Abandoned by her friends during the events of Anon-A-Miss, and facing a harsh, unforgiving winter homeless and without support, Sunset makes a choice. One that draws the eye of a certain Entity.
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Honestly, I mostly just feel sorry for Rainbow at this point. She’s had several chapters of torture and abuse now... and can’t say I really care for Tempest after that “I’m not doing this for them, I’m doing it for you” speech the last chapter — really, four little girls “don’t deserve to be saved” because they participated in a school bullying incident??? Pretty sure the only people who would deserve to be left behind would be, like, mass murderers and rapists. And now she apparently thinks that the endgame of trying to escape a murder dimension is a good time to over and over rub it in for RD that she screwed up and blame her for Sunset’s mental state entirely. It just seems kind of nasty to me. I can’t see RD or the Crusaders coming out of this in anything remotely close to healthy shape, emotionally.
This fic is well written, I’ll definitely say that, but I think it also falls into the same traps that so many other anon-a-miss fics do. One is Sunset’s characterization; she’s one of my favourite characters because she’s smart, and when confronted with a problem you see her over and over stepping up to take charge, to work the problem and try to find a solution (when she finally steps up in Rainbow Rocks, in Friendship Games, Everfree, even in the most recent Forgotten Friendship — which has a similar theme of her friends turning on her). But most of these fics have her turning into a weepy angst suicidal mess instead of that. It’s disappointing, because it’s gutting what’s so great about her character. The other is the kind of ridiculous hypocrisy these fics have when they go the “poor little Sunset, everyone else should rot who dared hurt her” route given that Sunset literally never faced any serious consequences of her own beyond the mistrust and dislike of her classmates after she spent YEARS doing the exact same sort of thing — bullying. And also that mind control and attempt murder incident at the end of the first EQG special? Yeah, got off scot free on that stuff too. The theme that seems to be popping up for the Crusaders and RD here is that your actions have consequences, and while it was touched on that Sunset’s past behaviour is what lead her to be an easy target, she’s basically gotten a pass on it all while it looks like no one else will. So to me it comes across as hypocritical, which makes it feel unjust.
That all said, I think one thing you did really well was dealing with the “villains” of Sunset’s story, her friends. Anon-a-miss fics usually turn them into flat cartoon villain caricatures that have little to no resemblance to the original source material, but here you’ve written them well, given them depth, and made their reactions and choices come across as realistic and understandable. They’re people who made a mistake and may have irreparably damaged a friendship because of it, and as the reader you can understand their motivations. So I think that part is well-written and nice to see in an Anon-a-Miss fic.
...Sorry, that got long! I had a lot of thoughts on this I guess
Sunset is on her last legs against the remaining killer... What did Sunset find in Sonata's mind?
8965308
You’ll find out in the side story: Sonata for Sisterhood
8965328
Damn, I hate waiting on side stories
8965114
Your points are well articulated and thought out so I wanted to clarify a few things; first on the note of Tempest, don’t mistakenly confuse her for a moral person. She’s a gangbanger and a self admitted killer. She cares about sunset but her morals are very skewed.
Tempest cares about Sunset and the rest of her new ‘gang’ and very little else. To put it crudely, if you wrong a bangers jeina, don’t expect to wake up tomorrow; that is her attitude.
Secondly; on the note of Sunset giving in to despair. She was homeless and alone in the world for the most part. Plus, bullies, even former bullies, often are the people with the most insecurities. No matter how strong they seem on the outside. You never know how close someone is from the edge, sometimes. Take that from someone who has lost someone else that exact way.
Thirdly; if you reread parts where she is ranting, Sunset’s whole deal isn’t that she was mistreated. She thinks she deserves that and even worse. It’s that she was lied to by the others. It was because they claimed to have forgiven her and then turned their backs on her. It was their lies and hypocrisy that drove her over the edge.
Sunset trusted them with her heart and they spat on her.
I NEED MOOOOAAARRRRRR
8965397
Thanks for the reply!
Re Tempest: fair enough, I suppose.
On the issue of Sunset, that’s all true generally (and I wasn’t suggesting that it wasn’t), it just doesn’t ring true to the character specifically for me... honestly, these are characters from a show aimed primarily at children, so they’re not really built for mega angst and issues. Suicidal girls in this fandom are a tough sell for me no matter which character it is. Unless you devote a lot of time to developing the issues in the story, you need to throw in a lot of headcanon/backstory to make it work, in my opinion, which edges on basically creating an OC at that point. So I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree on that.
On the third thing, I think I might not have been clear: I don’t think Sunset feels that way as presented in this story. My compliment to you was that I thought your characters were well written for what they are (whether they’re true to the show or not aside) — so it definitely came through that Sunset feels she deserves everything she got! I meant more what it seems like the audience, as in me the reader, is meant to feel... and the impression that I got is that I’m meant to be sympathetic to Sunset and opposed to the CHS girls in the same way as Tempest and co’s view on the situation is, and I’m not because it feels hypocritical. But that goes more to whether the story and ending are satisfactory to me as a reader or not, which obviously not all stories have to be — I just get the impression that I’m meant to feel satisfied with it while I’m not, which is why I brought it up at all. If that makes sense?
This one’s kinda interesting because that’s now how it came across to me... I thought the way it was presented was that the girls either believed, or at least had convinced themselves, that they could put the past behind them — when in reality they had not. The unfortunate result is they unintentionally mislead Sunset into believing she had a level of trust and friendship she didn’t etc. Etc. Which doesn’t lesson the sting of betrayal but does speak to the kind of characters presented. So if it’s actually they’re nasty liars that set out to mislead her only to turn around and stab her in the back, that’s... kinda awkward. Because it was the first thing that I found impressive in the story, a presentation of the characters that’s well rounded, still more or less true to the characters, and probably a more realistic take on how a bunch of teenage girls would react in this situation. If it’s really the second nasty liar thing, not so much.
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Unlike a lot of Anon-A-Miss fics I wasn't actually trying to set the sides as 'For Sunset and Against the CHS girls' at all. It's why I did my best to portray them in a sympathetic light. They had genuine grievances that they never aired fully, and then that came back to bite everyone when the bad blood boiled up. I figured people would pick their sides, because that's what people do, but the intention was to portray them all as genuine, if flawed, people and just roll from there. Real life doesn't have many actual heroes and villains, just regular people trying to do their best and occasionally doing exceptionally well or spectacularly badly.
As for Sunset, she was never meant to be squeaky clean either. When I said she 'was lied to' I meant that that's how she felt, not what actually happened. At least in my fics, Sunset is less of the cool-headed planner and more of a teenage pyromancer. She's smart, yeah; genius level smart actually. But she's also temperamental, angry, moody, a little condescending, and all the other character flaws that tend to come with not just thinking that you're a bit better than everyone else, but actually kinda being better.
In end whether you agree with my portrayal of the girls is up to you. I can only do the best job I can by what I see of them; it's a dark fic so it's gonna go dark places, but at the same time the point of the story is that Sunset and the girls are both wrong. Sunset gave in to despair because she believed the worst about both herself and the girls, that they lied and that she deserved it, while the girls tried to live up to ideals without really practicing them, just burying the parts that didn't fit, and hurting people they cared about because they were lying to themselves.
8967160
Ah, okay! Then I stand by my initial reaction to the Rainbooms' depiction (that I think that you did well with it). I was just second-guessing it based on your comment (or misinterpreting your comment, I guess), but I like those kinds of more realistic portrayals best. Flat 2D characters are dull, characters that are multi-faceted and flawed are more messy to deal with but infinitely more interesting :)
8967240
I completely agree! I’m glad you like my portrayal of them.
So given the latest Halloween movies retcon that Laurie Strode is NOT related to Michael Myers, any plans to rewrite those parts of this chapter?
8965114
Maybe but their stunt hurt sunset to point of suicide and most people get charged for their involvement in driving someone to that point. They targeted her without a care about her feelings beyond the fact she would be alone. I get the rainbooms having doubts but the cmcs were more than old enough to understand their actions were wrong they just chose not to care who got hurt as long as sunset went away from the girls.