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world-without-authors · 4 years ago

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15th anniversary of our madness!

Yes, you read that right. Today, April 13th 2021, marks the 15th anniversary of when I was crazy enough to bring out the idea of a crazy roundrobin crossover on the Moony Witcher Forum.

When on that day, April 13th 2006, I made a post with the general idea for Mai Dire Fine I never thought I would be starting a saga that would be still ongoing 15 years later.

But here we are, with me and Aelit still working on its latest sequel of sorts, The World without Authors. Compared to back then, our writing skills improved a lot (Mai Dire Fine was not a good story) and, while there’s always more we can still learn, we are proud of our improvement.

So, where are we? We published recently the 10th chapter of The World without Authors, which is currently around 69.000 words – we’re already closing in towards Blank Sprite‘s length (77.000) and that’s just part of the first arc, Scattered Shards. Adding in the previous stories, we’re past 320.000 already.

Even with The World without Authors‘s “all-stars” cast, we still only have a total of five characters from Mai Dire Fine, only three of which (Sergio, Nikki and Kathleen) were part of the main cast as the other two (Faith and Virgilia) were introduced towards the end… well, technically there’s a sixth character, the mysterious “Professor”, but his identity is spoilers as of now. I believe there might be enough hints between The World without Authors and my older behind the scenes post for you to be able to guess his identity already, but the reveal is meant to be a nasty surprise that will set up the second and third arcs, Venezia Immortale and The Dove and the Crow. Yes, we’re planning (well… sort of planning) that far!

But enough of that, let’s head to the celebration specials!

Unfortunately, the Q&A session was a complete failure. We didn’t receive any question by the deadline, but the mailbox is still open! Feel free to ask us anything, we’ll make a Q&A post as soon as the question come in, and we’ll keep it updated every time new questions arrive.

We still have a few more goodies, though. The first is a bit of an experiment on my part, I took one of my early PPC missions, A Very Awkward Exorcism, alongside a couple scenes from the interlude set chronologically just before it, Planes, Guns, Clones and other usual PPC Stuff, and gave them a complete makeover into a comic. Yes, I made what I believe might be the first full PPC mission in comic form! You can download it in PDF format (Trigger warning for rape, contains some partial nudity) here. I hope you’ll enjoy it!

Another thing I made is a special anniversary illustration, in which our characters, and a few we borrowed, from all over our works enjoy some partying. With all the things happening due to the Unravel they deserve some off time, don’t you think?

Let’s start with the back row, left to right.

First one is Ai Minase, from Koikatu. She has the distinction of being the “adopted canon character” of The World Without Authors – while we have other canons working with Strike Dove, she’s the only one who became part of the main cast on a deep level. While Hayate Yagami, her crew, the Razgriz and Long Caster also work with my main cast, they’re more of external allies. Her dress looks a bit like a tablecloth, but that’s a canon-ish outfit of hers: while she never wears it in her route, it is in her character card in the slot that gets used during dates in normal gameplay.

Next to her we have Keiko Caterina Turbo, Sergio and Nikki’s daughter with her own PPC spinoff, Wings of Canon: Second Strike. She is also the only survivor of the Second Strike cast, having lost Shiro and Saki in the Unravel, and as such the role of representative of her series is all on her. She also doesn’t like skirts, at all, why do you ask?

Then we have Hajime Irene Turbo, Keiko’s half sister/alternate incarnation from the timeline in which Sergio got together with Ami instead. She’s an original The World without Authors character, but still related to characters from my previous works. Fun fact: Keiko and Hajome’s birthday, April 13, in indeed based on the day and month we began Mai Dire Fine. If we consider HQ Standard Time (the PPC’s timeline) to coincide with the real world, they turned two years old today.

Next is Hajime’s mother, Ami Tanegashima. Mentioned first in I don’t like luxury cars to pave her way for her posthumous role in Blank Sprite, we can consider her the representative of my Blank Sprite original characters here. She’s now stuck with the absurdity of not only having a daughter she never thought she could have, but also of said daughter being currently only four years younger than her. Considering Ami’s small frame, there will likely be plenty of times in which she’s mistaken for Hajime’s younger sister… also, now that she’s 20 years old and of drinking age in Japan, she discovered she actually likes alcohol. And can deal with it surprisingly well despite her light build (as opposed to Sergio and Nikki who both can’t hold their liquor)… yes, she had more than a few glasses here. Luckily, she doesn’t drink very often.

Toasting with her is Aya Kibokami, the “fragment” that split off Madoka Kaname at the end of Blank Sprite. As such, she’s here as a representative of canon characters of Blank Sprite. Due to a certain scene of Madoka Magica, in which Madoka expresses a desire to go out drinking with her mother (who really enjoys drinking) once old enough, there is fanon of her eventually developing the same taste for liquor. While we’ll likely never know if the canon Madoka would, Aya is the other heavy drinker of my cast and here is depicted finally having a toast (or two… or a few…) with Ami to celebrate the success of their “Save Sergio and Homura from their spirals of self-destruction by making them defeat Vera and save Madoka together” master plan.

And, of course, fussing over Aya’s excessive drinking we have Kuroko Tenshimi, AKA the “split fragment” of Homura Akemi retaining the memories of the Blank Sprite Incident. While her and Aya haven’t featured yet, they did make it to the Unraveled World. However, I don’t plan on making them part of the main cast yet (in fact, I’m planning to reduce the amount of characters we’re following as the cast is getting too big), and I’m actually considering having them star in their own The World without Authors spinoff, but nothing set in stone yet. Oh, and fun fact about them, they did already have a bit of starring of their own as they were the hosts of the Third PPC HQ Hunger Games. How Nutmeg TV managed to get hold of them for that will forever remain a mistery.

Next, a character very few of you are likely to be familiar with. Nina De Nobili, the title character of the Nina, the child of the Sixth Moon book series. Acting as a representative of the Mai Dire Fine canon characters here, she’s been chosen since, as I said in the past, we started Mai Dire Fine on her author’s forum, and even received encouragement from her to keep writing at one point… despite the fact we were basically butchering her work. However, everyone has to begin somewhere, and Moony Witcher (real name Roberta Rizzo) knew that, so I’m glad she didn’t shoot down our hopes – I might not be here now with a 300.000+ words saga under my belt otherwise. Nina is not planned to reappear in the Unraveled Worlds, as she’s from a series intended for children that wouldn’t mesh well with our current plots.

The little guy sitting over the counter doing karaoke is Conan Edogawa from Detective Conan (anyone insisting on calling the series Case Closed can leave now). He’s again a canon character featured in Mai Dire Fine, but there are plans to involve him and some other characters of his series in the third arc. Also, as you can guess by Nina’s reaction, he’s a terrible, terrible singer.

Leaning on the couch we have Hiro Shirogane, our Gundam pilot. He’s a fully original character created for The World without Authors whose original concept was made by Aelit, although I was the one developing his backstory and relationship with Miksa. I admit that for a while we weren’t too sure about what to do with him, but I hope his current subplot will be enjoyable.

And now, the front row. Leftmost is Hanami, Nikki’s alternate from Kathleen’s alternate timeline (and as such a The World without Authors original). She’s been adopted by the Kinomotos (as she’s also an alternate of Sakura) and is now living with them. Something that debuted in this illustration are the glasses: those are her timeline’s Sergio, and she doesn’t actually have a need for eyesight correction. She had the lenses replaced with fake ones, and wears them due to them being one of the few things she has left of him, though they’re also a good way to differentiate herself from her “sisters”.

Then we have Sakura Kinomoto from Cardcaptor Sakura herself. If we go by name only, her first appearance in my works would be Mai Dire Fine, but that particular Sakura ended up becoming Nikki so it is safe to assume her first appearance was actually in the first mission of Wings of Canon, my main PPC spinoff, titled Don’t Forget The Canon, and she has been confirmed alive in the Unraveled World, in which she is now legally Nikki and Hanami’s younger sister. As in the comic I posted above, her hair is actually lighter than Nikki or Hanami’s as most CCS media have her with a light shade, but Nikki and Hanami both derive from the 1998 anime that had a darker brown as Sakura’s hair color.

Next to Sakura is Syaoran Li from the same series, who instead did appear as himself in Mai Dire Fine. He was badly OOC though, and if the The World without Authors incarnation of him does remember Sergio, things might a bit tense between them at first… though, hopefully, just until he gets explained that no, the “Sakura” Sergio was in love with was actualy Nikki and there’s no need to be jealous.

Then we get to Kathleen Leone. She is not the Mai Dire Fine incarnation of the character, but an alternate made for The World without Authors. Despite that, she started considering the main timeline Sergio as her own brother even before he had to kill her timeline’s, due to the latter’s descent into madness. We haven’t been able to give her much space until now, due to the action being mostly in the air, but that will change soon. I won’t spoiler anything, but Chapter 11 will be a big turning point in the story.

Of course, holding arms with her is Faith Leone, Everything I said about Kathleen applies about her too, as they’ve arrived in the Unraveled World together. We haven’t shown much on our plans to develop her so far, but trust us: we’re going to both fill in more of her bakcstory, and give her chances to shine soon.

Cutting the cake together we have Sergio Turbo and Nikki Cherryflower, both of which made their first appearances in Mai Dire Fine and appeared in all sequel works. For as much grief the Unraveled World is bringing them, it is arguable they’ve gained more than they have lost, as they’ve both got their families back thanks to it. Fun fact: their outfits are loosely based on the ones they wore during Chapter 7 of Blank Sprite.

Last but not least, Corolla. Introduced in Don’t Forget The Canon, she’s my most successful character. Defined by Aelit “Kathleen, but written well” way before we started working on The World without Authors, it isn’t a suprise they synergize so well together… much to Sergio and Nikki’s dismay. Here, is she more excited for the cake, or because they are cutting it together like it was a wedding cake? Probably both.

And that’s it, 15 years of writing, condensed in one image. We hope you’ll keep following us in the future!

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world-without-authors · 5 years ago

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The Vehicles of Wings of Canon: The Mysterious Stormer

Don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten about The World Without Authors, and neither has Aelit. However, as the ninth chapter is taking longer to write due to various Real Life impediments, I thought I could still throw you readers a bone with another behind-the-scenes snippet. And maybe even a little digital feelie.

The last chapter of Blank Sprite featured a car straight out of Mai Dire Fine, the Stormer. Before anyone asks no, it has nothing to do with the Land Rover concept car of nearly two decades ago. As in the chapter itself, the relevant car is “an old, red saloon of indiscernible model with a big rear wing and a yellow lightning bolt painted on each side”, with a spaceframe racing car chassis and a 900 horsepower Alfa Romeo Busso V6 which Sergio claims to have built himself when he was just 12 (and still as much of a Gary Stu as you can guess). It is all wheel drive, with power being transmitted by a sequential gearbox with seven gears. It’s a fairly big car, around five meters, that can seat five people comfortably (well, for as much a race car with a license plate on it can be comfortable) though it often had to carry more as Sergio was the only one capable of driving in the Mai Dire Fine core cast.

The car also features Molecular Bonded Shell from the Knight Rider continuum (the thing that makes KITT bulletproof and almost indestructable), as show in the last chapter of Blank Sprite when Vera’s MAC-10s failed to have any effect on it.

But the most insane feature of the car, not used in Blank Sprite, is the twin retractable turbofans. Housed in bays between the rear wheel wells and the rear lights, they can give the Stormer a huge boost in speed for a limited time (I think I recall claiming that their fuel tank, separate from the car’s main one, holds enough jet fuel for about five minutes of use). In Mai Dire Fine I claimed the boosted speed topped out at around 500 kph, so you can guess why Sergio wasn’t keen on using them when the Stormer is already much faster than Vera’s Porsche Carrera GT as it is. It goes without saying that the car is pretty much (by Sergio’s own admission) a Suvian artifact all in itself, though it is interesting that cars from Future GPX Cyber Formula feature similar boost systems and consistently outperform the Stormer – if I were to make a racing arc featuring Cyber Formulas it would require some in-universe rework to be actually able to keep up even with the like of the Asurada GSX and Superion GT from the first season.

As a completely fictional vehicle, for a while the only thing that existed about it was a drawing I made when I was (guess it!) 12 years old.

Notice a few things. First of all, Stormer wasn’t the original name – it was originally meant to be called R4 THS (Turbo High Speed), but I liked so much how it turned out that I made it into Sergio’s own car, and so changed its name into something that soulded cooler. “ST” was the fictional car brand I used for my designs at the time, while STV literally means “Sergio Turbo Version” to denote that it is his car.

Then the data specs. They came out a bit cut in the photo, but while I always meant the car to have a 3.0 V6 (it being a heavily tuned Busso was something I decided only later while writing Blank Sprite), as I drew it I meant it to have a staggering 1200 horsepower and to be able to reach 450 kph. The already ridicolous canon version, with 600 horsepower for 350 kph in the first arc of Mai Dire Fine and 900 hp for 400 kph top speed afterwards, is already a step down in my insanity!

I eventually reskinned a mod of a Maserati Quattroporte for Re-Volt (a videogame about RC cars released in 1999) to make a more “physical” and driveable Stormer. While not a proper car, it did allow me to make screenshots of the car to post on Mai Dire Fine‘s blog and satiated my desire to actually drive it somewhere.

But no, the car for Re-Volt is not the “feelie” I was talking about. Mostly because I edited someone else’s mod for my own use, and I have no idea if the original author of the car is even around in Re-Volt communities to ask for permission to release this. It has been a long time.

However, there is a game (or, rather, a combination of games) that allowed me to recreate the Stormer with a level of accuracy never seen before. Automation, a game centered in making your own car company, that allows you to design your own cars with a high degree of freedom. While it doesn’t feature the ability to drive the cars in the game itself, it has an export feature that allows them to be used as mods in BeamNG. And this is the result.

The Stormer, in all of its reality-breaking glory! In the end, I went for a mix of features of the original drawing and the Re-Volt mod. Sadly, it’s lacking the stripe on the side as I haven’t found a way to reliably do that yet.

Note the panel between the lights and the wheel arch. That’s one of the turbofan bays. Of course, it is only a dummy feature in the model – actual retractable turbofans are something that Automation is sadly unable to do, and while it could be doable in Beam it requires modding and 3D modeling skills I don’t have. Also, no tow hitch at the rear – it was fairly pointless in the first place.

It does feature an interior, though. It is only a recent addition to Automation and is mostly relying on mod fixtures to do the job, but it allows me to show you roughly how that car is on the inside as well. Which is… rather plain really. The Stormer was always meant as all go and no show.

And also features an actual spaceframe chassis.

The engine is, as I said, derived from a 3.0 liter Busso V6 and so I used the bore and stroke of said engine as a reference. While canonically the Stormer’s engine features also a supercharger for low RPM, in Automation I was only able to put the twin turbos on it, but I still managed to get 943 horsepower, actually a little bit more than the official Mai Dire Fine figure (918). It has 792 Nm of torque, but the redline is slightly lower than the one of Mai Dire Fine at 10500 RPM instead of 12000. It doesn’t quite break the 400 kph mark either, reaching “only” 392 on a flat even surface. However, its accelleration is way better than I ever claimed: even for the latest official version I claimed a 3.5 seconds for the 0-to-100, but in Beam it actually managed an impressive 2.9 seconds.

Car is running on 245/40 R17 tyres at the front and 305/35R17 at the rear, necessary to drop down all the power through a 30/70 torque split. Weirdly enough, it is around 1485 kg according to Automation but only 1352 in BeamNG – make of that what you will. The latter figure, while fairly unrealistic, is closer to what I used to claim in Mai Dire Fine though (1300 kg).

Handling is where the Automation/BeamNG version differ the most – deliberately. The Stormer as described in my works is “Oversteer. Lots of it. All the time.” Basically, undriveable for everyone aside Sergio and maybe a few extremely talented race car drivers – and that everyone includes me. So I decided to give it a tamer handling model – it actually tends to understeer during braking, instead of going into full on oversteer mode. You can still experience the “tail out then power-over” type of drift Sergio performed while entering the highway with a bit of handbrake, though, and I find the “tame” version of the Stormer is well controllable that way as well.

So, if you have BeamNG Drive, or are planning to get it (it’s good, but it kinda requires a beefy PC to run nicely), here it is. You can finally experience my insanity first-hand by downloading it here.

#blank sprite #world without authors

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world-without-authors · 5 years ago

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The Vehicles of Wings of Canon: Planes

As you’ve like noticed, the current arc of The World Without Authors has a lot of focus on aerial dogfighting. As my fellow cowrite Aelit, my beta reader Doctorlit, and most of my readers (so pretty much everyone) aren’t much knowledgeable about fighter jets, I thought this is a good time to add some infos about the planes featured in the story so far.

I will mostly give some background info and add photos of real world examples for context (where applicable), as for the boring technical stats there’s always Wikipedia, that does a better job than I’ll ever do!

MCDONNELL DOUGLAS F-4E PHANTOM II

An USAF F-4E in the light grey air superiority livery, which as you can see from Chapter 1’s illustrations is actually different from the Strike Dove one. Johnson’s plane was likely mothballed while in this livery, but during Vietnam War service it likely had the SEA green and tan camouflage.

The F-4 Phantom II is an old third generation fighter jet from the Vietnam War era. Designed as an interceptor, it also saw use as a fighter-bomber. More than 5,000 were built in the real world, and it still being used by some countries though mostly in a reconnaissance role. (As it was sort-of-mentioned in the last chapter, Japan still had F-4EJ and RF-4EJs in service as of 2014, and they still have a few F-4EJ now though the last squadron is expected to switch to F-35s soon.)

While not exactly the best in class manoeuvrability-wise, it had an incredible amount of thrust for the time and was heavily armed, being able to carry up to eight missiles or a dozen bombs. Earlier version didn’t feature an internal cannon, but from the F-4E they were equipped with a M61 Vulcan 20mm rotary cannon in the “chin”.

Normally, a F-4 requires a pilot and a Radar Inteception Officer, but Johnson’s F-4E received an avionics upgrade while being restored to combat-ready condition including AIM-120 compatibility (which USAF Phantoms never carried AFAIK but some Greek F-4Es did) which, being an active radar homing missile instead of a semi-active one like the AIM-7 usually carried by the Phantoms, means that the single F-4E converted to Strike Dove specifications is combat-wise a single seat fighter, and as such the rear seat is mostly a passenger seat now. As a former USAF aircraft, its tail code followed their standards with just the alterations needed to denote it being a Strike Dove aircraft now. its full code is DV SD 14 364, which denotes an aircraft stationed at Strike Dove’s headquarters (DV, an abbreviation which AFAIK isn’t used by any USAF air base or carrier), owned by Strike Dove Inc. (SD), commissioned in 2014 (14) and its serial number ending in 364. For practical reasons, though, it is mostly referred as DV 364 or Phantom 364.

As of Chapter 4, it further received modification with parts from its Ace Combat equivalent, allowing it to carry the ridiculous amount of ordinance the series is known for.

NORTHROP F-5F TIGER II

A F-5F of the Swiss Air Force. While a bit lighter, the livery is very similar to Strike Dove’s one.

The F-5F Tiger II is a light fighter also from the Vietnam War era, though it didn’t serve during that war (earlier variants of the F-5 were deployed there instead) and, in fact, alongside the F-5E single seater version never saw combat with the USAF.

The F variant is the dual seater conversion trainer for the E variant, and as such it features flight controls for both occupants, usually a student pilot in front and an instructor in the back. As Johnson was planning to build up a fleet of F-5Es for Strike Dove, the single F-5F was meant to train new Strike Dove pilots on how to operate Tiger IIs.

All F-5 variants have a fairly limited ordinance carrying capacity, something slightly mitigated by the addition of wingtip rails for AIM-9 missiles in the E and F variants. On top of that, in order to make space for the avionics displaced by the second seat the the F-5F had to sacrifice one of the M39 20mm cannons and most of the ammo storage for the other, leaving it with only 140 rounds (and causing Sergio to run out of ammo in Chapter 2).

Like the Phantom, Strike Dove’s Tiger II received Ace Combat-verse pylons and equipment in Chapter 4 somewhat improving its capabilities, but after the rescue of Nikki and Razgriz Squadron it got relegated to second line as Strike Dove and its allies got hold of better aircraft.

The F-5F in Strike Dove service has tail code DV SD 14 027, usually abbreviated in DV 027.

GRUMMAN F-14A TOMCAT

A F-14A Tomcat. Even by today’s standards, it is a very sleek aircraft.

The F-14A Tomcat is a carrier-based interceptor fighter designed for the US Navy in the late 60s and early 70s. It had barely entered service by the end of the Vietnam War, with its first aerial kills coming only in later incidents.

The aircraft was in service in the US Navy and is apparently is still in service today in Iran. As the two countries are pretty much sworn enemies now, this led to the fact that all surviving US aircraft are in permanently non-flyable conditions in museums as the US armed forces went through the trouble of shredding everything else related to the aircraft to simply force the Iranians to run out of spare parts for theirs.

Kind of a shame, for such an iconic and good-looking aircraft, but luckily that’s not the case in the Ace Combat universe, where it is built by different manifacturers and is in service with… well, pretty much every single air force in that world really. The most notable users are Wardog Squadron and its successor Razgriz Squadron, pilots from which feature as part of the extended cast of The World Without Authors, and so four Tomcats are with Strike Dove and the Wolfram now: airframes KT 007, KT 024 and KT 221 from Razgriz Squadron (flown by Nagase, Grimm and Snow) and airframe NZ 016 from Wardog Squadron (technically Blaze’s, but now flown by Davenport)

Tomcats are two seater jets, with a pilot in front and a RIO in the back, but the games never mention Wardog or Razgriz RIOs (as, depending on player choice, they could be flying anything between a single seat fighter to a four seat EA-6B Prowler), so I skated the issue by having all of them coming from situations in which it could be acceptable for the rear seat to be unoccupied, even finding a way of filling the plothole of the poor sod in Davenport’s back seat not being mentioned at all during the Journey Home mission.

We can assume that by the time Razgriz Squadron becomes a Strike Dove unit their planes were either fitted with a way to use their weaponry without a RIO, only fitted with ordinance that didn’t require one, or some people from the Wolfram and/or survivors from the Kumaneko were hastly trained to be their RIOs. The Razgriz planes retained their tailcodes, but Davenport’s has been resprayed in Razgriz livery and the tailcode changed into KT 008.

One last note, the F-14 was the main inspiration for the VF-1 Valkyrie from the Macross series, which will likely feature in the future.

LOCKHEED MARTIN F-22A RAPTOR

An USAF F-22A. In the real world, Raptors are only fielded by the Unites States due to a strict sales ban to protect the aicraft’s classified parts.

The F-22A Raptor is the current air superiority fighter of the USAF. It is the first aircraft of this type to be designed from the ground up as a stealth aircraft, and as such can carry most of its ordinance in internal bays.

Sergio commandeered one for his own use during a PPC mission, which remained in Corolla’s possession after his retirement but, luckily for him, she brought it along during the Unravel. As Strike Dove doesn’t have any other aircraft of this design, the Raptor can be considered to be Sergio’s signature aircraft. Something that already led Belkan pilots to be wary of the “Raptor with the white bird on the tail”.

Sergio’s Raptor came from an Ace Combat badfic, and as such it is already equipped with whatever allows the Ace Combat aircraft to carry dozens of missiles. It was originally fielded in a badfic copy of Heierlark Air Base (called Hierlark Air Base in the fic), and as such carried tailcode HK 032. After the repaint mentioned in Chapter 7, however, it received Strike Dove tailcode DV 001. As it was officially commissioned in Strike Dove after the Unravel, while Strike Dove doesn’t have an actual headquarter and people come from different years, the airbase and year markers were dropped, with DV becoming the identification code for Skystreaker Squadron as a way to pay respect to the Strike Dove personnel lost in the Unravel.

FB-22C SILENT RAPTOR

Corolla’s FB-22C, still with it old PPC markings.

The FB-22C Silent Raptor is a stealth strike aircraft Corolla made by modyfying a FB-22 Strike Raptor she claimed for herself during the same mission in which Sergio obtained his F-22A.

In the real world, the FB-22 Strike Raptor, a delta-winged derivative of the F-22A proposed for the strike bomber role, never left the drawing board, but it has been produced in limited quantities in the Ace Combat universe. Corolla modified the design by removing the vertical tails and revising the other control surfaces to compensate, sacrificing stability for better speed and stealth. (What did you expect from her, really?) thus obtaining her one-of-a-kind custom she christened the FB-22C Silent Raptor.

Like the regular Raptor, the Silent Raptor carries its ordinance internally, with a bigger main weapons bay than the Raptor (the proposed Strike Raptor was to carry thirty Small Diameter Bombs compared to the Raptor’s eight) and has a distinct advanage in speed and stealth, making it the fastest of the aircraft currently owned by Strike Dove.

The Silent Raptor originally carried the spurious tailcode PACS-0, which in Corolla’s mind was “PPC Air Command Squadron Zero”, but said squadron doesn’t officially exist in PPC records. Upon Corolla’s official switch to Strike Dove the tailcode was replaced with DV 003, reflecting her callsign Skystreaker 3 and leaving an open space in the numeration to allow Ami (Skystreaker 2) to claim DV 002 for her own aircraft in the future.

MITSUBISHI F-15J EAGLE

A F-15J from the Japan Air Self Defence Force, the sole user of the design

The F-15J is a variant of the McDonnell Douglas F-15C built by Mitsubishi for the JASDF. It is currently Japan’s air superiority fighter.

A F-15J in disrepair and originally slated for scrapping, airframe number 018, was assigned to Nikki during her brief stint as a Spare Squadron pilot. After her rescue, the aircraft was put in storage as DV 018. The tailcode was given only as a way to refer to the particular airframe on the ground, as it was deemed beyond repair by Corolla. The cockpit area is being converted into a simulator, while the rest is being dismantled in the hope some of its parts are still in decent enough condition to be overhauled as spares for the other Eagles in Strike Dove service.

MCDONNELL DOUGLAS F-15S/MTD

The sole F-15 STOL/MTD, with the engine configuation as featured in the Ace Combat games. The real aircraft was eventually fitted with round 3D thrust vectoring nozzles.

The F-15S/MTD is a development variant of the F-15 Eagle fitted with canards and thrust vectoring nozzles. While only one was built in real life, in the Ace Combat universe the design saw service with the Osean and Belkan air forces. The design never went in full adoption, with fielded examples retaining the instrumentation probe of the test variant.

Having been converted from a conversion trainer F-15B in real life, I’m not sure what the backseaters of the F-15S/MTDs actually do in Ace Combat – the F-15C and J air superiority versions are single seaters, and the F-15S/MTD is more geared towards being an air superiority fighter too. I guess it could be for a Weapon System Officer for strike missions, as the F-15E does have a seat for a WSO in the back. However, most of the functions of a WSO are done by the AWACS aircraft in Ace Combat-style warfare, so I guess the backseat of Strike Dove’s Eagles will be empty more often than not.

It has improved maneverability over the regulat F-15 variants, making it a favourite of several ace squadrons, and also earning Nikki’s appreciation after Strike Dove captured several Belkan Air Force ones.

Strike Dove currently has eleven F-15S/MTDs, but plans are to convert as many of them as possible to F-15J+ Kai Eagle Plus specs. So far, the only one I’ve confirmed the tail code for is the one Ami flew in Chapter 7, DV 005.

F-15J KAI EAGLE PLUS

A really nicely made scale model of an Eagle Plus.

The F-15J Kai Eagle Plus is a fictional upgrade of the F-15J that featured in Patlabor. With its enlarged control surfaces and F-22A Raptor-style thrust vectoring nozzles, the Eagle Plus looks like an improved S/MTD and I decided to consider it as such. I really like its design, and I decided to use its obscurity as a way to give Strike Dove a distinctive fighter for at least part of the Unravel arc.

Strike Dove currently owns two, captured from a Belkan Air Force base that had in turn captured them somewhere else. One was partially dismantled by the Belkans for study and is being reassembled, while the other has been already pressed into service with tail code DV 006, and is the one Nikki flew in Chapter 7.

Corolla has plans to convert the F-15S/MTDs to Eagle Plus specs, though it won’t be a perfect conversion as the Eagle Plus is a single seater while the S/MTD is a two seater. It is likely that a F-15DJ Kai Eagle Plus conversion trainer existed in the Patlabor universe, but again as I don’t know if the rear seat of the S/MTD had controls in the Ace Combat universe so that might not be a correct designation for it either. I guess I’ll come up with something once the converted planes start rolling out…

SUKHOI SU-47 BERKUT

The Su-47 demonstrator during an air show.

The Su-47 Berkut is, like the F-15S/MTD, an aircraft built only for development purposed in the real world that has been adapted as a fighter in the Ace Combat games. Known for its distinctive forward-swept wings, as per its fictional depictions it is a very agile aircraft and among the favourites of Ashley “Grabacr” Bernitz, who flew it during the Belkan War.

Technically, his squadron should’ve been equpped with S-32s, a fictional variant based on earlier development designs, as they were the aircraft they flew in the last mission of Ace Combat 5. However, the S-32 is obscure even by Ace Combat standards, having featured only in that game and the ones for hand-held consoles, so I don’t think it is much of a stretch to think Bernitz and the newly reformed Grabacr Squadron simply couldn’t get their hands on more S-32s and actually had to make do with the similar and easier to obtain Su-47 (which, again it is a design he actually flew)

TYPE II GADGET DRONE

A squadron of five Type II Gadget Drones. I’m sorry for the low quality, but there’s very few images of them around.

The Type II Gadget Drone is an autonomous combat drone that featured in Mahou Shoujo Lyrical Nanoha StrikerS. While other Gadget Drones do feature some flying ability, the Type II is the only one that can be considered a proper aircraft.

Its armament consists in missiles and one oversized laser cannon under each wing. Combined with its plausible flying wing design, 444th Air Base’s higher command had no reason to suspect it was any different from aerial weapons that already existed in their world, leading to Spare Squadron getting slaughtered by them.

MIKOYAN-GUREVICH MIG-21

A MiG-21 in Soviet livery. It has seen better days.

The MiG-21, NATO reporting name “Fishbed”, is a Vietnam War era light fighter developed by the Soviet Union. While it was a sizeable threat back then, nowadays is a very obsolete aircraft that in the Ace Combat games is used as cannon fodder for the player in the early missions.

The ones featured in Chapter 7 were actually old airframes converted into drones with a flight control system reverse-engineerd from the Type II Gadget Drones to be used as disposable decoy fighters in big numbers to distract the JASDF and make them waste planes and ordinance before the real attack force sneaked in.

BM-335 LINDWURM

Fitting for its origin as a Belkan plane, the Bm-335 does look like something out of WWII Germany.

The Bm-335 Lindwurm is a Belkan bomber from the Ace Combat universe. It is a very old design, having entered service in the 50s, with a distinctive double fuselage necessary to house both its oversized night bombing radar and the similarly oversized nuclear bombs of the era.

An outdated design by the Belkan War in 1995, it was infamously used by the Belkan Air Force during the self-bombing of the Waldreich Mountains, in which seven nuclear bombs were detonated in Belkan soil.

As Belkan forces had more advanced aircraft available even in the world that formed after the Unravel, several Bm-335s were outfitted with the flight control system reverse-engineered from Type II Gadget Drones to act as a decoy disposable bomber force.

NORTHROP GRUMMAN B-2A SPIRIT

A B-2A Spirit. Note how it is individually named like a ship – not surprising, since they’re worth more than their weight in gold and only 21 were made.

The B-2A Spirit is a stealth bomber developed for the USAF. In the Ace Combat universe, Belka fielded several of them, and the two B-2A pilots featured in Chapter 7, Vulkan and Felsen, are actual pilots from Ace Combat 0. Presumably, the versions of them featured in the story are from before they defected to A World With No Boundaries.

During the failed attack on Tokyo in Chapter 7, B-2As were used as the actual bombing force, escorted by Sukhoi Sv-51s. Both aircraft featured strealth and radar jamming equipment, and were supposed to sneak by thanks to the confusion caused by the decoy drone MiG-21s and Bm-335s, but were discovered and either shot down or forced to retreat.

SUKHOI-IAI-DORNIER SV-51

A scale model of the Sv-51 in fighter mode.

The Sv-51 is the first Variable Fighter design to appear in World Without Authors (if you discount the static appearance of VF-25s and VF-31s), flown by Svafnir Squadron to escort two B-2As.

A very early Variable Fighter design, it was developed in the Macross universe by Anti-UN forces in the early 2000s, and as such doesn’t have some of the iconic features of Variable Fighters like thermonuclear turbines. While fairly obsolete by Macross standards, it is still a cutting edge machine compared to modern conventional fighter designs thanks to its three-modes trnasformation system and superior agility and engine power.

As no reporting name or nickname was ever given for it in the Macross shows, I took the liberty of having the NATO forces in the leftover world give it the reporting name “Flapper” inspired by how the wings fold up when changing modes.

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world-without-authors · 5 years ago

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Some More Extra Content

For those wondering where the new chapter is, don’t worry, it is in the works. Unfortunately, Aelit is having some job-related time constraints and so we’re working a bit slower than usual.

This doesn’t mean I’ve been slacking off in the meanwhile, though. I’ve got some extra content for you guys and gals to enjoy!

First one, a sorry attempt at an anime ending-styled cinematic for Blank Sprite. Very basic, but I hope it is enjoyable.

youtube

The song is Amalee’s English cover of Rain from Fullmetal Alchemist, the original can be found here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ALpbkbuxXo). If you like the song, please support her by buying it!

Also, you might notice some oddities in the video. Let’s go behind the scene and explain them, shall we?

0:22 – The false memory of Sergio mercy-killing Kathleen. I deliberately used a off-looking color palette, and it’s technically the third different variant of the scene – in Chapter 1 there was rain, and in Chapter 13 Sergio claimed it was indoors instead.While initially an oversight on my part (I wanted to replicate the Chapter 1 version), I feel it does fit as we’re talking about something incoherent Sergio’s mind made up.

“Will I ever find peace?” “… Depends on your definition of “peace”. But she’ll be back, don’t worry.”

0:49 – Why I’m not showing the door gunner’s face? Laziness on my part. I actually reused the 3D model of Sergio with the flight suit from The World Without Authors. I mean, I could technically use one of the game’s base characters and put the suit on him instead, allowing for the face to be shown, but this was faster since the focus was on Sergio anyways.

Nikki as she appeared in the scene at 0:58, and in the photo Sergio was holding a few scenes earlier. This is actually how she appeared in September 2007 HST, with the slightly longer hair compared to Sakura’s as per the flashbacks in Blank Sprite’s Chapter 14.

0:58 – Nikki’s appearance is technically wrong in this scene – Pyro’s death was in January 2007 HST, so she would’ve still looked exactly like Sakura Kinomoto from Cardcaptor Sakura here. While the clothing would be a passable difference and the wand is simbly the closest thing to Sakura’s Star Wand present in Koikatu and its modpacks, she still had Sakura’s bobcut at the time. Also, Nina de Nobili from Nina, the child of the Sixth Moon was also present in the original Mai Dire Fine scene, but i decided to omi her. These differences were deliberate, as I wanted to avoid including copyright-protected characters in the video. (And did save me the hassle of making Nina’s 3D model myself) 1:13 – I did a terrible job at posing Ami’s hands. I know. But, at least, I was as accurate as possible with the game – I gave her a Xbox 360 controller, and the game on the screen is Ace Combat 6: Fires of Liberation, the one on that console. 1:54 – Yes, Faith and Kathleen have the same exact clothes throughout, and they’re the same as their introduction in The World Without Authors. More laziness on my part. (And, besides, I would need Aelit’s feedback for new sets, and he doesn’t really have the time at the moment to put up with more of my shenanigans) 2:13 – Sergio’s rifle isn’t accurate. He owns a dark grey Beretta ARX-160A2 by Blank Sprite, but the one in the video is a tan FN SCAR-H with a 5.56mm STANAG magazine jammed in. I had to make do with what was available in the modpacks for Koikatu‘s Chara Studio. 2:22 – Technically, this is a scene that never happened, but it’s a nice condensed way to show Nikki and Corolla’s attitude towards Sergio’s problems. They’ll be there for him, always. 2:37 – The magic circle of the Round Shield isn’t a Mid-Childan one, but again: I had to make do with what I could find. If anything, it does resemble Sakura’s one, so take that as a nod to Nikki’s origins. Also, Vanguard’s energy blade is also the wrong color. I can change it, but I only realized the mistake now.

As per the World Without Authors content, here some data about the only vehicle so far for which finding a reference is impossible: the CMS-001KHT Wave Gundam, the Mobile Suit Keiko and Hajime stole to get out of the collapsing PPC HQ.

Please forgive me for the shoddy paint job, this is one of the first Gundam models I made, based on a Mega Shiki, which I “recycled” for my story. Funnily enough, Keiko was always the “template” for this, it’s original designation being MSN-00100KT, with KT obviously standing for “Keiko Turbo”.

The change in name comes from the fact that now it is a Mobile Suit developed by Corolla (so CMS), 001 being the first such model, and KHT stands officially for Kinetic Handling Trainer (but it does also add Hajime’s initial), as Corolla modified a MSN-00100 Hyaku Shiki captured by the PPC as a training unit for PPC pilots (hence the dual seating arrangement). As such, it uses a small, simple beam rifle but is outfitted with additional thrusters on the back to allow the suit to meanuver on pretty much any kind of environment (ground, air, space, and the back lower thrusters can actually double as underwater jet thrusters)

Obviously, as the PPC isn’t exactly into giving its agents lots of training, I suspect that in the main PPC timeline it ended up being used in the field more than for its intended purpose – having two seats makes it perfect to send in an agent duo with a single Mobile Suit.

As for powerplant, it uses what Corolla dubbed the “Minotaur Drive System”, basically the Hyaku Shiki’s Minovsky Reactor doesn’t power the suit directly, but is used to provide the electricity needed for the suit’s GN Tau drives (hidden inside the backpack). This “cascaded drives” layout basically allows for the suit to use the powerful GN Tau drives without the drawback of having to rely on short-lived onboard batteries. While it still can’t rival a true GN drive in output, this solution does fix one of the GN Tau’s drawbacks while providing higher output than the Minovsky Reactor alone. (As per why it wasn’t thought of in canon, well Minovsky Reactors and GN Tau drives actually come from different Gundam continuities)

As per the control system, while there is still a full complement of regular Mobile Suit controls Corolla added repurposed Neuro Linkers (from the Accel World continuum) as a way fro the pilot to interface directly with the suit and move it as if it was his or her own body. As such, I actually intend for Keiko and Hajime to take turns in controlling the suit depending on the situation – Keiko, as a Magical Girl, is better at maneuvering in the air, while Hajime, who was training to become a Strike Dove operative, is a better shot.

All in all, my idea was for the Wave Gundam to be a good, if a bit “cobbled together” multipurpose suit. It won’t defeat more advanced models like Hiro’s Destiny Gundam in a straight fight, but will definitely hold its own agains more mookish suits like Zakus, or early Variable Fighters like the SV-51s.

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world-without-authors · 5 years ago

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A Look at Our Main Cast

The World without Authors features a rather big cast, and losing track of people between chapters is quite easy. That’s why I thought that it is the right time to toss in some more information about the main cast, to help follow who’s who in this huge thing where giving enough space to everyone is always a difficult balance.

As such, I will be using this post to write some “behind the scenes” of my characters, and Aelit’s, which I hope will be useful for understanding them, or at least get up to date with the things that are told in my previous works and are important to understand them now. And, why not, learn some of the odd details about their creation.

Sergio Turbo

Birthday: October 27th, 1991 HST Age: 22 years old as of Unravel Height: 180 cm Blood type: 0

Sergio has been one of the main characters since the very first chapter of Mai Dire Fine, released April 13th, 2006.

At 14 years old in 2006 HST, he was one of the oldest characters in the Mai Dire Fine core cast, with only Kathleen and Pyro being older by just a few months. This, combined with his leader-like attitude and me being one of the more prolific authors, not only led to him becoming the de facto leader of the “Kids of the War”, but also led to some of the other writers taking time off the development of their own characters to give it to the Sergio-Sakura-Syaoran love triangle.

Said love triangle, by the way, was born due to me writing one particular scene badly. “Sakura” (actually, Nikki) had just died on a cursed treasure, and I overstated his reaction to her death to the point the other authors convinced themselves he had a crush on her… and, once “Sakura” was brought back to life, ran with it.

Sergio, circa 2007 HST, with his trademark red jacket and bandana.

So, yes. One of the driving forces of of my following stories wasn’t my idea, and wasn’t planned on my part at all. It is also interesting to note that, as per PPC convention, Sakura’s death and resurrection was so out of what’s allowed in CLAMP canon that what came out simply had to be a Character Replacement at that point – so, contrary to what he believed, he had never made the actual Sakura fall in love with him (assuming she was ever present in Mai Dire Fine, and wasn’t Nikki all along).

Sergio, circa 2011 HST, as a PPC agent.

Another interesting fact is that he was supposed to have a weaker “copy” of Kathleen’s power, passed on by her when he was still in his test tube because… well, she thought it was a fun idea. He only ever used them once subconsciously, and so much time has passed that said “copy” likely has worn off or athrophized to the point of being no longer usable. As such, anything out of the ordinary he does is either a result of the genetic manipulation Marcus did on him, the result of his skills honed in years of fighting, or a combination of both.

Nikki Cherryflower

Birthday: April 1st, 1994 HST Age: 20 years old as of Unravel Height: 168 cm Blood type: A

Since she was originally meant to be Sakura Kinomoto in Mai Dire Fine (in which her first appearance was in Chapter 3), Nikki didn’t get her own name until Planes, Guns, Gun, Clones and other usual PPC stuff, originally released five years later in 2011.

As I’ve already mentioned in another post, Nikki wasn’t originally meant to be the same individual as the Sakura of Mai Dire Fine, and was created at first with the simple idea of “let’s toss another Sakura at Sergio and have fun at his awkward reactions”. This is quite noticeable in her first mission, A Very Awkward Exorcism, where I still didn’t have a clear direction on how to develop her character. But that’s OK, she didn’t know what to make of herself either at the time.

Nikki, circa 2011 HST, as a PPC agent.

It wasn’t until I was already planning Blank Sprite that I merged the characters, after realizing that my failed Sakura was actually quite close in characterization to Nikki. This gave her a development arc focused on regaining her lost memories, and fits with the overall theme of rediscovery and acceptance of the past.

A still from the first Cardcaptor Sakura movie, which gives a pretty good approximation on how Nikki looked during Mai Dire Fine. Just pretend she’s on a vaporetto in Venice instead of Hong Kong.

Perhaps one of the things that made Mai Dire Fine‘s “Sakura” and Nikki so similar is the fact that I deliberately avoided rewatching Cardcaptor Sakura while writing Nikki’s first few appearances. I wanted to make sure I was developing Nikki freely, without copying Sakura or deliberately doing the opposite, but this probably caused me to subconsciouly draw from my earlier “Sakura” iteration and from other sources – in fact, I believe Nikki ended up being more similar to Ran Mouri from Detective Conan than to Sakura.

Corolla

Birthday: May 25th, 2010 HST Age: 4 years old as of Unravel Height: 140 cm (full size form), 30 cm (Unison Device form), 15 cm (“Fun size” Unison Device form) Blood type: N/A

Corolla was created in 2010 specifically for my Protector of the Plot Continuum works, and to be the opposite of Sergio: ditzy, unfocused, and incapable of staying serious for more than a few seconds at a time.

Her name, as per Lyrical Nanoha naming scheme, comes from the 1983 Toyota Corolla GT, the US market version of the Toyota Sprinter Trueno Sergio drives. I’m a big fan of that car (oddly enough, not due to Initial D: I actually am quite angry at that series for making it too popular… and expensive to get), but I never decided if Corolla took her name on Sergio’s suggestion or if it was her own idea.

I was a huge Lyrical Nanoha fan a the time, and decided to make her an Unison Device to take full advantage of what her tiny size and tecnomagical nature would entail in term of funny situations.

I kept developing her throroughly during my PPC works, adding more facets to her personality and turning her into the ditzy, mischievious genius with a heart of gold and an undying loyalty towards her friends everyone knows and loves.

Corolla’s early appearance between 2010 and 2011 HST.

While everyone nowadays knows her with light blue hair in pigtails, she wasn’t like that when I originally created her but used to have brown hair in a ponytail. Her current appearance was only introduced in Planes, Guns, Clones and other usual PPC stuff, where it was the result of her getting zapped by Grace Leon’s failed hologram projector. She took a liking to the color, and so never had her hair pigmentation fixed.

She also switched to pigtails as a way of enhancing her “genius ditz” image, and she actually makes her “idiot hair” forelock herself by using hair gel on some strands every morning.

Corolla has been defined “Best Character” by more than one of my readers (though I’m mostly looking at you, Huinesoron) and I wholeheartedly agree: while she doesn’t have literally anything in the way of a character arc, that’s perhaps what makes her such a fresh supporting character alongside her free and wild personality.

Ami Tanegashima/Ami Cappuccino

Birthday: December 28th, 1993 HST Age: 19/20 years old as of Unravel (depending on whether Ami Cappuccino or Ami Tanegashima is considered) Height: 150 cm Blood type: A

Ami was introduced posthumously in I don’t like luxury cars, specifically to build up her later role in Blank Sprite.

Her background, in particular the death of her parents during the 2007 Organization War, was designed to make her into someone Sergio could relate to: they both lost the people they held dear, and kept fighting to make sure their sacrifice wasn’t in vain.

That, combined with her kind and honest personality, managed to somewhat break into the wall Sergio was already building around himself… only for her death to put back every brick and then some.

The “confession” outfit. Cute, but fails at making her look more mature… in fact, it does quite the opposite.

Her short (at 150 cm, she’s the shortest of the human girls in my main cast) and cute appearance is a leftover of her original “ill girl” concept I recycled from another story I never wrote, but I think I’ve managed to turn it into somewhing to give her more characterization. She’s quite self-conscious about her height, and does make an effort to look more mature by, for example, being the only girl in the new Strike Dove to go for the pencil skirt variant of the dress uniform. However, she also loves cute things, as exemplified by her collection of plushies and the single pigtail she wears with her Barrier Jacket and wore in chapter 12 of Blank Sprite during her failed confession attempt.

I grew so attached to the character that I decided to take advantage of the chaos caused by the Unravel to bring her back through Ami Cappuccino: her self-insert from a fanfiction she wrote some time before her death. During the Unravel, Tanegashima’s soul and memories crashed into Cappuccino’s body and merged with those already there.

As Tanegashima based Cappuccino off herself, it was a rather quick process which incapacitated her for just half a day as her brain tried to to deal with the sudden doubled amount of conflicting memories, but I still feel like it help set the theme of cross-fictionality that I’m using for building up the leftover world canon and original characters found themselves in.

Ami’s early concept.

Another oddity about her is that I took a lot of time to finalize some details of her appearance: while “short and cute” was set in stone since the beginning, I only finalized her hair and eye color while I was already writing Blank Sprite. In fact, for most of the time I spent working on the main plot synopsis before starting to write the first chapter and until around chapter 5 or 6 I was leaning more towards brown hair and reddish brown eyes, and only switched to the other style (black hair and purple eyes) as I was writing chapter 7 to make her resemble Homura that little bit more and cause a flashback to Sergio.

In hindsight, though, I do think the final combination suits her more, so I’m happy I switched.

Caterina “Kathleen” Leone

Birthday: July 31st, 1991 HST Age: 17 years old as of Unravel Height: 163 cm Blood type: 0

Kathleen, like her brother, was first introduced in Mai Dire Fine. However, due to her author, Aelit, only joining the writing group when the story was already ongoing Kathleen was introduced fairly later compared to the other main characters of Mai Dire Fine.

The subplot of her being Sergio’s sister was also developed well after her introduction, and Aelit and I came up with the idea of making our characters Marcus’ offsprings independently.

We can sum up the exchange roughly this way:

“Hey, SergioTurbo, I had this great idea about Kathleen but it involves Marcus so I want your opinion first: what if she’s his daughter?” “Aelit, I… actually was going to make the same thing for Sergio.” “So, they’re actually brother and sister but they don’t know it? Cool!”

With a bit of rework (namely, Kathleen actually knowing about Sergio but feigning ignorance) we dropped it in, but this hastily thought plot development we made while writing a terrible fanfiction is going to finally be developed properly now, ten years later, as the arc in which we were using it is also the one we never finished.

Aelit’s Notes:

Like Sergio, Kathleen began her life as a self-insert. Her personality was based partly on mine and partly on what I wished mine to be. That said, when I made her I was in middle school, and that’s why her personality never stood the same for more than two chapters: every time I tried a new style or saw something cool, she would change accordingly. Now Kathleen is only a little part of me and mostly her own person. This is part of the reason why I wanted this Kathleen to be from a timeline different than Mai Dire Fine‘s one, I wanted a sharp break between the two.

Federica “Faith” Leone

Birthday: February 13th, 1988 HST Age: 21 years old as of Unravel Height: 172 cm Blood type: A

Faith was one of the last characters created for Mai Dire Fine. She was introduced only during the last arc and had very few appareances as a result.

As such, we had never really developed her personality much past “kind, polite and refined girl from a wealthy background”, which however came with the fact she was also an almost completely white canvas we could work on without having to deal with our past sorry attempts at making characterization.

We do have something to work on – her refined background, her skills as a sniper and especially her relationship with her cousin and lover Kathleen (Don’t look at me that way, Aelit’s idea here. And CLAMP did it before us anyways, look at Tomoyo. And Tomoyo’s mother.)

Part of her planned development will be actually inspired by all of this: she will realize that, having spent most of her life keeping Kathleen safe both from outside danger and her own wild and reckless antics, she’s not sure about what she actually wants for herself.

Aelit’s Notes

I made Faith at the time I started questioning my sexuality and originally her only purpose was to be the starcrossed lover of Kathleen who’d die not long after being reunited. A clichéd romantic tragedy brought forth by the mind of a typical emo teen. The idea was that she was to stay dead, but later I felt sorry for her, since she didn’t have the opportunity to evolve as a character, and like Sergio’s anticipated I’d like for her to realize she literally only lived for Kathleen and start being independent. As for the cousins part, I honestly don’t remember much but knowing myself I probably did it for the shock value… at the time I was naïve and didn’t know most fandoms have their fair share of incest ships. If only, the fact that they’re cousins and not sisters makes for a much milder ship than most in the Web.

SergioTurbo’s Note on Aelit’s Notes

If you compare what Aelit just said to what I’ve said in the past, you’ll notice that we remember differently about how we were planning to play out Faith’s death: I actually remember that her death was to be undone by the main group coming back to the present after the “trip to the future”. This goes a long way to show how badly coordinated we were at the time, with people changing ideas or retconning things all the time.

Keiko Caterina Turbo

Birthday: April 13th, 2019 HST Age: 16 years old as of Unravel Height: 165 cm Blood type: 0

Sergio and Nikki’s daughter, Keiko was introduced in Youthful Indiscretion, a story I wrote with Desdendelle in 2016 which became the first of her own spinoff set in 2035 HST.

Of my characters, she’s the one who spent the most time in development limbo: a “daughter from the future” character was actually planned to be introduced in a later arc of Mai Dire Fine, though at the time it would’ve been another “serials filed off” character like Carol Liddell, with the stll unnamed daughter character being based off Nanoha Takamachi.

I think at the time I’ve briefly considered calling her Sara, being an Italian name that sounds pretty close to Sakura (as Nikki hadn’t “split off” from her at that point). As much as of a silly idea that is, it is actually the only Italian name I’ve ever considered for the character.

Keiko’s Magical Girl outfit. She wants it clear that it isn’t her design.

When I started working on her more seriously for a PPC context, I did briefly consider having her called after a canon character (Nanoha again), before scrapping that idea too. I wanted something more unique and used Akane as a placeholder, but I realized pretty soon that her parents would have chosen her name by looking at the meaning. And that’s where I found Keiko (“blessed/lucky child”) to be fitting: as her parents were the only survivors of the” Kids of the War”, and with everything they faced after, they believe Keiko is very lucky to have had the chance to exist.

Her second name, Caterina, is Kathleen’s legal first name. Sergio and Nikki decided to homage her as the “slap from behind the grave” she did to Sergio in Chapter 13 of Blank Sprite was one of the factors in Sergio regaining his lost confidence, and gaining the courage to finally face his past instead of running away from it.

Sergio and Nikki would’ve actually contemplated using Ami as a second name instead, if the actual Ami didn’t tell them not to. While I hadn’t come up with the idea for The World without Authors yet at the time, it would’ve indeed made things more awkward for her and Hajime.

Her parents wanted her to be able to live the normal childhood and teen years that they were denied themselves, but at the same time they let her make her own decisions. Even if they weren’t completely onboard with her becoming a Magical Girl first and a PPC agent later, they still supported her no matter what.

Which means that, somewhere in the multiverse, there was a world in which one of the top-ranking anime of 2032 was “Dream Guardian Wave Keiko”.

Hajime Irene Turbo

Birthday: April 13th, 2019 HST Age: 16 years old as of Unravel Height: 160 cm Blood type: A

Sergio and Ami’s daughter from an alternate timeline, Hajime was created specifically for The World withouth Authors, and is still somewhat work in progress as a character.

Despite being literally Keiko’s alternate timeline incarnation, they only really share a father: having different mothers and growing up in different continents made them into completely separate individuals.

Compared to Keiko, who had more of a “normal girl” life (Magical Girl shenanigans aside), Hajime grew up planning to become a Strike Dove operative like her parents – not unlike her mother herself did. As such, despite having a sweeter personality compared to Keiko, the more thorough survival training she had made her quicker to take practical decisions.

Like with Keiko, I decided that her name was to be a meaningful one for her parents: Hajime means “beginning”, symbolizing the beginning of a new life for the alternate universe versions of Sergio and Ami after all the fighting and losses caused by the 2007 Organization War.

Her second name, Irene, comes from Irene Johnson, Colonel Leroy Johnson’s daughter, Kathleen’s natural mother and Sergio’s genetical mother who disappeared in 1995 HST. It was mostly a thank you gesture by Sergio and Ami towards Leroy, who took care of Ami after her parents’ death and was the closest to a father figure Sergio ever had.

Ai Minase

Birthday: July 11th Age: 17 years old as of Unravel Height: 171 cm Blood type: 0

Ai is the only “proper” canon character in my core group, having been borrowed from Koikatu (the very same game I’m using to make illustrations due to my absolute lack of drawing skills).

I decided to use her as both her backstory as a troubled schoolgirl and origin in an H-game had a lot of storytelling potential in my setting, but a lot of it is spoilers so I’ll have to let you learn about her as the story proceeds.

One little interesting tidbit, though, is her height: as extrapolated from the game’s files, this cute, babyfaced girl is actually a lot taller than she looks. At 171 cm

Ai in her school uniform, the one she wears in Koikatu and in chapter 2 of The World without Authors.

she’s not only the tallest heroine in the game, she’s also the tallest of the Asian girls in my core cast (beating Nikki, who is already pretty tall for a Japanese girl, by three centimeters) and is the second tallest overall losing to Faith by only one centimeter. This actually led to some difficulties while making the “beach fanservice” illustration as she was the perfect victim for Corolla’s Super Soaker shenanigans, but with Corolla being the shortest at 140 cm it took a bit of fiddling to make the angle at which Corolla was firing her water gun look right.

#blank sprite #world without authors

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