TEEN: The 1K Words Oneshots Series

[Cresselia92]

Hello, everyone! Welcome to my series of oneshots.

The themes of these oneshots are going to be varied, ranging from humor to adventure to drama, and they will be either Teen-rated or Everyone-rated.

However, they all will also follow a simple rule: no oneshot must have less or more than 1.000 words. This is mostly a personal experiment to learn how to optimize the word count and trim unnecessary parts and stuff.

With this said, here’s my first oneshot, which is centered around an infamous theme in Pokémon: Nuzlocke runs. I hope you will enjoy it!

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Rating Warnings (so far)

• Moderate Violence - Implicit and/or infrequent depictions of blood, injury, and/or violent deaths.

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List of Oneshots

✧ "Last ‘Mon Standing" [Teen | Nuzlocke | Action / Tragedy] ✧

A Pokémon and their human partner face the fight of their lives! Will they come out victorious, or someone will bite the dust? Pokémon POV.​

 

[Snuggle Tier List]

Since this is openly experimentation, I figured I'd give less formal feedback than a review. I'm a believer in "experimentation for experimentation's sake", so I'd hard for me to seperate those feelings from your writing. I might go more in-depth on Last Mon Standing when I have the time; for now, I want to make a proposition:

I think it'd be extremely fitting if your threadmarked word count was exactly 1K per story.

I realise this is a nitpick-y detail, but something in my brain is latching onto it. However, as someone who published a fic collection myself, I think organizing everything up front will save you a lot of pain later. And getting each threadmarked post to be exactly 1K words would be a good way to do that.

Here's my proposed method:

1. Remove your threadmark from your OP.
2. Make one post for each of your 1K oneshots. These are the posts that will be threadmarked! (Note you'll need to migrate Last Mon Standing to another post for consistency.)
3. Place "extra info" (content rating, genre, summary, etc) in [SPOILER] tags, so they aren't included in the wordcount. Something like this:​

Spoiler: Summary, Content Warnings, and Info

Title: “Last ‘Mon Standing”
Rating: T
Genre: Action / Tragedy

A Pokémon and their human partner face the fight of their lives! Will they come out victorious, or someone will bite the dust?​

4. Add a super-basic banner fir each fic. If you want to go fancy, knock your socks off, but a white rounded rectangle with black text will do. Since the title is technically an image, it isn't included in the wordcount.
5. ????
6. Don't profit because it's fanfic we're all poor LOL​

Just my two cents based on personal experience. I found myself constantly reformating my poetry collection as it expanded, resulting in me wasting too many hours adjusting BBCode. Getting a plan in place early saves a lot of pain in the long run, assuming you don't already have a plan currently. It depends on personal taste; if you think these experimental oneshots warrant polishing, now's the time. If this is a more casual thing, keep doing what you're doing.

Regardless, looking forward to reading more! Self-imposed challenges scratch an itch for me. If I find time, I want to deep dive Last Mon Standing, but I'm behind on my own writing. No promises, but perhaps I'll give a full review soon? If I can't, my hot take: the word-to-content ratio can be improved, but the premise was interesting and the story short enough for even my time-strapped schedule. I like the style and I want to see more.

 

[Cresselia92]

Thousands of unknown faces are staring at us, looking from every single corner of the stadium. Roaring, screaming, cheering, waiting to see who will win this fight.

Our fight. Against our rivals.

We have come far. I remember when we first met. When you looked at me. When I looked back at you. When destiny made us meet each other.

We have faced many challenges. Battled other humans. Seen our team become stronger. Met new friends. And… lost many of them. I still miss them. I know you miss them, too.

But now we are here. Our dream is finally at our reach. Our teammates have given everything for us. Only you and I remain now. It’s time to become legends. Champions.

I won’t fail you, my friend.

Your rival shouts something. I see the cannons of my rival filling with water, and shooting enormous streams in my direction. With a flap of my wings, I fly high and away from the water.

“Air Slash,” you say.

I adjust my trajectory before flapping my wings with all my might, sending sharp blades of winds toward my rival. However, my rival reacts quickly, and hides inside that impenetrable shell. The blades clash noisily on the surface of the shell, dissipating in clouds of air.

You look thoughtful, and from the look you are giving me, it seems you have an idea.

“Dragon Pulse,” you say, and point your finger toward the upper hole of the shell.

I nod and gather a powerful energy in my jaws, the destructive essence of a dragon. I unleash the draconic wave right into the hole, letting out all my fury.

My rival cries out loudly. That makes me very proud. The attack succeeded.

Your rival shouts a new command, and before I know it, my rival rams into me. I hear a crunch coming from my chest, my ribs struck at full force. I roar in agony, and feel myself hitting the floor, my rival pinning me to the ground and crushing my lungs.

I see the cannons aiming at me, more water starting to flow into them, and almost ready to shoot a deadly blow.

No… I need to get up. I must get up. For our fallen friends. For us.

I feel my throat becoming incandescent as the fire on my tail becomes brighter and bigger. I roar on my rival’s face, releasing an explosive stream of flames, strong enough to make my rival stagger back in anger and allow me to wriggle out of the way.

My rival retreats in the shell and begins whirling like a spinning top, coming at a dangerously high speed toward me. I hear you say “Metal Claw and catch,” which I find quite odd. But I trust you, and as such I do as commanded.

I keep my arms open while my claws become as hard as steel, and I dig my claws into the spinning form of my rival. I let out a strained growl, my rival spinning way too fast, and I can feel the corners of the shell scraping at my skin and claws. However, the rotation slowly comes to a halt, and my rival begins wriggling in my grasp, trying to break free.

I won’t allow this. I gather more fire in my mouth and spew another stream of fire around my rival, encasing both of us in a twister of flames. The anguished roars of a burned beast echo around the stadium, but they are stifled by the uproar of yelling humans, rooting for their favorites.

You smile at me. We are about to win!

However, your rival… has that unreadable expression. Dark, almost twisted.

Another command and I feel myself like freezing. I notice an orb of ice forming inside my rival’s jaws, and aimed right at me.

I panic. I won’t be able to get out of the way.

And then, a chilling energy invades my whole body, snuffing out the heat I had been unleashing until now. I try to roar, but only a silent scream comes out from my throat. Even my lungs have been frozen by the powerful attack.

I fall to my knees. Breathing hard, coughing, shivering. I can feel my flame becoming smaller.

Your rival looks at us, almost with pity. It’s hard to tell underneath that smug expression. You, however, have a completely different expression.

Shocked.

Devastated.

Hopeless.

Your rival points at me, then looks at my rival. The last command.

My rival takes a few steps back, just as two enormous towers of water erupt from the cannons and form a massive tidal wave. I try to move my wings, but they are covered in thick ice, making it impossible to escape by flying.

I look at you. You look back at me. We both know what is about to come, but we will push it through the deep end.

Together.

You say that last order… “Blast Burn.”

Glaring defiantly at the tsunami, I gather all the firepower I have left in my body. Every single bit of energy I have left is sent right into my mouth. Then, I let it out.

Fire and water clash together in a glorious explosion of steam and scalding liquid, two mortal enemies trying to win against each other.

My rival and I are caught in the chaos. But out of both, I took it worse.

With no energy in my body, I hit the ground. I feel numb, my sight is starting to darken.

I can hear you calling me by my name. The name you have given me when we first met.

You lift my head and look at me. I can mostly see you as a shadow now, but the gleam in your eyes is unmistakable.

You beg me. Implore me to not go. To hang in there. To stay with you. But this is a promise I cannot fulfill.

I’ve failed you, my friend.

My flame goes out.

I’m really sorry.

Spoiler: Comments

I've decided to humor you, @Snuggle Tier List, and edited the OP so that it will be dedicated to links and summaries of my oneshots. Also, behold the new fancy mini-banner!

I appreciate your brief feedback and I hope I'll be able to work better on my content/word ratio. I'll certainly give my best with future oneshots.

 

[Snuggle Tier List]

For some reason, I feel very humorous. Must be the pollen.

Since I'm so humorous today, I'd figure I'd humor you with an I.O.U. for a Last Mon Standing deep dive. And by "today", I mean 9:15 PM Eastern Standard Time and I gotta wake up 6:30 tomorrow. Review's next on my todo list; bug me about it if you don't hear from me over the next couple days.

Oh, and that banner is awesome.

 

[Snuggle Tier List]

Time to pay off that I.O.U. Normally, I use a template where a divide a fic into Image and Substance, but my previous comments have already covered the "Image". So I'm skipping straight to...

Substance
Bits and bobs I personally believe do affect the quality of your work, but not necessarily how it's perceived​

Implication
You're explicitly writing to "optimize your word count", so that's where I'm going to focus this review. First up; words that've already been implied.

This, to me, seems to be the biggest drain on your word bank. Take the opening paragraph:

Thousands of unknown faces are staring at us, looking from every single corner of the stadium. Roaring, screaming, cheering, waiting to see who will win this fight.

The words I underlined I believe can be safely cut. That's because a roaring, screaming, cheering crowd in a packed stadium are already implied to be anticipating or enthralled. So once the reader sees this is a Pokémon battle, they'll know by implication why the crowd's excited.

Stressors
Feels like low-hanging fruit quoting the opening paragraph. Let's use the ending:

My flame goes out.

I’m really sorry.

"Really" is a stressor. It's a word used to add weight. But that weight is already there. Charizard just died; they don't need to stress anything. If anything, by using a stressor, Charizard comes off as low-confidence, as if they don't believe their trainer will understand the moment's gravitas. And that, in turn, clashed with Charizard's will-literally-die-for-you personality. And since it's unnecessary, it lets you chop another word away.

Context
Let's flip it around. One of the dangers of lowering wordcount is leaving your audience uninformed. I think the action opener was necessary due to this fic's enforced short length, but I never felt like I understood the fic's stakes, the greater context.

For instance; the rival. Why are they the rival? Why is there a rivalry? What's it about? Knowing Pokémon and Nuzlocke tropes, the rival's probably responsible for the death of some of Charizard's comrades. But I didn't get that feeling from the fic itself. No "fallen comrades" were named or given personalities, which makes Charizard's determination hard to empathize with.

What I'd love to see for a brief fic like this is a fake-out opening. Name every Pokémon lost to the rival. Don't mention they're dead, but give them each a sentence or two describing their personalities in the present tense. Then, bluntly: "They're dead. Our rival killed them." It'd take some words, but it'd let you cut mid-battle exposition and immediately establish emotional stakes.

Closing Thoughts​

If this review comes off negative, it's because I'm overcompensating for my own "experiment" bias. You're intentionally publishing for self improvement, because you want to learn, and that makes me smile. It takes courage. I enjoyed Last Mon Standing not because of its content, but because I enjoy seeing authors experiment. Even when it fails, it's easily one of if not the fastest way to improve. And when it succeeds, it's original and unexpected and can further the medium. So hat's off to you, @Cresselia92. I want to read more.