DVD Commentary: The Case of the Counterfeit Enchantments

[k_a_webb]

“That’s the problem, isn’t it? It’s so easy to view a hame as one thing or another, especially in the case of the war, but there would have been Fasachis who were against it in the same way there were those who joined the war effort. As far as I’m concerned we should base our decisions on what someone is like, not what their hame is or their phyle.”

Bertram: so, what were you thinking when you wrote this, then, Kayleigh?

Kayleigh: that you were having another exceedingly long conversation at a time of crisis. Honestly, I’ve never known a group of characters to talk so much. *Bertram and Sini look at each other before laughing* Thank you both for laughing at me.

Sini: we were getting to know each other. Yes, it may well have been a time of crisis, but that didn’t change the fact we’d just been thrown together. The situation wasn’t one any of us had been expecting… a Moonjumper walked into Seahorse Port with two Sheepshankians and while we were in the middle of attempting to solve an ongoing investigation, that I’m pretty sure I shouldn’t have been part of in the first place, we needed to see if we could work together. If we hadn’t got on for any reason it would have made the whole thing much harder.

B: I know you were exasperated, considering your expected word count, but you should know better. You could easily have skipped the ‘pointless’ conversations if you weren’t as interested in what we were saying as we were. Everything you wrote told you more about the Web and as you’re still in the middle of learning about it, the same way your readers are, it was important – if it hadn’t of been you wouldn’t have kept writing.

K: true. *I smile at the two of them* At one point I did think I should stop writing, and there are things that I’ve left out because there are certain parts that could have been longer, but you were teaching me a lot about the Web. That is one of the hardest parts about writing the way I do – I don’t always know everything when I start writing and I have to rely on my characters to be honest, but not all of you are.

S: *nods* We’re just grateful that you’re writing our stories. It can be hard to connect with people who have the ability to do what you do, so we were lucky to have found you.

B: well, really, we were lucky to find Elizabeth. Her connection to us was what meant we could start working with you as well and it was definitely the right thing to do. Other writers would have just gone from plot point to plot point, without writing the conversations we had between them, because to them it wouldn’t have been important, but you wanted to learn from us as much as we wanted to teach you.

K: so, you don’t think it would have been better for me to leave out half the conversation.

*Both Sini and Bertram shake their heads* B: not for us and not for you, but it might have made a better story if you simply went from one thing happening to the next thing happening for anyone who doesn’t know the way that you write. They wouldn’t understand that a huge part of the story, for you, is how the characters interact with each other, so if you hadn’t written them you wouldn’t have been staying true to yourself. You also have to take into consideration that life isn’t plot point to plot point and you’re writing about our lives. Between everything that happened there were lulls, that we took as a chance to sort ourselves out and talk while they… well, we have no idea what they were doing, but we couldn’t help imagining that they were waiting for the best moment to attack.

S: talking about other things was a good way of taking our minds off our worries. At the time of this conversation we weren’t even sure what the future was going to bring, because Bertram, Peric and Lucille had just arrived, we’d all met for the first time, and our conversations were all us trying to learn about each other without giving too much away, just in case.

B: *nods* I was trying to learn about Sini, because she was the first chimera I’d had a real chance to talk to and I wanted to know what it was like for her to be the child of two different hames, especially as they’re two I hadn’t had much contact with. Mothar I knew a little about, thanks to my brother, and I knew of Fasachi and the war they had waged on the people of Theas, but I wanted to learn more. Learning it from someone like Sini, who was not only related to someone from the two hames but also lived in a city like Seahorse Port, was fascinating.
The more I learnt from her the more I wanted to learn, and that was the same for Lucille and Meriwether, although, at that time, we had no idea that Merry was reincarnated fae. All the time we spent in Seahorse Port was worthwhile, even though there were more times than we were comfortable with that we all sat twiddling our thumbs waiting for something interesting to happen. Peric was the only one of us I think we glad that things had slowed, down, but he really did hate that we had somehow become such an integral part of the investigation, when we didn’t really do all that much to help in Sheepshank. Realising where Dubrana was became easy after her stupid actions gave us what we needed to know.

K: Peric was never going to have it easy in Seahorse Port – not with the amount of people and how loud it was all the time. Unlike Sheepshank there’s never a time when Seahorse closes down.

S: thankfully Kaito helped us out with that problem. *Shakes her head* I’m still can’t quite believe he really is an escaped Moonjumper, but I’m not surprised that Quiar would be one of the worlds someone in his position would think of hiding on. We’re so disconnected from the rest of the Web that he needn’t worry about someone finding him.

B: so, of course, the one Moonjumper he did come across happened to be one of his old friends. To me that sounds like someone putting him in the right place at the right time because they knew we’d need his help and by working with Lucille he might be able to get some of his things back.

K: it did seem too much of a coincidence to really be anything other than planned, but when I started writing Case I didn’t know how much of an effect the worlds could really have on themselves, even though I knew they were sentient.

S: we’re back once more to the reason you wrote so many of our conversations down. You were learning just as much as we were.

K: *smiles* Okay, this is supposed to be a DVD commentary, so what were you thinking when you said this line, Bertram?

B: one question first – what’s a DVD?

K: you know how you have storytellers? *Bertram and Sini nod* Well, one of the ways my race tells stories is to have a group of people act them out while they’re being filmed, which is a way of recording what they’re doing, so that lots of people can watch them and whoever made it can get lots of money. If you want, when we’re done with this, I’ll go upstairs and put a DVD on so you can see what I’m talking about.

B: that sounds like a really good idea. *clicks onto Scrivener to reread conversation* Right, we were talking about the war and what it was like for Sini to be part Fasachi. I can’t remember if that was before or after we talked about Mothar… and it was actually probably both, because we did talk a lot about Mothar. Meeting someone like Sini really helped me to understand the choice my brother had made to travel to another hame, alone, to follow a religion I couldn’t accept. *shrugs* One of the things I have never been able to accept is the disconnection between the different groups of Quiarans. It doesn’t make sense for us to be fighting each other when there are people who would happily rid the Web of us and learning about the other Webs, about the Quiar where there was a war, has just made me more certain that we should work together more.
Maybe Sini is right and it’s because my best friend is a mouse. Peric and I have been friends for such a long time that I can’t imagine what my life would be like without him. He’s always been there for me, right from the first time we met. There was a time when I thought he might walk away, because I couldn’t bring myself to tell him that my brother had gone to Mothar at a time when I was still having trouble coming to terms it, but he realised why it was so hard for me and accepted that I had a valid reason for not talking to him as soon as it happened.

K: I honestly can’t understand why you were worried. Peric is an empath and he would have been picking up on your feelings from the moment your brother told you he was thinking of going to Mothar, even though he has very good shields. You are his best friend, so he would care more about how you were feeling than anyone else, and if I was his position I’d probably let them down a little so I’d know when you were having a bad day, so I could get you something nice.

Peric: she’s right you know. *everyone looks at Peric, wondering where he appeared from* Sorry, I know I wasn’t meant to be here, but you were talking about me and I wanted a chance to have some input. *he smiles* Bertram is one of the few people I do let my main shields down around. I know that sometimes it isn’t easy to talk about how you’re feeling if you are having a bad day and the only way I can help is if I know about it, so, in order to be the best friend I can be, I make sure I almost always know how Bertram is feeling.

B: you already knew there was something wrong?

P: I knew there was something wrong. The problem with knowing that there’s something wrong is that you never know what the something actually is. As much as I would have loved to have known I didn’t, so I couldn’t really bring it up with you first. I could take you out for tea and ask if there was anything you wanted to talk about, but if you hadn’t of wanted to talk about it I never really would have known what it was, unless I happened to find out from someone else in your family that your brother had gone to Mothar.

B: *nods* that makes sense. I guess sometimes I expect your empathy to come with mindreading skills, even now, and I really shouldn’t. You do the best you can and I do appreciate that.

S: that would make being an empath easier. I can’t imagine what it must be like to know that something is wrong but have no idea what the something is.

P: it isn’t an easy thing to deal with, especially when whoever it is doesn’t want to talk about their problems, but I accept the limitations that come with my abilities. I’m glad that I am an empath, because it lets me understand people better than I would be able to otherwise – it’s just not as useful as others think it is. Sometimes I can tell if someone is lying, but only if they’re feeling something about the lie they’re telling, otherwise I know no more than Bertram would in the same position.

K: can you not feel something if you’re lying? *shakes head* No, we’re going off topic again and we’re already nearly two thousand words into this already. I think the best idea would be to come back to this another day, so we don’t entirely bore my readers, especially as I’ve been posting lots of Counterfeit work today.

P: *smiles* I noticed you posted the bonus story. When I get back to Sheepshank I’m going to make more of an effort to be friends with poor Aulus.

***

I know better than to ask Peric where he is right now. So, this is what happens when you try to write a DVD commentary with the help of a couple of characters… if anyone would be interested in me writing any more let me know.

Mirrored from K. A. Webb Writing.