing, and raising of voices, and “no, no, absolutely no.” Her breath died in her lungs as she feared that she might be being turned down for this, she would never be human at all, that they might send her back, send her home! But they did not send her away, even though Alisha seemed to have lost the argument. Instead, Alisha lifted her onto a bed and patted her head gently. Her breath returned with a purr.
“Looks like you get to do this the old fashioned way,” Alisha told her. That didn’t mean anything to her, but Alisha spoke so gently and with such confidence, that the fluttering of her heart ebbed at once.
Another human brought a sheaf of papers and a pen. This was what Jamie had had Alisha do — to give a ‘signature.’ She and the white-coated woman with her explained various things to Salem, carefully, but with growing impatience on the part of the stranger. Alisha admonished her more than once for this. Salem listened carefully as she was told about what was to happen. Some she already knew from Alisha or Church, and some she couldn’t understand, but there was something new — it was going to hurt. First when they pierced her skin to make her evolve, and then for days afterwards as her body changed. It would be slow. She would struggle to survive. A machine would even have to do her breathing for her.
[YOU - HELP?] she signed, hoping Alisha would understand.
“I’ll be here the whole time, Salem. I’ll do anything to make sure you make it through, okay?”
Okay. That was okay.
Salem had already struggled to survive for moons before now. If she could be human at the end of this new struggle, if Alisha would stay by her side as she gradually evolved — she would do it. When she thought about the choice, she found she’d already made it long ago, before she knew she had a choice to make.
Salem miaowed her assent and soon enough, Alisha presented Salem with a small black pad. Alisha held her paw to it, and her pads came away sticky and damp.
“Put your paw to this paper when you’re ready, kitten,” said Alisha. “That proves you understand what you’re about to do as best as we can explain to you. It gives us permission to change you.”
She didn’t hesitate. Her paw pressed the paper firmly enough to crease, and the print smudged a little as she pulled away. The woman she didn’t know took a wet wipe and cleaned her paw pad. It was unpleasant, but she wanted the ink gone and so she tolerated the sensation.
“Sorry about this,” she caught Alisha saying. Sorry for what? But she trusted Alisha. She didn’t question this.
“This might sting a little,” said the other woman.
The humans who were still strangers to her prepared a tray of small devices. She recognised the shape from visits to the pokémon centre. These objects were ‘injections.’ Was that the method? One injection and she would evolve? Not quite, it turned out. One of the humans — a man smelling only of disinfectant and not of his history or his life — took a trio of syringes and brought them to her side.
Alisha’s voice from behind him: “Try to relax, Salem.”
She did, even as this human took a buzzing razor and shaved away a patch of fur on her foreleg, held her paw firmly, and applied a syringe to her vein. She knew she was being given her dream, but still she growled through her clenched jaw at the intrusion. It only hurt as much as a warning nip from another cat, but it was all she could do not to tug away. She wouldn’t spoil this. She wanted this. She dug her claws into the bed sheet so that she wouldn’t scratch the man in a panic. He did this again with the other two injections with Salem mewling and growling the whole time, but by the time he’d found a vein for the second, she was already starting to feel different. Not different in any ‘human’ or unfamiliar way, but in the all too familiar sensations of nausea, thirst, and desperation to sleep.
She looked around for Alisha, and tried to sign for water, but she couldn’t raise her paw to her mouth. She licked her lips in vague distress. Alisha’s eyes were somewhere else. Salem turned to see what she was looking at: the other human hooking something into her skin. Not an injection this time, but something else — a transparent, flexible tube, through which ran a pale, translucent fluid. She wanted to make a miaow, just a small one, but the thought never made it from her brain to her lungs. Her mouth opened wide, but Salem could not make a sound as she fell into oblivion.
This was the moment when her story as a cat ended. The moment when the story of Salem the hybrid began.
Salem’s last thought as a purrloin was not fear, but hope.
She hoped that when she woke up, she could thank Alisha with real words.
Four
The Culmination of a Cat
Oh! How Salem wanted to yowl out loud! Of course, even if she’d dared to cry out she couldn’t have managed to with her torso so tensed up. Instead she only gripped the fabric of the seat-well harder with every swerve and acceleration, her flank thumping against the car until she felt bruised. She began to wish that she would pass out, but she just kept clinging on. Nothing could be as painful as Alisha heading back to the shelter.
By the time Alisha stopped the car, Salem’s limbs ached, her whole body was exhausted, and her belly had churned itself into a nausea she feared would never subside. Still, the car had stopped, and that meant they had arrived! Alisha surely wouldn’t take her back to the shelter now. When Alisha got out, Salem jumped onto the back seat to peek out of the window after her, stomach still lurching. There were cars. A shop? Was Alisha getting food?
Maybe. Definitely, she could smell food. But now there was also an awful smell of petrol. The vile taste of fuel in the air pushed her over the edge.
Vomiting was never pleasant, but relief always followed. There was also the relief of having arrived at Alisha’s destination, Salem not realising what a gas station was or that humans might stop for petrol on long journeys. Unsurprisingly therefore, when Alisha came back from the gas station Salem was sitting on the driver’s seat, looking up at her expectantly. When she spotted the stowaway purrloin in her car, she reacted only with a raised eyebrow. Salem had expected a yelp of surprise, at least.
“So,” she said, grinning as she did. “I guess you wanted to come with me after all. Hey, I won’t tell Jamie you’re with me if you don’t.”
She winked at Salem, and Salem winked back, although since she couldn’t do the little cheek motion or tongue click she was really only blinking with one eye. It made Alisha smile, though, so it was good enough.
Alisha took a minute to clean up Salem’s mess with minimal grumbling, before taking the driver’s seat again. As Salem waited from her spot in the passenger seat, her previous concern with whether Alisha would take her back to Jamie was succeeded by a concern with whether she could go back to Jamie. She hadn’t wanted to. She still didn’t. But she still felt uneasy at the thought that she’d already travelled too far to go back.
The journey from that point on was gentler on Salem. Alisha drove more carefully knowing she had a pokémon riding shotgun, and the passenger seat let Salem watch the scenery go by. Salem spent a lot of time with her front paws up on the dashboard, wide-eyed at the speed of passing trees, signs, vehicles. From time to time she would spot a pokémon in a passing car looking at her and barking, or a wild one travelling on foot beside the road.
Alisha spoke up soon after Salem had her chance to rest.
“So, kitten. You must have really wanted to try something new, huh?”
Keeping her eyes on the road meant Alisha couldn’t look round at Salem to read her pokésign. Instead of signing, Salem miaowed, trying to communicate her desperation and hopes and fears all in one sound.
“That bad, huh?”
Oh! This human was smart. This was good!
“Well, you sure look banged up, I have to say. You must have been out on the street a while, I’m guessing. That’s a yes? Okay, well, you’re not hard to figure out, then. You didn’t get on so well with your human, you didn’t get on okay as a stray, and you didn’t feel happy at the shelter either. Here’s the thing. I’ve got another way for you. If you want it.”
Alisha told Salem about the future that she’d offered the other shelter pokémon, rephrasing things as she went if Salem had any trouble following the explanation. Salem listened attentively, mewing in acknowledgement with each promise. The deal was this: Salem was being offered a new home, along with other pokémon ill-suited to their previous lives. She would be asked to work hard in return, maybe fight battles if she could do that, and she couldn’t turn back once she’d made her choice. What’s more, there was another condition, one which Salem thought was a miracle, not a sacrifice, once she was sure she’d understood. Alisha explained it carefully, building up to the reveal like a hunter stalking quarry.
“I’m sure you want to evolve, one day, Salem.”
She gave an affirmative miaow.
“Maybe you’ve dreamed about it. Changing who you are so completely. Permanently. It must seem terribly exciting.”
It was exciting. Even scary. But it was something she had long aspired to, originally to be stronger on a journey with Laura, but lately just so she could be less vulnerable. To fight other pokémon for resources. Maybe even humans.
“Humans aren’t much like pokémon. Humans don’t have your strength, and humans don’t evolve. There’s no bright light when humans become adults. They change only with age, which is a slow and gradual process that nobody can avoid. You’ve spent your whole life expecting that bright light. Maybe longing for it. Perhaps you’ve longed to be human, too.”
Salem miaowed, quieter this time. That was truer than Alisha could know.
“It’s not impossible, you know.”
Alisha let the thought sink in for a few breaths. It was a strange thought. Perhaps Alisha was only being figurative. Humans did that all the time, Salem had learnt. They were on a long stretch of road now, with many other cars. Salem found herself trying to follow the green blur of roadside trees, which whipped past her field of vision faster than was comfortable for her neck to track. It occurred to her that she had finally left Laura’s city for the first time, and it hadn’t been together. How would the world be different now?
“I knew a zorua once,” Alisha continued at last. “A pokémon very much like you, Salem. She liked to talk, even though signing is difficult, and people don’t pay attention, and she knew she couldn’t ever think the way humans think. She just kept wishing she could. Sound familiar?”
It did. As familiar as hunger, as familiar as the moon.
“She had hope, though. She knew that when she evolved, she’d become a zoroark, and stand on two legs, the better to sign. Of course, even that wouldn’t be perfect. But she’d got this idea that if she wanted it badly enough, she could evolve into a human instead. If she just imagined it hard enough when the time came, she’d be engulfed in bright light, and in a flash have not only hands and fingers but a person’s voice, so she could talk to her human friends properly for the first time. She thought about it all the time. Have you ever had those kind of thoughts, Salem?”
A soft rumbling showed her admission.
“Well, that zorua got her wish, eventually. That’s what we’re doing for the pokémon who agree to our offer. We’re making them human.”
Silence. Then her heartbeat, the sounds of cars and wind and the engine noise all at once. She had to remember to breathe.
“Well, it’s a close enough thing, anyway. They’re hybrids, to tell the truth. Part human. Part pokémon. They may as well be human as far as I’m concerned. They keep all their abilities and much of their original appearance, but they have the shape of a human, and the mind and voice of one too. That makes them people the same as any human, in my opinion.”
Once again, Alisha allowed Salem to digest the idea. The thought fluttered in her stomach like nothing ever had.
“It’ll be tough if you agree to it. The actual change itself is pretty distressing to go through and there’s no way to turn back if you regret it, but it’s a chance to be different, to be better, to have an incredible life. I’d make that choice if I were a pokémon. Would you go for that, Salem?”
She miaowed earnestly, several times for emphasis. Alisha laughed gently, and said she wasn’t surprised. All Salem could think of was what Alisha had said — “the voice of a human.” She would have a proper voice. A human voice. Alisha didn’t say anything else, just turned the music up on the radio and left Salem to her thoughts. Many breaths later, when the sky was growing darker, and the car had travelled countless spans, Salem thought of the questions, “why would you do this for me?” and “are there many others who have done this?” and “how is this possible?” These were questions she didn’t know how to ask. Alisha answered one for her at least.
“It’s a lot like evolution, just slower. Someone found a way to trick a pokémon’s body so that instead of evolving normally, it becomes part-human. I don’t understand how it works any more than you do, but it works. It does take several exhausting days and growing to ten times your body weight is a huge strain, so we’ll just make sure you’re asleep for as much of it as possible and you’ll just wake up afterwards with a new body. You might not even remember any of it, if you’re lucky.”
Salem already felt lucky. Lucky enough to make up for all her months of pained survival, every scratch and bruise she’d sustained in fights over food and shelter, even the loss of Laura’s devotion. She would do anything, anything at all for this.
Alisha tried to talk a few times later in the trip, but Salem found her attention sliding off anything that Alisha said. It was too ordinary — the weather, what their destination was like, how tired she was — nothing about the shock that was her chance to become human. So instead of speaking to a silent Salem, Alisha sang along to the radio. Salem didn't recognise it, and music was mostly just an arrangement of sounds to her, but Alisha was singing with enthusiasm, and Salem enjoyed hearing that.
Later, she slept shallowly on the passenger seat as they sped along the motorway, comfortable in the evening darkness. The winter sun had died before they had even reached their destination.
Alisha woke Salem from dreamless sleep with a gentle nudge, so she stirred, got to her feet and put her paws up on the dashboard. The car pulled in through a security gate and into a large bare-earth car park, past which she saw a broad, squat building complex, surrounded by vehicles and ringed by a network of dirt roads. Further away, fences secured the area. She could have scaled them easily if not for the spooled barbs at their tops. Beyond the complex and to every side, deciduous trees sprawled across a craggy landscape for a great distance, such as Salem had only ever seen in her imagination or on Laura’s television programs. These forests felt both dreamlike and inviting to her.
Alisha got out, and retrieved her things from the back seat. Salem caught the unique scent of new pokéballs from her bags. Would pokéballs still work on her after she evolved into a human? Or a “hybrid.” That was the word Alisha had used. Salem didn’t know that word, but she could infer the meaning. She made an experimental series of swipes with her paw, trying to combine her signs for ‘pokémon’ and ‘human.’ Clawing motions for [POKÉMON.] Tapping her head for [PERSON.] One paw at her temple then slashing downward; [HUMAN-POKÉMON.] That would be her, soon. Her heart and lungs accelerated in anticipation.
“You coming, Salem?”
She chirruped her reply, and bounded up to Alisha, who led her inside one of the buildings. Part of her wanted to know what was in the other buildings and if she’d get a chance to explore them. And the forest, for that matter! Only part of her, though. Almost all of her was fixated on what was about to happen. That is, if she didn’t have to wait long. Would she have to?
They entered through double doors, and Salem scented tracked-in soil and mud, cleaning products, dozens of separate humans, and the tang of new pine furniture. Something else, too. That same peculiar smell she had detected from Alisha. She half-guessed, half-hoped that it was the smell of hybrids. Alisha waved to another human behind a desk, who waved back idly from behind a computer monitor.
As the two humans discussed things Salem didn’t know about in words she didn’t understand, she looked about the room, studying it. She wanted to at least explore if she had to wait to ‘evolve’. There wasn’t much to catch her eye, however, so she stared at the doors that led to the rest of the building, waiting for them to open. She’d been sat still practically the whole day and now her chest was thumping and her breathing was rapid; she would shoot off the first chance she got.
“...called Salem, she was at the shelter too…”
Just as Salem turned her attention back to the discussion, a door swung open for a human coming out, and Salem took the opportunity to rush past their feet and into the corridor beyond. She was grateful to see that several rooms along the length of it had windows for her to look into. She leapt up to each of them in turn, hoping to catch sight of a pokémon who’d become human or even the way in which they were transformed.
She had no luck with the two nearest rooms. The first was occupied by a dozen or so human staff, working at computers and therefore completely mysterious to Salem. The other was unlit and not in use, but she noted stacks and stacks of crates and boxes inside. When she scrambled to perch on the third window’s lip, however, she could see that leaning against the inside wall with their back to the window was a figure with a mane of sand and charcoal unlike any human hair, yet belonging to a fully clothed humanoid nonetheless. They must have heard her jumping up and scrabbling for purchase, because they turned around to look at her, and for scarcely a breath-span, Salem could see red eyes, a protruding charcoal horn, and sandy fur. Not skin. Fur. A hybrid-!
“Salem!”
She lost her grip on her perch and landed heavily on her paws. Alisha towered over her, hands on hips, but she was smiling, not frowning. Salem signed a small apology to Alisha and tried to get her excitement across with frantic mews and gestures.
“Hey, I’m excited too, but you can’t go charging round the place unsupervised, and it’s late already. We gotta get some rest. Don’t worry, I literally just put you down first on the waiting list, just because you were such a sweetheart today. You’ll get your chance tomorrow, okay?”
Tomorrow-! If only tomorrow could be now! But there was no hurrying the sun and moon. Salem would have to wait after all. Even the thought of a single night’s wait was painful!
She miaowed loudly, and signed [HUMAN-POKÉMON! FOUND!], but Alisha didn’t get the message, and lead her elsewhere in the facility. Alisha had a room of her own, and invited Salem to spend the night there. Naturally, she accepted — although, what else could she have done? It turned out Alisha didn’t have proper packaged food manufactured for pokémon consumption, but she did have the contents of half a tuna sandwich and some suitable treats. Good enough. Salem accepted, and although it took her some time to calm down, she eventually had the most restful sleep she’d managed in many moons, curled up on the corner of Alisha’s bed.
In her dreams, she was human. She stood on two legs and her paws were hands. She was walking in a forest that went on forever, when she saw her own face in a clear pool of water.
She looked something like her normal self, and something like Alisha, and something like the hybrid-person she’d spied before. She turned to look at Alisha, standing beside her, and Alisha’s face seemed to be a reflection of her own. She smiled, and felt what it was to smile. Alisha smiled back. She opened her mouth to speak-
-and Alisha was stumbling out of bed, seemingly unaware of Salem nearby.
Salem miaowed a gentle but resentful greeting. Then, when she remembered — today! It was today! This was the morning of the day she would become human! — she voiced a chirruping, lively token of her excitement.
“Good to see you, cheeky kitty,” mumbled Alisha.
Alisha calling her that wasn’t the same as Laura calling her that, but it was still faintly pleasant.
Every breath that Alisha took to wash and dress herself was a breath that Salem spent miaowing, pacing or otherwise fussing. Alisha poked gentle fun at her, called her a silly cat. This reminded her of Laura, and so she stopped agitating so much and tried as hard as she could to be patient. Her patience would be worthwhile. Alisha had a plastic-wrapped bar of something for her breakfast, and when Salem signed [FOOD] she wagged her finger, saying “sorry, kitty, but no solids before the morphing process. Strict rule.” So, no food for her, for now. This, too, would be worth it.
Everything would be worth it.
So, were they going to where she would be transformed, immediately? Not quite.
“We have to give you a little checkup first,” cautioned Alisha. “It won’t take ages, I promise.”
Alisha led Salem through the corridors of the facility, and past several human and pokémon staff, but she didn’t get another glimpse of any hybrids. Alisha spotted her looking around, guessed why, and asked if she’d like to meet one. Apparently it was normal to offer ‘candidate pokémon’ (that was her!) the chance to speak to a hybrid before going through the transformation themselves. Salem accepted with eagerness.
They carried on to the clinic for the ‘checkup’. Alisha passed Salem over to the staff and went to arrange the meeting she’d promised. True to Alisha’s word, the checkup didn’t take all day, but to Salem it may as well have lasted a moon. A veterinary nurse looked her over for injuries, illness and the like, and was kind enough to explain what she was doing as she did it, for Salem’s benefit.
Her temperature was taken, as was a blood sample (against her loud objections) and her microchip. She didn’t realise in that moment what the value of the lost microchip was, being more concerned with the indignity of having her blood taken. No cat would realise the implications of removing such a thing, and nobody would bother giving them an explanation.
Eventually, Salem was pronounced ‘in surprisingly healthy condition, considering’. She was given some tablets for nutrient deficiencies, which she swallowed only after an extended squabble, and allowed to continue on her way.
The small lounge where they were to meet a real, actual ‘pokémorph’ was a cosy place. It had a variety of different chairs, stools and sofas, apparently because comfortable seating standards were different between hybrids. There was a water cooler, a little tray of treats (which interested Salem somewhat) and a small squeeze-toy filled with catnip (which interested her enormously). This was surely all in the pursuit of her comfort! Salem went for the treats, only to be shooed away by Alisha. No solids!
While Salem played with the catnip toy, Alisha sprawled herself out on a sofa, lying on it sideways with one leg over the arm and the other hanging over the side. “I let the staff know I’d like to let you meet Church. He’s our resident ‘retired’ morph, we like him to say hello to new candidates and tell them about what they’re signing on for before they take the plunge.”
[WHAT?]
“Oh, uh, Church is a hybrid. A pokémon-made-human. His job is to meet pokémon like you, so you know what it’s like.”
[THANK-YOU.]
“No problem, kitten.”
They didn’t have to wait long for Church to knock on the door — Salem had yet to tear open the chew toy. The arrival of a [HUMAN-POKÉMON!] was far more important than catnip, however, so she sat straight up and batted the toy away, curling her tail around her paws neatly. Alisha jumped to her feet to get the door for the incoming guest, holding it open as he entered. He moved slowly, deliberately, as if each step was a choice carefully made. Alisha helped him into an armchair.
He struck an imposing figure, at first glance. He was tall, broad, and his head was crowned with enormous black horns, but as Salem watched his tree-trunk limbs move, she noticed a hesitance in his steps. Everything about Church was striking, but nothing so much as his being absolutely covered in fur. Salem had imagined hybrids to look like humans in thick coats, in her naivety, but his off-white and woolly fur thickly obscured all skin. It was especially startling to see fur where human skin would be most visible, around his neck and face. His facial fur was accented by dark markings around his eyes as if he were wearing eyeshadow or a bandit’s mask, Salem preferring to think of it as the latter.
“It’s okay, Salem,” Alisha was saying, wrongly assuming that Salem was alarmed rather than transfixed. “He’s a big teddy bear. You can come over, come say hi.”
She did, creeping up to him like she would an unfamiliar human. He leaned down, seeming like nothing so much as a tree bending in the wind as he did so, and reached out a hand for her to sniff. His hands were hands — human hands! They were furred hands, hands where the middle two fingers had the receded remnants of cloven hooves, but hands all the same. His scent was more like plants and earth than anything. Not as if he’d been rolling in a field, but as if he had been made from a grassy hill dug into the shape of a person and brought to life. He had a short mane of what Salem was sure was some kind of scrub grass, which smelled not entirely unlike a freshly mowed lawn.
As she continued to scent him, taking in the familiar and the strange all at once, he bent down to sniff her in return. With each intake and exhalation of air he made a kind of blowing, roaring snort, like any number of large mammals on the nature documentaries Laura used to watch. Salem at last detected a signature smell both like and unlike human scent and the scent of human things — the familiar smells of uncooked vegetables, and of cotton clothing.
At last, she looked up from his outstretched hand and examined Church’s appearance. He gazed back, as attentive to her as she was to him. His face had a sloping bridge higher than any human’s, and ended in the same sort of soft, leathery black nose as Salem’s. Above that high bridge were the roots of those grand, backward-curving horns that looked like nothing so much as a pair of bike handles. Church wore a pair of cargo shorts, which revealed his legs as still being hoofed and bent like a normal gogoat’s, changing only enough to support his humanoid frame and not to become perfectly human. An orange sleeveless jacket was open to bare his torso and grassy mane; it was bizarre to see something so human framing something so wild.
Seen as a whole, Salem could barely register Church as a real creature. He was like a forest beast out of a children’s book, or something from an urban myth, yet his clothes were the sort of thing Laura’s father would wear in the garden on a summer’s day. If she focused on the jacket, he felt human. If she focused on the horns, he became a pokémon. Hands; human. Hooves; pokémon. It was hard to reconcile the conflicting aspects of his appearance so that she could recognise him as somehow both, but neither. Only his scent seemed perfectly ‘both’, between human and pokémon. She signed her word for ‘hybrid’: [HUMAN-POKÉMON.]
To her surprise, he signed [human-pokémon] back to her, more fluidly than her of course but nevertheless using the same approximate gestures. He repeated the gesture experimentally, and again, until he had comfortably mastered it with a flair Salem could only dream of.
[I am a human-pokémon, yes. Hello, little one. I am-] he signed, and then he used one she didn’t recognise, placing his hands flat together as if in prayer. ‘Church’, she guessed. [It is my pleasure to meet you. I hope that you are well, and comfortable in this place.]
His pokésign was easily the best Salem had seen in her life. Not the throh from the day before, not Laura, nobody had the confident and perfect signing that this gogoat hybrid could manage. Salem missed a breath, stunned.
Alisha replied for her. “Church, this is Salem. She’s a purrloin who snuck into my car while I wasn’t looking, I guess because she was desperate to come with me rather than get adopted out. Could you tell her a little bit about what happened to you?”
“Yes,” said Church. His voice was deeper than any human’s and yet he sounded perfectly human to Salem. “I would be glad to, Alisha. Salem, is it? Welcome, Salem.”
Oh, how Salem wanted that voice for herself. Any voice at all, so long as she could speak her name.
Church told Salem who he was. He was once a riding mount for a human named Shannon Church and her companion for many years. He’d had another name back then. She had died as people often do, of an illness he had not understood, leaving him in the care of her relatives. Where Shannon had understood him perfectly, now he struggled to be heard. Nothing was the same. He had spent too long being that woman’s singular partner. Eventually Shannon’s brother let Church leave for a pokémon sanctuary. He did not belong there either, without purpose as he was. One day, a human very much like Alisha turned up. They made him an offer. He took it.
“It was hard, Salem. Understand this. I chose to become what I am because I could no longer be what I was. I took an entire moon to consider my choice, and it took longer for my body to change. It was gradual, and it was exhausting. Even painful. Do you understand this, little cat?”
[YES,] she replied at once.
Church stroked his chin with a massive hand. “Be careful, Salem. I believe you should take as much time as I did to be sure of what you want.”
Salem was already sure. And as best as she could, she said so.
[I’M HUMAN-POKÉMON. YES, SOON. I AM.]
The effort was tremendous, but Church seemed to comprehend perfectly.
“Alright, Salem. You seem very sure of yourself. I hope you will be as comfortable with your new body and mind as I have become with mine. It was nice to meet you. I trust that when we meet again you will tell me about yourself. Alisha- I am tired now. Please.”
Alisha thanked Church and helped him to his feet. Once she’d let him through the door, she gestured to Salem, who jumped down from her spot to follow her elsewhere.
“You ready now, kitten? All decided?”
[YES!]
She signed so forcefully that she almost tripped herself in doing so. Alisha laughed to herself, and lead the way.
Their destination was a white-tiled room with metal equipment and furnishings. Several beds, though not nearly as plush as the beds Salem was used to. A row of empty glass cylinders reaching from the floor to the ceiling. A small collection of humans and a short pink-and-cream pokémon following the instructions of another human, whom Alisha went to speak to. Salem did her best to listen attentively to the conversation — this was the conversation preceding the most exciting and singular event of her life! — but she only knew a tiny portion of the words being used. Still, she tried to memorise the sounds used, hoping to understand them later, as a hybrid.
There was some bickering between Alisha and the others, and Salem caught her own name. There was gesturing, and raising of voices, and “no, no, absolutely no.” Her breath died in her lungs as she feared that she might be being turned down for this, she would never be human at all, that they might send her back, send her home! But they did not send her away, even though Alisha seemed to have lost the argument. Instead, Alisha lifted her onto a bed and patted her head gently. Her breath returned with a purr.
“Looks like you get to do this the old fashioned way,” Alisha told her. That didn’t mean anything to her, but Alisha spoke so gently and with such confidence, that the fluttering of her heart ebbed at once.
Another human brought a sheaf of papers and a pen. This was what Jamie had had Alisha do — to give a ‘signature.’ She and the white-coated woman with her explained various things to Salem, carefully, but with growing impatience on the part of the stranger. Alisha admonished her more than once for this. Salem listened carefully as she was told about what was to happen. Some she already knew from Alisha or Church, and some she couldn’t understand, but there was something new — it was going to hurt. First when they pierced her skin to make her evolve, and then for days afterwards as her body changed. It would be slow. She would struggle to survive. A machine would even have to do her breathing for her.
[YOU - HELP?] she signed, hoping Alisha would understand.
“I’ll be here the whole time, Salem. I’ll do anything to make sure you make it through, okay?”
Okay. That was okay.
Salem had already struggled to survive for moons before now. If she could be human at the end of this new struggle, if Alisha would stay by her side as she gradually evolved — she would do it. When she thought about the choice, she found she’d already made it long ago, before she knew she had a choice to make.
Salem miaowed her assent and soon enough, Alisha presented Salem with a small black pad. Alisha held her paw to it, and her pads came away sticky and damp.
“Put your paw to this paper when you’re ready, kitten,” said Alisha. “That proves you understand what you’re about to do as best as we can explain to you. It gives us permission to change you.”
She didn’t hesitate. Her paw pressed the paper firmly enough to crease, and the print smudged a little as she pulled away. The woman she didn’t know took a wet wipe and cleaned her paw pad. It was unpleasant, but she wanted the ink gone and so she tolerated the sensation.
“Sorry about this,” she caught Alisha saying. Sorry for what? But she trusted Alisha. She didn’t question this.
“This might sting a little,” said the other woman.
The humans who were still strangers to her prepared a tray of small devices. She recognised the shape from visits to the pokémon centre. These objects were ‘injections.’ Was that the method? One injection and she would evolve? Not quite, it turned out. One of the humans — a man smelling only of disinfectant and not of his history or his life — took a trio of syringes and brought them to her side.
Alisha’s voice from behind him: “Try to relax, Salem.”
She did, even as this human took a buzzing razor and shaved away a patch of fur on her foreleg, held her paw firmly, and applied a syringe to her vein. She knew she was being given her dream, but still she growled through her clenched jaw at the intrusion. It only hurt as much as a warning nip from another cat, but it was all she could do not to tug away. She wouldn’t spoil this. She wanted this. She dug her claws into the bed sheet so that she wouldn’t scratch the man in a panic. He did this again with the other two injections with Salem mewling and growling the whole time, but by the time he’d found a vein for the second, she was already starting to feel different. Not different in any ‘human’ or unfamiliar way, but in the all too familiar sensations of nausea, thirst, and desperation to sleep.
She looked around for Alisha, and tried to sign for water, but she couldn’t raise her paw to her mouth. She licked her lips in vague distress. Alisha’s eyes were somewhere else. Salem turned to see what she was looking at: the other human hooking something into her skin. Not an injection this time, but something else — a transparent, flexible tube, through which ran a pale, translucent fluid. She wanted to make a miaow, just a small one, but the thought never made it from her brain to her lungs. Her mouth opened wide, but Salem could not make a sound as she fell into oblivion.
This was the moment when her story as a cat ended. The moment when the story of Salem the hybrid began.
Salem’s last thought as a purrloin was not fear, but hope.
She hoped that when she woke up, she could thank Alisha with real words.
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Opting to wind down after my first con day with some reviewing. That's normal, right? :V
And you start with something very rarely seen in pokémon fics: actual car driving! Normally I'd feel bored with such a blasé opening, here, but this is coming from Salem's perspective. I think you capture her sense of "critter trapped in a giant metal death machine moving at high speeds" pretty well, with obligatory motion sickness tossed in for good measure. I'm not exactly a cat person, but it does feel like Salem's behavior after Alisha discovers her and keeps going anyway is more dog than cat. I would think if she's motion sick that following the rapidly-moving sights would actually make it worse. It certainly does for me. But I suppose I'm just nitpicking.
What's less nitpicking is how you pretty much gloss completely over what Alisha is explaining to Salem. I think previously you had said that Salem sometimes can't reason out everything that's been told to her. And given Alisha's a hot-shot scientist, I think you missed an opportunity to demonstrate that she could explain this complicated process to Salem in a way she'd understand. I know you had length in mind with these chapters and you're really desperate to get to the morphing point, but it is a bit glaring that you don't show the stuff I mentioned, and instead tell it in a quick paragraph. It may have also gone toward establishing Alisha's character a bit more, since she's pretty much a blank slate to me (through Salem's perspective, anyway).
Especially since you go from exposition into a dumbed down explanation of morphing... like a doctor would give to a child about a medical procedure. This also confuses me a bit... since now I'm wondering the exact things that Alisha said to Salem to start the conversation off. It's also a bit problematic because, during the anesthetizing scene, you graze over the explanations again, with Salem waving them off as things we heard before when we, the audience, never got to hear the full thing. You gave us two CliffNotes (or SalemNotes?) versions of the explanations. I realize the bonus outlined some of the morphing process, but I don't think that's exactly what Alisha (and later the scientists) were discussing with Salem.
I do think things pick up a bit once they reach the complex and Salem's anticipation shoots into overdrive. I kind of laugh at the irony of anyone, even a fictional character, being so eager to run through a giant medical lab or get put up for a medical test. Realistically speaking, that's not going to happen and I feel like some animal instinct deep inside Salem should've at least been the tiniest bit startled at the absol hybrind. Maybe not enough to second guess her overall decision, but the complete lack of hesitance on her part is kind of alarming. Especially when the next day arrives at Alisha mentions Salem being among the first deliberately-made ones. I assume Salem understood that, in which case she should probably be wondering if the procedure will be successful. Like... does the thought really not occur to her that something could go wrong and the morphing process would fail? I know her intelligence level doesn't compete with humans, but she's seemed perceptive enough (and wary enough) for that to pose an issue. Unless you're trying to portray her as naive, I suppose.
My other issue is a technical one and I'm going to nerd out a bit here. In the wide, wide world of animal research, there is not a chance that someone like Salem would get fast-tracked into an extraordinarily complex procedure without any sort of prep work or tests being done. She should have had the equivalent of a veterinary physical done, along with some bloodwork, with the results being passed on to Alisha's higher-ups to get their approval for the procedure. There should've been tests (given she doesn't seem to have a medical record) to make sure she lacked allergies to the materials used in the morphing process. And most importantly, she would've needed to be disinfected herself. She was a stray and then was at the shelter. From a medical standpoint, she could've picked up germs, bacteria, or fungi that could render a gene therapy process completely moot. I doubt you could add this stuff without lengthening the chapter, but I felt compelled to point it out, anyway. Even if your corporation is morally ambiguous, they'd cover their tracks with this stuff to avoid wasting time and resources.
Church is quite interesting, though. Took me a moment to register he was a gogoat hybrid, but I appreciate that it's spelled out for us, just in case I didn't pick up on it. His brief tale also gives some familiar nods with regards to Salem. As pointed out earlier though, I'm surprised that, with Salem's brain having difficulty reconciling the human and pokémon elements, she still doesn't display any sort of hesitancy. You've been taking great care with these chapters to approach this with an animalistic frame of mind, and what little research I've done tends toward the reaction to something unfamiliar and confusing being fear-related. Church has familiar elements, sure, but the way you phrase it, the splicing of them together initially confuses Salem, which would interfere with an eager response (e.g. when a dog meets another dog). And it definitely feels unrealistic for me when the anesthetizing scene comes up. I've been to more than enough vet appointments (and watched more than enough rats get put under) to know that's not a response you're usually going to see.
Sorry if this sounded harsh. I didn't mean for it to come out that way. I guess it's just the researcher in me speaking up. I get that the plot needs to move along, but I think you might've done so at the cost of making Salem feel one-dimensional this chapter. She's all in on morphing from the get-go. The lack of any sort of doubt or mental tussle that needs to happen dampened my interest in the chapter overall. But others may feel differently, so don't despair. I'm crazy, after all. ^^;
And you start with something very rarely seen in pokémon fics: actual car driving! Normally I'd feel bored with such a blasé opening, here, but this is coming from Salem's perspective. I think you capture her sense of "critter trapped in a giant metal death machine moving at high speeds" pretty well, with obligatory motion sickness tossed in for good measure. I'm not exactly a cat person, but it does feel like Salem's behavior after Alisha discovers her and keeps going anyway is more dog than cat. I would think if she's motion sick that following the rapidly-moving sights would actually make it worse. It certainly does for me. But I suppose I'm just nitpicking.
What's less nitpicking is how you pretty much gloss completely over what Alisha is explaining to Salem. I think previously you had said that Salem sometimes can't reason out everything that's been told to her. And given Alisha's a hot-shot scientist, I think you missed an opportunity to demonstrate that she could explain this complicated process to Salem in a way she'd understand. I know you had length in mind with these chapters and you're really desperate to get to the morphing point, but it is a bit glaring that you don't show the stuff I mentioned, and instead tell it in a quick paragraph. It may have also gone toward establishing Alisha's character a bit more, since she's pretty much a blank slate to me (through Salem's perspective, anyway).
Especially since you go from exposition into a dumbed down explanation of morphing... like a doctor would give to a child about a medical procedure. This also confuses me a bit... since now I'm wondering the exact things that Alisha said to Salem to start the conversation off. It's also a bit problematic because, during the anesthetizing scene, you graze over the explanations again, with Salem waving them off as things we heard before when we, the audience, never got to hear the full thing. You gave us two CliffNotes (or SalemNotes?) versions of the explanations. I realize the bonus outlined some of the morphing process, but I don't think that's exactly what Alisha (and later the scientists) were discussing with Salem.
I do think things pick up a bit once they reach the complex and Salem's anticipation shoots into overdrive. I kind of laugh at the irony of anyone, even a fictional character, being so eager to run through a giant medical lab or get put up for a medical test. Realistically speaking, that's not going to happen and I feel like some animal instinct deep inside Salem should've at least been the tiniest bit startled at the absol hybrind. Maybe not enough to second guess her overall decision, but the complete lack of hesitance on her part is kind of alarming. Especially when the next day arrives at Alisha mentions Salem being among the first deliberately-made ones. I assume Salem understood that, in which case she should probably be wondering if the procedure will be successful. Like... does the thought really not occur to her that something could go wrong and the morphing process would fail? I know her intelligence level doesn't compete with humans, but she's seemed perceptive enough (and wary enough) for that to pose an issue. Unless you're trying to portray her as naive, I suppose.
My other issue is a technical one and I'm going to nerd out a bit here. In the wide, wide world of animal research, there is not a chance that someone like Salem would get fast-tracked into an extraordinarily complex procedure without any sort of prep work or tests being done. She should have had the equivalent of a veterinary physical done, along with some bloodwork, with the results being passed on to Alisha's higher-ups to get their approval for the procedure. There should've been tests (given she doesn't seem to have a medical record) to make sure she lacked allergies to the materials used in the morphing process. And most importantly, she would've needed to be disinfected herself. She was a stray and then was at the shelter. From a medical standpoint, she could've picked up germs, bacteria, or fungi that could render a gene therapy process completely moot. I doubt you could add this stuff without lengthening the chapter, but I felt compelled to point it out, anyway. Even if your corporation is morally ambiguous, they'd cover their tracks with this stuff to avoid wasting time and resources.
Church is quite interesting, though. Took me a moment to register he was a gogoat hybrid, but I appreciate that it's spelled out for us, just in case I didn't pick up on it. His brief tale also gives some familiar nods with regards to Salem. As pointed out earlier though, I'm surprised that, with Salem's brain having difficulty reconciling the human and pokémon elements, she still doesn't display any sort of hesitancy. You've been taking great care with these chapters to approach this with an animalistic frame of mind, and what little research I've done tends toward the reaction to something unfamiliar and confusing being fear-related. Church has familiar elements, sure, but the way you phrase it, the splicing of them together initially confuses Salem, which would interfere with an eager response (e.g. when a dog meets another dog). And it definitely feels unrealistic for me when the anesthetizing scene comes up. I've been to more than enough vet appointments (and watched more than enough rats get put under) to know that's not a response you're usually going to see.
Sorry if this sounded harsh. I didn't mean for it to come out that way. I guess it's just the researcher in me speaking up. I get that the plot needs to move along, but I think you might've done so at the cost of making Salem feel one-dimensional this chapter. She's all in on morphing from the get-go. The lack of any sort of doubt or mental tussle that needs to happen dampened my interest in the chapter overall. But others may feel differently, so don't despair. I'm crazy, after all. ^^;
bluering8
Member
- Joined
- Apr 18, 2018
- Messages
- 71
- Reaction score
- 308
Oh yeah I said I'd do a review for this! Is there even anything to say that I haven't already said about this, hmm.
I agree with most of what Ambyssin said, especially regarding that it makes no medical sense whatsoever to throw Salem through the procedure so fast. On the other hand, pretty much anything you do to fix this short of restructuring huge chunks of the story is going to completely fuck your pacing: either you show the whole process which would alter the pacing from merely slow to outright glacial (bad plan), or you skip over large chunks of what's happening which would result in uneven pacing and additionally be clumsy as hell (also bad plan).
Personally I'm fine with the implausible medical shenanigans here because I'm too busy going "oh thank fuck something's finally happening" to care that what's happening is stupid, but on the gripping hand that's uh. probably super not the response you want your readers to be having.
I can't wait for Salem to finally have proper conversations next chapter. It's hard to do a slow-paced character-focused story when your protagonist's communication is limited to yelling disjointed words and hoping that people can work out what she means.
It's interesting to me that Salem's communication problems are a lot less of an issue in this chapter, though; Alisha and Church are both doing a much better job of interpreting her than anyone else has so far.
I agree with most of what Ambyssin said, especially regarding that it makes no medical sense whatsoever to throw Salem through the procedure so fast. On the other hand, pretty much anything you do to fix this short of restructuring huge chunks of the story is going to completely fuck your pacing: either you show the whole process which would alter the pacing from merely slow to outright glacial (bad plan), or you skip over large chunks of what's happening which would result in uneven pacing and additionally be clumsy as hell (also bad plan).
Personally I'm fine with the implausible medical shenanigans here because I'm too busy going "oh thank fuck something's finally happening" to care that what's happening is stupid, but on the gripping hand that's uh. probably super not the response you want your readers to be having.
Implying they've made accidental morphs! Sure, accidentally producing abominations against god and nature happens in science all the time. I wonder what the hell they were researching originally for the morphing process to be an offshoot of that.
I can't wait for Salem to finally have proper conversations next chapter. It's hard to do a slow-paced character-focused story when your protagonist's communication is limited to yelling disjointed words and hoping that people can work out what she means.
It's interesting to me that Salem's communication problems are a lot less of an issue in this chapter, though; Alisha and Church are both doing a much better job of interpreting her than anyone else has so far.
And I mean, considering spoilers spoilers I can only imagine this was intentional.
WanderingKalosan
Lv1 Author (Writer Wannabe)
- Joined
- May 19, 2018
- Messages
- 41
- Reaction score
- 38
Crossposting my review from serebii forums:
So, finally got to read Ch4. I am going to be a tiny bit biased because we talk on discord and I already knew about the feedback this chapter got on bulbagarden forums, before I even started to read it.
Overall the chapter does feel a bit rushed. I blame the pressure to finally get to the poke morph business ASAP to be the reason.
Two points that specifically give the impression we are moving forward too fast:
1. We barely got the glimpse of this poke morph facility / research center, or how things work there and we are already moving on.
2. Salem's change seems too fast. She arrives and basically gets to morph into a different form of life - in place of breakfast. No waiting for her spot on the list? No medical exam to check if she is even eligable (diseases, potential biological and chemical reactions...)? No preparation and training phase for the 'transition?' Just go in, get changed? I kinda feels like Alisha is running some sort of elaborate con business (even if she clearly isn't, since we got to see other morphs).
I feel like these points alone deserve an extra chapter. After all, you did invest in Salem staying briefly in the shelter. And that one was actually less important place than Alisha's facility. If anything you could skip or cut the shelter part and use that extra space to tell us more about poke morph facility (personally i liked the shelter scenes tho, i would prefer to keep those and just give the Alisha's facility equal level of detail... however if you are worried about your story's pacing...).
*
On the other hand, Salem's eagerness and naivety match her character perfectly. I recall some reviewers criticizing her behavior in terms of not questioning Alisha, nodding to everything etc.
But that is what I would expect from a mature reasonable person (which is not what Salem is, at least for now). We have had the foreshadowing of Salem's naivety/immature take on life from the very start:
1. Escaping from Laura's place and barely acknowledging how this must have hurt her owner
2. Having over the top expectations (Becoming human will resolve all my problems! What could possibly go wrong?)
3. Trusting a stranger who basically offers a candy to her (and having no guarantees about what will happen to her once she leaves with them)
So, intentional or not I think Salem's naivety and eagerness are actually very much in character here. I expect her to wisen up a bit after she does get to morph and realizes not everything will be sunshine and rainbows ever after. So far she didnt have a reason for that because she is just after her dream atm.
That being said, you could do with at least a paragraph acknowledging this. Perhaps a brief moment where Salem realizes Alisha could be liar/kidnapper/con woman, and then quickly brushing it off because she is too excited about her dream coming true? That would show her as being naive or irresponsible, but not necessarily stupid (and in meta meaning, this would telegraph your audience that while Salem might be naive, you as an author are not since you thought of the possibility too).
*
I also have to commend you on the cat POV. Some other reviewers already commented on this - Salem does feel like a cat just from the way you write her. It also directly leads to most dialogue being "a human and a cat Pokemon." This makes your conversations stand out. Most of the time I see human and human or Pokemon and Pokemon in PMD. It leads to cute and unique moments like this:
*
Anyway, those were my main points I wanted to mention. There one or two nitpicks I also have - we can talk about those on discord if you want to.
So, finally got to read Ch4. I am going to be a tiny bit biased because we talk on discord and I already knew about the feedback this chapter got on bulbagarden forums, before I even started to read it.
Overall the chapter does feel a bit rushed. I blame the pressure to finally get to the poke morph business ASAP to be the reason.
Two points that specifically give the impression we are moving forward too fast:
1. We barely got the glimpse of this poke morph facility / research center, or how things work there and we are already moving on.
2. Salem's change seems too fast. She arrives and basically gets to morph into a different form of life - in place of breakfast. No waiting for her spot on the list? No medical exam to check if she is even eligable (diseases, potential biological and chemical reactions...)? No preparation and training phase for the 'transition?' Just go in, get changed? I kinda feels like Alisha is running some sort of elaborate con business (even if she clearly isn't, since we got to see other morphs).
I feel like these points alone deserve an extra chapter. After all, you did invest in Salem staying briefly in the shelter. And that one was actually less important place than Alisha's facility. If anything you could skip or cut the shelter part and use that extra space to tell us more about poke morph facility (personally i liked the shelter scenes tho, i would prefer to keep those and just give the Alisha's facility equal level of detail... however if you are worried about your story's pacing...).
*
On the other hand, Salem's eagerness and naivety match her character perfectly. I recall some reviewers criticizing her behavior in terms of not questioning Alisha, nodding to everything etc.
But that is what I would expect from a mature reasonable person (which is not what Salem is, at least for now). We have had the foreshadowing of Salem's naivety/immature take on life from the very start:
1. Escaping from Laura's place and barely acknowledging how this must have hurt her owner
2. Having over the top expectations (Becoming human will resolve all my problems! What could possibly go wrong?)
3. Trusting a stranger who basically offers a candy to her (and having no guarantees about what will happen to her once she leaves with them)
So, intentional or not I think Salem's naivety and eagerness are actually very much in character here. I expect her to wisen up a bit after she does get to morph and realizes not everything will be sunshine and rainbows ever after. So far she didnt have a reason for that because she is just after her dream atm.
That being said, you could do with at least a paragraph acknowledging this. Perhaps a brief moment where Salem realizes Alisha could be liar/kidnapper/con woman, and then quickly brushing it off because she is too excited about her dream coming true? That would show her as being naive or irresponsible, but not necessarily stupid (and in meta meaning, this would telegraph your audience that while Salem might be naive, you as an author are not since you thought of the possibility too).
*
I also have to commend you on the cat POV. Some other reviewers already commented on this - Salem does feel like a cat just from the way you write her. It also directly leads to most dialogue being "a human and a cat Pokemon." This makes your conversations stand out. Most of the time I see human and human or Pokemon and Pokemon in PMD. It leads to cute and unique moments like this:
I absolutely adore those. What a treat!
*
Anyway, those were my main points I wanted to mention. There one or two nitpicks I also have - we can talk about those on discord if you want to.
unrepentantAuthor
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Interlude I
SHP
SHP
[OPEN ENTRY #C-122F]
***
[L1 ACCESS GRANTED]
[WARNING] — The contents of this article are restricted to personnel with L2-SHP clearance or equivalent.
***
Perihelion Database
Entry #C-122F
“Species Hybridisation Protocol”
This article describes Species Hybridisation Protocol in general terms. See sub-entry #C-122F-a for more information on the SHP development program from an administrative perspective and sub-entry #C-122F-b for further procedural detail from a medical and scientific perspective.
Overview:
SHP is predefined procedural methodology for the use of multiple technologies in the fields of genetic engineering, medicine, and pokémon bio-energy to alter the genotype, morphology and anatomy of a pokémon so as to closely resemble that of a human being. In other words, it is a process meant to turn pokémon into near-human beings. The requisite technologies are Perihelion patents in perpetuity, but the process itself is confidential, as the existence of pokémon-human hybrids (colloquially known as pokémorphs or morphs) remains restricted information. SHP has several informal names among personnel, most commonly ‘morphing.’
Ethics:
The SHP necessarily cannot undergo a traditional public ethical review by a neutral organisation, due to the sensitive nature of the program. However, Perihelion retains a strong commitment to medical ethics, and so a private ethical review has been conducted as at 2015/11/30. The review was carried out by representatives of several accredited institutional review boards for human and pokémon experimentation in Europe and North America, those representatives having signed strict NDAs beforehand. The representatives voted in favour of approving SHP research and implementation four votes to three. Operative Alisha Renadier was instrumental in securing the winning vote, having demonstrated to the representatives the high standard of care provided for hybrid subjects.
Methodology:
The principle underpinning SHP is the possibility of permanently introducing human genetic material to the genome of a pokémon subject, in such a way as to stimulate the evolutionary mechanism of its bio-energy. This stimulation, resembling that induced by ‘evolutionary stones’ and similar devices, causes the subject to adopt a hybrid physical form. This can be done in several ways, only a few of which are practical. For more information on the scientific principles of SHP, see Further Reading below.
Generation I:
The first successful SHP procedures in 2006 were performed on embryonic subjects sustained in artificial wombs until birth. Some procedures used living surrogates to host the subjects, but this was not found to be practical. The series of experimental trials and procedures using this method, along with all subjects created as a result, are collectively known as G1. G1 hybrids commonly acquired various medical disorders arising from the difficulty in undergoing the morphing process while still in prenatal development. The G1 process was also prohibitively expensive. For these reasons, the G1 protocol has been discontinued. Although G1 SHP has the reputation of being the first successful method of creating pokémon-human hybrids, the ‘ur-hybrid’ is believed to have been created by a covert research team in the Izu Archipelago.
[ATTACHED IMAGE “G1-SHP-31.jpg” NOT DISPLAYED]
[IMAGE CAPTION: “A foetal G1 subject inside an artificial womb, shown after seven months of gestation.”]
Generation II:
Current SHP procedures are performed on living, developmentally mature pokémon using new techniques in genome editing, the most important of which is the use of synthetic retroviruses. The retroviral agent, classified as HIRA, introduces human genes to every cell in a subject’s body, then activates those genes and self-terminates on introduction of a trigger compound injected subsequently. G2 subjects have a high survival rate, rarely acquire medical complications, and experience heightened neuroplasticity for some time after the procedure. The latter effect is of significant utility in allowing new subjects to acquire language and skills at an accelerated rate for as long as six months after the procedure. The G2 process is also dramatically more economical than G1, but still has some drawbacks, particularly the difficulty in acquiring suitable pokémon subjects and the need for intensive life support while they undergo the physical transformation. Additionally, there are many pokémon species unable to undergo the G2 procedure.
[ATTACHED IMAGE “G2-SHP-54.jpg” NOT DISPLAYED]
[IMAGE CAPTION: “A mature G2 subject nearing procedural completion, suspended in a life support tank.”]
Use on Humans:
No ‘reverse’ variant of SHP has proven successful on human trial subjects at this time. No further trials are planned.
Further Research:
Lab teams in Perihelion morphing facilities are currently directed to develop improved standards for the care and training of G2 pokémorphs, and to submit proposals for a third generation protocol which places less strain on a subject’s body. There are several promising avenues for development of ‘G3’ at this time, chief among which is the potential use of depleted evolutionary stones as a vehicle for gene delivery.
Other Applications:
The equipment and technical knowledge developed through the SHP program could theoretically be used to treat genetic disease, increase human longevity, and create modified organisms other than pokémorphs, such as highly productive, nutritious and disease-resistant crops. These applications are a secondary priority at this time.
Further Reading:
See entries for [pokémorphs, genome editing, life support, infinite energy, HIRA, Mewtwo, Izu Group, Perihelion Concordat.]
***
[CLOSE ENTRY]
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So, I know that this is the thing you had showed me a few weeks back and I see you made some tweaks to it in the interim. First thing first, as a general principle on scientific reports, when introducing a concept that you'll use an acronym for, it's standard practice to do the principle name, followed by the initials in parentheses. In this case, it would be "Species Hybridisation Protocol (SHP)." This sets you up to use the abbreviation for the rest of the paper. Likewise, I think it might be better to format the opening sentence as something like, "This article provides an abstract for the Species Hybridisation Protocol (SHP)." Since abstracts are usually overviews in scientific papers, with the full paper explaining everything in detail. As a similar nitpick, the full name for HIRA should be spelled out in its entirety.
I do like that you added an actual timetable to give me an idea of how long this project has been happening for. It's a remarkable amount of progress since 2006, but I find it believable in the context of the overall story. Likewise, I still think the bit about the ethics is phrased in a way that both makes enough sense will still sounding dubious enough to make me skeptical about this big corporation. Having it conveniently be a 4-3 vote certainly helps, I suppose.
Where things get a bit sketchier for me is with your Gen 2 morphing process, now that I've read it more thoroughly. I'm going to put this in a spoiler so anyone who accidentally reads this review doesn't get a jaded impression of this...
I do like that you added an actual timetable to give me an idea of how long this project has been happening for. It's a remarkable amount of progress since 2006, but I find it believable in the context of the overall story. Likewise, I still think the bit about the ethics is phrased in a way that both makes enough sense will still sounding dubious enough to make me skeptical about this big corporation. Having it conveniently be a 4-3 vote certainly helps, I suppose.
Where things get a bit sketchier for me is with your Gen 2 morphing process, now that I've read it more thoroughly. I'm going to put this in a spoiler so anyone who accidentally reads this review doesn't get a jaded impression of this...
Specifically the retrovirus and a self-termination mechanism. That... sounds a bit odd and, scientifically speaking, might not actually work. The typical method of retroviral recombinant DNA delivery involves using replication-defective vectors, which have had portions of their coding regions stripped away to prevent them from replicating. Basically, the vectors insert their material and then that's it. Granted, retroviral work is usually done on small tissue samples and not entire organisms, so this is a serious sci-fi stretch to start with. But the system you've described could have a realistic issue that would cause the process to fail. Retroviruses use the host cell's own mechanisms to replicate. Once they've injected their genetic material into a host cell, the host cell is what's doing all the work and making new copies of the virus to go infect other cells. So, in a sense, once the virus finds a cell and deposits its genetic material it deactivates. What you'd be targetting instead is the host cell, which in theory could risk killing the patient. A lesser issue is that neurons, the cornerstone to your plasticity tidbit, are unresponsive to retroviral transduction.
I'm not entirely sure that there's a good fix to this. But don't despair, because I don't think there needs to be one. The explanation sounds convincing enough to someone who doesn't have a biomedical background, which is what's important.
All I think you're missing is an explanation as to how the retrovirus is delivered to every tissue type in the patient. That's maybe a couple of sentences, tops. Because one injection wouldn't be good enough, since there are tissues that aren't in direct contact with blood circulation (e.g. neural tissue). That was the big hole that I could see detracting from the sci-fi angle you're going for. Otherwise, it should hold up well.
I'm not entirely sure that there's a good fix to this. But don't despair, because I don't think there needs to be one. The explanation sounds convincing enough to someone who doesn't have a biomedical background, which is what's important.
All I think you're missing is an explanation as to how the retrovirus is delivered to every tissue type in the patient. That's maybe a couple of sentences, tops. Because one injection wouldn't be good enough, since there are tissues that aren't in direct contact with blood circulation (e.g. neural tissue). That was the big hole that I could see detracting from the sci-fi angle you're going for. Otherwise, it should hold up well.
WanderingKalosan
Lv1 Author (Writer Wannabe)
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A very short review on Interlude I and Chapter 4 edits. You already know the details from our discord chat, so in short:
- Like the Interlude but have very little to say about it. It does its job right, while being completely optional in my head. Nice worldbuilding tidbits to make the morphing process sound more realistic and scientific, tho
- I approve of Ch4 new version It feels less rushed and more polished. The extra medical check up scene gives Alisha and her facility more plausibility and we see more of Salem's thoughts explored before and during the procedure start, which is always a nice touch.
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So technically I'm here for the Review Game. I had been wondering whether to review this for a while, but I'd always put it off because, as you know, I don't like cats. In many ways that limits what I can say here, if I'm to avoid either being snide about cats or appearing to be snide about cats. But, nevertheless, this is what I can say:
Technical Accuracy/Style
Nothing wrong with the accuracy, though I didn't expect there to be. I can see why you're consistently worried about the pacing. As far as the Prelude is concerned, it does exactly what it needs to. Chapter One is a trickier prospect - see Story below for the rest of those thoughts.
Setting
You may possibly be missing a trick in siting the story squarely in the real world - or at least, closer to the real world than most pokémon stories are, canon or otherwise. I wonder whether you couldn't have said where Laura's house is, or where she was going to university. You might say that these details don't mean much to a purrloin, but then, this purrloin also watches cartoons so it's not that out there in context.
Story/Character
This is a tricky one to comment on. Starting with the Prelude - it reads like something of a manifesto for the story, less about the story itself than in giving context to the story. I suppose this is what most people would call, vaguely, "meta". Not to say that there's not important contextual information there, but it is the kind of context that you only need if you're a reader of pokémon fanfiction already.
Chapter One consistently felt slow to me ... and I think it's because Salem is so very conventionally feline. Most of what she does, and wants, would be familiar to almost anyone even passingly familiar with cats - which in practice means essentially every reader. There's not a lot to the narrative that marks her out as "purrloin" rather than Felis catus. The upshot is that we get a sense of her comfy domestic cat life very quickly, and so the experience of reading it becomes more about waiting to see how she ended up homeless.
I've vacillated back and forth on this next point. I don't buy Salem's leaving home. She leaves because ... well, apparently because her owner told her to sod off for once. If Laura's a Uni student back home from Uni, then where are the rest of the people in the house? Leaving aside any comparisons with F. catus for a moment, for a creature of habit and routine it just seems like something she does for the convenience of the story.
Final Thoughts
I will also say that this was a difficult one for me to review. I always try to separate what I consider to be entirely personal preference from what you might call "genuine" criticism. That hasn't been a straightforward separation here. I suspect that most of your readers will feel heartbroken over Salem and won't think twice about her motivations. Most of your readers will be much more invested in Salem because she's a cat.
Technical Accuracy/Style
Nothing wrong with the accuracy, though I didn't expect there to be. I can see why you're consistently worried about the pacing. As far as the Prelude is concerned, it does exactly what it needs to. Chapter One is a trickier prospect - see Story below for the rest of those thoughts.
Setting
You may possibly be missing a trick in siting the story squarely in the real world - or at least, closer to the real world than most pokémon stories are, canon or otherwise. I wonder whether you couldn't have said where Laura's house is, or where she was going to university. You might say that these details don't mean much to a purrloin, but then, this purrloin also watches cartoons so it's not that out there in context.
Story/Character
This is a tricky one to comment on. Starting with the Prelude - it reads like something of a manifesto for the story, less about the story itself than in giving context to the story. I suppose this is what most people would call, vaguely, "meta". Not to say that there's not important contextual information there, but it is the kind of context that you only need if you're a reader of pokémon fanfiction already.
Chapter One consistently felt slow to me ... and I think it's because Salem is so very conventionally feline. Most of what she does, and wants, would be familiar to almost anyone even passingly familiar with cats - which in practice means essentially every reader. There's not a lot to the narrative that marks her out as "purrloin" rather than Felis catus. The upshot is that we get a sense of her comfy domestic cat life very quickly, and so the experience of reading it becomes more about waiting to see how she ended up homeless.
I've vacillated back and forth on this next point. I don't buy Salem's leaving home. She leaves because ... well, apparently because her owner told her to sod off for once. If Laura's a Uni student back home from Uni, then where are the rest of the people in the house? Leaving aside any comparisons with F. catus for a moment, for a creature of habit and routine it just seems like something she does for the convenience of the story.
Final Thoughts
I will also say that this was a difficult one for me to review. I always try to separate what I consider to be entirely personal preference from what you might call "genuine" criticism. That hasn't been a straightforward separation here. I suspect that most of your readers will feel heartbroken over Salem and won't think twice about her motivations. Most of your readers will be much more invested in Salem because she's a cat.
unrepentantAuthor
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@Ambyssin, hey man, thanks again for some really solid reviews. Your ch4 review was weighty, but it didn't sound too harsh or discourage me. Instead, I took your critical points seriously, considered them for a while, and did my best to edit ch4 such as to account for the concerns you raised. I hope that you might take a look at the modifications and let me know how successful I was. I note that Alisha isn't a scientist; could you let me know what made you think she was? Other than that, your chunky ch4 feedback is mostly accounted for by my edits. I think you might find the medical stuff a bit off-centre forever, given the profession you're in, but that's all the more reason to value your responses! Thanks for that, mate.
Your feedback regarding Interlude I is no trouble at all for me to implement some time later this month when I can manage to pay the necessary attention. Those are some good catches, although I'm certain you're right that none of my other readers would pick up on those points. Nevertheless, I'll be sure to make the edits eventually. I like that you picked up on the 4:3 vote!
Thanks again, hope to hear more from you in the future and to read & review more of Guiding Light in return when life is a little less hectic for me.
-
No need to reply to my chief beta @bluering8 as we're mates IRL and I already discuss DE with him constantly on Discord. Nevertheless, feedback implemented as best I can! Cheers, buddy.
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@WanderingKalosan, thanks as always for being a reliable reviewer, I truly appreciate it. I honestly feel like the pacing issue you've discussed is an inherent downside of the way in which I've approached the early story. I think that the edits I've made to Chapter Four are the best possible compromise at this time, and I will simply have to accept that the pacing at this point is naturally imperfect. You seem to find the edited version a real improvement, so that's reassuring!
Your analysis of Salem's capacity for broad abstract thought is entirely on the ball. She is only an especially smart cat, and she simply cannot conceive of the nuanced implications of human behaviour. However, you used her failure to model Laura's grief and confusion and therefore to empathise with her as your chief example of 'naivety/immaturity'. Note that Salem's chief motivator in this context is fear of being left unstimulated for months on end having established no relationships besides that with Laura. She is already demonstrating signs of animal stereotypy in the first chapter, and the severity of this problem combined with her inability to make herself understood is the archetypal example of inadequate care provision by a human to a pokémon. Given Salem has such trouble communicating, I think it's a perfectly adult choice to leave, and subsequently not to cooperate with Jamie after he broke his first promise to her like it was nothing without even considering that she might have been abused. You also called Laura her 'owner'. That is legally true, but I've done my best to indicate that Salem is a creature with greater sapience and more needs than a real cat, and the idea that she is property without the right to leave is an idea I wish to discredit.
I've implemented several edits in ch4, in part based on your suggestions, and I hope you noticed those in your second reading! Thanks so much for mentioning your favourite lines and for your well-wishing. I will strive forward and have the next chapter up shortly, despite my difficult circumstances offline right now. Cheers, WK, hope to hear from you next time as usual!
-
@Beth Pavell, thanks for your review. I suspect that your feelings about cats will disillusion you somewhat about DE indefinitely, although Salem's inevitable transformation and the use of other POV characters may nullify that concern somewhat.
The issue of the setting was a difficult one to reconcile with my various intentions and goals. Since not alluding heavily to specific locations is something I can get away with at this point in the story, I have done so in order to buy time to flesh out my intentions for the setting. Perhaps a future edit will change the early allusions.
You note that the Prelude only provides context to readers already familiar with pokémon fanfiction. Since I expect my readership to consist almost entirely of readers already familiar with pokémon fanfiction, I don't consider that a problem. I actually feel it's more helpful to people out-of-fandom than anybody, but I consider it important context I would otherwise be unable to provide for many chapters in an accessible way.
I feel that Salem's habitual interactions with Laura and her pokésign vocabulary indicate that she's more cognitively sophisticated than a real cat, not to mention the references to going on a trainer journey or battling at school. However, your point about Salem's purrloin-ness does make me wonder if she's sufficiently distinct from any other feline pokémon as opposed to mundane cats. Perhaps a future revision will include more overt references to deception and theft.
Salem leaves Laura not because she's "told to sod off for once" but because she has already been receiving less and less stimulation over time on a daily basis despite being a relatively intelligent creature, to the point of developing symptoms of what we might call animal stereotypy. Her repetitive pacing, grooming and scratching are indicators of stress, and she's conscious enough to anticipate that once Laura leaves for uni (she brushes Salem off in order to apply for uni, since she is presently commuting to school) she will suffer much much worse deprivation. She has no relationship with Laura's parents, who are implicitly both working professionals who spend most of their time out of the house, nor with any neighbouring pokémon, and she is the only pokémon left at home. This is a direct result of Laura encouraging Salem for several years beforehand to depend solely on her for company and stimulation. Salem exerts herself desperately to make her anxieties clear to Laura, but at the critical moment, Laura does not make the effort to understand or reassure her. To me, Salem's consequent departure makes sufficient sense, and her treatment by Laura is an example of unintentional negligence towards an pokémon with the demonstrable ability to feel and communicate her needs, only to be ignored. This is all the worse for Salem being a categorically more sapient being than an ordinary cat, but I also dislike treating real cats as unworthy of my patience simply because they might inconvenience me in some way.
Despite your belief that my readers will not think critically about Salem simply because they love cats, I've had a number of readers either choose to criticise Salem for leaving while remaining sympathetic to her difficulties, or engage critically with the concept that Laura's intention to leave Salem entirely unsupervised and without stimulation for months at a time is a form of abuse. I think that your interpretation of her motivations is influenced, as you did warn it might be, by your hostile attitude towards cats. If so, you may find it difficult to tolerate the un-morphed Salem as a protagonist, and I will understand if you have no interest in reading Different Eyes further. Nevertheless, I appreciate your review and invite you to take a look at future content featuring other, non-feline characters and Salem as a part-human individual, which you may enjoy more than the chapters posted to date.
Your feedback regarding Interlude I is no trouble at all for me to implement some time later this month when I can manage to pay the necessary attention. Those are some good catches, although I'm certain you're right that none of my other readers would pick up on those points. Nevertheless, I'll be sure to make the edits eventually. I like that you picked up on the 4:3 vote!
Thanks again, hope to hear more from you in the future and to read & review more of Guiding Light in return when life is a little less hectic for me.
-
No need to reply to my chief beta @bluering8 as we're mates IRL and I already discuss DE with him constantly on Discord. Nevertheless, feedback implemented as best I can! Cheers, buddy.
-
@WanderingKalosan, thanks as always for being a reliable reviewer, I truly appreciate it. I honestly feel like the pacing issue you've discussed is an inherent downside of the way in which I've approached the early story. I think that the edits I've made to Chapter Four are the best possible compromise at this time, and I will simply have to accept that the pacing at this point is naturally imperfect. You seem to find the edited version a real improvement, so that's reassuring!
Your analysis of Salem's capacity for broad abstract thought is entirely on the ball. She is only an especially smart cat, and she simply cannot conceive of the nuanced implications of human behaviour. However, you used her failure to model Laura's grief and confusion and therefore to empathise with her as your chief example of 'naivety/immaturity'. Note that Salem's chief motivator in this context is fear of being left unstimulated for months on end having established no relationships besides that with Laura. She is already demonstrating signs of animal stereotypy in the first chapter, and the severity of this problem combined with her inability to make herself understood is the archetypal example of inadequate care provision by a human to a pokémon. Given Salem has such trouble communicating, I think it's a perfectly adult choice to leave, and subsequently not to cooperate with Jamie after he broke his first promise to her like it was nothing without even considering that she might have been abused. You also called Laura her 'owner'. That is legally true, but I've done my best to indicate that Salem is a creature with greater sapience and more needs than a real cat, and the idea that she is property without the right to leave is an idea I wish to discredit.
I've implemented several edits in ch4, in part based on your suggestions, and I hope you noticed those in your second reading! Thanks so much for mentioning your favourite lines and for your well-wishing. I will strive forward and have the next chapter up shortly, despite my difficult circumstances offline right now. Cheers, WK, hope to hear from you next time as usual!
-
@Beth Pavell, thanks for your review. I suspect that your feelings about cats will disillusion you somewhat about DE indefinitely, although Salem's inevitable transformation and the use of other POV characters may nullify that concern somewhat.
The issue of the setting was a difficult one to reconcile with my various intentions and goals. Since not alluding heavily to specific locations is something I can get away with at this point in the story, I have done so in order to buy time to flesh out my intentions for the setting. Perhaps a future edit will change the early allusions.
You note that the Prelude only provides context to readers already familiar with pokémon fanfiction. Since I expect my readership to consist almost entirely of readers already familiar with pokémon fanfiction, I don't consider that a problem. I actually feel it's more helpful to people out-of-fandom than anybody, but I consider it important context I would otherwise be unable to provide for many chapters in an accessible way.
I feel that Salem's habitual interactions with Laura and her pokésign vocabulary indicate that she's more cognitively sophisticated than a real cat, not to mention the references to going on a trainer journey or battling at school. However, your point about Salem's purrloin-ness does make me wonder if she's sufficiently distinct from any other feline pokémon as opposed to mundane cats. Perhaps a future revision will include more overt references to deception and theft.
Salem leaves Laura not because she's "told to sod off for once" but because she has already been receiving less and less stimulation over time on a daily basis despite being a relatively intelligent creature, to the point of developing symptoms of what we might call animal stereotypy. Her repetitive pacing, grooming and scratching are indicators of stress, and she's conscious enough to anticipate that once Laura leaves for uni (she brushes Salem off in order to apply for uni, since she is presently commuting to school) she will suffer much much worse deprivation. She has no relationship with Laura's parents, who are implicitly both working professionals who spend most of their time out of the house, nor with any neighbouring pokémon, and she is the only pokémon left at home. This is a direct result of Laura encouraging Salem for several years beforehand to depend solely on her for company and stimulation. Salem exerts herself desperately to make her anxieties clear to Laura, but at the critical moment, Laura does not make the effort to understand or reassure her. To me, Salem's consequent departure makes sufficient sense, and her treatment by Laura is an example of unintentional negligence towards an pokémon with the demonstrable ability to feel and communicate her needs, only to be ignored. This is all the worse for Salem being a categorically more sapient being than an ordinary cat, but I also dislike treating real cats as unworthy of my patience simply because they might inconvenience me in some way.
Despite your belief that my readers will not think critically about Salem simply because they love cats, I've had a number of readers either choose to criticise Salem for leaving while remaining sympathetic to her difficulties, or engage critically with the concept that Laura's intention to leave Salem entirely unsupervised and without stimulation for months at a time is a form of abuse. I think that your interpretation of her motivations is influenced, as you did warn it might be, by your hostile attitude towards cats. If so, you may find it difficult to tolerate the un-morphed Salem as a protagonist, and I will understand if you have no interest in reading Different Eyes further. Nevertheless, I appreciate your review and invite you to take a look at future content featuring other, non-feline characters and Salem as a part-human individual, which you may enjoy more than the chapters posted to date.
unrepentantAuthor
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Oh hey, an early chapter just in the nick of time for consideration in the awards. How about that. Enjoy, everyone! This special chapter includes some wonderful illustrative art by the excellent @canisaries. Thanks mate, you're a legend.
Five
Second Nascence
It felt like dying.
She couldn’t breathe. There was no air. Her lungs strained — no air. She choked and gagged on something, something stuck in her throat. Her lungs strained. Her chest heaved. Nothing.
There was no air. Yet she did not die.
She tried to move, to clutch at her throat. Her forelegs were so tired she could hardly feel them. Her limbs moved weakly, so weakly, as if through water. There was water, she was in water. Submerged. She was underwater!
She tried to flail, to swim, but her limbs protested every command. Her eyes were shut; she could be asleep. No. She was not asleep. She opened her eyes, it stung, it hurt, but there — there was the room, through the faint glass and the green water and the dim light.
She was in the tank.
She kept forgetting she was in the tank.
Each time Salem woke from sleep — if it was sleep at all, for her dreams felt like memories and when she woke it felt like a dream — it got a little easier to remember she was in the tank. It began with choking, then struggling, then opening her eyes. She always realised where she was when she saw the ward, made green in hue by the liquid in the tank. She was looking down at the room as if from a height, so she knew that she could not be standing on the floor. She must be suspended in the tank, like always.
This time she was just barely lucid enough to notice an alien intrusion in her flesh. A tube from above pierced her chest. Another pierced her neck. More on either side of her head connected to the mask over her mouth. There could be more where she couldn’t see. She was suspended by them, held in place by them, held in this half-dream, half-death. She pawed weakly at one of the cables and felt it tug inside her. She would never have the strength to remove it. Maybe that was for the best. Maybe the cables were remaking her.
She hadn’t expected to wake at all while she was being remade. This wasn’t right. Something could be wrong with the tank, with the transformation. Something could be wrong with her. This was wrong. But thinking about it got harder and harder, and soon she fell back into the darkness once again.
Salem drifted in and out of unconsciousness, her eyes never open for long, her mind never able to cling to more than a droplet or two of memory from her dreams or her last days as herself. She dreamed of human faces and her own, of watching herself from behind and seeing her body standing on two legs; of needles; of being held; of being held tightly, too tightly; of blood and hunger and cold. Of fighting. Of losing.
When she woke to the room, she would look around for someone she knew. A couple times, she thought she could perceive Alisha, as a momentary hazy glimpse past the water and the tank, or as a faint familiar scent. But that was surely an illusion. She could smell nothing but the dead scent of rubber, the smell of the mask fitted to her muzzle. Still, she kept looking for Alisha’s face past the tank glass.
Her reality was fleeting. Her eyes lied to her. Now she was in the bed from before, but a different room. There were curtains around her. Different containers feeding fluids into her body. Different items applied to to her body. Different covers over her body. She understood none of it. Now she was in the tank again, and there were wires in her skin that felt cold, the way her pads felt on icy pavement. More numb than truly cold. The wires went up overhead and she could vaguely make out glass canisters of liquid fixed to the top of the tank.
She was changing. It was hard to perceive, to concentrate, but she could tell. It was too clear even through the clouds in her mind. She could feel her body aching, she could see it stretching out below her, longer than could be true. She could feel sensations unfamiliar and strange — her tongue resting differently in her mouth, impossible to feel comfortable with. Different muscles twitching; different extremities itching. Even her heart was different. The beat against her ribs was slow and powerful, like the heavy thumping of human footsteps. A human heartbeat. She could hear her heartbeat in her head, slower than could be right. She’d known she would change, but she’d thought of documentaries, of evolution in normal pokémon, of instant growth and light. This wasn’t evolution. It was slow, human change. Like ageing. Like the growth of trees.
Once, she woke up and tried to stretch, and she waved her paw in front of her face as she did. Her foreleg — her arm, it would be her arm — burned as she held her paw up, but she held it there all the same, to see the way her digits were lengthening. She tried to flex them, and they cramped up, making her whimper — a whimper that sounded strangely in her head, a whimper that felt odd as it formed in her throat. It never arrived at her ears past the mask and the fluid, instead she heard it from inside her own skull.
Still she saw her paws nonetheless; pads pulled apart from each other and joints stretched out too far. They were neither paws nor hands now. They were ugly, useless, halfway things. Too stubby and crude to grasp with, but elongated enough that they would be hard to walk on. She imagined her paws being stuck like this; useless for all but the most crude pokésign. She dared not move them too much. It might stop them growing.
She tried to tell how long she’d been this way. Days? Moons? Seasons? Hard to guess — impossible to know. There were only human lights — no windows, no way to measure the suns and moons. As her ordeal went on, she tried to track time by remembering details: what level the fluid canisters were at, how many plasters she wore on her arm and where, how far below her body her hind-paws — her feet — were. She tried to count how many times these details changed, and always lost cost after three or four.
It never got easier to focus, to stay awake, or to control her body, but it did get easier to think. Not easy, but possible to do without her thoughts bleeding out of her head. The drowsiness was less raw, more like an irritating scab than a fresh cut. First, it was just that her thoughts were clearer. Then, she could recall details more readily. At last, she was certain, the drip that fed into her arm had been changed five times since she started counting, half as many times as the plaster where the tube that bit her arm had been changed. She was certain too that she’d never recalled so many distinct moments at once. It was as if she’d been half asleep her entire life, and only now was she truly lucid.
Remembering several things at once and comparing them was thrilling enough, even through the continual panic of not breathing, not standing, not breathing. Even had she been breathing, it would have been breathtaking to think about something someone had said and at the same time consider why or how they had said it. At least, without the memory streaming out of her brain like water off her paw. More so to be able to think about both how she had felt, and why she felt that way. The difference between remembering and understanding… It was the difference between merely drinking water, and actually tasting it as you drank. For the first time, she could taste her thoughts. For the first time, she could clearly ask herself, “did I have to leave Laura? Was that the right thing to do? What if I hadn’t done it?” That was not thrilling. It was terrifying. It was miserable.
She could not escape the dark panic that came with those thoughts while conscious. So, she sought sleep again, and despite the cold bruise flowering in her chest, and the burning of her skin and eyes, she found it. With sleep came an escape from these new and jagged thoughts. Her dreams changed too. Now she dreamed of speaking English to Alisha, of full and plentiful sentences spilling out of her mouth like water from a tap, on and off at will. She couldn’t make sense of what she was saying, though, and when she tried to pay attention to the way her mouth and tongue were moving to produce the words, the dream wavered and she was pulled out of it. She stopped trying to listen to her own voice, and willed the dream to continue. So long as she did not concentrate, she kept speaking. She would speak forever.
She dreamed of speaking to Laura, but the words were trapped in her throat, and she choked on them, unable to make a sound. She dreamed of speaking to Mienshao, to the glameow tom, to the throh and the chatot. Of saying something to Church or another morph. These were good dreams. A zoroark hybrid, red mouth grinning and full of teeth, replied to her, saying “well, soft cat, Salem, good well, all and happy.” The words swam in her ears, meaningless but good, so good, and so comforting.
When she woke next, it was dimly lit in the ward, and a torrent of thoughts hit her with “is my body any different today” and “where’s alisha is she here” and “jamie lied to me why would he do that” and “i’m going to live like this for the rest of my life” and “can i still become a liepard” and “i have never been this tired.” Not just feelings or desires or half-thoughts, but full, clear thoughts. A half dozen at once. Now a dozen. Painful and scary and beautiful. She had never spoken a word of English and yet somehow she could hear her own voice in her own head, sounding out her thoughts.
The green-soaked shadow of a human moved past the tank, unseeing.
Her body ached in every possible place: in her stomach and her limbs and her head and her pads and her eyes. Even her fur seemed to be hurting. Once she’d paid attention to the cacophony of hurt, the blunt pain behind her eyes was the worst of them. Still, she made herself lift her forepaw in front of her face, just to examine it one more time, to examine it as was now her habit whenever she was awake.
Five distinct digits, long and dexterous and complete. A hand. A more or less human hand — albeit still covered in dark fur, still with firm pads, and still tipped with curved retractable claws. A hand all the same. One that could do everything a human hand could. A hand that could do anything at all.
She curled her fingers into a fist, and squeezed. Her claws extended, and dug into her palm, but it felt more wonderful than painful. Tiny swirls of dark blood emptied from the punctures she’d left. She tried to flatten out her hand, then to waggle her fingers individually. The experimental flexing ached awfully, but the satisfaction overwhelmed the discomfort. Nothing had ever been so satisfying. Not a meal, not a warm bed, not a victory. This was the only moment that mattered.
These were her hands. Her hands. Hers.
Salem brought her other hand above her head, and the sudden effort made her pass out again. When she came to, the lighting was no different and she was still alone. She attempted a ginger, awkward stretch, and though her body complained in a chorus of aching bones and sore muscles, she felt faintly better for it. Simply floating where she was and listening to her body did not tell her much about the changes she’d endured. All that she could be sure of besides the hands was her new size and proportions. Her size! She filled the tank. She could never fit on a pillow now. Or fit into cupboards. Or be held tight. But perhaps she could do other things. Maybe even better things.
Salem waggled her hind-paws in the same way as her hands, and to her vague surprise, they felt much the same as they always had. She tried flicking her tail, and found that it was still very much there, hanging weightlessly in the tank fluid. That was a relief. It would have been difficult to accept the loss of her tail. At least her limbs still belonged to her.
Her investigation continued, and for the first time it made sense why Laura had always made lists of things. She checked off items on an imaginary list as she tested each body part. She began to explore with her hands, starting with her face. There was fur, still, but the shape of her head was altered. Oh, she still had the same nose, it seemed, and she discovered her ears where they’d always been, but the bones… the structure of her skull was new. New brain, new head to keep it in.
A new brain. She would think differently now. Be different. A different person. That could mean anything. Now her new brain was screaming at her with thoughts and memories and sensory input and fear and pain and tiredness and everything, everything, everything all at once without letting up. She tried to gasp, and the gasp died in her chest. She couldn’t bear to think about her own thoughts, not yet. Not now.
She couldn’t gasp, not yet. The tube that breathed for her also muted her. But gasping reminded her — she had been promised a voice. Even with her tongue pressed down by the tube, she could move it as if she were trying to speak. She put a hand to her throat and tried to feel it vibrate as she mimicked human noises in the complete silence of the tank. She heard her own hums and whines in her skull, like before, and she ached with yearning even as her throat ached with effort.
Every part of her body that she touched ached in response, from her neck to her abdomen. Her gut churned when she pressed into it. Her muscles cramped as she touched them. She felt as tender as if her entire body was nothing but a person-shaped wound. But the important part wasn’t feeling like one enormous wound. It was being shaped like a person.
Even in pain and exhaustion as she was, she wanted to yowl joyously, to run and jump and climb, to roll about and rumble thunderously. The weariness rose to match her joy, and she felt so tired that it hurt. The emotions, the mental fog, the bodily pains, all of it was too much. This was too much, and she should be dreaming. She could still be dreaming even now, but for her newfound and unstoppable unyielding unrelenting ability to think and perceive and remember all at once. Her eyes hurt from an unfamiliar pressure and her face contorted involuntarily as for the first time in her life, she managed to cry.
She knew what crying was, of course. Laura had sometimes sobbed into Salem’s flank after difficult days, but she had never understood it. She understood it now, her chest heaving and her arms closing over on herself as tears welled up in her eyes and dissipated instantly into the hazy green liquid of the morphing tank. Her sobs were silent, but each one hit her bruised frame like a tackle blow. She let them happen, some part of her relishing the new and entirely human experience even as it hurt her.
Eventually, she passed whatever threshold she had for endurance and passed into sleep once again.
There were no more conscious moments in which to think and feel. Only a fleeting mist of faint and tiny memories.
Green shadows outside the tank.
The roar of draining liquid.
“Looking good, no problems here.”
Gravity, absent too long and unwelcome to return.
“There we go. It’s okay. It’s okay, kitten.”
Her lungs alive once more as they should be.
“Salem? Salem, can you hear me?”
Her tongue finally feeling at ease in her mouth.
“I hear you.”
Five
Second Nascence
It felt like dying.
She couldn’t breathe. There was no air. Her lungs strained — no air. She choked and gagged on something, something stuck in her throat. Her lungs strained. Her chest heaved. Nothing.
There was no air. Yet she did not die.
She tried to move, to clutch at her throat. Her forelegs were so tired she could hardly feel them. Her limbs moved weakly, so weakly, as if through water. There was water, she was in water. Submerged. She was underwater!
She tried to flail, to swim, but her limbs protested every command. Her eyes were shut; she could be asleep. No. She was not asleep. She opened her eyes, it stung, it hurt, but there — there was the room, through the faint glass and the green water and the dim light.
She was in the tank.
She kept forgetting she was in the tank.
Each time Salem woke from sleep — if it was sleep at all, for her dreams felt like memories and when she woke it felt like a dream — it got a little easier to remember she was in the tank. It began with choking, then struggling, then opening her eyes. She always realised where she was when she saw the ward, made green in hue by the liquid in the tank. She was looking down at the room as if from a height, so she knew that she could not be standing on the floor. She must be suspended in the tank, like always.
This time she was just barely lucid enough to notice an alien intrusion in her flesh. A tube from above pierced her chest. Another pierced her neck. More on either side of her head connected to the mask over her mouth. There could be more where she couldn’t see. She was suspended by them, held in place by them, held in this half-dream, half-death. She pawed weakly at one of the cables and felt it tug inside her. She would never have the strength to remove it. Maybe that was for the best. Maybe the cables were remaking her.
She hadn’t expected to wake at all while she was being remade. This wasn’t right. Something could be wrong with the tank, with the transformation. Something could be wrong with her. This was wrong. But thinking about it got harder and harder, and soon she fell back into the darkness once again.
Salem drifted in and out of unconsciousness, her eyes never open for long, her mind never able to cling to more than a droplet or two of memory from her dreams or her last days as herself. She dreamed of human faces and her own, of watching herself from behind and seeing her body standing on two legs; of needles; of being held; of being held tightly, too tightly; of blood and hunger and cold. Of fighting. Of losing.
When she woke to the room, she would look around for someone she knew. A couple times, she thought she could perceive Alisha, as a momentary hazy glimpse past the water and the tank, or as a faint familiar scent. But that was surely an illusion. She could smell nothing but the dead scent of rubber, the smell of the mask fitted to her muzzle. Still, she kept looking for Alisha’s face past the tank glass.
Her reality was fleeting. Her eyes lied to her. Now she was in the bed from before, but a different room. There were curtains around her. Different containers feeding fluids into her body. Different items applied to to her body. Different covers over her body. She understood none of it. Now she was in the tank again, and there were wires in her skin that felt cold, the way her pads felt on icy pavement. More numb than truly cold. The wires went up overhead and she could vaguely make out glass canisters of liquid fixed to the top of the tank.
She was changing. It was hard to perceive, to concentrate, but she could tell. It was too clear even through the clouds in her mind. She could feel her body aching, she could see it stretching out below her, longer than could be true. She could feel sensations unfamiliar and strange — her tongue resting differently in her mouth, impossible to feel comfortable with. Different muscles twitching; different extremities itching. Even her heart was different. The beat against her ribs was slow and powerful, like the heavy thumping of human footsteps. A human heartbeat. She could hear her heartbeat in her head, slower than could be right. She’d known she would change, but she’d thought of documentaries, of evolution in normal pokémon, of instant growth and light. This wasn’t evolution. It was slow, human change. Like ageing. Like the growth of trees.
Once, she woke up and tried to stretch, and she waved her paw in front of her face as she did. Her foreleg — her arm, it would be her arm — burned as she held her paw up, but she held it there all the same, to see the way her digits were lengthening. She tried to flex them, and they cramped up, making her whimper — a whimper that sounded strangely in her head, a whimper that felt odd as it formed in her throat. It never arrived at her ears past the mask and the fluid, instead she heard it from inside her own skull.
Still she saw her paws nonetheless; pads pulled apart from each other and joints stretched out too far. They were neither paws nor hands now. They were ugly, useless, halfway things. Too stubby and crude to grasp with, but elongated enough that they would be hard to walk on. She imagined her paws being stuck like this; useless for all but the most crude pokésign. She dared not move them too much. It might stop them growing.
She tried to tell how long she’d been this way. Days? Moons? Seasons? Hard to guess — impossible to know. There were only human lights — no windows, no way to measure the suns and moons. As her ordeal went on, she tried to track time by remembering details: what level the fluid canisters were at, how many plasters she wore on her arm and where, how far below her body her hind-paws — her feet — were. She tried to count how many times these details changed, and always lost cost after three or four.
It never got easier to focus, to stay awake, or to control her body, but it did get easier to think. Not easy, but possible to do without her thoughts bleeding out of her head. The drowsiness was less raw, more like an irritating scab than a fresh cut. First, it was just that her thoughts were clearer. Then, she could recall details more readily. At last, she was certain, the drip that fed into her arm had been changed five times since she started counting, half as many times as the plaster where the tube that bit her arm had been changed. She was certain too that she’d never recalled so many distinct moments at once. It was as if she’d been half asleep her entire life, and only now was she truly lucid.
Remembering several things at once and comparing them was thrilling enough, even through the continual panic of not breathing, not standing, not breathing. Even had she been breathing, it would have been breathtaking to think about something someone had said and at the same time consider why or how they had said it. At least, without the memory streaming out of her brain like water off her paw. More so to be able to think about both how she had felt, and why she felt that way. The difference between remembering and understanding… It was the difference between merely drinking water, and actually tasting it as you drank. For the first time, she could taste her thoughts. For the first time, she could clearly ask herself, “did I have to leave Laura? Was that the right thing to do? What if I hadn’t done it?” That was not thrilling. It was terrifying. It was miserable.
She could not escape the dark panic that came with those thoughts while conscious. So, she sought sleep again, and despite the cold bruise flowering in her chest, and the burning of her skin and eyes, she found it. With sleep came an escape from these new and jagged thoughts. Her dreams changed too. Now she dreamed of speaking English to Alisha, of full and plentiful sentences spilling out of her mouth like water from a tap, on and off at will. She couldn’t make sense of what she was saying, though, and when she tried to pay attention to the way her mouth and tongue were moving to produce the words, the dream wavered and she was pulled out of it. She stopped trying to listen to her own voice, and willed the dream to continue. So long as she did not concentrate, she kept speaking. She would speak forever.
She dreamed of speaking to Laura, but the words were trapped in her throat, and she choked on them, unable to make a sound. She dreamed of speaking to Mienshao, to the glameow tom, to the throh and the chatot. Of saying something to Church or another morph. These were good dreams. A zoroark hybrid, red mouth grinning and full of teeth, replied to her, saying “well, soft cat, Salem, good well, all and happy.” The words swam in her ears, meaningless but good, so good, and so comforting.
When she woke next, it was dimly lit in the ward, and a torrent of thoughts hit her with “is my body any different today” and “where’s alisha is she here” and “jamie lied to me why would he do that” and “i’m going to live like this for the rest of my life” and “can i still become a liepard” and “i have never been this tired.” Not just feelings or desires or half-thoughts, but full, clear thoughts. A half dozen at once. Now a dozen. Painful and scary and beautiful. She had never spoken a word of English and yet somehow she could hear her own voice in her own head, sounding out her thoughts.
The green-soaked shadow of a human moved past the tank, unseeing.
Her body ached in every possible place: in her stomach and her limbs and her head and her pads and her eyes. Even her fur seemed to be hurting. Once she’d paid attention to the cacophony of hurt, the blunt pain behind her eyes was the worst of them. Still, she made herself lift her forepaw in front of her face, just to examine it one more time, to examine it as was now her habit whenever she was awake.
Five distinct digits, long and dexterous and complete. A hand. A more or less human hand — albeit still covered in dark fur, still with firm pads, and still tipped with curved retractable claws. A hand all the same. One that could do everything a human hand could. A hand that could do anything at all.
She curled her fingers into a fist, and squeezed. Her claws extended, and dug into her palm, but it felt more wonderful than painful. Tiny swirls of dark blood emptied from the punctures she’d left. She tried to flatten out her hand, then to waggle her fingers individually. The experimental flexing ached awfully, but the satisfaction overwhelmed the discomfort. Nothing had ever been so satisfying. Not a meal, not a warm bed, not a victory. This was the only moment that mattered.
These were her hands. Her hands. Hers.
Salem brought her other hand above her head, and the sudden effort made her pass out again. When she came to, the lighting was no different and she was still alone. She attempted a ginger, awkward stretch, and though her body complained in a chorus of aching bones and sore muscles, she felt faintly better for it. Simply floating where she was and listening to her body did not tell her much about the changes she’d endured. All that she could be sure of besides the hands was her new size and proportions. Her size! She filled the tank. She could never fit on a pillow now. Or fit into cupboards. Or be held tight. But perhaps she could do other things. Maybe even better things.
Salem waggled her hind-paws in the same way as her hands, and to her vague surprise, they felt much the same as they always had. She tried flicking her tail, and found that it was still very much there, hanging weightlessly in the tank fluid. That was a relief. It would have been difficult to accept the loss of her tail. At least her limbs still belonged to her.
Her investigation continued, and for the first time it made sense why Laura had always made lists of things. She checked off items on an imaginary list as she tested each body part. She began to explore with her hands, starting with her face. There was fur, still, but the shape of her head was altered. Oh, she still had the same nose, it seemed, and she discovered her ears where they’d always been, but the bones… the structure of her skull was new. New brain, new head to keep it in.
A new brain. She would think differently now. Be different. A different person. That could mean anything. Now her new brain was screaming at her with thoughts and memories and sensory input and fear and pain and tiredness and everything, everything, everything all at once without letting up. She tried to gasp, and the gasp died in her chest. She couldn’t bear to think about her own thoughts, not yet. Not now.
She couldn’t gasp, not yet. The tube that breathed for her also muted her. But gasping reminded her — she had been promised a voice. Even with her tongue pressed down by the tube, she could move it as if she were trying to speak. She put a hand to her throat and tried to feel it vibrate as she mimicked human noises in the complete silence of the tank. She heard her own hums and whines in her skull, like before, and she ached with yearning even as her throat ached with effort.
Every part of her body that she touched ached in response, from her neck to her abdomen. Her gut churned when she pressed into it. Her muscles cramped as she touched them. She felt as tender as if her entire body was nothing but a person-shaped wound. But the important part wasn’t feeling like one enormous wound. It was being shaped like a person.
Even in pain and exhaustion as she was, she wanted to yowl joyously, to run and jump and climb, to roll about and rumble thunderously. The weariness rose to match her joy, and she felt so tired that it hurt. The emotions, the mental fog, the bodily pains, all of it was too much. This was too much, and she should be dreaming. She could still be dreaming even now, but for her newfound and unstoppable unyielding unrelenting ability to think and perceive and remember all at once. Her eyes hurt from an unfamiliar pressure and her face contorted involuntarily as for the first time in her life, she managed to cry.
She knew what crying was, of course. Laura had sometimes sobbed into Salem’s flank after difficult days, but she had never understood it. She understood it now, her chest heaving and her arms closing over on herself as tears welled up in her eyes and dissipated instantly into the hazy green liquid of the morphing tank. Her sobs were silent, but each one hit her bruised frame like a tackle blow. She let them happen, some part of her relishing the new and entirely human experience even as it hurt her.
Eventually, she passed whatever threshold she had for endurance and passed into sleep once again.
There were no more conscious moments in which to think and feel. Only a fleeting mist of faint and tiny memories.
Green shadows outside the tank.
The roar of draining liquid.
“Looking good, no problems here.”
Gravity, absent too long and unwelcome to return.
“There we go. It’s okay. It’s okay, kitten.”
Her lungs alive once more as they should be.
“Salem? Salem, can you hear me?”
Her tongue finally feeling at ease in her mouth.
“I hear you.”
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hi it me i offer to you ENERGY AND A REVIEW
Picky detail out of the way first. Do let me know if my memory's failed me on stuff throughout the entire review, though, since I'm not quite a reviewer known for my quick turnaround.
I'd argue it'd have been more effective to cover multiple nights with Jamie from the beginning. Is Salem so quick to judge and run that she'd risk the loss of what appears to be a decent human in her eyes (Jamie)? On the flip side, I can see a lot of impulsiveness in her, and she's struggled with humans overall in the past. Still, I'd argue that Alisha coming along so quickly and sweeping her away feels a little too convenient (and that's really the main reason this is tripping me up), especially with Alisha offering Salem everything she's ever wanted. I don't mean a huge deal with an extra scene or two about life with Jamie, either. A brief transition but one that doesn't feel rushed in terms of in-fic time would be fine, IMO.
I've got what I feel are less picky details on the SHP entry interlude, though I'll say first and foremost that it was damn well placed, haha. It served as a perfect transition into the morph chapter. My concern was over the lack of coverage on consent. You place emphasis on Alisha having Salem sign with her paw in a chapter and place emphasis on 'mons signing pre-change in an interlude... but there's absolutely no mention at all under the Ethics section about whether or not that's satisfactory as consent. How was/is it determined that a 'mon is considered sentient enough to be able to consent? Proper care for animals, semi-sentient or otherwise, in the middle of morphing or otherwise, doesn't justify turning lives upside down all by itself when it comes to getting ethics committee approval, IMO. I'd at least suspect some research going into reversing the process to not cause lasting damage on a morph's life after they've developed full sentience. Of course, this stuff could be expanded on later, but the lack of a mention threw me off entirely.
Overall, though, I stand by what I said in that the official documentation-esque POV is a nice touch and one that gives readers a different perspective on morphs and the world Salem's been wanting to dive headfirst into.
Anyway, back to the Salem specific stuff.What even is review organization at 3AM. I like the Jamie-related scenes. Salem's dissatisfaction with her current life really shines through, and her pickiness in things alongside her impulsiveness. Again I'll reiterate that I really, really have enjoyed the different beginning here and starting off with some pre-morph life glimpses. <3 Also, that conkeldurr and chatot dialogue was hilarious even the second time around reading it, hehe. All of this really worked to make it hit hard when Salem's in the middle of morphing in chapter 5 and actually... reminisces on her purrloin life. I didn't expect that, really. But it makes sense. It's still all she's ever known, and just because she was dissatisfied overall doesn't mean she didn't enjoy some things about that life.
Chapter 5 was near flawless indeed. The entire chapter flowed as smoothly as liquid, and I couldn't look down from the page for a second, that's how absorbed I was in Salem's thoughts, both the painful and the joyful ones. I think Salem's wish of being human is gonna be the thing she most regrets but also the thing she least regrets. A weird mix, I know. But I'm excited to gi along for the ride and find out.
Picky detail out of the way first. Do let me know if my memory's failed me on stuff throughout the entire review, though, since I'm not quite a reviewer known for my quick turnaround.
I'd argue it'd have been more effective to cover multiple nights with Jamie from the beginning. Is Salem so quick to judge and run that she'd risk the loss of what appears to be a decent human in her eyes (Jamie)? On the flip side, I can see a lot of impulsiveness in her, and she's struggled with humans overall in the past. Still, I'd argue that Alisha coming along so quickly and sweeping her away feels a little too convenient (and that's really the main reason this is tripping me up), especially with Alisha offering Salem everything she's ever wanted. I don't mean a huge deal with an extra scene or two about life with Jamie, either. A brief transition but one that doesn't feel rushed in terms of in-fic time would be fine, IMO.
I've got what I feel are less picky details on the SHP entry interlude, though I'll say first and foremost that it was damn well placed, haha. It served as a perfect transition into the morph chapter. My concern was over the lack of coverage on consent. You place emphasis on Alisha having Salem sign with her paw in a chapter and place emphasis on 'mons signing pre-change in an interlude... but there's absolutely no mention at all under the Ethics section about whether or not that's satisfactory as consent. How was/is it determined that a 'mon is considered sentient enough to be able to consent? Proper care for animals, semi-sentient or otherwise, in the middle of morphing or otherwise, doesn't justify turning lives upside down all by itself when it comes to getting ethics committee approval, IMO. I'd at least suspect some research going into reversing the process to not cause lasting damage on a morph's life after they've developed full sentience. Of course, this stuff could be expanded on later, but the lack of a mention threw me off entirely.
Overall, though, I stand by what I said in that the official documentation-esque POV is a nice touch and one that gives readers a different perspective on morphs and the world Salem's been wanting to dive headfirst into.
Anyway, back to the Salem specific stuff.
Chapter 5 was near flawless indeed. The entire chapter flowed as smoothly as liquid, and I couldn't look down from the page for a second, that's how absorbed I was in Salem's thoughts, both the painful and the joyful ones. I think Salem's wish of being human is gonna be the thing she most regrets but also the thing she least regrets. A weird mix, I know. But I'm excited to gi along for the ride and find out.
unrepentantAuthor
A cat who writes stories
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Hi, Kris! Always lovely to get reviews from you, friend. I'll return the favour once I've moved out, got settled, and sorted out study and job stuff, ahaha.
Maybe! I feel like I missed a trick by not employing some timeskips, but I've been very worried about pacing this whole time. As for Salem's judgment — Jamie explicitly cannot keep her indefinitely and must try to get her adopted out, which Salem resents, and lets slip on day two that he's contacted Laura against her will, which she also deeply resents. I reckon it gels okay. The fact that Alisha turns up at a convenient time is the sort of contrivance I usually try to avoid, but Salem staying on at the shelter would permit Laura to turn up. So if I fixed this, it'd have to involve Jamie putting off contacting Laura, or coming up with a less contrived arrival for Alisha.
Honestly, the consent isn't properly obtained, because how could any pokémon fully understand the implications of the procedure? It will be addressed, though. Without spoiling too much, I can promise that some morphs will actually express discontent with thesubject acquisition process hiring method in the future. Pretty much the entire fic is going to be about questions and problems like "what if it permanently ruins a morph's life to become one?" I hope you'll enjoy it as it comes!
Oh Kris, you made my day with this. I haven't been so chuffed in six years. Thanks for saying something so nice!
That's it, that's the fic! :'D
It begins
Thanks again, Kris. Hope to have you along for the long haul!
Maybe! I feel like I missed a trick by not employing some timeskips, but I've been very worried about pacing this whole time. As for Salem's judgment — Jamie explicitly cannot keep her indefinitely and must try to get her adopted out, which Salem resents, and lets slip on day two that he's contacted Laura against her will, which she also deeply resents. I reckon it gels okay. The fact that Alisha turns up at a convenient time is the sort of contrivance I usually try to avoid, but Salem staying on at the shelter would permit Laura to turn up. So if I fixed this, it'd have to involve Jamie putting off contacting Laura, or coming up with a less contrived arrival for Alisha.
Honestly, the consent isn't properly obtained, because how could any pokémon fully understand the implications of the procedure? It will be addressed, though. Without spoiling too much, I can promise that some morphs will actually express discontent with the
Oh Kris, you made my day with this. I haven't been so chuffed in six years. Thanks for saying something so nice!
That's it, that's the fic! :'D
It begins
Thanks again, Kris. Hope to have you along for the long haul!
WanderingKalosan
Lv1 Author (Writer Wannabe)
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Uh, so this review is going to be tough. This is no doubt due to being unusual chapter compared to what we had before.
Basically all my feelings can be summarized by two points, one positive and one negative:
The good: There is a beautiful, detailed description of what happens in the head of a Pokémon undergoing this fantastical change (metamorhposis would be probably a better term). It makes the whole deal more realistic and shows us that the author takes this seriously. We get details for both physical and psychical changes to reinforce the notion Salem is becoming a completely new person. Great job on that one uA!
The bad: That is all there is. From beginning to the end, it is one long very complex description.
I will be honest, my mind constatly kept slipping after certain point, I couldn't focus. Usually in DE we get these philosophical questions and descriptions mixed with fun dialogue (Salem/Laura, Salem/Jamie, Salem/Alisha) and bits of worldbuilding (Laura's realistic take on Pokémon training in this world; Pokémon shelters and Pokémon living in wild realistically).
In this chapter we get only descriptions of feelings and a bit of philosophy. The other two secret indgredients of DE are missing.
I see this as a problem, but I also see why it was done. The morphing process is too big of a deal to just skip or to be shortened.
After thinking about it, here are my two suggestions which might help:
(I don't think trimming would do Ch5 a service so naturally both of these will end up extending the chapter if you go for it. Also, please take them with a pinch of salt. I honestly don't think any of them ideal to be frank, I just think they may help spice the chapter up a bit)
1. This chapter could benefit from POV switch. Salem cannot provide fun dialogue for obvious reasons, but I could totally see Alisha having a conversation with other employees/scientists, the hybrids (maybe Church could return?) as she is clearly overseeing Salem's case. Salem's feelings could be interrupted in one or two points to give us Alisha (she can provide what Salem can't right now - dialogue and worldbuilding both).
The downside is, your story is clearly meant to be told from Salem's POV only and this ould break the formula.
2. If we insist on Salem's POV, this could be resolved by having her have one or two dreams (or nighmares) where you could have plenty of dialogue. To avoid making such a new section a complete filler, the dreams should foreshadow future events, or you could flesh out some important information about Zoroark hybrid / Church / Alisha / Jamie / Laura - or anyone else. Something Salem only got subconsciously but didn't fully realize, something that might come into play in future chapters.
To summarize: I liked how you dealt with morphing process, but I also think the chapter needs something more.
Thanks for the read and good luck with next chapters!
Basically all my feelings can be summarized by two points, one positive and one negative:
The good: There is a beautiful, detailed description of what happens in the head of a Pokémon undergoing this fantastical change (metamorhposis would be probably a better term). It makes the whole deal more realistic and shows us that the author takes this seriously. We get details for both physical and psychical changes to reinforce the notion Salem is becoming a completely new person. Great job on that one uA!
The bad: That is all there is. From beginning to the end, it is one long very complex description.
I will be honest, my mind constatly kept slipping after certain point, I couldn't focus. Usually in DE we get these philosophical questions and descriptions mixed with fun dialogue (Salem/Laura, Salem/Jamie, Salem/Alisha) and bits of worldbuilding (Laura's realistic take on Pokémon training in this world; Pokémon shelters and Pokémon living in wild realistically).
In this chapter we get only descriptions of feelings and a bit of philosophy. The other two secret indgredients of DE are missing.
I see this as a problem, but I also see why it was done. The morphing process is too big of a deal to just skip or to be shortened.
After thinking about it, here are my two suggestions which might help:
(I don't think trimming would do Ch5 a service so naturally both of these will end up extending the chapter if you go for it. Also, please take them with a pinch of salt. I honestly don't think any of them ideal to be frank, I just think they may help spice the chapter up a bit)
1. This chapter could benefit from POV switch. Salem cannot provide fun dialogue for obvious reasons, but I could totally see Alisha having a conversation with other employees/scientists, the hybrids (maybe Church could return?) as she is clearly overseeing Salem's case. Salem's feelings could be interrupted in one or two points to give us Alisha (she can provide what Salem can't right now - dialogue and worldbuilding both).
The downside is, your story is clearly meant to be told from Salem's POV only and this ould break the formula.
2. If we insist on Salem's POV, this could be resolved by having her have one or two dreams (or nighmares) where you could have plenty of dialogue. To avoid making such a new section a complete filler, the dreams should foreshadow future events, or you could flesh out some important information about Zoroark hybrid / Church / Alisha / Jamie / Laura - or anyone else. Something Salem only got subconsciously but didn't fully realize, something that might come into play in future chapters.
To summarize: I liked how you dealt with morphing process, but I also think the chapter needs something more.
Thanks for the read and good luck with next chapters!
unrepentantAuthor
A cat who writes stories
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Hallo, WK! Thanks for another review; I'm always happy to receive your feedback.
Ey, cheers. I'm chuffed.
You know, I suppose that's a fair criticism. I do believe that not every chapter has to have the same qualities as other chapters, but I can see how you might be let down by the omission of those elements mentioned.
That would actually be perfectly acceptable. The chapter isn't particularly long, after all. Certainly I wouldn't trim it much more than I already have!
I'm open to POV switching between chapters, but intra-chapter switching during such an intense and moody sequence as Salem's transformation would be the wrong time to implement it, in my opinion.
Actually, I had intended to have some future chapters be from the POV of other characters once Salem's story has progressed further, but for now the camera is very intensely focused on the run-up to, process, and immediate consequences of her transformation. What's given you the impression that I would stay tightly focused on Salem indefinitely?
I'm okay with this idea, and I suppose I might implement it in a future revision. I'll plough on for now, because I'm concerned about getting hung up on early chapters, but I'll take note!
Cheers WK, always a pleasure! See you next chapter~
Ey, cheers. I'm chuffed.
You know, I suppose that's a fair criticism. I do believe that not every chapter has to have the same qualities as other chapters, but I can see how you might be let down by the omission of those elements mentioned.
That would actually be perfectly acceptable. The chapter isn't particularly long, after all. Certainly I wouldn't trim it much more than I already have!
I'm open to POV switching between chapters, but intra-chapter switching during such an intense and moody sequence as Salem's transformation would be the wrong time to implement it, in my opinion.
Actually, I had intended to have some future chapters be from the POV of other characters once Salem's story has progressed further, but for now the camera is very intensely focused on the run-up to, process, and immediate consequences of her transformation. What's given you the impression that I would stay tightly focused on Salem indefinitely?
I'm okay with this idea, and I suppose I might implement it in a future revision. I'll plough on for now, because I'm concerned about getting hung up on early chapters, but I'll take note!
Cheers WK, always a pleasure! See you next chapter~
- Joined
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- 302
Okay, I’ll be the first one to admit that…I actually forgot about this story’s past incarnation…like completely. I’m sorry about that, I’ll try not to forget now.
Anyways, I was actually a little bit hesitant about this because I tend to try and avoid Pokemorph stories, if only because they don’t have the best of reputations. That being said, god knows I’ve written about things where Pokemon shouldn’t even fit (like mechas) so this makes a lot more sense as an application for a story already.
But anyways, let’s roll.
Chapter 1
So basically the most important point of this chapter is Salem’s relationship with Laura as we get more hints of their fate as a couple. You do a good job of getting into Salem’s mind and how a cat would see their owner and the way it would get along with it, in particular I liked how you showed us Salem adapting to human customs by having her be a fan of the anime (the name is dumb though).
Of course, the highlight of the chapter is Salem’s discussion with Laura and here you set a pretty big margin for how different this world is to the one depicted in their entertainment. Laura not only doesn’t want to become a Trainer, she seems to actively laugh at the idea of being one, this isn’t even a case of being a trainer being treated as a sport, it seems like something even riskier in that regard.
But main of all is the way in which you portray the emotion of the characters, particularly Salem as she tries and fails to convince Laura to go on a journey. Admittedly I think Laura acted pretty rudely here and whether or not she went looking for Salem is up in the air (we get hints that she hadn’t really been home much as of late anyway) so it’s a bit heartbreaking when it passes to the next scene and Salem is all battered and beaten down.
Chapter 2
Much like with the first chapter, the second one feels particularly sad when you realize what Salem’s left behind and how long it’s been. That being said, kudos to Jamie for trying to do his job even when a Pokemon arrives after hours, and the same goes for the Mienshao. You show us a little more of Salem’s personality here, even if most of her personality traits are really just traits you’d expect to see from a cat.
That being said, I found myself curious on how the process of caring for a Pokemon and putting it up for adoption works in the world of your story. It seems that, much like with the real world, there’s a lot of paper work that goes into adopting a pet, especially if it’s one that used to have an owner; in particular I liked the little mention of the trackers for Pokemon, which is pretty true to modern day pets and how they have their own trackers put on them.
If there’s one point where I think this chapter falters is that we don’t get to see more of the care center, it’s fair since Salem herself wants as little to do with it that doesn’t involve having a roof over her head and some food to keep her alive, but it would’ve been nice to see some more of the surroundings or maybe show us a bit more of how other Pokemon looked like while being there. In general the chapter goes by quick, which is good, but that also makes it feel as if it’s not making the most of the elements around it.
Chapter 3
Right off the bat I gotta say that this chapter was actually my least favorite. I’m not exactly sure why but I’d have to say that this one felt a lot more like an transition chapter to get us from the care center to the lab. The description here isn’t bad but it doesn’t flow as well as in past chapters and it makes it a bit hard to really imagine what’s going on. That’s without mentioning that again, we don’t really get to go too into detail with what’s going on, but then again that can be chalked down to the nature of our POV character.
I kind of feel like Jamie didn’t have to justify why Salem couldn’t go with Alisha too much. Like I think telling her about her having another trainer who he’s waiting a reply from might’ve been a little too much and he could’ve just stuck with it not being protocol. Granted, Salem would’ve probably still tried to get away, but who knows what her not feeling lied to would’ve done.
I did find your description of the gas station amusing, particularly with how it nauseates Salem once she realizes the smell of petrol mixed in with the food, it’s a nice little tidbit that I noticed. But anyways, like I said the chapter itself is mainly a transition one so we don’t really get too much insight into Salem or Aisha or anyone really, in fact the sequences at the care center go by rather quickly.
Chapter 4
I liked chapter 4 much more, particularly for how it builds up this feeling of uncertainty. We’re not sure on what the procedure of becoming a hybrid will entail for Salem and while she’s completely happy and oblivious it’s hard not to take everything that happens with a grain of salt, like how the hybrids are still kept in check and how Church could be monitored or guided so that he only says specifically what they want him to, I mean, I pretty much doubt they’d be okay with him telling Salem anything that might deter her from participating in the process right?
That also works for Aisha as well, who seems to be a bit of a cipher. At first I was afraid she’d be a cold scientist masking her intent with a smile, chapter 4 doesn’t completely dissuades those fears but she does seem to genuinely worry and care about Salem and making the experience as comfortable for her as possible. But then there are other comments like Aisha’s calls to Salem sounding like Laura’s but different that still give me some trepidation on whether or not the scientist has other intentions in mind.
All of the uncertainty comes full force once Salem’s procedure starts and we’re told that, yes, it’s going to hurt, even if she still remains oblivious. I’ll admit it was a little hard to take since I’m kind of soft when it comes to anything relating to animal cruelty, but it did leave me curious for what was to come.
Chapter 5
This chapter is I think the shortest chapter of the story but I think it’s also the best one yet. I think the biggest highlight in it is how you portrayed Salem slowly coming into being more human, with her being confused about her surroundings at first to the process of her body slowly changing as her mind suddenly opens up. Now she can think and rationalize and that allows her to realize that maybe Church had a point, that maybe she overreacted with her instinctual reaction to Laura and that maybe being a human isn’t such a good idea.
Granted, you the move on with Salem’s internal celebration once she realizes she’s truly become a hybrid and how her body has changed physically, mentally and emotionally. I particularly liked how you describe the feeling she had when crying the first time and it really got the point of the scene across.
That being said, the chapter is still short which leaves me with not much to comment on aside from expectancy on what will happen now that Salem is a Pokemorph, which should be interesting for the story going forward.
And well, in general I think Different Eyes is just getting started, but we’ve gotten a pretty good look at Salem in this first arc. Overall it isn’t a bad thing, giving us a first arc that functions as an introduction to the characters and the world. I would like to see it in more detail moving forward without it necessarily having to be explained in outside notes though. Also, I hope that now that Salem is a hybrid we can get some more meaningful interactions between her and other characters and actually get to know other characters a little better.
Anyways, I was actually a little bit hesitant about this because I tend to try and avoid Pokemorph stories, if only because they don’t have the best of reputations. That being said, god knows I’ve written about things where Pokemon shouldn’t even fit (like mechas) so this makes a lot more sense as an application for a story already.
But anyways, let’s roll.
Chapter 1
So basically the most important point of this chapter is Salem’s relationship with Laura as we get more hints of their fate as a couple. You do a good job of getting into Salem’s mind and how a cat would see their owner and the way it would get along with it, in particular I liked how you showed us Salem adapting to human customs by having her be a fan of the anime (the name is dumb though).
Of course, the highlight of the chapter is Salem’s discussion with Laura and here you set a pretty big margin for how different this world is to the one depicted in their entertainment. Laura not only doesn’t want to become a Trainer, she seems to actively laugh at the idea of being one, this isn’t even a case of being a trainer being treated as a sport, it seems like something even riskier in that regard.
But main of all is the way in which you portray the emotion of the characters, particularly Salem as she tries and fails to convince Laura to go on a journey. Admittedly I think Laura acted pretty rudely here and whether or not she went looking for Salem is up in the air (we get hints that she hadn’t really been home much as of late anyway) so it’s a bit heartbreaking when it passes to the next scene and Salem is all battered and beaten down.
Chapter 2
Much like with the first chapter, the second one feels particularly sad when you realize what Salem’s left behind and how long it’s been. That being said, kudos to Jamie for trying to do his job even when a Pokemon arrives after hours, and the same goes for the Mienshao. You show us a little more of Salem’s personality here, even if most of her personality traits are really just traits you’d expect to see from a cat.
That being said, I found myself curious on how the process of caring for a Pokemon and putting it up for adoption works in the world of your story. It seems that, much like with the real world, there’s a lot of paper work that goes into adopting a pet, especially if it’s one that used to have an owner; in particular I liked the little mention of the trackers for Pokemon, which is pretty true to modern day pets and how they have their own trackers put on them.
If there’s one point where I think this chapter falters is that we don’t get to see more of the care center, it’s fair since Salem herself wants as little to do with it that doesn’t involve having a roof over her head and some food to keep her alive, but it would’ve been nice to see some more of the surroundings or maybe show us a bit more of how other Pokemon looked like while being there. In general the chapter goes by quick, which is good, but that also makes it feel as if it’s not making the most of the elements around it.
Chapter 3
Right off the bat I gotta say that this chapter was actually my least favorite. I’m not exactly sure why but I’d have to say that this one felt a lot more like an transition chapter to get us from the care center to the lab. The description here isn’t bad but it doesn’t flow as well as in past chapters and it makes it a bit hard to really imagine what’s going on. That’s without mentioning that again, we don’t really get to go too into detail with what’s going on, but then again that can be chalked down to the nature of our POV character.
I kind of feel like Jamie didn’t have to justify why Salem couldn’t go with Alisha too much. Like I think telling her about her having another trainer who he’s waiting a reply from might’ve been a little too much and he could’ve just stuck with it not being protocol. Granted, Salem would’ve probably still tried to get away, but who knows what her not feeling lied to would’ve done.
I did find your description of the gas station amusing, particularly with how it nauseates Salem once she realizes the smell of petrol mixed in with the food, it’s a nice little tidbit that I noticed. But anyways, like I said the chapter itself is mainly a transition one so we don’t really get too much insight into Salem or Aisha or anyone really, in fact the sequences at the care center go by rather quickly.
Chapter 4
I liked chapter 4 much more, particularly for how it builds up this feeling of uncertainty. We’re not sure on what the procedure of becoming a hybrid will entail for Salem and while she’s completely happy and oblivious it’s hard not to take everything that happens with a grain of salt, like how the hybrids are still kept in check and how Church could be monitored or guided so that he only says specifically what they want him to, I mean, I pretty much doubt they’d be okay with him telling Salem anything that might deter her from participating in the process right?
That also works for Aisha as well, who seems to be a bit of a cipher. At first I was afraid she’d be a cold scientist masking her intent with a smile, chapter 4 doesn’t completely dissuades those fears but she does seem to genuinely worry and care about Salem and making the experience as comfortable for her as possible. But then there are other comments like Aisha’s calls to Salem sounding like Laura’s but different that still give me some trepidation on whether or not the scientist has other intentions in mind.
All of the uncertainty comes full force once Salem’s procedure starts and we’re told that, yes, it’s going to hurt, even if she still remains oblivious. I’ll admit it was a little hard to take since I’m kind of soft when it comes to anything relating to animal cruelty, but it did leave me curious for what was to come.
Chapter 5
This chapter is I think the shortest chapter of the story but I think it’s also the best one yet. I think the biggest highlight in it is how you portrayed Salem slowly coming into being more human, with her being confused about her surroundings at first to the process of her body slowly changing as her mind suddenly opens up. Now she can think and rationalize and that allows her to realize that maybe Church had a point, that maybe she overreacted with her instinctual reaction to Laura and that maybe being a human isn’t such a good idea.
Granted, you the move on with Salem’s internal celebration once she realizes she’s truly become a hybrid and how her body has changed physically, mentally and emotionally. I particularly liked how you describe the feeling she had when crying the first time and it really got the point of the scene across.
That being said, the chapter is still short which leaves me with not much to comment on aside from expectancy on what will happen now that Salem is a Pokemorph, which should be interesting for the story going forward.
And well, in general I think Different Eyes is just getting started, but we’ve gotten a pretty good look at Salem in this first arc. Overall it isn’t a bad thing, giving us a first arc that functions as an introduction to the characters and the world. I would like to see it in more detail moving forward without it necessarily having to be explained in outside notes though. Also, I hope that now that Salem is a hybrid we can get some more meaningful interactions between her and other characters and actually get to know other characters a little better.
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