Great filk, but my favorite line of the chapter still has to be Jack quoting Douglas Adams, with his "...and thanks for all the fish"! :)
Comments from author:
And you just know that went over well with all the Europeans. :-)
Then there are the lines that I come up with that are too snarky even for Jack, or just won't fit in where I want. I may put one or two of them in Author's Notes eventually.
Review By [RevDorothyL] • Date [23 May 13] • Not Rated
Once again a fun read. Her youthful innocence and grim determination is an interesting combination. Hanna had the last words in the movie, how much will she say for herself here?
Comments from author:
Well, it won't be that much longer before she turns up.
The secret to being a miracle worker is setting people's expectations too low and it seems Jack is a master at that! I wonder if it wouldn't be best to fake Hanna's death so no-one will know she joins team Terrawatt? Or maybe Jack is thinking of something even sneaker!
Comments from author:
Jack is always thinking of something sneakier. :-) And in SG-1, every enemy (even the Earth ones) always underestimates Jack, despite his track record going back before the SGC.
Review By [Gideon] • Date [22 May 13] • Rating [10 out of 10]
They have good intel, good methodology and you have me on the edge of my seat as to how they'll find Hanna before the hit teams do. Maybe there's a public gymansium/spa between the city and the house where she could hide out? That's all I got.
Comments from author:
Well, fortunately you only have to wait until Saturday. In the meantime, you can practice singing "I'm Terawatt" in the shower (my son sings inappropriate songs in the shower and never remembers that it echoes through the whole house).
Review By [VillageOrchid] • Date [22 May 13] • Not Rated
Interesting thought... Could Alex take Hanna 'silvery' and remove the bullet?
edit: Actually, I would think a foreign object would be relatively easy. A tumor, being a biological perversion of the person's own biology would be significantly more difficult. Alex would have to probably do years of medical study to even consider attempting such a thing, whereas a lead bullet is a discrete object. On the other hand, what damage might it cause to remove the bullet from where it is lodged.
But yeah, that is exactly the kind of thing I was implying ;)
Comments from author:
Wow, that would be pretty amazing if she could. If she could do that, could she 'cure' cancers too? Just pull someone into her morph, pull out the tumor... Could she grab a felon and inject a tracer or a control package into his brain?
Okay, I'll admit it, she can't do that stuff. For in-story and meta-fictional reasons.
Review By [HMaxMarius] • Date [19 May 13] • Not Rated
Heh! I pity Alex. I mean, most superheroes already have trouble dealing with only two identities. Civilian and super. She already has three. Civilian teenager, military, and superheroin. She's bound to slip at some time. I hope Jack at least has thought something just in case.
And after having read all this story line so far, and even though you haven't killed anyone so far... i'm not putting it past you to let Hanna die from her injuries before they manage to help her. That's most likely very unlikely, but i still think you could do it to try and surprise us.
Comments from author:
You can never trust an author. I still can't believe JKR killed Dobby! And Remus and Tonks! Okay, Dobby's death developed her plot, but some of the deaths were just 'piling on'. (Okay, I really figured she would kill Ron and give Harry that 'I will avenge you!' moment. I figured Hermione was safe, because Hermione=JKR herself.)
Terrawatt needs to carry ziplock baggies. She could have stuffed one of those bloody bandages into it to give to Jack to hand over to the analysts... Even dried blood would give them information.
Comments from author:
The subject of utility belts *will* come up. But not for a few chapters yet.
Review By [HMaxMarius] • Date [18 May 13] • Not Rated
Looks like Jo must be augmented genetically as well if the opinion is she could defeat Hannah. Hannah who already defeated John Reese level people in a straight up fight. I wonder if either is at the Jason Bourne level of abilities? I also wonder how Harold Finch or Root would match up against Willow? That would be an interesting cross.
Comments from author:
Well, the opinion is that Jo (and Graham and Riley) all have years of serious combat and hand-to-hand training, and they think they can take Hanna. None of them have *faced* Hanna yet. They could be wrong.
Yeeeesss, more delicious Alex Mack. To celebrate this special occasion, I am going to write a medium-length review instead of a short one! If it's TL;DR the gist of it is "yay! more Alex Mack!".
Is the T-phone like the B-phone? With less bunnies and more terrawatts? Why is Willow repeating the achievements of the SRI agents? We've already read all of that. When I saw that the powers returning wasn't unique to Atron (possibly due to the many experiments she did on herself for the ultimate powerset, or her status as the current Big Bad Thing in the Dark) I started to wonder if Alex's mother would eventually turn into a crazy supervillain. I thought "nah, Diane wouldn't be that evil", but then I realized that actually yes, you would definitely be that evil with your* characters. And then relief upon learning that this sort of thing shouldn't happen. Unlike some people, Alex does occasionally catch a break.
> Get there a little before sunset, so you can look around inside near the front windows with using a light. Shouldn't that sentence end with "without using a light"?
> And what if they changed to something like Marissa Weigler’s beliefs, or Maggie Walsh’s beliefs? In that case, you're going to have to start shaving to groom your goatee correctly. It may not look like it, but it's a lot of work.
> In various places, she pushed a few filters and fanblades and a fancy filtration system out of her way, and she slipped out one of the big air intakes. I'm surprised at the lack of comments on the "yucky things" she probably has to push out of her way down there. Maybe it doesn't really bother her when she's silvery? Or she's just used to it by now?
> He had a nice little house that sort of reminded her of a fairy tale cottage. Personally, "nice" isn't the word I'd use. More like "creepy", to be honest.
> If it was Hanna who had done that, she was one tough girl. Alex wouldn’t have wanted to try to climb a drainpipe to a roof with a bullet hole in her. Oh, yes, of course. She would still have done it, but she wouldn't want to. Speaking of being "one tough girl", how does she thinks Hanna feels about battling fire-breathing dragons? Yeah ... (must resist urge to go back and re-re-read The League of Extraordinary Women)
> Alex took a couple pictures of the blood drips, That's good, it's too bad she didn't think to... > and even found a ruler and put it on the floor next to a couple of the spatter-y drips 0_0 She DID think to provide a reference! Wow, that's one smart teen. Is she a genius or something? Now that I think about it, given her family history that would not be even remotely surprising.
> [Alex's first big step for her Hermionne plan is to get her at the meeting ... and she warns her just a few minutes before it starts] Yeah, she's smart, but she's not perfect, she messes up regularly (and she learns from her mistakes too!). That's good. Relatable amazing** characters with humanizing flaws are one of the main draw of Diane Castle stories.
> It was just too bad she couldn’t have a swirling magic wind She could do that with Telekinisesis. > Ooh. She could do that with telekinesis! Smart girl ^.^ And yes, practice would be good, or else she risks landing straight in the uncanny valley. Definitely not the effect she wants there.
> She came down with her right leg slightly raised, which just looked better when she practiced and watched herself in a mirror. You already explained that earlier. Granted, that was some time ago. The repetition is deliberate?
The "we're not friends" trick? Sneaky! I like.
Flying away in the classic superman pose, wheeeeeeeeeee! Most likely just to sneak back inside ;)
* neither Alex Mack nor her mother belongs to Diane Castle. This is disclaimer. This warns you. ** usually amazingly smart, which is very hard to write well
Comments from author:
Yes, the Beard Of Evil is an essential trope. Unless all of your versions are evil (like Lex Luthor), in which case you get a pass.
And the number of really stupid 'supposedly smart' characters in fiction is clear evidence that writing a really intelligent supervillain (or just important character) is too hard for most writers. Shows like Star Trek and The Big Bang Theory bring in scientists just to make sure their dialogues sound right. Dickson's "The R-Master" is a good example of the problem: I was continually frustrated by how lame the 'super-genius' plans of the supposed super-genius characters were. A well-written, highly intelligent supervillain is really rare (examples: Dr. Diabolik, Helen Narbon). More commonly, it's an informed attribute. Doctor Doom must be a genius because he built a time machine! Only he uses it in a fundamentally stupid manner and fails to plan for the intervention of people he KNOWS are likely to intervene...
Review By [Zorgdub] • Date [18 May 13] • Not Rated
Looks like Terrawatt has found the best clue to Hanna's whereabouts but it is still a few days old. They will have to do better than that! Maybe they can now that Hermione is on board!
Comments from author:
Now they have some real info on what happened to Hanna. That's got to help.
Review By [Gideon] • Date [18 May 13] • Rating [8 out of 10]