She's not wrong about the Equestrian military.

One factor for lowering the standarts could be so many ponies are still so terrified of her that the recruiting pool shrunk.

With that last line I just imagine the part in DBZA where Trunks screams wordlessly in his head.

Obligatory Booty song link

Can't wait till the chapter Anon snaps and just does the unthinkable. Or he snaps physically and that's the end of the story.

enjoyable as always, will wait for next chapter with grand expectation

Nice

11191536
nice

11191i see what you are getting at. at some point, there needs to be some character development. so far there was none indeed (besides anon yelling at daybreaker once)

11191711
I can understand the criticism and I've taken it to heart. The story at times can seem like its not going anywhere at all, and its simply staying complacent in its desire to be miserable.

However, the chapters are short, which gives the illusion that things are happening faster than it is. It has been two days since the story began, and to expect a change of mood that fast doesn't make much sense. Realistically speaking; anxiety and depression do not have a switch to turn on and off. This story starts at the peak of Anons misery, so you are not going to get someone who is going to consistently feel on top of the world.

Anon in most stories is a man who has no charm, only that he is a goofy character who says goofy things, who may develop certain characteristics but hardly so. This story is supposed to be the alternative. Anon is not happy, nor is he excited about the events in his life. He uses humor but not as much as other stories would.

In my eyes, I can realistically put myself in the shoes of someone who is not happy, than someone who is consistently made to be comic relief.

I'm sorry that the story so far hasn't seemed that enjoyable to you though, and I hope that it later improves for you.

Hell yeah, more chapters

11192076
I'll throw my vote on the other side here. I think what's here is doing a fairly good job keeping things moving, unless the story is planned to be rather short. So far, it pretty clearly establishes that Anon and Daybreaker have differing perspectives on things.

For Anon things are slowly getting worse, forced to interact with Daybreaker more and in ways that would make it harder to hide behind formalities. Which would naturally increase his stress and make him more miserable. When pressed he told her the truth about how he feels about the situation, and she has more or less ignored it, further reinforcing his view as being a slave.

Daybreaker on the other hand thinks Anon should be happy to have the 'honor' of his position and doesn't seem to understand why he might be upset about it. Her teasing attitude about the moon banishment seems to be more like friendly banter to her and she is trying to put him more at ease rather than trying to scare him into obeying her. It feels like she at least cares about his well being, and is trying to make him more of a friend without understanding how the disparity of power between them complicates that.

It can take a while to set the tone instead of just stating that he is at his low point. I think you're doing a great job of it so far, and in only about 8000 words. I'd say the pacing feels pretty good for a moderate length story so far. It will be fun to see where you take it, there's so many directions open to take the story from here. Happy Writing!

Personally I can’t really identify much with this story’s Anon because the first chapter suggests all this has been going on for months already and, well, (a) even at the most socially awkward points in my life I’d probably have figured out by then that Daybreaker’s not half as bad as my paranoia wants to suggest and (b) in any event I couldn’t really have sustained such a level of stress without snapping a fair bit sooner, come hell or high water afterwards. So he’s clearly not ‘me’ any more than any other J. Random Human Protagonist, second-person narrative notwithstanding.

That’s okay, though, because I wasn’t really expecting him to be in the first place; the idea of “Anon” is nice on the surface, but no one’s ever going to write the perfect stand-in character for every possible reader. Plus I’m pretty used to being addressed as “you” by the occasional game book or other piece of interactive fiction where I’m clearly not playing my literal self either anyway, so we’re good. It’ll still be interesting to see where this story is going, though I’ll freely admit that right at the moment I may actually be starting to feel just a touch more sympathy for Daybreaker (who’s really coming across as not so much a villain as simply a mare out of her time here, and I’m fine with that as well) than for the technical protagonist proper...anyway, tracking.

11192901
I'm glad you're still able to enjoy the story! Thank you for letting me know what you think about it; positivity rules everything.