Revised 26-Aug-2003
NOTE: This commentary is a companion piece to The Drums of Heaven. This commentary contains spoilers for chapters 20 through 23. If you've not read the story up to that point, it's recommended or you've just ruined your appetite by eating dessert first. Nyah.
Hilde: I think we should focus mostly on chapter 23.
Quatre: It seems a lot of readers had trouble with the exposition fairy.
Zefyr: Look, if I'd done it as dialogue, it would've taken me a chapter and a half just to get that out. Description takes up a lot of space, since I detest pages of dialogue that don't have something to tell you who's saying what.
Heero: You have this hang-up about business.
Wufei: Business?
Heero: It's when a character is talking, and they pause to sip a drink, light a cigarette, shrug... things like that.
Quatre: I think it's an important part. Helps me visualize.
Relena: Takes away from the dialogue, I think. A skillful writer should be able to have voices distinct enough that the constant reminder of who's speaker – outside the quotes – shouldn't be necessary.
Zefyr: Yeah, well, if I were a truly skillful writer, I'd be published.
Duo: As it is, you're just a mildly skillful writer who collects rejection slips.
Zefyr: And you wonder why you don't have a lemon. *sigh*
Heero: Duo, shut up while you're only mildly ahead.
Quatre: Ohhhhhkay, let's get back to the chapter. All the information we've gotten!
Hilde: I'm not sure I can keep track of all of it, and I'm one of the main characters.
Duo: Rat made a cheat sheet. Here's your copy.
Heero: What about mine?
Duo: Perfect characters don't need cheat sheets.
Heero: People who taunt perfect characters sleep alone.
Duo: Oh, look. I have an extra! Here ya go.
Wufei: So this whole thing was a Preventers mission.
Quatre: That's what it looks like.
Wufei: And Duo was the contact, because he was a former Sweeper.
Duo: Yup. And now a university student, but acting as contact.
Hilde: So Joe the really cool Rastafarian – who, incidentally, is about to get his picture done by CleverYoungThief –
Wufei: Is Joe a Rastafarian?
Relena: What do you mean?
Wufei: This is like assuming I must be Buddhist because I'm Chinese. Not all Jamaicans are Rastafarians.
Zefyr: This is true.
Wufei: Well?
Zefyr: Well what?
Wufei: Is he?
Zefyr: Sheesh. You are such the anal retentive character. Does it make any difference? By three hundred years in the future, will marijuana be replaced by synthetic substances? Will everyone follow Amsterdam's lead and make drugs legally controlled? Or will some of the now-popular religions even still exist? Joe might even be a snowboarding Zoroastrian.
Relena: Zoro..?
Heero: Zef's being theological again.
Zefyr: I'm going back to reading Naruto. Wake me when you're done.
Quatre: Cranky author.
Zefyr: Pffft.
Duo: What about my lemon?
Heero: Leave the author alone.
Duo: But I want---
Heero: Cranky author plus pestering character equals the chances of a lemon going downhill at an alarming rate.
Quatre: Back to the story! Where's Trowa?
Wufei: I think he's working on the laptop.
Trowa: I'm done. Here, look at this.
Quatre: It's a time line?
Trowa: For the story. June of After Colony 201, Joe went undercover. In December of that year, the mission was extended another six months.
Wufei: May of AC 202, Joe died, and Duo goes to Earth.
Hilde: To see Trowa.
Duo: No, to see Quatre.
Relena: Why did you two tell Heero that Duo had come specifically for Trowa?
Wufei: It's a mystery.
Heero: Then in June of AC 202, the shuttle is sabotaged, the Sweepers claim the loot, and Quatre goes to space to be the mediator.
Trowa: If you count backwards from when Heero got the messages from the hackers, this is also the same point when a track bot was uploaded with the message of 'use Zurich.'
Relena: And we still don't know what that means.
Heero: I'm betting it refers to the bank accounts that the hackers have found since then.
Hilde: What happened next?
Wufei: You forgot the four days around Lady Une's presentation to the Earth Sphere President.
Trowa: Right. Early June, Lady Une gives a short presentation to President Haune, who comes back with budget suggestions on which projects to end.
Heero: Normal course of affairs, in government, hospitals, and corporate. Everyone's always trying to cut back.
Trowa: As I was saying, Mr. Haune recommends project cuts, Lady Une disagrees only on Joe's project, and a day later Joe's ship is blown up.
Hilde: Major plot hole.
Duo: Wouldn't the syndicate be suspicious of Joe and his friends if they're the ones who blew up the shuttle?
Relena: Especially if it were such an obvious sabotage job?
Quatre: I don't know. The syndicate rumor was that Joe was believed to be selling information to the competition, right? So what if they think the ship was sabotaged as a way to warn the L2 syndicate?
Trowa: Wouldn't that usually call for retaliation of some sort?
Heero: Not if Joe was expendable.
Duo: Expendable! Geez.
Quatre: July and August of AC 202, the lines are quiet. No messages, no track bots, and nothing in Duo's story to indicate any action.
Hilde: But there's three track bots uploaded in September: 'Love you. Be safe.'
Relena: 'No interference.'
Trowa: And 'Starting here.'
Quatre: And we still don't know what those mean.
Relena: My bets are on the first one being from Quatre to Trowa.
Hilde: Awww.
Trowa: *cough* Moving along, in October – on the 3rd, actually – Heero was on earth, in Paris.
Quatre: And the remaining three messages all were uploaded after that meeting.
Relena: Over the next month, up to the day the bank account was opened – the day before Heero left for L2.
Wufei: We still don't have an explanation for that, either, do we.
Hilde: Y'know, this sucks. Next time I want Zefyr to write something that doesn't leave me with a headache.
Relena: I hear Meeting Beatrice is supposed to be a comedy.
Trowa: Really? Romantic comedy, parody, satire, or what?
Quatre: Romantic comeday.
Relena: What are the pairings?
Zefyr: Not saying.
Duo: Will you ever do a story where you tell the pairings?
Zefyr: I did for Creek.
Duo: That's because if you didn't have Kohaku and Chihiro getting together, everyone would have lynched you.
Heero: But Zef still did a number of fakes and switches to fool the audience in the meantime.
Duo: Look, do whatever you want, as long as I get a ---
Zefyr: Alright, already! You'll get one when it fits the story!
Heero: If no one's on the laptop, I'm going to go check email.
Hilde: What about the discussion?
Heero: Those two will be continuing The Great Lemon Debate for at least an hour.
Wufei: Hmph. In that case, I'm going back to Calic0cat's story.
Hilde: Xirtam should be ready with the next chapter on the Medieval Gundams by now...
Relena: I wonder if Kiya Sama's up for visitors tonight.
Quatre: I bet KatiKat's working on another drabble. Maybe if I take her some root beer...
Trowa: I'm going to see if CleverYoungThief needs my help with that Africa story.
Zefyr: Guys? Hey! Everyone?
Duo: Where did they go?
Zefyr: Sheesh. Well, then you an' me can share the ice cream.
Duo: With nuts?
Zefyr: Macadamia.
Duo: Now, if only it were lemon-flavored...
End Part 13
(:./sol/behind13)
