![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
It's something of a bizarre feeling when, most of the way through a story, you realise that not only has one of the characters been lying to every other character in the story, they've also been lying to you, the writer. *grins sheepishly* Looking back along the story, it changes absolutely nothing, not one action or consequence, to realise his motivations, but it changes everything, turns the whole thing sideways, and I'm not sure how to feel about that. Heh. Weirdly betrayed, maybe, and also somewhat admiring. Heh.
Seriously. For most of the story he's this sad, adorable, hugely broken man that you spend the entire story wanting to save (or at least, I do, and half the other characters do), and then ... there's this one scene, and you just catch a glimpse of this proud little smile on his face, and I got slapped across the face with the realisation that there were people who needed saving in this story, but he wasn't one of them. Because sixteen years before this story started, he made a decision, and everything since then has been his long, incredibly silent war, and he's winning. He's the most helpless and restricted character in the story, and he's still managed to accomplish everything he set out to do.
I really can't decide whether to admire the hell out of him for this, or be horribly betrayed, because I liked the sweet, damaged, surprisingly innocent version of him that we see for most of the story. And ... it wasn't a lie, in some ways. But ... it also really, really was.
... I'm not usually stunned silly by one of my own characters. Usually, I see this kind of thing coming sometime before pretty much the end of the story. But this one ... he couldn't let anyone see until he'd won, and he's not the main mover of the story. The big wars, the big freedoms, the big forces, all of those belong to other characters. Everything he does appears to be a desperate scramble in the service of one character, and it is, but all of those tiny actions are part of a long and subtle campaign he's been waging for almost all his life. They're all innocent actions, all things he would have done anyway, for love of that one character, but there was intent behind them, and it's that that shocks you when you hit the end.
*blinks* I ... Usually, it's not my own characters that do this to me. *grins sheepishly* I honestly thought he was innocent, the whole way through. And then ... he kinda wasn't.
Huh. This is why I loving running the stories in my head. You don't think they're gonna entertain, or surprise, not when it's you who's making them up, but then ... they kinda do. *grins* They go places that even surprise the writer. Heh.
Seriously. For most of the story he's this sad, adorable, hugely broken man that you spend the entire story wanting to save (or at least, I do, and half the other characters do), and then ... there's this one scene, and you just catch a glimpse of this proud little smile on his face, and I got slapped across the face with the realisation that there were people who needed saving in this story, but he wasn't one of them. Because sixteen years before this story started, he made a decision, and everything since then has been his long, incredibly silent war, and he's winning. He's the most helpless and restricted character in the story, and he's still managed to accomplish everything he set out to do.
I really can't decide whether to admire the hell out of him for this, or be horribly betrayed, because I liked the sweet, damaged, surprisingly innocent version of him that we see for most of the story. And ... it wasn't a lie, in some ways. But ... it also really, really was.
... I'm not usually stunned silly by one of my own characters. Usually, I see this kind of thing coming sometime before pretty much the end of the story. But this one ... he couldn't let anyone see until he'd won, and he's not the main mover of the story. The big wars, the big freedoms, the big forces, all of those belong to other characters. Everything he does appears to be a desperate scramble in the service of one character, and it is, but all of those tiny actions are part of a long and subtle campaign he's been waging for almost all his life. They're all innocent actions, all things he would have done anyway, for love of that one character, but there was intent behind them, and it's that that shocks you when you hit the end.
*blinks* I ... Usually, it's not my own characters that do this to me. *grins sheepishly* I honestly thought he was innocent, the whole way through. And then ... he kinda wasn't.
Huh. This is why I loving running the stories in my head. You don't think they're gonna entertain, or surprise, not when it's you who's making them up, but then ... they kinda do. *grins* They go places that even surprise the writer. Heh.
Tags: