Multiversing Strength of the Fallen

NaNo’s coming up quick, and to celebrate I thought I’d do a post a day on the projects I’ve got to look forward to. First up, Strength of the Fallen.

The plot: the S’riellan (translated as “the Fallen”) are the super-powered soldiers of the elves. But one morning, a S’riellan war hero named Minrei wakes up to find her strength, speed, and senses are those of a regular elf.

SotF is probably my favorite of the three NaNo projects.  It’s got a lot more going on than the stories I usually write, in that Minrei is not a predestined hero, nor a powerful rookie. Rather, Minrei is a physically-strong woman turned weak, an experienced fighter now reliant on smarts and creativity, and a fugitive from a government founded on conspiracies.

I reread the initial draft as prep for NaNo. Predictably, the writing became less well-thought-out as I went through it. I could tell when I started getting desperate for higher word counts, since I stopped using contractions and started adding notes about which swear words to use. (SotF was apparently written after watching Firefly, because I had decided to swear in Fijian. I now regret that decision. It’s too obvious.)

Basically, in the 88 page document, anything after page 40 might get cut. I’ve made a few plot-altering decisions for the coming NaNo already. A big one is that I’m cutting the romance bit that occurs in the last half. It doesn’t fit, and makes Minrei seem emotionally-weaker than I want her to be.

The other big change is that I’m making SotF part of 3PF canon – and by extension, Multiversed. When I first thought up Minrei, I used a similar worldbuilding premise to the one I used in 3PF. If you’re interested in an explanation, you can find it below the cut.